Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - Javier Gómez, Champion Triathlete

Episode Date: September 26, 2018

This week’s conversation is with Javier Gómez, a Spanish triathlete.Since 2006, Javier has accumulated one of the best records in triathlon history.Javier is a 5x International Triathlete Union (ITU) World Champion, 2x Ironman 70.3 World Champion, a 9 time world ITU number 1, and won a Silver medal for Spain at the 2012 Summer Olympics in men's triathlon.Simply put, he is a legend in the sport.Javier is currently in the final stages of training for the Ironman World Championship, which will take place on October 13 in Kona, Hawaii. You can learn more about Javi's pursuit to win Kona here.For those unfamiliar with the Ironman, it consists of a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride, and 26.2 mile marathon run.No matter how you slice it, this endurance event is rugged, and that’s why I was so excited to talk with Javier about his experience preparing and training for it.Last year’s winner completed the race in just over 8 hours.That’s a lot of time for your mind to wander if you aren’t disciplined - and it’s something we discuss in this conversation.Javi shares how he manages positive and negative thoughts, his process for remaining calm, and how he overcomes intense pain during competition.So much of what goes into training and succeeding in endurance sports is applicable to other aspects of life.It requires persistence, an appreciation for the process, and a willingness to play the long game._________________Subscribe to our Youtube Channel for more powerful conversations at the intersection of high performance, leadership, and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/c/FindingMasteryGet exclusive discounts and support our amazing sponsors! Go to: https://findingmastery.com/sponsors/Subscribe to the Finding Mastery newsletter for weekly high performance insights: https://www.findingmastery.com/newsletter Download Dr. Mike's Morning Mindset Routine! https://www.findingmastery.com/morningmindsetFollow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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anything pretty much all right welcome back or welcome to the finding mastery podcast i am michael gervais and by trade and training i'm a sport and performance psychologist and the whole idea behind these conversations is to learn is to learn from people who are on the path of mastery to better understand the deep stuff, the good stuff. What are they searching for? What are they craving? What are they working to understand? And that really is part of their psychological framework. And then we want to understand the mental skills that they've used to build and refine their craft. Finding Mastery is brought to you by LinkedIn Sales Solutions. In any high-performing environment that I've been part of, from elite teams to executive boardrooms, one thing holds true.

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Javier Gomez, a Spanish triathlete. And since 2006, Javier, known as Javi, has accumulated one of the best records in triathlon history. He is a five times international triathlete union ITU world champion, two-time Ironman and the 70.3 world champion, a nine-time world ITU number one, and won a silver medal for Spain at the 2012 Olympics in men's triathlon. I mean, simply put, he is a legend in the sport. And Javi is currently in the final stages of training for the Ironman World Championships, which will take place on October 13th in Kona, the legendary Kona, Hawaii triathlon. And so for those unfamiliar with an Ironman, it is grueling. It consists of a 2.4 mile swim.

It's out in the ocean, 112 mile bike ride, and then to top it off, a marathon, 26.2 miles for a marathon run. No matter how you slice it, this endurance event is rugged. It is ridiculous. And that's why I was so excited to talk to Javier about his experience and how he preps and trains for it. And last year's winner completed the race in just over eight hours. But imagine eight hours, a full workday where your heart rate is pounding through your chest, where it feels like there's a stove inside of you that your body is so heated up.

And that's a lot of time to be able to manage your interior world. And that's just race day. That doesn't include what training looks like on a regular basis. So Javi shares how he manages both positive and negative thoughts, his process for remaining calm, and how he overcomes that intense pain during competition. So there's so much in here, so much more than just what it takes to perform at a highest level for a triathlon. This is really about life endurance. This is about managing the inner experience for all of us. And so much of what goes into training and succeeding in endurance sports, it's applicable

for us all. It requires persistence, resiliency, and appreciation for the nuances inside the process and a willingness to play the long game. So with that, let's jump right into this conversation with Javier Gomez. Javier, how are you? I'm very well, thank you. How are you? Yeah, good. Where in the world are you today? I'm in Spain in a town called Cáceres, towards the south of Spain, in a training camp. And okay, so what do your training camps look like?

Because you're training right now for Kona, is that right? Yeah, that's the biggest race of the year for me, and it's my first time going to the World Championships in Kona, so this is the final preparation for that race. So we chose this place because it's pretty hot. The weather is really hot, similar conditions to what we're going to find in Kona in one month. So yeah, doing the final preparations for that. Okay, good. So let's do this.

So I think that some people that are listening might not be familiar with what the world championships for iron mans are you know what is an iron man what does it mean to be invited or included in the world championships you know at the legendary race of kona so let's do a little history there right at the top and then let's go back to like why in the world did you get into extreme distance endurance you know like i want to go back there okay so let's let's do it yeah good good let's do a top view of um ironman in general and what it means to go to kona well ironman in general that's it's the longest distance in triathlon and it's 3.8 kilometers swim 180 kilometers bike and 42 kilometers of full marathon run and Kona has been traditionally the most important of those Ironman and it's the official world championships

and yeah in a really extreme environment in terms of weather conditions really hot really humid and racing against the best in the world it's not only the distance itself that it's hard to do, but do it faster than everyone else, which is the challenge and the most difficult of all of this. Okay. And then some people aren't familiar with kilometers and some of us are still stuck in the miles. So it's 2.4 miles in the ocean. True. Right? Yeah. 112 miles on the bike yeah and then 26.2 uh marathon at the to cap it off yeah yeah okay so all right why why do this to yourself why good question why um well yeah i started don't know, as a kid I was very active

and I started in sport through swimming in the swim club in my hometown. And when I was 15, I just decided that I wanted to try a new sport called triathlon that I wasn't really sure what it was about. But some friends convinced me to do my first one much shorter than the Ironman distance. It was what we call Olympic distance, 1.5-kilometer swim and 40K bike and 10K run. And even though it was a tough experience, I loved the sport from the beginning. And, yeah, I guess I had some good ability, some talent or whatever, and I put a lot of work and got better and better,

and it became my job. Luckily, for the last 15 to 20 years, I have been racing all over the world as a professional athlete with some good results, and I'm still enjoying it. At this point in my career, as I'm getting older, I guess it's a natural step to step up longer distances. And now my main goal is this Ironman in Hawaii. Yeah, okay.

Are you more natural in the water, on the bike, or running? That's a good question because at the beginning I was more natural in the water because of my swimming background but as my training progressed and I got better I think I'm I could be pretty similar in all three so but now I'm trying to be strongest stronger on the bike and also the run because just because of the fact that swimming you only only swim for 50 minutes in an Ironman. But cycling, you're going to be cycling for four and a half hours and you're going to run a full marathon, which will take about two hours, 30 something, two hours, 40. So you need to be really consistent on the bike and have a lot of endurance on that final run. Okay, so world-class time, is that around, if I add it up, is that around six hours? It will be about eight hours.

Eight hours? Yeah, yeah. Four and a half, okay. Yeah, eight hours in a tough race like Kona. In other races, people go under eight hours, but yeah, Kona's very special. It's not a flat course, it's very windy, the heat is brutal there. It's not a fast race but we would call it a fast race. Again, I want to go back to why.

I know that's the obvious question you get asked all the time but I'd like to hear it from you. What is it about distance and endurance that is fascinating to you? Well, I guess it was also my natural ability. I realized when I was in school that there were some kids faster than me when we were running in shorter distances. But I was faster than them and had more endurance than most of them when we had to run for a longer period. And I was always fascinated by endurance sports like cycling, running, swimming.

Yeah, I don't know where other in my swim club, I remember most of the kids, they wanted to do like shorter events, like 100 meters, 50 meters, really fast. And I was more interested in longer distances because it was my natural talent. And there's something about the challenge and about the physical pain that you have to hold for longer. I don't know. I guess to athletes like me, that's very exciting and really challenging. So we want to do it. It's very exciting. i'm training right now i i'm laughing because i don't find it exciting and i'm training right now for um it's a about a 30 mile ocean paddle and it's a stand-up paddle it's about 30 miles and world-class records around five and a half hours and i'm sure i'm going to come in

around seven and a half eight you know and it's hard it's just hard it's hard and it's very challenging for sure but when you see yourself improving progressing and and when you finally achieve your goal it's very rewarding i guess and and that's what we really like more than the pain itself that you don't really enjoy it when you're suffering, but you know why you do it, you know what you want to achieve and what drives you to, to try to get better. Okay. Let's go into that for you. What is it that you're trying to understand, unlock, experience? Those three words are important to me. What are you trying to understand, unlock, and experience?

I don't know. I guess he got to a point that this is my job and this is what I do and I just love doing it. But I think endurance sport like and makes you understand your body much better and the way you function and and what you can achieve try to find your limits or get as close as possible to them and and get to know yourself better i guess and under stress under tough conditions and under the pressure of a race and all those kind of things. What have you come to understand about yourself? Because yes, you spend a lot of time with yourself

in mother nature, right? And there's something, I want to call it almost magical when we're, are immersed in, you know, the, the, the, I don't know, just the wild. There's something really amazing about that. But what is it that you've come to understand about yourself? Well, you get to understand that your body can go much further than what you think. Things that seem impossible, they're not with the right work and with a lot of passion and a lot of effort, you might achieve things that you thought you wouldn't. And you learn to deal with difficult situations. You learn to deal with pressure. calm when things are tough or not going as planned because um i don't know maybe you know you're not

having a good day or whatever so you learn to be patient and know that with effort and with work everything uh you can achieve anything pretty much okay cool because you talk about learning like you learn to be calm you learn to be calm, you learn to deal with pressure, you learn to deal with setbacks, you learn that you can go much further than you thought possible, what is potentially impossible at one point in time. So if you learn it, that means that it's a skill. And I'm going to nod my head for sure that all of those are skills and then the gold dust is really how do you train those skills so there's like the old school way which is just put yourself in difficult situations and figure it out kid and then right and then we can use some modern science which is to deconstruct each one of those mental skills and say okay well how do you, and this is now a question to you, not like the world, but like, how do you deal with staying calm when it's to stay calm you learn that you might feel bad now

or or training session didn't go as planned or the race is not going as planned but you know that anything you know things can change and get better you have to keep pushing keep focused and also you use science of course in your training you work with my case you work with professionals that help you in different areas where it's training recovery and some people also work with psychologists to help them with mental strength to overcome problems and be mentally stronger so there are different tools that you have to use and depending on your character the type of person you are in in order to to make you stronger make you better okay so what i heard in there is that you use a optimistic framework right so you're grounded in it's going to get better like this is hard right now i'm suffering

but i want i want to do this and it's going to get better after I get through this difficult experience, this difficult time. I guess you have to think on your ultimate goal and know why you're doing this. And yeah, you have to be patient and go through that crisis or through that tough time thinking and hoping that a better one will come. And in a race, you always tend to think that your rivals are much fresher much easier than you when you're struggling but in the end of the day everyone has the same fears the same problems and the same suffering so you have to think that you can be stronger than them mentally and and most of the times or many times it's a mental game in the end the one who can hold the pain for a bit longer is going to be the winner in a professional sport.

So you need to be prepared and you need to be ready for that. Oh, I love that. Okay, so the one that holds the pain longer. Okay, hold on on that thought in just a minute because that's a cool thought, isn't it? Yeah, I mean it's not fun though. But if it was easy everyone would do the same so yeah so but that's part i want to i'm not it's not lost on me that you also said the second part is that you've got a team you know yeah physiologists of trainers nutrition

i don't know if you work with psychologists or not but that's a big part of the game so i want to put that a pin in that just a moment, come back to holding the suffering longer. So how, like how, what do you do to hold suffering? I believe a lot in my training and my work. So when I know that I'm well prepared, when I train a lot for a race, then I have the confidence during the race. And in those tough times, I think of all those, you know, all the training sessions I did, all the suffer I went through on training, and I know that the sessions eventually went well. So I think of all that, and that, you know, gives me the confidence to believe that I can keep pushing, keep going for a bit longer because I'm prepared for that.

You know, it's not something magical. It's not something like I'm trying to do something impossible. I just believe that I'm prepared for that. So I'm going to do it. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Momentus. When it comes to high performance, whether you're leading a team, raising a family, pushing physical limits, or simply trying to be better today than you were yesterday, what you put in your body matters. And that's why I trust Momentus.

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and body with the best, Momentus has a great new offer just for our community right here. Use the code FINDINGMASTERY for 35% off your first subscription order at livemomentous.com. Again, that's L-I-V-E Momentous, M-O-M-E-N-T-O-U-S, livemomentous.com and use the code F use the code FindingMastery for 35% off your first subscription order. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Felix Gray. I spent a lot of time thinking about how we can create the conditions for high performance. How do we protect our ability to focus, to recover, to be present? And one of the biggest challenges we face today is our sheer amount of screen time. It messes with our sleep, our clarity, even our mood. And that's why I've been using Felix Gray glasses. What I appreciate most about Felix Gray is that they're just not another wellness product. They're rooted in real science. Developed alongside leading researchers and

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it out of competition but when you're in training mode and you're suffering in training it's one of those grinding mid distance you know moderate p paste or whatever that's just kind of grindy for you and you're feeling that ache and pain and that toaster inside of you that is just basically overheating you know your internal cavity at least i'm starting to relate to that feeling i don't know if that's true for you. Is that true for you? Yeah, it is. I go through that many times, yeah. Yep. And then, so what do you say to yourself? Where do you take your mind during those moments? Well, sometimes setting smaller goals help. If you are, let's say, covering a certain distance and it feels too far for the pace you're holding, you try to say, okay, let's get through another K and then another one and then get some mental strategies and know that after that turn, it's going to be slightly downhill so you can recover a little bit and recharge for the next part and just just break the the distance for example in in smaller parts and and try to not think too far ahead but

just focus in one thing at a time and and and if you are well prepared usually you can you can go through it you know or sometimes it's smarter to slow down a little bit and and try to recover to face the last part of the or the event or the training or whatever so yeah you have to be smart and try to think what's right to do every time which is not easy when you're suffering and when your heart rate is 180 it's not easy to take the right decision sometimes but that's a matter of practice like almost everything wait a minute your heart rate is up at 180 when you're racing well mine i think doesn't go that high anymore but yeah yeah so it goes it can go pretty high depends on the distance and the intensity for item and races uh not so hard because such a long time that you cannot hold it for so long but for some training sessions some intense workouts it could be

and then so during let's go flip back to race day what is your average heart rate what are what's the ranges that you're in for most of the seven hours six hours it could be for me i'm my heart rate is pretty low generally comparing to other people and it doesn't really mean anything but um i guess about 145 to 150 maybe for such a long race but other people can hold 170 or 165 for the whole way so it's more depending on what's your max you know okay oh wow that's pretty intense because as i'm training right now like when it's the noticeable difference between 140 and 155 like i can it's like oh i'm up in a whole different zone now oh yeah yeah you can just end like yeah three or four heart rate beats more or less can really get, maybe that's

the difference between being able to keep going for one more hour or two more hours than not. So you have to know yourself very well. And for somebody like, I don't really know, this is the first time I've done anything at distance, any endurance. I'd rather hook myself off a 20 foot vertical in the back country of somewhere on skis than, than do this. Right. And so, but, but I want to understand what you're coming to understand. So I'm in the thick of it right now. And if my event is about seven and a half hours,

let's just say, where, where would you imagine, and maybe you can't even say this, right. But where would you imagine my target heart rate to be most of the time if in training I'm ranging between 130 and 160? that is good for you for such a long event. And usually what happens in my events is that people tend to blow up towards the end. So if you're smart, if you save energy for the last, let's say, two hours of the event, you usually are going to go much faster generally. So it's a long day. It's a long way.

So take it easy at the beginning and save for the second half of the event. That sounds like a pro. Right? Such a rookie move to come out of the gates flying. Okay. All right. That's the idea, but sometimes it's not easy to do it. You know, in a long competition, you go through so many emotions, and you feel good, and you feel bad, and you feel good again,

and you have moments when you feel good, and you tend to push too hard, and then you feel bad, and then the negative thoughts come to your mind, and you slow down. So, yeah, sometimes it can be a bit of a roller coaster. And what do you do with, what are the themes of negative thoughts for you before we get to like what you do with them like they're they fall in buckets right like self-critical self-doubt whatever i don't know

but what are your themes yeah it's not easy that but i think you've experienced that on training before so um um i tried to think that i've been in that situation before and usually if you keep going things will get better or you get to a part of the race that suits you more or suits you better so i just try to don't think too much but keep focusing my case one step at a time or keep focus on my on my you know on the bike and how i apply the power to the pedals or like small things that um so i don't think much of how bad i'm i am feeling or something like that yes you lock in to the small details, the actual present moment activity. And that occupies your mind rather than thinking about how hard, you know, how bad your feet feel or how bad your whatever feels.

Yeah, yeah. When you're going through a tough time, probably it's better not to think too much far ahead, but focus more on the moment, on little things, on your technique, on your technique on your stroke or your step or whatever but not not too much just until you feel a bit better okay and what is it let's go back to that that top question like experience what are you trying to experience what are you trying to unlock so what is it that you're trying to unlock within yourself or unlock? I don't want to narrow it just as yourself, but what are you trying to unlock?

Well, I don't know. I just, I guess it's a challenge for myself trying to, to prove that I'm able to do something that I want to do or if I have a goal whether it's a race or or or whatever it is I I want to prove that I can do it and that what makes me feel good so and that that ability of overcoming problems is what what drives me sometimes. And is your nutrition two days before? What do you do then? What do you do the couple of days or couple of nights before? Well, I guess I'm in a car uploading two or three days before the race. So I try to eat healthy or quite plain like not many sauces or or things that can be

heavy or hard to digest but make sure they take enough carbs especially and also some protein but nothing special really like a good plate of pasta some let's say grilled chicken or something like that even though i like to eat vegetables and i eat lots of those i try to avoid them uh two three days before the race just to make sure my my uh stomach my gut works well and yeah i'm loaded and full for for a yeah for an eight hours event and are you just on a general kind of note are you taking supplements or probiotics or are you taking things to support you not really sometimes i do i i do uh blood tests every whatever maybe two or three months and if there's something a lack of whatever say iron or or something then i would take a supplement. But otherwise, I believe more in a healthy, balanced diet and make sure I eat good product,

good stuff and enough. And if there's any need of supplement, then I would take it. Otherwise, I don't. Yeah, I'm the same way. I've really valued the blood work to tell, right. Rather than me guessing, it's like,

look at the bloods and then you can tell like, okay, this is what's working. This is what's not working. And here's some, you know, thoughtful ways to course correct. Yeah.

Yeah. I think it's, it's good to always also for that, to have someone who can advise you, um, like a professional of what you should tell you or you shouldn't but um yeah i think the the more the base is having a good uh and you know nutrition habits and then uh if there's any like just try to get a supplement to

uh to feel that yeah okay do you have a family structure are you married do you have kids is that i'm going to get married in december i have my my girlfriend we're getting married this december so yeah beside about us don't don't have kids yet not yet yeah okay because for me that's one of the challenges is like managing time. Yeah, I can imagine that. As I said, I know other triathletes, other colleagues who have families, and it's not easy. This involves a lot of traveling, a lot of time training, and yeah, it could be quite challenging to find a balance

between a family and professional sport, but I guess a lot of people can do it, so I guess it's just a matter of getting organized and having support as well from your partner. That's very important. Yeah, okay. So early days for you. What was it like growing up?

Yeah, I was lucky. I always had great support from my parents. My dad especially was really into sport, and he encouraged me to practice sport. He would take me to training sessions, to events, to competitions and he was very supportive of my mom as well. I surrounded myself with a group of friends who were into sport as well so that environment was quite good in order to to practice sport you know so I was I think I was quite lucky and I met my first coach as well who was a very important person for

me for my first 10 years of my sports career and he is an amazing man and I learned a lot from him in terms of training or competitions and stuff so yeah, um, yeah, I was lucky and you need to be a bit lucky when you're a kid because, uh, yeah, if you don't surround yourself with the right people, you probably will choose a different path and, and do different stuff. But I was lucky that I was in a very sporty environment. Was it competitive? Was it supportive? Was it aggressive? Was it cooperative? What was the tone of your group? your first competition even though it might be like just a local event for you you get i used to get more nervous back then than now when i'm racing world championships so um yeah you put that pressure on yourself and it's something good it doesn't have to be bad but um yeah i always had the support of my family regardless the results you know they never really asked for for results or be like junior champion or anything

like that all that came quite natural because i trained because i loved what i was doing but i i never felt really pressure from from my environment from people around me to to achieve you know the pressure come came later obviously because when you become professional then you have to perform and you have sponsors and you have um people around and then you need to get the results but when i was a kid i never felt any of that what a gift mom and dad gave you yeah yeah well i don't know everything seemed quite natural for me when I was at that age. When I see it now and I see other kids, maybe it's not that natural and that common. But I guess it also depends on you as a kid, you know.

I was competing since I was 12 or 13 years old. But I always knew my goals were later on in my career you know I was only a kid and I didn't care much about the results back then but I wanted to be a good athlete in the future brilliant okay and when so the goal as a young kid or the vision was for you to be a professional athlete and did you have an idea that oh did i get that wrong no well yeah i kind of i don't know i i guess i want to be a professional athlete and and but it seems so far away when you're a kid you know and i was always quite realistic and even though i wanted to to be a professional, I always knew that it was going to be very difficult. I would probably never get that far.

So I was focused and trained day by day, always tried to study at the same time. And as I got better and better and started to win local races and more national races I went to international competitions and and he got to a point when I was under 23 world champion that I realized that I had a good potential in this sport to be a professional and do well but yeah he was it's not that I was 12 years old and I thought I'm gonna be a professional world champion now I was 12 years old and I thought I'm going to be a professional world champion now I was just working for it slowly and you know step by step never too aggressive never I don't know I was with my feet on the ground but I guess with work things things just got better. And that kind of dream became true or closer as I grew up.

Beautiful. And what are some of those, you sound really grounded, like super connected to the long game, the game of life, rather than the game of grabbing medals and trophies, which you've done plenty of those. And so what are some of those guiding principles that support you and keep you, you know, your nose pointed in the right direction and your feet firmly on the ground? Well, I guess the fact that I was doing what I liked, you know, what I wanted to do.

Sometimes when you have a big race, you obviously think of the rewarding and the medals and what it would mean to be world champion and all that, but it's just the fact of doing what you want to do and what you like. I like training every day. That's what I did when I was a kid and what I did in my free time after school, and now that's what I do as a job, so I can't complain, you know. So I think enjoying the process is very important, as important as the medals and the winning races. Obviously, when you're a professional, you need to win and you need to do well in order to survive and be able to be a professional.

But you have to keep that same spirit that when you're a kid and you just do it for fun and because you like what you're doing, you shouldn't forget that. You know, sometimes it could be easy to forget because there's so many things around and so much pressure that could put you in a situation that you don't enjoy the sport that much. You know, I've seen a lot of people struggling with that. And sometimes even myself, I forget about it a little bit. But then you slow down and you think, why are you doing this? And you love what you're doing. You know, I love going out and train and try to be better every day. And, yeah, I just try not to think much about the medals and the races, but focus on the process and day by day try to get better.

Okay. And then let's say that somebody doesn't completely love what they do. They're doing it as a profession. You know, they're a professional, whatever, in a corporation or whatever. They don't completely love it, but they want to do great. They want to push in their potential in that environment. So I think it's amazing. Your framework is that this is what I did as a kid like you kidding me now they're paying me this is awesome yeah you know and so that love and that joy and that clarity helps drive that intrinsic motivation for

you yeah what i've seen and other people who might be very talented but if you don't have the passion and if you don't really like what you're doing it won't last long i've seen a lot of people like amazingly talented more definitely more than me um like doing well for a year or two and then just they can't keep the same intensity on training and and they just or they're just interested on different stuff and they and their lives go in a different way so i guess to last in the sport and to to do well for a long time you need to be passionate and you need to enjoy what you're doing you cannot really do it because you're a professional this is your job and then you get money because of this because this requires a lot of sacrifice a lot of training, and say no to lots of things as well.

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them out head to caldera lab.com finding mastery and use the code finding mastery at checkout for 20 off your first order that's caldera lab c-a-l-d-e-r-l-a-b dot com slash finding mastery and if there were say five people that sit at your board of directors for life right so there's a imaginary table and there's five people sitting at the table plus you or four people plus you, you know, whatever number we have here. And who are those people that are, and they could be dead, they could be alive, it doesn't much matter, but who do you bring to the table as guiding philosophies and principle-based people that help you become your best. Who would I bring to that table? You already have your community, right? Who are they?

Well, for sure, mainly the people that work with me. My girlfriend, who is very supportive and is a triathlete as well and she understands uh what i do and my coach uh he's been doing my training program and guiding me for a few years already and the physio works with me and and also trains with me sometimes you know it's my inner circle uh people who i trust you know my manager as well who more important they are all friends you know it's not only um like people who I trust, you know, my manager as well, who more important, they are all friends, you know, it's not only like people who are from me, but, but like friends that people that I get along with. Okay.

And then let's just go through a couple of them. What does your girlfriend stand for? What does she represent to you that is so attractive that you would bring her to the table? Well, because she's probably my best friend, you know, my girlfriend. She understands what I do. She sees me training every day. She knows the sport very well, too. And she's just very helpful, you know, even though she has her own goals and her own uh plans the in

terms of achieving in the sport as well but and there's certain periods of training that i need a lot of uh you know a lot of help from my people and she's always there and and um yeah she's very supportive and uh yeah and when i'm not training or when I can just forget about sport for a bit, she's a great person to hang out with. You know, we really enjoy being together. Okay, perfect. And so it's more support and fun and understanding. And then how about your coach?

What does he stand for? Well, my coach, even though he has only been working with me for four or five years actually when i did my first triathlon back in 1998 he was competing as well so we know each other for a long time and and we've been friends for a long time so it's important for me it was important when i decided to train with him that he already knew the way I worked or the way my personality and how things how I do things and he is very he has knowledge obviously, but he's very flexible as well. He understands me very well and Yeah, and we spent so much time together that it's important that we get along

Well, you know, this is not a normal job that you do your hours in the office and then you go home and forget about it. You know, we travel together. We are together when we train, but sometimes we are together after training as well in the hotel or like sharing dinners, lunch, whatever. So it's a lot of hours together. So it's important to get along well. Yeah, I would imagine.

Okay. Do you have any guiding principles in your life that really support you and keep you connected? I think I asked it in a different way before, but I don't want to water any thoughts for you, but what are those philosophies and guiding principles for you? Well, for me, hard work, passion, and do what you want in life is the most important. Whatever you choose to do has to be something that you're passionate about and just put the effort and the work and things eventually will work out. And for me, I don't consider myself a super talented athlete. I guess I have some talent, but I work hard

and I have a lot of passion about what I do. So that's for me the most important. And is your passion, it doesn't sound like your passion is to win, but I didn't ask you that yet. Are you trying to be better than others or your best? I love winning for sure, but I see winning as a consequence of the hard work. People tend to see us crossing the finish line in the first position,

and they don't see much more than that but there's so much behind that and and and all that work for me i know if i do things right i have the chance to win and then i have to uh to do it the day of the race but um yeah for me it's winning is just the one more part of the sport you know which is very important but there's a lot of things to focus as well and all a lot of work to do in order to achieve that so i don't think that much specifically on that but focus on trying to get better okay and just recently you i think it was the iron man in south africa where you took third place is that you know and and you have i'm sure you had your sights on winning but tell me about taking third tell me about that relationship between wanting to win but also wanting to do

your best like i'd love to hear how you manage that yeah that's the thing like like a third place could be really good or really bad depending for me like in south africa uh i had physical problems i i had really bad side stitches and they had to to stop during the run and and i know that there is where i lost the race you know and And so I feel disappointed and frustrated about that. There are other races like London Olympic Games, I got silver medal, but I know that I did the best race I could possibly do. And I'm really happy with that,

really proud of that result, even though it wasn't enough to win. There was just someone faster than me and I know the pace we run, I know how I race tactically and i know i did my best and i couldn't win but there are other times that i got second and i felt really frustrated because i know i made mistakes and i could have done better so that's what would annoy me but when i give my best when i do a good race you know sometimes you win sometimes you don't if

there's someone better there's not much more you can do the only thing is you can control is your strategy the decisions you take during the race and when i make mistakes is when i when i'm i get a bit frustrated but if i do things right and i don't win but i'm usually okay okay all right and then are you a rule follower or risk taker? It sounds like more you stick to the rules. Yeah, I usually stick to the rules and control. And when I train, I know the times and know everything exactly, control everything around but sometimes yeah you have to take different decisions and everything things don't go as planned but as you have in mind but um i try to yeah to be like follow the rules and do you listen to music or are you headphone free when you're in training i love music and i play guitar myself my free time when I can. And sometimes in some easy sessions I do listen to music,

but for the simple fact that during the races you're not allowed to listen to music. When I have a hard session I try not to do it and just to simulate the race situation and try to not have that extra motivation that sometimes music is to go faster because in the race you cannot listen to. You're doing as much as you can to mirror race conditions, right? You're training in a hot human environment right now to match Kona. Yeah, I think that's important. What do you wear like how do you make the choices of the gear that you wear and I'm asking because I'm not sure what I'm gonna wear

and I'd love to learn what it is that you're wearing yeah well in my sport there are so many decisions you have to take in terms of gear like with the bike different types of wheels or depending on the conditions of the if it's a tough course if it's windy or um and in terms of clothes you're wearing depending on on the conditions as well like in kona it's extremely hot and you have to calculate how much you should drink and how often you should drink how much you should eat so there's a lot of a lot to think it's not just go as hard as you can from the gun you have to uh think a lot and be very focused for a long time which is uh not easy so um yeah it's important too do you wear long

sleeves or yeah are you wearing long sleeves in the heat or are you wearing like tank top short sleeve yeah no i don't wear long sleeves i know some people do but um i think uh just put some uh sunblock to try not to burn myself but long sleeve could feels like it's going to be even hotter so i don't know i don't i don't feel that comfortable that comfortable with that and how about like when the goggles that you're wearing and or the shoes that you're wearing yeah well um i've been training with the shoes i'm gonna wear for quite a long time um and with on shoes my sponsor and and they have great stuff so i've been uh training with different models of their shoes for uh the whole year and i'm yeah especially when you

have to race a marathon uh in this tough conditions easy to get blisters so you need to be very confident with the stuff you're wearing you know from shoes to cycling shoes for your helmet uh with everything so uh yeah you shouldn't try new stuff for the day of the race but everything you do try to do yeah yeah that okay and okay so then let's flip gears to recovery what do you what do you do after the hard trainings every day like uh i'm i'm enjoying compression i'm enjoying some crowd therapy i'm enjoying some soft tissue works and light stretching yeah you know um meditation yeah the most important is to refuel like as soon as possible after a hard session in terms of drink and and food have a snack and have like a let's

say a recovery shake or something like that and um usually i work with my physio as well like a massage or help me with some stretching depends on the type of training I did before but yeah that's requires time as well so it's not just that you finish your hard work and you're free you know you have things to do after and yes just to keep your body healthy to be able to train again the next day. Yeah, and then literally what is the post-workout drink that you're doing? The post, sorry? Yeah, the post-workout drink. Is it carbohydrate-based?

Is it like something? Yeah, it's a mix. There's more protein as well especially to recovery after training and like my girlfriend most of the times make a very good nice shake with recovery protein powder but two to six is the brand that sponsors me and she adds different stuff like a banana or like some dry nuts and everything uh that you need to recover the calories and the proteins the carbohydrates and and also drink just water or or something with electrolytes to recover everything you lost in your training okay and then during the the event

are you using like carbohydrate-based drinks or electrolyte drinks or just pure water yeah and that's very important in a race like kona where you lose so much uh actually it's it's actually the key of the race being able to replace all the fluids and the calories that you need to take, which is not easy, you know, because you do your studies and they tell you you have to eat this many calories and drink this much, but in the end of the day, it's going to be that you have to drink for about, I don't know, 8 to 10 liters. And we use a lot of gels, like energy gels, which is just high carbohydrates, sugar, basically. And then you have to take about 20 of those, which is not easy

for your stomach to digest, especially under the stress of a competition. So you have to figure out yourself. Everyone works differently. What are you going to take? You know, some people like more solid stuff like energy bars. Other people just take gels and and drinks and in my case i do a mix of both i try to have a couple of energy bars to have something solid in my stomach and also gels and then with a drink also with uh with carbohydrates and with electrolytes as well very cool and so what do you what do you have your heart set on for life? And I know you're coming up on Kona. I know you're training your ass off there. And like, if you go, obviously you want, it sounds like you want to be your very best prepared going into the race to trust yourself,

to work through the suffering, to be eloquent in the way that you show up and finish. And if you win, fantastic. And if you come in second, third, tenth, but you gave it your best, like, you know, okay. Right? And then if you go bigger and you think about life mission, what do you have your heart set on? It's hard to know. Well, I mean, for me, I always wanted to be a top athlete and perform well. And I've already done that. I've been five times world champion in different distances.

And now I'm excited about this challenging corner. But for me, just enjoy life. I think it's the most important you know and enjoy what you do or all the time and that's that's a big success so I just want to keep enjoying what I'm doing and be happy with my job I can't think of having a job that I don't like like unfortunately some people do you know I just want to keep living this type of life and when i retire i would like to keep uh involved in in the sport because you know it's been my life and obviously in all these years i've been a professional i learned a lot and i hopefully i can teach some

kids or people who wants to train and and and be at this, I can give them probably some advice. Brilliant. And then if you had to give one little gem nugget of advice to, you know, the next generation of kids or executives in global workforces, what would that one little gem be sometimes it depends on the people but usually it's important to know what you want in your life you know and sometimes that takes time to to figure out to know exactly what you want to do what what drives you what's your passion and and and and once you know that just work for it and don't get and don't get caught up in little things, you know. But just see the big picture, see the main goal and try to work for that and have fun on the way. You know, I bet people in your life love being around you.

Hopefully. Yeah, I just get that sense. All right, so here's the last big banger you know um how do you think about or define or articulate or how do you think about this concept of mastery um well yeah that's that's a hard one um well i guess you you need to it's a matter of of practice you know a matter of going through different experiences and try to be open to learn and learn from people who know more than you especially when you're younger when you're growing up and try to be a sponge, you know, just absorb everything and, and, and work hard, you know, and, and with that,

you will just keep improving and be more, uh, and know more about yourself and know a little more, um, about your sport and just try to keep learning like that until you, you master what you're doing but it takes time it usually just takes time you know it does yes i i respect that and understand that for sure and i just want to say thank you for your time and best success thank you very much it was a great chat yeah for sure and okay so if people want to learn more about what you're up to, and the race at Kona, they can also go to is that on dash running.com forward slash hobby. Is that what it is? Yeah, there you can follow me, my path.

And that's j a v i on dash running.com forward slash hobby. Yeah. Brilliant. So thank you, Javi. Take care. Thank you. Brilliant. So thank you, Javi. Take care. Thank you. Bye. All right. Thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us. Our team loves creating this podcast and sharing these conversations with you. We really appreciate you being part of this community. And if you're enjoying the show, the easiest no-cost way to support is to hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you're listening. Also, if you haven't already, please consider

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