Emily Lever Coaching Podcast

About Emily Lever Coaching Podcast

The Emily Lever Coaching Podcast is hosted by experienced fitness and nutrition coach Emily and her husband AJ Lever — both nurse practitioners — who bring honest, practical conversations to anyone looking for a more sustainable, grounded approach to health. Together, they break down realistic nutrition, efficient fitness, mindset shifts, and the "why" behind healthy habits, all through the lens of their clinical experience and years of coaching. With relatable stories, clear explanations, and zero guilt-driven advice, Emily and AJ offer supportive, sustainable strategies that fit into real-life schedules for parents, professionals, and anyone ready to feel better in their body and daily routine.

Publisher

Emily Lever

Category

health & fitness · health & fitness

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

30 Nov 2025

Latest episode

5 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

47 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   5 Oct 2026

   47. Stronger Miles: Why Runners Should Be Lifting Weights

   This week, we dive into why runners, and endurance athletes of all kinds, should be incorporating resistance training into their routines. We break down how lifting complements running by improving running economy, reducing injury risk, strengthening connective tissue, and building the muscular support your joints need to handle thousands of impacts per run. We also cover specific movements to prioritize, how to program lifting around your running schedule, and why strength training shouldn't compete with your endurance goals, it should support them. 5 Key Takeaways: Strength training improves running economy. Just like a fuel-efficient car uses less gas at the same speed, a stronger, more efficient runner expends less energy at the same pace, reducing stress on the body with every mile. Your muscles are your joints' shock absorbers. Stronger quads, hamstrings, and calves absorb impact that would otherwise go straight to your knees, ankles, and bones, think of muscle as a "sink for force" that protects your joints. Running is inherently unilateral. Since you're only on one foot at a time, single-leg resistance work (Bulgarian split squats, step-ups, single-leg RDLs, lunges) directly supports the movement pattern of running. Balance your training budget. You can't spend all your energy on lifting and expect to progress as a runner. A good ratio is 3–4 run sessions to 2 strength sessions, with thoughtful scheduling, don't crush a heavy leg day right before a long run. Target your resistance training to your sport. Runners should focus on squats, hinges (deadlifts, hip thrusts, kettlebell swings), calf work, and core, including rotational work, rather than following a generic bodybuilding split. "What if becoming stronger actually helps you run more efficiently, produce more force, you tolerate your training better, especially if you're doing something like really endurance, like an Ironman or a marathon. Your training is intense and takes a toll, so whatever you can do to help you tolerate and manage that better, and potentially reduce your risk of injuries." - AJ Connect with Emily and AJ Website: https://www.emilylevercoaching.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bedellever/ References https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s44410-025-00011-9 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31377851/ Enjoyed the Episode? If this conversation resonated with you, make sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with a friend who's stuck in the start-over cycle. Your support helps more people find the podcast and build healthier habits that last. Until next time—keep showing up, stay consistent, and remember: small steps add up to big change.

2. 

   28 Sept 2026

   46. Your Gut, Your Brain & Your Performance: The Science Behind the Connection (Part 2)

   In this episode, the Emily and AJ dig into the gut-brain connection, busting the myth that gut-produced serotonin directly controls your mood, and explaining how exercise redirects blood flow away from the GI tract, causing the nausea, cramping, and bathroom emergencies endurance athletes know all too well. They close out with practical guidance on tuning nutrition, hydration, and training around your body's individual GI responses rather than chasing a one-size-fits-all "perfect plan." 5 Key Takeaways: Your gut produces ~90% of your body's serotonin, but that serotonin can't cross the blood-brain barrier — so gut health doesn't directly "fix" your mood or depression the way people assume. Feeling better after improving gut health is likely an associative effect (better digestion, sleep, and energy), not a causative boost in brain serotonin. During intense or prolonged exercise, blood flow is diverted from the gut to the muscles, heart, and lungs — a process that can trigger nausea, cramping, bloating, and diarrhea in endurance athletes. GI distress during endurance sports is a "perfect storm" of heat, dehydration, physical bouncing, and hard-to-digest high-glycemic fuel (like gel packets) hitting a gut with minimal blood flow. There's no universal "perfect" nutrition plan — timing, food quality, and individual GI tolerance all matter, and the only way to dial it in is by testing how your own body responds. "Remember that your body is a very intricate system, and you can't always isolate nutrition from stress. They truly go hand-in-hand, and you also can't isolate digestion from your nervous system. So if you're looking at it that way, you basically can't isolate performance from recovery either." - Emily Connect with Emily and AJ Website: https://www.emilylevercoaching.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bedellever/ References https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s44410-025-00011-9 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31377851/ Enjoyed the Episode? If this conversation resonated with you, make sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with a friend who's stuck in the start-over cycle. Your support helps more people find the podcast and build healthier habits that last. Until next time—keep showing up, stay consistent, and remember: small steps add up to big change.

3. 

   21 Sept 2026

   45. Your Gut, Your Brain & Your Performance: The Science Behind the Connection (Part 1)

   Ever felt butterflies before a big presentation, or a stomach-drop when you're stressed? That's not "all in your head", it's the gut-brain axis at work. In this episode, we break down the science of how your brain and gut constantly talk to each other through the enteric nervous system, the vagus nerve, and the HPA axis. We cover why blood flow matters for digestion, how stress and cortisol shape your gut health, and why everyone's stress response looks different, plus practical takeaways on eating around workouts and managing chronic stress for better digestion. 5 Key Takeaways The gut-brain connection is real and two-way. Your gut and brain constantly communicate through the enteric nervous system, vagus nerve, and hormone signalin, it's not "in your head," it's physiology. Everyone's stress response is unique. Some people get stomach butterflies, others get chest pain or nausea, your gut-brain connection shows up differently than someone else's, and that's normal. Blood flow timing affects digestion. During exercise, blood is diverted to your muscles; you need to wait for hunger cues (signaling blood flow has returned to your gut) before eating a full post-workout meal. Cortisol isn't the enemy, dysregulation is. Cortisol should rise and fall throughout the day and spike appropriately with stress; the real problem is when it stays chronically elevated (or chronically too low). Chronic stress blocks "rest and digest." Staying in sympathetic (fight-or-flight) mode prevents your parasympathetic system from supporting proper motility, secretion, and nutrient absorption. "My point is recovery exists in all aspects of stress. Stress is actually a very positive thing. It's how we change. It's how we grow. It's just what we do afterwards to help recover from that in other forms."- Emily Connect with Emily and AJ Website: https://www.emilylevercoaching.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bedellever/ References https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s44410-025-00011-9 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31377851/ Enjoyed the Episode? If this conversation resonated with you, make sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with a friend who's stuck in the start-over cycle. Your support helps more people find the podcast and build healthier habits that last. Until next time—keep showing up, stay consistent, and remember: small steps add up to big change.