December 10, 2025 • 25 mins
The Winter Olympics are coming at us fast — almost as fast as a tight turn on an icy track. Ahead of the Milan-Cortina Games, producer Alex sat down with two-time skeleton world championship medalist Mystique Ro to discuss how she made the transition from track & field to sliding on ice, why “warming up” looks a little different in her sport, and what it will take to disrupt the monopoly one man has on the skeleton shoe market. Plus, the things you really want (Good Game's Holiday Gifting Guide) and the thing no one wants (a Dopp kit in lieu of prize money).
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Follow Mystique on Instagram here
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And watch Mystique’s video about her struggles on the Milan-Cortina track here
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Check out slice Erin Raw’s incredible “Good Game” recommendation spreadsheet here
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Pick up some Good Game merch from BreakingT here
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Leave us a voicemail at 872-204-5070 or send us a note at goodgame@wondermedianetwork.com
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Follow Sarah on social! Bluesky: @sarahspain.com Instagram: @Spain2323
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Good Game with Sarah Spain, where we're eating
our waffles dry. Today the Rivalry series is back, and
we're not giving those Canadians the satisfaction of seeing us
enjoy their delicious syrupy bounty. It's Wednesday, December tenth, and
on today's show, we're skipping the need to know and
getting straight to produce her Alex's interview with an expert
in the art of sledding aka elite skeleton athlete Mystique Row.
(00:22):
Alex sat down with Mistiq at the TMUSA Summit in
October to discuss how she made the transition from track
and field to skeleton, her goals looking ahead to the
Milan Courtina Olympics, and what it'll take to disrupt the
monopoly one man has on the skeleton shoe market.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
As for at home regular.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Sledding, tips that you can use while wax the bottom
of your sled with cooking spray, maintain a low position
to reduce drag and unlike skeleton, never ever go head first.
That interview, plus stick around for our Good Game Holiday
gifting guide and adopt kit No One Wants. But first,
it's Alex's conversation with the Steak Row from October that's
coming up right after.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
This, joining US now. She competes in the sport of skeleton,
aka the one in which human penguins speed faced first
down an icy track at speeds of eighty plus miles
per hour. She's a two time World championship medalist, and
her silver in the individual event at Worlds in twenty
twenty five and did an eight year metal drought for
(01:17):
Team USA. She competed in track and field at Queen's
University of Charlotte, but got her start in skeleton after
getting an invite to a rookie camp hosted by USA
Bob sled and Skeleton. She minored in theater performance in
stage combat, and her luggage weighs in at six hundred
pounds when she hits the road. It's miss Dekro, thanks
so much for being here, Mistique.
Speaker 4 (01:36):
Thank you for having me. That's a lot of news
in your homework.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
So I'm going to go out on the limb here
and guess that probably no one listening to this episode
right now has ever tried skeleton. It's unlike skiing or skating,
where people might be really bad at those sports, but
at least they have stepped foot on a mountain or
onto the ice. So skeleton you take four runs split
over two days. The athlete with the fastest combined time
at the end wins. But can you take us to
(02:02):
the start and just paint the picture for us of
what that run looks like for you?
Speaker 4 (02:06):
Yeah, So depending on what track you're at, there's different
levels of fear and the nerves, and so you have
to try to address sooes before you get to the line,
because once you're there, it's game time. So we have
our number warm up, going in, spiking up, suiting up,
and then we get called up and there's a countdown.
So once we get to the block, we're looking to
make sure we know second guessing everything it is what
it is, and so we want to be very confident.
(02:29):
You could there's time that stuff on line. I don't
know what I'm doing, but we're gonna We're gonna take
it to make it so once you get to the line,
we want to make sure that it's calm.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
The heart right needs to drop.
Speaker 4 (02:37):
So contrary to our sliding cousins, BOPSA, they get a
little empt up. For a lot of former football players,
they're hitting each other and I'm like, you don't, don't
hit me, please, I'm fragile. But so when I get
to the line, I'm swaying usually just kind of calming
myself down, kind of a little pendulum, and because the
first fifty meters is pure speed and power and then
I have to calm down, so I'm not trying to
(02:58):
end myself up too much. But once I get off
the block, it's it's committed. So you got to push hard.
You gotta push fast, and they get on the sled.
You could carry the bloss can do the track.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
You mentioned spiking up? Is that the shoes that.
Speaker 4 (03:08):
You wear, So we wear some brushpikes. These are very
very rare to find and they're very expensive. So imagine
buying a pair of Jordan's and dragging your feet on
concrete every day and then pennies just stripped away. So yeah, wow.
Speaker 3 (03:21):
You mentioned they're hard to find. Where where does one go? Amazon?
Speaker 4 (03:24):
Uh No, you gotta find it. You gotta know a
guy in Germany and hopefully he answers his emo. But again,
he's the one guy in the whole world that you
have the contact. So it makes it really tough because
he's kind of the distributor. So and obviously they're they're
very expensive, so it's very niche sports, so it's very
difficult to get your hands on them in that regardless,
so the price is not really negotiable.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
So one person supplies the entire world.
Speaker 4 (03:45):
Conn Yeah, it's yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
I feel like that could be a good business opportunity
to get some competition.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Yeah, so Adidas used to do it and now on
Clop picked it up, but there's other companies that are
stepping up to try to help break the expense of it,
but on the qual control and trying to make sure
it's accessible as in the challenge right now, So we're
trying to make sure we have an alternative.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
How often do you go through a pair of those shoes?
Is shoes even the right word here?
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Yet?
Speaker 4 (04:08):
Shoe spikes similar to track, It depends on the outrun,
tends on the run you have. And last year I
went I broke too in the outrun and at different tracks,
and that's their hundred fifty dollars. I just went away
right there another three und fifty dollars, So it adds
up very quickly. So that's not even from the sliding,
it's just trying to slow down, so trying to make
sure we don't destroy them. And so I travel with
like five pairs of spikes, which is obviously very expensive
(04:28):
times three fifty.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Yeah, do the math.
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
Yeah, Well I mentioned that you used to compete in
track and field and I think even heptathlon, so it
seems like you maybe have some experience with working with
lots of different shoes at the same time.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (04:40):
Bag is full of shoes, douffle bag full of shoes
and different equipment pieces that you need to do each
sport and each discipline. So I'm used to being a
bag lady. That's just kind of my calling. I think
I call them Mary Poppins bag. But obviously now we
have winter stuff, so you have all this extra beer
and you have to see warm on top of that,
so the heated stuff you need to stay warm because
you're experiencing pretty cold temperatures.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
I imagine it's a sport where a lot of times
people are used to doing an athletic thing and heating
up and sweating as part of it. But when you're
actually on the run, are you sweating?
Speaker 4 (05:09):
So in the warm up, if you sweat, if you
sweat too much, I am nervous and do hypothermia. So
I kind of I call it my crock pot warm up,
So you kind of warmed just a little bit, sit down,
warm a little bit more, sit down. You can't just
start sweaching and drenched because and another thing, I'm just
it gross me out. I'm not getting into my speech tootsbudding.
I'm sorry, it smells horrible. I'm not gonna do it.
(05:29):
You can't wash it enough. It's just it nasty. So
I typically switch out my T shirt and what I'm
wearing just so I can have a bit of a
fresher feel into it. But yeah, you don't want to
warm too much because then your body's gonna instantly feel
the cold. So it's gonna be tough to balance that.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
I want to go back in time for a minute
to that rookie camp you attended in twenty and sixteen.
What were your expectations heading into it?
Speaker 1 (05:51):
I zero.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
I just heard about Bob sled and remember we had
a guy sky Houlkom, the the guy back in twenty ten.
And there's different things that blots hit the media a
little bit but not a lot. It's social media is
very different than it was then. So I was very
like green in the whole subject matter. So I just
just have fun, see what happens. And that's kind of
what my approach was, just try different things and see
if it works. It works, if it doesn't, too bad
(06:12):
or not too bad, but like move on something else.
So yeah, just being open minded. And they had reached
out to you, right, So Alana myristatee, which is one
of the pilots we have on the women's side, she
sent an email blast out to other different coaches around
the country and actually my teammate who I was bumming
the couch off of, was invited and I was like,
should have to staggle along a teammate for a college contract? Yeah,
(06:33):
So she actually was like, you know, a NCAA champion
and like one hundred meters and I think the long jump.
So they were looking at her because she obviously had
b accolades and I was just there. So I was like, yeah,
we'll go hang out with you in South Carolina for
the combine and we both did well enough to get
invited up. And I was kind of like the start
and I was very much looking at bobsleid because I
thought skeleton was insane. Like, why would I want to
(06:53):
do that? That's stupid.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
But now we're here for that college teammate. Did they
have any interest in continuing on after that first camp?
Speaker 4 (07:01):
She stood out a little bit. I think it was
just there's a lot of things you have to sacrifice.
Is balances, so you have life, you have you know, partners,
or just work, so it's very challenging. I didn't have
anything going on. I was just like, sure, why not.
I was I can travel the world and see what's
going on, so I don't have any commitments or anything
holding me down. So I had that mobility, and I
think she's had some obligations.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
So that camp was in twenty sixteen, but your World
Cup debut wasn't until twenty twenty three, So can you
describe what those intervening years were like for you and
how you were growing in the sport but not on
the top stage at that point.
Speaker 4 (07:33):
Yeah, the first five years is a lot of ping pong. Actually,
when I coaches when I got to the World Cup,
he's like, you're still pingponging.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
I was like, I'm trying my best.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
Oh you mean literally ping ponging?
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Oh yeah, I'm hitting everything. I'm hitting everything inside.
Speaker 4 (07:44):
So the thing is like with my push, like you
have great velocity, but with great velocity comes faster speed
and hits her harder. So you have to learn how
to manage that. So I pulled my push back a
little bit to have little more control down the track.
So I actually started butting up with another teammate, Dan Barefoot,
to help me learn how to slide, because he's an engineer.
He's I didn't take physics, I don't know what I'm doing,
(08:05):
so I'm just I'm just has to go down somehow.
So he actually slowed it down from me and helped
me understand where to put pressure to, where to have
input and so a lot of it was robotic at first,
but then I started to feel, and that's something that
you can't teach. You have to actually feel it. You
have to experience it yourself. Once I got that and
I put the push with it, it was like game changer,
big time. So learning how to put that together. But
(08:25):
now every track is different, so there's no there's not
like track is the same foreign demeters. Every track is different,
so you have to learn how to adapt to each track.
And we changed tracks every other week, so you have
to learn how to switch. So the quicker you are
up pivoting, that's the better you're going to be.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
Along the way.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
As you were kind of working your way up to
the World Cup level, how are you funding that journey?
Because I think a lot of people don't know that
it takes a lot of money to fundamental dream.
Speaker 4 (08:47):
Bob said, skeleton is I think top five most expensive
Olympic sports. BOSSA is definitely more than the skeleton. But
lots and prayers. Honestly so a lot of times. But
a lot of us have like multiple jobs, like side households,
were working on place, came from full time jobs into
the sport, so they arely able to work remote. I
did not because I was still coming off of college.
So I've been working odd jobs since and it's very
(09:10):
colorful summers. You know, no what's you gonna you never
know what you're gonna do, So yeah, it's fun.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
Boss is supportive of like, oh, I have to go
take off for a week and do this skeleton thing.
Speaker 4 (09:17):
So I managed to actually get a job at the
venue that I train at, so in mett ben Hoveenberg
and they I'm a tour guide, so I get to
talk about skeleton NonStop, which is great. Just keep it,
keep to the support alive and you know, share to
the information. So they're more than a understanding because I
come home when a medal yay in summertime, and I'll
go back come home when I've been on the medal yay.
So I think it's been a good, good environment and
that's support because they're in it and we're living the
(09:39):
history that they're talking about.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
We got to take a quick break more with mystique
row right after this.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
I remember once interviewing a Loja athlete who described her
training including lying down on a bench with her face
facing the ceiling and I think with seventy pounds that
she would put on her forehead to strengthen her neck
muscles and prepare for like the G forces. And I'm curious,
in skeleton, your face is in the complete opposite orientation.
But is there anything like that where you're like, oh, I.
Speaker 4 (10:11):
Have to go do this and not putting seventy pounds
on my neck. No, So we use a similar tool.
Actually Emlely Sweeney started this, which she brought it in.
So there's a device called a top spin three sixty
which sents you have a football helmet with a little
weight on the end and you kind of spin like
a helicopter. So it helps work them like neck muscles
in a three sixty motion, so we can strengthen it.
So Luja actually has a stronger anterior. We have a
stronger postery, and Bob said as stronger lateral.
Speaker 3 (10:32):
So you're motioning but for our listeners, so the front
of the neck, the back of the neck.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
In the side.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
Yeah, So a lot of the time is just until
you actually get to slide, you don't so they feel
the same pressure. So the best we can do is
simulate it through different ISO holds or using this device.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
So it helps strengthen these muscles.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
So it's I I'm sure we could benefit. I'm scared.
I yeah, no, I'm not putting twenty pounds in my head. Sorry,
fair enough.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
In slang sports, As you mentioned, the track makes a huge,
huge difference, and the track and the sliding center in
general for the Milan Cortina Games was a question mark
for a very long time and still kind of is.
Have you yet been able to go and test it out?
Speaker 4 (11:10):
No, actually I'll be heading that way earlier November to
get eyes on the track. And watch some LuSE sleds
to kind of get an understanding and the gist of
how things work, and then the team will join us
later and then we'll actually get to get on the
ice and kind of see what's see what's happening, and
see what amount of pictures being to make.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
What does the process look like in order to learn
a new track for you.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
So I'm very obsorbent and like to watch a lot
of stuff. So I'm absorbing everything I could see. I'm
filming and I'm listening. I'm listening to scratches and listen
to people skidding. I'm listening to the trouble sections of
the track. And essentially what it comes down to is
it's a mile of ice. You can't cover that in
a week. I don't care. You can't cover that in
a month, honestly. So you have to pick up certain
corners and then you focus on those and thankfully with
(11:49):
the fast push to kind of mitigate some issues, but
it can create other problems. So just hopper focusing on
those situations where you cannot lose speed. You cann't afford
to loose speed.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
Here, how much can a track change over time, whether
the amount of ice in certain places gets worn down.
Can that just completely change it? Or once the turns
are there and kind of locked and loaded.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
It's similar.
Speaker 4 (12:09):
It can change by the hour, honestly, which is very unfortunate.
There's no consistency anywhere. So generally speaking, if the weather
is cooperative, the ice will change throughout this season. But
if you could have a warm day and you have
a cold day, and you can have another wet day
or in the same day, it can happen. So the
variables are so drastic that it's more of a consistency
battle now. So you can have the best set up
for the first heat and it could be completely trash
(12:30):
for the next. So you want to make sure you
kind of meet in the middle and learn how to
steer input like for the moment.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
Is it hard? You mentioned the listening to the scratches
and the skidding. Once a competition gets going, I imagine
there are people in a lot of sounds and all
these other things. Can you still be hearing that as
your competitors are.
Speaker 4 (12:45):
Going, not when they're going. Because I'm up top and
if there's cameras, I'm watching to see where people have
having struggles, I'm listening to splits. But when I'm sliding,
I know if I lose pressure or if I'm skidding,
and I'm like, well that's not good. But now I'm
two curves away, so I got to refocus. So it's
kind of a mental note because you're going seventy plus
miles an hour, so you can't like, darn, I missed
that curve. Oh we're two curves away. So you have
(13:06):
to really be present when you're sliding.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Yeah, I mentioned the six hundred pounds of luggage that
you carry me now and know that you have a
few pairs of shoes in there. What else is going
into that six hundred pounds off luggage?
Speaker 4 (13:17):
So the slued itself is about eighty eighty three pounds
with the runners and stuff. So the runners have to
go in a case and we have we travel with
maybe ten sets each, so that's a lot right there,
and those are that adds up real the quickest. So
that's equipment. The luggage is if you have normal clothes,
the winter gear you need, but I also travel my
own recovery stuff. That's very important for me to make
sure I can Actually, you know, after sliding, you're fried,
(13:38):
so I don't want to don't want move, so everything's
with an arm reach. So and then I like snacks.
IM a lot of girl dinners, so I like to
have some creature comforts I have on tour with me.
So because once you get in the middle of season,
you're kind of like, I'm tired of rat worst. I
want something like goldfish. They don't have that eur so
said girl dinners, A lot of girl dinners.
Speaker 3 (13:57):
Yeah, what defines a girl dinner for you?
Speaker 4 (14:00):
It is not it's not any nutritional balance. Okay, that's
what am I craving at this moment.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
So like mine nachos with like just chips and cheese
melted on them is girl dinner.
Speaker 4 (14:10):
Yeah, that's actually put together. It's it's a theme like
I'll have the journal and some gumming rooms. You know
what does that mean? Like, I don't know. It tastes good.
Speaker 3 (14:17):
So yeah, gender inequity and skeleton on the outside, at
least in the near twenty twenty five, it feels pretty
even in terms of competitors, prize money, number of events,
things like that. From your perspective, though, are there still
things that need to happen to make it a more
competitive and fair landscape for women the.
Speaker 4 (14:34):
General interest, and I think I would like to say
girls little have a little more logic. So you want
me to do a sport, and the wars of funding,
wars of support for that, that's tough. We go to
some tracks and they're they're very old, so a lot
of the infrastructure is in. It's a male dominated sport
with male history. So trying to figure out where's the
women's backroom, I figured out can we get it? Can
make it a toilets, but the door, you know, it'd
(14:55):
be nice. So I'll go moving that direction for sure.
And I think just making sure that we keep peep
on them, don't let them but like pushes around, you know,
make sure that we have a space, we protect that
space for women in the future.
Speaker 2 (15:04):
I have to let you go.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
But final question from me looking back at ten year
old mystique, what would she think of what you're doing
right now?
Speaker 1 (15:10):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (15:10):
She called me nuts? What are you doing?
Speaker 4 (15:13):
I thought were like, you know, the projection what we thought,
like the American dream at then is like, oh, have
a house, have a kids, blah blah Blah'm like, no,
we're we're we're doing bad as stuff. We're doing cool stuff.
So enjoying the moment and riding the wave of just
like you know, women's sports is it in right now,
and like you know, we're gonna keep it that away.
It's not gonna be a trend, it's gonna be a
permanent thing. So and we're part of the history and
slowdi find that for the future.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (15:32):
Well, thank you so much for taking the time and
appreciate you.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
Thanks again to Mistique for taking the time, and to
Alex for a great interview. One note, by the way,
Alex wants everyone to know that she's now caught up
on the concept of girl dinner. She didn't know what
it was when Mystique mentioned it, and I wonder if
anyone else out there is unfamiliar. It's actually a phrase
made popular by a lone Mar's sister Olivia on TikTok.
I know, very random, but she posted a video a
(15:58):
while back assembling a plate of bread and butter, cheese,
grapes and a glass of red wine, calling it girl
dinner or peasant dinner, and a trend was born. Basically,
it's just a snack plate put together without an aim
of hitting all the food groups or achieving any nutritional balance,
no meat and two vegs, just skipping cooking and dishes
all together and instead eating some bits and bobs of
(16:18):
whatever you're craving. And Alex says, after looking it up,
she realized that girl dinner is just.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Dinner for her.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
She ain't ever worried about nutritional balance, and you know,
we should actually talk about that out because as you
get older, you know, you got to get your protein,
your fiber, your vitamins, DNC, your healthy fats. You know what.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
I'll take this offline back to mystic.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
Since this interview was recorded, the Skeleton World Cup season
got underway in late November, with the Olympic Track and
Cortina playing host to the first.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
Stop of the season.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
Roe had a bit of a tough go of it
on the newly completed track, finishing fifth in the mixed
team event and twenty sixth in the individual women's event,
but she had a good attitude about it, posting a
fun video on Instagram showing off all the bruises she
earned after a couple bumpy rides down on the track.
We'll link to that in the show notes. All Right,
we got to pay the bills when we come back.
Free shampoo is great, but prize money is much better.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
Stick here welcome backslices.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
It's time to deliver on my promise of a little
good game with Sarah Spain Holiday gift guide featuring books, clothes,
and other goodies from guests of the show, brands we
love and more. Shout out to super Slice Aaron raw
for her continuously updating spreadsheet of show guests, pod.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
And book recommendations and more.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
It's a super helpful resource always, but especially when attempting
to curate some of the stuff we shouted out over
the course of this year's shows. We'll link to that
spreadsheet again in the show notes in case you don't
already have it bookmarked. Okay, let's start with the most
obvious gift, perfect for everyone in your family old enough
to know how to read.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
My book Runs in the Family. It's available in.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Book, audiobook and ebook, and I promised you it's for
both sports fans and non sports fans. Tons of fascinating
insight on nature versus nurture, epigenetics, ending cycles of trauma,
the outcomes of adoption and importance of found family, and
lots of lessons in grace and forgiveness. It really means
a lot to me that many of you have already
reached out to tell me what it meant to you
(18:16):
and to share your photos reading it. I really truly
can't tell you how much that means to me. So
if you're someone who hasn't read it yet and you
buy the book for yourself or for friends in a
physical book version, I'm happy to mail out a signature
on a sticker that you can affix to the title
page to make it a signed copy, to shoot me
an email.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
And that goes for anty of you that already bought
it as well.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
Speaking of books, a couple friends of the show wrote
fantastic books this year or near the end of last
year that are definitely worth your time. Jane McManus's fast
Track Inside the Surging Business of Women's Sports is a
must read for any.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Slices you got.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Don Staley's Uncommon Favor volleyball analyst A and Marie Anderson's
Cultivating Audacity, Former Harvard hoops coach Kathy Delaney Smith's Grit
and Wit Empowering Lives and Leaders, La Grundy and Susan
Shackelford's Shattering the Glass the Remarkable History of Women's Basketball,
Candae Parkers That Can Do Mindset and Abby Wambach, Glennon
Doyle and Amanda Doyle's We Can Do Hard Things, in
(19:11):
which yours truly has a little cameo. And while you're
in the book section, get anything by the incredible Andrea Gibson,
who was a gift and who left us far too soon.
This year you better be lightning and pole dancing to
gospel hymns are particularly good ones. And if you're one
to aggressively and theatrically read in public, you'll need some
slick apparel to make like a performative male and look
(19:32):
good doing it.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
Google it Olds.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Friends of the Show offer plenty of options, from the
merch at Round twenty one to the sneaks at Moolah Kicks,
Tisha Allin's golf gear, great goodies from the sports spra
athlete Barbie Dolls either with Python arms alone mar or
regular arms, Venus Williams, Immigrant City Football Club, teas from
Angel City Underdogs, My Ass teas from Gotham FC, and
(19:55):
all the great merch Truly great merch over at our
team side, the Minnesota Aurora FC website and of course,
all the leagues have great merch for sale WNBA and
wsl PWHL, AUSL love Volleyball, Unrivaled, the Northern Super League
and more. And they're not friends of the show yet,
but we obviously got to get that a one merch
to rep Asia Wilson and hit up the rebox site
(20:17):
for the Angel Reese collection. You can also get to
pay them what You Owe Them shirt to rep the
WNBPA from the Breaking t site. And while you're there,
grab a bunch of good Game with Sarah Spain merch
for your friends and fam Breakingtea dot com slash Spain.
And while we're talking good game merch, Alex and I
have gotten requests for show hats and stickers, so hit
us up via social or email and tell us if
(20:39):
you're interested. Breaking Tea only does shirts, but if there's
enough interest in hats and stickers and other stuff, we'll
try to make it happen for you. Speaking to making
it happen, the amazing beat reporters and journalists that we
have on the show are the engine behind all the
great coverage that we use to bring you the need
to know get inspired to have certain athletes and coaches
on and give us perspective on the topics and issues
(20:59):
innerse with women's sports every day. Now, you can't buy
the journalists this isn't the Trump administration. But you can
buy subscriptions for yourself and others to support their work.
And even better, you can indicate that the women's sports
coverage there is the reason you subscribed. Support folks like
Tamara Griffin, Ben Pickman, and others by subscribing to The Athletic,
Maurice and Jemmy at the San Francisco Chronicle, Jamel Hill
(21:21):
at The Atlantic, Howard Magdial and his staff of women's
sports writers over at the Nine, Nancy Armor at USA Today,
or sign up for Lindsay Gibbs newsletter Power Plays. By
the way, my current stance on funding places that have
some problematic stories and reporters is that I still believe
in funding journalism and supporting the availability of jobs for
those who do do good work.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
So I urge you to keep subscribing.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
There are, of course lines that need to be drawn,
and yours might be different from mine, but especially in
the current political climate, canceling subscriptions might end up hurting
the folks you actually like to read and want to support.
And as far as keeping up with all your subscriptions,
I say, even if you can't read everything, consider it
a donation with the bonus gift whenever you get the
chance to dive in Ah. There are so many more
(22:04):
gift suggestions to offer. Band aids that look like pickles,
a book of old fashioned literary insults, a banana phone,
a pad of paper that looks like a stick of butter.
We got to stick to show related stuff or we'll
be here all day. That being said, though, there's just
one thing that I have to recommend that I happened
upon while I was searching for a white Elephant gift.
It's called thirty second Dance Party. And it's just a
(22:26):
button that you can hit whenever you need a reset,
reset your attitude, your nervous system, maybe in the middle
of a family fight, when you're falling asleep mid work assignment.
You just tap the button and hear the British man
say thirty second dance, Pattie, and then you get after it.
Ever in the room must spend the next thirty seconds
bust in a move. I feel like this could be
the thing we all need. In twenty twenty six, You're welcome.
(22:50):
We always love that you're listening, but we want you
to get in the game every day too, So here's
our good game play of the day. Got a truly
incredible sports related gift you can't wait to give someone
you love this year, something we might not have seen
or heard of.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
Send it our way so we can share it with
the slices, and you.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Can check out links to all of our gift guide
suggestions on my Instagram and Blue Sky accounts. And don't
forget to follow mystique on social media. We'll link to
her Instagram in the show notes. We always love to
hear from you, so hit us up on email Good
game at wondermedianetwork dot com or leave us a voicemail
at eight seven two two o four fifty seventy, and
don't forget to subscribe, Rate and review. It's easy watch
(23:25):
ski jumping still being a big old boys club, rating
five out of five failures in the Crotch Machine review.
Shout out to Slice Michelle, who sent us a post
you saw on social media about pay inequality in ski jumping.
Now it actually centers on an event that happened a
year ago, but it recently got picked up again by
social media aggregators, so we're just learning about it for
(23:46):
the first time.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Here's the gist.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Last December, the winner of men's qualifying at a World
Cup ski jumping stop in Germany earned the equivalent of
about thirty two hundred US dollars, while the top athlete
in women's qualifying Germany, Selina Freytag, was gifted shower gel, shampoo.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
And hand towels.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
When media outlets reached out to FISS, ski Jumping's international
governing body to ask about the discrepancy, they learned that
the bundle of toiletries was a bonus, not a mistake.
FISS rules state that only the men's qualifying winner is
guaranteed prize money of any kind, and they felt it
was a nice gesture to offer her something. Now, there's
a long history of sexism and ski jumping a sport
(24:25):
that only added a women's Olympic event in twenty fourteen.
But we were curious to see if maybe the outcry
over fry tag swagbag would cause the ORG to make
things right this year, and no. We checked the rule
book and it's still only the men who get anything
for winning qualifying.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
And if you think it gets better once the athletes
advance out of the qualifying rounds. I'll think again. The
winner of a men's.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
World Cup event is guaranteed fifteen thousand euros compared to
five thousand euros on the women's side.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Oof.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
Now it's your turn, rate and review. Thanks for listening,
See you tomorrow. Good game, Mystique. Good games, Selena for
speaking out, even if it took us a while to
hear your message. You playing that awkward gift dance. If
I get you a gift, how do I communicate that
you really don't need to get me one back? And conversely,
oh shit, you got me a gift, I definitely have
one for you too. It's just it's back at the house.
(25:19):
Good Game with Sarah Spain is an iHeart women's sports
production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. You
can find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you get your podcasts. Production by Wonder Media Network,
our producers are alex Azzie Grace, Lynch, Taylor Williamson, and
Lucy Jones. Our executive producers are Christina Everett, Jesse Katz,
Jenny Kaplan and Emily Rudder. Our Editors are Emily Rudder,
(25:42):
Britney Martinez, and Gianna Palmer. Production assistants from Avery LOFTUS
and I'm Your Host Sarah Spain
Welcome to Good Game with Sarah Spain, where we're eating
our waffles dry. Today the Rivalry series is back, and
we're not giving those Canadians the satisfaction of seeing us
enjoy their delicious syrupy bounty. It's Wednesday, December tenth, and
on today's show, we're skipping the need to know and
getting straight to produce her Alex's interview with an expert
in the art of sledding aka elite skeleton athlete Mystique Row.
(00:22):
Alex sat down with Mistiq at the TMUSA Summit in
October to discuss how she made the transition from track
and field to skeleton, her goals looking ahead to the
Milan Courtina Olympics, and what it'll take to disrupt the
monopoly one man has on the skeleton shoe market.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
As for at home regular.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Sledding, tips that you can use while wax the bottom
of your sled with cooking spray, maintain a low position
to reduce drag and unlike skeleton, never ever go head first.
That interview, plus stick around for our Good Game Holiday
gifting guide and adopt kit No One Wants. But first,
it's Alex's conversation with the Steak Row from October that's
coming up right after.
Speaker 3 (00:57):
This, joining US now. She competes in the sport of skeleton,
aka the one in which human penguins speed faced first
down an icy track at speeds of eighty plus miles
per hour. She's a two time World championship medalist, and
her silver in the individual event at Worlds in twenty
twenty five and did an eight year metal drought for
(01:17):
Team USA. She competed in track and field at Queen's
University of Charlotte, but got her start in skeleton after
getting an invite to a rookie camp hosted by USA
Bob sled and Skeleton. She minored in theater performance in
stage combat, and her luggage weighs in at six hundred
pounds when she hits the road. It's miss Dekro, thanks
so much for being here, Mistique.
Speaker 4 (01:36):
Thank you for having me. That's a lot of news
in your homework.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
So I'm going to go out on the limb here
and guess that probably no one listening to this episode
right now has ever tried skeleton. It's unlike skiing or skating,
where people might be really bad at those sports, but
at least they have stepped foot on a mountain or
onto the ice. So skeleton you take four runs split
over two days. The athlete with the fastest combined time
at the end wins. But can you take us to
(02:02):
the start and just paint the picture for us of
what that run looks like for you?
Speaker 4 (02:06):
Yeah, So depending on what track you're at, there's different
levels of fear and the nerves, and so you have
to try to address sooes before you get to the line,
because once you're there, it's game time. So we have
our number warm up, going in, spiking up, suiting up,
and then we get called up and there's a countdown.
So once we get to the block, we're looking to
make sure we know second guessing everything it is what
it is, and so we want to be very confident.
(02:29):
You could there's time that stuff on line. I don't
know what I'm doing, but we're gonna We're gonna take
it to make it so once you get to the line,
we want to make sure that it's calm.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
The heart right needs to drop.
Speaker 4 (02:37):
So contrary to our sliding cousins, BOPSA, they get a
little empt up. For a lot of former football players,
they're hitting each other and I'm like, you don't, don't
hit me, please, I'm fragile. But so when I get
to the line, I'm swaying usually just kind of calming
myself down, kind of a little pendulum, and because the
first fifty meters is pure speed and power and then
I have to calm down, so I'm not trying to
(02:58):
end myself up too much. But once I get off
the block, it's it's committed. So you got to push hard.
You gotta push fast, and they get on the sled.
You could carry the bloss can do the track.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
You mentioned spiking up? Is that the shoes that.
Speaker 4 (03:08):
You wear, So we wear some brushpikes. These are very
very rare to find and they're very expensive. So imagine
buying a pair of Jordan's and dragging your feet on
concrete every day and then pennies just stripped away. So yeah, wow.
Speaker 3 (03:21):
You mentioned they're hard to find. Where where does one go? Amazon?
Speaker 4 (03:24):
Uh No, you gotta find it. You gotta know a
guy in Germany and hopefully he answers his emo. But again,
he's the one guy in the whole world that you
have the contact. So it makes it really tough because
he's kind of the distributor. So and obviously they're they're
very expensive, so it's very niche sports, so it's very
difficult to get your hands on them in that regardless,
so the price is not really negotiable.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
So one person supplies the entire world.
Speaker 4 (03:45):
Conn Yeah, it's yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
I feel like that could be a good business opportunity
to get some competition.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Yeah, so Adidas used to do it and now on
Clop picked it up, but there's other companies that are
stepping up to try to help break the expense of it,
but on the qual control and trying to make sure
it's accessible as in the challenge right now, So we're
trying to make sure we have an alternative.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
How often do you go through a pair of those shoes?
Is shoes even the right word here?
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Yet?
Speaker 4 (04:08):
Shoe spikes similar to track, It depends on the outrun,
tends on the run you have. And last year I
went I broke too in the outrun and at different tracks,
and that's their hundred fifty dollars. I just went away
right there another three und fifty dollars, So it adds
up very quickly. So that's not even from the sliding,
it's just trying to slow down, so trying to make
sure we don't destroy them. And so I travel with
like five pairs of spikes, which is obviously very expensive
(04:28):
times three fifty.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
Yeah, do the math.
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
Yeah, Well I mentioned that you used to compete in
track and field and I think even heptathlon, so it
seems like you maybe have some experience with working with
lots of different shoes at the same time.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (04:40):
Bag is full of shoes, douffle bag full of shoes
and different equipment pieces that you need to do each
sport and each discipline. So I'm used to being a
bag lady. That's just kind of my calling. I think
I call them Mary Poppins bag. But obviously now we
have winter stuff, so you have all this extra beer
and you have to see warm on top of that,
so the heated stuff you need to stay warm because
you're experiencing pretty cold temperatures.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:00):
I imagine it's a sport where a lot of times
people are used to doing an athletic thing and heating
up and sweating as part of it. But when you're
actually on the run, are you sweating?
Speaker 4 (05:09):
So in the warm up, if you sweat, if you
sweat too much, I am nervous and do hypothermia. So
I kind of I call it my crock pot warm up,
So you kind of warmed just a little bit, sit down,
warm a little bit more, sit down. You can't just
start sweaching and drenched because and another thing, I'm just
it gross me out. I'm not getting into my speech tootsbudding.
I'm sorry, it smells horrible. I'm not gonna do it.
(05:29):
You can't wash it enough. It's just it nasty. So
I typically switch out my T shirt and what I'm
wearing just so I can have a bit of a
fresher feel into it. But yeah, you don't want to
warm too much because then your body's gonna instantly feel
the cold. So it's gonna be tough to balance that.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
I want to go back in time for a minute
to that rookie camp you attended in twenty and sixteen.
What were your expectations heading into it?
Speaker 1 (05:51):
I zero.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
I just heard about Bob sled and remember we had
a guy sky Houlkom, the the guy back in twenty ten.
And there's different things that blots hit the media a
little bit but not a lot. It's social media is
very different than it was then. So I was very
like green in the whole subject matter. So I just
just have fun, see what happens. And that's kind of
what my approach was, just try different things and see
if it works. It works, if it doesn't, too bad
(06:12):
or not too bad, but like move on something else.
So yeah, just being open minded. And they had reached
out to you, right, So Alana myristatee, which is one
of the pilots we have on the women's side, she
sent an email blast out to other different coaches around
the country and actually my teammate who I was bumming
the couch off of, was invited and I was like,
should have to staggle along a teammate for a college contract? Yeah,
(06:33):
So she actually was like, you know, a NCAA champion
and like one hundred meters and I think the long jump.
So they were looking at her because she obviously had
b accolades and I was just there. So I was like, yeah,
we'll go hang out with you in South Carolina for
the combine and we both did well enough to get
invited up. And I was kind of like the start
and I was very much looking at bobsleid because I
thought skeleton was insane. Like, why would I want to
(06:53):
do that? That's stupid.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
But now we're here for that college teammate. Did they
have any interest in continuing on after that first camp?
Speaker 4 (07:01):
She stood out a little bit. I think it was
just there's a lot of things you have to sacrifice.
Is balances, so you have life, you have you know, partners,
or just work, so it's very challenging. I didn't have
anything going on. I was just like, sure, why not.
I was I can travel the world and see what's
going on, so I don't have any commitments or anything
holding me down. So I had that mobility, and I
think she's had some obligations.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
So that camp was in twenty sixteen, but your World
Cup debut wasn't until twenty twenty three, So can you
describe what those intervening years were like for you and
how you were growing in the sport but not on
the top stage at that point.
Speaker 4 (07:33):
Yeah, the first five years is a lot of ping pong. Actually,
when I coaches when I got to the World Cup,
he's like, you're still pingponging.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
I was like, I'm trying my best.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
Oh you mean literally ping ponging?
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Oh yeah, I'm hitting everything. I'm hitting everything inside.
Speaker 4 (07:44):
So the thing is like with my push, like you
have great velocity, but with great velocity comes faster speed
and hits her harder. So you have to learn how
to manage that. So I pulled my push back a
little bit to have little more control down the track.
So I actually started butting up with another teammate, Dan Barefoot,
to help me learn how to slide, because he's an engineer.
He's I didn't take physics, I don't know what I'm doing,
(08:05):
so I'm just I'm just has to go down somehow.
So he actually slowed it down from me and helped
me understand where to put pressure to, where to have
input and so a lot of it was robotic at first,
but then I started to feel, and that's something that
you can't teach. You have to actually feel it. You
have to experience it yourself. Once I got that and
I put the push with it, it was like game changer,
big time. So learning how to put that together. But
(08:25):
now every track is different, so there's no there's not
like track is the same foreign demeters. Every track is different,
so you have to learn how to adapt to each track.
And we changed tracks every other week, so you have
to learn how to switch. So the quicker you are
up pivoting, that's the better you're going to be.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
Along the way.
Speaker 3 (08:38):
As you were kind of working your way up to
the World Cup level, how are you funding that journey?
Because I think a lot of people don't know that
it takes a lot of money to fundamental dream.
Speaker 4 (08:47):
Bob said, skeleton is I think top five most expensive
Olympic sports. BOSSA is definitely more than the skeleton. But
lots and prayers. Honestly so a lot of times. But
a lot of us have like multiple jobs, like side households,
were working on place, came from full time jobs into
the sport, so they arely able to work remote. I
did not because I was still coming off of college.
So I've been working odd jobs since and it's very
(09:10):
colorful summers. You know, no what's you gonna you never
know what you're gonna do, So yeah, it's fun.
Speaker 3 (09:13):
Boss is supportive of like, oh, I have to go
take off for a week and do this skeleton thing.
Speaker 4 (09:17):
So I managed to actually get a job at the
venue that I train at, so in mett ben Hoveenberg
and they I'm a tour guide, so I get to
talk about skeleton NonStop, which is great. Just keep it,
keep to the support alive and you know, share to
the information. So they're more than a understanding because I
come home when a medal yay in summertime, and I'll
go back come home when I've been on the medal yay.
So I think it's been a good, good environment and
that's support because they're in it and we're living the
(09:39):
history that they're talking about.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
We got to take a quick break more with mystique
row right after this.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
I remember once interviewing a Loja athlete who described her
training including lying down on a bench with her face
facing the ceiling and I think with seventy pounds that
she would put on her forehead to strengthen her neck
muscles and prepare for like the G forces. And I'm curious,
in skeleton, your face is in the complete opposite orientation.
But is there anything like that where you're like, oh, I.
Speaker 4 (10:11):
Have to go do this and not putting seventy pounds
on my neck. No, So we use a similar tool.
Actually Emlely Sweeney started this, which she brought it in.
So there's a device called a top spin three sixty
which sents you have a football helmet with a little
weight on the end and you kind of spin like
a helicopter. So it helps work them like neck muscles
in a three sixty motion, so we can strengthen it.
So Luja actually has a stronger anterior. We have a
stronger postery, and Bob said as stronger lateral.
Speaker 3 (10:32):
So you're motioning but for our listeners, so the front
of the neck, the back of the neck.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
In the side.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
Yeah, So a lot of the time is just until
you actually get to slide, you don't so they feel
the same pressure. So the best we can do is
simulate it through different ISO holds or using this device.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
So it helps strengthen these muscles.
Speaker 4 (10:48):
So it's I I'm sure we could benefit. I'm scared.
I yeah, no, I'm not putting twenty pounds in my head. Sorry,
fair enough.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
In slang sports, As you mentioned, the track makes a huge,
huge difference, and the track and the sliding center in
general for the Milan Cortina Games was a question mark
for a very long time and still kind of is.
Have you yet been able to go and test it out?
Speaker 4 (11:10):
No, actually I'll be heading that way earlier November to
get eyes on the track. And watch some LuSE sleds
to kind of get an understanding and the gist of
how things work, and then the team will join us
later and then we'll actually get to get on the
ice and kind of see what's see what's happening, and
see what amount of pictures being to make.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
What does the process look like in order to learn
a new track for you.
Speaker 4 (11:28):
So I'm very obsorbent and like to watch a lot
of stuff. So I'm absorbing everything I could see. I'm
filming and I'm listening. I'm listening to scratches and listen
to people skidding. I'm listening to the trouble sections of
the track. And essentially what it comes down to is
it's a mile of ice. You can't cover that in
a week. I don't care. You can't cover that in
a month, honestly. So you have to pick up certain
corners and then you focus on those and thankfully with
(11:49):
the fast push to kind of mitigate some issues, but
it can create other problems. So just hopper focusing on
those situations where you cannot lose speed. You cann't afford
to loose speed.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
Here, how much can a track change over time, whether
the amount of ice in certain places gets worn down.
Can that just completely change it? Or once the turns
are there and kind of locked and loaded.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
It's similar.
Speaker 4 (12:09):
It can change by the hour, honestly, which is very unfortunate.
There's no consistency anywhere. So generally speaking, if the weather
is cooperative, the ice will change throughout this season. But
if you could have a warm day and you have
a cold day, and you can have another wet day
or in the same day, it can happen. So the
variables are so drastic that it's more of a consistency
battle now. So you can have the best set up
for the first heat and it could be completely trash
(12:30):
for the next. So you want to make sure you
kind of meet in the middle and learn how to
steer input like for the moment.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
Is it hard? You mentioned the listening to the scratches
and the skidding. Once a competition gets going, I imagine
there are people in a lot of sounds and all
these other things. Can you still be hearing that as
your competitors are.
Speaker 4 (12:45):
Going, not when they're going. Because I'm up top and
if there's cameras, I'm watching to see where people have
having struggles, I'm listening to splits. But when I'm sliding,
I know if I lose pressure or if I'm skidding,
and I'm like, well that's not good. But now I'm
two curves away, so I got to refocus. So it's
kind of a mental note because you're going seventy plus
miles an hour, so you can't like, darn, I missed
that curve. Oh we're two curves away. So you have
(13:06):
to really be present when you're sliding.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Yeah, I mentioned the six hundred pounds of luggage that
you carry me now and know that you have a
few pairs of shoes in there. What else is going
into that six hundred pounds off luggage?
Speaker 4 (13:17):
So the slued itself is about eighty eighty three pounds
with the runners and stuff. So the runners have to
go in a case and we have we travel with
maybe ten sets each, so that's a lot right there,
and those are that adds up real the quickest. So
that's equipment. The luggage is if you have normal clothes,
the winter gear you need, but I also travel my
own recovery stuff. That's very important for me to make
sure I can Actually, you know, after sliding, you're fried,
(13:38):
so I don't want to don't want move, so everything's
with an arm reach. So and then I like snacks.
IM a lot of girl dinners, so I like to
have some creature comforts I have on tour with me.
So because once you get in the middle of season,
you're kind of like, I'm tired of rat worst. I
want something like goldfish. They don't have that eur so
said girl dinners, A lot of girl dinners.
Speaker 3 (13:57):
Yeah, what defines a girl dinner for you?
Speaker 4 (14:00):
It is not it's not any nutritional balance. Okay, that's
what am I craving at this moment.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
So like mine nachos with like just chips and cheese
melted on them is girl dinner.
Speaker 4 (14:10):
Yeah, that's actually put together. It's it's a theme like
I'll have the journal and some gumming rooms. You know
what does that mean? Like, I don't know. It tastes good.
Speaker 3 (14:17):
So yeah, gender inequity and skeleton on the outside, at
least in the near twenty twenty five, it feels pretty
even in terms of competitors, prize money, number of events,
things like that. From your perspective, though, are there still
things that need to happen to make it a more
competitive and fair landscape for women the.
Speaker 4 (14:34):
General interest, and I think I would like to say
girls little have a little more logic. So you want
me to do a sport, and the wars of funding,
wars of support for that, that's tough. We go to
some tracks and they're they're very old, so a lot
of the infrastructure is in. It's a male dominated sport
with male history. So trying to figure out where's the
women's backroom, I figured out can we get it? Can
make it a toilets, but the door, you know, it'd
(14:55):
be nice. So I'll go moving that direction for sure.
And I think just making sure that we keep peep
on them, don't let them but like pushes around, you know,
make sure that we have a space, we protect that
space for women in the future.
Speaker 2 (15:04):
I have to let you go.
Speaker 3 (15:05):
But final question from me looking back at ten year
old mystique, what would she think of what you're doing
right now?
Speaker 1 (15:10):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (15:10):
She called me nuts? What are you doing?
Speaker 4 (15:13):
I thought were like, you know, the projection what we thought,
like the American dream at then is like, oh, have
a house, have a kids, blah blah Blah'm like, no,
we're we're we're doing bad as stuff. We're doing cool stuff.
So enjoying the moment and riding the wave of just
like you know, women's sports is it in right now,
and like you know, we're gonna keep it that away.
It's not gonna be a trend, it's gonna be a
permanent thing. So and we're part of the history and
slowdi find that for the future.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (15:32):
Well, thank you so much for taking the time and
appreciate you.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
Thanks again to Mistique for taking the time, and to
Alex for a great interview. One note, by the way,
Alex wants everyone to know that she's now caught up
on the concept of girl dinner. She didn't know what
it was when Mystique mentioned it, and I wonder if
anyone else out there is unfamiliar. It's actually a phrase
made popular by a lone Mar's sister Olivia on TikTok.
I know, very random, but she posted a video a
(15:58):
while back assembling a plate of bread and butter, cheese,
grapes and a glass of red wine, calling it girl
dinner or peasant dinner, and a trend was born. Basically,
it's just a snack plate put together without an aim
of hitting all the food groups or achieving any nutritional balance,
no meat and two vegs, just skipping cooking and dishes
all together and instead eating some bits and bobs of
(16:18):
whatever you're craving. And Alex says, after looking it up,
she realized that girl dinner is just.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Dinner for her.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
She ain't ever worried about nutritional balance, and you know,
we should actually talk about that out because as you
get older, you know, you got to get your protein,
your fiber, your vitamins, DNC, your healthy fats. You know what.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
I'll take this offline back to mystic.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
Since this interview was recorded, the Skeleton World Cup season
got underway in late November, with the Olympic Track and
Cortina playing host to the first.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
Stop of the season.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
Roe had a bit of a tough go of it
on the newly completed track, finishing fifth in the mixed
team event and twenty sixth in the individual women's event,
but she had a good attitude about it, posting a
fun video on Instagram showing off all the bruises she
earned after a couple bumpy rides down on the track.
We'll link to that in the show notes. All Right,
we got to pay the bills when we come back.
Free shampoo is great, but prize money is much better.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
Stick here welcome backslices.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
It's time to deliver on my promise of a little
good game with Sarah Spain Holiday gift guide featuring books, clothes,
and other goodies from guests of the show, brands we
love and more. Shout out to super Slice Aaron raw
for her continuously updating spreadsheet of show guests, pod.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
And book recommendations and more.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
It's a super helpful resource always, but especially when attempting
to curate some of the stuff we shouted out over
the course of this year's shows. We'll link to that
spreadsheet again in the show notes in case you don't
already have it bookmarked. Okay, let's start with the most
obvious gift, perfect for everyone in your family old enough
to know how to read.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
My book Runs in the Family. It's available in.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Book, audiobook and ebook, and I promised you it's for
both sports fans and non sports fans. Tons of fascinating
insight on nature versus nurture, epigenetics, ending cycles of trauma,
the outcomes of adoption and importance of found family, and
lots of lessons in grace and forgiveness. It really means
a lot to me that many of you have already
reached out to tell me what it meant to you
(18:16):
and to share your photos reading it. I really truly
can't tell you how much that means to me. So
if you're someone who hasn't read it yet and you
buy the book for yourself or for friends in a
physical book version, I'm happy to mail out a signature
on a sticker that you can affix to the title
page to make it a signed copy, to shoot me
an email.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
And that goes for anty of you that already bought
it as well.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
Speaking of books, a couple friends of the show wrote
fantastic books this year or near the end of last
year that are definitely worth your time. Jane McManus's fast
Track Inside the Surging Business of Women's Sports is a
must read for any.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
Slices you got.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Don Staley's Uncommon Favor volleyball analyst A and Marie Anderson's
Cultivating Audacity, Former Harvard hoops coach Kathy Delaney Smith's Grit
and Wit Empowering Lives and Leaders, La Grundy and Susan
Shackelford's Shattering the Glass the Remarkable History of Women's Basketball,
Candae Parkers That Can Do Mindset and Abby Wambach, Glennon
Doyle and Amanda Doyle's We Can Do Hard Things, in
(19:11):
which yours truly has a little cameo. And while you're
in the book section, get anything by the incredible Andrea Gibson,
who was a gift and who left us far too soon.
This year you better be lightning and pole dancing to
gospel hymns are particularly good ones. And if you're one
to aggressively and theatrically read in public, you'll need some
slick apparel to make like a performative male and look
(19:32):
good doing it.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
Google it Olds.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Friends of the Show offer plenty of options, from the
merch at Round twenty one to the sneaks at Moolah Kicks,
Tisha Allin's golf gear, great goodies from the sports spra
athlete Barbie Dolls either with Python arms alone mar or
regular arms, Venus Williams, Immigrant City Football Club, teas from
Angel City Underdogs, My Ass teas from Gotham FC, and
(19:55):
all the great merch Truly great merch over at our
team side, the Minnesota Aurora FC website and of course,
all the leagues have great merch for sale WNBA and
wsl PWHL, AUSL love Volleyball, Unrivaled, the Northern Super League
and more. And they're not friends of the show yet,
but we obviously got to get that a one merch
to rep Asia Wilson and hit up the rebox site
(20:17):
for the Angel Reese collection. You can also get to
pay them what You Owe Them shirt to rep the
WNBPA from the Breaking t site. And while you're there,
grab a bunch of good Game with Sarah Spain merch
for your friends and fam Breakingtea dot com slash Spain.
And while we're talking good game merch, Alex and I
have gotten requests for show hats and stickers, so hit
us up via social or email and tell us if
(20:39):
you're interested. Breaking Tea only does shirts, but if there's
enough interest in hats and stickers and other stuff, we'll
try to make it happen for you. Speaking to making
it happen, the amazing beat reporters and journalists that we
have on the show are the engine behind all the
great coverage that we use to bring you the need
to know get inspired to have certain athletes and coaches
on and give us perspective on the topics and issues
(20:59):
innerse with women's sports every day. Now, you can't buy
the journalists this isn't the Trump administration. But you can
buy subscriptions for yourself and others to support their work.
And even better, you can indicate that the women's sports
coverage there is the reason you subscribed. Support folks like
Tamara Griffin, Ben Pickman, and others by subscribing to The Athletic,
Maurice and Jemmy at the San Francisco Chronicle, Jamel Hill
(21:21):
at The Atlantic, Howard Magdial and his staff of women's
sports writers over at the Nine, Nancy Armor at USA Today,
or sign up for Lindsay Gibbs newsletter Power Plays. By
the way, my current stance on funding places that have
some problematic stories and reporters is that I still believe
in funding journalism and supporting the availability of jobs for
those who do do good work.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
So I urge you to keep subscribing.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
There are, of course lines that need to be drawn,
and yours might be different from mine, but especially in
the current political climate, canceling subscriptions might end up hurting
the folks you actually like to read and want to support.
And as far as keeping up with all your subscriptions,
I say, even if you can't read everything, consider it
a donation with the bonus gift whenever you get the
chance to dive in Ah. There are so many more
(22:04):
gift suggestions to offer. Band aids that look like pickles,
a book of old fashioned literary insults, a banana phone,
a pad of paper that looks like a stick of butter.
We got to stick to show related stuff or we'll
be here all day. That being said, though, there's just
one thing that I have to recommend that I happened
upon while I was searching for a white Elephant gift.
It's called thirty second Dance Party. And it's just a
(22:26):
button that you can hit whenever you need a reset,
reset your attitude, your nervous system, maybe in the middle
of a family fight, when you're falling asleep mid work assignment.
You just tap the button and hear the British man
say thirty second dance, Pattie, and then you get after it.
Ever in the room must spend the next thirty seconds
bust in a move. I feel like this could be
the thing we all need. In twenty twenty six, You're welcome.
(22:50):
We always love that you're listening, but we want you
to get in the game every day too, So here's
our good game play of the day. Got a truly
incredible sports related gift you can't wait to give someone
you love this year, something we might not have seen
or heard of.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
Send it our way so we can share it with
the slices, and you.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Can check out links to all of our gift guide
suggestions on my Instagram and Blue Sky accounts. And don't
forget to follow mystique on social media. We'll link to
her Instagram in the show notes. We always love to
hear from you, so hit us up on email Good
game at wondermedianetwork dot com or leave us a voicemail
at eight seven two two o four fifty seventy, and
don't forget to subscribe, Rate and review. It's easy watch
(23:25):
ski jumping still being a big old boys club, rating
five out of five failures in the Crotch Machine review.
Shout out to Slice Michelle, who sent us a post
you saw on social media about pay inequality in ski jumping.
Now it actually centers on an event that happened a
year ago, but it recently got picked up again by
social media aggregators, so we're just learning about it for
(23:46):
the first time.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Here's the gist.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
Last December, the winner of men's qualifying at a World
Cup ski jumping stop in Germany earned the equivalent of
about thirty two hundred US dollars, while the top athlete
in women's qualifying Germany, Selina Freytag, was gifted shower gel, shampoo.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
And hand towels.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
When media outlets reached out to FISS, ski Jumping's international
governing body to ask about the discrepancy, they learned that
the bundle of toiletries was a bonus, not a mistake.
FISS rules state that only the men's qualifying winner is
guaranteed prize money of any kind, and they felt it
was a nice gesture to offer her something. Now, there's
a long history of sexism and ski jumping a sport
(24:25):
that only added a women's Olympic event in twenty fourteen.
But we were curious to see if maybe the outcry
over fry tag swagbag would cause the ORG to make
things right this year, and no. We checked the rule
book and it's still only the men who get anything
for winning qualifying.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
And if you think it gets better once the athletes
advance out of the qualifying rounds. I'll think again. The
winner of a men's.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
World Cup event is guaranteed fifteen thousand euros compared to
five thousand euros on the women's side.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Oof.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
Now it's your turn, rate and review. Thanks for listening,
See you tomorrow. Good game, Mystique. Good games, Selena for
speaking out, even if it took us a while to
hear your message. You playing that awkward gift dance. If
I get you a gift, how do I communicate that
you really don't need to get me one back? And conversely,
oh shit, you got me a gift, I definitely have
one for you too. It's just it's back at the house.
(25:19):
Good Game with Sarah Spain is an iHeart women's sports
production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. You
can find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you get your podcasts. Production by Wonder Media Network,
our producers are alex Azzie Grace, Lynch, Taylor Williamson, and
Lucy Jones. Our executive producers are Christina Everett, Jesse Katz,
Jenny Kaplan and Emily Rudder. Our Editors are Emily Rudder,
(25:42):
Britney Martinez, and Gianna Palmer. Production assistants from Avery LOFTUS
and I'm Your Host Sarah Spain
Host
Sarah Spain
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