EP24 - JELLY ROLL'S RUN CLUB

[00:00] In the beginning at 24. Have you heard of Jelly Roll? Do you know Jelly Roll? You're in radio — he's a singer, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Rapper, now does country. But who's got the tattoos all over his face? Bloody cool. What's the song, what's his big one? I'm thinking of Teddy Swims — is that him? He looks similar though. I think "Sinner" might have been his first single, mate. You're the radio guy, you should be telling me this. Unless ACDC covers him, I'm not sure — he's on fire right now though.

[00:30] We see him everywhere. We're no longer the runners who are the geeks in the forest, no way. When I see this, I know we've made it. And have a listen to Jelly Roll, y'all: "It's been a long time since I came back and just had a straight look at y'all to talk to y'all moment. We were training for our second 5K a little bit over a year ago. I literally struggled to walk down my hill to the mailbox, y'all. I mean, it was really bad. And I had let myself get to a"

[01:00] "point of just being absolutely disgusted with myself. I was sick and tired of it. And I was like, man, I'm gonna figure this out. And about the time I was trying to find something to motivate me, I seen that Bert [Kreischer] and Tom Segura had teased doing a 5K by May — 5K by May. And I knew right then that if there was ever a place I was gonna feel safe trying to do my first 5K, it was going to be at the 2 Bears 5K. And I was lucky along the path that I had guys like Ian Laurios, like Gary Brecker, like Cameron Hanes push me and help me get across that finish line for the first time. And I thought I'd like to provide that same opportunity for people going into this 5K."

[01:33] "So we're going to start our own thing. I know it's been a lot of talking, but this is what all this is about. We're going to start our own thing — we've partnered with Strava, it's a free app on your phone, and we're going to start a Facebook group. It's going to be called the Jelly Roll Losers Run Club." I want to join, I want to join the Jelly Roll Losers Run Club! He talked about the Two Bears big podcast, you know, so these guys are all in. It's really here — it's been here and I love this.

[02:05] I love this so much. We've talked about it before, and if it's good, bad or otherwise — if it's bringing people to running, let's give it the benefit of the doubt, right. I don't love him calling it the "losers" run club, because inherently I go, these aren't losers, you're not — I think you start off owning it, right? Yeah, I'm fine with him calling it whatever he wants if that's what he's going to do. And I suppose these public

[02:37] figures — let's call them — getting involved now is just going to create more hype, more availability for people to feel comfortable running, right. And that's the key. When you see this kind of person, or celebrity, out there doing this, it's going to make it really accessible. This is clearly a guy who's not coming from a running background, who, as he said, was disgusted in himself, and he's overweight, and now — and I look, I'm

[03:10] not going to try to speak to what that's like because I've never been in that situation. I've, for the most part, always been pretty healthy and pretty active, and at my most unhealthy and inactive I was probably still fitter than the average person. So I'm not going to try to understand what it's like to try to motivate yourself when you get to the stage that Jelly Roll got to with his fitness and health. I don't — the mental fortitude it must actually take

[03:44] to look yourself in the mirror and have that conversation at that point, I don't understand. So I'm not going to try to, but I can only admire and commend it, because it must be really, really difficult. I won't share her name, but I had a conversation with somebody as I was heading out for a trail run on Sunday at Nerang. I was about to start, she was just finishing, and she stopped me and said, "I've literally just finished listening to—" she's a listener.

[04:14] Yeah, she's been listening since the start. We had about a 10-minute conversation and she spoke about how much she was enjoying the podcast, and then she started telling me about how she wasn't one of these athletes at school — she wasn't a runner at school, didn't really have an athletic background, and she's come to running really late. She'd just finished listening to last week's episode where you went through some of that Strava data and the average pace and

[04:46] all that sort of stuff. And we talked about the idea of slow runners, and she said, "that's me, that's who I am — I'm coming to this running world slow, I'm slower than the average time on Strava." She explained how she does some stuff up in the trails now, various challenges — again, I'm trying to respect her privacy and not give away too much about her identity — but she talked about the joy on her face as she explained she's come to

[05:20] running late and she's loving the beginner process. She doesn't have an aerobic base, she's building that now; she doesn't have a history of athletic stuff to draw on, she's building all that now and going through all these things. So when you and I can casually talk about the average running pace, or 4:30 times and all the rest of it, that's — she said she loves seeing what that top end looks like. But for her, that's

[05:51] almost incomprehensible stuff, completely incomprehensible. But when you look at someone like Jelly Roll — to bring it back to this Losers Run Club — I love it. Again, I can't understand it because it's at the other end of the scale from where I am, but I love that he's now opening up the world of running even more. I think this is going to create problems for fun runs, parkruns, and to another

[06:22] extent marathons and half marathons, because the entries are going to go nuts. If he targets a marathon or a half marathon or a 10K race in the near future, entries for those things will go bananas. Which is amazing, it's only going to continue to grow. Now, what I will say — if you're at the pointy end of running, don't get frustrated. I'd hate to see the worm

[06:52] turn and the elites start to — because sometimes when you've got a thing that's your thing and the community around it isn't massive, I get where you're going. Do you know what I mean? I think there's a — I'm going to talk pretty openly — I think there's a big difference. We've talked a lot about influencers on here. There's a big difference between having someone who's successful in his own area — he's a musician, he's got a

[07:24] massive following, I think when we looked at YouTube he's got 4 million people following — he's coming to running with pure intentions because he's found it and he loves running. That's very different to what a lot of the elites get upset about, when it's someone who's just "I'm going to make running my thing, create content on running because I want to be famous or a celebrity in running." You see the difference?

[07:55] Absolutely, you've nailed it. So let's be very, very clear — that's why I've shared that, and I'm so excited about it. You've nailed it. Anyone who's successful in their own area — I'm assuming to get to where he is in music he's had to face all those challenges, and gaoled for quite a long stint, yeah — and he's got a talented voice, a talented musician, all these things, he's succeeded at the highest level, and now he's coming to join in, and it'll be a fruitful combination in sport.

[08:26] He's walked through the running door and said "yeah, this looks fun" — that's very different to someone walking into running going "I see this trending, I'm going to jump on board," like "last week I was in the gym but this is bigger now so I'm going to jump over here and do this." That's what elites have a problem with — you can't trust that if something else pops up that becomes interesting, they might leave. One step further, then giving professional advice as if you'd been doing it for 30 years.

[08:56] Jelly Roll isn't coming in going, "I'm going to tell you how to run a sub-three-hour marathon." He's just telling everyone, anyone who wants to try and make 5K happen for the first time — come and join us. "I don't know how to do it, but I'm going to try, I'm going to get down to the letterbox and make it, but now I'm going to be there struggling." That's a very different scenario. That's why I'll always get behind and be excited about this type of thing — but I'll also always be critical of someone coming in with the wrong information. We're off to a

[09:26] good start here today, we're off to a really good start. Let's keep going, let's have a listen to something else. I'll only show you a small part of this and I want your opinion — please don't get mad at me. "New Balance: your idea of a tempo run is a brisk walk, and the only type of running you do is errands. ASICS: you've been running since before Strava was invented and you think a super shoe is a sneaker with a little cape on the back. Brooks—" this is straight up, all right, this is good — so it's what running shoes say about you. We talked a little bit about

[09:56] how if you turn up to a run club you can tell by the shoes people are running in. So I'm going to throw a few brands at you, and I want you to think about what that says. Let's start with the big one, Nike. As you do this, I'm going to close my eyes and imagine somebody at a running group in a pair of Nikes. Are you just going to give me the brand, or a specific type of shoe within that? No, no, I'm just going to give you brands. I've got a few to throw at you and I want you to come back — we're playing a game, we're joking around.

[10:26] I'm having some fun, so don't cancel us, okay? Go — brand, Nike. Somebody relatively new to running who's always been a Nike athlete, likes to look good when they're training — that's my take on Nike shoe wearers, okay, that's my take. "On" — alternative, like a bit

[10:57] of a deep cut, a bit alternative on what they run in — I see the "On" crowd as almost the hipster shoe of the running world, do you know what I mean? I don't know, I've never seen one. That's right, because they're alternative and underground. Yeah, I did see one, I think in 1998 — I did run in "On" for about a year, I think. Way back? Actually, my friend I met on the trail, who's new to running and building her aerobic base — she was running in "On" too. Oh, right, yeah.

[11:27] There you go, you've seen one in the wild. On the — they're the cloud ones, yeah, the Roger Federer's. Crossfitters who want to take up running — crossfitters. You mustn't have looked into them enough. I don't know much about them, it's like the Prada of running, usually. So I don't know enough about the Prada high heels — it's like the Prada of running shoes.

[11:58] Okay, good, like that — if I see "On" I'm thinking you're coined up. Expensive, okay, very expensive. Swiss Salomon — trails, trail runner. ASICS — serious runner, or dedicated runner, not necessarily serious runner. I don't want you to assume that if you're in a pair of ASICS you're really, really good at running, but if you run in ASICS, my inclination is that you do a

[12:29] lot, you love your running, running is your exercise of choice — that's what I go with, ASICS. Yeah, I always think ASICS is like the Foot Locker of it — the one that just says "always seem to be around," running from day dot. Do you remember I floated the idea a couple of weeks ago about doing a mystery shop, going into a store and actually having a conversation with the staff, and I wanted you to record it? I didn't record it.

[12:59] It was a bit — well, give it to us now, do you want it? Well, let's keep doing the rest of these shoes. No, no, give it to us now, since you mentioned ASICS — let's do it now. I went into a Rebel Sport — I won't tell you which one — and I walked in and was perusing the walls of running shoes. A young fella came up, said "hey mate, how are you going," I said "yeah mate, I'm just looking to get into some running, I want to do some more running and get a sense

[13:31] of what shoe I should be using." So I tried to limit how much I told him. I'll take my hat off to this young man — he did all the right things, everything I'd want a sales assistant to do when helping somebody who's just said "I'm trying to get into running." He said, "okay, how far are you going to run?" I said, "it could be anything from a couple of K to a half marathon.

[14:02] Is that okay? How often are you going to run?" I said I was trying to figure that out a little too — "might be two or three times a week." "Is that okay? Are you mainly going to be running on the road, on grass, what are you going to be running on?" He was asking all the right questions and I was again trying to keep it general and vague. And he said, okay, then went straight to the ASICS — because that's what was in front of us at the time — and said "this is, if you're doing sort of general running, this is

[14:36] a great everyday trainer," and pointed at the Gel-Cumulus, which has a lot of foam in it, a bit like a Hoka-type version — ASICS have a real soft, big shoe, so this is a really good all-rounder running shoe. And I said "oh, okay." And he said, "alternatively, if you wanted something a bit more running-specific," he showed me the Novablast and the

[15:08] DynaBlast. And I asked what's the main difference, and he said "oh look, it's a price-point thing — the Novablast is slightly more expensive, the DynaBlast is slightly cheaper, but they're both going to get you through the varying types of running." So he didn't try to upsell — no, no, did not try to upsell me, which I thought was great, and interestingly showed me three shoes of the one brand. He didn't actually — but he said, "and then if you want, there's the Nikes and," and so

[15:39] it's interesting, he did focus in on the ASICS, but this was the key point at the end of it — he said, "but mate, the best way is to try a bunch on and see what feels good." Wow. And I walked away and thought, mate, you've either been listening to the podcast or they're training you really well, because that is exactly the experience anybody going in to buy a pair of shoes because they're about to get into running should be having — not getting forced into buying

[16:10] the high-end stuff, not getting forced into buying something with carbon plates, not getting talked a whole lot of rubbish. Just try them on. And you bet he gave you a good guide — he gave me a great guide, yep, and if I ever need to buy shoes I'll probably go back to him. Yeah, I wonder in those shops — not just Rebel, but any of those shops with a big range of shoes — whether they're getting kickbacks on certain brands. I'm sure they would, the sales assistant's going to have a bias depending on margins and a

[16:40] whole range of things, probably commission and yeah. Well, the ASICS shoes were far more prominently displayed than some of the other brands in that particular one, so I don't know. But what I will say is I'm going to do it again — I'm going to go do some other shops, because I'd like to try and record the experience, although I don't know how legal that is, recording someone without their knowledge or consent. Probably not — I might take mental notes instead. Well, I mean, there's plenty of people who record people these days, but we're not like that, so let's just give you the information you get.

[17:10] Okay, back to you, sorry. No, no, I was interested in that, and it's really good to hear that someone's giving — not trying to upsell you, I love that too, because you don't need to go for the top of the range. Absolutely not. Brooks — safety running shoe, dad shoe. Yeah, it feels like the sort of shoe you'd be running in if you've had problems with your feet. I did find out last week they're an American brand, owned by Warren Buffett's parent company.

[17:42] So it's part of that investment mob — can't remember the name — don't mean they own hundreds of companies obviously bought over time, but yeah, Berkshire Hathaway. Yep, American brand from day dot, so that makes sense. Have you heard that name — what do you call it when you wear sneakers with jeans? Sneaking? Yeah, like Jerry Seinfeld — yeah, I mean Brooks are probably the #1 brand of choice for that.

[18:12] Okay, and then finally — One Mix, the Chinese carbon shoe. What do you think? It's a new frontier, that's for sure. I've run in them since we last spoke, I'll give you the review a bit later on, but yeah, new frontier — we're not going to give an opinion on that one just yet, I'll give you a full review later, but I think if that's your shoe of choice, it's kind of — I'm trying to think of a fashion comparison — it'd be like if somebody walked in

[18:43] these days wearing flared, colourful jeans, you'd be like, "whoa, that's a brave choice, good luck to you." When a mate first told me about them, I'm around it now, yeah, but when he first said it I was like, Jesus, that's going to be — I'll give you my — that's going to be ordinary. Okay, now let's keep on the shoe stuff. This is an article I found that I thought was really interesting — do you know your foot strike? No — is foot strike

[19:13] cadence, or is that something different? No, no. Foot strike — I'd say you've got a forefoot strike, a midfoot strike, or a heel strike. Do you know how you run? Sort of, I'd probably have to double check, but I'm fairly certain I'm a mid-to-forefoot striker, because when I had calf injuries previously and went to see a physio, they were checking my cadence and my foot strike, and that's when I got told I need to do a lot of calf-strength training because of the way I strike my feet — I put a lot of

[19:45] pressure through my calves because of the way I run. Okay, very generalised — like mid, mid-foot strike, and not too toe-y, but midfoot strikers tend to be the faster ones, they move faster, and that's a very generous — I'd say I'm quite mid. But there's a study — I found this on therun.co.nz or Runner's World online, published in the Frontiers in Sports and Active Living journal — irrelevant, but there's some

[20:16] background data. It was 710 runners from various backgrounds. After asking each runner if they were a heel striker, non-heel striker, or forefoot striker, or if they didn't know, the researchers then looked at their running gait — they worked out what they actually did, then correlated it against what the runners said they were. And the results were very clear that the runners who didn't know their foot-strike pattern or

[20:46] their running gait pattern had the greatest likelihood of sustaining injuries. So there's a correlation between not knowing how you run and being injured, yeah — so, awareness of how you run. Now, where I'm going with this — we've talked about shoes at the moment and having shoes where you can feel a little bit of ground contact, versus shoes that are becoming, like you called them before, "boats" — more rubber, bigger, and you're losing complete ground contact.

[21:17] So what they were saying is there's a correlation there — if you've got so much rubber that you start to not be able to feel what's happening on the ground, is that short-term gain of cushioning and comfort actually going to be long-term pain for a lot of people? Because — and this is me now just guessing — you're not using, not being able to understand or use

[21:49] those stabilising muscles in the feet, your foot isn't actually working as hard, isn't doing all those natural things it was meant to do running. Can we just say Courtney and I are not going to disappear down the barefoot-running path, we're not going to become disciples of bare feet, if that's where you think this might end up. But have you watched, on Netflix, "Starting 5," the basketball series — the basketball doco from last year that follows LeBron James, Jayson

[22:23] Tatum, Anthony Edwards, and Jimmy Butler through their NBA season, and there's obviously one more, which is why it's called Starting 5, I just can't remember who it is. Jimmy Butler — there's a point in there where he talks about his foot and the feel of his foot in shoes when he's running. There's a bit in one of the episodes where he talks about how important his feet are — him and his trainer — and the sheer amount of focus on the

[22:54] spaces — well, that's LeBron actually — but they talk about the sheer amount of focus they put on their feet, and having their feet working as they should, activating and working the way they should. And hearing you talk about that in running — a slightly different use of the foot compared to basketball players, because there's a lot more lateral movement and jumping — but I can only imagine that having your feet activating in the correct way when you're running is

[23:27] enormous. And this is us thinking out loud rather than any science — what we always say, check with your doctor, check with your medical profession, if you've got a podiatrist, check with them too. But I know I put a lot of thought, time and consideration into my legs, yes, with strength training because of running, but I don't pay much attention to my feet, if any. So it's really interesting to know that the people who aren't aware of how their foot hits the ground when they run are more

[23:59] likely to suffer an injury. Yes, I think it's to do with the awareness of landing and then using those stabilising — so I'm in a bit of a dilemma at the moment, because I've always liked quite a low, direct foot feel. I like to feel myself hitting the ground, I like to be able to activate and feel my feet, my plantars — I like that feel. But I also love the feel of putting on those — at the moment we've both been trying the Salomon Ultra Glide 3 Trail

[24:30] shoes. Super comfy shoe. There's so much rubber in it, it's nearly to the point where I'm so comfortable in them my foot's not working anymore — which is great for a long, easy run, but I just wonder over time whether that's also — and it's not just that shoe, this is a lot of the shoes coming out across all the brands now, they're so soft and rubbery you're losing complete ground feel, and I just don't know what the happy medium is. Just to go back to my

[25:03] unnamed friend I met on the trails — she used to run in "On" and I don't think it was because of the foot-feel stuff, but she said it was just too much fun for her to run in, and now she's got the "On" shoes on the trails and she really likes them. Well, I took the Ultra Glide 3s away and ran in various new shoes, new generations of shoes, last week — I was away for 10 days or so. This morning I went back out in the Thundercross, which are

[25:34] a lot more like the Speedcross 5 that you've worn — a lot harder, got a bit of trail feel, and I just wanted to go out and run in something different. Talking about the things I have hanging around here — also Liam, what's that, are you toe separators? I ordered some off Temu or somewhere one time, and I think I may use them — no, well actually I think I ordered them after watching that Starting 5 talk about foot care, and I sat around with the toe separators on, and then they've sat in that drawer since. But do you use them?

[26:04] Not anymore. I did try them for a bit, but they haven't stuck with me. Look after your feet, people — your feet are important. Now I don't know what you do to look after them, but here's a great feeling if no one's ever done this before: if you're sitting out there, just roll your foot over the top of a golf ball. Just get a golf ball — you probably know what it does, I don't know what it does but it feels amazing. Well, it's just a massage for your foot. Oh, this is loosening up all

[26:34] those muscles — Michael Shelley was always a massive advocate of rolling out his feet. Never got a lot of massage, but used to do some specific stuff. Now let's move on, because that's a bit up in the air, we're just talking out loud there. I want to make cross country great again — I saw the English cross country champs, if you have a look at that reel I've got in the notes here, the start of the English

[27:05] cross country champs on the weekend — looks like about 2,000 people in one race on grass, all just running off into the mud. Is this — it's in black and white, so it looks like an old video, but this is the most recent English National Cross Country Championships. Anyone can enter, it's all winner-take-all, it's just a mass start. It got me thinking, because the one thing I loved doing as a kid was running cross country when I

[27:35] was cross country — one of the great things, if you've got kids out there, kids need to be kids, kids need to want to do things, not making them do cross country — but cross country is such a great event as a kid, running around paddocks and parks, and it's not like — you know, when you're an adult we've talked about how hard running can be to get started, but when you're a kid, running is just part of life, you're around the playground, put into a bit of a fun, competitive environment outdoors.

[28:05] What a place to be. We don't run cross country enough as adults, that's what I'm saying — I'm not against trail, we're all in on trail, I'm just saying I want to make cross country great again. How so? Just for people out there listening going, "what would cross country look like in the Olympics?" — I love the idea of building a bespoke course, and hey, if Brisbane 2032, Cindy Hook, if you're listening, you've got a couple of race consultants right here. How far is the distance? 12K, 12 kilometres, so—

[28:37] you're taking a little bit out of that 10K mark — so you're taking the 10,000 metres, because I assume in my head, well, it's probably the best 10,000-metre runners in the world, and some of the best half-marathon runners and 5K runners in the world, and you're putting them over that. The only problem with this, talking about the Olympic thing here — I think one thing going for it is you don't have to increase the number of runners going to the Olympics, because they can double up, you're not extra-qualifying people. But someone's going to call me

[29:07] out, because the problem is athletics is in the second week of the Olympics, so it's going to clash with the marathons on the last day — it's going to be very hard for someone to back up, doing a cross country in the first week and then backing up for that. Life is about choices. How many races did Michael Phelps swim at Olympic Games? Running's a bit different to swimming for backing up and recovery, here we go, we've had to call out swimmers, oh, we've had to call out swimmers.

[29:37] I'm just saying there's no gravity involved in swimming. Oh, did you think I was saying running is better than swimming, says Michael Phelps? No, no, no, man — I love it, backing up. Swimmers can back up because there's obviously the muscle groups getting hammered differently. I think cross country is elite, and if you want to try and organise a cross country race, I'm there. I'll share this start though, because I've looked at it — have you seen — I think it's a friend of

[30:11] mine, Luke O'Shea, shout out Luke, amazing photographer, great marketing brain, used to work for two Tour de France teams — he's taken some photos, I don't want to say it's the African cross country championships, but he's taken photos at a cross country event in Africa and it looks unbelievable. The cross country starts are similar to this — the racing is on point, you're talking about some of the great distance athletes in the world, and it just looks amazing. Down south, in Victoria, they have a good club cross

[30:41] country system going where the elite runners get out on weekends, and the whole idea around cross country too is that it's not a timed event, so you're not "on show" each weekend, and you can use it as a great training session — a race-specific training session, and it's on softer ground so it's not knocking your legs around as much. I don't have visibility on whether we do enough of it in Queensland, but I'd really love to see, especially with run clubs and

[31:11] this type of thing, more of it. I think cross country can be a real fun way to get people involved without it being a 12K event — you don't have to shut down roads, you can do it in parks, in forests, whatever it is. That's a really great idea — if you're a run club out there listening to this, have a bit of a brainstorm with some people in the club and see if you can find a way to introduce a cross country run into your schedule. Even if it's once a month, it's a great idea.

[31:41] Last week we were talking about the Strava information I was sharing, and I was sharing the average pace of a Strava run being 6:22 minutes per kilometre. I have more data — get ready, people, because I'm bringing the data — we've got crowdsourcing here and we love it when that happens. This has come from a name that's familiar to people on the podcast — this has come from the great Eddie Gordon. It's about the average marathon times.

[32:11] Now, we know marathons are booming — what do you think the average marathon race time was as of last year? I'm going to say 4:20. That is such a bang-on guess it makes me think you've seen this. I haven't seen it, you withheld this from me. I didn't — as of 2024, the global average

[32:41] marathon finish time for recreational runners is approximately 4 hours and 25 minutes. This represents a slight improvement from the 2018 average, which was 4 hours and 29 minutes. Breaking it down by gender — men, the average finish time is around 4 hours and 14 minutes; women, the average finish time is around 4 hours and 41 minutes. It goes on to explain some of the data about age of runners, training, regional participation, etc. But it's important to note that these statistics focus on

[33:12] recreational runners and exclude elite athletes. So that's not taking into account the elite field. Yeah, but if I took a marathon field I'd only consider probably the first 20 people, surely. So I don't think it's taking out too many — it's not taking out the elites, but it is taking out probably some of those fast outlier times. The reason I said that, because I was thinking — I knew it would be — what made you guess that? Well, after last week I knew it would be probably slower. No, but I just thought — when I've

[33:44] watched, when I've gone down to watch the Gold Coast Marathon, for example, and my friends and a lot of people I'm watching are trying to break that three-hour mark, give or take — but if you watch the bulk of where people are coming through, when you see the thick field coming through, it's definitely more towards that 4-hour mark. And then obviously you've got a whole range of people participating, you've got the walkers at the back, and I just knew that would skew

[34:14] towards it. In saying that — like 4:20, I took a stab, but 4:25 is actually pretty damn good. I should have worked this out in advance, but what's four hours 25 minutes as a per-K pace? You wouldn't have a clue, would you? No idea — what was it, 6:22 per K? What was the average Strava pace, 6:22? Talk amongst yourself. To run a marathon in four hours and 25 minutes, you need to

[34:45] average a pace of 6:16 per K — actually, that's good running for a marathon, and that's the average pace of last year's marathon finishes. So shout out to everybody running marathons — anyone doing that, we salute you, that's good running. But yeah, a little bit of data for you — you're normally the one bringing the data. That's super interesting, speaking of data — we had Dylan Bradshaw drop a

[35:19] note, drop a message in our Spotify comments. So please, if you're on Spotify, you don't have to comment, but give us a rating and a like if you can, it helps — it helps build us up. A few people wrote back to us and, I'm not advocating this, but they want to see more of the journals. Oh yeah, and I'm shutting that down — what do you mean? Well, I've given you the last journal, I think this is the last one — we'll do it for one more week, we'll give a random page.

[35:51] This is my 2008 journal — this is the Beijing Olympic year. So just for context, where were you at in your career in 2008? I'd say the year before the Olympics I raced in Beijing at the test event and came second, which qualified me for the Olympics. So you'd arguably say I was a pretty decent chance, a medal chance, if not a win, right?

[36:22] So you were a medal chance going into the Olympic year. A hundred percent. And you've very generously handed me your 2008 diary for the Olympic year — I'm going to jump to a page. For context, the triathlon race happened on August 18th, a Monday. Let's jump to May 18th — so what are we, June, July — oh, you're three months out here. Yeah, that weekend, the 17th and 18th of May,

[36:55] Saturday the 17th, AM: ride 3 hours 40 minutes. What's Tomewin, would that be right? So that's a mountain here on the Gold Coast — 280 watts at a heart rate of 130, flat tempo 18 minutes, 311 watts at a heart rate of 135. Riding at 91 revs per minute, and then the back of Tomewin,

[37:29] 16:43, 139 watts at a heart rate of 141. You've written "strong, controlled resting." Decipher that — it would have been, so we've done a 100K loop in three hours 40, with three tempo efforts within it, two of them uphill and one on the flat. What was the uphill effort, about 329 watts? Yep. Then you've written "strong, controlled," and then "bonkers" — a bonk — and a BLT on the way home. Probably a bonk, I reckon.

[38:00] A bonk, and then you've had a BLT on the way home apparently — would that be a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich? Is that what you had on the way home? Could well be. And then in the afternoon you've written "swim 2.5K," and then a note saying "very tired, need rest." Sunday was a rest day — you did rest, you said Sunday, stretching, rest day. So you've obviously caught me on a day that I actually rested. I just want to find a run session I can share with people, because that's what people like hearing about here.

[38:30] Geez, you take some detailed notes as I flick through all this. All right, here's a run session — this was on Tuesday the 20th, so we're still about three months out from the triathlon here. 7am: run 1.4 hours — flats — you said 3 by 20 minutes A2.

[39:03] Yep. That would probably be, you know what, that's probably like the old way we'd say zone two — okay, so you've run 3 by — actually no, it wouldn't be zone 2, it'd be like just sub-threshold. So you've run 3 by 20 minutes A2, and then 10 minutes A1. Yeah, so that would be — I think I probably had paces down there, I'm going to guess I was probably doing the 20 minute efforts at 3:10 to 3:20 per kilometre and then backing off. You haven't written your pace, but you've written as a note: "good, controlled pace.

[39:33] Last 20 minutes started to fatigue." Okay, and then you've had an ice bath and a swim in the afternoon. So, 3 by 20-minute efforts within a run, and tapering through at A1, would mean no proper recovery — I mean, this is relentless. I'm flicking through, the notes in here are relentless. Can I ask why you seem to be drawing what appears to be either Elmo or Oscar the Grouch on some of these pages? Really — yeah, there's a drawing that looks like — it is.

[40:03] It's Elmo. You've written "Elmo" underneath one of them, why are you drawing Elmo on these pages? No one ever said athletes are sane, we're not. This is why there's a lot of problems afterward. Well, look — but the telling point — here's a serious question though, you look at that and keep saying how detailed it is, and I haven't looked at these for years. You can probably see why athletes, when you don't have anything else to do, spiral. Oh yeah, there is — it's making me think now.

[40:34] I can't recall doing this, but you can see there's a bloke teetering on the edge in these pages. This is intense data. I'll take a photo of one page that doesn't have any — see, in 2008 I was already married, so you're not going to find anything from — like last week you had a couple of rest days in Currumbin Cove here too. Okay, but the telling point here is on the 14th of August, you've flown to Singapore. You spent two days in transit, the 14th and 15th of August.

[41:05] Now bear in mind the race day was the 18th of August. Tell us about how that race went in 2008. Well, it was good — race good, just didn't go to plan. I didn't get in the top three, didn't get on the podium at the Olympics. Where'd you finish? Good question, Liam — you can't even remember where you finished at the Olympics? Your memory's — I can... do you know why I can't — I think I'm only going to say 8th or 11th. Okay, 8th or 11th? It doesn't matter — the point was I didn't win, no,

[41:35] and the point was I didn't get a medal, and that was the goal going there, so anything less than that, really — and what's the — do you remember how you processed that? Yeah, before the race we talked a lot, I did everything right going up to those Games, I raced actually — on the day I raced well, the time improved slightly from the year before, but the whole field just moved, there was a step up in the level on that day, and that often happens at the Olympics as well. What I can tell you, which is

[42:05] probably more of an interesting story, is some of the behind-the-scenes stuff you wouldn't realise about going to the Olympics. For Beijing, I was at home — we raced in the second week, I think the third-last or fourth-last day of the Olympics. Everyone would think, "oh, you made the Olympic Games, this will be an amazing experience" — I spent the first week and a half of the Olympics here, in the room behind you, at home, watching the Olympics on TV.

[42:36] I wasn't even there. Yeah, I was still back here training at home, just like any other day, didn't go to the opening ceremony — and this wasn't just me, this was the whole team. We flew out two or three days before the race via Singapore so we could have a night's sleep and be as rested as possible. It was the one time I can recall the Australian team flying business — for the London Olympics I was lucky because I

[43:06] was on board with Qantas by that time, so I was getting looked after. But for Beijing we rarely got flown business — for that one we did, so we did everything possible to get there in the right shape. But when we arrived at the Olympics, we dropped into the village, got our uniforms, then shipped an hour out of the village into the country to where we were racing. It genuinely felt like any other race I would've gone to around the world. The reason I say the date matters is how you mentally processed the result.

[43:39] The reason I ask is because after the 15th of August, where you write in this diary "fly to Beijing" — that's it, the diary finishes. You don't make another note in this entire diary. So basically Olympics happens, and then you stop writing. That's it, yeah — that's probably how I processed it. What did your training look like, when did you get back into it? Because I remember racing the Noosa Triathlon straight off the Beijing

[44:10] Olympics — I've told that story about ice baths before. Why do you think you abandoned the diary? I reckon it was just — when you're in a four-year cycle, when the Olympics is your life and then it's over, there's certain things, you know, how particular you are about diaries, eating, training, whatever — you just, after four years, want to get away from it. You need a break. And I'd say that was a mental break for me, of not needing to

[44:40] worry about how structured I needed to be. I probably didn't have a plan after that in the sense that I trained, I went and raced, but it wouldn't have been a structured plan. So we've talked a lot about periodisation over the years leading up to an Olympics — four years of periodisation, qualification races and all of that — and that's probably the last thing you want once it's all over. And I think that would've been the same result if I'd won a race — if you'd won, the same result. You did come 11th at those Games, and for what it's worth, you did win

[45:12] Noosa that year. I did win Noosa that year, yeah. And I did an ice bath before Noosa, but I did an ice bath every day during winter before Beijing. Yeah, but that's great — I think that was probably the last diary. I think after that we probably moved to digital training, Training Peaks and whole ranges of it. I do want you to try and remember why you drew Elmo so much — I'm going to talk about Elmo if we get time later on, there's a story, Elmo has popped up in my notes this week and I want your thoughts.

[45:42] Where are we up to — God, how long have we been rolling here at the moment? If someone's running long this week, maybe this is our long run, let's keep going, all right. Okay, where were we up to — oh, we've got too much to talk about. Why don't we talk about the big running story of the moment, if you're following the running news — the Sydney Marathon, which is a major this year for the first time, it's officially qualified as one of the

[46:12] major marathons of the world, and they've banned the winner of last year's marathon. Stephen Millard shared this with me directly, that's how I found it — Kip Kurier, give or take, apologies if I'm saying his name incorrectly, but he's failed an out-of-competition drugs test — so he's tested positive, he's suspended. It's a big

[46:42] story — I suppose the second part of that news is he's now one of 123 banned Kenyan athletes. I hadn't seen that, and what was it, EPO? What do you think when you hear that? I think you're surprised — no, disappointed. Oh, I think — man, now I'm not even in racing at that elite

[47:12] level, it's neither here nor there for me. To a degree it's to be expected, isn't it, it's sport — it's not just running, we've seen time and time again, whether it's cycling, running, endurance sports — there's obviously certain things you can take that are illegal that help you, and when money's involved, I think you're going to find people, it's — to a degree it's going to be human nature that some people try to cheat the system when money's involved.

[47:42] But this doesn't sound like it's just one — 123 Kenyans have been banned, which would suggest there's a programme happening. Yeah, you might even go as far as calling that systematic. That's not a fluke, that's a pattern — 123 banned Kenyan athletes. What I will say is the shame of all this, without getting into the drug debate — even I don't understand it well

[48:13] enough — but the shame is it taints every performance. That's the problem with all this, it doesn't matter, there's always going to be a question, and if there's the one outlier out there, like there is in everything, the immediate response is to question it. It's a bit like — and it went through cycling, right — when it happens a lot in that sport,

[48:44] it takes time to recover. I think, to be honest, in running, if I hadn't been told about it I wouldn't have known. You wouldn't have known about it? Probably not — fair enough, it depends. The people I'm running with now are running for different reasons, trying to break world records. It's interesting you mention the people you run with now, because I bumped into one of them on a run — who did you bump into? Do you want to get into our run week? Yeah — why don't you jump into it — Dr Ben, part of your run group, Ben Moulders, shout out to Ben, because I was — what was I in

[49:18] the middle of? I think I'd done a sort of easy 10K and then was trying to put in some 1K efforts, out at Tugun. Oh, okay, down at Tugun, yeah. And as I was running my warm-up, headphones in, I wasn't really paying attention, but I saw someone point and shout "Liam," and I thought, no worries, kept going. And as I turned around doing these 1K efforts, suddenly, at

[49:48] the end of one of the efforts, this angel in a very loud shirt appeared and handed me a Red Bull and an energy gel and said "you look like you'd need these" — and it was Dr Ben. Yeah, he had a Red Bull, and his wife were, I think, just looking at a few apartments, contemplating maybe a move one day, and they were down the south end of the coast, and he popped over and gave me a Red Bull — it was an absolute lifesaver. I wonder where he kept it, in his

[50:20] car, I guess — like, yeah, when we finish running, most people who run with me get a few Red Bulls in the car here and there. But yeah, he stopped and we had a nice little chat, it was great to see him. Well, now you know who I'm talking about all the time. Yeah, and I said, "you're looking great," and he said he's losing some weight at the moment because he's on a diet, because he let himself go a bit — but he said it was funny, because he looks great, but he's not eating enough to be

[50:50] out running like he normally would — he hasn't got the fuel on board. Which was interesting — he's a good runner, but he's losing weight for health reasons, and as a result he's eating a certain way, which means he's not actually fuelled up to run like he normally would. Feel like he wouldn't want to, yeah — Ben's deep in our run group challenge, the marathon challenge, there's a group of six including my brother and a few others, a few

[51:20] doctors in there — and put it this way, the mates are more competitive with each other than trying to win races. Absolutely, beating your mates matters more, yeah. And he's in the thick of it at the moment, getting ready for Gold Coast. I want to hear about your Mauritius running, so I'm going to quickly give you two more bits from my week. I had a double Mona Fartlek fail — I got caught up, fell into the old trap of seeing somebody run something on Strava, shout out to Ned and Gus,

[51:51] they did a session on Strava, called it their double Mona Fartlek session — double Mona, so they went through it twice. I failed, that was silly of me, I got caught up, tried to do it, it was a mistake, anyway, learnt my lesson. So to all those people out there — if you see your mates run something on Strava, don't just do it blindly, right, run to your level, we say this all the time anyway — the web's not always a good place to go looking for your inspiration.

[52:21] Do you want the review? I want the review, because I haven't been online a lot, I was travelling, but I did get a few people asking me, "we watched Liam's review on Instagram," and they had questions — did you actually like them or not? You didn't give a conclusion. Well, I wanted to save it for the podcast, okay. I did put something up if you're following In the Beginning Podcast on Instagram, go and jump on board, I did give a bit of a review there, but I wanted to save it

[52:53] for the podcast, because this is what it's all about. You gave me these shoes last week — the Chinese carbon plates that cost 115 bucks. And the question is: can something like these compete against the big carbon-plate shoes at this price point, and are they worth people looking into? I went out and did — I think I ended up doing about 13 or 14K in these.

[53:23] Fast running before — I did 6K at 3:50 pace, 3:55, which is moving for me — that's quick going for me, yes — these are really fun to run in, they're really bouncy, really — you've — there's no question about whether there's a carbon plate in these, they're bouncy, they're responsive, and at 115 bucks, value for money.

[53:53] Value for money — that's the conclusion, that's my conclusion, $115, cheaper than any other carbon shoe on the market, substantially value for money — but there's a but. There is a but, and I talked about this — as I lifted the sole up to show you, I talked a bit about this on Instagram — you're not getting much out of these long-term. If you're looking for it — I honestly think, if you've done the training, put in the hard yards, but for whatever reason can't justify

[54:24] going out and buying a pair of Alphaflys or Vaporflys or whatever it is — if you can't justify a plated shoe of choice — grab these, go grab them, but know they might not survive more than a couple of race outings. But I suppose the top-of-the-range, expensive shoes aren't necessarily designed to last much longer either, are they? No, I don't really know, because I haven't really raced in those either. Yeah, well, me neither. But no,

[54:54] from my understanding, a lot of the rubber — you don't want to run the rubber dry — and in a pair of really good race shoes, there's also those, isn't there the Adidas Adizero one, the top-end racer? Yeah, the top-end one — and the more expensive they are, sometimes it's because of the rubber being used, the racer compound. So depending on what you want to use them for — but if you're going through a lot of running shoes, the only benefit I can see is if you don't want to keep

[55:26] buying very expensive shoes and you go through a lot of them as a training option, maybe that's where these could be used. What I will say is you chose the worst colour. Yeah, I did that on purpose — yeah, I know, I can tell — a horrible design of a shoe stylistically. But you know, I like you, Liam. When I went to buy them off Temu, I think it was Temu I bought them off — you chose the worst colour, they were last year's colour model, so they were cheaper. Are you going to run in them though, in 2025? I'm going to have

[55:56] a run in them, because I'm curious, I'm just purely interested. I did walk down the hall in them, and the first thing I said was they're springy, they're super — you get a lot of return from them. Yeah, I look, if we just jump back in the episode a little bit — we talked about the average marathon time, right, if you're running 4:25 you don't need a carbon-plate shoe. You don't — if you want to get one for fun, go for it, you don't need them, but if you reckon — they've still got to help you.

[56:27] Well, I don't know what these do to your feet after a marathon, I don't know what state your foot would be in after — I did 14Ks and my feet felt fine. Yeah, but I'm also somewhat used to running in a carbon-plate shoe. But if you were going to do a marathon and jump into something new, I don't know what it would do to your feet and calves and everything. I wonder what the data is on carbon plates, whether different parts return energy at different paces. Yeah, I don't know, but I mean at some pace, I'd suggest if there's a

[56:58] benefit, and it's a stiff shoe, even if you're running 5-minute-K pace, you're going to feel better, so it's still of some benefit to run in them. I'd say if you're a heel striker there's no point getting these — I don't see what the carbon plate does for you if you're landing on the back of your foot. This feels very much like a kangaroo shoe — they're definitely — when I walked down the hall, at least, they were forefoot spring, yeah. If you're a forefoot striker like you and I are, then yeah.

[57:28] I want to try a lot more this weekend, I want to try a lot more road shoes, I want to understand these better and be able to talk from not so much experience in them, but from feel. Yeah, these feel fun to run in. Look, if I was running a 10K race tomorrow, I'd happily race in these. You could argue, taking brands out of it — you could have ten shoes in front of you, and in the end, like you said, go into the store, try them on, and what feels good is going to be right for you. Yeah, probably can't try these

[57:59] ones in store, but the point is different shoes are going to work for different people regardless. There's probably ten brands out there with carbon plates in them, not all of them — there's going to be no one answer for each runner. No, but look, if you've got 115 bucks to throw at a pair of these shoes, go for it, and if you want to have a crack at a race too, go for it. I look forward to getting your thoughts on them. But to all those people going, "well, did he like the shoe or

[58:29] not?" — yeah, I did, that's it, shush. The conclusion was, yes, I like these shoes. Will I buy them the next time I need a pair? No. Why not? Is it — here's a really upfront question, okay, because I can answer this — do you trust — is this a brand thing? If that shoe

[59:02] had "On" on it, would it change my opinion? Would it change your opinion on it? Absolutely. Yeah, me too, 100%. Unfortunately, in this world, I trust brands, brand matters. It's exactly like when we talk about why you pick the run group you pick, or the run coach you pick — because people you trust have recommended it to you. It's the same thing, but

[59:32] brand matters. It's not that it's about running in a Chinese pair of shoes for me — brand matters for quality, I want to be able to trust that the rubber's not going to break apart, that they've done the research, that it's not going to hurt me. All of those things — but yeah, for some reason I still trust — that's what I mean, I don't know how long these are going to last because I'd never heard of One Mix until you gave these to me a week ago. Exactly, okay, so brand does matter, that's part of it. So — where have you been? You've been in Mauritius,