Latest / The Endurance Athlete Journey / Don’t Wait for the Last Race: Jim Logan on Stage 4 Cancer, Ironman and Just Keeping Tri-ing

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Don’t Wait for the Last Race: Jim Logan on Stage 4 Cancer, Ironman and Just Keeping Tri-ing · The Endurance Athlete Journey

0:09
SPEAKER_03: Welcome everyone to the Endurance Athlete Journey Podcast.
0:12
SPEAKER_03: I'm your host, Coach Justin, and I'm here with Coach Katie.
0:14
SPEAKER_03: And today we have a special guest.
0:16
SPEAKER_03: We have athlete James Logan.
0:20
SPEAKER_03: And this is a story that is just absolutely fascinating.
0:24
SPEAKER_03: And we we I got a message from James a while back, and he's like, hey, you know, this is kind of what's going on.
0:30
SPEAKER_03: This is my story.
0:31
SPEAKER_03: Uh, would you be interested?
0:33
SPEAKER_03: And I immediately was just like, I I gotta have, we gotta have this guy on on the show.
0:38
SPEAKER_03: And so uh with with all of our crazy schedules, and we finally got hooked up.
0:43
SPEAKER_03: And so today we're going to bring uh James' story to the Endurance Athlete Journey podcast.
0:49
SPEAKER_03: So this is gonna fit right on into our series that we have is called the Athlete Stories.
0:53
SPEAKER_03: And so I really want you guys to stay tuned.
0:56
SPEAKER_03: We're gonna have some great information at the end on how you can contribute to uh what James is uh what he's working for.
1:04
SPEAKER_03: And uh this is really, really important, guys.
1:07
SPEAKER_03: So I wanna just I don't even want to waste any more time with an intro.
1:10
SPEAKER_03: So let's turn this thing over to James.
1:13
SPEAKER_03: James, thank you so much for for dialing in with us today.
1:16
SPEAKER_03: And uh let's go ahead and we'll let's just give us the the reader's digest of kind of like what your story is, sure, and then we're gonna dive a little bit deeper into the the endurance aspect of your story.
1:29
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for that introduction, Justin and Katie.
1:32
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for hosting me today.
1:34
SPEAKER_00: I really appreciate your time and sharing my message with you.
1:37
SPEAKER_00: You're your followers and your platform, so thank you for that.
1:40
SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah, basically, I'm a lifelong long-distance endurance athlete.
1:44
SPEAKER_00: Uh my dad was a marathon runner, and as a kid I watched him cross big finish lines in London, New York, Berlin, all over the world.
1:52
SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, I know he wasn't winning the races, but to me it sure looked like it.
1:55
SPEAKER_00: And I was always fascinated by that, and sure enough, wanted to follow in his footsteps.
2:00
SPEAKER_00: 1982 was my first exposure to Iron Man, like most people, NBC Wide Borough of Sports, Julie Moss.
2:05
SPEAKER_00: And at that point, that's where the seeds were planted early on in my in my life.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I had lived a pretty charmed 59 and a half years.
2:13
SPEAKER_00: Uh grew up in Jersey, normal family, blue collar, uh, ended up going to high school in Europe, graduated in '82, moved to Atlanta in '93, where I met my wife, Kelly, and in '96 I married Kelly.
2:25
SPEAKER_00: And uh we've been happily married for almost 30 years now, and built a business during that same time period.
2:31
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, right when things were really looking pretty good, uh, at age 59 and a half, I was hit with a stage four metastatic colorectal cancer diagnosis, really cancer of the rectum that had metastasized to my liver, leaving hundreds of tumors, uh, so much that even AI couldn't count them.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: And it left no option for surgery.
2:52
SPEAKER_00: It was chemo till you're dead, or you know, we'll keep you comfortable as long as we can, kind of thing.
2:57
SPEAKER_00: Six months, maybe two years.
2:58
SPEAKER_00: That was 28 months ago.
3:00
SPEAKER_00: Here I am, no evidence of disease.
3:02
SPEAKER_00: So uh one thing I would tell you is nobody knows what the future holds, so don't necessarily uh believe what the doctors tell you, it might not be true.
3:09
SPEAKER_00: So uh April of 24 was the day everything changed for me.
3:13
SPEAKER_00: And throughout the entire time I continue to train for Iron Man triathlons at the time I wasn't sure why.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: I just knew I needed to just keep trying, which is the title of the book.
3:23
SPEAKER_00: And you know, I've been through as recent as Monday, my most recent chemo session, I'll be on chemo when I hit Kona.
3:29
SPEAKER_00: I'll probably have 30 sessions in by then, five radiations and surgeries to remove 40% of my colon, 60% of my liver, all of my gallbladder, all of my rectum, resulting in the ostomy that I'll race with on October 10th.
3:43
SPEAKER_00: So it's been it's been quite a journey uh over the last 30 months, and I've learned a great deal.
3:51
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
3:51
SPEAKER_01: I know that's like a really I feel like there you just condensed like a lot into a very short show.
3:57
SPEAKER_00: I always tell people it's my life, I lived it, I wrote a book about it, and I've done probably 50 podcasts so far, and my goal was to do a hundred before I get to Kona.
4:05
SPEAKER_00: Profits from the book go to the Iron Man Foundation, and you know, the cancer rocks my foundation, but it gave me an opportunity, and I always tell people cancer is the worst thing that's ever happened to me, it's also the best thing that's ever happened to me.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: Cancer's given me some gifts that were hard to see at first.
4:21
SPEAKER_00: It took me a while, but uh cancer gave me time.
4:24
SPEAKER_00: Time gives you opportunities, and what you do with the opportunity is up to you.
4:27
SPEAKER_00: I was presented with a difficult set of circumstances, and I found a way to live a meaningful life uh regardless, to take what's given to me and turn it in tragedy into triumph and share my experience, my pain, my suffering, what I've learned and uh with people who may be in a similar situation.
4:43
SPEAKER_00: So uh that's been a great joy for me as I'm happier with what I'm doing now than I've ever been in my entire life, including my lifelong dream of you know going to Kona, which is just still to this day blows my mind every day that I'm gonna make it there.
4:59
SPEAKER_01: So I guess like backing up to the beginning, let's go back, sure like backtrack a little bit.
5:04
SPEAKER_01: So I'm curious before the um diagnosis, like were you all so you kind of said you've always been interested in um endurance sports.
5:14
SPEAKER_01: So like what were you doing?
5:15
SPEAKER_01: Were you training for Iron Man before you were diagnosed?
5:19
SPEAKER_01: Like what were you doing?
5:20
SPEAKER_00: Thirty years, I would say I was pretty serious into you know everything from 5K's to 10K's.
5:26
SPEAKER_00: So I would treat each year almost like a professional season, even though I'm a middle to the back of the pack.
5:32
SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't even say middle, I'm being back of the pack guy.
5:35
SPEAKER_00: Uh I go slow, but it's still, it doesn't matter.
5:37
SPEAKER_00: You know, there's still there's still joy in it.
5:40
SPEAKER_00: Um but yeah, I've I just uh everything from 5K's to marathons, and it's a natural progression.
5:45
SPEAKER_00: I think there's two kinds of people.
5:47
SPEAKER_00: Uh I've had friends that I've coached into sprint triathlons who did it once and said, I am done.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: Never again, no desire.
5:53
SPEAKER_00: The other guy I coached into it, he got finished with his first one, and he immediately started thinking, you know, I think I could do better on the swim if I did this, and if I get a little better bike, I said, You're hooked, you're gonna just keep up the escalator.
6:05
SPEAKER_00: So I climbed the escalator, and the only race left on my on my ticket was the Iron Man.
6:10
SPEAKER_00: I hadn't done an Iron Man.
6:11
SPEAKER_00: So at age 55 I decided to do that, and uh, you know, it's in the book, but I actually have eight DNFs at Iron Man and one DNS.
6:22
SPEAKER_00: And now I get a chance to rectify that that that that horrible record in the greatest plays, Coda.
6:29
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I always set my schedule for the year, and I try to do ten races a year with a couple of big ones to crescendo the year, and um over the last eight years for sure it's been Iron Man focused.
6:39
SPEAKER_00: Some of the early failures were my fault for not training correctly, some of the later failures were just cancer and chemo and different things in the way.
6:47
SPEAKER_00: So I've had my trials and tribulations, I've learned something from each race, and I'm more prepared now than I think I've ever been.
6:53
SPEAKER_00: So we'll see what happens.
6:55
SPEAKER_00: Uh I'd love to finish this race.
6:56
SPEAKER_00: I would love to put a cherry on the top of this cake and call it a day.
7:01
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
7:02
SPEAKER_03: So what what was the one that you that you finished?
7:05
SPEAKER_00: Oh, well, I would say the one that Iron Man would probably consider a finish would be the first one in Chattanooga, but that year, 2018, they canceled the swim.
7:13
SPEAKER_00: So I didn't do the swim.
7:14
SPEAKER_00: I did the 116-mile bike ride, I did the 26.2 mile run, I finished under the cutoff, but no swim.
7:22
SPEAKER_00: Ironman counts it as uh as legit.
7:25
SPEAKER_00: Uh although that day for me, my bike doesn't even show up on the thing because I forgot to put my chip on.
7:30
SPEAKER_00: So uh, you know, just yeah, there's a comedy of errors that I that I experienced through this process, and there's something about like if I'd have finished that first race in 2018, I don't know if I ever come back to do another one.
7:42
SPEAKER_00: The fact that I didn't finish the race is what's caused me to be on this journey that's led to this place where I am now.
7:48
SPEAKER_00: Even with the cancer, I thought I was finished, but turns out I wasn't finished.
7:53
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if we're ever finished.
7:54
SPEAKER_00: And I ask people all the time, if you knew your last race was your last race, would you treat it different?
7:59
SPEAKER_00: Uh I think you would.
8:01
SPEAKER_00: So uh I think I think one of the reasons I had so many DNFs is that I always thought I had a shot at another chance.
8:07
SPEAKER_00: And this time I don't there's no second chance for Kona with cancer and everything that I got going on.
8:12
SPEAKER_00: So um it it it it definitely played into the story because it heightens the anticipation.
8:18
SPEAKER_00: So uh this is the one I gotta finish this one.
8:22
SPEAKER_03: Uh yeah.
8:23
SPEAKER_03: I'll tell you, I was at Chattanooga 2017, so the year before you.
8:29
SPEAKER_03: Uh that was my first full.
8:31
SPEAKER_03: So I I know what that race is about.
8:34
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
8:35
SPEAKER_03: Um you you we both picked a uh a doozy of a race uh for that to be our our first that that run on the on the back half across the river.
8:46
SPEAKER_03: Yeah uh is no joke.
8:48
SPEAKER_00: It's a it's a hard finish.
8:49
SPEAKER_00: It's a hard run finish.
8:51
SPEAKER_00: You know, I enjoyed the bike ride.
8:52
SPEAKER_00: I loved the rolling hills.
8:53
SPEAKER_00: I know they changed the course and that sucks.
8:55
SPEAKER_00: Uh they changed it again, but it was 116 miles.
8:58
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I loved it.
8:59
SPEAKER_00: It was rolling hills, that's kind of my my thing.
9:01
SPEAKER_00: I don't like flats or or wind.
9:04
SPEAKER_00: Um but yeah, I have a love love hate affair with Chattanooga.
9:08
SPEAKER_00: I've done a lot of races there, and for many reasons I I didn't finish.
9:11
SPEAKER_00: So 18 was the swim.
9:13
SPEAKER_00: 19 I came back, and it was the hottest year in the history of the world.
9:16
SPEAKER_00: I mean, Satan took the day off.
9:17
SPEAKER_00: It was so hot.
9:18
SPEAKER_00: They swore they wouldn't run out of ice, they ran out of ice at the eight stations.
9:21
SPEAKER_00: They were giving out hot Gatorade, hot water.
9:24
SPEAKER_00: Ambulances are flying all over the place.
9:26
SPEAKER_00: So in that one, I did the swim, the bike, and got halfway through the run and couldn't make the cutoff.
9:31
SPEAKER_00: So I was close again.
9:32
SPEAKER_00: I've had a lot of really close, close, close calls, you know.
9:36
SPEAKER_00: But in my mind, I think I always thought, you know, you have another chance, and that may not be the case, you know, in you know, in some cases, you never know when your last big race is your last big race.
9:47
SPEAKER_03: Man, I I love I love that question that you asked, and it was if your last race, if this is your last race, what would it be like how would you treat it?
9:58
SPEAKER_00: Differently.
9:59
SPEAKER_03: And yeah, that it just it just goes to show because a lot of us as as endurance athletes, I think we're planners by nature.
10:07
SPEAKER_03: So even though we're we're scheduled for a race, we're always thinking like several months down the line on like what's the next one.
10:14
SPEAKER_00: Right.
10:15
SPEAKER_03: And I mean, just the fact that you have to sit back and say, Well, if this is my last one, yeah, what do I want to get out of this?
10:22
SPEAKER_00: Well, you know, cancer's really woke me up to that in many ways, not just in the racing, in my life, to my relationships.
10:29
SPEAKER_00: Uh again, I'm thankful to Cancer for the time and the opportunities to uh reevaluate my life, uh, reevaluate my relationships with my wife, my son.
10:38
SPEAKER_00: I've had an opportunity to talk to my family.
10:41
SPEAKER_00: You know, difficult at first, but rewarding in the end.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, I'm thankful for all of those things.
10:47
SPEAKER_00: But, you know, you nobody knows what tomorrow holds, so really all you get is today.
10:52
SPEAKER_00: So the lesson for me was to focus on the day ahead.
10:56
SPEAKER_00: Uh tomorrow will come, but today is the most important day.
10:59
SPEAKER_00: So if you take care of today, tomorrow will take care of itself.
11:02
SPEAKER_00: That's how I approached the training program.
11:04
SPEAKER_00: You know, if people say, How are you gonna do an Iron Man with you know all this cancer and whatnot?
11:07
SPEAKER_00: It's like, I don't have to do an Iron Man today.
11:09
SPEAKER_00: All I have to do today is an hour and forty minutes on an indoor bike.
11:12
SPEAKER_00: That's what's on the schedule.
11:14
SPEAKER_00: If I do that and I keep doing that, then I'll be okay when race day comes.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: Um so you compartmentalize and shrink things down a little bit, you know what I mean?
11:24
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you're just like in the moment a little bit more.
11:26
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and that's one of the great lessons that cancer taught me, and I think for a lot of us, uh, you know, if you don't have, unfortunately, it takes that catalyst to remind you of some of these things.
11:36
SPEAKER_00: But but one of the messages I try to share is don't wait for the stage four diagnosis.
11:41
SPEAKER_00: Go ahead and do it anyway, you know?
11:43
SPEAKER_00: So ask yourself the question, again, another question.
11:45
SPEAKER_00: If suddenly you were told you only have two years to live, would it change the way you spend the next two years?
11:51
SPEAKER_00: For most people, probably, yeah, you might have some things that you would hurry up and do, and I would encourage you to hurry up and do those things.
11:58
SPEAKER_00: Regardless of the diagnosis.
12:00
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, it's called prioritizing, you know, if there's something that you want to do.
12:04
SPEAKER_00: I never thought I'd be an author, now I'm an author.
12:07
SPEAKER_00: I never thought I'd be a public speaker, I'm public speaking.
12:09
SPEAKER_00: I never thought I would go to Kona, and I'm going to Kona.
12:13
SPEAKER_00: So regardless of your age, uh, you know, don't be complacent in your life.
12:17
SPEAKER_00: You can still do big things and dream and change whatever you're doing if that's what you want to do.
12:22
SPEAKER_00: So these are good questions to ask.
12:25
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
12:26
SPEAKER_01: Um this is great.
12:27
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
12:27
SPEAKER_01: So I'm cu I'm curious, you know, you have your own business and you're you're training for like Ironmans and m you know, running events.
12:37
SPEAKER_01: And um what like was there like before the cancer diagnosis, was there like something that was happening, like symptoms you were having having, or what kind of prompted you to get like seen or or uh, it's a really good question.
12:52
SPEAKER_00: It's a really good question, and and it's another subject I really like to touch on because the colorectal cancer is the second leading killer next to lung cancer, and the main reason is that most people get diagnosed late.
13:06
SPEAKER_00: Uh and by the time you get diagnosed, it's stage four.
13:08
SPEAKER_00: Once it's stage four, it's toothpaste out of the tube, you're not getting it back in.
13:12
SPEAKER_00: Uh but if you do a colonoscopy, and they used to recommend over fifty, now I think it's over forty.
13:18
SPEAKER_00: Go ahead, get in there, get one.
13:20
SPEAKER_00: It's the only way to know what's going on because a lot of these symptoms fly under the radar.
13:24
SPEAKER_00: I had health checkups, I had physicals, I had blood tests.
13:28
SPEAKER_00: Uh it didn't show up anywhere.
13:30
SPEAKER_00: And I finally started to experience extreme fatigue.
13:34
SPEAKER_00: You know, I was training seven days a week, sometimes two times a day.
13:38
SPEAKER_00: That was, you know, what the what my coach was prescribing at the time, and I was just so tired, and I figured, well, you know, you're 60, you know, you're old, and you're training at a high level.
13:47
SPEAKER_00: You're supposed to be tired.
13:48
SPEAKER_00: You gotta just push through it.
13:50
SPEAKER_00: And then it got to a point where I guess one morning I had did my morning workouts and I was about to go about my day, sat on the couch with a cup of coffee that I rested on my knee, and it was nine o'clock in the morning.
14:00
SPEAKER_00: I closed my eyes, I opened them, it was 3 p.m.
14:03
SPEAKER_00: Same cup of coffee on my knee, ice cold.
14:05
SPEAKER_00: Didn't spill it or anything.
14:07
SPEAKER_00: I sat there for six hours in the same position.
14:09
SPEAKER_00: I was like, all right, that's not normal.
14:11
SPEAKER_00: Uh go see the doctor, go do the colonoscopy.
14:14
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I went in thinking, well, you know, if there's a little something in there, they probably zapped it, or you know, if there's something, we'll treat it.
14:20
SPEAKER_00: And to come out with the stage four diagnosis and not treatable, and you know, they used the word terminal, which to this day I don't like the language, because as I look back twenty-eight months ago, terminal defined as the end, was not the end.
14:34
SPEAKER_00: It was just the beginning of something new, uh, and a life that I could have never imagined.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: It took me six months to come to terms with it after depression, disillusionment, and you know, a little bit of anger.
14:46
SPEAKER_00: Like one of the questions I would I would ask God is why why me?
14:49
SPEAKER_00: Why are these things happening to me?
14:51
SPEAKER_00: And just recently, in my most recent hospitalization, I realized as I thought I was dying from a blood clot, they come in and give me no evidence of disease, the the flip-flop back and forth of this crazy ride.
15:02
SPEAKER_00: I realized these things aren't happening to me, they're happening for me.
15:06
SPEAKER_00: And when you look at it that way, you look at it as, well, why is this happening for me and how can I use it to be stronger, to be uh more courageous, wiser, and then learn and grow and share.
15:18
SPEAKER_00: Sharing is the big thing for me, sharing my experience, hoping that somebody listening may benefit from what I have to say from my experience, and and that's been the great joy.
15:27
SPEAKER_00: Meeting people like yourselves.
15:29
SPEAKER_00: I've met so many people that I wouldn't have met otherwise.
15:31
SPEAKER_00: So again, these are things I'm thankful to cancer for.
15:34
SPEAKER_00: But once you switch your mindset to things don't happen to you, they happen for you.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: It's your job to figure out why and what to do with it.
15:41
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
15:42
SPEAKER_01: It's like you went through the stages, like all those stages of grief.
15:46
SPEAKER_00: And you do you have to go through it, you know.
15:48
SPEAKER_00: I know um a lot of people talk about it.
15:50
SPEAKER_00: Anthony Goggins talks about going through the pain, through the suffering.
15:54
SPEAKER_00: You have to experience every bit of it, but there's something on the other side if you stick with it long enough, and and us long distance endurance athletes know it.
16:03
SPEAKER_00: A lot of people don't understand.
16:04
SPEAKER_00: They're like, they ask me the question, what happens when you get deep in a race and it gets really hard?
16:08
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, that's what we came for.
16:10
SPEAKER_00: That's it takes that long to get to the good spot.
16:13
SPEAKER_00: And you know once you cross that finish line, it's all worthwhile.
16:17
SPEAKER_00: Um but at the same time, I I like to, you know, I've changed my mindset quite a bit over the two and a half years, and again, glad to have the time to do it.
16:24
SPEAKER_00: But you know, initially for me, like most people, it was all about the finish line.
16:27
SPEAKER_00: And then once I got cancer, I realized it's about the start line.
16:31
SPEAKER_00: All I want to do is get to the start line.
16:33
SPEAKER_00: We'll see what happens after that.
16:34
SPEAKER_00: But I need something to look forward to, to train for, to hope for.
16:37
SPEAKER_00: So it's about the start line.
16:39
SPEAKER_00: And then I began to realize once again that uh getting there is great, but really the true benefit of this lifestyle is it's in the daily pursuit.
16:49
SPEAKER_00: So if you have 10 months of training, four weeks in a month, 40 weeks, say 10 sessions a week, that's 400 training sessions over over 40 weeks leading up to one day.
16:59
SPEAKER_00: Are you telling me the 40 weeks is less important than the one day?
17:02
SPEAKER_00: I want the finish line and I want the start line.
17:05
SPEAKER_00: I want them in that order, start, finish.
17:07
SPEAKER_00: But the cakes are already baked, the benefits are already in the bank.
17:10
SPEAKER_00: Uh most of what you're gonna get out of this is already been gotten.
17:14
SPEAKER_00: And for me, it's not you don't pursue happiness, happiness is in the pursuit, and that's what I come to realize is I like the day-to-day discipline.
17:22
SPEAKER_00: I like the the the work of it.
17:24
SPEAKER_00: Uh so the the epiphany from start line to finish line, and you know, just doing the best you can to get there, and then once you get there, do the best you can to finish and and realize that regardless of the outcome, that the benefits are already in the bank.
17:39
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love that.
17:40
SPEAKER_01: Like it's it's the process, it's the journey.
17:42
SPEAKER_01: That's kind of what we talk about a lot.
17:44
SPEAKER_01: Like uh Justin and I.
17:46
SPEAKER_01: I always tell people like I like I I I don't really actually love racing too much.
17:50
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
17:51
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I do it because it's you know, you kind of want to see how how all of that work is kind of come together, and then you want to you want to race to see it.
18:00
SPEAKER_01: But it's the day-to-day training that you know, that day-to-day grind, you know, a little bit of blowing in the work.
18:07
SPEAKER_00: So many years people would ask that.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so many people the great question to people is asked, why?
18:12
SPEAKER_00: Why why do you torture yourself?
18:13
SPEAKER_00: Why do you do this?
18:14
SPEAKER_00: And I used to not really have a good answer.
18:16
SPEAKER_00: I finish line, I start line, all that.
18:18
SPEAKER_00: Now what I've come down to is because I love it.
18:20
SPEAKER_00: If you don't love something, you're not going to continue to do it.
18:22
SPEAKER_00: So when people come to me and say they're doing some fitness program, and you know, if it's whatever it is, if it's orange theory or whatever, I've seen a lot of people have success, but then not go back to it because there's they don't have the joy in it.
18:34
SPEAKER_00: There's no love in it.
18:35
SPEAKER_00: Uh but if you love something, like people love golf, they go every weekend.
18:39
SPEAKER_00: You know, we we this is what we love, and so I do it because I love it.
18:43
SPEAKER_00: That's the simple answer.
18:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
18:46
SPEAKER_01: I'm wondering, like you say you go, um you you have like the so the symptoms it that's that's interesting.
18:54
SPEAKER_01: I think that's really important for people to realize is that I think people think with like colon cancer or something like that, they're gonna have something very apparent.
19:03
SPEAKER_01: And I have had people I've worked with that have been diagnosed that have something kind of GI related that they're going in to get checked, but sometimes it's not that apparent.
19:12
SPEAKER_01: Um, it may be, oh, I just have IBS or something.
19:15
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, nobody attempts nobody attests it to cancer.
19:18
SPEAKER_00: You don't get a symptom and go, oh, you know, I'm having some gastroester, must be cancer.
19:22
SPEAKER_00: I thought must be all these stupid gels I'm eating.
19:24
SPEAKER_01: You know, yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking for this other individual I was working with, and then come to find out uh, you know, if she goes to see a GI, she must have had a colonoscopy and she had, I think, colon cancer, and it's like, whoa, like that didn't even occur to me either.
19:40
SPEAKER_01: And I, you know, work with people.
19:41
SPEAKER_01: So I think that's important for people to understand is and I also think there's a genetic propensity for it too.
19:47
SPEAKER_01: So maybe making sure if you have the genetics, you know, to maybe even do the colonoscopy more opt in.
19:54
SPEAKER_00: I theorize a little bit and I don't get too deep into it, but you know, cancer it gets everybody.
19:59
SPEAKER_00: So of all the people that get cancer, nobody in my realm of sphere of influence ever thought it would be me.
20:05
SPEAKER_00: I'm the healthiest guy everybody knows.
20:06
SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
20:07
SPEAKER_00: At 59, at 60 years old.
20:09
SPEAKER_00: Uh even now, uh, when I was diagnosed in April of 24, I was about 180 pounds, about 11% body fat.
20:15
SPEAKER_00: I'm about 180 pounds, 11% body fat.
20:18
SPEAKER_00: I've gone up and down as much as 35 pounds.
20:21
SPEAKER_00: Uh I've been down to like 155 almost pounds.
20:25
SPEAKER_00: I came close to death a few times and just fought my way back.
20:28
SPEAKER_00: So uh funny thing, my oncologist, Dr.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: Zha, was dead against long-distance endurance sports for someone in my condition.
20:35
SPEAKER_00: And I just defied her.
20:37
SPEAKER_00: Over time, she's now on the team.
20:39
SPEAKER_00: She's talking about setting me up so I don't have to do chemo in September leading up to the race.
20:43
SPEAKER_00: She's all she's all in.
20:44
SPEAKER_00: So when we go to the infusion room, my blood work looks better than everybody else's, and there's no other explanation other than the fact that I do these long distance things, which they don't have any research on because one, it's hard to get a stage four group together that wants to do this, and then they don't live long enough to get a study that works.
21:02
SPEAKER_00: So I'm a one I'm a one-man study in my own infusion room.
21:06
SPEAKER_00: And you know, they know mild activity gets great great benefits, as much as 40% additional longevity, but there's not a lot of evidence on.
21:13
SPEAKER_00: But I think you can do both things at the same time.
21:15
SPEAKER_00: I was telling you earlier, my fitness is improving.
21:18
SPEAKER_00: My VO2 max had dropped to 38 on the run, 38 on the bike when I was in the hospital, and over the last six weeks I've got it back up to 42, which puts me in the upper 15 percentile of my age group of healthy people.
21:30
SPEAKER_00: So while my health is improving, or my fitness is improving, my health is declining.
21:35
SPEAKER_00: Uh I don't know how that works, but but I think it I think I think endurance kicks cancer's ass.
21:40
SPEAKER_00: I think cancer's lazy and it doesn't like swimming, biking, and running.
21:44
SPEAKER_00: So I always think about that.
21:45
SPEAKER_00: When I'm in pain, the cancer's in pain.
21:48
SPEAKER_01: That's an interesting way to think of it.
21:50
SPEAKER_01: You're kind of like 'cause I mean there's that piece of it, like you wanna you're angry, you've got this thing in your this cancer in your body.
21:58
SPEAKER_01: You kind of want to like To view it that way that I want to kick its butt, like I want to do something to to make it hurt.
22:04
SPEAKER_00: Like it's compartmentalized.
22:06
SPEAKER_00: So that's one way I play with it.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: When I'm out there rate doing my training and it's hard, I I think I'm hurting the cancer, which makes me want to keep going.
22:13
SPEAKER_00: Also, I have a mantra that I say, if I can't do this, I can't go to Kona.
22:16
SPEAKER_00: So so uh but when I early on I told my wife, I said, We're gonna make this pretty simple.
22:21
SPEAKER_00: Cancer's gonna do whatever it wants to do, I'm gonna do whatever I want to do, and I'm gonna uh put it basically this way Cancer has my body, and I'll let the medical community handle that aspect of it.
22:33
SPEAKER_00: I'll do as I'm told.
22:34
SPEAKER_00: Cancer cannot have my heart because I gave that to my wife and my son.
22:38
SPEAKER_00: Cancer cannot have my mind because it belongs to me, and cancer cannot have my soul because I gave that to Jesus.
22:44
SPEAKER_00: So heart, mind, and soul against cancer, so far it's a winning philosophy for me.
22:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you're very you're very your mindset is like very po positive.
22:54
SPEAKER_00: It's built over time like a tidal wave.
22:56
SPEAKER_00: So like I said, you know, I'm not the man I was in April of 24.
22:59
SPEAKER_00: I was a weak broken man uh by September of 24.
23:03
SPEAKER_00: And then I had uh a scan that showed a bunch of tumors disappeared.
23:08
SPEAKER_00: After having an epiphany, I accepted the fact that I was gonna die.
23:11
SPEAKER_00: I was really close to death, and I only asked God for forgiveness for my sins and entry into heaven.
23:16
SPEAKER_00: A week later, they did a scan, almost all the tumors disappeared in my liver, which opened up the surgical options, which for me flipped the light switch.
23:24
SPEAKER_00: They don't know when I'm gonna die, they don't know what's possible.
23:27
SPEAKER_00: Iron Man Motto, anything's possible in the title of my book, Just Keep Trying, T R I hyphen-I N G.
23:33
SPEAKER_00: But if you get up every day, and this message is universal, regardless of what you're facing, just keep trying, point yourself in the right direction.
23:39
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you can't see the finish line, but you know you're going the right way, and just keep going, just keep trying, and you'd be surprised what you can accomplish if you just apply that simple mantra.
23:50
SPEAKER_01: Interesting.
23:51
SPEAKER_01: So you like so I'm just trying to think at the timeline here.
23:54
SPEAKER_01: So you get the diagnosis, you're kind of going through like, you know, telling your f your family, obviously, which is probably very, very hard, and you're kind of going through this whole, you know, trying to just kind of uh mentally and emotionally and physically figure out what it means.
24:11
SPEAKER_01: And then you have and then you have this.
24:13
SPEAKER_01: Did you start treatment already, or did you have six months into treatment?
24:18
SPEAKER_00: I had uh I had uh numerous and I'm able to handle a lot of chemo, so you know there's basically I call it three options mild, medium, and scorched earth.
24:27
SPEAKER_00: I've been on scorched earth for for 30 months.
24:29
SPEAKER_00: Apparently I could eat the chemo pretty well.
24:32
SPEAKER_00: I talk about it in the book, invited pain and uninvited pain.
24:35
SPEAKER_00: I I credit the Iron Man lifestyle and the endurance lifestyle for building the physical presence, the mental strength, the spiritual strength when I go into cancer that I I brought.
24:44
SPEAKER_00: I went from I went from swim bike run to chemo radiation surgery, and the the invited pain that you invite through training helped me when the uninvited pain and suffering came from chemo, and I really credit that preparedness uh for my longevity uh at this point.
25:01
SPEAKER_00: So um, you know, that's that's been a great gift as well.
25:05
SPEAKER_01: So okay.
25:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's yeah, but it was six months in and and things were bleak.
25:10
SPEAKER_00: I had lost 35 pounds, I had a level three skin infection, and you know, it was playing out just like the doctors had said, but then I had that epiphany, and then I and every time I did a race too, so I got diagnosed on April of 24, I had Texas on the schedule for two weeks later.
25:25
SPEAKER_00: And so I said, What the heck?
25:26
SPEAKER_00: I've already done the training, I already got the hotels, let's go give it a try.
25:29
SPEAKER_00: I got, I don't know, 80 miles into the bike and couldn't go any further.
25:33
SPEAKER_00: It was really disappointing.
25:34
SPEAKER_00: And uh that was the ride of shame.
25:36
SPEAKER_00: If you read the intro to the book, it was the first time I got picked up by a pickup truck.
25:40
SPEAKER_00: So here I am, diagnosed, untreated, looking at a terminal diagnosis, had this horrible race for my last race, got driven home in the truck.
25:48
SPEAKER_00: It was just the worst moment sitting in the back of the truck by myself, accepting defeat, and not being able to finish the way I wanted to finish.
25:55
SPEAKER_00: Well, it was only a week that I got home and and and signed up for Chattanooga 24.
26:00
SPEAKER_00: It didn't take long to say that's not gonna be my last race.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: That is not it.
26:05
SPEAKER_00: Uh and that was part of my.
26:21
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna keep doing I saw it again.
26:23
SPEAKER_00: I told my wife, I said, cancer might kill me, chemo might kill me, but swimming, biking, and running are not gonna kill me.
26:28
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna keep doing what I love to do for as long as I can do it.
26:31
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I can make the start line.
26:32
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I can train, but we're gonna find out.
26:35
SPEAKER_00: And I didn't want my last race to be my last race.
26:38
SPEAKER_00: That was not the way I'm going out.
26:39
SPEAKER_00: So I figured I had one more chance.
26:41
SPEAKER_00: And Chattanooga went worse than when, you know, uh Texas.
26:45
SPEAKER_00: So at some point my family said, Why are you doing this?
26:48
SPEAKER_00: Why are you torturing yourself?
26:49
SPEAKER_00: And I and I kept saying, I don't know, I just I just feel like I have to just keep trying, which ended up being the title of the book.
26:54
SPEAKER_00: And that's when I had the epiphany, that's when the tumors disappeared.
26:58
SPEAKER_00: And sure enough, after the horrible race and the tumors disappeared, even before they scheduled the surgery, uh, I had my liver removed on December of 24, and I ran the Atlanta half marathon on March 1st of 25.
27:13
SPEAKER_00: So my recovery rates were were really fantastic, but that just buoyed my spirit to to keep going.
27:18
SPEAKER_00: And uh and that's when I decided to write the book.
27:21
SPEAKER_00: And that's when I, you know, through writing the book and and signing up for Iron Man Florida 25 is how I got involved with the Iron Man Foundation, which is how I met Audrey, which is how I got invited to Hawaii.
27:31
SPEAKER_00: So if I didn't just keep trying, even though I couldn't see these events playing out the way they did, I would never know.
27:37
SPEAKER_00: So Yeah, that's interesting.
27:39
SPEAKER_01: Because I think many people with that would get that diagnosis and be like, I'm not even sure.
27:43
SPEAKER_00: Terminal doesn't mean the end.
27:46
SPEAKER_00: It's just the beginning.
27:47
SPEAKER_01: I'm just this is I think that's why your story's so incredible, because I do think so many people would have been like, oh no, like this is the end, like I'm not gonna do this anymore.
27:57
SPEAKER_01: And you are just determined to keep going and yeah, keep trying.
28:02
SPEAKER_00: You either accept you either accept your fate and and sit on the couch and and let let it play out on its own, or or you can decide to I I'm gonna die trying, put it that way.
28:12
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna die in motion.
28:14
SPEAKER_00: I always say if I die on the swim, I die with a grin.
28:16
SPEAKER_00: If I die on the bike, I die doing something I like, and if I die on the run, I was having fun.
28:21
SPEAKER_01: That's a good way of putting it.
28:23
SPEAKER_01: I was I I know there's always like people you do have those individuals who like pass away during a marathon or something, and I'm like, I don't know.
28:32
SPEAKER_00: Not so bad.
28:33
SPEAKER_01: I maybe that would be so bad.
28:35
SPEAKER_01: You know, that'd be doing something I love, and then there's always like think it's a tragedy, but to me, I mean, maybe if they're very young, it it is.
28:42
SPEAKER_01: But to me, I'm like, maybe it if I'm doing something I love, then it's not such a tragedy.
28:47
SPEAKER_00: That's kind of the way I looked at it.
28:48
SPEAKER_00: I got another question for you.
28:50
SPEAKER_00: If you were given the choice between dying suddenly or having time like I do to go through all this cancer stuff, uh I prefer to have the time.
28:59
SPEAKER_00: I I would hate to leave suddenly and leave people with unanswered questions.
29:03
SPEAKER_00: And then the next question you ask yourself, if you knew you were gonna die soon, well, you know, are there people you need to talk to?
29:09
SPEAKER_00: Are there things you need to do?
29:10
SPEAKER_00: Uh it causes you to focus on the things that are really matter.
29:14
SPEAKER_00: And one of the questions I had to ask myself is what makes a life worth living, and have I done those things?
29:19
SPEAKER_00: And and now I've changed my life in a way where I think I've filled some gaps.
29:23
SPEAKER_00: I'm living a life of service.
29:25
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and as long as I'm thriving and and and training and and writing books and doing podcasts and uh living to serve other people, help other people, my family doesn't worry about me.
29:36
SPEAKER_00: They see me thriving and doing well, unlike the first six months where I wasn't doing so well, they're not as concerned.
29:43
SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, I and my son especially, I know he's always watching.
29:46
SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that's always on top of my mind, you know, I spend 21 years teaching them how to live.
29:52
SPEAKER_00: The last lesson I'll teach him is how to die with some courage and dignity and meaning and purpose.
29:57
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, you have a choice if your time is short, how you want to spend it.
30:02
SPEAKER_00: That's that's up to you.
30:03
SPEAKER_00: But I want to make the most of it.
30:04
SPEAKER_00: And I'm really, really so happy with what I'm doing now, uh, that I wouldn't change the diagnosis.
30:10
SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't want to go back to the man I was before.
30:12
SPEAKER_00: I'm too happy with the person I'm becoming now.
30:16
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so there's there's two things that I that I kind of want to touch on right now.
30:21
SPEAKER_03: And there there aren't too many instances where I'm speechless, but listen listening to uh your story, I'm just I'm absolutely just at a loss for words.
30:36
SPEAKER_03: And I I want to say that many times athletes will come to me and they're and they're so con consumed with well, what's my performance going to be?
30:47
SPEAKER_03: What what can I do to to get this kind of performance?
30:50
SPEAKER_03: And you know, I I'm afraid to sign up for this race because you know this is how I want to perform.
30:57
SPEAKER_03: And every time I tell them, I was like, it it's not it's not the performance that matters.
31:02
SPEAKER_03: It's it's the daily steps that you take forward is what you're doing.
31:06
SPEAKER_00: If you do the little things you need to do along the way, if you do the if you want a great performance, it happens in the training.
31:12
SPEAKER_00: And you don't need to worry about tomorrow or the next day.
31:15
SPEAKER_00: What is on the schedule for today?
31:16
SPEAKER_00: Execute that plan to its fullest.
31:19
SPEAKER_00: And don't worry about tomorrow.
31:21
SPEAKER_00: Tomorrow will take care of itself if you take care of today.
31:24
SPEAKER_00: So to get you if you want to do great on race day, then you have to execute the plan flawlessly.
31:29
SPEAKER_00: And the little things, one thing I learned from Michael Phelps, and he talked about, you know, training seven days a week, no days off, but he also talked about in the swim, when they were doing their swims, he would swim to the wall every time, and you know, when you're training, maybe you lay off the last two or three strokes, maybe you lay off on you don't approach the wall the same way you would in a competition.
31:50
SPEAKER_00: He approached the wall, he finished every stroke to the wall.
31:53
SPEAKER_00: And do you know that I don't know how many of his medals he won by hundredths of a second?
31:58
SPEAKER_00: That little detail is what made the difference.
32:01
SPEAKER_00: You win one of those races by luck, you win seven of them by training.
32:05
SPEAKER_00: That's built in.
32:06
SPEAKER_00: He built it into the training.
32:08
SPEAKER_00: He didn't lay off on the last stroke in training, he treated it just like a race all the way to the wall.
32:13
SPEAKER_00: So if you take your daily training seriously and and little things matter a whole heck of a lot, we know that.
32:19
SPEAKER_00: You know, I had one person ask me, does that arrow helmet really matter?
32:23
SPEAKER_00: It's like, well, let's do the math.
32:24
SPEAKER_00: If you if you shave ten seconds a mile with an arrow helmet, it ends up being twenty minutes at the end of a hundred and twelve mile bike ride.
32:31
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, it matters.
32:32
SPEAKER_00: And that's just one little thing.
32:34
SPEAKER_00: You take ten little things, and now you've got something big, you know?
32:39
SPEAKER_00: But nothing big, nothing you nobody does anything big in one day.
32:42
SPEAKER_00: It's a series of little things, and we can all do little things.
32:46
SPEAKER_00: But pay attention to the details, yeah, for sure.
32:49
SPEAKER_03: We did an episode not too not too long ago.
32:52
SPEAKER_03: We did an episode where we talked about what to do after a disappointing race.
32:58
SPEAKER_03: And hearing hearing your story on how there were how many DNFs and actual in a in a DNS in there were you said it was like ten, right?
33:08
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm up to nine, yeah.
33:10
SPEAKER_00: The last one I I gave myself a break on because I had just come out of having my rectum removed, and even though I thought I could do it, I listened to the doctors, and I knew I was going to Kona, so I didn't want to waste my first finish in a in Florida if I could have it at Kona.
33:24
SPEAKER_03: So so the fact that you you keep coming back time and time again when when things just aren't going well and you're and you and you don't see the progress that you envisioned in your mind when you clicked on the registration button, we learn more about ourselves with those races than we do with the ones that are quote unquote successful.
33:48
SPEAKER_03: And I will tell you that most people are not inspired by the high performers.
33:55
SPEAKER_03: Most people, I believe, are inspired by the people that keep coming back time and time again to get better and to to finally achieve something that they've been working towards, even in spite of it not working out like they would hope it would.
34:13
SPEAKER_03: Those are way more inspiring stories than hearing about somebody who finishes, you know, on the podium or top ten or whatever.
34:20
SPEAKER_03: So your story on how you kept coming back time and time again, facing the adversity and not giving up is truly inspiring.
34:29
SPEAKER_00: So I I I love that I think all of us long distance endurance people have some of that in us.
34:36
SPEAKER_00: So I don't even like calling it failures, I call it a learning experience.
34:39
SPEAKER_00: I learned from each one.
34:40
SPEAKER_00: Something different happened in each one.
34:43
SPEAKER_00: And with each learning experience, I grow more determined.
34:48
SPEAKER_00: With each relapse, setback, side effect, treatment, surgery, I'd grow more determined.
34:55
SPEAKER_00: I'm more determined now than ever before.
34:57
SPEAKER_00: And and what I've said is, you know, for the longest time I wondered why these things are happening to me, well, they're happening for me, if you think of it this way.
35:04
SPEAKER_00: I'm doing the Iron Man training program the best I can, but I'm being prepared in ways that no other Iron Man is being prepared.
35:10
SPEAKER_00: Overcoming these surgeries mentally, physically, all the things you have to go through, by the time I get to Kona, there is nothing you can do to me in 17 hours swimming, biking, and running that I haven't been through in the previous 30 months.
35:23
SPEAKER_00: So whatever's out there, I'm prepared for, and I'm I'm I'm willing to push my body to the limit and see what we can do.
35:30
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I have tremendous optimism for for this race.
35:34
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, if you break it down real simple, if I'm out of the water and on the bike in two hours, that's a leisurely swim for me.
35:41
SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, I'm I grew up in the water on the ocean.
35:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm not afraid of water.
35:45
SPEAKER_00: I love being in the water.
35:46
SPEAKER_00: It's the easiest part of the day, just not terribly fast, and that's fine.
35:49
SPEAKER_00: Uh so you know, my greatest swim, I gotta bring it up because people are listening.
35:55
SPEAKER_00: My greatest swim was in Chattanooga 2019.
35:58
SPEAKER_00: Came back and uh the current was with me that day, 47 minutes.
36:02
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
36:03
SPEAKER_00: It was ridiculous.
36:04
SPEAKER_00: I thought I was lollygagging it.
36:06
SPEAKER_00: I thought my watch was broken.
36:07
SPEAKER_00: I was like, no way.
36:08
SPEAKER_00: And that was the day I only got halfway through the marathon, so my spirit went from I'm gonna kill this thing to I can't believe I didn't finish this thing.
36:16
SPEAKER_00: You know, and the next year COVID canceled the race.
36:18
SPEAKER_00: The next year I got COVID and delayed another year.
36:22
SPEAKER_00: The next year I overhydrated instead of dehydrated, so this is just a comedy of errors, you know.
36:27
SPEAKER_00: But each each with each with each setback, I grow more determined.
36:31
SPEAKER_00: And and uh, you know, I believe, I don't know, it's almost written like a movie, like a Rocky movie or something.
36:36
SPEAKER_00: I I need to finish this race in Kona and and wrap this whole thing up in a neat little bow so I can ride off into the sunset.
36:43
SPEAKER_00: But you know, I'm probably gonna I've already talked about um Chattanooga, the 70.3 World Championship next year might be my next target.
36:52
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was gonna say, I'm like, are you I'll never quit?
36:55
SPEAKER_00: Is that gonna be it?
36:56
SPEAKER_00: You'll have to drag me off by my feet.
36:58
SPEAKER_00: That's that's when I'll be done.
37:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
37:00
SPEAKER_03: So you you mentioned you mentioned that you that you're a man of faith.
37:04
SPEAKER_03: And so there's something that I want that I want to ask you, and this is something that I experienced in in my last uh Iron Man branded race.
37:14
SPEAKER_03: Through all of what you've gone through, you feel that there's something that God is trying to show you, that he's trying to teach you, and how have you taken that and and moved forward with it?
37:27
SPEAKER_00: I I go deep into this in the book that you know I was raised Catholic, I've always been a believer, I've always worn a crucifix or some sort of religious symbolry.
37:35
SPEAKER_00: Uh I go to church not as often as I used to, but it kind of drifted from the Catholic Church, the regiment of it.
37:41
SPEAKER_00: But I thought that I was a I I would describe myself as a faithful man, but not a man full of faith.
37:46
SPEAKER_00: So kind of like a faith of convenience, like a book on a shelf.
37:50
SPEAKER_00: You take it down when you need it, it's a selfish pursuit.
37:52
SPEAKER_00: It's not you're not all in the way you're supposed to be.
37:56
SPEAKER_00: And um it woke me up, it woke me up to that, to that fact.
37:59
SPEAKER_00: And you know, once I surrendered to God and I couldn't take it, you know, I just I just I tried to handle it all myself and it just doesn't work that way.
38:08
SPEAKER_00: When I relieved the burden is when I when I felt the joy and the light, and then the good results started happening to me.
38:14
SPEAKER_00: That was divine intervention.
38:16
SPEAKER_00: And since that moment, I decided to write the book, I decided to go to Florida, I got it to the Iron Man World Championship, uh, raised$40,000 for the foundation so far on my way to$100,000.
38:27
SPEAKER_00: My book is on Amazon.
38:29
SPEAKER_00: It achieved number one bestseller status in cancer, triathlon, and spiritual growth.
38:34
SPEAKER_00: And I'm meeting new people, I'm spreading the word all over the place.
38:37
SPEAKER_00: I know that I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, so much so that I retired as a home inspector, and this is what I do full time when I'm healthy enough, which is most of the time, is podcasting and and uh public speaking and promoting the book, which the proceeds from the book will go to my uh fundraising goal until we achieve that.
38:56
SPEAKER_00: And it's the greatest joy of my life.
38:58
SPEAKER_00: Again, I'm thankful to Cancer for the time and the opportunity to use my experience to help other people.
39:04
SPEAKER_00: And the greatest joy that I get is the feedback that I'm getting now from other people who are watching the podcasts and reading the book and you know, five-star reviews just is as far as the eye can see, and from people that barely know me.
39:16
SPEAKER_00: So I knew my family would review me nicely, but when I started getting good reviews from respectable people, I knew that I put together a pretty good product.
39:24
SPEAKER_00: Mo the book is short, easy to read, and full of really just the kind of stuff we're talking about right here.
39:30
SPEAKER_00: I don't think anyone, you know, it looks like a book about traffon, looks like a book about cancer, but it's really a book about faith and family and hope and love and the things that really matter, which are relationships and experiences.
39:41
SPEAKER_00: And it's all in there, young and old, men and women alike seem to really enjoy it.
39:46
SPEAKER_00: So I've been it's the greatest joy of my life that I've had these opportunities to, you know, meet new people like yourselves and put myself out there.
39:53
SPEAKER_00: You never know who's listening and who needs to hear it.
39:56
SPEAKER_01: Okay, I think it's like really powerful that you like the way that you're describing how the cancer I think a lot of people would be very negative about it.
40:08
SPEAKER_01: Like, oh I've got cancer, and it and you kind of you know, you go through that.
40:11
SPEAKER_01: I think everybody would like woe is me, kind of like why did this happen to me?
40:16
SPEAKER_01: But you were able to, as you know, through your journey with you know the cancer and the endurance sports, the way you frame it now is very interesting.
40:26
SPEAKER_01: And I've heard this before from people who've gone through something very difficult of like this, like they wouldn't necessarily go back and change it.
40:34
SPEAKER_01: Like there's something about that experience for you at the cancer that's kind of made you, you know, made you realize or you kind of realize maybe what you know what God intended for you, or whatever you know, whatever that is, like that you kind of have this epiphany and like it's changed your life in such a way that that maybe wouldn't have happened if you hadn't had the cancer especially.
40:56
SPEAKER_00: The question most people ask, you know, everyone knows you know, I believe God has a plan for me.
41:01
SPEAKER_00: I don't believe God makes mistakes.
41:03
SPEAKER_00: So this is the plan.
41:04
SPEAKER_00: Cancer is the plan.
41:06
SPEAKER_00: So what does that mean?
41:07
SPEAKER_00: How do I use that for me?
41:08
SPEAKER_00: Why would God put this in front of me to make me stronger, wiser, more courageous, to use what I've learned to help other people, which I think is what we're all supposed to be doing, uh living that life of service and sharing and caring and spreading the message of faith, hope, and love.
41:23
SPEAKER_00: And that's the reason I wrote the book, to give faith to the faithless and hope to the hopeless.
41:27
SPEAKER_00: As I entered the chemo rooms and the doctors and I saw the despair in people's faces, I saw the same look that I felt.
41:34
SPEAKER_00: And I just wanted to felt compelled to to do these things.
41:38
SPEAKER_00: And the more I do, the more feed the good feedback I get, the more doors open up that, you know, were never even on my radar previously.
41:46
SPEAKER_00: So I feel like I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing, and it's a lot it's the it's the easiest thing, easiest and hardest I would say at the same time, but it feels it just feels right.
41:57
SPEAKER_00: Like I'm not forcing anything, it's just coming right up before me.
42:01
SPEAKER_00: I've got television interviews set up, Iron Man's gonna be doing a thing on me.
42:06
SPEAKER_00: It's funny because growing up, I watched The Iron Man every year, and my wife and I always had this bet like who's gonna cry first, because they always did these heart-wrenching stories of people's, you know, coming back from a car accident or or or what the whatever their disability or or their challenge was.
42:22
SPEAKER_00: And you know, one of us would, you know, you can't get through one of those things without tears, and it was always so inspirational.
42:27
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm gonna be one of those people, is really quite the epiphany to me.
42:31
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like I said, I'm just thankful to cancer for that.
42:34
SPEAKER_00: And that's one of the ways you take cancer's power away.
42:37
SPEAKER_00: One, I'm not afraid of dying because I'm going to heaven.
42:40
SPEAKER_00: So all I have left is to figure out how to live between now and then, to the best of my ability.
42:45
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and two, I took the power away from cancer uh by thanking it for the good things.
42:51
SPEAKER_00: And uh so now it doesn't have that grip on me.
42:54
SPEAKER_00: So I have cancer, cancer does not have me, and I won't allow it the other way.
42:59
SPEAKER_01: That's amazing.
43:00
SPEAKER_01: You know, you could be very inspiration to you know, inspirational people who have cancer.
43:04
SPEAKER_01: I think a lot of people may be thinking to themselves, like, uh I have cancer, like I don't know if I could do, you know, an Iron Man or anyone in general, but it's like just especially someone who is experiencing that.
43:17
SPEAKER_01: But I'm curious, I'm kind of thinking to myself, maybe even like a 5k, you know, like perhaps if they can't.
43:23
SPEAKER_00: That's the message.
43:24
SPEAKER_00: That's exactly the point I want to get across.
43:26
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to have cancer, you don't have to be a long-distance endurance athlete.
43:30
SPEAKER_00: If you want to, you know, you could be a gardener, whatever your passion is, but you need to fill your your life with a purpose and a passion.
43:36
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you grow a garden and then you take the vegetables to cancer patients so they can eat healthy.
43:40
SPEAKER_00: Something like that.
43:41
SPEAKER_00: There's a way to do it other than what we do, but you have to find the thing that you love and then figure out a way to use it in service of others.
43:48
SPEAKER_00: And that's when it becomes a beautiful thing.
43:50
SPEAKER_00: So me to go into Kona is kind of personal.
43:53
SPEAKER_00: It also inspires people, but writing the book was to help people and then to use the money from profit from the book to fund the foundation.
44:00
SPEAKER_00: And give back to the community that I love so much.
44:02
SPEAKER_00: It just feels so right.
44:05
SPEAKER_00: I've never felt more fulfilled, more meaningful, purposeful life, and I know I'm inspiring others, and it's just been uh fantastic.
44:13
SPEAKER_00: I work with the American Cancer Society.
44:15
SPEAKER_00: We did a fundraising banquet the other night.
44:17
SPEAKER_00: They called it Cowboy Couture.
44:19
SPEAKER_00: I'm from New Jersey.
44:20
SPEAKER_00: They've had me up in a$1,500 ostrich boots, big black hat.
44:25
SPEAKER_00: Uh I could send you guys a picture.
44:26
SPEAKER_00: It's pretty funny.
44:27
SPEAKER_00: But we got to walk the runway.
44:28
SPEAKER_00: All the cancer survivors had to walk the runway.
44:31
SPEAKER_00: So just fun stuff like that has been has been great.
44:34
SPEAKER_00: We're having fun and raising money.
44:35
SPEAKER_00: And you know, same thing with the traffics.
44:38
SPEAKER_00: But you know, you it could be a 5K and you can walk it.
44:41
SPEAKER_00: You could do it with a friend, and you're supporting a local charity, you're getting a little health benefit, and sometimes you get a cupcake and a medal at the end, maybe even a cookie.
44:50
SPEAKER_00: I don't care who you are, crossing the finish line feels great.
44:53
SPEAKER_00: They put that metal around your neck.
44:55
SPEAKER_00: You get the t-shirt.
44:56
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't have to be an Iron Man.
44:57
SPEAKER_01: I mean, for some some I think people think that they're like, oh well, I can't do that.
45:02
SPEAKER_01: But the somebody's 5K, like or 10K, maybe a cool thing.
45:07
SPEAKER_00: So you're always helping somebody locally.
45:10
SPEAKER_00: It's a charity.
45:11
SPEAKER_00: You get a t-shirt, and you'll be surprised.
45:13
SPEAKER_00: I tell people this too, the people that you meet that you would not have met otherwise.
45:17
SPEAKER_00: And I I, you know, I love all my race people, but iron people in particular, I have a great affection for, as we all know what what what we what we go through.
45:26
SPEAKER_00: And I think a lot of people have said, after watching me talk, they're like, man, it's kind of hard to blow off that next workout when I'm perfectly healthy.
45:34
SPEAKER_00: And I tell people, you know, when you don't feel like doing your workout or your training or whatever, just realize that that's a privilege uh to be able to do it.
45:43
SPEAKER_00: There may come a day you're not able to do it.
45:45
SPEAKER_00: So while you can, you know, do it.
45:48
SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you this, I've never had a training session that I didn't want to do that I did that I regretted after it was done.
45:53
SPEAKER_00: Even if it was bad, at least I checked it off the list.
45:56
SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you what, uh tri-dot and then uh training peaks and all that have been great because that's accountability.
46:02
SPEAKER_00: You know, back in the day, if you had a coach, you know, you did you ride?
46:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
46:07
SPEAKER_00: 40 miles, well, you know, now it's all on Garmin and Strava, and it's like there's no hiding from the watch, you know, there's no hiding from the data.
46:15
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's true.
46:16
SPEAKER_00: And I for me, I don't know.
46:17
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure you guys are the same way, but you know, I don't have that problem anymore.
46:20
SPEAKER_00: And for a long time I haven't, I feel guilty if I miss a workout and I try to figure out ways to make it up instead of just letting it go, you know.
46:27
SPEAKER_00: So missing a workout is like, uh, like you missed one.
46:31
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I feel like we both we both can feel you there for sure.
46:34
SPEAKER_03: I think we're both like that.
46:36
SPEAKER_03: Um I I love it that you just brought this up because this was one of the questions that I wanted to ask you is, you know, what is it that you find that you have that you do uh for yourself to when you're just you just don't want to go out the door.
46:51
SPEAKER_03: You just you've got a workout that's on the schedule and you just don't want to do it.
46:55
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it sounds like that you don't really have that much of a problem with that now because it's if I can't do this, I can't do court.
47:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
47:07
SPEAKER_00: Even even the first six months of this year, just a I was no evidence of disease when I started my training program in December of 25.
47:15
SPEAKER_00: I'm training with Jill Bartholomew, Be Fierce Multisport, she's a great coach.
47:19
SPEAKER_00: And um, we started, you know, it's funny because you have to talk to her, she's a great interview as well, uh world world champion as well.
47:26
SPEAKER_00: But I I called her up, we had our initial consultation, and I told her what I was trying to do.
47:30
SPEAKER_00: And she's like, What?
47:33
SPEAKER_00: I have a million questions.
47:34
SPEAKER_00: She's in touch with my doctor, and they're trying to figure all this out if it's a good idea or not.
47:38
SPEAKER_00: But I told her, I said, Look, I got stage four, uh, but I'm no evidence of disease.
47:43
SPEAKER_00: I said, if we're lucky, I'll cruise through the year with no no big deal.
47:46
SPEAKER_00: So January, we get into January, and and uh I have an ostomy, which is just a little piece of your intestines.
47:52
SPEAKER_00: It's actually an illyostomy, small intestines hanging out.
47:55
SPEAKER_00: So you kind of poop into a bag or whatever.
47:57
SPEAKER_00: And first part of the year, it prolapsed, which means like three inches of it came plopping out of my stomach.
48:03
SPEAKER_00: Go to the hospital, and I figured it's a surgical solution.
48:06
SPEAKER_00: Turns out they just put a little table sugar on there, shrink it up, and shove it back in with their hands.
48:11
SPEAKER_00: And I told me I could do the same.
48:13
SPEAKER_00: So uh they did an abdominal scan while I was in the hospital and found that I had three golf ball-sized tumors had redeveloped on my liver.
48:21
SPEAKER_00: So now I'm back in chemo for the first three months of the year, uh, scorched earth, hardcore chemo, that I'm training through, did really doing pretty well with the chemo and training through it.
48:31
SPEAKER_00: And then I got the blood the infection on the port, which led to the blood clot, which led to the hospitalization, which led to the no evidence of disease, which led to the surgery that fixed the original problem on uh June 9th with the ostomy.
48:43
SPEAKER_00: So on June 10th, I was fixed, good to go, no evidence of disease.
48:48
SPEAKER_00: Until I overdosed on the over-the-counter medication and sent me back again.
48:52
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, it's funny with cancer that the same things don't repeat themselves.
48:56
SPEAKER_00: It's something new every time that you could never have imagined.
48:59
SPEAKER_00: So that that keeps it interesting.
49:02
SPEAKER_01: Never know what's coming on.
49:03
SPEAKER_01: That was actually the whole the cause I I'd listened to the other podcast um with um Karen.
49:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
49:10
SPEAKER_01: I I'd listened to another podcast you were on and you had told you were talking about the ileostomy.
49:14
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
49:15
SPEAKER_01: And as a dietitian, I'm that might have been what the diet is.
49:18
SPEAKER_01: I work with sports.
49:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I work with sports, but I work I have a strong clinical background.
49:23
SPEAKER_01: And you know, I I'm just curious, uh from just you know, we don't have to go into a lot of detail here, but I'm curious like with your nutrition, like how are, you know, how is the fueling?
49:33
SPEAKER_01: I mean, are you having like some significant side effects from the chemo that it does it make it hard to eat enough to because you you know how important fueling is?
49:41
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I don't even know if you can see right now I'm having some spasms as we speak in my in my lungs, in my esophagus from the chemo, from the steroids.
49:52
SPEAKER_00: Makes it hard to breathe and swallow.
49:54
SPEAKER_00: It interrupts that those patterns.
49:56
SPEAKER_00: And the skin infection causes uh blisters and sores on your skin, but it's not just on the surface.
50:03
SPEAKER_00: My gums, my tongue, my cheeks are all swollen and blistered, so chewing and swallowing are very difficult.
50:10
SPEAKER_00: And there's only a handful of foods that I can eat.
50:12
SPEAKER_00: Fortunately I like protein shakes.
50:16
SPEAKER_00: And so I can get my protein, my nutrients, uh, throw a little creatine in there to keep the muscle up.
50:22
SPEAKER_00: Uh a lot of people die from cancer from malnutrition.
50:26
SPEAKER_00: Um and the digestive system is the most difficult aspect of this.
50:31
SPEAKER_00: Uh, but I've managed to figure it out now where I can maintain my weight.
50:34
SPEAKER_00: Uh I have a handful of foods I know I can eat, you know, like a plain turkey sandwich, or you know, when I'm you know I've lost eight pounds in the last two weeks just because of the skin infection and whatnot, but now I'm on the mend and I'll I'll I don't necessarily need to gain it all back.
50:48
SPEAKER_00: I'm 175 pounds, that would be fine for race day.
50:52
SPEAKER_00: Um so you know, now I'm now I'm just fingers crossed that I could get some good weather.
50:57
SPEAKER_00: I think I deserve that if God is listening.
51:00
SPEAKER_00: I'd like no wind on that day.
51:02
unknown: Yeah.
51:03
SPEAKER_01: I was gonna say when you said you don't like wind and you don't like it.
51:08
SPEAKER_00: I need a glassy ocean, a smooth swim, no mechanicals, good health.
51:12
SPEAKER_00: I I need I need some divine intervention.
51:14
SPEAKER_00: I think I've earned it.
51:15
SPEAKER_00: But um I think God has a sense of humor, so I wouldn't be surprised if the heavens opened up and they just make it as hard as humanly possible, you know?
51:23
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I'm determined.
51:24
SPEAKER_00: Like I said, uh I'm optimistic and I'm determined, and and I'm okay no matter what happens, because I know that I've done the best that I can do, and when I get there, I'll do the best that I can do to be the best that I can be, and we'll see how it ends up.
51:37
SPEAKER_00: Uh I'll have to accept the result regardless.
51:40
SPEAKER_00: Uh but like I said, I've got some real optimism, and uh we'll see what happens.
51:44
SPEAKER_00: So it should be interesting.
51:46
SPEAKER_00: You got a lot of people following me, and uh, we can certainly follow up after the race too, so you'll get my feedback one way or the other.
51:53
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, whatever your deal is, you know, you don't need to have cancer, whatever your issue is.
51:58
SPEAKER_00: Just keep trying.
51:59
SPEAKER_00: You'd be surprised what you can accomplish when you just focus on the on the troubles in the day in front of you and just keep it that simple.
52:06
SPEAKER_00: Because worrying about tomorrow just steals your joy from today.
52:09
SPEAKER_00: If you're worried about race day, you can't really focus on the training you need to do or whatever it is you need to do in your life.
52:15
SPEAKER_00: So the message is universal.
52:17
SPEAKER_01: That's that's so true because I'm thinking about my last marathon, which I've had a difficult time with.
52:23
SPEAKER_01: And um, it was when I started to worry, start worrying about race day, like obsessing over it, thinking about it, not enjoying the training anymore.
52:33
SPEAKER_01: That, you know, that's kind of where the I finished the race and it was really hard, but it I it was a challenge and I kind of lost the joy from it.
52:42
SPEAKER_01: And um now, you know, trying to recuperate and recover from that, you know, I'm it's it took me a long time to kind of get to a point where I'm like kind of okay, I'm ready to do something again.
52:52
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, start working towards something again.
52:54
SPEAKER_01: Um, so I do think that's important.
52:57
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, when you start to lose that joy or that day, like you're you you're just out there doing it because you know you have to to get to the end, but you're not really there.
53:06
SPEAKER_00: More often than not, you're not gonna execute your plan.
53:09
SPEAKER_00: There's just too much that can go wrong, especially in an Iron Man.
53:12
SPEAKER_00: I have never done an Iron Man where something that you know, Texas, for instance, uh the very I just bought my Garmin 1040.
53:22
SPEAKER_00: And and uh ten miles into the bike ride, I look down, the damn thing's missing.
53:28
SPEAKER_00: I stopped, turned around, going against traffic, everybody yelling at me, I'm looking at the ground for this computer, and uh I had to go ten minutes back, finally found it, put it back on, you know, but that'll never happen again.
53:39
SPEAKER_00: I'll never dehydrate again, I'll never overhydrate again, I'll never drop my garment again.
53:43
SPEAKER_00: You know, so these things happen and you you learn from it.
53:46
SPEAKER_00: But just like cancer, the next thing is is unpredictable, unforeseeable, and it'll happen, you know.
53:53
SPEAKER_00: But every now and again you'll have that day where it just everything flows, everything goes.
53:59
SPEAKER_00: But it's it's that's a rare thing, you know.
54:02
SPEAKER_00: Uh, because more often than not, just like life, doesn't go as you plan, and you gotta roll with the punches.
54:07
SPEAKER_00: So for me, being self-employed my whole life, I I don't dwell on problems, I go immediately to solution, and I don't look for other people to solve it.
54:15
SPEAKER_00: Even if it's your problem, I'll solve it just so we could get through it.
54:17
SPEAKER_00: If you're if I'm in your car and you get a flat, I'll change it.
54:20
SPEAKER_00: Don't worry about it, you just sit there.
54:22
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I th I think endurance athletes tend to put so much emphasis on race day and that like i if if they don't have a good race, then somehow the work that they put in was a waste of time or they somehow feel invalidated.
54:38
SPEAKER_03: But I I don't think that they really kind of understand that a good race day is actually few and far between.
54:47
SPEAKER_03: There's just things that you just cannot control.
54:50
SPEAKER_00: Right.
54:50
SPEAKER_03: And it's it I've always said that you know, Iron Man and Triathlon, you it's a master's degree in crisis management.
54:59
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
54:59
SPEAKER_03: And you're just out there just putting out little fires here and there uh as they come up, and you know, race gate is what it is.
55:08
SPEAKER_00: So I would say the best analogy uh is you know, Tom Brady has what, seven Super Bowls?
55:15
SPEAKER_00: That's unusual.
55:16
SPEAKER_00: You can't expect that.
55:17
SPEAKER_00: Now, you take a guy like Dan Marino, 20 years in the NFL, Hall of Fame career, no Super Bowls.
55:24
SPEAKER_00: Does that diminish his accomplishment?
55:26
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure he would like to have a ring, but it does not diminish the accomplishment.
55:30
SPEAKER_00: He's still one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time.
55:33
SPEAKER_00: And that's something great to remind your athletes is it's not necessarily all in that that you know winning or or or that thing.
55:43
SPEAKER_00: You can still get all the benefits, you can still have a Hall of Fame career and no Super Bowl, if that's the way it plays out for you.
55:49
SPEAKER_00: But as long as you know you did your best to be your best and you left everything on the table, then that's the best you could do.
55:55
SPEAKER_00: What more could you ask of yourself?
55:57
SPEAKER_00: You know?
55:58
SPEAKER_00: So I I always look at that, that Dan Marino had that long, beautiful career.
56:03
SPEAKER_00: Great quarterback, just wasn't able ever to put all the pieces together.
56:07
SPEAKER_00: And it's not a result of not him working, not working hard, or the team not trying.
56:11
SPEAKER_00: Uh it just never came together for him in in the way that we're talking about in his time.
56:16
SPEAKER_00: And uh I hope I hope not to be the Dan Marino of the Iron Man Trial Triath Laws, but if that's what it ends up being, you know, it's still the image of who I am, it's still my lifestyle, um, and I still get all the benefits from it.
56:30
SPEAKER_00: So uh but I still believe I'll get that finish line, and it'll be a glorious moment.
56:36
SPEAKER_00: My wife, my son will be there, uh, all my new friends on the Iron Man Foundation team, Audra and all the great people at the Iron Man Foundation.
56:44
SPEAKER_00: Uh it's gonna be pretty epic.
56:46
SPEAKER_00: I've never been to Hawaii, but to me, as you know, that's like uh that's Mecca.
56:52
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's that's heaven on earth.
56:54
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna enjoy it.
56:55
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna make the best of it, and uh hopefully I can finish it in a way that will be movie-worthy, because that'll probably be my next step is make a movie.
57:03
SPEAKER_00: Let's turn it into a movie.
57:05
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
57:07
SPEAKER_00: It's like the Rocky, the Rocky, the Rocky of uh the Rocky of Iron Man, you know.
57:11
SPEAKER_00: There's not enough Iron Man movies out there.
57:13
SPEAKER_00: I look on Netflix, I look on Prime.
57:15
SPEAKER_00: These stories are great.
57:16
SPEAKER_00: You could tell uh you could tell them over and over again.
57:19
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you see it in the Iron Man you know channel on YouTube where they do this some of the stories on the pros, but I'm with you, Justin.
57:25
SPEAKER_00: I think the stories of the average people, and I've said this before, I believe you could go through every paddock, 2,500 bikes, pull any number, go talk to that person, and have something interesting to talk about their struggle and what their challenges were and how they overcame and who inspired them and and what it means to them and why they do it.
57:43
SPEAKER_00: You know, we all have our our whys and and everybody's got a story to tell.
57:47
SPEAKER_00: And I think more often than not, mm-hmm, most of those stories would be a pretty good listen.
57:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
57:55
SPEAKER_03: I was just gonna say that uh one question that I do have for you is I I've always said that Iron Man and Trathlon is we we don't go to race day alone.
58:08
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
58:09
SPEAKER_03: We don't train for Iron Man in isolation.
58:13
SPEAKER_03: The people that are around us, the people that love us the most, they're they train with us.
58:20
SPEAKER_03: They may not be swimming, biking, and running, but there's stuff that they're sacrificing, things that they that they do to support you because they love you.
58:27
SPEAKER_03: Then, you know, race day, I I've spectated a bunch of uh several races, and I think it was more challenging and more exhausting to spectate than it was to actually race.
58:37
SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't like spectating.
58:40
SPEAKER_03: So can can you tell me a little bit about how this journey that you've gone through, through the cancer and the treatment and the training, how has this what has this been like for the people that are closest to you?
58:54
SPEAKER_00: I think it's been a relief to them to see me get back to living not only the way that I used to live, but but in a better way.
59:01
SPEAKER_00: Speaking with my father this morning, and he said to me, he's very proud of me.
59:05
SPEAKER_00: And uh in the book I even mentioned the greatest accomplishment in my life is winning my father's respect, which I always had, but recently, you know, watching me go through this process, he said he's never been more proud of me and uh respects me as an equal and uh you know just the greatest compliment, the greatest reward thing ever in my life, you know.
59:26
SPEAKER_00: Um so you know, you know, it's an individual sport, nobody does it alone.
59:31
SPEAKER_00: Um you know, if you go around my house, I've got a bicycle in every room, training bikes, uh kickers, uh race bikes, uh mountain bikes, you know, you name it, uh running gear.
59:42
SPEAKER_00: It's just it's our lifestyle.
59:43
SPEAKER_00: So my family jumped in with me.
59:45
SPEAKER_00: We do race cations, we don't take vacations, I don't sit on the beach.
59:48
SPEAKER_00: My wife sits on the beach.
59:49
SPEAKER_00: I go ride bikes and run and do all that other stuff for many, many hours.
59:53
SPEAKER_00: So I have a little entourage that follows me now.
59:56
SPEAKER_00: My son, who's 21, been racing with me since he's 16, but he's more of a power lifter, so he does the little races, and it's just as much fun to race with him and cross a finish line with him.
1:00:07
SPEAKER_00: And uh he does it for fun with me.
1:00:09
SPEAKER_00: We turned uh Atlanta Half Marathon into a tradition.
1:00:12
SPEAKER_00: We do that every year in the first of the year, and that's always kind of fun.
1:00:15
SPEAKER_00: That's a big race, it's a fun race.
1:00:17
SPEAKER_00: Uh so the family is all in.
1:00:19
SPEAKER_00: Uh it's a it's it's a and I I've said this before, just like the interesting stories in the paddock, but I don't think you can have a long-distance endurance athlete in your house and not have everyone in the house benefit from their presence.
1:00:33
SPEAKER_00: Just in the discipline, just in the lifestyle, just in the diet, the nutrition, it can't help but rub off on others.
1:00:39
SPEAKER_00: Uh you know, the the all of it.
1:00:41
SPEAKER_00: It it just does.
1:00:42
SPEAKER_00: I know it's I know it's rubbed off on my son.
1:00:45
SPEAKER_01: So it's interesting the way to think of it, because sometimes I'm like doing my running and maybe not spending that time with my family, but there are probably p positive things like nutrition or yeah, this my son is seven.
1:00:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he's almost seven years old.
1:01:01
SPEAKER_00: So kids kids watch more what you do than what you say.
1:01:05
SPEAKER_00: Your actions mean more than your words, especially when they're teenagers.
1:01:08
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you feel like you're talking to a wall.
1:01:10
SPEAKER_00: Uh that they'll they'll follow your you know, when I was a kid, I had aunts and uncles smoking cigarettes and drinking whiskey telling me not to smoke cigarettes and drink whiskey.
1:01:19
SPEAKER_00: Uh that doesn't work, you know?
1:01:22
SPEAKER_00: So if you if you lead by example, and I think it's a good example that we set, uh they're watching that and they're proud of that.
1:01:30
SPEAKER_00: Uh I I know uh I'm in better shape than some of my friend friends, you know, my son's friends.
1:01:36
SPEAKER_00: Uh and they all think I'm some kind of Marvel hero, like uh cancer killer.
1:01:40
SPEAKER_00: They just, you know, they think I'm indestructible.
1:01:43
SPEAKER_00: So that's the way my son sees it too.
1:01:45
SPEAKER_00: He's not worried about me dying.
1:01:46
SPEAKER_00: He's like, I don't think cancer has a chance.
1:01:49
SPEAKER_01: You're like a Marvel hero.
1:01:51
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you kind of are.
1:01:52
SPEAKER_01: Could be one of the Marvel characters.
1:01:55
SPEAKER_00: Well we'll see, we'll see.
1:01:56
SPEAKER_00: I wrote the book, now I gotta finish the race.
1:01:58
SPEAKER_00: If I don't finish the race, there's no movie, you know.
1:02:00
SPEAKER_00: Right, you gotta have that moment in the end where you're hey yo, Adrian.
1:02:05
SPEAKER_00: Uh you know, so uh but even Rocky, you know, think about Rocky, he didn't win that first fight.
1:02:10
SPEAKER_03: It's true.
1:02:11
SPEAKER_00: He lost that fight.
1:02:13
SPEAKER_00: But it still felt like a victory, didn't it?
1:02:16
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna win no matter what.
1:02:18
unknown: Right.
1:02:19
SPEAKER_00: I'm coming out of the street.
1:02:20
SPEAKER_01: I wish I could be there to watch you now.
1:02:21
SPEAKER_01: I wish I could go to Kona.
1:02:24
SPEAKER_00: You can do the live live follow me, you know.
1:02:26
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna put my number up.
1:02:27
SPEAKER_00: So uh yeah.
1:02:29
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I've got a I've got an artist friend who's gonna be a pretty famous artist friend who's done he does live paintings at at giant sporting events.
1:02:37
SPEAKER_00: Like he was Dale Earnhardt's uh personal artist.
1:02:40
SPEAKER_00: He did Muhammad Ali, the Atlanta Braves.
1:02:42
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna be painting a picture of me live on Facebook, crossing a finish line during the race that we're then gonna auction off for charity.
1:02:50
SPEAKER_00: So that should be pretty interesting as well.
1:02:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:02:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
1:02:53
SPEAKER_00: He's a talented guy.
1:02:54
SPEAKER_00: He just called me about that today.
1:02:56
SPEAKER_00: So just thinking outside of the box, different ways to raise money.
1:02:59
SPEAKER_00: You know, you can only ask friends and family for so much, and then beyond that, you've got to figure out something.
1:03:04
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I thought if I could offer something of value, as well as, you know, if you give a donation, then you get the book.
1:03:10
SPEAKER_00: So the book is like a donation.
1:03:11
SPEAKER_00: Even though Amazon takes half, I think the paperback is 15 bucks.
1:03:15
SPEAKER_00: So I think I get seven bucks a book.
1:03:17
SPEAKER_00: So trying to raise$100,000,$7 at a time.
1:03:21
SPEAKER_00: But I've had a lot of friends and family be very generous and some corporate donations and matches.
1:03:26
SPEAKER_00: And uh my goal is a hundred thousand, I'm up to 40, and I think I can close that gap.
1:03:31
SPEAKER_00: I really do.
1:03:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:03:33
SPEAKER_01: Well, hopefully we can help a little bit.
1:03:35
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I I do want to make sure that we that we tell others, you know, how they can get how can they how they can contribute with the right thing.
1:03:42
SPEAKER_03: Well, I would say two things.
1:03:43
SPEAKER_00: Two two things.
1:03:44
SPEAKER_00: One, you can go to my Instagram page, which is stage four two zero two five, the number four two zero two five, s-t-a-g-e four two zero two five.
1:03:53
SPEAKER_00: And there in my bio, there's a link directly to the donor page.
1:03:56
SPEAKER_00: But beyond that, if if you're an Iron Man and you're racing an Iron Man, whether it's 70.3 or the full, you always have that option to click on the foundation option and and and and race for more is what we call it.
1:04:09
SPEAKER_00: Even if you just do one race, a 70.3, I think you have to raise like$4,000.
1:04:14
SPEAKER_00: Right off the bat, you get admission into the race, get a really cool kit, and then you know, you start your fundraising, and it's fun.
1:04:21
SPEAKER_00: And the people you meet and the team that you're involved with, it's great to give back to the community that does so much for us.
1:04:27
SPEAKER_00: And I found it really rewarding, and and they're always happy to have more people on the team.
1:04:31
SPEAKER_00: You know, all the money we raise goes into the communities we race in, and if you don't know what they do with it, uh, for instance, in Detroit, I was speaking with Shelly at the Iron Man Foundation, she lives in Detroit.
1:04:41
SPEAKER_00: Sixty percent of the kids in the city don't know how to swim.
1:04:44
SPEAKER_00: So one of the things the foundation does is they'll go into those communities, teach the kids how to swim, teach them how to bike.
1:04:50
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they'll give them bikes, teach them how to maintain the bikes.
1:04:53
SPEAKER_00: They were just over in Africa, giving kids bikes, so instead of walking all over the place, they get to ride.
1:04:58
SPEAKER_00: They taught them how to change tires and set goals and prove, you know, the Iron Man motto that anything's possible.
1:05:04
SPEAKER_00: But you know, what what do you actually do when you teach a kid to swim?
1:05:07
SPEAKER_00: Well, you teach them to swim, but beyond that, you teach them that what looked like an insurmountable obstacle is surmountable if you get some help and you're willing to just keep trying and do the work that you can overcome these things.
1:05:19
SPEAKER_00: And it opens up their mind to the idea that anything's possible.
1:05:23
SPEAKER_00: Fast forward, how does that impact and manifest later in life when you come across another tremendous challenge?
1:05:29
SPEAKER_00: Instead of shying away, backing off, you're gonna lean in.
1:05:32
SPEAKER_00: And that to me is the gift that keeps giving, and that's why I'm really proud to be part of the team.
1:05:36
SPEAKER_00: One, you can donate and help me, but two, you could also be part of the team.
1:05:42
SPEAKER_00: You know, without much effort.
1:05:44
SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
1:05:44
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:05:45
SPEAKER_01: Interesting.
1:05:46
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to raise a hundred thousand dollars.
1:05:48
SPEAKER_00: This is the championship.
1:05:49
SPEAKER_00: But if you do a local race, the numbers get a little more reasonable.
1:05:52
SPEAKER_00: So with the team kit, the team kits are really cool and you can only get them one way.
1:05:56
SPEAKER_00: Uh so that's worth a that's worth easily three hundred bucks right there.
1:06:00
SPEAKER_00: And then you know the admissions kind of makes up for some of it.
1:06:03
SPEAKER_00: And then most people can raise$4,000 through friends and family.
1:06:06
SPEAKER_00: That's not that hard.
1:06:08
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's true.
1:06:09
SPEAKER_00: So I encourage people to, if you haven't thought about it, pick a race, one race, and and just do it for one, you know?
1:06:15
SPEAKER_03: Do you have a website that uh that people can go to as like a central location for donations?
1:06:20
SPEAKER_00: Don't have a website.
1:06:21
SPEAKER_00: Iron Man has the website, it's the Iron Man Foundation.
1:06:24
SPEAKER_00: You can go directly to the foundation page and find my name, Jim Logan, and just put it in there.
1:06:28
SPEAKER_00: But I have the link in my uh in my Instagram, and I also connected it to you guys through email.
1:06:34
SPEAKER_00: I'll make sure you still have that as well.
1:06:36
SPEAKER_00: So but yeah, it's just easier to click through.
1:06:38
SPEAKER_00: That way you get the debt tax donation, you get the tax, you know, it's tax deductible.
1:06:42
SPEAKER_00: The foundation's been around for over two decades.
1:06:45
SPEAKER_00: They've already distributed well over$60 million.
1:06:48
SPEAKER_00: 501c3K, very highly rated.
1:06:50
SPEAKER_00: The money's going to to a good cause.
1:06:52
SPEAKER_00: And as far as I can tell, they're doing things that no other charity is really doing.
1:06:56
SPEAKER_00: So they're filling that void, which is, you know, what would the kind of stuff we care about.
1:07:01
SPEAKER_00: Um, so it's just really a great organization and just full of great people.
1:07:05
SPEAKER_00: Um and that's been a real tremendous joy as well, getting to work with all the Iron Man people.
1:07:10
SPEAKER_00: And and uh for me it's it's as as rewarding as training for the race is fundraising for the race as well.
1:07:16
SPEAKER_00: It's adding an element to the race that's really cool and unaccored.
1:07:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think that's like actually because you're actually doing it for a cause, not just for yourself.
1:07:27
SPEAKER_01: You know, it's not I mean I think sometimes inherently kind of these endurance.
1:07:32
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they call it racing.
1:07:35
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's that's the saying.
1:07:37
SPEAKER_00: Racing for more.
1:07:38
SPEAKER_01: For some people, for many people out there, maybe that is you know what would motivate them to get the case.
1:07:43
SPEAKER_00: I think charity is always best when it's close to your heart.
1:07:46
SPEAKER_00: So um you know, my dad was a UPS executive, he's big into education, and he really has a heart for single moms who struggle.
1:07:55
SPEAKER_00: And so he set up a he built a building, first of all, at a community college, a mathematics building, and then he set up a fund for single moms who maybe reach that point where they want to keep going to school, but money is tough, so he'll buy them books or help them with their apartment so that they can finish their degree and not fall off track just because of a couple hundred dollars for a few books.
1:08:14
SPEAKER_00: But it if you do the charity close to home where you can actually see the result, it just feels better.
1:08:20
SPEAKER_00: So it's natural for me to want to do charitable work in the community that I already love.
1:08:26
SPEAKER_00: And that's what you would do, whatever your community is, you know what I mean?
1:08:29
SPEAKER_00: So if you could tie it all together, do the thing you love, and tie it to a charity, a service, uh a higher cause, then it's just man, it's just that much more rewarding.
1:08:38
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
1:08:40
SPEAKER_01: I can see that.
1:08:41
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
1:08:42
SPEAKER_01: Well, and then the and then people should buy your book too.
1:08:44
SPEAKER_01: So the way the book is a great way.
1:08:46
SPEAKER_00: I two things with the book.
1:08:47
SPEAKER_00: What one I really think whether you have cancer or not, you know, what regardless of your situation, most people read the book.
1:08:53
SPEAKER_00: It's not long, it's not difficult to read.
1:08:56
SPEAKER_00: And most of the reviews that I get are that people pick it up and read it cover to cover.
1:09:00
SPEAKER_00: Uh or or in two sittings.
1:09:02
SPEAKER_00: It just kind of draws you in, it's an easy read, and it's done before you know it.
1:09:06
SPEAKER_00: So I wanted to make it meaningful but simple.
1:09:09
SPEAKER_00: I wanted it to appeal to as many people as possible without getting lost in triathlon stuff or cancer stuff or even faith stuff.
1:09:16
SPEAKER_00: So it's a little bit of everything.
1:09:17
SPEAKER_00: And I that's why I think people are able to find it easy to read, and everyone's able to pull something out of it.
1:09:23
SPEAKER_00: So not only are you making a nice little donation to charity, you're also hopefully getting something in return yourself.
1:09:29
SPEAKER_00: So uh that was the plan, and like I said, it's been very, very rewarding.
1:09:33
SPEAKER_00: Took me 13 months to write the book, and all I wanted was a good product.
1:09:37
SPEAKER_00: I didn't care how long it took, and I was nervous about it because I'd never written a book before, and it came out really good, and I'm really proud of it, and the reviews are fantastic.
1:09:46
SPEAKER_00: So this spent it's been a tremendous reward.
1:09:48
SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
1:09:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:09:49
SPEAKER_01: Well that's amazing.
1:09:50
SPEAKER_01: I think I think, yeah, I think you just told your story really well, and hopefully we were able to ask questions and dive in a little bit deeper.
1:09:58
SPEAKER_01: And I don't know, do you have any other questions, Justin, or anything you want to add?
1:10:03
SPEAKER_01: I don't.
1:10:04
SPEAKER_01: I again I'm just I'm just too much of your time.
1:10:07
SPEAKER_00: No, I think I think that about covers it.
1:10:09
SPEAKER_00: It seems to me I've done this enough times now.
1:10:11
SPEAKER_00: It's about 45 minutes an hour.
1:10:13
SPEAKER_00: After that, we're just covering the same subjects.
1:10:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:10:16
SPEAKER_00: Uh but just enough to keep people interested, motivated, inspired.
1:10:20
SPEAKER_00: And you know, if something we do, if something we say, if something we print, it can be helpful to somebody else, even if it's one person.
1:10:28
SPEAKER_00: That's okay.
1:10:28
SPEAKER_00: We'll do it one at a time.
1:10:30
SPEAKER_00: Uh and I think I think uh I think we've done that for sure.
1:10:34
SPEAKER_00: You guys ask great questions, and um, you know, we're we're we're all simpatico in this one area of long-distance endurance sports and the and the beauty and the wonder that come from the joy and the pain, uh, which is uh an odd thing, you know.
1:10:46
SPEAKER_00: I talk about it in the book, My Signature Philosophy, Discipline, Sacrifice, Suffering, and Pain, D double S P.
1:10:52
SPEAKER_00: If you apply these very simple principles, the four pillars of my life's philosophy, if you ha if you don't have discipline, forget about it, go back on the couch, nothing else is gonna work.
1:11:01
SPEAKER_00: But you can either suffer the pain of discipline or suffer the regret.
1:11:05
SPEAKER_00: Uh you're gonna have pain either way.
1:11:07
SPEAKER_00: So if you have discipline means you can execute a plan, if you have a good plan and you're willing to make sacrifices and you don't mind enduring a little suffering and pain, you'd be surprised what you can accomplish.
1:11:17
SPEAKER_00: And uh and that's been the case for me.
1:11:19
SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm living proof that regardless of your circumstances, you can turn tragedy into triumph.
1:11:25
SPEAKER_00: These things don't happen to you, they happen for you.
1:11:27
SPEAKER_00: Your job to figure it out.
1:11:29
SPEAKER_00: But once you say the prayers and once you set the goals, you gotta do the work.
1:11:33
SPEAKER_00: You gotta do the work.
1:11:34
SPEAKER_00: I love the saying that, you know, God makes sure all the birds get worms, but he doesn't drop them in their nest.
1:11:40
SPEAKER_00: You know, I can't pray for a cure for cancer, go sit on the couch and wait for it to be delivered like Amazon.
1:11:44
SPEAKER_00: You gotta go out in the world and seek it.
1:11:47
SPEAKER_00: And and the people that I'm meeting like yourselves, uh, I get as much out of this as I'm sure you do, and hopefully others that are listening the same.
1:11:54
SPEAKER_00: So uh I'm getting back more than I'm giving.
1:11:57
SPEAKER_00: So I appreciate you guys and I thank you so much for your time and sharing my story and and uh helping me do some good here because you guys are doing some good as well.
1:12:06
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I I just want to tell you by by the end of this conversation that we've just had, I've been kind of struggling over the past you know six months or so with trying to get back into racing at at the level that I wanted to do, and I've just been afraid to hit that registration button.
1:12:23
SPEAKER_03: You know, and I've I've just been sitting there, it's like, oh, what if I can't perform?
1:12:27
SPEAKER_03: What if I can't do this?
1:12:29
SPEAKER_03: And I I can honestly say that this conversation has led me to the conclusion, it's like, well, what do I have to be afraid of?
1:12:35
SPEAKER_03: If this guy can endure what he's had to endure and he still has the outlook that he has, what do I care if I'm first or last?
1:12:44
SPEAKER_03: It honestly it doesn't matter.
1:12:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's the man you become along the way.
1:12:49
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:12:50
SPEAKER_03: Just thank you for uh for that.
1:12:52
SPEAKER_03: I I really do appreciate it.
1:12:53
SPEAKER_00: Just got the tingly bumps.
1:12:55
SPEAKER_00: See, you made my day.
1:12:55
SPEAKER_00: You just buoyed my spirit.
1:12:57
SPEAKER_00: I'm telling you right now, when I do these things, symptoms go away.
1:13:00
SPEAKER_00: I I I I've never felt better.
1:13:02
SPEAKER_00: And I mean, looking at me, you would never know that I had cancer.
1:13:05
SPEAKER_00: I I said I'm gonna have to bring a doctor's note or something to Kona.
1:13:08
SPEAKER_00: People are gonna be like, he doesn't have cancer, no way.
1:13:13
SPEAKER_00: Just bad cancer.
1:13:14
SPEAKER_00: It's internal, so it's hard to I look better than I look better than I feel, but but these events, this cut this podcast has been a tremendous joy for me as well.
1:13:23
SPEAKER_00: And you've buoyed my spirit.
1:13:24
SPEAKER_00: Uh, I'm even more encouraged now than I was before.
1:13:27
SPEAKER_00: So what a great pleasure to meet you guys both.
1:13:29
unknown: Yeah.
1:13:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:13:31
SPEAKER_03: So what I'm gonna do is uh I'm gonna go out to Amazon and I'm gonna search for your book, and I'm ordering copies for my entire athlete roster.
1:13:41
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:13:41
SPEAKER_03: And so my athletes will be receiving uh a free copy of your book because I think it is it is worth it.
1:13:48
SPEAKER_03: Um also I'm feeling led that uh from Tabula Rasa Racing, I will be going out to your page or the Iron Man uh Foundation, and Tabula Rasta Racing will make a$300 donation towards uh your fundraising.
1:14:04
SPEAKER_03: Um thank you, sir.
1:14:05
SPEAKER_03: I have a really I have a really small athlete roster, but I feel like this is really important.
1:14:10
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:14:10
SPEAKER_03: And uh and so I'm going to I'm gonna commit to that.
1:14:14
SPEAKER_03: So I want to thank you so much for being on this episode.
1:14:17
SPEAKER_03: Thank you very much.
1:14:18
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Justin.
1:14:19
SPEAKER_00: Man, I'm just uh you you you guys really I can't tell you how heartfelt my thank you is, and that really means so much to me.
1:14:26
SPEAKER_00: And like I said, I love this community that we're in and just full of such good people, and and you two are certainly in that class, and I'm honored to be a colleague.
1:14:34
SPEAKER_00: I really am.
1:14:35
SPEAKER_03: Great.
1:14:36
SPEAKER_03: So so everybody who's been listening, I want to thank you guys for for done for joining us today on the Endurance Athlete Journey podcast.
1:14:44
SPEAKER_03: This has been episode 115 where we've talked with James Logan, uh, Iron Man.
1:14:49
SPEAKER_03: Uh I I don't even know how to describe it's like Marvel superhero.
1:14:54
SPEAKER_03: Let's just leave it at that.
1:14:56
SPEAKER_01: Cancer survivor, Iron Man, athlete, yeah, superhero.
1:15:01
SPEAKER_03: I I cannot wait for this episode to get to get pushed out and made public.
1:15:05
SPEAKER_03: I want to see just the outpouring that I know it's going to get.
1:15:09
SPEAKER_03: So thank you guys for for joining us today in this episode of the Endurance Athlete Journey Podcast.
1:15:14
SPEAKER_03: I'm not even going through the housekeeping stuff.
1:15:17
SPEAKER_03: I'm I'm Coach Justin along with Coach Katie and along with James Logan.
1:15:22
SPEAKER_03: I want to thank you guys for the support and thank you for joining us, and we'll talk to you all again next time.
1:15:27
SPEAKER_03: Until then, bye-bye.
1:15:40
SPEAKER_03: That wraps up today's episode of the Endurance Athlete Journey Podcast.
1:15:44
SPEAKER_03: Endurance sports have a way of teaching us patience, humility, and resilience.
1:15:49
SPEAKER_03: Lessons that carry far beyond the workout.
1:15:53
SPEAKER_03: Progress in endurance sports doesn't come from shortcuts.
1:15:56
SPEAKER_03: It comes from consistency, discipline, and doing the work when it's not glamorous.
1:16:01
SPEAKER_03: Wherever you are on your endurance journey, keep trusting the process and honoring the work you put in each day.
1:16:08
SPEAKER_03: If today's episode resonated, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone to help on their endurance journey.
1:16:15
SPEAKER_03: Or don't forget to join the conversation on our social sites to help build and foster a community where we all learn and support one another.
1:16:23
SPEAKER_03: We'll be back with more stories and insights from Coach Justin and Katie.
1:16:27
SPEAKER_03: Until then, visit the podcast website at the endurance athlete journey.buzzsprout.com for more episodes from the Endurance Athlete Journey Podcast.
1:16:38
SPEAKER_03: Have questions or comments about the podcast?
1:16:41
SPEAKER_03: Feel free to send us an email at the endurance athlete journey at gmail.com.
1:16:47
SPEAKER_03: For all things coaching, visit Coach Katie at fuel the number two run dot com and Coach Justin at tabula rasteracing.com.
1:16:57
SPEAKER_03: Again, thank you for listening to the Endurance Athlete Journey Podcast and remember to find joy in the journey.