TRAINED

Your thoughts can dictate your reality. That’s the premise of the placebo effect, which clinical psychologist Alia Crum, PhD, has spent years studying as the principal investigator of Stanford’s Mind & Body Lab. On this episode, Crum explains how to apply the placebo effect to every facet of our own lives, starting with understanding the factors that affect our mindsets. With her research and guidance, we can learn how to flip our scripts to make anything — tough training, healthy food, unexpected challenges — more enjoyable and use stress and uncertainty to our advantage.

Olympic gold medalist Simone Manuel isn’t just making waves in the pool. She’s making waves in bigger conversations around race, mental health and self-empowerment. On this episode, Simone shares how she got into swimming (at the early age of 4, when she swam across the pool during her second lesson), the attitude and actions that help her stay motivated when the future of competitive swimming (and, well, everything) is on hold, and how we can all protect our dreams, even when they seem out of reach or off limits.

Trained host Ryan Flaherty loves answering questions just as much as he loves asking them. Which is why he’s back for another round of fielding Q’s from listeners looking for his expert advice. On this special episode, Ryan offers detailed guidance on how to salvage sleep as a night-shift worker, help kids fall in love with a sport, and put on weight and muscle the healthy way. Then he wraps it all up with a clip from the next episode, where he interviews another elite athlete who’s trying to change the perception of her sport.

Only about 40 percent of our happiness is predetermined by our genes, and as little as 10 percent by our circumstances — which adds up to a lot of opportunity to shape our mental health, says Yale psychology professor Laurie Santos, PhD. On this episode, the woman behind the viral “Science of Well-Being” class, which guides people through research-backed ways to improve happiness, gives a crash course on why our tech habits are chipping away at our contentment, how a “boring” routine and meditation can improve our default mindset, and what we can do each night to set ourselves up for a lifetime of joy. It’s a timeless episode, but also one that couldn’t come at a better time.

What happens when a fertility physician, a trainer specializing in pre- and postnatal fitness, and an ob-gyn talk pregnancy in an unfiltered setting? Find out in this very special episode, in which three leading maternity experts get real about the struggles many of us face but few of us discuss. Natalie Crawford, MD, starts with the factors that affect conception and beyond, focusing on age, stress and nutrition. Trainer Jane Wake busts eye-roll-worthy exercise myths once and for all. And Dr. Christine Ekechi sheds light on the emotional toll of motherhood, including miscarriage and the racial disparities in maternity healthcare. Heavy stuff? Sometimes. But to these notable women, this convo is long overdue.

According to Precision Nutrition co-founder John Berardi, PhD, nutrition isn’t “one size fits all.” Berardi makes it his business to explore all the ways food intersects with our training, our work, and our families, clearing up conflicting research to offer straightforward advice for everyday life. On this episode, he reveals how to tell real science from BS, what he feeds his own kids, when to consider intermittent fasting, and how he gets away with eating a half pint of ice cream on the regular.

Parsley Health founder Robin Berzin, MD, believes a checkup should be more than a check-in. When we visit the doctor, she says, we should be talking about how we eat, how we move, and even how we think. As she puts it, “Health happens during the 99 percent of your life when you’re not at the doctor’s office.” In this episode, the trailblazing physician explains how she creates a “health biography” for each patient and outlines simple steps we can take at home to get a head start in maximizing our performance — and our potential.

Whether we’re building teams on the field, at home, or at work, Dr Kevin Elko believes we should always start by developing a winning language — that covers everything from creating a self-talk “script” to shifting the terms we use with teammates. Dr Elko would know. As a sports psychologist for pro and college football teams, he’s won more championship rings than most Hall of Famers have. On this episode, he goes deep on how self-talk can help us build self-confidence, how owning our actions puts us in the driver’s seat, and how good old-fashioned human connection is what holds a team together, especially in tough times.

WNBA champion Jewell Loyd knows that lifting up others is the stuff legacies are made of. She herself was mentored by the late, legendary Kobe Bryant, who dubbed Loyd the “Gold Mamba” in honor of her valuable skills. On this episode, she discusses how she’s passing Kobe’s “Mamba Mentality” on to the next generation — and how we can all put it to work in everyday life. Plus, drawing from her experience in quarantine, she shares the tools and apps that have kept her progressing from home.

The menstrual cycle is pretty low on our list of go-to topics to discuss at the gym. Georgie Bruinvels PhD, a research scientist at Orreco, is trying to change that. She believes it can serve as a guide for planning how you train, eat and recover to get more out of all three. On this episode, she outlines a plan for each of the cycle’s distinct phases; discusses the long, hard fight for gender equality in research; and debunks some enduring myths.