Shaun Stephens-Whale is a Spartan Pro, Elite mountain runner, and seasoned bear fighter. He stops on the podcast for the  first installment of an ongoing series of athlete-focused interviews called "TORC Talks."We talk about how he found immediate success as an OCR athlete and what he needs to do to improve his overall speed so he can get next-level results. We also touch on how ninja warrior training in a gym setting can help your OCR performance and what to do. Plus we get some storytime on his bear encounters. TORC is an acronym for The Obstacle Racing Collaboration. TORC is a team of elite athletes who will be working together to help get better results to push the sport forward. The team is compromised of 15 members - some you may know, some you will get to know.See the full roster here. Follow on Instagram hereThe TORC talk will give you the nuts and bolts behind what these high-end athletes do to prepare themselves for training and racing. Today in the first installment of TORC talk you will get to know Shaun Stephens Whale who is fresh off of a third-place finish in OCR Stars. We talk about his background as a mountain and tower runner and how it has prepared him for immediate success in OCR. Then we dive into some of the things he plans to do to take his results to the next level.Follow Shaun @verticalrunning_eh