EP 13 - ARE RUN CLUBS THE NEW CYCLISTS?

[00:01] In the beginning, episode 13. I've always wanted to start one of these episodes with that — Courtney Atkinson, remind me of the alpha blokes, mate. One of my favourite podcasts, but they're cracking a beer. In the Beginning EP 13, we're back, we're in person. You've returned from your adventure down in Victoria. I've come back early, but let's get straight into it, mate, because I've seen something on the web and it's trending a little bit on social media, and that's the question: are run clubs the new cyclists? So, mainstream crew, there's obviously enough runners

[00:34] that are pissing people off at the moment. What do you reckon? Yeah, I reckon they are. And the difference is, I've never really been part of a cycling group. I did a bit of riding around in Sydney when I was living there with a bit of a crew — not regular enough to call myself a cycling club member, but I was also very considerate of them on the roads. I was, you know, share the road and all that sort of stuff. But I did look at them at times

[01:05] with a sense of "come on, guys." There's a bit of eye-rolling with cyclists. The difference is now, and I can see, if this is online, it means the worm is starting to turn on run clubs, because like everything, particularly in this country, it reaches a point of popularity, and then tall poppy syndrome kicks in and we as Aussies like to cut it down. And clearly run clubs are almost getting there.

[01:35] The difference between run clubs and cycling clubs is the level of accessibility. You don't need a $2000 bike to go out and join a run club — you can just put your shoes on and jump in. It's far more for the everyday person; you can get run clubs of all levels, whereas you can't just jump into a cycling club if you don't have the gear — you don't need to spend ten grand on a bike. But if that's starting to simmer and percolate online, it tells me that maybe

[02:05] it's festering that we've hit run club peak. We question when the trend finally can't grow anymore — when's it hit its peak and where does it kind of tail off from there. I think this is a good indication that it's at such a height at the moment that it's starting to rub some people the wrong way — everyday people who have different interests in life. And it was specifically around running 5K and then sitting down with your boys having a coffee.

[02:35] Which is what — which is the cycling problem. So coffee is the issue here, not the running? I think that's what it came down to — the culture of what the run club has become is the issue, not the running itself. As you're saying this, I had a moment last Friday — I was trying to go to a mate's house to do a little gym session, this is around Currumbin near where I live, and there's the Cafe Salt

[03:05] Mill there, which is an awesome cafe. They have a Tuesday run, but there's also a run club that goes out of there, and on the Friday it's 6:00 AM in the morning and I couldn't get a park to save myself because the big Friday run club was operating. They do a couple — Tuesday and a Friday. But I can understand if you're not in that world, if you don't sympathise with it at all, because suddenly your local cafe or your local area is being overrun with

[03:37] regularity, with more and more happy, smiley squatters on the Gold Coast at the moment. I could understand why you'd start to turn on it. Yeah, I could totally understand why you'd start to turn on it. Before the Gold Coast absolutely stuffed our roads and you couldn't travel north and south anymore, I used to get down and run from well in front of Salt Mill on the Esplanade — there were some of the southern guys and we'd run down to Snapper Rocks and back and do some tempo stuff. Ando and the Wild Earth crew, we no longer

[04:07] can go — the traffic's just too difficult to get up and down the coast. But that was the start of the Salt Mill scene — there were just a few little runs starting. And here's the kicker: the cafe were giving them free coffees to start. So when there were only 20 or so of them, they were loading them up — they wanted them there, because if you're a cafe, once they grow to 100 and you're pulling 100 coffees, that's your week made — you may as well shut up and go on holidays for the rest of the week. The businesses are doing

[04:37] great out of run clubs. Yeah, breweries now are starting to catch on to this too — "can we get the run clubs in?" — because young people are doing this as their hobby, which is a great thing, but there are other patrons to think about. Big shout out to Johnny at Salt Mill — he's a ripping bloke, and the whole crew that work there are so good. What I'd say is that if it's starting to bubble away online like this, both parties need to

[05:08] take a look at themselves. Those people getting wound up about run clubs and what they're doing to the cafes and breweries around them — take a deep breath and calm the farm a little bit, because this is a good thing, these people are out there being active and getting healthy. If this is the problem for you, think about what the alternative problems could be —

[05:39] this is the lesser of two evils. Now, if you're the run club, the other thing I'd say is don't be ignorant to the inconvenience you might be putting on other people. Cycling groups and cycling clubs around cafes have survived for a long time, so I don't think it's going anywhere. But I just found it super interesting — we talked about when it reaches its peak, and I think when you start seeing mainstream attention on something, that's a sign it's reaching its heights. There's another big sign that

[06:09] running isn't reaching its peak, it's continuing its growth. If there were a business with growth like running has had over 12 months, you'd be cheering, you'd be buying shares, you'd be taking bonuses if you were the CEO — it's a company you'd want to get around. On the 21st of December last year, the Gold Coast Marathon sent out a press release saying that in the first three weeks of entries going on sale, they'd

[06:42] sold a record 50% of entries for the 2024 race — in the first three weeks they'd sold 56%, and that was a number they were trumpeting, cheering about, flying planes around about it, sky-writing. That was a big result for the Gold Coast Marathon. Twelve months on, this year's marathon has sold out in less than a week. It's crazy.

[07:14] That it's sold out — I'm going to say it again — last year's race sold 50% of entries in three weeks and they were all back-slapping, saying "we're doing a great job." The 2025 race has sold out in a week. So I don't know where the peak is. It crashed the website — it wasn't even over a full week, people knew they had to get in fast. The half marathon sold out in two days.

[07:45] Crazy — the half marathon was done within two to three days, the full marathon sold out within a week. They've changed it this year so that they've moved the 10K race, which often happened on the Sunday alongside the marathon, to the Saturday, so they can accommodate more runners in the marathon — more stragglers, people who'll take longer, can be on the roads for longer. They're shaping this so they can accommodate the increased popularity, and they still can't satisfy the hunger of

[08:15] the runners who want to come and race this thing. So here's my question: is this demand being driven by fear of missing out, or is it being driven by people genuinely wanting to run? We're going to touch on motivation a bit later, but I'm interested in what's motivating someone who's new to running, or who hasn't run a marathon before, to get out there

[08:46] and do a marathon. Is it about being part of the crowd — are we all sheep — or is it "I love running so much now that I've got to do a marathon"? It's probably a little column A, a little column B — a bit of both. The other thing I'll be interested to see: we know injuries will happen, and as a result people on the wait list will get spots. But I'll be interested to see what drop-off happens and what

[09:17] wait-list pickup happens as a result of people getting caught up in the FOMO now and then getting to February and going "I'm cooked, I'm pulling out." That's something for a later episode — I might do a deep dive into the economics of these races, because the other factor is we're in a cost-of-living crisis right now, and people would be looking at the finances of all this

[09:51] stuff. If you don't live locally to the marathon you're entering, you're talking an entry fee of somewhere around $200 these days, you're talking flights, you're talking accommodation — these experiences become incredibly costly. So maybe a factor here is that people are really picking one race, going all in — "that's my race, that's my weekend, that's my event, that's my

[10:21] experience for this year." But interestingly, we just talked about the expense of cycling and everything that goes with it — running is a really cheap form of exercise by comparison. If you compare it to triathlon, if you went to an Ironman or one of those long ultra trail races, you're talking $800 entry, over $1000 for the big ones. Even smaller locally-run events like trail runs, you can pay, you know, three,

[10:52] four hundred dollars. So when you put that into perspective and go "well, I'm getting to run the Gold Coast Marathon, the biggest run in Queensland" — definitely 100% the biggest in Queensland — and you can do that for $200, that's a bargain. It depends which way you're looking at it, where you're coming from. And for anybody hearing that number and thinking "is $200 still a fair whack for what's essentially a two-day experience?" — because whether you're running only on the Sunday, you still get around it on the Saturday with the spectating, the

[11:23] half marathon, the Expo and all the rest — if you pro-rata it, it's pretty cheap on an hourly rate. It's good value, right — it's cheaper than a movie, better than paying to go into a nightclub on a Saturday night. Exactly. And now, if you enjoyed that little rant we just ran, subscribe — Spotify, Apple Podcasts, wherever you're listening — make sure you subscribe and leave a review.

[11:54] We want to keep growing. The growth of In The Beginning through the first twelve and a half episodes has been awesome, the community is coming together, we're starting to see some really interesting things come out of it, and we want you to be a part of it. So we're giving you the heads-up early today: subscribe, leave a comment, leave a review, share it with your friends, share it with your run clubs — because whether running is peaking or continuing to grow, if running was a business, as we just talked about, we're investing more time and we just want to keep talking. Exactly.

[12:24] So help us out. Now, Liam, the biggest news is your news — this is huge. It feels like it would've been four weeks ago — you're in the paper, you've lost your job. Not the day job, not the In The Beginning Podcast job — I haven't got 5G yet — but you lost your other job four weeks ago. I read that in the newspaper anyway, so give us the lowdown. That was a really strange experience, seeing my face in the paper, because I'm not a celebrity. I work in radio, I've worked

[12:54] with celebrities, but I've never had a profile level that had any celebrity attached to it. So to see your face in the paper with the headline "axed" was a very surreal experience. Having said all that, I was okay about it, I was calm, because I knew what was going on, we knew what was in the world, we had the inside knowledge, didn't we. So, LeBron James style, Courtney — I'm pleased to announce that in 2025 and beyond I'll be taking my

[13:24] talents to the Triple M Gold Breakfast Show with Liesel Jones and Spida Everitt on the Gold Coast. We're bringing you home — we've had you from Adelaide to Sydney to Brisbane, and now you're in paradise. To the M1, I give you the middle finger, not the thumbs up — I can kiss goodbye to that road, the M1. I've been driving it for the last three years, every day back

[13:56] and forth to Brisbane, basically kissing goodbye to three hours of my day, because I love my job, I love my show, I love the radio programme I got to do with Liesl and Dubbo. But now, starting next year, I've got a nice 20-minute commute into our studios in Broadbeach, and I'm genuinely pumped, I'm so excited. Liesl — full-time Olympian, who I've been working with for the last three years — the chemistry I've developed with her over the last three years is great, and I think she's a

[14:27] genuine talent, and she's looking forward to this opportunity as well. And I get to keep working with Spida too, who I know a little bit — give us a bit of a rundown, for those who don't know who Spida Everitt is. Played just shy of 300 games of AFL footy, started at St Kilda, was at the Swans, was at the Hawks in the 90s — started his career in the mid-to-late 90s. He was one of these characters that I don't think we have as many of in

[14:57] professional sport anymore, because it's been beaten out of them a little bit. Who did he play against, what were the — Spida Everitt played with Tony Lockett, played in that 90s era. I think he played in the '97 grand final against the Adelaide Crows. He's a big ruckman, hence the nickname Spider. But yeah, he's from those glory years — Nathan Buckley, Shane Crawford, Robert Harvey — and Spida was a dominant ruckman.

[15:27] So every morning you're going to be in the element — you've got your AFL on one side, your Olympian on the other side. We might have to keep some of the sport chat for off-air, because that's not what people want to be hit over the head with every morning. But I am really, really looking forward to this show — not only because I get to ride the coattails of a couple of athletic champions, but also because, you know this, the Gold Coast — I reckon it's the best place on the planet. The growth of this area,

[16:01] I know you locals, the people born here, don't love the rate of growth, but there is so much going on and I'm really excited about getting to talk about all of it. Oh, mate, we're stoked for you. Stoked to have you local — going to miss our morning runs though, because that takes you out of early mornings. Early mornings, you're off — 100% pro hours only now, strictly a pro-hour runner. Every day after 9am I'll be able to go running. And the feedback I've seen online around the Gold Coast has been super

[16:32] positive. So yeah, there's a new radio show, a new crew in town. What, you're doing the school run now? Yeah, absolutely, we're going to have a lot of fun. It's the first time I've really experienced this kind of public discussion around my job, and it was strange. But at the same time I'm really, really looking forward to this year, and hopefully I never have to go through that

[17:03] again until I hang up the microphone twenty years from now. If you don't mind answering — not about you specifically, but at the moment radio is really in the news, right, you're seeing it every day, there's KIIS, there's a massive change in the industry — what's actually driving all that? I think it's like every industry at the moment, and people listening to this are probably seeing varying levels

[17:34] of it in their own industry — the economy's not flying at the moment, we're in something of a downturn. You hear about the cost of living and all that, and the flow-on effect is a domino: if the cost of living means people are tightening their belts, they're spending less money in the shops, which means the companies that sell products are being impacted. And generally when that's going on, the first thing companies typically cut back on is their marketing spend — advertising. They spend less money on advertising, and radio, for the most part, is about

[18:05] advertising. It's like television, it's like any media industry — we create these shows and products that hold advertising so people can sell you things. So radio's being impacted by that. And a lot of people out there, ironically, listening to this might be thinking "well, I don't listen to radio anymore, I only listen to podcasts" — and a lot of people do. But podcasts will never replace radio, because podcasts don't have the immediacy of radio.

[18:35] If you're on your way to school in the morning dropping the kids off, or on your way home, and news breaks, podcasters can't turn that information around for you and inform you of it immediately — radio can. Radio will never be replaced by podcasts. It's shifted, absolutely, but it won't be replaced. So radio's having an adjustment moment. And, not to get too technical and boring, there's also a slight move toward networking, or making something

[19:06] national. Kyle and Jackie O — people know that's a Sydney breakfast show that now goes into the Melbourne market as well. Some radio companies and businesses are looking at whether it's cheaper — to put it in newspaper terms — instead of printing the Gold Coast Bulletin and the Courier Mail and the Daily Telegraph and the Herald Sun, do you just put out one paper that only tells big enough stories to represent

[19:36] the nation? Yeah, it's interesting, because having followed this closely with you, you see audiences aren't happy — they love local, they love local. It's so hard, because on one hand, if you love local, you've got to support local to keep those things operating. But then podcasts, and whether it's streaming or Netflix, whatever it is — it's a great invention and it's so easy, so it's a happy medium. But I think, whether we're talking bringing it back

[20:07] to running — a bit like these events are being supported really well at the moment, but that tap can easily turn off when the trend stops too. That's right — the thing is, if you love something, you've got to get behind it and support it, because most things don't exist unless there's dollars behind them and an audience behind them. Everything you just said sums up perfectly what's going on at the moment. The support for this new show we've announced with Liesl and Spida has been

[20:39] tremendous. And what we're going to focus on is local — we are a Gold Coast breakfast show that's going to do its best to celebrate and have fun with everything about the Gold Coast, hopefully for the next ten years. If there's one thing you're looking forward to next year with it here on the Gold Coast — I'm putting you on the spot — what are you going to bring into the show? Look, we've got a great game we've played before, for those who might have heard the show previously — we've

[21:09] called it "Stick to the Beat," basically a game of categories, it's going to be a lot of fun, the kids in the car will love it, at 8:00 each day. But you know what, and I'm genuinely returning serve here — the thing I'm genuinely looking forward to is bringing people into our studio. Not dragging, but hoping that there are so many awesome people of varying levels of profile, celebrity, business success, political success, industry, film industry — we're opening our doors to

[21:41] these people in 2025. So you, Courtney Atkinson, will be a required guest at some point on our show. I can't say no to you. I know you want Kai Hurst as your first guest, but genuinely, from an athletic perspective — yourself, then the surf lifesavers like Kai Hurst, like Matt Bevilacqua, like the Hancock sisters, and then you go to the surf world and you've got Mick and Joel and Steph and all these people — some of the best ever, who live here on the

[22:11] coast. And then there's the likes of Baz Luhrmann from the film industry, who's setting up a brand new studio here in Miami near Nobby's. And we haven't even dipped our toe into the business world — LSKD, the activewear brand, Valley — there's all these amazing people and things that live here, and I want them all to come onto our show. We just open the doors, bring them in, make them feel a part of our show, because there's

[22:42] awesome people that live here. Good to see we've converted you to the Gold Coast, mate. So that's the first thing — one piece of advice I'll give you, since you want people in there: I've been into your new studio, you have to get rid of that fake brick wall. Don't worry, I've put a call into Scott Cam, I've asked him if he can come in and renovate the Gold Coast studios. But that's another thing — baby steps, baby steps, Korda. Just on that — I mean, we said you'd lost your job and we knew you hadn't, but I had two things happen to me yesterday.

[23:15] I was listening to a podcast, and an old mate of mine, Miles Stewart, was having a chat on it, and it was really interesting and really good. And I went to message him just to tell him how good it was, and then I thought, nah, no, no, give him a call instead — haven't spoken to him in a while. There's something about just picking up the phone and having a chat with someone, rather than this whole idea of always messaging people and never really connecting. So again, there was no agenda more than just "hey mate, I had

[23:46] a listen, it was great to reminisce," on this podcast you're on. And the one thing around jobs — I spent a lot of time with Miles, we talked about his coaching in previous episodes, about payments and things like that. But I was racing my best ever under his dad. Miles himself was a world champion, raced for twenty years at the top of the triathlon tree, but the best advice he ever gave me was actually once he left triathlon and had to go and join the workforce — effectively he lost his job

[24:17] as a traveller, or retired, or stopped doing the travelling, and had to start at the bottom of the tree back in the job world. And he said to me: whenever you get out and you've got to deal with businesses, or be inside a corporate office, remember that people just want to do their job as easily as possible, with as little stress as possible, and get paid. You're coming from an environment where every single person in your squad, in your sport, is doing every single thing they possibly can to become number

[24:49] one for themselves. So sport at the elite level is a really selfish thing, because you're always involved with squads — you're not going to last long in sport if you're not ticking every box, doing everything you can, self-motivated, because in the end it's you who loses if you don't. You're out of sport if you can't do that. But take that mentality — kill everyone, destroy everyone, win at all costs — into a business, and then you've got to start managing people, talking to people, delegating work.

[25:21] If you have that same expectation, you're going to struggle. And that's the one piece of advice in work he's given me — you can still try and be the best you can be, but you've got to understand everyone's got different purposes for being there and different ideas of what's good. It feels like you're about to apologise for the way you've treated me around the podcast. This was all leading somewhere — I would like to apologise, but no, that's

[25:51] not the interesting thing. I never took — with all the mentorship he gave me around triathlon, the one thing I think he taught me better than anything, and I always think about it, is this: for people out there listening who've never been elite athletes, this is probably an eye-opener. The reality for most people is that our jobs probably aren't something we love, probably aren't our

[26:22] passion. Most people don't get to make their passion their job. Most people have to pay bills, feed their kids, put a roof over their head, and that means taking a job that will achieve those things. It might not be doing the accounts, might not be their passion; working in HR might not be their passion; being a teacher, being a nurse, whatever it is, might not be their passion, but it's a job they've skilled up to do and that pays their bills.

[26:56] That mentality for athletes — you wouldn't survive on it. And it's a hard transition. So where this is all going: between jobs, once you retire from sport, it's a hard transition, because it's nearly like you've got to start at the bottom again and relearn what you've been taught. You've got to understand everyone else, you've got to understand how to work in teams — all of this stuff where you've just spent the last twenty years of your life being programmed to literally want to destroy anyone who comes in your way. Think of it like that.

[27:27] Well, think of it like that, then let's pivot — did you destroy everybody who got in your way down in Victoria over the last week while you were away filming for Subaru? I've learned my lessons. Okay, one thing — when I was down in Victoria, we were filming this Subaru commercial over ten days across the state, and the one thing I hate, and hopefully the crew don't call me out because I do preach what I say, is when you're in a situation where they're

[27:58] obviously doing long hours, the crew's doing a lot more of the work — I was the talent in this case, just doing the acting and whatever else — everyone should be able to just chip in and make things easier. You see something just sitting there, it might be shifting a car, it might be grabbing some gear for someone to help them out and save them doing two trips. Nobody's too good to not do that. And it's interesting, watching you talk a lot about life and jobs and different things that happen —

[28:29] I reckon that's one of the big things: it's not too hard to help, but it goes a long way. So if there's younger crew listening, that's a piece of advice I'd give — it doesn't matter what you're doing, you can always just chip in and help a little bit. You don't have to take the shirt off your back and start digging a trench, but you can at least grab a shovel. I like it — no, it's a good attitude to have. Tell us more about your week though, tell us more about this adventure down in Falls Creek.

[28:59] You finally got down there — so where we left off last week, I think the day I was speaking to you it was pouring rain in Falls Creek where all the runners were, and I talked about declining to go to the kilometre session with the Melbourne Track Club. Coward. Yes, very cowardly. That afternoon I did get out with Collis Birmingham and his mob for a run, an easy 8K — and again I can report back that their "easy" 8K is not my easy 8K. What are they running at? They were up at 1600

[29:32] metres elevation, on a pretty flat road, but you're looking at them clocking along at 4:00 to 4:15s on their second run of the day. I was running at the back of them trying to chat, and I'll tell you what, I was breathing between talking. It gave me a good reminder that this is real — these are the best in Australia, and we could barely stay within distance of them. The other thing I noticed,

[30:04] and I'm always looking and observing things — there was a group of probably 15 of some of the best Australian record holders, best in Australia across both women and men, different middle distances, long distances, and there's no one common run style or run shape that makes anyone better than anyone else. I was about to ask you about this, keep going. Yeah, so what got me was some of them were running on their toes, some of them had that perfect

[30:36] style you'd think the best runners in the world have, and then others just looked like the everyday park runner — and some of those were the Australian record holders. It was crazy, and why — I could not pick. If you asked me in that group of 15 to pick who's the best runner, I guarantee you the one I would have picked as the best-looking isn't the best runner there. It's so interesting, because my wife has this thing where she loves watching people run past and evaluating their technique, and

[31:09] that — I was about to ask, all right, you're at the back of the group watching the best in Australia do their thing, are you looking at technique, judging their style and all that? The fact you've said it's basically a licorice all-sorts — I'm not judging, because I always remember Jana Pittman — remember the 400 metre hurdles, one of Australia's greats, Doctor Jana Pittman — and I think, hopefully I've got this right, I remember she had a bumblebee tattoo.

[31:40] Hopefully I get this story right — I think the idea of the bumblebee tattoo was her way of going: a bumblebee doesn't look like it can fly, but it can, it's got wings, it moves, and it moves quick, and it does its job. Same thing — you don't have to have the perfect physique, you don't have to have the perfect running style. If you get the job done and are efficient at the way you go about it, that's good enough.

[32:11] And it's a little bit like we talked about with technique — you don't want to try and make everyone run identically and exactly the same, because that's not necessarily the most efficient and best way for you to run, especially if you haven't come from a real natural running background as a kid, if you're starting later in life. You're looking up my story — actually, I am, I'm fact-checking, because last time you dropped a story we had Olympians and radio personalities messaging in saying "Courtney's an idiot." No, I am checking.

[32:41] And yes — Jana Pittman has a tattoo on the lower left side of her abdomen of a bumblebee, and she says that aerodynamically the bumblebee shouldn't be able to fly, but it doesn't know this, so it goes on flying anyway. Basically, it means: I've been given this body and I'm capable of anything, I'm only limited by my own imagination. There you go — great message, and well remembered by you. Do you know why I always remember Jana? At Red Bull in Sydney — she ran for Red Bull for a couple of years, back at some point

[33:13] in her career. The reason I keep remembering her is that in our storeroom down in Sydney, there's a lot of athlete memorabilia that just sits in this room, about three by three metres — we've got Red Bull athlete-only gear branded just for the athletes sponsored by Red Bull. And there's a pair of Janas's spikes in there, spray-painted with a Red Bull logo and sun on them, signed by Jana. So every time I go into that storeroom I'm reminded of that story —

[33:45] pretty much — I look down at my big quads and think, you don't have to be the perfect specimen to run. She's one of the very few Aussie athletes to have competed at both the Winter and Summer Olympics — Jana went for the two-woman bobsled. That's a nice pivot actually, talking about technique — because right now Australia is getting familiar with a young man whose technique has a striking resemblance to the greatest sprinter of all time.

[34:17] In fact, Usain Bolt watched a video of this young man and said "looks like me." And if you're not familiar with him — we're talking about Gout Gout. I don't think anyone in the last two weeks hasn't heard or seen Gout Gout. If you don't know — over the weekend, last weekend, at the Australian school boys, the all-ages school race — he races for Ipswich Grammar, a good GPS school up here in Queensland,

[34:48] and broke the Australian 200 metre record in the under-18 boys final, running a 20.04. Now, that record has existed for — what's the maths on it — 60-odd years or thereabouts. Since 1968, when Peter Norman won silver in the 200 metre Olympic final, I think in Mexico City. Yeah, that famous image — I only just learnt this week, everybody would be doing this — he was the one on the podium in the famous

[35:18] image of the two American sprinters — I think it was Tommie Smith and John Carlos — you've jumped back to the Hitler Olympics there, that's Jesse Owens, different era. But no, as I said — there's a famous image of two American athletes protesting what was going on in their country around race and social inequality, and Peter — it's a really tragic story, we don't need to unpack it now — but the way Peter Norman was treated off the back of

[35:49] participating in that protest on the podium — he was treated terribly, not only by the Australian Olympic Committee at the time, but really unfairly and harshly treated, and it probably undermined his amazing performance in winning silver and setting that Australian record. But now Gout Gout, in 2024, has run a 20.04 — that's faster than Usain Bolt would ever have run at that age — and this kid is 16 years old. I did the maths on it, he would have finished sixth in

[36:22] the Paris Olympic final this year, on time. I saw you post that — that's what stood out to me, two things — that he's already that good, and the other thing was you talking about technique, and someone had put up the image of him — yes — Peter Norman on the bend, and it's funny because we say Gout Gout's got this amazing technique, but they look nearly identical running the bend. So here you've got two very different

[36:53] backgrounds, bodies and physiques, but you look at their style on the corner and it's still high knee drive, looks nearly identical. There's two things I want to unpack with you about Gout Gout, Courtney — firstly, can you play this audio for us — this is Gout's father, Bona, speaking to Seven News about his son's performance. "His name is Gwot. He's supposed to be Gwot. When I see people call him Gout Gout, I'm not really happy about it.

[37:25] When we came from Sudan, I know how to spell Gwot, but when he did the documents, they mixed the letters. So sometimes it was unheard, so nothing I can do — you know, the Australian people, they want to make a short name, that's why they call him Gout Gout, but it's not the correct name, because I know Gout is a disease name, and I don't want my son —" so that's Gout's dad Bona, informing us and telling

[37:56] us that we're getting his son's name wrong. The ship's sailed, mate — he's going to be known as Gout Gout. I think this is part of the personal brand — obviously it's a running thing, obviously it's a look, obviously it's a background, but Gout Gout — I mean, musicians go and change their name to make it more effective for the public to remember, and he's already got that.

[38:26] He's got it — his name is Gwot Gwot, not Gout Gout, I know that, but it's not going to change. This is his dad, imploring us early on before this kid becomes an international superstar. His parents are both from South Sudan, they fled to Australia with everything going on in that country. Gwot's been born and raised in Ipswich, and I think — for the fans of rugby league out there, you'd have seen this happen —

[38:58] there's a couple of players over the years, lots actually, who've had this happen late in their career — the Islanders and Pacific players finally correcting people who've been saying their name wrong. Junior Paulo, for example — his name is actually pronounced "Paulo" rather than "Paolo" — pronounce Joseph Suaalii, this young superstar who's just released a song with his mates, Joey Manu and the likes, now a Wallaby — his name is pronounced "Suaalii," and I think he made it clear early enough that now commentators

[39:30] refer to him as Joseph Suaalii. Do you get called out when you're commentating and you stuff up a name — do the fans come after you? Personally, look, in AFL it's not as big — I don't call rugby league, so there's not typically as many players in AFL with pronunciation difficulty. One of them, Orazio Fantasia — there was a big storm in a teacup about this because Brian Taylor, a Channel Seven commentator, started pronouncing his name as "Orazio

[40:01] Fantasia," which is how the Italians would pronounce it, but then Orazio came out and said he didn't really care how you say his name, so Brian went back to calling him "Orazio Fantasia," how everybody says the name in Australia. But I think if Gwot's father has come out now, this young man is 16 years old, and I haven't heard what he said — but if Gout Gout wants to be called Gwot Gwot, I think it's early enough that we should get behind that. Hey, I'm all for getting behind it, I'm just saying the ship's sailed.

[40:31] He's the number two trending — not person, thing, search term, whatever you want to call it — in the world over the last two weeks, as Gout Gout, and that's not changing now. Isn't it funny, the story his dad told, that when he — they basically spelled the name wrong, put the O in front of the U — whoever was doing the paperwork made a spelling error, Bona didn't correct them, and now Gwot

[41:02] Gwot is Gout Gout. The story of him coming from Ipswich too — there's so many things I love about this whole circus that's happening, but one of them is the name — I truly believe the name became the story before people knew the person, once it trended. Often you'll see something once and think "oh, is that the Australian who ran that time again?" and then maybe on the third or fourth

[41:32] time you see someone, you start to pick up names and that kind of thing — this was like instant. It was Gout Gout because it has that resonance — you know it's the disease name, but it has that quality, and the fact it's just "Gout Gout" — like if you called yourself Liam Liam, I'm going to remember it. There's an AFL player, used to be at the Swans, now at Port, called Aliir Aliir, who, when I'm commentating and I

[42:03] commentate — let's say I'm commentating the Brisbane Lions, it's Ashcroft, Zorko, Dunkley, surnames, right, because that's how the public know these players. When I commentate Aliir Aliir, I say Aliir Aliir — I say his first name and surname because they're the same, and there's that level of brand association. And I think what you're talking about with Gout Gout is that no one will ever refer to him as just Gout or

[42:33] just Gwot — it'll always be first name and surname. It's brilliant. The way he runs — going back to this whole idea, I've chatted to a few people who've been watching him at school athletics, this isn't an overnight sensation, he's been competing at GPS athletics, all-school athletics, right throughout his career. Sounds like he's got a great family behind him, hearing from his dad there, and a great team around him with his coach, Shepherd —

[43:03] she said the first time she saw him run, she knew. They're protecting him, which I think is the right thing to do at the moment — the biggest challenge he's going to have moving forward is the fact he's going to have attention on him every time he runs. Glad you've brought this up, this was the other point I wanted to discuss — talk to me about the level of hype, and what that

[43:34] can do to you as an athlete, because you were successful at a young age — there wasn't this level of hype around you, but you were successful young. Yeah, you can't get away from the pressure, and it's going to take a very unique individual to completely shut out the fact that people are turning up to old-school athletics — he had a crowd, thousands of people turned up just to watch him. He seems to be water off

[44:05] a duck's back at the moment, he just seems to be having fun, loving life, and let's hope he can continue to do that. But once he starts getting up into the seniors, and there's Olympics and things like that, that pressure is going to be on him. I'll say it right here — I actually believe he can become the biggest Australian athlete we've ever known. There you go — he's already known to every single person right now, but if he starts to

[44:36] perform for Australia at that Olympic level, he'll be up there with the greats. I love that, it makes me so excited. And Matt Shirvington — I was reading, very similar context, coming from one of our best Olympic sprinters, saying this guy — there's plenty of young kids out there, and I probably could have been thrown in with one of them, who eventually you might win an Olympic gold medal. Most of us don't.

[45:09] This kid is on another level, this is another playing field, he's unique. Yeah, I'm hooked, I can't wait to watch the next one. It's the perfect storm of hype, because we've discussed the name factor — people might think that sounds silly, but it plays a part. If Usain Bolt's name had been Usain Smith — not the same, probably it still goes down as the greatest sprinter of all

[45:39] time, but the brand's different — it's a brand, "Usain Bolt" for a sprinter, amazing. The name is a factor. We discussed the fact he's competing in an event Australia's never been world-beaters at, and Australians love the idea of busting through barriers, the underdog at world level, exploring new frontiers — Cadel Evans, when

[46:11] he won the Tour de France — wow, frontier conquered, we'd never had a Tour de France winner before, now we've got one, and Cadel became a household name. In the tennis world we've been doing it for a very long time, but the 100 metres — we've never really had that, Rohan Browning the last couple of years has been enormous because he's been the best prospect we've had. Now we're looking at this 16-year-old kid who could foreseeably compete at the next Olympics, when he'll be 20, in LA — Brisbane, but more

[46:44] to the point, when he's 24 and competing at his home Olympics — a true home Olympics, Ipswich born and bred, raised in Brisbane. Let's move on because we're an endurance show, but quickly, what I want to say is — I know it's great they're wrapping this kid up, and we're now starting to get other former elite athletes saying "everybody relax."

[47:18] No, I'm not going to relax, I refuse to relax. Elite athletes can tell us to relax — I'm going to be one of the masses, relish and celebrate and get carried away, because that's what this is about. I want to get excited about this kid, I want to get carried away with the prospect that an Australian is going to win gold in the 100 and the 200 in Brisbane in eight years. Let's get carried away.

[47:48] Maybe that is getting too carried away — going back to the great sprinting lunch, Matt Shirvington himself, and Patrick Johnson with a 9.93, the Aussie record — Gout's going to obliterate that at some point, he might hit it next year on this trajectory. Let's get excited, let's get carried away about this young man. Yep, agreed. So let's bring it back — hey, concentrate over here on me, mate. Thanks, I'll calm down now. Calm down — I'm still halfway through my week, but that was a very good segue. Anyway, we're talking about

[48:21] that — all that conversation came from talking about technique running at Falls Creek. So, I did get away from Falls Creek — the place I visited next, which was amazing, was Bright. Have you heard of Bright? I've heard of it, never been. What I found out is it's like the country club of Victoria — I'm told housing prices, you can't move there in January, it's like the Byron Bay of the

[48:52] hinterland — well, yeah, the hinterland — no, it's like the Byron Bay, the place to be away from the coast in summer for Victorians. Is that a word, "Victorians"? What do they call themselves — Victorians. They won't let me back in anyway. Bright was amazing — I ran up what they call Mystic Mountain in the afternoon when I got in there, only about four to five hundred metres of elevation, but got to look all over town — there's forestry tracks

[49:23] all through there, so it's great running, great mountain bike trails too — I did sneak onto a few of them while I was running just to check them out, maybe the best I've seen in Australia, without riding the whole system. I've been to Derby, been to a lot of places — these trails through the forestry are sick, really amazing. So, running through forestry and all that — but then the next day we got up early to shoot one of the most engaging posts, photos, I've ever put up.

[49:55] It was me on the side of this ledge with Andrew Daddo — it's called a portal ledge, you know, when you go climbing up these big walls, climbers will take them in their backpack, put them out and sleep on them for the night. This was a novelty for TV, don't believe everything you see, but we were literally out on a portal ledge, we had breakfast, they dropped a nice picnic bag down to us — yes, I did see that — but the photo made it look like we were sitting on a 3000 metre drop-off. The reality was we were about three metres over the edge.

[50:25] If anyone's seen the film Free Solo, you'll know what you're talking about there — that incredible rock face — what do you call it, like a sling on the side of a rock face? It's terrifying. So we had to get up and do that part of the segment for the show that morning, and then I thought I'd get out for a run at lunch. It was hot, but I didn't think too much of it — went out, did some 28-minute efforts,

[50:55] kind of tempo efforts. I was out running for an hour and I was cooked, mate, absolutely cooked. When I got back I looked at the weather and it was 34 degrees, felt like 38 — that explained it. But it got me thinking, and I put a poll out yesterday so we could talk about it, because when I arrived back in Queensland it was like walking back into Bali — I walked out of the airport and it hit me like a

[51:27] wall of water. So the poll I put out this week — I've been running and it's been tough here as well — the poll was: would you prefer to run in 34 degrees that feels like 38, with the humidity at 45%, or would you prefer to be in Queensland running in 26 that feels like 28, but at 91% humidity?

[51:58] What was your pick? Personally, that 34 degrees is too hot to run — as someone who grew up in Adelaide, in the heatwaves you get there, you never have the humidity problem because it's a dry heat. But there's a summer block of two to three weeks in Adelaide this time of year where you just can't run unless you're done by 6am. So you're saying it's worse in the south when it's hot? Yeah — I'd rather run in those high-20s temperatures with Queensland's humidity.

[52:28] Okay, it was interesting, because I didn't know which way I'd go — I was cooked that day, but then coming back to Queensland, there's nothing worse than trying to do a hard run when the humidity just drains you from the inside. People — would you rather run in the Melbourne weather at 34 and 38, or the Queensland weather at 26 and 28? 62% would rather the 34 degrees — they don't want the humidity.

[53:01] 38% would prefer to run in Queensland. Nah, that's — I reckon that's mostly Queenslanders saying "yeah, I'd love to get away from this humidity." Well, here's my favourite quote, maybe of the year, a comment sent in by Nick Stone — friend of the pod — "while it's hot in Queensland, it also means I'm living in Queensland,

[53:31] and I'll take that over any option, any day." Well played, Nick, that was brilliant, well done. So — what would you prefer? It was hot, it was real, I think it's easier running in Victoria, even in dry heat — the dry heat's easier, the humidity just continually eats you up. Of course I'd rather be running in Queensland, I'm not going to shy away from that, but that was an exceptional hot day, and I did run at 12 in the middle of the day —

[54:02] that was dumb, that was just — but it was a good idea to have a chat about it around the poll. So I was in Bright, then I got down to a place called Lakes Entrance — I've heard of Lakes Entrance, never been through there. We went out crabbing at Lakes Entrance, it was blowing a freaking gale, but it was nice to get into some cooler weather along the coast. And then, mate, I got back home to the Gold Coast, and I don't have to travel until Christmas, so

[54:32] I'm down to Adelaide this week — actually this weekend, when people hear this I'll be down in the Barossa Valley having a few wines with some friends. A couple of them are part-time runners, and we said if we get carried away at some of the wineries, we'll earn the next day with a couple of runs — so I'm planning a few runs down there. Good luck with that, sounds like a group that's definitely not going to happen. But we're getting close to the

[55:05] end-of-year period, tying up all the end-of-year stuff, it's getting close and I'm excited, we're almost there. All right, so what's next? After the back of the last few weeks we've had — I talked about these different styles of racing, we talked about the flyathlon — I got a lot of feedback about that, people saying it's stupid. Well, you want to talk about stupid, I'm going to keep this segment going, I'm calling it the WTF, or

[55:35] let's call it what it is — "what the f***." What is it? Okay, now I've got to put an explicit tag on our podcast this week, thanks Liam, no kids will be listening to us. Yeah, so I've got three events that have popped up this week. First one: the 2024 kettlebell juggling World Games freestyle battle. Take that in for a moment — you're in the gym doing your lifting with kettlebells, and there's a juggling competition

[56:07] for kettlebells, for gym rats. And the bonus part of that competition is a freestyle battle — think dancing, freestyle battle, rapping. I'm going to repost these on the Instagram. What do you reckon of that one, Liam? I reckon you'll struggle to find a dumber idea. Hey, we're going to find dumber ideas, don't worry. No, I don't know if you will, because if you think about the people who love kettlebells, they're probably

[56:39] the people who made fun of the kids who juggled at school, and now they're entering a world where they're combining kettlebells and juggling. First of all, every gym you ever go into tells you don't drop weights — don't drop the weights — I'm imagining in the kettlebell juggling World Games, they probably drop some of these things. They're big fellas, so I'm not going to argue with them about their event, but it does sound an awful lot like "I can't win the weightlifting competition, so I'm going to create my own." This is —

[57:14] I'm going to offend Liesl Jones here — a friend of the show, a work colleague — this is the breaststroke of weightlifting, when they create something else for the people who can't win the freestyle. You're kidding, you might have just lost Liesl for your show next year, mate. I love Liesl, she knows that. So the second one — a German man ran a marathon while baking a cake. I saw this and I love this one. I love this one. We couldn't disagree more, mate, because this is dumb. Well, hold on, you've never run

[57:45] a marathon, that's fine, so don't have a go at this bloke for trying to spice up his marathon. This is just getting out of hand. I was genuinely blown away when I saw this — I was amazed, because not only did he need to bake a cake, he had to do it while running the marathon, and he also had to create essentially a kitchen bench for himself to run behind. If I was running a marathon and

[58:15] I saw this idiot out there, I'd want to slash his tyres, that's what I'd want to do. You see, I'm just talking about marathons — I think this is a bit late — later news, I'm onto it — but the influencer at the New York Marathon copped it, banned, from using e-bikes and filming himself in the race. So — his mate was filming, basically he had his crew ride electric bikes alongside him during the New York Marathon

[58:48] for content, and now he's been banned for life. I thought that punishment — I thought something else must have happened, like "hold on, you've banned this guy for life" — repeat offender, he's come out and owned it, accepted his fate. But also I thought, I'm not sure if the punishment fits the crime — suspend him, maybe. But it's this world we now live in, and if you go right back to the start of the episode about people getting sick of run clubs, I imagine some of what they're getting sick of is the fact that these run clubs

[59:20] are constantly filming themselves and posting content around this. So this guy — I've read the response from the people who banned him, and they said it was partly a safety issue, because these people are operating cameras while riding e-bikes and impeding others, with tens of thousands of people on the streets of New York. Deep breath, just shaking my head. Have you got anything more for the WTF? I do — one last one, out of the Chinese National Traditional

[59:50] Championships — not going deep on this, but there's some weird stuff coming out, my algorithm's just popping off after our flyathlon segment. It's called board shoe racing — three runners connected by two planks of wood like skis, so think cross-country skiing on planks of wood, three guys backed up against each other, back to back, obviously enjoying themselves. Looking at this, it's like when we were kids at school and they

[01:00:22] used to do sack races, and sometimes join two of you by a rope, like a three-legged race — you'd stand alongside somebody — this is the Chinese version of the three-legged race. Having a look at it now, this is good, this is good — if I was to rank the three you've just listed by which I'd most want to participate in: this one's first, the man making a cake while running a marathon is second, and the stupid kettlebell juggling is third.

[01:00:53] This one we could absolutely do — I'm amazed at the coordination these guys have, going at the speeds they do with board shoe racing. I'm here for it — you like a little back-to-back. Imagine racing in the board shoe racing, you'd destroy it. Speaking of shoes, I do want to update people — last episode I gave a review of the Pegasus and said I'd

[01:01:26] have a review of the Alphaflys. I need to confess to you, Courtney, and the In The Beginning Podcast family — I don't know how to run in these shoes, I'm too scared to run in them, I don't feel like I've got a run in me worthy of these shoes. This is the Nike Alphafly, I haven't run in them yet, they're still sitting in the box, because at the moment I'm not — I'm running okay, I'm starting to try and get my

[01:01:57] miles up, I feel heavy at the moment, but I've put in a few tempo efforts and I feel sluggish and slow. I was running in the Saucony Endorphins actually, went for a sort of quickish run, and I got home and thought, I don't want to run in the Alphaflys in this state. You kind of want to get yourself to a level — yes, if they're that good they should help you regardless, right, but I understand what you're doing — you don't want to. When you wear a super shoe, whether it's a Nike or

[01:02:27] whatever other shoe it is, it's kind of like, if I'm going to wear it for the first time, I want to make sure it works, I want to be worthy of this, because there's nothing worse than getting into it on a bad day and going "oh no, this hasn't helped me, this is bad." I genuinely, you know — I have the same feeling with shoes. If I've got a new pair of racers, I only want to wear them when I know I'm fresh and ready to go, because once you've had a bad

[01:02:57] experience with any equipment on your first go, you're always going to have that in the back of your mind. So I feel you on that one. How are we going for time? We're over — we're at hour three. You know what, we're worth it, we can roll today, I reckon, we've got so much stuff. We do have a lot of stuff — do you want to jump into, you mentioned it a bit earlier, motivation around Trent? Do you want to talk a little bit about — I do, because I missed this last week, we're talking, what

[01:03:27] happened earlier on the episode, I can't remember now — I think we were talking about run clubs and potentially the motivation. This is about what motivates you. Oh no, we were talking about FOMO around the Gold Coast Marathon and people potentially signing up, whether they're just following the herd — that's right, being part of the crew. This one comes from Kendall — he sent this in, Kendall Lloyd. So, off the back of a few episodes ago I was talking about — I used to, there was an event where I rode with Mars bars on the front of my bike, and someone

[01:03:59] asked if it was motivation for me to chase the Mars bars towards the end of the race, or was I actually fuelling with them. The answer was I was fuelling with them. Kendall Lloyd — I finally got the real name — he gave us the idea about putting all the polls in our highlights on the Instagram. He's preparing for the UTA Blue Mountains at the moment, and what he does — he's got a separate Instagram, and he loves chocolate.

[01:04:29] What he does for motivation each day: after every run he buys himself a chocolate treat, and keeps his run diary on Instagram by what chocolate he's eaten that day. Love it — every day he runs, new chocolate to try, think of that for motivation. I love this, I love this — I'm going to go and follow him on Instagram now. What would you put up if you had an Instagram page, or just on your phone, and were going to

[01:04:59] give yourself motivation by putting up a picture of something every day, "I went for a run and this is what I'm—" what would motivation be for you — something you do, a picture, or something you eat? I love this — I don't want to steal Kendall's idea, but I've got a sweet tooth, and the idea of chocolate bars appeals — but the problem I have, and I still have this monkey brain,

[01:05:32] is "effort exerted equals reward" — like, I've just gone and done a 10K run, that means I can go and eat whatever the hell I want. When really, you've probably only burned off, like, 500 kilojoules or something. Look, ice cream for mine — Ben & Jerry's, people out there on the Ben & Jerry's train will understand, a different flavour every day. Look, you'd have to put in a pretty decent run to justify one of those Ben and

[01:06:05] Jerry's mini pints for every time you went for a run, but that half a litre of ice cream can go pretty quickly. Anyway, oh god, Kendall — yeah, I thought it was brilliant, and I'm definitely following along now to see what the next snack is. He also asked when will we see an In The Beginning x Red Bull running event, and if you could create the perfect event, what would it look like? Now I'm going to let you go first, because I've already

[01:06:36] done this, so I can just explain it. If I was to try, off the top of my head, to create an In The Beginning x Red Bull run event — I think what we're all about is the running movement, the running moment. So I'd want it to be a time-based event rather than a distance-based event, and the goal is: the event goes for this long, you need to see how far you can get in that time. So even if you're brand new to running, you're still going

[01:07:10] to get 90 minutes' worth of this event, the best of the best will go a lot further obviously — so it's a time-based event. I think the Red Bull nature of it means you need an adventure factor built in, so there's got to be some elevation. I'm thinking something of a 90-minute loop challenge, where there's some

[01:07:40] tricky uphill — whether it's stairs or rope-climbing up a steep embankment — combined with some sharp downhill on some single trails, mixed up with maybe a little obstacle course on the flat. A few up-and-unders, a little bit of a Tough Mudder-style thing — and just throw it all in there. Just throw it all in the blender and see what comes out, yeah. Before you got onto the adventure part — there is actually a Red Bull-style

[01:08:12] event that caters for this, no distance. Wings for Life World Run, a big charity event — great event, yeah. You start, and then after everyone gets off, half an hour later a car starts chasing you, and that's effectively the finish line — the longer you can run, the longer it takes for the car to catch you, and that's how they work out who was fastest, who was slowest. It's a great event, it only runs a couple of times, so — that one already exists. But talking about the In The

[01:08:44] Beginning x Red Bull running event — Red Bull's Race the Sun, the event that you literally created, and we run it each year — it's an invite-only event, there's an application process. Twenty-four hours, starts at Surfers Paradise beach, runs out to Tenterfield, which is 345K, in teams of six. It's a great event, not too many rules, you just have to get there, but the catch is it starts at sunrise, and your goal is to beat sunrise the next day, so it's a 24-hour event. Good news is it's coming back.

[01:09:17] Coming back in 2025 — we're on again, it's going to be mid-June, so we'll make sure to cover it here. Early next year we'll also put it out on the socials when the applications open. That's the other factor — if I was designing this hypothetical event, I'd incorporate the team element, because a relay-team environment breeds a better experience for everybody involved. Now you've stuffed yourself, mate, because you asked for questions —

[01:09:48] we get questions each week, this week you specifically went and asked for them, and we've got way too many. So what we're going to do is take some now, and put the rest in a list and keep coming back to them — maybe we'll have to do another episode that's just questions. Thanks to everyone who's shot us a message on the IG. Which one are we going to go with? I'll throw this one out — Dave Aldous has sent one in, and Dave's very much a man after my own heart — what shoes would suit a

[01:10:20] guy with shit calves? Well, I've got shit calves too, for the last few years. Yeah, I've had shit calves too. I've got my response for Dave — Dave, it ain't the shoes, it's age. It ain't the shoes, brother, and the only thing that can fix your shit calves is strength training. As someone who's had calf problems before, it wasn't the shoes I was running in that caused the problems, it was that I wasn't doing enough strength training to make them strong. And I'm an average runner —

[01:10:51] and Courtney, you've been through your own problems with this too. Yeah, we've gone through this — but it ain't the shoes, it's not the shoes, no. What I'd say is, if your calves have an issue, avoid shoes with a lower drop. When I say drop, front to back, you'll see different shoe specs — a 6mm drop, an 8mm drop, a 10mm drop. There was a period in the 2000s when we were literally

[01:11:21] running in zero-to-two-mil, four-mil drops. If you've got bad calves, probably don't choose the lower-drop shoes, because that means you're landing with a flat foot each time. If you've got your heel slightly raised, in some of the more supportive training shoes, it takes a little pressure off your Achilles and your calves. So Dave, to break that down into layman's terms — try and find a shoe with your heel raised and your toes on the

[01:11:52] ground, like it's got a lean built in. I hate giving advice like that because it's different for everyone, but you were on the money with this one, Liam — shoes is one thing, but it's strength, it's strength training. Trent Gow has hit us up, Courtney — he said he's been running for two years, he's 49 years old — good on you, Trent, getting into it later in life. He started at parkrun, his PB is 22:53 at Paradise Point, and he's done a 48-minute Gold Coast 10K.

[01:12:26] Courtney, "how do I get my parkrun time lower, and how should I prepare for a Gold Coast Half Marathon in July?" Well, do we have another hour — I'll answer both questions as simply as possible and add a bit on the end. Being away the last two weeks has just reinforced yet again how running is so simple — it's just consistency and slowly building.

[01:12:56] If you can get out and do a little bit more running, consistently over time, you will improve. So that's the first step — consistency in running. How you get quicker in that 5K parkrun, once you've got some aerobic volume there — if you stagnate, let's say you're going each week, running every other day or so, I'm assuming,

[01:13:26] and you get to a point where you're stagnating — well, then at that point it's time to start actually doing some repetition work, or some fartlek-type work, getting a bit of structure into your running, like we've talked about in the past. So for Trent, who's running just under a sub-23 at parkrun and has broken 50 minutes for the 10K — that's good, that's solid — he's probably running somewhere around 30 to 40K a week.

[01:13:57] For that parkrun goal, I think structuring the training to incorporate some more specific over-under work, fartlek work — Trent, just a reminder, if you haven't listened to the earlier episode, that's where you're testing the upper ranges of your speed, making yourself run faster, then changing pace. So you need to get more comfortable running quicker than your 23-minute pace, which I'm

[01:14:28] guessing works out around — let's do some brain maths — you're probably running your parkrun at around 4:40s. So in simple terms, you want to expose your body, expose your legs, at times to a quicker speed so it becomes more comfortable — build up a bit of a speed base, gives you a buffer, and hopefully you'll be able to run a bit quicker. And on the other hand, ever so slowly increase that mileage, tack on a little bit longer over time in each run.

[01:14:58] It's consistency that will eventually get you there, and it doesn't happen overnight — that's the hardest thing about running, being patient. This has actually happened to me right now — because I lost a bit of consistency while I was away, and I'd been having quite aggressive progression in my threshold work when I was at home and not travelling too much over the past five weeks or so, prior to the last two

[01:15:28] weeks — I've stagnated, and if anything I've actually regressed a little bit, simply because I had two rubbish weeks around it where I was running but there was no structure — I'd been tired, sleeping badly, in cars way too much, and it all adds up. There you go, Trent. And then obviously the Gold Coast Half Marathon in July — I think we might talk about this more early in the new year, but Courtney's basically alluded to it — consistency now,

[01:15:58] being consistent now, laying that foundation, and hopefully leading up to the Gold Coast we'll have some things in the pipeline that can really help you knuckle down. Maddie Palmer has also hit us up — shout out to Maddie, part of the Southport Sharks AFL setup, high performance manager, gets them very fit. Did they win? No, they lost in the grand final — VFL grand final, the level step down from AFL. Maddie's done an awesome job with that crew — shout out to

[01:16:30] Southport Sharks, an incredibly strong football club. Maddie loves the Nike Pegasus, sent us a photo of himself in action, training the boys in his footy gear, wearing the Pegasus. He said, let's hear about the Christmas Day period sessions out there — sounds like he took the boys out for a Mackay Athletics track session — well, he's from Mackay, so one of these old sessions. I'm assuming "four fours" refers to four hundreds, not

[01:17:01] four Ks, but four fours, three threes, two twos, and ten ones. What do you make of that session? Hoping he means 100 metres, not 4, 4, 4, 4 Ks — it's solid, hey, it's solid. Have you done any of these? I'm not one for going over the top, but I've heard of swimmers doing hundred-hundreds. Famously the Sydney Swans back in the day used to have their hundred-hundreds

[01:17:32] session — a famous pre-season session the players would get put through, on a time, something like a 15-second repeat, might've been more like 20 seconds, but you're doing 10K worth of sprint efforts, which is huge. I love that from Maddie. That's a very footy-track session. I do have a confession though — during my run the other day I tried to do a bit of tempo work, about 3K worth

[01:18:02] of tempo, then I was a bit cooked, so I recovered for a bit, then thought I'd do some interval sprints on the way home. Looking at my Garmin, I thought I was running 400s for the first one or two — I felt pretty good — what I realised was I had the data fields mixed up and I was running for 40 seconds each time. Were you doing one-minute reps? No, no, no, I was just running,

[01:18:32] looking down at my watch, and it was humid and cooked, and I was like "there's my 400" — and then I was like, what's that other number — oh, I'm running about 190 metres every 40 seconds. Maybe the lesson is not to watch — not to look at the watch at Christmas. I've never been one to jump into these crazy sessions for the sake of it, my theory's always just consistency, keep it simple. However, the last few years one

[01:19:02] thing I have been doing is jumping in with the Gold Coast Run Club — on New Year's Eve they do 24 x 400s at the track. Now, it's not about the session, I don't care what the session is, it's the fact they use it as one day to celebrate everyone who runs around the club, coming in and joining in as one group — whether they've got different levels, different squads,

[01:19:33] the Gold Coast Suns will come in and run, all of us go to the track that one day — you get like 150 people running around that track. That's what I think the holiday's about. When do they do it — New Year's Eve. Are you doing it this year? I will be doing it this year — you're going to come along? I'll come along, I'd love to experience that. I'll have to ask the boss whether I'm allowed. Fine, I'll come to a session before. But this comes back to the question Kendall put out there about creating an event —

[01:20:05] it's about running. And this goes all the way back to the start of the episode, talking about run clubs — that's what it's about, people wanting to feel like they're part of something while pushing themselves, and that kind of Christmas Day activity is awesome. We could keep going, we've got so much, which is great — if we haven't got to your question, apologies, we're keeping the list and we promise we'll get to them all. But quickly, before we finish up — we've mentioned a bit of footy chat here, you've received a message from the AFL world this week. Well, I received the message through an intermediary,

[01:20:38] another Courtney — Courtney Akrig, who looks after us really well up at Noosa, at the race — we don't call it the Noosa Tri legends race anymore, they call it a novelty race. I came second in that novelty race with Kai Hurst, thank you very much — going on your resume, mate — I've mentioned it a lot, that's how you got your new job, isn't it? So in that race, running — Scott Selwood, "Scooter" Selwood,

[01:21:09] you'd know a lot more about him. Scott Selwood, now retired, part of the coaching staff at Collingwood — he sent Courtney a message saying "we're back in the thick of it with training here at the moment, but you've unleashed a beast in Scott Pendlebury" — or as they called him at the Noosa Triathlon, "Scotty Pendlehurst." All he's doing now is messaging me about triathlons, talking about it at training too. I don't know if that's some insider information he should keep to himself instead of footy — no, no, this is great — Scott, he's entered the 400-game

[01:21:44] club this year, arguably one of the greatest footballers we've ever seen, he's done it all, and the fact that post-football — this might be his last season, who knows — what he's doing with his body is incredible. The fact that we could be welcoming him into the triathlon fold, yep — he might be doing the Olympic distance this year. Courtney did share that with me. So — shout out to Scott Selwood, shout out to Scott Pendlebury, welcome to the fold, and Courtney Akrig as well, we love the support she gives us. Can I quickly, to wrap things up

[01:22:15] here, also officially welcome another member of the running community, Tom Rockliff. For those who don't know, Tom was "the pig" back in the day, because when he played football he just hogged the footy, got so many touches. Former captain of the Brisbane Lions, played for Port Adelaide as well, I now work with him in AFL commentary for Triple M. Great fella, who this year went on something of a weight-loss journey, like a lot of

[01:22:45] footballers do who come from this world where they trained as professional athletes. Can you give us an idea, like, when you say weight loss — he got heavy, I don't know, I'll say he probably broke the 100 mark, he got heavy, and now he's in nick again, back below his playing weight, into the 80-kilo range. He's in great nick. What type of running is he doing? It's not — he just changed his diet, probably pulled back on the beers,

[01:23:15] he just made a lifestyle change and now he's healthy and reaping the rewards. But I want to officially welcome Tom — as I say this, down the cup — Tom Rockliff, welcome to the running community, because last weekend, Courtney, Tom Rockliff on a Sunday morning took himself for a 20 kilometre run at 5-minute pace. He's officially a runner now, embracing Sunday long runs. I had a look at his Strava the other day — he's rolling out 10K or 5K every day now, he's a runner, he's hooked.

[01:23:46] This is a guy who, if I'd say "let's go for a run," he'd say "man, I'm not running with you, I can't run with you." And now I don't know if I could run with him. So it's moving — Rockliff is officially part of the running community, awesome news. And on that note, we've got to wrap things up, we've got so much to get to, we'll be back next week. If you haven't already, subscribe, comment, favourite, share with your friends, and we'll see you same day next week.