Coach Bennett's Podcast

Episode 163. Embracing Your Community With Swetha Subbiah In this latest episode of the Nike After Dark Tour series, Coach Bennett sits down with coach, community builder, and Sisters in Sweat co-founder Shwetha Subbiah to unpack how running transforms when we stop doing it alone. From leading an impromptu race warmup that led to her very first 10K to building an inclusive running movement across India, Shwetha shares how borrowing belief from a group breaks down mental barriers, empowers new...

Episode 162. LIVE From Sydney: Personal Bests with Lydia O’Donnell, Riley Hemson, Isobel Hume and Elyse Sene-Lefao Recorded in front of a live audience at Pace Athletic in Sydney ahead of race weekend, this special installment of the After Dark Tour series brings together coaches and athletes to break down what it really means to pursue a "personal best". From redefining race-day goals beyond the finish-line clock to navigating pre-race nerves, training sacrifices, and the power of community,...

Get Better at Running Without Running With Pauline Lopez Coach Bennett sits down with Taekwondo athlete and coach Pauline Lopez to talk about the lessons she’s carrying from a lifetime in martial arts into a new chapter as a runner. Pauline shares how being told Taekwondo “wasn’t for girls” only made her more determined to step onto the mat, eventually leading her to compete at the highest levels of the sport. She reflects on training alongside her dad, chasing the Olympic dream, learning to ...

Episode 160. Own Your Fitness 🌟NEW EPISODE🌟Episode 160 “Own Your Fitness”. I recorded this episode of Coach Bennett’s Podcast in my hotel room in Sydney, Australia. So, you know what that means... that means this episode is a straight up banger. And this episode is once again inspired by you! Specifically, all of you that I’ve been talking to at Book Tour stops. Owning your fitness is essential to running the right way because owning your fitness is all about the present. Too many runners run...

Episode 159. Lessons From The Pack With Queenie Azabeth & Rehana Jade Coach Bennett shares two stories from the Nike After Dark Tour, sitting down with Queenie Azabeth from Shanghai and Rehana Jade from London to talk about the unexpected paths that brought them to running and the people who have helped them discover what they’re capable of. Queenie went from bodybuilding and group fitness to finding her place in running, eventually co-founding a run club and taking on the After Dark Tour...

Episode 158. This Is About Running. This Is Not About Running. My book This Is About Running. This Is Not About Running. is out in the wild! You can order it online. You can pick it up at your local indie bookshop. You can download the audiobook. You can get one for yourself. You can get one for your friend or someone in your family. You can get one for your teammate or neighbor or someone that you believe needs to read about courage and faith and hope and strength and endurance and Di...

Episode 157. Goal Setting On The Run With Joan Benoit Samuelson Today’s a big day: Coach Bennett’s new book, This Is About Running, This Is Not About Running, is officially out in the world. One of the chapters is dedicated to Joan Benoit Samuelson, so celebrating publication day with Joanie on the mic felt like the only way to do it. Every runner knows the feeling of setting a goal that makes your stomach flip a little. For Joanie, that feeling has never really gone away—not after winning th...

Episode 156: LIVE From Nike: Finding the Joy in Running With Brett Chody, Deepa Ramprasad and Kaytlin Lam Recorded live in front of an audience at Philip H. Knight Campus) Coach Chris Bennett and producer Emily Abbate celebrate the After Dark Tour and the power of women’s running communities. Joined by Deepa Ramprasad (Senior Director, Nike Road Running Footwear), Brett Chody (Global Nike Running Creator & Founder of Bites Run Club), and Kaytlin Lam (Global Brand Management Specialist, Ni...

Episode 155: Own Your Pace With Intisar Abdul-Kader Every runner has a moment when someone else sees something in them before they see it in themselves. For Intisar Abdul-Kader, that moment came in a school gym, when a PE teacher who also happened to be her science teacher told her the team needed another runner for the mixed 4x400 relay. She trusted him, she ran, and she never looked back. This episode covers a lot of ground including track in Abu Dhabi and cross country in the woods outside...

Your Running Glossary With Coach Lydia O’Donnell What do "tempo," "fartlek," and "recovery run" actually mean? Coach Bennett is joined by Nike Running Pacific Head Coach Lydia O'Donnell to break down the running terminology that can feel intimidating to new runners and explain why it doesn't have to be. Coach Lydia shares how her mom and high school coach sparked a lifelong love of running, why community has shaped every step of her coaching career, and how her own experience with RED-S inspi...

Episode 153. Telling the Story of a Run Using 80's Song Titles What can I say? I love 80's music. I love telling stories. And I love running. Seems like the perfect combination to give myself the excuse to mix them all up together for an episode of Coach Bennett's Podcast. This one was a fun one to make and because I love all of you so much I decided to make a companion playlist that you can listen to on your runs or in traffic or while you cook or party or shower or dance. No need to thank m...

Every runner has a starting line that didn't look like a starting line. For Lilia Martinez, hers looked like a dance floor. Ballet first, then tap, then jazz, the thing that finally stuck because it gave her room to move without a script. Running wasn't the plan. It showed up later, the way a lot of meaningful things do, in the form of a New Year's resolution with roommates and a half marathon she signed up for without fully understanding what she'd agreed to. That's basically the whole theme...

INTRODUCING: The After Dark Tour Series, Embracing The Starting Line With Emily Abbate Every run is a new version of you. That's the thing nobody tells you when you're standing there in your first pair of running shoes, wondering if you're allowed to call yourself a runner yet. You are. You already are. You were the moment you decided to lace up, not the moment someone else decided you'd earned it. In the first episode of our After Dark Tour series, I’m sitting down with Emily Abbate from t...

Episode 150. Come Back It's not about being away. It's about coming back. Could be about coming back to running or the team or racing or coming back to record another podcast after a few weeks away. This episode is all about making sure that if and when you decide to come back you come back as best as you can and coming back as best as you can means doing... well, you're going to need to listen to the episode to find out what exactly you need to do to come back as best as you can. Cheer...

Episode 149. Lessons From The Road I've been on the road a lot lately. I was in Berlin. I was in Washington, DC. I was in Boston. I was in London. I was in Copenhagen. I was in Amsterdam. I was in New Jersey. I'm in Chicago. And I'll be in Bolder in just a few days. Explains why this episode is being dropped a few days later than usual. Also explains my inability to fall asleep when it's time for bed. But all this travel also inspired this episode. Because all this travel has inspired me. Act...

Episode 148. Running Isn't Complicated. Runners Are. Sure, running may seem complicated. But, it's not. Don't let the internet and social media fool you. Running is a simple sport. It's the runners that make it complicated. And that's what also makes the sport so interesting and always fresh. You are in fact a new version of yourself each and every time you come back to the starting line for a new run. So, sit back or start a run or go for a walk and enjoy this episode where I bre...

Episode 147. 5 Ways To Build More Endurance Endurance. You need it for just about anything great in life. And that absolutely includes running. Because running is one of the great things in life. That's why we're going to talk about some way to build more endurance so you can run and live more. Some of the ways are obvious. Which is why they get overlooked. And some are not so obvious. Which is why they also get overlooked. Well, none of them will get overlooked by you anymore... assuming you...

Episode 146. Racing Better For so many racing your best only means running your fastest. Not only does that mentality limit the your chances for a successful race it also lowers your chances at running your fastest. So, we're going to talk about ways you can race better so you have your best chance at racing your best. And I'll have you know that I recorded this episode in a hotel room in London and we all know that episodes of Coach Bennett's Podcast recorded ion hotel rooms tend...

Episode 145. I WROTE A BOOK! Seriously. I did. I wrote a book! And I want you to read it. Because I'm really proud of it and I believe that it's a book that both runners and non-runners alike will enjoy and be better for having read it. It's called This Is About Running. This Is Not About Running. It's dropping on September 1st, 2026 but it is available for pre-order now. This episode gives you some background on how this all came to be, why I wrote the book, what's in the book, who the book ...

Episode 144. STOP There's a whole lot of stuff that runners do that they shouldn't do. The cool thing is that if runners stop doing things they shouldn't do they'll have more time to do the things that they should do. And if you can start doing the things you should do and stop doing the things you shouldn't do then you'll have a better time doing the things you want to do and you'll do those things better. Pretty sweet how it all works out. That's why I spend this episode going over a list o...

Episode 143. New Starting Lines It's that time of year. (It's always that time of year.) We start to show up at starting lines. And not just any kind of starting lines. New starting lines. We start. We start over. We start again. And that means we need to make sure that we are ready for what's next. That's why I brought in a rock star for this episode. That's right. She's back! The one. The only. Coach Bennett the Greater aka Coach Bennett the Creator aka Show Up Society aka Tammie Bennett. S...

Episode 142. What Makes A Run Successful? What makes a run successful? It's a great question, isn't it? I feel like most runners know what makes a run unsuccessful. And I feel like most runners all too quickly designate a run a total failure without really asking themselves what makes a run successful. That's why I also feel like so many runners miss out on so much success they earned from so many of their runs. I'm hoping that this episode will change that. So, settle in or go for a ru...

Episode 141. 8 Ways To Get Better So, you want you get better at running or at something other than running? Well, you found the right podcast. Because after I talk about my birthday weekend in NYC I spend 35 minutes of this episode detailing eight different ways you can work on getting better. And guess what? You can get started on all of them immediately. I intentionally ended the title of this episode without specifically mentioning running. Because I feel that all of these tips can be use...

Episode 140. 5 Ways To Make Your Easy Runs Easier Your easy runs are your most important runs. Why? Well, because you're going to run more easy run minutes, meters and miles than any other minutes, meters or miles. And if you don't run your easy runs or don't run your easy runs the right way you'll never be able to run those speed runs and long runs as great as you could or should. That's why. And that's why I made this episode. Because if you can make your easy runs e...

Episode 139. Stress Less If you really want to perform your best then you're going to need to learn how to deal with, handle, mitigate, remove, lessen the negative stressors in your life. There are positive and negative stressors in your life. There always will be. (Hopefully, running is an example of a positive stressor.) And if you want to run your best, perform at your best, be your best then you need recover from those positive stressors in your life and remove or deal with the negative s...

Episode 138. Longer Runs Let's talk about those longer runs you do. You know what runs I'm talking about. Sometimes they are known as our long runs and sometimes they're just our longer runs. No matter what we call them or how we describe them we can all do a better job on these longer runs. So, on this episode of Coach Bennett's Podcast we'll talk about how we can set ourselves up for success and make decisions and adjustments that will help and not hinder our efforts on our longer runs.&nbs...

Episode 137. Smart Stuff People Say About Running In a world that seems to be giving more and more screen time to really dumb opinions and asinine commentary about running (and just about everything else for that matter) I thought it might be a great idea to celebrate some smart stuff runners say. You can look at this episode as the companion show to Episode 136 which was entitled Dumb Stuff Runners Say. As much fun as the Dumb Stuff episode was to make I got to say that this was was even mor...

Episode 136. Dumb Stuff People Say About Running I hear all sorts of stuff. Some of it is inspiring. Some of it is motivational. Some of it is super smart. Some of it challenges my preconceived notions. Some of it is really... really... really dumb. Well, I figured that I could save you the time figuring out that some advice is asinine and sub-moronic by calling out that stupendously stupid advice on one of my podcast episodes. This means you'll have more time in your day to do cool things an...

Episode 135. Easy Wins We're talking about easy wins so you can end a losing streak and start a winning one. That's why we're going to talk about how we can set ourselves up for success. And that's why we're talking about why we should acknowledge and celebrate those easy wins. And that's why we're going to talk about a few different easy wins that I believe will lead to more easy wins and more confidence and more starting lines being crossed. By the way, listening to this episode of Coach Be...

Episode 134. Do The Right Thing It shouldn't be surprising that doing the right thing consistently leads to good things happening consistently or at the very least you can be proud of what YOU did consistently. And this is true between the start and finish lines and beyond the start and finish lines. This episode is about the foundational pillars of what exactly "do the right thing" means for a runner or coach and how it can shape the running journey they are on. It's never not the right time...

Episode 133. Right Here. Right Now. You want to know where and when you can work on getting better? Right here and right now. That's the answer. And that's the only answer. You can't work on getting better yesterday. That starting line has left the station and it ain't coming back. And you sure can't work on getting better tomorrow. You'll be waiting forever for that starting line to show up. It's here and now that we get the work done. And it's the best time to do that work because it's the ...

Episode 132. How To Start or Keep On Running (Using U2 Songs as Inspiration) You ever wonder how you or someone you care about could best start, start over, start running again or just keep on running? And did you ever wonder about those things but also wonder if there is a way to solely use song titles from the epic and legendary Irish band U2 to serve as chapter titles for that noble and righteous quest? You too??? Get it? I'll wait. Well, the wait is over! Because that's ...

Episode 131. Why I Didn't Break 4 I had a few big goals when I was running and racing competitively. One of those goals was breaking 4 minutes in the mile. Well, as you can probably surmise from the title of this episode... I didn't. But my failure to break 4 has led to this soon to be very successful episode of Coach Bennett's Podcast. That is assuming all of you listen to and share the episode with everyone you know. Anyway, in the episode I break down a whole bunch of reasons why I believe...

Episode 130. How To End The Year Running The end of the year is not the time that people start running. In fact, the end of the year os when most people stop running. Poor weather, less hours of sunlight, holiday obligations and travel, work and life stressors - it all adds up to less if any running getting done at all. That's why we have Episode #130! Because we're going to flip the script. We're not going to wait until the New Year to start running or start running again. This good ol...

Episode 129. Maybe Is A Power I headed out on my run today and it was drizzling. I though to myself that maybe I'll run 15 minutes... but maybe I'll run 20 minutes... and maybe I'll run 25 minutes. The power here resided in the word maybe. The ownership and the excitement and the honesty and the possibility was all birthed and made possible by that word maybe. This episode is about how you can make your running better by incorporating that word... maybe.. into your training and your running a...

Episode 128. Winter Is Coming. Get Ready To Run It. Winter is coming. Just ask Jon Snow or really anyone from the Stark family. All my Game of Throne nerds are nodding their heads. The rest of you are confused. That's okay! Because this episode is actually about running. Running in winter to be specific. I start by telling you how to get into the groove. Yes, there will be a special nod to Madonna. And I'll talk about the importance of getting into gear and getting inspired and getting ...

Episode 127. Now What? The race is over. The training cycle is finished. You crossed. the finish line. Now what? I've wanted to do this episode for a few weeks. So, I was super excited when it came time to record it. The problem was that I had a bad cough. The kind of cough that won't let you speak more than two sentences without coughing. And, I'm in a car driving across the country. Luckily, I happen to know the best coach in the world AND I'm driving across the country with her. So, ...

Episode 126. Just Wait A Minute Sometimes all it takes to set a day straight or a run right is a minute. But you'll need the strength and confidence to wait a minute and reset or refresh or retry or redo. I did just that today. Because I needed to tell myself to just wait a minute and take that minute to recharge. So, take 30 minutes here and now and listen to the latest episode of Coach Bennett's Podcast before you head out for a recovery run or long run or fartlek run or decide to start run...

Episode 125. How To Have A Better Race This is a special one. Because it's episode 125! And because running a race is special. And because we have Coach Bennett the Greater as a guest. That's right! Tammie Bennett of the Show Up Society is back! And this is also a special episode because you all asked for an episode on what you could do before race day and on the starting line on race day and on the other side of that starting line on race day so you have a better chance to run a better...

Episode 124. Moving On Sometimes the hardest part of a running a race isn't the race. And sometimes it's not even the training you need to do so you can run race that race. Sometimes the hardest part is after the race. It's letting go. It's moving on. We can give so much to a training cycle. We can put so much into the journey. We can invest so much into race day and the outcome. We can suddenly find ourselves lost and adrift when it's all over. This episode is about acknowledging all of this...

Episode 123. Success Success. What is it? How do you define it? How do you measure it? What happens when you don't reach a goal? Is there such a thing as partial success? So many questions. Even more answers in this episode. Inspired by getting to talk to so many of you at the Berlin Marathon, Portland Marathon, Chicago Marathon, I wanted to make sure we talked about success from the point of view of the athletes and a coach. So, check it out. And thank you for inspiring me with your efforts ...

Episode 122. On The Starting Line We all stand there on starting lines. Together. Alone. With the unknown ahead of us. No guarantees. This episode is inspired by so many of you that have reached out over the last few weeks to ask about the starting line. Over the last few weeks I've been to the Berlin Marathon, the Portland Marathon, Half Marathon, 10K and Kids Mile, and now I'm recording this episode in Chicago with this great city's marathon only a couple of days away. I talk nerves, confid...

Episode 121. Ready, Set, Go! This is a really special episode. Because I get to talk about something that is near and dear to my heart - how to introduce the sport to kids (and adults). About ten years ago, I helped create something called Ready, Set, Go! for Nike Running. It was a guide for both kids and the adult in their lives that was going to help introduce them to this wonderful sport. Well, we decided to refresh Ready, Set, Go! and I couldn't be more excited about it. ...

Episode 120. Keep It Easy It’s not just about making sure you run easy when you’re supposed to run easy. Keeping it easy is also about making sure you’re not making the hard stuff harder than it needs to be. Give this latest episode of Coach Bennett’s Podcast a listen and you’ll be a little better equipped to keep it easy… or at least help keep yourself from making the hard stuff harder. Cheers, Coach Bennett Send us a message My book This Is About Running. This Is Not About Running. ...

Episode 119. Getting Ready For The Big Day You got a big day coming up? Is it a race? 5K? 10K? Marathon? Maybe it's an exam you need to take or a presentation you need to give or a conversation you need to have. No matter what your big day is you can be better prepared to take it on AND enjoy it. How? How can you be better prepared and enjoy that big day more? So happy you asked! Just listen to this episode and there's a real good chance you're going to come up big on the big day. Cheer...

Episode 118: Better Autumn Running It's time to... wait for it... fall in love with running in the fall. Get it? Pretty great, right? I know. I just got whatever that thing is. Anyway, this episode is a few of my favorite tip and even a few rules for better Autumn running. So, fall back in your favorite chair or hit your favorite trail (or treadmill or road) and enjoy the latest episode. Cheers and thank you for listening! Coach Bennett Send us a message My book This Is About Runn...

Episode 117. All I Got It's been a tough couple of weeks. So much travel. Dropping kids off on the other side of the country. ER visits. Sickness. Heimlich Maneuvers. 7 year streaks being broken. Podcasts not getting published... or at least getting published a week later. So, this is the episode you're getting. It won't be the longest Coach Bennett's Podcast ever. It won't have the most rambles or even gloriously terrible weak jokes. But it is all I got. And it's the best I could do. I hope ...

Episode 116: Goals: How To Set, Change, Drop and Achieve Them It's always a great time to talk about goals. And when you talk about goals you need to talk about more than how to set them. You need to know how to change and adjust goals and how to drop goals too. Big goals. Little goals. Medium sized goals. Long term goals. Short term goals. We cover it all. So, enjoy the show and please know that one of my goals in making this episode was to help you have a better chance achieving all of your...

Episode 115. Get Out Of Your Own Way We all do it. We self-sabotage. We trip ourselves up. We set ourselves up for something less than success. Well, this episode is all about ways we can get out of our own ways so we can run ourselves somewhere better without the self-destructive hurdles and barriers we place in front of ourselves. And obviously you need to listen to Go Your Own Way by Fleetwood Mac. And because my brain decides to simply go rogue here is Don't Stop by Fleetwood Mac to...

Episode 114. Recovery On The Run You've probably heard me say that great running dependent on great recovery. Well, it's the truth. And if you can recover great and do that consistently you're going to give yourself the best chance to run great. So, listen up. Because this episode is all about how you can recover better and recover better consistently. None of the things I talk about in this episode are recovery techniques that you can't start taking advantage of today. Because almost everyth...