True. But if I was Sam and there's already a "Big Unit" sports star out there, I would declare myself as "The Bigger Unit". Or for triathlon distinction an homage to 50 Cent, "The T Unit".

No, Wattie drives a Honda Element.

Wattie and Heather are not big spenders; most of their money goes back into the business.

Looks like he lost it by 15min yesterday!
Anyone know how to flag a ride? Looks like this girl left her gps on in the car

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IG - @ryanppax
http://www.geluminati.com
Use code ST5 for $5 off your order

Putting the girl in the car aside, I'd like to know why Michael Woods was so slow relative to Long and Sanders. There is no way these guys are even in the same zip code as Woods. the guy was third at UCI World's in 2018 on that crazy Innsbruck course with 5000m of climbing over 265km. So either Woods had a massive headwind with gatorskins and a 20 lbs backpack on just for shits and giggles, or he was dogging it at the end of a 400km ride. He should beat Long and Sanders with one leg. The guy did run a 3:45 1500m as a junior at the Pan Am games and he's 20-30 lbs lighter than Long and Sanders. So would be interesting to see what a protour climber going all out does.

And they're down in Patagonia gravel riding and swimming.

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Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

Not everyone goes all out for a KOM on a training ride. Woods did it back in 2015 when he was still at Continental level and it was at a training camp in January, so probably not in the best shape (https://www.strava.com/activities/244273910).

I honestly don’t think the World Pro Tour guys are that far ahead of the top triathlon guys when it comes to straight power. LOOK at Andrew Talansky’s bike performances in triathlon..

Bike handling skills are a different subject.
We all saw how hard Phil Gaimon went up Lemmon now we have 2 triathletes that went harder..

Triathletes are the best athletes on the planet. It's no surprise they're competing with pro cyclists.

Gotcha. Heather recently posted her, Wattie, Paula and Eric were all quarantining together. Who knows....

Lemmon isn't really a great litmus test for "straight power."

The tri guys would get smoked if it was a 30-40min climb. And if it was a climb at the end of a 5hr stage @ high VI.

How do you define "straight power"? We can setup whatever boundary conditions we want to ensure our favorite kinds of athletes will win some theoretical competition.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

Hey, when pro cyclists just do cycling, they are way above triathletes. Once they have to swim and run, their bike suffers (ex Talansky, Chann McRae. Even Lance even got outsplit by Kienle at Galveston 2012 and Lance was only 2 years of racing as a pro cyclist). How good can some triathletes get if they just bike, we don't know. Richie Porte is probably a good example of a triathlete turned cyclist. I bet if he turned back to triathlon he would not have the fastest bike split in Kona. I think he's too small to ride as hard as some of the bigger tri guys like (Wurf...he is a good example of a diesel pro rider who is better as a triathlete than cyclist). But I bet Porte would blow the doors off Lemmon given his size.

i don't know what it means, i was replying to someone else.

Didnt lance retire at 40 though?

Pro triathletes becoming uphill kom killers to make the most of this situation is quite innovative and entertaining

I know, it's just that you made some specific inferences about how you would define it that was inherent in your answer. I'm not saying it's wrong just that it's arbitrary.

I think it's pretty safe to say that the vast majority of pro tour cyclists would beat the vast majority of pro triathletes in a typical cycling race and vice versa.

A solo time trial up a long climb is not a typical cycling race, as you correctly point out.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

i used it in quotes because it felt like an arbitrary "benchmark."

The all time "greatest" ITT on a 6000 ft vertical climb happened in the 2004 Dauphine (we can have a laugh of how fast juiced guys did Ventoux, but there you have it):

http://autobus.cyclingnews.com/...4/?id=results/stage4

1 Iban Mayo (Spa) Euskaltel-Euskadi 55.51.49 (23.202 km/h) 2 Tyler Hamilton (USA) Phonak Hearing Systems 0.35.26 3 Oscar Sevilla (Spa) Phonak Hearing Systems 1.03.09 4 Juan Miguel Mercado (Spa) Quick.Step-Davitamon 1.48.44 5 Lance Armstrong (USA) US Postal presented by Berry Floor 1.57.89 6 Inigo Landaluze (Spa) Euskaltel-Euskadi 2.22.75 7 Jos� Gutierrez (Spa) Phonak Hearing Systems 2.44.09 8 Levi Leipheimer (USA) Rabobank 3.21.18 9 Michael Rasmussen (Den) Rabobank 3.33.38 10 St�phane Goubert (Fra) Ag2R Prevoyance 3.35.81

Yo, Yo, Yo
It’s the BIG… UNIT… himself coming to provide some insight and clarification.

I actually laughed out loud (LOL) multiple times reading this. It’s just too dang funny. I’ll clarify a few things in no particular order. Well maybe in the order of what grabbed my attention!

The Ford Raptor. First off, it’s an 80K truck (I know ST’s care a lot about detail). Second off, it’s not my truck--I’m not sure how I would have ridden my bike and a truck up at the same time. In fact, I am down in Tucson without a car at all. Interestingly, I have never even owned a car. The F-150 (blue) that I lived out of and drove up to Canada to race in was my parents. So was the Prius they then let me use as well. I have now been downgraded and was not able to use their car(s). Thus, no car for me. Oh well, that’s the trying to make it as-a-pro-triathlete-life. It belongs to my friend who lives in Tucson (and sagged me for the ride). Dope car though.

As to the nickname Big Unit—It’s not self-proclaimed—and I agree if I wore skull kits, drove a Ford Raptor and called myself the Big Unit I would almost certainly be (have) the opposite 😊. I was first called the Big Unit in 2018 at a master’s workout. The coach decided to give me a lecture (about my swimming that needed work). He shouted something to the effect of “Sam, you’re a Big Unit, you’ve got a lot of power, and your strength to surface area is HUGE!! But you don’t know how to use your size and I’m going to teach you how…” (The coach is a true legend)

What made it better was that he stopped the whole pool to give me these pointers. The pool happened to be entirely full of females. We all got a good laugh and in Boulder, the name stuck. Like most things with me, it started with a good laugh and fun and just took off from there! I like the nickname Big Unit because yes it refers to my size but also, even more, my personality and way of life. I do things BIG: I train hard, I race a lot, I’m not afraid to fail, and I go all in regardless of what I’m doing. I also think it’s good to have a nickname on the professional side that make size and strength a positive (especially with all that has gone on about race weight, being lean as can be, Mary Cain, etc.). I’ll leave it at that—for now—and you’re more than welcome to call me Sam too.

As to going after KOM’s. I think it’s an awesome thing to do. That’s why it did. The world needs friendly competition and has been starved of that with COVID-19. Are there bigger concerns? Absolutely. I also have done everything I can to train in isolation and to protect my immune system before and after this effort. With races on the schedule, it is/was highly unlikely I would go after such a hard KOM as it really can take a bit to recover. The timing worked out well with training as I had been preparing for Oceanside and St. George. My fitness was therefore pretty good. As soon as these races got canceled, the training got toned down to base training. I did essentially one high-intensity workout for this effort (5x5’ at ~440, 5’ at ~490, and 30’ at 391) and was ready. In general, my physiology responds well to aerobic training and I hold onto fitness well so it’s no surprise that I was ready for this. I won’t be surprised if my bike keeps getting better with just base training right now as the volume is up due to a lack of swimming.

Way to bring up the first bike fit story. Man, that bike was a humble starting point. I bought it for 400 bucks used on Craigslist and still managed a 4:42 bike split in my first IM.

Thanks, everyone! I really enjoyed reading this. Hopefully, my humor wasn’t too much. I also really appreciate people being interested in the backstory of things and getting to know me as a person, not just an athlete. Thanks to my sponsors Argon18, Enve, Wattie Ink, SelectBlinds, IceFriction, First Endurance, AltRed, Suunto, Shimano,

Rudy, and ISM.

Cheers,
Sam (or I should I say THE BIG UNIT!!!)

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Sam Long
AKA The BigUnit
IG: @samgolong

That was solid. Now...don't tell us mortals about your workouts...I couldn't imagine holding 300 watts for 5 minutes let alone 440!

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Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

Didn't you pick the outlier, though? Seems most of the top 160-165 lb pros (Kienle, Hoffman, O'Donnell, Sanders) are around 5'10" - 5'11". Tall Unit might be more accurate. lol

I intentionally went with the tall boys. Now lets have some silver bullets for this float down the river!

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Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

Nice one, are there any other koms or vitual races youre considering?

What a beauty. Someone get this guy an active Youtube channel.

You (almost) made it into Phil's latest video! Around the 8 minute mark he says he is aware that Lionel took his KOM and that "someone else" took it from him...guess you aren't quite on a by-name basis for him (yet!)