Frankie Ruiz - Co-Founder, Life Time Miami Marathon | Breakwater Hospitality

Frankie Ruiz helped build Miami's running culture from the ground up. In this episode, he shares the story behind founding the Miami Marathon, scaling and selling the business, leading Nike Run Club across the Southeast, and spending more than two decades shaping Miami's parks, trails, and active lifestyle community; as well as his new ventures with Breakwater Hospitality Group. It's a conversation about entrepreneurship, civic impact, and the power of not stopping.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:13

How about Emmy? Yeah. So uh we can always take it back. No, I'm just kidding.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

That's what we want, right? We want the shit talking. Yeah, we want the shit talking. That's the fun stuff. That is the fun stuff. That's why we try to get people to drink. How are the headphone levels fit? Alright, let me put them on louder. That sound good? Louder, quieter, it's okay.

SPEAKER_02 0:42

A little, a little um echoee.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

Echoey, yeah, it's gonna be echoey. We'll take care of that. It's just a room. I add I edit that out. Um mic's good? Yeah, I think so. Yeah, looks good. Do I need to wear a hat? It's up to you. You can wear whatever you want. Yeah, maybe I'll take it off in the middle.

SPEAKER_01 1:02

If you want to take your shirt off, go for it too. I'm sure the ladies here in Miami would love that shit, man. This guy is fucking like probably totally ripped, runs all the time. Nah, nah, nah. I'm getting old. You don't want to make your wife jealous. I'm getting old, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

Well, we're rolling. Frankie, thanks for joining us.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Yeah. Awesome to have you, man. You're uh you're a legend here in Miami in the in the running circles. Appreciate it. And so uh it's good to have you on here. Uh I've you know, I the first time you and I met, um, I don't know if you remember, it was at a high rocks event.

SPEAKER_02 1:37

And uh couple years 2023?

SPEAKER_01 1:40

Yeah, I think so. Um maybe a little further back. We were we were I had the Cinder Fit. Um somewhere in that net. Yeah, 2022, 2023. Um, and uh you were organizing the first Hyrux event. That's right. Um, I think it was the first one, but I you know, I I'd had heard your name a thousand times before that. Um, so it's cool to to hang out with you. Um it's Friday, and uh we got Frankie on.

SPEAKER_00 2:11

Frankie Ruiz. Yeah. I guess we should cheers him. He's drinking water, we won't hold it against him. Yeah, man. I should have. Regardless, we Ben and I will drink the tequila for him.

SPEAKER_03 2:20

Here, cheers, Frankie.

unknown 2:23

Cheers.

SPEAKER_02 2:24

There you go, man. There you go. Thank you. Thank you. My my all my best friends are not happy that I'm not a drinker, but so you never you've never drank? I've never really drank, man. Like I mean, a glass of wine once a year, if anything, my my wife might have something that that uh has wine in that. I don't even know. I just wanted something to taste, but no, I don't.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

But you're a Miami guy, so what is it? Cocaine? What do you like?

SPEAKER_02 2:49

No. Red Bull, I guess, is is my my vice. And runny. Yeah, and it's just it's just one of those things that I don't I don't think I trust myself. Um, you know, I'm wired that way. My parents really never weren't weren't big drinkers, so I'd just been around a lot of people that drink.

SPEAKER_01 3:07

I'm sure. I mean, this is Miami's. I mean, you grew up here. Like you grew up uh how old are you?

SPEAKER_02 3:12

I am 47.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

Yeah, so you grew up here in uh prime uh Miami. Um you saw some shit down here in Miami.

SPEAKER_02 3:19

Yeah. Yeah and and in and and out west in Kendall, where I'm really from, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

That's a real Miami. It's a real Miami. That's what they say. Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 3:28

That's what the Kendall people will tell you.

SPEAKER_01 3:30

That's where the real shootings were happening in the 80s, was Kendall. Didn't it happen out there?

SPEAKER_00 3:34

Like that's where they were Oh, like Daydeland and the cocaine.

SPEAKER_01 3:42

Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_00 3:43

That's true. I guess I gotta stop hating on them.

SPEAKER_01 3:45

That's the real Miami. They love saying it's the real 305.

SPEAKER_02 3:50

Imagine if there were real cameras back then. The most interesting things that we'd be seeing on them. It'd be awesome.

SPEAKER_01 3:58

Well, cool. So um, yeah, we we really want to get to know you. Um, I know you're you were born here, you're born and raised in Miami, right? Your parents are Cuban.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

Yeah, uh dad. So you're first generation? Yes, my dad got here when he was six, and my mom born in New York, but Cuban parents. I mean, they uh she's I'm as Cuban as I guess I guess you can be.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

I'm sorry, you were you were born or your parents?

SPEAKER_02 4:19

No, no. My my mom was born in New York, but Cuban parents. Yeah. Um and then my dad came came to uh Miami when he was six.

SPEAKER_01 4:25

Oh, okay. So he's like he's like Kurocubano from the island. Yes, he is.

SPEAKER_02 4:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

Um and uh what did your parents do?

SPEAKER_02 4:34

Well my dad, believe it or not, my dad was a teacher at Balen um for a little while. What did he teach? He was a disciplinarian, taught math, a bunch of different different subjects at the Balen on 8th Street in Little Havana. Um, and then uh and then he went on to work at Procter Gamble, and now he's semi-retired. And um actually him and my uh my mom just bought an RV, so I they definitely retired.

SPEAKER_01 4:59

Um they just bought an RV?

SPEAKER_02 5:01

Yeah, that's cool this week. So that's amazing.

SPEAKER_00 5:03

I go, all right, they finally made it.

SPEAKER_02 5:05

What kind of RV do they get? No, just a small RV. I don't even know. I don't know the details. But it's they're out of here or what?

SPEAKER_00 5:10

What's that? Are they out of here? They're just gonna go driving.

SPEAKER_02 5:12

This weekend I don't even have babysitting because they're uh they're they're driving down to the keys. So fuckers. Yeah, man. That's the way it goes. But uh but no, and he he worked at Proctor Gamble for a bit, retired, and now uh now he helps out uh actually a close friend of mine and at uh at the uh little abner uh foundation. Um and then my mom was a teacher, school teacher, and also two years ago. She elementary, yeah, yeah. First grade teacher, and and then um you know uh retired recently from Miami Dade County schools after I don't know how many years. And you attended Balen? I did. I went uh I went to public school until fifth grade, and then I went to Balen from sixth through twelfth grade.

SPEAKER_00 5:51

Disciplinarian as a father sounds like a nightmare. What is that? Maybe that's why I don't drink. Maybe that's why I don't drink. Maybe that's why you love running. You just love let me get the fuck out of here. Just a masochist.

SPEAKER_02 6:03

Like I just need to be keep going. No, man. He's uh I guess he wasn't that that kind of disciplinary at home, but he's pretty awesome. You got any siblings? I do. I have uh a sister that is seven years younger than me, and a brother that is 14 years uh younger than me, who's getting married in two weeks, and I happen to be his best man. So same parents, which is crazy. My parents, I don't know what they were thinking, so there's three of us. I'm the oldest. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:28

So every seven years I had a kid?

SPEAKER_02 6:30

Just about seven to eight years, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

That's how long it takes before you're like you forget how brutal you're forgetting.

SPEAKER_02 6:36

It wasn't that bad, was it? Fuck. Yes, yes. Yeah, my poor brother, man. He got away with murder. I mean, 14 years of cool apart. Oh sure. Yeah, pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_01 6:46

But I mean, that that that point, like you guys are so far apart, like it's yeah, you're not as close, right?

SPEAKER_02 6:51

Now I think as we're we're older, we're a little close, a lot, I would say a lot closer than we were when we were younger. Um, you know, he's help helping me out at races, a lot uh more involved, I guess. And as they say, as you get older, you get you kind of get a little more, um, you have a little more in common as you as you age a bit.

SPEAKER_01 7:08

Yeah. Um and so you're you go to Bullet and what what what what did you enjoy at what sports did you play?

SPEAKER_02 7:15

I did a little bit of everything, man. I I tried it all, um, played basketball.

SPEAKER_01 7:19

Uh Were you any good?

SPEAKER_02 7:21

I I'd like to say I was okay, but I was short, so there was no there was no you're over six foot now. Yeah, but I wasn't I wasn't, I was I was one of the the young guys in the class. So that was probably the first interaction I had with a coach where I was like, wait a minute, I gotta pick something that's not up to the coach um or up to your your your your height. Um I I did track, I did um soccer, um I I don't know, all the all the other in-betweens there, but I ended up landing in in the running world uh because that felt I had the most control over my my outcome.

SPEAKER_01 7:56

Got it. Um and what did what did you run in track?

SPEAKER_02 8:00

So I did in in track, I was I was into the 800 and I was into uh I high jumped and I ended up actually at FIU walking on, but I I don't I'm glad that that computers weren't uh uh or the internet wasn't that that uh great. So you can't really look up a lot of those results, thankfully. But um I uh I specialized in in that and then I enjoy cross country, which is obviously back then it was just three miles. Um now it's a five kilometer distance. But those are that's what I that's what I enjoy doing.

SPEAKER_01 8:30

I high jump is pretty cool. I remember doing high jump in P in high school. That was like my one of my favorite track and field. Yeah. Super cool.

SPEAKER_02 8:39

I got myself up to uh almost six five, so which is oh really which isn't bad for a little Cuban kid. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

Were you good at school?

SPEAKER_02 8:49

In the middle, middle of the road, yeah, middle of the road, nothing, nothing too crazy. Um that was I was good enough, and that was it to get by. Balen. Balen. Um, I think I think his academic standards have gone up quite a bit now. It's a little harder to get into, but back then I did I did okay.

SPEAKER_01 9:06

Yeah, I know a kid that just got in there. He's friends with my son. He's not that bright. No, no. Ben. I'm just kidding. Ben's a cool kid. I give him shit. Every so often they they they one of them slips in, right? I'm gonna tell Ben that he came up on my podcast. He's gonna be like, what? He's a he's a funny.

SPEAKER_02 9:24

They didn't have somebody from that zip code, maybe or something.

SPEAKER_01 9:27

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 9:29

Uh shit. Um, did you like or hate school or were you kind of ambivalent?

SPEAKER_02 9:34

No, man, I I I enjoyed it there. I enjoyed I enjoyed school. I was, I mean, my mom was a teacher, so I you know, just by default, I enjoyed, I guess, that that environment. Um, yeah, Balen keeps you busy. They have tons of things to do.

SPEAKER_01 9:47

And your your mom taught at Berlin?

SPEAKER_02 9:48

No, she she uh she taught at public school, but I'm just saying, like being in the in the environment of a teacher's life, I can't go get home and say I hate school, and then my mom's making a living out of that, right? Yeah, so makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 10:01

Um and then uh and so you were any what were your favorite subjects?

SPEAKER_02 10:07

Damn, man, we're going deep here. I feel like I feel like I'm in front of a I don't I don't do psychology or psychiatry right, but I feel like we're trying to figure out. I don't know, man. Subject-wise, I I just enjoyed them all a little bit. I probably hate math the most. Um, but yeah, finally.

SPEAKER_01 10:26

Um, and uh and so you were at at that point you're you're okay at track and field in high school.

SPEAKER_02 10:34

Yeah, I mean I I I was decent in middle school. Um, I was okay in high school. Um I the the I guess the the story goes that I Balen wins its first state championship. And I'm when you were in high school. Yeah, and I'm the eighth man. And for those that don't know, cross cross country basically have seven guys that actually compete at the state meet. I was I was left out, uh I was the eighth man, so kind of like the guy on the bench. And um, you know, that that that was always inside me, so I stuck around to be a coach and and um you know I I get to use I get to share that story with either a kid that's left out or a kid that's leaving themselves out, right? Like, hey, this is this is something you're gonna carry for the rest of your life if you don't, you know, make it onto that uh that team. Um but yeah, I wasn't I wasn't the best runner, man, and turned uh a career of of running into into a way of life.

SPEAKER_01 11:31

So yeah. Um so you go to FIU. What did you study there?

SPEAKER_02 11:36

I studied uh public relations. Okay. Um I I don't know what it is. So a little bit of marketing-ish Yeah, public relations with a minor in marketing. I I I enjoyed going to North Campus um at FIU. At FIU. It was it just felt like I mean, I lived in Kendall and I was driving all the way to North Campus.

SPEAKER_01 11:53

And but you couldn't take classes uh at FIU South.

SPEAKER_02 11:56

They didn't have uh the PR the communications department was all based up in in North Campus. You may have like one or two classes down here as options, but everything was up there, which I back then it was probably like a 20-minute drive.

SPEAKER_01 12:06

Now it's like two hours to get up there. All these New Yorkers.

SPEAKER_02 12:10

You need you need a flight from Homestead to get there. Um no, it's um I did PR and then um and then I stuck around. I did my master's in public administration.

SPEAKER_01 12:20

Got it.

SPEAKER_02 12:20

Um because I tried I tried the the MBA and I didn't like it, so I went to the MPA, which was a lot less numbers. Go figure. Government, not as interested in numbers.

SPEAKER_01 12:31

They're not worried about it, other people's money. Exactly, exactly. It doesn't matter. They just yeah, just keep paying for it. Um, but you you walked on to the track and field team there.

SPEAKER_02 12:44

I walked on to the track and field team. Um back then, FIU actually had a track. Um, they had a track uh at at the South Campus, which was really nice, and then football and there's no track there anymore? There's no track now. Yeah, it's like massive D1 school with whatever it is, 50,000 students, and then we don't have a track. We have a track at North Campus that is not really comp uh a competitive track, but the facility they have a D1 track and field. So where do they train? All over the place. Sometimes they they use some of the schools, they use Tropical Park. I really don't know these days where where where else they're they're training, but I know at times they were even using Balen for high jump pit or whatnot.

SPEAKER_00 13:27

Wow. Did you know what you wanted to do at all when you were in college? Do you have any idea?

SPEAKER_02 13:32

I had a hunch, man. Um I was lucky enough that uh first I'm a busybody. I don't like to sleep. I don't like to how many hours a day do you sleep? I can do well with about four to five and a half. Really? Yeah, and and you take any naps? No.

SPEAKER_01 13:49

No naps either. Just Red Bull. Fucking just Red Bull it.

SPEAKER_02 13:54

Yeah, no, I I um I would say between being really busy and like just trying a bunch of different things, and uh whether it was school, government, or key club or community server, I didn't say no to anything. Um and one of the things I did uh right after Hurricane Andrew was uh we were sitting around, I don't know, if you're from you you don't know what a hurricane was back then, but basically when Hurricane Andrew came through, um there was a lot of debris all over the place, and we were sitting at home without electricity, and my neighbors and and I were looking at a pile of garbage, we're like, hey, Halloween's around the corner. Why don't we turn this garbage into a haunted house? And um we started building a haunted house in in uh my neighbor's garage and and just building out of nothing like old screen material, wood, and any other couches. I mean, people had all kinds of things in their in front of their houses after.

SPEAKER_01 14:57

It was awesome, man.

SPEAKER_02 14:58

It was it was it was crazy. So um it was such a success that I kept doing it year after year. We did probably did it for almost about seven or eight years, and a couple thousand people would line up in front of my parents' house.

SPEAKER_01 15:09

So this is the first kind of event that you've activated.

SPEAKER_02 15:12

Yeah, and that and I got I got I got this bug and I was like, all right, this is making events is is a cool interesting, huh? And uh I like the organized chaos that that comes with it. Um I love pulling people in in together and and I I knew then that I was all right, I'm gonna do something in that in that space. Um and I was also into politics at the same exact time.

SPEAKER_01 15:35

Like what kind of politics though?

SPEAKER_02 15:36

Man, I was I was helping out any elected official that that that would take me. Um this was probably right after I graduated from Valen. Like I just I just I was drawn to my dad had taught me to love the city, and I was drawn to people that affected our city. Um those were uh elected officials that uh somehow or another I can I can get a hold of and and be introduced to and and work their campaigns. I enjoyed the political campaign side of it. Um, you know, I worked on everything from a Republican to a Democrat, everything in between. Uh Mayor Manny Diaz was was one of the elections I I worked on.

SPEAKER_01 16:12

Um that got Miami 21 passed.

SPEAKER_02 16:15

That's correct, that's correct. Um, you know, I he he he taught me a lot and I learned I learned quite a bit from from that experience.

SPEAKER_01 16:21

So you so you helped him with his campaign?

SPEAKER_02 16:23

Yeah, man. Yeah, yeah. I was actually Were you his campaign manager? No, no, no, no, no. I can never roll punk.

SPEAKER_01 16:29

Um you know, I was just see helping him knock on doors and this. Yeah, man.

SPEAKER_02 16:32

Yeah, that's that's knocking on doors, putting up signs, and just being a fly in the on the wall. Um I I also helped out uh Marco Rubio. I um I was actually on his first state record.

SPEAKER_01 16:44

You got Marco's number on your cell phone over there?

SPEAKER_02 16:47

You want to give him a call? Let's give him a call. Let's get him on this podcast right now. I'm gonna put him on.

SPEAKER_01 16:51

Will Marco have a C Petequila with us?

SPEAKER_02 16:54

Um I worked for Gas and Cantons, which which was uh someone who's who's um now actually with he's working with a Fan Huhl family. Um I worked a little bit on Jeb Bush's campaign as an outsider. I mean, uh everybody along the way that that was running for office for those first five or six years while I was in college, um, and slightly thereafter.

SPEAKER_01 17:14

And and what was your impetus for this? Just you you wanted to build your network. I I didn't have an agenda. Because it doesn't sound like you had a political agenda either.

SPEAKER_02 17:23

No, I mean listen, I I I I can see myself one day running for office, and I probably saw myself back then, but it wasn't drawn it, I wasn't necessarily, you know, using that as the reason for working. I just I don't know, I wanted to to learn more about Miami, I want to learn more about you know that that world and and folks that shape w where where we live. Um I can't say it was it was you know intentional, like, oh I'm gonna build my network, like you know, some some folks might might think it was, but um I just thought they were pretty good people and and I was gonna learn some something from them. Um and I was studying public administration, so I had some sense. I mean while I was doing my masters, I I taught a year at at at at FIU or a semester.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

And what did you teach?

SPEAKER_02 18:07

Uh intro to public administration. Yeah, yeah. Um so anyhow, I was I was just drawn to that stuff. It was it was it was interesting to me for some reason. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 18:17

So it all kind of feels like in the realm of events, yeah. In a way. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:21

And so what do you what are you doing to make money? And just backing this up a little bit, like in high school, did you ever work to to make some money?

SPEAKER_02 18:28

So this this is good because I've been on a lot of podcasts and I don't think we've gone down this rabbit hole, which is uh um an uh I don't want to say an interesting one because I don't know what what's interesting to somebody somebody else, but besides doing that haunted house, um Did you make money doing the haunted house? No, no, we we would I mean we would make we would charge people but we I think we gave it away to to charity and paid for our what it costs us to put the thing together. There's still people that go to my parents' house and ask for that haunted house. Um it was awesome. I mean, we were front page of the Herald, one of the or neighbor section of the Herald at one point. Um but anyhow making money was never like an intention of mine at an early age, or even even now, I just I would just do what I thought needed to be done. So I worked for a company that put out movie posters. Um, yeah, this was to help pay for bills, but this was just something I don't know. I thought it was cool that I was working with a company that distributed movie posters, and these movie posters you would go into a uh barber shop because the that particular movie was being marketed to people that hung out at barbershops. And you'd go in there and you'd ask them if you can put this movie poster on their window. It was called Window Shoppers, the actual company. So I did that for like two years, and I I loved it because you get paid per location. And besides that, it it was just like I was exploring the whole city. I was going to places North Miami Beach and places that you didn't, I mean, Google Maps wasn't a thing, so you actually had to find your way around. Um so I did that for a bit, and while I was doing that, I I realized that a lot of these locations had some of them had candy machines in them, and I was like, this is this is pretty interesting. So I I started buying candy machines and putting them in some of these same locations, and I had close to 300 locations. Um, I was making good good money. It was uh on a monthly basis.

SPEAKER_01 20:17

Sounds like an amazing laundering uh opportunity. Money laundering.

SPEAKER_02 20:20

I I declared everything, man. I declared everything. People would tell me I didn't need to because it was coins, but I would go to the bank, I would I would still deposit my quarters. Um, but it was I I just realized I wasn't good at math, but I'm like, all right, wait a minute. So you sell a sell a gumball for 25 cents. It cost one back then it was like 1.3 cents a ball, a gumball. The return there was like unbelievable. And it wasn't too competitive out there. I was I would give even I would even give them 10, 20% to the business. And you you have a workforce out there and you weren't doing it. I mean, like vending machines, right? But these were actual gumball machines and candy machines that that vended, uh you would vend um uh uh peanut MMs. So it was peanut MMs and gumballs, the best selling.

SPEAKER_00 21:03

I remember the ones that had like the runs in them.

SPEAKER_02 21:05

Yeah, we we would do that with places that didn't want chocolate or or whatnot. We would we would have the runs so you would get a little some OG stuff, yeah. That's it, man. The little banana, so you thought you were having a fruit. Exactly. Um I love that shit. Runts count as fruit, right? Yeah, the little red bottom was supposed to be an apple or what, but it was you know, it was all fruit to me.

SPEAKER_00 21:26

The bananas look great, but they tasted like trash. Yeah, but break your teeth.

SPEAKER_02 21:29

No one wants banana candy. Yes. So I did that. I want to say I probably did that even well into starting the Miami Marathon. I I was I still had a route because I enjoyed it so much.

SPEAKER_00 21:38

How much money are we making off the candy machines?

SPEAKER_02 21:40

And I you you can break it. A good look, I'll tell you, a good a good machine would leave you at least a dollar a day, right? So you could do the math. I could I would I if it didn't leave you a dollar a day, you would move on and and go find another little. Yeah, so you had 300 of those. So now you can do the math there and um and you would leave maybe 10 to 20% commission if the place asked for it. Um, so there were there were some good months. Um mind you that's that's on the low end, but there were places that were leaving you 10, 15 bucks uh a a day.

SPEAKER_00 22:11

Um it's like a hundred grand a year on gumballs.

SPEAKER_02 22:13

Yeah, you said it on me, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:16

That's not even including the money he's laundering, too.

SPEAKER_00 22:18

I had to pull up the calculator because I was like in my head, I'm like, wait, that's like ninety, 110 grand. Like, is that real?

SPEAKER_02 22:23

Yeah, man. No, it's it's it's it's wild. And then and then I I And you just stumbled into that? Like what I stumbled into that, man. And I and the more money I made, the more machines I bought. And and as I did that, I also bumped into routes. This one guy who passed away and his wife sold sold the route. So I picked up another whatever 30 machines from him. Eventually I I did the same and I sold off parts of of the route. And then I just I gave away the machines to different you know, kids along the way, and I just I left the business. But I I had one up on not until the other day, I'm 47, but I probably had one until I was a couple locations, probably until I was like 30, 32, 33 years old. I still wanted to hold on to them, man.

SPEAKER_01 23:03

Just cash flowing back. Yeah, why let it go? That's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 23:06

Yeah, man. No, I mean, listen, what's happened though since is that there's so many chains out there that now they have rules for what you can leave at a in a lobby of a hotel or but back then, I mean, you'd go into coin laundries and you'd go into and they were all independent, right? So the owner, you would meet the owner. Now you go into a restaurant and it's owned by a company that owns 10 restaurants like me or 100 restaurants.

SPEAKER_01 23:28

But no one, no one has coins anymore, you guys. That's the other problem that you have now.

SPEAKER_02 23:31

Now you have to do Venmo or Apple Pay for a gumball for a 50 cent gumball. You always had a quarter. You always have high school, man. My tech probably end of senior year. I was I was already doing that.

SPEAKER_00 23:41

And uh just a natural born hustler, you didn't realize. I love that.

SPEAKER_02 23:45

Yeah, man. It was it was fun. And and I I had a so I had a Camaro, I got a Camaro V6, and so I would I would shove everything into this Camaro. Eventually I bought a pickup truck so I can I can move the machines.

SPEAKER_01 23:56

What kind of pickup truck you buy?

SPEAKER_02 23:58

Man, it's gonna be embarrassing, but I had a sport track, um, a Ford sport track, which was like a hybrid pickup truck that really wasn't an explorer, you know, Ford Explorer. Yeah, it was turned uh back then. I don't even know if sport track exists.

SPEAKER_00 24:11

It was like the Ford version of the Avalanche. Uh yeah, just about.

SPEAKER_02 24:14

That's right. Yeah, yeah. And then after that, I went into tundras and now I still have a tundra. Yeah. Live and die with a tundra. Big drug truck. What's that? A big dog truck. Big dog. I see a big drug.

SPEAKER_00 24:26

I'm like no, no, big dog truck. Big dog, yeah. I rented one recently. I was on a trip in Tennessee and I rented a tundra, and I think felt great. I was like, man, I want one of these.

SPEAKER_02 24:33

But driving a full-size truck in Miami is no joke. Yeah, man. And I'm and I'm not one to take care of them. I'm not like somebody at the You're not supposed to take care of Toyotas. Well, not only that, like I have my grandfather, my grandfather took care of themselves. Exactly. I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't wash the car. I don't I actually those ton those early tundres, I wouldn't change the oil, I wouldn't do anything to them. My grandfather once said something, he's since passed away, but he said that um you know the car is not for you to serve it, but for it to serve you. So I kind of took that to an extreme.

SPEAKER_00 25:05

As long as it's a Toyota. Try that philosophy on a BMW.

SPEAKER_02 25:11

So I'll run them to the ground.

SPEAKER_00 25:14

That's amazing. I love that. That hustle story is great. So you're doing you got the candy machine just cash flowing like a motherfucker. No wonder you're like, oh well, whatever. You graduate college, what was the next move? Do you have any idea on the career?

SPEAKER_01 25:25

Or you at this point you're still working for politicians, right?

SPEAKER_02 25:28

Yeah, I'm still doing that kind of stuff. I'm even a I'm a camp counselor at Balen just because I enjoyed being around uh kids and I I liked the chaos of a summer camp and Balen summer camp at the time was one of the, I think it still is one of the largest. So it was just chaotic. You know, I had a hundred kids and you were in charge of them. It was, you know, you had a lot of fun, um, you know, meeting young, you know, you know, young um uh young people out there. It was it was um that was what I would do in the summers. And I started to coach at at Balen uh as an assistant coach.

SPEAKER_01 25:59

And I track and field.

SPEAKER_02 26:01

Well, yeah, track and field and cross country. Okay. Um, yeah, they're they're even though people call track cross-country, cross country, track, they're two different, two entirely different sports. But um, but I started to help out in the summers, and um, and eventually I was I was like, all right, whatever I do in life career-wise, I have to find a job that lets me leave at three o'clock in the afternoon to come coach at a high school. Uh, I didn't want to be a teacher, I knew that that much, but I did love coaching.

SPEAKER_01 26:29

And what is it about coaching that you love?

SPEAKER_02 26:32

Man, it's just getting getting people, not necessarily just kids, but getting people to do things that are difficult, that are that that that challenge them. Uh I don't know. I get a I get a thrill out of that. Um, yeah, and in the process, they make themselves better. So you feel you feel like you you were a part, a big part of that person's development. Um, so I I just I don't know why I was drawn to that. Um, yeah, I was into the competing aspect of it. And I, you know, some might say I had unfinished business because I didn't I didn't make it um, you know, to the state meet, but I'm sitting here now and we've got 16 or 17 state championships since, and team is ranked nationally, and we've got the fastest runner in the country, lives in Miami and is coached by fastest cross cross-country runner in the cross country and track and field runner in the history of Florida, and the entire southeast US lives here. He happens happens to be Emmy's partner's son, who oh really who uh I've been coaching for a while. Um, but he's he's a uh you know kid, the kid's about to break four minutes in the mile. He's a uh you know 1350 uh 5k runner.

SPEAKER_01 27:40

I mean, the the he just got 1355 runner. He's been um what's the what's the world record for the 5k? Wow, that's a good question. 12 something come on, Dan.

SPEAKER_02 27:51

I should Frankie. One thing you're gonna learn about me in this hour or whatnot talking yet, my memory is is not the greatest. Um I'm just fucking with that. But 12, 12 and chains. I'll look it up now on my phone. Um but uh but yeah, so his name's Marcelo Mantecone. He's uh you know, it's been full rides to everything from Stanford to Duke to UF. Um, you know, I'm not gonna say where he where he ultimately is picked picking because he's about to announce that. Yeah. But uh no, he's a junior. He's a junior. He's a junior, but it's it's the fastest kid to come from you know a place like Miami that I I think deserves, you know, does deserve some recognition. It's not necessarily because we've coached them necessarily the kid's a genetic monster, but yeah. But um, but yeah, man, I going back to I love coaching.

SPEAKER_01 28:37

So but he he's he's a car he's a cross-country.

SPEAKER_02 28:39

He's a cross country and track and field athlete. He's both okay. Yeah, he's both.

SPEAKER_01 28:41

Where do you guys treat cross country here, though? Because cross-country what is cross-country? Like it, it's it's it's because I think it's a pretty cool.

SPEAKER_02 28:48

So look, I I I hope I hope uh the listeners don't get bored by by the uh you know description of what cross country is, but let me preface it by saying that when you combine cross country and track and field, the sheer number of kids that do both those sports make it the uh either second most popular sport in the country or the third. Um in in uh and people don't realize that in high school, um, as far as sheer numbers are concerned, because you on a cross country team, you can have 60 kids. There's teams with uh still water, massive teams. Um, you know, and in in Miami, my team have 40, 40 some odd kids on the team. So uh, and it could be girls and boys, obviously Bill and all boys' school, but cross country is open to to both genders, so it's not like football that might just be specific. Um, but so cross country is is a sport that um involves a team of seven or ten, depends on the on the actual competition. Seven to ten runners that run a set distance. In this case, in high school, it's five kilometers. Um and the places it's it's it's on an uneven terrain. It could be uneven, it it generally is off the road, right? That's the term cross country, right? That you're you're it's actually something that started in England. Um you you're you're running either through trail, through a park, through golf course, golf courses, exactly. Um gravel, you name it. Um, you know, every so often they might cross a road, but for the most part, it's all country. It's it's it's terrain. Anyhow, seven kids run or seven athletes run, and the top five of those seven are scored. And the way they're scored is a really simple according to their place. So if your team finishes one, two, three, four, five, you know, you get a perfect score, which would be 15, which is unlikely in most in most competitions because you always have one or two other kids coming in from another team that break up your your your pack. Um, but that's it. And then the team with the lowest points uh scored wins. And um it's the ultimate team sport in the sense that you're you can have the fastest kid in the country and this kid can run a 12-minute 5k. And you have a kid that runs a 30-minute 5k. Well, if 400 places you know finished between that first place kid and your kid, now you got 400 points, yeah, you know, to your name and uh to your to your team, and and you lose. So um, so anyhow, that's that's what cross country is. It's over generally speaking in about 15 to 20 minutes. It's a pretty short window for for high schools. Um and um these meets, these races are massive, right? Like you've got you know 800 kids, 700 kids racing sometimes. Um but that's that's something that you do in in in actually around the entire country. It's basically mid-August till about December. And then in December you take a break, and then track starts in the spring. And track is what I think most people know, which is on a on an actual track with set distances as well. But um but yeah, that's it's uh cross country is big in Europe, but it's not as big here in the States uh yet. But I think it's it's uh I think running is in a different place these days. So I think high schools are gonna feel that as well.

SPEAKER_00 32:07

That's awesome. Yeah, a lot of more events. This guy loves events. Yeah. So when did uh so you're coaching? Yeah, you get out of college. What was your move after college?

SPEAKER_02 32:20

So while I was still in college, I um uh I agreed to taking uh small I didn't agree. I actually saw it in the Miami Herald. It was uh an ad for a or an article, I forget it was an ad or an article for a uh fitness festival. It was called the Miami Beach Fitness Festival. What year is this? Oof 2000, I would say, 2001, give or take. Um and um probably 2000. And this fitness festival was um being called the Woodstock of Fitness ahead of its time. I'll I'll I'll say it to you know to the family, it's an Italian family that started it. They they had their finger on the pulse of where fitness was going. Um, and they set up this massive festival on the sand to the point that this is where Zumba is born. And and so you have Zumba classes, you have strongman competitions, but you didn't have CrossFit back then, but you had all these fitness-oriented competitions. So I saw this ad and it said, you know, team competition, fitness competition, win a trip to Italy. That's pretty cool. So I uh I got a bunch of the high school kids, and it had to be a co-ed team, so I got a couple, my sister and another friend of hers from Lourdes cross country team, and um took them to compete. Parents are like, they're not gonna win, and then trip to Italy. Well, they were the only team that competed because this festival was like so under the radar in that sense of it. Um, and but do people show up for this festival? They should they showed up, but not that particular competition, right? Like those imagine there's you know a bunch of tents and a bunch of stages and and whatnot. Um, you know, it's very similar to what Wadapalooza does, right? Yeah. This is but this is we're talking 30 years ago. Um or yeah, close to 30 years ago. And this is 2000. Yeah, man. And uh when Miami Beach had its glory days, right? Like it was, it was pretty, pretty awesome out there. I mean, I remember even having meetings um because eventually I end up working for this company. And I remember having meetings, and you know, you're sitting at News Cafe and you're yeah, you're watching you know models walk by. I mean, those were different days in in Miami Beach. Um, but anyhow, so they win they win this competition.

SPEAKER_01 34:32

This is when Miami Beach is getting gentrified, like late, late 90s, early 2000s. Well, I mean it starts like late 80s, early 90s, but it goes and it's really gritty and organic, and you know, people are just trying different things, right? And this fitness festival is one of them.

SPEAKER_02 34:49

Yeah, man. I sound old talking about it, but it was okay to have a business meeting on Ocean Drive. Yeah. Like you would tell somebody I'll meet you at the Pelican Hotel, and you would have a good a good meeting there. Now you you say that you're like uh bringing tourists along, like what's going on? Yeah, are we getting the two corona margaritas or what? 20, a $50, you know, drink. Um, but no, and and and um I I I end up working for this company for so you guys win the competition, you go to Italy. Yeah, so that's right. So so I went we actually win the competition, and the parents of these kids were uh because I like I said it was five of them, I think. Um their combined time of what they did, like they had to get on a treadmill, they had to do pull-ups, they had to do a bunch of different things, wins this prize, but nobody else competes, so you win by default. But anyhow, um the parents are like they're not gonna send us tickets. Like we mind you, the family that that own this festival, Italian, straight up Italians. I mean, like maybe language barriers, whatnot. Well, we get randomly in the mail, they had asked me for my mailing address. I get a stack of tickets to Italy.

SPEAKER_01 35:58

And the flight was in June to flight away.

SPEAKER_02 36:00

Well, you you flew into Rome and then you took a train to Rimini, Italy. And uh in Rimini they had the what was at the time the largest fitness festival in the world. 200,000 people in this massive, massive space. Um was the event here in Miami a success or not really? It was, but they kept getting rained on. This was in March. This was this was back during spring break. Yeah. And um, they would always get rained, man. And it and and they were the one the one thing I will say about them is that they weren't as pragmatic as the American was and in thinking of any of a festival. They were in their minds, it was like the more open air and you know, the breeze and and all that. And um, you know, uh it it it to their detriment in a way, they didn't want to cover anything, they didn't want to build a big tent like you know, say South Beach Window Food Festival has or or our Basel. They were just out in the open. In fact, the the producer of that festival is is still around, which is uh Randy Freeman. She produces um, you know, South Beach Winder Food Festival and uh Super Bowl um fan fest and all that. And um, but back then she was, I think, you know, well into her business. And she could be the first to tell you that they were just really laid back with how they structured this festival. Um, anyhow, I get to know these guys when I go to Italy. I take these kids, these high school kids to Italy alone with me, and I'm you know 20 years old or whatnot. And um the festival over there impresses the hell out of me. I'm like, man, I want to I want to do this. So this is where you get the bug. Yeah, I got the bug there. Um, you know, they the way that the at the time the Europeans or the Italians of this festival thought of fitness were not was not the way we were thinking about it here in the US. They they have a lifestyle uh association with it. Or uh I'll tell you how I realized that we were in a giant tent or a giant uh not tent, but a giant uh conference uh ballroom, probably 800 spinning bikes, everybody spinning. And uh I start to smell cigarette smoke, and I'm like, what's going on here? And there's like four guys behind the two rows down, biking the dead and spinning and smoking, right? I'm like, this is legends.

SPEAKER_00 38:19

Yeah, that's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 38:20

And I and it hit me at that moment. I'm like, this is they do fitness and exercise, not in a you know, a to-do every day. Oh god, I gotta go to the gym for 30 minutes. No, these people are socially here. Yeah, like you know, they it's so interesting. It was it was it it really it really did affect me a lot. And I'm like, all right, one at one point the US is gonna be there. And I think we're that's that's kind of what we're where we're at.

SPEAKER_00 38:42

You think we're gonna go back to smoking cigarettes on spitting bikes? I hope so. I hope not. Dude, I want to have you run a marathon of the SIG yet? No, I don't smoke, I don't smoke, but I was I mean, you don't have to smoke, I just think it needs to be done.

SPEAKER_02 38:54

There's a couple, there's a couple famous runners that run with this thing in their hand, their mouth. Yeah, that is true. But uh no, hopefully we don't go there, but I do it might work.

SPEAKER_00 39:04

26 miles is a cig, no big deal.

SPEAKER_02 39:06

Yeah, but I but I do think that that uh we've landed there when it, you know, you it's not weird now to call. Maybe maybe you guys think it is, but you can call a friend and be like, hey, let's go up, let's go run, let's go, you know, let's go on a bike ride, let's go, let's go do something that it would you would think of a ta as a task 20 years ago, you know, to lose weight or to you know muscle, you know, grow muscle. Now it's like just hey, let's go do this socially. Yeah. And you might might do that now more, a lot, a lot more so than you would have years back.

SPEAKER_00 39:37

Especially if we're smoking cigs.

SPEAKER_02 39:39

Yeah, right. Um but uh but yeah, so I I I came back and I was like, I I I want to do stuff with these guys. So they made me an co-executive producer of their event down here. So I started to help them with the event here.

SPEAKER_01 39:54

And how many years did you do this for?

SPEAKER_02 39:57

I think with them, I was probably maybe two or three before they pulled a plug on on the concept in Miami. I think they were gonna try it somewhere else, Santa Monica or something like that.

SPEAKER_01 40:06

But um while they were here, I mean that's pretty ear, it's pretty early on for Miami, I think, right? Like the fitness culture in the 2000 was like I just feel like I don't know, people were fit, but it was more of a party scene there, more it wasn't I don't I don't feel like there was that many people that were into fitness.

SPEAKER_02 40:27

Cocaine fit.

SPEAKER_01 40:28

Cocaine fit.

SPEAKER_02 40:30

I I I agree with you. I I mean I remember I I was tasked with marketing the event, so um just go sell tickets and I would go, I was going into the Gold's gyms and you know, the LA fitnesses, and the type of person that was in there was not certainly not anywhere near the type of person that you have now when you walk into to a to a gym. Um they're just it's just different, it's completely different. Um, but anyhow, they tried that for about three years, and one of the components of the event was a 5k. It was um they they tasked me with that. They're like, hey, produce a 5k. So I produced the first ever South Beach 5K, I think I called it Ocean Drive 5K, and then eventually became the South Beach 5K. Um, and that's when I really got my feet wet, and this is this type of of event production or this specific niche, I I want to be, I want to be a part of it. And um around that same time bumped into the idea of the Miami Marathon and launched the the the marathon. So, how how did the idea of the Miami Marathon come about? Uh it's it's uh it's a long story. I'm gonna shorten it as much as I can, but and this is where it all ties into stuff you guys were asking me before on how I was connected to elected officials. Um I'm coaching high school as an assistant, but I am also coaching as a head coach of the middle school team at uh at Balen. And I was annoyed with the excuses that kids were giving, and and I, you know, I thought I knew it all as a coach, a young coach, but I'm like, I gotta motivate these guys. This is all just about motivating these kids. And so um I I I decided that uh well, I didn't decide. I I was flipping through a magazine, triathlon magazine, and I see an ad for uh a kid named Rudy Garcia Tolson. So Rudy uh Garcia Tolson um has no uh no legs. Um he's standing in this picture with uh Robin Williams, and it's advertising the San Diego triathlon. And I thought to myself, that kid is 12 years old in that in that picture. Like that kid, I gotta bring that kid to Miami. I want him to talk to my middle schoolers and maybe the high schoolers so that they can think about not having legs the next time they're complaining that they're tired when they're running. And um, I reached out to his agent. I don't remember how I got a hold of them. Power bar was the agent, uh, the connection to the agent. Get a hold of the guy. And I'm like, listen, how much would it cost to bring this kid in? He's like, I don't know, talk to the parents. I don't appearances weren't a thing, especially not a 12-year-old. Being an amputee wasn't a thing. Um, you know, we still hadn't really made it over to seeing soldiers walking around with with uh prosthetic uh prosthetic legs and and whatnot. And uh with the dad, I talked to him, his name was Rudy Garcia Tolson. So he didn't speak Spanish, but the family wanted him to be exposed to the Hispanic media. So they're like, just yeah, we're gonna take send him over there with his dad and expose his his this the fact that this kid does triathlons, he's without legs, and he's he's um you know an inspiring kid just to look at. And I said, I said, All right, well, I'll figure it out. I got a flight donated from American Airlines, I got um hotel stay at the Alexander Hotel in in At the time in the gables, and just did a bunch of different things to make that week because they weren't gonna charge me. They just said, listen, just get him exposed. So I said, All right, my degree's in PR, I'm gonna, I'm gonna get him some stuff. So I reached out to a couple of the elected officials that I was friends with, Gaston Kentz being one of them, uh Manny Diaz, a few of these, and they helped me with things like throwing the first pitch at the Martins game, uh putting him on an airboat and doing all those, all those uh Miami things. And um, but the kid when he gets here, the first thing he tells me, he's 12 years old. He says, I wanna I want to see an alligator. I want to tell everybody that I lost my legs, um, you know, uh because I was they were bit off by an alligator. Mind you, he had Terrange syndrome, five years old, his he had cleft lip, um, webbed feet, uh, webbed hands or whatnot. And his there's videos of this because he was actually on the Oprah show. And um the kid at five years old, there's a video of him saying cut him off because he just was never gonna have straight legs. So um, anyhow, that's how he ends up uh as a as a double amputee. So amazing story. But the kid had charisma, he walks into a room and just lights up rooms. It was it was an awesome week. But part of the week involved him doing a triathlon with me. And he did the um the swim portion. I did the bike because he didn't bring his special bike in, and then we ran together, if I remember correctly. Um sorry, I he did the swim, I did the bike, and then we I think ran port of the the run portion together. Channel 7 shows up and they interview him. And as part of that interview, um, you know, the distribution of that interview, that 11 o'clock news, um the chief of staff to Mayor Alex Pinellas, um, his name's Javier Soto, uh, actually was watching that night. He somehow gets a hold of me through one of these elected officials that knew me and said, Hey, you don't know me, but I work for Mayor Alex Pinellas. I want to meet that kid and I want him to meet my entire staff. Can you get him to my office? And I said, Well, look, when he when my cell phone rang at the time, I was like, We are in the Everglades, we are wrestling an alligator right now. Um, back then you could stand over the alligator and hold the mouth. And this kid was in the middle of doing that. I'm like, if we're done quick enough, you know, and and and we're able to make it back to downtown before his flight because he had a uh a red eye back, um, it's a deal. I'll get there. So he's like, Yeah, the mayor wants to meet him, I want to meet him, you know. So that was on a Monday. Go over to the 29th floor of Stephen P. Clark building in downtown Miami, and um, you know, photo ops. Actually, I was thinking I was still in shorts. I had just, you know, he was in short. Everybody was, you know, from the Everglades. We had just come from the Everglades. And the mayor um asked him in front of the group of people that were there, his staff says, Hey, you know, what's the furthest distance you've ever run? And and Rudy answers, Well, I've done a I've done a half marathon. Uh, I'd like to do a marathon one day. The mayor says, Do we have a marathon in Miami? Uh, you know, maybe he should do it.

SPEAKER_01 47:13

I'm sorry to ask, how is he running? Does he have prosthetics? Yeah, yeah. Back then there were like almost these cheetah legs. And he's a 12-year-old that had run a half marathon. Yeah, man. He had already done a half. Um, dude, I ran it, I ran a five miles when I was 12 years old, and I thought I was a fucking champ, dude. That's that's fun. I won the Rybrook like youngest runner award. And I was like, I'm on top of the world here. This kid's fucking putting me to shame, dude, with no legs. With no legs, and he's running three times when I'm running.

SPEAKER_02 47:42

That's crazy. It's crazy. So, so anyhow, that the kid uh answers, he's like, Well, I want to do a marathon. One day I want to do an Iron Man. And the mayor's like, but why don't you come do the Miami marathon? And everyone's kind of like, uh, you know, those that knew, I knew, and and we're like, There's no marathon. You know, there isn't one. There was one in the 80s, there was uh the Orange Bull Marathon, but Miami doesn't have a race. And um, when we walked out of that room, the chief of staff said to me, Hey, call me. I want to see if I help you with that. Maybe we we need a marathon here. And I was like, Yeah, sure. So the next day on the phone with him, um, he tells me, I'll I'll do whatever I need to do to support you to make this happen. You figure that part out. I'm like, I've put on a 5K, I could figure out a marathon. Have you had you have you ever run a marathon or a half? At that time I had done the Disney marathon. I had done the Disney marathon. Um, I did the Disney marathon probably when I was 17 or 18 years old. Um and uh and yeah, so yeah, I did I did that while I was at FIU, correct. Yeah. And um the the the following day when the when the chief of staff and I spoke, he's like, listen, you probably need some help, you know, find somebody. And I said, uh I think I I I I religiously read the Miami Herald every day. And I remember reading an article about an attempt to put on the Miami Marathon, and it had fallen. Um the the the um the event never happened, but I remember the guys' names, and it turns out one of them went to Balen and his wife, they were kind of partners in it. Um, I reached out to them and I said, Listen, I don't know what you weren't able to do, but I think I can bring that piece. Uh I think I know why you weren't able to do it, and I think I can bring that piece to you, which is the government side. Like get this thing approved, 26.2 miles of roadway isn't easy to get.

SPEAKER_01 49:31

Because this is the thing, is like here in Miami, like you're dealing with county, you're dealing with the Florida Department of Transportation, you're different dealing with different municipalities. Like there's a whole lot of organization that's involved. Correct. And you're not just dealing with one government, you're dealing with multiple governments.

SPEAKER_02 49:47

Correct, correct. And I I the the route we came up with involved the city of Miami, Miami Beach, Miami Dade County Roadways, um, and um, and obviously you're F dot F dot. You had the State Road, which MacArthur, and and um, and then you had the bridges, which are Coast Guard. So there's a lot, there's a lot of layers in there. And um I'm not gonna pretend to say that I knew exactly what needed to be done, but I had the mayor's office and Manny's office and a few others that had I had relationships with. I'm like, we're gonna figure this out. So we spent about I want to say it was close to a year planning it, and we launched back then what was called the Miami Tropical Marathon. What year was that? Uh 2003. 2003 was our inaugural year. Um and how many people showed up? 3,000 in change. Um, I forget what the exact finisher count was, but um about 3,000 in change, and now we're celebrating 25 years, and we sell out in less than 10 days now, and uh that weekend now includes about 25,000 people. Uh which is which is uh something I I would have never I'm like I say I never imagined, but running wasn't where it was, where it is now. Um so so anyhow, we we launched this this race. I and together with that I launched the company to support the the ecosystem that's required for this race to even exist because running wasn't a thing in Miami. It it had we had a corporate run, we had some running stores, but it was not a big thing, big enough thing to get the numbers you needed to make these things profitable. And we were a for-profit. A lot of the attempts before were nonprofit and whatnot. This was a for-profit venture.

SPEAKER_01 51:29

So you guys made money the first year?

SPEAKER_02 51:31

We did. Yeah, we did make money the first year. Yeah. How do you make money in a marathon? Is it a sign up? Sponsorships.

SPEAKER_00 51:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 51:37

Sponsorship. I mean, eventually it is it is. It's registrations too. Yeah, but when you're 3,000 people and you've got a it's more sponsors. Yeah, back then the police bill was probably 70,000 bucks. That's the that's the biggest expense is uh police. Your police, your your fire bill, your road closures. Um, those are those are your big ticket items besides obviously your staff. You know, you you know we we we grew a team of uh up to 14 people to put this thing on on a yearly basis, in addition to some other smaller races that supported the ecosystem of of the sort of running community we were trying to build here. Um we started marketing the hell out of out of this as a destination race. I went you're gonna like this one because you're from Minnesota, but um I went to Duluth. Why? I'll never forget this, man. So so we had partnered up with a convention of visitors bureau um here in Miami, and um, which actually David Whitaker, who's back in in town, and uh Bill Talbot.

SPEAKER_01 52:37

He was a guest on our podcast.

SPEAKER_02 52:38

Yeah, I saw I saw him on the list, and that's why I brought it up. Um so David, David Whitaker and um Bill Talbert were were fans of this idea. And and I um actually David Whitaker was at one of our and Rolando Aedo, they were one of at one of our first uh press conferences. And I I they they said, listen, we'll support you however we can, financially, not necessarily with a check, but we will fly you and your team to promote the race at other races. Like kind of like you go like to like to an expo hall and you let's say like the Duluth, it was called the Grandma's Marathon in in Duluth. Um Grandma's is the restaurant, uh, and and um and that was our first stop. And the idea was we're gonna go somewhere where it's cold in January and tell people, hey, come to Miami to run. That was that was our logic.

SPEAKER_00 53:31

Do people in Duluth have money to travel? I mean, you're making the jokes, not leaving, but um Duluth is like three hours north of the Twin Cities, for anyone that's wondering. It's like it's out there. I remember.

SPEAKER_02 53:45

I so I I went, I we I didn't go with a team necessarily, it was myself. I went with a backdrop or booth.

SPEAKER_01 53:51

And uh these people are running marathons in the wintertime in Duluth. It's a big it's a big race. It's a it's a it's a it's a pretty can you imagine doing that? Marathon in Duluth in the middle of January.

SPEAKER_00 54:00

I thought everyone I thought the minimum weight up there was like 250. Like, I don't know. We're eating biscuits and gravy and wearing big coats. Um ice fishing, right? Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 54:11

Pounding Bud Light. Yeah, man. So I'm trying to remember. I think I want to say the race was like July, June or July. I forget, I forget when the race is, and but it's I still landed in fog and miserable, dreary rut weather. Maybe it may have been may have been April. I don't remember. It was terrible. I just remember that the plane landed, and that's when you knew like like you landed, and the the pilot almost had to tell you we just landed because you looked out the window, you didn't see anything. It was just it was um anyhow. When we when when I set up the booth and I'm there promoting Miami, I'm giving out these flyers that the CBB gave us, and I printed out a trifold uh uh pamphlet or whatnot. Some guy I had a I I always thought it was cool to show Miami's the uh uh aerial shot. We had worked with uh county's department um to print out a big map, and it was almost like pre-Google. Yeah, this is when they're going up with airplanes and shooting. It actually was it was done in sections, yeah. Um, and this picture was spliced together, and and they would take the picture once a year. So whatever wasn't built that year, you wouldn't see until the next, you know, whatnot. So we had a line that showed the route, which the route back then has still thankfully not really changed much since then, which is it started downtown, went into Miami Beach, went to the Coconut Grove, and came back into downtown. And so that's an interesting shot. Like, yeah, if you're not from here, you're like, man, this is kind of cool. You see the islands, you see Star, you see Fit Fisher, you see Keep Biscayne. Some guy comes over, and I'm thinking, he's gonna ask me, like, you know, where Gloria Stefan lives, or you know, because that's what the questions you would get, right? And and he points down, he goes, You see that over there? And I'm like, No, what's that? He's like, that's the guy who's gonna shoot back at you when you shoot the gun at the start line. And I was I was like so demoralized because then after that, I that's all I would hear. I would hear like people like Miami, who wants to go to Miami? And it was like this, we had this really bad.

SPEAKER_01 56:11

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we had you know, like the time cover, right? Like Paradise Lost. I got that, and so this is 20 years later, people still have that, I'm sure, right? Especially in fucking Minnesota. No offense, Ben.

SPEAKER_00 56:25

Oh, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 56:27

Another true comment that came from that same expo was and I it was like, is your dad a drug dealer? I believe it. And I and I said, Not that I know of, but um, but uh that's interesting. I never like I never thought of my of our I I stayed here for college, like I didn't leave. I didn't know what people thought of us. I mean to travel for vacation, but I didn't know what people thought of us, and it was it was shocking. Yeah, and and I came back or I called. I think I called you know my partners at the time uh and I said, guys, we we can't go back to doing it.

SPEAKER_01 56:58

So we're never gonna go.

SPEAKER_02 56:59

I don't think I got a single runner from there, you know. If uh if any if anything, like people may have you know asked for a refund if they accidentally signed for my signed up for Miami after my visit. So no registrations, no registration came back from that one.

SPEAKER_01 57:12

Not surprising at all.

SPEAKER_00 57:13

Yeah, they delivered the you know, they're probably like what's this Mexican from Miami? Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 57:17

I'll find a missing for sure, for sure. Um and uh illegal, yeah. Yeah, man. So it was it was it was rough. Um and after that we we refocused our um our marketing strategy and it didn't involve uh anything in the Midwest for a while.

SPEAKER_01 57:33

That's a good idea, yeah. Yeah, but ironically, like uh of the marathon, and they're from min Minneapolis.

SPEAKER_02 57:40

Yeah, so still let me fast forward a little. I sell the race to Lifetime. Like Lifetime now owns but you sold it, you sold it to another company. I sold it to another company first. Um after how many years? Oh, we were probably in the business for about seven, eight. Did you make any money on the sale? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I sold it. We sold it to uh kind of like a venture capital fund or whatever they it was a group of investors that um somehow or another were indirectly tied to to um some some big I'm not gonna say the names, but some big names in in Texas.

SPEAKER_01 58:13

And um was it a cash sale or did you get some equity in it too?

SPEAKER_02 58:16

I had equity, I had equity. Um and um I was incentivized to stay on board, so I stayed on as the the face of the race. Um and then uh a few years after that, the they they uh sold to Lifetime and I was I cashed out because I I wasn't given the option to it was a complete sell to to lifetime. Um and uh and yeah, here I am still working with Lifetime. I still am the face of the race. I I just don't want to let go because I still feel it's uh feel responsibility to it.

SPEAKER_01 58:48

Uh a lot of people how long has Lifetime been running through let's give us a little background on who Lifetime is, too, because they're uh they're a pretty prominent player in the fitness industry and um and real estate and real estate is where they've really pivoted to because they actually own a lot of the underlying real estate. A lot of correct you know, gyms do not own real estate, they just lease. These guys are actually they're building condos, office, gyms, like it's pretty incredible.

SPEAKER_02 59:17

So if you can give us a little background, as far as I'm concerned, they're the they're the gold standard when it comes to to being a health club operator um in in the United States. They um uh didn't have a property in Miami. Um they did not yet have their their uh their uh what they call their club, their their resort, um uh expanded to to our market. They were the closest they were to here, they had acquired a club in in Boca.

SPEAKER_01 59:46

Um and they're catering to like the upper echelon of fitness.

SPEAKER_02 59:51

Yeah, I would I would say so. I mean not not not completely off the scale, but they're you know, it's it's not it's not your you know your $19 a month.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:00

It's a full service.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:01

It's you're getting you're getting a lot inside inside these clubs. And um, so when they when they purchased the the race, they they were focused on it wasn't necessarily a business play for the the the gyms themselves, because one, they didn't even have one here. It was that they truly believed in the endurance space. They believed in in gravel mountain biking, they believed in in running, obviously. Um and um and they were in the timing business of these events as well. They had bought a timing company, and so so these guys they they they they bought uh a race in Leadville, they bought uh a few races in Chicago.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:42

The Leadville 100? Yes, the Leadville 100, which is a fucking grueling mountain bike race. Correct. Um I think it's a hundred miles, right? Or something like that. Yeah, it's it's it's on a bike, on a mountain bike. Yeah, I thought you were running it like a real man. No, no, this is bike, this isn't goggins, huh? This is biking's the real shit. It's not the running.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:02

Yeah, no, for sure, especially uphill.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:04

Yeah, so they bought the Leadville, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:06

So they, you know, they they they started acquiring all these. Um, so they had a Chicago half marathon. They re bought our entire portfolio, which included everything from a Sarasota Half Marathon to Turkey Trots and Half Marathons uh Dallas and all kinds of uh of different cities that we had, and we had we had built all of these on the back of my original company. And um, and so when US Road Sports sells it to Lifetime, all those properties go with it. Um, and um, so I stay on board with them. And initially, one of the one of the uh initial meetings we had, I'm like, when are you guys coming to Miami to bring this health club concept? Because I had I had already experienced it in in Minneapolis, I'd already experienced it in Colorado and and all these different places that were cold that they had their clubs in. And um, I said, Miami, Miami's ready for one of these. And and so they they they started their work into Miami. I I encouraged it as much as I could. I'm like, man, you guys gotta put one of these, gotta put one of these in here. So now we have two in Miami.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:13

One in um one in the falls, and then the other one in the gables.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:17

Yeah, um, the gables was uh uh I think their first one of their first steps into real estate as well, like the the the the whole package, like you can rent and and live there, you know, the live, work and play concept.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:31

It's a it's a truly mixed use development where it's there's there's a co-working, there's uh a gym, there's a residential tower, it's rentals. Yes, and then there's the Trader Joe's, there's restaurants, like they own the land and they developed it themselves. Correct, correct.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:49

Yeah, yeah. And that's I think that's um, you know, the the first it kind of cracked the code in into this level of fitness in Miami. There's been now a few others. I think it's it's forced some other competing brands to to level up in Miami and treat this fitness market in Miami like they were treating some of these other colder markets or colder weather markets. Um and now they I think they're up to a hundred and I want to say 170 health clubs uh around the the country and pickleball facilities as well. That they some of the some of these locations are entirely different. Philippa loves pickleball.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:27

Fucking hate it. Do you do you consider it a real sport? Oh man. He can't comment. I'm not gonna comment. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:36

It's probably something in the uh lifetime fine print.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:39

Yeah, man. It gets people, it gets people off, man. I think it's people moving.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:44

Have you ever picked up a pickleball racket? Yeah, man. I've done it a couple times. Come on, Frank. Don't do it on a regular basis, but you know, come on, dude.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:52

Yeah, man. It's it's fine. Yeah, you know. Okay. Everybody needs to play, you know, something, man. So it's fine.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:00

So you sell to Lifetime. Did you have like a deal to stay on, or you like were you getting?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:04

Yeah, man, I I I did. I mean, I I became one of you know, one of one of their 24,000 employees.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:10

What year do you sell to Lifetime?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:12

It was 12 years ago, whatever that I don't know. About 12 years ago. Okay. Um, so I s I stuck around. I kept running their Miami office. Um, I became what they called their chief running officer. Um and I I I'm hanging on because I I feel uh one, uh a responsibility to it, and and two, I I I think they're they're they're a great company, man. Overall, they they really do they've done fitness and health, healthy uh communities a big service.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:45

Yeah, I've heard that it's it's a wonderful company to work for, and it's I it gets some some awards that like one of the greatest companies to work for too.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:53

Yeah, and I mean you get you get c uh health club membership. Uh, I mean that if you've never been to the one in the falls, I mean they got resort pool with slides.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:02

Do you do anything else besides run? You work at?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:04

Um I go to the I go to the gym. I go there, go there almost every day. Um, I I bike. I um I like paddle board.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:12

Um and um a multi multi-sport athlete. I like it.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:16

Yeah, I don't play pickleball on a regular basis. Good.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:18

I like to hear that. You know, most most uh marathoners. We used to joke around in in high school, they were uh part of Team Spa. You know what team spa is? Never heard of it. Skinny people against wind. Um against wind. I didn't heard that. I didn't hear that. Frankie doesn't look like he's on team spa. He's got a little muscle to him over here. Yeah, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:40

He punches through the wind. Yeah. So you stayed on with lifetime after the name. I mean, that's pretty awesome because I mean most founders don't see an exit like that. So you saw basically two exits, right? Two exits twice, yeah. So you you hung on through both. And then the Nike Run Club thing kicked up. Yeah, let's talk about that because that's super fucking cool too.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:57

Because you started that in two thousand nine. Yes. And all at lifetime. No.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:03

Started on my own. Okay. Yeah, I started that on my own.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:05

So he's just started a run club, and there's a there's a real estate component to this because Edardo defortuna was integral in helping you. So talk a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:15

At the 1300 location.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:17

Um yes. So before but before we started there, we um we started on on Lincoln Road. It was called the South Beach Run Club. It's still around. Um, that was my first um entry into what I would say modern run club. Um, the modern run club scene. Uh Miami didn't have anything like that. They had kind of old school traditional pay a membership and come run with us and short short high socks, you know, uh skinny white guys, right? Um and I wanted to change it. I wanted to be a little more social and in a cool setting, like Lincoln Road. So together with Nike and Baptist Health, we we started uh a run club out of a little, a little small business uh specialty running uh specialty lifestyle store called Mr. R Sports. Um, you know, uh amazing, amazing guy, man. He he let us in.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:11

How'd you guys promote this?

SPEAKER_02 1:07:12

This is 2009, right? It was just when Facebook was kind of taking off. So we had a little, everything was organic. Nike made it clear like, listen, we want this to be word of mouth. We want this to be if you know, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:22

But how did you get connected with Nike?

SPEAKER_02 1:07:24

So I get connected with Nike because they hire my company to produce a 5K race or sorry, a five-mile race in Miami. Um, we were there what they call their LRO, their local race organizer, and the race was called the Nike Run Hit Remix. And it was um originally called the Nike Run Hit Wonder, which is basically what it is, which is if you were a one-hit wonder, they would bring you in to entertain the runners. So that year we had Vanilla Ice, we had De La Sol, we had um uh I think MC Hammer, if I vaguely remember all these one-hit wonders that would come in and basically perform every mile during the the race.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:05

Oh, that's cool.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:06

And so my company was hired at the time to do that race. So as part of that, I I start to build the relationship with Nike. And um, I'm brought in to be their southeast guy for run clubs, and we start to grow this concept of running in South Florida. The club grows pretty quickly. So, about a year into it, uh a gentleman by the name of Andres Acion um sees that we started a similar because he lived in Miami Beach. He was working for Fortune. Uh, I don't know if he was working at that moment, but he he he um I think he came a couple times when I was just a South Beach run club, so he knew of us. So when we expand to Brickle, we start meeting out of Sega Fredo's, um which is right next door, yeah, which is right next to 1300 Brickle Ave. And uh it starts to grow a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:54

And it is what what year is this? Uh it's 2010. Yeah. And listen, 2010 is really when you start getting delivery of multi of condos and multifamilies on Brickle, because before that, it's really just an office down, it's really a financial district with no no residents.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:12

It was a ghost town. Yeah, like I I could have laid down on the street and probably not not get run over back when we started.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:19

Um on a Tuesday night. And so we we um uh are are growing there at Sega Fredos. I'm still keeping the South Beach Run Club going. Um, and Andreas comes over and he's like, hey, I spoke to Edgardo and and um the team over at Fortune. Why don't you move this from Sega Fredos? You've outgrown this this place, come over and um and do it out of our parking lot. Like, I don't know, parking lot. I mean, he had the vision. I'm not gonna take that away, man. He he knew he knew that it was gonna grow beyond. And so we we moved over there and at least we had a parking lot uh to to stage and to to gather and and um and then it just started to grow, man, and grow and grow. And we expanded the concept to now actually I launched Miami Lakes Run Club yesterday, or Baptist Health Miami Lakes Run Club yesterday, and now we have 10 different run clubs we probably service on a weekly basis close to 3,000 people through these run clubs, and they're all free. Um, you know, I make uh uh some money out of the sponsorships basically. So that's how we sustain these things. Um and that particular club, Brickle Run Club, I owe the the world to Edgardo because it's a nuisance to Edgardo. I mean, he's gotta send sometimes his employees have to leave early because there's no way they can get out.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:35

You know, um when do when does the Red Run Club meet?

SPEAKER_02 1:10:38

Every single Tuesday night at 7 p.m. There's only two weekends a year we don't meet, which is Christmas and New Year's, or weeks rather, uh, that we don't meet. Every single Tuesday night. It doesn't matter if we're at a you know tropical storm warning, doesn't matter if it's lightning, and we're st we're still gonna wait for you there.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:55

And and how many people show up to this past because the brickle one's the biggest.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:59

Yeah, man. Yeah, yeah. So this past Tuesday, uh, we go by how many how many bottles of water we give people because Baptist Health provides water to everybody there. And we went through over 1,200 bottles on Tuesday.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:10

So So probably more than twice as much at least, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:11:13

Probably 1,500 to 1,600 people there on Tuesday night. Um, and imagine they they they come in from all four sides of this property, and but they arrive within 15 minutes. It's the craziest, coolest thing to see. Um how long is the run? Usually about three and a half miles. I call it the optimum social distance. Because you know, it's it's uh you get the weekend warriors.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:35

That's all I got in here. That's all you got, man. That's all Ben's the weekend warrior.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:39

I'm like a 22-minute 5k. That's all right. That's not bad. On a great day. Yeah, on a great day. That's not bad. That's good, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:47

You really you can run that that quickly?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:48

24 minutes? I don't know. I'm guessing he's moving up. Yeah, I'm like an eight-minute miler.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:53

I think you're okay then, dude.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:54

Yeah, 24. Are you really?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:56

Yeah, dang, dude.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:57

I don't know, I don't know what I'm at. Yeah, I got the Nike Run Club app. Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:02

Oh man, you gotta do one of my guided runs on there.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:04

Yeah, you're on there?

SPEAKER_02 1:12:05

Yeah, man. All right, sweet. There's one that's actually called uh 305 something or another. So it's okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:10

I'll check it out.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:10

It's half Spanish, half English.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:12

I'll get lost.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:13

Yeah, man. Um, but no, check check it out. There's a couple good ones in there, but um I always use it to track my my runs. Yeah, man. That's a good, great basic app, man. It's awesome. Um, but yeah, we we um we've grown that that location now is is everything to me. But I mean, I don't know where else we would go if we weren't there because you're gonna have to figure it out because they're gonna put a building there soon. I know, man. One day, one day. I hope I I talk to him all the time every time he walks out of the office. Well, both.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:41

Is that a guard that ever joined you on the on a run?

SPEAKER_02 1:12:43

No, he just comes out, he just kind of looks and gets in his car, and he's like, I every I'm like, man, one day this guy's gonna lose his mind. He's gotta, he's backing up his nice car into these, you know, these runners. It makes him have to do a three-point turn to get out.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:57

What kind of car is that a guard to rock it?

SPEAKER_02 1:12:58

I'm not gonna say it's a good thing. Rolls Royce. I think it's a royal.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:01

He's fish bowling in the rolls.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:02

Nice car. No tense. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:04

Yeah. He's he's I owe him a lot, man. He's he what he's and he's never asked for anything. It just he just kind of just does it because I think his staff has told him, you know, they this makes some sense for fortune, but I mean Do you make any money on the run club? Make a little bit, yeah, man. How do you make money from a run club like that? Spon sponsorships is basically the vendors and sponsors. Because the the members don't pay anything, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:13:26

The members do you do you have like a mailing list, I imagine? Yeah. That's it.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:30

Yeah, because we have we ask people to sign a waiver, we ask people to to sort of register for at least a year, and it doesn't cost them anything, so that's how we stay in touch with them. So we can promote, you know, other things, right? What races I'm producing or events I'm doing or anything, anything like that. Um, but yeah, that's and and we've never really even sold merch. So I try hard never to feel like I'm taking advantage of anybody.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:55

Yeah. Um, you guys don't have like Miami Run Club shirts?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:58

No, we do every so often like we'll do these We Run Miami shirts, sell them for whatever, 15 bucks.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:03

I like the the We Run Miami shirts. That's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:06

Yeah, that's that's a brand of mine. Yeah. I just just I I try to we try to make because look, running, for those that don't know, running is in a very different place. I mean, they're taught they're calling this the third running boom or whatnot. And find a run club at the corner of your house at time if you if you if you look hard enough. Um, but I want Brickle to always be known as as the United Nations of the run clubs and and a place where you start your journey into running or you start your journey into into Miami, even like not just running, but that this is a place where you can connect with a couple people and make this place a better place for yourself, right? And and ultimately for everybody else. Because I think that's what was missing from Miami. Not everybody's gonna say you think running was missing from Miami. I'm like it's one of the things, but one of the things that was missing from Miami is that it was difficult to connect with other people. It was a very transient place, and not that not that it isn't a little bit still, but uh the the run clubs gave you a place to at least you I I kid you not, there's probably five percent of that crowd. That's their first Miami uh you know interaction. They move down here for a job or just uh search for even for school or whatnot. They don't know anybody, they come here.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:21

That's great. I love it. It's such a great activation for for a Tuesday night, right? Like to get so many people, and then and then the businesses must love this because there's there's so much that happens afterwards.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:33

Like there's people, I'm sure, going out for drinks, going out for dinner, like and Tuesday n Tuesday night is typically not on the hospitality side, because I I know that that that business pretty well these days, but it's not a big night, right? Um, it's not a college night, it's not unless it's happens to fall on a Valentine's, there's really nothing that a Tuesday night's gonna bring you. But these guys are finishing the run and they made a friend and they're gonna have a pizza or they're going uh you know to a Brazilian place that's there, the pasta place that's there. Um, and it just brings life. Now the argument can be made, oh brickle's full of life now, now it's got a its own pulse. But there was a time when there was two or three restaurants, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:16:15

In 2010, there was nothing going on.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:17

Just Sega. Sega Sega Fredo and Torrancento. Yeah, that's correct. That's correct. Uh so but we we do these things called invasions once a month, and the demand for them is is uh off the charts. We're we're basically we will land at a business, like and we will invade the business. Sometimes it's even in a little Havana.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:36

So it's like a shoplifting opportunity.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:38

Yeah, I could have could have picked uh I could have picked a better name, but I I could have picked a better name, but including in Brazil, that's what they would do.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:48

They just fucking show up and stick everything.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:50

Yeah, no, but but I remember like the reason I called it that is that there was there was somebody in Spanish yelled out when they saw us running by, they're like, and I'm like, you know what, we're gonna call this an invasion, and and that's what we do. We'll descend on a new restaurant or a new uh hotel, bar, or something. And obviously, very few places can accommodate a thousand plus people. So does the business pay for you guys? Yeah, sometimes we we will charge the the business. Uh you know, I don't see us any different than a Google AdWord, right? I at the end of the day, I'm bringing you a focused crowd that that is is you know like-minded to a certain extent, you know, if you want to market to them and the the age range is usually our sweet spot is probably about 26. So it's a you know, it's somebody on on the on the up uh on the upside of of of their you know career and their their spending habits and so forth. So they they it's pretty pretty good pla a group of people to market to. And we get all walks of life. I get I get people that uh yesterday I was at Miami Lakes, and this one girl came to me. She goes, I drive every day from Miami Lakes, I mean every Tuesday from Miami Lakes to Brickle to Rome with you guys. So we're getting people like that. There's people that jump on the bright line that come down from Palm Beach for it because it is an experience. Yeah, but there's people that have just made it part of their their weekly, you know, uh routine. I have people in wheelchairs, I have I have moms with strollers.

unknown 1:18:10

Um, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:11

What a fantastic event. It's cool. So let me ask you a question about um the Miami Marathon. Um it's how how does it rank, or it's a half marathon, right? How does it rank, you know, on the global scale of half marathons in terms of you know participation and also curious about like what percentage of the people that participate in the half marathon are from Miami and are what percentage of people are coming from out of town and what's the economic impact of the Miami half marathon on Miami?

SPEAKER_02 1:18:49

So from uh half so do you ask me about ranking uh from half marathons, it is a a large um number of of runners. Like our we we rank up there with the top say 25 half marathons in in um in the US.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:06

It's not a full marathon.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:08

We have we have a full and a half, right? So so you have the less people do the full than they do the half. Um and uh although these days the the the full has become a little more popular, and part of that is that Miami's a a warm place, right? Like if you start at 6 a.m. in the morning by 10 a.m. in the morning, if you're if you're still out there, it's getting cooking, it's getting warm. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:30

Um I I love going out there, by the way. Uh and I I I go on my bike. Good. You know, and it's so just cruising the marathon on my bike is is a fantastic experience. Yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:42

It's so cool to see. The city, the city uh, you know, come bec I think it's it sort of pauses a little bit because traffic obviously is is is uh impacted, but it it's if you've never gone to go see a race, it's worth just standing on a corner.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:59

It's a great vibe.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:00

Yeah, man. I think it inspires you to, you know, maybe get healthier and it also makes you feel good about the city because people are generally in a good mood, even though they're suffering and they're running, yeah, they're running through some of our you know harshest weather um at at 10 a.m. in the morning, but there there's still there's still a lot of energy that comes from it. So to your question about the economic impact, so about 67% of our runners come from um outside of 67%. About 67 come from outside Miami Dave County. So it's a destination race.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:28

Um what percentage are international?

SPEAKER_02 1:20:31

We do about 14, about 14 percent.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:34

International.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:35

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:36

And what percent is is outside of Florida?

SPEAKER_02 1:20:40

Uh that's a good one. I would say we are probably close to of those. Because our biggest, our biggest state's probably New York. Um, then we move over to actually we do a good good number, comes from Chicago. I would say we're we're probably a 30, a little bit over 30 percent.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:00

Or outside of Florida. And that's including international.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:03

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Um maybe it's probably a little higher these these days. Um we made a conscious effort. Uh I don't know if you've heard of the name Peter Delara, but uh Peter Delara passed away, but Peter was a a um uh big executive at at American Airlines. And he he was one of our first sponsors. American Airlines was was one of our first partners, and he sat me down and he said, The secret to your race is Latin America. And I know he was telling me something obvious, but he said, You need to make this race a Latin American, you know, destination, right? And all things Miami were, but he he had already a track record. He had done what year was this that he said the city? This was 2001 when he sat me down when I met him, or 2002, right before starting the race. Um and he said he was part of the executive team that made the New York City marathon uh kind of what what he was saying we needed to become for uh Latin America, he did that for Europe. He was bringing he they marketed um that New York marathon back then to Europeans and it became a destination for all Europeans. So he's like, you need to have that same you know uh laser focus with um with Latin America. So what he did, which was awesome for us, he said, I will give two free tickets to the top runner of each of the Latin American countries. So for a few years, we would award that and we would advertise that. So we were out like the best Columb, the top Colombian female, male, you're gonna get a ticket. You're uh and the Caribbean, by the way. So whoever won the Sao Paulo marathon, no, no, no, no. No, no, no. If you came to Miami and you were the fastest Colombian from Columbia, you know, not that you were Colombian living in Miami, but uh you came from an with an address based in Bogota, let's say, and you were the fastest runner from your country, we'd give you a a voucher fly, I forget where allowed you to fly. Oh, that's cool. And that and that helped us. And then I would go, I would travel to Bogota, I would travel to San Jose, I would travel to to Peru. I would try all these all these um hubs that we we were we were seeing that it was easy to get to from you know to Miami. The visas were available. Um and uh and I would go down there to their expos and their races and promote the Miami Marathon. And that's how we we built this into what it is now, which I would say that 85% of the about 80% of that field um speak Spanish, which I think is amazing. Like we most of our announcements are in Spanish. That's cool. Which is which is a lot of fun. Uh, you know.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:38

The people from Duluth won't like that. I know, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:43

I think Frankie gave up on Duluth a long time ago.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:46

I hope nobody's listening from Duluth.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:47

Oh, fuck them.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:48

They've changed, they've changed, it's been 25 years.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:51

We can say that here because Ben is from I'm the resident gringo, so I got I got the card.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:56

Uh so how did the Breakwater Hospitality chapter come about?

SPEAKER_01 1:23:59

Yeah, let's talk about that. I'd love to hear that.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:02

Yeah, man. Um, so that's another dimension of kind of my my daily life is um is working with Breakwater Hospitality. And um uh that actually started with um my relationship with Alex Mantekong. Alex is actually one of my best friends. We ran in high school together. That's how we met. We met in the on the cross-country team.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:23

So you guys went to Ballet together?

SPEAKER_02 1:24:24

Yeah, we went to Balen together. Uh, and um he's a year younger than me, but we got to know each other pretty well on on the on the same state championship cross-country team. And so um Alex uh I happen to consider one of one of the smartest guys that that I was uh that I'm friends with. And he came to me one day and said, Hey, um I have I bought bought this property on on the Miami River. I want to do something with it uh that's uh you know nightlife related. Can you connect me with um with Emmy Guerra? Because Emmy happened to be in my fraternity at FIU. We were uh fraternity brothers at uh Phi Sigma Kappa. Um he Emmy graduated from Columbus. I graduated from Balen, but we were the same year, so we we got along pretty well. And um I happened, I would call Emmy to get me into nightclubs and all the places he used to work at.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:17

Hold on, so hold on a second. You don't drink, but you were going to allow it.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:20

I like the I like I like the music, I I like the scene, and obviously, you know, dating and I'm I'm out and about, you know. I I I use Miami the the way everybody else is you know using it back then.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:31

Sounds alcohol.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:32

Yeah, exactly. Um so um so anyhow, um Alex asked me to connect me connect him with with Emmy who was involved. Emmy, for those that don't know, man, he's got he's got roots in space, he's got roots uh attached to Ultra, he's got roots attached to every major night, night, nightclub venue in in Miami. At some point, somebody was uh was in touch with Emmy.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:56

By the way, we had Emmy uh on the podcast, and he also joined us. Uh I'm I co-taught a real estate entrepreneurship class at UM this semester. Oh, that's awesome. And uh Emmy uh joined us in the classroom.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:11

Oh man, so maybe I'm I'm giving the story that he probably gave her.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:14

Keep going, Emmy's the man, but keep going.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:15

Yeah, man. So so anyhow, Emmy and I got to we were in the same pledge class, and and so we got to know each other pretty well. And um I was I was the I don't know, he would let me into these clubs and he knew I wasn't gonna spend money. Um but he I don't know why. He would just he always always uh hook me up and and uh get me in. But uh I got to know him in that scene, and I would also sometimes bring Alex along because he was one of my closest friends and his uh which is now his wife, they would all we'd all meet up and go into mainly Miami Beach Clubs, by the way. Which clubs were you going to? Yeah, we would uh I want to say Mansion, um Crowbar, um names. I forget some of those names, but um anyhow uh Alex asked me, connect me with him. I I I tried at first because Emmy was he was busy, I forget what was going on, and I'm like, Emmy, just meet with this guy, man. Like, whatever he's gonna present you is worth your while. At least just listen to him. So I think we finally did breakfast or lunch or something here in downtown, and um they they hit it off, uh, they exchanged ideas and the wharf was born. Uh, after that, obviously Breakwater uh and everything every other property that they they uh they have uh has succeeded since then. And um, you know, I was just glad to help them with that that connection. So you fast forward to about three years ago, Alex had been bugging me for a while. He's like, hey, come you know, come work with us, come work with us. I don't know what you're gonna do, but I want you to work with us. And um about three years ago I agreed to uh working with them, but there was somewhat of an agenda which is like, hey, we events, fitness, something, something's gonna give, and uh we just want to. Want you guys around so or want you around us. And so I um I'm hanging out with them uh a couple years back, and one of the first ideas that that we had was bringing uh a change to uh Miami Beach spring break, and we brought High Rocks in into uh onto the sand.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:18

And that was kind of my little background on HyROX too, because they're they're they're really big players in Europe, right? Yeah. Um and so talk a little bit about what they do. Sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:28

Yeah, so so I kind of skipped a few steps, but um while getting to find my place at Breakwater, uh, you know, events kept coming up because that's that's what I I do and that's what I'm doing. And um I a couple of good friends of Emmy's um are were were in involved with Wadapalooza. I won't throw throw too many names, but I think I you know the the founder of Wadapalooza, whatnot, uh, which is uh uh uh happens to be a friend of mine too, was close to Emmy. I said, Hey, Emmy, if if we can bring a a Wadapalooza style event to to the sands of Miami Beach, we can help with this narrative to make Miami Beach a fitness destination for the month of March and change this whole spring break problem that they have. And um, I was in touch with with the um special events office. I had given them the idea, hey, fitness is our should are should be our go-to. We do it pretty well. Miami Beach should stick to what it does well, and it already does it. In fact, it's heritage involved in the Miami Beach Fitness Festival. We I produced a half marathon there. We have um a good track record with fitness. We had a big triathlon called the South Beast triathlon for a while. Why don't we go back to that kind of stuff? And they agreed, and um, you know, we we got some funding to bring in high rocks. We built a tent, massive tent. It was uh it was a it was a hit. It helped the narrative that Watapalooza had also um been a part of. And um, you know, fast forward to those that don't know what what high rocks is, I know you asked me that question. It's fitness racing. It's a concept of that let's serve that community that goes to the gym and and isn't a crossfitter and isn't a runner, and let's let's somehow or another provide some competitive opportunity for them to um you know to compete.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:18

So they have it's like an hour or two two hour long race, right? Roughly, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:21

It's 10 different dis different disciplines, everything from a wall ball to um you know sled push and uh all these different aspects. It includes some running, but it's it's mainly um you know functional movements. And now you you had this this concept in Europe. Again, we go back to Miami Beach Fitness Festival. Like I think great fitness concepts do start in in Europe, and they were importing that idea from Germany into the States. Um, they had they had tried a few years prior to this uh uh as well at the convention center, but this was the first time they were gonna do it outdoors on the sands of Miami Beach. Um, and um, anyhow, they they succeed. I consider it a big success, but Miami Beach was still struggling uh with the spring break stuff. So the year after that, they shut down the beach and they shut it down one more year after that. And then now this year, High Rocks moves into the Miami Beach Convention Center, and we brought a concept called Athex to um to the sands of Miami Beach, which is very similar except it's it's got a it's a little more strength based. And um, yeah, I'd I'd say it's a slightly I don't say better concept, but it's different.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:31

How does Breakwater play with the hospital with this?

SPEAKER_02 1:31:34

So Breakwater um plays with it. One, they do marketing pretty well, so they helped with with the marketing, especially those those initial days with high rocks. Um the Emmy's team is is is second to none when it comes to to marketing things.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:47

Because they're meaning like a bar, food and restaurant, yeah, sure, but outlets so but think about it. Do you do like powerlifting and then get a beer after?

SPEAKER_02 1:31:54

No, then I I I think I think that that's they've changed with the market, right? Like I think um there's there's still a segment of the population that wants to go and have a beer and party and whatnot. And then and there's a segment that used to do that and is now looking for healthier options, right? Um, you know, we we do know of some night other nightclub guys that are successful with with uh with gyms, right? It's because eventually your demo evolves. Yep. Um, you know, they get a family, they're not into into the partying as much, and they they have that database and they and they know how to market to them. And and and Emmy's team has has been great at that. So they that's how breakwater plays a big role, besides the F and B side of it for these events. Um, you know, so that's that's one of the big things I do with them. I also produce their their St. Patrick's Day uh festival. That one is you know, it's a festival that there's no fitness component to that. Um I just helped out with uh put a little beer pong in there.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:49

Maybe we can do some of beer dye, beer pong. That's kind of like it's almost like the pickleball of drinking, and we can bring that.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:56

Um but uh but yeah, and then I I've helped Emmy out now with his concept of together, which are music festivals at the Surf Cumber. Um I'm I'm involved. I was involved with uh this this recent McLaren um uh event that took place at City Hall. And um, and then we've uh any activation that's somewhat event or fitness related, that's when I get involved.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:19

What uh what what what are the cool fitness uh concepts have you seen? Or are you guys kind of like looking to bring to Miami Beach? Because it it seems like you know, Miami really has become this focus for fitness, right? We have so many great events, whether it's tennis, you know, we have our sports teams here in our Miami now. Um we have you know F1 as well. Um we're starting to do, you guys are starting to do more events on the beach. Like I think this is something that Miami wants to capitalize on. What are some other concepts that that you're seeing that are interesting?

SPEAKER_02 1:33:58

I mean, definitely this fitness uh racing world uh is is is interesting to me. Uh you know, this hybrid athlete is interesting and serving serving those folks. There, there is a uh uh obviously Miami has its its all its its draw as is of being a destination. If you can if you can infuse that that destination experience with something healthy, people are just a little less, they feel a little less guilty about about traveling somewhere. Uh I I want to make I I know that that's not necessarily novel, but I think that's gonna be a growing um there's gonna be a growing demand for that. We I I still think running has even more to to sort of reinvent that that wheel. Uh I'm gonna, you know, I'm not I'm not gonna spill the beans on on things, but we we are we are working on a couple of concepts, even even into the ultra space, uh, where I think there's there's now this. So imagine before a runner, uh and I hate to keep going back to running, but that's that's what I know best in this case. But a runner uh would enter the running space later in life, right? And they would maybe do a marathon when they're in their mid-30s or early 40s. Well, now they're doing it in their early 20s. So we've got to find what the next bar is. Um, you know, what the what what what's that next challenge? Some folks are gravitating towards um, you know, uh these extreme races and these these ultras and stuff. So I think we're we're gonna we're gonna touch that that space at some point. Um, you know, I think even the run club scene I think is is still is still maturing. So we're I know that that Emmy wants uh wants to put put his his um you know his fingerprints on on that. So we're gonna help I'm gonna help him there. We're also activating a lot more with brands like this week, weekend alone for with F1. Um, I I mean to think that brands like Aston Martin, um uh Cadillac, uh I just heard uh there was another one. Um is it Ford? I I forget which one was having another. Oh no, it was um Adidas with it. Um is on happening on the beach. I forget what other race team they're having runs as part of the big event in town. Well, you know, before it used to be if you had the Super Bowl in town, maybe there was a 5K. Now these all these brands are activating around um, you know, around the the big event in town. So I we're we are part of those conversations now. We actually just activated something at Pier 5 for Aston Martin. So I want to do more of that, that uh that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:30

That's uh that's uh is is beach tennis on your radar at all? Have you have you heard about this at all?

SPEAKER_02 1:36:36

I've heard about it, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:38

Yeah, but could be okay, could be talking. We'll talk about that offline later on.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:42

Could be. I I know that the beach did talk. What they so they the beach brought AVP um volleyball as part of our high rocks weekend and and whatnot. And beach tennis was actually one of one of those things that they were exploring back then.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:56

Yeah, so it's it's been around for a little bit, it's been around for a long time, and it actually started in Italy. Oh, yeah. Um, like 30 or 40 years ago. Huge in Brazil. Um makes sense. And uh it's it's I've been told the second largest sport in Brazil right now, after soccer net, of course. Um and it's they've put on a bunch of beach tennis courts on South Beach and North Beach. So um I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:26

It's kind of maybe maybe that with foot volley. I think foot volley is pretty cool too.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:30

Yeah, but that's that's uh it's hard, maybe that's a whole other level of difficulty.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:33

Sorry, but I see people now playing it at Kennedy Park, and so it's moving beyond uh you know the the spectacle of South Beach.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:40

So um yeah, just curious to see what else you see down the pipeline. And I think that you're you're also seeing like our demographic, right, which is late 40s, you know, 50s, and and people being fit into fitness um later in life, right? And longevity, right? Like what are the sports that people can continue doing as they get older, you know? So and those are people with disposable income too. So the opportunity there, I think, is what are those next, you know, um events that people want to to go out, be athletic, be social, I think, right? And that's what these these events really do.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:21

I I I I couldn't, you know, I couldn't think of a better um time where you have the extremes are rising at the same time. Like you have young people and you have old people, and then they're squeezing even the middle here. They're like you have old, I mean, there are there are you know 75-year-olds that are lining up at start lines and and and crushing it, and they're and then there are 18-year-olds on that same start line, which is amazing.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:48

And I think you probably didn't have 75-year-olds.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:51

You didn't have the 75-year-olds and you didn't have the 18-year-olds. Yeah, we all kind of always had like the middle now. Now I think you have both extremes happening at the same time. I know we used to sit in a in a room with a bunch of race directors, and we're like, how do we get young people into to races? They think running is boring, and now like I kid you not, there was nothing boring about what we did this past uh you know, this past week in at at Pier 5.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:16

Cool. This we didn't talk about the sneaker impact thing. Oh, yeah, let's talk about the sneaker impact. Yeah, man. This guy just can't say he says yes to everything. He still does.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:25

I know, man. And I'm sure there's stuff we're not even touching. He doesn't say yes to tequila. That's the only thing. We're gonna work on it. By the time we're done with him, he's gonna tell us about the sneaker impact thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:34

Sneaker impact. I um I used to own a running shoe store. Um, I owned I own two of them actually for about six, six years. And um, I met a guy back then who was collecting our shoes that people would leave behind. And I didn't know where they were going. I just I just knew that people didn't want their old shoes, and rather than throwing them in the garbage, we would shove them into our fitting room and um and they would disappear, right? Somebody would come in, pick them up. And it happened to be it was it was this guy, his name's Mo and uh Mo Mo Hashem. And Mo um had a uh company that was in the reverse export liquidation business out of uh little little Haiti, little little river area. And um Mo would export mainly apparel, um all used clothing, either used or uh excess stock, right? Uh overstock of of you know, you were a brand and you didn't want to put your stuff you know on on clearance. This is he was your your outlet, and he would guarantee it wasn't gonna be resold in the States, it was gonna be sent to developing countries and upcycled and and and whatnot. And um about a couple years after I sold the store, um he approached me and I was like, I don't know. I approached me again, and eventually about four years ago, I finally sat with him and um his actually I think it was his cousin or his I forget how we get connected again. I I'm like, all right, this guy's insistent, I gotta hear him out. And he's like, Look, I want to market to runners. Runners are using their shoes and not completely you know destroying them. They're using them and they're after 300 miles, they're tossing them. They're either in garbage cans or you know, even even to Goodwill. And Goodwill ends up calling him at times because they have so many, so much of it. Because I have I have not only the ability to distribute this stuff, but I know the demand is there. Like it's it you just need to help me with a collection. You know, something like 92% of running shoes are discarded, or maybe it's even higher than that, are just discarded and done away with and not given any extended life to them, despite the tread and the the upper and everything being intact. Like you can almost you can clean them up and probably resell them, but just because you know uh the runner had 300 miles logged on them, he's been told he can't use them anymore. And um, and the truth is they do lose their efficacy, and there's something to that, but they can still be used as daily shoes for people in the world.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:10

Transportation, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:11

There's that's transportation for a person in a developing country. And anyhow, so he says help me penetrate that running space. How how do we do that? And we just started. Um, now we're in close to 600 running specialty doors. Uh, I've kind of guided him through this. Uh I've got a small little sales team that that uh helps me knock on the doors and and uh and market his his business. And um, I mean uh we're in fleet feet doors, we're in in in uh rack rooms and gyms and uh you name it. We we have collection bins, and he's collect he collects the shoes, um, and uh those get sorted, and uh the ones that still have life get sent off. The ones that don't have life, which we call them end-of-life shoes, those get grinded, and the man has figured out a way to reuse the materials that he separates. Eventually there's some materials that just don't have use, but a typical shoe can have uh 30 components. It could have uh glue, it has the the rubber, it has the EVA, it has uh textile, it has uh it has plastic, it has everything. But nobody had successfully chopped up the shoe and divided into usable, pure material that could be um you know resold even. And that's what he's been doing. He just made sandals a couple weeks ago. I got them at my house. Um he's con he's pro proving the concept works. Uh, and it's right here, man. Like a mad scientist, man. He's got the equipment, he's got the separators, he's got it all, and he's built it out of a warehouse in in uh in Little Haiti. And we just gave a tour to Mayor Higgins this week, and I don't think people know it's there, which is which is pretty awesome. That's really cool. Is that a nonprofit or does it see that that that that's the misconception that it had to be a nonprofit? His business is what I would refer to as a socially responsible business. Like so, how do they make money? So he sells them to resellers.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:14

So you'll have I I'll give you this example. You'll have um a Haitian woman um that goes in and literally handpicks her allotment of shoes and that into the thousands, takes them to Haiti and resells them uh through her channels. Got it. It could be, you know, it could be out of a shopping center somewhere, or it could be out of the back of a car. And they give these shoes and they clean them up themselves. Some of them will stitch up little holes, you know, clean them off. And he doesn't care how much they resell them for, he sells them to by the pound to her. And so he's creating these micro business opportunities, and um, and it's not set up as a for-profit. Everybody's making money. These I've met these women, these women are putting their kids through colleges in the US.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:02

Um, so so I spent a couple years in Guatemala. I was in the Peace Corps there. And uh, you know, there are these when when we were living down there, like there are stores. I mean, they're just everywhere. They're called ropa americana. Yes, American clothes. And this is where these products end up, right? Like, and you can literally find just amazing quality clothing. I mean, we'd pull out and like get North Face, Patagonia, like I mean, incredible quality clothes, like in in in Central America, right? And so a lot of this, you know, there's a there's a business there, right? And like when we tour our warehouses in Hyalea, like we see all these used clothing store, like used clothing, that's what's happening, right? Like people are buying the stuff by the pound, correct, by the ton rather, yeah, and then sending them to Haiti, Central America, Latin America, all over the world. It's crazy, Africa, you know. Um, but shoes are are something that is generally very expensive in these third world countries. And we use shoes probably to their you know, 50% life lifestyle. Barely. Barely, right? And we send them off where people will continue to use this the shoe that you think it is is dead for the next five years. Correct. Um, and so it's it what an what an amazing initiative.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:26

Yeah, man. No, it's it's awesome. It's like I like I said, if more businesses were socially responsible, where it's a they can create a win-win for everybody that that's involved. He employs 30 people at the warehouse, but uh that's just the tip of the opportunity for someone else to succeed, that that doesn't have a price. Like that, that is that's everything. I I think it's one of the the most um uh underrecognized in uh business, successful business people in our community.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:54

And he's getting product at zero cost too, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:46:58

Yeah, so so at times though, he will pay, especially there's there's nonprofits that they work for, work with where they'll pay them per pound for the collection of it. So, like let's say you're a running store and you're raising money for something, um, you know, a kid's running program or whatnot, he will pay you for the shoes. And then uh there's still money left to be made, right? So he'll still pay to acquire the shoes at times, although, although most people just feel good giving them back, just like you would take them to Goodwill and you have them as a write-off. Um, you know, and and uh so I'd like to think that he's also made a dent in the in the landfills. At the end of the day, they eventually land end up there, right? Like it's material, unless it's these end-of-life, you know, pieces where he's just shredding them and and turning them into uh you know stuff for sandals or yoga mats and a bunch of other things.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:51

Your your motto is don't stop. Yeah, man. Would you ever retire or stop? No, man. I I don't you seem like the guy, the kind of guy that needs to just be doing a million things at all times.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:02

Yeah, man. Yeah. I I I I I think that uh I don't know. I don't like I don't like to waste the I mean you know nobody indefinite you don't know what how much time we have here, but I don't like to waste time. I don't watch a lot of TV. I don't I don't lounge around. I my vacations, I'll I'll try to actually do stuff at them. I'm not the guy who sits under a you know uh nothing I'm not knocking anybody, I just can't do it. I sit under an umbrella and and and and relax. I just it's just not in me. Um I probably need to relax a little bit sometimes, probably be healthy, but I don't know. I'm I'm I have uh I I also feel that in the few times that I have stopped in life, like I've just been like, all right, I'm done. This that's when opportunities stop coming your way. That's when you kind of like it. I use the bike, the bike analogy, right? It's it's uh you stop pedaling, you fall over. Like I just keep just keep pedaling, man. A roadie or are you a mountain biker? I'm a I gravel, man. And mountain and mountain. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:04

I was about to shit on roadies over here. You know who you are out there, roadies.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:08

I live in the groves, I see them all the time.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:10

And uh so you got a gravel bike and uh you do a little mountain biking too?

SPEAKER_02 1:49:14

I do, yeah. What do you hit?

SPEAKER_01 1:49:15

Virginia Key?

SPEAKER_02 1:49:16

Virginia Key. I like Markham. Um, you know, I've uh I've I've gone to Whistler.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:21

I mean, I I I enjoy that that that uh but you're more of a cross country guy than uh than a downhiller, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:49:27

Yeah, I did Whistler's dangerous. Yeah, Whistler's downstairs. It's terrifying gnarly, dude. It was awesome. It was it was the best. Um but I like I like um I think we've done great, great with Markham and Virginia Key, man. Yeah, Virginia Key is amazing. The media is pretty good, but uh, but I think um those those two places stand out. Um yeah, man. And then and then people don't realize the amount of gravel we have in this community. We have I mean several hundred miles of access to gravel. You can ride gravel. To the keys practically and up to Lake Okeechobee without possibly crossing too many roads. And it's beautiful out there, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:08

I just love going out there and so you do a lot, you do a lot of gravel riding? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Dang. Where where do you usually start off of off of chrome? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:50:17

I'll jump on on uh any of the levees out there that the take them. You can take a 27-mile loop. There's I mean there's there's so many, so many areas. Yeah. I've I've uh I've graveled with a group out um near um uh what do you arrow aeroljet uh down down uh by the entrance of the Everglades. Um you know it's to me that's awesome, man. Cool. I mean there's no shade out there, but yeah, but it's awesome, man. Gravel's great. Whenever you want to ride gravel, we'll go do that.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:45

I love it. I got a gravel bike. Yeah, yeah. I got an old school 1993 Bridgestone that's a gravel bike. That's awesome. Yeah. Um dude, uh thank you for for doing so many activations for this city. Like, I think it's it's so important to bring people together and do these events, and you know, it just elevates um the the the Miami brand. Um, and uh this is you know, it what you do helps so many operas operators of businesses in real estate. Um, and uh it's just it it's it it's in a lot of ways, people don't understand the impact that you have and the events that you help bring to Miami and and what it does for for us as a community. So keep crushing it, dude. Thanks, man. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 1:51:41

I think Miami, Miami can't be anywhere else. And and I love telling people that that this is this is a unique place, and and I I love hearing when people move here and they stay here. Um, you know, people that come through here and and give back and they move out, that's fine.

SPEAKER_01 1:51:55

Ben's only here because of his hot wife. That's the only reason. Oh man. No, but I think Ben likes Miami too. He likes the crazy. He couldn't move back to Minnesota either. No, it's I couldn't be back with the uptight white.

SPEAKER_02 1:52:09

It's too stiff up there. Man, no, this this place has there's not things to hate, but I think what makes it unique is that there's just such a bunch of things that we shouldn't change that just make us Miami. Yeah. Because then when you love something, you'll take in the bad and the good, and then every so often you'll try to make the bad uh a little better. But I don't know, this place is is is pretty pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:38

Yeah. Well, thanks for coming down, Frankie. It was great to hear your story and get to know you, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:52:42

Yeah. To our listeners out there, don't stop. Don't stop. That's right.

SPEAKER_02 1:52:46

Never, never.

SPEAKER_01 1:52:46

All right. Thanks, Frankie. Appreciate that. That was awesome. Thanks.

SPEAKER_03 1:52:49

Cheers.