That Triathlon Life Podcast - Episode 200! Celebrating and taking live calls from listeners

Episode Date: January 15, 2026

Make sure you watch this episode on YouTube!This week we’re all together in Bend, Oregon recording our 200th podcast episode. For this milestone, we set up the cameras and did something a little different, calling podcast listeners live and letting them ask their most pressing triathlon questions.More than anything, this episode is a thank you. Thank you for sticking with us over the years, saying hi at races, sending in questions, and sharing the stoke that keeps this podcast going. We’re incredibly grateful for this community and excited to keep building it together.Here’s to the next 200.To submit a question for the podcast and to become a podcast supporter, head over to ThatTriathlonLife.com/podcast

Hey everyone, welcome to that triathlon life podcast. I'm Eric Lauggestrom. I'm Paula Finley. I'm Nick Goldstone. And welcome to our 200th episode. Wow. Wow is right. You know, actually somebody recently told us that we say wow a lot, so we thought it would only be fitting to say wow at least 10 times in the first 30 seconds of this podcast. You know what else is fitting? Sir Flynn is right here taking a well-deserved nap. Yep. Just off camera. So if you have, I haven't been following along in the buildup to this. We are all three in Bend, Oregon, in I guess what you might call the podcast studio slash my office. We are on camera. So hello.

There are a couple different ways you could watch this. We're going to try to get up on Spotify, but it is definitely going to be on YouTube. So you can see our smiling faces and see how much fun we're having. And you can also see this massive pile of 200 donut holes. Or Timbits, depending on where you hail from. They're definitely not Tim. because we didn't buy them at Tim Hortons.

Okay, Paula, do you remember, this is going to be a kind of a reflective episode, but do you remember when you claimed that in a 24-hour period, if push came to shove, you could eat over 700 timbits? Yeah, I stand by that. Looking at them now, this is 200. Well, I thought of the idea. We were trying to think of something special for 200th episode, how we could incorporate donuts.

And for the 100th episode, we did a long jaw on two circles equal to look like 100, but it was kind of lame. It was, excuse you, I thought it was brilliant. It was cool, it was cool. So for the 200th episode, we decided to get 200 donut holes. And I thought we'd go to pick them up at the donut store and they'd be like, wheel up your car, we'll bring them out on a pallet. Hope you brought a truck.

Hope you brought a truck and some extra people to lift these. But they just like handed us one box. Right. And I was like, okay, so this is like a third, right? Or a quarter. But no, that was 200. So 200 donut holes doesn't look like that much. like I could eat all these.

I was thinking of which. Can we now, can we now eat one of these? Sure, we might as well Chris in the bottle. Yeah, and then my sister had the idea of we can't stop recording until we eat all of them. Yeah, that's an ER visit right there. No way. We, the three of us could do it and then we ruined the rest of our day, I think. Well, I think we could each eat 60 of these like no problem and Flynn would eat 20.

Oh, so Flynn's helping out. Well, then I'm sure we could get rid of these in two minutes. Anyway, just so you all know these will not go to waste, we will either eat them all or we will give them to our friends. Yeah. I guess if you're,

this happens to be the first time that you're seeing us. Paul and I are both professional athletes. Nick is a professional musician. We do this podcast together. Normally, Nick's in Santa Monica and we're doing remotely. These are the most fun episodes we do

when we can look at each other's eyes in real life, not virtually. And normally what we do is we take a bunch of questions, people ride into the podcast via the website, if you had an email, Paul goes through it, and it goes through it, and then we read them. Today, extra special,

we're going to be calling people because we collected some phone numbers, and we're going to have people ask us questions in real time. Can't prep, can't make it up. We basically, we gave people a window, so they shouldn't somewhat expect it, although we got hundreds of phone numbers, so the chances of us calling you are fairly low.

So there should be still an element of surprise when people pick up. We hope so. And we did this for our, we've done this twice before, and it's always really fun. First, we're going to take a little bit of a trip down memory lane because, was it yesterday, Nick? It was five years to the day. Yesterday was the first time that we met, sweet little Nick.

Yeah, it was not far from here at all. It was at a, what's the name of the river run park? It doesn't matter the name, but yeah, we went for our first run five years ago, which is crazy because it really feels like we've known you since birth. Yeah, I know. I know. But five years is, I mean, I guess it's a long time, but also it's not a long time at all.

I was telling Eric, that did you feel like a sister, like my sister? Yeah, I feel like you're my brother because I can like just, I have no hesitation just giving you shit any time. Oh, really? You've gone way past the friend zone and you're like the brother or the mom's zone or somewhere in there? Can I go backwards? And I definitely don't treat you like a husband.

No, no. Lucky for you. Yeah. That's the best case scenario. Yeah, I guess so. I don't know if there's anything we want to touch on over the past year, the past couple years, but we've had a blast that puts us at what we've been doing the podcast for four years, I guess, 52 weeks in a year. This is the 200th episodes.

So I don't know. And we've been through a lot of stuff and it's been a lot of fun. Yeah, I think if you went back and listened to the early episodes, we would sound different. We would be. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, it might be kind of fun to go listen to a couple of them. I can't stay on the sound of my voice back then. I feel like I sound a little bit more.

fake. Like I was trying to do a podcast voice. Interesting. And now I just, since we do it so much, you can't fake it. You just, this is what we are. Right. I wonder if people who binge it, like, who, who discover it and then listen to a bunch of episodes in a row, if they can tell. Because I think week to week, you probably can't. But if you're listening to like three in a day, you know? No, it's like when I go back and literally. I'm like, totally, totally, totally. Well, I would have never, I don't know, did you think we'd make it to 200 episodes when we started?

I figured we'd run out of content, like, ideas or questions around like 50. Right. But here we are. Yeah, every week we still get amazing questions. So I think it's appropriate to say an enormous thank you to everyone who's listened, who's sent in questions, who's a podcast supporter, who, you know, keep this running essentially, make it so that we, it's a little bit profitable. Yeah. And it's not just a for fun thing anymore. So it is fun, though.

Keep listening. Yeah. And so I guess on that note, before we kick things off, we never do ads on this podcast. There are no sponsor of the podcast as of yet. But if you are watching this on TV, you can see that in front of us, we have some incredible looking new TTL mugs. And we are teasing a new coffee collaboration that we're going to be doing with Thump Coffee here in Bend.

So those are kind of the ways that you can support the show. You can write in questions. You can support the podcast directly by being a podcast supporter. and then you can always buy the really fun stuff that we cook up with that triathlon life. I guess merchandise. Is cooking up coffee? Is that appropriate use of language? Roasting.

Roasting, right, of course. Yeah. And we helped pick out the exact roast of this. This can be really awesome stuff. And there's a incident as well. So that's the end of the spiel. Team TTL members all got some instant in their boxes. And there was some feedback that it's like the best instant they've ever had,

which we already knew. But it's nice to like put it in people's hands and have them. confirm that this instant coffee is not like Starbucks. It's not like Nesquick. It's like truly made from the actual beans that Bobby roasts at Thump. And it's real tasty. So that'll be available to. Yep, that'll be coming out in February. So keep an eye out for that. Love it. Okay. Well, let's start with some phone calls. Yeah. Okay. And this is going to be completely random. Yeah, it's mostly random. But there's a couple of people that we... There's going to be some people that are very clearly not random. Like, since day one, they've been

super fans. Right. So we're going to give them a call to. Okay, let's see here. What if we call Lindy Kent? Do you guys remember Lindy? Oh, of course. We know Lindy.

Because she's popped up on my screen here, and we tried to call her the first time, and she didn't pick up because it was a random number or something, and then the second time she gave us the wrong number. Yep. I don't know if we want to put this in here. But when we first started doing, like, the podcast, the Instagram, Lindy was like one of the number one comments like always commented on literally every story

and still does. But her avatar, her picture on Instagram is like a, it's like someone doing bobsledders. I mean, it's like, it looks like a bat. Yeah, it's hard to tell. So we're like, who is this person? And then she came to Lake Las Vegas T-100 last year and she's like the sweetest lady.

Oh my gosh, she is. And like super put together and she was, I mean, we couldn't believe it was her. We're like, Lindy, you need to change her profile picture. Yeah. And I think I took a photo of her to. I'm like, use this. Okay, well, I have, I have the number ready. Okay, let's do it. Are we ready? Yeah. Hello. Oh my gosh. Yes. Third time's a charm, Lindy. You are on the TTL podcast right now. Finally, you've made it on. How does it feel? What is happening? Oh, my gosh. Tell, where are you right now, Linda? You're the first caller that we're going to have today. We chose you first. It was a combination of random chance and memory that brought us here. And just, and just feeling sorry for me, right?

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I'm giving you the right phone number thinking you were a spam car. We already actually went over that. Yeah, yeah, we mentioned that. Okay, well, Lindy, this is your chance to ask us a live question about triathlon. So what do you got for us? Well, first, I just want to say I got my TTL team box and the quality is off the chart. Oh, good. Love it. I'm telling you, it's, yeah, it is beyond quality. It's so exciting.

Can't wait for this year to begin. Oh, nice. Thanks for being on the team. We're so glad you joined. Stoked is what you would always say. Yeah, we would say that. The boys would say that for sure. The boys, that's right.

I'm sorry, the boys. Okay, my question is, and this is really, kind of a I don't know psychological type question but I run on this amazing road

through the woods it's soft packed it goes past a waterfall it's just amazing I don't wear a watch I don't listen to music because it's just so beautiful

but my mind sometimes will wonder and I'm looking around you know I'm solving all the world's problems of course and, of course, looking out for bear. But I realize that I'm running the tangents automatically of this curvy road when I finally start to focus.

And I think, do we do that consciously just out of repetition? Or is it actually a cognitive process, do you think? I just found it really unusual. And I don't know, maybe it's just something I do. I don't know if others do it, but I don't know. That's interesting. Yeah, I've never thought about that. But the fact that you're running without a watch, you don't care about the speed necessarily,

but you're still running the tangents. It must be, you know, you're not thinking about it. But I think inherently because we race and because we do workouts, you want to take the shortest line. And I don't think it's a bad thing subconsciously to do that because when you are then competing, it's honestly going to save you a lot of time to do that. So that is such an interesting question. Yeah, I just find, I just didn't know whether all of us have a tendency to let our mind go beyond our pace and so forth, that we just generately do that. And I kind of, I'm, my background is the animal field.

And I keep thinking it's like imprinting, you know, when the mother and the baby are imprinted because that's what they're taught. they automatically do that as a behavior. And I'm thinking, is this, is this us or is this just something we do because we've done it for so long? So that was my question. If anybody else experiences that as well. Yeah, for sure. I also experience this, I guess even while trail running, you're taking the shortest line. And I don't think it has anything to do with speed, but if I had to put a guess on it, it's like, I want to go further.

And these little, like, micro shortcuts or whatever allow you to potentially go a little bit of first. a little bit further with the time that you have. And that's just like drilled in so deep. And yeah, I wouldn't have ever thought about it until you just brought it up. Also, if you're thinking about like a bear trying to get from point A to point B. He's not taken to wide. No, he's going tangent. Efficiency has allowed us to prosper as a species.

Yeah. It's probably locked in pretty deep. It feels like a psychological representation of what we do physiologically by training. We make our body more efficient. And by taking the tangents, you're making your route more efficient. Yeah. Saving calories for famine. Yeah, exactly. Although the one time that I don't is if you're like riding on a bike path, you have to stay to the right.

Because if you take the tangents, you're going to go head on to someone. Yeah, yeah. So there are situations where nurture takes over. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good point. So I just thought, well, I know. And I was going to write it.

I was going to email it. But then I thought, you're going to read between the lines and think, you know, this person is a little nuts, you know. We still think that, Lindy. I'm sorry. You didn't successfully convince us otherwise. And I totally understand and I oftentimes agree with that. So I just have to. Well, Lindy, are you going to be at any races that we're at this year?

What's your race schedule? I hope so. I actually just announced my retirement after 41 plus years at a veterinary clinic. So I have all the time in the world now to train. Oh, so you're going to be pro. You're going pro. is what I'm getting out of this. Yeah, at 65 years old, I'm going to be a professional.

It's a new world out there. I'm up there with D.D. Grisberger, so anyway. Well, we loved meeting you in Vegas last year. I really hope we're, we crossed past again in 2026. And just a huge thanks for being like, seriously, probably our number one supporter with TTL. We really appreciate it. Thank you. You're my entertainment. I come to stop signs and I'm listening to your podcast and I'm laughing.

You're laughing with us, right? Someone is. On myself in the car and they're looking at me like, yeah, no, I'm going to be at hopefully at Happy Valley and I'm thinking about Vancouver. So hopefully maybe somewhere in there. Beautiful. Yeah. I'm going to try that.

So all right. I love you guys. Thank you so much for giving me the third chance. Of course, Linda. We love you too. Thanks for picking up. We'll have a great Sunday. You too.

Thank you. Bye. Bye. As advertised. What a gem. She's amazing. What a gem. Also, people are going to comment about what I'm wearing, Eric,

because they have been commenting on little photos of these. So what am I wearing and what do we think? This is a fleece that I got as like a potential thing that we might do about three years ago. Yeah, I've been wearing it a lot too. And every time I do people comment on it. Yeah. So it was basically that exact one is. extremely expensive, but we have found one that is very similar, and I think we're going to be doing

a pre-order of that in the next couple weeks when we drop, well, probably in like the next week or so. We've got a new men's t-shirt, new women's t-shirt, a couple of beanies-tooks, and it'll be part of that. Do we want to say that after each call, we have, each one of us has to have a timid? Has to? I mean, I'm just doing that. Okay, you can do whatever you want superlatively, but I think necessarily, it's a rule. It's a rule. So I'm going to have a way. Lest we forget. And Flynn, too. Give him one.

Hey, bud. But I have great news. Instant. Vacuum cleaner. No, he sniffed it and assessed what it was. Did he? He's not a vacuum cleaner. Just in the kitchen floor.

I can't see. He's right below the table, but it looked like he just inhaled it. He's intrigued by the texture. Yeah. I'm sure. Okay. Next. Let's do full random now.

Okay. Oakville. That's where my aunt lives. Paris, I guess. Paris. Paris, Ontario. Hello. Hello, you are on the TTL podcast right now.

Can you believe it? Yes or no? Holy cow. Hi, Nick. How are you? Doing great. I'm joined here with Eric and Paula and Flynn too. Hello.

Oh, hi Paula. Hi, Eric. Hi, Flynn. Okay, so you're Michelle and you're in Paris, right? Paris, Ontario, Canada. Yep. The only Paris that really matters. Well, Nick, where did you get Oakville from?

When I was calling, the caller ID said Oakville. Okay, because I used to live in Ontario, and I have never heard of Paris, Ontario. That's crazy. We are between Brantford and Cambridge. Okay. So a small town. Yeah. Very small town.

Cool. But loss of great biking trails. Nice. Ooh, you have my name. Yeah. So is there any kind of whatever comment, but are there any funny Paris adjacent, like Paris-France-adjacent things in Paris? Like, is there any nod to the other Paris, the lesser Paris?

We do have a lot of, like, Eiffel Tower and things like that. Right, yeah. And we have, like, rivers run through here and stuff. So, kind of like. Nice. Yeah, scenic. Very nice. Nice.

Okay, well, Michelle, do you have a question for the podcast? I do. And I'll try and keep it short. but I'm not a fast triathlet and so sometimes I struggle with like the whole balance between I want to go to a race and crush it but I'm also like if you ask me why I do triathlon

it's not to go to a race and crush other people and so but I get into a situation where you have a good race for you but then you look up the standings and you're like oh I'm still 11th in my age group like oh I didn't move up this year or like whatever So how do you find or how do you keep that motivation when it's like, hey, yeah, I'm not necessarily going to go out and smoke Taylor Nib on the bike next year.

Yeah. But I had a really good race within myself. But like overall, maybe I'm not hitting the goals. Yeah. I want to hit like relative to other people. For sure. I think that that's so applicable across the board, no matter what level you're at, no matter how fast you are.

Because I sometimes talk to Taylor Nib after her races. And maybe she didn't win. she came second or third and she's like bummed about it because relative to, you know, the race, she didn't win, even though maybe she had a great performance. So even at the tippy top level, it happens. And I think that it's like human nature to compare yourself to other people, regardless of how you yourself performed or did something, whether it's in sport or otherwise. I don't know how to keep it in check though.

Do you have any tips, Nick? I kind of teased this last week, but I think shifting the self-reward you gave yourself from outcome-based things to things you can control, like your effort and your preparation. And be proud of yourself for how hard you tried. And when things got hard, like sometimes I'm really proud of myself when my race didn't go well, but when I was feeling bad and I pushed through anyway. I'm not as proud of myself on days where everything just works. I'm like, that feels great, but it's not the same.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's true. And also it's like, it's really hard in the sport now to compare yourself to others because everything is getting so much faster. So even if you yourself are getting faster, The bike technology is faster. The nutrition's faster. Every race has a different field, so it's hard to compare from one to the other. And it's, yeah, there's so many variables that I guess it's like a position is so hard to.

Also, some races are, your age group will be super competitive. That's what I mean. And some just won't. You don't even know. You might win a race and not even done that well for yourself. Yeah. Yeah. No, a couple years ago, I moved up from like 40 to 45 to 45 to 47 or 45.

or 45 to 50, and I've come down. Like, these women are incredible. Like, there are some super fit women in these, like, sort of post-mom era. Like, you finally have more time to train. That's a big factor, yeah. That's funny. Yeah, anyway. Are you a mom?

Awesome. Do you have kids? I am. I have four teenage girls. Whoa. Yeah. Oh, my. Yeah. Well, I'd say it's impressive you, Ray.

I yeah I think it well it stops me from going crazy that's true same little sanity Eric I feel like you might more than any of us actually have hands on experience with this though because you have now competed as a pro in in so many different sports mountain biking triathlon trail running swim run yeah I mean I feel like you guys answered this to exhaustion already but for me it's about like I set a goal for myself and you have to like remember that was the goal. Like I want to go out and I want to paste this 50K and negative split it or whatever and then not getting to the finish line and be like, oh well I just got second. I guess I suck.

Like no, like even if it takes like writing those goals down so you can go look at them later, like that's a really hard thing that I see other people experience this. And I, you know, I can't act like I don't, I'm immune to it. But you set a goal, you hit that goal. But then you just let that competition drive override and decide that it sucked. even though this is the best by power by 20% you've ever hit. Right. Remember what you told yourself early on and stick to it.

Love that. Yeah. Cool. Yeah. That's awesome. Thanks, Michelle. Thanks so much for calling us. Enjoy Paris.

Thank you. I got my team kit last week, so I can't wait to rocket this spring. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We'll see you out there. Thank you. Awesome.

Thanks for calling. Cool. Thank you, Michelle. Bye. Bye. Great. Two for two team TTL people. That's crazy.

Yeah. That's crazy. That's fun. They should tell us right off the bat. Okay, guys, you know what time it is? Donut time. Yep, definitely. I think this is, I'm having too many.

I thought we were going to finish the box by the end of the episode, Paula. That's the goal. My mindset's different. Now I'm like, okay. 57 to go. Now I'm just being a pig. You're all or nothing. Real athlete mindset.

Is it an eating contest or are we just eating donut holes? Interesting. Interesting. Okay. Anything else we want to tangent on before? No, next person. Great. All right, we're going to the next caller here.

Not sure about his name. But we got his number. And he's from San Diego. It's Nick. Nick, okay. How could we forget? How? Nick, it's Nick.

Hello? Hello, Nick. You're on the Twilight Zone talking to yourself. I am also Nick. I had a feeling when I saw a New York number. I'm glad you've been. picked up. I would have just like thrown that on the ground. So you're in San Diego and you are a devoted and adoring podcast listener. Is that right?

That is true. Your words not mine. Oh yeah. Yeah. I said that. You said that. You said that to me. Oh, cool. Yeah. For for for people who I guess Nick and I, we met at the Oceanside premiere. And you were a fan of the film. It turned out you skated. I liked your voice. I think I've liked every single skate video you've posted in the last year. So welcome to the podcast. By the way, just to everyone knows, this was random. It just happens to be that this person is someone that we know.

Yeah. Yeah, sort of know. We've met once. There you go. So, Nick, what's your question? Do you have a question? Do you have something prepped and ready to go? Yeah, I was actually, let's see, what question do I want to go with?

So, yeah, like Eric said, I'm like a lifelong skateboarder and an ultra marathoner. And from skateboarding, you kind of choose your favorite skater based on like style and how they carry themselves. And in ultra or endurance sports, people kind of choose their favorite athlete based on results. So I was wondering, like, who do you guys? follow or look up to who carries themselves in a way that you respect like who is your favorite athlete

based on style? What a great question. What a great question? I absolutely love this. First of all, my two, whatever, I'm simping for these, but my two favorite athletes are Eric and Paula. This is what drew me to them at the beginning was the style and results.

Yeah, yeah, results. I really think that Eric is a good example of this. because, like, you've had good results, but that's not why people follow you. If you had your results and you didn't do anything with video or photos or TTL, you wouldn't have any following.

So I think you're the perfect example of. Yeah, it's, I do still have people occasionally tell me that they saw me race at Alcatraz in 2015. Yeah, I wouldn't say any, because Eric's won 70.3 years. But yeah, more and more so people say they watched the film and it really had an impact or, you know,

the podcast or the YouTube, etc. Which, I mean, I said this a very long time ago. I set out and I hoped that I could be one of the people that brought the most people possible into the sport. And I feel like this is a way I can do it. Yeah, my favorite, I think I'd say Daniel Bacagard. I think he has a really cool style and vibe. And he's all so fast, but that's not why I like following him.

Yeah. I would say Ari for me. Ari Klow. Yeah. He's another good example. I just think he's funny and lighthearted and still tries hard. and still tries hard and does cool stuff and makes music. And he's a musician.

Good music, yeah. Are we picking triathletes specifically? What about, do you have any favorite ultra runners? I guess I'll do my triathlet first. I used to be a massive, I shouldn't say I used to, but Harvey Gomez would have just been like full stop the end. But I got to say, like we hung out with Jan a little bit at 70.3 worlds. Paula was having a hard time.

Yon's demeanor and ability to like say the right things and just, it was interested in what Nick and I were doing and cameras and Paula and just, I was incredibly, incredibly impressed and kind of always assumed that he just had this online aura and put on a face and like was James Bond, but he's like legitimately incredible in person and was really impressed. We were talking about this like two days ago. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. They left an impression. Yeah, I don't know. I would skaters, Bob Bernquist, I was pretty obsessed with. Christian Hossoy. But in those types of sports, like skating, there are competitions, but so much of it is about the style. Correct.

I think that's where this question stems from is like triathlon is so much about your result and idolizing the best. In skating, it's even more intense. Someone like Nigel Houston, who is an unbelievable skater and I think has awesome style when he skates. People hate on him because of what he wears. He wears like short shorts and people like laugh at him about it. I'm like, God, it's so hard to be cool in skating.

Yeah. Yeah, being, like, having good results almost like detours people from liking that skater sometimes. But it also just depends on. Yeah, exactly. I mean, he got a lot of hate, but he's also got a lot of love just from longevity in the sport. Yeah. But. Who's your favorite triathlet based on style?

And you can't say us. And there are wrong answers here. I can't say you guys. I don't know. He's like, what's a triathlon? Yeah, what's a triathlon? You can throw an ultra runner too if you want. It's like swimming, right?

Yeah, for ultra running, I'm a big fan of like Michael Versteig and like Max Joliffe and kind of like the more rough cut type runners, not so much like the, the, clean cut guys. First D is so cool. Every podcast he's on, I have to listen to completion. Yeah, he's got a great just like outlook on stuff.

But yeah, sometimes I get turned off if like the person take, I don't know, there's certain times where I'm just like, eh, that's not kind of

what I'm going for in my sport, but that's cool that that person does it too. Yeah, there's so many variety. Yeah, well, that might be the greatest question

in a long time. That's a great question. Thanks for bringing that. And your favorite skater, Sean? No, his name is Nick. Sorry, Sean? Your thing is Sean White? I don't know where Sean came from. My favorite skater, I've always been a big fan of this guy named Dennis Boussinitz. He skates for Adidas. He's really fast. He doesn't do like big handrails or big stair sets, but he finds like fun little banks and alleyways and things to skate. that just like he's just got a really good style. Cool. Skates really fast.

You can't trifle up at Toro though? No, he's not doing that. But yeah, thanks for calling guys because I'm posted up. I had surgery two days ago. Wow. Oh, dang. Yeah, I got ankle surgery. I had to reattach a ligament and tendon and remove bone spurs.

Oh, my gosh. I'm on the road to recovery right now. That sounds great. Yeah. Bionic, man. Well, good luck with the recovery and thanks again for listening to this. Yeah. Yeah.

Thanks, guys. I appreciate the phone call. And thanks for everything you guys do. Maybe we'll see you on Oceanside. Hope so. Definitely. I'll try and make it out. All right.

Sounds good. Thanks, Nick. Bye. Bye. Bye. Happy 200th episode. Thanks. Thank you.

Wow. Cool guy. Super cool. Epic question. Yeah. Oh, we talked. like way longer than I should have been talking to one person. Right, right, right, right.

But I was like, you look awesome. Yeah. And, yeah, I don't know, we hit it off. That's crazy. That's, he came up. I'm going to give you a number. Okay, great, great. All right, we need to eat a timbitt here.

I'm calling him timbets. Nova Scotia, Halifax. Fun. Hello, guess who's calling? You get one guess. Stop. Oh my gosh. I missed this whole last year. We know. We took pity on you and we're calling back. One year later. Wow, that's so exciting.

Yep. You're here. You're live on the TTL podcast. And by live, I mean, we're going to heavily edit this later. So don't worry. You don't need to be held accountable for everything you say. Amazing because I can be weird sometimes and I'm nervous. Great. Great. So is your name Callie? We're trying to decipher from your Instagram. It's Cali. Okay. Nice to meet you. All right.

Did you, do you have a question? The question is, do you guys think, and I would like to hear all of your different takes, that different people are best suited for different distances in triathlon? Like, you think about people that are like marathons or 5K people, or is it just a function of your training age and like how you have been training, that sort of thing. So yeah, I'd love to hear your answer on that. I don't know if I take my answer off the line or... No, you're going to stay right here with us.

You're locked in now. Sorry. You're getting it. Okay, cool. I think it's a bit of both. I think as you go up, you know, in age, people definitely tend to do better at longer distances. You just have more base and fitness. But I personally feel like 70.3 was kind of my sweet spot.

I don't know if Iron Man would work out, but I felt like Olympic distance. I was really having to push it and get injured. 70.3 felt like a natural speed for me anyway. No, I think it's a really good question because, of course, when you're younger, you tend to start with like the Olympic pathway, sprint distance, Olympic distance, which is maybe more appropriate for a body that's developing and can't handle marathon training. But as the sport develops, more younger athletes are starting with Iron Man or starting with 70.3. And it's interesting to see how that has caused the sport to just get faster overall because people aren't coming into Iron Man like, oh, it's the end of my career. I guess I'll do one.

they're like, I want to win Kona. So they're starting that mission when they're in their late teens or early 20s and the Iron Man champions are getting younger and younger. So I think that completely people are suited to different distances. And just because of the way things are, it's always the older athletes do Iron Man, but that's changing now. Yeah, you have to enjoy it. You have to like it.

You have to be resilient. But of course, some bodies are more suited for eight-hour races, right? I do think there are just certain physiologies that are better at the longer stuff. Yeah. I mean, just like you said with running, the 5K athlete is so different than the 100-mileer. Yeah. And even what's the name of the woman who's winning the 200-mile races now? Is it Rebecca?

Oh, I forget her name now. Bummer. But she's like, you know, she was racing against Courtney DeWalter. And Courtney DeWalter is a way faster runner at these distances, but this other woman could just endure. more and keep the same pace for longer. I bet in a marathon, you know, Courtney to Walter would probably win. But in these long distances, there's just these bodies, the bodies make a big difference. Well, the interesting little thing about like a 200-mile race, this is also massively dependent

on if you can sleep in the middle of running. Yeah. And a lot of people can't. So that's definitely generic predisposition. Yeah, that's almost like, well, is that a different sport now? Like, there's cross-country skiing, but then there's biathlon where you cross-country skiing. ski and you shoot a rifle. Like, okay, there's two skill sets now. Yeah, that's a different sport for sure. Yeah, exactly. What distance do you do, Kelly? Well, I'm an age grouper, obviously,

like most listeners, I think. And I started out doing, like, as an adult, because I didn't come from a triathlon background. It just played soccer and that sort of thing. And then I started doing sprint and Olympic distance just locally, and I was pretty good at it. And it seems kind of like the age group pathway if you get into it at an older age that you start at that level and then you're like oh well I've mastered that so I'm going to move up to 70.3 and I've gone to 70.3 and I've done really well at that distance and I don't I was just kind of wondering like is it am I better suited at 70.3 or is it just my training a little bit of both or like yeah just trying to figure out like are you is someone better at a certain distance or is it just you just keep getting better and just

probably a little bit of both, you know. But I really like the 70.2 distance. Yeah, for sure, a little bit of both, because you can get faster, but you can also, I mean, as you start training more, you're going to get better at half distance, but it doesn't necessarily mean you're going to be good at an Ironman. But I don't know, it's so individual, right? Awesome.

Well, thanks so much for your question. Thanks for calling, guys. I'm so excited to be on the line. I hope you have a productive phone call podcast thing, and you don't get any guts. So far so good. If I don't make the pod, I won't be, I'll know I'm a dead. You're making the pod.

Yeah. We've never, we've never cut anyone out. Sometimes we just edit it down if they talk too much. Okay. Fair enough. Which you did not. Okay, well, congrats on 200. That's awesome.

Thanks, Kelly. Thanks for picking up. Have a good day. Thanks, bye. Bye. Yeah, but what she's saying about the age group thing, about going through the different distances, the thing I always want to stress is that,

you only get to do that new distance for the first time once. And so not to like rush into like, oh, I did Olympic well. I mean, it's like just enjoy each step. And then even I think it's fun, even after doing an Iron Man to go back and think, well, it would be really fun to do an Olympic really well now that I have all this experience from Iron Man training. Like you can kind of renew that stoke. Yeah.

For sure. And I don't feel like I've mastered any of the distances. Right. There's still big things at like 70.3 at sprint, at Olympic, etc. that I feel like, man, I didn't have the perfect race. I could do better. This is the addiction of Triaths. But it's completion and then there's mastering.

Also, there's like 70.3 races are usually more prestigious Iron Man branded. Like you want to go to that because it feels like a bigger deal than a local Olympic. So it's not even the distance. It's like if there was an Iron Man branded Olympic distance, that'd be more appealing. Bring back 5150. 51. Okay. One donut each?

Paul, I think he's a lot. I think you might have skipped the last one, but we'll just look the other way. I need a donut. The problem is when you have one, you immediately want another one because that's how brains work. But after five minutes, your brain kind of forgets. This is a secret, I think. Those temptations, they kind of come and they go. But when they're there, you're like, no, this is all that matters and this will never leave my mind.

So we're saying we need to pick up the rate of questions to slow down. To satisfy our completing the donuts by the time we're done? Yeah. Okay. Forget so quickly. Yeah. Yesterday after night. Yeah. And now?

Hi, you bring Lisa Bacarris. Sorry, I missed your call. If you just don't leave a quick message, I will get back to you as soon as I can't. Sounds like she's recording that on her bike. Lisa. At the tone, please record your message. When you finished recording, you may hang up or press one for more options. Lisa, first of all, I don't think you should be skydiving while recording your voicemail message.

She's in the back of a cattle car. But you missed a call from TTL here. Gosh, what could possibly be more important than this call? I was like she's probably training like we all should be training. But instead we're eating donuts here. Yeah, we're getting tomato tomato. Thanks for submitting your number though. And we hope to see you in Oceanside.

I can't wait to do some races with you this year. Adios. Bye, Lisa. Okay, great. We tried. Sorry, Lisa. Okay, next. skydiving.

So it sounded like. Okay. I think this is fun because it feels like we are prank calling them. It feels naughty. Yeah, it does. Hello? Hey, Brett. Is your refrigerator running?

Yeah. Well, then you better go catch it. Oh, no. Well, we're all here, but Nick fully did that on the sign. I was like, I can't recognize. this voice. Hey, Brett. So first of all, let's let's talk about the important things. You live in Boston? I live in Boston. Love Boston. Where do you live in Boston? I'm just south of the city, like 45 minutes. Like south? No, further south. Further south, like halfway to Providence, Rhode Island.

Nice, nice. Well, we're very happy to have you on the podcast here. I have Eric and Paul smiling looking at me. So what question do you have for us, for our our audience at large. For our 200th episode. Oh man. 200th episode. All right. I guess what is one piece of advice you gave early on in the podcast that you would

absolutely not give today? Wow. That's interesting. This was one of the questions I was going to ask us is if you would give different advice now, then you would have two years ago. Two years ago, but this is going on four years. four years ago. Yeah, four years ago.

The podcast is four. Wow. There's 50 weeks. You're right. You're right. Wow. Yeah, we're four years. I don't know.

We're wildly consistent with our values and our recommendations. I'm going to have to take a minute to come up with something personally. Yeah, me too. Paula, can you think of something? I don't know because like every year has been so different in our lives, you know? Like TTL has gotten bigger and we've done more. more things like made a team this year. I don't know. It's hard to even remember what I would have told someone four years ago. I think I could answer this question better if it's like 20 years ago. What if I

said you'd give differently? I think like the biggest thing that I've learned over the last four years, I guess, is that consistency and just keeping things simple, even if they seem boring, I think is the best route to success. Like we've done nothing really drastic with TTR or with our racing. It's been very kind of a steady growth. We haven't like injected investments from anyone. We haven't made these big moves that are really risky, but just over time, we've been able to, yeah, slowly grow it to the point that it's at now. I don't know if that's like necessarily answering the question, but it's kind of just advice now that I've realized over the last five years that, yeah, sometimes boring and slow is better. I guess what occurred to me is just like, if we were talking to a young athlete who was up and

coming and like how what is the pathway to be coming a professional triathlete do we feel like that's changed at all now that the t-100 has feels like it's a little bit more of a locked in thing yeah world trathons involved iron man series versus t-100 you know like would we change that pathway of like start an ITU you know like draft legal and then work your way into non-draft or just like straight to 70.3 and t-100 that could be my advice now actually I think if if you want to be successful as a pro triathlete now, you don't necessarily have to do all the social media and everything. You can just literally be the fastest person, whereas before that was not necessarily the case. Like, there's so many opportunity now to make money in the sport if you're good. So there's a little bit more

freedom to, yeah, maybe not do all of the extra stuff that we like doing. But yeah, I don't think it hurts at all. It can only help. But if it's, if you're just completely allergic to it and you can win or get on the podium at T-100s and in the pro series. You can make a good living. The thing, the counter to that is that there are fewer, there are a limited number of spots on the podium. There are an unlimited number of spots in people's imagination that you can grasp. Yeah. So if you can be the best, sure. But the statistics show that you're probably not going to be the best.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. Yeah, interesting question, though. Are you a triathlete? I am. I am. And actually, I like the idea of like the slow say, go of the podcast. I think the same with training. right you don't need to make big jumps to slow study there and yeah um actually nick and i uh we met

very briefly after wisconsin this year um just after the race oh nice nice how what what spirits was i in at the time and what spirits were you in at the time uh you were decent spirits you were you were good it was a little bit later in the night it wasn't right after you had finished i think had time to decompress a little bit okay okay so it was a little bit you know after dark yeah yeah got it Because immediately after I would have probably said, why did we do that? That was awful. Awesome. Well, thanks so much for allowing us to call you for listening to the podcast and for bringing

your question. Awesome. Thanks, guys. Yeah, thanks for calling. Bye. Bye. See you. God, these have been like such great questions and so randomly.

Yeah. If you've been writing in and you haven't been bringing this level of depth to your question, You don't have to save it for when we call you. You can just write it in. You can just write it. Yep. Here we go. Paul is reaching.

She's reaching for another. Even though my body's like fine with not having one. Oh, of course. I mean, like, believe it or not, these donut dolls are not a need. Although they feel like it sometimes. Okay, wonderful. I feel like we've been batting a thousand of these questions. For the people who've picked up.

Okay, so for all the listeners, we have a $100 gift card for TTL. store. But we're going to do two 50s, right? Oh yeah, we changed our minds. We're going to do $250 gift cards because then two people can be happy. And we're just going to give it to like random people who we call. So next person? Next person. We're going to give them the $50 gift card. There's a lot riding on you picking up this unknown call. Oh my gosh. Okay, this Chloe. Her name is Chloe. Someone can't believe I missed the call. Is this Lisa? This was Lisa. Okay. We could call Lisa back. Yeah, we could try it. Okay. Great. Her name is Chloe. Chloe. And does you say where she's from?

Nothing. She's on the team, though. It's going to go to voicemail. Hello? Hello? Hello? Oh, you tried, Chloe. Nice try.

Okay. Okay, should we call Lisa? Let's come back to Lisa after we've given away the $50. Right, right, right, right. Oh, it's like Lisa tried, and then she was like, prank call throwing a... Sarah. Careful now.

That would be a fun surprise. Hi, if you record your name and reason for calling, I'll see if this person is available. When? Thanks. Please stay on the line. Oh, no. Come on.

You're not going to give me a beep? No. That's... Needs work. Figure that out. Yeah. Needs work. Needs work.

Nice callback. She's never going to answer that. Remember? Well, that was confusing. Can you still pick, like, the ringtone that people hear when they call you? Remember that time? I'm sorry. This person is not available.

If you would like to leave an additional message, please reply after the tone. All right. There's a tone now? Yeah, thanks. Pick your, okay, sorry. We tried to call you, but your voicemail thing is a little confusing. This is Eric, Paula, and Nick and Flynn. And we wanted to ask you a question on the podcast, but you didn't pick up.

I guess we're not good enough. Well, there's so many prank calls, or so many junk mail calls these days that it's so confusing. I know. Anyway, you want to pick up every call, though. Thank you for submitting your number anyway, and better look next time. Adios. Adios. All right. Next caller here, Caroline.

On T.L. Team TTC has cats. Is that a positive or a strike? On TBTL. Has cats. Hello? Do you know the song Caroline by the 1975? I don't.

Okay. It's a great song. This is Nick, Eric, and Paula. Check out the song, though. It's great. We're going to get sued if I sing it, so I won't sing it. But it's a great song, check it out. I will.

Caroline, you are on the TTR podcast. Congratulations. And there's an extra congratulations. I'm going to let Eric deliver the news. For our 200th episode, we have two $50 gift cards to give away, and you are the lucky winner of one of them. Oh, thank you. If you're not excited about it, we can give it to somebody else.

Flynn really wanted it actually. No, no, I'm really excited. Assuming you have a question for us, of course. I do. Let's see, I was thinking about what all you guys have talked about in the past, and I think you touched on this at one point, but maybe elaborate some more if you can. My question is about heat training,

and if you use any of the core sensor, like the Core 2 sensor app, how do you know you're overheated in a race? Oh, that's a good question. When I'm laying on the ground in Mexico, I'm overheated. Yeah. I personally have never used it to race with, but I've used it for heat training. And I've found it to be really, and maybe this is just because I'm actually not getting hot enough,

but I found it really hard to get the core sensor to read that I'm in zone three. It takes me like 45 minutes to get up there of pretty hard riding, which is kind of the zone you're supposed to be in to have an effect of heat training stimulus. But for me, it takes a lot of work to get there. So I do use it, but I also actually use. use an ear thermometer just to get an internal body temperature read as well to kind of double check it. The core sensor also uses an algorithm that uses heart rate. So you have to attach your heart rate monitor to the app as well. So if my heart rate's low, I like always

think maybe it's not reading it properly. I don't know. I don't have full trust in these devices, but I do think it's a good tool to track your progress as you do some heat training. Yeah, I would second that. I haven't, I've struggled with feeling like, Oh, this definitely is reading the way I would expect based on how I'm feeling. Yes. Was about to pass out, but I haven't gotten to the right temperature yet. Like when I've used it, it was like, I'm sweating, I want to die. The heater is blasting in my face, but I'm not in Zone 3 yet.

Like, how is that possible? Yeah, this thing's actually telling me I'm a corpse. Yeah. So I don't know. I've heard that it's really hard to rely on in a situation like that where you're on a razor's edge because it's just not as accurate as it could be. I would assume that they also have the heart rate going and just like this deep knowledge of having used both of these devices

consistently over years. Do you have one? I do. I got one partially for medical reasons. I tend to get rhabdo if I overheat. Like I have a genetic mutation that does it. Okay. So my doctor wanted me to get one and I used one in a race

and I didn't look at it during the race. But I looked afterwards and I was kind of surprised. I did the last eight miles of the 70.3 over 103 degrees. Wow. And I felt like garbage, but I just assumed it's because I was tired. Yeah. Yeah. And you were cooking.

So I don't know. Yeah, but I didn't feel like out of it, you know, like I was running and I wasn't like lightheaded or anything. I was just exhausted. But I had a rough training leading up to the race. So I just assumed it's like, well, I didn't train enough of the run. So yeah, I didn't feel like. I feel like I had any overheating symptoms, which is what I'm wondering.

Yeah, I think you did a good thing by like wearing it but not living by it because if you feel fine, I think that it's safe to continue. But maybe like, especially on the bike, using it to kind of moderate your effort knowing that the run is coming could be a good tool if you just have it on your bike computer. But again, like these things are using your skin temperature plus heart rate to guess your internal body temperature. So using it as a tool is good as with all things like this. but I don't know about like dictating your complete race plan based on it.

I feel like I want to run a pole. Do you have a core sensor? If you do, do you feel like it was a good tool? Yeah. Yeah, that'd be interesting. I think a lot of pro cycling teams use it and everything. So it's not a bad thing. It's just hard for me to think like, okay, you pour water on yourself.

How does that affect your skin temperature versus your core temperature or the sensor itself? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I can tell you at this race, pouring water didn't do anything for any of that. looking at the data. But it was also like, it was like 97 degrees Fahrenheit or something. Where was this?

During the race. It was in Cardahena, Columbia. Oh, so it was humid too. Yeah. So, yeah, it was hot and humid. And dumping water and you didn't do much. Right. At least, well, you didn't feel it.

And then the core sensor was like, whatever, nothing changed. Yeah, yeah. Oh, that's an interesting question. All right. Well, thank you for picking up and for being a podcast. Are you on Team TTL? I am. You are.

Awesome. Yeah. Well, we would love to email you your gift cards. So maybe shoot Nick or TTL, Instagram, your email address. Okay, I will. All right. Thank you so much. Thank you.

Have a good day. Thanks for choosing me, you too. Bye. We had two people call back during that. Nice. Which I don't know how to turn off, unfortunately. Yeah, because it's disrupting our current calls. Yeah.

Yeah, but I can't like, I'm on, I'm already on, do not disturb, you know, I can't be anymore. It's okay. It doesn't bug me too much. Great. Another timet here? Yeah. Yammers. I don't even know how many I've had now.

Well, we could see how many calls we've taken. We could watch the tape. Okay. Okay, let's do another caller. Okay, we don't usually do callbacks, but for... VIPs? For Lisa, we'll do a callback. Let's try again.

I'm doing FaceTime audio for this one. Okay. Is this Gianna? It's her dog. Okay. Hi, this is Flynn. I'm looking for Gianna. Flynn Findlay.

Oh my gosh. Well, Gianna's a little busy right now because I've given her mental stimulation games because we got a dog trainer. I'm sorry. She's like licking peanut butter out of some type area. Yes, exactly. but it's um yeah we got now we didn't get scolded but we hired a dog trainer because she's kind of crazy and the dog trainer's like she needs at least 60 to 90 minutes of mental stimulation a day and we're

like oh my gosh like how do we do that she's like put a put a treat in a cong and give it to her oh wow that's bar as well yeah yeah that's exactly what i was mad yeah yeah like eat something out of a thing that's the mental stimulation i was gonna say peanut butter in a con but i wasn't sure for it was too Lisa, this is what you should do with her. This is what we did with Flynn a couple years ago. We taught him to, if you put like a cylinder or a circle of something on the floor, go touch it and come back to you. And he can do it now with anything.

If you put like a Tupperware on the floor and say touch, you'll touch it and come back. And after 20 minutes of that game, he's so tired. So there's something to... Just run to the thing and touch it? Yeah, touch it with your paw, come back to you. Paw or nose. And it's true that dogs that are just like thinking and doing stuff with their brains do get really tired. So, so do we.

Oh, that's good. This is, this is true. I also need 90 minutes of mental stimulation today. I think that's actually too much for me. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Well, thanks for putting your number into the pod. This is our 200th episode, and you are on our list.

We wanted to chat with you. Lisa, be honest. Have you actually ever listened to an episode of the pod before? No, I have. I'm actually a podcast fan. Oh my gosh. I'm not a subscriber or like a, what do you call it? Supporter, supporter.

But I support with my listening minutes. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, that's hugely critical. For anybody who doesn't know, Lisa is a pro-tra athlete. So that's the backstory. Yeah, great dancer. I actually, Paula, because you like grew up dancing,

it would be like a dream of I'm to like do a collab with you. Oh, I'd love it. Maybe Oceanside, we can come up with the dance. you could make me twirl. Yes. Dance collab. Love it. Love it.

You know, when I saw Allison Jackson at Cycling Worlds one year, I wanted to do that with her, but I was too scared to ask her. So, Lisa, you and I can do it together. Okay, we can do it together. I'm also a huge Allison Jackson fan. Yeah, me too. Me too. Yeah, she's incredible.

But, yeah, guys, okay, first of all, I feel so honored to be on the podcast. And I just want to know if you guys are planning on coming to, our real triathlon squad camp starting tomorrow in Cozbel, Mexico. It's not too late. Yeah, we're right, bags are packed right after this. We're going.

I thought we were driving, Eric. Well, for Paula, you and I can try. Okay, great. No, Lisa, we're actually, we've been inspired by the RTS camp, so we're doing a TTL camp this year in Lake Las Vegas. I heard that. It was February, March?

Early Feb. Early Feb. Perfect. How do I get the invite? Can I just show up? You can just show up. We might have one extra hotel room right now, actually. Yep. You have to room with Flynn and me and a twin bed. That's fine. Easy. Done. Is it Kigiana come?

Your husband? Yes. Your husband can also come. So we know. We'll really get to know each other. Yeah. Oh, it would be, I mean, we love that. We're going to, uh, Steve, my husband's coming to Coswell camp for like the last two days. And then we're doing a little vacation for my dad's 70th birthday in Cosimel. And, uh, he's staying with, uh, Nicole Falcaro and our. and I in our like room for two nights. It's going to be nice and cozy in there. That's awesome. Okay, well, then I have a question for you, Lisa.

And keep it nice and, well, as brief as you want. But as a pro triathlet, if you could choose between having a race that you're really proud of or having a slightly better result at this point, what would you choose? Oh, man. Well, it's, I think a result that I'm really proud of. Even though, you know, guys, I've never finished on the Iron Man podium before. And so, like, I feel like I need to do that at some point before I retire. But that might mean I have to go like cherry pick a race in some country we've never heard of.

No. I think you can do it in the U.S. Oceanside, 2026. Oceanside, 2026. Yeah, you might as well just do both at the same time. Get on the podium and be proud of it. Easy. You know, best case scenario.

Exactly. Can't believe you didn't think of that right away. Yeah, but I feel like this day, if for someone at my caliber or like my level, not to like diminish myself at all, but there's just some like total badass ladies like Paula out there. Makes it really hard to get on like podiums. And so I think I've had to kind of alter and shift my mindset to be like, wow, you know, me finishing, I think I was seventh at Oceanside last year, was like, that was like a great result for me.

Yeah, yeah. And like all around, I was like really happy with that performance. So yeah. That's actually super cool because one of our first questions was somebody writing and asking about exactly that. Like, I'm really excited about this result because of the power, the speed or whatever. But then I go look at where I placed overall and I'm unhappy asking if we had any advice. And, you know, like coming back to focusing on, you know, your goals and everything.

And the caliber of the field. I mean, Oceanside is so fast every year. Yeah. And I think at the end of the day, like, this sport is really like you versus you. Like there's a great chance. I'm never going to be world champion. Like,

and that's okay because I think I still get so much out of this sport in the community. And on the, and on our podcast, the Real Triathlon Squad podcast, we were talking about something like this, uh, last week where it's, um,

we only get to do this for like a small amount of time at this level. Yeah. And I think I'm, I'm coming up to my like sunset years. So, So as I'm like approaching that timeline, I kind of think I'm like, oh, it's, you know, you just have to appreciate being able to be this fast. Because, you know, in 10 years from now, I probably won't be as fast. That's a good realization because often when you're in the moment, it's hard to appreciate it.

So thinking about the fact that these are the best years of our lives is kind of a special thing. The fastest. The fastest. The fastest. Yeah, yeah. The best years are to come, right? I hope so. I just want every year to get better than the last. Right?

Yeah. For real. No, it's amazing. But you guys do a great job at the podcast. Big fan. And I think we've got to figure out how to do a TTL RTS collab at some point. For sure. For all of our listeners, go listen to the Real Triathlon Squad podcast.

Don't go to their training camp. Come to our training camp. You can go to both. Yeah, we can do both. Yeah, we can do both. And make sure you cheer for Lisa on the race course, everybody. Yeah, Paula. Also, I'm ready and I think maybe you're ready. Let's bring on the 20 meter draft rule. Oh, yeah, totally. I mean, I am a huge supporter of that. I feel like I don't have much influence, but with everything that's going on right now, I think there's a possibility of it happening.

Yes, I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Me too. It helps us strong bikers. Yes, yes, because I don't think I'm winning any races on the run yet, you know. But, um, but, um, but, um, it helps us. Strong bikers. I don't think I'm winning any races on the run yet, you know. But, uh, so yeah. Well, I saw you take off out of transition at Oceanside last year. It took a long time to catch you. Yeah. I went too fast on that first mile and then, you know, the victory laugh. Got to go for it.

By slowing down. It's easy to do with that race. Yeah. The hype. Yes, it is. Um, well, I appreciate you guys. I'm also like 10 minutes into my gravel bike ride, but I was so excited. Oh, wow.

Thank you. Well, thanks for stopping. Yes. No, my training partners bailed on me, so I got to go do a long ride alone. Oh, no. Oh, geez. Yes, this warms my heart. Well, good job.

We're hoping to go right after this, too, because we're feeling like we need to exercise. Oh, we are. We've been eating a donut hole after every call, so we are going on a bike ride. I'm actually so jealous. Okay, thanks, Lisa, and we'll talk to you soon, hopefully. Okay, sounds good. Bye, guys. Bye.

You know how some races if you do like their triple crown or whatever, you get a metal that fits all three metals together? If you do the Real Tri-Swad camp and the TTL camp, we will come up with a joint medal for you as well. Oh, boy, we will. Okay. Sorry, Eric. We is you.

Okay, great. I can't wait to design it. Okay, are we ready for our next person? Let's do our next person. But before that, Paula, don't try to get out of eating another timet here. Oh, yeah. Guys, I can't do it. Yes, you can.

You can't. Oh my gosh. I'm going to stash them here for later. Okay. Holy cow. Oh, my God. You're on the TTL podcast. How are you? Hey, Sean. Hey, what's up? Nick. How are you? We got Eric and Paula here as well. We're all here. Hello. Squads here. How is everybody? Everybody's feeling better to, hopefully?

We're like very, you know, we're mixed bag here. All of us are, have a little injury we're dealing with. But we're eating timbits and we're... We're currently having an awesome time. Yeah, we're having fun. We're having fun. Life is good. Yeah. Awesome. So where are we calling you at? Where are we calling you at? In the world, are you? Portland, Oregon. So not too far from here now. Damn. That's awesome. You could have come in person. I know. Exactly. If I had a heads up and I had driven the three hours.

Very cool. Well, do you happen to have a question ready for us? If not, we'll give you a few seconds to think of one. Yeah, like three seconds, max. I was actually curious if you guys want to do a little this or that. Oh my gosh. Are we freaking gone? 100% right. Sweet, man.

Let's go. And it's themed today. So I was going to say, let's do TTR and the horrible, no good, very bad day. Okay. Well, this sounds like we, it sounds like we, um, you're planted. It sounds like we planted you with. Yeah, we did not plant you. All right.

Wow. No, no. This is all. this is all real. I sat down with a cup of coffee and wrote some things out this morning. Wow. No, the general theme is you're getting up in the day, maybe a little behind on everything. Nothing's going your way. So you got to make some tough calls throughout the day.

Okay. So you guys ready? Yeah. Let's go. Cool. All right. So for breakfast, you get day old cold coffee with no reheat. or a stale bagel with no reheat.

I'm going to take the bagel. Same. Because you toast that baby up. Yeah. He said no reheat. Oh, shoot. You're right. You're running out the door.

No reheat. Yeah, I get super grumpy when I'm hungry, so I'm just going to go with the stale bagel. Eric? How do you feel about cold coffee? I can knock back some cold coffee, no problem. It's like cold brew. That's what I was going to say.

Don't people pay extra for cold coffee? Warm bagel, cold coffee. No, you can't have both. Yeah, well, you can have one of the other. Since he's baking the cold coffee, now he can make himself a warm bagel. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, whatever. Okay, next one.

Eric. A wet towel in the bag for your post-swim dry off. Ugh. Or no swim cap for your whole workout. I can go no swim cap, no problem. Currently. Well, I mean, 100% of the time, Eric does have a wet towel in a swim bag. He likes it, actually.

He's never actually hung his towel up in his life. I'm going to go wet towel. I'm going to go no swim cap. Because you have no hair. So welcome to Paula just slamming Eric and Nick. Thank you for your patience. Okay, great. Well, no swim cap's not going to help my no hair.

Okay, I love that one. Yeah, what else you got? These are good. No bike shorts or shammie for a three-hour long ride or no socks for a long ride. or no socks for a long run. Oh, that's a good question. Because those are both horrible.

Yeah, I'm going to go the no shammy because my bike, I'm pretty comfortable on my bike. But the no socks would just be a blister nightmare. Can I wear like half tights on the bike? Yeah, you can wear shorts. You're not naked. No, I'm saying like wearing like regular shorts at bunch up, I think would be terrible.

Jorts. Just no, Patty. Just no added patting. Everything else is fair game. So if you want to go naked, Nick, power to you. But, you know, it's up to you. So you're saying I can go naked

and I can hold you accountable for whatever repercussions happened to me if I do so. Hey, it's Portland, dude. We got the naked bike right here. So, you know, you're not on the custom to it. Okay, great. Yeah.

I'd probably go with the no shorts thing. No shorts. I think I could probably get away with that. Yeah. The no socks could, like, ruin the next two weeks of your life. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

All right. Last one. No hot water for your post-workout shower for the day or no sweet treats all day. Oh my God. I could do no sweet treats. Yeah. Yeah, we were saying that now. We've never even tried that.

My entire life prior to you being involved was no sweet treats. No, I need the hot shower so much. Yeah, I'll go no sweet treats. Yeah. Unless it's the summer and you've just been sweating your ass off outside. Then coming back to a cold shower can be so nice. That could work. But I've had the situation where my hot water's been off.

And taking a cold shower when you were not hoping to take a cold shower is the worst. It's the worst experience. Were you about you about to say you've had the situation where your water broke? Yes, yes. I don't. Yeah. My water has never broken. Those are awesome questions, man.

Thank you. Yeah, that was fun. We're so glad we had a game. And we're going to try out all of those. the things that we picked in the coming week now. We're going to need updates. Just throw them in the app. And we'll all be tracking you, okay?

Love it. Love it. Well, thanks for picking up and having that prep. That was amazing. And hopefully we'll see you at a race this year. Of course, yeah. Thank you guys for having me on. I really appreciate it.

No problem. All right. Have a good one. Later. Bye. That was just a coincidence. That was great. He sat down over coffee and wrote that.

Imagine if we didn't call him, which is a strong chance. Yeah, yeah. Gosh, I feel bad for anyone else who's done any real work here. We're calling people who aren't picking them up and we've got people who are making notes. But you know what? If you wrote down a game like that, just send it in. Just send it in.

We'll do it next week. Maybe he would have. And if you've written a question too, send it in. If you saw that and thought it was awesome and didn't realize that you could write in games. You can. And actually, I have them all saved in a separate note for later use. If we don't use them right away. We could just do one episode fully games.

Just the game. Okay, are we ready? Should we give this person the $50 gift card? That's right. Okay, here we go. Hello. Okay, what's your favorite punk band? And remember that you're on the TTR podcast,

so you will be judged for it if it's not a cool punk band. My favorite punk band of all time is rancid. Far and away. Rancid. All right. Nice. No hesitation. That was easy answer.

No hesitation. I'm 42. They've been my favorite since I was 12 years old. Okay, wait. follow-up question. Now, what is your guilty pleasure in pop music? As far as a band? Anything. Even just a song.

Feel the way on your skin. Pop music? I don't know if anybody's ever heard a hot chip. Hot chip. Heck yeah. Harachi lights. Yes. I used to live in San Francisco. They were very popular, so I just kind of trended towards them. Yeah, that's a good answer. That's great. Well, thank you for picking up, Jason.

I think that's your name, right? Yes. And you're on Team TTL. I saw on your Instagram. Very cool. Awesome. We actually have an extra surprise for you because we are giving away two gift cards on this episode and we randomly selected you to get one of them.

That's awesome. You can use it at our store when we come out with new mugs in the next couple weeks and new hats and all the things. That sounds awesome. Where do you live? I live in Arizona, but I work in Alaska. So I'm in Alaska right now. like negative 10. I'm freezing my bottle.

Oh, damn. Are you outside? I'm outside currently, yes. Okay. Well, ask us a question really quick and we'll let you go warm up. If you have one. My question was, who do you guys think is the funniest out of the three of you? We all think ourselves are the funniest.

I hate to say it. And I really do hate to say it. But I think Paula might actually be the funniest. I really hate to say it. Why? Because it'll go straight to my head? No. It's just because you, like, don't even really try.

And it's like with your freaking photography, too. I hate how good you are at it without really putting an effort in, it seems like. Okay. Well, that's flattering. Thank you, Nick. Yeah. Paula makes me laugh the most. I'll be listening to it on the treadmill, and I'll laugh out loud to what she has to say about different topics.

If you don't laugh, you cry. Yeah. Oh, that means a lot. Thank you. I don't know. I think that we bring out humor in each other because we have the same sense of humor. and personally I think that's why the podcast works. It wouldn't work without any one or three of us.

So I don't know. Eric has some witty things sometimes. I have moments. I would say Nick is the most fun. Yes. Just like on average. Yes. Brings a lot to the room, lights it up.

Yeah, because we record this every week. And like Eric and I are not always in the best of moods after training together all day. But you pick up the phone with Nick and it's like all that kind of dissipates. Oh, good. Thank God. You bring out the best in us, my boy. Good. I'm glad.

Yeah. Can I ask you what you're doing in Alaska? What's your job? Is it outdoor? I work at an underground gold mine. I'm a mechanic. Oh my gosh. That is so cool.

That is crazy. Is that one of those things that's like two months on, a month off? I do three weeks on, three weeks off. So I go back and forth every three weeks. Wow. And when you're in Alaska, can you train, like some bike run at all or not really? We have a gym. So I can get on the treadmill.

and then they kind of have the crappy gym style bikes, but obviously no swimming. Yeah, that's fine. Well, that's really cool. Good for you. Yeah, dedication. Yes, for sure. Thanks so much for picking up,

and just maybe text, Nick, your email, and we can get you your gift card or send it to TCL. Awesome. I appreciate it. Yeah, no problem. Thanks for being on the team. We'll see you hopefully at a race this year. Yeah. All right, guys.

Have a good one. See you. You have you too. Bye. Bye. Wow, that is a crazy job and to commute to Alaska. Yeah, no, I have a buddy who lives in Alaska who is a commercial fisherman. And it's the same thing.

Like, deadliest catch, you just are gone for three weeks and you make a crazy amount of money. But then, you know, you come back. It's like just two lives. So, Nick, I'm the funniest. Stop. You knew I shouldn't have said that. We can't vote for ourselves. God.

Who's the funniest? No. nothing. Never mind. Take it back. I'm just going to keep that in my back pocket. Okay. Nice. Let's, why don't we fast forward to the next caller, which we'll be. Julia. Julia, okay. You don't need a special number for Canada. Hello. Oh my gosh, you're on the TTL podcast. Can you believe it? Hello.

Oh, hello. Hi, Julia. We, Eric Paula, Nick are here. We're doing our 200th recording, and you're one of our last people that we're calling. So we hope you have a question for us. Oh, so exciting. Yes, I do have a second. Where are you, are you in Canada, Nick said, based on your phone number? Yeah, I'm in Toronto.

Oh, sweet. That's where my mom's from. That was our most listened to city last year. Wow. More than any American city, Toronto has most of our listeners. That's crazy. Yeah, not most of our listeners. but most by any city.

All right. You're representing all of Toronto then with this question. What do you got? Okay. I guess I just got swim paddles for Christmas. I got the ones from, I think, the castle on, like, the smallest size. What, like, workouts would you recommend for me to start using those to, I guess, improve my swimming? I'm right now at, like, two minutes per 100 meters, and I kind of want to break that barrier.

Yeah. And like, will the paddles actually help me with that? Or obviously there's other things I can do with like form and everything. Well, first of all, you two, Eric and Paula, what percentage, if you're training normally, you're healthy, what percentage of your freestyle is done with paddles on a normal session? I'm training for swim run 100%. Okay. Because your swim run is all done with paddles, right?

That's interesting. That's, it's, you laugh, but maybe someone would say like, oh, no, you don't want to do that. it's too much stress on your shoulder. No, that's a little bit of an exaggeration, but I do a lot more when swim runs coming up. Personally, I think that structuring your entire workout around one with paddles, one without is good. Like if you're doing a strength session where you're doing 10-200s, all pull with paddles, you're really going to get like a muscular effort for that that it feels like versus

if you're doing 10-200s at race pace, it'll feel more like an aerobic thresholdy effort. So I think paddles are a really good tool for building strength. Your stroke rate will naturally decrease a little bit because there's more resistance. But your feel for the water kind of increases in a good way. And it kind of lets you feel it in a different way than if you're not wearing them. So there's no way they're going to make you slower. I think the only way they can be bad is if you overdo it because they put more stress on your shoulders. But doing like big, long sessions with paddles, I think is the best use of them.

What do you think Eric? Yeah, the two different ways that we use them came to mind. Basically, like doing a, I really like doing a thing where you start with, like, paddles pull buoy and you're pulling, and you do, like, whatever, some 300s, and then you do some 200s with, like, no paddles, but you keep the buoy, and then you take the buoy off for, like, some hundreds at the end. So you're, like, starting with the paddles and everything and, like, the flotation of the buoy, and then you slowly work to swimming.

And the other thing I think that's kind of common is, like, you do a speed session, and then you put on paddles for, like, three, four hundreds at the end of the workout, just to, like, kind of drill in. some extra strength after you've done that speedwork. Yeah, yeah. We usually always finish our sessions with like 800 meters of pulling. Right. And whether that's junk miles or just like building extra strength, I don't know.

But we like it. It's kind of a relaxing way to finish. And I think the more tools you can add to your swim bag to make swimming more fun, the better. Totally. And don't use them as a crotch. But of course, like having a different stimulus like that is not a bad thing. Yeah.

And then the other thing that we always do, and we'd say this pretty often is we'll do like 100 with right arm, only the paddle on the right hand, and then we'll do 100 with, you know, only the paddle on the left hand during warmup. And then a hundred with both. We like doing that like body balance and everything. I swear you find more water with your other hand when you're doing this. It's crazy. Yeah. It's like a brain trick.

Yeah. Yeah. Do you have a pool boy? I assume you could borrow one at the pool. Yeah. Yeah, I have one. Okay, cool. Well, it's fun.

Are you, what distance do you race primarily? I did my first 70.3 in 2025. I did Monty. Oh, cool. I know you signed up for one this year. And then, yeah, I signed up for Musselman for this summer. Nice. Nice. Nice. I heard that's a really, really fun race. I stayed in Wisconsin with some people who all did it and they loved it. Yeah. It's not a pro race, right? I heard it was, I heard it was a bit easier than Misscoka. I'm a bit afraid of signing up for that one yet. So I thought I'd, maybe sign up for that one next, I guess, 2027. Yeah, nice.

Well, it's a good plan. Once the winter is over in Toronto, you can start. Yeah. Is it ever over really? Right. Yeah, it's over eventually. Well, if you do happen to find your way to Happy Valley, I think that's the closest that will be in your area next year.

So hopefully we do run into it at a race. Yeah. Okay. Good luck. Awesome. Good luck with the paddle journey. Yeah, thanks for calling. Happy 200th episode.

Thank you. Thanks a lot. Have a great Sunday. Bye. Bye. Sorry, cut her off. Okay, I think we have time for one final person. Hello? Just barely squeezed in there as the last caller of the day.

Welcome to the TTL podcast, episode number 200. Yep, you're here. We're about to hang up because you took like nine rings. Yeah. Usually we go to 10. Yeah. Oh my God. I'm just trying to get off my bike.

You're on your bike. You don't have to get off your bike. Don't get off your bike for us. It's okay. Just do a quick 1,000 watt sprint and then talk to us about your experience. No, I will definitely pause my workout for this. Well, we are trucking along. We're like two hours into recording this, but you are our final caller.

So we are hoping you have a question for us. But first of all, tell us your name and where you're from and what your bike workout is. My name is Nathaniel. I'm in Ottawa. Nice. And so what was the last question? Bike workout. What are you in the middle of? Oh, I'm doing some threshold repeats. Oh, yeah.

No. This is way better than that. We're sitting here doing donut repeats. Yeah. Oh, I don't think I had one after the last caller, actually. I should want up. Yeah. Cool. Canadian then. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. Do you have a question? I do have a question. I wrote it down just in case because I figured I would space if you guys did call.

All right. I love it. So admittedly, it's a little bit selfish, but I just moved and I am shit at interior decorated. So what would be other than like I have my look for things where you can find them post suits up, but like non-endurance sports decorating ideas. Like for a pain cave or just for a house in general? Just general house things. I have lots of bare walls that need to be.

Yeah. Honestly, this is my dream job. I would love to do interior design and come to your house and make it look good. I would absolutely love that. It's a little hard to do on a podcast virtually. But what Eric and I found when we moved is our walls were also blank for a long time. to the point where people were watching our YouTube videos and being like, oh my gosh, your walls are so boring.

Like they would criticize us. And the thing about art is that you wanted to have like some kind of sentimental value to you. Nick's mom painted us this beautiful painting. And every time we look at it, we think about her, we appreciate it. So I think rushing to throw stuff on the wall that doesn't really have any meaning to you is not the way to go. But that said, there are a lot of really cool print websites where you can go on and order a cool print

for not too expensive and they'll even frame it for you. And you can find so much cool stuff on there. Whether you like more nature stuff or more abstract or cool photos, they could even be placeholders until you find something that means a little bit more to you. But it does go a long way to put stuff on the walls for sure. Also something like this, and you can't see this, Nathaniel, but right behind us between us, there's a big shelf. And it's not books on here.

There's kind of things that represent Eric up here. And I think that can be similar to what Paul is saying about something that has sentimental value instead of functional use. Bookshelves go such a long way. Totally. Like you could go to a secondhand thrift store and find a bookshelf that looks kind of meh. But you could put like a plant, a light, three books, a TTIA, like a plaque from erase, something like that. And it just brings a lot of visual, you know, interest to that spot that's otherwise just blank and sitting there. So bookshelves are good answers.

Nick. But also my biggest tip is to go to thrift stores, go to secondhand stores. You can find so much cool stuff for not a lot of money. Cool chairs, cool tables. That's how we furnished most of our house, honestly. Yeah, our favorite things are things that we found that were like on sale or at a thrift shop or just not like at a big box store. And what I noticed when we did our living room is I felt like we were pretty lost on that at this house until we found this rug. And this is going to be like sound like I'm just trying to put Big Lubowski in here, but the rug. It really tied the room together. I feel like for me anyway, that gave us this anchor point of like, okay, that's what this

style is going to be. And you start to like base things off of that versus just like standing in a department store and looking at a lamp and a bath towel and a poster and trying to draw a connection. Yeah, thrift store is over IKEA is my biggest tip. But if you want to send me pictures and all you can help you on the journey. Paul's career starts now with Nathaniel. Ideally, there's no budget. That would be the most fun.

Yeah, spending other people's money is fun. Right. I agree, yeah. Cool. Well, thank you so much for picking up in the middle of your bike ride. Good luck with the rest of the efforts. Yeah, of course. Threshold repeats.

Congratulations on all the podcasts. Oh, thank you. It's so much talking. Thanks for listening to them. Sure is. All right, have a good one. Enjoy. Thanks, Nathaniel.

Bye. Wow. Good luck. Good luck getting back to that. That was a tangent. Also, like, threshold repeats anything to get away from that. Threshold's not supposed to be that hard. It's so hard for me.

It's not that hard. I don't know why. I think people, I think you're doing it wrong. I think VO2 efforts are hard. Well, I can't do VO2 efforts more than like four and a half minutes. Exactly. Like 20 minutes of threshold hurts. Yeah, you're right.

Because like, you're like 10 minutes and you're like, how could this get worse? And then it feels much worse by the next 10 minutes. You're right. Especially indoors. You can do it outside. Yeah, yeah, I wouldn't know. But yeah. All right. So we've made no dent in the donuts, but we're going to.

Oh, for sure. We can do it before and after. Yeah, yeah. Which is going to be sad. We're going to be sad. We're going to bike ride around bed and give them out to our friends. How about that? We'll throw them out like.

Just like male boys. Yeah. You got to catch it in your mouth. Like male boys. Yeah. Guys, 200. What occurred to me as we were in the last couple of questions is just like, I am so thankful that we get to do this.

and that we get to have a conversation and that people are into TTL, people buy T-shirts, people are like feeling what we're putting out there. And to me, TTL has always just been this like incredible creative outlet where like I can express myself through the shirt that you're wearing through the podcast, through video and everything and to have that connection with people is just like I feel so I am just like very thankful to do that. Yeah, still every time someone picked up, I was like, wait, you know who we are? I know.

And you care enough? It's just really freaking cool. They gave us their number. Yeah, but we're a little bit insulated when we're in our places talking like we're just being friends. Yeah, that's why we love doing the calls. Right. Because you're like, oh, yeah, there's other humans on the other end of us. Yeah.

Cool. Well, thanks, guys. That was 200. We'll maybe call everyone again for 250. This is like our yearly work retreat for the pod, you know? A little bit. Yeah. That's awesome.

Thanks for listening. Thanks for watching. you're able to watch. We'll see you next week. One last timet. One last timbet. Okay, sounds good. One for the road.

While the outro music is playing. That one is the best one I've had so much. That was the best one. Great mouth feel. Good mouth feel on that one. Yeah. Okay. That was great.

I think we should just call a couple more people without that. Just for fun. I feel like you're not actually on podcast. We just want to say hi.