Sophie Woods | Via Alpina FKT

Sophie Woods just ran the length of the Alps faster than anyone in recorded history. Starting in Trieste, Italy on July 4 and finishing in Monaco on August 1, she covered the Via Alpina, 2,018 kilometers and 117,614 meters of climbing across eight countries, in 28 days, 17 hours, and 59 minutes, beating the previous overall record by more than seven days.

In this conversation, Sophie takes us inside the effort: the highs and lows, what she ate, how she paced certain sections, her sleep strategy, and how she handled setbacks like wildfires, bugs, and course reroutes.  

We also discuss her background as a London-based hairdresser, seven years living in a camper van, her IVF journey, three finishes at Tor des Géants, and a podium debut at the Winter Spine Race that she credits with giving her a whole new level to dig from. Plus what she learned from other multi-week specialists and whether she's really lining up for PTL just weeks after this FKT.

Partners:

• Precision Fuel and Hydration - use code SINGLETRACK at checkout for 15% off your next order
• Janji - running apparel that goes the distance
• Raide - Making equipment for efficient human-powered movement in the mountains 
• Norda - check out the 005: the lightest, fastest, most stable trail racing shoe ever made
• Kodiak Cakes - my favorite oatmeal and pancakes

Additional Links:

• Follow Sophie Woods on Instagram
• Centurion Coaching

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back or welcome to the Single Track Podcast. I'm your host, Phil Melanson, and in this episode, we're talking with Sophie Woods, who just ran the length of the Alps faster than anyone in recorded history, starting in Trieste, Italy on July 4th and finishing in Monaco on August 1st. She covered the Via Alpina, which I believe is just over 2,000 kilometers long, includes over 117,000 meters of climbing across eight countries. She did it in 28 days, 17 hours and 59 minutes, beating the previous overall record by more than seven days. An incredible accomplishment in this conversation. Sophie takes us inside the effort, the highs and the lows, what she ate, her sleep strategy, how she paced certain sections, and how she handled setbacks like flat tires on the crew vehicle, wildfires, bugs, course reroutes, the like. We also discussed her background as a London-based hairdresser, seven years living in a camper van, her IVF journey, three finishes at Torgeon, and a podium debut at the Winter Spine Race earlier this year that she credits with giving her a whole new level to dig from in these types of projects, plus what she learned from other multi-week specialists like John Kelly, Tara Dauer, Carol Saab, and what I should say, whether she's really lining up for the PTL in Chamini, France later this month, just weeks after this incredible FKT. Before we get started, I, you know, since it's been three weeks, I figured I'd share some personal and single track related updates. Uh we took July off from the moves. We're also taking August off. The nose is going to be back after UTMB. So from September onward, that'll be a weekly cadence. Um I also think in future years, just that July-August window, Jules and I do so much travel. I'm often back on the East Coast doing personal projects, et cetera, that it's sort of our time to break. But um love the format, and we are excited to have it back in September. What I've been up to, so uh I did a fast pack of the Weiss 100 route in mid-July. This is the hundred miles of trail, uh, the Appalachian Trail, I should say, that uh is set between Glencliffe, New Hampshire, and Goyam, New Hampshire. You travel through the Kinsmans, Mount Moosealoch, the Pemi Wilderness, the Presidential Range, the Carter Mariah Range. It the official numbers, it's something like 93 miles, 34,000 feet of climbing. Got to share a bunch of time with people like Chris Shane, Hillary McCloy, Kara Baskin, Phil Karsha, Andrew Drummond. Huge thanks to JP Kroll for car shuttles, lodging, food. He was he was amazing. I happened to be doing this at the same time hard rock was going on. And so, top of mind for me was comparing this route to hard rock. They're very similar in a lot of ways, I would say. This route, obviously lower elevation, but the humidity factor and it's just so busy underfoot, the root tangles, the glacial erratics. It's just, there's no free steps, no free miles. It's spectacular. The views are incredible. It really is the crown jewel of the Northeast. And at some point, I want to go back to give it a proper single push. And yeah, the community up there is amazing. I've been in Maine for a bit last weekend, did the Beach to Beak in 10K. This is my favorite 10K road race in America. I'm sure a lot of other folks who have experienced it would agree. There's a lot of fanfare around it. They put together a great elite field. The race director is Joan Bonnoit Samuelson. Obviously, it takes place in my hometown of Cape Elizabeth, Maine. I had a great time out there on Saturday, shared a bunch of miles with friend and trail media colleague Abby Levine. And now I got to figure out what to do with the fall. Do I sign up for something more in the roads like the California International Marathon in early December? You know, is 2026 just like the year of marathoning for me, or do I try to fit some sort of push on a route like the Whites 100? Do I do, you know, Andrew Drummond, who I just mentioned, he's kind of one of the key figureheads up in the uh the White Mounds of New Hampshire. He puts on this fat ass event that makes a single push along the Whites 100 route possible. Maybe I do that, but I just don't know if I can get enough training and prep, and we'll see. Uh, for the last two weeks of August, we're gonna be in Chamonix, France for coverage of the UTMB World Series finals. My friend, colleague Brett Hornig is gonna be in the co-host seat with me. He's gonna be helping on previews for OCC, CCC, UTMB, and then instant recaps for all three as well. And then we'll have a good mix of athlete interviews and more like evergreen state of the sport type stuff that'll come out during that time. And I'm gonna try to consolidate content into like daily episodes so that you're not totally overwhelmed with the amount of content coming through. What else should we say before we get into it? Oh, call for guests. So yeah, I kind of want to put this out to the outside. I'm always thinking independently, but would love to hear from you. You know, we did an episode with Wright Thompson at the end of last month that got published, yeah, in late July. Wright, you know, he's not of this trail running world. He's a sports journalist who focuses on, you know, hockey, baseball, basketball, football, the major sports. But I felt like there were still a lot of talking points for that episode that had intrigue and applicability to our world. So, you know, I'm thinking like, do I go more into the sports journalism route? Do I find people like, you know, the Dan Patricks and the Seth Wickershams and, you know, other folks in that ESPN world? Uh, do I do a doping series? I've I've been talking about, you know, possibly doing an anti-doping focused series, getting, you know, a coach to talk about it, someone from Wada, an athlete, et cetera. You know, what do we do? So I'm starting to think about what our fall content looks like in addition to single track news and would love to hear from you. So shoot us a DM on Instagram at RunSingleTrack to let us know. Yeah, that's that's about it, you know. Um, got to scratch like the racing and the project itch in the middle of the summer. And I I think we feel pretty well rested and prepared heading into UTMB. So, you know, I think the goal, especially now that we have a kid, I think the goal is to strike that balance of like working hard, but also smart and creating a lot of slack in the schedule so that like if I want to at 10 a.m. on Monday of UTMB week, I can like go out with Sloan for you know a hike up to the Bravon or something, you know. Like that's I think that's pretty important to us. So that's it. Uh also, you know, got to thank a couple of our partners, Norda, the official footwear partner of single track. As you know, the 055 released last month uh for a while there. A lot of sizes were out of stock. It looks like a lot is back in. All sizes, 11 and below, are back in stock. Unfortunately, sizes 11.5 and up are still out. But if you join their mailing list at NordaRun.com, uh they you'll be the first to know when they're back. For the uninitiated, the 5.5 is an all-terrain speed and stability shoe featuring a seamless knit collar, 100% Arnitel TPEE midsole tuned for speed and energy return, a biocircular dynema upper, and a Norda Vibram collabed sole plate with Megagrip Elite and Lightbase Tech for unparalleled performance and durability. Check everything out at NordaRind.com. Also, thank you to Precision, the official nutrition partner of Single Track. We are in the dog days of summer. Many of you are probably putting the final touches on training for your A-goal. Maybe it's, you know, a late summer, early fall, 100 miler, some other big project, whatever it is, if you haven't completely dealt in nutrition yet, I encourage you to go check out Precision's Fuel and Hydration Planner, input your race, answer a few questions around goals, your sweat rate, composition, other bio information, and it will give you a solid plan to follow. I have used this for every project of 2026. I even used it last weekend for the Beach2Be content K. It takes out all the guesswork. Go check it out using the custom link in the show notes of this episode. And with that, let's get on to this conversation with Sophie Woods. Sophie Woods, it is an honor to have you on the Single Track Podcast. How are you doing? At least for me, it's uh it's it's the morning over here in the States. How are you doing on this uh this Friday?

SPEAKER_02 8:26

I'm doing all right. I'm doing much better than I was. I'm managing to stay awake for more than four hours at a time and I'm still wanting to eat everything I can possibly find, but I'm doing all right.

SPEAKER_00 8:36

Do you still have dreams about the effort? Like do you still wake up thinking that you're still in it?

SPEAKER_02 8:40

Yeah. Like they I didn't have dreams about it for the first couple of nights, and they've kind of just started, and it's intense. I am not enjoying them. Um, yeah, so I'm s I at the moment I am waking up, kind of like waking up still on the trail, and still thinking I have so far to run, and just feeling exhausted and not knowing how I'm gonna do it. And then I kind of like come to and I'm like, oh no, it's okay, you're in your bed. Like, it's all right, but it's yeah, it's happening a couple of times a night. Huh.

SPEAKER_00 9:14

And I know you have a background with a lot of multi-day stuff, Tortegeon, winter spine, et cetera. Is is that type of like post-effort scenario, is that unique to this multi-week stuff, or is this stuff you've experienced in your other parts of your career?

SPEAKER_02 9:28

I think the most notable time I've had this before was when I tried to recce a sky race in the UK. And I thankfully actually didn't find the route. Um, I was in the c in the clouds and had to kind of downclimb a bit. And, you know, the route was actually much much sketchier, but all of a sudden you realize that you're very alone in a very tricky situation that things could go horribly wrong. Anyway, I found my way down. I followed a sheep down, actually, and I found my way down, and that night I was back on the mountain desperately trying to stay on the bed. My husband said I was just kind of like scrabbling next to him. So I have had these types of things before, but not typically so much after, say, something like the Tortegeant, um, possibly after the spine, because that was hard.

SPEAKER_00 10:21

And then we've so we've talked with folks like Tara Dower before post-Appalachian Trail, John Kelly, a lot of these folks who are similar to you, like really pushing the bounds in these multi-week efforts. And one of the things that I'm always curious about is okay, the the project itself was obviously you went to these extraordinary depths, but what's it like managing, like, for example, this media inquiry post-event? Like, talk about just like the the the people competing for your time and how you manage all of that.

SPEAKER_02 10:48

I mean, look, it's been crazy. I mean, because this kind of started while I was out on the trail too, right? Like I'm maybe like two weeks in, and Steph puts up this post that goes viral. And this thing that, you know, a few people knew about in the trail running world suddenly becomes this massive thing, and there's there's just requests coming from left, right, and center. Thankfully, I had this incredible powerhouse team of women who just stepped in and managed everything for me. But I I was very involved in the chat for a while, and eventually I just had to step back because I was like, I actually can't take on any more of this because I really now more than ever need to make sure that I get to the finish of this because so many more people are watching now. Like it kind of went from, you know, like a couple of hundred people knew I was out there to thousands. So I um yeah, I had to, I had to step back from that. And, you know, I'm I'm really grateful actually the that um Belinda from Shiny Projects is still managing me because there is there's just requests coming from left, right, and center, and it and it's amazing. And obviously I want to get this story out there because it's so important for women to see that we are capable of big, scary things. But, you know, having to do an interview, like I mean, I finished, I don't know what time I finished, what, 10:30, 11:30. By the time we actually got to bed that night, and then I had to be up for a BBC breakfast interview the next morning, I tell you what, that blow dry almost killed me.

SPEAKER_00 12:25

It must be awesome to have the chance, except like when like the BBC comes knocking or these bigger media elements, it must be cool to have that platform if there's a cool message that you want to share through this effort.

SPEAKER_02 12:37

Oh, absolutely. I'm so grateful. You know, like it's it's incredible because like in our little trail-running world, right? Like, yeah, this is really cool, but it's not super abnormal. Well, at least I don't think so, you know, like there are women out there doing really cool things every year. And and we know about them and we celebrate them in our kind of small community. But to be able to have something like this go out into the wider environment and for people who may never really run or, you know, are interested in trail running to kind of know that there are people out there like smashing records and um showing the world that like give give us woman a little bit of belief and some support, and we will show you what we can do.

SPEAKER_00 13:24

So our audience is largely North American, so there might be some fans that have been following your career for years, but there also might be a bunch that haven't. And so I did want to talk before we get into the Via Alpina route, just a bit about your background. I've got a couple notes here. Hairdresser in London for many years, van life for many years, now based in it. Can you uh maybe some of the highlights like talk about this hairdressing background?

SPEAKER_02 13:47

Okay, so moved uh from New Zealand from Christchurch, moved to London when I was 20, um, was a hairdresser and worked in a salon in predominantly in a salon in Chelsea for most of my career, lock and ego, and uh loved it, absolutely loved it. Uh, you know, loved like it's a great job. You make people look good all day, and they're so grateful to you, right? Like all you do is do your job, and they're like, oh my god, you're the best thing in the world. Um, but ultimately burnt myself out. So started, started running in my mid-20s, you know, very slowly, very like short bits, and then eventually fell in love with ultra running and trying to combine a full-time busy salon job where you are on your feet all day, you know, clients rammed in, and then you're, you know, on your in your off days, you are running all day. Um, so trying to do, you know, some sort of like, I don't know, it's probably doing 80 miles a week, and I was working 40 hours at the salon, and then we were climbing a couple of nights a week, and it just I got to the point where I was just going home and bursting into tears. And not because I was unhappy, but just I think I was just so tired and I was so burnt out. And eventually my husband, um, who also had a has had a very stressful job for a very long time, he turned to me and he said, I think we have to go. And so we handed in the notice on our house that night. And then we decided to get a campervan, and both of our jobs actually kept us. So I used to fly, when I was living in the camper van, I used to fly back to the salon and work one, like four days every five weeks. Um, and my husband worked remotely, and we moved into the camper van and then had seven years living roaming around Europe.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

Was the plan seven years when you started, or was it kind of like touch and go?

SPEAKER_02 15:37

No, when we started, we thought we'd buy some like old bangers, throw a mattress in the back and do six months and then move back to New Zealand. Our parents are very disappointed that we have not actually moved back to New Zealand. But because our jobs kept us, it meant that we were able to financially support ourselves while we were there. So we were like, well, we can afford to have a bit of a better van. And so we had one um made for us and we just loved it. I honestly like I love living where I live now. In fact, there is apart from my family home, you know, there has not been somewhere that I have been so excited to come back to. But I just love being in the camper. We both do. Like the freedom of it is incredible.

unknown 16:19

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 16:20

And now based in Andorra.

SPEAKER_02 16:22

Now based in Andorra, we are very lucky. We live basically on a ski field at the bottom of Andorra's highest mountain. Um, so it's a it's a pretty awesome spot.

SPEAKER_00 16:31

I read that you were learning Catalan.

SPEAKER_02 16:34

Uh yes, very slowly and very badly.

unknown 16:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 16:38

Okay. Um and then I mean it sounds like you you had to have become a proponent of van life at this point. Like if you live if you're if you're doing it for seven years, it must have been a great experience.

SPEAKER_02 16:48

Oh, I just I can't tell you how freeing it was. Like to to just move to where you needed to be, right? Like we even did it through COVID, which was tricky, very tricky. But you know, it's um it just the weather's bad. You go somewhere else. You know, we do we have done seven ski seasons, which are a little more challenging because everything freezes. So you have no running water and it's kind of like camping in the winter in a tin can. But even that, you know, you can park at the bottom of a ski field. Like I learned to ski when we moved into the camper van because I was like, I don't want to be this person who does a week a year. If I'm gonna learn something, I want to be able to do it properly. And I mean, that's even being able to do that was incredible because it gave me the mountains in the winter that I'd never had before. So I think it just it just allowed us to have amazing experiences and you know, it only takes like 10 minutes to clean it.

SPEAKER_00 17:51

I I do also, I know you've talked about this in other interviews. I did want to talk about your fertility journey, IVF, etc. And, you know, I think I don't want to rehash too much, but one question I had for you, and this is how like how do you ultimately decide to move outwards from that journey into into into a year like this?

SPEAKER_02 18:15

Yeah, look, I mean, it was so hard for me, you know, like trying to get pregnant, it not working, being an ultra runner, thinking that the thing that you love to do was the reason that you're not getting pregnant. There's no research on, you know, this. So it yeah, and then to go through failed IVF, um, it it was really, really difficult. And I grieved for a long time. And I kind of was just showing up to the same races, doing the same thing, but not my heart wasn't in it. Like I didn't really want to be there doing that. And I think for for George and I, like we had decided because it's so disruptive to your life to try to have a child, right? And and when it just doesn't work out and you are grieving every month, like I just wasn't the same person. And so at some point you have to say enough is enough. I don't want to spend the next five, ten years of my life feeling like this. And that's a really hard decision to make because you know, everybody wants to offer you hope. Everybody's like, oh, but you could adopt. And it's like, yeah, I'm adopted, I understand the process. Like, and it, you know, that there's just options that we as a couple don't want to have to go through the rigour of trying to go that way because we have this amazing adventurous life, and a lot of those options wouldn't be possible to do what we're doing now and do them. Um, and so yeah, we kind of had to come to the decision that enough was enough and and move on. And that was really hard. But I think for me this year, doing first the winter spine at the beginning of the year, and now this, and my husband and I are going to be towing the PTL. Um, it's been a year of doing stuff that I never thought I wanted to do, apart from the PTL, but really learning again and challenging myself and just trying some different stuff.

SPEAKER_00 20:17

To the extent that you're comfortable sharing, in what ways is that process disruptive, especially as you're balancing this career, you know, as a as a professional athlete?

SPEAKER_01 20:26

Yeah, I mean, look, every time you get your period, you grieve. Because it is not a child.

SPEAKER_02 20:34

So every month you are grieving the fact that you don't have a child. And not just that, but if you're trying to combine that with any sort of racing, then you're like, well, do I race? Do I not race? Do I take a pregnancy test? Do I not take a pregnancy test? Is this why I'm not getting pregnant? You know, if you pull back on the racing and the running, and then you're like, okay, but now I'm just this. And it's, you know, I think for us ultrarners, a lot of it is woven into our identity that it's a it's a really tricky line to walk. And there's just so much kind of stigma and my God, everybody has an opinion, you know, and even when they're well-meaning, it it's it stacks up.

SPEAKER_00 21:24

For you, uh, and I'm sure it's different for everyone. For you, has the path you've chosen the last few months, has that provided any sense of peace or closure to that era of your life?

SPEAKER_02 21:35

Yeah, look, I really fell out of love with my body um through that process because I am I'm just I'm used to using it to get what I want effectively. Right? Like I, you know, if I sign up for a hundred mile race, I train my body, me and my body, we do this race and we finish. And like I'm a finisher. I don't have a DNF. So it's like I Will take it to the edge of what it what it's capable of doing to get to the finish of races. So to have this thing that I was unable to do through sheer force of will, it's yeah, it I really had fallen out of love with my body and with the sport a bit too, you know, like it it sounds ridiculous to show up to something like the UTMB or the Tour de Gionde and just do it on autopilot. But that was where I was at, is that it wasn't will I finish? It's just how fast. And I just, yeah, I think this last, you know, six months of really challenging myself. Like the winter spine, this is really spoiled. The winter spine is the first time I've had to use a drop bag because my husband crews me on all my races, right? So for me, the winter spine was like a solo adventure of me out racing in some horrible conditions. And just to know that I had my own back and that I could save myself. And then the FKT was this massive adventure that I was gonna have with my husband and, you know, my best mate. Like it, yeah, it just it's allowed me to go, you know what? It's really, it's really sad, and it will always make me really sad that we don't get to have the adventure of having a child. But we will live big, adventurous lives.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

Yes. And, you know, uh I'm I'm reminded of a I think it could be a parallel here. You know, I I've had the pleasure of getting to know Jen Lichter over here in the States, and she's kind of lighting the ultra world on fire, Western States win course record. I mean, this whole year has just been incredible. But you share uh a background in that you're both adopted. And uh I it's been cool to get to know her better and see how that experience of being adopted sort of informs how she operates in the world today. Can you share from your perspective, like how that part of your identity is still present, if if at all?

SPEAKER_02 24:05

Yeah, look, I think being adopted is um, you know, I am I'm so lucky. My adoptive parents are amazing. Um, but you do, I mean, it depends and it depends on your story. Everybody's story is different, but you do grow up wondering where you've come from. Like, I didn't know a lot about my mother or my father. I didn't know where my calves came from. I didn't, you know, I didn't know why I had the nose that I've got. Um, and so when I was about 25, I actually hunted them down and met them. Um and I think I think when you are adopted, well, at least for me, being adopted has meant that I have probably seeked approval in a lot of areas or wanted to be loved, you know? And I think that that drives a lot of my kind of like wanting to be loved by those that love me and wanting to also love myself. Like I've worked really hard on getting to know who I am and what I can do for myself to make sure that I am safe and loved. And I think probably being adopted has like driven that.

SPEAKER_00 25:13

RAID is the official equipment partner of Single Track. We've got some news here. The LF5L Vest, it's gonna be back in stock this month. Uh Henriette Albin has joined the athlete team. She will be racing UTMB in a debut raid kit that they have been working on with her. So be on the lookout for when you are viewing the live stream at the end of this month. That's yeah, really exciting. A few new additions to their trail tech range, including an Anorak shell. This is the lightest three-layer shell, I believe, that you can find on the market. Also, their race tech tea that weighs 66 grams and has an integrated ice pocket for hot days. Finally, and this might have actually launched a few days ago, but uh this month they're debuting their first women-specific kit. This includes a women's running belt and cargo crop top. Go check out everything at raidresearch.com. That's R-A-I-D-E-Research.com. Also, thanks to John G, the official apparel partner of Singletrack, and I got to talk here about those pinnacle endurance kits trusted by athletes like Ryan Montgomery, the first and only American to ever break 14 hours at Western States. There's four more race forward styles built from relentless experimentation with athletes like Ryan, including their gossamer-based t-shirts and singlets. Uh, gossamer is this fabric technology that uses wave-shaped fiber to mimic gauze-like construction for exceptional breathability. It's ultralight, it's cling-free, cool to the touch, essential for my racing and long project-based days because it is built to go the distance too. Go check out at jongy.com forward slash singletrack. You talked about the winter spiner earlier. It sounds like, especially with the drop bag stuff, the weather, the nature of that, right? Like it gives you this whole new level to dig from, I would imagine. Uh, what are the key experiences that you pick up that help with via Alpina later in the year?

SPEAKER_02 27:04

Oh my God. Well, when it was hard on the Via Alpina, I was like, at least you're not waiting through bog. Like the spine. Do you know what? I actually loved it. I actually loved probably 80% of it. But I went to depths in that race that I've never been to before, you know, sleeping on a toilet floor wrapped in a sleeping bag sort of stuff. Um it it really challenged me that race. Um and I think that's the thing with the Vera Alpina, like it was different because you're not, yes, I didn't sleep very much, but you're not dealing with that constant sleep deprivation that you are from a long race. And that's the stuff that really sends you, doolally, is the is the sleep deprivation. So I kind of was just like, you just have to treat each day, each moment as a new race, effectively, or as a new day in the mountains. Like, you can't think about tomorrow, you can't think about next week, you can't think about the week after. All you have to, all you can do is think about today and getting through this climb or this descent. Um, and I think, yeah, certainly like I I got towards the end of the various and I was like, I actually might get through this with no new weird things happening to me. And then small wounds opened up on the balls of my feet, and I was like, oh no, there we go, cool, thanks for that. Um, but you know, I think through a decade of racing ultras and doing some really hard ones, like you just you have seen some shit, right? Like it's I know I feel like I've seen more than my fair share of it, actually, but you just have dealt with a lot of stuff. So going into the Vera Alpina, it was like, well, let's see if something new pops up and we'll just cope with it if it happens.

SPEAKER_00 29:00

How about at Tor? Because I know you've had a lot of success there. What have you pulled from those tour experiences that were invaluable here?

SPEAKER_02 29:06

Uh, dealing with the sleep deprivation. Yeah, because I really try and push it at the tour. And I haven't gotten it right yet, but definitely that. And and also just, you know, that like fueling long days and multiple days, and making sure that you are staying on top of your fueling and hydration.

SPEAKER_00 29:29

Because I it does that include McDonald's? Because I saw that McDonald's played a big role in in the in the nutrition this time around.

SPEAKER_02 29:35

Yeah, it does. So the McDonald's actually started in the tour when it was delivered by staff. Um, and I was like, I'm not sure if I want this. And then I had it and I was like, oh my god, that was amazing. Please can you get me another one? Um, you know, is again, it's not the sort of thing I would necessarily eat in my normal daily life, but when you're doing something like that, any calories are good calories.

SPEAKER_00 29:55

Okay. So it's not like I need to hit 80 grams of carbs per hour and my hydration profile needs to be this. It can kind of just be like whatever, whatever's available.

SPEAKER_02 30:03

Yeah, look, I mean, I was pretty much every drink I had was either Coke, Fanta, or um like a high carb drink. So I was drinking a huge amount of calories every day because I was like, at least if I'm drinking, I'm continuing to get a good amount in. And that was keeping me really nice, actually keeping me quite like really nice, hydr nicely hydrated. I was having some electrolyte drinks along the way, but most of it was high carb drinks. And then on top of that was as much food as I could possibly eat. Because it's that thing of like, you know, yeah, maybe I'm managing to top it up just, or I'm probably getting just under, but day on day on day on day of that, like I think it is one of the things that helped me to stay as good as I did for as long as I did out there.

SPEAKER_00 30:58

I was reading that in your prep for this, you tried to listen to every single podcast that Carol Saad did, John Kelly, Tara. Um, what do you recall picking up from them for this?

SPEAKER_02 31:10

Uh, so um, I think Carol said to Tara to that uh your body wants to run. So even when you don't want to, your body wants to run. So I would always remind myself of that on the flats when I'm like, I don't want to do this, because the flats were the worst. But I was like, okay, your body wants to run. The other thing that I picked up from him was that um I think he changed this over the years that he's done as FKTs was getting up early and trying to do his like miles in the dark in the morning, which was my plan. And then every day took me like way longer than I was expecting. So I did miles at both ends of the day. Um but also kind of just looking at what they did um fueling, and John sent me, he was so amazing. He sent me his like spreadsheets for his appellate appellate appellation, Appalachian. I don't I don't know if I'm pronouncing it properly, and I apologize if I'm not. Um and I mean that they were insane. They're like so organized. But he had also listed everything that had gone wrong. So like my med kit had, you know, I was expecting to get mouth ulcers, like all sorts of stuff. I had like things in there for everything and and managed to not, which was amazing. Um but his was so detailed, and then ours was kind of like I had a plan for each day of like where the van could get to for me to sleep, and it was a bit like day one, just winging it. Day two, just winging it, because I didn't have, you know, I didn't know if people would be able to come out and run with me. I didn't know if how much George and Zoe would be able to run with me, you know, like I didn't have people there carrying my bag and and d doing all that sort of stuff. It was most, you know, yes, George and Zoe ran with me decent chunks, but a lot of the time I was just alone by myself. And, you know, so it was kind of like, well, we're just gonna start and we will see what happens.

SPEAKER_00 33:14

I want to get back to some of these sort of like strategy reflections in a second, but I haven't even asked yet. Like, can you talk about the draw to this route, the Via Alpina?

SPEAKER_02 33:23

So I'd never really wanted to do an FKT. Um, but George could obviously see that I needed something big to do. And I think he read about it on Reddit and he was like, hey, what about the Via Alpina? I was like, what is that? And he's like, it's the entire length of the Alps. And I mean, how cool. Just how cool. That was the draw. Like, I love being in the mountains and the chance to take a month out of your life, like who gets to do that, really? Who is privileged enough to take to just be like, oh yeah, I'm just gonna step out of my life for a month and I am going to run the length of the Alps? And it was so cool because even even in the places that I have run a huge amount, so the Dolomites, you know, the Aosta, I was still on trail that I have never been on before and got to see stuff that I have never seen. And, you know, I've never run in Slovenia, I've never run in Liechtenstein, I've, you know, I actually don't know if I've run in Austria either. Like I just I got to see stuff. Uh, it was incredible. It was absolutely incredible.

SPEAKER_00 34:28

You know, I I was reading something you wrote somewhere, and basically you were, it sounded like you were surprised that with each week that went by, especially around week three, you start to feel better than you did the week before. And um do you have any theories or ideas about why that was the case?

SPEAKER_02 34:46

So I think uh so certainly week one, I think we had my souled out um a bit, and I was quite swollen, which was very uncomfortable. I had to go into much bigger shoes. Um, you know, this has happened to me before in races. I'm a bit of a sweller, so I'm kind of used to it, but um, that wasn't great. And I also like it it felt like I was gonna pull all of my muscles. So it was like this Archilles, that Achilles, this calf, this calf, this hamstring, this quad. Um but once that settled down, it just I just started to settle in. It was like my body was like, fine, this is this is our life now. We understand this. You are giving us enough food for this to be possible. You are definitely not giving us enough sleep to recover very well. But like, yeah, it's it's it's a funny thing. I had a few, um, so I kind of pushed the sleep quite a bit in the first week, just because it was taking me so much longer than I expected. Um and we were getting into the rhythm of how it worked as a team. Um, but then I had like at one point I had like a seven-hour night, and it like that kind of like reset me. And I was like, okay, I feel like I've actually done some decent recovery now. And yeah, I think I think the body just just adapted. It was amazing.

SPEAKER_00 36:11

Based on how you prepared and studied for this, did you anticipate that this type of thing might happen? It's sort of like peculiar to multi-week efforts.

SPEAKER_02 36:20

So I had heard from through hikers that you can that you do get fitter. And I did keep reminding myself, I was like, you're not doing this with 20 kgs on your back. Like people do this for months with 20 kgs on their back. Um but I think Yeah, I look, I no, I didn't expect this to happen. I expected to like I can get myself into a massive state by the end of some of these races. Like at the end of the tour, and there's like blisters all over my toes, and you know, toenails are coming off and all sorts of things. I expected to be in really bad shape. Um, but I was just really careful in those first couple of weeks. Like, it was so boring, but every time I got a little stone in my shoe, I would stop and get it out. And like, just like that real like self-care of everything. Because I was like, whatever I do now is gonna affect me in week three and week four.

SPEAKER_00 37:15

Correct me if I'm wrong here. I'm I I wrote down you were averaging 63 kilometers a day, about 3700 meters of climbing.

SPEAKER_02 37:24

Is that about so I think it will oh I don't even know. I think it was a little more than that. Okay. But roughly.

SPEAKER_00 37:33

Do you do you think d in retrospect, did that appear to be the right way to spread out this effort? Do you have any reflections on like, okay, I think I could have done more here, more less here? Like how satisfied are you with how like everything was sort of like spaced out?

SPEAKER_02 37:48

So we there was quite early on there was a 20-hour day. And that was a, you know, 20 hours getting up again at the 3 a.m. alarm um was tough. But so I maybe would have liked to have not done that, but ultimately it a lot of it depended on where the van could get to, because I really wanted to my preference was to sleep in the van as opposed to in a refuge. Like one of the refuge I slept in. I mean, they were amazing, but we were on the top bunk by the roof, squashed into the ceiling. I think we had four hours of sleep there. But to go to the low, which I needed to do four times that night, you had to climb down this massive ladder, could go through the refuge, and then hike up a hill. And so, you know, what like it just wasn't preferable to sleep in refuges. So really the way that we split it up was the best that we could do with what we had. But even that, we had to make some adjustments along the way when I kind of was just like, I actually need to stop and sleep earlier today. And so, you know, it was like things, things changed a lot along the way. There was definitely movement within the plan.

SPEAKER_00 39:06

Help uh help the audience understand some of the maybe they were unforeseen challenges along the way, like the record heat waves, storms, bugs, reroutes. Like what were you contending with that might have been like outside the normal scope of doing this route?

SPEAKER_02 39:20

Yeah, I mean, two heat waves. So that was awesome. Like it was so hot. Um, but you know, look, I mean, you do anything now, and I think you have to prepare for the heat because the world sadly seems to be on fire. So I think, you know, that's unfortunately part and parcel of racing through the summer now. Um we had wildfires that we had to divert from. We had uh a flat tire in the camper van on a Sunday in Switzerland, um, which I thought that was going to be game over, actually, because I just I I left the van in the morning not knowing if I was going to see them again, what was going to happen. Um, my husband managed to take like a train and a bus to come and support me. He got a ticket as well on the train. Um, and you know, like I they flagged down a passing like car that saw Zoe's Tour de Giant bag in the back of the van, and they were runners, and so they helped. And it there's just like honestly, and there's more stories coming out too. Like George said in one of the storms as we were descending, he just told me this as we were descending. He said, there were two people who were just naked outside washing themselves in a fountain on the side of the road. Oh, it's great. I love this. This is what I love about racing and having my husband support me is that when you come back together at the end of it, you're like, so how was your experience?

SPEAKER_00 40:52

Um I mean, I mean, maybe, well, actually, uh, how's he doing? Like, is he just as tired and sort of re recuperating like you are?

SPEAKER_02 41:02

Yeah, no, I think um both of them are really tired. And that I actually found that really, really difficult. Like I uh tend to want to make sure that the people around me are okay. And I could see that they were deteriorating. So my husband was still working for that month. So sometimes I would have to be helped outside the van while he was having a like zoom in his shirt inside. Um, but yeah, I could see that they were just getting more and more tired and more and more exhausted, and there was just nothing I could do to help because all I could do was get in, basically demand food and then lie on the bed and go to sleep. So it was quite hard to watch. So yeah, I think they are both um very much trying to recover as as I am.

SPEAKER_00 41:48

I can only imagine what it would have been like, but I would I would imagine the best thing you can do in that scenario is just sort of honor their sacrifice by keep pushing.

SPEAKER_02 41:56

Yeah, I mean, that's part of the reason that I wanted to get finished on Saturday was because I was like, God, it'd be really nice if we could all have Sunday off, wouldn't it?

SPEAKER_00 42:04

I don't know about you, but in the hour or so before run, especially the early morning training runs, I find it helpful to have something easy to grab that actually keeps me going and not feeling like I'm operating on empty right off the bat lately. That is why I have been slotting in Kodiak bars to my morning routine. I think everyone has that bar that has earned a permanent spot in their glove box of their car. This one is mine. They come with seven grams of protein per serving, and they are made with whole grains and real ingredients. I am partial to their chocolate chip in s'mores flavors. Find them at Kodiakcakes.com or your local grocery store. They are the ones with the bear on the box. It sounds like maybe the flat tire incident was the pivotal moment, but were there any other like key moments or if if at all, like crisis of faith that you recount where it was like, I need to keep going here or else everything is in doubt or everything is sort of like hanging in the balance?

SPEAKER_02 42:57

Yeah, so I mean the there were a few, there were a few moments. Um there was a big storm that Zoe and I were in that was genuinely terrifying um and not that safe to be fair. Um and it, you know, at at that point I'm just like, okay, are we are we being reckless here? Um I think as well, you know, there were just I think for me personally, there were moments at the at the start that when my calf like I felt like I was gonna pull a calf muscle. And I just thought, God, imagine, imagine we've gone through like all of this to get here to start and I'm in week one and I pull a muscle. And I think that that really for me was those were the moments that were the uh some of the hardest was just thinking that I not that I would let everybody down in in any sense of it, but just like that I wouldn't be able to continue because my body had let me down.

SPEAKER_00 43:58

Can you recall the context of that storm? You said borderline shouldn't be out there. Like what were what was going on around you?

SPEAKER_02 44:04

So so I mean, you know how it is in the mountains. You lie certainly in the mountains in the summer here, there are just thunderstorms. They're predicted every day. Sometimes they arrive, sometimes they don't. Sometimes you can see them off in the distance, sometimes they're on top of you. So there was definitely a storm coming in. And I um, you know, because I didn't know the route, it meant that what I thought was us going up to the top of the climb, uh, you know, as the storm was kind of coming to us, I'm like, okay, I think we're okay, let's go. Because I think when we get to the top of this climb, we're going to be able to descend. We got to the top of the climb, and it wasn't a descent. It was one of those lovely, like, oh no, we're going to keep you up here for a while and like make you do a few miles before you then descend. And it was in those miles that the storm was on us. And I am talking like lightning and thunder. Like, you know, when you you hear it and it is together and it's hailing. And Zoe's got her camera on the front of her, a poncho over her. She can't see her feet when she's running downhill. So we're just, I'm like, I'm really tired. And I don't know if I ever ran as fast as that. We are just pelting it down, trying to get out of this, because you know, your options at that point are to keep moving or to stop and try and shelter in place. But there isn't like rocks are conductive, our poles are conductive, the camera's conductive. Something I hadn't even thought of. Zoe was like, Sophie, try and stay out of the water. The water and our feet is conductive. You know, you're just in this situation of like the chances of lightning hitting you, very slim.

unknown 45:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:48

But a lot higher when you're in the middle of the storm at the top of a mountain. If I'd had more brain power to think about it, maybe I probably would have stopped at the refuge before and gone, okay, let's have dinner and just have all these snooze on the couches until this passes. But you don't have, there's not, there's not that same processing power that you have when you've had enough sleep. So it's like, okay, no, let's just go and we'll be okay. And then you get into these situations where you're like, no, maybe this isn't okay, actually. But now we're here. So the only thing we can do is get out.

SPEAKER_00 46:23

Favorite section of the trail for you? And why?

SPEAKER_02 46:26

That is so tricky. There was some really cool stuff in Switzerland. Like, oh, but then there was like this amazing ridgeline in Austria that's like single, like really like exposed, single track with some Via Ferrata. Um, no, there was there's too many. There's there's just too many. Like there was it was so varied, and I didn't expect that. I didn't expect there to be so much variation along the way. Because you kind of think the Alps, right? You're like, well, they're just gonna be big, the big grey mountains. But you know, you go into the Ukrins in France, which is the Maritime Alps, and suddenly you feel like you're on an island and it feels coastal, like it's Corsica. And you know, you have these like really technical like ascents and descents, and then you come and there's like the most beautiful lake you've ever seen with just waterfalls coming down on either side of it. Like, yeah, I I I don't think I can pick one.

SPEAKER_00 47:30

What did you learn about yourself out there?

SPEAKER_01 47:33

Oh my god, that I am like so strong. I just that I am capable of big things.

SPEAKER_00 47:47

And you didn't know that after tour or the winner's body.

SPEAKER_02 47:51

I did, but this was different. This was different. I don't know how you can do something like this and not be kind of it for it to fundamentally change you really. Like to show up day after day after day and to kind of look after yourself and to back yourself. Like I I really, I really didn't expect to I didn't expect for it to go as well as it did. I expected for it to be harder, I expected for like a a lot more to go wrong with my body. And so to see it get stronger and be as like fierce as I could be at the fin, like towards the end, to go, you know. I think George at one point he's like, it's 170 kilometers left. And I'm like, that's a UTMB. Now we race. Now we go. I know this, I know this distance. Now we now we push it, now we see how fast we can do it. And to be able to do that after what, 26 days? Like it's pretty is a pretty cool place to be in.

SPEAKER_00 49:02

How do you suspect you will use this new knowledge about yourself moving forward?

SPEAKER_01 49:10

I think that I will look for another adventure.

SPEAKER_02 49:16

Multi-week?

SPEAKER_00 49:16

Multi-week?

SPEAKER_02 49:18

Yeah, it's possible. I think I will look for, yep, to go and have another little look at something like this again. Whereas I'm not, you know, as I said, it never really appealed to me. Because I love racing fast women. I love being on the start line with other women, but there was something really um just wonderful about tackling this as a just by yourself.

SPEAKER_00 49:44

So that's it. So it it it generates even more curiosity for you.

SPEAKER_02 49:49

Yeah. And I think that was a big part of it for me this year is that I just not not that I, God, I do not know everything about ultra racing or anything like that by any means of the imagination, but I have a formula, right, that works for me that I have um used for the last 10 years or so, training racing. This doing actually both the spine and this has allowed me to learn again. Like to really learn more about our sport, more about what we are capable of as humans, and just yeah, broadened, broadened my kind of base of knowledge, which is so exciting.

SPEAKER_00 50:28

So, from from what I gather, and you you certainly know more than I do, uh, there's not a ton of research out there on like women's physiology in these ultra-endurance settings. If you were to put on like a scientist hat, do you are there any like questions that you would want to submit for research based on your experience out there? Like, are there any like working theories that you have about how things work, maybe why you were able to perform so well uh in this effort?

SPEAKER_02 50:57

Yeah, I mean, look, I think there's probably some stuff around fat adaption because we definitely carry more and and use it probably slightly differently in the way that men do. I think a lot of it is um uh adaptability. And to be honest, a lot of it is your crew. Like I think, you know, uh yes, I um I think that women are amazing, and I think that, you know, we are capable of so much. And I don't know what I would necessarily study in that. Maybe it's resilience, maybe it's adaptability, maybe it's um, you know, uh using of fuel. I'm not sure. But I do think that like none of these things are done alone either.

SPEAKER_00 51:50

Have you I mean, I'm sure it's it's all happening so fast, so it's it's tough to have like the closest beat on it. But so far, have you been satisfied with how this record has been understood and portrayed in the trail media and broader landscape?

SPEAKER_02 52:10

I have to say my favorite uh headlines are the ones that start with my age. 42-year-old. Oh no, no way. Don't, don't, don't women just like disintegrate after 35? I particularly like the ones that don't actually even say my name. They're just like 42-year-old crosses the Alps. It's like, yep, that's awesome. Thanks, thanks for that. Um, but no, I think so, yeah. Like it's, you know, I mean, it doesn't help that we thought we'd done it in 29 and we had actually done it in 28 days.

SPEAKER_01 52:46

But uh I think that it has been portrayed in a way that is um authentic to the trail. I don't I don't think people understand how technical it was.

SPEAKER_02 53:00

Um they sort of, you know, you say 2,000 kilometers and it's like, I mean, that in itself is a feat, right? But I was surprised at how technical the trail was.

SPEAKER_00 53:10

Talk about that if you don't mind. Like what what are some like can you visualize some of the aspects?

SPEAKER_02 53:15

Boulder fields, like scrambling up, scrambling down, super like via ferrata, just like stuff that you probably want to do on more than two hours' sleep. But yeah, like scree fields, you know, like the sort of stuff that you would find in a sky race.

SPEAKER_00 53:37

I actually I want to come back. You that news article that fixated on your age. Um, I mean, do you think yeah, to like talk about the extent to which you think our society misunderstands or doesn't appreciate what you can do in your 40s in an athletic context?

SPEAKER_02 53:55

Like, once you're like a perimet pulse or woman, that's it. You're like I want to say feels like you're bit on the trash heap, you know? Like it's um it's like there's this surprise that you are still capable and able and it's um it's not fair that so much is expected of women. And as soon as you hit an age that is not deemed to be, you know, young and vibrant anymore, is that well, you're not you, you know, you must fade into the background. And you know what? There are a lot of us that are going to keep, you know, yelling and screaming into the void to try and change that because like women in their 40s. I remember one of my first UTMBs seeing all of those women up there on the podium, and that most of them were in their 40s, most of them had kids, and they're incredible women, right? Absolutely amazing women. And I all I thought to myself is that I want to be like one of them. And I think in ultralunning, we are lucky that, you know, yes, we are, we are getting younger, uh younger women in the sport now, which is super cool. But predominantly, you're not getting women in their 20s, you know? It is older women who have more experience, who are, you know, more patient and also just have put some put some time in. Um, but yes, I think we we almost rile against this uh feeling that we are done.

SPEAKER_00 55:34

Who who are what were the names of some of those women that come to mind that you were inspired by?

SPEAKER_02 55:38

Caroline Shaverot, Nero Picas, um uh who else did we have? Oh, I can see their faces. You're getting me with like not that many brains.

SPEAKER_00 55:48

But two great names. I mean, Caroline uh in Nuria, incredible.

SPEAKER_02 55:53

Yeah. I mean, there was just, you know, I think for me when I first started out in this sport, like there weren't that many women. It just, you know, there's still not as many women as there should be. We're still having to fight for equality in this sport, which is very depressing in 2026. But, you know, it was even worse back when I first started 10 years ago. And so seeing these incredible women on the fin like on the podium and just going, wow, they are they're amazing, and they're like, you know, 10 years older than me, is just super inspiring.

SPEAKER_00 56:28

What's a policy or a reality from 10 years ago that would shock us today that like Caroline and Naria had to navigate?

SPEAKER_02 56:36

Oh, I mean, there was no pregnancy policy for the UTMB. I mean, that's very recent. Right? Like, it's you know, it you you could defer for injury but not for pregnancy. I in fact, not that long ago, I mean I would say probably four years ago, did a schemo race in Switzerland where you could get a refund if you had a business meeting, but not if you were pregnant.

SPEAKER_00 57:09

Wasn't there also, and again, I'm I have the jaw in my mind, wasn't there also um unequal uh recognition of the top tens? Like the women only went three or five deep.

SPEAKER_02 57:19

And I am so grateful to Ruri Bosio for her um I feel like she really helped move that forward because I'm pretty sure she said to them, I'm not gonna come back and race until you change that. And that was the year that I got 10th at the UTMB and I got to be on the podium. And so like I just yeah, you know, the woman had top five, the men had top ten. I've I've raced in races, my friends have raced in races that, you know, maybe the men get shoes and the women get manicure sets.

SPEAKER_01 57:56

There's some really cool stuff going on.

SPEAKER_00 58:00

Are you j I mean, at least as it as it in terms of uh work on equality, progress, and that are you are you happy with the rate of change that's happening in the sport?

SPEAKER_02 58:10

No, absolutely not. It's it's ridiculous. We're like we're like desperate for crumbs that we get given, right? Everybody's like, oh yeah, we're trying to get more women on the start line. Well, just make your ballots 50-50. It's not that difficult. There are enough women out there who want to race these races, you know, we're we're still getting what, 10, 15, maybe 20%. Actually, the lonesome, is it the lonesome hundred?

SPEAKER_00 58:38

Hi, lonesome.

SPEAKER_02 58:39

Yeah. I haven't raced it, but love what they've done. I I think they're incredible. Um, but you know, that that is what we need. We need radical change to make the sport more equal. And everyone's just too scared to do it.

SPEAKER_00 58:55

Okay, let's imagine that they're well, I don't even know if this role exists, but like if you were elected, oh yeah, if you if you were like president of the PTRA, if if that is a position they have, like what are the three, like which which three policies, two to three policies would you be like really investing all of your time in and working hard on to keep moving this all forward?

SPEAKER_02 59:16

I would make it a 50-50, I would say a 50-50 ballot. And then, you know what? If the woman's ballot hasn't been filled, then you fill the excess with men. And I'd be working on diversity.

SPEAKER_01 59:31

Right?

SPEAKER_02 59:32

Like the space is just too white. So I would be working on that, on how to, you know, make the mountains more accessible for everyone.

SPEAKER_00 59:45

Last question for you. Uh I know I've said that a bunch of times, but I we I I couldn't believe it when I saw it that you're signed up for PTL.

SPEAKER_02 59:53

Oh, it's a terrible idea. It's a terrible idea as an athlete, it's a terrible idea as a coach. Um, but my husband is an adaptive athlete, and we never re we never thought he was gonna be able to run. And so he um he actually had a device made in the States that he can put onto his foot um that allows him to run pain-free. So uh we'll see if he has to use it during the race. Um but um he, yeah, so he never, we never thought he was gonna be able to run. So there's never a good time for me to do the PTL. And I kind of said to him, look, if I can get to the start line and you can get to the start line, then we will try. We will not be doing it fast. It will be, there will be sleep, there will be lots of eating. It will be, what did John Kelly? I said to him, I was like, oh, I'm really, I'm quite worried about doing these two things so close together. And he's like, ah, don't worry. The PTL can be a recovery hike. Honestly, you've got to be really careful who your friends are.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:56

For for those that, I mean, uh, we a lot of us know about OCC, CCC, TDS, UTMB, the EC, you know, ETC. But there's a little bit of mystique, I think, around PT, at least for Americans. Like, um, what makes this event challenging?

SPEAKER_02 1:01:12

So the PTL, I think, is 250 to 300 kilometers long. It is navigation. You do it in a team. You have to take via Ferrata kit with you, helmets, like it's um it's tricky. It's build not as a race, but as an adventure. And, you know, it's one of those things that I've always wanted to do it, but it's just when you're an athlete, it's like when? You can when do you fit that in, you know, because you're either racing the UTMB, or for me, I'm racing something like the tour, or like it's just hard to go into something like that because you're not racing. It's not, you know, it's not something that your sponsors are like, oh yeah, great, you're doing the PTL. Um, although mine are very supportive that I'm doing it. Um, but you know, it's yeah, it's always been tricky to fit in. And it's also something I really wanted to do with my husband. So this is kind of like he has supported me through so much and in so many ways that this is kind of like a little, I guess, for him, really.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:16

Is the technicality similar to what you experienced on the Via Alpina? Similar, different? How would you characterize it?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:23

Um, I think it is similar, if not slightly more technical.

unknown 1:02:28

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:29

Because, you know, on the on the Vera Alpina, I wouldn't actually have to like hook into anything with a harness and a helmet on. Whereas there is the possibility that we will have to do that in the PTL.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:41

Well, it's uh I I always hesitate to ask, you know, what's next in these types of interviews because it's like let's just enjoy. But you're I this is it. You're you're already on to the next one.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:50

Yeah. Yeah. But I am I like am trying not to tell my feet about it because they're still kind of weird. But um, you know, look, I've come out of this in much better shape than I was expecting. My endocrine system is going to be screwed. So after this, we're gonna take some nice recovery time. Um, and you know, between like now and then I am just eating as much food as I possibly can.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:14

Like just trying to give it, give my body everything it possibly can to recover as much as it can. And and you know, with the PTL, it won't, as I said, it won't be fast. It will just be us out in the mountains having a having a jolly.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:29

Well, Sophie, I really appreciate the time. I really, you know, I can't imagine how busy you are with inquiries and stuff. So this this means a lot. Thanks for um, you know, sharing this effort with our North American audience. And we wish you the best uh at PTL later this month and chan.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:47

Uh thank you so much for having me. It's been really great.