Canada O'Brien

0:03Conan O 'Brien needs a fan. Want to talk to Conan? Visit teamcoco.com slash call Conan. Okay, let's get started. Hey, Devon. Welcome to Conan O 'Brien Needs a Fan. Hey, Devon. How are you? I'm good. How are you? Well, you don't... I'm sorry. This is crazy. Well, I think it's crazy that your shirt matches your background exactly. Because you look like a floating head right now. It's cool. It's pretty cool. You have a good look going for you. Thank you. Yeah. Devon, there's so much we need to talk about. But the first thing I need to understand is where are you coming from right now? I have no idea where you are in the world.

0:45So I'm from Calgary, Alberta in Canada. I originally was from Edmonton, but yeah, I'm in Calgary now. Okay. So you live in Calgary and what's the temperature where you are right now? It's unseasonably warm. It's about five degrees Celsius. So yeah. That always still sounds cold when you do Celsius. Doesn't it sound like, oh, it's real hard. It's five degrees. What is that in American temperature? Yeah. We like everything done the American way. We're soon to buy your country. I've never figured out the conversion there. So your guess would be as good as mine. So it's 41 degrees. Okay. Did you call it Calgary?

1:25Yeah. So I'm not originally from here. So I call it Calgary. I'm supposed to call it Calgary. You know what I say, Devon? Stick to your guns. Yeah. Yeah. The locals don't really know what they're talking about. I don't think so. hey I'm gonna say this Devon and I'm this is a compliment you look yoked doesn't he look like a do you lift yeah I mean you look swole is that what the kids say yoked you look incredible I should have worn my shirt that says yoked it would have been way better guess what pal you don't have to cause you've got the muscles to prove it your muscles have muscles it's out of control what's going on here tell us a little do you lift every day what's the story uh yeah i do work out quite often um i've been training for i mean how old am i now almost 33 so since i was like 16 um wow so yeah i started working out when i was 55 and i'm still on very light weight you'll get there yeah no and i'm in my 70s i'm going to move up to the old 20 pounder.

2:37Okay. You'll get there. You're a very nice guy, you'll get there. By the time you're in your nineties, you'll be okay. Well, are you a professional athlete in any way? I'm not a professional. I would, I would make that clear for sure. Okay. But I, I did, I did compete in bobsleigh last year for our Canadian national team. Oh, you're kidding. You're right. So you are a, I mean, you're a serious bobsledder. I would call it former because I'm not doing it this year. But last year I did do it. It was my first year. And yeah, I was on the World Cup team last year. I think when I sent the email last year, I could be wrong.

3:22I sent applications a few times to you guys. But when I made the team, I was like, I'm going to send it. And hopefully Conan will want to talk to me now. And I might have been in Europe right when I sent it. Yeah, but let me tell you something, Devon. If I was on a bobsled for two seconds, I would spend the rest of my life telling people that I was I was a bobsledder. That's just me. You're being way too modest. It sounds like I mean, this is serious stuff. You have competed at a top level. Yeah, I was barely I would I say lucky. I was also just very fortunate to be in good positions. I put myself there and put myself out there last year and, uh, was able to just find my way into, uh, one of our top sleds last year and somehow ended up over there.

4:07It was, uh, I just took a shot at it. So I don't know. We've all seen the images of bobsledding. Um, but I don't know much about it. I know there's a couple of, a couple of you are crammed into a bobsled. How many? So it's either two or four, uh, four, it gets real cozy in there, but, uh, it's nice. You're with your buddies kind of going down. And if they're not your buddies, they become your buddies real fast. Yeah, they do, for sure. So you are interlocked with these, there's four of you and you're on this sled that's like a rocket. And how fast do you go at times? 150 kilometers an hour. Damn it, you and your metric system.

4:46I don't know, is that, I mean, that could be 11 miles an hour for all I know. I'm sorry, I'm very ignorant. I want 150. I can go any other country and save us. You can run 150 kilometers an hour. 93 miles an hour. Wait, 93 miles an hour? And what is that in kilometers? Yeah, stop it. I just got us off of that. Okay, all right. Wait a minute. So 93 miles an hour on a bobsled. I don't understand. What happens if you crash? You hang on for dear life. Seriously. Because there are no seatbelts. Have you, do you fall out? What happens? You can. If you don't hang on, you will fall out. Yeah, like it's kind of my first crash.

5:26I learned it real quick. I was doing a two man. So it doesn't go quite as fast. It gets to I don't know what it is in miles per hour, but it gets to like 140 ish kilometers an hour. And we crashed probably at the fastest point on the track in Whistler. And you feel it right away. It's like trying to kick you out. It's like almost like a bull just trying to kick you off. So you have to like grab on to the frame and pull yourself back in and just try and stay in. The other thing is if you let yourself come out, you're usually scraping on ice. There's walls, so you might hit them. You're trying to get as low into the sled so that the sled takes it and not your body.

6:04But wait a minute, are you wearing any protection? There's a helmet and then we have what is called a burn vest. So to prevent any ice burn from like skidding on it, you have this like Kevlar vest. But other than that, it's just a speed suit. Okay, okay. I don't understand. It's not a ton. I don't understand how you're not killed. I'm being serious. I don't understand how if someone threw me at 93 miles an hour onto ice and I was just wearing a skin tight suit, which wouldn't look great, by the way, and a helmet, there'd be an immediate funeral. Just an immediate. A doctor wouldn't even check on me.

6:41They would just put me in a box and have a funeral. slide down the track into a crowd of people dressed in black yeah we would all wait the coffin would be opened at one end and i'd slide right in and they'd say well there we go and put me down um so i mean have you ever been seriously hurt i haven't there's been i've been really fortunate um our crashes uh one was one looked violent it wasn't that bad in it but it looked really bad um just because you're about halfway down we crashed we tipped over and as you're going through all these turns going down the sled's just doing its own thing no one's controlling it so when it goes up on a turn it comes back down like as if it's coming down on your head you can kind of feel it but you're just hanging on again you're with your buddies so you're kind of like hanging on like okay let's hope we all don't fall out and get hurt here but uh that's a pretty low key conversation you guys are having you're it's 93 miles an hour you're soaring through an ice tunnel out of control i kind of hope we don't get hurt here is one of you reading the paper oh look says you're the oilers are in town our uh i think like the last crash that we had i i was thinking like my first thought was like because it was our first four man on the world cup together and i'd like told my family all back home like this is where you can watch it make sure you tune in it's at this time and like first thing i was like oh man my mom is watching this and she's not gonna like this sport anymore just because that's all i was thinking the whole time i'm like oh man i need this to like end so i can pop out and just like give her a show her show her that you're all right uh quick question is my instinct would be I would want to be like the third person in a four person because if something went wrong I would try to use the bodies in front and behind me as a buffer, as a shield is that a sign of low character on my part?

8:47I would try to be positioned behind you so that I could steer you towards the ice and the rocks and your body I'm just being honest your legs are too long What? Your legs are too long. Yeah, that's right. Well, I think the minute the crash starts, my legs would fall off. They'd say, oh, look, two strands of denim spaghetti just fell out the back of the... Excuse me, you're wearing denim? I'm wearing denim, yeah. I'm not putting on this goddamn Kevlar. What do I look like? I'm a man, see? A pure Canadian tuxedo. Yeah, exactly. So I'm just being honest with you. I would try to use your body to absorb all the punishment.

9:26Well, I was always... I was the third guy. So when you load, you have like a routine. Yeah. I was the third guy. And I mean, in the crash, your instinct is to get as low as possible into the sled. So yeah, in fairness, I am trying to get lower than everyone else in that sled. Yeah. You know what I would do? I would build a little trap door in the sled so that I, there's like, and some steps so I could go downstairs into a tiny little room and read a novel during the crash. How big is your bobsled? It's a bigger bobsled, yes. It's less aerodynamic. But in my insistence, it has, when the crash starts, excuse me, gents, and I open a little door, and then you hear footsteps going down some steps, and then I shut it.

10:10It's a little cocoa, and I read the third Harry Potter. I think it's Harry Potter and the stone that's made of bones. And I'm in there with a little sweater and stuff, and there's a little fireplace. No one's going to want to be on your team. You don't know about bobsledding like I do. Bobsled sounds more like one of those big, like, tall bands. It's going to tip over all the time. Oh, so suddenly you're the expert, Devon. I think I know a little more about bobsledding than you do, having spoken to you and seen a photograph.

10:50Now, what's the economics behind bobsledding? How do you guys, do you need sponsorships? Do you, who's funding this? Does the Canadian government step in and throw some loonies at it? See what I did right there? That was a good reference. That was a good Canadian reference. Well, you know, I've been around. I've stayed at Martin Short's Lake Cottage. That's where I know all this stuff. Okay, so you know that. Oh yeah. He's always saying, you have any loonies on you, Conan? So that's where I picked it up. Yeah, so a lot of Olympic sports are pretty underfunded. Bobsleigh is certainly no different.

11:24um the we do get some support as of course um and we are obviously very grateful for it and and any support that teams do get uh yeah like we're happy about it but usually especially the last few years it's been self-funded um divine athletes are needing to get just ask him just ask him yeah no so the main reason i'm here is like could you put your face just on a side of a sled just give us some money we'll slap it on there um what i really get if i i could get some uh you know uh kone o 'brien needs a friend podcast sponsors if i gave if i threw some dough your way i could get a little bit of a sponsorship i could probably get you on a sled for sure i could get you connected with the right people yeah but what if it's one of those things you know when it's a grim subject but if an airplane goes down the company quickly covers the logo Have you ever found You ever hear about that They like cover the logo Of the plane Because there's all this footage Of and you know They're like Cover up that logo The corporation But it looks bad So I'm just saying They're gonna do that If they win

12:30And the winner is Hold on They're covering up something Devon is quickly Spray painting over An image Yeah Yeah that's something You know what But I have to talk to the people here that control the purse strings. You'd think that would be me, but it is not. I've assumed it was. It's Jeff Ross who seems to control these things. He's a hard guy to get to. You know what I mean? It's tough. It's tough to... You know how Jeff, he moves around so quickly. He's always darting from room to room. He's like an eel. Conan, when did this become the Jeff Ross podcast and not the Conan O 'Brien? I like this guy.

13:14Devon, I see what Devon's doing. He's getting me to say, Jeff Ross doesn't run things. I'll pledge the money. Yeah, yeah. I think we have to look into this, Devon. Who's the real boss around here? Write a check. Who wears the pants? Who wears the pants? How much do you need, Devon? Whatever you want to give. Yeah, and do it in kilometers. Do you want it in Canadian dollar? Yeah, how many? If you give us U.S. funds, we really would be thrilled. What's the difference between, what's the exchange rate now between? One Canadian dollar, 69 U.S. cents. Oh, is it that low? Wow. That's a little rough.

13:54That's a little rough. Sorry. Did you bring your dog to the podcast? It's a good one. A pretty good one. It's a good one. Yeah, rough, rough. What do you think of that exchange rate, pup? Rough. God, I'm killing over here with myself. You're just hydrating. Devon is hydrating. He has to. I know. He's, I mean, you've, and also when you take a swig, it's the largest water bottle I've ever seen. There must be at least 95. Oh man. Look at that thing. And he's a big guy. Imagine how big that thing is. That's all the water I've had in my life. But he just looked it up. How do you even get into Bob? You call it Bob's sleighing?

14:38Bob's sled, Bob's sleigh. It's the same. Is it a sleigh or a sled? Honestly, I call it bobsled. I prefer it bobsled. It's because you can use it in lots of different ways. Bobsled is very singular. Yeah, bobsled is if you use it to kill people.

14:55So, okay, I have another question here, and then we'll come back around to the money. I'll take care of the money. Don't you worry about that. What are you doing? You're the third. What is it you're doing in the bobsled other than just hanging on for dear life? Are you shifting your weight at certain times? Are you or I mean, who's steering the thing? Who's in charge of snacks? I want to know what's going on in the very front that he he steers it. I want no part of steering it. It seems like a lot of pressure. I just have to exist for like five seconds pushing it. And then I hop in and just the rest of the blame can go to the guy at the front after that.

15:32So wait, so your contribution is pushing it and then jumping in and then hoping things go well. Pretty much like you. You try and get in like, so when you get in, it's kind of like a, I call it like a meathead ballet. There's three big guys that are all trying to get in moving as fast as they can. And then it's like quick and in, it's like, if you see it, it's very orchestrated. It looks if the good, the teams that are good at it look very good when they do it. Um, so it's like, you're very quick off the bunk and then in and down as low as you can. Wow. And then when you're back there, you don't want to be shifting a bunch.

16:06because if you've got three guys shifting around in the back, the pilot will feel it. So you're trying to just kind of stay as still as you can and stay as low as possible. Stay very still, stay very low. That's interesting. I think I'd be trying to escape most of the time. Which country, just for example, would you say is, what's the country that's dominant in this sport? Germany is probably the most dominant in it. Germany. I bet it's because they've designed some crazily, insane bobsled. Yeah, like Volkswagen. They genuinely do have, they're bobsleds at times. We try and take a look at them, but they look very sleek.

16:46They're very high tech. Have you ever checked it for an internal combustion engine? I mean, I'm sorry. I don't mean to impugn the Germans, but, you know, they make BMWs and Porsches and everything. Have you checked to make sure? I said Volkswagen. I don't know why I chose, like, the weakest. Mercedes. Have you ever checked to make sure that there's not an eight cylinder, beautiful BMW engine in there? And that's why they always win. Have you noticed that they go uphill sometimes for 20 minutes? I fear if I touch their, their sled, I would be. Yeah. They probably wouldn't like that. Yeah. I don't know.

17:25I don't want to know. I don't want to know what happened. What color are they? What, what are they sponsored by? What's on their sled? DHL was a big sponsor. that makes sense he said not sure why

17:40it's like you're shipping something somewhere and it's got to get there fast yeah that makes sense yeah and you need four guys to wear tights and hug each other while it's delivered who are your sponsors now or in the past so the program has their own as far as like who we had last year there's a lot of like local companies um because it's not a especially in canada it's not and like north america generally it's not a well covered sport like you're not flipping through the channels and like oh there's bobsled unless it's the olympics yep so all those other years you're not going to see the sport typically unless people direct you right to it so um it's not like a high coverage sport you're typically not selling people that like tons of eyes are going to get on the sled and see your logo So you're more or less selling a dream of what you're competing for, which everyone who joins the sport is joining to, for the most part, some people might not be, but almost everyone is joining to make the Olympics eventually.

18:44So that's what you're selling when you're selling it to people. Otherwise, yeah, you can try and do what you can for social media sponsorship and give shout outs and stuff. But otherwise, the coverage on it isn't super high. Well, I'm going to tell you something. So you're not selling that part. If I can figure this out and if I do sponsor you guys, it's going to work the other way. You're going to start getting eyeballs because my face is on that bobsled. You see what I'm saying? It's not, oh, I hope people tune in and happen to see my face. When my face is on that bobsled, you're going to see viewership double, quadruple, and then the words that go higher.

19:20But it won't work for, like, you can't, you're going to sponsor them for now, but when they go to the Olympics, it's just going to say Canada on it. No, I'm going to get past those rules. I'm going to say Canada O 'Brien yeah Canada O 'Brien and then just me in a Mountie hat Canada O 'Brien needs a friend is what this line will be called Devon Canada O 'Brien I'm proud to meet you Devon I'm proud to meet you and you seem like a fine fellow and I will you know we're going to think this over but there could be a future in this do you know what I mean? Thank you yeah i uh i just i would like to say i've been watching you since i was like nine i used to watch i used to like stay up late oh and then i'd pretend to go to sleep and then i i had this little like 15 inch tv in my room that i'd like quietly turn on when i was a kid and just like find the channel and watch it you know i used to watch it all the time and like this is to see you now talking directly to me is very like it's almost not about out of out of body experience for me so well this is like quite literally a dream come true well thank you yeah don't mention anyone else it hurts it um you know uh devon i will say this when i started way back in the day my best fans were canadians uh before americans were liking me canadians i think that canada put me on their tv guide like three years before america did because Canadians.

20:53I mean, I revere Canadian comedy and Canadian comedians and SCTV. And so you guys were always in my corner in the early days. And so the image of you, you know, sneaking some Conan O 'Brien illegally makes me really happy. And so this is nice. I'm glad I met you. I'm going to talk to the money guys. We're going to figure this out and I'm going to start to get in shape because perfect yes i want to be killed uh you can always you can always take a ride in a bobsledder you head to whistler or lake placard they have tours for you so uh no no i'm going i'm going with you or with no one so it's you or no one all right hey devon uh very nice to meet you and i hope our paths cross down the road okay awesome thank you very much take care man bye bye Bye.

21:43Conan O 'Brien Needs a Fan. With Conan O 'Brien, Sonam Ovcesian, and Matt Gourley. Produced by me, Matt Gourley. Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Jeff Ross, and Nick Leow. Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy. Supervising producer, Aaron Blair. Associate talent producer, Jennifer Samples. Associate producers, Sean Doherty and Lisa Berm. Engineering by Eduardo Perez. Get three free months of Sirius XM when you sign up at SiriusXM.com slash Conan. Please rate, review, and subscribe to Conan O 'Brien Needs a Fan wherever fine podcasts are down.