That Triathlon Life Podcast - Triathlon racing wheel depth, night sweats, power meter necessity, and more!

Episode Date: March 13, 2025

This week, Eric is in South America shooting a film, so Paula and Nick take on the challenge of a two-person episode. We kick things off with some current events, a round of Swim Sets with Paula, and a brand-new segment, How Hard Can It Be, before diving into your listener questions.This week, we discuss:Hot flashes unrelated to menopauseReducing sugar intake while still fueling trainingHow pros get their country’s flag at the finish lineUsing a trainer to prepare for a hilly raceThe role of technical race officialsRacing for one country while living in anotherIdeal wheel depth for racing and trainingCoordinating training with other athletesAdjusting training and racing with a newbornWhether a power meter is necessary for a first raceWearing Ironman apparel without having done oneA big thank you to our podcast supporters who keep the podcast alive! To submit a question for the podcast and to become a podcast supporter, head over to ThatTriathlonLife.com/podcast—————————Swim sets with Paula 400 choice8 x 25 (1 easy, 1 build to fast) on :304 x (150 FAST on short rest, 100 easy with :30 rest)200 ez kick/swim mix4 x (125 easy with :20 rest, 75 FAST on short rest)200 ez kick/swim mix100 cool down —————————40% off TTL Warehouse Sale(Tickets) Look For Things Where You Can Find Them | Official Trailer

Hello, everyone. Welcome to That Triathlon Life podcast. I am Paula Finley. I'm Eric Loggerstrom. No, you're not. Eric's not here this week. Oh, no. This is our first time doing the podcast with just the two of us. That's right. Do you think it's going to be awkward? I think it's going to be awesome, but I'm still going to miss Sweetie. I mean, we all bring in very special dynamic to this, and his is, it's intangible. I can't even describe it. It's true. It's true. We will manage. And I do. think that putting one out with just the two of us, Nick, is better than not at all. Oh, for sure. Just the girls this week. No, it's makes it more stressful for me is I can't just

like dink around on my phone for a couple minutes while you guys carry the conversation. I got to be 100% engaged, 100% of the time. That's right. I'm so sorry. It's okay. It's okay. It's probably good for me. Yeah. Okay, so who are you? Who am I? What are we doing here? Oh, yeah. I have to intro it too. That's also Eric's job usually. Right. Okay. Me and Eric, who is away. We are both professional triathletes. Eric is also a filmmaker, adventure runner, adventure biker, and he's down in Patagonia, Chile right now with Ian Boswell and a big group of people for a big ride. I think he should tell everyone more about it when he gets back because I don't think I could do it justice explaining what exactly he's doing since I don't know, but he's making a film about it. So he's tired,

he's not getting a ton of sleep. He had nightmare travel to get there, but he made it. And I'm just kind of sporadically following his fine friends when he has service to make sure he's still moving. That's good. I haven't been checking on him, actually. I just assume he didn't have service. No, he's had service like at least every evening. So that's been good to know he's alive. Nick here, my co-host.

Yep. I guess are we both co-hosts of each other? We're all co-hosts, yeah, we're all co-host. You're a professional musician, amateur triathlete, and if you're new, here, welcome. Thank you, everyone. This is not normal. This is not normal. Normally, there's three of us, but we're going to make it fun. We're going to make a real fun today. So speaking of fun, you did a four-hour trainer ride yesterday, didn't you? Speaking of fun, yeah. I don't know. I was kind of into it. I was like, I'm going to do three to four hours, and after two hours, I had a

quick phone call that I was excited about, and then I just had another two hours. So I don't You also called me in the middle there. That's not the phone call you're referring to. No, I called you to tell you about the phone call that I had. Yeah, yeah, right. So, yeah, I had about a 20-minute break in the middle. But it really broke it up nicely, and I just took the first hour super chill, got one on my phone, cut up on messages.

And then before I knew it, it was over. Actually, what I was watching is the Zwift Academy. There's a, on GCN. Does anyone know about this? It's like they transform and informant based. John Zwift data and power numbers to come and try out for Canyon Stram for the women. And what's the men's team? I don't remember.

I only know Canyon Stram because I'm more invested in the women's team for whatever reason. I don't know why I am too. But they chose one cyclist at the end of this to be a member of their pro tour teams after doing a bunch of power tests and technical tests and really, really cool series. So if you want to go on YouTube and watch that, I would recommend it, especially while you're on the trainer. Yeah, and I was also this week was watching the Straday Bianca race in Italy. Did you follow that at all? I did, yeah.

Pretty epic. Pretty epic. I mean, Tade once again, I mean, I don't know if we want to spoil it for people, but Tade raced, and he was the favorite for the race. And he was off the front with a group and then crashed pretty badly if you watch the footage. It's like a pretty wild crash. And then still managed to pull out the wind, solo effort at the front, finishing in glory. And Demi-Vollering on the women's side. Yeah. Really

cool. That's the news because Eric's not here. Yes, sweetie. I didn't want to call it the news, but that's just what we've been excited about this week. Yeah. Okay, so normally we play a little game, and we are going to get to that, but Paula, since it's just you this week, you told me that you might have something special for the swim aficionados out there this week. Yeah, I figured it would be a good

week to do a swim sets with Paula. Sets with Paula. I can't actually take credit for this set. It's every Saturday I swim with a good fast group of people and usually I mean our dear friend Jamie used to bring the set but he moved away so now kind of rotates but we did

a pretty fun set this Saturday so I'm going to share it with you guys and hopefully you can find it fun as well. It starts with the warm up is just you can kind of warm up as you choose but my suggestion is a 400 choice followed by 825s one easy one build to fast. So that'll

wake up your body a little bit. It's just a 600 pretty short. You can kind of mimic that warm up actually in open water if you ever get to warm up for a triathlon. It's kind of a good activation set. The main set is basically the pattern goes 150 and then 100. You do that four times through. And the 100 is always easy. 150 is always fast.

So put the 150 on a pretty tight pace time. Like for example, if you're swimming 25 meter pool, you can do it on two minutes or 210, I don't know, whatever would allow you to get maybe five seconds rest. Oh, fine. And then the 100 is really easy. You can put it on enough to get maybe 20 seconds rest. Okay. So that's 1,000 meters. Take a 200 kick, real chill, kick, pull, mix it, mix it up, recover for the next set.

the next round goes 125 and a 75 four times through. The 125 is always easy and the 75 is fast. So again, put the 125 on something easy where you get 20 seconds rest and then the 75, maybe you do it on a minute or challenge yourself so you're just touching and going.

So the first time through, the 150 is the hard one, but the second time through the shorter interval is the hard one. Exactly. Okay, got it. And then, so that four times through that is an 800, 200 easy kick, 100 cool down. That's a 3K workout. So when you do a 200 easy kick, I don't know if I've ever done that. How shot are your legs after that?

Oh, they should not be shot. This should be like lose social kicking. I mean, if you didn't grow up swimming or you don't swim a lot, that might be too much. And you can just mix it up with swimming. but I actually love doing kick for recovery because your heads above water, you can breathe, there's all the oxygen. It's really nice to flush out your legs that way. And, yeah, 200 might be overkill if you're not a...

I just noticed that like my hips get like really fatigued after 100 kick already. That's kind of normal. You could do 50 kick, 50 swim or whatever. The point of that 200 is to recover for the next set. Do you think there's value to a triathlete to be able to... to strengthen their kick enough so that they can do a 200 kick? Or is that something that's not as relevant for us? I think that as a baseline you should be able to do at least a 200 kick without going into severe hip cramps.

Okay, yeah. Not me, of course. Yeah. But of course, it's not necessary in order to complete a triathlon. It's just a kind of like a skill you should just do. But a lot of really fast swimmers are not great kickers and vice versa. Some really good kickers are not great swimmers. So there's no real correlation.

but I just think it's a good, mostly recovery tool to kick and, like, loosen your legs up. And if I do a set in the morning that has some kick, I usually feel better afterwards and ready to bike or run for the day. Yeah, okay, fair. I, yeah. Great. Well, thank you for that, Paula. You're welcome. If anyone does it, make sure you tag that triathlon on life.

On Strava. Yeah, on Strava. People do that. If you do. Quite fun, yeah. Yeah. Cool. And I have a little game for us.

Well, it's not for us. It's for you, Paula. Just me. It's just you. And it's based on a submission from a listener, but I modified it slightly. And it's going to be a new game. I don't know how many times we're going to do it, but I liked it for this. And the game is going to be called How Hard Can It Be?

Are you making a jingle? Yes, of course. Okay, so there's five things here. And the question here is going to be, how long do you think it would take for you to learn to do this thing or could you ever do it? Okay? So the first one is how much work do you think it would take for you to ride a unicycle, a kilometer without putting a foot down? Like in days or hours or? I don't know. Is it going to take days? Is it going to take hours? Could it take months? Could it take years? It's so hard to know without like initially trying it, you know? Eric and I forget who else were

so confident that they could do this. And I was no. nowhere near as confident as them. I think for me it would take me like at least a week or two of like, have you played this game with Eric already? No, no, no, but we were talking about unicycling because Eric unicycled when he was a kid and I kind of got into it very lightly as well. Yeah, my gut instinct is Eric would get it in 10 minutes. Yeah, right. And I would take, I honestly don't even know if it would be possible for me to do it. Right. Okay. That's fair. If I dedicated myself to it, yeah, maybe a month. Yeah, right. I mean, so that's the answer, a month. I would say a month. What about winning a round of jeopardy?

Oh. I'm so bad at the trivia stuff. There's no chance. There's no chance. An infinite amount of years, I'm never going to accrue that amount of knowledge. It's a little bit of a, you've got to start when you're young. It's almost like swimming. You have to be an encyclopedia for random facts and very aware of the news and past events. and history.

I also think it's a little bit skewed towards being American. I think as a Canadian, it might be harder. Yeah. Or an Italian, right? So never. I agree.

Never. That would never be able to win around. Okay, what about returning a tennis serve? And let's say a first serve from Carlos Al-Carras, who is currently world number three. Returning a tennis serve from him? From one of the top pros?

I mean, I mean, impossible. Just beyond impossible. I would say maybe if you had a thousand serves at you, you get lucky once and the ball bounces in for me. So just because you think it's impossible because he's serving it so hard? Yeah, serving it so hard. Okay. If you think it's impossible, I guess it's impossible for me too. Well, did you play tennis at all growing up?

No. No. I played a little bit, but it was never very good. And I have a couple of friends who are tennis players, and they were telling me that they who played in college could never return a first serve. So I think for us that's impossible. I'm going off of the questions from the listener submitted questions here. But how about eat a full rack of beef ribs in one sitting? Okay, there's something I can do.

And it's about 3,500 calories. I could do that right now during the podcast and not break a sweat. There's no doubt I could do that. Yeah, anything eating related? Bring it on. Bring it on. And what about Block a soccer penalty kick from a champion high school player? as a goalie.

As a goalie, yeah. No, I did play soccer, but I was never a goalie. I think those, I mean, if you're talking about like a top high schooler, I'm sure they are extremely good. Yep. But I think blocking one goal, yeah. I think, you know, after in a hundred shots, I could block one of them. Yeah, in a hundred, I think I could block one. Just based on luck alone, I agree, I agree, I agree.

I agree. I agree. Nice. Well, that was how hard can it be? Just a little warm up for our minds here. Since Sweetie's not here, we need all the help we can get. Okay, so before we start going into the questions from the listeners, of which there are so many this week, so thank you to everyone who contributed to those.

I just want to let everybody know about a fun thing we are doing this week. We are considering moving our current TTL warehouse to bend, where we'll have a little bit more control and support a local business here and just be able to... Yeah, if someone asks to like, can you sign a hat for me before this sends out? Yeah, we can do that or whatever it is. It's nice to keep it closer to home right now or our shipping facilities in Utah. They've been amazing, but I think it's just time to bring it closer to home. So we are having a warehouse sale, 40% off, everything on our website with the hopes of getting through as much of the inventory that we have in Utah right now before we come out with new collections that will bring straight to bend. for us to ship here. So mugs, hats, travel mugs, T-shirts, swim caps,

whatever's on the site right now is discounted. And if you've ever wanted something, maybe it's like cost prohibitive, then now's the time to go get it. There's still some really nice stuff up there. And even if you want to get stuff maybe for someone for a birthday or Christmas is a little far away. Oh, Christmas. Sure, yeah.

This is a 365 days of year Christmas store. So why not do Christmas? us now. I will say the coffee mugs and the cappuccino mugs are super nice. They've lasted us years now. Yeah. And they're made in Italy and the paint on them is like in the enamel. So it's, they're really, really good quality. So anyway, just a thought. I wanted to let everyone know about that. And we do have the TTL trail collection coming soon, which is being printed and bend and then shipped from Ben. That is so cool. Kind of changing things up here, how we operate. It was Eric's idea. Yeah. I prefer to just keep things simple and status quo, but Eric likes to make things better. Special and unique and limited run and this artist and this coffee company over here. Maybe this will be a little harder, a little more work, a little more logistically challenging, but it'll be better. So that's what's happening. Sweet. And then also as far as tickets for the film, so we dropped the trailer on Friday for Look for Things.

you can find them, the film that Eric and I are making. And that was to also announce sales of the tickets. We are almost sold out of tickets. So I don't know if by the time the podcast comes out on Thursday if there will be any tickets left, but you can go to the YouTube link of the trailer and there's a link right there to the tickets. If you want to go, you have to get tickets now because we are not going to be selling any there other than some at the Castelli booth, but I think those will go extremely quickly as well. We will not have any tickets at the door. They will be sold out by then.

So if you want to come and we would love to see you there, make sure you get the tickets now. Are we ready for questions, Paula? No, I'm ready. Let's do it. You can submit a question for the podcast at ThattriathlonLife.com slash podcast. We got a lot of really good questions this week. and we are going to go through as many of them as we can. I think we're just going to be a little quick with them this week.

Because we got so many. Because we got so many. Usually we pick a podcast supporter winner, but we don't have Eric to do the random number thing, and he has the access to all the data. So we're actually going to skip it this week. But thank you so much to all our podcast supporters. It's the only way this podcast makes any money right now.

So we really, really appreciate that. On to the questions here. First one is from Alexa. this is mostly for Paula, but maybe guys deal with this too. I'm 30 years old, so clearly not in premenopause. I'm training for my first full Ironman, and I've been noticing I'm waking up with hot flashes in the morning. I wake up to an alarm, sleep in a cold room,

60 to 65 degrees, and sleep soundly. Any experience with this trying to figure out if it's training-induced or just a part of being in my 30s now, figured I'd crowdsource before talking with my doc, the actual expert about it, Alexa. Paula, has this ever happened to you? Yeah, it's interesting. First of all, disclaimer, we are not medical experts at all, and I feel very unqualified to answer this.

But from personal experience, I do get night sweats, I guess. I don't know if I'd call it a hot flash because I don't feel hot when this is happening. But throughout the night, the night before a race, I'll wake up in wet bed sheets, like total sweat. And it happens to Eric, too. And it happens to me too, by the way. So I don't know if that's just a neurological response or your body is getting ready for this thing and it knows it and the nerves just I don't know. But I always make sure the night before a race that I have a full bottle of electrolyte beside my bed because I'm thinking if I'm sweating this much, I'm actually losing a lot of liquid and fluid, which I need for the race. So every time I wake up in this nervous sweat, I'll chug half a bottle of water.

and then pee, and I don't know, the night before a race is awful, but it never happens to me on a regular basis just on a normal night. So perhaps this is something that you should go to your doctor for. It's probably not something to be hugely concerned about, but I think Nick did a bit of research if you're maybe new to training or it's a hormonal imbalance or something, then that could trigger something like this, right, Nick? Yeah, especially if it's your first full. There's just like, hormonal shifts and your body is adjusting to this thing. So I read a few things that it could be.

They all seem safe. But like Paula said, always better to talk to a doctor about it if you can. And these days it seems like most health insurance companies allow you to talk to a doctor kind of like for free online before actually going to an appointment with someone. It might be worth it to try to do that first. Yeah, that's a good idea. Wow, we fired through that one so quick. No problem.

Easy. Without Eric. Wow. Okay. Next question here is from Nika. Hi, TTLs. This is for all of you, but especially Nick, as he was on sugar ban. Paul had texted me about this question yesterday. Sugar ban in the beginning of the year. I am preparing for my half-distance triathlon, and in general, I do a lot of trail running. General things which require regular fueling. At the same time, I want to do a sugar fast. How to combine avoiding sugar and long sessions. Did you include gel, and isotonic drinks into your sugar fast.

Any ideas on convenient substitutes which do not take a lot of space time to prepare. Thanks and keep rocking, Nika. So, Paula, have you ever done a sugar fast? No, and the reason I was laughing is I don't think you've done one either. Excuse you, first of all. How dare you? It's like, Nick, how long did your sugar ban last?

One day, one hour? It was about, you know, the fires happened. I was emotional, so I needed my sugar. It was probably about two and a half weeks. I did it full, but I didn't do it full. So that's the thing, Nika, you're right. I did include, I ate as much sugar as I wanted if I was mid-training. Or at a coffee shop.

No, no, I did not do that. Although when I was in bed, I caved, of course. But, no, like on a four-hour ride, I'm taking gels or stopping in a coffee shop and getting a croissant 100%. It was outside of training. I was not doing sugar. Everyone listening's like, how much sugar does he eat? Too much, okay? That was the point of the sugar ban.

And since the ban was lifted, February 1st, I am self-imposed. I have eaten, I've been eating a lot less sugar outside of training. So I think it helped me a little bit detox from it. So is his name Carlos? Nika. Nika is saying that he wants to do a shixtap. sugar fast. Yeah.

And also then not eat sugar while he's training. Yeah, I don't know about that. So he's asking for substitutes. Yeah. Because I think that there's a way where you could get carbohydrates, but not eat a sugary gel. For example, these like rice bars or something. The rice bars is exactly what I was thinking of too.

But they usually have sugar in them, don't they? There's this book called The Feeds of. I think Alan Lim wrote it or someone from scratch. And you can basically make these rice patties out of Jasmine rice or whatever kind of rice you have in your rice cooker and bind it together with, yeah, you probably have to use like honey or peanut butter or something. So yes, it does have sugar.

But there's ways to use natural sugar like that to make things at home. But that's time consuming. You said you're trying to do a not time consuming thing. You can have a Rice Krispies treat. it's not quite the same. Yeah, but like Nick said about, he was trying to limit sugar, but not during training.

I think that's a smart approach because your body does need sugar and carbohydrate when you're training to fuel itself. It's like the primary fuel while you're exercising. So it's healthy. I mean, none of this is healthy. Exercising the amount we all exercise to require gels and shit is not healthy.

But for performance reasons, it's essential. So perhaps you approach your sugar fast by doing what Nick did and cut out sugar. outside of your training hours, especially if the exercise is longer than an hour. Oh, yeah. I think you could get through a run, a swim, an hour bike ride without anything, but anything longer than that or with intensity, I think you're better off having a bit of wiggle room

in your rules. We don't metabolize sugar the same during exercise and outside of exercise. That was my rationale for allowing it to happen during exercise. So yeah, Nika, eat all the sugar you want during training. actually really lean into it. Okay, next question here is from Johan or Johan. Hi, Penf, and unfortunately, it's just going to be, pymph. Quick question, when the pros are running in for the win and they have their country flag,

do they have a box of flags ready for them, or have they just stolen some poor guy's flag close to the finish, Johan? Have you ever done this, Paula? Have you ever, like, ran down the finishing shoot with the Canadian flag in your entire triathlon career? only one time I did and there's no organized system of like a box of flags waiting there for the winner to grab one but if you are at a very busy finish line shoot and someone from your country has a flag and they pass it to you that's how you get the flags so at a world championship or a big big event oftentimes there will be fans whether it's like your own family or someone from your country that has a flag and then you can grab it it's definitely not

mandatory by any means, but it's fun if there happens to be one. And especially if the race is a world championship and you're sort of representing your country and the Olympics, stuff like that. So the only time I've ever done it was my first World Cup win, actually. It was in 2010 in Monterey, Mexico. And someone had a Canadian flag and it's just kind of instinctual. I grabbed it and I still have a picture of in that race. Oh, man. Way back in the the day. We got to put that up somewhere. Do you think you could find it? Yeah, I could probably find it. I'll just Google Paula Finley, Monterey, Mexico. I'm serious. Sometimes that works. Of course it works. I still know who took it. Paul Phillips took this picture. There it is. I see it.

Can I see? Oh, yeah. I love it. That's awesome. That's awesome. Fun, hey? Yeah, that's fun. I'll send that to you, Nick. I mean, or anyone could just Google Paula Finley, Monterey, Monary Mexico World Cup It'll pop right up Yeah That's fun I think I've seen Non-winners do that

Is that okay? Is that in poor taste? That's fine Okay Like I've seen people like Like whatever Ninth place in Kona Going down with the

Whatever Argentinian flag or whatever That's totally fine If you're really proud To represent your country Which you should be Right It is completely fine

If you're an amateur athlete And you're crossing the line at your first race or any race. Okay, great. Next question here from Kathleen. Hi, guys. I have a question about bike training. I live in a northern Chicago suburb, which is pancake flat,

and I'm currently training for Ironman, Wisconsin. Let's go, Kathleen. Let's go. My question is, what is your advice on training for a hilly bike course when you don't have easy access to hilly roads in training? Does climbing hills on the trainer translate to a hilly race course? Thank you for everything you guys do with the podcast. I really love the authenticity with how you represent triathlon in all of your content.

And I always look forward to listening to your episodes in my own training. Good luck with all your own races this season, Kathleen. Nice. I feel like we've answered this before, but it doesn't hurt to revisit it. I feel like we've answered what are ways that you can train for hills when you live in a flat area. But I don't know if we've answered how well does a trainer mimic that physiological stimulus. Right. Well, the nice thing now is that Zwift is so realistic in some ways. Totally.

And that the resistance in the Zwift world goes to your trainer. So if there's a climb on Zwift, your trainer is actually providing enough resistance to mimic whatever grade the climb is. So it is very possible to do even like hill reps on Zwift without going outside. And if you don't have access to Zwift or a smart trainer, doing big gear reps, just making your legs kind of strong and resilient. As you're going uphill, your cadence will likely be lower. You'll have this feeling like you want to stand up out of the saddle sometimes, potentially. So it's really a leg strength thing, and you can definitely train that indoors. Or even on flat road doing big gear work on a flat road.

like you can just put your bike in a very high gear so that you're kind of over-torking it. And that is kind of just all developing your muscles so that you can be a good climber. It's not an exact replica, but it's way better than nothing. How low the cadence do you think you should shoot for for big gear work? Oh, I don't know, like 60 to 70 RPM maybe for big gear. When I had a coach, he was saying 50 to 60. I don't know if that's exaggeratedly low. Yeah, 50 is really low.

I don't know. I don't necessarily think it's like the lower the better. Right. But it's like a strength endurance kind of thing. That's the idea, right? Yeah. In fact, your heart rate might actually be lower than normal, but your muscular fatigue will be higher. Right. And then when you're on Zwift and you hit a hill, do you find yourself coming out of the aerobars and like sitting up? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, sure. Is that a natural thing or is that an intentional thing? It's natural. I don't think about it. Maybe because, I'm just so used to riding Zwift now for the last eight years or whatever it's been. But it does have like a real road feel where the resistance increases.

And yeah, if it's not too steep of a climb, like a 3% or 4% I can stay in the bars and just shift. But if it turns into Alpda Zwift or something, yeah, you're standing up and different pitches going around switchbacks. It changes the resistance based on the steepness. So sometimes you're like up out of the saddle, getting up. but a 10% grade type of thing. Oh, wow. That's quite a bit. Yeah.

Cool. Okay, well, there you go. Kathleen, oh my gosh. I really, really hope to see you at Iron Man, Wisconsin. Make sure you reach out. I'd love to say hi. Next one is from Mike. Dear Eric, Paula, Nick, and Flynn.

Sorry, Eric's not here, of course. Warmest wishes from our eight-legged household. Suzanne's spouse, hooty sprinter chihuahua. I don't know. I don't know what a sprinter. Chihuahua is, but that sounds terrifying. And I have been a long-term viewer of the videos and listener of the podcast. I'm a former triathlete turned technical official. We met professionally in Sarasota, 2018-ish, swim-canceled. There's question marks after both of those. And Beijing, 2019,

question mark. Paula Hurt. You and Mario Mola turned another athlete back to T2, no run number. Does this bring a bell at all, Paula? I don't think I race in Beijing. Maybe I raced in Beijing in 2019, yeah. Anyway, I know you both aren't big fans of technical officials, so I'll ask a couple of quick questions. One, would you ever consider becoming a technical official for USAT, Triathlon, Canada, or World Triathlon? Let's start there. Paula, would you ever do that? Yeah, I guess I'm as an athlete, very unclear of the role of a technical official, which, I think maybe athletes should be better educated about what the technical officials do.

Well, do they not just enforce the rules? Just because they are such an important part of the race. Yes, enforcing the rules. They're the ones giving the pre-race briefings. They're walking it on the pontoon before us. So really prevalent people when you go to a world triathlon event. But maybe as an athlete that's so focused on what you're doing there, and your own performance,

you're not thinking about everything that goes into making the event possible. Right, of course. And I think when I first started to appreciate the technical officials was when my mom was the race director for the World Triathlon event in Edmonton and watching the whole hoop delo of how that requires a full year and a whole team of people to organize. So that's when I became more aware of each role and people flying in. And of course, as an athlete that raced on the circuit for decades,

I started to get to know the technical officials, especially the ones from Canada. So I don't know if I would ever do that. I think I'd be more interested in something like coaching if I was going to stay in the sport in that capacity. But it is a really important and interesting job. And then the second thing here was, what one thing would you suggest to make technical officials more adept in their trade?

Love what you do for the triathlon community. so your honest feedback is appreciated. I look forward to listening to your thoughts. It makes my commute home from my instructional design job much more pleasant. That's what I'm confused about is our technical officials, is that their full-time job? It seems like for Mike it's not. No, I don't think it is. Is it a volunteer role?

Is it a paid role? I can't. Or is it strictly a volunteer? I had some USAT refs answered this question, but it's been like a year. I think some of them are volunteer and some of them are paid, but none of them are paid very well. So I think they all have other jobs, if I remember correctly. Yeah, I don't know. I've never had a bad experience with the technical official. Well, you got that penalty in Vegas, and that felt from my point.

Yeah, but is a ref on a motorbike, a technical official? Oh, I see. I thought that was, I thought technical official was like a catch-all term. See, I am so, this is what I mean. I've been racing triathlon for 20 years. And I'm not clear on what a technical official does. That's crazy. Right. Like, we all have to do, I'm trying to say like less, by the way.

So every time I say it now, I catch myself. I'm going to be a shot collar. You, bz. Yeah, you should just buzz me every time I say like. I think it's great that we all as athletes have to do an online anti-doping seminar every single year before the year starts if you're in the registered testing pool. I think there should be something like that for just. teaching about the sport and what a technical official does. And I think in general, especially for the younger athletes,

just enhances your appreciation for everything that goes in to putting an event on. Because as an athlete, you jump into South Korea or China or Italy or Australia, do a race and fly home, but you don't even realize how much work went into putting that race on and closing roads and having people there to officiate and n-a-na-na-n-n-n-n. So it's, I think, I don't know, it took me a lot of years to appreciate all of these things. So maybe there should be a little course for juniors or something. Well, I'm not really curious when you said that you have to do the anti-doping seminar that all of you do, all the pros.

I'm just trying to think of what could be in that seminar other than, hey, don't. Like, what are they trying to teach you there? Other than the obvious of doping is cheating, don't do it. Oh, there's so many things. Like the, I said like again. The process of being drug tested. Are you a lot of chaperone? Oh, I see.

These types of things. What is considered an offense if is like mistests, all these things. There's so many layers and just don't take drugs. Yeah. So most of it is the reality of what the drug testing entails and what the consequences of. are they're not trying to, it's not like putting a smoker's long on a pack of cigarettes where they're like, this is what's going to happen if you smoke.

They're like, they're just, they're letting you do whatever you do. But this is the reality of how you'll be tested and the consequences of if you get caught. Yeah, the course takes hours. Wow. It's crazy. As someone who's been in the registered testing pool for 15 years, I find it a bit tedious to have to do it every year. But it's not a bad thing.

Yeah. Okay. Cool. Okay. next question here. Hey, TTL fam. Thanks for changing my life and rekindling my love for triathlon. Oh, dang. That's nice. My question is about athletes who compete for their home country when they live in another. Paula, since this is relevant, I'm curious if there are special things you need to do to be able to compete for Canada while living in the U.S. When I've looked at Triathlon Canada eligibility

for age group world championships, it says you have to be a member of a provincial governing body, but it seems like most provinces require you to be a resident of that providence. I live in California now, but if I ever get back to being fit and fast enough, would want to continue to compete for Canada at age group worlds, not the U.S., sorry Nick and Eric. So this made me curious about what, if anything, pros have to do to declare which country they race for. Thank you so much for considering my question. Yeah, this has never been a problem for me.

I, as an person who has a Canadian passport and grew up in Canada, I couldn't race for the U.S. even if I want it to, which I don't. But I think if you hold a Canadian passport, you're definitely eligible to race as a Canadian at a world championship. And there are some loopholes like you're saying about the provincial membership. And I do actually run into this problem because I need to get a, triathlon Canada elite license. And in order to do that, Anita,

trathlon Alberta license. There's a lot of layers, but I can use my parents' address in Edmonton for that. And I don't know if that's allowed. I might get in trouble for this. But 100% I'm allowed to race for Canada. And it's all I want to do. So I'm down here on an athlete visa.

I'm by no means American or, you know, wanting to race for the U.S. What this makes me think of and presents a completely different set of circumstances is qualifying for an Olympic team of a country that you don't live in because there's only certain amount of spots available usually. Whereas when you're competing as an age group or a world, I don't think that's the case. You qualify based on your time and then you can, you know, they can be as many people from a certain country as possible.

Is that correct? Yeah, I would reach out to, I, either Trathlon Alberta or Trath on Canada about this. I'm sure you're not the only one that runs into this problem. I'm a Canadian citizen. I want to race for Canada at Worlds. I want to pay all the entry fees, which they ultimately want. But I have an address in San Francisco where I relive. So there's got to be a way around it. But even for the Olympics, Nick, if you're not living in the country, you can still race for that country. I remember reading about this. There's quite a few criteria that have to be met. You are, you know, if I wanted to, for example, race for Italy, I would have to do certain things to be able to do that.

I can't just decide. Are you talking about as an age group? No, I mean for the Olympics. You know, obviously I'm not going to the Olympics, but I'm just saying, you're right. Like, there are many strict criteria for the Olympics for you to be able to race for another country. But you have an Italian passport. Yeah, but I, yeah, but there's something about living there for a certain amount of time or being born there. I don't remember the details.

But I haven't tied a passport, so maybe it's easy for me. But like, I don't know, for Eric to race for whatever his Viking heritage is, you know, I'm certain. Oh, 100% not. Yeah, it's much more strict. But for me, there's no other country I could represent other than Canada. Right. I have no roots in the U.S. I have no ancestors from here.

Right. Right. Okay, next question here is from David. I have a question on race wheels for my T-T bike. I'm looking to get a wheel set but have no idea what the best. depth of wheel combination to get is. I'm told that if it's windy to avoid using certain depth wheels, but a disc wheel is still fine unless it's super windy, which adds more confusion. I'll be using them mainly on undulating or flat courses, nothing hilly if that helps.

What depth wheels do most of the pros race on? Do you tend to take multiple sets and choose on the day depending on the conditions and course, or is there a golden depth? Many thanks for your help, and all the best with the race and the film at Oceanside, David. So do you bring multiple wheels to a race? Do you guys bring multiple wheels with multiple depths for this purpose to erase? I do actually for the front, multiple options for the front. Is he talking about a race specific setup? I think these days, the age groupers that I know do not differentiate other than the disc on the back. But I feel like most people run the same front wheel and then have a deep section rear wheel that they swap out for a race if they feel like it's a good race for a disc wheel. Yeah, you could get away with just owning three wheels total.

So say you're buying zip, a 454 front, a 454 rear. You can train on that set. And then you have a disc to swap out the back when you do a race. Yeah. I train on 454s, and I also often race on a 454 front and a disc rear. I think there's no race where a disc is not the absolute best option unless you're in Conan, you're not allowed to use a disc. Always faster, barely heavier. It doesn't change the handling that much. It's always the best option. The front is where wind conditions and hills,

et cetera, could change your preference. And for me, the 858 is the faster, more aerodynamic wheel, but I do feel the wind quite a lot more, the crosswind when I'm riding an 858. So in a race that has gusts or is going to be really windy, I'll go with a 454 front based on my bike handling ability and my comfort. If I have a 454, I'm super comfortable with it. I know how it rides. Switching to an 858 can make me nervous. But on a course like Daytona or Miami where it's a very flat speedway and all that matters is aerodynamics, the 858's better. So if this person just wants to buy one wheel depth, the 4-5-4 is the go-to-s safest, very fast, but kind of universal choice. The NSW-454s are variable depth, and they're 53 and 58.

Because they got the squiggly design. The squiggly squigs. So that's around, that's what the depth that Paula is talking about here, which seems to be, I mean, Paula does great in races. If it works for her, it works. Yeah, what I've heard is like the 8-5-8 is, it's faster, but if it means you're going to get nervous and sit up in the wind or something, that's never faster. Yep.

But, I mean, the heavier you are also, the less you'll be impacted by that. So some of the bigger guys might be more comfortable on a wider front. But they don't get any wider than 8-5-8. That's the widest. Yep. Cool. Okay. Next question here is from Cassidy.

We are just rifling through these. Hi, all, I was wondering how you go about training with others and groups. I struggle with wanting to do more runs and rides with friends or local groups, but it may not match my training plan and prescribed workout for the day. Seeing Paula and Tucson running with others made me wonder how they all coordinate that. Do you pick what are your workouts to follow for the session? Do you talk to your coach about it beforehand? Curious how you go about it and would also love Nick's thoughts as an age trooper.

Thanks for all you do, Cassidy. So I feel like as an age trooper, it's not that. I mean, I often find people who are willing to do whatever I want. But as a pro, I would imagine you're all being hyper-specific with your training. How do you manage that? Yeah, I am definitely an athlete that's on the side of I'm willing to switch my workout structure a little bit in order to train with someone who has a similar session. Because I know I'll get much more out of myself and enjoy it more if I'm training with someone else. else. So I really took advantage of that in Tucson where there were a lot of other pros and

maybe we'd all show up to the pool and someone would have a different swim set than what I was supposed to do. But it is similar and its overall goal in terms of like VOT or threshold. The actual structure didn't really matter to me too much. So I would much rather swim with some other people than do what I have prescribed on paper. That's just me. Some other pros are very like stick exactly to their plan. But the other nice thing about Tucson is we were staying with Heather Jackson and there were some other athletes in town who aren't really training under a coached program. So they're either coaching themselves or in a little bit of a phase where they're trying to decide what to do next. So they are very flexible to do what I had to do, which was really nice. I felt very spoiled to have

Heather and Sophie Lynn and a few other people that were just kind of down for anything. And so I would bring my sessions to the table and they'd say, yeah, we're in, let's go. And they would do it with me. So that was a really unique situation, but I found it extremely enjoyable and fun to have their company. That is the ideal, isn't it, when you can do that? The ideal is when other people are conforming to your work. Well, of course, of course, which is the position I'm usually in and I feel grateful for it. Yeah, but I do feel like being a little bit mentally flexible or talking to your coach beforehand

so that they can reassure you that it's okay to divert a little bit from what is written on paper in the name of training with someone else who is a really good athlete or who motivates you or just when I'm on the bike path running with Sophie and Heather, like I'm pushing harder than I would on my own or I'm not thinking as much about how much time I have left. It's a completely different mindset to me and kind of a unique one that I'm not used to.

I haven't trained with people for a long time. So it was definitely worth it for me to potentially change my training a little bit in order to have that aspect. And I was just thinking about being an age grouper and being, I think there's, it's really fun to follow a very specific plan for me. I like going out and warming up at this pace and then doing, you know, I just did now. I did five times 10 minutes at this very specific pace and then two minutes recovery at this other specific pace. And it keeps my mind busy with the thing. And I think it's easy for us as age rupers to think, oh, I'm getting such a specific physiological benefit from doing this thing. But for the most part, I think if you're doing one day of intense running versus a different day of intense running, if it's someone else's plan, if you're like, oh, this is working my V-O-2, not my threshold.

I think it just let go of that and go out and do the session with a person. It's going to provide such a similar benefit and you're doing something with someone else. It's social. It's fun. Like, this is not, we are not at the tippy, tippy, tippy top of our potential in fitness where we're trying to squeeze out every last drop. It's really about going out there and just doing a hard session, whatever it is. Yeah, that's where it can be a little bit different for pros because there is that degree of what's the point of a coach if you're not. not going to follow what they're saying. Specificity, yeah, right. But what I'm saying is that

with communication with your coach, that's okay sometimes. Yeah, cool. Okay, next question here is from Alex, from Ottawa. Hi, Paula, Eric, Nick and Flynn. I discovered your pod last year as I was preparing for my first sprint triathlon, and I've been hooked since. Listening to the pod and watching the YouTube show has been truly inspiring to me. I loved following Paula at all the T-100 races while on my trainer rides. That's awesome. My wife and I are expecting our first child in June. Oh my God. Beautiful. Given the timing is right around triathlon season in Ottawa, I've decided not to sign up for any races this year. My question may be more suited for Nick, but I'd appreciate advice from everyone.

How can I stay motivated to progress with less time on my hands to train and without a race booked on the calendar? I was debating on signing up for a different challenge like a half marathon as training for one sport, less time consuming than three. alternatively, I could use this time to get stronger and improve my base for next year. Really long off season. Last option is the Timbitt's T-100 challenge mentioned in the pod. Very nice. Yes, that's worth training for. And then one more question.

Baby name for us. How about Tim, short for a Timbit? That would be nice, especially if he's Canadian. Baby name? I don't know. I love the name Flynn. If I was going to have a baby, I might name it Flynn as well. Sweet Flynn.

Thank you, Alex from Ottawa. So, first of all... So she's pregnant now. She's having a baby in June. Of course she's not going to sign up for any trathons. That'd be insane. It's a man. My wife and I are expecting our first child.

Oh, so he's not the pregnant one. Okay. Okay. That changes things. Yeah. Sign up for a full trathlon season, bro. I mean, I have a friend right now who just had a kid and is training for this race where he has to do two weeks in Europe, where every day is a double century and a lot of it is on gravel.

So, I don't know, people do all kinds of stuff with newborns. It just depends on how your partner feels about you doing all this stuff. Yeah, you're right. You do need to be engaged with the baby. It's, I think it's a good time to take a year of a break from the sport. But I personally think that, like you suggested, signing up for a half marathon or something is a great way to stay motivated, while not having a really daunting goal or anything,

it's ultimately going to help your triathlon performance the next year if you want to keep racing triathons. And if you were signed up for a running race, incorporating biking and swimming into your training plan is not going to hurt you. It's just going to alleviate the stress of having to follow a realistic triathlon busy program, maybe only some once a week,

or maybe only bike once or twice a week, But the overall running is a really efficient sport to get exercise. That's what I was thinking. If you just do running, you're still getting so much benefit from it. And the time spent is minimal compared to biking and swimming in there as well. There's no commuting. There's very little barrier to putting your shoes on and running. So even a 30-minute run is really beneficial.

And you can't really say the same about swimming or riding. No. So, yeah, I would say you might not even need motivation like a race because your body's so used to exercising and training that it feels good to do it. And if you just stop cold turkey, you're just going to be, you're not going to feel good. So for me, that would be enough to get me at the door even without a race on the schedule. But everyone's different. What you're describing is what happened to me.

I used to train for the race and I needed the race to be there. And now I'm almost at the point where I'm like, do I even like, do I want? want a race, I just love the training. I love following a plan, but it's not like the joy now is in the training. But would you say that like picking a Strava segment to get better at, would that be enough motivation? Yeah. No one cares about Strava. No, just kidding. No one cares about Strava. Yeah, we all, we care about Strava. But no, you think, you think pick, pick a running race, right? That does seem to be the, I mean, they suggested it, but that does seem to be such a easy and time efficient thing. Yeah, do that. There's still

any of them. Okay, next question here is from Alex. Hi, Penf, a longtime listener of the pod, but just signed up to do my first triathlon Olympic distance later this year. Do I need a power meter for my first race? I use the Wahoo Kicker Snap when I ride inside, so I have the power data from that. Not sure if that's accurate. Is it okay to go by effort in heart rate zones, or do I really need the power meter? Thanks, Alex. First of all, how accurate are the kickers? Very accurate. So don't need to worry about that. And then for your first race, do you need a power meter? Do you even need a power meter for your fifth race? As long as you have power to train with, what do you think? It depends how long the race is. I do think that power's a really good guide to not overdo it in the first half of the race. And just to have a bit of a monitor of how hard you're actually going.

Because when you're tapered and you're in this exciting race environment, often your rate of perceived exertion is lower than what you're actually doing. So power can kind of keep that under check. but you could do a similar thing with a heart rate monitor. And to a certain extent, it's like just freaking go for it. If you're feeling locked in by these power number restraints, then maybe it is a better thing. Maybe we should all race without power. I don't know.

I kind of feel like I race really well. The couple times I've had problems in my power meter was not working on race day. I also would be pretty cautious to not do heart rate monitoring on race day because it can be so all over the place. I never do it. Yeah, I don't look at it at all. Your heart rate can be just crazy because of nerves and adrenaline and caffeine. I mean, and if you're tapered or not tapered, like that's a very personal preference. Yeah.

But for an Olympic, especially your first one, you do not need a power meter. Yeah, that's true. Oh, it's an Olympic. Having fun. Yeah, Olympic, yeah. Yeah, even if you go out too hard and you blow, it's not that long. So you're fine. I think the power meter becomes more essential as you're doing longer races like an Iron Man.

Yeah. Then it's a better tool. How often are you in, let's say in a 70.3, when you're looking at power, why are you looking at it? What are you hoping to get from that? To see if my feelings match with the power of what I'm doing. I don't know. Yeah. I'm really, my body's really in tune with what it feels like to ride 250 watts or 220 watts or 280 watts. And yeah, it's, I know what I can do for two hours. So am I on track with that?

Or there's a billion reasons. So if you look down and you feel like you're doing 250, but you look down and you're doing 275, do you change anything? He's off a little. Do you do? Or do you just use that as a motivator? I'm just like, wow, okay, I'm feeling really good to that.

No, because in a 70.3, it's so long. Like the consequences later, overriding. Depending on the situation, like, you really have to read the race and are you riding with someone? Are you up a hill? There's so many factors. What about the opposite? If you look down and you feel like you're holding 250, but you're really holding 225. Do you change anything? Okay. Do you try to push harder? Do you just accept what's happening? You know, like, where does your bring up? Take a gel, lap your watch, whatever you got to do. Okay, got it. Forget about it. Forget about it. Okay, nice. Yeah, there you go, Alex.

I hope it's just fun. That's the point. I hope it's really fun. Last question here is from Amanda. Hey guys, day oneer and YouTuber since Rona. I haven't heard someone call it Rona since the beginning of Rona.

So I was kind of bullied during a race. My ultimate goal is to one day complete an Iron Man 70.3. So I decided to purchase an Iron Man official tri-top to support my cause because I want Iron Man to continue on.

Anyways, I war said, top to one race and a passer by asked which race I did. I told him that I've not yet done one, but my dream is to one day. He looked at me like I was an imposter and scoffed off. Did I do something wrong wearing a top when I haven't completed an Iron Man? I just wanted to support triathlon, which I love. I mean, I wear Saints jerseys, but it doesn't mean I play for the Saints. What do y'all think? Be honest. FYI, I have not bought anything Iron Man since. Thanks for all you do, Amanda. This makes me combination

mad and sad. Yeah, my only solution for this is to buy TTL stuff because we do not discriminate between if you've done a triathlon, if you even know what a triathlon is. And it's 40% off right now. And it's 40% off right now.

If you're a supporter, if your husband or your wife or your partner or your kid or your parents do triathlon, you can wear that TTL stuff, just show your support. To come to your question directly, though, there is nothing wrong with wearing an Ironman-branded thing when you've never done a race. I give my parents all my Iron Man hats and they wear them and they've never done an Iron Man. Yeah.

Maybe if it says like finisher on it, I could see that being a little bit more controversial. I totally agree. I don't care at all. I think my parents have an Iron Man Wisconsin T-shirt and I didn't even finish it. Right. My son, DNF. Yeah. That's great.

My son DNF to Iron Man, Wisconsin, and all I got was this lousy t-shirt. Yeah, there's nothing wrong with that. And that's sad that someone made you feel bad about it, but that's, you know, people make... There's always one of those, you know? It's whatever. There's always the people that make one mean comment on our videos and complain to us that the foreign rider jerseys are one week late shipping. Right. There's always one. But we're trying our best.

best. You're trying your best. I think it's amazing to have something tangible and that you can wear to motivate you to do your thing. Yeah, it's so great. And I love that as part of the journey. I love the whole thought process behind this. Like, I want to do this one day. I'm going to buy this now as a motivator to do this. And I also want to support triathlon and the race organization that I'm going to sign up for the race with. Actually, I have a good idea. I'm going to send this person a TTL hat for free. Oh, my gosh. Can you believe that? There's Amanda. You've been really screwing. You've been really screwing that up of this episode, Paula. I'm sorry.

Yeah, yeah, it's okay. Amanda. I'm going to send Amanda a hat. So, Amanda, send us your address and we'll send you a hat. Yes. No discrimination. Yeah, that's a bummer though. You did nothing wrong, Amanda.

There's no still in valor here. But I will also say that the 99% of people that are at Iron Man events are extremely welcoming. And I mean, the majority of people aren't going to do that. So don't be afraid to wear it going forward, for example. Yes. Yes, agreed. Okay, well, those were our questions. Paula, we did it.

We made it through a whole episode just us to do. What did you think? How'd you feel? I missed Eric a bit. Oh, I definitely miss Eric a lot. I missed Eric a lot. But for the pod, I missed him a little bit. But we did make it work.

We did. I mean, it just, when I'm gone, now I can take breaks and you guys can do the point. Now that we know that it works. I see what the point of this was. Oh, it works. with two people, great. I'm going to take a week off. But you know, Paula, you're the lifeblood of this podcast.

It's a little different. If Eric and I do it, we just spiral off and talk about techy things, you know? No, I mean, there's so many things that I've, Eric's gone for like almost two weeks. And there's so many things that I've realized that I am so incompetent or I just have no idea how to do. It's insane how much I rely on him. Like, for example, I drove the van home from San Francisco alone, which is crazy.

I've never once taken the bikes out of the bike rack at the back. I didn't know how to lower the bike rack to open the rear doors, to slide out the slider to take the bikes off the racks. I have no idea. You didn't know how to set up the mics for the podcast. We had to walk through that at the beginning of the podcast. Yeah. I don't know how to take the ladder down for the attic so I can get up to the attic.

I don't know how to swap the cassette on my new kicker that I got so I could put a 12 speed on. I am so dependent on Eric. But on the other hand, Eric doesn't even know. where the washer dryer are in the house, right? So there's a little bit of this, a little bit of that. No, I'm saying, yeah, of course we balance each other out really nicely when we're both home, but it's really eye-opening and also a little bit empowering to learn how to do these things that maybe when he gets home, I want you to ask him for help every single second of the day. Wow. Wow. Cool. The main reason that's at those, I don't know how to use our freaking coffee machine.

Oh, no. The Las-A, the Lama Zoko, no idea. There's like a scale and you got to dial in the I just go to Thump. Which is great. Which is great. Also, Eric put out, you guys put out a vlog this week as well. So check that out if you haven't already checked it out on YouTube. Yeah, Eric added in a vlog of our last couple of days in Tucson, the Mount Lemon attempt, and somehow found enough Wi-Fi at one of his hotels to upload it.

So go check that out if you want to check it out. And don't forget about our warehouse sale on the website. We barely ever have sale. I don't think we've ever had a sale, actually. You have sale on particular items, but not an overall sale. Yeah, and we don't do Black Friday and stuff, so this is really unique. So go grab something before where they're all gone. Four day gone.

Okay, we did it, Paula. Congratulations. Thank you so much. Thanks for sticking it out. Thanks, Nick. We'll talk to you guys next week when the trio is back. The tripod is back. Bye, everyone.