FTP tests, do pros actually do them? Paula's brutal Ironman swim set, rest days vs. active recovery, and more!

Eric Lagerstrom (0:00)

Hey everyone, welcome to That Triathlon Life Podcast. I'm Eric Lagerstrom.

Paula Findlay (0:04)

I'm Paula Findlay.

Nick Goldston (0:05)

I'm Nick Goldston.

Eric Lagerstrom (0:06)

Welcome to our podcast. If you're new here, Paul and I are both professional athletes. Nick is a musician, amateur triathlete. We all love the sport.

We love a lot of sports. Multi-sport is our thing. So what we do is we talk about what's going on in the triathlon world. Sometimes we'll talk about trail running, swim run, things of that nature. And then most of the show is made up by questions that we get from listeners that write in to us. So if that's you, thank you so much. I think we got a lot to cover today. So let's just get right into it.

Nick Goldston (0:36)

You know what you didn't say that we do on this podcast, which we sometimes do, although it is not our specialty, is news.

Eric Lagerstrom (0:43)

Do we have news today?

Nick Goldston (0:44)

I mean, I think there's a lot of interesting news that happened this weekend. We had the grand final, we had Road Racing Worlds, and we also had Augusta 70.3, which we knew several of our close fam and friends had raced and did well.

Eric Lagerstrom (0:59)

I feel like that's not even all the things. It was just completely overwhelming. Every morning we woke up, we were like, should we go train or should we watch this massive event that's happening?

Paula Findlay (1:07)

Right. A lot of World Championship finals are happening in the next...

Nick Goldston (1:11)

Yeah, next week there's European Champs?

Paula Findlay (1:14)

Yeah, I don't understand that. Why Road Racing did the World Championships a week before the European Champs, but that'd be hard to rally for European Champs the week after, hey?

Eric Lagerstrom (1:23)

And Gravel Worlds is in Australia. Is that next weekend?

Paula Findlay (1:28)

Two weekends.

Eric Lagerstrom (1:28)

Two weekends? Pray for these cyclists that are doing all those things.

Nick Goldston (1:35)

Yeah, okay, so already we're getting sidetracked, but I was in a bike shop the other day and I was looking at these kind of some new, top of the line gravel race bikes, and they're really optimizing for aerodynamics and gravel now, which is crazy because these pros are going so fast that they do need aerodynamic shapes. How do you feel about what that means for the general consumer?

Eric Lagerstrom (2:01)

I mean, as long as it doesn't make for a harsher riding bike, which in the case of my Crux, the Crux 5 feels amazing, and I think I could have a sprint with anybody on a road bike at any given time, but wow, harsh ride.

Yeah.

But I feel like my guess is that it's kind of like Kona, how bike brands build triathlon bikes around the demands of Kona. Like, oh, there's going to be crosswinds, and weight doesn't matter that much because there's no steep hills, and handling doesn't matter at all. We just need to go straight really well. It's like, is Unbound doing that in the gravel scene and Unbound XL? Where you're like, well, it might as well be aerodynamic. The gravel there is like pretty smooth relative to, I don't know, like a road that's rocky or has a ton of washboard, et cetera. But if that's-

Paula Findlay (2:55)

I also think the people that are super skilled at riding these races don't need a super cushy ride, and you can get some of the cush with the tires.

Eric Lagerstrom (3:03)

Totally.

Paula Findlay (3:03)

And wheels.

Eric Lagerstrom (3:04)

Totally. For me, now that I have the Diverge STR, which like RIP, I don't think they're making that anymore, and the Crux 5, it's like if I'm going out into unknown territory, I'm taking the Diverge STR. And if I know I'm going on a pretty smooth, like with some technicality, and I want this really nimble, racy feel and go really fast, then you're grabbing the Crux. But, oh my gosh, if I end up somewhere.

Paula Findlay (3:29)

Wait, aren't we supposed to be doing the news right now?

Nick Goldston (3:32)

Yeah, that's why we're already on a tangent.

Paula Findlay (3:35)

We don't need to talk about bikes first.

Nick Goldston (3:38)

First of all, we always need to talk about bikes, but let's talk about Augusta 70.3, because this was kind of became an interesting race because of some of other dynamics in triathlon. But to win the women's side, we had our very own friend and former Devo team member, Lydia Russell, took the W.

Eric Lagerstrom (3:56)