Tom Regal (00:02.21)
Hey Kenny, how you doing?

Kenny (00:03.426)
I'm doing fantastic, Tom. How are you?

Tom Regal (00:05.266)
I'm doing fantastic as well now that we've figured out how to record. And they've changed the software up on me. And that makes sense. I had choices to choose record and it was into a test mod. So we started our a great conversation here. welcome everybody back to the show. we're gonna we're gonna have some fun with this. Yeah. And that's it, folks. Thanks for watching. Thanks for listening. yeah. Anyway, we're

Kenny (00:08.474)
It's it's that R button. Hit the R button. There you go.

Kenny (00:19.02)
Yeah, you should believe it. I was just like Yeah. And then the plane landed. so thank you. It's the best show we've ever had.

Tom Regal (00:32.216)
We're chatting amongst ourselves today because we wanted to reintroduce ourselves. it's been five years. we've done almost a hundred episodes. still enjoying it. getting through all the crazy trying to schedule our lives as we change jobs or do different things. So that's we appreciate everybody for listening. thank you. Thank you, thank you. And

Kenny (00:53.295)
Yes.

Tom Regal (00:56.21)
Keep sending us ideas and and thoughts and thumbs up and five stars and all that good stuff. That gets the algorithms out. subscribe somewhere wherever the subscribe button ends up on the YouTube channel. and if you're listening to us on audio, yeah, subscribe, hit that button. We really appreciate that. So we're getting to know each other again. So let's let's go through this, Kenny. Talk to us.

Kenny (01:16.644)
Ha ha.

Kenny (01:19.971)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (01:21.804)
How'd you get started in this whole thing? Intr let's reintroduce ourselves to our listeners again.

Kenny (01:25.316)
There we go. Yes, and I am gonna start with my childhood. no, it's kinda funny. i I was kinda thinking about this. I'm the youngest of five and so I had older brothers and sisters that would be like, Well, let's get Kenny to do and I'd be like, Okay. And then I go do some stupid stuff, like, you know, hey Kenny'll do I'm like, Okay. Evil Kennyvil are like, Hey Kenny, can take your bike and jump off of the Okay. So I go do that, right? So you know, in my late thirties I was at a corporate job burning

Tom Regal (01:28.876)
Yes, yes. Let's go all the way back this time.

Tom Regal (01:41.004)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (01:47.094)
Okay.

Kenny (01:54.501)
Candles on both end, traveling like a hundred plus thousand miles a a a year. I mean it was international travel. It was just a lot of, you know, we would have wine parties, you know, with dinner and just things were kind of, you know, and I was starting to get to a point where things were I was getting heavier. I was I didn't like the version of myself. I had a a couple of friends that were road cycling and they're like, Hey, do you want join us? And I said, Great, I need to lose weight. So I started

cycling to lose weight and then we started cycling enough where I started losing weight so I can cycle. And then one of 'em's like, Hey, I think we should go do a sentry ride, which is a hundred miles in one day. And I went, Okay. And not kinda understanding what I got myself into. first sentry ride, I was on an aluminum bike and it was a flat century and there was so much road chop that I literally threw my bike in the ditch and I said, I'm not doing that again.

Tom Regal (02:45.709)
At what mile did you do that? At the end or or mile sixty?

Kenny (02:48.154)
And so what do I do? Yeah, it was like at ninety, like somebody gave me a fig Newton, by the way. They're chew this. And I got instant dry mouth on that fig newton. So careful what people hand you. and so I started doing we started doing sentries and I got a new bike. I got a a carbon bike that was a lot more compliant, fell in love with that thing. sentries were kind of fun, and then we learned about double sentries, which are two hundred miles in a day. We Well, we you know, we should go do that. And of course I'm like, Okay.

Tom Regal (02:57.845)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (03:16.685)
Okay.

Kenny (03:16.964)
You know, not fully understanding what I'm getting myself into and sure enough, we started training for double centuries in Northern California and the first time we did was in Davis, a hundred and seven degrees that day. It was the hottest day. It was eighty degrees the weekend before and eighty five degrees the weekend after. And the weekend that we raced, it was a hundred and seven. And it was insane. but it was one of those super epic things you did, the climbs in the middle of the day. That's you know, the biggest climb at a hundred degrees.

Tom Regal (03:36.013)
Wow. That's nuts.

Kenny (03:47.019)
dragged our, you know, get to the night, came across the finish line. My my wife was there with the kids and they had posters and it was awesome. So went and did that a few times. So we spent a few years doing double centuries. and then a buddy of mine's like, Hey I'm tired of doing doubles. I'm gonna do these, you know, he's a really good swimmer and he's like, I'm gonna start doing Iron Man. And we're like, and I've always watched Iron Man since I was a kid, like since I was a teenager. And it just felt unattainable. Like that's just not a thing I can do.

Tom Regal (04:08.289)
Ha ha.

Kenny (04:14.916)
But after f finishing double centuries, I'm like, well, maybe I can, but I can't swim. I'm a terrible swimmer. so he started doing that. And actually I started out in duathlons because I I was so afraid of swimming. but all the cool kids were over there putting wetsuits on and all the nerds were over here getting ready to do a run, you know, run bike run. So so I just started learning how to swim. And one day I clicked enough to start going in, did a signed up in twenty sixteen to Iron Man Arizona. I was there a couple of times with some

Tom Regal (04:23.405)
Nice. Yeah.

Kenny (04:44.836)
with but my buddies, watching the event, seeing all the just seeing the the the pomp and circumstance and the and the famili the family family element, just you know the camaraderie, all of it was just and just people all shapes and sizes, just you know, I was like, look, I can do too. I mean I I'm not you always have this picture of these, you know, people from Kona, right? you know, these, you know, yeah, six foot three and a hundred and sixty pounds, and they yeah, and it's like, ugh.

Tom Regal (05:06.317)
Yeah, yeah. The top ten athletes, yeah. They're all like yeah.

Kenny (05:12.218)
I'm like, I'm not that. And then you see, like, wait a minute, you don't have to be that. And I did Arizona and it was epic. tried, you know, I was in Tennessee at the time when I did it. you know, work got a little crazy, the stuff kind of kinda tried to do it again. but I was at a point where I I realized that you can't fake your way into doing these things. I didn't train enough. I lied to myself. Well, you know, if I did a a a two thousand yard swim but it's only fifteen hundred, it's close enough. I did that close enough training.

Tom Regal (05:40.951)
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is

Kenny (05:42.233)
Which is the worst kind of training you can do. so did a DNF on that one. I kind of got burned out a little bit, but then California came along. It's like, wow, I spent twenty years in Sacramento, Northern California, riding those hills, riding those exact courses, ran those course. I did California International Marathon. I I've done those courses and so super excited about it. Got my energy back in twenty three. I tried to go back, the cyclone hit this giant hurricane lands in California, the you know, most epic.

Tom Regal (06:09.314)
Yeah.

Kenny (06:09.334)
Storm of the you know, the decade decides to land on the day we're supposed to do Iron Man. so they had to cancel it. So eleven months of training, just you know. sat in a hotel room and with no power, trying to read my iPad, eating pizza and drinking beer at nine o'clock in the morning. So it's like what else are you gonna do? Right. So it's like Mountain Mikes. So yeah, the day's shy, what do you do? I think I ended up watching football. It was just kind of funny. It was crazy. So got came back the next year in twenty four.

Tom Regal (06:22.925)
Nine in the mor. The d the day was shot. There wasn't yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (06:33.933)
Yeah.

Kenny (06:38.574)
fast river swim, it was great. again, you know, forty mile an hour headwind, it was just one of those things. I had to walk half of the course because my quads gave out and my calves were garbage. So it was, you know, it was again another epic. and since then I've been doing some halves and been doing some little ones, but switched over, kind of started working out more, switched over to do high rocks. And that's just been a kind of a fun thing to do. It's just a different sort of thing. You know, got a gravel bike, I'm trying to do more gravel. have haven't done a very good job of that. But

Just wanna be able to go back. I mean, I was riding BMX when I was a kid. It's I've been riding bicycles a ton. That's my kind of bread and butter. I was racing bikes, you know, before I started doing Iron Man, got in a pretty bad wreck. So that's what, you know, got me into traath lines, is you know, the wife's like, You're not gonna race those anymore with fifty people bumping you. You get to go, you know, have space between you now. So five five bike length different you know, gap, that's what you get to do. So for me it's always been, you know, hey, do you wanna do something? Okay.

Tom Regal (07:36.993)
Yeah.

Kenny (07:36.995)
and did it, you know. It was just like, you know, hey, do you want your triathlon? I'm like, okay. I kinda stupidly get into it. And I think, then you realize, like, I actually have to kind of think and train for this. I have to be serious about it. I have to, you know. what's fun about those distances, even half distance, is there's no hiding, right? You've you've gotta kind of be disciplined. You can't you know, I tried the, you know, a good enough approach and that that's not good enough. So so yeah, it was kind of fun. And then

twenty one I opened up twenty twenty opened up a place called the recovery lounge and a guy named Tom Regal walked in my door. So start s somebody we started chatting and here we are. So Tom, you've got a long illustrious championship career. Okay.

Tom Regal (08:09.933)
Somebody sent me your way.

Yeah, there we are, yeah.

I the same I'm thinking thinking back, the same start for me was that I was working in the entertainment industry. I was sitting in a dark room and they were feeding us sugary drinks. and I'm a little guy and I was not very little at that point and I put on a whole bunch of weight. when I I used to cycle as all the time as a kid, that was my mode of transportation. so I was always on a bike or I was walking or I was running and

I got to this point my life where I was I think I was thirty at the time. And like would try to run and then I couldn't walk for like three days afterwards and had all this extra weight and was trying to figure things out and I go to a doctor and they're just kinda like, Well, you're getting older and you just can't do the things that you used to be able to do. And I'm like, I'm thirty. Dude, that is that is not old. As much as when I was ten, yeah, thirty seemed like ancient, but now that I'm thirty, it's like, okay, this this shouldn't be happening this way, and kinda got me thinking about

Kenny (09:06.874)
That's not yeah.

Kenny (09:12.833)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (09:17.419)
what I need to do to get fit. So I started losing weight and doing some things and I had a little a little kink in my shoulder with I was like at a physical therapy office one time working on and I'm doing whatever motion they have me doing and we're just having conversations with a therapist and some other folks that were there. And I was like, yeah, let's keep seeing this triathlon thing. I really want to give it a give it a try. I go watch Julie Moss do her epic collapse at the at the finish line.

Kenny (09:44.751)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (09:44.994)
you know, years earlier and you know, always had it in the back of my mind, always kinda followed. Iron Man always kinda followed some of the stuff. And I was like, you know, saying, Yeah, I want to give this this triathlon thing, you know, a go. And and she she let out a gaffaw like no other. Like, like, not with that shoulder. And I looked at her like, that was the wrong answer. That totally is the wrong answer because now I'm going to do it. Like now that was like the impetus that just pushed me into

Kenny (10:00.303)
Yeah.

Kenny (10:05.44)
Yeah, wrong answer. Yeah.

Tom Regal (10:13.311)
And going through and at that time I was working for Universal Studios and shortly after I did the very first triathlon, my very first triathlon, found out that they had a corporate team and it was like, I don't know, nine people. So I became co captain of that and we grew that to like three hundred people. and I never remembered the name. I should have written the name down of that therapist because I would just wanna send a note back to her going like, Yeah, by the way, I just finished an Ultraman, yeah, with a ten K swim, so shut up.

Kenny (10:37.604)
Yeah send them out. Yeah.

Yeah.

Tom Regal (10:43.105)
You know, we don't we don't I don't need that kind of negativity in my life. but that kind of got me once I got into the sport, I just love the fact that there's three sports and I'm a process guy and how can you get from one sport to the next sport to the next sport? and just kind of was doing sprints in Olympics and then adding more. I was probably doing what, five, six a year at least, 'cause there was a whole bunch on the California coast while I was out in LA.

And and then did my first Iron Man in 2010 at Lake Placid. and then just kind of grew from there and then started coaching on the side. I ended up coaching athletes and then was like, well, I should probably get certified with USAT and you know learn a little bit more about coaching and get into that. And then I started getting into bike fitting. and then in 2017 I made the the pivot. I kind of burned out after 30 years in the industry and said,

I need something different. I want to see if I can do this full time. And that's when I kind of switch gears. And at that point, yeah, we were we were already trying to move out of LA. because we're from New York. We're not we're not LA folks. We were just there for the business. And as we started looking during COVID, great time to travel. There's nobody on the planes. And we just ended up picking Franklin was the of one of the stops that we had and and ended up we had some friends that retired here.

so we kind of knew of it. And once we discovered it was it was great. And then that's when I bumped into Kenny when like our our good friends at the Franklin Roadrunners who only knew tro two triathletes in their life said you guys should you guys should talk. and yeah, then just came came up with the idea of like let's let's have a podcast so we can talk to people and meet people. I didn't know anybody in town. I didn't even know what the endurance community was like here. I knew there was one other independent bike fitter.

Kenny (12:18.539)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (12:34.399)
And me, and I figured, well, there's plenty of cyclists. There's gotta be plenty of cyclists for both of us. And there is, there's tons. it turns out that there's a fantastic endurance community here. really good group of runners, cyclists, lots of cyclists, lots of runners, and some swimmers. Go figure. And all of that. so yeah, that's kind of that's kind of kind of brought us to this point. So

Kenny (12:52.996)
There you go. So

Kenny (13:00.312)
Yeah, no kidding. So what are you doing what are you training for now? What's your you've you've got a project you're doing?

Tom Regal (13:05.729)
So now I'm I'm I'm working on st I'm still racing and training and doing all that fun stuff, but I've started a project. It's I'm a year into it of called what I'm calling Project Old Guy. and what it is is I've done the Hawaii Ultraman, which is a three day event around the circumference of the big island of Hawaii. You should look it up. It's great, it's epic. Yeah, the a couple of years after, like it's been around for over forty years. Yeah.

Kenny (13:26.81)
'Cause just Iron Man wasn't, you know, bad at you anybody could do a one day event.

Tom Regal (13:34.306)
Yeah, how can we how can we incorporate the entire circumference of the island? It's three hundred and twenty miles swimming, six Ks of swimming, two hundred and some odd miles of cycling on a double marathon. it's fantastic. It's it's a very, very small, tight knit community. they've only they only accept forty racers per year. And you have to do one of their qualifying races, which is either in Florida, I think they have one in Mexico now, and

Kenny (13:37.077)
Island. Yeah, okay. That's crazy.

Tom Regal (14:03.361)
Canada. There used to be one in Arizona. There was a couple others that would pop up and and go down. Same distance, same format, never as hard as Hawaii with the weather, the ten different microclimate climates that you go through and the humidity and all of that stuff is crazy. so it was never so I ended up qualifying in Florida in twenty seventeen and twenty eighteen I raced, got injured in the race, didn't finish day two. I f well I finished day two, but it was six minutes past the cutoff.

that ended my race. Went back the following year. Actually did a race in injured. I did a race in in Hawaii in Kona that's Iron Man Distance called Monster Try. I was the only one doing the long course and an epic storm rolled through and they were closing the beaches down. I was the only one out on course doing the long course all the way out to Javi. I made it to Javi in two hours. and for folks that know, like that was one hell of a tailwind.

Kenny (14:33.028)
Yeah.

Kenny (14:49.114)
No, no

Kenny (14:58.18)
Geez.

Tom Regal (15:02.709)
It took me four hours to come back. I was riding sideways and and getting through it. Finished I needed that to check the box for me to go back to Ultraman, so I have to had to validate my entry. back in there. Went back in the fall, healed up, went back in the fall, got injured just before the race, and raced injured, which I can't recommend. once again, like

Kenny (15:02.756)
Mm.

Kenny (15:24.388)
Seems to be a theme. Yeah.

Tom Regal (15:28.695)
Doing too much, right? Learning all about the different training, at that point. and finished it though. I wasn't last. I did finish it. the run was just miserable. but I got it all done and it's great. So my goal is to go back, right? Go back healthy. I've set up two year a two year plan for me to build up and get to that point. I've hired a coach myself.

I'm working with Chris Bag up at Campfire Endurance in Bend, Oregon, who we connected with really well. So interviewed multiple coaches, talked to lots of people, really sat down of who was gonna work best with me, right? It's gotta be this kind of kind of partnership. especially like a lot of folks had asked me, it was like, Are you coachable? Like as a coach yourself, as someone with twenty-five plus years of experience.

Kenny (16:12.195)
Exactly.

Tom Regal (16:21.141)
Are you coachable? And I'm like, well, I'm gonna have to be. Like I want to do this and like I'm not gonna fight him. Like, because he's helping me take my coaching. He's mentoring me as well, right? So he's taking my coaching from I've got twenty five years of racing experience. So I have tons of experience. I've got tons of coaching experience. But there's a next step of getting that extra expertise. and that's the piece that I'm learning and working on as I'm always working on towards that.

Kenny (16:45.816)
Well, it's also i it feels like there could be an Icarus problem too, where you're too close to the sun, right? Where you have somebody that can take a step back and say, I know what you're trying to do, but the method you're going about it may be and so far the results this year have been great. I mean you've you've so

Tom Regal (16:51.137)
Totally. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (17:00.213)
It's fantastic. PR a Maine seventy point three. And I hadn't done a seventy point three in ten years. Like it re I really felt like it wasn't my distance. I have n I have struggled on seventy point threes. just never never happy with performances in Donna. I did Utah, I did Austin. I've d I've I did I did five or six of in Hawaii. and then went up to Maine and crushed it. Like for me it was

Kenny (17:06.746)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (17:17.135)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (17:29.097)
It was the most perfect race. We had an ideal race plan. the weather for them was super hot, but for us it was ridiculously cold. because we had s so my heat accumulation was there. I was I was really pumped and ready. We had a really great race plan and I was able to follow the race plan and do that. So we're that was that was step number one, going back to Lake Placid for the third time, to see if I can actually beat my time again. So

Kenny (17:38.436)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (17:56.042)
So far I've been faster each time I've gone to Cona or gone to Lake Placid. So we'll get a Lake Placid and if that goes well and I have a good time there, then I will I will put in an entry, put in an application to to go back to the big island for the World Champs and see if I get an invitation and get out there and like that's that's the point. So two two years of really Yeah. I think like

Kenny (18:08.546)
Mm. There you go.

Kenny (18:19.418)
We should start a a petition for you. So folks, just write in.

Tom Regal (18:24.597)
I volunteered I volunteered enough times. they usually save a slot or two for the slow old guys to get out there. But yeah, the goal is to see what I can do healthy. What what's my absolute peak best 'cause I've I've I'm constantly improving. when you when you like really focus on the things that matter and really get in consistent training, the consistency has been fantastic and that's where it's that's where it's really happening.

Kenny (18:34.842)
Should be fun.

Healthy, yeah.

Kenny (18:54.126)
Yeah. Very cool.

Tom Regal (18:54.155)
So we'll see. We'll see. Giving an I'm letting everybody know. I'm letting it out of the bag. I usually don't talk about races that I've signed up for, what I'm doing, and I just do them and then I don't tell anybody about 'cause it's it's all for me. but I figure people be inspired and can hold me accountable. I've got a second run to do tonight.

Kenny (19:02.072)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (19:11.77)
There you go. Well we're rooting for you, man. It's gonna be kinda fun. I mean I think you're you're hopefully, you know, with age also comes wisdom, right? And like you said, you're you're training smart, right? Rather than Yeah. So yeah.

Tom Regal (19:21.687)
Training smart and racing smart. those are two things that we're we're doing, figuring out a lot of new things and and like all of the things that I've learned as a coach over the last ten years, of really putting that into play. And then being able to bounce that off of Chris and like get the feedback and once again, you you taught you hit it perfectly. It was like having somebody see you from the outside and be able to call things and call you on things, like

Kenny (19:46.702)
Mm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (19:49.28)
you in your mind, like in my mind I look like Michael Phelps. Like in the pool, I look like Michael Phelps. My times do not are not indicative of that. and it's nice to have someone that looks at my video and goes, okay, yeah, let's work on this, right?

Kenny (20:02.584)
Well i Yeah, I remember distinctly though, too, it's not just 'cause you and I were training and I was on the struggle bus in on the lake, right? And I think I was another like six hundred yards from the shoreline and I pull up and it's not and again I get this I'm using this as a way to say it's not just, hey, we look at numbers, but you're sitting there and I'm like, and you stared at me and you're like, you know what? You're you're an F an Iron Man. And I'm like, I am

Tom Regal (20:12.289)
Hm, yeah.

Tom Regal (20:29.953)
Yeah. I remember that. Yep.

Kenny (20:32.394)
I am. And then, you know, it was like so it's those things once in a while that's like, hey, you know you're you know, and you you you use the full word, which is great. but it's like I needed that sort of, hey, you just remember where, you know, y you you've done this, so what's going on? And it was like, you're right. And so settle in and kind of get going. And you kind of need that from a coach. It's not just, you know, do we dial the numbers correctly? But every once in a while you just kind of need that mental push to say, Hey, both directions, right? Either keep going or hey, you're

Tom Regal (20:46.699)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (21:01.282)
I I know what you're trying to do. I think you what you're you're you're you're getting close to injury. I think you just need to take a take a step back. But that's it's great. I mean it's great that you've got a big, hairy, crazy goal ahead of you. it it it's amazing how that forces you to get up in the morning and and do that. So that's

Tom Regal (21:06.753)
Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (21:16.599)
Yeah. Yeah. I'm not cutting corners on it. I'm yeah, getting my workouts in and as I've mentioned before, it's probably like I'm probably a little behind getting to some emails and responses and phone calls, but yeah, I'm getting up. I'm I'm really prioritizing my my workouts for a change, which I haven't done for a very long time. So it's kinda nice. Feel good. Feel good about it.

Kenny (21:20.482)
Mm. There you go.

Kenny (21:26.447)
Yep.

So so.

Kenny (21:35.94)
Yeah. Yeah, so if you look back on sort of the f times you've been doing, is there a couple of highlights that were like, Yeah, that was really cool that kind of pop in your head?

Tom Regal (21:45.674)
If anyone's been to or seen Lake Placid, New York, upstate New York, it's absolutely gorgeous up there. I mean, that's an old there the mountain range isn't like I think the tallest peak, Whiteface Mountain, is like four thousand feet. So it's nothing like the Fourteeners out west, but it's much, much older. I mean, it's it's like the original the original, you know, kind of mountain range and is there. So they've they're worn down a little bit, but it's epic. It's beautiful.

Kenny (22:01.242)
But, yeah. Mm-hmm.

Tom Regal (22:15.373)
I grew up in up in upstate New York, went to school further upstate New York. and it's just it's just a beautiful I love the Alpine area. I love all the the town is beautiful. they take a photo of you running on the course at one point where the ski jump is right over your shoulder in the distance, you know, and it's just there's just the history that's there from the nineteen eighty Olympics.

Kenny (22:40.333)
Yeah, it's yeah.

Tom Regal (22:41.043)
you start at your transition area is is right in the middle of the outdoor speed skating oval. and your finish is on the speed skating oval. You'll actually run one half of the speed skating oval and finish in front of grandstands right next to the Olympic Training Center. It's it's epic. It's really beautiful. and when I did that that just that just sealed the deal for me that I was going to make this a lifestyle. and go through. And then the other piece of it was probably a year or so later.

Kenny (22:55.46)
That's great.

Tom Regal (23:09.421)
when I went to Hawaii, did a seventy point three with a friend who was doing it and just about drowned on the swim. ocean swim, warm water, non wetsuit, first time. My the pockets in my tri suit filled up. I was windmilling like crazy. It was super choppy. It was crazy, crazy windy. I was throwing up a mile into the swim, just off on the side, just trying to not drown. And the picture of me coming out of the water almost dead last was just

Kenny (23:19.47)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (23:25.037)
Cheese.

Tom Regal (23:39.276)
Like it looked horrible. I managed to save it on the bike. I ate everything I could possibly get. survived the survived the bike. And then I actually pulled together a decent run. It was one of my one of my better runs for half half marathon distance and survived it and said I either need to quit the sport or learn how to swim. And that was the next turning point for me. I used to sit back and then got with Coach Stu, who we had on on the on the podcast here a while ago.

Kenny (23:39.844)
Mm. Yeah.

Tom Regal (24:09.421)
and then just yeah, got back to fundamentals and really started to learn how to swim. That's the only thing that allowed me to do Ultraman ten K swim, right? I've done th four ten K swims now. and figured out that I get seasick after three miles. the data is crazy because it happened the first time on the very first Ultraman that I did in well, I did the ten K swim in in Florida in a lake. and then got to the ocean. The ocean was a different story. Three miles in

Kenny (24:22.894)
Well.

Tom Regal (24:37.451)
You look at the data, I'm doing like a one forty per one hundred, and then at three miles it just drops and I'm just once again throwing up in the water, trying to just get through, get through, get through it. I finish. went off and did the test event for LA twenty eight Olympics in in California.

Kenny (24:46.266)
Yeah. Happens to a lot of people, yeah.

Tom Regal (24:59.543)
beach was that on. I'm blanking out where where was that, but they had a 10 K swim. So I signed up for that. Got in there, same thing, exact same thing happens. When we lined up the data, the data trailed off at exactly three miles, my one forty per one hundred pace just dropped to like, you know, two fifty, three ten. and I was thrown up. And and technically that one I didn't finish, I was of the what? of the of the ten K I was

Kenny (25:10.17)
Crazy.

Tom Regal (25:28.617)
I could see the finish and they were they were deflating the finish chute. And they made me get out of the water. I'm less than a half mile from the I'm probably I'm probably about maybe maybe a thousand to fifteen hundred yards out. And they made me go in to shore and then do the walk of shame past all the beachgoers all the way up. They wouldn't even let me finish the swim all the way up and I and I was shivering cold and throwing up and I was miserable. But

Kenny (25:32.536)
No.

Kenny (25:48.826)
I hate that. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Tom Regal (25:57.952)
It helped me figure out like, okay, we gotta figure out dramamine, we gotta figure out what I can and what I can't take and Yeah. Yeah. You need that. You need to you need to push through that and it made what so and that was nice because it was right after the other one, so we had data to look at and go, like, okay, so this is an ocean thing. This is not a swim thing. This is you get seasick and we were able to adjust for that and then the next one that I did much, much better.

Kenny (26:02.532)
Yeah. Well in d you know, in defeat you yeah, either, you know, get, you know, iron, yeah.

Tom Regal (26:24.927)
In crazy conditions. The Kona swim conditions are crazy. And swimming all the way down the coast six point two miles. crazy. It was we've had crazy conditions the years that I've done it. So it's it's not for the faint of heart. So I'm really working on the swim now. As as I I need to be even stronger on the swim. so there's a lot a lot of things to work on in the two year run up here. So it'll be good. It'll be fun. We'll keep updating everybody through the throughout the year.

Kenny (26:40.856)
No kidding. Good. As you need to, yeah.

Kenny (26:51.45)
Cool. Yeah, absolutely.

Tom Regal (26:54.357)
As it goes. getting through that. And speaking of that, had did anybody watch the race this past weekend? That's the big key. Was that epic? my god I'm I'm not the fastest swimmer out there for sure, but I can get it done and yeah.

Kenny (27:00.526)
My goodness. You're the Lucy Charles Barclay of Swim, by the way, I just thinking so

Kenny (27:10.554)
But you have that certain spot. so for those that don't know, the the twenty twenty six Iron Man Kona Nash World Championship was over the weekend. happens in October. for some reason it's like my I've had it on my birthday like three years in a row. And it's just hilarious. Just a quick story. My wife, for some reason three years in a row, she suffers from migraines every once in a while. And the kind that like she'll go down on a Friday won't come up on a s till a Sunday. It's horrible. So she goes in a closet.

Tom Regal (27:18.253)
Just this past week. I'm recording this right after it.

Kenny (27:40.227)
It's just you don't, you shut the door. And three years in a row, I had my birthday sitting in front of a computer on a streaming, eating a steak and potato and drinking red wine is kind of the joke now. watching Kona on a computer screen, you know, by myself, you know, watching Kona. But for this year, it was it was crazy in the fact that you never know what's gonna happen, and even when you think it's done, it's not done.

Tom Regal (27:49.695)
Yeah. Nice.

Kenny (28:08.342)
And it was a great testament on two things, which is the idea that it it's choices you make, it's not fitness you have, right? So whether somebody fails or doesn't fail is because they're lack of fitness. It's just whatever choices they're making, right? Either they take too much hydration, they don't take enough hydration, they miss the bottle, or they push it on a swim because you don't want to get too far behind, or you kind of are are cycling outside of your comfort zone.

On the flip side, you stay in your comfort zone, you do your ride, you do your race, and you could pop up and and be the winner. And so this year was particularly funky, really choppy swim, really crazy headwind, overcast. I think it had a storm the night you know, the rain came in the the night before. It was it was even though overcast gave you this lull of false hope of it should be nice, the humidity was so rockin' that it still caused all sorts of problems.

And so kinda long story short, if you guys watch it, if you didn't watch it, please go watch the highlights. But it's insane because the men's race, Magnus

Tom Regal (29:08.769)
You should definitely watch it, yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (29:16.268)
Six foot what three dude, very long stride. Just yeah, he's just yeah, I mean you look at his running, he looks like he's loping, but the guy's running, you know, a two forty marathon, right? did really did it okay on the swim. front of the pack with the bike, and then just started running at a steady pace. And Magnus was looking great. yeah.

Tom Regal (29:19.213)
Yeah, he's bigger. Yeah. I think he's six four, six five or something.

Tom Regal (29:28.386)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (29:36.588)
He's a Uber biker for sure. And the big guys the big guys Taborn f from several years ago would struggle with the heat dissipation, right? You can't dissipate the heat fast enough and it's always a struggle. I don't think anybody who's been super tall has ever won the race. I think I think maybe a second place someplace in the top ten. It's just it's just you can't shed the heat, right? You just generate too much heat in the heat and it's just

Kenny (29:55.291)
Well that hurts. So yeah.

Tom Regal (30:05.001)
it becomes an issue. So he was doing everything with the ice and doing all that stuff and it's just it was brutal. It was brutal to watch, but

Kenny (30:11.503)
Yeah, so sure enough, Vincent Luis, our French guy, got a three minute penalty on the bike. First time on Kona. it was his retirement one too. He said this is the last time I'm gonna race. I guess this is my last race, first time in Kona, I'm gonna retire after this race. Gets a three minute penalty. And for for pros, three minutes is like that's yeah, you can make it up, but it's when you got people running. but same thing. He stayed within his race. Luis or Vincent got I think

Tom Regal (30:15.115)
Yep. First time at Kona.

His last race. Yeah, he says he's retiring after this show.

Tom Regal (30:30.337)
That's huge.

Kenny (30:39.585)
He was running like a two thirty five, so his pace was faster, but it wasn't enough to catch up. So they were doing math about eight miles out and they're like, Hey, he's making up about thirty seconds, but it's just not enough. He's you know, Magnus is five minutes out, and then what happens at the at the five mile marker? But all of a sudden

Tom Regal (30:42.571)
He was

Tom Regal (30:49.986)
Yeah.

Kenny (30:58.329)
Magnus starts, you know, wobbling aid station, you know, he's trying to grab ice, he's walking pretty slowly through the aid station, he starts running, starts wobbling, and my gosh, right? I mean, here comes here comes Vincent, right? He's just steady pace going, steady pace going. All of a sudden, five minutes to three minutes to two minutes, and I think it was about what, three miles in when he caught him, I think.

Tom Regal (30:59.905)
The wheels came off the bus big time.

Tom Regal (31:12.481)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (31:18.241)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (31:24.437)
I think it was somewhere around that point. Yeah, and you had Gustav Eden that was just flying on the marathon, just tearing through everybody, and then he got close he got close but then ended up having to back off and then finished a minute back or something like that. But it was almost another I thought they were gonna sprint down the tunnel. down the red carway. Yeah. It's a sprint race. Yeah.

Kenny (31:29.283)
Mm. Yep.

Kenny (31:34.233)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

So

Yeah, so a hundred and forty point six mile race and a hundred and thirty seven of it was great for this guy. It's it's you know, and and I think everyone watching was like, this guy's got it. I stride's looking great, he's looking healthy, everything's looking good. And the way people run, usually what you try to look for is how they're running, right? They're running smooth, they're they're running you know, if the all of a sudden they're going side to side or they're bouncing or they're bobbling or you start seeing grimacing. and he just imploded. Yeah.

Tom Regal (32:10.089)
Once the wobble happens, once the wobble happens. So last you go back to last year. watch last year's as well, right? You gotta check it out because you had Taylor Taylor Nibb and Lucy Charles Barkley were racing each other on the bike, and then they were racing each other on the run, like they traded positions and they were ch going through. And the energy lab is this one section that they go into and when you come out of it, you're 10K from the finish. And it is the lowest point on the island. It is hotter than hot.

Kenny (32:32.324)
Yeah. It's dreaded. Yeah.

Tom Regal (32:39.841)
there's not a lot of wind down there because it's kind of protected. and you've got you've got to drop down into it. It's a little Death Valley type of thing. You go all the way down it, you turn around, you come back again. And I forgot the distance that you're actually in the energy lab, but when you come out, I think it's only about 10k from the finish. and you climb out of it. Yeah, you're climbing back out of it again. So everybody looks great going in. And and those who survive coming out. So the the wheels came off the bus for Lucy.

Kenny (32:43.596)
And you have to climb up out of energy lab. So

Kenny (32:57.06)
But you're climbing out of that too, so it's yeah.

Tom Regal (33:09.011)
last year when she was leading it and we went, Okay, this is Taylor's year, then Taylor's just gonna pick up the pieces and go. And then Taylor the wheels came off the bus for her like a mile from the finish and sh and she was on the ground like she it was it was catastrophic for both of them. and then and then you've we've got our fun Norwegian what was her I'm blanking on her name now Solvey

Kenny (33:27.214)
Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (33:37.162)
comes through and wins the race, right? Sitting there in third place and ends up just staying nice and steady. So then this year rolls around. The ladies are at it again, right? They're both like Taylor doing Taylor things off the front. Three minutes out on on Lucy. Lucy comes back. yeah, the wheels came off the bus for Lucy in the energy lab this time. I I think it was it was she came out of the energy lab, I think, last year, or was it the same spot? It was close. So she was at the turnaround.

Kenny (33:46.18)
Same thing. Yeah.

Kenny (33:56.768)
Same spot as last year, yeah.

Kenny (34:02.498)
Okay. They were mentioning it may have been around that same area. It's just that I mean the

Tom Regal (34:06.827)
Maybe, yeah, yeah, yeah. So unfortunately she was thrown up and like it was it was ugly for her, so she was out. Taylor looks so steady, like, okay, she's got this thing, and then all of a sudden the wheels came off for her, so she started slowing down, and then Sulvay came through looking like the most impressive thing ever. Like she just looks so strong, and they're out of the energy lab at this point. And Solvey's like got this thing in the bag. And then the wheels came off the bus.

Kenny (34:35.278)
The wheels came off bus. A kilometer to go and she collap literally collapses. I think it was a camera guy like one of those unicycle things and she literally collapsed on him. Yeah, and

Tom Regal (34:36.201)
And she was on the side of the road just like laying down there. Yeah.

Tom Regal (34:44.523)
Yeah, she fell on him. She fell multiple times. She was trying to get up and go and and give give credit to Taylor. So Taylor learned from last year. Like when when she got past, Taylor started to stay to go with her. And that would have been a huge mistake. And then she backed off and she just said she just let it go. And she said, I've just gotta collect sh she needed to regroup and get her body cooled back down and get some stuff. So she just

Kenny (34:58.562)
And then Yeah.

Tom Regal (35:11.127)
did her thing and Sauve just run it ran off into the distance. So yeah, if you're when you're racing the other folks, so they do these races amongst themselves and other other athletes will do their own and just be like, I just rode my bike and I didn't worry about the pace of everybody else. And then they're the ones that come through at the end and and then you never give up, right? You never give up 'cause then and and give Solve credit. She she did finally recover and walked in into eighth place.

Kenny (35:11.992)
Run your race. I mean that's the thing.

Kenny (35:22.702)
Yep. Yeah.

Kenny (35:29.934)
Yeah. It's it's insane. Well it's just

Kenny (35:38.437)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, Magnus had to pull out, right? Yeah, Magnus collapsed, he he had to pull up short. And then Vincent, here he is, his you know he said he was gonna do retirement and now he's a Kono world champion. And and Taylor Yeah, we'll see how that goes. And then, you know, Taylor did such a great job and it's such a testament to the idea that, you know, they say the you know, mile sixteen is where the race starts, right? So it happens between sixteen and twenty six and

Tom Regal (35:40.071)
she's still top ten and she still scored points. Yeah, he had to pull up. That was medically not safe.

Tom Regal (35:52.29)
Yeah. Yeah. He says he's still retiring, but we'll see how he feels. We'll see how he feels. like

Tom Regal (36:05.313)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (36:08.63)
It's such a crazy because these guys are professionals. They see each other all the time. Like they're at races all the time. They know exactly what each other's paces are. I mean, they know. it was kind of fun for me because we had one about we had a a racer that was running our fleet feet up in Sacramento and he shows up to a race and he already knows like what place he's probably gonna be in. Just on the people that show up to you know, he's like, I've I've raced with this person, I've raced with this person, this person, I'm probably gonna get third on this one.

Tom Regal (36:27.597)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (36:31.862)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (36:37.23)
Just, you I'm gonna try to do what I can. But and so these people know, and to your point, you have to race your race, right? If if if if you s succumb to that, if if she tried to race Soleg's race and tried to if Taylor tried to do that and say, Well, I just need to not let the rubber band break, you know, don't let her get that distance. I need to do that. And then you're racing her race, not your race, and that's when you implode. And it's such a and at this distance anything can happen. But I actually I actually turned off the TV. I thought I thought she had it, like two miles to go.

Tom Regal (36:53.153)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (37:06.862)
I've been watching this thing all day. And then I I go, you know, I look at my phone, I'm like, I can't believe I missed that. So I had to go back and watch the highlights of it. It was like insane. I mean it's just that last it's like the Dallas Cowboys. They seven seconds left in the game and they have to lose. yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you do this. Yeah.

Tom Regal (37:13.23)
yeah.

Every time I wanted to get off the couch Yeah. Every time I get off the couch and start to head like we had dinner ready and waiting, it was just kinda like I'd get up and I was like, no I'd start yelling at the T V again and I'd sit down as I was live streaming it up on the big T V.

Kenny (37:30.586)
Yeah, it was funny 'cause I had I I I'm a big football fan, so I had football upstairs on the TV and I come down and I had the Iron Man on the TV downstairs and I'd like watching this and all of a sudden I'm sitting there and I'm watching the the Iron Man for like an hour and a half and I forgot that football was upstairs because it was just like, Man, this is just it's and it's just fun because what i it's I know it's terrible to say, but seeing other people suffer to a certain extent or seeing that, you know, it du even at the pro level

Tom Regal (37:43.925)
Yeah, you're like, football's later. Yeah.

Kenny (37:57.099)
you you're gonna have an off day. I mean, Lucy Charles Bark, my heart goes out to her. I mean, she's she's been she is I mean, the her swim is gorgeous. I mean, she's ninety seconds ahead on anybody. She's swimming in clean open water and and she just you know, that one particular you know it's gonna cheer up for another year trying to figure out how do I get past that. And just Yeah, Chris was surprising.

Tom Regal (38:01.066)
I it breaks my heart when she's

Tom Regal (38:07.277)
She is yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (38:13.355)
Yeah. Yeah, Blumenfeld, the same Christian, the same thing. He hates to lose and he was moving up and then he just faded he faded back a bit. Was he another like eighth place or something like that? I think he faded to eighth. and st and struggled as well, which is another one.

Kenny (38:22.586)
It's another one.

Yeah, I think he he made top ten, but he he struggled. I think he may have been six, but it was just again, it's one of those I think the the overcast I think the people thought maybe I and they it was hotter and windier than I think what they expected. But I think the the nutrition thing, it was just it was a little bit tricky on this one. I mean and I've I saw people online saying, Well, why are you should you race in Cone in October? I it's really humid, why don't they move it, you know, later and it's like, well

Tom Regal (38:42.379)
Very humid. Yeah.

Tom Regal (38:52.471)
There's no when. Yeah.

Kenny (38:53.966)
Well not well, that's not the point either. I mean I mean you if you're gonna be a world champion, you truly want I mean, these people want to have a hard race. I mean you want to be able to like you're doing Ultraman, you don't want Ultraman to be soft, right? it should just be a flat race. No, you I mean they want it to be 'cause when you earn it, it's just that much, you know, sweeter. It's just that so

Tom Regal (39:06.327)
Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (39:13.069)
Yeah, this is the like for for the Iron Man distance, this is like the islands is where it started. It started in Oahu. you know, and it was like we talk about the history of it, it was it was how they chose the distances. I think Tri Athlete magazine did a nice little thing where they said, Hey, don't forget about the history of this thing. It started in Oahu. it was three endurance events that they combined the distances and put them together. So you had the the op the open water swim. was it bomb.

blanking on the name of it now. so there was a two point four mile open water swim that's out there, the rough water, the wet gosh, I'm blanking on it. Anyway, getting old. then they took then that there was a you know a a bike race that's around the island that they shortened to 112, it 115 miles, they shortened to 112 miles so that they could have a transition area at the swim at the swim point. and then and then they had the marathon.

The Oahu Marathon. So they just took those three pieces and put it together. So it was on there for a couple of years and then they moved it, what is that seventy eight, seventy-nine, eighty, eighty one is when they moved it to the big island. And they moved it to Kona. that was the first time that they had two world championships in the same year, just for a little bit of trivia. They held it in Oahu 'cause it used to be in February, and then they held moved it to Kona on the Big Island in that in that October, and it's been there ever since.

Kenny (40:28.868)
Yeah yeah.

Kenny (40:38.66)
Yeah. Nice, yeah. But we w but we don't talk about that. It's like we had a fling in Nice for a little while and then we came back, but I think the new CEO's doing great by the way.

Tom Regal (40:39.339)
Suffer a short jaunt across like well, Nice or yeah. Well, we had the COVID issues, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. but it's all it yeah, they're doing really good with it. So that's a little bit of the history of it. But I mean, so that's the essence of Iron Man is there at the island. So to have a world championship, I think anywhere else, I mean there's th people can argue that all the time. There's some people that don't do well in the heat and they will never have a successful world championship race. That's just what it is, right?

Kenny (41:05.722)
Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (41:08.897)
Some people don't race well in the cold, so they're not gonna do well at cold races and that's just part of what happens. So

Kenny (41:14.636)
Yeah, and what makes triathlon so much fun to your point is you you you know, it's not fun to carry all the gear to a race, but it's the idea is I'm not I'm not a good swimmer. I mean, I'm an okay swimmer. however, I'm a good cyclist. and I'm an okay runner. So when I did Arizona, it took me hour and forty eight. It was a horrible swim. And I was just so dang happy to get out of that water. I I I like the distance 'cause you feel like

I just don't want to be in water anymore. And then you get on a bike, like, thank goodness I'm on a bike. I just don't have to swim again. And then it's so long in the bike, you're like, God, I just want to have this bike and I just want to run. And you're like, okay, thank goodness I'm running. And then you're running far enough, you're like, I just want the damn thing over with now. I mean, I just want it over with. But but for me, it was like I knew I was horrible on the swim. But when I got on a bike, I passed hundreds of people on a bike. So you may have one discipline where you're just okay at, but if you're if you're pretty good at the other two, you know, you know, play to your strength and don't try to overcook on the thing you don't know how to do.

Tom Regal (41:42.465)
Yeah.

Yeah, I just want to be a

Yeah, I just want to be done. Yeah.

Kenny (42:07.384)
And so yeah, it was a it was one of these weird, sort of slow roll, exciting races that and the commentary was great. I think Iron Man put on a great, you know, I was watching on YouTube. I I love the fact they had people on the road or in the water. I think when they had on the boat watching doing the turnaround was fantastic. for some reason if you're on a a Australian accent, you sound like more like sort of more informed if you know, I don't know what it is, but you know.

Tom Regal (42:16.385)
Yeah, they do a good job.

Tom Regal (42:23.969)
Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (42:29.857)
You sound more yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The Australian and British accents are yeah, they just do everything for us. The sport sounds more exotic.

Kenny (42:35.266)
Yeah, I don't know why. Did they just sound better at it, right? And y you know, you had well, and you had multi you know, multi world champions that are that are, you know, commentating on it. Yeah. And it's just it's such a fun thing to watch. And it's it's kinda, you know, a little funky at first, but like you said, you just kinda have it on and you sort of suddenly you just kinda sit down and this one in particular.

Tom Regal (42:43.169)
Yeah, they're explaining to you what's happening, yeah. That's kinda nice. Yeah.

Tom Regal (42:54.219)
I walk around with the laptop usually and then as we get onto the run then I come up and I just stream it up onto the onto the T V so I could sit down and watch it in a bigger bigger screen. But it's

Kenny (42:56.558)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. But it was a fantastic I mean it it was good for me because I've been kind of burned out on a little bit. you know, I've had I've had struggles on the swim. I've had sort of just I've had this mental block on the swim, and for me to be able to watch that and be able to see kind of these swim strokes and just that choppy water, man, to just be able to slice through that water like they were doing it was in was was fun. but you know, I'm looking at the bikes and I'm looking at the setups like wow, they two bottles of

you know, stacked on top and they got two bottles back. That seems really heavy. And what are they doing there? And how are they doing that? The ginormous, you know, arrow helmets which are cracking me up. you know, space balls helmets. But it's just fun to see that. And kind of I I wanted to watch it to see if I can get that juice back and I kinda did. You know, I kind of I don't think I'm gonna do an Iron Man next year, but I definitely want to get out there and start start swimming again. It just f for me personally it's a little bit different. The last time I swam in water I was a hundred and

Tom Regal (43:37.492)
God, yeah. Yeah. Yep.

Kenny (43:56.727)
eighty eight pounds. I'm 215 pounds now. So I've got a little bit of you know, I got a lot more muscle, so I gotta figure out, you know, kinda Well it it's working on the run. I mean I've been running and it's just been a you know I can tell there there's a difference between running at 215 and running at 188. It's just and the bike's great though. but it's just Yeah, if I can stay flat on a bike I'll be fine. But it's just a different so now it's gonna be a different thing to to learn how to deal with it's just and I want to be able to do it at a

Tom Regal (43:59.803)
A lot more muscle.

Tom Regal (44:11.607)
Big time. Big time.

Yeah, you're pounding the you're pounding the bike. That's the best. Yeah, you've gets yeah.

Kenny (44:25.762)
at a bigger weight, I guess, a muscular weight than just, you know, 'cause I've realized I'm not a skinny person. I just I don't you know, I forced myself to get down to that. So I was down to I think the lowest weight I've ever been in was 179 and people thought I was, you know, they were pulling me off to the side and asking me

Tom Regal (44:27.863)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (44:40.553)
I s I think you showed me a picture where you were that way and you you didn't look healthy. Like you looked you looked you looked too thin. Like just from based on what I know now, it's just kinda like you're you looked st you look too thin. Like for your height, yeah, we gotta have a little bit.

Kenny (44:44.344)
Yeah. I was I was gone. I mean I

Kenny (44:53.87)
Yeah, I mean I was yeah, I was we rode you know, we did a charity charity ride across the United States and when I got done with that I ended up going on vacation. I think the photo was taken. I was I had braces in so I couldn't eat anything. and you know, and I was a hundred and seventy nine pounds. I was racing, you know, pretty decent speed, but I just I can't I can't do that. I tried to get down to race weight, whatever that is, and just I find out I'm just a person that

Tom Regal (45:09.645)
Chase.

Tom Regal (45:22.123)
Yeah. And for an endurance yeah, for an endurance race for something that's longer than that, going in like less than ten percent body fat is not healthy. Like you need a little extra body fat 'cause you need to burn that. You're you're chewing through all of that, in these races as you're as you're going on. And it was so it was two two takeaways that I got from the world champs watching it this year. I probably get the same things f each year, but first first is to do your own race.

Kenny (45:24.068)
carries weight, so so

Kenny (45:34.51)
Yeah. So

Tom Regal (45:50.444)
Right, race your own race and race within yourself. have a really good plan, stick with the plan, right? You're not going to race any better in the race than you've been training. So when I talk to athletes and they're like, you know, they've been training at X, right? But they're hoping to do this at the f at the big race, whatever half distance, even if it's a sprint or Olympic, and you go like, but your training hasn't been that.

So you you're not gonna just miraculously pull this out of your butt and like go, hey, like all of a sudden, you know, like all my all my marathon running has been, you know, four hours. So I'm gonna try to pull a three thirty five out of this race at the end of, you know, my my Iron Man. And like, yeah, that's not gonna happen, right? If anything, you're gonna you're gonna be w worse off, right? So the the key is to slow down the least amount. So if you pace yourself right, getting off, especially the run, get out there.

Kenny (46:20.524)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (46:30.094)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kenny (46:35.502)
Yeah.

Tom Regal (46:46.337)
go super, super easy and then it will like you'll slow down the least amount. That's that's the goal, right? the second thing is never never give up, right? Never think you're out of it. If you're racing for position or you're racing in your age group or you're trying to beat your buddy or whatever, never give up. Stay in your race and stay through that because it might just come back to you. The longer the distance, the longer, you know, the easier it is that's like it doesn't

Kenny (47:03.962)
Mm-hmm.

Tom Regal (47:14.999)
play itself out. We know, we know Kona doesn't doesn't play out until the energy lab. The energy lab is the hottest point. It's super low. It's like so everyone goes in super fresh. Like when they hand in your water there, the water is hot. Like the poor volunteers that actually have to work the A station out there is just, it's horrible. They've got pallets of ice and they've got it covered and it's just, it's just so it's melting so quickly. So everything that you have is warm at your

Kenny (47:21.53)
Mm-hmm.

Kenny (47:30.842)
Mm-hmm.

Tom Regal (47:43.478)
you know, your core temperature is rising and then you've got to run up the hill to get out of there again. That's when if you do too much, it shows up. Right. So it's like those are those are my key takeaways from this year, especially. seeing on how the race has played out. And and watching the pros, I think they've gotten so fast and they've gotten so science driven and gone through is exciting because it's like, a big fan of Formula One. I've watched motor racing my whole life and there was a g there was a point where

Kenny (47:44.57)
Uh-huh.

Kenny (47:50.874)
Mm-hmm.

Tom Regal (48:12.001)
They were allowing them to really tweak the engines within an inch of their lives. And as much as there was a lot of engine blow ups and sometimes crashes because of that, whatever going through, it was exciting to watch because you knew they were on the limit, right? They were tweaking everything within like like like fractions of millimeters and then like it would blow up, like because it was just this much like oops, didn't do that. And it was the same thing watching these amazing athletes.

Kenny (48:19.546)
Yeah.

Kenny (48:34.692)
Mm. Yeah.

Tom Regal (48:40.375)
that have trained, they've got all the science and they get on the island and they've gotta be able to flow and go like they've gotta be able to make adjustments, not stay with the plan. If the plan doesn't seem to be working, you've got to be able to adjust and flow through it. I mean, I watched Mag dis grab lots of ice, right? He was stopping, he was filling his hat up with ice, he was doing all that stuff. I didn't see him taking in a lot of fluid. Like maybe because the cameras were showing him just putting the ice in his hat.

so I saw him trying to keep himself cool from the very beginning. He was stopping and he was putting the ice in, he was taking the time and it looked like he was doing things right. But thinking back on it now, I don't remember seeing him like taking in lots of liquids and stuff. He had the bottles stuffed in his in his jersey. So he had them sticking out. He looked like it was pretty interesting look. two bottles sticking out of his chest and it was just kinda like so they were warm.

Kenny (49:18.07)
Yeah, I don't remember that either.

Kenny (49:26.57)
Ha.

Tom Regal (49:33.975)
But I didn't see him like drinking a lot of fluid, so it made me think of like like seeing that. But I mean our focus was the ice trying to cool down, but yeah.

Kenny (49:36.73)
Yeah, I don't remember that either. Yeah, it's a I

Kenny (49:44.101)
Yeah, I think for me, I think it's it what's interesting about the fun part about long distance trathlon is it it adapts to life really, really well. And and what's interesting about it is Vincent, you know, my wife was like, Well, why is Vincent running? He's three minute you got a three minute penalty, he's in like eighth place. What you know, and I'm and I and I see to myself it's like whenever it

You know, when people ask like, My gosh, that's such a long distance, how do you do it? I'm just like, I'm not. What I'm doing is I'm gonna get in the water and I'm gonna swim to that buoy. And then what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna swim to the other buoy. And then what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna swim to the bridge. And then I know after the bridge I gotta turn left and then I gotta swim on the other part. You know, that's what I did in California, right? You go down the American River, you turn left, and you get to the Sacramento River, and it's like I've just gotta get to the the Sacramento River. And then once I see the Sacramento River, I'm gonna get to this buoy and by the way, there's the finish, right?

You're on the bike. I'm not doing a hundred and twelve miles. I have to go thirty seven miles out and then I'm gonna turn around and that's gonna be fifty six. I'm gonna do it again. Right. So I don't have a a hundred and twelve mile bike ride. I have a thirty-seven miles to that point, and then I gotta come back. And you can see that's happening with with Vincent was you can just tell he's like, Look, I know I need to get to the run because he's a really fast runner. Right. And it's just run your pace. And it's the same thing. If you got a giant project ahead of you or something feels overwhelming, or my gosh, I got these things to do, you know, you just tell people.

Like, hey, we've got you know, I was overseeing a huge construction project that was gonna take 14 weeks to do. So you just take it week on week. Hey, let's just get this done with this week, and then we worry about next week. We get this done with next week and just chunk it out. Just put it in, you know, and it's by the way, every project manager knows work breakdown theory, right? It's just you you put it into smaller chunks. Same thing on training, right? As a coach, you know you put them in because people are overwhelmed with that that sort of bigness of it, but if you just really

Tom Regal (51:16.695)
Break it into chunks. Yep.

Tom Regal (51:22.251)
Yeah. Yeah. Yep.

Kenny (51:32.527)
break it down and that's what these guys are doing. To your point, I just need to get to the energy lab. I just need to get out of the energy lab. Right. Once I get out of the energy lab, okay, check, you know, wha how things are going. Am I taking nutrition? Am I doing what need to do? But just, you know, to me that's always been a kind of the key takeaway with any of these long sports is is to be able to do that and and be able to allow yourself to say, look, let's I just need to get to this spot right here. I mean, I had to walk California unfortunately I had to walk half of it and it was horrible. So

But I'm like, okay, I'm just gonna make it to the trail, and then I'm just gonna get to the end of the trail, and then I'm gonna make it back, right? And I keep moving. I'm like, you I look, I'm like, I'm gonna make a I'm gonna get a medal. The metal's not gonna have the time etched on the back of it. It's not gonna be a good, you know, my calves blew up, my quads blew up, but I can walk. So to your point, it's just you just keep moving. You just keep doing your thing that you can do, and then with any luck you see the finish line. And for these guys, with any luck, you, you know, see the finish line with with a paycheck. Exactly. So

Tom Regal (52:03.669)
But as long as you keep moving. Yeah.

Tom Regal (52:14.389)
Yeah. But yeah.

You just keep moving forward.

Tom Regal (52:26.093)
with a paycheck. Yeah, with yeah, yeah. who is it? Laura Phillips, I think, won the the the the Iron Man pro series with that with a second place finish and Gustav Eden the same thing won and that was two hundred thousand dollar paycheck for them, for both of them each. So I mean that's that's huge. So yeah. Yeah, maybe.

Kenny (52:32.569)
So

Kenny (52:47.982)
Yeah. Yeah. The pace for their bikes These days. As a trip to Kona, right? So

Tom Regal (52:55.339)
Yeah, so I break it down for my athletes that I'm that I have doing Ironman distance stuff where they get to the marathon is just overwhelming. It's a marathon, it's a marathon, it's a marathon. I No, it's two half marathons. It's really just two half marathons. You can run a half marathon. You can run a half marathon. You're at your point in training, you can run a half marathon right now. If it in fact your long run was, you know, ten miles or eleven miles, right. so you can run a half marathon, you just gotta do twice. That's how I break down the the the double

Kenny (53:09.818)
Yeah.

Kenny (53:22.33)
Yeah. Yeah.

Tom Regal (53:25.441)
For Ultraman is it's just four half marathons. I can run a half marathon, no problem. Right? I can do it. I've just got to do it four times. it's easy. Just just you just break it into those chunks and and just think like the the fourth one doesn't matter if I don't get the first one done. Right? So I just focus on that first that first piece. And then you focus on the second piece because nothing else matters. The swim. When you're in the swim, the bike and run don't matter.

Kenny (53:28.75)
Yeah. Exactly. You just Yeah, you just gotta reframe the thinking. Yeah.

Kenny (53:52.815)
Exactly.

Tom Regal (53:53.422)
Because you gotta finish the swim. So focus on the buoys. Focus on just stepping through there. Boom, I'm here. Transition. Now I get on the bike. Now all I have to do is worry about the bike. So when you can break it down that way, the same with your training, and breaking your year into it. So as you're periodizing your your year on what you should be training and working on, break it into pieces so it's not overwhelming and yeah, it doesn't doesn't blow you out completely. So no burnout. No burnout.

Kenny (53:56.122)
Yeah. Yeah. Yep.

Kenny (54:06.564)
There you go.

Kenny (54:19.138)
There you go. Tom, what do we have coming up? We've got a a couple of guests you got.

Tom Regal (54:23.543)
We've got some I've got a couple of guests we've got. We've always gotten good feedback from Carel Laurent, our our f our favorite nutritionist in Portugal. I love Carell, she's fantastic. and then Sarah Malam with our our therapist, bringing her in, our sports therapist, so we'll probably bring her back because we just get great like lots of response and and good downloads on those. So we'll we'll definitely have those two back on for sure. We've got a couple of other things in the we've got

Kenny (54:30.754)
Mm-hmm. She's great to talk about.

Tom Regal (54:52.503)
couple local legends and some other folks that I wanna I'm trying to coordinate all our schedules and get that happening. But some fun stuff. But folks let us know if there's a topic or thing that you want us to cover, you want us to know what's going on.

Kenny (55:05.636)
If anybody knows Mike Riley, he's got a new book coming out, so reach out to Mike Riley and let him know we want him on the show. He just just did one. So Dear Mike, if you read if you're if you see this or if somebody knows Mike the seasus, we'd love to have you on. So

Tom Regal (55:08.678)
Has he got another one coming out? Yeah.

Okay. I've s I've seen his podcast. Here, Mike. I've talked to Mike a few times. I was trying to get him on the podcast in the early days and I just couldn't wrangle his schedule. it would have been it would've been nice. he's always always that way. So yeah, and if there's little things that you want to hear from us, I'll be giving some updates on my project, going through and some racing.

Kenny (55:23.928)
Yeah, he's a he's busier, you know, retired. That's what they always say, right? So There you go.

Kenny (55:35.77)
Yeah, that'd be great.

Tom Regal (55:36.685)
we'll do that and we'll come over some other topics and things. So probably just be the couple of us once in a while and then we'll have our guests in. and we're gonna get back into regular programming for everybody. So we appreciate everyone. hit the subscribe button. five stars, thumbs up, like if you know, share this with everybody you know. We really appreciate it. It helps us helps us grow, keeps us keeps us at this. So I get I bump into people at races every once in a while that I don't know.

some that I do know and they actually bring up and say that they've enjoyed listening to the podcast and that just makes me happy. and then we just keep going. So we'll keep going on this as we as we go. So thank you everybody for all of for all of that and listening. Kenny as always we'll do this again real soon. We'll catch you on the next one.