Raise The Bar
Raise the Bar is a podcast that explores health, fitness, and high performance through honest conversations. Hosts Ariel Comeau and Matt Duncan, experienced coaches, discuss research, lessons, and the realities of personal transformation with experts and high performers. The show aims to cut through noise and conflicting advice to provide actionable tools and mindset shifts.
Episodes
The Brutal Truth About Making It To The UFC | Cameron Rowston
Talent is highly overrated; undeniable execution is what scales. In this episode, Ariel Comeau and Matt Duncan sit down with undefeated UFC middleweight fighter Cameron Rowston (3-0 UFC, "The Battle Giraffe") to strip back the hyper-polished world of professional mixed martial arts and reveal what it actually takes to survive the trenches.If you are a martial artist, a personal trainer,
Where Should You Start in Health: Movement, Sleep, or Nutrition? | Coach’s Corner
In this Coach's Corner, the hosts reflect on their conversation with exercise physiologist Rob Lyon. They take two ideas from his episode and turn them into steps listeners can use throughout the week. The first is the lead domino, an idea that a single change makes every following event easier. They discuss how to use the mindset as a coach, from assessing training regimens to determining the bes
Exercise Physiologist: The Cardio You Need for Longevity | Rob Lyon
Training can be about more than numbers on a scale. In this episode, exercise physiologist Rob Lyon joins Raise the Bar to discuss his unique training approach and why he's chosen to focus on lifestyle changes and longevity over aesthetically based results. He explains the importance of family history and how to use it to build an effective training routine. Rob has spent more than 20 years in
Discipline or Control? What a World Champion Got Wrong About Winning: Coach’s Corner
After speaking with Hattie Boydle, professional bodybuilder and world champion fitness model, Ariel and Matt sit down to discuss a hot topic in the fitness community: discipline. Hattie’s story is a prime example of what discipline can achieve. Her strict training regimens transformed her body and ultimately led her to become a world champion. But her struggle to separate discipline from control s
Building Body & Mindset with World Champion Fitness Model Hattie Boydle
What happens when you finally achieve the goal you’ve been working towards, but it doesn’t change the way you see yourself?Fitness World Champion Hattie Boydle joins Raise the Bar to unpack what 15 years of bodybuilding has taught her about mindset, identity and the pursuit of ambitious goals. From being hospitalised at 16 to becoming a World Champion, Hattie shares how her understanding of discip
How to Train for HYROX: Building Your Aerobic Base, Strength, and Race-Specific Fitness | Coach’s Corner
After speaking with Ben Seymour, a former professional rugby player and ultra-endurance athlete, the coaches come together to discuss what a real HYROX prep block looks like. They break down what’s required and explore an issue many people run into when training for mixed sports: how to train properly. Your body can only do so much at one time, which is why it’s important to break up your training
The 16 Week HYROX Prep Plan a Pro Athlete Actually Follows | Ben Seymour
What does it take to keep performing at a high level when your priorities keep changing? Former professional rugby player and HYROX athlete Ben Seymour joins Raise the Bar to talk training, fuelling, recovery and the lessons he’s carried from professional sport into business and fatherhood. Ben shares the strategies he uses to keep pushing himself without pretending everything can be the priority
What Building Muscle Does for GLP-1s, Testosterone and Diabetes Risk | Coach's Corner
During this recap, Ariel and Matt reflect on their conversation with Dr. Steven Lu, a medical professional and founder of preventive health company Everlab. The Australian-based company focuses on longevity by testing early and taking a proactive approach to chronic disease. But the conversation brought up another topic for the hosts: exercise. More than a lifestyle element, movement is fundamenta
How to Catch Disease Years Before Symptoms Start | Dr Steven Lu
Preventative health physician Dr Steven Lu reveals why your "normal" blood test results may not tell the truth about your health, why one in three people are already insulin resistant without knowing it, and why a hidden genetic marker can triple your heart attack risk even with perfect cholesterol.Dr. Steven co-founded and became the Chief Medical Officer of Everlab, one of Australia's leading pr
Heart Rate Zones Explained: How to Train for Your First 5K | Coach’s Corner
The coaches sit down to unpack their favorite moments from the Jay Stevens and Jen Irvine episode, including news that broke after the interview: Jay's successful 24-hour world record treadmill walk. The hosts break down the mental models Jay built to survive an 18-hour dark patch, why a ten-minute break was strategic at hour eleven, and how he used hydration to bring his mind back in focus. A
How to Create a Resilient Mindset from a Paraplegic Endurance Athlete & Ultramarathon Coach | Jay Stevens & Jen Irvine
When the odds are stacked against you, you have the option to choose to make the impossible achievable. Don’t believe it? Paraplegic endurance athlete Jay Stevens and ultramarathon coach Jen Irvine reveal how a helicopter crash and a slipped disc from a TikTok challenge became the starting point for two of the most demanding endurance careers in the country. In this episode, they walk through the
Coach's Corner: Why Rest and Work Are the Same Process
A few weeks aftersitting down with Nic Monteforte, Ariel and Matt come back to the conversationto ask the only question that matters: what actually stuck? For Matt, it wasone line, "the calmest person in the room always wins," and the quotepinned above his desk that it dragged back into view. Between stimulus andresponse there is a space, and in that space is our power to choose ourrespo
Stress Expert on Burnout, Nervous System Repair and Expanding Capacity
Executive coach and stress expert Nic Monteforte reveals why the problem isn’t being stressed, it’s staying stress, why sixty seconds of something physical restores a brain that has stopped thinking clearly, and what the hardest decade of her life taught her about the power of calm.Nic Monteforte spent close to thirty years in leadership, coaching and peak performance, becoming the inaugural femal
Coach’s Corner: Willpower Won’t Make You Consistent with Exercise
After sitting down with Gordon to unpack the science of motivation, Ariel and Matt do what most shows skip: they go back and ask what actually stuck. The answer, for Ariel, was a ballet class — her first in eighteen months. Not because Gordon told her to, but because the conversation reminded her that movement is a gift with an expiry date on certain forms of it. "If I don't start doing t
Psychologist & Exercise Scientist on Why Knowing You “Should” Exercise Isn’t Enough | Dr Gordon Spence
Coaching psychologistand exercise scientist Dr Gordon Spence reveals why thirty years of healthmessaging has failed to make anyone move more, why the reason behind your goalpredicts how long you last better than your discipline does, and how the questionsa coach refuses to answer for you are the ones that change your behaviour.Dr Gordon Spence holds aPhD in coaching psychology from the University
How to Maximize Muscle Growth (In Way Less Time) | Coach's Corner
A few days on from the Tony Boutagy episode, Ariel and Matt sit down to unpack what actually stuck. What starts as a debrief turns into a working session on the ideas that changed how they are writing programs: that research gives us principles and not prescriptions, that mechanical tension is the driver of hypertrophy, and that a lot of the volume we have all been chasing sits well past the point
Everything We Got Wrong About Building Muscle | Dr Tony Boutagy
Exercise scientist Dr Tony Boutagy reveals why one or two hard sets are enough to build significant muscle mass, why soreness is not a sign of muscle growth, and how you can train your entire body in twelve minutes.Dr Tony Boutagy holds a PhD in exercise and sports science and has spent more than 30 years working in the fitness industry, educating over 50,000 coaches along the way. He has built hi
Coach's Corner: What We Took From the Sheridan Skye Episode on Women's Health
Ariel Comeau and Matt Duncan sit down after the Sheridan Skye conversation to unpack what stuck with them, and the honest answer is that a single statistic reframed the whole thing. Only about 20% of women resistance train. Both hosts admit they were floored, because inside the fitness industry it can feel like everyone already knows better. That gap between the bubble they work in and the reality
Why Women Should Strength Train with Women's Health Expert | Sheridan Skye
Registered nurse turned strength coach Sheridan Skye reveals how 80% of women skip the one thing that protects their independence as they age, what the cycle syncing trend was actually built on, and why "for research purposes only" means you are the research.Sheridan Skye spent 15 years as a registered nurse, including intensive care and a stint as a nursing officer in the Air Force, before she le
Coach's Corner | Sebastian Oreb: The 8 Essential Strength Categories
Ariel and Matt reflect on a recent conversation with elite strength coach Sebastian Oreb, diving deep into the mindset shifts required for professional and personal growth. They discuss the power of taking on opportunities before you feel fully ready and how leaning into self-doubt can serve as a powerful indicator that you are successfully stretching your limits.The conversation also breaks down
Coach to the Strongest Man Alive On Breaking Plateaus and Building Max Strength - Sebastian Oreb
Strength coach Sebastian Oreb, The Australian Strength Coach, reveals why maxing out every week is the reason you stopped getting stronger, how long you should really be resting between heavy sets, and the four-week model behind the heaviest deadlift in human history.Sebastian is the coach behind Hafthór Björnsson, aka Mountain from Game of Thrones. He coached Thor through breaking multiple world
How to Stay Healthy When Life Gets Hard: Shona Vertue
Shona Vertue has built one of Australia's strongest fitness brands - over 600,000 Instagram followers and 25,000 people inside her online training system. At the height of that success, she went back to university to study psychology, and in this episode she explains why understanding the mind became just as important as training the body. Drawing on her path through competitive gymnastics, ballet
Raise The Bar Trailer
Health and fitness advice is everywhere right now — the problem is most of it contradicts itself. Raise the Bar is a new podcast powered by One Coach and hosted by Ariel Comeau and Matt Duncan, two coaches with a combined 30 years in the health and performance space, built for people who are tired of quick-fix answers and want to actually understand what works and why.Raise The Bar brings real con
