The Shakeout Podcast

If Rookie cards were a thing in the sport of Track & Field, then Foster Malleck’s would be one you’d kill to get your hands on. 

After a 6 year NCAA career at Boston University where it took right up until his final collegiate season to qualify for the national championships, the Kitchener Ontario native wasted no time making a splash in his first year as pro. 

Less than a week after his final race in the BU Kit, Malleck was back on the track in a different shade of red, this time representing Canada at the 2025 World Indoor Championships in Nanjing China. His first-ever appearance at a senior international championship would kick off a rookie year as a pro that has been, quite literally, one for the record books. 

Since Nanjing, Malleck has lowered his Personal bests at the 1500,  Mile, 2000, and 3000m while breaking three Canadian records and becoming the second-fastest Canadian in the 1500m of all time. Add to that a NACAC Gold Medal last summer and trip to the World Championship semi-finals in Tokyo in September and it’s safe to say that jump to the big leagues was not a leap too far for the 24 year old. 

Now, a trip around the sun and countless laps around the track later, and Malleck returns to the World Indoor Championships this week in Poland no longer a fresh faced rookie but a battle-hardened vet ready to mix it up with the very best in the sport. 

Follow Foster @fostermalleck

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This week's episode is presented by Under Armour

Racing season is here and if you’re on the hunt for your next personal best, why not reach for the shoe that’s propelled the best athletes in the world to theirs? The Velociti Elite 3 combines Under Armour’s HOVR+ super foam with a specially tuned carbon plate and a light but durable outsole to give you all the tools you need to break through on race day.

Cover Photo: Jan Figueroa

It’s been common wisdom in endurance sports that the further the race distance gets, the longer it takes to figure it out.

But every rule needs an exception to prove it and on this count one needs look no further than the career of Molly Seidel. 

After a gold-studded NCAA career at Notre Dame winning titles at 3000, 5000, 10000 and cross country, Seidel’s star only seemed to rise higher as the distances grew greater.

She made her marathon debut in 2020 at the US Olympic Trials, proving a quick-study at the event with a stunning 2nd placing showing and a spot on the US Olympic Team headed to Tokyo. 

A year and a half later, at those pandemic-postponed Olympic Games, She’d once again outperform expectations to run away from the best of the best en route to a brilliant bronze medal.

Fast forward to today and it seems her reputation for moving up in distance and throwing down continues to hold true, even with yet another change of surface.

In January she marked the start of a new chapter on the trail scene with a win and course record clocking at the Banderas 50k in Texas. Weeks later, she would take another huge leap forward at the famously competitive Black Canyon 100k in Arizona. 

Facing some of the best trail talent in the world, Seidel turned a lack of experience into gold, claiming a 4th-place finish and snagging an elusive “Golden Ticket”, securing her a place in the biggest ultra of them all, the 100-mile Western States Endurance Run. 

Today, Molly joins the show to recap her incredible rise through the trail running ranks, what it’s looked like to double her race distance with every start, and how she’s applying the lessons of a legendary career on the roads and track to a the new challenges of the trails.

Check Molly out @bygolly.molly

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Thanks to this week's sponsor, CanPrev

Prime your preparation, power your performance, and prioritize your post-run recovery with CanPrev. Learn how natural health formulas can help you reach your running goals! Find CanPrev products at your friendly local health food store!

Cover Photo: Misty Wong

It’s the first week of March and that means one things for Canadian track & field fans: the U Sports track & field championships have arrived. This week on The Shakeout Podcast we’re joined by Canadian Running staff writer and U Sport insider Cameron Ormond, who joins the show to give us the rundown on the top storylines, podium picks, and athletes to watch heading into an action packed weekend.

The University of Manitoba is set to play host to Canada’s top student-athletes from March 5-7 as they vie for podium places and men’s and women’s team titles. The University of Guelph looks to reclaim titles in both men’s and women’s team competitions after being thrown from the top of the podium in 2025 by a dominant home-track showing from then-host Western.

Meanwhile, the individual competition sees a mix of returning U Sports stars such as Guelph’s Max Davies looking to cap off his university career with a four-peat in the men’s 1500m and emerging talents like Western’s Maria Linton, who will look to carry the momentum of a breakout season into a podium performance in the women’s 3000m.

Checkout Runningmagazine.ca and @Canadianrunning on Social Media so you don't miss any of the action!

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This episode is brought to you by Under Armour: all season long Under Armor has highlighted the top performances of the USport track and field season through their Athlete of the Week awards and this week the action reaches it’s boiling point at the 2026 USports championships. Check out their line up by visiting the link below. 

https://www.underarmour.ca/en-ca/p/ua_velociti_distance_mens_running_shoes/6006030.html

The injury cycle can feel like a game of whack-a-mole, with one nagging pain going away only to be replaced by several different issues elsewhere. For the injured runner, the path to lasting health and getting back to the pain-free running begins with the right diagnosis. Yet while that may sound obvious the reality of getting there can often feel far from straightforward. 

On this week's episode we're joined by Doctor of Chiropractic Bryan Kent to explore why so many runners treat the same injury over and over without lasting success—and how shifting the focus to accurate diagnosis can break that cycle. 

Bryan unpacks some of the common myths around dealing with injury and pain, laying out a path for runners to take on a more active role in their long term resilience by working alongside their care providers to create lasting results. So whether you’ve been stuck in the not-so-merry go round of injuries or are looking to protect against set backs on the road ahead, then this is the episode for you. 

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Follow Bryan on social media for more tips on running injury free @forwardspineandsport

Like finishing a marathon, successfully completing a Rubik's Cube is something that even those who have never done it understand that it's challenging, unique and worth celebrating. And the few who have done it enjoy a special type of camaraderie.

To most minds, the similarities between the cube and the marathon stop there. But for this week’s guest, Canadian Running's cover athlete, George Scholey, there’s much more to the equation. 

At just 23, Scholey has already broken multiple Rubik's Cube world records, including for the most cubes solved in 24 hours. In recent years, he’s begun a new pursuit: marathon running. It wasn’t long before his two passions converged–in his hometown at the London Marathon, where he broke yet another record, solving 520 cubes over the course of the marathon (an average of more than 12 cubes per kilometre).

On this week's episode, George joins us from his new home base in Canada, where he’s working on the business of cubing as a brand manager at Rubik’s global headquarters in Toronto. We talk about the parallels between cubing and training, how he fits the pieces of his full-time work and passion project together, and what the world’s most popular puzzle might have to offer runners of all ability levels.

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Follow George on Social Media @George.Scholey

Thanks to this week's sponsor, CanPrev

Prime your preparation, power your performance, and prioritize your post-run recovery with CanPrev. Learn how natural health formulas can help you reach your running goals! Find CanPrev products at your friendly local health food store!

So who’s really driving this machine?

Today’s guest, Paul Gamble, PhD, has spent his career preparing elite and international athletes. But after years inside professional sport, he started asking an uncomfortable question: Are we developing better athletes—or just burning kids out earlier?

In his book, Sport Parenting, Paul introduces the idea of the Sport Parent, a powerful, often invisible force shaping sport more than governing bodies, or even coaches. Whether you’re a parent, a former youth athlete or someone who still has emotional scars from PE class, this conversation hits close to home.

We’re talking about early specialization, the rise of “premature professionalism,” why modern kids are actually becoming less athletic, and how well-meaning adults may be trading their kids' long-term confidence and love of movement for short-term results.

This isn’t an episode about blaming parents. It’s about unpacking how a culture obsessed with performance turns play into pressure—and what it costs kids, sport and, ultimately, all of us.

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Follow Paul on social media @PaulGamblePHD and check out his book, Sport Parenting 

The last time Cam Levins took the streets of Vancouver for the Vancouver First Half, he left with a new Canadian record at the half-marathon distance. Weeks later, he kept the record-breaking streak going with a career-defining run of 2:05:36 at the 2023 Tokyo Marathon, taking a minute and a half off of his personal best and breaking his own Canadian record in the process. 

Fast forward three years, and Levins is returning to the playbook that served him so well in the past, as he’ll toe the line this weekend at the Vancouver First Half in a final tuneup effort before a much-anticipated return to the streets of Tokyo on March 1.

Now, eight years into his marathon career and nearly 14 years since his first Olympic team in London, Cam joins the show to talk about how he continues to chase excellence in the sport. We talk about his famous high-mileage training, how he’s found his way back to healthy running after years battling injury, and what it all looks like while balancing life as a new father. Plus we talk about his return to the streets of Tokyo, a city that has been a common thread throughout his marathon career, and what it’ll take to once again capture lightning in a bottle there in less than a month’s time. 

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Follow Cam on Social Media @CamLevins

Getting the worst flu of your life isn’t a perfect plan for anyone’s marathon race-week, but if there’s any athlete who's used to less-than-ideal prep it’s Hamilton’s Erin Mawhinney, a nurse educator who balances training upwards of 150km each week with the demands of full-time healthcare work. 

At last month's Marathon Project in Arizona, Mawhinney's hopes of capitalizing on a flat, fast course against world-class competition were dashed by a nasty race-week flu that forced her to withdraw just 10K into the race. Yet for her and coach Reid Coolsaet, a 2xOlympian at the marathon himself, letting the months great training go unused was never an option.  

Fast forward to January 11th and Mawhinney was back on the starting line of a marathon for the second time in under a month, this time in Texas at the Aramco Houston Marathon. Free from the illness that had derailed her previous attempt, Mawhinney would go on to run a massive 7-minute personal best of 2:29:36, finishing 5th in the women's elite field and making her the 12th fastest Canadian marathoner of all time. 

Today on The Shakeout Podcast, we’re joined by Erin Mawhinney and Coach Reid Coolsaet to talk about the work behind the breakout performance and how they approach elite marathon training while balancing the demands of a full life outside of sport. 

Follow Erin @ErinMawhinney_

Follow Reid @ReidCoolsaet

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Huge thank you to this week’s sponsor Smartwool. Join the Smartwool mailing

list to receive updates and 15% off your first smartwool.com purchase on full

price products only. See terms for details. 

https://bit.ly/481oMZY

Conditions apply: Valid on regular-priced items. Can., 16+. Initial registration only. See terms for details.

If there’s one word to describe the professional career of Lucia Stafford, it’s consistency. Since storming onto her first Olympic team in Tokyo at just 22, there has yet to be a global championship or major games where the Toronto native hasn’t been a part of Team Canada. For half a decade, she’s been a constant presence on national championship podiums, while also lowering Canadian records at both the 1K and 2K distances.

Yet, for all the success that consistency has brought over the past five years, 2026 will be a season of change for Stafford. Earlier this month she announced her move to the U.K., where she has joined the likes of Olympic medallists Keely Hodgkinson and Georgia Hunter-Bell as a member of the Manchester-based M11 track Club. 

Today on The Shakeout Podcast, Lucia joins us from training camp in South Africa, sharing about her decision to strike out in a new direction and what she’s excited for in the new year, with a new team around her. 

Follow Lucia on Instagram @luciastafford7

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Huge thank you to this week’s sponsor Smartwool. Join the Smartwool mailing

list to receive updates and 15% off your first smartwool.com purchase on full

price products only. See terms for details. 

https://bit.ly/481oMZY

Conditions apply: Valid on regular-priced items. Can., 16+. Initial registration only. See terms for details.

If the early days of 2026 are any indication, the year ahead might be one for the history books in Canadian road running. This past weekend saw the fall of not one, but two national records in two of the most hotly-contested distances, the 10K and the half-marathon. 

Within the span of just a few hours, the duo of Kieran Lumb and Rory Linkletter lowered the all-time best marks at the 10K and half, breaking new ground for Canadian distance running by eclipsing the elusive 28-minute and 1-hour marks, respectively. 

After a mid-season coaching change in 2025 to begin working with Gjert Ingebrigtsen–the estranged father and former coach of multi-time Olympic champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen–Lumb’s pivot and subsequent move to a new training base in Europe paid off on Sunday morning in Valencia, Spain. His mark of 27 minutes and 50 seconds over 10K made him the first Canadian to dip under 28 minutes on the roads, eclipsing Charles Philibert-Thiboutot’s 2025 mark of 28:10.

Mere hours later, in Houston, Texas, Linkletter continued the momentum of a career-defining 2025 season by reclaiming the Canadian half-marathon record with a 59:49 clocking, besting Cam Levins's mark by nearly 30 seconds and becoming the first Canadian man to break the one-hour barrier.

Lumb and Linkletter join this week's episode of The Shakeout Podcast to recap their record-breaking weekend and to set the tone for a year of action in Canadian running that is off to an historic start.

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Check out @Kieran.M.Lumb & @Rory_Linkletter on Social Media

Huge thank you to this week’s sponsor Smartwool. Join the Smartwool mailing

list to receive updates and 15% off your first smartwool.com purchase on full

price products only. See terms for details. 

https://bit.ly/481oMZY

Conditions apply: Valid on regular-priced items. Can., 16+. Initial registration only. See

terms for details.