Running Buddies - John Calabrese

Based on the transcript of the "Running Buddies" podcast with John Calabrese and Jamie Roberts, here is the full text:

Jamie Roberts (00:00.934) If it does like drop out, you know, we're pretty good about getting it back. I just kind of let it go and then sometimes it just kind of buffers and it's okay. I just want to check some technology. I just want to check some levels and are you good to go?  you hearing me okay? Everything sounds all right.

John (00:20.845) Everything sounds good. I'm going to turn you up just a little bit before I head out there because of other noise and stuff like that.

Jamie Roberts (00:24.742) Okay, hold on, let me see.

Jamie Roberts (00:29.096) Yeah, and you know, I just turned my mic up a little bit just on the output . if, don't worry about the ambient noise, that's kind of, it's honestly kind of a nice piece to it, right? Like sometimes there's birds or, you know, just something in the background, which kind of adds a little bit to it. The only thing I would ask.

John (00:45.336) The random guy. Hey, fuck you!

Jamie Roberts (00:48.732) Yeah, you just, there was, I did one guy and actually a pretty famous one. And then he stopped and had a whole conversation with his buddy at the coffee shop while we were doing the interview. It was kind of funny, but.

John (01:02.807) Well, that's so like, I'm kind of weird in this area. So like, I was really involved with like the run clubs here, but like, so like, got into like a breakup with a girl here and we both were kind of like, you know, pretty big. So yeah, I mean like that could happen because people do know me, but you know, I'm more than likely they're not going to be on the sale. That's got, that's another reason why I picked it. Everyone's going to stay off the spucker today because it sucks that it's cold out. I doubt I'll be shocked if we see anybody.

Jamie Roberts (01:10.835) Yeah.

John (01:31.917) else out here but if we do um you know if it's a runner especially i'm gonna have to be like hey you're crazy too cool

Jamie Roberts (01:38.686) Yeah, no, it's like a cold snap everywhere . you're, man, you're like, you're even a little bit more south. But anyways, let's, we'll get this, we'll get this on the, on the pod. So the only thing I would ask is that when we're done, just keep the app open for like 60 seconds. Even if we, even if I leave the studio, like the, I'm doing air quotes, the studio, because on your end, just uploads your file. And then I'm downloading them simultaneously so that when I go to cut it, I have the raw files, right? Sometimes it just needs a minute to upload, for like right now your signal is strong and everything is coming in really well. So you let me know. Sorry, go ahead.

John (02:20.108) I'm familiar. Yeah, I'm familiar. Yeah, I'm familiar with this app, man. I got it.

Jamie Roberts (02:25.372) Okay, cool. Yeah, it's honestly, it's not the best, but it's the best that I've got right now until I can start flying my people out to the locations and actually be there with you. So this is what we're going to use.

John (02:38.188) That would be aw- that would be awesomeness. Then we could do like the trails and stuff.

Jamie Roberts (02:40.924) That's exactly that's like actually I have anyways, we don't need to get into it, but that's my North Star. So we'll see if we can get there in the next next little while. But OK, just so I know it's OK, cool. It's John Calabrese, right?

John (02:52.3) Alright man, you can keep the word and I'll head out.

John (02:58.348) Calabrese, but if you want to go Cal if you want to go full five odd bad go for it You can do it if you want, but I mean like I just

Jamie Roberts (03:01.192) Gallipers. How am I what? No, I'll do, I'll do your name. My wife's Italian. She was asking, how do we pronounce this?

John (03:11.996) Oh. Yeah, it's Calabrese . you know, there's been debate like when my, you know, when my family came over, they might have like, don't let sit down, don't let down, it's Calabrese now, you ain't no goddamn calabraising.

Jamie Roberts (03:14.728) Calibris, okay.

Jamie Roberts (03:21.978) Yeah.

Jamie Roberts (03:25.886) Okay, sweet. All right. Okay, I'll just, I give the three, two, one count in and then I go and then I don't know if you had a chance to look at the question. I'm just going to do some, some kind of like quick hits and then more, some longer form stuff and just see how it goes. Okay.

John (03:47.18) Alright, I'm going start to go right now.

Jamie Roberts (03:50.27) Alright, let's do it.

John (03:52.172) Alright, here we go. And we're on.

Jamie Roberts (03:55.614) On today's show, we're running with John Calabrese, a runner, dance dad, professional eater sometimes, and one hell of an ultra runner. Welcome to the show, John.

John (04:10.549) Great to be here, man.

Jamie Roberts (04:12.772) Awesome. Listen, okay, so everybody listens to running buddies know that for starters, we are going to just do a little bit of quick hits just to find out sort of where you are, what's going on, how you're doing it, when you're doing it. So where are you right now? Where are you running?

John (04:27.254) Right now I am on Fall Hill in Fredericksburg, Virginia. I picked this location because the cell reception's good, it's a really shitty hill, and I needed a hill workout.

Jamie Roberts (04:40.464) Amazing. That sort of that leads me to my next thing. So what's the fitness goal today and how long you going to be out there doing the Hill workout?

John (04:47.788) I mean, probably just the duration of the pod because it's pretty cold today and I ran back to back ultras over the weekend . did a 50K both Saturday and Sunday.

Jamie Roberts (05:04.34) my God. So this is like just Saturday and Saturday. What is it Wednesday, right? So just what was your Monday and Tuesday like? Just rest days or?

John (05:05.739) You

John (05:14.773) So Monday, I ran three on the treadmill at the gym, and then I did some swimming and some weights. Pretty much all the gym stuff. Yesterday, I wanted to run, but I had a lot of stuff going on. Wasn't able to pull it off, so I used it as a rest day.

Jamie Roberts (05:35.548) I'm curious, know, after talking with a bunch of runners, some that are running all the time, some that just do sort of intermittent ultras really quickly, what's the philosophy on you? If you're going to be doing big long races, are you right back at it in sort of a day or two? Or do you, or do you take a little bit of time after a big long race, let your body recoup or do you find that you kind of need to keep going? What's, what's your kind of, I guess, training philosophy in that sense after coming off a big run?

John (06:03.883) So if my body's feeling good, I'll try to run at least a little bit. That's like the three miles on Monday. But if I'm tired or if I got stuff going on with my daughter, and like I'm like this, like I don't force runs if I got like a lot of stuff going on with my kids. Because I know on the weekend I'm probably going to do some kind of adventure. But I don't try to let anything do that.

Jamie Roberts (06:31.89) Yeah, you know, that makes that makes a lot of sense . that's something that I hear often is just listening to the body and making sure the body feels good. But I'm wondering the body is the body is in a cold space right now. Can you tell me something interesting about the root place space that you that you're in right now? Like if you look around, what do you see?

John (06:37.098) you

John (06:50.922) So 95 towards Washington DC. I just went over a bridge and you can see the highway. And now I'm going towards a little mini-mart that a lot of day workers wait for jobs. There's some cool trails back there also. Like Cal Rook and his foundation set up like this thing where they help revitalize the local area. And I don't know if they helped build the trails back there, but they put this awesome baseball field back there. Like you can go into it and everything is like, it looks like a professional baseball field. There's like a dugout and stuff. You can go in and play it anytime. And then you run out the trails and stuff back there. So like, yeah, I think FredExpert partnered with them. Again, I'm not sure who made the trails if it was the Cowher Kitchen Foundation, but it's awesome. So yeah, there's a lot of cool stuff happening here.

Jamie Roberts (07:48.881) Are you a baseball fan?

John (07:51.134) So I am an Orioles fan and they break my heart every year, man. I need to go to therapy. I've got a black heart, man. I'm like that guy that has been through like a billion different bad relationships because of that team . like, like I said, I probably need therapy, man. I'm like a Jets fan basically.

Jamie Roberts (08:14.706) Are you a baseball fan,

John (08:20.349) Jamie's over there?

John (08:32.701) Jamie.

John (08:42.025) Hey Jamie, you still there, buddy?

Jamie Roberts (08:43.752) Yeah, I'm here. I'm here. You know what? Give me one second. You know, no, no, give me give me one second. Okay.

John (08:45.533) Okay.

John (08:49.02) Take your time,

Jamie Roberts (08:50.738) Yeah, give me one sec. I'm gonna fix one thing.

Jamie Roberts (09:20.488) Okay, you can hear me? Okay, I'm curious. So are you a baseball fan?

John (09:22.184) I can hear everybody.

John (09:27.91) Yeah, I'm an Orioles fan, man. I've been tortured for ever since I was a kid. Orioles are pretty brutal. They make you think they're going to be good, and then they're not. And they really break your heart every time. My heart is black.

Jamie Roberts (09:43.582) You got Pete Alonso though,

John (09:47.801) I mean dude, the worst I think was a couple years back. Like we were in the, I felt like we were headed in this great direction. And like, you know, I saw like good things coming. Oh hell no. Just in Oreo fashion. You know, they become like a basement dollar again. But see. I mean like I have hope. I can't quit them. I wish I could, but I can't.

Jamie Roberts (10:12.414) Listen, you gotta stick with it. I'm a Blue Jays fan and when I had John Kelly on here, he's a Rangers fan, so we were talking about the battles that we had in 2015. I just came off, you wanna talk about Heartbreak with the Dodgers, the World Series, literally being like an inch away from the World Series, the Heartbreak I've never had so much. So I definitely feel your pain.

John (10:33.234) I was rooting for y'all just to see somebody different, you know?

Jamie Roberts (10:38.078) Yeah, for sure. Exactly. But I digress. So if you're in Fredericksburg, that sounds like an amazing place with the trails and with the baseball field. But when you're in Fredericksburg, Virginia, I remember my aunt actually has a place down in South Carolina. So not that I'm going through Fredericksburg, but driving through West Virginia, Virginia, it's absolutely beautiful. Like the Appalachian part of the United States. Is there an amazing trail or area that if someone is coming down to Fredericksburg, they need to run like just a really beautiful spot that you'd want to check out.

John (11:14.491) So, Fredericksburg is just kind of local trails, but if you can, like go to Shenandoah, you'll see the Massenutton trail, go to, my favorite is the Wild Oak trail. I'm gonna be doing a hundred mile there on Friday the 13th.

Jamie Roberts (11:29.924) nice.

John (11:31.72) Well you want to hear something worse like I've got beef with that trail like we have a long history my last DNF there I was trying to do a 200 mile race there and I couldn't pull it off man and not only did I not pull it off it sent me into a really bad tailspin sometimes man DNF's are rough man I mean like you know with like everyone's humans all runners are humans they got other like real real life stuff going on You know, it can trigger some bad stuff, So I'm going try to rectify that this time.

Jamie Roberts (12:07.582) It's you know, it's interesting when you try to tackle like a hundred mile race or a 200 mile race Someone from the outside in would be thinking and I've spoken to my non runner friends or even just my non hiking friends or like I like to snowboard and surf and do all these kind of things and they're just like man just getting out there is a moral victory, but when you commit yourself to something to that to that level I Understand I haven't ever had DNF in that kind of capacity , but I can understand how you feel. Like just really quickly, take me to that space when you can't finish the race, what is making it feel so crippling?

John (12:37.87) you

John (12:47.527) Well, so I'll use this one as an example because it's still fresh. So even though it's a year ago, my friend that I did the race with a lot, he passed away a few months before unexpectedly. And I'd been fighting with my girlfriend at the time and like we broke up. So I was going through like a lot of stuff. And then after the DNF, I was weak, man. So like, you know, was sad that he wasn't there. I ended up trying to talk to my ex-girlfriend, which was a terrible mistake. I mean, like. Especially under the circumstances and stuff like that, I should have just stayed away. But it was like a bad situation because you know like in some situations where like you break up or you're still living like in the same area, you know like in our case, yeah we were living like in a farm . we had to live next to each other for months. So yeah man, that was probably the lowest. But the good thing, when you get your ass kicked like that, I mean like for me...

Jamie Roberts (13:29.054) 100 % yeah.

John (13:45.742) If I don't get like beat up like that, I'm not gonna grow. And I think that the tragedy with running is sometimes people are scared to kind of like experience life like that, you know? And it sucks, don't get me wrong, but it takes stuff like that to get you to grow.

Jamie Roberts (14:03.646) So what is, you know, it's interesting. I see like a through line through many of the athletes that I talked to, not just runners about how the sport they really dive into and especially adventure sports in dealing with trauma . my condolences to your friend and the passing and your relationship trauma and even mixed in with running adversity. But what is it about the sport for you that is the beacon?

John (14:03.941) Thanks.

Jamie Roberts (14:32.018) the shining light, the thing that kind of keeps you going. Is it the way you deal with stress? Is it just a time for you to be free? Is it just you need to get energy out and that's just the best way for you to do it?  Is it the community aspect of it? Is it the solo aspect? I know you talked about you used to be part of the community and now that's sort of contracted a little bit. So how does that run parallel to kind of adversity, tragedy, and just your own running journey and exploration?

John (15:01.114) I think about this a lot because I think for me I never really fit in anywhere. I didn't know a lot of ultra runners would say that because you know I think for ultra it's a weird pocket where you get a lot of ex-military, a lot of former addicts, alcoholics, or just like people that just feel like they don't belong anywhere else. And I think it really checks a lot of boxes because you know you get to work out lot of on your own doing ultras. You know, able to, you know, heading into like a meditative state, like running up to the stupid hill right now. You know, it's like, I've never been able to really focus to do like meditation and stuff like that. So for me, I think it's just like being around people that can relate to and doing something that takes my mind and just unpack things, you know.

Jamie Roberts (15:56.806) It's that that is, yeah, thanks for coming on because even just, that is a very insightful comment because what you just said there in terms of, the demographics of ultra running, I'm not saying everybody is this, but after talking with lots of people now you're, you're, you're spot on, you're bang on about the community. So it makes me think. Is it, is there like an addictive aspect of it, or is it, is it really about control being able to control because you are there kind of solely . on your own, doing it. I don't know, does it end up being a control thing, right? Where you can really sort of control all the movements and all the pieces around your running, your race experience, and how that substitutes for maybe something that you had in your life that was negative before.

John (16:45.849) I never really thought about control personally. I mean, I'm sure that's an element. Like, I mean, like, I knew I had to get shape, to get in shape when I was, you know, trying to think about ways to be healthier and quit alcohol and stuff like that. And I wanted to do team sports and stuff, but I'm not coordinated. And, you know, I just kind of I just went all into running and it worked. It's this weird like running something I always wanted to avoid because I was more into stuff like baseball, football, and never had the discipline. But again, I think I really need to get my ass kicked in life to really appreciate it.

Jamie Roberts (17:31.622) I, it's so funny, like you hear about people talking, you know, I can't do running. I can't, I can't do this. It's so like monotonous . then on the other, on the other side of it, when people get into it, they just are so, it becomes part of them. So my question to you, John, take me back to the beginning, man. When did, when did you start running? Where did this, where did the passion stem from? Like, I know you talked about team sports as a kid, but when does this running thing all start to make sense for you?

John (18:01.14) So when I was in the Navy, they make you do like a physical writing test. And I think one of reasons I never got like recycled or sent back in boot camp was just because of my running and athletics and stuff. Because I helped bring up the averages of the boot camp. Can I use this? It was kind of easy for me, I never really tried. But, I was like an idiot who kept, like, laughing a lot. Like a complete joker. And, like, I think that planted the seed. Because even though I drank a lot and partied, I still ran here and there. And again, it was effortless. So it all passed the PRT. Even out in the fleet. But, when I went through divorce, I, I think- instinctively I knew I had that there. I like, this is my only sport. Again, looking at like, you know, I went on Google like, what sports can adults do and stuff like that. Looking at rugby, I'm too little. You know, I'm not coordinating for basketball. And so on. So yeah, I think sometimes your sport chooses you, man, I think. I really believe that.

Jamie Roberts (19:23.922) Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense. I don't know, man. You seem pretty tall from your pictures. I maybe basketball, but maybe just do it.

John (19:25.984) Thank you. I'm not coordinated. I love basketball. I love ball sports. But yeah, I I'm not fancy with the group. If anything, I'm more of a facilitator. I'd probably play if I can.

Jamie Roberts (19:36.68) Yeah.

Jamie Roberts (19:48.382) So you talked about just at the top there, know, kind of the ultra community. So I'm curious, my first thing is like, I guess when you first got into it and you said you're part of the run group and what made that kind of special for you and then what has been one of the key drivers in why you run solo now?

John (20:10.531) I think for me initially, I ran solo when I was training for my first marathon, going through the moors. Like I didn't really use the watch. I just have like, kinda funny, I just have like a step counter. I had no idea what I was doing. But like, I just, you know, I just, I did a marathon. And then I loved it so much I was sad it was over. Cause I needed it, you know?  I mean, uh. I just, knew I needed that kind of training and to do it consistently and I didn't just want to stop after one. So I signed up for another marathon, just the next available one and it happened to be a trail marathon, which I was just like so naive. You're like thinking, oh, it must be just like running on the Yeah, so like I saw people walking up hills and shit . was like, yeah, I was just thinking like. You guys thought that you'd just think it like that, just like a typical roadrunner. But I think what happened with me is that once I really got like ingratiated or whatever into the trail community, I took a look at myself and just kind of like, you know, I can realize like, hey, I relate to a lot of these people. And like you said earlier, there's not, not everyone in the trail community is like associated with trauma and addiction and like You know, that kind of stuff. There's people that have never experienced that before. But for some reason, like it's like a tribe that like, I don't know man, like somebody, I can't quote it exactly, but one of my friends, you know, it's just like some instinctual tribe man. Like you just, when you finally meet your people, it's just like, I don't even know how to explain man. It's just, you just feel like you belong. Like that was like one of the first times ever. I was like, wow, I finally belong with a clique. And then once like I did that, I had some struggles, kind of, because I do like running road, but then I just really clash with road runners and self-promotion. And I do it myself too, because sometimes we always want to run fast and we want to do good, but there's races I'll want to do really fast. And then others, I might be dead last. It just kind of depends. I might use a run for therapy. I might not.

Jamie Roberts (22:21.139) Yeah.

Jamie Roberts (22:39.282) Yeah, you know, it's funny you talk about the tribe. I remember when I was younger, I did tree planting and I went up to like, I'm Canadian, right? So, and I live in Ontario and our province is enormous. So there's like just forest after forest. Anyways, my point of the story is when I got up there, it was people from all over the country. And I just felt like I was kind of at ease there. Not that I'm not in my daily life, right?  You know, like I'm an educator and

John (23:07.875) you

Jamie Roberts (23:08.67) But I just, it was something about being in that kind of wilderness, in that really kind of barren land, people that were willing to kind of get down and be out there. I don't know. There was something and it sounds like you're sort of highlighting the same sort of thing. And as for me, I run my entire life, but as I get more into trail, longer trail and, and ultra, um, I'm sort of starting to feel the same sort of thing. So I want to bring it back to something where I think this is a teachable moment for you. Right? So you just said like, you had a step counter, you didn't have a watch. And when you went into trail for that trail marathon, how did you get your training set up? Like if somebody is just thinking about, okay, you know what, want to take my running a little bit serious and I want to maybe do some trail ultra. Like what, I know what a training week for you now is going to look different than before, but what was kind of like your starting, how did you set up your week, right? Or even your, your couple of weeks when you started to get training, did you ask a friend?  Did you join a group? Did you just. do some research on your own and then what did that look like sort of for the seven days.

John (24:08.389) I think the main thing is like just you have to identify and be true to yourself. Like what do you want to do with it? Like you don't have, I mean, I feel like everyone can, myself included, I feel like we get into the trap like, oh, I want to qualify for Boston. Or like, you oh, I want to do this race. And you're like, first off, you should run for you. It's not because of a race . know, running is going to help you and you don't need a race to, I feel like if you're going to make it about a race. Like, so like when I ran the first marathon, once that race is over, what happens after that? I think you first off need to ask yourself, find out your why. Cause if you don't have the right why, where's the motivation going to come from? You have to be motivated. And I think a huge thing people overlook is like, you know, do it. If you don't do it for you, it's not, you're not going to get the pass or from it. And you're not going to be able to get the benefit. Like again, I use it as kind of like, meditation. And also when I say therapy, it's not an exchange for therapy though. If you need therapy, definitely seek it. But I do think physical activity helps, you know? So like, if you're not thinking like that, I think that's your first mistake. And then your second, if you do end up buying like a watch and stuff like that, don't care about what other people do. You know, like, don't be obsessed with Strava. If you want to give your friends kudos, cool, but...

Jamie Roberts (25:15.196) 100%. Yeah.

John (25:34.804) Like, don't be jealous. Don't be watching that thing. Don't be compa- I think comparison is probably the thing that's killing the sport worse than anything. Because it doesn't matter what somebody else is doing. You know, like, you shouldn't be jealous about it. You should work into it, independently of your why, you know? Like, do what you want to do with it, and don't be jealous of somebody else. I think that's a- that's a huge problem. I think people like hating on each other because of that, and toxic shit.

Jamie Roberts (25:57.512) Yeah, that's.

John (26:04.448) And like, right now it's weird. I love some aspects of social media with running. I think it's creating more opportunity even for like, you know, people that aren't your elite runners that would be sponsored in the past. Now you can have, you can be like an average runner and have a good personality and still be able to make like a career off running, you know? I think it's really cool that that's out there. with that. I think there's a lot of people out there that are like jealous and hateful of others.

Jamie Roberts (26:38.366) Yeah, there's, yeah, that's a great answer. There's a lot of stuff in here. I like for us, you hit the nail on the head. Like we, we, we want to platform all runners here and we kind of make a concerted effort to do just that because you know, um, there's the confluence of events that are making the sport a lot more professionalized and growing at a rapid rate. And I'm going to, I want to kind of just put a pin in that for a second because I want to get your take on that . and how, and you're not the first person that I've heard talk about the comparison and kind of that toxic element, right? I think a lot of people talk about the ultra community as this like, or the running communities, you know, this constantly positive thing, but when you kind of dig a little bit deeper, I do hear some critique in different areas from different people that we speak to, but for you yourself, I'm curious for you and your races and your own journey, right? Cause it's really just about John and what he's doing.

John (27:05.823) you

John (27:31.399) you

Jamie Roberts (27:33.16) You talked about the Johnson 100, you talked about the Barkley Fall Classic and then the real Barkley. Like, what is it about those races that you're striving for and then what's your North Star on your own journey?  Like, is there an event that you really want to conquer, enter in? I think you talked about Badwater. Just take us through, where's kind of running taking you in the next year or two?

John (27:36.927) you

John (27:58.274) So my second ever trail run was the Barkley Fall Classic and like it was so crazy because like I met a really nice lady Melinda at that trail marathon. I met her, didn't know her well, but I knew she lived in Knoxville like close to where person that they park is from Hartley. And yeah, so I was like, I don't know you that well, but can I crash at your pad? And she's like, don't pick up my friend, you know, that lives by you and bring him also because he needs a ride. Like in what universe would you be comfortable doing that? That's what I was writing. Or like the funniest thing for me.

Jamie Roberts (28:23.698) Yeah, that's right.

John (28:51.134) that I saw like early on, you know, people just randomly asking each other for like salt naps and stuff like that. It's such a pure and like honest community, I think, but not to dribble that much into what we just talked about. I see like a lot of that could change, you know? But like, I feel like

Jamie Roberts (29:16.338) Yeah, yeah,

John (29:22.722) Barkley is something I've always wanted to because it got me in. it's a limited field of runners. Just kind of like Wild Oaks. You're alone and you're out in the woods. And you've got to throw all parts of the stuff in there.

Jamie Roberts (29:25.736) Yeah, yeah, yeah, can't

Jamie Roberts (29:40.272) I, I'm so intrigued by that race, like, and, many people are because of the, the topography, because the time of year, because of the time limit and the fact that it's like, it's trail running. It's like mounts, not maybe not mountaineering, but it's like orienteering. It's survivalism. It's like, it's, it's really quite cool. And, it makes me think about sort of the future of, of, of trail running. I'm going to put a pin on this and I just want to finish off with.

John (29:43.868) Okay.

John (29:55.358) I'm pretty sure.

John (30:00.04) Thank you.

Jamie Roberts (30:10.268) sort of the big one to get your take on it, right? So you talked about the community, you talked about your own journey, and then you talked about, you know, how social media and I'm not going to get into AI and just, know that there's the technology piece of it, right? So the sport is growing and it's growing at a rapid rate. Like you just see the coverage and what they're doing with UTMB.

John (30:31.154) Thank you.

Jamie Roberts (30:33.234) And now you talked about even sort of maybe not the most high profile athletes that are able to still make a living doing it right through a sponsor or whatever it might be. So what do you see? Where do you see their sport going? And then what are the potential pitfalls that you can see like almost from a grassroots level, maybe not, you know, like a full sponsorship level, but, as running grows in popularity and professionalism, like where's it going to be in three to five years and

John (30:49.053) So I'm gonna be really honest about this. I think it's tough. I think there's like right now we're getting to the point in ultra running where it's like road running where

Jamie Roberts (31:02.908) Where's some pitfalls that they need to be really careful about maybe navigating? That's a big one.

John (31:19.269) It's almost like multiple different races. I mean, you can say even maybe even more extreme in ways than road running, because you have runners that are going to boycott UTMB or any of the big races and just do the grassroots ones. Or, you know, you have runners that may not like UTMB, but are going to show up anyway. And just, you know, just to do it. There's so many different types of trail and ultra runners.