That Triathlon Life Podcast - Paula Findlay's Ironman 70.3 Worlds Nice debrief, Race Ranger chaos on the Col de Vance, and more!

Episode Date: September 17, 2026

Paula and Eric are home from Nice, jet lagged, and ready to talk about it. Paula raced 70.3 World Championships on a course that demands technical descending skills built over years on European roads, and still finished top ten. The swim packs that split apart, arriving at the Col de Vance already fatigued, the Race Ranger rules that disrupted everyone's rhythm on the climb, a drafting incident that was caught live on the broadcast, fueling on a demanding course, and then on to questions.This week we discussed:Paula's 70.3 Worlds Nice full debrief: swim tactics, the Col de Vance, descending faster than 2019, and what the run actually felt likeThe on-camera drafting incident explained, what Race Ranger rules require, what happened on the climb, and the personal apology that followed the next dayWhy Kristian Blummenfelt's 1:05:12 half marathon off the bike might make more sense on this specific course than it looksKatie Schide showing up at the turnaround on the run course, and what it meant to Paula to see her thereThe Nice croissant run: hundreds of people, one visit from the French policeTTL Kona edition apparel launches Thursday, limited numbers, no pre-order, Foreign Rider collabDoes cadence actually matter for cyclists, or is it just a distraction from the real problem?Wheel-on vs. direct drive trainers for a new TT bike: what actually mattersBucket hats in triathlon: sun protection or aesthetic surrender?Where to position your support crew on a 70.3 run course for maximum impactRunning downhills without destroying your knees: shoe fit, grip, and why sizing up a full size might be the culpritMaking mountainous training roads translate to triathlon-specific fitnessTaper week from two pro perspectives: structure, what feeling bad on Tuesday actually means, and why consistency beats reinvention every timeA big thank you to our podcast supporters who keep the podcast alive. To submit a question and to become a podcast supporter, head over to ThatTriathlonLife.com/podcast

Hey everyone, welcome to that triathlon life podcast. I'm Eric Loggerstrom. I'm Paula Finley. I'm Nick Goldstone. Paul and I are extremely jet lagged. Nick is bus lagged. I don't know. You had a long bus ride after Nice. Several bus rides. But we're back home from 70.3 World Championships in Nice. So we'll do a little bit of chatting about that. It's totally free form. We don't have much of a plan, however much Paula wants to talk. And Nick and I want to bug her. But we got a ton. of awesome questions to get through. So if you're new here, if this is your first time listening, Paul and I are both professional athletes. Nick is a amateur athlete and we just love talking about

multi-sport. Welcome to the show. How backwards is your time zone right now? Eric, you were texting me at 4 a.m. your time today. Well, I waited a couple hours before I texted you after waking up. Oh, I see. Today was rough. The first night back, we had traveled for like, 30 hours and just completely missed one, you know, full cycle of sleep. So we passed out pretty hard. But last night, yeah, man, we were just up it too. And that weird in between space where, like, you really want to fall back asleep and you feel like you should. But like your body's like, your brain's like kind of half waking up. It's very strange and awful feeling. Sleep is so weird like that. The front of your mind's like, I just want to go to sleep. And

something, that message just does not get to the back of your mind. It's like, I'm trying to help you. I feel like paralyzed. Like my body is so tired and terrible feeling, but my brain's kind of like, well, well, to go. So how much of this whole, like,

because obviously you have this in both directions. When you get there, you also have the same problem. How much does that make a trip like this feel not worth it? I don't like to throw around. I'm just going to keep talking until Paula jumps in. I don't like to throw around not worth it because the worth it is completely up to you.

And, you know, if Paula had won the entire thing, then like anything on earth would have been, quote, worth it. And if she gets 20th place, then nothing is worth it. So, you know, it makes it harder, that's for sure. Yeah, you can't decide after the fact if it was worth it or not because... Right. You did it. It was what it was.

Mm-hmm. But I really struggled with the jet leg this time. I have been to Europe a lot over my life and trained or traveled and raced over there. And I don't know, for some reason, all week I was just really sleepy, really having a hard time getting excited about the race, having a hard time getting feeling good in training and was kind of just forcing myself to go through the motions, even though I didn't want to. So in Placet, I felt really prepared for that course and that race and that distance and that everything about it I was very prepared for mentally and physically. and I felt like going into Nice, I wasn't prepared for that kind of race as well, like the technicality of the descending,

the time change we didn't go as early as maybe I would have if it was like, you know, one of the very key races of the year for me. I had Kona on my mind and putting that as a priority. So everything, Nice took not as much of a priority. And for that reason, when I got there, and it's a world championship,

all the best people are there. It's one of the most competitive fields I've ever raced against and I felt kind of sluggish and unprepared. So that combined with everything else just made the excitement levels a little lower. But I was still optimistic. Like the climbing is really good for me. I've done that course before. I had a good race in Vancouver. So all these little things were like keeping my mind somewhat positive and optimistic, despite not feeling as excited as I was for some other races this year. We've kind of talked about this before and like what makes you feel prepared for, not you specifically, but makes one feel prepared for a race. And doing all the things

that would make you feel super prepared for this race were kind of counterproductive to feeling prepared for Kona. Like you would have gone and done all these really hard climbs. We would have gone to Portland and like practice all the dissents and stuff. But that doesn't really have anything to do with the specific things that you need to do for Kona. And as a result, you're going to feel less prepared for this equally competitive event. But, you know, Lucy Charles didn't even go to this. Like, plenty of people just skip niece in particular because of how challenging it is from this technical perspective and it features just like a completely different type of athlete and

preparation. Yeah, I said to my coach after like, I don't know why the hell I even came to this race. That was so below what I wanted to do here. And he's like, you went because it was a world championship. I'm like, oh yeah, that's a good point. This is my job. This is a world championship. I'm competitive. And I'm one of the best in the world at this distance. Why would I skip a world championship? It would be, I would regret it if I didn't go. I would have questions. Like, how would I have done?

You know, there's, it's not like I regret going to the race necessarily. But it's a hard, it's a hard thing to do to make that big trip and then also prep for Kona. Being one of the only ones besides Taylor Nib and a couple others who traveled from North America for this race. Like if you're based in Europe, it's a little easier. You're not dealing with a jet light. You're not dealing with the time change. you're dropping in and racing on the same time zone. But, yeah, it was a little more logistically and, like, time commitment-wise,

bigger for athletes coming from over here. Let's do like a little reality check here. You got top 10 at Worlds. It's, that is phenomenally good against people from all over the world and a lot of which do not race Iron Man at all. It's really a great result. You didn't, you have very high standards for yourself. That's great. It's part of the reason why you're the athlete you are. But top 10 in the world at Worlds is really great. Yeah, I think it's hard because I've finished top five in the last three times I've done it. So my expectation is higher. And I'm not quite in the mindset or mood yet to be receptive to people telling me that I did great. Because people are telling me that. And I'm just like, I don't want to talk about it. But I'm also just like extra tired and grumpy right now. So I appreciate that, Nick. And you're right.

I'm not even saying, I'm not even saying it for you. the road. I'll appreciate it more, but I'm not like, you're right. I am top 10 the world. It's a combination of things. I'm saying it for our dear listeners. For our listeners. Okay, okay. Okay. Yeah. And something else I'd like to say for our dear listeners, Paula, if you'll let me say this and you can stop me if I can't. Paula, you descended on one of these segments, random segments we saw two minutes faster this time over about 20, 25 minutes than when you did this in 2019. That is a huge. huge win. For me, that is the coolest thing. As a fan of you, that is the coolest thing about

the whole day is that you descended way better. Yeah, my initial reaction after the race was, oh, I was, I sucked at the dissent. I got caught by everybody on the dissent. And Strava is kind of cool because you can look at my file from 2019 and my file from 2026 and see the segments, like there's a 25 minute segment that's basically the descent. And I was three minutes quicker this year than in 2019. Oh, three minutes. Yeah. Wow.

It was three minutes. It's crazy. I was descending so much better. And of course, it wasn't as fast as the women that live on these roads and train on them all the time and maybe are definitely a lot more skilled at it than me. But I did push my comfort zone and I was better than 2019. I actually climbed slower than 2019, though. I don't know if it was, there was some headwind this year and, like, the dynamics of the race

Ranger definitely impacts the race a little bit in the speed of your ability to climb when you're having to drop back and stuff. But yeah, 2019, slightly faster climb, way faster descent this year. So overall, a better bike this year than in 2019 and a way better run. So I've definitely improved over seven years. And I truly think that if I had had the race I had on Saturday, back in 2019, I would have been like top five maybe podium. Like the sports just gone, much better. Yeah. So it's, it's crazy.

The top level is so crazy. Yeah. I said the men's and the women's. I mean, just to quickly say that Christian Blumenfeld ran a 10512, I believe, for his that marathon, which is the fastest. Got second. It's not like he's a slow swimmer and biker, but that's the fastest run off the bike ever. Yeah.

I'm having a hard time deciding if this course is easier or harder to have a fast run split. because one way you could think of it is you're climbing so hard for like an hour or 75 minutes and then you kind of get to recover on the descent in terms of just the effort you're putting out. Of course, mentally it's very taxing because you're focusing on descending well, but you kind of get this long rest and then you're peddling hard into town for 15K before the run that's flat at sea level and barely any wind that day. So in some ways that can make your legs feel really dead and heavy. And on other ways, it's like you're not putting out this sustained,

two-hour power that you would in a regular 70.3 and running off of that. So I guess since the run splits were so fast, you could say that having that kind of recovery on the descent may have helped the run times be quicker than normal for this. And the athletes are just getting fitter and faster. But the course kind of suited that. I think it kind of depends on how well you check yourself on the climb. Like if you can be as fast as everyone else and go like 95, 98% of your ability versus a whole bunch of people having to go 100%. That sucks your legs. But for like Christian,

I think he's the master of, or just not quite able to climb as fast as Hayden. And that allowed him to have this completely bonkers split. Maybe if Hayden hadn't ridden as hard as he hadn't tried to put that gap into Christian, maybe he could also run that fast, but two different ways to attack it. Yeah, the climbing was so, the cold of us was interesting because I had no idea at any point really how many people were ahead of us. I ended up having not a great swim,

got kind of strung out from the front pack, and thought the gap was not as big as it actually was to the front of the race. So when I got to the Col de Vance, I was like catching people, catching people, it was motivating, but there was still actually quite a lot of people in front of me. But two days before the race, I rode the Col de Vance and only climbed 20 seconds slower than I did in the actual race itself as I was doing a workout. And it wasn't nearly, is hard, like perceived exertion-wise. The workout was like two minutes hard, three minutes steady, three minutes easy. I did that four times to the top. So as I was climbing in the race, I'm like, just do that workout. Like go two minutes at 300 watts, three minutes at 250, three

minutes easy. And I just couldn't do it. So I think it's proof that the amount of effort it takes to get from the swim to the bottom of the cold avance, you're arriving there pretty fatigued already. And it is so hard to climb that climb hard at that point of the race. And it's so impressive what Nib did and what the men did. But for some reason, I just really had a hard time climbing at the watts that I wanted to or thought I could at that point. Racing is hard. I mean, racing is so much harder than training some. I mean, it should be. But based on what I did in training two days ago I should have been able to climb quicker on paper, but I couldn't. So let's play a little game here. Let's say all things being equal, you get to do it again,

but nothing physiologically about your body changes, but you get mentally teleported back to five seconds before the gun goes off at the swim. Knowing what you know now, do you think there's anything you could have done to have a better day? A swim better. And so what does that mean? swim better, right? Your fitness is your fitness. Yeah, exactly. I don't know. Tactically in the swim, I think I make some mistakes. But I got out really well in the swim and felt like I was in the front, like with people that got out in the front pack. And then sort of halfway through the swim this happened in Vancouver as well. A gat forms and it just grows and grows and grows. And suddenly I'm leading the second pack. And I am not fast enough to lead a pack. And it just kind of balloons to over a

minute. So just being able to swim on feet is so hard for me. And I like lose the feet if I swim a little bit off course of them or don't have the ability to kind of sprint for five seconds to get back on if I do get dropped from it. So I don't know. Open water swimming is a really tactical skill. And even if I swim fitness in the pool is pretty good, I don't personally practice open water swimming that much. And it's proven in the last couple of races to be a little bit of a challenge for me to stay with packs, you know. So I don't know. I wouldn't have changed, I can't change anything, of course, on that day. But I think it could have changed the outcome quite a lot if I had been even just one minute up on the swim than what I ended up being.

Okay, Eric, so you are a very establishedly good, establishedly is not a word, open water swimmer. And you also open water swim with Paula all the time. Is there something that you see in her swimming that you think she could improve here tactically to have. help herself out. Yeah, I think when we go open water swimming with our group, we need to focus on not splitting up. Like, when we go swim across the lake, I think it's rather dumb. Everybody just kind of

like goes wherever they want. Well, everyone's a different speed. They're not. Yes, they are. They are not enough of a different speed. No one even makes an attempt to sit on other people's feet. It's just it's kind of insane to me because I think we could all stand there and go like,

okay, we're going to go 300 and everyone's going to try to stay together. Eric's going to lead, go a little bit slower. And we're just going to work on swimming as a group instead of just like, let's swim to that buoy. And literally five different people take five different lines. And I feel like I'm the only one practicing swimming on anyone's feet. And I'll sit on Andy's feet. And it's easy for me. And then I'll try to come around him because I'm working on practicing, like touching feet, siding around a person. Like you can just work on it, but it might come at the expense of a little bit of the

optimization of your like whatever workout or heart rate or something. Yeah, it's hard with a drastically different ability in everyone's swim skills. But yeah, that is the way. But like, Paula and I could go do it. But we would just want to set out, you know, with like, here's the plan. We're going to go 200 at a time. The watch is going to beep. And for that period of time, I'm going to go 70% send. And Paul is going to sit on my feet. And like, once every minute or at my discretion, I'm going to put in a 30 second surge. And Paula has to like pay attention to that. Because I feel like that's probably the disconnect that she's having in a race is like you settle into a pace and how feel sitting on someone's feet and then like a half a second lapse of you thought you just like lost

feet because you swam to the right a little bit too much but there was actually an acceleration and just like it's a stressful thing to like constantly be ready to respond at any second and be ready to go all in no matter what if there is an acceleration but i think at least for me that's how i've had to be to make lead packs in swims is just it's like maximum focus and eric when you are on someone's feet like that, how often are you siding above water for buoys versus kind of siding, maybe even underwater at the bubbles in front of you? Often, probably too often. If I'm behind somebody, I'll like take a site like every five strokes or something because I want to like look up and see if the person in front of that person has maybe changed course and I'm behind a person who's now

going the wrong direction. So I'm like trying to check in on the people in front of me and how effectively they're actually swimming straight and is there a gap forming looking to my right looking to my left seeing if somebody's coming up on either side that I need to be concerned about them trying to like take my spot in the line it's just like bike racing where you want to be aware of as many people in your proximity as possible yeah that's that's great advice and hard to do when you're swimming and you're already struggling to cite that much but I'm surprised you're that even the pros do that I mean if you're on the rivet sometimes you just got to like pray and commit to those feet right in front of you, but if I have a chance, I'll try to be aware of the whole

situation. And then the run is like pretty wide. It's just flat out and back twice to the airport, right? Yeah, the gaps in these kind of races are pretty big. And I, I knew this might happen. Like, it's really hard to fuel in a race like this because you're just focused so hard on the descending. So I definitely didn't eat enough or drink enough and felt really out of energy by T2. But right away, I took a couple gels and realized that this was probably the reason I felt so garbage. And kind of got into a rhythm. I refused to look at my watch because I was like kind of surrendering to the fact that I was not doing well and I was being negative in my head. And I was like, just don't look at your watch and run as best as you can. Hopefully the gels will hit your blood

soon. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, I came in a transition with like, Laura and Julie and Carol and immediately was strung out from them, but had Carol in my sight. And then started to see Kat, who was having, unfortunately, a bit of a rough day or she was being smart with what she was dealing with. So I started to gain on her a little bit. And I knew immediately there's something must be wrong because there's no world in which I should be catching Kat on the run. But just having those little carrots in front of me helped me stay kind of engaged. And once I caught Carol, she responded and stayed with me and repassed me and it made it a little bit of a battle, which actually in this situation was good for me. Because if the gaps were

like a minute on either side, it would have been so easy for me to check out, run 10 seconds per K slower, except my fate. I knew I was kind of running between 9th and 11th and I wanted to get top 10 at this point. I'm like just top 10 sounds better than 11th. So just try to get there and stay there. But a little bit too far ahead to catch eighth. And I had a big gap to the person behind me once I was kind of settled into that spot. So it was fine. I mean, I ran 120 flat, which is actually it's a good run. Good. It's like one of my better runs that I've had. I don't usually run under 120. So considering that I was just kind of running without trying as hard as Christian Blumenfeld tries. What are you screaming? My splits were pretty good.

And I was kind of trying to just be efficient And I took like four gels on the run Because I took zero on the bike practically And think a little bit more about just getting to the finish line Feeling good and staying ahead of Carol Who was kind of just hunting me the whole time So yeah Finished in ninth was

Disappointed at first Kind of came to terms with it And I don't know, I just wanted to be better than that But it's what I had on the day And considering how I felt all week how I felt at the start line, how I felt at the start of the run. I think I made the best of it and definitely tried as hard as I could in all the aspects when it was feeling pretty hard.

Did you think about Kona at all during the race? No, I've been trying not to think about Kona. It's its own entity. And I was there doing that thing, couldn't do anything about it. There were times throughout the week where I was like, I shouldn't think, come. I should stay at home. But it was counterproductive to think that way. So it was for sure like a good training day hard effort.

Not a training day. It was a race. But in terms of a training stimulus, it definitely had some benefit to do that on Sunday. Huge effort on the bike, huge effort on the run. Wouldn't have worked that hard in a workout that day. So there's some positives. And I'm trying not to let my result there foreshadow what I'm capable of in Kona. Because I'm racing pretty much the same people.

And one of my thoughts was like, well, fuck if I'm ninth here, I'm not going to be top five in Kona. Like, they're all way too good. But Kona is a whole different thing. And maybe I'll be worse. Maybe I'll be way better. But it's not the same type of race, obviously. Could not create two different races without doing an alt-oise triathlon straight up the mountain. Although it was really hot.

It was really hot and humid in Nice. And the nice thing was I never felt hot or humid. like I felt totally fine the whole time. So I think the heat training I've been doing has been working because people were saying, oh my God, it was so hot, I was dying, and I was actually fine. Yeah, when Nick and I were spectating,

we were cognizant of trying to stand in the shade. Oh, really? Oh, my God. Yeah, we were so hot. We were so hot. Yeah, Katie Shide was out cheering, which was the highlight of the day, to be honest. It's so cool.

Like, Katie Shodd is one of my favorite athletes. She's a best trail runner in the world. and some reason she follows triathlon and TTL and watches the videos and stuff. So it was messaging her a bit before the race. She was on the cold of all. And then she was out on the run course. And I kind of had this flashback to when I was cheering for her at Western States. And she like looked at me and acknowledged me and smiled at me while she was racing.

So I made a point to do that to her because I appreciated seeing her there. But same thing next. She said she said it was hot. I was like, I didn't feel that hot. Yeah. Anyway. If you send, if you Venmo, enough money. We'll send you a screenshot of our conversation with Katie as she was asking us what

she should tell Paula when she sees Paula on the course. And if you've been listening to this podcast at you at all, you know, that is quite the conundrum. Well, Katie could have said literally anything to me and I would have been like, you are my hero. That's what I told her. I was like, tell her what you want. I'm just going to love it. She wanted to know the normal thing. Like, well, should I tell her if there's like a group in front or a group behind and we're like, I don't know, just tell her that she's the best. She's not enough time. She's easy. on the bike to give any significant information. Exactly.

Anyway, that was cool. That was the highlight. Yeah. That's cool. Come on. It's cool. There was a lot of cool stuff. We also had a good time.

Like the vibe of niece is great, of course. Oh yeah. Throughout the week, the croissant run was blown out of the water of what we expect. Like literally hundreds of people. We're at the croissant run. I can't explain how outrageous this thing was in the best way. narrowly avoided getting broken up by the police. Fortunately, no one was appearing to be in charge at that point, I think.

Kistelli sort of was. Yeah, well, we just said that we wanted to do it. And Kistelli incredibly kind of like took over a management of it and booked out the triathlon store there in Nice for it. And they had posters for Paula to sign afterwards. And we had the shirts on sale. And it was, oh my gosh, amazing. Nobody went home without having enough sweets.

It was so cool. I mean, we're doing the same thing again in Kona. I'm going to do just like a little bit of a, you could call it an ad, but more of an awareness thing. On Thursday, when this comes out, we will be launching the TTL Kona edition apparel. This is actually quite special,

and it is truly limited. This version is not a pre-order. It is a pre-sale, but all of the stuff that we were going to bring to Kona, we're actually putting online to sell to sell online and it is in limited numbers. So we got a t-shirt, a poster. Poster is going to be hand numbered one through 100. And this is going to follow the entire design aesthetic of what we did for Oceanside,

Lake Placid, Nice, etc. On top of that, we've partnered with Foreign Rider for this entire launch. And the unisex shirts are going to be Foreign Rider. So they will be a little more expensive. but they will be significantly more incredible feeling. And we have, in addition to that normal design that we've done, we are going to have four or five, I have lost track at this point of additional T-shirt designs

that Foreign Rider helped us prep on other color T-shirts, and they are incredible. Super, super cool. But in those additional designs, we're only doing 36 of each. So this is extremely limited. I just want people to know that it's how. happening because I think it's going to go pretty fast. And it's not a pre-order. So you can't just kind of like wait around until the final day or anything. Yeah, and then complain.

Yeah. Over the top of that, we are, so we are going to allow people to like, we're going to do local pickup in Kona. So that will really help you not have to deal with any of like the tariffs and stuff if you're coming from overseas. We'll also offer an option to ship to your house. And then at the Kestelli booth, there in Kona, we will also have some Kestelli T.T.L. collaborative items in technical apparel that is we're going all out it's super awesome but i just wanted to let everybody know that it's not a pre-order so you do if you want it you really got to get on it on thursday love it love it um but we're going to do a donut run there and we're already putting our heads together on how exactly we're going to make sure that that also does not get shut down by

the police or ruin anybody's day with how large it is and how small kona is that was the other thing I forget who said it. It was like maybe Crowey, or maybe it was Brad from Precision. It was saying, I was asking people like, how did this feel compared to Marbea or even Topa? And they said that those places are kind of small in a way.

And so the Iron Man takes over, you know, the identity of the Iron Man becomes that place. And then in a place like Nice, it's so big already that Nice becomes the identity of, the race. Right. Yeah, thinking about the donut run in Kona, we cannot do it on Alihi. Like, that's impossible. I think we need to do it at the energy lab. It's the only place where there's

a bit of desolate room to have that many people. There's like near the swimming pool, Jordan said that there's like a fairly large parking lot area where it could be staged up and everything. But we're going to check in with like Wadi and a few people that have done stuff there before and make sure we do it as best as it can be done. It might just be a four. It might just be a 400 been a run, which is fine. That's all we want to do anyway. Yeah.

Anyway, if you were in Nice and you got a picture with me, I probably took about a thousand selfies of people. It was fun. It was so fun. It's like a little pocket of feeling like you're a celebrity. And then you come back to real life with your dogs and you're like, I'm just normal.

It was fun though. Yeah. I think that's it. Is that all for the recap? Well, yes, but there's several things in the questions that will bring us back to the race, even just briefly. But we'll start with one that's not niece related. And this is a question from Jackie, just to be clear, and, you know, most people probably know this, but this is kind of a special podcast since you just raised, Paula.

You can submit your questions to the podcast at thattriathlonlife.com slash podcast, where you can also become a podcast supporter. We love podcast supporters. We appreciate you podcast supporters. First question is from Jackie. Help TTL. I somehow found myself qualifying for USAT Nationals next year. Thanks to my swim and run.

Definitely not the bike, hence the question. And I really want to improve my bike. The internet told me I'm slow because of my cadence. So I started listening to a 170 to 180 BPM playlist to help. Any other tips? For reference, I ride a Trek domain. Yes, a fancier bike would help me, but not in the budget. And I'm primarily a marathoner, 15 marathons so far. So I have the endurance, just maybe not the power. I'd love to get my 14 mile per hour average to at least 17 miles per hour by the race. Thanks for all you do, inspiring this marathoner to start loving tries. Jackie.

This reminds me of when we were sitting at ice cream the day after the race, the day of the race. and we saw this lady sitting eating ice cream and she looked very old but very fit, but she looked about 80, you know, and she had tattoos and we're like... She was about 80. She was 80. And I just went and I couldn't believe she had the tattoos on that she had done this freaking race that I had just done. So I asked her, like, did you do this race even though I knew she did because she had the tattoos?

and she said that she was two minutes past the bike cutoff, so they didn't let her run. And the bike was 93 kilometers, and they didn't adjust the time for the bike cutoff, despite it being 3K longer. So had the race actually been 90K, she would have made the cutoff, and she was a good runner and could have ran under the cutoff as well.

So she was super bombed. She's done Kona 23 times, just like a legend. When she told us she had done Kona 23 times, she said, yeah, I've done Kona 23 times. She was saying, yeah, I've done Kona 23. And we all kind of thought she meant like 20, 23. And then she hit us with the times. Our jaws dropped.

I about fell out of my chair. Yeah. That is. So that's at least 46 Iron Man's that she's done. Yeah, we started talking to her. And then it turned out she did actually know who I was. Then we talked, chatted for a while. She was Canadian.

That was super cool. Yeah, she's Canadian. But is the person writing in now older? they've done 15 marathons, they can't be that young. Yeah, I mean, they don't say. Yeah, they don't say. But some people do like three a year. So, you know, that's not that.

That's already four. They could be younger. Yeah, I think part of the problem with runners, who are good runners, coming over to triathlon, is it is really hard to get good at cycling because you don't realize how hard cycling is. It's like a different type of hard and a different type of suffering. And it takes years to kind of develop that ability to push yourself as hard as you're capable of on the bike. I don't know if running, it's like limited by your

biomechanics. And of course, it's so extremely hard as well. But on the bike, you can really go harder, I think, because there's nothing biomechanically stopping you from going faster. It can hurt more. You can make yourself hurt more. Yeah. Like in a non-dangerous way, you can make yourself hurt more. So I think truly the answer to this, cadence aside and bike fit aside is like working harder on the bike sadly is kind of the solution to getting better at biking and it involves doing like hill rut repeats and getting a power meter and pushing yourself beyond what you think you're capable of because the injury risk is basically zero Eric how much do you think cadence is actually to blame for this versus what

paula is talking about zero I think the cadence is going to be what it's going to be like yes you can increase that, but that's not just going to also increase your power. Like, you know, whatever, Paula likes to ride at 91 RPM if she just had her eyes closed and raced as hard as you could. Nick likes to ride at 82. I like to ride at 95 and you just kind of like end up there. And I think it's more important, like Paula said, to just like focus on pushing power as much as you can. Because it's like, it's like, it's like she said. It's a completely different thing. It's like drumming hard with like the versus like turning butter. Like this constant, like, uncomfortable resistance when you're biking.

So, yeah. And maybe when you're really fit, you can kind of play with the numbers and see what makes you less fatigued for the run later. But at this point, it probably is exactly what Eric and Paula are saying. Well, Nick, don't you have a lot of friends in Santa Monica who are runners who recently got bikes and they're so slow at biking? But you're like, you're so good at running. Why doesn't it translate? It's not a fitness problem. It must be this connection between your brain and your muscles and your ability to try harder in some ways.

Yeah. It always shocks me. And then I'm like, you say you're working really hard, but you can kind of talk. So there's something that's not quite happening. And sometimes when you're running faster, or if you try harder at running, you're almost trying to like float and have a lighter stride and be lighter and not muscle it versus in cycling. Yeah. So you're almost like trying to. to be light as a feather and make it like bounceier on the bike you really just have to

fucking grind as hard as you can and push on the pedals as hard as you can it's not there's nothing pretty about it there's nothing i mean it can look fluid it can look very it can look good if you're a good cyclist but it definitely is not this feeling of like just increase your cadence and you'll go faster no you have to push a lot harder yeah anyway that's yeah i'm very passionate about this because i think it happens all the time and the answer is just working harder for a period of time. Run less, bike all the time, and bike hard. Put that on a t-shirt. Okay. Next question here is from Allison. Hi, TTL. Congrats, Paula. In an epic world showing I was glued to the broadcast all night watching and cheering for you from YVR. Paula, what's YVR? Vancouver.

My question is maybe a bit controversial and Eric already drew some attention to the situation, but can you talk a little bit about race dynamics? The modos tend to be with the front ladies, so we may not see what goes on further back. Clearly, you pass another rider, and she put the writer's initials in quotes. I'm not going to say them just in case, Paul, you don't want to put this out there. And then she blatantly passed you right back without falling back. And she didn't write this in, but she was probably like a meter behind you and then passed you again. And just so everyone knows, the rules are for pros.

and amateurs, if you get passed by someone, you have 45 seconds to drop back to the, whatever the legal distance is, which in this race was 20 meters. If you do not do that, you get a penalty. That is, if you get caught, very importantly, if you get caught, you get a penalty. Okay, back to Allison's question. Rini called this out on the broadcast right away. Rini is Marinda Carfrey. But it seems there wasn't an official close by, so no penalty. assessed to this athlete. How much rule bending is going on further back in the pack? Or was there just a lot of jostling while everyone was getting settled into the climb? Was there information provided in the race briefing saying there would be some leeway because of the climbing or was just just

blatant disregard and someone in the zone? Saw a lot of this in the men's race also with no repercussions. Cheers. Allison. Yeah, and never in the race briefing will ever say that there's leniency. They do not. Like, you have to follow the rules. Of course, the refs are going to use some of their discretion in situations where it bunches at a corner or there is a steep climb. But they're never just going to come out and say, yeah, on this climb, we're not going to follow the rules. You just do what you want. And sadly, this did happen. I mean, it happened to me.

I was a victim of it. And then also, like, witnessed it happened so many times where because of Race Ranger, which I think is good in a lot of ways, but also makes the racing so frustrating for me. and to a lot of other women, is that if you're on a climb, you come into the blinking red of someone ahead of you, maybe inadvertently, and just for a split second,

we're told that if you see blinking red, you pass. So I see blinking red, I have to make this big surge, pass someone like Kat or Julie, whoever's in front of me at the time, apologize to them and say, I'm sorry, I did not want to do this,

but Race Ranger was blinking red. And then they have to sit up, barely pedal, and back out 20 minutes, meters before 45 seconds is up. And it sucks because it disrupts the flow of the group. I make this big surge to get up to the front. And then I'm kind of blown, so I have to slow down a bit.

And just the whole point of our little pack was to try to catch the front. And we all kept doing this sort of by accident and then having to drop back. And it just slowed our whole flow. So we all obeyed the rules in our pack. Everyone dropped back 20 meters. And on the Col de Vance, I came around Marjolain. lane because I caught her slowly over a couple of kilometers. And right away she passed me back.

And there was no cameras around. There was no refs around or anything. And I thought, wow, she must have gone really hard to drop back 20 meters and then repass me. And then it happened two more times when the camera was on us. I came around her. She sat there for a second and immediately passed me back. And she actually wrote me a really nice message. yesterday apologizing for this. And I don't know if she misunderstands the rule or whatever,

but she thought that I was passing her and slowing way down to like mess with her race or something. And I was like, no, I wasn't slowing way down. I kept the same watts. But sadly, if you're having to drop back on a steep hill 20 meters, it feels like we're all slowing down because you have to slow down. So she thought I was maybe like trying to sabotage. or something. I don't know. She was really nice about it, but she also apologized and realized that like it sucks that this was on the

broadcast and she's like, we can all both admit that it didn't infect the race results. I'm like, well, not really, but like if you would actually got a penalty. You've got a penalty. Exactly. I don't like it. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm not buying it. The main reason isn't whatever she talked

about. The main reason is these are the rules. You can think they're silly. You can think Paula's sabotage. You can think Paul is sabotaging you, whatever, but these are the rules. And when this happens to other athletes, they have to do the uncomfortable and inconvenient thing of dropping back. And when you don't do that, you are giving yourself an advantage. I'm sorry, Marginleine. It doesn't really matter what you think was happening.

These are the rules of the sport that you're a professional athlete at. And at the start of the Col de Vance, Julie came around me. And I wanted to start the Cold Avals and like hit it, you know. But she came around me. So I had to start the Cold Avals climb at 180 watts. Exactly. Letting her get ahead of me. Exactly.

And then another athlete came around me as I was trying to drop back and I was just like, this is exactly what I experienced in Vancouver. I'm starting the biggest climb of the race and I am soft peddling to get out of the blinking red of these two girls. And as soon as I was out of the blinking red of them, I came around them, dropped them and never saw them again until like way later in the race. So it impacted my race earlier on following this rule. it impacted everyone else's race.

It's unfortunate that this rule has such a big impact when we're climbing. If you're on a flat, fast course, it's not really a big deal because you can drop back 20 meters in five seconds, you know, and get out of their zone. But on a hill, it takes a little longer. It takes a more concerted effort. And regardless of if you think there's an advantage to drafting on a hill or not, like you said, Nick, it's the rule. So you just have to do it.

And it was super annoying. To address Allison's question, do you, you think, I mean, because the thing that was kind of shocking was, it's not like Marjoraleen didn't know that the cameras were on her. It was they were right next to you guys. And she did this while on camera. That's how it doesn't matter. Because we don't make penalties based on camera footage. Like, the problem with this course, it's great, but there's like no room for motorcycles to move around. And like, once the camera's in there, where's the freaking referee going to sit? No, I don't, I didn't know if there was a ref or a camera. To be honest, when I'm

racing personally. I take zero attention to what types of motorcycles are around or if there even is one. I don't give a fuck if there's a motorcycle there. I'm going to obey the rules no matter what. So I also think she may have been in that mode, like that total race mindset, you're at the top of the hardest climb and you're not really thinking clearly of like, is there motors around me that are going to penalize me? She was just doing what she was like reactively doing. So I don't think necessarily that people are looking around for, is the ref here? Can I cheat or not? Maybe some athletes are, but I certainly

have never looked around to see if there's a referee. Yeah. Close by. I looked around anytime this kind of shit, what happened to me in a race. Be like, is anybody seeing this? Yeah, I did look around when she did that because I'm like, what is going on?

Anyway, I do think she's a really good athlete who, you know, deserve to have a good race on this course, on her home course. She wrote the dissent. I think she crossed a lot of center lines potentially, but she rode the dissent fast, put herself in a position of podium. And I don't want to have bad blood with, like, anyone that I race with.

So it is what it is. It was shown on camera. It'll be less of an issue in Kona where the course is a little, like, less steep on the hills. But that's the situation. Yeah. Yeah. I think this is like, whatever,

50% hate in the player, but 100%, there's a problem with the game. this drafting concept, the race ranger thing, the dropback thing, just it does, none of it freaking matters if the referees are too afraid to enforce the rules or they're just not there. So it's like you can't, I'm not going to like get super, super mad at athletes when you're at a world championship and your entire livelihoods on the line. And you see on the broadcast over and over again that rules are not enforced.

And like I've been in this position. you go like, am I just going to keep being one of the only people upholding every single rule to the letter of the T when I see over and over and over again people around me gaining an advantage over me by bending or ignoring the rules and nothing happens? Like, I got bills to pay, et cetera. So it's a shitty situation to be in as an athlete at the end of the day. Imagine being someone that's gotten decued for an imaginary centerline violation and watching this broadcast. It would never happen. Okay, next question here is Caroline from Boston. Hi, team, Paula.

Thank you for showing us how to leave it all out on the course and fight for the finish, even when the day isn't going as planned. Congrats on top 10 in an insane field. I recently purchased my first tri-bike, Cervello P-Series with Ultegra Di2. My current indoor setup is my road bike on a Wahoo kicker snap, which is the wheel-on trainer.

My question is, with a nice, real tri-bike, if I want to set it up inside. Is wheel on okay for the integrity of the bike and frame? Or would you say that I should upgrade and direct drive is safer for the bike? Wahoo has since discontinued the snap. Thanks for the input and looking forward to Kona. Caroline from Boston.

Bastian. There can answer that. I don't know. I don't think there's anything wrong. It's not going to hurt the bike or the frame or anything if you put it on properly and use the through axle or whatever skewer adapter that it got sent with. but we've been pretty clear about the direct drive trainers are unquestionably more enjoyable to ride. The feelings are much more realistic. Does it ruin the wheel to have the wheel on a trainer?

No. It just destroys the tire. It just destroys the tires like crazy. Yeah, you can get a trainer specific tire if it's the kind of bike that's just going to sit on the trainer all winter. They make trainer tires. Yeah. You can do that or what I would always do is just when I felt like a tired kind of gone past the point of where I wanted to use it on the road, I would just kill it on the trainer. I would just let it give out its last dying breaths all the way down to the freaking fabric casing underneath the rubber on the trainer. Yeah, but at what point does the cost of a direct drive versus a wheel on trainer negate the need to like go through all this, like the changing of tires and worrying about your tire and like having a less smooth experience on the trainer?

I would guess this is why they've discontinued it because the price of direct drive has come down enough that exactly what you're saying. Because they have the kicker core, right? Which is cheaper than the kicker move and the kicker regular. Yeah. Yeah. I think the only upside at this point might be that the snap was like slightly more packable or lightweight because it doesn't have, you know, whatever there's cassette on there.

Yeah. Yeah, direct drive trainers are so heavy. Like you cannot move those things. Yeah. On like bringing it on an airplane or whatever. We bring it in the van sometimes, but it's a pain to pick it up. And it has put some big holes in the floor when it falls off. Yeah, one time it, Eric took a turn and it tumbled off where it was sitting and just dented the wall, dented the floor.

It was so bad of the new man. That was a moment of rage on my behalf. That hurts. Yeah, so really secure that down with some bungeys if you're going to travel with it. Or just don't. We just don't travel with it. I've been bringing the feedback travel trainer. It's not Oahu, so I shouldn't really say.

this, but they are great for transporting to races. They're super small. And I use it several times during race week when I don't want to go outside. But I think Wahoo's sending me a kicker to Kona. They are. Ideally, in a perfect world, you would just get sponsored by Wahoo and have them send you a trainer at every race that you go to.

That's the slam dunk. Yeah, so work hard, everyone. Pedal harder. Don't worry about cadence. Do more power and then get sponsored by Wahoo. It's a very easy clear road. This whole equipment, all these equipment questions just go away when people start giving stuff. Okay. Next question here is from Beth. Hi, TTL pod friends. Day one are here. You, thank you, Beth.

One of the things I love about TTL is the design and aesthetic sense. Bucket Hats have been appearing on triathlon courses more frequently in the past few years. I think Laidlow and now 70.3 world champion Hayden Wilde. Although Hayden's was missing a top. Did you see that? His hair was sticking out of the top. It's like a visor, but with a 360 degree visor. We call it a frisbee. With a hole in the middle. Nice. Love the sun protection, but not sure about the look. I have some really unfortunate race picks when compression socks were having a moment several years ago.

Beth, actually, we have a question about compression socks that we may or may not get to. But, okay, what's your guys take on bucket hats? I don't know if you've noticed, Beth, but you've never seen a photo of any one of us wearing a bucket hat. Eric, I feel like you could pull it off. I do have one. I have a Rourke one that I like. that I've run in a couple of times. It has to just be like a brutally unbearable sun

and I really don't want anybody to see me with it. It's like a purely functional thing. Zero percent. I don't know. It's, I don't want to throw them under the bus, but like precision, for example, like the design aesthetic that they've gone for with everything, it's like irreverent and goofy

and you're like putting on this thing that kind of makes you giggle. Like when I freaking grow a mustache, you know? You're like, this is like not who I necessarily I am, but it's like kind of fun and whatever. I'm trying to like not take myself too seriously. That's a bucket hat. Totally. Totally.

And so we've talked about like doing a special edition bucket hat for like Kona. But I don't think Paul is ever going to wear one and I'm not racing Kona. And I think it is so on the line of just like too dumb that we haven't done it yet. Yeah. It kind of feels like the crocks of hats, right? like crops are so ugly that somehow they're they kind of have this like I don't take myself too seriously thing yeah but do you think the bucket do you think the bucket hat rear shield on the on your neck actually has any kind of like sun protection effect or is it usually too shallow

of a brim to actually that's a good question I guess on it's directly overhead then it can have some because Rico Bogan also had some silly looking path situation on that I can only assume as like a heat sun. One would hope. Protection thing. It's certainly not as effective as, you know, like the Josh Hamburger hat that he did for Padigan Man that had like the full,

full like, yeah, towel down the back. If you're real serious, that's what you got to do. Get that freaking desert style thing. I guess the last thing I'll say on this is that I'm, that we're like very hesitant to create any sort of gear with TTR

that we feel has like a one or two time use thing. We don't want to ever. make something that's going to get worn one time and is like so specific or strange that it's like just sits in the back of your closet. Like that's just wasteful and kind of against our core principles. Yeah. Okay. Next question here is from Eli. Hi, I'm racing my first pro 70.3 in Cozumel. I'm trying to figure out the best plan for my small support crew. If your family or friends could be anywhere on the run course, where would you want them most? rather have them spread out throughout the run around halfway or save them for the last few miles

when you need a boost. Eli? Something Paulo told me before Placid, which I think was a good strategy, was for you guys to split up and be a bit all over because it's not the same as an Iron Man doing a half because you don't really go through the same kind of lows as you do in an Iron Man necessarily. Maybe in Cosmell you do because it's so hot and horrible. but having someone to see more frequently sometimes is better than your whole support crew standing there together and giving you this big boost and then being alone for 45 minutes. So I kind of enjoyed seeing Eric and then seeing Nick 10 minutes later and then seeing my uncle 10 minutes later and you intentionally spread out so that there was a little bit more frequency of information or just encouragement. Do you think also to stay maybe away from something like a turnaround where you might be able to get your own splits from other racers or is that not a consideration?

I don't think so. I think you see if you're close to a turnaround, you see them twice pretty quick. I don't know. It's really athlete dependent, but also intentionally going out to places that are quieter on the course. Like in Nice, Katie was way out at the turnaround when there was nobody cheering and it was kind of a low moment. So seeing her out there was really nice versus you come back closer to the finish line and it's deafening cheers

like so many people I couldn't have even seen you guys if you were there so maybe intentionally choosing spots that are further away from the finish line and where the center of the action is is nice because it does get quiet and lonely and sad the further you get from the finish. Okay, next question here is from Emmy.

Bonjour TTL Pod. First, congrats to Paula for amazing finish at World Champs. I recently came back from running, hiking, crawling, the Tour de Mont Blanc course with a guided tour company over seven days of running. Hence my bonjour intro. As you might already know, there are a lot of ups and downs. The ups were challenging for my lungs, high altitude,

but what I noticed the most was that the steep downhills were painful on my knees. I kept trying to stop myself from gaining too much speed due to gravity and momentum, and maybe that is exactly why I was hurting. My question is, how do you get better of running down hills? Aside from experience and practice, is this an issue of me not trusting the rubber on my trail shoes? I do much better running down hills when there are roots or rocks for my shoes to grab onto, but as soon as I get to gravel, all I think about is not sliding down.

Can't wait to follow Paula for the big dance in less than a month. Good luck. Emmy. Eric, I feel like you are the... resident trail run pro here. What do you think can be done here? Yeah. Practice.

Practice is the biggest thing. But then there are certain shoes in my lineup, arsenal, whatever you want to say, that if I know I'm going to go run a route that has like a lot of loose gravel or scree, I'm just not picking those shoes because I just don't think that they're stable enough or I know that they don't really do a good job

of locking in my forefoot. So I feel like I'm sliding on top of the shoe as I'm trying to run down, hill, if it's grippy. But if it's just like a really steep gravel road, then I think beyond just like

picking the grippiest soul that you can, that's just you getting used to the feeling of it sliding a little bit and being able to be predictable with it. Well, it's funny that you say that because something I didn't read in the question

just because I was kind of trying to pare it down is she said for reference I use Brooks Bacadayas and size up a whole size. Am I sizing up too much? But maybe that is part of the issue. That would be awful for downhill running. For me, anyway. Like your toes are just like... Yeah, that's why...

That's why there's like a couple of like the supery, you know, type trail run shoes that they have a really nice open toe box, which is like really great for running 100 miles and your feet swelling and stuff. But if I'm going down a freaking... 45 degree slope that is actually grippy enough. I'm just constantly feeling like I'm going to, my toes are jamming into the front and it's not grabbing my arch tightly enough. So if I'm going to do that type of a thing, I know I have like this sustained very steep downhill, then that's a bit of a trade off, but I would potentially go with like, I have some solomons that feel like slippers and they're just so glued to your foot. And that gives you a lot more confidence on steep descents. But this is

the cool thing about trail running is you should ultimately, I think, have like five or six different pairs of shoes that all do, that have a slightly different function like that, just like mountain bike tires, it can make such a crazy difference. You know, if you're trying to go for speed. There's your permission to buy five or six pairs of different trail shoes. Alongside your road shoes and your race shoes. Five or six different pairs of road shoes, too, of course. One pair of road shoes is enough.

Well, the road shoes, you need different colors for different outfits. You know, there's, we're talking about fashion here, honey. One night. Different cushiness for different effort levels, etc. Okay, we have two more questions that we could do. We have a few more, but I think we'll stick to two. So this one, Paula, is for you. And we've answered this before, but not since you've done an Iron Man.

So this is from Maddie. Hi, team, I'd love to know all about Taper Week. How does Paula Taper for the 70.3 world champs? Is her taper for 70.3 is the same as an Iron Man or even the Olympics? I see that some people rode the whole course only a few days prior, which is wild to me. I'd love to hear how the very best approach it. Thanks so much, Maddie. Yeah, I have a general structure that was the same for the Ironman, same for 70.3s.

One thing that's different, though, is if the international travel kind of impacted the taper week a little bit, because you're trying to recover from the travel, still get some intensity in, preview the course, which was really technical and long and challenging to preview it since it's a one-loop course, all in a relatively short time frame to the race. So I'd say my week looking into, heading into Nice was nothing like other race preps that I've done. But in terms of just like decreasing the overall volume, an Ironman taper is longer, for sure. Like your last long run or long ride might be 10 days out instead of six days out, something like this. Also, depending on the importance of the race, is it a race you're kind of training through or is it the world championship?

But in terms of, I think it's totally reasonable as athletes that train 25 hours. hours a week to ride the course at a conservative effort three days out from the race. That's kind of what I did. Most of the course three days out. Because I don't know, if you do a hard workout, three days later, you're ready to do another hard workout. We kind of train our bodies for this. So it's reasonable, I think, as long as you're just like eating well. And the biggest thing for Taper Week for me is trying to minimize other things. So you're doing the workouts that are prescribed that are less volume, keeping some intensity,

but then keeping the other parts of the day a lot more mellow and putting your feet up as much as you can, getting a lot of the logistics out of the way as early as possible so that you're not scrambling as the race gets closer, and that at least helps me keep my mind a little more calm. And mental prep is just as important as the physical prep, of course. So I don't know. There's no magic thing,

I think changing it every time is not necessary. If you have a formula that kind of works, keeping it consistent so your body kind of knows what you expect. And if you don't feel good, you don't panic because you've done it before, then it is a nice thing to get into that routine. Since we have the honor of abundance here and have two professional athletes, Eric, how much was your taper week? I mean, how much would your answer to this question be similar to what Paula just said?

Yeah, I loved having the same taper week every single week. I feel like I was pretty good at, I was drilled into me when I was like on swim team back when I was 10 years old. You don't have to feel good on Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday or Friday. In fact, you might feel like shit. But as long as you're ready to go on Saturday, like if you're feeling good on Tuesday, then your taper hit or too early and you're going to feel kind of flat on Saturday. So that's a good thing to remember that you don't need to be going out on Wednesday before a Saturday race and like putting out lifetime power to be guaranteed to have a good race on Saturday. And if you do, that could be creating too much fatigue for that race on Saturday. So it's like race week, you're going through the motions,

you're doing the thing, you're keeping your body used to moving, but it's all prep for what's important. And that's on race day. That's my attitude. Yeah. I've actually have not had a taper week this year where I've felt bad, except niece, which I think is like time change. But every taper week this year I felt pretty good. Also, Chad Nugia. I didn't feel good. In fact, you didn't race well. It's a pretty good indicator, it seems. It's a bit of an indicator, yeah. At least for you, Paula. At least for you.

Okay, last question here. This is from Tucker, and I feel like it's a very apt question. I recently moved from Texas to mountainous Colorado. Out my door, I have beautiful mountain roads and can easily gain 4 to 8K avert, per ride. Is it possible to make riding in the mountains like this translate to triathlon? I am loving the altitude, the views, and the limited traffic these roads offer, and do want to incorporate this style for 70.3 and maybe even a full. Is it possible? Tucker. Possible! That's what Whirls just was, Tucker. Yeah, but that's unusual. I mean, as long as the climbing is fairly sustained, so it's not just like completely,

really rolling and there's a whole bunch of time that your power's off. I think you can use the climbs for like 40 minute uphill efforts or whatever. I do think like once, you know, once a week or something, it's going to be a good idea if you're, I don't know, where in Colorado you are. I'm just assuming you're in Boulder to go do those farm roads and just like ride flat TT consistently for three hours. Like we've had this conversation with Nick. His terrain is very, very similar. And it's obviously more fun to do the ascent and then do the descent. But once every once, everyone's, while he's got to ride just four hours down and back on PCH to get those freaking hip flexors and glutes and everything used to that. Yeah, also if it's not an option, if you're not in

Boulder and you're actually are deep in the mountains, riding the trainer is important, I think, because if you're climbing and descending, you're not really in the TT position, usually. So like Eric said, doing big, long interval reps in the TT bars is important for, is he prepping for an Ironman? both either in a in a 70.3 year in the bars for two and a half hours so you need to be comfortable in the bars but fitness wise you can do a lot with hill reps etc it's it's probably built some good bike handling skills but the truth is that you can be a really fast overall racer and not have anything but mediocre bike handling skills yeah yeah so just ride the trainer a little bit

Sadly. Sadly. Okay. Well, guys, Paula, thank you for doing this when you are got a million of the things that you need to be doing. And you are not obviously talking about this race is not your number one favorite thing to do on top of that. So thank you for sitting here with us and talking about it. I don't have that many things to do. But yeah, I'm not in the mood for talking about the race while jet lag.

That's for sure. But I did it. You did it. Just like we do other hard things, right? just like yeah you things are hard and you just do them that's right um one more thing i'll say is eric is working on a ttl video a vlog of this race and eric when do you think that'll come out it totally depends on when i can get some race footage from the iron man media guys in a perfect world it would come out on sunday but we'll just see okay okay we're shooting for sunday

in the meantime though when's our dissent video coming out nick that's a good question i'm going to try to work on it while I'm here. I think that should come out first. Oh, really? Okay, yeah, we could do that. Yeah, like immediately. That's low-hanging, easy fruit. Okay, I'll work on that then. While I'm waiting for Iron Man to get me the media. Eric and I did, we did the dissents from the, we did the full race course the day before Paula did it at a much more leisurely pace uphill for sure.

But we kind of sent the downhills and Eric has this really cool mount that it's like you bite down on it. And then so the camera is like really first person view. And so I followed Eric down these descents. And we had a lot of fun with it. So we're going to be putting out a video with some of those dissents on there to get you stoked. Especially if you do this race in the future, kind of nice to know what these descents look like. Or just see what it was like since everyone's talking about it right now. You can get a real live POV of descending this descent faster than anyone else did.

Or did you guys go faster than any of the men? Did you check that? We probably were faster than some of the men, but we weren't going as hard as we could. And also, we weren't crossing over the center. But we would be like top 20 on some of those. So yeah, we're like halfway through the men's field. I don't know how many men there were. And you're on road bikes.

You can get the feel for it. You can get the bad. But yeah, we filmed almost the entire thing. So I think that'll be sweet. Are you going to write music for it? Or are we going to, should I be picking out some music? Either way, I'll do the music either through the service that we always use, which will not name. Or I can make something that kind of,

has a vibe, but I really wish we could use French rap for it. That's what I used for the little teaser and it worked so well. If you're a French rapper and you listen to this podcast and you want some seriously great exposure. French rapper of any ability level. Yeah. We can put your music in it. Actually, if you're French and you just want to like read some lines, Nick's really good with auto tune. Exactly. Exactly. We just need your accent. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my God. Yeah. Okay. off air, something else. Okay, we'll do TTL after dark here, but thanks to us.

See you next week. Bye, yeah. Bye.