Talking Fitness with Alfie Manthorpe, Danny Rae & Andy Butchart | Ep 64

0:00Lads, welcome to the podcast. We've got Alfie, we've got Danny, we've got Andy. What are we going to talk about? Well, you WhatsApp me saying we're just going to chat shit for 90 minutes. And that's exactly what we're going to do. How's everyone been over the last couple of weeks or months? Last time you've been on the podcast. Alfie, you're on all the time, so we'll start with Danny. When? That was April. I was racing Poland and Warsaw. all is it that was how long ago it was yeah um lots happened since then hasn't it uh been uh i've converted from high rocks over to trail running to take on a new challenge so that is the bulk of my training at the minute um with a view of becoming a better runner and i'm around good people um to do that um but still dabbling a little bit of high rocks but been busy you know what i actually brought you on this podcast because i'm sick of these two giving me shit like two runners give me shit about high rocks and i thought i'll get another high rockser in and now this high rockser has turned into a runner so i'm back at square one we're all runners here aren't we we're all runners yeah that's it yeah what about you andy what have you been up to i'm chilling racing the two half martins back to back big half seven days in between or like i know yeah seven days exactly yes sunday sunday do the math i don't know um yeah big half and then great north run just finished so it was very good a couple weekends um not too bad performances 63 08 and 62 58 but it's not a bit of time it's about taking part having fun um and i'm glad to be here to talk about it which was better can i say uh you know it's hard to look past great north run such a sick sick event like i feel like the city comes alive proper in london it's hard to obviously there's so much going on but newcastle properly shuts down for it and like everyone buzzes off everyone you talk to has at least done it once or is racing it at the weekend i mean it's huge it's such a big event is it like the biggest half marathon like in the uk in the world yeah i think so yeah i think so 63 000 people yeah i think it's the biggest one in the world i don't know back check that if you want but i'm pretty sure it is that's mad in newcastle you mentioned about the red red arrows red arrows yeah it's cool yeah the red arrows flew over us just at the first 200 meters it was so sick i didn't expect it because usually you miss it being the elites because it usually flies over the tin bridge just randomly um but my my wee boy or both boys were actually at the finish and when i finished it they were like oh we saw the red arrows so they must have gone across us then across the beach as well so i think it's pretty sick yeah it's cool if you ever get a chance you should go and do it i swear mate is such a cool event because it runs like next year alphi maybe you've done it as well i was gonna say he's done it before i've done it before i did actually yeah last year what time do you run then let's compare uh i think one hour 13 or something like that that's actually all right that's good not bad it's quite a hilly course it's not a fast course it's not fast it's not it's a nice course because like it's weird because you're on dual cars we're pretty much the whole way aren't you but like you're just people the whole way like pretty much like there's not much dead yeah now it's sick like the environment yeah it's so good there's not

3:17Alfie Manthorpe: one dead part like you mentioned what about you Alfie I mean I didn't think I've had a haircut since last time I came on here so that recent just really been focused on you watching you race how often do you get your hair cut yeah I was gonna say every few weeks my hair grows quickly so I've gotta keep you you mean you've not had your hair dyed that's what you mean no cut I probably only had it cut once it was a joke about how frequently I've come on yeah I know I'm glad that went over your head. No, I actually wear a cap again because it's too long. But yeah, honestly, not much has been going on in my life.

3:49Alfie Manthorpe: Just been training a lot, getting ready for this race next weekend. You've been getting fit? Trying to, yeah. It's been going pretty well the last few weeks. And what's the race at the weekend? The World Half Marathon Championships in Copenhagen. Copenhagen, that's flat as well, flat course, right? Yeah, I think it's probably one of the quickest courses in the world, I think. or Valencia maybe. Would you say that's true? I think it's going to be a good question. I think you're going to run very fast. It's going to cause this issue. So I expect, I've got high expectations, I should say. Yeah. Well, go on, Alvy, what are you going to do?

4:22What's the plan?

4:24Alfie Manthorpe: Just do exactly what I do in training with you, really. Just sit behind someone for as long as possible and then hopefully drop them at the end. That never happens at training. Yeah, you normally stop before that happens. Finish the session early. So yeah, I'm looking forward to it. Yeah. Sick. Are you feeling ready? Yeah, very, very. You only got the call up like a couple of weeks ago, right? Yeah, it was two Mondays ago. You can probably tell me 27th of August and for that. So how's training changed? No, because I was already training for a half marathon. I would have raced him this weekend if I didn't get selected.

5:03Alfie Manthorpe: Who would have won? Obviously, you can answer that if you want. so we'll have to race each other sometime soon don't we yeah of course he likes to now what he likes to do is either if he finishes the 10k grab his kid so then it looks like he wasn't trying cross the line with his kid or this time he's double stats the half marathons then he's like oh I did two in one week so it's he doesn't have to race well in either of them because he did two so it kind of works really well clever though yeah clever play the game play the game when you've been to two Olympics and someone hasn't you have to play the game of it don't you so I'll feel eventually books but we'll see yeah maybe maybe in the next eight years i hopefully i can do what you do now yeah that'd be the dream you can put those eight years up with a lot of good performances and danny what are you training for at the moment obviously you said that you're getting into trail running yes i am training for the bob graham round we spoke about it last time on the podcast i remember i got clipped and i absolutely butchered it people were like it's not 12 000 meters it's 8 000 meters it's not 44 fells it's 42 fells but no yes 8 200 meters of elevation over 42 fells in the Lake District starting and finishing in Keswick about 66 miles and you've got 24 hours to do it and when we spoke about it last time um previous attempts I'd done like self-supported hadn't really trained specifically for it and it is a niche that just won't ever go away so I decided to specifically focus on that um bring in like local experts that can show me the routes tell me how to train for it all the hints and tips so I've been training properly for that with a view of doing it in about five weeks from now sick have you got any paces yes so a lot of the local fell running community in keswick have been like super helpful um so they've offered up help in that regard um i think the key thing is with that challenge it's like got a lot of history behind it so it's first done by bob graham owns a owned a hotel decided to do 42 fells for his 42nd birthday did it when there was like no lines to take and he had help and he did a pair of tennis plimsolls um and i think the local runners appreciate people that go all right he's coming to do the challenge but at least he understands the reason you know why we have the round and it's a big thing for people from keswick the bob graham round so i may have seen it like they all take to the streets yeah yeah finish and for the start for the start as well or just for the finish um so people will be there around floating around at the start they'll know what you're doing but then when people will come in to finish it's like it's so cool because you run up the high street people know what's going down um and there's a pub right next to it called the rounds and what normally happens is when someone finishes they come out of a big pint of beer and they give it to the finisher and they just sat there in turmoil on the steps like wow what if what have i done for the last 24 hours the record's like 12 and a half hours which is crazy but yeah who's got the record a guy called jack i think he might be a canadian guy an american guy but 12 hours 23 minutes it's just that is like running up every single hill and not even stopping at checkpoints um i just want to complete it obviously i want to get rounded under 24 and i'm confident that i'll do it um but the last two times i've done it not been training specifically for it not had the best luck and now i just yeah so is it every year every year you can do it whenever you want you can go tomorrow i'm doing it and you register it with the bob graham association you have people to witness it right um i'm being naive here sorry no no i'm intrigued do you have to run up aaron hall or don't think so i don't think that's one of the fells no i did a mountain race what is the biggest fell it will be scar fell so you go yeah you do yeah 981 meters yeah you do yeah you end up doing that good ball knowledge yeah good mountain the key thing is like clocking um people it's all about the elevation but it's going down as you guys will know if you've ever run down a hill it just it slowly but surely just like beats you up and whittles you down um so i've been trying to hit like 3000 meters a week of elevation um just to try and get that conditioning what is that the training that you do to get the conditioning or do you do like specific stuff in the gym for that deceleration as well so i do two strength sessions with all like the single leg stuff as you can imagine um trying to like maintain strength and like rate of force production all that sort of stuff but also like knowing that i'm going to be hammering down hills and getting dragged down we tried that thing that uh i don't know how easy it is to set up but that thing that went viral off tom evans going down his woodway yeah i've seen that i was like running down a treadmill need proper up like proper on like oh yeah he's got like a special treadmill that goes to like 30 decline or whatever but it was like I'm sure it goes backwards as well.

9:42So like you can actually run down. Oh, really? So like it was, it was spun around the opposite way on a treadmill. Yeah. And then running like he was running downhill. It's mega. Yeah. He's a beast. I had a duty rumour that he's doing it very soon. Oh, okay. Yeah. He's training for it or he's going to do the Bob Graham round soon. How often can people sign up? Like anytime. So I think, so like facts wise, it's just under 2000 people that have completed it. I think one third of people are successful. How many a year? try it let's say 50 people a year maybe 50 that maybe are successful do you reckon you could do it no I'm going to need it no chance what's the furthest you'd run if you had to gun to the head a long way to enjoy less than a marathon probably to be honest I don't think anyone like actually enjoys maybe I would I enjoy running 20 miles yeah more than that I'm probably maybe like two hours of running I'm like time to go home have a cup of tea what did you feel like after finishing like the half marathon obviously like it's always hard the last kind of like push but like it's not that bad is it no I mean I probably didn't run hard enough to get that but that's why I did two in one week obviously like Alfie said beforehand I've got Valencia half coming up so I'll tell you after that one because I'll run very very very fast much faster than Alfie can even imagine.

11:14I've got nothing for that. No, I feel like, yeah, the half marathon, it's not like you're not grueled by the end of it because you're running at like not a threshold state, but you're not like redlining. Well, it kind of is like your actual threshold, right? Is that not your definition? Like how fast you can run for an hour? I mean, like in layman's terms, yeah, like pretty much, yeah. So yeah, it's just threshold running. um what have you signed up to after well you've signed up to something right i have go on explain i feel like everyone in the comments is going to be buzzing about this yeah i'm doing london high rocks doubles open open i'm going to open yeah they're going to be calling you a pussy for that nah do you know what they gave us the option of open and pro and i was a bit like i don't quite want to like make the full i'm just gonna do it for fun yeah you don't you don't want to be a professional heroes doing the world record and then just yeah you can't break the proper world record in pro can you I probably could no but like just like yeah yeah yeah I need to be like at the end of the day I'm a runner and this is just a bit of off season fun with a mate who's pretty good so I think that so what time are you going for I don't even know what times are just whatever the fastest someone's done it how fast is it I think it's 47 something 47 50 or something faster than that hopefully okay is that possible for the open yeah that was Berlin wasn't it yeah Berlin but they're doing it London XL yeah is that one it's a fast course yeah so you've got the course for it you had to put money on but then you don't know my partner because my partner he's not done a higher up shit he's done his first one if I was to put money on he's done Birmingham right okay if I was to is he doing a pro solo yeah pro solo yeah pro solo we'll see with that.

13:09But I reckon I don't think you're going to get the record. I'd love for you to do it. I'd love it. I'd be the happiest guy in the world if you did. Thanks, mate. But if we're being real, I don't think you're going to do it. I said like, if you beat my pro record, I've not got a record, but like my personal record in the pro doubles, then I think that's decent, which is 48-09. So if you beat that in the open, I think that'd be pretty sick. would you respect me a bit more i respect you you're already there so yeah probably like that yes yeah i'm wearing this bag it's like sleeper build under here i'm actually jacked under this right just sleeper is training changed at all we've been doing anymore no i've got how long how many weeks i've got ages ages yeah so we actually said he's gonna start doing like burpees

13:58Alfie Manthorpe: because he's training less than me now so when we still train together if i'm doing double threshold he runs a bit too quickly so he's gonna start doing burpees and stuff in the in the rest so we can run together a bit more i'm just i'm better than afi at running so like to like make it easier i have to do some stuff between because i'm kidding nah yeah i'm running a little bit less just now so i'm more fresh for why is that just uh i just i'm just doing a little bit of a different training just now just with family things other things in my life so i'm training a little bit less which means that my threshold pace is higher if that makes sense i'm fresher for these things so alf is running on tired legs when we show up for training and i'm a little bit less tired so to make it even i think uh i'll maybe do some stations between we'll see how that goes won't we yeah no no i've not done it yet so i don't know how i don't like i'm naive obviously but you're like to be fair you have said multiple times that you're going to crush this world record you said that the pace that i run you could run faster backwards within a high rocks you did say that as well yeah yeah yeah so we'll see but i'm happy that it's happening if i was you yeah i could mention to alfie i'd just never do a high rocks and just keep saying that you're going to break the world record because you have no you have to be if you're going to say something you have to like go and do it so like yeah like that's why i'm doing it I've been invited to come down part of an amazing weekend experience I'm sure I don't actually know what day I'm racing but I'm sure I'll find out but you know I'm excited to see what Hyrox has to offer because it's a very big and growing sport yeah well if you want any training or if you want to come do some training then let's get in the gym together yeah I reckon you've got a good chance though around 48 I think are you going to train specifically for?

15:57i'm gonna do bits i'm not gonna i'm not gonna stop running i mean like at the end of the day like you guys know it's a running race at the end of the day yeah so i'll do more in the gym and i'll do more specific higher ups work like i was gonna do a thing where like maybe i could do like under 10k of volume on a skier before my first high upson break a world record because i'm sure you've done hundreds of kilometers skierging so i see how little i could do of rowing and skier because I think I'll be fine with that. I just don't think that... I think the gap of, like, me a row versus you in a row just now is going to be less.

16:31Like, if you were going to row for a K and then run for a K, surely I'm going to take more out of you in a K run than a K roll. Yeah, as is. A K roll. Which way around would you do it? I don't care, whatever. Does it really matter? All right, like, let's just say this. So you're, like, let's say I do a K. What, if we did an all-out, say if we're doing, like, if we go for time yeah 1k row yeah 1k run yeah add it together yeah you think that you'd beat me yeah

16:59Alfie Manthorpe: I would I would easily yeah yeah I would as well do you know what yeah 1k row I think that'd be that'd be fun let's just do it let's do it let's do it next week what would you run your k in all out like two I mean like on a really good day like 2.31 2.32 okay after the thing but like I'm only running a k so I reckon I can get like a a 3 3.05 to 310. You got a 15... 305 to 310. Bro, you think I'm... Mate, I'm wearing a baggy jumper, lad. Like, I could smash a roll. Mate. Your workout, remember last year, it was a 1K run into a row. Yeah, yeah. Right. And I think I'll have to look at it. You've got a 3-minute K or something.

17:40Yeah, I ran like a 259 and then rode in like 315 or something like that. Yeah. So I'm just thinking, so how quick could you row a K? That is the question. Well, how quick could you row a K? under two minutes definitely no not under two minutes nah but like I reckon I reckon for no no no faster

18:01Alfie Manthorpe: a little bit faster you'll be about 340 I think you'll be about 340 average 150 pace I think we'd hang on for 140 like me or Danny I'd hang on for a 140 for 1k straight into a three minute k so if you work that out you'd have to run a 240k yeah that's fine I would win this out of the four out of the four of you now Alfie stop it I was I was rowing 145 easily well then if you can do that I can do that if you can do that yeah but over and over again I was it was chill should we go to the gym right now and do it we can go downstairs yeah whatever let's do it we'll fucking fight after I'm kidding I think I could row 310 anyway if Alfie can row 310 I can do 305 and then and then run and then run a 240.

18:52Alfie Manthorpe: So that was a 135 pace for... Yeah, I was doing 145 and it was nothing. I was running 65 second 400. You did say that you was aching a little... Yeah, it hurt my arms a bit, but it's okay. It's not exactly like it's three minutes of work. Yeah. Okay. It's easy. Should we do it next week, yeah? Yeah, we'll do it next week. After Africa comes back from his World Half Marathon Championships, we can do it. Yeah. I'll do it. Okay. Danny, up for it? Do you know what? I actually fancy myself in this and I would never say that amongst you guys. That's what makes it fun though. Yeah, it does, yeah. Yeah.

19:25Must be a good roar. Well, he's tall, isn't he? Yeah, he's tall. He's got the length. Tall and weighty. A lot of length, yeah. Yeah. A lot of length. You said a lot of length. What's funny about that? Is he tall? Right. So I invited you guys here and I said, bring something to talk about. Has anyone got anything to talk about? I think you left that quiet. arbitrary actually but I did say so we can talk about anything

19:54Alfie Manthorpe: I'm happy to talk about anything but did you bring anything? no well you did mention that you was working on something in particular you said about AI and you wanted to leave it for the podcast oh go on yeah he's been doing chat GPT oh he has yeah he's been messaging me about it as well have you been on chat GPT recently? I have yeah and tried Astra and stuff like that yeah I thought he was talking about like a Vox or Astra. It's life-changing. So good. So explain what you can do on it. Anything you want, basically. I know that sounds daft, but I've seen also Meta have got Muse now as well. But you can't download the app, right?

20:32Alfie Manthorpe: Not yet. Not in the UK. Right. But with like ChatGPT, this is very like, I don't even know. I pay 20 quid a month for it. And I feel like it's well worth it. But what I'm saying is like, it's a bit dystopian, I guess. for like the stuff I ask it to do is kind of like, why don't you just do it yourself? But every morning you get like your emails checked and stuff and tells you what you need to do. And then I ask it to teach me something every day and then ask it to like. What did it teach you today? I've not read it today. Oh God. What did it teach you yesterday? I didn't read it yesterday either.

21:03Right. So it's not very good. No, no. What's it taught you? No, I feel like charge EPT is one of them things that like, it's meant to make your life easier, but you spend so much fucking time on that EPT. Yeah, I agree, agree, agree, agree. and then whatever it summarizes anyway you could have just fucking done in the time yeah yeah yeah

21:18Alfie Manthorpe: yeah but this new one like even with like the managing google drives and stuff like being able to like we could have a conversation what's like 40 minutes long i could just transcribe it or paste it in and just go oh edit jake's training calendar based off what we just said and it was edited without me having to basically you're getting coached by ai and not no no no that's it ai is coaching just put it in for me so just started anyone getting coached by alphys so so So Tenerife was all I. Tenerife was all I. Tenerife got you to win a pro singles race for the first time in ages. Well, there we go.

21:47How was the first one actually? What question, what do you get if you win it? Do you get anything? Points. Points. Yeah, some points. Yeah. So that was like a qualifying race. Right. Yeah. For like the majors and then that's to get you into the Elite 15. So I got like the top amount of points. You need five races. Yeah. You need to basically win five races to get into the Elite 15. That's what it's going to be. Is it? in a way so um i've got two wins and a second place at the moment so i need two more wins do you have like that might get me a roll down is there a rank like from like one to like 100 yeah where are you moment for singles i'm right 29th that's not bad and then for doubles we've got three wins so we at the top yeah well we'll join okay yeah up at the top yeah have you guys been playing krillian that's just dwelled but no you're not playing a computer game you've been

22:37Alfie Manthorpe: playing Crillian. What the fuck's Crillian? What is it? I feel like these subjects I've come to talk about are just no one's going to know what we're... Crillian? Crillian is like a new game. It's like, it's not like Wordle, but it's like the same sort of... Okay, yeah, yeah. Every day there's a new one and it's like you go online and you get seven questions and it could be like name a country that begins with a letter B or something and then the next question could be a Marvel character or something and you've got to try and guess the most obscure answer possible. Have you not played this? Nah.

23:04Alfie Manthorpe: It's another pointless topic. Great, great, great, great chat. great chat no but it's a good it's a good um was it like a tv show called like one percent club yeah it's like that's good not for that but every day you do it and one percent club but every day oh no it's not like and it's good and it's a bit like pointless pointless and i don't even know i don't watch any of that shit anyway we watch one percent quite a lot as well actually and at the end of it you find out what how just how strange the answer is yeah how obscure you've been compared to everyone else and the point is to try and be as obscure as possible what's your most obscuredness point scoring?

23:36Alfie Manthorpe: Like some questions, it's like name a double Olympian. So then it's... No. So you've picked on it. No, that's what I'm saying. You could put Andy Butchart in, but sometimes it's too obscure and they go, well, hold on. He must be cheating or something. Oh God. I mean, we can play it on here if you want. No. If this is what this podcast is for. Yeah, let's get it out. I'm intrigued. We can keep talking amongst... When Alfie plays his little game on his phone. yeah you could just play it mine's outside anyway so next segment c10 reef so how was a prep lead into that tell us i want to ask you how you're yeah uh it was a lot more reserved than usual i feel like normally when i'm training i'm like all over the place trying to cram everything in and i'm like trying to improve everything at once this time we didn't do that under alfie's guidance because i tried doing that and alfie just said that he'd never coach me again never speak to me again if i didn't listen to him so um basically i scaled stuff back focused on the necessary things took out all the bullshit and then that allowed me to actually recover from my sessions and then going into the race i was completely pain-free which is probably the first time ever that you're going into a race like with no niggles or anything like that um the week before probably wasn't ideal with like in terms of travel but it was all right uh and then we we got to the actual race and it was really really hot but luckily i spent the last like four weeks in heat waves it was when i was in la it was a heat wave um i then went to lanzarote which is sunny as fuck and then tenerife was hot as well so i kind of did heat training in all my sessions uh and i feel like i just dealt with the heat the best i may not have been the fittest hopefully i was you're having three holidays back to back weren't you yeah three holidays I've not seen you training with me for ages you've been I know I'm missing you the tan's looking very good though isn't it it's actually gone all this week to go away again yeah I need to go away again yeah we could plan this on the podcast oh the camp yeah the camp but we'll leave that for a minute so Tenerife was super hot yeah Danny actually raced as well I know I was talking about it in the car up yeah how did you find it like a greenhouse yeah you got some good points though right yeah we got 96 yeah 96 points are you planning to go to are you trying the world champs are you so me and my doubles partner are just trying to score points and doubles but he's in the military full-time so it's like you know we can't we don't have the the time to go to say like beijing and bounce to thailand and mumbai and score you know high points so we just go to european destinations and try and score some points to see what happens really yeah i rate it i i don't like going traveling for points i know quite a few people do it but a lot of people some people say it's unfair because you need money to do that basically you go to travel to asia because you think the standard is going to be a little bit worse there so you can win and get more points are you going to asia i'm not going to asia no i don't do that because i don't want to get into the elite 15 and then when i get to the elite 15 just be shit i want to like earn the place to be in the elite 15 i think that's what danny's getting at like he'll be in the elite 15 doubles when it's time okay and then he'll actually be able to compete rather than just getting into the Elite 15 and then hope for 10th place.

26:58When's Worlds? Worlds is June. It's always June, but that's in Hong Kong, actually. So we will be going over to Hong Kong. Oh, God. Fair. But yeah, obviously, we've got to qualify before that, stuff like that. But yeah, going back to Tenerife, it was super hot. I think I just dealt the best of the heat. I watched the video. It was like, he was a year and other guy. I went at neck to neck pretty much. Yeah, Thomas Tervic, great guy. Yeah. he's a he's a beast to be fair he's yeah he looked a bit he looked stacked um but yeah great guy and um yeah yeah what was uh training camps i'll go back to that yeah yeah let's go back to that you're going to be in february uh february i think we might so with the race calendar is the the major the the third major of the high rocks calendar is in bangkok and then one month later there's one in Vegas so I was thinking instead of coming back to the UK and doing jet lag twice because I have to come back to the UK get used to being here and then go to Vegas just fly straight to Flagstaff get cold get cold then go Vegas it's a bit sunny and then go straight to Vegas because it's only a three hour drive but it works with my races which are to be confirmed and there's no reason why I wouldn't you didn't Alfie did London Marathon next year maybe maybe yeah so it might tie in it might tie in yeah february you'll be full-time hyrax up by next year for when the world record and yeah maybe i'll just do them both get the world record whatever i'll win it all nah i'm not i'm kidding but yeah i'm up for that like yeah sick do you think that'll be all right to do do you think that's the best yeah i think as long

28:41Alfie Manthorpe: as you don't push too much altitude you'll be fine yeah have you been to altitude before kenya well i can't on a camp or just to well when i went with the military it was like 2000 meters for like three months that doesn't does that count or not yeah it counts because you've been yeah that counts man yeah that counts you train when you're there like were you training as an athlete no no i was just there literally in the army doing my job we trained out there though yeah and i remember coming back and like you know whoa like breathing airs like soup yeah um but no i would love to go back and spend that amount of time at altitude what's the what's the maddest story you've had from being in the army a maddest story that you can say on here because i bet there's a lot of stories you can't say do you know what it is i'm one of these people and i find it so frustrating i've got the memory of a goldfish and i went around my mates from the army they start reminding me on stuff i'm like that is hilarious but i just genuinely i'd have to sit here for like 10 minutes and try and think of something interesting where's the best place you've been then uh the jungle so i was in the jungle i lived in the jungle what jungle what one brunei oh wow so yeah that was i mean that was like the coolest experience i had in the military was living under the canopy for four weeks and filling up my water from streams and using puritabs and doing something like the hardest soldiering i've ever done that was that was pretty cool um but like the jungle is such a cool place like you're just constantly wet like always soaked through to the bone you've got to be on top of your admin it's very moist very moist yeah very hot very moist bit like uh a bit like a bit like tenerife but nah brunei was cool yeah sick how long would you last in the jungle who'd last longer you or alfie i think both of us would probably not want to go to be honest alfie was there's snakes i assume there's snakes spiders yeah i'm not going in there i think i'd last longer than that yeah you think you would alfie can get his hair cut he saw me in iceland i'm not lasting a second anyway what's not got that electricity and the hot bath i think if uh if we just decided right let's fuck off being athletes or whatever like we're never athletes again we're not returning to that we're just going to the jungle like i could i could live with that and i could like settle in i mean i'd lock into it i'd like push towards it did you ever watch like the outdoor boys you seen that guy oh yeah so like i feel like i know what i'm doing but i don't have a clue because he's like he makes it look easy yeah doesn't he he makes it look so good i feel like it i'd rather be somewhere like that where it's cold constantly but you can warm up with like a fire and stuff yeah rather than be in the jungle where you've got no air con you're just fucking boiling all the time was it that hot when you it was like 35 degrees but like the humidity percentage was through the roof just constantly sweating yeah constantly it takes a long time to acclimatize you ever had prickly heat before like where your backs like where your paws are just stinging so much no never oh no um yeah well it's uncomfortable when you get that for like the first 10 days because your body's adjusting to it um it feels like having like 10 grams of beta alanine but for 24 hours a day like you're just itchy um but yeah it's funny how your body just adjusts to it like if you get a cut on your arm in the jungle it takes forever to heal so like you take stuff out there to you know iodine and make so it like stops it from getting infected and things there's just so many different considerations when you're living in a you can get all them like diseases country that like no one can heal i'll ask you a normal question you know when see when you're there like what like what are you like what are you doing like what is what's the like what like what's the purpose so i was there training and um the thing with training in the jungle is it strips like warfare right back down to the the basics so um like back in the 50s when we was doing jungle warfare like you can't see at night um your gps doesn't work because of the canopy gps is like what you use to follow your maps and stuff so you have to do you know micro navigation it basically strips soldier right down to the simplest form so it's a great place to train and that's why british army trains out there but it's also like very challenging and very arduous um do you miss it yes yeah no i definitely do miss aspects of it yeah you're living like a normal king just now like coffee whenever you want whatever and it's so weird being in control of your own time it's such a strange dynamic like when you're in the army it's like be here this time with this kit this is what you're doing and then you leave and you get control of all of your time and you think that it's like man i've got like all this time in the world i'm gonna do this this isn't this but it's kind of that's like not the reality do you feel because a lot of people feel lost when they come out the army with that do you feel like you're lazier when you come out the army or do you feel like you you do more and like you you burnt out some people are different like for me like if i've got a job to do i'm super productive um and the army made me really productive and now i feel like i'm out i feel like i'm not using my time as efficiently as what i could do i'm obviously getting better because i've been out the army since january so i'm like it's a work in progress um but i find like the busy i am the more stuff that's happening the better i am if there's not much in the pipeline then yeah i look bone idle to most I'd look like someone that's super lazy, even if that isn't really the case.

33:49But like the tempo of going from army to in control of your own time is just like completely different. You've been making your own races as well. Yes. We mentioned last time that you started like an events company. What are the ones that have happened? So we've done the Backyard Ultra. So we're affiliated to that, which is great. We hosted a big one at Cheltenham Racecourse. Who won? Jay Stapley. So guy from Ultringham. um just oh i know that is yeah yeah you probably see him on the canal all the time um but no it's like being on that side of the fence where you're planning these events just open your eye opens up your eyes to how much is actually out there like because i was so tunnel visioned on like high rocks high rocks high rocks and you go and host the backyard ultra and just like this is so cool um so no i completely love being in that event space we then went from that we did a 12-hour event but we wanted to try to combine like the fun aspect of fitness you know like music and like a bit of an after party with like ultra endurance of people are out there running for 12 hours on their own or in a team of three um but and then we've got another backyard ultra in october and then one in may which is like huge we've got so many people signed up to that that i wouldn't want to say on here because someone might hear it and go i'm not having them have the biggest in the world and go and put one on and you know be able to get more people but it's like a lot of people have signed up for it you think it potentially could be the biggest in the world on paper it definitely if if it if we have that many people come based off the record it would be but if i say now oh we've got the x amount of people coming someone will go nah i'm getting one in is it is it at the limit yeah we couldn't host any more at that venue um the venue wouldn't allow us to do that um do you not sneak some more people in i reckon probably could do that yeah um but it's that big that we have to have like potentially two start finish gantries two corrals because have that many people going through one they all wouldn't all get through it in a minute so like in london marathon you've got like three different start points we'll have to explore that avenue um that's not but it's cool it's so cool just watching it unfold how uh how long do you think you'd last in the backyard ultra what is the backyard ultra how is that 4.167 miles every hour on the hour until the last a long time until I got bored until I got bored do you know well I just did the math three laps then yeah well how many nah well how many if someone had like gone to the head I could go for a long time I did see that guy in America who did it for a long time yes Mark Dowdle well how long did it take him to do that like on average if he's got an hour how long is his rest I think they do it in 48-50 minutes what's he doing so I just walk running the whole time I feel bad I'm not saying he's a beast they're just they're just yeah yeah probably not very long so I would just get bored I'd be less than a day for sure yeah I'd be less than a day yeah I'm trying to get up the record you'd be better than us at that Phil Gore and it was like 4 days 23 hours so whatever that is in yards that's mad he tried to get it the other day

36:52Alfie Manthorpe: of a week didn't he but yeah on his own 4 days 4 days of running almost 5 days 4 hours and 23 hours 4 days and 23 hours I just don't know I can't do lack of sleep i think my hours mine would be like the mine would be yeah diva mine would be like i wouldn't be able to plan the nutrition properly so i would just be like get i would get tired and i just wouldn't be able to feel enough i don't think what about you danny i've only done one once but i was racing afterwards and i did 15 yards but i don't know i think i could you did 15 hours but i remember you that you was doing a high roots like a couple of weeks after yeah and you was like i'm you went in there you wanted to do 100k yeah and you said i'm just pulling out after that yeah um i'd be interested like i i genuinely think like the people that do well at these are just that it's upstairs they're just different gravy um like i went for a run with jay the other day on the trails for a few hours and he was like lads slow down type thing and i'm not a great runner but if you put me in that environment against jay and he just keeps coming back for more and more and more like they're just they're mentally wired different i think that's what it is it's not even like how good of a runner you are it's obviously how physically robust you are but it's all up there these guys are just tapped yeah the the record is five days and three hours apparently five days as well and it's set by dmitry dmitry kilmoff of russia yeah so that got ah so the russians have been cheating in that so the issue of that this is what i'm right we're backyard ultra rules i'm sorry i don't want to just like talk just about backyard ultra the rules are very ambiguous and it's kind of up to race directors based off like um who they disqualify essentially they got caught wind of this event there was loads of stuff that were happening that's not allowed to happen like support out on course and whatnot something as ridiculous as me taking a selfie with you if you're out running would be seen as support so you'd get disqualified which is really bad you go and ruin everyone's life so this guy that ran a record got disqualified for I genuinely think it was a selfie or something oh that's a shame silly that's a shame didn't that happen with I don't want to say it now you can edit it out with Holly Archer didn't it she got someone disqualified by running next to them there was a big thing about it oh yeah she did is that right?

39:10yeah she did did she? she's got some bad luck I'm sorry Holly I absolutely love Holly like she's a great person like she's so knowledgeable but like she's had some bad luck no yeah definitely like that situation actually felt for her what yeah obviously she she like with the whole whole hyrox thing like the amount of penalties she's got like a vital moments where it's like she can make the elite 15 and everything and then like penalties have basically ruined their chances really uh and then and then with the backyard ultra she took a selfie with someone and they got disqualified no way yeah at your event no this is a different event a different affiliated event but the race director made the decision that that was support on course and obviously she wasn't to know that most people in the backyard ultra world didn't even know that was a thing so yeah that is harsh for her that bad luck but actually do you know what she's a great example her and a partner of like actual runners that come and do yeah yeah yeah no she's a beast penalties she's a beast yeah she's a beast like and she's done well transitioning from running to yeah and uh she did the launder marathon she She ran like 230 with like no training.

40:15Yeah. Obviously she was running for high rocks and stuff like that. But yeah, it was pretty impressive. Have you seen that guy that... Are we going to bring up this guy from Australia? What guy from Australia? Someone said to me there's a guy that you're... Now, carry on. I was going to say that this job, obviously that running challenges now are like, everyone's doing the running challenge. Like everyone. There's this guy that's done a cricket one and he's done the longest run up. to bowl. What? And he's ran, basically ran with a cricket ball and in like cricket clothing. He's ran 100 kilometers and then bowled a ball.

40:53Shut up. It was wide as well. That's true.

40:55Alfie Manthorpe: And it was wide. Shut up. Yeah, but I think his dad was batting and he managed to get a, it's like a snick on it. So it counted. Did he run to a cricket ground? Yeah, he did 100K. He did 100K, ran to a cricket ground. Everyone was waiting for him. And then he like ran onto the pitch, bowled, And then it was wide. I saw one of the day, it was like, you know, level crossings. And it was a guy who was trying to do runs until the car honked at him. So he was doing like, I mean, she's run back and forth the roads. I'm like a zebra crossing until the car got on. He was fuming. He was like, they're like 18 runs back and forth.

41:32That's more my cup of tea. Yeah. That's crazy. I love the guy on Instagram that, um, throws stuff at cars that speeding in. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a full box of eggs or like a full spag ball thrown over a car. Yeah. Yeah. I wouldn't do it in America. I don't know why. Yeah. Yeah. It's mad though. I don't like someone not just pull out a gun. I think they're fake. I think they're fake. Yeah. I was going to say they're fake. Yeah. Cause it's a different car every time though.

42:02Alfie Manthorpe: Nah, nah, nah. That's fake. Yeah. Cause it's always, I reckon maybe one of them was legit and he was like, oh my God, I've got like a bit of a thing here. Well, do you want me to show my, how my brain works? Cause you know that guy does a 5k, like in a bathtub or on top of a fridge. Oh yeah. Yeah. That's rubbish. It does my head in because I know for a fact that his GPS will be wrong. So he probably never does. He never does a 5k. Nah. Cause it's like, you see him sometimes run on top of another and it's like 12 minute kilometers. Yeah. I mean, I'm with you. I'm with you on that. I'm with you on that.

42:32Alfie Manthorpe: It's still crazy, but he's not even doing a 5k. Yeah. I'm with you on that. So. And then he did one in a plane toilet, right? Yeah. But he didn't. Cause it's GPS. I did see a guy do like someone, they're like the world record mile on a plane and he like went up and down the aisle and he like worked out how far it was. And that was cool. Like a nine minute mile. Can you imagine that on the plane? This dude just like doing laps. Can someone not just like, someone who's rich just take a treadmill up on a private jet and just fucking knock it out the park though? Go on then. Well, I wanted to do space, but someone's already done it.

43:05Yeah. I wanted to go to space. Running a marathon in space would be sick. Someone's done that? Yeah. Yeah. Have they? Female, yeah. do a high rocks in space be easy I don't think it's cool bring all the kit out there's a lot better things you can do in space marathon on the moon fuck that's that's sick that's what I'm asking no one's done it so who's running someone's done a marathon in the space in the space centre

43:29Alfie Manthorpe: oh yeah on the treadmill yeah do it the outside yeah what mad challenge would you guys do that's such a well Hardy Skeezer runs across Africa. Will Gouge runs across America. I don't find running far is very exciting. So he's not running far, so what would you do? I don't know.

43:52Try and... What do you think? Yeah, Danny? My brain's rattling. I'm not niche enough for this. Because I prefer... You know how Chris Kelv, he's like doing mad tricks. That's way more fun to look at. Like running is just boring. Like, do you know what I mean? Like it's just dull. Like you don't like... You're not... Wow. like it's gonna have to be the hottest chilli innit the hottest chilli it's gonna have to be something spicy you do a lot of spicy food don't you yeah it's gonna have to be like something spicy something spicy and physical did you say that you went to the I overheard a conversation that you went to the Indian yesterday yeah what happened so the Indian the other day I rang him up and I was like can I get a mixed grill and can I get fowl sauce he's like you know fowl spicy I get that every time I'm like yeah I know I want it I like it and I got there I picked it up and he went I didn't put fowl in there I put nagger it tastes a lot better and I'm like I literally asked you if I'm a foul but no if they didn't trust me they didn't back me um but who would they back like what's the point in having it in the shop if they're not going to give it yeah exactly that exactly that and then you went home and did you did you eat your mixed grill I enjoyed it yeah I enjoyed it was the was the sauce better than the foul sauce um I don't know what it is about spicy food I find that I love I enjoy the flavor um and I've been having spicy food and everything every single meal breakfast lunch dinner so breakfast you have spicy food tabasco yeah what are you cereal queer bangs and tabasco honey oh yeah every every day that's mad see i think that spice takes away from the flavor yeah me too ah okay so i can't taste anything after spice back in the day i was a bit facebook famous right used to do prank calls and facebook famous i'm talking like in my local town you know like a few hundred likes on facebook back in the day was a big deal on it and um had this sauce and it was a can't remember how many billion scoville units it was but like do a teaspoon of it for a few likes on facebook back in a day so my spicy food journey's been in the work for a long time well did you ever do the cinnamon challenge when you're younger yes i did yeah yeah yeah did you manage it no i don't think i did too well at that i'll probably find that on the facebook archives as well it's actually more challenging than you think full tablespoon of cinnamon no with no water or anything you've just got to swallow try and swallow it no don't i feel you don't know yeah no maybe we can do that it's not it's not optimal for performance is it alfie

46:20i want to know about these prank phone calls what kind of prank phone calls are you doing like what do you know what do you know what do you know what do you know what do you know what I'll be able to I reckon I'd be able to find them in the archive somewhere you put in a voice yeah like a Norfolk accent yeah my Norfolk accent I've taken that everywhere I've taken that to Sky Sports you know but if you've ever heard of Norfolk accent mine's mine's not too bad actually and what do you say like what's the government can you give us an example I'll be like hire just calling you about your delivery for tomorrow morning.

46:55We've got a ton of concrete coming to your address and they'll be like I've not ordered a ton of concrete. This is 16 year old Danny Ray. I'd hope so. Yeah, 30 years old. People would go wow, that's hilarious. You rang them saying you're going to drop off a ton of concrete mate, you're mental. They just keep going. They'd just be losing it. That's funny. I do read that actually. Simple but effective. yeah uh talking back to aiding performance oh here we go this is gonna this is good right so is it yeah there's some wild stuff people do to try and aid their performance and try and like get the the one percent advantage over everyone else the most recent one that i've seen is uh using viagra like a pre-workout yeah i thought i find that absolutely mad but apparently it's quite common within i've heard that i've heard that a bit is there anything that you have heard of that's like madder than that nah but i don't know any pros that have done that i'm not gonna lie yeah i feel like it's just more i don't know anyone that's taken viagra to run but it does must be done with like red blood cells uh that that's events yeah okay so it's like do you know how you use a beat it shot yeah and it'll be like the extreme version so instead of having citrulline in my life you just have viagra viagra before yeah so i tannerif went so well just running around with a rock on emily was filming she looked very happy the whole time i will say you did say you

48:30Alfie Manthorpe: didn't sleep after i didn't sleep no interesting i've got viagra packed for world champs next weekend i would i would test it though maybe after because it's not actually viagra viagra i know i Yeah, I know. I know. I know. I'm trying to think if there's anything else. Because I would have probably done it. Done it all, haven't you? Done it all, Alfie. Anything that's like - All that massive progression you've had. Scientifically, like obviously legal and safe. What was the sleeping one? Oh, I've not tried that. You've not tried it? No. On the bed? Like an angle. Sleeping on a decline. Yeah, apparently.

49:05Alfie Manthorpe: Sleeping on an angle. Have you heard about this, Danny? No. I think there's some studies that it shows it increases. I think it was increases. he's just on the wind up I mean serious you can link the study and the podcast notes with this why don't you just try it and let us know no because I think I wouldn't have a girlfriend if I tried it would you be fine with me sleeping on it no okay what's your opinion on altitude tents are they too are they too nerdy or not I'm not that bothered I think you're better just going to altitude for a month and then using that fitness for the next three months or two months however long it lasts i did an altitude tent at home it just became a bit of a faff it's probably more expensive did your did your girlfriend stay in yeah uh no we had two two bedrooms two bedrooms yeah yeah you're sleeping alone yeah i remember i've done them before it's like a because you need different canopies one's like a box over your head that you're just gonna sleep in like a little box and then the other one's like i guess i've done one's like a half tent when like takes up half the bed so Lindsay's slept next to me night night and then put the cupboard and then one's like a full canopy over the bed but mate like just a faff like turn the generator on it's dead noisy like you don't sleep as well like some people love it but for me like it just wasn't worth it if that makes sense yeah I'd rather just go and go and camp and you get to go and see somewhere else rather than just your own bedroom like are you thinking about it?

50:34no I was just I think Emily she said she said we're done do you know what I think that's like the final straw like if you get an altitude tent in the room we're fucking done that's what she said you do all this nerdy shit everything else that I do I take my mouth I put my eye mask on do your breathing exercises oh yeah breathing exercises in bed Wim Hof yeah if anyone's not done that it's class yeah search Wim Hof yeah breathing dead loud for 10 minutes before bed what else do I do grey noise you do grey noise Grey noise as well. So that's going at the side of the bed. I think that's enough.

51:14Alfie Manthorpe: Have you got a picture of you with your mouth taped? Yeah. Because it's the funniest thing ever because it's literally the tiniest bit of tape. It won't do anything at all. So it's just meant to keep your lips closed. That's the point. It's not meant to fucking suffocate you. The idea is you keep your lips closed. You know when a dog is sick, when it's always got its mouth open. Yeah. a baby that's a sign that it's poorly or something wrong with it if it's always got its mouth open apparently I don't know I don't hang around babies no you'd know Andy you'd know Andy but apparently that's a do I hang around babies do I yeah you hang around babies I've got kids yeah you've got kids that one but is that true yeah I mean I don't know about your tape but no no if a baby's sick they'll have their mouth open they'll be crying mate they'll be in some sort of discomfort yeah they won't yeah is that because they've got blocked nose though yeah yeah that's the tape look at that yeah get that on camera that's not doing anything for you mate yeah that isn't take that off you got no one's seen that he's got a tiny little fucking bit no well edit that out won't you yeah i'm gonna edit that out i mean yeah so make sure you send that romey for the clip as well do you know thing i see the altitude tense i will say one good thing about it is see the generator you put it like in the room like further away and the tube comes into your room i quite liked the yeah well it dries your clothes so fast because it obviously just like yeah so it's like it's a free i don't like it just dries your clothes i'm no idea if that then the moisture goes into your generator but like we oh we also have an eight sleep which i feel like is one of the best things ever that mattress yeah and i'm not even an advert not working with them not and anything to do with eight sleep but basically it's a mattress topper that you put on your bed it connects a pipe connects to kind of like a generator thing and it puts either hot or cold water through the mattress so then it cools or warms you up and it keeps you like a certain temperature so when it's boiling in summer in the uk and we've not got any air con like it just keeps your mattress cool as well separate for for the separate sides so emily will have it on warm all the time because she's a psychopath i'll have it on cold but we're not arguing about the window being open as well no but i've seen it okay yeah just i think we're just with relationships i feel like lads always want it a little bit warm uh colder and ladies want it a little bit hotter i think it's great so i think that would be something that i'd uh so that but not a generator what about obviously everyone's doing heat training at the moment I know you two don't do heat training do you know what's so funny I was in a sauna yesterday after the Great North run there was like a place called Steaming Salt in Tymouth by the beach oh it looked like a nice place I've seen it it was class to be fair I mean obviously I just it was like an hour and a half after I finished I was cooking after like four minutes I was gassed I was like saying to Lindsay I'm like i i need to get out get some air because i was just like dripping and sweat but i was also so dehydrated but like it was classic like jumping from there into the sea and back that was meant but i'm not planning on doing any heat training anytime soon do you think it's bollocks i don't think it's i mean like do you know the thing is i always come back to it and it's like i trained with some of the best athletes that have ever lived in 5k 10k in the marathon and they just ran and trained very sensibly and it worked for them didn't do any sauna none of the one percent things cold plunges or whatever it is people do and i'm very much on on board with that yeah makes sense but i mean each to their own like the other thing for me is like i'm not saying it's a faff but like the time like for me i've got two kids i like to be at home all the time like to nip away for an hour to go to the gym to do a sauna just doesn't make sense in my lifestyle and i'm probably guessing most people's lifestyles like it is quite a unless you have it in your back garden i don't really see the point i feel like you're talking sense um the reason i bring it up is because after i was doing research into heat training and apparently meant to do the sauna after a run so obviously you're meant to like dehydrate yourself on the run well sorry you do dehydrate yourself on the run and then you're meant to go into the sauna and then you're not meant to drink in between finishing the run and going into the sauna and then you're meant to like stay in the sauna for like 20 minutes to 40 minutes sometimes depending on the research that you read to dehydrate yourself even more because then that will spike more blood plasma more red blood cells and so on i just find that mad i think that's mad i mean i'm if the science is there go for it but yeah just get in the shower yourself and have a shake yeah i remember doing like a like a consultation a couple of years ago of a guy from new zealand and he said exactly that so run into sauna and he said five days that's when the adaptation will then happen um do you guys do heat training like regularly or in the lead up to events yeah five times a week for five six weeks something like that i think after that it's it's quite a lot of diminishing returns but i think for the first five or five weeks you kind of gradually progress in terms of you still drink water in it though don't you no well sorry your heat session but if you were you wouldn't go like 90 minutes without a drink sometimes so i i've run into sauna and not drink or maybe have a tiny bit of water maybe before but like most of the time i'm doing And I sometimes do a session.

57:05Alfie Manthorpe: Obviously I'll be taking fuel on that, but I might do like a 10, 12K easy run and get straight into the sauna and go for about 20 minutes without drinking or anything. It is awful though. It is awful. If you're going to lose like one aspect of your like training system, like lose a threshold session, lose an easy run, lose gym, lose heat training, I don't think of others, but like what would you lose if you had to lose one first? I mean, it would be heat training, but that's more because of the function of all the other things you mentioned. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that actually has a very good performance benefit.

57:40Alfie Manthorpe: Like, since I've started doing it, I've run, like, I started heat training August 2025. You also started training with me in that time too. And then training's been getting better. Like, no, it's just, that's just a fact. Your training's just been getting better. I wouldn't, like, I'm not saying, like, it's because of the sauna, but, like, your training has just, you're just getting better at running. you're developing as an athlete simple i also think one of the keys is if you're used to the same like you were talking about you've trained pretty similar for the last three years you say yeah like if you're so if your body's so used to the same training any different stimulus will probably push you along a bit more because it's just a new stress your body has to adapt to so i think if even if i started i can't do like another example of a heat training but if i start something else i probably see improvements as well because your body just it's so good at getting used to something you don't adapt the same from it but i think it's it i think it's been very good for yeah does anyone do cold plunge no no no none of that stuff yeah so no no one has any other things that they uh they find actually given advantage i honestly i think much it do you know what i think i think the best adaptation you're ever going to get is going to altitude as you're if you're an elite athlete and you have time it's not necessarily like it's not even necessarily like the fact that you're out of your that's just because like you get a structure where you don't have normal daily life tasks in the way of your training so you can recover best so yeah you get a month block of full training and it just helps that you're out of your I think that's you're going to gain multiple percentage points doing that I think I would say well do you know when you were saying like bring stuff to the podcast I was trying to think of all the podcasts listen to when they talk about life hacks and stuff and one of the things i was going to say which has nothing to what annie just said but it's the same thing about training is i think you can talk about all this stuff but i still think like if i had to have one training tool with me wherever i went i'd be like it's probably like a good eye mask or something just to help you sleep better i honestly think that's like the biggest game changer i've had like consistency of sleep and most of that has been from just i've started using an eye mask in the last few years like stuff like that i think probably helps more than heat or even altitude.

59:52Sleep is important, very important. I'm asking, what else would you take away with you if you could only have something? Is there any, what do you call it, biohacking or something? Yeah, probably. Biohacking things that you do.

1:00:05Alfie Manthorpe: I mean, this is probably all nonsense. Yeah, yeah, you could not. Biohacking is like, what are we saying? Like things that just improve your life, I think. We spoke about it last time, didn't we? And it was like screen time, like sleep hygiene. oh you've got a brick haven't you yeah but you know what it is i don't need to use my brick all the time now because it's like held me to account enough and coach me that i realize that actually if i don't use my phone before bed guess what i sleep really good yeah so what do you do before bed just don't go on my phone be able like just sit or read or so like speak to his missus yeah

1:00:39converse stroke my dog uh watch gray's anatomy but like i don't know what it is would you class Is that a screen time or not? No, because like, you know, like when you just scroll in, it's like, like brain fog.

1:00:51Alfie Manthorpe: Yeah. But when I'm watching like a series I'm getting into, it helps me fall asleep. What have you all been watching recently? I was chatting gentlemen, wasn't I? Yeah. We watch a lot of true crime at home. Quite weird. Yeah. I look like true crime. I watch lanterns as well, but that's probably too true. True crime. A lot of women like that, right? Yeah. It's weird, isn't it? Yeah. My missus loves like literally like serial killers. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Even like 24 hours in police custody, stuff like that. It's just like, yeah. So what is your screen time now? Oh, it won't be great. Let's have a look.

1:01:24Oh,

1:01:24Alfie Manthorpe: should we do all that? I got mine. Mine's over there. I was like, this is atrocious. Mine'll be, mine's up too bad. I, to be fair, I fall asleep watching YouTube quite a lot. My phone's a mouse. that's a great excuse. Daily average. Come on. Three hours. Three hours, 28. Oh yeah, that's good. Yeah, that's good. That's good. Four hours, 18. Yeah, I'll be about that as well. I'm quite happy with that. I was expecting a lot. It's WhatsApp. WhatsApp's the killer. Sending memes on WhatsApp or Instagram, actually. You love a meme on Instagram, don't you? Yeah. I feel like that's my way of connecting with people.

1:02:00Yeah. Just like a little meme every now and again to the 30 top people. I don't know. It just keeps you in contact. You've all had a rogue meme off me, right? Yeah. More than rogue, yeah.

1:02:11Alfie Manthorpe: Yeah, I get concerned for who else you send them to and like what your relationship with that person is. Well, I did send one to, and it was pretty bad, but I did send it to one of my like athlete managers of a brand that I work with. And I think he messaged Emily saying, has Jake's phone been hacked? That's probably time to stop. Yeah. That's funny. But yeah, anything else? Biohacking. So there's one thing I want to touch on and i've talked about this before but i've started taking using it again is you know the tens machines i showed you the day where it's like you put on like electric pads and it tenses your legs yeah i still stand by i think that's the only recovery tool i've ever used where i'm like that that worked i've got one that's like called uh what's it called it's like something eight but it's like i used it when i broke my foot to maintain calf muscle mass and it was mint it was so good you put it on for like two hours a day you do like two sessions and it was just like polish your calf and you can put it on different like settings what's it called again i don't know what it's called but yeah it's tens machine or it's not it's it's a bit more it's a bit more uh like sport yeah sport yeah it's it's decent they're expensive bits of kit and like you put it on like it's meant to like yeah it's for rehab but you put it on it'd be like muscle a trophy and you put it on a certain place and it would like work it could do 10 stuff too but like it was good you know it was really good for like my tendons like so good for my tendons the issue is if you're in this is getting really niche now but if you're in proper training and you're not having that issue you need to be careful of which setting you pick because you can just get a lot of doms from it as well so i've had races before i caught the train i was like i'll stick it on because i'm sat down got off the train and my calves were both absolutely dead because i just it's like a workout so you've got to pick certain settings i think there's obviously some for like muscle or stopping atrophy and there's also some for blood flow i think it was originally designed for people who would have injuries like that or are in hospital beds and can't move so they need to get their blood flow.

1:04:11Alfie Manthorpe: So like for flights, long travel, or even just like, I don't nap, but I try to lay down now in like big training days and just laying down with it or like walking around with it. It's just like extra blood flow. Yeah, if I fly, I put it on. Yeah, I've tried it fine, but I'm exactly the same as you are. I feel like I'll just get fucking bored and I'm like, let's ramp this fucking thing up. See what I can take, what I can handle. and then you fucked after it it kind of gives you an injury I would do like gym with it on you'd do like reps with it on and it'd you know like it pulses you like that and you'd have to do like a rep you'd like like that like ramping up 60, 70 come on like it's class feels great yeah that's all good it's burn I swear I've seen a video of someone the other day I can't remember who it was but they like literally cut off the blood flow to their legs and were like doing squats in the gym do that is that a thing?

1:04:58yeah blood flow restriction yeah blood flow restriction really good is it? yeah really good so how when would you like factor that into your training in the gym okay let's hear it so apparently you don't have to lift as heavy no so you lift at like 50 of your max okay but then you'd get the same gains as if you was doing like 100 of your max unreal how long have people been doing this for or is it like a long time for like biceps and shit like that yeah no i'd never see i've seen i did it again same surgery actually both surgeries but like i'd be like doing calf raises but like on the central leader but like on like a reformer bench when you put like the bands on to be like in a boot you put the blood flow restriction around and make your veins just like on fire like they're popping out like it's mad and you're like doing calf raises like with the boot on and it's just meant to like maintain muscle mass or grow muscle mass like without like sort of massive weights on you or whatever

1:05:54Alfie Manthorpe: what adaptation is that supposed to be I think it's to do I think it's to do with like I think it's to do with something to the blood clearly it's like stopping blood to get that place or holding blood in that place and then working the muscle it does like makes you try it it's very very sore i'll bring it down i've got one at home okay yeah is there any part of your training that if you could like not do it but still get the benefits of it all of it long yeah all of it long run long run yeah do you not like a long run no so it'd be a long run for you probably one thing one thing out your week right either either um i love the guy but my massage not do that because it's very painful or long run or gym no i like gym actually yeah massage massage or um long run what about you danny anything bike related bike i hate the bike yeah i find it like i don't know i just haven't got the attention span so i have to gamify it so i use swift or i watch youtube but it's still not enough i'd take a run any day just stationary or if you go out on the bike as well is it i can live with that but then it's like people the risk just goes up doesn't it i know it sounds like i'm being a fanny but when you're going around the cheshire back roads yeah i just saw my bike actually because of it yeah i just saw that yeah it's just like yeah um so i've been swapping all my easy bikes out for easy runs and i just find that so much more enjoyable yeah obviously there's a trade the bike i found that it's a little bit of a hack and i know it looks a bit tramping me doing this but i put a film on and then i'll get like a bag of haribo like i'm eating popcorn yeah and i'll just sit there no come on lad eating haribo and watching because it's obviously carbohydrates yeah and then i'll just eat a bag of sweets whilst watching my film and then bang two hours what's your heart rate at when you're doing that uh 110 which is you're chilling so that's about you may have to sit so far 220 watts so you're a big boy aren't you you're a big boy 220 watts I think that's alright it's just meant to be like an easy yeah but yeah just watch film been watching Rocky it gets you like when when it's the fight at the end like you're pushing kind of like 240 240 250 watts go on finishing when it's a fight it's pretty sick yeah so that's my little like hack for that but I always keep the sweets for the second hour as I look forward to yeah I feel I think it's a bit scruffy Me eating sweets on a bike But It's what you gotta do right What would you give up In your training week Apart from obviously Phone calls with the coach You know what I think the time Away from training Which sounds Mad Wait say that again Like the time In between training Like I hate the time Like recovery Or do you mean At home with the missus No no She's over there Yeah I saw that Hi No like After I'm done after a day fucking buzzing but that time in between your first and second session when you're like dreading your second session you're just like oh because obviously you're tired from your first session yeah you got a second session to do but the time in between i love actually doing the session but it's the time in between where i'm just like fucked and all you have to do is eat probably do a little bit of work and then like crack on so i'd take out that bit fair so your question was what bit would you not do and get the benefit of so you're just getting rid of nothing that gives you the benefit so you just love training yeah I love training I don't know do you understand that though yeah yeah no I know what you mean but I think you're an idiot for thinking yeah you said get the benefit from doing something he said I don't need to do the bike and get the benefit I said I don't want to do a long one you said I don't want to rest yeah true yeah but if I could if I could not do the rest but get the benefit of the rest so what are you doing back on the bike yeah back on the bike eating my sweets come on he needs to record an episode on the bike I think now yeah I don't know if I'd be able to keep my lots up I'll figure one what are you doing I'm losing heat training oh heat training yeah for sure or gym imagine you said sleep still in sleep to be honest that would be if you didn't have to sleep yeah that's actually amazing yeah that is a good job that would fix my screen time you could train more as well yeah get the benefit of sleep without sleeping yeah that would be perfect you do that anyway sort of really don't you yeah I do yeah four hours a night whatever you have four hours nah you do look like a plonker when you're running around in a sweatsuit though thank you not just you did you wear a sweatsuit tonight for your run lots of layers did you oh layers not sweatsuit yeah but he had his hood up he had gloves on he's running around Horwich with his gloves on what did you have on it was hot today I had a beanie on and a hoodie on sorry can we remind actually today you put a video of you on a treadmill with a beanie on top floor top top people do you know why people are clicking on it like that oh people are asking why did you wear a beanie the real reason i wore a beanie is because it keeps my earphones in my for some reason my ears i think it's because they're so big my earphones like drop out that is like that if i put a beanie on that's nonsense that's nonsense because i've seen you with headphones running all the time without a beanie on so you're just rage beating no no no probably maybe I am maybe I am just admit it it's fine yeah nah it's getting I'm getting into the season I'm getting festive into the season September time we should stop the room that it is for training training reason well technically it could be but I'd have to wear some clothes as well but I was topless so I'm getting no heat benefit from that I thought it was funny yeah nah it was it was to be fair I gave you a like did you Didn't comment though Did you I know how bad Sorry mate Yeah nah Is the I'm just going to sneak away For that meeting Oh Oh you're going to hear Alfi Oh what's happening here Meeting with who You're going to tell the people Why you're going away Where you off lad I don't even Secret What would you call it I've got to go and Run for my country So I've got to have a meeting about it Oh Perfect That's big Boom Is the Best of luck Alfi For your race This weekend Thank you Drew Cheers No worries Alf No worries Alf Are you done how long will it take five minutes we'll get the insights as to what the plan is for his race so I asked this with George and Mike and Alfie actually found it fascinating but is there anything in the world that you think is a huge scam that we all just accept I've got one but I hate insurance when they just pull numbers out for car insurance or like like how is home insurance so cheap but yet car insurance is so expensive i'm sorry but like how is why is that i know your house your house costs an absolute fortune and the car costs nothing what would you change about that then like if we're if we're thinking about that like would you have to go for like another test where you can prove that you're a fucking great drive no because it's done on like it's done on the other people on the road isn't it that's what will say they say oh it's not you it's yeah but how many crashes have you had none actually someone's backed into me but that counts yeah i've never crashed that's weird but you didn't claim for your insurance right uh no yeah yeah we did yeah well the lorry lorry hit into the back of us you can't fucking complain then can you yeah but i would have just fixed it myself whatever like i didn't claim my insurance he had to claim on his insurance because he hit me my insurance was fine like nothing happened yeah but you got you got your car fixed for free right yeah yeah so that's why you have insurance yeah but it's the cost like why is it so expect like yeah i feel like i've paid like i don't know how many thousand pounds i've never claimed once i just lost money go on how's with your one since mine's so bad oh no no that was pretty good to be fair i think insurance in general like pet insurance yeah yeah like what was that about i paid 30 pound a month for my i've been paying 30 pound a month for my dog insurance for the last eight years our dog's been alive and then i was to claim for an operation because she needed an operation she was put really really poorly the operation cost five grand and they said here you go you can have a grand shut up i know i know it's probably my fault for not looking into the season c's when i got the oh mate insurance but like at the end of the day i was 17 like i just picked the cheapest insurance but it's still like 30 quid a month see all the americans that i know the health insurance that they pay in america is mad and then like it actually only covers like a certain amount so you actually better just not having insurance just pay it danny what's my scam yeah not really a scam but i was showering the other day it's not going to go in a weird direction i looked on the shower gel bottle and it said electrolytes i'm like you see electrolytes oh yeah i've seen i've seen a few folks in electric scans yeah but obviously like when you're training they're not they're great i think the the big thing at the minute is everyone's like over consuming electrolytes and drink them all the time and you get through food and whatnot but i was like it's on my shower gel bottle now like it's everywhere you're really hydrated super hydrated the skin is hydrated i looked on the back i was like right what electrolytes are in this shower gel i could see sodium i was like right where's the rest of them not on there but it's on the shower gel bottle that's mad i saw a thing about it was actually like you'll be doing this from now on do you ever have epsom salts yeah but i have some salt baths i saw a thing it was like before you shower you should put like epsom salts on the floor and stand on it whilst you shower and it's meant to do something like through the soles of your foot meant to be really good for you there you go lad I've not tried it yet but I'll try that before I get my oxygen chamber tonight do you have an oxygen chamber?

1:15:36no no no have a work chamber? everyone's buzzing over them at the moment do you have one? mate they're about 100 grand are they? how am I going to get one of them? I don't know some sponsor could do it I wish I wouldn't actually want one oh I'd fucking love one mate really? apparently the the number one anti-aging not but not that i need it but i did get to all the age fucking we're talking before and you're like you're pretty old not yeah i do i do you know some some guy said on instagram that i look 42 today um how old are you actually 27 are you 27 yeah so you're not after the same age dm no it was a comment right yeah emily emily showed me it jing baron yeah just yeah do you get a guy message you guessing your weight oh weight height there's a guy and he's an anonymous profile but he nails it every time what is a just a random person like an anonymous account will like dm me saying you look about 85 kilo here or or you're looking about 87 kilo and he's always like on the money i don't know if he's like hacked my rent for scales or something.

1:16:42It's so bizarre. It's like Elder Weiss or something. It's a real obscure name. People are weird. He guesses my weight. European guy. Just loving my picture. Yeah. He's scarily accurate a lot of the time as well. Yeah. I know it's not a scam, but have you seen that like the BBC has started like documenting like UFO sightings? No. Not seen. I mean, not seen. Do you believe in aliens? Do you believe in aliens? Yeah, I believe in aliens, but I feel like Not UFOs. I feel like they're trying to hide other things By saying that there's like UFO sightings and stuff like that Hiding what other things? Like the Epstein files and stuff like that Yeah No comment No comment Because you're in them I'm not in them What the What's next?

1:17:33Race wise for you Next for me is You're your assistant Bordeaux bordeaux bordeaux in three weeks time it's another kind of qualifying race and then after that we've got the first major of the season which is going to be in hamburg how many majors are there five majors and then there's one world champs so if i do my open how do i get to world champs let's see let's see you can't get to world champs what because you're doing open oh you've got to do pro to get to work so if i do open let's say do open london and then do decent so as a break the break the record yeah break the record then i go and do oh uh so uh pro doubles break the world record do i get to go to the world champs you'd need two more races oh no you would go to the world champs yeah you go to a world champs as an age grouper if you want to get into the elite 15 you've got to do three races qualify for a major and then you've got to come top three in a major to then go to world champs.

1:18:33So if I did that, the person who won worlds would know that they're not the best in the world. Is that right? If I broke the world record. I feel like if you broke the world record, they'd know that they're not the best in the world and they'd know you're the best in the world. Fair. So that's how world record works, right? Nah. Nah. World champion is the best in the world. World record's not like, in running time, let's just say, if you break the world record in the same year as world champs, you don't want world champs, you can't say, I'm the best in the world. you'd say I finished third at world champs or whatever it was you did do you know what I mean is that always because world champs is the finale of the season like if if you broke the world record after world champs say if world champs is in the middle how's it about this if you went out tomorrow and broke the high rocks world record solo would you be like I'm the best in the world I think you'd have a good argument for it yeah really yeah you wouldn't be like the one you've got the current fastest time the world the world champion from last year you wouldn't just say that they're the best because they're the current world champion that's a good subject lad no this is a great subject I'm telling you yeah because I think so what would you say Dylan Scott or would you say no no because the problem is the world record has been broke before the world championships but like if if the world I feel like it's whatever's the most recent that's what I think really yeah because World Championships was June.

1:20:01If someone like literally comes in this week, breaks the world record, then... They're the best in the world. Well, it's just all news, isn't it? World Champs. Like this is the new thing. Like nothing's happened since World Champs. That's why it's kind of... It's whatever's like... When Josh Kerr broke the mile. Yeah? Yeah. He wasn't world champion, right? No. No? No. But after he broke the mile world record... He's won everything else since, yeah. Yeah, but he's the... Yeah, but even before that at Diamond League, after he got that, he was like, fair play. He's the best in the world at the mile.

1:20:36Yeah, that's a very fair point, yeah. Yeah. There's records, isn't there? The thing is, I'm in a place where it's like, you have records and you have champions. The thing with Hirox is it's like a timed event. It's not tactical, is it? Whereas for us at Athletics, running all of them at the championship level are tactical. they're not necessarily the like the fastest performance if that makes sense no yeah i mean they are exactly the same they are tactical at the world championships so the world championships to come first is probably harder than getting a world record because the world record technically you could just do on a really fast track but and it needs to be perfect conditions and so on but i know like you say you need paces and world championships you don't have paces and stuff like that so it's kind of like a slow race into a sprint finish is it always like that by the way uh yeah but a lot of the time yeah yeah well in distance events because obviously like yeah shorter events are just first like jumping like 100 meters they're not they're not tactical so why would someone i know alf is explained inge britson does this quite a lot but why would you not if you knew that you was the fittest from the start but you knew that you had a shit kick like so you shit finish but you know that you're the fittest why would you not just go out super a hot and and try and break from the pack yeah it's a very good argument i just think i think to actually do that one takes like a lot of balls and then two like because you're going to be front running either way right if you're if you're the strongest you're going to be either the front of the pack no not necessarily let's just take jakob for he's a great example because like he usually is the fittest person on the start line let's take it say for a 5k i think he just won world whatever it's called the last one Ultimate Ultimate Champs yeah so he was the fittest but he didn't hit the front really at all until he had to at the end when he had a great kick but he was the fittest like yeah yeah yeah like he's the fittest person with 200 metres to go so like even if he's not like the quickest person in the race because he's the freshest person he can then exploit all of his speed if that makes sense yeah so what I'm saying is like so seeing high rocks when you're doing it let's say you're like do you do you In running, you like look at your field that you're racing against and you like look at their advantages and disadvantages of what that athlete has and how you'd exploit that so that they can't use their, their, their, their, their, their best skills.

1:23:03Yeah. So like, for example, like if I know I'm racing, someone has a great kick, like you said, I'll try and run that kick out of that person. So they don't have a kick at the end. So in high rocks, when you're doing it, do you do that like do you look at like i'm racing this bird and he's bad at wall balls so if i know i'm with him at wall balls i'll beat him yeah exactly that exactly that the problem is yeah yeah but if you so say for example when i was racing tenerife yeah i knew the guy that was neck and neck with we came out of lunges neck and neck so i caught up to him lunges and then i knew that he has the potential to go unbroken on wall walls so i was thinking if and i know i've struggled and i knew on the day because it was so hot that i'd probably my chances of going unbroken are probably i've never done it in in a top race yeah yeah so i then pushed that last run like i ran as fast as i could and hoping that like either he'd keep up with me and then be knackered for the wall walls or he'd mentally think fuck this guy's got more energy than me i'm just gonna hold back and luckily it worked and the other thing was when i got to the wall walls i was eight ahead eight wall balls eight wall balls ahead and i had a feeling just because it was really hot that no one was gonna go unbroken um so i was like i'm just gonna try and keep hold of this ball for longer than him and that was it I was like so I'm not going to drop at 50 I'm not going to drop I'm probably going to drop but like if I can get to 50 wall balls and next to me he's still going then I'm going to keep trying trying to go and then so how many did you win by the end?

1:24:48instead of like say breaking it up into 25s having a quick rest then going again because every time I drop the wall it's kind of like a sign of weakness dropping the wall ball is a sign of weakness I saw a video the other day it was like someone who was like throw the wall ball up then just let it hit the ground then pick it up and throw it yeah is that slow no it's bollocks up is that don't work yeah you look rapid no no so it probably wouldn't have been in an event because if you drop it and when you pick it up you're not allowed to squat clean it which means you're not allowed to go straight into the squat and then push it back up you've got to stand up tall with it and then go down oh yeah so so it'd be that's rubbish then yeah oh well that's that hit my head oops yeah i'm not gonna lie i won't be very good at wall walls i've done a couple and geez yeah what's next for you professionally andy valencia half marathon end of october 25th so i've got six weeks okay and uh your aim there obviously it's it's weird because you never know who's going to be in this race but would you be able to explain that with running by the way because like people i don't know it sounds weird but like with the top competitors it seems like there's two levels at the top there's the africans who are running like mad quick yeah yeah probably over the half marathon two minutes quicker than they saw the pack of people that i'd say you're and you are elite yeah but you're not you're still two minutes difference off like the the africans like what why i don't know nah to be fair like i mean I actually don't know and the thing is I've raced against a lot of those top guys like Yomif Kijeltsch who's got the water herd I think I've beat him in the track have I beat him in the track I've definitely been nearby him on the track and he's like a light year ahead of me now on the road I have no idea what training he's been doing or how he's managed to get that good but he is filthy fast for sure but yeah like here all I can do is control my control training at the level that I think I can train at push the race as fast as I can push the race and hope for the fastest time at the end of the day like do I know I'm not going to break the world record at the half marathon yes am I okay with that yeah I am I'm pretty pretty chill about that um but I have my own goals and I want to run faster than I ever have hopefully break 61 minutes would be nice um and then yeah be up there with the pack that I'm in and try and beat as many people as I can that's the plan i'm not gonna lie that was an incredible answer was it i hope people can read through that but that was an incredible answer yeah was it sorry i should have slowed down what i was saying no no yeah it was it was yeah fantastic but um yeah no it's just it's just intriguing um the thing is i'm at a point in the career my career i'm i'm 35 this year and i've i feel like i've achieved like if you were to say to a 15 old buchi you're gonna do this on the track like you just said like nah not gonna happen so now like anything i do now is a bonus so if i can have fun whilst doing it i'm all good because i know that like obviously i finished sixth olympics am i gonna finish sixth olympics ever again probably not am i okay with that yeah so i'll just do as best i can and if people want to watch along and be part of that journey then amazing and if you're like oh elitist and think that i should keep trying to win medals then fine you You can go for it yourself if you want to try it, but I'm good.

1:28:18No, I think you bring the right message. No butchie, no party. Some people say that, but I'm not that much of a party, am I? You're all right. No, I'm all right, yeah. Are you good at a party? Yeah, I'm okay. Do you know what's actually sick? On the past two races I ran, when I met a folk that have shared that me, no butchie, no party, I'm like, yeah, sick. I'm like, come on, high five. Danny, if you could have a motto, what would it be? did you say it's a motto slogan is it yeah yeah no it's not a motto is it because my motto obviously is small ones every day yeah i know my slogan is no but you know party sorry lad no no that is i like it i actually want to see the party aspect of that as well one day maybe uh maybe i uh i say basics done well and that's not mine that's just a regular term we use in the army um like good soldiers did the basic stuff well and i kind of tried to do that in my training um it's like when i'm listening to you guys obviously you know two-time olympian gb runner red bull athlete like always trying to find the small percents like for me i've got to find two minutes in my running in the high rocks world how are you gonna do that i'm gonna have to periodize my training and probably go for a bit more of a running focus like when i look at my training split over the last three years and like we've changed it up because i'm training for a trail running challenge and it's now more like aerobic and more running and before that it was like pretty much like an equal split of running and strength of hyroxphone in there so like it was a proper like hybrid training split whereas i think i need to do more running so tell you on the street i've got a question for you then 40 50k of running is not enough whereas now i do like 90 to 100 which is like way different to the before so jake i would say is like joined me and alfie training quite a lot had a i'd say a decent bump in his training and if you had to ask jake like what do you reckon your ceiling is for like let's say a 10k what do you reckon you're and you can be outrageous like what do you reckon you're if you had to train for a 10k train for what and then ceiling yes i think i think lifetime i think like i'd i'd love to try and go sub 30th lifetime like and i know you you might laugh at that or whatever but i think i i might not be the build that i am now i might be lighter maybe 5 10 kg light or whatever um and and go into like a running focus but I don't think I want to leave this earth without a sub 30.

1:30:37And what's your current PB? 31, 40. Right. Well, same question. What's your own? Your ceiling is for a 10K. Then you can understand like how you should need to get to it. Cause he knows like that's what three minutes per K. Yeah. So like, yeah. What's your own? Your ceiling is for a 10K. Like if you had to like, and you can be outrageous cause that's what you have to be like at this level of sport. You have to think beyond. Yeah. So my PB is like, I feel embarrassing. sitting around this. I'm 34-44 as my PB. It didn't matter how you think that's like embarrassing. But that's just the world we live in.

1:31:11Like social media normalizes like crazy achievements. And I know that that's above average. Mate, how long was it ago when you was fighting sub 40? About two years ago, three years ago. Yeah. That's mad. So to have a six minute improvement within your 10K when it's already decent. Yeah. It's crazy. um but i guess like let's say i could go and do a 16 minute 5k then i would love to be able to do a 10k in 32 minutes like that for me is what i know i need to do to bridge the gap yeah i just don't know how long how long that would take or yeah you know i think i've got a training's probably got to switch up and i've got to take more of a running focus to do that 100 percent um but like when i look in you know we look at high rock stats all this all the time i'm like right where am i going to bridge the gap it's always the running like i got number one in stations in poland's number one in stations in london but you don't win it's not the stations it's the running isn't it and i look at the run difference two two and a half minutes and it's that's the gap that i got a bridge yeah so that's what i so me and my partner that we're in london with we look at like what like the stats are and we're like our runs should be theoretically like so much faster that we're not going to lose that amount on the stations i don't think so i don't i don't see how it's possible to not go really fast and that sounds really weird but like let's see it's possible because i'm not gonna run i'm not gonna i'll put it out there like i'm not gonna run a 330k in the high rocks it's not gonna happen like i i i'll be much closer to three even with my partner and that sounds mad maybe i don't know but like i just and it's not and people's not gonna get like five minutes out of me over wall balls it's not gonna happen but that's the gap that I reckon I've got.

1:32:55Yeah, that is true. Especially with doubles, like the stations are a lot easier. Like when you're struggling, your partner takes over. There's no rest. I will say as well, like, so like we've done a bit of training together and like we're going to split it pretty well. So like he's going to do like probably 70 % of the stations. And then I'm leading, like we've done a bit of practice with like drafting. And I think that we can gain quite a lot because you see the doubles partners that are running, this is going to be a rage bit here, but like those runners run side by side stupid yeah but like we so we did a test like with us running behind each other and like my partner's getting like almost 10 seconds per k faster sitting on me than if he was going by himself so i can lead the runs out and he can sit and have to switch off and his heart rate stays low and then we get to the station i can start while he recovers and then he'll take it on do most of the work i'll finish it off and same happens to the run he can sit behind me and he's had a bit of a break we've thought it a bit will it work i don't know but we've definitely drafted a bit and he's got quite a big big improvement no i spoke to alfie about that about drafting and he said all right it doesn't work under if you're running like slowly around 320 drafting doesn't work yeah i think it still does no no it's not even just a mental it's mental it's not draft it's like the same as when you're on the track like that's why you said like before like oh if you're in the best shape and you're leading a race it's same as like the tour de france or whatever it is an effort to lead the front whether you're running fast or slow like it is an effort and if you're behind you can just switch off mentally you can focus on the back of their head or their back whatever you want to look at and you can just keep the distance the same like it's the same doing the high rocks unless it's like a windy course but i just wouldn't do a windy course because i'm not going to gain that gap over a run if it's like back and forth if that makes sense yeah all right it's going to be good i don't do you think there's going to be anywhere where they could have a hiccup on the high-rex course?

1:34:50Probably just like penalties, like easy penalties to lose that you maybe don't know about with technique and stuff. That's what I'm thinking of. I think open, I think the judges are just eyes closed. Is it? There we go then, perfect. If you're watching me at London, then keep your eyes shut. I'll tune with you and then you can give me pointers of like... I'm not going to let you go into the racing with see lunges lunges do your knees have to touch the floor yeah boring i feel like i feel like lunges is the only one where they might like just it might just take a little bit longer so you think of lunges with the knees touching the floor it just seems like and obviously war balls with hitting the target if you're not used to it in terms of what hitting the target hit a certain sensor if you don't it's no rep yeah yeah around or whatever so you need a bit of practice down there for that.

1:35:42Like shooting hips. Yeah, basically. Yeah, fine. Is there anyone you know that springs to mind like who's come from a completely different sport in High Rock's world? There was a triathlon guy and I can't remember his name. It was like... Alexander Ronkowicz was a swimmer, a professional swimmer back in the day. Charlie Bottrill was a cyclist. As in like someone... Just rocked up recently and just like... There was a guy who was winning Ironmans regularly. I can't remember his name but he's quite big on Instagram at the minute from norfolk just retired from triathlon and i feel oh um the guy that he's actually just um been banned from triathlon should we get into this just a little bit because this is that's quite important if you're a professional athlete and you get put on with adam's whereabouts system where you get tested yeah the way it works is there's two levels from what i know one where you leave a slot one hour every day that you can be in a certain place so let's say you say 6am at your home address every day for the year you can change it every day as well if you need to change it so it's very adaptable it's a simple app to use and the other option as well as people can come to your house at any time and test you but you don't need to be there at that time yeah so one hour slot every day for the duration you're on the thing so i've missed a test before right so this guy i think he had three missed tests within the period and like he came out and he said that he didn't take any drugs which is fair enough like blah blah but like my caveat to that is like and this is to everybody who's missed three tests it's like i missed one test mate like i was on it because i'm not missing it's my career it's my my livelihood like so if you missed three tests like you either like a little bit dumb or you are hiding something so like that's that's my opinion on it because it's not it's not hard to fill in a form and say like oh yeah i'm going to be at home at 6 a.m and then because it was a filing fair a filing error which is exactly what i got i was staying in an apartment building and i didn't put down what room number i was in so like they came to the door they came to the reception and was like well he's not here and he's not given that he's in room 128 but i should have done that so it was a filing error but filing error i didn't miss a test i just didn't file it properly if that makes sense and that's what he said he did but for three times exactly three times if you know if you know after you're getting one that you it's like when you get points in your driving license if you could do speeding you know you're not going to go and run red lights and drive fast because you lose your license like you just don't do it like unless i don't like you're a criminal but i'm not i'm not saying like if you miss three tests you're automatically like doping or you're doing something wrong but like you are doing something wrong because it's the rules that we all have to play against and if you can't follow those rules then yeah you deserve a ban like i know there's so many athletes that have missed three tests and they can get away with it because they can like i don't have a good lawyer whatever that can change it from because it's within a it's within like a 365 day period i think it is like from the first test to the third test oh it's not in a year as well i thought it was like three no no no in one year in one year so it's not like first of jan to first of december it's like if you let's say you miss a test on the first of april that then clock starts then until mate so it's even harsher than your driving license like driving three points and it's on your record for five years yeah it's not it gets cleared every 365 days yeah yeah it can't it doesn't seem that hard it it shouldn't be that hard and if it is hard for you like you're an elite athlete because like you have to be a certain level to get on these systems so you're going to have a team around you like you're not going to be a sole trader doing it so like literally like there should be someone that can help yeah oh there you go but anyway is he doing good tire ups is he done one or uh no so he's done one before um but he obviously came from like winning ironman uk and around the world there was there was a there was a olympic uh 5k guy he's like from holland yeah he's like um i think he's somali descent so like yeah i've seen the video yeah yeah he was trash and uh i like i do you know um his name's like mahadi do you know the alf is back he um he um yeah he did like he did a hyrox and he was like 1308 or something like that five key guy and he was he took him like two hours and i saw him after it like at a race and i was like bro how's the hyrox because he was like he was raging about on social media but he's tiny and he didn't put any work in and he was like bro i couldn't lift any of the weights i was like did you're not practice before you start chatting shit but he's a good dude but yeah it didn't translate the 1308 that i think is going to translate to my high rocks but anyway no i think you'll uh smoke it alfie's back you told me you're struggling with skier yeah i am actually doing my skier yeah do you know i'm doing it wrong though because like my triceps are just getting battered i'm also doing it wrong because i'm like pulling like like a tricep push down yeah yeah i was at alfay he was good yeah are you team captain no who's team captain didn't say that what did they say safeguarding stuff oh jesus you're glad you missed us we were chatting about drugs and stuff like that

1:40:57Alfie Manthorpe: you you've been around enough people to know about that what kind of drugs performance enhancing or yeah yeah yeah yeah you've been around no but you've been in the sport yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah like you've you've probably lost a lot of money from drug streets but i don't know yeah potentially yeah have you actually moved up from like places within your kind of like game nah well i've not looked into it i probably have uh no i have so from people being caught yeah you move up places yeah but i mean there's sport i think it's like I was saying before like it's just business you know like if there's money to be made people are going to bend the rules like it's just simple it's just life like I think for me I'll just play by my rules and every and like the rules that are actually on paper and and then if I do my best I'm happy yeah anyway Alfie go on tell us what was the chat was it safeguarding what was it don't touch kids and be sensible in Copenhagen they didn't actually include any of that stuff that's on the table apparently if you're interested i'm not going to use your team no just just about where the hotel is obviously all the interesting stuff the metro we need to get an app for the metro um some people right two flights are at seven o 'clock in the morning so they're having to get to the airport at five in the morning i saw that actually i didn't hear that they don't get a pay like british athletics don't pay for internal travel or hotels so they're all the athletes are gonna have to stay at like I think it's Heathrow the night before or Stanford Stanford Stan Stansted Stansted sorry yeah Stansted the night before out of their own pocket and then still get up at 5 in the morning or 4.30 in the morning that's why you just best pay for your flights yeah well ours is at 11.40 so I'm chilling where are you staying can you tell anyone no don't let any paparazzi come to Papi we're not allowed that was another thing they're safeguarding not allowed to announce where we're staying what's your travel kit I don't know GB stuff okay it's always fun are you travelling with anyone else or are you just riding solo I'm not sure who's going from Manchester are you going to be bunking with anyone yeah we usually share a room and the last one I did I shared with a guy called Charlie Wheeler who is possibly the worst guy you want to share with after the race he's on a team he's on a team yeah yeah so you'll share with him I'll probably share with him again which is great to share with before the race good guy he gets a little bit loose afterwards how loose are you talking like just as loose as you Alfie or oh yeah well I'm very wild wild no it'd be a good day if he doesn't get arrested I'd say maybe so what about you you'd be fine it'd be a good day if I do get arrested no I yeah I'm the life of the party can't you tell me you are the most health conscious person I think it's not even health conscious I don't think it's not bothered which is fine you've never had a drink right like end of year 11 GCSE like I had a shot or something.

1:44:01Alfie Manthorpe: I've had one shot. Tequila on holiday once before as well. I like, I've had a shot of baby Guinness. That was pretty nice. I like all the more, like the cocktails, sex on the beach. The mocktails, like mocktails, mocktails. Mocktails or cocktails? Oh no, I like, I like the taste of some cocktails, like the fruity Caribbean ones. You don't have alcohol world, do you? No. No, but I like, I have a sip of it if someone's drinking. Oh, I'll have a sip of this. Okay. So like Rumi's Gully drinks, you'll drink that. Yeah, well, girls like at the minute, well, Aperol Spritz. Oh, a banging drink. Is it?

1:44:34Yeah, yeah, it's a good drink. Hugo Spritz now, isn't it? Is that the rave now? And what's the new one? There's another one now. Danny Knows. He's in the Knows. He's in there. What's it called? I can't remember. What's your favorite beer? I like an Asahi. I enjoy one. Do you know what that one is? Yes. That's the Indian, right? Not quite. No. That's Cobra. That's a lovely one as well. Goes down well with Afal. Yeah. what happened to like a chicken tikka masala do people still get that in an indian yeah yeah that's uh that's still the most common yeah that's common that's what i get is it or mixed grill with tikka masala sauce just because you get extra protein gains circling back to indian yeah we're going off topic of alfie's race here i'm more intrigued about how he's gonna we've got a big moment i've got a massive race coming up and i want to know the insides of where his head's at leading into it what's the tactics?

1:45:31Alfie Manthorpe: I've told you this earlier in the podcast I know it's been a long episode have you looked at the field I mean? have you looked at the field? have you looked at like well he's the best in the world Andy so who's done it? everyone Chepter Guy John Green no he almost's not done it so we were just talking about so you almost's the best in the world isn't he so he's not done it so the best in the world aren't done it well he's never won anything so but he but we were just speaking speaking about if you've got a world record you are the best in the world and you said he's not there so yeah so yeah so the best in the world aren't actually there some of the best in the world are but the best well Trev's guy's got a world record yeah but he's not the best at half marathon is he so no so Jomov isn't there but it's a good field it's a very good field yeah really good field yeah and then what's your hopes for top I'd love I mean I'd love to get like top 20 or something that's what I had in my head but I think I mean I came 40th at the Europeans in cross and on the road for 10k you know i've i've got a target i want you to be top 10 non-african i want to be top five non-african oh are we as long as we include like yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah as long as we agree no no because european africans there's a lot of countries what tend to pay east africans to run for them no or like there's a lot of like like some of them my best mates are like farah Somali like yeah there's a lot but he's British like so yeah I'm saying like non non-African for context maybe for people who don't understand that's a genetic advantage yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah it's not just a random no no no make sure you beat all these Africans no it's it's genetics like they're just who are the top non-Africans in the race then Ongren for sure Ongren yeah other than that I'm not too sure probably Etienne de Gunas from France probably the gunners yeah does jimmy do that no i would beat jimmy anyway world champion thank you he pulled up in our world record attempts he did yeah i think yeah think me what's his name your mate from clinton young no rory linclair oh yeah yeah he's doing it yeah he's doing it he's to be honest i reckon you'd beat him no he's a bit ahead of me um sound rory he's a good lad yeah and i say a bit ahead of me he's i'd say he's quite a way ahead of me but quietly in my own head i'm like i'm looking at him as kind of someone to gauge off yeah gauge off a bit yeah but i would say it would take me to have an amazing day and him to have a bad day for us to be uh like close to each other at the finish i think yeah depends how the race is run that's the beauty of like championships is it's so like at the minute the weather forecast looks terrible like loads of wind so it might just be quite a massive pack for over half the race and then you get lots different variables so we'll see it's windy yeah like 30 32 mile an hour gusts and then like always 20 miles an hour it says so bad day oh wow i hope it's not that bad all right i wanted to run quick so no i think you'll run quick because it's a really fast course and i even in the windy days i'm sure copenhagen's being pretty quick plus at the end of the day you've got the best runners in the world ahead of you to lead you out so you just sit in and ride it so i would do is that your advice sitting and ride it yeah okay and that my advice is you're in good shape so whatever i think you'll be able to handle whatever is thrown at you i mean you're not running 58 for a half but you don't you need to so like i think i could be in low 60 shape i said to someone today 60 20 yeah i'd say so what do you think your ceiling is andy asked us before mine and danny's ceiling for us for a 10k but you can ask a different event can't you because you probably hit the ceiling on 10k do you know what i think it's quite hard to gauge as well because last year when i ran 28 12 i was like i'm never running quicker than that but when i ran the year of like my personal best before last year's 28 12 was 29 10 and when i ran that i was fully grown already training a lot i was like there's no way i'm ever going to run much quicker than that and now i'm a minute and a half quicker than that i'm 27 38 so it's like i'm still the same genetics as i was when i ran 29 10 flat out so it is hard to tell i think with ceilings sometimes because i've not i've not even got stronger i've just got so if you could like end goal i believe it also depends on shoe technology obviously let's say shoes stay the same from now onwards i think i could get down to mid 59s in the half maybe on the road low 27s in the 10k like 27 15 to 20 um in the marathon i would say genetic capabilities 159 no if i perfected if i perfected everything i still don't think i'd run sub two or five if i perfected everything maybe i think you would maybe two or four thirty would be like the top peak peak peak i couldn't see myself running quicker than that if it but obviously the marathon no one really ever gets perfectly so i think that'll probably be the one where i've got the biggest gap between the ceiling and what i actually want but it does change best of luck halfway thank you andrew best of luck should we call it a podcast yeah yeah i'm not sure what you guys spoke about when i was oh i thought we just spoke about we're talking about high rocks and about other people joining in and we mentioned about the guy this just this test this triathlete guy i'm just saying about how you're either dumb or doping to do that you're doping aren't you really because it's not worth even if you're dumb it's not worth yeah yeah well we said he was we said that he's either we didn't say that we said dumb or doping well he's dumb or doping we said we said dumb you said doping okay allegedly of course i can't say he was you don't know it seems like that's the like it's not too hard like i would be the most biggest hyper contract in the Yeah, me, you would not.

1:51:28Have you missed one test? Yeah. I would sleep in my house. Yeah, yeah.

1:51:32Alfie Manthorpe: I'd change my sleeping hours from like 12 in the afternoon till 6 in the evening. Just so I was awake for like 6am just in case they ran with a doorbell. Yeah, I guess. It is madly extensible. We were talking about Jake Whiteman when he went to Portugal. He took a ring doorbell with him. Oh, yeah, yeah. To make sure that he would hear the guy that came at 6am. And they did come and test him, right? They did, yeah. Yeah. And if he didn't hear that, that would have been a strike. And the thing is, like, if you get one, not too bad, but if you get two, imagine how on edge you'd be. Like, every day if you had two missed tests, you know, if you get one more, like, done.

1:52:10And everyone thinks that you're doping. Because that's just what happens, isn't it? There's no one that's missed three tests and someone's not gone, probably doping.

1:52:18Alfie Manthorpe: And which governing body was it the missed test for the triathlon governing body? I assume, so I'll just say. It wouldn't matter. It could be a mixture. Well, I'm saying that you're not going to get out of competition tests for high rock so yeah is what i'm saying no no no yeah no no but his actually was his actually was failing failing errors he said rather than like missed tests yeah okay yeah it's what i had i had a failing error in mine it is a tricky situation though because if he is innocent and you are right everyone just thinks you're doping yeah yeah i mean you look like a great example is mo kateer mo kateer is like one of the best runners in the world for a few years came from absolutely nowhere and then didn't fail a test but got three missed tests and i was like well yeah he was doping money didn't feel a test today no he's been done for tampering yeah yeah but he but he initially had three missed tests and then he got done for tampering so his band got like even lengthened more i think what he did was he got he got three missed tests and then tried to alter that to then get let off and then they were like no you've done up worse now that make sense so then he got given an even longer sentence it's so funny because this guy used to get accused of doping in like comment sections and he'd reply like oh just because your wife thinks i'm better looking than you are the guy's top g the guy's the guy's got mad aura like to be fair to him he's just he's like he's but i can tell you when he's right there's another i won't name actually i shouldn't even tell it but there's another athlete who i presumed was doping who called him out as doping i thought well she's definitely doping if you think he's doping you know i mean like yeah it's funny because i i i got told about his training because people obviously go to the same training camp locations it's like yeah he never ran he just did like sled pulls like he just it's the high rocks well he'd sprint with a sled on his back and that's what he'd do for training most of the time he would never do much endurance i'm like well probably because he's getting his endurance elsewhere but yeah i think there's quite a lot of that still in the sport unfortunately there's certain athletes you see and you're just like it seems pretty impossible to obviously speed is one thing like how fast they actually run but the way people run like sometimes people like can just drop like a a sub 60 second lap in the middle of the 5k and then be fine that doesn't generally happen like they kind of defy the laws of what fitness or like racing still applies to if that makes sense Have you been tested before?

1:54:45Alfie Manthorpe: No, I've never been tested. So here we go. Alfred had a very big improvement. And then now, after this weekend, he might have got put on the register to get tested. I'm quite offended. What would you want to do to get on the register? Well, I mean, if I ran a second quicker in Valencia, I would have been tested that day because I would have... And then are you on the register? No, but you wouldn't have been tested. You would have asked to have been tested. Yeah, yeah. So you wouldn't have been picked to have been tested. You'd have asked to, please test me. but what's the what's the guidelines for actually getting on this whereabouts it's up to your governing body you've been on it before haven't you yeah yeah i got off it i was like oh yes now i can i'm kidding um yeah i think when you i made my first i mean i got put on it pretty quick because i in the first year that i turned pro i went to olympics i was like yeah straight away got put on the the pool but yeah i don't see why i reckon alfie will get put on it end of this year because he's going because he's going to a world championships and it's not his first competition and they'll look at like the trajectory of the athlete so i would hope that i just hope they don't look at that and go oh let's test him 6 a.m the day before or something like that like in the morning i don't want to get like they can't they're not to do that they did i know someone who got tested like 6 a.m before they won't do that they won't do it at a world chance okay it'll never happen that's only that's the only thing i think about i won't be able to sleep if I knew I'd get tested in the morning.

1:56:05If you do that, then they must suspect you of something.

1:56:08Alfie Manthorpe: Well, it's like in Tour de France to do it like two in the morning, don't they? It's very different though. Yeah, yeah. I know, but just mad. I reckon there'll be like a group of people that will have to test. You might be in that. Hopefully you are, and then you can get your, do your first ever. Yeah, it means you're doing something right if you're getting tested because then it's like I'm running fast enough. So you're doing nothing right and you've never been tested before? No, I'm not, yeah. so i just call this on bluff yeah okay i know it just legitimizes like it does yeah good enough runner for people to do you reckon have you practiced with roomy like to pee in for someone and take up no i don't want to do that either to be honest you've got to do that you don't have to face them though do you you can yes you do yeah you've got to face no you have no they have to they have to like they're they're watching you mate you're not allowed to like just pissing your urinal you've got to turn around and face them is it like a wide cup or is it don't worry you're fitting it lads is everyone being drug tested no it's not a narrow yeah you'll be fine mate so you could you have to aim or you can you like mate you just just whack it in whack it in and then go for it lad there's a cup about that big okay it's like this you'll be fine mate okay um yeah you should practice because there's actually there's a guy i'll call him out but his name is david malarkey he won a medal at conf games and And he, we both got tested at British Champs.

1:57:28And he told me that he gets like, he's got a bit of like the fear it took him. Like it took him so many hours to do the toilet. Cause you're just like.

1:57:35Alfie Manthorpe: Stage fright. Yeah. Proper bad. I mean, I'm like, yeah. I'm in and out. I'm like first one. Yeah. I'm so dehydrated. I take me like an hour, two hours. Well, otherwise like if you're, if you're not the first one, you've got to wait until the person, like you're in a queue with Hyrox. So you, you get assigned like someone, but that someone might have someone before you is it urine and blood uh no just urine okay they don't do that in a flex it's one person one person two people to one athlete normally right no no so so they have they have one person that's with you and stays with you at all times to make sure that you don't run off yeah but then they have a different tester and the tester that's fine we'll see everyone so one will see all the males one will see all the females um there's five people that get tested at each event five males five females if it's doubles then 10 people will get tested so you don't want to be that 10th person so you you go in as soon as possible because well you're out there well blood is you can't do blood uh like i think it's like i think it's an hour now uh since you finished your race so you have to sit for an hour no matter what but just playing devil's advocate right say if someone was cheating and they knew they were oh you're about to get tested could they just like pretend to faint or like so then they know they have to go to the hospital so they can't get blood tested straight away and stuff like that does that do you not think that happens nah i don't think so though because it's like a medical intervention isn't it nah no i don't think oh so i accidentally had an iv so there's there's so many different not allowed iv but what about if like nah that punishment's worse than the punishment they originally were going to get i think do you know what the thing is you're thinking it the wrong way what what actually is is i know i wanted to wrap this up but whatever the athlete is has all the rights not the tester so you need to remember that like you're the one who like vehicle down and so forth yeah yeah like you have the right to go and do a cool down you have the right to have a representative with you like it like you're on the same team like it's not like the attestors are attacking you like they're like normal people that are just doing their job and like but like they do make mistakes and you have to call them up on that like so if i was doing my first test i would if i'm if i'm you in the weekend and you get tested like yeah but i'll phone the doc and get the doc to come because i've not done it before and i don't want this to go wrong then i would recommend you do that yeah because it's like if they did something wrong it could come yeah well no no no none too because even just like me even just like double checking what you've written like what you should do is like supplements and things so take a picture of all your supplements that you take just now the massive long list that you probably got it's gone down a bit actually is it but have it because like when you're sitting there and you haven't thrown anything I don't fucking remember what I took in the last seven days especially you and then no I'm kidding so then yeah so like but like I mean like I mean I'll tell you if I'm like then you have to try and urine in front of blood or urine but like if you don't need the toilet I'm just usually like I've had to do a toilet to get urine you're out to what?

2:00:38no you have so they've watched you they've watched you fuck off no the other they've watched your shit you had to stand up as well stand up nah just sit in the tub and then like just get the cup

2:00:53Alfie Manthorpe: and they're in the cubicle with you come on Andy I bet you did that on purpose not on you as well nah just like wanting to make them feel so awkward because I bet you didn't give a fuck I bet nah but you can't go and I know I'm going to go if I do the toilet so like another thing is if you get a partial test you know about that yeah where you get less than 80 mil or something yeah and you have to sit there and wait until the next that's going to take a while oh mate like literally ages Well, I look forward to it. We get into it. Hope you run well enough. Imagine if I placed high enough to get drugs tested after the race.

2:01:29Not having.

2:01:32Alfie Manthorpe: That's a shame. I hope it does. There we go. There we go. Thank you, guys. Finish on that. Let's finish on that. Yeah. Let's finish on Andy taking a shit in front of a drug tester.