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The Steep Stuff Podcast
Kobe Trail Golden Trail World Series - Race Companion with Guest Nick Tusa
The 2024 Golden Trail Series kicks off in Japan with the technically challenging Kobe Trail race, and we've got the complete preview to get you ready for all the action. This 21K mountain course packs a serious punch with nearly 7,000 feet of climbing across four increasingly difficult loops, culminating in a brutal final climb that will separate the contenders from the pretenders.
What makes this race particularly fascinating is the unique intersection of skills required – pure climbing strength versus technical descending prowess. The Japanese terrain features slick roots, rocks, and challenging singletrack that caused several DNFs last year when Philemon Kiriago twisted his ankle while running in the lead pack. This technical challenge especially favors athletes with orienteering backgrounds, potentially giving an edge to competitors like Switzerland's Joey Hadron.
We break down the surprisingly thin elite field (compared to typical Golden Trail events), analyzing why many top athletes chose to skip this opener and how that creates a strategic advantage for those who made the journey to Japan. On the men's side, defending champion Patrick Kipngeno returns as the clear favorite, coming off remarkable training blocks in Kenya with 120+ mile weeks. For the women, newly-signed Norda athlete Joyce Njeru faces strong challenges from technical specialists Sarah Alonso and Malin Osa in what promises to be a fascinating tactical battle.
Whether you're following the Golden Trail Series all season or just love expert race breakdowns, this episode delivers insider knowledge on course specifics, athlete preparation, and bold predictions for who might take home the win. The conversation also explores broader themes in the sport including sponsor dynamics, athlete development, and the strategic importance of early-season race selection in a championship year.
This episode was brought to you by Ultimate Direction, use code steepstuffpod for 25% off your next purchase on ultimatedirection.com
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What's up, boys and girls? Welcome back to the Steep Stuff Podcast. I'm your host, james Lauriello. Guys, I'm pumped. I got a good one for you.
Speaker 1:I am so excited to bring you a race preview with frequent co-host, mr Nick Tusa, for the Golden Trail Series race, kobe Trail that is happening this upcoming Saturday, april 19th in Japan. Pretty stacked field, I got to be honest. It's not one of Golden Trails like most stacked fields, but some boys and girls are showing up so it's going to be competitive nonetheless. I think there's a lot of really fun storylines with this one. I think you guys are going to like it. So I'm not going to hold up too much. I want to thank my frequent co-host, mr Nick Toose, for coming um and giving some expert analysis and opinion. Um, but I think this is going to be a good one. So hope you guys enjoy this one without further ado. Kobe trail race preview. It's time. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. We are live. Listen up, guys.
Speaker 1:The Steep Stuff Podcast is brought to you by Ultimate Direction, usa. Guys, I am so excited. Ud just dropped their new race vest six liter and ultra vest 12 liter in two beautiful aesthetic colors. You guys got to check these new vests out. They're dynamic in ways, um, like that you just have never seen from an ultimate direction vest um, very stretchy, lots of storage. Uh, beautiful aesthetic colorways coming into, coming to you in a new, like a white and blue and an onyx and green. Just absolutely beautiful vests. Um, I think these ones are just like some of the best products we've ever dropped and I'm so excited for you guys to try them out.
Speaker 1:Hop on ultimate directioncom and use code steep stuff pod Again, that's steep stuff pod for 25% off your new vest. I mean, they're already affordably priced, but 25% off is just going to make it so much more affordable for folks in an already increasingly expensive trail running environment. So hop on ultimate directioncom, get yourself a new vest, a pack or any hydration solution and let me know what you guys think, nick too. So welcome back to the Steep Stuff Podcast. How are you, homie?
Speaker 2:I'm good man, stoked to be kicking off the season, kicking off Golden Trail, yeah how crazy.
Speaker 1:We're here already, man.
Speaker 2:I know.
Speaker 1:It's like end of April already. Crazy, you're racing this weekend already Shit's popping off. How are you feeling?
Speaker 2:Oh, dude, you ready to throw down? Oh, I'm ready to throw it out. Yeah, it's been a great couple months Consistency. Name of the game. Now we'll see what happens. Yeah, that's been a good build. Yeah, I'm excited.
Speaker 1:I'm excited to see you beat up on some Castle Rock and Denver dudes this weekend. It's going to be fun to follow. Yeah Well, dude, what else is going on these days? I'm stoked because Alexander Volkanovski is now the featherweight champion, so all is good.
Speaker 2:Yeah, pretty happy about that. As far as NBA playoffs are starting, nhl playoffs are starting. It's a good time of year for sports.
Speaker 1:Honestly, I've been watching a good amount of hockey lately and it's yeah, yeah, it's good stuff, it's good stuff, so all right.
Speaker 1:We're here to talk about Kobe Kobe trail. Yeah, so hopping in this upcoming uh saturday, for it's going to be april the 19th um, it's a short race, it's only like 21k, so it's like 13, 13 miles and some change. Um interesting course, like it's a. It's a four looped course, which seems kind of dope. Um, we can obviously get into storylines and talk about the race. Dude, I gotta be honest with you, like I I'm surprised by not a lot of people turning up at this race, just because it's a looks like a beautiful area, beautiful course. Like if I could go pick a golden trail series race, that's like not in europe to go do this probably, probably would be the one, a hundred percent.
Speaker 2:If not, if, if my sponsors were giving me a budget to to go, I'm going 100. So it's, it's, it's weird. Yeah, I don't know, and not a lot of. I don't know, and not a lot of people I don't know have ran in Japan before and it's weird. I think we're seeing a lot of a lot of repeat people. I would think we'd be seeing new people come, but yeah, yeah, I'm surprised.
Speaker 1:There's not like we'll talk about this as we get further into the episode, but I am, I'm very surprised, like I don't know what, if I don't know what's going on with golden trail for this first race. I don't know if it's just timing of the season, but like we might have I don't know like one fifth of the names that we had last year, like last year, like I mean, allie Mac was there, christina masquerade, like Andy whack, or like there was a lot of Americans showed. This year, we might have, like, well, with the absence possibly, of Lauren Gregory, we might have one or two Americans. Crazy, yeah, very small American field which is kind of a bummer. But yeah, I don't know, we can hop into it now and maybe talk about it a little bit. I think it's worth talking about the course, absolutely yeah. So what do you think about that course? Four loops looks gnarly dude, yeah.
Speaker 2:I don't hate the four loop format. It's gonna allow for people to carry pretty light um, maybe just bring a handheld or something like that, or I don't even know if they even need that. I mean, aid stations will probably be pretty centralized. I would imagine um, some fans and stuff. I'm sure the japanese community will be out there um in full force cheering people on, which would be awesome, um.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I have here loop one um is about 2.3 miles with 950 feet of gain, so the shortest and the lowest vert loop of the four. Uh, the second loop there we have 3.8 miles with 1700 feet of gain, so getting a little steeper there. So you had six miles with 2700 feet in the first half. Um, pretty solid, like that's a true mountain race, like that's, yeah, I mean. And then you got loop three, 3.85 miles with 2200 feet of gain. That's like out the back door here with green mountain, like that that's steep, that's that's gnarly um. And then loop four, 2.3 miles with 2000 feet of gain. So you end up with right around a marathon with what does that end up being?
Speaker 1:It's like 6,900 feet, yeah, almost 7,000 feet of gain. Wow, it's like it made me laugh because I'm like 21K, 2109 meters. The math started. A math informant.
Speaker 2:I'm like, oh, that's the Pike's Peak Ascent. Yeah, yeah, it's like almost, almost.
Speaker 1:Well, like yeah, yeah, almost seriously. Well, I think it's like another thousand feet for the pikes ascent, but like sure, it's pretty descending as well. Yeah, pretty close, yeah, yeah, I mean, dude, the race starts like I remember, uh, when I had christina on, she was telling me the race starts on a descent as well. So like yeah, you start going down. She was like she's like I looked at my watch and I'm running like low five, like high four something per mile. She's like I should not be running.
Speaker 2:This is insane I have a feeling a lot of people are going to be taking those first two loops out a little hard and, uh, it's going to slap them across the face that final loop. So I think I think if you have your climbing legs ready this early in the season, you're going to be coming out on top.
Speaker 1:So I'd focus on the climbers here for sure it's going to be interesting, right like we've got this dichotomy because you're gonna see, I mean, this is a, this is a course, particularly for me, that I think like. So, for instance, like joey um held iran or hadron, I can't pronounce it the swiss athlete from solomon, like he had a lot of success very early on. He's also a very talented orienteer. The race is insanely technical, very like like philomon got knocked out of the race last year I think he was in tandem first, second, third with Joey and Patrick last year and Phil Oman twisted his ankle and dropped. It's an extremely technical race. So to me, I think it's going to be if you can run efficiently downhill like very strong and you, I don't know, can follow course markings very well and you just can kind of get dialed in on that. I think that's where the race is going to be won on the descents things very well and you just can kind of get dialed in on that. I think that's where the race is going to be won on the descents because, like, if you don't know what you're doing on the technical descents, you're just going to be, you know, kind of molly, whopping your way going down and it's not going to end up very good. So, yeah, I don't know, I think it's, it's going to be. You got to be really strong on the technical department in order to, uh, to make this happen.
Speaker 1:I don't, we've got some names, though. I mean, like. So, one of the things I saw, joyce Nauru returns. Joyce Nauru, golden Trail Series female winner last year, just signed with Normal. My question to you is like so last year we got El Hussein coming out just after signing with Normal, had a great result at Kobe I think he took fourth there and then went on to win the Golden Trail World Series and just completely dominate. I kind of see a similar storyline for someone like Joyce. Now that she has the resources, what?
Speaker 2:do you think? Oh, 100%. Yeah, I mean, I have Joyce for my. I think she was what fourth year last year. Yeah, yeah, just returning to that course again. I'm sure she's had some time out there, I don't know. Do you know if she's out there already?
Speaker 1:I'm out there, I don't know. Do you know if she's out there already? Okay, so interesting. She does not have a Strava. Okay, I did did a ton of digging into some of these athletes. Like Madalina Floria does not have a straw. Like does have a Strava but doesn't post. Um, malinosa doesn't post on Strava. Like I literally found like one athlete in my women's top five that has a fucking Strava, which drives me crazy. Yeah, it's funny. Like I mean I'm kind of cryptic on Strava but I know like a lot of my friends are not. Like a lot of people put their shit out there. Yeah, it's kind of annoying, it's tough to get.
Speaker 2:It's just tough for us to talk about it If we don't know, like, how someone's fitness is, like we can really just go off past, uh, past experience yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um, so in in addition to joyce. I'm excited for this joyce. Uh, sarah alonzo rematch. Um, sarah had a great late race last year. Um, wouldn't be surprised to see someone like sarah come in, because you gotta remember, like this is, this is an interesting like intersection of a race. Right, like you're getting a lot of people coming in with a ton of fitness, right, I'm sure, like based on like what I've been looking at, because like philip mont has a very public strava and dude's running like 130 miles a week, oh wow, so he's coming in with a a shit ton of fitness. I'm sure patrick as well.
Speaker 1:But you also have this weird dichotomy too, where you'll see, the orienteers are kind of very much in their orienteering season right now. Um, what does that look like? They're better technical runners. They might not have the same fitness level, but they can handle courses like this, maybe better than people that are just like running on flat service roads or dirt roads or easy kind of tame trails, so that maybe you haven't like put that specific stuff into their blocks yet. So you're very much going to get this intersection of. I think that's why Joyce maybe came in fourth last year, because you get a Sarah Alonzo and a Malinosa that you know. These are Spanish athletes that run on very technical trails. You know, joyce might be fitter in theory but might not be able to match some of those descents or um, you know, in some of those areas. So it's going to be interesting to kind of see this intersection and what that looks like.
Speaker 2:That will be interesting, cause like yeah, I mean fitness translates incredibly well to the uphill, but, like the downhill, obviously that's a skill. Um, so you could be the best climber in the field, but if you're tiptoeing down, maybe you can get by. I don't know. It's. This isn't a super deep field, but it's deep enough to where it could bite you at the towards the end.
Speaker 1:Um, yeah, yeah. So it's going to be interesting, I think. So we get Patrick back, we get Phil on back. Patrick took second in the overall golden trail world series last year. Phil Amon took fourth overall. Dropped from this race, patrick won the race last year. Uh, joey Hadron, who took eighth last year overall in the golden trail world series and took second at this race. I think this race, in my opinion, kind of made a name for him. Um, cause Solomon, I mean this race, I think this race, in my opinion, kind of made a name for him. Um, because solomon, I mean he did take top 10 overall in the ranking but, like at the end of the day, he um, yeah, solomon, signed him to the international team this year. You know, he reminds me of kind of like a sam hendry for some reason, I don't know what it is about him that he just kind of reminds me of sam hendry 100.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I wish they would have kept sam on the team as well, but it's unfortunate. But yeah, but yeah it's I mean taking second at any golden trail event. Like you're going to make a name for yourself and you deserve to be sponsored. So yeah, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:All right, let's. Let's get into maybe some questions, just some general questions. I think my question to you is like do you think this particular course, because it is so, is going to favor? We kind of tackled it a little bit. I'm just kind of curious to get your take on it. Do you think the course favors any, like certain type of athlete?
Speaker 2:um, yes, like I wanted to put lauren gregory up there because I feel like it fits like an east coast kind of kind of runner. Um, as well as like sarah alonso and uh malinosa running in, I'm sure what are they training out of spain or something right? Now um super technical, um, maybe a different type of technicality. I feel like this race is a little bit more like roots yeah, so that's why I'm getting that kind of east coast.
Speaker 2:That's why it sucks that lauren's not there, because I really I mean I had lauren potentially over joyce like for this one, if she for sure I mean she showed it in the end of the season last year. But yeah, I think it definitely favors that technical mountain athlete, which not a lot of these Golden Trail events favor, necessarily like maybe like a Mount Block Marathon or something like that. But this one 100, I mean we just talked about the course profile. I mean it's steep, there's not going to be a lot of flat running.
Speaker 1:Um, it's up and down yeah, who I would have really liked in this course, uh, and it really favored like his abilities is dan kurtz um, yeah dan's listening to this.
Speaker 1:God damn it. I wish I could just send you a pin and go beat up on some of these dudes because it would be really fun to see him with like with patrick and philomon and like racing in front, because dan's like a nasty descender dude. He's like really really strong um, I mean he's strong kind of everywhere. It's why he's one of the best in the world but like, at the same time, like to see him at one of these courses would be, especially something like this, which is very east coast vibes.
Speaker 1:It would have been sick with all the rocks and roots and shit like all the stuff I hate um a couple other things. So like we got joey hedron, who I brought up before daniel pattis, um kind of a cryptic guy doesn't post much on strava, if anything at all. He's more active like on like instagram and shit like that. Took fifth over like kind of a quiet crusher. Fifth and golden trail last year.
Speaker 1:He's a brooks athlete and he's back in this race. I think he finished. I'm pretty, almost like a hundred percent sure. He ran into the top five last year at this race, so he's another one that's coming back in search of. I mean, dude, I gotta be honest with you, like, if it was me at a very top, top level, like one of these guys, why would you not go to this race? Because no one's going to it, like exactly.
Speaker 1:It's such an easy opportunity to get points Like I feel like this is the least stack golden trail series race I've ever seen 100%, and what do you think this is going to do for the rest of the season?
Speaker 2:I mean Sears and all Zagama these races are going to be 40, 50, like elite deep, Like it's going to be so hard to get any kind of points. Come here free, couple points it just you know it's, it's tough and you know what's gonna. These guys have an advantage now. They're gonna be able to, uh, to sit back kind of the rest of the season and maybe like be a little bit more strategic on what they want to pick, and they're gonna be fresh as can be come come the finals. So, um, all the power to these people are flying out to asia. I'm sure it's tough with the time zone and everything like that, but, uh, but it's gonna, it's gonna fare well for them. I have a feeling. I have a feeling we're gonna see a lot of those men that, uh, we probably both have here in our top five. Uh, they're late in the season.
Speaker 1:Well, that's the thing, like exactly that's the thing is. Like you're like it's just, why would you have to go through, like I mean obviously zagama series and all like amazing races, but like it's killer's row, like where you would probably go top five in this race. You're top 25 in in something like zagama or series at all. So, yeah, I, I definitely I am very surprised, and dude it speaks to golden trail, like maybe because it's a world selection year, people's priorities have changed. Uh, maybe the other thing I could think is like a lot of the euros, um, also double eskimo athletes, like world schema was still going on. Like, yeah, like I I wouldn't expect to see something like a remi here, um, or like a davide magnini, or even like a deer, but like it's very weird to me to not see just so many people absent. So, uh, even I guess it was even too early for uh, what's his face? Um, oh, has seen till the season?
Speaker 2:I guess he didn't, yeah so interesting.
Speaker 1:What do you think, uh, baseline fitness, what do you think? Well, obviously, we could probably guess. I don't know what patrick's 10k time is, or even what his 5k time is, but what do you think he's hitting like? What do you think his fitness is at? I mean, mean dude Phil, my mind Strava is is redonkulous.
Speaker 2:I need to look at it.
Speaker 1:I actually have not looked at it 120, 130 miles a week and like pretty easy stuff. And then like he'll throw in like one threshold day where he'll run like a half marathon and like one oh five or one oh six, like just completely like do like most of the splits at like 8,500 feet or like below five minute mile.
Speaker 2:It's, it's ridiculous, um, just like dirt roads Most of the time.
Speaker 1:A lot of it's dirt roads and you know it's interesting I don't know and like this speaks to uh, you know, training theory, to very little vert. Like the most vert he'll do is like maybe 2000 feet, but it's like spread out in like a 13, 14 mile run.
Speaker 2:Right, it comes with the mileage. I mean, when you're putting in 130 miles like you're probably gonna still hit 10 000 feet of gain, I would imagine 12 um, yeah yeah, so maybe for them it just it comes with the mileage. Yeah, interesting though it is interesting.
Speaker 1:it is interesting, um, so yeah, what do you think? Like base fitness, like I mean, obviously patrick's a sub 30 minute guy 28, 30, maybe something like that. I mean elite stuff, yeah, sub-14, 15.
Speaker 2:If Patrick trained for it he could probably go to the Olympics in probably the 10K, I would imagine, or get very, very close Olympic standard. You know what's?
Speaker 1:crazy. The other day I was on an easy run with my dog and me and Lunar trotting around. I'm running like, maybe like an eight or nine minute pace, like on the greenway trail, like just an easy, just relaxing, chill day. I'm looking up at pike's peak and who comes running past me, but a group of like kenyan olympians and then joe gray, like five minutes, like mad, soon say five minutes maybe like 45 seconds later on their tail.
Speaker 1:These guys are running like mid to low five minute pace, like just hammering on the greenway trail and then joe gray's like hammering behind them, trying to like keep with. It was really cool to see I was like awesome. I was like damn dude like that. That got me, gave me the fire for the rest of the week to go out and like go hammer my workout the following day.
Speaker 2:It was do you see? Do you see them out there, often like um, like kenyan and like other elite I got lucky.
Speaker 1:I saw I think it was hillary boore um at the track on saturday after the incline. I was like wow, we are. Dudes are showing up. Yeah, it's like very random. Like I saw the kenyans on on, I was like I must have saw the kenyans on. It might have been friday is probably what it was. And then saturday after the incline on the track I saw some guys. So I was like wow cool, very cool.
Speaker 1:What do you think about? All right. So I got a question. If let's say Joey, somebody like Joey comes out or Daniel Pettis comes out and has a stellar race, like let's say Daniel Pettis goes and beats Phil Amon or Patrick let's say he beats Patrick, beatable does that push him to a little more superstardom? Does that elevate him? Or like maybe joey, like you think, joey, if he goes and beats, uh, someone like like a patrick, will that elevate him to superstardom a little bit more? Like will he become solomon's next guy?
Speaker 2:I, I think, man, if you beat patrick, yeah, you gotta at least talk about, at least have the conversation. Um, it might not happen in an instant, but I mean this guy, he's, I mean he was eighth last year in. Man, if you beat Patrick, yeah, you got to at least talk about it, at least have the conversation. Um, it might not happen in an instant, but I mean this guy he's, I mean, he was eighth last year in this series, like, he's definitely one of their top athletes, as it is, but, um, but no, I think beating Patrick or Philemon, it's yeah, no, all eyes on them going to the next race, cause that's all we're going to be talking about. Yeah, no, yeah, I agree, yeah, like I said.
Speaker 1:I'm really onto this like joey hadron guys. So listen to this. 2024 swiss cross-country title holder, signed to solomon, this year also. He's a swiss orienteer. Like I said, he's 28 years old, he's from burn. Like I told you, he reminds me of like a sam hendry, also 2024 world orienteering gold medalist and last year he balanced orienteering with trail running. I'm not sure if he's doing the same, but like this, this kid could. I think Solomon's sending this guy up to be he's like not that Remy's old, but, like you know, this guy's a bit younger. Um, you know, this guy's got some promise they don't have, I know, especially with Bart and Thibaut going to more of the ultra scene like Bart's not doing as many Golden Trail series races, I feel like that's why Solomon kind of invested more to get some more guys.
Speaker 1:I mean this dude's pretty legit. Second at Kobe last year, fifth at the Great Wall Race, 17th at Headlands, which was straight up barn burner ran eighth in the prologue and then 16th in the overall final to finish eighth overall.
Speaker 2:That's pretty solid for a first year kids talented, so last year was he on the developmental team because I swear he had a solomon kit so it's like their national oh yeah, the national, yes, yes I guess there's like a solomon swiss or solomon france and like it'll be a part of that, but now he's like the international dude.
Speaker 2:So so I think I think joey is the next um version of judith. You know what I mean, the male version. I mean I think I, if judith can do it, coming at, dominate in in orienteering and coming to, I think joey can do the same yeah, I don't know much about that sport it's just interesting because, like no, it produces a ton of really good technical uh athletes like uh fred trenchard, who runs a lot of more sky running stuff oh, he's a monster.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he was an, or he's a, french orienteer um judas obviously yeah, yeah, he did go to merrill this year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he left scott for merrill.
Speaker 1:Good for him. Cool, yeah, merrill probably threw the bag at him. Good for that. Um, um, okay, do you think the winner of this overall race, let's say Patrick goes and wins? Do you think this year is going to be Patrick's year? He's gotten. I think he's going to be his third year or fourth year. You think Al-Hussein falls off a little bit now that he's already won it. You think he still is hungry? I'd love to see Patrick go and get it. There's been some holes in Patrick's game over the years. Patrick's so nasty though, dude.
Speaker 2:So patrick's so nasty, though dude so nasty. I think if he wins this man it's gonna be tough. Uh, he's just not having to go against al-hazin for a race like I just I think that's like a huge advantage for him here, um, because, like we just talked about, he can now pick and choose going forward. It's. This result is going to tell me a lot, I think, after, after this, if he, if he wins this, like in a pretty like convincing fashion, I have a feeling that this is a this is his year.
Speaker 1:I think the winners of this race go on to win the whole thing. I think if Patrick I'm going to pick Patrick to win the whole overall thing this year I'm going to pick Joyce to win the whole overall thing this year. I'm going to pick Joyce to win the whole overall thing too. I think Joyce probably, and we'll see when we get to picks. But like I think Joyce has a great opportunity to win the whole damn thing. We'll see what happens at this race for her.
Speaker 2:But Can you take over?
Speaker 1:Yep, let's talk women's names. So we've got Joyce Nauru, sarah Alonzoin, osa osa, madalena, floria, um. And then we're gonna say, I'm gonna say, lauren gregory's a scratch. It's not official, but as of this morning, we're recording. This is it tuesday? This is tuesday. This will come out, uh, friday. She's still in phoenix, according to strava, as of this morning. So, but then again, when I checked philip onstrava this morning, he ran today and he was still in kenya.
Speaker 1:So shorter flight, but still yeah, yeah, I don't know but like I feel like to go across the world, you might want to be there already um, yeah, and then on top of that, uh, lauren was pretty public about dropping out of I think it was the new york city marathon because of some achilles issues and she said her spring was up in the air. I would guess she's probably not going to be there. If I was putting smart money on it, um, I'd say probably not. And then for the men's names, uh, daniel pattis. Uh, we talked about roy rui. Uh, roy, damn it rui. Uh, you wait he's in this.
Speaker 2:He's in this, yeah, okay, okay, good, because he should be.
Speaker 1:I had to decide, dude. I deciphered some serious Japanese names Bogdan Damien, patrick, obviously, patrick Philemon, joey Hadron, and then the only American that I could find is Nicholas Turco, who we had talked about a little bit earlier when we were chatting about this he's a Boulder guy, yeah, did you see anything on him? What's the deal there? Who we had talked about a little bit earlier when we were chatting about this. He's a Boulder guy, yeah. Yeah, did you see anything on him? What's the deal there?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I saw. I mean he's been racing Golden Trail now since 2022, maybe even 2021. Yeah, I just really fly under the radar, kind of taking my 20th, 30th place at most, which is great in Golden Trail. Kind of taken like 20, 30th place at most, which is great in golden trail. Um, I've here 31st at uh, mammoth 26k, and 2023 and 2024, uh, 23rd at pikes, ran a 224, which is super stuff.
Speaker 1:We know, you know, pikes, that's yeah, so it's just it's.
Speaker 2:It's interesting. Yeah, it seems like he may be a product of uh of western um born. I think he was born in uh in durango um, so probably just a. You know, mountains have been a part of his life, um his entire life and I dm'd him, yeah I dm'd him today to get him on the podcast.
Speaker 1:Dude, it's just weird. Like I always feel like I'm in the know and I know like all, like I have an idea of who everybody is. And this guy, like it's funny because, like I I saw like kieran follows him, a lot of people like I know follow him and he was well and I was like what the shit? Like how do I never, like, never heard of this kid? Like how is that possible? It's just crazy. Like goes to show you, like I think he's a Western product to Western. How many athletes that goddamn school produces is insane. Dude, this is bananas, yeah, bananas. What do you think about Madeline Euphoria? We didn't get a chance to talk about this in our free agency episode. Since then, she signed with Scott, left Solomon to go to Scott.
Speaker 1:What's your take on that? You think they just get paid.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I think. So I think she's kind of the face of the brand, kind of on the female side probably now, I would imagine, and maybe that's something that she wanted. Maybe she didn't want to go to another bigger brand and kind of just get lost in the weeds there. That she wanted. I feel like she's the type of like her attitude I've listened to her on some podcasts. She wants to be a priority, she takes the sport really really serious, and so I I'm really excited for her. I think this year is the year that she really really blossoms. Yeah yeah, she was six last year in Golden Trail't. I think I have her in like my top three this year um, yeah, I'm excited she's legit.
Speaker 1:She's probably one of the best marathoners in the entire like for the women in the entire field. Like she's legit, she ran 114 and a half marathon just a few months ago. I know she did a speed block out in kenya which some people frown upon because there might be some anti-doping allegations there.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to start that conversation.
Speaker 1:But I don't know, it's a little weird. But anyway also has a small orienteering background and obviously has represented her home country of romania on numerous occasions. So she's legit like one of the best, came onto the scene in a massive way and uh, yeah, it's gonna be interesting to see her out there. You know kind of match. I think there's some really good matchups here. Like sarah alonso, ever since she went to asics and left solomon, like she's like kind of spotty with the amount of golden trail series races she does, like when she does race, yeah she does great um, and she kind of mixes it up which I kind of like.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I kind of like better, like I don't know. I feel like when you're signed with a company like solomon, like it's in your contract, like you're you're going to the golden trail series like you have to race these races, whereas like going to asics, I feel like, just like you're probably getting paid a little bit more and you're probably, in my opinion, like it opens things up, like you can do golden trail series races but you can also go sky racing like you could do a little. There's more incentives, let's put it that way. So it kind of opens you up a little bit more, uh, to go do things. So I wouldn't be surprised to see sarah alonzo go win the damn thing. Um, challenged for the lead last year she finished second place at this race. Very good technical runner. Mod won this race last year. She finished second place at this race. Very good technical runner. Mod won this race. Last year she did. Yeah, which is uh upsetting to not see mod back.
Speaker 1:Um, she's another one on the a6 team this year, that's right yeah, therese laboe. Um, who's another swiss athlete, um, joyce naru obviously got fourth and then maidlin took fifth. So it's interesting. We got a lot of returning characters on the women's side. It's going to be, I think, I don't know. I think you're going to see malin key off of sarah probably I would yes yeah, because they're tight.
Speaker 1:I'd like to you know I I think they probably work together. Um, I think it's going to be them working together to run down joyce you know, I agree, I agree, no, honestly.
Speaker 2:Malin is another one. Um, she's, she's young. She was on like Solomon's development team. She's kind of similar to like a Remy Um. She's been with the brand for a while. They've kind of been developing her. Um, I think this is the year that she kind of blows up and kind of becomes like. I think she has potential to be like the face of Solomon Um, um, so big things from her coming this year. I think if she can stamp her her name on a good result here it's, it's gonna be big, yeah dude, I'm curious to see, even like now that you, like you mentioned remy.
Speaker 1:Obviously he's not in this race. This is an olympic selection year. Is remy even going to be racing? That much like I'd be curious, like he'll probably do a small trail season, but I I'd be curious to see why. I mean, for instance, the Americans Cam Smith's going to throw down. I'm sure Griffin Biley will be racing. Obviously those are the Americans. Those boys are any place, anywhere, anytime.
Speaker 2:Remy's a little different no-transcript makes the finals or something like that. Um, I think he's still gonna run, but it just might not be a priority, like you said.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I mean, if I were him I'd go honestly, did same. I would do it short season, like he's never. I think he might've won Sagana once. I'd go maybe throw it out on Sagama, see if I can go get that, cause it's early season. He probably won't be ready for that. Go see if you can go tune things up at a series at all. I'd love to see him go finally win series, and all cause he's never broken the Swiss curse course. Um, yeah, I'm, I'm. It's funny, I'm pretty hard on remy for some reason. Maybe it's because he took our course record at pike's peak.
Speaker 2:That's great no, so the season, though this year it ends with series at all correct, it does yeah and so that's kind of mid-august, so it does end a little bit earlier.
Speaker 1:So yeah, because the world.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm big props to to golden trail for for working around worlds. Um, I feel like a lot of people and races aren't really doing that this year. Um, I don't know, I had some gripe with races that were for selection races and I heard you chat about it on the podcast too, and just like timing of everything and, uh, I don't know people racing these big races right before it, it just it kind of puts a sour taste in my mouth, but you know is what it is.
Speaker 1:Well, I think there's a lot of things to discuss from that right. The first one is is like, I mean, I'm super critical, obviously, of golden trail and a lot of things, particularly, most notably probably, anti-doping, but like I can give them their flowers when it comes to something like this, where it's like damn dude, most of the other big series, like Skyrunning, has like 700 fucking races, they're not slowing down, they're not changing.
Speaker 1:And that's fine, and I think it's World Mountain Running as well, wrma. They're not changing their schedule as well for uh, for world. So it's like, I think to me like this is this is probably the best decision, considering most of these athletes are going to go represent their country, um, respectively. I don't know what do you think, uh? Not to change the subject too close, but like, what do you think of? Uh? Obviously we just had gorgeous past weekend. Yeah, I think the winners are the top. The people that won and got their tickets to worlds were the right. That was the right 100 percent, not right, worked out the way it did 100. I'm glad. I was definitely skeptical. The people that won and got their tickets to worlds were the right.
Speaker 2:that was the right. 100% Not right. It worked out the way it did 100%. I'm glad. I was definitely skeptical going in, as were a lot of people. Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of mountainous races this time of year in North America. It's very hard to come across one, especially one that's like has big infrastructures, like free trail has with with gorge, um. But yeah, I'm really excited for for the choices um that came out of that and um, yeah, I think it's gonna be a great team a star is born in shakwalano.
Speaker 2:Dude like yeah crusher yeah, midwest crusher indiana like great story.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I had you know. It's funny I had her on like a few days before the race I really I gotta release that episode because she's made the trail team.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, but it's funny, like I like she's going to be signed to a brand before I even get this thing out, because, like dude, I got to say, like she had a great race at Black Canyon too. I think she's the story for Western states this year on the women's side. Dude, she could very well go win that, sneak up and win that race and just completely shock people and she got in off of a lottery ticket, which she did. Yes, that's right.
Speaker 2:And then the other two obviously adam peterman.
Speaker 1:I figured was gonna win anyway, but, like I gotta say I am so stoked that tracen and claire both got tickets because, like alaskan mountain runners, you know, and it's like both extremely good on technical terrain, both have experience at mount marathon and big mountain races, uh, namely the rut and things like that like you're, you're sending four people that can seriously compete, um, when it comes to the pyrenees. So, yeah, I think that the people that were should have gone are the ones that are going, which is good, yeah, yeah, all right back to golden trail. Um, let's get into pics. Dude, I think we're probably somewhere near where we need to go. I'll let you take it over with women. See who you got.
Speaker 2:Let's start with the women. Yeah, so I have Joyce taking it. I think she is the best runner in the field. She took fourth last year. She knows the course. I think that's a big thing, whereas, like Lauren Gregory, even though that she's potentially a a scratch, I'm still going to include her in this um. I had her second because she this is her type of course, but she's never ran it before, so, um. And then I have sarah alonzo in third um, or potentially second um. She was second last year. Um, this is her kind of course. Um, she's going to be right on the heels of Joyce. I can imagine the whole time.
Speaker 2:I think this is a race like last year, like you were saying, philemon blew up or blew up his ankle or something like that. I mean, it could be some carnage that launches someone to the top, like Zara. I have Madalena Floria in fourth. She hasn't ran this before, but we talked about her and how great she is. And then in fifth I have Melanosa, who was also fifth last year. She very well could be right up there. Honestly, she's my sleeper for taking the win if she has her day. Just what I see from her. She takes the sport so serious and, like I said, solomon is investing so much in her. I think she really has taken her game to the next level and uh we'll see.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I like that. No, I honestly, ours are pretty, pretty identical. What? What I found interesting was like I looked most of these ladies up on strava and other outside of sarah alonzo, like nobody has a public or like put stuff on their Strava, which is kind of funny. I'm going to start with first. I'm going to do this. So I was so conflicted. The story of the women's race is going to be Joyce Nauru getting chased by other, like Joyce Nauru on the ups versus Sarah Lonzo and Malin Osa working together in the downs, possibly tailed by Madalena Floria. So it's like how does this shake out? This is, is it Sarah's downhill? And like ability to technically descend versus Joyce's ascending. And, like I said, dude, like if you're you're training in Kenya, like you're just not getting techie stuff.
Speaker 1:Like you're going to have a boatload of fitness, especially this time of the year. You're going to be super fit, but it's like, have you dialed it in to where you're going to be ready to not destroy your ankles and and break something? Or like, really just like, because there's just I don't know if you've looked at some of the photos of this course, but it's fucking nasty dude, like I don't know, like not something I would want to have to run a five or six minute mile downhill like it looks really not fun. Um, with that, I am going to go with sarah lonzo's first. I kind of waited, just like roll the dice on this and like. So she's pretty transparent in her, in her um strava peaked last week, had a huge 120 mile week split up between two. I'd say like it was probably like 50 miles of biking, um, and then the 70 miles of running, but like solid quality, vertical, pretty good looking stuff and seems to be kind of what looks like a proper taper for this week. Maybe I'd say maybe a shorter taper for something like this. I might've given it like maybe a two week taper, but I don't know, everybody's a little bit different and yeah, so I'm going to take her as first. Better on technical terrain, I think sarah lonzo pulls it off second last year and was very close behind mod um.
Speaker 1:Second is going to be joyce naru. The only thing I wish I did before we did this episode. I should have gone back today to watch the videos um of this race on kobe and saw like what was joyce's weakness. The only thing I can assume is it was the descending and not the ascent, but I don't know.
Speaker 1:I'm going to go second, with Joyce, very closely followed. I'm going to go third Madalena Floria and I'm going to go fourth, malin Osa and what would have been the top five. I'm going to lower it down to a four because Lauren Gregory is probably a scratch, so we'll stick with just the top four women. I looked at a lot of Japanese names. So, for those of you who are interested, kobe has a pretty solid website as far as for English audiences, but a lot of these names are in Japanese, so you have to get pretty heavily involved in Google Translate. I went through and looked through because Remy La larue kind of tipped me off and so, like last year, a lot of the names that were uh, some of them that should have been in english, were in japanese, so you kind of got to decipher and play around.
Speaker 1:So it's like all right, I'll get busy on the translate and I couldn't find like any really solid japanese athletes but I I could be overlooking. Um, I'm sure there are a ton of them. And I just cause you gotta remember it's not like Japan is ultra sign up or like run sign up, Like it's hard to look for these results, um, in some degree. So yeah, we we could be talking out of our ass and some Japanese runner goes and wins. The damn thing. I wouldn't be good yeah.
Speaker 2:Last year I think there was a local that took, I think, ninth. I want to say overall. So you never know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's totally possible, all right. Um, let's talk. To talk about the men. I'll let you take it away for what you think as far as the men go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so first I have Patrick. Um, I mean, he won last year. He was second overall in the series last year. Um, second. And also another thing I wanted to add to um, this race is lower, uh, lower altitude. Uh, Patrick is training, you know, up at, up at him, and Joyce training up at 8,000 plus feet. That is an advantage. We just saw it a couple weeks ago at Big Alta, being able to run it at such a low altitude like that. You can just, oh, it's the gaps that these guys are putting in. It's insane, yeah. With that being said, second, uh, Joey Hadorn. Uh, second last year, eighth overall in the series. Um, expecting a big year from him. Third, Philemon um, as long as, uh, he can uh keep those ankles taped, maybe or something, I don't know he should, he should do great. Um, he was fourth last year in the series. Um, Daniel Pettisis um, in my opinion, one of the best runners on brooks, um, super underrated nasty um, yeah, fifth last year at kobe, um, and fifth over on the series.
Speaker 2:So big contender, um. And then fifth. I have one that we actually did not mention. Um, this is, um, what's his name? Uh, sylvan uh kachard. If I'm saying that correctly, he's a hoka athlete. He was seventh last year at uh sears and all. Uh, he was fourth at sears and all in 2023 and he was 17th at uh occ, which is still occ was so, so, so deep last year. Um, so this guy's yeah, he's, um, he might be the real deal. He might be an up and comer. I haven't heard much about him, but, uh, he has a pretty. He's raced in a lot of big time races, so this is not his first first time here, um. And then one guy that I just wanted to throw out there as well Um, I might be pronouncing this name incorrectly, but his name is theo uh burgois, potentially burgos he's a brooks athlete as well.
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, maybe that could be it. Uh, brooks athlete as well, and I was uh just peeking through his instagram and he kind of made it clear, uh, that he is fully focused on golden trail series this year. He's kind of an up-and-comer. He took 12th at mont blanc marathon last year. Mont blanc's always super stout, so very well could see him sneak into that. Maybe fifth spot, um, and then as well as we'll have to mention a local here, that nicholas turco, who he chatted with uh training out of boulder um very well could, could surprise us. Uh, he's thrown down some, some great results. So that is my men picks.
Speaker 1:Hopefully he's been running up and down green.
Speaker 2:Yeah, four wraps up green up and down.
Speaker 1:You're ready to go for this race? No, I do. I couldn't agree more. I think we've got a very similar top five. I'm going to start with my fifth place pick. I'm going to stick for fifth, rui Ueda. His Strava is pretty, pretty transparent. He doesn't do high volume, 60 to 80 miles a week. He actually raced last. What saturday? This past saturday ran a 50, let's do ran a 50k. Listen to this shit. Six hour race, 50k, 13 000 feet of vert. So like he knows these trails, um, and like he can hang on him, I mean rui's got like amazing background and like he's been on him. I mean Rui's got like amazing background and like he's been in the game for a long time. Years and years and years he's had great finishes at pikes, like the dude's legit. So I'd count him in for the top five. You know home Japanese trails. See what happens, man, you know it'll be fun.
Speaker 1:And fourth, I'm going to go fill him on average, 119 miles a week for the last four weeks, between 150 and 119. I should say, like I said, he threw in this like nasty 12 and a half mile workout at 502 per mile at 87 000 feet. Now, I should note it was a descent, mostly a descending route. Um, there's a point to point descent, but like 8700 feet. You're running like most of that, like it's gonna beat your legs to shit. He's running like 4 forties or most of that. Um, and then started slowing down a little bit towards the end. So I if Phil mine's definitely fit, we'll see- what happens?
Speaker 1:I don't know you know it's funny, I'm very hard on Phil, I'm on, and the only reason is with philomon and he's always catchable, like I like have. We both have friends that have caught philomon races. Um, so like he doesn't, he does have chinks in his armor for some reason. The dude just has always figured out series and all. I don't know what it is. Um, like doesn't show up for like he just like kind of, like it's like okay at every other race and then like completely like shows in the world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's in the world took Took Killian to the brink dude. Philemon's got the ability to be the best in the world, but I don't know, maybe he's better this year. I don't know. Like I said, I tend to be a little harder on Philemon. I probably shouldn't be, but I want to see more out of him. Come on, philemon, let's get this done. Dude um, third place, I'm gonna go. Joey hadron um, like I said, he doesn't have a strava either, but it seems like solomon's riding on this dude to come back and reproduce. Um, he's got some stories on instagram where he's on the course right now running around, so he's quite taking this quite seriously obviously it's really important for these races.
Speaker 1:You want to adapt to your sleep, you want to adapt to your diet. There's a lot of things you got to do ahead of time to ensure success on race day. These races start a little bit later too. They're like afternoon based races, so there's a lot of like little tweaks you're going to have to make to make sure like you're on point for this Um, and it sounds like he's doing all those things.
Speaker 1:Like I said, phil Oman, I checked a Strava today. Dude, still in Kenya, maybe it's a different strategy, but like joey's on the course doing his thing. So, um, yeah, I don't know we'll see what happens, but I I see him competing for the podium. Um, and second, I'm gonna go to daniel pattis. Daniel passes a fucking beast dude, like that guy's legit.
Speaker 1:Um, like I said, fifth overall at the golden trail world series last year. Um finished fifth this particular race last year, so it shows that he can hang. Um would have gotten sixth probably, or seventh if it wasn't for philip munn's drop, so hopefully he's learned and can hang on to some of this technical stuff. Um, it's gonna be interesting to see. And then, in first place, uh, I got patrick. He's going sizzler bro. I don't even think patrick means patrick doesn't even need to show up, like he's just like, goes and does this thing and like. I don't think he actually has to work very hard to win this race. He's not going to be pushed up front, in my opinion. All he has to do is work pretty hard on the ups and probably chill on the downs.
Speaker 1:I just don't think he's going to have to work particularly hard. I know Joey took him to the brink last year and they had a tight race and Patrick was able to get away in the fourth loop. Dude.
Speaker 1:I think, Patrick has just made a like monumental jump in the last like like few months throughout that year. So I I wouldn't be surprised to see him like I said, like I like that term going sizzler. That that's where he's going. He's go, he's, he's done, doesn't, doesn't even have to do anything, it's over. So how old is patrick now? Is he 31?
Speaker 2:we don't really know, according to joe, gray.
Speaker 1:we're not sure he might actually lie about his age. We're not sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, whatever, I guess no, but no, I think he's made a jump. Like I said, I think this is his year. He's got the world in his fingertips.
Speaker 1:I'm excited for him. I think he's going to win the whole thing this year. I would like to see it, dude, I'd love to see him. I don't know, I've heard a bunch of inside baseball and I don't want to like speak for him, but like I've heard a bunch of inside baseball in the way like a lot of these kenyan athletes get like they should be making more money let's put it that way like he's on this team run together which is based out of kenya and they have like a manager that kind of manages all their shit and their contracts and their money and like that's cool and all. But, like you know, patrick should be making well into the six figures per year. I mean, he's one of the best in the world, he's he is literally the best in the world as far as uphill.
Speaker 1:He's the VK world champion and until that changes this year, if, if he doesn't wind up going to get a good prelude to that dude, I actually think he's coming to Broken Arrow. The reason I say that is because WRMA comes back and he runs a lot of those WRMA races. So he'll be back for the Broken Arrow Ascent this year so we might get Patrick and Joe and the whole crew out there for the Broken Arrow Ascent, which is going to be a good prelude.
Speaker 1:It's a good world qualifier, yeah, um but yeah, I don't know, like, I think somebody like patrick uh I can't speak too much for philomon because I think philomon's really good, but you know, like david norris went and beat philomon at at cirque brighton, like philomon, and he got also got beat up at cirque, uh, a base, so I've seen it twice um, yeah, I don't know. So I I think that pat Patrick is genuinely like world class. Oh, yeah, um, so yeah, I'd like to see him. Uh, I'd like to see some, like maybe Hoka or someone, go get him and pay him what he's worth, cause he should be, uh, yeah, up there.
Speaker 2:I mean on gets him all the run together, that they get him to every important race that like he needs to be at. That is the one thing that they they definitely do for him. I'm sure it's travel stipends insane but yeah, who knows what he's getting paid? I'm sure it's not enough, yeah. But I just want to say this about him. I'm going to go ahead and make this prediction Patrick is going to win the golden trail series and he is going to win the vertical championships as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think, championships as well. Yeah, I think, I think so.
Speaker 2:I like that's a good prediction and if he does that, safe bet and if he does that, he is trail runner of the year in my eyes.
Speaker 1:But oh, we will see, yep yeah, um, yeah, there's no, no doubt in my mind. I I think he's yeah world champion. I think he might be early 30s, something like that I'd say 32.
Speaker 2:That'd be my guess. 33, I don't know. Yeah, that'd be my guess something like that.
Speaker 1:But yeah, I mean, dude, like I would take the over under, I would take the under, I'd say 32.
Speaker 2:That'd be my guess 33. I don't know.
Speaker 1:That'd be my guess, something like that. I would take the over-under, I would take the under on that. I think he's probably the betting favorite to double and go win the vertical as well as the overall Golden Trail series. I don't know, for some reason I just have a feeling that Yossi Seen's not going to repeat this year. I don't know what it is, but I just Because Remy only was able to do it once and then I think he was two years in a row where he won and then he kind of fell off this year, or his pass in 2024. It's a hard thing to carry man.
Speaker 2:It's hard to repeat oh yeah, no. That's why I think Patrick, going into this just with a little chip on his shoulder, being second last year, it's yeah, yeah, no, very hard to repeat.
Speaker 1:And then on the women's side, dude, it's even more unpredictable for the ladies. Like Joyce came out of nowhere this year. I mean, you know, who really shocked the hell out of me this year was Lauren Gregory. Like Lauren Gary's, like she's a world beater, like that girl probably will challenge, like Grayson, for the title in the next few years, as well as um uh, anna gibson, another one that's like killer, killer, dude. Did you see her take second place the grudge 30k yeah, be joe dude, yeah, but joan was like leading that rate.
Speaker 1:What happened he?
Speaker 2:blew, he blew, yeah, so I heard he was like 25k and um and he, I think he just stopped and he just exploded I I don't know. Cramps like a mother? I don't know. Yeah, cramped like a mother. I don't know. Yeah, it's unfortunate.
Speaker 1:He's going to. Yeah, she, she crushed it. Yeah, I think.
Speaker 2:I think us women wise yeah, Lauren Gregory and Ana Gibson are, are the two I mean, that's well, I guess we can't leave out Sophia locally as well. It's when people get injured. We have a tendency to like sports. They pushed out, yeah, it's, it's tough. And that's like with Lauren Gregory too. Like, yeah, she, she had her time at the end of the season last year and really put on a show and ended up seventh overall. Um, but she's just been battling with injury.
Speaker 1:So it's like if she can just get over that man. So, for instance, grayson doesn't even have to really run Sunipi or Broken Arrow. She's already on the World Vertical team because she's reigning champion. Did she win in the Classic or the Vertical? I should know this. I think she won in the Classic Classic. Yes, she got second. Maybe she got a silver medal in the Vertical.
Speaker 1:Second or third, yeah, yeah, she won the Mountain Classic, that's exactly what it was. So her third yeah, yeah, so she's. So yeah, she won the mountain classic, that's exactly what it was. So she's already selected for the classic team. The question so that's soon a piece, so she doesn't technically have to go back and race. I'm curious can tell she's dealing with a lot of like health issues. Does she go back to do it or you know, you're gonna have to get like rip off. It's tough for her because you're gonna have to rip off the band-aid before worlds.
Speaker 2:You can't just show up and not have a show. She just does. I don't know what it is. It's when worlds is knocking. She's there, so can't count her out.
Speaker 1:I wouldn't be surprised to see her go be a three time world champion. But I do think the, the, the women, um, so like I mean I'm just guessing for the up-down, or we should call it the Mountain Classic, that's the right way to say it. But like dude Soonipi's going to be nasty, like between Lauren Gregory and like, if she's healthy, with the Achilles thing and you get Anna Gibson like, and Rachel Tomaszak, like Allie Mack as well I don't know if Allie Mack's going to run, decide to race the mountain classic, but like I max, another killer dude world beer. Like it's going to be so much fun to see who we send, because that that's my favorite distance. Uh, is the mountain classic.
Speaker 2:It's going to be really fun to see, like who shows up for that you know and I guess with that being unpredictable with that being said, I bet lauren gregor I bet she's holding out this for super soon to be I would, yeah, yeah, I mean it's 60, 60, where I have literally counted down on my calendar.
Speaker 1:It's like 60 something days away. So it's common, yeah, it's common, gotta get healthy, gotta get fit. I know you got Dan Kurtz out here. He's playing in a playing in Boulder.
Speaker 2:You see him running around the trail. I haven't seen him yet. He's up there yeah, he is.
Speaker 1:so, yeah, all right, dude, I think we nailed it. I think we got it all. Yeah, I haven't seen him yet. He's out there. Yeah, he is. So, yeah, all right, dude, I think we nailed it. I think we got it all. Yeah, anything you think we missed, anything we didn't get?
Speaker 2:I think we hit just about everything, yeah, and then next week or the week yeah.
Speaker 1:Next week will be the Great Wall.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I reached out to Golden.
Speaker 1:Trail. Just so the audience knows this. I reached out to Golden Trail, got crickets, put the bath signal up on Instagram. Literally nobody responded. I do want to give a big shout out to Remy LaRue. Guy's so helpful, super nice Joe.
Speaker 2:Love Remy LaRue, big fan of his.
Speaker 1:He just put his schedule out today. Sunopi Cannon in the room, big fan of his um. He just put his schedule out today, dude, he's. We did soon a p cannon um broken arrow. Yeah, he's, he's gonna have. I'm excited for what? And he's gonna go. Dude, there's a mexico world series, golden trail race I did see that and sir killington, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it looks good, that's gonna be interesting, I don't know.
Speaker 2:Are we gonna see? So I guess I'll throw it there. Are we gonna see some like I don't know, breakout, like I don't know, like south american, like mexico runner, like there's some crushers out there, you know, we saw what was his name last year at um. What was it? Black canyon. Uh, yeah, you put it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah you never know, made a star out of him dude he's running on the craft team. Now I'm a big fan as he applied, so I I I have an idea of like who. Obviously I get to see who applies for like the the lead entries for pike's peak right. So he applied. Last year we gave him um an elite bib, so I want to see if we can get him back this year. It'd be fun to get him and like run the marathon or something yeah, yeah, but he could be dewey.
Speaker 2:I mean, he very well could be on the world's team, I don't know. Mexico yeah, yeah, I don't know probably I would think they have some gnarly mountains, so I'm really excited for that race. That one's gonna be fun. I always like to see new races on the golden trail series schedule, so I think it was cool.
Speaker 1:I think it was a good move too, because, like the sky, I guess it was like to combat you've got utmb there now and utmb's got their um, the hell is the name of it not montez, there's a special name for that. I can't, honestly cannot remember. Uh, the utmb calls their their race and then, which everybody seems to go to because it's late utmb mexico one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, porto barra, thank you, thank you and then there's the mexico sky challenge, which is the sky, you know, sky running. So I guess it was only a matter of time before golden trail series decided to come in there. You know what's bummer though? I was perusing their website today and it's like they have for every country, like a north american, they have like a national series, national. They got and got rid of the north american national series. I don't know what the deal is there like what?
Speaker 2:I don't know what the deal yeah, no, I think they're focusing more on the asian market, potentially, and now maybe with mexico, they're trying to get like the I don't know that side of the world. They're trying to expand all the power to them. Um, but you can't leave out. You know the us there's so many good mountain?
Speaker 1:I don't know. Yeah, dude, I also wonder, like I know a lot of people and this is very inside baseball and I like I don't want to go too hard on like golden trail, but like I know a lot of people have like a very big issue with their anti-doping program, like it used to be called courts, I think, is what it was as and then they changed it to like clean sport or some bullshit like that and it's like, yeah, it's like a lot of people have issues with that, including race directors, um, from across the board that I've heard aren't so fond of their situation than what they do. So, yeah, I don't know, maybe I the only thing I can wonder is like maybe the north american race directors were, like some of them were, like the only problem is is like, how can you say no to that? Like you're gonna make some money, right, oh yeah. Like you're gonna track so much, yeah it's. And people keep coming to your race.
Speaker 1:Like I was really surprised, like I thought tim Tollefson's race was going to fall off after golden trail series left. Oh, no, dude, that 26, 800 people signed up for it. Holy shit, like he's. Yeah, good for him.
Speaker 2:So the fact that mammoth didn't have a race before. It was like crazy, at least one that I knew of. I don't know about it. He, he, like the perfect scenario for him and good for him. He took advantage of it. Yeah, awesome, funny races are crazy. Oh yeah, um, one last thing, um, did you have any inside baseball, and why golden?
Speaker 1:trail series left um pikes. Did you ever hear why, like do they want to keep it or like I? There's some stuff I can say, some stuff I can't some stuff I can't say.
Speaker 1:Let's just say it's probably the best for the race to be in the position that it's in now. You know like, listen, when Golden Trail Series comes to your race there's a lot of really good things right Like you get world-class talent, everybody comes. You know it's always a really, really big deal, but also there's a lot of stipulations and they kind of run the show. Let's put it that way. I don't want to say it alienates the race director, but it makes it much more hard for a lot of people to do their jobs Totally get it and, yeah, I'll leave it at that.
Speaker 1:I still want it to come back. I still think it would be a net benefit for a lot of races. Dude, you know what there has been. I'm going to put this out into the world now. I probably shouldn't because I haven't even pitched this yet, but this is something that's really interesting. I had a friend of mine who has been on the podcast, who I won't name, has reached out to me the other day, who is tight with the Mount Marathon race director, matthias, and there was some discussion and I even ran this. I talked to Brian Whitfield about this. I talked to a few people and I was like what do you think about if we created, so I think, races, especially something like pikes? Right, it's very difficult for races to survive on their own now. You almost have to be a part of some sort of series.
Speaker 1:So I was like what if we just created our own like, like legendary race series like mount marathon, pikes, mount washington road race, um, you know maybe a handful of other races that you can kind of throw in there that are like legendary, um, and then have it as like a series that you would go race and you can copy the point system that, like golden trail does, and then at the end of the year we just we make like a like we find either a race or we create one that is like a you know for um, you know for the final, and we do something like that and we could just do it as like the north american thing um, that is something I've heard thrown around that I was like, oh, that needs to, like I, I'm gonna need to have that happen, because unless, like golden trail series comes back like this is that's something I'd want to pursue is like, get us, get us in that and have pike's peak like the marathon and the ascent.
Speaker 1:Be like the crown jewel and mount marathon like mount marathons, like so crazy, such a high octane race.
Speaker 1:So, um, and then, like you see other races like, uh, you know, like mount washington road race has kind of like fallen back in the last few years, um, yeah, so I don't want to give away too much, but like that's something that has been brought up and something like I I'm going to be pushing for, I'm all in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'd go race it. Absolutely yeah, 100%.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, yeah, Well, dude, thank you so much. I want to wish you the best of luck of your race this weekend.
Speaker 2:Bring it home, thank you.
Speaker 1:Nick's going to sizzler. Have a good week. Have a good week, patrick. All right, bye, thank you, we'll see you next time.
