Speaking of writing things down. I wrote down Jackson’s bike workout from episode 2 and rode it yesterday for my long ride (power adjusted to my ftp of course) and it was fantastic. Really enjoyed it a lot.
I did some light edits to the times to stretch it to 3 hrs (Jackson’s was 2:45). I also didn’t push the spikes past 125% like Jackson did.
Surprised I haven’t seen any reactions here to Jack’s interview with Taylor Knibb. I thought Jack did a great job getting Taylor to open up, and has good chemistry with Taylor, kudos Jack!
It was really interesting to hear Taylor talk about how her core temp was elevated from the night before in Kona and how she was really limited to what she could do all day. Crazy to be getting sick, firing at 80% and not feeling good, and still in position to win Kona on an extra humid day. And her stories of what happened after she collapsed were entertaining too.
Lots of other good nuggets too- her T100 contract negotiations and them not paying her (or giving her the trophy for winning), her struggles leading into Texas and London, and her surprising 2026 plans (short course?). Definitely one of the best interviews Jacks done! The regular show is fun especially in season with the crew, but I personally would still love to hear these in depth type of interviews with other athletes.
Eerily similar to an old Matt Hanson workout. YMMV.
Yes, I really enjoyed Jack’s interview with Knibb. She offered a good amount of detail about her loss of interest in—and tension with—the T100, early season challenges, and Kona experience. It was a really engaging, informative conversation.
There text transcript of this interview?
Apple Podcasts app now provides transcripts of all pods
Don’t we listen to Podcasts nowadays so we don’t have to read?
It was a great interview and I appreciate how open she is. She can be challenging to follow along with, she’s sort of all over the place.
reading it is much easier to skip to the part you want information on
It was hard to follow her thoughts and Jack hardly reigned her in however she shared lots of great insights and also its super fun how she wasnt even aware LCB gave her the tap
I enjoy listening to her thoughts. Great interview and responses.
I’m glad she’s not just all business or all PR mode but permits herself be a real person in the interview.
I will say this though. Taylor is pushing into the limits of ‘BS Science’ that Neumann decried when he schooled everyone years back at T100 (not that his long term performance was any better). But I get this vibe of too much dependancy on numbers. Both emotional and physical performance dependency.
She’s stressing over mri imaging, marginal decimal points in core temp, beats per minute in hr, and watts on the bike.
Here’s the thing. Taylor does not strike me as the person who doesn’t carry around a mental burden. You can imagine someone who goes by feel and just focuses on performance on the day, but I wonder if her strong commitment to data (euphemism for compulsive) is getting in her head too much without realizing all the intangibles behind the data she can never fully factor in.
I wonder if her enthusiasm for going with Dan is the heavy data driven approach that appeals to her own biases but could there be a possibility that she is exactly the type of athlete that shouldn’t have all that data? Not everyone is the same, we all agree, so could it be possible the uber coach and the uber athlete with obsessive observation enthusiasm is not the best combination?
Or will she get it all under control and balance out both sides of this equation.
What gives me hope is her run guru guy seems to be the exact opposite end of the spectrum and out there dancing around in the forest barefooted with tires strapped to his waist. So maybe she’s just got two sides of Taylor she’s working on.
Maybe that’s a reason why she’s looking to go back to short course, where its much more pure racing the competitors and dynamics and not thinking about numbers, data, etc. If you look at her anchor leg in the Paris mixed relay, she clearly can just go all in and bury herself when she’s put in that situation. It’s a tough balance because theoretically getting the best out of yourself in long course racing is very data driven, but it puts a massive mental load on you especially if you’re a classic overthinker like Taylor.
Quite an intersting point of view you have raised.
Even for amateurs - now its almost like, if you dont have a specially crafted, periodised training plan, targeted to zones based on HR, lactate or watts, recovery wooper doopered, recorded on TP or strava, you are harming your performance, harming your health and wasting your time.
Hard to go back to just, lacing up and sweating it out by feel
Really liked the Road to Oceanside today. Interesting conversation with Riele’s coach.
I like that new segment. Probably the one I’m not looking forward to is Jack being on because we already know his opinions. Different coaches make it really quite interesting to hear.
Yeah that was a great segment. Everyone was like “Justin, quit your job and go all in on triathlon!” and Justin was like “yes but no, I don’t wanna give up 250k/year and driving a Tesla living in San Fran for a lot less $$ and no security!” Justin very clearly loves triathlon and would love to be a full time pro, but when the rubber meets the road it doesn’t make sense to give up current income unless you have a longer track record of top results and more of a pathway to replace a lot of that income from triathlon.
And this is why I would like a text transcript. PS, I dont have an iphone.
I remember Matthew Marquadt saying similar when he was asked why he doesn’t just give up the whole medical doctor thing for a couple years to live the lift of a pro
Except it was more “save people from cancer” than “drive a Tesla” 
Well he should definitely get rid of the Tesla. Perhaps a EREV F-150 next year. 700 mile range.
ive said this before on this forum and jb had a lol in response to it.
the guy works in tech and he is now a manager. its all just talky talky no worky worky…. he’s too smart to “quit”. his work would just be sitting on meetings and delegating. i bet bro does sweet f all work. i assume he also has a very low resistance / low friction relationship with his manager - so he can just cruise by. he will just keep getting year on year increase in pay, and he probably gets more kudos for doing the tri on the side internally and with clients.
Text dump from J in another thread -
Haha… “Talkie Talkie” vs. “Workie Workie” is a good one. I should do a thread on my work vs. training balance as a pro. I think I’m the top world ranked pro with a corporate job now which has always been a goal of mine. But yeah obviously being fully remote and working at a publicly traded tech company make my training lifestyle possible (not consulting or a startup, which I did from 2016-2020). It is true that I’m mostly in team meetings (I’m a Sr. Director, with a VP above me, and a team of 16 below me). Yesterday I had 12 30-minute back to back meetings with no break, but I also basically worked from 10-4pm after a long swim, and then was on the trainer from 4-6pm. I’m solidly middle management but don’t get the C-suite text messages on the weekends - my boss does. I have earned a ton of flexibility in my day to day working life after years of grinding long hours in my early and mid 20s. I’m 30 now and someone on Slowtwitch actually gave me a great piece of advice a couple years ago basically saying “just don’t become a VP and you can go pro…” I’m at the point now where I would turn down a promotion if it meant more work. Not quite ready to consider quitting my job as surviving on $20-30k/year isn’t gonna cut it lol. Wife and I plan to move back to the SF Bay Area where I was born and raised so saving up for that $2.5M 1500 sq ft dream home lol…
