Argentinian Pro-Rugby Player Discusses Setbacks | Ep 161 | Self-Belief Chief

3, 2, 1. And we are live. Welcome to the Self Belief Chief podcast, you wonderful people. You're here with David Holman. And if you've ever asked the question, am I good enough? Whether it's in your relationships or your performance or your career or in terms of your health, whatever it might be, then you're in the right place. We're not here to hype you up. We're here to give you strategies and techniques to help you transform your life in those areas, ones that I've shared with the highest performers, from Olympic athletes to business owners. So make sure to hit that subscribe button. Share your favorite episodes and remember, if you change today, today will change your life. Hello, Lucas. Thank you very, very much for joining me today. So when I was looking through your bio and sort of the scale of the different things that you've done and the scope and the locations and all of this stuff, there's a lot for us to unpack. The first thing I really wanted to get to know about you, Lucas, was having sort of started in Argentina. What was it like growing up in Argentina in the 90s? What was that like?

Well, the 90s was pretty much a good period of time, I would say. But again, I mean, Argentina is my home. My family is there. I was pretty lucky because I had a good sporting family, and I consider myself a lucky guy from where I was living and the experience that I had, the friends that I had. So, yeah, it was very, very happy experience. I know there's. Back home, there's lots of difficulties, especially in terms of economics and security. So, yeah, you do have you. You get concerned or worried about what's happening. I was pretty lucky. Was not involved in any very, very heavy situation. So, yeah, it was pretty good. Very, very good, I would say. And I think it also made me the person I am today. So I'm grateful that I've lived through all that and I wouldn't change it.

Yeah. And so off the back of that, you know, we probably find out that we've. We're quite similar in terms of the stories that we have, starting from a kind of a sporting background. But you started rugby at five. I mean, I didn't start my sporting career until, you know, twice. Twice that I don't know how someone gets into rugby at five. I wish I could have got into sports at a sooner age. How do you get started at 5? I just. I can't rattle. I can't work that out in my. In my mind. So what was that starting point that really got you hooked into rugby?

Well, it's. Back home is more normal that you think I would say. Okay, so it's usually like big fans or. I don't know if I, when I, when I get, I have a 9, 9 month daughter, but if I, if I had a boy, I would probably take him at the same age. And that's usually the case. It's usually your parents taking you to rugby school. It was not my case though because my dad played basket, my mom played every single sport and I think that's where it comes from. My mom, she just took me playing rugby because she thought it was a good idea for, for me to practice team sports as a learning process, as a grow up process. Also because I was always very hyperactive, which I still am. And it's a good way to have your kids spend some energy running around, right? Absolutely. Get them tired.

Yeah. I mean my dad's massive, massively into rugby. He kept trying to, he tried to get me started at an early age and I just couldn't get into it. It took me a little while, like years to really start to understand specifically what I was good at when it came to rugby. But I just thought it's just not my game, not my sport at all. But eventually I got into it. And so what I'm curious about when I speak with athletes, whether they're clients of mine or when I have conversations with them, is the ones that continue it on for a little bit, they have a moment where they kind of go, ah, I'm actually quite good at this. This is a little bit more than a hobby now. This is something that I actually have a bit of talent for, but a bit of work into it. And they make a decision at that moment that, okay, it's got to go up a level now and I'm going to pursue this in a very serious way. I'm just curious what that moment might have looked like for you. That kind of informed you going, actually this might be something that's a bit more than just something I enjoy.

I think I was considered a good player since I was young, especially my defense. But I don't think it came through that, not actually realizing I was pretty good, I could do bigger things. I think it came as something that I was, it became my dream to actually become a professional rugby player because I knew I wanted more. Rugby is my passion, one of my passions today. I think when you have so much energy, that much passion about something and you are a big competitor as I am, you're kind of looking for something more. That's something more. Beginning was getting better. I, after that was playing for my. For the senior team at my club. And then, I mean, even that wasn't enough. So I wanted to become the best player. I wanted to become a regional player for my country, for my town, for whatever. And. But my, yeah, my goal, my objective was always a step further, actually becoming a professional athlete, basically because I. I wanted to live through that experience of just focusing on rugby and doing nothing else. That was the, I would say, the objective. Like at least have one season where the only thing that you're doing is focusing on rugby training, eating, sleeping, everything just in your head, you know, so. And why? Because I also wanted to test what that felt, but also what that would bring to myself as an athlete, as a player.

And so when I. There are many you, probably through your. As you were coming up through the ranks, you probably came across players that were better than you, just like I did as an athlete who aren't able to make that jump into being a professional athlete. They might have had more talent or more skill. And you know what? You might have players that did better than you in your career that you had more skill and talent than actually. But they had something else. There was something else that allowed them to make another step. So I'm just curious, and again, it's the sort of thing, I think, with lots of athletes and I often think with myself. For you, what is it that you think makes the difference between someone who can play at a kind of an amateur level, let's call it, and someone who can play at a professional level? Obviously, skill and talent is obviously important, but what do you think really makes the difference for someone who can make that step up as a professional athlete?

I think that first and foremost, I think it's a beautiful sport because it allows anyone to have a position, a place at a team. That's one of the things I like the most about rugby. No matter if you're told you're short, you're big, you're small, fat or thin, quick or slow, there's always a spot that you can cover. There's always the need for you at every single team, but that's the starting point. And then you need to actually get to that next level and to make that jump, to make that big step, there's lots of things that need to come into mind. I have a couple of things that for me are very important or were always important. One is the passion that you have into the sport, into what you do, whatever it Is, I mean, if you don't have that passion, that fire that allows you to, to make the efforts that you need to get there, I would say resilience. It's great value to have being a competitor. It allows you to just keep going, to have that thing fixed on your mind that can keep you pushing. Because sometimes you think if all wanted to quit or whatever we were doing at least a couple times, but you need to be able to keep pushing. And I think mindset plays a very, very important role. I always say that, I say it for rugby, but I think it's for sports in general, maybe even for business or whatnot. It's 20 skills. Yeah. Then 80% is mindset.

Yeah.

Whatever happens here, it's what dominates. And if you for any reason are not good in your head, whatever that is, you will probably not make it there. If you don't have your things out there pretty defined, pretty clear of what you want to do, who do you want to become? Because that's what it is too. And I think setting those objectives, setting those, those lines of where, of where you want to be, help a lot in who you become afterwards.

Yeah. One of the things I say to people often is clarity brings things closer and people's clarity. People are very clear of what they don't want. If I ask people what they want, what they'll usually say is, I want to not feel this, I want this not to happen. And that's not really what you want. That's just how you avoid pain. And that's why people struggle to find a compelling future or something that gives them passion because they're staring at something that they don't want as opposed to something they do want.

I agree, I agree with you.

That picture is really, really, really important. And you used that sort of percentage balance. I totally agree with that. In terms of 20% skill and 80% mindset. I'm just curious, when people say give that sort of percentage, I often wonder and I think about this sort of post Mike sporting career now, if we think it's 20% skill and 80% mindset psychology, should we have been spending 80% of our time working on our psychology? You think of how many training sessions that one has to improve their skill and sharpen that. How much do we spend 80% of the time also working on our mindset? So I'm just curious for you, how much time outside of your sport did you work on sharpening your mind? No doubt the training helps with it of course, as well. In terms of that mindset that was.

What I was going to say. I mean, for me, we train our minds 100% of our time. That's how I see it. Because whatever you're doing, there's some learning something that you're teaching your mind or that you are not or that you're wasting your time at, because it could be both things. But if you actually profit from the time that you're spending in whatever you're doing to grow as a human being and actually sharpen your mind, get it ready. Because sometimes it's just a matter of getting your head into the game or just a matter of focus. Because how many times an excellent player who is perfectly fit, perfectly trained fails because he's not focused. And that's all, that's all in your head. Whenever you're not ready to. What's going to happen whenever you're not 100% into it, you usually tend to have more risk of failing. And no matter how prepared you are, I think the training in general, it's actually training your mindset to get ready to where you are. It's not just training your skills, which of course you need to improve, but it's usually how you're going to overcome problems, how you are going to react against the things that they will be put in front of you to actually throw you back, to prevent you to getting to your goals. And how are you going to overcome them? Because at the end of the day, sports, business or life, they're all about that, overcoming those obstacles and getting to where you want to be. I would say winning or succeeding, which is just getting to wherever you want to be or becoming the person that you want to become. It's not just beating someone else. Quite the opposite.

Yeah. And so you spoke about preparation. What does that half an hour before a game look like for you? So that moment, probably about half an hour before, I would guess you've probably finished the sort of the warm up or whatever it might have been, you might be back in the changing rooms or whatever. I don't know if that's the exact timing, but what is that half an hour for you in terms of your preparation? What does that look like?

Actually my game starts a lot before that time. I would say. Yeah, I usually try to spend the whole day into a mindset that allows me to get ready and maybe that changes a lot, especially because of the time that we play. Sometimes play in the morning, sometimes we play in the afternoon or at night. And for me the good thing is to just sleep well, eat well, put Things into my favor, I would say, so you need to be rested to have a good game. Okay, Rest well. I mean, nothing stops you from sleeping well. If you need to have energy, you need to eat well, okay, let's have the best thing possible. And I think that gives you also the confidence that you need to perform because, you know, you're putting the luck, like, put the luck on your side. I mean, you can't just blame, oh, I was unlucky. If you did everything to fail, I mean, you know, you know what you mean. I don't know if I, if I went out last night, had 10 beers instead of sleeping well, of course I'm going to do a shit game or the chances are that I'm going to suck next game. And. But if you at least do as much as you can, shit happens. And we've all had very bad games, very bad actions or whatever, but just try to reduce that risk as much as you can and get as ready as you can to avoid that.

So part of the thing, that question, because preparation is something that I think is incredibly important because sort of to the point you were just making when you lose, but you prepare properly. Most people outside of sport think of it in terms of, oh, I hate the idea that I did everything and it wasn't enough in that moment. Whereas actually, I think for athletes, if you can really prepare efficiently and feel like you've really left everything on the table and, you know, you might not succeed or win, but you've prepared properly and therefore performed well enough, then some days you don't win, but you also, you kind of feel okay about it. And one of the stories that sticks out in my head was when I was younger playing rugby, so I was a scrum half. We found out about four weeks before a particular game that we were playing this team with one particular player, I think we're 15, 16 at the time, who we were told was an exceptional player. And this was a quite. This was a very strange thing at that age group that you would, you know, there were loads of good players, but we were being told there's this one player that's absolutely exceptional. And we started to prepare in the training sessions in the weeks ahead of it, despite the fact that we had games in the meantime, which made no sense to me at all, but this guy apparently was that good. So anyway, so really sharpened. We had a plan, all of this stuff in place for this particular person. I prepared well on the morning because we'd really been really sort of been built up in A particular. It's quite important game as well. And so I prepared properly and we get to this game and they point out who it is. They basically say it's this guy, by the way, he was playing center, I think, in that game. Anyway, one of those players that sort of has hit puberty a bit earlier than everyone else as well. Right. It's got a beard way too early. Anyway, so playing this game and part of the. Part of the challenge, a part of the sort of game plan, not even really a game plan, was we had basically two of our set biggest centers. As soon as he got the ball, it didn't matter if we created an overlap out wide. It would just be that they would be able to sort of make sure that they got him down as quickly as possible. Anyway, got two centers, they tackle the hell out of him. And yet somehow he frees out one arm. And I remember it so clearly, he throws a pass at the back of his hand, probably about 30 yards to the winger in front of him, not. Not to him, but in front of him so he could run onto it, score in the corner. And there was this sort of stunned silence in this game. That player turned out to be Owen Farrell.

Oh, and.

And sort of made a bit more sense.

He was. He is exceptional.

Yeah, a bit later on it made a bit more sense, but. But what was good was that game being built up so much. We lost by about 10 points or something. And yet a lot of us, because we prepared so efficiently, were perfectly fine with it. We really did. You know, every other team got beaten by about 50 points and we prepared so efficiently and so well that actually we felt comfortable with, okay, we didn't win it, but at least there wasn't something we couldn't have done elsewhere. It just is exceptional. That's it. We did the right thing. And so my sort of sporting career continued and preparation. All these things are important, including injury prevention. One of the unfortunate things that we have in common is sort of knee injuries. I've seen. It's not a club that many people want to be a part of, but I've. I've had my fair share of them as well. That. That moment where you had yours, I don't know how serious it was, but what's the. What's the initial thought process and sort of when you experience it in the days after. What was that thought process initially like?

Anyway, Pretty tough, to be honest. It was a serious injury. I broke two ligaments. I think it's LCA and the internal ligament. So pretty Much. Six to eight months recovery after surgery. If everything goes well, you'll be pretty good. But you know how it is. It's not always easy, especially for. I mean, I play Winger. I need to run quick.

Yeah, sure.

Serious knee injury at 25. Might be the end. You never know. I remember on that game that I got injured. We had a doctor at our team that was pretty much. We call him the Butcher, because instead of a doctor, he was like, pretty much, yeah, keep going. You know those kind of guys that always finds a way to keep you pushing, which I really liked about the guy. Honestly, no matter what happened, you could always keep playing. And that day when I went down to the floor and I tried to stand up and my knee was going everywhere, called him straight away, get strapped. Do you mean get it strapped? Yeah, get his trap. I need to keep going. He looks at my knee and he says, not this time. It's like, what the fuck? Not this time. Strapped my knee. I mean, it was. My mind was on the game. Was not asking right. Just get it done quickly. And I think he said it for like three or four times. Not this time. Till I actually realized that he, he was serious this time, that there's no, keep. Keep going. Couldn't keep pushing. There's like a complete, say, a wake up call. Something was wrong. Yeah. Of course, after that, getting all the, the scans and whatnot about what, what's happening, I knew it was broken, that I had, I mean, at least go through surgery and get, get it back. And again, yeah, it was pretty, I would say, devastating. The year before, I was playing for our regional Sevens team. We were champions. I was pretty confident that that year I was having a very good season. I could, could have been called for the 15th regional championship again. That came at the end of the season, roughly. I think we're five to 10 games left before that, before we ended. So it was the time when the championships happened. Yeah. And one of the things that helped me a lot, I would say, was to look ahead. We already had the games for the next season. The dates and the games. I remember looking at the first game of next season, we were playing against one of the best teams in Argentina. And I had, I think, one of the best coaches I could have. Very, very, very nice guy who I really appreciate. And I was pretty much one of the captains of the team. So, I mean, I played every single game. I was not. It's not because I'm not humble or whatnot, but I'm not being selfish. I was one of the guys that always played. No, not a guy you put on bench or you don't. Don't make. And I remember going to the coach and telling him, hey, I mean, I. I need to get operated on pretty soon. I know we are playing this team for the first game. Before that, we have exhibition games, three friendly games as we. As we speak. How many of those do you need me to play in order to put me on the first game? Right. So let's just try to get ready. And the guy looked at me and he said, if you want to play the first game, you need to play all three. No way. I mean, give me a break. I started counting, and actually the first exhibition game was five months and one week out of my surgery. I was like, oh, God. I mean, are you serious? You need to just at least let me skip one first one? No, I'm sorry, but you need to. You need to play all three. I was like, cool. So I don't know if I do think he did it at least a little bit on purpose, and maybe if I skip to one or two, he would have given me a chance at least. But I actually thank him for pushing me that hard because I think that completely changed my mindset at that time. And I knew I had five months and one week. Not a day, not a. Not an extra day. And that got me into work right away. I remember the day of this, before the surgery, I asked my surgeon, what do I need to do to make this quicker. He said, I mean, if your knee heals, whenever it heals, minimum time is six months before you. I'll let you play. It's like, well, I need to pay in five months, one week. Well, that won't happen. Okay, let's try. Let's go step by step and see how it goes. And he gave me a couple of exercises to do. As quickly as he. As quickly as you can. He said, okay. And as soon as the surgery ended, I was laying on the bed, dizzy and whatnot. The room was not ready yet, so I was laying on the hallway with lots of other people. I remember, okay, this is time to start doing the exercises. So people stared at me because I was, like, putting my leg up and whatnot with all the stitches and everything. And when I told that story to my doctor, he looked at me, are you completely out of your mind? I mean, you should have waited. I was like, you told me as quickly as you can. And for me, that was as quickly as you can. I didn't have an extra hour. I didn't have an extra day. And that's what I was focusing on. And I know there's hundreds of stories about that, but it's all about what you are willing to do to get there. I think again, there's no time to lose. Well, but what, what things are you going to stop doing to actually get you to the place you want to be? Because you need to make the efforts, you need to let things go, to actually focus on what matters the most. And at that time, at least that was my sole purpose and my whole focus was to get ready. And a bit of a good story. The good side of it. The first exhibition game, five weeks and one month. Five months and one week after the surgery, I played for 10 minutes. He didn't say how much, how long. He didn't specify. I always tell him you said play three games. So first game, 10 minutes, second game, 63rd game, the whole game for the first season game, I was ready.

Oh, that's good. You said it's about what you're willing to, to put yourself through or go through. And it's the other side of that injury, I guess, that I'm very curious about talking about in a second because again, it is in those types of moments where you just make a decision, most people go, oh, it's just this is how it is. And you go, well, no, you have, you don't get to control the events, but you get to control what they mean. And you get to make a decision as what does this moment mean when I go through this? What does this do for my life going forward? And what you did post that seems fairly remarkable in lots of different areas. But before we talk about some of that stuff, I'm just curious in terms of you said what I was willing to go through. I mean, what, what were you willing to go through in terms of the consequences? You know, how the. Because I'm fully aware of the. I'm fully aware of the risks that you were essentially taking by the process you were going through. But for lots of people listening who might not understand some of those risks and consequences, what consequences were you essentially risking and willing to put yourself, or what's the right way of saying it, to potentially put yourself through at the hope that you could turn this the right way.

I mean, in terms of consequences, I was very much guided by my. But the doctors. But I do think that the consequences are not just physically, but mental.

Yeah.

And in terms of not just that, but your surroundings, your family, your friends. I mean, I remember, I don't know A couple things, a couple stories. But one of them was my. I. How do you say? Physician? I think he told me, yeah, don't do this, this sessions because unless you do at least four hours a day, they don't change anything. So I actually went, rented that thing I did at least 10 hours a day.

Wow.

It's just, you know, I think you need to put around your knee, it does nothing but you need to be laying on a bed for 10 hours day. There's no other things to do. And those are, I mean, I think it's called. You can also tell it's sacrifices. And my friends went out at night. I'd had something to drink. Again, I don't know, I said, what are you willing to do to get there? And one of the things I said, why not try? Don't have anything to drink. Like not, not even a single beer for at least five months and one week to get ready to try and get to that point. So, I mean, since that date in 2014, I, I've not. I don't drink anymore. I mean, why? Because I don't know if it was that, but it worked. So why not keep doing it? Yeah, it's hard to tell what was the turning point, what made the whole difference, but I think that everything as a whole did. It's not just one thing that it's going to make, make it up for everything else. It's actually what are you willing to sacrifice? What are you going to do to do it? I was at that moment, I was studying, I was working. I had to kind of pull it slow on both because I was spending at least five hours every single day with my physician to get ready. If you add up that to the 10 hours of the other thing that I was doing, there's not much time left. Again, my girlfriend at that time, my wife today, I probably not spend as much time as I would with her. Same with my friends. Same at school, at university, same at work. So yeah, I mean, so much you can do in 24 hours. And unluckily for us, I still don't know a way to make days longer. I would like to because there's always so much to do. But again, it's how you take advantage of that time. What are your priorities and what do you sacrifice? Because at the end of the day you're always sacrificing something.

You use sacrifice quite often there. I can think of times when I was playing where you'd call, you'd use the word sacrifice because that's essentially what you're doing. But it didn't for me. It didn't feel like a sacrifice. It really didn't. I knew I was technically sacrificing things that I would otherwise be doing, but it didn't feel like a sacrifice because I was so. I had complete certainty that what was required was the right thing to be doing. And essentially that's just to be brutally honest. That's how I wanted to spend my time. You know, I could have done the other thing, but technically that's what I wanted to do.

I couldn't agree more.

Did it feel like a sacrifice at the time?

No, not.

Yeah.

Because again, we come back to that mindset, to that passion that you need to have.

Yeah, that's it.

To actually follow that dream. Have a dream. And it's not. Again, one of the things that you said before that, I mean, keeps turning on my head. It's not what you don't want to do, it's what you want to do. Who do you want to become? And when you got that question answered, I think everything is easy because you know where you're going and then it's not a sacrifice anymore. That's true. It's something that you need to do and you just do it. And you actually spend a great time doing it. If you are smart enough, you actually enjoy a lot what you're doing.

Absolutely. And so. And looking at therefore where your career went both in terms of your rugby, but then for someone who comes across or reading about you, an unbelievable, unbelievable laser like focus, single minded ability that if you want to switch that on, you can do to then start being able to pursue things outside of rugby. I find really interesting and knowing probably similar that making that type of transition in your case still doing both at the same time. But in my case that transition can be very, very challenging to put sports on the either on the back burner or stop it at all. Making that transition mentally is a real challenge for a lot of people. Especially if someone has just their whole life had a laser like focus and passion. For one thing, the idea that you could be passionate about something else seems completely ridiculous. And then for whatever reason you do find those things and it is true with everyone that we do, I think we do have multiple passions in life and it can feel quite sad or lonely. At points when you feel like you've just got one passion and therefore only one group of people can possibly understand you, you start to have multiple passions. It's like actually I've got these different sides of me that really do have different abilities and different skills. So I'm just curious as you could share for us a little bit how you, you know, in terms of the stuff with how you met. What was his name? Dom from Unicorn. And how you started branching out and finding this new passion, what that was like when you started to find this other side of. Without it sounding a bit too cliche. So to find this other side of you and start to find these other interests and start to find this other stuff that you had a. You could bring some of that athletic mindset to, rather than saying, you know, that's a separate thing, is actually I've got a lot of skills that I've learned and I can now utilize them in a different space. What was that transition like? How did you start it? How did you find this passion for something else?

I do think it comes with who I am also, because I do. I've always been hyperactive. I've always been a competitor myself and I always want more. And again, when I wanted to become a professional player and do that, just that I did it. But then at one point in time it was not enough. Yeah. So I, while I was playing, I've also started a career online. Why? Because I wanted something, something more, something extra. At one point in time, when I finished that, I asked myself, okay, what are we going to do next? Yes, you can keep playing rugby. At one point in time, I want something more. I want to do something extra. That's how I came to Dom and how I met him and was fascinated about this whole business startup world that he's been into for the last 25 to 28 years and which, I mean, I love. And it became a passion of my own and I think it always was because I was an entrepreneur myself, since I can remember with little things at the beginning. I had a food catering myself when I was 18, had for quite a long period of time. I founded a shoe company back in Argentina with my wife. You know, I've always been into the business world and always wanted to do something more, but this came up and was adventure, I call it, because I think that's what it is to actually to both things at the same time and jingle around, around them and being able to, I think it's also an opportunity to be, to be able to do both things at the same time and actually get ready to whenever you end your career, as you said, have that transition a bit smoother, a bit easier. Because again, how many people actually found their passion? Not many. Yeah. And I think that's one of the most, probably the most important thing to do is actually find what you love to do because it's a lot easier to do that and not just struggle and have like that being forced to do something that you don't like. And that's why I think it's a great opportunity to be doing both things at the same time. And actually I enjoy it a lot and I think I'm very lucky to be in this position. And yeah, and we're doing great things. We're doing so many things.

I'd love to know what they are. So what are the current things that.

You'D love to like? First and foremost with. We at Unicorn, we are a startup incubator accelerator. So that gives you like the big picture. And then for instance, we took in the rugby club as one of the startups we work with. Even though it's 118 years old for us, we see it as one of our clients. Why? Because they all have the same problems in terms of image, in terms of branding, in terms of monetization, in terms of what they're doing, what they're offering, the, the organization, the administration, finance, investors, you name it. I mean, and then we started fixing those problems, finding solutions. We started, I would say, at the bottom of the line with creating an actual brand that people can identify themselves with. Not just a rugby club, but actually a brand. And for that you need to have a very catch logo that everyone likes. That was one of our first, first steps. We created a website. We are a very small club, I would say into the fifth division in France today. But if you go into our website, you don't see the difference between ourselves and a pro club.

I see.

And that's the idea. It is to actually show that we can look and do things as a pro club because there's no limit in terms of technology to be able to do so. In fact, we took in the social media. I would say between nine and 12 months ago, we had around 1500 followers on Facebook. Today we are over 140k. So I mean, again, how quickly was that growth?

Sorry, how long did it take you?

Nine months, roughly.

Wow.

But why? Because we know how to do it and we, we need to be at that position. That's what, that's who we want to become. And I think we are currently number five or six in terms of rugby clubs in France.

Wow. Okay.

Even though we are in fifth division in our very small town. And then we, we started out like that and we started growing a lot more into merchandise processes, monetization process, sponsorship, things we develop for our, our team, things we put in place. Like for instance, every, every club needs a budget. Right? Right. So how do you get that budget? We asked the former president. How, who is in charge of getting that? Well, you have a sales force or something? Oh, no, not really. We were shocked. I mean, how are you going to look for that budget? Or sometimes it comes to us. Whenever I see one of my clients, I ask him to jump in. But that's, I mean it was very good for that time. But yeah, I mean you need to set up strategy, you need to be selling something, you need to have people selling that what you're selling because if not, I mean, you're not going to get very far. And so we put all that into place and the whole idea was to actually bring this as a SaaS for other teams. So the way we work, we always have our model first. We try things first before we tell anyone else to do them. We do think that leading by example is one of the most powerful things you can do. So that's, I mean, we try to say what we preach, preach what we say and not just say it because we think it is the good option. Because, I mean, in terms of trust and confidence, it's important to actually do what you say you do. And then this is how we planned it out and it came a lot quicker than we were expecting. But clubs from all around and from all sports are actually contacting us and asking us, how did you do it? How can we do the same as you did? And that was our whole purpose with Solar Rugby to actually, it's our proof of concept for a much larger company that we funded already two weeks ago, two or three weeks ago. It's called Challenger X and it's, I mean, objectives of the company are very insane, I would say because we are inviting every people to join, every club to join. We are in a position today that we can bring in 100 clubs right away. Right, okay. We are actually trying to defeat the records into getting a company listed in London. We expect to be listed by the 15th of July in the Aqueous Exchange in London. That's eight weeks since we funded the company. So it's pretty damn challenging. That's why they name two. But yeah, it's a great venture again. And the cherry on the top on that company is that we are in a position today that we can actually mint a social token for whatever club we decide to in 10 to 15 minutes. We are in a position Today to get that done. And we've done it already with Sarllar Rugby. We've minted Sarla, we have not yet commercialized it just because we are waiting for the right time. But that again, is something that we are very much into the defi world, the decentralized finance world. And we believe that social tokens are going to help clubs so many different things in terms of monetization, in terms of engaging their fans, in terms of building those communities that will just make them stronger and help them to take their club into the next level.

Well, that's what I was going to ask. So presumably these clubs come to you because they want to grow their profits on. Ultimately, that's, that's the, that's what they've got going on in their head when they reach out to you. I was going to ask you what your, you know, often with, you know, for example, when I work with a client, I give them what they want and then I'll give them what they need, right? So this is what they've asked for. So I'll give them that. And then there's this other thing over here that when we have a discussion, I get to know them better, that I realize they actually need. I can give them that as well. And so, but from your point of view, the business, the rugby club, they want to make profits. I was going to ask you, what is it that you're hoping for? It sounds like what you said is beyond the profits. Ultimately it's that community, but it's that they can scale that ladder in terms of your French rugby pyramid and that they can actually climb through the rankings, which I think is just an incredible thing really, if that's essentially what you've got going in your head. But just in terms of communities, I know what a club does for a town or a city in England. What does it do in France or Argentina? What does it do to have a sports team that's doing well? What does it do for that town or city in France?

Well, it's not just the town of the city, because in our case we'd like to call ourselves the. A club that's worldwide. We, we have signed today 62 Broadcast TV OTTA streaming agreements all over the world because we'd like to bring rugby to, to the whole world. We did one research in the States asking how many people follow rugby because we were about to take this project, right? And then they told us, I'm sorry to tell you, but only 12% of the people in here know rugby rules. Yeah, and after two seconds we actually say, okay, that's an even better reply. The guys looked at us like, what do you mean? Yes, because it's not the 12% that I'm interested on, it's the 80% that's missing. So I'm willing to take rugby to those people by the train of Salah rugby. So by the example of solar rugby, I'm bringing it to them, I'm showing them what rugby is. We are actually, we have an inside team in here that's creating videos, photos, pictures of tutorials, explanations, telling people the rules, telling people what rugby is, and they can identify right away. And they, I mean those people that you've actually took rugby to their house, they become real fans. And then it's what you give your fans, what you can offer them that keeps them engaged. And that's why our games, our team that we've recruited like 25 people for this year of very high level because again, of course we, one of our main objective is to get into the pro leagues, that's second division in France in the next five to seven years. But in order to get there, it's not just an objective and okay, yeah, this is where we want to be. No, we need to give ourselves the means to get there. And all that comes through Challenger X in terms of getting ourselves ready.

And it's good because the last bit you just said is good because obviously parts of that objective is, you know, you want to get to Division 2, you want to stay there. You know, a lot of clubs can, can create a plan, make an objective and okay, we've got some good players this year and maybe we can't afford the salaries or we haven't got the foundations, we actually haven't got the right stadium size, we haven't got the, the fan base to bring in the revenue at this level, all of that type of stuff. And then they get there and actually brings the whole club down. It's sort of a gift and a curse, isn't it? You get to that level and all of a sudden it can't, you know, get sort of bankrupt out of it. It sounds great in terms of that, exactly what you said, which is the foundations have to be laid so that it's not just how get there as quickly as possible, it's actually more importantly, can we get there and sustain it? Can we live, can we thrive?

In fact, in fact, this year because of COVID and whatnot, they're changing again the rules here in France, the divisions they offered us to go up One division. Even though there were no games like just on paper and we refused. Why? First and foremost, I would say because it's not fun to go up on paper. I would like to show that we are ready to go up, but on the pitch and then also because that also allows us to keep getting ready and not just bouncing up and down. Because it's definitely not. Not what we want to do.

Yeah, do just have interest. Slight tangent. I'm interested. Are you working with esports teams? Is that something. Is that like. Because that whole world, which is starting to be sort of very new to me and we're sort of a similar age. I'm sure it's sort of. In some ways it's sort of almost the generation just behind us where it's like a tidal wave esports. And I'm just curious whether that's a sort of market that you're also tapping into.

In fact, yes, we funded a company that's an esports platform six months ago.

Right.

So yeah, we are very much into esports too. It's called Formation J gg. It's an esports platform basically where you can just play tournaments in every single game in every single part of the world. And it's mainly focused and I would say non professional. Again, that's the target that we are looking for because we do believe there's a lot of lack of tools on that world. Professional sector is pretty much covered. There's games, there's tournaments every single time. But whenever you're a more casual gamer. But you. You do want to compete, there's nowhere to go. And that's why we brought formation in. In terms of just getting that to the people. I think we have in around 30k players today after 6 months. Yeah.

I mean, and there's a whole different debate again. Another. It would be another tangent, but in terms of esports players treating themselves like athletes that actually they get all the basics right in terms of sleep, in terms of diet and all those things where it's. It's different in terms of the physicality. Of course it is. But it's actually, I'm starting to see more and more that you do have to treat yourself like an athlete in order to sharpen your focus, be well rested, have the energy requirements. And you, as you sort of pointed out that that gap between people who do professional where almost everything is covered and then there's a big drop off between everyone else who wants to get involved. But yeah, don't necessarily have the tools to know how to get involved. I think that's awesome.

Yeah. So I do, I do think they are athletes. I mean, there's no. They do have. Every professional team has a physiotherapist right now. Right.

Okay.

You know, how many wrist injuries do those guys have? I'm serious. Yeah, it's like carpal tunnel and stuff. Yeah. Imagine you're playing games for 12 hours in a row.

Yeah.

It's like if you were running for 12 hours, at the end of the day you're ankles and knees will suffer. Well, this same thing, imagine you're back sitting at a chair for know how long, you know, I mean, I do think it's. I mean it's not tough in the terms of cardio exercise, but it. You need to get ready. Yeah. And those guys, I mean the time they have to react. I've read some articles about that and it's amazing because they do have milliseconds to actually do actions and coordination between so many different things that they can do at the same time and get the right option, the right decision. So I think those people will probably be very good decision makers because they need to react and like just very, very quick.

It's, it's a, it's a strange, strange new world to me when I'd quite like to get involved in myself actually, because I think, you know, having worked with athletes in terms of the psychology of helping athletes, I think with esports gamers as it to the point you made that ability in terms of decision making and the speed of thought is everything at that in that type of area, I think the psychology is really important as well. Lucas, I really enjoyed this conversation. I wanted to ask you one more question and then make sure that people sort of know where to find you and find out more about unicorn and the other work that you've got going on as well. In Challenger X, the question I wanted to leave you with was when you started out, whether it's as an athlete, in terms of being a rugby player, or whether it's to do with the work that you're dedicated to now, when you started, you would have had a picture in your mind of how you wanted it to look. And however many years decades later, first question is, I'd like to know does it look anything like that picture or does it look completely different, whether it's better, whether it's worse or whatever it might be, does it look similar to the picture when you started out of what you wanted it to look like? And the second question will be in terms of the footprints or Footsteps that you'd like to leave for other people going forward. What do they look like? So first question, does it look like you thought it was going to look and you sort of started out on whatever, however long this journey has felt for you.

Now, I think I don't set up those pictures like in. In stone. I don't know how to say it, but for me the picture is more like, you know, when you are painting. So it's just a whiteboard at the beginning. Then you start drawing, you start painting it out and you change it a hundred times. And for me, that picture is more like that. And we build it every day, we nourish it every day. We. It's like a plant. You just. You put some water in, you take care of it, and that's that picture. I mean, I don't think it never looks like something. It always looks like today. And this is where I am today. Of course, I want to be in a certain position next, but that position, it's more. I don't think myself, at least I don't, I don't. I'm not saying this is for everyone, Right. But don't see myself. Okay. In five years, I want to be this place, living like this, have this amount of children, dog, such a house. No, I want to. It's more general, general view. And I think it's a more, I would say sane experience because then, yeah, imagine you want to be, I don't know, you want to have two kids in five years and you have three. Well, wouldn't that be a good thing? Yes, I think it does. Right. But your head, you, your picture was too. So it's not the same. So you're never going to be happy about that if that's the case. At least that's how I feel. And I think it's very personal. But I do like to give myself a more option thing, a more wider. For variety. I do have objectives, of course, and they are specific on one side, but not that the picture is not painted yet.

Fine. So it's almost like having a goal or objective, but multiple ways of getting to it. Right. It doesn't have to be like the pictures. This only one picture. It's. It could, could happen in lots of different ways. It's quite fluid. Okay.

That's all because it's. Because it's very easy to get frustrated if you do it.

Yeah, sure. Yeah, sure.

And then your second question, the second.

Part, in terms of the footprint, what are the footprints you want to leave for other people?

Well, I Do think there's two sides of that coin which I do like and I do enjoy very much. First I would say it's on sports, on rugby. Whenever I have the chance, whenever I can, I'd like to go train the young people and I do that every single time I go home. Because back in Argentina there are no professional coaches or almost none. It's always someone giving up some of his time to teach. And that's what I've lived through for 25 years when I was playing rugby and I think I've learned so much through that that I would like to give back some of all that care that I was given when I was kid and even until I was 25 when I was playing back in Argentina. So whenever I have the chance I really enjoy going to my club and help as much as I can. Spend as much time as I can with the kids. Try to like, I don't know even if it's just a conversation about life. Right. It doesn't need to be real coaching but I think just sharing your experience for them to have at least another vision of the story that they can use or not. They can take bits and pieces, just build their own journey but I usually try to tell them that there's whatever they have in mind they can make it. That's one of the things I like to do. Like it does sound cliche, follow your dreams but do it. And then on the business side I tried to do the same because people have done it for me. I do feel Dom is my mentor and I learn every single day from him. But I also have my own team inside which I try to take care of and I try to motivate. I try to, I wouldn't say teach them but actually try to support them in whatever they need, try to be there when they need me and try to actually just show them what they've shown me. And it's like a give and take back. Right. And I think it's important thing to do and that's how we learn. And they say that whenever you are able to teach someone something it's only that there that you really know what you're talking about.

That's a great answer. That's a great answer. Lucas, where can people find out a bit more about Challenger X and what else you've got going on?

Sure. So for challengerX just go to the website, it's challengerX IO and well be ready because we are going to be listed on the Aquis exchange pretty soon. And then if you want to contact me personally, I would say the best way is through LinkedIn. Just Lucas Canada. It's Lucas C A N E D A. Just look me up and I'm open to whatever you guys need.

Lukas, thank you very much for your time.

Thank you, David.

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