One of the most honest conversations i've ever had. Jani opens up about depression, bullying, eating disorders and doping infractions. He shares insights from riding with Contador & Armstrong but what he really does is start to remove the stigma around mental health problems within the professional peloton.
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It started already when I was an amateur. And the thing was, I had this teammate and he was really, he was really successful. But then he started seeing me as a threat. And for one season all the time, he was just pulling me all the time, all the time. And at the only time, yeah, he was nice to me was when I lost weight. And I looked skinny. And he started to be nice to me and my friend and everything. And so I found a way how to keep my weight off and still able to eat normal amounts or sometimes overeat and then it just escalated. Then throughout the years. What was the eating disorder out of Sebelemia? Yeah. Yeah. The big question is this. How do we use cycling as a tool to improve our health, our happiness and our lung changes? That is the question. This podcast will give you the answers. My name is Anthony Walsh and welcome to the Row Man Podcast. Hello, roadman. Welcome back to another roadman podcast. Have I got a serious treat in store for you today? But yesterday is Jani Bracavich. Jani Bracavich has written for Discovery Channel. He's written for Astana. He's written for Bahareh, Marita. Jani Bracavich is a top 10 finisher general classification in the Tour de France. He's also a former Criterium de Dauphiné winner. He was, I think, the first ever Slovenian world champion when he won the U-23 World Time Trial Championships as an amateur, which is still crazy to think. He's been teammates with Alberto Contador and Lance Armstrong, but he really opened up in this interview. It's an amazing interview where Jani all credit to him. He opens his heart and he talks to us about bullying, depression, doping, eating disorders and ultimately it's a story of redemption. It's a story of somebody coming out the far side of all that adversity and I suppose editorial note since we recorded this podcast, Jani finished four in the Slovenian National Road Race Championships. One and two was, you guessed it, Primos, Roglich and Pogakar. Two of the most two of the best riders in the world. I was going to say most promising, but they're far beyond most promising. They're two of the best boy crudders in the world at the moment. Jani was in the break at the business end of that. So congratulations to Jani, undoubtedly maybe a little disappointed in the nature of the character he is, but a great result nonetheless. So I'm going to jump into that, but before I do, the way I am able to bring you these podcasts every Wednesday is true to the generosity of the Patreons. A bunch of you guys have gone off and you've bought me a beer to say thank you over on patreon and patreon.com forward slash Anthony underscore watch. And that is how I fund this podcast. We haven't quite hit break even point yet, but I'm hoping we will do that real soon. So if you're enjoying this content, if you would buy me a beer to say thank you, that would be very much appreciated. If you just tip the cap, say, Shappo, I'm enjoying listening to this and narrow along each week. And I tell tell you many, many, many more hours of preparation on editing post production. If you want to tip your cap and just say, you know what, thanks, I'll get you a beer for facilitating all that. Patreon is your way. You can do that. Jump on over there. I'm going to put the link in the description. Another way you can support the podcast and get something out of it yourself is jump on over to our merch store. And I know it's shrunk you guys have bought Robeman merch already which I can't wait to see you rocking that. I want to build on the roads, on Instagram, make sure you tag me on it. I'm going to put the link to our merch store in the description. Also, strap in, turn off any distractions. You have canceled those meetings. Just you got to goksto Zoom calls. This one is epic at Yanny Brackovich. Yanny Brackovich, welcome to the Roadman podcast. Thank you. Jania, I'm excited about this chat. Yeah, me too. I used to finally. Yeah, we had some internet connectivity issues yesterday. You're in Slovenia at the moment? Yeah, yeah. What was going on yesterday? It's somewhere to understorm. Well, yeah, we had the thunderstorm and there was no Wi-Fi and we're staying at the hotel. It's basically an Olympic training center with hypoxic rooms. and because it's only four of us here, everybody leaves at like 2pm, so we're on our own and there was nobody to fix it. Ah, amazing. Is that something that public? No. Go to or is it like just your team? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's amazing facility. Yeah. Yeah, we're chatting a little bit about Slovenia on your Instagram, sorry, it just looks absolutely breathtaking. Yeah, yeah, it's beautiful. I need to get over there soon.
Yanny, I used to watch you. I remember just when I was getting into cycling and just being, you know, when you're starting off and you're just trying to consume everything you can about cycling. I think you were one of the four riders, I really started kind of following their career because I suppose you were coming into the sport at the time when I was starting to watch the sport seriously. And I feel like I've just watched your whole career all the way through. So, yeah, I kind of have this weird voyeuristic thing chatting to you. There are now a lot about you, but you don't know much about me. But you're famous for these crazy long training rides. And I even at one point heard you describe it as it's an addiction. When did that addiction start? Oh, it started back in... It's basically started when I started riding my road bike. The thing was I started training really late. I was 17, 18. That was my first year as a road racer. And the problem was I was very, very skinny. No muscle mass. I had no history of any other sports beforehand. So at the start of the year, I was not doing well, to be honest. I was getting dropped at the start line. And I would finish. I would do 20 minutes and then I would drop out. So that summer, summer break, all my teammates went for holidays. And I stayed at home. And I started doing this long rides from 8 a.m. till 5 p.m. And yeah, seriously, I remember doing about 1200 kilometers per week for two months. Wow. And when we started racing again, I was able to race, to actually race. And at the end of that year, I almost qualified for the world. And that's basically how it started and it just went up and up from there. Because I've heard you talking about you had a difficult childhood and you were sort of bullies growing up. Was Saetland a little bit of an escape for you? Yeah, yeah. Definitely. Because I was very, very shy. I didn't want to engage in anything. I didn't want to be judged by others and riding a bike was my escape. Basically, I was able to do whatever I wanted and I loved it. And then on the top of it, I was becoming really good at it. So it was a bonus and that's how it started. And you hit the Sport I suppose, your pro. It was actually pre-pro. 2004, you hadn't even turned pro. Is your pro in 2005? Yeah, August 2005. Yeah. So in 2004, you're a world champion as an amateur. Yeah. And like talk to me about that, the tran, what was the training like in the lead up to that? Because well, it was purely coincidence because one of my teammates, teammates, he was supposed to do the time trial of your team championships and then the world's. and he got injured. So our coach said, well, maybe you should try it. And that's how we started. I started training. There was a lot of motopacing that year I won the nationals. And then I think I was second or third of the Europeans. And then I won the world. How much work we have put in it? Because you're a skin, you're still a very lane rider and you're all through your career, you were someone who really was a slight rider. You don't know how to see those guys as TT powerhouses. Yeah, but at that time I was, I was heavier than now. I was about 62, 63 kilos. So I was, I was okay. I wasn't skinny skinny. Yeah. Now I'm, I'm, I'm skinny. And how much, say back in 2004, how much focus did you guys put on, you know, coefficient of frontal drag and aerodynamics and this sort of thing? Nothing. It was nothing. It was just motor pacing, nothing else. And I got the bike from my teammate and we kept the same position and everything. We didn't change anything. It was just his bike. I remember at the start line, they hit the scale and they were waiting the bikes. And so this guy takes my bike and he tries to put it on a scale and he's like, no, no, it's okay. Because it was like 12 kilos, seriously. It was a really heavy bike. That's crazy, on your beach. Yeah. Was it Thomas Decker, your beach? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like that's pretty not so I'm sure he had some aerial testing going on. Yeah, yeah, for sure. So that win kind of gets you in the shop window and was there, was that strange kind of going from because Slovenia, you were first ever Slovenian, World Champion? Yes, that's correct. It was strange because at the end of that year I was supposed to, actually I signed the pre-contract with Italian, you would say, second division team. Yeah. And so that was set. I was supposed to write for them from August on.
And then that November, Johan Varnil called the team director. And so we met in Belgium that it's testing, and that was it. He just said, OK. We're gonna sign you and don't work. So what's that like? Yo-Hamp, like, because we're talking in 2005. Yo-Hamp, or your nail is the biggest director in cycling at that time, and he's just off the back of the poll for years. Like, how insane is that? It was, I was really excited, but I don't wanna sound arrogant, I don't want to sound arrogant, but I had the goal. And that was just the part of my development. I wanted to turn pro, and I wanted to race for a really big team. And I was fortunate to sign that contract immediately. Of course, I was really happy, but I was also a little bit scared because I didn't know anybody. I never went to the States beforehand and it was a little bit stressful. Are you making some decent cash out of that back in 2005? Now, I was making first year, I was making $45,000, second year, 55, and third year, 65. Okay, but it's a big jump from your amateur days. Oh, yeah, yeah, definitely, definitely. What's your number? I'll be very honest. I love him. And he's probably the guy who kept me sane and who kept me in the shape that I was capable of being at that time because I always wanted to try something new, something else, different I even at one point, I wanted to bring my altitude to 10 to race. And I had everything packed, ready to travel. And then he called me and said, no. And looking back, it was really crazy. But then you followed Johan across to Estana and you're out of Stana. What were you dealing when you heard the news that Armstrong is coming back out of retirement and he's gonna be your teammate? It was cool. It was really nice. And already that winter I was told I was gonna do the gyro with him. So it was a big goal for me to be in good shape. And I think I did pretty well at race. Was that the first time you admit Armstrong when you came? No, no. No, no, I met him in 2005 because I turned pro in August, but they brought me to the states for their training camp in January already. So I trained with them for two weeks. So that was the first time I talked to him. What was Armstrong like compared to that? Because I know I've buddies who are involved in that whole use of cases and stuff. And sometimes the image of them in the press is just not the person they are. And is Armstrong, do you see two different people, the person you know and the guy you see in the documentaries and the guy you see on the press? Yeah, absolutely. I think people only see one side of him, and I was lucky enough to see his other part. And overall, I would say he's done some bad things, but I don't think he's a bad person. I don't think so. How open then was the knowledge that Haram Strong was to open or how widespread was it around that time. There was, there was in the team, there was no talk about that, no talk. It wasn't like something you knew, but it was just like not mentioned. Well, I think you could suspect, but nobody talked about it. I think nobody wanted to talk about it. I suppose he's just such a big character as well. And I know it's obviously different and saw it, but one of the saws we've seen over and over again with him is almost a little bit of a bully, like the treatment of Emma O'Royley and stuff like that. Yeah, yeah. It's not like a reason that people just didn't broge that subject, that it was just, you know, fear the arms wrong or rot. Yeah, probably. I mean, he defended himself by attacking others. I think many people didn't even try to do anything. Would you say you were friends with him? I consider him a friend. I still talk to him from time to time. But I'm not his best buddy, you know? It's not like my teammate here in the next room. Yeah. It's got to be hard watching a buddy go through because whatever about, he doped, he took a penalty. But when I look at it, Mike Barry, Christian van de Veld, all these guys all had the same thing on USADA. They all admitted to dope and sure to postal years. A lot of them took six-month bans. Then Armstrong got the life ban, and it's like the same crime. One person got a six-month ban, one person got a dead sentence. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I also have some experiences with that because in 2018, I got suspended and I admit it was totally my fault, even though it was an intentional, it was Myers' flexibility.
And I know how that UCI and the ADF, how they work. And it was nothing about trying to find out what happened. It was just if you can tell us about something, about somebody, you can get reduced sentence. Is it actually like that? Yeah. The first conversation I had with them was like, if you can tell us something about somebody, we can reduce your suspension for like a lot. Fucking hell. How much resuction are you talking? I mean, I got... So I was pretty... I did everything myself, defending myself. and I got to 10 months, which I think was a little bit harsh, because my, the quantity of the substance in my urine was like 100 times less than when you actually take the substance to get the benefit, you know? But okay, I got it 10 months. I deserved it. And if I was able to provide them with some information, it would be maybe 3 months. Because I think this is the moment as well, because I'm on the whereabouts protocol on the tandem, trying to qualify for Tokyo at the moment. So the testers land up to your house, and I never begrudge the testers go and you know it's inconvenient. You're planning on doing it. Like I came in a few weeks ago and I just come back from the GM and they're like, okay, where have you been? And I was like, as soon as I said GM, I was like, fuck. Cause I just went up to stretch. But if you've exercised, they have to come in. You can't get tested in like for the next two hours or something. Yeah, yeah. So like I've planned like recording podcasts, some Zoom calls and I'm literally just sitting there drinking fucking cup city and making small talk. But and I don't mind that because that's part of the job. But exactly, exactly. It's just when you're at like, I'd say compared to where you were and I suppose where you were now, like you're at a very low level nail compared to where you were. Yeah. Is it it's kind of easy to let I find that I'm not sure what you think. It's easy to let the guard down and you take a multi vitamin And you're not entirely sure what's in the multivitamin. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So what was your, what did you get popped for? It was MH Metal Hexenamine. It's also called, it's known as DMAA. It's some sort of stimulant. But the reason why it's banned, it's not that it's ergogenic, it's actually bad for your health. It's dangerous. It used to be a drug and 10, 15 years ago, they stopped producing it because it increased blood pressure for some people and that's why it's banned. do you think it got into your system? Oh, I'm pretty sure that I know the reason, but I wasn't able to prove it. So I bought this because I also talked about my eating disorder. And it was at the end of 2017 when I didn't have a contract for next year. And I was going through a really rough time. and the only thing I was able to eat and actually keep it in my body was a meal replacement. So I bought this meal replacement powder which was, it had a pretty good formula. It was like oats and beef protein and fish protein and it was minimally processed. It tasted pretty good. But I didn't know at the time that this very same company used to produce a supplement containing this ingredient. And I guess it was cross-contamination. Because the amount of substance was so low that if you take it intentionally, it would be 100 times more in your urine. So for anyone listening, like Dopin is a strict liability offense, which means you just have to have the prohibited substance in your system and then you're found guilty of the Dopin infraction. They don't really care how it got there. Exactly. So it is... Unless there's one thing that you have to note, unless you were prescribed a drug and And that drug was contaminated with a bent substance and you can prove it. Then it's possible to get out without the suspension. I suppose the most famous example. He has to be a drug. The most famous example of the tainted stuff is an ex-team, my ears Alberto Contador. I think, did he claim that the beef was contaminated? Yeah. Was it clambutero? Was that for now? Yeah. Is that plausible in your opinion? Well it's possible but there's no clan allowed in European Union. So if he was training in Argentina or China, it would be very likely. But in the Europe I have no idea. I cannot say that he was lying or that he was right. As clambutero, I know it's popular with bodybuilders and stuff like that for strip and weight off. It's illegal in cycling. But is it something that would have been talked about? Are you seeing riders using clambutero to try and strip weight in season or out season?
I don't think so. Because the thing with cleanse, it stays in your fat issue. So when you race, you're naturally going to go through some lipolysis. And then when you start burning fat, that cleanse is going to get liberated and get into your blood circulation. And then you beat out. So one day you can be negative, and the next day you can be positive, but you didn't change anything, you know. Jani, you spoke, or you mentioned briefly the eating disorder, your heart. Do you want to talk to me a little bit about that? How did that come about? Yeah. So the thing with me was it started already when I was an amateur and the thing was I had this teammate and he was really successful. But then he started seeing me as a threat and for one season all the time he was just pulling me all the time, all the time. And at the only time, yeah, he was nice to me was when I lost weight and I looked skinny and he started to be nice to me and my friend and everything. And so So I found a way how to keep my weight off and still able to eat normal amounts or sometimes overeat and then it just escalated. Then throughout the years. What was eating this already? How was it, bulimia? Yeah. Yeah. And then what does that do to, I know you're quite accomplished now and you've sort of keen interest in nutrition. Like with the knowledge you have now, what does making yourself sick porridge and what's at the onto you like in terms of electrolyte balance? Yeah, yeah, there's there's a huge imbalance. And every time you purge, there's loss of electrolytes. And then your magnesium gets slower, your potassium can be can be low. But I I never, well, I wanted to address my problem but I just couldn't. So I started checking my potassium, my sodium, magnesium, and I started supplementing and trying to at least not to kill myself if I'm honest. And so are you okay? Are you purging like in your discovery years? Like at what point? Because of all through your career? It was on and off throughout my career for 10 years, 11 years. How hard is that to ask for help? It's impossible. I mean, because at that point, your self-esteem is zero. And you feel like you're not worth living a life. And everybody you talk to and they're praising you how fit your look, how skinny you are, you're basically lying to them. Because they would also talk about the tide and what you eat, how much you eat, how much you drink. And whatever you say you're lying. So that's another thing. And then at some point there would be somebody who would ask me if there's something wrong with me. Because it's, for me, it was really easy to hide it. But at times somebody would notice that something's not right. And when they approach you, you're not ready to talk about it. gonna deny and from that point on you also know that you were lying to that person and you can never be honest with him again. Dude, dude, it's our intermission. This podcast has been good so far but trust me as somebody who sat there late into the noise added in this podcast. The second half of this podcast really starts to heat up. Danny Brockovich, he's a great character. This is your weekly intermission. This is the point where maybe at some point we'll get a sponsor and we'll insert it in here. But for now, you're gonna listen to me and you're gonna listen to me with a smile on your face. The purpose of this intermission is for all to just decompress, take a collective exhalation, appreciate what has gone and look forward to what has to come. said like a true man who was raised in Catlik, Ireland, and was forced into the church every Sunday morning. The reason for this break, much like the church, it's our collection. It's time to pass around the hat. The way we fund this podcast, it's true user generosity over on patreon.com. If you will be willing to buoy me a beer, to buoy me a coffee at my next coffee stop and say, you know what, I've enjoyed this. Yannin Brackovich, Steve Cummins, Tyler Hamilton, Ted King, how the fuck you doing it? Where are you getting all the guests from? If you're willing to say, holy shit these guests are unbelievable. I will buy you a beer, patreon.com forward slash Anthony Walsh That's the place you can do it. Now, just relax, set the jaw to stone, because this Yannin by Brackovich podcast is about to take off. Is it like living a double life because we spoke about Armstrong a minute ago and he obviously had double life with open. You're winning the biggest bike races, you won the criteria of the Delphine and you're following Comtador in the mountains. You're the pin up boy for Saitland, I'm in Ireland and I'm watching video clips of Yanny Brackovich.
But you're going back to your hotel room and you're deeply troubled. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And there were times when I could control it, especially when I was going well, like doing doffin air for that 10 days, 12 days, I was fine. I was not feeling fine, but I did not do anything crazy or stupid. I just tried to control it as much as I could. But then after the race, it starts again. And if you don't get help, it's almost impossible to win this fight alone. Like we spoke at the very start of the podcast about your sort of obsessive training. And is that sort of obsessive quality? Because I know the little I know about eating disorders, I know one aspect of it is the control aspect that you're taking control back because it is something you can control. Do you think that was, you know, that personality trace that caused you to get up in the morning at 8 o'clock and right till 5 p.m. was also the same personality trait that made it difficult to come to terms with this eating disorder? Yeah, well, in the beginning, you think that you have control, but very quickly you realize that food controls you and you're not in control. You're just a passenger. And when you, in my case at least, when I started overeating, I knew what was gonna happen but I couldn't stop. And that was the thing I just couldn't control. And you cannot talk to anybody about it. Were you working with any sports psychologist or anything like that at the time? No, no. Because it just seems to me like nearly the perfect cocktail of... Yeah, when you're yeah, but when you're in that situation, you don't want to work with anybody. You because you're so ashamed that you don't want anybody to know what's going on and you don't want to help. That's also why in all these years I always did my training camps by myself all alone. No, nobody to help me, just me and my bike. Were you depressed during those points as well? I wouldn't define it as depression but when I wasn't going well, I think there were some times when you could say I was not well mentally. It's like I always think because I know we're roughly the same age and definitely grown up from a depression. It was a bad word almost. It was like a sign of vulnerability. It still is. Yeah, I think just depend on culturally on where you are, it's becoming, Well, at least my understanding of it is I used to think either it's binary, either you're depressed or you're not depressed. It's a yes or no question. I think to be honest, it's not binary, it's a scale. We're all on the scale somewhere from I'm trying to write today, I'm stuck in traffic to I'm suicidal and we're all on that continuum somewhere. And I guess with living that double life, it's putting you further up that continuum than than it would like to be. Yeah, yeah. What do you think about how we can address this? Because I know you're a cycling coach now and you're, I'd say, I'd nearly refer to you as sort of a student at a sport. It seems like you have a passion for just learning everything about the body and physiology. And so, you know, you more than anyone and the listeners, if you don't know already the two main variables that govern how fast we go uphill, govern a lot of our performance, it's the power we can produce and our weight. And, you know, how do we reconcile that power-to-weight equation with the vulnerabilities people have and the prevalence of eating disorders? Well, I think first we need to talk about it more openly. And then there should be people trained in psychology and eating disorders in the teams because doctors cannot help you. And the fact is that in all the things I've wrote for, the doctors were, there was no patient, doctor, like nothing was confidential, nothing. So when I had a problem, I talked to the doctor and five minutes later, the S talks to me on the bus if I'm fine, you know, and nobody wants to talk to a doctor who's telling everybody my problems. That's why why we need people specialized in these areas and people who can keep things private, of course. Because I talked to Tyler Hamilton on the podcast a couple of months ago on Tyler, a lovely guy. And Tyler was telling me about his experiences with Dr. Farrari. And he said he mightn't see him for a month, but one of the four things he'd do when he'd see him is pull out to callipers and go, you're too fast. Yeah, yeah. Well, I can tell you, I'm not gonna name the team, but from time to time, I get contacted by World 2 riders. And this year in January, they, this team had a training camp in Spain, I think.
And the nutritionist who was never a cyclist, never rode the bike but she's the additional whatever. She put the whole team on ketogenic diet and their food was measured and every night they would get a plate with their amount of food and that's what they eat and not the cows. And then every morning they would step on a scale and if the weight was too high why their meals were adjusted so that the next day they're going in the right direction weight-wise. But what that is, if you, you know, to a butcher has one solution to every problem, it's, you know, the meat cleaver. It's the same with this. The dietitian is trained in one approach. like you know, and I've heard you speaking about it, when you're stressed, the body's naturally high elevated cortisol levels, it makes it difficult for us to lose weight. And if you have constant awareness about food, and it's the front of every conversation in dialogue, that has to bump up stress levels. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, what happened next is when they went home, they started overeating and then they gained all the way they lost during the camp and gained some extra weight. It's crazy. It's a crazy culture and I actually don't know the solution to it because it's obviously not okay to be heavy in cycling because it do need to be launched. It's also how they approach it. I know there are still sports directors who will directly tell you that you're fat and you're fat as a pig and you should lose weight and you're never going to be cyclist again if you don't lose weight. These are some really heavy words and they have an effect on the cyclist. I chat to Nicholas Rauch on the podcast and he actually has quite a nice sensible approach to diet. He said he tries to stop it being an impulsive thing. He's not just walking down the pier and monacoan thinks, oh, you know what, I'll go in and have an ice cream and two beers. He thinks about his day at the start of the day and goes, you know what, I'm going to have a couple of beers and a nice cream to noise. So he maybe roids an extra 30 minutes that day or he maybe just holds back a little bit on lunch and he won't have an extra baguette or an extra potato at lunch and he just looks at the totality of his day and he said for him that just gives him great balance. Yeah, yeah absolutely. I mean even if you look at in a length of a week even if you're one day, I don't know, one thousand calories higher than you should be, there are still six days, you know, so what it matters is your weekly calories first, because I don't think we should count calories because it's an extra stress. I've tried that and even though I don't count calories right now, I would always subconsciously know how much I'm not really obsessing with it, but I just know. But isn't this a cultural thing now, Yannita? People think that they're everyone's looking for a quick fix or they think, you know, if I'm under on calories this, like a question I get all the time with like, knock coach clients for people like, you know, inquiring about stuff. It's like, oh, you know, what's the best session to do or something? And you're just trying to go like you're pulling your hair out gone. There's no bet. Like one session, those new shit. You know, it's it's a repetition of behavior over a period of time like missing one session doesn't fuck you up Doing one amazing session doesn't make it and it's the same way one bad day on good day on diet Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly exactly and it's also like Counting calories can be helpful and For somebody might be really important, but for somebody else it might be a way to an eating disorder, you know, it's it's it's a very thin line between Being professional and being obsessed and having eating disorder. Yeah I like the idea of counting calories for like a week and then you get an idea of what because you know you talked some guys and And you get them to do a small food diary and you look at it and straight away with an understanding of how many calories and stuff you're like, I can see what you're putting on waste. You're just eating way too much. But they don't understand that, you know, the fucking chocolate brown eater having on lunch four days a week is actually another 750 calories. Like in their head, they're kind of gone, oh, maybe it's two 50 calories. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, well, we're like, People are wired to over report good behaviors and under report bad behaviors. So it's when it comes to calories, they're always going to under report if it's about the weight loss. What's your question? Well, what I do with my clients, we would, as you said, we would count calories for a week, just like lock everything.
I like the chronometer, you know, the app? No, what's that? Chronometer. It's called chronometer. It's just like fitness pile, but it's way better. It's way more accurate and gives you like minerals, vitamins. everything you can imagine and just see what they eat for a week and then go from there and how much they wait at the start and the end of the week and then we see what we can do. Do you have a particular dot like so I'm just thinking about our typical listener and I think it's fair to say without insulting any listeners out there that most of them will be looking to to lose anywhere from 3 kilograms to 6 kilograms. Someone, if a client like that comes into you, what are the sort of things you're looking for in their dooyas at the end of that week after you have it in chronometer? Well, I look what they eat, how much they eat, sometimes when they eat. And then there's some people that really to restrict carbs and I think carbs can be very good and very bad depending on situation. So and then I make sure they have enough vitamin D, magnesium, omega trees, of course, both whole healthy food, basically. Are you in favor of kind of like carb, backloading, having the carbs? No. Straight after training? Straight after training, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And it also depends what you want to achieve. In my case with my training, I would sometimes, if I do five hours, I would try to restrict not carbs, just calories, because I don't do well on low carb diet. I do well on low calorie diet. When I need to lose weight, of course. I would restrict carbs or calories in the last 60 to 90 minutes of the training. And then I would have some carbs after training and protein. And then I also do another training session in the evening, which really works well for me. just for weight loss, but also for how I feel, how I sleep, and how I perform. And obviously, there's so many people and so many different options and what they do well on that I cannot say this is the best diet or approach for everybody. Yeah, I know for the second training session for any new Hasentroid.in a day, I know it seems pretty crazy, especially for amateurs who are struggling to get in one session, but there's such a huge benefit in terms of human growth hormone production on that second session later in the day. On days when you're not doing a second session, will you look to nap to get that same human growth? I cannot nap. That's impossible. Because it seems to the world to our guys, a lot of them, if they don't do a second session in a day, they will be nappers. I know a chat to Willy Smith from Progress BH last week and Willy's an interesting guy, but I'm not sure if you've experimented with this, but Willy will try for his fasted ride. So if he's doing a fasted ride on a Saturday, he starts thinking about this fasted ride on a Friday and the second half of his Friday ride, he was stopping carbohydrates. Then he won't replace carbohydrates post-rise with a recovery drink or anything and he won't have carbohydrates for dinner that night. Then he'll wake up the next morning and have a black coffee, won't eat at all during his spend and then he'll replace carbs after the spend. Yeah, yeah. Have you played around with that? I don't like riding fast. It doesn't work for me because I usually in the morning I need an hour to wake up and at home there's so many things to do that I just don't see any benefits riding fast. Coming back home, having a breakfast and then going out again. What works way better for me is just restricting at the end of the ride and then going low-carb, no, no-carb, but just low-carb for the rest of the day and maybe for the night as well, depending what I have the next day. On a two, say today, I just pick and figure out my head at, well I'm trying to think what I'm trying to do today. So I had a two and a half thousand calorie ride today. So if you're doing a 2,500 calorie rise, how much of that 2,500 calories are you looking through a place on the bike versus when you finish with recovery drinks? What I figured out for myself is I started feeling being in low energy state when 1,000 calories in deficit during the ride. So if I'm at 2500 and that's very rough. Let's say 2500 and my metabolic rate is let's say 1500, it's more basically. It's more than 2000. I'm a nominally. That's it. 1,525,000 calories. And if I eat 3,000 calories, that's 1,000 in deficit. And that's when I started to start feeling being in low energy state. And I would usually end my session with that 1,000 deficit.
And then go from there. And that's my depleted right, let's say. Janit, we've talked about some, you know, I'm going to say some heavy topics and some very serious topics. But let's finish off the podcast and just revisit. I suppose, would you say the Dauphiné win career highlights or top 10 in Tour de France? Which one do you look at? Definitely. Also because at that time I was so much better than anybody else that I didn't think I was ever that that's wrong. When you look back on your career now are you happy with it? I believe it was successful. I have no regrets and I I feel lucky to be around people I was in the beginning of my career. What was the next chapter called for you? I know you're still riding the bike, you're still riding a continental level. How serious are you taking that? The answer is Sunday. We have national championships. Ah, nice. And there's not, let's say we don't have many cyclists, but the problem is we have two of the best cyclists in the world. Yeah, you got ruglets going on over there. And pogacha. Oh, yeah, shit. Yeah, we got two of the best in the world. So how cold is your form at the moment? How well are you looking after yourself? Uh, honestly? Yeah. I've never been better. Seriously? Yeah. numbers looking good numbers. I'm 58 kilos and 383 threshold. Oh fuck. Yeah. Fuck. That's going on, Yani. So can you, can you do a podium? I want to win. Oh, that's what we want to hair because there's a mountain top finish. So will you is like, you know, you're not old. You want your 35 36 years old 36 like will you consider stepping back up a level again? Or is there are you on the wind down now? No, I'm not done because I started when I was 18 And I still feel I have a lot of energy, a lot of mental and physical energy to continue for at least a year, two years, three years. But when I wake up and I start thinking about how much I hate training, I'll just stop. Did you take a lot of comfort from looking at Vavirde and going, fuck, he's still gone. He's still doing it. Yeah, yeah. Yanny, I wish you all the best on Sunday and it's been really an honor to chat here. Really enjoyed it and thanks for opening up around some really difficult topics. Thanks a lot. It was a pleasure. Yanny, best of luck Sunday and I'll chat you soon. Thank you very much. Oh leave it out. I was on tender hooks. I actually didn't I felt uncomfortable. I felt uncomfortable. I punched her in the podcast. It was so...he opened up so much. I honestly on the Dublin lab and I didn't know I'm a marker around that sort of motion sometimes. I didn't know where to look. Oh it was a good one. Thank you for your attention this week. Thank you for everyone who's checked out the Patreon. Oh before I go I wanted to make you guys make available to you listeners. Crazy, crazy. If I had a boss, the boss would definitely sack me for this one. We have this trending edition in course. It's an insane course. It's worked with some sports scientists and some physiole, just put this together. It's 12 weeks. It's a periodized trending edition in course made with cycling in mind. So it's periodized around your training plan. It's two sessions a week. video series telling you, showing you a demo of exactly what you should do through all these and there's a lot more shit in there as well. It's epic. This is normally priced at around 400 and something, 440 something like that. For podcast listeners, you want to start generating the hype around this podcast and go, you know what, Anthony is a sound man on the podcast and he's also given away some crazy deals on the podcast. So it's an extra bonus reason to listen to it at at the end. So this 400 odd euro strength and conditioning series which every cyclist needs to have in their hands on a minute shop, the price on how to put a unique link into the description here and make it like a young day in quit, a 9 day 95 for podcast listeners. Don't go sharing that link around. That's yours, that's you, that's your payoff for listening to my ramblands. That's it, that's a wrap up on the podcast, that's a romance podcast for another week. Thank you for your time and be safe on the roads.
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