S4E5 -- UMAZ Athlete in Profile : Shane Duffy

I am joined in this episode by Shane Duffy from Australia as my Athlete in Profile for the 2023 Ultraman Arizona race.  

This is the second episode released this week, as I also do a Race Preview with UMAZ race director, Jen McVeay and the voice of 515 everywhere, Steve King.  Listen to that episode here.

As you will hear in this episode, when Shane starts something new he jumps all in.  A personality trait that has led him to attempt to complete six 515 races in just 12 months.  UMAZ is race number five.   

As a result of our conversation, I took on a role as one of his crew for the race, so watch the 515 Podcast (listed below) socials for updates on our adventure.  And if you are looking for race updates for UMAZ be sure to check out their socials at:

Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/ultramanarizona/
Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/UltramanArizona

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Indian Pacific Wheel Race
• Terra Australis
• Ultraman Canada 
• Ultraman Florida
• Ultraman Australia
• Ultraman Hawaii
• IM Cairns
• Cairns 70.3
• 2015 Women’s World Cup Soccer

Shout outs and mentions in this episode:

• Don Bradman 
• Nick Mallett (S2E12)
• Mike Hall 
• Steve King (S1 Episodes 1-3)
• Sheryl Cobb (S3E11)
• Dave Cobb (S2E6)
• Miguel Lopez
• Richard Thompson 
• Matt Turvey
• Warrick Semit
• Gail Laux
• Arnaud Selekov (S2E3)
• Elías Sánchez Quirante
• Armando Armellini
• Alison Duffy
• Brooke Duffy
• Heather Duffy
• Alen Stajcic

___________________________________________________________

Show Contributors:
Host : Larry Ryan
Contributing Raconteur : Steve King
Announcer : Mary Jo Dionne
Production : 5Five Enterprises
Music  :  Run by 331

___________________________________________________________

For show notes and past guests, please visit the Podcast Website: https://515theultrapodcast.buzzsprout.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/515TheUltraPodcast
Insta : 515theultrapodcast
Email : 515Ultraman@gmail.com

Transcript

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Larry 0:28

Thank you, MJ. If you are listening to this, but you have not heard the Ultraman Arizona preview episode, then check your library for season four, episode four. I've released two episodes this week, and believe me, don't want to miss the preview.

Shane’s introduction

Larry 0:47

My next guest was a high school cross-country champion and an avid soccer player up to the age of 22. He holds an Australian record in game fishing by catching a 287 kilo Mako shark and a 417 kilo tiger shark in the same tournament. He is my guest today as an athlete in profile for Ultraman Arizona, which will be his fifth 515 distance race in just 12 months. Joining me from Canberra, although his home is in Fitzroy Falls, New South Wales, Australia, it's the Duff Man, Shane Duffy. Welcome.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

Thank you, Larry.

Larry 1:29

Yeah, so just in the pre-interview here, you were mentioning that you um you're over in Canberra. What's going on over in Canberra?

SPEAKER_00 1:37

Uh I've been down here for the last 12 months um on a project at the Australian National University. Um, I have a landscape construction company, and we were doing some work around one of their new accommodation uh precincts. Fairly large project. So yeah, we've been renting a house down here in Canberra, and uh with today being a public holiday here, Australia Day, um all the guys have gone home to be with their family. So uh it was a nice place to be on my own and a nice quiet location to do this.

Larry 2:07

Yeah, yeah, that's great. Happy Australia Day.

SPEAKER_00 2:10

Thank you.

Larry 2:11

So I understand that Fitzroy Falls is a pretty small town, uh, kind of halfway between Sydney and Canberra. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_00 2:22

Yeah, correct. It's like a small village. I mean, the main sort of town there would be uh a place called Barrel. Um, and its sort of claim to fame would be the home of um Don Bradman, who's out of um uh sporting sort of people, people who like the statistics, he has an average of 99.73 as a cricketer. So I think across all sports he's um probably up there as the highest.

Larry 2:49

Oh wow. That's that's interesting because I was going to ask you what is Fitzroy's Fitzroy Falls uh famous for, other than the falls?

SPEAKER_00 2:57

Fitzroy Falls is 25 kilometers south of Barrel. So anywhere that we go, it's quite rural. It's you know it's a it's 20 kilometers to anywhere. So it's just a very small village, probably about you know 150 people if that.

Larry 3:11

Yeah. So is that a good place for you to to train ultra then? You got lots of places to go from there?

SPEAKER_00 3:18

Uh our property or our um our home backs onto the national park there. So I could actually sort of go out my back gate uh onto fire trails, and I could end up down here in Canberra in probably two days, like riding my um bike, uh you know, my off-road bike. So so yeah, there are plenty of trails, but it's fairly well um traversed by four-wheel drivers and stuff, so it's um not the nicest place to be out running.

Larry 3:46

Yeah. Well, you're uh you're no stranger to doing some long treks around Australia. And I know that back before COVID came and ruined your plans, you had a big race planned uh to trek from the north to the south of Australia. Um, people who have been following my socials probably know that I've been following Ohana member Nick Mallet and his bikepacking tour that he's using to get ready for the Indian Pacific wheel race. Um, but what is this one that you were going to take on, uh, going from north to south? And kind of like how how far is that for people that don't know your continent?

SPEAKER_00 4:25

Yeah, the race terror astralis, it goes from the northernmost point of Australia at Cape York to the southernmost point of the mainland um to um the Mornington Peninsula. Um, the overall distance is 6,250 kilometers, um, and it traverses through uh from Queensland into New South Wales through the ACT where I currently am, then into Victoria. So goes through four states. It's been run probably about half a dozen times, and there's only been two people that have completed it. It's quite a you know arduous journey.

Larry 5:03

Well, yeah, I mean at that distance, it's incredible. Um, I I looked up some comparable distances just to try and give uh some listeners the idea of what it might be like. And for Canada, it is longer than going from the top of Canada to the south of Canada. And Canada goes very far north with all the islands, and down in the US, um, you would have to go from the farthest point in Key West, Florida, all the way up into Washington State uh diagonally, and you still wouldn't be going as far as that race is.

SPEAKER_00 5:41

Yeah, I believe it's the longest sort of off-road or bikepacking sort of uh route in the world. I mean, I stand to be corrected, but that's my understanding, yeah.

Larry 5:52

Yeah, that's incredible. Um, are you familiar with Nick?

SPEAKER_00 5:56

Uh yes, I am. Uh Nick actually uh came to my aid uh when uh the opportunity for me to participate in um Ultraman Canada came along and I needed to find some crew and I was having trouble. It was a last minute thing to participate, and um he threw out a shout-out to all of his contacts on Facebook, and and that's how I was able to get a crew.

Larry 6:22

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:23

And uh and then you mentioned the Indian Pacific wheel race. I mean, that was a race that was on my agenda in uh 2019, and um but uh at the time it was a race that you had to apply for, and when I applied, I was told that I didn't have enough experience to be able to participate. Um, and then the year before that was the year that um my call, anyone that knows sort of anything about ultra-distance cycling would know my call's name. He um he he was killed during the race. So the following year the race was kind of held, but it wasn't run officially, so now anyone can pretty much enter the race. But to be able to do that now, it conflicts with um other things that I've got on my agenda. So it's definitely something that I'm looking to do, whether it's 20 or won't be in 2023. 2024 was already taken up, so maybe 25.

Larry 7:22

Oh, yeah. Well, you gotta have things to look forward to.

SPEAKER_00 7:26

Yeah, I could seek some more advice from Nick after he's completed it.

Larry 7:29

Exactly.

Six 515 races in 12 months

Larry 7:30

Yeah. Well, um, let's talk about your your busy schedule. Um, so we're talking about doing Ultraman Arizona, but you're also coming over to do Ultraman Florida in a couple weeks. Um, and that's gonna be your fourth and fifth uh 515 distance races in the calendar year. Um tell tell us what where did it start? I believe it started in Australia back in May.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

That was uh yeah, I competed in uh Ultraman uh 2022 in in Musa. Upon completing that, um, a friend of mine who I crewed for in 2019 had sent me a message. He just had completed Arizona in March of 22, and then he was looking to qualify for Hawaii. So then after we had spoken, um, I was trying to work out how I was going to be able to attend Hawaii, as you know, NUSA doesn't qualify me for that. The only way that that was going to happen was to be able to go to Canada. So I got on the you know hotline to Nick, uh to Steve King, and yeah, between all the people that sort of the Ohana helped me out to get on to um uh Brad, and then yeah, he invited me to come over and I went and competed at Canada and had a great time. It was pretty close to having just done the uh Ultraman in Noosa, but I'd also won an entry into Iron Man Cairns. So I'd done uh May in Nusa, I'd done Iron Man Cairns in June, and then I went to Canada in July.

Larry 9:09

Wow, busy, busy summer. Yeah. And then uh you took that and and got into the Ultraman Hawaii, is that correct?

SPEAKER_00 9:18

That's correct, yeah. So um Cheryl and David were there and they knew that I was trying to do that. I had approached them before the uh the race in Canada. So at the finish line, you know, Cheryl came up and said, you know, I'm looking forward to seeing you in in Hawaii, um, which is where I then got a chance to to race uh alongside uh my my great friend Miguel Um from Spain. And uh yeah, that was a great experience. It was something that we spoke about in 2019 and trying to do, and when COVID happened, uh it looked like that was kind of not gonna be possible, but we made it, we made it work.

Larry 9:59

Yeah, that's Miguel Lopez, right?

SPEAKER_00 10:02

Correct, yes. Yeah, yeah.

Larry 10:04

All right, so you've got uh Australia in May, Canada July, Hawaii in November, and now you're coming back to North America, you're gonna do Florida in February, Arizona in March, and then is it gonna end again back in Australia?

SPEAKER_00 10:23

Yeah, so I've um I've been accepted again in Australia, so yeah, I'll finish it off where I started back in uh in NUSA in May 23.

Larry 10:32

Wow, so six six races in one calendar year. That's that's gonna be we gotta talk to Steve King. That might be a record, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 10:41

Yeah, I'm not sure. Um, I mean, I've heard that potentially it is, but um, yeah, I don't know how how that will be seen by some people, but anyway, I mean it's my own personal challenge. And I I think also in Australia this year, you've got Richard Thompson who's um looking to sort

Triathlon introduction and growing Ohana

SPEAKER_00 11:00

of go sub 20 hours. He was in Hawaii this year as well and was the winner there.

Larry 11:04

Yeah, that that'd be a good one to follow as well. Yeah, well, let's let's go back to the start then for for triathlon for you. I understand that you're you kind of follow one of those typical stories of being a bit of an unhealthy guy, and then you you find uh running or triathlon and everything kind of turns around for you. How did how did it start out for you? Uh who who got you hooked into this sport?

SPEAKER_00 11:27

2015. I um had come back, I'd been on a trip into Canada uh for the Women's World Cup. I'd come back and um I was preparing some stuff for um uh a training camp for a team that I was coaching, female soccer team, and met up with a nutritionalist to do a presentation for the girls, and you know, she asked me at the end of it what I was doing for myself because at the time I was about 130 kilos. Um, I was doing all the wrong things, drinking too much, eating the wrong foods, zero exercise. Um, so yeah, I started, you know, changed a lot of things, got to a point in uh 2016 where a friend of mine was um had met up, or I don't know what the right term is, hooked up with a with a lady on Tinder, and she was going to be participating in a triathlon. And he asked me to go along and be his wingman in case things didn't work out. I could help him kind of get out of the situation. And I didn't realize I thought we were going to watch, but then um about a week before the race, um, an entry or uh an email popped up with um you know he had signed me and him and myself up to to participate in the race, and I'd never done something. So yeah, that was quite interesting. It was a very small race. I think it was like a 500-meter swim and a I don't know, 20k ride and a 5k run. But I remember when we did start the swim, um, there was me and my friend Matt, and uh there was two 65-year-old ladies that I met on the on the swim. And when I got back finally to the uh bikes, there was mine and Matt's bike, and these two ladies, so it wasn't hard to find my bike. And I was I headed out thinking this was the worst decision I've ever made in my life. Um, but then I caught the first person on the bike, and then I caught another person, and then next thing you know, I was like, okay, how many can I catch? So I changed the situation around a bit. And yeah, by the end of it, I was pretty much hooked. Wow.

Larry 13:39

So and and how did Matt do with his Tinder date?

SPEAKER_00 13:44

Uh well, it turned out that his date was racing, not even on that day. I mean, we didn't know how the thing was structured or how it worked, but her race was the next day because she was doing a standard distance, I think is the term, distance race. Okay, we were doing a sprint race. And so I said, I'm not coming back down tomorrow. So he went on his own, and yeah, it never worked out.

Larry 14:07

Poor Matt.

SPEAKER_00 14:08

But he kind of got me uh hooked into this, and um and I met up with a couple of guys, which was quite you know interesting at the time when we're setting up the bike and our gear for transition, and I was putting my stuff next to the bike, and then a guy came up to me and said, Oh, you put your stuff on that side, this is where my stuff goes, and otherwise, you know, and so that guy um I ended up running into him about another four or five times during the next year on different races, and we sort of became fairly good friends. Um, and I went on to do about I think seven of those like smaller events traveling around the state, and um, I ended up winning some like overall age group thing because you got points for each race you did.

Larry 14:54

Oh, yeah, yeah, point series.

SPEAKER_00 14:56

Yeah, so um along while I was doing that, one of the races was up on the far north coast in New South Wales, and um there was a sprint race on the Saturday and then a standard distance race on the Sunday, and then after that race, um I met up with the guys who were who had put the race on. They were staying on for a couple of days afterwards, and so I went out for a ride with them the next day, and we kept running into each other in this small village or the town where the race had been held, and they spoke to me about um an Iron Man race that was being held at Port Macquarie. The double calling in there, and I'd never even heard of Iron Man, so I didn't know much about it. So I had spoken to he said, if you want to go down and learn how it all works, go down and volunteer. So I went with the battery race, yeah. So I went to volunteer in the transition to see how all that kind of works, and then after I got the run through, um, I said to the guy, can you still like sign up for this race? And the guy's like, Yeah, I think so. So I walked out of the transition and I went to the uh you know registrations tent and I signed up to do the 70.3, so I ditched the volunteer.

Larry 16:16

Who lost the volunteer?

SPEAKER_00 16:18

They lost the volunteer, but they lost one and gained two because my the two people that I'd met up with um ended up volunteering. And a funny story, one of the guys um who I had met up with, Tinder seems to follow me around a bit. He asked me if I could drop him off on my way from McLean to uh Port Macquarie in a town called Coffs Harbor because he'd matched up with some girl in Coffs Harbour. I dropped him off for a Tinder date on the way through. So yeah, that was funny. And um, and so once I had signed up and I told these guys I had, they said, Have you got like a wetsuit or have you what have you got any of this stuff? And I was like, Not really. They um said, You need to ring this guy, and they gave me guy's number, Warwick uh Semit. And uh I rang him, he arranged a wetsuit for me, and we got talking. And to this day, he's still my coach.

Larry 17:22

Oh wow, that's that's how you met your coach. That's that's a good story, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:26

Yeah, yeah. I mean, he didn't know me from a bar of soap, and uh he was like, What do you need? Have you got this? Have you got this? And he set me up on that day and and um gave me a bit of a plan of what to do, and and uh yeah, to this day we're you know we still work together.

Larry 17:44

Wow, that's amazing. So he he was there at your at your first uh you know, somewhat real try, I guess, the the 70.3 working your way into those bigger distances.

SPEAKER_00 17:55

Yeah, so that was you know, I went from doing the smaller ones where you know you might have had 150 people doing the whole event to I think that event there is probably you know a couple of thousand people. So it was you know, your eyes were open to what the potential was, I guess. And then being a naturally competitive person, you know, you're just like, okay, when can I do the next one? How can I do it better?

Larry 18:19

Yeah. Well, you know, um I I guess what you're finding out is it's just like one person leads to the next and the next step and the next race, and then the next challenge. And along the way, you know, we always talk about the Ohana and the the people that we meet, and and someone's always you know ready to take you or point you toward that next direction. Um who are some of the people that you've met along the way that have that you've kind of become really good friends with that have maybe pointed you in the next direction or bailed you out, like um Warwick did?

SPEAKER_00 18:54

Like Yeah, Warwick did on that day for the for the race in uh I think that was in 2017. Um and then I ended up going back and doing the the race uh in 2018. I'd done the um I'd done the uh iron man, like the full distance. And then there was another race on after that that was in uh cairns in the Cairns 70.3. So I decided I would drive up there. And again, like being from Australia, I sort of thought, I mean, how far can it be? You know, like I'm used to driving long distances, but it was it was a long drive, it was a long drive. Um, and I got up there and I wasn't feeling the best, and my back and hips and everything were pretty tight. So I went over to register, and on the way over, there was like a massage tent set up overlooking the beach. And I walked up and said, Um, you know, what's the situation or for bookings or how does this work? And they were like, Yeah, just have a look at what times are available. And there was a guy that was getting changed and walking out, and he said, If you've got an opportunity, you want to see Gail. She's the person that you want to see. I went, right eh. So they were saying, Oh, you can see this person and this person. And I said, What times does Gail have available? And she turned around and like looked, and then she came over and um said, I can do this time tomorrow. So I was like, Right. So I got there, met up with her. Um, Gail has been uh on my journey with Ultraman as well, the whole way through. But during the NASA, she was telling me how she had been crewing for Ultraman. I didn't know anything about Ultraman, so that was the first I heard of it. She crewed in Hawaii for Arno Selikov.

Larry 20:49

Yes, yes, he's been on the show.

SPEAKER_00 20:51

Yeah, I know. So um, yeah, so she's she kind of planted the seed, or she was the first person to mention it. And then uh once we got talking, I found out that she lived in Newsta, and that's obviously where the race is. And then she also, because I had been up there to do the Newsta triathlon, I said, the next time I'm up there, can I come and see you, you know, where you live? And she's like, Yeah, absolutely. So we sort of struck up a friendship, and so that time I first met her was in June. So I met up with her again in November uh 2018, and then she uh suggested that I contact the lady that was um looking after the Ultraman, putting my name down as a volunteer to see how it worked, and then if you were volunteering, you'd have the priority the following year type of thing.

SPEAKER_03 21:41

Right.

SPEAKER_00 21:42

So 2019, I went in as a volunteer to Ultraman Australia, and I got paired up with um to crew uh for Miguel Lopez.

Larry 21:53

Oh, that's how you met Miguel. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:56

And so there was Miguel and there was another gentleman uh Elias Sanchez from Spain and they were both traveling together. So between myself, my wife, and my daughter, we ended up sort of helping both of them during the race and struck up a friendship. And then from watching that, I at the end of it, I said, you know what, I think I can do this. I think I'd be able to manage it. So I then set my sights on 2020, but then everyone knows what happened in 2020.

Larry 22:35

Yeah. Well, that's yeah, that's great. I mean, yeah, and and that's the way it happens. You just keep meeting more and more people as uh more and more races you go to, and that uh uh that web of people that are gonna help you out just keeps growing. That's great. Let's jump into the transition round that I do with all the athletes in profile, where I can uh give you some quick questions, you give me the quick answers, uh, just so we can pop a bunch of questions in at once, and then we'll talk a little bit more about your uh personal life on the other side.

SPEAKER_03 23:07

Okay.

Larry 23:07

All right, great. So we are talking

2 minutes in transition

Larry 23:10

a little bit about your bikes already. How many bikes do you own?

SPEAKER_00 23:13

Five or six, I would say.

Larry 23:16

Doesn't even know.

SPEAKER_00 23:18

No.

Larry 23:19

Do you have a favorite?

SPEAKER_00 23:20

Uh at the moment, my uh uh Cervello P5 and I spend a lot of time on it, I guess, so I have to like it.

Larry 23:28

Do you have anything that's on your bucket list that you still want to do?

SPEAKER_00 23:33

I'd still like to be able to do the terrorist trailers. Um I want to you know cross the country from north to south. I'd like to do what Nick's about to do and go from west to east. Um and then the plan is to do the same across the US and then Europe. So that's the longer term plan.

Larry 23:55

No, that's that's uh yeah, that's multi-year plan you got there. Um who is the most competitive person in your house?

SPEAKER_00 24:04

That's probably out of myself and my oldest daughter, Brooklyn.

Larry 24:09

Which athlete do you most admire?

SPEAKER_00 24:12

If I'm thinking of recent times, uh Amanda and what he was trying to do uh with his four races.

SPEAKER_03 24:21

Among the meeting.

SPEAKER_00 24:22

Correct, yes. Um I had a chance to meet with him in Canada. I didn't know that the time he was looking to do four. And I think we had a sort of chance meeting in the car park on day two, and they were trying to like pin his number on to his uh race kit and um his daughters and that were there, and I and I seen them sort of fumbling around, and I went back to the car, had a spare race belt, and I offered it to him, and they reluctantly took it. And at the end of the race, when he finished the run, sorry, for the run morning you want to give it back, and I said, no, no, keep it. And then after the run, he tried to hand it back to me again, and I said, no, keep it as a momento. So when I then seen him in Hawaii, um you know, it was great to see that I guess he was doing the same as what I was sort of looking to try and do. Um, I was really um disappointed for him that he didn't quite make the cutoff and I was waiting there at the finish line on uh day one for um for him and also for my friend Miguel because Miguel only made it the cutoff by um you know like 70 seconds or something. So um, I mean I was I only made it by like 14 minutes, and I'm normally like in within within inside of 10 hours. So that was um Hawaii definitely is the uh was a challenge.

Family Life

Larry 25:45

Yeah, yeah. Okay, so you mentioned that you're probably your eldest daughter might be the most competitive in your house. What is your household makeup of a family unit?

SPEAKER_00 25:57

There's myself and my wife Allison, and uh we have two daughters, uh Brooke and Heather.

Larry 26:03

And what do Brooke and Heather do?

SPEAKER_00 26:06

They're actually they're both teachers, so um, they've both gone into the teaching profession.

Larry 26:12

Um I love that.

SPEAKER_00 26:14

Yeah, my wife has two sisters, and they're both teachers, so my wife is the uh odd one out.

Larry 26:20

Oh yeah. What what do what does she do?

SPEAKER_00 26:23

Well, she currently works within our uh company that we have. Uh prior to that she was involved in the in the banking industry.

Larry 26:30

Oh yeah. So so what is it? You were saying that you're in Canberra working at the did you say university? Sorry.

SPEAKER_00 26:37

Uh oh well, we were on a project here. We do a lot of like uh commercial, you know, large-scale commercial like infrastructure projects. So uh we'll come in and do like the you know the paving and uh concreting and planting and you know open sort of green spaces um for these types of projects, for schools, hospitals, and stuff like that.

Larry 26:59

Oh yeah, all the big stuff. That's good. How did you get involved in that minor work?

SPEAKER_00 27:03

Well, I actually it's a funny story. I um in uh high school, I mean, as I don't know if it's the same over there in Canada, but in high school, when you're 15 here, you go and do like work experience.

Larry 27:16

Yeah, we do that.

SPEAKER_00 27:18

And you go to a sort of company of something that you think you're gonna want to do. In September 1987, I went and done work experience with this company, and then I just never went back to school. I kind of went, I think I'm wasted my time at school.

Larry 27:34

So what is that year nine, year ten for you guys?

SPEAKER_00 27:38

Uh that was year nine, uh year nine. Yeah, I didn't start year ten.

Larry 27:44

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 27:45

Yeah, so I sort of September done that, and then that was kind of that was over, but then I kind of went, Do you think I could get a job or something here or an apprenticeship? Again, I'm not sure what they call it over there, yeah, yeah, like a traineeship or something. Um so I worked the remainder of the year, uh sort of casual or part-time or whatever, but it was pretty much every day. And then the following year um I was offered like an apprenticeship fast forward to 2023, and I now own the company. Um in 1996, the guy who owned it, Craig, he um him and his wife used to they do a lot of still do a lot of skiing, and they used to travel. Uh she was a teacher as well, and they used to travel through her school holidays overseas and always go skiing. And one of their sort of um ambitions was to buy a lodge somewhere, ski lodge. Um, they ended up buying a uh a business on the ski fields here in Australia and um ended up eventually getting into having a lodge up there, but um, yeah, he was gonna shut the thing down, the company down, because he couldn't sell it or no one would take it over. Um, in the meantime, I'd gone back to school over night time to complete my high school certificate, and uh I had applied to join the police force and got accepted in, but I had to wait for the next sort of intake uh to go to the academy. So, in the meantime, we had a couple of jobs to finish, so I was finishing those jobs off, and then yeah, they come to me and said they're ready, but I had a job to finish, and then they come back to me the next time and said, You're ready for you, and then I had another job to finish. Um, in the meantime, my wife's parents said, Why don't you stay doing this? And um, you know, they kind of helped us get started, and we bought a truck off of Craig and some of these tools, and yeah, I just continued on.

Larry 29:48

Oh yeah, so you must love it.

SPEAKER_00 29:51

Yeah, I I really do. I actually really love what I do. Um and I kind of I said at the beginning that I was kind of uh out of shape in 2015, like I went through a period of time where you kind of work on the tools and you and you do what you do, and I guess that keeps you sort of naturally fit or in shape at what point. But then as the company was growing, I my role changed, and I had to become more of a an operations person and not be out on the tools, right? And so then, yeah, my kind of lifestyle changed, and then obviously my shape changed as well. Um, and so then fast forward, I just decided that when I was going to do something about my health, I mean, I didn't want to be trying to I I had to make a change, so I decided to go back out into the field, employ somebody to basically try and look after my business or run it day to day.

Larry 30:46

Oh, okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:47

And then allow me to be out there um, you know, mentoring people in the field.

Larry 30:53

Oh, that's that's a a different way about going around running your business.

SPEAKER_00 30:59

Yeah, so that's sort of where I am now. And then the reason why I I also said like I'm away in Canberra is when we go away, like I don't want to be asking uh employees to go and do something that I wouldn't or you know, wouldn't do or couldn't do myself. So you know it gives me an opportunity to sort of uh spend some time with them, um sort of with work, outside of work, and um yeah, it's been an interesting, interesting last four years of you know, we've traveled the state.

Larry 31:30

So that's great. Yeah. Now you were saying earlier that um it was when you came back from Canada that you kind of started making these changes.

Other endeavors

Larry 31:40

Um and and you were coaching soccer at the time. Can you tell us a little bit about your soccer coaching experience?

SPEAKER_00 31:46

Well, as I said just a bit earlier, I had two daughters. Um, there was one stage at the time I'm not real good with dates or years, but um I had a friend of mine uh through business who had said to me, you know, you're spending a lot of time on your business or in your business. You need to make sure you you find ways of uh doing things with your family because your kids are going to grow up too quick. My my oldest daughter, Brooke, that we just mentioned, is who is quite competitive. Um she had started playing like local soccer soccer with a local soccer team in our the next village over from where we are. So I went along and watched that, and then um you know how how old is she at this edge?

Larry 32:31

Is this like the five, six year old or the teens?

SPEAKER_00 32:34

No, no, she's uh probably around about nine or ten.

SPEAKER_03 32:38

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 32:39

Yeah, probably 10, 10 or 11, something like that. And so yeah, she started to play, and then one of the fathers was coaching, and then I then got kind of dragged into like playing for the same club. Um and then one of the guys who was coaching was part of that team, and then he asked me to help him with the junior team. So, yeah, that's kind of where it started, and then they had some like local rep trials for the you know, the team to represent the region, yeah. And then Brooke went along to those. She was like unsuccessful at the time, but went back the following year, and then she trialed and she was successful. So then we kind of moved out of you, couldn't play for for both, you had to play for one or the other. So then that was involving us traveling probably 60 or 70 kilometers each way to go training, you know, a couple of times a week. Yeah.

Larry 33:37

So here in Canada, we call that a hockey parent.

SPEAKER_00 33:42

Okay, right. Well, yeah, we we did that for um well, I don't know, 10 or so years. Um, with and then along the way, the youngest daughter, she got involved as well, and uh they both sort of played at that rep level and they made their way into state teams. And then along the way, I got sort of uh convinced to start coaching some of those teams, and then I started to have some success, and uh that regional team would be playing against you know, like Sydney-based and and other regional-based teams. And so from there, you know, I was asked to go and coach in the state level in the state teams. We have like uh for New South Wales, which is the state that I live in, um we have like a New South Wales team, but they also have like a New South Wales country, so they have a New South Wales metro side and then a New South Wales country side.

SPEAKER_03 34:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 34:38

So I had an opportunity to work and coach the um New South Wales country squads and went to the national titles with them a few times. And then from that, you know, you start speaking to people at the next level up, and I'm just the person that's like, well, where can you go to next? And where can you go to next?

Larry 34:56

So not not unlike your triathlon career, you just hang out at these next events and talk to people and find out what's the next level.

SPEAKER_00 35:04

Exactly. So then I started to uh assist with um like a a national, like a in a national league team um called Sydney FC, the women's team there. And then I was with them for a while, and then the gentleman that I was working with, Alan Stagic, he became the national coach, national women's national team coach. So he took uh the Matildas to Canada in 2015, which is why I was there then. And I followed the team around.

Larry 35:37

Um I was lucky enough to go to some of those games down at BC Place and see see those games.

SPEAKER_00 35:43

Yeah, well, we flew into uh Winnipeg, which was my first ace of Canada, and so we were there, and then we went from Winnipeg to Edmonton, and then we went from uh Edmonton and we qualified for the next round. So we flew then to Moncton, okay, and went to the other side of the country, and then we flew back to Edmonton, and uh yeah, we got knocked out by Japan in the quarterfinals. So um, but then we ended up my wife and I stayed on afterwards, and we uh traveled around for another week or so, and this is why our youngest daughter Heather was doing her like higher school certificate, like her last year of high school. And with the tournament, like there's no set date, you don't know when you're gonna get knocked out. So our we just kept extending our dates. So yeah, um, that was interesting, but yeah, we done a well at the time I done like a wings and uh and a beer tour of Canada, yeah. And then trying to work we in two time zones as well, because you know, trying to stay in contact with my office and and stuff like that. So upon my return, I was probably not in the best shape.

Larry 37:01

Right, yeah. So were you basically full-time coaching at that point then? And and the business was being run by someone else, or you were trying to juggle ball.

SPEAKER_00 37:10

You might as well say I was yeah, I was pretty much. I mean, I was still trying to manage stuff within my business. There was a couple of times there where, well, not a couple of times, there was one time in particular where I um I was traveling, you know, four hours each way for training sessions, and um one night on the way back to work in uh country town called Orange. I uh I fell asleep on the highway in the middle of the road, and uh a semi-trailer like on the horn woke me up and I was like, yeah, something's got to change here. This is yeah, this is I can't keep burning the candles at both ends.

Larry 37:47

Yeah, holy.

SPEAKER_00 37:49

Very close call. Yeah. But I can sleep anywhere.

Larry 37:56

Which comes in handy like on an ultra run or something when

Fish stories

Larry 38:00

you're going for a few days.

SPEAKER_04 38:02

Yeah.

Larry 38:03

Yeah. Um, and and the other thing that I mentioned right off the top, uh, one of your hobbies is to do some like big game fishing, and and you've you've won tournaments and you've caught these big fish. Tell me a little tell me some fish stories.

SPEAKER_00 38:18

I'd always kind of been interesting where I live at Fitzroy Falls. I guess the story behind why I live there is that when I started working and I was quite young, the people that were uh I was working with, who were my like um, I guess tradespeople above me, they used to, if we had like a rain day, uh we would go to this village, Fitroy Falls, and go trout fishing. Uh there's like a lake there. Um, so we used to go up there maybe half a dozen times a year, and um, and these guys introduced me to that sort of style and type of fishing. And then you know, we were either said to them at one stage, well, one day I'm gonna like move up here because I really enjoy it. And the funny side of that is I've lived up there for over 20 years and I've been fishing there about you could count on one hand how many times I've been fishing.

Larry 39:13

Live kids in the way.

SPEAKER_00 39:16

Um, so uh, you know, fishing then introduces you, as we said before, like with uh Ultraman and with Triathlon to that to that group of people, and then people who fish don't just do one style of fishing, they do multiple styles. So I started to uh fish in a series called Um, there was like an Australian uh bass and brim series where you used to travel up and down the coast um sort of every other weekend fishing in different locations, and uh you would arrive, um enter as like a boat if you had your own boat, which I did, and uh you would be paired up on each day with a different person. Um, so there'd be you'd enter as a boater and you'd enter as a non-boater, so you could get paired up with people that you didn't know.

Larry 40:05

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:06

And so yeah, I'd done that for a while, and then from that, the people that I was fishing with um were involved, some of the people were involved in game fishing. So then I went out a couple of times and then went, well, these are bigger, you know, they go faster. This is uh something I want to do. So I ended up doing that for quite a while, got involved on um on the committee. I was the treasurer for you know six or seven years, something like gee, you don't do anything half-assed, eh?

Larry 40:39

You do you get you get right in there and and and get part of everything.

SPEAKER_00 40:45

Yeah, well, I like to like. I mean, I'm not one of those people who likes to sit back and and uh complain. Like if you if it's not happening the way that you think it should, you know, I'll put my hand up and have a go myself. And then I tend to stay around until people then start to like do that back to me. And I think, well, it's time to move on now, it's someone else's turn. Because inevitably that's where it always ends up, you know. Someone thinks that you're gaining an advantage from it or whatever, so you just kind of go, Well, you do it. And um, but yeah, we traveled uh with that, and at the time we were probably like one of the best, the guys that I ended up sort of fishing with the most uh targeted uh sharks at the time. And so yeah, we we had quite a bit of success. So caught some and lost some. You know, we lost uh a big Mako shark after fighting it for about 18 hours in one tournament. Goodness, and um yeah, that was gut-wrenching for me because I uh there were three of us on the boat, uh Ronnie and then the guy on the rod, Tony, a very good friend of mine, and myself. And so my role in that particular fish was to be the trace man, and so it was pitch black dark, we didn't have the boat wasn't well lit, and um, after that period of time, you know, we're obviously all getting a little bit, you know, uh clouded our our heads, and we hear the noise like the of the trace hitting the rod tip, and I went over and this maker was lying there, and it was like it would have been a an Australian record, potential world record, it would have been over 300 kilo. This maker, and I grabbed it, got a wrap on the trace, and started to bring it to the side of the boat so that we could gaff it. And um, yeah, for whatever it sat there for a split second, and then it must have come to, or you know, it then took off. And I'm supposed to part of my role is to back off the drag so that when it goes, there's a you know, there's not so much tension on the line straight away.

SPEAKER_03 42:48

Right.

SPEAKER_00 42:48

And so, yeah, the line broke. Uh the spish slam away, and and my two colleagues, you know, the guy on the rod just put the rod in the rod holder, right? Let's go home, and then I'm there going. I sat at the back of the boat kicking myself all the way back. But yeah, but as they say, I mean it's part of what we do. I mean, if yeah, if every time you hooked it, you caught it, um, you know, it wouldn't be fish, you know, it wouldn't be dangerous.

Larry 43:17

It wouldn't be any fun, yeah. Yeah. Um, now I'm guessing that this is not just your typical rod, then you go down to Bunnings and pick up a fishing rod. Like, what what do you have to use to catch a fish of this size?

SPEAKER_00 43:31

Yeah, I think that was um, I mean, we had like um, you know, obviously all the appropriate like game fishing gear. I mean, the rods and and the reels were were quite expensive. Um, the reels are like, I don't know, if you're sending that kind of stuff, like a big sort of gold reel that holds, you know, nearly a kilometer of line. Um so Shimano, which we, you know, I guess we still use with our bikes. So I'm uh I'm still using Shimano to this day. But yeah, Shimano, uh, Tiagras were the were the reels that we used that could hold enough line and had enough drag in a good enough drag system to be able to play those fish over the you know at the line classes that we needed to. Yeah, we're we've we predominantly fish with about a 15 kilo line. So when you're talking about catching a three, four hundred kilo fish, um, yeah, it's not like you can just hook it and wind it in. There's a bit of um there's a bit of spilling ball and a lot of luck.

Larry 44:33

Yeah. So um when you go to Florida, are you gonna try and get some fishing in there? Go catch some marlin.

SPEAKER_00 44:40

It wasn't my plan. I don't know how I'm gonna feel or how I'm gonna be after I finish this race. Um, I mean, I have been to Miami before and I have been down to Puerto Rico, but I've never actually done any fishing in all of my visits to the states. So so, but I am gonna be in the States for a while. At the moment, it looks like I'll be um yeah, Florida and then um doing a bit of a road trip from Florida to Arizona.

Larry 45:07

Are you gonna bike there? No.

SPEAKER_00 45:12

Um, I'm gonna be I've got a a couple of work-related things. I'm uh in the process of setting up uh another business at the moment, so I'm um I'm kind of challenging myself to see if I can replicate what I currently have or do it again. Um, I guess the business that I currently run was initially started by somebody else, and I pretty much picked it up. And um, although we've done you know, our turnover, you know, the business before had never done a million dollars worth of work in a year, and now we probably do five, six, seven million dollars annually. Um so I want to see if I can, I guess, start over again.

Larry 45:54

And and what field is that gonna be?

SPEAKER_00 45:56

It's in uh pool construction. Um and so there's one part of it is like the pool construction side of it, but it's with a product that I have the ability to be able to become the distributor of the product as well. It's uh a French French-based product. Um but there is um a company, or they are set up in the States, so it's much easier for me to liaise and communicate with the guys in the States than what it is with the the boys in uh in France. My French is not so good.

Larry 46:30

Yeah, yeah. So I I guess that gives you the ability to write off your your two Ultraman races as well, because you'll be doing business on the way.

SPEAKER_00 46:38

Oh well, I guess so. I mean, I keep saying those things to my wife, but she goes, Well, you've still got to put the money in at the start. So um this whole journey of where we've currently got to is um uh happened because the race in Australia obviously didn't qualify me to race in Hawaii. Um and so you know, once you've then done Canada and then you've done Hawaii, it's like, well, I might as well get these other two out of the way because I know that I'll run into somebody somewhere and they'll say, Oh, but you didn't do Florida and that's great, or you didn't do Arizona and that's even better. So if I get it out of the way now, I can come back and get this business up and running and spend a bit of time focusing on um, I guess, replenishing the bank account.

Larry 47:26

Right, yeah, yeah. Well, I'm guessing you you do have to sacrifice some things to to follow these pursuits.

SPEAKER_00 47:35

Yes, I mean I'm very lucky that um, you know, a lot of the people that work with me um, you know, are prepared to sort of cover me. I know that they grabbed me a little while ago and said, um, can you not do any more races just before Christmas? Because you know, that's a fairly busy time for us.

Larry 47:51

That's the middle of your summer.

SPEAKER_00 47:54

And I said, Yeah, that's fine, no worries. And um they said, when's your next race? And I went, uh, four weeks. I went, yeah. And I mean, I still haven't told them that I'm staying on yet, so that'll be a discussion. I mean, I leave uh what is it here now, Thursday. I leave not Monday coming, but the Monday after. So sometime between now and then I need to let them know that yeah, I'm actually not going to be around for a little while.

Larry 48:24

Yeah, well, break it to them gently.

SPEAKER_00 48:28

Yeah, well, I'm hoping that um you know they've had the Christmas break and they've been able to spend a little bit of time away. So if I get this out of the way, well, um, yeah, I'll be covering them for you know the next 12 months or maybe longer.

Larry 48:44

Well, uh Shane, uh it's been great uh to catch up with you today. And um I look forward to seeing if you're able to get these six calendar or six races done in one calendar year. I I think it's a it's a great feat to go out and attempt and a good personal challenge for you. Uh hopefully we'll be catching up in the near future and hearing about uh how the how it all turned out for you.

SPEAKER_00 49:10

All right, thank you. I really appreciate the opportunity to chat. I've been listening for a while and um you know the people that are on here, and I mean I'm not sure that I can offer a lot to to the people listening, but there's been plenty of people that have that I have listened to that have given me um plenty of things that I've been able to implement and use along my journey. So thank you for the um for offering this service, mate.

Larry 49:32

Oh, yeah, you bet. That's that's all part of it. That's why we do it, and and to do it to introduce the athletes, just to you know, um, not everybody's done a thousand mega events, uh, but we we still want to get to know the Ohana. So these athletes and profile are also very important.

SPEAKER_00 49:47

Thank you if you're talking.

Larry 49:50

Thanks for listening to my conversation with Shane Duffy. And as you probably know by now, during this conversation, we had a discussion about me joining his crew because he didn't have any crew members for that race. So I'm heading down to Arizona to be a part of this crew, and I'm very excited about that. Perhaps I will have the time to do some special updates from the race on a daily basis down there, if I'm not too tired and if I don't have too much work to do for Shane. So stay tuned and hopefully we'll have some daily updates for you from Ultra Mom or like the internet today, please.