The DHC Podcast
Ever wondered what it’s like to be truly involved in sports? Wonder no more!
On this podcast, I’ll sit down with players, GMs, owners, and passionate fans like you to uncover how they fell in love with sports. We’ll dive into their unique journeys, explore the business side of the game, and discuss the endless possibilities that the sport offers.
From behind-the-scenes stories to deep conversations about the sport, I’m here to explore it all—while having a ton of fun along the way!
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The DHC Podcast
Racing to Success: Katie's Journey from Amateur to Semi-Professional Cyclist PT2
A former pro cyclist shares her journey through the highs and lows of competitive cycling, discussing the importance of nutrition, training, and mental resilience. Katie's insights reveal the complexity of preparation and life after competing.
• Exploration of the unique challenges and experiences of pro cyclists
• Importance of nutrition in maintaining energy and performance
• Balancing various training demands for optimal performance
• Coping strategies for the mental aspects of cycling
• Transitioning from competitive cycling to managing teams
• Importance of community and support in the cycling world
Make sure to follow the Dad Hat Chronicles: https://linktr.ee/TheDadHatChronicles
Is anybody there? What's up, deadhackery? Welcome to part two, the final episode of my discussion about cycling. That's right, my good friend Katie was gracious enough to sit for well over an hour and talk about cycling, the sport of cycling, what it takes to be a cyclist, a professional, semi-professional. Here On this episode, though on the final one, we are discussing nutrition, training. And then you know, life after cycling, right, what do you do once you know that you no longer can compete at a high level in cycling? So we get into all of that in this one. But before, guys, I give you this episode, make sure you guys do me a favor. Go on my youtube channel, hit the subscribe button, go ahead and grab this episode once you listen to it, and go ahead and send it to somebody else so that way they're able to enjoy it as much as you are. All right, right Now, without further ado, I'll give you the episode.
Speaker 1:Uh, all right. So I got a couple of questions here and I wanted to. You know, like, what does um? You know, like we talked about the training like, um, how do you balance the endurance, strength and recovery? Like, how, what's the, what's your the, the that balance look like.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, um, in a typical training week you would always have at least one recovery day, or um, if it had been, let's say, a super strenuous week beforehand in training and I had a long work week, then my coach was always wonderful of giving me an extra rest day whenever I needed it. Strength training with cycling probably should be happening more year round, but because the sport requires so much time investment on the bike during the season that a lot of cyclists spend most of their time strength training in the gym in the off season which for us is, you know, late fall through early winter, and people can get pretty heavy in the gym and spend a lot of time there. And then, once your training really ramps up, then it's just a lot of time there. And then, once your training really ramps up, then it's just a lot of on the bike, strength training and less gym work.
Speaker 1:Okay, so it's like it tapes, or it tapes off as soon as the season's about to start.
Speaker 2:Right Correct For most athletes.
Speaker 1:Okay, all right. So nutrition plays a big role in your performance, like, I mean massive role, right? Yes, what does your, a typical cyclist, you know in your, in your sport, in your level? What does that diet look like?
Speaker 2:Okay, so I'll give you two different scenarios, because they're kind of extreme opposites. I would say or at least this is what worked really well for me Stage racing so for example, like a race we would do in Ireland every year was six days long, seven stages was six days long, seven stages, and all of those stages, except for two, were long road race days with a lot of climbing.
Speaker 2:And if I was not intaking anywhere from 60 to 80 grams of carbs an hour while I'm racing, starting from the beginning, then I would find myself in a situation where all of a sudden you hit the wall and you run out of glycogen stores and energy stores just in your body. Those types of races the going gets real tough, like halfway through towards the end, and if you haven't been fueling properly up until then, you kind of reach the point of no return. And then that evening we had wonderful staff on our team who would make us food and we ate like you have to eat a lot because you know if you burned let's say you know 1500 calories or 2000 calories in a race. You know 1500 calories or 2000 calories in a race and you have to make up for that, plus all the muscle damage that you're trying to repair overnight and your body is continuing to burn calories. Till the next day You're eating.
Speaker 2:I mean, sometimes it's almost hard to eat enough and you really have to train your stomach over time before you get to race day to be able to handle that amount of food, that amount of calories and that amount of carbs consistently for hours on time to be able to fuel yourself. Through races doing, let's say, a one day crit race that's an hour long, your fueling strategy is going to be a bit different. Because you haven't fueled enough. You know right before the start or the night before then there's really not much you can do. Let's say you know 45 minutes into the race and you've only got 15 minutes less.
Speaker 1:I mean I wouldn't hardly take in many calories in just a 60 minute race, because you either come prepared or not.
Speaker 2:Yeah At that point.
Speaker 1:You're like yeah, you're ready or not?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's not like I'm feeling for the third hour that I know I'm going to be racing really hard in. You know. I know I'm going to be racing really hard in. You know, in a road race I just come prepared to the start line. I might have a bottle, one bottle of whatever type of fluid and electrolytes I'm intaking and that's it for the crit race and then obviously recovering afterwards.
Speaker 1:But Interesting yeah.
Speaker 2:Very different fueling scenarios.
Speaker 1:That's a lot of an hour. Yeah, scenarios, that's a lot of.
Speaker 2:It's like an hour yeah, it's a lot, but we had uh amazing nutrition sponsors where in one bottle um I could easily have 60 grams of carbs and it and it would be easily digestible carbs so you're constantly drinking, always eating something, and but you do have to train your stomach to be able to take in that many carbs, not much food per hour, okay.
Speaker 1:So, uh, speaking of, and I I'm I'm sorry, I apologize ahead. Okay, oh, no, okay, this is the part that no one you know. But you're in a race, you got to go when nature calls, you got to go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one, you know, but you're in the race. You gotta go when nature calls you gotta go. Yeah, uh, I remember one race that we were doing in vermont where it seemed like everyone in the peloton had to use the bathroom and we took a nature break, like the peloton decided as a group that this was happening. We're stopping, we're going. Yeah, I mean, men have the ability to kind of pee off the side of their bike.
Speaker 2:Women can't really do that but most of the time that doesn't happen, like you just come prepared or you're you're chasing back on if you really have to stop oh my god, yeah, okay, I'm sorry, I've always wondered.
Speaker 1:I yeah, I'm sure a lot of people, a lot of people wonder the same thing too, so let's be honest about that right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, if you're racing for three or four hours, it's a fair question, but most of the time, like I don't know, I just, you just become prepared.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and you're burning so much calories. Yeah, like that point like uh, you know, oh, you're burning so much calories. Yeah, like that point like ah, you know.
Speaker 2:Oh, you're sweating so much that, no matter how much liquid I took in some at the end of some of these long races where it was, I don't even have to be that particularly hot, but you're just working so hard I was still felt dehydrated at the end, even though I'd had five bottles, you know, fluid.
Speaker 1:Okay, I have a have a couple questions here now and I want to move on to your, your mental aspect of this, because you have to train your mind you do to do all of this, like you know, like how do you handle those psychological demands of like, of racing, because that that's a lot.
Speaker 2:It is.
Speaker 2:Cycling is, I think, uniquely psychologically hard at the pro level If you're doing stage racing because it is day in and day out and you're on the bike for, like I said, three or four hours um for each of the races.
Speaker 2:And we did have a, a sports psychologist, that helped our team um one full year and then for half of a year the following year after that, um year after that. That taught you how to really focus your mind away from what is happening within your body, because not many sports are going to have you racing for five or six days back to back, all out for many hours, and so it can wear on you if you are unable to put your mind in a positive space and try to not focus on how much your body is hurting. And for me, instead I would focus on other small goals I would have throughout the race. So let's say I need to be on the front of the peloton at this point in the race because I'm going to work for my teammates as much as I can or I don't know. A lot of times too, I just found that there was so much going on around me and I would try and stay away from people that I knew were super unsafe.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like I didn't want to crash. Yeah, that would take my mind away from just how hard it was. But for me to. I will never forget my coach Emma telling me to don't be afraid of big mountain climbs, like when you would get to. Because for me, that was always where my mind would start to freak out. Because I'm just not. I'm not the best climber. I'm super tall. I don't weigh a hundred pounds because I'm not five foot one you know, like these small girls are gonna fly past me.
Speaker 2:But she said you can climb and you have to make them drop. You don't just give up. You make people drop you like you go all in. And that mindset helped me so much on big climbs that I was to be with these people until they literally like I'm going to make you drop me. And so you know, small things like that were super helpful for me. But every athlete who has their own different type of mental challenges based on their strengths, I'm sure have a ton of different strategies to get them through hard, hard race days.
Speaker 1:Did you do the throughout the training and, uh, during racing and all that did you do? Any kind of meditation Are? You one of those that believe in in meditating.
Speaker 2:I probably should have. We had a girl on the team one year. That was really good at it. Um, and she would be super zen and in her own space, um, and she now is a phenomenal cyclist really yeah, she's great. Uh, she did a lot of racing in europe and she actually got to race the welta one year, um, and so she was really good at it. I never was. I probably should have tried.
Speaker 1:I was a person that's going to be jamming out to some loud music in my headphones before I got into some race. Yeah, it's not for everybody, right? It's just, it really isn't. So that's cool, though I mean La Vuelta, that's a Spanish race, correct?
Speaker 2:Yes, correct.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's correct, I'm learning some stuff, see, um, okay, so and and and. Then just to put it into, you know what other people don't understand as well as in in normal races not normal, I'm sorry, in professional races like in the tour in la vuelta and tour de ronda and things like that there's always a bunch of cars all the way. In the tour in la vuelta and tour de aranda and things like that, there's always a bunch of cars all the way in the back yes right, and also your coaches and all that do you got.
Speaker 1:Did you have that as well?
Speaker 2:we did. Yes, we were um lucky enough to have team car uh, team directors, people that were just helping out the team giving feeds um, and the last year that I actually helped run the team, I was also in the team car helping out our star athletes.
Speaker 1:We're going to talk about that here in a second, but a lot of the strategy goes on in the car, like you guys are, there's discussion going on in the car about the strategy throughout the race of our game.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Yep, because in a lot of the big stage races you're allowed to have a mic in your ear and so your team car can be talking to you. Okay, race officials, that would be on motorcycles in the race If someone on our team needed something, and you're not the first car in the line of team car so you can't see what's going on. They're going to be communicating with us of what we need to do to help our rider. There's a lot going on in the team car.
Speaker 1:Interesting, so okay, all right, I like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That's again. These are the little things that no one you know really knows about, because you guys are. It's such a different world than a normal person like myself, because you guys are all superhuman, uh, you know that, able to do these stage races, and I'm like I can't do that and you, if you think about it too.
Speaker 2:If you're racing for four hours, you are unable to carry enough nutrition in your kit and on your bike to get you through that race, and so you rely on your team car to help you throughout the race so you have some, you have someone going back, absolutely get, absolutely, and then come back in Correct, I got you. Yep.
Speaker 1:And then the drafting right, because, like I mean, you can, you can go into cars and all that. How long is that how? How long can you stay behind that one car drafting?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that one car drafting. Yeah, so you're allowed to hop from car to car, um, to get back up to the main peloton, um, there's, if you're in like the cavalcade of cars, then as long as you're moving up once you're done at your team car, then there's really no like set rule. You can't.
Speaker 2:Just you know if they see you back there, yeah yeah, if you're like sitting back there just taking a, you know like five, ten minute break, you know you're gonna get in trouble for that, but if you're moving up and they see that you're actively trying to move up, then that's all that really matters.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's pretty cool.
Speaker 2:I like that. How big was your team? So we had a team of six and seven girls at one point.
Speaker 1:Oh wow, yes, Pretty big team.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean we were. I would say we were more of like medium-sized team because we gave so much support with flights, kits, bikes, you name it, and all the team staff and flying the team staff wherever we were going. It's expensive. Cycling is incredibly expensive, it's expensive. It's cycling is incredibly expensive, and we get, you know, the Airbnb that we'd stay at, we buy all the food, we get the rental car, the gas, I mean, you name it. And so, because we wanted to operate our team as closely to a pro team as possible, we couldn't support, say, 15 or 20 girls like some other teams may have. We had a smaller group of select girls that we felt could work really well together, that we could fully support throughout the season interesting.
Speaker 1:I like that. Uh, okay, so that's actually not bad at all.
Speaker 1:Um so, technology, because that plays a big, huge part now yeah in cycling and not just technology, like you know, electronics or anything like that, but like technology in the bike, because the bikes have become so, so different than what they used to be. They're so lightweight, um, I know, and they may not do this in your races, but I know in some of the races, like the tour and things like that, that they actually have to put actual weights on to meet a certain weight restriction, I guess.
Speaker 2:Yep, and I never had this problem because I ride a large bike, because I am so tall and it's naturally going to weigh more than a small bike. But some women who ride super tiny bikes would have to put a weight somewhere on their bike to make it legal. Yeah, I did not have that problem. But a lot of road bikes these days that used to be like standard geometry with what we would call round tubing, so you know how the bike frame were made out of round tubes. A lot of road bikes these days are made out of more aerodynamic geometry and aerodynamic tubing, so that I mean including the wheels, the tires, your handlebars, helmet, skin, suit. Everything is super aero and incredibly faster than technology from 10 years ago.
Speaker 2:I mean some of the road bikes are so aero that they're like almost time trial bikes with road cycling geometry so fast yeah.
Speaker 1:And they're carbon fiber framing. Well, most of the even the wheels, are carbon fiber nowadays.
Speaker 2:Yep, they all are. If you're going to be racing like some top in road bikes, everything's carbon fiber. Yeah, god, I'm so jealous, including the bottle cages, everything.
Speaker 1:Even the bottle cages. Yeah, and even the bottle cages were designed specifically so that way it was aerodynamic, that everything fit together.
Speaker 2:Yep, everything's aero. These days, aero is everything.
Speaker 1:I really would like to see how a, an engineering team, goes through the whole process of you know cause, like I mean, everything had to be fitted specifically for one you know writer. So, seeing that process of like, all right, we're going to get you as aerodynamic as we can, we need you to come into the wind tunnel and then do all this, all this experiment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, dynamic as we can, we need you to come into the wind tunnel and then do all this, all this experiment. Yeah, I wish I could have gone into a wind tunnel because me being so tall, yeah, I am sure that there was something I could have tweaked on my bike to be more aerodynamic, but we weren't. Our team was not lucky enough to get into a wind tunnel, but a lot of athletes do get to do that, which is super cool.
Speaker 1:That is super cool. Yeah, you know you said something that in that I wanted to ask you. As far as tweaking, you know some things here and there like obviously also position, you worked on positioning yourself a lot all the time. I'm sure that was a constant thing to do.
Speaker 2:Yes, so it took me a while to get the most efficient position on the bike that I mean, I probably had the same same position on my bike maybe the last couple of years. But if you're in a race position, I mean you think about a lot of cyclists riding down the street, they're pretty like upright.
Speaker 2:But if you're racing, I mean you're, you're really down down low because you want to be, as this is super, not air, but it takes a lot of, takes a lot of core, it takes a lot of back muscles, it takes a lot of back muscles, it takes a lot of upper body strength, like everything you can think of, to be able to hold a super aero race position.
Speaker 1:So over time I know my fit definitely changed, especially as the bikes changed, but it was something that I tweaked for a long while Interesting. I have a couple more questions for you because I'm'm finding this super fascinating. Good, I'm glad, yeah, because, well, I mean, let's be honest, like a lot of people don't really get to see or or hear these things nowadays, like they just see cycling like, oh my god, they're super fast, they can do this, but they don't know what. You know the work that you have to put in right. You know to get to be like, yep, that's a fast person, yep, so. So, just like every sport, in my favorite sport, uh, there was huge controversy when it comes to doping and all that. I'm sure this is also a big part, a big no-no, and you know the, the things that you guys don't talk about, but doping is part of the, the, the sport as well. In cycling, yeah, how is that managed? Is it managed at your level? And, you know, is it noticeable?
Speaker 2:obviously, yes, it absolutely is managed um, because there have been some big doping controversies in cycling over the years and you know, at your local races small regional, local races there's not going to be any sort of doping control.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But at your big national events, if you're on the podium, you are getting tested, and they also will randomly pull race numbers for people to come and get tested. So a lot of people are being tested. This is every day, um, and I've. I was at a race where the winner was found to be doping. This was, yeah, back in 2019, I believe, um, and so they they do find those people and you can. Also, if you have good evidence and reason to suspect that some athlete is doping, you can also report that to USA Cycling and they can do an out-of-competition test.
Speaker 1:And that has happened.
Speaker 2:That definitely has happened, yeah so they're really trying to crack down on it.
Speaker 1:I was going to say you guys are also policing your own sport as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, some people do I mean sometimes it's pretty noticeable, but a lot of people that get reported to usa cycling. This might sound bad, but it's gonna be like maybe the older men that are racing in the masters category.
Speaker 1:They're still trying to live it up like.
Speaker 2:You're 20, you can't race like that, so you're doping and you don't have to be in the pro fields to get drug tested.
Speaker 1:Okay so see, now I'm, you know I'm going into the weeds here. So doping, what does that look like in your sport? Obviously, you have you know.
Speaker 2:I did not.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, not you no. But I'm talking about, like, is it blood transfusions, Is it, you know, injections, what you know? What did a lot of those people get caught with?
Speaker 2:Oh gosh, I mean, there are so many ways that people can dope these days, and there's also ways that people could get caught doping without even realizing it, like I found out that if you drink too many Red Bulls, you can have something in your system Shut up, uh, yeah, so, um, like my, my husband won a big race uh one time where he had to go through, uh, a doping test, and you know, they made him pee in a cup and they test for all different kinds of things. Sure, uh, what they test for?
Speaker 2:I mean, I don't know everything specifically but I mean, there's a million way, I'm sure, like at the super um world tour level, there's probably some questionable things that are going on that we don't even know yeah it's possible, like you know, in our world so what was that one cyclist from?
Speaker 1:who lance armstrong the biggest yeah, biggest doper of all time. Yeah, no, no, it was after him. Uh, who was? He was racing with him, but, um, oh my lord, uh, it was. Uh, it was from Team Astana. Oh God, what was his name? The name is escaping me now.
Speaker 2:Oh.
Speaker 1:Then he blamed it on steak. It was a Spanish racer.
Speaker 2:I know why can't I think of his name? Because we watched a documentary with him in it not that long ago. Oh, see If my husband was here he would know.
Speaker 1:I know what you're talking about um, I know, you know what I'm talking about yeah, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2:There's all different ways people can try and dope in this sport.
Speaker 2:And because it's so uniquely challenging, especially at that level where you're racing for 21 days yeah you know, max effort at some point in all of those days, people are looking for any way to gain an advantage and trying to push the limits with things that may not be illegal at the time but then at some point becomes illegal my god, I can't remember the name now and it's gonna really make me mad, because it's like I remember it was a spanish guy and then he was.
Speaker 1:He was caught doping. Um, I can't remember his name, but I'll find it don't you worry uh, okay, so, uh, when did you know right? This is the part where you're like, okay, my career is coming to oh yeah, an end to a time has come. Yeah, it's like it's time for me to hang it up. Yeah, um, did you realize it? When did you realize it? And, like you know, what was that? What did you go through all that? When, when, that, when that realization finally came?
Speaker 2:I probably should have stopped a year earlier. I will say um looking back at it now, there were a couple of things that really pushed me to decide it was time to stop and, instead of racing, help manage team um the last two years, um, I I didn't realize at the time that I was racing with a full-blown Epstein-Barr viral infection, which happens from stress, really, and I'm sure, yeah, the stress of cycling plus our former workplace. That shall not be mentioned.
Speaker 2:Uh yeah had probably a big play into that. And so a lot, of, a lot of race days. Um, you know, I I can't explain how awful I felt and how much harder I would have to work to output the power that I wanted. And and then, when I was racing the national crit race one year, I had a tachycardia event, which is where my heart spiked to like I think it was 225 is what they said and they had to do some crazy things for it to my heart rate to regulate.
Speaker 2:And then I went to a cardiologist and wore a heart monitor for a while and I mean, I basically found out that I needed to take in a lot more electrolytes because I'm just aging, I'm getting older, like I don't function, like I'm 25 anymore, and you know, my husband and I we also wanted to start our own family, and it's really those three things over the course of two years that made me realize that it was time. I had fun, I loved what I did and I just couldn't. I started to not be able to recover as well as I used to because I was just well, it was a lot of the Epstein-Barr viral infection, but it was just just getting older At that point it's like my body can't handle this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean it was fun, but that's when I decided it was time to move on.
Speaker 1:Okay, all right, so you, but then you moved on from from the, the, the participating like as far as like the actual racing, but you really didn't move on from racing still, though you were. Then at that point you were managing the team.
Speaker 2:Yes, I was helping to manage the team.
Speaker 1:How was that?
Speaker 2:It was great. So cycling gave so much to my life and enriched it in so many ways and I've met so many wonderful people and traveled to so many cool places and it gave me a real direction in my life a lot of times and I really needed direction that I wanted to give back to the sport and continue to help up-and-coming athletes who wanted to dabble in stage racing and really be treated as much of a, as much of like a pro as we could, and so I helped manage our team. I got a lot of the sponsorship money brought into the team and I'd be in the team car helping girls. I would help any way I could in team housing. Afterwards I did a lot of the social media for the team, for a lot of our sponsors, and just did whatever I could to help some girls who were super talented.
Speaker 1:That's interesting. Let me ask you this and then you know I'll let you go, because we've been here for over an hour, but I could keep asking. I got, I got questions galore, girl, don't you worry. I got questions on questions. But you say something is and is the sponsorship like like, did the sponsors approach you guys? Did you approach? Did you guys approach the sponsors like Like, how, how does that work?
Speaker 2:So we had a big sponsorship deck that we would hand out to different companies that we would love to partner with, and our sponsorship deck would talk about you know the team, our culture, how your investment is going to help athletes, what you're going to get out of the investment. And we would approach companies, individuals, product sponsors that we would want to be involved with, and if they were interested and saw a potential fit, then me and the team owner, Shane, were the main ones who would sit down and have sponsorship talks with them and negotiate basically what the deal would be for them to come on board to support the team.
Speaker 1:Gotcha, and then their name, their fancy name, will go on the kit.
Speaker 2:Absolutely On the kit all over social media on our website. I mean on the kit all over social media on our website. I mean, you know, depending on what level of sponsorship they signed up for, or if it was a large sponsorship, because we did have some very large sponsors we would customize a plan for them to get what they wanted out of the team, as well as what we did too gotcha, yeah, interesting, yeah again the things that no one tells you about there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes to get sponsors or that no one knows about yeah, because it it takes a lot of uh a lot of communication before you get really big sponsors on board, because it's not as large of a sport like baseball, that's just super televised and you get a lot of viewership through tv.
Speaker 2:You know that's not really a part of cycling, um at least you know live streams yeah, that are for some races. So there's.
Speaker 1:We had to become creative in ways that we would partner with our big money sponsors I wish they would be a lot more popular here in the us because it's such a fascinating sport. You know, like I said at the beginning, I said it's like you. You know I won't retain anything. I'm lying, obviously I, I I'm a fan of this sport. I really am. Yeah, because it's such a. I find it so fascinating that to see these Athletes that have these God giving abilities to do what I cannot do, it's simple truth. I can't. I mean, I love, I love it. I wish I could. You know, I already have two bad knees, I'm already out.
Speaker 2:You know what.
Speaker 1:I mean I'm done.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, I tried playing softball one year and I was not very good at it, so I'm not good at baseball. Softball, like I found it was very uncoordinated with objects coming towards my body, so I just rode a bike and I was on Give me your bike, give me your bike.
Speaker 1:I like this. Yeah, but you know, I wish that also, that a lot of these cycling events were not behind a paywall, right? Yeah, so that way people can enjoy it, because I mean, you go to Europe and then it's everywhere, it's everywhere.
Speaker 2:I know, I know, I know the investment in Europe, but also just the cost of racing in Europe, is significantly less than the cost of racing in the US.
Speaker 1:Because of the popularity. Right here in the US it's like this is an elite sport. You're going to have to pay for this.
Speaker 2:Well, and it seems like when we were in Europe, the communities where the races are happening just really get behind the sport and the race and help make it happen, Whereas here in America it's like, hey, you have to pay up for us to make this happen. So it's a totally different culture in Europe than compared to America.
Speaker 1:One of these days we'll get there.
Speaker 2:I know hopefully.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know right, one of these days I still have hope that we can. So are you done with that part of the world now? Have you seen? Just hung it up? You're retired. You're done with.
Speaker 2:I mean I couldn't ride while I was pregnant and just had my baby, and so I'm. I have ridden the trainer a few times now that I'm able to, and I would like to do some gravel racing again whenever I can, whenever my daughter's a little bit older and I get a little bit more freedom. Yeah. Yeah, I'm probably probably not going to do much. Road racing. Gravel racing is like a a party on dirt. Uh. It's super fun style of racing and it's not quite so serious okay it's also not quite so dangerous.
Speaker 1:So but that's the thing people think. I look, I've seen it and it looks fun, and you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, it's, I've done some gravel racing. It's very fun and if you crash, I mean typically your crash is not going to be nearly as bad as in a road race or a crit race. There's a lot of dirt, a lot of grass, you know. I mean there can be some awful crash. But I would love to do that, you know, maybe a couple of years in the future, but I'm not done writing when, when I can get outside and ride again, I'm definitely going to love it, love it, all right.
Speaker 1:Is there anything that I haven't asked you Cause I mean, I think I've asked you a lot of questions here and we could be here for another hour because I have a whole bunch more.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would just say, if you are listening to this podcast and you are in a city where you have a criterium race that is near you because they do happen all over the US all summer long go to it. They are so fun. There is loud music. Usually the announcers are great, they're funny. There's always beer. Um, it's like I said, it's like nascar on bikes, or a spandex rodeo, like a lot of people call it, and it's super fun to watch they go all day long, with various levels of racing throughout the day, with the pros racing last.
Speaker 2:I promise you you will have fun watching it and you'll be surprised, um, at what you will witness, especially towards the end of the race when people are going all out to win. So just go see it if you see that there's a criterion or a bike race near you I think there's actually one here in Raleigh Carolina, so there's that. I didn't know that, yeah, and there's one in oh gosh, I don't think Winston-Salem is that far away from you guys, right?
Speaker 1:No, no, no no.
Speaker 2:There's a big one there at Winston-Salem too.
Speaker 1:Winston-Salem for me is about, I want to say, about an hour, half, two hours from here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, they have a huge race there.
Speaker 1:Do they?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Yes, I do know, I've been there.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:It's a lot of fun.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Kate, thanks so much for doing this. Katie, Absolutely. Where can people find you on socials if they want to follow you?
Speaker 2:Because I know you got your own socials that they want to follow you, cause I know you got your own business going on right now. Uh, so actually you know what? What is your business?
Speaker 1:now. I currently run Airbnb that we own, yes, here in Columbia, south Carolina. All right, so there you go, you're. You are very busy, you're a mom, and you're running your own business.
Speaker 1:Uh, that's awesome. I love that. Thank you so much, um, and I don't know for, for the people that are listening to this podcast, I want to ask you guys now uh, I've done tennis, I've done cycling. What is the next sport that you guys want me to look into so I can, um, so I can interview them and so I can learn more about other sports other than your typical basketball, football, baseball, because baseball, cause I mean, there's so many sports out here in the U S, I know, right, I kind of want to have someone who does not tennis already did tennis, maybe golf or pickleball, you know swimming, because we have so many Americans that are good at swimming.
Speaker 1:They are true story. That is true Skiing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that too so there you go.
Speaker 1:See, we're going to get some people on this podcast that are other sports. So again, thank you, katie, and for you guys, again on the podcast, if you want me to look at any other sport, put it in the comments, make sure you let me know. Otherwise, make sure you're following me on all of the socials that have 216 or look up for data chronicles, as well as on youtube, and we will see you guys on the next one. Bye.
