Episode 100: Getting Out Of The Pain Cave with Chip Chilson

Welcome to this episode of the Million Dollar Mastermind. I'm Larry Weidell, and let's get started. We are back with Chip Chilson, legendary cycling and ski coach from Aspen, Colorado. And I asked Chip to come back because I wanted him to tell us the story of how there's a lot of lessons packed into specific examples. And there's one specific example there was a real highlight for me to hear about, and I think you'll learn a lot from it, too. So, Chip, welcome back.

All right. Thank you for having me back. It's my pleasure.

One of the things that I just think is a lifetime achievement for a couple of our friends, Mark and Todd. We'll just call him Mark and Todd for now, but getting while you coach them up to do the Leadville 100. And Todd we talked a little bit about in the first episode and that was he had. Well, I'll let you tell the story about Todd and then we'll bring Mark into it later. But there's just a lot of lessons about this. But the end result, I'll tell you the end of the story is both of them, them finished the Leadville 100, and that is 100 miles through some of the steepest mountains, most rugged terrain. And I don't know how long it took them to finish, but I mean, it's like a huge lifetime achievement to just finish this race one time. And so talk about how that, how that happened.

Well, it goes back to a foundation that I started working for and a masterful athlete, a world champion and Olympic bronze medalist, Chris Klug, asked me to come on board. He's a real passionate, passionate about doing the Leadville 100. It's a, as you said, it's a real hard man's event. It's 103 miles actually, starting in world famous Leadville, Colorado, 10,500ft. And the whole race is basically from 10,000ft all the way up to 12,500 out and back through the mountains and passes. That's how I got started with these two individuals you're talking about. They had, they came onto the Chris Klug foundation, which is an organ donation foundation for people that need an organ. And they had family members that got them interested in, you know, Leadville 100 and raising money for that. So grateful to Chris Klug and all the people I met down the road. But Todd and Mark were both really special interest stories for that event.

And, and then so at some point, Todd is involved in the Oregon donor program. He gets, he comes to Aspen Gets involved in cycling and he decides he, he wants to get in this Leadville 100. I didn't know Chris was a. I didn't know Chris was big in the Leadville 100. I knew he was, yeah.

Chris Klug.

I knew he was a snowboarder and had the kidney transplant. And, you know, he's got a miraculous story and I'm going to interview him as soon as I can. He and I can kind of chase each other down. But anyway, I didn't know he was big in the Leadville 100. But talk about. So Todd decides he, he's going to get in the Leadville 100. You have to have something kind of captures your imagination. And that's where the story really started for Todd, didn't it?

Absolutely. You know, Chris Kaluk started the organ donor foundation via, you know, he got a quick story. He had his organ prior to the 2002 Olympics, healed from that, went on to win an Olympic bronze medal, started his foundation. Many people saw the organ donor foundation Chris got. Chris is a phenomenal athlete, you know, world class, obviously. He's an Olympian, loves biking, you know, outdoor activities and he's, you know, semi pro mountain biker in his own right. Phenomenal.

I didn't know that.

Strong. And anyway, he's passionate about Leadville and people that want to get on board and raise money for the Chris Kalugh foundation organ donation. Todd Raup was one of them. He came on board, living in Chicago, started training for the event. You know, definitely typical Chicago businessman with, you know, very smart, big goals. The first year was a definite struggle because he's trying to train from Chicago. You know, he came out to a couple of our Leadville camps, almost made it the first year, but not quite. Didn't make the cutoff time. The second year he came back and was almost there again, didn't quite make it.

What's the cutoff, what's the cutoff time now?

I think the cutoff time at one of the checkpoints is right at about seven hours. You get a medal, you get a belt buckle if you come in under the 12 hour mark. But if you don't make the cutoff times and they'll pull you from the race because they don't want you to come in after dark.

Yeah, logistics. Yeah.

Todd, you know, it actually starts in the dark at about 6 o', clock, 6:30 in the morning. And third year, Todd comes back. He had moved to Colorado with his family, realizing that, you know, he definitely wanted to pursue a much healthier Way of life. He was able to run his business from his home in Colorado. The third year was a, was a winner, was a game changer for him. He finished the Leadville 100 and came in well under 12 hours and got.

His belt buckle and that was the year he was out here training with, with you the more full time, right?

He went right into it full bore. He was very passionate about that, that event. It's a bucket list event, very few people can finish it. He jumped on board, you know, moved it, moved out here again full time, bought a home out here, was able to run his Chicago business from his home. And we trained heavily for a strong six month period before the event. You know, Leadville's just obviously on the other side of the hill from Aspen. We were over there every 10 days riding pre riding. He drove right into it and he did a massive.

Well, of course, of course you couldn't go year. You know, you're in the winter, you're on the, you know, you're inside on the cycling machines but you know, you can't get out of the hill until the snow stops. But you're still warming up, you're still training. And Mark came along, Mark lives out here. He was already out here. He's been an athlete, but he had never a World cup skier, but he had never competed and really probably never thought about the Leadville 100. And you got him caught up in it. He decided he wanted to be a part of it. So y' all trained together or they trained together as I understand it.

That's true. I mean the three of us actually ended up training to together on many occasions. You know, specifically going to Leadville which is just, you know, a 40 minute drive from Aspen, going over the past, getting on course and riding every single bit of the 103 miles and riding and pre riding and riding over and over all the climbs, all the descents. Mark and Todd were a great story of, you know, commitment, desire to get that bulk go and they, they did a great job.

And talk about having the buddy system, I feel like having both of them as being able to train together a lot rather than just themselves with you as the coach, but having a little peer pressure that they put on each other. I felt like that had something to do with both of them finishing too.

Absolutely Great friends, you know, like any sport, you know, going out playing with your friend friend in any sport, you know, buddy in the weight room. In this case. Two great cyclists that they, they became, they pushed each other and when it came to Race, race day, it's like, you know, think about it. You get on a bike, you really want to have some fun. You want, you want to see if you can beat your buddy. And those guys worked hard on the outcome, was extremely good and positive on both sides. They both finished well and both got their buckles. It was a great day for both of them.

And talk about Mark's accident. Where Mark comes into the story is ordinarily he would just, you know, just be an average story of the guy trained hard and he went and completed the race. But things don't always work out that way. What? Tell them the story of Mark.

You know, here again, Mark's an exceptional athlete. I mean, he is definitely a renaissance man. And his story is pretty amazing. But you know, former World cup skier, great athlete, great biker, just makes sense. He trained extremely hard. We actually started working way back in the wintertime in January, both indoors and outdoors. You know, going down to Moab, Utah in February and finding warmer temperatures. You know, I did a lot of racing in between. A lot of periodization, worked hard. Ten days before the event, he's doing his final little short mountain bike race and he goes over the handlebars and does a third degree separation on his shoulder. Was like, okay. Well, you know, if you look at possibilities there, I mean a lot of the tour guys, a lot of the big racers, they, they tape it up, get a little injection and get after it. I told Mark, you know, we've come too far. Let's just kind of moderate it day by day. Long story short, he lines up with Leadville 100 and he finished it well under time to get his buckle. I mean with a third degree separation. It was an amazing day. Amazing day.

It's interesting to hear you tell the story and then hear him tell the story because as he tells the story when the accident happened, in his mind, it's over, you know, I'm done. It's going to take forever to recover from this. And he's sitting in intense pain in the hospital and in comes Chip and Chip says, okay, take the rest of the day off.

You know, when you look at a world class athlete like that and it is good to look back and have a little bit of a laugh, but you know, with great respect, you know, you know it wasn't a full on tear, but he thought it was.

And there's another lesson, there's another lesson there, Chip though, that when tragedy, tragic things happen and you're working, you know, you busted your gut at this point, you guys have Been uncounted times up to this hundred mile race. Like you say, you know, you, you've been up and down it, you've scoped it out, you scouted it, you've practiced this, that, the other. Then right before, a little over a week out, he tears that shoulder, goes over the handlebars and, and his mind is hopeless. But you, that's the value of a coach who can keep perspective and say, okay, you know, don't worry about it today. But then you brought him around like tomorrow, you said, what? What did you say? Tomorrow? What, what kind of. How did you get him back? Getting back? Because you had to convince, you had to convince him, Chip, that he could do it. It was not a matter of just telling him what to do. You had to get him back believing he could make it happen again. And so talk about how you talked him through that part of it, Larry.

Was the luck of growing up with Mark. I mean, we grew up as kids in the ski club. I knew his talents. He raced at the highest level in the world in alpine ski racing on the World Cup. He also had some unbelievable injuries. You know, where he had knee, knee replacement, knee scopes. He was a product of Dr. Richard Steadman, the knee surgeon. He knows pain. This did not require surgery. So it was just, hey, Mark, let's take a step back for the next couple days. Let's see if we can get a cortisone shot in this thing and let's regroup. And it worked. He knows how to handle pain. He knows how to manage pain. We got, got everything managed well and he was able to line up. And his talent on the bike was a big part of it too. Knowing how to ride smoothly and getting his shoulder wrapped properly, it was a no brainer, you know.

Well, it was a no brainer. It was a no brainer for you, but it was a big brainer for him because even in spite of all that, that was pain in the past. There's something about pain. When you have an accident or you have pain, something goes wrong. It's like, forget all the pain in the past. This hurts. This is killing me. I'm dying over here, you know, it was my job.

That's a good point. And Will said, I mean, it was my job to get him out of the pain cave, you know, so we worked with the therapist, we worked with the doctor to get the, you know, pain relief through cortisone shots and a proper taping of the shoulder, and it worked. So when he lined up that day, he Was in minimal pain to no pain.

Yeah.

And you know, the, his athletic prowess and his ability to hand handle pain as a world class athlete all his life. You know, basically he's not in the air racing at 70 miles an hour down a ski slope. He's got his tires on the ground. So he knew, you know, how to manage the race. He did quite well. So it was his manner of mark, believing in himself as well.

And how would you say getting that phrase you tossed off there, getting out of the pain cave, how do you feel like that applies in life? Because that's just something you got to deal with all the time, don't you think?

Absolutely. We all have our stuff, so it's been great. We all live with, you know, having to manage our lives. It's a roller coaster, ups and downs, you know, personal pain, physical pain, psychological pain. And it's a matter of addressing it, knowing how to turn it off and you know, come up with a sunny side up attitude. But that takes, that's a whole nother discussion in terms of the psychological aspect. But yeah, I mean, you, me, all of us, we deal with a certain amount of it, but it's a matter of understanding we all have great qualities. And to bring them out of every individual, that's not hard to do really, if you've been on the coaching side of it. It's recognizing that and giving them the opportunity to be their best self every day.

But isn't that, wouldn't you say that that's the key, that's the main thing as a coach, that it goes. It seems like the fundamentals and the techniques and working out the schedules and things like that can be pretty much pretty easy because you've done it so many times, there's only so many options. But dealing with people psychologically, getting them to stay on track and not get sidetracked or get depressed because of pain or anything going on emotional things in their life. Don't you feel like that's one of the biggest things that you bring to the table in terms of helping people finish the things they start.

Start. That's what I really enjoy. It's getting to know them on a one to one basis. You know what? You know, again, it's like a prescription from a doctor. You come in, you sit down with the doctor, he analyzes you, does his testing, and I do the same thing. It's getting to know them on a one to one basis, a friendship basis, looking at their life, understanding what they do, you know, family first. Is always my saying, you Know, understanding the, you know, make sure you get. Get on board with your family in terms of what you're doing to stay healthy. And that's where the exciting part is, is to kind of take it a little bit out of the athletic side, the fitness side, and understanding what makes them tick as an individual and then being able to plug in, you know, get program that makes sense for them. That's going to be fun and enjoyable.

Yeah. And that's what, that's what you're so good at, at seeing the good in people and reinforcing that and reminding them. And, you know, you're a great appreciator of people, and that allows you to treat them differently. And I have to feel like some of those skills paid off with you. You know, like, you talk about the family, raising the three. Your three adult children now, quite. All of them completely different, but all of them doing well, having their own families, except your youngest daughter. And once she gets out of COVID prison, she's going to go take over the world. And you just got to feel like those, those same techniques, it's the same way you deal with your family, to help your kids, your close friends around you reach their peak. Peak performance is not everybody's going to be a World cup skier, but they can reach their peak in the areas that they have gifts for. And you're never going to find out what that is until you get to know them and spend some time with them. And so what would you. What do you think about. What would you tell? Just top of my head, what do you think about scheduling, you know, and staying with the routine? And part of getting out of the pain cave and not giving in to disasters is to stay on your schedule, to stay on that workout schedule every day. You've got certain things, performance goals to hit. How. How do you keep people on track for that? And. And how important is that?

Well, the way I keep people on track, I think is the most important is you got to be creative. You got to make it fun. If it's not fun, you don't want to do it. Two, you got to make it exciting, too. It's got to be a part of their day. You know, there's going to be. Everybody's got a job, everybody works hard, they've got, you know, classic nine to five. Then they have family. But, you know, they want to plug into that missing element, and that's, you know, just good health and fitness. So it's analyzing their day, coming up with a schedule, as you said, and, you know, that time that works for. Works well into their day, you know, between their family and their work schedule, and take that short amount of time and make it worthwhile for them. That's when they can get excited.

And in terms of keeping the excitement up until they get the job done and to make a breakthrough. I know you had all of these kind of techniques you would use as I was dead on my feet, you know, trying to make it up to the top of Maroon Bells, and I'd be just about ready to quit. And you would say, okay, take a sip of water, or take three, three long sips of water. You know, you'd have the thing to get my mind off of the pain, you know, and then you say, or you'd say, get out the. Whatever that those little bars are, those little goos, and you know, get some food in you, you know, and. Or you'd say, oh, look, look, look up. Look at those trees over there. Look at those leaves. Aren't we the luckiest people in the world? Look at that view. You, you know, you would do things to shift my mind off of the pain, of the process of doing it, of developing the strength to be able to do it. And when you said that Mark was familiar with pain and, you know, pushing himself because he'd been a world class athlete before in skiing, that's part of peak performance, is dealing with pain or dealing with the pain of doing breakthroughs while you're developing skill. You know, your lungs, your aerobic capacity, your strength, developing that mental toughness. A lot of that has to do with just getting through the next moment. You know, forget about the rest of the race, just stay on track, get through the next day, shift your mind, you know, break that, that obsession with the frustration you're going through right now and say, you know, shift your perspective. So explain that.

Well, you know, I think specifically with you and or Mark, I mean, two similar athletes in some ways. I mean, you guys are very determined, you know, quick recollection. Recollection. Larry with you is, you know, we started out slow. We did not go for the gusto. It took many, many months to start biking at altitude, biking up to the Maroon Bells, biking up the pass. But you took the time and the effort out of your day to really work closely on the guided program, you know, so baby steps, small steps up the ladder with a guy like Mark and you achieved your goals. I mean, that was pretty amazing. Less people know, less be known to the people out there. You know, Larry Wydell and I went to Moab Utah, we trained down there. You put in the time, you know, in the desert environment to log in big miles. Then we came back up to altitude and he kept working away, but we took time, we kept it fun and we worked up the ladder and that would. That way you were able to exit a team, your goals. With a guy like Mark, who's, you know, world class athlete, who's worked at the highest level, it's a little bit easier in some ways because they know pain, deep, hard pain from crashing and falling at 70 miles an hour in the World cup and how to translate that into something like cycling and how to manage it. So his pain experience was pretty doggone high. Not to discount you, because I know you've known plenty of poor, plenty of pain in your lifetime, but you guys are exceptional in terms of you have a good amount of high athleticism, you've been through a process, a workout process, entire life, so you know how to manage the pain. That makes it easier for me as a coach.

What would you say about learning to deal with pain for people who've maybe been in the comfortable lifestyle for quite a long time, but they, they know they're capable of more, they really want to break out. They want to get maybe breakout in their business. They want to break out in, you know, physically. They just want to get out and start doing some more stuff. And you're going to have to go through some stages of where things are not that comfortable as you're developing, you know, these new strengths and skills and things like that. What would you tell them about getting through pain or getting through those points where you just to keep yourself from being overwhelmed to where you quit?

I think two words come to mind, Larry, and that's embrace it. But intelligently, I think no pain, no gain. All those lifelong adages we all hear, but coming in at low levels, you want to minimize the pain early on. Pain only comes in if you want to call it pain or I call it fun. The fun starts when you're adding intensity and intervals into any kind of a program. It's really not that hard to recognize it and manage it and know when to add it or back it off. But just embrace the process. It's fun. A little bit of pain, a little bit of sweat goes a long way in terms of becoming a much stronger, much more viable person and athlete, just like you.

And I think, Chip, you put your finger right on the difference between people who are successful in these things and others is they're more focused on the fun of it and the reward of it than you know, what they've got to do to get there. But also they don't drive themselves insane trying to hit some arbitrary standard of comparing them to other people. They just get in and start enjoying it. And you know, you have to push yourself a little bit. You know, do you even get out of bed in the morning? But you, you just keep your mind, keep yourself focused on the fun of it. And it is fun to compete and it is fun to get in better shape and it is fun to be able to make it to the top of the hill when you never thought you could and you know, win races, break records, things like that. And what are some of the things that, some of the fun things that adventures that you've had through cycling? Because you can look at cycling say, well, it's just riding a bike around, but you've been able to, you know, you know, there's all kind of things people do in cycling. They have these races across America. They have local races, you know, 10k, 50k, 100k, they've got race, you know, race for the Cure. Talk about some of. And you've been to training in Italy. What, what are some of the things that, the great benefits that you've had from your life that you would look back on and say these were highlights?

Well, I think the thing about cycling, you know, as we all become Asian athletes and maybe you can't quite run or walk as you used to, I mean, you know, sitting in a saddle is much easier. Number one, you know, where they say it's about as close as we can come to be to fly on our own. You know, I get a little wind in your face, a little fresh air and you can cover so much more ground and so much more beauty. Obviously here in Colorado we're so fortunate to have the entire high country at our disposal. Whether we're in the lower valley on the bike path or you want to venture up one of the valleys, you know, cycling in itself or hiking trail hiking, it just offers so much in terms of beauty. That's the first thing I think about, you know, and in order to step up the ladder and see more and more of the beauty, if you want to do, you know, a little one mile ride or five mile or as you say, get into designated goal events, you know, it takes a little time, but the beauty is what the beauty of the sport and what you can see in your surroundings is what makes it so viable.

Anyway, Chip, I appreciate you taking the time to kind of give your some insights on Coaching and really high level coaching is not so much a lot of technical stuff, but just getting to know people and helping them stay on track and keep moving forward and helping them keep perspective when they go through situations that are a little tough for them so they stay on track and they're able to get where they want to go. So anything that you want to add to wrap this up before we finish?

You know, I think yeah, the most part of this, have a positive outlook, keep a positive mind on your day to day life in terms of, you know, trying to add a little bit of fun and fitness in there will make you much more productive in every, every way from business, especially family and then, you know, in your own personal health. So that that's how I would take a strong look at my approach to every day.

It allows you to stay strong and when you're strong, you're in your best position to be able to, you know, to face whatever life throws you in a given day and also when good things happen, to be able to take the biggest adv advantage of it too. So anyway, Chip, thanks so much. A lot of great insights and I look forward seeing you around town soon.

Larry, thanks again. I mean it's definitely wide. Ella. I'm winning. There's nothing like feeling good about yourself every day in terms of, you know, starting out with some positivity and a good program. So thank you for all the wisdom that you've given me and direction with my business.

And if people want to reach you, they would go to your reps website or how would they go? How would they reach you?

They can go to astronsports performance.com pull up my email and my address or go to chip_chilson.com or call me directly at 970-948-1212. Love to talk to anybody at any time.

All right, thanks so much Chip and thank you for the great coaching you've given me over the years. So thank you.

Been an incredible pleasure. And we're not done.

Absolutely. Talk to you later. Thank you. Thanks for listening to this episode of Million Dollar Mastermind with me, Larry Wydell. If I've helped you in any way, leave us a five star rating and review on Apple podcasts. For more information like this, listen to our other million Dollar Mastermind episodes and check out my Widel Academy YouTube channel and visit us on widelawnwinning.com I'm the million Dollar Mastermind. And until next time, go, go, go.