S6E13 -- Ultraman Florida 2025 Preview + Athlete in Profile (Nick Gillombardo)

Jen McVeay joins me in this episode to preview the field of athletes toeing the line at 2025 Ultraman Florida, February 14-16th.  We are joined by to 2 time Ultraman Champion Steve Keller.

Steve offers the perspective of previous champion, current athlete, and current coach.  Steve has embarked on a special journey that he reveals in our conversation.  First to Five Youtube Page : https://youtube.com/@firsttofive?si=VrnzTnC0vs7cr4Oj

Following the preview, I am joined by another of the 2025 athletes, Nick Gillombardo as my Athlete in Profile.  Nick has been chasing the dream for a number of years and he is excited to be finally hitting the start line.  

Nick’s NAMI fundraising link : https://donate.nami.org/fundraiser/4514687

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Ultraman Florida
• National Parks at NIght
• Hurt 100
• Ultraman World Championships
• Ultraman Arizona 
• Mindset Endurance
• Challenge Roth
• One Water
• Ultraman Canada
• Ultraman Mexico
• NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness)
• Infinitri 
• First to Five Youtube Page
• Marathon Des Sables
• Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
• A Christmas Story House
• Castle Noel
• Ironman Louisville
• Badwater 135
• Burning River 50 / 100 
• Fool’s Trail race 100
• 1958 Topps baseball set

Shout outs and mentions in this episode:

• Michelle Vesterby (S5E12)
• Jen Annett  (S6E9) (S6E11)
• Nicole Suss
• Keri Mandell (S6E10)
• Shane Duffy (S4E5)
• Van Sanchez (S1E6)
• Jacob Beldick
• Terumasa Matsuda
• Eiko Hibino (S1E5)
• Davis Bryan
• Pablo Laprea
• Ryan Carlin  
• Jordan Taylor
• Travis Rademaker
• Bastian Witte
• Martin Le Bleis
• Nick Gillombardo
• Patrick Clerkin
• Curtis Linehan
• Rick Hunt
• Steve Keller (S2E10)
• Vladymir Bobarykin
• Doug Ellis
• Ryan Toner
• Andres Jimenez Quijano
• Beimal Patel
• Brian Amende
• Javier Cortes Zaguirre
• Jeff Baer
• Jermey Howard (S2E8)
• Michelle Williamson
• Mitch Heskett
• Chuck Kemeny
• Truong Lively
• Consuela Lively
• Mohammad Kotb
• Phil Cuppernell
• Steve King (S1E1) (S1E2) (S1E3)
• Ryan Rinnear
• Rohit Pawar
• Tyler Sloden
• Caroline Bloom (S2E3)
• Alexandre Rizzi
• Ben Nelson
• Jose Fuente Pepe Garcia
• Ramiro Gutierrez
• Leida Velez
• Zach Powell
• Dougin Walker
• Dan Attard
• Jenn Uy
• Mary Latza
• Randy Latza
• Cynthia Bartus Special
• Nuria Sanchez
• Fiona Siemelink
• Simon Shurey
• Dale and Christy
• Iron Cowboy -  James Lawrence
• Reid Brosco
• Ferg Hawke (S3E10)
• Makoto Hoshino (S1E2)
• Keri Gillombardo
• Ben Gillombardo
• Leo Gillombardo
• Kristin Filipowicz
• Roger Maris 
• Heidi Buttery (S4E10)

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

So that's when I actually started setting my sights on Ultraman to begin with, and I found your podcast. And I was listening from the very beginning on various training runs for a while. And I would say it's really been part of my training and getting embedded into the Ultraman mantra and what it really encapsulates. And I think you've done a great job promoting the the event itself and what it really you know stands behind. So it you've been part of my journey from the very beginning, really.

Larry 1:42

And now today's show. Joining me today on the podcast, I have two guests, and we're gonna do a special Ultraman Florida preview. First up on the podcast today is race director Jen McVeigh. Hey Jen, how's it going? Hi very good. How are you doing? I'm doing well. Thanks for coming and uh bringing us the information about your race and your athletes. Thanks for having me. So uh it's been a while since you've been on. So just a couple of quick catch-up questions. Let's find out what you've been doing. What have you been up to? Have you had any good uh travels with your travel company?

SPEAKER_02 2:24

Uh yeah, I've been traveling a lot since we last spoke. I go to Africa every year for anywhere from three to six weeks. So that's really cool because I get to do my wildlife photography down there. I've been on several cruises. The um the travel agent side gig is good to me, and I get lots of free cruises, so that's pretty fun. Nice.

Larry 2:48

What uh what's been your favorite cruise?

SPEAKER_02 2:51

Oh gosh. Um I did uh a Canada Fall Colors one that was super cool. Oh, that went to several different ports up in the northeast, um, started in uh Quebec City and ended in New Jersey, Newark. Oh, nice.

Larry 3:10

So up to the Gulf of St. Lawrence and back down around the east side of the Atlantic.

unknown 3:14

Excellent.

SPEAKER_02 3:15

Yeah, Prince Edward Islands, uh lots of lots, lots of little islands up there. Yeah, it was cool.

Larry 3:21

Oh, right on.

SPEAKER_02 3:22

Yeah.

Larry 3:23

And uh the photography, you're still taking lots of pictures.

SPEAKER_02 3:27

Yep, still taking lots of pictures. Um doing uh several night photography workshops every year with uh my friends over at National Parks at night. They they put on workshops and uh take us to really cool places, mostly national parks, obviously. But uh yeah, so I just did Death Valley, um, off the beaten path, kind of Death Valley stuff. So that was cool. And uh this year I'm gonna be heading out to uh North Cascades, which is one of the least visited national parks in the country, uh, which is nice when you're trying to take pictures and there's nobody around.

Larry 4:02

Is that in Washington?

SPEAKER_02 4:04

Yeah, it's in Washington. Actually, it's super close to you. It's the very, very, very top of Washington. It's probably only an hour or two from your house.

SPEAKER_06 4:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:13

Um then I'm gonna be hitting uh Tetons and Yellowstone, and then in uh in the winter, I'm gonna be hitting Monument Valley during a meteor shower. So that's really gonna be cool.

Larry 4:25

Excellent timing.

SPEAKER_02 4:26

Yeah.

Larry 4:28

No, right on. Um and um what about the other races that you're involved with? What's been going on there? Tell us about those.

SPEAKER_02 4:36

Oh my gosh. Uh I just finished up with Hurt 100, yeah, which is uh one of the top 10 hardest trail runs in the world. That's on my island uh of Oahu. So that was you know a good 36 hours of no sleep, but lots of fun. Um and I'm in charge of several different things for Hertz. So it was it was a busy, busy couple of weeks in January. And then uh I was at Worlds uh out on the big island in over Thanksgiving weekend in November.

Larry 5:10

Yeah, tell us about what your thoughts on that uh epic race and showdown that happened.

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Oh my gosh, that was so cool to see that. I'm so glad I was there because the females just like crushed it, and it was so cool to see two moms come in first and second. Yeah, you know, absolutely amazing. Um, I've I feel very, very, very lucky that I got to witness that. And they're really nice people, they're just super nice ladies, and so it was nice.

Larry 5:38

Yeah, yeah. I've had both of them on the podcast, and uh I really enjoyed speaking with them both, just down to earth.

SPEAKER_02 5:46

Yep, totally.

Larry 5:48

Yeah. Well, I've got you listed as somewhere in Arizona USA. Um, um I'm suspecting that you might be out in your little adventure trailer. Um, where where are you joining from today?

SPEAKER_02 6:01

I'm in Phoenix. I'm actually not in the farmhouse on wheels. I uh the farmhouse on wheels, that's what you call it. Yeah, the farmhouse on wheels. Um I'm actually dog sitting for um my college besties who are on my Arizona staff. So they're on a big Antarctica adventure, so I'm in charge of the dogs for a week. Oh, all right. And yep, and from here I'm heading to Florida for uh for a little bit of uh race stuff.

Larry 6:25

Yeah, so we got the race coming up February 14th to the 16th. Um, who do you got helping you out over on that one? I saw a lot of your uh regular peeps are doing some crewing. So uh what kind of what kind of help you get on the staff on this one?

SPEAKER_02 6:40

Yeah, several of my uh staff are crewing, and I'm like, hey, wait, what what's going on here? Um a certain athlete took one and was trying to take two. Actually, he took two. Um but most of the regular staff is gonna be their staffing. Um we are gonna be missing uh one um who couldn't she has a new job, Nicole. Shout out to Nicole. Uh she couldn't get down here for the race because her job's too new. So hopefully we'll get her back next year. But otherwise, it's it's the same usual uh cast of characters behind the scenes at Ultraman, Florida. I it's just an awesome staff. We have so much fun and everybody works really hard, but we also play really hard behind the scenes.

Larry 7:26

Yeah, yeah. And do you have any um updates to the courses this year? Where did you have to change anything for permitting or anything like that?

SPEAKER_02 7:35

We did slightly change it. We're going back to start at Victory Point, uh where we started uh a few years ago. And uh that area was it ended up it was caught up in a lawsuit for a few years, um because the town didn't actually own the area and blah blah blah, but it's all cleared up now. So we're back at Victory Point, which was actually uh built for triathlon. So um I love that area. Um so it's it's only you know a couple miles down from where we were last year at Waterfront Park. So the course is almost identical, just a little bit of changes for the start-finish to try to get my mileage back to being exactly right. So that's what I was working on all day today. It was mass.

Larry 8:21

Those pesky things that you have to update right up into the last second.

SPEAKER_01 8:25

Yep, exactly.

Larry 8:26

Including the information that comes in from your athletes that we'll be talking about.

SPEAKER_01 8:31

For sure.

Larry 8:32

Yeah. Well, um, I did mention off the top that we do have two guests for this special update. So I should probably introduce our other guest who's been sitting in the wings. And uh joining us today is a former Florida champion and Arizona champion, Stephen Keller. Welcome back.

SPEAKER_03 8:53

Hello, Larry. Thank you for having me. It's uh it's a pleasure to be back. It's been a few years since I've been on the podcast, but thank you.

Larry 9:02

Yeah, the first time you came on, we were talking to you as the athlete in profile for the inaugural Ultraman Arizona. Um, that was after your Florida victory, I believe.

SPEAKER_03 9:17

Yep, yep. That was back in 2022 uh for the the inaugural and uh one not to forget uh Ultraman Arizona.

Larry 9:30

And uh just uh for the listener, can you give us your Ultraman background? What are the races you completed and uh podiumed on? Because you always seem to get on the podium.

SPEAKER_03 9:41

Yeah, yeah, I'm very fortunate to always have um a good crew that keeps me going, keeps me fast out there. Um so to date, I've done five Ultraman races. Um I've done Florida um three times now, Arizona once, and uh World Champs. Um the World Champs was in 2022, as well as Arizona, and then my last race was Florida, which was in 2024, the the last year's race.

Larry 10:17

And so what have you been up to as far as your own personal life in the time since we've also chatted? I know um you're uh a veterinarian. I see that today you're joining us from the Bahamas. I don't know if that's a family vacation or you're off saving dolphins, what you're doing. Maybe you can fill us in.

SPEAKER_03 10:38

Oh man, I feel like uh yeah, calling from the Bahamas is is definitely um it's not representative of the typical life that I live. But uh yeah, we just came here for a quick family vacation. It was centered around uh the fact that it's cold and winter break at home and the kids were uh off school for a few days. But yeah, I mean my day job is of a veterinarian um and medical director of a small animal hospital in Virginia Beach. And I also am a coach for primarily ultra-distance athletes, training athletes, runners. Um, so since the last time we spoke, I've been putting a lot of time and passion into the coaching world. Um we coach about 10 athletes at a time, but it allows me to really focus some of my attention on each of those athletes. Several of them are ultraman or future ultraman. Um we'll be talking about a few of them lining up for Florida uh here in a few minutes. And um, you know, from a personal standpoint, I did Ultraman Florida back in February of 2024, which seems like forever ago, and then raced uh Challenge Roma in Germany over the summer, and then went and did a it's a swim run adventure race called One Water in uh the Swedish archipelago or the Stockholm Archipelago in August. So been a little bit of everywhere this past year, and um hadn't really um had my 2025 mapped out until the world championship went down in November, and I think you and I were both part of a group chat for uh Carrie Mandel, who was on the podcast. She had a great episode. And um I think I got the juices flowing and and uh all the all the positive energy of having all the people who were on that group chat really got me thinking, you know, maybe I want to come back and do another Ultraman this year.

Larry 13:01

Yeah, and and so obviously you're gonna come back to to where it started for you and do Ultraman Florida. That is that's fantastic.

SPEAKER_03 13:10

Yeah, yeah. So the goal, uh I guess I should announce it here, um, is to do all of the Ultraman races in one year this year. So we're gonna go from Florida to Arizona and then Canada in the summer, and then there's a new race, Ultraman Mexico, that's in October.

SPEAKER_06 13:34

Right.

SPEAKER_03 13:34

And then we'll finish it up with Worlds in November. So there's been a very select few who have done uh four to five Ultraman within a 12-month window. You know, uh Shane, he did six actually. Um but the the kind of spin on this is to do the the five series in order in in one calendar year. So that's that's the goal for 2025.

Larry 14:04

Oh, that's awesome. That is that's an incredible uh thing to reach for. Um I chime in. Yes, please, Jen.

SPEAKER_02 14:14

When Steve first texted me about this idea, there were only four at the time.

SPEAKER_06 14:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:21

And then and then we added a fifth, and he was like, Well, okay, I guess it gotta be five.

SPEAKER_03 14:29

Yeah. The original goal was to do four, but if they're gonna add another one, it's not like I can skip over that.

Larry 14:35

So no, of course not. Yeah. And congratulations to Van Sanchez, who is bringing that race to Mexico, the Ultraman branded race to Mexico. Um, and I know he's gonna be at the race as well, crewing. Um, so we'll maybe chat about him in a few minutes. But congratulations to you, Van. Um, I I have put my feelers out to him to get him on to come and talk about that. And hopefully that's gonna happen real soon as well.

SPEAKER_02 15:03

Yeah, Van's a great guy. He's a great race director. I think he'll be a really good representation of the Ultraman brand. And he totally gets Aloha Ohana Kopua. Um, he coaches athletes, he brings them to our races, he loves everything about it. And and and it's nice to have someone who uh he already gets it, he already knows, you know. And so I'm looking forward to it. It's gonna be it's gonna be super cool to have the new event. I can't wait to see the terrain.

Larry 15:37

I haven't looked at profiles, so we have had people on uh that have raced it and talked about it, and he's obviously come on and done previews with me as well and talked about those um race profiles. So people that might be considering going down to Sacataris this year or the next year in order to do part of this Ultraman series now, uh go back into the history of the podcast and look for the ones with Van Sanchez, and uh they're all available for free and you get all the info that you need. But let's let's let's get back on to Florida here. Let's let's start talking about your race, Jen. Um let's go through the let's go through the um the racers that we have this year coming, and we'll try and hit on most, if not all of them, a little bit. I know some people have a little more information available to talk about, so that makes it a bit easier. But let's uh let's do a little rundown uh maybe by age group, as we've done in the past. I'll I'll let you start us off and then Steve. I know you know a lot of these people. Jump in and give us some information when you know it, and uh I've got a few notes that I'll try and share as well.

unknown 16:49

Awesome.

SPEAKER_02 16:49

Well done. Uh in our 20 to 29 category, we've got two youngsters. They're they're young to me. Uh Jacob will be one of our youngest, perhaps the youngest ever. I have to look up birthdates. He's 20, and uh Jacob's from Atlanta, hot Atlanta, and that's a big challenge for a youngster like that to be doing this distance. Steve, you can chime in on that. Like our average age is like 42, so 20 is way under our average age.

SPEAKER_03 17:22

Yeah, it's definitely not a typically a young person's sport. You tend to see majority of the athletes 40 or over. Um, but it doesn't mean it can't be done, and you just have to you have to lean on other people, I think, and and the experience that they've uh that they can pass along because um there is some tactic for anybody who's doing uh an Ultraman for their first time, there's definitely some tactics to to be successful and make sure that you get through it in one piece.

Larry 17:59

Yeah, and uh it looks like he's bringing his mother and father for the crew, so we'll we'll leave that at that and see.

SPEAKER_01 18:09

That could be super awesome, it or it could be super awesome.

Larry 18:19

And and speaking of youngsters doing this, uh going back to Van Sanchez, um, I think both of you know he is the youngest person to ever complete an Ultraman because he did it when he was still 19 years old at Ultraman Wales.

SPEAKER_03 18:33

Yeah, that's impressive.

SPEAKER_02 18:35

Larry with a fun fact that is impressive. And then we also have in the 20 to 29, we've got uh Terumasa Matsuda from Japan. So that's cool that we have someone coming all the way from Japan, and uh he is going to be crewed by Aiko. Uh uh his crew chief is Aiko Hibino, and Aiko has crewed before. I don't know how to do it.

Larry 18:58

She's raced before. She's raised Canada or where she has raised Canada and she has raced at the worlds.

SPEAKER_02 19:04

That's what I thought. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So that'll be nice to have her. Um, we have tons of alumni coming out to support everybody.

Larry 19:11

So that's I believe that's her boyfriend that she's crewing for. I believe you're a connection of how he got into this. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:18

Exactly. Yeah. So looking forward to having them out there. So that that's our 20 to 29 age group, just the two of them.

Larry 19:26

Let's move on to the the 30-year-olds then. There's a there's a big clump of those in the in the mails.

SPEAKER_02 19:32

There are a lot of them, and some of them are very fast. So we've got uh Davis Bryan, uh he's 30. We'll start with the youngsters. Davis Bryan's 30. Uh Pablo La Praya, 30, Ryan Carlin, 30. Uh side note, Ryan has declared uh that he's gonna win.

Larry 19:54

But he's gonna win.

SPEAKER_02 19:56

Yes, that's what he has declared. Uh Jordan Taylor, he's 34, another 34-year-old, Travis Radmaker. Then we've got uh Bastion Whitty, he's 35. Also 35 is Martin Lewis. 36-year-olds, we've got Nick Gilombardo and Patrick Clerkin. And then uh wrapping it up with a 39-year-old, Jeff Bayer. Now, some of these guys are uh are are definitely in contention. Uh Patrick has I I compiled all of our fastest swim times, their fastest Iron Man swim times that they all listed on their applications. Uh Patrick, Patrick's from North Carolina, he had a 50-minute Iron Man swim. Very impressive.

SPEAKER_03 20:38

I'm actually Patrick's coach, so I know exactly how fast he is, and he's a very talented swimmer.

SPEAKER_02 20:46

And you know what's really awesome is when the uh when the student is faster than the coach.

SPEAKER_03 20:53

Yeah, he's he's a he's a very uh gifted swimmer, and um he's done a lot of ultra cycling. He's got that uh uh experience as well. He's also from Florida, he's very familiar with those roads. Um so he I know I just know from talking to him, he has no concern with the terrain and the navigation of where the courses are gonna be. He's very comfortable with the climate, even though he lives in North Carolina now. He he'll be up there with the top, the top group um all three days.

Larry 21:29

That's awesome. And and do you think that his Iron Man swim time will translate to the 10-kilometer swim?

SPEAKER_03 21:38

Yeah, I think he'll be there or thereabouts. Um, I would say just roughly he'll probably be there with me um getting out of the water. You know, hopefully I've prepared him for the you know the longer distance. But in terms of uh endurance and speed, I think he'll be you know between the three and three and a half inches. Hour mark three and a half hour would probably be a um that that would be an easy day for him. I think he'll be closer to the three hours for the swim.

SPEAKER_02 22:10

Excellent. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_03 22:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:13

And then not far behind him, Ryan Carlin, he had a 55-minute swim. He's also another local Floridian. He's from Palm Beach. Um, he's actually racing to support the National Alliance on Mental Illness, as is Nick Gilombardo as well. Um, both of them are supporting Nami, which is awesome. Such a good uh charity to support.

Larry 22:35

And I'm gonna be having Nick on this episode as the athlete in profile for your race as well.

SPEAKER_01 22:42

Oh, great.

Larry 22:42

So there'll be lots more to hear about Nick.

SPEAKER_01 22:45

Awesome, super cool.

SPEAKER_03 22:47

I did some research. Um, Martin, I'm not sure how to pronounce his last name. He has done um Ultraman distance racing in the past.

Larry 23:00

Yes, he did the Infinitri in Spain.

SPEAKER_03 23:03

Yes, so he's definitely not a novice to the distance.

Larry 23:08

Yeah. And he was 28 hours at that event.

SPEAKER_03 23:12

I also am coaching Jeff Bear. He's coming from Illinois, so um, he'll be coming from the cold weather, which I think a large uh percentage of athletes are are right now are coming from colder climates.

SPEAKER_02 23:28

Pretty much everybody except the Floridians, I think.

SPEAKER_03 23:30

Yeah.

Larry 23:31

Well, it did snow in Florida this past week.

SPEAKER_02 23:34

I saw that. Crazy. I don't know what the weather's doing.

SPEAKER_03 23:40

Jeff's Jeff's a very balanced athlete as well. He's uh got quite a bit of experience with Iron Man, and he'll he'll be in in in the middle uh up towards the front on all three days, just with being balanced on all his abilities.

SPEAKER_02 24:00

Awesome.

Larry 24:01

Yeah, looking at some of these Iron Man times for these guys, um, it looks like Jordan, I think, had uh a sub-10-hour Iron Man, as did Bastion.

SPEAKER_02 24:13

He had a 921. So, yeah, so the three fastest Iron Man PRs that they listed, um Davis Bryant had a 931, super impressive. Bastion had a 921, and then this guy named Keller, he had a 915. So definitely gonna be fast.

Larry 24:33

I thought Keller had a 908.

SPEAKER_03 24:35

I was gonna say, is that what I put? Because I think I've gone faster than that.

SPEAKER_02 24:39

He he put you put 915, so I didn't go check.

SPEAKER_03 24:44

I don't remember any of my times, but I thought I had gone faster. But Larry Larry called it there. I think 908 is the fastest.

SPEAKER_02 24:51

I've got I think I recall that on last year's application you put 908.

SPEAKER_03 24:57

Could have been. I I don't I don't know majority of the times I've done you all you guys all blend together in my brain.

SPEAKER_02 25:05

But then talking about our talking about our 30 to 39 year olds, uh um, as far as run times, Bastion can run. Um he did uh he's had a 320 before, 320 Iron Man run. So that's super good. Um and then Davis had a 330. Now Davis is interesting because he listed that he is fueled by Yu-Hoo and Red Bull. And so I want to see how that really comes out in the end, or maybe I don't want to see it.

SPEAKER_03 25:39

Or maybe we don't want to see it come out. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:44

So definitely some really good, strong aspects in that 30 to 30 minutes probably.

Larry 25:50

Well, let's move on to the uh the 40-year-olds then, because there's another huge chunk of people there. As you said, that's generally where the uh ultraman community comes in, is closer to that 40, you know, mid-40 range. So um tell us what we got in the in the 40-year-olds, Jen.

SPEAKER_02 26:07

Yeah, we've got uh several in the 40 to 49 age group. We've got Curtis Lynihan, he's 40. Rick Hunt is also 40, Keller is also 40, so three 40-year-olds. We've got, I'm gonna mess this up, Vladimir Bobarikin, he's 41. Uh, then we've got Doug Ellis and Ryan Toner, he's an alumni, they're both 43. We've got uh uh uh Andres Jimenez Qijano, Bemal Patel, they're both 47, Brian Amende is 48, and uh as well as Javier Cortez Daghieri.

Larry 26:45

That was well done.

SPEAKER_02 26:46

Very close. Sounds very good.

Larry 26:50

Yeah, he's at a he's at a Chile, right? Like so he's making a good jaunt to come and do your race.

SPEAKER_02 26:57

Yeah, there's um we actually have 13 countries represented. Um dates of 13 countries. So we've got uh Brazil, uh Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, uh, Germany, uh Japan, Mexico, uh, the Philippines, uh, Spain, India, and Venezuela. And the USA, of course.

Larry 27:30

Yeah, that's definitely a good spread. Um, I I feel like that's probably one of the better ones you've had.

SPEAKER_02 27:35

We we usually are in like the 13 to 16 country range, I think. So yeah. Yeah, I love I love our international athletes.

SPEAKER_03 27:44

Florida tends to bring a lot of international athletes to that race compared to some of the others.

SPEAKER_02 27:51

Yeah, because closest point that makes it exactly they don't have to fly as far. Yeah, and I mean having the Mexico race is gonna be great for everybody down south because it's a little bit closer for them. Although we might miss out on some of the athletes now, which will be a bummer, but hopefully they'll we'll get a chunk of them that want to do all of them.

Larry 28:11

So yeah, yeah. Well, one of the things that I noticed in this group while you're looking up some of your stats, Jen, is that you you got two people that mentioned that they were friends, and that is uh Curtis and Rick. Um they seem to be fairly close in in times as well. Um Curtis has got a 1223 Iron Man, and Rick is around the 13-hour mark. So I have a feeling there'll be some pretty good uh rivalry going on between those two.

SPEAKER_02 28:41

Yeah, and it'll be cool if sometimes maybe we'll see them out like close to each other out there. Um yeah, I I love when friends apply. Um I I love that dynamic of you know having them compete against each other, but also having them support each other and having the crew support each other. Um that's one of my favorite things. So I'm looking forward to that. We also have another pair um that are friends as well, and that is uh one of our ladies that we're gonna talk about later. And uh she is friends with one of our uh one of our guys that's in the 50 to 59 age group.

Larry 29:24

Oh, excellent. That's gonna work out well.

SPEAKER_02 29:27

Oh what's cool about them is they got one big house and they are both crewed by our alumni. So it's a house full of our alumni and two international athletes.

Larry 29:39

Oh yeah. Okay. I I know which one you're talking about now then. Um and and that's what I was just gonna bring up as well for this uh category. You said that Ryan's an alumni, and uh, of course, he's got Jeremy Howard as his crew chief. Um that that's gonna be an advantage for him being an alumni. Oh, for sure. Jeremy on the team.

SPEAKER_02 30:02

Yeah, because they've they've both done the race. Jeremy has won the race as well, just like uh Steve has. Um Ryan is a very fast swimmer, he is one of our uh fastest swimmers. He's uh his Iron Man PR is a 57-minute swim. So he's gonna be up there. Um it's gonna be fun to see who because there are so many fast swimmers. Like who knows which one of these guys are gonna be the first ones to come out.

SPEAKER_03 30:33

Yeah, another guy I'll I'll point out um right above uh Ryan, and then right before Ryan is Doug, who's also 43. He's coached by Jeremy as well. And um ironically, Doug Ellis is also a very strong swimmer. And um, I had no idea he actually lives in my hometown and reached out, you know, just randomly like, hey, what are the chances of two guys in Virginia in the same hometown doing a race down in Florida? So that's pretty cool. I haven't met him in person, but he is doing the race um in efforts for his foundation, the River El Ellis Foundation, um, which I think he's been promoting on social media and he'll be promoting down at the race. But um I think with him having Jeremy as a coach, he's also gonna be out in the front coming out of the water with Ryan, both of them together.

Larry 31:32

And he's got a very lofty goal on that. Um, do either of you have that in front of you?

SPEAKER_03 31:38

I checked it earlier today. He he had posted if he got over 20, somebody was gonna add another 10. And he was up to he was up to 21 this morning. So he's definitely doing very well. And um, it looks like his foundation is very active in what they do. Um, I'm not gonna speak out because I don't want to misspeak, but um, it's a it's a great organization.

Larry 32:06

Uh yeah, absolutely. Um, what I read in his bio is that the River Ellis Foundation is in honor of his daughter, who unexpectedly passed away at just two days old, and that the foundation provides short-term assistance to those who've experienced some unexpected hardship or tragedy. So I'll make sure to put that link in my show notes as well.

SPEAKER_03 32:32

Very cool that he's doing that for that reason.

SPEAKER_02 32:37

I love when athletes uh bring charity into it, into the mix and and either to bring awareness or for fundraising purposes.

Larry 32:49

We will be right back. Hello, listener. I love getting your feedback and suggestions for the podcast. Keep them coming at 515ultraman at gmail.com. For those that want to help me promote the show, I suggest that you tell a friend to listen to. Word of mouth is a great way for podcasts to get new listeners. And if you don't mind publishing your feelings, a free way to support the show is by leaving a five-star rating and review on your podcast app. It's a chance to tell me what you love about the show, and it helps others discover it too. Finally, if you're so inclined, you can show your appreciation for my work by clicking the support link at the bottom of the show notes to go to my Buy Me a Coffee page. Thanks for all of your feedback and support. Now back to the show. Steve, why don't you tell us about your crew? Um, because I think maybe you're one of those people that stole staff. And you've got the the alumni crew.

SPEAKER_03 33:58

Yeah. Yeah. So um when I decided that I wanted to do this race, um, Michelle, who has been on four out of the five Ultraman that I've done, she's she's always right there with me. She said, Of course I'll be there for you. And um then she had a great idea. She said, well, let me back up a minute. So part of the reason I'm doing the five races is to bring a bit of the spotlight to the Ultraman brand and really try to highlight the experience, uh, at least from the inside.

SPEAKER_06 34:37

Right.

SPEAKER_03 34:37

So people can kind of really get an idea of what it's all about. They can follow my story and they can kind of see um see everything that's involved. And it's not so much about setting any records or personal best, but really just showcasing the Ultraman races. And so Michelle had this great idea to open it up and see if anybody who maybe is interested in Ultraman wanted to volunteer to be on the crew. Um, you know, I've done enough of these, and Michelle's done enough of these that we can kind of we can get through a race, you know, in many different conditions, and we have done it in many different conditions. So as far as who the individual was, we weren't too worried about someone wanting to join the crew that maybe um would be a detriment to to the team. And so we had Mitch reach out, Mitch Heskett, and Mitch has zero ultraman experience. We don't know him uh other than through Zoom calls, but he lives in the Panhandle in Florida, and he actually knows Chuck from many, many years ago, Chuck Kimeney.

Larry 35:54

The original race director.

SPEAKER_03 35:56

Yeah, yeah. And so not he's not the original race director, he's the second previous to Jen. Yeah. Yes, sorry.

SPEAKER_02 36:06

Sway and Trung were the originals, right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 36:11

So Mitch volunteered to be on the crew um just out of his own generosity, and which is is really amazing. And um, you know, we said we're gonna show you what it's all about. There's no pressure, we'll we'll we'll show you what's involved. And then Carrie uh Mandel, who once again she's been on your podcast um and I coach her. She's actually located in Florida right now, and um I had to I had to take her off of the staff roster. So she can't.

SPEAKER_02 36:44

You actually you actually took you actually took Michelle too. I get I got a text from Michelle asking for permission to crew for killer.

SPEAKER_03 36:52

Yeah. I think that's cur that was a courtesy. They had already said, yeah, we're gonna come back.

SPEAKER_02 36:57

I know. Well, they also know I'm not gonna say no.

SPEAKER_03 37:02

Sure.

unknown 37:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:04

But then you were gonna steal if if so there was a possibility that Shane Duffy was gonna race. So if Shane raced, he was gonna take Carrie. And so then Kelber was gonna take Brian Rainier off my staff. So there was this juggle. We all had to wait to see if Shane is Shane racing or not, because if Shane was racing, it's gonna change everything again.

SPEAKER_03 37:26

I think that's the amazing thing about Ultraman. Um, you know, the listeners of the podcast won't have this list in front of us, but we have a list of all the athletes and the the alum are highlighted, and it's just it looks like a Christmas tree, the number of alum that are volunteering their time to come and crew for athletes, many of them who they don't even know. And it's it's an unbelievable um you know, just experience that goes on that I don't really think you see at any other types of events. Um, you know, I at one point I opened this up. Um I'm sure you guys have heard of the uh Slow Twitch forum, the online forum, which can be both a healthy place for conversation as well as um the opposite.

SPEAKER_06 38:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 38:19

And I went on there and I I invited anyone who wanted to be part of my crew, which was a to me, I was I was like, this is playing with fire, inviting anyone on Slow Twitch to come be part of the crew. And people actually called Ultraman and maybe me personally very selfish for doing these races. Wow. And and to me, I was like, that's exactly what I'm trying to show is that the the people who are part of this race, they want to be here. They're volunteering. It's not it's not a task or a chore for majority of them. But once you're there and once you really feel the vibe that goes on within it, you really get a very different perspective than what it is from the outside. So um while it is, you know, to go back, while it is it is a selfish endeavor to to do any type of race, I think the people who show up and help Jen as staff and volunteer, uh, it's a prime example how you know people really want to be part of this of this race and and these events.

SPEAKER_02 39:30

Yeah, and the green that is showing on this list doesn't even count the alumni that are on the staff that aren't even showing on this list. I haven't counted them up this year, but I think we've got gosh, more than close to 30, 20, 20 something, 30 alumni that are gonna be there. It's pretty incredible.

Larry 39:50

Well, I think just in the cruise alone, you you you're probably getting close to that. Yeah, true. I I saw one that we we kind of uh skipped over with Nick. Um he has a uh his paddler is another alumni from from Arizona a couple years ago.

SPEAKER_02 40:09

Yep. Mohammed caught me. He's actually on our staff too. And he's uh last year we had a lot of great social media and and uh Mohammed was was the man behind the scenes for all of that, and he's gonna be doing it again this year. So he can't do it while he's paddling, but once he's out of the kayak, he's we also um, if we're gonna mention our alumni going back to our 30 30 category, Phil Cuppernel, who's a Florida alumni, he's gonna be paddling for Martin. And then uh we'll get to the ladies, but uh, we've got some alumn more alumni there with the ladies.

SPEAKER_03 40:44

Yeah, and Phil's gonna be doing a six-part documentary series on my journey this year for completing all the races. Phil's a very talented videographer and photographer, so he's going to be following me around at each of the events with his camera, and we've got a lot of exciting things coming. If you guys haven't checked it out yet, we just released the trailer to the first episode today on YouTube, and it's under uh it's called First of Five. So uh shout out to Phil and all of his great work, and he's also volunteering an incredible amount of his time, which is amazing.

Larry 41:28

Oh, that's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 41:29

Yeah, he's yeah, he's also on my staff, and I can vouch an awesome photographer.

SPEAKER_03 41:34

Yes, very talented.

Larry 41:37

Well, I'll make sure that that link is also in the show notes for people listening so that uh if they forget the first five, that uh they can go and check that out on YouTube. Thank you. Uh Jen, did we miss any of the uh amazing times that you wanted to talk about? Um well, maybe we should start with you again, Steve. I believe do you not still hold the uh bike record for the combined biking? Jen's website is correct.

SPEAKER_03 42:06

Oh, that's a question. That's a question for Steve King. But um yeah, I think it's there or thereabouts. The course is now, in my opinion, a bit more challenging. Um, it's got when I set that record, it was a little bit flatter. Um and and Jen has reverted the course to put the hills at the back end of day two, which um you know it's super nice, it's super good. It's I think I'm pretty sure when I was finishing day two, as I was coming back to the bike path, which is the last quarter mile of the course, uh Ryan Rainier, who's alum, was standing right there, and the words out of my mouth were next year, I'm not racing, I'm definitely staffed. And that was all because of the challenge of the hills on the back end of the course. And as soon as I said I was doing this race, he brought that to my attention that I told him that. Uh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:11

And I can confirm um Steve does still hold the bike day one and two combined record. 114110, set in 2020.

SPEAKER_03 43:22

Yeah. That was the year I won. Yeah, yeah.

Larry 43:26

And that winning time was 2149.

SPEAKER_01 43:31

Crazy. Just crazy.

Larry 43:35

Yeah. Dude, how Steve, let me ask you this. How how do you feel about like you're obviously going to be the favorite in the race, despite these other people that we've mentioned with fast swims and fast bikes? You're the one with the most experience. You you've you've got the five races. Are are you comfortable with being the favorite going into this?

SPEAKER_03 43:58

Yeah, I'm comfortable with you. You know, the outside perspective, I've really tried to from the internally not focus on the outcome of any individual race, at least the times. Um I'm not coming in at peak fitness because I have to stretch this across the entire year. So I know what my, you know, my boundaries and my guardrails are for what I should be able to push on the bike and on the run. And my goal is to come out of the race unscathed and be able to recover fairly quick. You know, I take in the recover. I've been doing these things for quite a while now. I can recover pretty fast, but I have to keep in mind that there's very little room for error going from Florida to Arizona. It's only five weeks. So yeah, so I I have told my crew, you know, if something happens and I get a mechanical on the bike, I take a wrong turn, we just stop, we take a breath, we chill out, there's no pressure. Right. It's not about speed, it's about completion. But at the same time, I'm not gonna hold back. Like, I'm really glad you told me somebody said that they want to win because now they just put a target on their back. And like it's just, you know, the competitor in me is gonna make sure that that person has a a tough day or three days.

SPEAKER_01 45:26

Of course.

SPEAKER_03 45:28

Um, but yeah, it's definitely not the number one priority is to win, it's to to come in and compete at my best, but also come out ready to rock and roll for Arizona in five weeks. If I was really trying to peak, I wouldn't be in the Bahamas right now. Well, you're not swimming? I swam a thousand yards today, so not not a lot of volume going on.

SPEAKER_02 45:58

And since it's 1201 a.m. there, you're not getting up at three hours to go run.

SPEAKER_03 46:04

Oh, I probably will. You probably will crazy.

SPEAKER_01 46:10

You're crazy.

Larry 46:11

Yeah. Um one other thing of note that I saw in here that I know Steve will be uh grabbing too, um, and that is with um Bemal Patel. He on day one will be celebrating his wedding anniversary on Valentine's Day.

SPEAKER_06 46:29

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_02 46:30

Oh, that's awesome.

Larry 46:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:34

He's got a couple of alumni on his crew, too. He's got uh Roheet and Tyler, who both raced with us previously. So he's got you know some good experience on his crew. So he's got some some inside information from those guys.

Larry 46:51

Um, and I see another alumni in this category, Caroline Bloom, going to be paddling.

SPEAKER_02 46:57

He is, she's on our staff, and she's gonna be paddling for Brian. She comes out every year and either cruised or staffs and paddles, she does everything. Fantastic girl. And please and an incredible, incredible athlete. And she's bringing the youke, and there will be a song at the uh at the awards banquet, and no pressure, but she uh she writes a song for us every year. It's fantastic, it's my favorite part. So moving on to our 50 to 59 category, we've got four gentlemen in that category. We have Alex Alessandre Rizzi from Brazil, Ben Nelson. Oh, Alessandra is 51, Ben is 53. We have Jose Fuente Pepe Garcia, he's 54, and we have Ramiro Gutierrez from Mexico, he's 57. Uh, that's that's who Van is gonna be uh crewing for out there.

Larry 47:55

And and he's done two Ultramans in the past uh that I know of. I think he's probably done it in Mexico as well, but I just didn't get around to looking that up. But I know he's done Canada, um, and I believe he's done the world as well.

SPEAKER_03 48:08

If that's I was talking to Van about Ramiro, and I believe he has done 16 ultra distance races, and he will potentially do all five this year.

SPEAKER_02 48:26

Oh, yeah, he has the same goal.

SPEAKER_03 48:29

Yeah, because his goal is to get to 21 total. Yeah, yeah.

Larry 48:35

Yeah, I know in speaking with Van for previewing his race in the past that that name has come up. So um I have not um um got the the memory of Steve King, but I I I know that he definitely has a few under his belt. Um, I know most recently the Canadian one he did in 32 hours. He did have a hard time at the swim at the worlds, Jen. You would know. Um he had a long swim and didn't finish day one, if I remember that correctly. True.

SPEAKER_02 49:07

Uh, but super nice guy. So, you know, when actually Van contacted me, he's like, Ramiro would like to do Florida. This was, you know, right after Worlds. And I was like, Bring him. I like Ramiro. Let's have Ramiro come. Yeah, so I'm looking forward to it. And uh and you know, we want to help people reach their goals. So if he's gonna go for the five, I want to help him go for five.

Larry 49:32

That's awesome. Yeah, yeah. And there's another um experienced racer there in that category as well. Um, and that's uh Alex Rizzy. Uh he's done the race in Brazil, and he's done that in 28 hours. So there's another contender in the race who has the experience at the distance and you know, um a reasonable time at doing it as well.

SPEAKER_06 49:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 49:56

Yeah, so that you know, having the experience of doing the ultra distance, the the 320 or the 515, like there's so much that goes into it that's just logistically, it's not it's not just about how fast can your body go. Yeah, there's so much more than that. And that experience, like people who have done it time and time again, they know you can't go out too fast on any given day because you're just gonna crush your body. And so it's an advantage for sure to have done the distance before. Yeah, and uh other alumni that are helping out, uh Jose Pepe Pepe, uh, he's got Leda Velez and Zach Powell, who are two of our alumni, um, crewing for him, and Zach is gonna be paddling for him. And and that's that's half of the party palace where uh they're all gonna be sharing a house.

SPEAKER_06 51:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 51:02

So moving on to our our final gentleman, uh 60 years young, Duggan Walker. And uh this guy is is is really interesting to me. He has put down a 55-minute swim, which is extremely impressive. I don't know what year he did that, but that is extremely impressive. And um, one of the things he listed that I found really interesting, he ran 52 marathons in 52 weeks in 50 states plus DC and St. Croix, and did all of them under four hours.

SPEAKER_03 51:41

Whoa.

SPEAKER_02 51:42

So logistically to be able to do 50 states is like one state per week is crazy.

SPEAKER_03 51:51

Yeah, where's he based out of? Do you remember?

SPEAKER_02 51:56

Yeah, Tampa. He's a local.

SPEAKER_03 51:58

Wow, that's impressive.

SPEAKER_02 52:00

Yep, very much.

Larry 52:02

Yeah, that is impressive. And he's got 77 Ironmans with with his best Iron Man being a 1010.

SPEAKER_02 52:12

Yeah, he's got some experience. Wouldn't that be fun?

Larry 52:15

At 60 years old, I don't know when he did it. It might have been last week, but uh, you know, he's gonna bring it.

SPEAKER_02 52:21

Yeah, and wouldn't it be fun to have a 60-year-old podium?

SPEAKER_03 52:25

Yeah, I wonder what the record is for does that go to Dan? Is that is he the fastest?

Larry 52:32

Dan has the record for the race.

SPEAKER_03 52:35

Yeah, okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 52:38

So yeah, that's gonna be fun to watch for sure. Yeah. Um, moving on to our ladies, we unfortunately only have two ladies this year, which is the opposite of last year when we had like a million ladies. Uh but the ladies that are coming are awesome. We've got Jen Yui, she's from the Philippines. She's uh got a pro crew. Uh, first of all, her husband's gonna be crewing her, but then she also has the Lotsas, Mary and Randy Lotsa, who have a ton of Ultraman experience.

Larry 53:13

Um they're lots of fun.

SPEAKER_02 53:15

They're lots of fun, that's for sure. Uh Randy was just in Hawaii with me at uh crewing another one of our alumni, Cynthia Bardas, at the Hurt 100, and and he brought out the costumes. And so the lotsas always bring the costumes. So that's gonna be a fun crew.

Larry 53:33

Have you got anything new for this year?

SPEAKER_02 53:36

Do I or do they does Randy?

Larry 53:38

Does he have anything new for this year?

SPEAKER_02 53:40

I'm sure he does. I will be shocked if we didn't. Um, Mary's gonna be paddling for Jen, so Mary's very experienced in paddling. Uh, we no longer put Randy in a kayak because he located his shoulder that one time.

SPEAKER_03 53:58

Yeah, Mary crew for media in Arizona in 2022. Yeah, and she she did an amazing job. So she's they're both very experienced.

SPEAKER_02 54:08

Yeah, so Jen's just in great hands, and I know they've been communicating a lot ahead of time. So and then our other, so Jen is 37 years old, and then our second female is Nuria Sanchez, and she is 42 years old, and she is crewed by alumni as well. This is the other half of the Party Palace. Uh, she's crewed by Fiona Similink and Simon Shuri. And Simon's gonna be doing the paddling for her. So, and again, two very, very experienced alumni who know everything there is to know about racing in Ultraman. So um both of those ladies are in super good hands. It's gonna be fun to watch them battle it out.

Larry 54:49

Yeah, and and it looks like it will be a battle, even though there's only two of them. Looking at their stats, I saw that um we have Nuria with a 1324 PB at the Iron Man. Uh, but she also has the experience of a marathon de Sab. So she's a lot of something extra. And then Jen's um PB is right near there at uh 1241. Um and she has a Oh I've got her.

SPEAKER_02 55:15

I I've got her credit at 1225.

Larry 55:18

Oh, 12. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 55:20

Yeah. So yeah, they're both they're both very strong athletes for sure.

SPEAKER_06 55:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 55:28

They've both got rock star crew. I mean, they're that that's about as even on paper when it comes to their times and the amount of experience they have for their crew. That's gonna be very interesting just to see them, you know, whether they're competing against each other or just you know, competing against themselves, they've that's both of their stories are gonna be amazing by the by the end of the three days.

SPEAKER_02 55:53

Yeah, for sure. It'd be fun if those two ladies were close in in the race, so that those crews could be close together. Because there's there's gonna be a lot of crew fun on this one. There's there's a lot of really fun alumni crew going out there.

SPEAKER_03 56:09

Yeah, it's it's impressive.

SPEAKER_02 56:12

And of course, we are gonna have the the annual crew contest. I haven't decided what it's gonna be. We've been doing a scavenger hunt the past few years, and that's been uh pretty fun, so we might do that. I can't I can't give up any information because Keller would have the advantage.

SPEAKER_03 56:28

So my crew never gets a chance to do the scavenger hunt. We're moving too fast.

SPEAKER_02 56:34

I know you need to you need to slow down. Your crew needs to have more fun.

SPEAKER_03 56:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:41

Um there's a couple a couple fun facts that I definitely wanted to mention. Um, this this group of athletes, they they are animal lovers. Uh, besides Mr. Killer, speaking of animals, sorry about that. I'm dog sitting. I ask people what pets do you have because I I learn a lot when people tell me about their pets. Because some of them will say, I have two dogs here or their names. Other people will write me like a book about their animals. It's really interesting. But this group has a really huge variety of animals. Uh I was gonna say, Mr. Keller the Veterinarian, uh, they have a guinea pig, a tortoise named Taco, and a dog. But there are people that have thoroughbred racehorses, regular horses, uh, lots more dogs. There's someone with a really nice reef of fish tank. There's a beta fish, there's cats, and there are 13 chickens. Now I have to give a shout out. I have to give a shout-out to Curtis Linahan. Curtis doesn't have any pets, but he has five kids. And I think that counts for way more than 13 chickens. So I had to give him a shout out with his five kids. It's a lot of kids.

SPEAKER_03 57:58

A few of them have to be feral animals.

SPEAKER_02 58:01

Probably, yeah. And then uh I wanted to test you guys, uh, especially Keller. I wanted to see, I I also asked in their application, what's your favorite food? And so we have a tie for the number one favorite food. I want to see if either of you can guess the favorite food.

SPEAKER_03 58:22

I was gonna say pizza, but he but Larry Larry already said pizza, so um. Can you give me a clue? Is it a dessert or um an entree?

SPEAKER_02 58:39

Well, it's an entree and a dessert because it's tied for first.

SPEAKER_03 58:43

Oh goodness. All right. Let's go with uh I'll go with ice cream.

SPEAKER_02 58:50

Ice cream is tied for first. Good job. Okay, the other, the other is steak. We had a lot of steak lovers, just straight up steak.

SPEAKER_06 58:59

Glad it wasn't chicken and rice.

SPEAKER_02 59:01

And then no, it wasn't chicken and rice. However, in second place, tied for second place, fried chicken, and uh Keller's favorite, chicken wings.

SPEAKER_03 59:11

Chicken wings, yeah. Think about chicken wings three nights in a row here in the Bahamas.

SPEAKER_02 59:17

Oh, do they like them in the Bahamas?

SPEAKER_03 59:19

Yeah, they're good.

SPEAKER_02 59:21

Yeah, so overall, a really great group of people. It looks like we've got um, it's gonna be a fast one, I think. Um, although, you know, we always love our back at the packers. Remember, if you are the final official finisher, you get the Gatorbait award. Which is the coveted award. Well, if you come in last, yeah, you should get a prize for that. And so um uh we came up with the Gatorbait Award. There are no alligators in our lake. Said no one ever. There are alligators in every lake in Florida, but we've never seen an alligator in our lake.

Larry 1:00:02

That's not what Caroline says.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:04

Caroline is so scared of alligators, she's unreasonably scared of alligators. No, so whoever uh whoever comes in last, official finisher, they're gonna get a special alligator to take home with them. And it's a really cool one this year. It's different from what I've done in the past.

Larry 1:00:25

Oh, good, good, good, good.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:27

Well, uh not that you should shoot for last place, but at least you're getting something. Exactly.

Larry 1:00:34

Yeah. Uh I want to thank you guys for coming in and doing this race preview and giving the listeners a chance to get to know obviously all the alumni and all the racers that are coming and give them a little heads up so that we can follow them on February 14th to the 16th. Uh, Jen, what's going to be our best way to follow the race?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:55

Best way to follow is gonna be Instagram uh and Facebook. We're gonna be going live. I'm pretty sure we go live on Instagram. Mohammed's in charge of that department, but I'm pretty sure we go live on Instagram and it might feed into our Facebook page. Um, but there will be posts on both for sure. Um, yeah, that's gonna be the your best way to follow. And then we're gonna, you know, the results will be up on the website uh every night. No, they won't be on the website every night. They'll be on Facebook every night and Instagram every night. And then once the race is completed, they will be up on the website.

Larry 1:01:33

When they're official.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:35

And I have a I have when they're official. And I have a feeling we might be updating some records this year. There's some fast people.

Larry 1:01:44

No pressure, Steve.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:46

Yeah. I hope she wasn't thinking about me.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:50

That was not, I was actually not thinking about you.

Larry 1:01:56

Uh Steve, I especially appreciate you coming uh and taking time out of your vacation in the Bahamas to join us uh late night. So uh thanks again for coming. And uh we'll be watching your YouTube journey to see how this goes. Um once again, what was the name of that YouTube uh that we're gonna look for?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:16

Yep, so it's called First of Five. And we have we're on Instagram and YouTube. Uh we just released the trailer, first trailer today. Um also throwing it out there if if there are particular things that anybody wants to see us document along the way of the journey, you can uh send us a message on Instagram. But Phil's gonna keep that account active and updated uh probably every day as we move along. So you guys can find us on first to five. All right.

Larry 1:02:48

Well, thanks, guys. I really appreciate it. Uh it's been great catching up with you. And um for everybody that is uh listening right now, we uh we've we've done our wrap on the Ultraman Florida race preview. And uh just check it out February 14th to the 16th on Instagram and Facebook. Thanks, guys.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:06

Thanks, Larry. Thanks, Larry.

Larry 1:03:09

And Jen wanted me to let you know that the applications are open for 2026 Ultraman Florida. If you've been inspired by what you've heard today or what you've seen at the race when you follow along. Stay tuned. Coming up, I have my conversation with my athlete in profile for this race, Nick Gilimbardo. Today I have an athlete in profile for the upcoming Ultraman Florida happening February 14th through the 16th. This athlete had completed just one Iron Man race when he was accepted to Florida, but he knew that Ultra was the path he wanted to follow. He's been a longtime listener of the podcast and has been taking in all of the advice that is offered here. He does have a growing resume of Ultra runs. I'm happy to introduce to you this rookie joining me from the forest city of Cleveland, Ohio, Nick Gillombardo. Welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:21

Thanks, Larry. It's great to be on, and I appreciate you giving me this opportunity to share my story.

Larry 1:04:27

Yeah, well, I'm I'm really happy to have you on as well. Um the athletes and profile are an important part, I think, of introducing the athletes to the rest of the audience and finding out what everybody's all about. Sometimes we have people that are a little more well-known, they've been around the scene for a bit. Other times I like to bring in new people so that we can be introduced to them as well. So um happy to have you here. Thanks for coming along. Um, I want to ask you a couple questions about Cleveland first, since uh that's the area you're in. I I know you're close to Cleveland at least. Um favorite team, Browns, Cavaliers, Guardians?

SPEAKER_04 1:05:08

I am the tribe all day long. So I'm a baseball fan through and through. That is my my sport that I follow the most.

Larry 1:05:17

So the baseball fan, okay. Um, I I think maybe we'll get into a little bit more of that as well later. But um, and how about the thing that Cleveland's probably most known for? The rock and roll hall of fame. How what's your experience with that?

SPEAKER_04 1:05:33

You know what? I I've only been there probably two or three times in my life. Um, I I think people underestimate not just the rock and roll scene, but the food scene. The food in Cleveland is so underrated. Uh it is an amazing place to visit if you've never been.

Larry 1:05:55

I have never been, and it is definitely one of the places that I want to get to. Um And the the other reason I want to get there, there's something else there that I want to see. Um, I'm gonna share this with you. Hopefully, it comes up on the camera. And this is my holiday sweater, and I love it. So I right now for the listeners, I'm holding up my ugly sweater, which is the leg lamp from a Christmas story. And my understanding is that a Christmas story, the house, is there in the Cleveland area as well.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:29

It is, it's right near uh the Tremont area, and I I've I've been there before. You can drive past it any day. It it is exactly what it looks like in the movie. Hasn't changed. And is that a major tourist attraction? I would say it's definitely major when it comes to you know the Christmas season. Um that's definitely you know what we celebrate. It's Christmas story 24/7. Um, another great area um for Christmas activity is Castle Noel uh out in Medina, and they have a bunch of um memorabilia from a bunch of Christmas movies, including the van or the RV from uh Christmas Vacation. So it's incredible, it's it's a lot of fun stuff there.

Larry 1:07:17

Cool, that's cool. I'm definitely gonna have to get down to Cleveland then and check this stuff out.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:22

Yeah, highly recommend it.

Larry 1:07:24

Yeah. Um, I said in the beginning that you have been a longtime listener of the podcast, and I like to follow back the people that are you know following the podcast. So I noticed recently that uh in the lead up to this Ultraman race, you have been doing some more long distance races, but more importantly, you had a little bit of an incident with a deer. Can you can you tell us about what happened with the deer when you're out training?

SPEAKER_04 1:07:52

Sure. Uh it was uh a typical Saturday or Sunday morning, I can't remember which. And I went out for a century ride. That was the plan. And I was coming over the crest of this one hill and approaching a stop sign at the bottom. And I was only eight miles into this into this ride, and I noticed there were a couple deer um that were starting to cross the street, and I was about 50 yards out or so, so I figured okay, I got plenty of time before they start walking the rest of the way, and they started proceeding to cross the street, and I got closer to where they were standing originally, and a third deer appeared. The third deer and I locked eyes, and it was truly a deer and headlights situation where it did not move, and I remember pressing on my front brake, and it went dark. The next thing I remember is waking up on the side of the road talking to these, you know, good Samaritans to see what was going on and if I was okay.

Larry 1:09:05

Oh yeah. And did they see your accident or did they come upon you afterwards?

SPEAKER_04 1:09:11

They found me um afterwards. They heard it, they were actually walking on a trail nearby, walking their dogs, and they lived in the area, and they heard everything happen. And so they rushed over and saw me. And, you know, after talking with them a few weeks after the accident, um, they filled in a lot of the uh a lot of the gaps and told me that you know I was repeating a lot of what I was saying, and you know, God bless them. They they really are my guardian angels. Um shout out to you know Dale and Christy for being there and doing above and beyond you know what I could have ever asked for.

Larry 1:09:53

And and so do you're not aware exactly of what happened? You just figure like you went over the handlebars, or did you hit a deer? Didn't what happened?

SPEAKER_04 1:10:03

So I I don't think I hit the deer. Um, I think that what happened was I I pressed on my front bait braked a little too hard, and I think I went splat right onto the pavement. Oh right forward. I didn't fly or anything like that. I just went splat and my my helmet, my shoulder, my face took the blunt force of it all, and I had a lot of damage, to say the least.

Larry 1:10:30

Yeah, and it sounds like you had a concussion from the way you were talking to the Good Samaritans. Um everybody listening right now is gonna want to know, you know, more importantly, was your bike okay?

SPEAKER_04 1:10:44

It was unscathed. I don't know how it possibly was perfectly fine. Oh not even the chain popped off. So it was perfect, which was honestly a godsend because I don't want to pay for another bike.

Larry 1:11:00

So you'll be riding the same bike.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:02

I'll be riding that same exact bike for the race.

Larry 1:11:05

Yeah, I assume you got a new helmet though.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:08

Absolutely, yeah. I I was able to see what the damage was on the original helmet and definitely needed anyone.

Larry 1:11:16

Yeah, yeah. So with that in mind and um, you know, the recovery from that, uh, I'm sure it's it set you back a little bit in what you were hoping your training plan to be. Um, are you feeling confident approaching the race a couple weeks away now?

SPEAKER_04 1:11:34

I would say when it first happened, I thought it was done. I I didn't think I even stood a chance of towing the line. And it wasn't until maybe three or four weeks after the accident that I even started training back up again in some manner. And just going out for a couple of training rides on, you know, just my my cycling trainer, my my Wahoo kicker, and then a couple, you know, runs around the neighborhood, I felt a little bit more confident in testing the waters. And then in November, I really kind of just said, this is my shot. I don't know if I can do another year of this kind of training and you know, this kind of involvement, because it it is a it's a lot, and and I can't underestimate that to everyone listening. It is a big undertaking for everyone involved. Um, but yeah, I I think that's when it kind of gave me some sort of confidence where I could start back up and really increase my training uh to where it needed to be so that I have any shot to finish you know that race, you know, come race day.

Larry 1:12:51

Yeah. And and when you say for everybody involved, I assume you're talking about your your family or training partners or coaches and things like that.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:00

Absolutely. Yeah, I mean it's every aspect of life, right? It's it's you know, family, work, your your own personal, you know, mental health, you know, when it comes down to it. There's a lot to balance, and you know, if you can't maintain that equilibrium across all those, there's a lot of things that suffer, and maintaining that balance has just been one of those you know eye-opening experiences along the way, but it's it's been very challenging.

Larry 1:13:31

And and you've been training for this now for quite some time. Like you've you're you're not the person who's like, oh, I'm gonna do a year and get into it. You've been looking at this race for quite a while. Um, when was it back when you did your Louisville Iron Man and then realized I need to go ultra? What year was that?

SPEAKER_04 1:13:52

Well, in Louisville, that was actually 2015. And I was able to, you know, do that, and I figured, well, what's next? And for a period of time, I didn't know what to do. You know, I I was almost in this autopilot mode um for quite some time where I did, you know, a few races here and there, but nothing of that kind of distance. But I I knew I wanted to do something more, and there was an opportunity in you know 2021, um, and probably a story we we can get into with the uh the Iron Cowboy James Lawrence, where I went to Utah and was able to participate in part of the Conquer 100 that event that he did. And that's when I knew I I had to hit the reset button for myself and really set my my goal for the next next big thing. And that's when it really, you know, set my eyes on this race and something that I really wanted to conquer. So 2021 was when I really had my eyes um, you know, really triggered on on this event.

Larry 1:14:55

Yeah. And and what was your um connection with the Iron Cowboy? Were you just following the the journey? Or I I I think you got actually involved with some of the running.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:07

Yeah. Um, so back in 2014, he was actually doing the 50-50-50, which was 50 consecutive Iron Man distances in all 50 states in 50 consecutive days. And when he came to Ohio, I I had you know the privilege and and you know opportunity to go to where he was because it was relatively nearby. Um, it's actually where I typically train, you know, from trail running. And so I was able to go to the rec center where he was swimming, and I did the full swim with him because I was in the middle of training for my first Iron Man. Um, I wasn't able to do the bike portion because I didn't feel confident at that point, but then I was able to do the full marathon with him in that same that same day, and so that was kind of like the introductory uh for you know my I guess my in-awe or inspiration of of this kind of endurance. And then he decided to do another Conquer 100, which was a hundred consecutive iron distances, um, in in Utah, in basically in his own backyard, right? And so that's when I was able to go out and fly out to Utah and participate three consecutive days, uh, three or three full marathons back to back to back.

Larry 1:16:23

And and so this has been one of the major inspirations for you, and I'm sure that's what one of the purposes of what he was doing was to inspire more people like you to get out and and and make that next leap, that jump to the next thing.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:38

Yeah, and it was great to see because there was a such a big community behind that event. And and I think one of the best things that came out from that is there are people from all over of all different you know talents. You know, some people I'm sure could you know run a sub-three-hour marathon if they wanted to, but the vast majority of those that actually were there were people that were just walking, and it was because he was also walking because I mean he was in rough shape, yeah. And so, but it got to build a community and meet the people around you, and that's actually when I I met a fellow Ultraman uh alumni and uh Reed Brasco. I'll shout out to him. He was training for 2021 uh Ultraman Florida, and so I got to talk to him, and it was like just one of those other aha moments of maybe this is something I I would want to do.

Larry 1:17:35

Yeah. So so then in 2021, you started looking into what you would have to do in order to do it, and uh I I think that's also when you you came across the podcast, is that right?

SPEAKER_04 1:17:47

That's exactly right. Yeah, I was looking for something to motivate me and kind of get me embedded into what this event was all about. And the 515 Ultra Podcast was the perfect avenue. I mean, I I was you know there from season one and and listening in and just listening to the different stories and the different you know personalities that are across this event and and really the the purpose and value behind this race, which I think resonates the most with me, and and looking, you know, having that family behind you to really support you in your dreams and your and your aspirations. And so, you know, listening from day one has kind of kept me embedded into that that story, that that overarching, you know, family connection. And it's it's been a very good you know atmosphere to be around.

Larry 1:18:45

Yeah, that's awesome. I'm glad I'm glad that the the purpose of this podcast is serving its purpose to you and and to others. Um not to sound too self-serving, but do you have a favorite interview you've heard, or what is the best advice you've heard that you've already put into place, or that you're like, if I didn't know that, I would have messed that up when I go into Florida?

SPEAKER_04 1:19:08

Yeah, I I think one of the most interesting um ones was Furt Hawk. I mean, the storytelling that he has, his his ability to really just capture the audience is just amazing. And you know, the the number of stories from Burning River to Ultraman, or I'm sorry, not Burning River, Bad Badwater, it's just remarkable of the people that he's met are along the way, and it's very inspiring, but it's also just just a wow factor for for many. Um, and I would say one of the other earlier ones, and I'm gonna I'm I can't even pronounce his name, but he was climbing all the various summits uh across Makoto. Yeah, Makoto. So funny. I mean, you can't just be help but be captured into that conversation because of of his personality.

Larry 1:20:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:05

So those kind of interviews is really what draws, I think, the audience in. Um, but the advice I would say is you know, simple things like the handoffs on the bike or attaching a string to the water bottle uh during the swim so the kayaker can pull it back in. You know, things like that I think resonates the most, and things I wouldn't really think of if I were doing this first time, no way, no experience, no background at all.

Larry 1:20:37

Yeah. Um when we were talking about the beginning, and I said that you have the um you've done some bigger races now because you had done just the one Iron Man. Um, I know you were doing a lot of trail races and stuff like that, some 50 milers and stuff like that, and and you've bumped that up. Um you and you when you were meant to say Badwater, you said Burning River a little earlier. I know that's a race you've done. What is the Burning River race?

SPEAKER_04 1:21:09

So the Burning River is a hundred-mile trail race. There's also a 50-mile option, front and back half. Um, it's in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. It's a beautiful area. Again, one of the best parts of you know the outskirts of Cleveland. I highly recommend it. Um, but that is brought on by Vertical Runner as well as Western Reserve Trail Racing, um, Crooked River. It's it's just a well-put event. It's in the heat of July with high humidity, but thankfully a lot of that race is under the canopy of the trees. Um, so it's a beautiful event, but it it there are parts where it really you know kicks you down a little bit. And I remember for that event when I was running, I was at mile 60, and my sister was pacing me, and I started to form blisters at the on the pads of both of my feet, and for 40 miles I had excruciating pain on both of my feet.

Larry 1:22:18

And that race, if if I understand correctly, was also the thing that helped you out after you did your Iron Man, because up to Iron Man, that was kind of the the goal. That was like the thing you were gonna do. And so you had that post-race blues of now what? And and you were able to use that ultra as part of your recovery from the now what moment of oh I did what I supposed to do, what what's next, and those blues that come on. Um, how how was it that that served you? And more importantly, what have you lined up for the post-race blues that are gonna come after finishing Ultramat?

SPEAKER_04 1:23:03

So the Burning River 100, I I always wanted to have a 100-mile bucket list kind of trail race under my belt. I I I figured that I would do 100k before that and then a hundred miles, you know, thereafter. And I was able to do the 100k uh pools trail race um this past past year, and that was kind of that stepping stone of there's something in my target, something in my sights, and Ultraman was a little bit too far away to kind of bridge that gap. And so I would say that really gave me a pathway to just say, okay, there's something on the horizon, um, so that I I was able to occupy myself and my mind, and because I am not somebody that likes to sit still, um, as I'm sure many of us don't. And Burning River 100 was that next thing after that. And so I've always wanted to make sure that I had that checkbox next to it. But after Ultra Man, Florida, I I I say this now, I'm sure, but I definitely want to take a break over at least two to three weeks of just nothing. Um I do have some goals on the mind. Um, probably something like a uh 24-hour event or a kind of a backyard ultra, I think would be kind of up my alley. But for now, nothing nothing too crazy, but I I'm gonna take my time.

Larry 1:24:36

That's fair, that's fair. Although at the finish line, you might be asking Jen if you can sign up for Ultraman Arizona in six weeks after that, and or come back to Florida right away. It's once it's in your blood.

SPEAKER_04 1:24:50

That might be the case, but right now I I am man, I am on the edge. I I am I I will say that one of the biggest things from this journey has been I feel like I've already accomplished everything before even towing the start line. And I think that's where you know the journey is really where you get the most out of it. And I've learned so much about myself and you know the sacrifices that I've made, my family have made, you know, it's there's a lot to it, and I I I can't underestimate and that enough, and I respect the hell out of every person that even wants to think about towing the start line because if they do, I know what they've gone through, and I can not just express my utmost respect for what they put put in to get to that finish line.

Larry 1:25:53

Yeah. And and you're talking about your family as well. What's your family situation? I I think you have some young kids, wife, young kids.

SPEAKER_04 1:26:01

I do. So my wife Carrie, uh, her and I have been married almost eight years, and we have two young boys, Benjamin, who's six, and Leo, who is almost four.

Larry 1:26:12

Okay. And so the your journey has been going as long as you've had Leo, then. Exactly. Yeah, he has seen the whole thing. Yeah, does he have any idea of what he's seeing? Does he does he watch you on your trainer? Does he like know what's going on?

SPEAKER_04 1:26:33

I I think he knows to a degree because he he'll see me on my bike on the trainer in the basement while he watches like Power Rangers or something like that. Um, but I would say that you know, I'll come up from you know the basement where the trainer is, or I'll come back from a run and he'll ask me, Did did you go for a bike ride, or did you go for a run? He doesn't understand how far or how long, but he knows uh daddy likes to run and bike and swim.

unknown 1:27:00

Yeah.

Larry 1:27:01

And does he know that that's not every daddy? That's that's only his daddy that does that. The other kids, their dads aren't doing that?

SPEAKER_04 1:27:08

I don't think uh he realizes that. I'm I'm sure my oldest Ben, he probably kind of understands it a little bit more. Figuring it out. Um, but but yeah, it's it's definitely not common.

Larry 1:27:21

Yeah. And will Carrie be coming to crew? With are the kids coming? Do you have someone babysitting them? What's going on in that situation?

SPEAKER_04 1:27:29

Yeah, so my dad and I are gonna uh drive down there, and my my wife and two kids, and my in-laws, and my mom, and my sister, who's actually gonna be my crew chief, and my nephew are gonna fly down. And and so my sister and my my wife Carrie is are going to be my my crew. Oh, perfect. That's good.

Larry 1:27:51

And in the meantime, all the grandparents are looking after the kids.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:55

Bingo, you got it.

Larry 1:27:58

Oh, that's great. Um Um now I was looking at your um information for your work as well, and I saw that throughout all of this um you you ended up getting a promotion. So why not throw more work into more training? What is it that you do and um and and how has that been uh balancing?

SPEAKER_04 1:28:24

Yeah, so about a year ago I was able to get uh another promotion to be finance director of a uh kind of a major hospital system here in northeast Ohio. And it's been a great opportunity, um, but to your point, it doesn't you know come with less work by any means. It's more role, more responsibility, a lot more to manage. And so it's it's been hard, um, especially over the past few months, is our busiest season uh with budgets and you know, figuring out the next year, and there's just a lot of detail that goes into it. Our team has gone through a number of transitions, and so really trying to take that in and setting the culture that we want our organization to be has been a challenge in itself. Um, and and managing that along with you know my family life, but also with the training behind it that is required to do this kind of event, right? It's it's all encompassing.

Larry 1:29:32

And I I asked this because we like to get to know the whole athlete, but um in the rest of your spare time, what what what kind of hobbies do you have? What do you do when you're not training and raising children and trying to get ahead in your career?

SPEAKER_04 1:29:51

Well, I did. Um not anymore, but but right now I would say, you know, when I do have time, um, I I enjoy collecting the baseball cards. Um, you know, I'm putting together a uh a 1958 baseball tops set um that's taken you know three and a half years, four years to put together, and I'm you know 85% of the way there. Um but occasionally I like to do that or you know enjoy you know small glass of bourbon on the side, but yeah, simple.

Larry 1:30:26

And and why that particular set, the 1958 top set. What is it about that one? Is it related to Cleveland by chance?

SPEAKER_04 1:30:35

So that is Roger Maris's um rookie card for when he was on the Cleveland Indians, uh, and so not many people realize that because he was primarily a Yankee, but he was the home run record breaker uh of Babe Ruth. So that that rookie card just kind of drew my my love of it and kind of just wanted to say, Well, I got this card, might as well get all the others.

Larry 1:30:59

So you have that one.

SPEAKER_04 1:31:01

I have that one, absolutely. That was my first one of the set.

Larry 1:31:04

Oh wow, and then so um, how hard is it to acquire these cards then? Like, are is there one out there that you know is like I'm not getting that one? It's I can't afford it, it's too hard, there's not enough of them left.

SPEAKER_04 1:31:21

Yeah, so my set is actually graded, so it's it's not a raw or ungraded card, so they're all kind of encapsulated into kind of like a protector, and they're graded on a scale of one through ten. Typically, I have around like an eight uh grade of six or seven, um, but there's five hundred and thirty-five cards in the set, um, if not more now. And there's one card in particular, uh, for Pancho Herrera, it's an error card where there was a printing error uh when it was being printed, and there was only so many that they printed before it was actually caught. And so there's very few in circulation that are graded, and that is the white whale of that set.

Larry 1:32:04

And what would someone have to pay to get one of those if they could find it?

SPEAKER_04 1:32:08

Depending on the grade. Um, I think one recently went to auction. Um, that was probably a graded six, maybe a seven, and that was about six or seven thousand dollars.

unknown 1:32:19

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_04 1:32:20

So that is probably outside of my my range. So if anything, I'll get a very, very low-end one.

Larry 1:32:27

Right.

SPEAKER_04 1:32:28

Yeah.

Larry 1:32:29

Well, good luck on getting that set completed.

SPEAKER_04 1:32:32

I appreciate it.

Larry 1:32:33

Yeah. Um, let's go back a little bit in time. Um, what what sort of things brought you to triathlon? Usually there's a person that introduces you, or maybe you were good at one of the disciplines back in high school or college or something. What what brought you to to the sport of triathlon?

SPEAKER_04 1:32:56

So it actually started with running for me first. Um my high school journey wasn't the best. Um, I I I wouldn't say it was you know severe bullying or anything like that, but you know, definitely a lot more of like emotional type of bullying. Um, and I I just wasn't in a great state of mind uh in my in my high school, you know, academia. And so near the end of it, I really wanted to kind of branch out and experience new things. Um, but it got to a point where I was actually at a very low place in my life. And my sister um kind of took me out to uh the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, actually, and we just talked. And at that moment, uh she had actually mentioned that she had recently done a 10K, the Cleveland 10K, and she challenged me to do it as well. And so over the you know, two or three months uh leading up to it, I started training for it, and as soon as I completed that first 10K race, I was hooked. And after that, it was just what else can I do?

Larry 1:34:08

And and how old were you at that time?

SPEAKER_04 1:34:11

I was 17 or 18 at that time, yeah.

Larry 1:34:15

Okay. And and you you say that you weren't in a in a good place, you had some bullying going on or whatever it is. Um, I don't want to delve too deep into that, but I did see that you're also doing a fundraiser with this race, and you've been posting about that in your Facebook as well, um, related to mental health. Um, so can you can you tell us what your fundraiser is? Um, I'll put in a link later for people that want to maybe join in with you, but tell us what it is and and why you chose that one.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:47

Yeah, so I'm I'm actually doing a fundraiser for NAMI, which is the National Alliance on Mental Health, uh Mental Illness. And the reason I chose that is because I I you know later in my endurance athlete kind of career, I guess you call it, I wanted to start raising awareness for something. And I wanted to find something or some campaign or some charity that resonated closely with me. And because I know I've been dealing with mental you know health, you know, throughout my entire life, as many, many of us do, we just don't really bring a lot of attention to it. Um, and a lot of people don't know that there are resources available to them. Um, it's just a matter of looking them up and and and really trying to figure out what can I what can I use to find help. And NAMI does an excellent job in uh providing that guidance, that help and statistics and really kind of removing the stigma on mental health issues. You know, me personally, I deal with a lot of anxiety and stress, and this has been an outlet for me, and this is my best way to kind of bring back a little bit, you know, that I've benefited from and offer resources or at least information to those that need it as well.

Larry 1:36:16

Oh, excellent, excellent. And do you have a specific um connection, like a web page or a place where people could donate in your name if they wanted to for this race?

SPEAKER_04 1:36:26

I do, and and I don't really have much of a social media presence. Um, but yeah, I absolutely do have a dedicated link where I've been trying to post uh various updates along my journey. Um a lot of the you know write-up ones have been a little bit challenging throughout that that time as training has commenced, but I I've been trying to do various video journals as well. That's also on my Facebook uh page.

Larry 1:36:51

Okay, great. And I know um in speaking with Jen earlier in this episode that there is also another um athlete who's fundraising for NAMI. And in the past, um in season four, we had Heidi Buttery on, and she was a NAMI um uh fundraiser as well, and she's a major mental health advocate. Um, she has a whole website of all those links and stuff like that you've been talking about. I don't know if you had a chance to listen to that episode or look up her connections.

SPEAKER_04 1:37:23

Yeah, I I actually, if I'm not mistaken, I think I actually I I vividly remember listening to that episode because it resonated very closely with me. And if I'm not mistaken, I think I actually shared her website into one of my posts just to give additional information and guidance for those that are looking for it.

Larry 1:37:42

Excellent. There's the Ohana. You got it. All the connections. That's great. Um, all right, so we're um we're getting close to the race. Um what's what's the thing that you're maybe most nervous about, or what's the thing that's giving you some jitters?

SPEAKER_04 1:38:00

I would say the thing that's giving me the most anxiety are things outside of my control. Um whether it be weather or bike mechanic, you know, that kind of stuff is definitely worrying me the most, but I think the the day that's scaring me the most physically is going to be the run. And I think it's primarily because my depending on how well I'm able to balance the level of effort in the first two days, I just hope my legs aren't completely thrashed by the time I have to tow the third day.

Larry 1:38:36

Right. Well, you've listened to enough of these to know how to balance that out and not to uh go too hard on day two. Um get yourself to the finish line without a mechanical, and and day three is is is all you and you've got the trail race experiences now. So I think if you get there, you will get through it in the in the time allotted, no problem.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:00

I am very hopeful.

Larry 1:39:05

Well, uh Nick, thank you very much for coming to the podcast and uh letting us find out a little bit about you and your family and your training and your journey. Um, for people that want to support NAMI, maybe um they were thinking about doing it anyway. I'll throw up that link and they can do it in in your name and help support you in this Ultraman journey as well. So thank you very much for coming on the podcast.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:30

Thank you. And Larry, thank you for everything you do for promoting this sport and this family, because like I said, it's been a major part of my own, you know, training and and journey uh and getting embedded into this family. So not even towing the start line yet, and I already feel like I'm there.

Larry 1:39:49

That's awesome. I'm glad that's happened for you and uh good luck at the race February 14th to the 16th.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:56

Thank you.

Larry 1:39:57

All right.