Spoke and Sole

There is a transition that actually is coming. Right? When you get to October, sometimes the weather will bring some people indoors, Anthony in particular, but there are some people that ride throughout the actual year. The weather does not impact them them cycling.

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Shout out to URI. Great win against Elon.

I had the opportunity to go to the game. Shout out to Andre, Andre DePina Gray putting work in there out there as a safety for URI. Congratulations, he's gonna be graduating. But we're in September. Which September is one of those timeframes where depending on how much you are in the cycling, there is a transition that actually is coming.

Right? When you get to October, sometimes the weather will bring some people indoors, Anthony in particular, but there are some people that ride throughout the actual year. The weather does not impact cycling. Preparation is always the actual key and I should have brought out some of the actual gear that I do have for winter cycling. So I'm gonna ask you this question.

And again, this is one of those ones where we're gonna free fall a little bit. I'm gonna give you credit from this perspective, not last year, but before we started Zwifting, you expanded your outdoor cycling time. I did. And it was cold. We did a ride...

Oh man. We did one ride where I remember cats came out, they had the bags over their shoes. Shoes, yep. The shoe covers. The shoe covers, but that ride in particular, it was very, very cold.

But there was, it was the gain, elevation gain on it was a lot and we got to a point where I remember Chicken saying that was the last hill. And then we get to this hill and he goes, Oh shit. He forgot about that hill and it was like this. I wanna say that that might have been the last outdoor ride because I wanna say that was... It was probably it was probably in the high forties, low fifties for that ride.

I can remember seeing like the mist and everything, man, like it was cold.

It was cold. It was cold.

It very cold.

And then that, I got a question for you. After that year, we didn't... We gave up on the winter cycling outdoors. Did you get Zwift the year after that?

Probably. I think, and what... A couple of reasons why I ended up getting Zwift was because, well you were on it and you were exploring it but then I was actually, I was a peloton guy and I was a peloton guy because I had my whole ghetto peloton set up too. But they started playing around with the rates and the subscriptions.

Yeah, yes, yes, I remember that.

That's why I ended up going to, well I tried it and then I couldn't get into it, and then I went back to peloton, and then I explored it a little more and it was the best thing ever. But I, and I just wanna preface that with, yes, I do put my bike away, probably like middle, end of September, and it's not really because the riding...

You know, it really should be October, not September.

I mean, for me it's not the actual ride itself, it's more just like the body temperature piece. Honestly, I could find a way to regulate my hands and my toes, I would be good, you know.

You got those phalanges with the handwarmers and those gloves with the handwarmers.

You know, again sometimes they interfere with the whole, the gear switching so that becomes like a different thing but I think. You know,

I think part of that is this, Once you start doing something and you get accustomed to it Mhmm. And your body adapts to it, it gets a little bit easier. I think from a riding perspective, we could probably ride through the end of October. We've done it before. On the actual And you know, this summer life's been life in man.

Mean, we haven't ridden nearly as much as we normally do during the actual year. So We might have to extend that a little bit. I know October is the cutoff. Well, me rephrase that. I know a lot of cyclists who October is actually the cutoff and when they actually say, alright, you know what, that's it.

And part of that has to do with John at Johnny's place, he starts his

His indoor.

Indoor training, I wanna say either the beginning or the middle of October. I had a conversation with him, they're actually, because of the new place, it may allow them to do some things a little different as opposed to expanding the number of people. They can actually have having set days. I think they said Mondays would be, Mondays and Fridays, it would be women's and then Fridays might be open. You know how they have certain days for specific clubs.

They even... This is not a definite, but they're even talking about if they have the opportunity of being able to do a morning class, seven in the morning. Because I told them, I said, listen, seven at night for me is out.

On the bridge too?

Yeah, the bridge and... I I get up so early in the morning, man, that... You know. So we take it indoors when we start talking about October. And part of that is, you said, you know, you start talking about the actual weather and things like that.

And the focus too. I don't think, I mean, it's not really just that, just the weather, but it's, you know, when we were biking and running, it's about the focus too. Think to try to get it balanced, it's not just because it's riding, but, you know, traditionally that's been

That's when a switch happens.

That's when a switch happens, and normally, we normally go into the running aspect of

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, but I mean, I think all of that, all of it is really about preparation. If you have the right gear or you prepare, mean, like even running, when we go back to the yak tracks, when we start talking about nothing stops the run undefeated against the actual elements. I know when you're riding because of the wind, it's a bit different. That wind factor plays a much bigger role when you're riding versus running.

But if you have the right equipment, then you should be good. But speaking of equipment, when it comes to cycling, there are some pieces of equipment that you probably should have to keep you safe, and I know we had talked about gear before, but I don't think we actually showed it. So I bought a couple pieces out here, and I'm gonna start with whether it's running or cycling, the one piece of gear that I think everybody should have, and that is this right here. And I don't know how well they can see this and I might try to zoom in afterwards, but you know what this is.

Road ID, and I

should The Road ID.

And I'll say I like the Road ID too, not just the regular bracelet, you can also get them on the

On the

The various different watch

Yeah.

Versions that you have too. I'll say that that's really important because a lot of times as athletes, you know, we normally, well a lot of times will, will run or ride solo. And anything can happen, you know, when you're out there and, it's good at least to be able to have the contact information as well as any particular health issues that you have where if somebody finds you along side of the road or on the route they know who to call.

Yeah, mean that's what it is, road ID and the thing with that is even if you're with someone, right, you know what they say about pressure. It's either gonna burst pipes or make diamonds. What this does is you don't have to think about it. You got all that information right there and in the event you need to call someone, their emergency contact or whatever, it's right there. So this is a very, very invaluable piece of equipment, and like you said, they make it for the other types of watches.

The

watches, They got the ones that you can actually They put on your have all different types of actual variations of the Road ID. I And think it's very important, think whether you're running, cycling, rollerblading, whatever it is, I think you should invest in getting a road ID. And

actually real life, I know you have the sprint questions, a real life scenario, does Courtney have one? Because I'm really... That's a good question. It was a long time ago that we were badgering him about something. Yeah.

About getting it, and I don't remember. So the next time we all get together, we gotta check out.

We should ask him. The funny thing about, shout out to Court, the funny thing about Court, man, Court is always late to the game when it comes to some of this stuff.

And when he gets the gadgets, he only He doesn't even them,

yeah.

He doesn't even use them, that's actually from a real life perspective, as though we're giving advice out, we gotta make sure that our own people are like that, because I never really thought about that. And in thinking about it from a real life perspective too, like, I know both your wives and everything, again, you know, if we're riding, sometimes I got my phone, sometimes I don't.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, you know, just nice and simple.

Yeah, and I think also, I thought that I had it on here, I thought her information was on

Yeah, with the the lock screen, yep. Think Your Road ID I think has that too.

I don't see it on there, but it used to be on there on the actual lock screen. So the Road ID, regardless of what you're doing, whatever sport you are, think everyone should actually have Road ID. Now, I don't have, I used to have them for running, but when we start talking running or cycling, I'm gonna show you what I have from the cycling perspective. But for running, visibility is key also. And so from a cycling perspective, we always wanna make sure that you have your lights.

These are two different variations. These are the ones... This is a small one I had from Trek and I have the matching one. This is the front light and it has a different mode. It's on.

It has the daylight running with the flashing. And the rear one is the same size and has the same thing. This is also a front light. It has those modes and this is a Garmin. I call this the

I call it the beam me up stock. That's what we call that.

I call this one like the shotgun. This thing has a lot of weight on it, but it has all those different modes. Also the front light. The rear light, my rear light is a, to me, a very important piece and I just realized that this thing is on. It's been on all this time.

So let me first shut that off. There we go. This is my rear light but it also is my Garmin Vario which actually records video and the modes you can have it record all the time, you can have it record when someone gets close to you. But the other important part about this is this is an actual radar. And what this does is it connects to my bike computer and it gives me an indication of when a car or something is approaching and it gives the actual, not the distance from a distance perspective, but the light, the color of the light actually changes based on how close the actual vehicle, person, or whatever it is behind me is.

And I wanna comment on that too, I wanna give you props too, because again, we talked in one of the previous episodes about the people, when we had the issue in, Burraville about the aggressive drivers and, when you had gotten that initially, it was like, oh yeah, like you had a readout or whatever, and that's almost become standard.

Yeah.

And I will tell you, I think, I don't know if I had told you before, but I actually, I love that, especially when I drive in, or when I ride in the city, you Yeah, mhmm. And when it's congested, you know, especially like in my local neighborhood, you know, where there's traffic and there's traffic coming from all the different directions and it's very accurate. Like it is, it's accurate and it's so accurate and I know you probably laugh about it actually, even when we're riding on the trails it picks up the bikes, Yeah, car Car back? Which is hilarious, you know, when you have someone coming, you know, and getting you on your left, so, and again, I think that's, and I will say, we haven't ranked them, but that is by far, I will, you know, when we talk about different things that people won't leave without, that has become a staple where I would, you know, I don't ride without that.

Oh, 100%, 100 I don't. Even... And so I actually bought, Well, I got one for my wife because she rides. But I actually bought two of the actual pieces that they actually connect to. So it doesn't make a difference which bike I'm on.

The same equipment actually attaches to both vehicles. And I think that particularly when you start talking about safety and people being people, it's very important to have some of those things. And to be honest, in a previous episode I was talking about some of the videos that I had seen where drivers were just being Aggressive. Idiots and being aggressive. A lot of those videos came from things like this or some other form of video device that cyclists had, like a GoPro

or something

like that.

And again, I wish we had had that. And again, I'm tying all the episodes together, but for the followers that have followed us, you know, when we were talking about the political episode where if we had something like that and we were in, you know, our cycling or pelotonics stage, that's something that we could've utilized, something like that. And it's for your safety and for theirs too. You know, especially with, you know, not just for people being aggressive, but even sometimes when when bikers are hit.

Yeah.

You know, and you have that video and make... It it could make all the difference.

Yeah. And the one piece of equipment that's not over here, but is obviously it's extremely important for safety, that's the helmet. And I keep... These devices I keep over here. I have a charging station, that's why they're so

easily And you didn't... I mean, know you don't wanna unlock that, unplug it and bring it in, but again, that's another thing that you, that you... That is one of... And maybe you'll have to show a picture of it. But, the the Trekbox that you you got that originally.

You were the first person. You got the box. It's the Trek charging box that has all the cables and you just plug it in. You have that.

No. That's... I just got a... That's not a Trek thing. That's just

a thing. Well, you put us onto that.

Have all my equipment that's plugged into it, it's not from Trek. But

you put us onto that. I think you were gonna get it or something and something happened, but I actually ended up buying that or actually my kids ended up getting it to me for Father's Day because you had recommended that. It's a Trek box and it has like the six lights with the six different devices. You plug it in and it has like the little light where it blinks. Yeah, might have

seen, you know, sometimes I go into these stores and I come up with a lot of stuff that I don't necessarily need.

That one's a keeper too, you can keep all your... I know you have that, but it's a little box where you keep all the things together, and it's easy, it has, you know, like the USB, it has the C, it has... And you can swap them out, two different things. Yeah. So I actually got one that it swaps out for my watch,

Here's the beauty part about having something like that, and again I don't have the actual Trek one, but it has all your gear And in one before I go out on a ride, I go to this and I end up grabbing my helmet from the actual other side. And I take my helmet and I put all my gear that I need for the actual ride in the actual helmet. And then I take that and if my bag is in the car, I bring that out to the bag and if my bag is in here, I put it in the bag and just make sure that I have everything. The challenge, I was looking for something the other day and I still don't know where they actually are. I went to my bag, my cycling bag is actually in the house because I was looking for my arm sleeves.

I can't find them. They aren't... They're not in my bag. Yeah. Maybe I gotta check.

I got a running bag too. I thought I checked that, but they're not in anywhere. I got... You know, I have my whole cycling setup over there in in the training room right next to to the bikes. And it's That's not in why I need

to convert you, because I know, you know, now we're talk... We're gonna get into that, but as an aside for...

Convert me to what?

I need to convert you to, even though you don't do triathlons, you guys always crack on me about the tri bag, that's why the tri bag is amazing because everything goes in that bag. Running, biking, all that and you don't have to swap them out.

Well no so here's the thing I mean depending on the size of your bag you can put it all in there it was I hadn't, it's summer. Well, I can't, I technically it's still a summertime, right? We haven't hit fall yet. I think that's next week or whatever, but I didn't need the arm sleeves. So my assumption were they were in the bag because I keep like, I got a full kit in there, I got a bib, I got all that stuff in there and the arm sleeves aren't in there.

I see, and I'll try, think you got the little zippers.

Oh no, this bag has... Listen, it has two zippers. It has the main compartment, two zippers on the side. You know how this zips up, there's a zipper underneath there. So there's all these different compartments.

You just got a lot of bags, man. You got the running bag.

The difference is this, the running bag is, if you remember, I used to run before work.

That's true. That's

true. And so it's easier when I'm running before work, the running bag is much lighter. And what happens with that is I put, I take a, I have a bag that goes inside there because I bring it back and forth because I gotta wash those clothes. So I put the, my clothes in there and when I shower or whatever, put that stuff in the bag, boom, take it home, dump it out. And that's back and forth, and it's a lighter bag.

The cycling bag has much more in it. I got an extra pair of actual glasses in there. I used to have the extra helmet in there, I'm like, well, know what, the extra helmet but

But again, you never know, and I think a point that I wanna make too is, I think from a cycling perspective, we don't, well not us, but I think a lot of people, we talked about it in one of the episodes, like helmets are very important.

Oh yeah, And

I think even with us even checking them and, you know, the life cycle of a helmet too. I think a lot of, know I haven't checked, you know, what the life cycle are for the specific helmets, but I know for a fact that, you know, obviously when you crash, when you gotta get rid of them.

Yeah, yep.

You know, but, kind of like they do with the car seats, but the helmet's very important. I think a lot of people, I think more cyclists pay more attention to the aesthetics and the look of it versus what they can actually do with the gel technology and all those other things. I wanted to bring that point up about the helmets.

So yeah, the helmets are very, very important. Another piece of gear that... So from the perspective of what I feel I need, it's definitely the Road ID, the front and rear light, whether or not it has the ability to record in the back. Obviously the actual helmet, preferably the proper attire, when I say attire, I need my padded shorts.

Yeah, that is a non negotiable.

You know, and obviously...

And the quality ones too.

Quality ones,

Now that you're talking about gear, we don't have that here, I think that is, I wanna say was it Cort who had brought up a good point about that when he was talking about, which I think we should start actually looking into, 2027, new, new cycling jerseys. But he talked about that on how, when he was talking he was like, yeah, he's like, you know, I'd rather just get, you know, two or three new really good kits than, you know, to buy a whole bunch of them. And I'm guilty of that too because I think one year I was just going ham and it was just like, I was just getting them from Amazon and throwing a logo on them. And then sometimes it's more about the quality than the quantity.

Yeah, and so the place that I get mine from, they're very good quality. But I wanna be more... What's the word that I'm looking for? Intentional. Intentional.

From this perspective. We talk a lot about building community. I wanna represent that community and I want people in that community to represent. Need to... Like I said, was in Johnny's the other day.

I need to get a Johnny's Place actual jersey. Need to actually have... Because we have the new logo now. Got Spoke Sole logo. We have ones that say Spoke and Sole but it's the actual old logo.

We need to have one with the actual new logo. I think it needs to be intentional about not so much saying, I want mine and not yours, but if you're building the community, represent that community and represent those individuals.

No, understand that because we talk about WSCOT, like WSCOT has his club, it's funny because, you know, we have our own, know, obviously we have Spoke and Sole, we have We Run This Town, we have, you know, those things. But even, last week I ended up, when I did the ride, I ended up, I don't know if you remember, but, Tom Span, Coach Span had the, was the major Taylor Rhode Island one and I forgot I ended up having it and I'm like, oh, represents community.

Yeah.

You know, and I had worn that, and even with WSCA, and like you said, you know, representing the organizations that are actually building, and having them be a part of what you're doing, so I think that's incredible. And I know we're gonna get into some of these other ones, but before we get into

that I think we covered all those ones right there. Well, the exception of this.

Yeah, didn't cover the watch. Because that... It's We know... We're saying it's a given, but it's...

No. So I'm not even saying it's a given, right? So for me, this really only has one purpose for cycling. Running, it's for for me, it's metrics for running. I don't really use this for cycling, although it does track cycling, actually tracks everything.

I'm calling you out on that, as a matter of fact I'm gonna do a Jada and what's her name, next time we're gonna have to have a penalty flag, I'm throwing a penalty flag on that.

For not using that for cycling?

No no, because it has a great purpose for cycling. Here's...

No no no no, wait. What you're talking about

is... No.

My bike computer, I should've just grabbed that, is my primary... Hold on. Primary metrics for the actual bike computer. That's what I use.

So what you run your music through? Right there. Then that's primary. Well

here's the thing.

I do all fucking, Jonah.

Here's I have the thing I'm just

saying though bro.

Here's the thing. It's not primary from this perspective, Particularly when cycling. Sometimes we only put that on as background. Sometimes it's not even on at I bring it because if I want the option, I have it. The challenge is the last ride we did with these, you have to sync because my music...

Spotify. After so long, you have to resync it. And if you don't resync it, you can't use it. So the last ride, I couldn't even use it because I hadn't synced it in a while. So from the perspective of being primary, my bike computer is primary over that for two reasons.

One, that's where my metrics really come from, right? And the bike computer, if you wanna talk about metrics, my power meters, whether it be the pedals or the ones that's built into the actual crank, the cadence sensor, all that stuff is cycled through my bike computer. It's not there, right? So the bike computer is more essential to me. Not that it's necessary.

Like when we start talking about equipment from a cycling perspective, I'm always gonna go with what you need for safety first. What you actually need. Then there's those things that are pleasantries. And at that point, this is a pleasantry because it's not something that you actually need. For me, some people might say it's a pleasantry, but for me, the other piece of equipment that I need is my gloves.

My fingerless gloves, depending on the actual weather. If it's cold, then I got the fluorescent ones that are built Ford tough, for lack of a better term.

Yeah, and I think you make a great point too, even with the discussion that we're having about, you know, you gotta have the right gear and the right gadgets, and the gadgets, know, I think a lot of times when people get into the sport initially, they just go off and they just do all these different things and they get things that they don't really need and they don't define what they essentially need, you know? Yeah. And building up to those different types of things, you know, like, you had mentioned about the bike computer, I think that's, I think everyone should have a bike computer no matter whether it's whatever it may be, whether it's a Garmin, whether it's a, you know, Coolio, whatever that brand is.

There's a Wahoo and... Wahoo, whatever it is. There's couple brands out there.

Just so it can track and actually that being your ride cockpit to know really what's going on, you know, when you're out there riding, you know, and also for it to interact with the other things. Yeah. Like your radar, you know, and to know, for it to tell you kinda what your

heart rate is, know, your average

cadence that adds up to life. You know, and even, and for me, you know, we didn't ride a lot on the road, but from a perspective when you're doing navigation, that's very important.

That's what I wanted because I said there were two aspects of why I used the bike computer, other part about that was navigation. Navigation is key because, you know, I tell people all the time, listen, if you're following me and I ain't got that, you're gonna get lost.

Always say that too. You

following me, I ain't got that navigation, you're get lost. There's some routes that you don't need it. If you're gonna go do one of the bike paths and it's really an out and back, don't need that. And I think that I wanna be careful because as we talk about some of this stuff, I mentioned earlier that some of this stuff might be a restriction, guess not restriction. A barrier to entry.

To entry. That's why it's important. And this is the other thing, look, I'm always gonna talk about places that I feel do a phenomenal job of representing what or the way that things should be. And I go back to Johnny's place because again, like I said, I was there and I was talking to Sean and we were talking about the independent versus corporate bike shops. And they were talking about how they just wanna make sure that people have what they need when it comes to cycling, whether it be a unicycle or whatever.

They're not in the business or they're not trying to sell you stuff You don't need. You don't need because they don't have a metric that they actually have to meet from an actual sales perspective, from a corporate perspective. They're part of the community. They wanna see the community grow. They're providing a service to the actual community.

So from the perspective of cycling, if we wanna talk about what you need, for me, obviously, if you ain't got a bike, you ain't cycling. But, if you have a bike and you're gonna cycle, you wanna have a helmet.

You need to have a helmet.

You need have a you need to have a front and a rear light and you need to have a road ID.

Yep.

After that, depending on what your level is, you start getting in some of the niceties. The bike computer, it's a nice hat depending on the type of actual ride you're doing in, but if you're just doing the bike paths out and back and you know the bike path then

And you could use your phone. Even up until when you graduate to get to that point, you could do that. You could get to that particular point. And I think it's, we as a collective have done a great job. When I sit back and I think about how like when, from when we initially started biking, you know, we learned more and then we moved into different things and how we all taught each other about that.

But again, that goes back to, you know, part of being in the community and kinda knowing what you feel comfortable with. Like, you know, I cycle, but for me, like, haven't gotten, I haven't got, I don't, I haven't gotten to the point where there's, like, certain, I guess, like you said, well, add it ons that I've gotten to, like, the power meter and those things. Like, I haven't really gotten to that piece yet, but some of that is like not really knowing and having it apply to what you do, but then there's some other things that I have come across that aren't necessarily, necessities, but you know, like when you gifted me the wheels, like that was a good, like that was an upgrade that I didn't necessarily need, but it was a good one that kind of

put It looks good on a bike too.

Oh, looks damn good on a bike. But, you know, things that can help you with that too. And down to other, you know, other particular things too we didn't talk about, like with the shoes, you know, everyone doesn't need clip and pedals. Yeah. You know, like when you first thought you can use flat pedals.

And I know like from a biking perspective, and even myself, I'll say that I had to catch myself a couple times when I, you know, like, like you're being a bike snob, like when I would see people, you know, with, you know, they have really, you know, a really nice bike and they got flat pedals and you're like, you know. Well even down to the little dumb stuff that we do when like, like back in the day and I remember, think I got tortured for like, probably like a month and a half, when I had my new bike, and when they keep the reflectors on.

I knew you were going with that, the reflectors on. I kept saying Saying it was the same, listen, take those reflectors off. That's a nice bike, take those reflectors off.

But even with that, too, understanding, too, that in a way it is about safety if they don't Like, have the other I had a chance to, like, really, in retrospect, take a look at it and say, okay, well what if that person isn't, know, if they haven't gotten to the point where they can afford the lights, that's a way for them to kinda stay, you know, to...

And here's the thing, you go out and you just buy a regular bike, go buy a Huff or whatever, there is a reflector, not just in the wheels, but there's one in the front and it's white and there's one in the back. And that's so when the light from a car actually hits it, it actually sees it, it reflects and you actually see that thing. The other thing that is necessary, it's not necessary as from a barrier perspective but it's really necessary from this perspective, you should have a certain level of knowledge. And let me explain what I mean by that. Absolutely.

You go for a bike ride and you get a flat. Depending on the length of ride that you actually go, you got two options. You can be stranded or you can use your knowledge and change that actual flat.

And

as part of that, we're gonna introduce that piece of equipment there because in order to change a flat, you need air. And the old way that I used to travel with air was, and I still keep some in there, CO2 cartridges But with the little then I came across this and I was skeptical from this perspective. I wasn't sure if these little powerful tools would be able to reseat a tire in the event that I got a flat, because you know I run tubeless. Tubeless, yep. But there's no problem with those actually being able to reseat that actual tire.

And so my plan was to start using that as the actual pump from a day to day perspective. But what happened was when I went to use it, it was dead. So I had to actually charge it and that's why it was sitting over at that actual station because I keep that in the actual... And that's the challenge. I keep it in the bag.

The problem with keeping the stuff in the bag is if you have equipment that relies on a charge and you keep it in the bag, then you have to do a better job of actually keeping it charged. And ironically, so I took my Amunda to Johnny's place and I said, well, you know what, I haven't ridden this bike all week because I've been riding the... I mean all year because I've been riding the Madone. I was like, let me just make sure that the batteries, because that's an electronic, the batteries are all set. So I go through the process of waking up the batteries and for the rear derailleur, that battery's dead.

So I could only change the actual gear on the front crank. But at that point, I needed to leave and so I brought it there. And they have actual chargers so they said that they would charge it for And

this is the Trek

Yes.

Air Rush. Pretty handy, you can put it right in your back pocket of your jersey. And I'm very interested, hopefully you can test this throughout the winter when you're actually on your trainer.

Oh yeah, that's the beauty part about it. That's what I need to do. The only difference that I need to do over there is, and I shot a quick video of what my actual setup and I'll probably, I'll weave that into this episode Cause I got the setup over there. My setup's over there, my wife's setup's over there, and that's where I keep the bikes or whatever. But that is over there.

What I need to do is, I need to set up a charging station over there because then from a cycling perspective, everything is over there because I now have that actual shelf. My challenge is I got a lot of wires going on, I gotta get some, the hiders, you see I have that wire going in there to change that.

He has a nice and pretty...

Yeah, you gotta keep it pretty,

gotta keep good. It pretty. It and held off. And I know you normally go through your new thing as your sprint question, so I got my own damn question today. So we talked about tech, which is a very good topic.

I wanna know.

What you got?

I wanna know, and I know we primarily talked about cycling, but I wanna know between the two sports, what is your is... I I think the... What is the... What is your favorite gadget and why? The two sports.

So

gadget is different from equipment. So I would have to say my favorite gadget that transcends both of them is the watch. The reason for that is this. From a running perspective, the watch does so much more for me as far as letting me know where I am. Like you know a lot of times I like to run how I feel.

But every now and then I can glance down to get a sense of okay well this is where I'm at right. From a training perspective, I can actually put training plans into the actual watch and I used to do that at an actual And then if I wanted to actually listen to music, I have the option of the actual watch. So the watch is multi purpose from that. The only reason why the watch plays a lesser role on the bike is because the bike computer does most of that stuff and all those different pieces of equipment attached to it. Running you don't need those different pieces of equipment, right?

From a cadence perspective, you can really do that here mentally once you're familiar with the strides per minute and the ting ting ting ting ting ting, the beats per minute or whatever. Doing that after you've run for a long period of time, that becomes second nature. But you're not concerned with a power meter. Because your power meter's gonna be, if you wanna know anything, it's your pace. You know what I mean?

So it's really the actual watch. But I've left home without the watch, but I've never left home without the Road ID. Okay. And I don't really consider the Road ID a gadget, it's wearable, it's Yeah,

we'll term them all equipment, just equipment in general. Which one do you think is the least beneficial?

Equipment? Yes. Of those two?

No, of all equipment pieces that you've named in today's...

Well, here's what I'm gonna say. The one in your hand is the least beneficial. Wow. The reason for that is this. When you're in the act, when you're actually doing what it is you actually do, if nothing happens with that, it's useless.

In other words, if you don't need to use it, you're not getting anything out of it. But From the perspective of when you're performing, whether it's running or cycling, you're getting the benefit from the watch. You can say you're getting the benefit from the road ID, but when you're cycling, that VAR is important. Because it's watching your back. And then from a visibility perspective, it's making sure that people actually see you.

And the same thing with the light up front, right?

I would just counter that with saying that this is very important because it gives you a peace of mind that you don't have to worry about with the CO2s. That's why I asked you that question.

You know what peace of mind for me is? I run tubeless. So the idea with the tubeless is I already with the exception, with the exception. Now I gotta clarify here because if you remember, those were racing tires and that route was trashed. There was potholes everywhere.

But with the exception of that one ride where I got two flats from one pothole, I've never had to change an actual tire. I've gotten punctures and the fluid is sealed up because as it goes around. So if as long as I'm from a maintenance perspective taking care of making sure that the tubeless fluid is changed out every few months so it doesn't dry out. I have peace of mind because I'm running tubeless. And on top of that, there's very seldom where I ride alone.

So if I ain't got that piece of equipment, somebody else And may have I'm used to using the actual CO2. I always have the CO2. But here's the thing, that's small enough I can always have it. But your question was which was the least important? Yeah.

Okay. You know what I mean?

Let's see, for me, I think the, for me, I would say my watch, because it's like, I don't leave home without it. Like, and I know like from, and maybe because I'm a triathlete too because, but I think mainly not because of what it does in the workouts, but what it does outside of the workouts. Like, I know different people have, you know, they use them differently, but for me it's for like, I love the battery, the body battery piece of it. I think that's phenomenal. I think the, the sleep, you know, the sleep indicator, that is like extremely on point, you know, between the two of those two things, I think that enables me to have a good perspective, from when I'm, whatever exercise I'm doing.: Yeah.: And even if, even if I threw out the triathlon piece and it was just cycling and running, I would say it really does that.

Because like, you know, sometimes you think you're really, you're up, you know, and it's telling you about your body battery and it's giving you more information before you actually even need it.

And you know what the funny thing is? I don't use any of those functions. When... If you notice where that was, that was over there charging. I am...

If I'm not running, not on the bike, I do not have a watch on. I'm gonna switch it up, but I'm not gonna go, because I found, I have all these watches that are from, they're nice watches, they're not all expensive. One of them is, I still got my nice Movado, but they're just sitting there, I don't use them for anything. And so now I'm like, you know what, I go to an event maybe I should

throw That's the watch curse of being an athlete, because I, it's funny, and you know I'm in fashion and everything, and it's like, like you, and watches are my thing. Like, I love watches, but, you know, it's tough to take this off and lose the, I hate to say it, lose the data, or there'd be a gap in data, you know, in between then, you know, but I think it's really good data, you know, especially when you're, you know, I think especially if, and I would say this too, and they all do it, not just this particular model, but most of the Garmin models have that, And I think especially for people that are coming into the sport. Yeah. You know, I think especially with, and didn't actually, one that we didn't talk about, because they're built into the watches happens to be the hot remodel. But you can, you know, you can wear those separately, I think that's something that, you know, again, with the watch, it tracks all of that, and even real time, you know, when you happen to be doing the biking.

I know for me, and I know you're always like, Oh, he's always looking at his computer. But, that's a very good gauge for me to gauge my heart rate. And a lot of times I'm not looking at how fast we're going. A lot of times I'm looking at it because, no,

a lot of I hear I'm looking at it because myself telling you, Stop looking at Yes, I'm looking

at me watching you. But a lot of times I'm looking at that because I'm trying to gauge my heart rate because a lot of times I'm struggling the most on the inclines and you you and I talked about that before and for me, it's never really about the ride, it's once I lose my heart rate and my heart rate spikes, it's tough for me to regain control of the ride. For me, if I can gauge when it's going up, and again to work on some of the things that you talk about, like when you talk about the breathing and that part of it, and I can keep it down, it's not like I'm so winded to the point where it's a wrap.

Yeah, and I think part of that too is communication. And what I mean by that I always say, you know how like if when I first started coming back from energy it was like, oh you good, you good, you good? Sometimes it's like, alright listen, when you know, Jesus Christ, when you know that you're getting to a particular point, it's like, all right, I should be pulling back or I should be letting the group know, all right, well listen, because there's always gonna be these sections where we push the button. Let's make sure we put ourself in position where we can actually push the button and be

And I have to say even though I guess maybe this might be a good way to close out is I think in retrospect looking at the season close and looking back on some of the, I guess the wins that we've had, for me, I think for us collectively, we've done a better job with intentional focus on what we were doing at certain aspects of the ride.

Yeah.

And personally I've been like, I, I found myself, even though we haven't rode as many miles,

I

feel as though the quality miles have been amazing in the sense that, you know, I think that last road, the last ride we rode to, Coventry, Connecticut route, there was one point, man, that like we were literally probably 21, 22 ish for like a good five, six miles and it was effortless.

Yeah and that was a, that's the route where part of it where I said afterwards, we were doing 25 for a bit and you guys didn't complain.

And again, and it was because we were focused on it, it was like when we needed to pull back, like we relaxed, and I remember because vividly, because when we, first when we initially started, like we kinda gradually moved up to what it was, and then once we got warmed up we said, okay, you know, this is an intentional piece between this smile and this smile that we're gonna push, they wanna pull back. We're gonna push, we're gonna pull back. So for me, I have to say, like, for me, that, and I know, again, we didn't ride as much, but for me that has been probably one of the strongest, most fulfilling riding seasons that I had in that respect because, and I know you did climb, was like, you don't really know, you know, you don't give yourself enough credit, but this is the year I was able to realize, okay, you can do it if you stay structured in it and you... And you're not just going balls to the walls all the time, but you're saying, okay, during this particular point in time, we're gonna push. And then we're gonna push, but then once we push and we step back, we're gonna say, Okay, we're gonna recover, we're gonna do that.: Yeah.: It was intentional in what we were doing, so I have to say, appreciate what we did in that respect, and I'm looking forward to how it's gonna carry over into next year, with having the time to work on some of the other things where Zwift provides that opportunity with the cadence and with the climbing to it.

And for myself personally, I found that I made some strides with the cadence, like it's at a point where I had always struggled with the cadence, but this year the cadence was better and enabled when it was time to... For us to push the button that it wasn't like, and shout out to Trimon, because she used to call it the Wicked Witch of the West. You know, and it wasn't like it was just spinning aimlessly out of control, so that would be my end of season thought.

Yeah and as we come to, and I'm not even gonna say end of season because I think we're Wow,

the season.

Yeah, yeah. Well I mean listen, that's what I mean because you know I think we're in the middle of September, I think we got at least three or four more rides.

Two.

Two. We got like three or four more rides before. I think that I agree that this season provided us with the ability to be more intentional. I think part of that was, and I had mentioned this in some previous episodes before, was coming back from injury and now being able to say okay well you gotta focus on these pieces. I think what it does also as you reflect on what's happened is for preparation of next season, it really now allows us to look forward to getting back to those longer endurance.

Because you think about it, we haven't done any real endurance rides We've this done some chill rides where we've gone up to like forty, fifty miles,

but

when I say we went up to Uxbridge once. When I say endurance, what I mean is a true zone two from start to finish. Right? And staying in zone two as opposed to, we do a nice easy ride, push the button, relax, do a nice easy push the button. Know what I mean?

And when I say easy, mean some of those rides, were like thirteen, fourteen. Not that it was a problem because again, I think a big part of this and this is and I'll close with this. Every time we go out we have a good time. And that doesn't have to be intentional because that's natural. But next year what we want to start doing is some of these rides, All of the rides we have a good time.

Some of the rides we wanna be intentional from the perspective of, if we're talking about endurance and maintaining the base, the endurance is, okay well, we're picking zone two, we're riding it and we're riding it for the full ride. We ain't gotta push the button, we ain't gotta drop back, we're just doing this so we actually build the endurance So we're good.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to that too. Think that's gonna be vital for me coming back in, trying to do an endurance race, know, of three things. So I'm looking forward to that too. And just the ongoing learning and building, I think that's one of the things I think, you know, we always think about the athletic piece of it, we never really think about the cerebral piece of it. You know, the piece of where you're like, okay, well, you know, I gotta learn and be a little better and not just focus on, because, you know, mean, life be life and a lot of times too, you know, like when you get, oh, just I gotta get on this WIFT, I just gotta get these quick 10, you know, and sometimes, and sometimes you still have the opportunity to say, okay, I'm gonna work on the cadence, I'm gonna work on my breathing, I'm gonna work on that, and intentionally doing that.

And you've always done a great job with that, which I think is, is good, you know, like will you be honest, oh man, do breathing, gotta do this, gotta do that. You know, and and getting into it intentionally so that it becomes automatic.

Yeah, and that's the beauty part. Once it becomes automatic then you ain't gotta worry about it. But what the end of the season does for us is this it provides us with the opportunity to start looking at some of these things that we're actually doing from a training perspective. We can do more stuff on Zwift. We can review those talk about those.

So until next time remember keep those wheels turning as long as the weather allows it. Those feet moving and we'll see you on the road.