Accountability Corner
Embark on an adventure with Darren, Morgan, and Chris, the dynamic trio steering the ship at "Accountability Corner." As passionate OCR enthusiasts, they're on a mission to share their expertise and enthusiasm for obstacle course racing with the world. From sharing insider tips on overcoming training plateaus to demystifying the complexities of race registration and gear selection, no stone is left unturned. Whether you're a seasoned competitor hungry for fresh perspectives or a newcomer eager to dip your toes into the muddy waters of OCR, these hosts are here to guide you every step of the way. Join them as they peel back the curtain on the electrifying world of OCR, revealing stories of triumph, camaraderie, and boundless adventure.
Don't miss out – tune in and discover why OCR is capturing hearts and minds around the globe!
Accountability Corner
#31: 2024 European Obstacle Course Championships and British Champs Review
What if navigating an obstacle course could be as thrilling for spectators as it is for racers? Join us on this electrifying episode of Accountability Corner, where we break down the recent British and European Championships and share our personal training journeys. We discuss the challenges we faced at the Euros in Italy, shoutout to Jamie Gain's new podcast, "Never Stumped: Adaptive OCR Podcast," and question if our previous recaps have really given these events the justice they deserve.
Imagine a 3K Euro race so intense it keeps audiences on the edge of their seats. We reimagine the 3K race, exploring its diverse challenges across different locations and debating how to make it more engaging for spectators. From tweaking obstacle density to revising penalty systems, we brainstorm ways to amplify the excitement and introduce unpredictability into the competition. We also delve into the nuances between the 3K and 12K races, offering insights on how athletes must uniquely prepare for each.
Finally, we tackle the grueling mountain races with their unexpected elevation gains and the importance of specialized training. Reflecting on personal experiences, we discuss the strategic benefits of mass starts, the impact of obstacle penalties, and the new prize money at the European Championships. Even without a gold medal, recognizing achievements remains vital. Join us as we share our lessons learned, the significance of preparation and perseverance, and our anticipations for future competitions.
Welcome to the Accountability Corner, where we talk about everything obstacle course racing, from staying disciplined in training, affording the sport, signing up for your first race and, more importantly, how the sport is growing around the world, with your hosts Morgan Maxwell, chris Shipley and Darren Martin.
Speaker 2:Okay, let's go. Episode 31, Accountability Corner. I think I'm going to stop doing. I'm going to phase out them intros. I don't know if they're getting boring.
Speaker 3:What's going to be your new?
Speaker 2:intro no intro. We just go straight into our topic.
Speaker 3:We'll definitely never forget what episode we're on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we do it for us, really, don't we?
Speaker 3:I like knowing how far we've actually got.
Speaker 1:I suppose it helps you when you do the editing. Oh, we're on episode 31.
Speaker 3:I'm on the right one.
Speaker 1:I've clicked on the wrong right recorded.
Speaker 2:Since Mo asked us literally seconds before this episode what topic we're doing. Do you want to intro it, mo? You're up. I don't know, I wasn't 100. You're up, get on the stage. You're on, go.
Speaker 3:I think we're doing something about British Champs slash Euros recapping yeah or no? Yeah, keep going come on, you got this so, yeah, we're going to be recapping how the Euros went and then how British Champs went, and our thoughts and feelings. So this might be a long one, it might be a short one.
Speaker 1:We'll find out in a minute we're all still trying to find out, yeah it could be a short one, don't know.
Speaker 2:We haven't talked about the Euros in depth. And we haven't talked about the Euros in depth. We haven't talked about the British Champs in depth. Yeah, we've had Jamie on, which was amazing, and also shout out, jamie has launched his new podcast. Anyone remember what it's called?
Speaker 1:Something about a stump, stumped, stumped and Stumpy uh, stumped, stumped and uh, stumpy, stump and stumpy. Jamie gain, I'm gonna google it. Oh no, I bet I'll get there.
Speaker 2:First. It's called never stumped, never stumped. We were stumped at the name of that. No, never stumped. Adaptive ocr podcast. There you go big up, jamie ships. Do you think we've, uh, recapped the euros enough in like jamie's episode, or do you think there's more?
Speaker 2:there's more to be said then I think we recapped the one particular race that we was in where we were racing with an adaptive athlete, and we covered a lot of things about how the adaptive athletes are progressing in the sport, but I don't think we covered what the euros was like and how it went for us in a way yeah, well, we, we've been very clear with everyone uh, all the listeners that we've been focusing on the Euros quite a considerable amount, that all of our training's gone towards being technically adapted to obstacles so that we can overcome whatever the Euros throws at us, because it throws all sorts of different obstacles at you, from flying monkey bars to hammers as nunchucks. It's the most random obstacle selection you can get so until yeah.
Speaker 2:But we, when we started training for the euros back when the euros you worlds finished last year, because we knew that we needed to do the ocr long run, we've banged on about that. That's been incredible for obstacle endurance. And then we've also gone through how we change up obstacles, learning from like uh, even like russell, talking to him about how he changes up these obstacles and doing those tempo sessions. So so it went well, like we. We we felt prepared, didn't we?
Speaker 1:yeah, we did the recon, we did the preparation, we did everything that I think we needed to do.
Speaker 3:And that was about it, maybe minus the hills.
Speaker 2:That's what I was going to get onto. No, this particular race.
Speaker 3:I think we did everything right if we were going back to Hungary.
Speaker 1:I disagree because I think I trained right.
Speaker 3:I was just injured Well well, maybe you're the exception, but personally I think I did everything right for a Euros. It's just. This wasn't a Euros of its typical nature, so my training was a little bit skewed. It's going to help me in the future, definitely this block that we've been through, but I don't think I needed this for this Euros in particular. But I'm sure we'll get on to that.
Speaker 1:You wasn't focusing 100% on the Euros, though, so it didn't really matter so much for you no, but I was focusing my obstacles.
Speaker 3:I was making sure I would get through the toughest Euros course.
Speaker 2:Yeah, true that. So, going back to when we obviously we booked our flights, we knew where we're going, but there was still, yes, we knew it was going to be in italy. Yes, we knew it was going to be a ski resort, but we never knew how much of like the ski resort they were going to use. Did we like when did when? Did we get um the the map? Well, no, it wasn't a map, wasn't it? It was a. It was like a flyby, wasn't it of like the terrain was it a flyby?
Speaker 2:we got yeah yeah, it was, wasn't it? It was something like a recording of, like this is this is the elevation gain, but it didn't tell you how you were going to achieve that elevation gain.
Speaker 1:I mean, it was pretty decent early on, wasn't it? It was probably I'm going to give a figure out there probably about six months. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That only takes us to December. It was probably like February or something. So it was like February, March, April, May, June, One, two, three, four, Four months.
Speaker 3:Four months, june, uh, one, two, three, four, four months. Four months, so do you think that's enough time to us to adapt our training to for the for the race, not for that particular race. No, I mean because we don't have the experience of them sort of races yeah, we could.
Speaker 1:I mean, with that sort of elevation you could probably do with a bigger base build with that sort of those sort of hills. But I mean, let's, let's not be around the bush. We knew it was in the mountains. We should have known. I mean, we didn't really have to see the, the, the flybys to know that it was going to be hilly. So so the Bloody Mountains.
Speaker 3:To be fair, though, that wasn't even I wasn't preparing necessarily like shipping to the start for that race in particular, so I knew the hills would get me, and that's actually wasn't what the problem was. The problem, well, the thing I thought could have been harder was the obstacles, or just even, maybe not even harder Like the obstacles they had.
Speaker 1:I think were the perfect balance. I think it's just a few more. Yeah, I think you're right, because I think we didn't train the hills to run the hills as the most key part of that race. We thought the hill was going to be a factor, but the hill wasn't going to determine determine the winner, as much as it probably well determine how well your race went by the hill, because the obstacles didn't matter as much as that hill mattered. We thought, oh right, it's going to be a big hill, but you, you're still going to gain a lot of stuff back on the obstacles you're right.
Speaker 2:If I was going to mausine to spartan european championships, I'll be like right. The biggest factors for winning this race, or doing well, is to be a mountain goat. I need to know that. I need to run. Yes, obstacles need to be a factor, but they need to be 25 of my performance. 75 of it needs to be my running ability to go over the terrain of a mountain.
Speaker 2:But when we approach, how we've approached the euros, because we've got this big stigma of the Euros being the most technical race in the world we treated it the other way around. I think when our approach this is us kind of recapping our approach into the Euros, I feel like I approached it at 75% needs to be the obstacle game and 25% needs to be the running or the terrain. And yes, I did train for hills, yes, I did get my elevation in in, but only at 25 of what I did. So then we arrived at the euros. We had the 3k, we had the 12k standard course and then we had the team race. The 3k literally had one hill, didn't it? Or two, two, I'd say two, two hills yeah, yeah, you're right, first hill going up the ski slope.
Speaker 1:And then you had a second after um spaghetti obstacle yeah, you had like a warm-up hill and then a whole hill. So okay, because it was half and then half again, wasn't it?
Speaker 3:and even the downhill mattered. A lot on that, that was, even though you weren't going uphill as much. Lot on that, that was, even though you didn't weren't going uphill as much the downhill. On that you could put at like minutes into people.
Speaker 2:So you two, you two competed in the 3k. I obviously did the journeyman wave because I thought you won it, didn't you win it.
Speaker 1:I came second in the journey, second yeah you're talking to a silver medalist right here.
Speaker 2:Do you feel it was significantly easier, let's say obstacles-wise?
Speaker 1:Obstacle-wise, in terms of technicality of obstacles or density of obstacles, it was definitely easy. The only troubles I think most people were having on any of the obstacles was a few of the marshals being quite critical on one of them Personally. What do you think?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it needs to be easier to I don't want to blame it on the marshals as well, because I think there was points where there was just still a bit of grey areas. I think the Euros did a better job than the Worlds did at kind of start and finish points and making it as clear for the marshals as possible. But I also think there's still some grey areas, especially when it comes to rigs, that we just need to iron out.
Speaker 2:So what way around do you think the race was? Do you think, because let's think back to euros uh, denmark, poland, a 3k course? You're. You needed to be at the top of the game for obstacle athlete. You needed to be technically good to get through it and that was your win or lose moments. If you're good at your obstacles, you, you win yeah, you had to.
Speaker 1:You had to have endurance over them, obstacles as well, because they were dense, yeah, but let's go back to the euros just been.
Speaker 2:Do you think that's become well balanced or do you think that's switched around too far this year?
Speaker 3:I keep struggling. I keep going back and forth in my head whether we needed it to be more dense or we just needed the obstacles to be a little bit more technical. But then I think I think the obstacle, tech, technique wise, was probably spot on. I do think it maybe just was a density issue yeah, I'm with you on that 100 I think it's hard in the mountains, obviously, to get the obstacles there.
Speaker 3:That's the only thing, the kind of thing I'll give them. So they've used the train and used that almost as an obstacle to help that and not have to get as many obstacles up the mountain. But I do think, especially on the 3K where it's I mean, maybe it's just because we've known it to be this grueling endurance test, even though it's 3k typically a euro is the 3k, it's not the harder race. But they normally end up taking obstacles out or changing the next day because they find out on the 3k that oh, maybe that was a bit too tough. I think because we're used to that. It was kind of a bit of a shock to the system when I didn't even get a pump across the finish line yeah, yeah, even even the bigger obstacles.
Speaker 1:I mean that, yeah, like, like you say, the technicality of them was pretty good, but then there just wasn't a lot of other bits and pieces to slow you down. And I noticed that because obviously I wasn't being able, I weren't able to run at a good pace, so I was obviously a lot slower off my usual pace because of injury. And then you notice that going into the obstacles because you notice is there's there's not a lot of them to like in bulk, as it would usually be.
Speaker 2:I actually, when I went around it, I found I found it quite well balanced than I've ever done a. Then I've done a 3k euros. The reason being is that you were I felt like it was balanced enough that you were able to attack the technical obstacles without worrying about slowing down into them. That I've done in the past. I don't know if you felt that ships, you've done it, you've done a fair few 3k euros and I know no, no no, I haven't.
Speaker 2:I've only done two, all right okay, I'm the veteran in here, so I did poland, I did, I think, poland. What was after poland?
Speaker 1:italy because we had covid, didn't we?
Speaker 2:oh yeah, done worlds as well. Actually, was it Italy? No, when was it last year? Euros, hungary, hungary Did the 3K there as well. See, the thing is 3K and Hungary, that was dense.
Speaker 3:Yeah, see, I like the balance of Hungary.
Speaker 1:Yeah, hungary had a better balance, I thought.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so did we. Are we agreeing? Did we hit? Did we hit the mark of our training for the 3k or not?
Speaker 3:Yes, I think it suited us more. I think it was. I don't know. It's weird, though, cause like that middle section where it was run up the hill, do the balance beam and then run down the hill, basically, like it was just a bit strange that whole section. I don't know what it was about it and I get it was technical running, so maybe that's why they didn't need many obstacles there.
Speaker 1:I think I just wanted an obstacle there, just one more maybe yeah, I know what you mean, but you don't forget, even in hungary we we had that road section towards the end after you did the what was it? The tractor tyre drag, not tractor tyre drag, the tank drag. After that you had quite a long run section to the last final obstacle as well. So that was pretty similar in distance probably.
Speaker 3:I think that was just easier to potentially overwork because it was so flat. But then I guess you could argue the same about the hill. If you really pushed the hill, you'd have been pretty messed up I think they do not.
Speaker 2:Controversial opinion. I think the 3k and the 12k are completely different races and they need to treat them like completely different races. So what I mean by that? They're trying to make them both kind of endurance races, when really I think they should go back to poland and denmark and make the 3k the most grueling, obstacle, dense thing in the world and it's a different athlete that becomes.
Speaker 1:That ends up being focusing on the two races well, the reason people enjoy the 3k and this is this is what people say, anyway, this is what most athletes say that they enjoy the 3k because it's usually more obstacle dense and the focus is not on the running. Yeah, you still have to be able to run, don't get me wrong. I mean, you still have to be able to run, but you still have to be able to get over those obstacles at a fluid rate, that you still have to move quickly, but it isn't. I mean, yes, you do need a run section, don't you know that? That's that to move quickly, but it isn't. I mean, yes, you do need a run section, don't you know? That's that is part of it, but it doesn't have to be a long one and it doesn't have to be a technical one, but you still need to get through a multitude of obstacles efficiently and fast, and I think that's what draws people to that 3k.
Speaker 2:What do you reckon though?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I agree, I think maybe make the 3K something different and you could have even there made the 3K there was enough space around the village area to have had a really spectator-friendly 3K around the whole kind of village and make it an atmosphere and make it kind of like what they do for the 100 metres. Make it so it's a bit more spectator friendly and that it is grueling and there's lots of changes because people are falling off stuff and different people are taking leads and obstacles and make the obstacle times matter a bit more oh, can you imagine that as well?
Speaker 2:change the penalty system for it. Make it completely dense. Get rid of the penalty system of the band and make it a retry. That would be brutal. That'd be brilliant to watch, because you have people falling off like chasing going back on yeah, you would get queues yeah, it'd be horrible to manage.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that'd be hard yeah it'd be hard to manage, especially the 3k wave system as it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I think yeah it 3k is a spectator sport and they need to treat it like a spectator sport. And it's also an obstacle. A proficient obstacle course racer who isn't as good as a running should feel confident in a 3k, and that's what it also should be you still.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I think the problem is with this sport it is a foot race, so the fastest runners are always going to have a really good shot, but you need to make it. So you have to be decent at running but also know your obstacles and be good at your obstacles. I think, like stein and jesse are always going to be the exception, because they're both amazing runners and also amazing obstacle athletes, so you will see them do well, but you need to make it so that some maybe of the lesser running guys that are really solid at obstacles, they have a good shot at getting, even if it's in the top 10, top 15.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Because that's their thing.
Speaker 1:You know what it's like when you're going through a dense section, but you are getting through it fast. It's a different way of movement. It's not the same. It's like you just got to get over things so smooth that that's your effort. You're not going like when you run hard. You're running hard, your heart rate goes up quite hard, but when you're going through a dense section you've hard, but when you're going for a dense section of obstacles so smooth.
Speaker 1:Yeah, dense section of obstacles you've got to be getting over it. Real fluid and like you're, almost like you're breathing hard, but it's because your whole body's working hard. It's not because you're putting down a hard run. It's such a different way, a hard way to explain.
Speaker 3:But and it also rewards people that have the skill of getting over obstacles quickly but still manage to maintain a good effort. I know we're going to talk about British Champs later, but it's quite clear when we were at Spartan Race, like British Champs weekend, it was very clear that I was better on most of the obstacles than the guys around me in the top 10. But on every obstacle you're getting either closer to them or in front of them, but then soon as because Spartan traditionally is quite a run heavy race, the running matters, whereas I think you should be rewarded more in the 3K at European Championships if you're that person that can get through obstacles quicker than make seconds.
Speaker 2:That's the summary. Then who should the race reward? That's what they need to ask themselves. And 3Ks of old have awarded obstacle specialists. I remember seeing leon beat john alwyn for the first time because leon out-obstacled him and and that would that he wouldn't, because the race awarded an obstacle athlete rather than a running athlete, which john has traditionally been, even though john's solid obstacles as well.
Speaker 1:But yeah, we don't have to fall down the path of it being a 3k ninja warrior no, no but it needs to be dense.
Speaker 2:It needs to be scary to be dense, yeah dense.
Speaker 1:Dense is the word. I think we need to keep saying they're not technical, because I think people get misguided with the fact that like, oh, everyone wants a technical race, it's not, we want a dense obstacle race, you, you was spectating and also you saw mo like mo, like the brit, not the british champs, but the spartan afterwards, just going over walls.
Speaker 2:I'm getting gaining like seconds over walls. Yeah, because we train walls, we've said, we said we love mandatory obstacles. But you're the same mo, that's what you're saying, aren't you? Even? You're not saying all the monkey bars, you're doing quicker. It's like walls um rope, climbs, all of the like, the easy, traditional things. If you practice them, you can also.
Speaker 3:It rewards an obstacle athlete massively, and I think obviously this is all our opinion and maybe it's we're a little bit biased because we like obstacle races like that as well. So the runners are always going to want a more run, suited course, I guess, with bigger breaks in between obstacles. But I don't think you should reward technique too much either. I think the obstacles don't need to be crazy, crazy technical. They need to have an element of technical or some rigs that are a little bit technical. So you have to learn a skill. But I think even just throwing in a few more walls or just things where people can make time up, if they've actually spent time learning that skill, it doesn't necessarily need to be crazy hard or something that's going to catch loads of people out. I think it just needs to be dense. Testing the endurance, I think, is the key.
Speaker 1:Because they're getting always confused with like always saying, oh, we need better completion rates. We're looking at the stats. We've got to have this many completion rates. We don't like having a low completion rate. Well, stop doing the technical obstacles and just put a few more mandatory ones. You can have retries. How many times can you get to retry a wall? You're not to get cues on a wall, but you have a load of them, a load of, like, um, irish tables or something. Great obstacle, because that's that's quite a challenging obstacle, but you don't have to have single attempt on it, it's multiple attempt because, all right, you messed it up at the first time, you can go back in it.
Speaker 3:It's still a spectacle because if you get over it fluid and efficiently, it looks pretty cool especially and like the thing that's so easy to do is just stack them, put three walls next to each other. A lot of times the other thing is they're putting a couple of these mandatory obstacles in to say they're an extra obstacle, but the problem is especially a wall. For example, if you put one wall in a mile run, it doesn't really do anything for anyone, whereas if you put three walls next to each other, that changes everything well, that's what they had at hungary, that with that section, say so, like you know the bit.
Speaker 1:After you came off the track with the laser shooting, then you had that like the uh tires and ropes, then you had a wall, then you had the weaver and then you had um skitch. You know that's three decent obstacles. They're not super duper hard, but they're stacked on top of each other. They look good to watch and then you've got that like oh, that was a bit of a pump onto next one and then they had another group of obstacles. So it was.
Speaker 3:It was nice and dense well, even belgium, like think about the world champs? You had them, was it three or four balls all together? And then you went on to the monkey bar, olympus, and then you went onto that kind of monkey bar obstacle, yeah, and you got to that monkey bar obstacle and you felt fucked just because you went through all these walls, did Olympus. Before that you had firefighters and yeah, it changed the race yeah.
Speaker 1:I said to you, I said to you guys didn't, I said I failed the which one? Was it that? Yeah, I said. I said to you guys didn't, I said I failed the. Which one? Was it that? Last one? The um, the one with the no monkey dips the tricep bar.
Speaker 1:The tricep bars I failed that, not at the tricep dips. I failed it back on firefighters because of how, how badly I did firefighters. All right, I got through firefighters, but that was the, that was the rolling of the deck, that was what brought me down eventually, because I used up pump there, which got me at that obstacle. And that's what it's about. It's not about, oh, you failed that one obstacle, it's about getting through it so fluid that you get through the whole course fluid, and that's what gives you the speed, that's what gives you the champion.
Speaker 2:Yeah so we're saying the euro's just being, we're chucking some mandatory obstacles and we would have been golden. Yeah, some, what you know there was there was quite a few straights, like the straight before the last two technical obstacles at the end. Imagine five walls in a row there, that straight yeah, yeah yeah, you would have been.
Speaker 2:You would have been blowing as you go into, like then you go into the tire flip, then you go into the balance beam and then you go into two very technical obstacles that that would be a gauntlet and you know, mandatory obstacles give you as well.
Speaker 1:They give the ability to the spectators to catch up to the athletes because they slow them down yeah, yeah, how hard was it when we was trying to chase each other trying to do a bit of filming yeah it was.
Speaker 2:It was that fast that we couldn't catch up watching yeah, they need to think about how, how spectators actually want to flow around the course, especially when it comes to european championships. There's people that were trying to record, trying to get sponsorship, trying to really put themselves out there. And and also, you want to invite your family over to say you can actually see me, but none of us would do that because they definitely can't see you, especially when you go. We go to the main race, the 12k. Yeah, so how? So? We summarize our obstacle game was solid. That it's just. It's just maybe rewarding it. It was. It wasn't as dense as it used to be and we trained for density, yeah yeah, we definitely trained for more density than that wait, but mo, I feel like you, you performed, you did.
Speaker 2:You did an amazing result in the uh 3k and I think that's down to your focus on the british champs, on your training.
Speaker 3:Yeah, because I think actually my training was spot on for the free care, even though there's a few hills and things and again that downhill, that's where I lost most my time, I think if I could have attacked. Yeah, I think actually my training was spot on for the free kick, even though there's a few hills and things and again that downhill, that's where I lost most of my time. I think if I could have attacked that I lost a few places on that downhill, but if I could have attacked that, that would be the only place I think would have bumped me even further yeah well, he beats.
Speaker 2:Dine anyway yeah, on, well, he beats Stein anyway, yeah, on camera.
Speaker 3:On camera so. I've still never lost a sprint finish.
Speaker 2:There you go. What about the 12K, 14K, 13K, 12K plus?
Speaker 3:It felt like a mountain Spartan race, with a few more technical obstacles than Spartan would traditionally have. Do you know what it was?
Speaker 1:It was a bigger version of the British Champs.
Speaker 3:Yeah, rather than the British Champs being flat, they just threw you up a mountain. I just thought it was just a bit. I enjoyed it because of the experience. I think spending the time with the views and not that I was really taking in the views and and the mist over the mountain when he was up there was quite cool and I enjoyed, maybe, the race, but there was just parts where I found myself like craving obstacles which I did not expect to think I'd have at euros I agree the adventure got me rather than the race, because it was just, it was like you say, ships.
Speaker 2:Maybe we were just stupid. We should have actually understood. It's in the ski resort, it's in the mountain, they're going to put you straight up it. But I never expected when they said they're going to put you straight up. It is like, was it 500 meters within the first three miles straight up? And you're just, you're not even able sometimes. Yeah, if you trained a bit more, if I trained a bit more, I would have been able to run in certain circumstances. But I don't think even the best were running at times. They were speed hiking up the mountain and that just didn't feel like a race to me. And that just didn't feel like a race to me, that it felt like I don't know. It just took the enjoyment out of it. Because obstacle course racing is fast octane, sort of like jumping through obstacles.
Speaker 3:You're going really fast, you're running, but it just felt like three miles of just hiking and then then you hit some obstacles and then it's downhill and I think your heart rate was lower than normal because the height, because you couldn't run and you're reduced to a power height but you can't really power hike and get your heart rate up that high. So when you, as soon as you got back to the running and the obstacles, it just made that a little bit easier as well, which is was weird in a way, because it was like now I'm doing these obstacles quite chilled and there's not many of them, so now I'm just like in a going for a run in the mountain yeah, I think they just put one too many hill in there.
Speaker 1:It was pretty good up until that, because I think we got to a section I think it was probably about the section where I throw up. It was a bit where you were coming for a nice single track and you think, all right, now we're onto a bit of single track, that's probably all the hills done, and that if it was around about that that sort of elevation, it probably would have ended up being about 5 000 meters, not 5 000 meters, yeah, 5 000 meters.
Speaker 2:Is that right 500 meters?
Speaker 1:yeah, that's a, that's really day in it. Yeah, it would have been about 500 meters, not 5 000. Um, that would have been not too bad because you would have had that power hike, but then you could have still had like a flat section and then it would have been a bit more evened out, shall we say so what should we have done in our training?
Speaker 2:what could, should we have done better?
Speaker 1:no, I don't know. I think we did all right for well I.
Speaker 3:I did all right for the hill training it's hard to train for that when you don't live near a ski resort. Yeah, because it's even the ground, like on that first section, because it's like a ski resort. It's it's not like technical in terms of like foot placements and stuff. It's not like technical in terms of like foot placements and stuff. It's all quite easy. It's just grass but it's just steep, like that level of steepness you could get it on a treadmill I guess, but it's, it's just hard to replicate that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you should have tried to find terrain like it. I'm lucky down this way where I live, because I have got terrain that I thought was going to be like the terrain that was there and I used that terrain. It's just. I had a bad ankle and I was sick. I've thrown loads of excuses out there today.
Speaker 2:There is yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sorry about that?
Speaker 3:No, but I actually would agree. I think you were the most prepared for that particular race. Unfortunately, because of circumstances, I didn't get to show your skills on the day, but, knowing your training, I think you were, out of all of us, probably the most prepared well, I prepared to fail and failed.
Speaker 1:I prepared well, I just failed.
Speaker 3:He's preparing he just did one too many things training. Yeah, pushed the boat out too much.
Speaker 2:But again we over-trained obstacles. The obstacles were easy on the 12K.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we could have took an obstacle session out and ran hills more.
Speaker 1:But you guys train obstacles every week.
Speaker 2:We need to get our balance right with our training, but we need to understand the balance of the course we're going on to be able to train for that course specifically, or we need to keep at such a high level at both running and obstacle proficiency to be able to perform at any race that we hit, which means you have to train more.
Speaker 3:It's a bit harder when you've uh, when you've got a job and life in the way but that wasn't and but that also was a very specific skill set when it comes to running. It wasn't traditional running, so it's also like another plate to juggle. And that was my struggle was because I was so all in on the british champs I couldn't afford to juggle that kind of third plate, if you like. I had to kind of go well and I kind of went to the Euros thinking I haven't done as I was, training hills, but I wasn't doing as much hill work as you need to for that sort of course. But I accepted that in the beginning. But my only hope, my kind of saving grace, was when well, it's the European champs, my obstacle should help me bump me up the leaderboard a bit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that was in the back of everyone's mind. I think that is probably going to contradict what we said earlier, but in the back of everyone's mind we think well, it's the Euros, Our obstacle game's good, that's going to get us through any sort of running that they're going to throw at us and that's just us. It's probably why other athletes did so well at this Euros that we weren't expecting.
Speaker 2:I was super, super confident that I would be up there on a podium in my age group because of my obstacle game and that that is the most arrogant thing that I've, a thing I've ever thought about the euros. I can't believe that, that I thought I was that arrogant about the euros, my obstacle ability. I thought it doesn't matter if they're outrun me, it's the euros, I'll out, obstacle them, I'll get the time back. That just wasn't the case on this course. The Euros changed completely Even out-obstacling people. They were already gone. They were already up the mountain.
Speaker 1:The thing is there was no one to out-obstacle, because everyone was at that ability with the obstacles.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because the ability of the obstacles came down slightly. It wasn't at a level that we trained for. Also, the obstacles came down slightly.
Speaker 3:It wasn't at a level that we trained for, yeah, and also the obstacles were quite short as well. So, even if the seconds you would make didn't really matter because the runs were so long compared to the obstacles even like the penalty loop, the amount of special it wasn't so much on the 3K If you got a penalty in the 3K, you were still pretty much done for how it should be. It wasn't so much on the 3k if you got a penalty in the 3k, you were still pretty much done for how it should be. But on the 12k or it was actually like 14k, weren't it but on that race it didn't really matter. If you got a penalty loop and you're a good runner, because or a good mountain runner, shall we say, because the running helped you so much more than the penalty, especially because most people that were getting penalties were falling off the block obstacle, and that obstacle was probably about the same time duration maybe a little bit quicker, but the same time duration as the penalty.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, when I did OCR series this year and I said it was a 21K race and did I had two penalties but it didn't impact the race. It's literally that because the running's so spread out, it makes the the penalty system. If it was a, I suppose it does change. If it's if the field's really, really dense, like the people that you're racing against, and there's so many people filling their spots with time, but when you are in your age group and your ways and all that, it spreads it out a bit more. Yeah, and the the obstacles don't matter as much because oh, I'm sorry the penalty doesn't matter as much because you, you're gaining that time back. If you're a good runner, do some math. So, like, say, you ran 10, 10 kilometers and the penalty was, I don't know, shorter, I don't know. Do some math, do some equations.
Speaker 3:The penalty loop was about, let's say, anywhere between 40 seconds and a minute. Yeah, and you could probably gain the good runners could gain a minimum of 40 seconds per mile. I'd say up some of the hills and downhills if you were good in the mountains there you go, maths.
Speaker 2:Essentially, you're saying that the the most failable obstacles need to be the longer obstacles. To reward people that are good at obstacles. Is that right?
Speaker 3:no, the opposite way around, I think, if you're going to keep, the if you're going to do short obstacles, all the obstacles need to be short, and then you can't make your most technical obstacle, your longest obstacle right I get what you mean, because then it doesn't. It makes the penalty loop redundant, especially if you say someone falls off at the very beginning of the obstacle. They can make up that time on a run, even just from adrenaline of falling off the obstacle if they really pushed you know how to fix this.
Speaker 1:You just make them. You just make them technical obstacles the same, but then you just put a section of density there. Yeah, so if you had that same obstacle but then threw in a couple of mandatory obstacles or a couple of walls, crawls another carry or something where, say, if you came off that obstacle, that person gets their band cut, catches up with them, but that person in front already been slowed down and has to go through their obstacle skills to get over a load of more mandatory obstacles, which brings them back to each other and closes that gap, that time gap, whereas you just, if you were running, you just go ahead and you'd increase that time, but if you came back you'd regain time. I'm moving my hands a lot here.
Speaker 2:I get it. I get it. I'm loving the hands.
Speaker 1:No one can see that?
Speaker 3:No one can see it. You know what I'm saying?
Speaker 2:He's so energetic right now.
Speaker 3:I do think this argument doesn't translate to the podium, though, which I guess is always what they want. It doesn't actually matter in retrospect of the people that won would have still won, because they didn't get penalties. Penalties didn't matter if you wanted to win the race, but I think it was just. It was a more well-rounded race from the whole field If the penalty system and the obstacle systems all line up, because it's when you're racing someone as well, especially because the way they do it as time trial, you don't really know who you're racing, what's going on, and then you can be racing someone. They fall off an obstacle and just disappear and you've done the obstacle and now you don't even know where they are and it's, and you get to the end and you don't know if they're, if you're going to see them on the penalty loop, if not, if you're going to catch them up, like you, don't it just?
Speaker 1:there's a lot of blurred lines blurred lines. It's so many doing.
Speaker 2:Doing the penalty at the obstacle is, I think, is a better way to keep a race from a racing point of view yeah and also having a mass start.
Speaker 3:Not that's the other. The other thing I didn't get about the 15k that why are we not mass starting that yeah or at least two waves.
Speaker 1:Yeah, two waves if the numbers are that big.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah or at least, yeah, at least two waves, not like that. Many people want to go, they.
Speaker 3:Well, when at a spartan and we're saying this race is similar to a spartan right yeah, and actually the differences between I guess spartan do the same, because they do the penalties at the obstacle, so it doesn't there's not really any cue in, and because you're doing that, you get rid of any cue. So why can't we have a mass start? Make the okay, the first rig might have to be a little bit later on, but just throw some balls or just some stuff to break up the field first.
Speaker 2:And you've seen Spartans where they have monkey bars and they've got everyone jumping on kicking each other, everyone. And they've got everyone jumping on kicking each other. Everyone's just on there at the same time. There's nothing wrong with that. That's competition. That's the idea.
Speaker 3:You just make the course. You design the course like that Because it doesn't work, I guess, with the more technical stuff, because there's only four lanes or five lanes whatever. But you just throw some monkey bars and some more simpler stuff where you can have everyone on just kicking each other.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, simpler stuff, where you can have everyone on just kicking each other. Yeah, yeah, right, so what have? What have we learned from?
Speaker 3:the euros. Did we like it? I enjoyed the experience. I really enjoyed. I did enjoy the races. I mean we've been. I thought it might have been a bit too negative. I did really enjoy the racing and just yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, you said the 3K was your best course you've ever been on.
Speaker 3:When did I say that Straight afterwards? You're just so excited afterwards aren't you?
Speaker 1:Oh, that was the best. 3k.
Speaker 3:That's just the best fucking course I've ever done, man, yeah, I've looked back on that since. No, but that's the thing. It was really enjoyable and it was an experience. Maybe and again I think, maybe they did get the 3k right. I think it was the 12k that was probably wrong oh, just full of contradictions here, isn't he? Yeah, the 3k was hard because it was like yeah, it's just I don't know.
Speaker 3:I've gone back and forth on the 3k loads with how I felt about it, but the 12K I do think not got it wrong, but it just didn't feel like what I expected it to feel like. Maybe that's where I think all three of us are at is like we expected this humbling like we always get. Because we didn't get that, it's kind of like left us a bit empty.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, you always. You always learn something from the euros. Obstacle wise. You always come away from it like, oh, should have done that obstacle better.
Speaker 3:But maybe, yeah, maybe, we are feeling a little bit empty from the obstacles well, the long course, all I felt like I've learned was that I didn't do enough hills, which is the exact thing I already knew going so I didn't learn anything.
Speaker 3:I think that was the kicker it was like I didn't get the best result in the world. And then I love to reflect on my races and see what I've learned. But I ran a really strong race considering the fact that I was limited. So it's kind of like, yeah, I don't know. I think that's why I feel a bit weird.
Speaker 1:Chips. What did you learn? I learned a lot of things to be fair, a lot of things of myself, about how I should not get so stressed about things, how I should let things go. I learned how all that stuff happens, and I also learned that it's I don't know what I've learned. To be fair, I didn't actually learn that much in terms of course, and that because I don't think I've got the opportunity to find out anything yeah, listeners, we need to let you know that um shipley's giving us excuses right now, but we we have to.
Speaker 2:We have to be fair to him. He was ill. We don't know why he was ill. Maybe it was too much pizza, too much espressos, whatever italian air expressos. We don't know what it was, but shipley was not himself it's such a but also like into the race.
Speaker 1:I knew things weren't going Like. It was like a. Do you know what I'm calling it? And I've already spoken, I'm calling it the cracker curse. It's because I'm a podcaster, right? Yeah, Like another podcaster on another podcast. Since they started podcasting, their athletic regime or skills have gone downhill and they seem to be cursed with injuries or things going wrong during races.
Speaker 2:It's not that.
Speaker 3:I thought Kirk was doing alright, though weren't he Kirk's doing alright, but Kirk's only on.
Speaker 1:I'll take the Kirk of the podcast. Kirk's only on one podcast.
Speaker 3:Oh, and you're on more than one.
Speaker 1:I've got the cracker curse I'm seeing this yeah, but um, it is disappointing and I've noticed it because I've been watching a lot of like, um, like the tour de france thing and the the um, the athletics things on netflix at the moment and it's like it's so disappointing when you put a lot of eggs in one basket and don't get to perform. Because of like not being able to perform, it's not because you didn't get to give everything you gave and it just doesn't, doesn't happen on that day it's a real pain in the ass. So I learned also this is the good thing from it, the positive bit from it is that afterwards you can't let that stop you doing from what you like doing or love doing, because you still got to. I mean I'm not going to give up training now. I mean I'm going to go back to it and plan again and I'm not going to change anything like I want to.
Speaker 3:No-transcript there you go, that's it yeah, darren what did you learn?
Speaker 1:what did you learn, darren?
Speaker 2:I learned, I think the biggest learning, same with you guys bit empty, bit felt like I never gave my full ability because because I need to be honest with myself I feel like I I missed the mark a little bit on the training of the hills, and that didn't because I did that. I wasn't able to fully get up to speed to attack the running which I thought I was really good at at the minute, but that didn't happen. But the biggest learning is I'm gonna go back, gonna absolutely contradict myself of what I've said in the past about focusing on a race. I am gonna erase 3k races as well as the 12k in the future. Now I've said on this podcast that I am gonna focus on one race because that's what I'm good at, that's what I need to do.
Speaker 2:But the thing is it's it's a matter of learning, isn't it? You go, you learn about yourself more and more the more you race and the more you change things up. I'm learning right now that I actually am good at the 3k, so I should race the 3k. Um, I've, I've done it. I've gone around twice now the worlds and the euros quite slowly, conservatively, ready for the next day, and done a really good performance and I need to actually properly focus on the 3k now, I think, as well as the 12k.
Speaker 3:That's my, you know the one thing we all learned that we forgot to mention what's that? And it links to kind of being specific to the race. Well, what do we all agree on that we're going to do for next year? And that's get out there early, yeah, and learn the course a bit more. And and rather than I mean today we were better than Hungary or this year, as we were better than Hungary than getting there super late, but get even out like a week before. And it looked at all the top athletes that were there, they were out there early and they were learning the terrain, learning the course, understanding what the race would entail.
Speaker 1:If we did that, we, we would have such a better understanding even just the little things like just being able to sleep a bit better because you've got there a bit earlier and a bit more used, a bit more relaxed. I think it's just that getting that relaxation side of things out of it. We were so nervous because we'd just arrived that time before yeah, and it was even like the shops, like there was nothing open the shops were not
Speaker 3:well, yeah, but if we were out there a week before, we'd have known that yeah, and we'd have learned up yeah yeah, we could have got a routine together. We could have learned.
Speaker 1:Okay, this is what I do before the race yeah, we would have known where to go get something to eat so we could be like right, it's race night. That night I'm gonna book somewhere to eat, because if I don't, I'm not gonna get anything in me.
Speaker 3:I want to be really stressed about that because I'm hungry, yeah so there was some lessons learned, I think, more on the travel side of things rather than maybe the racing. And that makes a difference. It definitely does when we race.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, I agree, and we've said that prep, prep is key. We I think we failed again on prep. We said it last year, we failed on prep, but this year didn't fail as much, but we definitely failed again. So next year is another way of we're going to go into it in a bit better. It's because we're just every year we're thinking it's a trip, like it's just a. It's just a I don't know holiday, but we actually need to be thinking about it more and more specifically towards trying to for performance. It's just a I don't know a holiday, but we actually need to be thinking about it more and more specifically towards trying to for performance.
Speaker 1:It's so much. How, how much effort have we put in? I mean, oh man, I'll put in so much effort, so much effort. I mean getting up at four o'clock in the morning to do a bloody lift. We've got to do that all again now. We've got to do that all again now. I know.
Speaker 2:And all the traveling that we've done to see each other, like training together. Yeah, we put in a lot of effort, yet we, when the actual pinnacle race turns up, we don't put in the effort there, which is strange, because I feel. I think we get complacent. We feel like we've done the hard work. Now we can chill out.
Speaker 3:The hard work doesn't stop till race day it doesn't.
Speaker 2:No, yeah, no, that's where we failed, so we're holding ourselves accountable. Again, again, yeah.
Speaker 3:For the second year in a row, bloody podcast. Didn't we do this last time? Yeah, we did. Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1:I wonder what lessons we'll learn next year.
Speaker 2:Hopefully not the same ones, because what's the definition of in definition of insanity?
Speaker 1:oh, we've done this, haven't we?
Speaker 2:go on ships. You got this uh, I can't remember in it, uh, no, it's not coming doing the same thing again and expecting a different result oh, that's it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, doing the same thing again and expecting a different result. Yeah, makes sense, that's us well, we did.
Speaker 2:We did slightly. If we go out a day early, no, not a day earlier. We got an earlier flight. We didn't get there a day earlier.
Speaker 1:Um, well, uh, hang on a minute. Oh, you did what? No, no, no, no no well you know what this comes down to, because I said that we should get out of there earlier.
Speaker 2:I don't have holiday enough to do that. Sponsor me. Yeah, you're getting married. Sponsored athlete. That was the problem.
Speaker 3:Darren's fault yet again. He's got a honeymoon coming up so we had to suffer. It's not like we can't buy our own flights and independent things, and then we got bloody stuck.
Speaker 2:That's our learning. Our learning is there's always silver lining. We had a lovely little day trip to venice. Oh yeah, that was nice, it was nice yeah, ba, if you're listening, I still want my money back yeah, ba, we're boycotting you yeah hopefully one day we'll be big enough to attack yeah, we can boycott ba.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we can get army to boycott yeah, well, do you? Know? Do you know what we are big enough at right now, though? Bit of a tangent, we have a troll we made we do have a troll. We made it, guys. We've made it. We have a.
Speaker 3:We have a social troll yeah, we do have a troll, but also we have a lot, lot of lovely listeners and thank you for all the positivity and the niceness. This troll has highlighted that I love you guys more than I like trolls trolls do not I'm not even gonna say his name.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he doesn't deserve any time of day and, yeah, I think I love everyone commenting on our posts and getting involved. We'd love to hear how everyone else thought about the euros I know it's and getting involved, we'd love to hear how everyone else thought about the Euros.
Speaker 2:I know it's nearly four or three weeks ago, almost a month ago. Yeah, it's gone well quick. But yeah, we're reflecting. I think it's just been a lot going on. We've had the European Championships, then we went straight into the British Championships and then we're just trying to muddle our way through training. It definitely felt muddling through. At the minute it's not felt consistent, yeah it's been a very difficult.
Speaker 1:In fact, that's one thing that he always has taught us that it's really hard to have a slump, to get the motivation and the what's the word I'm looking for, not motivation the drive, I suppose, to want to do something again.
Speaker 2:Yeah that's post-race blues, wasn't it? We spoke oh, yeah, yeah, having something booked gives you the drive towards it. But it doesn't.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but it doesn't mean just because something's booked doesn't mean you want to still do it well, I also think you're a bit of a dead end with your season, where there's no real championships left.
Speaker 2:Do you?
Speaker 3:know what.
Speaker 1:I've got. Do you know what I've got? Hang on, no, no.
Speaker 3:I've got that back.
Speaker 1:I've got OCR imputancy.
Speaker 2:What's that? Yeah, I was going to say elaborate Imputancy. You haven't got any left.
Speaker 1:OCR imputancy. I don't know what that means. Yeah, what does that word mean? I can't. I can't get it up for OCR at the moment.
Speaker 2:Expand all right, all right, you've got. You've got OCR dysfunction.
Speaker 3:I've got, I've got a flaccid OCR yeah yeah, see, I'm the opposite, but I'm hard for OCR, I'm in love. But I've just had some good news and I've got now something to train for.
Speaker 2:Hold that for the next episode. We'll talk about that because in the next episode I think what we should do in the next episode I know you probably want to talk about today, because we've talked about this for a bit now Probably we should talk about British champs and then like what's next after the british champs? Keep that as another episode. What do you think? Because?
Speaker 3:this is quite well. Yeah, I think we don't. Don't smudge it all together and rush the british champs will so yeah.
Speaker 2:So where's the euros next year? Portugal, she go in lisbon lisbon, portugal yeah, so we already. So we already know where it is.
Speaker 1:We've already Googled the terrain.
Speaker 2:We know the terrain, we know where we can get hotels. So we know it's flat, it's going to be foresty, probably obstacle dense, I would assume, if it's flat.
Speaker 1:That's the only thing we don't know.
Speaker 2:My assumption is going to be incorrect again. We're over terrain obstacles. See, it's flat. That's the only thing we don't, my assumption is going to be incorrect.
Speaker 3:Again, we're over train obstacles, but see, I think this is a hungry 2.0. I think this is the redemption that we need, because even looking at the course you think about hungry course. That was a track, a like an olympic venue, similar sort of thing to this athletic stadium venue and forests yeah we've got redemption coming.
Speaker 2:I think everyone probably I don't know if they prepare as much as we do ahead of it, but I've already started. Well, you have ships and you have modes started thinking about where we're staying next year, what the training's going to look like, and, yeah, everything about the Euros like we have to treat this. It is the European Championships, like there's no other way of describing how important it is, and everything about the Euros we have to treat this.
Speaker 3:It is the European Championships. There's no other way of describing how important it is. I've already looked at the shoes that I want to wear and what ones I'm buying to test for it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've done my whole plan up until December in preparation just to make sure that my plan's going to work for the plan that's going to be coming together after december you need to.
Speaker 2:You need to do a mock, we need to do a mock test like that's what you would do, wouldn't you?
Speaker 2:we need to do that. So in april time we could probably go do a mock test. I think that's a good time to do it, or a bit earlier actually, probably. We have to think about that. But definitely that is going to be on the cards because I've spoken already spoke to dave, like on training and things of how I need to implement my speed and flat trail running speed to be good at this. Next euros coming up, but yeah, we'll talk about that a bit more. That in terms of what we're going to do next. Anything else you guys want to chat about the Euros or any more positivity.
Speaker 3:It was a great event. I felt like maybe we were a bit too negative there it was. I did enjoy myself. I enjoyed my company, or the company that I had, not my own company. I enjoyed the people around me. No, it was good and as a one-off, I think the course and everything was a great experience. I think I'm hoping that is not the direction the sport is going and with the announcement of the next Euros, I don't think that is the direction the sport is going.
Speaker 2:No, I think it's getting more and more official, because actually, let's end it with some good news ships. We haven't told Mo about this, have we, have we not?
Speaker 1:No, oh, this is going to upset him. I'm a bit scared.
Speaker 2:This is how official the sport is getting. I don't know if we we do want to share this. This is good news. So you know one thing what's the one thing we've been asking for in this sport, when you win something, Prize money. There was prize money at the European Championships.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, you have told me this, oh have we. Yeah. Well, I think everyone knows, you can announce this to the world if you'd like.
Speaker 2:Yeah it's incredible, like I don't know why. I appreciate actually why they haven't said there was prize money, because in the past there's been controversy about like why haven't you paid it? Where is it? Why is it that little, why is it that high? But actually, yeah, we had a lovely email come through at the weekend, didn't we Ships winning? Their prize money for the team race are you willing to share how much?
Speaker 1:10 million dollars it worked out to be.
Speaker 2:Are you willing to share how much $10 million it worked out to be, with tax, £270 each.
Speaker 3:To be fair, that's good yeah For what we've won before.
Speaker 2:I've won 25 quid at Spartan. It's something to be celebrated. It's just incredible. I don't know why they probably should do a post now saying that they've done it, or I don't know what they're trying to do to keep it secret.
Speaker 1:It's not in our bank account.
Speaker 2:yeah, yeah, it's not there yet, but they've emailed me real quick today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, same. Yeah, it is good, and not only us, but like athletes have said it before, I mean it. We don't really need the prize money because we're not as good as the proper athletes are out there. Jamie does, jamie definitely does, um, but it helps keep these guys doing the sport that they need to train for, because the only way that they're as good as they are and, mo, you could do with the prize money, because you could get a lot better as well is by having the funds to be able to train like an athlete, like not 100% full time athlete, but at least having the means because you just it does help. Even buying a pair of god damn trainers helps.
Speaker 2:It's helped me to return like buying a pair of goddamn trainers. Helps. It's good, it's helped. It's helped me to return like 270 pounds. Pay for, pays for my ticket next year.
Speaker 2:You're, you're yeah you're asking for champions to return, and that's what you should always be promoting. Like don't, don't let the champion not return. Like this country could definitely do with with just the winners getting a free ticket for next year. Like there you go, just just do you want to come next year as well? Well done you win today. Uh, we want you back to try to retain your win.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't know why we don't do that cost, cost the race absolutely nothing nothing, yeah well, if challenge cup come to me and this is not, it's not just nuclear, because every race call them out call them out.
Speaker 3:I mean, challenge cup is quite an expensive race really. Now we will that. We've seen some of the european. I've been looking at european races and seeing some of their prices as well.
Speaker 3:I'm like challenge cup is quite an expensive race and obviously I won that last year. And if they come to me and said you couldn't come back for free next year for winning and that because I didn't get any prizes for winning last year, I got a medal that said first place, but that was it really, which is nice and you appreciate the podium. But if they just said to me, oh, you've got a free race next year, I would have raced challenge cup and done the double day, but because they didn't have anything to offer, I was more likely to go and race a Spartan. And I think if racers want to start getting people back and I mean in our country I guess the community don't have it as much but rude rampage if they were, if they just came out and said, oh, because you won last year or came in podium last year, you can come back for free. Or oh, we've got the, even if they just say they've got prize money up for grabs or a prize people would go yeah.
Speaker 2:No, it was incredible and it's definitely worth something to shout out about and talking about more. Only if we had a podcast or somewhere to talk about this.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, fair play.
Speaker 3:I also like the fact that, like the adaptive athletes got some prize money, because I didn't. I wasn't too clued up on what they got really, and when I saw you get up on the podium without even gold medals, I was kind of thinking, oh, that's a bit of an afterthought, but no, well done cheers sorry.
Speaker 2:Should we let these people go? Well done, cheers sorry coffee.
Speaker 3:Alright, should we let these people go? But look, we've talked enough about an outdated thing yeah, it's outdated.
Speaker 2:Next year, portugal, be there or be squared. Alright, see you later see you later there you have it. See you later. There you go.
