Latest / Hurdle with Emily Abbate / 222. Sarah Sturm, Pro Cyclist

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222. Sarah Sturm, Pro Cyclist · Hurdle with Emily Abbate

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: You learn so much more from those low spots than
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: you do from like the glory moments.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: Hey, everybody, EMILYA Badi here. You are listening to episode
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: two hundred and twenty two. We love a nice even
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: number of hurdle a while on this focused podcast where
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: I connect with everyone from your favorite athletes to top
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: experts in industry CEOs about their highest highs, toughest moments, and.
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: Everything in between.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: We all go through hurdles in life, and my goal
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: through these discussions is to empower you to better navigate
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: yours and move with intention so that you can stride
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: towards your own big potential and of course have some
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: fun along the way. For today's episode, I am excited
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: to bring you my convo with Sarah Stern.
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: She is a pro cyclist and bike racer.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: Who made the decision not all that long ago, to
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: leave a career in graphic design to follow her passions
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: on two wheels. Sarah and I have a really interesting
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: conversation about the discrepancies let's call them, within male and
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: female cycling and how a lot of women in this
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: sport in particular had other careers before making the transition
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: into the saddle full time. She shed some light on
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: why that might be and also shares her hopes for
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: the future of the sport. Funnily enough, Sarah and I
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: happened to share the same motto, which is too good,
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: and we have a really beautiful chat on what that
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: looks like in our day to day. And of course
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: I could not have a pro cyclist on the show
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: without asking her for her best practice cycling tips. So
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: Sarah's offering up a lot of really helpful information on
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: everything that you need to know to feel successful on
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: the bike, arranging from the thing that you shouldn't be
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: wearing under your vibs to her full proof way to
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: enjoy the ride more every single time.
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: Loved this conversation.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: Sarah's energy is electric in full transparency. I learned of
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: Sarah and started following Sarah after I saw her gorgeous
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: new kit that she made in collaboration with Rapa, following
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: that in the show notes. But Yeah, loved this combo.
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: Loves Sarah's energy and I have her to think now
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: for encouraging me to finally take an Enneagram personality test.
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: I did it on this website called Trudy dot com.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: That's t r U. I t y not sponsored, but.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: Ironically enough, I am exactly what she guessed that I
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: would be and my mind is kind of blown. For
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: more on this, what an enneagram test is and all
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: that stuff, we chat about it in today's episode, So
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: stay tuned as for a little housekeeping and make sure
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: you're following along with Hurdle over on the social at
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: Hurdle podcast.
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: I am over at Emily a Body and if.
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: You have yet to subscribe, you can find a link
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: to do that in the show notes. We would love,
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: love love to be in your inbox every Friday with
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: a lot of the same motivation and inspiration you love
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: from the show. Subscribing is free, although there is an
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: option to donate or support. I love you all the same,
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: regardless of what you choose to do. Also in the
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: show notes links to the events that I have coming
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: up in both London and Chicago this weekend and next weekend.
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: I am so excited to see you if you happen
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: to be in town, make sure you are sv P.
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: I think that's it for now. With that, let's get
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: to a hurdlike today.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: Today, I am sitting down with Sarah stm. She is
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: a pro cyclist. How are you doing today, Sarah.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: Great, did a little walk with my dog this morning
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: and feeling good.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: Feeling good, a little walk with your dog? Where are
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: you and I speaking today? Where are you right now?
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: I'm in Durango, Colorado for just a moment before heading
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: off again to more events. But thus is the life
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: and I'm stoked on it. I do really love where
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: I live. I'm in kind of a smaller mountain town
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: in the southwest corner of Colorado, so pretty close to
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: where I grew up in New Mexico.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: I just need to let you know as we get
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: into this that it seems as though, and I don't
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: want to make any bold assumptions from your Instagram bio,
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: but you and I have a similar vibe in our
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: life motto approach. My family motto is do good, and
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: I've kind of adopted as like be kind as a
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: secondary to that as I've gotten over So we're on
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: the same page here totally.
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's so funny when you like think of
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: like what to put in those little bios, You're like
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: you're trying to be true to yourself, but also like
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: not total marketing or like cheeseball but like those things
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: are really important to me. You know, Like doing good
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: like can mean so many things, and I think in
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: general it means that you're, like you're just trying to
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: be the good version of yourself.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: Right when you right now think about what you're doing
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: and the idea of doing good. What does doing good
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: or the act of doing good look like to you?
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: That's a good question. Actually, It's something that I've thought
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: about a lot this year, especially with the season being
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: a little more challenging emotionally for me, you always question everything,
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: you know, when you're like having a bad time, And
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: the thing that I have come back to is like,
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: at least in my life, like doing good is like
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: just trying to move forward and through which sometimes requires
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: you know, staying still and moving backwards, which none of
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: that makes sense if you actually think about the sentence
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: I just said. But I would say, like doing good
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: is like trying to better yourself, others and the world
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: around you, and like that looks actually very different than
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: the like glorified version that we have in our heads.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: I think everything kind of gets that like Hollywood tint
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: to it sometimes, like you think it can be nicely
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: tied up with you know, a good plot ending or
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: a bow, but really it's like small things.
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: Small things. That's interesting too. Write this idea that we
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: think of doing good and it's like I need to
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: help the homeless, like help people that don't have access
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: to X or Y. You want to do as much
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: good as possible, but realistically, in the everyday sense, like
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: doing good isn't always going to look to that capacity.
• 7:04
  Speaker 3: Doing good is just hopefully being a good human and
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: being kind to other people.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: I know. It's so it's so funny, like I do
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: think like being nice to humans is like the best
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: place to start, and I'm not even gonna stay easiest
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: because sometimes it's super hard. When we bought our hout
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: this is a funny story, but we bought our house
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: a couple of years ago, and my mother in law
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: put this like sign that's like, you know, we accept
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: everybody like kindness, you know whatever, like one of those
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: like just like LGBTQ signs like everything blah blah blah
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: and uh. And every time I drive around with my
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: sister in my car and have like a bit of
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: a road rage moment, like mainly it's just verbal for
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: me where I'm like get out of the way, you're
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: driving too slow or something like that. Hannah's like, wow,
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: your sign really like eyes. You're not a kind person.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: Which if you ever want a humble moment, just have
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: a little sister.
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: She'll paint some she'll shed.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, she'll get a kicked out of this. She does
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: listen to my podcast, which is really supportive and funny.
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: In all this coming and going.
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: Like I mentioned at the top of this pro cyclist,
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: what does that look like for you these days?
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: What a professional cyclist means? At least in my scope.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: There's obviously like lots of different niches you can choose
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: within cycling, from road racing, mountain biking, cycling, crat like,
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: there's tons and I race endurance events on dirt, so
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: that's like endurance mountain bike events, endurance gravel events. Anything
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: that sounds horrible really so like two hundred miles one
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: hundred miles plus usually. And this year there's a new
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: series for I mean really it's the biggest series in
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: the US, which is kind of crazy. It's called the
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: Lifetime Grand Prix. So it's like six races, three mountain
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: bike races, three gravel races over six months of the year,
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: and then at the end there's like a quarter million
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: dollar prize perse and they selected you know, twenty men
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: twenty women for this professionals, and we have one race.
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: To go, one race to go. How are you feeling?
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: Finally, I feel good? Sorry, did you mean mentally or physically?
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: Well, okay, let's address both a start with how is
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: your body feeling?
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: The body's good. It's crazy. I think women have this
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: just natural ability to endure. I have a theory that
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: has something to do with our ability to bring a
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: human being into the this world. So I think that
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: that helps, uh just biologically, but I mean women can really,
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: we can really suffer, So I think it really helps
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: for our endurance. And so my body feels actually like
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: shockingly fine. This is my fifth year as a professional,
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: so it's not like a totally new thing. This is
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: definitely like the most intense season I've had. But mentally
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: it's a different story.
• 10:29
  Speaker 3: Mentally it is a different story. What's the story?
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean, if anyone, I think any athlete can
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: relate to this. But most of the time, it's like
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: the game is mental because when you're competing at the
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: highest level, everyone's sort of equal in a lot of ways.
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: Like I think there are some marginal gains, and some
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: people are just blessed biologically, I guess, have like crazy
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: superhuman abilities. But for the most part, I think it's
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: all on your head and so that becomes the biggest game.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: And it's sort of like the thing that a lot
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: of athletes I don't know if they pay attention to
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: or like give give as much credit to, but like
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: it's really hard to stay focused and the pressure becomes
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: pretty intense, which is something I was not expecting this year.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: As I kind of climbed higher in the series, I
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: thought I would be like more and more stoked, but
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: really I was like, oh my god, this is less and.
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: Less fun, less and less fun. And you mentioned becoming pro.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: You've been pro for five years now, and I'll tell
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: you that a few years ago, maybe two or three
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: years ago, I did a story. I wrote an article
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: for Cannondale, and I interviewed women that were on a pro.
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: Cycling team for Cannondale.
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: And the thing that was interesting about the women versus
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: what I know to be true about male cyclists is
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: that all of these women had thriving careers before they
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: decided to take plunge and go pro cyclist. Like they
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: were like teachers and nurses and so many in lawyers,
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: like so many interesting things, and then they were like, oh, you.
• 12:10
  Speaker 3: Know what, I'm going to try this passion project of mine.
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: So talk to us a little bit about what you
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: were doing five years ago.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, just like you hit the nail on
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: the head. I mean that, like we saw like a
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: road cyclist win the Olympics and she was like like
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: a rocket scientist or something like I mean, I don't
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: even know if I'm exaggerating there, Like she won an
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: Olympic gold in the road and like had a full
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: time job doing something with math, which is why I
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: don't know what it is, because my job before this
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: was a graphic designer and I worked for a couple
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: different companies. I owned my own business for a while,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: and I just always sort of like needed that balance,
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: Like I've I have ridden my bike and raced my
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: bike competitively since I moved to drink for college in
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: two thousand and eight. So whoever it can be that math,
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: I always had a balance of multiple things, Like I
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: didn't fully step away from design until really, like last
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: year was kind of like I had slowly been phasing
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: design out, but I always really liked having a balance
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: of things going on. I think a lot of the time,
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: for women, there are fewer opportunities to make enough money
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: to support yourself. So I would say that that is
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: a huge reason that a lot of women have other careers. Also,
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: I don't want to like sound anti male, because I'm not,
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: but from what I have gathered of racing closely and
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: like being friends with a lot of the guys in
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: the sport who they haven't even gone to college, which
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: is fine, Like I'm not saying like you have to
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: go to college at all, but more the point being
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: like they don't really have a backup plan other than
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: like all into cycling. But I'm like, what if you
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: get injured, what are you going to do?
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: I wouldn't. I wouldn't I hear where you're coming from.
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: As one type a person, I would approach this in
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: the same way that you would. And then I'm like, Okay,
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: well if this would work out, Like I remember in
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: one of the first episodes of the show, a man
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: that is now my mentor. His name's Fred Santarpia, and
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: he used to be the chief digital officer at Conde
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: NAS and he said to me something that I'll never forget,
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: which was, if you don't have a plan B, then
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: you don't have a plan. And there's nothing wrong with
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: like going all in and being passionate about something, but
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: if you do not have the bandwidth or thought process
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: to be like, if this doesn't happen.
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: Then what then? I ask you, like, how prepared are you? Really?
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: Totally? Totally, I mean that's like I do think that
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: my parents and my upbringing like that that really helped.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: And I'll back up a little bit. I got into
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: cycling in college when I was a teenager like eighteen,
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: which now, I mean is super late in the game.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: Like I didn't start mountain biking until I was in
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: my twenties, which I felt like was well now, looking back,
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: I'm like, that was a really long time time ago.
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: But I so like I came into the sport like
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: really new, whereas like all of my peers had been
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: racing as juniors in high school. And I stumbled into
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: the best collegiate cycling program in the country at the time,
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: which honestly was truly just super lucky that Fort Lewis
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: College ended up being like a place that gave me
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: an academic scholarship, was in the mountains, was close to
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: my family, blah blah blah, and I just kind of
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: lucked into this like really awesome bike community. And I
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: noticed that like all of the male my male teammates
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: were like all in for cycling, and like school was
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: like pretty secondary to most of them. And that was
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: kind of the vibe of like the whole sport. I mean, one,
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of dudes in cycling, especially in like
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: mountain biking and off road stuff. There's just a lot
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: of dudes that is changing, which is cool. But I
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: just felt very different, like when I got onto my
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: first pro team out of college, like I had a
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: full time job as a designer, because I was like, well,
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: I'm certainly not making any money at the sport, so
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: at least I'm going to like break even here, you know,
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: Like it just never even occurred to me to like
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: But also part of that was fear. You know, I
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: think sometimes it's kind of it's freeing to have that
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: level of commitment, and I've actually had to work to
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: accept like the potential failure if I put everything into it,
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: because I always kind of used like, oh, I'm so
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: busy doing so many different things as like a bit
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: of a cop out. So I've sort of like there's
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: ruggles with both sides.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: It's scary to put all of your eggs in the basket.
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: It's scary to be vulnerable. It's so frightening to be
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: like this is where I'm at, what do we want
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: to do with this? And know that your ducks are
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: in a row, they're in front of you, your cards
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: are on the table, all the sayings right, I through
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: like therapy and the work that I've done, and at
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: a point now that and I have a feeling you
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: are too, like I'd rather put my cards on the table,
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: like I would rather be true to who I am
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: and tell you how I feel then hold that in
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: or like ask myself like what if, Like why am
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: I going to be the only thing standing in my
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: own way of whatever it is that I want?
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: Right? Yeah, yeah, totally. I Mean it's funny because like
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: in a lot of other parts of my life, I'm
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: like really like an open book, you know, like I'm
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: pretty it's easy for me to be vulnerable in like
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: some ways. But then like with sport and athletics, there's
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: like ego involved, right, so like you're you know, your
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: own personal battle of like, god, I really care about this,
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: and what if I like try the hardest thing and
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: then fail, so I know I'm not the best, so
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: might as like I would always do the low hanging
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: fruit thing, you know, where I'm like, Okay, i don't
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: want to show myself that I'm not capable of competing
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: with the best, so I'm just going to go a
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: step down. And it's just not And this is something
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: that honestly I've learned this season through the help of
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: my coach, and you know, I work with a therapist
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: as well. I really have like all hands on deck here.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: And my coach was like, why, like would you feel
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: as good doing this race and winning it like by
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: far versus like lining up with like the best of
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: the best and like seeing where you stack up and
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: then learning from that, And like that was like a,
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: I know, it's like so simple, but it's like really
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: hard to do, and like it was kind of like
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: the first step of that was like stepping away from
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: graphic design, which was multifaceted of course, but that just
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: meant that, like, like you said, all eggs were in
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: the cycling basket, and I was like all in because
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: like before I could be like, oh well, I get
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: bonus credit because I'm doing I'm a professional cyclist and
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: a professional graphic designer. But really, in actuality I did,
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: I was just stretched so thin that I did both
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: really poorly.
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I hear that you.
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: We'll touch on that bold career transition in just a second,
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: but yeah, for you, you mentioned coming up in cycling
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: at the collegiate level, and then shortly after that, for you,
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: there weren't a ton of women around. You were cycling
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: with a lot of men. Now we hear this saying
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: all the time. In order to be her sometimes you
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: need to see her. What was it like for you
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: to come up in this sport without a ton of
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: females to look up to?
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean there were definitely like key women in
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: my life. A lot of them were my peers. And
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: then as I raced more and more, I was like
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: exposed to like, you know, more professional level women in
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: the sport, and that was huge. But it's not like
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: those like it was really before social media, you know,
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: like that's that is a whole crazy thing I guess
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: to have like like watched develop from like in the
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: professional sport world. Like it's not like I could just
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: follow like some of my favorite athletes. You sort of
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: had to like get indoctrinated into the sport to know
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: who the women were. So like it did start with
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: like my peers and like my friends who like my girlfriends,
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: who got me into the sport, and like, I'm definitely
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: so thankful for those for those women. And you know,
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: one of the reasons I never stuck with real racing,
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: which was the thing that I would say I'm most
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: naturally talented in, you know, the thing with the curly
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: bars and you're on roads and you're in a big pack.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: Like I loved it. You know, I came from soccer
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: teams and swim teams and all these team sports, and
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: it is a team sport. But there was this like
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: crazy hostility and kind of like protectiveness within the peloton
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: because there were so few opportunities for women. I think
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: especially kind of the matriarchs of the peloton were like,
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: who are these young kids, Like we don't like I
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: don't know if it was like initiation or like kind
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: of like, well, we had to go through this, so
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: we're going to put you through this kind of thing.
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: So there was a lot of that in road and
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: I was like, no, thanks, this is not fun for me.
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Like there was there were some like standout women who
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: I am still dear friends with to this day in
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: within that peloton that were like get on my wheel,
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: like I got you, and if it weren't for them,
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: like there's no way. So like shout out to Meredith
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Miller and Lauren Hall for being that just doing so
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: many shout outs on your podcast for some reason.
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: I'm bored.
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: Hopefully all the people that you're shouting out your sister,
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: Meredith Miller, Lauren Hall, hopefully all share the episode, like
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: subscribe for.
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: We're into it.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: I mean, there's such a there's such a beautiful opportunity
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: that is to help someone else, knowing that no one
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: else necessarily needs to be your competition, that there's room
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: for everyone to excel in whatever way that they are
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: going to excel. So for you to have this perspective
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: on the benefits of female camaraderie both in and outside
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: of sport, that's like really helpful and really critical. And
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: I hope that as we all proceed and as we
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: see women cycling taking such a big step forward when
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: it comes to media attention and important partnerships, which you'll
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: talk about in a second, Like it's so so great
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: to see where we can go if we lift, if
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: we choose to lift one another up.
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, and it's it's it's complicated, right, Like
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: if you're in a workplace, if you're in you know,
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: a race, like you're your competitors, the people you are
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: competing against for a win or you know, a promotion,
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: Like they're also the ones that you need to have
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: on your team because like, collectively, we're the ones that
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: like make moves forward, and not all women see that.
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: Like and in sport, it's really complex because like you know,
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: we are competitive, like when the race starts, like you
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: everyone is trying to win and there can only be
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: one winner and it sort of goes against like everything
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: else that like we kind of work together on so
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: like it's I don't know, like there's some women who
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: are like, nah, you're not my friend, and like we
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: are competitors and this is our job and like I'm
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: a professional and that is their definition of that. And
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: that has been really not challenging for me to learn.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: But like I have learned that, Like I see that
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: now because like I used to view those those athletes
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: as like ooh, I don't want anything to do with that.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: But I'm like, well, that's just how they do their sport,
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: and like I don't have to be like that, Like
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: I I'm gonna I am different, Like I like I
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: like the social side. Like if if the social side
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: of cycling went away, there's no way I would do
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: this sport. Like there's no way if it was just
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: racing and me, and like it's it's solitary enough, Like
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: I want to go and enjoy myself with my friend,
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: you know. Like before our last race, I texted this
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: woman who is one place ahead of me in the series,
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: and I was like, hey, are you running a pack?
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: Like I'm thinking this and she's like, oh, well I
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: was thinking this because of this, and like it was
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: totally back and forth and she helped me out. She
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: helped me like make a decision. We are not even
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: on the same team, we are like competing closely against
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: each other, and like she's someone who's like me, you know,
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: like I don't. I don't withhold that information for my
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: personal gain and some people do. And you just kind
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: of have to like suss out who that is. So
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: it's those sorts of things have been like a huge
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: learning for me in the pro field.
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: And it goes back to that idea also of how
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: you feel about yourself when you're by yourself, Like would
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: you rather be the person that's there to lift each
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: other up and lift somebody else up? Or would you
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: rather be the person that's so busy saucing out the
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: competition that like does the win feel as good if
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: you're only in it for you?
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: I'm not so sure.
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: Oh totally. And it's so it's so interesting. I mean, man,
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: I should have gone into like sociology or something. I
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: find sport like fascinating, and cycling specifically because like, well
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: we're racing with men also, which like we can get
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: into like that whole thing. But like it is, I
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: don't know, I think in a lot of ways, like
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: competition brings out these like this like weird like primal
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: response right with people, and like sometimes it gets kind
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: of ugly, but then other times it's really beautiful.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: Too, right, right, like what the unification under the circumstances
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: can look like.
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: Totally, Like sometimes I look around and I'm like this
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: is so silly, Like we all care so much. We're
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: in like spandex onesies with like a glorified diaper on
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: and we're riding mountain bikes like through the north Woods
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: of Wisconsin in a torrential downpour. Like I don't know,
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: it's just and I'm like, and this is my job, right.
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: Right, Like this is what I am here to do today.
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: I'm here to wear this glorified diaper in.
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: Pod Yeah totally. And we all think we're cool. And
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: then I'm like, I just have these moments of like,
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: oh no, nope, no one's cool here.
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: Sarah, you are cool. You are cool.
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: Let's pivot a little bit and talk about deciding to
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: go all in on the career change, because I do
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: think that this is a topic. I'm sure people have
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: message you about it, but it can be really intimidating
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: and quite scary to say to yourself. Okay, I have
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: worked for this many years and done X and Y
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: and Z to get to this place, but you know what,
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: I'm not so sure that this place serves me anymore.
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: So talk us through your decision to lean away from
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: graphic design and maybe some of the emotions that we're
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: associated with that.
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, oh totally. And I think all of this is
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: so relevant right now, just with what we're seeing with
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: burnout and what people have learned, you know, through twenty
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: twenty and having some time away. And I'm not gonna lie,
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: like that totally affected me. Like twenty twenty, like racing stopped,
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: like jobs stopped, and I was sort of approaching like
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: not burnout, but like definitely I was like feeling like
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: the design world like was less and less interesting to me,
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: Like I wasn't you know, when you're like really excited
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: about new stuff, you lose track of time when you're
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: like going down a rabbit hole in whatever that is.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: And like design was that for me for a really
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: long time, Like and then I got a job as
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: a graphic designer, and that that starts to like dim
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: the light a little bit, Like I, I don't know
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: if you've done your like enneagram before.
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: Can I tell you this is like something I'm embarrassed
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: about that I haven't done.
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: I mean I should.
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: I feel as though.
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: The listeners are probably like Emily, I feel some right
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: away now that I know that you've never done this,
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: because I think it's something that I would do, but
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: I have been doing so many other things that I've
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: never well, I can.
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: Give you all all of the information. Actually, my our
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: couples therapists suggested it, which like love it it it.
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: It is like the coolest thing to learn about your partner.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: Like it is so interesting, especially.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: So for someone who doesn't know what an enneagram is,
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: can you tell them what it is?
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: So I think there's like nine numbers, and I'm pretty
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: sure it's like it's sort of like a biblical thing.
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: So if you're into the religion part of it, there
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: is that for you. If you are not, I'm not
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: like a religious person, so like I kind of went.
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: I used this enneagram institute. Dot com is like the
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: website for all the information. But basically there's like nine
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: types and everyone's like sort of a common nation of
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: all of them. But like you show up strongest as
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: one of them, and then like you'll have like a
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: wing of this in your best moments, and then you'll
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: be this in your like worst moments or like places
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: of growth, and so it's fascinating. Sometimes it takes people
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: a really long time to figure out which number they are.
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: I know them all so well that I can like
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: tell my friend like, hey, I think you're a six,
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: and then they'll like take the whole test or like
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: read through all of them and they're like, oh my god,
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: you were right, like totally a six.
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: Okay, Sarah.
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: At the end of this, when we have like another
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: like twenty eight minutes to get to know each other
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: before I ask you the final question, I'm going to
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: ask you to tell me what my enneagram is.
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: Okay, sounds good, I love that.
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: Okay, keep going though, So why is this relevant to
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: your career? Friendship?
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: So this is really relevant? So I'm an enthusiast and
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: basically which is like a seven or something, but basically
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: like the defining part of that for me. And I
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: will preface this with I am not into like Myers
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: Briggs or like personality tech, Like I don't like any
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: of that stuff, but this this felt like super interesting
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: to me and like pretty relevant. But basically I'm always
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: seeking out the best and newest experiences, which is why,
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: like I think add goes into that as well, but
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: we can get into that later. But I think once
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: something sort of starts to like feel less sparkly and
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: interesting to me, which you know, I've learned a lot,
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: Like I felt like in school as a designer, I
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: was like had this like glorified idea of like what
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: a designer was. And like, honestly, before I found cycling,
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: I thought I was going to like move to New
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: York City, like be in like art curation, like not
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: sport at all. So design balanced with cycling felt like
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: a really awesome perfect match for me, and it was.
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: And then I got a job and it was still
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: sort of exciting, but I had to tweak so many
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: things in my mind as to like I mean, when
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: you're a designer, you basically like your client or the
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: company you work for, Like you are doing designs for
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: those people. It's very rarely like for yourself. And that
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: was like a really hard thing for me. And over
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: the years, like I had some awesome clients and some
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: really amazing fun projects and I learned a ton. You know,
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: I worked for a company in Durango, saw an acquisition.
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: Like I had a whole life before professional athletics, and
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: I'm really grateful for that because people who live in Durango,
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: especially who are interested in cycling, often they have done
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: that thing for a very long time. So I think
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: part of the reason I have found success, albeit a
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: bit later in life. Like I said, signed with Specialized
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: when I was twenty eight, which is late for a
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: cyclist but not for women, I guess. And I think
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: that really like was important for me because I was
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: sort of seeing like I was sort of feeling like
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: I wanted to have a career change anyway with design
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: and I had left the company that I was working
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: for and I got a job in PR, and I
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: was sort of like I was just slowly like phasing
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: out of these things and those decisions, Like I remember,
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: I had quit this job that I had worked at
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: for seven years as a designer, and I had gotten
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: another job in PR for an outdoor company, and I
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: was driving to my new job and I just cried
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: like the whole way there, and I was like, no
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: one told me that career changes were so hard and
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: really like painful, and it almost it feels like a
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: break up, like it's you know, it's the right thing,
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: but it feels really wrong and bad, I mean sometimes.
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: And then I left that job because I was like, WHOA,
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: this is wrong. And then I was like totally lost
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: for a while.
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, when you say that you were totally lost for
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: a while. What did that look like for you?
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I knew that the job that I
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: had moved into was sort of that stepping stone job
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: like I had moved out of, like my main career.
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: I knew I needed to do it, but I was
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: too scared to just quit and like have nothing else
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: lined up. So it was sort of that like baby step,
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: sometimes you have to jump, you know, sometimes there's no
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: baby step to help you, and you just have to
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: like peace out and know that like you will figure
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: it out, you know, like you can pinch pennies, you
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: can budget, you can like live very frugally until you
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: figure it out. But like there's a lot of opportunity
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: out there, and like something my mom has always told
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: me is like we are tough and smart and like
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: you figure it out, especially when it's like no other option.
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: Taking a break from today's episode to give some love
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: to my sponsor at AG one from Athletic Greens. If
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: you're a longtime listener of the show or a new hurdler,
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  Speaker 3: Again I said, I've been taking this for.
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: A while now, of all of those good adaptogens, whether
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• 37:00
  Speaker 3: Sentiment, though, like that when there's no other option.
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: Oftentimes it's when you're truly like down and out, when
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: you figure out the solution that's truly aligned with who
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: you are and where you are supposed to go.
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: And I hate the words supposed to, but when you.
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: Have less say, sometimes that is actually within your favor.
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: The times that I have turned or pivoted within my
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: career often had nothing to do with a choice of
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: my own. It was getting laid off by a publishing
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: company twice and saying to myself, Okay, like what's the
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: best I can do with what I have right now?
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, going back to that like Enneagram number, Like I
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: just I like, I'm such a visual person and I
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: can see, like I could visualize my life right now
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: as like a fashion designer, you know, and like And
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: I remember working through this a lot in therapy when
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: I was like at my job as a designer, and
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: I would like come up with these ideas of like
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: I want to be a therapist and then like do
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: everything like all of the mental gymnastics and like research
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: and then never take that like first step into it.
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: And like what I initially like came to terms with
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: pretty much just by like living and like continuing to
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: like make these decisions. But like if that was actually
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: the right move for me, I would have done the
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: things to like start setting myself up to do that.
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: Like sometimes there is that scary step, but like I
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: had to let go of like forcing myself into these
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: like ideas that I had had and just like let
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: myself just naturally do things that I was interested in.
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: And when I was like in that new job that
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: I was not super happy with, it was like it
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: was only thirty hours a week, so I had an
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: extra ten hours a week, and I just rode. I
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: rode my bike and I raced. I did like little
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: like low cyclo Cross series, and that allowed me to
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: like come back. I had quit racing at that point.
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: That's a whole other story, but that kind of like
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: gave me space to like fill that time with the
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: thing that I wanted to do. And apparently that thing
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: I wanted to do was ride my bike and race
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: in the way that I wanted to race, not having
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: that defined by other people. And I was able to
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: put myself in different situations that ultimately allowed me to
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: sign a contract.
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: This whole conversation that reminds me of a lot of
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: takeaways from How Bad Do You Want It? By Matt Fitzgerald.
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: So I'm just going to like drop that book here
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: in case anyone's listening and like wants to think on
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: that ten out of Time would recommend. And the next
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: thing that you know that I'm gonna have to double
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: click on now is why did you stop racing in
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: the first place.
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I stopped racing because it was not fun
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: for me, and I didn't even realize that it wasn't fun.
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: I'm just so I'm like so driven, like absolutely to
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: a fault where I'm like all right, like I'm doing
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: this thing and I'm like I will like be so
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: focused on it that I don't even realize like what
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: it is that I'm doing in some ways, And like
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: you know, I was younger, I was like just out
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: of college, and collegiate racing was like the most fun
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: I'd ever had, And like fun for me is being
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: competitive and being like serious in like a lighthearted way,
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: which doesn't make sense. But then I like signed onto
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: like a semi pro team, and we raced all around
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: the country and I hated it. I was so miserable.
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: It was Yeah, I don't know. I've actually connected with
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: some of my old teammates and they too had a
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: very similar experience on that team, which is interesting because
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: a lot of us have actually on I mean, we
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: have one of one of my old teammates race is
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: like the top Racer and like the Tour de France,
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: and like, you know, we have another guy sponsored by
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: Red Bull who's in the same series. Like it's crazy,
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: like the talent on this team and and how many
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: of us felt very similar that, uh to how I felt,
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: which was like this is not I know, this is
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: like should be enjoyable, but like I'm not having fun.
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: And I remember driving home from a race and my
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: boyfriend my partner at the time, and well, same same person,
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: Dylan told me or asked me, He's like, are you
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: having fun doing this? And it didn't even occur to
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: me that it that I was not having any fun
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: and I didn't have and that I didn't have to
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: do it. That was the craziest part, Like I was
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: choosing to do all these things and I didn't have to,
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: so I stopped racing and I sold all my race bys,
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: and I got this thing called a trail bike, which
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: is a mountain bike that's basically meant to like make
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: you have fun, like going downhill and uphill, so sometimes
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: you have to sacrifice one for the other. But trail
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: bikes are awesome, and they're light enough that you have
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: fun pedaling up mountains, and they're super stable coming down
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: so you don't feel like you're going to die in
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: every turn. And that was a huge turning point for me,
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: and I would go on these like long rides in
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: the mountains with my friends that were super challenging, but
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: like there was like no pressure on the situation, Like
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: it was just all like about what you could do,
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: and like there was no proving yourself, there was no
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: finish line, Like it just was purely like about the
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: experience that you were having.
• 42:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, well, first of all, to be able to.
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: Take stock of what you were doing and recognize that
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: despite it was just because you're used to something doesn't
• 43:05
  Speaker 2: mean that you can't pivot. It doesn't mean that you
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: can't shift. So to have the level of self awareness
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: to say like this isn't fun, and I can get
• 43:15
  Speaker 2: out of it. I think oftentimes that change is the
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: thing that prevents us from making that pivot.
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: We're scared of change.
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think too. And this was a point
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: that I meant to touch on earlier when you asked
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: about career change. But it feels like a loss of identity,
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: you know, like whether it's your and I see a
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: lot of my friends, you know, I'm in my early
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: thirties and a lot of my friends are becoming parents
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: for the first time, and especially my female friends are like,
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: you know, they sort of feel like a loss of
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: identity of who they were because like now they're a
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: mom or like if you step way as a graphic
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: designer like or a cyclist, Like who am I if
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: not this thing that I've been, you know, practicing or
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: trying to be for X amount of years And it
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: really forces you to like actually think about who you
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: are and what makes you who you are. And it's
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: not always the things that you do, but some I mean,
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: it's it's a painful. It's an incredibly painful process, but
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: it's something that like I wouldn't trade those moments for anything,
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: because I really I think I've learned. I know this
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: is so cheesy, but it is really true, Like you
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: learn so much more from those low spots than you
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: do from like the glory moments.
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: Yes, one hundred percent. That's why the podcast my friend
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: is called Hurdle nailed it. Upon making this choice for
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: yourself and now five years into it, what would you
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: say was the mo moment.
• 45:00
  Speaker 3: That you knew that you made the right call?
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: Oh? I think I kind of knew right away. There
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: were like so many moments where I was like, oh
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: my gosh, I like cannot believe this is like my life.
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: The way that I entered the professional world of cycling
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: was like weirdly perfect for me, and it was really
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: like a combination of right place at right at the
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: right time. So it all felt very serendipitous. But there
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: was a new team that was launching it Specialized that
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: was focused highly on graphic design and art, which was
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: like kind of a dream come true. And our our kits,
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: like the our jerseys, our bikes, our helmets, our shoes,
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: at like everything was like this beautiful custom design with
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: this kind of this brand called ten Speed hero Who
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: and they've become like some of my dear friends now
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: and they're like sort of a design first company and
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: like cycling second, which is awesome, And they partnered with Specialized,
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: which is like one of the biggest bike companies in
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: the world, and signed myself and my then teammate Ruby West,
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: Canadian woman, onto this cycle across team. And I had
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: literally never raced professional cycle across. I mean I'd raced
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: it before, but I was like everything just felt so
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: so like perfect. And that's not to say like there
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: were plenty of moments of being calling Dylan in tears
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: and like feeling like this was absolutely the wrong the
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: wrong move, but like I like I laugh because like
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: it's just not like nothing is ever Like like I
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: don't think there's ever that like moment of like, oh wow,
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: this all just fit perfectly into place and like this
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: is how it's meant to be. I think it just
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: takes a lot of work to make things feel right,
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: and then a lot of self awareness because like sometimes
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: when you're putting in that work to make it feel right,
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: you are just trying to shove a square peg into
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: a round hole, and like sometimes you have to like
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: like know that that isn't the way. But for me,
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: like with cycling. It did very much feel like, Wow,
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I'm really
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: grateful and like this is where I am supposed to be.
• 47:39
  Speaker 3: What excites you right now?
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: My first thought was like accomplishing this season and being done. Okay,
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: everything is pretty malleable, Like I have a lot of
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: control in like a positive way, Like there's a lot
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: of opportunity and I can work as hard as I
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: can work to change how things are, which is cool.
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I like that. I like that a lot.
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: I know also to pivot a little bit. We have
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: a lot of cyclists that listen to the show, and
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: a lot of these cyclists also happen to be runners.
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: I myself huge runner. Do talk about it like sporadically
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: here on Hurdle, but I know that as you can
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: understand for sure, a great way to cross train for
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: my go to sport is to do your sport. So
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: for someone who may not yet be in a place
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: where you know, they're writing a ton, they're you know,
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: hitting centuries or whatever, but they do want to become
• 48:44
  Speaker 2: more familiar with it. Do you have any like initial
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: a couple of tips, a couple of pointers that you
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: want to offer up for the more beginner cyclist when
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: it comes to getting more comfortable in the SAP.
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: So totally we can jump into it. I mean, gear
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: is a huge piece, which I'm not a really technical person. However,
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: especially for women, like because we tend to be smaller,
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: the power to wait thing is something that matters as
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: far as like your enjoyment of the sport. So if
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: you have Basically what I'm saying is if if your
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: gear is from the nineties, that could be a big
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: like setback in some ways. Like and I'm not saying
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: like those bikes aren't bad ass, because they are. But
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: I've coached plenty of clinics where like women will show
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: up on these like machines that just do not work,
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: like and then their husbands will have like the ten
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: thousand dollars set up and then they got them this
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: like turn bike, which drives me crazy. But oftentimes like
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: if you can get like an entry level but like
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: nicer ish bike that fits you, that is like I
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: see people like, it's literally the difference of like continuing
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: the sports or not. Another thing that people like super
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: beginner don't know is that with bike shorts, like with
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: a shammy, like with a pad in it, you're actually
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: not supposed to wear underwear with those I knew that.
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: I knew, Yeah, you are Like every I've like talked
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: to like a couple of different women that this is
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: like their first year in the sport, and I'm like
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: how yeah, Like how would you know that? Like one,
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: there's like a million dudes, So like they're not going
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: to tell you, like, hey, by the way, don't wear
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: a thong with your like shammy, Like they're not going
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: to like come up to you, but I'll be the
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: one to tell you. Like it's all like the reason
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: you have a shammy and the pad is like it's
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: to minimize the seam the seams with our sensitive parts.
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: So that's a big deal. And then also like motivation,
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: right like for me, like sometimes like hopping on like
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: the trainer in the winter is like all, like that
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: feels good, like checking the boxes of like I did
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: a hard work out today and like that that's what
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: I needed. Sometimes like this late in the season for me,
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: it's like really hard to motivate to like go out
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: for like a four hour open ride. So like sure,
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: like that's my that's my ride. But like for a
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: lot of newbies, Like doing an hour is a lot
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: of exercise on a bicycle, especially for something that feels
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: like really clunky and foreign and like kind of scary,
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: especially with traffic. I would honestly suggest like using an
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: app or a website like ride with GPS or Strava.
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: I've never really used Strava for like mapping, but you
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: can like find, like if you can find a really
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: cool route that uses like bike paths and like backroads
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: instead of like main roads, that can be like really
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: a like really fun, adventurous thing. And then if you
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: are fancy enough to have like a computer or like
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: a head unit I use Wahoo, you can actually like
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: sink the route so it gives you like turn by
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: turn instructions so you don't have to pay attention to
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: that stuff like these are sorry, I'm just coming up
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: with like little tips.
• 52:08
  Speaker 3: No, these are, I mean they were all really helpful tips.
• 52:10
  Speaker 2: And I think of that the hardest thing about cycling,
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: And I believe I heard you say this on another podcast,
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: like the great thing about running is that quote unquote
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: all you need is a pair of sneakers. But when
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: it comes to getting out on your bike, it's like
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: there are so many different puzzle pieces that you need
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: to assemble to even step out and have a not
• 52:32
  Speaker 2: only a good ride, but then also a safe ride.
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: Right totally, And I think, like I need to honestly
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: listen to my own advice here, but like because it
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: is a gear intensive sport, like and as we all know,
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: like it is really hard to motivate for exercise, especially
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: like if you're not that type of person. Like my sister,
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: she's like I I hike and run and do whatever
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: just until the point that she feels an endorphin bump
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: and then she turns around like we experience. Anna, Yeah,
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: we're talking Hannah. She's such a good balance. Like honestly,
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: she's probably healthier and will like live longer. Like I
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: think always pushing yourself so hard to your limit is
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: not actually good for you. But going back, like I
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: think having all of your gear like readily accessible, especially
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: with cycling, like having your flat kit already just like
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: something that's like easy to grab, so it has your
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: tire lever, your pump, a tube, some tire plugs, like
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: all the things like right there, you just grab it.
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: Your shoes are there, your helmet's there, your glasses are there,
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: and then all you have to do is like put
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: your little shammy on and get out the door. It's
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: just like so helpful, and like I think something that
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: people don't know is like just having a functioning bike
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: is really helpful. And like it's sort of like your car,
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: like you get your oil changed a bunch, you kind
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: of have to bring your bike in a bunch and
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: just make sure everything's functioning because it makes it like
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: more fun.
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: You know, it's definitely time for me to bring my
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: bike in for sure. I have I have a Rebel
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: and I love her. She is a babe, but she's
• 54:14
  Speaker 2: a babe.
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: That is a great bike because it like it really
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: I'm all for like using one piece of equipment for
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: like multiple things. Like I'm not going to be the
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: person that says, like, well you really need to buy
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: a mountain bike, across bike, drive a bike, a road bike,
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: like really like a bike like the Rubey or the Diverge,
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: and I'm not like you don't have to buy specialized
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: Like that's just what I ride, So that's what I know.
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: But like I do actually think the Rubey is an
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: awesome bike because you can eventually like put actually like
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: pretty big tires in there and like start like dabbling
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: with dirt and like just allow yourself to like have
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: fun and play with like different routes. And then if
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: you're in a big city, I guarantee there is some
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: group ride going from some bike shop that is that
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: will fulfill what you're looking for. So, like if you're
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: super into bike racing, there will be that for you.
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: If you just want to go and like meet up
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: with some chicks or like some other people in the
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: sport that like just tootle after work and like go
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: grab a cocktail or a beer afterwards, there is for
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: sure that for you as well. So like just go
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: to like your bike shop too, because I think group
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: exercise is I mean, like I said, I wouldn't be
• 55:30
  Speaker 1: doing this if it weren't social.
• 55:34
  Speaker 3: I love it. I love it. I'm a name drop.
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: Real quick shout out to Kelly from Specialized from my
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: rub I.
• 55:41
  Speaker 3: Kelly, Kelly.
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: I've done a triathlon previously, but at the beginning of
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: the pandemic is when I got my bike and it
• 55:48
  Speaker 2: just completely changed the way that I was able to
• 55:52
  Speaker 2: navigate emotionally during like such a tough time, especially living
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: at the time on the Upper East Side of New York,
• 55:57
  Speaker 2: like being able to get out of the city proper
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: and find space and solace on two wheels. I don't
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: need to tell you. It's just like such a special opportunity.
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: And from the beginning of April twenty twenty, my rube
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: has never had a flat tire.
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: There's a lot of people that found cycling in the pandemic.
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: Like I was working at a bike shop in twenty wait,
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: no was I before that anyway, it doesn't matter. Bike
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: shops were like literally like sold out of bikes. So
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: like if I were one of those people that bought
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: a bike and it's just been hanging in your garage,
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: like and you needed a sign, here's the sign. But
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: it is, it's really it's a special like even though
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: it feels very much like my job sometimes, which it
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: can get. It's sort of a complicated relationship when like
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: the thing that relieves your stress is also the thing
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: that causes a lot of it. But I still even
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: even so, I still use the bicycle like to says things.
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: And it's like my form of you know, meditation and
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: escape and health and you know, the number of times
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: like I'm not like a big, big crier, which like
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: there's some people that for some reason I just cry
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: in front of. But I'm like, if the right song
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: comes on and I'm like in a really weird place
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: or a beautiful place, like those those tears.
• 57:26
  Speaker 3: Come out, they come out.
• 57:29
  Speaker 2: Well, I think that the people that you feel comfortable
• 57:31
  Speaker 2: crying in front of are probably the people that have.
• 57:34
  Speaker 3: A special impact hut on you.
• 57:38
  Speaker 2: Sometimes your Instagram page right now, they see a cyclist
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: that has thirty five thousand followers, She's got a bunch
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: of rad sponsors. When you look in the mirror, what
• 57:49
  Speaker 2: is it that you see looking back at you?
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: Oh my god, that's such a good question. Ah Man. Sadly,
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: I see all the ways that I could just be better,
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: to be honest, and I'm I want to be like
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: totally totally honest here. Like there's it takes hard work
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: to feel like proud of myself, Like I don't spend
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: enough time really like being stoked on the things that
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: I've accomplished. Like there's moments of that, but like you know,
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: I've everyone has their struggles, and I think that I
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: just sort of like always feel to this or not
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: enough this, or you know I could be doing this
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: so I I could do better at like like being
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: being proud of myself for like how far I've.
• 58:47
  Speaker 2: Come, as you should be not taking time to celebrate
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: the wins. I would say a big win for you.
• 58:55
  Speaker 2: Recently this Ratha kit talk to us a little bit
• 58:58
  Speaker 2: about this partnership, why it's a big deal for you,
• 59:01
  Speaker 2: and how it feels now to like kind of be
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: in this place where your name is the one that's
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: quote unquote in lights.
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's I mean Rafa. My decision to sign with
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: Rafa from Tenspeed Hero was like definitely like the hardest
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: choice I've had to make as a professional cyclist. They
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: have taken such good care of me just because I
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: was so such good friends with ten Speed Hero and
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: it was sort of like where I'd started. And I
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: think sometimes you forget that these brands are just they're
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: comprised of human beings, Like there are people you know
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: behind the scenes, like Kelly it specialized, you know, like
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: there's that. It's like that is what makes it up
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: working with Rafa, which, to be honest, like I remember
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: so Dylan, my partner, has worked every single job in
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: the bike industry. You could work from like professional athlete
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: to like product development market And I remember he told
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: me about Rafa, and I remember going to their website
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: and I was like, as a designer, I'm like, oh
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: my god, this is so cool. Like it was the
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: first time that I like saw cycling kits as like
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: not the dorky thing sorry dad that my dad wore
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: because my dad was a road biker when I was
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: growing up, which naturally I was like, whoof, I don't
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: want anything to do with that until I left. But Rafa,
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: It's it's been so cool to work with them. I
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: would say, like in the cycling scene, the thing that
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: I'm like most stoked on like is clothing. Like I've
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: just always like really been into clothing and those products
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: versus like super technical stuff. It's so special to like
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: get to work with their design team. They have an
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: amazing group of designers. And I think a lot of
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: people think I designed the kit, but I was just
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: like a part of the process, Like I was never
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 1: the one that's that was like putting colors down and
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: like coming up with this concept. But the kits that
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: they that they made this season have so there's like
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: so many layers, like I'm sure people look at and
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: they're like, oh, yeah, they just put a blob of
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: yellow here, some pink here, some blue. But it's actually
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: they made a pattern like with like a line drawing
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: pattern of like storm clouds and lightning bolts, and like
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: overlapped it with the checkerboard flag pattern, which was kind
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: of you know, tilting the hat towards like my old kit,
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 1: the no finish line kit, And so they made this
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: like crazy psychedelic looking pattern with all this negative space
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 1: from those two things overlapped they like zoomed in on
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: it and then filled in all of the spaces with
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: those colors that you see on the kit. And I think, like,
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: I just think that that's such a sick way to
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: like end up. It's the like crazy colorful thing that
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: they that they made. Also, like it's been cool to
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: work with them because I know that like I sort
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: of like push the limits of like colors and patterns
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: and craziness because usually they're like pretty sleek, simple designs.
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: I mean, although they've they've really like started doing some
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: really wild stuff.
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 3: Well I got the kit, I'm gonna tell you, I
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 3: think it's still Yes, it's also so.
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: Cool to see people like and it's so so special,
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: like I just yeah, it's it's awesome. Like also like
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: going back to that like motivation piece, Like I cannot
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: tell you how many times like new Kit Day has
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: been the reason that I like motivate to that I
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: keep going.
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 2: There have been many times that you've had to persist
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 2: on days when it wasn't New Kid Day, which will
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 2: lead me here into the final question for you, Sarah.
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 2: I'm sad that you could talk to you. Wait wait, wait, wait,
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 2: now's the time. Now is the time? Oh, you can
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 2: tell me why any agreement.
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: Okay, just based on literally this conversation.
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm ready.
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: I kind of I feel like you're okay, I have
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 1: to pull it up, but I feel like you're a three.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: I have to make sure that these are actually the numbers.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: You're a three, which is the achiever, and potentially like
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: with a wing seven, which is the enthusiast, the one
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: that I am. Enthusiasts are just like people that are
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: like really like energetic and motivated and like yeah, sometimes sporadic,
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: but I like so they have like your wings or
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 1: like stress or growth, and I would say, like you
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: definitely give like achiever vibes and Okay, the most interesting part.
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: If you look at the like synopsis, they'll give you
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: a list of examples of other people that are like Okay,
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, Arnold Schwitzenberger, Paul McCartney, Elvis Presley,
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: Lance Armstrong, Will Smith, Courtney Cox, Jenny Moore, Reese Witherspoon,
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: Anne Hathaway. It's so interesting.
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 3: Oh my god. Okay, I'll report back.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 2: Final question, Sarah, Right now you have an opportunity to
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 2: offer yourself a piece of advice.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 3: Let's go Actually, when you.
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 2: Were going through your career transition and you were trying
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 2: to decide in that hurdle moment what felt right for you.
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: Right now you have an opportunity to offer yourself a
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: piece of advice. Knowing what you do, now, what do
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 2: you tell yourself?
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: I tell myself that it is equally, if not more,
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: important to slow down and be quiet and have moments
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: of being bored and sad, and that chasing happiness is
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: not the goal.
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: Love that, Sarah. I'm so happy we did this. Thank
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 2: you so much again for making the time and for
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: just gracing us with all of your wisdom. How does ever,
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 2: writlers follow along?
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 3: With you. How do they keep up with you? Give
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 3: us the details.
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: I love that they're hurdlers. No, this has been awesome,
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: Like I feel, yeah, this is great. Probably Instagram. I
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: am on TikTok, which is so funny, but mostly I
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: just like enjoy that space so much. But I am
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: bad at making things on TikTok. I'm a voyeur if
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: you would call it that, but yeah, I would say Instagram.
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: If you have any questions, if you're like new to cycling,
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: please damn me. It might take me a couple of
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: weeks to see it and get back to you. But
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: I'm always like really stoked to answer questions. Sarah Sarah
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: Underscore stir Me, which is my nickname, s t U r.
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 3: M y beautiful. I'm over at Emily.
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 2: A Body and at Hurdle Podcast Another Hurdle Conquered.
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 3: Catch you guys next time