Episode 647: Trackbeast

0:12Eric Avila: Welcome to The Running Public with Bracken Crocker and Kirk DeWint. Whether you are a brand new runner or you already have a great mustache, we're here to help you increase your running knowledge and present it at a practical level. This is The Running Public.

0:32Eric Avila: When you're ready to take your training or racing to the next level, go to the running public.com. We have both monthly subscription training plans,$19.99 a month. And Bracken and I both offer one-on-one customized coaching. Again, go to the running public.com and check out our offerings.

0:50Adam Dailey: Kirk, before we get started, I actually have a couples question for you. Lisa and I have this thing where she'll be like, what did I hear in the car today? You know, like been together long enough. We kind of are on the same wavelength here. But Kirk, what did I eat? What did I pound right before I got on this today? It's out of left field. This is one of those strange ones. We'll see how deep our work wife connection is.

1:15Eric Avila: It's not cold pizza or cold hamburger.

1:17Adam Dailey: No, it's not my usual.

1:19Eric Avila: A bag of gummy bears. I don't know. Wow. I don't know if you could be more off. What did you eat before coming on the podcast? It was cold. Chicken noodle soup. That's disgusting. I didn't say I liked it, but you got to get carbs in. How are you guys doing today? So you guys are both in San Diego?

1:35Adam Dailey: Yeah. Yeah. We're northern. Yeah, living the dream.

1:39Eric Avila: Yeah. Have you guys been there for a while?

1:42Adam Dailey: Eric grew up here. I've been here about 15, 16 years. Okay.

1:45Eric Avila: Yeah. And we have some very, I don't know, tenured runners with a resume on our hand. Is that fair to say? Yeah. Yeah? Yeah, I think Adam and I have a pretty long career with running. Yeah.

2:01Adam Dailey: I don't mean this as a shot to you, Adam, but I spent years watching Eric at races. I didn't get the pleasure of watching you run, but this is interesting. I was a good collegian. I didn't really run. I ran like a year professionally. I was a mediocre collegian, so you're ahead of that. Same. There you go. But yeah, Eric, this is not the first time you've been on my screen.

2:26Eric Avila: wait really oh oh right just from like watching races that you were in thanks man hopefully that was good but adam ran with some killers man some of the stories he's got of training with like the 90s some of the biggest guys in the 90s is pretty cool so um between the both of us we we have some fun stories probably covering you know a scope of 30 years of the last maybe 35 adam maybe even 40 years the last like professional scene to some extent so Adam, when was your pro career? What time frame?

2:58Adam Dailey: I mean, like I said, I was in college from 95 to 2000. And I ran like not even a full year after that. I was kind of done. And then I came back and ran professionally like from 2002 to 2003. And then that's when I connected with Eric because I was trying to qualify for the Olympic trials when I was like a 43-year-old again. I qualified in 2000 in track and was like trying to do this like thing. and met Eric and started training with all the young guys in town.

3:27Eric Avila: Qualifying for the trials at 43 in what specifically?

3:30Adam Dailey: In the marathon.

3:31Eric Avila: It's funny. I'm 43. I'm 43 right now, and I'm still kind of – I mean, I was a D3 All-American, not a D1 All-American or pro, but I'm still chasing it pretty hard at 43, and I believe that there's still some legs left in your early 40s if you don't get seriously injured at any point, that ruins your build. And if you stay on top of your crap and your body composition and consistency, like I think my legs are still working quite well at 43. So you felt the same way, obviously.

4:03Adam Dailey: Looking back on it, I'm 50 now. So now I'm like, oh man, I had it back then. But at the time it was more like every three or four years I had in my head, like, oh, maybe I'll do this thing and try and qualify for the trial. And I knew at that point, I was like, this is the last, this is the last time I can ever do this. You know, so I was like, I was a, I was like a 1625k runner. So I was decent, but not, not good enough to think about running 518 for 26 miles. So I was like, well, let me just commit to something bigger, you know? And I think that's a lot of what we talk about now, you know, Eric and I as coaches or whatever is like, like the, the, the bigger thing.

4:39Adam Dailey: So it was like, I ran, you know, I did that. And then, you know, I was a 1630 guy. and within a couple of months, I became a 1530 guy because I just blew that out of the water because your goal is so much bigger, right? And so I think, yeah, as a 43-year-old, you're smarter for sure. You understand your body, you understand your limitations. Obviously in San Diego, we don't have like weather to hold us back. I was lucky because I kind of work out when I wanted and I'm an entrepreneur. I don't have to wake up at five in the morning or run at 8 PM or anything like that. So there's some advantages for sure to being older.

5:12Adam Dailey: Your first time through, what did you qualify for trials in? Uh, 5k and 10k. 5 and 10k? Yeah. How close did you get when you went for the marathon? Uh, I was on pace through about 17 miles. I came through in just under about 108 high, 108 mid, and the wheels started coming off about 17 or 18. And then they really, they fell all the way around 21 or two and i ran 227 so where was that that was cim yeah 2019 okay i

5:44Eric Avila: remember when you did that i was in hawaii the day of that race racing the road mile and i remember checking the results and i was like oh he blew up but yeah i mean really if you were threading the needle to qualify you have no choice but to go out on pace and if you die you die and you died I think a lot of people do that chase in the standard for sure.

6:02Adam Dailey: 100%. I was definitely a 221 guy and I knew it in my training. I was like, but I'm like, I'm going to go for it. Maybe the shoes will help. Maybe the adrenaline will help. Maybe the downhill. So speaking of holding marathon pace to the end, did you see what happened in Berlin?

6:16Eric Avila: Mm-hmm.

6:17Adam Dailey: No. A woman ran world record pace for 25 miles and then injured her Achilles and limped in to 211. Oh my God. and was on the way to the hospital for surgery before the podium even happened. But she had the world record, and then it was taken from her by the woman who then tested positive later. And so this was her bid to get it back, and she was on pace for like over 24 miles. And again, limped the last mile to, what, 11.05 or something weird. Still crazy fast, but 25 miles on world record pace. That's insane.

6:57Eric Avila: How much of it goes to the conversation of plated shoes and lower leg issues? Do you think it's a classic case of riding the needle for so long? And it just, what do you think? I mean, do you think that's an easy finger to point at? I think everyone points at it now when there's an Achilles injury. Yeah. I mean, the shoes do a lot of the lower leg work for you. I mean, I tore my planter that kind of ended my career because I was like, oh, I love these shoes. And I ran in them, I think looking back, I ran in them way too much. um and yeah so adam and i talk about this too with coaching and what we're doing is i'm like you guys gotta lower load the lower legs load like the achilles and soleus and and the planter because um yeah i mean there's a reason the shoes are good they do a lot of the work for you but also you know physics says that there's a recoil right so if your body can't handle that load um that's crazy that she snapped i have to go find that video that she snapped it's a partial tear

7:51Adam Dailey: I heard of the Achilles. She looks like she's finished.

7:54Eric Avila: She looked pretty bad.

7:56Adam Dailey: I mean, limping to a 2.11 is pretty cool.

8:00Eric Avila: She only fell off pace two minutes. I was in Chicago for the Chicago Marathon when that girl ran 2.09. I was pacing like a corporate office for that marathon. And I remember after the race, my buddy was one of the pacers. It was Reed Buchanan. I don't know if you know that name. And he was one of the pacers for the women. and Centro, my other buddy, was pacing another group of the women. And they both were like, yeah, this girl just kept passing us. And then Reed had the pace. I remember he was pacing the lead women and Centro was pacing the American women or something. So Centro was like, yeah, I didn't even go with them.

8:35Eric Avila: And Reed was complaining because I guess he kept yelling at her to slow down. And she kept running. Well, obviously she ran 209. And Reed, after the race, is like, she's on drugs. She's on drugs. And then lo and behold, he was right. but it's kind of funny. But anyway, I remember that because I got off and I was like, yeah, I don't think I'd want to run the marathon. If, if two Oh nine is world's record for the women's. It's like, I think I'm going to retire.

8:58Adam Dailey: There was a time not too long ago that if you ran two Oh, you were a contender at trials for top three. Oh, for sure. Yeah. That's gross. We had a guy run two 14 and go to the Olympics and he was the only guy we sent. I'm pretty sure to something like that. Rod, Rod to Haven.

9:15Eric Avila: If you ran Ryan Hall, in the Ritzenheim day, they run 209, 207, and that was break 210, and we talked about that. Dude, Brian Sell ran 210, right? Made the team.

9:27Adam Dailey: We had a question in our mailbag a week or two ago about what is the optimum loading of how often you use super shoes in training? We both had our opinions on it, but with pro runners here who also coach, and you said your career basically ended as a result of overuse of it. What do you think? Now it's obviously different for what your foot action looks like and what your volume looks like and what kind of, are you wearing a super stiff one versus something that's a little more forgiving, but if general thoughts on it, what would you say is a good prescription for how you dose a super shoe in training?

10:02Eric Avila: I mean, depends on like, are we talking? So I coach like high school and right now and specifically track. And I do in the past had some work with, you know obviously some college and professional athletes but track so i know you guys do like marathons and ultras and so i guess i can't really answer on that front but in terms of high school i'm just gonna answer for the high school kids because that's what i'm like kind of doing now um like once a week maybe twice a week for what for like threshold days um i don't want them more than that i mean even now we have them do easy runs and then we have them do barefoot strides or sometimes they'll do their cool down after a track day and they'll do barefoot cool down like for a mile or something so my point is is i want them to strengthen their lower achilles and feet the shoes do the job um but the problem is if you rely on that too much then you're actually like i think you're doing more harm than good when the kids don't realize it because what ends up happening and i've talked adam and i've talked about this a lot is the super shoes are amazing but then once they put the track spikes on that rigidity and stiffness that you're getting from the shoe doesn't isn't there so you're fully exposed to your planter and achilles having to take the load of you know what is the what's the percent load when you when you're running it's like is it like 4x your body weight i don't know maybe it's 10x i can't remember the number but your achilles and soleus is taking that full load so if if your shoe is doing it which is amazing and that's why the shoe is so good uh but if we're talking kids here and most of these kids i mean we have a kid on the team uh adam massimo we have a kid who's like he's a freshman and he probably weighs like 85 pounds and he's like these shoes are great i'm like yeah dude because your leg is a freaking string bean and he basically his leg can't handle you know pushing down but the shoe does it for him but long term it's like you know at some point we need to build out that foot so a lot of times the injuries come when you switch from the shoes to spikes it's like right now if you guys went on put some spikes on and did some ripping fours i bet you'd be pretty sore the next day i don't know how much work you're doing on this track but it totally blasts your Achilles and planter.

12:08Eric Avila: And that's ultimately like what I got hurt with is I was doing all this work in these super shoes. And then I had to put the spikes on because I can't wear super shoes on the track and, and it exposed me. That's all.

12:18Adam Dailey: There's a recovery component too. I think like when we, we like, there's an advantage to doing super shoes cause you recover quicker, but it's like, again, it's like playing with fire. If you do it every day, you're just, you know, so it's like, there's that we think about that a lot too, the recovery. So it's like, it's actually better for you to work out in super spice because you'll feel better tomorrow but you can come back quicker

12:40Eric Avila: like adam is saying you can um you can do more of an aerobic load so we're talking two things here right guys like uh you can stress the aerobic system more now because of the shoes and spikes but then you know is this specific question you asked it was more exposure of the lower tendons so there's this balance that adam and i have to dance with with some of our athletes because you need to develop their tendons but you also need to like we want to expose them in the we do a lot threshold work and that takes repeated exposure aerobically. So it's kind of going back and forth. Does that make sense?

13:09Adam Dailey: So you almost have to do prehab work intentionally for lower tendon development and loading to undo the extra work you're doing aerobically. That's not sending it the stress it should have been getting 10 years ago doing the same workout.

13:24Eric Avila: Or you could compensate by doing it in the gym. So we do a lot of isometric holds. You go single leg and you just hold and that is mimicking the same load um eventually you would do it with weights on your back and stuff like that and the kids are like this is so hard i'm like you know why because because you don't use that tendon tendon and and uh so yeah but they need it and again it's even harder now adam i was going to tell you this i noticed in the fall because it's cross country and in california you're not allowed to wear spikes you like can't wear you have in cross country you have to wear super shoes so the kids will go six to eight months eight months maybe without wearing spikes and so they're like oh it's great the shoes are amazing and what they don't know is what adam and i know is like they're gonna get to february put spikes on and be like oh my god you know super shoes are super spikes or not it's like they're used to wearing 40 millimeter stack and all of a sudden they're wearing 20 millimeter and they're like oh i feel flat i'm like you know why because your achilles is trying to do the work that's not there so part of the coaching is to yeah mitigate that.

14:22Adam Dailey: Why can't the kids wear spikes in California? We don't have real cross-country. They run on parking lots.

14:27Eric Avila: I have seen. There's a lot of concrete crossings. Have you heard of Woodbridge? So what shoes are the kids choosing if you're going to run cross-country, not in a spike? What's the shoe of choice or two? Vaporfly. So people are running the vapors. No problem. God, that's so different than cross-country here. I feel like there's no way you get away with that on most of these courses in the Midwest anyways. That would just, it wouldn't work.

14:51Adam Dailey: because yeah you got real real cross-country courses we we fundamentally like dumb them down we have some hard courses and our heart the hardest course in the state two years ago they made easy after 40 years of running the exact same course because they're just like oh we're getting criticism from coaches that it's too hard and kids want to run a fast time so we're gonna alter the course after 40 years so just fundamentally missing the point of what we're doing here 100 especially high school cross country i was trying to explain to the kids

15:23Eric Avila: the other day about european cross country and i don't know how much you guys follow this but if you ever go watch european cross champs um they don't have a set distance so you'll get to the course and be like yeah tomorrow's four laps or five laps around whatever and people you know i'm like what's the distance and it'll be like oh it's 7.6k or it's 10.11 sorry 10.11 10.4k and it's not, it's an arbitrary distance. And World Athletics does that on purpose. And so the kids couldn't get their mind around it. They're like, but how do you know your pace? And I'm like, it doesn't matter, dude. You're pin cross.

15:56Eric Avila: They're racing. It's racing. It doesn't matter if there's a mud pit and hay bales in the way, right? Exactly. You got to run through a barn. You've seen that sometimes in Europe. Eric, how old are you right now as we're speaking here? I'm 36. And when was, what was the time domain of your pro career? My last pro race was summer of 2024. Yeah, August. And you were chasing the 1500, right? Yeah, 15 and five. I was trying to train for the five, and then I snapped my planter in a race in Prague in the summer of 2023. And that's when I was like, all right. Like, you know, I got healthy. I got back.

16:32Eric Avila: I ran like 338 by this summer. But I was in a boot for six months. And so by the time I got to that boot, it was January, maybe mid-December 2023. And so I'm looking at it and I remember thinking, like telling Adam, I'm like, you know, it's an easy math equation. You know, a fun statistic out there is if you look at the people that make the teams in endurance for USA, the main commonality they all have is they've all been healthy and had interrupted training for at least 18 months. and so my best years was I had that and then coming out of a boot in December 2023 I'm like you know I made a I made a comment to my PT so I got a real bad case of PF right now and I'm sure super shoes etc they're all involved I'm not wearing spikes these days but and I said this to him and I meant it tongue-in-cheek but I said I just wish I would tear the damn thing and be done with it and he goes no and he goes you don't want to do that and I was like well tell me more here and I of course I knew I didn't want to do that but it's been real bad you know the whole limping out of bed, drive 20 minutes and looking like an old man.

17:36Eric Avila: It sucks. It's, it's, you can't get away from it and I'm still training on it. Right. And so you limp run your first five to eight minutes of your run kind of get, you know, the whole song and dance. But my question for you, all that to say is, um, he's like, yeah, man, like, sure. That sounds great. Like maybe the pain would be gone or something or you went, but like you really lose your force off the ground and you're never going to be the same afterwards. So do not wish for that. So my question for you is, did you experienced that? Like, did you like disconnect with that, like rebound or coil effect?

18:05Eric Avila: Was it notably dulled after you tore it? Uh, yeah. So I did, it wasn't a full tear. It was like a, it's like tethered down. So I don't know if that makes sense. So like pulled down one side. And then I had, I ended up having a nerve issue because there's a nerve in your heel and the scar tissue was pushing on the nerve. So it just felt like someone had a lighter on my foot. And I remember I was like, this sucks. And then I had this like big ball. So we had to get shockwave to break it up because I was trying not to do surgery. And then we had to, it was the whole thing, needling. But yeah, I mean, one thing that exposed what you're kind of saying was when I tore it and had to go through rehab, I realized like, oh my God, my soleus and Achilles is like atrophied almost.

18:46Eric Avila: It wasn't atrophied, but it was a lot weaker because I was wearing super shoes. I was wearing super shoes on easy runs. I don't know why. I was like, they just feel so great. And I didn't realize. And I remember that year I had switched coaches and I got away from the weight room. And I was like, oh, you know, and I, before this, I was big on the weight room and then I got away from it. So looking back in hindsight, I realized no shit, you know, this is like a perfect storm. And now I've completely gone back to Adam and I talk, I'm like, dude, the weight room is so important because that's like, I think why I got hurt also.

19:15Adam Dailey: Well, everything you get that, that pendulum effect in every training fad and the super shoes coinciding with threshold craze. it was a great advancement and a real issue at the same time. And I feel like we're in the balancing out swing phase of people are paying for their sins a little bit. You went in too far. You doubled your weekly anaerobic volume. All of it was done in shoes that allowed you to do that volume. So you felt better, but you loaded less and you grew one side while you atrophied the other. And like we're coming full circle. It will never be full circle. Like threshold's not going anywhere.

19:54Adam Dailey: super shoes aren't going anywhere but like the gym is becoming in vogue again yeah yeah exactly yeah plus it's it's different for everyone right that's the that's the other tricky part if you got 20 20 athletes they're not all the same right summer summit might not even help that much you know and i heard like oregon they do tons of super shoes and they're i mean a lot of those kids are always banged up you know because it's like i mean it's free free super shoes every day all the time and you're like, oh, I don't know. Might as well. Like, why would I run into this one? Well, and why would you intentionally choose to feel worse unless you had a long-term vision of, like, this is my version of going out for a crappy double in the PM.

20:36Adam Dailey: Like, I know it's better even though I'm going to feel bad now. Like, choosing to feel worse on a run for the greater good when you know you could just run quicker and feel better. It's seductive. Yeah, this kid who's, like, won't stop lifting weights on our team is like i was trying to explain to him like man just stop it's like it's like imagine that workout carrying just two cans of coke and it wouldn't be like impossible but it'd just be awkward and hard right i mean that's just that's a little bit of a just to visualize you know that's it's harder right so you're like you said you're putting on this big clunky shoe versus this

21:12Eric Avila: thing that makes you feel pretty pretty nice yeah i need to be reminded of this conversation this very conversation so this is good for me to hear um well you're such a responder too with your foot action it's just suits my stride so well um yeah kirk i get it me too i was that's why i was like oh this is great i remember at one point adidas was you know they send us gear drops and everything when i was sponsored by them and i remember like it's so funny because hindsight's 2020 i remember emailing them and being like the next drop like just send me 10 super shoes i was like i'm gonna strain in them i'm gonna run in them and looking back i'm like i want to shake myself and be like, you idiot.

21:46Eric Avila: Like, no, what are you toy plant?

21:48Adam Dailey: We did a takeaway episode probably two years ago of maybe a year ago of all the high level athletes and the good minds we'd talked to some of their best pieces of advice. And one of them, we talked that super shoes are the volume multiplier. Like you can use it like a poor man's alter G go ahead and get 20 % more.

22:08Eric Avila: Go do it. I started hovering around 110 miles a week. I was like, I've never done this. This is great aerobically and i arguably when i got hurt i was in the best shape of my life so aerobically it worked but it didn't balance out the tendons and the muscle you know and once i put the spikes on i remember i felt like i was running like i felt like i weighed 200 pounds because my lower legs couldn't handle the load that i was pushing down i was like oh shit so what would you do different

22:31Adam Dailey: now would you spam the prehab work or would you back off on the volume i had this conversation

22:37Eric Avila: with Hobbs. Um, and we basically like, we're talking about how we like Hobbs doesn't work out in super shoes at all now. Cause he's like, I need to load. And he only brings super shoes in when he gets in like the last six weeks or eight weeks of a season. So he feels a little fresher, but in the base phase, which is, you would think it'd be the opposite, but he was like, no, I need to load my Achilles and stuff. And I was like, Oh, so we talk about that. So I would maybe do something like that, or I would do the one to two days a week. And then on easy runs, I'd be like, You're definitely wearing the most low profile thing.

23:08Eric Avila: Go feel a little heavy on a Monday. I don't care. But then the other thing that I noticed is the gym. Like I said already, I wish I wouldn't have got rid of it because you can, like Kirk, maybe you could argue you could get away with wearing super shoes a lot if you're hitting the gym hard on isometric loading because that's where you're going to get it. Or you could not do weights but then do barefoot running. But either way, that's going to load the lower Achilles and planter and it should compensate. But again, everyone's a little different. Everyone's strides a little different. Adam and I, our mechanics are very different.

23:39Eric Avila: And I don't know your guys' mechanics. So that's my thought.

23:43Adam Dailey: I get beat up by them enough that they are self-limiters. They're great for me right up until I can't hold the stride anymore. It gives me a stride I'm not capable of keeping. The right shoe for the right distance is beautiful, but then I pay for it. Then I'm sore and I just can't choose one for a few days. So I used to be mad at that, and now I'm happy in that it's a self-limiting thing. But Kirk's foot action, he could run at them every day, and he'd be better every day.

24:13Eric Avila: Until I tear it. I'm not tempted by that.

24:15Adam Dailey: Until you tear it.

24:17Eric Avila: Moving on from Super Shoes, are either of you guys chasing any metrics right now or chasing competition in any capacity, structured training, or have we moved into the season of life where we're running for life? That's a good question. I guess I can answer first. I don't know where I'm at with it. I wanted to take a gap year or two. I was really mentally wanting that break. But now I've been telling Adam, I'm kind of looking for something. I'm like, ooh. So the other day I was talking to Teva, the sandal company, and they were like, hey, you want to wear these sandals? They're making a sandal with a carbon plate in it.

24:50Eric Avila: And they're like, can you run a mile in this? And like, so we were joking around and I was telling Adam, I was like, maybe I'll do that. Maybe I'll do. And I've actually never run a marathon. So I did tell Adam at some point, maybe when it gets closer to 2028, I'll necessarily around and try to qualify just i don't know in type of then again if we get busy with this i might just we're gonna get to that in a second too of course but are you would would you uh would you chase it hard like see if we can run something like for real for real chase it or dabble and then let come to you it's a good question i mean obviously your hype and potential is so high so yeah i can i can see what'll happen is is uh i'll probably start like tasting some fitness and then i'm sure i'll right now i'm like oh no i'm just gonna do it for fun but i know that's not what's gonna happen you know you're gonna start getting fit and like adam and i'll go on runs and one of us will feel good and it's like two pitbulls you just like like he's a competitive guy too and so we'll be with our kids you know sometimes every coach and i can't let them go i don't know i'm like damn it maybe that's what makes us good athletes but like even the other yesterday we were running with them and i was like yeah i gotta train i have i have like unwritten rule.

25:57Eric Avila: I'm like, my athletes can't be faster than me. Problem is my kids are really fast. So I'm like, but anyway, yeah, I guess I don't have an answer, but, um, it's definitely been brewing a little bit on my mind. What about you, Adam? Are you chasing anything right now?

26:10Adam Dailey: No. And like we kind of said in the beginning, I think it, it helps when you are versus, I mean, I'm fit. I mean, I'd run every day with, with all of our kids and do the jump in a bunch of workouts and stuff, but it would definitely be better if I was like, I'm trying to run this time or place top 10 in this right i i know that about myself i just i'm also just like kind of a puss sometimes where i'm just like i just want to want to i don't want to be held accountable you know like i want to you know so it's it is that it's the the thing of running is like we tell we talk to our kids about this a lot it's uh it's actually like really vulnerable in a way because you think you're putting a number next to your name right you're putting something in black and white that will literally be there for the forever.

26:53Adam Dailey: At this point, there's going to be an imprint on the internet with your name and this time forever. And maybe no one cares, but, but maybe they do. You know what I mean? I mean, so it's like, it's, it's, uh, you're kind of putting yourself out there. And so I think that's one of the beautiful things about it, but that's also the stories I tell myself of like, you know, I think I'm going to jump in a cross country race this weekend. I thought about it the other day and I was like, Ooh, kind of getting nervous thinking about it. I was like, shit, I haven't had those like nerves in a while, but it's like good thing.

27:20Adam Dailey: You know, I mean, making yourself uncomfortable. It's another thing we talk about all the time. We've all chosen this really weird sport that 99 % of the world cannot relate. They can relate to the running. They can't put themselves as deep in the pain cave as we can. Like, it's just not something a normal person does on a regular basis when they're going to work or playing basketball with their friends or doing anything, even hitting the weight room. They may be feeling that for like half a second on that 10th rep, you know what I mean? but they are not 15 minutes just in that deep, dark place at a time or whatever.

27:55Adam Dailey: My daughter started cross two weeks ago. She's in sixth grade. And it was a good reminder that you're really only as tough as you are fit. There's so many kids out there just not really able to hurt for very long because it's so self-limiting. And we're surrounded by athletes who are training hard. And then it is mind games matter and where you're at mentally and your life stress and all that. But then it's a good reminder that when you're not in shape, no, you have no concept of what it means to sit real close to the flame for an extended period of time. For sure.

28:34Eric Avila: Adam, I have a selfish question for you. So I said I'm 43. You were chasing the marathon trials, 43. Somebody that's run so high end is you. Uh, now that you're 50 does, cause I'm in this own little, you know, midlife running crisis. I'm still comparing, like, I still want to win everything. I don't care if I'm racing a 26 year old or a 36 year old and doing a decent job at it. However, at some point, like even somebody who has run so high level as you, who's still training to this day, do you ever switch that? Does that mindset ever change to like, is being a grand master now? like is that are you happy enough to set 50 50 year old plus records or win the age group or does that mean very little compared to your previous life because i'm not sure how it's gonna be for

29:24Adam Dailey: me uh yeah i don't i think it there's like a little bit of satisfaction but not really i mean i think it's like you want it you want to win you want to prove yourself you want it like eric said we get competitive with our kids all the time but it's also like i mean i'm a little more confident in kind of who I like I knowing when to back but like yesterday we did this you know we did three times a two mile in a mile all threshold right and so I did the first two and they're like are you are you gonna do the whole thing like during the second one I was like hell no I'm not doing I they laughed you know the top two guys were laughing because I'm like hell no I'm not running seven miles of shit with you guys but I'm like but I jumped in and did like the first two and then I did a mile mile so I did I got like just under six or you know compared to their seven And so it's like, you know, I think that was, it's just understanding.

30:12Adam Dailey: I also, I've gotten, I tore my hamstring last year and I'm like, I don't want to like, it's not worth, it's kind of like if you ever snow ski, like I love snow skiing, but I never want to like do anything dangerous to where I'm like in a boot for six months. And so for me, that's where I'm just like, when we get three years ago, we used to go down the track and do 200s and I'd be running 29s and stuff. and I don't touch that stuff anymore because I'm just like, the risk is the risk. But yeah, I mean, I don't, I don't, I have that here at CIM, I have, I got this really cool backpack that I like because it's a cool backpack with cool colors and has a bunch of pockets, but it says like CIM age group champion.

30:51Adam Dailey: I hate that backpack. Like I use it, but I hate it because I think people think I'm like bringing it to the airport and bragging like, oh, check this out. And I'm like, I hate that mentality, right? And so I just like, I mean, it's embarrassing Even though it's my favorite backpack and I bring it on most of my trips, people will notice and I'm like, oh, shit, I need to put a patch over there.

31:10Eric Avila: He's resorted to the age group champ, right? That's what you think people are thinking.

31:14Adam Dailey: Exactly. But there's some community. Like in these cross-country races, there's a master's race. And it's like you don't – there's a community component. It's definitely less intense, right? I mean in terms of like we're having fun. Every now and then we'll be like, oh, we all drank beers together last night. You know, so there's like there's it's it's not as intense as it was. But I think, yeah, I think when you're when you've got, you know, like like you, Kirk, if you got if you got the hot hand and you're feeling good, you got to ride. You got to play that play that hand out as long as you can and stay at the table for as long as you can.

31:47Eric Avila: And maybe go down in flames. Maybe.

31:50Adam Dailey: Yeah. I mean, we all got it. We all got to be bounced from that table eventually. Sad reality.

31:56Eric Avila: So let's talk about what you what we're kind of here to talk about today. I just want to get to know you guys a little bit first because you guys obviously have such a vast running history that I'm sure we could BS about this stuff all day. But I'm assuming, Adam, is it your kid who you were along the ride with the recruiting process from high school to college and reached out basically talking about the process, the recruitment process for high school kids entering the collegiate ranks? And your daughter goes to Stanford, is it?

32:29Adam Dailey: Yeah, she just started Stanford.

32:30Eric Avila: Stanford. So quite a running acumen as well. And you're talking about how the recruiting process hasn't changed much. And that sparked some ideas with you guys. Talk to us about that. Start wherever you'd like.

32:46Adam Dailey: Yeah. I mean, like you said, I think it was, you know, I knew about my recruiting process. And same thing with Eric. We both were, you know, kind of top kids in the nation. Got to pick where we wanted to go and all that. At Stanford, ironically, was my second choice. and so for years I would tell Kiara I'm like ah maybe you should go to Stanford that would have been a good that would have been a good choice you know not but uh but I think a lot of it was just the fact that it's it that it hadn't changed and that I was I'd reached out to coaches for some of the other athletes we coach and just just realize this no one knows what's going on the coaches kind of are overwhelmed and you know some of the best coaches are great coaches and they suck at recruiting right they don't have the bandwidth to do that or they have they're raising their families.

33:31Adam Dailey: So they don't want to call kids at night or whatever. And so what we just found was there wasn't much information, you know, and there wasn't this journey was easier for Kiara, my daughter, someone like that, when she's, you know, top five in the country, it's an easier, you know, people know her by name. So the coaches would pick up or whatever, but it wasn't, they weren't pursuing her in the way that I was even pursued back in the day. And part of that's just a lot of information out there, right? I mean, in terms of like, they could call me on my home phone in college, right? And they're, you know, and, but, but so that kind of led us to, to start, it just started with, I think, you know, everyone approaching me in terms of colleagues, other parents and things of like, how I'm starting this process, explain to me how this goes, you know, and I'd introduce kids to coaches, and they'd end up going there.

34:20Adam Dailey: And it was like, and I realized I was like, man, this is a process that I understand really well. How do I teach others without creating some consulting company or something like that? How do I fix this problem? So that's kind of where we started was just like, hey, let's get all the information out there. And it took us like a year to basically accumulate all the info. So we found information about every single college, about every one they have on their roster, every single recruit they've had the past couple of years. and then just listened to what the data, because it's like, if you Google like, oh, Stanford recruiting times, you'll find third-party websites telling you these times and sometimes they're accurate, sometimes they're not.

35:00Adam Dailey: And so what we wanted was just actually, what does the data say? Like, oh, this is, and sometimes it's really different than what you think it might be. So that's kind of how we started it. I think that's the story behind it. And I think that was like me as like the recruiting component. And I think what Eric can talk in his own component is like the coaching and how those those kind of fit together. We just saw all this alignment of like, oh, my gosh, these kids need help here and here and here. And they want, you know, they want their hand held on lots of it. And and the joke is like, you know, like in all these youth sports we've seen is a parent will pay seventy thousand dollars to get their kid a thirty thousand dollar scholarship.

35:39Adam Dailey: You know, so and so we're not trying. I wouldn't say we're trying to capitalize on that, but we see the opportunity with with, you know, a lot of people want to compete at the next level and they just don't know how. And it's there's a there's a huge variation from Chiara who ran a 433 mile. And we had a girl who ran a 523 mile last year, almost a minute slower. She's running D1 and they had a complete they had completely different journeys, completely different sets of problems. But there was a lot of misinformation and struggling in terms of getting to the finish line. This would have been beautiful for me in high school.

36:13Adam Dailey: I was not a D1 runner. I didn't belong there. But all I wanted to do was get out of state and compete at a level that would give me money. I didn't care where I went. I just wanted to do it. And I went through every D1 and D2 website. I took a study hall and dropped it and spent that time every day going through every... I ended up sending out like 188 athletic resumes to these, but I went through every roster and looked at what they ran and sorted by these were the schools that I thought I could convince someone I could make their roster. 188 different times I said, yeah, maybe and sent it out.

36:53Adam Dailey: And from that 188, there were four letters from the four letters. There were two calls from the two calls. there was one partial scholarship offer to a place I should never gone in the first place. But there's no information about why I shouldn't have gone there. But this was made for me. That process, I lived. And it was so gray area and so frustrating to try to find information. And I went back through when I was coaching high school and did this process for one of my athletes. And this was now 20 some years later. And the websites were no better. all the PT timing all of these sites and they're still missing results everywhere you are right so this resonates with me but I just want you to know this probably I know you know what happens but it probably happens to the sub-elite runners like every minute out there someone's going through this I'm not even going to try because it's so overwhelming you only wrote half the schools You don't even realize it.

37:54Adam Dailey: There's 345 D1 programs. I looked through every single one, and this was the information I could find. Right. So, yeah, there were rocks that I couldn't even find to look underneath. Yeah. And that's one of the neat things now is you have all this information, but there's not ways to process it. And so that's where we're continually trying to figure out how to process it. I mean, I got a junior boy in high school who doesn't want to do anything for himself. you know, clean up his room or anything or check his text message or anything like that. And so for for me, that's like the, you know, again, the next level of like, how do you how do you help this kid, you know, go through this process, especially when the coaches don't want to hear from me as the coach or as the parent or anything like that.

38:39Adam Dailey: So it's like you have to teach, you have to give these kids a platform where they can control their own journey or else it's just they end up, you know, getting lost. And a lot of the things that happen are the these kids just end up at the wrong places, like you said, the wrong choice, or they end up this mad scramble right at the end with roster. It's like with the two weeks to go and the school's been saying no, or like, okay, fine, we'll take you because this didn't work out how we wanted, but it's got to be a fit, right? And there's opportunities, right? That's the cool thing. There's a place for everyone.

39:10And that's kind of what we think about.

39:12Adam Dailey: So what is the perfect product? Let's say that endgame, you got there. You built everything you ever wanted. What would this platform look like and how would I use it? I think the perfect product is, you know, it gets easier and easier for us. We're trying to curate all this data into a good user experience, which is tough for a couple of guys who aren't super techie. But I think it's, again, giving you this curated journey to where you understand the process and can have kind of someone holding your hand throughout it and you end up at the right place, at a place that wants you. And that's kind of the thing that as humans, we all want to be wanted, right?

39:52Adam Dailey: We don't want to feel like people are doing us a favor or like we're a burden or whatever. And that's sometimes how this goes, unfortunately, for the student athlete is it's like they have to follow up with the coaches more than that. that dynamic has completely changed. I feel like when I was getting recruited, the coaches pursued the athlete more and that is not the way it is anymore. It is, they, they got, I don't know if it's because they're busier or because they're lazier or because they, you know, kids are just faster or whatever it is. But, um, but it's like, I want, we want to give the kids some power back.

40:26Adam Dailey: Um, I also think we want event, our long-term vision is this, this is a better, like a marketplace to where the college coaches are just as active as, as the high school kids and the parents. And And so that way that you can find it's like a match finder. Right. But in order for college coaches to do that, we need to bring the athletes to the platform first. But for college coaches, the same thing. They see a kid. I need a pole vaulter. So, you know, if you're in Washington, you start with Washington, probably pole vaulters. And if you're not that good in pole vault, you're probably not going to go recruit the best kids in Florida.

40:55Adam Dailey: So you don't even try in Florida. And so it's like but there could be this marketplace to where you're like, look, I need a 16 foot pole vaulter. I got half a scholarship, but I don't have, I can't go and call 75 kids or reach out to them on Instagram or do all this. I don't have a recruiting budget. Like it's, I know it's overwhelming for the coaches too. So I think it's like, that's the problem. The bigger problem I think we eventually want to solve is like, how do we just like facilitate that whole process? And right now we're just like from point to advocate for the student athletes so that, so that kids can continue.

41:25Adam Dailey: I think that's our, that's another thing we talk about a lot. It's like, I mean, Eric ran, you know, he started at D1, then he went another route. And there's tons of guys making the Olympic team every, maybe not in 2024 as much, but like Brian Sell and these types of guys who were not competitive in college. There's always a guy or girl like that on the distance team that they just didn't give up. Right. And so it's like, if you don't give up, we, our thesis is that you can continue to compete maybe in D1, maybe not. But if you are a boy 22 ,800 runner and you really want to run and call it and keep going, there's a place.

42:02Adam Dailey: We'll help find you a place type of thing.

42:04Eric Avila: I graduated high school in 2001. And I got recruited, we'll call it, heavily by D3 and pretty much by nobody else. And my experience was at the end of the day, the school announcements would say, and Kirk DeWitt, you have mail at the office, like over the PA system. That's how it happened in my day. There'd be a few kids getting recruited. And so we would get called to the school administrative office and I would have a hard mail saying, from the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, coach where I ended up going. And then the follow-up would be like a phone number in there or like a form to fill out.

42:42Eric Avila: But I didn't know you could even reach out to coaches, let alone get anybody's attention with my mid-high school resume. And so it was letters. in the mail at my school. They didn't have our address. And so my perspective was back then, it was like, I thought the only route was the coaches reached out to you. And now if I'm understanding correctly, it almost is reversed where these kids are chasing the coaches because the programs have established themselves and made a name and everybody wants to go to Oregon or wants to go to Stanford or, um, the Midwest kids want to go to Wisconsin. Um, so is that accurate?

43:18Adam Dailey: is that really shifted like that that much yeah yeah it's it's it's the dynamic has shifted and it's uh i think it's there's a lot of so again kiara is a good example she's this top five kid and the top five freshman in this country then top five sophomore she was always top five and i think she reached out to every single one of the colleges that she does as a 433 mile And I think, I don't think there were more than a dozen schools that reached out other than those, you know, because they also are like, oh, I'm at Nebraska. She'd never come here. So, like, what also happens, like, I had the same experience as you, Kirk.

43:58Adam Dailey: I'd get tons of letters, right? And I was like, oh, this is cool. Because back then they were just printing them out and sending them to any kid that ran under a certain time, right? And now I think there's just a lot of coaches just like, oh, I would never come here. She's from California. Californians don't leave California. or whatever story they're telling themselves, right? Oh, I recruit from here and, you know, whatever. I don't know. But it's, yeah, that's, the dynamic has definitely shifted. I don't know. I can't, I can't tell you if KR got one letter to the school. Really? I mean, honestly.

44:28Adam Dailey: And a lot of the reach out, the other 12 I told you about are probably like Instagram DMs and stuff, you know?

44:34Eric Avila: Yeah. Instagram goes hard right now with these kids. It's crazy. We interviewed my alma mater head coach. you remember that Bracken we interviewed Eamon uh great in retrospect right now no no not great in retrospect right now program just got canned it did but but he was I mean I don't think he is the the recruiting process was very frustrating for him because he felt like the kids were very accessible right and and they were chasing down who they wanted where they wanted to go to school and Oshkosh program we were national champs there a few times while I was there and the program had deteriorated.

45:08Eric Avila: And so the, the sex appeal wasn't there for anybody to come there. And so it was just almost not an option. Like he couldn't get the kids to buy in and they were already talking to a bunch of other schools and it was all via Instagram. Honestly, he's like, I'm not even on Instagram. Like I am losing this battle here on the recruiting front. I just can't get kids to even want to come here and keep an eye. Cause they've already, they've already been talking to other schools. Like, is that what it's just like, is it a social media game right now? Is it

45:36Adam Dailey: like is that for real that's where we're at eric's big on instagram i'll let him take that but i

45:41Eric Avila: think yeah i mean i i think uh there's a couple things i wrote down that i was as adam was talking is some of the kids you know rightfully so they're in high school so uh their social media is private and i kind of had to tell some of them like hey your senior year you should probably make it public because if it's private if a coach messages you like or at least check your request file you know if it's private i don't know um but yeah because that's part of the recruiting game you know and i was hanging out i was gonna say between adam and i the other reason why this is a really cool scope for us to pivot with this with this idea brand is um we're at a we're at a good age gap where adam knows pretty much every coach or director from you know that he crossed pathways from like let's say 90 to 2010 or 15 and then and then i've got all the younger whatever you want I'll call it like my buddy Ryan Hill, who ran the 5K, and he's now the head coach or the head distance at Berkeley.

46:38Eric Avila: And then yesterday, I actually ironically just spoke to Ben True, and I'm sure you guys know who that is. He's the coach at Dartmouth, and one of our kids is getting recruited by him. And so those are like – I wouldn't say the younger coaches, but those are the next generation coach. And then you have a John McDonald who obviously passed away, but that Adam has connections with those that I don't have. those you know so and but talking to these coaches um yeah one of my friends is that she's the head women's at university of san francisco or head assistant i guess and she sat with me one time and we were at nike outdoor nationals in eugene and she was on instagram actively dming the kids as they would finish a race she'd be like who's that kid and then she'd pull up their instagram dm them be like hey and she was on the university of san francisco uh like instagram like team's Instagram.

47:27Eric Avila: And she was DMing the kids as they would cross the line. And then she'd be like, but I was watching her do it. And I was like, this is how you recruit. This is what you're doing. So it's interesting. And to piggyback that, if you've guys seen the movie hustle with Adam Sandler or a money ball with Jonah Hill and Brad Pitt. So in those cases in hustle, he's, you know, he's a recruiter and a scout for Philadelphia 76ers, right? Yeah. A lot of money. He's flying all over the place and he's scouting athletes. And in Moneyball, you know, it's a major league baseball and you have a whole team with an algorithm.

48:02Eric Avila: Well, in cross country and track, the honest answer is the person probably recruiting your kid is probably some 23-year-old grad student. And so it's not necessarily – unless you're like Kiara, Adam's daughter, then – But the other kids, I'd almost argued 90 % of them, they're getting recruited off the bat from this 23-year-old grad student. And so what I mean by that is they may miss some gaps here in recruiting, while if you take ownership and you reach out directly to the contact of the coach, then they'll be like, oh my gosh, there's Kirk. Maybe I should talk to him. But otherwise, the 23-year-old grad student is like, I picked these, who knows.

48:44Eric Avila: Um, but that's what I mean by, uh, there's a, not a power dynamic struggle, but there's a shift in, um, how to, how to take control a little bit. Adam, does that make sense? I don't know if you had anything to add.

48:55Adam Dailey: So is your goal just that everyone gets seen by the right eyes? Is this basically just, is this a dating app, but for recruiting, are you just trying to match people up? Like that are good matches. Is that an oversimplification? No, I mean, I think that's where we're trying to go. I think we're trying to do, we'll, we'll eventually, like I said, try and do other things. But yeah, absolutely. That's where we want people to go in. And the best case scenarios, they end up somewhere that wants them and they don't waste their time writing the wrong people or contacting the wrong people. So outside of ensuring that when, I don't even know what your platform would look like, but when a list populates that it's PRs based around potential roster slots and previous years' performances, outside of that, so that you're seeing programs that would mesh well.

49:41Adam Dailey: What are you doing to make sure that the right names get seen by the right eyes? I mean, we've put a lot of other things into it in terms of like, oh, school size, SAT, do you need money? All these things go into kind of the formula so that people, so we can actually match them. And kind of what Eric said is like, it's like, yeah, the Oregons and the Stamfords and the University of Texas, these programs are always going to be okay. They're never going to be. And, and, you know, the, the very tiny programs probably too, because they don't have any money or scholarship and they'll just take, you know, whoever they can get type of thing.

50:17Adam Dailey: But it's like, there's, there's hundreds of schools kind of in the middle that again, they're, they're too intimidated to go after the blue chips. They kind of don't know, they don't know, you know, they don't probably have a bunch of money. And so for us, it's like, we're trying to like, why, why would you write, you know, why would you write a university of Oregon if you're, you know, a 423 boy, my, there, like, you're just, you're just wasting people's time and you're, you're, you know, um, that being said, there's, there's good places for you to go. And we even have like a projection component where it's like, if you're running four 23 as a sophomore, we've, it's not a, like a guess it's data that tells us you're going to run, you know, four 16 as a senior four 15 or whatever it is like based on thousands of kids who ran for, we we've only gone about five years back, but about, about, you know, based on that, this is how good you're going to get.

51:03Adam Dailey: If you're already running four or seven as a sophomore, where you're not going to run, you're not going to improve as much. Right. And so we show them that to where, so they can kind of equip themselves with that information too, of like, Hey, when they're talking to coaches, but it's also that guidance of like, like that's what a lot of coaches will tell us is like, dude, we don't care that you're in theater and that you're this, or that it was raining the day you set your PR. Like, Oh, you know, we just, we just need some numbers and we need to understand that to even like baseline know if you're worth talking to, which is like, you know, you're basically, can I get you into school here?

51:34Adam Dailey: And how good are you? And how old are you? That's like, that's it. But all these kids will write paragraphs and paragraphs on being student body president and how, you know, they were really sick when they ran that PR and they're capable of so much more, you know. Is there a component to that that would be necessary though? It'd be like, we ran 14 miles a week in high school and I ran 420 versus I ran 80 miles a week and ran 420? Not until you've talked to them. I don't think so. I think when they call you on the phone and you can actually get to know them, I think that becomes relevant. But I don't even know if they believe you.

52:08Adam Dailey: Everyone says that, right? I'm pure talent. I don't run much. Is there a component to that built into this where you're helping put an appropriate asterisk or is that just not even the aim of this? That's not in the outreach. Like I said, I think that's a – I mean because that's what we're hearing is the coaches just don't care. honestly they don't they don't want to develop as much there's a there's a handful of coaches that do but i would say the vast majority they would never admit that of course but they don't want to develop this kid based on you know because it's also they have their own demands right like there's a lot more pressure on these coaches than there was probably 30 years ago um so they they gotta they gotta look at the like can this kid score how how how soon can this kid score and so I was telling Eric the other day, it's like when I was in school, which was the low point in American distance running the late mid nineties, right?

53:01Adam Dailey: It was literally, that's where I told you, Rod DeHaven made it the Olympic team. He's the only guy. And I think he ran like two, two 13 or two 14. And, and it was, it's documented as being the low point. And so, but we were recruited off of like, like the, the least you ran was, it was cool. Like it was like the, the coaches all wanted the raw talent they wanted the guy who ran nine miles a week and you know and and i feel like that's shifted i feel like it's now you want the nico young like oh this guy's gonna come in day one i don't have to worry about him getting hurt he's gonna come contribute he's gonna be you know fourth or fifth in the ncaa's his freshman year like i want that i don't want the raw talent i'm this raw talent kid who runs nine miles a week who knows he might get he might be hurt his first three years you know so would your platform have a then a route for those kids like you don't have a number to show what you have, but we have programs that like developing, like, will you eventually flesh all those paths out for kids?

53:56Adam Dailey: I think so. But like most of the people, I mean, Eric and me know the developers. Okay. And I think it's like right now, I don't know if there's a number that you can do that with. Right. I mean, but it's like, there's a lot of coaches who like developing talent.

54:09Eric Avila: I think it's curated more towards roster caps right now. So the biggest thing that's changed that I was going to chime in on is that there's roster caps now. Like, And so what's happening is people are getting cut, which didn't used to have as much because now it's like, hey, you can only have 17 people on that roster for cross country, no more. And so what the platform is also doing is it's looking for like, okay, like most recently there's an athlete that I'm helping find a school. She's a senior. She's a jumper, all state, everything. And we put in schools and a Berkeley came up. And she was like, wait, I'm matching with Berkeley.

54:45Eric Avila: And we looked and basically Berkeley has two senior high jumpers and they have nothing else. So next year they will have this many high jumpers. So she fills the roster cap or like she fills a gap there. So it's like, she's like, oh my gosh, maybe, maybe, you know, there's an opportunity there. And then, so then we contact them and go, well, look, you know, you're about to have zero high jumpers in, in, you know, in nine months. You know, so where are they at with that? Were they, you know, whatever. And if they can fill that gap. So maybe not so much with distance running because we like the whole big group, you know, train of threshold and development.

55:19Eric Avila: But at the end of the day, these guys get paid. These coaches, unfortunately, you know, they got to they got to fill the rosters out. And with the roster caps happening, I think it's also going to cause shifting. So the whole sexy, like we said, guy who's a B or C tier athlete on the team, instead of sticking it out and grinding, he's just going to get cut because of like University of Florida. we were talking to the coach at U20s and he was like, anyone on my roster now is on this much money. And if you're not on the roster, there's no middle ground or whatever.

55:54Adam Dailey: Yeah, it's all full right.

55:55Eric Avila: Yeah, every school is different. But I'm saying, well, if it's full right or nothing, then there is no developmental athlete at the University of Florida in that conversation, right? So now maybe D3 or D2, like Kirk is talking about, it moves different. But that's where this would curate. When you put your data in, it'd be like, oh, I didn't realize this is an option or that is an option. And that's what I meant by between Adam and I and being in communication with coaches. We know most of these coaches, so we can actually fact check them a little bit. We know we do some data scrubbing and we have a developer working on stuff.

56:28Eric Avila: And then I can also, like my buddy, I ran with him in college and he just became right below Jerry at Oregon. And so I was texting him the other day and I was like, I'm going to pick your brain now. what's going on in Oregon or, you know, and things like that. And, and we can fact check like, Hey, what do you need? And you know, whatever. So it's interesting to be able to figure that out.

56:49Adam Dailey: We're trying to give everyone the information and so they can curate and advocate for themselves. But it's like, what, what Eric said is like what it'll end up happening is you'll, you'll have a, you know, a five, three, five, four high jumper. And they'll contact someone and they're like, sorry, we only recruit five, six and above. And you're like, okay. And then what part of what our site does, it shows them, well, here's what they did last year. And so you'll see like, dude, your top girl ran to jump five, three, like, why are you telling me you wouldn't even look, you're not even going to talk to me.

57:15Adam Dailey: And so again, we don't want them to go say that to a coach and be arrogant and be like, well, you know, so it's just, but we want them to have the information. Right. So they can understand like, look, this is, you know, this is what coaches sometimes say, but here's how to approach it. And again, you're, you're also not looking to top out at five, three, right. You're the story eventually does become what you're saying, Kirk is like, I think I can beat better. Right. You know, I can get to a better level. I think there's a, there's a story here. Um, it's just hard on that first one because they're getting these emails every day for, you know, so they're just like, no, no, no, too long, too long, too long.

57:49Eric Avila: Interesting. And the late nineties had Bob Kennedy and now your daughter's her teammate. So it's full circle, full circle, right?

57:56Adam Dailey: Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty cool.

57:58Eric Avila: I'm trying to think of another sport that this, uh, gosh, this is such a, a needed space. And I'm trying to think of an objective sport. Like, I mean, And as you said, Adam, unfortunately, your name is attached to the number when the race is over. And there's nothing more objective than that. Nobody cares about your tummy ache that day. What's on paper is on paper. So this is the perfect sport to do this with.

58:20Adam Dailey: You could argue swimming and maybe wrestling.

58:23Eric Avila: Obviously, wrestling is less.

58:26Adam Dailey: But I think wrestling could make sense. Golf. In terms of weight and whatever. Running coaches may be the least prepared to handle recruiting demands out of any sport I know. since it's really not a huge part of their training.

58:41Eric Avila: That's why it goes to the grad student, man. That's what I was saying. Handle this.

58:46Adam Dailey: I watched my sister get recruited for basketball, and then she ended up coaching at the collegiate level. And that is part of their job description. That is part of what they're hired for is, can you recruit? What are your connections? Here are your regions. That's part of how they fill their coaching tree is, where can you connect us to? run that really doesn't enter the equation and running very often so this is a this is a sport that's wholly unprepared to do anything other than try to fill a roster yeah my one of my best buddies was like the coach at university of texas for years and he was like his joke was always like dude i couldn't talk to like high school girls when i was in high school how do they think i'm supposed to talk to them calling at night now but you know 20 years later and have all this confidence you know but it's yeah i mean it's and he's a great coach he just was he just didn't like recruiting and i i mean i've you know i think all of us have thought about something coaching but it's the same thing when i get home i want to i want to relax and have a beer i don't want to start getting the phone out and calling a bunch of high school kids that might blow me off and make me feel make me feel worse than i already do like i'm like this high school kid just rejected me it's sales it's not coaching 100 coaches don't handle rejection any better than athletes do but salesmen do and they kind of just spam the button that they know like you get a pipeline to a place you just you just spam that which is why football programs have recruiting coordinators that they make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year and that's all they do right well yeah and those

1:00:15Eric Avila: sports i mean most of those are like well i see this kid's numbers on paper but i got to get eyes on them or at least watch some footage and any run run coach can be like i can just wait for the results to come through and pop up on the internet and i can objectively i don't i don't really care how this kid ran 405 in the mile that day. I just care that he ran 405, right? Whereas like the sand between the cracks matters so much more in like skill-based ball sports in particular, right? This algorithm may not work quite as smoothly, but like for this sector, it's beautiful.

1:00:43Adam Dailey: Yeah, like I said, maybe the marketplace thing, if we can figure that out in the future, maybe that's where it goes to football and things like that. If you could actually go like, you know, let them coordinate things together, right? Yeah.

1:00:55Eric Avila: It's money ball, man. It is. if you read that book and or Sockonomics, I don't know if you've read that book. It's all, it's similar to this, but with European football, it's just breaks it all down analytically with, and then there's a component of crossover in terms of how can you fill the gaps per team? And it's pretty cool.

1:01:12Adam Dailey: So how hands-on are you two currently with this? Like if I was, if I, I'm a junior in high school, am I given information and tools and I go with it? Or are you like, are you wheeling and dealing when needed? I mean, we're the, we're the main two people doing it. So it's like, if you're, if you're, if you're working with us, you're going to work with one of us likely. And yeah, and like, like there's other kind of, I guess you could say curated services we do where it's like, we will hold some hands for some, some families if they want that, like, of like, oh, we'll actually call. We'll, we'll reach out to the San Francisco coach or the Oregon coach or whatever.

1:01:47Adam Dailey: We, we, we know these people we can help. um but yeah for the most part we're we're we've got our head down and we're we're this is all we're kind of working on we've had a bunch of other ventures in the past both of us individually but this is like we're we're excited about solving these problems and we have a whole coaching component that that eric handles we do we coach the kids too so it's like this full package of like oh we can you know in order to get where you want to go you need to run a 408 mile and you've got 18 months to do it. So we can get you there. Not only can we get you in contact with that school, but we can get you to be a 408 miler.

1:02:23Adam Dailey: So this intrigues me because I say no to all those requests. I do not coach high schoolers. I coached high school back in the day, but now I do not, as an independent coach, I just don't say yes to those requests because I don't want to navigate that process. But clearly you're all in on that process. So how do you go about training a high school kid when they are on a team? How do you navigate the full 12 months of the year? What does that look like working with a kid who is on track or wanting to go D1?

1:02:55Eric Avila: I guess I'll take that one. Yeah. Yeah, it kind of depends. I'm assuming you're talking remote. So like if it was a kid in Minnesota. Yeah. Either or. But yeah. Because it is different. I mean, because California has CIF rules. So we have to abide by these in-season rules. So what's really cool here is outside of the CIF season, the California season, that there's nothing, there's no structure. Most of the schools, what I'm noticing, don't have any infrastructure for the offseason. So these kids in the summertime and wintertime, they want to train, but they're just like, what do they do and where do they go and how do they communicate?

1:03:30Eric Avila: And so it's been cool to have like a summer winter program for them to kind of stay in touch and then kind of bridge that for them. And then, yeah, I mean, some of the kids go back to their coaches in season.

1:03:43Adam Dailey: But talk about the Minnesota. Talk about the Minnesota. I think the more complex ones. I mean, talk about.

1:03:48Eric Avila: Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, so in Minnesota, it'd be remote. I think we would, you know, it depends on what your situation is, obviously, with the coaches at that school. A lot of times, you know, we'll give guidance and support. so again if you were in minnesota and you were looking for you know obviously colleges and stuff we would uh kind of do consulting to to discuss well this is what you need to get to this is what you need to run and then it'd be like well who's your coach what's your setup now and then it'd be more on you of like how much touch points you need in terms of uh guidance now if you were like some of these kids come to us and they're like i don't have a coach and i'm like we don't and so those are cleaner, obviously, to navigate the coaching.

1:04:30And then some of them, they're like, well, my

1:04:33Eric Avila: coach is there, but they said I can do my own program if you... I'm not going to be in Minnesota. So I'm like, okay, well, ask your coach if you could do something along these lines. And that's kind of how we navigate that. So it's been pretty fun. And then one of the kids, he was like, can I do a lactate blood lactate test? Can you analyze it? So he went to a local university. This is up in LA. I had nothing to do with it, but they scheduled it and then they sent me the results And I was able to like give them guidance of like, well, this is what this means now. And this is, you know, this is how we can tweak your training based on your blood volume and based on your lactate testing.

1:05:03Eric Avila: And so it's cool stuff like that, that we can kind of curate.

1:05:06Adam Dailey: I think it's also the parents figuring out the right parent. I mean, I think that's the thing that scares most coaches away is dealing with parents. And so it's like the parents have to be a better fit almost than the athletes. So like how, like, you know, who's getting coached? Am I coaching the parents or am I coaching the athlete? Right. So what do you do in the scenario where off seasons are like open season? Kids, great. Parents are great. Then you get in season and you've been, let's say you've been running 70 miles per week with these kids. And now the coach is like, we're a 30 mile program.

1:05:41Adam Dailey: How do you go about navigating when the coach doesn't want to work with you?

1:05:45Eric Avila: Yeah. I mean, it's individual. So we try to figure that out beforehand, obviously. um so right now we have a coaching like platform that i can message the kids and the parents are on there so it's you know that's all there and then um if the coach didn't didn't want to work together then yeah i mean at the end of the day i think uh you know you got to find something that

1:06:06Adam Dailey: works for the kids and uh i think we default to to their school and if that's what they want yeah i don't think you'd ever tell a kid not to listen to their yeah i would never sneak around and go run 40 miles on their own in the afternoons or something you just pause it and you'd be like you

1:06:21Eric Avila: know what we pause and then we'll you know we'll we'll re re like go in the off season again and we just want to be there as a tool as a support tool and as much as we can but we're not going to fight the states and the uh the school so yeah that that's i think how i think you said the other

1:06:35Adam Dailey: day you're like i'm a coach in the off season and more of a consultant and even though it's like the similar yeah you told someone that the other day and i was like oh that's a good way of looking I mean, so it's like, you know, Eric's like, I'll guide you if you, especially if you have a coach who wants to, wants to drive the car. Right. It depends on everyone. And if there were a coach who was doing really stupid stuff in the spring and, or like I said, they had overbearing parents or whatever it was, we'd probably sniff that on the beginning and be like, dude, this isn't, this isn't going to be the right fit, you know, because we want, we want what's best for everyone, you know?

1:07:06Adam Dailey: And so that's where it's like the parents have different ideas than the kids sometimes and as well as the coaches. And most of the time we found the coaches don't really on the high school level know what they're doing. And most of them are OK, like admitting that, you know, when they get it, when they get it, you know, they get a Ferrari. They're like, dude, I've never driven a Ferrari, actually. Like, I don't mind if you like give me some pointers on how to drive the Ferrari, you know, like as long as I can. Is that your main clientele? are you getting mostly high performers or do you have a lot of kids who their parents want them to

1:07:38Eric Avila: be high performers but aren't you get a mixed bag i think i mean we got some killers for sure um but you get a mixed bag i mean like we have i have a client up in san francisco area which is what's that eight hours from here and uh i don't see them at all but the dad's the coach of the school and so i just send the program the dad runs it and for all the kids they probably just think the dad made up or that coach made the but it's we're consulting i guess in that case you know for him. And, and, um, you know, a lot of the stuff we're doing is, uh, I mean, I basically took everything I did at Adidas at the end there, um, all the Norwegian model stuff and the threshold work.

1:08:13Eric Avila: So it's a cool, I think it's, we haven't even talked about that, but I think the training has completely changed. And I think I'm opinionated that I feel like this is adapt or die. I feel like if you don't pivot to this kind of style, I think you're going to get left behind. I just think that science is pointing that direction, but, um, so we're offering that on a grander scale to these clients, to these people, whether it's a coach or a parent that wants to... But having said that, we're not going to fight the state rules, whatever state they're in, or the local coach. So it's either you're in or out.

1:08:44Eric Avila: And if that means coaching or some sort of consulting, happy to support. Otherwise, we have other options for you. We can help you with recruiting. And we just go that way. So I don't think it's a... Yeah, it's not a this or that. It's just whatever you fit on the menu. And we have a few options. Last question for me. And then we actually have to wrap this thing up because I got to get to work. Question is, what do you what what seems to be the most common gaps in these kids training when you analyze what they're doing? What are the what are the fixes that you find the most common? Is it something as simple as mileage?

1:09:20Eric Avila: Is it they're running too hard too often? Is it what would you say the common the common gaps are that you're filling for them? Yeah. I mean, I'll answer first. Uh, it's, you just said it. Most of these kids are running way too hard. I mean, guilty at that age. I for sure was, we all were. Yeah. Yeah. Most of them are like, I don't understand why my legs are hurting. And I'm like, well, what'd you do Monday? And they're like, I ran, you know, four miles at six flat. I'm like, what'd you do Tuesday? They're like, I did, you know, four miles at six flat again or something. And I'm like, okay, what was your race pace?

1:09:51Eric Avila: They're like three miles at five 50. And I'm like, so you're racing every day basically. Um, you know, to some extent, That's an extreme example. But yeah, getting them to learn what training runs look like, and that's hard for them to understand. That's the first thing. Are most kids running enough? Are they running enough to your liking generally or no? You get a spectrum. You get kids that don't run at all, and then they have to learn how to run. And then you get kids that I've had some kids come on board, and they're like, yeah, well, last summer I was doing 70. And I was like, cool, you're doing 45 now.

1:10:24Eric Avila: They're like, what? And I'm like, this is how it goes. And they're like, wait, what? And I'm like, you know. So, yeah, I don't like my own rule is at least I kind of I don't like my kids going over 50. You know, maybe the killers could go a little more. But, you know, at the end of the day, they're in high school. And I think the biggest thing here is keep them healthy and get them off to college and then leave room for them to grow in that sense. 50 is enough, man, for these kids. Most of them. they um you know they got sat prep they got homecoming they got prom they got they got a bunch of stuff and most of them their bones aren't even fully calcified and tendons are still growing so um you know and then it would curate down freshman sophomores probably be more like 30

1:11:06Adam Dailey: 40 but um you know i would argue every every nxm team is running probably 70 miles a week really like in terms of the team level to have five six seven guys that good you're you got 13 guys who are training and getting hurt and, you know, and not making the team type of thing. Yeah.

1:11:23Eric Avila: Yeah. Um, all right. This was insightful. This was a great conversation, guys. I really appreciate you taking the time and we haven't even mentioned the name of the company or where people can go if they want to reach out. So could you just help us out there? What's the name of this thing and where are people going to go to reach out?

1:11:39Adam Dailey: Trackbeast, trackbeast.com.

1:11:41Eric Avila: There's a contact page on there. That simple?

1:11:43Adam Dailey: Yeah, there's a contact page or the form where you could write Adam at track beast or Eric at track beast. And we're, we're pretty responsive.

1:11:51Eric Avila: We also have an Instagram, you know, so we can, we can also talk to the college coaches like they are on there anyway. So nice. Yeah. Get with the times. Bracken, do you have anything else? Yeah, dude, Kurt, get it together.

1:12:01Adam Dailey: Yeah. I want to hear, I want to hear their take on threshold training, but I think we're out of time.

1:12:05Eric Avila: Yeah. I got to be out the door. Give me a call, man. I also want to talk about highlight workouts from your like pro careers, like the, the needle moving workouts, the ones like if you had to be confident, 10 days out from your race, which we love talking the spice, but maybe we'll have to save this for another time. But my time here is...

1:12:23Adam Dailey: That's the problem with threshold training. You don't get those. That's the only thing I don't like about it. You don't get those confidence building. I know it. I can do it.

1:12:35Eric Avila: 10 by 3 minutes isn't sexy. No. All right. But it works.

1:12:41Adam Dailey: Like Inger Britson said, you don't check the carrots when they're growing in the ground, right? You don't pull them up and see how they're growing. I like that analogy. That was probably his best thing he's ever said.

1:12:50Eric Avila: Yeah. I mean, it's on our website. I was telling Adam the other day, we were updating things and I put on there. I was like, dude, like 100 % left my PR in practice. And it frustrates me to this day because that number next to my name pisses me off. Even though I had a great career, I'm like, I swear I was at whatever. And I know that. That's part of why I'm so pulled towards this because I'm trying to like typical, right? You see a kid and you're like, no, I know what you're about to do. You're about to make a mistake. It's like a parent. You see it happening. But sometimes you have to let them burn their hand on the stove, I guess.

1:13:21Adam Dailey: I'll never forget the best race I ever ran was absolutely my final tune-up workout before our last chance meet. It was absolutely the best performance I've ever had in my life. And that sucks.

1:13:34Eric Avila: Yeah. It's tough, man. You want to work out hard to feel confident. But then if you do that, you're also pulling the food out of the oven early and you're like, shit, or leaving it in too long. Anyway, thanks, guys. I appreciate you guys having us on. And it was cool to chat. And now, yeah, we'll have to have just a training talk episode maybe down the road if you want. Yeah, we'd enjoy that. Appreciate your time, guys.

1:13:57Adam Dailey: All right. Good to work, Kirk.

1:13:58Eric Avila: That's the plan. See ya.

1:14:09Thank you.