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Crushing Iron Triathlon Podcast

Find out why thousands of beginner, intermediate, and advanced athletes are improving their training and racing with accessible, functional and genuine conversation about triathlon. Two coaches, who aren't afraid to laugh at themselves, look for smart and enjoyable solutions in a sport that's often dumb and painful. Mike Tarrolly and Robbie Bruce explore the mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual side of training and racing everything from Ironman to a Sprint. on Monday and Thursday.
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Now displaying: October, 2025
Oct 31, 2025

Don’t turn triathlon into a job you hate. Now is the time to embrace flexibility and work on being healthy, happy, and a more resilient athlete. Today we look at the toughest times of the year and how to use them to your advantage. We also get into how gratitude makes us faster. We talk about keeping an eye on how far you’ve come. We talk maintaining vs. losing and how your body will thank you on race day. We talk about why overly specific interval training is overrated. We look at burn out and how to make sure you can have a long and healthy life with triathlon as your guide.

Topics:

  • Embrace The Costume Day
  • Ironman Florida
  • 2nd Toughest Time of Year for Training
  • Last hour of the road trip
  • When we get sooo close to the season
  • Max Flexibility Season
  • It’s keep moving time
  • Starting a band
  • Cramming for a test
  • The triathlete’s seasonal cycle
  • Craving the run?
  • It’s Yellow Season
  • Gratitude can make us faster
  • Look back at how far you’ve come
  • Don’t let yourself fall so far behind
  • Being an Athlete versus Chasing a Race Goal
  • Not going too far in either direction
  • Maintaining instead of losing
  • Excuses in relation to the time of year
  • Choose your adventure
  • Making sure athletes do aerobic work
  • Specific training overrated?
  • Building a base . . . of consistency
  • Why people get burned out
  • Don’t turn triathlon into a job you hate

 

 

Mike Tarrolly - mike@c26triathlon.com

Robbie Bruce - robbie@c26triathlon.com

 

Check us out at www.c26triathlon.com

Looking to find your flow? Check out C26 Adventures!

Oct 23, 2025

Today we look at the three dominant metrics in triathlon: Heart Rate, Power, and RPE. Which one is right for you, and does that answer change with different variables? We look at things like time of the day, time of the year, and adjusting based on how you feel. We tackle questions like intensity vs. volume and look at different scenarios depending on if you’re racing an Ironman or something shorter. We talk Vo2 max and look at whether or not you should even be thinking about it. And we also get into how a lot of triathletes screw up their races with nutrition.

Topics:

  • Wetsuit legal questions
  • Dominant metrics
  • When to use power vs HR vs RPE
  • Does the time of day matter?
  • Different stress from different pools
  • Hot water, cold water, shallow water
  • When are you strongest on the bike?
  • Is HR higher in the morning?
  • Warm ups
  • Lower volume, higher intensity
  • Swim hard, bike aerobic, run hard?
  • Looking at numbers too often
  • How we screw up our races with nutrition
  • Smash test for a 15 hour race?
  • Vo2 Max - small piece of the puzzle
  • Keep it alive and primed
  • Putting in the real volume

 

Mike Tarrolly - mike@c26triathlon.com

Robbie Bruce - robbie@c26triathlon.com

Oct 16, 2025

Motivation is fleeting. How do we train and live in such a way that we’re looking forward to what’s next? Not down the road in 10 months, but what’s next today and tomorrow? Today, we look at finding a good combination of freedom within the discipline. Do you buy in to your direction or are you struggling with understanding the real goals? Do you have conviction for what you’re chasing?

Topics:

  • Favorite Holidays
  • Four reels per week?
  • What’s the top thing to do right now?
  • Put your shoes on and go
  • We all need freedom
  • Racing season is our school year
  • Finding a freedom and discipline mix
  • Athlete buy-in and conviction
  • Workouts as prompts
  • Mine and matching workouts
  • Getting that dopamine rush
  • Accepting the outcome
  • Guiding and giving options
  • Creating new options
  • Enlightened monk is like winning the age group
  • Less conviction to one thing
  • Igniting a workout
  • It’s YOUR dream
  • Long-term buy in to yourself

 

Mike Tarrolly - mike@c26triathlon.com

Robbie Bruce - robbie@c26triathlon.com

Oct 14, 2025

What a race! Today we go through our observations of the Kona Women’s World Championship. We start with some intriguing swim strategies, get into decision making on the bike, and look at what might have gone wrong from the leaders in the run. It was a fascinating day and we get into the concept of going wire to wire. Mental pressure. Working together. How smart can you be. And why it clearly ain’t over till it’s over.

Topics:

  • 100 Milers
  • Spoiler alert
  • It ain’t over til it’s over
  • Lucy Charles Barclay
  • Taylor Knibb
  • Kat Matthews
  • Solveig Lovseth
  • Kona swim
  • Pro swim strategies
  • Did they race like Age groupers to win?
  • Keeping the core temp down is the goal
  • Surges
  • Racing by impulse
  • How smart can you be?
  • The Ass tap
  • The meltdown
  • He coaches both
  • Julie Moss
  • You have to do you when they don’t do them
  • Is parity good for the sport?
  • Gambling?

 

Mike Tarrolly - mike@c26triathlon.com

 

Robbie Bruce - robbie@c26triathlon.com

Oct 7, 2025

Today we come partly from the great north of Wisconsin. We get into Kona predictions, jeans and ribeyes, then dive into the question of: how do the best separate themselves from the rest. We bring it to an age group level and explore how we can be at our best then stay at our best. How do we outwork doubt? 

Topics:

  • Jeans and ribeyes
  • Cold Weather
  • Lake Superior
  • Kona Women
  • Biggest Questions
  • What's the difference between the best and rest
  • Do you over correct? 
  • Game face in training
  • Outworking your doubts
  • How do you respond after your best race?
  • Is it enough?
  • You have to detrain
  • We need room for growth

mike@c26triathlon.com

robbie@c26triathlon.com

 

Oct 2, 2025

This is a great time to build the cake, or maybe even just put your shopping list together. Today, we look at the unlimited potential of aerobic capacity and why it’s at the core of making you a better long course athlete. We talk about Mark Allen’s quest to beat Dave Scott and how patience allowed him to set the IM run course record. We get into using this time to reduce your stress and level your cortisol to be a healthier person. We look at how your body adapts to training and how we actually get faster and stronger. Get faster in a more meaningful (and functional) way. The goal right now is to train in a way so that you feel good tomorrow . . . and the next day. Be patient and the speed will come.

Topics:

  • We all have options
  • Sitting in no man’s land
  • FOMO on both sides of the aisle
  • Build the aerobic reservoir
  • High intensity can wait
  • Is periodization dead?
  • Roller coaster highs and lows are bad for the body
  • Using TIME to reduce stress
  • Aerobic work is maximum quality
  • Keep showing up but “don’t try”
  • The poison is in the dose
  • DNF rate going up?
  • Stress Flexibility
  • Fatigue resistance
  • Don’t eat into your ability to push threshold
  • Running and swimming as intuitive strengths
  • Your training plan as a menu
  • Mark Allen - 7 months of no intensity for the win
  • How your body adapts and gets stronger
  • Consistency going out of your watt range
  • Waking up the next day able to do it again
  • Peaks and valleys are stressful
  • Get faster in a meaningful way
  • The goal is to feel good tomorrow
  • Don’t feel good just to dig another hole

 

Mike Tarrolly - mike@c26triathlon.com

 

Robbie Bruce - robbie@c26triathlon.com

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