This podcast episode of Tempo Talks provides an in-depth analysis of the upcoming 70.3 World Championship race, emphasizing the significance of course dynamics and athlete performance. We delve into the critical factors that will influence race outcomes, including the impact of jet lag strategies and the athletes' physical conditioning. The discussion features key competitors, such as the defending champion, Jelle Geens, alongside formidable athletes like Kristian Blumenfeld and Gustav Iden, both of whom are poised to contest the title vigorously. We also explore potential dark horses and the intricacies of race tactics, particularly in the context of the challenging course that awaits the participants. As we anticipate this highly competitive event, our insights aim to illuminate the diverse narratives that will unfold during the race.

Links to topics discussed:

The TriDoc Podcast

Matt's Instagram

Jeff's Instagram

LifeSport Coaching

Email Jeff: tri_doc@icloud.com

Email Matt: Matt@thetemponews.com

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Welcome to Tempo Talks, a show that brings you analysis of the biggest stories in triathlon training, tips to make you a better athlete, and breakdowns of the latest science and performance.

I'm Matthew Sharp, an olympian in triathlon, 70.3 champion and co founder of the Tempo News.

And I'm Jeff Sankoff, the tridoc medical contributor for Triathlete magazine, age group winner and coach at Life Sport Coaching.

Our goal, inform and entertain two perspectives.

One sport, all things triathlon.

Now let's get into it.

Hello.

Hello, everyone.

Welcome back to another episode of Tempo Talks.

Hope you've had a great day and you're ready for some good action.

Talking about the 70.3 Worlds race coming up.

This is actually our second day in the row of recording.

Jeff, why don't we just do this every day?

We could just get on every day.

Have a daily podcast.

I'm sure my wife would love that.

Your wife would love that for sure.

I'm Matthew Sharp, co host of Tempo Talks podcast with my better Half co host, Dr. Jeffrey Senkoff.

Jeff, how are you doing today?

You are getting ready to go to world yourself?

I am.

We are recording this a week before the big day and I leave on Sunday, but when this comes out, it'll actually be coming out on Friday, November 7th.

So you will all be listening to this and I will be quickly approaching race day.

So, yeah, scope in the course, getting acclimated, getting on the time zone.

Do you have any, by the way, do you have any jet lag tips hacks for the.

So I.

What's your stack?

Well, so generally I try to switch my watch.

Hang on, I'm grabbing something here.

Generally I try to switch my watch to the time zone of the place I'm going to as soon as I get on my overnight flight.

And then I will try and actually live by that time zone as much as possible.

That has been pretty good and I've had some success with that.

But let's face it, as I get older, it's hard enough to get sleep and I find shifting is difficult.

Going east is always easier.

So going across the ocean to the east is easier than coming home where it becomes more difficult.

But we reviewed something.

Listener submitted a question on the Tridoc podcast and we reviewed this fancy Lumos sleep mask.

What am I looking at here?

So it's a mask that has some LED lights on the inside and it is supposed to be able to help you shift your clock so that you can actually reduce the amount of jet lag that you have.

So I Told the app on my phone, I said, hey, I'm going to Spain.

I leave on Sunday.

And it tells me that starting on Saturday, I'm going to start wearing this thing Saturday morning.

It tells you how to.

When to expose yourself to light.

And you sleep with this.

And it'll actually do lights through your eyelids to help you shift your clock.

Wow.

The science on this has been reasonable.

It seems to allow you to shift your clock a little bit quicker.

It takes maybe a day less.

And I'm going somewhere that's.

I think it's seven hours difference from here.

Seven or eight hours.

So that would normally take seven or eight days to get used to.

If I can cut a day or two off of that, I'll be happy.

So very good.

We'll see.

That's my.

That's going to be.

I'll let you know how it goes.

So we'll see.

Yeah, I'm curious.

I'm actually curious now about this jet lag thing.

We'll have to check in on that.

Amongst other things from your world championship experience.

Yes.

Before we get to the men's preview, which is really the focus of this program, I do want to acknowledge there have been a couple of stories that have come out this week.

And again we're recording this the week.

It's Halloween tomorrow.

So we're recording this the last week of October.

And there have been a couple of things that have come out recently that I think we just want to acknowledge are happening.

We're not going to dedicate a whole bunch of time to it.

One of them was just today.

There's a new 70.3 race announced in Northern California and Redding, California.

That looks to be a pretty cool race.

Cool, but very hot.

The average temperature.

Yeah.

Mid August, average daytime temperature over 100.

It's a little bit of a weird choice given this idea that maybe we should be more conscious of temperature and climate when we choose our races.

But that being said, net downhill bike, I don't remember ever seeing one of those.

And very flat run swim in a lake.

It just looks like a really nice kind of race.

It's a little bit hard to get to kind of place.

But I'm interested.

So if I can make it work.

It's right in between.

It's a.

It's literally like the weekend that is completely in between Oregon and Nice.

So I'm gonna see if I can make it work for me.

I'm not sure if I'll be able to.

We'll see if anyone will do it.

Yeah.

The Other story that we wanted to acknowledge was the Imogen Simmons, the doping story that we talked about when it first happened.

How long ago was that now?

February.

It was when we were first starting this podcast, I think.

And we said at the time that it was surprising.

It was unfortunate, but I opined that I felt based on the precedents that I had seen of other people who had a very similar story, that I thought that she would be exonerated.

And in fact, she has been.

And I, for one, I'm happy about that.

I understand.

I know that you were not totally happy with it, but we could talk about that at a later time because it's.

I get the sense it's not totally.

We're not done with this story because she's been understandably, a little bit reserved.

She hasn't really announced her plans for coming back.

So we'll see how that all goes.

Definitely.

Yeah.

All right.

But the focus for today is the preview of the men's race.

It is a sensational field.

We're going to do similar to what we did when we looked at the women's field.

We'll run through the bib start list, and then we will give you a sense of how we think the day will play out and give you our selections for podium picks.

So at the top, we have the men's defending champion, bib number one, Yellow Geens.

He's had a very solid year yet again.

What do you think?

He's looking pretty great coming into this, don't you think?

Yeah, fitness wise.

He only had a bit of a stumble earlier this year at the Singapore T100 where he DNF'd.

And that was off the back of a pretty late season with the 70.3 win in December in Taupo.

So he is.

He's in form.

He's ready to go.

My only question with him is going to be how he performs on these hills.

Like, he's a great cyclist, so he's a smaller guy, too, so probably will do very well.

I just.

When you've seen these guys go up the hills in Nice and whatnot, there's just some evidence to.

To back yourself right.

There's some proof that they can go up the hills.

And Yella, I'm sure he can.

That's my only question mark.

Because if he is within sniffing distance starting the run, it's game over.

Oh, yeah.

This course is going to be.

If he comes up with anyone else.

I can't think of anyone else in the field besides a Jason west character who I don't think will be there.

No one's running with him.

Yeah.

Like bar none.

Yeah, I agree.

The question is he close enough to the front coming off the bike?

So we'll talk about that when we get to that later.

Rico Boken is a name that has come up frequently this year.

He has been a demolisher of bike courses but he's not been able.

I guess he's just not the strongest runner.

So he.

But on a course like this, these guys on a course like this, it's really suits him.

We saw in San Francisco at that T100 and when he won that race, he just unleashed fury on the bike and made his presence known.

He had such a great gap coming off and he honestly ran very well too in that race.

I shouldn't discount his running.

It's all.

It's improved over time.

But this is also how he won the 70.3 Worlds in.

It was.

Yep.

So he's a former winner.

He knows what it takes to win this race.

I think the field this time is levels above when he won.

But in saying that this course, the way it's designed with the hills and everything really suits him.

So I'm super happy he's there because I think he'll make it really interesting.

When I think of Rico, I think of him as a cyclist.

I think of him as a average swimmer, average runner.

But in reality, what is.

What does he gen. What are his run splits?

They're not.

It's not like it's actually pedestrian.

So he'll come off the bike and run, I would say two plus minutes at least slower than a yellow.

But then most people do that.

So it's like he's a great.

Like he's a.

He's an amazing swimmer, amazing cyclist, quite solid runner relative to his competition.

It's just when he goes up against the Hayden Wilds and the Rico or sorry, and the yellow of the world.

Yeah.

Like it's just he's not going to be there.

But when the of course is hilly like this.

Yes.

It presents an opportunity for him to potentially win again.

All right, number three and number four, the indomitable pair of Christian Blumenfeld and Gustav Eden.

It's hard to talk about one without talking about the other.

They are inseparable.

They have been for their whole career.

Christian's been a house on fire.

He did not get the performance in Nice that I think he was hoping for.

All that it's winter.

Fantastic.

Yeah, exactly.

Because he finishes in third And I'm sitting here saying he didn't have a great performance, but that's just because I think we're so used to seeing him win.

He didn't win last year either, though.

And I just wonder is.

Is, you know, he.

He has.

He can win at this distance.

He's had some.

He's undefeated at 70.3s.

This year, he's undefeated except for Oceanside, when he had a mechanical or flat or whatever.

Otherwise, he's undefeated.

His win in Exxon Provence was something else.

It was.

Yeah.

That was incredible.

This race, too, obviously, with the hills.

We've seen him go up these hills in Nice.

He's ready to go.

So it's more, to me, it feels like with him.

How much of a gap does he have on Yella starting the run?

That's what it seems like for his race.

If he.

I think he's the guy in this race if Yella is not within striking distance.

And what about Gustav?

It's funny how Gustav is almost an afterthought.

And yet Gustav beat Christian in Nice.

And this is the thing.

Is he, like, on the up and up?

Is his form only continuing to go up relative to Christian?

Like, he could be.

It's just hard because Christian's been so dominant this year.

But is it a sense or a timing thing where all of a sudden this time of year, Christian's kind of on the down as Gustavo.

He's had some rough years, but he's really got his momentum this year.

Is that going to carry him through to this next race?

I would love to see them both come off the bike again together, because it'll be a battle all the way.

But maybe this time.

Yeah.

With Christian, Gustav could be another battle and maybe Christian tries to get one over him again.

Those two are going to be.

I think we'll know early if those two are really going to assert themselves because that Christian goes to the front and just wants to dominate the race.

Yeah.

And one thing I think to consider is the nice guys.

They've had way more of a break, a repose, what have you, after their Ironman World Championship.

So.

Versus the women, where we're.

Oh, are these girls going to be hobbling in to.

Oh, yeah.

To whatever Marbella.

These guys are.

Probably have had decent recovery and are.

And training to go.

Yes.

In training.

Truly.

Yeah.

Mark Dubrick, American ran.

He's bib number five.

Haven't really said his name a lot this year.

We've talked about him as being in races, but I don't really Recall talking about him as a force.

Well, he was on the up and he did a couple.

So he kind of got caught in, I would say I'm calling it the T100 trap because it's like a.

What's the siren.

The siren song of the T100 where a guy like him, he could be going to these North American 70 point threes and winning, coming second, whatever.

But then he did the San Francisco race, he did the Vancouver race, I believe, and I think he was.

He was like.

I don't even know if he was in the top 10 in those races.

Like I.

That's the thing, I don't remember.

So it wasn't significant where.

Yeah, he was on a good track but kind of got lost in the sauce there.

And then he was training for Lake Placid for his Ironman debut and got a stress reaction or even maybe fracture in his femur.

So.

So that's why this is his first race back since his injury.

That is a big injury.

Yeah, that'll take you out.

All right.

My favorite name in the field is bib number seven, Panagiotis Bitatos.

A great name.

The Greek.

Yeah, he's already won for the name.

The Adonis.

The he.

This guy.

He was he a rookie this year?

I just.

I know we hadn't really.

Last year he had some good races and then was coming into this year.

He came into this year in my eyes as like one of the hot people on the circuit.

Like he was on a heater in the second half of the year last year.

He started out okay, but then, yeah, did again.

Siren song of the T100.

Jumped into a couple of those, kind of had middling results.

And then since then, honestly, I haven't heard anything from him and I don't even know if he's going to be there, to be quite honest.

I think he is.

But looking at my start list thing here now, he hasn't been Xed off, so I guess he's going to be there, but just someone who.

There was a lot of hype and then did not deliver, in my opinion.

Maybe this will be his coming out party again.

We'll see.

Vincent, Louis.

Vincent, Louis.

A guy who I really thought was going to transition to 70.3 similar to how some of the other guys have, and yet he hasn't really had the sort of sustained success.

He's had a lot of injuries and I think that's been part of his problem.

Yeah, he's had an interesting year.

Again, the T100.

He was got a contract, so that was great.

He was.

Became a contracted athlete.

So he's locked into the T100 system in some ways.

But I think really his year, the first half of the year anyways was really based on challenge.

Roth, like he went all in, I would say, for that race because I think he wanted to win it.

It's a iconic race.

He's in the twilight of his career.

So I think he wants to get a few more of these maybe iconic races under his belt.

Maybe a win or two to put the bow on what has been one of the most exceptional careers I've seen for especially a short course athlete.

But just since that Roth race, I think he was fourth in the end.

I don't even know if he got on the podium.

He's had some injuries.

I think maybe this race, it could be a warm up a little bit for the final couple T100 events.

He seems like a guy to me who maybe.

Yeah, he's at the end of his career.

He's taking and choosing his races a little more.

Yeah, yeah.

Interesting.

He'll be up front though.

Like he'll be at the front of the race.

So he'll be in the race.

It's more again, when things happen on these hills, will he be ready to respond?

Usually a great runner if he's in the position to.

He could get on the podium or he could be a little further back.

And Louis Berger not there.

He's not, no.

He's been injured.

He's been injured.

Okay.

Yeah.

All right.

Because he.

He would have been, I think, really interesting.

He's always a podium pick.

Yeah, typically.

But this year, like I've never seen this guy injured before, as an aside.

And he's had a pretty tough year, I think with these injuries.

So it eventually, sometimes it catches up to you.

But he had an incredible year last year with an Olympic medal.

So I think he's.

Whatever.

I'll take a year off here.

All right.

Another rookie at nine, some guy, Casper something or other.

Never heard of him.

Similar.

Yeah, similar to the conversation we had about that Solvig woman.

Yeah.

Unknowns.

Unknowns under the radar.

So Casper Stornes remind me of his 70.3 accomplishments because I gotta tell you, I think of him as an Ironman guy.

How could you not?

He won world championships.

He's a Ironman world champion.

But he's had some really good races.

Like when Blumenfeld's won, he's been second or third in that orbit.

So he's always been there.

Who knows?

Maybe he is more of an Ironman guy, although he is from the short course stuff.

So I don't see him having a problem in this race.

I think if, you know, him and Christian come off the bike together, Christian is going to destroy himself.

Yeah.

To try to beat Storn as he's just going to turn himself.

We've seen him when he goes off, right, he turns into the Terminator and I think, I think he's.

Casper is like his good friend, blah, blah, blah.

But we know Blumenfeld.

This guy wants to win and he will destroy himself.

So he'll be his good friend.

He'll be his good friend before the race and after the race, but not during the race.

I think, and I honestly think Christian genuinely was happy for Casper when he won, like I think he was.

They share so much time together these miles.

Like they have an incredible bond.

At the end of the day, Christian, he's a.

He wants to win, he's a winner.

And if he doesn't win, then he's going to find a way to win next time.

You got to love it.

So BIB10, I believe is not there.

Right.

Sam Long, he's not at this race.

I feel like he was not 100% sure.

By the time people listen to this, they'll know.

Either way, I feel like he's not going.

But if he is, then the beginning fun to have him.

But I just in this field, ah, it's tough.

Yeah.

Friend of the podcast, Brian Dunn tells us that Sam is participating in the Ironman Arizona.

I don't see that necessarily precludes him racing in Marbella, but they are somewhat close together and with the travel and everything else might make more sense to not show up in Marbella if you're doing Arizona.

Yeah.

If I was his on his team, I would probably tell him to skip Marbella and just go for Arizona.

It's a two hour drive up the road for him.

I don't think it makes sense for him to go just with the field and how it's going to shake out.

He's a great athlete for him to go to Arizona, have a good race, get a Kona slot.

Like that's just way better, I think for him.

Long, is that where Lionel's going to be?

I thought.

I didn't think he was going to Arizona.

Is he going to Cozumel?

Where is he going?

Maybe.

Yeah.

Again, Arizona, two hours up the road for him.

So I. I'm gonna have to watch a video or something to see where he's at.

But it makes sense for sure.

I was a little surprised that he wasn't coming to Marbella.

The Marbella course really suits him.

It's too bad.

All right.

Christian Hogan Haug.

Yeah.

Great cyclist.

Yeah.

He was the one who was that incredible second place to Blumenfelt.

Maybe even could have won if he didn't have that penalty at Ironman Frankfurt earlier this year.

I think he's an athlete who probably, maybe more suited for the Ironman.

This is maybe more focused.

And this is the thing with a lot of these athletes now.

The incentives for being good at full distance are just so much better than being like the incentives for being good at 70.3.

So I don't see him factoring on the podium.

I think if he did get in the top 10, for him, that's a great day because I think that might keep him or get him close to closer to podium for the pro series.

For the pro series.

I think a guy like that, all he's thinking about is having a good day for the pro series.

I don't think he really cares if he does well placing wise, just relative to the people he wants to beat for the pro series.

Good money.

Yeah.

Nick Thompson's had a good year and he will be at this race.

Yeah, Definitely a great athlete.

We saw how he absolutely smashed that bike and knees.

He was a front pack with all those guys, big names coming off the bike in Nice.

So I don't think he's gotten any weaker between these races.

So you can imagine a guy like him, especially if it is a wetsuit swim and he can be closer to the front starting the bike.

It'll be advantageous for him.

He'll have a lot of people around him who are good too.

So a great opportunity.

Another great opportunity for him to have a stellar result for sure.

So we're at number 15 and there are still some huge names to come.

Could you believe it?

It's just quite a list.

Rudy von Berg, second American on the list.

So third if you consider Sam, but I haven't heard much from him.

I think he was probably not thrilled with his day at east top 15, but after being third in Kona, I would have to think that's a little bit of a disappointment for him.

I wonder if he feels like he's got something to atone for coming into Marbella.

I think he does.

But again, for him, it's just so much more critical to perform well at these Ironman races.

And I think he's really focused on that.

So again, I don't really expect him to be featuring at the pointy end in terms of the podium.

Again, if he gets a top 10 at this race, I think that's a really good result for him given the quality of the field and the people who he's competing against.

Who, yeah.

Are focused on this distance and coming up from the shorter distance as well.

And these guys will move at such a faster speed.

It's.

It really is impressive to me.

When you look at Ironman, they'll finish an Ironman in around eight hours, but they're finishing these races in 3.45-3.30ish.

It's insane how fast they go on these 70.3 courses.

It's really amazing.

And just based on how many people are in the race too, it's just going to be even quicker.

There's the depth, out of control.

Jonas Schberg, you.

I think you told me he's not there.

Is that correct?

I think he is going to be there.

He is going to be there.

Okay.

I believe he is.

I hope he is because he was a guy in Nice.

He was in that front group out of the water.

Yeah.

Pushing the pace with Martin Van Real, with Jamie Riddle, another athlete who's going to be in Marbella.

So those boys are going to try and run back that front pack attack basically from the gun.

But they're going to have more friends with them, more, I guess, teammates in a way.

If you're thinking front pack versus chase pack, they're going to have way more bodies who are going to help share the load.

So this race, again, another great opportunity for them.

It's just a matter of how the bike shakes out.

But if they can come off the bike like Schomburg, he had a great day in Nice.

Riddle had a great day.

I think they're both top 10.

Schomburg might have been top six, top seven, something like that.

I think so.

Yeah, I think so.

It wasn't top five, but it was very close.

I just don't know if they're podium.

But they will be featuring at the front of the race the entire time because that's their brand.

That's who they are.

Matt Hansen has had a quietly productive year.

You hear his name all the time, but I don't.

I can't remember him winning anything.

No.

Matt Hansen, I think last year did he have a win or two for Iron Mans for 70 point threes?

I think he did.

But this year, like he's had some injury stuff.

I know he had a back problem through the whole season.

It's been so he's really literally been battling through like a broken back I think for this entire year.

So he's just not able to.

But that's the thing.

He's been racing still.

Yeah, I'm like, bro, like, you don't need to flog yourself.

Like, he did three Ironmans, he did Roth, he did Lake Placid, he did another one too.

Like it was like three Ironmans in six or seven weeks.

And I'm like, dude, you're like not 20 years old.

Like, I just don't understand why he needed to do that unless he was getting paid really well by Roth to show up.

And then I don't know, it didn't make sense to me.

I don't see him doing super great.

But again, he's a guy who's just going to be trying to beat as many other pro series people as he can to maintain because I think he's in the top six maybe for the pro series top five again.

That's what I mean.

He's, he's had this like quietly productive year where he hasn't really been winning anything but he's just racking up the points because he seems to show up every weekend.

So it's pretty amazing.

Got to respect it.

Yeah.

Jamie Riddle, big, big time swimmer, big time cyclist.

He'll be putting on a show.

He'll be putting on the show at the first half of the race anyways on that swimming bike.

So expect him up there.

Otherwise he's must not be feeling good.

And then we get to question mark.

Wouldn't be a question mark except for what happened in Nissan.

That's Magnus, that Dlov.

You almost wonder if Magnus is going to be primed because didn't have the day he wanted and maybe has more energy than some of the others.

I would say similar to a Laura Philip who got on the podium in Kona but didn't have the race she wanted.

Ditlev is going to be the Laura Phillip of this race.

He's got a chip on his shoulder.

He was all in for nice and was sick and couldn't finish.

And so he's coming in here I think pretty fit.

He must be incredibly fit.

The course suits him so well because he's such a strong cyclist.

So he might be a guy who I think could make some moves on the bike to try and get away from a yellow geens to try and get away from Christian Blumenfeld if he has a friend like Nick Thompson who's also keen to bike hard, get away from Some runners, like they could be putting on a show in the back half of the bike.

All right, so I'm not going to run through the entirety of this very lengthy list, but there are some big names that I think we should just touch on quickly because they are a little further down.

Trevor Foley, he's not going confirm today and I wouldn't.

He's not a guy who I would tell to go to that race.

He's going to do Ironman Arizona.

I think that race is shaping up.

Arizona.

As an aside, it's going to be really good because people are just looking for these Kona spots.

Yeah, it always is for age groupers too.

How about Jake Burtwistle?

We've talked about him before.

Your previous house guest.

I cursed him.

I feel so bad.

He stayed at my house for a few weeks there and then went on a crappy runner races.

Sorry, sorry, Jake, but he's not staying in my house before worlds and he is in good form.

He just won a 70.3 in Australia.

I'm.

It's funny because I've talked about him before.

He has incredible DNA for racing for all this kind of stuff, but just that when I've seen him race this year, he's just been missing one gear and you just can't be missing any gears on this course.

He won't swim at the very front too.

So maybe if he can get stuck into a group and really stay around because he is actually quite a good runner as well.

And if he is within the top whatever coming off the bike, he could snake onto a podium for sure.

But I'm not sure he's going to do that.

His compatriot, Sam Appleton.

Sam, he's had an incredible summer of racing in North America.

He was what, like four, three races in a row?

He won 70.3s.

But to be fair, he's racing guys like me and there's a reason I'm not showing up to Marbella.

But he's a guy, he's a KG veteran.

He's been around the sport.

He's got 20 70.3 wins.

So I would like to see him have a good race, but I just don't see him on the podium.

But again, he could be.

If he features near the front and can tuck in and hang around in the group or whatever, he could have a good day.

But no, no podium.

I think for Appleton.

I don't know what to make of Jason West.

He.

He's not had a good year.

He recently had a string of, I think two or three good races but he's.

I don't know, I don't know what happened to him this year.

What I think is interesting with Jason because he jumped onto the T100 as well where I was like and he's had great T100 races in the past but this year arguably has been his worst T100 year.

I think he, he's even podium in the past but I haven't seen him anywhere near the podium in any of these races.

It almost seemed like he made a mid year pivot to do Ironman.

So he went in, trained for Lake Placid and got on the podium there, got a slot there, went to Nice.

Nice was never going to be a great race for him because he just doesn't have the bike legs that are required to like a Blumenfeld like Gustav.

Like he just, he's just not on that level.

He's better runner than them but they just have such a big gap coming off the bike and so with this race it almost feels like a.

He just, he's just going to go like he's.

On paper he should have a good race but in a lot of ways I just don't think this race sets up well for him.

I don't expect a lot, I tell you.

I don't disagree.

Another guy who's on the list here who has been tough to really explain is Ben Kanute.

Yeah, just a guy who.

It's tough because he's, he has the pedigree.

But the level has just gone up so much and I just don't know if his.

He's been able to match it.

And he again he was someone who focused on Ironman this year as well.

Like he made the pro series his focus but then he didn't even qualify for Nice.

So a guy who.

He'll be at the front of the race coming out of the water because he's a great swimmer.

It's just once they hit the hills will he have the juice to go up them with the leaders and I don't know, I just haven't seen anything.

But he's been training in the mountains here in Colorado so the best chance of any.

There are still a ton of names on here.

It's amazing but we should talk at least about the lone Canadian, Jackson Laundry.

Yeah, Jackson.

He's had a good year.

He's had some injuries.

He's had some injuries.

It's been a really inconsistent year for him.

I don't think he'd be fired up on the year that he's had.

But he's done a good job I think managing it through all these injuries.

Well, he started the year with his.

He got a podium in Oceanside.

Right.

He was he third.

Oceanside, yeah.

And then he had a podium after that but then he had injuries and then he was struggling.

But I know he did an Ironman and he did well in an Ironman.

Trying to remember which one.

Yeah, honestly, I don't remember.

I think for him really his game is the bike and he's actually the last little bit been training with the Norwegians.

Like he's just embedded with them the last couple weeks.

So I think actually he'll come out of that in a good place.

If he had been training with them for a couple months, I might be like, ooh, he might cook himself.

But it's only a couple weeks.

He can't do too much damage.

You might get a little psychological boost just being with them and pushing yourself with them.

For him though, it's just about swimming as far up as he can and once he gets on the bike it's great.

Cuz he's a great cyclist.

So he could definitely be a surprise, I think at this race, especially if the run is a bit neutralized cuz that's something that he's been injured for.

So.

Yeah, opportunity for Jackson for sure.

I like I said there's so many names here, Daniel Bakugaard and all these other guys.

But one name I do want to just point out quickly is Miguel Hidalgo.

Yes.

Because this guy, what did he just set a record for the fastest time or something?

It was like a crazy time.

Yeah, May or something.

He's a great athlete.

He was second like behind Matt Hauser.

He's second in the ITU World Triathlon World Championship.

So a credible athlete.

He sent a couple T1 hundreds this year to not much fanfare.

Like I would have expected better results from him based on his talent.

But again because of the specific.

Specificity.

Thank you.

Required for these races now just because the level of talent in these races, it's actually much harder now for these short course guys to jump up and have instant success.

He's going to come out of the water in the front pack.

There's another guy, Alessio Crociani from Italy who was third in Wollongong a couple weeks ago.

Yeah.

So again another great short course athlete.

You actually have Taylor Reed from New Zealand, front pack guy Seth Ryder from the US who had a great race in Oceanside, I think he was fourth.

He's coming from short course, so, you know, some interesting fellows there.

It's just a matter of will.

If they're there at the top of the first long climb, then, okay, we've got someone here, but they got to get up there with the leaders.

Yeah, and Max Newman, Andrea Straits, there's all these other guys.

Two names that aren't on the list.

Two Kiwis, Kyle Smith, and of course, Hayden Wilde.

And I think especially with Hayden Wild, that absence is going to be felt because I almost feel like the best 70.3 athlete is not here.

100.

And he would have been unfortunate, I.

Think, if he hadn't had his collision with the car because he probably would have done a random 70.3, got a slot and then totally been here, but he wasn't able to because of his injuries.

So unfortunately he's not there.

But maybe fortunate because we know what he's capable of and it would be pretty easy to pick the podium if he's.

Yeah, it would have been really.

It would have been.

Would have definitely put a whole different look on the race.

Okay, let's talk about how we think the race is going to play out.

I think similar to what we said about the women.

I think you can imagine that there's going to be a group of guys just like you said, the Jamie Riddles, the Jonas Schoenbergs, these big swimmers who are just going to go and try and dominate the swim and try and get out there with a gap.

Who do you see trying to.

Christian, obviously, but who do you see trying to make that front pack?

It's interesting because the swim is a lot shorter, and if there is a wetsuit component, it's just going to bring everybody a little closer together.

Maybe they have a better chance to close any potential gaps.

I don't know if there's going to be a distinct one kind of front pack versus another chase pack versus another pack, like in Kona or in Nice, rather.

But I think what you're going to see is just a very long line of athletes.

Like maybe there's a small split here and there, but generally there's just going to be a huge line of these people.

And from tip to the end, it's going to be a decent amount of time, but everyone's going to be there.

One thing I'll be looking for is if they do the same thing that they did in Nice, where the guys are basically rolling turns in the swimming Pushing hard for a couple hundred meters and then jumping on backstroke and then getting some of the next guy to go through.

I think that kind of stuff is going to happen again because really if you're a Jamie Riddle, you want to keep the swim pace as high as possible and keep people moving as quickly as possible versus having one person on the front the whole time slowing it down.

So that'll be interesting to watch.

I just think coming out of the water is just going to be a long line of athletes and it'll be interesting to see who is near the front of that and who's ready to push and who's maybe further back than they'd like to be and they'll have to catch up.

That'll be an interesting, interesting theme from the beginning of the race.

One thing I forgot to ask you about when we talked about the women's race is the swim course design itself.

There's a lot of turns.

There's like a 200 meter swim and then a left hand turn and then 300 meters and a right hand turn.

There's no real.

The longest sort of straightaway is about 500 meters, but you're constantly turning to the right and to the left.

And does that impact the pros at all?

Does that cause them to get out of rhythm or is that just.

Yeah, definitely having those turns.

And we saw that in Wollongong because they had to make this kind of dinky course in, in the harbor because the waves were too big and they, these guys were doing like an M shape for their two laps and that really actually strung things out.

I don't think there's as many turns for Marbella.

But what the turn buoys do, especially if they're hard turns, is it puts people under pressure.

It makes people have to fight through the buoys and expend energy not swimming, like literally just trying to get through it.

And while the front people can get into a rhythm really quickly out of the buoy and just continue their pace.

That could help string things out a little bit.

But because there's just so much depth in this field, it might break things up a little bit, but I just don't think meaningfully.

Anyways, what's.

How long is it to the first buoy, do you know?

It's like 250 meters or so, so that's great.

That's going to be great action.

I hope they have a good drone shot right above that because you're going to have 50 guys going to the buoy at the same time and like we saw in that Wollongong race, chaos ensues.

It's just good drama.

I don't want to be in that, but I want to watch it.

Yeah, I think there's seven turns.

Matt.

It's left turn.

Left, left.

So it might be five.

It might be five turns.

Yeah.

It's a fair amount of turns.

And in World Triathlon, they have referees there with iPads getting the video of the swim behavior in Iron Man.

It's Wild West.

They're not going to have anybody taking.

They're going to have cameras zooming in on the carnage and trying to get those clips for social media.

They're not going to be giving people penalties after that.

And who knows?

They'll probably make a rule change after this race because somebody will pass out.

Expect carnage on those first buoys.

Okay, onto the bike.

They've got the same course that we talked about yesterday, which is fairly flat for a couple of miles.

And then between mile 5 and 10, there is that first pretty steep climb.

And then they get into the kind of rolling 2 to 3% grade for quite a while.

I think we've already mentioned that it's going to look probably similar to what we saw in Nice, which is the really strong cyclists are going to try and just get away and leave the stronger runners behind if possible.

I'm wondering if people are going to make moves, like, super early on in the bike.

Say a Magnus Dlev is closer to the front coming out of the swim than maybe he would expect.

Is he gonna make that move on maybe not that first steep climb, but then the second longer one up till, what is it, 20 miles on the bike?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So maybe depending on what's going on in the race, maybe he's.

Screw this.

This is my chance to have a lead going into T2.

I'm gonna go now.

And maybe he brings a couple people with him, but maybe that's how he gets away from Yella, from Christian, the people who are gonna outrun him.

Typically, I'd be looking for that on the first hill, but then you could also have the situation where you have the Norwegian Express coming up from behind, working together.

Maybe they've come back out of the water a little bit behind, but once they get to the top of that hill, they're the ones in the lead, in charge, and then they dictate the terms out there.

If I think about a traditional cycling race, the time to make your break is on the steeper hills.

The longer hill, the long one, that's like, at 2 to 3%.

That's going to be hard to really break away.

That's going to be grinding and just can you out muscle the other people.

But when you get a sharp, punchy hill like they do between miles 5 and 10, that that's the time, if you're a strong cyclist, to really try to make a break for it.

And I would say if Magnus finds himself in a good place or if he finds himself surrounded by people he doesn't want to be surrounded by, that could be a good place to try and make a surge and try and establish himself.

Yeah, I just think athletes who have.

Feel like they have good legs early on will probably try to make moves early on because they know, oh, I'm feeling good today, I can take advantage of this.

It's not like where it's a flat course where if they attack, they're dragging people around with them.

Right.

If they attack on the hill, there's no advantage for the people sitting behind.

They're just trying to hold on.

You expect.

I feel like every hill that's in this race is an opportunity for an attack.

And there's obviously a few distinct ones.

Probably three or four, I think, or.

Maybe just, I would think three or four, for sure.

So I think.

And maybe it happens in the back half, like I said, there's that longer, the longer climb in the second half of the race.

And usually in that half of the race, that's when people are getting defensive and trying to conserve energy for the run.

And if you have someone who's maybe been sitting in, maybe biding their time, maybe that's when they strike and just blow the race open.

Because typically that's where good runners would sit up and look at each other and not be willing to put themselves out, like Laura Philip did in Kona, to try and chase.

Do you think that we're going to be looking at a similar situation as we had in Nice, where five guys come in together?

Do you think we'll be seeing what we saw in New Zealand, where it was basically one, then another, then three?

I feel like maybe that's what's going to happen, because as the race.

Which one?

Sorry, the second.

The New Zealand version.

It's.

It is just so interesting because we haven't really had a race like this.

I guess.

Nice showed what it could be like.

A lot can happen.

It's hard for me to rack my brain and feel like I know exactly what's going to happen.

I think you're.

Maybe you're just going to have a breakaway of Two or three athletes come in with a decent lead or you could have a big kind of string of athletes come in and that's where the runners are going to be and then they're going to make their move and make things happen on the run.

It's really hard to predict which is what makes this race so great because I'm just having a very hard time and versus like a Kona where we predicted.

I feel like what was going to happen in a lot of ways.

But this race just feels.

If someone's having a good day, they could totally surprise versus someone who you expect to do well and maybe having a bad day.

The hills, they're.

They speak the truth, they don't lie.

Do you think there'll be any explosions like blow ups on the run because they went too hard on the bike?

Because there's gonna be, there's gonna be.

Explosions early on the bike.

You saw that in Nice and it's an Ironman.

People are supposed to be conserving for a long day.

No, it was like, it was like an ITU race, world triathlon race in that.

So this is just gonna be like that.

And there's gonna be people who believe they have the legs like they should to go with certain people and they're going to find out they don't.

You're going to have people who are going into this race weren't.

Aren't sure where their legs are at and they're going to find themselves with people who they never expected to be with start going on these climbs.

So that's what's great too.

There's just going to be so much intrigue and.

But it's just a matter of okay, who's going to go.

And one person who I do think we need to really pay attention to in this race is Rico Bogan because I think he knows he can win if he gets a gap.

And so he's going to be willing to take, he's going to be willing to take risks in this race because at the end of the day he's already a 70.3 world champion.

He's got a really good T100 run under him right now.

So I think he can go out there and just take risks to make things happen for him.

And he knows how to win this race.

So hey, why not go for it?

Wow.

Okay.

All right, let's get your podium man.

Again.

It's so hard.

And like I said, the names on this list are crazy.

It's crazy.

I was like thinking about, okay, who am I going to curse this time because I've already cursed people with my podium picks.

But who knows, maybe this race I won't curse them.

Probably not.

But my envisioning of what this race turns out to be is maybe a Ditlev, maybe Bogan gets away a little bit, but I just don't think they're going to have enough of a gap on a Christian Blumenfeld type group.

The Norwegians, they work as a team and I think they're going to do whatever they can to ensure all three of them are as close to the front as possible while also getting rid of Yellow Geens.

Like, I think their whole race plan is to get rid of Yella so that they can duke it out for the positions.

And so to me, I just feel like Blumenfeld, he's ready to win this race based on the team tactics, I think that's going to happen in this race and based on his 70.3 performance this year and based on his just pure retribution for Nice that he will destroy himself to get the win here.

So I'm picking Blumenfeld for the win.

Wow, that's.

It's very.

What you have drawn out there is very reasonable and certainly I can imagine that happening.

I can also imagine him blowing up though, because he has had that happen.

I'm going to do my usual and give a few names because I think that it's not impossible to.

For this list is just so ridiculous.

But I think that certainly Christian's got to be on the list.

I think Magnus needs to be on the list.

Rico Bogan needs to be on the list.

So that's three, Yella, Yellow's four and I. I'm really struggling because like Gustav, I.

It's so hard to know what you're getting with Gustav.

You never know which Gustav Eden is showing up for this race and then you look down this list a little bit further and there's some phenomenal other athletes down on this list know.

It's just really hard to know, but I think I will.

Gosh, I had this all set in my head earlier today and I was like, now I'm just second guessing myself.

But I will go with Gustav.

That's who I had earlier today.

He's.

Is he like your soul vague type dark horse?

Is that.

No, I would say I think my soul fig type dark horse is going to be someone like.

Oh God, I can't.

The German guy we just talked about.

Schomburg.

Schomburg, yeah.

He's gonna be my pick.

Yeah, he's my dark horse because I think.

Great choice.

Yeah, I think he is somebody who could surprise a lot of people on race day and I'd love to see that happen.

Okay, I'm gonna pick.

I. Yeah, I wanted to pick him for sure because that is a great pick.

I think he is on for a dark horse type performance.

I'll pick put Rico Bogan as my dark horse even though he's.

I think he could actually potentially win.

But I picked Blumenfeld for the win.

My other podium picks second.

I'm going with Gustav.

I think he's on the up.

What year did he win?

2022.

Is that.

Oh, gosh.

He's been on a podium so many times though, of late.

Yeah, I just think he's returning to his form.

And then I've got Ditlev for third.

I think that chip on his shoulder, he is going to be incredibly motivated to come out of this season with a kind of marquee performance that he didn't get in nice that he typically is getting at these races.

He gets on the podium of world champs and I think he wants another one.

Maybe not the win, but I think he's podium third.

The fields are so good here.

Like, none of these people could be on it and I wouldn't be surprised because there are so many amazing athletes showing up here.

So, yeah, Casper is going to listen to this and be like, okay, I'm going to prove you wrong and win both iron man in 70.3 worlds.

I just think he's cooked after in a lot of ways.

After that Iron man win.

I liked what you said about I liked what you said about the way you said both Solvig and Casper, they've got this sort of world championship Ironman, world championship hangover where they've come out of nowhere and now they're the focus of attention.

Nobody's going to let them get away.

I think that was a really insightful kind of take on the whole thing.

We'll find out if that's actually insightful or not.

We'll find out.

We'll find out.

All right.

That is what we have for our previews.

Hopefully you have left your own opinions in the Talk Tempo Talks Facebook group about who your picks are for the men's and the women's and we will look forward to engaging in a dialogue with you to see what your thoughts are and see who's right about all of this.

It's going to be a sensational weekend of racing.

We're both really looking forward to it.

I hope to have some enjoyable content to share with you, Matt, that you can then post on your feed as well so we can collaborate.

Yeah, of course.

Good luck in your race in Marbella.

Thank you.

It's going to be a great time.

Do you have a specific goal for the race?

What's like your vision or what's happening going into this one?

What do you.

Last year I was really disappointed with my swim and my bike and then I had.

I was thrilled with my run.

I ran my way through a lot of my age group and this year I want to execute much better.

I feel like I'm swimming much better.

So I really want to have a swim that I'm capable of.

I want to bike within myself but have the kind of bike that I'm capable of.

Because I've really put in a lot of climbing training.

So I feel like I'm primed to be able to have a good ride there.

But with the focus being I want to run down all the guys that go too hard on the bike.

Look, I'm never.

I am not going to be a top five in my age group.

I'm not going to be a top 10 in my age group, but I feel like I could do better than I did last year.

Last year I think I was like 50th or something.

I'm at the top of my age group.

Right.

I'm 58, so I think 55 year olds have quite a bit on me.

But still, if I can come home and say I executed well, I had a solid run off of a solid bike, then I'm going to be happy.

Yeah, I think in a race like this you are going to thank yourself at the end of the run for not overdoing it on the bike.

Oh, yeah.

Future Jeff will be happy because you can really do some damage on that run when people just implode to pieces because they probably.

Like I talked about in the pro man, there's going to be implosions just on the bike.

Yeah, yeah, I saw that last year.

New Zealand was a tougher than expected course and I road within myself and I spent the whole time going, why are all these people passing me?

And I recognize in the end because I'm usually a pretty strong cyclist, but I just cycled within myself and I saved my legs and I had a great run and I could see after the fact that a lot of guys who are usually much faster runners than I am, were way slower than I was because they overdid it on the bike.

So great feeling passing people like that.

Bike for show, run for dough, right?

There we go.

So we'll see how it all works out.

I look forward to recapping the weekend's excitement on our next episode.

So until then, Matt, great chatting with you as always.

Thanks to our listeners for listening in and we will chat with you again next week.

Thanks for being here.

Thanks gang and good luck.

Jeff.

Thanks.

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