Road men, welcome back to the podcast. Today's guest is Mr. Alex Wild. Today's podcast is a little bit unique. Alex Wild is one of the top racers in the Lifetime Grand Prix series. Sea Otter was the opening race in that series which just took place. Alex has agreed to come on the podcast, open up his data, show us exactly what it takes to be at the front of these bike races. The preparation in race, the data, the fueling strategies, the tactics, the dynamics, the gossip, it's all here. Welcome to the podcast, Mr. Alex Wild. Alex, welcome back to the Roman Pod. Thanks for having me. What did it feel like to finally be standing on the sea otter start line knowing the lifetime Grand Prix is officially underway for 2025? Man, it it felt quick this year. I feel like I was just taking my my month off and I've done a good job in the off season of what I call keeping it fun. There's like I guess stages of my off seasonason like I trained through December and then my wife and I went to do a camp dedicated took some time off work to go to Maui and just ride and run. Um and then me and my buddies always do what we call a coast ride which is three big days normally six hours on Memorial Day weekend. So, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and yeah, come off the back of that, go into Cape Epic, and yeah, like you said, I just standing on the start line of Sea, like, wow, the the season's here. It's it's time to go. We're going to dive in. We're going to talk data, tactics, tech, everything Sea Odder. But just to give some context as to the leadin to sea, what did that block look like in between, as you said, riding Cape Epic and coming into Sea Order? or is a case of just freshening up or what's going on there? Um, I think it's listening to your body. So, taking a step back, before we went to Cape Epic, we did a Cape Replica block. So, it was 2,000 TSS, I think, in 8 days. So, big block. And then the nice thing about that is it makes travel less stressful for me because you take those days off because you need them anyway. So, you're not worrying about like getting there, building the mic, spinning. Like, there's no rush to travel, which I enjoy. and then came into Cape Epic. Um, going into Cape Epic, my body was saying, "Hey, we need a little extra time." So, we took a little more spin days as I got to South Africa and just trusted that the body would show up. And then the day before the TT when we did some openers, it was kind of like, okay, now now we're cooking with gas. We got the engine back underneath me. And Cape Epic went super well for me. Um, some people probably listen to the pod. Zach struggled a little bit with some just some health stuff. So I was going well we both going slower than we expected. So with that we thought we might recover a little quicker which we did honestly within two days after Cape Epic which was very surprising to me. I was doing spins. So for me that's like 2 to 240 roughly just easy cruising. And I was feeling like I needed to up those a little bit. So, I put them into endurance, so closer to 250 just just because I knew travel back again is two days off the bike. So, I didn't really want to lose too much. Um, we got back, got off the plane, swapped to the the drop bar bike, which is always uh an interesting one for me. Sometimes it takes a few days to get used to, but honestly, right off the plane felt great. The next day we did uh 7 by 8 minutes with 3 minutes rest and was hitting phenomenal numbers. So, we knew we were ready. What's a phenomenal number? I mean, I did the 7 by 8 minutes at 4 to 4:30 with only 3 minutes rest between. So, I think the normalized was like 390 for over an hour. Oh, that's a brutal session. Yeah. And and it's it's a good sign, right? Because in that the three minutes is strategic because it's teaching your body to flush that lactate and flush it quickly. So, I think that repeatability was there which was exciting. And then kind of when you see something like that as an athlete, you're like, "Oh, sick. I want to do intervals again tomorrow." And as a coach, you're like, "Oh, sick. He's ready for a race. Let's not do intervals again tomorrow." So, it was nice that uh I had that that knowledge. And so, we knew we were ready for seat at that point. It was kind of just maintaining. So, we got a little bit of a block in.
Um got out to the course one more time to see it. And then the usual week leadup. Um, we did do some sauna work just because South Africa was hot, so we know we had heat acclimatization already. So, we did a few uh 25 to 30 minute sessions in the sauna just to make sure we kept that topped up. And then, yeah, I mean, coming into Sea Otter, it was the opposite of Cape Epic. I was worried about being too fresh, so I just want to do a little bit of work. We did uh the group ride the Saturday before and just punched it a little bit just to kind of keep the engine running but also again not let your legs go from fresh to blocked essentially. So the week before is interesting. I was chatting to Dan Lurang last week. He's the head of performance for Bora and he's saying a lot of the writers there now have moved away from a taper before a big event. So they're tapering them two weeks out from an event and then going back into build one week before an event because they like to come in with a bit of fatigue. They just feel too undercooked with a traditional taper. Yeah, I think that a bit of it comes with experience, right? And I think listening to your body is key there because at Cape Epic, right, the taper was what made me good for the race. And then coming into Sea Otter, knowing that I needed a little bit more to make sure I wasn't blocked to kind of have the engine going. So, I think you learn how that feels and you can kind of like I was coming to each race from a different perspective. like Cape Epic. I was trying to get good and Sea Otter I was I was flying and trying to make it so I didn't like drain almost. Any interesting bike setup decisions? What did you go on today? Um I was going to run Explore, but it's an interesting course. It's a really really fast course with a really steep climb at the end, like a proper 8 to 12 minute climb, depending on if you include the the cork screw and everything. Um, so I knew I wanted to run the biggest chain ring possible, but I went to transmission so that I could run a 50 to up front, but still have a 50-52 as my bailout gear instead of a 5046. So, how does that work for someone that's not familiar with it? So, essentially, you divide the front chain ring by the rear to get what's called your gear ratio. So if I had run transmission with a 50-52, that's underneath one. So to put it in perspective, to get that same ratio or close to it on Explore, I would have had to run a 44 to front chain ring. Also, in terms of efficiency, a rough, I guess, best practice is the bigger the chain ring, the less the chain bends, the more efficient it is. So I knew I would be in that biggest gear going up parts of Lookout no matter what because it's just steep. So essentially what I did is the cassette on the transmission is 10 to 52 where on the Explore it's 10 to 46. So I still have the same fastest gear with a 10. For the flats, the downhill, anywhere that's really pedaly, which Sea Otter is notoriously a big power course. There's very little time you're spent coasting. So, it was kind of trying to get both ends of that spectrum, which is rare because we're doing a pretty long steep climb. And I just felt that those first two laps could be submaximal as the group kind of suses itself out. So, I wanted to be able to have a higher cadence while still riding that lower power. And it worked out. My average cadence, I think, ended up being 91 for the day. So, how about setup? I did the 22 Air Track, which is the replacement for the Renegade in the front, and then a 50 Tracer, which is our new gravel tire in the rear. Nope. I don't really do inserts ever. I don't like the way they make the tires feel. Um, I may run them at Unbound just because you don't really need tire feel there. There are a lot of flat left and right hand corners that just don't require much skill, I guess, for lack of another word. Um, just so extra safety there, but no, don't no don't don't. Yeah, don't normally run inserts. And will you stick with Sorry to jump ahead to Unbound. We will get into I know we're going to do a separate part on that, but is the initial thinking you're going to run mountain bike tires for unbound or will you stick with gravel? I will likely run the 22 air tracks front and rear.
Um I think people are forced to recognize their pecking order with with how fast that start was. Um it's a Darwinian pecking order. Yeah. Yeah. I think I think we came out swinging pretty fast. Uh Sea Otter regardless of being the Fuego XL or this new gravel race, we start up the track. It's kind of the same formula. Uh I didn't have a call up this year because they decided to do top five overall from the Grand Prix last year and then top five at Sea Otter last year. Both of which I narrowly missed. So I knew it was going to be the same thing as always that the sooner you line up the better. So I actually started my warm-up I think 25 minutes early just so I knew I'd get my full warmup in. And I also told my mechanic Daniel to essentially have rollers set up at the finish just in case I wanted to hop on them and I could kind of wait in line while rolling. Um, so as soon as I saw people lining up, I was at the tape and I was essentially right behind everyone that got the call up. So second row and that's like a drag race like into that first single track like where Pete Stetta broke his hand a couple of years ago. It's not that same single track section and this time it is onto a fire road, but I was a little worried because that fire road is technical in terms of riding it full gas with 100 people next to you, there's ruts, there's a little bit of sand, there's a lot of dust you can't see. So, although it's not technical to ride per se, I think the race made it technical. So, being up front is still super important. Um, I wasn't too bothered about leading the race at that point or or being top three. I thought, you know, top 10 to 20 would be fine. Essentially, I felt we still do that chicane, so a quick right, quick left, and then there's a little climb and then we start descending. I felt if I was top 10, 15 wheels, that I'm kind of out of that possibility of carnage where someone's divebombing you because they're not where they want to be. someone's super tired because they're, you know, riding above their fitness level, crossing wheels, crashing, unclipping, whatever it is. I just didn't want to waste those matches. So, it's kind of that fine balance of at the front enough and I just I checked that box. When did the first pivotal moments come? I think that was the first pivotal moment, honestly. Um, it doesn't feel like it when you've succeeded, but there are riders that started too far back and still made the front group, but they had a few less matches in their matchbook. So, that was the first fight. And then that uh fire road brings us to the bottom of the second longest climb on course. And Matt hit it pretty hard there. So, I imagine someone probably just got on and then has to do 450, 500 watts for three minutes to to get up this climb. And that's got to hurt. And Matt puts out Matt Beers here. Matt puts out wild power. Like he's a big dude. His power numbers are wild. Well, in his wheel, it feels like he's a big dude. You feel like you should get a better draft than you do because he puts out so much power. You just feel like you don't actually get a draft because you're still putting out just as much power in his wheel. So it Yeah. Massive. Is there any psychological advantage to going, "Oh, like I'm sitting at 440 in his wheel here." Like, he's got to be doing easy 540 up there. Like, that's has to be hurting. Yeah. I don't have power up when I race, but I mean, I've I know I'm at that level that if I'm hurting, everyone's hurting. So I think there is solace in that in terms of if if I'm hurting behind him, he's hurting himself to do the effort and anyone who's still with us is hurting, which every time that happens, you kind of are are a little happy because your first five wheels, so imagine someone who's 25th wheel seeing gaps open up. Not only is it mentally taxing, but if they're gonna go faster than Matt is at the front to get to the front, then that's either a really impressive rider or they're writing their own ticket. Well, that's also where you're talking about that first win of the day position in the top 15. And because for anyone that hasn't been in that position, if you find yourself 40 wheels back, initially, you're doing the same draft maybe as someone in wheel 10, but then somebody in wheel 35 decides, "Oh, this is too much for me." in they pull out.