When Lane first set out to realize his dream of running races, he was without clear guidance. He trained alone, pushing himself harder and harder every day with no real understanding of how to refine and improve his performance. But when he joined enduraLAB, everything began to click into place. Suddenly, Lane had access to experts in the field who could advise him on technique, nutrition, and more importantly – how to stay motivated and inspired when the running game gets tough. With knowledge from enduraLAB, Lane has been able to push through barriers that previously felt insurmountable and make incredible progress toward his goals. Read more about Lane and his journey below.
What brought you to enduraLAB?
I set an intention to change my relationship with running at the end of 2020, and one of my goals was to get back into running half marathons. I signed up for the 2021 Cowtown and quickly realized that what I was doing on my own wasn't going to be enough. I trained with the LAB back in the early days and knew I could count on Lee for killer endurance programming, so I reached out to Isis about coming back and the rest is history.
What did your workout routine look like before joining the LAB?
To put it simply, it was an overloaded mess. I was going all-out 4-5 days a week with no variation in effort and very little variation in distance. Everything was an 8-8:45 mile for 3-5 miles. I eventually hit a major wall because my body had simply had enough.
What healthy changes have you made since joining the LAB?
Where do I start? I guess first of all, I started to understand that even though I was really active and following what I thought was a good nutrition plan for myself, I had to learn the hard way that I wasn't being very kind to my body. I was going far too hard with not enough fuel on most days and it was really wrecking my metabolic health and completely exhausting me. If you really want to break it down, the primary thing that's led me to all the healthy changes I've been able to make is simply listening.
Sometimes the thing that's best for you isn't what you want to hear, but being open to hearing it anyway and really thinking about how you can apply it is the key to making sustainable, long-term changes. Just from having conversations with Coach Lee and really absorbing all the information he's shared with me, I've:
- Incorporated SO MUCH more zone 2 work into my running, which has done wonders for improving my aerobic base and in turn shaved a ton of time off my race paces at every distance
- Committed to doing mobility work after every single run, which has massively decreased aches and pains during my training progressions
- Significantly increased my daily water intake and made sure dehydration isn't impeding my performance
- Started intermittent fasting, which over the course of six months has led to me losing more than 17 lbs of fat and gaining almost 7 lbs of lean tissue
Coach Isis has also been a huge help with nutritional accountability, and really inspired me to find a way to *accurately* track how I was fueling my body. When it comes to race prep, this has been a huge part of my success because I'm not going into any training sessions or races without fuel to get me through, but I'm also not going overboard on treat days.
Tell us what you do outside of the LAB?
Outside the LAB I'm a group account director for a digital marketing agency, which means I basically tell big companies how to spend their ad budgets and then make sure we're executing our media strategies efficiently. Honestly, it's a really fancy way of saying "I sell clicks on the internet." I'm also married to the world's greatest cheerleader, have two dogs, and love cooking, fine dining, and live music.
How have you grown as an athlete since joining the LAB? Brag a little.
Here's a topic I could easily talk about for an hour, but no one has that kind of attention span so I'll do my best to be brief. In terms of performance, I'm lightyears beyond where I was when I showed up at Taylor Street for hill repeats on March 2, 2021. I was capping out at around 5 miles for distance and even though the average pace for my runs the year before was an 8:45/mi, I had lost my ability to maintain that speed and really had to build my aerobic base and lactate threshold from scratch.
Fast forward 2 years later, and I just ran a 1:52:17 at Cowtown, which was a 16:08 race PR and 44:26 course PR. To give even more context there, I set my previous best half time in June of 2022 on a flat-to-downhill course, so I took more than a quarter of an hour off my half time on a far more challenging course in just 8 months. In the past six months I've also absolutely smashed my goal times in the 1-mile, 5K, 10K and 10-mile, and have finished in the top 25% of the field or better in my last 4 races. I'm running farther and faster than I ever have, and things that I once would've thought were insanely out of my reach (i.e. a sub-1:50 half marathon and sub-6 mile) are absolutely within striking distance.
And not to neglect the strength side of things...even though the lack of cartilage in my knees keeps me from doing a ton with the S&C classes, I've made huge gains on the bench and what was my 1-rep max in May 2022 became my 10-rep max in February 2023. (Shoutout to Coach Blake for getting me to strengthen my wrists and giving me all the best cues to engage my lats.)
Before moving on, let me be super clear about something: the only thing I've done workout-wise to achieve these things is the programming that Coach Lee puts in front of me to complete. I'm not going rogue and adding things that could ultimately lead to overtraining or injury. Every single tool you need to succeed is in the plan. You've got speed work, hills, tempo, low aerobic (aka zone 2) and distance, and if you show up and do the work you'll see the results, no matter what your goals are. That goes for every program at the LAB, not just endurance. The biggest key is consistency.
What is a goal you have set for yourself in the next 6 months?
I'm shooting for a sub-1:50 race time at the Missoula Half Marathon in June, and I want to hit 200 lbs on the bench press by mid-July.
What is your favorite enduraLAB event or program?
I LOVE 30/30 season. You get faster and improve your VO2 Max while running 40-50 miles in the Target parking lot at your 1-mile pace over the course of 8 weeks. What's not to love about that? It takes some mental fortitude, but you come out on the other side feeling a huge sense of accomplishment and you're pretty much guaranteed to shave at least 15 seconds off your mile time. P.S. this will also help you crush high-intensity S&C workouts, even if they don't involve a traditional endurance component.
What advice would you have for a new person starting at enduraLAB?
Listen to your coaches, and don't be afraid to ask questions. Building your knowledge base and really understanding how certain programming impacts you will help you stick with it and see better results. Also, scale when you need to and prioritize mobility.
If we had a workout in honor of you, what would it be called and what would it consist of?
Oh it would definitely be a tempo workout called "Death by 5K Pace" and consist of:
2 rounds (Run @5K Pace or an RPE of 7/8):
- 200m run
- 100m active recovery
- 400m run
- 200m active recovery
- 800m run
- 400m active recovery
- 1600m run
- Rest 3:00 between rounds
I love a workout that challenges you to stay at a certain speed even when you want to go faster or slower, and this gives you that challenge over a variety of distances with active recovery built in. At the end of it you won't even realize you've covered more than 4.5 miles.
Favorite treat meal/restaurant in D/FW?
I love duck, and Ellerbe and Clay Pigeon do it better than anyone. Also, if you really want a treat, order the bread pudding at Ellerbe a la mode. Dare I say it's the best dessert in Fort Worth.
Current read / podcast?
I'm more of a periodical reader these days, predictably run-focused magazines like Trail Runner, but I just got Born to Run and I'm really excited to start reading it.
Pump up song?
I have a few...
- Physical by Dua Lipa
- Sabotage by Beastie Boys
- I Feel Love by Donna Summer
- Black Out Days by Phantogram (this is a pre-race staple)
Any final words or thoughts?
Progress isn't always linear, so don't give up on the process just because the outcome isn't what you thought it would be. The big results take time, but the programming here really does put you on a path to get there. Just put in the work and stay consistent.
