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Speaker 1: What are the things, the little things that we can

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Speaker 1: do in our lives to push our performance as people

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Speaker 1: and partners as citizens forward. You know, whether that's getting

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Speaker 1: better sleep, or what if that's engaging in a mindfulness practice.

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Speaker 1: You know, what if that's shifting our diet and our

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Speaker 1: nutrition left or right and sort of eating more sustainably

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Speaker 1: for our planet but also more sustainably for our bodies

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Speaker 1: and our community. So those sort of marginal gains I

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Speaker 1: like to think of as things that you can sort

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Speaker 1: of learn from elite runners or elite athletes and bring

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Speaker 1: that into our own lives.

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Speaker 2: Hey Hurdlers, Emily a Body bringing you Episode one thirteen

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Speaker 2: of Hurdle, a wellness focused podcast where I sit down

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Speaker 2: with inspiring individuals to talk about everything from their big

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Speaker 2: wins to how they've gotten through some of life's toughest moments.

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Speaker 2: On the show, you can expect vulnerability, motivation, and candid

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Speaker 2: discussions with everyone from top athletes to aspiring entrepreneurs on

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Speaker 2: what it really takes to follow your passions. My mission

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Speaker 2: is simple to inspire you to be your best self,

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Speaker 2: move with intention, and have some fun along the way.

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Speaker 2: Today's episode, I am bringing you my conversation with Knox Robinson,

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Speaker 2: originally recorded in December twenty nineteen. To be honest, I

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Speaker 2: could listen to Knox talk for a while, which is

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Speaker 2: no wonder why this is one of my longest hurtles today.

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Speaker 2: He's a Brooklyn based writer and runner. He's also the

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Speaker 2: founder of Black Roses NYC. And he's got his fair

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Speaker 2: share of how did that even happen? Stories from his

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Speaker 2: days logging miles in Ethiopia with Mo Ferra and running

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Speaker 2: with Elliott Kipchogi in Kenya, to heading up Fader magazine

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Speaker 2: and writing Kanye West's first cover article. Seriously, there's a

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Speaker 2: lot here. Upon sitting down with this writer and runner,

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Speaker 2: I saw a whole other side to him that I

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Speaker 2: have a hunch some of his twenty eight thousand Instagram

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Speaker 2: followers maybe have never seen. In today's episode, Knox talks

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Speaker 2: to me about founding Nike Plus Run Club, and he

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Speaker 2: also shares a bit about his beginnings growing up in

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Speaker 2: San Diego. We also talk about his passions that landed

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Speaker 2: him running at a collegiate level at Wake Forest. He

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Speaker 2: gets super honest about a hurtle moment that may him

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Speaker 2: quit the sport for ten plus years, and he shares

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Speaker 2: the life changing event that reunited him with his biggest passion.

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Speaker 2: We talk about everything from impossible training tactics and what

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Speaker 2: it felt like to be one of the top one

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Speaker 2: hundred mail finishers in the New York City Marathon twice

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Speaker 2: to his best advice for anyone new to la sing up.

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Speaker 2: There's a lot of gems in here. I really hope

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Speaker 2: you like it as always at Emily a body at

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Speaker 2: Little podcast. And if you have a hurdle moment of

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Speaker 2: your own to share or just want to say hi,

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Speaker 2: you can always teach me over email. It's Emily at

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Speaker 2: hurdle dot us. Without further ado, let's get to hurdling.

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Speaker 1: Today.

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Speaker 2: I'm sitting down with Knox Robinson. He is a writer,

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Speaker 2: a runner. Anything else should be thrown to the tap here.

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Speaker 1: I'm a father of son, a partner, a quasi coach,

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Speaker 1: quasi quasi coach.

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Speaker 2: Talk to me about that.

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Speaker 1: Well. In some ways, I don't believe in certifications and

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Speaker 1: that sort of credential making right. A lot of times

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Speaker 1: the very certification process was used to disenfranchise underrepresented folks

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Speaker 1: or poor folks, black folks in this country. So, for instance,

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Speaker 1: led abatement if you need a led abatement certification. They

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Speaker 1: made it inaccessible to be a lead, a lead remover

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Speaker 1: from from houses or schools or bridges or whatever. So

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Speaker 1: a lot of times these days, much respect to everybody

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Speaker 1: out there with you know, credentialed coaching, but for me,

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Speaker 1: I just like to do it based on my experience

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Speaker 1: and my inspirations and having like studied master coaches for

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Speaker 1: most of my life.

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Speaker 2: And of course when we say coaching here we're talking

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Speaker 2: about run coaching. Sure, sure, unless is there another coaching

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Speaker 2: we want to talk about?

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Speaker 1: No, I mean, you know, But of course, speaking self advantageously,

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Speaker 1: I'd say that like run coaching is life coaching, you know,

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Speaker 1: yea for better or for worse, because running is such

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Speaker 1: an intimate, you know, expression of who we are. That like,

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Speaker 1: once you take up or endeavor to coach someone to

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Speaker 1: run a five k run a marathon, you end up

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Speaker 1: like with much more on your hands.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's true. I think all the time about

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Speaker 2: how I h One of my dearest friends is a

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Speaker 2: certified trainer. Talk about certifications. But I met her because

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Speaker 2: an agency connected us for me to work out with her.

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Speaker 2: And after about like two months of us working out together.

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Speaker 2: We stopped working out together and started just hanging out

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Speaker 2: all the time, and she became, you know, one of

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Speaker 2: my most respected and trusted confidants. I also don't want

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Speaker 2: to skip over how good of a runner you are,

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Speaker 2: so let's talk about that a little bit. So we

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Speaker 2: have a marathon PR of two thirty three. Correct, that's insane.

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Speaker 1: It felt insane at the time. I definitely was insane

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Speaker 1: at the time it happened.

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Speaker 2: Where were you?

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Speaker 1: I was in Berlin, and you know it was this year,

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Speaker 1: was after breaking two, and so Kip Chog kind of

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Speaker 1: came into town obviously in peak condition, and before the

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Speaker 1: race everyone's saying like, oh, he loves these conditions. It

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Speaker 1: was a little cool, a little rainy, and everyone's like, ah,

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Speaker 1: this he's going to get the world record because he

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Speaker 1: loves running in the rain because it makes him feel like,

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Speaker 1: you know, he's running in the forest of Capta Gat

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Speaker 1: back home in Kenya. So I go to my squad,

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Speaker 1: we're all racing. I was like, this is Kip choke

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Speaker 1: were the We're all going to hit it today. This

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Speaker 1: is Everything's perfect. We all went out ran crazy in

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Speaker 1: the rain. I ran this PR and then afterwards Kip

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Speaker 1: Choke said he didn't get the world record because it

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Speaker 1: was a raining and he hates the weather. I was

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Speaker 1: like I was with him.

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Speaker 2: I think it's also important to note that you are

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Speaker 2: so ingrained and knowledgeable on the run culture. The typical

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Speaker 2: hurdler or listener may not completely be as up to

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Speaker 2: speed as you are, and I think that's something that's

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Speaker 2: really interesting about you. And definitely why I wanted to

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Speaker 2: sit down with you is because of your vast knowledge

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Speaker 2: of the sport, of the history, and and really because

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Speaker 2: you've you've gotten out there and run some miles with

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Speaker 2: some of the best of them. I mean, if we're

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Speaker 2: defining the best of them as the fastest of.

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Speaker 1: Them, yeah, it's interesting. You know, like at any given

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Speaker 1: point in my life, I've come to realize that, you know,

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Speaker 1: I've never been close to being the best, but I've

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Speaker 1: always bizarrely been around runners who were the best in

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Speaker 1: that context. So in high school I ended up training

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Speaker 1: with some you know, some some some tough dudes from

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Speaker 1: across the tracks who still hold track records in New

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Speaker 1: York State to this day. Ran ran with these kind

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Speaker 1: of uh tough, tough, tough dudes. In college. The day

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Speaker 1: I walked into the locker room for you know, the

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Speaker 1: first day of practice, half of the guys or half

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Speaker 1: of the United States Junior cross country team was presented

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Speaker 1: in the locker room, like we had like three guys

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Speaker 1: on the USA team, like those are my teammates. And

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Speaker 1: then later on to have had interesting and unexpected friendships

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Speaker 1: with Leo Manzano, who you know, got a silver medal

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Speaker 1: in London in twenty twelve, or Mofarra and Abdi Abdi Raman,

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Speaker 1: incredible athletes like Shannon Rowberry, Tremier, moser Uh and so

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Speaker 1: it's just been Ali Keifer. So it's just been cool

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Speaker 1: to have been in constant conversation and proximity with some

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Speaker 1: of the best and really study their practices. And maybe

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Speaker 1: that's kind of one of the things that first sparked

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Speaker 1: this iteration of my personal running journey in terms of

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Speaker 1: the intersection of running on culture is that I was

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Speaker 1: really starting to take some of the practices and the

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Speaker 1: ideas and the belief systems of some of the best

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Speaker 1: athletes in the world and thought about how I could

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Speaker 1: share that with you know, passionate everyday athletes like you know,

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Speaker 1: the kind we see here in New York.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so how are you doing that?

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Speaker 1: Well? You know a lot of times, you know, we

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Speaker 1: might joke about this idea of marginal gains, and a

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Speaker 1: lot of times marginal gains might be euphemism for various

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Speaker 1: sorts of gray area cheating. Whether that's you know, Team

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Speaker 1: Sky in the Tour de France swapping out their mattresses

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Speaker 1: when they're on tour, staying in different hotel rooms and that,

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Speaker 1: or it might be sort of, as we see from

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Speaker 1: Oregon projects, doing stuff that's not necessarily illegal but is

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Speaker 1: not ethical. But the idea is interesting, what are the things,

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Speaker 1: the little things that we can do in our lives

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Speaker 1: to push our performance as people and partners as citizens forward.

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Speaker 1: You know, whether that's getting better sleep, or what if

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Speaker 1: that's engaging in a mindfulness practice. You know, what if

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Speaker 1: that's shifting our diet and our nutrition left or right

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Speaker 1: and sort of eating more sustainably for our planet but

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Speaker 1: also more sustainably for our bodies and our community. So

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Speaker 1: those sort of marginal gains I like to think of

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Speaker 1: as things that you can sort of learn from elite

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Speaker 1: runners or elite athletes and bring that into our own

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Speaker 1: lives and then on a running level, you know, just

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Speaker 1: seeing what it takes to be the best. And that

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Speaker 1: doesn't mean like knocking yourself out in a workout, but like,

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Speaker 1: how do you even like structure your pursuit of excellence?

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Speaker 1: I guess that's what I'm saying is when you're thinking

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Speaker 1: about elite athletes, they have a structured approach to being

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Speaker 1: the best, and it's interesting to look at how that's

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Speaker 1: systematized and organized, and then again how we can bring

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Speaker 1: that into our own lives.

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Speaker 2: So we're into running these days. Growing up in San Diego,

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Speaker 2: were you an active kid?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? I mean how could you not be. I mean

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Speaker 1: you're just like living there between the mountains and the beach.

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Speaker 1: So growing up, it was all these childhood memories of

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Speaker 1: you know, camping in the Onzabarigo Desert with my family obviously,

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Speaker 1: always at the beach in La Jolla, going into the

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Speaker 1: mountains to mining towns and exploring sort of the history

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Speaker 1: of California and all those respects, and so yeah, I've

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Speaker 1: always been sometimes I reflect like I've always been outdoors,

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Speaker 1: getting rained.

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Speaker 2: On from a young age to Berlin Marathon prs. All Right,

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Speaker 2: so growing up in San Diego, you're active kid. You

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Speaker 2: go to college at Wake Forest, and are you running

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Speaker 2: in college?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? I ran for the first year, year and a half, No,

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Speaker 1: first Yeah, first year and a half of school and yeah,

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Speaker 1: those incredibles A D one program and again our distance

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Speaker 1: program was you know, one of the best in the country.

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Speaker 1: So it was really inspiring and also incredibly daunting to

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Speaker 1: be you know, like a young teenager walk on trying

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Speaker 1: to figure out life and running.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean figuring out life is hard enough. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: talk to me about what life was like for you

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Speaker 2: at that time.

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Speaker 1: I mean, uh, there was there was uh, there was running,

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Speaker 1: and then once I stopped running for the team, there

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Speaker 1: was life after running and I didn't pick it up

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Speaker 1: again for another, you know, ten years basically, So when

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Speaker 1: I was a college athlete, I was, you know, kind

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Speaker 1: of living that life where you know, you're practicing twice

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Speaker 1: a day. Uh, your athletic life and pursuits are the

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Speaker 1: center of your college experience, and you kind of share

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Speaker 1: that space, you know, sometimes absurdly with football players, basketball players.

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Speaker 1: You know. I went to school with Tim Duncan, so

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Speaker 1: it was kind of like always again being around folks

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Speaker 1: who were the best or went on to you know,

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Speaker 1: continue to be the best. Then after I stopped running,

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Speaker 1: to discover an entirely different world was incredible. Obviously, you

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Speaker 1: have all this free time on your hands. Yes, you're

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Speaker 1: not going to practice, and I just fell headlong into

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Speaker 1: other pursuits, studying, you know, Chinese and Chinese translation, East

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Speaker 1: Asian religion, philosophy, Buddhism and Daoism, and then a deep

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Speaker 1: and abiding love for poetry that continues to this day.

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Speaker 2: It's interesting the descriptors. There's life, and then there's life

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Speaker 2: after running, and then there's life with running again for

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Speaker 2: you when you stopped running, because I find it interesting

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Speaker 2: that you could love it so much, and then just

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Speaker 2: I just made a hand gesture, which is not helpful,

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Speaker 2: and podcasting, but I find it so interesting that you

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Speaker 2: can just be so enamored with the sport and do

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Speaker 2: it so actively and then like completely step away. So

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Speaker 2: was it actually like a complete step away?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it was. It was rather poignant and of something

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Speaker 1: I blocked out for a much of my life, starting

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Speaker 1: with you know, the sort of circumstances that precipitated my

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Speaker 1: my quitting running. Literally that's just the only way to

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Speaker 1: describe it. And then getting back into it and then

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Speaker 1: like reflecting on the whole passage of time after that.

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Speaker 1: I mean, so at this point, I've been running most

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Speaker 1: of my life. I've been running more years probably than

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Speaker 1: I than I haven't. And the ten years or so

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Speaker 1: that I stopped running between college and the birth of

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Speaker 1: my son really seems like an aberration. Yeah, and an

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Speaker 1: otherwise sort of continuous love affair with running.

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Speaker 2: Why did you stop?

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Speaker 1: You know? It was? It was? It was very nineties.

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Speaker 1: I there was like a misunderstanding with some teammates that

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Speaker 1: I definitely overreacted to and exacerbated before we met up today,

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Speaker 1: kind of like prompting me to think about a hurdle moment,

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Speaker 1: and I was pretty sure I wasn't going to talk

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Speaker 1: about this. But I was accused of stealing some money

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Speaker 1: from a party and I racialized the incident, or I

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Speaker 1: felt the incident was racialized and I overreacted, or I

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Speaker 1: reacted wildly and passionately, and the fractice that followed getting

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Speaker 1: into like an altercation with some teammates, I I quit

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Speaker 1: the team after never really dealt with it until many

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Speaker 1: many years later, and as only through getting back into

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Speaker 1: running that I, you know, healed those wounds and like

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Speaker 1: patched up those relationships, but then also came to realize

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Speaker 1: how crucial running is in my life. And so times

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Speaker 1: more recently when I've been challenged or my love is running,

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Speaker 1: it's been challenged or or sometimes even threatened. I really

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Speaker 1: have these strong, visceral memories of knowing what it means

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Speaker 1: to lose something you love and how important it is

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Speaker 1: to hold on to it with both hands and never

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Speaker 1: let it go.

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Speaker 2: Did you feel differently without running in your life?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it there was an ache, There was

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Speaker 1: an emptiness, even years years, years later when my life

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Speaker 1: was totally different and I was, you know, living as

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Speaker 1: like a bohemian writer in New York broke, you know,

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Speaker 1: hanging out and bars and poetry cafes. Well, they say

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Speaker 1: there's a light that never goes out, you know, and

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Speaker 1: sometimes on that one fall day when like the leaves

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Speaker 1: turn and the air has a certain smell to it,

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Speaker 1: and the sound of the leaves scuttling across the pavement

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Speaker 1: makes you think of, you know, racing cross country in

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Speaker 1: high school. That's something that sticks with you. And so yeah,

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Speaker 1: running was in some ways an unshakable ghost. You know,

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Speaker 1: you're always you know, once you're a runner, you always

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Speaker 1: are measuring the distance between where you're at and the

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Speaker 1: corner and the stoplight and can I make it. Once

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Speaker 1: you're a runner, you're always going to feel like you

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Speaker 1: could run for the bus, or you're like sizing up

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Speaker 1: how far away the buses and if you're going to

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Speaker 1: run to catch it or not. So that always stuck

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Speaker 1: with me and it's unshakable.

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Speaker 2: Did you like actively avoid just running to run during

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Speaker 2: this time?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? I mean yeah, I mean running is a commitment.

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Speaker 1: Well now I don't understand how you could how that's

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Speaker 1: even possible, Like how I could have loved something so

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Speaker 1: much and then stopped and didn't have a relationship. And

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Speaker 1: that's why I like sharing kind of what I'm doing

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Speaker 1: now with younger people who you know, follow me on

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Speaker 1: Instagram or when I see them out at a race

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Speaker 1: or training or randomly like running in the woods. Is

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Speaker 1: you know, there's a life outside of running in high

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Speaker 1: school and college, and I think when I quit running,

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Speaker 1: there wasn't any suggestion of that you're either like running

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Speaker 1: for your school team or you didn't you know, there

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Speaker 1: wasn't an idea that I would go out and run socially.

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Speaker 1: There was an idea that I would go out and

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Speaker 1: like run for fun or for health. So it's it's

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Speaker 1: really awesome to suggest to folks now that running can

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Speaker 1: be an unlocked for travel, running can be an unlocked

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Speaker 1: for meeting new people. Running can be an unlock for

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Speaker 1: your creativity and your self expression. And when I was

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Speaker 1: running in school, it was just about like whipping people's asses.

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Speaker 2: So then what gets you back into running? And I mean,

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Speaker 2: there's so much that happens during the ten year period

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Speaker 2: that like it's hard to just like kind of glaze

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Speaker 2: over it, and I don't want to necessarily, but I'm

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Speaker 2: so curious to know what the catalyst is that brings

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Speaker 2: you back to lacing up.

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Speaker 1: You know, honestly, it was a very specific incident. Was

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Speaker 1: like witnessing the birth of my son. However, many moons ago,

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Speaker 1: sixteen years ago, I'm there in the delivery room, and

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Speaker 1: I was just struck by this idea, this scene of

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Speaker 1: you know, like, as adults, rightfully, so we walk around

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Speaker 1: sometimes dragging our knuckles with long faces about the state

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Speaker 1: of the world now more than ever, and you know,

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Speaker 1: the sky is always falling, and of course it's important

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Speaker 1: to sort of you know, be real about to state

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Speaker 1: our planet and our culture and our countries in but

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Speaker 1: at the same time, to watch this human claw their

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Speaker 1: way into the world and demand that their ticket be

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Speaker 1: punched to join the human community was very affecting and

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Speaker 1: very startling. And then to see that what it required,

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Speaker 1: a singular unity of body, mind, and spirit, was mind

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Speaker 1: blowing and astonishing in the moment. And then I thought,

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Speaker 1: you know, when's the last time I did anything that

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Speaker 1: required this singular unity of those things? And the only

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Speaker 1: thing I could think of was running, and the last

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Speaker 1: time I had done that. I started running the very

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Speaker 1: next day.

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Speaker 2: Talk to me about that run.

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Speaker 1: I was living in Fort Green, and I went across

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Speaker 1: the street from my apartment to fork Green Park and

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Speaker 1: ran a loop around the park. And like everybody who

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Speaker 1: starts running a fork Green Park, you think it's like

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Speaker 1: three miles, and it's less than a mile, you know,

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Speaker 1: But went out ran a loop one day. The next

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Speaker 1: day I went out and did two loops, then three loops,

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Speaker 1: and then kind of held for three loops, and then

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Speaker 1: all of a sudden, the park that originally seems so

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Speaker 1: big becomes so small, and I was like, oh, what

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Speaker 1: else is around here? And then I think I must

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Speaker 1: have looked at Google Maps and I was like, oh,

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Speaker 1: Prospect Park is nearby, I'm going to run to Prospect Park.

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Speaker 1: And so that became a thing. And then you know,

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Speaker 1: built by accretion, and suddenly I was like back up

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Speaker 1: into long distance running and rather obsessed.

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Speaker 2: I was going to ask you what were you running

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Speaker 2: in college distance?

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Speaker 1: I flirted with the steeplechase. So again, when it comes

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Speaker 1: to to hurdles, you want to ask about hurdles. I

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Speaker 1: have this scar. You can't see it on this podcast,

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Speaker 1: but this.

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Speaker 2: Oh wow scar, it's a real scar.

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Speaker 1: Guys from hurdling oh wow, and steeple chase practice.

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Speaker 2: I had squigs on the pod calling quickly, okay, my

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Speaker 2: only real herd largely until you Elliot.

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Speaker 1: Kipchoge's coach was a world class steeplechaser in the nineties

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Speaker 1: and when I met him in Berlin, who were like

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Speaker 1: having a chat. Turns out we have matching scars from

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Speaker 1: steeple chase practice.

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Speaker 2: So I always find runners that can steeplechase very impressive

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Speaker 2: because it requires such a great amount of hip mobility

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Speaker 2: in a way that typically runners don't possess.

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Speaker 1: Right, it's rough, it's just like, wait, we didn't sign

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Speaker 1: up what hip flexibility? Like, I'm just trying to go

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Speaker 1: that way fast. That's it. Now there's something in my way.

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Speaker 2: So you were steeple chasing and then you were doing distance, yeah,

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Speaker 2: and that.

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Speaker 1: Kind of stuff that's contry. Yeah, ten thousand. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: So when you start getting back reunited with this love

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Speaker 2: for long distance running, talk to me about what that

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Speaker 2: process is like for you, Like, are you the kind

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Speaker 2: of person that's out there running and working through your

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Speaker 2: thoughts or you're the kind of person that's out there

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Speaker 2: running and listening to music, Like what is it for

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Speaker 2: you at this time?

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Speaker 1: This is why I relate to folks and I love

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Speaker 1: quasi coaching or writing about running because I'm just like

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Speaker 1: everybody else. I kind of went off the deep end,

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Speaker 1: and so my exploits have sometimes been rather epic. But

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Speaker 1: I was figuring out like everybody else. It was early

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Speaker 1: days of the internet, so like maybe there was like

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Speaker 1: a let's run message board to kind of discover later on,

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Speaker 1: but I was really putting one foot in front of

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Speaker 1: the other and like figuring it out.

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Speaker 2: So so we're in like two thousand and five, two

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Speaker 2: thousand and five, okay, and great math NOWO.

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Speaker 1: Thousand and four, two thousand and five. My first race

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Speaker 1: was the Brooklyn Half Marathon and it used to run

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Speaker 1: start on the boardwalk in Cony Island finishing Prospect Park,

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Speaker 1: and it was in March, I think, very cold, but

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Speaker 1: I ran one fifteen and I qualified for the New

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Speaker 1: York City Marathon automatically in that first race. So I'm like,

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Speaker 1: oh cool, all right, I'm gonna run New York training

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Speaker 1: for the marathon, and you know, I was just out

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Speaker 1: of my mind. I was eating a pint of Ben

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Speaker 1: and Jerry's every night.

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Speaker 2: All men can do this. I never understand.

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Speaker 1: Why young before the metabolism.

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Speaker 2: But I feel like every guy I know trains for

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Speaker 2: any sort of event, whether it's a marathon or like,

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Speaker 2: fuck it, maybe he's track like training for a mile

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Speaker 2: and he can eat whatever he wants. He's like, you

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Speaker 2: know what happened when I started running? I'm like what

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Speaker 2: He's like, I lost twenty five pounds and I'm like,

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Speaker 2: I trained for a marathon every year without fail. It's

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Speaker 2: a weight gain season. I'm like, why is this a

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Speaker 2: men thing?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? Well, the metabolism is different. I mean totally, You've

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Speaker 1: you got that that Stacy Simms book Roars is an

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Speaker 1: incredible sort of like exploration of women's fitness endurance sports.

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Speaker 1: And I was talking with some women in Black Roses, NYC.

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Speaker 1: Last night, and I guess, you know, a lot of

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Speaker 1: times women at a certain volume of running, you end

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Speaker 1: up gaining weight just because of like the hormonal fluctuations

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Speaker 1: and like the different you know, phases of the cycle

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Speaker 1: over the month or five weeks.

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Speaker 2: So I should read the book. I should also stop

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Speaker 2: just being so snarky about this discrepancy that we have here. Also,

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Speaker 2: did you say you ran it in one fifteen?

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Speaker 1: Yes?

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Speaker 2: Cash, did you go into it knowing that like that

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Speaker 2: was kind of the vibe?

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Speaker 1: No, because I hadn't rased, that's what I'm saying a

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Speaker 1: decade or more so. Or yeah, I hadn't raised. I

431
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Speaker 1: didn't didn't know what I was doing. You're just out

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Speaker 1: there again just having the muscle memory of like whipping

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Speaker 1: dude's asses. So I was out there. And it must

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Speaker 1: be said that the Brooklyn this is kind of before

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Speaker 1: the running boom that we're enjoying now, and so the

436
00:24:54,440 --> 00:24:57,639
Speaker 1: Brooklyn half Marathon was a much more humble affair. I

437
00:24:57,680 --> 00:25:02,800
Speaker 1: got like ninth place, eighth place, and uh, you know,

438
00:25:02,960 --> 00:25:07,680
Speaker 1: now to see the race is so wild. Now I

439
00:25:07,720 --> 00:25:10,560
Speaker 1: can only watch it because it's just pure enjoyment. Everybody

440
00:25:10,600 --> 00:25:13,199
Speaker 1: from the city's out, and it's a big kind of

441
00:25:13,200 --> 00:25:16,840
Speaker 1: celebration beyond the New York City Marathon. It's a kind

442
00:25:16,840 --> 00:25:19,320
Speaker 1: of like a big celebration of running in New York.

443
00:25:19,359 --> 00:25:21,360
Speaker 1: So I just like to watch the Brooklyn half now.

444
00:25:21,400 --> 00:25:25,040
Speaker 2: So you get back into running. You obviously qualify for

445
00:25:25,119 --> 00:25:27,360
Speaker 2: New York. So then talk to me about your first marathon.

446
00:25:28,560 --> 00:25:32,359
Speaker 1: God, it was a nightmare. I mean everything built up

447
00:25:32,400 --> 00:25:33,679
Speaker 1: to that, you know, because I was going at it

448
00:25:33,720 --> 00:25:38,600
Speaker 1: with you know, college post college row expectations. So every

449
00:25:39,160 --> 00:25:41,960
Speaker 1: kind of dude at a certain level who gets out

450
00:25:41,960 --> 00:25:45,600
Speaker 1: of college running thinks that they're going to run sub

451
00:25:45,640 --> 00:25:48,040
Speaker 1: to thirty in their first marathon, right, So the whole

452
00:25:48,040 --> 00:25:50,400
Speaker 1: time I'm training, I think I'm going to run sub

453
00:25:50,440 --> 00:25:53,480
Speaker 1: to thirty. I'm flying through the park, I'm trying my

454
00:25:53,480 --> 00:25:55,840
Speaker 1: first long run, my first long run eighteen miles. I

455
00:25:55,880 --> 00:25:58,800
Speaker 1: fell down after and I had to go to a

456
00:25:58,840 --> 00:26:03,080
Speaker 1: bodega and I ordered and I bought like cheese, its

457
00:26:03,720 --> 00:26:07,720
Speaker 1: more ice cream, the wafer cookies, and I was just

458
00:26:07,760 --> 00:26:10,679
Speaker 1: like ate every couple of twinkies ate all that, and

459
00:26:10,720 --> 00:26:14,080
Speaker 1: then went out and had like eight fish tacos in

460
00:26:14,119 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 1: Williamsburg after and I thought I was gonna die.

461
00:26:17,119 --> 00:26:18,879
Speaker 2: I love what you said when you sat down with

462
00:26:18,960 --> 00:26:21,879
Speaker 2: Ritual and you were talking about your training, and you said,

463
00:26:22,080 --> 00:26:24,000
Speaker 2: in New York, it's just so different because you're just

464
00:26:24,080 --> 00:26:25,919
Speaker 2: dodging cabs all the time, and then you get to

465
00:26:25,920 --> 00:26:28,280
Speaker 2: the marathon and like there are no cabs to dodge,

466
00:26:28,320 --> 00:26:29,439
Speaker 2: and it's just very different.

467
00:26:29,600 --> 00:26:33,720
Speaker 1: You freak out right was like, wait, where are the stops? Yeah?

468
00:26:33,760 --> 00:26:37,080
Speaker 1: And then my first marathon was insane. I went through

469
00:26:37,160 --> 00:26:41,240
Speaker 1: the half in you know, one fourteen probably and thought

470
00:26:41,280 --> 00:26:44,199
Speaker 1: I was going to hang on. But I didn't have

471
00:26:44,280 --> 00:26:47,760
Speaker 1: experience really marathon training, even though I had done like

472
00:26:47,840 --> 00:26:51,160
Speaker 1: some some requisite long runs. And I get to mile

473
00:26:51,200 --> 00:26:53,840
Speaker 1: fourteen and the strangest thing happened. Like this dude from

474
00:26:53,960 --> 00:26:56,879
Speaker 1: France was ahead of me and started walking, and it

475
00:26:57,000 --> 00:26:59,840
Speaker 1: was like a scene from those old Warner Brothers cartoons

476
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:03,560
Speaker 1: of the Guys stranded on a desert island and sees

477
00:27:03,600 --> 00:27:06,080
Speaker 1: like a beautiful woman walking but she looks like a

478
00:27:06,080 --> 00:27:09,800
Speaker 1: hot dog, you know. Like this dude started ahead, walking

479
00:27:09,800 --> 00:27:11,240
Speaker 1: ahead of me, and I swear he looked like a

480
00:27:11,240 --> 00:27:14,760
Speaker 1: banana split. I was like, oh, walking looks really good.

481
00:27:14,880 --> 00:27:17,160
Speaker 1: I'm just going to try it to see how it feels,

482
00:27:17,280 --> 00:27:18,480
Speaker 1: and then I'll start running again.

483
00:27:18,560 --> 00:27:20,760
Speaker 2: There's such a big contrast between the pace that you're

484
00:27:20,800 --> 00:27:21,600
Speaker 2: going and a walk.

485
00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:24,160
Speaker 1: Though. Oh yeah, well, I mean again, this guy turned

486
00:27:24,160 --> 00:27:25,720
Speaker 1: into a banana split right in front of me, and

487
00:27:25,800 --> 00:27:28,760
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, yeah, that looks really good. Right now,

488
00:27:28,760 --> 00:27:32,600
Speaker 1: I'm going to try it, and yeah, started walking and

489
00:27:32,840 --> 00:27:35,240
Speaker 1: ended up like walking and jogging over the second half

490
00:27:35,240 --> 00:27:40,880
Speaker 1: of the race like garbage fire. Yeah, garbage, garbage, garbage fire.

491
00:27:40,920 --> 00:27:44,720
Speaker 1: For sure, still ran under three. I ran like two

492
00:27:44,840 --> 00:27:45,439
Speaker 1: fifty seven.

493
00:27:47,000 --> 00:27:49,840
Speaker 2: But like, you know, the people that work there, I mean,

494
00:27:49,960 --> 00:27:52,400
Speaker 2: everyone who runs a marathon works very hard. And I'm

495
00:27:52,440 --> 00:27:54,400
Speaker 2: just talking about like what we're getting to be, these

496
00:27:54,760 --> 00:27:58,320
Speaker 2: faster special humans. People work their butt off to get

497
00:27:58,359 --> 00:28:00,400
Speaker 2: a sub three, and just like people were, they're button

498
00:28:00,440 --> 00:28:01,920
Speaker 2: off to get a sub for and people also work

499
00:28:01,960 --> 00:28:05,480
Speaker 2: them off to subshine. You know. But you turn into

500
00:28:05,480 --> 00:28:09,920
Speaker 2: a mirage and still managed to do fifty seven.

501
00:28:10,080 --> 00:28:12,080
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, but you know to that point, that's

502
00:28:12,119 --> 00:28:14,439
Speaker 1: why I don't know, that's why I'm in love with it.

503
00:28:14,520 --> 00:28:20,200
Speaker 1: But That's why I respect the whole range of of

504
00:28:20,440 --> 00:28:25,400
Speaker 1: running of runners, you know, That's why I'm using whatever

505
00:28:25,480 --> 00:28:29,000
Speaker 1: I have to help folks in Black Roses, NYC or

506
00:28:29,040 --> 00:28:31,360
Speaker 1: outside of the squad break four I mean, breaking four

507
00:28:31,400 --> 00:28:34,639
Speaker 1: hours in the marathon is a huge accomplishment for folks

508
00:28:35,800 --> 00:28:38,960
Speaker 1: now all of a sudden. Now these days, obviously, like

509
00:28:39,000 --> 00:28:42,160
Speaker 1: people are obsessed with not no you know, no shots

510
00:28:42,160 --> 00:28:45,640
Speaker 1: at anybody here, but obsessed with getting a BQ. You know,

511
00:28:45,720 --> 00:28:48,280
Speaker 1: that wasn't even a thing a few years ago, and

512
00:28:48,360 --> 00:28:53,120
Speaker 1: so now to really watch the passion with which people

513
00:28:53,160 --> 00:28:57,040
Speaker 1: throw themselves at qualifying for the Boston Marathon is incredible.

514
00:28:57,080 --> 00:28:59,640
Speaker 1: So whatever I can do to help people get past

515
00:28:59,680 --> 00:29:02,840
Speaker 1: that area. Sometimes you need some insight from Ellied Kipchoge

516
00:29:03,160 --> 00:29:05,200
Speaker 1: and how to structure that, and sometimes you need some

517
00:29:05,240 --> 00:29:07,880
Speaker 1: insight from people who have broken other bearers irrespective of

518
00:29:07,920 --> 00:29:08,280
Speaker 1: the time.

519
00:29:08,520 --> 00:29:11,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, so, I mean you've mentioned Black Roses twice, so

520
00:29:11,200 --> 00:29:13,680
Speaker 2: let's I don't I feel like we're like jumping around

521
00:29:13,720 --> 00:29:16,320
Speaker 2: a little bit. But you run the first marathon and

522
00:29:16,360 --> 00:29:21,120
Speaker 2: you keep running, and when does your passion for running

523
00:29:21,440 --> 00:29:24,360
Speaker 2: that you're feeling inside, When does that passion become something

524
00:29:24,360 --> 00:29:27,400
Speaker 2: that you want to help other people with right.

525
00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:31,760
Speaker 1: Well, it's funny, like things used to be inverted. Running

526
00:29:31,920 --> 00:29:35,760
Speaker 1: used to be my personal life and my private life.

527
00:29:35,800 --> 00:29:37,880
Speaker 1: It was something that I kind of just did on

528
00:29:37,920 --> 00:29:40,680
Speaker 1: the low, maybe for redemption of like how I was

529
00:29:40,720 --> 00:29:43,480
Speaker 1: like wilding out in other aspects of my life. But

530
00:29:43,600 --> 00:29:46,040
Speaker 1: at the time, you know, I was working in magazine

531
00:29:46,120 --> 00:29:49,040
Speaker 1: journalism and music journalism and they moved into music management

532
00:29:49,360 --> 00:29:53,240
Speaker 1: and really had like a real wild ride in doing

533
00:29:53,280 --> 00:29:57,200
Speaker 1: both of those kind of career paths. And then in

534
00:29:57,280 --> 00:30:01,360
Speaker 1: twenty eleven, I had just come back from like a

535
00:30:01,360 --> 00:30:05,440
Speaker 1: long trip to South Africa and Paris, you know, out

536
00:30:05,560 --> 00:30:08,240
Speaker 1: at like Paris Fashion Week with Virgil and Kanye and

537
00:30:08,640 --> 00:30:11,880
Speaker 1: like this guy was managing and just really acting crazy.

538
00:30:12,440 --> 00:30:17,880
Speaker 1: Came back my running shoes, had didn't leave my luggage

539
00:30:17,880 --> 00:30:20,000
Speaker 1: the entire time I was on the road, came back,

540
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:23,040
Speaker 1: jumped into the New York City Marathon and got a

541
00:30:23,120 --> 00:30:27,000
Speaker 1: hundredth place. But at the time I was telling everyone

542
00:30:27,040 --> 00:30:29,080
Speaker 1: in the industry or like folks on you know, homies

543
00:30:29,120 --> 00:30:32,600
Speaker 1: in Brooklyn, that that that was the goal. People like,

544
00:30:32,600 --> 00:30:34,320
Speaker 1: what are you gonna do in the marathon? I was like, Oh,

545
00:30:34,320 --> 00:30:36,240
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get in top hundred and get into the

546
00:30:36,240 --> 00:30:38,880
Speaker 1: Century Club and they're like, the Century Club, what's that?

547
00:30:38,960 --> 00:30:42,000
Speaker 1: It's like, oh, the Century Club is is a club

548
00:30:42,040 --> 00:30:45,160
Speaker 1: for people who have gotten top hundred in the marathon?

549
00:30:45,240 --> 00:30:46,080
Speaker 2: Is it a real club?

550
00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:48,080
Speaker 1: No? I just made it up.

551
00:30:48,160 --> 00:30:50,040
Speaker 2: I mean, but hey, like I would have. I want

552
00:30:50,080 --> 00:30:52,240
Speaker 2: to believe it. Even told me you guys get together

553
00:30:52,280 --> 00:30:53,280
Speaker 2: once a month, I'd be like, good to.

554
00:30:55,760 --> 00:30:57,520
Speaker 1: The cool thing about at least at the time. The

555
00:30:57,560 --> 00:31:01,680
Speaker 1: cool thing about getting hundredth is that it the last

556
00:31:02,040 --> 00:31:04,760
Speaker 1: name on the first page of the results that's printed

557
00:31:04,800 --> 00:31:07,600
Speaker 1: in the New York Times special edition the day after

558
00:31:07,640 --> 00:31:11,600
Speaker 1: the race, And so New Yorkers, especially non runners, look

559
00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:15,760
Speaker 1: who's first, and then they look who's last on the

560
00:31:15,800 --> 00:31:17,960
Speaker 1: first page, and then they turned to the last page

561
00:31:17,960 --> 00:31:21,000
Speaker 1: to see how long the slowest person is. So everybody

562
00:31:21,040 --> 00:31:23,040
Speaker 1: the next day woke up and saw like Knox Robinson

563
00:31:23,160 --> 00:31:25,360
Speaker 1: out of the place. Yo, he's in the Centric Club.

564
00:31:25,400 --> 00:31:26,600
Speaker 1: He said he was going to do it, and he

565
00:31:26,680 --> 00:31:28,360
Speaker 1: did it. So then I would see dudes at like

566
00:31:28,400 --> 00:31:31,720
Speaker 1: industry functions or whatever, and people are like, yo, I

567
00:31:31,720 --> 00:31:34,080
Speaker 1: heard you in the Centric Club. That's big. I was like, yeah,

568
00:31:34,120 --> 00:31:35,440
Speaker 1: you know, Centric.

569
00:31:35,160 --> 00:31:39,880
Speaker 2: Club and you did that after wilding out with Kanye.

570
00:31:40,440 --> 00:31:42,400
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, like, you know, don't want to blame

571
00:31:42,440 --> 00:31:43,680
Speaker 1: it on Ye.

572
00:31:43,440 --> 00:31:48,360
Speaker 2: But can we recap that that component of your life

573
00:31:48,760 --> 00:31:50,200
Speaker 2: all bite briefly? Maybe?

574
00:31:50,840 --> 00:31:54,600
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, you know, I once I I was

575
00:31:54,800 --> 00:31:58,840
Speaker 1: fired unceremoniously from being editor in chief for the Fader magazine.

576
00:32:00,040 --> 00:32:00,680
Speaker 2: What happened with that?

577
00:32:01,520 --> 00:32:05,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, just general theme. I was, I was

578
00:32:05,560 --> 00:32:08,160
Speaker 1: out of control, pushing things too far.

579
00:32:09,320 --> 00:32:12,080
Speaker 2: When you were at Fader, that's when you did Kanye's

580
00:32:12,080 --> 00:32:13,760
Speaker 2: first cover, correct, correct?

581
00:32:14,480 --> 00:32:18,440
Speaker 1: So yeah, have kind of been around Kanye from almost

582
00:32:18,480 --> 00:32:22,880
Speaker 1: the very beginning, for better or for worse. It's been

583
00:32:22,920 --> 00:32:25,400
Speaker 1: interesting to watch his journey.

584
00:32:26,120 --> 00:32:29,720
Speaker 2: So you're at Fader, you have, I mean, and what

585
00:32:29,800 --> 00:32:33,600
Speaker 2: was it like for you at this time to get

586
00:32:33,920 --> 00:32:37,920
Speaker 2: so much exposure with like these bigger name individuals, whether

587
00:32:37,960 --> 00:32:40,560
Speaker 2: it be you know, Yeah or the others. And I

588
00:32:40,600 --> 00:32:43,200
Speaker 2: think it's I think it's interesting actually kind of to

589
00:32:43,320 --> 00:32:48,240
Speaker 2: set up your career in running also because it's like

590
00:32:48,320 --> 00:32:51,280
Speaker 2: you have this experience where you are around a lot

591
00:32:51,320 --> 00:32:54,960
Speaker 2: of high profile people in a very different type of industry. Yeah,

592
00:32:55,000 --> 00:32:56,720
Speaker 2: and then you transition into what you're doing now and

593
00:32:56,800 --> 00:32:58,480
Speaker 2: it's like a totally different beast.

594
00:32:58,880 --> 00:33:02,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, totally different beasts. On the outside. But like the

595
00:33:02,080 --> 00:33:06,080
Speaker 1: access and the unlocks were so simple, just because I

596
00:33:06,120 --> 00:33:10,880
Speaker 1: had spent so many years reporting and figuring out how

597
00:33:10,920 --> 00:33:13,000
Speaker 1: to report. I mean, I've been like a writer since

598
00:33:13,280 --> 00:33:16,080
Speaker 1: age four, you know, and have been like thinking about

599
00:33:16,240 --> 00:33:21,280
Speaker 1: these things like on a craft level, you know, as

600
00:33:21,280 --> 00:33:24,440
Speaker 1: a pre teen. And so when it comes to you know,

601
00:33:24,600 --> 00:33:29,120
Speaker 1: what we could call the craft of interviewing or how

602
00:33:29,160 --> 00:33:32,440
Speaker 1: to get stories out of people, and then also how

603
00:33:32,480 --> 00:33:35,600
Speaker 1: to like share those stories and relate those stories, reproduce

604
00:33:35,640 --> 00:33:39,120
Speaker 1: those stories, or reconstitute those stories, That's been something that

605
00:33:39,160 --> 00:33:42,280
Speaker 1: I've like always been engaged in. And so coming out

606
00:33:42,280 --> 00:33:45,959
Speaker 1: of this time where first of all, to be at

607
00:33:45,960 --> 00:33:48,160
Speaker 1: Fader in those early years, you know, the first five

608
00:33:48,240 --> 00:33:51,800
Speaker 1: years of the magazine's publication was incredibly intoxicating. You know.

609
00:33:53,520 --> 00:33:56,000
Speaker 1: I ended up writing and then editing a lot of

610
00:33:56,000 --> 00:34:00,760
Speaker 1: the magazine and together with you know, the other the

611
00:34:00,800 --> 00:34:02,960
Speaker 1: small team who was behind the book at the time,

612
00:34:04,320 --> 00:34:07,160
Speaker 1: there were very few boundaries, for better or for worse,

613
00:34:07,200 --> 00:34:09,839
Speaker 1: and so whether it was like the narrative devices we

614
00:34:09,840 --> 00:34:13,440
Speaker 1: were using to tell a story about rappers, you know,

615
00:34:13,800 --> 00:34:16,760
Speaker 1: or we were you know, just sort of like jumping

616
00:34:16,800 --> 00:34:22,080
Speaker 1: on you know, an indie band from Williamsburg that just

617
00:34:22,160 --> 00:34:26,880
Speaker 1: moved to town that week. We recovering anything and everything

618
00:34:26,960 --> 00:34:33,360
Speaker 1: that our appetites dictated. Fast forwarding to now working into running.

619
00:34:33,360 --> 00:34:37,280
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously, several years ago, running was generally perceived

620
00:34:37,320 --> 00:34:42,040
Speaker 1: to be the domain and the purview of you know, moneyed,

621
00:34:42,520 --> 00:34:46,279
Speaker 1: white males. It's striking if you look at magazines from

622
00:34:46,280 --> 00:34:53,839
Speaker 1: those times, it's just like so homogeneous and monochromatic. And

623
00:34:53,920 --> 00:34:59,320
Speaker 1: now when you look in the magazines, in some ways

624
00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:02,920
Speaker 1: it's verse, at least on an advertising level, there's a

625
00:35:02,960 --> 00:35:06,799
Speaker 1: wild greater representation of different types of runners. And it's

626
00:35:07,080 --> 00:35:09,600
Speaker 1: been great to see the culture open up to that

627
00:35:09,719 --> 00:35:12,640
Speaker 1: idea of like who is a runner and who can

628
00:35:12,719 --> 00:35:15,160
Speaker 1: be a runner, And that's something I'm definitely proud to

629
00:35:15,800 --> 00:35:16,440
Speaker 1: have witnessed.

630
00:35:16,800 --> 00:35:19,319
Speaker 2: So you get kicked out of Fader, get kicked out

631
00:35:19,360 --> 00:35:21,560
Speaker 2: of Fader. I feel like we need to take a

632
00:35:21,600 --> 00:35:25,719
Speaker 2: beat to bring up the theme of the week here,

633
00:35:25,880 --> 00:35:29,720
Speaker 2: which is that you seem to have so much passion

634
00:35:29,760 --> 00:35:31,439
Speaker 2: for the things that you care about that it gets

635
00:35:31,480 --> 00:35:32,120
Speaker 2: you into trouble.

636
00:35:33,239 --> 00:35:36,120
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, you got to know what there's a

637
00:35:36,120 --> 00:35:39,680
Speaker 1: boss you that painting that said most kings get their

638
00:35:39,719 --> 00:35:41,960
Speaker 1: heads chopped off, like that you just got to know.

639
00:35:42,040 --> 00:35:46,319
Speaker 1: That's what it is that you're growing up black in America, Like,

640
00:35:46,760 --> 00:35:51,000
Speaker 1: are so many reference points for our icons are trailblazers

641
00:35:51,000 --> 00:35:56,080
Speaker 1: and innovators who are taken from us too soon. So yeah,

642
00:35:56,560 --> 00:36:03,960
Speaker 1: for me, those sort of rebuffs often come with a sting.

643
00:36:04,760 --> 00:36:09,000
Speaker 1: But you know, if you're not pushing the boundaries, then

644
00:36:09,560 --> 00:36:10,560
Speaker 1: you're not doing it right.

645
00:36:11,719 --> 00:36:14,279
Speaker 2: Yeah. I feel like the follow up question then for

646
00:36:14,400 --> 00:36:18,359
Speaker 2: that is have you regretted pushing the boundary?

647
00:36:18,600 --> 00:36:21,520
Speaker 1: Oh? No, That's who I am. That's like in my DNA.

648
00:36:21,719 --> 00:36:24,680
Speaker 1: That's that's just the way I see the world, you know,

649
00:36:25,360 --> 00:36:31,360
Speaker 1: And if anything, it's it's sometimes quaint, I guess because

650
00:36:32,920 --> 00:36:35,080
Speaker 1: I just do that every day, you know, like to

651
00:36:35,200 --> 00:36:38,600
Speaker 1: the absurd coming I made earlier about like running for

652
00:36:38,640 --> 00:36:41,799
Speaker 1: the bus, like you're still doing that. You're still like

653
00:36:41,880 --> 00:36:44,799
Speaker 1: sizing up the distance and like can I make that

654
00:36:45,000 --> 00:36:48,759
Speaker 1: yellow light like over the crosswalk? And so when it

655
00:36:48,840 --> 00:36:51,840
Speaker 1: comes to running, I enjoy it. I love it. I

656
00:36:52,000 --> 00:36:53,840
Speaker 1: love running on a fall day without a care in

657
00:36:53,880 --> 00:36:56,520
Speaker 1: the world. I love running whatever kind of paces. So

658
00:36:56,560 --> 00:37:00,600
Speaker 1: I have, like again an overwhelming passion for it. But

659
00:37:01,600 --> 00:37:04,200
Speaker 1: I do when I'm in the zone, I do love

660
00:37:04,320 --> 00:37:06,520
Speaker 1: pushing the boundaries and see how fast I can go.

661
00:37:06,600 --> 00:37:10,360
Speaker 1: I mean, by this point, I've run almost thirty marathons,

662
00:37:10,640 --> 00:37:15,200
Speaker 1: almost almost thirty. I'm creeping up on thirty of twenty

663
00:37:15,200 --> 00:37:20,040
Speaker 1: eight twenty nine marathons, and I've never broken to thirty.

664
00:37:20,280 --> 00:37:23,200
Speaker 1: And if you ask me today, I'm going to run

665
00:37:23,560 --> 00:37:26,920
Speaker 1: to twenty six at the London Marathon in April. So

666
00:37:27,400 --> 00:37:30,600
Speaker 1: I'm still just obsessed as I was fifteen sixteen years ago.

667
00:37:30,719 --> 00:37:32,239
Speaker 2: I love that. I love that.

668
00:37:32,360 --> 00:37:35,239
Speaker 1: You don't like it, no why? I just wish I

669
00:37:35,239 --> 00:37:37,120
Speaker 1: could like wake up one day and like be freed

670
00:37:37,160 --> 00:37:39,319
Speaker 1: from like this dream, you know, like.

671
00:37:40,920 --> 00:37:43,279
Speaker 2: You know, I don't know, But isn't the pursuit of

672
00:37:43,320 --> 00:37:47,680
Speaker 2: the dream what keeps us like excited and alive. And

673
00:37:48,360 --> 00:37:49,160
Speaker 2: if you pursue it.

674
00:37:49,440 --> 00:37:53,799
Speaker 1: An overtrain And like, look, if I wasn't running, if

675
00:37:53,840 --> 00:37:55,800
Speaker 1: I ryan, let's say I ran two twenty nine to

676
00:37:55,880 --> 00:37:59,400
Speaker 1: fifty nine, I wouldn't have to pursue the goal anymore.

677
00:37:59,600 --> 00:38:01,640
Speaker 1: I would quit running. I could go back to eating

678
00:38:01,680 --> 00:38:05,200
Speaker 1: ice cream with smoking weed every night. And you know,

679
00:38:06,400 --> 00:38:10,800
Speaker 1: like aside from perpetually having the munchies because of smoking

680
00:38:10,880 --> 00:38:13,560
Speaker 1: so much weed, my grocery bill would go down I

681
00:38:13,560 --> 00:38:15,560
Speaker 1: wouldn't be eating for two all the time, like a

682
00:38:15,560 --> 00:38:18,600
Speaker 1: marathon or does. I'd be good, so my finances would

683
00:38:18,640 --> 00:38:20,880
Speaker 1: be more arranged. I wouldn't be blowing money on running

684
00:38:20,880 --> 00:38:22,360
Speaker 1: gear and traveling to races.

685
00:38:22,520 --> 00:38:24,839
Speaker 2: But doesn't this bring you back then to the time

686
00:38:24,920 --> 00:38:27,000
Speaker 2: where you left running and then you remember how that

687
00:38:27,000 --> 00:38:30,080
Speaker 2: felt and you don't like life really that much without running,

688
00:38:30,120 --> 00:38:31,680
Speaker 2: So then you get back into it again, and it's

689
00:38:31,719 --> 00:38:33,560
Speaker 2: a cycle. It's a cycle.

690
00:38:33,960 --> 00:38:36,799
Speaker 1: One of my favorite books is this, this book. I've

691
00:38:36,800 --> 00:38:39,359
Speaker 1: been reading it for like twenty years. It's too good

692
00:38:39,400 --> 00:38:43,440
Speaker 1: to finish. It's Prisoner of Love by Jean Janet, and

693
00:38:43,920 --> 00:38:46,680
Speaker 1: I think I'm just in love with the title. You

694
00:38:46,680 --> 00:38:49,279
Speaker 1: no prisoner of love, And it's an accounting of his

695
00:38:50,040 --> 00:38:51,880
Speaker 1: time at the end of his career when he was

696
00:38:52,560 --> 00:38:55,479
Speaker 1: following the It's a memoir of like following the Black

697
00:38:55,520 --> 00:39:03,360
Speaker 1: Panthers around and also the plo and like camps in Syria, Lebanon,

698
00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:08,080
Speaker 1: Palaceline in Israel at the time. So he was just

699
00:39:08,200 --> 00:39:12,280
Speaker 1: like in love with people and to be a prisoner

700
00:39:12,320 --> 00:39:16,440
Speaker 1: of love of running and running culture is definitely a

701
00:39:16,480 --> 00:39:18,799
Speaker 1: way to describe it. You know, it's love, but like

702
00:39:20,000 --> 00:39:21,120
Speaker 1: I'm trapped in it for sure.

703
00:39:21,239 --> 00:39:24,000
Speaker 2: I feel trapped in it, for sure. I do. Okay,

704
00:39:24,080 --> 00:39:27,799
Speaker 2: so you post Fader, what do you get into with

705
00:39:27,840 --> 00:39:28,280
Speaker 2: your career?

706
00:39:28,680 --> 00:39:34,759
Speaker 1: I took my settlement and just started buying Budweiser every

707
00:39:34,800 --> 00:39:36,840
Speaker 1: day and like sitting around my house playing like reggae

708
00:39:36,920 --> 00:39:40,920
Speaker 1: records and just hanging out, like I'll figure out something.

709
00:39:42,560 --> 00:39:48,560
Speaker 1: And I ended up producing a roots reggae compilation for

710
00:39:48,600 --> 00:39:51,040
Speaker 1: a UK label that took up a little bit of time.

711
00:39:51,920 --> 00:39:54,640
Speaker 2: How does one just go about to start randomly producing

712
00:39:54,640 --> 00:39:55,680
Speaker 2: a roots record label?

713
00:39:55,920 --> 00:39:58,879
Speaker 1: Well, you know, I'm like an inveterate record collector. And

714
00:39:59,040 --> 00:40:02,680
Speaker 1: after I left the magaz I still had like my credentials.

715
00:40:02,719 --> 00:40:06,280
Speaker 1: I still had like my my my cvs where people

716
00:40:06,320 --> 00:40:09,680
Speaker 1: know what I did. So a lot of folks pursued

717
00:40:09,719 --> 00:40:12,439
Speaker 1: me with different opportunities. I knew I couldn't very well

718
00:40:12,480 --> 00:40:14,320
Speaker 1: just like go and write for another magazine because I

719
00:40:14,320 --> 00:40:19,560
Speaker 1: already had like an editor in chief's ego. So I

720
00:40:19,680 --> 00:40:21,399
Speaker 1: just kind of was going to wait for another ship

721
00:40:21,440 --> 00:40:26,080
Speaker 1: to come in and so yeah, put this this reggae

722
00:40:26,080 --> 00:40:29,520
Speaker 1: compilation out that was super educational and amazing, and then

723
00:40:29,560 --> 00:40:34,360
Speaker 1: from there I just started managing acts. I you know,

724
00:40:34,920 --> 00:40:39,239
Speaker 1: saw an eight piece spiritual cosmic brass band busking the

725
00:40:39,280 --> 00:40:42,759
Speaker 1: Street in New York and started working with them. That

726
00:40:42,880 --> 00:40:45,440
Speaker 1: was a crazy trip, that was like a brush with

727
00:40:45,680 --> 00:40:49,840
Speaker 1: joining a cult that was very interesting. From there, I

728
00:40:49,400 --> 00:40:54,960
Speaker 1: worked with a four piece indie rock band from Johannesburg

729
00:40:55,000 --> 00:40:58,320
Speaker 1: and Soweto, South Africa. And then after that I worked

730
00:40:58,320 --> 00:41:01,839
Speaker 1: with an early kind of like post Kanye rapper named

731
00:41:01,880 --> 00:41:04,680
Speaker 1: Theophalis London, who actually was from just a few blocks

732
00:41:04,719 --> 00:41:04,960
Speaker 1: from here.

733
00:41:05,000 --> 00:41:07,879
Speaker 2: I remember, yeah, yeah, you grew up right around here,

734
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:11,960
Speaker 2: right around here. Yeah. Knox talks about being a collector

735
00:41:12,000 --> 00:41:13,839
Speaker 2: of records and how many do you have that you're

736
00:41:13,840 --> 00:41:19,320
Speaker 2: sitting in front of right now? Probably like ten thousand records,

737
00:41:20,320 --> 00:41:26,080
Speaker 2: ten thousand records cash. Yeah, Okay, so we're doing we're

738
00:41:26,120 --> 00:41:30,600
Speaker 2: doing records, We're making the hits, we're still running.

739
00:41:31,200 --> 00:41:34,160
Speaker 1: Yeah. And then yeah, after that, you know that that

740
00:41:34,200 --> 00:41:39,080
Speaker 1: twenty eleven, folks kind of saw folks kind of like

741
00:41:39,719 --> 00:41:41,839
Speaker 1: dragged running out of me. You know, Folks were like

742
00:41:42,120 --> 00:41:46,359
Speaker 1: I went from just being like a dude who kind

743
00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:50,440
Speaker 1: of people knew on this burgeoning urban running scene to

744
00:41:50,760 --> 00:41:54,480
Speaker 1: folks who were kind of like asking me advice, you know, like, hey,

745
00:41:54,600 --> 00:41:58,760
Speaker 1: is this workout legitimate? Or how do I stretch or whatever,

746
00:41:58,800 --> 00:42:04,920
Speaker 1: And so I rather reluctantly started offering that experience and

747
00:42:05,040 --> 00:42:07,520
Speaker 1: acumen to folks, you know, against better judgment.

748
00:42:07,680 --> 00:42:11,279
Speaker 3: Why reluctantly, Yeah, because I was just trying to hang out,

749
00:42:11,320 --> 00:42:13,120
Speaker 3: like it was cool to you know, I was living

750
00:42:13,200 --> 00:42:18,280
Speaker 3: upstate in Beacon, and I loved really hard training.

751
00:42:19,200 --> 00:42:22,319
Speaker 1: But then I liked coming to the city and hanging

752
00:42:22,360 --> 00:42:24,959
Speaker 1: out downtown in the l e s, running with Bridge

753
00:42:25,000 --> 00:42:28,200
Speaker 1: runners and going out for margaritas after. So I didn't

754
00:42:28,200 --> 00:42:31,319
Speaker 1: need to like mix that up and conflate having a

755
00:42:31,360 --> 00:42:34,120
Speaker 1: good time with the hard training that I was kind

756
00:42:34,120 --> 00:42:39,480
Speaker 1: of engaged, you know, in my personal life. But after

757
00:42:39,520 --> 00:42:44,080
Speaker 1: a while, the things started to get blurry and there

758
00:42:44,160 --> 00:42:49,120
Speaker 1: was like a greater interest in just what it takes

759
00:42:49,200 --> 00:42:53,080
Speaker 1: to crack long distance running. It's cool to, you know,

760
00:42:53,120 --> 00:42:55,600
Speaker 1: sign up for your first marathon and not train for

761
00:42:55,640 --> 00:42:59,640
Speaker 1: it and bomb your way through it, but you know,

762
00:43:00,120 --> 00:43:03,600
Speaker 1: ninety seven percent of people who do that finish, and

763
00:43:03,640 --> 00:43:06,680
Speaker 1: no matter how painful it is and so debilitating and humiliating.

764
00:43:08,480 --> 00:43:12,600
Speaker 1: It's like this with everybody, from that person who bombs

765
00:43:12,600 --> 00:43:14,800
Speaker 1: their way through their first all the way to Elliott Kipchoge.

766
00:43:15,160 --> 00:43:22,080
Speaker 1: There's something about the marathon that for almost everybody really

767
00:43:24,160 --> 00:43:27,560
Speaker 1: triggers you and you want to figure it out. You

768
00:43:27,640 --> 00:43:31,239
Speaker 1: want to go back, almost everyone, no matter how hard

769
00:43:31,280 --> 00:43:35,479
Speaker 1: though that first marathon is, You're like, ah, I could

770
00:43:35,600 --> 00:43:37,399
Speaker 1: go back and do it again and change this thing

771
00:43:37,480 --> 00:43:39,960
Speaker 1: or that thing and run faster. You know.

772
00:43:40,160 --> 00:43:44,319
Speaker 2: I think it's just like an overwhelming excitement about the

773
00:43:44,360 --> 00:43:51,160
Speaker 2: ability to understand your true potential. Yeah and untap that.

774
00:43:51,680 --> 00:43:56,319
Speaker 1: Yeah, right, which is a lifelong pursuit, right, and is

775
00:43:56,480 --> 00:44:01,560
Speaker 1: so challenging. I mean it literally is takes so long,

776
00:44:02,200 --> 00:44:07,920
Speaker 1: and then running long distance running is the most central

777
00:44:08,560 --> 00:44:12,600
Speaker 1: example we have in like our human culture of something

778
00:44:12,600 --> 00:44:15,360
Speaker 1: that takes a very long time with very little reward

779
00:44:15,400 --> 00:44:19,520
Speaker 1: that is so crucial to unlocking. And so I really

780
00:44:19,600 --> 00:44:24,600
Speaker 1: think that the marathon distances is so bizarrely perfect because

781
00:44:25,280 --> 00:44:31,680
Speaker 1: it's so long that mathematically speaking, there's so many things

782
00:44:31,719 --> 00:44:34,759
Speaker 1: that can go wrong. I mean, it's like Murphy's law

783
00:44:35,120 --> 00:44:37,879
Speaker 1: writ large, you know, like what can go wrong will

784
00:44:37,920 --> 00:44:41,560
Speaker 1: go wrong. And so you keep going back to the

785
00:44:41,560 --> 00:44:43,719
Speaker 1: marathon because you want to figure it out. You want

786
00:44:43,760 --> 00:44:47,040
Speaker 1: to run faster, like you want to qualify for Boston.

787
00:44:47,120 --> 00:44:50,080
Speaker 1: You want to you know, do this or that and

788
00:44:50,800 --> 00:44:55,120
Speaker 1: it's the seduction is you know, complete.

789
00:44:55,480 --> 00:44:58,000
Speaker 2: So people are coming to you asking for your advice

790
00:44:58,239 --> 00:45:03,160
Speaker 2: on how to get fast. Sure, all right, and it's overwhelming.

791
00:45:03,400 --> 00:45:05,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know what. You know, You're like, hey, let's

792
00:45:05,400 --> 00:45:07,840
Speaker 1: just let's be friends, right, let's just hang out, like

793
00:45:07,960 --> 00:45:11,359
Speaker 1: you know, you don't need to sort of like know

794
00:45:11,400 --> 00:45:15,319
Speaker 1: what it's like to you know, do twenty two mile

795
00:45:15,440 --> 00:45:17,839
Speaker 1: runs in the mountains in like vomit after like that.

796
00:45:17,920 --> 00:45:22,839
Speaker 1: You know what they say, like everything ain't for everybody. Yeah, yeah,

797
00:45:23,160 --> 00:45:27,280
Speaker 1: but you know, nevertheless, it was cool to start sharing

798
00:45:27,800 --> 00:45:30,560
Speaker 1: those gifts and those experiences with the folks. And then

799
00:45:31,080 --> 00:45:34,279
Speaker 1: you know, I was a magazine guy. I'n't always been

800
00:45:34,320 --> 00:45:36,239
Speaker 1: a magazine guy as a writer. So then I had

801
00:45:36,239 --> 00:45:39,560
Speaker 1: the idea to start a magazine. So I took a

802
00:45:39,600 --> 00:45:41,960
Speaker 1: bunch of money that I had from from uh being

803
00:45:42,000 --> 00:45:46,000
Speaker 1: in the music business, and I funded like eighty percent

804
00:45:46,239 --> 00:45:52,920
Speaker 1: of a sort of coffee table wallpapery, posh running magazine

805
00:45:52,960 --> 00:45:55,560
Speaker 1: called First Run. I mean, I was finding like a

806
00:45:55,600 --> 00:45:58,200
Speaker 1: fashion photographer into like a training camp in the deserts

807
00:45:58,200 --> 00:46:02,680
Speaker 1: of Mexico and like shooting athletes.

808
00:46:02,960 --> 00:46:05,440
Speaker 2: It's like everything we did at Conde that was wrong

809
00:46:05,480 --> 00:46:06,680
Speaker 2: with condy.

810
00:46:06,360 --> 00:46:08,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, which is why you go to work at Conde

811
00:46:08,640 --> 00:46:10,480
Speaker 1: because you're like, this is what it's all about, and

812
00:46:10,520 --> 00:46:13,960
Speaker 1: you're like everything wrong. Like my magazine was about like

813
00:46:14,560 --> 00:46:18,640
Speaker 1: the most expensive running jacket possible, the most expensive gear.

814
00:46:18,680 --> 00:46:21,360
Speaker 1: It was like, you know what, let's just like twist

815
00:46:21,400 --> 00:46:25,279
Speaker 1: this dire calculus of a formula all the way out, yeah,

816
00:46:25,640 --> 00:46:29,759
Speaker 1: and sell it back to rich dudes. Now, I've been

817
00:46:30,360 --> 00:46:32,560
Speaker 1: taken to task over the years, and I realized like

818
00:46:32,680 --> 00:46:37,680
Speaker 1: how limited that concept is and it was and is,

819
00:46:38,120 --> 00:46:44,319
Speaker 1: and also just like how possibly toxic you know, that

820
00:46:44,440 --> 00:46:47,680
Speaker 1: vision of what it could be. But nevertheless, I blew

821
00:46:47,680 --> 00:46:50,520
Speaker 1: a lot of money on the idea. The hard drive

822
00:46:50,680 --> 00:46:55,120
Speaker 1: today is pretty incredible for what's in that that magazine

823
00:46:55,120 --> 00:46:58,680
Speaker 1: that never was published. And then around that time, Instagram

824
00:46:58,760 --> 00:47:03,560
Speaker 1: took off, and I found so much more edification and

825
00:47:03,640 --> 00:47:08,320
Speaker 1: satisfaction by you know, writing sort of gazette style dispatches,

826
00:47:08,920 --> 00:47:13,439
Speaker 1: abusing the length of the caption and really getting out

827
00:47:13,560 --> 00:47:17,600
Speaker 1: that sort of combination of image and text that like

828
00:47:17,719 --> 00:47:20,279
Speaker 1: for anybody who's been in love with magazines from a

829
00:47:20,320 --> 00:47:24,080
Speaker 1: young age, know that, like Instagram is that that is

830
00:47:24,120 --> 00:47:26,719
Speaker 1: that for us, image and text, Image and text.

831
00:47:26,560 --> 00:47:30,160
Speaker 2: Right right, Okay, so you come back from this trip

832
00:47:30,239 --> 00:47:33,319
Speaker 2: to the desert to take all these about us, right,

833
00:47:34,640 --> 00:47:38,560
Speaker 2: so you never make the magazine no, wow, Yeah, because

834
00:47:38,600 --> 00:47:41,280
Speaker 2: it's like, right when I was about to push print,

835
00:47:41,360 --> 00:47:43,840
Speaker 2: you know, at the printing press or whatever, basically like

836
00:47:43,880 --> 00:47:45,279
Speaker 2: had it all lined up, I was like.

837
00:47:46,760 --> 00:47:51,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, but Instagram was more fun, and so yeah, the

838
00:47:51,600 --> 00:47:56,160
Speaker 1: magazine just sort of idled. The concept of that sort

839
00:47:56,200 --> 00:48:00,040
Speaker 1: of like curated lifestyle approach to running is in the

840
00:48:00,120 --> 00:48:03,520
Speaker 1: DNA of like what I do on Instagram and social media,

841
00:48:04,640 --> 00:48:08,439
Speaker 1: and I think, if anything, it's sort of been that

842
00:48:09,440 --> 00:48:11,759
Speaker 1: projection of a personal brand that I've kind of put

843
00:48:11,800 --> 00:48:13,279
Speaker 1: out there in the world. I mean it's real. I

844
00:48:13,320 --> 00:48:15,920
Speaker 1: mean I do go to these places I have trained

845
00:48:15,920 --> 00:48:18,239
Speaker 1: in this way, I have sort of like you know,

846
00:48:18,320 --> 00:48:22,359
Speaker 1: all these kind of relationships and interactions and adventures are

847
00:48:23,280 --> 00:48:26,560
Speaker 1: are for real, for better or for worse. But I

848
00:48:26,600 --> 00:48:28,800
Speaker 1: do also have like a personal life and a private

849
00:48:28,840 --> 00:48:32,080
Speaker 1: life as well. Right, So the First Run thing is

850
00:48:32,360 --> 00:48:36,040
Speaker 1: has been like an extension of that magazine idea.

851
00:48:36,480 --> 00:48:39,560
Speaker 2: I never knew that that's where First Run came from. Yeah,

852
00:48:39,640 --> 00:48:40,479
Speaker 2: why First Run.

853
00:48:41,239 --> 00:48:44,120
Speaker 1: I was having a conversation with a person who is,

854
00:48:44,560 --> 00:48:48,640
Speaker 1: you know, helping me get The project started early on

855
00:48:48,719 --> 00:48:52,520
Speaker 1: and she was talking about her first run when she

856
00:48:52,640 --> 00:48:57,040
Speaker 1: was in college, wearing like repetto flats and like just

857
00:48:57,360 --> 00:49:01,799
Speaker 1: jogging through the East village just to feel some sense

858
00:49:01,840 --> 00:49:04,479
Speaker 1: of freedom. And she was going on about her first run,

859
00:49:04,520 --> 00:49:06,239
Speaker 1: and I was like, then it made me think about

860
00:49:06,280 --> 00:49:09,400
Speaker 1: what my first run was and how mad cap and

861
00:49:09,520 --> 00:49:13,800
Speaker 1: visceral and memorable those sort of zany experiences are. And

862
00:49:13,840 --> 00:49:16,359
Speaker 1: then I realized, oh man, it doesn't matter if you're

863
00:49:16,360 --> 00:49:19,479
Speaker 1: an Olympian or a first time or The thing about

864
00:49:19,480 --> 00:49:21,759
Speaker 1: a first run is that everyone has one, and that's

865
00:49:21,880 --> 00:49:23,680
Speaker 1: like a great connection.

866
00:49:24,120 --> 00:49:27,719
Speaker 2: You come back and you have this Instagram platform, and

867
00:49:27,760 --> 00:49:32,080
Speaker 2: I'm sure as the Instagram platform builds, you are being

868
00:49:32,120 --> 00:49:35,759
Speaker 2: approached more and more, and perhaps reluctantly but maybe not

869
00:49:35,800 --> 00:49:39,239
Speaker 2: so much anymore. Are in the position to continue to

870
00:49:39,560 --> 00:49:40,680
Speaker 2: offer advice?

871
00:49:41,239 --> 00:49:45,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it's great because I just have had

872
00:49:45,600 --> 00:49:48,799
Speaker 1: the experience. And now in this running boom, there's so

873
00:49:48,840 --> 00:49:52,280
Speaker 1: many new runners and first time runners that like, folks

874
00:49:52,320 --> 00:49:54,759
Speaker 1: are going at it and you know, especially back in

875
00:49:54,760 --> 00:49:57,720
Speaker 1: the day, going at it in any number of ways.

876
00:49:58,560 --> 00:50:02,439
Speaker 1: And you know, when your kids learning how to walk,

877
00:50:02,480 --> 00:50:04,360
Speaker 1: you just got to stand back and let it happen,

878
00:50:04,400 --> 00:50:07,040
Speaker 1: but that doesn't stop you from like kind of wringing

879
00:50:07,080 --> 00:50:09,800
Speaker 1: your hands when they stumble a couple of times and

880
00:50:09,840 --> 00:50:14,040
Speaker 1: want to reach out and help them. So I think

881
00:50:14,080 --> 00:50:17,200
Speaker 1: that the platform of kind of sharing a running journey,

882
00:50:17,239 --> 00:50:20,759
Speaker 1: and early on I was kind of much more straightforward

883
00:50:20,800 --> 00:50:24,920
Speaker 1: about like sharing specific workouts and explaining sort of the

884
00:50:24,960 --> 00:50:28,439
Speaker 1: ins and outs of the approach, and then that sort

885
00:50:28,480 --> 00:50:33,560
Speaker 1: of grew into like a narrative voice that sort of

886
00:50:34,080 --> 00:50:38,560
Speaker 1: reflects on running as a healing practice and or just

887
00:50:38,760 --> 00:50:42,799
Speaker 1: sort of a transmutation in a way. It's how we

888
00:50:42,880 --> 00:50:46,960
Speaker 1: kind of convert our understanding of one experience into like

889
00:50:47,000 --> 00:50:50,080
Speaker 1: a resolution of that and understanding it in a different way.

890
00:50:50,200 --> 00:50:52,440
Speaker 1: So I think running at a time, once it started

891
00:50:52,480 --> 00:50:55,040
Speaker 1: to build to like a fever pitch for me, I

892
00:50:55,120 --> 00:50:58,960
Speaker 1: was just working through a lot of things in my

893
00:50:59,080 --> 00:51:02,280
Speaker 1: life and was sharing that rather ardently, and I feel

894
00:51:02,320 --> 00:51:07,080
Speaker 1: like a lot of that Instagram following came from the

895
00:51:07,120 --> 00:51:08,720
Speaker 1: ways in which I was sharing those stories.

896
00:51:08,880 --> 00:51:11,840
Speaker 2: I think it's interesting as well because so many people

897
00:51:12,000 --> 00:51:15,600
Speaker 2: lean into running for healing, right, like lean into it

898
00:51:15,640 --> 00:51:17,839
Speaker 2: to get through hard stuff, And you're saying that that's

899
00:51:17,880 --> 00:51:22,000
Speaker 2: what you do now, which is why it is disheartening

900
00:51:22,040 --> 00:51:25,400
Speaker 2: and sad for me to think about your beginnings with

901
00:51:25,560 --> 00:51:28,120
Speaker 2: running and that you had to literally walk away from

902
00:51:28,160 --> 00:51:32,000
Speaker 2: it to heal from a really negative situation. Do you

903
00:51:32,200 --> 00:51:36,360
Speaker 2: find that you have to battle between those two sides ever?

904
00:51:36,520 --> 00:51:38,520
Speaker 1: Still, I don't think there's going to be a time

905
00:51:38,560 --> 00:51:42,680
Speaker 1: where I'm going to walk away from it because having

906
00:51:42,719 --> 00:51:48,080
Speaker 1: done that, you know, folks around me, my detractors will

907
00:51:48,080 --> 00:51:51,480
Speaker 1: definitely say that, Like I don't admit to mistakes, I

908
00:51:51,480 --> 00:51:55,040
Speaker 1: don't think I've made too many of my life. Definitely

909
00:51:55,200 --> 00:51:57,520
Speaker 1: some errors in judgment all the way along. But I

910
00:51:57,520 --> 00:51:59,840
Speaker 1: guess when I think back on mistakes I've made in

911
00:51:59,840 --> 00:52:02,840
Speaker 1: my life, quitting running was definitely the first thing that

912
00:52:03,200 --> 00:52:05,120
Speaker 1: leaps out, and I'm never going to do that again.

913
00:52:05,800 --> 00:52:07,839
Speaker 1: So yeah, I'm always going to lean into it. I

914
00:52:07,880 --> 00:52:13,080
Speaker 1: don't always see it as a vehicle for a healing

915
00:52:13,440 --> 00:52:17,200
Speaker 1: for me. Sometimes a lot of times for me in

916
00:52:17,239 --> 00:52:20,440
Speaker 1: recent years, I found that like a mindfulness practice and

917
00:52:20,520 --> 00:52:23,960
Speaker 1: meditation also combined with running has been great. But if anything,

918
00:52:24,360 --> 00:52:28,560
Speaker 1: a mindfulness practice sort of changed my approach to running

919
00:52:28,560 --> 00:52:31,520
Speaker 1: and like freed me up to get even deeper into

920
00:52:31,760 --> 00:52:32,280
Speaker 1: the pursuit.

921
00:52:32,480 --> 00:52:35,759
Speaker 2: How do you pair the two of them.

922
00:52:34,680 --> 00:52:37,600
Speaker 1: Just in a pretty parochial fashion. You know, I think

923
00:52:37,640 --> 00:52:40,759
Speaker 1: at my peak, you know, I was, you know, a

924
00:52:40,800 --> 00:52:42,719
Speaker 1: few years ago, I was running one hundred miles a week,

925
00:52:42,760 --> 00:52:45,719
Speaker 1: and like meditating, I was on like a ninety day

926
00:52:45,760 --> 00:52:48,560
Speaker 1: meditation streak or a hundred day meditation streak. And so

927
00:52:49,239 --> 00:52:53,880
Speaker 1: the two together really sort of were a wild cocktail,

928
00:52:53,960 --> 00:52:57,400
Speaker 1: I guess you could say, of personal unlock. And this

929
00:52:57,480 --> 00:53:00,080
Speaker 1: is going to another dimension of who I knew my

930
00:53:00,080 --> 00:53:03,800
Speaker 1: self to be. And that precipitated some pretty eye popping

931
00:53:03,840 --> 00:53:07,680
Speaker 1: performances that I didn't really anticipate. The you know, two

932
00:53:07,719 --> 00:53:10,719
Speaker 1: thirty three in Berlin, and then I rather shockingly ran

933
00:53:11,040 --> 00:53:14,000
Speaker 1: broke seventy minutes and the half marathon the following spring

934
00:53:14,040 --> 00:53:14,919
Speaker 1: in Valencia.

935
00:53:15,000 --> 00:53:17,719
Speaker 2: Wow, Yeah, that's fast, that was you know.

936
00:53:17,800 --> 00:53:21,520
Speaker 1: I mean it's all relative, and you can't say that's

937
00:53:21,560 --> 00:53:23,959
Speaker 1: fast to guys who are going to the Olympic Trials

938
00:53:24,040 --> 00:53:27,640
Speaker 1: or whatever, but for me to run sixty nine minutes

939
00:53:27,640 --> 00:53:33,520
Speaker 1: in the half marathon and an advanced age was definitely.

940
00:53:33,320 --> 00:53:35,960
Speaker 2: Shocking for sure. For sure. Okay, so when does the

941
00:53:36,000 --> 00:53:38,880
Speaker 2: coaching go off Instagram into real life?

942
00:53:39,120 --> 00:53:41,040
Speaker 1: Yeah? Well, you know, like so you know, I was,

943
00:53:41,680 --> 00:53:44,400
Speaker 1: you know, helping folks out with with Bridge Runners, and

944
00:53:44,760 --> 00:53:48,160
Speaker 1: then really had a special bond with one of the

945
00:53:48,600 --> 00:53:52,879
Speaker 1: other captains over there, Jesse Zappo, who's a long time

946
00:53:53,600 --> 00:53:56,360
Speaker 1: icon of urban running in New York City and indeed

947
00:53:56,640 --> 00:54:01,960
Speaker 1: running cultural worldwide. Jesse and I saw an opportunity to

948
00:54:02,040 --> 00:54:05,040
Speaker 1: take a smaller group of runners and work with them

949
00:54:06,040 --> 00:54:10,759
Speaker 1: over time in a curated fashion. So say, take thirty

950
00:54:10,840 --> 00:54:15,560
Speaker 1: runners and sort of have regular workouts. And again, now

951
00:54:15,680 --> 00:54:19,240
Speaker 1: you know, five or six years on, this idea sounds

952
00:54:19,280 --> 00:54:23,160
Speaker 1: again quaint, but there weren't urban run crews back in

953
00:54:23,200 --> 00:54:25,840
Speaker 1: the day. There was one, and you know Bridge Runners

954
00:54:25,840 --> 00:54:28,560
Speaker 1: and Rundom Crew in London and Parafount Club, but five

955
00:54:28,600 --> 00:54:32,560
Speaker 1: worldwide or something like that, and maybe even in this day,

956
00:54:32,760 --> 00:54:36,839
Speaker 1: this era, there's three or one. So nobody was doing

957
00:54:36,880 --> 00:54:40,120
Speaker 1: track workouts, nobody was doing long runs, nobody had an

958
00:54:40,160 --> 00:54:42,759
Speaker 1: idea of like how to prepare for the marathon. I mean,

959
00:54:42,960 --> 00:54:45,480
Speaker 1: in the Bridge Runners era, preparing for the New York

960
00:54:45,520 --> 00:54:48,080
Speaker 1: City Marathon met going to max Fish till it closed

961
00:54:48,600 --> 00:54:50,640
Speaker 1: and then like jumping on the ferry and like banditing

962
00:54:50,640 --> 00:54:53,920
Speaker 1: the race. And you can just see how much the

963
00:54:54,040 --> 00:54:57,200
Speaker 1: culture has blossomed since, you know, just those few years ago.

964
00:54:57,800 --> 00:55:01,239
Speaker 1: So Jesse and I started the Black Rose NYC as

965
00:55:01,320 --> 00:55:08,200
Speaker 1: a way to you know, more actively and activistically take

966
00:55:09,160 --> 00:55:12,000
Speaker 1: the learnings and the practices from elite runners and bring

967
00:55:12,040 --> 00:55:15,520
Speaker 1: them to everyday New Yorkers from a you know, wide

968
00:55:15,680 --> 00:55:20,960
Speaker 1: range of uh careers and lifestyle. So bartenders and out

969
00:55:20,960 --> 00:55:26,960
Speaker 1: of work bartenders and you know, architects and ex rock

970
00:55:27,000 --> 00:55:30,200
Speaker 1: stars and you know some elias and chefs like these

971
00:55:30,239 --> 00:55:33,560
Speaker 1: are all sort of true blue New Yorkers who have

972
00:55:33,640 --> 00:55:38,080
Speaker 1: come through the squad and to give them insights on

973
00:55:38,160 --> 00:55:42,560
Speaker 1: a training journey and a running culture level has been

974
00:55:43,680 --> 00:55:45,560
Speaker 1: you know, work that I'm super proud of.

975
00:55:45,880 --> 00:55:51,320
Speaker 2: So are all these people shooting for that sub thirty

976
00:55:51,360 --> 00:55:53,800
Speaker 2: marathon or are you working on people of all pieces?

977
00:55:54,200 --> 00:55:58,319
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, it's definitely, it's definitely definitely. The folks in

978
00:55:58,360 --> 00:56:01,640
Speaker 1: Black Roses are folks who keep showing up, folks who

979
00:56:01,640 --> 00:56:06,240
Speaker 1: haven't quit. Yeah, you know, so we're not about pace,

980
00:56:06,360 --> 00:56:10,040
Speaker 1: We're not about a real We're definitely like against, if

981
00:56:10,080 --> 00:56:14,800
Speaker 1: anything against, sort of a materialist acquisitional approach to running

982
00:56:14,840 --> 00:56:18,120
Speaker 1: and grabbing, grabbing, grabbing like I want this time or

983
00:56:18,160 --> 00:56:21,359
Speaker 1: I want this, you know, accomplishment or I won these

984
00:56:21,440 --> 00:56:25,759
Speaker 1: laurels it's really about an investigation into the craft and

985
00:56:25,800 --> 00:56:30,360
Speaker 1: an investigation and an exploration of the self and of community.

986
00:56:30,520 --> 00:56:32,120
Speaker 2: How big is your community now.

987
00:56:32,200 --> 00:56:34,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean our community is worldwide. We have you know,

988
00:56:34,640 --> 00:56:37,239
Speaker 1: twenty to thirty people in the squad at any given time.

989
00:56:37,880 --> 00:56:42,040
Speaker 1: But I like to think that the serialized nature of

990
00:56:42,080 --> 00:56:46,480
Speaker 1: our squad has sort of fans and followers and definitely

991
00:56:46,560 --> 00:56:52,520
Speaker 1: haters around the world. So I think one of the

992
00:56:52,560 --> 00:56:55,080
Speaker 1: interesting thing about Black Roses is like people come into

993
00:56:55,080 --> 00:56:59,000
Speaker 1: the squad and people leave, and people have a sharp

994
00:56:59,440 --> 00:57:01,719
Speaker 1: focus at point, and then they can just sort of

995
00:57:01,760 --> 00:57:05,000
Speaker 1: like fade away. And so I think that the episodic

996
00:57:05,160 --> 00:57:11,280
Speaker 1: nature of how our squad exists is feels like it's

997
00:57:11,680 --> 00:57:14,400
Speaker 1: content and entertainment for folks to consume, you know.

998
00:57:14,680 --> 00:57:16,720
Speaker 2: I think it's interesting as well. I mean for a

999
00:57:16,760 --> 00:57:18,680
Speaker 2: lot of people listening to this, they think of a

1000
00:57:18,760 --> 00:57:21,800
Speaker 2: run club, and they think of you know, Nike run club,

1001
00:57:21,920 --> 00:57:26,440
Speaker 2: or maybe opportunities that might feel a lot more accessible

1002
00:57:26,720 --> 00:57:30,880
Speaker 2: than something like this. What is it about this type

1003
00:57:31,240 --> 00:57:34,440
Speaker 2: of structure, you know, how you guys are putting this

1004
00:57:34,440 --> 00:57:36,960
Speaker 2: together that like jives with who you are.

1005
00:57:37,840 --> 00:57:39,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it's something that I've had to reflect

1006
00:57:39,520 --> 00:57:41,560
Speaker 1: on later because like who you know, I helped found

1007
00:57:41,600 --> 00:57:44,480
Speaker 1: Nike Plus Run Club and that that time was awesome.

1008
00:57:45,440 --> 00:57:48,280
Speaker 1: I have I like to think I have so much

1009
00:57:48,280 --> 00:57:51,240
Speaker 1: to share and give that I'm like, you know, here

1010
00:57:51,360 --> 00:57:56,640
Speaker 1: for the largest possible platform to do that. So yeah,

1011
00:57:56,680 --> 00:58:01,400
Speaker 1: I'm envious of those large oportunities. At the same time,

1012
00:58:01,440 --> 00:58:03,400
Speaker 1: I have to be real about who I am as

1013
00:58:03,400 --> 00:58:08,880
Speaker 1: a person, and you know, Black Roses is so wildly

1014
00:58:09,200 --> 00:58:13,760
Speaker 1: an extension of or an expression of, like what I

1015
00:58:13,920 --> 00:58:19,160
Speaker 1: always thought it would be, you know, and it's only

1016
00:58:19,200 --> 00:58:22,600
Speaker 1: getting to be that more and more. So. The training

1017
00:58:22,680 --> 00:58:27,880
Speaker 1: is definitely intense. The level that we set for ourselves

1018
00:58:28,800 --> 00:58:35,240
Speaker 1: is absurdly high. But in generally we refuse to do

1019
00:58:35,280 --> 00:58:41,480
Speaker 1: that without a commensurate amount, commensurate event, a commensurate amount

1020
00:58:41,640 --> 00:58:48,040
Speaker 1: of uh of uh of wilding out. And so there's

1021
00:58:48,120 --> 00:58:51,160
Speaker 1: definitely not folks like sleeping in you know, oxygen tents

1022
00:58:51,160 --> 00:58:53,480
Speaker 1: and chambers in our squad. There are folks who are

1023
00:58:53,480 --> 00:58:55,960
Speaker 1: gonna like give it their all when they're out training

1024
00:58:56,320 --> 00:58:59,080
Speaker 1: and then from there it's like off to a bar

1025
00:58:59,480 --> 00:59:03,200
Speaker 1: or off to a party, and sometimes fitting all those

1026
00:59:03,240 --> 00:59:05,480
Speaker 1: things together in a short amount of time is what

1027
00:59:05,960 --> 00:59:09,520
Speaker 1: sort of gives our squad, the sort of mad cap

1028
00:59:09,560 --> 00:59:10,800
Speaker 1: identity that it has.

1029
00:59:11,320 --> 00:59:14,200
Speaker 2: You said, intense talk to me about intents.

1030
00:59:14,880 --> 00:59:18,240
Speaker 1: Well, again, there's a lot of games in town this

1031
00:59:18,360 --> 00:59:20,479
Speaker 1: day these days, so I don't want to like sort

1032
00:59:20,520 --> 00:59:23,520
Speaker 1: of you know, tout Black Roses is sort of like

1033
00:59:23,600 --> 00:59:29,600
Speaker 1: this unparalleled performance, you know situation. But you know, we

1034
00:59:29,680 --> 00:59:32,880
Speaker 1: do have regular folks and folks who are you know,

1035
00:59:33,000 --> 00:59:37,000
Speaker 1: training for breakthrough marathons going out on twenty two mile runs,

1036
00:59:37,120 --> 00:59:40,040
Speaker 1: finishing at the track and then doing like a series

1037
00:59:40,080 --> 00:59:43,040
Speaker 1: of mile repeats after twenty two mile or all out

1038
00:59:43,080 --> 00:59:46,160
Speaker 1: to the point of exhaustion or vomit or both. We

1039
00:59:46,320 --> 00:59:50,560
Speaker 1: are training, you know, in the hills of upstate New

1040
00:59:50,640 --> 00:59:54,600
Speaker 1: York in February in a snowstorm to get that long

1041
00:59:54,680 --> 00:59:57,600
Speaker 1: run end for marathon that's months and months away. So

1042
00:59:58,120 --> 01:00:02,800
Speaker 1: you know, that sort of inten density is a hallmark

1043
01:00:02,960 --> 01:00:06,200
Speaker 1: to our training. But again that's just a direct extension

1044
01:00:06,240 --> 01:00:09,440
Speaker 1: of like the master athletes and coaches that I've seen

1045
01:00:10,000 --> 01:00:13,200
Speaker 1: over the course of my lifetime, and indeed, like these

1046
01:00:13,240 --> 01:00:15,960
Speaker 1: are practices that I've sort of used in my own

1047
01:00:16,000 --> 01:00:19,840
Speaker 1: training with you know, whatever effect and results.

1048
01:00:20,040 --> 01:00:24,640
Speaker 2: I think the question from the more recreational runner would

1049
01:00:24,720 --> 01:00:29,360
Speaker 2: be why like why the twenty two mile are followed

1050
01:00:29,360 --> 01:00:31,960
Speaker 2: by the track repeats, why do you have to like

1051
01:00:32,120 --> 01:00:35,120
Speaker 2: tackle it in the snow? Like what is it about

1052
01:00:35,600 --> 01:00:40,840
Speaker 2: this next level that drives this type of athlete?

1053
01:00:41,800 --> 01:00:44,240
Speaker 1: You know it's that cliche, but it's just like you

1054
01:00:44,320 --> 01:00:49,520
Speaker 1: go through so many challenging training exercises and practices that

1055
01:00:50,360 --> 01:00:53,720
Speaker 1: you know by the time you get to your performance,

1056
01:00:55,280 --> 01:00:58,760
Speaker 1: a lot of times you meet it with excitement, but

1057
01:00:58,880 --> 01:01:02,080
Speaker 1: sometimes melancholy because you're thinking about like all the work

1058
01:01:02,120 --> 01:01:05,040
Speaker 1: you did and then sometimes the race is over in

1059
01:01:05,040 --> 01:01:07,840
Speaker 1: a heartbeat compared to like how wild your journey was.

1060
01:01:07,880 --> 01:01:11,840
Speaker 1: I mean when you had your breakthrough marathon recently, you

1061
01:01:11,880 --> 01:01:17,800
Speaker 1: were kind of like sad after because you I'm super

1062
01:01:17,800 --> 01:01:20,960
Speaker 1: imposing on you, but like You've left so many emilies

1063
01:01:21,040 --> 01:01:25,400
Speaker 1: behind on the way, and like those emilies were a

1064
01:01:25,400 --> 01:01:29,040
Speaker 1: reflection of who you were at the time. Nevertheless, you know,

1065
01:01:29,080 --> 01:01:32,160
Speaker 1: to reach out and grab something and grab hold of something,

1066
01:01:32,200 --> 01:01:34,320
Speaker 1: you necessarily have to let go of your grasp of

1067
01:01:34,400 --> 01:01:39,520
Speaker 1: whatever you were holding before, and that is a that's

1068
01:01:39,640 --> 01:01:42,960
Speaker 1: an emotional experience, yeah, especially to reflect on after it's over.

1069
01:01:42,960 --> 01:01:45,640
Speaker 2: You're like, oh man, I know, well, then you think

1070
01:01:45,680 --> 01:01:47,680
Speaker 2: about like what you don't have anymore. But then you

1071
01:01:47,720 --> 01:01:50,200
Speaker 2: have to have an appreciation for what you do instead

1072
01:01:50,240 --> 01:01:52,440
Speaker 2: of focusing on the things that you don't, sure, focus

1073
01:01:52,480 --> 01:01:55,120
Speaker 2: on the things that you do. Yeah, I also can't

1074
01:01:55,200 --> 01:01:59,160
Speaker 2: let us glaze over the founding of Nike Plus. Just

1075
01:01:59,160 --> 01:02:00,480
Speaker 2: talk to me a little bit about that.

1076
01:02:00,840 --> 01:02:03,760
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was like an interesting time, I think. Obviously,

1077
01:02:04,400 --> 01:02:08,720
Speaker 1: Nike Run Club has has been around in the city

1078
01:02:08,960 --> 01:02:12,520
Speaker 1: for over a decade, obviously like almost twenty years, maybe

1079
01:02:12,520 --> 01:02:15,840
Speaker 1: at this point, shortly after Black Rosa started, and I

1080
01:02:15,840 --> 01:02:19,200
Speaker 1: think Nike was starting to see that folks wanted more.

1081
01:02:19,280 --> 01:02:21,680
Speaker 1: It wasn't just about you know, buying a pair of

1082
01:02:21,760 --> 01:02:23,680
Speaker 1: running shoes, throwing them in the closet and pulling him

1083
01:02:23,720 --> 01:02:26,040
Speaker 1: out and like slogging your way through a marathon. In

1084
01:02:26,080 --> 01:02:31,640
Speaker 1: the personal excellence moment and in the running boom in general,

1085
01:02:31,680 --> 01:02:34,920
Speaker 1: I think Nike sort of suddenly woke up to the

1086
01:02:34,920 --> 01:02:37,880
Speaker 1: fact that folks wanted more and that we could deliver

1087
01:02:37,960 --> 01:02:41,320
Speaker 1: that to them. So rather than just getting together for

1088
01:02:41,440 --> 01:02:44,560
Speaker 1: like a big group run for the social aspect on

1089
01:02:44,600 --> 01:02:47,800
Speaker 1: a Saturday or on a Tuesday, you know, you could

1090
01:02:48,200 --> 01:02:53,160
Speaker 1: present folks with coaching resources or like top level coaching

1091
01:02:53,440 --> 01:02:58,240
Speaker 1: resources that were informed by elite level practices, you could

1092
01:03:00,400 --> 01:03:06,240
Speaker 1: kind of like offer a wide range of training principles

1093
01:03:06,280 --> 01:03:09,560
Speaker 1: and practices to folks to complement their running. And so

1094
01:03:10,680 --> 01:03:13,760
Speaker 1: in those early days of a Nike Plus Run Club,

1095
01:03:14,160 --> 01:03:19,080
Speaker 1: it was like all hands on deck sort of effort

1096
01:03:19,160 --> 01:03:25,080
Speaker 1: to open up running to what it could be. I mean,

1097
01:03:25,440 --> 01:03:27,800
Speaker 1: one of my sort of fucaie at the time was

1098
01:03:27,880 --> 01:03:31,960
Speaker 1: the local run and intense but like weekly runs with

1099
01:03:32,040 --> 01:03:36,480
Speaker 1: a cultural destination that looked at some aspect of New

1100
01:03:36,520 --> 01:03:41,000
Speaker 1: York City, whether that was Langston Hughes's homes and celebrating

1101
01:03:41,040 --> 01:03:46,560
Speaker 1: the Harlem Renaissance, or a run out to Queen's to

1102
01:03:47,080 --> 01:03:56,240
Speaker 1: sample three different kinds of dumplings from South Asia. You know. Yeah,

1103
01:03:56,280 --> 01:04:01,680
Speaker 1: so it was a real chance to again explore the

1104
01:04:01,720 --> 01:04:05,000
Speaker 1: greatest city on the planet from a runner's point of view.

1105
01:04:05,520 --> 01:04:07,800
Speaker 1: And that also was part of Nike Plus Run Club.

1106
01:04:07,800 --> 01:04:11,040
Speaker 1: It wasn't just about like you know, long runs and workouts,

1107
01:04:11,040 --> 01:04:18,120
Speaker 1: but it was about running culture in a kind of

1108
01:04:18,160 --> 01:04:20,360
Speaker 1: three sixty understanding of it.

1109
01:04:20,360 --> 01:04:23,080
Speaker 2: It's funny because I'm thinking about not just the evolution

1110
01:04:23,280 --> 01:04:25,800
Speaker 2: of Nike Plus Run Club, but like how much has

1111
01:04:25,880 --> 01:04:29,960
Speaker 2: happened since it started, and how much is different now

1112
01:04:30,000 --> 01:04:32,360
Speaker 2: and It's like I think back to you know, when

1113
01:04:32,360 --> 01:04:35,520
Speaker 2: I had my first Nike Plus fuel band, right, I

1114
01:04:35,560 --> 01:04:38,800
Speaker 2: remember how excited I was to get my custom EA

1115
01:04:39,200 --> 01:04:43,600
Speaker 2: Nike Rose Gold of course fuel band. It was definitely

1116
01:04:43,680 --> 01:04:46,000
Speaker 2: Rose Gold, yeah, and you know, like what I did

1117
01:04:46,040 --> 01:04:49,320
Speaker 2: with that, and then I mean even fast forward to

1118
01:04:49,880 --> 01:04:51,960
Speaker 2: when you and I met when I was running the

1119
01:04:52,000 --> 01:04:54,840
Speaker 2: fastest mile with Nike. Just to think about like the

1120
01:04:54,920 --> 01:04:56,960
Speaker 2: gear that we were using then and how different that

1121
01:04:57,280 --> 01:05:01,120
Speaker 2: was versus like what's happening with ni Plus as an

1122
01:05:01,160 --> 01:05:04,560
Speaker 2: app right now as a whole. It's like worlds away

1123
01:05:04,720 --> 01:05:07,440
Speaker 2: from where it started. I mean, is that something that

1124
01:05:07,480 --> 01:05:11,720
Speaker 2: you guys even really comprehended was possible at the beginning.

1125
01:05:12,320 --> 01:05:14,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I think there were there were there

1126
01:05:14,080 --> 01:05:16,000
Speaker 1: were levels to it. I think on a corporate level,

1127
01:05:16,880 --> 01:05:20,120
Speaker 1: I kind of got the sense that like Nike had

1128
01:05:20,520 --> 01:05:23,000
Speaker 1: they had so much data. You know, every time you

1129
01:05:23,040 --> 01:05:24,720
Speaker 1: went to an event or a party, they had an

1130
01:05:24,720 --> 01:05:27,880
Speaker 1: email or like your profile, but there wasn't a unified

1131
01:05:28,400 --> 01:05:35,120
Speaker 1: a database of the Nike consumer. Everything was in different silos, right,

1132
01:05:35,320 --> 01:05:41,200
Speaker 1: or different servers. And so I think that Nike Plus

1133
01:05:41,280 --> 01:05:45,160
Speaker 1: run Club, a Nike run club on a back end level,

1134
01:05:45,200 --> 01:05:49,840
Speaker 1: was about unifying all that data in a way that

1135
01:05:50,000 --> 01:05:55,800
Speaker 1: like we could better understand who that runner was, the

1136
01:05:55,920 --> 01:05:58,400
Speaker 1: athlete was, and then also how to better serve them.

1137
01:05:58,560 --> 01:06:01,720
Speaker 1: Obviously that means like also to sell them sneakers, but

1138
01:06:02,600 --> 01:06:06,840
Speaker 1: how to really sort of support their passion for movement

1139
01:06:07,000 --> 01:06:10,760
Speaker 1: and and and that lifestyle. So in a way, yeah,

1140
01:06:10,800 --> 01:06:14,880
Speaker 1: it's changed so much, But I think as long as

1141
01:06:14,880 --> 01:06:17,920
Speaker 1: the mission is going to be about making better runners

1142
01:06:17,960 --> 01:06:20,600
Speaker 1: and making runners better, then it's going to adhere to

1143
01:06:20,640 --> 01:06:22,880
Speaker 1: that the DNA that's been in the company since the

1144
01:06:22,960 --> 01:06:23,520
Speaker 1: very beginning.

1145
01:06:23,840 --> 01:06:28,080
Speaker 2: What does movement and running look like for you these days?

1146
01:06:29,560 --> 01:06:33,440
Speaker 1: Now? As I was saying, I'm newly inspired and fired

1147
01:06:33,520 --> 01:06:36,880
Speaker 1: up to make another go at a personal time goal

1148
01:06:37,000 --> 01:06:42,000
Speaker 1: that's you know, been bewitching me for for all these marathons.

1149
01:06:42,920 --> 01:06:46,960
Speaker 1: But I'm also kind of like thinking about no pun intended,

1150
01:06:47,000 --> 01:06:49,200
Speaker 1: the road ahead and what that looks like and how

1151
01:06:49,240 --> 01:06:54,200
Speaker 1: to keep sharing this idea because in some ways culture

1152
01:06:54,240 --> 01:06:56,840
Speaker 1: is fragile, and you know, without sort of taking a

1153
01:06:56,880 --> 01:07:00,920
Speaker 1: pretentious view of it, we do have to continue to

1154
01:07:00,960 --> 01:07:04,960
Speaker 1: cultivate it and protect it. And so I think a

1155
01:07:04,960 --> 01:07:08,440
Speaker 1: lot of times in this ecosystem, it's easy to exploit

1156
01:07:08,600 --> 01:07:13,160
Speaker 1: people's passion for running, whether that's like a brand doing

1157
01:07:13,160 --> 01:07:18,600
Speaker 1: that or that's a social media influencer doing that. And

1158
01:07:18,680 --> 01:07:22,360
Speaker 1: so I really want to keep shining a light for

1159
01:07:22,560 --> 01:07:27,760
Speaker 1: what the promise and the passion or maybe the purity

1160
01:07:27,760 --> 01:07:31,760
Speaker 1: of running, the joys that it offers for all of us.

1161
01:07:32,160 --> 01:07:35,880
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you said passion for sharing, and obviously

1162
01:07:35,920 --> 01:07:38,680
Speaker 2: you've shared a lot of miles with a lot of

1163
01:07:38,680 --> 01:07:42,320
Speaker 2: different people. I'm curious to know when and kind of

1164
01:07:42,360 --> 01:07:46,040
Speaker 2: how some of like how you found yourself in some

1165
01:07:46,120 --> 01:07:49,360
Speaker 2: of the insane situations that you have And maybe obviously

1166
01:07:49,400 --> 01:07:51,800
Speaker 2: you can't reflect on all of them, but if you

1167
01:07:52,000 --> 01:07:55,200
Speaker 2: could maybe reflect on one or two where you kind

1168
01:07:55,240 --> 01:07:59,600
Speaker 2: of just open your eyes and realize, hey, here I

1169
01:07:59,600 --> 01:08:03,440
Speaker 2: am in far away desert doing X y Z, Like

1170
01:08:03,480 --> 01:08:05,760
Speaker 2: how does someone just end up doing some of the

1171
01:08:05,800 --> 01:08:07,720
Speaker 2: things that you've been so fortunate to do.

1172
01:08:08,400 --> 01:08:15,120
Speaker 1: I've always been a person to write that letter, you know,

1173
01:08:15,240 --> 01:08:17,639
Speaker 1: I've always been the person to make that trip. I've

1174
01:08:17,680 --> 01:08:20,719
Speaker 1: always been that person to go through an unlocked door.

1175
01:08:20,920 --> 01:08:27,000
Speaker 1: You know. Sometimes sometimes I like to to to joke

1176
01:08:27,080 --> 01:08:30,479
Speaker 1: that I'm extremely adept at like kicking down unlocked doors,

1177
01:08:30,720 --> 01:08:32,639
Speaker 1: you know, like make a lot of noise and make

1178
01:08:32,640 --> 01:08:34,920
Speaker 1: it seem super dramatic, but the door was open the

1179
01:08:34,920 --> 01:08:43,000
Speaker 1: whole time. But but yeah, you know, like again, all

1180
01:08:43,080 --> 01:08:45,800
Speaker 1: the sort of experience have the same pattern. Once I

1181
01:08:45,920 --> 01:08:49,479
Speaker 1: was at south By Southwest in the music business and

1182
01:08:49,600 --> 01:08:53,080
Speaker 1: was running with some you know, rich music industry types

1183
01:08:53,120 --> 01:08:57,479
Speaker 1: and lawyers there in Austin in the morning and a

1184
01:08:57,560 --> 01:09:03,080
Speaker 1: group of young fit athletes, you know, and one of

1185
01:09:03,080 --> 01:09:06,040
Speaker 1: my good friends just starts talking trash to like the kids.

1186
01:09:06,040 --> 01:09:08,400
Speaker 1: They're like, Oh, you think you're so fucking bad by

1187
01:09:08,439 --> 01:09:10,240
Speaker 1: passing it, but this guy right here is showing you

1188
01:09:10,280 --> 01:09:12,840
Speaker 1: for the Boston Marathon, and I guarantee he can kick

1189
01:09:12,880 --> 01:09:15,479
Speaker 1: your ass. And one of the dudes turned over his

1190
01:09:15,520 --> 01:09:17,840
Speaker 1: shoulder and he's like, oh yeah, and I was like, ah.

1191
01:09:18,479 --> 01:09:20,280
Speaker 1: They started like thinking about it, and I was like,

1192
01:09:20,880 --> 01:09:24,320
Speaker 1: why is this brown dude running with this black woman

1193
01:09:24,600 --> 01:09:26,760
Speaker 1: running with like this white dude. This is not like

1194
01:09:27,320 --> 01:09:29,439
Speaker 1: a group of friends, this is a team, you know.

1195
01:09:29,520 --> 01:09:34,120
Speaker 1: And that was an awesome track club and we ended

1196
01:09:34,200 --> 01:09:37,280
Speaker 1: up getting into like a friendly banter invited them out

1197
01:09:37,280 --> 01:09:39,920
Speaker 1: to some south By Southwest shows, so they're like backstage

1198
01:09:39,920 --> 01:09:42,479
Speaker 1: C and Diddy and like TV on the radio. And

1199
01:09:42,520 --> 01:09:45,840
Speaker 1: then I was asking for like a track, so I

1200
01:09:45,880 --> 01:09:48,000
Speaker 1: could do you know, my like Boston workout while I

1201
01:09:48,040 --> 01:09:50,800
Speaker 1: was there at south By, and they invited me to

1202
01:09:50,880 --> 01:09:52,960
Speaker 1: like come out and train with them. So then next

1203
01:09:53,000 --> 01:09:55,639
Speaker 1: thing you know, I'm like out on a track with

1204
01:09:55,840 --> 01:10:00,240
Speaker 1: like Trinier Moser and and Leo Manzano and you know,

1205
01:10:00,400 --> 01:10:02,920
Speaker 1: folks who again went on who are some of the

1206
01:10:02,960 --> 01:10:06,639
Speaker 1: best runners in the world, And so all the way along,

1207
01:10:06,960 --> 01:10:10,720
Speaker 1: I have just always kind of taken folks up on

1208
01:10:10,800 --> 01:10:14,800
Speaker 1: an offer, just to see what's gonna happen. You're it's

1209
01:10:14,800 --> 01:10:20,120
Speaker 1: nerve wracking, but journalism kind of like teaches you to

1210
01:10:20,120 --> 01:10:23,839
Speaker 1: to play it off, like you know, and those interviewing

1211
01:10:23,880 --> 01:10:27,320
Speaker 1: skills come in handy when you're just keeping a poker face, uh,

1212
01:10:27,840 --> 01:10:30,519
Speaker 1: you know, and and like walking into a training camp

1213
01:10:30,520 --> 01:10:33,479
Speaker 1: in Ethiopia and you know, greeting Mo Farra as he's

1214
01:10:33,479 --> 01:10:34,360
Speaker 1: like having his coffee.

1215
01:10:34,439 --> 01:10:38,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's talk about that man. Like literally, do you

1216
01:10:39,000 --> 01:10:41,400
Speaker 2: just buy a plane ticket and you're like, well, let's

1217
01:10:41,400 --> 01:10:42,479
Speaker 2: just see what's gonna happen here.

1218
01:10:42,560 --> 01:10:44,879
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've just always I've always done that.

1219
01:10:45,120 --> 01:10:49,760
Speaker 2: Like you know, and there's no one like stopping you

1220
01:10:49,800 --> 01:10:52,040
Speaker 2: from going to hang out with Molfara, no or like

1221
01:10:52,080 --> 01:10:54,200
Speaker 2: how does Mofera feel about you wanting to go hang

1222
01:10:54,240 --> 01:10:54,720
Speaker 2: out with him?

1223
01:10:55,400 --> 01:10:57,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're not gonna know until you get kicked out,

1224
01:10:58,520 --> 01:11:01,759
Speaker 1: you know. Like sometime I just think if the only

1225
01:11:01,840 --> 01:11:06,919
Speaker 1: thing between me and an experience, or me and a breakthrough,

1226
01:11:06,960 --> 01:11:10,000
Speaker 1: or me getting that story is a flight, that's no

1227
01:11:10,160 --> 01:11:10,920
Speaker 1: deterrent at all.

1228
01:11:11,000 --> 01:11:13,280
Speaker 2: That's just like logistics.

1229
01:11:13,400 --> 01:11:19,320
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's just logistics. The real barrier is like having

1230
01:11:19,360 --> 01:11:22,439
Speaker 1: the ideas in the first place. So yeah, I mean

1231
01:11:22,800 --> 01:11:26,559
Speaker 1: training out with the guys in Ethiopia. I was hanging

1232
01:11:26,560 --> 01:11:30,120
Speaker 1: out with abd Abdi raman four time Olympian before the

1233
01:11:30,160 --> 01:11:30,959
Speaker 1: New York City.

1234
01:11:30,760 --> 01:11:33,920
Speaker 2: Marathon, and how are you hanging out with him?

1235
01:11:34,920 --> 01:11:36,920
Speaker 1: This year? I was in good shape and so I

1236
01:11:36,960 --> 01:11:39,080
Speaker 1: had the sub elite start. So the sub elite start

1237
01:11:39,120 --> 01:11:40,720
Speaker 1: for the New York City Marathon is when like a

1238
01:11:40,760 --> 01:11:44,400
Speaker 1: small group of athletes who are on the precipice of

1239
01:11:45,120 --> 01:11:50,000
Speaker 1: having a breakthrough get almost the same treatment that the elites,

1240
01:11:50,400 --> 01:11:53,400
Speaker 1: get a bus out to the start and staying in

1241
01:11:53,400 --> 01:11:55,639
Speaker 1: a warm room and now you know there's a warm

1242
01:11:55,720 --> 01:11:58,360
Speaker 1: up track and all that kind of stuff. So yeah,

1243
01:11:58,479 --> 01:12:01,840
Speaker 1: I definitely jumped at the opper Henny to be in

1244
01:12:01,880 --> 01:12:04,639
Speaker 1: the subleete start. Went out, and I'm out there stretching

1245
01:12:04,720 --> 01:12:08,200
Speaker 1: and the rich white dudes from like New York City

1246
01:12:08,479 --> 01:12:12,120
Speaker 1: posh clubs sitting on the bleachers and talking to each other.

1247
01:12:12,960 --> 01:12:15,880
Speaker 1: That's not really my type. So I was just thinking

1248
01:12:15,920 --> 01:12:17,400
Speaker 1: I was gonna hang out with the brothers. So I

1249
01:12:17,439 --> 01:12:19,800
Speaker 1: just went over and was like sat next to MEB

1250
01:12:20,320 --> 01:12:23,120
Speaker 1: and i'bdy, you know, like what's up guys. You know,

1251
01:12:23,240 --> 01:12:25,760
Speaker 1: like not trying to like rub elbows with dudes who

1252
01:12:25,800 --> 01:12:29,880
Speaker 1: are running two o eight, but you know, whatever I

1253
01:12:29,880 --> 01:12:35,600
Speaker 1: think i'd be at the time, was trying to be

1254
01:12:35,680 --> 01:12:38,080
Speaker 1: polite and nice to me for like hanging out over there,

1255
01:12:38,120 --> 01:12:39,840
Speaker 1: but also maybe trying to show off in front of

1256
01:12:39,880 --> 01:12:43,400
Speaker 1: the other guys that he knew, me that he knew

1257
01:12:43,560 --> 01:12:46,160
Speaker 1: like a regular person. So OBD just says like, hey, man,

1258
01:12:46,920 --> 01:12:50,080
Speaker 1: I think I'm gonna go to Ethiopia and with Mo

1259
01:12:50,320 --> 01:12:53,639
Speaker 1: and help Moe get ready for London. You should come out.

1260
01:12:53,680 --> 01:12:59,559
Speaker 1: And I was like, yeah, all right, cool. And that day,

1261
01:12:59,680 --> 01:13:02,639
Speaker 1: like I went home and told my lady, I was like, look,

1262
01:13:03,920 --> 01:13:06,240
Speaker 1: I gotta go to Ethiopia. I don't think the guys

1263
01:13:06,280 --> 01:13:08,680
Speaker 1: really thought I was going to show up, but you know,

1264
01:13:08,920 --> 01:13:11,960
Speaker 1: obviously I stayed in touch with Abdy, bought the flight

1265
01:13:12,160 --> 01:13:15,400
Speaker 1: and then walked into the training camp one day and

1266
01:13:15,840 --> 01:13:18,840
Speaker 1: guys were like, what's up. I was like, what's up?

1267
01:13:19,840 --> 01:13:25,439
Speaker 2: Ever me from the start? Hey, wow, okay, what would

1268
01:13:25,479 --> 01:13:29,559
Speaker 2: you say that personality trait in you? This like knock

1269
01:13:29,680 --> 01:13:33,360
Speaker 2: down the unlocked door? Yeah, what would you say that

1270
01:13:33,360 --> 01:13:37,080
Speaker 2: that has actually just unlocked for you?

1271
01:13:37,080 --> 01:13:39,719
Speaker 1: You know, there's this concept in meditation about like what's

1272
01:13:39,760 --> 01:13:42,559
Speaker 1: happening behind the eyes and seeing like behind the eyes

1273
01:13:42,600 --> 01:13:46,559
Speaker 1: when you're in that meditative state, and I like I've

1274
01:13:46,600 --> 01:13:54,720
Speaker 1: always been I've always had this practice of like introducing

1275
01:13:54,760 --> 01:14:00,320
Speaker 1: myself as a character just to watch what happened. It's

1276
01:14:00,320 --> 01:14:04,240
Speaker 1: almost like you introduce a personality for people to react to,

1277
01:14:04,400 --> 01:14:06,840
Speaker 1: and then you study that reaction and you learn from that,

1278
01:14:07,000 --> 01:14:11,320
Speaker 1: and then that sort of like that's a super abstract example,

1279
01:14:11,320 --> 01:14:14,040
Speaker 1: but that's just what I would do in journalism, and

1280
01:14:14,080 --> 01:14:16,920
Speaker 1: then that's sort of what I've just done, Like in running,

1281
01:14:16,960 --> 01:14:20,280
Speaker 1: I really was just using sort of journalistic practices of

1282
01:14:20,479 --> 01:14:25,360
Speaker 1: just walking through the door, you know, and just to

1283
01:14:25,360 --> 01:14:27,840
Speaker 1: find out, like all the stuff I thought, you know

1284
01:14:27,880 --> 01:14:31,200
Speaker 1: it was true, is not. You know, for instance, if

1285
01:14:31,240 --> 01:14:33,639
Speaker 1: you read let's run message boards, you think every elite

1286
01:14:33,720 --> 01:14:36,720
Speaker 1: is like on wild performance enhancing drugs. And so the

1287
01:14:36,720 --> 01:14:38,559
Speaker 1: first time I started hanging out with elites, I was

1288
01:14:38,600 --> 01:14:42,760
Speaker 1: like didn't want to like go in the room or whatever,

1289
01:14:42,840 --> 01:14:44,720
Speaker 1: because I thought there'd be like the mini fridge full

1290
01:14:44,720 --> 01:14:48,559
Speaker 1: of syringes. And then also I like had such a

1291
01:14:48,760 --> 01:14:54,040
Speaker 1: high esteem for like athletes and how glamorous their lives

1292
01:14:54,080 --> 01:14:55,560
Speaker 1: that was I thought that there was going to be

1293
01:14:55,600 --> 01:14:57,880
Speaker 1: like groupies hanging around. I'm thinking, like I'm coming to

1294
01:14:57,880 --> 01:15:01,760
Speaker 1: the music business. I'm thinking about like rap videos, So

1295
01:15:01,800 --> 01:15:04,640
Speaker 1: I just think that, like there's gonna be like fridges

1296
01:15:04,680 --> 01:15:08,080
Speaker 1: of drugs and like people shooting up and all that.

1297
01:15:08,160 --> 01:15:11,040
Speaker 1: And then you realize these are like kids out of

1298
01:15:11,040 --> 01:15:13,360
Speaker 1: school who are making fifteen thousand dollars a year and

1299
01:15:13,439 --> 01:15:15,960
Speaker 1: like a cup of noodles once a day just to

1300
01:15:16,000 --> 01:15:21,040
Speaker 1: survive and like run to chase their dreams of being

1301
01:15:21,120 --> 01:15:22,920
Speaker 1: like some of the best runners in the world. And

1302
01:15:23,000 --> 01:15:30,240
Speaker 1: so really looking at how tough and bleak and elite

1303
01:15:31,080 --> 01:15:34,559
Speaker 1: runners existence can be was one of the early sort

1304
01:15:34,600 --> 01:15:38,720
Speaker 1: of illuminations that I had, And if anything, I kind

1305
01:15:38,720 --> 01:15:42,519
Speaker 1: of I've also wanted to share that, you know with

1306
01:15:42,880 --> 01:15:43,639
Speaker 1: folks as well.

1307
01:15:44,200 --> 01:15:46,320
Speaker 2: What would you say? And this is going to be

1308
01:15:46,360 --> 01:15:50,080
Speaker 2: kind of twofold first fold best piece of advice that

1309
01:15:50,479 --> 01:15:53,559
Speaker 2: maybe you've offered somebody else when it comes to that

1310
01:15:53,640 --> 01:15:56,840
Speaker 2: first run, and then the second fold of this that

1311
01:15:56,880 --> 01:15:59,800
Speaker 2: we'll get to after you answer that is really maybe

1312
01:16:00,120 --> 01:16:02,400
Speaker 2: the best piece of advice that you've been offered to

1313
01:16:02,560 --> 01:16:03,679
Speaker 2: keep going on the run.

1314
01:16:04,920 --> 01:16:10,400
Speaker 1: Lately, I've been telling folks just simply to give yourself

1315
01:16:10,439 --> 01:16:15,040
Speaker 1: a chance. You know, I think on race day that's

1316
01:16:15,080 --> 01:16:17,200
Speaker 1: been some advice that I've been giving over the past

1317
01:16:17,200 --> 01:16:19,760
Speaker 1: couple of years. And it must sound super underwhelming, like

1318
01:16:19,800 --> 01:16:22,479
Speaker 1: after you come on this epic training journey and you're

1319
01:16:22,479 --> 01:16:23,840
Speaker 1: in the shape of your life and then all of

1320
01:16:23,880 --> 01:16:26,640
Speaker 1: a sudden your coach is like, just go out there

1321
01:16:26,640 --> 01:16:28,439
Speaker 1: and give yourself a chance. But I feel that, like

1322
01:16:30,360 --> 01:16:34,080
Speaker 1: that's actually a very provocative idea. You know, we do

1323
01:16:34,240 --> 01:16:38,719
Speaker 1: so many things to hinder ourselves and hamper ourselves with

1324
01:16:39,000 --> 01:16:43,320
Speaker 1: self doubt and self criticism and sort of self denial

1325
01:16:43,920 --> 01:16:48,040
Speaker 1: that after you've put in all this work, the real

1326
01:16:48,120 --> 01:16:53,160
Speaker 1: liberation comes from just like freeing yourself from that and

1327
01:16:53,960 --> 01:16:57,639
Speaker 1: just seeing what happens if you go outside of your

1328
01:16:57,840 --> 01:17:02,000
Speaker 1: comfort zone and and what happens to you on the

1329
01:17:02,040 --> 01:17:04,640
Speaker 1: other side. Or what happens to you through that process.

1330
01:17:04,720 --> 01:17:08,640
Speaker 1: So again, underwhelming as it may sound, I've been suggesting

1331
01:17:08,680 --> 01:17:10,519
Speaker 1: folks to just go out there and give yourself a

1332
01:17:10,640 --> 01:17:14,200
Speaker 1: chance on the day and then some of the best

1333
01:17:15,240 --> 01:17:19,160
Speaker 1: running advices. It was specific, but again, you know, I

1334
01:17:19,200 --> 01:17:22,559
Speaker 1: met this guy, Leo Manzano from from from Austin, Texas,

1335
01:17:22,560 --> 01:17:26,200
Speaker 1: one of the top runners in the world, multiple Olympian

1336
01:17:26,280 --> 01:17:29,160
Speaker 1: and national champion, ended up getting the silver medal in London.

1337
01:17:30,080 --> 01:17:31,840
Speaker 1: I called him up and I was like, hey man,

1338
01:17:31,840 --> 01:17:35,559
Speaker 1: I'm starting this running magazine and I'd like to come

1339
01:17:35,600 --> 01:17:38,680
Speaker 1: down to the camp, you know, for a day or

1340
01:17:38,720 --> 01:17:41,559
Speaker 1: two with a photographer and take some photos and do

1341
01:17:41,680 --> 01:17:44,599
Speaker 1: like a whole story for my magazine. And Leo said,

1342
01:17:45,360 --> 01:17:48,080
Speaker 1: hey man, that sounds cool, but why don't you just

1343
01:17:48,160 --> 01:17:51,679
Speaker 1: come and stay for the whole time, stay for three weeks.

1344
01:17:52,720 --> 01:17:58,360
Speaker 1: You might learn something about running. And I think that's

1345
01:17:58,360 --> 01:18:01,080
Speaker 1: why I got on the plane because I was so annoyed.

1346
01:18:01,120 --> 01:18:03,519
Speaker 1: I was like, learn something about running, dude, I'm starting

1347
01:18:03,520 --> 01:18:05,840
Speaker 1: a running magazine. Of course I know everything about running.

1348
01:18:05,840 --> 01:18:08,760
Speaker 1: What do you mean learn something about running? And I

1349
01:18:08,840 --> 01:18:11,920
Speaker 1: was so intrigued by the deft way in which my

1350
01:18:12,000 --> 01:18:16,360
Speaker 1: man said, like, come and see that that is, so

1351
01:18:16,479 --> 01:18:20,839
Speaker 1: you know, there's always something to learn at this craft

1352
01:18:20,880 --> 01:18:23,200
Speaker 1: and this practice. So for me, that's what's kept me

1353
01:18:23,280 --> 01:18:27,120
Speaker 1: humble from then. It's like the fact that, like, hey, man,

1354
01:18:27,240 --> 01:18:29,920
Speaker 1: come down and learn something. There's always something to learn.

1355
01:18:30,760 --> 01:18:33,840
Speaker 2: What would you say? And your time interacting with so

1356
01:18:34,000 --> 01:18:36,960
Speaker 2: many of these top level performers has been one of

1357
01:18:36,960 --> 01:18:38,280
Speaker 2: the biggest takeaways for you.

1358
01:18:38,840 --> 01:18:40,760
Speaker 1: I wish I had stuff that, like you know, you

1359
01:18:40,760 --> 01:18:44,080
Speaker 1: could put on a T shirt was marketable, But I

1360
01:18:44,160 --> 01:18:47,960
Speaker 1: learned that you're supposed to eat immediately following to workout,

1361
01:18:48,439 --> 01:18:51,240
Speaker 1: and so at these camps, the athletes were like making

1362
01:18:51,560 --> 01:18:53,720
Speaker 1: sandwiches in the morning and packing them in their bag,

1363
01:18:54,479 --> 01:18:57,720
Speaker 1: and you know, they do these epic track workouts and

1364
01:18:57,760 --> 01:19:00,639
Speaker 1: then go to the gym and like do lifts after

1365
01:19:01,280 --> 01:19:03,560
Speaker 1: and in between the track and the gym this like

1366
01:19:03,560 --> 01:19:05,920
Speaker 1: one hundred meter walk they were reaching into like eating

1367
01:19:05,960 --> 01:19:08,599
Speaker 1: two sandwiches like halfway. I was like, you're eating two

1368
01:19:08,680 --> 01:19:11,160
Speaker 1: sandwiches like halfway through a workout and then going to lift.

1369
01:19:11,640 --> 01:19:16,479
Speaker 1: So I learned. I learned always packed two sandwiches, And yeah,

1370
01:19:16,479 --> 01:19:18,920
Speaker 1: I think that's good advice for life in general. Always

1371
01:19:18,920 --> 01:19:20,200
Speaker 1: pack two sandwiches.

1372
01:19:19,880 --> 01:19:22,920
Speaker 2: Always have them with you. Yeah, you have a great

1373
01:19:23,200 --> 01:19:27,320
Speaker 2: platform now, and on that platform again the opportunity to

1374
01:19:27,760 --> 01:19:31,040
Speaker 2: help a lot of people. When people come there, they

1375
01:19:31,080 --> 01:19:34,479
Speaker 2: read your advice, they read your feedback, they read your thoughts,

1376
01:19:35,040 --> 01:19:38,559
Speaker 2: and they see, visually a guy that likes to run.

1377
01:19:39,439 --> 01:19:42,840
Speaker 2: When you look in the mirror, what is it that

1378
01:19:43,000 --> 01:19:44,519
Speaker 2: you see looking back at you?

1379
01:19:45,720 --> 01:19:48,400
Speaker 1: I see when I look in the mirror. I very

1380
01:19:48,479 --> 01:19:51,439
Speaker 1: rarely look in the mirror, But on those occasions when

1381
01:19:51,479 --> 01:19:58,080
Speaker 1: I do, I see someone who is perpetually engaged in struggle,

1382
01:19:58,960 --> 01:20:04,439
Speaker 1: and I think that that's beautiful. I am definitely in

1383
01:20:04,479 --> 01:20:08,000
Speaker 1: a constant struggle with myself and understanding myself and my

1384
01:20:08,040 --> 01:20:14,680
Speaker 1: motivations and my appetites. But I'm also engaged in a

1385
01:20:14,720 --> 01:20:19,799
Speaker 1: struggle for folks to, in the words of Bob Marley,

1386
01:20:19,880 --> 01:20:23,639
Speaker 1: to you know, emancipate themselves for mental slavery. I feel

1387
01:20:23,640 --> 01:20:26,679
Speaker 1: like so much of us have a yearning for freedom.

1388
01:20:26,840 --> 01:20:34,320
Speaker 1: It's probably one of my lifelong pursuits to investigate and

1389
01:20:34,640 --> 01:20:40,360
Speaker 1: understand what it takes to be liberated and what it

1390
01:20:40,560 --> 01:20:46,360
Speaker 1: means to be free, and you know, sharing that back

1391
01:20:46,479 --> 01:20:50,439
Speaker 1: with folks, whether they want to hear it or not.

1392
01:20:53,479 --> 01:20:56,920
Speaker 1: I see someone who is troubled, but at the same

1393
01:20:57,000 --> 01:21:00,439
Speaker 1: time someone who as the years have gone on, I

1394
01:21:00,520 --> 01:21:06,960
Speaker 1: realize that there are things we can do to deepen

1395
01:21:07,000 --> 01:21:11,960
Speaker 1: our understanding of ourselves and the challenges that life brings

1396
01:21:12,040 --> 01:21:15,720
Speaker 1: us as a matter of course, and that in and of

1397
01:21:15,760 --> 01:21:20,000
Speaker 1: itself has just made me dive deeper into you know,

1398
01:21:20,320 --> 01:21:24,520
Speaker 1: those practices and whether that's writing, running, meditating.

1399
01:21:25,160 --> 01:21:31,519
Speaker 2: You within the last few years, as you said, added

1400
01:21:32,200 --> 01:21:38,280
Speaker 2: a regular meditation practice into your regular running routine. Do

1401
01:21:38,479 --> 01:21:43,960
Speaker 2: you foresee there being any other unlocks that you can

1402
01:21:44,160 --> 01:21:47,200
Speaker 2: reach for when it comes to gearing up for London

1403
01:21:47,280 --> 01:21:48,120
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty.

1404
01:21:49,600 --> 01:21:53,719
Speaker 1: The unlocks are perpetual and for a long time after

1405
01:21:53,760 --> 01:21:58,400
Speaker 1: I had this last performance peak, this unexpected, an unparalleled

1406
01:21:58,400 --> 01:22:01,360
Speaker 1: performance peak for me a couple of years ago. You know,

1407
01:22:01,400 --> 01:22:04,559
Speaker 1: no one ever tells you about the downside of that mountain,

1408
01:22:05,920 --> 01:22:10,120
Speaker 1: and I was thoroughly unprepared for the slippery slope from

1409
01:22:10,800 --> 01:22:13,320
Speaker 1: running fast times and whatever it took to get me

1410
01:22:13,400 --> 01:22:16,439
Speaker 1: to that level. And it was a real walk through

1411
01:22:16,439 --> 01:22:20,960
Speaker 1: the wilderness after. And so for a lot of that

1412
01:22:21,080 --> 01:22:27,720
Speaker 1: time when I wasn't numb and self medicating and you know,

1413
01:22:28,040 --> 01:22:32,040
Speaker 1: turning through my life with any mistake possible I was thinking,

1414
01:22:32,040 --> 01:22:33,880
Speaker 1: I gotta get back, I gotta get back, I gotta

1415
01:22:33,920 --> 01:22:36,880
Speaker 1: get back, And recently I came to realize that there

1416
01:22:36,920 --> 01:22:40,920
Speaker 1: is no getting back, you know, because why would you

1417
01:22:40,960 --> 01:22:43,920
Speaker 1: expend all that effort just to get back to where

1418
01:22:43,960 --> 01:22:46,840
Speaker 1: you were? Why wouldn't you just keep going and go farther.

1419
01:22:47,040 --> 01:22:51,760
Speaker 1: So for me, that was a big release for me.

1420
01:22:52,280 --> 01:22:57,479
Speaker 1: So yeah, I'm I'm don't think about where I was before.

1421
01:22:57,520 --> 01:22:59,640
Speaker 1: Now I'm only thinking about where I'm going and like

1422
01:22:59,680 --> 01:23:01,320
Speaker 1: what I'm to do when I get there.

1423
01:23:02,160 --> 01:23:04,800
Speaker 2: So the way that I close out is right now,

1424
01:23:04,840 --> 01:23:06,839
Speaker 2: what I'd love for you to do is think about

1425
01:23:06,960 --> 01:23:10,320
Speaker 2: the guy that walked away from running, and that was

1426
01:23:10,360 --> 01:23:12,679
Speaker 2: a really hard time for you at a hurdle moment

1427
01:23:12,760 --> 01:23:15,600
Speaker 2: for sure. So right now you have the opportunity to

1428
01:23:15,680 --> 01:23:20,639
Speaker 2: offer the guy back then one piece of advice. What

1429
01:23:20,800 --> 01:23:21,759
Speaker 2: would you tell him?

1430
01:23:22,560 --> 01:23:27,360
Speaker 1: I would say, take your time. You know, it takes

1431
01:23:28,040 --> 01:23:32,120
Speaker 1: time to sort it all out and figure it out

1432
01:23:32,200 --> 01:23:36,840
Speaker 1: and it's okay. So for the young person who's having

1433
01:23:36,880 --> 01:23:39,080
Speaker 1: a tough time with running or has there you know,

1434
01:23:39,120 --> 01:23:42,920
Speaker 1: really what it is, it's about like heartbreak. To love

1435
01:23:43,040 --> 01:23:51,280
Speaker 1: running so much and have running break your heart is crushing.

1436
01:23:51,360 --> 01:23:53,080
Speaker 1: We see like a lot of folks around us right

1437
01:23:53,080 --> 01:23:55,559
Speaker 1: in this running ecosystem who have had their hearts broken

1438
01:23:55,600 --> 01:24:00,320
Speaker 1: by it, And I would just say to that person

1439
01:24:00,320 --> 01:24:03,400
Speaker 1: who finds themself challenged by it and heartbroken, just give

1440
01:24:03,439 --> 01:24:06,559
Speaker 1: it time for that room to heal and know that

1441
01:24:06,960 --> 01:24:10,400
Speaker 1: running is going to be there and it's going to

1442
01:24:10,479 --> 01:24:13,599
Speaker 1: welcome you back, you know when when you're ready.

1443
01:24:14,240 --> 01:24:15,720
Speaker 2: Thanks so much for sitting down with me.

1444
01:24:15,920 --> 01:24:18,000
Speaker 1: That's has been super special. Thanks for the opportunity.

1445
01:24:18,160 --> 01:24:20,320
Speaker 2: Please take a moment and leave a quick review by

1446
01:24:20,320 --> 01:24:23,040
Speaker 2: clicking the link with the description to this episode. We

1447
01:24:23,120 --> 01:24:25,640
Speaker 2: all face multiple hurdles in life. I want to hear

1448
01:24:25,640 --> 01:24:27,639
Speaker 2: about yours. Reach out to me at Emily at Hurdle

1449
01:24:27,640 --> 01:24:30,840
Speaker 2: Dot you as connect with the podcast Instagram, Twitter at

1450
01:24:30,880 --> 01:24:34,040
Speaker 2: Hurdle podcast Knox. Where do they find you? How do

1451
01:24:34,040 --> 01:24:34,800
Speaker 2: they keep up with you?

1452
01:24:35,800 --> 01:24:39,400
Speaker 1: Uh? You can find me in the on the bike

1453
01:24:39,479 --> 01:24:43,720
Speaker 1: paths in Prospect Park or eating with my hands in

1454
01:24:43,840 --> 01:24:47,200
Speaker 1: Ethiopia and on Instagram at First Run.

1455
01:24:47,520 --> 01:24:51,720
Speaker 2: I am at Emily Abodi another hurdle concered. Catch you

1456
01:24:51,720 --> 01:24:52,400
Speaker 2: guys next time.