Kate Bevilaqua returns to Sparta Chicks Radio this week!
Kate was first on the podcast way back in 2017 in episode 3 (yes, 3!).
At that time, she was the Women’s Ultraman Triathlon World Champion.
Ultraman is the distance beyond an Ironman event. It has a 10km (6.2mi) swim, 421km (261mi) ride finished off with a double marathon, that’s 84km (56mi). It’s a stage race over 3 days and Kate won the World Championship on the Big Island of Hawaii in 2016.
A year earlier, in 2015, Kate became the first woman in history to win an Ultraman race outright. That’s an extraordinary achievement for a woman who says she hated running before she got into the sport of triathlon.
In our first conversation in 2017, Kate shared her story:
- her early days in the sport when she (to use her words) “crashed and burned” in her first attempt at the Hawaii Ironman as an age group athlete,
- that even after 10 years as a professional athlete she still has doubts when she’s standing on the start line,
- the importance of understanding what success means to you and
- how hard work, and not natural talent, has been the secret to her success.
One topic we didn’t explore in that conversation is that Kate is also a coach.
In fact, the idea for this conversation came from one of her athletes who also happens to be one of our most popular podcast guests - Melissa Urie!
So this episode, Kate shares her experience as a coach and we discuss, from a coach’s perspective, working with athletes towards ultra events.
Even if you aren’t training for an ultra-distance event, I have no doubt you’ll benefit from Kate’s wisdom regardless of what distance, or what event, you are training for.
Given it’s January and most of us are thinking about or setting our goals, I thought it would be the perfect time to have this discussion.
In this conversation Kate shares:
* how to find the right coach,
* some of the biggest mistakes athletes make when setting goals or choosing races,
* the importance of having a strong ‘why’ (and how to work out if your ‘why’ is strong enough)
* how you only need to do 85% of your program and why you shouldn’t feel guilty if you don’t or can’t tick every box on your program
* how to decide when to push through your fatigue and train versus when you should rest,
* how to make sure you can fit your training around your life,
* the biggest mistakes athletes make in training,
* her advice on how to handle pre-race nerves (and yes, Kate still struggles with them too after 16 years of racing as a professional!) and
* how to prevent spiralling mentally when things get tough on race day.
Click here to listen on iTunes.
Notes and resources:
To find out more about Kate or to say hello, you can find her on Instagram, via her website or on GK Endurance