A convergence of expertise unfolds as a professional triathlete joins forces with the esteemed producer of a highly regarded triathlon newsletter, complemented by insights from a medical contributor at Triathlete magazine. This episode embarks on an exploration of the dynamic interplay between professional racing and amateur participation in triathlon. The discussion extends to the implications of drafting rules, particularly the 12-meter draft rule, and its impact on race outcomes, especially in prestigious competitions such as Kona and Nice. The conversation articulates the tension between tradition and evolution within the sport, as well as the historical significance of Kona as a pinnacle event that encapsulates triathlon's essence. Through a critical lens, the speakers dissect the merits and challenges of various race courses, presenting a nuanced perspective on what constitutes true athletic excellence in triathlon.

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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What would happen if you brought together a professional triathlete and producer of one of the most widely read triathlon newsletters.

Together with the tridoc medical contributor for Triathlete magazine, age group winner and coach at LifeSport coaching.

Let's say you had the makings of a pretty good podcast.

Welcome to Tempo Talks.

Two perspectives, One sport.

All things triathlon.

I think as a professional, if I was looking at the sport purely from the aspects of a professional, I think that we're losing something and that especially with only a 12 meter draft rule.

So the beauty of Nice is that the bike is so hard and it breaks up the course and it really helps it make sure that it's the best athlete that wins.

The best all around athlete wins, whereas Kona is generally speaking much more better for the person that kind of saves up as much energy on the bike.

Obviously that is not what Solvig did.

She was solo all day.

Lucy and Taylor were solo all day.

But there was also a giant pack of six or seven people that included Laura and Kat.

And Kona is basically, you're right, Kona is about the elements.

Kona, having everyone at Kona is best for the future of the sport.

When you consider age groupers as well, there's the history there.

That's what age groupers want.

That's, that's what a lot of pros dream of as well.

But I think when you're thinking about, if you were to think about the sport in the purest sense of who's the best swim, bike and runner, I think niche is the best course for that.

And so I do feel like we're losing out a little bit on moving away from Nice.

But also I don't necessarily have any problem going back to Kona because that's just where the history of the sport is.

That it's the super bowl, it's the Olympics all combined into one and it's the place where a non triathlete, if someone learns I'm a professional triathlete, their first question is, have you done Kona?

It's the identity of the sport and, and like Nice will just never be able to replace that.

I think it's like there's obviously there's pros and cons to it and I definitely will miss not going back to France, but I'm also very happy to be focused on Kona moving forward.

It's very bittersweet, I would say.

Hey, everybody, I am Jeff Sankoff, the Tridoc, and I'm joined as always by Matt Sharp.

Matt, how you doing?

I'm doing well.

Doing well.

Busy over here, but doing well.

How are you going?

I'm doing great.

And I think we should pause just to say that the voice you heard at the beginning of the podcast was not either of our voices, but rather was my number one active Ironman pro.

That would be Matthew Marquardt.

Matthew was a is a guest on the Tridock Podcast.

A Florida length interview with Matthew is featured on today's episode.

It is out right now.

If you're not a subscriber, you should head on over to the Tridoc podcast.

We'll put a link in the show notes for this show.

But Matthew was gracious enough to return to my show and do a like 30 plus minute interview with me talking about a wide range of topics.

But we wanted to include that little snippet from that interview where I asked him about his thoughts about the race moving away from Nice and now coalescing in Kona.

And that's our way of introducing our discussion of the epic.

I mean, there are not enough superlatives.

Not enough, there are not enough to describe that race.

The World Championships.

We tried to hype up this race and we thought maybe we overdid it.

We did not.

I literally said this was hyped as the race of the ages and it over delivered.

Right, Jeff?

Yeah.

And I mean, most of the time you think there's no way.

And yeah, we undersold it.

So we have a lot to talk about.

We're going to spend the full episode discussing what went down, the fallout from what went down.

And at the end we're going to talk about my pet peeve of all time, which continues to be a pet peeve.

And that was the broadcast which really was the only negative of the day.

But Matt, I should point out that the top three looked remarkably similar to some names that I kind of highlighted.

I was, when I list relistened to our podcast and this was after the race, I was dying laughing because I was like, Jeff is going to bring this up and I hope you did.

And you did and I love it because you nailed it.

You nailed it for sure.

Yeah, I don't know.

I just had a feeling.

Just had a feeling.

I thought that Kat was coming in primed and boy, she just ran out of room.

But let's, let's get there.

Let's, let's begin.

I mean, I, you know, we talked enough about the lead up to this race, but let's just talk about how it all unfolded.

The, the imagery of Lucy Charles Barkley doing some backstroke because she'd established such a huge lead early in the swim.

So, I mean, what were you thinking as you're watching the swimming?

So I was actually ironically swimming when they started the swim, so I didn't see the swim start.

Did you see the swim start?

I did not, no.

Okay.

I, I did not.

So from what I understand, Lucy Charles basically took it out like a, like a 100 meter sprint at the Olympics.

Like she just went full gas.

And that was her game plan, was to obviously get a lot of separation on the rest of the field.

And I think Taylor Nib, who I really thought would probably maybe be on her feet, was kind of there, but she opened up like a bit of like a 1 meter gap and then it just, I think the elastic band snapped.

And so Lucy Charles took off on her own, Just dropped the rest of the field.

And I think nib had to kind of cut her losses and go back to the main chase crew for the rest of the swim.

I did not see the swim live, but when I saw the footage of it afterwards, I couldn't help thinking of last year.

Right.

Where Sam did the same thing.

And, you know, now in retrospect, echoes.

Right.

Of almost the same thing.

Truly, truly echoes.

Yeah.

I mean, Lucy Charles, it seemed like she like, was pressing like pretty hard.

Like, I, I mean, I don't think she got the swim course record, but it was also quite choppy.

So maybe just conditions played a part in that.

Yeah.

But do you know what her gap was out of the water?

Like 136, something like that.

Yeah.

Which was a lot more than I expected.

I expected to someone like Taylor kn maybe a minute back, 30 seconds.

It's eons.

Right.

Like she comes out of the water and you're waiting and waiting and waiting and.

And you know, 136 for these women is like over 100 meters.

And it's like the next woman in the water was like a speck.

She was like way down the dock.

I don't even know if she.

She'd come past the, the, the end of the pier yet.

I mean, it was.

The drone had to go up very high to get them that Lucy Charles and the lead pack in the same shot.

It was this chase pack, rather.

Yeah, it was very impressive.

Very impressive.

But what was to me almost as impressive was how close to the front Chelsea Storaro came out.

That was huge.

When I, whoever was the announcer said, you know, Chelsea Sodaro's in there, my eyes lit up because I was like, oh, my God.

You know, she has put a lot into this race.

She's been in Kona training or Hawaii training.

And I was like, man, she's on for one today because she's never usually that close to like the front of the race to like a Taylor nib.

Didn't really work out in the end.

But it didn't work out in the end, incredibly.

But I had a question for you.

Intriguing.

I had a question for you.

Do you, like, listen, I'm not a great swimmer.

When I go to Kona, I have to be careful about ingesting salt water.

Chelsea not known as a great swimmer.

And knowing what happened to her later, is it possible that she would have ingested because she was working so hard on the swim that she might have ingested a bunch of salt water?

Cause that can damage.

Definitely cause stomach problems.

Yeah.

I'm sure if she was maybe pushing her limit and really just working her stroke, there could have been some, you know, miss whatever.

Miss strokes that would have caused her.

Maybe she was on someone's feet who was kicking a lot and kind of just got that sucked back that salt water.

Because I.

That was what the talking point was after.

Right.

That she took in too much salt water.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's really unfortunate, you know, she's had such a rough year, really.

We all were looking for her to have a sort of a redemption race, and it just, it ended so early and I felt pretty bad for her.

She seems to have been quite positive about the whole thing.

But you gotta know it's gotta hurt.

Yeah.

And once that nib, Chelsea Zadaro, Holly Lawrence group came out of the water, we were waiting a while.

Yeah.

For the next group.

Yeah, that we were.

But six minutes, I believe, was the gap minutes from.

Oh, my God.

Chase back.

And like, you know, you're seeing six minutes to.

To like these women who can certainly bike hard, but it's like you're thinking, wow, that's already.

Because you know that Lucy's going to go out there and push even harder on the bike, which she did.

So.

So.

And one thing, one thing that made me realize that I've kind of forgot, you know, last year in Nice, I mean, Lucy Charles wasn't there, to be fair, but I believe it was a wetsuit swim for that race.

And so being in Kona, you have the non wetsuit factor, so maybe that's why the gap blew out as well.

Right?

Maybe.

Yeah, maybe.

Yeah, it's a good point.

You also, I mean, both places have pretty Calm water, so you can't really say anything about it.

And there's no current in either place.

And Cat didn't help herself with the.

The ice issue.

The helmet thing that she ran.

Yeah.

She was having to, like, pull out all this ice from her helmet, which, like, it sounded like a great idea.

Yeah.

Put some ice in your helmet.

It'll cool you off at the beginning.

But I guess it kind of melted or came one into like, a big bunch and.

Yeah.

Backfired because you lost, like, you know, bunch of time.

Yeah.

Chasing that thing.

Yeah, well, yeah.

All these little things that, like, in retrospect, you're like, h. I wonder.

Right?

For sure.

Yeah, for sure.

Well, okay.

So they go out on the bike, and Lucy and Taylor clearly have the same plan.

You almost wonder if they have the same coach.

Maybe.

Maybe.

Who knows?

We'll never know.

Well, they just went out there.

And so again, knowing what we know in retrospect, I mean, we'll probably come to this later as well.

But again, looking at Sam last year, you would think that people would learn from that.

Now I understand that they were trying to drop the runners.

I get it.

Although neither of them are really any slouch at the run.

No, definitely not.

So I don't really understand what the strategy is to go out and blow up the bike like that.

Well, you would think they would both have kind of like a power number, maybe that one of those core temperature sensors.

Because Taylor on the bike, you could see her looking down at her watch a bunch, and you're kind of like, huh, I wonder if maybe there's a.

Some kind of.

Yeah.

Core temperature metric going on there or something.

I don't know why she was looking down so much, but, yeah, it's just crazy how aggressive they were.

I mean, watching.

And entertainment wise, it was brilliant.

Yeah.

I was loving it because it was literally playing out as I kind of thought it might, where you had the two of them.

I thought they'd be together right from the beginning.

And in looking back, you're almost like, huh.

I wonder if Lucy Charles was able to bring Taylor with her in the swim, have her on her feet.

Maybe that would have had them working together sooner on the bike.

Like.

Yeah.

Maybe their core temperatures would have been lower going onto the run.

I guess Lucy had her penalty, so whatever.

But, yeah, there's just all.

A lot of so many what ifs.

Where.

Ooh, maybe.

And.

Or who knows, maybe Taylor would have got to that finish.

Well, Taylor catches her at Javi and halfway through.

Right.

Or more Than halfway through.

That's more than halfway through.

But it's, you know, it's.

It's close enough.

But, you know, they start that downhill and they're pretty much together, and at that point, they could start working together.

They.

They could see what a big lead they have over everybody else.

I didn't see what the inadvertent littering was.

I gathered no one did.

Because it wasn't on camera.

Yeah.

But, I mean, I was immediately concerned when I saw her pull into the penalty tent and start trying to cool down, because I was like, oh, that's not a great sign.

Usually on the bike you're not overheating, because on the bike, you have the benefit of the.

You know, you can cool, you can wet yourself.

And then, you know, even though it's hot and humid, generally, you don't generally start getting overheated till you get to the run.

If she's already dousing herself, pouring ice down her kit and everything else, that maybe isn't the best sign.

And sure enough, that proved to be foreshadowing, I think.

Yeah, when I saw that, I was kind of thinking, oh, like, she's just refueling, rehydrating.

Like, yeah, smart call.

But maybe not in a great place.

But she just seemed.

She seemed pretty good anyways, like, when she started back up.

But we should really talk about what was happening behind those two as well.

Before halfway or before Javi, they all came.

Like, you had that big group together out of the water with Solveg, with Kat Matthews, Laura Philipp, Lisa Perder.

That was a very sizable group.

And we should mention that unfortunately, Tamra was never a factor in this race.

I didn't realize she was quite sick.

I mean, I heard her.

She recorded an Instagram afterwards, and she just sounded awful.

I mean, she clearly was quite ill, and that's really unfortunate.

But even with that terrible viral thing, she was.

She still ran 303, which is pretty amazing.

I know.

And it's one of the things where, yeah, as athletes, you're.

You're pushing the line a lot of the time, and, you know, for a world championship, you're going to take those kind of risk with training and whatnot.

And maybe she was just a little overdone and just caught.

Caught a little bug or something, because your immune system, as I'm sure you know, gets depressed.

I just felt so bad for her, but I was glad to hear her say that she was intending to be back next year.

So I'm.

No, it wasn't.

It wasn't a defeated situation.

Not at all.

And I understand that Tamara's mom is sometimes listening.

I do want to say that I had an exchange with Tamara in the week leading up to the race.

She was incredibly gracious.

I had written to her to ask her something about Canadian university track and field and not expecting her to get back to me, given that Kona was coming up.

And she took the time not just to write to me back, but also to reach out to someone in Canadian university sport.

And it was just, you know, very.

She's just, I think she's a tremendous class act.

And Tamara's mom, if you're listening, I'm a huge fan, not just of Matthew Marquardt, but also of Tamara.

And so we, please wish her well for us and we look forward to seeing her back at full strength and hope to see her back at Kona where she can set the women's run record.

But we'll get to the, the, the new women's run record that's coming up in a little bit.

All right, let's, let's get back to what you were saying.

The, the Solvig and Cat and Laura.

Laura, Philip and a bunch of very, very big name strong women were trying desperately to work together to eat into the gigantic and ever growing lead that Taylor and Lucy were establishing.

Yeah.

And as the bike just kept going, the gap just kept growing.

Like it wasn't, I don't know if there's any big blowups in time at any point, but it was just always steadily increasing like from the first mile to the, like almost the last mile.

Just never, they could never claw back time.

Soviet kind of held her own.

She was out on her own and she kind of held around that 5, 6 minute gap.

But, but everybody else was losing time.

Yeah.

So it was interesting because they had, they did have carrots in front of them.

I would say the stragglers from that first pack that was 90 seconds back.

Yeah.

You know, they could see them coming back to them.

And then funnily enough, I guess when they caught up to the last, I would say, quote, stragglers.

That makes them sound bad, but they're, they were destroying like they were having a great race.

You know, that's when Solvag went to the front and that, that was like the move of the day.

And I don't even think she intended to have this race defining move.

But do you know about this?

No.

So essentially she would just went to the front because, I don't know, she wanted to go to the front and set the pace.

And she kind of had her power that she was looking at and maybe it was a little higher than she thought, but she was pretty comfortable doing it.

So just kept pushing on.

And this was when they caught the, the last two quote, stragglers.

And all of a sudden a bit later she was ready to, to pull off and whatnot.

And she looked back and no one was there.

So it was like an inadvertent breakaway.

Yeah, yeah.

But I don't think the group was super organized.

Right.

So maybe she went off the front.

Whoever was kind of around was like, I'm not going to chase this because I don't want to do anything.

And then everybody had the same idea.

So, like that was where the race was won.

Yeah, I think, yeah.

Because she just did her own thing.

Right.

Well, she, and she, she was strong enough to be able to do it and hold it and just keep pushing and hold that gap.

And you know, we were talking, I was talking with my colleague Juliet and we were, we were saying we wondered how much information they're getting on course.

Do you have any sense of how much they're hearing in terms of gaps?

I feel like I've seen in broadcast before officials with like little whiteboards with gaps, but even then I don't think there's much of that.

It's not like the Tour de France where they always know where people are.

So, you know, like in cycling, when they take away the, the earpieces and stuff, it gets more intriguing.

And I think, like, I guess they don't have that for triathlon, but, you know, this is partly why the race ended up like that.

And, and yeah, it just made it so, like way more intriguing.

Yeah, well, when they came back from the bike, it really looked like it was for all intents and purposes a two woman race.

It did not look like anybody, everybody else was going to be going for the minor placings because you had Solvig by herself about six minutes back.

And then it was just a gigantic gap to Kat Matthews, Laura Philip and Lisa Perder.

It was just, it was huge.

It was nothing to make you think that anything was going to happen there.

So when we did our predictions last week before the race, I said they would need a six minute gap in order to hold off the Kat Matthews, the Laura Phillips of the world.

And it was 14 plus minutes.

Yeah.

And maybe if it was six minutes, maybe then the issues that happened later on, who knows, maybe that wouldn't have happened.

That's the thing.

Let's get to what happened.

And then we could talk about why we think it happened, but I think everybody knows that Taylor and Lucy pushed each other quite hard over the first few miles.

Lucy, Taylor came out first from transition.

So Taylor had a 90 second gap, pretty much 90 seconds leaving T2 and.

Then over Lucy, Lucy was pushing her along a Lee.

And then when they got to the bottom of Polani, Lucy definitively made the pass and went up the hill.

Yeah.

And did the nice little back tap as she went by.

Yeah.

And Taylor, and Taylor actually said in her press conference afterwards, she was saying, well I thought that was it.

I thought, you know, there goes Lucy for win number two.

Congratulations.

And she looked good, which I thought interesting, which I thought was interesting because it was pretty early.

Like why would Taylor already be thinking that?

But okay, so up they go onto the Queen K and Lucy puts a gap but she doesn't really snap the gap.

She just kind of holds.

Was interesting.

I think it got up to maybe 20 seconds.

Yeah.

And you know Taylor was there, she could see her.

They had like a camera shot from behind and the gap looked different, decent.

But then she, yeah, like was it.

Cuz she walked and then Taylor came back on her.

Was that when she, it was when.

She hit an aid station and walked.

And did you think there like things were bad?

Cuz I didn't.

Yeah.

As soon as I saw her walk I said, oh, that's it.

Interesting.

Yeah.

I thought it was just like, oh, she's just ready to, you know, she's got a buffer.

She's going to get some ice.

No, I, I, I said no.

This is Sam Laidlaw all over again.

And I literally said that.

The reason I said that is because you just can see it.

These guys, these women, these men, if they're hot, they'll do what Patrick Lange did last year, which is grab the stuff as he's going, pour it over his head, pour it all over the place.

But they keep going.

The second they stop.

That's an age group thing.

I stop.

Right.

Can you describe the Kona heat?

I've never been to Kona.

It's just, can you describe it?

Well and apparently this day was particularly, particularly awful.

Apparently it got really hot and it was with the humidity was 80% and it got, it got, it got hotter than it like when I was there in 22 it was hot, but it wasn't, apparently it was, it was almost low 90s before the humidity, which is awful.

Wow.

And when I was there I think it was low 80s before the humidity which made it feel low 90s so it's just oppressive.

And the worst of it is the energy lab and I, they don't understand the energy lab.

Like it's like you're running down towards the ocean but you're running like into this oppressive furnace of heat and then you get lava for some reason there's no wind down there.

It's just awful.

It's like I have, I have PTSD of that stretch of road and like you turn around and then you have to run up a hill to go back.

It's just, it's just awful.

And Lucy fell apart right at the top before turning into the energy lab and she was, she was done.

I mean and the reason, and people, people have said this to me, they're like, well why didn't she just like focus herself on cooling herself down so she can get going again?

And the reason for that is because once you cross that threshold your body becomes dysregulated and can no longer shed heat appropriately and it's continuing to generate heat.

It's not even able to cool down.

It's not able to cool down and you're trying to cool it externally.

But just think like, think about how long it takes to boil a pot of water.

That is the same thing you're doing, you're trying to do in reverse.

You see, you're basically because remember we're 70% water so the amount of energy transfer that needs to occur from your body to the exterior, it's a huge amount of energy, huge amount of heat energy and the environment is incredibly hot, incredibly humid.

So it's actually throwing more energy back at you.

So all the ice you want, you're not going to be able to cool down a 100 pound person who is 70 pounds water that has an incredible capacity for holding heat and it's just, you're not going to be able to cool that down.

Plus on top of it your body has become dysregulated and is producing because it's not metabolizing efficiently it's producing more heat than it should.

And so the whole thing is just off the rails.

You know, last year we saw Sam, I mentioned this last year I felt like Sam should have been pulled off the course.

Somehow he finished and he ended up I think paying the price for that over the first several months of this year as he tried to recover.

I had a conversation with Matthew as part of my interview is does Ironman have a responsibility to the athletes to police that a little better?

Because these athletes are not going to do the right thing.

Their Mind is not going to allow them to stop.

Think of how hard they push and that's all they know.

Well, you saw.

You saw Rhys Barkley, right.

Reece Barclay.

You saw him do, I think, what needed to be done and be the adult in the room.

And she was desperately trying to get away from him, to get back onto the course, and he would not let go.

And thankfully.

And you could see in her speaking after the race, I was glad to see her speak because I hadn't heard her initially.

And speaking after the race, she was like, so thankful that he had done that because she's not gonna be able to.

Yeah, she's not gonna be able to make that decision.

Yeah.

And she would have put herself in danger.

Right.

Because even if you do manage to cool yourself down a little bit, you're gonna go back out and start running at that pace.

You're not gonna stay cool for long.

She.

Well, yeah.

What was it?

What was interesting was like, obviously she was really walking and said, slowed down at the top.

But then she started running again and I was like, oh, man.

Like she just got that ice in or whatever.

And then shortly after.

Yeah, no, I knew it was kind.

Of swaying a little bit.

Not as.

Not as bad as someone else, but there's a.

There wasn't a straight line she was running and that's when she got pulled and.

Yeah.

So the first casualty, the leader of the race.

Yep.

So now we have a whole new leader.

And now we have a whole new leader.

And Taylor's running along.

And I said to you at that.

Point, she looked great.

I thought she looked good.

She looked good.

But I said to you at that point, I said, solvik's four and a half minutes back.

I said, she looks like she's running well.

She does.

Sovik has a weird gait.

She has this weird leg swing.

So she doesn't look quite as.

As fluid as Taylor does when she's running.

So it was kind of hard to appreciate whether or not she was running well, but her pace was ticking along.

She was picking up time on Taylor every single mile.

And I did the math and I said to you at the time, I said, I don't know if she's got enough room left because she only.

She didn't have enough room.

She only had four miles left and she was picking up about 15 seconds a mile.

I said, I don't think she's gonn to make it, but, man, it's going to be close.

And then I said to you, I said, oh, Taylor does not look Good.

And.

And the thing I noticed was it.

Which camera angle was this from behind?

Because from behind, I could see that Taylor, suddenly.

I've said this to you before about your running, about how nice your, like, feet come up behind you as you're pushing off the ground.

And it really generates a lot of forward velocity.

And I saw the first thing I noticed about Taylor was that her feet weren't coming up anymore.

Interesting.

Yeah.

And I thought, oh, she's not able to generate the thrust to move forward anymore.

And then she looked back.

And the second I saw her look back, I was like, oh, she's done.

She's done.

Not someone who typically looks back.

I would say.

No, never.

Never.

Yeah, I saw this.

They were showing her from the side.

There was a side angle.

And before, like you said, just very upright and.

And, yeah, forward.

Good propulsion forward.

And the angle that she was at.

And I was watching with.

With Kirsten, my wife, and Kirsten was like, oh, she's rigging.

Because the way she was almost, like, sitting back into her stride, it was just like it was noticeable.

I'm not really.

I've never done an iron man, so I'm just like, oh, yeah, she's getting fatigued.

Like, the glutes are kind of fatiguing or whatever.

She's just running like she is at the end of a hard race.

But, no, it was not that.

She had three miles left.

And.

And I think to myself, of all the races I've done where I've got three miles left and I'm just like, three miles.

Three miles.

Three.

I'm.

I. I know she was thinking that.

But then finally she ran into the Julie boss, Wendy Ingram fallen.

We were watching her sway across the road, and it was just like, I went from being like, oh, my God, like, this race is crazy.

To be like, oh, like, I hope she's gonna be okay.

Yeah.

Because it did not look nice.

And then also, maybe we can bring in the broadcast comment when that was happening.

I don't know if you picked up on what was happening.

Right.

She was having her episode so bad.

They had a new commentator on.

She's definitely new.

And I think she was so shocked, but she was, like, laughing during nibs, like, collapse.

And she was saying, like, oh, this is amazing.

And, like, laughing.

I think it was a nervous laugh.

I don't think that she was actually laughing at her, but it was just so bad.

Yeah, it just.

Like, this is the opposite of what you need in a pretty serious scary moment.

This is where you need a professional Because I was getting worried and I wanted someone to be like, oh, like, just on top of it.

Yeah, they.

Anyways, Taylor, for the incredible career that she's had, for all of the amazing things that she's going to do from this point forward, and she will, I mean, she could come back and win Kona three times.

Four times.

Right.

She's, she's young, she's got an incredible.

She can medal at the next Olympics.

Exactly.

She, she will continue to be a star in the sport for a long time.

It doesn't matter.

She will be remembered and indelibly associated with that moment.

Because just like we see Julie Moss every year, every single year, we have to watch Julie Moss crawl.

We have to watch Paul and UBI Fraser collapse, you know, very close to the finish.

We have to watch Wendy Ingram crawl.

Now we're gonna watch the situation we're gonna see.

Now we watch her watch Solvag run into the lead.

Yeah.

The Kona rookie, all of a sudden the leader.

And then all of a sudden, after I had been saying, solvig's coming, she looks like she's gonna catch her.

All of a sudden, I looked back one more and I'm like, holy crap, look who's booking along.

And finally they gave us a camera on her.

And she looked amazing.

Amazing.

How is Cat an open marathon?

It was an open marathon.

Oh, my gosh.

That woman looked, for all intents and purposes, like she was so fresh.

I, I, I could not believe how.

Well she was running when Sulveg took the lead.

And then we saw Cat.

Did you think that Cat could still win?

Did you have that thought?

I mean, it occurred.

We just seen two people collapse, so.

Yeah, well, I didn't.

Solvig didn't look like she was in that kind of dire straits, but she did look like she was hurting.

She did look like she was fatigued.

And Cat looked fresh as Daisy and was chewing up the ground between them.

The problem was we were getting such bad commentary that I couldn't really tell how much of a threat it really was.

So I was relying on the tracker, and every time I saw the tracker update, she was closing down that gap very quickly.

So it was, I mean, we went from, I'm trying not to talk about the broadcast over and over, but you have Greg Welch going freaking on and on about Sovig running down Polani to win her first ever Iron man, and then 10 seconds later, he's like, oh, my gosh, Kat Matthews looks like she's going to catch her.

Maybe she hasn't won.

It was just.

Yeah.

Anyways.

Solveg.

She's amazing.

She was amazing.

Rookie composure.

Rookie composure.

Yeah.

It was, it was a sight to behold.

I mean after all that drama, all those twists and turns, he, like I was just in disbelief.

Like I've never watched an Iron man before really like that.

And I was, I couldn't go away from the TV or when I took my dog out for a walk during the race, I was literally on the tracker.

Yeah.

And like listening to the race and because there was so much that could still happen based on the dynamics of the race.

Like, I mean we watched what happened in Nice and that was an all time race.

Yeah.

But this was a step above.

So did she win or did she just survive?

She won by being pragmatic, I guess.

I don't think.

I mean, I guess at the end of the run it looked like she was struggling but other than that I think she was fairly in control.

Yeah.

So it wasn't like, yeah, survived it's.

But it, but that's what you need to do obviously in, in this kind of race you need to, to be pragmatic as much as you can so that you can get to the finish.

Kat had the most impressive run but I think Solvig had the most impressive race because she was on her own the whole time and she managed to just like pace it perfectly and really do a great job.

So, you know.

Yeah.

The one thing I'll say about Cat, I feel like in the back half of the bike I really didn't see her much on the front.

Maybe on the first half of the race she was kind of at the front but I feel like the back half of the race, Laura Phillip was up there quite a bit.

I don't know, maybe I'm totally off base but it just seemed like.

I don't want to say she was sitting in but maybe she was being a little more tactical because obviously she dusted Philip.

Yeah.

And who I would say was on the front of the bike quite a bit based on the coverage that I saw.

And Laura Phillip had the quietest third place ever.

Just.

Yeah.

I mean, what do you even think when you're getting in third place or getting on the podium in that situation, you're just like, wow.

Yeah.

Like I can't believe I'm here.

And.

And our fourth place finisher came out of nowhere.

Hannah Berry.

Yeah.

She had a great year.

She's had a great year.

She has been ripping it up, I'd say in the T100 and by ripping it up.

I mean consistently top eight, which is great against the, the top, you know, some of the top women in the world.

And yeah, she's, she's just been having a very good year and she showed her consistency even more in this race and she was in that kind of main bunch.

I don't know if she was again, like maybe not at the front as much so maybe a little cooler, a little fresher coming off the bike.

Ran a, a stellar race as well.

Lisa Perder in fifth too.

Yeah.

Kona rookie.

Phenomenal.

I mean a great.

That's a great debut.

Until the other rookie win.

Yeah.

So Matt, you know, in, in your career, I'm sure you've had your share of missteps in terms tactics.

Was this a tactical mistake on the part of Lucy and or Taylor in pushing each other too hard on the bike?

And certainly at the beginning of the run Taylor even said at some point she's like I just gave up on my plan and just allowed myself to race Lucy because it was a great race.

And she said.

Did she say that?

She said that in her press conference.

She said, she said she wouldn't change anything in the moment, but now knowing what she knows, of course she would.

Like she wouldn't do it all over again.

Exactly the same.

Cause that obviously would be foolish.

But in the moment she was quite happy to do what she did and she would do that again if she was in that moment again because it just felt right to race.

But Kona's not a place where you can really just throw all that.

Yeah.

So do you think it was a mistake?

And again, you know, listen, it's easy.

For us to Monday.

It's easy for us to Monday morning quarterback.

I understand that.

Yeah, I guess it was a mistake.

But I also personally love to race and I would have done the same thing because I just love to race, love to be amongst it.

Especially when clearly they knew they were giving it to the rest of the field, especially on that bike.

Like that just gives you a mental lift as well.

Like I feel like I'm on top of the world where in a cooler can climate you can kind of get away with it.

But obviously in Kona and especially if she did deviate from her, her plan, maybe she knew her core temperature kind of what her zones were with that going into it and she deviated from that.

Then it's a mistake.

But it was such an entertaining mistake for us.

Yes, it was.

How do you mistake.

How do you think it affects them mentally coming back to Kona next year.

Do you think they.

Do you think they'll carry more?

Like they'll be a bit of gun shy?

I guess, maybe.

But also they're going to go back to Kona and they'll be together again.

So maybe they'll just talk about it before the race and try and share the load a little bit more and maybe that'll be.

Make the difference.

It's.

It's just, I just wonder though, about the like, obviously pushing your body to that limit.

Like, could they both have done damage, like, laid low style?

Yeah, that's what, based on what you saw, that's what worries me.

I think maybe less so for Lucy because she got pulled off earlier.

But yeah, it worries me.

It worries me.

That is, that's a huge physiologic stress and that's potentially got.

Look, like I said, look what happened to Sam.

I hope that we don't see the same issue for either of them.

It's also funny because I think in the previous podcast we did the pre race, I even said something like, oh, I don't think, you know, there, there's going to be a Sam laid low suicide mission.

Well, and you even said, you said, who do you think would be most likely to do it?

And I can't remember what we said when we talked about it, but yeah, I was, I didn't think a woman would do that and yet.

But they felt good.

They felt good.

Yeah, right from the gun.

Lucy did it and she had the same result.

So you got to wonder if it's going to inform people next year to change their tactics.

The one thing that, let's say, you know, one of them won.

I wonder if there would have been comments on the motos.

Being too close.

Being too close, because I think in the past we've heard issues with that and that's, that's been brought up.

And so because obviously they didn't finish, no one's talking about it, but I wonder if that would have been a big talking point coming out of this if they had won because obviously they were on the front.

I think there are more motos in that situation with the cameras and whatnot.

And also I was looking at the wind that was happening during the race and when they were coming back, the wind was coming from, I guess I don't even know how to say, like it was coming off the land towards the water.

And it was such that because the moto was on the, like closer to the land than there was.

The women were potentially shielding.

There was potentially shielding And I was just watching this, and I'm like, ooh.

Like that could be advantageous if it was coming off the ocean.

Yeah.

Wouldn't have matter, but it was, you know, they wanted to get that angle or whatever, so.

Because it was beautiful, right?

With the ocean in the background, like, stunning.

Stunning.

So there's some just beautiful shots out of that race.

This moto with the way the wind was going, I think it would have been a talking point.

Well, we have enough talking points about the broadcast, so why don't we.

We go there next?

You enjoyed it, didn't you?

Yeah.

I think we've ascertained yet again that just because you were a very successful professional triathlete, that does translate to being a good commentator.

I think my biggest problem about the commentators are, number one, they spend eight hours describing what we're looking at, and I never understand why they feel the need to talk incessantly about exactly what we're looking at.

That always drives me crazy.

Number two, they are being fans instead of commentators.

Correct.

That is not okay.

That's not what we want.

I was talking to you about one of my favorite baseball announcers and baseball calls, Vin Scully.

So he had every reason to be a homer and be calling the game, favoring the dogs and hollering, yeah, but he didn't.

He was very, very neutral.

And when Kirk Gibson hit a home run in the bottom of the ninth inning to win the game, he didn't talk over it.

He basically let the pictures speak for themselves.

Kirk Gibson was circling the bases to thunderous applause.

The scene was insane.

And Scully didn't say a word.

He just let the picture speak for themselves.

Sacks waiting on deck.

But the game right now is at the plate.

High fly ball into right field.

She is gone.

It's in a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened.

And these announcers just are incapable of doing that.

They are incapable of being impartial.

Like, they were so cheering for Lucy, and then they were so cheering for Taylor, and it's like not telling us what's going on behind those two.

It was infuriate.

And their inane comments, like Daniela Ryf saying, oh, maybe Lucy woke up with a fever this morning, and that's what she.

That's why she's not able to handle the heat.

And I was like, how is that helpful?

Yeah, no, you're.

I think you're pretty, pretty spot on.

I go back to the fact that these are not professional broadcasters.

These are people who know the sport very well, have a lot of their own, I'd say pretty interesting experiences to draw back on.

But they are not professional.

And they are not professional because Ironman will not invest in them.

Right.

I, I don't put the blame on them.

It is all on Ironman.

Like, we just witnessed two of the most incredible world championship races back to back.

And Iron man did not meet the moment with the quality of the broadcast.

No.

And neither.

He did not meet the moment.

No.

And not.

And you know, I was in, in interviewing Matthew and when Matthew was telling me about his day in Nice, and one of the things he pointed out was that he crashed late in the bike.

And I didn't know that.

None of us knew that because it wasn't mentioned during the broadcast because they never focused on anybody except the top three guys.

They never talked about anybody.

They never talked about what was going.

There's no graphics on the screen to tell you what's going on.

There's no recognition that there's anybody else in the race.

And here's Matthew Marquardt, the top American in the race, which you would think would be a point to mention.

And he crashed on the bike and yet he's still able to get up, continue run his way, have a great marathon.

Never got mentioned, noted nothing.

Yeah, I had one of the.

I think she's in our group, Christy C. I won't give the full name, but she commented on the newsletter that I wrote that like, she's wants to see kind of, I guess like the Welches of the world retired.

And I actually, like, I, you know, Welch, he has like, intonation in his voice.

Like he's kind of got some random stories.

Like, I think what he says is, yeah, sometimes it's just whatever, like, not great.

But I think if they really invested in him, like, I don't know, like, he's got an interesting voice, which I think is important, especially when you gotta listen for eight hours.

And, and this is the thing.

These people are talking and supposed to be on for eight hours and they're like, it's just.

It's a long time.

It's a long time.

So I hate it when people are like, oh, these people suck at broadcasting.

Because it's like, okay, you go try talking about triathlon.

For eight hours and, and have no producer in your ear because that seems to be the way it is that Ironman has nobody producing these broadcasts.

If they do, they're doing a shitty job.

Yeah, and I don't disagree with you.

They're not trained broadcasters and that's a big part of it.

I do disagree a little bit in that they continue to bring the same people back over and over again.

And those people don't seem to be getting any better.

Now part of it is probably because they're not getting trained, but part of it also is I wonder, are they doing anything to try and get make themselves better because they're getting the same feedback over and over again.

You're not very good at this.

Here's what's wrong.

And nothing changes.

So that there has to be a little bit of self awareness there.

The other thing is, listen, I agree, Ironman, they're broadcasting this stuff and sure, it's mostly us triathletes watching it, but man, that was a hell of a product they put out there and that could have been so much better if they'd had good announcing.

And I keep going back to the fact that, look, I spent a lot of time watching professional cycling.

Those races are just as long.

And you know what?

They're so much better.

There's now again, like you said, professional broadcasters, but just they're easy to watch, they're easy to listen to, they're entertaining, they keep you drawn in the whole way.

And it's just small things, small things that they could do differently.

And I do agree, I think they need to change wholesale who is showing up.

Stop bringing on professional triathletes.

They're just not that good at this.

No, I think they could probably bring in maybe even just swap in voices during.

So like keep it fresh.

Maybe have like a roster especially for world champs.

Like, come on.

It's funny because nowadays I've talked about this before, like sports like this is our last like what is called appointment viewing where we all sit down and watch this thing at the same time.

You can't go into Netflix and, and pull up the world champs like it's on this day and that's it.

It's like all sports are like this.

And that is why the valuations of these NBA, mls, Premier League, all these things, NFL are skyrocketing because they command attention.

And Ironman, like, I just don't understand how they aren't taking advantage of this moment where sports has.

And live broadcasts have never been more valuable.

Like the commercials.

I I paid attention to the commercials during that broadcast and I don't know if it was my feed or not, but literally the first half of the broadcast was pretty much for me anyways.

The same two commercials for these, like, outside products.

Like I even remember in the past seeing like ads for State Farm and like all these kind of, you know, higher paying advertisers.

Like Triathlon has a very high value audience and obviously if you have these people paying attention for this time, like, I just don't understand how they aren't able to invest more in this because they should be able to sell pretty premium advertising during this.

But I'm not in the room, so I don't know.

But this is just from what I've observed.

Well, I, you know, my, my suggestion is basic one, just do open auditions.

Just, just get, I mean there's enough.

Get us on there for an hour or so, you know, just, just.

There's enough chopping it up.

There's enough triathletes out there who I'm sure have some kind of experience doing this kind of thing.

There is a guy who does.

He's the best in the world.

His name's Will McCloy.

He does super League.

Get him.

You know, I know they did.

They actually.

So to be fair, they actually did have him on the Karen's broadcast, which I watched a little bit and a.

Very engaging.

Yeah, it's like there, it's out there.

They just need to put in the effort.

They just need to put in the effort.

But I mean, even if they just did open auditions, I'm sure they'd find some better people.

And the thing is.

American Idol.

Yeah, exactly.

Just go full American.

Listen, they do these, they do these like be fun.

They do these Road to Kona things where they age groupers like compete to try and, you know, get a slot to Kona.

Well, here, here.

Do, do get.

Get a bunch of people to just sign on to, to audition to do broadcast.

They could do this because.

And you could show up because they have their studio that they use in Boulder for these broadcasts.

Yeah.

So open audition put.

Get you in the lineup out there and you can go toe to toe with Welchi.

Yeah.

God, I could do, I could do one tenth of the metaphors and it would.

When, when Solveig, who was running it was Solvig running after Taylor.

And I think he used like 30 different ways of saying, you know, that she was, you know, reeling her in the marlin one marlin thing.

We remember it.

We remember it.

It's awful.

Anyways, all right, I think we've done this to death.

Is there any more that we.

We, we went in.

We came in with Matthew.

We're gonna go out with Matthew.

Do we have something else before?

I think I got my monologue in about the broadcasts and the advertising.

Well, as part of my interview with Matthew, I had told you guys and I had told you Matt that I was concerned that we might not see him back on the professional circuit next year because I thought he was going to be finishing up med school and heading into residency.

Turns out that's not the case and so I was very happy as his number one fan on this podcast.

Anyways, to learn that we will get another full season of Matthew racing professionally.

This is another scoop for you.

Another scoop.

Yes.

Again, if you want to hear the full interview, please do head over to the Tridock podcast that is out also today and you can hear that interview with Matthew.

Matt Sharp, it was great chatting with you.

I look forward to talking to you again next week.

Definitely looking forward to it already.

Actually.

The Ironman Pro series schedule for next year is actually phenomenal for my medical school calendar.

So I have about six months of third year left and then I start fourth year.

And for those that aren't familiar at least like fourth year basically starts in May and the first four months of fourth year are super, super busy because you're taking your step two, which is a nine hour exam and like one of the crucial metrics that you have for getting into residency.

And then you also do your away rotations which are basically a month long interview process where you're probably working 80 to 100 hours a week for the whole month and probably not really having much time off.

And you're doing that at other institutions where you'd potentially like do residency.

So next summer will be super busy.

But thankfully because of the way that the Ironman Pro series is laid out, I can actually get basically most of my racing done in the spring or the fall and leverage the time after applications are in as well as before fourth year starts.

We're.

I'm still trying to finalize things with school in terms of moving stuff around to enable me to do the races.

But I think that next year should still be like a pretty full racing year and certainly hopefully we'll be at Kona no matter what.

Next year should be still like another good year.

And then after that we still have.

To figure that out.

Tempo Talks, along with the Tridock Podcast, are both productions of the Triathlon Performance Hub and are produced and edited by Jeff Sankoff.

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Tempo Talks will be back again next week with another new episode covering the best in triathlon and bringing you tips for training.

Until then, keep up the tempo.