With Pace
Professional mountain biker Payson McElveen sits down with some of the biggest names in sports and adventure to get an inside look at what sets them apart. With no script, the casual conversations are as diverse as the guests, with topics ranging from harrowing tales of survival, to debates on current events, to everyday tips and tricks and everything in between. As Payson travels the world for his two-wheeled day job, listen in as he rubs shoulders with and learns from some of the most inspiring athletes, entrepreneurs, academics, and others as they chase and inspire greatness.
Episodes
402 episodes
Sarah Sturm on motherhood and the future of US gravel
One month after giving birth to her daughter, Sarah Sturm is back in the studio with Payson to talk about what has changed and what has stayed the same in these past few transformational weeks. After a relatively smooth pregnancy and birth, she...
Quinn Simmons on Leadville, the Tour, and his Dauphiné stage win
Quinn Simmons made headlines last month when it was announced that he’d be jumping into Leadville just a couple of weeks after racing the Tour de France. He sat down with Payson in Durango this week to talk about his last-minute decision to do ...
Leadville 100 recap with Cobe Freeburn and Lauren Aggeler
This year’s Leadville 100 was unlike any other, with wildfires last month necessitating a reroute of the iconic course and cool temperatures and rain contributing to a chaotic race. Quinn Simmons and Rosa Klöser dropped in just after finishing ...
Cam Jones on racing the Grand Prix as the defending champion and his Leadville strategy
A lot has changed for Cam Jones since our last episode with him a year ago. Back then, he’d just had his breakout ride at Unbound, winning the biggest gravel race in the world as a Grand Prix wild card. Now, he’s the defending champion of the e...
Chad Cheeney on tracklocross and Sepp Kuss’s Tour de France crash
For the past 20 years, Chad Cheeney has been one of the most influential people in U.S. cycling, even if you’ve never heard of him. As the co-founder of Durango Devo, he’s helped foster the childhood talents of Sepp Kuss, Chris Blevins, Howard ...
Matt Wilson on winning Tulsa Tough on a gravel bike and his breakout year
If you were racing with Matt Wilson last year, it was pretty clear that he was one of the strongest in the bunch, but through mechanicals and various other extenuating circumstances, he never managed to translate his talents into a top finish. ...
Tom Evans on his Hardrock 100 training camp and early military career
Tom Evans is one of the best ultrarunners in the world, having won both UTMB and Western States. Now, the British runner has his sights set on the Hardrock 100, one of the most technical of the major ultradistance races that starts at 9,300 fee...
Levi Leipheimer on reckoning with the past and his life after the WorldTour
This week, Payson sits down for a candid conversation with Levi Leipheimer. They discuss his long road to processing his time in the WorldTour in the early 2000s, which was marked by remarkable professional success but marred by the doping scan...
Nino Schurter on retirement, gravel, and his unprecedented longevity in the sport
Nino Schurter hardly needs an introduction. Widely considered the greatest XCO mountain bike racer of all time, he's won 10 World Championships, nine World Cup overalls, and Olympic bronze, silver, and gold medals. Having retired from World Cup...
Unbound recap pt. 2: the age-group race (with Will, Emily, and Justin)
In the second part of our Unbound recap, Payson speaks to three age-group riders who finished in the middle of the night during torrential rain and thunderstorms. First up is Will Bledsoe, who completed the 100 last year and did most of his tra...
Unbound recap pt. 1: the pro race (with Danni Shrosbree)
This year’s Unbound was humbling. Mud, thunder storms, and mechanicals galore plagued the racers and culled the pro field. To recap the carnage, Payson is joined by Danni Shrosbree, who battled multiple crises to grab a top 10 and secure a wild...
Unbound course preview with four-time winner Dan Hughes
Dan Hughes is a certified Unbound legend, having won the very first edition way back in 2006 and another three times for good measure. He’s seen the race go from 34 people in a hotel parking lot in Emporia to the most prestigious gravel race in...
Sam Shaw on setting a new FKT on New Zealand’s Great Tracks
Sam Shaw isn’t your average FKT setter. The Kiwi rider has raced XC, gravel, and Enduro over the years (he was on the podium at XCO nationals just this year), but since getting married and starting a family, he’s worked full-time off the bike a...
Maddie Munro on battling the mud to her first World Cup podium
The first World Cup of the season took place in a new country (South Korea) and featured treacherously muddy conditions that forced riders to navigate large sections of the course on foot. 24-year-old Maddie Munro crossed the finish line in thi...
Lauren Stephens and Levi Leipheimer on Levi's GranFondo
This week, we continue our recap of Levi’s GranFondo with this year’s winner, Lauren Stephens, who checked in from the Tour of the Gila to talk about running her own team, the dismal state of road racing in the US, and her controversial use of ...
Brennan Wertz on his unexpected Levi's GranFondo podium
Brennan Wertz wasn’t expecting much at Levi’s GranFondo last weekend. At 6’5” and over 200 pounds, he isn’t the type of rider who usually excels at races with nearly 14,000 feet of climbing, and, to use his own description, he'd “got his doors ...
Sea Otter recap with Sarah Sturm
The 2026 Life Time Grand Prix is officially underway after an action-packed day at Sea Otter. In the injury-ridden men’s field, Bradyn Lange surged to victory in a sprint finish with Keegan Swenson. In the women’s field, Sofia Gomez-Villafañe t...
Morgan Aguirre on preparing for her first Grand Prix season
It’s been more than two years since we last had Morgan Aguirre on the show, and since then, a lot has changed for her. After two strong seasons racing gravel mainly in Europe, she is headed for the Grand Prix this year for the first time. Payso...
Mike Woods on his unlikely WorldTour career and multi-sport retirement plans
Mike Woods' career in the WorldTour was practically a fluke. After earning a full ride to college for running, he quit the sport over a series of injuries and started riding his dad's bike on the weekends. Fast forward about a decade and he had...
Samuele Bressan, Head of Global Marketing for Pirelli's cycling division
During Payson’s trip to Italy last week to race The Hills, he stopped by the headquarters of his new tire sponsor, Pirelli, for a tour of the factory floor. Afterward, he sat down with Samuele Bressan, the company’s Head of Global Marketing for...
George Hincapie on Modern Adventure Pro Cycling and his storied racing career
After more than three decades in the sport, George Hincapie has started a new venture this year as the founder of the UCI Pro Road Team Modern Adventure Pro Cycling. It’s already gaining steam much faster than he expected — so fast, in fact, th...
Alex Miller on growing up in rural Namibia and joining Swatt Club
Alex Miller is a two-time Olympic XC racer from Namibia with multiple road and XC marathon national titles. These days, he lives in Girona and races for Swatt Club, splitting his schedule between gravel, road, and mountain bike races. He joins ...
Luke Lamperti on opening weekend of the Belgian Classics and chasing marginal gains
The last time we spoke to Luke Lamperti was two years ago, when he was just starting out as a WorldTour neo-pro with Quick-Step. This year, he’s switched to EF and has already racked up some impressive finishes. In fact, Payson ran into him jus...
Sahara Gravel stage 4 recap with Leoni Kolberg
To close out our Sahara Gravel coverage, Payson sat down with race volunteer Leoni Kolberg, who has spent the past four years riding around the world, often solo and sleeping in a tent. Last year, she rode across South America. Before that, she...
Sahara Gravel stage 3 recap with Eddy Le Huitouze
Stage 3 of Sahara Gravel took the riders away from the Atlas Mountains and towards the Sahara Desert, with 95 kilometers ending in a tailwind. Payson is joined by stage winner Eddy Le Huitouze to discuss how the race played out, but first, they...