Crohn’s, Comebacks, and the Grit of Middle-Aged Fitness: Back in the Saddle with Evan St. Clair

What happens when life throws you off the bike—literally and figuratively? In this powerful episode of Healthspan Digest, I sit down with Evan St. Clair: lifelong cyclist, business owner, and local legend, as he shares his journey through Crohn’s disease, injuries, family challenges, and the road back to fitness in his 50s.

We talk about:

🚵 Overcoming chronic illness through movement

💥 What breaking your back teaches you about resilience

🥗 Nutrition truths: sugar addiction, meal prep, and why fast food is sabotaging your health

🧠 Mental health, motivation, and how cycling became Evan’s moving meditation

🧬 Bone density, VO₂ max, and the science of longevity

Whether you’re rebuilding from a setback or just looking for real, gritty inspiration to take charge of your healthspan, this episode delivers.

🔗 Follow Evan: Cycle Path Bike Shop – https://www.thecyclepath.net/

📲 Learn more about the Healthspan Foundations Program: HERE

FREE Coaching Plans at Healthspan Pillars!
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Healthspan YouTube Channel

Transcript

All right, well, today we have a special guest and a special conversation. And this is especially for those of us that are middle-aged and are looking for some inspiration on how to stay motivated, how to stay disciplined when life is really chaotic and really busy. So if you kind of find yourself fitting in that description, you're in the right place. You're going to want to listen to my guest, Evan St. Clair, which I'll give him a full introduction here in a moment, but let's just kind of set the stage.

This podcast, HealthSpan Digest, is about helping people extend their healthspan. And healthspan is the length of time within our lifespan that we are healthy, active, vibrant, ideally free from disease and disabilities, especially conditions that can be prevented. And we know that the pillars of healthspan, which we talked about on this episode, include exercise, nutrition, sleep, emotional wellbeing, and preventative care.

And I am a healthspan coach and I coach clients on all of those things. I have a smartphone app and I love talking about it. Hence this podcast and also hence why I have Evan who's so gracious to join us here this morning. He also, I don't want to like, give too much away right now, but he's also think a middle-aged guy. he is a local legend here in Davidson, North Carolina, owner of the Cycle Path bike shop, which if you are

in the area, I would highly suggest going there. live down the street from it right now and it is my go-to place. Evan, thanks for joining me. Appreciate you joining me this morning.

Evan St.Clair (02:38)

Yeah, good morning. Glad to be here.

Aaron Shaw (02:40)

Right. Well, let's kind of set the stage a little bit with you and your background. So our paths are similar, regarding a passion for cycling, but you've done a lot of stuff. You've done a whole bunch of multi-sport stuff. So maybe kind of take us back and kind of what's your, what got you into various sports and what have you done?

Evan St.Clair (03:05)

Yeah, it goes back to my childhood. think I got a BMX bike when I was probably eight or nine years old. And I would wake up in the morning and watch Wild World sports and just go outside. And my older brother and I, would build ramps and we'd do whatever on our, just look, you know, normal kids living out in the country. Wasn't a lot to do. So we just found things to do on our bikes.

I that was the beginning of it. And then I got into skateboarding for a while. I was a skateboarder for years, kind of crossed back and forth between riding bikes and skating and some snowboarding. But the one thing that I've always hung onto is riding bikes. And I think it's just, there's something different about it. I think it's the exercise, the cardiovascular, the rhythm. It's almost like a, it's almost like a form of meditation. And when I,

When I shell stat, it seems like my mental health can decline. So I've said it for years. I really feel like riding bikes in a lot of ways have saved my life. Just from a mental standpoint of not getting stuck, not falling into a constant negative place. I mean, we can all go negative sometimes, but you know, I'm always better when I'm out getting exercise on my bike and,

spooling up the cardio system and it's almost like being in a trance and yeah, I think that's what's kept me into it over the years and I've crossed over between road racing, mountain bike racing, all different forms of mountain bike racing, bike packing, ultra-distance mountain bike racing and I just think the cool thing about riding bikes is there's so many different things you can do on it.

Aaron Shaw (05:03)

Yeah. Well, sounds like you've certainly ticked the box of all things. think our growing up was probably similar. grew up in rural New Hampshire and sometimes the entertainment for the day was getting three or four cinder blocks and a piece of plywood and making a jump out of it. Yeah. Kind of eating it half the time and learning how to do it half the time. But I think what's interesting regarding cycling and listeners will have to bear with us because we've got two cycling nuts here kind of on having this conversation.

Evan St.Clair (05:15)

you

Pretty much.

Aaron Shaw (05:34)

It is certainly cardiovascular health, is great for your longevity and health and whatnot, but it is equal parts for me as well. It's the head game, it's kind of the rhythm of, obviously the repetition of the pedal stroke and the cadence. I think that having a bad day is fixed by getting out on the bike, plus or minus whatever's heart rate zones aside and all that other sort of stuff.

freeing up the mind, you will, to, um, manage stress and, and the challenges of life, which, uh, again, you can feel free to share as you will, but you've had a few challenges yourself with health and some, um, health of your family, taking some spills along the way. I want to talk about that a little bit.

Evan St.Clair (06:25)

I mean yeah, it's been, well first of all, most people don't know, but I actually have Crohn's disease. you know, the first doctor that I was going to when I was diagnosed told me absolutely do not ride your bike anymore. I was doing a lot of road racing and I had trained really hard through the winter, was pulled off the bike and told yeah, you need to rest. You do not need to be out.

And it was like, honestly, the worst advice I was ever given. And I didn't ride from, I guess that was 2004 to 2010. I didn't touch my bikes. And my life dramatically just.

looking back, like I had a lot of good things going on. was doing some skateboard racing. I was out doing things, but just, it was just something in my life that was missing. And I was just not getting that constant exercise. The meditation that comes with being on the bike. And so that was probably the first struggle that hit me. They had me on friend's end for over a year. So I put a bunch of weight on.

like super depressed about it. I mean it's not easy to talk about but it's reality of what it is. It's, you know, I trusted the medical system and you know I'm not saying all the medical system is wrong but you know I think that it's too bad they can't write scripts or exercise and getting outside because it's definitely helps me a lot.

And I think that it could definitely, I think there's people out there. Like I went, and I'm ashamed to say this, but it's the truth. I went from 168 pounds to 215 pounds. And like, it was rough. And when I finally did get back on my bike, I couldn't not five miles. Like it was terrible. And I just kept working at it and working at it and kind of got back to where I wanted to be with it. I got on a very strict diet and

lost all the way back down into the mid 170s and got my health back.

Weird thing about that is I stopped taking all the medication that they were giving me and my doctor was advising against it. He was like, you're going to get colon cancer. You cannot be off the anti-inflammatories. And I was on this theory, if I constantly rode my bike really hard, my body was working on recovering from the bike rides and not maybe over, and this is just a crazy theory of mine.

I've had almost rocks thrown at me for saying this in the doctor's office. I feel like my body's not over, my immune system's not attacking my intestines if I'm riding my bike. As soon as I get off my bike, I start having stomach problems. And so I'm in remission. I've been in remission completely 100 % since 2011. No issues. Every time I get tested, I'm good, I'm healthy. And you know,

That's something I think is important to share. So even if you're a top athlete and then you fall down and you have to have step back, there's always a way to work forward through just dedication one day at a time. It would have been real easy for me to be one of the cat three road racers in the area and then all of sudden I couldn't ride my bike five miles. And it's just like, man, how do you ever get back to that? And I did.

So it's never too late and you have to be patient. I knew for me it was what I wanted to do and I just put my head down and it was a two year process to get back to where I was, but it was achievable. I was in my late 30s, so was almost pushing 40 when I went through that.

Aaron Shaw (10:17)

You have to be humble. have to be really humble with that.

Evan St.Clair (10:45)

period in my life.

At that point, my older son got into downhill racing, so he got really good. So now all of sudden we're traveling to races every weekend. We're going to Europe. So now I'm taking back off the bike again. And for a great cause. I had never had any resentment or anything but love and support to see my son have success. And I was super proud of him. But it came with a sacrifice and the sacrifice was my time on the bike. And so I kind of started

slipping back again and with my fitness and stuff. it was all, so it was a challenge to balance all that. And then my younger son ended up having a traumatic brain injury. So then we went through that. We're still going through, that's an ongoing thing that we deal with even to today. Don't share a lot of that on social media. I try to keep things positive, but we still deal with the TBI at home every day. And he is doing absolutely wonderful.

checking off all the boxes and he is knocking out of the park with the success of where he was and where he's at today. We couldn't be more proud of him, but there's all those things have, you know, there are hurdles to get over. I think, and if you talk to anybody, they have these same stories, right? There's just hurdles in life. This is just life. It's just what we all go through. And I guess why I'm sharing all this is because

nothing's ever always just easy. There's always going to be roadblocks, whether it's health, injury, work, schedule, family. So I think you just have to be patient and dedicated and look at the long-term.

Aaron Shaw (12:28)

work schedule.

Yeah, think that there's a whole bunch of great points in there. I think that for listeners who may be in one of those hurdles right now and their life is not creating a roadblock to a healthy lifestyle or even making healthy decisions or whether it's bandwidth, being in the right headspace, having the time to do that, that when you look around and I think when you see people who are

perhaps need to go into the gym or they're riding their bike and they're doing things to maybe cut yourself some slack and realize in this moment, maybe they're just in a place where they don't have a major hurdle in front of them and maybe you do. And that's okay. And realize that some of these things, everybody has struggles no matter how fast or strong or fit or whatever they look like. To be clear, every single person has

barriers that they come up against. And when days are good, we can kind of overcome them or, you know, the season changes that we can kind of get through that. But I wouldn't say it's ever easy. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think there are periods of time where the stars align for a while and like, Hey, you kind of get a routine. But it's certainly as we've, as we mature through middle age, we realize this is probably a season because something's going to come up sooner or later. So the question I would say to you is.

How was your head space and how do you navigate from going from being really fit at one point and then you're getting on a bike trying to get crank out five miles and feel like this is hard. mean, that's a gap from where you were and where you want to be to where you are. Like, how do you take those days from there, from that point?

Evan St.Clair (14:29)

Yeah, I two things. think it was demoralizing at first and super frustrating, but I was also excited to be back on my bike. just the time away, I was having a, I was rekindling a love that had been absent from my life. And so that was keeping me motivated. And like I started after about a month, I started seeing some

like changes, okay, I'm losing a little weight, I'm getting a little faster. I think the biggest thing for me was not just blow myself up on every single ride that I went out on because like my mind had this like I'm racer and I want to do these things but my body was not ready and so it you know it took it took a while to be patient with the expectations of what I could do on the bike and just stay stay steady at it.

Yeah, and just, you know, I feel like I'm, for me personally, when I get into something, I really get focused on it. I'm kind of all in or all out kind of guy. I'm not really, that's probably been one of my personal biggest strong points of what I've been successful at and biggest weaknesses of what I've been a failure at because

I find it very hard to balance things. Especially when I have multiple things going on with the shop being busy. It's really hard in the summertime for me to get out of the shop to get my rods in, to make the rods that I want to make, to get the hours on the bike. And in the winter time, I don't know, as I get older and you, I'm curious about this with you and other people, like as I've gotten older, the winters are harder for me.

with the training because of the cold and the dark. don't see as well at night anymore. the cold sense tends to affect me more now than it did when I was younger. and I absolutely despise the trainer. I'm just not a trainer person. I respect and I'm jealous of all the guys that can sit in and ride the trainer for hours and hours. But I'm just, I think, I think losing a lot of my mates out on the

Aaron Shaw (16:47)

Thank

Evan St.Clair (16:53)

cold winter nights, holding me accountable to get out definitely changed my winter training program. So that's another struggle that I'm sure I'm not the only one out there facing. I'm curious to you, does the cold affect you more as you're getting older?

Aaron Shaw (17:12)

Yeah, for sure. so I think, mean, correct me if I'm wrong, we're both in our, we both crossed over the 50 year old Mark. there've been, I look back to when I was racing on the road, you know, basically race a full schedule for about a decade or so. And we would train, we would say we, we win races in the winter and collect trophies in the summer. So we would train all winter long on the road. This is up in the Pacific Northwest. so

The cutoff for rides for us was if it was both raining and below 47 degrees, but if it was 48 degrees and raining, we would be out there for three, four five hours, you know, oftentimes riding really hard. And they were many times, and this is just looking back, like it just kind of questionable decisions on even being able to do this, but being so absolutely freezing, absolutely soaking wet.

you know, stopping off at a coffee shop, kind of to regroup, going to the restroom and literally being in the fetal position on the floor of a restroom, shivering. There's no way home other than, you know, because we're like out in the boonies and basically like there's only one way home and it's getting back on the bike, getting back outside and continuing to ride. And it was brutal. And I think that it was, you know, it was a source of, you know, mental toughness, if you will. mean, I know now a big thing is like cold plunges. It's like, dude, I've

I've I've been cold plunged so many times. You know, I've been a recipient, you know, not plunging. I've been plunged in a sense. And so, I don't need to go out of my way to do that. So I think, I do that now? No, I have no interest in doing that. I do recognize though, that the challenge of doing, you know, doing exercise, the whole point is to, you know, take whatever capacity you have and kind of like bump up against that to create.

Evan St.Clair (18:42)

We were close. Yeah, for sure.

Aaron Shaw (19:09)

physiological change, muscle strength, cardiovascular health, all those things, you have to challenge it or you're losing it. But I am playing the long game, which is why I'm in my 50s and still doing stuff because if my only option was to go out on those brutal days and say like, that's the only way you can exercise. You have to be cold plunged out there for four hours. I don't think I can do that on the regular anymore. But instead,

I can look back and say, you know what, I've done hard things. I know I've done that in the past. it's certainly, it doesn't need to be 68 and sunny for me to go out and do stuff. I still go out when it's pretty cold and you know, conditions aren't great, but it's not the, it's not really worth being hating what I'm doing. Cause I am playing the long game, right? And I think that's where a lot of people who started an exercise program, especially ones who just

kind of pick up the latest fad and go from the couch to like boot camp mode. They kind of, they overstep things. Instead of doing like incremental changes like, oh, I'm to go from here and I'm going to like go all in and it's miserable and it's uncomfortable. And I don't know, I don't think that that's really sustainable for a lot of people. So you've got to pick your battles and sometimes, you know, brutal freezing cold, you know, with rain coming down, like that's not a battle I'm willing to fight.

Evan St.Clair (20:33)

But I think, know, like...

think people who don't experience that miss out in a lot of ways. At some point, at some time, I think we all need to live a moment outside of our comfort zone because that's how we grow. And a good friend of mine told me that years ago. I was about to do something pretty gnarly that I'd never done. it was a big deal to me at the time. And my buddy said,

Aaron Shaw (20:52)

100 % 100 %

Evan St.Clair (21:07)

You know, if you don't live outside of your comfort zone, how can you ever grow? And that's always stuck with me. Anytime I'm like doing something gnarly or and I'm not like not necessarily gnarly like shredding on a mountain bike. You're like, it can be whatever, right? Just even like this trip going on a solar trip to Croatia by myself and you know, I always like to come back and like, you know, man, like gotta live outside your comfort zone sometimes to really live. And we only get one shot at this and like you gotta, you gotta

follow those dreams and it's never really too late to check that off the box.

Aaron Shaw (21:42)

100%.

I think that in a sense, the harder thing, when you do hard things, it makes the rest of life feel so much better. mean, there's nothing like, know, not, if I sit on the couch and I'm a kick on some Netflix, I can assure you that if I've done a hard ride that day or done a hard workout or something that day, that couch feels so amazing versus.

If I've kind of haven't done anything for a day or two, it's just, I'm a sloth and it's sort of like plop on the couch. mean, yeah, couch is comfortable, but there's nothing like doing something that's so hard that gives you perspective on how easy everything else is and how comfortable everything else is. So you actually get to enjoy kind of a higher high. If you can kind of dig in a little bit and do some things that are uncomfortable. think that the challenge and I'd love if you have any tips on this, for there, I think they're not everybody is.

Maybe wire to go deep or go into that discomfort zone. if somebody's new coach athletes too. I mean, how do you help people kind of push that limit or explore that discomfort and kind of settling into that interval, if you will, and say, yeah, this is going to be uncomfortable, but you need to kind of stay there for a little bit. Like how do you help somebody wire that into their system?

Evan St.Clair (23:01)

That's a good question. I'm not even sure, even coaching people for years now, I'm not even sure that there's a direct, just streamlined answer. It's kind of, when I look at individuals as they're doing sports, they're all diamonds and you polish a diamond differently. No two diamonds are polished the same. So I think the person has to look and self reflect.

and figure out what inspires them and what drives them to be able to do that. And for different people, like, you for me as a kid, I grew up in, you know, my family situation wasn't the greatest. My parents split up when I was young and for me, I would go out and do sprints on the BMX bike and just get the anger out because I would just struggle with some anger issues of just, you know, being in the situation that I was in as a kid. So I would go out and I would just,

I would just do these crazy hard sprints on my BMX bike and it would feel good. And it was better than like, you know, punching something or doing something that's destructive to myself and other things. And I tried to channel that energy into something that felt good. And then there's been other times in my life where maybe I was fighting some depression when I was sick with Crohn's and I would just go out to Lakeland State Park on my bike alone and I would just be in the woods.

there's a point that I believe Gary Klein wrote, Klein Bikes. I don't remember exactly how it goes, it says something to the state of like, at some point, your bicycle disappears from underneath you and you're floating through the woods. And that's the true essence of mountain biking. And so sometimes it's that, right? It's like, I'm just in the woods and the bike disappears and I'm in this just

this play, I don't even know, I can't even put it to words, euphoric feeling of just freedom. so sometimes it's that, right? Sometimes it's the really positive side of riding a bike. And so I think there's a lot of different tools there for people to

to use to keep them motivated and to find their way. But I think it's different for everyone. it's even, think, well, I know for me, it's been different for me through different periods of my life. I've been personally struggling with, once I got into the downhill racing with my older son and I really got it. And I've always been an adrenaline junkie from snowboarding and skateboarding. And so as I've gotten older,

It's been a lot more difficult for me to continue to push the limits. then I got, I paid the price, as you know, I guess it's been about seven months ago now. I broke my back in places, two ribs under my right arm, had a pretty good concussion. I took a hard slam and it was, unfortunately I wasn't even doing anything gnarly. I just, I hit a rock off the face of the jump, got weirded out and it was over.

My garment sales going 33 miles an hour on my downhill bike and there's snow coming back from it. And so I think the biggest downfall, I think the first thing that went through my mind when I hit the ground was, oh no, all the work I've been doing on my road bike for the last year is gone. I just got a massive setback. I knew the bones would heal. I knew I was going to be okay with the parts that physically.

Aaron Shaw (26:27)

Yeah.

Evan St.Clair (26:48)

side of it but it was a it was the mental setback for me. Here we go, we up put 15 pounds on, couldn't really ride for a long for a while. Now I'm like starting this process all over again and so you know for me going forward I think what's going to interest me more is there's different types of gnarly. I mean you remember the Trans-North Georgia Epic Bike Race that I did that was super gnarly. That was one of the gnarliest if not the gnarliest thing I've ever done.

Aaron Shaw (27:15)

How

far was that?

Evan St.Clair (27:17)

It was 360 miles with right at 60,000 feet of climbing and all self-navigating, self-supported in August in Georgia through the Northern mountains. It's definitely the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. It was way harder than I was expecting it to be. So there's different gnarly things out there, right? And so I use that as an example to not like say, well, what have I done? But like,

Everybody has to just kind of see what their idea of a good time or gnarly or how they can look at exercise. It might be running the 5k. It might be doing the marathon. It can be so many different things, you know. So it's I just don't think there's a direct answer to the question that you ask is I think it's different for everybody.

Aaron Shaw (28:14)

Yeah, I think that's hard. of course it'd be nice. Everybody wants on those days when you can, on those days when you can rally and do a hard workout. think those are. And feel good about it and motivated when I've done other episodes on this concept of motivation, which I think is fleeting and it's, you know, for totally responsive to, know, I need to wake up the weather needs to be good. You know, my.

My bike needs to be ready to roll. have to have the time. have to have this open slot of time to do things. And I have to have motivation where I'm just like super pumped to go do something challenging. Like that happens, you know, once a decade, all the stars align where everything is perfect. And the rest of it is, you know, I got a list of excuses on why like now is not a good time. I'm not feeling really tired. I'm not really motivated and eat enough or ate too much and don't feel well. And maybe everything else is good, but man.

Do I really want to go be uncomfortable? Like put myself on a place that is purposefully uncomfortable. And that is, I think it's a hard sell for people. And, you know, to speak for a lot of my coaching clients who are not cyclists per se, that trying to encourage people to invest in like VO2, you know, the VO2 max is a really great measure of longevity. And it's really kind of, it's a reflection of your engine, if you will, your life engine and the higher VO2.

It's correlated to how long you live and how well you're, you how long your healthspan is. And it, it takes a little bit of work. You know, if you really want to kind of get that number higher to give you a bigger engine for capacity for life, not just for racing or anything, but just for life overall, you have to kind of go out of your way. We have to go out of our way and really be uncomfortable for, you know, several minutes at a time. And, you know, as well as I do that.

a four minute interval. Four minutes isn't very long when I'm doing other stuff around the house, but four minutes feels like an hour and a half sometimes when you're pushing really hard. But to encourage people to do that, I found that sometimes breaking things down to really small pieces and maybe somebody's, as opposed to doing an epic multi-day race, for example, maybe their big event is literally being able to do a good VO2 interval session that will improve their health.

And instead of digging in at four minutes or five minutes or 10 minutes saying, do a 30 second, just push really hard for 30 seconds and then rest for a minute or two. just taste that a little bit. And that's sort of like coming back from your five mile ride to build back up. You don't go from five miles to 50 miles. Like you go five miles to six miles and it kind of feels like, well, it's not really much of anything. do you know, the next week you do a little bit more and that doesn't feel like much of anything, but then you zoom out the lens and realize.

Evan St.Clair (30:52)

Great.

Aaron Shaw (31:03)

my 30 second interval was not that hard. And then 45 seconds, well, that was a little bit and a minute and a half, two minutes. like I'm kind of getting used to it. I know what to expect. Then things can really change. Then you really move the needle. But I think the hard part for most people, and I think hopefully this changes in middle age where we get a little wisdom and we've got kind of some scars of not great decisions is that sometimes the goal is a year away.

or two years away and realize like this is kind of a process. So just leaning into like a plan and a process and say, yeah, I want to be healthier or fitter or I have an event or something I want to do, or I want to lose a certain amount of weight or my doctor said, hey, your numbers need to be, your blood work needs to be a little bit better. And realize that it's a tiny change today that may be kind of imperceivable. But if you keep doing that, six months is going to go by pretty quick. Time, unfortunately, goes by too quick now, but these things happen.

Evan St.Clair (31:59)

for sure and I think a big hurdle is the food. I think like for most of you, from what I see at the shop and just my surroundings, the food is the easiest way to like skimp out on your health. It's so easy to just run through and drive through or just grab something that's not like, I'm packing all my meals, like I'm making all my meals.

trying to stay on a pretty strict diet right now. And it takes a lot of work to get up in the morning and chop vegetables for salad and grill chicken and do all the things that I'm doing to really...

count everything that's going into my mouth. And I'll tell you that I've always been a little bit of a sugar addict. Since I was a kid, I'm just addicted to sugar. And it's poison. And I know it. And sometimes I'll get depressed or I'll get down and I'll just be like, oh, I'm just gonna have a milkshake or whatever. you know, my kids will want a milkshake. And it's like, oh, whatever.

I'd kind of slip back into that after I broke my back a little bit, just like hanging around the house, not doing anything, just like, and you just kind of slip into it, right? And it's like a little bit, and then the next thing you know, it's kind of getting a little bit more, and I can say without doubt, I have not had any sugar in weeks now, and I literally feel like it has taken 10 years off my life to be.

Aaron Shaw (33:27)

comfort.

Evan St.Clair (33:48)

The aches and pains in my joints have reduced. I feel like my flexibility has increased. The inflammation is dramatically going down in my body. But it's hard. I went to the grocery store last night to get some stuff for dinner and I came back up the aisle with all the breads and the candies and I was just like, yeah, exactly. Do not even look over, just keep walking.

Aaron Shaw (34:13)

Yeah. Yeah. I don't present.

Evan St.Clair (34:17)

went straight to the checkout and got out of there. it's, know, and it's like, unfortunately they just tag you, man. They just, they, you know, these marketing companies, they just like, even at the checkout, it's like, look at everything, it's like a rack full of candy bars. It's like, dude, don't, just, no, it's not. And so, um,

Aaron Shaw (34:23)

for sure.

Right there. It's not an accident.

They don't put

the organic apples at the checkout. You're right. mean, I nutrition is really hard. I mean, hard always, certainly hard in the American culture. No, you want to save money, eat poorly. mean, the bad food is readily accessible. If you can grab something in a drive-through, again, I'll use the organic apple as the extreme on the other end of the spectrum.

Evan St.Clair (34:38)

No.

It's expensive. It's not cheap to eat healthy.

Aaron Shaw (35:03)

Go to McDonald's and say, I'd like an organic Fuji apple and some almond butter. Sorry, no, that's not an order by number. That's not a thing that they can do, but for two bucks, they can give you three quarters of your day's calories need and you can eat it in like a minute and a half. Then you get the whole day ahead of you and your body's like, we want more of that. I think nutrition is super hard and I would say that for people who are

trying to be healthier overall in all aspects of it that if you can certainly move your body, the benefits of exercise are listed long, but you can't, here's a cliche, right? You can't outrun a poor diet. If you're 50 pounds overweight, you can't run, walk, or far enough to burn all those extra calories.

unless you're also addressing your calorie intake. that is

Evan St.Clair (36:04)

And you're also

not even getting the nutrition because most of that food is just like chemicals and it's not real nutrition. it's not, and it's, think that there's going to be a point in the future where we look back as humans at this fast food phase that we're in, and laugh them in. It might as well have been putting lead paint on the walls. it's, and so I'm.

Aaron Shaw (36:10)

It's not real food.

this phase.

Yeah, for sure.

Evan St.Clair (36:32)

I try to have this rule of not eating anywhere that has a drive-through. I don't know, it's just, you know, so there's little tips. Don't eat anywhere that has a drive-through. Just skip it. Because you really don't want to, do really want your food like made in two minutes in some fast, I don't know, whatever those machines that spits out the patties? It's not, it's like.

Aaron Shaw (36:37)

Good. Yeah, that's great. Yeah.

Yeah, not a good it's not a good sign. It's a big warning sign.

You don't, you don't think of appetizing. Isn't the word that comes to mind necessarily. It's like watching how sausage gets made, right? It's like, you, just kind of don't want to know what actually happens, happens behind the scenes. Yeah.

Evan St.Clair (37:12)

But,

and then the other thing is, is like when I work on a diet and really start getting myself in it's like, I've tried the fasting thing and I guess it works for some people. I never could get it to work for me. The best thing that always works for me with a diet is like, I'll eat five or six meals a day and each one of those meals will be like the size of the palm of my hand. Like it's not a lot of food. Like I might have two hard boiled eggs at eight o'clock.

Aaron Shaw (37:35)

Mm-hmm.

Evan St.Clair (37:41)

And then at 10 o'clock I'll have an apple. And then at 1130, I'll have my first lunch, which might be a salad that might have oil and vinegar and some vegetables and spinach and maybe a little bit of chicken on it. And then around 230, I'll have maybe another piece of protein, maybe, you know, a piece of grilled fish or some more grilled chicken. And then maybe another apple or some carrots or something in the afternoon. If I'm going to go ride hard.

I'll have a sweet potato somewhere around two and three o'clock that afternoon to give him some, some, some carbs to go ride. And I'm really, when, when I do that, the weight comes off, like I just, and I feel so much better. to give you an example, when I got invited to this race for Croatia, I was like, man, I have got to get it together. Like I'm not, I'm, I want to go on this trip and I'm not ready. And I've done this for two weeks.

I've lost 10 pounds as of today in two weeks and I feel amazing. A lot of people say that's too much weight too fast but the reality of it is I'm eating like 16, 17, 1800 calories on the days I'm not riding and taking in about 2000 calories on the days that I'm riding but I'm not eating any junk, no carbs, I'm really limiting the carbohydrates unless I'm exercising and honestly I'm...

Aaron Shaw (38:43)

you

Evan St.Clair (39:09)

way better than I did four weeks ago. And it just works for me. that's, know, like today I'm going to go on a hard ride. I'm going have my sweet potato. I'll probably take a little bar or something and have that right before the ride and take a goo to get them through. If I start cracking toward getting the ride. But, you know, that's, that's just kind of how I roll with it. And it's, it's always worked.

Aaron Shaw (39:34)

I think that one of the big lessons that we're kind of kicking through here between both exercise and VO2 max and nutrition is that it is a little bit of wisdom, but basically it's trial and error. mean, we've kind of gone back through and our nutrition has changed off and on through the years, sometimes season to season, our activity changes, our overcoming injuries, overcoming the mental hurdles and stuff. And I think that for

success is to really look at this as a process. I am fortunate that I love health and fitness and I love science and I love how the body changes. I'm an athlete and I'm in my 50s and I can still say like, I'm an athlete because I'm constantly curious on how my nutrition changes and how my body changes and how my strength changes and my cardiovascular status and how's my training today compared to what the way it was.

you know, decades ago and it's very different. And I think that as long as people can kind of look at maybe their health journey as just that, it's like this journey, it's a journey. What we're doing today is going to be different. You and I can have another conversation in 10 years and it's going to be different. know, the underpinnings will be kind of the same, but it's always going to be like, well, now my nutrition is a little bit different. Now I exercise a little bit different or now I get this nagging injury. I got to kind of change. And as long as we stay

Evan St.Clair (40:58)

Thank

Aaron Shaw (41:01)

curious and engaged. And I think that what's tough is that it doesn't fit our psyche because we want the quick, what are the tough, know, tell me the three things I got to do that are really simple. That's going to get me super fit. And I want to have a beach body and realizing that everybody's so different. know, me and you, like our bodies are different. We're the same, you know, the same age, but you're like, we're on a path that's a little bit different and everybody's different. it's frustrating for people who want a quick fix.

And for anybody who's listened to this, that's in their 20s or 30s or 40s, just wait because it doesn't get easier when you get older. You just need to kind of like explore and be okay exploring how your body responds to things.

Evan St.Clair (41:44)

Yeah, think, no, I totally agree with that. And bone density is something else that I'm learning about. Go back to the crash for a second last summer.

crashed a lot harder in the past than I did that day and got up and yeah, I'm be sore for a few days, maybe a week or two, but not put in the hospital for three days. it was.

It was kind of an eye-opener. then, so I've been going to the gym. So I went through therapy over at 4D and went through all my physical therapy, that right now. And I've stayed at the gym and I'm doing more gym work than I've ever done in my life. trying to build some bone density. Well, they had a company come in and they did a full body scan and they scan. I never had anything like this. It's almost like a,

a CAT scan, lay you on this table and this machine just scans everything about it's indexes. Yeah. And so you can see your bone density. You can see your fat content. You can see your muscle content and lean muscle. You can see everything about what's really going on inside of your body. So I had that done and it was super interesting because like the bone density in my legs was like off the chart for my age. Like it was all the way at the far end of the bone density. And

Aaron Shaw (42:48)

Like a Dexys fan.

lean muscle.

Evan St.Clair (43:14)

my spine and my rib cage was at average at best, maybe on the little bit of the worse side of average. because that part of my body doesn't get any, it's not, it hasn't been getting anything riding the bike. Right. And then he was, what was weird was we were trying to figure out, he's like, your bone density is actually higher than your, the bone density in your arms are actually higher than the bone density in your legs. We're trying to figure out how

bone density is so high in your arms. Like we've never seen anyone your age that has bone density in your arms. I was like, I have to hear them. I don't have bone density in my arms. So, and then I started thinking about it. It's the trail work, dude. You know how many days I've slapped the shovel just over and over out of the bike park, just like working on jumps. And I was like, that's why I'm bone density. So,

So I'm always like, so it's interesting. Like, so that scan gave me a lot and I came back and I was like, okay, I know what I need to work on. need to lose a little bit of weight and I need to work on bone density in my core region, my spine, my rib cage and yeah, I'm good. And so I'll continue to go to the gym. I like it.

Aaron Shaw (44:29)

Yeah, I think it's key for those. I the stats have to kind of pretty sure these numbers are accurate. Basically we lose, what is it? We lose, you know, three to 5 % of muscle mass, you know, per decade, basically starting in year 30, you know, so once, you know, once you're in your, once you hit 30, unless you really do some proactive activity for bone density and muscle mass and so on, you've kind of physiologically peek out.

And the rest of it's downhill from there unless you get a DEXA scan or unless you do something where you can say, hey, let me get some numbers here and then let me have a plan. Because I don't want to lose muscle mass. mean, certainly, as we've said, driving through the fast food, drive-throughs aren't great. Sitting on the couch all day, not great. And we need something to push us in the right direction.

direction and sometimes having these tests, I think are really good. mean, I love it when my clients will do a DEXA scan, even just because it gives us a sense of like, hey, whether you feel good or don't feel good, those numbers are legit. And you can say like, here's your bone density, here's your lean muscle mass. What can we do about it? And I think that you have to do, we have to do some sort of resistance training. And for those of us that are endurance athletes, you know, giving me the option of like, hey, do you want to go mountain bike for the day or do you want to go to the gym? It's like, man, like that's not even a, that's not a hard question at all.

Evan St.Clair (45:57)

Right.

Aaron Shaw (45:58)

But sooner or later, and maybe this is where like the bad weather days come in or the winters come in and be like, okay, you know, it's tougher to get outside perhaps. Maybe I can, you know, buckle down and get in a half hour of like proper resistance training, stimulate the bone density, stimulate my muscles and tendons and my nervous system, which will actually fortify us a little bit for getting back on the No, a bit, a little bit less, a little bit less risk of injury. Well, let's kind of recap here that,

Evan St.Clair (46:21)

Yeah, for sure.

Aaron Shaw (46:27)

First of all, when you're a middle-aged athlete or you want to be a middle-aged athlete, you can do it. We can do it as Evan and I have shared. I think that we could probably do a full episode just on listing the various injuries we've had and compare battle scars because that's kind of par for the course. I too have broken a couple bones from cycling. Speaking of bone density, I crashed my bike probably a decade ago now on a training ride and broke my collarbone.

And I was doing 30 plus miles an hour and landed a smack on my shoulder, very common injury to have. And some of my colleagues would say, it must be because you have low bone density. I said, either that or it's because I hit the pavement at 30 miles an hour. Bones aren't totally bomb proof, we do need to attend, those of us that are cyclists do need to attend to bone density for sure. But we talk about injuries, they happen.

navigating family life, work life, nutrition. mean, when you're in that checkered aisle, just keep your head straight ahead. Don't look at the garbage on the side, all that sugar stuff and having big goals. so, Evan, as you alluded to, you have a big trip coming up, big mountain bike trip coming up that is going to be a stretch for you, it sounds like. It's like you haven't exactly totally got your

Evan St.Clair (47:53)

Bye.

Aaron Shaw (47:55)

training dialed for this right now.

Evan St.Clair (47:58)

No, not at all. I'm definitely coming off the couch on this one. Yeah, I'm going to Croatia. I leave on Saturday. And I'll be over there doing a five-day stage race. It's the epic, part of the epic series. think it's qualifier for the Cape Epic. So it's the four island of Croatia. yeah, first day looks pretty simple. It's a short.

20k prologue, but then after that it's 40, 45 miles a day, 4 to 5,000. think the biggest day is 5900 feet of climb and 44 miles. So it's like, you know, it's not high altitude, but it's definitely, I mean, it's, it's, they're big days back to back and you know, I'm fingers crossed. I'm going to rely on 30 years of muscle memory and just trying to be smart.

and not cook myself and I'm just gonna let the race come to me. I'm gonna start the first couple days out kind of slow and just let my legs kind of come on board. And then I know I've got one really hard day. I've got a seven hour cutoff day on the biggest day. And then I got a little more thrown at me. Like I looked at the weather yesterday and it looks like it's gonna be between 50 and 60 degrees and rain every day. it's not looking like it's gonna be all sunshine and rainbows, but you know,

I'm up for it. I'm going to go give it my best. I'm going to do the best I can. my goal is to finish it. And we'll just have to stay tuned and see what happens.

Aaron Shaw (49:33)

Yeah, we'll also do a recap on that. So if there was one thing that you would advise a, say there's a listener who's middle age or approaching middle age and they are trying to get onto a routine and they've had some of the barriers that we've had, like what's one thing you could suggest for them?

Evan St.Clair (49:52)

to, to don't be too critical on themselves, be patient with the results and be steady. don't try to force things. Don't try to rush things. and just, set a goal and just, just put the work in and stick with it. And, the results can come from anyone who were, listen, none of us are being different. Like I'm not special. I'm just someone that.

just saw something I wanted to go after and get it. I've not. I've had remarks from people, you're a great mountain biker. I just work hard at it. I don't really see myself that way. mean, being good at something is what you put into it. And we're all humans. all kind of the same mold. Some of us have more challenges than others. like, Matt that works in the bike shop, he broke his neck when he was 13.

was completely paralyzed, told me never walk again. He has inspired me almost more than anybody to see all the things that he's come through. I say just give it time and just be patient with it because we're not 20 anymore. We don't recover overnight. It takes a little bit more time, but that's all right.

Aaron Shaw (51:12)

Yeah. think consistency is that's it. If every day you can try to do something and not get hung up on some unrealistic, massive, you know, goal, if you will, and just say, just keep showing up, just keep doing a little bit every day. The rest kind of takes care of herself. that's great wisdom. Well, Evan, I appreciate you taking the time to chat. We'll have to do a recap post race. You'll have to tell us if you saw any sunshine on your big event.

Evan St.Clair (51:43)

I'm hoping fingers crossed.

Aaron Shaw (51:45)

Yeah, right. And also, in the show notes, I'll put links to the bike shop. So if anybody's in the hood, they can kind of swing by and give a shout and check in on you.

Evan St.Clair (51:58)

Sounds good. Thank you so much for having me. Cheers.

Aaron Shaw (51:58)

All All right, man. Thanks a lot.