Episode 66: Hosts Only: TDF 2025 Picks, Western States 100 Recap, and Big Butts 50K Prep
This week it's just us, your two favorite hosts back behind the mics, and we are bringing the energy, the opinions, and a few questionable predictions. Anthony and Zach take you through an action packed episode covering everything that has the endurance world buzzing right now.
We open with a quick story about Zach surviving twelve days without AC in the Mississippi summer (involuntary heat training is still heat training, right?) before diving into the biggest cycling story of the year: the Tour de France 2025.
We break down the entire field, jersey by jersey. The yellow jersey GC race that almost everyone (us included) is calling for Tadej Pogačar to run away with. The white jersey young rider race that might be the most exciting battle of the entire tour, with Paul Seixas, Isaac Del Toro, and Florian Lipowitz all in the mix. The green jersey sprint duel between Jonathan Milan, Jasper Philipsen, and Biniam Girmay. The polka dot KOM jersey hunt with names like Lenny Martinez and Richard Carapaz. And the first stage time trial where Remco Evenepoel is the question mark of the entire race after a long time off.
We also nerd out on Wout van Aert being out for Visma, Visma losing their key director to Red Bull, the UAE Team Emirates monster roster supporting Tadej, the Garmin to Whoop competitor we expect to debut, and the watches on the riders' wrists. Including a brand new Richard Mille that Tadej will reportedly wear during the tour priced at $989,000.
Then we pivot to one of the most exciting Western States 100 races in recent memory. With unprecedented weather conditions, we saw record breaking performances all over the field. Zach gives a deep breakdown of the old guard versus the new guard. Jim Walmsley (the four time champion and reigning course record holder), Killian Journet, the Hoka super team of Adam Peterman, Hayden Hawks, Hans Troyer, Jim Walmsley, and Francesco Puppi all toed the line. We get into Hans Troyer running on 13:35 pace at halfway (the course record is 14:09) and blowing up at mile 78. And then the cinderella story of the entire weekend: Vincent Bouillard, the former Hoka employee turned pro after winning UTMB, who became the first Frenchman ever to win Western States.
We talk about the pros who finished even when their race fell apart. Shout outs to Molly Seidel for completing her first 100 miler in 24 hours after being projected for the podium. We celebrate Zach Miller's iconic full send finish that gave us Steve Prefontaine vibes. And we discuss the wild 87% finish rate this year and the "ultra lean" moments at the line that we never want to experience ourselves.
From there we get personal. The Big Butts 50K is three weeks away. Anthony reports being in the best shape he has been in two years. Zach is feeling behind on heat training. We dig into the Adidas Evo SL shoes that Anthony has converted to and why the lacing makes all the difference.
We close with a real conversation about the Longleaf Trace controversy. Water fountains removed without communication. Bathrooms locked due to vandalism. The homeless and addicted populations using the trace as a safe haven. And the bigger conversation Hattiesburg needs to have about both the trace and the underlying community issues. We share ideas on patrolling staff, communication improvements, and what could come from the public meeting being held this Thursday at 10 AM.
And we wrap with a quick announcement about our trip to the Rocket City Marathon in December.
If you love endurance sports, you are gonna want every minute of this one.
EPISODE TIMESTAMPS
00:00 Welcome back. Hosts only this week.
01:30 Zach survives twelve days without AC in Mississippi summer
04:30 Tour de France 2025: yellow jersey predictions
07:30 Why Tadej Pogačar is the heaviest favorite in years
10:30 The white jersey race may be the best race of the tour
13:30 Polka dot jersey predict
1 SPEAKER_00: From back roads to start lines, early mornings,
late nights, miles on the pavement, head down, chasing
daylight.
Mississippi heartbeat, sweat mixed with the grind.
Pain in the legs, but it's all in the mind.
Endurance state of mind where the weeds don't last.
Ultra miles, long rides.
We're built for the past and the future.
No shortcuts, no skipping the test.
When you spoiled your punishment, give it your best.
From five K's to hundreds, trail dust in our lungs.
Every story earned, every finish hard won.
No hype, just truth.
No filters, no cap.
If you suffer for growth, yeah, this podcast is that.
Hosted by the miles, not the fame or the shine.
If you know, then you know.
Endurance, state of mind.
SPEAKER_02: Welcome back to Endurance State of Mind.
This week it's just the hosts, which means we're bringing the
energy, the opinions, and probably a few questionable
predictions.
We're diving into all the excitement from Western states,
record-breaking performances, incredible stories, and the
continued evolution of what's possible in the ultra world.
We'll also look ahead to the Tour de France because
apparently we can't talk enough about endurance sports without
finding another way to suffer for hours at a time.
We'll recap some standout performances from around the
community, celebrate the weekend miles, and then turn our
attention to our own upcoming challenge, the Big Butts 50K.
So grab your coffee, your recovery snack, maybe your
favorite pair of race shoes, because we've got a lot to cover
in this week's episode.
What's up, Anthony?
How are you doing this week, brother?
SPEAKER_03: Bro, I'm ex I'm I'm super excited to talk about
this.
I wasn't sure that I was excited to talk about this until I
really started diving into my tour de France, you know?
And then I got real excited real quick.
I think Friday, I a lot of people are gonna know this
because I shot out like 30 messages where I was just
telling people, like, give me off-the-wall predictions so we
can have it on the podcast.
So you're probably gonna hear a few of those as well on this
episode.
Um, bro, I don't know about you.
SPEAKER_02: It's getting hot out there, ain't it?
Dude, before we started recording, I told you about our
house, our AC unit went out about two weeks ago at this
point, and it was out for a proper 12 days, 12 days in the
Mississippi summer heat.
I missed so many good opportunities for Strava titles
and heat training, but who can you believe that?
SPEAKER_03: No, that dude, I don't know how y'all were doing
it.
I bet Carrie was she was not happy.
Because I could only imagine coming home having three girls
screaming and it being like probably I know you said you had
some fans going and stuff.
Let's say it's like seven, like mid to high seventies in the
house, and you're just like, nope, this ain't it.
SPEAKER_02: Dude, let me tell you, I and I say this, like we
got off kind of easy.
You know, they say you learn a lot of first thing, a lot of
things the first time you buy a house, like first-time buyer
things.
One of the things I did do right was have that guy put a decouple
the air conditioned system and put a separate one upstairs from
my office.
That saved us.
So we had my office and the girls' big bedroom that they
share.
That was completely air conditioned.
And then by God's grace, that those 12 days, like 10 of them
were overcast and rainy, and not to say it was comfortable
downstairs, like we were sleeping down there or not
making quick work of when we needed to be down there, but it
could have been way worse.
I'll just say that much.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, but those those rainy days, they really
weren't like none of them were super bad, truthfully.
So yeah, that uh y'all did y'all did catch a break on that one.
Somebody's looking out for y'all, right?
SPEAKER_02: I I don't know.
And then about I guess about after the park got delayed the
second time, the company like volunteered to bring out some
portable AC, like remote units.
And that that that kept it to where, like, okay, this ain't
that bad.
But I did have some friends reach out and say, dude, my wife
would have us in a hotel.
Ain't no doubt.
Yeah, dude.
SPEAKER_03: If I'd have known that, I'd have I'd have been
like, hey, y'all, it's summer vacation, you can come work at
the house if you want.
I'd have been vouching for you.
I'd been giving you the house or whatever.
It's crazy.
I don't know.
Dude, well, you made it through.
Now you've uh now you've got some heat acclamation for big
butts coming up.
SPEAKER_02: All that to say, I still feel like I'm behind on my
heat trainer for big butts, but we'll put up internet.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we will.
We'll we'll definitely do that.
I I hear you on that 100% though.
Let's talk, uh, dude.
Let's start off straight off the top.
Tour de France.
I want to hear, I've got, so I asked the I asked several
people, and I'm gonna ask you on the pod right now.
Let me pull it up.
There we go.
All right, who do you have well?
I I'm gonna say all these.
This is what I asked a bunch of people.
Yeah, I know you won't have them all off the top of your head
right now, but I'm gonna ask a bunch of people, and then I've
got one question that I didn't ask anybody that I'm gonna ask
you because you and I have talked about it before.
I want to know who you think is gonna win overall GC, green
jersey, king of the mountains, or the polka dotted jersey,
whatever you would like to call it, and then the white jersey,
which is the best new young rider.
And then I was thinking who wins first day time trial?
Because I do think that we have it it could be interesting for
time trial.
I'm gonna go ahead and give you a few of my hot takes if you
want me to.
Or I'll how about this?
You want to give me a yellow jersey prediction?
I'll okay.
I'll go ahead and give you a channel.
We kind of know.
SPEAKER_02: We kind of know.
You know, I I enjoyed the five, I feel like, five text threads
that you sent this question to.
I I think I don't know why I couldn't respond um when you
originally sent it out, but I saw some of their answers come
in and it made me think even deeper.
So by the time I got to responding, there was a debate
on there was a debate on whether or not like Tade is gonna run
away with it.
Like if the gap to Tade got bigger or if it got sm if it
shrunk some.
And I think you know, over the last several days I've been
preparing and kind of nerding out for it.
I think one of the articles I read, the headline was the best
article.
It said, this might be one of the deepest Tour de France
fields, but this is also the best that Tade Pagaccio looked.
And I think that's where I come down on it.
I think while Van Art being out for Visma and Visma Lee losing
that key, I don't know the word for him, director, that key
figurehead on the Unchained docuseries, he think he went to
Red Bull.
I think that's a big deal.
That's a big loss for Jonas.
And then coupled with that, if you follow Tade in any of the
offseason, the dude has not gotten any weaker.
And it's just hard for me to say, Anthony, anybody but Tade.
I think barring a mechanical, barring a crash, barring some
bad luck through the tour, bet the house on Tade.
And I say that to say, what am I rooting for?
I'm rooting for parody.
I'm rooting for, I wish, I wish there were five guys that were
battling this whole thing that could trade punches and blows
and could take Tade to the line in some of these mountain
stages.
That's what I would like to see.
But dude, if you follow Grand Cycling, there there's just not
another Tade out there.
There's like levels to this game, and he just seems like
he's far and away.
We'll talk about Sexus in a little bit or but Tade's my
pick, far and away.
SPEAKER_03: Dude, I I think uh I I'm definitely gonna agree with
you on this one.
This is not a crazy, this is not a crazy take by any means.
I think, and I will throw, I'm gonna throw out some crazy takes
here in a minute.
I do think Tade will win.
Here will be my crazy take is I think Tade will win early.
I don't I don't even think it's gonna, I think once, you know,
you and I were talking about like looking at watching the
race together, and by all means, I hope we get this stage, like
the last two, three stages of of the race where there's these
huge climbs, and we see Jonas and maybe Paul say it, Sussex
and Tade all going at it, you know, to and they're like a
30-second gap.
I don't think that's gonna happen.
I think you I think you may have I think Tade may have minutes on
Jonas by that point, like somewhere between three and
five.
Yeah.
Because and I was looking at it, so UAE just announced the team
lineup.
I think it may have been today, actually.
Dude, they have like three guys that could potentially like
fight for GC classification by themselves.
You know what I mean?
And they're all their their job is to just help Tade win this
thing.
So I think that um, yeah, I think Tade's gonna pull away
with this.
Like, I don't think it's a hard, hard thing.
Now I do think that uh I was I was hopeful Jonas would be in
like decent.
I don't know, dude.
I I've watched him.
He's looked he looked good in uh the giro Italia.
I I just I don't know.
He's I think with Wild Van Art, you know, injured, I think that
that brings something.
You've got Mateo Mateo Jorgis in there as well.
Uh I think you've got are one of the Yates brothers still with
him?
You've got the two Yates brothers, and I don't know if
they're both I don't one was with one was with uh Tade, and
then the other one was with uh Jonas, and I don't know if
they're still like that.
But anyway, besides the point, don't think you have a problem
there.
I also think that uh Paul Sussex is gonna be a good one to watch
out for.
He's gonna be the big young rider this year, who is, and
I'll go ahead and tell you he's my person that I picked for the
white jersey, which is I looked it up.
It's your under 26 age.
So kid's 19 years old, does not have much of a team around him.
He does have a decent team, but not much of one.
So he's gonna be using Tade and Jonas's guys to basically help
carry him, carry him up these mountains, essentially.
So I think that um, I mean, at the end of the day, I don't I I
don't think he wins it either.
So we're going straight Tade, but I people people that are
watching, watch Paul Sussex unless he gets hurt, injured, or
something crazy.
The dude will probably be the legend that is Tade in the next
few years.
He's 19 years old.
SPEAKER_02: That's crazy, dude.
Honestly, I'm looking at eligible, age eligible riders
for best young riders.
That might be the best race that we're watching, the race race
for the white jersey.
You've got Isaac Del Toro from UAE, one of those guys on Tade's
team you're talking about, who's going to be a potential GC rider
this year.
Yep.
22-year-old Mexican Phenon recently won Tour de Roan Alps.
Then you've got, I forgot about Florian Lipowitz, the defending
white jersey holder.
So between Florian Paul Sexis and Isaac Del Toro, those are
just three names.
You know, they might come up and be that next generation that's
actually more competitive, more parody.
You're not quite sure who's going to win after Tade's passed
his prime in several years.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and I was I was kind of hoping, you know,
like we had what, two years ago.
We had Remco Ebnunapool.
He was wearing a white jersey, and you were like, oh yeah, this
is gonna be like the next guy.
He's kind of, I don't know if he's fallen off.
I don't know what he's done.
He's he's really he's doing a great job, but he's still, I
dude, he hadn't raced all year.
It it's hard for me to sit here and say anything about him
because we hadn't seen anything from him.
SPEAKER_02: He feels like the biggest question mark in this
whole race to me.
I don't know what other than if there's a flat time trial, like
I would bank on Remco winning it.
But outside of that, I don't know what to expect with the
time off and all this.
SPEAKER_03: I will say I did also see like he had he had some
pretty high, like his average power right now is is
impressive, and they were talking about that.
But then I also saw like I think it was two days later they were
talking the team was basically talking about like they had two
leaders, essentially.
Like one day it may be Rimco, and the other day it may be some
other guy, and I forget his name at the top of my head right now,
but I was just like, What what?
We just paid Remco this much money and we're talking about we
got two leaders?
What are we doing?
SPEAKER_02: So put the football term on you.
When you got two quarterbacks, you got no quarterback.
So it's like if you got two leaders, do you what what does
that mean?
And that showed confidence in Rimco.
SPEAKER_03: It ain't it ain't great, that's what I'll say.
And then so KOM, which is the everybody calls it the polka dot
jersey.
I call it the King of the Mountain because it's King of
the Mountain stages.
You've got Tade I truthfully Tade will probably win the will
probably wear this jersey as well.
He won't wear it while he's racing because he'll wear
yellow.
So you'll have like a Lenny Martinez, who's a really good
rider.
Um, and then he's actually a French rider, so I'm sure the
people of France will love this because you know they love to
watch him watch the home crowd win races.
And then you have Richard, I think his last name is Carapaz.
He works for he he rides for EF, so education first, which is
like an American-based group or whatever.
So I'm kind of excited to see him.
I think he was he had a pretty good, he had a pretty good
little run in 2024 with KOM.
So we'll we'll see if he's if he's ready for it.
SPEAKER_02: You got any uh thoughts on that?
I've got no comments on that.
I'm a little ignorant there, so I'll I'll follow your lead on
that one.
I will flip it back before we get away from the yellow jersey,
just for what it's worth for our audience worth.
Anthony, I've been kind of keeping up with like betting
odds.
I've been wanting to actually just like place bets on it, just
seeing what the line's doing.
I find that interesting.
So it's most of the U.S.
sportsbook will only bet, let you bet on the winner.
I want to get like the 20-page, like um, what do you call it?
Prop style bets, stage winners, this, this, and this.
I can't find that anywhere.
But, anyways, as of today, DraftKings sportsbook.
We've got Tade Pagaccha, minus 340 to be the winner.
And then everybody else's positive odds from there.
You have Tade, Jonas, Paul Sexis, Isaac Del Toro, Remco
Evanopol, Florian Lippowitz, Juan Iusso, and then we're about
910 in to where they're about similar, plus 8,000 odds.
So that's kind of how the betting odds makers are seeing
it for the yellow jersey.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, Tade minus 340, that makes sense.
Yeah.
I would be cool to actually see some of those like individual
stage races, and I wonder if you could find it because there
would be some that you would just know some guys are going
after different days and stuff like that.
So that would be cool to see.
SPEAKER_02: The guys on the move talking about bet talk about
betting on it every year.
So we'll do some more digging before those stages come up.
SPEAKER_03: We'll find it.
All right.
Maybe we'll go maybe I'll go throw uh enduring state of mind.
I'll go throw a hundred dollars on the hot day.
You think uh you think if I went to the Beau Revage over here on
the coast and said I'd like to put money on the tour, they'd
say, What?
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, what?
They have it.
I've actually looked.
That's one of the sports books.
You can do it.
You can actually do it.
So next time we get together, I'm gonna we're gonna go to the
sports book.
SPEAKER_03: There you go.
Okay.
Um, so you got that.
I dude.
Then you have Green Jersey, which I think this this could
actually be a super fun.
I know that they've changed it up a little bit, and people are
saying that Todd A could potentially win the green jersey
as well.
I I don't know how that works.
Like, I don't know.
I'd say I don't know how that works.
I know how it could work.
It just means some of these mountain stages where he's off
the attack, he'll potentially like do better.
Um they'll have more it'll be worth more points, I guess I
should say.
The I if it doesn't work like that, dude, the green jersey
could be the best jersey by far.
Because you have um you're gonna have you're gonna have Jasper
Phillipson, who's gonna go after everything.
Disaster Jasper.
Um Jonathan Milan, and then what is his name?
Bri Brian Germai.
SPEAKER_02: I want to say that Biniam Germai from last year and
the last couple years kind of rose to the scenes.
SPEAKER_03: Yep.
So you have those three, and there's a few other guys that'll
also be very, very good.
Um I'm I don't know.
I'm pretty I'm pretty excited to watch some of these green jersey
sprints because these guys, dude, you saw it.
I mean, uh, would Milan do like a he did like a thousand it was
over a thousand watts.
It was like two thousand watts or something like that.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, they'll get to like two thousand watts in a
burst, which makes no sense to me.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and that is just unbelievable.
So I I'm excited to see, I'm excited to see what that's gonna
look like.
Um I if you if you had to put my money on it, I'm gonna say uh
Jonathan Milan is gonna win the green jersey.
Okay.
Um I only because he's he was like far and away the best
sprint rider last year.
Um I would love to see Jasper and I I hate to say this, I
would love to see Jasper and Matthew Vanderpool like just
taking folks out.
My God.
Not like in a wrecking way, but like more so just like calling
their shot and and doing it.
Because dude, do you I know you remember this?
We were talking about it last year.
First like 10 days of the race, those two guys were the most
like phenomenal stories of the entire race.
Oh, yeah.
And Rasp Jasper Rex on the first day, I think, actually.
Now that I think about it, it was like the first three days.
And then Matthew Vanderpoel was just like, I'm just gonna go out
and do it and just hammer everything.
Dude goes so hard, he catches the flu within like the first 10
days.
SPEAKER_02: Dude, the way those guys were riding to start the
tour was exciting.
Like, I wish every that's kind of what I wish I saw more out of
Jonas this year.
Like, if he gets to a spot where it starts slipping away, just
start, just start sending it, Jonas.
Come on, quit being a little conservative.
Like, Lee, don't sit on his wheel the whole time.
SPEAKER_03: I I was crazy, bro.
Dude, I would love to see that.
I'd love to see him just like try to.
He does so much where he he's like, I'm gonna sit with Tade
and I'm gonna let him burn his matches and I'm gonna stay on
his wheel and then I'm gonna burn my match whenever I think
he's tired.
And I think that um I think you're right.
I think he would do very well catching him on some of these
days where it's just like, I'm gonna go out there, I'm gonna
get my whole team, we're gonna be in a line, we're gonna hammer
it, we're gonna tire him out, Tade out, and I'm gonna save my
legs as much as possible and go right back at him tomorrow.
You know what I mean?
Like that would be great.
Yep.
Not happening, but we'll see.
New team, new hey, new coach, they may, I mean, new team uh
principal as you could call it.
They may, they may go for it.
SPEAKER_02: He can he could start iBoys Wouts out new
sheriffs in town.
SPEAKER_03: There you go.
There you go.
Um how many wrecks do you think Jasper Phillipson will cause
this year?
SPEAKER_02: What a question.
Well, yeah, the question, so I haven't been keeping up with him
post shoulder surgery and all that stuff from last year.
I wonder if there's any more conservatism in his game.
Uh, my guess is no.
I think if you're a sprinter, you can't.
This is just my guess, Anthony.
It's kind of like with I don't know, if you have an injury and
running and it's it's an a broken ankle and you're on a
technical descent, if you're thinking about that too much,
you're gonna hurt yourself again.
I imagine when you're like your whole job is like sprinting for
what is it, 40 seconds or whatever.
I imagine you gotta you gotta have reckless abandon or you're
gonna get yourself hurt.
What are your thoughts on this guy?
SPEAKER_03: Dude, I mean you gotta think about it.
He he like has I guess he has the attention span of like a
goldfish, you know, type of thing.
He has like the memory of a goldfish because he calls like
three wrecks.
It was one of the first like Netflix tour docs, and he calls
like three wrecks and everybody's pissed off.
Dude didn't care, and he will continue to cause them.
I mean, I I hate to say it, I do love that about him.
Not that he causes wrecks, but I do love like he has absolutely
no fear.
Like it may be a little dirty, and I I respect that people
don't like that, but at the same time, if you tell me, hey, I'm
gonna go 50 miles an hour on this bike, potentially like mess
myself up because I'm gonna have a wreck and do it four, five,
six times.
I mind next race I go on, I am not gonna be like, oh yeah,
there's this little bitty gap that's like two centimeters
wide.
I'm gonna stick my tire there and go for it.
That ain't what I'm doing.
SPEAKER_02: You know, I imagine you get he just gets to a
singular focused tunnel vision and then everything else kind of
gets out of it, you know, finish line out, you know.
Um full form and just reading this about him and Vanderpool
being in top shape makes me excited.
Now I'm you know, like I want more of last year chaos.
SPEAKER_03: Dude, me too.
I I I I really like Matthew Vanderpoel only because he he
reminds me a lot of Wout, which I really liked.
Wout.
He can do it all.
Like he's not which Toddy's the same way, but you're not gonna
see Todde going out carrying his bike, running up a mountain of
mud like Wout and Matthew Vanderpool do.
And I think that I dude honestly it's just so cool to watch
somebody that is like it basically would be like Tom
Brady kicking, punting, playing offensive line, wide receiver,
defensive back, safety linebacker.
All of it.
So it's it's cool to see.
SPEAKER_02: Another thing, too.
This is one I wish I had a prop bet on, like an over or under a
number of sprint stages he wins.
I don't know if it that you know, an odd might be one and a
half or something like two and a half that he wins.
SPEAKER_03: That would be a good one.
SPEAKER_02: Because it's Alpison like fully backing him to win
sprint stages, and you got this Ferrari and Matthew Vanderpool
that can just pull you.
Like that's exciting, folks.
Like, you know what I mean?
Like, even me being new to this, we can nerd out later and look
at the sprint stages, circle those, and Alpison's gonna have
a game plan for that.
And it's gonna involve Matthew Vanderpool leading him out and
sprinting to the finish.
Like, that's just I don't know.
SPEAKER_03: 100%.
There may be a tan, there may be an opportunity where Matthew
Vanderpool just wins the whole thing on the sprint stage, too,
though.
Is the thing, like he's that good.
Um I got a I got a last question for you on the tour.
We've we're 20 minutes into the episode, so I got one last
question and we'll switch it over to Western States because I
gotta keep us on track so we don't just talk tour for an
hour.
What riders, what what I let me think about how to ask this
question.
What are you most excited for to see on Rider's Wrist this this
uh this summer?
Well, well, well.
Oh, the Richard Milly.
Yeah, I think uh I think Tade, we we were joking about it, Tade
and Um Vanderpool were both wearing Richard Milley's.
And funny enough, I've actually already looked it up.
Tade will be wearing a Richard Milley again this year, and I
would like to ask you how much do you think that watch cost?
SPEAKER_02: Didn't we play this game a little last year?
And one of them was at least half a million dollars or
something like this.
SPEAKER_03: Yep.
So traditionally, traditionally the watches go for about half a
million dollars, I believe.
They have built a watch, they have built this watch, and I'm
assuming it's gonna be like a limited release, which they all
are in the watch industry.
Um, it is a million-dollar watch.
Boy, a million-dollar watch.
A million-dollar watch that he will be wearing at some point in
the race.
Holy cow.
Is that not insane?
SPEAKER_02: That is nuts.
Let me ask you a stupid question.
We're shaving leg hairs off for aerodynamic principles here.
Does that they just don't care when you got the sponsorship for
a hundred a million dollar piece?
I probably wouldn't.
SPEAKER_03: Shit, at a million, I mean, let me re let me not say
that.
At a million dollars, I think you better be aerodynamic.
SPEAKER_02: No kidding.
SPEAKER_03: Jeez.
Yeah.
So there's gonna be a few guys, obviously.
I think Tissot is the um is like the official timekeeper of the
tour, so you'll see a bunch of people wearing Tisso.
I bet everybody probably gets a Tissot in the whenever they like
show up.
And then um who was it?
Tudor, Tudor has a team, so they'll all be wearing tutors.
I'm sure we'll see some relaxes.
I'm gonna keep I'm gonna try to keep a like a segment going of
new watches that I've seen and what the costs are of them.
All right.
So keep me up on this.
In two weeks after the tour starts, I'm gonna give you the
top five watches of the tour.
SPEAKER_02: I love it.
I love it.
We gotta come up with some living room talk too, if like we
see any other trends, like I feel like Whoop was a big deal
last year, anything like this.
SPEAKER_03: Dude, I have heard, and I I don't know, this would
have been actually a great race to announce it on, and I don't
know if Garmin's gonna do it or not, but Garmin was supposed to
come out with a competitor to Whoop.
SPEAKER_02: Interesting.
SPEAKER_03: And Matthew Vanderpoel was wearing it at one
point, I guess for data, and they were trying to learn stuff.
Dude, this would have been a great, obviously a great race
internationally for them to launch that.
Heck yeah.
With all their guys.
SPEAKER_02: Dude, just like just like the London Marathon where I
kind of snuck up on Adidas making that announcement on that
four-ounce shoe.
There could be some of that stuff where they're about to
crack into it as soon as like this week, you know.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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SPEAKER_03: All right, let's go over.
We're gonna get into something you know a little bit more about
than I do.
Um, Western States was this past weekend.
I know there was a we had a kind of like my Tour de France group
chats, we had a ton of group chats where people were keeping
us up keeping me up to date because I was doing other stuff,
but keeping us up to date on on the race.
What'd you think about it?
SPEAKER_02: Well, I'll start by setting the backdrop for me that
the kids went down to the coast with my parents on Friday night,
and I got back from my run, Anthony, and dropping them off
on the coast, and I had the whole day Saturday to watch that
race.
I've never watched more Western States coverage any year ever.
I probably watched 90% of it, not watched it like keeping up
with it, my phone on an ear, but like in the bed or on the couch,
watched it.
I was kind of glued to it.
And um it was it was a record-breaking year.
There was unprecedented weather conditions.
So kind of all the stars are lined on records going down,
man.
Um I've got so many takeaways and highlights.
I I'll start by asking you what what through the grapevine did
you hear that you're most excited to hear about with with
Western States?
I'll start there because there's a lot of topics to get into.
SPEAKER_03: I was interested in, we've talked about him before,
Hans Troyer.
Like I was I was trying to keep up with him.
Um, and I know he obviously didn't finish.
And then remind me, tell me if I'm wrong on this.
There was a guy that had like won this back in the day.
He hadn't raced it in a while, he had like a course record for
a long time, maybe broke his own course record a few different
times.
Am I thinking of the same of the same course?
I don't think so.
Okay, that one's not coming to mind.
I was I was thinking you and I were talking about that.
Or Jim Walmsley.
SPEAKER_02: Yes, Jim Walmsley.
Yes.
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
Did he have the course record at some point?
SPEAKER_02: Yes, he will, he was the he's the reigning course
record holder in.
SPEAKER_03: But he hadn't been here.
unknown: Yep.
SPEAKER_03: He's he hadn't raced it.
He hadn't raced here in a while.
Yep.
A few maybe a few years.
Okay, that's what it was.
So I was kind of interested to see what what Jim would do
because of like you and I talking about it.
Um, so those those were the two that I was really interested in.
The other guys I I didn't hear a lot about, but obviously kept up
with them through y'all.
SPEAKER_02: So that's a good way for me to break into it.
So to your point, it did feel like a little bit of old guard
with Jim Walmsley, who's a four-time champion, current
record holder, Killian Journey.
We're talking two goats here between Killian and Jim.
Like Jim, this is his course.
If he's been in the race and he's finished it, he's won it.
Current record holder.
Killian is just like this goat.
He's a widely recognized goat.
If we're talking more mountainous races or alpining or
any crazy adventure like this, it's Killian.
So both of these two guys are in it.
You can kind of throw them into an older guard, still highly
competitive.
Like most people, myself included, are still picking Jim
Walmsley to win this race.
Killian, he won the race at least 10 years ago.
Came in third last year as one of the older people in the in
the field.
So old guard, there you go.
Then you got this new generation of the Hans Troyers, young and
fit is his catch name.
Guy couldn't be more likable or just full of energy.
Coached by David Roche.
David Roche famously like a year ago said, bet on Hans, because
he's never just like given more training to an athlete that's
just absorbed it and just like, give me more, give me more, has
been winning a lot of big races.
Hans got on a lot of people's radars because he ran himself
into the hospital early in one of his first or second races,
like straight ignoring all the pain and all the signs and
rhabdo, like serious rhabdomyolysis, like in it for a
week, organ shutting down, not dehydrated.
I mean, it's all serious, right?
But not like dehydrated, goes to the hospital for a second, gets
topped off, leave that day.
He was in the hospital for like a week or two and they were like
having hard conversations.
Insert hyperlight, uh, nutrition sponsors, gotten them taken care
of since then.
But, anyways, Hans had a crack at Western States like shear,
had a great debut.
You had a bunch of Hoka athletes in the field that trained
together a lot.
They're Hayden Hawks, Adam Peterman, who's won Western
States before, Hans Troyer, Jim Walmsley, a guy named Francesco
Pupi who's Italian.
So Hoka's title sponsor this thing coming in hot.
Excuse me.
Um, and then so old guard, new guard.
Hans goes out on this race, unprecedented weather
conditions.
Hans goes out leading this race on a heater, like not just like
setting the pace, being aggressive, like making and
taking moves early and like intentional to where at the
halfway mark he's on 1335 pace, and the the record is 1409.
So we're talking Anthony about running like 40, 45 minutes
under course record pace.
You know, this isn't I'm running off the front trying to break
this.
I'm running or trying to run away with this.
So the race is playing out such that Rocky Chucky is this water
crossing at mile 78.
It's something iconic.
I can't wait till one of us get into Western States or one of
our friends go and we get to go out and spend some time on this
course.
It's just one of those epic courses.
It's got high country, it's got canyons, hot, technical,
runnable.
It's got it all, you know, and it's just a storied race.
Um, but Hans blows up at 78.
So Hans, Hans, Hans ran the Western State 78 and he's done.
Um, and then you have a race playing out behind him and who
what people can like maintain that early pace.
But long story short, one of the coolest stories, the guy that
goes on the win win it's a man named Vincent Bouillard.
He was a HOCA employee up through 2024.
Listen to this story.
Do you know this story?
No.
A HOCA employee, not a HOCA professional runner.
He was on the product engineering team, something like
material sciences for their product team.
He showed up to UTMB, aka probably like the most
competitive global mountain race in the world, and won it, and
won it as a HOCA employee.
And HOCA was like, oh, we're gonna sign you as a to be a
professional athlete.
And so he goes on to win Western States this year as a Hoker
professional.
But I think that's just one of the coolest stories.
He's a Frenchman, he's the first Frenchman to ever win it,
Anthony.
And it begs the question: is this gonna be the sporting event
that the country of France has something to be excited about a
champion, or does this streak continue into the World Cup and
Paul Sex is winning to the Tour de France?
SPEAKER_03: Oh, that is actually uh uh great, great thought
there.
I think that they have a very good chance at the World Cup.
I don't think they have a good chance at the tour, but you
know, two for three is great.
SPEAKER_02: That's what I was gonna give you.
I was gonna give you the odds of what's more likely the fr the uh
French World Cup team winning or Paul Sexis and what a summer it
would be.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
I you know it's funny, like there they would obviously,
there's a lot of people, French people that would be super
excited about the World Cup.
I'm curious if they had a French, a young 19-year-old
Frenchman win the Tour de France, how like just ignorant
they would go.
SPEAKER_02: I feel like, man, that's such a great question.
European friends and countries listening, what would be more
important for I feel like, man, that's a tough one because the
Euros take their soccer serious too.
Yeah, they do.
But you know, though I'm so jaded by the tour to France,
like I just feel like that would immediately break the mold.
SPEAKER_03: But but when's the last time of I I don't know,
because I don't know how how much uh Europeans are watching.
Obviously, I know cycling is a lot bigger in in Europe than it
is in America, and we're talking about it like here if we won the
World Cup, it would it would be far outweigh anybody winning the
American winning the Tour to France.
But at the same time, if you think about it like when's the
last time a Frenchman won the tour in his home country?
I would be Are you looking that up for us?
SPEAKER_02: I I've got to look something else up first.
And it was when was the last time France won the World Cup
runner-up to Argentina in 2022?
So to catch you up on uh World Cup stuff, they do have a player
called um Killian Mbappe.
And the guy is like the best in the world.
World class, yeah.
He's sick.
My daughter has Mbappe cleats, like he's legit.
Um, so yeah, good point.
I don't know if you looked up the last time our French won.
1985.
SPEAKER_04: Ooh.
SPEAKER_03: Bernard Henocht secured his fifth and final
victory.
That was the last time they won.
So last time France France won the World Cup would probably be
a lot sooner than that, I would think.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so listen to this 1998, they won it.
Looks like their first one.
Twin 2006 runner-up to Italy, lost on penalties.
2018 won it, 2022 won it.
So they've had more of a storied, not starved fan base
when it comes to World Cup winning.
Plus, they've got the best, if not, well, he's probably the
best young up-and-coming talent in Killian.
So yeah.
SPEAKER_03: So I I don't know.
I that's interesting.
I I would be curious to see what like people of France would say.
Would they rather have like if you could go up to somebody
because I I've definitely said this in my life, or I say in my
life uh recently as an Ole Miss fan, give me an Ole Miss
football national championship, and I would take us being the
worst college baseball team ever for the next 10 years.
You know what I mean?
Like I've definitely said that.
I wonder if you could say, like, hey, would you take a World Cup
win to never win or to keep on your demise of the Tour de
France, or would you take a Tour de France win to not win a World
Cup for the next, let's say, 10 World Cups?
SPEAKER_02: That's a good one.
That's a real good one, man.
So harmonizing that and pulling it all together, we're running
big butts on the 18th of July.
Sunday, the 19th, is the World Cup final.
Yep.
It's also one of the sickiest mountain stages of the Tour de
France.
Stage 15.
It's a 183-kilometer mountain stage with the summit finish.
Yes, it is.
So me and you are gonna be celebrating some 50k big butts
PRs and have a six stage to watch.
Well, maybe together.
I don't know.
Yeah, that'd be cool.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that would be super cool.
Yeah, we may we may try to do something like that.
That'd be awesome.
Um, speaking of speaking of big butts, you want to you want to
jump.
You you got anything else to say about western states?
I know we've got to do that.
I've got a cool other thing.
SPEAKER_02: You know, a couple of things I want to say.
Uh one, shout out to the pros that stick in and finish Western
states when they're not having their day.
Let's let's say something about Hans.
When Hans goes for it like that, that's brutal suffering.
That wasn't you're just gonna suffer the last 22 miles.
That is kind of what you saw at me at Big Butts that one year.
That is major blow up, extreme suffering.
Like, I don't know if this is gonna happen.
So when he stepped off at 78, I saw that.
Now, other pros that had bad days but didn't quite blow up
like that, that maintained it and got to the finish line, I
want to shout them out by name because I think those are good
examples for us, non-elite professional runners that look
to them because it speaks to being in it for the experience.
And I think if we anchor our baseline goal of, man, I'm just
happy to be here, man, I'm grateful.
This is a crazy experience.
Mean you could think Zion Ultra, just get into that finish line.
That's our baseline goal.
I think that's a major takeaway.
And seeing pros do it, her incentivized by time and nothing
to gain air quotes by getting there and eight hours slower
than they should.
I like that.
So Molly Seidel, her first hundred miler, but she was
talked about as a potential podium winner or whatever.
24 hours.
Shout out to Molly.
She was probably projected to run something more like nine
hours, eight hours faster.
Throw it back to last year.
Adam Peterman, former 2022 winner, he ran something like 20
hours, Anthony.
Like, that's just to me, that's kind of cool.
That's like you see it happen.
You'll see you see people abandon the tour too, sometimes.
Like GC contenders that aren't in it anymore.
They're like, screw this crap, I'm not suffering for two more
weeks.
I'm out, bro.
Well, I mean, Remco did it last year.
Exactly.
Exactly.
So I wanted to say that out loud.
SPEAKER_03: No, I I hear you on that completely.
I we've we saw there was a girl that did that um at the um at
Coca-Dona this year, who was like a potential winner.
And she got to a point where like her stomach was so messed
up that she was literally like running for a minute, walking
for 30 seconds or something.
Like that was where she was at.
I don't, it was somebody that Jared and Hezekiah follow.
I don't know who it was, but um, yeah, I mean, shout out to
people that are just like out there because but those are the
people I I don't mean this in a bad way by any means, but those
are the people that are really trying to push their body to the
limit.
They don't they they care about that more than they do the race.
SPEAKER_02: Yep, absolutely.
Speaking of, that's a good segue for the last point I want to
make about Western states.
Zach Miller.
Somewhere in the grave, Steve Prefontaine smiles every time he
gets to see Zach Miller finish a race.
Send you a video if you haven't seen it, Anthony.
But it is going to the arms, full gas.
Like when I see it, it was the Steve Prefontaine finish that
popped in my head of to give anything less is to sacrifice
this gift.
I don't like I think he's a made man when it comes to
sponsorships, but it's not for sponsors.
But it is like you and I have been shooting commercials for
products and stuff lately.
Like this is commercial content, like just full arms gets to that
track, Anthony.
He is digging in, grimacing.
I'm like, wow, this is awesome, dude.
SPEAKER_03: This is awesome.
I think you actually shared that on the uh on the Instagram
story.
So it was I watched it, it was cool.
I wasn't expecting it, and it was a super cool little little
finish right there.
I was expecting you and I have talked about it, and we we did
not do our due diligence and do well enough.
I was kind of expecting you to put up something of the uh the
ultra lane because I saw a few people that were finishing up
right at the last the last little groups, and there was a
few of them that had some serious ultra lanes going on.
I saw those two.
Dude, I saw one guy that was literally like had this he had
his um hike trekking poles, and he was literally like had his
arms behind he had his trekking poles in between his arm and
like behind his bat, and that's what he was using as a brace to
keep his Oh my gosh, dude.
Yeah.
Bro, that is I will say one thing.
That is like my biggest, I'm gonna say it to the audience
now.
That is my biggest fear of Zion is is getting the ultra lane.
SPEAKER_04: Ultra lane.
SPEAKER_03: That's hilarious.
I'm gonna lean on Chris as he as he carries me over the finish
line.
Oh my gosh, that's hilarious.
Yeah.
Um, anything else from Western States?
It was, dude, it was looked like a super cool event.
I agree with you.
Whenever somebody gets the opportunity to go, I hope we get
the invite to pay some or do whatever because the people that
were out there was just unmatched.
SPEAKER_02: They're they were everywhere.
So cool.
I you know the uh supply and demand of how hard it gets in.
Like you get tickets in the lottery and you roll and they
exponentially grow.
To me, it feels like not a matter of if but when, but the
win could be eight, ten years or something.
So I feel like it's gonna happen.
But to your point, there's something about getting there.
Oh, last thing you made me think of.
I'm glad you said that, Anthony.
The finishing rate at this thing is this year was one of the
highest finishing rates they have, and it's always high.
It was something like almost like 90%.
So if you start that sucker, that's that's that was a better,
more succinct way of pulling that thread all the way through
of what I said about the pros.
Because it's like me like if I get it.
If and when I get into that in eight years, I better break my
leg because I'm getting to the finish line.
And it's cool because everybody feels that way too.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
Well, I mean, they gotta at what it's yeah, it says I'm looking
at the finish percentage right now.
It says 87% finish.
Last year was 77.
It's 76, and that was the lowest in the last five years.
Pretty impressive.
That is.
Yeah.
It's unbelievable.
Well, let's talk about finishing um something that we got coming
up that we that we gotta do.
Uh, and that is big butts.
SPEAKER_02: It is big butts, man.
What are we about three weeks?
SPEAKER_03: Two or so weeks out?
I think we're two, three weeks out.
Well, how are you feeling about big butts?
I I I can say what I'm feeling later, but you tell me how
you're feeling.
SPEAKER_02: I'm feeling uh I'm feeling excited that I signed up
for the 50k and not the 100k when I go outside in the middle
of the day sometimes.
But I just gotta say that on the line set.
What about you?
SPEAKER_03: Dude, I feel the same way.
I never was gonna sign up for the 100K, but I'm excited that
I've signed up for the 50K.
I I have been doing some weird trainings where I'm like staying
in the house later and starting at seven, eight, nine o'clock.
And I recently past two days have kind of switched that up
where I've started a little bit earlier.
Dude, it's getting it's cooking out there on them streets at
nine o'clock when you just got pavement coming from the bottom
and the top.
SPEAKER_02: I was sitting there thinking, I wonder if they ever
have an appetite to pull that race in a little bit with an
earlier start.
I can't remember what it is now.
I feel like it's 7 or 7 30.
Yeah.
I'd love to start around five.
SPEAKER_03: It would be nice, wouldn't it?
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it would.
We're sitting here complaining.
How's your training going though, for real?
SPEAKER_03: Dude, training wise, I'm gonna say that um I'm
probably in the best shape I've been in in the past like two
years.
Um currently.
So I'm hopefully optimistic about potentially doing decent
at uh at beatbuts.
We'll see that.
SPEAKER_02: I think that's a humble way to put it, man.
I am I am excited for both of us, really.
Um we get, I mean, you'll get in and get out in 30 30 miles.
I know that's still not a short distance, but I I guess you can
anchor it to not being out there for twice that long all day.
And you we've got that cooling down, we've got the heat
mitigation down.
And to your point, you're rocking this fitness that you
hadn't had in a while, or maybe ever.
And there's something to say about that, dude.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I I'm I'm cautiously optimistic.
I'm cautious because I know that the heat can, I know the heat,
and I still I will never forget that final lap of that 50k
walking and running through that humidity of that of what I would
call the the Mississippi College jungle because it was it was
brutal.
But um I'm cautiously optimistic that I may not even see too too
terribly much of that that 2 p.m.
heat.
SPEAKER_02: I think if this sucker wasn't in the middle of
the summer, man, you might be a little more bullish and maybe a
little more whatever about some time goals because we know what
we're getting into, I guess.
SPEAKER_03: Yep.
I I would be I would be a lot more bullish about some time
goals if it wasn't for uh if it wasn't for this heat.
I I don't know what's gonna happen because truthfully, we
could get out there, it could be like mid 80s, low 80s and
raining and feel phenomenal all day, or it could be like it was
today, and I think it was 93 degrees by 7:30 this morning, so
or felt like outside.
So who knows?
Um, I will tell you, I I will say this on I'm I'm almost
prepared to goat some uh some tennis she's let's go, bro.
For the people that are listening, Zach is on the Adidas
Evo SL SLs.
SPEAKER_04: Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_03: Zach has got me to buy it, purchase a pair of
Adidas Evo SLs.
Um, and they are a phenomenal shoe for I guess for our feet.
I don't know.
We we tend to have the same feet.
Like we have whenever we have, whenever I say, hey Zach, my
foot's hurting like this, you're like, yeah, mine does that all
the time.
So we I guess we traditionally have more of a a similar style
foot, but uh dude, those those shoes are they're nice.
SPEAKER_02: I like them, man.
I'm glad they work for you.
Your initial step in made me a little nervous.
I was like, dang, I hope that's not Anthony's feedback, because
the the small percentage of people I have heard say they
don't like them find the softness too unstable.
But something changed.
I think and and that's an give the audience your feedback too,
because that's a good feedback.
If if something doesn't feel right before you get out there
in your first, play with the lacing a little bit because the
lacing and locking down can change the whole experience for
you.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so first for the audience listening, Zach and
I were chatting because he was he I sent him a picture and he
was excited to hear about it.
So I was like, I put them on.
I didn't really I tied them how I would normally tie my old
shoes, where I like have them a little loose so that my feet
aren't just like you know how whenever you get your shoelaces
too tight, you almost feel like you've cut off circulation.
So I yeah, I I had them I had them a little, a little loose,
just like feel them around.
And I was walking around, I was like, ooh, I don't like these.
My feet were moving, shifting way too much.
And then um I went, I was just like, all right, I'm gonna try
to tighten it down just a little bit and then just go on, even if
I go two miles, come back and say, hey, I hate these shoes and
send them back, that's what it is.
But I'm gonna at least give them a shot.
Dude, I went and there was no coming back after that.
It was literally like, yep, these are the shoes for for for
a good while.
So um, awesome pair of shoes.
SPEAKER_02: They've been they've been super fun to wear.
The stats on your runs have been showing how well they work too,
man.
They do, yeah.
SPEAKER_03: The the past two days, whenever I'm running nine
minute miles, which is not fast by any means, but it the heart
rate, the heart rate that I'm running at is just like okay.
In that heat, in that heat too.
Let's go.
In that heat, and I'm like, all right, this is not saying it's
effortless because it's not, but it it definitely feels a lot
better.
So I don't and and I equate that to a mixture of obviously
training, because I shouldn't I shouldn't sit here and say that
the training that I've been doing has not put me there, but
it's a mixture of training and the shoot.
So what else we got?
Um we got a few more minutes on this on this joint.
Let's see.
SPEAKER_02: Do we want to talk anything about the um the PC
nature of what's going on on the long leaf trace?
I think we should drop a little few comments in on that.
SPEAKER_03: I think we should too, because there's a lot of
people that are upset about it, myself being included.
And I think we saw it the first day, probably the it was early
on last Saturday, whenever we all went, we all met and did a
trail run um from Jed's.
Well, we get there like 5 30 in the morning sometime.
SPEAKER_02: I got there at 5 30 over there earlier.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, well, some of us show up on top.
Oh, some of us show up early to events at not right at the time
storage.
Um, anyway, we get there at 5 30.
I walk over to the water fountain, is nowhere to be seen,
the bathrooms are locked, and I was talking to Josh, and I was
like, yo, what's going on with this?
And he was like, somebody took the water fountain?
I was like, there's a sign on the door that says longleaf
traces were moved to all water fountains.
And he was like, What in the world?
Um, so we were chatting about that, and then next thing you
know, it's now a big thing on pretty much every Facebook
social media form that you and I are a part of in Hattiesburg.
What do you think about it?
SPEAKER_02: There's like pictures floating out there of a
water fountain graveyard.
SPEAKER_03: I don't know if those are real or not, but those
are Dude, it's funny if it is, but I mean, somebody took I I
assumed somebody took that photo.
I don't know if they did or not, but I thought that was like
where the water fountains were.
SPEAKER_02: Um I got some immediate thoughts.
Let's go, let's get into it.
Okay, perfect.
Let's say on balance, one, where this is a fail, and I don't
think it's debatable, is the communication or lack thereof,
to where runners, cyclists go out there and have expectations
that part of their hydration plan has just been removed
without any communication.
I think that's a fail.
That's bad.
There's no defending that.
There should be, at minimum, everything's an opportunity.
I think there should be acknowledgement of that by
somebody from the longleaf trace board or whatever.
If they have a PR person, they need to acknowledge that piece.
That's wrong.
Second, okay, from all I've read and all I've seen, there have
been complaints about vandalism and homeless population or um an
addicted population using needles in restrooms.
So that's the justification for locking restrooms and things
like this.
I get that.
I understand that too.
But as I thought about it more and I saw the outrage, you know
what I did?
I listened to my wife a little bit, Anthony.
Hold on just a second.
I empathized.
I thought, what would Michaela, what would Carrie say about
this?
I'm being serious right now.
We're all sitting here voluntary, voluntarily
suffering, complaining, whining about not having our water and
our runs and our bikes, and that's true.
And all of what I just said up until that point is true.
It messed up on a communication.
Is there a is there something we're really missing with this,
like a fundamental homeless or addicted population that we're
not serving that could make this go away?
You know what I mean?
Like everybody's thinking about it one way, which I 90% agree
with.
And I want to talk like solutions for that, because I
think you have a couple good ones.
But I think there's also something being missed of like,
A, is there a homeless population problem in
Hattersburg?
Is there an addicted population problem in Hattersburg?
We should probably be talking about that too.
SPEAKER_03: So I I could not agree more with you on that.
And to be honest with you, until you mention that, I I had not
even thought about it.
I do know that there is I've seen it before, and I know you
probably have.
There's like homeless encampments that you'll see in
the woods, and then somebody will come in and clear it out,
and then the homeless people go somewhere else.
And I think that you're seeing the move towards the trace
because people aren't bothering the the homeless people on the
trace.
Not unfortunately, but fortunately for them, they have
a little bit of more peace and quiet.
Um, but yeah, I I agree with you.
I think that there's there's a serious problem, probably when
it comes to you know, drug addiction and stuff like that in
the Hattiesburg area, apparently.
So um it's unfortunate, and I think that a lot of people like
need to think about that for care-wise.
I know we have um, I'm trying to think, Moore's bicycle shop is a
very he's a huge advocate for um the owner of Moore's is a huge
advocate for like um Narcan and stuff.
So I'm assuming he would probably have a little more.
I'd actually probably like to get him on and talk about it.
Because I bet you he would have a lot more uh to say about like,
hey, what we can do to help those people that are in that
are going through that crisis or whatever in their life at this
point at this moment.
Um so yeah, that's that's an interesting thought.
I had not thought about that.
Carrie Carrie said something about it.
SPEAKER_02: I I haven't talked to her about it at length at it
with any level of substance.
This was my own organic thought that I want to take credit for.
But I I was I was thinking about it a little bit more like she
probably would, you know, inspired by conversations we've
had.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
Um I think there's a I think there are a lot of good
alternatives.
I I changed the subject a little bit on it, but I think there are
a lot of good alternatives to the water fountain stations.
And I think that you and I talking on this podcast, we just
have a platform so we're able to talk a little bit more.
We haven't thought, truthfully, nobody, I don't think anybody,
probably some people do, go out to Detrace, and the water at the
water fountain is their primal source of meat of like
consumption of water whenever they're out on the runs or
whatever.
For us, it's not the case.
Like, it's just an added benefit of like, hey, if I get 18 miles
out and I really need some water, I know that two miles
from Jeds, there's a water fountain.
Um, I agree with you on the poor communication.
Like, I think that the trace does a poor job of
communication.
They've done it before, they they keep doing it,
unfortunately.
I've I've had some run-ins with people at the trace before as
well.
Whenever I've rode my bike out and then rode back and rode like
through Southern and then come back to the parking lot, and
they have a ticket on my car, and I'm like, dude, I'm
literally riding my bike, I'm not going to school.
You can clearly see the difference in a student and a
somebody that's out for whatever.
Um, anyway, I think they did I think they did a poor job of of
communicating, like you said.
Um I I I really wish they've they've always locked the doors,
in my opinion, from a certain time at night to a certain time
of morning.
That's not abnormal to me.
And I don't know if you see that or not, but I remember running,
I don't know, two summers ago, and it would be like five it I'd
run through there at like six o'clock in the morning and doors
would be locked.
Come back at six thirty, they'd be unlocked.
Um so I f I find the the water fountain thing is still just
like mind blowing to me.
Like, why did why did we get to this point?
SPEAKER_02: I agree.
Um You made a suggestion too about was it you either having
like patrolling cops on I like that idea, like cyclist cops or
Yep.
There's gotta be ways, man.
SPEAKER_03: Just like uh I mean they have a you see them.
It's the person that that maintains the trail, they come
through, they blow off the trail, they clean the trail up.
Dude, if you had two people that are you could probably need
about four people because you're gonna have to rotate through
hours and different stuff, but you have four people that are in
a golf cart or a side by side that are literally riding the
trail, going back and forth, they're cleaning up.
They're hey, if there's a tree down, they're marking it,
they're checking on the bathrooms.
Because we talk about the vandalism and oh, they're
vandalizing the the water stations and they're we're
locking the doors at night because that's when it's
happening.
That's not that's not the only time it's happening.
You know what I mean?
Like, so it's gonna get to a point where they're gonna lock
the doors for the bathrooms 24-7.
It's not gonna be a 6 p.m.
to 6 a.m.
thing.
It's gonna be, yeah, bathrooms are done, water's done, and then
you're gonna see less and less people using the trace, and it's
gonna come to a point of like nobody's gonna use it and it's
not gonna be worth anything.
SPEAKER_02: That can turn into an unexpected consequence to
them too, just like it did for them the week the weekend we
shot that commercial.
If those bathrooms are locked, people are gonna have to find a
place to use it in the woods nearby.
Yeah.
You don't want that problem.
SPEAKER_03: 100%.
But it's it's just it's sad to see that like you have such a
crowd and an uproar.
And I I don't know that people, don't get me wrong, I have no
clue if the people that are on the board are using the trace or
not.
And I saw a lot of people talking about that.
Like these people probably never even touch foot on the trace,
you know.
And respectfully, based off of their community affiliations,
they're they're elected officials.
We should probably have people that are like dead, who is
literally at the on the trace every single day as a board
member of the trace.
I think I think it should be a different, a little bit
different way.
SPEAKER_02: I think at minimum, what this is gonna do, if you
look at everything as an opportunity, at least it's gonna
maybe show some light on how the money flows into the trace, who
actually has positions with say, hopefully there's some good
ideas that are outborne out of it, like a Jed or somebody from
the Pine Belt Pacers, or both, or certain sections that are
looked after, maintained up.
You know, me and you are just spitballing here, but I agree
with you.
I I could something needs to change a little bit, and at
minimum it has to be the communication.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
I mean, at minimum the communication has to be changed.
I I it's it's atrocious that they literally just said, we're
gonna take them all down, and then that's how you're gonna
find out.
We're not even gonna tell you prior to.
Um, and I I say that.
I don't no, I definitely didn't say anything on Facebook about
it.
I'm not even in the Hattiesburg area, but I follow them
religiously whenever they post something, just so I know.
You know why?
SPEAKER_02: I sell this to my dad all the time, how fortunate
I feel like I am.
I've moved several times between high school, college stops,
professional stops.
I feel very fortunate to be 0.8 miles from that thing and have
44 miles to go in different directions.
And I'm not the only one.
There are a lot of people that get out there and use that
thing.
And I'm proud of that because it's very easy to take certain
things that you have around you for granted.
And I'm I just wanted to maintain that.
And I think that's where let's um steel man the outrage.
Let's steel man the outrage.
I think that's what the outrage is born in because we don't want
to see that go downhill from there, right?
Because people do enjoy it.
We want to continue to pour into it and make it better.
So let's use it as an opportunity to make it better,
maybe.
SPEAKER_03: I a hundred percent agree.
And I mean, I think about it, you're talking about like how
fortunate you are.
I tell Michaela this all the time.
She's like, Did you miss Hattiesburg?
I say the one thing that I really miss about Hattiesburg is
that trace.
Because it was such a like, I felt more comfortable riding my
bike on the trace.
I felt more comfortable running on the trace.
Like everything about it was so nice.
And then, like, you don't get me wrong, Coast is awesome.
There's a bunch of places to do stuff, but if I ever felt unsafe
like on my bicycle or anything, I had 44 44 miles of tracer
time.
So, um, yeah, it's unfortunate.
I'm I'm hope, I'm hopeful.
I know there's a bunch of people that are probably going to be at
um, I want to say it's this Thursday at 10 a.m.
People are going to voice their concerns with the um committee
and board members, and I I know that there's quite a few people
that will be there on Thursday.
So we'll see.
I'm hopeful.
I'm hopeful that we I I really I hate to say this, I hope that we
don't have like a just a shouting match.
Let me just use bad words here, bitching session, you know, and
we actually see some positive change out of this meeting.
Agree.
Agree.
We'll see.
Um past that, we've got we'll we'll mention one more thing.
Um we have the Rocket City Marathon coming up in December.
Zach and I will both be there.
Um, we will have some some more stuff coming out about that.
We've got two two specific Rocket City Marathon episodes
that we're gonna put out later in the year.
Zach and I are both going out.
Um, we're gonna record a podcast up there, and then we'll be
around all.
I guess we're going.
We haven't actually talked about the the uh what our time frame
looks like up there, but we will be up there for a podcast or one
or two, and then um probably do a live podcast kind of like we
did at um the big run a few weeks ago, and then we'll both
be running the race.
So we hope to see you all there.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
Turn it up.
Yeah, from back roads to start lines, early mornings, late
nights, miles on the pavement, head down, chasing daylight.
Mississippi heartbeat, sweat mixed with the grind.
Pain in the legs, but it's all in the mind, endurance state of
mind where the weeds don't last.
Uh from miles long rides, we're built for the past and the
future, no shortcuts, no skipping the test.
When you spoiled it, your punishment and give it your
best.
From 5K's to hundreds, trail dust in our lungs.
Every story earned, every finish hard won.
No hype, just truth.
No filters, no cap.
If you suffer for growth, yeah, this podcast is that.
Posted by the miles, not the flame or the shine.
If you know, then you know.
Endurance, state of mind.