How To Pace And Execute Your Endurance Race

This podcast is brought to you by Trivelo Coaching, where we help triathletes and cyclists like you train smarter to race faster. I'm your host, Jordan Donnelly and on my left is former Australian Ironman champion and head coach of Trivalo Coaching, Gerard Donnelly. Welcome back to another episode. Lots of exciting things to discuss today. It's July, so of course the Tour de France is back on, which makes us very happy. We're going to be discussing the results from that, the results from the recent half marathon and marathon race that was on in a Australia. We've got a time trial question to discuss about threshold. We've got to run off the bike question and much more to go into detail for. So another good episode coming up. Dad, welcome in. Let's start with what is your gratitude?

Thanks, George. Look, I want to just be a little bit father, son, self indulgent here, which I don't really like doing. But I think there is a time when the gratitude has to, you have to be honest and open. That's what gratitude is about. And tell your truth feelings. So I was going to put it out there. So whilst we've been kind of on training camp up at the Sunshine coast here in Queensland, we got an opportunity, you and I, to actually go and do a local club race together. And we had a fair few Trivelo people up here at the same time. So we actually had five Trivalo people in the one race which was pretty much fun and I hadn't raced for quite a, quite a while. And you know, you and I have never actually raced together in an outdoor real world race with done plenty of zwift, might I say artificial type races. But you know, it's nothing better than actually doing a real race outdoors. And, and for me to be in the same race as one of my sons was, I've got to say I'm pretty grateful for that opportunity and boy did we have some fun. And, and I've, and I've got to say that out right from the outset that even though you've never done an outdoor road race, you rode it like a veteran, like you'd ridden a hundred road races. Your, your ability to decide the moves to make was super impressive and you ended up winning the race and I know you didn't want anybody to know that. But, but you actually, you know, your very first race, you end up winning. There was some really good local riders in there, some really crafty good road riders who I've known for years who are one of the, you know, amongst the best executors of race strategies. And you actually outsmarted them all. And it, it just showed me that if you're willing to listen to advice, you can actually implement it whether you've done one race or whether you've done 300. And you know, you may never get an opportunity to have things work out or pan out like that again, but it was a great example of someone who listens and then executes when the opportunity arises. And we did actually, you know, outsmart the whole field and, and it was, it was, it was fun to do it. And my gratitude is based around, you know, it was actually fun to race with you and, and you know, watch, watch you take the victory, which is fantastic.

I couldn't agree anymore. It was absolutely going to be my gratitude as well. Uh, not many people can say they get to race competitively with their, with their a hundred year old dad as you always say. But, but seriously, it was uh, it was so much fun. And uh, yeah, I, I am officially hooked on road cycling and I might give up all triathlons because it's so much fun. There's something about the getting to mix in tactics with fitness levels and you know, really short, sharp efforts, a bit of recovery and you know, you talk about outsmarting them. I don't know if I can take much credit because I had you in my ear throughout the race kind of giving some instructions, but to, to talk about how the race kind of panned out. We ended up in a breakaway together and there was three of us and I was, I was, I was exhausted at the time, I was breathing very heavily, but I literally laughed out loud at the situation because I thought, how has this happened where there's two of us and one other guy in a breakaway? I just shook my head going, this is unbelievable and I don't know how many times we'll get that chance again in the future, you know, for a race to pan out like that. And it was, yeah, it was just so much fun to make a breakaway together and then stay away to the end and, and yeah, work together in a two on one at the finish. It was, it was just awesome.

Yeah. And look, I was, look, I don't know if people want to hear this but, but I got away with one of the other younger kids in the race and he was 18 and I'm 63, so I found that pretty funny that we were away together and the field let us go up the road and, and that worked perfectly. Into your hands or anybody in the Trivalo kids hands, because having one of your teammates up the road means the other riders have to chase. So that was a great scenario, which one that, you know, most road riders would, would see that happening a lot, but you've never experienced it. But as soon as the other guys put down the hammer and started chasing, the minute that they stopped the chase was your time to attack or any of the trivelos people's time to attack. And which you did, you rode across to us, which meant that we three of us were away, we only had 6 or 7k to go, and you were the strongest out of the three of us and you did all the work and then you actually won the sprint. So it was, it was a real fun thing to see. You leave the pack solo, don't drag the whole bunch across to us. You ran, you rode across to us on your own with really good power at the time when the bunch was tired. So you did all the right things that got you the result you did. So it was pretty special to see you put everything together and end up with a really good outcome. And as you say, it may never happen again, but it was sure fun to experience it. You know, I just, I had a smile on my face actually when we were breaking. When we were away together, I thought we could actually bugger up this sprint, two versus one. But we. But we eventually got the first and third, so. So it was good anyway. We better move.

Exactly. Yeah. My gratitude, because it was going to be that, but I'll say another one was that the Tour de France is on. I just have to say that every year the coverage seems to be getting better with social media. You seem to be getting more and more angles and footage of things that are happening and more insight. And it's just. I just absolutely love it. Every year I complain a little bit about the lack of sleep and it's already happening, but, you know, last night stayed up the entire stage. Definitely makes it hard to work the next day and train, but it is absolutely worth it because the race is just so gripping. So I'm so grateful to be able to watch that again. Moving on to the actual podcast topics of today, and let's start with a couple of key things that have caught our attention. And you wanted to talk about the recent Ironman in. I can't remember the location, but it was one of the toughest Ironman races on the calendar.

Yeah, it's Ironman UK and it's in Bristol, which is just a little bit north of Manchester. And to be Honest, I don't take much notice. There's hundreds of races going on around the world almost, you know, during summer at the moment, you know, there's, there's races everywhere happening, so it's really hard to be across every race. But happened to be coaching one one of the trivelo guys to this race and I seriously, I've never seen such a hard course on the bike. I was shocked at how difficult it was and I was, you know, I was seeing some bike times that just didn't make sense to me. You know, the amount of elevation that was in the, in the, in the ride. And you know, combine that with pretty average conditions in summer in England, you know, you got a fair bit of cold weather and rain and drizzle, so you've got all this, this against you. And I, I really think that, you know, when people start to talk about comparing times from race to race, that's a mistake. When you see a race like this and you know, someone who does, maybe an example would be a fast course like Busselton in, in Australia, in Western Australia here it's really flat, you know, really opportunity to, to ride, swim and run fast. And then you, you, if you did that race and then you went to UK Ironman, you could potentially have the same data, same effort and be an hour slower. That's how different it is when you, when you look at two races against each other and that's a bad thing to do to. You shouldn't compare one time in one race compared to another. You should compare all of your times at Basso against all of your times at Busso and you should compare. If you do Ironman uk, I don't think many people would front up for more than two or three of those because you, you know, a lot of people like to do fast times in an Iron Man. That's one of the things, you know. Have you done an Iron Man? Yes, I have. I watched. What's your best time? And if you've only done Ironman uk, you'll be, you know, you, you won't be sort of one of the top people at the party telling you you've done a 10 hour Ironman when someone else has done a 9 hour. Yet your event result probably was better than a nine hour. And that's kind of the message I'm trying to get across here is there's, you know, you know, we, we thought about Kona being, you know, a tough event and it is, it's got lots of elevation, it's got lots of High temperatures and the lava fields and it's, you know, it was meant to be the toughest race but boy, there's a lot of races that are rivaling at the moment. And you know, it doesn't have to be all about temperature, it can be about, you know, the amount of, the amount of climbing you're doing. And a lot of the age group bike times were, you know, if you, if you look across the world in age groups, say the 30 to 40 to 50 to 60 year olds, they're all riding around, you know, anywhere between four hours, 40 to five hours, 20 if you're in the top three. Well, most of the times at the UK race were 550 to 615, you know, and they were winning, they were winning their age group and, and that was kind of, it's in your face like, how hard is this? And then you've got to run. You know, running, running after a ride like that is different to running after a ride where you've been on the flat and you've, and you've only been out there for five hours. Yeah. And if, you know, if you, if you, if you do a five hour Bustleton then you go to Ironman UK and do six hours, that's a different run after riding for six hours compared to riding for five hours. And that's, that's kind of really grabbed my attention. It stuck out to me. It's a different race when, when you're trying to run a marathon, it's almost like you're being, you've handicapped yourself because now you're trying to run a marathon off a six hour ride instead of a five hour ride. And that, that takes a, takes more nutrition, takes more planning, takes better execution. You can't be as aggressive because you're out there for an hour longer. You know, the swim and the ride, swim and the run are the same but the ride adds a different dimension. So yeah, I just found it, I was really interesting to see, you know, the event was run in the middle of our night. You talk about losing sleep with the Tour de France. I was watching one of our guys do this race so I could not put it down because he actually ran through the field from 70th place to 24th in the run because he did everything right. And, and, and it was, you know, it was almost hilarious. 1:30 in the morning, 2 o'. Clock. What's he up to? 3, 3am you know, I just, I might as well have stayed awake the whole night rather than just getting up at intervals. But but it was, it was really good to see what I thought was going to be a. You know, I was thinking how far out the ride's taken a lot longer than we anticipated because of the difficulty, yet he still ran the house down. It was, it was brilliant.

And we were talking about this. You had a great chat with this athlete afterwards and they good runner, but you had to have some pretty clear conversations about, you know, that running might not translate at the end of an Ironman. It was their first Ironman and they were very thankful for, I guess, the respect you made sure they understood of the event. And especially when it turns out this event was so much tougher than others because they would have been able to run half as well had they not respected the event properly.

Yeah, it's a really good point. And you know, anybody who can run under three hours in a fresh marathon is a good runner because there's a. Only a small percentage of the population ever do that, run a marathon under three hours. And this particular guy could do that. And he went to Boston and ran a PB low 250. So his expectation is that he's a really good runner. Regardless what the swim and the ride were about, he should be able to execute his strength as a runner. And I said, yes, that is true, but you can't underestimate, I suppose, the difficulty of what you've just done. And you can't just assume that you can just run north normally. And you know, we did have a fair, fairly good, robust discussion about what his pace should be. And we had a good range and, and he kind of said at the end of the day, I'm so glad that we, we had that range because I could have got ahead of myself and I had to keep myself in check at 5 and 12 and 20k because, yeah, boy, did I feel different at 26k and 36k running the same pace. And you know, we talk about that perceived exertion at 10k. At, for example, he was trying to run 445 pace. That felt comfortable. And at 5k it felt like this is too slow, this is too easy. You know, I can run faster than this. And I'm warning him about this before the event. I'm saying the perceived exertion is just such a bad way to, to execute in, in an endurance race because the first 5k compared to the 35th k, the same pace feels completely different. It feels like a 10 out of 10 as compared to a 3 out of 10. And, and that was one thing he said. I Just had to trust the process and stay with it because I knew it was going to get hard at some point and, and boy, he said it did get hard. And, but because I was so grateful that I hadn't got ahead of myself and I was able to, you know, and the fact that he was running through the field, he said, don't underestimate how unbelievably good experience and feeling with people yelling out, mate, looking strong, running well, you know, you're flying. And he said it just gave me extra legs and no one in the field was, was, was passing him. He, he didn't get past. Yeah, from the minute he started running.

It must make you happy as a coach to hear all that, all that post race.

Yes. And you know, we've done many podcasts on you must be strong in the back half of the ride and the back half of the run. And that's the first thing he said to me was, you know, as much as I hated those training sessions, boy was I strong in the back half that I was able to maintain the pace that I wanted to run to. And it just proved to be so instrumental in allowing me to execute the race plan for the marathon that I wanted to. And we've spent a lot of time saying that the triathlon marathon is not a walking event and we don't hide from that. And this particular guy said to me, I don't care what happens, I am not walking. And I said, oh, just be careful with that sentence because it could come back to bite you. And to his credit, he did not walk one step. And he said you felt like it a lot. But definitely the mindset is that you can run the marathon no matter what pace you select. You know, whether you're running at 6 minute k pace or 630 minute k pace or 430 k pace, you can not have to walk if you've measured your effort well. And walking's okay. Don't get me wrong, this particular guy said he didn't want to walk. But if walking helps you keep the pace that you're trying to do, then that's okay. But it's not about doing the swim and bike and then I'm just going to walk. That's, that's what we're sort, sort of trying to get across here.

And on the other end of the scale, we, we were at the Gold Coast Marathon Festival, which was, There was the 5k, 10k half marathon and marathon all over the weekend on the Gold coast, which is in northern part of Australia. And yeah, there's definitely some observations we both had from, from watching people compete in the half, half marathon and marathon events. And it is different when it's a fresh marathon. It's like. That's why I said it's the other end of the scale. But I saw a lot of people. One of my observations were people not respecting the event and specific examples of people getting what you say, their ambition and ability confused. And on that point of perceived exertion. A friend of ours put up a hilarious caption after the marathon and she said it's so funny how 35km and 272km adds up to 42.2km because she's basically saying that the last 7k felt like it was 270km. Found that hilarious. And to her credit, she ran an unbelievable 2 hours 40 marathon. So that is absolutely flying. I think she was 11th female overall. But that is just, it's just the, this wall that happens in the marathon. Right. Where wherever it is 30k, 35k, it's a totally. Feels like you're in a totally different race to what you were before that.

Yeah. And I suppose that's one of the coaching points that I want to get across to the people listening is that endurance events, if you don' the event and the pace that you selected, which is what we say, getting your ability and your ambition confused, then it will be a horrendous outcome and experience for you on race day. And I've said many times, I don't know how people re front up again and repeat the same mistake over and over because if you do it once, I'm never going to go through that again. If I'm feeling bad at 32k and I've got to hang on for 10k, I don't want to do that next time. I want to make sure I got my pacing right for the next race. But I continue to front up to all these big, big races and, and whether people don't know that this is what they should be doing and they just run to feel and then progressively get slower and are happy with that. That could be, that could be what's happening. But. Or they're just not respecting it and going, you know, this is a pace I want to run at even though I've never done that in training and I haven't run this far at that pace. And that's, that's kind of just some of your nose at the event and it will bite you so badly that you know that you end up in a state of disarray and, you know, to a point where you're staggering to the finish line, which is. Which did happen to a few people walking sideways. And, and you know, I say it's great that people can get themselves to that point, but I've been to that point myself. But it's not something that's. That I would recommend. I would rather you finish full of legs and get to the finish and say, oh, maybe I could have gone harder. Not many people can say that in most endurance events when they get to the finish. And if you do get to that position, great. Look out next time. And that's what a learning experience is about, is doing some events and learning where your ability is and trying to improve. And we saw many examples in the half marathon. Even the 10k, it just gets exposed more in the marathon because you have to. You have to sustain it for agonizingly up to an hour. Whereas, you know, if you make a mistake in a 10k, you really only have to suffer for five minutes. It's bad enough suffering, but. But yeah, was really interesting. And, and you know, there's a lot I want to talk about around.

Well, yeah, I mean, let's go into it because we had some great discussions about people we observed and we put. We observe people within Trivelo and then outside of Travelo and, you know, different people that we knew. I saw one specific example. I didn't know the person, but I knew their friend. And their. The person, like you said, staggered across the line in the marathon, you know, got there and was in a really bad way medically. And I asked the friend, you know, what happened? You know, were they. Were they like too super dehydrated or what? Like, what was the issue there? And they just said I'd just push themselves too hard. And that confused me a little bit. And I sort of pressed, pressed and said, oh, do you know specifically what happened? Because not everyone ends up in that state from pushing themselves too hard. You know, you say a lot of people in that race are pushing themselves to their limit, but not everyone is walking sideways or ends up in the medical tent. And just because you end up in the medical tent doesn't mean you push yourself harder than someone else. I was trying to get to the bottom of kind of what happened. And I said, was it nutrition or dehydration? And they said, no, none of those things eventually got out of the friend who said, look there. They probably just went too hard. Their previous PB was 3:30 and they were thought they were in much better form and they went out in three hour pace and they just absolutely blew up because of it. Because their body, you know, this is my conclusion. The friend didn't say this, but I heard that and went, okay, so they've just gotten gone way too hard compared to what their body's actually capable of. And it's absolutely destroyed them. And for me that's an example of probably not respecting the event enough. And I guess we ended up having this conversation where we went. You know, a lot of people think that the training is everything. If you train really well, if your numbers are good in your testing, then that's it. But for the age group athlete or any non pro or any pro, even getting to the start line fresh, tapered and healthy is just as much of a battle as all the training required. And then executing is an even more battle. And a lot of people just think. And I saw some, some friends of mine who had been training the house down again, probably not respect the event enough and kind of went in with a few niggles. You know, they probably overtrained a little bit and were confident that their body could get through when they'd done too much and didn't think about the getting to the start line fresh, healthy and tapered. And they ended up pulling out halfway through because those needles just got too much. So those are some of the conversations we were having.

Yeah. And with so much ability to look at data, whether you're looking at Strava or so, you can actually look at people's pace. You know, you can go into the event and the event gives you splits of 5k, 10k, half marathon, etc, etc. So I could, it made me go and look because I wanted to get a gauge in my mind if is this a common thing or is this a minority of people doing it? And my conclusion was the majority of people are doing this. I could not find many people in the half marathon who had negative splitted. I just picked, I think I tried 20 or 30 different people and you know, it just, it just wasn't becoming evident that anybody was running the same pace the whole way through. Everybody faded. And you know, I'm being the coach here and I kind of, I get frustrated because there is a better way. That's what I'm trying to get across to people. You will have a better, a better outcome, but you'll also have a better experience. So what are you there for? 1, you're trying to improve on what you've done before. It could be your first time. Two, you are Actually trying to enjoy yourself because it's what you've chosen to do as your recreation, as your passion. So the two things are very important. You need to enjoy the experience. And if you're going to get an outcome that's really good, it will be so much enjoyable. It will be such an adrenaline rush about. I can't wait to do the next race because that was fun. I executed exactly the way I wanted to. I ran the same pace from start to finish. I only faded maybe 2 or 3 seconds per per K. And that to me is fine. You know, close to a negative split is fine. But if you're running 20 to 30 seconds slower in the second half than the first half, that is a hard way to run and not such a good experience. And. And they're the things I was looking for. And. And I couldn't find much evidence that that was happening. And obviously we had Liam, my daughter in law, in the. In the half marathon and she, she had only done one other half marathon before in her life. And so this is her second go. She's had a baby in between. So she's had lots going on and she's followed a really good training program. Like you said before, she's done everything well and she arrived at race day fit and healthy.

And I want to set the context a little bit from her perspective as well, because she's someone that comes from the other type of mindset where she. She would. Wouldn't mind us saying that she probably comes from a little bit more conservative mindset, probably lacks a little bit of belief in what she could do. And you were having to kind of. You wouldn't do this for many athletes trying to instill the belief in her that she can run this certain pace. So keep going, but talk us through that.

Yep, yep. So, and look, she had picked a race earlier, which was the Noosa Half Marathon, and she actually got sick. She got kidney infection before it, so she couldn't do it. So already her training program was a little bit in the air. So we had to reset to a race that was six or seven weeks later. So we had to. We were already peaked for the Noosa race, so we had to reset and move the goalpost, so to speak. So she did do a good job in recovering from that illness and then resetting her target to the Gold coast half Marathon, which was good because it gave her another opportunity to have a crack at the race she was trying to improve on. So coming into the race, we had a race plan and this is her range that she was going to run at and she absolutely nailed it. She ran a negative split and she was running through the field from the first half to the second half. So much had to go into that conversation. At the start of this race, there will be people streaming past you. You have to let them go. You have to stay with your running pace and as you get to 10 or 11k, people will stop passing you and you'll start to run the same pace as the people around you. As you get to 12, 13, 14, 15, you will start passing people. And that is exactly the scenario that happened because everybody else around her is slowing down. She is running the same pace and she actually did run a little bit faster from 15k to 21k and she ended up doing an 8 minute PB, which was unbelievable. And it was another example of someone who trained well, had a clear understanding of their race pace. And the thing that you talked about at the start was the key. She executed. She didn't get carried away, she didn't get sucked in by the other people's pace around her. She stuck to her guns and what an outcome for her. So the execution, that makes the result what it is. You can be the fittest person, the most well prepared person, have the greatest plan, be fresh as a daisy and then still stuff it up because you executed poorly. So it's never one thing, it's a combination of things you have to get right. You have to get five things right. And the execution is the final key to the safe. And that's kind of the bit that you can stuff up the most if you just do that wrong. And, and so it was, it was great to see her do that. But on the other hand, I was so disappointed and almost angry at the other 98% who, who, who were not doing that. And, and I felt like getting on the dais at the end with a megaphone going, what are you all doing? Why can't you see that that's a really hard way to race and people will go, well, you're being too serious. I'll go, no, it doesn't matter whether you're a beginner or intermediate or an elite, you still need to have a strategy that's going to make it enjoyable. And I guarantee you, if I had a microphone and interviewed people at the end, the majority of the answers going, I never want to do that again. That is the hardest thing I've ever done. And that's not. We want to have an interview at the end going, far out. That was fun. It was so much fun running. My best time. I feel great and I'm not exhausted. I won't be able to not walk for seven days. I'll be able to just resume, you know, my normal life and, you know, call me, you know, harsh, but it's just almost infuriating that people, either they don't know that that's an option for them or they refuse to listen.

Well, what about the belief thing? Because again, you wouldn't come across this too often where you really had to instill belief in her that she could do it. She just, she probably wasn't confident that that was possible. And you were having to say to her, no, you, you really can do this pace and don't be afraid to go for that. Yeah. How do you, how do you get that belief right before the race?

There's a few little strategies there which, and you know how we've talked about data. I have to, you know, I have to, I have to prove with evidence to her. She has to come up with her race plan and she, she did. And I have to make her understand that she's got data that proves to her that she can do it. So the step up races that we did on the lead up into the event, say maybe a 5k park run, and we did another race where it was a 5k park run and she had to run another 5k after the park run. And so she's got all this evidence from racing experience of what pace she can do. We did a 16k progressive fast run. We also did a 21k, you know, so we did lots of events that she could not argue with that that was a pace that she's capable of doing. So you can't tell someone and they expect them to believe it without evidence. That's my opinion. If you've got solid, sound evidence, then the person has no option but to go, well, I've done it, so why can't I replicate it again? And I suppose that's the motivating part that I need to take on is I've got strong belief that you can do this because of these examples that I've just given you training examples and race practice examples. And it was a really easy decision and she just had to in the end totally embrace and trust me 100%. And by the end I was actually riding the bike alongside her for the last 5k. You could not take the smile off her face. It was, you know, I've got this and, you know, and this is, it was a really good experience and I Wanted to tell this. This story because I know that it will help many other people who are aspiring to, do, you know, their first park run of 5K or they're an experienced athlete who doesn't seem to be getting any improvement that it can change if you. If you actually respect the things that we've been talking about in the last 20 minutes.

On a really positive note from the event, something I've noticed over the last 12 months, especially specifically post lockdown, is the emergence of so many running groups. There are running groups popping over all over the shop at the moment. And I have so many people in my. In my network and social circle who have just taken up running and being converted into fully fledged runners, which I am so shocked at. I look at some people and they're. They're now doing a full running program, which I never would have expected from certain people. And it's amazing to see so many people who I'd never would see before taking up the half marathon or marathon challenge. And for me, that's just awesome. And I'm talking about a lot of people I know, so a lot of young people. I'm just seeing massive amounts of running groups training, training at Olympic park on Tuesday or Thursday mornings or training at any of the local ATH tracks that we've grown up on running for a long time around here. I just loved absolutely seeing that and people, you know, really talented people coming through, people who've only been running for a few years. I saw multiple people break three hours and it was their second attempt at a marathon. They'd only taken up running a couple of years ago, and just consistent training with the group that they love. They've fallen in love with running. I just absolutely loved seeing that.

Yeah, it's. It is good. And running was kind of not cool to do, but. But certainly I think. I think Covid has changed people's attitudes of community and, And I think the community. The running's almost like a secondary thing. People just want to not go to the pub together anymore. They'd rather go to the meetup for the. For the. I know that just here, the local coffee shop has a. As a coffee shop runner on Thursday, they just started, you know, six months ago, maybe six weeks ago. But that started with three people. Now they're regularly getting 20 people. I just think that's. That's what this is about. Just in getting people off the couch and making themselves healthier. And it'll be. Be more beneficial in every other aspect of their life, in their work and their Relationships. So if you're happy with the way you are, healthy wise and fitness wise, it has a flow on effect. There's no doubt in my mind we.

Do want to touch on the tour a little bit and we're, we're cognizant of the fact that by the time this episode comes out, it will be week three of the tour. We sometimes record episodes a fair bit in advance, so a lot will have happened. And normally we do do some mini Tour de France episodes outside of our weekly podcast. So we may have done, by the time this comes out, we may have done a few more of them. But we just did want to talk about Simon Clark on this episode because the Cobble stage was last night. So if you're hearing this in a couple of weeks time. This was recorded the night after the Cobble stage where dad, you and I both stayed up. I didn't know you were up, but we were both watching in separate places the entire race and it was just so awesome to watch. It was like a couple's classic. And Simon Clark actually grew up in, right near us in Belgrade, in Victoria. And we, we have family friends that, you know, know each other. And he almost came on the podcast back in January. He was very kind, he was willing to be a guest, but we didn't know that he was going through all this contract turmoil where he didn't have a team. He was calling up teams around the world trying to get signed. He was under a lot of pressure. His career was slipping through his fingers and we didn't end up being able to get him on the podcast because we didn't know this. But he was obviously very busy and obviously a little bit stressed with his career situation. And then he got a call from Israel saying, get to Europe now. And he's off to Europe within 24 or 48 hours. And now he's won a stage at the Tour de France, which will just put him on the highest pedestal in terms of Australian cycling. Whenever an Aussie wins a Tour de France stage, it's just unbelievable. So hopefully we can get Simon on the podcast at some point in the future. He was very kind when he was messaging us. It just didn't work out at that time. But we just wanted to mention how unbelievable that win was to watch.

Yeah, look, I was cheering as much as I've ever cheered on a tally for that final throw to the line where he won by centimeters. It was like watching Matthew Heyman win Paris Roubaix. That's kind of. It was like. It was Like a one day classic stage to me. And the two contrasting races that were going on. The guys in the break and the kids, the turmoil behind. Like the guys on the break were just riding even tempo the whole way through, helping each other and made the best man win. And meanwhile there was just carnage with the other 190 riders behind who were trying to catch the guys in the break and, and I've got to say Simon is one of the canniest bike riders that I've ever watched. And he's not, he's done this many times. You know, he's, he's a, you know he nearly rolled Matthew Vanderpoel at, was it Amstel Gold where he got second?

I can't remember.

I think, I think it was. But, but you know that's the sort of writer he is. He can, he can produce one day riding results and he's, he's one of the best spring classics writers I know. And I'm not just talking about Paris, Roubaix or Tour of Flanders. I'm talking about the whole, you know, he is such a smart, clever bike rider and, and he's been underrated in Australian cycling in my opinion. He's up, right up there. He's won stages at the welter and now he's won a Tour de France stage. Well that, you know, he'll, that'll be one that he would just be so proud of. And he couldn't have won it in any, any better fashion. The fact that he had Bosenhagen, one of the best sprinters in the world.

And he out foxed him, you know.

He outsmarted him and boy, I wouldn't want to play cards against Simon Clark because you would lose every time. You know, I think, I can't remember who the guy was who attacked. Got a jump on them pals and, and the three of them were sitting there waiting for Bosenhagen to do something and you know, I, I don't know if I could have sat behind I would have had to go. But that was, it was such the.

Longest 10 seconds I've watched in cycling. I think it's just with every second that passes, Powers is getting further up the road and Boston Hagen's looking behind at them and Clark and Target Menorah just sitting there going, we're not budging. And it's just the tension is incredible. With every second that passes there could be the Tour de France stage chance. You know, I just couldn't believe that. And the nerves it took for him to sit There and go nut you go nut you go. And whoever the first one to, to fold is the loser. And that Bosonhagen was the first one. So.

I know and something Clark said in the interview, which I loved was I, I gave him a meter or two and when he turned around he had a little gap and he took the bait which was intentional by me to, to get him to go and of course I had to accelerate to get back on his wheel but, but it made him go first and you know, you don't even notice that that's what he was doing.

So smart.

That's how clever he is. And of course the guy on his wheel was getting a free ride as well. But then Clark had the ability to wait for that guy to go and then jump on his wheel because you know, you are tired sprinting fresh and sprinting at the end of a cobble stage is completely different.

It was a tired sprint from all four of them, wasn't it?

Yeah. And you can't afford to go too long on these sprints. And that proved the person who gave their one effort got the victory and Clark was the last one to give the effort. And boy, what it was just, it was a great story. And the fact that he's. No team wanted him, you know, and since he's been with Israel cycling he has actually raced over the, over the last three months of riding. So he's in great form and, and today's result was, you know, because he's just tried to give them everything back that they've invested in him and boy, what a decision. Now all those other teams that didn't take up his call, his ple to take him on would be, you know, that, that's just, that's gold for Israel cycling. They've got a Tour de France stage win, you know, that they never would have had if they didn't take him on. I just think it's a great story. I love it. And the fact that, you know, he rides the roads where we live and it's fantastic.

Yeah, yeah. I couldn't agree more. And I just loved everything about his post race interview. You know, he said in that sprint, it was such a long sprint, both legs were cramping and you could see on his face he was giving absolutely everything. And that was one of the best lunges for the line I've ever seen. And the poor guy was second would he couldn't have done any more. And you know, you, you see the throw that Clark does and that's what gets him the Win. It was just incredible. And I felt better for my housemates because it's 2am here and, and the tension was just palpable in that last K and I just, I couldn't hold it in. I just burst out and yelled when he crossed the line and I thought, geez, it's a bit unfair for me to wake them up, but it was worth it.

Yeah. And look, you know, he's 36. He's been, he left home when he was 16. He's had 20 years. And every little race experience that he's had in 20 years culminated in that throw. And you know, of course he had to get in the break, he had to roll turns, he had to keep riding hard in the break. All those things contributed to the win. But, but you know, don't underestimate every experience you have when it counts on that one day and you put it together, the satisfaction, you couldn't wipe the smile off his face. It was, you know, it was emotional for him. It was, it was, it was brilliant.

It's so true. And you always say that the sprint isn't just the most powerful person, it's a combination of the timing, the power that you push, your positioning, all these things. And I can't remember if it was last night or the night before Brady actually asked on the commentaries, Simon Garrons two time previous stage winner of the Tour de France what's it take to win a sprint finish properly? And he just said, well, you know, how long's a piece of string? Basically there's a thousand things that you have to get right and including everything that leads up to the exact moment that you do that throw. And yeah, Clark's experience came through because he got all of those things right. So just awesome to watch. And I can't wait to see what happens over the next few weeks.

Yeah, well, like, you know, if we just before we finish on the Tour de France, you know, the first four stages have been basically about sprinting and, and all of those guys, you know, you can rattle them off from Caleb, Philipson, Jacobsen, Sagan van Aert, they're all equally as good sprinters and there's, there's probably four more grinderwagon, you know, there's so many guys in there who could actually win. Yet seemingly Van Aert keeps coming first or second so he's doing a lot right in positioning and you know, the lead out team has a bit to do with it. So there's, there's other things that come into play. But, but certainly, you know, you're defined by your result as a sprinter. And it could, you know, Caleb could be very disappointed because he hasn't done anything yet. But, but don't write him off. It's still, you know, there's still a long way to go. We said this many tours before. You know, you learn a lot from the mistakes you make and the victories you don't have because then you put it together, you've got to get the positioning, the timing and the power to sprint properly. Right? And you know, he is, he is one of the best fastest sprinters in the world, yet it just hasn't happened and it's not, you know, so you, I'm trying to say this to, to guys who are just doing club, club races where, you know, you can still be the best sprinter and not win and it can still be the best rider in a bike race and not win. You know, our example was, you know, I'm by far, I was in that club race. I was probably the 20th best rider there, but I got third. You know, it's got nothing to do with just your ability as a powerful rider. It's got to do with lots of other things, timing and tactics. And so, you know, for everybody listening, you know, you don't always expect that the result's going to go your way. It's, it's going to be 1 out of 100 or 1 out of 50. But in Van Aert's case, it's every single race he's getting a result. But, but there he's an exceptional bike rider. He's a 1 in 100 year bike rider, you know, so, so you can't.

Base it off him.

You can't just put, yeah, you can't base it off his results. But, but yeah, so that's the point. I want to get across there. I think we'll finish there.

That's probably all we have time for. I do apologize because at the start we did say we're going to talk about a lot more and as always, we just love talking about some of these topics and we. And time ends up running away from us, but we will eventually get to a lot of the topics that we talk about. I do apologize if you're waiting for a certain question to be answered. If you do have questions for us, be sure to send them in. We will get to them eventually, but that will be it for this episode. So as always, thank you very much for listening. We appreciate it and we'll see you in the next episode.