#9 Embracing Your First Ironman: Insights, Challenges, and Tips

In this episode, we're diving into the journey of tackling your first Ironman, sharing personal experiences, challenges faced, and practical advice for both beginners and seasoned athletes. Whether you're racing your first or your fiftieth, this discussion offers valuable perspectives on preparation, mental resilience, and race day strategies.

Main Topics:

• Common fears and barriers for first-time Ironman athletes
• Key preparations and mental strategies for race day
• The importance of outdoor riding and open water training
• Nutrition planning and hydration challenges
• The role of equipment, technology, and recovery

In this episode:

• Emma shares her personal journey into Ironman and the significance of mindset
• Cal discusses transitioning from short-course to full Ironman and race-day learnings
• Tim highlights crucial training elements like outdoor cycling and open water swimming
• Strategies for managing nutrition, hydration, and race logistics
• Tips for maintaining positivity and mental resilience leading up to race day

Come find us Cartel Coaching — Swim. Bike. Run. Together.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Hi team, welcome to Cartel Coaching. I'm Callum Millward. I'm an ex-professional triathlete and a three times Iron Man 70.3 champion. And now I'm getting a proper reintroduction into the sport of triathlon as an age grouper. I spent a number of years at the pointy end of the sport, and now I've got a business, a life, a family, and the same 24 hours as everyone else who's trying to figure out how to be competitive again. And I tell you what, it is super humbling and it's interesting. What I bring to the table is the elite side of things. I'm living the age group reality right now. Not going to pretend that they're the same thing. With me every episode is Tim Brazier, who coaches everyone from first timers to Olympians, and M, our resident age grouper, who is keeping us honest. This is Cartel Coaching, and let's get into it.

SPEAKER_00 1:03

Welcome back to Cartel Coaching. So today, today we're going to talk all things about your first Iron Man. So as someone who has made their entire life about Iron Man and their personal identity, this is probably going to be, I think, my favorite episode because I just absolutely love talking about this stuff. And I know firsthand what it's like to be someone going into the deep end as a noob, trying to do an Iron Man and just having absolutely no idea what you're actually in for. And I think I'm really excited actually, Cal, to hear about your experience as well from a pro point of view, because I'd say it's well, it could be the same as someone in the age group category, but it might also be like a super, super different. So um keen to jump in. But boys, how are we? How how are things going? Cal, how how have you been? You've been racing, haven't you?

SPEAKER_01 1:59

Uh yeah, I've uh I got back into my first triathlon last weekend and it was cool. I I forgot how much uh was involved in preparing for the event. So that was a Sunday race. I spent what I felt like all of Saturday just getting set up, just remembering all the bits and bobs that you need. And the the list is out of control what you need. I think I was mentally exhausted by the time I arrived, but um it was cool to be a part of it again. And um I guess one thing we'll touch upon during our chat um for people who are signing up for Iron Man is just like um just going through the motions of it, the uh potential imposter syndrome, especially for people that have come across from different sports and that. And then um yeah, just where to start with it all because it can be overwhelming sometimes. So do you have a checklist, Carl, that you had lined up when you were taking off for the day? I didn't myself, but Elise has one on her phone, so I pinched that, but I have a fair idea. It's just there's little things like a good example is a race belt or stretchy laces, um, talcum powder for the shoes. It all depends on how extreme you want to take it, but most of it does come back. It's just we've all had nightmares lying in bed where we're like we've turned up to an event and we've forgotten our helmet or our bike shoes or something like that. So I was trying to avoid that. Yeah, perfect.

SPEAKER_02 3:18

Or the timing chip.

SPEAKER_01 3:19

Seen that so many times.

SPEAKER_02 3:21

Yeah, left the timing chip behind in the apartment.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

I still managed to butcher the event, which is great because it's the first time in about 20 years I've been disqualified. So we'll touch upon the learnings as well. And obviously, I feel a big part of Trithlon is learning and adapting and troubleshooting and um uh just you know continuing to move forward and overcome these different obstacles.

SPEAKER_02 3:45

I love how it took you to become an age grouper to get disqualified.

SPEAKER_01 3:51

Yeah, well, I mean at the end of the day, the fault the fault is my own, but um I am pointing fingers at people.

SPEAKER_00 3:59

We can't leave us hanging cow.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Well, okay, so the story goes, um, I cut a can on the swimming course, and uh it's my own fault, first and foremost, Your Honor. The problem was is I was swimming on the leader's feet, and um this is a guy that's done a whole bunch of these races, and it's like no um disrespect to anyone, but I didn't actually see the third can. We we turned early and hid towards the beach, and we we weren't notified by any sort of water patrol or anything like that. It was only on the second lap where I went to turn again that an IRB came up to me and said you need to go around the third one. So by the time I'd looped back, I felt like I'd done an extra two or three hundred metres. And the course itself, if you'd done the full course, was long. So only one person swam under 20 uh under 30 minutes for the 2K. I swam 31 minutes and um yeah, so I got I got the shoulder tap on the way out um of a T T1 that I'd be disqualified, but that's the other thing as well. Like it's it was a race that was always going to be a training day, so I still got to bike and run, and the times are irrelevant, but I still managed to go through the motions, and I figure it's better than me just plodding along here on the Sunshine Coast going through a brick session. I've got an opportunity to go through the motions of a race, you know, like I said, getting everything ready on a Saturday. Um and hopefully next race, 70.3 cans, will be a lot easier and will be a well-oiled machine. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 5:29

It'll be great, mate. It's I think it's one of those things that people don't do enough of, though. Like there's an age grouper, just go race. Like go enjoy them. It's what it's all about. You know, turn up, make mistakes, screw up, and and have all those little races to be able to do all that stuff and learn that, rather than getting to a 70.3 at your first event and going, shit, and and making all the mistakes at your first big A race. It's uh I think we see that a little bit more now. People just diving straight and like I'm gonna do a half iron man and just train for that event, um, rather than maybe taking a bit of a stepping stone process towards it.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

The big things I took for granted though are just some of the basic things, like the lay of the land with um the flow of transition. A lot of events they'll have a one-way flow. So you'll swim in and you'll bike in and you'll bike out and run out from um the the same points, so it's it's fair for everyone. And I guess um when you race for so long, you take that for granted. And a lot of Iron Man have a very simple system like that as well, and then you go to a different organization, it could be different again, and um it's all just it's good though, it's good to polish up and just learn, you know, every event's gonna be different as well. And back to your point about racing, Tim. I s I have a bunch of friends racing um Kona, and I sort of said to them um during our conversations, is like just trying to enjoy it because one, the event is pretty rough, and like it's very rare that someone goes to Kona and has an awesome event, and two, there's a whole lot of events in the week leading into the actual race that are really cool. Like, go to breakfast with Bob and listen to some of the pros get interviewed. There's Undy Run, there's a Parade Nation, there's all the sponsors, expos, there's so much cool stuff to go to. I was like, lap it all up because you don't know if you'll be going back. And two, um, a lot of people will be walking the run as well. So it doesn't matter how fit you look, uh, it will humble you. So you try you should try and enjoy it, enjoy it with the family. If you can tack on a couple of days, holiday and holly little after, go for it. But you know, at the end of the day, like you say, we've got to enjoy racing.

SPEAKER_02 7:37

Yeah, totally. I think it's a great way to think about it because the A goal often for everybody is around time and they're just chasing time. And it's the age old thing. And if you worked in high performance sport or you've been involved in high performance sport, all you'll hear about now is the process. It's all about the process, the process. And I think it it relates so well into the age side of things because if we can actually go out and enjoy it and then set other goals like I'm just gonna race smart, I'm gonna fuel well, I'm gonna finish strong, you know, and and set up things we can be really proud of along the way. You have a really good time, and then you can finish the race. And you may have been humbled, but you can tick off all these things you're really proud of and have enjoyed along the way. And I and I think it transfer sorry, it transforms your perspective on events and how you can actually really enjoy them.

SPEAKER_01 8:27

M, you're new to relatively new to the I-Man distance. What were what were some of the barriers you found and how did you navigate them?

SPEAKER_00 8:36

I think uh well everything was a barrier for me. But um I I think one of the biggest ones for me was around um riding outside. So you need to do a lot of time in the saddle, you need to do some really, really big rides, and uh this is just my personal opinion, but I think you really need to do a lot of it outside. Uh, you need to be comfortable riding outside. And um the course that I chose for my first IMM was Port Macquarie, like IMN Australia, and it's a roly bike course. Um, and so I wanted to make sure that I could ride properly on that course, and um, and so I think that was one of the biggest barriers for me was actually finding somewhere appropriate in Sydney where I could actually do that training and do those sorts of kilometres by myself on my TT bike um and and get that exposure. And I I pushed through. It was really, really difficult. I was so scary to do a lot of that riding alone. I ended up doing most of it on highways, um, sort of up the coast, you know, just with the semi-trailers whizzing past me. And and I, you know, I was really questioning my life choices a lot of the time when I was doing that. But um, I was so thankful that I actually did. Um, and I know I was really nervous. I thought there's no way I'm gonna, like I just didn't even know if I was gonna make it, to be honest. I didn't know if I'd done enough to be able to make it through that bike course. But then I could tell, I could tell the people who hadn't probably done as much outdoor riding um on the day. There was a lot of questionable bike handling moments, and then there were a lot of people who who I saw they just couldn't make it because it's so different to be riding indoors, you know. You can sit on a trainer for six hours and watch TV, but it's never gonna be the same as what it's like when you're actually outdoors. So I reckon that was probably one. The second one I was really nervous about was actually the swim, you know, it's it's hard to sort of get that open water exposure. But my first Iron Man swims cancelled, so I didn't have to worry about that part. Um that's a different story. But yeah, I could tell like I was I was pretty nervous about that as well, just because it's a big distance. And when I did my first Iron Man swim, it was actually at Kona without a wetsuit or anything. But I think I was just uh so stunned to be there um that the fear got me got me through.

SPEAKER_01 11:03

Tim, what are some of the things that you see with especially first-time Iron Man races? What are some of the things that they are most concerned about um going into an Iron Man distance?

SPEAKER_02 11:17

Yeah, I think Em's touched on a really good one. Like people aren't riding outside enough. And the interesting part around that too is who actually goes out and rides when it's raining outside? Or when it's a crosswind? Or when it's both. And how do you so when you turn up on race day and you haven't operated in those conditions before, how are you actually gonna operate in them in race day? How are you gonna understand what to do, how to break on the corners, how to break on downhills, how to lean into the crosswind, setting up your tires appropriately, all those little things that come with that, um, unless you actually go outside and do it. We're quite protective now that we've got a trainer. Um and one thing that I do notice with people, and especially in some of the environments now, is they're quite afraid of these big group environments. Because you get two and a half thousand people on a Sunshine Coast course, for example, you know, there's people everywhere. And it's really hard for you to be confident to stay down on your air bars and to maintain that position the whole way. Um when all these people whizzing around you and you don't know how to handle that. And that's something people are quite nervous about. The probably the m most prominent thing though that we do see is swimming. Swimming is the biggest fear for most people, and you can be the best pool swimmer, and I've seen it multiple occasions, and go into the open water, and you've really str and people have struggled a lot. There's a deep panic effect that happens. And we've seen this happen with pros where they're rolling over on their back, having little panic attacks, and things happen to them. And a lot of it is it's not a physical capacity for most people, it's a mental capacity of how they can cope with that environment because it's it's pretty frantic and it's it's pretty full on, and you know, you layer on what you can get in like a Molula bar, for example, with some waves, um some good little surf riding in there, that makes it even more challenging and more scary for people.

SPEAKER_01 13:17

I I I I always remember, you know, you start off doing sprint distance and Olympic distance, and I felt like Olympic distance was a long way. After doing sprint distance, just trying to get your head around a 10k run. It's like it's a long way. And I remember asking one of the local guys um back in Hawke Spay, I said, how do how do you like what do you think? And he's like, you just gotta he's just like, just tell yourself you can run fast, tell yourself you can run fast, just keep repeating it, convince yourself, and I guess that taps into the mental component, and you start to um carry over some of those skills, all of a sudden you apply them to a 70.3, you like run in a half iron uh half marathon or riding 90k or swimming 2k seems super long, and then all of a sudden you throw in uh you tackle a full Iron Man and you do a few of those and all of a sudden it becomes manageable, and then you go back and do it again, you try and do it a bit faster, and it's sort of like ticking off those boxes and those goals along the way. But I always felt Iron Man was such a long way, and I guess you know that probably segues into a big part of um our next uh sort of topic, I guess like the nutrition of it all. Like how do you carry all your nutrition, how do you feel? A lot of people have GI issues these days, and um there's gotta be some kind of barrier, like um for for a lot of people, M.

SPEAKER_00 14:34

Yeah. Well, if I can share something that's probably not not great, but I got to Kona and I realized I had never actually taken a bottle from an aid station. I'd never even practiced that. And you know, like I knew it was gonna be hot, like I'm not an idiot, right? But then I it became really obvious the day I got to Kona that I was like, oh my god, I'm gonna have to pick up heaps of bottles. Like, how am I gonna do this? So Rachel and a friend of mine and I were we were just in the car park and I just had to practice that for a couple of days before the race, and I just thought, wow, we like this could have been a total disaster. But it was kind of good because then it turned into a game for me throughout the race that it was like, okay, I'm gonna pick up two bottles at every aid station, one over my head and one in my um, you know, drink holder. And it it panned out, but um yeah, s severely underprepared. And um, yeah, and then I ended up drinking a lot of the drink mix that was on course, and I hadn't trained with that, and um, yeah, it didn't didn't really vibe with me. Was not not a vibe. But anyway, you live and learn.

SPEAKER_02 15:46

So what did you go what was your nutrition plan if you share with people, you know, it was your second Iron Man?

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:54

What did you learn from your first Iron Man and what did you put into place in Kona in terms of your nutrition?

SPEAKER_00 15:59

Yeah, so I didn't nail it. So I went with my nutrition plan that I had for Port Mac, which was a fairly cool race, like it wasn't wasn't hot at all, and I was able to basically carry all of my nutrition. So I had most of my carbs were coming out of um carb mix in my bottles. Like I use like a race day fuel which has like 90 grams of carbs in it, and um then just some gels, some block bars, and just a bunch of stuff that's kind of in my um bento box, and and so I just thought I'll just mimic exactly what happened on race day, and that at the halfway point where you get your special needs bag, I just changed the bottles, and so then I put the two other bottles with the 90 grams in it, and then that's all I needed, and and that worked really great for me on at at um Port Max. I was like, nailed it, that that'll be fine. But it was just not an it was not enough hydration for Kona, like it was just I just didn't think like how much I was how much liquid I was gonna need and how hot I was actually gonna be on the bike, like even to be just having to dump water, you know, over myself to try and keep cool. Um, so yeah, I just really underprepared and and even my setup was a little bit wrong. So I realized I, you know, I only had one, I have um two bottles on the front of my bike, and then I had one on the rear. And really, because I was having to pick up so many bottles on the course, it would have been really great to have two bottle cages on the back so that then I had a spare, um, so that there was always just one free. Because what ended up happening is that all my bottle cages were always full and I was having to just juggle things the whole time. So that was my lesson, and I've actually changed that now. So I've got just a spare one so that there's somewhere to put something if I want to pick it up.

SPEAKER_02 17:46

So if you were to take that into practice now, Ian, do you think, or what would I have done differently in training to prepare better for that? What would you have done? How would you have managed that differently?

SPEAKER_00 17:57

Oh, i it's it was hard because it was really I trained through winter. So even when I was training outside in the elements when I was doing sort of the bottle manoeuvres and and thinking about, you know, fueling for my training, it was just a different ball game, right? Because I was eating and drinking less because it was cold. So I think it I just would have thought about it. Uh that's that's now what I I I think I take into it is that I know that a hot race is different to, you know, nice cool race, and that I will have to think differently about um hydration and and just water. I think that's that's probably what I, you know, I spent a lot of time thinking about the carb intake and how that needed to stack up, but less about actually just drinking water and and staying hydrated. And and I didn't do it well. I could tell, you know, in the half back half of the marathon, I was not good dire. It was dire at that point.

SPEAKER_02 18:59

How did how did your first Iron Man go Cal?

SPEAKER_00 19:01

Yeah, let's hear about that.

SPEAKER_01 19:02

Yeah, it was pretty good. I I was gonna say it was 2015, it was in Melbourne, and I again I had no clue. The biggest thing that concerned me was not the distance, it was the uh the fueling. And I spoke to a guy um who was renowned in Trothlon Circles, and he just said, just once you're on the bike, just take a gel every 20 minutes. So I took four and a half hours worth of gels, and then he said, once you start caffeine, you just can't stop. So I had my first caffeine drink of I guess coke at about 120k on the bike, and then from that point on we just stuck to it. So what I found though is especially coming up from 70.3 racing, is the bike felt super slow because 70.3 is so intense. So I felt like we're sort of riding within ourselves, um, which sounds crazy, uh, because you're still averaging like 40k an hour, but just the intensity drop-off for the longer distance. But then I remember starting the run, and um well, the first thing I guess we'll wind back is the last kilometer or two on the swim felt like it took forever. And then what they don't tell you on the bike is like the last hour, hour and a half just takes forever as well, where you're just wanting to get off and stretch your back and that kind of thing. And then I found starting the run again, a bit like the bike, the intensity, it just seemed super chill. Um, and I remember getting to halfway on the run, it was a point-to-point run from Frankston into Melbourne, and um, so I was all one way, which is kind of unheard of. And so I got to like 19k and I went from feeling awesome and like talking to people to like, I don't know if I can finish this. And um, it's just it's crazy the amount of emotions and energy levels you have, where it's like, I'm doing this, I'm doing this, ma'am, look at my hands, and then you're like, Oh, yeah, we better like we better, we better check that like my medical insurance covers this because um I'm like suffering here. So um it was just and then the last 10k, we know it's always hard, right? Um, but this was I felt like you're just going super slow and you're just trying to get to the finish line, even though you're still racing. But I think it just goes to show um everyone, and it's very rare that someone is just feeling amazing the whole day, like it is a journey. Um, and I tip my hat to people that are to ro that race these events that are doing like 14 to sort of 17 hours where like you're out you're out there uh for a long time and you're getting your entry fees worth.

SPEAKER_02 21:31

Yeah, you certainly do dial on the dollars for the entry fee. It's pretty amazing. So when you transferred into the run, Cal, I mean, we're talking people who don't know, you know, back in the day of 2015, 2016, liquid carbs weren't really a thing. That much like that. They hadn't really evolved. So what did you really do on the run for your nutrition in that part?

SPEAKER_01 21:51

See, I underfueled on the run. The bike was fine because I had a strategy, but the run, I guess you can only you can take the on course nutrition like M. In said. And Iron Man's become really good with having consistent um aid station markers. So you know, but again, you could have an aid station that's run by the local scout group who's diluted the heck out of all the electrolyte. Um I got a good picture of a girl in Hawaii on the Queen K who's handing me bottles of uh sorry um paper cups of water and she's got like her fingernails inside the water and I'm like, mmm, tastes like last night's salad dressing as well. So um you you never really know what you're gonna get. Like so to answer your question, I underfueled it, made a mistake, got to 20k. I had a red bull and my special needs, and um, but again, it's sometimes it can be too late. Caffeine will generally try and pick will it pick you up. I heard Craig Alexander and Cam Brown used to always have Coke, and you'll notice when they used to have the fuel belts, they're all always dark, or it was um the red bull colour. So it's like once you start that, you just can't stop. And I think that's why after an Iron Man, generally it's very hard to sleep at night because you're so wired from the event and from the the amount of crap that you've just pumped into your body.

SPEAKER_02 23:08

Yeah, big time. I think in coast to coast I actually lost my liquid carbs bladder with my kayak flipped. And so I was pretty much left with coke, and I think I downed two litres of coke through a five-hour kayak or four and a half hour kayak. And I was and then I had more on the last bite because you already started. So by that stage my teeth are falling out, and I was just wired to absolute nights all evening. I was so on. Um stuff works though.

SPEAKER_01 23:38

It's marvelous to say there's definitely options now, right? There's uh what is it, infinite, there's precision, there's probably tailwind, there's a whole bunch of them now. I guess you've just got to figure out and you've got to test it in training. Um, if I'm gonna put all my carbs into liquid format, am I able to consume them? Or am I gonna force myself to drink and become bloated? So again, it's just a bit of trial and error, test it out in the weeks leading to an event.

SPEAKER_02 24:03

Yeah, Victor, and I think that's one of the things, one of the biggest mistakes we still see with a lot of people is that they're not testing and trialing their nutrition and then they're taking different things on race day, and it normally always ends up in a little green box with a white lid in the door, um, if you go that way. So it's really important to really look at it. And you know, what we have seen the evolution of it, if you've got people like David Roach now who's set the Leadville record for the hundred mile of through there, he's having up to 120 to 140 grams of carbs an hour running. So and and he's just trained himself to do it. So it's a real trainable thing. We just got to be able to rehearse it and constantly go out there and do it, and probably take a big roll of toilet paper with us when we do that, because likely it's not gonna go well the first few times.

SPEAKER_01 24:52

I used to race on 90 grams of carbs an hour, and then now that this carb thing's become a thing, I've tried 130 and 140, and I feel like you're just force feeding yourself, and it is it's a bit of trial and error to figure out what you can stomach, and some people are gonna be able to like consume more than others, but it is interesting to see, you know, as well I'd I'd put it to you, Tim. What do you think the reason is that we've seen so many advances in fast times these days? Do you think it's more the technology, the equipment, the super shoes, the uh bikes, or more like the the carbs and the uh progress they've made on that front?

SPEAKER_02 25:32

I think in the last few years it's certainly been the nutrition. It's had a huge, huge effect on times across the board. Obviously in the running side of things, shoes has obviously been pretty big. You know, we're talking three to five percent in some circumstances compared to what we used to race in, you know, ten years ago. And and I think also there has been the stage, the third tier where bikes have made a big difference. I was interviewing Gordo Byrne a while back, who's a legend Iron Man athlete, and he went and raced at Indian Wells and set a bike time, which is actually only five or six minutes, off one of his previous best times that he raced as a pro, you know, fifteen years earlier. But his power was something like ten or fifteen percent less, like it was quite a lot less, and he just put it all down to the bike or down to the aerodynamic position he can now hold and how much faster it allowed him to go. Um and we all know drag's exponential, so the faster you go, the more you're creating. Um so it makes a a significant difference to your efficiency as well, and then that's gonna roll over onto your run.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

A big thing I've noticed too with the super shoes, I find you don't you're not getting the DOMs next day. And so I raced on Sunday and on Monday your carbs used to be just trashed. And I was interested to see Christian Blumenfeld at Iron Man, Texas had a w he smashed the race at Iron Man, Texas, ran sort of circa 2.30, and then he took his week off, went back to Bergen and Norway, and he did like a half marathon like a week later or so. And uh that would have been unheard of um probably ten years ago. And now I I with without knowing too much about the science behind all the shoes and that, I would suggest that that like he's able to back up, right? And there's probably some recovery component in there, but I find that amazing that that's that's he he can do that.

SPEAKER_02 27:31

Yeah, yeah, totally. And you think about what they're doing before the Iron Man too, like often you see them doing this key brick session eight days out, which is like a 30k run. Um, and they're able to back that up. And I think that is all down to technology and you think about how that probably layers in training as well, what they're then able to do in training, choosing the right footwear all the way through, makes a significant difference. And you know, we reflect back, and you guys used to run 10k off the bike in an Essex Piranha Callum, which you know barely had a sole of the the brim of your cat.

SPEAKER_01 28:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:02

You know.

SPEAKER_01 28:03

I know, yeah. You'd you'd be blown out calves left, right, and centre, and everyone would have Bar Achilles issues. Yeah, but um you'd feel them. I remember doing um some uh some Iron Man in them, you'd feel like a million bucks for about the first five or seven K. And as soon as that novelty worn off and you started running a bit more flat footed, you'd feel like a mountain goat where you're just like slapping the pavement. And uh, but yeah, it's it's amazing now, like the stack and that and just the cushioning that you have. Um I uh it it'd be interesting to see where things evolve in the next ten years because I'm sure things will get faster and we will get to like a sub-7 Iron Man at some point. Because I mean sub eight was unheard of. Yeah. And um now like the ladies are not knocking on the door of that.

SPEAKER_02 28:49

Yeah, totally. And you think sub 230 marathon. Yeah, we've now got you know eight guys nearly in in Texas who are down closer to that. I think they were they're close to 235. It's just insane. You know, we've got Tamara Jeward who's running sub 240 for a marathon. It's just amazing the progress that we have seen in the sport in the last five years, and I think it just shows that that shuffle shuffles down to the age group category too. I mean, we've got you know a lot of age group men now going sub eight and a halves on a regular basis. Um, and age group woman knocking on the door of nine. So it's super.

SPEAKER_01 29:26

It will be interesting sorry, it will be interesting to see when the next wave coming through of Hayden Wilde, Alex Yi, what they're capable of because obviously we've got a lot of these short course guys coming through now who've come through national programs, especially the Norwegians, uh, there's a few Americans, there's some Kiwis, uh, who they've been on it in this high performance environment for like probably 15 years or 10 years, some of them, and now they're applying their craft to the longer distance and really racing it.

SPEAKER_02 29:59

Yeah, yeah, it's gonna be super fascinating to see how fast those guys can go. And you look at Hayden and how much he's just cleaning up in the T100. And I know from speaking to Craig, he just talks about the guy's capacity to train and how massive that is. And if you layer that on to what you really need, what's the key driver for Iron Man? Well, volume's big a big part of it. You know, Hayden could crush it. He could really make guys suffer in that event, and it'd be really interesting to see what he can go.

SPEAKER_00 30:27

So back on the Iron Man trains, it's the week of leading in the past.

SPEAKER_03 30:31

We're talking about a current affair.

SPEAKER_00 30:33

I know, you're really on the current affairs bus. Um, but like let's talk about what that that week looks like leading in. Um it'd probably be really different for age grouper versus you know someone who's who's racing in the pro field. But um I think that's really where a whole lot of the anxiety comes and where all the panic purchasing starts arriving. So Cal, I'd like to hear what what that's been like for you. What's your experience as you're sort of bleeding into race week for a big one like an Iron Man?

SPEAKER_01 31:04

It's interesting because I mean we've been surrounded by age groupers for a long time, uh, with you know, with our team at Captain Cartel. And I I've never really felt too, too nervous, uh, because I think if you've done your, you know, your 12, 16, 18 week blocks of training to get prepared, you should have some kind of quiet confidence. You can cover the distance. Yeah. I think I think you should be nervous if you haven't prepared yourself properly. And I guess there will be different levels of nervousness, you know, in a pro race, you're you're competing for money, for livelihood, for sponsorship, uh, for position, for points. Um as an age grouper, uh, you've got time off work, you've probably got family coming, there's different external pressures as well, which I think are real as it's quite interesting because it's like as a pro, if you bomb out, you generally have entered another race not long after as a plan B. And that's very common, and you'll oftentimes see a pro who's not doing well pull out of an event, and that can be frowned upon depending on whether or not you understand the reason behind that. But I think as an age grouper, this this this pressure to like finish the event, and there's pressure just to get to the start line too, because you're trying to manage probably kids, travel, family, dogs, work, all that kind of stuff. So I guess it's a long way of saying I think there's shared pressures between the the both of them, but the principles underlying them are still the same. You want to arrive race week feeling good, freshening up, deloading, doing some key sessions. You've still got to work through traveling to get to the event, packing, just like a pro. It's all the same stuff, just uh on a parallel train track. Um, and again, as a pro, I'd still say that you want to try and enjoy it. And the maybe pros do enjoy it more because it's what you do more regularly. And I I I would say to age groupers too, it's it's really important to enjoy that process. You know, go through the motions, figure out the logistics of the event, the timetables, you need to be at briefings to check in, all that kind of stuff. There's so much to jam into that week. Um, pros and age groupers are both doing the same thing, you're just at different speeds. So I would say when well, I'm an age grouper now, but I'd say it's you're you're doing the same stuff, just at a different pace.

SPEAKER_00 33:25

I don't know. Prep for me is just to start taking armor force. That's my my race prep. It's um I always just am so scared that I'm gonna get sick. And I feel like um before my first Iron Man, I could tell that I was starting to get sick, and so I was just smashing the armor force. Um, and then before cona, I've never been more of a diva in my life around germs, people being around me, even the way that I was acting on the plane. Like I was a psycho, but I'm kind of happy I was because I didn't get sick for conar, but um yeah, it's all about the armor force for me.

SPEAKER_01 34:03

That's the biggest risk, I think, almost like you start getting that scratchy throat or that sore head. Oh, nervous times.

SPEAKER_02 34:11

Very nervous, and I and I think the difference there, I mean it's big for the eight the pros too, they've invested a lot of money in being there. But you are often as an A trooper, you might be the one time you go that you can afford to drop the amount of money you've got to drop to go to Kona or one of these big events. And it really sucks if you turn up and you get sick. Um it hurts you and you want to do it again, and and you gotta try to find the the the space in your life and invest the time, energy, and that over other things to repeat the process. And that's that's a tough one. I and I think that's a a unique stress that the age groupers carry. Um, you know, pros as you said, Carol, you can go back and you can do it again some stage, it's your journey, it's what you've on. Um for some people it's just a one and done, and that's the only chance they've got to invest in it. And the other things I think we see in those tape weeks is people panicking, they're losing fitness. And they're like, oh my god, I've got to do something and I'm not doing enough. And and because they're not doing enough, it allows them time to get in their own heads and they start processing stuff and and negatively spiralling. So people just really need to I think if you can relax, as we've already talked about, back yourself and go out and enjoy some of the stuff that's going on in a race week. You know, it takes your mind off things, it's not going to beat you up too much, and you're not gonna lose fitness within a week, hands down. In fact, I know a couple of pros, and Brady and Curry used to do it when I was coaching him into coast to coast. He'd barely train race week at all. Yeah. Then turn up and and smash the heck out of everybody. So it's a it's a mindset. Taper week is a mindset over a physical presence. Um yeah, you know, and a physical engagement.

SPEAKER_00 35:57

I feel like that confidence can only come with experience though. When you when you really don't know, it's it's hard to manage that that panic.

SPEAKER_02 36:05

Yeah, I think you're right. And I I I think though, probably a lesson of something we can help share with people is just maybe surround you yourself with people who've had that experience or you know, surround yourself with good people that are gonna jack you up and keep you positive and it's gonna be a real vibe and it's gonna be really enjoyable and that aren't gonna stress out. Um I think the worst is when you get into those environments and you've got stress starts around you everywhere and they're just bringing you down, or they're just their tone and their language and their actions and behaviors um really affect you. You want to surround yourself with positive energy um and positive people, and that's that's really important. And even just having your kids there, like I I loved having my kids at before coasts, because they're just bubbly, they don't give a crap about what's going on. They don't understand it either. Yeah, they just want to have a yarma dad and go get pushed on the swing.

SPEAKER_01 36:59

It is a nice sort of leveler, and like you say, um I I've always found though a lot of the time you're troubleshooting something, there's something you're getting last-minute nutrition, or your bike could have got damaged, or something will pop like something will pop up. It's very rare that it all just goes smooth. You you land at your destination or you drive there and everything you unpack and it's perfect. So um how many times you see on these event pages someone looking for a DI2 charger or a pump or that kind of thing, but I guess the more you can expose yourself to it, the more better prepared you'll be.

unknown 37:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:38

People need to do some tire changes. They gotta you gotta have a go changing the tire before your Iron Man, I think.

SPEAKER_02 37:45

Yeah. Yeah, and some of this comes from just, you know, if you've got to step back like nearly eight weeks from the event, just start working through some of those little processes and and ticking them off bit by bit on your way to it, rather than getting to last week and having that oh fuck moment and really having to try to work through everything and putting more pressure and stress on you in the last week where you just want to be enjoying it um and stepping back and relaxing.

SPEAKER_01 38:10

Because there's a there is a possibility the event goes bad, and I find that is not uncommon too. You could get a puncher. Um, it's hard to have an awesome swim bike and run, you can still have a good result, but um I just kind of look at a triathon as you're troubleshooting, right? Like it was seen so many times, your power meter might not connect, your visor on the bike could be foggy. Uh Lottie Wilms, you know, she lost her her watch, she was watch dependent on the run um at at T2 and Cairns a few years back. Just stuff like that. Um I don't know, you've just got to try and think on your feet, be your own biggest supporter, positive reinforcement, and get through it.

SPEAKER_00 38:53

Well, that's a wrap. But if you want to keep the conversation going, come find us on Instagram at cartel.coaching. And for coaching camps and community, you can check out our web page. I've linked it in the show notes. See you next time.