> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.inthebeginningpodcast.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # What To Actually Do In The Two Weeks After A Marathon | EP 94 - URL: https://www.inthebeginningpodcast.com/ep-094-in-the-beginning-podcast-the-marathon-is-done-now-what/ - Published: 2026-07-10T06:00:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-08-21T00:31:53.000Z - Description: Courtney Atkinson and Liam Flanagan on Gold Coast Marathon, Olympics & 2032, run clubs — recorded on the Gold Coast. - Author: Courtney Atkinson - Tags: Episodes, Main Feed, Gold Coast Marathon, Olympics, Running Training, #Import 2026-07-28 20:58 *Courtney Atkinson and Liam Flanagan run a coach's viral post-marathon recovery protocol past Claude AI, dig into whether this is the biggest week Australian distance running's had in years, and debate what Melbourne needs to find its own identity next to Gold Coast and Sydney.* *The back half covers merch and shoe trends spotted on course, a listener's Guinness World Record via Benita's Lace Up Running, and Liam's "capture the flag" run club race concept — before a wander through NRL's new broadcast deal, the Tour de France's missing Netflix documentary, and who they'd each want to sit down with out of any distance runner in the world.* ## In this episode - What should you actually do in the first two weeks after a marathon? - Is this the biggest week Australian distance running has had in years? - Does Gold Coast have the strongest claim to being Australia's fastest marathon? - What does Melbourne need to find its own marathon identity? - What the shoes and outfits on course revealed about where running fashion's heading - If you could sit down with any distance runner in the world, who would it be? ## Timestamps - **\[00:00\]** A coach's viral post on the first two weeks after a marathon - **\[03:05\]** Running the same recovery protocol past Claude AI - **\[06:10\]** Race-day listener stories — PBs, tears at the finish line, a Guinness record in the making - **\[08:16\]** Is this the biggest week for Australian distance running in years? - **\[17:03\]** Does Gold Coast have the strongest claim to being Australia's fastest marathon? - **\[19:36\]** What Melbourne needs to find its own identity — MCG finish vs. the Sydney Opera House - **\[31:05\]** Listener mail: a Guinness World Record and a "capture the flag" run club concept - **\[52:56\]** If you could sit down with any distance runner in the world, who would it be? ## Listen ## Related In The Beginning episodes - [EP 093 — GC Marathon Weekend, $100 Carbon & Run Club Capture The Flag](https://www.inthebeginningpodcast.com/ep-093-in-the-beginning-podcast-gc-marathon-weekend-100-carbon-run-club-capture-/) — race weekend itself, the episode right before this one - [Gold Coast Marathon Series — Courtney's Race Diary Monologue](https://www.inthebeginningpodcast.com/gold-coast-marathon-series-courtney-s-race-diary-monologue/) — Courtney's own account of the race this episode is recovering from - [EP 090 — Claude AI x Strava Thinks Courtney Is Cooked](https://www.inthebeginningpodcast.com/ep-90-claude-ai-x-strava-thinks-courtney-is-cooked/) — the recurring Claude-as-coach experiment this episode continues - [The Gold Coast Marathon guide](https://www.inthebeginningpodcast.com/gold-coast-marathon/) — everything two full series taught us about the race ## Full transcript Auto-generated transcript. Timestamps approximate. Hosts: Courtney Atkinson & Liam Flanagan. **Read the full transcript** \[00:00\] Episode 94, In The Beginning podcast. Courtney, we're back — still buzzing from the Gold Coast Marathon, still in its shadow, for 2026 it's still got the shine. Here's a question — when will you return to running?" "I'll leave it this week, I'll get on the bike and do some spins, but there's no point rushing into it. The reason I ask, and I want to bring it up, is I found this during the week and" \[00:30\] thought, that's a great one to share." "I think I saw that — did you send it to me?" "I'm not sure — it came from 1609 Coaching, a running coach named Luis Harenko. I don't know exactly where he's based, but must be somewhat local. His bio says 'I fix broken runners,' which I love. He posted this the Monday after the marathon: if you just ran the Gold Coast Marathon, read this." \[01:02\] "I'll share it with you — 'Your first fourteen days after the marathon, backed by science. Right now your body is more broken down than at any point in your training. Muscle damage markers stay elevated for up to fourteen days after a marathon. Inside your legs right now: muscle fibre micro-tears throughout the quads and calves, glycogen drained, twenty-four to forty-eight hours to refill, immune system suppressed for up to seventy-two hours, stress hormones — cortisol stays elevated for" \[01:32\] days. It's supposed to feel like this.'" "Kind of makes you wonder why you'd do this thing." "'The first twenty-four hours — this might matter for people — start to repair today. Eat within the hour. A ten-minute walk this afternoon beats the couch. Sip fluids all day until your urine turns pale. The real timeline: soreness gone in three to four days, muscle repair takes one to two weeks —'" "My soreness isn't going to be gone in three to four days, I can tell you that." "'Tendon and bone damage takes longer still. Soreness fades days before repair is complete —" \[02:03\] it's a poor measure of damage.' So just because you don't feel sore anymore doesn't mean the damage is gone. 'Days one to seven' — this is his recommendation — 'no running. Here's what to do instead: days one to three, walking only, twenty to thirty minutes. Days four to seven, easy swim or spin, twenty to forty minutes. All week: eight-plus hours' sleep, protein every three to four hours.'" "Yep." "'Days eight to fourteen: run again, don't train yet. Days eight to ten, one test run, twenty minutes easy — if that felt normal, easy runs every second day," \[02:35\] strides in week three, first proper workout in week four. Scared of losing fitness? De-training takes two to four weeks to even begin — two easy weeks costs you almost nothing.' There's more slides too, but interestingly — do you know why that's interesting? I'll link it in the show notes. I've just given you the thoughts of an actual human — now Courtney's going to turn to his AI. I put it into Claude, just out of" \[03:05\] interest — there's people around me suggesting certain things, and everyone's going to respond differently depending on how they ran the marathon too. I also think you've got to factor in — Michael Shelley used to say this — if the marathon was your pinnacle event for the year, go and take a holiday. It's more a mental thing than a physical one. It's like, I've trained," \[03:36\] I've done what I set out to do, now forget about it for a while and go off. Forget all this science stuff, just go have a holiday, don't run, come back when you're ready." "That's common sense, right?" "But I did put into Claude, just out of interest, to see what it would say — do a scrape of the most trusted sources on the web and give me recommendations for recovering from the marathon and a timeline to get back training for another marathon in November — might" \[04:08\] give something away there. I can tell you it came back nearly word for word what was in that post — down to immune suppression, central nervous system fatigue, a whole range of things. Same protocol — days one to seven, zero running, days seven to fourteen, diagnostic return, easing back into" \[04:39\] some easy running. I think that's a pretty common structure. But I love what Michael Shelley used to tell me — he'd run London Marathon as part of an Olympic build or whatever it was, and then say, I'm just going to get pissed for a week, sit on a beach with my mates. It's that old case of reward yourself — don't get bogged down" \[05:09\] worrying about hitting thirty grams of protein again the next day. Go and live a little." "Go and live a little, exactly. The Gold Coast Marathon — we're in the shadow of it now, in the rear-view mirror. My voice is cooked from the amount of" \[05:40\] love we got out there, Courtney, running the course — the support was awesome. That's what makes us want to keep doing this podcast — so many people came up on the sidelines and at the finish line, genuinely appreciating being able to follow this podcast during their running journey. People messaging saying they were listening to the episode while running the Gold Coast Marathon —" \[06:10\] brilliant. We could go through a few — B Rad Dad, a regular contributor, wanted to let us know: last year he ran a 5:01 marathon, this year a 3:58 — over an hour off his marathon time, a massive drop. Congratulations — the amount of support that came your way too, Courtney, was huge, and we'll dig into that more in Wednesday's episode. Max," \[06:43\] who ran the half with his wife Megan — they were down there in the bottle caps, and Max was chewing my ear off about the podcast all day, telling me to make sure I gave Megan a shout-out when she came through. I teared up at one point too — a bloke named Tommy came over right at the end of the day and said, I'm a listener of the podcast, I just wanted to say thanks for helping us get here today. And thank you, Liam, because his young fella was running the 2K dash —" \[07:13\] and man, that 2K kids' dash — my kids can't wait to run it next year, they're already locked in. There's something for everyone there, isn't there. Again, thank you to the EMQ team for letting you and I be part of the Gold Coast Marathon in 2026 — we're back in 2027\. Being local helps, but honestly even if it wasn't local, it's the fastest marathon in Australia now — if you want to run fast, that's where you've got to be." \[07:43\] "And beyond being local, that's exactly why I was in it in the first place — that's where you've got to be. So, after this weekend, and Cam Myers's run too — do you think this has been the biggest seven days for Australian distance running in a long time?" "Why do you feel it's not getting the recognition outside running that it deserves?" \[08:16\] "Do I think distance running, or where we're at right now — you've got our middle-distance women, our marathoners, our half marathoners, Cam Myers breaking the record — world-beaters, genuine world-class athletes across all distances. Do you think distance running really gets the attention it deserves in the public eye?" "Not yet." \[08:48\] "Or are we just getting carried away — no, like, we had Craig Mottram's era, we've had this before, or is it just that you're always caught up in the present thinking this is the best? Undeniably, generations get quicker, that's always been true historically — we're running faster than ever, but that's recency bias, and being in the middle of it, you don't realise" \[09:18\] those were the good days until they're gone. Right now, in the middle of it, it feels like the heyday of running because we're living it. If I had to try and identify why we're not celebrating it like we could be — who's the biggest personality in the space right now? We live in an attention economy, and I couldn't tell you. Hatsu, who just broke" \[09:50\] the Australian marathon record, has an amazing story to tell. I met him — only had a three or four minute conversation — he's a mild-mannered young man, might be more engaging in private, but comes across quiet and respectful, and he's an amazing marathon runner. Do you know much of his background?" "I don't, not much — I mean, this is probably the point, right?" \[10:20\] "Did you speak to him, interview him?" "No, I didn't interview him — there was a broadcast element with him after he finished the race, and I met him properly at a function afterwards. I did some research because I thought, who is this guy — I knew who he was, but not the backstory. Born and raised in Ethiopia, I believe orphaned there, and adopted by a Melbourne" \[10:52\] family. He's grown up here and is an Australian citizen now — been in Australia around ten years." "Who does he train with?" "I don't know his training group. But the point — getting back to it — is that I'm asking you these questions and" \[11:22\] that's the challenge, right — who's the biggest name? We've had all this happen this weekend. Cam Myers is another example, though he gets a bit more recognition because he's doing it on the world stage, racing Diamond League events and winning at big meets. But your question still holds — who is the biggest personality in distance running? When you asked me who's the biggest name, my mind went straight to Gout —" \[11:53\] and he's not even a distance runner, but he's the biggest name we've got. That's the broader point — we live in an attention economy, that's what TikTok, YouTube, Instagram are about — grabbing and holding attention. Right now we're having these moments — Cam Myers's performance, Hatsu's performance, Izzy's performance — that capture our attention, but none of them are holding it, none are converting those eyes into sustained interest in distance running." \[12:23\] "But interestingly, there's way more participation in distance running than in almost anything else — of course you're not getting thirty-five to fifty year olds sprinting a hundred metres, but you're getting them at marathons, because the event itself is what's capturing and holding attention — the event, the vehicle, is almost bigger than the individual. It comes back to a point you've made consistently, Courtney," \[12:54\] that most marathon participants don't care who wins — what they care about is the experience of being part of it." "That's true — I'll jump in, because straight after I finished, purely because of our relationship with the marathon, I did an interview, and the interviewer started talking about the winner of the race, assuming I'd know who" \[13:27\] won, but I'd been out there running — I had zero idea what was going on. Which makes me think ninety-nine point five percent of people out there are in exactly the same boat, they probably don't even find out. Having said that, I've seen far greater coverage of Hatsu breaking the record than last year's winner. It's the first time an" \[13:57\] Australian's won since Lee Troop in 2006 — another key marker. So the coverage, the shelf these feats sit on, is a culmination of a whole bunch of things, not just the time. Hatsu being the first Australian male winner in twenty years, breaking the record, and doing it on the Gold Coast with his unique backstory, has put his" \[14:29\] name in lights more than Cam Myers's, I think, because Cam did it overseas — fastest Aussie time, sure, but in a sport where distance dilutes attention, and Izzi Batt-Doyle did her thing the weekend before the marathon too. Where the marathon is the showpiece, it all affects how much we remember and how much stock we put in the achievement itself." \[15:00\] "If you use Cathy Freeman as the pinnacle — a home event, all the build-up, all the noise, the golden girl, the suit, lighting the flame — that's our greatest ever running moment, and it'll probably never be topped. As you move down the spectrum you can evaluate where these other achievements sit. Will we forget Hatsu quickly? I think it depends what he does next." \[15:32\] "What I'm looking up is whether he's running the Commonwealth Games marathon — I don't think he is, because I asked him and his manager what was next, and I don't think they mentioned it. Could be wrong. So back to where we are as a country — I still think Jess Hull is under-celebrated in this country." "A hundred percent, couldn't agree more." \[16:03\] "We had that meet down in Melbourne at the start of the year, the Maurie Plant meet, and then Nationals with the Claudia Hollingsworth incident and everything — I still think that was probably the most attention she's ever gotten. But I reckon if you asked the average person on the street who Jess Hull is — maybe this is a guess — you'd get, what, a fifty-fifty hit," \[16:33\] or probably less. All the achievements happening right now are fantastic, and yes, I think we're in a golden generation, but because of the broader attention economy, I don't think it's going to stick in memory the way Moneghetti and De Castella and that generation did — because we simply had less to watch back then, that's the big thing. So do you think Gold Coast now" \[17:03\] has the strongest claim to being the fastest marathon?" "Undeniably — fastest course in Australia, if you want to run fast, that's where you go, and hopefully they keep leaning into that. You want a PB, first time or tenth time, come to the Gold Coast Marathon — that's their angle, the F1 marathon of Australia, and they market it brilliantly." \[17:34\] "The challenge now's on Melbourne — I think it's on Melbourne. They've done a great job with Nike setting themselves up for the back end of the year — Sydney's your major, Gold Coast is your fast one, so what are you, Melbourne? That's the question they need to answer, because Gold Coast's numbers this year were bigger than Melbourne's, I believe — second biggest. That's what they said was the challenge — I think Melbourne will lean hard into influencers this year." \[18:05\] "Melbourne, the city, and the race — if I had their marketing budget I'd be throwing it all at influencers, ninety-five percent, trying to make it the cool influencer race." "I think we've got to be careful — we've got to watch for location bias too, since we're here in Queensland, on the Gold" \[18:36\] Coast — we see everything about our own race. I'm not likely to go watch the Sydney Marathon, so we see it from a distance, same with Melbourne. I wonder if you actually live in Melbourne, whether you still see the Melbourne Marathon as the marathon, because it's—" "That's a very sensible take, Courtney. But here's what I'll say — is Melbourne a major? No. Is it the fastest? No. Is it running along beautiful sunny water?" \[19:06\] "Definitely not. So yes, there's geographical bias from us here. But Melbourne needs to — and I think they can, based on what they've already done this year — really nail their identity. They've got the biggest partner in the world in Nike, the perfect partner to help sell and nail the marathon. So what do you" \[19:36\] think — will they nail their identity? What could that identity even be?" "You've said MCG before — I still think that's their opportunity, their unique selling point. I know Sydney finishes at the Opera House — I don't think that's as amazing a finish as the MCG." "I disagree, strongly. I think the Opera House finish is" \[20:06\] probably the best finish you can have in Australia, hands down — I've raced there in triathlons before the Olympics, run through there." "You might be right — there's no way—" "It's the most iconic place, that forecourt, finishing at the Opera House with the Harbour Bridge right there in the centre of the city. No way." "I know the MCG's sacred, holds a huge sporting weight, but a stadium's a stadium — you can reproduce a stadium finish elsewhere. You can't reproduce the Opera House." \[20:38\] "Well, that's the challenge then — I don't know how many people normally fill that stadium at the finish, but here's a question for Melbourne: how do you get sixty thousand people to turn up there for it?" "Free stuff." "You joke, but yeah, free stuff — did you watch any of the NBA Finals? No? Something those stadiums do amazingly well is give away shirts — Nike, if Melbourne" \[21:12\] put sixty thousand shirts out on those seats, you'd get sixty thousand people turning out. Speaking of shirts — did you see the Colombian soccer team at the World Cup? There was a company — I wish I had the details — helping sell the jerseys, offering to buy fans their national jersey if a sponsor logo went on it, and the bigger the logo, the more money they gave." \[21:43\] "I'm sure it was a proper activation, I don't have the exact details, but the idea is: we'll buy you the jersey, but our brand logo has to go on it as part of that." "That's a great idea." "It's a good one — the" \[22:13\] customer gets a free jersey, supports the country by wearing it, and the sponsor — who isn't the actual soccer jersey sponsor — effectively gets the advertising, paying for it through all those fans in, I believe, Colombia. There are so many amazing opportunities for these companies — people love merch. I'm sitting here right now in my Gold Coast Marathon cap because I love it." \[22:44\] People love merch — if it wasn't for merch I'd turn up to my radio show, running events, surf lifesaving events, most days completely naked, because most of what I wear is merch. So hey Nike — if you want to give me a free shirt for the Melbourne Marathon this year, I'll be there. Have you been watching the soccer? I can't believe I'm bringing this up —" \[23:14\] you can bring up soccer, mate, that's fine. Have I been watching it? Absolutely, I love it. What do you make of it — you're not usually a soccer fan?" "No, it's not something I'd normally watch — but since we hit the round of sixteen, it's pinnacle sport, that's the way I'd put it — once it matters, once it has impact, it gets interesting. I followed" \[23:44\] Australia through the early rounds and was hoping they'd go through, but I'm not that interested as an occasional watcher in the group-stage rounds. Now it's got to the pointy end and the games have been good." "And now you're also getting a different style of football because" \[24:16\] there are no draws left. Did you see, before the England game in Mexico, fans letting fireworks off outside their hotel all night?" "Genius, honestly — I've been shifting my thinking on this lately, because part of me, the umpire voice in my head, goes, that's not fair. But why should Mexican fans care whether the other team gets a good night's sleep? They only care about Mexico — I've been thinking about that" \[24:48\] with home-ground advantage, and also with footy coaches I interview — sometimes I" think, you don't seem to care enough about the whole competition. What do you mean?" "Sometimes there's an incident, and a coach gets asked about it and gives a very one-eyed, biased view in favour of their own side, and I used to sit back thinking, that's not showing enough care for the whole sport. Because I just love football, most sport really," \[25:20\] and I always want what's best for the game overall. But more recently I've thought, well, they don't have to care about that — their job is for their team to win, not to be caretakers of the whole competition. That's where I've landed more recently, and I've become far more critical of the actual governing bodies" \[25:52\] of any sport — you're the ones with the power, you're the ones who need to govern with more of an iron fist, because the eighteen AFL coaches aren't there to help enforce the rules or deliver the product fans want, they're there to win a premiership. The governing bodies need to rule harder. Which brings it back to the World Cup, and what just happened with the US—" \[26:26\] "I was wondering if you were going there. To bring it back — the umpire issue, quickly: stay out of it. If you're the AFL field umpire, I get what you're trying to do, but stay out of it — you're not physically capable of stopping any of eighteen players on the field, or as it turned out, forty-six of them, from getting to each other." \[26:58\] "The moment something's about to go off, leave — the fines will come after. The AFL made about seventy thousand dollars out of that one fight. If you're an official, your job is to officiate the game — that's not the game anymore once it's forty-six grown men wanting to throw punches. You can't stop that, the AFL will punish it after the fact — get out of the way. Do you think more of that would help the game?" "More fights?" "I don't think the game needs" \[27:28\] help — it needs clearer rules, that's what frustrates people." "Do you think the spectacle would improve with a bit more of it?" "It's a hard one — not really. Ultimately, anyone who watches NRL or AFL knows the game is already so hard, so physical, the contest is rock solid, we still get concussions and serious injuries — this game isn't soft." \[27:58\] "I think the problem AFL has now is ambiguity in the rules — they change them so often that even the best-paid, full-time umpires can't consistently officiate, because the rules are too confusing. That's the hard part. I think one of the reasons the NRL's having a real purple patch over the AFL right now is the rules are easier to understand," \[28:29\] easier to officiate, and easier for viewers to follow, which is why people are preferring to watch it right now." "You know what I think — I agree with you on the fighting itself not needing to happen. But the competition, the rivalry, the love lost between two players, and the fuel that provides for a game — that changes how the average" \[28:59\] fan engages. I get it from the hardcore lifelong AFL fans who watch the technicals in and out, but for more casual, armchair viewers, it's like what we started this with — who's the biggest personality? That's what creates personalities. Every time two rivals match up, it's not the teams facing off, it's the individuals within them — off the ball, players get stuck into each other" \[29:29\] and then it becomes the story. And when governing bodies say they want to cut it out of the game — not the fighting, but the rivalry — that's why State of Origin's still the best product in Australian sport, because of the rivalry between the states. Which brings us back to the World Cup, which is what we were just talking about — governing bodies and how they" \[30:01\] officiate. For those who missed it — a red card was handed down to a US striker in the dying moments of their knockout game. Under FIFA's rules, that red card isn't subject to appeal — but FIFA then came out ahead of their game against Belgium and announced the red card had been suspended, which doesn't mean rescinded, because apparently it wasn't actually a" \[30:32\] red card incident to begin with, it was a yellow-card incident — given as a straight red under FIFA's own rules, which can't be appealed. Then it comes out that it's been suspended for twelve months, essentially putting him on a good-behaviour bond, and then Trump comes out and says something about it, and" \[31:05\] FIFA's been made to look an absolute fool, at the most public level imaginable. What did they think was going to happen if Trump seriously pushed for it? Hey, can I pivot quickly — there were two things I wanted to bring up on the marathon. One thing on the marathon — Lucy wrote in: 'I just want to say a huge thanks. I listened to your episodes with Benita last year on the road to the Gold Coast, and your episode earlier this year. I got in touch with Lace Up Running in February and they" \[31:35\] connected me with a running coach.' This is from the Monday after the marathon — 'My sister and I got the Guinness World Record for fastest female twins to run a half marathon. When we set our sights on this goal last year I knew I needed to lift my training and get serious guidance. My sister's the speedy one, and as the slow twin I didn't want to let her down — I knew I needed to hit 1:55 for my half. Lace Up Running gave me the path," \[32:06\] support and guidance to get there — my sister ran 1:31\. I really appreciated the show's recognition that all runners do it tough, and the spirit of bringing running to everybody.' So this podcast, the Gold Coast Marathon, and especially Benita's Lace Up Running, helped Lucy and her sister become Guinness World Record holders — didn't expect that story to go there, Liam." "Cool message — we got so many great ones. Moving on though, someone's wanting to help a scheme come to" \[32:36\] life — Martin Cohen wrote in about the run club competitive idea we talked about, whether run clubs are better with a speaker or a flag. I started out for the flag, and by the end of the chat we'd both come around to loving it. Martin's come back off the back of that: 'Gents, just listened to this podcast on the way to work this morning, and with your capture-the-flag idea, I think a format using an Oztag-style flag system would be a goer — fixed-distance" \[33:07\] race, as you go past other run club members you grab the flag tag off their hip, whichever club finishes with the most flags wins.' I've thought about this and I really like the Oztag system. I haven't quite figured out — do you" \[33:39\] have to put the tag back on after taking it?" "Yes, yes, you take it and put it back on your own hip. I think it then becomes strategic, because you can only take one tag off a runner at a time — and look, I'm going to work on this properly. Martin, I love what you've given me, I'm going to build this out, because I think there's a" \[34:09\] genuinely fantastic race concept in that capture-the-flag, Oztag mentality. I just need to figure out how it rewards more than just the fastest runner" winning outright — got to work on the concept a bit more. But suffice to say, this flag idea's gone from me hating flags to now thinking every run club needs one. You need — sorry, I'm jumping all over the place, I've got another one — I kept notes on outfits from the marathon." \[34:40\] "What have you got on outfits?" "We talked a bit on Wednesday's episode about shoes — ASICS obviously dominated a bit since it's an ASICS event, but I saw a lot of different shoes, a big change from last year, and you ran in them too." "Yeah, Nike Vaporflys dropped off significantly — I felt like they were everywhere in 2025\. This year, once they dropped the next model, I wonder if" \[35:12\] everyone's moving to that next release. But outfit-wise, my big observation was LSKD." "Really?" "And I know we're geographically biased —" "But women in LSKD, matching sets—" "Not just pink ones, blue, green — this," \[35:42\] when you say matching sets between runners, that's what probably made them stand out more crossing the line together — like the doubles at Hyrox events." "Maybe — because that's a big thing at Hyrox, you go watch the doubles and they're" \[36:13\] dressed the same. I think it's coming to marathons — I saw groups of three or four running together in matching outfits, a fashion thing. We've talked about the influence of fashion on running, and I think you'll see more and more blocks of runners inspired to dress in matching kit going forward." "Interestingly, my mind didn't go there — maybe it's where I was running — but I agree that where you'd have seen maybe ninety percent Alphaflys two or three years ago, it's" \[36:43\] a much wider range of shoes now. However, at the front, singlets and tops were predominantly Nike." "Really? Still the top brand?" "Some of my observations — predominantly Nike tops, but people still wearing other brand shoes. Nike, for whatever reason, still dominates the actual" \[37:15\] apparel side, and black — still the dominant colour, Nike Dri-FIT still owns the running apparel space, at least" \[37:46\] at the performance end, no doubt. Let's keep rolling. What about the Tour — haven't seen a second of it." "No way, haven't seen any of it either — I want to hear your theory on this." "I'm going to be pretty transparent —" \[38:17\] I didn't either, and normally when I haven't been racing in France, it's literally on TV all day, I'd be up every morning watching the highlights — the Tour starts at the beginning of July every year, and I just hadn't opened YouTube to see the first stage until the algorithm threw it at me, which is" \[38:48\] why I saw it at all. Otherwise I'd have had no idea, which is embarrassing. My theory is that for the last, I think three years — correct me if I'm wrong — they've run a Drive to Survive-style Netflix series in the lead-up to the Tour. If you're a Netflix watcher into sport, you'd have been spammed for the two weeks" \[39:18\] before it started with — I think it was called Unchained — following the previous year's Tour, the rivalries, exactly the Drive to Survive template. They didn't do it this year, and I wonder how much impact that's had on general awareness of what's going on in the race right now. Netflix, in Australia at least, would be one of the most prominent" \[39:50\] streaming platforms — if you're into sport, the algorithm would throw the Tour at you and get you onto the journey of watching it. Where do you even pick up a sport like this now, if it's not already in your weekly watch list — if you're not into the spring classics and cycling generally, your social media algorithm isn't going to serve it up, because you don't already watch" \[40:23\] cycling. You need someone at the office, a mate talking about it — word of mouth's still strong, but otherwise it's hard work out there for these sports. It's funny — as you're saying this I've just got an alert that the NRL has announced" \[40:53\] its new broadcast deal — huge — officially announced today with Channel 9 and Fox Sports, and the dollar value media organisations are putting on sport content has never been bigger, or more fiercely fought at the top end — AFL, NRL, cricket," \[41:23\] the big three in Australia arguably. But at the lower level — cycling, triathlon and the like — the fight's over crumbs, and I don't think the audience size is there yet to make those crumbs particularly valuable. It'll be an interesting business that finds a way to cobble those crumbs together profitably at the" \[41:54\] right price point. As far as the Tour goes, if you look at global viewership, I think a few years back it was the second most-watched sporting event after the Olympics." "I'd be interested to check that." "Globally, for sure. But back to your point about the pre-tour Netflix doco, Unchained —" \[42:25\] we saw the same with Drive to Survive and the eyeballs it brought F1 among casual, non-die-hard followers, and the UFC used to do a pre-fight-camp series on YouTube too, I can't remember what it was called, but it was brilliant. It's a tale as old as time — stories are what help us process information," \[42:57\] stories are what create attachment to things. It's proven — sport has increasingly seen that building a narrative arc around your product brings in audiences who might never otherwise have cared. One word: Wrexham — a lower-tier Welsh football club has never been so relevant. Now, that's not" \[43:27\] forever lasting, and maybe the Tour organisers decided the investment in Unchained wasn't worth the return anymore. But ultimately, stories, narrative — it's everything." "Agreed, a hundred percent — that's where these Netflix shows have been so instrumental, F1's a great example. I've just done a quick" \[44:01\] check because I figured I'd get called out if the Tour wasn't actually one of the highest-viewed — it depends which source you look at, but the World Cup's the largest even though it's only every four years: World Cup, Summer Olympics, Tour de France, Women's World Cup, Winter Games, Cricket World Cup — all the big global ones, Super" \[44:32\] Bowl, Wimbledon, World Series, Kentucky Derby —" "The horse race?" "Huge horse race, comes in around thirteenth, bigger than the Masters by viewership — shorter event, different metrics, but this is like Andrew Johns — I'm going to cite Joey here — he always talked about this. I think I started working in" \[45:03\] radio back in 2012, and 2013 was my first year as a producer, on a show called The Rush Hour. Dan Ganon, who I think is the best rugby league commentator in the business, was hosting it — I'll forever be indebted to him for being patient with someone who didn't know what they were doing and teaching me a lot about radio. Andrew Johns was a regular guest host once a week on that show." \[45:34\] "I got to know Joey a little through that. He always used to say, back when they were talking expansion — this was 2012, a sixteen-team competition then — that the talent pool wasn't there to support expansion. He'd also talk about everyone wanting new shows and formats, and he'd say, we don't have" \[46:07\] enough people. You can have the best idea in the world, but the NRL, as an Australian product, just doesn't have enough people to go around, he'd say. I've always thought about Sydney as the reference point for this — I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but Sydney has too many sports teams." "Are you talking NRL specifically, or in general?" "Sydney's probably the most densely populated sporting city in the" \[46:38\] world — two AFL teams, men's and women's, two basketball teams, two A-League teams, two Big Bash franchises, again men's and women's for the most part. You've got another NRL team just up the road in Newcastle, another basketball team down in Wollongong. I haven't even counted the actual" \[47:08\] Sydney-based NRL teams — I think it's seven or eight of the sixteen. You're talking nearly thirty professional sporting teams in one city, all needing sponsorship, all needing membership, and we don't even have enough people to go around. Which brings it back to where we started — the Tour de" \[47:40\] France, the largest event by watch numbers, and population plays into that hugely — the reason the Kentucky Derby sits where it does on the list is because America's a huge population, though we're probably not getting good data on what's watched in China. We definitely are getting the numbers for the Cricket World Cup though, it's massive — that's part of why cricket's going to be at the Olympics." \[48:11\] "Kenny Wallace told me the most-watched sport at the Olympics is table tennis — not badminton, table tennis, because of China. Same reason cricket's coming in — because of India. Eyeballs matter, and one set is worth exactly the same as the next. So back to the Tour — what were we saying? If you're not watching it, get on it, because the racing in the first three days has been unbelievable." \[48:41\] "All the usual suspects are there, battling it out, all in form — go and watch, it's going to be fireworks." "Controversial take — I think it's boring, I've never really been grabbed by it." "Never?" "Never. Do you know the one time it did grab me? Armstrong." "Yep, the only time." \[49:11\] "The comeback, or the original — all of it. That's the only time I've been genuinely captivated by the Tour, and again, it comes back a bit to what we were talking about at the start — for me to get engaged with something, I need a person, the sport itself doesn't do it alone. The competition right now is better than ever, and I agree the personalities are probably better" \[49:46\] than they've been — what's the Slovenian rider's name, Pogačar?" "I know who he is, but no, not that engaged with him either. As Andy Buchanan said, it's on the athletes now to tell their story in a more consumable way — you can't just turn up and do your job as an elite athlete anymore. If you had one Australian runner right now you could sit down with, who would it be?" \[50:24\] "Gut reaction is Gout Gout, but I don't know if he's got a story to tell yet. If I said middle distance or endurance — Peter Bol isn't strictly an endurance runner, 800 metres —" "Yep, I'll give you the 800 up. I think, no one really — just" \[50:54\] because of what she's achieved from a global perspective — Peter Bol's got a really unique story to tell." "Does it have to be an Australian?" "Well, that's where we began, right — we're talking about whether this is the moment for Australian running, and the note I had was, why" \[51:24\] hasn't the country properly clocked that we're having this big moment? And then you brought up personalities, and I asked, and you didn't really have a definitive answer, did you." "No — who would you want to talk to? I don't know, that's a genuinely good question — I'd like to leave that one open. Anyone listening, tell us who you want to hear from. We've got the platform, we just need" \[51:56\] to know who." "Honestly, I want to sit down with all of them." "You can't sit on the fence, pick one." "I really want to hear Hatsu's whole story from him — I've read about it, met the man very briefly right after he broke the record. And I love Andy Buchanan, think he tells an amazing story too, but we'll keep" \[52:26\] talking to Andy anyway — I mean, who's the one person you want to hear from in Australian running right now? Anyone listening, shout that out too. And can I broaden it — I know his reputation's already well established, but if you gave me a choice of" \[52:56\] the whole field, anyone in world distance running, not just Australian—" "You're going further now, OK. If I said, I've got them on the phone right now, any distance runner in the world — I honestly don't think I'd be able to pick who you'd say." "This is interesting, because we talk every week and I don't think I could pick yours either. Go on, who's your first —" "Jakob Ingebrigtsen." "Great choice, no idea where you're going with that." "Is that who you'd like to talk to?" "No, no, you asked me first, I'll tell you mine after —" \[53:27\] "Knee-jerk reaction, I'd say Kilian Jornet." "Good choice too, though probably not for the running side, just interested in everything else about him." "Mine's Mo Farah." "Right, OK — and I think that's my radio brain at work, because" \[53:58\] in those conversations I have with football clubs I always say, don't give me your best player, give me your best talker. Doesn't have to be your best player, your star, an Origin player, or a Brownlow medallist — give me someone who wants to sit down and have an engaging conversation, tell a story with a laugh and some emotion. To me, Mo Farah, over the last decade, is probably the most engaging distance runner I can think of. I feel like if I sat down with him for an hour I'd come out the other" \[54:28\] end wanting another hour with him." "That's where my mind went too — though technically he's British, not Australian, so maybe that's cheating a bit, but that's where my brain went. Tell us who you want to hear from, or keep it to Australia and we'll try to make it happen a bit more easily than Hatsu. Leave it with me, I don't know why my brain" \[54:58\] went straight there — I didn't have much voice left when I met him and his manager, but we should make it happen. One more thing quickly for the podcast — we're wrapping up the Gold Coast Marathon series on Wednesday, but this is a real moment, Courtney, because twelve months ago we both set ourselves a goal at the Gold Coast Marathon, and neither of us got to the finish line. Now you've done the marathon, I've done the Miler — nothing but blue skies ahead. We've got to figure out what's" next. Alright, we'll see you next week."