Latest / The People Run Podcast / #74 Army Ranger Dylan Truesdale Lost an Eye in a Crash. Then He Started Running Ultras.

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#74 Army Ranger Dylan Truesdale Lost an Eye in a Crash. Then He Started Running Ultras. · The People Run Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: Dylan, you have one of the most badass jobs there is pretty much here in the world and uh being an army ranger.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_02: You get an injury, you shared this like losing eye at one point, but then you start running ultras, you lift heavy, you're doing a RUC 100 here in the fall.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_02: I gotta ask, man, what does perseverance mean to you?
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Oh man, dude, that's such a well, first of all, thank you for for having me in the first place.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I've done a few things, but uh I try to I always I always feel a little bit like imposter syndrome, but I do appreciate it.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: I try I try to take those compliments in stride.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: All to say I do appreciate it.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Man, perseverance to me, it just it's it's such a complex topic.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that a lot of people try to condense it down into like, you know, a sound bite or like something like shareable on reels.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: But it's to me, it's basically the attitude that's like no matter what happens to me, no matter what obstacles I face or what hurdles I have to go over, I'm gonna continue to fight, and I'm gonna continue to move forward.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: It might not look pretty, it might be a crawl, it might be a walk, and other times it might be a sprint, but it's just continued movement forward.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, I love that.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_02: Before the injury, coaching, running, and all that, like why the army?
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: Oh man, so the military service had been planted in in me from an early age.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I grew up well, I grew up poor.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up without a lot.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: My my dad went to prison whenever I was really young.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, my mom struggled with addiction.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: I bounced around from house to house to house.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: So there's a lot of instability.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um I had a I had a really and still do have a really awesome uncle who who tried his best to instill like discipline and and also just like how to be a man within like with me.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: But um he he bought me Lone Survivor book about Marcus Latrell and Navy SEAL, I'm sure most people are familiar.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever I was quite young, actually.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's kind of funny now that looking back.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: But um, and uh and I read that book and I was incredibly inspired.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: And for a long time I thought, or at an earlier age, I I did think that I would try to go to BUDS and all that.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: But what once I got to high school, I I figured out that I was a pretty decent athlete.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um pretty decent in track.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: I was a sprinter.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um I ran the 100, 200, 300 hurdles, 110 hurdles.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, literally all the sprints from 100 to 400 I ran and did well.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: So when I realized that I had opportunity to get out of my situation, my childhood situation as a as an athlete, I basically just poured 100% into it.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um and to make a long story kind of short here, I ended up getting a lot of D1 offers, and I kind of fumbled all those offers and didn't really make the most out of it.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I went to I went to a uh school and it was actually UTSA, UT San Antonio, just because I wanted to be a part of the University of Texas system and probably wasn't the best choice for me.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I ended up dropping out like within the first semester.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: I went back home and it was like my worst nightmare.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like every all the hard work that I put in for years and years to try to get out of that place, to get out of like, I mean, truly what I thought was probably the worst place on worst place on earth, I was back there.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I was just like everybody else that I saw leave and then come back, and then their life was just like in this constant turmoil.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I was like, I don't know what I need to do, but I need to get out of here.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I kind of just relied or fell back on my old, you know, aspirations, I guess, of military service.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: I've always been a very service-minded person as well.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like I've always loved growing up in the United States, and it's always been like particularly, I've always been particularly aware of how lucky I am to be, to have have grown up here.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: My um, this is just a little aside, but my grandmother grew up in post-World War II Germany.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: And so she moved to the States whenever she, like when my mom was young.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: So having that like insight and having those stories and and just knowing, you know, what life could look like on the outside for other or for other people, just made me have a lot, a ton of appreciation for where I grew up.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I've just like I said, I've always had a very I've always been very patriotic.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I mean, still to this day, like if the national anthem plays, I'm not gonna lie, I get a little teary-eyed.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: But um all that to say, I had made some friends who were in the army whenever I was in, when I was at UTSA.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I told them, you know, they asked, you know, where I went after I dropped out of school when they and they kind of pushed the army.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: They were like, you should join the army.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: There's this thing called an option 40 contract.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: You could they they knew my athleticism and my determination and everything like that.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: So like you could, you could actually do it.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: If you if you got a if you're able to secure an option 40 contract, you could actually do it.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I basically went into a recruiter's office and I was like, I want to enlist in the army, I want an option 40, or I just won't listen enlist in the army.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: And after some back and forth, I I was able to obtain one of those contracts.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: What's uh is it like option where you also do sports as well?
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_02: Is that what it is, the option 40?
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, sorry, I should get into that.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: Option 40 is is basically like it's less known.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Like a lot of people are familiar with like the 18 X-ray contract, which is I this is a kind of a longer, like a longer tangent, but that's if you want to go into special forces and you want like a direct pipeline to special forces, you get an 18 x-ray.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's pretty common people know about it.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, option 40 is a little bit less known about, so I do like to talk about it.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: And it's um it's basically the equivalent of that for range regiment.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: So you, if you get an option 40 contract, as long as you continue to progress and pass your like prerequisites essentially, yeah.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Basic training, airborne school, all those things, then you'll at least get an opportunity to go to RASP or the Ranger Assessment Selection Program, which is what gets you into the Ranger Regiment, which is where I was stationed or the unit that I was part of.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_02: Is that how you ended up and then eventually becoming an Army Ranger?
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_02: You just went through everything, you just kept knocking them out.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: So went to basic training, and I was actually uh I I specialized as a radio operator, so so I was the guy out there all doing all the things, but also carrying in a ridiculously heavy radio.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: So Suckfest has been a part of my trajectory all along.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: But um I had to go to radio radio operator school, did that, and then went to airborne school and then and then RASP, so Ranger Assessment Selection Program, and and basically just knocked all those out within about a six-month time frame.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_02: Wow.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_02: Well, I want to pause here and say this again, man.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for your service.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_02: It's uh amazing, man, what you've gone through and done.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_02: So thank you.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_02: And the continued support, obviously.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's it it's it's honestly been uh an honor and a privilege, truthfully.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_02: What was it like becoming an Ranger?
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_02: What did it require from you mentally?
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_02: Did you find it kind of easy given it was six months?
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_02: It was like, no man, I'm just going all out for six months.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_02: This is hard.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: Well, what did it require?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: It it required a lot.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: It in different, it it undulated, it kind of ebbed and flowed.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like there were times where things were really difficult.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: You know, basic training is relatively easy, in my opinion.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: The hardest part of that, even being very independent as a young man and even as just a teenager, it was it was different in the sense that I was so far from home and then also just like so far removed from any situation or environment that I was used to.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: So that part was it was, I would just say it was it was new and challenging.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: But physically it was it was super easy, as was radio operator school and airborne school.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: These were just all things that you really had to check off.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: Airborne school interesting a lot, interestingly enough, physically was was quite easy, but mentally was was challenging because, and and people always laugh when I say this because it seems backwards, but the first jump, the first time you jump out of an airplane, in my opinion, is the easiest time because you're excited, and then also you you don't have, you're kind of almost disillusioned.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: So like nothing's gonna go wrong, right?
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: But then the more you jump, the more you're like, man, that percentage that something's gonna go wrong gets higher every single time I jump out of this plane.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then of course you hear the horror story.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: So that was more the that was I never had any, I never had any issues getting out the door for jumping out of an airplane, but it was the it was the beforehand that I was always like, man, I I don't know if I really like doing this.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: But uh it also doesn't help whenever you're six foot five and that door is like six foot two, and you're like, man, I gotta squeeze my body through that tiny hole.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um but yeah, grasp was was quite challenging.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: It was it was challenging mentally and physically, especially coming from my background and and others, other people maybe with similar backgrounds, with like their fathers might might struggle with this too.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: Is like I've always sought to make other men that I respected proud.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's something that I've always had, like whenever I when I when I do find some like a man that I I really respect, like um, I do almost revert more to that boyish nature of like I just want to make this guy proud.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it's something that I've like really struggled with and something that I like have to get over, especially now that I'm now that I'm older, you know.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I always like being in an being in an environment where you're constantly being um hazed and berated, and like there's there's no winning, there's just getting through it, and you're not gonna get any praise for doing the standard.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: Like that that part was tough.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't even realize that that is what made it tough until much later in life.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: Physically it was it was challenging as well, um, but kind of also in a in a fun, sadistic way, you know.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: But um uh and then and then the the tasks were not, you know, the tasks that you have in basic training, like your your move and shoot drills, your you know, your standards, like your qualifying with a rifle, all those things, extremely easy.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um whenever you get to, when you get to rasp and the standard is elevated exponentially, those things do get get more challenging.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: And and some people are more natural than I was.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like I really had to um I had to really be on my A game for some of the more tactical stuff.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: Physically, I was always really squared away, but I didn't I didn't have a background of, you know, maybe it had to do with with because I didn't have a dad.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't have a background of like shooting guns and you know, all that stuff.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: So like all of that was extremely new to me.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um I also didn't have like a background of like communicating with other men because I wasn't ever around them.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: The only men that ever came into my life were like come and go type situations, the like you know, I'll call them boyfriends of my my mom, but also didn't know how to communicate.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: So those things were were kind of challenging, but uh ultimately was able to to get through it and and and get through it with good scores as well.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_02: Nice.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_02: You wrote something that kind of makes sense that I was gonna ask you about.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_02: You were already operating as a ranger.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_02: Everyone knows this guy, Jocko Willink.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_02: And uh you thought, man, I could never do that.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_02: He's different.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_02: Like, dude, you were an army ranger.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: What did you think was like uh missing, you know?
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um I whenever I was whenever I was in Ranger Battalion, and I think it's just I think it really just revolves to answer your question up front and then kind of go a little bit deeper.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think it really revolves around just mindset.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Because yes, I was a ranger and I and I was effective and and you know, really good at my job within the regiment.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: My mindset was was different.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't a lot different than it is now.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: It was it was still very individual, very selfish, and it's just like young.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: I I was a young, I mean, I really was young.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: It was like in my early 20s.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, when I got to battalion, I was 19.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: So, like seeing someone in in in an aspirational way and like following someone like Jocko, specifically Jocko, like putting out like 430, 330, 345, whatever, you know, wake up times in in getting after it for for that long.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: I just remember thinking like that guy must be built from something different because I like I know the level of training that it requires.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: And like, you know, I go, I'm smoked by the end of the day.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like just waking up at like 5.25 to be in formation at 6, and then, you know, on a there's different kinds of training schedules, but like your standard training schedule where you're still on like day shift, you know, being at being in formation at 6, 6 a.m.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: and then like hopefully getting off around 6 p.m.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: and like and then maybe getting a lift in after that.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: Like I was like, that that's yeah that's everything I can do.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: And in the day-to-day, like it's something I always this is a little bit of a tangent, but something that I always try to emphasize to people because I do coach a lot of I do coach a lot of service members or aspiring service members that want to go into the right direction.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I always say that RASP is like RASP is just the tryout.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like when you finish RASP, it doesn't, it it gets harder.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: So like you to maintain, to be in the unit itself, like I said, RASP is just a tryout.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna get a lot harder and it's gonna get a lot more intense.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: So just like your day-to-day is quite intense.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: So any adding anything extra onto that just seemed like wild to me.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: Now, now, you know, being where I am currently, I I can see um I can see how that's possible.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean, yeah, in hindsight, everything as they say is 2020.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, exactly.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_02: So is it fair to say the discipline came in later then?
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: In in some areas.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, whenever I I was extremely disciplined with my fitness, always have been.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um just I like I mentioned before we actually got started, like I've been an athlete or been in training environments my entire life, but um, and that does require a level of discipline.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, getting to a D1 school also requires a good amount of discipline, but but there were areas that I wasn't disciplined in, like with like lifestyle, I don't drink now.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean, I've been sober for I think like I don't know, 25 months or something like that.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: So um, and just like disciplined with my time and with my, you know, being more responsible, all those things.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: So there is a level of discipline that I have now that I didn't have before, but I I I didn't I didn't lack discipline while I was in regiment.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: I just didn't use it to its full potential.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_02: Gotcha.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_02: Dylan, walk me through when like the incident happened.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_02: Did that happen in the army or did that happen later on?
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: No, yeah.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: Wild wild enough is I you know I went on multiple deployments, combat deployments, and have more missions than I can under my belt than than I can count.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: And also, caveat or something that I like to always say is there's plenty of people who have been on way more missions and have been on way more deployments and have done way more intense stuff than I have.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: But um, but I do have a lot of experience or had, you know, it's been so many years now, but I had a lot of experience in combat environments and and uh in firefights and all those things.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: But um I can't I was lucky enough to come home from all my deployments without any physical injuries.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that doesn't necessarily count for the emotional toll that it takes, but without any physical injuries.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: But, you know, when I when I got home, I was just talking about this recently, you know, the there's a lot of life that happened in between getting out of the out of the military and then and then my accident where I lost my eye.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_00: But um, you know, and we can get into that if you'd like, but I'll kind of gloss over it just for now.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: But um I I had actually was involved in a car accident, so pretty major car accident, and pretty much, and I was and I was the one that was driving.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: I had fallen as a fall, I fell asleep at the wheel um driving home after basically just like a three-day slog of of working.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: I was I was working as a photo assistant on a uh so totally completely different career, but um, I was working on a foot as a photo assistant on a commercial shoot in in Hawaii.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_00: And where I lived in Hawaii at the time was about an hour away from where the chute was.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: And if you know anything about um commercial shoots, it's like you have to be there really early and you probably not getting out until like really late at night.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: So after about three days of just like on the grind of that, on the third night, after everything was pretty much wrapped, uh, I was driving home and ended up falling asleep at the wheel.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: And um, crazy, crazy enough, they were doing construction on the road that I was driving on, and uh I ran into the back one of the construction trucks that was just parked there.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, who knows, maybe that actually saved my life.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: But um the the car that I was driving was basically just like an old beater.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of those on on on Oahu.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean on all the Hawaiian Islands really, but um uh, you know, it probably wasn't even registered.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: Probably I actually I'm positive it didn't have insurance.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: So I just ran into the back of a uh of a of a uh construction truck, roadwork truck, and uh airbag didn't deploy and the the car pretty much like folded like an accordion.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: And um my face hit the steering wheel and broke every bone, pretty much like from the bridge of my nose, all the bones in my cheek, all the way down to essentially um my jaw.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, spring gly.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_02: The deaf it's a nice way to put it, an early.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_02: Do you remember uh waking up?
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_02: Like, what were your first thoughts?
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_02: Did you understand the extent of what happened when you woke up?
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I remember waking up, like kind of coming to and some doctors hovering over me, and my I had so many tubes coming out of my my mouth, my face, and then I have a trach so out of my throat as well.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I I wasn't really coherent enough to talk at the time anyway, but I even if I wanted to, I couldn't.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: But uh the uh the doc or I I remember my hands being tied to uh the bed so that I wouldn't pull the cords out, and that was kind of freaky, and then also the doctor hovering over me and saying that I'd been in a car accident and that it was pretty bad.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: And and uh I remember just thinking there was an odd calmness to it, oddly enough, and maybe partially due to the meds that I was on, but uh, I just remember thinking like, okay, while I'm alive, it must have been like if this is the situation that I'm in right now, I must have been pretty bad.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and there was a there was a coworker with me in in the car, and I I just remember all I could think was if she was okay.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and and she ended up being okay.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: She actually ended up being in a lot better shape than I was in, you know, thank God.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and uh those were like kind of the main thoughts that were running through my head was, you know, okay, I'm alive.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: This must be pretty pretty bad.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's strangely calm, but is Savannah okay?
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: Gotcha.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_02: I saw you describe how you fell a little bit through like some of your posts, if you don't mind me sharing, and we can gloss over if anything.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: No, go for it.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, I'm you said you felt like ashamed, embarrassed and broken, but why ashamed?
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_02: I can understand the other first few, but like why did you feel ashamed about it?
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, just because like I mean, uh the the shame came from like a lot of different places.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, and and the embarrassment came from a lot of different places too.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's just like, you know, I I thought that I could just get away with anything, you know, not not nefarious or or bad, just I thought that I could, you know, like I thought I was invincible.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and like I I didn't ever think like anything was gonna happen to me.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: Like I had already survived and been through so much, and and I had just like I had also like turned my life around in the sense of like, you know, I like I said, I in between the accident and and my and getting out of the army, a lot of life happened.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: And and there's I'm actually, you know, there's some there's a lot of turmoil there.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I had like finally gotten my life together, and I had gotten graduated like valedictorian of of the photo school that I went to.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: I had this like amazing job that was waiting for me in Hawaii.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, I was I was like literally making it like um opportunity that only comes around once in a lifetime, and I snagged it.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: And and now I was in this situation, and it was because of just something stupid that I did, right?
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like it wasn't like I mean, it was in retrospect, and now I know it's kind of a freak accident, but like just with all the different variables that were in play.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_00: But but in the moment, you know, I was just like, oh man, how did I fuck this up?
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like, and then, you know, I was like I said, I was worried about my friend and coworker, and I, you know, I'm I'm sure there was those other reasons, and now I'm kind of just like thinking about it, but um.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I just I was just embarrassed, you know.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_02: When you were a little bit more recovered, like did you think of your past experience with fitness, Ranger, like what life is gonna be like?
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_02: I'm sure doctors were telling you, hey, here's the next six something months going like what were you thinking through that time of like what's next?
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: I just remember thinking very, very vividly, like okay, God everyone else would have like like everyone else in this situation would be dead.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: I have no idea why I'm here.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like I don't know what it is yet, but I know that I'm here for a reason.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: And this is just further evidence of like other things that I survived that I probably shouldn't have survived, that I'm supposed to be here.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: And like I don't know, I just remember thinking like praying like God, like I don't know why you decided to save me and decided to keep me here, but whatever it is that you want me to do, like I'm all in.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm 100% in.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: I I will not like I will not waste this second chance.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: That was and I just remember thinking, like, I'm gonna use this.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_00: I like I am going to like I am going to become the baddest motherfucker ever.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna use this to impact the world in a positive way.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I mean, and I know that's probably sounds like a cliche, but that is genuinely what was just like that whether whether I believed it or not in the moment, that's what I was telling myself.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: And like that was my fuel to just like keep going, keep going.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_00: And and similar to sorry, I don't want to ramble, but it's similar to when the doctors first, when I first woke up, there was like an odd calmness in it.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like there's a lot of times then when we like get ourselves hyped up or excited about something, we're like, you know, we got all this energy going into it, and we're like, yeah, yeah, like this is what we're gonna do.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't like that at all.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_00: It was just this calm, just like, I'm about to fuck shit up.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like, sorry, excuse my language, but and that is yeah, that's that's what it was.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_02: Was that like in retrospect, do you think just life and where you've been or ranger school training helping you go, you know what?
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_02: All right, it is what it is.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna to use one of your own words, time to fight back.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: It was it was a culmination, 100%.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I I don't want to say that everything I'd been through in the past was preparing me for that moment, but everything that I had been through in the past definitely contributed to my ability to get through that moment.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think you know, resiliency is is built like a little bit out of time.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I just I started getting my doses whenever I was five years old.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_02: So what was the first physical thing you did after the accident?
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: The first physical thing that I did, and I and I haven't really talked about, I think I've talked about this a little bit, but I haven't talked about it that much because my brain is a little hazy on on those on those times.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I want to say that it was I want to say that it was three months after the accident, or maybe it was three months after I got home.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like I said, I'm a little hazy on the exact details, but I know it I know it revolved around three months because I I set it up in a specific way.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: So it was it was three months after either the accident or I got home, because that there was some delay period between whenever I was discharged, or even whenever I was like went from the ICU to a regular bed, and then from a regular bed to a hotel room, and then I still had to stay in Hawaii, all this stuff.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: But so it took a little while to get home.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: But three months nonetheless, I ran three miles, essentially ran a 5k.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: So I ran three miles, and like that just felt like that that felt like kind of a little bit of like my first step in the right direction, because it was just like, I mean, my face was still swollen out to here, you know, I still had stitches.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, like my I I hadn't got my um, you know, my eye, my eye actually that was ruptured in the impact was still in there.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: So I mean, I I looked like, I mean, people wouldn't probably admit it, but I looked like a monster.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like honestly, like I looked messed up.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I was just like, it today is three months.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna have my grandma drive me down to the beach and I'm going to run three miles.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I'll die trying.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I did.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 26:28
  unknown: Oof.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: So that was three months.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: Three months.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, three months roughly.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I still had a broken leg too.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_00: So that was, I mean, I had I had a lot of injuries, like, but the the most, the worst one.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's it doesn't, it kind of is frustrating because I don't like I I don't really talk about this part that much.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_00: So I had a tibial, a tibial plat plateau fracture.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_00: So basically, like it's actually not that bad of an injury unless you're a runner, because it's essentially like if you take the tibia, which is you know the bone of the lower leg, like your shin bone, a tibial fract uh plateau fracture is basically like where it meets up with the femur, it's like a crack down the middle.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: So every time there's pressure with your femur going down onto the tibia, it's basically like splitting your tibia in half.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: All to say that was a tough three miles.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I bet, man.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_02: Is that fixed now?
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, crazy enough, I I think that there's like this thing that nobody talks about, and this is total pseudoscience, but I think whenever you're broken, if you just like basically force it to force your body to heal, it just starts healing.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_00: Because I don't know, it was like a few months later after that.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_00: I went for another, I think it's an MRI, I can't remember all the terms now, but um, when they when they look at your bones, but um to check out my my leg.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_00: And uh they were the the doctor was like, Oh, I I don't see, I don't know where you're like, I don't see your fract, I don't see your your the break in your in your tibia anymore.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like running on that shit, that's why.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: What I think really happened is they probably scanned the wrong leg.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_02: Gotcha.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_02: Makes the photos or something.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know, but yeah, no, all jokes.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, they just three mile turn into then running ultras in the mountains.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: Ooh, that's that's a long one.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, well, you know, whenever I was recovering, you know, I I'd already I had at this point I already read Can't Hurt Me by David Goggins, and and he he has been and always will be like a uh major role model to me.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: I haven't ever met him.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: I would love to meet him one day, but I can honestly just say thank you because I don't want to compare my story to his, but there's just so many similarities that it's hard not to.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um but yeah, I I so I leaned heavily on that book, and then you know, uh, and just like some of his podcasts and interviews, and I listened to a lot of Cam Haynes as well, and and I read his book, and like those were like kind of just the the things that helped like the external things that helped me get through my recovery.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_00: And like they all, you know, they they all did ultramarathons, and like it just was it just seemed like this thing, and I that uh was so transcendent.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I just thought to myself, like, how crazy would it be if after everything I've been through, like I ran an ultra marathon?
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like that would be that would be wild.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like literally no one could ever no, like no one expects it.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: No, at that point, nobody expected anything from me.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: Like I could, I could, I could be on social security disability right now for all my injuries and my and my disabilities.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: I don't claim a single thing.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: So like, but everybody would have expected me to like just basically give up and be like live off of social security for the rest of my life.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like, but I was like, man, how crazy would it be if like I just became, you know, I and like I said, I already kind of uh uh said this before whenever I was in in the hospital, but I was like, if I just started doing these wild things.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: So at that point, I basically made uh a promise to myself that I was like, I was gonna run an ultra marathon.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: I was just gonna start, I'm gonna do the ultra, and then we'll just see like where it goes from there.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like I just want to be able to call myself and like I just want to be able to say I did an ultra marathon because then like there no one could ever have an excuse for anything.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's like look at this guy who has literally been through the ringer in like multiple stages of his life.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: He he got, he doesn't like I I can't even see.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like most people, sorry, I don't mean to go on a ramp, but most people don't realize like I lost my right eye.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's this is a prosthetic.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_00: I could pop it out right now.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: But in my left eye, I have what's called a choroidal rupture.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I also can't see out of my left eye.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's there's like a basically, it's not only is it blurry, there's like a giant, not a giant, but there's basically just like a slash right through the middle, like right through the center of my vision, like that's just a black line.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, my vision at its best is like, you know, most people would like, you know, would say 2020.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, it's weird because of there's a lot of factors at play, but it ranges from anywhere between 2040 to 20 over 100.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: So like I could be like certain days, some days I wake up and my vision is worse than other days, and then I wake up the next day and it's a little bit better.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: It just like kind of ebbs and flows between that 2040 and 2100.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_00: But like everything is blurry, my depth perception is shit.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I can't even walk down a flight of stairs without literally the stairs looking like just like basically a ramp, is what it looks like to me.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I go, yeah, like you said, and I go do these ultras in the mountains, and I'm like, dude, there's literally no excuse.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: Like, there's no excuse.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: Like, if I can do it and start literally from scratch, because I was like literally a ragdoll laying in bed whenever I was on in recovery and lost all of my, yeah, I was a great athlete as a kid, but I lost all I lost everything whenever after my accident, you know.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: I the only thing I had was my drive, determination, and discipline.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the only things I had.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't have any physical attributes anymore.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_02: As you're ramping up to let's say the second phase, for lack of better words, of running.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_02: Did you find you still love running or more like what you had to prove out there now?
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's a good one.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's both.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: I do love running.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm extremely I'm actually extremely passionate about running because I did start running.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: Running, running was something that I used.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't try to do it competitively, and I didn't try to like run ultramarathons or anything like that.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_00: But for for clarity, running was something that I used like extensively in between like getting like basically just after I got out of the army.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it's it's it's still like super healing to me.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: And like whenever I'm having a bad day, which I I have bad days, and uh my wife will be like, you need to go run, and I'll and I'll just put my screws on and I'll go run and I will feel so much better.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: Like I've my mind is so much more clear.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I mean there's so many aspects of running that I love, and you know, it's a universal sport, everybody can do it for the most part.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there obviously are some populations that that aren't able to do it, but pretty much almost everyone can do it and successible.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you know, it's it gives you so much clarity, and then of course, like the whole fitness and and health side health benefits of it, you know, I can get into that for days, but um but yeah, and then and then there's always a layer of like um what what what I have to prove and and not to draw this out further, but I think growing up without a dad also like put a huge chip on my shoulder.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I I would like I said my dad went to prison when I was five.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_00: I remember having like school teachers tell me, like, well, I knew your dad before you went to prison.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'd be like in I'd be like in fourth grade, and like he was such a great guy, like what a shame.
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, what?
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like, anyway, you know, it's just like I'm in fourth grade, you know.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and and I mean it was embarrassing too.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: But so I always had this this chip on my shoulder.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: And then this is funny enough, I I I had a coach in in in high school who was my track coach and was a major mentor to me.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: And he was also in the army, and and and he he I owe a lot of my of where I've gotten to in life to him, but he did tell me one time we're we're driving home from the state track meet, and and a couple of the guys that I was with were like, you know, hey coach, you think I could make it as a Navy SEAL?
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_00: And and he was like, I think you can.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: And then I'm I was like, what about me?
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_00: And he's like, I don't think you can, Dylan, to be honest.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: He's like, I don't think you have the discipline.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, I I use that chip on my shoulder for a long time.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_00: Now, as I get older, it's like that chip is kind of diminishing, but I don't like, you know, when I say like the cumulative chip on my shoulder is diminishing, I slightly don't want it to go away all the way because I, you know, it it does give a lot of power.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_02: Probably pick it in moments is my guess right now.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I need to chat.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, just throw that on there.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_00: But uh yeah, I try not to, I try I try not to like let that be uh a driving force in my life anymore.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_02: Dylan, what was your first ultra like?
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_02: You just described your day-to-day a little bit, some of the challenges you will.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_02: But something I love you say all the time is like there's no excuses, nobody's coming.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_02: Like, what were like the logistics and learnings you had during your first ultra marathon given eyesight?
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_02: Might be one day this way, it might be another way this way.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_02: You got terrain, uh, food, the logistics of being in the mountains, etc.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: The first ultra that I did actually was was in Texas and it presented its own unique challenges.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's called, what is it called?
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_00: I can't remember now, but maybe I'll, if I do remember, I'll I'll put it in the comments or or I'll share it with you so you can share it with people because it is a great race.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_00: But um it's kind of interesting.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: I like I said, I wanted to be an old, I want to run an ultra marathon so bad, and I was like meeting all these people who were super interested in my story, and I was like I said, I've always been open book, and I just so badly wanted to insert in there, like that, you know, I've also like I've done an ultra marathon, like I am an ultra marathoner.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to be able to say that, you know, not just because I wanted the ego hit of being ultra marathoner, but to round out that story of like you can still do all like no matter what happens to you, besides a few, besides a few things.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, actually I didn't want to say that because you have that.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_00: I I oh I'm gonna mess up his name, but I think his name is Eglin or something like that.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_00: He's the guy in the wheelchair who did the BP in Ultra.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um I saw this, I don't know what you're talking about.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: I apologize if I butchered his name.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: I think his name is like Mike Eglin or something like that, but mad respect.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like, so again, he is an even more exaggerated version of what I'm trying to prove, which is like it does not matter what has happened to you.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_00: You you can find a way to do part things, or you can do do the things that that uh you know maybe uh you're passionate about or that mean a lot to you.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: So uh all to say is like I I really wanted to get this done.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_00: Like I really wanted it.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so I just signed up.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_00: Literally, the first one that was in my area that was like feasible to go to was this race and uh the River's Bend 50K was what it was.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I was in Georgetown, Texas, uh, which is like kind of outskirts of Austin, kind of slightly hill country.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like limestone rock and like all along the river.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_00: So you're like, there is a decent amount of elevation change actually in that race, despite it being in Texas.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but it's it's in May, it's at the end of May.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_00: That's it, it's over Memorial Day weekend.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_00: So Memorial Day weekend in Central Texas is very hot.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_00: I think like I think like the heat index that day was like 115 degrees.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um so and and the and the worst part about it was actually that like I so many things actually now I'm thinking about it.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um I only had seven weeks to train.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_00: So the race was in seven weeks, and I was like, well, I guess I'm gonna find out if I can run an ultra marathon with only seven weeks of training.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: So that's what I did, and and I was able to complete it.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I actually, um, I mean, it was it was a it was an interesting race.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_00: I uh I got lost definitely.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_00: So I got some bonus miles, you know, just with my vision.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I will the the course was really well marked, but like with my vision, um, it it was very hard to follow.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: And not being super remote, there I didn't wasn't carrying like a GPS or anything like that.
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I just had my phone, but at certain points my phone was pretty much useless.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_00: So I did I did get lost and had I think it was like six or so bonus miles and had to get picked up by the race director and he brought me back.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_00: Like my wife explained, like the situation, like my husband is super lost, he's blind for the most part, he doesn't know where he's at.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like, so race director ended up coming picking me up and and dropped me back off where I had kind of gotten off track.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: So, but all the say, you know, it it I fell a lot.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_00: I was beat and bruised and and and battered, but I just kept going.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_00: I just kept like, you know, I I just as much of a cliche as it is, I just kept putting one foot in front of the other.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: And even though I was hurting and I was at a disadvantage compared to my peers, I was just like, it's not really about them.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's about me.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, can I actually do this thing?
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you know, I think that it was literally could not have been more perfect because of the conditions.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: I think like 90% of the field dropped out and DNF'd because it was literally so hot.
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_00: Like people were just like DNFing like left and right.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_00: And the whole reason that I set out on that race was to find out like if I had like if I had this discipline and this, if I had the grit that I like thought I had, and if I had the grit that I was like telling people that I had.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then also that people were telling me that I had.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, people that didn't even know, like that had heard my story, they were like, you've got grit, you know, like all this stuff, like you're so you know, determined.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_00: So it was like a it was like a mission to prove that.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_00: So all the all the extra hard that was put into that race, you know, with like the the falling, like, you know, the I mean limestone is it hurts whenever you fall on it.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're it's like very rocky terrain country.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_00: So uh yeah, it was rough, but uh and then the heat just going through that.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I also like ran in uh this is just an aside, but I also ran in like uh literally the worst shoes.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_00: I basically just ran in like sneakers that you would just buy at like Target, essentially.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like I mean they were not running.
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I don't want to say the brand, but um fair enough.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_00: But they were literally like the worst.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_00: They were just bad running shoes, let alone ultra shoes.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, that's that's not really here nor there.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's just uh I think all the extra added pain was just like I got exactly what I wanted out of that race.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_02: Dylan, where does the uh stuff I see you say often, like nobody's coming, I gotta give 110% for those counting on me?
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_02: Like, what does that mean to you?
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: Well, uh, I mean, it's true.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: Like, there's no no one's really coming to save you.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_00: Like, if you want, if you have desires and goals and dreams, like no one's gonna come and like facilitate you to get those.
• 41:53
  SPEAKER_00: You have to just go get them on your own.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_00: And there's so many people who have invested in me, like their time, their money, their energy, their love, their you know, whatever have you, it's just like even just like God giving me a second chance.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I can't waste that.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_00: I can't, I can't let that like I can't go, I can't let that go to waste.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, when it when when you say like no one's coming to save you, I mean like if you're in a in a bad spot, like you gotta get yourself out of it.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_00: You gotta crawl, you have to crawl out.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I've had to do it plenty of times, and and unfortunately, that's just the truth is like that you have to do it on your own.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I mean, you can leverage your friends and family, but ultimately you're the one who has to do the work.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_00: And and unless you do it, no one's coming to do it for you.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_00: And you're your your dreams are not gonna just fall in your lap.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that only happens in movies.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_02: True.
• 42:50
  SPEAKER_02: Dylan, you wake up at 3 30 a.m., right?
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_02: Jocko was posting four o'clock.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: You switched to level it up to 3 30.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_02: Why?
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I want to compete with Jocko, but no, 3:30 ultimately I get a lot of I get a lot of messages about that.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um not all of them are nice messages, but um I I get up at 3.30 because I have to.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_00: I don't do it because it's cool.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_00: I don't do it because of, you know, ego or clout or anything.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_00: I do it because I have to.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_00: I have a family, I have a business, I'm training for something that means uh so much to me that's way bigger than me.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_00: I just started going back to school because I want to get my master's in in coaching, which is which is what I do now.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I I there's just I won't sacrifice those things.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_00: I won't, I I I I I also like I read my Bible every morning.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm not I'm I'm not gonna sacrifice any of those things.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna sacrifice like my faith.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna sacrifice my family.
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_00: And it goes deeper than just family.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, I'm not gonna sacrifice my time with my family, you know, like.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: I I I'm so busy I don't get much time with them.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: But if I if I wake up at 3 30 and I start getting my stuff done, and then maybe then maybe I can be done by six, and then maybe I'll have it like you know a little bit of time with my wife and my son.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I'm not gonna sacrifice my business because I've worked too damn hard to build it.
• 44:20
  SPEAKER_00: And it and it's still just kind of in its infancy, even though I've been, I mean, I've been coaching for for for many years.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, business building a business is tough.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's challenging.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and especially as like a solo entrepreneur, like, you know, I'm just not, I'm, I'm not willing to give any of those things up.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm definitely not willing.
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_00: I've made promises to people about my training and about like what I'm what I'm chasing.
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_00: And and also I've made like promises to myself of like that I'm gonna I'm gonna do these uh physical events and and um I've almost made like these like greater promises of like I'm gonna continue to show you know the people that I can uh that anything is is possible, you know, like continue to create that effect.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_00: So and I'm not willing to give any of that up.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_00: And and so the only thing left is sleep.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um and plenty of people have come before me and and and done much bigger things on less sleep.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, if I have to get five and a half hours of sleep or you know, whatever, I mean, it that's usually a good day.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, if I have to go, if I have to go to bed at whatever whatever time my son goes down and I can go to bed, you know, maybe after an hour of spending some time with my wife, and and then I get up at 3 30, uh, then I'll do that gladly.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'll do that with like a smile on my face like every day.
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_02: Be remiss if I don't ask, because I know the people gonna ask like, how do you recover given the low amount of sleep?
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_02: You said five hours is a good day.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um I try to I this is this can get like super science-y, but I try to do my best to I don't even know if this is the right word to use, but uh I'm gonna kind of I'm gonna kind of paraphrase a little bit here.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_00: So for the like if anyone who is like, you know, in allied science out there that that hears this and says that well, that's not exactly right.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry, I'm just I'm I'm paraphrasing.
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um so basically I try to like modulate my nervous system as as much as I can.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_00: So like you know, do doing like hard, strenuous things is you know what they would call a sympathetic nervous system response.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like you're more like upregulated.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_00: And then, you know, recovery in those things is more of a parasympathetic response.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like those are the things like what people hear often is like rest and rest and digest.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like that's a common thing that's thrown out.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, so I try to like do my best to like be aware of like where I'm sitting at, like with my like sympathetic or my like nervous, like autonomic nervous system like response.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_00: So um, you know, just being mindful, like in the in the evening, like maybe I'm not gonna get, you know, maybe I'm only gonna get five and a half hours of sleep that night.
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_00: But like when I am done with my tasks, like finding a way, finding ways like reset mindfulness, meditation, uh, breath work, you know, these are all things that I um do, but also could do better.
• 47:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then like turning, I mean, we we we do pretty good about like turning off the like, you know, the main lights and like dimming all the lights, and then you know, whether this I I don't I don't know the science behind this part, or and I'm not claiming that it has anything science related, but something that does help me and my wife is like um we lived in New Zealand for a while and we got really into drinking tea in the afternoon.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um so my wife and I will actually drink tea at night, uh like an herbal tea, and uh I I'll drink like typically something with uh turmeric and and like black pepper in there because it's uh uh anti-inflammatory.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_00: And um, you know, just just doing that helps kind of like center me and reset me.
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_00: And then like I said, just being mindful, and you know, that's kind of like on a day-to-day basis, but I also like to do like regeneration techniques, so like cold plunge, sauna.
• 48:04
  SPEAKER_00: I don't do them every day.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_00: There's value in doing them every day, but there's also you can get a lot of value, and and you don't have to do them every day, but particularly on certain days of the week, whenever you're trying to basically bolster your recovery, great to do those contrast therapy, all those things.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I also use like um I'm I'm being a coach and and you know, having studied in one aspect or another human performance for the last like 10 years.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_00: I have a good understanding of how to like also just undulate my training.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, I I program for myself in a way that uh helps with my recovery.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_00: I I am a big um a big follower and big believer of of uh, I would say he's probably one of the greatest conditioning coaches of all time.
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_00: His name is Joel Jameson.
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um I took his course.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm one of like the uh you know, one of his certified conditioning coaches.
• 48:58
  SPEAKER_00: He he emphasizes recovery um and programming recovery into your into your weekly training load.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I and I do that and I still run on those days, but it does my running looks different on those days.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_00: But uh kind of doing all those things helps me recover.
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_00: Could I recover better if I got more sleep?
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_00: If I, you know, basically if I got more sleep, yeah, of course.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_01: But it's just I can't pull that lever right now.
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_01: Dylan, pivoting here a little bit.
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_01: You're I think you said six five, correct?
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, six five.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_02: Six five, you gotta explain something for me.
• 49:36
  SPEAKER_02: Six five, two hundred pounds, part of the thousand-pound club, meaning squad, deadlift, bench.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_02: But you ran a 303 marathon.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_02: Like, what the hell?
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'm still mad about that 303.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_02: Mad about 303, okay.
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_02: You wanted less, I take it.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I I said I was gonna run a sub-three hour marathon this year, and I did I did 316 in Austin, and then and then I did uh 303 in Missoula.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_00: So man, I was close.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I'll get it.
• 50:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'll get it next year.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_02: Well, how do you do this?
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_02: Because often you hear like, oh, you know, get lighter, save some weight.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_02: Obviously, you gotta do the mileage and do the training, that's all kind of known.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_02: But you often hear about the lighter, you're over here lifting super heavy, uh training, running, and you're a big dude, right?
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think that I think there's like so many misnomers and like, or just misunderstandings in in in training and like like exercise physiology, and like there I mean, I I'm not saying bro science is bad, but there's also just like you know, there's just some misconceptions out there of like um, you know, how to train, or like what do you want to train for?
• 50:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's like you know trying to kind of think of like a way to describe this, so apologize if I if I pause here for a second, but um you know, I I train in a very specific way that allows me to be strong and be fast.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_00: And you're absolutely right.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like, if I were to shave if I were to like drop weight, I would definitely be faster.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like that is just scientifically proven, like that, you know, per pound of body weight, you shave a certain amount of time off of you know your marathon pace, right?
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_00: That just is what it is.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't have, you know, it's not that I, you know, have a uh animosity towards being lighter, it's just that I also want to be strong.
• 51:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's important to me to be strong.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm 6'5 and I'm just kind of naturally built this way.
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_00: I was funny enough, I was actually super skinny as a as a kid all the way up through high school, like even you know, when I first joined the army.
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but when I learned how to train, I put on like muscle and I also put on like a lot of performance as well.
• 51:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't want to like give that up.
• 51:45
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I just I train in a way that allows me to be super strong and that it also allows me to run a decent, you know, I would say like an okay marathon pace.
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_00: And and really what it what it boils down to is just like how you train.
• 52:00
  SPEAKER_00: So like being extremely diligent or extremely intentional about the type of training that you're you're doing.
• 52:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know, in the past, I used to like, you know, I'd run like 40, 50, 60 miles a week.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I well, I say in the past, before I have like before I got to where I am now, and in my my coaching ability, my coaching knowledge, and what I guess you what some people would call like coaching IQ is, you know, I would I would go run 50, 60 miles a week, and then I would also be lifting like five times a week, and I'd be doing like very bodybuilding style type training.
• 52:33
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, as I just dove into this, this the study of this like, you know, sport and study of science and exercise science, and literally would be like reading Soviet-era Russian textbooks to try to figure out how all these things interplay with each other.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because I'm obsessed like that.
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_00: But I just learned that there's a way of training that that allows you to continue, like ties back into that recovery, allows you to recover better, get stronger, maintain muscle, build muscle if you if that's your goal, um, and then also just get really fast.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I I'll if you want me to kind of go into specifics, I can, but uh I'll put it this way.
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_02: So this way people can reach out, but like if you were to say, look, I want to be, you got a new athlete, and Dylan in four principles I just want you to break down.
• 53:16
  SPEAKER_02: I want to be strong, but I want to run fast, and you had to break it down in three, four principles.
• 53:22
  SPEAKER_02: What would those be?
• 53:23
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 53:26
  SPEAKER_00: So absolute strength for sure.
• 53:29
  SPEAKER_00: So well, let's just talk about the lower body.
• 53:31
  SPEAKER_00: And but all these all these principles apply to the for the most part to the upper body too.
• 53:35
  SPEAKER_00: But you have a little bit more lead weight in the upper body.
• 53:37
  SPEAKER_00: So absolute strength for sure.
• 53:39
  SPEAKER_00: So get strong.
• 53:40
  SPEAKER_00: So like you know, heavyweight, low reps, big rests in between, you like approaching near maximum during your training session.
• 53:49
  SPEAKER_00: So get strong, like get strong legs, like be able to like lift a lot of weight across differ across like your compound lifts, right?
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_00: Start start incorporating um apply.
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well, let me go back a little bit.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_00: The reason you want to do that is because like you're if you raise the ceiling, everything below the ceiling gets easier, you know, proportionately easier.
• 54:10
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like if you know you can let's just make the math easy.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_00: If you can only squat your body weight whenever you're running and you're producing forces that are actually likely above your body weight, then you are using a huge percentage of your maximum ability.
• 54:26
  SPEAKER_00: But if you double your, essentially if you double your squat, like you'd squat two times your body weight, then now you're only using 50% of your your capacity.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_00: Your max, yeah.
• 54:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 54:36
  SPEAKER_00: That also caveat, it's not exactly how it works.
• 54:39
  SPEAKER_00: So please do not harass me in the comments about that.
• 54:42
  SPEAKER_00: But it's enough to get the point across.
• 54:44
  SPEAKER_00: So that's that's the point.
• 54:45
  SPEAKER_00: When you raise the absolute strength, the other thing is plymetrics, extensive and intensive plymetrics.
• 54:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm not going to get into the science behind why plymetrics, but plyometrics.
• 54:55
  SPEAKER_00: So move from like start incorporating them at a low intensity and a high volume at like early on, and then move toward a lower volume and a higher intensity of plymetrics.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm talking about things like pogo hops and you know, bounds, box jumps.
• 55:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um eventually you can move into like um, you know, uh drop jumps and depth jumps, like for really advanced, you know, I'd say like the depth jumps for more advanced athletes and with more experience with plyometrics, but bounding and and and uh this also it it it helps so many different things, like rate of force development, and then which is basically how fast can you absorb and generate force, but um, and then also like reactive strength.
• 55:34
  SPEAKER_00: Well, actually, reactive strength is how fast you can absorb and reproduce force, but uh rate of force development is how fast you can just produce force in general.
• 55:41
  SPEAKER_00: But these are all important things um with uh with running, direct directly correlated.
• 55:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then, you know, of course, your nutrition as well, like you make sure you're getting your macros, and I don't mean macros like in a bodybuilding sense, like you know, I'm not that strict on mine, but I do make sure that I get like, you know, typically on my more intense, longer runs, I'm getting 90 grams of uh carbs for uh saying that right, my brain is all over the place now.
• 56:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um getting 90 grams of carbs per hour.
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then yeah, just make sure you're fueling basically is what I'm getting at.
• 56:17
  SPEAKER_00: But um, and then I'm trying to think of like some other stuff that's like kind of key to to uh to that.
• 56:25
  SPEAKER_00: But I think the the final if we if we were to make four pillars, the fourth pillar would would really be um to well, this is not even getting into all like the run volume and and intensity.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, this is what I'll say the 80-20 rule.
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_00: So make 20 20% of your make 20% of your um your running volume high intensity, whether that be really what it should be is a is a mixture of uh of zone four and zone five if you're using a traditional zone system, which it has its inherent flaws, but where did you call it that?
• 56:59
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and then the rest of the 80% low intensity.
• 57:02
  SPEAKER_00: So that could be like zone two, and it's okay if you peak up into zone three from time to time, especially towards the end of a end of a like a longer zone two run if you're if you're peaking into zone three, but you're holding a steady effort and you feel comfortable, yep, that's fine.
• 57:16
  SPEAKER_00: But um, and then also pairing those pairing those higher intensity running days with your uh your absolute strength days for your for your uh lower body is super important because then you're consolidating central nervous system fatigue, and then you that ties back to the recovery.
• 57:31
  SPEAKER_00: So if if I were to actually replace that nutrition pillar, I would say it's actually more recovery pillar, and you can incorporate um how you undulate your program, basically like what you're doing on a daily on a on a daily, weekly basis, and then also how the nutrition ties into that.
• 57:48
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like recovery is kind of how you program, and then also how you feel real lightly.
• 57:54
  SPEAKER_02: Like, how much are you eating on a given to support both strength and the running?
• 57:59
  SPEAKER_02: It's gotta be more than just running.
• 58:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I mean I I've gotten I've gotten this question a lot recently, and I hate to say, but I I kind of stopped tracking.
• 58:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um because things have gone so busy.
• 58:11
  SPEAKER_00: And also now, like um, you didn't it has not always been this way, it's actually only been this way recently, but my wife makes a lot of our meals now.
• 58:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um so admittedly, I I don't really track anymore, and I should.
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_00: Full full transparency, I should absolutely be tracking.
• 58:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so that's that's something that again, discipline is ever evolving.
• 58:33
  SPEAKER_00: So um, you know, that's something that I can bring discipline back into.
• 58:39
  SPEAKER_02: Dylan, you're now preparing to rock a hundred miles in 24 hours.
• 58:45
  SPEAKER_02: Why 100?
• 58:47
  SPEAKER_02: That's a lot.
• 58:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I just mean well, uh a few different reasons.
• 58:52
  SPEAKER_00: One, I want to do a hundred miler.
• 58:54
  SPEAKER_00: I haven't done a hundred miler yet.
• 58:56
  SPEAKER_00: So um, and that was I had all these goals this year, like I wanted to run a sub-60 high rocks, I wanted to um, you know, run a sub-three hour marathon, I wanted to run a sub-five minute mile.
• 59:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and uh I I unfortunately I didn't actually get to try the mile because um things just started getting out of hand with the marathon prep.
• 59:15
  SPEAKER_00: But um, I ran a 303 marathon and then I ran literally an hour high rocks, and I'm like, dude, what the hell?
• 59:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm I'm getting so close.
• 59:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I mean, next year I'm gonna knock them off.
• 59:26
  SPEAKER_00: But um, but so I wasn't gonna compromise on this, on this 100 miler.
• 59:31
  SPEAKER_00: So I knew that I wanted to run a hundred miler, and um and I've been wanting to do it for a long time, and I and I got this like I got this idea of doing a hundred, I originally was a hundred K ruck in under 24 hours.
• 59:43
  SPEAKER_00: I got this idea in my head a couple years ago just because I wanted to see if it was possible, if anybody could do it.
• 59:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought it would be like a fun, unique challenge and kind of blend my current and my past together.
• 59:57
  SPEAKER_00: And then I started seeing seeing these uh really incredible athletes like doing all these fundraisers.
• 1:00:02
  SPEAKER_00: And and I just I I became like super passionate about it.
• 1:00:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I just like I I love that that they're doing that.
• 1:00:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like they don't have to, right?
• 1:00:10
  SPEAKER_00: But um, you know, they want to help people and and my whole thing is about lifting people up and and and uh put yes, pushing people and and and being frank and saying like you can actually do this, like you know, no one's coming to save you all those things, like there's no excuses, like all those things.
• 1:00:28
  SPEAKER_00: But ultimately it's about lifting people up, and and I try to lift people up on a regular basis.
• 1:00:32
  SPEAKER_00: So it just like all these things culminated together.
• 1:00:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I, you know, I wanted to do the 100 miler, I wanted to do this like long ruck, see if it was possible.
• 1:00:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then I found out like at the time, actually, I thought no one had ever rucked 100 miles before.
• 1:00:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um I have found out that actually one person that I know has has done it, but he did it in 36 hours, and he's actually super cool.
• 1:00:54
  SPEAKER_00: He was like, you better go get that in under 24.
• 1:00:56
  SPEAKER_00: And he was hyped me up, and I really appreciate that.
• 1:00:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I just like all these things kind of coalesced together and uh came up with this idea.
• 1:01:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, okay, this is a new also a new challenge for me, and I love new challenges.
• 1:01:08
  SPEAKER_00: I I knew that Missoula was gonna be my last marathon of the year.
• 1:01:11
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, all right, let's try to do this 100 miler.
• 1:01:16
  SPEAKER_02: You're doing this for veterans, and I've seen you describe this like a fraction of what veterans carry on a day-to-day basis.
• 1:01:23
  SPEAKER_02: Why is it so personal to you?
• 1:01:24
  SPEAKER_02: You got like three goals here, first hundred miler.
• 1:01:27
  SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna rock the hundred miler, 24 hour, and I'm doing it for veterans.
• 1:01:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, trying to raise$100,000, which is a fundraiser, is harder than I thought, to be honest.
• 1:01:37
  SPEAKER_00: So all the help is much appreciated.
• 1:01:40
  SPEAKER_00: But um, yeah, so for veterans, I mean, there the thing is, is there's there are resources out there for veterans, right?
• 1:01:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but our our veterans, especially our like um especially our veterans of like GWAT, with global global war on terrorism.
• 1:01:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there are a lot of guys are guys and girls, a lot of people are struggling from that, from that era and and from those wars.
• 1:02:04
  SPEAKER_00: And and there's not there are resources, but I always say that like a res resource is only as good as the participants' willingness to participate in it or to you know accept the help.
• 1:02:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think that's where a lot of the problems exist.
• 1:02:20
  SPEAKER_00: And and you know, I don't mean to always shame the VA or or cast shade towards them, but they don't have a good system for reintegrating veterans into back into society and then like helping them with their with their problems, uh with their you know, their mental health and PTSD and all those things.
• 1:02:35
  SPEAKER_00: And um and also people have this like miss misunderstanding that like PTSD only comes from from war.
• 1:02:43
  SPEAKER_00: And like, yeah, I went to war and that's and and I was in plenty of firefights, and that's where my PTSD comes from, amongst other things.
• 1:02:49
  SPEAKER_00: But you can get PTSD just you know from being in the military.
• 1:02:52
  SPEAKER_00: And then also uh the transition is I mean, imagine being a stranger in the country that you grew up in.
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's what it's like when you get out of the army or the military.
• 1:03:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's like um you're a foreigner in your own country um because you're just so indoctrinated into a different way of life.
• 1:03:07
  SPEAKER_00: So I mean, it's hard on like so many fronts.
• 1:03:09
  SPEAKER_00: And and um, you know, there's a few companies out there that are doing like really great work and really helping veterans like from all the way through the all the way through the process.
• 1:03:18
  SPEAKER_00: And and um, you know, me being someone who like I in I think it was you know maybe 2018, 2019, um, you know, I almost committed suicide because I was struggling so hard.
• 1:03:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I was on the SSRI like pain train of, you know, like that the VA essentially just uh gives you when you get out of the army, there's like load you up with uh antidepressants.
• 1:03:40
  SPEAKER_00: And then, you know, of course, you don't you're a veteran and you probably have a certain specific kind of lifestyle.
• 1:03:46
  SPEAKER_00: And and I I know I did, I know I was like also drinking to numb the pain, and I was taking all these like um medications and they weren't working, and then after a year I just said screw it, and I just tossed them.
• 1:03:58
  SPEAKER_00: And uh that's like the worst thing you can do.
• 1:04:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and yeah, I almost committed suicide.
• 1:04:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I ended up in like a hospital, um, you know, uh uh not mental hospital, but uh in like the I can't remember what it's called, but essentially the mental unit of the ER, um, because I was gonna kill myself and I had to get like a chaperone and they had to like take my firearms away and like all this stuff.
• 1:04:21
  SPEAKER_00: It was a horrible experience.
• 1:04:24
  SPEAKER_00: But I survived.
• 1:04:26
  SPEAKER_00: I I'm still alive, I didn't kill myself.
• 1:04:29
  SPEAKER_00: So um, but that's not the case for everybody.
• 1:04:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I have, you know, I there's a girl um that I know that I was in training with who uh killed herself while she was in the army.
• 1:04:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there's somebody that I was close with that I went to rasp with.
• 1:04:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um that uh, you know, he got out of the army around the same time I did.
• 1:04:50
  SPEAKER_00: He got married.
• 1:04:50
  SPEAKER_00: I think he had a baby on the way.
• 1:04:52
  SPEAKER_00: He was like a sheriff's deputy in his hometown, seemed like he was doing great, just bought a house and then killed himself.
• 1:04:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because a lot of these wounds are like a lot of these guys, like they just they don't um, you know, they don't show it.
• 1:05:04
  SPEAKER_00: We're not we're we're literally taught like to like go through pain.
• 1:05:08
  SPEAKER_00: So but sometimes it gets so big that it it it is all consuming, literally.
• 1:05:13
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and so I just really wanted to support, you know, um, I made it through uh and I and I I was lucky because I had the resources and uh the yeah and I think also God was just with me at that moment, but um as I made I ended up making the right choice to go seek help, but uh but I think that we can be doing a lot a lot better job and these companies that are already doing a good job and have like big goals for how they can help, but they need they need help funding.
• 1:05:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so that's kind of why I'm doing what I'm doing.
• 1:05:46
  SPEAKER_02: Man, that's a big why, man.
• 1:05:48
  SPEAKER_02: And I appreciate you sharing all that.
• 1:05:50
  SPEAKER_02: Like, wow.
• 1:05:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um we're gonna throw the link in there.
• 1:05:55
  SPEAKER_02: Please that's tough, man.
• 1:06:00
  SPEAKER_02: Glad you're still here, man.
• 1:06:01
  SPEAKER_02: I gotta say that.
• 1:06:02
  SPEAKER_02: Having this over now and uh everything you're doing for sure.
• 1:06:06
  SPEAKER_02: As crazy as this race sound, like what's training like?
• 1:06:09
  SPEAKER_02: How heavy is this ruck?
• 1:06:11
  SPEAKER_02: Like, how are you gearing up for this?
• 1:06:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:06:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, in in the ruck, I'd I'd so we've kind of condensed it down to like a like uh essentially what most people would consider a plate carrier.
• 1:06:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um just because logistically it makes way more sense.
• 1:06:24
  SPEAKER_00: And and ultimately the goal is not just to run around with a giant backpack on, it's it's to carry the weight, which is like symbolic of the veterans that are carrying the weight through daily life.
• 1:06:34
  SPEAKER_00: So um, so we've condensed it down to a plate carrier.
• 1:06:37
  SPEAKER_00: I have a 20-pound plate carrier and I have a 30-pound plate carrier.
• 1:06:40
  SPEAKER_00: We hadn't really made any decisions on what's what's going to be worn quite yet.
• 1:06:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and honestly, just mostly because when I got the plate carriers, they sent me a 20-pound and they sent me a 30-pound.
• 1:06:51
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know what I was getting, and that's just what they sent.
• 1:06:53
  SPEAKER_00: But um, so uh yeah, I mean the the training is tough.
• 1:06:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's it it's you know, I mean, training for an ultra is tough in general, and training for um a hundred miler, of course, just requires a lot of mileage.
• 1:07:06
  SPEAKER_00: But um, and I did I did have an injury pretty early on that I basically just been pushing through for the last few weeks, and and mileage has been kind of low, but um it's it's gotten a lot better now.
• 1:07:18
  SPEAKER_00: So about to ramp back up.
• 1:07:20
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, starting next week um will be a big ramp up.
• 1:07:24
  SPEAKER_00: But um uh we'll start the big ramp up rather.
• 1:07:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so we'll have like 12 more weeks until until the ultra, which will be like the weekend of December 18th in Austin, Texas.
• 1:07:34
  SPEAKER_00: So if anybody's in Austin and they want to come run some miles with me, uh you are more than welcome.
• 1:07:38
  SPEAKER_00: I'll be on Ladybird like.
• 1:07:40
  SPEAKER_00: But um, you're doing this on Lady Bird.
• 1:07:42
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, yeah.
• 1:07:44
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, that's gonna be cool.
• 1:07:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, hopefully I don't get in trouble um because I don't have any permits or anything, but um we'll do it anyways.
• 1:07:52
  SPEAKER_00: But uh 10, yeah, 10 laps around uh because it's a 10-mile, 10-mile circuit.
• 1:07:56
  SPEAKER_00: But um so um gosh, I'm sorry, I apologize.
• 1:08:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I lost my train.
• 1:08:01
  SPEAKER_00: I thought well, what uh was your question again?
• 1:08:05
  SPEAKER_02: No, you could we were talking about how the training has been and all that, and and you you shared that.
• 1:08:09
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah.
• 1:08:11
  SPEAKER_00: No, it's it's it's good, but um, yeah, definitely dealt with that injury and then now kind of getting back on track.
• 1:08:15
  SPEAKER_00: And uh logistically, it it it you know the miles are the most important part, but then also just getting time under the plate carrier is also super important.
• 1:08:24
  SPEAKER_00: So um it's been a unique and fun programming challenge for me as well, because I program all my own training.
• 1:08:32
  SPEAKER_00: So um yeah, that's been fun.
• 1:08:34
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's just it's uh the cool thing about training for an ultra is you you kind of you can kind of experiment.
• 1:08:42
  SPEAKER_02: Dylan, we started this whole EP talking about Army Ranger, the incident with your eye, marathons, ultras.
• 1:08:50
  SPEAKER_02: Like you even dropped the high rocks there, our high rocks.
• 1:08:55
  SPEAKER_02: Like, do you think you've done the craziest thing you're gonna do yet, or there's still more to come?
• 1:09:01
  SPEAKER_00: Oh man, there's all there's always more, to be honest.
• 1:09:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there's always more.
• 1:09:05
  SPEAKER_00: There's a ton of other things that I want to do too.
• 1:09:07
  SPEAKER_00: Is like, you know, I I think a hybrid athlete is is kind of, you know, some people like it, some people don't like it.
• 1:09:13
  SPEAKER_00: But I mean, I think it's kind of unique and cool in a way, in the sense it's like it kind of opens the door to do like there's so many cool things that you can do.
• 1:09:20
  SPEAKER_00: And and you know, even though I'm 31, I mean, some people might call that old and still feel very young.
• 1:09:25
  SPEAKER_00: And like, you know, so you see some of these guys like putting out their best efforts in like, you know, 30s or later 30s, 40s, 50s.
• 1:09:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, like like I said, I'm a big fan of Cameron Haynes.
• 1:09:36
  SPEAKER_00: He just ran a spasticis marathon and he's like, I think he's like 58 or maybe a little bit older.
• 1:09:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, yeah, dude, I mean, this is, I mean, I honestly kind of feel like I'm just getting started.
• 1:09:46
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I'm honestly like a baby in the space.
• 1:09:48
  SPEAKER_00: But um, but yeah, uh, there's there's lots of events that I that I want to do, you know.
• 1:09:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's also this new thing called Apex Athlete.
• 1:09:58
  SPEAKER_00: I think like um it's something that I would be uh actually coming from uh I think I'm you know mostly getting into like the science behind things.
• 1:10:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm I'm more specifically a speed and power athlete, um, you know, genetically.
• 1:10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so I would be way more adept at that type of training.
• 1:10:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I'm just forcing myself to be an endurance athlete, which is kind of going against the grain for me.
• 1:10:21
  SPEAKER_00: But um, but uh I'd love to try that.
• 1:10:25
  SPEAKER_00: I'd want to do more high rocks.
• 1:10:27
  SPEAKER_00: I definitely want to do an iron.
• 1:10:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, more hundred miles.
• 1:10:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love to do like lifetime achievements for me.
• 1:10:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I really want to do Leadville um 100 and like big time, big time lifetime achievement, which I think would be very hard logistically, especially with my vision.
• 1:10:43
  SPEAKER_00: But um, I'd love to do UT and B.
• 1:10:45
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's like that's like on my bucket list.
• 1:10:48
  SPEAKER_02: That'd be sick.
• 1:10:50
  SPEAKER_00: So a lot of things.
• 1:10:52
  SPEAKER_02: There's that perseverance showing again.
• 1:10:56
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:10:57
  SPEAKER_02: So Dylan, I appreciate you, man.
• 1:10:59
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for coming on and sharing and talking running with me here on the podcast, man.
• 1:11:03
  SPEAKER_02: I appreciate you coming on the uh the the show, man.
• 1:11:07
  SPEAKER_00: Dude, it's been an absolute pleasure.
• 1:11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um, thank you so much for for allowing me to share my story.
• 1:11:11
  SPEAKER_00: And um, yeah, it's it's been an honor.
• 1:11:15
  SPEAKER_02: Sure, man.
• 1:11:16
  SPEAKER_02: Everyone, this has been the People Run Podcast.
• 1:11:19
  SPEAKER_02: Catch you on the next one.
• 1:11:20
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for tuning in.