The Rich Roll Podcast - Roll On: How Social Media Erodes The Mind, Finding Meaning in Grief & Fitness After Covid (+ Endurance Wins & Rollie Victors!)

Episode Date: April 21, 2022

Welcome to another edition of ‘Roll On’, wherein Rich Roll and journalist & author Adam Skolnick riff on matters of interest across sports, culture, entertainment, and self-betterment.  Topics discussed in today’s episode include: Rich’s recent adventures in Miami (and getting COVID) Oz Pearlman’s Central Park FKT Robbie Balenger on ‘outlasting a Tesla’ Memorable performances from the Boston Marathon Why the Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been Uniquely Stupid Winners of the 2021 ‘Rollies’ Coaching check-in with Chris Hauth; and We field a listener question on how to make sense of catastrophic and heartbreaking losses If you want your query discussed in a future ‘Roll On’, leave it on our voicemail at [phone]. Note: We will be recording a sleep specific AMA episode with Dr. Matthew Walker (RRP 600) in the near future. Please submit your seep questions for consideration by sending an e-mail to [e-mail] or leaving a voicemail at [phone]. Reminder that you can watch today’s podcast on YouTube. And as always, the podcast streams wild and free on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Enjoy! Peace + Plants, Rich

The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey everybody, welcome to Roll On, where my journalist appendage, Mr. Adam Skolnick and I rip matters of interest from the headlines and our lived experience. We riff on sports, culture, entertainment, self-betterment. We answer a few listener questions and so much more. Today we've got a fun, I should say light in comparison

to at least the roll on from two weeks ago. Show today, we're gonna announce the winners of the 2021 Rollies. Ooh, very exciting. Talk a little bit of endurance news, answer one single listener question. And once again, we're gonna close with a coaching call check-in with friend of the pod, my coach, Chris Hout,

the man guiding me towards this perhaps ill-fated 12 and a half mile open water swim race that is looming on my calendar. But first, how goes it comrade? Rich, Larry Ellison owes me $25. That sounds like a story. It's not that great of a story, but I went, we have a family and I, we went to the tennis tournament,

Larry's tennis tournament, Indian Wells. And we had two days planned. One day we went, we took my parents, we got like two stadium seats and we had two days planned. One day we went, we took my parents, we got like two stadium seats and we had two grounds passes and we brought Zuma because April was a very high ranked junior tennis player in Australia. So tennis is a big deal in our house.

And so anyway, we parked the car in this huge grassy lot, looks like sides of Coachella Festival. And as we're walking, we're pushing the stroller. It looks like the size of Coachella Festival. And as we're walking, we're pushing the stroller. It's a vaccinated only entrance thing. And Zuma is under five, can't be vaxxed. But usually they're allowed in anyway. But in this case, we had all the people who were working in the parking lot saying, they're not going to let them in. They're not going to let them in. So we were prepared. I go up to the counter or whatever, the ticket place to get my refund because I said, well, okay, I'll just get my money back.

Couldn't go because they wouldn't let Zoom in. And nowhere on the website does it say, you know, you have under five aren't allowed. And so then, but she wouldn't give me my parking refund because she couldn't, because it's been scanned. So like there was no way for her to do it. And so I'm like, I'm parking, refund, because she couldn't, because it's been scanned. So like there was no way for her to do it. And so I'm like, okay. And so she said, you can just call, email this guy

and he'll- Larry Ellison, directly. Turned out to be Larry. And I haven't heard back yet. Okay. Yeah. So how are we gonna get justice for you for this? You know, Larry's very busy.

I don't wanna be an apologist for Larry. He is very busy. He does owe me $25 and I am gonna tax some interest on there. Well, maybe when you're out swimming, you'll see him fly by on one of his sailboats. Yeah, well, to make matters worse, I shorted Twitter. Yeah, not smart.

Yeah, because Elon comes in, he's a regular at the B and J. And he comes in, he gets a triple scoop. He gets a triple scoop, I'm just saying. And he told me he was gonna buy Twitter. He was gonna bull rush Twitter. And I thought he was kidding, cause he's that kind of guy. We have like a, like you and I,

like you and I, you know, we have a thing. And I thought he was fucking with me, so I shorted Twitter. It's gonna be interesting to see what pans out with that. I know. It's all upside down. Poison pill and everything. That's a different podcast though.

We're not gonna pick that one apart today. We're not getting into Elon's head today. I will say that I stood behind Larry Ellison in line at a CVS once. How did that go? I don't know. I mean, it was just, he was buying band-aids or something. I can't even remember.

This was years ago. Celebrities are just like us. What's interesting is that, you know, he owns like an insane amount of Malibu beachfront property, including I think where like Nobu and the Soho house is. Doesn't he own the Malibrew Beach Inn and the Ryoko? I think so, I think so. And Lanai, he owns the island of Lanai.

He owns like that whole island, right? Founder of Oracle for people that don't know. Which is cloud stuff. He did make an appearance in Founder Television. Did you watch the dropout? I watched the first, because when we were talking, I watched the first you watch the dropout? I watched the first, cause when we were talking, I watched the first episode of the dropout.

So he is portrayed in that mini series, including a scene with Elizabeth Holmes played by Amanda Seyfried on one of his yachts in the San Francisco Bay. He does seem to live well. Yeah, anyway, that is all aside of what we're actually gonna talk about today. Yes.

But first I should probably check in with what's going on. Yeah, what's going on with you? I know you were in Miami. Adam, I'm always waiting, you know, I always ask you what's going on with you. You never ask me what's going on with me. It's true. I feel unfulfilled in this relationship.

Every week I miss my cue. What's going on with you? If we're gonna have a healthy relationship, it has to be two ways. That's what I told Elon yesterday. Okay, anyway, I'm good. I was in Miami like two weeks ago and had this incredible experience.

I hosted my first conference. It was for this organization called YPO, Young Presidents Organization. I've done a lot of events for this organization over the years. What does that mean? It's basically like this global organization of young CEOs and each kind of local chapter functions

almost like a mastermind group where it's pretty cool though. Like they really help each other out and they have all these like family community oriented events and all this infrastructure, but it's essentially like young CEOs. I think there's a cap on the age limit. And it's kind of like a way for them to have a means to share what's going on with them

and have other people help out, et cetera. Info share. And they do like a lot of speaking stuff. So like when I went to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia and Bahrain and Morocco, like all of those were YPO events, which is cool. But I- Do they cap on the boomers when they're in private?

I don't know. But this was my first stab at actually hosting like an all day event where I had to be on stage, like, I don't know, 14 times over the course of the day. And it was a wellness oriented thing where a lot of friends of the podcast were actually the speakers like Matthew Walker and Valter Longo, Laird and Gabby were there,

Dan Buettner, Mark Hyman was there, Ken Cook from the Environmental Working Group, Chip Conley, who's this hotelier who was instrumental in helping build Airbnb, who now has this thing called the Modern Elder Academy, he was super cool. Cool. Ken and Chip, I'm definitely getting on the podcast. We're trying to schedule all that right now.

But my point being like, I thought it would be like, oh, it'll be cool. Like you just get up and you introduce each guest, like how hard can it be? And then when I got into like the responsibility of what that entailed, because you're basically like charged with holding the energy of the crowd and keeping this thing moving and making sure

that everyone's really engaged and interested in what's happening and ended up like rehearsing for like eight hours the day before and wrote like a 35 page script. And then during the day was like revising the script and trying to find jokes. And it was a cool challenge and definitely like a puzzle that I've never tried to assemble before, but it was pretty thrilling.

It went well. Yeah, I dug it. It was super fun. And everyone was into it. Yeah, I It went well? Yeah, I dug it. It was super fun. And everyone was into it? Yeah, I think so. I mean, I think it went really well and I found like a groove with it. I found it to be more fulfilling

than just being one of the keynote people. Right. Because it's like, okay, it's up to you. Like, can you get these people excited? Can you make sure that they're holding their attention? Can you keep them entertained? Can you keep this thing moving on time? All that kind of stuff.

It was pretty cool. So anyway, that was really gratifying. Cool. I really wanna do more of that. Like that kind of busted my cherry with that type of work. And I have such a whole new level of respect for people that host, because I think it's easy to look at,

I don't know, people that host like reality TV shows and the like, and just be like, they just read, they're reading off teleprompter. How hard can it be? Like the bachelor guy. Yeah, like, well, I called my friend, Osher Gunsberg, who hosts The Bachelor in Australia. And I was like, cause I was having a panic moment.

I was like, dude, I gotta do this thing tomorrow. And I just realized like, it's so much more intense than I thought it would be. And I only have so much time to get ready. Like, you gotta do this thing tomorrow. And I just realized like, it's so much more intense than I thought it would be. And I only have so much time to get ready. Like you gotta talk me through this. And he spent a couple hours with me on the phone and it was incredibly helpful. He gave me all of these tips and tools

cause he's been doing it for like 25 years. I like the amazing race guy, Jeff Probst. Yeah, right? I could see you as a Jeff Probst. It's a cool thing. Like I was very dismissive of the whole thing until I did it. And I was like, wow, this is like a lot, you know.

Props to anybody who hosts stuff. So that was very cool. And I had gone to Miami a couple of days earlier so I could get some swimming in and prep for this race. Got a bunch of cool open water swims under my belt, including one the final day, I shared this on social media and I talked to you about it. I was out, I was probably a little bit too offshore,

like Miami beach, it stays pretty shallow until you get pretty far out. And it was a little bit choppier than I would have liked. So I wanted to get past the break, but it was still only, I was probably like 200 meters offshore. It was still only like maybe eight feet deep. So it's not like, oh man, I'm out at open sea or anything like that.

It's all very manageable. Swimming along and then four, five foot lemon sharks swam just beneath me, like right along the bottom, which was super cool. But also, you know, it's like, dude, they're sharks. They're right there. Sharks look like sharks. And I know that lemon sharks are not the most aggressive.

And I found myself much calmer in the situation that I would have predicted. I was like, okay, I should probably get a little bit closer to shore and just kind of calmly pivoted towards shore. And it's not like any of them even noticed me or anything like that. Well, they probably noticed you, but they didn't care.

Right, but they don't give a shit. Right. Right, which is, that's basically- And they would go close to shore too. I mean, that's 200, it's not like they're staying at 200. Right. Do you know much about lemon sharks? No, would you like me to Google?

Well, live right now. Live Google? Yeah. I mean, they're not innocuous. Like they have attacked people. I don't think they've ever- I think probably mistaken. I don't know if they've ever killed anybody. It's so rare for people to get even bit. It's crazy rare.

It's insane. But they weren't small. I mean, they were like the length of this table. No, they can get 11 feet. They can get, those are probably juveniles. They can get, I'm just looking at- And they look like, you know, like it's not like they look different

than what you would expect. Sharks always look so sharky, don't they? They can be counted out for that. Unless they're like the funky kind of like port towns. We just found the title of this podcast, sharks can look so sharky. I mean leopard sharks. That's the quote graphic that we're gonna use.

Like nurse sharks have the little like catfish thingos that makes you realize that whale sharks still look sharky, but that you know they don't bite you. But everything from reef shark up looks so sharky. Let's see what it says. What does it eat? It eats known ultra athletes that wrote books. That's a very small group of people.

Yeah, they eat crustaceans. You know, they're not eating humans. I know. So that was a cool experience. I'd never been out in the water and seen a shark in the wild. Never? No.

What about in Hawaii? You never seen it? You never seen reef sharks in Hawaii? Dolphins, but never, no. Really? Maybe tiny little sharks that I don't even remember, but nothing that was like, wow, that's a legit. A legit shark.

Group of sharks right there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know. That's fun. In any event, the conference that I was at was just prior to the Bitcoin conference. Okay. Which is what brings, like that was like a big deal.

So I left like the day before that started, but I have a bunch of friends that are Bitcoiners who came into town early. So I was able to see one or two of them. Did you guys hit the clubs? It made me, no. But I have this friend, Peter McCormick, who has the biggest Bitcoin podcast.

It's called What Bitcoin Did. And he came on one of our retreats to Italy several years ago. And he had this idea of starting a Bitcoin podcast and I kind of helped him get it up on its feet. And now he's like the man in Bitcoin. Like he ended up like hosting essentially like a full day of the conference.

Like he's a big name in that world. And it made me think like, oh, maybe Peter would be a good guest. Like I've never had anyone on to talk about Bitcoin. Yeah, that's a good idea. I have a lot to learn. We've attempted to talk about NFT. Yeah, I'm the furthest thing from an expert on crypto.

No. But it ain't going away. And that Bitcoin conference was a big deal. You know what my favorite thing about crypto is? The Larry David commercial. That you don't have any of it? The Larry David, I do have some. Oh, is that the Superbowl commercial one?

Yeah, yeah. I can't remember whether I saw that or not. Oh yeah, it's great. We'll link it in the show notes. There's a long form on YouTube. Yeah, no, I do own some Bitcoin. Not Bitcoin, some lesser known cryptos. Some weird crypto coin?

All right, why is that? No, I own some lesser known cryptos. Some weird crypto coin? All right, why is that? No, I own some lesser known cryptos that haven't quite taken off yet. I own like a negligible amount of Bitcoin. Like a quarter of a coin? Less than that. A quarter of a coin would be, I mean, Bitcoin's at 40 grand right now.

So a quarter of a coin would be- 10 full grand? Yeah, it would be 10 grand. Okay. I don't have that. Larry Ellison, if you're listening, you can put that 25 straight into a Bitcoin percentage. Into your wallet, your crypto wallet.

In my crypto wallet. Exactly. Not yours, Larry. But here's the thing. I returned from Florida with COVID, which is interesting because I thought COVID didn't exist in Florida, but maybe that's why I didn't start to experience symptoms until I was on the plane home.

I like that joke, but Rich, I think it's good. You left Miami with a communicative disease like you should have. Right. I mean, I interacted with hundreds of people. It was spring break. The Bitcoiners were coming into town. You also went to spring break?

Well, spring, like you're in these hotels at Miami beach. And it's just like, like at the pools all day long and all night. You can't escape it. And the music let's, you know what?

I like dance music. I like house music. This is where I'm an old man. I'm like, I like dance music. I like, I like the old, I like the disco house,

the old stuff, this crap, this like Miami version. it's remarkably bad. What's interesting is that in Miami, everywhere you go, that's the soundtrack. I went to the Time Out food court, like Time Out builds these food courts all over the world with like, and they're pretty cool spaces.

And they built one on Lincoln Road in Miami and I'd never seen it or been to it. I was like, oh, I'm gonna go check it out. And I walked in and it was like, oomph, oomph, like so loud in there that I did a loop and just walked out. I was like, I can't eat in here. Oh, that was the dinner soundtrack.

No, it was in the middle of the day. Let me hear what was the soundtrack again. It's just, oomph, oomph, you know, like, come on. All right, anyway. What hotel did you stay in? I was at the W. Is the Standard still there? Because they closed here,

but the Standard there is cool. The Standard was there, but the Delano, which was kind of like the OG hotspot, is closed down right now. And that used to be the furthest north than anybody would go in South Beach before it kind of got gnarly.

Now it goes quite a bit further north, but there's still, it's an interesting spot. I like Miami. I think Miami has some charm. Some people don't like it because it looks like shallow on the surface. I like that it's like this great Pan-American city, probably the only Pan-American city

where people from all over Latin America live. It's a true bilingual city. It's got great Cuban and just Latino food in general, Mexican, Cuban, whatever, everything's there. Yeah, and if you're there and you wanna eat plant-based, you gotta go to Love Life in Wynwood. So our friends, Diego and Veronica own this restaurant. They're geniuses.

It is the best plant-based restaurant I've ever been. Really? And that's like, I say that, like I've been to a lot of places. You're gonna get a lot of phone calls and texts. I know, I love it. They're so good. Diego's recipes are incredible.

Does he have a cookbook? I love it. I shared it. No, they don't have a cookbook. I think one of the recipes is gonna be in Dan Buettner's next book, which is coming out soon. Oh, cool.

And they're making some cool moves that aren't public yet, but I'll be sharing about soon. Buettner's And they're making some cool moves that aren't public yet, but I'll be sharing about soon. I love them. Living out there. So yeah, that's my recommendation. Love life in Wynwood. Good stuff.

But anyway, yeah, I came back with COVID. That's why there was no roll on last week, which is, you know, we would have typically done it then. How was it for you? It was pretty mild. You know, I was vaccinated. So within it for you? It was pretty mild. I was vaccinated. So within a couple of days, I was kind of over it.

I didn't lose my taste. I didn't lose my smell. I had two nights where I experienced some form of fever and chills. So for 48 hours, just at night, I got like shivery or whatever. And then basically just kind of achy and weak for a couple of days.

And then it passed. So- Did you isolate somewhere in the house? I isolated in my tent. You stayed in the tent? So I was like the English patient. You were. It was like, you know, Tyler was joking.

The smallpox guy in his tent. It's like it's 1910 and you're recovering from consumption. Yes, yes. In the backyard. The only problem is it was like 95 degrees out. So the tent got way too hot in the middle of the day for me to convalesce.

But yeah, I isolated and everybody else in the family is fine. I basically just hydrated, slept, rested. I did do a five day course of Paxlovid, which is an antiviral that was recommended to me. And I think that probably expedited how quickly I got over it. In addition to that, I took a lot of supplements.

I took about 40,000 IUDs of vitamin D every day, vitamin C, vitamin K, quercetin, curcumin on top of what I typically take, which is just a multivitamin, athletic greens, B12 and stuff like that. So your pee was like rainbow color. It was very, yeah, it was very yellow. It was very yellow.

But three and a half days in, I was pretty much fine. I had talked to a bunch of athletes who were cautioning me not to get back into any kind of training and to really take my time with it because it can snap back on you. I've had friends that have taken three weeks off, but I felt like five days in, I was like, I felt completely fine.

So I went back to the pool on day six, I think, for a light swim and I've just been slowly building since then, but I feel 100% now. But I did miss, I think, seven days of training. So in the context of training for this long open water swim that is not too far away in the future, that definitely set me back. Seems like you're rocking it though,

from Instagram stories. Okay, it's been nice to just be in the pool and focus on swimming every day, because during all of the ultra endurance races that I trained for, I would only swim two or three days a week, because the focus was on other stuff. So it's been decades since I just focused on swimming

and kind of swam pretty much every day. And it feels good. I feel swam pretty much every day. And it feels good. I feel strong and getting stronger every day. You look great. Thank you, sir. Yeah, thank you. Yes. What else we got?

A quick little piece of housekeeping before we move into the next thing. Matthew Walker, who was in Miami, I talked to him about coming back on the podcast. Oh, cool. And I think what we wanna do is an AMA formatted conversation that's obviously specific to sleep. We haven't scheduled it yet, but we'll be doing that

at some point in the spring or the summer. And I thought it would be good to just make the announcement now. If you have a sleep question, you can submit that on our voicemail at 424-235-4626, or you can send an email to rrpstudio at richroll.com. So sleep questions only to that email for Matthew Walker. We'll go through all the questions, of course,

find the best ones and kind of do a very structured sleep oriented conversation. I'm really not that great at sleep. If Matthew cares to tinker with me or in any way. I think Matthew cares deeply, Adam. Yeah, he seems like a caring guy. He is, he's a wonderful, wonderful man. All right, well, let's do our endurance sports check-in.

We got a lot of news to share today. Where do you wanna start? Robbie Ballinger. Of course. John Henry, or as I call it, John Henry 2.0, or as I call him, Don Juan Henry. Don Juan, he is very charming with that mustache. Very swarthy.

Don Juan Henry. The idea was that he was going to outlast a Tesla, outrun a Tesla. I think there's a lot of people who don't know. Tesla, you pronounce it Tesla. As opposed to what? Tesla. Tesla, Tesla, Tesla. Tesla. Like a Z with a As opposed to what? Tesla. Tesla, Tesla, Tesla. Tesla.

Like a Z with a Z vibe on it, Tesla. That's what you said. I don't know. I'm not even consciously aware of how I'm pronouncing it. My point though, is that you throw the name John Henry out like everybody knows who that is. People don't know who John Henry is? Do they not learn that in grade school anymore? There might be a lot of people out there

who are less studied in American history. So spell it out. John Henry, it was this period of time when basically people were building the roads and getting through mountains. So they were using, they would blow it up and then people would kind of go in with a pickaxe and like hack their way through mountains.

And then the steam engine was invented. And John Henry was the greatest of them all. He did the work of 20 men. There's like folk songs about him. Yeah. He was like the David Goggins of road engineers. He was the workhorse beyond. Like he was like, you know, 50 men. He ate like, you ate like 10 steaks for breakfast kind of thing, I forget what it was. But he, and he was like revered. And this steam engine came along and promised to put them all out of work. And so John Henry was challenged to beat the steam engine.

I think he did it for his fellow workers. Let's show this engine who's boss and the coal powered steam engine. I think he did it for his fellow workers. You know, let's show this engine who's boss and the coal powered steam engine versus John Henry. And John Henry was in a race, but it was a timed race. And John Henry beats the steam engine and then dies on the spot. Like drilling through the side of a mountain. Right.

And then he dies at the finish line, but he wins. There's a great book called John Henry Days by Colson Whitehead who I've name dropped on this podcast a few times before. It's one of his first books. I think it's his second or third. Very, very, very funny, very poignant. It's excellent.

And so John Henry Days, and I actually recommended that to Robbie in case he was interested. Right. Yeah. Well, not to spoil it, Robbie did not die. No. At the end of his challenge. And it wasn't timed.

It wasn't timed. And he did technically outlast the Tesla, although he didn't meet his kind of time goal. So basically this Tesla starts out on the outskirts of Austin and drives until it has a full battery charge and drives until the battery dies. It goes 242 miles and Robbie's challenge was to run

that distance from where the Tesla started in under 72 hours. He succeeded in running the full 242 miles. It took him a little bit longer, just under 77 hours. And I think, you know, the heat and humidity of the Texas hill country, like an average of 93 degrees Fahrenheit plus 13,000 feet of elevation gain. We think of Texas as flat,

but they did it in the hill country. So lots of ups and downs was, you know, it laid the pain on him. It's a lot of miles. And I had serious FOMO watching this because I was invited to attend and support and I really wanted to, but I had just gotten back from Miami

and didn't feel like I could leave town again. Plus I had COVID so I couldn't have gone even if I had agreed to do it. So I just watched it on Instagram like everybody else. But what was cool is so many cool people and friends of the podcast were there to support Robbie. We had Hela was there, Hela Sidibe, of course. Dan Churchill, who hasn't been on the podcast,

but is a good friend of mine. He is the owner and head chef at Charlie Street in New York City. Just an amazing dude, a guy that everybody should follow on Instagram. He shares recipes and training stuff. Super positive, fit dude, Australian contributor to Chris Hemsworth's Center app.

Oh, really? I love this guy. And he's an incredible athlete as well. So Dan underscore Churchill. He's very photogenic. He's very handsome and charming. Yeah. And positive.

Must be nice. Wonderful, wonderful guy. Robbie, of course, is Robbie Ballinger on Instagram. There's his page if you're watching on YouTube. So he was sharing, of course, images and videos along the way. But here's the idea, basically. Outlast of Tesla.

And he did. He did it. We had Hella there as well. Here's Hella with another guy who showed up to support Robbie, William Gouge, Gouge, who Robbie supported when William ran the circumference of the, I think he ran around the United Kingdom. Yeah.

Like a year ago and Robbie went out to crew for him and support him. He's an incredible athlete, very unique human being. He ran like 48 marathons in 30 days. Crazy. And then in the week, like prior to Robbie's challenge, he did marathon to sob and he shared all his WHOOP scores. Like I think WHOOP posted a bunch of stuff

like on their website. Maybe I can find a link to that. And then like a day later, he went to Zurich and ran a marathon there. And then he flew to Austin, did the Robbie thing. And then he went like straight to Coachella. Now he's like a hype beast in Coachella. Like this guy, like he wears gold chains.

He's very like, he's like a hype beast. And there's something like kind of cool. I like that the baggy sweats are back. I noticed clothes are gotten baggier. I mean, he's a style master, this dude. Like, you know, check him out. But like a beast of an athlete. And it was cool that Robbie supported him.

And then he flew all the way, you know, basically halfway around the world to support Robbie. Here's William at MDS. Oh, nice. Looking like a fashion model out on the sand. Anyway, really cool. Congrats to Robbie for his latest adventure that was- You mean Don Juan Henry.

Don Juan Henry, supported by 10,000, of course, that works with Dan Churchill and I. Yes. Among another, a group of really cool athletes. So it was kind of a 10,000 sponsored challenge. It was. Yeah. And it was cool to see what Robbie does next. It looked at one point, it looked like he was real shaky.

Like he could move, if he was moving, he was fine. But like getting up from his support vehicle and getting back on his feet, man, there were times where he was like, he was real wobbly, yeah. Yeah, super wobbly. And then he was running like no problem. But then he was fine, yeah.

And that's the way these ultras are. You look like, oh, there's no, this guy's done. There's no way he can't even walk. And then a couple hours later or night falls, gets a little bit cooler out, get some calories and some food, a little bit of a nap. And then all of a sudden it's a new human. Amazing.

So good on you, Robbie. Sorry I wasn't there to support you. We love you though. And it's cool to see you continue to inspire people all over the world. 100%. But Robbie plays a big part in the next dispatch from the world of endurance

that we're gonna talk about today. Yes, the O's Pearlman record. Yeah. You know, if you have not seen, I mean, I feel like your listeners and our listeners, our listeners. I feel like they're our listeners. Own it, Adam.

Our listeners are aware of what happened. You were Instagramming about it, tweeting about it. Oz Pearlman, Oz the Mentalist, who was just recently a guest on this here program, wanted to set the record for the FKT for most loops around Central Park. He ended up doing 19 loops, 116 miles. In a day. In a day. And it's important to note that-

It's 18 hours, 50 minutes. Yeah, they don't, it's only the part, that loop is only open during certain hours of the day, like 6 a.m. to 1 a.m. or something like that, right? That's right, 6 a.m. and you can't start till 6.05 and you have to finish at 12.55. So it gives you 18.50. And he's breaking Robbie's record.

Robbie did 16 loops and Robbie held the second FKT. So it's not that like it's been around a long time. It started in 2020. Someone laid down, I believe it was 12 loops. It's in the article. Aaron Zollho down, I believe it was 12 loops. It's in the article. Aaron Zollhofer, I believe is his name. And by the article, you must be referring to the New York Times article

that you wrote. Yes, so I was lucky enough to be able to cover it. So I knew OZ was gonna go for this. OZ, the backstory of the whole article is that David Goggins invited me to a Zoom at the beginning of the pandemic when Oz was having to transition his business from live shows to Zoom. And I'd heard of Oz before, but I wasn't really that acquainted with how great he was. And I sat in on this Zoom and I saw him predict the serial numbers on some dollar bill

in some dude's wallet, like 2,000 miles away from him through Zoom. And I realized, wow, this guy's amazing. And then quickly after that, I found out he was a great runner. And so I stayed in contact with him, just mostly Instagram messaging. And then I said, if there's ever an event he's going to tackle, let me know because I think it would be a cool story. And he was going to do last summer, Montauk to Manhattan, 170 miles, but it didn't end up happening. And so I'd already gotten New York Times Sports

interested in that. And then he called me like two weeks before this. So three weeks ago now, two weeks before this and said, what do you think of me doing this? And I said, I think that's great. And so I talked to my editor who's in charge of endurance and adventure sports at New York Times. Her name is Talia Minsberg.

And we talked about O's and she quickly got on board. And so I did it, you know, at first I said, you're the New York Times at Central Park. Like I can't get there and you don't need me there. You have a whole office of reporters, really good ones. Why don't you just do it? I wasn't even gonna do it. And, or that's how I positioned it.

But it turns out she wanted me to do it. So I ended up having to report it remotely, but Hilary Swift, who did amazing photographs, she was also kind of my eyes and ears. So we stayed in contact. I was obviously watching him on Instagram. I FaceTimed with him. I called him, I texted, everything.

So I had full access, but it was interesting that it was a remote story. And you talked to Robbie also. I talked to Robbie beforehand. So I interviewed Oze and Robbie the week before. And so that was cool as my first chance to really talk to Robbie and understand what he's about. So he's mentioned in there.

The best story that's not in there is there's a guy named George A. Hirsch. Have you heard of George A. Hirsch? He's the chairman of the New York Roadrunners. He's like 87 years old, I believe. And he also is a giant in publishing. He started New York Magazine. He went on to become the global editor,

first global editor of Men's Health. So, yeah. And so head of Men's Health, started a New York Magazine, also a giant in running. Not only is he now the acting chairman of New York Road Runners, he is the founder of the Five Borough New York Marathon. Wow.

So he changed that whole course and was an early runner, like in the 60s, he's running around, nobody's running. Anyway, so he became friends with Oze many years ago. And so he knew about, he's known him for a long time. And at one point when his wife was in the hospital, she died of cancer. And when she was in the hospital after like a treatment went bad,

Oze was out on a long run and stopped by. And you could tell he was running. He stopped by to lift her spirits because they'd had dinner. They were close. And he comes in and says to his wife, he does a whole thing with his wife to lift her spirits. And at one point he's like, this is what George described.

He says, I want you to think of one person that is famous and one person who's not. And she said, okay. And then he goes over to her laptop and he pulls up a picture of Bill Clinton and turns it to her. And she's like, of course, wow. You know, it's crazy. And then I wanna get this right, so I'm gonna go to,

then he scribbles down a note to, you know, and hands it to her and she opens up the note. And let me just make sure I get it. And she opens up the note and it says, say hello to Shirley. And George's wife was named Shay. That's Shay's childhood best friend from Idaho, Shirley. And so like, that's the kind of stuff he's doing.

And the fact that he took his time out and he did that, I think that's amazing. And I really wanted George to be part of the story, but there just wasn't enough words. And so they ended up using an example of what he did to me, which at mile 80, which was- You're on the phone with him. Yeah.

He's on mile 80. Mile 80. He's like running while talking to you on the phone. FaceTime. And he's like, Adam, I want you to think of a friend. And I said, okay. And he goes, he said, no, you're not thinking. If he's a friend, I could find, I could have researched.

You're thinking less clearly than me and I'm at mile 80. I want you to think of your first crush. And so I said, okay, thought of my first crush. Then he asked me, you know, how many letters were in her name or think of how, yeah. No, he said, think of her name. Okay, then he didn't ask me how many letters. He said, I want you to count the letters in her name.

I said, okay, done. And he goes, see, now I know it's a short name. Yeah, he got that right away. But that still doesn't, I mean, it was an odd name. And so then, pretty quickly he gets it. It's Roz, R-O-Z. It's really remarkable how quickly he gets it. And this is someone I haven't talked to,

I haven't heard from, I haven't had any contact with in decades. So there's impossible for him to like, it's just incredible. And he's running miles at this point. I mean, he did that time and time again, we just put up a video of kind of behind the scenes of when he was here,

where he's screwing around with the team here and doing all kinds of shenanigans. And it's just, it's unbelievable. Yeah, Blake, who the hell is Eamon? So that was the version of what he did to Hirsch's wife. He basically pulls this name out of nowhere so quickly. So he's a magic, he's a magical man. It is wizardry.

Yeah, it's really awesome. And it was a lot of fun to write it. And it was cool. It was one of those stories I'll remember. So if you're watching on YouTube, we're just kind of sharing the New York Times article. And in print, it was beautiful. I mean, they put all of these photographs in there

and it was a full page deal. So that's gotta be cool. Yeah, it was cool. And yeah, it was cool. And how does it work with the New York Times? It was teased to A1. Oh, yeah, teased to A1, right? That's a big deal.

Yeah. So you submit, you get like the green light to write this thing. Right. They assign a photographer, even though you're not there, you do your reporting, you write the thing, you turn it in, and then it goes through like a fact checking

and an editorial process, right? And they strip a bunch of stuff out of it. I mean, I think it depends on the desk. With sports stuff, I do my own fact checking. I want it real tight. So what happens is I report it, I'll file it. And then depending on the quick turnaround, this one we published Monday.

So there wasn't like, they had stuff already, Saturday and Sunday covered, so they didn't need more stories. And so we're later than everybody else, which means you have to be better than everybody else. You have to be smarter, right? But we also had more space. So I file it and then Talia does an edit, gets it back to me. I might make some changes. Then there's a second edit, like a copy edit, top edit. In that period of time, I'm doing all my fact checking.

And then I, so anything I'm not 100% certain on, I will call whoever. So with O's, I had to call him like three times on a day. And then he, here's the other thing. So we didn't even say what he did. He did 19 loops, 116 miles, crushes the record, goes home, it's, you know, at that point it's like what, two in the morning or something like that.

Goes home, grabs a couple hours of sleep and then has a 1pm flight to Augusta because he's doing a show at the Masters the next day. Totally fine, he's fine. And then he shares this and he's like, I feel guilty for not running today or I feel like I need to go running. He only lost one toenail.

Because he's on a streak, I think too. Yeah, well, no, he took a week off. Oh, he did? He took a week off. Okay. Shout out Hilary Swift, the photographer. She was on a bicycle, like, riding around with him all day. She must've done 50 miles on a bicycle.

And she's a good marathoner. She's a sub four-hour marathoner. And friends with Alexi. And friends with Alexi Pappas. And Talia, the editor on this, was also just ran Boston today. And she's a sub four-hour marathoner. So we're gonna talk about Boston,

but let's take a quick break and we'll be right back. 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 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, 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. 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. 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. Life 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, and we're back. We're gonna talk about Boston for a couple of minutes.

Today is Monday. So Boston was just run and concluded right before we started recording. By the time anybody listens to this, it will be Thursday at a minimum. So there'll be lots of articles out and hot takes, et cetera. So I don't wanna spend a ton of time on this other than to just kind of note

a couple interesting performances. First of all, friend of the pod, Scott Fable, been on the show before for a previous amazing Boston experience. He came in as the fastest American in seventh, ran PR of 208.52, seventh fastest American of all time. And what's interesting is that he's unsponsored right now. Really?

So he literally wore a Lululemon tank top that he bought himself off the rack. Incredible. Which is crazy. Yeah. Right? He's gonna be sponsored now. And interestingly, he even split the race.

He went from 22nd to seventh in the second half, ran 64.26 for the first half and 64.26 for the second half, which is unbelievable. Fastest American man since Meb in 2014. So a burrito for you, sir. That's his thing, burritos. We love you, Scott. Congratulations. There thing, burritos. We love you, Scott.

Congratulations. There were a lot of eyes on this athlete, CJ Albertson. He ended up being the third American, ran a 210, his PR. And the reason there's a lot of eyes on him is that he led Boston last year for the first, I don't know, 21 miles or something like that. Yeah, I think 21 miles he led the race. He's a rabbit.

He loves to be super aggressive. And he's been sharing his workouts on Strava and he's just an absolute maniac. So everyone's like, this guy's gonna crush it based on what he was posting in this public forum. His final long run leading into Boston was a 22 mile run where he averaged five minute pace. So he's a beast. And he sprinted like right off the start of Boston

and like led immediately and like really, you know, aggressively kind of forced the lead pack into, you know, a pace that was probably uncomfortable for most. So good for him. That's cool. On the women's side. Evans Shibet won for the men. Right.

Yeah, we should have noted who actually won the race. Correctly, thank you. Congrats to him. Yes. On the women's side, Olympic and New York City Marathon champion, Perez Chepchurcher. I hope I'm pronouncing that right, from Kenya One.

It was a epic final mile duel with the half marathon world record holder, Ababel Yeshene. Oh, really? I'm pronouncing that as well from Ethiopia. Perez ran 2.2101, second fastest ever at Boston. Yeshene ran 2.2105, so just four seconds separating them. Wow. Their final mile was a 523 mile.

That's how fast these women were running. That's amazing. But just of kind of personal interest, 42-year-old Edna Kipligott got fourth running 221, destroying her own master's record. 42 years old, 221, that's unbelievable. Nell Rojas was the top American with a 225, 57 performance. Among the other American women

who were getting a lot of attention, Stephanie Rothstein Bruce ran a 228. Des Linden, friend of the podcast, was the third American. She ran 228. Molly Seidel, there was a lot of eyes on her and she ended up dropping out. Did she not even tow up? No, she towed up and I can't remember

at what point she dropped out. I mean, again, I just glanced at results in Twitter quickly before we started recording. So my take is half baked at this point. Okay, cool. I do know that Knox Robinson of course was there running because he goes to every cool marathon. Alexi Pappas, interestingly, ran as a guide to a blind athlete, Lisa Thompson.

So that's pretty cool. And also, and this is kind of a story that's a bit aside that I've been tracking and paying attention to. Ultra runner and amputee, Jackie Hunt Brursma, and I hope I'm pronouncing her last name correct, also ran Boston. It was the 91st consecutive marathon that she's run. She's on pace to set a new world record.

92 days into her goal to run 102 marathons in as many days, which is pretty cool. Amazing. So I think Boston was, was it day 90? Maybe it was day 92. I'm not sure. Have you run Boston? I have not. How many marathons have you run? None really.

Oh, you haven't done an official marathon? No, I did the Long Beach Marathon like early in my ultra career and was humbled by that. And that's the only legitimate like marathon that I've ever- Do you ever wanna run New York? I know you love New York. Well, I got a charity slot for New York this year. I've gotta heal my back though,

cause I'm not running at all right now, but I'd love to be able to go and participate in the New York City Marathon in the fall, we'll see. Let's talk about St. George. Let's do it. What about it? I'm a little- This is you. I threw the ball to you.

You're fumbling a little bit. Come on, this is your jam, dude. You've been following the Norwegians. I have, I have. I thought you were gonna go to St. George and be boots on the ground to report. I was supposed to go to St. George at one point, but it's just not gonna happen for me, unfortunately.

But I'm really excited to see what Christian Blumenfeldt can do and some of the other guys, Gustav Eden as well. The Norwegians are ready to drop the hammer, but it does seem like this race is lost a little shine for me. I was excited to see Lucy Charles Barclay who won the half out there, the world championship. And she was kind of like rounding in a form and feeling really good about her form.

I interviewed her for that same story I did on Christian and the Norwegians. And so she felt, she was like really confident then and to have a fracture like that in the hip is unfortunate cause it seems like that could take a little while. And then Jan Frodeno, who I also interviewed for that story was very excited to see run. He also is-

Yeah, I heard that he's out, but why is he out? What happened to him? I didn't follow up on that, unfortunately, I'm sorry.'s out, but why is he out? What happened to him? I didn't follow up on that, unfortunately, I'm sorry. It's been very busy. I've been busy. Adam. I'm sorry. You're working on a top secret project that we'll be able to talk about soon,

but we can't talk about it right now. But I was, you know, he's 42 years old. So like you want, but I think that having talked, having spoken to him, most likely he's gearing up his year. You know, when you're, I think he, everything orients for him to the North star of Kona. And so I know that he wants to do Kona and I know he reveres Kona.

I know he wasn't really super stoked with the idea of racing outside of Kona. Right, so just for people that don't know, this St. George Ironman is taking place on May 7th and it's been set up as an Ironman World Championship because of COVID and all these other reasons. It's last year's World Championship. Yeah, because they couldn't do it.

They canceled it in Kona because if there had been an outbreak, they would not have been able to handle it on that island. The island was like basically saying, we don't think you should do it. And then it kind of stopped. So this is last year's world championship, but Kona will still is scheduled

to take place in October as usual. Same, same, yeah. So it's still supposed to happen. They're not divorcing from Kona by any means, but they're interested in seeing, Ironman as a brand is interested in seeing what's going to transpire. Will this like, maybe people won't miss it.

Maybe they can travel every other year from Kona to cities around the world because Europe is such, is kind of where the sport's happening now anyway. You know, it's so funny, because when it really started, California, like San Diego, Santa Cruz, Mark Allen, Hawaii, like that was the epicenter of triathlon.

Some Australians too, but mostly it was like- San Diego, North County, San Diego was really where the heartbeat of the whole thing was. And then Boulder came into it, but it was always really North American focus. And if you look at now, the rankings and all the big athletes, it's European focus. So to be able to take everyone,

I think this St. George is setting them up to maybe see, hey, can we do it in Berlin? Can we make it a more interesting thing for the sport? Right. Which I like that idea, but then to come back every other year to K see, hey, can we do it in Berlin? Can we make it a more interesting thing for the sport? Right. Which I like that idea, but then to come back every other year to Kona, that's how it was kind of told to me. I like that idea.

I think it is important to shake this up a little bit and try to make it more interesting. There is something epic about the legacy of Kona and Kona is what it is, but frankly, it's not that interesting of a course. Like you're on the Queen K going, it's like, I've spent a lot of time on the big island. I've done a lot of riding on the Queen K.

After you've done it a couple of times, you're like, is there anywhere else to ride? Like, I think that the sport would benefit from mixing it up, putting the world championships every other year in a different setting with a different type of course that would favor or disadvantage a different type of course that would favor or disadvantage a different type of athlete

to really make it interesting. Well, that's what's interesting about this course. It's gonna be hillier. The cycling will be different. The swimming, you're swimming in a lake versus the warm sea. May is not always hot in St. George. So it'll be interesting to see. And yeah, I agree with you.

Like the cinematics of imagine doing a race and moving it around like Paris or Tokyo or wherever it is. I think that there is an appeal there, but we'll see how it goes. But I am kind of bummed that these two big stars are out. You're always bummed when the two big stars are out, but I think really it was always gonna come down. Will the Norwegian experiment work?

Will they have a world Ironman champion? Yeah, well, what's cool is that there has been some shit talking going on. If you wanna be on top of that, the best follow on Twitter is Brad Culp, who's a journalist in the triathlon space. He's at BB Culp on Twitter. And he tweeted the other day, triathlon needs rivalries.

And a few weeks ago, Joe Skipper, who's a British pro, he's the UK Ironman champion, started talking a little bit of smack about the Norwegians and saying, you know, don't believe the Norwegian hype train. Yes, yes. You know, and when we talk about the Norwegians, what we're really talking about is Christian Blumenfeld

and Gustav Iden, who are just crushing it right now. And what's great is that there's this training video on YouTube, it's Gustav and Christian on a track with snow everywhere, throwing down like insane intervals. In Sierra Nevada, Spain. Yeah, at altitude, right? And they're just hauling ass. And at about 1040 or something into this video,

we'll share it for those on YouTube. Christian's got a little bit of a response. Here he is. He just dusted Gustav on this set, pulling away from him. Whatever you do, don't believe it. I don't know if we should hide. Believe Joe Skipper. I'm hyped.

Believe, George Skipper. A little reverse psychology from the Norwegian hype train. He looks great, doesn't he? Norwegian hype train is looking good. If I was a betting man, I'm not betting against these guys. I mean, me neither. I think he's already shown what he can do at the distance, Christian. And Gustav has too, quite frankly.

He had a very fast race as well in Florida. The sort of source of this is, sorry to interrupt you. The source of this is that, you know, look, Christian's only, he did Cozumel, but he's not that experienced at Ironman. Fair. And you know, Skipper's saying he's in over his head here.

He didn't have a great half in St. George. Correct. So we'll see. All right, well, we'll report back on that And he didn't have a great half. He didn't have a great half in St. George. So we'll see. All right. Well, we'll report back on that in the wake of May 7th. We gotta talk about the Rollies. The Rollie winners. Do you remember a couple of weeks ago when we announced the nominees for the first annual Rollies?

Do I remember? Yes. No. You don't remember? I blanked it out completely. You know how I feel like people have received the Rollies? They're like my parents, who by the way are devout listeners now of yours.

Yeah, how did they feel about the Rollies? My dad wasn't really thrilled by them. My mother really liked them. And I think that's kind of like 50-50, right? It was an interesting response. Like, yeah, I mean, a lot of people were like, come on, man, really? You're gonna waste my time with this? My time is limited. But we introduced them saying like, yeah, I mean, a lot of people were like, come on, man, really? You're gonna waste my time with this?

My time is limited. But we introduced them saying like, we're gonna now waste your time. Yeah, yeah. With a bunch of nonsense. I mean- So tune out or enjoy. I mean, it's entertainment. It's your choice. It's entertainment, right?

Yeah. That's what we're doing. Are we entertaining? I'm not sure. We're somewhere- Are we wasting your time? Probably. We're infotainment. Okay. What do you think? Are you committed? We're knee deep in this, so we wasting your time? Probably. We're infotainment. Okay. So what do you think? Are you committed? We're knee deep in this.

So we have to see it through. Are you committed now though? I'm committed. So we're doing year two. I'm committed. So for year two, we also have to come up with a trophy. I agree. Yeah, or trophies.

I think year two, we have special guests. Yeah, I think that would be good. We could have a lot of hype leading up to who the nominees are gonna be. We nominate, maybe we don't nominate on the air. We can just dominate roll-on content. We don't nominate on the air. We do extended rollies for the winners.

We don't nominate on the air. All right, well, we got to report back on who the winners are. And what's great about this Google form, thank you to everybody who voted. They come back at you with like, yeah, we got like pie charts. We got analytics on this whole thing.

It's unbelievable. So I don't wanna spend a ton of time on this. Let's rifle through it. Let's do it. First category, best endurance performance in an RRP supporting role. Who lobbied for this award the hardest? We all know who did. It was Jason Camiolo.

He wanted it badly. He posted about it on social media. He courted voters. Who knows what else he was doing? Sending checks out, holding cocktail parties, pulling a full Miramax campaign. It's a scandal. He changed his avatar on Instagram to the Rolly symbol. It worked. This is how bad he wanted it. It worked. And you know what? He shall be duly rewarded because he walked away with 49.7% of the vote to be the 2021 victor. He destroyed us.

He destroyed us. Of best endurance performance in an RRP supporting role. Congratulations. Congratulations. Jason, I wish we had a trophy for you. It was actually Jason's idea that we get a trophy. I think he wanted it for himself.

We didn't get it together in time. Maybe we can do it post-ostomously. I'd like to just for the record say, I voted for everyone but me. Blake, I think I was one of your two votes. Yeah, so Davey came in second with 22.6% of the vote. Then we've got Adam. You got 22.3.

Poor Blake, courteous Blake, gentleman Blake. Yeah. We'll have to work on that for next year. What do you get, 5.4? I think Blake's impressive arc in becoming a competitive athlete is not being duly- I think there's an argument that Blake is the best athlete. I think that probably is true.

And the most diverse. But we'll have to wait for another year. But that doesn't matter when voting day. But the pressure is on the staff to really up their game for the following year. I see this category just getting more and more competitive. I see my resume not changing at all. You could be the constant.

I'll do the same three things every year. All right, next category, best endurance performance of the year by an RRP guest. Yes. The nominees were Hella Sidibe, Robbie Ballinger, Courtney Dewalter, Harvey Lewis, Leah Goldstein, Yarn Cowboy, Timothy Olson, Lewis Pugh, and Jason Caldwell. Walking away with victory with 42.9% of the vote is,

drum roll. We need sound effects, Jason. The Iron Cowboy. Yes, yes. Well-deserved. Congratulations, James. Moving on. We have a lot of categories to get through here.

Yes. Coolest person of 2021. The nominees were Johnny Greenwood, Rafael Nadal, Bo Burnham, Nirmal Persia, and Billie Eilish. And victorious with 28.7% of the vote this year is one Billie Eilish. It's not really fair that- Headlining Coachella this past weekend, by the way.

Yeah. I mean, come on. I mean, Billie and Rafa are like two legit stars. It's kind of not fair to the others. I feel like Johnny Greenwood didn't get enough love. I know, that was your guy. 6.1%. He got so little that there wasn't enough room to actually write the percentage in his little slice of the pie.

When did you have time to vote from 48 times, Rich? Yeah, I know, right? I didn't vote. I stayed out of this. Here, you wanna handle this next one? Best limited series about narcissistic self-mythologizing, aka scammers. Scammer series or founder television, I guess, right?

Yes, founder TV. My favorite category, but I'm handing it over to you. Okay, super pumped. We crashed the dropout at Venting Anna, Bad Vegan. And the winner is Bad Vegan. With 35.7% of the vote. Very interesting. Low voter turnout on that one.

Not the best of that group, but I guess given the subject matter and interest of our particular audience, it's not surprising. But Inventing Anna came in second, even though it's not that great of a show, but that shows you the popularity of the show. That's so interesting.

And by the way, like- The dropout is the best of all of these. But the hardest to watch. In terms of quality. Yes, hardest to watch. Yeah, inventing Anna is garbage. Didn't I say that last time? You did, but- I guess the audience disagrees.

How many people disagree with you? I guess. But maybe the best at self-mythologizing? I don't know. Anyway, all right, next category. Anna Dovey. Anna Dovey. We gotta keep this moving. Allizing. I don't know. Anyway, all right. Next category. And a doubt, right? We gotta keep this moving.

I'm a host these days, right? Most RRP LARP-like film of 2021. The Alpinist, 14 Peaks, Don't Look Up, Roadrunner, The Rescue, Dope Sick. And the winner is? With 31.8% of the votes, 14 Peaks. NIMS with a win. Nims was nominated for two rollies.

This one was a little closer with Don't Look Up and Dope Sick pretty close on the heels. Yeah, but I like that this is like one of those, he's walking up and say, Nims was nominated for two rollies this year and he came home with one. That's right. Best book by an RRP guest in 2021,

another hotly contested competitive category. We got Bravey, Think Again, Why We Sleep, Dopamine Nation, Regeneration, Your Turn, The Awakened Brain, Stolen Focus, and Transcendence. And the winner is Adam. Bravey by Alexi Pappas. Audience favorite. We knew that would happen. Of course, everybody loves Alexi.

Where's the, how come everyone only claps for Jason? Come on. Yeah, I know, right? It's Alexi. We need like that little button drop with a little applause, you know? And also the music that like cues us off stage. The little symphonic, like little ditty.

My favorite category is coming up. It had a lot of responses. Yeah, this was your, I'll let you do this one because this was your, you came up with this category. We're gonna have to revamp these. Put a little more thought in the categories next year.

Yeah, I don't know what we're doing. Best ritual Neovo obsession. Sprouting. Weightlifting. Decoding the gurus. Ice baths. And Adam's swim mask. Now this one, this must be very gratifying for you.

This is a landslide. By a landslide, the biggest obsession, the most rewarded obsession of the audience is Adam's swim mask. Yes. With an incredible 47.7% of the votes. People can't get enough of the swim mask. In fact, when I posted pictures of me swimming in Florida,

people were outraged that I was not wearing the mask that you gifted me. I know, where was the mask? Where is that mask? But have I ever expressed any interest in wearing a swim mask while I'm open water swimming? No, I have not. It's your birthday gift.

That gift, I appreciate it. It was symbolic. I could put it in like a Lucite case and keep it I have not. It's your birthday gift. That gift, I appreciate it. It was symbolic. I could put it in like a Lucite case and keep it in my office. You should, you should. But I probably will never swim with it. When you set up the Rich Roll Museum, then I think that's where it belongs.

And I think given the way that the audience voted on this, that will be the thing people will be most interested in seeing of anything that we've ever done in the history of the show. It'll be great. It'll be like your mask and then my mask. My mask will be all corroded and used. Your mask will be pristine as if you could just,

it's never been used. Right, but among the many other artifacts, signed books by luminaries or whatever, knickknacks that we've collected over the years as a result of hosting this show, the swim mask will be the thing. The low tech swim mask. That will go on the epitaph of the show. My swim mask won a Rollie. I lost, but my swim mask won be the thing. The low tech swim mask. That will go on the epitaph, you know, like of the show.

My swim mask won a Rollie. I lost, but my swim mask won a Rollie. Right, what do we make of that? Like that, we could dissect that into an interesting narrative. Yes, yes. All right, next category, luckiest rocker of all time. This is a garbage category.

This was your idea. The nominees for Ringo Starr. It's a repudiation of my idea. The nominees for Ringo Starr. It's a repudiation of my theory. And again, Ringo Starr. So, okay. It's a repudiation. An outright repudiation of my theory. What's interesting is that the first mention

of Ringo Starr got 41.4% of the vote. The second mention of Ringo got 42.5%. So Ringo walking away with a whopping 84% of the vote, ostensibly. And once again, my George Harrison theory does not hold water. Jason's clapping back there. You should be rooting for the drummer, my friend.

Let's put this in the rear view mirror. The dystopia you would most want to live in. Yeah. The nominees are Dune, Station Eleven, Don't Look Up and Squid Game. Interesting. And the victory goes to Dune. What do you, how do you feel about that?

45.5% of the vote. Would you rather live like with the giant worm trying to swallow you whole all the time? See, here's what I think people don't get when they're voting for this. They all imagine themselves as the hero in Dune, but most of us are not the hero. We're the people.

No, you're like the slave drone. We're the slave drones. So you gotta think of yourself that way. Driving the mining craft. Yeah, yeah. And being victimized by the Bene Gesserit. Totally, you don't And being victimized by the Bene Gesserit. Totally. You don't wanna be victimized by the Bene Gesserit.

It's surprising that Station Eleven only got 25.4% of the vote. I chalk that up to people just haven't watched it yet because clearly that is the optimal dystopia that you wanna live in. No, you don't wanna live in that dystopia. But if you survive it, then you're fine. And you can go like about your merry way

as a Shakespearean actor. Maybe, I didn't have quite a sunny reaction to Don't Look. I think I think- But there is something communitarian about it and celebratory about trying to, you know, find meaning in your life in this post virus world that they live in. And they love Shakespeare.

They do. They seem to actually be enjoying themselves. All right. As long as they're not getting killed. Best performance by an ice cream scooper in a leading role. This is another Skolnick category. You know, I don't, what do I even say about this? Thank you.

Two nominees, the Cold Stone guy or Adam at Ben and Jerry's. Thank you, folks. Adam's being crowned with his first Roli victory. Adam's been nominated for- 83.8% of the vote. For three Rolis. I mean, what are we even doing here? Why are we wasting people's time?

Thank you, thank you, folks. Thanks for- Best streaming series, the nominees, White Lotus, Station Eleven, The North Water, Severance and Succession. White Lotus winning with 35.1%. Severance, which has taken my top spot, actually behind Station Eleven.

I love Station Eleven, but the Severance- You have Station Eleven over Severance. The Severance season finale was unbelievable. You haven't watched that. I know you kind of lost interest. I heard, I heard. I gotta go back in. It's an extraordinary achievement, that show.

You gotta check it out. Shout out to Ben Stiller. Unbelievable work from him and hisievement that show. You gotta check it out. I will. Shout out to Ben Stiller, unbelievable work from him and his team on that project. Best film content, period, series, film, whatever. Adam, you wanna listen on this here? Bo Burnham for Inside. Denis Villeneuve.

Villeneuve, Villeneuve, Adam. Villeneuve, dude. The North Water Severance Station 11, and Rich's stealth TikTok account. Ugh, why is that even a cat? That got 23.5%. It came close. More than my favorite show,

The North Water, coming in with a dismal 6.7%. But it wasn't your favorite show. Your favorite show, you just said two shows you liked better. You're right. I've got lots of favorites. The North Water though. I mean, come on.

You know what? Richard Skolnick. That show is unbelievable. Richard Skolnick is now, he hated the Rollies, but he was very interested in your North Water. So is he watching it? He's gonna watch it, yeah. All right, good.

I hopefully have to- See, the Rollies do help. But Bo Burnham walks away with a rollie with 30.4%. He's a genius. Well observed, he is. Let's give it up for him. Honor Rollie Lifetime Achievement Award for Artist Working Film Profession.

There's no vote here. Frank Grillo is the guy. Honor Rollie. I mean, congrats to Frank. Last category, most overrated, overhyped film of 2021. There was only one category here, The Matrix Resurrections. So it walked home with 100% of the vote as well.

Well, you know, it didn't make a lot of sense that the hero of the revolution would then opt back into the Matrix. Right, let's just create a better Matrix. That's how that thing panned out. Yeah. Oh, anyway. All right, congrats. All right, we did it.

So you can be mad if you're still with us, but you know, we had to see it through. We had to see it through. We had to see it through. And based on that, I'm not sure year two is going to happen, but it could. Yeah, I know, right? It could, we'll see. I'm sure we'll be on the receiving end of some responses,

both tepid and enthusiastic. What do we wanna talk about next? A couple of things I wanna mention. The first is- See what happened there? What? I tried to then get into it. I'm trying to, I tried the timing. I am throwing it to you, sorry.

Yes, no, this is Bill Spindle's Substack. I wanna be a generous co-host, Adam. Sorry, I interrupted you. While I'm interrupting you again. People get really mad that I interrupt you too much. I, Adam. Sorry, I interrupted you. While I'm interrupting you again. People get really mad that I interrupt you too much. I think it's a, I interrupt you too. I do, and I plead guilty to that. Yeah, I do too.

But also as a host, you're like, I gotta move it forward. Right. What are we doing next? The Energy Adventurer is what we're doing next. Bill Spindle, Substack, your cousin? My cousin. Your cousin.

A couple of years older than me. Tell us about your cousin. So Bill Spindle, he's been my cousin my whole life. He's a couple of years older than me. He is an amazing journalist. He's been a journalist his whole adult life. He was editor of the Daily at the University of Michigan. And after that has just pursued this career.

I think he got his graduate degree in journalism at Columbia. He worked for the Wall Street Journal for 20 years. He was the former South Asia Bureau Chief for the Wall Street Journal covering India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka. Also the former Middle East Bureau Chief. He lived in Abu Dhabi for many years.

He was in New York City living downtown, working for the Journal when 9-11 happened. And it's just been covering climate change, energy, that sort of portion of the world for a long time. He's currently a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs fellow living in India. And he started this sub stack to travel across India, cover climate change, and in a broader context,

the transformation of the global energy system. And he's a wonderful writer and he's sort of reporting boots on the ground and it's pretty cool what he's done. So in this world of subscriptions and so many Substacks, I think he's signal amidst the noise and everybody should check it out. So the link is billspindle.substack.com

and I'll link that up in the show notes. Yeah, I read great stuff on the Indian railway system, which was really cool. It reads like a journalist that's been set free. He doesn't have to, right. Yeah, he can- He's not reporting to anyone. No, but his reporting is still good.

Like it's solid stuff, but yet it has a voice and it has a, you know, we try to have a voice, but usually it's kind of restrained in journalism, but like his set free and he's trying to, he has a point of view that's really interesting. And I mean, I think we always do, but like I said, it's usually restrained this time it's kind of set free and I love it.

And I've always said many times, the best travelers are journalists with their boots on the ground in any country and they can teach us so much. So I'm gonna be staying tuned in to Bill. That's cool. I can see you in another life with a sub stack hoofing around the planet. Is this my two weeks notice?

This is your multiverse. Like if you were living in a parallel universe. No. Oh, I can see what I'm- You know what I mean? No, your job is security right now. Okay, okay. What would you do without you? You know, it's funny, I did that. You know, I did it for nine months job is secure. Okay, okay. What would you do without you?

You know, it's funny, I did that. You know, I did it for nine months a year for Lonely Planet, but- But it was a pre-substack world. It was pre-substack. I don't think at that time I would have made much of a living on substack. I do have an idea for a substack,

but I gotta get some stuff done this year and then we'll turn to it. Right on. Yeah. All right, well, one of the main things I wanted to talk about today is this recent article that Jonathan Haidt wrote for the Atlantic, which has been up now for, I don't know, at least a week,

and it's still the number one most read story on the site. Is it? It's entitled, Why the Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been Uniquely Stupid. So you wanna launch into this for us, Alan? Yeah, so the background on the story is, he launches with the story of Babel,

the biblical story of the tower of people who are technologically advanced, and they build this massive tower, but God curses them to make sure they can't communicate. And it becomes this metaphor for social media and what we've done and how that miscommunication has imperiled groups and institutions and the future of our country. I think he talks about it as America,

but this same problem is overseas. Many places have these exact same problems. It's not just here. Brazil has had it. Burma's had it. Russia has it right now. And so the idea is how do we get to this point where people's idea of the truth are so completely divergent

and not just people left and right, but within the right and within the left and what's happening to keep dialogue from happening and make us dumber. And it really, he really hands it to Mark Zuckerberg, to be honest. Yeah, for sure. I mean, he talks about the kind of inflection points

along the timeline where this really tipped into being a real problem, where we went from this idea of social media being the great uniter and this modality that would facilitate unity and communication into kind of the dystopic division that we're seeing and the increasing acrimony between in-groups, I suppose, is a way of putting it.

And I think what's, you know, first of all, it takes like an hour to read this article. Like it's not a small thing. Like it requires you to really kind of like wrestle with it and grapple with it. It's incredibly well done. He walks you through kind of like how social media evolved to the point where these algorithms, you know,

are what they are that are, you know, increasingly creating these information silos. But- Pre-share, pre-retweet to post. Like it's really the share button and the retweet. Exactly. And that's what brought the algorithm in to reward those or to basically serve up what people like to retweet and share the most.

But in addition to the use of Babel as you know, as a metaphor or as an analogy, it's also a way of approaching this subject matter through the lens of James Madison and the Federalist Papers. Yeah, that was cool. As well as de Tocqueville, which I think is fantastic, right? Like I'm trying to recollect my study of these individuals

as, you know, as a young college student. But, you know, essentially like what Madison was saying, which is true today is, you know, you just can't quite trust the masses. They get very emotional. They're factionalized. Which is kind of an anti-democratic idea, right? But what people often forget

is that we don't live in a pure democracy. We live in a democratic republic. There are checks and balances on our purely democratic systems that favor kind of institutional stability. And this was the whole idea with Madison's perspective in the federal's papers. And Haidt makes the case that that idea,

that warning that Madison was forecasting, we're seeing in reality getting played out in the democratic kind of forum of ideas that social media avails us of. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, the idea that Madison's saying that humans kind of tend towards factionalization and mutual animosity.

And so, and he kind of called this and the Zuckerberg point of it is kind of like he paints Zuckerberg as this, obviously no one's saying he's not a very, very smart guy. So he's this genius, but he's a very, very greedy, very, very naive genius who kind of bumbled his way into something that has cost that he couldn't comprehend. I mean, he, you know, like he was so taken

with his invention and the amount of power and money he was gonna make that he didn't think of any negative costs. And so this idea of lack of skepticism, which started there has then been passed, I think, he doesn't actually say this, but I think the fact that the founders of these platforms lacked so much skepticism in what could go wrong

or just simply ignored it, that lack of skepticism has been passed down to us now. And so now you have people, cause one of my favorite parts of the story is he basically breaks down, most of the people who are so political on these platforms are a very small minority of people. They tend to be wealthy white people

and they're either far right or far left. And one thing I noticed when people who are super impassioned on social media platforms, like to make points, almost always they're not skeptical of their own ideas. Right, there's not a lot of self-awareness around that. Hence the dumbing down. On both sides. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so he talks about this hidden tribe study

that was implemented by this pro-democracy group called More in Common that surveyed 8,000 Americans in 2017 and 2018, and ultimately identified seven groups that shared beliefs and behaviors. And there's the one furthest to the right that they call the devoted conservatives, which comprise 6% of the US population. And the one that's furthest to the left

that they call the progressive activists comprise 8% of the population. So we're talking about 14% of the population that really monopolizes public discourse on social media because they're the loudest and they're the ones that get the most retweets and shares, which creates this imperfect sense of what is actually transpiring in households. Yes, they're the bulk of the shares.

And that they're both like white and rich on the polls. Right? Yeah. That's what we're- So we're being torn apart by a battle between two subsets of the elite. Right. Even though we're shouting about the elites in the context of all of that. And what's funny,

it's like how I think last time we were on the air, I even mentioned this. It's like, I said jokingly that, you know, if you're being ultra political, you're an asshole. And so we're being torn apart by assholes. Right, so basically that's the TLDR of this whole thing. Right? Yes. So in other words, like, conservatives,

if you're within an aspect of one of those in groups on both sides, if you divert from that, let's say you divert from that conservative perspective, you're gonna get accused of being a traitor. A rhino. And if you take a position at odds with the progressive side of it, you're not gonna get called a traitor,

you're gonna get called a racist, a transphobe, or a Karen. So on one side, it's the political candidates. If you're a rhino, you lose, you have no chance. But on the left, it is almost more insidious because it can really harm you in your daily life a lot more. And I think he's a little bit breathless and overdramatic about cancel culture. I do think it's a problem.

I think we've talked about it. We've talked about this whole thing. I think it stems from academic theories that have leaked into our newspapers. And even I think it stems from academic theories that have leaked into our newspapers. And even I think it's a problem. I do think that there's too much academic thought in our daily papers. Yeah. Sorry, I was interrupting you again. No. The idea being that that small percentage of people who are screaming about that thing finds its way into these institutions, into media and academia.

And even though it's such a small percentage of people, they're able to hold those institutions hostage. Because the social ramifications of, you know, the shouting that's going on about these issues, it's the consequences are too dire. So there's a retreat from really contending with the issues and a kind of silencing of ideas that results as a matter of course. Right.

But you think that's overblown? No, I think the way he frames it is a little overblown. I don't think, you know, I think he, one thing, I think I have a quote here. The punishment that feels right for such crime does not execution it, it is public shaming and social death. I mean, I don't think every time something happens, it gets to that level,

but I think there are examples of that level. Sure, there's plenty of examples of professors losing their jobs and journalists getting fired and the like. There's quite a bit of it, but it's more about like, okay, so maybe there's not hundreds of those, but there's enough of them. And what is the chilling effect of that?

That's right. No, 100%. You and I, almost every week, we talk about stuff we're not gonna talk about. Right. Well, let's kind of contextualize this article with the conversation we had on the last roll-on about Leah Thomas.

Yeah. So we tried to have a balanced, nuanced conversation about a very difficult issue and the challenge of trying to solve this problem of serving both fairness and inclusion. And I think we did as best as we could with a problem that has yet to have a solution. And I can tell you just publicly,

I was on the receiving end of a lot of vitriol from both women on the one hand and trans advocates on the other hand. So women were angry that I didn't take a hardcore position or you and I didn't take a hardcore position on fairness. And trans advocates were very angry that we were even having this conversation

without doing it in the presence of a trans person. Basically making the argument that you shouldn't even be talking about this unless you have a trans person with you. Which I completely reject. I have a hard time with that. I reject it completely. It's ridiculous.

Well, if you're gonna set up a condition that you can't talk about this issue unless you do A, B, and C, like most people are just gonna say, well, I'm just not gonna have the conversation. We have to be able to talk about these things. And yes, would that conversation have been more informed had we had a trans person

who's familiar with this terrain with us, probably you could make the same argument if we had a coach of a college, you know, women's team. Or just a women's team. Whatever, you know what I mean? Like, of course, any kind of like experience-based perspective on either side of that

would have better informed the conversation. But to say you have to, that's the problem. Right, but the point being that like publicly, I felt like it was hard. that would have better informed the conversation. But to say you have to, that's the problem. But the point being that like publicly, I felt like it was hard. Like I'm not courting controversy. I tried to have that conversation. I felt like it was important.

I think you and I agree on that. Publicly, it felt like I'd failed everybody and had done like a terrible job of even trying to do this. Privately, I got a lot of phone calls and text messages and DMs from people thanking us for having that conversation. And those messages came from both sides of the camp, from women athletes, women, trans people, trans advocates, trans parents and the like.

So, but that's one example of the difference between what is truly kind of like the larger, quieter majority of people versus the very loud polarities. Right, well, we were speaking to that quiet majority, right? Which is what I think people like about the role on stuff is because we tend to do that. I mean, we might get onto the progressive side more often than not,

but I don't think we're that kind of religiously progressive. And so we'd speak to this majority. And I think that's important. I think the majority needs to speak up more and support liberalism, which is free thought and free debate and free speech. And it's not in order to talk about this issue, you have to have this in your background or you have to,

I mean, that's crazy. And it doesn't, I mean, yes, you should be a serious person. You shouldn't be talking about bullshit you have no idea about. But like, I mean, yes, you should be a serious person. You shouldn't be talking about bullshit you have no idea about. But like, if you study up, you can have a discussion and it doesn't matter your background. So I think that that's important. I also think that he talked about the fact that

the left is the one that controls the majority of written media, entertainment, and all of this. So there is this broader impact of a quieter middle and a vocal left. And I thought about this when I watched, cause I had my niece stayed with us and she wanted to watch the Grammys. I don't typically watch the Grammys.

I've been like out of the mainstream music scene for a long time. Like I like what I like and I never pay attention to the Grammys since I'm like in high school. But I really enjoyed it. And the difference between the Oscars and the Grammys is like, it's almost like film people seem to think that their job is education now and the Grammy people know it's entertainment and like your job is to entertain. And so like, there's this different, like people have a

different perspective. That's why I have a problem with academic theory in journalism. It's like, yes, you can be in the op-ed section, but academic theories should not impact news reporting. But everything is op-ed now. Right, there's so much, yeah. But that's kind of my take is that like people forget what their primary job is. It's a stay in your lane idea.

We should focus on our primary job. If you're, yes, we need to have equal opportunity. We need to have more opportunity for more people who've been shut out of the system. But that doesn't mean that your job is in entertainment. That's how I look at it. Yeah, back to the sub stack issue though. You're seeing this flight of journalists

from these institutions that have been kind of degraded in terms of public trust. But what's interesting is that those substacks tend to be like opinion first, right? Right. It's some version of activism journalism for the most part in the most popular substacks. That's true.

And people who are distrustful of the old guard, the New York Times, whatever, seem to have the inability to lend that critical eye to the opinion-driven pieces of some of the big sub-stackers. Well, sure. I mean, especially if you look at it on the left, because who invented opinion journalism? Rupert Murdoch. So you're basically playing by that playbook, and it's a bullshit playbook. Because what opinion journalism does is what a lot of people, I've seen it before, people make,

they overstate their argument. And when you overstate a winning argument or any argument, but specifically a winning argument, you make yourself look like an idiot and it doesn't actually help the cause. And so like, we should all be more restrained. We should all be trending more to the middle. We should all be thinking, actually, you know what?

I don't know enough. I don't know shit really. And that's what we were saying with the Leah Thomas stuff was, you know, look, this is what it's at stake. We didn't make any judgments. We just kind of presented all the thought and feelings that were out there and did our best. Well put.

Yeah, well put. But like the idea of back to the Oscars and Grammys, the Grammys was fun. And the Oscars- They were performing. Yeah, well put. But like the idea of back to the Oscars and Grammys, the Grammys was fun. The Oscars- Performing, yeah. The Oscars didn't get fun until the very end. The Oscars, well, that got crazy. Yeah, it is a different vibe between those two things.

You know what I'm saying? Like Trevor Noah's up there having a great time. Everyone's having fun. It's like, it felt like a global thing. It felt like free, felt like art. It felt like entertainment. Well, it's also much global thing. It felt like free, it felt like art. It felt like entertainment. Well, it's also much more diverse in terms of the artists, you know,

from country music to hip hop and the like, like you're casting a much wider net in terms of the kind of people that are adorning the stage. It felt like the silent majority's preferred entertainment system to the elite ivory tower weirdos. Okay, there you go. Yeah. All right, speaking of elite ivory tower weirdos. Okay, there you go. Yeah.

All right, speaking of elite ivory tower weirdos, we had a whole category here of like cool stuff to share and content that we're enjoying, but we're at like an hour and 30 in. Okay. So maybe let's just save that for next time. Cause we did the rollies already. So we had our diversion down entertainment alley

that I think is plenty for this episode and maybe we'll revisit that next time. So let's just go to, we're gonna go to this listener question and then after that, we're gonna go to a quick Zoom call with Chris Howarth. Let's do it. Just as a reminder,

we entertain listener questions here. If you want your question considered for Adam and I to talk about on the show, leave us a voicemail at 424-235-4626. That's 424-235-4626. Do it now. Our voicemail is standing by.

All right, here we go. Jake from your old neck of the woods, Palo Alto. Here we go. Hi, Rich and Adam. My name is Jake. I'm calling from Palo Alto, California, where I just relocated five months ago. I left my hometown Ventura, California,

and dream job of four years in order to be closer to my wife's family and in hopes for the betterment of our marriage and future of our five-year-old son. I'm a vegan 37-year-old primary care doctor and swim, bike, or run for about an hour every morning for my sanity. Last month, my larger-than-life younger brother Steve was tragically killed at the age of 34 by a rogue power line that hit him on the head while he was working on a ranch. Six months ago, he married his high school sweetheart after a 16-year courtship that included world travels and great adventures. Steve regularly swam in his Speedo in the San Francisco Bay, even in the winter. He surfed big waves, snowboarded in the backcountry, went off of cliffs, and lived life to the

fullest. He was on top of his game with ambitious goals, looking forward to starting a family, expanding his agricultural tech company, and was in the process of buying an avocado ranch in Carpinteria. 16 years ago, my older brother, Dave, died at the age of 24 after a heroic battle to leukemia. He was diagnosed with leukemia at age six. I was four and Steve was just one. He was cured at 10, re-diagnosed at 18, cured at 21, re-diagnosed at 22

and had a bone marrow transplant and suffered the last year of his life on a ventilator at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles, not once giving up the fight. These catastrophic losses have been heartbreaking and trying to make sense of them

is emotional torture. My questions are, do you believe everything in life happens for a reason? And is there a point in trying to make sense of this incomprehensible life and world we live in? Or does this just lead to despair? I respect you guys and appreciate all you do. The RRP has been an inspiration to me. Feel free to play this on the air. That's heavy, Jake. It's a pretty heavy one. My heart goes out to you.

This is heavy stuff, real life stuff. And the questions that you're asking are philosophical and difficult to answer. So I'm not sure that I can come up with anything that's gonna be fully satisfying to you. But I'm not sure that I can come up with anything that's gonna be fully satisfying to you, but I will say this, to your question of whether we believe or whether I believe everything happens for a reason.

I mean, I can't say that everything happens for a reason in the universal sense of the word. 100% no. Yeah. And of course, I concede and recognize the difficulty and the pain that you've experienced trying to reckon with this and in this endeavor to kind of try to make sense of something

so seemingly senseless and tragic. And so I think what I will say is that setting aside, like, is there a universal point to any of this and focus on what I do know, which is that I think you can find solace and comfort in your own personal attempt to find personal meaning in these events because these events, which are big, hard events,

present you with a choice. On the one hand, you can either allow them to define you in a self-destructive way. The world sucks, nothing's good, bad things happen to me, but I probably don't have to tell you that this mindset is not gonna serve you well. Or on the other hand, you can try to find some spark

in what has occurred to ignite you in a more positive direction. When I look at, or when I listen to you talk about your brother, Steve, being this incredible adventurer and how he lived life to the fullest, I can't help but think perhaps that was a choice that he made in response to your brother, Dave, and his early demise, like looking at his life

and realizing life's short and I've been gifted this life, I'm gonna make the most out of it. And celebrating the fact that he lived his life in that way. And that was a risky way to live. And if you're gonna live your life on the edge, surfing big waves and doing the things that he did, like this shit happens, you know? And it doesn't mean that the world is a terrible place.

I think he probably would say that he understood that there was a risk in living his life that way, but that was a choice that he made for himself. It seems like the way it happened was such a tragic accident. Yeah, I mean, it was like freak out. That's not how he died. So it's like, I could see how that would be like,

wait a second. And you do hear about that, like these great people who have these amazing lives and then they die doing something random, like falling off the second story by accident. It happens all the time though. But on that point of making this other choice, like this can come in many forms.

Like you could channel that energy to raise awareness around leukemia or perhaps share transparently how you're surviving this seemingly senseless passing of a loved one. In other words, like, can you take the unique experiences of your life, tragic, hard, and flip them to fuel a path in service to others?

And I think we see this all the time. Like parents of kids that are killed in school shootings become activists or they start nonprofits to raise awareness around these issues that have affected them so deeply and personally. And I think that, you know, heartbreak and despair, these emotions that you're experiencing are totally,

you know, they're totally natural human responses to what has occurred in your life. And I think you should feel all of that, but the challenge for you at some point after you've felt all of it is to process the events in a healthy way so that they don't fester and become the foundation for a lot of unhealthy responses. So you got to find a way to make peace with yourself over what happened and transmute the events into something positive for other people. And I think when you direct that energy outward in service,

that will provide you with a path that's lined with meaning, with purpose, with direction, with fulfillment. And it doesn't mean that you have to quit your job or that this even needs to be your primary focus, but devoting some part of your energy or your intention to that first through therapy or some kind of modality to help you cope and process what has happened to you,

which is an act of self-love. And then after that, through service, which is an act of love for other people. That was so beautiful, Rich. I can't add anything to that other than to say you're a primary care physician as well. So you're already living a very cool life. Like you're kind of leaning towards service already.

I think when you have a broken heart, I think you can feel more what people have gone through. I think it allows you to be more empathetic. And I think that there's power in that. And not power, like personal power, but power in your ability to reach others and to reach parts of yourself, maybe that you didn't even know were there.

And I just wanna commend you for living a cool life already and for sharing this in this way. And life is a beautiful gift. And so we can't forget that. No matter everything that happens, we have to remember that life is a beautiful gift. Whatever is we can't forget that. No matter everything that happens, we have to remember that life is a beautiful gift. Whatever is happening out there, it's often tragic, but it is a gift.

So we have to remember. Yeah, 100% man, 100%. Well, good, I think that's a good place to put a pin in it. We're gonna turn our attention to a coaching call with Chris, but Adam, thank you. Thank you. Appreciate you. Appreciate you. I love you. And I'll see you back here in two weeks.

I love you too. Where's my Rollies? Let's go party. We gotta design. Maybe we should outsource the, or just put it out to the audience to come up with designs for the Rollie trophy. Yeah. I think that's a good idea. I'm gonna go celebrate with fellow Rolly winner,

Jason Camiolo. Yeah, at the after party. Where's the after party? Yes, behind the velvet robe. Yes, yes, of course. Very exclusive and elite. If he lost, he might've slapped us. It would have been rough.

I'm so glad that the audience came through. I'm glad too. All right, dude, see you back here in two weeks. Like I said, I love you. Thank you everybody for taking this journey with me and roll on, we'll be back in two weeks from now. Yeah, all right, peace out. There he is.

Yeah. I guess the first thing I would ask you is, what is the typical experience with the athletes that you're working with? Because I'm sure a lot of them, if not most of them, have had COVID at some point. So you have some data points on what's working, what's not working,

people who try to get back into it too quickly, et cetera. Yeah, I mean, that's the thing. I think it's gone through every one of my athletes. I can't really think of anybody who hasn't besides myself. That's the crazy thing. You still haven't had it, wow. Not with four kids, that's even more surprising. Right.

So, and we have to test also going to different households because it affects different households. So if somebody is feeling under the weather or something like that. So anyway, but that being said, your question is a legitimate one because it's across the board different for every athlete. But what I've found is really two camps.

One, and this is the larger group, it takes longer than they thought to kick out of it. They have this general sense of malaise, of just not being 100%. They feel good enough to train. They feel good enough to do all the activities, but they're just missing a gear or two. And they're surprised how long it takes.

And then from one day to the next, the cloud lifts and they feel mostly back to normal. And so the advice is- Yeah, in those cases, are you just asking people to train through it and deal with it? Or is it better to just take your foot off the gas completely or slightly? Well, I think the first component there is

you can train or I let them train how they want to, but recognize that they might not be at 100% and not be so hard on themselves because of it. We're constantly evaluating how we're progressing. And so it becomes just like, oh, I'm not progressing or I feel off or I'm tired or I'm flat or I didn't eat enough or something. And I say, you know, it might still just be this carrying on for a longer period of time than you think. So allow yourself to not necessarily, once again, train without intention, but give yourself that little extra space of forgiveness, quite honestly.

But you don't think that the training itself is ill-advised or prolonging that recovery period? I haven't seen it because those that I've given more time off to or I've backed off the training completely, they're not necessarily getting healthier quicker. Interesting. And so there's those who three, four days later are basically back to normal and then maybe another two, three days and then they're 100%. But then there's others three, four weeks

of just feeling just enough to notice that they're off, that they just can't perform, let's say intervals or strength work or paces that they were before getting COVID. And so it's just a close watching process for the athlete and really providing the insight to me so that I can say, all right, you know what? We'll take out a few of these higher quality,

higher intensity workouts, and just stay true to the endurance or stay true to clean motions or just good strength work. Maybe we're not looking to top out the strength work, but just staying connected to, so that once you are healthy, that you're ready to really hit that gear. And that's the fun, right?

That you as the athlete feel good about like, okay, as soon as that fog lifts, at least I'm ready and I can have some really good training days. Well, I feel pretty fortunate in that at least so far, I don't feel that malaise or that general fatigue. I thought like I might have to take a couple of weeks off. Like I had athletes pinging me, friends of mine. And I know, you know, because I know them and their friends, I know that they, you know, they're not afraid to train hard. Yeah. And a couple of them were like, I took three weeks off. Like I just needed that. But I felt pretty good pretty quickly. Like after four days, I felt pretty much fine. I was like,

yeah, but I'm going to be conservative. I'm going to sit this out. And I think I took seven days off total, but I felt ready to go and just very gradually and gently got back into the pool. I didn't push anything. Like I would go three or 4,000 yards, but I didn't really do anything very hard just to gauge it and see how I felt. But today you gave me a 4,700 yard workout and there was some hard efforts in there and I felt pretty good, you know, and I got through it and that's the most yards that I've done. And I know there's a lot of volume waiting for me,

but I'm feeling pretty grateful that I'm not in that camp of feeling like I'm missing a step. Maybe that'll change, but right now that's kind of where I'm at, but I did miss seven days on a pretty short time window. I'm now eight weeks out of the swim. So there's a lot of work that has to happen.

And obviously, not everything has gone perfectly to plan and I've got a lot more hiccups along the way over the course of the next eight weeks, including this weekend, where I'm gonna be driving up north to your neck of the woods for an appointment for my back. And I'm gonna miss a couple of swim days in there as well because I'm doing it, doing the road trip with my kid.

And I don't wanna be just training all the time. Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, there's pools up here too. I can help you find it. That's true. But like, I don't know. I'm like, hey, Jaya, go sit in the corner while I go train. Like I gotta balance that. You know, it's supposed to be I'm like, hey, Jaya, go sit in the corner while I go train. Like I gotta balance that.

You know, it's supposed to be kind of like a father-son road trip. Yeah, yeah. So with that being said, it's hard to know where you're at with regards to the health because you might've felt pretty good today because you also had a week lighter leading up to it

to really absorb the training that you were doing prior and also increasing sort of the build as you were going. So it's hard to know that until we're a couple of days further down the road here, at which point you're taking a couple of days off. So that's why we're taking the windows and you're just a classic example of most any athlete that has a full-time job and has a family, right? Like it's stressful for all of us. And that's the whole challenge, how to navigate these little windows of when we can train

and using the time we have to maximize the fitness gains. And so here we are eight weeks out to do 21,000 yards in one fell swoop. Right, so what am I looking at here? How is this volume gonna escalate? Cause I'm itching, I'm always itching at this phase to be doing more and you're always like pushing me to slow down a little bit,

but I've worked with you long enough to know like those days are coming. Yeah, well, the beauty is we're starting that sort of the bigger prep this week with some longer sets. I'm hopeful that we can get in two key workouts this week and they include some long continuous swimming. And you're gonna curse me plenty then

when you say I wanna do more. And then I have two 1800 straight for you waiting with four minutes rest. And you're gonna do that in the pool and be like, really, my brain is going mush back to our youth. No, I love that stuff. But the good thing is, is that with that, with our watches these days, we no longer have to count.

Remember back in the day, if we had to swim longer, we didn't know if we missed a 50 or a 100 or something. Now we can just look at our watch. So lucky on that. But that being said, it's a great opportunity to swim 3,600 yards broken and to do some fueling and hydrating halfway through to see how you're doing with that. And just, we want to get better at finding that all day swim day pace, right? Swim pace, excuse me. So that rhythm and that pacing that you can just turn the brain off and just keep swimming and getting familiar with that so that now we have a baseline for going along in order to do that just a bit faster and

using that in our training in order to work around it. You know, a few seconds faster than all day swim pace, a few seconds slower than all day swim pace, a few seconds slower than all day swim pace, so that we can start setting the intervals and the work around that. Right, a couple of questions. The first thing is I got some good open water swims when I was in Miami and I have a lifetime of open water experience.

So I've never been uptight about making sure that I'm in the ocean doing workouts because I'm comfortable enough to know that like when I get there, it will be fine. But do you think that it would be wise to start incorporating some long course workouts in? Because I'm swimming in a 25 yard pool and I specifically go to this pool where they overheat it because it's more of like an older person therapy pool. But that's perfect for the environment that I'm going to do this swim in. It's going to be really hot. So I want to acclimate to the heat and the overheating. But I do think I would be well-served by getting some long course workouts in, but I have to drive great distances like either to Pasadena or way out to Simi Valley

to get access to a 50 meter pool. Yeah, so that will take some planning. And again, if we have to choose between getting to a 50 meter pool or getting in a longer workout in a 25 meter pool, because you're using your training time to drive, I'd rather, right? Right.

Because you're going to, and I say that we're both nodding our heads because I'm saying that because you already know, okay, that what the benefits are of 50 meter, and you know how you'll feel getting into the open water and lengthening out your stroke and just finding that all day pace. So if that means we spend 45 more minutes in the pool

versus driving and you get in another 4,000, that's sort of the equation that we need to play in these last eight weeks, given that you have limited time every day anyway. Right, I think that those moments, I could pick those moments though, where I do have more free time, like on a weekend or whatever.

And you and I both know that no matter how fit you are, short course, when you get into a long course pool and you throw down pretty hard, like you're going to be sore the next day. Like it is different in a meaningful way. And depressing too, because you thought you were fit and next thing you know, you're like out of breath on a couple hundreds. Long course, don't lie. Yeah, no, that's a whole different, and it's a different swim sport. I mean, just knowing from being swimmers, we both know people who were world class at short course meters or even yards, NCAA swimmers.

And then you put them in a 50 meter pool. They never even qualified for the Olympics, let alone up to their potential than the world fastest times they were doing in the NCAA swims. So it's almost a different swim sport. Right. So when you're looking at how much work I've done and how much work remains to be done,

are we talking survival here? Like where, you know, like obviously I'm not gonna be tip top, but I would like to be more fit than just trying to get through it. For sure, for sure. With also knowing like, I'm not gonna be able to hammer the way

that I would prefer if I lived a different life. Well, there's always that risk where you just throw the dice out there and see what happens. You know, it's saltwater, you'll float long enough. No, but you gotta look at it this way that you woke up today after a week sort of off and gently building your fitness back in and quickly in three, four days or trying to.

And you did a quarter of the distance basically this morning. So if we needed to push ourselves, could you have done a third or even up to half today and back off the pace substantially, but just continue to keep going? Probably, you'd be sore tomorrow or a little bit more fatigued, but you could. So that's where we're moving to next,

where you do half the distance and you feel like you did today for a quarter of the distance. That's our next check-in point. Now, hopefully that happens in the next two, three weeks. So you have five weeks to go to sort of add that last little component. Are we gonna do the full distance?

Of course not. Are we gonna do three quarters of the distance? Most likely not because we missed that window. But will we go 12, 13,000 yards and you feel good about that? Yes. Yeah, that seems totally doable. And if I can throw down 12, 13,000

and not be completely wrecked, that's enough confidence for me. Exactly. That and fueling and hydrating during or the combination in swimming because you sort of fuel with hydration, that will sustain you an hour three and so forth so that you feel good versus getting fatigued

and you think it's fitness where it's actually running low on fuel. Those that combined with as you're building the volume, I think you will have plenty of confidence going into 21,000 yards. Yeah, the hydration and fueling piece is the next thing because I haven't done any experimentation with that. I just go with water or nothing so far because the workouts haven't been long enough to justify it. But starting to play around with that

is something I'm eager to begin doing, especially in the higher temperature water where it's more meaningful. And what have you, so what have you, obviously this is a very personal thing, but what have you determined in your experience and all the open water marathon stuff that you've done that seems to be a good workable equation?

Yeah, so for me, it's first off in the warmer temperatures, it's hydration, right? Electrolyte hydration. So that at least that component, I'm staying topped off with regards to hydration because we dehydrate in warm water dramatically. And it's hard to recognize until it's too late,

until we're completely sort of dehydrated and it's affecting our performance. The second part is that you will have that opportunity this weekend, just before I forget that, to do two 1800s with four minutes rest. And so you can start laying out some different products, whether that's gels or chews. Personally, I like the chews. If I'm going to eat something solid, I can get through them pretty quickly, wash it down with water and keep swimming. Anything more substantial like a bar or anything like that, I'm still chewing hard and working in that rest

or even swimming one handed backstroke while we're continuing to swim and that's not ideal. So therefore we have the choose gels or bottles with calories in them. And there's plenty of those products out there that are really good, that have really advanced the technology over the last few years.

There's a variety of products out there like Precision Fuel and Hydration. There is Martins. So there are these bottles that have 200, 300 calories in, a lot of electrolytes, plenty of sodium, and therefore you can also get your calories in for what we're looking to do. We're not going that big in a deficit for your 21,000. It's probably going to be around five, six hours. And so that's not going to be something too dramatic that with a

good breakfast being topped off and staying on top of it with liquid fuel, you'll be pretty well versed in that by then. Right on. With the added complexity of salt water. Exactly, and so that's why you want cold, fresh water, so that you can rinse out your mouth, so that you can get rid of that hunger debilitating

sensation in your mouth, that salty water. You don't wanna eat anything or drink anything. You're just like, you know. So therefore we wanna be able to test that over the next few weeks. Cool. All right, so we'll check back in in two weeks. Where would you like to see me then versus now?

Well, that's where we're gonna start adding those longer swims. So in two weeks, you're gonna have, might maybe even up to 6,000, 7,000 where you feel pretty comfortable and you feel like, you know what, that wasn't so bad. Like I got out, went out and went on with the rest of my day. to 10,000 or 11,000, because the beauty of six to seven to 8,000, let's just say 65 to 8,000, 10,000, 11,000 is no difference. It's just more time in the water, but your arms and your body doesn't feel any different. And you're going to laugh because it's really remarkable how you feel just as fatigued at 7,200 as you do at 9,800. You're just like, I spend more time in the water, but I'm not necessarily more tired. And that's our next sort of threshold to cross.

All right. Sounds good, man. I appreciate all the sage counsel. I'm actually really enjoying this. It's nice to just kind of do one thing. I can't tell you the last time I just swam like pretty much every day and didn't have to worry about all the other stuff because even during the most intense kind of Ultraman training, we were still only swimming like two

or three days a week at most, right? So you never got that day in, day out cycle of swim training that compounds much more quickly when versus when you're wedging it into, you know, the cycling and the running. Isn't the psyche sort of so happy to be returning to this ritual? It is bizarre. It's like going back into the womb. Yes, I kept telling Emily last year or two years ago,

or last year when I was getting ready for the length of Tahoe, I was like, I miss this. This just being able to swim forever or turn on the gears automatically or just settling into a really smooth swim pace the day in, day out, it just comes so naturally

and it feels so good for us who are so used to staring at a black line at the bottom of a pool. And it is crazy for anybody who's watching or listening because we have so robust a background, like even at 55, like I know that I'm still tapping into what I started to build when I was 12, 14 years old.

Yeah, and it's just going back in the mind going, oh yeah, I remember this feeling that I can just click 200s and 300s over and over again. And I just, there it is. It's fine. Right. Cool, man. We'll always appreciate it. We're glad to see you're healthy. Yeah. Glad to see you're healthy. And you're starting to look like a swimmer again. I know. My hair has gotten fried. I wore a cap when I had long hair, but I was like, my hair's short, I'm not wearing a cap. And now like my hair is completely fritzed out

from the chlorine. But I'm kind of like, yeah, that's what you do when you're a swimmer. I'm just embracing it, you know what I mean? It's just that we didn't have beards back then when we were swimmers. Let alone completely white beards. Well, it's good to see you're healthy and I'm glad you're back and I will

dive into your training as we speak. Sounds good. Thanks, my friend. I'll talk to you soon. All right. Peace. Bye. you know like come on Thank you.