Episode 278: Purple Patch Case Study Series - #2 - David Farsai
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On this week's episode of the Purple Patch podcast, we present the second part of our Purple Patch Performance Case Studies series, where we share practical insights about performance by analyzing real-life examples.
Matt welcomes Purple Patch athlete David Farsai to the show. David is a busy executive seeking performance in sport, work, and life. He recently qualified for the IRONMAN World Championship in Nice after a remarkable performance at the IRONMAN Coeur d'Alene in Idaho.
Aside from his impressive racing accomplishments, David's story highlights the importance of coachability and offers a lesson in optimizing your coaching relationship. He discusses developing the appropriate mindset around coaching and how to apply coaching lessons and strategies on race day to achieve results.
David’s story is a valuable lesson for any time-starved athlete looking to improve their performance in all areas of life. Hopefully, it will inspire you and help you in your sporting journey.
David Farsai
Partner at Mainsail, a software-focused private equity investment firm
Husband and father of two
Training and competing in triathlon since 2019
Purple Patch Athlete training 1 on 1 with Matt Dixon
Athletic background in youth team sports - Basketball
Episode Timestamps
00:00 - 04:20 - Welcome and Episode Introduction
04:28 - 07:38 - Matt's News-ings
07:46 - 52:40 - The Meat and Potatoes - Episode 278: Purple Patch Case Study Series - #2 - David Farsai
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Full Transcript
SPEAKERS
David Farsai, Matt Dixon
Matt Dixon 00:00
I'm Matt Dixon and welcome to the Purple Patch podcast. The mission of Purple Patch is to empower and educate every human being to reach their athletic potential. Through the lens of athletic potential, you reach your human potential. The purpose of this podcast is to help time-starved people everywhere integrate sport into life.
Matt Dixon 00:24
Greetings, guys, just before we get going on the show, today, we're going to hear a case study of a busy executive seeking performance in sport, work, and life. Now, David, our guest, has adopted a performance mindset and is a great example of what I would label high coachability, gaining performance gains across all areas of his life. Success with anyone, and of course, David being a prime example of this, requires a strong platform of health and resilience. It also requires some precision around focus on the things that are actually going to yield performance gains. A tool in our toolbox that we leverage to refine our focus and get really specific is InsideTracker. David leverages InsideTracker and by assessing his biometrics and aligning it with the recommendations from the scientists and experts at InsideTracker, David and I are able to take actionable steps that deliver a platform of health and ensure that his training is really productive, the measurable results and the tracking helped with accountability, the education and resources are of course invaluable. And guess what InsideTracker is not just reserved, for Purple Patch athletes, just like David, you can utilize it tool, all you need to do is head to insidetracker.com/purple patch that's insidetracker.com/purple patch and use this sneaky code, Purple Patch pro 20 That's Purple Patch Pro to zero, you'll get 20% off everything at the store a Kickstart to your measurable results across your performance journey. All right, let's get on with the show.
Matt Dixon 02:01
And welcome to the Purple Patch podcast as ever, your host, Matt Dixon, and we march on together Yes, this month is our month of case studies. And the theme of today's is coachability. One of my favorite words. We're going to welcome Purple Patch athlete, David Farsai to the show. Now David recently had a breakthrough personal performance of Ironman Coeur d'Alene. That's a wonderful little town based right in the heart of Idaho. And in that race, he qualified for the Ironman World Championships which are this September in Nice for the male athletes. But it isn't the result that really demands our attention here. I work with David on a one-to-one basis and I believe that he is a prime example of our Word of the Day coachability. Now in today's discussion, I want you to listen to David's mindset around coaching, how he views the role of sport across all arenas of life, and most importantly, how he's managed to successfully apply the mindset and strategies into real-life work problems. And, of course, how he applied his mindset and strategies that we try to enforce during the coaching process into race day. You see his Ironman race day in Coeur d'Alene was not quote the perfect race. In fact, it was full of adversity and little setbacks that for many athletes would just lead them into the gutter of despair. But during the race, he successfully deployed his lessons from coaching and impacted the result in a major, major way. And of course, that result was positive. So I think that there are a lot of lessons here and a great example that we're going to unpack in this case study around how to optimize your coaching relationship, whoever your coach is. But who is David? Well, he's a father of two and a husband. He's a partner of Mainsail, which is a software-focused, private equity investment firm. And he's only been doing triathlons since 2019. His background in sports is purely team sports as a youth. And I think that his story is really valuable, highly educational, and I think will inspire many of you folks to get cracking on your own performance journey, and that really excites me. But before we get going here, Barry, I do need to do a couple of bits of news and so let's dive into it. Let's do Matt's News-ings.
Matt Dixon 04:28
Yes, folks, it is Matt's News-ings And guess what we want to hear from you. We've got a survey. This is how you access the survey, head to the website PurplePatchfitness.com/survey. Very simple and easy to remember. PurplePatchfitness.com/survey. Barry will put it into the show notes of course, but this is a survey where we want to investigate what you guys are looking for, what you want, and how Purple Patch can help you. Give us some feedback on how we go about things. And this is really, really important for us, we take your guy's opinion really, really seriously. But the only way that we can mold our offerings, our education, and how we set up our programming around your needs, what you're really looking for, is by asking you, and hearing from you. And guess what the survey only takes a couple of minutes. It's very, very quick, no more than five minutes of your time. But by you taking the survey, I promise you, it's going to really help us. It's going to help us drive and deliver the education that you want, and the program that is going to help you thrive and be successful. And so today, it is a big ask for you. If you could just take five minutes out of your day, the link is in the show notes, PurplePatchfitness.com/survey, and you get a blank landscape with some tailored questions around it to give us your opinions and your thoughts, and it's going to help us become even better. After all, one of the Purple Patch sayings that we always like to say, evolve or die, we need to grow, we need to improve and this is a big part of it. So we want to hear from you on that.
Matt Dixon 06:06
Now, the second thing I'll just do before we get into the meat and potatoes, I do want to remind you now is a wonderful time for you to think about joining us at Purple Patch. You're going to hear from some highly successful coaching relationships over the next couple of weeks. We're also going to go into some cautionary tales towards the end of the month. But I tell you, the reason this is a great time is we have a very big end-of-year set of plans for all of our athletes. In fact, in Q4, we are going to do a completely reimagined set of programming that's going to be focused on around technical and skill development, a host of community activities, a really deep educational program, and some options around specific strength training and even body composition done right in the right context. It is a wonderful time and opportunity for you to build the athlete, all while having a whole bunch of flexibility and ensuring that it's not overwhelming. It's going to be a lot of fun. Myself and the Purple Patch coaches are really really excited. And so if you're interested, feel free to reach out. If you want to hear more, you can head to PurplePatchfitness.com or just have a friendly complimentary conversation with us -- info@purplepatchfitness.com we'll tell you all about it in your plans, we'll understand your situation a little bit and can give you a little bit of free guidance. All right, I hope that helps. Barry, it is a cracker today. I'm really excited. It's gonna be a lot of fun. Let's get going. It is ladies and gentlemen, time for David Farsai. And it is the meat and potatoes. All right guys, yes indeed it is the meat and potatoes and we have well one would say the most special guest. David, I've already introduced you before we dive into this, but thanks so much for joining the show.
David Farsai 08:01
Absolutely, glad to be here.
Matt Dixon 08:03
We spend a lot of time with each other, sometimes in person, but also obviously remotely because we work with each other individually. And as August is our case studies month -- case studies month, I thought it would be great to go through your story. And I'll just give the folks listening and watching at home a little bit of a grounding here. David and I work with each other individually and for about the last year. And our goal collectively has been to both succeed in the sporting goals that we're going to talk about because you have been very, very successful over the course of the last year, but also help you sort of show up in the other areas of life. And so hopefully today we can unpack this in the form of a case study and, provide some lessons and a little bit of inspiration. So to kick us off, and get us going I like to do this with all guests because I think it's important I like to sort of get grounded as it were and so we're going to do it with you. Why don't you provide the audience with just a little bit of background on the really simple stuff about where you grew up and what your family situation was, I think it provides context.
David Farsai 09:12
Yeah, sure. So I grew up in the Bay Area, the San Jose area, I was an only child was spent most of my life in California and was lucky enough to go to school for my undergrad at USC down in Southern California. And most recently moved up to the Seattle area where I live with my wife of seven years and our two kids our daughter's three years old, her son's one year old and we have a golden retriever that is six that is equally part of the family.
Matt Dixon 09:42
Fantastic, and so, why don't you give a little context of what your role is from a professional standpoint, what do you do in the real world as I like to say?
David Farsai 09:53
Yeah, so I am an investment partner at a private equity investment firm. So essentially we invest in software companies that are growing, and our goal is to help them, you know, go from good businesses to good companies. And so we invest in these businesses, we grow them for three to five years and ultimately, we sell them and try to generate returns for our investors. So that's sort of the crux of what my firm does as a role. And in terms of my specific job, I am responsible for managing about six of those investments. And so I sit on the boards of those six companies and play a pretty active role in helping those CEOs and management teams grow their companies, obviously have my direct team at mainsail that I work with. And I also help co-run the firm with my partners. So it's sort of a multifaceted job.
Matt Dixon 10:47
And, on top of it, just grounding everyone listening. I would say the epitome of the case study of the time-starved athlete because of everything you just explained there as the partner but then I just want to remind folks, not just that golden retriever who's very very cute, by the way, but two kids under the age of four three and one I think that's right, yes. So it's it must be chaos
David Farsai 11:11
That's right? It is chaos but it's fun.
Matt Dixon 11:14
And you are training for and competing in both half Ironman distance and, as we're going to unpack a little bit, Ironman distance racing. So the first question I'm sure you get when you sit at dinner parties, and someone mentions that you've done an Ironman is how do you fit it all in? So hopefully we can go through some of that.
David Farsai 11:34
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it's a typical topic of conversation both socially and professionally.
Matt Dixon 11:42
And so, I always liked this question because it's very interesting of how folks stumble into this sport which is ultimately an individual sport. there's a lot of team dynamics around it which people from the outside don't realize -- a lot of community etc. But growing up were you always an endurance athlete what are the sports that you love to do growing up?
12:05
I was a big team sports fan. So I grew up playing basketball, football, but my first love in terms of sports was basketball. I played competitively through most of my childhood, competitively in high school, had the opportunity to play smaller Division Two, Division Three, and basketball, but opted to prioritize education and did my best to make the USC basketball team. I got caught a couple of times and hung it up there. But yeah, basketball was my traditional sport, and really had no exposure to endurance sports. I was a decent runner as part of my training for basketball but didn't own a bike when I picked this sport up, didn't run hardly 10 miles a year probably, and didn't know how to swim. So I really started from scratch, right around the I guess pre pandemic 2019.
Matt Dixon 13:01
Yeah, so that -- so okay, you haven't been in triathlon for long? Yeah, well that was always the follow-up question. So what was, what was the catalyst, and what was the route to triathlon?
13:11
So I think in general, I've always had a respect for triathlon, what it meant to do three sports, especially in the long, the long courses and the 70 point threes in the iron and the Ironman distance. So always a sense of respect and my gosh, wouldn't that be a cool thing to do someday, but very, very remote from my day-to-day life and my day-to-day experiences as an athlete? So, the gateway for me, which may resonate with some of the folks that listen to the podcast is that I got a Peloton, and I started doing 30-minute classes, 45-minute classes, and then I had a few friends that started getting into triathlon. And one encouraged me to sign up for a half and I said, Well, I don't own a bike. I don't run and I don't swim. But you know, I like what I'm getting out of endurance, sports, and specifically sitting on a trainer. And so let's, let's try it. So that was the midpoint of 2019. So I was basically sitting on a stationary bike, just, you know, dreaming about doing it, and then and then it sort of evolved from there.
Matt Dixon 14:20
I see. I see a tension of a positive and a negative emerging because we all know what happened in early 2020. And, therefore there were no triathlons to be had at the flip side, you maybe had some modalities to keep you fit and keep you structured while you were sort of removed from everyone as we all were.
14:41
Yeah, I mean, so that the last half of 2019 I basically took the opportunity to get introduced to the sport, learn how to ride a bike clipped in, and learned how to swim, albeit not very well. And you know, had the running backbone from just you know my years playing basketball that I I was able to pull off the 70.3 distance, but then the pandemic hit, and right when the pandemic hit, I had my first child. And so 2020 You know, all shots were off in terms of trying to progress in the sport. I definitely digressed and used what time I could to try to get a run in here, and there but there was really no triathlon for me in 2020. And it wasn't until 2021, where I kind of got back into it.
Matt Dixon 15:28
It's funny, so it can completely tangentially we all have our -- most people have, I guess we all have our pandemic stories as it were, but having a child right in the height of that must have presented so many challenges in a different way yeah?
15:45
Oh, it was stressful. I mean, you know, I'm sure, like everybody, I was Lysoling groceries, closing windows early in the early days of the pandemic, we just wanted to do everything we could to protect our newborn. So that was definitely a major, major stressor as it was for everybody but for different reasons.
Matt Dixon 16:04
Well, let's, let's begin and what, what I'm hoping for, and there's a word that I keep coming back to when I reflect on your recent success at Ironman Coeur d'Alene, in Idaho, which is coachability. We talked about this, I think just a couple of days after the race. And I said you're a prime example of great coachability. And, and really fostering a really positive coaching relationship, at least from my side, I guess we'll find out today whether it's reciprocal, but -- we've been working with each other for just under a year, and you've had a lot of success from the coaches side, that's always good if the coach thinks that you're, you're being a good boy, and you're doing well. But um, I think, your story and approach can be a great source of learning for folks that are sort of hopeful to magnify their performance, particularly if they're interested in collaborating with a coach of any nature. And so, as we do, in our case studies globally, we like to sort of go through challenges and say, okay, here's the profile, where we've gone through that, some of the challenges and so in order to do that, we need to look back in your case. So I'd love you to give the audience some insight into your prior training, your prior racing, knowing it's a pretty short window. But some of the challenges that you faced and some of the experiences, how did you go about it? What were the challenges? What were the experiences of your early part of triathlon when you were not coached?
17:33
Yeah. So I will provide a little bit of context. But let's, let's double click wherever you think, makes the most sense. So coming out of 2020, it was clear that there was no commuting to offices for the foreseeable future, largely in 2021. And so I had some newfound time on my hands where, you know, the, my firstborn was approaching the year, we were out of the vortex and I didn't have to commute because I was working from home. And so the same friend who encouraged me to get involved with the 70.3 had signed up for Ironman Maryland and had sort of floated the idea of me doing it with him. So yeah, talked to my wife, committed to the race, and signed up. And from there, I then figured out I had to probably develop a training plan because you can't just sort of hack your way into 140.6 distance, race. So, I bought a book. I followed a program that was pretty generically designed and I really stuck to that plan. A couple of things happened that I think are relevant. One is the training definitely became a burden. And so I spent, you know, in peak training 20, 22, 24 hours a week training, I didn't have a great set of context for taking the easy days easy and the hard days hard. I sort of went pretty hard at every workout. And the result of that was injuries. I had two or three pretty major setbacks over the course of six months of training. And ultimately, when I showed up to my full-distance Ironman in Maryland in September, I hadn't been able to run for six weeks. So we talk a lot about showing up fit and fresh. I showed up exhausted and injured.
Matt Dixon 19:34
Fit and fatigued, fit and injured and that's uh -- and I guess digging back into I think it's interesting just to dig into a couple of components here and for context by the way for folks listening if they don't know Ironman Maryland. Ironman Maryland is thought of as a quote "faster course" There's nothing fast about going 11, 12, hours, whatever it might be, but it's a flatter course it tends to be more quote accessible, certainly than the one that you just did in Coeur d'Alene, that's very uppish. But, going back into the mindset there, do you think one of the challenges was how you emotionally had this sport, so you're sort of going into the unknown and you went and got a plan and I'm assuming just from, you know, and I'm joining the dots here, so tell me if I'm off, but I'm assuming that you're like, this is the plan. Success means following it, period, and there was probably less, putting the plan in context of all of the other demands, all of the other stresses, were you sort of pretty mutually exclusive in your mindset?
David Farsai 20:39
Absolutely. I mean, I viewed success as hitting, hitting the volume of hours. You know, whether it meant doing it at 9 pm at night, or 4 am in the morning because I had to meet the rest of my demands in my personal and professional life. So it was absolutely all about trying to fit everything into the context of 24 hours. And I was very tired as a result, and that obviously had ripple effects for the rest of my life.
Matt Dixon 21:08
And what -- how did the race itself go?
21:13
The race itself was a success in the sense that I finished the race. I had probably loftier goals two months prior to the race but given that I was injured, I had literally no running going into the race, I was able to jog a few miles the week leading up, and my expectations were fairly low. So in the sense that I wanted to finish, I was able to do that. I obviously — it wasn't competitive in the way that I thought I was athletically capable of performing. But, you know, it was a success in the sense that I finished but it wasn't a fun experience. Everything from you know, nutrition and hydration. You know, I just didn't have those tools in my tool set developed. And so I had a lot of, you know, I had a lot of issues on the run related, you know, being in that heat -- dehydrated, not properly fed. And so it was a success, but it wasn't a fun success.
Matt Dixon 22:22
Yeah, that's just for context, because we'll come back to your later performances. How long -- do you remember how long it took you? The first race there?
David Farsai 22:31
Yeah, took me about 11 hours and 46 minutes.
Matt Dixon 22:35
Okay. So it's still very, by the way, very decent first Ironman and, particularly coming in injured and coming in, at least through my perspective fatigued, so, you executed it well, probably within the context of, everything. So let's talk about the transition of focus and the transition of approach a little bit in the pursuit of being helpful to the listeners. We began working with each other a couple of months before your last race of last year 2022. And I guess the first question is, what was the -- what was the catalyst? You'd had this experience and you decided to invest in coaching. How did you -- what was the catalyst for engaging a coach I guess is the first question.
David Farsai 23:19
Yeah, a couple of things. I think, one, I enjoyed the sport, and I wanted to develop as an athlete, and I know that I don't know what I don't know. So that's, that was step one, two is, you know, the injuries were really, really frustrating. And I, you know, I am a person probably like many others, that when you feel something coming on, you know, there's a tendency to just finish the workout. Success is hitting the volume and the goal that you set out for the week. And as a result, I found myself just consistently inconsistent. And what I mean by that is consistently injured. I'd say those two things were early catalysts. The third thing was, as I was doing my research and talking to other athletes that worked with with with coaches, I found that if a coach is doing their job well, they're working with the athlete to understand the context of the upcoming week and the upcoming roadmap and the way of scheduling where I am in terms of travel, work stressors, life stressors, and then using that as a fabric to create the training plan that is specific to where I'm at, in terms of my fitness and my capabilities today. And so, those three things, I think sort of piqued my interest. And were really the I think the catalyzing forces for why I engaged with a few coaches and started having conversations about working with someone.
Matt Dixon 24:55
So that third point there, if folks are listening to that, is coaching And I'm just gonna go on a little tangent here, I think you nailed one of the fundamental basics of being an effective coach that is, and I'm going to borrow your phrase, coaches tend to be consistently inconsistent around this, which is, the first thing is, is not taking a plan and driving into an athlete's life, the first step is understanding their life on a week to week basis, and building the plan around that. And you can get as a coach, I'm going on a little bit of an (inaudible) here, but you can get a lot more success out of your athlete with even a, let's call it a less preferable program if you take that step. Like that should -- That's the number one thing that you can do. And I will say the number one frustration of athletes that are leaving coaches, is often exactly that element. So I'm so glad that you brought that up as a sort of catalyst for wanting a coach because I think you're absolutely spot on, I think is absolutely central to what effective coaching is when people are very, very busy. So let's go to our initial months because I remember having a conversation, you might not remember this, but in the initial months of said, I'm hoping that I can underwhelm you a little bit. And you had Indian Wells Half Ironman, which was an early December race, we had started in September timeframe by my memory, and we're driving towards it. What were the last few months? Like it's always a transition or change, what the first few months were like, what surprised you? What was good? What was bad?
David Farsai 26:33
Yeah, well, so mostly good. I think the biggest thing that sticks out to me in hindsight, and I may not have appreciated it at the moment, was patience. The sport is a long game, you really — there's no hacks, I mean, physiology is physiology, and it'll catch up to you. And so what I remember most about those first few months was consistency. consistent, consistent habits and making sure there was good habit creation being formed. And what I mean by that was consistent movement, whether it's running biking, swimming strength, we were very consistent on a day-to-day basis, it didn't mean we were doing huge blocks of time, but you know, 30-minute soul-filling run on the trails to you know, a 45 minute, smooth ride to maybe an hour with intensity, we were pretty consistent about doing one of those, you know, three or four things every single day to build it into a habit, or habit, habit creation. And then on things like nutrition and hydration and pre-work you know, pre-workout fueling and post-workout feeling I think we also nailed a lot of those, those basics and at the time felt, you know, a little bit like, hey, when, when is when is the ramp going to happen? You know, I hired this coach, I'm expecting to put in tons of volume and tons of intensity. But in hindsight, I now realize these were the basic fundamental building blocks, of, you know, helping me as an athlete get to where I am now and then obviously, where I want to get to in the future.
Matt Dixon 28:04
Now, it's a tremendous perspective, I will point out, one of the things when I asked about your prior program, the thing you talked about was the plan. The first thing that you talked about when you talked about coming was habits and creation of habits, so you had immediately a broader perspective on this, you went straight to sleep and nutrition and recovery, which is of course the methodology that we subscribe to. So it's good that we hear that, you know.
David Farsai 28:28
Yeah, and I think two things that are worth highlighting in there. One is, you know, knock on wood, but we haven't had any injuries. You know, working together in the last year, obviously, I've prayed - pray that I don't jinx myself, but call it what it is in the last year. I mean, we've had a few things pop up but working with you has really taught me to be disciplined about backing off when we sense them and feeling comfortable with what is uncomfortable for folks that are committed to training, which is taking a day or two of recovery to let the body heal. And so, you know, there's the performance results, but also there's such a hangover from being injured when you can't do what you want to do. And a sense of unhappiness that happens. And I've been very happy in the last year, for the most part being able to do what I like to do and not have injuries hold me back. So I think that's a direct function of consistency. I also think it's a direct function of implementing strength, which I hadn't done before.
Matt Dixon 29:28
Yeah, that's very true. That was, that was the first thing that we - we initiated. When I reflect on the first few months my my first catalyst comes to my word of this, this session here coachability. I really sort of started to realize this is an athlete that's highly coachable. You're arriving to meetings, very organized, prepared, engaged, and present, asking questions, both short term and long term, by the way. And I think one thing that helps that coachability is wanting to understand the why. And so there it's sort of being open to the knowledge transfer, et cetera. So I'm very interested in your mindset, you engage, you've made a commitment -- your mindset around coaching and the coaching process from an athlete perspective.
David Farsai 30:18
Yeah, well, I think you have to, in order to be successful, when you are spread thin across work life, family, and sport, you need to be able to rely on people you trust, and that are more knowledgeable than you and their particular areas of expertise. And that's, you know, exactly, you know, I gave you some sub reasons as to why I hired a coach, but the global point was, I wanted to rely on and work with somebody that I trusted, that knew what they were doing. And if I've taken, if I put myself in that position, then shame on me for not listening. And so, you know, I think there's reasons why, you know, I think we got into a good rhythm in terms of, of trust, and maybe you perceive that as good listening early on, I think, we just, you know, you, when you, when you do your research on coaches, you got to do your research, you got to understand what success stories other athletes have had, you got to just talk to coaches and understand their styles and if it meshes with yours, and I felt like I did a pretty good job in my diligence period of talking to four or five coaches that were all would have been, could have been great coaches, but, you know, I, I made the decision to work with you, and I trusted that decision. And if that decision had let me down, and maybe I wouldn't have listened, but it hasn't, to date. And so I think a lot of it comes down to I trusted the research I put in, and if I'm going to work with somebody, I gotta you know, it's on me to make the most of that opportunity. And listen.
Matt Dixon 31:47
Well, that’s great, I think that's great. And you highlighted something that I'm just going to flag as well, you, you talk to multiple coaches, and that's a great thing. Because there's, it's not just the results, it's also ultimately a relationship. So you've got to sort of, for lack of a better phrase, gel with a coach, think hang on, I can, I wouldn't mind spending 30 minutes, 60 minutes, however long it takes each week going through a discussion, be able to communicate, be able to listen. And so there's, and we all have different styles on that. So I think that's a good thing for listeners to go through. The interesting thing, the catalyst of really asking you to, come on to the show was the race, because we talked about coachability, and so far, we're sort of keeping it in the clouds a little bit and conceptually, but I think your race experience at Coeur d'Alene at end of June, is a great coached athlete executing as intended. And so I want to take the listeners through the race a little bit. And I think out of that, we're going to get some lessons. So leading into the race, why don't you you've done one Ironman, this is your second Ironman, you haven't been injured, etc? What were your expectations and hope for the race individually inside in self? What were you hoping for when you thought about this race?
David Farsai 33:06
Yeah, and it's, it may be revealing in some sense, because I always made sure not to talk about outcomes with you because we talk about what we can control and outcomes are just the outcomes, right? But I have to admit, I mean, I was very motivated to try to be in the top 10% of my age group. And to have a chance to qualify for the World Championships in Nice. So from an outcomes perspective, that was sort of what I had in mind. From a, from sort of a micro level I wanted to, I wanted to, you know, sort of have a good swim. I'm not the best swimmer. As you know, we've already heard I learned how to swim a few years ago, and have a strong effort on the bike. And so for me, that's probably somewhere in the top 20, you know, 10 to 20% of the age group, but then show up for the run, being able to execute, because that is probably my natural strength of the three sports. And, you know, I wanted it to be a smooth day. And, you know, it was a good day and the outcome was achieved, but it was not a smooth day out there on the course, which, you know, you drop the plan. You have a way you see things going you envision it and nothing, nothing goes according to plan.
Matt Dixon 34:28
And we'll get into that. There's something that you said earlier at the start-- and I'm really glad that you said that -- you hoped to be top 10% of your age group, and you would love to have qualified. That -- those are the things that get us out of bed. Like that -- those are the things -- it's great to have dreams that quite often when we talk about the coaching process and we talked about not focusing on the outcomes, focusing on the things you can control. I think that is really, really important. But we must appreciate that you've also got to have vision, dreams, hopes, desires, like, that's what it would look like. That'll be fantastic as that's the thing that's, that gets the juices flowing. The thing is, we can't think about that outcome while you're in the middle of the swim, while you're coming out of the transition, while someone gets a flat tire on the bicycle, etc. You think about actions. Before we go into race day, we'll give you a couple of minutes to summarize it. I want to go back to pre-race because every coach and every athlete has a pre-race strategy if you want to call it that. So what were your memories of how we set up the approach both in terms of sort of quick strategy, but also mindset, what were the instructions?
David Farsai 35:41
Yeah, well, from a training perspective, I think we built really well through the last five to six weeks going into the race and we started a proper taper, probably eight-ish, nine-ish days before the race. So came into the week physically feeling good and fresh, but not dormant either. Like we were, you know, we were still working intensity into the program not too long ago. Yeah, so showed up to race week feeling physically fresh. And the two of us obviously brainstormed and iterated a few times on a race plan. And so we had a very, very sort of specific, both targets, nutrition and hydration plans, as well as just mottos things to think about to just simplify things when you're out on the course. And I'd say I came in very rehearsed and could probably tell you every single word on that plan because we spent a lot of time building it together. But what I remember most about heading into the race was our last conversation where you said, okay, success, we built the race plan, you know it, I know it. But here's the thing, that race plan is going to get broken somewhere along the way of the day. And you're going to, you're going to have to remember that the goal is to get from point A to point B, as quickly as possible. And so there's going to be things that happen that are out of your control. Don't get hung up on them, because they don't align with the race plan. Remember to be resourceful. And use all the tools in your toolkit to make sure you do what you need to do to get from point A to point B. And I remember hearing that. And you know, in my mind I said I hope he's wrong, of course. But it turns out, you were right. There were some hiccups throughout the day.
Matt Dixon 37:38
And that’s — and why don't we go to the very end here the outcome and then I'm going to come back and tell the story because I think the story is, is given great context. You qualified to Hawaii. You what place in your age group? I'll let you say it.
David Farsai 37:57
I finished seventh out of about 120 starters. Excuse me finishers. Yeah.
Matt Dixon 38:03
So if if you if you're attending it afterward, and just hearing that it'd be like dream day, like, goodness, me like everything fell into place. Fantastic. You're heading to Nice, it's going to be a great race. Congratulations. It's great when a plan comes together. So give us two minutes on the race.
David Farsai 38:27
Yeah, well, the one thing to add to that too is the time I had in my head that I thought would get me where I wanted to be in terms of all those outcomes was basically the exact time I finished the race so it's comical that I had this exact plan both in terms of times, in terms of race strategy, but you know, I still got from point A to point B in the right amount of time but the journey was quite different. So let me hit you with a few of the quick the quick the quick bullets from the day. So in Ironman Coeur d'Alene on the swim, it's two loops and you come out of the water and you run back into the to the first buoy and so that was great. I had a good first loop you know was my PR in terms of a 70.3 swim and so I go back into the water feeling pretty pretty happy about the first 37 minutes of the day. As soon as I get back in the water from standing up to laying horizontally to swim. My right hamstring completely cramped up and so I had to pull off to the side and stretch out my hamstring it obviously threw me for a loop I decided to get back into the water after a minute of getting my hamstring loosened up and just sort of decided to not push it too hard on the way back out and anyways finished with a fine swim for me probably. You know I would just say that not the best swim for you know probably most of your swimmers that are listening but look it was a fine swim. Got into transition, and wanted to move quickly because of the lost time. Got on the bike, and I realized I left my caffeine and my -- some of my nutrition at T-1. You know threw me a little bit of a wrench but just decided that I had to be resourceful with the train or with the aid stations. So in my mind, I already knew that I had enough fuel and hydration to get me through a few hours and I was going to have to make some adjustments to my fueling plan in terms of what I picked up and when I picked it up, so no big deal -- adapted. Good first loop on the bike second loop so heading into you know, mile 70 or so, I did notice that I started to get a little bit mentally tired and a little bit distracted. Hit some rumble strip and out with all my electrolytes, all my nutrition, my flat -- my flat tire repair kit. So you know I -- one that was a wake-up call that I needed to get my head back in the race and probably needed to eat a little bit more. Second, it was also like you gotta be careful not to get hurt out here. So, as I continue to ride the bike, you know, we got about mile 80, mile 90 and you know, things got worse. My legs completely cramped up. Started with a little bit of cramping in one leg and about five miles later, I mean my legs just locked and so adapted the hydration plan loaded up on you know, the Gatorade endurance they give you at aid stations and basically did everything I could from a riding perspective to give my legs a chance to catch back up because I knew I still had a marathon ahead of me. So at that point in time I just didn't know what was going to happen with the day. I thought maybe there's a chance my race is done because I'd never experienced my legs locking up like that so luckily legs came back to life a little bit around mile 100, just decided to take it easy on the way home, not push it, got into transition, refueled rehydrated, put my race my running shoes on and said, let's, let's see what happens here. And it was just the craziest thing I started running and I just felt great. And I think some of that was the combination of the mental relief of not feeling those cramps and, you know, the juxtaposition of cramping versus not cramping will make anybody happy. But I also think it was the refueling and hydration on, you know, mile 90, mile 100 at the end of that, that ride to make sure I've set up for a good run. And then from there, we just, frankly followed the race plan. It was a bit of a diversion, obviously with the cramping but fell back into a groove. I remember the two words we talked about on the run were stand tall. And that was my mental cue for the run and splits were, you know, were -- I was pretty happy with the splits, they were on the faster end of the range we thought would be good. And was able to pull, you know, pull off a better than expected run, albeit with a slower than expected ride with a bunch of turbulence and hurdles.
Matt Dixon 43:03
Yeah, so I mean, the Gatorade endurance was certainly nowhere near your race-fueling plan before, we weren't anticipating putting any of that syrup in your body as well. And actually, if you look at the (inaudible) to outcomes and posthoc, you can see the last 20 miles, you wouldn't be very happy with that average power yeah? You were, I mean, basically having to, to really be patient on that.
David Farsai 43:27
Really be patient, really be patient. And it was, it was frustrating, too, because I passed a lot of folks on the bike and I was feeling good. And everyone I passed me. And I'm sure in their minds, they were like, you know, told you so I saw you, you know, flying by me earlier like this is going to catch up to you. And they were right. I think I just went out a little bit too hard on that first loop. But luckily was able to sense that, you know, it was starting to cause some physiological stress that could impair my ability to finish the race and recognize that and decided not to power through it and decided to, you know, back off, make sure I got sodium and calories into my system. Let my body reset. So I was set up for a good run.
Matt Dixon 44:12
Well, I tell ya. You had, firstly, this is Ironman. I mean, this is just, I'm sure there are so many people listening going oh, saying I have the same thing, et cetera. But it's decision-making. And the reason I really liked the story is firstly, the outcome was great for you, you achieved your goal, but to get there, it was not written in the script, it forced adaptation. But on top of that, there were so many offramps for you mentally. So there's -- you know, we talked about staying in the moment making smart decision-making, problem-solving. But how did you manage to stay, so strong, and remain committed? Because so often when something goes wrong, you have multiple times where it's just like this isn't my day voom, and as soon as the mind goes, the body is going to follow that pathway, of course. So how did you manage to stay committed to that?
David Farsai 45:07
I think that one element of it is, even though this is an individual sport, in many ways, it's a team sport, it requires a really good support system from a great coach, friends, and family that, you know, provide you the capacity to put in the work to be able to show up and perform. And so in a moment like that, there was never any question that I was going to just throw in the towel and quit. And not just for myself, but you know, there have been a lot of work and a lot of sacrifices that the team has put in to get us here. And so my mentality at moments like that is I, you know, I need to, I need to adapt and adjust the strategy, but we're not, we're not throwing in the towel, we're just gonna do the best we can, given the circumstances. And so I thought a lot about I think a lot about that, like, you had warned me that this could happen. And we might have to adapt. You know, in my, my family's sitting in the town of Coeur d'Alene waiting for me to show back up, I'm not, I'm not just going to hang it up and call it here. So, never was there a question about, you know, commitment to finishing the race to the best of my ability, I think there's a tension between your heart and your brain in moments like that. Your heart's saying, let's go, let's fight. Let's go through it. Let's go as hard as you can. And your brain is telling you well, if you want to get from point A to point B as fast as possible, riding at 250 plus watts, you know, up a hill without the right nutrition, hydration is just, -- you're just gonna fall off. Exactly. So yeah, I didn't have any issues with the commitment side, it was just being balancing the emotional side with the brain.
Matt Dixon 46:56
So a couple of quickfire questions to finish.
David Farsai 46:59
Sure.
Matt Dixon 47:00
Firstly, well, hearing your story of progression. It's a great case study, but what were the biggest couple of lessons that you've gained over the last season of progression?
David Farsai 47:11
Oh, well, there's, I would say it goes outside of the context of just the sport, but just in terms of a lot of life lessons. And I'd say a couple that comes to mind our, we talk a lot about key sessions, you know, throughout the week in our training programs, and I think that can be applied to both work and in life. There are certain sessions or times or meetings where you really need to bring your best self and your best sense of focus, you can't just be your best self and best-focused self at every moment. And so being selective about how you prioritize, and then also feeling comfortable with, you know, keeping the easy days easy, whatever, whatever that means, in the context of life work or training. So that perspective versus just going hard at everything all the time has been really, really, really helpful for me. There's and I'd say, just really, really good habits that have been, you know, laid down foundationally for hopefully the rest of my life in terms of, you know, nutrition, what I eat, when I eat, regardless of training. Obviously, post-race fueling is a big deal when it comes to recovery and habit creation. Making sure I'm hydrated so that I'm able to show up to work, you know, as best as I can. There are a lot of I'd say physical and sort of habitual things that we picked up on that are definitely helpful in the rest of my life. But I'd say, yeah, the time management, prioritization piece, as well as some of the health habits that we've made, you know or that we've created and instilled over the last, call it a year, have been, have probably been two of the biggest lessons and things I'm certainly carrying forward.
Matt Dixon 49:03
So my last question, if I can just sneak it in, knowing that we're, we're up against father time here, but the sporting journey itself, so many people say, how do you have time for this? But you've obviously found time, you've integrated it. What's the impact? We know what the impact has been on your sporting results. What's the impact been on how you show up for the rest of your life? Family, friends, and then you as a leader, in many ways,
David Farsai 49:28
Yeah. There is a very notable halo effect from this piece of training into the rest of my life and whether that be with family, or with my colleagues at work, I think, in general, feeling far more present. And I think that bleeds into there's a sense of achievement that I'm, you know, doing what it is I like to do, but also, you know, organizationally hitting you know, hitting the plan. I also think there's a big element of energy management where look you're getting, if you're getting stimulus from the training and if you're following good nutrition, hydration habits, sleep habits, all of that just makes you a healthier, more present individual, whether it's with your family or with your colleagues at work. And so I just think that everything I've I've picked up over the last year is very multifaceted in terms of how I can apply it to other areas of my life. So I've been very, very pleased and wasn't expecting that, frankly, coming out of, you know, coming out of the early days of deciding to hire a coach.
Matt Dixon 50:34
That's a great way to end. And that's a great perspective. So, David, thank you. And, most importantly, thank you for being a great part of Purple Patch. And I tell you what, I think your story genuinely will really inform and inspire many people that are ultimately trying to crack that recipe, not necessarily getting ready for Ironman competition, but just feeling better and showing up and improving. And I think that's what we're all united in is trying to become better versions of ourselves. So I wish you the best of luck, and I look forward to continuing the relationship.
David Farsai 51:05
All right. Thank you for having me.
Matt Dixon 51:06
Take care. Guys, thanks so much for joining. And thank you for listening. I hope that you enjoyed the new format. You can never miss an episode by simply subscribing, head to the Purple Patch channel on YouTube, and you will find it there and you could subscribe. Of course, I'd like to ask you, if you will subscribe also share it with your friends. And it's really helpful if you leave a nice positive review in the comments. Now any questions that you have, let me know, feel free to add a comment and I will try my best to respond and support you on your performance journey. And in fact, as we commence this video podcast experience, if you have any feedback at all, as mentioned earlier in the show, we would love your help in helping us to improve. Simply email us at info@purplepatchfitness.com or leave it in the comments of the show on the Purple Patch page and we will get you dialed in. We'd love constructive feedback. We are in a growth mindset as we like to call it. And so feel free to share with your friends. But as I said, let's build this together. Let's make it something special. It's really fun. We're really trying hard to make it a special experience. And we want to welcome you into the Purple Patch community. With that, I hope you have a great week. Stay healthy, have fun, keep smiling, doing whatever you do. Take care.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
race, coach, athlete, sport, work, plan, training, life, good, purple, triathlon, talked, ironman, patch, context, David, started, listening, hydration, nutrition