Latest / Zone2Speak Podcast / Living with Purpose: World Champion Sonya Looney on Mountain Biking, Motherhood, and Mindset

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Living with Purpose: World Champion Sonya Looney on Mountain Biking, Motherhood, and Mindset · Zone2Speak Podcast

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Music.
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And now for the episode.
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Welcome to Zone to Speak. Today we are thrilled to have the incredible Sonia
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Looney joining us, professional mountain biker, world champion, entrepreneur,
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mom, and fellow podcaster who inspires both on and off the bike.
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She also has a master's in applied positive psychology and a master's in electrical engineering.
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Sonia has built a career racing some of the toughest mountain bike events,
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from grueling stage races to extreme endurance challenges.
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But her journey doesn't stop there. She's also the host of the popular Sonia
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Looney Show, where she dives into mindset, resilience, and personal growth,
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all while balancing life as a mom and athlete.
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In this episode, we explore Sonia's approach to thriving in high-performance
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sports, parenting, and entrepreneurship.
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From her mental strategies tackling challenges to her insights on fostering
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balancing and passion in life, Sonia's story is a testament to the power of
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grit, determination, and a love for adventure.
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So, gear up for an inspiring conversation with the amazing Sonia Looney. Welcome.
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Wow. Thanks so much. It's always interesting when people read your bio back to you.
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Did I miss anything? No. It's a great opportunity to savor.
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I think so many of us are so busy trying to do things in life that we rarely
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pause to think about the things that have even happened in the last week.
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So thanks for helping me do that for the course of my career.
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Absolutely. You are amazing.
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A high achiever. Tell us how you do it all.
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I mean, you have two masters, you have two kids, you are pro mountain biker,
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you have your own podcast.
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I'm sure there's more that I don't know, but maybe let's start in the beginning.
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How was your journey? How did you get into mountain bike and became a pro?
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Yeah, you know, it's all the things are curiosity, one foot in front of the
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other and courage to go after all the things.
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When I started mountain biking, which I'll tell you about in a minute,
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this is beyond my wildest dreams.
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And I think that anybody can achieve this in their life. I truly believe that.
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A lot of times we get in our own way, telling ourselves we can't do something
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or waiting for somebody to pick us or waiting for the right moment.
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I became a mountain biker by accident. I didn't grow up as a mountain biker.
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I was definitely like very focused on school and I was a musician and I played
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tennis, but I wasn't a cyclist. I had never even heard of cycling.
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And I ran a marathon when I just graduated high school because it was just something
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that sounded cool that I wanted to try.
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And because I had run a marathon, these guys at my work invited me to go mountain biking.
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And I thought, well, I've run a marathon before, so I can probably do anything.
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And running a marathon was the thing that unlocked that belief.
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It wasn't like being a top musician in my school. It wasn't being top of my class.
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It was running that taught me to believe in myself that I could go after anything.
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So whenever I ran that marathon, it unlocked a new level of what I thought was capable.
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So I said, sure, I'll go mountain biking. That sounds like fun.
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And then they saw that I was good at mountain biking. So they said,
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well, you should do a race.
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And that was a couple of weeks later, I did a race from my first mountain bike
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ride and it didn't go well.
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I mean, I didn't know what I was doing. My bike didn't shift.
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I came in last place, like all the things, but it was so much fun.
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And it was such an adventure that I went all in on mountain biking.
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And that was 20, 20, what year is this? 20 years ago.
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It's amazing what sports can do to someone.
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It just creates so much strength, courage, and believe in yourself.
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Like you said, you're such a big accomplisher. You've done so well in school
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when you were a top musician.
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And then from unlocking this power of finishing a marathon, you were able to embrace new things.
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Yeah, and I think a lot of people can attest to that.
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I don't know why it's physical feats. I know that there's other things that
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can help unlock that agency and confidence in us, But I think there's something about sport.
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I think I have a thought or hypothesis that we unlock a different level of consciousness
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whenever we are doing our sport.
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I agree. I agree. I've never been a pro or I've never even been good at any
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sports, but just from doing and unlocking different levels in the sports,
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I definitely feel the change internal. all.
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And I love what you said about that, because a lot of times people think,
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well, I have to be like, you know, look at an outcome or a metric or an accolade
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in order to be access something about yourself.
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But no, it doesn't even matter how fast you are, how strong you are.
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What matters is that you're doing it because doing it is what helps you figure out who you are.
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All the things that come as a result of that, like the results or your power
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number, all that stuff doesn't actually matter. It's the process.
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It's learning through challenge and choosing to show up, choosing to keep going
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on the good days and on the challenging days.
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Yeah, absolutely. And I feel in the beginning, I was chasing something because
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I wanted to prove to myself that I could do because I was never good at sports growing up.
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And then I finally got to a point where I was like, you know what?
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I reached this point. I'm so happy and I don't need to prove anything else.
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And then I started enjoying so much more. Not that I did enjoy it before,
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but it was just a different journey.
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I think this is a normal rite of passage. People ask me about my journey,
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and I've been racing a long time.
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And I was trying to prove myself early on in my days as a pro.
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My self-worth was contingent upon doing well, looking for approval from others,
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looking for doing well, being better than others in competition.
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And my first couple years as a pro, I wasn't doing very well.
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I was finishing near the back of the pack.
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I admit that I would cry during my races out of shame and embarrassment.
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I would dream about stabbing a hole in my tire because I just thought if there
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was just an excuse for me to be this bad, which isn't bad at all.
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But that's really good that that happened. That is a rite of passage whenever
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you realize over time, I don't have to prove myself anymore.
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And that's a question for me to think about is, you know, well,
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what if I had never attained any results?
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Would I still be chasing going on that uphill battle or not?
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But I think that once we start thinking about how our actions are positively
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impacting others and seeing that impact in the world, we stop worrying so much
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about trying to prove ourselves because it's not about just us anymore.
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Yeah, it's a much bigger picture. I agree.
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And from that first race that you didn't do well, but you really had fun and
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enjoy yourself. How was the journey going?
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To being a pro? Yeah, you know, a lot of people think when you're a pro,
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you're getting paid, you know, everything's going awesome.
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But that's not the case for most, especially women who are professional athletes.
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I got my pro license, which you get from racing at the national level and earning
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points so that you can have this, you know, UCI pro card so that you can race
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internationally as a pro and maybe, you know, go to the Olympics.
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That was in cross country racing. So that happened pretty quickly for me.
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That happened after two years.
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And the reason that happened quickly is because of the background I had in being
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an athlete. So I don't want to make it sound like, oh, I had all this natural
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talent and it just happened overnight.
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No, I played soccer my whole life growing up. I played tennis in high school. I was a runner.
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So all of those were building blocks to get me to that point.
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But I wasn't a full-time pro until 2012.
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So I was at it for six years as a pro where I had to buy my bike.
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I was working multiple jobs, just trying to make something work.
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And I moved away from cross-country racing because I wasn't great at it.
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I wasn't terrible, but I was never going to be racing at the front.
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And I found endurance and ultra endurance racing primarily out of,
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again, out of interest and curiosity.
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I want an adventure. I don't want to ride my bike around in circles and go to
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the same places every single year. I want to go see the world.
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And because of that choice, and because of wanting to share those experiences
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with other people, it started attracting sponsors that wanted to pay me money,
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which was not something I was expecting.
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And I had to walk away from a job. I was working at that time in the bike industry.
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I had a big national sales and marketing job. I was racing on a team associated with that company.
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But then I was getting offered money. So I had to walk away from security and
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take a risk. And my husband, he's my now husband at the time,
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is the one who encouraged me to do that.
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And without that belief from him and without that encouragement,
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I might not have been able to do that.
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And I've been able to... The entrepreneurship journey started from there because
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I realized, okay, I'm...
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I have some control over my future. I didn't want to be an engineer.
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I just went to engineering school because I was good at math and science.
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And I loved math and science. And I did a master's in Colorado because I wanted to move to Colorado.
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So the master's degree was just a job that I could do while because I had a
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fellowship. Something to fall back. Yeah.
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Yeah. So again, starting and trying and just building one foot in front of the
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other, you start realizing there's other paths that I can build in front of me.
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And you might not be able to anticipate what those are in the moment.
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But as you start moving down the path, you say, wow, there's a lot of resources
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that I have to start figuring out where I want to go.
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And I think that's hard for a lot of people. Even now, people are like,
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well, what are you going to do with your life?
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I don't need to know exactly what I'm going to do with my life.
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I don't want to know what my life is going to look like.
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I had that future laid out in front of me as an engineer.
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I had a company, a big government lab offering to pay for my master's degree,
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which I turned down, I had a great career that I could have had like good money
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and security like the rest of my life. And I walked away from that because I just don't want that.
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That takes a lot of courage and happy that you had, you know,
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your husband there as a support system to encourage you.
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And, you know, maybe you just needed that little push because I'm sure it was scary.
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Like you said, you know, you were six years working and being a pro at the same
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time, balancing all that.
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I guess it would be hard to know how much you would make. So,
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yeah, so I was super curious about that. And thanks for sharing,
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because I wasn't sure, like, when you become a pro, what happens?
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You know, you immediately join a team and get paid. That's what I think most people think it works.
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A team has to choose you and the odds of that are so low. So most pros are just
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trying to make it some way.
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They're trying to find jobs that are flexible enough so that they can train
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and travel, but then they have to get paid enough so that they can afford on
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their own dime to travel.
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And then they're hoping that a team will find them. And that's kind of the older model.
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The newer model is now, you know, you can be more of a privateer and you can
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go out and get your own sponsors. but even that landscape is incredibly challenging.
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And I honestly think that the sponsorship model takes a toll on your mental health.
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And I've never really heard a lot of people speak out about that,
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but I'm starting to walk away from the sponsorship model again.
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And I just think that it becomes so much about your performance,
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your identity becomes so tied with your performance, whether it's like your
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performance in a race or your performance online or all these things that are
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out of your control, or you could do the best job ever for these brands.
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And it doesn't even matter because sometimes people don't even care.
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And then they just let you go after years.
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You just don't feel like you matter.
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And mattering is such an important psychological need that we have.
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It's about adding value and feeling valued in the world.
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And I think a lot of athletes are working so hard to add value,
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but they don't feel valued because
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they're not receiving the right type of affirmation and recognition.
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And I mean, this happens across the bike industry for bike industry employees
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as well. I mean, I think cycling has a mattering problem.
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Yeah, especially, like you said, you know, a privateer, I believe most contracts are annual.
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And you don't know what's going to happen the next year. You don't know what's
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going to happen if you get injured, especially mountain biking.
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I mean, it's so much more dangerous.
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I have a special admiration for mountain bikers in the cycling world because it's so badass.
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Just in my head, I think about trying, but I definitely don't have the courage. I'm too clumsy.
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I'm a liability on a mountain bike for sure.
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Well, I think it's about learning step by step. I think we need to be at a certain
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level immediately once we get on the dirt.
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And it's really about breaking it down into just manageable challenges and getting some guidance on that.
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When I moved to Canada from the United States, I live in British Columbia.
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It's a different sport here. And I've been a pro, let's see,
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now for like eight years.
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And I couldn't ride any of the downhills. A lot of the features, I'd have to walk.
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And it was embarrassing because everybody would take me out on their weekend
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ride and I just wouldn't be able to do it. So I had to relearn how to mountain bike.
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So it's a skill that always is evolving and it can be really fun.
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But I get how that's intimidating because if you fall, it hurts and you do fall sometimes.
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Yeah. Yeah. I see those mountain bikers coming out of trails always with scratches and bruises.
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And being such a hardcore sport,
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I'm sure you have faced also a lot of adversity, moments of adversity.
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How do you overcome those challenges? How do you mentally and physically prepare
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for those grueling events?
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Honestly, there's a lot of things that go into mentally preparing for an event.
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And a lot of times people will think, well, I'll just learn how to be resilient
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in the moment. And it's what you practice every day.
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So weather is a typical challenge that a lot of people have at races.
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I'll share that I came, I've done the Andalusia bike race, the stage race a few times.
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And one of the years I came, it was the worst weather. It rained the entire time.
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And all these people had come because it was February in Andalusia from all over the world.
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And people mentally just melted down because they just were not prepared for the weather.
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But I had done, I had trained in lots of different weather conditions.
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I'd raced in lots of different weather conditions. And while I prefer nice weather, I chose...
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It's called like your explanatory style. I chose to view that adversity as a
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benefit, as an adventure.
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What's going to happen when I go out there and it's wet? Like, it's going to be fun.
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Yeah, I'm going to be cold, but who cares? Like, that's a skill that I've had to hone over the years.
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And that's how I approach all challenges that come up on the bike,
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whether it's a crash, whether it's, you know, the biggest challenge in the last
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couple of years, thankfully not this year, but like after having kids and having
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little kids is not feeling good on my bike most of the time.
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Going to a race and not being able to get my heart rate up and knowing that
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I'm performing at like a 60 to 70% of my capacity just because I'm too tired.
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And that is a very hard place to be, to keep showing up, not able to perform properly.
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So not to give up through that. And that requires having perspective and big picture.
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So I'm talking about resilience. How do you be resilient so that you can face
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anything that comes your way?
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And that comes with acceptance and acceptance is not complacency.
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It comes with understanding your emotions and being able to name them,
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but not identify with them. I'm feeling upset.
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I wish things were different, but I'm going to continue to keep going and challenging
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the beliefs around the adversity that's happening to you.
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So if you tell yourself it's raining and it's going to suck and you're not going
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to have any fun or you're not going to perform well, is that true?
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Challenge that belief. Or if you get a flat tire or someone passes you and a
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negative thought pops in your head.
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Is it true that your race is over or that you're not going to be able to do as well as you'd hoped?
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And another thing is really untangling from outcomes because you can't control
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how fast everybody else is going to be. You can't control the weather.
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You can't control all these different things that are going to happen to you,
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but you can control your attitude.
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You can control your effort and you control your actions.
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So when you show up on race day or any day for that matter, what is going on in your head?
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And are you able to weather the storm whenever your brain starts telling you
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that you're not good enough?
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Wow. That's very good advice.
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I'm taking notes. I hope everybody's taking notes. I think this conversation
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with yourself, I mean, it does take practice because I think it's not something
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that comes to you just because I'm taking these notes of like, okay,
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I'm going to name my emotion and I'm going to talk to myself and I'm still going
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to continue the race or I'm going to continue to have fun.
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I guess we'll take practice, but this is very good.
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Tip. And you're talking a lot about mindset and resilience. And you talk about
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that in your podcast on cultivating mental health, strength.
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How has that helped you as an athlete and entrepreneur?
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It's given me everything. I mean, the longevity that I've had in the sport,
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being able to weather so many different challenges.
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I mean, the biggest challenge to my career was having children.
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I lost most of my sponsors. I haven't been able to get sponsors.
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I don't have a bike sponsor.
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That's very perplexing to me and very frustrating. And it's coming back to your purpose.
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Why are you doing this in the first place and having a purpose bigger than you?
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Because if it was always just about me, if it was about proving myself,
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if it was about results, which some years I didn't deliver the results that
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I was hoping for, I probably would have quit by now.
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It's about something bigger than that. And it's also about exploration.
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I think really, I mentioned curiosity earlier. I think really tapping into exploration
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is a very powerful place to be because it's boundless.
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It's not about just trying to show something, trying to prove something to yourself.
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It allows more flexibility when you're striving. We were talking about how we're
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both not feeling well right now.
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When you're sick and you can't train, what does that mean?
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Well, are you going to give up because you know that you're not going to perform
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as well because you've lost however many weeks from training?
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Or are you going to go see what's possible and not make it about having to be
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the best you've ever been, but the best you can be on that day?
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I love that you said that because I was going to ask you what type of practice
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and tools you use to stay motivated.
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And one of your episodes, I think, two episodes ago on your podcast,
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The Sonia Looney Show, you talked about purpose.
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And I I really love that episode. I hope people go check out your podcast. It's amazing content.
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But the purpose one really talked to me what you just said.
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So is this one of the tools that you use to practice to stay motivated?
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It is. I would say in more recent years it is, but in the past it wasn't.
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Something that keeps me motivated is just being consistent and connecting with
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my values. So I know what my values are and I connect them to my goals.
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And I don't think a lot of people think to connect it in that way.
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And I'm always thinking long-term and big picture.
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And I'm thinking about the type of person that I want to be.
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However, there's caveats to this. If you say, I want to be somebody who's consistent.
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This can lead to you burning yourself out, like training when you shouldn't
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be training or working when you shouldn't be working and having the insight
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to take a break and to rest and to also have more dimension.
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I think an issue for a lot of endurance athletes is that.
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The culture of being an endurance athlete is that your life revolves around
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training and racing and every decision revolves around training and racing.
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And I think that this can be detrimental to well-being because you stop doing things.
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Well-being is not just about achievement. Well-being is about relationships
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and positive emotions and self-acceptance and purpose and a lot of different things.
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So if you're not spending time in your relationships, if you're not having fun,
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And if all your life is revolving around training, then you're not going to
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have much balance in your life.
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And overall, I think that's going to cause burnout and it's going to make you
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develop a relationship with the sport that might not be a healthy relationship.
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And I can say that because I've been there. And there are times where you have to do that.
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But keeping in mind that well-being isn't just about performance is such an important lesson.
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And it might be one of those things where you have to touch the fire just like
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trying to prove yourself through achievements that we were talking about.
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Maybe you have to touch that fire of having complete lack of balance in your
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life and maybe feeling lonely because you don't have other things coming out
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of the thing that you're working towards.
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So just making sure that people are thinking about that.
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It might not feel good to skip a ride, to spend time with friends or family.
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It doesn't have to feel good in the moment, but reflect after you're done, was it worth it?
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If I didn't listen to the striving, that feeling telling me you should be doing
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more, you're not doing enough. What's just a little bit more?
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It's important to think about how that feels in your body, like the embodiment of striving.
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Because I think a lot of times we think it's in our head. I should do that.
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Our motivation's in our head. But motivation is also an embodied feeling.
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And making sure that it's coming from an intrinsic place instead of an extrinsic
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thing that's trying to control you, that is such an important lesson.
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Yeah it's good to hear this because
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i would never imagine that in the pro world that
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will also come up because your life i would think assuming it is eat sleep breathe
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the sport because obviously i'm not a pro but i like to train and i like to
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stay active but i also have gone through the process of,
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I have to sleep early, I have to wake up early, I have to eat right,
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and ended up like, I'm not going out to eat because there's not going to be
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healthy food, I'm not going out with not having social life,
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and really trying to find the balance.
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And I like what you said about even not feeling good in the moment,
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do it, and then evaluate later, because there's a lot of guilt on putting away
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training to be more social, or eat a dessert or something.
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So absolutely, you need to find balance on everything because otherwise it's just empty.
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Yeah. And I think whenever you shift forward thinking either about death or
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just thinking about 10 years from now, am I going to wish that I spent more
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time with my friends and enjoying some of the things in life?
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Or am I going to wish that I was even stricter?
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And maybe that's fine for you. I'm not saying that this is bad for everybody,
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but it's just something that's important to think about because it's so easy
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to get sucked in to the endurance athlete lifestyle. Yeah, yeah.
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And you said, at the moment, you are dealing with the setback or not having a bike sponsor.
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And all these changes happened. Since you had kids, I think that's,
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you know, a big subject for another podcast talking about being a woman in sports.
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But how do you deal with the setbacks?
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In general, like balancing personal life, professional life?
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Yeah. I mean, I asked myself, what's it all for?
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Am I racing for sponsors because I want sponsorship?
24:27
No, that is not why I race. But when I talked about the extrinsic validation
24:31
and motivation, sometimes you forget that you're racing because you love racing
24:35
or you're doing the thing because you love it.
24:37
Because this is really research-backed topics here that I'm talking about is
24:43
that once you start getting external rewards for something that you love doing,
24:47
it changes your relationship with it.
24:49
So as a professional sponsored athlete where I made my income for over a decade,
24:54
whenever you start losing that, you start asking yourself questions like,
24:57
do I still want to do this? Do I still like this?
25:00
Am I doing this for me or am I doing it for my sponsors?
25:03
And then when it starts costing a lot of money now, because I take my family to my races.
25:08
Is this sustainable to do it in this way? So yeah, I mean, it's always evolving.
25:14
My relationship with racing is evolving.
25:16
It's not because of the sponsorship stuff. It's primarily because before I had
25:21
kids, I loved racing internationally and I was chasing adventure.
25:25
And I am choosing not to do that now because I want to be with my family.
25:29
And there are going to be times in the near future where maybe I'll start racing
25:33
a little bit internationally again, but my career will never be what it was
25:37
because I'm choosing that.
25:38
And also, I love riding my bike, but I love doing other things.
25:43
So being flexible with why you're doing something and just asking yourself,
25:48
am I doing this for external reasons or am I doing this for internal reasons?
25:52
And again, sometimes you have to do things for external reasons,
25:55
but making sure that you are being intentional with those choices.
25:59
So that's how I balance it. And even all these other things in my life that
26:04
I do. I've never been just a professional writer.
26:06
I've always had other things going on. I love my mental performance coaching practice.
26:11
I get the most joy probably out of that because I get to help people unlock
26:14
their potential and wrestle with a lot of the topics we're talking about today.
26:19
I love keynote speaking. I love doing all these things off the bike because
26:24
that really helps me connect to my purpose.
26:27
Again, so your purpose is bigger than you. It's bigger than being a bike racer
26:31
and than any role that you wear.
26:32
All the things that you do contribute to that. So I think when people are thinking
26:36
about balance, it's like, how am I plugging into this thing that is a compass
26:41
for my life so that I can feel fulfilled even if I am not training and racing as much as I was before?
26:48
It makes sense. So you're just staying more in local races in the U.S. for now.
26:53
Yeah, U.S. and Canada. But then, you know, you have to set different goals around that.
26:57
So the goal is, you know, the exploration piece isn't as big because I'm not
27:02
in a different country. There's not as much novelty there.
27:04
But then the focus shifts instead of that to community. How can I impact my
27:08
community in the biggest way?
27:10
I honestly don't care how I do in the races. And it was weird because I won
27:14
a big race this summer and I just didn't care.
27:16
But it was actually good that I didn't care because it's not about that anymore
27:19
at all. It's about how can I be of service to other people?
27:23
And that is primarily why I race now. And that shifted a long time ago.
27:27
And that is a great reason to be racing because it takes all the pressure off too.
27:32
Absolutely. And do you think it was also an impact of you becoming a mom?
27:37
Has this impact you in, I mean, of course has impacted, you know,
27:41
becoming a mom in life and in
27:42
racing, but how has this impacted your perspective in life and in racing?
27:48
I had this perspective before I became a mom, but becoming a mom is a forcing
27:52
function into really, you know, looking at it closer and really being able to articulate it.
27:59
The biggest thing about becoming a mom that was interesting to me is,
28:02
you know, my son was born on the day of lockdown in the pandemic.
28:05
He was probably the last baby in the hospital to have a birth without all the rules.
28:11
And then we didn't see anybody for several months. And then there was no racing
28:14
for years for me, because in Canada, the border was closed.
28:17
So I couldn't even go to the US to race when racing started back up again.
28:20
So racing was taken away from me. And being able to do a lot of the things that
28:25
I was doing before, traveling, that was taken away from me.
28:28
So I had to ask myself, Am I okay? And the answer was, yeah.
28:31
I was great. It didn't matter.
28:34
And that helped me so much because it made me realize these things that I thought
28:38
I needed, I don't actually need in the way that I thought.
28:43
And the rate that I was achieving things, I don't need to be achieving things at breakneck speed.
28:49
A little bit slower is fine.
28:51
But we are so afraid to take our foot off the gas for so many different reasons.
28:55
But when it was forced upon me, it actually helped me realize like,
28:58
oh, I don't need that in the same way.
29:01
Yeah. Would you say that's one of the biggest rewards of balancing motherhood
29:05
with being a pro athlete?
29:09
Yeah, actually, I love working. I was working like 12 hours a day.
29:15
It was hard for me to stop because I love everything I do so much and I get
29:20
energy from it. I love learning.
29:22
But having kids actually creates boundaries for me. It forces me to stop working.
29:27
So I have a nanny for six hours a day.
29:29
I have to jam everything, my training, my work, everything into that time because
29:33
I've committed to being with my kids the rest of the time.
29:35
And that's been really good for me. It's hard at the same time.
29:38
I mean, I admit that, yeah, it is frustrating. And I wish I was achieving more
29:41
things. And I see everybody around me and wish that I had more time.
29:45
But what am I getting? And I'm getting so much from that.
29:48
So having kids has actually helped me have more balance.
29:53
Yeah, when my daughter was younger, I remember I would actually accomplish more,
29:58
I feel because I had to be so structured.
30:00
And the time that I had for me, I really needed to, you know,
30:05
fit in my training and get everything done.
30:07
And yet there was no time to, I'll do this later, which I do now.
30:11
And then I ended up not doing because when you have little kids,
30:14
you have to structure your day really to the T to have your own time to do your
30:19
own things like training.
30:21
We touched briefly, I don't know if you want to share more, because I know that
30:26
some of the pro women are afraid to take time off for pregnancy and motherhood
30:32
and come back to the training, to the racing scene.
30:36
What could that impact them? And you already answered some of that.
30:41
And when you mentioned that you lost some of the sponsors.
30:44
I mean, I think that this experience varies wildly for everybody.
30:48
I think that it's getting better.
30:49
Like, you know, in 2020, when I had my son, there wasn't many women who had
30:53
had a baby and continued racing mountain bikes.
30:56
Like in running, it was more of a thing. So that's who I was looking to for inspiration.
31:00
But that just wasn't the case. So I was kind of one of the early people to do that.
31:05
And I think that in being one of those early people to do that with a few others,
31:09
that's helped make it better for people who are having kids now.
31:13
And also, there's other factors influencing this. I'm 41.
31:18
Maybe brands don't want to work with a 41-year-old. They'd rather work with
31:21
a 25-year-old. And that's fine.
31:23
So I don't think that women should wait. How I decided to have kids or my husband
31:29
and I decided to have kids, there's never going to be a good time.
31:32
If you are an athlete, there's never going to be a right time.
31:35
And so are you going to wait until the end of your career where maybe you won't be able to have kids.
31:41
Or maybe you wish that you had started sooner.
31:45
So I actually had kids at the peak of my career, which is kind of crazy.
31:49
Someone pointed that out to me the other day.
31:51
But it's because I knew there was never going to be a right time.
31:53
And I thought, again, thinking way into the future, using the strength of perspective,
31:57
am I going to regret not doing this?
31:59
Is my career as a cyclist, which is a temporary thing, is that more important
32:04
than having a family down the road?
32:07
And for some people, the answer might be yes, that is more important.
32:09
And that's okay. But for me, the answer was no, that's not okay.
32:12
Like, at some point, I'm not going to want to race my bike at the same level.
32:16
Maybe I don't even want to race my bike at all someday. And am I going to regret
32:19
making that more important than having a family?
32:23
And that's what helped me make that choice.
32:25
And then I had all these fears of, well, what if I'm not able to ride my bike ever again?
32:29
Or what if I can't train during my pregnancy? or what if I, you know,
32:33
all the what ifs, but I approached it just like everything else.
32:36
Well, you know, I see, I see all these other things. I'm just going to do it my way.
32:39
So, you know, I was able to train, like train.
32:42
I use that word lightly. I was exercising for health, but I was able to mountain
32:45
bike until the day before both my kids were born.
32:48
And I was fortunate because I know that's not the case for everybody,
32:51
but there's so much that you can do.
32:54
And I think that just in general, we always are thinking about all the things
32:57
that we can't do or all the things that might happen or all the reasons why
33:01
something might go wrong.
33:02
And we forget that there's a lot of things that are available to us.
33:07
And I was also fortunate with both of my births that I was able to get back
33:12
to riding very quickly afterwards.
33:15
So yeah, there's so much you can do. And I don't think you should have to give
33:18
up on who you are, on your identity, just because you have kids.
33:22
And this is what people send me messages about all the time.
33:26
Women, they say, I was so afraid to have a baby because I didn't want to give up who I was.
33:31
But then they realized afterwards that they didn't have to give up who they were.
33:35
Things change for sure, but you don't have to give up who you are because you
33:39
have a kid. And what we don't talk about with parenting is all the things that you get.
33:44
Whenever you hear about parenting, it's like, get ready. It's all the negatives.
33:47
Get ready to never sleep again. And like toddlers are so hard or teenagers are
33:51
so hard, like all these things.
33:52
And there are challenging moments, but man, there are a lot of amazing moments
33:57
and so many things you learn about yourself.
33:59
So parenting, I think is a positive thing. And we don't hear about that very
34:03
much. And even the way, I'm sorry, I know I'm ranting.
34:07
Even the way that we were given parenting advice online. It's like,
34:10
here are all the problems that are going to happen with your kids.
34:13
And here is why it's 100% up to you to fix it. And if you don't fix it, it's your fault.
34:18
Instead of like, here are all the amazing things about parenting.
34:22
And as my friend, my friend, Steph Tussignot, she's from the program I just
34:26
did, the master's program.
34:28
She does work with parents saying, parenting with gratitude about how you have
34:34
everything you need inside you already.
34:36
And I think the athlete moms need to remember that. You already are you.
34:40
You have everything you need inside of you. So don't be afraid to have kids
34:44
because someone else put a limitation on you.
34:47
That's an amazing message.
34:49
I really like that. And I think it's so important what you said about just asking
34:54
yourself and obviously the important thing is to You have the answer of what
35:01
is really important to you.
35:02
And if it is racing, do that.
35:06
If it is having a family, do that.
35:10
Don't do something out of fear and stay just racing and don't have a family
35:15
because you're afraid of the what-ifs.
35:17
And I also want to comment that I can't believe you're 41. You do look 25.
35:26
I want to go back to your podcast what inspired
35:29
you to start the sonia looney show and
35:33
what have been some of your favorite moments yeah and i just want to give a
35:38
quick tip that we're actually changing the name in january okay we're it's going
35:42
to be moving away from the sonia looney show to grow the good podcast wow i
35:47
like that and it'll be it'll have five pillars purpose vitality resilience, hope, and connection.
35:53
So yeah, I started my podcast, gosh, yeah, seven and a half years ago,
35:57
which is crazy to think about.
35:59
And it's been one of the best things I've ever done because of the connections
36:02
I've made with others, the ability to reach other people and really help them
36:06
through these guests and the learning journey that I've had.
36:11
I started the podcast because...
36:14
Okay. Cause out of, out of, well, initially I got rejected to go on a really big podcast.
36:18
Initially this really big podcast host, I had reached out to them and said,
36:22
I'd love to come on your show.
36:23
And they said to me, sure, you can come on my show. And then they just ghosted me.
36:28
So that sucked. However, that is what inspired me to start my own show.
36:33
So I thought, well, I don't need to go on so-and-so show. You know,
36:36
I don't want to throw this person under the bus.
36:38
So I thought, you know, I'll just, I'll just start my own show.
36:41
I don't need you, which is what happens a lot
36:44
like in my life a lot of the big things i've done is someone
36:47
tries to put a barrier or whether it's on purpose or not
36:50
in front of me and i just go around it like i'll just i'll just do it
36:52
myself so i started my podcast because of that like i have things to say i i
36:57
have lots of people that i know and so i did and it was a perfect evolution
37:01
from like blogging and social media because i started blogging in like 2006
37:05
and it's been awesome because i've gotten to talk to so many different people.
37:10
My favorite guests, it's just so hard to pick a favorite guest.
37:14
And I don't even know because it's been like 400 plus episodes.
37:18
Wow. My favorite guests are the ones where I really feel like the audience is
37:23
benefiting from something.
37:24
And they might have heard something that they haven't heard before.
37:27
Or guests who are maybe their top Olympians or top of their field in science
37:33
or something like that, where they are vulnerable.
37:36
And they talk about stories where I know that people are thinking to themselves,
37:40
Hey, I feel that in me too.
37:42
And I think a lot of times people look at top performers and they make them
37:45
other, like they think, Oh, you know, I'm not like that person.
37:49
And then they realize, wow, like that person is a human being just like me.
37:53
And whenever you see the common humanity, you can start seeing the potential in yourself too.
37:58
So it's not just seeing that, Oh, we share similar challenges.
38:00
It's, well, maybe I have something inside myself that is unique that I get to
38:04
express too. Yeah, yeah.
38:06
And now you can thank so-and-so because you started something amazing.
38:10
I am following. I love it. And I'm not just saying this because you're here.
38:14
I really, really like it.
38:15
I love the topics. It really resonates with me. So keep going.
38:22
It's evolved over time like it used to be about how
38:25
to live a high performance life and then it then
38:28
it evolved i realized kind of in line with what i was talking about
38:30
earlier it's not just about high performance it's about high performance and
38:34
well-being it's about balancing the two because you can have high performance
38:38
and not have any well-being you can have well-being and not have any high performance
38:42
and that that intersection of those two is a tricky area to play in.
38:48
Yeah. And how do you balance podcasting,
38:53
athlete, parenting, coaching?
38:57
Yeah, I mean, we talked about time management. I don't do everything all at
39:01
once. I call it intentional imbalance. So I don't try to be balanced.
39:04
So like right now, I'm really focused on the podcast. I've been recording lots of episodes.
39:09
I've been doing a lot of work so that I don't have to touch the podcast for several months.
39:13
And I have a team that I hired, shout out to Palm Tree Pod, so that I don't have to do that.
39:17
So I'll get hyper-focused in one area and the other ones will be there,
39:21
but I won't really be doing a lot in them.
39:23
And then I'll let that go. And then I will go to something else.
39:27
Like right now, I'm trying to get my master thesis published.
39:30
So that's another thing that is, you know, trying to rewrite like 100 page thesis
39:35
into a short journal article is really challenging.
39:38
And then next year, early in the year, I'll be focusing on writing my book.
39:42
So, you know, just choosing what the goal is, what is the priority,
39:46
pick one or two top priorities.
39:48
Then there's other things that are going to be kind of simmering in the background
39:51
that you touch, you move the ball forward a little bit, but you have to pick
39:55
things that are going to be taking the bulk of your time while touching the other things.
40:00
And then there's other priorities that are just always a priority.
40:02
Like my family is always a top priority.
40:04
That's not something I can just put aside, but there are periods where I will
40:08
spend even more time with my family, like coming up in the next couple of weeks,
40:11
our nanny is going to be gone.
40:13
So I'm not going to be able to work very much. So I'm planning ahead for that.
40:17
And then when I'm with my kids, I'm going to be like, I earn this.
40:20
I earn this time with them.
40:22
And there's times where training has to take precedent. Of course,
40:25
I'm always training, but I don't train big hours year round.
40:29
In fact, I rarely train big hours at all.
40:31
But there's times of year where the training becomes the primary focus and everything
40:36
else is a secondary focus.
40:39
So just making sure that you're intentional with what that focus is.
40:43
And that's hard sometimes because we always want to do everything and you can't
40:47
do everything all the time.
40:48
But you can do everything if you break it up into intentional goals and make
40:54
sure that you have boundaries around what those things are.
40:58
Yeah, makes sense. And you touched on training. How is your training?
41:02
I know you're in Canada and super cold winters.
41:06
Do you do a lot indoors? Do you take easier? Because maybe you're not as racing. It's off season.
41:12
Does the training peak more during spring and summer? How is your routine?
41:17
I'm a bit of an outlier, I think, when it comes to training.
41:20
I train less hours than most pros train.
41:23
I think part of that is because I have such a massive base for so many years
41:27
of racing that I'm able to do that. So I know not everybody can do that.
41:31
And honestly, I don't like training 15 to 20 hours a week. I just feel totally
41:36
imbalanced in my life and I just don't enjoy that.
41:39
I think a lot of people are overtraining, to be honest.
41:42
So for me, so when I lived in Colorado, It was different, but I've lived in
41:46
Canada now for, I guess, 10 plus years.
41:51
I ride the trainer a lot in the winter. We've moved in the last three years
41:55
to a more mild part of Canada on the coast, but,
41:58
So I ride outside a lot in the wintertime as well now. But previously,
42:02
I would ride the trainer all winter.
42:04
There'd be four months where I couldn't train outside.
42:07
And I would actually do a lot of my interval training in the winter.
42:09
So it's called reverse periodization.
42:12
So the winters would be the times that I would do most of my structured work
42:15
because I'm on the trainer and that's a great use of the time.
42:17
And then whenever spring rolls around, I would just start...
42:20
This is before kids, so I'm trying to give context.
42:23
I would just start racing in the spring so that my training and racing would
42:27
revolve around my race season.
42:29
And then, so the winters would be the time where I'd be doing structure training.
42:33
And then I would be using racing as a way to train and be doing more volume
42:38
stuff in between races. So that's a bit of a different approach.
42:41
Now my approach is more of a mixed approach.
42:44
The summers are more of the longer rides and the winters are still doing intensity
42:50
when I'm indoors. And then when I'm outdoors, working on my technical skills
42:53
and just trying to have fun because now I live in Squamish.
42:57
It's incredibly technical, very steep, very wet all winter long.
43:01
So I'm riding in the rain a lot.
43:03
And now I'm also trail running a lot. So a couple years ago,
43:07
I thought I need to have some more balance because I've been riding my bike
43:10
six days a year for a very long time.
43:12
And actually this winter is the first winter where biking is not a priority.
43:16
It's been a priority for forever.
43:19
I ride my bike one or two days a week and now I'm running like when I'm not
43:23
sick, like 40 to 50 miles a week on the trail. And I'm doing some trail running racing.
43:27
And that's actually helped my biking a lot. It's added more torque.
43:31
It's helped the mental side because I get a break from it.
43:33
It gives me more mental flexibility with my identity that, oh my gosh,
43:37
what happens if I don't ride my bike six days a week? Am I okay?
43:40
It's like, yeah, I'm okay. Like I'm really enjoying this other thing.
43:44
I get to learn how to like new skills as a runner, it offers that flexibility
43:50
and that novelty and that exploration piece.
43:52
And I know a lot of people do strength training. I wish I did strength training.
43:56
I'm not making time for that.
43:59
So yeah, I think figuring out what works for you and being able to evolve over
44:03
time. And there's no one right way to train.
44:06
And it's funny with training.
44:09
It's like, oh, I need to be doing a certain number of intervals or my coach
44:12
put four by eight minutes, so I have to do all of them. Those are just random numbers.
44:17
Yes, there is sports science behind training, but everybody is an individual
44:21
and you're a different athlete every single day.
44:24
So maybe one day you should be doing four by eight minutes. Maybe one day you
44:27
should be doing seven by eight minutes, even though it's prescribed that you
44:30
should have four by eight.
44:31
The best coach and the best training is to know yourself.
44:35
It's to figure out you and what are your inputs as an athlete because a lot
44:39
of people have different stresses in life, different priorities in life,
44:43
and it's very hard for a coach to know exactly what all those things are.
44:47
So the best coach is actually within you and knowing when you need to do more
44:52
and knowing when you need to do less and knowing when you need to just go home.
44:56
Yeah, just take that as a guidance. And I really like what you said that you
45:00
are now trail running and that helped your cycling, not on the physical side,
45:06
but on the mental side, because it took your mind off the bike.
45:10
And that's really good because I also been wanting to run lately.
45:15
And my coach said, it's not going to help your cycling, but now I'm going to
45:18
use the argument because it's going to be better for me mentally,
45:21
because I'd be craving that and maybe it'll be good for me.
45:25
And let me tell you ways that it actually does help your cycling physically.
45:28
Number one, if you're doing trail running, it will build your torque on the bike.
45:32
So I noticed because I've been doing this for three years, whenever I need a
45:35
little bit more power to get up and over a rock, like that type of torque,
45:38
you build that from trail running. So you're actually going to be better.
45:41
You're going to be building, you're going to have better balance and cross training muscles.
45:47
That's going to make you better and more injury resilient on the bike. and
45:50
also like riding your legs burn like crazy but
45:53
running they don't because it's different you don't have a machine under
45:56
you so you actually might be strengthening your respiratory system
45:59
or your cardiovascular system more as a runner because you're not limited by
46:05
like your legs in the same way you are on the bike so i think there's a lot
46:08
of benefit to running the hard part is like making sure that you don't get injured
46:13
running and making sure that you still if you're planning to keep riding,
46:16
you need to keep riding while you're running.
46:18
So riding a little bit. And there's different ways to do that.
46:21
Like you could go for a run and then come back and ride the trainer for 15 minutes
46:25
to keep the coordination and the neuromuscular part going for your riding.
46:29
Sounds great. I want to start doing that. All right. You should do it.
46:33
Report back. I'm on it. I'm on it.
46:36
And how is the mountain biking community, Snoqualmish? And what's that community meant to you.
46:43
Yeah, it's awesome here. Like, I wish I could say that I was more a part of
46:46
the community, but because of my schedule of my life, I'm not.
46:50
There's not many people that are cross-country oriented people.
46:53
Most people are like downhill or enduro. So the fitness piece is a challenge
46:56
to find people to ride with.
46:58
And then like a lot of the community events are in the evenings,
47:01
which I can't go to because I'm choosing not to go to because I want to be with
47:04
my kids. I want to put my kids to bed, like that kind of thing.
47:07
So I haven't really gotten to interface with the community a whole lot, unfortunately.
47:11
But overall, the community here is great. Like there's lots of different events.
47:14
The vibe on the trails is really good. Like when you see people out,
47:18
they're friendly. They want to show you their trail, like they're encouraging and excited for you.
47:23
Our trail organization is amazing. So personally, you know, I haven't been able
47:27
to really get into the community as much as I would have liked.
47:31
I know that's coming in the future.
47:33
And overall, it's just, it's great here. That's why we moved here.
47:37
Awesome. It came to mind now. Can you talk to me about your world championship?
47:43
How was that? Yeah, so it was in 24 hour racing.
47:47
So you race your bike for 24 hours straight and
47:50
it's all the all the 24-hour racing has a set
47:53
track so it's like a set course it'd be like a one lap
47:56
cross-country race you know hour to hour and a half is how long a lap would
48:00
be if you were just to do one lap so i'm just explaining 24-hour racing because
48:04
it's that was in 2015 and i don't even know how much 24-hour racing is a thing
48:08
anymore um i know there's a couple and you come through a pit kind of like formula
48:12
one where there's a support team.
48:14
So if you need to grab food or you need to like grab a battery for your lights
48:17
or whatever, you do that. And whoever rides the most laps in 24 hours wins the race.
48:21
And it was pretty funny. So I'd done lots of 24 hour racing.
48:24
I'd been national champion, but it would be like on a two person team or on a four person team.
48:29
I'd never taken on the challenge of a solo 24 before, but it was something that I wanted to do.
48:34
And I was doing lots of 100 mile mountain bike racing and I was doing really, really well at those.
48:39
So someone actually said to me, Hey, the 24 hour world championships are in
48:42
the U S this year. I think I'm going to go.
48:45
And they told me it was in California. And I thought, well.
48:48
I could drive there. It's like a 20-hour drive. Maybe I'll just go do it.
48:52
So I asked my husband to be my support crew.
48:54
So it's just weird because it's not something that I set out.
48:56
It wasn't a big goal that I had.
48:58
And I found out about it a month before and just decided, well,
49:01
I've done all these things.
49:03
I'll just go give it a go and see what happens. And I want to do one solo 24-hour
49:08
in my life. So I'll just check it off the list.
49:10
And I went down there and yeah, there was some great competition there like
49:15
the adventure racing world champion female was there and like all these like
49:19
well seasoned 24-hour racers but I just thought well I'll just see what happens
49:23
and I'll just ride my own race and I ended up winning so wow incredible yeah.
49:30
Congratulations that's amazing yeah I think it's funny though because then when
49:35
you win like it's it's a whole series it's the world so it's not a UCI event
49:39
it's a it's it's the WEMBO it's World endurance mountain bike organization.
49:43
And so they're their own organization and they have a 24, they still are doing
49:47
24 hour worlds every year and it's in a different country.
49:50
And so the next year it was in New Zealand and I didn't actually like 24 hour
49:54
racing, but because I won, I had to go defend my title.
49:58
And my husband's like, well, you got to go. And like, they pay for you to go. So, okay.
50:01
I went to New Zealand, but then I ended up crashing a few days before the race
50:04
and it hit my head. So I couldn't race cause I had a concussion.
50:08
And so that was like kind of weird, but it was also kind of awesome because
50:11
I probably would have won again.
50:13
And then I would have been on the treadmill of having to defend a 24 hour title
50:16
every year, even though I don't want to do it because whatever reason there's
50:19
like some natural ability there. So in a way, it was actually kind of good.
50:23
That's funny. Well, we didn't want to, you weren't sure about going,
50:27
so maybe I'll work out, but too bad it was like, you know, you had to go through a concussion.
50:34
Well, the universe works in strange ways sometimes. That's true.
50:38
That's true. So just a few rapid fire questions.
50:42
What's your favorite mountain bike trail or destination?
50:46
Exactly where I live, Squamish, British Columbia. Easy.
50:50
Pre-ride snack or ritual you can't go without?
50:55
Pre-ride snack. I usually eat just toast and almond butter. I don't really have any rituals.
51:02
So hardest climb or stage you ever faced
51:05
oh it's a
51:07
hard one i'll just go to nepal man the annapurna circuit racing your bike in
51:12
the highest mountain bike race in the world is pretty hard going up to throng
51:15
lot 18 000 feet hiking your bike through the snow in the dark that was the hardest
51:19
climb i've ever done wow wow wow wow i that's on my list not riding a bike but just,
51:27
hike and breathe that mountain air?
51:30
That'd be way better than carrying your bike on your back. I would not recommend taking your bike.
51:37
And if you could ride with anyone, past or present, who would it be?
51:41
Oh man, that's a great question.
51:44
Let me think about that for a second. You know, I don't have a good answer for
51:47
that, but I'll just say Nina Baum.
51:49
She was my mentor when I got into riding.
51:52
She and I have raced the Brazil ride on a team together, and I haven't seen
51:55
her in about 10 years and I would love to ride with her again.
51:59
Okay. Well, Nina. That's pretty easy. You know what to do.
52:04
Also, and it's been so lovely to meet you and have this chat with you.
52:09
I hope you have an amazing 2025 season and a great holiday coming up your two
52:15
weeks without the nanny emerged with the family.
52:19
And I'll be listening to your podcast. Can't wait to what's coming next. Yeah, thanks, Juliana.
52:25
It was great to chat with you. And thanks so much to the listeners for tuning
52:29
in. And it was such a pleasure. Thank you.
52:34
And that's all for today's episode. I want to thank the listeners for tuning in.
52:39
Your support means everything. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider
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52:49
Music.