June 3, 2025 • 58 mins
What does it take to transform your life? For Paul, it started with a sobering realization at age 43 that his health was deteriorating, affecting everything from his sleep to his ability to be present for his family. That wake-up call sparked a remarkable journey from 230 pounds to becoming an accomplished endurance athlete.
In this deeply personal conversation, Paul takes us through his first challenging race—the Bataan Death March—where despite blisters and exhaustion, he discovered something unexpected: the addictive feeling of accomplishment that comes from pushing beyond your perceived limits. With raw honesty, he describes the moment when "adrenaline wears off and reality hits," yet somehow that feeling hooked him into a lifestyle he never imagined possible.
The most fascinating turn in Paul's story came when a broken foot—seemingly a devastating setback while training for an ultramarathon—introduced him to swimming and eventually triathlon. Listen as he describes the humbling experience of barely completing 100 meters in the pool despite being an accomplished runner, and how perseverance transformed weakness into strength. His vivid descriptions of competing in the Ironman 70.3 Oceanside bring you right into the experience—from the pre-dawn nervous energy to the euphoria of crossing the finish line after conquering a 1.2-mile swim, 56-mile bike ride, and half marathon.
Beyond the impressive accomplishments lies the real heart of this episode: how physical transformation creates ripple effects in every area of life. Paul's journey has inspired family members to begin their own fitness quests and demonstrates how wellness impacts relationships, work performance, and self-image. His practical insights about training, recovery, and listening to your body offer valuable guidance whether you're considering your first 5K or dreaming of more ambitious goals.
Ready to make a change in your own life? This conversation might be exactly the motivation you need. Subscribe and leave a review if Paul's story resonates with you!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to Real People, Real Life.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
You know the sign is pretty dope.
I gotta admit I was prettyimpressed with that when you
came out with the new intro Alittle bit different, eh.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
I like it, man.
So you're back again, paul.
Yep, how you doing, ryan?
I'm doing good, man, I'm doinggood.
I got my 100,000 subscribers.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
I saw that.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Appreciate that to all the people out there.
Last time you were on, youactually have.
I should have looked it up.
I'm going to look it up.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Wow, looked it up.
I'm gonna look it up.
Wow, 30 705 views.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
That's just.
That's just the actual main one.
Okay, so that's youtube.
Yeah, all right, paul, you'reback.
Last time you were here, wekind of just covered a whole lot
of different things.
That video on youtube has over30 000 views in a couple months.
Yeah, that's just youtube.
We're not talking about all thepodcast channels.
The shorts probably have doublethat all the short videos.
(01:09):
People love your stories, greatcomments.
Wanted to get you back in witha little bit more focus.
As everybody can see, thetable's got all this bric-a-brac
on it.
We talked originally about yourjourney to health and a lot of
people I mean we've got the newhealth RFK Jr talking about
(01:31):
health and trying to get Americahealthy again.
2019 was an eye-opening momentfor you.
Why don't we walk through thatstory and then how it went from
2019 to this?
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So you know, like I mentionedbefore, my aunt was the one that
actually got me started.
I had known before that that Iwas, you know, needing to really
get healthy.
I mean it wasn't a an option forme.
(02:06):
I was really feeling, you know,sluggish and I couldn't sleep.
And you know, my wife was likehey, you're, you're snoring a
lot, you're keeping me up.
So I'm like you know what Ireally need to?
And then I just, you know, said, you know, I really need to
focus on myself.
Because if I can't really needto focus on myself, because if I
can't, you know, be healthy,then I can't be the best dad I
(02:28):
can be, or the best husband, andthen also at work, like you
know, I can't perform, you know,the best I can, either because,
um, I'm either tired or I'm outof shape.
And I'm just at the end of theday, I'm just, you know, fizzled
it fizzled out.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
How old were you?
2019?
Speaker 3 (02:46):
2019.
I was 43, 44.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Yeah, young man.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
So I had 43 going on about 62.
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:54):
I'm 51 this year.
So, man, it goes by quick, man.
So I realized that I needed todo something.
And my, I could tell by youknow, the look of my wife's face
, my kid, you know, my kids, youknow they were.
They weren't physically tellingme.
You know, hey, you know you're,you're getting big.
(03:16):
You know, something needs tochange.
This isn't what I married.
Um, yeah, I could see, I couldsee that.
So my aunt, you know, I made avisit out to Tucson where she
lives, and she's been biking andrunning her whole her whole
life and she made a couple ofcomments you know, hey, you know
you're not the, you know ashealthy as you were back in the
(03:39):
day.
Yeah, I mean in the Navy it wasa little bit easier because you
were required to stay healthyand be in shape, because you had
to be out there in the middleof the ocean on a ship, and so I
took that as a motivation.
And then I came back to SanDiego a couple months later and
(04:01):
she told me about this batonondeath march race and I'm like,
ah, that just doesn't even soundfun, you know.
I'm like and so I looked it upand you know, the history of the
baton death march was, you know, back in world war.
I believe it was uh two, uh,world war two.
Anyways, is the battle of baton, it was the it, it was the
(04:25):
trail of prisoners that weretaken through Bataan and held at
the camp and anyway.
So the Bataan Death March wasthat actual trail of soldiers
and veterans and locals thatwere held captive, that were
freed.
And so the baton death marchrace was, is held in, uh, white
(04:47):
sands, new mexico, at themissile range, and there's a
couple different races.
There's a full marathon throughthe mountains and then the army
gets involved, right, um, andthey ruck it and they'll,
they'll do the full 26 point.
I think it's actually more thana marathon.
It's uh, I, I don't know, it's26.8 or something like that.
(05:10):
Anyway, it's elevation gains of6 000 feet.
I mean it's, you know.
And then they'll do it in teamsand they'll do it in companies
and they'll do it in full gearand 50 pound, 50 pound or no, I
think it's 70-pound rucks.
Odd to verify that, but theseguys were the locals and
civilians were running it inrunning gear and shorts and
(05:32):
comfortable stuff and these guyswere in their boots and full on
and they had cannons there andthey had this 100-foot flag
draped over these cranes andthey had three of the actual
survivors of the baton deathmarch that were there to start
it.
Wow, and there was that year.
(05:54):
There was about in 2019, therewas about 32,000 or 33,000 and
it was 30 degrees outside.
It was cold.
Everybody just had throwawaysweats and I'm new to the game
so I didn't have anythingthrowaway, so I'm just throwing
on gloves and everything,because once you start moving
about mile five, you just startthrowing it away.
(06:15):
So that was the first race thatkind of actually started.
I had blisters.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
How unprepared were you.
In your mind what was yourmindset going into it?
Oh, this is not going to be,this will be no problem.
Your mind you're still thinkingyoung, still thinking in shape.
And your body said, no, I'm notgoing to have any of this.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Yeah, it was an eye-opener.
You know, adrenaline takes youabout through mile five, six and
then reality hits when you getin these, because it wasn't a
road race, it was road trail.
Then you hit some riverbeds soyou're cross-country, it's deep
sand.
So you know you, you thinkyou're prepared.
Now my aunt had you know, Ilistened to her and she gave me
(07:00):
some advice.
You know, you want to weargaiters so you don't get sand in
your shoes and that way youdon't get, you know, blisters.
And it was at elevation, I thinkstart elevation there was like
4,000.
You know, and I was running atsea level.
So you know, right off the bat,I'm like man, why am I so tired
(07:20):
?
You know, but you kind of getin the groove.
So once the adrenaline wearsoff, then you just kind of just
like, okay, I can, I could dothis, stop at the station, get
some water, get electrolytes,whatever, um, it wasn't till um,
toward the last couple miles,getting in there, really getting
that determination to say, okay, am I gonna finish this?
(07:41):
And this was a half right, thisis a fort.
That one was 14.1, a littleheavier than a half but it felt
like 100 miles, I mean, you know, because I had never done it.
So it was kind of it was kindof neat.
My wife was there, my daughterwas there, and and then I
finished and I waited for myaunt, my uncle they both ran it
(08:07):
my, my uncle Rich.
He came across a finish line.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
He's like.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
I'll never do this again.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
This is so stupid.
I don't know why people do youknow.
But my aunt, you know she justkind of.
You know she's a hundred andprobably 10 pounds soaking wet.
You know biking.
I mean, what am I going to tellmy aunt?
You know it's like, come on,you know, if she could do it, I
could do it.
You know, it's totally not likethat.
You really get a wake up callwhen you, when you start doing
(08:29):
these and that was the first onethat kind of got it going, and
I was just hooked after that.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
So you come on across the finish line.
Little over a half marathon yougot blisters on your feet.
I mean, how many more poundsdid you have on your frame back
then?
Listeners on your feet I mean,how many more pounds did you
have on your frame back then?
Speaker 3 (08:45):
So when I started, my son went to bootcamp in 2018, I
believe.
So I had started about the timehe went to bootcamp and I, when
I first started running,getting going, I was two 30.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
And you're what?
Six, two, six, one six, two,six, two six.
And you're what?
Speaker 3 (09:04):
6'2", 6'1", 6'2", 6'2", 6'2", you know, and at the
time there I was probably205-ish.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Okay so.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
So I had started the decline and you know, obviously
people had noticed.
You know, like, you know, Iknow my clothes are fitting
different, but you know I knew Icould do better, finish better.
I think my mile time there wasprobably like nine and a half or
10 or something like that, youknow, but you know I finished.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
After you finished, were you like I'm not going to
do this again?
Or were you pumped up and saidI finished, I'm going to sign up
for the next one?
Speaker 3 (09:39):
So I drove back to the hotel got out of the car and
I could barely stand up and ourhotel room was on the second
floor and then I made themistake of taking off my shoes
because my feet were swollen andeverything's just pounding.
(10:00):
It was pretty painful.
Where everything's pounding andyou're just so it was.
It was pretty painful.
I didn't um that.
That day I, you know, I took anap at the hotel, you know, and
you know you could telleverybody there was only a few
hotels there so all the runnerswere just kind of it was.
You know that this community'skind of tight so everybody stays
.
They know what hotels to stayat.
You know, I, I didn't know atthe time.
(10:20):
But so I go back to the hoteland everyone's just kind of.
You know they're trying torecover taped up blisters.
I think my, I think my unclerich, I think he lost like two
or three toenails and I mean itwas just sounds like fun, paul,
he was.
He come back to the.
We got back to tucson when wedrove back.
(10:41):
He goes.
I'll never do that again.
Did he ever, ever do it?
What?
Speaker 1 (10:44):
did he do?
He has never done it again.
No, well, I mean, if you gothrough that kind of pain, the
human spirit's kind of like,well, why the hell did I just do
that?
My toes are bleeding, I've gotblisters, I can't walk.
You probably take a week beforeyour body actually starts, or
maybe longer, depending on howbad a shape you are in um, it
had to cross your mind like,yeah, I'm not sure if I'm going
(11:05):
to do this again, or was itinstant, like man, I gotta do
this again yeah, it's, you getthis.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
You know they call it a runner's high.
I don't know what exactly youknow physically you call that,
but it's definitely euphoric,when you finish something, that
you look back and in retrospectyou look back and you go man,
that was pretty cool.
And then you look at the listof people that you know after
they post the results, and thenyou look at any like I actually
(11:36):
finished, I did, okay, you know,other than some people didn't
even finish.
I was like, okay, so a coupleof days after, I'm like, all
right, that was pretty cool.
So my aunt, she goes okay, well, what's the next race you're
going to do?
And I didn't even think I waslike oh, yeah, let's do another.
So I was like all right, let'sdo a half.
So I started looking into halfmarathons.
(11:57):
Um, and that's kind of whatstarted everything going.
I was like the next year, youknow, it was 20.
So I was like, well, what am Igoing to do?
So I started looking into theSan Diego halves and, um, the
San Diego, um, there's a bunchof half marathons.
So I was like, well, if I coulddo this for 2.1, I can, you
(12:20):
know, train up, start doing, getdecent times on a half.
So that's what started thatjourney.
I was like you know what I said.
This is you know, I likerunning, it keeps me in shape.
And then, from then, what Ireally did in 20 to 21 is when I
really started looking at mydiet and really getting into
(12:41):
physically taking care of myself, how to recover, how to train,
because in the beginning I wasreally doing too much, I was
loading up my body too much andgetting injured too often, too
much, too fast, right, and so Iwould have to Did you have a
coach besides your aunt givingyou some advice?
No, my aunt was the motivationcoach.
(13:03):
She would keep me um honest,hey, how many miles did you do,
you know?
And I would ask her, like ifshe had some injuries.
And I said hey, what, what didyou do to do this?
And I would ask some, somefriends that I started running
with, and they go hey, don't dothis, do this.
You need more salt, you needmore, you need more protein, you
(13:26):
need more.
You know, you know, kill thesugars or you know.
And then that is when it reallystarted taking off in my, my
times.
My, my lap time started to comedown and so and then I noticed
that, you know, I just startedfeeling really good after the
first year.
Man, I was just like I waspumped, and then I started I was
(13:48):
like, oh okay, let me see if Ican do this race, and then I
would skip a month or two andthen do one.
But I have races that I reallylike to do.
I like flat races because youcan really get a sense of where
you're at on your times training.
And so I just started doing alot of local races.
You know, here at the San Diego, I think the first half I did
(14:09):
was, um, the San Diego half yeah, it was a San Diego half and
then, um, I think that one's inApril and then in June is rock
and roll.
So I did the rock and roll halfwith a buddy of mine who was a
cross-country track star in highschool.
(14:29):
He actually went to SweetwaterHigh School.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
You're running all these.
You've got the running thingdown.
Obviously there's a lot ofmedals here that are triathlons,
ie, ironman races.
Yeah, at what point did you sayto yourself okay, I like this
(14:51):
running thing, but I'm gonnathrow some biking and swimming
into it.
And how did that evolve?
Speaker 3 (14:54):
so the triathlon was never even on my radar, never
even.
You know, I was marathon,marathon, marathon.
Get your time down.
You, you know cause I reallylike to stay around the three 45
time on my marathon.
So, um, the last, the lastmarathon I did in Oklahoma city,
(15:15):
uh, a couple of weeks ago, was,uh, I didn't do very well
because I I was just it was realhumid and I got really gassed
out.
I took off the first 15,.
I was just it was real humidand I got really gassed out.
I took off the first 15.
I was just gassed and I couldtell, like that's the other
thing, when you're, when you'rerunning, you can tell like your
body's like hey, you can't dothis right now, you gotta, you
(15:36):
gotta slow down.
I knew I wasn't going to makemy PR.
There's no, there's no sense ofcause.
Then it's like what, whatpurpose are you doing?
You're not going to win therace.
You know the, by the time yourealize that those guys, the
elite guys, are already finished.
You know, I think the guy thatwon Oklahoma city marathon this
year, it was like a two or two20 or something like that.
That's two, 15 or two 20,something like that.
(15:58):
Yeah, so you know, that's justnot me.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
Well, you're ultimately, in these races to
beat your best time right,you're competing against
yourself.
You want to progress.
Speaker 3 (16:10):
Yeah, yeah.
But as you're progressingyou're also getting older.
So you know you kind of have tobe realistic.
You know, plus there's time andyou got job and life and you
know just other things you gotto do.
You don't want it to fullyconsume your life, but it it.
It is good to stay focused onsomething and be active and stay
(16:33):
with it.
So when the triathlons got intoit, I got injured.
I was going to do an ultramarathon.
Uh, three years ago, definethat.
Anything over 26.2.
Okay, so I was going to do thenoble canyon.
It's a local race, um out inpine valley.
So you start pine valley, headup to mount laguna.
(16:55):
You do that loop up there onthe top of the hill and come
back down.
50k is what?
32, 32, about 32, 33 miles, butyou're at elevation in the sun
and it's hot.
So I went on a training run andI was getting.
I was about a month away fromdoing this 50K and I'm like, oh
(17:18):
man, I'm ready.
I was in shape, I was, I wasgogging out David Goggins was
you know in my head coming downthe hill.
I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I hit this rock.
And it was a pointy rock.
It was something I stepped on,I don't know what, but I
remember when I stepped on itand it felt really sharp on my
foot.
But it just kept running andI'm like, man, this is not
(17:42):
feeling good.
But I kept going.
I had to make it back.
So I got down and the next day Igot I was going to go to a
drone conference in Vegas andI'm like, man, my foot is really
not feeling good, but you know,the conference is a couple of
days maybe.
Got out there, got with mybuddy Skip, we got to the, the
(18:07):
convention center there, and myfoot was just.
I woke up the next day and itwas just swollen and I'm like,
man, something is not right.
And I'm in Vegas and so I cameback from the convention and
realized something was wrong.
I told my wife, I said I got togo to the doctor.
(18:29):
Of course, she had told me, hey, you should go to the doctor
before we go to Vegas.
And I'm like okay, yeah, allright, I'm good, I'm good.
What are you talking about?
I'm about to run anultramarathon, I'm invincible.
So I go to urgent care and thedoc's like, hey, you know, yeah,
let me get some x-rays.
This is probably not good.
I said okay whatever you know, Ithought it was sprain.
(18:51):
You know I was walking on itfor two days.
It was broke.
And he came back and I go lookman, I'm about three weeks away
from this ultra.
So what are we going to do?
Was there some kind of splint?
He goes no, you're not going tobe running for a couple months
and I was like, oh, no man, no,you wouldn't.
No.
(19:11):
And in the back of my mind, man, I was crushed, yeah, I bet,
crushed emotionally, and I'mlike and any runner out there
that has that knows, like whatI'm talking about you train for
and it doesn't matter if it's abike, if it's swim, it's run.
You go through this process andyou sacrifice time out of your
(19:35):
day.
You're eating, right, you're,you're.
You're turning down the burgers, you're turning down the pizza,
you're turning down the sugar,you're not doing soda.
Your're turning down the sugar.
You're, you're not doing soda.
You're, your coffee has nosugar.
You, you know everything,you're and you're feeling good.
And then you step on a rock andit snaps, and then you're done
and and you don't get money backfor these.
There's no, because you know,because you fail.
(19:56):
You know they can't.
You know that they're planningthe races.
They can't.
You know that.
They're planning the races.
They can't ask for money backfor.
So I told him.
I said, well, what's he goes?
Look man, he goes.
You're not running, I'm tellingyou right now.
I was like okay.
So after my self-pity, I waslike, well, this isn't good and
he goes, I'm gonna put a cast.
I said you're not putting acast on my foot?
(20:18):
I said that he goes.
Yeah, we got.
I said no, I'll wear a boot orsomething, man.
But I said I gotta gotta keepmoving.
And he told me he's like.
He looked at me for a coupleseconds and he realized he's
like like, yeah, um, okay, hegoes if you, if you stay off the
foot, I said.
(20:38):
And I asked him.
I said what about swimming?
And he goes, you coulddefinitely swim, but you have to
drag your feet and I don't wantyou swimming for at least a
couple of weeks.
And I was like okay, goodcompromise.
There's hope, and that's how Igot into triathlon.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Were you a swimmer before that?
No, no.
So where did you go swimming at?
Speaker 3 (21:00):
So Southwestern College down south bay, I'm
about a mile and a half fromthere.
So I said, well, that'sconvenient, it's kind of on the
way home from work, I can.
And I got in there and man, Iwas man.
The first hundred meters I wasdying.
I mean, I thought I was inshape because I could run all
different muscles.
Now swim, swim shape isdifferent.
(21:21):
Those guys are beasts.
I mean, you know the MichaelPhelps and all the Olympic guys.
It's crazy to realize how Imean, and they do it for years.
They're in the pool, sometimestwice a day, you know, and
they'll take a couple days offdepending on their training
schedule.
But you know, I went down therethere and I'm seeing these guys
(21:43):
swim and they're just just bam,bam, bam, flip, bam, flip, bam.
I'm like I could do that.
You know you can do it.
I get in there and I've gotregular shorts on, my goggles
are leaking.
These guys, you know, theseguys got caps on and snorkels
and fins and paddles.
I'm like man, what are you,let's say, swimming?
Of course they could swim withpaddles.
(22:03):
You know, you get in there realquick and realize that you are
out of shape and I'm like okay,this in my mind.
I'm like, well, this is goingto be good for my cardio so I
can stay, you know, fit and keeprunning.
So I still didn't even realizethe triathlon thing wasn't even
(22:24):
an issue.
A buddy of mine had mentioned,um, you know, he's like, hey, we
need your run.
There's like a, there's acouple relay races you can do in
these triathlon races and youknow the guys that can swim, the
guys that can bike, the guysthat can run, so they put those
three times together and that'syour finish time.
It's kind of like a relay andhe had been trying to get me to
do that for a long time.
But I just like, you know,whatever ocean swim, you know,
(22:46):
do I really want to put thatmuch time into it?
And I got in the water, man, andafter the first week I knew I
was hooked.
Yeah, because I'd already beenbiking.
Um, uh, my wife or my aunt hadgot me into biking and I'd been
doing that to kind ofcross-train, so I don't load up
my legs and my joints as muchwhen I'm running so I can kind
(23:08):
of spread it out a little bit.
And that's pretty typical, witha lot of endurance athletes
that do that.
You kind of want to cross-trainand work all the muscle groups.
I was like okay.
So once that third puzzle piececlicked in, man it was like I
don't even know how to explainit right.
It was like a drug man, I mean,and every time I got in the
(23:30):
pool I was like man, this ispretty fun.
And then my lap time startedcoming down.
I think my first hundred waslike two and a half minutes or
something like that.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
You know what's considered so decent.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
So these olympic guys are, you know they're doing it
28 seconds, yeah, they're I mean, and it's?
They're already in the showersby the time you finish yours you
know, so I'm like man, so I, Iand I started seeing my times
come down right.
I'm like, so a good, liketriathlon, like ocean swim time
(24:11):
is like 130, you know, in theocean, um, you know the pros are
finishing.
You know, 115s an hour, uh, one, no, uh a minute and 15 per 100
, per 100, got it, you know, andhow long is the swim an
international, which is what I.
I did my international and youcould do.
(24:32):
Olympics are a little bitshorter um the internationals.
I think it's like point 1.1 or0.8 or something like that,
depends on the course somecourses are a little different.
Uh, the first one I did was thesandy or the mission bay in san
diego, tries um, and it was sotechnical because you're in
transition, you come out of thewater but you're in the ocean,
(24:54):
not a swimming pool, correct?
Okay, so did you do any oceantraining?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
yeah, you have to.
Yeah, I was gonna say that's,that's not even comparable to a
swim.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
Yeah, and you're swimming with a wetsuit and
there's no lane, so you've gotto learn how to swim straight.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
A lot of guys are just, and then you're getting
pushed by the current.
Speaker 3 (25:15):
Yeah, I mean some of the bigger races that Ironman
puts on the full Ironmans theyhead out straight to like Kona
and all those.
Those guys are heading out inthe middle of the ocean and
dealing with the currents andbut the the local ones are like
the two I did were in the bay.
The Ironman I did in Oceanside.
It kind of went out in theHarbor of Oceanside, went out
(25:37):
toward the ocean.
And then you kind of doubleback into the Harbor.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
So ocean and then you kind of double back into the
harbor, so, but so you're notfighting six foot waves, right,
but I mean that'd be aninteresting race it.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
Yeah, it was.
We'll talk about the ironman.
Um, that was a totallydifferent experience in itself,
but the triathlons is why Istarted getting into that was
because of the recovery when Ibroke my foot.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
So what's the difference between I mean the
triathlon, the Ironman as Iunderstand it, swimming, biking,
running, different levels ofIronman?
Speaker 2 (26:13):
races distances.
Speaker 1 (26:17):
Ironman is the brand.
Yeah, at what point did you sayI've got got it?
Now that I've done a couple ofthese, I gotta get an iron man
metal it's.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
it had to be at the top of your list once I did the
first try when I when I did thattry in um, the the tri classic
is what it's called it it'sactually.
It goes out in the harbor rightright across from nTC.
In fact NTC is where thetransitions are.
Once I did that one I knew theIronman was attainable because I
(26:52):
knew I could ride 56 miles.
I knew I could swim thatdistance.
At this point I was alreadyswimming, you know, six, seven
miles a week in the pool, youknow, and I did a few ocean
swims.
I have a really good friend ofmine, that um.
He's a retired navy seal.
He went out with me and hiswife in their kayak and then we
(27:12):
just a couple miles in the oceanand swam back, you know.
So you really have to getcomfortable in.
If you're going to do an ironman, you have to get comfortable
in the ocean.
Some are in lakes, like um.
I think there was one this weekin new mexico, so obviously
they're doing in lakes.
But the most popular races withthe views, and you know, if
you're going to pay all thatmoney to do the race, do one
(27:34):
that you want to do, make it funoh, you get to pay for all this
too.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
Yes, yeah, well, you get the pain and the pay and the
pain and you pay, pay a lot.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
I see, yeah, each race is different.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
Sign me up.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
Yeah, really.
So the Ironman was attainableand I said you know why don't I
try and do one local?
I wanted to try and do one.
You know, at this point it'slike I've done a few marathons
and races in different citiesand you know it's fun to travel
there, but I'm like if I'm goingto do this Ironman I want to
(28:05):
stay kind of local and get somelocal support and really stay in
my, in my lane.
There was no obvious.
Obviously I was not going to winthis race, I was just want to
stay on my feet and man, what ashock that race was from the get
(28:25):
, from going and picking up yourpacket, to the next morning
when you start.
It was just Explain the shock.
In a good way.
Yeah, I mean the adrenalinewhen you go to pick up your
stuff.
I mean everybody's in shape,everybody's in shape,
everybody's in shape.
It's like a.
You know, it's 3 000.
I think it was about 3 000people and, and, and it was just
(28:49):
just an amazing to see adisplay of health athleticism
and I think, more of anything,it was like how dedicated people
are to the sport
Speaker 1 (29:02):
you know you'd have to be, though, in order to
compete in that, but not evencompete.
Just to finish.
Yeah, you have to.
This isn't something you youdon't make this decision
lightheartedly.
It takes years of training andand hard work, and pain and
everything else that goes alongwith that A lot of time.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
A lot of time and you have to do all three
disciplines and you have to dowhat's called block training, to
where you practice thesetransitions and you come off
your bike and go right into arun.
So I would head around Eastlakefrom my house, do 25, 26 miles,
come back and then do my looptwice, which is about six miles
(29:47):
and there's a few hills.
So I was like, wow, this is youknow.
So the first time I realizedthat, you know, once you get off
a bike and you start running,it's totally different.
It's not, you know, you got togive yourself some time, you got
to slow your pace down a littlebit, get in your groove,
getting your cadence going.
Um, that's why it's when I seethe, the pros do it.
It's amazing to see these guys,just you know, hopping a bike,
(30:08):
boom, boom, run, boom, boom boomyou know, yeah, they're,
they're ripping out their suits,their their transition bams are
already in it and they're gone.
You know, um, now that's whatthey do for a living.
But the technical side of thetriathlon is what really
attracted me, because it wasn'tjust like 26 miles of grinding
and, you know, getting your timedown.
(30:28):
It was okay.
You got to set up everything.
Shoes have to be right.
Right, you can get deductedpoints.
They can actually eliminate youfrom the race if you don't have
your helmet on at a certaintime.
Um, there's rules on the like.
Uh, the iron man ocean side waskind of was really neat because
they let us go on camppendleton and it was that I was
(30:52):
not ready for um, becausethere's so many hills.
It was like there's some 15, 12percent grades that were just
there, were people getting offwalking up these hills.
Yeah, so I I've done, I did alot of biking, so I you know I
was, you know I stayed on mybike and kept grinding up and I
think that's what killed me inmy run, because my runtime
(31:15):
wasn't what I wanted.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
And what were the distances on?
This is the one you justfinished up last month, right,
and what were the distances on.
This is the one you justfinished up last month, right
April 5th, and what were yourdistance, what are the distances
in this one?
Speaker 3 (31:26):
So the swim was 1.2.
Okay, the bike was 56.56 milesand then it was a half marathon.
It was fun.
It was so much fun it, when Igot to the end I was spent.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Yeah, I would imagine .
Speaker 3 (31:45):
I ran out of.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
And that's your biggest race to date, correct?
Speaker 3 (31:49):
Yeah, I mean I ran out of salt and my packs.
So the last five miles, four orfive miles, I had to stop at
every station and just poundelectrolytes because I I was
done.
What?
Speaker 1 (32:03):
do you carry salt electrolyte packets or what do
you?
What do you carry?
Speaker 3 (32:07):
tabs salt tabs, um gels, with, with caffeine and
carbohydrates, and you, just,you can't um you, once you get
to that point where you, youknow you're sweating and your
electrolytes are depleted, youcan't you.
You have to keep it coming in.
And if you get to the pointwhere you're already like okay,
(32:29):
I'm, I'm, I'm already tired, I'mdragging, it's too late, yeah,
you, you have to preload and youhave to, and that's part of the
you have to stay ahead of therace.
Speaker 1 (32:38):
You have to, can't get behind on it in your head
yeah, and you will be in so muchpain so quick.
Did you track your calories onthat run?
Yes, on that race.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
Yeah.
It was around 4,800 calories.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
Yeah, wow.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Yeah, yeah, and the marathon I just did last weekend
was or yeah, last weekend was3800 yeah, I liked.
Speaker 1 (33:08):
Um, when you uh told me about the iron man race and
you were pretty pumped up for it, I said listen, paul.
As soon as you know you workedall these years to do this race.
As soon as you're done, come onthe podcast.
People really like you.
Um, this is inspirational andyou're done.
Come on the podcast, peoplereally like you.
This is inspirational.
And you're like well, I got tolike leave in a couple of weeks
(33:28):
because I'm actually running amarathon.
So you come off this ridiculouswhere people probably take
months to recover, I mean, or atleast take a break.
I finally reached the apex of,or at least this race at this
point in your running career andyou tackle this beast and
(33:51):
you're successful.
No, sorry, ryan, can't come onthe podcast.
Speaker 2 (33:55):
I'm jumping on the road driving down to Oklahoma.
Speaker 1 (33:59):
Got to run another one in a few weeks Marathon.
That's dedication.
It's obviously a love for thesport.
It's fun.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
It's fun.
You know, the Oklahoma CityMarathon.
I man, you know, I've gotfamily in Oklahoma.
I have family that's reallyclose to that bomb site when it
went off.
So it, you know, it kind of,you know, touched home a little
bit.
But the race itself isorganized so well and it's so
(34:31):
supported.
And the course is moredifficult when people realize,
um, just because it's like long,rolling hills, you know, and
it's um every year I've beenthere it's the weather's almost
threatened to shut it downbecause of lightning.
Um, the Saturday before wherethey do the 5k.
(34:52):
I didn't do the 5k this year, Idid the 5k last year.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
I finished seventh in the 5k, so you ran a 5k.
Last year I finished seventh inthe 5k, so you ran a 5k.
And then the next day.
Speaker 3 (34:58):
You ran a marathon last year and I didn't do that
this year because my my timeseventh in is age group?
Speaker 1 (35:06):
is it based on age group or?
Uh, that was the entire race.
You took seventh place yeah,wow yeah, the old man good job
yeah, I was flying man.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
Yeah, I think I was like yeah, but three, I mean,
what is that?
3.2 yeah, so I was just for me,it was just like right, yeah,
go.
But I was torched and I felt itthe next day, so I couldn't yeah
I was like, nope, not doingthat this year, but I wanted to
do it because my, my brother andmy nephew, um, they've been
(35:37):
working really hard on gettingtheir weight down and getting in
shape, so I wanted to supportthem.
Did they run the race?
Yeah, so this year they did thehalf last year and they did the
half and the 5K this year aswell.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
And what was their journey like?
Where did they start from?
When you started motivatingthem?
Speaker 3 (35:58):
man, it's, you know, my, my brother, um, he travels a
lot for work and when you knowhe got, he started saying, hey,
I've been, I've been working onthis, my diet and all this stuff
like that, and man, he'sdropped a lot of weight, him,
and and my nephew, and my nephewstarted getting in the gym, you
(36:21):
know.
So you know, if I help motivatethem to do that, then that's
great.
You know a lot of guys that atmy church, you know they're like
, hey, man, you're inspiring me,if you can do it, I can do it.
And then they get out there andthey're like it's a lot of work
.
I'm like, yeah, it's a lot ofwork, you got to stay with it,
you got to sell it, right, youknow it's straight honesty.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
You know.
You look at these guys on theinternet that have achieved
greatness and their stories arestories of pain, perseverance,
goal setting it's.
You know, to achieve the bigprize is not easy, and that's
why most people don't do it.
You gotta give something up inorder to get something, uh.
(37:04):
So what are you giving up yourtime that you would do sitting
on the couch?
Uh, you know that.
Nice pizza when all yourbuddies are going out and pizza
and beer, right, these are thekinds of things you know, am I.
You know getting up on themorning when it's raining and
say every excuse in the book inyour head is going well, it's
raining, I don't need to go run,or it's this or that?
Oh, you know I.
(37:26):
You know it's difficult.
Um, and then achieving this,all of these metals, you know
some people might say, oh, he'sbrought all his medals out.
You know he's bragging.
No, it's not bragging if you'vedone it.
There's so much pain, hard work, blood, sweat and tears in this
.
He's proud, you're proud, I'mproud of you for what you've
(37:48):
accomplished in a very shortperiod of time, and we're going
to be throwing some pictures upthroughout this podcast so that
people can see your journey.
It's going to see hey, this iswhere you were and this is what
you've done and accomplished.
And by inspiring people outthere to become healthy, have
(38:09):
their spouse look at themdifferently, their clothes
fitting better, dropping themedications, right Big deal.
Sleeping better at nightPotentially living longer, right
.
Yeah, big deal.
Sleeping better at night,potentially living longer, right
.
So it's a worthy goal and it'sworthy to inspire people to
(38:32):
follow this health Plus.
You love it.
I mean, you're kind of addictedto it.
We don't have to talk aboutthat.
Speaker 3 (38:41):
Yeah, my wife says too, you can start backing down
a little bit now.
Do you think you're going to?
Speaker 1 (38:47):
back down.
How's your body?
I mean you look great.
Is your body yelling back atyou, your knees, your ankles.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
I haven't really had any issues.
The Ironman and and OceansideUm, the only thing that happened
there was in the morning you,it's really cold, and the way
that they filed us in the oceanit was maybe three or four, you
know, just kind of everybody'sfiling in, everyone was cramped
(39:16):
and you go in the chute at yourestimated lap time, right.
So I went in at the 135, 140lap time that's per hundred,
right so?
And everyone's just crammedtogether and you can't move and
your, your body's sitting therefor 45 minutes and you're just
everyone's just in my legs Icould just feel them tightening
(39:38):
up and I'm like no 45 minutes.
You're in the water before youwere released no, you're in this
shoot in the parking lot.
Ah, everybody was complainingabout this.
And then so you get in there,you get in the water.
It's freezing, it's 55, so coldpeople are.
People were hyperventilating,they were grabbing onto the
(40:01):
lifeguard uh, the buoys.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
Just because they weren't, they weren't ready they
didn't ocean that water, thatcold shock, yeah, where you
can't breathe, all of a sudden,that's a real thing.
Speaker 3 (40:12):
Yeah, people started freaking out, and if you're not
ready for that, it's prettyevident.
And so when I tightened up theback of my leg, my hamstring, I
was hoping that on the bike Icould stretch that out and get
it to where I was.
Like this is not going to begood if I don't get this
stretched out.
And I was like okay let me getto the run, and the first three
(40:36):
miles were good, and then it.
Then it starts tightening upand I'm like, yeah, I was trying
to get like a six 30,.
Uh, finish, I got a six 46.
Um, it was frustrating becauseof all the time you put into it.
And then you get into thatmorning and then you tighten up
and it's like you, those kindsof things you don't, you can't
(40:57):
prep for those.
Like you, those kind of thingsyou don't, you can't prep for
those until you actually do theevent.
Speaker 1 (41:02):
So it starts water goes water first water run bike
or bike water bike run boy, theyshould, is it?
Speaker 3 (41:11):
always that order.
Yeah, you kind of have to do itthat way, right, because you
don't want to you think thewater would be last.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
Well, you're done running and then go for your
swim and be out of it.
I mean, think about it, youdon't want people tired in the
water.
Yeah, I guess that makes sense,it's more likely to have an
injury or something.
Speaker 3 (41:31):
People were struggling, as it was, yeah.
You know, that was the firstevent and it's a little bit
different swimming with awetsuit right.
You know, that was the firstevent and it's a little bit
different swimming with awetsuit right, it's a different
swim.
Speaker 1 (41:39):
It's a different stroke.
You hit the bike and yourhamstring was tightened up and
never loosened up during thehole.
Mm-mm, At some point did youthink you're going to have to
cut out?
I wasn't quitting.
Speaker 3 (41:54):
Yeah, but see, it's that mentality that gets
permanent injuries happening youknow you made it.
It is what it is, and you ran amarathon.
Speaker 1 (42:03):
I'm finishing because you just scaled back a little
bit.
Speaker 3 (42:08):
Yeah.
So before the marathon I didn'teven.
I wanted to make sure that Iwas good at the marathon, so I
didn't even.
I didn't even do my normal runs, you know, two or three weeks
before I just kind of cruised,got on the bike, stayed loose,
took a couple of days off.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
After the Ironman stretched out, hydrate, you know
, got back into it, and when youwent to Oklahoma had it worked
itself out.
Speaker 3 (42:33):
Yeah, I didn't have any issue there.
It was just the, it was thehumidity was was.
Speaker 1 (42:38):
I was just the, I was so dehydrated toward toward the
end of that race air, trying tobreathe that thick, sticky air
and uh it was the.
Speaker 3 (42:46):
The morning was great oh, it was so cool, it was nice
.
The first 10 I was cruising ata you know eight minute.
I was just like, yeah, this.
And I felt good, I'm like I,you know.
When I got to mile 10, I'm likeI can, this is good, you know.
I felt good I'm like I'm gonnapr this.
I was shooting for like a 350and I finished at a 424.
(43:10):
Um, I was very and and I knewthat if I pushed it to that I
was going to hurt myself.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
Do you finish strong or do you steady?
The whole study, the whole time?
Speaker 3 (43:22):
What I, what I do, is , like some people call it the
wall, I just think it's.
You know, you're not hittingthe wall, you're just not.
You're not prepared.
You're not, you didn't becauseevery race is different.
You know, if it was 10 degreescooler, yeah, I wouldn't hit the
wall so soon.
I would have mile 18, 19instead of mile 16 or whatever,
um, but I just could not putenough salt in me and you know
(43:46):
it like you know do you startcramping up?
Speaker 1 (43:51):
what is it that you're feeling with the the salt
issue?
Speaker 3 (43:55):
you just your legs are really heavy, it's you can't
move, it's your every step.
And then I started gettingblisters, which I usually don't
get, which that kind ofsurprised me more than anything.
But I didn't, I didn't feellike I was like gonna be, you
know, like injure myselfpermanently.
(44:15):
It was more like like, justlike, just just the you could
feel like.
And then I'd stopped at um, um,uh, an outhouse, a commode and
a honey or the bathroom restroomthere, port-a-potty, and and it
was.
You know, I could tell by my,by my piss.
I was like this ain't good.
Speaker 1 (44:36):
I was like I just didn't, I couldn't.
And they didn't have drinkstations, or you just kind of.
Speaker 3 (44:40):
Every single one.
I stopped Every single one.
A glass of water, You're justsweating it out, sweating it out
, sweating it out Wow.
And it was still fun, thoughyou still had a good time.
Yeah, because I slowed down,because I saw it coming.
Speaker 1 (44:55):
You're listening to your body.
Speaker 3 (44:59):
And that's what.
That's what I was kind oftalking about.
You don't, yeah, you want to doyour best and you want to
finish, but you can't if you'regoing to hurt yourself, and then
it's not fun, you know you'llput yourself.
Speaker 1 (45:11):
You know, at the end of the race you'd be like, oh
yeah and you're, you know,you're, as you've been mentioned
earlier, getting older everyyear.
You have to kind of have toadjust that mentality Right In
our brains.
We're still teenagers, you know, we're still.
You know, I'll watch.
I ran track in high school andI'll watch and, man, I think I
could do that, you know.
And, um, you know, I'd be luckyto, you know, to make it around
(45:33):
the track once.
But in your mind you, you stillremember it and you feel it and
that adrenaline and you're likeI can get out there and do this
.
And you have to be smart, yeah.
Speaker 3 (45:45):
You got to take care of yourself.
It's a big, you know.
I looked at the Ironman resultsand you know there was 20, 28,
2,900 people that signed up forit and there was probably four,
three or 400 that didn't finish.
Oh wow.
Speaker 1 (46:04):
You know that's a, that's a, a physical beating,
and if you aren't prepared, Imean the training.
You know what did your trainingschedule look like three months
before?
Speaker 3 (46:16):
So you're leading up to that, you you're.
A lot of times you're doinglike I would go in the morning
wait train, knock out five mileson a salt fitness treadmill,
get home on the way home.
Monday, wednesday, friday swimTuesdays and Thursdays I would
(46:37):
swim with the master class downat Southwestern college.
Really good guys down there.
They just and they push you andyou need that.
You need to chase guys.
You know I never caught thoseguys.
I'm not going to catch them.
These guys are swimming incollege Olympics.
These guys are beasts.
That's just not me.
(46:57):
And so in the pool, these guysare putting out 112s, 115s, uh,
per hundred, and I'm like, yeah,I'm not gonna get that, but I'm
gonna try and achieve it right,and plus you learn fundamentals
, you're pushing yourselftechnique swimming is all
technique.
How?
Speaker 1 (47:15):
many miles a week.
Are you putting in on theground running?
Speaker 3 (47:19):
On the ground at least 30, 30 to 40.
Speaker 1 (47:25):
What's your average run?
Speaker 3 (47:27):
So I don't do anything less than six miles and
so usually, like on a Wednesday, saturday, sunday, it would be
my longer runs, like I'll doleading up to a marathon.
I didn't do my long runs onthis one because of the Ironman
Kind of messed up the schedulewith that, but usually I'll put
(47:49):
a 20-mile run three or fourweeks before the marathon and
taper back off of that, just tokeep your muscles from being
overstrained.
Yeah, it's time on your feet.
It's getting your feetconditioned.
It's getting your tendons, yourmuscles, your joints,
(48:09):
everything it needs to get usedto being on your feet for three
and a half, four hours.
The only way to simulate thatis to buy intensity.
So, whether you're doing a hitworkout, where you're doing a
high intensity um, hitting Hills, you know, getting your cardio
up, heart rate up, you know, um,or get, if you have the time
(48:31):
getting that, that long run, youcould even do it at a slower
pace, but you still got to get,get your time on your feet.
Speaker 1 (48:38):
Yeah, it's the, the movement, the joints, the one of
the things that I would noticeum I wrote when I'm in high
school coach would say you knowyou come back after summer not
running at all, and he wouldknow.
But the funny thing is is it'slike you're feeling
uncoordinated, you're runningaround the track and your body
just isn't flowing.
Yeah, and he says you know youdidn't run this summer Because
(48:59):
that's why you feel that way.
You know, you feel like everystep hurts, you feel like you
know you're going to break yourknees and then eventually you
get back into that running shapeand it just flows and your
joints are running and yourmuscles are working Everybody
can do something right.
Speaker 3 (49:17):
You don't want to hurt yourself.
You don't want to hurt yourself.
You don't want to get your, getyourself to a point where
you're like, because when youkeep getting injured it's
discouraging, it's not fun,right?
If it's not fun, you're notgoing to do it, right?
So, whether so, whether it'srunning or triathlon or biking,
if you just want to bike, justget out there and bike.
(49:38):
If you want to run, get outthere and run.
Some people can do.
You know.
Three miles a day, 10 miles aday, you know some people are
built for that.
You know the hardest thing isfinding something and sticking
with it.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
And if you don't stick with it and that's the
hardest thing for human beingsto do with anything.
Yeah, I mean studying, sticking.
Sticking to things is, you know, difficult, for you know your
brain gets bored.
You know, this is the neat thingabout what you're doing here is
you just didn't stick to.
You know the first five K orwhatever, the first half
(50:18):
marathon, you get pushingyourself.
Okay, you know something new,something different.
The other thing I love aboutthis is you get to go all over
the place.
You know you're not juststicking here in san diego,
you're going.
You know, all over the placefor these events.
Different scenery keeps thebrain stimulated.
Create vacation time with yourfamily, with your wife, wife,
(50:39):
and stay in shape.
Continue to move.
Speaker 3 (50:41):
I've got a good story for that the guy I was next to
at the Ironman.
He came from the East Coast andhe was I don't know if he was
like a semi-pro Ironman, he wassponsored, he had a really nice
bike and so I was getting sometips from him, just talking to
him, and I was telling him hewas sponsored, he had, you know,
really nice bike, and so I wasgetting some tips from him, just
talking to him, and I wastelling him.
I was like, hey, I was thinkingabout you know, if this one
(51:03):
goes, well, go and do another70.3 somewhere you know.
And he started.
He started telling me he wasfrom Jersey.
So the East coast Ironman's,there's jellyfish, Right.
And I'm like in the back of myhead I said, well, I'm not going
to East Coast, I am not goingto.
You know, that to me is notworth it.
(51:24):
There's a lot of jellyfish sothere's a line there, right?
Why do I want to go swim in theocean with a bunch of jellyfish?
You know they're not paying me.
Make you go faster.
You know what I mean?
It's like he goes.
Oh yeah, I mean I was gettingstung all the time and I'm like,
oh, look at this guy.
Speaker 1 (51:41):
I'm like, okay, I'm not that, you know yeah, you got
, you've got the spectrum of ofthese people that I mean, he's,
he's obviously maybe a semi-pro,but this, you know, these, this
, the spectrum of hey, this isfun, I'm competitive to, I'll do
absolutely whatever it takesand if I die doing it, I'm there
(52:03):
.
You know just that wholespectrum of people and you have
to swim with the sharks, swimwith the jellyfish.
Speaker 3 (52:08):
His time was.
I looked up his time after hewas an hour behind me.
Something went wrong in therace.
You know, and when I went topick up my gear, his bike bike
was still there, so that meanseither the run went south or he
cramped up, or whatever you justyou just don't, you know, you
just don't know you know, youdon't when I, when I it didn't
really hit me when I finished.
(52:28):
I you know, I there's some.
If you're familiar withoceanside, there's the junior
seo um, he's got a.
They named a rec center afterhim, so they have like an
amphitheater area where there'skind of kicking it and eating
and stuff like that.
And I just laid out I was done.
Speaker 1 (52:47):
But you're ready to do it again?
Speaker 3 (52:49):
Yeah, I can't wait to do it again.
Speaker 1 (52:52):
Hey, you sent me a picture of you with a gentleman
and I want to put it up on thepodcast.
You said he was um renowned inthe iron man world emilio de
soto.
Yeah, yeah I want to get thatpicture up he tell me about him.
Speaker 3 (53:06):
He is, so he's got a great story.
He would be a great person toput on he.
He started out man old schoolfirst triathlons and just
started competing.
He would ride his bike fromlike 100 miles up the coast,
(53:27):
like when he was in school.
I got hooked up with him from afriend of mine, pete, who I did
some work with, got introducedto him through another friend
and so he hooked me up withEmilio and that's where I got my
wetsuit and some of my runninggear, some shirts and stuff like
(53:49):
that.
I'm actually going to be doingsome drone stuff with him to
promote his company.
He's very famous in thetriathlon community.
Super nice guy super local,correct.
Speaker 1 (54:03):
He's out here in southern california yep we'll
have to get him on super, super,super nice guy does he compete?
Speaker 3 (54:09):
still, uh, I don't think he does.
Um, he's a mechanical engineer,you know, so he speaks our
language.
He's really just a super niceguy.
I mean, he's super fit.
Still, obviously, yeah, but he?
Speaker 1 (54:26):
What's his contributions to?
Speaker 3 (54:29):
So he realized by doing triathlons that the gear
wasn't you know, so he developedsome of the fabrics and the
cuts and his the t1 wetsuit iswhat I wear on triathlons.
Um it's a two-piece and so whenyou're swimming you it, you get
(54:50):
better.
Um extension so it doesn't feellike your wetsuit stretching out
pulling up on the side yeah,it's, it's what's called a bib
john, so that the bib john comesin, two piece, comes up over
unzip and then it's just a greatwetsuit, um the bottoms of five
mil, middles, three arms or two, so you get that flexibility um
(55:13):
yeah, so that picture you sawhe was was at Ironman in
Oceanside selling all his gear,and I got a tri bag from him and
a belt that I can put my bib on.
Speaker 1 (55:32):
Let's get him on the show.
Speaker 3 (55:33):
Yeah, yeah, he is for sure.
Speaker 1 (55:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (55:37):
Super nice guy.
Speaker 1 (55:38):
I love the idea of him re-engineering the sport?
Speaker 3 (55:42):
Yeah, and he's done a bunch and he competitive,
competitive.
You know, in his early days hewas a pro.
So when's the next race?
When is the next race?
Well, the, the 50 K, that ultraup at Noble Canyon.
I'm going to do that inSeptember.
Speaker 1 (55:57):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (56:00):
And the weekend before that is, I think, the san
diego try, you know.
So that'll be a good warm-upfor that the weekend before yeah
, the, the internationaltriathlons are very.
They're not very long, so itdepends, if you hit them hard,
you're gonna feel it for acouple days, but I but I, that
50 K man, that's a demon.
I gotta, I gotta kill thatthing because I was so ready for
(56:23):
that.
Speaker 1 (56:24):
Okay, yes, this is the one that you broke your foot
before.
Don't break your foot this time.
Stay off the trails, I might.
You never know.
Speaker 3 (56:31):
You know you don't know you know, so I, that one's
probably the next big one.
I'm not going to do rock androll this year.
There's too many people, it'sjust a mess at the beginning and
you can't get a good time.
Yeah, it's a party, basically.
It's basically yeah, and 30,000people is ridiculous.
Yeah, you can't even move.
And then if I, if I see acouple of trail races between I
(56:54):
like the trail races, cause Ilike being outside, and I and I
like it's a more technical race,it's definitely more
challenging.
Um, but you know these, youknow, whatever comes up,
sometimes I, I, you know someonewill come.
Hey, you want to do this one andI'll just just look at it yeah,
and just knock it out, andthat's kind of the advantage of
(57:16):
staying in shape you knowbecause you rotary's ready to go
.
Yeah, If I had to go do amarathon tomorrow then I'd just
check.
Speaker 1 (57:26):
I love it.
Throw on the shoes and go.
Well, keep it going.
Paul, Appreciate you coming outand telling the story.
The follow-up, yeah, thefollow-up.
See if you can break over30,000 views.
We'll throw some pictures up onthe podcast.
People can check out some ofyour races.
Appreciate it and talk to youlater cuckoo, All right baby,
All right bye.
Speaker 2 (57:47):
Later.
You've been listening to RealPeople, real Life.
Our passion is to have realconversations with real people
who've made it, real peoplewho've made it who did it on
their own terms.
We'll be back soon, but in themeantime, catch us on Twitter or
(58:08):
X at RPRL podcast and onYouTube at Real People Real Life
podcast.
You.
Welcome to Real People, Real Life.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
You know the sign is pretty dope.
I gotta admit I was prettyimpressed with that when you
came out with the new intro Alittle bit different, eh.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
I like it, man.
So you're back again, paul.
Yep, how you doing, ryan?
I'm doing good, man, I'm doinggood.
I got my 100,000 subscribers.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
I saw that.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Appreciate that to all the people out there.
Last time you were on, youactually have.
I should have looked it up.
I'm going to look it up.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Wow, looked it up.
I'm gonna look it up.
Wow, 30 705 views.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
That's just.
That's just the actual main one.
Okay, so that's youtube.
Yeah, all right, paul, you'reback.
Last time you were here, wekind of just covered a whole lot
of different things.
That video on youtube has over30 000 views in a couple months.
Yeah, that's just youtube.
We're not talking about all thepodcast channels.
The shorts probably have doublethat all the short videos.
(01:09):
People love your stories, greatcomments.
Wanted to get you back in witha little bit more focus.
As everybody can see, thetable's got all this bric-a-brac
on it.
We talked originally about yourjourney to health and a lot of
people I mean we've got the newhealth RFK Jr talking about
(01:31):
health and trying to get Americahealthy again.
2019 was an eye-opening momentfor you.
Why don't we walk through thatstory and then how it went from
2019 to this?
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So you know, like I mentionedbefore, my aunt was the one that
actually got me started.
I had known before that that Iwas, you know, needing to really
get healthy.
I mean it wasn't a an option forme.
(02:06):
I was really feeling, you know,sluggish and I couldn't sleep.
And you know, my wife was likehey, you're, you're snoring a
lot, you're keeping me up.
So I'm like you know what Ireally need to?
And then I just, you know, said, you know, I really need to
focus on myself.
Because if I can't really needto focus on myself, because if I
can't, you know, be healthy,then I can't be the best dad I
(02:28):
can be, or the best husband, andthen also at work, like you
know, I can't perform, you know,the best I can, either because,
um, I'm either tired or I'm outof shape.
And I'm just at the end of theday, I'm just, you know, fizzled
it fizzled out.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
How old were you?
2019?
Speaker 3 (02:46):
2019.
I was 43, 44.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Yeah, young man.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
So I had 43 going on about 62.
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:54):
I'm 51 this year.
So, man, it goes by quick, man.
So I realized that I needed todo something.
And my, I could tell by youknow, the look of my wife's face
, my kid, you know, my kids, youknow they were.
They weren't physically tellingme.
You know, hey, you know you're,you're getting big.
(03:16):
You know, something needs tochange.
This isn't what I married.
Um, yeah, I could see, I couldsee that.
So my aunt, you know, I made avisit out to Tucson where she
lives, and she's been biking andrunning her whole her whole
life and she made a couple ofcomments you know, hey, you know
you're not the, you know ashealthy as you were back in the
(03:39):
day.
Yeah, I mean in the Navy it wasa little bit easier because you
were required to stay healthyand be in shape, because you had
to be out there in the middleof the ocean on a ship, and so I
took that as a motivation.
And then I came back to SanDiego a couple months later and
(04:01):
she told me about this batonondeath march race and I'm like,
ah, that just doesn't even soundfun, you know.
I'm like and so I looked it upand you know, the history of the
baton death march was, you know, back in world war.
I believe it was uh two, uh,world war two.
Anyways, is the battle of baton, it was the it, it was the
(04:25):
trail of prisoners that weretaken through Bataan and held at
the camp and anyway.
So the Bataan Death March wasthat actual trail of soldiers
and veterans and locals thatwere held captive, that were
freed.
And so the baton death marchrace was, is held in, uh, white
(04:47):
sands, new mexico, at themissile range, and there's a
couple different races.
There's a full marathon throughthe mountains and then the army
gets involved, right, um, andthey ruck it and they'll,
they'll do the full 26 point.
I think it's actually more thana marathon.
It's uh, I, I don't know, it's26.8 or something like that.
(05:10):
Anyway, it's elevation gains of6 000 feet.
I mean it's, you know.
And then they'll do it in teamsand they'll do it in companies
and they'll do it in full gearand 50 pound, 50 pound or no, I
think it's 70-pound rucks.
Odd to verify that, but theseguys were the locals and
civilians were running it inrunning gear and shorts and
(05:32):
comfortable stuff and these guyswere in their boots and full on
and they had cannons there andthey had this 100-foot flag
draped over these cranes andthey had three of the actual
survivors of the baton deathmarch that were there to start
it.
Wow, and there was that year.
(05:54):
There was about in 2019, therewas about 32,000 or 33,000 and
it was 30 degrees outside.
It was cold.
Everybody just had throwawaysweats and I'm new to the game
so I didn't have anythingthrowaway, so I'm just throwing
on gloves and everything,because once you start moving
about mile five, you just startthrowing it away.
(06:15):
So that was the first race thatkind of actually started.
I had blisters.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
How unprepared were you.
In your mind what was yourmindset going into it?
Oh, this is not going to be,this will be no problem.
Your mind you're still thinkingyoung, still thinking in shape.
And your body said, no, I'm notgoing to have any of this.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Yeah, it was an eye-opener.
You know, adrenaline takes youabout through mile five, six and
then reality hits when you getin these, because it wasn't a
road race, it was road trail.
Then you hit some riverbeds soyou're cross-country, it's deep
sand.
So you know you, you thinkyou're prepared.
Now my aunt had you know, Ilistened to her and she gave me
(07:00):
some advice.
You know, you want to weargaiters so you don't get sand in
your shoes and that way youdon't get, you know, blisters.
And it was at elevation, I thinkstart elevation there was like
4,000.
You know, and I was running atsea level.
So you know, right off the bat,I'm like man, why am I so tired
(07:20):
?
You know, but you kind of getin the groove.
So once the adrenaline wearsoff, then you just kind of just
like, okay, I can, I could dothis, stop at the station, get
some water, get electrolytes,whatever, um, it wasn't till um,
toward the last couple miles,getting in there, really getting
that determination to say, okay, am I gonna finish this?
(07:41):
And this was a half right, thisis a fort.
That one was 14.1, a littleheavier than a half but it felt
like 100 miles, I mean, you know, because I had never done it.
So it was kind of it was kindof neat.
My wife was there, my daughterwas there, and and then I
finished and I waited for myaunt, my uncle they both ran it
(08:07):
my, my uncle Rich.
He came across a finish line.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
He's like.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
I'll never do this again.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
This is so stupid.
I don't know why people do youknow.
But my aunt, you know she justkind of.
You know she's a hundred andprobably 10 pounds soaking wet.
You know biking.
I mean, what am I going to tellmy aunt?
You know it's like, come on,you know, if she could do it, I
could do it.
You know, it's totally not likethat.
You really get a wake up callwhen you, when you start doing
(08:29):
these and that was the first onethat kind of got it going, and
I was just hooked after that.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
So you come on across the finish line.
Little over a half marathon yougot blisters on your feet.
I mean, how many more poundsdid you have on your frame back
then?
Listeners on your feet I mean,how many more pounds did you
have on your frame back then?
Speaker 3 (08:45):
So when I started, my son went to bootcamp in 2018, I
believe.
So I had started about the timehe went to bootcamp and I, when
I first started running,getting going, I was two 30.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
And you're what?
Six, two, six, one six, two,six, two six.
And you're what?
Speaker 3 (09:04):
6'2", 6'1", 6'2", 6'2", 6'2", you know, and at the
time there I was probably205-ish.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Okay so.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
So I had started the decline and you know, obviously
people had noticed.
You know, like, you know, Iknow my clothes are fitting
different, but you know I knew Icould do better, finish better.
I think my mile time there wasprobably like nine and a half or
10 or something like that, youknow, but you know I finished.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
After you finished, were you like I'm not going to
do this again?
Or were you pumped up and saidI finished, I'm going to sign up
for the next one?
Speaker 3 (09:39):
So I drove back to the hotel got out of the car and
I could barely stand up and ourhotel room was on the second
floor and then I made themistake of taking off my shoes
because my feet were swollen andeverything's just pounding.
(10:00):
It was pretty painful.
Where everything's pounding andyou're just so it was.
It was pretty painful.
I didn't um that.
That day I, you know, I took anap at the hotel, you know, and
you know you could telleverybody there was only a few
hotels there so all the runnerswere just kind of it was.
You know that this community'skind of tight so everybody stays
.
They know what hotels to stayat.
You know, I, I didn't know atthe time.
(10:20):
But so I go back to the hoteland everyone's just kind of.
You know they're trying torecover taped up blisters.
I think my, I think my unclerich, I think he lost like two
or three toenails and I mean itwas just sounds like fun, paul,
he was.
He come back to the.
We got back to tucson when wedrove back.
(10:41):
He goes.
I'll never do that again.
Did he ever, ever do it?
What?
Speaker 1 (10:44):
did he do?
He has never done it again.
No, well, I mean, if you gothrough that kind of pain, the
human spirit's kind of like,well, why the hell did I just do
that?
My toes are bleeding, I've gotblisters, I can't walk.
You probably take a week beforeyour body actually starts, or
maybe longer, depending on howbad a shape you are in um, it
had to cross your mind like,yeah, I'm not sure if I'm going
(11:05):
to do this again, or was itinstant, like man, I gotta do
this again yeah, it's, you getthis.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
You know they call it a runner's high.
I don't know what exactly youknow physically you call that,
but it's definitely euphoric,when you finish something, that
you look back and in retrospectyou look back and you go man,
that was pretty cool.
And then you look at the listof people that you know after
they post the results, and thenyou look at any like I actually
(11:36):
finished, I did, okay, you know,other than some people didn't
even finish.
I was like, okay, so a coupleof days after, I'm like, all
right, that was pretty cool.
So my aunt, she goes okay, well, what's the next race you're
going to do?
And I didn't even think I waslike oh, yeah, let's do another.
So I was like all right, let'sdo a half.
So I started looking into halfmarathons.
(11:57):
Um, and that's kind of whatstarted everything going.
I was like the next year, youknow, it was 20.
So I was like, well, what am Igoing to do?
So I started looking into theSan Diego halves and, um, the
San Diego, um, there's a bunchof half marathons.
So I was like, well, if I coulddo this for 2.1, I can, you
(12:20):
know, train up, start doing, getdecent times on a half.
So that's what started thatjourney.
I was like you know what I said.
This is you know, I likerunning, it keeps me in shape.
And then, from then, what Ireally did in 20 to 21 is when I
really started looking at mydiet and really getting into
(12:41):
physically taking care of myself, how to recover, how to train,
because in the beginning I wasreally doing too much, I was
loading up my body too much andgetting injured too often, too
much, too fast, right, and so Iwould have to Did you have a
coach besides your aunt givingyou some advice?
No, my aunt was the motivationcoach.
(13:03):
She would keep me um honest,hey, how many miles did you do,
you know?
And I would ask her, like ifshe had some injuries.
And I said hey, what, what didyou do to do this?
And I would ask some, somefriends that I started running
with, and they go hey, don't dothis, do this.
You need more salt, you needmore, you need more protein, you
(13:26):
need more.
You know, you know, kill thesugars or you know.
And then that is when it reallystarted taking off in my, my
times.
My, my lap time started to comedown and so and then I noticed
that, you know, I just startedfeeling really good after the
first year.
Man, I was just like I waspumped, and then I started I was
(13:48):
like, oh okay, let me see if Ican do this race, and then I
would skip a month or two andthen do one.
But I have races that I reallylike to do.
I like flat races because youcan really get a sense of where
you're at on your times training.
And so I just started doing alot of local races.
You know, here at the San Diego, I think the first half I did
(14:09):
was, um, the San Diego half yeah, it was a San Diego half and
then, um, I think that one's inApril and then in June is rock
and roll.
So I did the rock and roll halfwith a buddy of mine who was a
cross-country track star in highschool.
(14:29):
He actually went to SweetwaterHigh School.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
You're running all these.
You've got the running thingdown.
Obviously there's a lot ofmedals here that are triathlons,
ie, ironman races.
Yeah, at what point did you sayto yourself okay, I like this
(14:51):
running thing, but I'm gonnathrow some biking and swimming
into it.
And how did that evolve?
Speaker 3 (14:54):
so the triathlon was never even on my radar, never
even.
You know, I was marathon,marathon, marathon.
Get your time down.
You, you know cause I reallylike to stay around the three 45
time on my marathon.
So, um, the last, the lastmarathon I did in Oklahoma city,
(15:15):
uh, a couple of weeks ago, was,uh, I didn't do very well
because I I was just it was realhumid and I got really gassed
out.
I took off the first 15,.
I was just it was real humidand I got really gassed out.
I took off the first 15.
I was just gassed and I couldtell, like that's the other
thing, when you're, when you'rerunning, you can tell like your
body's like hey, you can't dothis right now, you gotta, you
(15:36):
gotta slow down.
I knew I wasn't going to makemy PR.
There's no, there's no sense ofcause.
Then it's like what, whatpurpose are you doing?
You're not going to win therace.
You know the, by the time yourealize that those guys, the
elite guys, are already finished.
You know, I think the guy thatwon Oklahoma city marathon this
year, it was like a two or two20 or something like that.
That's two, 15 or two 20,something like that.
(15:58):
Yeah, so you know, that's justnot me.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
Well, you're ultimately, in these races to
beat your best time right,you're competing against
yourself.
You want to progress.
Speaker 3 (16:10):
Yeah, yeah.
But as you're progressingyou're also getting older.
So you know you kind of have tobe realistic.
You know, plus there's time andyou got job and life and you
know just other things you gotto do.
You don't want it to fullyconsume your life, but it it.
It is good to stay focused onsomething and be active and stay
(16:33):
with it.
So when the triathlons got intoit, I got injured.
I was going to do an ultramarathon.
Uh, three years ago, definethat.
Anything over 26.2.
Okay, so I was going to do thenoble canyon.
It's a local race, um out inpine valley.
So you start pine valley, headup to mount laguna.
(16:55):
You do that loop up there onthe top of the hill and come
back down.
50k is what?
32, 32, about 32, 33 miles, butyou're at elevation in the sun
and it's hot.
So I went on a training run andI was getting.
I was about a month away fromdoing this 50K and I'm like, oh
(17:18):
man, I'm ready.
I was in shape, I was, I wasgogging out David Goggins was
you know in my head coming downthe hill.
I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I hit this rock.
And it was a pointy rock.
It was something I stepped on,I don't know what, but I
remember when I stepped on itand it felt really sharp on my
foot.
But it just kept running andI'm like, man, this is not
(17:42):
feeling good.
But I kept going.
I had to make it back.
So I got down and the next day Igot I was going to go to a
drone conference in Vegas andI'm like, man, my foot is really
not feeling good, but you know,the conference is a couple of
days maybe.
Got out there, got with mybuddy Skip, we got to the, the
(18:07):
convention center there, and myfoot was just.
I woke up the next day and itwas just swollen and I'm like,
man, something is not right.
And I'm in Vegas and so I cameback from the convention and
realized something was wrong.
I told my wife, I said I got togo to the doctor.
(18:29):
Of course, she had told me, hey, you should go to the doctor
before we go to Vegas.
And I'm like okay, yeah, allright, I'm good, I'm good.
What are you talking about?
I'm about to run anultramarathon, I'm invincible.
So I go to urgent care and thedoc's like, hey, you know, yeah,
let me get some x-rays.
This is probably not good.
I said okay whatever you know, Ithought it was sprain.
(18:51):
You know I was walking on itfor two days.
It was broke.
And he came back and I go lookman, I'm about three weeks away
from this ultra.
So what are we going to do?
Was there some kind of splint?
He goes no, you're not going tobe running for a couple months
and I was like, oh, no man, no,you wouldn't.
No.
(19:11):
And in the back of my mind, man, I was crushed, yeah, I bet,
crushed emotionally, and I'mlike and any runner out there
that has that knows, like whatI'm talking about you train for
and it doesn't matter if it's abike, if it's swim, it's run.
You go through this process andyou sacrifice time out of your
(19:35):
day.
You're eating, right, you're,you're.
You're turning down the burgers, you're turning down the pizza,
you're turning down the sugar,you're not doing soda.
Your're turning down the sugar.
You're, you're not doing soda.
You're, your coffee has nosugar.
You, you know everything,you're and you're feeling good.
And then you step on a rock andit snaps, and then you're done
and and you don't get money backfor these.
There's no, because you know,because you fail.
(19:56):
You know they can't.
You know that they're planningthe races.
They can't.
You know that.
They're planning the races.
They can't ask for money backfor.
So I told him.
I said, well, what's he goes?
Look man, he goes.
You're not running, I'm tellingyou right now.
I was like okay.
So after my self-pity, I waslike, well, this isn't good and
he goes, I'm gonna put a cast.
I said you're not putting acast on my foot?
(20:18):
I said that he goes.
Yeah, we got.
I said no, I'll wear a boot orsomething, man.
But I said I gotta gotta keepmoving.
And he told me he's like.
He looked at me for a coupleseconds and he realized he's
like like, yeah, um, okay, hegoes if you, if you stay off the
foot, I said.
(20:38):
And I asked him.
I said what about swimming?
And he goes, you coulddefinitely swim, but you have to
drag your feet and I don't wantyou swimming for at least a
couple of weeks.
And I was like okay, goodcompromise.
There's hope, and that's how Igot into triathlon.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Were you a swimmer before that?
No, no.
So where did you go swimming at?
Speaker 3 (21:00):
So Southwestern College down south bay, I'm
about a mile and a half fromthere.
So I said, well, that'sconvenient, it's kind of on the
way home from work, I can.
And I got in there and man, Iwas man.
The first hundred meters I wasdying.
I mean, I thought I was inshape because I could run all
different muscles.
Now swim, swim shape isdifferent.
(21:21):
Those guys are beasts.
I mean, you know the MichaelPhelps and all the Olympic guys.
It's crazy to realize how Imean, and they do it for years.
They're in the pool, sometimestwice a day, you know, and
they'll take a couple days offdepending on their training
schedule.
But you know, I went down therethere and I'm seeing these guys
(21:43):
swim and they're just just bam,bam, bam, flip, bam, flip, bam.
I'm like I could do that.
You know you can do it.
I get in there and I've gotregular shorts on, my goggles
are leaking.
These guys, you know, theseguys got caps on and snorkels
and fins and paddles.
I'm like man, what are you,let's say, swimming?
Of course they could swim withpaddles.
(22:03):
You know, you get in there realquick and realize that you are
out of shape and I'm like okay,this in my mind.
I'm like, well, this is goingto be good for my cardio so I
can stay, you know, fit and keeprunning.
So I still didn't even realizethe triathlon thing wasn't even
(22:24):
an issue.
A buddy of mine had mentioned,um, you know, he's like, hey, we
need your run.
There's like a, there's acouple relay races you can do in
these triathlon races and youknow the guys that can swim, the
guys that can bike, the guysthat can run, so they put those
three times together and that'syour finish time.
It's kind of like a relay andhe had been trying to get me to
do that for a long time.
But I just like, you know,whatever ocean swim, you know,
(22:46):
do I really want to put thatmuch time into it?
And I got in the water, man, andafter the first week I knew I
was hooked.
Yeah, because I'd already beenbiking.
Um, uh, my wife or my aunt hadgot me into biking and I'd been
doing that to kind ofcross-train, so I don't load up
my legs and my joints as muchwhen I'm running so I can kind
(23:08):
of spread it out a little bit.
And that's pretty typical, witha lot of endurance athletes
that do that.
You kind of want to cross-trainand work all the muscle groups.
I was like okay.
So once that third puzzle piececlicked in, man it was like I
don't even know how to explainit right.
It was like a drug man, I mean,and every time I got in the
(23:30):
pool I was like man, this ispretty fun.
And then my lap time startedcoming down.
I think my first hundred waslike two and a half minutes or
something like that.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
You know what's considered so decent.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
So these olympic guys are, you know they're doing it
28 seconds, yeah, they're I mean, and it's?
They're already in the showersby the time you finish yours you
know, so I'm like man, so I, Iand I started seeing my times
come down right.
I'm like, so a good, liketriathlon, like ocean swim time
(24:11):
is like 130, you know, in theocean, um, you know the pros are
finishing.
You know, 115s an hour, uh, one, no, uh a minute and 15 per 100
, per 100, got it, you know, andhow long is the swim an
international, which is what I.
I did my international and youcould do.
(24:32):
Olympics are a little bitshorter um the internationals.
I think it's like point 1.1 or0.8 or something like that,
depends on the course somecourses are a little different.
Uh, the first one I did was thesandy or the mission bay in san
diego, tries um, and it was sotechnical because you're in
transition, you come out of thewater but you're in the ocean,
(24:54):
not a swimming pool, correct?
Okay, so did you do any oceantraining?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
yeah, you have to.
Yeah, I was gonna say that's,that's not even comparable to a
swim.
Speaker 3 (25:03):
Yeah, and you're swimming with a wetsuit and
there's no lane, so you've gotto learn how to swim straight.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
A lot of guys are just, and then you're getting
pushed by the current.
Speaker 3 (25:15):
Yeah, I mean some of the bigger races that Ironman
puts on the full Ironmans theyhead out straight to like Kona
and all those.
Those guys are heading out inthe middle of the ocean and
dealing with the currents andbut the the local ones are like
the two I did were in the bay.
The Ironman I did in Oceanside.
It kind of went out in theHarbor of Oceanside, went out
(25:37):
toward the ocean.
And then you kind of doubleback into the Harbor.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
So ocean and then you kind of double back into the
harbor, so, but so you're notfighting six foot waves, right,
but I mean that'd be aninteresting race it.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
Yeah, it was.
We'll talk about the ironman.
Um, that was a totallydifferent experience in itself,
but the triathlons is why Istarted getting into that was
because of the recovery when Ibroke my foot.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
So what's the difference between I mean the
triathlon, the Ironman as Iunderstand it, swimming, biking,
running, different levels ofIronman?
Speaker 2 (26:13):
races distances.
Speaker 1 (26:17):
Ironman is the brand.
Yeah, at what point did you sayI've got got it?
Now that I've done a couple ofthese, I gotta get an iron man
metal it's.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
it had to be at the top of your list once I did the
first try when I when I did thattry in um, the the tri classic
is what it's called it it'sactually.
It goes out in the harbor rightright across from nTC.
In fact NTC is where thetransitions are.
Once I did that one I knew theIronman was attainable because I
(26:52):
knew I could ride 56 miles.
I knew I could swim thatdistance.
At this point I was alreadyswimming, you know, six, seven
miles a week in the pool, youknow, and I did a few ocean
swims.
I have a really good friend ofmine, that um.
He's a retired navy seal.
He went out with me and hiswife in their kayak and then we
(27:12):
just a couple miles in the oceanand swam back, you know.
So you really have to getcomfortable in.
If you're going to do an ironman, you have to get comfortable
in the ocean.
Some are in lakes, like um.
I think there was one this weekin new mexico, so obviously
they're doing in lakes.
But the most popular races withthe views, and you know, if
you're going to pay all thatmoney to do the race, do one
(27:34):
that you want to do, make it funoh, you get to pay for all this
too.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
Yes, yeah, well, you get the pain and the pay and the
pain and you pay, pay a lot.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
I see, yeah, each race is different.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
Sign me up.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
Yeah, really.
So the Ironman was attainableand I said you know why don't I
try and do one local?
I wanted to try and do one.
You know, at this point it'slike I've done a few marathons
and races in different citiesand you know it's fun to travel
there, but I'm like if I'm goingto do this Ironman I want to
(28:05):
stay kind of local and get somelocal support and really stay in
my, in my lane.
There was no obvious.
Obviously I was not going to winthis race, I was just want to
stay on my feet and man, what ashock that race was from the get
(28:25):
, from going and picking up yourpacket, to the next morning
when you start.
It was just Explain the shock.
In a good way.
Yeah, I mean the adrenalinewhen you go to pick up your
stuff.
I mean everybody's in shape,everybody's in shape,
everybody's in shape.
It's like a.
You know, it's 3 000.
I think it was about 3 000people and, and, and it was just
(28:49):
just an amazing to see adisplay of health athleticism
and I think, more of anything,it was like how dedicated people
are to the sport
Speaker 1 (29:02):
you know you'd have to be, though, in order to
compete in that, but not evencompete.
Just to finish.
Yeah, you have to.
This isn't something you youdon't make this decision
lightheartedly.
It takes years of training andand hard work, and pain and
everything else that goes alongwith that A lot of time.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
A lot of time and you have to do all three
disciplines and you have to dowhat's called block training, to
where you practice thesetransitions and you come off
your bike and go right into arun.
So I would head around Eastlakefrom my house, do 25, 26 miles,
come back and then do my looptwice, which is about six miles
(29:47):
and there's a few hills.
So I was like, wow, this is youknow.
So the first time I realizedthat, you know, once you get off
a bike and you start running,it's totally different.
It's not, you know, you got togive yourself some time, you got
to slow your pace down a littlebit, get in your groove,
getting your cadence going.
Um, that's why it's when I seethe, the pros do it.
It's amazing to see these guys,just you know, hopping a bike,
(30:08):
boom, boom, run, boom, boom boomyou know, yeah, they're,
they're ripping out their suits,their their transition bams are
already in it and they're gone.
You know, um, now that's whatthey do for a living.
But the technical side of thetriathlon is what really
attracted me, because it wasn'tjust like 26 miles of grinding
and, you know, getting your timedown.
(30:28):
It was okay.
You got to set up everything.
Shoes have to be right.
Right, you can get deductedpoints.
They can actually eliminate youfrom the race if you don't have
your helmet on at a certaintime.
Um, there's rules on the like.
Uh, the iron man ocean side waskind of was really neat because
they let us go on camppendleton and it was that I was
(30:52):
not ready for um, becausethere's so many hills.
It was like there's some 15, 12percent grades that were just
there, were people getting offwalking up these hills.
Yeah, so I I've done, I did alot of biking, so I you know I
was, you know I stayed on mybike and kept grinding up and I
think that's what killed me inmy run, because my runtime
(31:15):
wasn't what I wanted.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
And what were the distances on?
This is the one you justfinished up last month, right,
and what were the distances on.
This is the one you justfinished up last month, right
April 5th, and what were yourdistance, what are the distances
in this one?
Speaker 3 (31:26):
So the swim was 1.2.
Okay, the bike was 56.56 milesand then it was a half marathon.
It was fun.
It was so much fun it, when Igot to the end I was spent.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Yeah, I would imagine .
Speaker 3 (31:45):
I ran out of.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
And that's your biggest race to date, correct?
Speaker 3 (31:49):
Yeah, I mean I ran out of salt and my packs.
So the last five miles, four orfive miles, I had to stop at
every station and just poundelectrolytes because I I was
done.
What?
Speaker 1 (32:03):
do you carry salt electrolyte packets or what do
you?
What do you carry?
Speaker 3 (32:07):
tabs salt tabs, um gels, with, with caffeine and
carbohydrates, and you, just,you can't um you, once you get
to that point where you, youknow you're sweating and your
electrolytes are depleted, youcan't you.
You have to keep it coming in.
And if you get to the pointwhere you're already like okay,
(32:29):
I'm, I'm, I'm already tired, I'mdragging, it's too late, yeah,
you, you have to preload and youhave to, and that's part of the
you have to stay ahead of therace.
Speaker 1 (32:38):
You have to, can't get behind on it in your head
yeah, and you will be in so muchpain so quick.
Did you track your calories onthat run?
Yes, on that race.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
Yeah.
It was around 4,800 calories.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
Yeah, wow.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Yeah, yeah, and the marathon I just did last weekend
was or yeah, last weekend was3800 yeah, I liked.
Speaker 1 (33:08):
Um, when you uh told me about the iron man race and
you were pretty pumped up for it, I said listen, paul.
As soon as you know you workedall these years to do this race.
As soon as you're done, come onthe podcast.
People really like you.
Um, this is inspirational andyou're done.
Come on the podcast, peoplereally like you.
This is inspirational.
And you're like well, I got tolike leave in a couple of weeks
(33:28):
because I'm actually running amarathon.
So you come off this ridiculouswhere people probably take
months to recover, I mean, or atleast take a break.
I finally reached the apex of,or at least this race at this
point in your running career andyou tackle this beast and
(33:51):
you're successful.
No, sorry, ryan, can't come onthe podcast.
Speaker 2 (33:55):
I'm jumping on the road driving down to Oklahoma.
Speaker 1 (33:59):
Got to run another one in a few weeks Marathon.
That's dedication.
It's obviously a love for thesport.
It's fun.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
It's fun.
You know, the Oklahoma CityMarathon.
I man, you know, I've gotfamily in Oklahoma.
I have family that's reallyclose to that bomb site when it
went off.
So it, you know, it kind of,you know, touched home a little
bit.
But the race itself isorganized so well and it's so
(34:31):
supported.
And the course is moredifficult when people realize,
um, just because it's like long,rolling hills, you know, and
it's um every year I've beenthere it's the weather's almost
threatened to shut it downbecause of lightning.
Um, the Saturday before wherethey do the 5k.
(34:52):
I didn't do the 5k this year, Idid the 5k last year.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
I finished seventh in the 5k, so you ran a 5k.
Last year I finished seventh inthe 5k, so you ran a 5k.
And then the next day.
Speaker 3 (34:58):
You ran a marathon last year and I didn't do that
this year because my my timeseventh in is age group?
Speaker 1 (35:06):
is it based on age group or?
Uh, that was the entire race.
You took seventh place yeah,wow yeah, the old man good job
yeah, I was flying man.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
Yeah, I think I was like yeah, but three, I mean,
what is that?
3.2 yeah, so I was just for me,it was just like right, yeah,
go.
But I was torched and I felt itthe next day, so I couldn't yeah
I was like, nope, not doingthat this year, but I wanted to
do it because my, my brother andmy nephew, um, they've been
(35:37):
working really hard on gettingtheir weight down and getting in
shape, so I wanted to supportthem.
Did they run the race?
Yeah, so this year they did thehalf last year and they did the
half and the 5K this year aswell.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
And what was their journey like?
Where did they start from?
When you started motivatingthem?
Speaker 3 (35:58):
man, it's, you know, my, my brother, um, he travels a
lot for work and when you knowhe got, he started saying, hey,
I've been, I've been working onthis, my diet and all this stuff
like that, and man, he'sdropped a lot of weight, him,
and and my nephew, and my nephewstarted getting in the gym, you
(36:21):
know.
So you know, if I help motivatethem to do that, then that's
great.
You know a lot of guys that atmy church, you know they're like
, hey, man, you're inspiring me,if you can do it, I can do it.
And then they get out there andthey're like it's a lot of work
.
I'm like, yeah, it's a lot ofwork, you got to stay with it,
you got to sell it, right, youknow it's straight honesty.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
You know.
You look at these guys on theinternet that have achieved
greatness and their stories arestories of pain, perseverance,
goal setting it's.
You know, to achieve the bigprize is not easy, and that's
why most people don't do it.
You gotta give something up inorder to get something, uh.
(37:04):
So what are you giving up yourtime that you would do sitting
on the couch?
Uh, you know that.
Nice pizza when all yourbuddies are going out and pizza
and beer, right, these are thekinds of things you know, am I.
You know getting up on themorning when it's raining and
say every excuse in the book inyour head is going well, it's
raining, I don't need to go run,or it's this or that?
Oh, you know I.
(37:26):
You know it's difficult.
Um, and then achieving this,all of these metals, you know
some people might say, oh, he'sbrought all his medals out.
You know he's bragging.
No, it's not bragging if you'vedone it.
There's so much pain, hard work, blood, sweat and tears in this
.
He's proud, you're proud, I'mproud of you for what you've
(37:48):
accomplished in a very shortperiod of time, and we're going
to be throwing some pictures upthroughout this podcast so that
people can see your journey.
It's going to see hey, this iswhere you were and this is what
you've done and accomplished.
And by inspiring people outthere to become healthy, have
(38:09):
their spouse look at themdifferently, their clothes
fitting better, dropping themedications, right Big deal.
Sleeping better at nightPotentially living longer, right
.
Yeah, big deal.
Sleeping better at night,potentially living longer, right
.
So it's a worthy goal and it'sworthy to inspire people to
(38:32):
follow this health Plus.
You love it.
I mean, you're kind of addictedto it.
We don't have to talk aboutthat.
Speaker 3 (38:41):
Yeah, my wife says too, you can start backing down
a little bit now.
Do you think you're going to?
Speaker 1 (38:47):
back down.
How's your body?
I mean you look great.
Is your body yelling back atyou, your knees, your ankles.
Speaker 3 (38:55):
I haven't really had any issues.
The Ironman and and OceansideUm, the only thing that happened
there was in the morning you,it's really cold, and the way
that they filed us in the oceanit was maybe three or four, you
know, just kind of everybody'sfiling in, everyone was cramped
(39:16):
and you go in the chute at yourestimated lap time, right.
So I went in at the 135, 140lap time that's per hundred,
right so?
And everyone's just crammedtogether and you can't move and
your, your body's sitting therefor 45 minutes and you're just
everyone's just in my legs Icould just feel them tightening
(39:38):
up and I'm like no 45 minutes.
You're in the water before youwere released no, you're in this
shoot in the parking lot.
Ah, everybody was complainingabout this.
And then so you get in there,you get in the water.
It's freezing, it's 55, so coldpeople are.
People were hyperventilating,they were grabbing onto the
(40:01):
lifeguard uh, the buoys.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
Just because they weren't, they weren't ready they
didn't ocean that water, thatcold shock, yeah, where you
can't breathe, all of a sudden,that's a real thing.
Speaker 3 (40:12):
Yeah, people started freaking out, and if you're not
ready for that, it's prettyevident.
And so when I tightened up theback of my leg, my hamstring, I
was hoping that on the bike Icould stretch that out and get
it to where I was.
Like this is not going to begood if I don't get this
stretched out.
And I was like okay let me getto the run, and the first three
(40:36):
miles were good, and then it.
Then it starts tightening upand I'm like, yeah, I was trying
to get like a six 30,.
Uh, finish, I got a six 46.
Um, it was frustrating becauseof all the time you put into it.
And then you get into thatmorning and then you tighten up
and it's like you, those kindsof things you don't, you can't
(40:57):
prep for those.
Like you, those kind of thingsyou don't, you can't prep for
those until you actually do theevent.
Speaker 1 (41:02):
So it starts water goes water first water run bike
or bike water bike run boy, theyshould, is it?
Speaker 3 (41:11):
always that order.
Yeah, you kind of have to do itthat way, right, because you
don't want to you think thewater would be last.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
Well, you're done running and then go for your
swim and be out of it.
I mean, think about it, youdon't want people tired in the
water.
Yeah, I guess that makes sense,it's more likely to have an
injury or something.
Speaker 3 (41:31):
People were struggling, as it was, yeah.
You know, that was the firstevent and it's a little bit
different swimming with awetsuit right.
You know, that was the firstevent and it's a little bit
different swimming with awetsuit right, it's a different
swim.
Speaker 1 (41:39):
It's a different stroke.
You hit the bike and yourhamstring was tightened up and
never loosened up during thehole.
Mm-mm, At some point did youthink you're going to have to
cut out?
I wasn't quitting.
Speaker 3 (41:54):
Yeah, but see, it's that mentality that gets
permanent injuries happening youknow you made it.
It is what it is, and you ran amarathon.
Speaker 1 (42:03):
I'm finishing because you just scaled back a little
bit.
Speaker 3 (42:08):
Yeah.
So before the marathon I didn'teven.
I wanted to make sure that Iwas good at the marathon, so I
didn't even.
I didn't even do my normal runs, you know, two or three weeks
before I just kind of cruised,got on the bike, stayed loose,
took a couple of days off.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
After the Ironman stretched out, hydrate, you know
, got back into it, and when youwent to Oklahoma had it worked
itself out.
Speaker 3 (42:33):
Yeah, I didn't have any issue there.
It was just the, it was thehumidity was was.
Speaker 1 (42:38):
I was just the, I was so dehydrated toward toward the
end of that race air, trying tobreathe that thick, sticky air
and uh it was the.
Speaker 3 (42:46):
The morning was great oh, it was so cool, it was nice
.
The first 10 I was cruising ata you know eight minute.
I was just like, yeah, this.
And I felt good, I'm like I,you know.
When I got to mile 10, I'm likeI can, this is good, you know.
I felt good I'm like I'm gonnapr this.
I was shooting for like a 350and I finished at a 424.
(43:10):
Um, I was very and and I knewthat if I pushed it to that I
was going to hurt myself.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
Do you finish strong or do you steady?
The whole study, the whole time?
Speaker 3 (43:22):
What I, what I do, is , like some people call it the
wall, I just think it's.
You know, you're not hittingthe wall, you're just not.
You're not prepared.
You're not, you didn't becauseevery race is different.
You know, if it was 10 degreescooler, yeah, I wouldn't hit the
wall so soon.
I would have mile 18, 19instead of mile 16 or whatever,
um, but I just could not putenough salt in me and you know
(43:46):
it like you know do you startcramping up?
Speaker 1 (43:51):
what is it that you're feeling with the the salt
issue?
Speaker 3 (43:55):
you just your legs are really heavy, it's you can't
move, it's your every step.
And then I started gettingblisters, which I usually don't
get, which that kind ofsurprised me more than anything.
But I didn't, I didn't feellike I was like gonna be, you
know, like injure myselfpermanently.
(44:15):
It was more like like, justlike, just just the you could
feel like.
And then I'd stopped at um, um,uh, an outhouse, a commode and
a honey or the bathroom restroomthere, port-a-potty, and and it
was.
You know, I could tell by my,by my piss.
I was like this ain't good.
Speaker 1 (44:36):
I was like I just didn't, I couldn't.
And they didn't have drinkstations, or you just kind of.
Speaker 3 (44:40):
Every single one.
I stopped Every single one.
A glass of water, You're justsweating it out, sweating it out
, sweating it out Wow.
And it was still fun, thoughyou still had a good time.
Yeah, because I slowed down,because I saw it coming.
Speaker 1 (44:55):
You're listening to your body.
Speaker 3 (44:59):
And that's what.
That's what I was kind oftalking about.
You don't, yeah, you want to doyour best and you want to
finish, but you can't if you'regoing to hurt yourself, and then
it's not fun, you know you'llput yourself.
Speaker 1 (45:11):
You know, at the end of the race you'd be like, oh
yeah and you're, you know,you're, as you've been mentioned
earlier, getting older everyyear.
You have to kind of have toadjust that mentality Right In
our brains.
We're still teenagers, you know, we're still.
You know, I'll watch.
I ran track in high school andI'll watch and, man, I think I
could do that, you know.
And, um, you know, I'd be luckyto, you know, to make it around
(45:33):
the track once.
But in your mind you, you stillremember it and you feel it and
that adrenaline and you're likeI can get out there and do this
.
And you have to be smart, yeah.
Speaker 3 (45:45):
You got to take care of yourself.
It's a big, you know.
I looked at the Ironman resultsand you know there was 20, 28,
2,900 people that signed up forit and there was probably four,
three or 400 that didn't finish.
Oh wow.
Speaker 1 (46:04):
You know that's a, that's a, a physical beating,
and if you aren't prepared, Imean the training.
You know what did your trainingschedule look like three months
before?
Speaker 3 (46:16):
So you're leading up to that, you you're.
A lot of times you're doinglike I would go in the morning
wait train, knock out five mileson a salt fitness treadmill,
get home on the way home.
Monday, wednesday, friday swimTuesdays and Thursdays I would
(46:37):
swim with the master class downat Southwestern college.
Really good guys down there.
They just and they push you andyou need that.
You need to chase guys.
You know I never caught thoseguys.
I'm not going to catch them.
These guys are swimming incollege Olympics.
These guys are beasts.
That's just not me.
(46:57):
And so in the pool, these guysare putting out 112s, 115s, uh,
per hundred, and I'm like, yeah,I'm not gonna get that, but I'm
gonna try and achieve it right,and plus you learn fundamentals
, you're pushing yourselftechnique swimming is all
technique.
How?
Speaker 1 (47:15):
many miles a week.
Are you putting in on theground running?
Speaker 3 (47:19):
On the ground at least 30, 30 to 40.
Speaker 1 (47:25):
What's your average run?
Speaker 3 (47:27):
So I don't do anything less than six miles and
so usually, like on a Wednesday, saturday, sunday, it would be
my longer runs, like I'll doleading up to a marathon.
I didn't do my long runs onthis one because of the Ironman
Kind of messed up the schedulewith that, but usually I'll put
(47:49):
a 20-mile run three or fourweeks before the marathon and
taper back off of that, just tokeep your muscles from being
overstrained.
Yeah, it's time on your feet.
It's getting your feetconditioned.
It's getting your tendons, yourmuscles, your joints,
(48:09):
everything it needs to get usedto being on your feet for three
and a half, four hours.
The only way to simulate thatis to buy intensity.
So, whether you're doing a hitworkout, where you're doing a
high intensity um, hitting Hills, you know, getting your cardio
up, heart rate up, you know, um,or get, if you have the time
(48:31):
getting that, that long run, youcould even do it at a slower
pace, but you still got to get,get your time on your feet.
Speaker 1 (48:38):
Yeah, it's the, the movement, the joints, the one of
the things that I would noticeum I wrote when I'm in high
school coach would say you knowyou come back after summer not
running at all, and he wouldknow.
But the funny thing is is it'slike you're feeling
uncoordinated, you're runningaround the track and your body
just isn't flowing.
Yeah, and he says you know youdidn't run this summer Because
(48:59):
that's why you feel that way.
You know, you feel like everystep hurts, you feel like you
know you're going to break yourknees and then eventually you
get back into that running shapeand it just flows and your
joints are running and yourmuscles are working Everybody
can do something right.
Speaker 3 (49:17):
You don't want to hurt yourself.
You don't want to hurt yourself.
You don't want to get your, getyourself to a point where
you're like, because when youkeep getting injured it's
discouraging, it's not fun,right?
If it's not fun, you're notgoing to do it, right?
So, whether so, whether it'srunning or triathlon or biking,
if you just want to bike, justget out there and bike.
(49:38):
If you want to run, get outthere and run.
Some people can do.
You know.
Three miles a day, 10 miles aday, you know some people are
built for that.
You know the hardest thing isfinding something and sticking
with it.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
And if you don't stick with it and that's the
hardest thing for human beingsto do with anything.
Yeah, I mean studying, sticking.
Sticking to things is, you know, difficult, for you know your
brain gets bored.
You know, this is the neat thingabout what you're doing here is
you just didn't stick to.
You know the first five K orwhatever, the first half
(50:18):
marathon, you get pushingyourself.
Okay, you know something new,something different.
The other thing I love aboutthis is you get to go all over
the place.
You know you're not juststicking here in san diego,
you're going.
You know, all over the placefor these events.
Different scenery keeps thebrain stimulated.
Create vacation time with yourfamily, with your wife, wife,
(50:39):
and stay in shape.
Continue to move.
Speaker 3 (50:41):
I've got a good story for that the guy I was next to
at the Ironman.
He came from the East Coast andhe was I don't know if he was
like a semi-pro Ironman, he wassponsored, he had a really nice
bike and so I was getting sometips from him, just talking to
him, and I was telling him hewas sponsored, he had, you know,
really nice bike, and so I wasgetting some tips from him, just
talking to him, and I wastelling him.
I was like, hey, I was thinkingabout you know, if this one
(51:03):
goes, well, go and do another70.3 somewhere you know.
And he started.
He started telling me he wasfrom Jersey.
So the East coast Ironman's,there's jellyfish, Right.
And I'm like in the back of myhead I said, well, I'm not going
to East Coast, I am not goingto.
You know, that to me is notworth it.
(51:24):
There's a lot of jellyfish sothere's a line there, right?
Why do I want to go swim in theocean with a bunch of jellyfish?
You know they're not paying me.
Make you go faster.
You know what I mean?
It's like he goes.
Oh yeah, I mean I was gettingstung all the time and I'm like,
oh, look at this guy.
Speaker 1 (51:41):
I'm like, okay, I'm not that, you know yeah, you got
, you've got the spectrum of ofthese people that I mean, he's,
he's obviously maybe a semi-pro,but this, you know, these, this
, the spectrum of hey, this isfun, I'm competitive to, I'll do
absolutely whatever it takesand if I die doing it, I'm there
(52:03):
.
You know just that wholespectrum of people and you have
to swim with the sharks, swimwith the jellyfish.
Speaker 3 (52:08):
His time was.
I looked up his time after hewas an hour behind me.
Something went wrong in therace.
You know, and when I went topick up my gear, his bike bike
was still there, so that meanseither the run went south or he
cramped up, or whatever you justyou just don't, you know, you
just don't know you know, youdon't when I, when I it didn't
really hit me when I finished.
(52:28):
I you know, I there's some.
If you're familiar withoceanside, there's the junior
seo um, he's got a.
They named a rec center afterhim, so they have like an
amphitheater area where there'skind of kicking it and eating
and stuff like that.
And I just laid out I was done.
Speaker 1 (52:47):
But you're ready to do it again?
Speaker 3 (52:49):
Yeah, I can't wait to do it again.
Speaker 1 (52:52):
Hey, you sent me a picture of you with a gentleman
and I want to put it up on thepodcast.
You said he was um renowned inthe iron man world emilio de
soto.
Yeah, yeah I want to get thatpicture up he tell me about him.
Speaker 3 (53:06):
He is, so he's got a great story.
He would be a great person toput on he.
He started out man old schoolfirst triathlons and just
started competing.
He would ride his bike fromlike 100 miles up the coast,
(53:27):
like when he was in school.
I got hooked up with him from afriend of mine, pete, who I did
some work with, got introducedto him through another friend
and so he hooked me up withEmilio and that's where I got my
wetsuit and some of my runninggear, some shirts and stuff like
(53:49):
that.
I'm actually going to be doingsome drone stuff with him to
promote his company.
He's very famous in thetriathlon community.
Super nice guy super local,correct.
Speaker 1 (54:03):
He's out here in southern california yep we'll
have to get him on super, super,super nice guy does he compete?
Speaker 3 (54:09):
still, uh, I don't think he does.
Um, he's a mechanical engineer,you know, so he speaks our
language.
He's really just a super niceguy.
I mean, he's super fit.
Still, obviously, yeah, but he?
Speaker 1 (54:26):
What's his contributions to?
Speaker 3 (54:29):
So he realized by doing triathlons that the gear
wasn't you know, so he developedsome of the fabrics and the
cuts and his the t1 wetsuit iswhat I wear on triathlons.
Um it's a two-piece and so whenyou're swimming you it, you get
(54:50):
better.
Um extension so it doesn't feellike your wetsuit stretching out
pulling up on the side yeah,it's, it's what's called a bib
john, so that the bib john comesin, two piece, comes up over
unzip and then it's just a greatwetsuit, um the bottoms of five
mil, middles, three arms or two, so you get that flexibility um
(55:13):
yeah, so that picture you sawhe was was at Ironman in
Oceanside selling all his gear,and I got a tri bag from him and
a belt that I can put my bib on.
Speaker 1 (55:32):
Let's get him on the show.
Speaker 3 (55:33):
Yeah, yeah, he is for sure.
Speaker 1 (55:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (55:37):
Super nice guy.
Speaker 1 (55:38):
I love the idea of him re-engineering the sport?
Speaker 3 (55:42):
Yeah, and he's done a bunch and he competitive,
competitive.
You know, in his early days hewas a pro.
So when's the next race?
When is the next race?
Well, the, the 50 K, that ultraup at Noble Canyon.
I'm going to do that inSeptember.
Speaker 1 (55:57):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (56:00):
And the weekend before that is, I think, the san
diego try, you know.
So that'll be a good warm-upfor that the weekend before yeah
, the, the internationaltriathlons are very.
They're not very long, so itdepends, if you hit them hard,
you're gonna feel it for acouple days, but I but I, that
50 K man, that's a demon.
I gotta, I gotta kill thatthing because I was so ready for
(56:23):
that.
Speaker 1 (56:24):
Okay, yes, this is the one that you broke your foot
before.
Don't break your foot this time.
Stay off the trails, I might.
You never know.
Speaker 3 (56:31):
You know you don't know you know, so I, that one's
probably the next big one.
I'm not going to do rock androll this year.
There's too many people, it'sjust a mess at the beginning and
you can't get a good time.
Yeah, it's a party, basically.
It's basically yeah, and 30,000people is ridiculous.
Yeah, you can't even move.
And then if I, if I see acouple of trail races between I
(56:54):
like the trail races, cause Ilike being outside, and I and I
like it's a more technical race,it's definitely more
challenging.
Um, but you know these, youknow, whatever comes up,
sometimes I, I, you know someonewill come.
Hey, you want to do this one andI'll just just look at it yeah,
and just knock it out, andthat's kind of the advantage of
(57:16):
staying in shape you knowbecause you rotary's ready to go
.
Yeah, If I had to go do amarathon tomorrow then I'd just
check.
Speaker 1 (57:26):
I love it.
Throw on the shoes and go.
Well, keep it going.
Paul, Appreciate you coming outand telling the story.
The follow-up, yeah, thefollow-up.
See if you can break over30,000 views.
We'll throw some pictures up onthe podcast.
People can check out some ofyour races.
Appreciate it and talk to youlater cuckoo, All right baby,
All right bye.
Speaker 2 (57:47):
Later.
You've been listening to RealPeople, real Life.
Our passion is to have realconversations with real people
who've made it, real peoplewho've made it who did it on
their own terms.
We'll be back soon, but in themeantime, catch us on Twitter or
(58:08):
X at RPRL podcast and onYouTube at Real People Real Life
podcast.
You.
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