That Triathlon Life Podcast - Eric Races the High Cascades 100, buying a used carbon bike, and more!

Episode Date: July 25, 2024

This week we start out with some "Bike Tech With Eric" and then we move on to your questions! This week we discussed:What to look for when buying a used carbon bicycleWheather or not ceramic components are worth itHow loud a waxed chain should beCrank lengthHow much faster we swim in a wetsuitSide stitchesThe On Cloudboom Strike prototype shoeGloves or no gloves for mountain bikingBest bike for an older athlete getting into riding road and trailA big thank you to our podcast supporters who keep the podcast alive! To submit a question for the podcast, and to become a podcast supporter, head over to ThatTriathlonLife.com/podcast

Hi, everyone. Welcome to That Triathlon Life podcast. I am Paula Finley. I'm Eric Loggerstrom. I'm Nick Goldstein. And we are coming to you for a podcast about triathlon, about what's going on in triathlon, our own stories, our own race reports, and most importantly, questions from the listeners, you guys that we get every week and we try to address as many as we can. And we really appreciate getting those questions from everyone. So thank you. And Eric and I are both professional triathletters. athletes. Nick is a professional musician actually over in Italy right now. So we're recording this

early in the day on Monday so that we can work both time zones. But we are thoroughly committed to getting this podcast out each Thursday. So we make it happen a matter where we are in the world. Okay. So Eric, you just did this crazy mountain bike race. And I'm wondering how your body felt in the pool. Like, did you still feel it or does it feel pretty nice and smooth in the pool? No, I mean, I just felt a little weird most because I didn't do much swimming last week as I was tapering. Oh, right? No, I guess I shouldn't say tapering, but just focusing on the 100-mile mountain bike race. And I definitely felt like I need to just make sure that if anything else, I am, if nothing else, I'm, like, rested and ready to go hard for six to seven hours.

So getting back in the pool just feels awkward then. My low back, my lower back, when you do a lot of mountain biking, generally speaking for most people, your lower back gets a little tight. that actually started feeling better by the end of the pool, by the end of the swim. The biggest thing right now for me is I just feel like deeply tired. Like way more than when I've done 70.3s, even had really good 70.3 races. I went out and tried to join Paula for, she had short intervals, but like a three-hour ride the day after the race. And I woke up in the morning. I thought, man, I think I actually might be okay.

Man, I just recovered really quick. And then halfway through that ride, it just completely switched. It's like, I want to go lay down in that shade right there and just somebody please bring me a whole bunch of food and I'm just going to nap. But you were telling me that you felt pretty zapped like day and the two days before the race. And then you kind of came around the day of the race, but I wonder how much of this is just a cumulative effect. Yeah, I did bike like 500 kilometers total last week. 80% of that was on dirt, going pretty slow. So it was a big bike week for me.

And I do just feel deeply tired. But things came around on race morning. I think I did a good job the two days before, hydrating and really resting. And I had a couple things on my schedule that I was supposed to do. And I just cut those and laid in bed instead. Okay, so for the people who don't know, can you kind of tell us about what this race was,

like what the idea was before? And then we'd love to hear your experience. And Paula, I also want to hear your experience as the chief crew leader. Yeah, so last year I did the High Cascades 100 mountain bike race, which is a mountain bike race that's been running for a long time here in Bend. I can ride it over the start line if I so choose. And it's predominantly on single track, riding a mountain bike. It's a very endurance type of a race.

Last year, it took me seven hours and 15 minutes. It takes plenty of people out there 16, 17, 18 hours. It's kind of like Iron Man, you know, in length of time. but in a mountain bike space. So along with obviously just trying to complete the distance, there's a whole bunch of things that go into this because you can't just have an aid station every mile or wherever you want, like in triathlon.

You're fully in the woods, a lot of times without cell service, and the process for getting water while you're out there and getting food and refueling is pretty complicated, which is part of the excitement and what I have been enjoying about this whole endurance mountain bike sort of thing that I do twice, you know, once a year.

Hopefully more in the future. So last year, my goal with it was to just complete and feel like I paced really well and got to the finish line in one piece. It's generally hot this time of year. And I got fourth place. I was a few minutes behind third place. So coming into this year, I thought, you know, I had some really good training early in the year in Ventura.

I feel like my hip has been okay. and I haven't had super consistent, like, race-specific training the last few months, but I had a good last couple weeks of workouts. I've been feeling okay. And I've just kept my volume up while, you know, supporting pilot races and just getting through the summer. So I was optimistic and thought there was a chance that I could get on the podium. And that was my goal. This year's field was a little bit deeper than last year.

So I ended up getting fourth again this year. but first place is a guy who races professionally gravel stuff, mountain bike stuff, anything that's off-road. He went to gravel worlds. He's got 44th place there. He races for the Eastern Overland team. Legit dude, also super nice guy. Second place is Australian. And he's Australian. He's over here from Australia. Wow. Yeah. Second place was a guy who is, I was told, ex-pro world tour cyclist. So, you know, was doing like the Giro d'Italia and stuff like that.

And in his retirement is still ripping fast and doing more alternative dirt stuff. Third place is a guy that I pre-road the course with last week. His name's Landon. Super nice. Ben, local guy, but also making a living in the sport. He does a little bit of coaching. He races for himself and for his team. It's called drive racing and focuses on mountain biking and gravel stuff.

And then there was me. So first triathlete Yeah first triathlet I mean I certainly cannot be upset about the result I think it was great I'm psyched on it I do wish I could have you know been on the one two three podium

but I just have to keep chasing that But you have the fastest downhill times It's kind of like Strava allows you to kind of compare your segments to other people that raced as well So these guys are just so light and so powerful And very What do you call it like watts per? kilo. Like they can climb so well, power to weight. But then on the descents, Eric is technically

very good. It's just, world class. It's so weird, because I would imagine the exact opposite. I would imagine these dedicated mountain bikers obviously have the technical skills Eric doesn't have, but Eric would have the fitness from all the crazy endurance training that he does. But it really is the opposite. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure these guys train more than us on the bike. Yeah. I think I'm definitely a bit of an anomaly in the triathlon space that I can, you know, turn. bike really well and ride on dirt. Also, you're just used to the terrain. Like, it's so sandy here and you've done these descents quite a lot.

I know these trails really well. Landon, who got third, obviously knows the trails super well. The Australian has been living here for the last month. He knows the trails pretty well. The guy who got second, he's won this race four times. Like, these are all, these guys didn't just show up on Friday and race on Saturday. But I do have a pretty good grasp on how to ride here. So it was also different than last year.

Last year we were like sitting at the table the night before the race trying to figure out when to get bottles and like do we even need to have a crew at an aid station? Can you just do a bottle drop with the bags? I was woefully unprepared. But this year we had like Eric had a Castelli jersey with a sleeve in the back that you can slide a bladder down with a straw. Yeah. So we had three of those on ice to switch out at every aid station. And that as the ice melted could kind of cool him. him as he was also, we had tailwind high carb in each one.

So that was good. And we like handed him off bottles, dumped water on him every time he stopped. So just staying on top of being cool and being hydrated and having a really good plan of where you could have crew access and where you just had to use the neutral aid, I think helped a lot from last year. And although he had the same result, I think the race was much faster this year than last year. And you were kind of giving me estimates of time of when you'd be at each year. Aide Station and you were well ahead of that.

So yeah. It was a fast course and a fast day. It was very fast. So like at each day station basically I'd roll up and I'd have already taken the current hydration pack out of my hand out of my back and was like holding on to it. And then I'd skid to a stop next to Paula and like throw that on the ground, take my bottles out of the cages. While I'm doing that, she stuffs a new hydration pack in my back.

And then at one eight station there was like a guy helping and he put the bottles on my frame. Otherwise Paula would then put the bottles on my frame and I'm out in like eight seconds. It's like full Formula One. That was pretty sick. Every time we did it, I felt like, I felt like, I bet that looked cool. That felt cool. There was the one drone shot of Paula handing you off a bottle that was definitely cool.

Yeah, okay, so that was the first aid station. So the reason that at the first aid station like that, I just got the bottle, is because we had just climbed for an hour and 15 minutes. And then following that, there was going to be like six miles of gravel road. And I knew if there was any chance I was near somebody or with a group, I needed that first aid to be very quick because if you could be working together on that gravel road, you could lose like two or three minutes

in the course of the 30-minute gravel road section. And that also contributed to, I started the race with just the hydration bladder. My S-Works, Epic 8, has two bottle positions on the frame. I started with no bottles. I just wanted to be as light as I possibly could. And then that first stop at hour 15 in, Paula just gave me a water bottle.

And I tried to drink that before I saw her again. like 40 minutes later. Okay. Yeah. Unfortunately, the, just lightweight strategy still was not enough.

I got dropped going up that first climb. I was averaging 337 watts on trail. Averaging. Not normalized. This is including, like,

turning and doing stuff and still getting dropped. Wow. Somewhat significantly. I think I had lost two minutes on that hour 15 climb. And that's, that's kind of just a bit

where things, ended up staying for the rest of the day. Four guys got away. I was in fifth place. I ended up catching one guy going up one of the climbs, coming through an aid station later. He came back by me on the climb. I really did very well on the longest descent of the day,

dropped him, never saw him again, and kind of just stayed in fourth place, five minutes behind the leaders, five minutes in front of the guy behind me for the rest of the time. In the same way that I feel like a lot of amateur triathletes, we, you know, we see triathlon as this escape from who we've been told we are our entire life. Like for me, I'm a musician and I'm thinking, okay, I'm going to do this. This is going to be a stretch for me. Did you feel any of that doing this? So you're like, I'm a triathlet and I'm here

kind of like telling myself I can do this thing and I'm doing it well. Yeah, yeah, I had a realization going down that one main descent. I was like, man, I'm descending really well and within three seconds I crashed. Oh, oops. That has happened to me a couple of times actually where I'm like, man, this is fast. I'm going fast. I think into the bushes. Fueling in this kind of race is more important than even in a triathlon because if you get a little bit delusional or bongy or out of it, then you're... You pay the crash.

Then you can crash. Yeah. Like in a triathlon, you can kind of get, you know, maybe a bit bonked feeling, but there's no danger. In not in biking, there actually is a danger of being lightheaded or not being properly fueled. Also, the peak intensity is much higher. You know, on these climbs, I'm going back and forth between 450 watts for 10 seconds just to get up up some rocks and then you're recovering at 230 or 50 or whatever versus being able to like, okay, no, I was going to ride 310 watts for this 70.3

and I'm like kind of falling off and it's like 302, 301, 300, but you're still, your speed doesn't drop off quite as much. The difference between like 450 up those rocks and 300 up those rocks is you're walking the rocks. Yeah. And it's very slow. I think the race reminded me a lot of a triathlon, though, just as a spectator, because as I was, I did a little ride to meet Eric at the awards that were 13 hours after the start of the race. And I was riding on the last part of the course where the race finished and people were still coming in and finishing.

So people were literally taking over twice the amount of time that Eric did. And I think just completing the feat is so amazing. And every time I passed a person, I was like, that is insane what you just did. It does not matter how slow you go. Yes, they probably walked some of the rock parts that are extremely challenging. But just getting around the course, similar to an Iron Man, is a huge achievement. And I think in a lot of ways that we've talked about before with triathlon racing, they have it harder in the heat of the day. For sure.

So, yeah, Eric's going faster. and pushing more watts, but they're out there when it's 100 degrees out, and Eric's already at home having a cold shower. And they might also be less familiar with the suffering that Eric is so familiar with day in and day out. Of course. Maybe, but you adjust your effort to account for the amount of suffering you're willing to endure, and you're just more prepared for a 13-hour day. You're really letting aid stations and whatever.

And it's hot. They shortened it to 90 miles from 100 because of the heat, and at first we were confused of why they would take only 10 miles off. I know, it's like, what is that going to do? But for these people coming in at hour 13, they could have been an hour 15. Yeah, we're talking about a five mile an hour average. Taking 10 miles off is like two hours. Two hours of time on this journey.

Yeah, you're right. Yeah, it's very slow. So, good job, Eric. So, Paula, you said that there was a, you felt like he did better this year. Eric, was there any objective way to quantify if you actually did better or not? Or is it the course too different year to year to really do that? They were fast. Yeah, I say the course is a bit too different.

But what I could do is I could go in and look at like my 30 minute power in the first climb. In the middle of the first climb, my 30 minute power in the middle of the second climb and the third climb and like compare that to last year and see if there was a drop off, you know, more or less. It's hard to compare year to year power wise even. But I think just the quality of the field was good this year. and being within striking distance of those kind of athletes is really crazy. And Eric will put out a video with some footage, and his friend Curtis jumped in for the last descent from behind with a GoPro, and it's insane how fast he's going around these corners and stuff.

Yeah. Very impressive. The video is going to be great. I haven't started editing you yet, but we had Wadi out. We had Hank Whalen, who helped shoot some of Oak Mountain video. He flew all the way out to film and to hang out. Oh, yeah. Thank you.

That's great. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I kind of went all in on trying to make sure that this video would be good and that I could show this because I think it's a unique, cool thing. And yeah, I'm hoping to get that out this week. Can I was just about to say, was this before or after you? Yeah, I was going to blow my 100 mile mountain bike race story out of the water. Oh, man, what a crazy story. Okay, Paula, take it away. Well, I raced a crit on Wednesday. That's like my race of the week. But I can, I don't think I need to talk about that this week, maybe next week. But the day after the crit, Thursday. I was going out for. for an easy ride and I was trying to sandwich it in between a phone call and picking up my wedding

dress. So I had like 90 minutes to do this ride and I have a 90 minute ride. So I'm like, Kim, only going to get 80 minutes in, whatever. So I'm blasting down the road by our house and a bug flies into my ear. And at first it's just like buzzing around and I thought I got it out, shake my head. And I can't feel it. I'm like sticking my finger in my ear and I can't feel it. So I'm like, okay, it's probably gone. And then if you say, seconds later, I still hear it. And it is inside my ear canal. No. Not happy.

Busing around, freaking out, as am I, of course. And I'm probably like 15 minute ride from the house. So a five minute extremely fast drive. I called Eric, freaking out, not even knowing, like, is this life, not life threatening, but like, can this bug get further than my ear? Oh, my God. Membrane. Like what's going to happen?

And I can't explain how uncomfortable it was to have this thing rattling around and freaking out inside my ear canal. I pick up the phone and it's just screaming. And I'm like sprinting around the house, trying to put her on speakerphone, looking for the keys. I thought for sure you'd gotten hit. Yeah, maybe it should have been more. Screaming. And all I got out of it was like the road that you were on. So it like took off driving really fast.

in our monster truck. Found her. And then, it was just, it was so terrible because, not, yes,

it was terrible for, you know, Paula, obviously. But for me, I'm, like, get Paula in the car.

And, like, every 10, 15 seconds, all of a sudden, she just starts, writhing, like,

full on the exorcist. There is something in my head, in the seat. And, like, what am I supposed to do? Like, if I go to,

like, try to touch her, it's just, like, can, Completely helpless. Oh my gosh. And we just beeline it for our friend, Dr. Nate's house.

He's an ER doctor. He's an ER doctor. Fortunately was off duty and at his house. And then, yeah, Paula can take it from there. But it was awful to witness, let alone the experience. We waited for him really quick. He was coming home from his kid's swim lessons. And I'm sitting on his porch losing my shit because it's still buzzing around.

And every once in a while, a little stop. And everything will be okay. And then it'll start again and I'm losing it. And so I lay on my side on the front porch and Nate, like, pours lytocaine down my ear, which... That's numbing at, like, the doctor's office or, like, dentist. It's a numbing agent. So it killed the bug and kind of numbed my ear canal a little bit. Because at this point, my ear canal was quite irritated.

Oh, really? The bug was now dead. Dude, it's super sensitive in there. Like, you know, if you just put a key chip in and swirl it around five or six times, it can be a very thin membrane. let alone a freaking bug in there trying to scratch its way out. I don't even think you put cuttibs that deep, but as Nate was trying to dig around with, he had like some basic tools at his house, but obviously not the full, like what you'd have at an ER with him. And he had a little tiny camera, like a microscopic camera where you could see on the screen.

So he could see the bug. He showed Eric the bug. I didn't want to see it. But he couldn't get it out. It was too deep. It was. It was right up against her eardrum. It was scratching against her ear drum.

Yeah. So every time he would like stick something in to get it, it was really painful for me. And I was trying to like be brave. I've experienced much worse pain in training. But it's a totally different kind of pain. And it's really hard to distinguish between like physical exercise pain and like this type of pain you have no control over. And he even tried like putting derma glue at the end of a cue tip and trying to stick the bug onto it. but that just felt like a burning sensation in my ear.

Oh, no. So anyways, Nate kind of gets worried about puncturing my eardrums. So he said, I need to go to an E&T doctor, which is an earnose and throat specialist, and called a favor into his friend who could get me in within an hour. Thank God. So we went to his clinic. This is the crazy thing, though. If she'd gone to the ER, they wouldn't have been able to do anything for her.

She would have still needed to go back across town to this. E&T. They may have found an E&T at the hospital. Like maybe, but there's a good chance that she had shown up to the ER and had this bug in her ear for an hour and a half and then they'd be like, we don't have any tools small enough to get that. I mean, I would say, not that I was in a life-threatening situation, but I think the way that it was causing discomfort, it may have been treated like maybe more urgent than some other things. I don't know how ERs work in the US. I mean, if you were screaming the way that you were in the car while sitting in the ER, I think they would have done something just to get you out of there.

So anyway, we go to the E&T. At this point, the bug is dead. So I'm not, at least not in pain anymore, but I still know it's there. Yeah. And he uses this little tiny vacuum suction tool to dislodge it, first of all, because it's kind of stuck in there. And then a slightly bigger tube to fully pull it out. Got it.

It was basically like a really, really small straw that he hooked up to, like a vacuum. and then just to like touch the bug you would get suction on its shell and be able to pull it out. Oh my God. Yeah, so it was a little beetle. Did you feel a ton of relief when you, when it came out or were you just like emotionally? That was the worst thing of my life. Yeah, my ear was so irritated at that point. It felt like someone had taken a, I don't know, a razor blade and like.

Oh, God. So it didn't make my ear feel better, but it did make me feel better knowing it wasn't in there anymore. Yeah. And for the rest of the day, I was like, I think they love. left like a leg in there. Like, it feels like there's still there. Oh, my gosh. She kept asking me to look.

I'm like, too deep. Yeah, it doesn't matter if there is anything left. So the crazy thing is like, if you were riding with AirPods, this would not happen. I don't advocate for riding with both AirPods, but man, what a freaking one in a billion situation. I mean, I've never heard of this happening to anyone, though. Have you guys ever heard this happen to anyone?

No. Not on the bike. It probably has happened. The ENT guy said he'd only seen a couple people ever, and they were both, you know, said, this was the worst thing that I've ever experienced. And it's just, I mean, when it's that deep in your ear, I imagine that it's very hard to differentiate between it, like, being in your ear and it's just fully being inside of your head. Yeah, exactly. Anyway, I don't want to hijack the pot any longer with my bug story, but it was totally wild. It's okay.

I think there's a bunch of people running on the treadmill right now that are gagging. I can't finish. A lot of people's like worst nightmare to get things in holes in their faces where it's not supposed to be. Oh my God. That is so scary.

Yeah. And I missed my dress appointment to pick up my dress. You're going to wear your TTL kid on your wedding now? I was lying on the ground with Nate trying to get this thing out and I'm like,

Eric, call this bridal shop and tell them what happened. Tell them I'm not going to make it. And thankfully they squeezed me in. Pretty much I went from the ENT clinic straight to the wedding dress shop.

Forget my wedding dress. Oh my gosh. I'll never forget. I'll never forget it. No. Well, on a much more positive note, Oregon 70.3 happened this weekend. And our very own Maya Watson from the TTL development team

won the women's race, which is fantastic. Overall. Yeah. In commanding style. Yeah, very cool. First woman overall. I feel like every week we just have a good devo team update.

of races that happened. It's completely out of control and exactly what we'd hoped what happened. They are constantly, every single day, it's like, oh, yeah, John's racing, Zach's racing, Maya's racing, and they are all doing great, and we can, so cool, just love it. Love it. And I heard there were a lot of TTL kits at Oregon as well. I mean, if we didn't have anything else going on, we should have gone out to watch. but this was the morning after the mountain bike race, unfortunately.

Otherwise, was planning on going out to it. Maybe next year. Yeah. Cool. Are we cool to move on to questions here? So we've done the bug story. We've done the race recap. Yeah.

Yeah, we're good. I think that's all the things. Yeah, stay tuned for the YouTube video about the mountain bike race. And there's no YouTube video about the bug, unfortunately. That was too traumatic in real time for me to record. We don't need the visual aid in addition to the story. No. Just got one picture. That's it. Eric, is it coming out on Sunday, the video?

Yeah, probably. Okay. You know, ambitiously would like it to come out sooner, but I think that's reasonable because it's a bit of... There's a lot of cameras and stuff involved. Okay, well, Eric, you're not off the hook here because we're going to start with three bike tech with Eric questions. Bike Tech with Eric!

I got to say, I am a little bit brain dead, slash a lot, brain dead. I keep losing my train of thought. after riding seven hours in the heat. Second nature for you. This will be easy. Okay, first one here is from Andy. Hi, how do you determine if a carbon bike is safe after a crash?

If there are no visible marks on any of the carbon parts, thanks, Andy. So Eric, just if you're too brain dead, I did do some research on this, but I have a feeling that you'll be able to, you worked at a bike shop, so you'll be able to at least give your personal experience here. Yeah. If there are no visible marks, that is a great sign. I would still probably take it to the bike shop and have them look it over just to have a second set of eyes because you never know. Sometimes the light in the garage and whatever, you just kind of miss a little crack or something.

But what the bike shop will likely do is they'll go, and if they see any sort of a scuff or a nick or anything that looks a little bit suspicious, they'll press on it a little bit. it might tap it with a coin. They'll do some things just to try to assess whether or not there's like an actual break in the carbon and the carbon is compromised and a little bit soft and squishy, or if it's just like a crack in the paint or, you know, how deep does this imperfection that we see go? Right. Yeah, that's funny because you touched on a couple of the things that are part of the kind

of list of things that I found out you should do. And it seems like those are the two most important things and certainly the two most convenient things. The coin thing is pretty cool that you could like tap and you're like, apparently you listen for a thud instead of a clear

kind of ringing sound. Exactly, exactly. It's like trying to find a stud in the wall. You know, you tap the wall and it sounds pretty hollow and then you find a stud. It's like thunk. It's going to sound a little bit different

because that carbon is now no longer, you know, like held together with glue and as one solid piece, it's kind of like a little bit frayed on a microscopic level and it's going to make more of a soft thund. Have you ever done, have you ever had a bike X-rayed or like a CT scan on a bike? Have you ever heard of that?

Dude, no. That's over the top. Only for searching for, you know, hidden motors. Yeah, right. Yeah, that seems like if you have the money to pay for the x-ray of the bike, then you probably have the money to buy a new bike. I don't know. Yeah. It seems, it seems, maybe we're missing a piece here. Maybe bike shops have an x-ray machine in the back that they just don't often use. Yeah. And, I don't know. I could be wrong, but I haven't like heard in my experience of somebody who like crashed a bike and didn't find

anything and then they were just riding along you know, JRA and the whole thing just like split apart and splintered because there was a crack that they didn't know about. It's usually, I mean, I've seen people that have cracks in the frames and they just continue to ride them for another five years because it, yes, it's compromised

but the bike is still overbuilt enough that it was it was fine and they were kind of like, yeah. I can't afford a new one, and I'm just going to risk it and keep an eye on it, see if it gets any bigger, see if I feel anything weird. Okay, so from what I had, it was the visual inspection, which you already mentioned, then the tap test, which you also already mentioned, you know, listen for that dull, kind of that dull thud. What about a flex test where you kind of like put pressure on different parts of the bike just to see if you hear any creaking or anything like that, or a bend that sound that feels a little weird? that's kind of what I was saying about like pushing on it I would you know

kind of like get a thumb in the spot that looks weird and like start to put some light pressure on it and see if I hear that like it's a kind of a crunchy sound yeah that's not good it's like if you took a bundle of straw and like made a like a washcloth you know ringing motion with it that's kind of what's going on it's like this dry crinkly sound rough okay okay well great that's Andy that's what you should do

for your used carbon bike inspection and getting used bikes is great. And usually, I mean, the people that I know that have done it

have had good results with it. Also, Eric has sold his carbon bikes before to happy customers. Yeah, so far so good. Okay, next one here. Still,

Bike Tech with Eric is from Jill. Hey, folks, question about ceramic components for bikes. I recently joined a Tri Club that has discounts from partners that we can take advantage of.

I, like most, don't have more money than sense. so I'm fairly critical about how many dollars add up for triathlon. Recently, there's been a lot of conversation around ceramic components like hubs, pulley wheels, bottom brackets, etc., claiming to get you anywhere from 4 to 16 watts. Are they worth the hype? Is it worth putting them on a tri-bike that's seven years old, and the only upgrade is that it has race wheels?

How far or fast do you need to be riding for the decreased friction in ceramic to actually make a difference? Thanks for all the great content information and the TTL community. Much love from the captain. of the back of the back, Jill. Awesome. That's great. That is a lot of great information

on where you're at and what you're trying to accomplish. I would say you don't need this. I think if you're trying to win the Tour de France and there's a chance that three seconds can separate winning or losing or winning the stage and not winning the stage, 100%. Yeah, and money is not an object there.

but if you're kind of wondering if this is like a good next thing, I think there are so many other things. Like a cycling kit, you know, a new tri-kit that just fits really tightly is going to be so much more effective. And you can get 20 watts there. An arrow helmet, huge aerodynamic gains. And that's going to be a much more worthwhile investment, in my opinion. If money is no object, I say go for it. It's very cool.

there's definitely some, there is definitely a little bit of benefit to it. But what Paul and I do, we wax our chains. We do not have ceramic oversized, like the big ass, pulley wheels, that kind of a thing. We do, I have a ceramic bottom bracket on my mountain bike, and then we use like the standard SRM GXP bottom brackets on most of our bikes. Do you think there's any world where you could take a well, maintain drive train, replace some of the components with ceramic components, and get 16 watts? No.

That seems outrageous. No, I mean, I don't personally, and maybe we'll get some emails with people refuting this, but I think that's got to be a measurement off of what is the absolute slowest chain, chain ring, derailer combination we can possibly find compared to our absolute most tricked out 3,000. $1,000 drive train with the best lube. Right. Right. That sounds...

I've heard in the neighborhood of like four to eight, you know, for what. Okay, we have two more questions here with bike take with Eric. This one's from Daniel. I recently relued my chain, cleaned it first, and used some wax loob, but liquid-like oil. And since my chain is rattling, I checked it's still lubed. The chain length is less than .75, so I'm not really sure where it comes from. Already ordered new chain and cassette. However, I'm not sure if there's...

change is needed. So what could be happening here if there's a rattling chain, but the wax is apparently done correctly? I mean, was the drive train silent prior to doing all of this? That's my, I'm wondering if there is just an alignment issue going on. Yeah, that's kind of what I'm thinking. It sounds like this might just, you need a barrel adjustment or, you know, the electronic equivalent of that on the rear derailer, or if the front draylor is rubbing ever so slightly, Also, I've just found personally that SRAM drive trains are just slightly louder when you're running a one-by because that chain line is just more extreme on either end of the cassette. And that does make it so you really want to do a good job of keeping the drivetrain lubed. But my guess with this is this is just an adjustment issue rather than a lubrication solution.

Because if your wax chain is waxed properly, it should not be very loud at all. That's your experience, right? Same with my. We ride in silence. Yeah, we ride in silence, both conversationally and drive trade. Yeah. Okay, then the final one here. I'm sure you already mentioned this before, but I can't find it on the podcast.

I'm about to check out a new bike and was asking myself about crank length. I have a leg length of 85.7 centimeters. Thank you for the leg length. And was wondering if a shorter crank length, 170 or maybe even shorter, would be beneficial. I remember that you are trending towards shorter crank lengths. Thanks for the question

and I tried to keep it short. Andrew, you guys know your leg length and centimeters? No, I know my crank lengths, but not my leg length. Yeah, me neither. So Paul and I both run 165 cranks on our TT bikes

and for the most part, 170s on road bikes, mountain bikes. No, we got 167.5. Are you got 167.5 now? Yeah. Okay. And we both started out riding 172-5s. That was like super standard in the 2000s and even up until whatever, like six years ago.

And I can definitely tell the difference. It's better on my hip. You get less impingement over the top. It doesn't seem to have any sort of implications, ramifications in terms of your total power output. The one thing I've heard on mountain biking is that you have a slightly, you know, less wide pedal stance for just feeling like your stable. Right, right. Your feet are effectively a little bit closer together. That's the only potential drawback I've heard of.

You have to remember, too, if you're switching the crank arm length to adjust the saddle height. Yep. You can't just put a shorter crank length and then keep the saddle height the same because it's effectively shorter. Yep. Exactly. If you go from 170 to 165, you put your saddle up 5 millimeters. Yeah. But yeah.

But it does open your hip angle a lot, especially on a TT bike. Yeah. Which is why most people do it, right? That's the trick. because if you think about, so if you raise your saddle five millimeters to account for where your foot is at the bottom of the pedal stroke, now at the top of the battle stroke, you've gotten 10 millimeters of difference because your saddle is now 5 millimeters higher. The crank is five millimeters less tall on the top end. You're, you know, twice as open on the top end. Yeah. Yep. Awesome. So shorter is, I'm also 165 on my TT. I wouldn't say just blanket generalization that shorter is better. But I think that is a, it is a good option to explore. It does seem to be trending in that direction. There's certainly a lot of people and armchair experts who would say,

just short is better no matter what, yeah. But obviously you can't ride 100 millimeter cranks. So at a certain point in time. We don't, we're what, Paul and I are both, I'm like 59, Paul is like 58, Nix 6 foot. We all ride 165. This is going to become a running joke of you overestimating my height, Eric. Same with me.

I'm not 58, but okay. 5, 7, 5, 9. Yeah, 511. Hey, there you go. Nice, nice, nice. Okay, wonderful. Well, let's move on to more general triathlon questions now. Before we do that, we want to let everyone know that you can submit your own questions at that triathlonlife.com slash podcast,

which is also where you can become one of our beloved podcast supporters. And as a little thank you to our podcast supporters, we like to throw out some TTL swag. Is that allowed to say TTL swag, Eric, or is that a, a no? No, no word list. I mean, I like swag way better than I like merch. Okay, great. Let's call it Swarch then. And this week we put our random number generated to work.

And congratulations. Coach William Nichols. You won Bottle and Sox T-TL-Branded. Brand new. Wear them out. Tag us on your socials, coach. Thank you so much, Coach. We appreciate you being a podcast supporter.

We definitely do. First question here is from Josh. Question for all three of you. how much faster do you find your swim when wearing versus not wearing a wetsuit? A friend of mine swam a 22 minute in a wetsuit legal Olympic race and then swam the exact same race in a non-wetsuit Olympic swim. And I did the same race and went from a mediocre 33 minutes to an embarrassingly pathetic 44 minutes. Both swims were otherwise similar conditions, calm lakes, true 1500 meter distance, large races with competitive fields, Josh. That is a huge difference.

That's like a 25% difference in speed. I have to believe there was something else at play there. But do you guys know your times in the pool, wetsuit versus not wetsuit? How much faster they are? Yeah, you can go watch our early season wetsuit testing video to see exactly the difference between a few different wetsuits we tried.

And I'm pretty sure I did a control where I swam with no wetsuit. You did. But we've found it to be like in the neighborhood of like six to eight seconds per hundred. And my thinking on this as far as, you know, we swim like 22 minutes, 24 minutes for a 70.3, the worst of a swimmer you are or the less competent of a swimmer you are, the more fatigue you're going to get. And I think this could just blow up exponentially.

For sure. Like our body position just from growing up swimming is already fairly decent. And the wetsuit just makes us a little bit faster. If you're a very poor swimmer and your legs, you know, your legs are really dragging in the water. the wetsuit's going to make an even bigger speed difference. Yeah. This is pretty interesting, though, because I... What's the time difference for this person?

Hardly anybody's ever tried this, you know, in the age group field, because the wetsuit temperature is so high. It's almost always a wetsuit. Yeah. I brought the wetsuit to the pool once and found that for me it was about 10 seconds. Yeah. Which is a lot, and obviously I'm a much slower swimmer than you guys, but that kind of checks out, right?

The faster you go... For 100 yards. Yeah, exactly. Per 100 yards. Yeah, so that's a big difference. Multiply that times... 16 or 20. If you're doing a 2K swim,

that's a lot. That's a lot of seconds. I do think it has a more, like if you're sprinting 100 and comparing, it's not the same as swimming like a 1,500 meter race case. You're right. The difference is going to be less. Yeah, I wonder though, like if you're sprinting 100,

maybe your body position in the water is a little bit better. And the slower you go, the more, like for me, the more my legs start to drag in a wetsuit might help that even more so. That's what I'm wondering. that's what I'm wondering. Like your form just falls apart really hard. And the wetsuit doesn't save you if it's not there. It's not just about buoyancy, though.

I think a lot of it is about the material of a wetsuit is so much faster than skin and a bathing suit. Yeah, totally. That's obvious. Yeah. But most importantly, what's his question, though? Like, should I buy a wetsuit? No, how big of a difference is a wetsuit for all of us? Big.

He's like, this is some crazy numbers. Does this make sense to you? Yeah, the wetseats big. It brings the field way more together because it equalizes everyone a lot. And the most important thing for wetsuits, which we discovered in the last two years, is to make sure it fits you properly. Because if you have a wetsuit that's uncomfortable and it doesn't fit you, the difference is not going to be 10 seconds per 100.

It's going to be like, get me out of this thing immediately. I can't breathe. But with the orca wetsuits, we are so comfortable. I could sit in that thing all day. Okay, great. Next question here is from Owen. What up Paula, Nick, Eric and Flynn. This is still Grateful Oceanside Hitchhiker.

You picked up the morning of the race. Do you guys remember this? Of course, yeah. I think he was staying at that, we were staying at that hotel that they gave a discount to the TTL community. And we showed up there and we didn't have a reservation. Right, of course. We did. They lost it.

There was a computer glitch. Yeah, man, that was a mess. But this guy was staying there because we had kind of suggested it through our podcast. And then he was walking to transition, which. You can throw a rock and hit transition across the harbor, but you had to walk several miles around the harbor to get to transition. So we saw him and we're like, you can get in the car or we'll drive you over. This is crazy.

Yeah, we actually have a groove lounge. Flint move over. Sorry, Flynn. You're getting ousted. But I do remember him. I do remember him. What's this question? His question is,

it seems hard to find a lot of definitive answers for side stitches. exactly what are they and when they start how do you fight them off in the middle of a session and race i'm finding i'll get one stopping to break then taking it easier is the only thing that keeps it from subsiding it also lingers where if i do another hard session in the next 24 to 48 hours it very well could come back appreciate all you do for the community way to go eric on the hundred mile or today owen so is this something you guys ever experience yeah i get side stitches sometimes rarely I definitely remember getting them more in high school across country as a kid. Is that because we ate like shit and we didn't drink any water?

I have two theories, but I'm curious to hear your ideas first as to what causes them. I have no idea. I just feel like it's a fitness thing. I've never looked into it scientifically, but I think it's more of a dehydration issue, more than like a fitness thing. The only times I have experienced it outside of when I was like in high school. school or whatever back thing, which I had them all the time back then, I remember. Even like a light run, it would give it to me. Now the only time I experience it is if I am not properly trained, like I've been a little slacking and haven't been training a lot, and then I can get one. Or if I

have too much food in my stomach, and I'll get sizage like that. If I don't have one of those two things, I will never, never get them. I can't recall a single time of God. Did you look up the scientific? There is no consensus on it. There's many different reasons for it. And there's many different reasons for and it's not enough of a thing for people to be interested enough, I think, to give it proper research. I think it's definitely a thing. No one's passing away from side stitches,

so it's not getting researched by Stanford. I mean, think about this. People still don't fully understand what leads to cramps. It's like, yes, sometimes it's dehydration. Yes, sometimes it's lack of salt. Sometimes it's over-exertion. Sometimes it's a different in your bike position, right?

There's a lot of different things that can lead to cramps. And a size stitch is just a form of a cramp a bit. Yeah. Yeah, I'd say if it's hot, or if you're racing fast, like staying on top of your hydration and nutrition could alleviate the possibility of it happening. And the fact that it's coming back potentially within 24 hours is maybe just a lingering effect of that.

You haven't had enough to drink or electrolytes or whatever in the days leading in. And often if I have a headache from being dehydrated, it's because I haven't drank enough during or right after a workout. And I don't notice it in the moment, but then I'm just so thirsty for the rest of the day. So proactively staying on top of it when it's really hot outside or when you're in a race, hopefully could help a little bit. And you're right. The only way to really make it go away is to stop, slow down, let it chill. I remember I was doing San Diego International Triathlon many years ago and I housed like half a dozen donuts the day before the race. I remember waking up

and still being like, those donuts are right in my stomach still right now. And fair enough. maybe I'm having a deja vu, but I feel like we've answered this question before in our 128 episodes. Maybe. Maybe. There's a good chance we have because I remember that story, Nick of the donuts and us being like, well, maybe I just told you though. We talk a lot too. Yeah, but I do remember. I remember this story about Nick eating donuts. Yeah, me too. No, I remember the story about cramps and Nick being like happens when you're not fit. Oh, maybe. Maybe. Yeah.

But I get cramps and I feel like I'm fit-ish. I don't think it's a fitness thing. You get side-stitches still. Sometimes on tempo runs, yeah. And I always attribute it to just being thirsty and not drinking. Yeah. But could be wrong. Well, good luck, Owen.

Let us know if you figure it out for yourself. Yeah, right. Okay, next one here is from Dean. Hey, team. Paula, have you been able to get your hands on the new on shoes yet? They look crazy. Also, how many kilometers do you run before changing to a new pair of shoes? How many kilometers would they be?

for everyday trainers and super shoes. Hope that makes sense. Thanks for the latest YouTube video. P.S. Paul, my wife absolutely loves your new bike. Thanks, Dean. We all love her new bike. Yeah, it's so nice.

It's so flashy. It's all I've ridden since I got it. I haven't touched a gravel bike or a TT bike or anything else. I have not tried the new light spray technology that On just came out with, which is basically a shoelace-free shoe that they make by a robotic arms. spraying this fabric into like a sock-like material that is the upper and then it's a raised shoe on the bottom. So my friend Hannah, who works for On, actually was just in Zurich. And she said that you can't buy them yet, but they're coming to some flagship stores

across the world. And they actually custom make it in front of your eyes to fit your foot specifically. So it takes three minutes to make. And they'll be making it specific to people's feet. So I don't think it's the type of thing necessarily right away that you can just order online. I think it's a specifically tailored. I didn't know that either. And I was confused why on hadn't sent me a pair to try or show people. You're like, what the hell?

Which is fine. I mean, there's so many on athletes and they did an amazing job of launching this and creating hype around it. But I think it is a little bit of a custom situation. Don't take my word for that. It could be that eventually they'll come out with a bigger line down the road where maybe they do fit more universally like an eight and a half woman is just that's what it is. But if you think about it,

shoelaces let you adjust very specifically to the tightness and the tension of the shoe based on your foot width and everything. So it makes sense that this would be a little bit more custom situation that you slide into and it fits like a glove. But it's so cool. And it takes less materials. It is environmentally friendly relative to other shoes that are made.

Wow. And I've heard, I mean, Helen Obieri won Boston Marathon in it, so it's obviously a very fast shoe. And I couldn't think of a more perfect launch of a new thing than to have one of the biggest marathon winners in the world where the shoe and win. I don't know. Did she see LeBron's new mountain bike? Oh, God, here we go. LeBron is apparently sponsored by Canyon. No, he's not sponsored by Canyon.

He bought shares in Canyon. Oh. He's sponsoring Canyon. He's giving Canyon money. I see. Right. Okay, that makes more sense. But then he's like, oh, it's in my best interest to get my followers to go buy Canyon bikes.

So this has this campaign with them. But it's kind of reverse. It's not really the typical like partnership or ambassadorship that you'd think of. Yeah, but Canyon's like, yeah, definitely we'll make a video with you in it, of course. Yeah. Yeah. What was the question, though, is about replacing shoes? Often you replace them.

How often do you replace them? Like super shoes, I assume. Oh, super shoes. Both super shoes and trainers. Yeah, I'll usually wear super shoes for three races and then I'll use them as like a fast training shoe afterwards. So I'm not throwing them away after three races. But I think after, I don't know, maybe 100 miles they're kind of breaking down to the point where they have less effectiveness in terms of their foam that they have. It's more of the foam that breaks down more than anything.

I think the carbon plate stays pretty sturdy. But I'll still wear the shoes for tempo runs. afterwards. And then a training shoe, I'm not very good about, you know, noting when I start wearing a pair and seeing how many miles I do in it because I rotate between so many pairs every week. But honestly, a lot of it is just determined by how dirty it is. And if the tread on the bottom is gone, then I'll replace them. And I'm pretty spoiled to have a closet top to bottom full of on shoes. So it's not that much of a difficult thought process to throw out a pair and get a new pair out. but usually visually,

you can see with the tread if a pair is worn down. Would you say, Eric? Yeah, that and you just see a ton of wrinkles in the foam on the side of it. Yeah, that too. Because it's been compressed so much.

We generally, because we run on soft surface so much, you're going to get that compression a little bit before you get like the sole worn off because we're not running on asphalt quite as much. Yeah. Or if they have literal holes in the fabric, then you know.

That's too far gone. Yeah. Excuse you. So it reminds me of something that Paulo said to you, I think it was to both of you, but he said, if you put on a new pair of the same shoes that you already own, and they feel different,

then it's time to replace them, which I thought was kind of an interesting way that he thinks about it. Yeah, this is a thing that you can do if you're a pro athlete and you have new pairs of shoes sitting in the closet. Of course. Yeah. But I think it's smart if you're going to buy a new pair of shoes to buy two pairs and then rotate them.

I think we've said this before. on the podcast as well. They'll last twice as long because you're wearing them half as often, but having a day in between to let the foam re-expand, I think is really good and prolongs the duration of them versus if you're just wearing the same pair of shoes every single day, hammering the foam down. Or if you run in the evening and then the next morning, this is what I've heard before. This is interesting. It doesn't let the foam kind of come back to its natural state. They're just constantly being hammered. So doing every other day. That's what I do. It does seem like there's no downside, though, because, you know, you're going to put the miles on the shoes no matter what.

Yeah. Yeah, this is, maybe it's like an old wives tale, but I remember someone telling me that once back in my early years of running. And ever since then, I've never, I don't wear the same pair of shoes on consecutive days ever. Interesting. You didn't know that about me, Eric? I mean, I didn't know that you were, like, processing that in your head and, like, had a shoe schedule. Yeah, like, I wore the black ones yesterday and wearing the white ones. today. No, I had no idea you were that methodical about it. Yeah. Wow. I would say here's your

protocol. If you think your shoes get 300 miles out of them, when you've gone 150, get a new pair, and then, yeah, alternate shoes every day. And then, you know, you're always like halfway through one pair. Oh, that's smart. That's smart. Like that. So you're never getting to a like 290 out of 300 miles of the shoe and then getting a new pair. If you're really on top of it, you can track on Strava your shoes and how many miles they have. Yeah, but you have to remember when you get a new pair. And then you still run them until 1,500 miles. Yeah.

Well, I'm not saying I'm responsible with it. I'm just like, six hundred miles. Just to like look at the data and do nothing about it. I mean, that's mostly true. That is mostly true. We call that G-WIS data. Gee-Wiz. Isn't that cool?

You won't recover until March of next year. G-Wiz. Still going for a run tomorrow. Yeah. Oh, 90 hours of recovery. Must be broken. I'll just go and check it. Yeah, exactly.

Still going to send it. Okay, great. This next one here is from Everett. Hello, TTL fam. From Gresham. From Gresham. Yeah, good memory, Paula. Really? Yeah, I read all the questions in depth, and I know, for I send them to you. But you remember the Everett is from Gresham. Grisham is Eric's hometown, by the way. That's why it's a note. Yeah. Okay, here's the question. Hello, TTL fam. I am sure we will hear all about the 100-mileer bike Eric raced. but I did notice he wasn't wearing gloves during the training video he put up.

Do you usually not wear gloves? Do you wear gloves during the race? I always wear gloves when I ride mountain bike. Thanks, Everett, from Gresham. This is probably the one ride that I did without gloves on a mountain bike in my life. And Everett noticed.

Yeah, with the exception of my race Xera. So why, Eric? This seems like a perfect race to have long clothes. Because I forgot them, Nick. Oh! Oh, I see. I did a thing that I don't do very often, which is drive to begin the mountain bike ride,

because if I were to ride from the house to get to where we needed to preview the first, or like the middle half, whatever, of the course, I would revert in like 80 miles. So I had to drive to the start of this thing, and I got there, and my, Paula had wonderfully, like an angel, washed my gloves, and I just had not reconnected with them

and put them in the van and all the things. Right, I see. That's why. And my hands were, yes, absolutely disgusting. and hurting and not happy. So you normally wear gloves, what is the main reason? Is it crash protection?

Is it comfort while riding? Is it keeping them clean? Grip. Yes, there's a lot of little branches and we have things called Manzanita bushes here that'll just tear the backs of your hands open. Feels good. Yes, even on the road bike,

I will typically wear full-finger gloves just because I like the feeling of that. And yeah, if you crash, there's a little bit of extra protection. you can reach down and like rub your tire off. You know, if you go through a patch of glass very easily. It's just a thing that I like and I'm used to, so I do it. Yeah. Very few people ride with full finger gloves on the road.

That's very strange, but I kind of like it. I never ride with gloves, but I do, sometimes I get like numb or sore hands if I'm doing a long ride on my road bike and I wonder if having a padded glove would help. But I don't know. I don't. I think it definitely could because the way that you grab your hoods is not, it looks like there's kind of a bridge between the lower half of your

palm and the upper half of your palm rather than being like super flush on the bars I've noticed. So that like lower half of your palm pad could actually feel pretty nice. Yeah, I have a bunch from Castelli. Maybe I'll try it. With a shot. Where I'm in the crit. Yeah, that's cool. That's cool. That's not cool. I don't think gloves are cool necessarily. I'm not on a crit. You're like, yeah, I might go down. Who knows? Like, I've raced aggressively. Watch out. Yeah, these are crash protection. I need all the grip like.

I'll get like the rollerblading ones that have that like solid thing on the wrist. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You never know. It's like I'll stay away from her. Yeah. Some guy was in the crit in the crit last week. I was in, I jumped in the men's race for after the women's race. And some guy was like, you're my favorite wheel to follow.

And I was like, wow. Wow, that is a compliment. Thank you. And he said, no, it's because you have the nicest frame. Oh. I thought it was because you're taking good lines. That's what I thought too. I was like, oh, it's because I'm riding so well and I'm taking good corner lines.

But really it's because you like just staring at my bike, which is also a compliment. That's nice. Generally speaking, some very interesting characters in the cat 4 or 5 men's field of bike races. As you would expect. Yeah. It's a trip. It's always fun. Okay.

Last question here is from Brian. Hey, guys. Love the Pod. You guys are an inspiration and truly ambassadors for the sport. Thank you, Brian. I have a question. I'm 50 years old, never done anything close to a triathlon or anything on a bike, really, except recreational riding.

I have taken up running recently, particularly trail running. I do an average of about two 5Ks or 10K races a month. I want to include biking in my competitive efforts, but open water swimming is really not my thing, so I'm leaning towards duathlon. I have a nice hard-tail mountain bike, but most duathlons where I live are road. bike and road running. A few are trail runs with gravel or mountain bike rides, but those are the scarcity around here. So I would need a road bike or at least a gravel bike that could serve dual purpose. Let me be clear. I'm not looking for serious competition just to have fun and expand my

fitness. So first question, at age 50, am I nuts? If not, can you help me with additional equipment suggestions? I'm already a runner, as I said. I have road and trail shoes, GPS watch, etc. Thanks again, Brian. Well, let's make it easy. What kind of bike should Brian get that is kind of a do-it-all bike where he can do everything he likes to do and still race and maybe even race competitively? Wasn't he asking about if 50 is too old to get into doathlons? Yes. We know the obvious answer to that is no, it's not too old. Definitely not. You got this, Brian. Yeah, but if he's self-conscious about it and he's asking us, then it's not obvious. No, we're saying definitely not. Definitely not too old. There is an 80 to 85-year-old category at, you know,

triathlon world championships and people race it. Yeah, it's not too old. And it's, I think, better than running in terms of just introducing an aerobic activity that's not weight-bearing.

Yeah, you can bike for pretty much ever until you just can't see. You see old dudes right and way into their old age. Yeah, running hurts. So I think that getting a comfortable, you could either,

you could go two ways. You could get a road bike, which will be faster than a gravel bike, or you could get a gravel bike and just, if you're not worried at all about pacing, you can for sure ride a gravel bike on the road and it's totally fine.

It might be like 10 minutes slower over a 40K, I don't know, but that's not your concern. Then that would work out fine and you could use it on gravel as well. Or you could put road wheels on a gravel bike and use it as a road bike. Yeah, I think that's the move. The gravel bike might be the most versatile option

for someone who's not concerned about going as fast as they can. And for a bike that's very multifunctional comfortable, maybe less expensive than a racing road bike. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So for example, inside of the specialized bike line, which is what we're the most familiar with, they have the crux, which is basically a cycle across bike that they're kind of

marketing as a gravel bike and it has no suspension of any sort in it. It can fit pretty wide tires. And Paula likes to ride that when she rides the road and any gravel that's pretty buttery or champagne gravel. And then we both have the diverge, which has a little bit. bit of a shock in the, basically kind of in the headset, in the fork area. And that'll give you just a little bit of washboard relief and stuff. And you can ride a little bit fatter tires on that and going a little bit rougher gravel. But it's heavier. Like the beefier the bike is, the more forgiving

it is on rougher terrain. So if you're thinking you're going to get this and ride mostly on the road, maybe a bike like the crux is more appropriate. Yep. And it sounds like if you already have a mountain bike, then I would kind of agree. Maybe going to the crux route because if you're going to do something rough. You can always just do the mountain bike and ride that on really chunky gravel road. The advice I give when people ask me this question, Eric, tell me if this is bad advice, is to buy, if you can afford it, buy the gravel bike, let's say the crux, and then buy also a separate set of wheels that you put road tires on that have a cassette on their rear wheel, that have their discs, the rotors on there already. So it's a super easy swap. And you kind of

have the best of both a little bit. Yeah, yeah, exactly. If you already have a road bike, then maybe your wheels already fit on there and you're, you know. Oh, that's a good point. Yeah. Possible. Yeah, you don't have to switch your tires every single time you want to do a different surface.

Oh, my God. That sounds terrible. Ideally. Yeah. You guys, last week, the shredder bed questions, apparently some other guy also had that idea. And he messaged us. He's like, where's my free poster?

This was my idea. But I saw, I didn't see his message or I saw it later. He didn't submit it through the forum. He submitted it. it through Instagram. Which is not an official submission. Yes. We have been very clear about that.

But I want to tell this person, I don't remember their name, that we do really appreciate it. It's a genius idea. I'm not going to send you a poster, really, because I don't know, I didn't see it till after. We're out of posters. Well, also, he didn't officially send it in. He sent it to, he sent it, I think I might have also gotten a message from him with a screenshot I just wanted to acknowledge that I acknowledge that he thought of it.

It's kind of funny that two people came up with it. Yeah, it's really smart, really smart. I think that's all I had to say. That's wonderful. Nice. Well, I'm going to go to sleep here, and you guys are just getting started on your day. That's how far away we are from each other. Yeah.

And speaking of shred till bed, Shred to Bed, Shred to Bed, it's imminent. It will be happening within the next week. So check Instagram. Definitely check the website as soon, I think in the next... Are we doing the podcast supporters get special priority again? I think that will... They'll just sell out.

They'll just sell out. They'll just sell out. They'll just sell out. They sold out in like five minutes last time, so I just... We will continue to do podcast supporter early launches. This is just like a very special situation. So not every single time will we do that. Yeah, that's...

And just because they went so quick. you kind of want everyone to have access to it. Exactly. Well, it is a way to incentivize literally everybody to be a supporter for the podcast. That's right. That's true. Boost up that number again a little bit. We need those numbers.

Yeah. We do appreciate the podcast supporters. No, we don't want to force people to be supporters, though. Yeah, no, we wanted to just feel like you got some extra special every once in a while. Yeah. So yeah, so that's it. Anyway, what I was trying to say is we will have a countdown timer like usual on the website. So check back there as well.

Fantastic. Thank you so much, guys. Thanks for making this time work too. I appreciate it. And I appreciate you. Thanks, Nick. Bye, guys. Later.