Chad Silverstein describes getting dropped on a French climb, sprinting back, and connects it to work-life balance: careers are seasonal, needing intense pushes and deliberate rest days. The lesson is knowing when to sprint and when to recover.
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Chet and I talk about this day a lot. I remember it like it was yesterday. We were riding in France and I was bombed. You know, these guys, they were. They were. They were really good. And we hit the bottom of a mountain two minutes into the ride, and up we go up the mountain and these guys take off, and I'm just like 2 mph pedaling up this mountain for hours. I told Chet yesterday when we were together, and I said, you know, it was so, so crazy how you could experience so many mixed emotions in one experience. It was definitely a once in a lifetime experience. You know, riding your bike in France on the same mountains as a Tour de France. And, you know, you don't just often get a chance to do that. And I certainly never thought I'd ever be able to do that. And this day was towards the end of the. Of the. Our time in France. And I remember it was a mindset. Like, I remember thinking, I. I'm just gonna jet home. And I just took off. I remember. I remember thinking I. I was just out of my mind. I was just. I just. There was just no way I was going to not get back fast. Just convinced myself, and I just put the pedal to the metal and went hard. And sometimes you got to do that. You got to just be able to just go crazy and go after something as a sprint. And sometimes you got to know when to pull back for sure. And on this trip, I definitely pulled back a lot. But on this day, I remember it very well. I just. I kicked it into a high gear and took off. And I've done this with work a lot. You know, we always say things are seasonal. You know, there's times where you're going to. You're going to work a lot. There's times where you're going to be with your family a lot. There's times where, you know, it's a new job, you got to train a lot, and there's times when you're going to, you know, take it easy because you need to be a little bit unproductive to give yourself a kind of a reset. This is why I'm a big believer in taking free days where you just. You get away and you don't work at all, and. And hopefully you'll be able to revive some of the energy that you're going to need in order to, you know, sprint once in a while. It's good to be able to do that. It's good to be able to do that, and it's good to look back and see the impact that it can have on other people. You know, I wasn't thinking much, but, you know, Chet will still talk about it because he remembers the example. And it was a great learning experience for me that I was able to do something that I didn't think I was able to do, and I certainly didn't want to do. But, you know, there was just no alternative. I was going to do it, and I just. I just went forward. And hopefully you have times where you can do that and recognize when and where you need to be able to do that, show your team how to do it, and hopefully you'll have some other people around you who can push you when they do it.
