How Ben Rosario Built Three Running Businesses by Putting Community First

Kamal Datta: Hey everyone, welcome to What Runs A Run Pod, special series on nutrition and coaching in 26.2. today we are sitting down with someone who has worn virtually every single hat in the running industry, Ben Rosario. Ben started out on the Elite circuit as a professional marathoner with a PR of 218. From there, he stepped into the business side, opening and scaling. A specialty retail running stores with big river running company, building run clubs, managing major national events. He then POTE high performance coaching, founding Hoganas Elite, where he coached some of the top distance runners in North America, including Olympic trials champions and world majors top ten finishers. And when the world ground to a halt in 2020, Ben co-founded The Marathon Project, an event that revitalized elite road running in North America. Today we are unpacking his transition from athlete to entrepreneurship to master coach and what it really takes to build a sustainable success in the running industry. Ben, welcome to the show.

Ben: Well, thanks for that nice intro. appreciate you having me. Excited to be on.

Kamal Datta: Great. And I I'm looking forward to our conversation. I we have so many things to unpack. I want to start with your elite running phase of your life. and I'm always curious what it takes to be an elite runner. And I I if you can unpack that question for me first.

Ben: Yes, as the as the years go by that's that's farther and farther away, so har harder to answer these questions.

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: You know, you know, first of all, I think I think it's important to recognize that, you know, that professional runner tag is used quite loosely, in in my in my case and and in and in the case of others. Yes, I did make some money running, probably not enough to to really call myself a true pro runner because it wasn't my only source of income. I would

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: probably more appropriately be described as a semi professional runner. But what it took was Just a lot of dedication, I suppose, which is not different than succeeding in any other walk of life. I actually think that in retrospect, having done other things on the business side, the business side is is much harder. I think running a hundred twenty miles is a is a piece of cake compared to owning a running store or or directing a a professional running team, but Yeah, just took a lot of dedication, takes takes a fair amount of talent. I didn't I didn't have the talent to be a a true pro, but

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: I think I think the talent is is the first thing because you can't do it without that. And then and then you try to maximize that talent. And in order to maximize that talent, you have to spend a tremendous amount of time running, obviously, but you also have to spend a lot of time in the gym and recovering and recovering properly and preparing mentally and emotionally for for all the things it takes to to compete at the highest level. So it's it's certainly a a job, but a very fun job and my career, if you want to call it that, was was short, but it was extremely fun and exciting and left me with memories for a lifetime.

Kamal Datta: That's great. you mentioned talent and I wonder 'cause basically there are poor runners, everyone wants to compete on these big races. If you want to say that to bring the talent to compete at the, you know, the the big events, what are the key factors that play in role? I would guess, you know, the having a a team that supports you would probably play, including your coaches, nutrition coaches, and different set of folks that actually support you to bring the talent out to compete on those big races or whatever you choose to compete at. what what role that does it play? Because I know talent is the starting point.

Ben: Yeah, I mean I'm biased, but I I agree with you. I think that it takes a village. I was a big proponent of the team model. Not only did I compete for a team, the Hansons Brooks Distance Project, but then I founded and coached the Hoka Northern Arizona Elite team, as you mentioned at the top for a decade. And, you know, to me having a coach was essential, because I wanted like I wanted as an athlete I wanted that part off of my plate. I didn't want to be worrying about the workouts. I just wanted to do the workouts. I just wanted to be the athlete and let the coach be the coach. And that's sort of how I liked to do it as a coach as well. I wanted to do my job, which was to coach, and I wanted the athletes to do their job, which was to be the athlete. and I think that is a really big piece of it for the athlete because when they have full trust in their coach. They don't really have to worry about the workouts. They don't have to stress, like, is this the right thing? Am I doing the right thing? They already believe that inherently because they've established this trust with their coach. And then those teams have a number of things, especially nowadays, that are sort of these ancillary things that make sure the athletes stay healthy. massage therapists, strength and conditioning coaches. They also have a lot of times mental performance coaches to help with the psychological side of things and the mental side of things. a lot of these races or a lot of these athletes see therapists to make sure that their life in general is in a good place mentally and emotionally. So yeah, it takes it takes all these people and then and then they have, you know, friends and family members that help support them you know, from a From a life standpoint, you know, that you need people that love you and support you no matter if you win

Kamal Datta: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Ben: or lose. You need those people in your life as well. And and then oftentimes the top pros have brands that support them as well, not

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: only financially, but you know, most of the top brands have these athlete managers that that that help make sure the the their athletes are getting all the things that they need. And then the athletes, the top athletes have agents as well, and those agents take a lot of the business things off of their plate. So the agents will negotiate their contracts with the shoe companies, negotiate their appearance fees with big marathons, get them into races. And again, those are all things that without these people, the athletes would have to be doing these things themselves. And these things

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: are stressful. And so having people take care of the business side of things for you, having someone write your workouts, coach you, guide you, having people support you emotionally. having a strength and conditioning coach to make sure you're doing the right things in the gym, having a massage therapist to make sure your muscles, and tendons and ligaments are being taken care of on a regular basis. All of those things are important and they all matter.

Kamal Datta: No, that's that's so true. Ben, you alluded to this fact about the business side of an elite runner. I'm just curious how it has evolved. I know you are saying your elite running is in the rear view mirror at this point, but as you look back and then you you know you have coached elite runners, you know, we're gonna talk a little bit more on that, you know, NAS elite group that you also coached personally and also what you're doing with the Martin project, how it has evolved the business side of Elite Runner, that what as a personal Elite runner you have seen versus what you are seeing, the different runners you are coaching in today or you have coached over the years.

Ben: It just continues to evolve. It can we're a sport that historically is connected to amateurism. You know, in the nineteen

Kamal Datta: okay. Okay.

Ben: in the nineteen sixties when a lot of sports chose to go a professional route. So we're talking about golf, we're talking about tennis. our sport and of course other sports had already very much been professional, baseball and and basketball and and football, soccer. to name the the major ones,

Kamal Datta: Yeah. Yeah.

Ben: boxing. But but but track and and golf and tennis were kinda equal. And they were all kind of these sort of amateur sports with amateur ideals. And tennis and golf chose to go the professional route. Arnold Palmer really led that on the golf side.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: tennis it was really led by the the major tournaments and and some of the agencies that got behind those tournaments and and turned them into these gigantic professional events. but Track and Field chose to stay amateur. And so we we really were behind the eight ball for a long, long, long time until you know, even when we did quote unquote become a professional sport, it was it was still we were still steeped in that amateur with that th those amateur ideals, I suppose. And so You know, when when I was running in the early two thousands, it was still very wild, wild west. You know, it was still very grassroots. You you kind of got into whatever races you could and and the money wasn't there wasn't a lot of money in it. over the years, over the last twenty five years, there is more money in some ways. certainly sponsorship money has increased.

Kamal Datta: Okay.

Ben: what what the brands are paying athletes has has increased quite a bit. the prize money at major road races and and major track events has not increased all that much. But the money that has gone into those events has increased. So there's more pomp and circumstance circumstance at the New York City Marathon, the the Diamond League track events, the Olympic trials, all of those things have more There's more money being poured into those things than ever before. the athletes aren't seeing all of it, but they're seeing more than they did before. I I think the the biggest difference now too is you really have to be good to b to be a professional. You can't scrape your way but you can't fake it. You know, I wasn't very talented, but I made a little money here and there. But now, I mean, you gotta be good. You have to be really, really talented because because the fact that there's more money in it, which is a good thing because Now, if you're talented, you're gonna stick with it and you're gonna maximize your your potential. And when you do, you're gonna do some really good things that are valuable and and you're gonna make some money. So I would just say the biggest difference is that it is more professional than it was twenty-five years ago with these agents, with the money that's being paid to the athletes. the the the professional nature of the big events is better now than it was before. And so yeah, I j I just think it's a natural evolution. Taking longer than maybe some of us would like at times, but it

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: is getting it is getting there.

Kamal Datta: y if you have to look at performance metric of an elite runner Ben and as you have coached elite runners, are there a handful of metrics you would say that hey, he is an elite runner or a pro runner versus he has some work to do or she has some work to do.

Ben: Yeah, the the the setup in the United States is such that it's not tremendously difficult to figure out who's gonna be able to do it, because

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: of the NCAA level. So if you competed at the NCAA level and were winning national titles, competing up front for national titles, finishing second, third, y you you probably have the talent necessary to compete

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: at the highest level. Now, that doesn't mean it's an automatic though. you have to then take that next step and become much more professional in the way you go about your daily life. You have to really commit to this is gonna sound silly, but taking naps, getting to bed on time, eating healthy, treating your body the way it needs to be treated in order to compete at the highest level. These these are sort of the next step kind of things. But in terms of do they have enough talent, yeah, they have to have competed at a high level at the NCAA in most cases. Now there are some You know, late bloomers, particularly in the marathon, that maybe didn't win a national title, but they were certainly very good. It's just that at the NCAA level, it's really 10K is the farthest distance, obviously. So you don't you don't really get to see who might be great at the marathon, in the same way that you get to see who's clearly gonna be great at fifteen hundred meters and five thousand meters.

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: You have to sort of look at the NCAA cross-country results and you know, we had a guy on NAZ, Scott Fauble, who was top fifteen three different times in in the NCAAs that in the cross-country championships, but never in the top ten. He was, I think, twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth or something like that. And he ended up being a world class marathoner. but

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: but but you had to kind of do your homework on the guy and and talk to his college coach and see what he was doing in training and understand that He had the capabilities of doing these special things at longer distances. So yeah, I think it's results and then it's doing your homework on the type of training that an athlete's doing and the type of program that that they're a part of and and just sort of using your gut along with the metrics to decide if the ceiling of this person is is high enough to be a a true pro.

Kamal Datta: Makes sense. Thank you. Now let's transition to your next phase of starting the Big River running company. how was the transition or what led you to pivot to starting a the Big River running company?

Ben: Yeah, so in two thousand five, that was my second I was wrapping up my second full year with the Hanson's Brooks Distance Project team. And like I said, I wasn't doing that well. You have to be really good to to make it. And I'm a I'm an optimistic realist, you know. So so I live in reality, even though I am, you know, optimistic, I I think I I I very much am a pragmatic as well. So I knew that Hey, look, I'm not gonna make the Olympics. There's no way. You know, I'm just not I'm not good enough and and that's okay. I that didn't bother me. I had a ton of fun. So, but I also knew that I wasn't gonna stay there forever and make no money just so I could run a lot and have fun. That wasn't

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: you know, that's not sustainable i in my opinion. So yeah, I started looking for jobs. I got a job in St. Louis, which is my hometown, at the St. Louis Marathon. I I was the special events coordinator there for a year, but a few months into that process or into that job, I should say. My good buddy Matt Helbig from college started talking to me about maybe starting a running store. He had worked at a outdoor store. I had worked at a running store in Michigan, the Hansen stores, and really liked that job. And we felt like there was a need in St. Louis at the time based on the the landscape and He had had some money saved up from leading adventure trips out west for a couple of years. And though I didn't have any money when I moved back home, I did I did actually get second place at the Twin Cities Marathon in in two thousand five in the fall and I won twenty thousand bucks. And so I I used that money, and he used his money and we we scraped together a little bit of money from friends and family and we

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: were able to start the store you know, just on a shoestring budget, if you will. And that was I guess we worked on it from the fall of five to the summer of six, like the business plan and and getting the lease on the the the storefront and getting the vendors set up and yeah, we we opened our doors in August of six. So we just the store just had its twentieth anniversary, actually. even

Kamal Datta: nice. Okay.

Ben: though I I'm not a part of it anymore. But but yeah, we we opened in August of six and then ended up opening a second store or second location and two years later and a third location two years after that. So yeah, we just had a whirlwind of a time and yeah, I'd l I'd I'd love to go into more of it. It was a incredible journey.

Kamal Datta: Let's talk. So I think you not only started one store, you scaled that to multiple stores, I believe, over the years. I would be curious if you want to break down the business side of running a running store in that time versus I I don't know, I think as you kind of transition off of the big river. let's start with the scaling and what led you to scale first.

Ben: Think it was just our mindset. Our mindset was just to say yes to everything and keep growing and growing and growing. So, you know, just to talk dollars, we only had sixty thousand dollars to start the business. That's all we

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: had that's all we had raised. And so by the time we opened the doors in early August of 2006, we were down to less than $10,000 in the bank account and we had, you know, a store full of inventory. I think the brands that opened us were Mizuno. And Brooks and Pearl Azumi. They don't even make shoes anymore. And maybe maybe new ballots, I think. And we just had to sell those shoes one way or another. And we did. We did. We never missed a payment. We we had worked so hard in June and July going to every road race in St. Louis and talking to people and handing out flyers. And we had built a website and we were putting pictures on our website from the different races, and people were visiting it and We had done a really good job talking to all the cross country teams in town. We were young, we were only twenty-six. So we still knew a lot of the coaches in town and we got them to come to cross country team nights at the store and we sold them spikes and yeah, we actually did nine thousand dollars in sales on our first ever Saturday because we had done so much community marketing. So yeah, we we we scaled really quickly because we worked hard. I mean, that's the bottom line. Is

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: you know, Matt and I were at the stores every single day. So if you came into the stores, you were seeing one of the two owners. One of us would work from ten to six and the other would work from twelve to eight every day. So

Kamal Datta: Aw.

Ben: we'd over we'd overlap for for six hours every day and work together. And it's not like it was super busy during the week, those that f those first few months. And so a lot of it was just working on working on the business. you know, again, the website, the gosh, what were we working on early on? Well, j r really just trying to figure out the ordering. That was that was the number one thing that you had to figure out quickly was how to properly make the orders. And when you're growing, it's really difficult because at first you're just guessing. Now we

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: were educated, we were these were educated guesses after talking to our mentors in the industry, people that were kind enough to help us, people like Chris Hartner from Naperville Running Company, people like Rob Finnegan who had worked at a store called FitRite Northwest in in Portland. Those and my wife, Jen, who had worked at FitRite in in Portland as well, they were helping us based on what they knew. Their stores were doing, you know? And so we were making the orders. We were working really closely with the reps at each brand, each brand has a rep in in each region that helps you make your orders. And we had some great reps. And so, you know, those kind of things were really what we were working on early on. And then as our business sort of naturally grew, Matt, my business partner, really was the guy who did that sort of thing, because

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: he was more of a numbers guy. And then I really took on being the face of the company. So if we had an event like a a group run, which we had a lot of group runs, our summer speed workouts, our youth team, our a training team, our our sub-elite training team, like all the I coached, managed, did all of that. So

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: you know, I just ended up being sort of the face of the brand. And that was important. We needed a face of the brand, you know. So I was at And and I would go to little little YMCA health fairs. I would go to I mean, I was everywhere. so that was my role. His role was the ordering. And then we started launching events, cross-country meets, road races, trail races, a big track meet that's now the number one high school all-star distance meet in the country, the Festival of Miles. We we started that in 2008. really, really as a way to raise money for for an injured athlete. So Yeah, all all kinds of things that we did for the community. That that's really that was really our business model was build a running community around the store

Kamal Datta: Uh-huh.

Ben: and let the fact that those people in that community were gonna shop at your store let let that let that be the by product of the community piece, right? So

Kamal Datta: Got it. Yeah.

Ben: so be special, right? Put the special in specialty. That was sort of our our belief and and We felt like if those folks who were coming to all these free speed workouts and group runs and everything else felt a a sense of loyalty to us that they would almost feel bad buying their shoes anywhere but but at Big River and and I think that's

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: what we had going and and and we were really big on the experience in store as well. We we didn't hire just anybody. We hired people that were passionate about running and and and good with people and understood that it's not about selling, it's about relationship building. And you have twenty minutes or so to get to know this person and let them talk about their running and their goals and their dreams. And yeah, at the end of the day they walk out with a pair of shoes. But we we were very much I believe the the classic run specialty store, not the corporate type run specialty store. And I still believe in that model. I believe those are the best stores even even today.

Kamal Datta: You mentioned the ordering side and I have seen I guess certain brands and I didn't I think you mentioned a couple of brands that you carried at the Big River.

Ben: Eventually we carried everybody. I'm just talking about the brands that opened us to begin with. Not everybody believed in us at first,

Kamal Datta: Okay. Wa we need to start.

Ben: but ev everybody did pretty soon thereafter.

Kamal Datta: So, how is it different, the ordering side of having those partnerships with those big brands and the shoe? Sometimes the shoe companies may have a different view of, hey, I may not be able to, I may want to go directly to the customers versus going to the specialty stores or in a brick and mortar stores. Have you faced that challenge? Like, I'm a big brand decided I don't want to put my shoes into the the running stores versus I'll go directly to the consumers.

Ben: Yeah, that wasn't a b I mean, I own the stores from two thousand six to two thousand twelve. So that hadn't

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: that hadn't become as big of an issue as it as it is today. So what you're talking about is what they call DTC, direct to consumer. So a lot

Kamal Datta: Correct, correct.

Ben: of the brands understand well, they all understand this. They all understand that from a margin perspective, and anyone can understand this, it's a fairly easy concept. The brand is gonna make more money on a shoe that they sell from their own website and their own warehouses, right? So if a shoe

Kamal Datta: Correct. Yeah.

Ben: costs Let's let's say an expensive shoe, right? $200. If a shoe costs $200, it probably you know their cost is probably about fifty dollars. And so, you know, they're gonna make a hundred and fifty dollars on that pair of shoes if they sell it from their website. But if they sell it to a wholesaler, you know, a run specialty store, that run specialty store is gonna buy it from them for a hundred dollars. So they're only gonna make fifty dollars on that shoe and the run

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: re then and the retailer is gonna make a hundred dollars when they sell it, right? So there's margins and there's percentages that are a little different, but that's

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: a basic way to explain it to people. And so obviously they're gonna in they're gonna want to sell a lot of shoes off of their own website. However, even though that was a big push for a lot of brands for a number of years there as as that online world grew. I think there has been somewhat of a regression to the mean where they also understand that the run specialty stores are s are still the gatekeepers, in terms of trust and loyalty and credibility.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: And the best stores in the country are still the places that the really serious runners and I don't mean serious as in fast, I just mean serious as they take their running seriously, they're passionate about it, it's their hobby, it's their i it it's it's one of the biggest, most important things in their lives. They're still going to run specialty stores to buy these shoes. Now, do they buy every single pair from Run Specialty? Maybe not, but if you want your brand represented in the right way, you should be at Run S you should be in Run Specialty. You should have your best models in Run Specialty and you should be treating those those folks, the the owners, the managers, the employees, you should be treating them like partners because they are. And so

Kamal Datta: Yeah, yeah.

Ben: and so the best brands do that and and the number one brands in Run Specialty get that. I think, you know, Brooks does a great job in Run Specialty, Hoka does a great job in Run Specialty. And actually I would tell you that almost all the brands right now are kind of making a push to get back to that channel and and treat that channel well. So, you know, it it's it's cyclical, but The DTC the D T C stuff is never going to go away. But I don't think Run Specialty is gonna go away either. I think there's a place for both. you just have to be a really good store because it's not gonna be like it was in two thousand ten when there's, you know, almost a thousand doors in the in the country. There's gonna be less doors, but the doors that are open are gonna be really good.

Kamal Datta: No, that's that's that's well well said, Ben. you mentioned about putting together the run clubs, the running event, the the special the summer training camps. And if I want to break it down, you know, in terms of my business side of like a funnel of how you're driving the business to the store, how would you say that you know at least with the big river, how it it it it it was? And obviously I have to see if we have any different take on how it is done today in terms of a funnel, say, Hey, you are putting together X number of events and then driving X number of sales, or there are other channels that you're bringing into the into the funnel itself for for sales for the store.

Ben: I think for us at that time, from a percentage standpoint, it was probably it was probably close to ninety percent of what we were doing was driven in one way or another by our community events. And I say that because

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm. I see.

Ben: let's say we had let's say we had a hundred people every week coming to our Tuesday night speed workouts on the track, which is probably a fair number. Now Is all our business coming from those 100 people? No, obviously it's not. However, you've got to also think about all of the people that those hundred people are connected to. Their neighbors, their sons, their daughters, their husbands, their wives, their their church members, you know, all all of the people that they know, right? And then same with the Sunday long run group and the youth group and the training team group and then all the people that came to our races, right? So some of our races were thousands of people, right?

Kamal Datta: Uh-huh.

Ben: and so you just had all these touch points,

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: real tangible moments of relationship building, at all of those grassroots types events. And and I feel like the tentacles spread from there for us. That's how we did it. We spent very little money on advertisements on we did have a commercial on television at one point. We did have some ads on the radio at one point. But we really we really relied on our community building and and went from there. Now today it's a little bit of a different world. A lot of people also have built a community online through Instagram, sometimes TikTok, those kind of things.

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: And and that's great, you know. That's great. But I still think you need the the real stuff too. the in the in person stuff I think still matters a great deal to to a run specialty store. And I think I I I think when you see the stores that do a lot of the the group runs and the races and the speed workouts and those kind of things, I think I think you can kind of know the experien I I can tell you the kind of experience you're probably gonna get at those stores. And it's a really cool, fun experience where you get to go in there and talk about running and talk about the marathon the local marathon and the local ten K that's coming up. And that's that's the experience you're gonna get at those stores. The stores that don't do any of that and all they do is TV marketing and ads on Facebook, you're

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: probably gonna pr get a pretty corporate bland experience. That's what I believe, you know? And so that's okay. Like some people that's all they want. But But I think again I like to put the special in specialty. So my heart is with those stores that do all of the the great community work.

Kamal Datta: I see. No, that that's that's a great way of putting it. 'cause I I again in the Boston area also I'm experienced the similar events like specialty stores and they're primarily, you know, ton of events they're putting together and build this very strong community and obviously build the loyalty in the process that, you know, to shop from instead of going to Amazon dot com, you probably end up shopping there. because of what value they deliver to you and to the people you know for for sure. let's talk about a little bit scaling from one store to multiple store because I think that would be a different game altogether. Either you're in a business hat or you want to scale the building of community because one store maybe you are the face. When you're talking about five stores, I would be curious how did you balance or to scale it?

Ben: Yeah, well I think first of all we came at it from the right mindset, which was the same mindset that we had had at the beginning, which was that the money was just gonna be a byproduct of doing cool things. Right.

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: So it wasn't like we never sat down and said, we need to have another location so we can make more money. That was never why we did it. We we I don't even remember ever talking about that. You know, it was just the natural evolution of our business because we could just reach more people and the The second location was in the city where I grew up. I'm a city guy. And

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: look where I lived and where I grew up, was it as rich of an area as where we opened our first location? No, it wasn't. You know, of course we did the demographic research, we knew what the average median, you know, household income was in our second location and we knew it wasn't gonna be comparable to our first, but I knew those people. I knew they were loyal people. I knew

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: they would like this kind of store, I knew they would frequent our group runs, I knew that we could create a community around that store. And so we put our second store, our first store was in a classic like suburban strip mall. And then we put our second store in this little cool brick building on the corner in a neighborhood, right in the middle of a neighborhood,

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: as opposed to on a big boulevard or something. And, you know, of course people said, don't you need to have traffic driving by. I said, No. A a running store, especially ours, now that we've built a name for ourselves, people are gonna come to us. It's not where we put the store, it's what we do with it. And and so we put it in this neighborhood and I think that was a great choice because it it gave it that neighborhood feel sort of inherently. And yeah, we had awesome group runs from that. That store was a hit from day one, from day one. I mean we never had the challenge of, you know, zero dollar days or you know hundred dollar days where you sell one pair of shoes or something.

Kamal Datta: Yeah, yeah.

Ben: And and that did happen with our third location. But but it it was it was a hit and I was there almost every day. I actually rented my wife and I rented the apartment above the store. So I was

Kamal Datta: okay.

Ben: I was there all the time and then even when we moved out of that and bought a house, we bought a house two blocks away. So I could leave two minutes before work, you know, and run down the street and get get the get the store opened. But yeah, it was just a it was just an awesome thing to do to to bring a store like that to that community that had never had one before. They had never had a a running store within within ten miles of that location, anywhere in the city ever. So yeah, it was awesome. And then the third location also, by the way, you're asking about scaling. It's not double the work to open a second store. That that's that's what you would think, but not really because you're still working with all the same it's not like you have to reconvince all these brands that you're gonna succeed. I mean As long as the store is in a location that they approve of and you're not like horning in on another store that they have a great relationship with or something, like you're

Kamal Datta: Yeah, yeah.

Ben: you're like Matt, my business partner, he's still just writing one set of orders. He's just writing them now thinking of both stores. And

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: and actually there's an advantage to it because from an inventory standpoint, you're able to balance the inventory easier. Because if for whatever reason Our West County store, which was our first store, sold five pairs of size nine Brooks adrenalines in one day. We

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: could just that person at the end of the day could just call, you know, because the inventory was all on spreadsheets and everything. And so that person could just call the South City store and say, Hey, can you send us three pairs of adrenaline size nines? And so we we had people that would drive, oftentimes us, from one store to the other and just balance out the inventory. And so it actually made like our margins better to have a a second location. And

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: and it was kind of the same concept when we when we opened the third location. For for a lot of reasons that store never took off in the way the other two did, mostly because it was in a it was in a it was in an area that those folks were just really used to big corporate sho it was like a deep suburb and so like the grassroots stuff didn't really catch on there. And we ended

Kamal Datta: I see. Yeah.

Ben: up actually as I left, a right after I left, closing that location when that lease ended and and opening up a third location in a different spot that was much,

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: much better and it it it thrived. So but you know, you're always gonna have stripes and gutters, you know, some some things work and some things don't. But yeah, I I thought I thought three was a good number for us. I thought given the the size of the city, which it's about two million people metro area wise,

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: it can only have so many stores. And there were other stores, competitors, you know, and so

Kamal Datta: I see, I see.

Ben: I think I think three for us was was plenty and and it would have been greedy and and I think a mistake to to open a fourth. So we just did it based on need.

Kamal Datta: And how did you scale yourself, personally scaling? Because you mentioned in the prior storm attending you probably put in like, you know, you know, you're the face of the store, face of the kind of the events. How did you scale yourself in in say three stores?

Ben: Not well.

Kamal Datta: Tell a little bit more about it.

Ben: I just worked too much, you know. I was just so passionate

Kamal Datta: Okay.

Ben: about it and just felt such a sense of responsibility. I I I only took one vacation those whole six years. That was my honeymoon, 2008.

Kamal Datta: Wow.

Ben: Other other than that, I was at the stores, never left, you know. oftentimes would with seven full days a week. you know, if you put hours on it, I mean it it have to be let's see, there's seven days in a week. I mean, it would have to be. fifty to seventy hours a week, most weeks. because you have to count not only the hours that you're at the store, but also the hours that you're doing the speed work sessions and coaching the youth team and and doing the events and yeah, it was just total madness, you know. And we started when I was twenty six and so I had the energy to do it. But yeah, by the end, for me, six years later, I was just fried, you know, but

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: I didn't know how else to do it. That's how my brain is wired. And I thought that's what we needed to be successful was to work really, really hard, and I think I'm correct on that. And so I don't really have any regrets. I worked as hard as I could and then when I felt fried I left and that's that's how I operate.

Kamal Datta: So you pivoted off of did you end up selling the stores or how was your exit from Big River?

Ben: I sold my half. So I owned it fift

Kamal Datta: okay.

Ben: fifty fifty with my partner, Matt, and he bought me out I think

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: it was a lump sum or it was a bunch of it was in a lump sum and then some of it came in chunks over the next couple of years until we got to the total number, you know. So it was a really nice situation for me financially because I had some time then, you know, to to relax a little bit and to decide what was next. And even when I decided what was next, I still kinda had some income, you know, coming

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: in from from the buyout. So yeah, it created a really nice free situation or a nice sense of freedom for the next couple of years as I decided what to do what to do next.

Kamal Datta: That's that's great. That's great. Ben, as you are running these six years stores, if I'm looking into the the runner side of things, have you seen that the the runners psychology or the need of the around the building, the community building or the nutrition needs has evolved, which you may end up not have seen as an early trainer yourself.

Ben: for sure. For sure. In in a ton of ways. I mean when I was when I was running for the Hansons team, you know, we were still you know, playing poker every Tuesday night and having a few beers, you know.

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: that's just not the way it is anymore. for and that's to the good, you know. But yeah, the the the athletes now at almost every level take care of themselves better.

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: even even selling product in my stores You couldn't you couldn't sell a a pair of racing shoes. I mean you we tried, but you know, unless you were at the very front of the pack, nobody wanted to buy racing shoes. They thought they weren't needed, you know, and now everybody buys super shoes,

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: everybody, everybody cares about their nutrition, everybody's got a GPS watch, everybody's on Strava. None of these things were happening then. I mean our store was shoes apparel, Goo's. Everybody loved, well, I should say gels, energy gels. Goo was one of the brands. energy gels and and you know, some cliff bars. But it wasn't it wasn't anything like it is today in terms of the the extra things that people will buy to make sure that they can run their PR. And that's cool. It's really cool. It's great for the industry and I think it's great for people's health. it's it's been a cool thing to see happen and evolve over the last Twenty years.

Kamal Datta: That's great. So in twenty fourteen you took another massive leave. You moved to Flagstaff Arizona, I believe, and founded Hoka Nas Alid. let's talk about the transition.

Ben: Yeah, so I left the stores in March of 2012 with my wife

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: and daughter. My daughter was one. We moved to Flagstaff at that time. I had been in Flagstaff for three weeks in two thousand seven. Cause even when I owned the stores, I still ran for a couple of years after, like fairly

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: seriously, which I don't know why I did that, but I was getting ready for the Olympic trials in the fall of seven and I went out there and trained for three weeks for that. And I really liked Flagstaff's beautiful town. So and it's a different pace of life. We we had lived such a whirlwind life for six years at the store. And so my wife and I decided Flagstaff would be a cool place to live. No real plans, no plans to start a team, no plans at all, actually.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: we just rented a house sight on scene that seemed like it was in a cool spot. And I talked to Greg McMillan, who was a friend of mine and had coached me for a little bit. in in 2007, but at the tail end of my career if you want to call it that. But Greg had his online coaching business, McMillan Running Company. And so I did some work for him in 2012 and 2013, for one year basically. just did some marketing stuff and helped him grow his business a little bit. Nothing nothing too strenuous. And yeah, toward the end of 2013 I had actually been coaching a couple of pretty good pro runners on my own and

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: he had a pro team that was coached by sponsored by Adidas, but it was dissolving. He had decided he just wanted to focus on his online coaching business and his family, which is totally understandable. And so there was a lot of there were a lot of athletes that had been on his team that liked that structured environment. And I had I loved that side of things, and had been a part of a group like that when I ran at the Hansons and felt strongly that I could bring the sort of business acumen that I had acquired over the course of my time at the stores, combine that with my coaching ability, which for whatever reason that's that's something that I'm able to do and was always good at. And so yeah, just combining combining the business side with the with the pro sport side of things and Yeah, my wife and I treated it like a business. We built a business plan, wrote out a five year plan, all those things. And it was kind of like starting all over with the stores again, where we were

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: organically growing it, but at the same time trying to pitch it to sponsors, mostly shoe brands, sort of in the same way we had tried to convince brands that we were gonna be a good running store. We had to convince brands that we were gonna be a good team. And luckily that first year I mean it wasn't luck, but But we worked really hard that first year and our athletes worked really hard and you know, we launched in January fourteen. We won a couple of national titles on the road that first year, ran some really fast times, created a fan base, and by two thousand fifteen, early two thousand fifteen, we we had a sponsor, Hoka. And they signed a deal with us and you know, the rest is history, I suppose. We w their the team is still with them to this day. Now once again I got fried and left, like I did with the stores, but

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: Not bef not before doing a lot of cool things. So I was I was the coach from fourteen to twenty two and then then just directed the program for a couple of years, and then and then moved on and and now now we live in Phoenix, Arizona. But yeah, happy to talk about those years. They were they were they were a lot of fun.

Kamal Datta: Yeah, let's talk about what it takes to actually take it off. I know you paint the picture like, hey, this all came together probably in a series of events. And I would guess that probably it's not as a straight line as you're probably painting the picture. I'll be curious if you want to dig in a little bit maybe the the starting and getting to the sponsorship. And also why would an Elitrunner would run for the Nasalit team, right? I think that's probably another story because you have to build it. the brand that you know electronics would like to be part of this team.

Ben: Yeah, I think it would be very hard to do today. And it w it was very hard to do back then. We we had a lot of things going for us. One was we were in Flagstaff, Arizona, which is a very desirable place to to come live and train. That's seven

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: thousand feet, beautiful small town in the mountains. you can go down in an hour and train at lower elevations. great facilities, great great dirt roads to run on. So that That was a big part of it.

Kamal Datta: Mm, I see.

Ben: n number two, we had already a group of really good athletes. Because the thing is, and we talked about this at the top, you have to be talented, you have to perform at the highest level, you have to be winning races, you have to be running world class times. And if

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: you're not doing that, that's great. You can be a some s like a semi pro team or a club team, but you can't be a pro team. You can't expect to get money from a big company. So again, I was fortunate in the sense of the timing where these athletes like Kellen Taylor, Stephanie Bruce, Ben Bruce, Scott Smith, Amy Van Alstein, all these people had been on that Adidas team and they wanted to be on a team. And so right away, I mean, we started with nine athletes, those that I just mentioned, plus Matt Yano, who was having a lot of success, and a guy named Eric Fernandez who had been very good at the N Cou A level, a guy named David Rooney who had been very good at the NCAA level, and a guy named Jordan Chippagama who had been a star at NAU. So we we started with these nine athletes that were already really, really good. And

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: they wanted to be there and, you know, look I got plenty of problems, man. there's plenty of things I'm not good at. But for whatever reason, I can coach people and I can motivate and inspire people and and I have I'm just it's very c it comes very easy to me. And so I was able to convince these people that this was gonna work and that we were gonna we were gonna do some special things. And so they they they believed and they trusted me and we were able to hit the ground running. And so I think all those things were a part of it. The other thing that I'll say that we had that maybe some other people who have tried this haven't had or or just just just don't have because it's it's not common, right? Like A lot of people when they love the sport, they don't understand the business side or they don't like the business side. And I would I would I would I would equate it to what I talked about earlier. If if it was only me that owned the stores, we would

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: have failed. I'm I'm telling you, we would have failed because I did not like the ordering and the spreadsheets and the money stuff and all that. It just was not for me. And having Matt do what he did and he would have failed without me too, by the way. So like we

Kamal Datta: Right, right.

Ben: we needed one another. And when we started the team, because it was my wife and I, and we both had this business background. She really had a business background. I mean that was her degree,

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: we were able to treat it like a business instead of like this this fun thing. We had

Kamal Datta: I see. Mm-hmm.

Ben: a lot of fun.

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: But we we understood that we had to market this team, we had to create a fan base. So, you know, we were we were active on social media before anybody was doing that kind of stuff. We were making videos on YouTube, we were sending out a weekly newsletter, we were building that fan base up. we were doing events when we went to cities, we were we were setting up you know group runs at at running stores with our team. And so we we we very much understood that sort of like we had done with the stores in St. Louis. we had to create this community around N as the Elite, where we had all these really loyal fans, just like

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: any other sports team. And that was where our value came from was was our fan base. of course the athletes performances were a huge part of that and and they they lend credibility to the product, you know, when you're talking about a shoe a shoe sponsor. But but the fan base was was really our our number one goal is was creating taking those performances, performance being number one, and then and then maximizing them by by putting these athletes on a pedestal and and making them stars.

Kamal Datta: And how does the elite team operate span? So basically you have a group of elites part of their year coaching and how do you take them to say competing levels? Is that all athletes go or like you have partnerships to b build with different you know big races? How does it work?

Ben: Yeah. Yes, a lot of relationship building. If your athletes are good enough, then they'll get into these big races. But I think because we had a name, there was a value in having an NAZ athlete run at your race because they knew that we were gonna promote that race and promote them being in that race and put it in our newsletter and put

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: it on the internet, and and I think I think that helped us a lot, especially before anybody was doing that. So yeah, that was a piece of it and just being really grateful for the opportunities that we were given saying thank you, you know, sending notes to people after the race, hey, thanks for having me. Thanks for having us. Those kind of things were important. and I think picking the right races and for our athletes and of course from a coaching standpoint, making sure that they were ready for the biggest days and that they were performing at a high level on the biggest days. And win you know, I I was a big believer in making sure that we were winning a lot of races

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: because that's a that's really marketable winning. that that that picture

Kamal Datta: Yes, yes.

Ben: as they're crossing the line and their arms are out and and then I I I wanted to use those wins as a way to prepare them for even bigger stages where, you know, maybe winning was possible, maybe it wasn't, but just just that that confident attitude. And and I I feel like we did create and have a really confident group of athletes. for the most part over the years going

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: into these big events and that's I think why you saw us compete well at New York City and Boston and London and and Berlin and Chicago and the Olympic trials and all the events that I considered our our biggest events, that's when we were the most ready to go.

Kamal Datta: That's cool. Now, if you have to wear your coach hat, from your perspective, Ben, either someone is targeting SESA for marathon or an Olympic spot. What would you say that the fundamental principles of long-term athlete development that probably never change?

Ben: for no matter what your level. Just

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: aro aerobic development. You know, just making

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: sure that you're running as many miles as you can, given your physical limitations in terms of your muscles, tendons, and ligaments, and then your life limitations in terms of your schedule, and then your limitations in terms of your age because as we get older we can't run

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: as many miles. But yeah, I think I think maximizing your your time spent aerobically is is probably the number one thing that's gonna make you better. And then as you get into the weeds a little bit more the time spent at at your in in your lactate threshold zone. So if you're into those kind of numbers and metrics, you know, doing a lot of workouts where your blood lactate levels are between two point five millimoles per liter and three point five millimoles per liter. that's the vast majority of your workouts should be in those zones because you can recover from that kind of work really easily. And

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: so if you're doing work just below that and then like for your easy runs, like at that two point zero millimeters or millimoles per liter, excuse me, and then a lot of your hard workouts between two point five and three point five, you can you can train and train and train and train and train. It's when you

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: get greedy and do the do the really hard stuff that's the stuff or the really fast stuff that's more difficult and and then it becomes a little bit more nuanced in terms of how to incorporate that kind of work into your training and that's maybe another podcast. But if you're asking me the the number one similarity it would just be a aerobic work and threshold work.

Kamal Datta: Thank you for putting it out. and as you coach probably in both sides of things, probably this is coming from what you have seen in your athletes or what you think that should happen scientifically as well. Yeah, thank you.

Ben: For sure.

Kamal Datta: So what caused it the the burnout with NASA Let Tim? I'm curious.

Ben: I mean, just well, it really goes back to twenty twenty because

Kamal Datta: Okay.

Ben: s in so many ways our whole team had been leading up to that Olympic trials.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: we were really a marathon group. The vast majority of our athletes were either focused on the marathon or eventually gonna focus on the marathon, and we had done very well at the two thousand sixteen trials, but not made the team. We had two sixth place finishes, two fourth place finishes in the ten thousand actually on the track. So we'd come so close to making the Olympics four years prior and we had an incredible group of athletes all in their prime heading into that trials and it was such a tight knit group and a group that I cared about so much and and they cared about each other so much. And so when we made the team, when Alphine won the race, it was such a It was such an emotional moment and such a high, but then

Kamal Datta: Yeah. Yeah.

Ben: it was followed by such a low two weeks later because the pandemic hit. So

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: we had been on an incredible roll for three years, really. It just seemed like everything we touched turned to gold from a performance standpoint. So you got this pause out of our control that

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: kind of stopped our momentum. Then at the same time, you had these super shoes that had been introduced. to the industry, but we didn't have them yet because our brand did not have them yet. And, you know, hey, these

Kamal Datta: okay.

Ben: these th these things happen, you know. but so when things got going again and we started racing, we were losing to people that we had always beaten. And we were running the same times that we'd always run, but people were running right by us. And it's very frustrating to lose. I'm a very competitive person and the people on our team Rightly so, are very competitive. And so this great momentum and positive emotion that we had had for so many years, now there were cracks in the armor, you know, because doubt seeps in when you're losing. And we had never done much of that. So and by losing I don't just mean not winning the race, but like we were always running well. You know, even if we didn't win the race, we were running well. We were running fast times and setting PRs and getting better, you know, very,

Kamal Datta: Yeah, yeah.

Ben: very, very clearly getting better. And when we when that when that doubt crept in, it was difficult for me and and for them. And then it was happening on the track as well because the spikes were getting better as well. So it wasn't just the road shoes. And so we're now we were the same thing that was happening on the roads were ha was happening on the track. And yeah, I just wasn't having as much fun. I mean, that's the best way to put it. And In all my years at the store until I left, I was having a ton of fun. And in all my years up to that point with the team, I was having a ton of fun. And when I have wasn't having fun, I I I I don't function well. I was in a bad place and so, you know, I didn't want to bring that on the athletes. And so, you know, I let them know that we were gonna search for a new coach, but I think you know, I think that was really difficult on a lot of them because that's not what they signed up for. They signed up to be coached by me. And so we

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: brought on a new coach. The first one didn't work. Then we brought on a second coach and and he's awesome. He's unbelievable and he's great. And so I think that was the best thing I ever did, you know, on my

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: way out was bringing Jack in. But it still was a difficult transition because the people who had been with me for a long time, it you know, obviously that's gonna be a difficult situation. And so the and then when I was directing the team, I really didn't have fun with that because I'm a people person. And so

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: not being at practice every day, working with the athletes one on one, I didn't realize how much I was gonna miss that. Not to say

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: I wanted to get back into coaching per se, but it was more just I just missed the interaction, the human interaction. That's what I was good at at the stores. That's what I was good at at the w or with the team. And so yeah, it was just finding out some things about myself that I didn't really know. 'cause you don't know until you don't know. or you don't know until

Kamal Datta: That's true.

Ben: you know. You don't know until you know. That's what I meant to say. And and I found that out. And so, you know, when we moved to Phoenix, And I started the Marathon project, I thought I thought that would be an because I actually I actually didn't realize at the time what it was that was wrong. I just thought I needed a change.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: And so I thought relaunching the marathon project would be that change. I I just thought, I lost the passion. I need to be passionate about something. But as it turns out, that wasn't the right thing either. At least it wasn't enough because it's not enough human interaction on a daily basis. So I ended up getting a teaching job. which I told you before we came on, but

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: now now my bucket is full because now I'm working with people every single day and motivating people and inspiring people. It happens to be sixth graders instead of pro athletes, but that's what I need. That's what puts me in a good mood. And if I can still be involved in the sport, that's great. And and I am and the Marathon Project, we have a lot of fun things going on. But because it's only once a year, it just wasn't enough for me to to to do that and nothing else.

Kamal Datta: Yeah, yeah.

Ben: and so this is a much better situation for me. And hopefully that was a long winded answer, but an answer that was thorough.

Kamal Datta: Now it is, indeed. let's talk about the marathon project because personally I am very fascinated. And if I followed your journey so far in our conversation, I feel like the marathon project is a combination of what you have learned as an elite runner, you're learning from the big river and leading the NASA Lit team. They all come together into this this marathon project. So if you want to for our audience, maybe if you want to share what is the the marathon project. 'Cause I am personally very fascinated what what you're doing there.

Ben: Yeah, thank you. Yeah, and and I and I am very very excited about it. So we launched or we we ha how do you say launched it is the wrong word. We held it in twenty twenty, in December

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: of twenty twenty, as a way for the pro athletes to have a race to run. So all these athletes in in North America had run or in the United States had run the Olympic trials in February of twenty twenty, and then everything shut down in March. And they didn't have Boston and they didn't have Chicago and they didn't have New York and they didn't have any national championships to run, no Olympic trials track, n nothing. And so myself and Josh Cox, who is a really good agent and a friend of mine, and then Matt Helbig, who was my old business partner, we started and because he I mean Matt was hurting too, because by that time he had gotten out of the stores and all he was doing was race management, timing races all over the city and and all over the country. And so you know, he he was gonna have to lay people off if they didn't have something to do. And

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: Josh had all these athletes who weren't making any money. And it was just a tough time. And so we found this place in Arizona called Wild Horse Pass Resort, which is a beautiful resort on private land with this really flat loop where we were like, man, we could have the race on this loop. We could

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: have everybody stay at this hotel that's on the property, this resort hotel.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: We could wear masks when we're in the hotel. We could have all the athletes eat only at the hotel, not go anywhere, and we can be totally safe. And so we

Kamal Datta: Mm. I see.

Ben: we did that and we had, you know, we limited it to a hundred people, just pros only, and we got Brooks to sponsor it. And we we appreciate that because that kind of made it possible financially. There was a

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: prize purse. it looked really cool. Sarah Hall ran two twenty, which is really fast. It was the second fastest US time ever. For a female, we had Seven US men break 210 in the race, which is the only time that's ever happened in the history of marathoning. Seven US men breaking two ten in one race. And it was a blast. And we had so much fun and I was really proud of it. But that was gonna be it. That was gonna be a one and done kind of thing. And then in the summer of twenty four, when I decided I was gonna leave NAZ Elite and move down to Phoenix. That's when I started to think about relaunching it with this bigger, bolder vision of having an amateur race as well and giving other people the opportunity to set a PR on this really fast loop and and really just to feel what it was like to be treated like a pro. Because

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: if you're a four-hour marathoner, three and a half hour, three-hour marathoner, you don't get your bottles on the course. You don't get an indoor warm-up area. You don't get pace groups at two forty, two forty five. There's never pace groups for those folks. And so to

Kamal Datta: Right, right.

Ben: to give this larger group of people, still a small group overall, but

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: but a a larger group of people the opportunity to have that experience, which I think is really fun. The pro experience is really fun, having lived it as an athlete and as a coach. as as you say, so yeah, that was the idea was to give these people that kind of VIP treatment. And last year when we launched it or relaunched it, we had the amateur race on Saturday, the

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: pro race on Sunday. And it was really it it went off very well. The amateur race ha they loved it. I mean, the winner was two nineteen on the men's side and two forty two on the women's side, so it's still pretty fast. But

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: but but you know, tons of people running two fifty, two fifty five, three hours, three ten, you know, setting PRs, you know, getting the personal bottles on the course, having the pasters. I mean, it was awesome. And then the next day the pro race went really well. The w the women's winner ran two twenty five. the men's w winner ran two ten. Priska Chirono won the women's race. Really good Kenyan athlete. And then JP Flavin from Hanson's Brooks, bringing it full circle for me. My old

Kamal Datta: Okay, okay.

Ben: my old coach Kevin Hansen coaches JP. So yeah, that was cool. the only thing we decided after year one was to combine them and make into one race and make it even smaller. because the Gold Wave runners, that's what we call the amateur race, they actually really enjoyed the seeing the 219 guy, you know, pass them and like be a part of the race with him. And so we were like,

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: well, logistically 219 is not that different than 209. So yes, there will be some lapping, but it'll actually be really fun and it'll like amplify the atmosphere. So

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: in 2026, we're just limiting it, the whole race is only 400 people tops. That's all that we're gonna let in. but we're gonna bring back all of those things. All 400 people can have personal bottles Everybody has access to this big giant indoor warm-up area that's right across the parking lot from the start. And now the amateurs are gonna be warming up with the pros. And we

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: increase the prize purse to forty five thousand total. So it's like the winner gets twelve thousand five hundred, which is a pretty good prize purse for like a you know, it's a second tier marathon right now. Eventually we'd like it to become you know, really, really big. But but, you know, you gotta take these organic steps, as I said, with all my businesses. And so, Yeah, we're we're looking forward to this year. We're we only got we only have about a hundred spots left. So hopefully people are listening, they'll they'll sign up. But yeah, I just it's a VIP experience. It's really fun. You get to hang out with the pros. Everybody stays at the resort hotel.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: there's a pool and it's Arizona weather, so it's super cool in the morning in December. And then

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: in the after afternoon you can hit the pool. So yeah, I don't know. I'm looking forward to it.

Kamal Datta: That's that that's great. how is the qualification process? Are you is that athletes need to apply for this to be the one of the 400s or how how you're deciding who to have on the course?

Ben: Yeah, last year we made it really too hard on ourselves and it was this whole application process and we had to verify everybody's times and blah blah blah. And we

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: realized that runners are pretty honest people. So we didn't really need to do it that way. So now we're just saying on our website, look, if you run under three thirty, sign up and you're in. And so

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: it's it's very simple. And they do have to s send us a link to their time, but

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: as long as they run under three thirty or really close or run a equivalent time at a shorter distance, they're in and we'd love to have Four hour people, four and a half, five hours. It just we can't do it because of the lapping. That's the only issue. And and our thing is more it's it's not a it's not about being exclusive. We want to be as inclusive as we can, but we also are really big on the experience. And we don't want to hurt anyone's experience, whether they're a four-hour person or a three-hour person, right? And

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: so and so in order to provide that true first class VIP experience. we kind of limit it to to, you know, three thirty and under. and and who knows if that'll change in the future. But but the nature of the 'cause it's a it's a four mile loop, but it's really a two mile stretch of road with a median. And so you go kind of down and around one side and then down and around the other side and you just keep going. And so it's six laps, which is a lot of laps and and it's it makes it awesome for you as a runner, especially if you're having a good day, because you can

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: get in a really incredible rhythm. but But there's going to be lapping and we can only allow so much without it you know, being a ne a a negative for for the experience.

Kamal Datta: Yeah. W when you said the VIP experience, you want to double click on it, say someone signed up today, like what is the VIP experience would be for the upcoming twenty twenty-six one?

Ben: It everybody has a VIP experience. That's the whole thing. Yeah. So so why

Kamal Datta: Right, right. What what yeah.

Ben: is it a VIP experience? Well, first of all, you're not one of fifty thousand. You're you're you're

Kamal Datta: Correct. That is true. Yeah.

Ben: one of four hundred. So if you want to send the CEO, me an email, you can. so it's a very different experience in terms of the communication. number

Kamal Datta: Yeah, yeah.

Ben: one. So I sent out a monthly newsletter for the first part of the year, and then starting in August, you get a weekly newsletter. It's really written for you. Cause these are all kind of really serious runners. So it's not I don't have to I don't have to cater to fifty thousand. I can I can speak to this

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: group that I kind of know what they're like. You know, these are the people that are getting up at five in the morning and doing their long run. these are the people that are doing model repeats after work. You know, these are these are the people that are really serious about about what they're doing. And so we try to cater to them. We try to share, you know, pretty high-level training tips. we try to work with companies that are catering to that group of people. Hybrid Water, our official nutrition sponsor. They're co-owned by Adrian Wilscott, who's one of the best runners in the whole world. He's finished 10th at the Olympics in the 10,000 meters, won the New York City half marathon. He's one of the owners. So they they've got an incredible product in terms of their electrolyte mix that is really good. Luke Humphrey running is our online coaching sponsor. Luke's a former pro runner himself, wrote the Hanson's Marathon Method book, so he's very well known and he he he gives us tips and articles for the newsletter. you can get coached by Scott Fauble as part of the TMP experience group. Scott was a 208 marathoner, he was our color commentator last year. you know, the race is the this year your friends and family can watch the race on Flowtrack live. Last year we only

Kamal Datta: cool.

Ben: we only showed the fro tr pro race, but now Since it's one day, the entire race is gonna be on flow track. and then when you get there, that's the big difference. I mean, race weekend, you're checking into this nice hotel. You go straight down and get your packet, you drop your personal bottles off the day before the race, just like the pros do. You're gonna have this really cool race guide that tells you everything you need to know, just like the pros get. Like you're treated exactly like them.

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: we Pay our pacers to come in from all over the country. We have pacers from New York, from Canada, from Minnesota. They're coming in. They've paced before. They know what they're doing. So every five-minute increment, there's a pacer from 210 all the way to three all the way to 330. In

Kamal Datta: wow. Mm-hmm.

Ben: some cases more than one for the groups that are gonna have a lot of people. the loop course allows your friends and family to see you twelve times, you know.

Kamal Datta: Multiple right.

Ben: Like if you go to New York, first of all, it's so expensive, you know. Our race is five hundred dollars to enter, but

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: our to to stay at our hotel is two hundred dollars a night. And there's

Kamal Datta: okay.

Ben: so many flights to Phoenix. I mean, ultimately you spend less than you do at New York City or Boston. and then you know, I would say that race morning, that experience of warming up with the pros. Usually the pros are kept in some other kind of place. you have all the access to everything that they do. at the start, you don't have to stand in a corral for an hour or forty-five minutes before the race goes off. You can be warming up till ten minutes before. There's only four hundred people. You can you can you can keep your sweats on because it'll be nice and cool in the morning. You can keep your sweats on till six fifty p.m. and drop them off right at the start and be ready to go. so everything is catered for you to run as fast as you possibly can. And then of course once you get out on the course, your bottles are set up. So if you put you know, your cherry electrolyte drink, you know, if you put number one on that, when you come by that that station for the first time, that cherry drink will be there. If you like water with a gel tape to it for the second time around, there'll be a water there with a gel tape 'cause our volunteers will put it on the table for you.

Kamal Datta: Nice.

Ben: that kind of stuff is really cool. And then afterward the post race parties I mean, look, all the post race parties are fun, but you're right there with all these like minded people that you just race with and you're hanging out, you're drinking beer and you're Yeah, you know, we're playing music and then and then you go to the pool and hang out at the at at the resort and and have a fun time. So yeah, I j I just think it's a it's a really like intimate feel the entire weekend.

Kamal Datta: No, that's that's a great you know, way to explain the thank you for putting out the how the VIP experience looks like. Yeah. Cause usually and I've run the all six majors and I I see the the warm-up of the elites on clips on social media, right? I probably there around. I'm in s behind some coral, nowhere to experience that in how does it look like. So It is. thank you. and it looks like it's such a fascinating experience for the group of people who will be participating there, that four hundred group of all folks. Ben, if you want to look ahead, especially looking at where the sport is, you know, today and then going ahead, from high carbon plated shoes, he alluded to the fact with the last w when it started to come out. to say precision nutrition. What is your vision for the future of professional and sabbilit marathon racing or long distance running in general?

Ben: it's gonna keep getting faster. You know, it's gonna keep getting faster because Yeah, when the brands realized that the shoes could do a lot of the work for you that your lower legs used to have to do. the

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: sky's the limit because first of all, the technology will continue to improve. It i it might plateau at some point, but it's still getting better every year at this at this stage. And the other thing that's happening is The training is is is really good right now. The science out there is really good. And so people year after year after year are training so well. And that

Kamal Datta: I see.

Ben: is gonna create better and better performances. And so now you have to think about it. Like take a take a kid who's in the NCAA right now, who's let's say 20 years old. Since he or she, let's say she Since she was a freshman in high school, which was only, you know, six years ago, in 2020, right? Super shoes have been out there. So she's been training in these incredible shoes that make her more efficient in every single workout that she does and in every single race that she runs. And Probably if she had a good high school coach and a good college coach, she's been running a lot of work in that threshold zone. sh and then as she becomes a pro or a sub-elite, right? Or even someone who just trains for fun on the side while she's working, right?

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: She she's going to be maximizing her performances because of the training that she's doing, the knowledge that's out there, as well as the technology. And so her performances are going to be going to be decidedly better than someone twenty years before who didn't have that technology, didn't have that training knowledge, didn't have the access to all of those things. And so I I just see I just think we're in this sort of super cycle where you're gonna see the times continue to improve for another five years at least on a pretty crazy trajectory before they finally plateau. That's that's kind of what I see.

Kamal Datta: Interesting. And do you think and I I probably have to ask you to being in technology myself, and you said the training got really better. Obviously there is a technology inside coming up with this in the carbon plate or high performance shoes. But if you look at the the training side, does technology play a role that as it got getting and getting and better?

Ben: Big time. Big time. You know, because I think look, not to toot my own horn, but I already knew that spending a tremendous amount of money much of spending a tremendous amount of time doing like threshold work was was the way to go.

Kamal Datta: Uh-huh.

Ben: we we we did that in NAZ Elite. We did things like twenty times a kilometer, fifteen times a mile, three times three miles, three times four miles, all these things that the I mean other people were doing it too, but we were doing a lot of it. but I think a lot of people were afraid to do it.

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: Because they thought it was too much volume. They were always so much so afraid of the volume. But when the technology came out and they started trying these type of workouts and realizing that, my athletes are very efficient at this, like they can do this. then everybody started adopting this kind of high volume threshold sort of training. And it's it's just clearly working so well. And I'm not saying it's working for every person. There's still things we need to figure out. It's a whole other podcast, but I think some of our female track athletes could be doing a little bit better. I think some of that type of work isn't necessarily working for them in the same way it's working for the men. but but but overall the technology is playing a tremendous role because we're just doing more work and and more work in the right kind of zones and the the technology is allowing us to do it. You know, you used to have to be a really naturally efficient runner. Just blessed essentially with phenomenal biomechanics. And

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: now in order to stay healthy and staying healthy was the only way that you could do a lot of work, right? But now

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: the because the shoes are doing so much of the work for us, we're like we're seeing some other injuries maybe from the shoes, but I think from a percentage standpoint, overall we're staying healthier more. and and we're doing more work. And so It's a pretty simple equation, right? if we're doing

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: more work and the right kind of work, we're we're gonna get faster and we're just more efficient because of the shoes and I think I think that's why the the shoe technology plays a role in the training.

Kamal Datta: And and in in addition to the shoes, what other technology you are saying that playing a big role in terms of the the high volume, the training regimen regiment you just mentioned?

Ben: knowledge, the internet, you know, understanding

Kamal Datta: Sure.

Ben: the the the the role that nutrition plays and that understanding on the female side the role that the menstrual cycle plays and and

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: understanding the role that the emotional and psychological side of things plays. We just we just know more now because there's a greater abundance of information that's available to us twenty four seven and and we can In in the past you had to make a lot of mistakes before you knew these things. The mistakes have already been made by others and and and and

Kamal Datta: Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Ben: we've learned from those mistakes and and now we can be on a much quicker path to understanding the best way to train. And I think those things are really they're really good overall. You know, they're really good. Sometimes I miss kind of the the puzzle of it all. a as

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: a coach as a coach I really enjoyed the puzzle. I feel like It's kinda paint by number at this point. but

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: you know, I I I think the the coaches and the athletes that that ultimately will win out in the future are the ones that take what we know now and and take it to an even other an even higher level and and figure out ways to to train even better. there's always, you know I'm a history teacher, right? humans have been around for a long time and we always figure out how to make our lives better. as we sit here in twenty twenty six our lives are lot better than they were a hundred years ago and and that applies to our daily life but it also applies to sports and we'll continue to to find ways to be better in this sport as well.

Kamal Datta: Now, what is your take on being a in a coach for elites for a long time? Take on an AI and the role of AI in and in coaching. I I'm probably have seen enough in the market getting a lot of attention. What is your personal take on that?

Ben: Yeah, it's interesting. I'm my my take on AI continues to evolve. I try to stay open-minded about it. I it's interesting as a teacher, you know, I tried to not use it at all last year because I thought it was unethical. And

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: then th this year what I've done is I've taken my lessons and I've sort of put them into AI and just asked for some advice. And sometimes I've gotten some little nuggets that have been really cool. But I, as a human being, have still used my own vetting process, done my own due diligence to decide, okay, yeah, I'm gonna add that. Or no, I'm not gonna add that, you know, and

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: and I think I think that's the key, right, with AI is understanding that the human brain still has to vet the AI algorithms, right? And the A whatever AI spits out, you still have to edit that. And

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: and so I think it's figuring out how to use it to your advantage. while not relying on it solely. certainly there's things that a AI algorithm can't do in terms of coaching. I mean it can spit out a training schedule for sure, but it's not gonna know the nuances of you know just just little things that that that only a a human coach can know and say that that requires an the empathy of of a human being and the understanding of a human being. So Yeah, I I just think it's gonna be a mix moving forward. But I but I think it would be a mistake not to not to use it at all. kind of like my teaching example. I think I think there's probably ways that we can use it to our advantage. I know that with the Marathon project, you know, I've sponsored decks and things. I've spit what I have created into a into an AI model and and gotten some advice on how to make it even better. And I still do it. I haven't had the AI bought spit the whole thing out, but but I've used it to my advantage, where where I can. And so yeah, I just think that's for for us as a as a as a race, right? As a hum as a species,

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: we need to we need to use it to our advantage but but not rely on it solely. And in that way it's similar to the internet. But it is it is a more scary proposition than the internet, I think, because it has the ability to to take us places that I think maybe we don't want to go, but that's, you know That's another podcast, and we're still trying to figure that out. People a lot smarter than me are trying to figure that out. So I'll just stick to the running side.

Kamal Datta: That's true, but I think you're taking it on that you still believe that humans should be in the loop to the final decision, right? It's not just blindly trust what is spitting out, but bat out. Yeah.

Ben: Well, the the the the best way to explain it is this, because I'm always talking about pros and amateurs, right?

Kamal Datta: Yes, yes.

Ben: No pro in the world is gonna hire an AI coach.

Kamal Datta: Make sense.

Ben: No way. No way. They're not going to put their livelihood in the hands of an AI coach.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: So if you wanna be the best you can be, why would you?

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: That's that's the easiest way for me to put it.

Kamal Datta: But y you are also suggesting that they can leverage it to the extent they can to help them maybe become a better coach.

Ben: The coach can use it, the athlete can use it, of course. You know one

Kamal Datta: Right.

Ben: you know a way I think AI is cool? Do

Kamal Datta: Sure.

Ben: your let it do your grocery shopping for you. Put put

Kamal Datta: yeah, that's for sure. Yeah.

Ben: put in the fact that you're an athlete, an endurance athlete specifically. Put in you know, the maybe it's the number of calories, g give it some kind of metrics, right? And and and have it and

Kamal Datta: Got it, got it. Yeah, your nutrition plan. Yeah.

Ben: have it create your your your grocery shopping list. I mean, that's awesome. To me, that's a cool way of taking advantage of AI, without you know, any sort of ethical issues or anything like that. Like that's just that's just a smart way to first of all save money. You don't have to si hire a nutritionist. Not to say you shouldn't. Like if you want some if you want some even more nuanced, individualized things, then yes, maybe a a personal chef or a nutritionist. But if you just want some simple grocery shopping, gosh, AI's AI's awesome for that. So that's just a quick example. You know, there's probably a couple of other things as well, but but I think for a for a training plan, I would still go with a coach, especially like just like a race strategy, race plan, those kind of things. You just I just don't think we're there yet with AI in terms of like if I'm running the Chicago Marathon and trying to set a PR, let's say three hours, right? And I want to break three hours and the night before, I don't know, or the week of, my dog dies, my girlfriend breaks up with me,

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: and it's gonna be really windy.

Kamal Datta: Mm-hmm.

Ben: I'm sorry. I'm not plugging that into an AI bot. I need I need a human being with empathy to

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: to get me through the death of my dog, the relationship breakup, and how much I should change my race plan based on the wind. I I need that. I need a human being talking to me to do that. and those are just I mean, those are real examples. I mean, that could really happen to somebody, you know, you know, and

Kamal Datta: yeah. yeah, absolutely.

Ben: so and and I and I say that just to say that. Overall, training is not I I I said right, I said earlier that it's it's become almost paint by number, but that doesn't mean that there's not a tremendous amount of nuance. yes, the overall training plans right now, I think there's sort of a model that has kind of taken over the the Western world, at least in terms of what people are doing. But you y there's still individualization that needs to take place in terms of volume, in terms of which days you're doing these workouts, in terms of how to execute them, where to execute them, just all kinds of things that I think right now a human being is still gonna be a little bit better at than than AI.

Kamal Datta: Well said. Thank you, Ben. Now let's move to our rapid fire round. It's a sign five simple questions. I I can probably can say in your sleep probably. but let's start that. first one your go-to pre-raised meal or snack.

Ben: For me as an athlete.

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: Well, I know a lot more than I do I know a lot more now than I do did back then, but you know, i for me the early two thousand late nineties, early two thousands, it's just some spaghetti the night before, you know, and and in the morning some God, what what would I eat in the morning? like a snack in the morning. Just a bagel. I think a bagel would was my was my pre race breakfast. yeah. Right now it would be much more like some lean meat. a little bit of pasta but not much sauce, some vegetables, y you know, the the morning breakfast you know, and then before I went to bed I would probably have some kind of electrolyte drink. yeah, in the morning, maybe some white rice. yeah, my preferred electrolyte drink. All kinds of things would be much more scientific today.

Kamal Datta: Wow. Looks like it has evolved, huh? From your early

Ben: for sure.

Kamal Datta: twin 2000s to now. that's cool. One piece of running gear or tech you can't leave without.

Ben: Running gear. I'm not much of a gear head. just give me a good pair of shoes. Off I go, you know? pair of shoes that feel good on my feet, kinda light. I've always liked lighter shoes, so as long as I feel nice and light as I head out the door, I'm good to go.

Kamal Datta: Okay. So would be still a light shoe, probably your favorite running gear?

Ben: Yep, yep. I I've evolved out of my my you know, running shorts and running shirts into just you know, cotton tee and some long shorts and you know, I'm I'm a dad now, you know, I'm a

Kamal Datta: Yeah. Right.

Ben: I'm a old guy. Half hour jobs, that's all I do.

Kamal Datta: I see. Next one. Your favorite running route or location anywhere in the world?

Ben: Okay, wow. That's such a great question. Man, I've been so fortunate. I've run in so many cool places.

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: You know, it's tempting to say one of the places in Flagstaff, but you know, I wasn't a serious runner at that point. I ran in a lot of those places, but you know, just kind of putzing along. for me, Forest Park in St. Louis has a grass loop central fields where we held the US cross-country championships in 2012 and 2013, which I directed. and it's where my high school did its hard workouts and it's where I did a lot of hard workouts in my in my mid-20s when I moved back there. it's just got a special place in my heart. And I think a lot of people probably have somewhere like that. It's not I mean, it is a nice park and it's beautiful, but it's not near as beautiful as some of the places I ran in Flagstaff or Michigan even. But for me, I just my hardest workouts were there. So that's the place I would I would love to say is is my favorite.

Kamal Datta: Gotta check it out n when I ran the St. Louis State half for sure.

Ben: Yes.

Kamal Datta: Yeah.

Ben: Yes.

Kamal Datta: Next one, the best advice for a runner who hits the wall in training or racing.

Ben: Well, that's hard. If if you want me to give you the rapid fire one, I would say do a self audit of your training and you know, were you fresh and ready to go? and if the answer is yes, then that's not the problem. So then the problem was prob so it's not that you did too much, it's that it's that something wasn't there in training that needed to be. And it's probably just it's probably just more more volume and more volume at threshold. It's probably not anything too crazy. It's it's probably just, hey, if you've been doing six by a mile at ten K pace, you should probably do ten by a mile at just a little bit faster than marathon pace. Just just do just slow down the repeats but do more of them. That's usually what people get wrong, honestly.

Kamal Datta: okay. That's interesting one for sure. All right, that will be a tough one. in one word, what fuels Ben's passion for the sport today?

Ben: One word.

Kamal Datta: You can expand more than one word.

Ben: No, that's okay. I'll take on the challenge. it's competition.

Kamal Datta: Mm.

Ben: It's it's always been competition for me. I'm a competitive person. I want to win when I play chess, I want to win when I play basketball, I wanna win when I play soccer, and I wanna win when I run. And luckily in running that means a lot of different things, but because I don't want that to sound exclusive or elite, I I love working with four hour marathoners who are competitive. They're competitive with themselves, right? Like trying to s

Kamal Datta: Yeah, yeah.

Ben: set up set a PR. to me that's always been the most fun part, the competition I still see it as a sport, you know? So a really cool sport that's really inclusive with a lot of people and a lot of different ability levels, but competition. That's what fuels me, man.

Kamal Datta: Well said, and I think it is obvious from our discussion we have had so far. So thank you, Ben. Well, thanks so much again, Ben, for sharing your journey from being an elite athlete, to building a communities through Big River, coaching champions and shaping the future of distance running. Thank you so much for being on the pod and share everything that you've

Ben: Thank you.

Kamal Datta: shared so far.

Ben: Thanks for having me.