The Importance of Mental Toughness in Endurance Sport | #4 ft. Andy St. Germain

Welcome to the Critical Oxygen Podcast! In this episode Andy St. Germain and I talk about how we met, Andy's background, and the importance of mental toughness from endurance training and Crossfit. Enjoy! Enjoying these podcasts? Subscribe to get notified when new episodes are released. If you have a question or topic you want us to address, leave a comment! Follow Phil on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/criticalo2 Follow Andy on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/andyst.germain/ Interested in testing, courses, or other long form content check out the critical oxygen website - https://www.criticaloxygen.com OUTLINE: 0:00 – Introduction 0:45 – Andy’s Background 2:29 – Athlete to coach 3:20 – Wrestling and mental toughness 8:20 – Mental Toughness for Crossfitters 10:06 – Different pain for different workouts 12:15 – Does mental toughness trump physiology? 12:52 – The parallels of life and sport 16:30 – Train your mind! 16:49 – Sometimes the best workout is rest or to slow down! 18:08 – The challenge with hustle mentality 20:31 – Why HIIT feels good 21:45 – Reprogramming your brain 24:10 – How to mentally assess your athlete 26:44 – Talk to your athletes! 27:55 – The stress bucket 30:40 – The mark of a good coach 32:51 – The balance of coaching 34:30 – Two types of athletes you coach 35:59 – Why men are less likely to share their feelings 36:49 – Coaching kids 38:56 – How Crossfit teaches mental toughness 41:56 – You don’t have to be perfect 44:00 – What Crossfit is good at 44:56 – Where Crossfit falls short 48:18 – Recap and why scaling is good! 49:17 – Outro