Episode 471: Lance Armstrong: The Real Doping Story, $100M Loss, and His Venture Capital Comeback

What does it take to survive a 20% chance of living, win seven Tour de France titles, and rebuild your life after losing everything? Lance Armstrong joins me on the Habits and Hustle podcast for a raw, unfiltered conversation about resilience, authenticity, and the mindset that refuses to quit. We discuss the grueling reality of the Tour de France and why he says the doping controversy was not anti-doping failure. We also dive into his current ventures with Next Ventures, his "We Do Hard Things" podcast, and the personality traits that his kids say define him most. Lance Armstrong is a cancer survivor, former professional cyclist, and co-founder of Next Ventures. He won the Tour de France seven consecutive times. Today, he's a successful venture capitalist investing in health and wellness companies and has built a new life focused on family, business, and doing only what brings him joy. What We Discuss: (08:11) Getting Tested at 15 and Discovering Elite VO2 Max Numbers (15:44) The Doping Controversy: "Technically I Didn't Get Caught" (17:23) Why He Thinks He Was Made a Poster Child (22:27) Getting Cancer at 25 with Only a 20% Chance of Survival (36:18) The Livestrong Foundation and Selling 82 Million Yellow Bands (42:04) His Love of Being Alone and Sacred Solo Bike Rides (59:54) Having to Pay Back Over $100 Million After the Scandal (1:02:37) How Uber Investment Through Lowercase Capital Saved His Family (1:06:09) The Netflix 30 for 30 Documentary and Public Perception Shift …and more! Thank you to our sponsors: Momentous: Shop this link https://www.livemomentous.com/?srsltid=AfmBOorDUIZz3psr1Qsq_n1yE8_6JTq_QUFabOO9lH65HDEXCIoJOPLj and use code Jen for 20% off Therasage: Head over to therasage.com http://therasage.com/ and use code Be Bold for 15% off TruNiagen: Head over to truniagen.com http://truniagen.com/ and use code HUSTLE20 to get $20 off any purchase over $100. Magic Mind: Head over to www http://www/.magicmind.com http://magicmind.com//jen and use code Jen at checkout. Bio.me: Link to daily prebiotic fiber here https://bio.me/?utm_source=Jennifer, code Jennifer20 for 20% off. David: Buy 4, get the 5th free at davidprotein.com/habitsandhustle http://davidprotein.com/habitsandhustle. Find more from Jen: Website: https://www.jennifercohen.com/ Instagram: @therealjencohen Books: https://www.jennifercohen.com/books Speaking: https://www.jennifercohen.com/speaking-engagement Find more from Lance Armstrong: Website: https://www.nextventures.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lancearmstrong/?hl=en

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Speaker 00

  Hi guys, this is Tony Robbins. You're listening to Habits and Hustle. Crush it.

• 0:07Jen Cohen?

  Welcome to Habits and Hustle. And today's guest is one of the most iconic and controversial figures in modern sports history. Lance Armstrong is a seven-time Tour de France winner, a cancer survivor, and a global name who went from hero to headline and back again. He dominated the world of cycling, inspired millions with his comeback from cancer, and later faced one of the biggest doping scandals in sports history. But Lance's story doesn't end there. In recent years, he's emerged with a new voice as a podcaster, entrepreneur, and an unapologetic truth teller, who isn't afraid to tackle tough conversations, including the ones about himself. In this episode, we talk all about legacy, resilience, reinvention, and what it takes

• 0:52Jen Cohen?

  to come back when the world counts you out. Love him or criticize him, there's no denying Lance Armstrong has lived a life worth unpacking. So let's get into it. Enjoy.

• 1:11Jen Cohen?

  Before we dive into today's episode, I want to thank our sponsor Momentous. When your goal is health span, living better and longer, there are very few non-negotiables. One of them, quality. And when it comes to supplements designed for high performers, nobody does it better than Momentous. Momentus goes all in on NSF certification, which means every single batch is tested for heavy metals, harmful additives, and label accuracy. And that's why they're trusted by all 32 NFL teams and top collegiate sports dietitians across the country. Here's the thing, they don't sell every supplement under the sun, because they

• 1:54Jen Cohen?

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• 2:37Jen Cohen?

  I have Lance Armstrong on the podcast. It's been a long time coming. I've been trying to get you on this show.

• 2:42Speaker 00

  No.

• 2:43Jen Cohen?

  For at least what, a year and a half?

• 2:45Speaker 00

  Yeah, a while, at least.

• 2:47Jen Cohen?

  And we've had a lot of like different like run ins together, which is very funny.

• 2:50Speaker 00

  On a podcast.

• 2:51Jen Cohen?

  You don't really. It's true, because when I was doing like more research on you, they were kind of like old, like 2023, 2017.

• 3:00Speaker 00

  I feel like I stopped doing them.

• 3:02Jen Cohen?

  Well, why? Do you don't like, I mean, you get, you probably, we said this earlier, you get asked the same questions over and over again.

• 3:08Speaker 00

  And I just, maybe a little of that, but I just don't love, now that I'm sitting here. I just don't love sitting around talking about myself. I mean, it's not, you know, and I think, I think they're good for, here we are again, about to start this thing. So it's odd. But I think if you're, say you're an author, right? And you have a new book out, right? You have to go do shows and podcasts and to promote the book. Or if you're a band or a singer songwriter, you might go out to promote the album.

• 3:37Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 3:38Speaker 00

  Like, I don't know, I live at this point, a pretty quiet, simple life that I don't, I don't need to promote anything. I'm not promoting anything.

• 3:48Jen Cohen?

  Well, then why did you say yes?

• 3:50Speaker 00

  Because you're a friend.

• 3:51Jen Cohen?

  And because I harassed you for long enough.

• 3:53Speaker 00

  No, no, no, like I, and I mean, it's weird. Like I did, like I did Steve-O's podcast.

• 3:59Jen Cohen?

  Yeah, I saw that.

• 4:00Speaker 00

  Just because I grew up, I didn't know Steve-O, but I grew up watching Jackass and I just thought, well, that's fun.

• 4:06Jen Cohen?

  Right. So you're doing things more based on like just how like in the moment of how you feel, right? Like, oh, yeah.

• 4:11Speaker 00

  Do whatever I want to do.

• 4:13Jen Cohen?

  Right. That's a good place to be in life, right?

• 4:15Speaker 00

  It's an amazing place to be. I only do what I want to do.

• 4:18Jen Cohen?

  So, okay, so by the way, so thank you for, for doing this. I really appreciate it.

• 4:22Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 4:23Jen Cohen?

  I tell you, I told you this before. I'm fascinated by your whole trajectory of life, your personality. And like, and I don't know you so well, but what I find so interesting, I said this to you before, when we were, I was attempting to work out with you. I had too many questions for you, but it was kind of a, you know, it was a half ass workout because of it. But you have.

• 4:44Speaker 00

  We moved, we moved a little.

• 4:45Jen Cohen?

  We moved a little bit, okay. But I, I really am a workout person. I promise you, next time we'll do a better job. But I had so many questions. And the thing is, you have like a real authenticity to you that like you may come across kind of more gruff, but like you, you have a very like kind, true, authentic heart. And like you, I think you probably, it looks to me like you kind of feed off of energy. Like if you like somebody or you like something, you probably are very different in that environment than you are.

• 5:12Speaker 00

  I think that's right.

• 5:14Jen Cohen?

  Right?

• 5:14Speaker 00

  You're exactly right.

• 5:15Jen Cohen?

  And so, right?

• 5:16Speaker 00

  And I choose to be, you can't always choose this, but I, I can, at this point, I've built it up so that I can choose the room that I'm in normally.

• 5:26Jen Cohen?

  Right, of course.

• 5:27Speaker 00

  Most of the time, and I tend, I choose rooms that have good energy. So whether that's the people that you're around, the friends that you choose to, to hang out with, the types of businesses that you're in, it just whoever's on your team. I mean, I have teams around me, whether it's on the podcast side or, or on the investing side. Like I'm around people on those teams that I want to be around.

• 5:52Jen Cohen?

  Right. What do you like to do now? Okay, besides the fact that you have now, you've, you can do whatever the hell you want. Like you said, you have options, you don't care, you're the boss. I've heard you say that before on some podcasts, like now you're the boss.

• 6:04Speaker 00

  Well, that sounds weird. I mean, I'm, I'm my boss.

• 6:06Jen Cohen?

  You're your boss, because even when you were, well, let's go back, let's go back to Little Lance. Let's kind of like chronologically do this, okay? Cause when you were Little Lance, cause you were not always, you weren't, you didn't start off as a cyclist, right?

• 6:19Speaker 00

  Right.

• 6:19Jen Cohen?

  You started off like you were doing swimming, I heard.

• 6:22Speaker 00

  So, yep, swimming was my first serious sport.

• 6:25Jen Cohen?

  Do you still swim?

• 6:26Speaker 00

  Occasionally, it's funny, I, so when you're my age and you swim seriously, you would swim what they call masters.

• 6:35Jen Cohen?

  Right, I know masters.

• 6:37Speaker 00

  Right, but most people listening may not know master. Masters is, it, it looks like a swim team for old people.

• 6:43Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 6:44Speaker 00

  So I grew up swimming with kids and so the, and if you're a serious swimmer at that age, you swim what they call age group swimming, right?

• 6:53Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 6:53Speaker 00

  So kids, when they're young, they can sort of do the, the summer country club swim league. Which is just in the summer. Or if you swim year round and you swim more serious, you swim age group, right? It's like Michael Phelps, Katie Ledecky, they grew up swimming, age group swimming. So that means they swam twice a day, every day, 12 months a year. That's how I grew up swimming. So then when you get older and you want to be a serious swimmer, you swim masters, right? And so that's when I, like 15 years ago, I started swimming again seriously. And the masters team that I swam with is like two blocks from my house. I could walk there every day.

• 7:31Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 7:32Speaker 00

  And I just, I don't go that often and I haven't been in a while, but I can, I still enjoy swimming. I don't love chlorine.

• 7:40Jen Cohen?

  Yeah, no.

• 7:40Speaker 00

  To be honest with you.

• 7:41Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 7:41Speaker 00

  Chlorine, you know, if I, if I lived at the beach, I would probably swim open water. I'd probably swim almost every day, but the chlorine thing and you're just kind of.

• 7:53Jen Cohen?

  It kind of steers you away from that. So my question more was like, okay, so you started off in swimming. Like, how did you get into cycling? Was it, did you have, it seems to me like your endurance is off the charts genetically. Were you tested? Did you have like, did you, was it just something? How did you know that cycling was going to be the sport? You did swimming, which was an endurance thing.

• 8:13Speaker 00

  And then I started doing triathlons.

• 8:14Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 8:15Speaker 00

  And then I turned pro in triathlon when I was 15.

• 8:18Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 8:19Speaker 00

  And so then I knew that I had, I was getting results as a 15 year old kid racing against 30 year old men.

• 8:26Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 8:26Speaker 00

  That you didn't need to be in a lab to, to, to know that you had some. That I had the DNA or the talent to be an endurance athlete. But at that time, I did, I lived in, I grew up in Dallas. So I went, I got asked to go be tested at a place in Dallas called the Cooper Clinic, which is pretty well known. It's a place that it's not dissimilar to Mayo Clinic or other places where folks will go and get tested. So I went as a, as a young kid and the testing, you know, I did a VO2 max test and all these things. And the, and the physiologist was like, wow, this is, I'm not sure we've seen a VO2 like this before. So, but again.

• 9:06Jen Cohen?

  Do you remember what it was?

• 9:07Speaker 00

  I mean, I'm 53, that was 40 years ago, so no, but it was high.

• 9:12Jen Cohen?

  Yeah, very, I heard it was 86. I don't know if that was right.

• 9:15Speaker 00

  Who knows? Who knows? It's funny, VO2 is having a moment again. Like I feel like, you know, when we were at that, when I was that age and then, and then when I was cycling and at the Olympic Training Center, we, we would test VO2 max. And then it kind of, you know, maybe it was prohibited because you needed all, you needed the lab, you needed the equipment. And now they've got these mobile units and so it's having a moment again.

• 9:41Jen Cohen?

  It is.

• 9:41Speaker 00

  And so anyhow, but it's, it's, there's a lot of different variables when it comes to VO2 max.

• 9:47Jen Cohen?

  But why, okay, cause another endurance, like when they try, why cycling and not running? Like why, why did you single out cycling?

• 9:55Speaker 00

  Well, a couple of things. One, I enjoyed cycling more.

• 9:57Jen Cohen?

  Okay, that's a good reason.

• 9:58Speaker 00

  And who wouldn't?

• 9:59Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 10:00Speaker 00

  Right? I mean, if you're, if you have the option to, to, to go for four or five hours and see 80 miles of beautiful terrain versus in no impact on the body versus, you know, you know, seeing 15 miles of beautiful terrain and a lot of it, I just, I just, and I was better at cycling. I quickly figured out that, that cycling was my strength. Now, when I was a young kid and doing triathlons, I could swim with the front group. So I would come out of the water with the leaders. I would come off the bike with the leaders and they would run away from the, these guys that I would race with would run away from me because they were, I mean, they're 30 year old men. They run a lot faster. And so I, I mean, I still would finish top 10,

• 10:44Speaker 00

  but, but I knew that cycling was going to be the best of those, of the three. So then I started just gradually transitioned to cycling and I went to the Olympic Training Center. And then I got selected for the junior world championships team, which was in 1989, which was in Moscow, which is kind of wild. I mean, this is, this would have been in August of 89 before the wall came down. Like I was a, I was a 17 year old kid in Moscow. Like it was, it was.

• 11:20Jen Cohen?

  That was crazy.

• 11:21Speaker 00

  Yeah, I'm like, this is, and, and so that, that was, and then pretty much a year or two later, I switched full time.

• 11:28Jen Cohen?

  What, how old were you when you won the first Tour de France? How old were you?

• 11:32Speaker 00

  Um, 27 years old.

• 11:37Jen Cohen?

  Your first one was 27?

• 11:38Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 11:39Jen Cohen?

  So.

• 11:39Speaker 00

  I think that's right. I'm trying to do the math. 1989. Yeah, maybe, maybe 28 actually. Geez.

• 11:46Jen Cohen?

  Well, because what's, I want to like, how, how do you train for that? Because I think people are, you hear it's super grueling. It's like, it's, it's.

• 11:53Speaker 00

  That's all true.

• 11:54Jen Cohen?

  It's, I, I.

• 11:55Speaker 00

  It is grueling.

• 11:56Jen Cohen?

  Horrible. Like people like, you, you, you hear like little rumblings, but people who are not cyclists or who don't follow it. Can you describe why it is as grueling as people hear rumors to be? Like, why is it so, and so dangerous on top of it?

• 12:11Speaker 00

  Very dangerous. And, and I mean, I think that's the thing that it's obviously an endurance event.

• 12:17Jen Cohen?

  Obviously.

• 12:17Speaker 00

  It's three weeks. It's over 2,000 miles. It's every day. There are two rest days, but it's, it's, you know, the, it's recovery is difficult, but there are 200 guys on the road, all trying to be at the same place at the same time. So you're not just, and of course we are on a team. We had, in my generation, we had nine riders on the team. So we're racing against 190 other people. It's, it's hard to control that. And, you know, the roads are technical. There's crashes. There's mechanicals. And so it's, there's a lot. Like it's a mix of endurance, it's sort of NASCAR because you're fighting for position all the time, strategy.

• 12:59Speaker 00

  Politics, right? Since you have the politics piece, when you think about it, if you're nine guys trying to control 200,

• 13:07Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 13:08Speaker 00

  You have to be political. You can't, no team can control that. You're constantly trying to find allies and friends in that Peloton. And those people that are your allies and friends on day two might be your enemies on day eight.

• 13:24Jen Cohen?

  Wow.

• 13:25Speaker 00

  So you're constantly trying to figure out the dynamics of this, this living thing that's going down the road known as the Peloton.

• 13:33Jen Cohen?

  And so like, what's the trade, like, how do you train for that? Like, what's the training schedule? Like, how do you? Cause it takes a very particular mindset person to be able to even go through the grueling training schedule. Like, do you remember what you did day in, day out?

• 13:48Speaker 00

  No, I mean, well, first of all, there's a lot of racing beforehand.

• 13:51Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 13:52Speaker 00

  So it's not, you don't just show up to the tour and say, I've trained perfectly. I mean, we would do anywhere from 40 to 60 race days before that. And then, and then obviously a lot of training, a lot of reconnaissance.

• 14:08Jen Cohen?

  Do you have to do weight training? Cause you had to be like skinny, right? Like very small.

• 14:11Speaker 00

  Not a ton of strength training.

• 14:12Jen Cohen?

  So what do you, is it all endurance training? Like, did you do like mental mindset tricks? And do you like, how do you psychologically prepare for that? Like, is there anything on that side?

• 14:23Speaker 00

  No, no, I mean, we, we, other than being convinced I was gonna win.

• 14:28Jen Cohen?

  Like, no, exactly. But you have, you have to believe, your belief system on yourself has to be so strong, like that you, that you actually believe that you can actually.

• 14:38Speaker 00

  Yeah. I mean, not, not the first couple, but after I got a couple under my belt, I was, I was pretty sure we were, I mean, look, anything can happen. You can have all these things I described, accidents, illnesses, bad luck or just bad luck, you know, caught out in a crosswind, lose five minutes. I mean, this can.

• 14:55Jen Cohen?

  But what made you, like, I guess, what made you so much? Like, this is the thing, okay? So I'm gonna not beat around the bush, obviously. Like, why is it that everybody on the tour, like, you got caught for doping, but everybody was doing it, right? So like the playing field right away.

• 15:11Speaker 00

  Technically, I didn't get caught, but that's another.

• 15:14Jen Cohen?

  That's a whole other discussion, but my first.

• 15:17Speaker 00

  I was exposed, certainly exposed, but not caught.

• 15:19Jen Cohen?

  That's true.

• 15:20Speaker 00

  If that makes sense.

• 15:21Jen Cohen?

  No, explain it.

• 15:22Speaker 00

  I mean,

• 15:23Jen Cohen?

  because for people who don't like, who are not familiar with like my, of course I know, but people who are like younger, who are listening, who don't really know all the details and minutia, people would just say, yeah, Lance Harman got caught for doping, right?

• 15:36Speaker 00

  Which is, that's fine, too. I mean, that's, that's, if that's, if that's sort of the story that, or the storyline that is, that has survived, then that's, that's fair, too. But what I was, and I was just half joking, I mean, being caught, being caught, we obviously were tested every day.

• 15:54Jen Cohen?

  Right, right, right.

• 15:55Speaker 00

  So being caught would be like you tested positive. I mean, there was none of that. It was, it was way more complicated. There was a, it was more of a legal process.

• 16:04Jen Cohen?

  Yes.

• 16:05Speaker 00

  Then, uh, it was a success of the legal system and not a success of the anti-doping system.

• 16:11Jen Cohen?

  But why do you think that you were made to be such a poster child? Like people, everybody was, my point was it's such, it's so grueling, it's so horrible. I feel like the, it seems to me the baseline was everybody was doing it and you still were in that baseline so much better and exceeded everybody else.

• 16:27Speaker 00

  I don't, I don't, I think that's right. And I think that, that's not a popular answer, but the popular answer isn't an informed answer.

• 16:36Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 16:36Speaker 00

  The informed answer is, and this is, you know, I've talked a little about this in the past, the only people that matter, the only people that matter are the people who were in the race. That's it. In my, in my opinion, that's all I care about. Now, if 90% of them were yelling and screaming, you know, you know, lynch this guy, then I, that would suck. But the reality is 0% of them have said that. So they're all that matter, right? The people who were in the war and in the battles and in the trenches and in the fights and were head to head, that's all that matters, right? And so.

• 17:14Jen Cohen?

  Like, what would be the one thing that you wish people knew that hasn't really, that people don't realize or don't know? If there's like one piece of information that's been very misbranded in the, in the media, what would it be?

• 17:27Speaker 00

  I mean, Look, there's, I'm not going to get into the, the details of it because I've moved on with my life and, and I feel like I've done a decent job moving on with my life. What I will say is that there were a few things as this legal process played out to sort of reinforce and really to dance on my grave. There were three or four taglines and PR statements made that just weren't true. Right? And so that's, but whatever. I mean, it, that's what those agencies chose to do and they're not, they're simply not true.

• 18:06Speaker 00

  And the, again, if, if it, time tells the true story here. And I'll just give an example, right? So if, if somebody says, that guy right there pointing to me, that's the biggest fraud in the history of sport. I mean, come on. That's, that's easy to say at the time. That feels good for the other side to say, I'm sorry. That is not true. Right? And, and I know that. My competitors know that. My teammates know that. The people that I raced as a 15 year old professional triathlete know that. The people that I raced as a 53 year old high rocks athlete know that. So that's just the, they're just jerking themselves off. But hey.

• 18:50Jen Cohen?

  No, I think that's, I think, I think it's because I think also the biggest and best, people love to see that person fall, right? And then rebuild, like someone like you, because you've had like between that, I was going to ask.

• 19:04Speaker 00

  I don't think they considered the rebuild.

• 19:07Jen Cohen?

  I mean.

• 19:08Speaker 00

  I don't. I think, I think, I meant what I said. When you dance on somebody's grave, they're in the grave.

• 19:13Jen Cohen?

  That's true.

• 19:14Speaker 00

  And that's what they did. And that's, that's, but, but that, that, that wasn't going to stay in the grave.

• 19:21Jen Cohen?

  Well, also, you know, it's interesting. I said this to you before, it's like you, you were such, you were probably such a low place, but it didn't ever, it never really, it didn't seem like you ever got, it didn't take you into a bad place. I feel like you kept on succeeding over and over in other areas of life.

• 19:38Speaker 00

  Yeah, but it's been, look, it's been 12, 13 years. That's a long time. So, so I, I had time. I didn't have time to, to, to be a professional athlete again. Right? Time was up for me. I was 40 years old and, and was banned in cycling. But I had time to be patient and to reimagine, reassess, reinvent, reemerge in whatever way. So I had time for that, but there was a long period, and I say long, I mean, five, five-ish years, where I was just patient and I just watched and waited and, and, and, and did all the things I just laid out, right? Primarily reimagining and reassessing.

• 20:21Jen Cohen?

  But even like we get, you get cancer at 25 years old, right? And like your doc, I read that your doctor gave you like basically 20% chance of living, right? And you're, you, you were that, that little amount, you were able to, you know, against all odds, beat that and then go on again to win. Like that to me says something about like your, your brain and your mindset and your will, I guess, overall, the will is what I, was what I'm so fascinated by. Like, is that something that is just so innate in you? Like, nothing can like, you're un, like, it seems like you're actually are, like, you are like unstoppable. Is that something that you trained for? Are you just born like that? Like, can people

• 21:03Jen Cohen?

  become that if they're not that way? Cause you just are who you are, right?

• 21:08Speaker 00

  I mean, look, I, I, maybe, I mean, that's, that, that all sounds good.

• 21:15Jen Cohen?

  But yeah, but how do you, like you, and then you went to win again and you like, even-

• 21:19Speaker 00

  I, I, I think, I think some people are, are just better equipped. I was equipped to, to not quit, right? And so I didn't quit when I was diagnosed and I fought for my life and I got my life back. And then I fought to win the tours and then, and then that got, that story got edited.

• 21:38Jen Cohen?

  Well, tell me about how, how did you even get, how did, were you able to ever train like that again? Never mind, like, people can't, people who are the healthiest as have ever, I can't even imagine like cycling like around the block 40 times. How do you win-

• 21:51Speaker 00

  The body comes back.

• 21:52Jen Cohen?

  To that level? Like, your cancer was all over your body, right? Like you-

• 21:56Speaker 00

  Yeah, but then the cancer, I mean, clearly.

• 21:59Jen Cohen?

  Clearly, yeah.

• 22:00Speaker 00

  But I also, I was racing sick, probably, I don't know for how long, but, but long enough to, in my mind, I thought, well, God, I've been sick for, I mean, I did the Olympics in Atlanta, two months before I was diagnosed.

• 22:14Jen Cohen?

  I know it's

• 22:15Speaker 00

  So a part of me, part of me, if you're in and and I'm just, I was just telling myself this, but I was like, wow, I've been sick for a long time. Like, just imagine when I get healthy and I get all of this stuff out of my body. Wow. Like, I'm gonna be super badass then. No, I don't know if that's true or not, but that's what I was telling myself.

• 22:34Jen Cohen?

  And so did you do, do you do a lot of self-talk? Like, I want to know, like, the intricacies, like, do you have to, do you talk to yourself to, like, push you? Do you like, what's your name? Like, what do you, what goes on in your brain? Like, is there a narrative? Is there, like, something you're saying?

• 22:46Speaker 00

  I don't, I don't push myself. It's been a minute since I've pushed myself. Like, back then, we trained a lot and pushed ourselves a lot. And I don't do that anymore. So it's

• 22:58Jen Cohen?

  But you kind of like, you still are training daily.

• 23:00Speaker 00

  Yeah, but not, not like that. I'm just, I'm just, I mean, I do, depends if I, if I ride my bike, those, that takes longer. But if, if I train in the gym or go for a run, I mean, it's an hour a day. It's not, you know, it's

• 23:13Jen Cohen?

  No, I know. It's not. But what I'm saying, like, okay, after you, when you got diagnosed with cancer and then you beat cancer, what was the process to get back to be like a champion again? Like, what did you do? What was the, what was the mental?

• 23:25Speaker 00

  I just went straight back to

• 23:27Jen Cohen?

  It didn't even

• 23:28Speaker 00

  No, I went, I mean, I took a year off. I took the year, I was, all of 1997, I didn't raise. So then I, I just, but when I went back, I straight back in.

• 23:38Jen Cohen?

  My, my question is, I think that people like are, well, this is what I want to know, is like, when I, you just overall, like, if you are succeeding in a lot of different areas, like, business, you've become like a rock star and like with, with Next Ventures, the, the cycling, like, it seems like everything that you do, there is like a massive level of success. Okay. So to me, that's, that is indicative of someone's like mindset and will and determination and ambition and all these things, right? My question is really, not even a question, but is that just something you've always been? Like, that's just who you are and that's just how you, like, how does somebody, is there like, is there like actionable things that people can do to become better that way?

• 24:20Speaker 00

  I mean, look, I grew up in a, in a, with a mother, a single mother, more or less a single mother, that had me very young and

• 24:28Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 24:29Speaker 00

  She overcame a lot of odds, different than my obstacles. And she wasn't an athlete, but she just didn't, she never quit. Like, she was constantly

• 24:39Jen Cohen?

  Pushing.

• 24:40Speaker 00

  Just trying to defy the odds, right? Whether it's having a kid at 17 years old in Dallas, Texas, right? With, you know, with no, obviously, she was in a relationship, but had never met my father. I said, but this was not an ideal situation, but she didn't care. I mean, she just, she was dead set on having me and, and, you know, we grew up poor and I say grew up poor. I mean, we didn't grow up, we, at that time, we were very poor. Then she remarried and that relationship wasn't perfect. And but she's stuck, you know, she just, she's just, she's tough. She has grit. She's overcome a lot. I do think that, that you either, that's

• 25:22Speaker 00

  just a part of my DNA, but I have also absorbed a lot of that just by having watched her as I grew up and we grew up together, right? To keep in mind, my mom was 34 years old when I graduated high school.

• 25:35Jen Cohen?

  Wow, wow.

• 25:36Speaker 00

  So I, I think there's, there's a lot of that. I mean, if I look back to my diagnosis and if I look back to the last decade, I attribute a lot of that to my mother, right? Who overcame a lot of long odds, you know, to build a life for herself and to build a life for me.

• 25:53Jen Cohen?

  What'd you say? What would be the one thing that people don't know about you? Is there something that you would say?

• 25:59Speaker 00

  Oh, I, I think the, I think when people get to know me, I'm a lot goofier than people. Like, I don't take myself, I, I take myself seriously, but most of the time I do not take myself very seriously. So it's like a good example, right, is obviously my kids know me, right? They're like, my dad is, is, is a goofball.

• 26:20Jen Cohen?

  Would they say that about you?

• 26:21Speaker 00

  Yeah, for sure, for sure. But my, but their friends would, would be like, oh, my God, you're, you know, and then they get around their friend's father, who's me, and they're like, wow, this, that's not what I expected. Like, this guy's, is a goof.

• 26:36Jen Cohen?

  I totally know what you mean. Like,

• 26:37Speaker 00

  Yeah, I'm way more playful.

• 26:39Jen Cohen?

  And you don't take yourself seriously. You're much more like, you have, you're not so serious all the time.

• 26:45Speaker 00

  And I think that's, you know, there was this, and it is true. I mean, when we trained, and of course, back then, you know, when I was winning the tours, there wasn't social media. So people's personalities, let's just say that, I mean, I was doing goofy shit all the time back then. But now if that athlete, you would be capturing that and sort of putting that out to the world, whereas nobody had, nobody had access to us. Like, we were in a hotel, or in a team bus, or in the race, or not available, right?

• 27:18Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 27:18Speaker 00

  There was no access. So, speaking of children, oh my God, what does she want?

• 27:23Jen Cohen?

  You can answer it. We could just edit that part out.

• 27:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, right. Watch this.

• 27:27Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 27:28Speaker 00

  Yes? What's up?

• 27:31Jen Cohen?

  I'm busy right now.

• 27:32Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 27:34Jen Cohen?

  That's hilarious.

• 27:35Speaker 00

  Olivia, let me ask you a question.

• 27:37Jen Cohen?

  Ask her, yeah.

• 27:39Speaker 00

  Is your dad goofy?

• 27:41Jen Cohen?

  On occasion. On occasion. What would be the one thing that people don't know, or would ever think that your dad was like?

• 27:49Speaker 00

  I'm in the middle of a podcast, so you're actually on the podcast right now, and you're on my watch, which is slightly awkward.

• 27:55Jen Cohen?

  What was the question?

• 27:57Speaker 00

  What is the one thing that people don't know about your dad?

• 28:00Jen Cohen?

  I want you fart.

• 28:04Speaker 00

  All right, I gotta go. I'll call you later.

• 28:05Jen Cohen?

  We're keeping that in there. We're keeping that in there.

• 28:08Speaker 00

  I love you. Love you. Bye. I, I can't lie. I, that's, that's 100% keeping that in there. I'm very proud of my fart prowess. I, it's, it's a thing. I don't know. She's right.

• 28:21Jen Cohen?

  Do you eat a lot of like coniferous vegetables?

• 28:23Speaker 00

  I don't know. No, I don't. And I just-

• 28:25Jen Cohen?

  Do you have gut problems?

• 28:27Speaker 00

  I don't know. I just know. But anyways, that's, that's, that's funny she said that. It's true.

• 28:33Jen Cohen?

  That is true. That's your, that's the big baby keystone.

• 28:35Speaker 00

  I'm sort of a world, world champ when it comes to, to that.

• 28:39Jen Cohen?

  Really? So you're a world champ in a lot of different areas? That's hilarious. I'm glad that Olivia called just in that time.

• 28:45Speaker 00

  That's the 14-year-old. She's, no, actually 15-year-old. Wait, how old is Olivia? 14?

• 28:51Jen Cohen?

  So then, that's so funny. What would your 17-year-old say? Same thing? That you're like a champion farter?

• 28:56Speaker 00

  Yeah, he would, he's 15, almost 16.

• 28:59Jen Cohen?

  Oh, he's 15, okay.

• 29:00Speaker 00

  He would, um- Yeah, he probably said the same thing.

• 29:05Jen Cohen?

  Cause you've been, cause they, you, this happened like your whole, the downfall, so to speak, happened like, what, 15 years ago, you said, like 13?

• 29:13Speaker 00

  12, 13 years.

• 29:14Jen Cohen?

  12, 13. How did it like, did it soften you? Did you become more playful because you?

• 29:19Speaker 00

  No, I was always playful.

• 29:20Jen Cohen?

  You were always this way. So how did this, how did what happened to you with the doping change your personality or did it change your personality? Did you become much more, was there more humility because of it or did you lose a lot of friends? So then you had to like kind of pivot and?

• 29:35Speaker 00

  Look, I don't, I think you lose, I certainly know you lose a piece of the following and anybody in that situation would, and anybody in that situation would lose a part of the team, right? So the parts of the team that were there, because it was their job to be there, right? Whether that's an agent, a business manager, a publicist, whatever, you know, people that have jobs because of this machine, right?

• 30:01Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 30:02Speaker 00

  Which was me. When that machine goes from 100 miles an hour to zero, there's, it's not a business anymore. So those people then, so that, that part of my life went away, which is, is to be expected, right? I mean, you're gonna, you're gonna lose people like that. So, but people that, I mean, I didn't have anybody who I would have sworn was a great, amazing, true friend that I lost. Like all the people that, that I loved and I would have called in the darkest moments, they're still there. I mean, they, they stayed. And so now, you know, there was obviously the situation with Liv Strong, which, which did go away.

• 30:43Jen Cohen?

  Right. But you started, can you talk about that a little bit? Cause I mean, you did rate, because of you, that there was like a five, was it 500 million, 700 million? What was it?

• 30:52Speaker 00

  Well, yeah, at the time, 500.

• 30:55Jen Cohen?

  Million was raised. And it was, who thought of those yellow bands?

• 31:00Speaker 00

  Nike thought of the yellow wristband.

• 31:02Jen Cohen?

  And so?

• 31:03Speaker 00

  And fun, fun fact, my partner at Next Ventures, Mel Strong, was on, she worked at Nike at the time and was part of that original team that, that, that had this crazy idea, which there's still some debate on who's. Actual idea it was because it turned out to be an amazing idea.

• 31:21Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 31:22Speaker 00

  But so just wild to be totally reunited with her and having been her partner the last six years. But yeah, so that, right. I mean, just answer the, I mean, I started the organization when, when I was diagnosed.

• 31:37Jen Cohen?

  So many years.

• 31:37Speaker 00

  And then obviously, yeah, I mean, that was in 1996. It was fueled by two things. One, I mean, if I was diagnosed in 96, we were officially a 501(c)(3) in 1997. I won the Tour de France in 1999. Right? So this, that's the first sort of call tipping point.

• 31:59Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 31:59Speaker 00

  And then, and but then the, the organization continued to grow and then the Yellow Risk Band came in 2004, right? And we sold 82 million of those in a fairly short amount of time.

• 32:11Jen Cohen?

  I used to wear one.

• 32:12Speaker 00

  Yeah. So it, it, but, but that was, that was, you know, if there was, if, and I considered it a friend, right? I considered the organization and the movement a friend of mine and that friend went away. Right?

• 32:25Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 32:26Speaker 00

  Because that friend chose to go away.

• 32:28Jen Cohen?

  It's too bad because it's a great thing. I mean.

• 32:30Speaker 00

  Yeah. Well, it's still a thing.

• 32:32Jen Cohen?

  Is it though? Like, I don't really hear about it or see it or is it really a thing?

• 32:36Speaker 00

  Yeah, it is. Yeah.

• 32:37Jen Cohen?

  So I, I mean, obviously you don't have a relationship with Nike, of course.

• 32:41Speaker 00

  No.

• 32:41Jen Cohen?

  But yet.

• 32:42Speaker 00

  I mean, yes and no. I don't, I don't, I'm not a sponsored athlete. Mel is no longer at Nike. Obviously she's full time.

• 32:51Jen Cohen?

  What did she do at Nike when she was at Nike?

• 32:53Speaker 00

  Well, the better question is what did she not do?

• 32:55Jen Cohen?

  Oh, really?

• 32:56Speaker 00

  She was there almost 20 years and worked her way up. She ran a ton of businesses there. She's, she's a force of nature, but that's a whole separate podcast. Like she's, you should have her on your business.

• 33:06Jen Cohen?

  That's actually very interesting. Yeah.

• 33:08Speaker 00

  She's a force of nature. So.

• 33:12Jen Cohen?

  Does that mean, by the way, Nex is only six years old? Cause you said she's your partner for the last six years.

• 33:17Speaker 00

  That's right.

• 33:17Jen Cohen?

  So you started Nex with Mel?

• 33:19Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 33:20Jen Cohen?

  Okay. And so obviously the relationship with Nike was pretty good if you became partners with one of the

• 33:26Speaker 00

  Well, she had.

• 33:27Jen Cohen?

  executives there.

• 33:28Speaker 00

  She had, yeah, she had decided to leave Nike. But I still have, I mean, I'm still very close to Phil Knight, the CEO of the business as of nine months ago was Elliot Hill, who before he went back to Nike to take that job, lived in Austin. I've grown, grew up in, grew up in Austin, Texas kid. I consider him a dear friend. So I still, I have a relationship through that, but I, I, I don't wear the swoosh.

• 33:57Jen Cohen?

  Well, yeah, and also, but, but also though, you're not even an athlete, you're not like a professional athlete anyway.

• 34:02Speaker 00

  Yeah, I mean, you're gonna, yeah.

• 34:05Jen Cohen?

  That's not, so then how did it go from, okay, so then that's with, with Live Strong and all of that. Mel became like, so how did you kind of ricochet into the venture area? Like, were you always interested in, in like CPG brands or business?

• 34:20Speaker 00

  I tended towards consumer brands. So we're drinking Waterloo, Waterloo, like that's one, for example.

• 34:27Jen Cohen?

  Is this one of your brands?

• 34:28Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 34:28Jen Cohen?

  I love Waterloo, actually. It's really good.

• 34:30Speaker 00

  That's right.

• 34:31Jen Cohen?

  It's one of my favorite types of.

• 34:33Speaker 00

  Good.

• 34:33Jen Cohen?

  Yeah, this is very good. Yeah. When, when did you guys invest? At what stage?

• 34:37Speaker 00

  Well, these, these I just did personally before Nex Venture. So I did Waterloo before that. I did Athletic Brewing before that. I did Honey Stinger before that. I did just.

• 34:49Jen Cohen?

  That's just on your own before you even started an actual?

• 34:51Speaker 00

  And so we, we raised Fund One. It's technically a 2019 vintage. So we fully deployed the first fund and now almost done raising our second fund. And, you know, that is, there has been some consumer exposure there, but less and less. I still have a soft spot for it, but that's, there are funds that, that focus exclusively on consumer and they're great at it.

• 35:20Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 35:20Speaker 00

  And not that we wouldn't do consumer, but we just do less now.

• 35:24Jen Cohen?

  What do you do more of now?

• 35:26Speaker 00

  We do more, it's, we define investing in, if you think about in health and you think about investing in health and you can look at it. In a simple way, really two ways, upstream care, downstream care. It's a preventative care and more sick care.

• 35:42Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 35:43Speaker 00

  We will dabble in both of those and I'll give you examples, right? So we did a point of care diagnostics company in Fund One called Vital Bio. So lab testing in the doctor's office, very fast results. Sounds an awful lot like another story that this world has heard before, but this one works. We explore a lot of opportunities.

• 36:04Jen Cohen?

  Oh, yeah, it sounds very familiar.

• 36:05Speaker 00

  Yeah. Right, so without naming any names.

• 36:08Jen Cohen?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 36:09Speaker 00

  We explore opportunities in and around Medicare, Medicaid. But at the same time, we did Outside Inc. We did a really cool, our last investment in Fund One, because you're so passionate about this space. You probably know about it. We were talking about Stacy Sims earlier. She does work with a company called Eternal. So that was our 21st and last deal out of Fund One. So however you define Eternal, an optimization, a health play, there's a lot of that.

• 36:40Jen Cohen?

  So are you like a big, are you, do you like?

• 36:43Speaker 00

  But let me just finish on Eternal. So I mean, the thing I love about Eternal, other than just believing that society has fundamentally shifted their views on health. I do believe that, I believe, and I live that. I love backing exceptional founders and Alex Mather, who started Eternal and has been successful many times over. Is just a guy you wouldn't bet against, right? And so what was, you were going somewhere?

• 37:08Jen Cohen?

  No, no, I was gonna say, like, are you someone who's like, are you like really into like longevity and biohacking? Like, do you kind of like gravitate to that stuff or?

• 37:17Speaker 00

  I don't, probably not.

• 37:20Jen Cohen?

  Okay, so.

• 37:21Speaker 00

  I'm not opposed to that, but, but you were, I mean, I have a gym in my house.

• 37:25Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 37:25Speaker 00

  But I don't have a cold plunge. I don't have a sauna yet, although we're getting those this summer.

• 37:31Jen Cohen?

  I was gonna say, do you like that kind of stuff?

• 37:32Speaker 00

  Yeah, I don't like cold, but the sauna I would do every day. So that's, that's, but I'm not, I don't, I don't invest a lot of time in all these things that you read about or see on TikTok or Instagram.

• 37:47Jen Cohen?

  Like, do you think a lot of it's just a bunch of nonsense?

• 37:51Jen Cohen?

  And be honest.

• 37:53Speaker 00

  I think lifestyle is the biggest factor. Right?

• 37:57Jen Cohen?

  Like, what was, what would you say the number one core? Or the keystone habit is for someone to be optimally at their best?

• 38:08Speaker 00

  Well, sleep's an obvious answer.

• 38:10Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 38:10Speaker 00

  But not ever, there are people that are just really challenged by sleep and they try different things and different hacks and it's very hard to get that right. But I, I've been blessed my entire life to be an incredible sleeper. Like I, I just, I can.

• 38:23Jen Cohen?

  Really?

• 38:24Speaker 00

  Yeah, I can sleep, I get to lay down right here, right now, go to sleep. It's so weird. Yeah.

• 38:28Jen Cohen?

  Lucky you. Yeah, I hate you too.

• 38:30Speaker 00

  And, and I think, you know, and I'm, my diet is not great, but getting better.

• 38:35Jen Cohen?

  What do you eat? What kind of stuff do you eat?

• 38:37Speaker 00

  Whatever I want to eat.

• 38:39Jen Cohen?

  Although I remember that because I went to see Kill, we went to see Kill Tony and you had like four of these like gross, like hot dogs that they had in that room.

• 38:46Speaker 00

  And probably Diet Coke.

• 38:47Jen Cohen?

  Yeah. You have like, just like nonsense, but what I find to be like super ironic.

• 38:52Speaker 00

  Five years ago, I would have had, you know, 10 cocktails.

• 38:55Jen Cohen?

  You would, but, but, but the interesting thing is like the people I know who are at like the most elite, elite, high performance people, like truly who are, are like you. They're not so into the longevity and all the biohacking stuff. They're not doing the cold plunges and the saunas and like the glucose monitoring and they're not eating like.

• 39:13Speaker 00

  By the way, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not knocking all these things.

• 39:16Jen Cohen?

  It's not because, I'm not even saying it as a knock. I'm just saying like, it's just not part of their daily rituals, right? They're like you. They like eat whatever they want. They kind of just.

• 39:25Speaker 00

  I mean, take CGMs for example.

• 39:27Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 39:27Speaker 00

  You just mentioned it, right?

• 39:28Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 39:28Speaker 00

  The, the glucose monitor. There's no scenario where I would wear that 365 days a year.

• 39:36Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 39:36Speaker 00

  There is a very real scenario where I would wear that for three weeks, twice a year. Absolutely. And I would love that.

• 39:45Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 39:46Speaker 00

  So you get in. You know,

• 39:48Jen Cohen?

  You track everything.

• 39:49Speaker 00

  First time, you're gonna learn a lot. You're gonna learn about your habits and your lifestyle and your diet and how they impact these things. And you're gonna see, you're gonna learn quickly if you're paying attention.

• 39:59Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 40:00Speaker 00

  And then you're gonna get out. I would get out. And then, you know, six months later, go back and check in again and kind of relearn and refresh. I love that, right? But there's no world where that lives in my arm year round.

• 40:13Jen Cohen?

  Yeah. Well, also, it's for people who are legitimately who are diabetic.

• 40:17Speaker 00

  Well, that's the difference. That's the, that's different.

• 40:19Jen Cohen?

  But I'm saying all of this stuff has gone just a little bit too far, right? Like, I think that, where does it end? I think it's become a massive business, right? It's like a trillion dollar business. Everyone wants to, right? No, exactly. This is an area that you should really be thinking about. That's why I told you to come with me to the conference tomorrow. Because I feel like there's, not like a, I'm not gonna say a sucker is born every day, but I think that people are chasing youth and people wanna live to 180. And any little thing that you think might, but there's no regulation on anything. You could be, it could be all a bunch of snail. A lot of these things really are not moving the needle that much, right? Maybe if you don't have your diet and your exercise and the basics and the like fundamentals

• 41:03Jen Cohen?

  down, these things are not gonna move your needle.

• 41:05Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 41:06Jen Cohen?

  You know?

• 41:07Speaker 00

  It's better that people are engaged.

• 41:10Jen Cohen?

  Or aware of it. Yeah, but if you could take 170 supplements, but if you're not exercising and moving your body daily.

• 41:16Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 41:17Jen Cohen?

  Like, so?

• 41:18Speaker 00

  Well, I would hope, I would hope that in conjunction with the 170 supplements, they would go move a little bit.

• 41:25Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 41:26Speaker 00

  There's no substitute for that.

• 41:27Jen Cohen?

  There's no substitute for that, right? Okay, that's my, and so.

• 41:30Speaker 00

  And physically and also, I think mentally, I mean, I think there's, I know I would go crazy, literally go crazy if I didn't work out.

• 41:40Jen Cohen?

  Me too.

• 41:40Speaker 00

  Like, I would be, I would, I don't know what, I would be, be bad.

• 41:43Jen Cohen?

  Well, because you probably, does, have you found anything beside, does anything besides cycling get your

• 41:50Speaker 00

  No.

• 41:50Jen Cohen?

  brain to turn on?

• 41:51Speaker 00

  No.

• 41:52Jen Cohen?

  Right, because it's the endorphins from.

• 41:54Speaker 00

  I don't know. It's just what, that's my church.

• 41:56Jen Cohen?

  Yeah. Would you like to be alone a lot?

• 41:58Speaker 00

  I'm obsessed with being alone.

• 42:01Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 42:02Speaker 00

  I love being alone.

• 42:03Jen Cohen?

  Because you spend a lot of time alone. If you're on a bike for hours and hours training a day, right, that's like people like ultra marathoners.

• 42:12Speaker 00

  I preferred to ride alone. Now, there are a lot of times I would ride with other people. And if I ride now, I will mostly ride with other people, but there are plenty of times I get to ride by myself and it's, it's just sacred. I love it. But I also just like being alone. Like, I'll give you an example. Like, I'm in a, um, I don't know what the date, this is probably two weeks from now. We spend the summers in Colorado. I will, when we take our cars up there, and so I'm going to drive my car there all alone. Straight shot, thousand miles, all alone. And it's, it's, I'm not, Jen, I'm not shitting you. It's like, it is my favorite day of the year.

• 42:49Jen Cohen?

  Really?

• 42:50Speaker 00

  I'm, I'm talking about it right now. I'm like, wow, that's right around the corner. I love it.

• 42:55Jen Cohen?

  So you're married for 17 years?

• 42:57Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 42:57Jen Cohen?

  Okay, so you spend a lot, like.

• 42:59Speaker 00

  Haven't been married that long, but we've been.

• 43:01Jen Cohen?

  Oh, no, no.

• 43:01Speaker 00

  But, but, yeah, more or less.

• 43:03Jen Cohen?

  But you've been together a long, long time? And what would she say? What would your wife say about you and your, you know, your love for being alone?

• 43:10Speaker 00

  I think she would agree and she would, she'd support it.

• 43:14Jen Cohen?

  Does she like to be alone too? Not as much as you?

• 43:18Speaker 00

  Probably not as much as, I mean, not as much as me. But I, I probably like to be alone more than most people.

• 43:25Jen Cohen?

  Yeah. I mean, because you.

• 43:26Speaker 00

  I've been around so many people my whole life and I'm still around a lot of people. And I don't, I, when you're younger, I think you're better equipped to just sort of deal with it. As I've gotten older, I now know that I have to stop and I have to carve out time to be by myself and just reset this whole thing and calm everything down. I just, and, and I get to, right? I, I get to, to create my schedule. And so I will intentionally make sure that I have that time.

• 44:03Jen Cohen?

  So how do you spend your time? Like, give me.

• 44:04Speaker 00

  I can't imagine being miserable, being alone. Now, there are a lot of people that can't be alone.

• 44:10Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 44:11Speaker 00

  And that's fine. That's, that's the way they're wired and I can't imagine that.

• 44:16Jen Cohen?

  So how much, okay, so like a day in the life, right? Let's just go through a day in the life. Like what would a day, a typical day?

• 44:22Speaker 00

  I get up very early.

• 44:23Jen Cohen?

  What time do you get up?

• 44:24Speaker 00

  I mean, I get up, not very early. I mean, I get up, today I got up at 5:30.

• 44:28Jen Cohen?

  Okay, that's very early, by the way.

• 44:30Speaker 00

  I mean, there are people that get up, but I'm just, I am an early riser, but I'm also guaranteed.

• 44:35Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 44:36Speaker 00

  To be alone.

• 44:37Jen Cohen?

  Right, exactly.

• 44:38Speaker 00

  So I get up early and I have probably a couple of hours where.

• 44:43Jen Cohen?

  What do you do?

• 44:44Speaker 00

  I'm all alone. What do I do? I drink coffee. I, I read the news.

• 44:48Jen Cohen?

  Are you a big reader?

• 44:49Speaker 00

  I, I don't read books, but I read, I read, I mean, I read news slash current events. I read stuff relevant to our space and whether it's, you know, I read a lot of newsletters or pretty religious about, you know, reading Axios and Strictly VC and a lot of these, I mean, I think you learn, you just kind of keep a pulse on. I think also Fit Insider, I think they do a great job.

• 45:14Jen Cohen?

  That's a good, they do a good job. I agree.

• 45:16Speaker 00

  Yeah, no, it's once a week, so you don't have to, but the other ones are daily. But if I subscribe to a newsletter, I read every word. And if, and if I find myself just skipping it or deleting it for a few days in a row, I'll just unsubscribe. Like it's not, it's not sticking with me.

• 45:32Jen Cohen?

  Do you read my newsletter?

• 45:36Jen Cohen?

  Yeah, I have one.

• 45:37Speaker 00

  I will after today.

• 45:38Jen Cohen?

  Okay, good. And if you don't like it, you could always just unsubscribe.

• 45:41Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 45:42Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 45:42Speaker 00

  I mean, I think that's the healthy thing.

• 45:43Jen Cohen?

  Okay, go on. So 5:30 to 7:30, you're reading the news and all that stuff?

• 45:47Speaker 00

  It just depends. I mean, if, if, if my daughter's now out of school, summer's started for her, so I would take her to school at eight. And then I, I have to work out in the morning because my motivation drops in the afternoon. And then I'll, you know, I'll come here to the office and work and.

• 46:02Jen Cohen?

  So you work out for an hour, you said, in the morning?

• 46:05Speaker 00

  Yeah, if I ride, nobody rides, I mean, I wouldn't ride for an hour. It's not worth getting dressed for, but I would.

• 46:11Jen Cohen?

  How long would you ride for?

• 46:12Speaker 00

  Two, two hours. I could ride for more, but. Then that's more time.

• 46:17Jen Cohen?

  That's similar. Yeah. So then, okay. And then what? You come to, you, you work every day at the office?

• 46:21Speaker 00

  I work here every day.

• 46:22Jen Cohen?

  So do you spend most of your time when you're at the office doing your venture stuff?

• 46:26Speaker 00

  Most, I spend 90% of my time on Next Ventures.

• 46:29Jen Cohen?

  And are you picking the companies that you are like interested in or people bringing you deals?

• 46:35Speaker 00

  All the above. And we either source through, there's obviously inbound.

• 46:42Speaker 00

  And then there's outbound. We will hunt for deals. Our founders networked, our existing founders have a, have a, we like to think a great network. Other VCs have, have, bring us deals. So it's, it's all over the place. And then, and then in terms of who decides, it's not me that decides, it's we decide, right? So we, me and Mel, who I've talked about, and Jordan, who's been on the team for years, we're the, it's a three person team. So we will ultimately decide, not so much if we want to spend time on a deal, because it takes time to, you have to decide to diligence a deal. But we collectively, we're the IC. So we will decide if we do the deal.

• 47:22Jen Cohen?

  And, okay, so then, what, what's we do? Because I see outside.

• 47:26Speaker 00

  We do is the podcast.

• 47:28Jen Cohen?

  Okay. It's just, but do you, we do hard things? Is that like the we do whatever?

• 47:32Speaker 00

  Whatever. He wants to do crazy shit.

• 47:33Jen Cohen?

  It's just, it's just the podcast?

• 47:34Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 47:34Jen Cohen?

  Okay. I thought it was going to be like a, there was another, I thought there was an umbrella and then you're going to have other things.

• 47:39Speaker 00

  I mean, we do other, we have merch and we have, it, it, it could probably be a lot of things.

• 47:47Jen Cohen?

  Because I like the name. It's very good. Yeah. Did you think of that name?

• 47:52Speaker 00

  You know, no. I mean, well, the idea behind the name of we do, like, who wants to do crazy hard stuff?

• 47:59Jen Cohen?

  Yeah. Or like, we do anything. That's why it's, it's a great brand name because you can like add whatever to the end of the sentence, right?

• 48:05Speaker 00

  But it could be all, I mean, we could do, I just, I have to admit, I got a little lazy with it. I'm not lazy because we still do the podcast, but like you couldn't. Next requires, and as it should require, 90% of my attention. The podcasts are, for the most part, easy, right? Like, take the tour podcast, for example.

• 48:24Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 48:24Speaker 00

  That's, that's, you know, that's, we're talking about the day's action, right? So that's, we sit down and we watch the race, we sit down and we talk about it. And that show's huge.

• 48:36Jen Cohen?

  Huge.

• 48:37Speaker 00

  We've sort of been spoiled by the success of the tour show. It's not like we sat around and are not trying to be creative or entrepreneurial with that brand.

• 48:47Jen Cohen?

  So you're the most passionate, though, about Next Ventures, it feels like, right?

• 48:52Speaker 00

  I'm passionate about both of them, but it's, I think it's, um, look, we have, I don't know, 100 LPs, right? So that's, which is great, but what that means is they have trusted us with their hard-earned money.

• 49:09Jen Cohen?

  Yeah, 100%.

• 49:10Speaker 00

  So that's a serious commitment. So that I spend, that's why I spend most of my time on that.

• 49:15Jen Cohen?

  Were you always interested in business like this when you were like an athlete also? Or did you have to just?

• 49:23Speaker 00

  Not to this degree, but I mean, a lot of these deals I did, you know, very early on. I mean, I was the very first in, for example, I was the first check into active.com in 1997.

• 49:36Jen Cohen?

  Oh, wow. Okay.

• 49:38Speaker 00

  So.

• 49:38Jen Cohen?

  Tell people what that is, because I don't think a lot of people would know what active.

• 49:41Speaker 00

  Well, now they would, I mean, active.com is, is an event registry. I don't even know. I haven't gone and looked in a while if people still register events on active.com.

• 49:50Jen Cohen?

  Do they? Probably not. But at the time, it was a big deal, right?

• 49:52Speaker 00

  At the time, it was a big deal, right? And so, but I knew the founder and liked him and wanted to support him. But that's, my point being, that was a long time ago.

• 50:01Jen Cohen?

  So name other ones that you were like, kind of like first in on that were big moneymakers for you.

• 50:06Speaker 00

  Direct investments, I mean, obviously Athletic Brewing is, is between Waterloo and Athletic Brewing, those will be.

• 50:14Jen Cohen?

  I thought you were involved in like Oura Ring and stuff like that.

• 50:17Speaker 00

  Oura is a part of our fund. So in Fund One, we were, we were an early investor in Oura Ring.

• 50:22Jen Cohen?

  Okay. What do you think about wearables? Is that an Oura Ring right there?

• 50:26Speaker 00

  It's an Oura Ring.

• 50:26Jen Cohen?

  Like, do you feel like it's kind of like, I feel there's now backlash a little bit on wearables.

• 50:32Speaker 00

  No, it's because you read the article in the New York Times last week.

• 50:34Jen Cohen?

  I did, but I also know that.

• 50:36Speaker 00

  You can't, but just because.

• 50:37Jen Cohen?

  But no, that's not why, though. That's not why.

• 50:39Speaker 00

  But by the way, I think the article is totally fair. Like if, my wife is a good example. Like, she's a bad sleeper. So now she has a device that's, that's very accurate, that is just confirming daily that you're a bad sleeper.

• 50:52Jen Cohen?

  That you're a bad sleeper. Exactly.

• 50:53Speaker 00

  So there, there is, um, a natural sort of just anxiety around that.

• 51:00Jen Cohen?

  And you get more anxiety. Like, I, I was.

• 51:02Speaker 00

  I mean, I. I don't know. I mean, that's she goes through phases. She will. She's now wears the ring daily, but she's she's gone through phases where she's like, all right, I'm sick of this. I don't want to look at this data anymore. I'm not going to wear it for a while.

• 51:17Jen Cohen?

  Well, I also think that the anxiety piece is real, right? Like, if you're constantly looking to see if I'm sleeping well, not sleeping well, how many steps, all of that, like, all that noise is actually causing more issues versus less. By the way, it's not just the farting. I think you have like burping too. I think you drink.

• 51:35Speaker 00

  The Waterloo.

• 51:35Jen Cohen?

  Are you sure?

• 51:37Speaker 00

  Hundred percent.

• 51:37Jen Cohen?

  I think you should.

• 51:38Speaker 00

  Waterloo is very carbonated. Waterloo. I did. I did. I did a whole thing.

• 51:42Jen Cohen?

  Maybe you're allergic to some. Maybe you have like a gut.

• 51:44Speaker 00

  Are you not drink?

• 51:45Jen Cohen?

  I am. Nothing's happening to me.

• 51:47Speaker 00

  You're going off off topic here. This is very carbonated.

• 51:52Jen Cohen?

  It is carbonated, but I feel you're having an issue. Like, we should probably take a break because you're having like, okay, well, I'm just making sure.

• 51:58Speaker 00

  How much time do we have left?

• 51:59Jen Cohen?

  Listen, excuse me. I have I haven't even started all my questions. That was just me like trying to get to know you a little bit.

• 52:05Speaker 00

  We have to. We have to be done in eight minutes.

• 52:07Jen Cohen?

  Are you joking me right now? This is a joke. I mean, I didn't even get to all the important things.

• 52:12Speaker 00

  This is what we'll do. This will be part one.

• 52:15Jen Cohen?

  That that's like you're just kind of placating me. And then when when when will be part two in two thousand in twenty thirty four? Like, I have lots of questions. Yeah, but I mean, if you I would I would allow it to happen if you'll do part two in the next six months.

• 52:30Speaker 00

  Okay, I got to leave in ten minutes.

• 52:31Jen Cohen?

  Okay, so I have. Okay.

• 52:33Speaker 00

  I want to do a question.

• 52:34Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 52:34Speaker 00

  I want to do. Let's play the question game.

• 52:35Jen Cohen?

  Okay, well, wait, you just kind of like got me off off track. I had all these things to ask you.

• 52:39Speaker 00

  Questions have been amazing, so.

• 52:41Jen Cohen?

  Okay, well, that's very nice of you. I have a whole lot of other questions and I just lost my page, which is not exactly wonderful. But hold on a second here. Well, wait, I'll just go. Okay, so let me go back to. Okay, so because I can't be bothered. Now I'm getting nervous because I only have seven minutes on the clock with you. And that gets me all like scared here. Okay, so I for you for Clint. Okay, so how also you I want to get to the money part because I think this is what I I'm curious. So when this whole thing happened with the doping and you had to give back all these things, you must have had like a crash of money. Like your sponsors were pulling out, all these things, but by that point, you already made a lot of money. Right. So it wasn't like you had to give back. Well, you didn't have to give back money.

• 53:24Speaker 00

  I did have to give back.

• 53:25Jen Cohen?

  Well, I heard that, but I didn't know if that was actually true. You had to actually write checks back to the people.

• 53:30Speaker 00

  Not so much to sponsors, but, but there were, I mean, this gets really complicated, but.

• 53:36Jen Cohen?

  Okay. My audience is very smart.

• 53:40Speaker 00

  So if you lose a sponsor, you just lose future revenue.

• 53:44Jen Cohen?

  Right.

• 53:44Speaker 00

  So it just stops. So you could count that as some sort of loss, but there were other, the way that my team had structured, most of my bonuses and salary were through insurance policies.

• 53:59Jen Cohen?

  Hmm. Okay. You're right. This is complicated.

• 54:01Speaker 00

  And so they were either, either they didn't have the budget to fulfill the contract or, or meet the contract. Or for whatever reason, they were just engineering it that way. And so when it went down, then the insurance companies came and said, we want the money back. So yes, had to pay it back.

• 54:21Jen Cohen?

  So did you have, were you?

• 54:22Speaker 00

  Quite a lot of it.

• 54:23Jen Cohen?

  How much did you have to give back?

• 54:25Speaker 00

  A lot. I mean, the, the.

• 54:27Jen Cohen?

  People like details. This is the thing.

• 54:29Speaker 00

  You know, tens and tens of millions.

• 54:31Jen Cohen?

  More than a hundred million?

• 54:33Speaker 00

  If you factor the repayments with whatever guaranteed contracts were in place that you could have just assumed would have, you would have fulfilled, it was north of a hundred million bucks.

• 54:45Jen Cohen?

  Holy moly.

• 54:46Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 54:47Jen Cohen?

  And so.

• 54:48Speaker 00

  But hey.

• 54:49Jen Cohen?

  That in itself would drive me into a depression.

• 54:52Speaker 00

  You don't know that it's that number at the time. So you, I didn't know if somebody would have walked up and said, hey, no, you're having a shitty day, but by the way, this is exactly what this is going to cost you. Of course it would have driven, driven me crazy, but it's, it was death by a thousand cuts. And so, but over, whatever. I mean, over time I was able to, to navigate it and I had made great investments and obviously things like Uber.

• 55:18Jen Cohen?

  See Uber, that's another one.

• 55:20Speaker 00

  But I was, I had access to Uber through a fund. So I was an LP in lowercase, which if you look at the record books, I mean, it was the most successful venture fund in the history of the world. And, and you know, by the grace of God, you know, I had access to that and, and that, that changed.

• 55:41Jen Cohen?

  Everything.

• 55:42Speaker 00

  Everything. Everything.

• 55:44Jen Cohen?

  Right. So you, because of that.

• 55:46Speaker 00

  Saved my family.

• 55:48Jen Cohen?

  100%.

• 55:49Speaker 00

  No, I'm, that's not, I meant that.

• 55:53Jen Cohen?

  So, wow. So then, how were you then making money? Like, what was the first way of making money after that? Wasn't sponsors? Did you give back the money? Of course, these, these investments. Were you, were you like someone who people like, were you doing a lot of speaking gigs? Cause people were super curious.

• 56:10Speaker 00

  No, that dried up. I mean, that's back, you know, I wouldn't say with a vengeance, but I do a lot of speaking now. But no, that, I couldn't, no, there was no speaking gigs.

• 56:23Jen Cohen?

  Cause I would think if I was a person, a company, I would, resilience is a major topic, right? You'd think that would be.

• 56:29Speaker 00

  But the resilience story, it's, it's a story now. Cause people, and this is the story they like to hear is, is, I mean, if it's the first two, three, four, five years, you haven't proven that you've.

• 56:43Jen Cohen?

  Are resilient.

• 56:44Speaker 00

  Are resilient or have been able to reemerge or reimagine, right? And so now that's the story that, that people love to hear. But at the time, I mean, I was, you just had cooties, right? And so they wouldn't.

• 56:57Jen Cohen?

  That's true, right? But, but also I think there's also like, you know, there's an accident you want to look like. People are curious about like where someone is.

• 57:05Speaker 00

  I didn't, I didn't get any calls for the accident. I didn't get those calls.

• 57:09Jen Cohen?

  But the resilient piece is massive. I do feel you're having an up, like, like an uptick right now. I don't know if it's because of social media or what, but I feel there's a lot of like, there's more curiosity about you. Also, don't forget our Netflix special that we did together, our 30 for, our 30 for 30.

• 57:27Speaker 00

  I'm so glad you did that for me.

• 57:29Jen Cohen?

  You're welcome.

• 57:30Speaker 00

  You know, it's interesting, it's a fun data point because it, it wasn't the Netflix documentary.

• 57:35Jen Cohen?

  I know. Just for people to know, so Lance did a 30 for 30. I'm kind of half kidding, but long story short, I should have started the podcast by saying this. Lance and I have a mutual friend, Eric Byrne, so shout out to Eric, who introduced us many years ago.

• 57:50Speaker 00

  Amazing guy.

• 57:51Jen Cohen?

  Amazing guy. I had a breast cancer charity with my best friend Nikki Austin for many years where we auctioned off bachelors and all the money we got for dinner dates and all the money we got, we gave to breast cancer. And every year we had a celebrity host or someone to be involved. Eric suggested Lance, many years ago, to be involved because of his situation with cancer. Long story short, he did it as a favor on like, not, he didn't want to do it, but he did it as a favor to Eric. We met briefly at the thing, 30 for 30. ESPN was doing a story on Lance. They came to the event, they interviewed me. Cut to the 30 for 30. Go on.

• 58:36Speaker 00

  Yeah, well, it was released as a 30 for 30 on ESPN.

• 58:40Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 58:41Speaker 00

  But that was, it came out about five or six years ago.

• 58:46Jen Cohen?

  Five years ago.

• 58:47Speaker 00

  Yeah, five years. And I didn't know that it was going to be, whether they call it re-released or put up on Netflix. But they did like six months ago.

• 58:57Jen Cohen?

  No longer.

• 58:57Speaker 00

  No, it was not, it was less than a year ago.

• 59:00Jen Cohen?

  Really?

• 59:00Speaker 00

  Yes, yes. The Netflix part of the story is new. And, but people think it's a new documentary. Cause they didn't watch it on ESPN and they don't watch 30 for 30s. But everybody has Netflix. So I, and I only know this because people come up to me every day like, hey, I just watched your new documentary. And you don't, I mean, well, I don't take the time to tell them that, but I'm like, oh, cool. Thanks. But nonetheless, I had the opportunity really to watch people's reaction five years ago and their reaction today. Cause they're two really distinct periods of time. And there's no, there's no time in the middle. Like the people weren't discovering it in the middle, but when it hit Netflix, a lot more people saw it.

• 59:43Speaker 00

  And so, but their reaction to the film on Netflix, which is, by the way, the film is unchanged.

• 59:50Jen Cohen?

  Right, I read out.

• 59:51Speaker 00

  Very same film. Their reaction is totally different.

• 59:54Jen Cohen?

  What is the reaction?

• 59:57Speaker 00

  Well, I think it's important to say that when it came out on ESPN, people were like, eh, they were mixed. Now, I don't hear from everybody, but, but the people, but I do hear from a lot, the people that react to watching it on Netflix, which is a current, is real time, is they're like, wow, that, that guy's the fucking man. Like, it's, it's just a totally different, it's a totally different reaction.

• 1:00:23Jen Cohen?

  It's funny you say, I agree with you. And it's funny because I remember watching it five years ago on ESPN because someone was like, hey, I just saw you in Lance Armstrong's 30 for 30. I'm like, really? And then now, I know, thank you. I am a star. Thank you for, for putting me on the map. It's, we, we, it's a symbiotic relationship. And then now, or the last six or seven months, whatever, it's been on Netflix. Number one, it did really well on Netflix. It was like in the top 10.

• 1:00:49Speaker 00

  Oh, really?

• 1:00:49Jen Cohen?

  Did you not know that for a long time? So the funny thing is, I would get hit up constantly. People are like, why, you know, I just saw you in Lance Armstrong's, you know, thing on Netflix. And that's why I even knew it was even on Netflix. And people did have a different, a totally different response. But I feel like people, like you've become very likeable recently. I don't, it's because of, it's probably part of that, part of it's social media, part of the podcast. Like, I feel like you've kind of rebranded as-

• 1:01:18Speaker 00

  Time does, I mean, time helps. I think, I think-

• 1:01:23Jen Cohen?

  But, but it's funny because now we're living in a time of cancel culture more than ever before.

• 1:01:28Speaker 00

  I actually, I, I actually completely disagree.

• 1:01:31Jen Cohen?

  Really? Tell me.

• 1:01:32Speaker 00

  I think, I mean, without being political, but you can just observe the political landscape.

• 1:01:38Jen Cohen?

  Oh, no. In the last, yeah, in the last six months, different.

• 1:01:41Speaker 00

  But I was one of the first people that America canceled.

• 1:01:44Jen Cohen?

  Yes.

• 1:01:46Speaker 00

  And no matter what you think of the current situation politically, I mean, it's, it's, it's, I mean, here's a guy who is now president, who for two years, we were trying to put in jail and people swore that you'd never hear from this guy ever again. And now he's president again. So there is- Clearly some redemption from somebody, right? And so, and there, I don't know.

• 1:02:09Jen Cohen?

  Talk about resilience. Talk about like not, not staying down. I mean, that's another one.

• 1:02:14Speaker 00

  Yeah, I mean.

• 1:02:16Jen Cohen?

  You're not going to say a word one way or the other. Yes.

• 1:02:19Speaker 00

  I mean, I, but I feel like, I do think that there is this, this overall sentiment. And whether it's with Donald Trump, or whether it's with me, or whether it's whoever of like, hey, did we really just, are we just gonna, because we tried to erase him and now the guy's president again. I was convinced we erased him. He's our president, right? And, you know, we erased him, that guy, that cyclist, right? And so he's, I don't know, and now he's, so there, there's been a, which, look, I'm super grateful for, right? I mean, whatever that is, that, that society has allowed me to, to reemerge. I could have willed it all I wanted to, Jen, right? We can all will shit.

• 1:03:04Speaker 00

  I will, you know, winning the lottery, I'm not going to win the lottery. There has to be this, this moment, or these moments where society says, all right, we'll let you come in for a little bit. Let's see how this, let's see how we feel about this. And then they let you in, and then they let you in some more, and then all of a sudden, but none of that happens if, if society doesn't say, okay.

• 1:03:25Jen Cohen?

  Well, I think people like human, like the human, like human aspect of people, right? Like to get into know people in a real way. Social media does that because you show yourself, like you, you're doing these, you know, your workouts and you're doing your podcast now and like.

• 1:03:39Speaker 00

  My daughter said I fart a lot.

• 1:03:40Jen Cohen?

  Your daughter said you fart all the time and you let me keep it in the podcast, right? You're not like, oh, we're gonna have to.

• 1:03:45Speaker 00

  I mean, the only thing better would be if I actually farted on the podcast.

• 1:03:50Jen Cohen?

  Listen, we have another minute and a half.

• 1:03:52Speaker 00

  As I'm trying to get you to wrap this up.

• 1:03:54Jen Cohen?

  That could be a great way to wrap it up.

• 1:03:56Speaker 00

  Because I'm gonna go play golf. I, what would you?

• 1:04:01Jen Cohen?

  Well, listen, if you really want to wrap it up quickly.

• 1:04:03Speaker 00

  I sent this, I sent my wife this thing on Instagram the other day because it was, somebody put it up like this is the sign of a healthy, or couples who fart around each other, that's a sign of a healthy relationship. And I thought that was a, I sent it to her. I was like, see, honey?

• 1:04:18Jen Cohen?

  And what did she say? Oh, yeah. Great.

• 1:04:21Speaker 00

  No, she, she, I mean, what did you, what did you?

• 1:04:25Jen Cohen?

  Well, no, what did she say? She's like, yeah, well, great. Then we must have a really healthy relationship.

• 1:04:29Speaker 00

  Yeah, we do have, yeah.

• 1:04:30Jen Cohen?

  Well, I mean, I think, well, listen, I think after time you get comfortable with anybody, right? And like you're, everything just kind of, it's a, it's a free for all.

• 1:04:39Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:04:39Jen Cohen?

  How much time do I have with you still?

• 1:04:41Speaker 00

  Not much.

• 1:04:42Jen Cohen?

  Well, you tell me, because I, should I, should I wrap you right now?

• 1:04:45Speaker 00

  Yeah, let's wrap. Yeah. Well, this is part one.

• 1:04:48Jen Cohen?

  Do you promise?

• 1:04:48Speaker 00

  I promise. I promise.

• 1:04:50Jen Cohen?

  Because, because there are so many other things that I want to talk to you about, all these projects that we're not going to, you know, that I want to know about.

• 1:04:56Speaker 00

  We talked about a lot of fun stuff, I thought.

• 1:04:58Jen Cohen?

  We did, but like it's, this is kind of a short ish podcast.

• 1:05:01Speaker 00

  You told me 45 minutes.

• 1:05:03Jen Cohen?

  I, I know.

• 1:05:04Speaker 00

  If you would have, if you would have said, let me just put it this way. If you would have said, listen, my shows are three hours. Do you know what I would have said?

• 1:05:10Jen Cohen?

  No way.

• 1:05:11Speaker 00

  Jen, I love you. There is a 0% chance I'm doing that.

• 1:05:14Jen Cohen?

  But you did Joe Rogan like 10 years ago.

• 1:05:16Speaker 00

  I know. And I'm one of the shortest ones he's ever done.

• 1:05:18Jen Cohen?

  Really? How long was it?

• 1:05:20Speaker 00

  It was like low twos.

• 1:05:22Jen Cohen?

  Really?

• 1:05:23Speaker 00

  And I asked him before, I was like, wait, how long, how long you do these things for? He's like, ah, three, three and a half hours. I said, Joe, I'm not sitting there for three hours.

• 1:05:31Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:31Speaker 00

  I won't sit anywhere for three hours.

• 1:05:33Jen Cohen?

  I mean, that's a long time to sit.

• 1:05:34Speaker 00

  A long time.

• 1:05:35Jen Cohen?

  Did he, did he ask you anything earth shattering in that two and a half hours?

• 1:05:40Speaker 00

  It was a long time. It was 10 years ago.

• 1:05:41Jen Cohen?

  I know. But like, how do you ask someone? I mean, I could actually probably do it.

• 1:05:44Speaker 00

  Look, Joe's the king. He's, he's very conversational. He, he doesn't, I mean, he has, I mean, I think Jamie helps him a lot, but I don't, he, he, I would not like to sit and just chit chat for three hours. I wouldn't like that. He doesn't mind it.

• 1:06:01Jen Cohen?

  Well, also, because you like to, you probably have ants in your pants. Like, you're not interested in like, you want to go play.

• 1:06:05Speaker 00

  I do have ants in my pants.

• 1:06:06Jen Cohen?

  You do, right? Like, it's like a lot, which is interesting because you sit on a bike for 12 hours at a time.

• 1:06:11Speaker 00

  No, but you're moving, you're seeing things. There's tons of energy that everything is, you're constantly reacting.

• 1:06:20Jen Cohen?

  Like, that was one question.

• 1:06:21Speaker 00

  Constantly reacting.

• 1:06:22Jen Cohen?

  Okay, then we can do part two. While you're on this bike doing the Tour de France, like, what's going through your head as you're riding? Are you, like, just super focused? Do you listen to music? Can you listen to music?

• 1:06:31Speaker 00

  No, you can't listen to music. But there's no daydreaming in the Tour de France. Ever, ever.

• 1:06:36Jen Cohen?

  You've got to be, like, really alert.

• 1:06:38Speaker 00

  Yeah, and think about it. I mean, it's, it's, whatever, four to seven hours a day.

• 1:06:44Jen Cohen?

  Alone?

• 1:06:45Speaker 00

  No, no, no, no, you're with 200 guys.

• 1:06:47Jen Cohen?

  No, but like, you're alone on the bike.

• 1:06:48Speaker 00

  Yeah, but you're constantly, there's the crowds as well. I mean, you have a million people a day on the side of the road. You see every year, somebody jumps out on the road to take a photo, or there's, there's a lot of obstacles.

• 1:07:01Jen Cohen?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:02Speaker 00

  And, you know, the, you know, the group is tight and packed together. You're constantly, God forbid, the weather turns bad and there's rain and the roads are slick. No, there's no daydreaming, no listening to music, no zoning out, so to speak.

• 1:07:17Jen Cohen?

  Did you ever get any bad injuries? I don't remember hearing of you ever getting a bad injury.

• 1:07:22Speaker 00

  I was lucky there.

• 1:07:24Jen Cohen?

  Right? Like, you never had, like, an issue like that? Do people, like, change your bikes, like they do with the F1? Like, a wheel here, a wheel there? How often does that happen?

• 1:07:32Speaker 00

  It didn't happen very often for us.

• 1:07:34Jen Cohen?

  It didn't?

• 1:07:35Speaker 00

  Mm-mm. But it's not like Formula One.

• 1:07:37Jen Cohen?

  It's not like Formula One.

• 1:07:38Speaker 00

  But somebody would change your wheel if you got a flat tire.

• 1:07:40Jen Cohen?

  Well, it is, the only way I think of it as Formula One, too, is very dangerous. Like I said, like, you're going so fast and, like, one bad move and you're dead, basically. Like, that's scary.

• 1:07:50Speaker 00

  I don't know if you're dead.

• 1:07:51Jen Cohen?

  Well, with F1, you could be dead, but...

• 1:07:53Speaker 00

  In cycling, you can die. But it's more, it would be more just road rash, broken collarbone. But, look, I mean, your, people ask me, look, people ask me all the time, wow, what's it like when you crash in the Tour? I said, well... Let me just make this really easy for you and we can end on this. Is in this guy's a cyclist, right? Or a gal, whoever asked the question. I said, well, here, well, here's what you should, here's what you should do, just so you can answer it for yourself. I said, go put your bike clothes on and have your wife or husband or whoever you want to drive the car. And have them just drive down the road at 30 miles an hour and jump out of the car. That's what it feels like.

• 1:08:32Jen Cohen?

  That's a really good way to end the podcast.

• 1:08:34Speaker 00

  But that's, that's exactly, that's what happens.

• 1:08:36Jen Cohen?

  It's and, and that's

• 1:08:37Speaker 00

  No, but nobody would, nobody

• 1:08:39Jen Cohen?

  Nobody would want to feel that way, of course.

• 1:08:40Speaker 00

  Could ever jump out of the car, you know, like, nobody's that hungry to get the answer to that question. But that is exactly what it feels like.

• 1:08:47Jen Cohen?

  How many times did that happen?

• 1:08:49Speaker 00

  A lot. That happens a lot.

• 1:08:50Jen Cohen?

  To you?

• 1:08:51Speaker 00

  Yeah, to everybody.

• 1:08:53Jen Cohen?

  Wow. I know. Even to you, even to you.

• 1:08:56Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:08:56Jen Cohen?

  Okay, fine. I'll let you go.

• 1:08:58Speaker 00

  Part one.

• 1:08:58Jen Cohen?

  Okay. So thank you. And I appreciate you actually doing this, even though, even though you hate sitting. So this is a big honor. Thank you for sitting. I appreciate it.

• 1:09:09Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 1:09:09Jen Cohen?

  Go follow Lance Armstrong if you haven't already. He's amazing. He's got great workouts and listen to his podcast. Goodbye.