That Triathlon Life Podcast - Paula wins Ironman 70.3 St George!

Episode Date: May 9, 2024

Paula becomes North American Champion by winning IM 70.3 St George! This week we get a race recap from her, and we even get to your triathlon questions. After the race recap we talk about race splits, losing a feel for the water after some time away from the pool, indoor power vs outdoor power, pursuing a hobby outside of triathlon, getting interviewed in T2 while racing, thinking about Ironman race points while racing, the occasional bad workout, and more! Thank you to our awesome podcast supporters who help keep the podcast ad free. You can submit your own question and help support the podcast at ThatTriathlonLife.com

Hi, everyone. Welcome to That Triathlon Life podcast. I'm Paula Findlay. Hi, I'm Eric Loggersome. I'm Nick Goldston. Welcome to our podcast where every week we talk about what's happening in triathlon. We might do a race recap. We talk about TTL and everything we've got going on with TTL with our Devo team, with our launches, and all the thing Eric and Nick and I are working on. And most importantly, we answer your questions that so many of you send in every week, They are constantly great questions. We are surprised every week by how many new things you guys can ask us about because we think someday we must run out of questions, but we will never run out. You guys have very, very good questions and we love answering them.

Eric and I am both professional triathletes. Nick is an amateur triathlete. So we are somewhat qualified to answer those questions from a variety of different experience levels. And yeah, we're glad to be here. I feel like on podcast number 10, I thought, there's no way we're making it of 50. We're going to run out of questions. All the things have been asked already. And here we are.

The number of questions about triathlon are how many, or exactly the amount of stars there are in the sky? Infinity. Eric, your voice sounds a lot better. How are you feeling? I'm feeling a lot better. Around like noon, 1 o'clock on Sunday, after Paul was race, I really felt like I had fully turned a corner.

and well, you and I went for a very chill trail run in St. George, which made me happy. That was a thing that I wanted to do the whole week I was there and was just bumming me out that I was sick just because I couldn't go out and see the nature and do the things. It was a fantastic weekend for the three of us. Very, not only was the result very good, but I feel like the entire feeling was very good, even leading up to the race. Yeah, yeah, I think so. Paul and I both have really good memories of St. George.

It's a cool place. It's got a good vibe. It's, we like it a lot. And we especially like it when we have good races there. Yeah, we were staying in the amazing hotel, which really enhanced the experience. But I do feel like when you're going back to a race that's so familiar, everything's such kind of second nature. And there's not a lot of stress involved. Like every year you do that race, you learn how to do it a little bit better in terms of like the pre-race day, dropping off your stuff.

getting organized. I could see it being quite a stressful race for someone who's never done it before, but when you've done it six or seven times, it really is kind of fun to go back and just know exactly what you got to do, know exactly the course. And you're mentally prepared for the fact that you're going to have to drive 30 minutes out to the lake, drop off your bike the day before, and then you're going to drive back into town and drop off your shoes in town. It's a bit of a thing. But it, yeah, it ended up being very relaxed pre-race, which I think, helped a lot with the eventual outcome. So speaking of the eventual outcome, it's race day, you're feeling like, like, how often

are you thinking about the results versus being focused on, okay, right now, I'm racking at my bike. Right now, I am getting my transition area ready. Yeah, I think I talked a little bit in the last podcast about my general feelings leading in in terms of the training and my, you know, questioning if I want to keep doing this and just very up and down emotions about triathlon in general, not just about this race. And even texting Paulo last week and saying, do I even go to St. George? Like, none of my training has been going that well.

I don't want to go. But honestly, the reason I got on the airplane to go was, A, because Eric was already there. And B, because we had this amazing hotel room. waiting for us. So I'm like, if anything, I'm going to go enjoy this freaking holiday. But once I got there, I was like a little bit more in race mode. I'm like, okay, I'm here, I'm doing it. There's no ifs or if I'm going to go or not. So the commitment had been made. And it was just about getting ready to start the race and feeling as good as I possibly could. And the start list was not as competitive as literally every other race I've done in the last long time.

So looking at the start list, I thought my chances of winning were good if I was having a good day, although there were some really, really good athletes on the start list. It felt like, you know, if I just raced the way I was able to, especially on that course, I could potentially win. So it's a different feeling than when I go into a T-100 race and I'm like, this would take a mirror. a cold to win. You know, that's how I feel the most of the time. So, but I like that.

I like going to a race where I know the outcome could be, yeah, ultimately what it was. The hooter goes off. And how cold is it? Oh, well, I decided to not warm up in the swim because, honestly, before this race, I was in the state of like, let's just stay as happy and as comfortable as you possibly can

until it gets hard. So I was like, I am not warming up. I am just going to be happy as much as I can. So like literally everyone got in for the warmup and then you got to get out for 10 minutes. And I was completely dry and not cold at all. So I'm like, I think I made the right choice here. I don't know.

Right. Still feeling good. I'm feeling fine. You guys are all shivering. Yeah. So that's a good tip for all the age groupers. They don't even have the option to warm up. But I think that is fine. That is totally fine.

So I, once you get in the water for the race, like you don't, you're not thinking about the warm up. the temperature at that point. You're just thinking about racing. Some people just like to warm up the muscles in their shoulders and there's also sometimes like a shock, a cold shock response that if you get water in your wetsuit first, you can avoid that. So there are

reasons for it. But we talked about this. I've had fantastic races at Alcatraz. I've never felt like in the watered Alcatraz. I'm like, oh, I feel so sluggish and my arms aren't warmed up and you can't warm up. You just dive off the boat into freezing cold water at the end. It's fine.

Yeah, I didn't warm up in ocean side and I felt fine. There's plenty of races where I've never warmed up. I did a little run warm up so my body temperature was warm and I kept clothing on as long as I could. And then as soon as the race started, I felt completely fine in the swim. I will venture to say it was the easiest swim of ever in triathlon that I've ever had. I just felt like I was swimming a warm-up speed. It was insane.

Wait, can we figure out why? Because you were in the front pack with fast people. It might have been like the position I would. was in. It was a new orca wetsuit, of course. Well, the wetsuit makes an enormous difference, I will say, being comfortable in that wetsuit and having confidence in it versus last year I just felt like panicked and I needed to get it off.

That makes a difference for sure. But Ellie was leading. Kate was right beside me being a little rough. And I feel like I was on Ellie's feet first and she kind of elbowed me away. Okay, I'm just going to stay here because I feel completely comfortable. And I deserve to be here too. Like, I'm not going to go and sit on your feet. Obviously.

I've made that mistake before, like, just surrendering to whoever's beating me up. And then I get dropped. So I just stayed there and swam very controlled. And I knew in this race that it wasn't going to be won on the swim. So I just needed to be as relaxed as I possibly could. And that's what I did. I never panicked. I was somewhat enjoying it.

It wasn't too cold. The water was really clear. could sight really well. And I knew that I was in the front of the race. So it was totally fine. I was not hating it at any point. I love that. That's what we all dream of.

Yeah. It's the swim you always want to have. It's like, I'm in the front. I'm feeling good. We're moving fast. But, I mean, it felt so easy to me that I thought everybody must be on our feet. Right. I don't think we're breaking away from anyone in the race here.

The best races I've had, that's the same feeling. Yeah, but I guess we, yeah, we had two minutes on Jackie and, you know, all the people that I would hope to have a bit of a gap on. So it was good. And then same thing coming out of the water. I was still in this like very Zen mode where I didn't want to run as fast as I could through transition. And Ellie gets out and sprints and Kate sprints. I'm just like, you guys can have 20 seconds on me through transition. I'll see you on the bike. But I think that ultimately helped me just keeping my heart rate really low. And it felt like I didn't. I didn't really start trying in the race until 10 or 15 minutes into the bike. So I think that ultimately helped in this challenging of a course when, you know, the hardest stuff is like a couple hours down the road. Right. Yeah, it's super interesting. And I know we'll get to it.

But like when we were watching, you didn't put any, like, significant time on anybody for the first half of the bike. And then the second half of the bike was just like, boom. Yeah, I think that all had to do with me, maybe just pacing it properly at the start. Yeah. Well, I noticed that you were riding behind Ellie for some of the flatter portions, and I was wondering how much of that, at the beginning, how much of that was intentional versus just that's how you were feeling in that moment. Yeah, I know this course so well. And there's a pretty steep, like five-minute climb about maybe 10 minutes into the ride. And I knew that that's where I

wanted to kind of break the elastic. So I just got to Ellie and stayed with her, like within legal distance. We all had Race Ranger, which I ultimately think allows you to ride closer than I would if there was no race ranger because 12 meters is so close. And I always err on the side of caution when there's no race ranger. But when you have confirmation on the blinker that you're in the legal zone, even though you're so freaking close to them that it feels like it shouldn't be allowed, it's crazy. So I sat in that draft and was going, yeah, 50 watts lower than I would have if I was riding alone. Eric, do you think she said that allows people to ride closer?

Do you think it's just her that usually rides further back? Or do you think in general, people ride more than 12 meters back? I don't know, because I'm the same way. I always err on the side of caution and tend to get dropped out of bike groups as a result and have people slot it in front of me, which I think I feel like they're slotting in, but maybe it's actually legal. Because on numerous occasions when I feel like I'm too close and I'm in a group, but I feel like I'm as close as everybody else

and there's an official next to me. I asked the official. I was like, is this fine? And they go, yep, you're fine. I'm like, wow. I would have not in a million years guessed that this was fine. Yeah, it's so close. It's really, really close.

But the nice thing about a hilly course is that as soon as it kicks up, the drafting has less of an impact. So I knew that's where I had to make a move if I was going to make one because the 12 meters, the whole train could just stay behind me. So I was like 280, 300 watts up that five-minute climb. And then I tried to maintain that power over the top of the hill and ride really hard the descent as well because I thought if I just like ride this hard and then kind of ease off, then it all comes back together. So I tried to like be smart in that way. I was worried the day before about my scaredness in the wind and my ability to ride time trial position when it's really fast.

and things I get spooked about in training, but it all went away in the race, and I felt really confident on the bike. So, yeah, I could see a couple U-turns that I had made that little break and just kind of tried to ride hard, but comfortably for the first, yeah, half or so of the race. It was kind of funny because Eric and I were kind of curious

about how the Snow Canyon situation would pan out. And for those who don't know, Snow Canyon is like this iconic climb towards the end of the bike. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful climb, but the bike can be decided there. And we knew you would climb fast, but we weren't sure how you were feeling

about the confidence of the descent. So when you started Snow Canyon, you had about two minutes on second place, on Ellie. And Eric Wren and I were very curious about what would happen timing-wise for you to come back down. And the timing mat, unfortunately, there's no timing mat at the top of Snow Canyon.

It's just kind of almost at the end of the bike. The only out and back where you kind of really see where you are, because people were telling me 50 seconds to Ellie, and I was like, well, what time split is that at? Like, you guys are just looking at the tracker, which is not up to date. It's at the last timing, Matt, which could have been 10 miles ago. When we told you 50

seconds, it was one mile ago. Yeah, okay, well, then that split was accurate. But then by the turnaround that you do before Snow Canyon, I timed it and it was two minutes. So, yeah, I think I rode the back half of the course just as

strong as the front half of the course. I just want to say, like, I think my split-giving strategy this time around was dialed. Because every time I saw you, I don't know if you could hear me or not because you're, you know, in Darth Vader helmet, but I was like two minutes at 40K. Like, I was telling you the time split. Yes. That was helpful. The mile marker at which we got that time split. And like, I just assumed since you are always looking at your thing, you like, you know that you're, okay, I'm at 41K and you tell me 40K, then it's pretty recent. Yeah. One thing I was extremely self-conscious about and very annoyed with on the bike was the pro men that were essentially in the way of the women's race without it being their fault. Like they're just doing their race.

They're that speed. But I caught a lot of pro men on the bike and would pass them. And they would come and surge past me again and then immediately slow down. So I'd have to repass them. And it was just a very messy situation where I was putting on the brakes to not get a penalty. and then I was going around them because they were slowing down as soon as they got around me. So it broke up my rhythm quite a lot. And I truly don't think I got any benefit from these men.

Like every time one came around me, I got completely out of the blinking light. So well beyond 12, 15, 20 meters. And I don't know how it looked on the camera, but it's, a serious problem with this type of racing. And I think if you're going to allow 100 men to start the pro men's race, there needs to be a 10-minute gap to the pro-women so that we never see any of them. Because I was interacting with probably 15 pro men overall, whether it was on the swim, whether it was on the bike, whether it was on the run. And it's not fair to me, to Ellie, to anyone else to have this on the course.

So there's an easy solution. And whatever it takes for Ironman to make this happen, it needs to be a bigger gap. Yeah, 100% agree. That's my only complaint of the day is that I was riding thinking like, I'm going to be accused of drafting the men, but I'm doing nothing wrong. I'm just riding as hard as I can.

I'm doing my own Watts. and they are there. Here's the thing, guys. If you get passed by a pro woman, the end. You let her go. You sit up and you take a drink of water. You collect yourself. You think about your life.

Whatever it is, like give a hundred meter gap. And then go right back. Like, when you see that pro woman come by, look at your watts and just keep doing those watts. This is not the time to realize that you care a lot or that, you're serious or like, it's, ah. Because if I'm literally catching them, It's not like they're coming around me and I'm getting in their draft.

It's like, I'm riding up to you and going around you. And then suddenly the ego kicks in and it's like, oh, no, I'm not letting girls pass me. And then they're trying to get by me again. So like the real equalizer is like so many of them just like surge past me on the flat. And then as soon as we get to Snow Canyon, I passed all of them. So it's like you guys, obviously my intention through the whole ride was to leave as much space as I could between me and the men, but I was trying to win the race. And that was extremely disruptive.

So there was some questions about this and saying, like, oh, you must have gotten advantage from this. And I would ultimately say, no, I did not get an advantage because the amount of times I had to sit up and leave a gap open to the men who were surging past me. And, like, that was disruptive when I could have been riding arrow and riding hard. I was sitting up and breaking. Yeah. Yeah, that was that. But anyway, I was pretty good on the descent from Snow Canyon. It's never my favorite part.

It's so fast. It's a little scary. It's kind of windy. They have counterflow cars coming on the other side of the cones. So it feels like not my favorite scenario, but I, like, every single guy that I passed going up Snow Canyon then came whizzing by me on the descent. Right, of course, of course. Yeah, not that I stayed with them. and they just went by and kept going harder than me,

but it gave me something to think about anyway. I was not alone. What's funny is that Eric and I were really eager to try to give you a split when you were in T2 to give you an idea of how much you had off the bike. And the last time the tracker had given us anything, it was two minutes. And so we were expecting like 230 maybe, you know, 240 at most or something like that. And I'm like trying to text Eric with the split, but it's not coming and it's not coming and it's not coming.

Yeah, I'm like sprinting away from T2 as fast as I can, like looking at the tracker while I run, hoping that it updates before you catch me, and it just doesn't happen. Like I get to the first roundabout like two minutes out of transition and like it still hasn't updated. It's been four minutes. And then just when you're out of earshot, it's like bloop,

at the like 401 or something. Yeah, exactly. Well, I will say I rode Snow Canyon extremely hard. And I was feeling good. So I think it's very, I mean, that's what happened. It went from two minutes to four minutes just in that section of the race. And I felt like I rode Snow Canyon well enough that I definitely could have put a minute on everyone else in that period or two minutes, I guess. Yeah, yeah.

So wonderful. So then you start out on the run and everyone always says those first couple of steps are a big indication of how the run's going to go. Did you know right away like, okay, today's good. I'm feeling good. This run's going to go at least well. I didn't feel good on the first. It's like you're climbing on this false flat for the first two miles. And yeah, it did not feel good.

But I also had to remind myself that it didn't feel good in 2022. And I was second at Worlds and that I can run the same as Ellie. She's not going to run four minutes into me unless I have a real problem. So at that point, I was pretty confident. And I was running like tempo effort, but not to my complete maximum effort. You know, I tried to kind of. And then I was getting some timing split saying that the gaps were staying the same. So I knew that what I was doing was fine.

And I think I saw Eric at like 6K and I was like, I feel completely fine. I just want this to be over, which is the feeling we all have in a 70.3. We don't want to run for another hour. But I felt like I definitely could. I was totally fine. So I was just, you know, trying to eat some gels and get to the aid stations and drink and be entertained by all the pro men that were trying to run with me that I had biked around.

They're still running with you. You're like, hey, give me some space, bro. I did say that to one guy. I was like, please go ahead of me or give me some space. Like, don't run on my shoulder. You hear his breath in your ear like, yeah. It was so annoying.

Oh, my God. And I knew I wasn't in a race with him, but I was just like, God, go. ahead of me. And he's like, I don't think I could go ahead of you. And I don't want to mess up your race. And I'm like, well, dude, then go 10 meters back from me. Whoever that was.

I don't know. But, yeah, it was actually like the second lap I was feeling much better. And I allowed myself to slow down quite a lot because I didn't care about my time or whatever. I was just like, you might as well enjoy this because this is so hard. And I've had a lot of trouble enjoying triathes. on the last year or so. So I was like, just make it enjoyable and soak up the cheers and, you know, have fun on the parts of the course that you like, which is the golf course and the fun descents.

And so I just, yeah, I didn't hate it for the last 10K. I was just feeling fine and I-fiving people that were wearing TTL kits and got to the end. And I did lose quite a lot of time on that second lap, but I was, I didn't care at that point. It was just, yeah. PTO points, you're not really concerned about that because the likelihood of this being one of your top three races is like near impossible. Is that the thought process there? No, there was no thought process. It was just like I wanted to win and I was going to win.

And I wasn't thinking about PTO points or Ironman points or times or anything. Just like the good old days. This is the... Yeah, seriously. Rock on. Like the good old days of why I started doing 70.3 in the first place. Yeah. The struggle with, like, I think why Paul has been feeling a lot of stress and one of the reasons that I'm not, like, ultimately super bummed that I'm not doing the PTO.

It makes every single second of every single race feel like it's the last second of every, you know, of your life. And it's so important. Like, okay, you're winning or you're whatever. Like, and you're thinking about what you got to do pre race. Like, okay, well, I need to try to win. Okay. Like, and if I'm not winning, then I need to make sure I stay on the gas 100% of the time to try to get the maximum amount of points because how does that play into the next race? and everybody who's here, every single time I line up is like,

world champion, world champion, world champion, world champion. Like, back in the day, you'd like, write on your schedule, like, this is a B race, this is a C race, this is my A race. I have two A races a year. And now it's just like PTO, every single race is an A race, maximum stress, maximum effort all the way to the line, which is cool, like, I guess, for spectators to watch. But for as an athlete, it's a lot.

I mean, the PTO supports us a ton. It's not a bad thing. not trying to make it out to be a bad thing, but it is, it's a lot. It makes every single race feel super important and like, you know, part of a big picture. And it's just a lot. I feel for you. And there's people who thrive in that, right? There's people who love that. It's all. It's big. It's important every time. And then there's people who are like, okay, this is overwhelming. And I, and not what it was like at the very least when you got into the sport. I feel like if it's going well and you're hitting your strength.

ride, you're Sam Long and like every race is going a little bit better and a little bit better, then it's fun and it's awesome. But also it's like we're not super humans. Like you have moments and days that you're not feeling quite 100%. And when every single event feels like you have to be at 105%. It's, yeah, it's asking a lot to like stack that up year after year and race after racing. Yeah. Also, the sport has just like gotten so fast that winning any race is really hard.

Like I won St. George in 2018. on a very similar, pretty much identical chorus, maybe a few changes, but my average power in 2018 was 30 watts lower and I still won. Wow. Yeah, so it's just getting increasingly difficult to win these things at any level, even at races that aren't in the pro series. 30 watts is a lot. Yeah, I mean, Nick, I was kind of like telling you this while we were doing our little easy run after the race.

Like, I feel like 70.3 paces, wats, swim speed, run, pace, you know, everything. It's just what Olympic distance was six years ago. It is. And now you just have to hold it for twice as long. Yeah, it's so fast now. It's like a really special pain level and like talent set and, you know, aerobics. Yeah, not only were my watts lower, but my aerodynamics were not as good and my nutrition was not as dialed. It's like all these things that everyone's just nailing now and going to wind tunnels and getting all the special gear.

It's just equalized, the feel a lot more and elevated the level enormously. So it just makes me that much more appreciative to ultimately win these things still six years later, or whatever it is, six years, I guess. Yeah, 2018 was my first pro-70.3 win in St. George. Yeah, six years later, I want to get. But this was, so you've had, you've had, so you won that race as a regular 70.3, and then you got second in St. George when it was 70.3 World Championships, and then you won this race as a North American regional championship.

Yeah, it might have been a regional championship in 2018. I can't remember. Oh, okay. It doesn't really matter. That is a little bit insignificant, except for the fact that the prize money is a bit higher and my bonuses are a bit more. Well, that's significant because the prize money is higher for everybody. It's just like the 200 raises the prize money is higher.

I'm saying I think the ocean side depth of field was higher. than this race. And Oceanside was not a North American championship. So anyway, it's kind of a title, but it doesn't necessarily attract a way bigger field or anything. Right. So run down the shoot, crossing the finish line. Tell us the story about that. How did that feel?

Yeah, it was great. I mean, winning always feels great, especially in St. George. The crowds are awesome and good memories there in general. And then to have Ellie come second and Jackie come third. was really cool. They're really good friends of mine. They're both invited to my wedding. So that just gives you a sense of how good of friends they are. And that make it even more cool. And I don't know, to be able to, I said to Eric before the race, like, I really want to win this race, but I don't really want to work that hard to win. That's kind of what you always dream of, you know? That's great.

Well, you said you wanted to bike hard enough that you weren't stressed on the run, which is exactly what happened. Yeah. I would always rather bike so hard and then be able to chill on the run a little bit. That's like my dream scenario because running hard, I just think is so awful. But I don't mind biking hard. And that's kind of what happened this time. I, I biked really well. I biked smart. I biked the state arrow. My cornering was good. My watts were good. And that gave me the luxury of being able to run a little more comfortably. I tried to like, like, Paulo texted me right after the race, my coach, because he knows that I've been having a hard time. And he's like, you can't be mad about winning a race.

Like, one day you'll miss these days or something like that. So I tried to not finish and be like, hmm, what could I have done better? You know? Yeah, well, of course. Of course. I don't care. I don't know. I probably could have done a lot of things better. But I tried to not focus on that. You did. You did what you needed to do on the Yeah, it was not a perfect race by any means. I don't think it would have won against a lot of other people, if other people were there. But I raced what I had to do on that day to win the race against the field that was there.

And yeah, I was happy with how I felt across swim and bike and run. So it was good. That's great. I'm really glad that Eric and I were there too. Obviously, Eric is a little more standard. But I have to be at closer races. so I was happy to cheer. Yeah, it was fun to have you guys there giving splits.

Kind of everyone was giving me splits, which was great. That is the racer cap. I think that's enough of me blabbing about the race, which is great. Eric's going to make a vlog about St. George. It'll probably come out around the same time as the podcast, so you can see a little bit of our pre-race stuff and the visuals and all that if you're interested in that. It is fun. If I do say so myself.

Yeah, the vlog is really good. The first half is super fun. We'll see what I can do with the racer recap. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so between the race and when the podcast comes out on Sunday, the Ventura Collection went up live. Can you guys believe this, by the way, that I race one day and the next day we released a bunch of stuff? What? Are we me magicians? A bunch.

Firing on all cylinders. It's just like, how are they doing this? Oh, my God. It's a lot of work beforehand for the launch. It's Eric never stopping. I've been. Yes. I have been building

Danny, our web guy has been building for many months to get the Ventura collection off the ground. Yeah, but I think there's the timing

of like, okay, I happened to win the race and there was like hype and there was a little bit of TTL traction this weekend

and then the launch. It couldn't have been better timing. Perfect. This is the stuff that I dream about. I'm like, oh,

wouldn't it be singing. Winns? And then we don't see the gym. Yeah. Oh, yeah. It was great. And the collection

went off fantastically. I think it was our best single day of sales on Shopify. So Flynn can keep eating wet food duck, one-third of a can for dinner every single night for at least a couple months.

And the good news is, for all of you who are listening to this now, I haven't bought anything, there's plenty of stuff still in stock. The only thing that sold out is the cappuccino mugs, but pretty much everything else is still there. All the hats, the T-shirts, the shorts. Yeah. Yeah. So for everybody who's always like, oh, you guys don't order enough.

What the heck? What's the problem? We did. Go help yourself. It's there and it's awesome. And we're psyched on it. and we can't wait to see people at it. Yeah.

I even ordered some stuff for myself. I ordered a pair of shorts. Nice. You ordered sweatshorts? I did. Dude. Those things are so good. I saw you wearing them this week and I was like,

yep, that's going to be a need. Going to need that. You put on sweatshorts and you recover better. It's science. Yeah. It's proven science. They're more effective than Norm Tag boots. And way more affordable and way cooler if you're seen in them.

They're missing one zero, approximately. Yeah, if anyone's bought the sweatshorts in the past, these ones are a little bit better. They're like a little bit thicker and a little bit, in my opinion,

look nicer than the other sweatshorts that we made. And they're organic cotton. Oh, yeah. Okay, cool. Well, we also have some questions and some of them are related to the race and some of them are just triathlon questions.

And these questions, as Paula said earlier, they come from all of you listening. We really appreciate when you send in questions and we really appreciate our podcast supporters. You can become a support. and submit a question to the podcast at that triathlonlife.com slash podcast. Which helps keep our podcast ad-free. That's right.

If you want me to do my spiel about ads again, I will. I know you will. You got it locked and loaded. You didn't have to listen to a single athletic greens added on this podcast. Yeah, well, that's so funny because there was a question of, I had a couple people asked me messages like, why was Paula wearing her medal like that when she was getting her post-race interview? because you had it like underneath your armpit like across your chest.

Yeah, I was trying to hide the AG1 logo. I think we should just say if you know, you know. If you don't know, go back a couple episodes. Well, I will say that my new kit is ready to go finally. And I'll have the orca logo instead of that AG1 logo. So I'll no longer need to duct tape over it for the awards. Love it. Love it. Cool.

Well, something we like to do for our podcast supporters is when we can most weeks, we pick a random supporter to be a winner. And this week, I have really good news. news. If your name is Lou Pear, you are a winner this week. Thank you, Lou Pear. So much for being a podcast supporter. Paula's going to send you out a bottle. But you got to send Nick your address first. Also, if you give me your social security number and your mother's maiden name, that's fine as well. Send Nick your address. Nick sends me your address. I go to the post office. It's convoluted, but it works. Okay, first question here is from Katie, from Tennessee. Hey, TTL. I'm curious how Paula

celebrated her victory off camera. What happens after the race comes to a close? celebratory burritos, drinks all around, a hot shower, and early bedtime. We're so happy for you and 100% not surprised at all at your amazing race. Thanks for letting us share it through the TTL community, sending high fives from Tennessee, Katie. Yeah, the post race is not always as glamorous as it might seem. A lot of time it involves packing, like I got back to the room and I packed my bike. And I cleaned up the hotel room because race morning it kind of turns into like a bomb went off. and we went to the hotel restaurant and had pancakes and fries and, you know, a bunch of food,

which was really nice. And then later on that evening, we went to hang out with the guys from Zoot and Eric Gwynn from Slow Twitch and Holly was there, Ellie was there, Jackie was there, some of my best friends in the triathlon. So just spent time with people. And Eric and I had to wake up at 4 a.m. the next day to get back here. but it was uncomfortable but you know when you're booking the flights like a month out you're like yeah getting back by noon the next day

sounds amazing but I didn't consider the early wake-up it actually worked out fine because Paula didn't like quite realize that we had a three and a half hour labor in Salt Lake City but while on our layer over in Salt Lake City the Ventura collection launched so we could be there just in case the website broke or something we were able to get a nice little breakfast at the airport and super chill and we got home and I went for a two and a half hour mountain bike ride.

So ultimately a pretty fantastic travel day. Yeah. Love it. Love it. Love it. Wonderful. Okay. Next question is from James.

Hi, all, I've been out of training and racing for about eight years and have signed up for my first race back later this year. Prior to my hiatus, I was a fairly decent swimmer for a self-taught age roper with an Olympic PR right around 22 minutes. As I'm getting back into the pool, I'm noticing it doesn't feel like I'm grabbing as much water on my, catch and pull as I remember being able to before.

My plan is to spend the next month or two really hammering drills during my warm-ups to get my form back down. Since Eric and Paul are actual good swimmers, I was hoping y'all would have some suggestions for drills that you found particularly useful over the years. Thanks for putting out great videos and podcasts over the last few years, they've been one of my ways I've been able to stay connected with the sport while not racing, James. So first of all, do you guys feel when you take a time away from swimming at all that you are like pulling less water.

It's not just a muscular thing, but like you're not as able to grab as much water. Is that a thing for you guys? I don't have ends on how long we take away from swimming. If I take two days away from swimming, I feel like shit. If I take like two and a half weeks because it's the off season and come back to swing,

I feel amazing for like one day. I'm all strong and, you know, I feel like you forget some of the bad habits a little bit and you start from a blank slate and then you just get tired and then it all balances itself out. I don't know. We talked about this a little bit on the podcast last week,

like the power of doing, like, if you're going to only swim three days a week, like actually going back to back on like at least, you know, on one of them so that you have like Friday, Saturday to reinforce some of the good habits and not just feel kind of like every time you get in the water, you're trying to remember what you did last year. But I would say that if you feel like you're weak on the catch, it's less of a drill exercise and it's more of a do some pull paddles type of thing, like get stronger versus.

your form. I think that might be more of the problem. And triathletes tend to use pullboy and paddles as a crutch a lot of the time because it's a little easier and you go faster, but it really is a good tool for increasing strength if you use it appropriately. And I think if you can like tie a band around your ankles with the pull boy and eliminate all kick, all of that stuff just helps to make it a lot more focused on upper body pulling strong. What we both do in every warm up and we've talked about this a bazillion times, and I feel like I came up with it, but I don't know, is having a paddle only in your left arm for a hundred and having a paddle only in your right arm for the hundred. But then with whatever arm it does not have the paddle, you're trying

to hold an equal amount of water. And I feel like that just sort of freaking tricks your brain and you're holding your muscular system into catching a little bit more water and you equalize it out. And then when you go back to swimming normally, I feel like you should feel something a little bit special there. When you tell me about that, it totally worked for me. and I do that all the time now. That's one of my jokes. I don't know why, but your body just kind of like tries to figure it out and balance itself out naturally.

And I just give it a shot. I'll say also, do you guys, something that helps me so much with a catch, and I don't think I've ever seen you do it, maybe because you're way beyond it is fists, swimming with fists, so you don't have the surface of your hand. You have to rely on your forearm and your bicep more so.

Do you guys ever do that? I remember when I was eight years old. Yeah, exactly. man, I am eight years old. No, I still think it's a good drill to do. I'm totally joking. No, that's a totally legit thing. We're like holding a tennis ball. Like, yeah, for sure.

I just don't do it because it feels so slow. But it's definitely, it is a good drill for feeling your forearm pulling. As soon as I open my hand up, it's like, oh, right, okay. Then it kind of clicks, at least for me, for a more self-taught age grouper like James here.

Okay, cool. Next question here is from Jack, from Boston. Hi, Paula, Eric, Nick and Flint. Can you help me explain this? I use the same power meter on Zwift and outside, and I notice I'm able to push 20-ish more watts outside than I am on the trainer. I've read articles that this is normal and everyone else has the same issue. Do you notice this? What are the reasons why? Thanks, Paula, congrats on the win at St. George, Jack from Boston. So the two of you, I think you have two different answers for this, am I right? Yep. I'm definitely like this person a little bit more. My pedal stroke outside, I move around just a little bit more. If you watch Paula while she rides indoors or outdoors, it's really hard to tell if she's going hard or easy because her core is so solid. Her pedal stroke is so smooth and everything. And her power indoors translates, outdoors translates a little better to indoors than mine as well. Yeah, I don't really notice a big discrepancy in the power. I sometimes notice a discrepancy. and see in my, like, the mental effort it takes to execute that indoors, but I can still do it inside. It's not a physical barrier. It's just sometimes feels harder and you're focusing more to get the same wants. Yeah. I honestly don't know if I can completely separate out the mental aspect of it. I have a very hard time mentally indoors and yeah, like, yes, if whatever, If your brain didn't exist, maybe physiologically I could do the same thing indoors as outdoors,

but my brain does exist. And it's a struggle for me to look at the wall or even just look at Zwift, not be moving, not look at trees going by and do the same thing as outdoors where I get kind of excited when I go around a corner and I'm cresting a hill and these little external stimulus. Just like we can all push out magically more effort on race day. There's something about being outside versus inside that has a similar bump for some people. I'm definitely one of them too. That's definitely common. What would you guys say your differences between being down in the arrow position versus

sitting up on the base bar? What watts difference are we talking about? Man, I would almost say it's just more like two levels of perceived exertion. So like the watts you can actually do are maybe the same, but it hurts so much more. Yeah, it just like takes more effort and like things tie up. And it's like maybe ultimately on a long enough timeline, you could boil it down to watts, but for me, it's like 250 watts sitting up versus 250 watts arrow. It's like four out of ten versus six out of ten, you know, that kind of thing. Paul, do you feel the same

or are you kind of more equalized in that? If I'm like on my road bikes sitting up on a climb, I can kind of get higher power. But for the most part, I can achieve very similar watts in arrow and sometimes even higher because I think my glutes are engaged more. It's like using maybe my quads more. I don't know. But I'm totally fine pushing Watts in the era position. And maybe that's, I've trained for the TT, Canadian TT championships now for two years in a row. And the little block leading into that race will do a lot of maximum effort intervals in the TT position. So maybe I've just kind of gotten used to that. But it's definitely something you do have to kind of train yourself to do. If you're sitting up and you got leverage and it's just different, but I can do it in TT as well.

I think you also just have like a gift for it. I have a gift. I have a gift. Like just if you look at anybody like the climb in not Red Hills Parkway, but like in St. George, like the first kind of like significant climb you hit on that highway before you like kind of go into Washington. 99.99, like every 99% of the people that came by me while I was waiting there to give you a split. it broke arrow, we're huffing and puffing. Some of them were standing out of the saddle,

and you're just like roll by in arrow as though it's not even a hill. Yeah, I try to stay arrow as much as I can on uphills. And to a certain point, if it's steep, of course you're not, because it's no aerodynamic advantage. But you can be going like a surprising amount slower than you think and still have an arrow advantage by staying arrow. Sure, but most people are like, F it.

It is not, no matter what it is worth it, I want to sit up so badly. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's right. I know that feeling. I'm like, 17 miles an hour slow enough. I am sitting up. I sit up if I was going 40 miles an hour right now. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Awesome. Well, that's kind of inspiring, Paula. I don't know if it's heartbreaking that you can do that, but good to know. To put me on a downhill in TT position, and it's a completely different story. I'll sit up. I'll do 600 watts downhill on the TTI bike. No problem. Let me add it.

Oh, the feel of wind of my hair. Okay, next question here is from Vinny. Hello, team. I was thinking a lot about the discussion on the last pod about having outside hobbies to triathlon. As an amateur, I always say that triathlon gives me a secondary goal to work. That gives me balance to make sure

I don't put too much pressure on one aspect of my life. Do you feel that as a pro triathlete, it would be beneficial to have a side hobby to help avoid putting too much pressure on your day-by-day workouts? P.S., I went over my handlebars this weekend on a training ride and fractured my collarbone. I plan on working on the little things I can improve, like Eric said, while I can't do the three sports.

Sound advice from the pod. Thanks for all you do, Finney. Man, sorry for your loss. Yeah, I think having a hobby is essential. Or a job or a kid or a dog or a family or anything else. Like if triathons, the only thing in your entire life, then it's going to break you eventually. It's too hard to be the only thing. And I think just as humans, we crave other things that bring us happiness in other ways,

whether it's creative or caring for another thing or... Yeah. And especially, like, it's not always going perfectly. If you have a bad workout and you have seriously nothing except for waiting until the next workout. And then what if that workout goes bad? And you're just like going through a little bit of a rough patch. And this is the only thing that is bringing meaning or giving you validation. each day, that can just like spiral really hard.

Versus if you had a bad workout, but also like you're going to do in finger paint class tonight and you talk to some people and they tell you about how their kids are doing in school and one of them dropped out. Well, this just comes back to, we were talking to Holly about this this weekend is when you're like one degree removed from the sport and going and doing an activity with someone who doesn't follow it, you realize how tiny and insignificant triathlon is really in the big picture. and Holly was in St. George kind of observing from the other side, not racing herself, but just watching and cheering. And she got that sense that like when you're in it, it feels like the end of

the world, the biggest deal ever. All eyes are on you. But in reality, it's a very small percentage of people that really care about it at all. So I think it's healthy to have friends that are not in the sport and things outside of the sport that just like kind of ground you and remind you that triathlon is just a sport. It's not your whole life, especially as pros. Eric and I were with her when she kind of came to this realization, or at least when she vocalized to the two of us while you were racing. She's having a baby now, and that's public information. She's thinking that this will actually extend her career because she has this year to focus on something else. It's not a hobby, but it's something else. Then they can come back

to it. And Eric said that he doesn't know where you guys would be in your career if you didn't have that year of COVID that kind of had a similar effect of like, okay, everything's shut down. There's no races. We're just kind of having fun and training. And then just that break kind of injected a little more like just like a breath of air before getting back into it. Like I would love. I mean, the thing about COVID that was great as an athlete is that you could take a year off, but you didn't feel this guilt of like everyone else is still doing it.

I'm missing out. And you could say. yeah, well, I'm just going to take a year off like I did during COVID, but you'd have this fomo all year of like, I could be doing this and this and this and everyone else is racing. And it truly was like a career-changing period for us where we could really just take the gas off or the pedal or your foot off the gas pedal and not feel guilt about it because everyone is in the same boat. So maybe having a kid would kind of be a similar thing. It's like you're forced to take this break and no one's going to blame you for.

it's a very common life decision that people make. Yeah. Yeah, I've always also felt like anytime that you get injured and like having that sort of a break is like a similar sort of thing where like it pops that like bubble that you're in. And then you coming back to training hard, ultimately like you're reaffirming to yourself how much you enjoy it and how much you want to do it more than like that is more of an active choice and decision than just, okay, I'm getting up tomorrow and I'm doing the next thing that's on my schedule and I'm continuing and continuing. And I feel like that's powerful.

Yeah, it does make you appreciate it more. I think that if we went away and had a kid, I think I would like really learn for myself if I felt like doing this anymore. Do I miss it? Do I, am I glad I'm not racing right now? I don't know. I just think it would be a very eye-opening experience. This is turning into a different topic. Well, I think it's very interesting, and I was going to relate it to music. So I don't think this is unique to sport, because I went to a music school where a lot of people that went there, their whole life was music, music, music, since they were very young. And the amount of those people who feel totally burnt out on music, because that's all they did

as well, I think it happens with anything. And triathlons, like there's physiological stuff that happens, too. but just having multiple interests I feel like it's one of the secrets in life. No, totally. I can't imagine why this would be different in other similar situations of things that you can be obsessed about

and dedicate your life too. Yeah. Okay, next question here is from McKenna, and this is a great question because I'm kind of curious what the thought process is here. Hi, team, question for Paula. The interview during the race Saturday

and T2, question mark, what were you thinking? I honestly was shocked. They were all up in your face, got a bit defensive, Every time you win, I melt and I feel like when I first watched you when I was a kid, you are my inspiration. Always cheering for you from Austin, Texas, McKenna. Yeah, I was kind of surprised when I rewatched because Iron Man posted that little clip as a reel on their Instagram.

And the comments on it were pretty harsh. They were like, wow, this is so insane that you're doing this to her. Like, what a distraction. Why would you interview her during the race? Because for people that didn't watch, there was a camera and a guy on a microphone. I was racking my bike and putting my running shoes on, asking me questions for the live feed. And it definitely caught me off guard. Like, you know.

Like, hello, I'm racing. That transition between bike and run is really critical and just gathering yourself and thinking about how you feel and making that an efficient period in the race where you get your shoes on really smoothly and you grab all of your things and you're thinking about what's coming next, which is an extremely hard. hour and 20 minute effort. So to have someone asking me how I was feel and what my strategy was for the run was a little, a little like, I'm not going to say I was mad about it at the time, but I definitely wasn't giving well-thought-out answers to appease the crowd or anything. I was just kind of like, I just need to do my job and finish. Yeah, it's kind of insane.

They do this in Super League, but it's completely preempted. I'm sure it's written into a contract somewhere. Like, you must be okay with answering a question while you're... No, actually, that's funny, Eric, because I, as they were doing this, I was thinking about Super League. Yeah. I was like, wow, this happens. We watch all the Super League's, and they do three races with like 10 minutes break in between, and they're interviewing the athletes between the races.

And they're usually, the athletes are usually, you can get a sense that they're like, I don't really want to be talking to you right now. I only have 10 minutes to recover for the next all-out effort. So I actually thought about that during this. Like, they're trying to do what Super League does. and I'm not into it. Yeah. With like no warning whatsoever.

Yeah. And like the tough part is it's not like they're recording this and like maybe they'll use it if I say something interesting. It's like it was on the live feed. So no matter what I said, if I swore, if I told them to, you know, leave me alone, that was going to be on there. So it's a reflection of my character. I think Ellie just ignored it. I somebody told me that she just didn't even acknowledge. Yeah, the thing about this race is like, we're just 70.3s in general, is I'm never on the rivet where my heart rate and my breathing is so high that I can't talk.

So I was like feeling fine. I could definitely speak. I mean, I don't know. I had a huge buffer. It was not stressful. But I was like, the thing that really got me flustered was it when you're trying to put socks on. in T2 and then shoes, it feels like an eternity, especially if there's a camera on you. If you're on your own bubble doing it, it's like, yeah, it feels long, but whatever, everyone's doing this. But when there's a camera on you, it really makes it feel like time is standing still as you're trying to get your socks on your wet feet. So that was, I guess, what I was most embarrassed about.

Yeah, wow. That's so funny. It is crazy. Just like, isn't this a race? You would never do that to a marathoner, you know, in the middle of their marathon, but I guess there's that little downtime. Okay, last question here is from Laura. Hi, I'm currently training for 70.3.

And while training has been going very well and I'm happy with my fitness gains, every other week or so, I have a workout that just feels awful. Nothing hurts. It just feels hard for the output I'm getting. This got me wondering how often you all have these types of workouts. I always try and tell myself that the bad ones will help me push through hard sections on race day. But I have to say they don't do a lot for my confidence. Thanks so much for providing us with endless amounts of advice.

Love from Canada. Laura. Man, if I have like a couple weeks where more than 50% of the workouts aren't like that, I'm like, man, I'm having a good block. Yeah, it's very common. Yeah, that's a sign of fatigue, really. That's pro athletes saying that to you, Laura. Yeah, I remember, I distinctly remember like Javier Gomez answering a question.

And you know, someone's like, are you feeling, Javier? You've been racing a lot. Are you tired? He's like, I'm a professional athlete. I've been tired for 15 years. Yeah. That's brutal. Like that's the job is showing up when you're like, oh, I feel smashed.

And now I have to go do 10 by a K. And I don't know how I'm going to do it. And each one, the first one felt hard and the last one felt hard. None of them felt easy. That is more often the case versus like, wow, I felt good. I feel like I could have done three more of those, you know, that we savor and enjoy. those moments when they happen and when you string together a lot of those is when you kind of

start to have one of those really special seasons. But I do think about, I think what she's saying is like, for me, I have one-off days like that. Like there were a couple of them before St. George, which is why I was freaking out about if I should even go to St. George, where I'm trying to do a certain number of watts. And I can't even imagine doing 50 watts lower than that. And that to me was a sign like you're way too tired today to even attend. to do this workout and therefore you should shut it down.

So there's a difference between feeling tired and pushing through and doing it and you're not feeling your best and then just like physically not being able to do it. And I think that could be due to physical stress or life stress or you should know your body enough to know when you are able to push through the feeling and when you should really just put an end to it for the day. Yeah. And you're really maybe going to do damage if you try to force it for too many days in a row because that could mean you're putting yourself in a hole. Yeah, it's kind of similar to the feeling that you have when you're sick,

which is just what's fresh in my brain. Where I, like, one day when I was sick, I was like, oh, you know, I think I can go out and I can run with Paula. And then the next day, I made it like 10 minutes into running with her. And I was like, I actually am concerned that if I run a couple minutes further, like, I'm not going to make it back to the hotel. And then the next day, like, I act, like walking down the street. sounds like a huge undertaking.

And that's, if you feel like that about a workout, I agree with Paula. Maybe go, this is just going to be a bridge too far and the hole is going to get dug exponentially deeper. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like I try to have all my workouts go well. But the thought that creeps into my head is if all my workouts are going well, I'm not working hard enough.

Yep. I think there's a definitely, I mean, there's a line. But that's for sure a thing. Yeah. It could be that you're tired or also that you're just like not eating enough or well enough. Like there's so many factors that could go into, it's crazy how quick your body can turn around from one day to the other. Like one day I couldn't even imagine doing it. And the next day I did it because I shut it down, had a nap, ate a ton, sat in the Norma Tex, went to bed at 8.30.

I did all these things to set my myself up for success the next day and the next day I felt completely better. So you can really do a lot with just a little bit of focus on recovery and getting your body ready to go the next time that you have a hard workout. There's kind of an interesting thought, though, about like postponing workouts because I was like, I couldn't do my pre-race brick that I always do the six days or seven days out from my race. And I was like, oh, this is terrible. I do this every time I race. If I don't do it, I shouldn't even bother racing. And then I thought, should I do it the day after? And Eric's like, well, postponing a workout.

It just gets too easy to do that, you know? I just like, oh, I'll do it tomorrow. That's not the point. If you don't do a workout, just forget about it and move on with your schedule. My coach was like more concerned about me quitting the sport than he was about me completing this pre-race brick. So he wasn't giving me guidance, which is good. Like, he wasn't going to say, yeah, you need to do it tomorrow if you're not doing it today.

That's not what I needed to hear. And of course, like, you're never going to win the race off of one workout either. Yeah, it all ended up fine. I felt totally fine on the race. All the workouts are important workouts, and none of them are the workout. Yeah, it's consistency. That's kind of dovetails nicely into something that Eric and I were talking about a lot, which is, and it reflects also what Sam Long said in his, in his, like, little winning speech about people really, it's easy to. point at, it's like, oh, the lactate testing or V-O-2 max testing or all these very specific

workouts. But the best performance booster that you can have is been, Eric said, like, be doing this since you were 10 years old. That's the best performance boost you can have, like consistently training for a long, long time. Like, neither one of the winners at St. George do lactate testing. You know, both of them are just like tried and true, go out every day. train hard, show up and race. And you've been doing it for a long time. And it's like, yeah. And Eric's, Eric, you're just totally right.

Like the people who are really fast, they've just been doing it a long time. Yeah, I remember though, when I was training with Siri Linley back in 2013-14 kind of area. And Sam Long was like this young kid in Boulder. And he joined Siri's group. And he could not swim. He was swam like a rock. He was like in-lane one floundering. we'd all be lapping him. He was just like so bad at swimming, but had obviously a lot of potential

on the bike and run. He was really strong. He was kind of a goofy kid. And I remember that vividly of when Sam was fresh to the sport. So he's like a freak of nature with his abilities and his talent and his work ethic. And he's built himself up to be the best in the world, one of the best in the world in a relatively short time frame. That's like 10 years of training hard. So I don't know. It was just fine. to think about how hard he's worked in the last 10 years to get where he is versus where he came from. I don't know if that's relevant, but... Yeah. You hear that everybody? 10 years is fast.

Yeah, exactly. I guess 10 years is actually a long time. Patience. Yeah, patience. Okay, well, those are all the questions. There's plenty more questions. Those are just all we got time for. Yeah, yeah. Those are the ones that I chose, yeah. This weekend, Eric, if you can believe it, is racing. as well. Eric, what are you race? Oh, it's not, oh, right, of course. Next weekend, yes, of course.

Same weekend I'm racing. Yes, I have one week to train and then I'm tapering. So you hear that 10 years or one week? For X-Dara, North American Championships, and Oak Mountain in Alabama, which is my favorite X-Dara that I've done. And one that I put on my calendar this year as a race that I really wanted to go try to win.

I've had a little bit of an up and down preparation the last couple months, so I'm just going to do the best that I possibly can and hang it all out there and see what happens. But you were second last year. Did you just say that? Yep. I was second place last year to the then world champion. And I'm just looking forward to it.

Oak Mountain is a place where if I could go 10 days before the race and mountain bike and stay for five days after and mountain bike on the trails, I would. It's just like a cool spot. So no matter what happens, I'm going to have a great time. Yeah. I'm going to send it. I'm still going to send it.

Send it. Yeah, I went last year with you too. Remember I raced Chattanooga and you race that? Uh-huh. Yeah, it's a super nice place. Yeah, my dad's going to come with me this year, give me a little bit of company, so. Oh, that's nice.

It'll be a lot of fun. And my next race isn't until San Francisco, which is in a month, so I got a lot of downtime. My coach said I need a vacation this week, so I'm doing a staycation. Yeah, Paul is vacationing. I'm panic training. Nice.

This will be. a very exciting vlog after Paula's race recap blog. Stay tuned for them. That's what we got. Yeah? See you later, everybody.

All right. See you next week. Bye. Ciao.