The Rich Roll Podcast - Gordo Byrn on Making A 1000 Day Plan, Small Promises, The 5:2 Rule, & Designing Your Best Life

Episode Date: October 24, 2022

In today’s panoply of role models, rare is the story of an everyman transforming his life wholesale—then sharing his process openly and honestly with humility and vulnerability. Today I convene with one of these aspirational, endurance veteran and personal hero Gordo Byrn. Gordo is someone who greatly inspired and influenced my endurance career and mentored me from afar in ways beyond my ability to calculate. This conversation, long in the making, is thus personally special. A former private equity investment banker, Gordo metamorphosed into an elite ultra-endurance athlete, a student of human performance, an endurance coach, and, mostly, a devoted family man. He’s also the co-author of the endurance bible 'Going Long'—an incredible resource for any and all athletes seeking to better understand and apply the principles of endurance. A Web 1.0 blogger and podcaste, Gordo's humble guidance and wisdom was a consistent presence during my heavy training years, a tradition he continues today on Twitter (@feelthebyrn1)—a platform he uses to share his experience on everything from endurance training to marriage, personal finance and parenting. Meeting Gordo was like meeting a lost twin for the first time, and this conversation was everything I hoped it would be. Watch: YouTube. Read: Show notes. The Swedish superstar and multiple Ultraman and Otillo champion Jonas Colting calls Gordo ‘Tony Robbins in a Speedo.’ I agree with this statement, and after listening to this one, you will too. Peace + Plants, Rich

You know, we all have these talents in us that we have no idea about. And we have these paths in our lives that we can take at any time that we never get to see because we never take them. If you know yourself and you can give yourself something to do, you can replace dark thoughts with other thoughts. Make a small promise to yourself. It might be a walk. It might just be waking up before noon. It's a small promise. And you're going to start really small.

And it's going to seem tiny. And all you got to do is keep that small promise to yourself. all you got to do is keep that small promise to yourself. And every positive change in my life has built from the ability to keep a small promise to myself. Change starts small, and it's a daily habit of doing the small thing to start the day. And you turn yourself into a winner by having a small win every day. And that's how it happens. The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey everybody, welcome to the podcast.

Although I've done over 700 episodes of this show at this point, and on some level, all of these conversations are special, I would say that this one is uniquely special. And it's special because my guest today is somebody who, although we had never met in person until the date of this podcast, nonetheless has greatly inspired and influenced my endurance career. He's somebody who has kind of mentored me from afar in ways almost beyond my ability to calculate. His name is Gordo Byrne.

And if you're a veteran endurance or ultra endurance junkie like myself, then chances are you may already know what a legend this guy is. But for everybody else, Gordo is a guy who kind of took the road less traveled. He's a former private equity investment banker who ended up transforming himself into an elite ultra endurance athlete, as well as a student of elite performance, a veteran endurance coach, a co-author with Joe Friel of the Endurance Bible entitled Going Long, and mostly a devoted family man. And one of the things that

makes Gordo more aspirational versus inspirational is that his athletic journey, this guy who started out as an obese finance guy and turned himself into an elite athlete, really began with a simple walk. That walk turned into a jog, that jog turned into a run. And thereafter, what set in was this obsession with elite endurance performance that culminated in seven sub nine hour Ironmans, including an 829 for second place at Ironman Canada, and also being crowned Ultraman World Champion in 2002. A result at my very favorite race that captured my fascination

and really motivated in so many ways my own Ultraman dreams and performances. In addition to some shared DNA that we have in both our backstories as well as our life philosophies, one of the reasons that Gordo was able to so profoundly impact me back in the mid to late 2000s during my most intense years of training and competing is that he was a willing and early adopter

of sharing his experience on the internet as a web 1.0 blogger, as well as an early podcaster. It's a tradition. He continues today on Twitter at Feel the Burn, a platform he uses to share his experience and wisdom on everything really, everything from endurance training to marriage and parenting.

It was truly an honor to spend an afternoon with a man who has influenced me so profoundly. It was kind of like meeting a lost twin for the first time. And this conversation was everything I hoped it would be. So in addition to chronicling Gordo's life story among the specific topics we cover, which abound with actionable advice applicable to not just athletes, but truly to everybody. We discuss leveraging pain to catalyze a life change. We discuss the dangers of chasing elite performance. We talk about what endurance teaches us about life. We discuss the importance of creating what he calls a 1000 day plan and how success is really built upon small steps undertaken with ruthless consistency.

We talk about establishing credibility with yourself, what that means and why it's so important to keep small promises to yourself. We talk about fitness after age 50, the pillars of health and longevity, parenting kids to fall in love with being active, and just tons more wisdom. Our mutual friend, Jonas Kolting, the Swedish superstar, multiple Ultraman, and Otillo champion, calls Gordo, quote, Tony Robbins in a Speedo. And I agree with that. And I'm pretty sure after listening to this one, you will too.

Final note, I recorded this podcast old school during my recent visit to Boulder. Just two mics in Gordo's home, no cameras. So although this one is a rare audio only throwback episode on some level, it's also very much well worth your full attention. So with that, let's quickly take care of business and thereafter dive into the pain cave

with the singular Gordo Byrne. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life. And in the many years since, I've in turn helped many suffering addicts and their loved ones find treatment. And with that, I know all too well just how confusing and how overwhelming and how challenging it can be to find the right place and the right level of care, especially because, unfortunately, not all treatment resources adhere to ethical practices. It's a real problem. at recovery.com, who created an online support portal designed to guide, to support, and empower

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I really do. And they have treatment options for you. Life in recovery is wonderful, and recovery.com is your partner in starting that journey. When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. We're brought to you today by recovery.com.

I've been in recovery for a long time. It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life. And in the many years since, I've in turn helped many suffering addicts and their loved ones find treatment. And with that, I know all too well just how confusing and how overwhelming

and how challenging it can be to find the right place and the right level of care, especially because unfortunately, not all treatment resources adhere to ethical practices. It's a real problem. A problem I'm now happy and proud to share has been solved by the people at recovery.com, who created an online support portal designed to guide, to support, and empower you to find the ideal level of care tailored to your personal needs. They've partnered with the best global behavioral health providers to cover the full spectrum of behavioral health disorders, including substance use disorders, depression, anxiety,

eating disorders, gambling addictions, and more. Navigating their site is simple. Search by insurance coverage, location, treatment type, you name it. Plus, you can read reviews from former patients to help you decide. Whether you're a busy exec, a parent of a struggling teen, or battling addiction yourself, I feel you. I empathize with you. I really do. And they have treatment options for you. empathize with you. I really do. And they have treatment options for you. Life in recovery is wonderful. And recovery.com is your partner in starting that journey. When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. All right, let's do the show. Super nice to be here with you. We're going old school audio only. Me with my traveling

recording suitcase at your home today. I've been wanting to meet you forever. I just tweeted out a little bit ago that you have been like this North Star or compass in my life dating back, I think to about 2007 when I was first getting interested in fitness, endurance, triathlon, et cetera. And you were like this OG blogger going all the way back to like web 1.0, you know, on forums and stuff like that. One of the few, you know, kind of really cogent voices out there talking about how to do this thing correctly. And without us ever having met prior to today, you've had just a tremendous influence on my life. So, you know, just publicly, I wanted to thank you for that guidance and that mentorship from afar.

And so I'm just thrilled to be able to talk to you today. It's great to make the connection. I mean, this is a very special opportunity for me. As a triathlete, I had a lot of success, but the one thing I wanted to do, and I was never able to do it, was the big room speech. What does that mean? At first, I was like, some of your tweets are cryptic. They're like Zen Coens. I'm like trying to decode them. I'm like, what is the big speech? So, I got really fit in 2004, really fit, as fit as anybody. And I raced Ironman Canada

and I had a flat tire and I came up a little bit short and I finished second. And it was great. It was a really, really good experience. And the night before the race, I wrote my victory speech and I never got a chance to deliver it. And it's actually something I got out of the artist's way. Julia Cameron, just make it happen. And one of the weirdest things about that whole summer is I actually dreamt my finishing time a month before the race, like down to the minute. Wow. the whole summer is actually dreamt my finishing time

a month before the race, like down to the minute. Wow. And the whole, I mean, I got, I'm tingling cause it's all coming back, but it was just such a special block from March to August of that year. We rode across America, my friend and I. And then I trained under Dave Scott with his team world is what he called it.

It was like me, Simon Lessing, Michael Lovato, and all these really fit women in skimpy shorts and sports bras after I'd been living in a trailer for a couple of months going across the US. It was just, it was an amazing opportunity for me. And I came out of that whole experience just feeling just in the best shape of my life. And it was kind of, you know, when you have that, you have that great build, you have that opportunity and it all kind of comes together on the day. And obviously the flat was kind of, you know, when you have that great build, you have that opportunity, and it all kind of comes together on the day. And obviously the flat is kind of something you remember, but so much went right that year, that day. And so it was just a really special experience, but I never got to deliver the speech. I wrote it for my column, for Xtrize, who I wrote for at the time. But I never really got to reach the people

and say the thing. So I got some things that maybe we get into that I've been kind of holding onto for maybe 18 years a bit. And just to get them out. I'm giving you the platform. We'll let it like kind of seep out over the course of you telling the story.

But what are some of the general tenets of that speech? What are the principles? So, you know, the most important thing is really, you know, I got a copy of Finding Ultra on my desk here beside us. And I think a lot of people read that and it's just such an amazing story. So great and so honest.

And in that people would say, well, you know, yeah, Rich did all these amazing things, but he was a great athlete, a walk-on at Stanford and stuff. And I really wanted to tell everybody that we all have these talents in us that we have no idea about. And we have these paths in our lives that we can take at any time that we really, we never get to see because we never take them. And so I was, okay, in the book, you have your bike crash and Julie comes to you and she's, you know, hey, is it it? If this was it, you know, yes or no. I mean, are you cool with that? And so I'm in Hong Kong and it's 2000

and just got divorced. And I'm at the top of the heap. I'm a partner in a private equity firm. I'm making a lot of money, but I'm alone. It's just me and my mate in the house. And it's a beautiful house. It's a townhouse, Persian rugs, art on the walls. The whole deal. Everything, everything. And we just raised a huge fund. And the next 10 years are like mapped out for me.

I'm gonna be a partner, gonna make a lot of money. My boss is great. My partners are great. They let me do whatever I want. I had that kind of support you talk about. I'm secure in the organization and there's just nothing. I'm like, you know, if I spend the next 10 years doing this, I will have wasted my 30s.

It would have been a complete waste. It's like that moment. Yeah. And so I'm like, I gotta make a change. Yeah, that Rubicon moment. I mean, I'm getting goosebumps now hearing this. I mean, there's a lot of shared DNA here. I mean, the facts of your life and experience are different from mine in certain qualitative ways,

but there's a lot of overlap here. You wrote my book. And- So great. Yeah, it's just, you know, the fact that you had all of that makes it all the harder to walk away, right? Like everybody would claim you're, you know,

you're being ludicrous to consider an alternative path when you're reaping the benefits that society smiles upon. My family begged me not to do it. Like, they're like, you're reaping the benefits that society smiles upon. My family begged me not to do it. Like, they're like, you're nuts. And I was just like- What was the, I wanna like double click and drill down on that moment. Cause I think, you know, to your point of all of us

sitting atop mountains of untapped potential that we're completely oblivious to, I think we're all visited with different versions of those moments in our life, but it requires a certain, either a pain point or a presence of mind to recognize them. And then even further to take any kind of action upon that. Pain point. Yeah. Divorce. That was the moment where everything I thought I was gonna do with my life got yanked. And I had the plan. I was gonna ultimately, you know,

the whole private equity thing, swing it into the Bay Area, get to Cali. I mean, I had the five-year plan and it was all gonna come together. Mm-hmm. The marriage was just like a year, right? It was a short-lived marriage. It's very similar to the story in Finding Altria.

And you know, but likewise, how you closed out that chapter where you said, you know, with the benefit of time, I felt my own role. I mean, I created that situation because all I wanted to do was work or ride my bike. And recognizing that and owning it is the only way to free yourself from whatever complicated emotions you have about it.

Yeah, and write something about it and publish it. I mean, my blog and my writing has been therapeutic for, well, since my teens. I've been writing a lot. And when I write, when I publish, it just goes. I mean, sometimes people come to me about my blogs, but they'll just come to me about a personal episode in my life. And I'm kind of thinking, how do you know that? And they're like, well, I read it a year and a half ago and it just leaves me when I publish it. It's really good.

It's a great way for me to deal with stuff. Right. Well, you've been writing online for like 17 years or something. Long time. Right. And still you can unearth those archives like Gordo's World or whatever the original sort of website was, and it's still public. And I got a hard drive that's got all the other stuff too. I mean, it's just sitting there and I read it and it's neat because it makes sense, but it's gone.

Like I'm reliving it in a sense when I go back and read my diaries. Yeah, well, this is a little bit of a tangent. We'll get back to the narrative, but yes, you are prolific in how often you post. It's very much, I don't know if this has influenced you, but it feels to me very much like a page out of the Seth Godin book. Like he writes a blog post every single day. Some of them are long, but most of them are pretty short. And yours, as I said earlier, are kind of like they're puzzles on some level.

They are Zen Koans. You'll have just like seven lines, like the economy of language. And then I'll spend the day trying to decipher exactly what you mean. And then you made a choice to kind of disappear from the internet for a while. About a decade. Yeah. You resurfaced recently and we can get into later, you know, the reasons behind that, but that's how we ended up reconnecting. Like you, you followed me and I was like, and then I realized I wasn't following you. And I was like, wait, I know that I was following Gordo. I DM'd you. And I was like, I apologize. I thought he's like, no, you deleted your account. Now you're back with a vengeance

posting on Twitter. You're sort of using Twitter as a micro blogging platform, posting these threads that get, you know, a lot of engagement. Yeah. Well, let's just talk a bit about social media. It's been great. And I think it's been great because I'm doing it with intent and I know why I'm there and I'm limiting how I'm doing it. So about, say, probably about two years ago, the pandemic was really hard. The homeschool and just the nature of being locked down and in the house all the time. I don't do too well with that. And there's a lot of static and drama on Facebook.

And I find Instagram creates all this memetic desire in me for stuff. It gets me wanting to take my life somewhere that I don't wanna go, but I'm powerless against images and video. That's why I mainly read books. I'm very prone to suggestion. So movies, video, pictures, I mean, they just control me.

So those platforms are really tough for me. Twitter is more a reading type platform, so I can kind of tailor it a bit more and handle it a bit more. So I was just like, you know what? I'm going to take a 30 day break from everything. And I got to the end of 30 days and I'm like, I'm just going to nuke it, nuked everything and started fresh. Now with Twitter, why I wanted to start fresh was I felt that my life had changed from when I was an elite athlete. And so the people in that group knew me in one aspect of my life. And I was like, you know what? I just want to start small with people that I can relate to

and relate to me. And I really want to just build this community and get some connection in my life. And it's been really good for that, making me feel connected. And it's been really good for that, making me feel connected. And then the other thing, I'm pretty niched down with my life, exercise physiology, training, trying to be fit in middle age. And so I'm able to follow people that are world-class experts at helping me go where I want to go. And they'll answer my questions and engage with me. to go and they'll answer my questions and engage with me. And that's just so nuts that I can ask some guy in Helsinki about human physiology and he'll answer. Or there's a high school coach in

Texas that's teaching me how to get my daughter to jump higher so her starts are quicker in swimming. And they're all just there. And you just put something out there and they'll answer you within 24 hours. And I think if you use it with intent, it can be a very powerful tool for learning. Mindful curation. We were chatting before the podcast and I was saying that I probably follow too many people. And a culling is probably in order for me right now. But for some reason, the algorithm, when I open up that app the first time each day, it's basically posts from you, from Alan Cousins, from Steve Magnus, and from Brad Stolberg. So that's like my initial hit every time, which is positive and always kind of directional,

you know, in a positive way. And so it really is about like how you're managing it. And that is, you know, your own responsibility. It is. And that's in any situation, one of the things I ask myself is, you know, well, there's two things. It's like, what's my role here?

And what am I trying to, what's my purpose? And I think when we run into situations where we feel like we're getting a bit stressed out, we've lost track of those two things, the role and sort of what we're trying to get out of it. Yeah, well, let's take it back to the kind of life story aspect of this. Sure.

I mean, we jumped right to Hong Kong, but maybe- Let's go way back. Let's go way back. I mean, you grew up in Vancouver, right? But were you an athlete as a kid? No. Not at all. So I'm reading about you setting summer league records and that's what my kids do now.

They set summer league records, but I didn't have that childhood. My memory, if I'm thinking about myself in elementary school, I'm kind of chubby. I played badminton. I ate donuts. I was not an athlete. Didn't think of myself as an athlete until Ultraman, which we'll get to in time. And just really, actually, I have this memory of kindergarten or something when I was like that

age, that five or six, and I got some sort of report card and they told me that in the report card, it said gross motor deficient. And I didn't even know what that meant. And I asked- I can't believe you remember that. Well, it was deficient, you know, and gross. It sounded like so big, like such a big deal. And it just meant I was really awkward, you know, wasn't very coordinated. And I was like, oh, I was deficient.

And then we lived in Boston for a couple of years. My dad was going to school and they tried to, I don't even remember hockey, but they tried to get me to play hockey. And I couldn't, like I couldn't skate. And so then they put me in net and tried, well, maybe we can make them a goalie. You can just stand there, but I couldn't do that either. So then we just had to stop.

And so I was a kid that didn't have any real athletic stuff. And then I was always the youngest in the year. And I grew kind of normally, but everybody was always bigger than me. And that worked itself out by the end of high school. So my final year, I was 17 when I graduated and I was just starting to get an inkling of kind of my physical capacity. And then, yeah, didn't play any real... I played football in high school and figured that out by the end. And then in university, I was not a walk-on at a national class. Right. You go to school in Montreal for college, right?

Exactly. Which was great. I loved it. I would have stayed there if I could have worked in French, but I'm an English speaker. Right. So where does the finance thing come in then? So the finance is my degree. So I got to do it. Oh, well, let's go way back. So I'm a kid, not really good at anything, but I'm very good at math. And then I'm good at math. I'm good at chemistry.

Anything that's kind of formula driven where you can kind of, if it's black and white, I'm really good at it as a kid. So my dad was in finance and I was like, well, you know, maybe I'll track into something similar to him. So I go to McGill and do my finance degree there. I do some economics as well. The economics degree, I mean, other than intro to economics, the economics degree was not particularly useful as it turned out when I went out in the real world, but the business degree and the finance side was pretty useful. And I get an opportunity to do a two-month kind of like internship over in London. And I didn't know it, but the desk they gave me, the guy that was sitting there before me, it had a nervous breakdown because he was working so hard.

Wow. So, I roll in. Foreshadowing. This is your life. I roll in. Kind of like a Dickensian kind of way. Well, yeah. But I mean, you know the life. Uh-huh. And I'm just really into it. I'm enjoying it. And the guy that works right beside me, a guy called Alan Haight, he's really good at his job. And we hit it off and he kind of takes me under his wing and he teaches me everything. And because I'm good at the Excel and the math and all that and the accounting, I'm able to learn pretty quick.

And so there's six partners in our group and me and Alan, and we just do a lot of case studies. And this is 1990 in London. I think interest rates were like 15% and we're doing leveraged buyouts and stuff. And it's really difficult the first year, but interest rates start coming down and everybody's been beat up. There's been a recession and stuff. And so all of a sudden, we start doing deals. And I just get an opportunity to do a ton of work for three years. And I end up, I'm in London for four years. And in that period, I was thinking going off to business school, even applied. But then I realized I'd just be asking for my old job back. And so I decided to stay with the firm. And they set up a new operation in Hong Kong.

I knew everybody in Europe. They're like, you know, I have no ties. And they're like, why don't you go out to Asia? Yeah. And we'll promote you. And so I'm, so what would I be? I'm 25 years old and I'm a partner in a private equity firm heading off to a new region.

It was great. Right. And so during your tenure in London, what was the state of your fitness? You have that famous photo of you that kind of percolates up in the internet that I remember seeing at the very beginning of my journey. I think you're on a boat.

Yeah. You got your shirt off. That goes back to Gordo World days of you blogging and not looking so fit, not like hugely obese. You look like a banker, you know? And I was like, that is me. Like I just so identified with that image of you at that time.

So there's another picture that I wish I had saved because it was a picture of me at peak weight at an office function. And I had these big white, because you're kind of pale when you're in the UK, and I had these big white jowls. So I'm 24 with jowls, and I'm so pale, and I'm drunk pale and I'm drunk and I'm having a blast. And I wish I had saved that one, but it's gone. So all I got is like front of the boat, like kind of hairy, kind of pale. Yeah, well, when you're in that state, you're not like keen on having your picture

taken too often, right? So it's like the one of me and finding Ultra, like I got way heavier than that. I just couldn't find any photos of it. Especially without my shirt on you know so i found them i ran them through the shredder the so yeah let's talk about that that one moment i decided and i and i got and i have no idea why i decided to go for a walk that was it i just decided to go for a walk. And I, and- Because you had some kind of base level disgust

with your physical condition at the time, or what was the inspiration for that? Yeah, be sick of sickness is the only cure, you know? And I'm just, so let's dial it back. Maybe I'm 23, 24. I just decided to go for a walk. It's like, you know what? I'm gonna go let's dial it back. Maybe I'm 23, 24. I just decided to go for a walk. And it's like, you know what? I'm going to go for a walk.

And then we decide, well, maybe we could walk to the pub. Or maybe we could walk between pubs. We could go out to the country. So I'm still living the same life. Not changing my eating, still drinking all the time. Very much that kind of banker lifestyle. But we throw in some walking. We just start by walking. And there was this, whatever it was, there was this drive or this desire in me to be just healthier, be better. And then I start bike commuting in London.

And then I find out I'm going to get promoted. I'm like, well, I should probably clean up my act a bit because everybody dressed fancy in Hong Kong. The Brits are pretty, well, I don't know what it's like now, but back then it was pretty, you didn't really have to look too sharp. And I mean, some people did, were they were okay with kind of however however i looked we'd wear a tie but it wasn't like all fancy whereas out in hong kong everybody's wearing it's all tailored yeah it's like tailored suits and it's more new york the look or if you

if you think back to new york and um in the early 90s and stuff before we all kind of went casual. So I'm like, all right, got to turn it around. And so I roll out to, I'm still heavy, but I'm starting to get a bit of fitness. I haven't really lost any weight. I roll out to Hong Kong and don't know anybody. Get back into lifting weights and start lifting weights. Again, start hiking. Hiking leads to maybe a little bit of jogging, jog the downs.

And then I decide to climb Kilimanjaro out of the blue. Where did that come from? I have no idea. I was probably, you know, I always loved reading climbing books. And I had some friends that before there was ever these really nice indoor climbing gyms, the YWCA in Kowloon in Hong Kong took a squash court and they just drilled holds into the walls. And we used to go over there and, um, climb and then we'd run after work. So like Monday, Wednesday, Friday, say you do the squash court thing and Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, you do a run on Tuesday, Thursday, and then you go

for a long hike on Saturday. So the week, that's kind of what the week looked like. And it was a group of guys and they were all ultra runners, but I wasn't at their level. So I could do the shorter stuff with them and then kind of hike on my own on the weekends. But over time, I build it up and I start getting more fit. And then when I do these little trips, I do day trips in Asia. So Semeru is a volcano in Indonesia.

And I just flew in, climbed it in a long weekend. I was back at my desk on Tuesday. Kinabalu, Borneo, near Kota Kinabalu, that's the airport you fly into. I think it's 4,100 meters. These are big, you know, big kind of days. Right. But it's not technical. It's just hiking.

And I noticed that the mountaineering, I just love it. One of the things about anybody that gets into ultra distance is that we experience exercise differently than many people. So my internal experience of exercise, something is happening in my neurochemistry, which is different than the average person. So talk about that a little bit more. I get high. I mean, that's the only way to describe it. I'm buying the kombucha in Whole Foods this morning. Check out guy, says, "'Hey man, you look really, really happy.

"'You look really good.'" And I was like, well, I spent the whole morning exercising and it just gives off a vibe. And I felt, so this feeling, it's coming to me in the mid nineties, in my twenties, and it builds. Right, but what's so cool is that it is this really slow percolating progression that begins with a walk, right?

And then years later, it's like, okay, I'm gonna hike this mountain. But this is over quite an extended period of time. Yeah, so how- You're trying to wrestle with like, what is my relationship to physical activity and my body and the direction of my life? Yeah, so how'd I end up in triathlon?

So I'm married for one year, okay? My wife goes and sees a fortune teller. And the fortune teller says, "'Your husband's gonna die in the mountains.'" So she comes home, she says, "'Hey, fortune teller told me "'you were gonna die in the mountains and i'm like oh that's kind of unfortunate because i i got a expedition to clinton

okay anyhow so she gets the she gets that that. And so I'm like, you know what? And it's like, you know, with mountaineering, it's like good, great, dead. That's your general progression. And I was like, okay, well, you know, there's probably a chance. Cause I was doing some business stuff and they wanted to do a life insurance policy. And I answered the questionnaire, honestly. Right. And they tripled my premium. And I'm like, I'm in good health. And at this stage, I'm not even 30 years old. And they're like, sorry, that's just what it says. And so it's these things. So I was like, you know what? I'll just

let it go. And so I'm on this bulletin board before we had all this internet stuff. And everybody's talking about this thing called IMC. And I've got no idea what IMC is. And so I researched. I find out it's Ironman Canada. So I know I can do a 13-hour summit day. But I don't know how to swim. And I don't have a bike in Hong Kong. But I'm like, you know what? I'll figure it out. So I sign up.

And this was back where you could just sign up. But it's not like your story was six months to Ultraman or whatever it was. This was one year to an Ironman. And this would have been, I was just about to turn 30. And I start going to Masters and I get myself a triathlon bike and Troy Jacobson. And Troy Jacobson is my first coach. And the piece of paper would roll off the fax machine every Sunday or Monday or whatever. This is your plan for the week. That was back then. It just, the piece of paper comes out and that's what you do in that week.

And he gets me through my first Ironman. But on the way, I know nothing. And so I'm- And did this supplant the Denali expedition? Did you scrap that? No, I- You went and did it. I did Denali.

Returned, didn't die. Marriage doesn't work out, but at least you summited Denali. Well, so in that first Ironman year, that's my marriage year. That's the, so the, so, and we'll get to an interesting story when I talk about the race. There's something similar to your experience. So, I'm training, I get the bike, but there's all this stuff with triathlon that kind of scare me, like the open water. I got no background with swimming. And oh, the first race I did, I was second to last out of the water. The last guy was 80, and it was me. And so it was a sprint try. And I had stapled my race number through my bike jersey

to my run jersey or something and i'm all like pinned up and everything and so i get out second to last and obviously i'm passing people the whole day and so i have a really good experience i mean being a slow swimmer in triathlon is not a not a problem i may be much tougher for you you come out of the encouragement of like passing people moving forward all you're a good swimmer then you just end up getting passed for the rest of the race. And that was actually, I think that's part of why I was able to learn so quickly because I would move through most of the field and be able to see what's really going on. It was really helpful to me as a coach. But so one of my first triathlons, Escape from Alcatraz. So I'd sign up for that because I figure if you can jump off a boat in the middle of the harbor

and get to shore, Lake Okanagan in Penticton for Ironman Canada, you're gonna be good. So I'm kind of, you overload, you just overload the system. And that race goes pretty well. I mean, there was some breaststroking and a little bit of floating on my back in the harbor because I had a tendency to go out too fast. And it is, even though it's not a long swim,

it's a scary swim. You're way out in the middle there when you're like halfway and the current starts to go back out towards the bridge. It's, you're like, I'm in a shipping lane right now. I love that race. I did, so I've done that race, unfit, super fit. I've done the rock and roll version or whatever it was, the kind of fancy one.

And then I did the original where you swim into aquatic park. It's just such an amazing venue to race. It's just that water. And pretty technical for a triathlon. Yeah, it was. It's just kind of up and down. A lot of surging. You got to do that part where you run on the sand and then you run up that ladder,

the staircase from the beach. Yeah. Sand ladder. I had a, one year I had a mustache. So there's a great picture of me somewhere. You can't be a triathlete in that era without rocking the mustache at least at one point. So I'm all pumped up coming up the sand ladder with

the mustache on. It was, it's a great shot. I've been looking for it. I can't find it. So I do all these different races and, uh, I get to, I get to Penticton and by, by then I got, there's some issues in the relationship because I've been, you know, I've discovered this passion for training, whatever. So I go for a swim on race morning. And that was the last time I ever saw my wedding ring. I get out of the water. It was bizarre when I read it in your book. And I was like, wow.

And I never found it. My ring is in Lake Okanagan. I don't think I ever told anybody that story. Mine's somewhere off the coast of Jamaica. And we were separated at that stage. So it was kind of an Iron Man widow scenario. Yeah, well, it was more than that. I was a partner in a private equity firm. There were some years where I would sleep in my bed in Hong Kong 150 times. So we were an international business and I spent a

lot of time on the road and we just, you know, we weren't together. And that was, you know, sometimes you got to do things wrong to learn how to do them right. And I got a great marriage now because I basically do the opposite of what I did the first time. And it's been, it was a difficult period, but, you know, I think we didn't have any kids and we got out of it. Well, so why was I, I'll tell you a story. Why was I wearing the ring? I was wearing the ring because, you know, I realized that I was going to get divorced, but I was completely committed to minimizing the damage to everyone. Everyone in the whole situation, including my ex-wife.

And when people talk to me about divorce, I say, you know, you're going to have a good reason to go after the other person. And when people are hurting and it's highly emotional, they might even give you that reason. Because there's a sense that they want it to be your fault. And so they want you to engage them in battle. And you have to be smart enough and in control enough to see past the moment and see where you're trying to get to. And where I was trying to get to was out of the marriage. And what's it going to take to get me out of the marriage? And I don't want to fight and I don't want to argue about anything. And so I pretty much disagreed to everything and got out of it. And we were young. We both had

great jobs. There wasn't, there wasn't. We could have fought, but there wasn't really anything to fight about. And so it was an emotional time, but we got through it and we both went on with our lives. And then I had that moment on the couch where I asked myself, if this is it, the only thing left for me on that path I was on was money. That was the only thing left for me. I was very good at my job. I'd done it for a decade. And I used to sit in my office at that Harbor View and I'd look out and I just wanted to be out there. I wanted to be outside. I didn't want to be in this building. And I was like, you know what? So my parents tell me I'm crazy. My grandma, I visit her. She's like, oh, you can't, you know, are you sure? And I'm like, I agree. Sorry to interrupt, but like, was there

a vision of what would be on the other side of that? Or was it just a sense of this is not right and I'm not going to be able to figure out what is right until I exit. The only thing that I knew that was right was leaving. I knew I had to leave and I had no plan. So I ended up in New Zealand, but I went to far North Queensland first. I went to Australia for a month just because I had a bike sponsor there and I don't know, I just tried it out and it was okay. Right, so hold on a second. So prior to that though, I would imagine, of course, you know, your colleagues and your peers are gonna tell you you're insane. But then there's also the argument of,

look, if you're not happy here and you wanna figure out something else, like stay here until you figure, like keep one foot in here until you figure out what the next thing is, why make the imprudent choice of just leaving? But from what I understand though, they gave you like a one year leave of absence. So first step, my boss is like, just take two months, take two months and see what you want to

do. So he's like, he's probably thinking to himself, Gordo just needs some time. He's going to go away, come to his senses. Yeah, he just got divorced. He needs a minute. Exactly. We'll just let him go. So in my two months, July, August, I start that with the escape from Alcatraz. And then I go to Boulder and I'm in the foot, I'm in the mountains above us.

So I'm living up Sugarloaf. So I'm living with a nurse, not a girlfriend situation. It was a nurse that had a spare room. And I'm there for about six weeks doing my triathlon training. So we've, by the way, we've rolled forward now to my second season of triathlon. And it's, I'm swim, bike, run every day. I pack my car up, drive down to Scott Carpenter Pool, do my swimming, do my training. At the end of the day, I drive back up.

I really enjoy that life. And so it gave me a chance to train like a pro, but I'm not a pro. I mean, by this stage, I'm kind of a fast age grouper. And I go up to Penticton and I have a really good race. And I just love it. I love the whole thing about it. So after a decade of living in these major metros doing finance, London and Hong Kong, I'm outside, I'm running in the forest. It's beautiful. It's Colorado in the summer. It's great. And so I go back and then I negotiate the leave of absence. And so the last time I worked for the firm or in a desk situation, it's October 2000, say. So I go back for a couple

months and they give me a leave of absence for a year. They're like, you know what? Maybe come back. But it was also a way when a partner leaves a firm, it can be a signal that there might be a problem in the firm. So, but there was no problem. I just felt like doing something else. And so it let us manage my exit as well, too. So it kind of worked out for everybody. Right. Hence begins this dive down the rabbit hole.

Yes. That like, you know, it just is mind boggling. Like you go so deep into this. I mean, I don't even think any, like were there even any pros who were as immersed in this training lifestyle that you were? And I'm interested in your mindset and what led to that, because yes, okay, you're like an amateur triathlete, you're doing pretty good.

That's a far leap from, I'm gonna just make this my entire life. Yeah, well, that says a little something about the ultra personality, doesn't it? Right, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, I mean, that's how I'm wired.

To 11 and beyond. Yeah, I just go deep. Was that driven by a sense of possibility? Like, I think I could actually win one of these races or was it just, let me see what I'm capable of. Like I want to challenge myself and leave no unfinished business on the table. So win one is not yet, not, not yet. So now we're, we're kind of 2000, 2001. I'm in New Zealand. I've connected with a guy called Scott Molina. Scott Molina is one of the original big four triathletes, over a hundred race wins, amazing guy, huge capacity to exercise.

And my vibe then is I was born to do this. I feel like I've finally arrived at something that is me. So it's just my thing. That knowingness, that intuition. I'm on the path and this path is my path for right then. The other thing is I notice when I'm doing these long rides sometimes, I'm working through all this baggage, this emotional baggage, this karma, whatever you want to call it. I have, you know, this is back before we all had AirPods and

that. And so I'm just out there on a chip seal road getting blasted by Kiwi winds and stuff. But I'm working through all these emotions and all this tension and everything that was in my body from all those years sitting in a desk. And so it's very, in some ways, really therapeutic. Sure. And it's just great. So I'm developing emotionally, I'm becoming a better person, but I don't really have anybody to interact with.

Other than my swimming partners. Scott Molina and the monk life, right? It is. And like, didn't you buy a house down there for like close to nothing? Like a five bedroom house for like almost no money? 110,000 US. That's so crazy.

Did you hold onto that? For a few years, yeah, it worked out. Well, the Kiwi dollar was blown out. And at the time, New Zealand was panicking because they thought the brain drain, they thought everybody was going to leave the country. And so, you know, I roll in and it's 110,000 to buy a five bedroom house. And, you know, that's kind of like what my rent was in Hong Kong for, and I was like, I'm going to do this. And so, then I get the idea, well, I can rent out a couple rooms, and now I can live for free in Christchurch. So, I'm viable. So, I can just do this

for a couple years, and I only need a few coaching clients, and the whole thing works. few coaching clients and the whole thing works. And again, not thinking forward, but my present, you know, my plan works. I got a sustainable life and I'm loving the training. And then I would alternate hemispheres and I just keep getting faster. So, let's talk a bit about how I end up at Ultraman. So first, my first season, I signed up for Ironman Canada. And then there's, back then there was this thing called the international. It was the first year they ever had the international lottery for Kona and nobody knew about it, but I found out. And so I apply and I get a slot. So I'm the new guy at the triathlon swim workout. And I come in one day and I'm like, I got a slot for Kona. And everybody's like, you? And I was like, yeah, I just applied to the lottery, a piece of paper stuck to a lamppost, and it's about Ultraman. That's how you find out about it. A janky flyer. What year is this? 2003? No, this is 1999. October of 99. And it's on the lamppost. And I'm looking at the numbers, like swim six miles, you know, like ride.

I mean, what is it? 274 or something? For miles, it's 90 the first day and 171 the second day, I think. And then the double marathon. And I'm like, how could anybody do that? Like, it's just so far out of my reality. And, yeah, so I keep doing it. So now, so I get decent.

You know, my Ironman times are in the low nine hours. I'm sort of, you'd either call me a really great age grouper or a slow pro or whatever. And I'm like, you know. And I'm loving the volume. And so I'm like, you know what? I'm going to go do Ultraman. And so this is 2002. And I didn't have any expectations, but I did a lot of training because I'm a pretty seasoned Ironman athlete then.

And just paint the picture on the volume because I'm not sure people who are listening really understand the extent of the volume that you guys were putting in in New Zealand. Yeah. It's difficult. I mean, sure. We can talk. I mean, it's got to be 30, 35 hours a week. Yeah. It's 35 hours a week. It's, I mean, it's 10K. So I remember the first time I ever swam 10,000 meters long course in a session. And it took me, so what would that be? So, well, I'm not as fast as you. So it probably- I had to, you know, I grew up with it. So it probably took me took me that up later

three hours and 45 minutes and I get out of the pool and I can't move my arms and my my my roommates had left me because it's 10k back to my house and I was like yeah I was like I'm gonna jog home because I'm gonna I know for Ultraman I'm gonna have to do it and so I'm like jogging home I can't get my hands up for anything so I'm jogging home hanging my arms and I get home and I just go to bed. And I'm thinking to myself, wow, this is going to be, this is going to, this is going to be a tough event. And that was the first time though. And then, then I actually did a training camp in Kona where I did a six-mile swim in the ocean, three from Kehoe Bay. So from the finish, I went three out, three back.

That's the Kailua Pier. Oh, three out and three back to Kehoe. From Kehoe. So not from Kailua. So from the swim exit. And that went pretty well. And then I did another 10Ks and then I'm noticing, okay, I'm not really getting used to it, but I'm able to function afterwards. And so I start,

you know, it turns out I got a capacity for ultra swimming and we don't, we don't, I don't do a lot of those 10 K swims because it takes so much out of me. But it'd be stuff like that. Seven hour rides on Kiwi chip sealed roads. So you're getting like vibrated like crazy. And is this before you start doing like the, you did the thing where you went all the way across the United States. That's later. Yeah, that's later.

And the Epic camps and all of that. You would go like, you would go the north to south or south to north across New Zealand. We did that. We did the, we did the length of New Zealand. There was one camp where things got a little carried away. I think I might've done 85 hours of training in 12 days, including a marathon on the weekend that was in the middle. My training buddy, Klaus Bjorling, he ran a marathon too, and he was like holding four-minute Ks like in the middle of that kind of week, just because he could.

And yeah, we did a lot of volume. And we actually did more volume. Well, the volume was appropriate. What we missed and what we would have been helped by was understanding recovery better. Nowadays, with heart rate variability and the different methods people use to monitor fatigue, we ignored a lot of fatigue. people use to monitor fatigue. We ignored a lot of fatigue. Right. And ignoring fatigue is great because you can get through it.

If you're doing, well, in the book, if you're doing five Ironmans in a week and you get to a rough patch in one Ironman or any one day event, you're like, this is just a patch. This is just a moment. I'm just going to- Yeah, mentally, it's great. You're going to just blow through it.

For knowing that you can get through stuff. So we used to take these regular athletes that were good and we'd take them and we'd put them through the ringer for like eight to 12 days. And then they would go back to their races and they'd be at a whole new mental level because it was just a moment and they don't have like the next five days hanging over them or anything. It's like, I just got to get through this moment and this day is going to be done before I know it. So that was one of the things. I had a moment similar to your moment. I think it was in Maui where I got so tired that all of a sudden it just left me. And tired, you just have this feeling of total acceptance and you're just going to keep moving.

And you go beyond the fatigue. The fatigue loses its emotional value or content for you. And you just learn how to kind of keep rolling. And those are useful skills, but those skills can also get you into trouble in a sense. I mean, both Klaus and I had issues with overtraining. Klaus was sick for three years. Yeah, I remember that.

That was kind of like a pretty, that was a big story. Like he just couldn't, he had such a massive engine and capacity, but he just flamed out from doing too much. And nobody could figure out what was wrong. He saw so many doctors and then he connected with one doctor in, I think it was the Bay Area. And he had a mold infection.

He had Epstein-Barr and he had one other thing going on. And this doctor helped him get his health back. And then he came back at a very high level. He won Ironman, Cal Mar. He went really fast in Roth. So he was able to get back. But when he came back, he never went that deep again in training, having learned the lesson. And I think the athletes from that era and from Melina's era before us, we took a lot of risks with our health

that these days some risks are necessary, but you can take them much more intelligently as a long distance athlete. Those moments more precisely, when to choose to go deep and when it's best to ease off the gas a little bit. Well, and something that, I took 10 years off to raise my family and I come back and I'm wondering, is there a need for my voice? And a lot of the issues we're talking about are

the exact same issues. They just have different brand names now in nutrition and stuff. But something that is new now is this concept of dynamic loading. So you're gonna load yourself when your body is ready to adapt rather than chuck a bunch of load at the athletes and the fittest are gonna survive, which is very much the way it was done back in the day, at swimming particularly. You have this super wide pyramid.

We're gonna throw a ton of work at everybody and whoever comes out the top, we've weeded everybody else out. It's just a roulette wheel. I mean, it was insane. I came up in that era and it's just volume beyond, right? And then you just roll the dice on a two week taper and sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn't.

And that's kind of it, right? And the training now, like we just, I talked about this on the podcast before, but we just saw the world championships in Budapest and you see 17 year old kids putting in performances that just to me are unfathomable. And when you're 17, like how many years of real training have you even had at that point? The training is so different.

Like they've really figured out a new approach and methodology that is, you know, miles beyond kind of what it used to be like. And the athletes out, if you're an athlete listening to this, you need to learn about dynamic loading. You need to learn about heart rate variability. You need to learn about assessing your readiness, your active readiness. You can tell if your body's ready to load and you can learn from your errors. You can actually see how you're adapting to the load. You can see when you're not adapting to the load. Back in the day, I used to go out and do a seven hour training day. And then I'd go send an email off to Melina and say, hey, my heart rate was a

little low today. And I've just put myself further in the hole. Whereas today I would wake up, I would have my readiness test. I would look at my overnight metrics and my morning metrics. And I'd be like, hey, this is not a day to go do something like that. And so you get a much better response to your training. You still do the work. You still have to do a ton of work, but the idea is you do the work when you're ready to adapt. Right, and the good news is you just published a blog post on this called

"'Dynamic Loading Via Daily Readiness Assessments." It's like a classic Gordo blog post. And if you think it's just about checking your Oura Ring or your WHOOP score in the morning, oh no. So this goes way deeper than no. This goes way deeper than that. It goes way deeper. I was like, do I need a PhD to understand this blog post? Well, here's the other thing. So who do I relate to in sport? I relate to practitioners. The people, because I've done it. So I relate to other people who have done it. So John Hellemans in New Zealand, Scott Molina,

athletes, coaches, doctors, practitioners, people who have done it. I speak the same language as them. So this active readiness blog you talk about, it came to me because there's a Swedish speed skater called Nils who broke the world record for the 5K and the 10Ks, the world champion gold medal. Now Nils has a coach called Johan and Johan has something in common with you and me. He's done a Otilo, which is this epic swim run event

where you go down the archipelago in the Baltic. And so after Neil's breaks the world record, he writes his manifesto and he's probably 25 years younger than me. So not quite old enough to be my grandkid, but definitely, you know, it's kind of like a generation removed.

So anyhow, so before I read the manifesto, how to win a 10K. And we should just say, let me just interject quickly, sorry to interrupt, but this manifesto that you're about to describe, if you're like in on endurance Twitter, like this just lit the internet on fire. Like everybody was reading this and dissecting it. It was a, it was a big story. We've was reading this and dissecting it. It was a big story. We've talked about it on the podcast before. It was like some kind of Bible has now been, you know, kind of divinely delivered upon us

with the answer to how to achieve great endurance. I mean, it's howtoskate.se. If you're an endurance athlete, you need to read it. And if you want to talk about it just at me on twitter because i love i love it so you know you know after they break the world record this tweet just appears from johan saying to alan and me it's just like hey i just want you to know i read your guys stuff 20 years ago and it really helped me. Mm, that's cool. But get this, Niels is from a small town in Sweden

called Trollhätten. Trollhätten is where a guy called Bjorn Andersson grew up. Bjorn's one of my training partners from way back along with Colting and Bierling. Just a beast on the bike. Total beast. So like he had the most amazing legs I've ever seen in my life. At VO2, like above 80, mid 80s, just an amazing specimen, superhuman specimen. And so this little town in Sweden kicks out these two superhumans, Nils and Bjorn. And Nils writes the manifesto. So I read the manifesto and this is it. So what

they did was they took everything from my ultra days, from my Ironman days that I learned from Melina, they took it and they made it better. And how did they make it better? They made it better with radical recovery. This concept where they take the two days off. So five days of loading. recovery, this concept where they take the two days off. So five days of loading. So you take a whole week of elite cycling and you pack it into five days. And then for two days, you just chill and you do it over and over and over and you get more and more aerobically fit, like just amazing fitness. And then they, then they put together their, the, the threshold preparation. And then they do the specific prep to break the record. It's an amazing story. But the back also has three years of daily training logs in it. And so, you know, you dig into it. And so for somebody like me, it's just a goldmine. I'm just like looking. And he's totally honest. Like he gets wrecked and he has to take a week off and then he goes and does some sort of ultra race and then he has to take another week off. I mean, like, so he kind of breaks all the rules in the early days, but then he connects with Johan and they figure it out. And it's just, it's just an amazing story because, you know, then obviously

you get the medal, you break the record. It has a happy ending. And so, so I see this and I was so inspired, but there was a little piece of me that felt sad because I was there. I was doing the work. I was doing the work and I was like, oh, that was it, the recovery. So I'm like, well, it's not too late. I mean, I'm still alive. And so what I've done is, and there's a series of blogs about it, now as a 53-year-old series of blogs about it. Now as a 53-year-old father of three, I'm like, you know what? Let's see if these principles still work on my body. And so that's what I'm working on now. That's my project. And you're working with Johan as your coach. Yeah, that's just the best part is the ability to connect and really go full circle with Johan and help him with his preparations. So, you know, we're taking a speed skater and we're turning him in, in a sense,

I'm trying to help him with the swimming. One of the neat things about when you're working kind of elite to elite or coach to coach is you already know how to train. You know your body really well. And so, I like to think of it more as a, we're like technical consultants to each other. So we sort of speak the same language and we have this, we have this basis of respect for work. And so he's, he's helping me with some of my blind spots, which is recovery. So obviously if you're training at Nielsen's level and you don't get the recovery, right, you totally nuke yourself. So, but same deal with me, you know, I'm, I'm older,

I don't recover as well. And so we're trying to put those principles together. And then we're also trying to learn and trying to make this whole adaptive loading so we get better loading into the bodies and we get a better result. And by documenting it all and doing the math like you love to do, hopefully there are deeper and greater insights that can be canonized for everybody else. Yeah. And here's another thing. It's a form of self-hypnosis. So, one of the things about athletic performance is that the more you believe in your plan, the better it works. So yeah, I mean, whatever plan I have at any stage of my life, I always believe it's the best plan or I have to change it. And so it's very much, I mean, yeah. I mean, my friends laugh at me because they're like, yeah, you always think you're right, dude.

What is the plan for? Like, what is the, you know, in what direction are you headed right now? That's the beauty of it. My account on Training Peaks is always asking me, like, what's your race? You know, what's your event? And eventually I got sick of it asking me. So I just said, get fit. And the date was my 57th birthday and I'm just trying to get fit. And so,

and this gives me a huge advantage because I have nothing hanging over my head. I have no reason to rush. And so I can just do it right and enjoy the process and see what happens and share it with people. And really, I'm living my next book. I'm living it. And I'm blogging it. And I'm sharing it with people. And what I learn, I'm just putting it out in the world. And so it's just a whole experience.

And one of the best, you don't need a race to be winning. You can just go out and live it. And it's just been so engaging for me to be back into it. And then you get all the positive neurochemistry from base training. If you actually ask endurance athletes, especially ultra endurance athletes, the part they like, the part they love, it's the base training. It's the easy training outside when there's no pace pressure and you're not trying to achieve anything or you don't have to hit any splits

and you can just enjoy it. Yeah, you feel that fitness in your legs when you hit a climb, but you're keeping it all dialed to a certain exertion level so that it's fun. And you're not walking around like a zombie all the time. That's the part that I really don't want in my life anymore. So the 5-2, it's great.

And my readiness metrics, I've set up a system where I can't put myself in the hole. It just becomes obvious. My HRV for training app turns yellow and I don't put myself in the hole. It just becomes obvious. You know, my HRV for training app turns yellow and I don't want it to turn red on me. So I got to back off. And just so people, if they're not familiar with the app, it checks some stuff going on with your heart, your heart rate variability, your morning resting heart rate. And before it tells you to stop, it kind of gives you a yellow light, this yellow thing. And then I've got my other metrics

and I just have to back off. And then even if I have a great five days and normally, you know, back in the day, I'd try and just keep it going. I got to shut it down. So, you never get too tired. And I think it strikes me as a neat experiment. The other thing is I talk about it with serious athletes and they say, oh, you know, it sounds good, but I don't think that's for me. And I was that athlete when I was elite. And there's a guy called Hunter Kemper who used to take Sundays off. And we thought he was nuts because he was giving us a day, you know, like one extra day of training. And so he was radical then. And then Neil comes, does the hardest training I've ever seen in my training. And so he was radical then. And then Neil comes, does the hardest training I've ever seen in my life. And he's taken two days off a week.

And you're thinking, well, if it works for him, how about just a more regular guy, some guy in his fifties, it's probably gonna work okay for me. So that's where I got the idea from. There's certainly no cost. If you can break a world record, 10K skate on two days off a week. I mean, I don't know how anybody else could justify that it's gonna hold them back. Right, right. But isn't there an argument that what he is doing

in those five days becomes so superhuman? I mean, he's putting in like just massive amounts of work into those five days. So the argument would be, wouldn't it be better if you spread that out over six days? I would say come and watch because what I'm doing is I'm compressing my modest weekend to five days. So I'm giving myself, my five day dose is pretty good.

Last five days was 20 hours of training in five days for, you know. That's a lot. That's a lot. And it's compressed. And so you get this overload, but the idea is it's overload you can manage. And I think that's part of the reason why it works. I don't necessarily think the radical part's actually in the training. I think the radical part's in the recovery. I think there's something about, because you end up, if you actually look at how many hours you get off in the two day, it ends up being like 60 hours. And that's actually, and Niels talks about it in the manifesto. He talks about this hormonal reset. And so you come

into each cycle really craving training in a sense. So there's probably something physiological going on. Here's another thing I want to put out there for people too. Another change I've made. I'm heavy. And I know you said I look fit when we met. Yeah, you look very fit. I am. You don't look heavy at all. Okay. Well, I'm about 170 pounds. Okay. Now, if I was an elite runner on my frame, I'd probably want to go down to 158. And as an elite Ironman athlete, I used to like to get down to about 163. Okay. I think there's, and one of the things Neil, he was, when he was in his base training, he was,

he was about 11 pounds heavier than race weight. And that was about the biggest swing that I would have. And when I was at my absolute strongest and doing my biggest training, I was relatively heavy. And I felt like it was a disadvantage back then. So that's a change I've made. I've made a conscious decision to be a little heavy and not to be in this situation where I'm always trying to cut weight or in a bit of a slight energy deficit and stuff. And I think this also helps recovery. So when you're doing these five-day overloads

or whatever overload people are using, if you're a little heavy, a little heavier, and you talk about your avocado sandwiches a lot in the book. Yeah, well, I think there's a lot of disordered eating, especially in triathlon. And there is this obsession with power to weight and being as lean as possible.

And I think there is something to be said for being lean to a certain extent on race day. But during the heavy training, what is the downstream impact on your hormones, for example? How are you able to absorb the training when you are like paper thin at that point? And I've made that mistake. When I went to Ultraman in 2011, I was like 158.

It was the skinniest I'd ever been. And I ended up getting a respiratory infection and DNFing. Like I couldn't handle it. So Klaus and I, when we both went over the edge, we had been very lean for a very long time. And the toughest part about it is it feels great. So the stress hormones associated with being underweight combined with the high intensity training, it feels good. So you feel great right up until the moment where you're done. And so carrying a little bit of extra weight, I think you get a better adaptation from the training.

But I also think it de-risks the lifestyle quite a bit. quite a bit. But it goes against the mindset and it goes against a lot of the positive feedback that the ultra community gives each other. But I don't have anybody to impress. I don't have a race coming up, happily married to my wonderful wife, and we're good. And so if I'm, you know, if I'm built more like a fireman than an elite triathlete now, it's cool. She's okay with it. So I don't have any real pressure with that. So I want to put that out there. And because, you know, the fastest man in the world right now,

he might not necessarily be the skinniest athlete. Molina used to say the same thing too. He used to say, look, if it was all about weight, they'd have scales instead of finish lines. But it's a mindset thing for us in this community. And there's just something about that being greyhound lean that just feels great. But I don't think it works.

And in the sense, I think- If you look at Christian Blumenfeld, he doesn't look like that. He's great. He looks very powerful. And also they know performance. I mean, we should all be paying a lot of attention. And you think back to some of the great athletes over time, great cyclists, people that were able to do some amazing training. Their physiology was like a

stockier physiology. And if you're a recreational athlete or even a very serious amateur athlete, I would say, you know, you're probably gonna get a better result rolling it a little heavier. And the reality is it's a little heavier, but the way it's gonna feel to you is a lot heavier. Like I feel gigantic right now,

but, you know, just because it's just the mindset thing, you have that endurance athlete mindset. All right. Well, let's get back to, we're still talking about Ultraman, your Ultraman race. Oh, it was so life-changing experience. It really was. It was, it was, it was, my brother was there and he was kind of my crew chief. And this was 2002? 2002 is when it went well. And, and so we line up and, uh, I'm heading out on the swim and I come out first.

So the, like the training works. So I come out, I'm leading the race and I treat it like a one day race. I just hit the bike as hard as I can. And cause I know I'm going to be okay. I've done a lot of volume and I'm like, at least I'll win day one. And I do. And, uh, and it goes great. And our course is different that year. That was when you start and finish every day in Kona. So we don't go around. Oh, yeah, that's right. I forgot about that. Yeah.

So you didn't go up, you didn't have the volcano climb. I would have loved that, but didn't have it because they were trying a new thing. Might've been something to do with permits or maybe there was an issue with the red road being closed back then because of a bit of lava flows or something. So it goes great. And then day two, it's basically you ride out to Javi on the Ironman course,

you go over the Kohalas, then you drop down the far side of Waimea Saddle, turn around, come back, take the upper highway and then drop into Kailua. So I just, I think we all, it's not draft legal. So we got to space it out. We spaced it out, get a few gaps. And I just, I just wait until the climb. And then I just full gas up the Kohalas and just ride away from everybody. And that was kind of it. I had a bit of a low spot around a hundred miles. And, but I was far enough ahead that nobody noticed, but I was actually riding with my feet out of my shoes for a while, um, because my feet hurt so much, but then I got through it and, uh, won that day. And then, so Melina reaches out to me and he's like, okay, so you can win this thing now. And what you got to do is the only way they're going to beat you is if they convince you to start fast on the marathon.

So you got to promise me that you're going to not do that. Because, you know, like, because he knows this is big for me. Like this is, and so I follow, I'm good at following his advice and I go out and sure enough they kind of take off and uh who was the big runner that year oh Fink Don Fink I think was one of the guys that was off Tony was off the front too I think and there is but it wasn't wasn't like trying to it wasn't like trying to run with Peter Cotland or something. Right, Cotland wasn't right. Yeah, I mean, that guy, he got like 520 or something like that.

So it was, but they take off. And so I just let him go. I do my thing because I got a cushion from the two days. And I just, and I run and it gets really hard. And there's a picture of me. We went into the, did you go into the energy lab on the way back? No. Okay. So we go- We start in Javi and go straight. So if you're starting in Kona, are you running up to Javi?

No. We start in Javi. We go halfway out to the lava fields. Out and back. But on the way back- You go into the energy lab. You got to go into the energy lab with about, I don't know, 40 miles in your legs or something. And it's so hot coming out.

So there's a picture of me at the final turnaround, which is the Ironman turnaround in the energy lab. And I got these baby blue tri shorts on, but I'm bleeding, right? And I don't know it because the saddle sores and all the chafe and everything. So I got these two lines of blood kind of like on the front. I'm so gone. And you got no idea like how wrecked you are. And they were giving me mile splits and then they go to half mile splits. And then what I didn't know was I was going so slow that my brother told them just to lie to me about my splits because I was so out of it. But he knew I was going fast enough to win the thing. So he's like, we're just going to give him the same split. And so it was good. He got me

through. And then, you know, there's that magic point. You're 5K from home and you realize you can walk it in and still win the race. And then you start feeling a bit better and kind of stagger in. So I didn't, at the time I was happy to win, but I didn't realize what that race would do to me at the time. Melina just said, hey, enjoy the sunset, enjoy the moment. You're not going to have many moments like this in your life. And what happened though is after this childhood and this life in finance, it was like a rebirth. I saw myself as an athlete from there on in. And that was when I realized I could win an Ironman. When I won that race.

And it completely changed my identity as a person. And ever since that day, I've thought of myself as an athlete. And so it was a transformative experience. There is something really unique and special about that race. And I remember you saw it first time on a flyer. I read an article in like Competitor Magazine or something like that. And I think it was the year that Goggins had done it. But I vividly recall the way in which the race was described, which was that it was this like spiritual odyssey, right? Like, yes, it's a race, it's a world championship.

And I think it was maybe Jane, you know, Bacchus who was quoted and saying like, but the most important thing is that everybody who endures this experience, athletes and their crew members are transformed in the process of traversing the island. And that really spoke to me. It was like that, when I read that, I was like, that's what I'm looking for. I'm trying to transform my life. Like this is a vehicle or a catalyst for that. And I think there is something really powerful about that island and the configuration of that race that is conducive to that. And I

know lots of people whose lives have been transformed in different ways, but for it to, you know, provoke this epiphany in you, I mean, obviously winning is no small thing, but I think it's more than just winning that race. It's like that place and that specific race, that location, that course, the kind of community aspect of what is entailed and in doing that thing is really unique. There's a picture on the internet of David coming out of the water and it's the same swim finish

line. And I look at that picture and I feel connected to him. And it's the most wild, powerful feeling to be connected to somebody like that through the race. And I think everybody that's done that race, we all share a connection. And it was just a wonderful experience. So let's talk about the power of the island. Yeah. So that year when I win it, I come out of the, I'm leading the swim. I come out and I'm trying to empty my goggle. And what I don't know is I've been stung by a jellyfish, my eyes swollen shut.

And I'm terrified because I think they're going to pull me from the race. And I get to my bike and I just, I'm like, I got to get out of here before the docks pull me from the race or something because I got hit by the jellyfish. And it wasn't too bad that year. I ride and after about 45 minutes or so, moving the body clears the toxins and I'm good to go. But the next year off magic sands, I swim through the jellyfish and I go into anaphylactic shock and I nearly die. And I get picked up by a boat and they drive me to the pier and they lay me on the pier. The ambulance is coming, but they gotta get back out to the race

in case something goes down with somebody else. And so I'm just lying there sweating like crazy when the ambulance rolls up and they take me to the hospital and I'm getting a lot of attention and that there's 10 people around me and I can't see myself, but I'm like going full shock.

And for days afterwards, every time I would come off the meds, I can't see myself, but I'm like going full shock. And for days afterwards, every time I would come off the meds, I'd start swelling up again and stuff. So we don't know kind of what happened, but that was the end of my open water, my ocean swimming career. And that was the end of Ultraman for me. Madame Pele and the island had decided,

you've had enough. Yeah. You got your victory. Time for you to move on to something else. Exactly. And I knew, you know, I know this story, but I didn't know it was that serious or that bad. Like I thought, how bad could it have been?

He got stung by a city. He went to the hospital. Now he won't go in the ocean anymore? Like, so my, so I ocean anymore? So I swim through and immediately I feel it's like a huge chemical burn. And my paddler says to me, well, you'd be all right. You know, like, because the year before we swam through it. And I'm like, no, you need to get me to a hospital now. And so it's like right angle and he's powering

into magic sands and then the boat picks up and then we're in the boat they're like hey how you doing you good and i was like you need to call an ambulance i need to get to a hospital now like i have this feeling inside me that things are going wrong very quickly and so i knew i knew that it was it was over at that stage and so i I talked to the doctor, the ER doc, and I was sort of like, all right, well, if you had to give it marks, how would you score my reaction? She said, well, one is not a problem.

10's dead, you were nine. You can't go back in the ocean again. And that was it. Now, there happens to be one place in the world where I can actually swim and that's Bora Bora because it's a lagoon and the way the wind blows, I'm good. So, I did some training there for a Tilo, long open water swimming with my wife. So, I have done a little bit of ocean swimming, but it's like EpiPen around and you gotta be really careful. So what happens when you're swimming in the Stockholm archipelago?

Oh, you know that story. And no, I don't know that I know, I don't know the story. All I know is my experience doing it, there's jellyfish everywhere. Now, these jellyfish don't sting, but they are ubiquitous. I mean, everywhere throughout that entire day, just thousands and thousands of jellyfish swarming around you. So, Koltik and I are doing the race. And by this time, we're doing the race.

We're leading the race. He's a phenomenal athlete. Right. It's everything I got to stay on his feet. I mean, I might've led, I don't know, 200 meters of the 15K of swimming we did. That goddamn guy is so damn handsome and good at sports. It's ridiculous.

My friend, Justin Daris says, it's how a man should be. I mean, he's, if you were gonna, well, I mean, he's the Nord you were going to, well, I mean, he's the Nordic God, isn't he? I mean, he really is. It's like something out of mythology. He's tall, he's strong, he's athletic. So it's this little bay, it's this little track and, you know, he goes in and he's off. I go in, there's jellyfish everywhere. And there's just nowhere. And so there's just nowhere to go. So I was just like, all right,

well, this is it. This is it. And I just started swimming through all the jellyfish and I'm not getting stung. I'm good. So it was, it worked out,

but it was, it was definitely a big psychologically, you know, freaking you out. Well, and I had had it in New Zealand too. I, I had a,

did a half Ironman race and I figured I'd be good. Cause it was cold water. It wasn't like the blue bottles that had got me, the Hawaiian box jellyfish. But it was, I was, I had a real tough time on that swim,

just trying to stay calm because the jellyfish are all going through. You're having a little bit of a flashback, but I got past the whole thing. I think the most impressive race that you've done is winning Otillo. Like the fact that you weren't, you didn't grow up as a swimmer and you were able to like compete at that level in that race. I was so

humbled in my experience doing that. Like the minute the gun went off and we started, like, we jumped into the water and got to the end of the first, you know, swim, I realized like, oh, I haven't prepared for this race properly at all. Like, I have no idea what I'm doing and just got my ass kicked and held health back like the entire day. I just felt terrible about the whole thing. Well, we were lucky. We were a very well-balanced team. So, I was just fit enough to stay on his feet. And he was really driven at the beginning of the race. And then in the early days, some of the people weren't all that happy

the race was going on. And we were so far out in front, we got lost on the long run. And so we ended up, I think it's supposed to be, I don't know, I think it's supposed to be like a 20K run or something down the big island. Oh yeah, there's that half marathon like two-thirds of the way in yeah and we ended up banging out 30k because we got lost and another team got in front of us and so we get lost because somebody pulled

the flagging off Colting flags down a postman with one of those European bikes that you see like in old paintings. And they start, he's telling this guy his tale of woe, like we got lost. It's not my fault. It's all happening in Swedish. It's like, how do we get back? And so the postman knows the way. So he gets us back. And then we find out we're down to the Swedish special forces team or whatever it is. And so we were just like, we got to get moving. And as triathletes, you know, a long run is probably the only, you know, it's a good spot to kind of catch up. So we just crush ourselves and we can, we can see them when we get to, when we get to the water and we just,

we, we just reel them in, reel them in, reel them in the last run, the short run, we come out of the water together with this team and Colting locks up as soon as he stands up. And I'm just like, I mean, you lock up after like seven hours. I mean, that could be it. That last run up to the finish line?

The hill. Just straight uphill. Not that one. So there's a little roller though that you go over before you go down and then run up to the finish line. So he's locking up. So I get in behind him and I push him as hard as I can to the top of the hill. He gets to the top of the hill. He's not cramping anymore and he's gone. I was like, hey, bud, you got to wait.

I can't keep up. And so we end up winning. I mean, once we gap the guys, they sort of shut it down a little bit. So we end up winning by three minutes or something. But I didn't know this, but Colting had booked good morning Sweden or something for the next morning because he was pretty confident that we were going to have a good day. And so it was all unraveling for him in the middle. And then it comes back. And so we have this, it was just such a great experience because we we feel like the day's lost we're lost and then we have to chase up and then

we managed to win it at the end and it was it was a really phenomenal day and the geography and the nature of that race just in and out of the water and just being outside all day. That was the best day or one of the best days of my entire life. I mean, it's definitely top 10. It was just so great. And the preparation, so in terms of being ready for the swim, I was prepared. So I had done a ton of swim run. I had done a lot of very challenging five-mile swim sets, open water. We'd be doing open water towel drags, open water medley, all kinds of stuff to get ourselves ready for the

ocean and just have that strength endurance. And then it helps to have Colting along because you really do feel like you got a shot. So your motivation's pretty high. And he knows the course and he's been doing it forever. And he's sort of the Prince at that race. But we should probably point out for people that are listening who have no idea what we're talking about. Otillo is the world championships of something called swim run. It's a race that's held annually in the archipelago

of islands off the coast of Stockholm. It's a 70 kilometer race, I believe, where you traverse how many islands? Like 35 islands or something like, I think there's something like 52 transitions. You do the whole thing in a modified wetsuit with your running shoes on. The rules are such that you can bring whatever aid

you would like as long as you carry it the entire way. So people have hand paddles and pull buoys strapped to their legs. And it's very strange, you know, to see these athletes running around in wetsuits, crossing the island, you jump in the water, the water's freezing. On our day, we had like sideways rain and crazy chop

and the conditions were terrible, which kind of made it more epic, although not enjoyable in the moment. And I was, yeah, like, I mean, Jonas was there that year just doing it for fun. And, you know, I just, I trained by, I mean, I did a lot of swimming, but it was mostly in the pool and then trail running, you know, in Los Angeles. What I did not train for and was completely ill prepared for was all the technical climbing around and traipsing through the mud and like hauling yourself up on these rocks

and sliding down on your ass into the water. Like just trying, and I had the wrong shoes. They didn't have grip. And so these like slabs of rock that you have to like kind of come out of the water up on. Like, and then I'm watching these Swedish special forces guys who look like ballerinas on these rocks. And I was like, I'm in the wrong place for this right now.

It's a neat concept. I mean, just dreaming it up. I mean, amazing. What an experience. And what a beautifully curated experience that the founders and the organizers have really manifested. It's special. Yeah. So why do I want to get fit again? I'd like that to be the last thing. I'd like to be that how, I mean, it's not the last thing, but I think that I can build up if I'm fortunate and patient. I can build up about the time my son is able to make it. Because we're going to cross at some point.

I think about the time we're crossing in terms of physical capacities, we might be able to go do something like that together. And so Colting has a race weekend and he does a short swim run in Sweden in June. So I'm gonna take my son there next year and we're gonna do a little one to see what he thinks. That's cool. Yeah, that's really cool. I mean, the other thing we should point out is that yes,

you do it in tandem, you do it with a teammate and you have to stay within like three meters of your teammate the entire time. And I think that's, I mean, for me, that's part of what makes that event special is that team aspect. And that's probably why I had such a great day is because we each contributed to our day and we had a great outcome. And that's part of the attraction from doing it with my son too. It could be something. And it'll also, I think swimming is a great thing for life. Yeah.

And it would give him a reason to keep swimming, is to have this goal out there in his teens. A lot of boys drop out of swimming, you know, when they get to that high school age. And I think if we could kind of keep him in the game, he'll be glad that he kept it going later in life. Yeah, cool. Well, speaking of life, you know,

one of the things that makes you so compelling to me, I mean, we've gone down this deep rabbit hole of like total endurance geekdom, but what's really resonant in who you are and kind of what you do is that you were able to kind of graduate from that on some level. And so much of the advice and the kind of principled way that you live your life is oriented around

like what you learned from endurance and how that's applicable to, you know, basically living a good life that's grounded in your values and really prioritizes like how you allocate your resources from time to finances, you know, parenting, et cetera. So that's kind of like the direction that I wanna take this right now. I'm so glad you brought that up.

So I'm 42 years old and one of the fastest 40 something triathletes in the world at an amateur level now. And I take a look around. I got a two-year-old and a baby son at home. And I just look at how we're all living, all of us, and my peers, the elites, the elites with kids. And I asked myself a question, not the question, but a question. I was like, if I keep doing this, where's this going to take me? Where's this going to take my family? And I'm not comfortable with the answer. I'm not comfortable with what I tell myself.

And I'm like, I got to make a change. And it wasn't to do with how anybody else was living. It was very much internally driven. It was where I wanted to be, the man I wanted to be, the father I wanted to be, where I wanted to take my family. And I was like, I'm going to leave it. And I did. I left it. And I was like, I'm going to put my marriage first.

I'm going to put being a father first, and I'm going to do that marriage first. I'm going to put being a father first. And I'm going to do that. And it was awful. It was so hard at the beginning because you have no skills. And if you're a parent and you're listening and it's awful, I know it. I know it's awful for you. And it is. And what would I tell you? I would tell you, well, I'd tell you two things, definitely. First, I say it's temporary. It's not going to

last. And I would encourage you to reach out to the best teachers that you come across. People that have been with kids for their whole lives, particularly preschool teachers. If you're going to get triggered, you'll get triggered by a toddler. Preschool teachers are angels. And if you come to them with an open heart and you're willing to learn and use the techniques that they teach you, your life will get better. It's not going to be great, but you're gonna be able to cut those difficult moments in half. And that can be the difference between falling apart and not staying involved and being a successful parent. And I would also say, particularly to the moms,

you need to be realistic with your expectations of yourself. You need to be taking care of yourself. And really, what's your goal? Well, my goal as a father is to persist and not retaliate. Those are the two things. Those are number one and number two. And if I'm having a good day and I'm skillful, maybe I can deescalate almost every situation. So it's persist, don't retaliate, and the skill is in the deescalation. So maybe share an example of that in practice. In practice, there's a lot of distraction involved with kids. I mean, one of the best preschool teachers used to carry a Leatherman around in his pocket.

And when the four-year-olds were starting to get a little wound up, he would pull out his Leatherman and he would just go, have you ever seen my Leatherman? And he would just pull a tool out and it's kind of shiny. And he would pull a tool out,

a screwdriver or something, and the kids would just be mesmerized. And so it's the art of distraction. Because the kids don't want... The other thing is, as adults, we put all this stuff on the kid. Oh, they're being that way. We create this whole story around this difficult kid, but there is no story. The kid is just a kid. And if you can get through the moment or maybe distract them or give them a hug or something, I mean, it's gone. And kids have no memory. And so, you need to remember that the child that gave you such a difficult time doesn't exist anymore. That's another really powerful one

because you can have this trauma from going through the experience of living with preschoolers and toddlers. You can be really traumatized from all the noise. I mean, anybody that's an ultra endurance athlete needs a lot of quiet time. Noise really affects me. And you can hold these resentments against a situation and a child that doesn't even exist anymore it's completely gone the the it's a it's a different child and to get around this and to teach myself that i don't talk about how my kids were i talk about little axel or little lexi was that way there's a differentiation and i teach my kids that. I teach them that they have this illusion that they are the same person that they were a couple of years ago, but they're not.

And they're free to be a different person. And that person that they used to be doesn't actually exist anymore. And you can even go deeper. You say, well, actually that person never existed. But most kids will be able to get that, this concept that, well, you know, I kind of seem different, but I'm not kind of the same continual person. But as parents and adults and in family systems, it's a big transition for the parents when you go from kid to adult, and then you go from adult to elder. These are all major shifts and the relationship needs to shift too. So you need to kind of let go of all that prior baggage or process it somehow.

And so for parents, that's the persist, don't retaliate and forgive, forgive yourself, forgive the kids, forgive the past. I like that idea of, you know, hitting up the preschool teachers too. It's like, that's a, to me, that's an example of you as a learner, always seeking for the teacher or the mentor,

whether it's Scott Molina or whoever it is, like, how can I find that, that person who can teach, to be teachable at all times and to be the person who has the humility to say, I don't have the answer, but I can find these other people that do, and I'm going to listen to them. Here in Boulder, there is a preschool that sits under Naropa. So, it's a Buddhist preschool, but I mean, a Buddhist preschool is, I mean, it'd be different. Well, it's not like you're getting a religion class or something like that, but the vibe.

And it's called Aliyah. And if you're gonna spend money on education for your kids, it's gonna make a difference. Do it when they're preschoolers. That would be my advice. And if you happen to have a boy that's challenged with socializing skills, an early intervention with very patient preschool teachers can really, really help that kid. And it'll be in ways that

you don't see because the kid will learn skills. So our kids are, you know, they're anywhere from nine to a teenager now, and they're still using the skills, the get along skills that they picked up from three years at this Buddhist preschool. And it's transformative. And I saw how well it worked. And I knew that we were clueless. A lot of parents think, I mean, yeah, you have a right to an opinion, but you don't necessarily have any skills. And the teachers, the people in the school system, they have a lot of skills and they've seen a lot of different kids and they can really help you out at a very difficult time. Many parents of young children don't realize the magnitude of the stress they're under from the disrupted sleep from the whole situation and they have this feeling that

that things are unraveling on them but it's just stress and so one of the things we used to do was we would we would do date nights, but we would alternate. So we would try and get each of us once a week would have 24 hours or at least one night where we didn't get yelled at by the toddlers. And I called it like a nervous system reset. And it really helped me because I knew that I would get this break somewhere in the week from the day in, day out of the bedtimes and that. Right.

And I think the trick is to, you know, overcome that sense that that's like self-indulgent or you're being selfish. Like you can't show up and be the parent that you wanna be when you're completely depleted. It's back to like the recovery question, like how it's less about the quantity of time spent and more about like elevating the quality of the time spent. And when you're not in your best state, maybe take a back seat to too much interaction until you can kind of recalibrate. So let's talk a bit about that. That's how I've lived my life. So when we were in it,

so we had three under four when our third was born. And so effectively two babies and a toddler. And, you know, a lot of people opt into very challenging situations, taking the whole family on vacation, driving places in cars. We did the opposite. I was like, you know what we're going to spend money on? Childcare, so we can spend time with each other. And the approach was childcare is meant to benefit the marriage. And it's not meant to give mom a break or whoever the lead parent is a break. It's meant to benefit the marriage. So if we're spending money on childcare,

we're doing it so that we're making our marriage stronger because that's the best thing we can do for this family is keep ourselves together, keep ourselves engaged and just get through this because it is gonna end, you'll come out of it. And I think that's a key thing. So if you think you're saving money for college or you're going to send the kids off to private school, I would say reevaluate that and fancy vacations and stuff. Childcare benefits the marriage. And now the

other thing is I have the capacity to be in a very high-paying profession. If I do that, the beneficiaries of that will be my adult children that I never spent time with. And I made a choice to spend time with them young and give them a human capital benefit of my presence and my capacity to parent and lead and coach them rather than accrue assets and financial wealth that I would pass onto them, which they don't really need. They should be earning that themselves. That's their obligation, the way they want to live their lives. And so I took a human capital approach to the family system. And I gave them time when they were young.

And the benefit of that is I learned how to interact in a different way with kids. And I bring those skills out to the wider world. Like if you're not going to get rattled by a four-year-old or a couple of toddlers, you can go out into very difficult situations in the world and still think rationally. And so, it's a useful skill. But the other thing is, it gives me a chance to pass my philosophy off to them. And when we're hiking in the hills or stuff like that, we have this relationship. And so, we develop a powerful relationship so that later in life, relationship. And so, we develop a powerful relationship so that later in life, it can be a source of strength for the family. Because I view the family as like a river, in a sense. You

know, each of us is kind of coming in and out, and we're not going to be there the whole time. I think sometimes in the West, we can think of it very discreetly as, you know, it's like my it very discreetly as, you know, it's like my family, as opposed to an Eastern philosophy, which is a family over time. And people are coming and going, we're having these life cycle events with births and deaths and stuff. And if you can be in that and pass that philosophy onto your kids, and that's also why I dialed my coaching down. People ask me, well, who do you coach? I was like, well, I coach my kids, you know, because that's where the big gain comes. Because if I don't coach my kids, that could also be a source of big regret for me, is not having taken that opportunity. And it's turned out to be very rewarding for me. But you're talking about the limit,

how much you put in and, and you don't want to, you want to limit it so that your kids are seeing the best aspects of yourself. So that's why I like doing stuff with them outside in my best environment. There's so much in there to unpack, but maybe the first thing that I want to hear a little bit more about is this, this, this, this sort of idea that you're coaching your kids. Like, what is the distinction or dividing line between being your kid's coach and being their dad? Well, yeah. So, let's talk about, well, first off, as a coach, this is one of the things, one of my difficulties with professional sport from an ethical point of view and my personal

values. So I was an elite. I was not a professional. An elite is somebody that competes at a very high level. A professional makes a living and it's about winning. The rules for a professional are different than the rules for an elite. I followed a different code in my racing and I'm comfortable with the way I did it. But professional sport is very different than it appears to somebody that's not on the inside. So similarly, step back with my kids. Relationship is always first. Always first. It's not about performance. It's not about trying to get them somewhere. What I'm trying to do is deliver a skill set to them so that they can live their life as they see fit. There's no goal for me.

Really, all I want to do is support them, give them a bunch of skills so they can just go out in the world and do what they want to do. And they'll do what they do and they'll have the consequences of whatever those choices are and they'll reap the benefits. So a lot of that is about thinking, first off, I don't want to mess it up. So if we happen to have an Olympian, a future president, an amazing musician in the house, I don't want my choice to constrain where they can take their life. So I want to keep as many options open for them as they can. So that's kind of more my coaching philosophy. So we're not working towards a goal, but I happen to have a skill set. And if they come to me and ask me for ideas, I can help them. So our oldest wanted some ideas this summer about, well, first you wanted to have a personal

trainer. And I said, no, you're not getting a personal trainer. I'm not doing that. Because in this town, kids have trainers, personal coaches, and all that. Do they really? Oh, yeah. Oh, wow. So keeping up with the Joneses in Boulder is literally physically keeping up with the Joneses. It's a whole, I don't know, man. You know, like it's got to be heavy. It's not just Olympians. It's like, what medal did you get? I mean, it's like that kind of level. This is like an Olympic village.

Like I was sitting out at dinner the other day. Oh, Anton Krupicka rode his bike by and then like a running group went by and the person I was eating with was like, oh, she's national champion and this and that. I was like. So like, oh, she's national champion and this and that. I was like. So it's, you know, and that's the environment they're growing up in.

So, and they can deal with it, you know? So I also want to, you know, we have, I mean, they're great athletes, but I'm a little bit torn because I want them to be great people. I don't want them to be great athletes if you're, you know, to be laying all the cards on the table.

And I think that athletic path, if it becomes about winning, it can really lead you astray. One of the things I tell my son who's hyper-competitive is like, be the best Axel. Be the best you can be. Because he gets wrapped up in winning and trophies and stuff. And I was like, you know what? I mean, that's great, but you can win

and really have done not your best effort. So you should be the best you can be. So it's value stuff. So I want to kind of pass that on. And then in the coaching side, yeah, if they come to me and they want me to help, we hang out together and I like lifting weights. And so I teach him how to lift weights

and we do indoor climbing together. But it's really about sharing that experience, sharing an active life in nature. Like it's hiking, it's going out in the mountains. It's like climbing 13ers and 14ers. It's that. Lots of skiing too. You gotta ski a lot.

Well, yeah. And let's talk about skiing. Well, first off, it's ridiculously expensive. So you got to really have your house in order financially before you go down that path. Some aspects of skiing, it puts you in that demographic. Certainly the Aspen demographic is something that I made a choice to leave when I left private equity. I find it really challenging. It brings me right back to my high finance days. I get very competitive. I get very focused on the whole competing with money and stuff when I'm in that environment. It's challenging for me.

But we do it. Let me tell you how we do it. We do it as a non-competitive. We don't race. let me tell you how we do it. We do it as a non-competitive. We don't race. We do it together. We have fun together. There's no real way to keep score. I mean, it's about style, you know? So my kids would be like, oh, I skied that. And I was like, well, how did, you know, how'd it feel? Do you feel like you did that with style? And we're just, it's kind of lower key. And so that's, it's nice to have something we can all do together. Yeah. The real kind of like focus of so much of your writing and the stuff that you share

is really oriented around crafting the life that you want to live and how to do that by getting clear on what your values are. And I wouldn't say that it's a minimalist approach, but it is an approach of asking the reader or the recipient of your content to really ask themselves, what is it that you actually need? And if you're being really honest with yourself, is that thing that you're chasing the solution to the problem that you're ignoring, right? Like you could be at a hedge fund or you could easily step back into that world and make it rain cash.

And you've made a very conscious, deliberate choice to construct your life very differently because you have clarity on what's important to you. And so those choices, whether they be financial or how you allocate our most precious resource and non-renewable resource, which is our time and attention to be directed towards those pursuits

that bring your life the most meaning. So talk a little bit about how you've crafted that philosophy and perhaps share a little bit about how people can consider these things in their own lives. Okay. What one thing, if it happened, would change everything? It's a question I ask myself from time to time. What one thing? So when I made the decision to step back from racing, the one thing that would make a difference in my life was a better relationship with a three-year-old girl that I was living with. That one thing. And I was like, that would really,

it would help my wife. It would help my daughter. And it would really help my family. And so that's why I stepped back. And I was very focused on that one thing, the relationship with the little girl. And we would do, I had a trailer in my mountain bike. I put her in the trailer and we'd go ride up hills and stuff. I did Independence Pass and she had a pillow and an iPad, a lunchbox. And we'd do a lot of trips, just her and me.

And it wasn't much fun, but I built a relationship. And she's a wonderful young woman now. And I got through it and it did. It made a difference. So I'm very fortunate that I picked the right one things. So when I was in Hong Kong, my one thing was, well, getting out of here was my thing. Getting out of here and just trying something different. I'm on the wrong path.

So in that case, it was a change. So I'm on the path out there. What one thing? Well, love. Love in my life. I'm fit. But there's no connection Well, love. Love in my life. I'm fit. But there's no connection. There's no woman in my life.

I want love in my life. Another one thing, helping people, connecting. Help 100,000 people with my writing. I wrote that down. I've done that and then some with my books and my blogs. So I would say to achieve things, you got to know what you're trying to do. Otherwise, you just get the default of whatever's coming out of your phone screen at you and that you end up kind of working towards all these thin desires. But if you can work

towards a thick desire, connection with a child, love in your life. Or even now, frankly, one of my things I'm working on is just getting myself aerobically fit again. And you talk about the minimalist, I'm not a minimalist. But what I am doing is I've made a decision to not add any commitments to my life, to continue to have the space to try and become an athlete again. And because it's tempting to like take little commitments and they're all really attractive, but you have to kind of say no and pair them away so that those, when you're doing, when you got your five days of training, you can still meet your obligations to your work colleagues and your

family, but you also have enough space to get your exercise done. Yeah. One of the big kind of driving principles in all of this that tracks all the way back to Melina that I think is so instructive and perhaps helpful for people is this idea of the thousand day plan, right? So talk a little bit about that because it plays right into this thing that I love to talk about, which is that most people over-index on what they think they can do in a year and completely, you know, miss the boat when it comes to what they could accomplish in a decade. And by casting your glance, you know, what they could accomplish in a decade. And by casting your glance, you know, much further down the line

and making life decisions around that provides you the capacity and the space to actually achieve that thing that continues to elude you despite, you know, making it a New Year's resolution year after year. So it's January, 2001, Scott Molina and I are riding up towards Evans Pass in Christchurch. And he just leans over and he says to me,

how long are you going to give this thing? Because he's agreed to take me on as an athlete, former world champion, Ironman Hawaii champion. I mean, it was a real opportunity for me. And it's deeper than that though. He's, I didn't realize, I didn't, I didn't know how great he was as an athlete. And he was actually a little out of shape at the time. So really he was getting into shape, training with me, mentoring me, teaching me. And I live 5K from his house. I just turn up his garage and we go ride for five hours and shoot the breeze sometimes.

So he says to me, how long are you gonna give it? And I was like, I was honest. I was like, I mean, I don't know. I mean, I'm not sure. And he's like, well, before you make any decision, I want you to give it three years. So that's where the thousand days came from. You gotta give it. And he just said want you to give it three years. So that's where the thousand days came from. You got to give it. And he just said, you got to give it three years just to see where it takes

you. So the three years, so, you know, like a year, like a year and a half, well, two years in, I win Ultraman. So I get the positive feedback, but he's right. You know, I'm still only just beginning. It was another two years after that until I had my absolute best performance in Canada. And so it worked and I pay attention to things that work. And so I brought that into my coaching and it worked great with athletes, people that are trying to qualify for Kona.

And I brought it into my life and I'm bringing it back too. I was like, well, you know, I get back on Twitter and I start looking around and you know, you're the reason I got back on Twitter, right? Do you know that? No, I didn't know. Well, I kind of told you. Well, yeah, but we don't have to talk about that. We should. We should talk about it because if you want to free yourself from something, you might have to talk about it at some stage, right? Okay. So, I'm watching Rich, okay? You're getting more and the ball's rolling with the pod, with the books, and everything you do is aesthetically beautiful. I mean, I look at it

aesthetically beautiful. I mean, I look at it and it's not just you on the cover. It's the cookbook. I mean, I look at it and it just makes me feel. I was like, oh, it's just so beautiful. It's beauty. It really is. It's art. And I'm looking at it. And then as well, you know, there's in me and certainly in the people I know and definitely in my kids, we all have this desire to be liked and a desire for approval. And so, your snowball is rolling and I'm just watching it go bigger and bigger. And there's this feeling of envy. And envy is something we don't talk about much as a society. And I read this book called Wanting by Luke. we don't talk about much as a society. And I read this book called Wanting by Luke. And he talks about your envy tells you there's information there and you really need to pay attention to it. And so I acknowledge it. And I don't just acknowledge it, I acknowledge it publicly.

And I say, wow, I just got this feeling of envy. But really, what does it mean? It's not about, it's not about, it's not about, it's never about what it's about. It's not about your success. It's about this calling. It's about this need to connect, this need to share my message with people. And I was like, you know what, I'm going to embrace it. But I'm going to do it right. I'm going to do it on a thousand day time horizon. So I'm going to come back to Twitter and I'm just going to, I'm just going to try and pump out some good content every single day for a thousand days and just see what happens. I'm at day 150. I got 850 to go. So I'm doing the Twitter thing. And then, you know, sure enough, Johan tweet rolls in, you know, we start DMing.

There's all this stuff starts happening around me. And I was like, wow, there's something going on here. And I'm like, you know what? This is it. I've said I'm going to go for a thousand days. I know I can shut it down and kind of disappear again after it, but I'm going to ride this out for a thousand days and just see where it takes me. And so that's it.

I got my, again, just like training where you have your basic week, I got my basic week on Twitter. I do this kind of similar things every day. I'm just going to roll it forward and just see where it takes me. And one of the neat things is I was less than a hundred days in and I already got everything I wanted out of the whole process for me personally. So now you're moving forward with just this curiosity and this sense of, well, I've kind of won. I mean, I really just wanted, I mean, what do you need to have a great life? I mean, you probably need like, you need a few people to love you, a few people to serve. I got that with my family. And then, you know, a few dozen people on Twitter that you can interact with and have fun with. It's great. Yeah. And it gives you that opportunity to express

yourself creatively, artistically, and to do it in service. Like you're giving back, like you're sitting on top of all this wisdom and experience. And there is such a, you know, a desire for personal growth. If you have curated your social media feeds properly, people want the truth, right? And there's a lot of fucking bullshit out there and people trying to sell you their course or whatever. But I think people have developed much more finely tuned radar or antennae for that bullshit, which makes it easier for the people who are, you know, genuinely coming from a heartfelt place to rise to the surface.

I mean, I'm looking around your office and I see there's Steve Magnus' book over there, and there's Brad Stolberg's book, you know, over there. Like, you know, it's like, these are the people who are like, you know, doing it for the right reasons, who have a lot of value and experience to share. And now you're part of that ecosystem in my life. And you know, that's what brought us together today.

And that's, that's, yes. And that is a honorable way to live. But there's another side of me. There's another side of all of us that has a dark energy. Yeah. There's a dark side. The drive to be recognized and valued in a public way. That's not necessarily dark.

I consider that innate. That's like a human thing. I think that what I'm, let's talk about addiction. And I had a tough time last year. And so, sometimes, if you know yourself and you can give yourself something to do, and you can give yourself something to do, you can replace dark thoughts with other thoughts. And you can- But ultimately, you're compartmentalizing or just running away from that thing

that really demands your redress. Well, maybe. But maybe the darkness is coming because you haven't given yourself something positive to do. So maybe your dedication to whatever you're dedicated to was a good thing at the start. Your family, your children, being a provider. But you take it too far. And you're doing too much.

And you're not connecting to your source. You're not connecting to what keeps you energized. You're just trying to do what you think is right. And it leads you to a dark place and you don't start thinking as well as you used to. So you got to re-energize yourself. You got to get to your place of power. Point break. Surfing's the source. For me, exercise is the source. That's it.

It's riding my bike uphill or walking through a forest or holding hands with my wife beside looking at the water. I mean, whatever it is, we each have a source and you got to stay in touch with that. And if you can share that with other people, you know, some of these, we all have these kind of dark thoughts and faulty thinking. When you're in a good place from a mental health point of view, they just come and go. They just, it's just an idea and it just comes and goes. It doesn't become an obsession. It's not a, it's not a big deal. And so a lot of, I needed to connect. I needed to break that negative cycle. And, you know, this,

this return to writing and engagement does it. So, and, and, you know, if, if somebody's listening and they're having a, they're having a tough time, you know, like I left Hong Kong, you know, I knew I needed to change. I didn't know what I was going to do. I had to leave. I would say, you know, sometimes you gotta just, you gotta, I mean, the first step before you can transcend step before you can transcend addiction is to replace it. You have to replace it with something that's maybe a little bit more positive. And from that point of positivity, you can work, then you can kind of work on it. And that's, you know, because all I did with my exercise was replace it. And then I just, I mean, I took it to the point where I got sick from doing too much of it and I kind of had to back off. And then I kind of came to terms with it and I came to a better spot with that. But, you know, until you, and it was the same deal

with work. I was working all the time. And with my drinking, I say that I've got two ways I drink progressively more or not at all. And so I was just like, you know what? I got kids. Best thing I can do for my kids is just stop. And a few years ago, and that was it. And that just comes to my feeling like I need to have integrity when we sit down and we have talks about addiction, alcohol and drugs and stuff. And I'd be like, yeah, you could do that. And at some be like, yeah, you could do that. And at some point you'll be an adult. It'll be your choice. You're not going to get in trouble, but you're going to have to make a choice about how you want to live your life. I mean,

you know, they've had these childhoods where they were doing stuff all the time and I would hope that they would stay engaged and continue to do stuff. And so it's really living that example for the kids is my approach to it. Well, I really appreciate the honesty with all of that. I mean, obviously that's a reflection of the inner work that you've done to have that kind of clarity on that. I think it's easy for a lot of endurance athletes to shirk off the addiction question, but if you're doing ultra endurance

and you're so down the rabbit hole, like you have gone and I've flirted with, like you have to be somebody who is prone to that level of obsessive compulsive behavior or straight up addiction. And I have this history with alcoholism to be sure there is some connectivity between that and like my love for the world of endurance.

And I can dismiss it and say, well, that made my life better and the alcohol made it worse. So these things are not the same, but of course they are, if you're being honest. So I like the way that you describe it as replacing one for the other, but still it being a step on the journey towards transcending it because we're learning as we're going, right? And we get better and then we slip and we find ourselves using something else to distract ourselves from our own pain or what have you. And like, this is just life, man, you know, and we wake up and we try to do a little bit better the next day. Yeah, I think we, I think you just, you own the way, own the way you are, limit the damage, try and be kind.

damage. Try and be kind. You know, I think as a coach, I have a friend in town that's very high level running coach and very good with athletes that have eating disorders. And he says, one of the greatest gifts you can bring to an athlete as a coach is to give them enough self-confidence that they can step out of sport, out of competition, but also out of the compulsion. So they get enough confidence in themselves through that athletic journey. And they get this new vision that I experienced in Ultraman. And ultimately that strength is what enables you to step out of the compulsion to train. As well, as we age, we change. And our neurochemistry changes.

And men particularly, we're gonna become a lot less aggressive. It's also why I would really caution people about supplementing with testosterone and that. You don't necessarily want to give yourself the chemistry of a 19-year-old again. You want to let that aging process play out for you because it can be very beneficial to your life to do that and to let you fully engage in your family and ultimately become the leader and the elder that your family's going to need you to be later in life and develop. And I think that'll

be part of the transcendence. But personally, I'm thinking maybe not yet in the sense that I'm not quite ready to step all the way out. I would really like to get some fitness back and share some of that with my son or the young man my son will become. I think I'd find that very rewarding and I think I could offer something to him. Maybe I'm reading between the lines here, but I do get this sense that part of the challenge for you

or what you're kind of grappling with is how do you kind of quote unquote like coach your kids and parent your children, but do it in a way where you can have some level of healthy detachment from the results of that, right? Like if you're so caught up in like what your kids are doing, the path, the paths that they're pursuing, that can be, you know, as unhealthy an obsession as anything else. Yeah. So you just touched on it. If you don't deal with it in yourself, you're passing it right down the family tree. And that's what happens in this town. That's why I don't go to swim meets. The vibe sometimes there is really intense for me. So yeah, you know, you just, you pass, I mean, it's addiction and family systems. It's like epigenetics.

You just, you pass that behavioral pattern right down through the kids. Yeah. The reality though, with elite and super elite performance is it's not your decision as the parent. The path is so difficult. There's so much work required that ultimately it'll be, you'll have to pass the, basically pass the child off to the adult they will become, and then it's up to them. And that's something I talk about with parents is it's not gonna be your decision. You can't make this happen.

You can prevent it from happening. You can make mistakes. The other thing is, I would say work on yourself, get yourself worth tied up in yourself rather than in your kids. You know, bring honor to your family through the way you're acting under the roof when nobody's looking. I mean, that's kind of what I'm all about because this whole integrity thing. I couldn't go out and be a hero athlete and have these age group victories and know that my wife was at home with a bunch of toddlers really struggling.

I mean, that just, for me, that sort of didn't work. And I think that's probably something, well, that's a lot of top athletes have to grapple with at some point. And I would encourage the athletes to turn towards the kids. Because if you don't, you're very likely, because I've seen it at the other end, you're very likely to have some lifelong regrets.

But if you turn towards the kids and things don't work out, in your heart, you'll know that you had done the right thing for those kids when they were kids. Yeah, yeah, that's well put. I wanna pivot back to the big speech that you never got to make. I don't know how much of those themes that we've hit on,

but I wanna return to this idea of latent potential. You know, your story is so powerful in that you were able to unlock this capacity that you didn't know existed, but you had a tickle in the back of your soul that was telling you to move in a certain direction. So that was expressed athletically in your life. It can be directed in any number of,

millions of different ways, depending upon who you are. But on the theme of like the speech that you wanna make, like what is it, how can we continue that thread on unlocking the potential that we all have? Well, what's your tickle? I mean, what's tickling? So you out there that's listening to Rich and me, do you know your tickle? Do you know what it is? Are you listening? Are you able to get in contact with that part of your mind, with whatever the muse, with wherever that

comes from. Are you able to get in touch with that? Now, here's a way to get in touch with it. You can get yourself a copy of The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. You can do the morning pages. You can diarize. Do you still do it? Well, actually, so in 2000, I wrote 10 things.

I did the process. It's like daily pages. You just write three pages of whatever comes to your mind every morning, say for a month. Then you just do it. No judgment. And then you go back and you read it, you look for your themes and you just put together a top 10 list. Okay. And I wrote 10 things down on a piece of paper. And I got them all done in five years. And some of them seemed way out there. Like, you know, and- Like what? You know-

Big like Cheshire grin. So I have to ask. You know, I had no experience writing. I wanted to touch 100,000 people with my writing. I wanted to, and more than that, I wanted to help 100,000 people. And writing. I wanted to, and more than that, I wanted to help 100,000 people and I don't know where it came from. And that was my goal.

And I mean, I don't know, I think we sold 50,000 copies of the book or something. So, you know, that was half of it. And the rest was, you know, you get your IP stats on your blog and that. Love in my life, I was really hurt from that whole process of the divorce. If I read my writing at the time, I could see the pain. I was very anti-marriage.

But when I met Monica, I knew that if I let her go, it'd be the biggest mistake of my life. That's how I knew we had to get, I mean, it was like, we have to get married. Like I, this is, you know, I don't know. It's just, I, it was just, that was it. And that feeling, and I accepted the feeling. It was the right, it was, I feel so lucky that it kind of worked out for us and we're different, but we're also, you know, we got that, the way we live as active people and our values are a good fit, even though we're very different in terms of approach. So I would say, you know, just get yourself a top 10 list, you know, just write down 10 things you want to get done, look at it every day, change it, work on it. And if you don't know that top 10 list, just keep doing the

morning pages. Yeah. And listen, like listen to what you want to do. And I would say, you know, in the top 10 list, there could be some thin, there could be some thin desires. I mean, not every, like one of them is just ride up independence, go down the other side and ride back up Independence. It's a big climb. It tops out about 12,000 feet. It's just something. It just kind of came to me. Some of them are pretty deeper.

I mean, I've got a friend that just retired from the Navy. And I got another friend who's a doctor. And when they listen to me, I really feel heard. And I was like, you know what? If I could listen just a bit like those guys can listen, it would really change my life. It would be one of those transformative skills. So that's one of my things. And then another one of my things is just get fit

and expedition with my son. So, I mean, you've got to let yourself know, even if it seems impossible, I guess it's kind of like acknowledging maybe where you want to go. And you'd be surprised, your brain does a good job of taking you there. At least mine does with these things.

And it's fun to have a project that you're working on. Yeah. I mean, I think the issue that a lot of people run into is just starting to create that connection with self that has been shunted for too long because we're living our lives and we're on a certain path or a certain direction and we don't have time or bandwidth

to really entertain the muse, right? And so to sit down and create a practice out of engaging with your unconscious impulses is really powerful. So if you feel like, I don't know, everybody talks about chasing their passion. I don't know, you know, everybody talks about chasing their passion. I don't know what my passion is. Well, just start writing. And then, like you said, you review these pages and you will start to see recurring themes. And I think when you see things

that recur, it's a cue to pay attention and to maybe say, okay, why is this recurring? Let me go a little bit deeper into this. And then it's the simple things like, you know, maybe it's just some stupid thing that you kind of always wanted to do that's easy to do, like honoring that, right? And the more energy that you give to those things, they then, you know, lead you in a certain direction, like another brick gets laid. And I think the problem is most people get caught up in wanting to know the destination. Like when you said, you know, I just can't show up at this office anymore in Hong Kong, I need to do something else. It wasn't because you had a vision of crossing the finish line at Ultraman, you just had a gut

feeling that you needed to be outdoors or doing something else, right? You don't get to see too many steps down the path. And I think that's where a lot of people get caught up because they can't see that destination. They're then too afraid to indulge the impulse. Easy exercise, light exercise, walking, meditation, cycling. If they're an athlete from your background, it'll be touching the water, easy.

It'll get you back in your body. The issue I had in Hong Kong was I wasn't in myself in the sense that there was all this stress and noise and cars and like all that kind of city stuff. I needed to get kind of into myself. And what I mean is it's this concept of maybe an integrated self or even just, you know, and that's where exercise is great. It peels it away. I think part of that for a lot of people, extreme exercise, dangerous exercise, I was a mountaineer before, is it gets you to that state of emptiness. So when you're on a climb, and if you make a mistake, you're going to die, your mind goes empty. And there's this stillness and quietness that you

experience that you don't experience at a desk in Hong Kong. And the stillness, you can misinterpret it so that you're attracted to the stillness. You're not attracted to the danger. I think a lot of people misinterpret it. So in the ultra community, you think it's the fatigue that is the necessary ingredient, but it's not. It's the letting go and the stillness that is what you're feeling. And it can mislead you. And so you keep going back to the danger if your pursuit is a climber or the free solo, but, but you know, this, your goals are available right now.

The stillness is available right now. If you can, if you can figure out a way to tap into it and you tap into it by kind of peeling all this other stuff away, all these, all these desires and this noise. And it's a meditative practice for many. For me, it's always been exercise outside, particularly with trees around me. I don't know what the deal is. When I'm around trees, I'm totally chilled out.

And maybe that's growing up in Vancouver. You know, it was like, there's like rain and water and trees, but that's what it's about. So I would say to people, you know, get in touch, figure out what that is, whatever that natural source is. And I think you'll find if you give yourself that, a little bit of it every day, and it might just be like just walking around the block, getting away from your desk or something. Sometimes I just walk up the street and have a look at the flat irons, and then come on back down just for a bit of a reset

and get in touch with that. I detect a strain of Buddhism in that perspective. Is that accurate? And then as you're telling that I'm remembering, maybe my memory is failing me, but did you not like study Buddhism? Did you do a tenure at Naropa? Or am I imagining that?

Well, actually it's a, I knew an Indonesian beauty queen called Sita. And when I was in Hong Kong and she, the teachings of Buddha, she, you know, one day she just gave me that book and she said, you know, here you go. And that's it. She gave me the book. And that was kind of my introduction to Buddhism.

And then I read it. And then, you know, like I said, with the whole neurochemistry and kind of getting open up, you know, it opens your mind up, the exercise and stuff. And then that was like a seed. And then I studied a lot of Asian philosophy. And so, you know, it just kind of grows on you. I mean, Buddhism is really just common sense though, I would say. I didn't formally study at Naropa, but I've done a lot of reading of the different traditions, all the major traditions. There's a part of me that was very Old Testament. Yeah.

Very Old Testament. So it's, you know, my need for revenge. The baser Gordo. At bay, held at bay. It's there. I mean, these ancient traditions are like built on who we are. And I mean, you can learn something from all of them. So I feel, and also I like a lot of rules.

So Judaism, I mean, kind of appeals to me, the code. You know, I really relate to that. Right. Well, I think, you know, the codification appeals to your, you know, kind of numbers brain. My sense of structure. Yeah, like so much of the way that you think about, you know, living a principled life is, is drilling down to, you know, kind of like these enumerated tools that reminds me of, um, who's the Farnham street guy, Shane, uh, Shane. Yeah. So it's like, I had him on the podcast and I made a joke with him. I was

like, you're, you're a, you're a computer programmer. You're trying to, you're literally trying to come up with a coding language for human behavior. You know, and I see, you know, a strain of that sensibility in the way that you think about these things as well. You know, so kids have been great in the sense of trying to take things a little less seriously. First website that was ever built for me, the webmaster, she put a quote on it. You know, don't take life so seriously. Nobody's going to make it out alive. That was on the front page way back 20 years ago.

And I do take things seriously. And I take things too seriously and and my friends that operate in the in the real world i have some friends that are really good at getting along with everybody and that's a skill and we need people like that um you know so we need we need folks that are like you know um into duty and service and honor but we also need other people that are a little more relaxed and able to kind of forgive, you know, the wisdom of forgiveness.

That's something I could definitely do better at. So. I wanna kind of end this by bringing it back to the walk. You know, like I think, you know, the fact that this whole journey begins with a walk for you is a really powerful metaphor. Like if anybody takes anything away from this, it's that if you have an impulse to do this thing,

that's sort of orthogonal to the way that you've been living, that that's something that you should pay attention to and honor. So maybe, you know, like let's end this with some principled thoughts around, you know, honoring yourself on this journey towards that greater kind of self-integration and authenticity. Because when I look at you, it's like everything you've done is to be just more of who you are and like honoring that along the way and enduring self-imposed hardship on some level

in order to kind of bring that to the surface. Yeah. Well, we like things to be difficult. I read your book. I connect with that. Most of my friends are that way too. My wife's a bit like that. I see it with some of my kids. So some folks like it to be difficult. So you need to,

so if you can see that in yourself, if you happen to be wired that way, you have to, there's a couple of things. I would say, be careful about hurting yourself because you like it to be difficult. You don't need to hurt yourself. You can challenge yourself without hurting yourself and you can challenge yourself without hurting other people. So that's that personality strain. But when I went for that walk, I was not that man. I didn't have that capability. That was something that I built up over time. How did I build that up over time? The number one thing that I would hope somebody that wants to make a change,

I would say, first off, stay in the game. Stay with us. You help the world. You help the community by staying with us. Don't check out, Stay. The next thing, always stay. The next thing I would say to that individual is make a small promise to yourself. Might be a walk. It might just be waking up before noon. It's a small promise and you're going to start really small and it's going to seem tiny. And all you got to do is keep that

small promise to yourself. And every positive change in my life has built from the ability to keep a small promise to myself. And this skill has extended to some very difficult challenges. And it grows on itself over time. It's a skill. It's a strength. And you can build out from that in your life. But you have change starts small and it's a daily habit of doing the small thing to start the day. And you turn yourself into a winner by having a small win every day. And that's how it happens. Yeah. And those small wins, when they accumulate, Yeah, and those small wins, when they accumulate, create a momentum that then takes on its own energy. Human beings are not capable of understanding compounding.

That's the number one lesson. Says the finance guy. Trust me, I'm professionally trained. I've spent my whole life working around money and with investments and I still get it wrong. I still underestimate the power of the thousand days. I would really encourage people to start small, stick with it and it's gonna change your life. It really will.

Well, I think that's a good place to put a pin on it for now, but hopefully to be continued, because this was magical and I love talking to you. I'd love to have you back on and explore some of this stuff more deeply. I think you have a gift for helping people and for communicating your experience. I hope that at some point

you'll consider writing another book. I think you've got a great book inside you. And it's just been great to see you kind of resurface on the internet and how that kind of like brought us together. Finally, you know, you're somebody I've wanted to meet for a long time. And I say this like with all of my heart,

you've been like so helpful and instrumental in kind of guiding me from afar. And I just, I really appreciate that. And just wanted to thank you for that and for being so open today. Thank you. Yeah. Gordo's easy to find on Twitter at Gordo. Is it GordoBurn1? No, no. It's GordoBurn. What is it? Oh, feed Burn. No, I got to say it. That's the website. So my kids, well, the blog is, yeah, it's a WordPress blog. Well, it's Feel the Burn. Feel the Burn.

But Burn, everybody always says my, yeah, everybody says my name wrong. And then Bernie comes out. He's very popular in Boulder. Feel the Burn was the slogan. So somehow my kids got on feel the burn. So when they go to their swim meets, it's like, yeah, people are gonna be feeling the burn today. Like we're gonna be racing.

So it's feel the burn with a Y, but on Twitter, I'm feel the burn one. There you go. So. All right, man. Thanks, buddy. Peace. That's it for today. Peace. Visit the episode page at richroll.com where you can find the entire podcast archive,

as well as podcast merch, my books, Finding Ultra, Voicing Change in the Plant Power Way, as well as the Plant Power Meal Planner at meals.richroll.com. If you'd like to support the podcast, the easiest and most impactful thing you can do is to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify and on YouTube and leave a review and or comment.

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Peace. Plants. Namaste. Thank you.