That Triathlon Life Podcast - Talbot Cox: Our first ever podcast guest. We talk triathlon media and growth with the legend himself!

Episode Date: May 19, 2022

We discuss Triathlon with the man who helped it become relevant off the race course. Talbot currently creates all of Lionel Sanders' YouTube videos, as well as compelling race week content for many other pro triathletes. He has helped build and shape triathlon media on YouTube and beyond, so we are extremely happy to have him as our first guest. For everything TTL, visit http://www.thattriathlonlife.com

Hey, everyone, welcome to that triathlon life podcast. I'm Eric Loggerstrom. I'm Nick Goldston. My partner, Paula Finley, is not with us right now. We're both professional triathletes. I just raced the LA triathlon. She is in an airplane as we speak on her way to Chattanooga 70.3. So in her place, we have a very special guest. This is not just any special guest. This is our very first special guest. This is the CEO of YouTube, Lionel Sanders' father, the Oakland a homo kid, the biggest personality in triathlon, tell the cocks. Oh my. How did we land this guy? What an introduction. I don't even know what to say. It took a long time to get through his manager. Yeah. Like we had to battle and put up some big money.

He's like, just called my people. Your people call my people. Yeah. Like we are our people. And then like $40,000 later, here we are. Yeah. You know what? Whatever it takes. He checked on the way. Okay. So we were really hoping to have Talbot in person here with us because he was just here. We were just all hanging out. But that race was over and he was on a flight to Oklahoma. We're closing on a house in like literally four days.

I've been gone for three and a half weeks. I have not been home. So I was ready to be home. I in a house, like even if you're there is an awful, awful experience as it is. I'm like editing it like two. the stupid like all the not stupid sorry but all like the linal youtube stuff or the st george countdown all this stuff and i'm getting emails from like the freaking loan company and they're like we need your liver can you send it in a box we need this we need this and i'm like exact dimensions

of your liver yeah i'm self-employed on top of that so it's uh eric no doubt is i'm sure nick too oh of course it's like constant rolling the dice and finger crossing well i wanted to start things off just kind of light and easy with a little segment that we do sometimes called this or that. So we're going to do this or that with Talbot Cox here. So first of all, who would win in a fight? You at peak fitness or a one wheel on low battery. Definitely me at peak fitness.

And let me just tell you why. I respect. You have to have respect for the one wheel. You have to have respect for it. Really? That's kind of funny coming from you of all people. Oh, I know, right. Well, it's first-hand experience.

First-hand experience. I never respected it. So now I do. So for people who don't know this story, Eric, do you want to tell it? Sure, like Daytona, the year that Paula won, I think, right? We're there in, like, Talbot's in the parking lot the night before the race. Like, dude, I just got a one wheel from Walmart. Like, if you have any tips, I'm like, go back to when you were six and ride a skateboard.

Oh, dude. And then, dude, I mean, I don't even, how much can you? Amber gear did you break when you crashed and also your collarbone or something? Oh, dude, it was gnarly. I don't even really remember. I just know that about 10 people messaged me told me not to write it. I think you were like, ah, it's pretty, it's really, it's really useful. You can get some great shots, but I would practice a whole lot before. So basically it has this built-in mechanism that like if you lean too far forward, that's how you get the momentum and it comes back like saying you're going too fast. Yeah, it's like a segue.

Yeah. And Bill Christie decides to start the pro men in the middle of the female race. I'm still very confused on why they still do that. But whatever, that's a whole other side note. So I'm like, oh, my God, I had to get back to the men's race. They're starting in like one minute ago. And so I hop on it. I'm like going as I'm leaning as far as I can for it. It's like resisting back. Then I'm like, no, I got to go fast. and I lean as hard as I can for it and then just with the gimbal come straight down landed on my shoulder it dislocated it torn AC level 5 whatever that freaking but no collarbone break no collarbone break see that's you're not some weak road cyclist

oh you're strong I made it to the start line and I'm sitting there and I'm like leasing and Kyle comes to me he's like what's wrong buddy like that's my shoulder and I'm like no no no no no no I'm like, my arms dislocated. My arm's dislocated. Hold on, I just have to record to start. So I'm like recording to start. My arms is literally dislocated. And then I go to the ambulance.

Yeah. And then the guy's like, we can't help you unless you get into the ambulance. We take it into the hospital. And I'm like, I got to shoot this race. At this point, I'm like shocked full of adrenaline. I don't even feel anything. That's commitment to the craft. Oh, dude, 20 seconds later, I'm like, help.

He's like, grab onto the. this golf card handle and yank yourself to the side. And so I did that. And it popped, at least popped my like shoulder or something back into place. And then I went to the hospital. They gave me lots and lots of drugs. And I came back and I shot the rest of the race. You can't, oh my gosh. That's great. And the camera, you had like a lot of camera gear on you too. Was it mostly fine? I did. I mean, no, it destroyed my C70 a week after. I mean, literally I I'm not like saying that I'm important that I got a C70 before everyone else. I just happened to pre-order it like forever in advance.

I got one literally. It was like the first time. Like there was hardly even review videos online from it and I had already destroyed one. This is a fancy high-end canon cinema camera. Yeah. Yeah. Well, speaking, sorry, maybe we haven't said this for people who don't know because I think there's some people who just find the podcast by searching triathlon on Spotify or something.

Potentially. Talba Cox invented triathlon YouTube. That's hard. Lindsay Corbyn Z-O-G. I will say. She invented triathlon like social media. Social media. Yeah.

Yeah. I had a, I can distinctly remember having a conversation with her husband, Chris Corbyn and him saying like, oh, dude, we tried YouTube for it. I mean, that is like not a good return on investment. That's back in like 2015. He's not wrong.

It took me, what, like six years before anything happened at all? but yeah but it wasn't really until talbot started cranking with the uh well with with linal obviously in the kona series that i think most triathlet triathletes kind of became aware of that youtube was a place where you could go watch anything other than a cat video and that kind of that's right that i mean i've been putting stuff up for a while but that's when people started actually paying attention i remember those videos so well yeah i remember just being glued to the youtube trying to see when you were going to upload something next and it was crazy because I think we started to really grow.

And also, too, a lot of it has to do with timing. I mean, whether it was me or whether it was anyone else. It was just the timing of social media and me gathering content. I was just the first one to, I don't want to say first one to do it. I introduced it. It would have been introduced by someone else if I wouldn't have done it. But I distinctly remember about a year later after we'd grown a bit having conversations, even with you, Eric, when you were like, I just don't see the point in YouTube.

And then now you have like, and I was trying to like, I don't know, more so sell you on it. Yeah, no, exactly, because I was the same way too. I mean, and of course, even still to this day, I'm sure Eric, you get contacted by like multiple people and they're like, oh, we have a subscription platform. We want you to come over to that and just post on there. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, that's true. If you're talking about back when I was kind of like, I initially started posting stuff on Vimeo because I just thought it was it was prettier and. more artistic and everything. And I wouldn't say that YouTube

had like hit its peak where it is right now in terms of being such a search engine where when you Google anything on the internet, like YouTube videos are the first thing that pop up. But now it's like so painfully obvious. If you want to get discovered in any way, that's where it's got to be. Yeah, yeah. Okay, sorry, didn't mean

to divert the podcast. No, no, that's, no, that's it. We want... Awesome, would you rather? We want, yeah, that's right. I just wanted to give some context to who you are for people who don't know. You know every single pro triathlet and every single person in pro triathlon, whether they're an athlete or not.

You're like pervasive throughout the world of triathlon in a way that I don't know if anybody else is. You play every side. So you're a, you're a, you have a very unique point of view because you don't have, you don't have really like side. You're not on the side. You're on the side of the success of the sport. Yeah, yeah. Right. Great.

So the second question is, would you rather run a marathon? Or sit through a pro athlete race briefing in the middle of the day and the Kona Sun once a week for a year? Oh, marathon once. I mean, I would run a marathon ten times. Yeah. I do an Iron Man. Right. Just to not do that.

To give context, those are the worst things ever. And I don't understand why they're outdoors, but they put these, the athlete briefing outdoors or the press conference in this humid, hot, sweaty tent. No one's even there. Oh, miserable. Miserable. And then last one is a sweet tea or soda? Soda. Really?

I used to be on that, what was it? Is it called like Diamond Peak or something? Oh, yeah, yeah. I'd get like the very sweet. And then I was like, wow. I'm probably going to have like cavities for life. Yeah. Is that like an Oklahoma specific question?

Sweet tea is a southern thing. Yeah, definitely a southern thing. Yeah. But I'm on that like grape soda kick. Got it. Oh, you're too good for Sweet Tea. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, Eric, did you not know about Sweet Tea?

I mean, I know it exists, but it's definitely not a question, like a thing that anybody in the northwest. Oh, yeah, I'm just asking because my dad grew up in Oklahoma as well. He's, uh... How far is Lindsay from Oklahoma City? Uh, long story short, this... I had a girlfriend. She, uh, left me for a guy in Lindsay, so it's a tough topic. I see.

But it's literally like probably like probably, 45 minutes. But Eric, your coffee to like Portland Northwest is our tea. Right. That's kind of what I was saying. It's like, do you want coffee or regular tea? drip or espresso. Yeah. Exactly. It would be like a soda. Yeah. I know that it kills you. That's true. I mean, I don't drink much soda anymore. Well, we wanted to, I wanted to talk about the race that just happened this past weekend for people who don't know. There was a, there used to be a really big race in LA called LA, L.A. and then it kind of went away for a bit. And now it's coming back and it's seeming like it's becoming more

and more of a focus and more and more exciting. And Eric just raced this weekend. And Talbot, you were doing media for the PTO this weekend. Eric, maybe you wanted to kind of run through a little bit what your race was like. And then Talbot, feel free to jump in at any point if you find something to be relevant or anything like that. Yeah, sure.

I can kind of just go through a little bit of my race experience and everything, but I do think it'll be really cool with Talbot here to talk about just like kind of what this race represents in the sport and kind of how it came to be and everything. So like I, I raced in St. Anthony's a few weeks back, a couple weeks back now, and that was an Olympic distance race. And the one thing that I didn't really like about my performance there was I got dropped on the swim by the lead group. And I feel like that kind of set up, set me up for not being able to win the race. So my big focus for this was not getting dropped by that

lead group no matter what and just then getting on the bike and riding as hard as I could see where I ended up. Like I would say I definitely achieved that. It was the hardest swim I've done in a long time, just like maximum effort the whole way. And I came out of the water with this ITU kid named Jamie Riddle, very, very fast swimmer. And then Greg Harper, the guy who led out of St. Anthony's. And I kind of caught up, got into second place by the time we were through transition one and caught Jamie at the front of the race at like 3K into the bike.

and I wrote as hard as I could put in a bunch of surges trying to drop him. And even with the 20 meter draft rule that the PTO's instated here, I wasn't able to drop him and he ended up ultimately running away from me on the 10K run. Which, I mean, as I look back on the racers, I accomplished exactly what I wanted to, what I set out to, and I had a great run split, a great bite split, and swam well. So I'm totally happy, and I feel like I'm kind of closing in on just having, you know, the most perfect race where I've plugged every.

little gap that I've identified this year. So this weekend I'll be going to Chattanooga, race 70.3 Chattanooga. Paulo will also be there, and that's North American champs. So hopefully everything's been building towards this. Yeah, I remember when I saw, I woke up and instead of going to the swim start,

I thought I'd go to T2 just to not get stuck at the swim start. And I was like, oh, I'll go to Venice Boulevard where the bike course just goes for a long time, just to see if I can catch them. And I park right there, and I run over to the course. and as I'm running over to the road, I see Riddle go on his bike, and then I whip out the camera,

and Eric is right behind him going. I'm like, oh, that's great. Then I get to T2, and I see Eric come in first from T2, but Riddle was behind you by like five seconds. And I just, he just looks, you look at him and you're like, this kid can run his ass off.

Yeah. Shit. And I saw like the 5K in, you're like, maybe he had lost like 15, 20 seconds. Yeah. And then pretty much that can, continued to go until 10K. Yeah, you really opened up the gap on.

There is, like, a hill on the course that you go up at, like, I don't know what it is, like a mile and a half, and then you go up it again on the second loop at, like, four and a half miles. And that's where he was putting some time into me. Yeah. Legs just pretty heavy from that bike ride for sure. And just to, like, paint the picture of this race for everybody, so you kind of, like, understand what Nick was saying is you swim, actually, like, right around Venice Beach. It's in Venice Beach, yeah.

And then, like, in the ocean, you go through the waves, come out of the waves, and everything, and then you ride basically straight inland through L.A. to the Staples Center, and then you do your run down there. It's like the coolest experience you can have. And like for that reason, I think like this race does have a lot of potential long term, and I really hope they continue to build it because it's so novel to ride your bike through L.A. You got the most insane footage. Well, we should say first of all that there was coverage of the event. Yeah.

Right? Yeah. But it wasn't covering the pro race. So, Talba, do you want to explain what was going on? What were you doing that? It was pretty funny because even the day before the race, I was talking to Eric, and he's like, is it covering the pro race? And I'm like, dude, I have no idea because I don't even know what really I'm doing here, to be honest. So they did, the whole point of this is to, if you look almost like at golf and you see like that they do like the celebrity golf charity event every year.

That's PTO's aim. with this event. So they had always planned to just highlight this pro race. And if you do recall, there was a pretty stacked start line, not saying that the pro field was not stacked, but what originally is supposed to be, it was supposed to be Jan Ferdino, Gustav Eden, Lucy Charles, like Sebastian Kinley, Holly, Lawrence, Paula.

I mean, there was Laura Phillip, there was so many people on the start list and then also Jim Carrey had agreed to doing the event so did Will Farrell that Stevo was toying with the idea and I know that Nick was talking to Trixie about it trying to get but I think what happened was towards the end of it everything I don't want to say fell apart but it wasn't able to come to fruition yeah but the PTO's goal is

they still wanted to cover the event because they wanted to get all the media for next year. So they didn't want to just completely dodge it and then not have the content because next year they can make all this promotional stuff and do all this stuff. So that originally that was the goal. That's why the broadcast was there. That's why. And instead of them

being like, oh, we're just going to give up and pivot on this, which I guess you could argue both ways, especially with the depth of field and the pro race, the pro race, outside of the relay actually started to become a pretty cool event. They wanted to still completely focus on it for media and advertisement and sponsorship

dollars for next year, also getting the famous celebrities for next year as well. And then most importantly, representing and raising awareness for the CAF athletes. So that seems like what it kind of turned into, right? Yeah, yeah. That's why they did not cover the elite race. I think there was a lot of confusion on that. So, yeah. Yeah. No, that does make a lot of sense. If you're trying to get something long-term going versus just like grab it the most valuable thing that's right in front of you, it is really great to have that for the promotion next year, like you said. I mean, I hadn't really thought about it like that, but that does, that makes sense.

Those were two completely separate races. Herbalife was 100% in charge of the elite race, the elite pro race. PTO put up the money, the funding, the broadcast and all that for the pro a.m. So they were completely. separate. I even saw like Laura Sidel comment on there. Such a disappointment for PTO. The female came across, which is like Lopez, shout to her. She had an incredible race. When she crossed finish line, there was no like finish tape or anything. And people were like bash and PTO and PTO is like, we literally have nothing to do with that race.

Like we tried to show a little bit of it just like to help the pros and then because there's not as much going on. So they did show like glimpses like when you guys came into camera reviews. stuff, but they had nothing to do with it. So PTO was kind of catching some slack on that, but they were like, we just, that wasn't our race. That's, that's kind of tough because they definitely put their branding all over it and there were PTO banners everywhere. And I'm sure that they wanted to take some credit for like the money that they put into the pro race and everything. But then if it, yeah, if it doesn't go well. Because, so I don't know, it will be interesting

to see. I do think, though, that if everyone did show up next year, it could actually long-term, like you said, turned into a pretty fun event. The only, there's a guy named Adam. I'm reading his name right now. Skullnick, he's on Rich Rolls podcast all the time. Super cool guy writes incredible articles for, like, New York Times and all that. They just actually interviewed Christian Blumenfeld. Great podcast. Him and I were chatting about it, and he was like, it seems like it would make a little bit more sense and you'd know more about the sick if they moved it out to Malibu

that's where the previous really famous celebrity race was Correct well that still happens that still happens every September it's called Malibu Try and actual celebrities show up every single year Yeah one thing the difference we were talking about as well with that is that's entirely for charity right

Correct that's a big draw Children's Hospital Yeah And they put a lot of actual focus on it It's not just some ancillary thing. It's they really care about, or they appear to really care about it.

Yeah. And I think the hardest thing was, is even for Lionel, we had gotten the hotel down in L.A., and he was like, after a day and a half, he was like, oh, I got to train. I can't be here. In downtown, you can't train downtown.

So we ended up getting an Airbnb. He paid for it himself out in Venice Beach so he could train. So it sounds like if you did get everyone out to Malibu, it might make a little bit more sense for the professional athletes. but I don't know the pricing, logistics, and all that. Yeah, that was part of the reason, I mean, pretty much the entire reason that Paul ended up not doing it. And they also wanted to have an equal number of like men and women. So when Jan pulled out, they kind of, like, it was totally fine that she didn't.

But the reason was because she couldn't do any training at downtown L.A., basically leading to Chattanooga next weekend. Well, also was when all these people were signed up, these big names, was it, Did they know that Worlds was like a week before? I think that's why they were okay with it, to be honest. That's why they were okay with it. I see. So they would just go there and then drive over in LA. And it was kind of like a charity.

Yeah, it is good. It is perfectly timed. Yeah, it'll be interesting to see what they do with all the footage and how they promote. If anyone knows how to promote a race, it's PTO. Yeah. You think that racing at an Olympic, is perfect timing a week after a peak Iron Man?

You're not racing it. You do the bike leg. Sorry. Maybe I misunderstood, but I thought you were saying originally Lucy, Jan, and Laura Phillip were doing the race.

No, no, no, no. They're all doing the pro-am relay. I see, I see. And their partners were going to be people like Will Ferrell, Jim Carrey. Okay, now that, I see. I thought those were two separate things. I see.

And that was another thing to. Everyone was like Bash and PTO, like, oh, this is the biggest flop ever. None of the, the biggest celebrity on there is Paul Felder, and then they have, like, random people I don't even know about. And a lot of it, too, is I think the agency they hired to get the celebrities, like, committed the moon. Yeah.

They didn't deliver one person, so. I was telling Eric, I think I could have gotten better celebrities to show up. Yeah, and, of course, I mean, it's like the PTO. They're like, this isn't like, we hired an agency to do. this. So, and the agency promised like XYZ. Yeah. I honestly, I think probably this all could have been, like everybody would have been totally

happy if there's just like a kind of a classic communication thing. Like there was not communication about like, oh, we're just doing this program. This is the whole focus. And oh, yeah, there's also, you needed to be like, what's the priority here? What's going on and storytell a little bit better leading up into it versus people just turn on the broadcast and it's like, wait, what's happening? Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. And I don't even think that, I think, though, to Eric, to, I'd not argue that, but like,

I think if you would have seen a start list amongst the names of like Jan Fredino, Gustafide, and Lucy, Charles, Paula Finley, Laura, Phil, all these people, I mean, it would just completely make sense to just cover that, but it wasn't that. So then they should have probably been a little more, like you said, clarifying, like, oh, are we just going to watch Lionel Sanders pedal a bike for two hours or whatever? You know what I mean? So I completely understand. So we'll see where it goes next year.

I did kind of think the challenge athletes thing. That was a cool angle to take with it, at least there. It's like, okay. That's kind of cool and different for most of us to see that. Yeah. Yeah, definitely, definitely. So it will be interesting to see what they do. Talbot, your footage of Heather Jackson And that is the, I just thought that was the coolest thing.

It's just like in 120 frames per second. And that front wheel, you just, she hits a pothole or something. And sealant just goes everywhere. And you can just see like the whole bike lowers down an inch because it's totally flat immediately. And just the look on her face of like, oh, no. There's even a cooler side of this. And we can dive from this into content.

I didn't, I didn't even, so basically I was out there shooting the race. You're on a moto, right? I was on a motto shooting the race, shooting all the athletes. I literally, it was by chance of luck, I roll up to Heather. Canon, I hate you because you don't have audio at 120. 120 means slow motion for the people that don't understand. But, and I'm recording her, and then I heard a freaking explosion, and I'm like, the first thing in my head is we just hit someone.

like my motor driver did. And because I'm not even looking at Heather. And then I look over at Heather and Heather's like, fuck! Screw to the F word. And then so I'm just like, oh my God. And then I realized it was like her tire was rattling. And I was like, I think I got that in the shot.

But I didn't even know really that I'd even got it. So from there, I shoot the rest of the race, roll in. I literally dump my cards. They clear my cards. and then I go home. I had completely even forgot about that. And then literally an hour and a half later, PTO, this tells you how good, and we'll dive into this more, how good their content team is, they literally went skimmed, like literally probably an hour of footage, they just found that clip, knew it was going to be good, they clip that up and put it online.

I wouldn't even, I actually would have never even posted that clip. Like, I would have probably sent it to Heather and be like, this is crazy. recorded this and I'm like watching this so much traction so many comments and I'm just like I don't know if I if any I'm sure there probably is I don't know if anyone's sealant tire blown out has ever been caught on film just like that just like that no it's so epic only like maybe in downhill mountain biking or something and not at that at that close range it's that was wild so I was just like but that that's where I tip my hat to the PTO I mean yeah This is an hour after the race.

They literally found that in the clip. They clipped it out. They put audio behind it. And they put like a truck freaking... Yeah. I'm probably making a little bit different audio. But the most important thing is it creates traction and brings content to the sport. And so, I mean, like, no offense.

I love Iron Man. I'm working, like, very closely with them now. But this would have never been something on their channels. You know what I mean? so yeah the PTO is just like masters of viral or like attempting to make things viral and and quick like speed and I feel like that's ultimately what you initially brought to the sport and maybe maybe they're experts at it from other sports is like that people want to know now and what's exciting and presenting it really quickly versus oh you know hey we made a cool video recap

of this a month later yeah yeah when it's all said and done so yeah totally totally which It'll be, I'm stoked. Their team is growing, is bigger and bigger. But it will be interesting to see what they do with their PTO tour events this year with Edmonton and Dallas. Will you go to both of those, Eric? I don't know. I'm still trying to qualify. That's part of the big thing I'm trying to do at Chattanooga this weekend.

I need to get one more high score. But at any rate, I will definitely be there supporting Paula if I don't qualify. qualify. Yeah, that makes sense. Nice. Nice. And Nick, are you coming? Chattanooga? Yeah. No. No, no, no, no. Sorry, Edmonton. To Edmonton? Well, considering that we were looking at flights

the other day and they're in the multiple thousands of dollars region, no problem. Of course I'll come. Done. It's crazy. I'll be cheering from here, I think. Wait, can we, uh, are you of a, for hire. Yeah. Would you do? Would you like do video stuff with PTO?

Yeah, I probably would do that. The only thing is my camera setup is really not ideal for that because I don't have auto focus. Yeah. It's my camera, I guess. We'll just, we'll play that by ear. Yeah. They'll probably let you know that they want you to help film about three days before

the event. I totally bet if we, if I told Nick that you would be willing to come up, I totally bet that they would bring you on their media. for everyone listening. Yeah, PTO Nick. He's like the head of content guy there. I'm supposed to have a phone call with him this week, actually. So I'll just put that in there.

Can you throw a few extra Gs for my guy to come? Yeah, yeah. Make him into him a good. Come out. You know, this is a good opportunity to say this. Something I love this about you, Talbot, is that watching, watching like a sterilized interview of triathletes is like, it's not that interesting for me.

me, even if the triathlete is interesting, but watching you talk to triathletes and, like, having your voice, like, behind the camera talking to them and kind of, like, half-joking, making fun of them, that's the content that makes me want to watch the stuff. Yeah. No, I would say that's, like, your special power, man. You have, like, an ability to, like, walk up to random pro triathlet who's probably so skittish, like, racehorse mode two days before World Championships and just, like, kind of put them at ease and get them to talk to you about, like, whatever. Yeah. You know, versus, like, people sit down in front of a camera and they're just like, uh,

and interview mode. I'm going to say the right things and, like you're disarming. I think, um, what, I mean, how I kind of even started all this was,

I just remember when I was like, I can't even remember how old I was, maybe eight or nine. I'd literally wake up every day in July and I'd turn on the tour to France and I'd watch Lance Armstrong. And I was like, so inspired by him. And I'd literally get on Google.

I found his, uh, photographer's personal photographer like litz cruise and anything behind the scenes i could see i would like find and i would like get on her website and i would like minim and like try to look for photos and i'd like do hashtags and like try to like find different race galleries and things like that just to see like more photos and and then anytime like discovery channel or us post service or anyone posted like a video online i would like watch the entire thing and it's an entirety and that's like what gave me so much fashion. Then I'd literally go out, put on my little yellow helmet and my discovery jersey, and I'd

pedal up and down the street. And I'd pass my, I'd pass the stop sign at the front of my neighbor, and I'd put my arms in the air, like, I would have won the tour to France. But seeing those things is like what really wanted me to get into the sport and essentially start telling more, like, behind the scenes, because like triathlon is just as interesting. Because I would, when I moved out to Boulder for Software Development School, long story short, I started working. And, taking pictures, dated a professional athlete, and then I was just like taking pictures and just kind of getting involved.

And I'm like, how do we not see more of like what these athletes do? Like we have to like somehow, like they're awesome people. There's so much fun to be around. And the only time you ever see them is like in this polished up triathlet magazine interview or the Kona broadcast. It's like the only time you ever even saw these athletes. And so that's what I wanted to try to do was to really try to, just literally press record

and at the time I had no idea what I was even doing well humanize these people that seem inhuman to the most age groupers right exactly exactly we came from the exact same place with that for sure that was exactly what I was trying to do back and I don't even know when it was now

like 2014-15 was like I kind of came from the perspective of having watched a lot of surf films and skate movies and snowboarding I was like why is there not stuff like this about triathlon I was like the same thing like I think triathlon's pretty freaking cool it could have this kind of stuff too. Yeah, exactly. And then I started getting like better at interviewing and better at asking

questions. I can't take the credit for this. Someone told me one time, whether it was Steve Fleck or Barry Shepley or somebody or maybe someone outside of the industry, they said, the best way to get people to talk is to ask them a question with the inaccurate information. Oh, that's awesome. So that's why a lot of my questions are like, I look so stupid because then they want to like essentially answer your, because a lot of times you can even, when you go to sit down to the interview, you're like, hey, can you answer the question back to me and then tell me? So that's why a lot of times, like, Eric, I can look at you and be like, hey, so how did the bike ride to go? Like, how was it pushing 250? 250 watts. And you're going to be like, oh, well, the bike ride went great.

I didn't push 250 watts. I pushed like 350. You know what I mean? Yeah. And it's going to like make your mind think like I need to like really explain to this to him because I didn't push 250. I need to prove that. So, don't know.

Let me break it down. So that's why you always say like questions like that. Like that's why always to line on like something about Sam Long or are you like, Yon Ferdino is going to get beat you again or something like that because it stimulates their brain. And it makes them like want to talk more. So that's like a little niche. Someone told me, I can't remember who told me to ask a question, give them the wrong information. Might have been like Steve Fleck.

But that's funny. That's what I love doing in interviews. I'm like imagining trying that on Paula next time I want to talk about something. I think she'd just like stare at me and be like, that is wrong. Yeah. Like no, Paula, tell them it. Okay, never mind. You're like, hey Paula, even though Holly crashed, I mean, are you like nervous the fact that she said that she was going to destroy you this weekend?

She's like, are you kidding me? That's incorrect. That's incorrect. I'm going to kill her. Paul goes breast comfort. She's like shaking with views. She would never say that, yeah. That's funny.

So, yeah, I kind of like, tell the truth, semi, but say something semi, not accurate. Yeah, I love it. I mean, to me, the dynamic of you, like, poking fun at Lionel, something about that is so funny to me. Like, while he's, like, in a workout and working really hard and you just kind of making fun of them as you're like sitting pretty with your camera. I there's something about that that is so satisfying. Dude, it's it's it's it's a lot of fun. Lionel is such an easy client though because he is like so good in front of a camera.

Yeah. It's like I mean like it makes my job like all everyone's like oh I love your videos so much. I'm like dude I could literally pull out a freaking GoPro hero two and make videos and everyone to watch him because of Lionel. He's so compelling. Yeah. It's so compelling and stuff. It's so well.

It's impressive. The funniest thing, too, is you've seen people come and go in the YouTube game and they're like, make these videos and are like, our videos are going to be different than everyone else's. We're not going to make coffee in them and they're not going to be scripted. And I'm like looking like, it's like a conversation I have it. Eric, you're like, we're just trying to like record what we do every day. We're definitely aren't scripted and we just drink coffee. Who has time to script? Anything.

Yeah, there's no script. I mean, I think the only times I've ever taken out, actually, Lionel has never redone audio bit. I've never been like, oh, can you re-say that again? Or can you say this? Oh, never once. I mean, if I, or we've never had a planned shoot. Like, if I'm like, hey, can we go shoot at sunset?

Like, so I can get like this shot and this angle and stuff, he'd look at me and be like, what's for dinner tonight? Yeah. That's funny. we're exactly the same way and I find like so much entertainment and personal satisfaction

in that of like no I didn't massively alter our training schedule or our day or anything to get this story and somehow managed to like film while riding a bike and actually experiencing it

and that's what I don't know scripted versus unscripted it makes feel real that's what's making you and Lionel's thing works so well that's what's making you and Paula's thing

works so well is that people can smell bullshit when it's like this open overly planned out, curated little video. And there's a time and place for that,

and those can be cool, but I don't feel emotionally invested in those videos. It's like, oh, that was cool. And I got some great information from that. But when I watch Linos YouTube or your YouTube, it's you, Eric. It feels like, oh, I'm like,

this is, these are my friends, kind of, right? Like, I'm getting to know them in a way that, like, Talbot just happens to have the camera out. Eric just happens to have the camera out and I'm just living a moment in their day as these athletes that I look up to and think are amazing, right? That's the whole point.

This is something that Eric and I have talked about for like a long time because we're both like on the fence of like quality over quantity where's the even line and for YouTube it's just so interesting and it kills you because you look at someone like Jake Paul are like some of these vloggers

that literally you get sick watching their videos because they're literally just walking around talking to the camera, but they're getting like 6 million views. And we work so hard on our videos, but then it's almost to the point, like, the funniest experiment we've ever done is Lionel did this thing

called like LS Diary Journal or something like this. He literally got like a DJI action cam and just recorded himself. He edited himself and everything. He's like, just let me just do it. I just want to do it. And I was like, I was so against it. like this looks so bad. Oh, well, and of course, like 80,000 views.

And I'm just like, I'm, from that point on, I was just like, I'm freaking done. I'm done. You don't have to be artsy. I've had that experience watching some of those things that maybe he did or maybe you did it, but like the race week thing where I'm like, they literally just dropped stuff onto a timeline and I'm sitting here. That's all it is. I'm trying.

What? She's off. But it's great. It totally works because you do feel like it feels so much like you're there because it doesn't feel polished in any way. So it's like obviously this is not being presented to me in any sort of special spin. It's just like this is what happened. Yeah, yeah. And it's hard because probably I'm not just tooting y'all's horn.

I tell everyone this. I've even like shown this video to people. Literally one of my favorite ever triathlon videos. Well, number one triathlon video ever is, I don't know if you've ever seen this Nick Chris Lietta like throwing rocks in the beach and then running underwater with rocks in Hawaii. Have you ever seen those videos?

No, I've never seen that. Oh dude, I'm like, he lives the dream life. He lives in Hawaii. That's like my favorite everyone. And then there's the classic Tim Don and Jan Ferdino day in a life of a pro track. Oh yeah, of course.

Of course I remember those. I know those so well. Pinnacle. But then the controlled burn. Wow, you even know it by name. I, bro, I probably, I probably am 20,000 of your views. Well, we don't even have 20,000 on it. Yeah, I know, I know, you have like 21,000, so it's like, you have a flop in terms of view.

But should we? I feel like we should. This is a great. Okay, we'll bring it up here. This is breaking news. This is breaking news. Literally, nobody knows this. I think I told Talbot, but.

Yeah, you told me. So we, there's this film festival in Telleride, Colorado called Mountain Film. and they have a shorts section, and I submitted controlled burn to it many, many months ago, and we found out that we were accepted in the film festival. So I'll be going there next week. There's a less than 1% chance that Eric comes, but he's very welcome to.

Telluride is like getting to the moon. Yes, it is very out of the way. So we'll be presenting, and I'll present the little short film before it, and our biggest fan Talbot Cox, you're welcome to join us to. Establish flu there at gum. Yeah. Right.

It is, we are so, so excited because, I mean, a lot of the films that are in there, I'm sure they, like, you know, flew to a place and, like,

had a budget and did a thing. I've been there a few times. It's legit. This is the real deal. And, like, not to say that our film is not, but, like, we got,

it was initially a thing for Lulu Lemon, and they said they just wanted a video, like basically telling our followers that they made run apparel now. And they gave me some money to put it on our YouTube channel. I used that money to fly Nick to Ben to film with me. And we like literally went out at like 5 p.m. and filmed for like an hour and a half. And meanwhile, Paula's texting us that like dinner's getting cold and what are we taking

so long on? And then we went out at like 7 a.m. the next morning and filmed for like another 30 minutes. Through this together in like five days of editing. And now it's in a film festival. it's spectacular. We're so stoked. And I think there's a good chance that might get into two other film festivals

if the rumors I'm hearing are correct. So we're very happy. And by the way, it's on YouTube. If you search Eric Loggerstrom controlled Byrne, it'll be the first one that comes up. We've got to add some laurels to that. Yeah, I have the laurels.

They send it in the original email. We just weren't allowed to tell anyone until May 3rd. So it's happening. There we go. Wow, that's actually incredible. So happy you like that, man. Yeah. There's some music.

Oh, yeah. You know, Eric chose that music. I had nothing to do with that. I've been saving that one for a while. I like have a little bank of audio for things. I'm like, oh, that's too good for a regular, for every week video. I've got to save that for something epic.

I feel like once every month or two, I get a photo from Talbot. He sends me a message, and it's him on the couch, and I see his feet and the TV. and controlled burn is playing on the TV. It's 20, this is what we were talking about a second ago, though, 23,000 views,

and I feel like that this is one of the most articulated, beautiful cinematic videos. Thank you, Salbot. Videos in the sport, but it's interesting. It's interesting. It's crazy. People were expecting me to pick up a camera and talk to it, and they're like, what is this?

Where's the data? Yeah, yeah. And that's the same thing. I was going to try to mimic my Kona series in St. George. So I put together like this full list and athlete schedules and everything for this series called Countdown to St. George. I work so hard on these videos. And to give everyone reference, I make my money, like my yearly salary from YouTube, from Lionel's YouTube. He just tells me, I'll just take 100% of it.

So it's like incredible. So the more views I get, the better it is for me. So I'm like, all right, I'm going to do this insane job on this series. I'm going to spend so much time. And it takes so much freaking work. So I launched the first one. It was Lionel's video. Then I did like a Sam Long one.

Ken and St. George. Cat Matthews and just everybody. These videos, I mean, you're shooting all day long and then you're editing to like 3 a.m. Yeah. And they got like not even a quarter. well, a quarter, they got like half of the amount of views that the race week videos get. And just to give you, like, probably a seven to eight hour edit with a full day of filming is what one of those videos takes. A race week series video takes about a total of four hours of freaking BS and with pro athletes hanging out and then literally dropping raw footage onto a timeline and doing nothing and then hitting export and uploading YouTube and everyone's like, this is so incredible.

And I'm like, yeah, it is. It hurts. Doesn't it? Doesn't it hurts? It really hurts. It hurts so much because I'm like, even Nick texts me. He's like, dude, you've really up your game on the editing. These videos are so good. And I'm like, yeah, I mean, that's not what the views say, but thanks. Yeah. Well, we will always appreciate the things that you put the effort into. That's for sure. And like, I tell Nick about that. And you're like, well, as long as I get a text from Nick and like these other five people who I know. appreciate more artistic stuff. I don't care what the view counts are as long as these people are like, dude, that was great. Like, okay. When DC Rainmaker commented on... I'm reading his comment. What he commented on controlled burn?

Oh my God. I was like starstruck. I thought it was the coolest thing. I know you need to go on and say one more thing. That leads me to one more. So we discussed this with Lionel and all this stuff. And I haven't told anyone this other than Lionel and I had talked about it. Oh, breaking news?

Breaking news. Wow, you're going to hear it here first. Good and bad news. I literally started my career with the Kona series, and the whole object and goal of the Kona series was to bring media to the sport of triathlon. And with the countdown to St. George, kind of being a flop,

also a lot of athletes all have their own media guys now, like Florian Arngard, like Ruth Assel, like everyone has their own media guy. and also the PTO was doing a massive amount of media Iron Man now is doing a massive amount of media so I chat with Lionel about it and I'm actually

retiring the Kona series there's not going to be a Kona series anymore dude but but but I was wondering about this yeah this was the this is the thing though is that the Kona series was not for the money it was I mean it was not for the money

it wasn't for the views. It was to just one goal was bring media to the sport. Just get the story out there. Just get the story out there. And now it's here. So why would I try to continue to be original and try to go up against Iron Man and go up against all these other athletes? Everyone is doing their thing now. And everything that I wanted the Kona series to do has been accomplished.

So there's no reason for me to now then now I would be taking away from the athletes' time and requiring them to do this and that. Back then it was beneficial, but now everyone has their own thing, so not mission accomplished man. No more. You did it. You affected change.

So that was the goal. If it ever became a money thing, then I would of course, would have wanted it to go on, but it's never, for me, it's just how can you see behind the scenes. We will do a race week series that is a lot easier. Does it require any of the time from the athletes? And it will

start seven days out and we will focus more on Lionel as well but no more Kona series I'm going to put it to rest I'm probably going to make a post about it soon but uh it's interesting like with all of that with all with all the athletes having their own YouTube channels and everything I do hope I don't know like in my brain I still kind of wish there was like it was centralized in a little bit of a way like it could maybe potentially be bigger versus like 40 athletes with 40 YouTube channels and every person every viewer has got to go like try to figure out which one are good and what's interesting versus, I don't know, like what the PTO is trying to do with, like, have it be a hub or something.

I don't know, it'll be really interesting to watch over the next few years. We'll chat about it more on another podcast. Sounds good, man. Yeah, I got to get to the airport. Yeah, we're literally driving straight to the airport from here. Sorry for a ratting on. That's great. We really appreciated your time.

Do you have anything that you want to send people to, point people to the Lionel YouTube channel or anything else? No. If you just, if you just, if you just, if you just, If you just go to YouTube and you type in professional triathlon and you just subscribe to every single pro athlete out there, support all the pro athletes. And also, too, give a lot of support to any time that Ironman gives the pro athletes credit, comment on that stuff. And most importantly, support the PTO because they are trying to bring media to the sport of triathlon. So if you could support those, it helps every single one of us. so well said amen thank you talbot we really appreciate what you've done for the sport what you continue to do for the sport

and your transparency with all this stuff is is really cool for most of us and i hope all the podcast listeners this week i know this was a very different episode we didn't have paula we didn't answer any questions but we thought talbot was the perfect first person to have as our guest he's like i said the CEO of youtube he's at the very least the CEO and founder of youtube triathlon yeah oh god can't take credit. Yeah, whenever we make a post on Instagram about this episode going live, if you could like maybe comment there and let us know if you like this format

and how much you loved this format would be great. Definitely. Definitely. Great. Well, thank you guys. We'll catch you next week. Hey, thanks to everyone. Later.