Episode 146 - Ultraman Australia Race Nutrition with Paul & Lisa McDonald

Ultraman Australia Race Nutrition with Paul & Lisa McDonald

 

Today, I'm joined by two passionate triathletes, Lisa and Paul McDonald, to discuss his recent experience with the gruelling Ultraman Australia.

Lisa was with him all the way and, as a member of the TNA, had the knowledge to equip him for success. Our conversation goes over the whole journey, from training and nutrition planning to the actual race and recovery.

So, get ready for some actionable advice on optimising your performance in long-distance triathlons.

Photo credit: SunnyCoast photos

 

Links:

Check how well you’re doing when it comes to your nutrition with our 50 Step Checklist to Triathlon Nutrition Mastery

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It’s for you if you’re a triathlete and you feel like you’ve got your training under control and you’re ready to layer in your nutrition. It's your warmup on the path to becoming a SUPERCHARGED triathlete – woohoo!

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Episode Transcription

Episode 146: Ultraman Australia Race Nutrition with Paul & Lisa McDonald

Welcome to the Triathlon Nutrition Academy podcast. The show designed to serve you up evidence-based sports nutrition advice from the experts. Hi, I'm your host Taryn, Accredited Practicing Dietitian, Advanced Sports Dietitian and founder of Dietitian Approved. Listen as I break down the latest evidence to give you practical, easy-to-digest strategies to train hard, recover faster and perform at your best. You have so much potential, and I want to help you unlock that with the power of nutrition. Let's get into it.

[00:00:00] Taryn: Joining me today on the podcast is not one, but two triathletes. We have Lisa McDonald, who is one of our TNA members and honorary TNA member, husband Paul, who is joining us today so that we can hear all about his lowdown and rundown of Ultraman Australia. So welcome team, the A team,

[00:00:38] Lisa: Thank you.

[00:00:39] Paul: Hi. 

[00:00:39] Taryn: So for those people that have no idea what Ultraman is, Paul, do you want to give us a quick run through about what this three-day multi-stage event entails?

[00:00:48] Paul: Okay, so Ultra Man's, uh, three day ultra-distance triathlon. So still you swim, you bike and you run, but it's split over three days. So day one is a 10 kilometre swim and 140 kilometre bike ride. Then day two is just a 281 kilometre bike ride. And then, just, only. And then day 3 is just a double marathon. 84. 4km to finish it out.

[00:01:17] Taryn: it's not like something to be sneezed at, right? It is a big beast and we've had Jodie Walker on the podcast before talk about her experience.

[00:01:24] I would love to get your experience because. You went into this race for fun, basically, is kind of the summary of you, I think. It wasn't like any particular reason. It was like, let's go and have a great day out or three days out. So what on earth made you want to do this race in the first place?

[00:01:43] Paul: So I think I've known about Ultraman since its conception nearly 10 years ago now. But it's been one of those things you think, oh nah, there's no way I could do that. too many things to string together to make it work. So when we first moved to Brisbane in 22, we had a friend that competed in it, which ended up being two friends. So we went and watched them do that and thought, oh well, I mean, this is not so crazy. It kind of looks fun. Sure. And then one of those friends came back in 23, and had another go at it. And they asked if we could be part of their team, their support team for it, which we did, which then cemented the, like, no, actually this is, totally possible.

[00:02:21] And. And fun. Well, this looks like a great event. So I guess that cemented then for me, for the rest of 23 to sort of do some long endurance events, singular things, cycling and running, just, just to make sure I'm ahead, I could do those crazy distances and then went, all right, well, next step is jump in.

[00:02:39] Let's have a go.

[00:02:40] Taryn: Crazy. not many people's minds work that way, but I love that yours does. And, you know, you went in having fun. fun, like the goal was to have fun, but you ended up coming fifth overall first in your age group. And you were the first service member across the line. I'm going to give you your time away. You happy if I run through what your time was? 

[00:02:59] Paul: Go right ahead. 

[00:03:00] Taryn: It's 26 hours 38 minutes and 49 seconds, which is a lot of exercise, right? So much 

[00:03:08] Paul: a lot of cardio. 

[00:03:10] Taryn: the swim 10k minutes and 20 seconds.

[00:03:14] Paul: it was a little long, by the way. It was 

[00:03:16] Taryn: Oh, was it, was it 0. 1 or was it 

[00:03:18] Paul: No, it was 10. 6. One of the boys went for a little float. 

[00:03:22] Taryn: that's not good. not at the end of 10Ks and you're like, the finish line should be here already. Why am I still swimming? And then annoyingly, they break up your ride and run just like that. So you did ride 421 kilometres in 14 hours, 22 minutes and 22 seconds. 

[00:03:37] Again, a lot of time in the saddle. How's your butt? How's your butt after that? Was it all right?

[00:03:41] Paul: Oh, it was great. I described it as my bike and I'm not breaking up, but we might just have a little bit of time to decide where our relationship is going. 

[00:03:49] Taryn: Yeah, that's a nice strategy. I like it. Have a little bit of a breather from each other. 

[00:03:54] And a lazy double marathon in eight hours, 46 minutes and 58 seconds. Do you know what your average pace was for that actually? Off the top of your head? Do you remember?

[00:04:02] Paul: that's just under six minutes K's. 

[00:04:04] Taryn: Solid. Solid. lot of people can't run six-minute kilometres. And you did it for 84. 3 kilometers. Okay, so that just gives you a summary of the type of person Paul is, right? He was the happiest dude on course. I've never seen anyone throw so many shuckers like at the end of a double marathon, like smiling at the 80 kilometre mark, just having a great day out there. So like, other than having fun, did you have any goals going into Ultraman that you wanted to achieve? And then did you achieve them? 

[00:04:33] Paul: Yeah, so I did, so I set myself. You know, triathletes, we love to have a tiered system of goals just in case some don't eventuate. So I had three, three goals. And the first one was to have fun. Like above all else, fun was the most important. If something was going to interrupt, you know, all of us and the sport of having fun, then, you know, that was a no brainer. The next one obviously was to finish because having seen, friends and other competitors in previous years who have some, you know, completely unexpected things come up and finishing is not an option. You know, always a certainty. So, so that was the second goal was to make sure whatever we're doing, it doesn't stop us getting to that finish line each day. And then the last one why ambitious goal was to do sub 10 hours every day, which thankfully I absolutely smashed. So that was great.

[00:05:19] Taryn: So what were your times then for each day? Sub 10 hours. Do you remember?

[00:05:23] Paul: it was about eight and a half on the first day. And then just over nine the second day. And yeah, the eight just on the eight for or eight and a half for the marathon. So. 

[00:05:35] Taryn: They blew it out of the park. Maybe they weren't sort of hairy and audacious enough. 

[00:05:39] Paul: clearly not. 

[00:05:40] Taryn: So to, to go out there and have fun in 26 something hours of exercise, what did you need to do to prepare yourself? Like physically, you need to prepare mentally and obviously nutritionally. What sort of things did you know you had to do to get to the start line and go, I'm comfortable that I can do this and, and reach some of my goals.

[00:06:00] Paul: Yeah, so maybe I went about it differently to most people, but in 23, yeah, I went and did long distance events. I did 100k ultra trail run. I did a 360k single event off road mountain bike ride, gravel ride. Only a 5k swim because, you know, who really likes swimming? But, 

[00:06:19] Taryn: Me! And maybe your wife. 

[00:06:20] Paul: you and Lisa, that's, they like swimming.

[00:06:22] And that gave me the confidence that, that those distances were completely achievable as individual events, which then only leaves the so what of stacking the days on top of each other, you know, how am I going to wake up day two and day three? And can I push through that? And so that, you know, went to plan. and then that, that's what my training for Ultraman specifically probably didn't start until six to eight months out. And then that was just about specific race fitness and pace and time on the TT bike, because I hadn't ridden the TT bike specifically for that many hours. Whereas most people probably train 18 months in advance specifically for the event. But I think that the alternative option that I took was good because you could train in those ultra endurance events, mental side of running, riding for those long hours and the nutrition as well. Um, Both those events were over 16 hours, so, you know, I had to get the nutrition right in those, which then, you know, applies quite well to a 12 hour event each day.

[00:07:21] Taryn: And you're generally fit like on a day to day basis, right? Compared to a lot of triathletes, you have a very active kind of job. You've got to stay fit for work. So your, your baseline going into something like this is probably way higher than somebody that decides that they want to go from Ironman to Ultraman, I would say.

[00:07:39] Paul: Yeah, yeah, that's, that's correct, and my preference is endurance events, you know, the notion of going out for a four or five hour bike ride on the weekend is, you know, is exciting and interesting to me, so that's almost normal.

[00:07:50] Taryn: You do that for a hot date, right? Five hour ride, coffee afterwards, done.

[00:07:54] And did you have a coach that did your programming for you or did you do it yourself?

[00:07:58] Paul: No, self coached.

[00:08:00] Taryn: Self coached. There you 

[00:08:02] Paul: I think if I had a coach, I'd probably would try harder and maybe go faster, but life gets in the way a lot with my training. So I like to be very flexible and I know what I should be doing and I can just sort of fit it in where I can.

[00:08:14] Taryn: And how do you go if you don't do the sessions that you had in mind or, you know, you can't achieve what you had set yourself out to do in a, training week or a training block? How, how do you go managing that mentally?

[00:08:25] Paul: Again, I'm a very flexible, happy person. So if I don't get it in, I just know that, oh, well, run a few minutes slower. That'll be all right. 

[00:08:32] Taryn: You're so chill, Paul. So chill. 

[00:08:35] Paul: You're definitely not an A type personality when it comes to training. 

[00:08:38] Taryn: yeah, it's so rare to have a triathlete that is so relaxed about training and like, meh, I'll be right.

[00:08:43] Okay, so Ultraman Nutrition is not what we cover specifically in the Triathlon Nutrition Academy. We talk about setting up sprint race nutrition, Olympic distance, 70. 3 full distance, and we have a plan for each of those. set races, plus I guess all the components that go into endurance racing, like carbohydrate loading, using some ergogenic aids to enhance our performance, your pre race meals, like what you're doing on the bike, what you're doing on the run, all those different pieces of the puzzle.

[00:09:13] But Ultraman Nutrition is not something that we specifically do. But you managed, and this is why Lisa is here, because I'm fairly sure Lisa wrote your entire race nutrition plan. 

[00:09:23] Paul: without, without Lisa and without the TNA programs input, I I think the result would have been very different and you could see that from the competitors that clearly hadn't given as much thought to their nutrition as they could have. There was degradation over the three days and luckily we didn't have that, so

[00:09:41] Taryn: It still blows my mind that people do even an Ironman without nutrition support. But then there are people that do Ultraman without nutrition support, which is even crazier. So we've got all these tools and resources in the TNA program that helped Lisa develop your plan. And then you got us to review it.

[00:10:00] I got my eyes over it a few times, actually. Plus we had all of our alumni. I put their two cents in, which is pretty cool. it makes my heart so fuzzy when I'm like, yes, my own athletes can now help someone with their race nutrition plan. Like, yes, I've taught them well. So giving all of our secrets away though, Lise, maybe you can jump in here.

[00:10:19] How did you go about developing Paul's Ultraman nutrition plan from scratch?

[00:10:25] Lisa: Oh gosh. Well, I guess we just took everything that you had taught me and, I don't think he really said it, but Paul has been doing endurance events for a very, very long time. Like when we talked about it before, it's. He started this sort of stuff at 20. and we've been doing triathlon for a while.

[00:10:44] So we've worked out what suits us nutritionally and what we can handle and what we can't. And then, so it was just a case of thinking about what you have said. And classically, we were underfueling, like, pretty much, I think everybody does. And so it was a way of, alright, can we do to boost this up?

[00:11:01] And my biggest worry was, a bit like what Paul was saying, well, I know we can get through one day, but how do we get through three days? Or how do we get to the point where day two and day three, Paul wakes up and he's, he's good to go.

[00:11:15] Taryn: Yeah. And so what sort of things did you then have to tweak with that plan? Cause you, you did it without me. And then I was like, hang on a minute. We need to do a few alterations here. What did you need to do to make sure Paul woke up and was still the happy go lucky Paul that he is right now?

[00:11:33] Lisa: Well, I was still under fueling. You wanted us to push a lot higher with our targets, which, you know, in the end we tried to, and actually it was quite funny when I think it was day two, yeah, it was day two on the bike. We noticed a real, well, Paul felt a real lull in his race and that was Directly linked to when he kind of got sick of eating or sick of having his nutrition drop, basically. And it dropped from the targets you were trying to push us to, to what we had originally planned. And then when he was able to pick it back up and he ate some more, his mood picked up and He was a lot better. But aside from our carb targets, the other thing that I was unsure of, I guess, or, you know, not sure how to go about was that time in between how much protein should Paul have in between and what exactly do we need to get him to eat to get through the evening and to be ready for the next day.

[00:12:27] And that was, you know, that was the one thing I was unsure of that you obviously helped us out with. Thankfully.

[00:12:34] Taryn: Yeah. It's a beast to not have a plan to recover. To then do the next day, the people that have no plan for that. And then just kind of eat to how they feel or what they feel like, or they go and have a nap instead. Like that is setting yourself up to fail. If you don't have that like really structured regimented plan, because you're not going to feel like eating and just like Paul experienced on day two. 

[00:12:55] Paul: Yeah, and after day two, where I would have stopped eating would have been a matter of a quarter of what I needed to eat. But knowing that. That was way too low. And on day two, we had to change what I was eating, because I just said, like, I couldn't, I can't eat that. I can't put any more in. I'm full to here. So we had to change to something else. And having  those numbers and knowing what the targets was allowed us to change on the spot and go, OK, well, let's switch to this. it was great.

[00:13:22] Taryn: Yeah, it's really valuable, isn't it? And it's not that a lot of athletes don't have that, that ability and information and education to go, okay, this isn't working, but I still know how I can reach my goals. And so I'm going to change checked by doing that. I think that's a really valuable skill that a lot of people don't have.

[00:13:38] Lisa: that was exactly what we had to do going forward, because, what we had set out for him to eat, he was never going to be able to just physically eat it, so we had to change to something else to be able to get that much in.

[00:13:51] Taryn: It's funny that you feel like going in, you're like, yes, like our, one of our athletes wanted to do, I probably shouldn't say this live because people are going to do it, but I'm going to say it anyway. One of our athletes, Jake, wanted to eat a cheeseburger in the middle of his marathon at the end of it.

[00:14:06] An Ironman at Cairns. And he's like, yes, this is going to be amazing. Exactly what I feel like, like it's salty. It's like savory. And then on the day he's like, there is no way I can do that, but if you had that plan and it was structured and regimented and it's, you only have to do this and there's no alternative, then yeah, it's not going to go pear shaped pretty quickly.

[00:14:27] So what are some of the foods that you did have out there on the bike on day two? Cause I know some people. probably itching to hear the types of things that you had. And your plan was quite interesting. It's not your, you know, standard sports drink and gels type plan. What sort of things did you love to have out there?

[00:14:41] Paul: day one on the bike, the plan. was to eat real food as much as we could until I was sick of real food and then switch to your traditional gels and things. And we found at the end of the day that that wasn't quite working. Well, I kind of got to the sugar stuff a bit too quick. So on day two, we switched it up and went okay. Well, in the time blocks that we'd set up to eat. will alternate between real food and the high carb food which meant we could get the high calories in, but not overload me on the sugars. when I say real food, I mean sandwich stacks um, Potato gems,

[00:15:16] bananas, dates, you know, anything that you actually need to put some effort into and chew and eat, because it makes you feel full and it's not just sickly sweet things again and again and again. and that works really well, the alternation between the two, because it means that then you had the double time interval for the real food to settle, and then you could just top up the sugars in between. So that was fantastic. 

[00:15:39] Taryn: knowing that is what happened with you, would you write your plan differently if you did it again? What sort of things would you change?

[00:15:46] Lisa: I think when we talked about it, we said maybe what we did, Through the actual event was okay, like, especially once we went to that, you know, liquid or gel and then real food, liquid or gel, and we alternated those, but what we said we definitely have to change would be the recovery type food still have some meals, but a lot more liquid base for recovery.

[00:16:08] Taryn: Yeah, and Paul can eat, right? Paul can eat. 

[00:16:12] Paul: a normal day. Yeah, for sure.

[00:16:14] Taryn: Particularly, yeah, you're going from eating a whole, day of, you know, real food on the bike when you're exercising and then trying to smash that in afterwards as well, which is great. And you know, you might be better at that next time too, because you've had that practice and you know how you're going to feel.

[00:16:29] And you can also do more of that practice in training to help next time. Cause is there a Are you going to do this thing again? 

[00:16:37] Paul: I wouldn't say no, certainly not next year. I think I need more than 24 to realign what I want to do. But, but I definitely, you're 100 percent right. I think, think there's still. some little things we left out on course that you could tweak and do better, make it more fun. Come back. 

[00:16:51] Taryn: Can it be any more fun?

[00:16:52] Paul: Absolutely. It was great. 

[00:16:54] Taryn: So there's, not a lot of information online for people that do want to do a race like this. I'm trying to help that. And Jodie was really forward about helping athletes who are interested in doing the event. So do you have any advice for somebody that is looking at doing something like an Ultraman that they could make sure they are implementing in their training and in their nutrition so that they can be thrown shuckers everywhere on their double marathon as well? 

[00:17:16] Paul: I think 100 percent and you've said it, , from day one the TNA program, triathletes get carb loading and nutrition post recovery nutrition completely wrong. And you could see the competitors in the field that weren't, well, may or may not have had their carb loading correct and certainly weren't doing. recovery nutrition as aggressively as you suggest, you could see it day to day that they were just going downhill and downhill. We're all very good at counting calories and carbs on the bike. But afterwards is when it really counts, that ability to be standing on day two and day three, yep, ready to high five whatever comes, that I think is the key. 

[00:17:56] Taryn: Okay, super aggressive recovery 

[00:17:58] Paul: Yes, yeah, from the minute of recovery as well, well, Lisa was straight there on the finish line with the recovery meal, shoving it in my face, going, eat this, take this, eat this whilst you're getting a massage Whereas I think other people would have been an hour or two hours before they even looked at food, which immediately put them back. You know, you've only got 12 hours to be back on that start line fueled and ready. So

[00:18:20] Taryn: Yeah, and sometimes even less for some people, depending on how long their days are. So it's, yeah, very rapid turnaround. I always ask for photographic evidence that there's some recovery happening at the finish line, which, thankfully, all that happened, which is good. 

[00:18:35] So what's a summary of what you would do differently then? You would change up how you would fuel on the day a little bit, and then majorly what you would do outside. Is there anything you would do differently with training or your nutrition training going in? 

[00:18:49] Paul: nutrition training going in, I probably didn't train the volume enough on the bike. You can't go and ride eight to 12 hours every day, , every weekend , to get that experience. So you tend to plan your nutrition for a four or five hour ride, which is lower. So I probably should have respected that and done over nutrition training, going for a three hour ride, but eat the nutrition required to eat for a six hour ride. that's exactly the same as what I did with the distances, you know, you ride over the distance so you're comfortable with the lower distance. I think if you applied a similar aspect with nutrition, I can handle more, so less is okay. I could only handle, enough. And it got me through the race , but yeah, if I had any problems along the way, if I had some stomach upsets I would have been in the, in the hurt locker real quick.

[00:19:39] Taryn: Yeah. And thankfully you weren't. I also love that you were so like chill about how you were going, that Lisa told us you were in the toilet for way too long, just having pit stops and just, I don't know, what were you doing on Instagram or something? Having a scroll faffing around.

[00:19:54] Paul: Lisa says I need to eat faster and go to the toilet faster. 

[00:19:57] Taryn: Yeah, maybe wear a two piece suit so that you can go to the toilet faster. Nope, nothing. He's like, whatever. 

[00:20:04] Paul: That's how long it takes, Darren.

[00:20:08] Taryn: And you still came fifth overall, even though you were dicking around in the bathrooms for ages. Like, you had a shower on day one, and I was like, Lisa, no, you can't, he 

[00:20:17] Paul: you've got to have a shower. 

[00:20:18] That's the best. What, ten hours in salty water? You just want to rinse that off and forget about it.

[00:20:23] Taryn: Hose, keep going.

[00:20:25] Lisa: To be fair, that turned out quite well because we didn't know he was coming out of the water when he came out. So, I handed him his clothes, he went and had a shower, and I went and set up his transition.

[00:20:35] Taryn: Okay. Would you want to go back and try and win the thing? Or would you want to go back and just, you know, see if you could better your time?

[00:20:43] Paul: Oh, the speed required to win. Ultraman those ladies and women that are at the front They're on the next level to be able to race at that speed, you know, they're a sub 10 hour ironman pace But doing it over three days, hats off to them. That's too quick for my little legs.

[00:21:01] Taryn: You're a perfect endurance physique, though. You could do it. It's just in your mind, I think.

[00:21:07] Paul: Yeah, maybe, but I'm not sure if I'd have fun the whole way though. So that's a problem. I'd be hurting too much.

[00:21:13] Taryn: I love it. I love it. what have you set your sights on next then? That was the big crazy 

[00:21:17] thing for 2024. What are, what are you planning on doing next?

[00:21:21] Paul: The big question mark is, what's longer than a three day ultra triathlon. Um, I am eyeing off it. 240 kilometer ultra run in the Northern Territory. So that's maybe the next one.

[00:21:35] Taryn: Oh gosh, what do you think, Lise?

[00:21:37] Lisa: Oh yeah, I'm always, I'm always behind all these events.

[00:21:42] Taryn: Live vicariously through Paul.

[00:21:43] Lisa: Yeah. Anything he wants to do, especially if it gets me some sort of holiday or trip to somewhere cool, I'm always, I'm always down for that.

[00:21:51] Taryn: You are the ultimate support person though, cause, and also cause he's so happy, and he's not an asshole, that you're like, yeah we can do that again. Like you never risk divorce because he's just so chill and he has a great time and it just is infectious. It is.

[00:22:04] Lisa: Yes, we did have a very good crew and we had a very good three days as well. We did, we did say that, that, you know, it was very easy to crew for Paul. And, you know, we had fun and no one was yelling at anybody. It was all really, really cruisy, really happy. We loved it.

[00:22:18] Taryn: Yeah, you do hear those horror stories, don't you? And it is like, your crew can make or break your event too, so perhaps that's good advice for somebody looking to do Ultraman, is that you've got to get good crew, because not good crew definitely breaks the day. 

[00:22:31] Paul: Yeah. And a crew, that just understands what you need, when you need it without you having to ask or talk about it. Cause yeah, mental fatigue. I think at the end of day three, you just, you just want to be handed something and said, eat it. You don't want to be 

[00:22:43] Taryn: Yep. Perhaps that's a perk of having your wife crew for you, because she knows you so well, that you can just look at her a certain way, and she's like, ooh, he needs this right now.

[00:22:52] Paul: Yep. 

[00:22:52] Lisa: Well, I did do that, but he didn't listen at some point. 

[00:22:55] Taryn: ha!

[00:22:56] Lisa: He said, no, I'd like this instead.

[00:22:59] Taryn: Maybe it goes both ways. 

[00:23:01] Lisa: yeah. we had the best crew. And I think for anyone that wants to do this event, having, you know, A really good crew and for us, that person that Paul said, she's one of my friends and now both her and her husband are our good friends. But because Lani had done the event and her husband, Andy, had been the crew, so that was, by the time Paul was doing it, that was their, well, Andy's third time being a crew captain and Lani's. third time being at the event and being involved. So they were just amazing. And they took the pressure off me.

[00:23:32] All I had to worry about was Paul's nutrition and the girls were, our girls were there too, just cheering every single day. And even Andy, I remember like Paul said, knowing your crew, knowing you on the run day, Andy just randomly said, Oh, I think I'm going to run with Paul for a bit. Cause you're allowed to have paces. Paul doesn't normally, he doesn't 

[00:23:50] Taryn: ha! 

[00:23:51] Lisa: pretty solo. but Andy said, I'm just going to run with him. And looking back, you know, Paul said that was what he needed at the time. probably would have slowed down and his pace would have dropped a bit, but yeah, he just got out and went, yeah, we're just going to run.

[00:24:05] Taryn: Nice, nice. How do you find GoodCrew then? If you've got people that have done the event, would be a good place to look. But any other suggestions to find GoodCrew?

[00:24:15] Paul: if they're willing to you know, stump up the expense to travel with you to these events, it, the crew you train with all the time, makes the better crew. Because they, gel with you, they get you. That would be my first place to look. then if not, you then certainly look out. for people that have participated or crewed in the event before to know those little nuances of things that take the pressure off.

[00:24:37] Taryn: Yeah, it's all those details that you can't, you know, find on the internet. And even talking with people, you just can't get that detail sometimes. So it's good to have that experience. And like now you've got amazing experience that you can share with others too. Because Ultraman's not something you do every year, is it?

[00:24:52] Do you know anybody that is doing it annually?

[00:24:55] Paul: I do have another fellow in my workplace who has done it eight times, so we did several back to back. He's a font of knowledge for Ultraman. But yeah, the average Joe, no not back to back.

[00:25:06] Taryn: when have you set your sights for Ultraman again?

[00:25:08] Paul: we're in the plan, it's a line again, you know, being local to it this year was great. So the travel and things, so just when it lines up and it looks like a fun thing to do, that's, we'll be straight back in there.

[00:25:22] Taryn: So relaxed! So relaxed. Most triathletes have like, got the next three years mapped out exactly. And Paul's like, meh, whenever. I love it. You're a good person to have around, Paul. 

[00:25:35] Paul: needs a balance of type A and type C people.

[00:25:39] Taryn: Yep. Alright Legends, so any, any famous last words? Any famous 

[00:25:44] last words summary for Ultraman Australia? Give it a big thumbs up. 

[00:25:49] Paul: absolutely. If you just thumb up, even if you just, you

[00:25:52] know, throw your hand up to come and crew for someone one day. It's probably over 50 percent of the experience you'll have as crew. And it's completely achievable by, you know, anyone who can complete an Iron Man. I if they put their mind to it, can readily, you know, achieve that Ultraman goal.

[00:26:09] It's not,, so far in the distance that it's unachievable. You just gotta plan for it and do the right things and you'll get there and it's, it's amazing.

[00:26:17] Lisa: And it is the most supported event, I think, in Australia. team that organise it are just amazing and they go out of their way as well to help you with anything you can think of.

[00:26:28] Taryn: Yeah, that's great. It does look like an amazing event. Like all the photos on the day, like the finish line shots, everything looks really awesome. I always have massive FOMO when it's on. But it does look like a great event. And like you said, Paul, a lot of people can achieve it. And I know a lot of our TNA athletes are kind of thinking about it.

[00:26:44] They're mulling it over. So I know that they're listening, going, okay, reckon I could do it with, you know, these steps to get there. 'cause we're usually pretty planned and organized. Well, thank you so much for sharing your experience with us. And yeah, Ultraman 2026 maybe calling it.

[00:27:02] Paul: Maybe. Before 2030. I'll I'll be too grey then.

[00:27:07] Taryn: Nah, your diesel engine just keeps building as you get older and you've got a pretty good one. Plus you're like, perfect endurance physique.

[00:27:13] Thank you team! Thank you McDonald's team! 

Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Triathlon Nutrition Academy podcast. I would love to hear from you. If you have any questions or want to share with me what you've learned, email me at [email protected]. You can also spread the word by leaving me a review and taking a screenshot of you listening to the show. Don't forget to tag me on social media, @dietitian.approved, so I can give you a shout out, too. If you want to learn more about what we do, head to dietitianapproved.com. And if you want to learn more about the Triathlon Nutrition Academy program, head to dietitianapproved.com/academy. Thanks for joining me and I look forward to helping you smashed in the fourth leg - nutrition!