Roll On: The Art Of Memoir

Welcome to another edition of ‘Roll On’, wherein Rich Roll and journalist & author Adam Skolnick riff on matters of interest across sports, culture, entertainment, and self-betterment. Today we dissect top headlines from the world of endurance, celebrate the 10-year anniversary of Rich’s book Finding Ultra, and talk about what makes an impactful memoir. NOTE: This episode was recorded one day PRIOR to the Uvalde school shooting, so this topic is not discussed. Specific topics discussed in today’s episode include: the murder of star gravel cyclist Moriah ‘Mo’ Wilson ; the upcoming sub-7-hour Ironman triathlon project; advice from 90-year-old runners; pop star Cody Simpson making the Aussie World Championship Swimming Team; and what Rich learned about writing, publishing, life, and success on the 10th anniversary of Finding Ultra. Today’s episode is also viewable on YouTube: https://bit.ly/rollon682 Peace + Plants, Rich Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:09Adam Skolnick?

  The Rich Roll Podcast.

• 0:13Rich Roll?

  Hey, everybody. Welcome to Roll On. We're an athlete/podcastor/writer and a journalist/author/mask-wearing shark lover. Rip headlines from the internet and real world life and wax on matters of interest, try to make sense of the world. Today, we've got a few interesting matters to unpack, but the thrust of today is celebrating that little book that you're reading right there, Adam. What are you reading?

• 0:42Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, are we on? Is this live?

• 0:45Rich Roll?

  We're on.

• 0:45Adam Skolnick?

  Is this thing live? Is this a hot mic?

• 0:47Rich Roll?

  This is.

• 0:49Adam Skolnick?

  I'm reading this great memoir. It's captivating. I think you should check it out.

• 0:52Rich Roll?

  Actually, you're reading the first version before I revise it.

• 0:55Adam Skolnick?

  First edition, baby.

• 0:56Rich Roll?

  You need to read this one, I think.

• 0:58Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, really? Is that the better version?

• 0:59Rich Roll?

  This is better, yes.

• 1:01Adam Skolnick?

  So I have the first version and it's signed by the author. Adam, let's hit the point soon. Thanks for being you, my friend.

• 1:11Rich Roll?

  Is that the one that I gave you when we did our first podcast together?

• 1:15Adam Skolnick?

  It is. I had a Kindle copy and then you sent me this one, or you gave me this one.

• 1:20Rich Roll?

  I'm glad that you still have it.

• 1:22Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, man. When I did the New York Times story on you for backstory, yes, I wrote a Rich Roll New York Times sports story. I reread it and love it, of course.

• 1:34Rich Roll?

  I appreciate that. You being on Roll On is just me paying you back for that New York Times story. That was the deal that we struck.

• 1:41Adam Skolnick?

  Has it been that useful for you?

• 1:46Rich Roll?

  No, it was great. That was in the wake of "Etleh."

• 1:50Adam Skolnick?

  "Etleh," yeah. No, it came out in the wake of it, right? Yeah, but we did the research.

• 1:55Rich Roll?

  That one never made the print edition, though.

• 1:58Adam Skolnick?

  Listen, man.

• 1:59Rich Roll?

  I'm still grinding on that.

• 2:00Adam Skolnick?

  I just work here.

• 2:03Rich Roll?

  Anyway, good to see you, my friend.

• 2:05Adam Skolnick?

  Good to see you.

• 2:05Rich Roll?

  Glad to be back in the podcast studio with you.

• 2:07Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 2:08Rich Roll?

  And yes, we're going to talk about Finding Ultra. Why are we talking about Finding Ultra? Because this week marks the 10th anniversary of this book. So I thought it would be fun

• 2:18Adam Skolnick?

  Congratulations.

• 2:18Rich Roll?

  to celebrate that a little bit. Have a little peek through the rear, through the rear view. I'm having trouble talking today. Anyway, yeah, we're going to have a little discussion about the art of memoir and just writing in general. And I think it's going to be cool. But before that, how goes it, my friend?

• 2:39Adam Skolnick?

  It's good. I'm, I have been.

• 2:41Rich Roll?

  See, you just said you were good.

• 2:43Adam Skolnick?

  Well, I know.

• 2:43Rich Roll?

  You said, people are complaining that every time I ask you how you're doing, you say you're good.

• 2:47Adam Skolnick?

  No, they did complain. They did complain. And then I, I came up with my hijinks, my intro hijinks. And then, but then the intro hijinks got.

• 2:57Rich Roll?

  Just pivoted back to your.

• 2:58Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, so then I went back to my muscle. But to be honest.

• 3:02Rich Roll?

  How are you doing, really?

• 3:03Adam Skolnick?

  If you really want to know, I've been deep in the, in the deadline cave and I have a deadline beard to show for it.

• 3:10Rich Roll?

  You do.

• 3:10Adam Skolnick?

  If you're not watching.

• 3:11Rich Roll?

  I think you should just continue with the beard.

• 3:13Adam Skolnick?

  It's start, it's, now it's moved past the growing down and out and it's moved into the round phase. So I'm, I'm dangerously close to having a half circle of hair that just arcs around my face.

• 3:27Rich Roll?

  I know the feeling. That's why I just shaved mine off because it was in Chia Pet stage.

• 3:32Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, that's where I'm at. It's jowly. It's real jowly.

• 3:35Rich Roll?

  It gets good when it gets long enough where you can kind of bring it down.

• 3:38Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 3:39Rich Roll?

  But that's a full commitment. When I shaved mine the other day, I thought about keeping the mustache.

• 3:43Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 3:44Rich Roll?

  I was this close.

• 3:45Adam Skolnick?

  That would have been pretty.

• 3:46Rich Roll?

  And I chickened out.

• 3:47Adam Skolnick?

  I'm, I'm actually thankful I'm not staring at a mustache right now. That would be hard to.

• 3:51Rich Roll?

  It's distracting. Nobody needs that, you know?

• 3:55Adam Skolnick?

  But, but this is a deadline beard. It's kind of like a cousin to the hockey playoff beard. Shout out to my brothers and sisters up in Canada. Not that. There's anything wrong with playoff beards? I like playoff beards. I used it once in Nicaragua when I was on a Lonely Planet Jag. A deep, I'd done like back to back to back Lonely Planet assignments. And the last one was in Nicaragua. And they get, it was me and one other writer. And he lived in Guatemala, so he had first choice. And he picked all the places that tourists actually go. And then three quarters of the geographic region of Nicaragua, where tourists never go, he gave to me. So I was like, literally like in the jungles. I mean, it was great stuff.

• 4:41Adam Skolnick?

  I loved being out there, but like, I don't know that anybody will ever have used my material for my, I mean, maybe Peace Corps volunteers have used it. But it, by the time I got to the jungles, I was like so whacked that like, I just couldn't shave. I'd like, my nails were growing. My, I was like a beast. And I showed up in a Costa Rica hotel two days before my flight home. And at like Christmas time and went to the check in desk. And they thought that they did not look happy to see me.

• 5:10Rich Roll?

  Right. You have photographic evidence of this?

• 5:12Adam Skolnick?

  I don't know.

• 5:13Rich Roll?

  You should throw that up on Instagram.

• 5:15Adam Skolnick?

  I must, I must.

• 5:16Rich Roll?

  Thursday, when this goes out as a companion piece.

• 5:19Adam Skolnick?

  Well, you know, it's.

• 5:20Rich Roll?

  I need a visual.

• 5:20Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, it's 10 years since I've joined Instagram. So we both have 10 year.

• 5:25Rich Roll?

  Congratulations.

• 5:31Adam Skolnick?

  I thought you'd like that.

• 5:31Rich Roll?

  We can all lament that.

• 5:33Adam Skolnick?

  Uh, but I'm, I have been just writing and, um, you know, making oatmeal for Zuma in the mornings and then doing some running. I'm 75 miles into that 100 mile challenge we spoke about last time for Give Back Homes. The Give Back Homies sent us some hats. Uh, and I've been swimming like once a week. I need to swim more. Uh, my swolff, my swolff is suffering. What is swolff, by the way?

• 5:56Rich Roll?

  I've never heard that before.

• 5:58Adam Skolnick?

  You never heard of swolff? Stroke, it's like a stroke score that like comes up on my Garmin.

• 6:03Rich Roll?

  Oh, I have, I have no idea. I don't pay attention to that stuff.

• 6:06Adam Skolnick?

  No?

• 6:07Rich Roll?

  No, I'm a, I'm a purist naturalist when it comes to swimming.

• 6:11Adam Skolnick?

  You swim naked?

• 6:12Rich Roll?

  I have, not recently. But yeah, with all the, all the kind of data metrics on swimming. I mean, I wear a garment so that I can keep track of my yardage and time and stuff like that. But I don't look at cadence or any of the other metrics that it tracks.

• 6:28Adam Skolnick?

  Doesn't bother you, doesn't matter your stroke rate doesn't even register for you?

• 6:32Rich Roll?

  I've just been doing it so long that I don't rely upon that for anything meaningful.

• 6:37Adam Skolnick?

  Just feel.

• 6:38Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 6:39Adam Skolnick?

  I like it.

• 6:39Rich Roll?

  What does that stand for even?

• 6:40Adam Skolnick?

  You know what? I thought you would know.

• 6:42Rich Roll?

  No, I don't know.

• 6:43Adam Skolnick?

  SWOFL.

• 6:44Rich Roll?

  Maybe this is why swimmers are so much faster now than they were when I was coming up.

• 6:48Adam Skolnick?

  It's a combination of stroke count and time taken in the water and is often used as a measure for your swimming efficiency.

• 6:55Rich Roll?

  Ah, so how much, how much forward propulsion are you getting per stroke?

• 7:00Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 7:01Rich Roll?

  Kind of.

• 7:01Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 7:02Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I get it. That's helpful. Maybe I should look at that.

• 7:05Adam Skolnick?

  You seem like a guy that would, you'd probably have a really good SWOFL.

• 7:08Rich Roll?

  That would mean that I need to be swimming, which I'm not right now.

• 7:11Adam Skolnick?

  How are you? What's going on? What's going on with you?

• 7:14Rich Roll?

  Oh, man. Adam.

• 7:16Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, talk to me, bro.

• 7:18Rich Roll?

  The back is not good, which is one reason why we're not going to do a check in with Chris Hoult today. It's, it's really painful right now. If I try to do anything physical the next day, I have a real struggle. So first of all, we shared a couple of weeks ago about this. I was just inundated with emails and DMs from people. So I appreciate everybody's sort of sympathy and concern. That means a lot. It also came with a lot of recommendations. A lot of, you know, check out this guy. Here's my protocol. Here's how I solved my back problem. And that's great. I have to sift through it and, and figure out what else I can or should be doing beyond the protocol that I'm currently engaged in, uh, cause

• 8:02Rich Roll?

  I'm not experiencing any kind of relief. If I do nothing, then it's a little bit better. But I was in DC the other weekend, visiting my parents and I had a little speaking gig. I couldn't resist the temptation of going out for a jog. DC is such a great city to run in and the weather was perfect. So I thought, all right, I'm just going to do the slowest run ever, like almost a walk, like a really gentle jog, just so I can cruise around the mall. Which I did, and I was very grateful to be able to do, and I felt okay while I was doing it. I didn't do anything hard. I didn't push myself at all. And the next day I was like, I couldn't sit up in bed.

• 8:39Adam Skolnick?

  Really?

• 8:39Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And I haven't been back to the pool. So I'm pretty much benched right now, and it's challenging. It's much easier for me to train, you know, the, the, the physical exertion is so tied to my mental health that, you know, I'm not happy about it, but this is where I'm at right now until I figure out a path forward that is, um, got some daylight at the end of it. So.

• 9:01Adam Skolnick?

  Is it a herniated disc type situation?

• 9:04Rich Roll?

  No, it's not. It's, it's, it's spondy. My L4 protrudes about a centimeter towards my gut, like forward. It's out of alignment and it puts pressure on the nerves that have created a lot of foot pain and some numbness in my left foot and just general discomfort. And I think the muscles that surround my spine are working so hard to keep it all intact that they just get really tense. So I, and like your back, unlike, like if my shoulder was bothering me, I could go running. If my knee was bothering me, I could go swimming. But with this, every which way that you move is impacted by your back, obviously. So I, I, I literally can't do anything without pain. So even if I sit for an extended period

• 9:48Rich Roll?

  of time, like at the end of this podcast, when I go to stand up, I can't stand up straight. So not great, but given that I can't run, um, I still can rock the new Solomon.

• 10:00Adam Skolnick?

  You still got the runner's calves.

• 10:02Rich Roll?

  I know. I got, those are from my mom. Those, those are, those are there no matter what.

• 10:06Adam Skolnick?

  You've always had them.

• 10:07Rich Roll?

  Yeah. It's all show, no go, Adam. But these are the new Solomon, uh, CLA collaboration shoes.

• 10:13Adam Skolnick?

  Looking good.

• 10:14Rich Roll?

  Some kind of weird leopard print. I don't know exactly what that is, but, uh, pretty dope, right?

• 10:19Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, those are dope, man. I love them. I, I remember you posted about all the different collabs. They all look great. Solomon.

• 10:24Rich Roll?

  It's all about collabs.

• 10:25Adam Skolnick?

  Solomon, I'm running on Solomons right now.

• 10:27Rich Roll?

  Good. You should be. I would take it personally if you weren't.

• 10:33Adam Skolnick?

  Don't make this weird, Rich. But yeah, I know that I love those. I don't have the fancy new collab Solomons.

• 10:40Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 10:41Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, they don't want to give those to me.

• 10:42Rich Roll?

  But you know, on the subject of collabs,

• 10:44Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 10:44Rich Roll?

  because collabs is where it's at, I'm thinking, what should the RRP collab should be? And then I thought, well, this is a collab. This is a Rol Skolnik collab.

• 10:54Adam Skolnick?

  It is.

• 10:54Rich Roll?

  Right here.

• 10:56Adam Skolnick?

  And it's that sought after.

• 10:57Rich Roll?

  The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

• 10:59Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, thank you. Thank you.

• 11:01Rich Roll?

  There we go.

• 11:02Adam Skolnick?

  Thank you for that. But I like our collab. A, I was, I was gonna ask a zone two question for you on the subject of running shoes. I've been, I know it's trying to bring your, I put the spotlight, we put it on you and then I'm bringing it back to me. But I've been zone twoing, you know, back, I'm back since running a bit more this month, swimming less. I got my zone two to under 10 minutes a mile now.

• 11:26Rich Roll?

  Good. How did you calculate your zone two?

• 11:29Adam Skolnick?

  Just through my Garmin.

• 11:31Rich Roll?

  Hmm, not a reliable.

• 11:33Adam Skolnick?

  I know. That's all I got. What am I gonna do?

• 11:35Rich Roll?

  Well, there's lots of protocols. I should send you to a lab and have you do a proper lactate test.

• 11:41Adam Skolnick?

  Let's do it.

• 11:42Rich Roll?

  Yeah. All right.

• 11:43Adam Skolnick?

  I'll table.

• 11:43Rich Roll?

  There's a place in Santa Monica, if it's still there. I haven't done one in years.

• 11:46Adam Skolnick?

  I'd love to do that.

• 11:47Rich Roll?

  But I'm getting a lot of questions about zone two. We're getting Dr. Peter Attia on the podcast, I think in June, right?

• 11:56Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, cool.

• 11:56Rich Roll?

  We scheduled it. He's quite the authority on zone two.

• 12:00Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 12:00Rich Roll?

  So we're gonna do a deep dive on that. But the proper way to calculate and measure your zone two is to do it in a clinical setting, either on a treadmill or on a stationary bike, where you basically undergo this protocol. The last time I did it, I brought my bike into a place in Santa Monica. They hook it up to a trainer. You warm up for five or 10 minutes. And then you start at a certain wattage. I think, I think if memory serves me, we started at something really easy, like 100 watts. And every four minutes, you increase the wattage 10 watts. And you have your finger pricked for blood lactate. You calculate your heart rate at that interval point.

• 12:44Rich Roll?

  And you give your perceived effort, like how hard is this on a scale of one to 10? And then you just keep increasing the wattage until failure. And then you plot those metrics on a, on a graph and you can see when you get this crazy uptick is where you're going from your anaerobic energy system to your anaerobic energy system. And true endurance is reflected when that upward tick is way down the line in terms of wattage. And instead of like a hockey stick, it's a more gradual curve upwards. And you're always trying to push that uptick out as far to the right as possible. And it's pretty revealing, like you think you're fit or you're doing a certain thing. And then you get a proper test and you're like, holy shit.

• 13:26Rich Roll?

  Like I go from my aerobic system into my anaerobic system at the snap of a finger. When I hit this exertion level and the idea is to push that exertion level as far to the right as possible. So that that switch from one energy, energy system to the next is sort of protracted as far out in terms of energy expenditure as possible. Or effort.

• 13:49Adam Skolnick?

  Well, I look forward, I want to do that because I'm just so bored at running like over 10 minute miles. Like it's just, it's like hard to keep doing it. And like, I don't feel like I'm getting, I mean, I'm getting a little bit faster, but like at the zone two, but it's like, I want to be able to be a little faster, you know? So it's like.

• 14:07Rich Roll?

  Zone two works, it takes a lot of time. If you're just doing it and doing it and doing it, but you need incredible consistency.

• 14:13Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 14:14Rich Roll?

  With it. If you're just running three times a week in your zone two, it's going to take a lot longer. Before you can hit a faster pace at that same heart rate. But this is a longer conversation.

• 14:28Adam Skolnick?

  Okay, let's move back to you. How's your career in NFL broadcasting going?

• 14:31Rich Roll?

  Yeah, this is hilarious. I tweeted this out the other day. So this guy Connor Ora wrote a, wrote an article for Sports Illustrated entitled 10 dream candidates for an NFL broadcast booth where he's reflecting on the Tom Brady deal, the $375 million deal.

• 14:50Rich Roll?

  To get Tom Brady in that booth and thought, who else would be good or who would be better? And he lists a bunch of people and at the very bottom of the article, I get nominated along with Steve Magnus, who was recently on the podcast. That episode hasn't gone up yet. A rotating cast of performance science experts, Steve Magnus, Rich Roll, David Goggins, et cetera.

• 15:14Adam Skolnick?

  Those are three good names?

• 15:15Rich Roll?

  So, yeah, I mean, I'm honored. But the hilarious and ironic thing is that like, I know anybody who knows me knows I know nothing about football.

• 15:22Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 15:23Rich Roll?

  Trapper, my stepson is, is an NFL fanatic. He knows everything. So I emailed him this story and I said, this, this will give you a good laugh because he knows how little I follow it these days.

• 15:34Adam Skolnick?

  I mean, you're not a ball sport guy at all.

• 15:36Rich Roll?

  I'm not, no. I'm into the obscure sports.

• 15:39Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, you're in, you're kind of like, that's why the, the mustache would work. You're a hipster sports fan.

• 15:45Rich Roll?

  I, I am indeed.

• 15:47Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 15:47Rich Roll?

  Hipster, is that what it is?

• 15:49Adam Skolnick?

  I don't know. You're into curling.

• 15:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah, here, here's, uh, let me just highlight this for the YouTubers. So, yeah, Goggins, Goggins would be good.

• 15:58Adam Skolnick?

  He would be good.

• 15:59Rich Roll?

  Magnus, Roll and Goggins have all written about the source of our internal drive about great leaders and exceptional people. Having them put a coach in a psychiatrist's chair during the week would be more instructive to us as a football watching society than a decades removed former player more interested in catching the red eye.

• 16:19Adam Skolnick?

  I love how, I love how, how salty he is about the typical broadcast.

• 16:24Rich Roll?

  I know. So, yeah, thank you for that. I am touched and honored.

• 16:29Adam Skolnick?

  Connor Orr.

• 16:29Rich Roll?

  And as I tweeted, um, although, uh, I'm lacking in knowledge. I'm sure Steve Magnus can bring me up to speed with all his track and field expertise. And I'm sitting by the phone waiting for it to bring.

• 16:44Adam Skolnick?

  But you'd be asking the play by make questions like, so how many downs do they get?

• 16:49Rich Roll?

  Right. I'm not that bad. I used to go to Redskins games, now the Washington Football Club.

• 16:56Adam Skolnick?

  Can't say that.

• 16:57Rich Roll?

  Can't say that anymore. Growing up, my dad would.

• 16:59Adam Skolnick?

  Commanders.

• 17:00Rich Roll?

  My dad's a huge football fan.

• 17:01Adam Skolnick?

  The Washington Commanders.

• 17:02Rich Roll?

  I grew up watching tons of football and then when I became an adult, I just stopped. But I love my dad and Lord knows he loves football.

• 17:11Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, yeah. Look at that.

• 17:13Rich Roll?

  Anyway.

• 17:14Adam Skolnick?

  What else? How was DC?

• 17:16Rich Roll?

  It was good. I got to see my folks. Got to do like a little speaking gig there and it was the first time that I'd seen them since before the pandemic. So that was good. And yeah, caught a screening here in LA of Blue Velvet yesterday, Sunday afternoon, 3:30 screening at the Alamo Drafthouse in downtown Los Angeles.

• 17:38Adam Skolnick?

  That's amazing.

• 17:39Rich Roll?

  Of a Blue Velvet, which I highly recommend seeing in a real movie theater. I hadn't seen it in like 20 years.

• 17:46Adam Skolnick?

  Were you the only non-stoned person in the, in the audience?

• 17:50Rich Roll?

  Probably. But interestingly, Timothy Chalamet was there watching the movie as well.

• 17:56Adam Skolnick?

  Really?

• 17:57Rich Roll?

  So little only in LA star sighting situation. And then I thought, that's pretty cool. Like a teen heartthrob who could be doing anything is catching a 3:30 in the afternoon screening of Blue Velvet. And then I thought a little bit more about it and I thought, well, okay, he's the star of Dune. David Lynch made the first Dune and Kyle McLaughlin played his character in Dune.

• 18:21Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 18:22Rich Roll?

  So here he is watching Kyle McLaughlin in a David Lynch movie, the guy whose role he's reprising in the latest iteration of Dune. I thought that was pretty cool.

• 18:30Adam Skolnick?

  It is cool.

• 18:31Rich Roll?

  Anyway.

• 18:32Adam Skolnick?

  It'd been cooler if the guy that played the worm also happened to be there.

• 18:35Rich Roll?

  That's true. Who is that guy?

• 18:37Adam Skolnick?

  The giant worm? Whatever. Timothy was there and then the giant worm was like, and then they look at each other like awkwardly and then they, you know, like they don't sit together.

• 18:48Rich Roll?

  This joke's going nowhere. All right. Let's take a, a quick break and we'll be back with some pretty interesting news from the world of obscure hipster sports and endurance.

• 19:01Adam Skolnick?

  Love it.

• 19:09Rich Roll?

  And we're back. So this first story that we're going to get into, Adam, is bananas.

• 19:14Adam Skolnick?

  It is.

• 19:15Rich Roll?

  It's the story of Anna Mariah Wilson, Mo Wilson, who was a rising star in cycling, in gravel cycling, who was murdered the other day in a story that is, you know, basically deserving of any kind of true crime Netflix series.

• 19:38Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 19:38Rich Roll?

  Because the details behind this are just crazy, especially for anybody who follows endurance sports and particularly the relatively obscure world of gravel cycling, which I do.

• 19:51Adam Skolnick?

  You follow gravel cycling?

• 19:53Rich Roll?

  A little bit, not, not super closely, but it's an up and coming sport and it has its stars. And this young woman had just arrived in Austin in preparation for a race.

• 20:07Adam Skolnick?

  And she was like dominating all year, right?

• 20:09Rich Roll?

  Yeah, she's been crushing. She's been dominating the sport. And a lot of people are thinking like she's the next coming, like she's like the best female cyclist in this discipline.

• 20:20Adam Skolnick?

  25 years old. She just had quit her day job and was going pro, like full time.

• 20:25Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So she arrives in Austin. She's staying with a friend and she hooks up with this guy, Colin Strickland, who is a very successful male gravel cyclist who lives in Austin. They had had a little bit of a dating thing. Colin's, I think, live-in girlfriend, Kaitlyn Marie Armstrong, who he's been with for a while. They had a period where they broke up for a couple of weeks. Colin and Mo got together during that period of time, but it was short-lived. Mo left. He got back together with Kaitlyn. Anyway, while Mo

• 21:07Rich Roll?

  was in town, Colin took her swimming and out to dinner and allegedly dropped her back off at this apartment where Mo was staying with her friend. And later that evening, the friend returns home to discover Mo dead in the apartment.

• 21:23Rich Roll?

  At this point in time, it appears that all eyes are on Kaitlyn Marie Armstrong as the alleged perpetrator of this violent act.

• 21:33Adam Skolnick?

  Not just all eyes, there's a murder warrant.

• 21:35Rich Roll?

  Yeah, there's a murder warrant out for her.

• 21:37Adam Skolnick?

  And the US Marshals are trying to find her.

• 21:40Rich Roll?

  Surveillance cameras have her black Jeep driving right by the house in the time period surrounding the murder. Colin and Kaitlyn both have registered firearms.

• 21:54Adam Skolnick?

  Nine millimeters and hers is the one they are, they have a very high degree of certainty fired the bullets.

• 22:00Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And, and there's some evidence of Kaitlyn's jealousy over Colin's relationship with Mo.

• 22:12Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 22:13Rich Roll?

  So much so that I believe there's some less than honest statements that were made to the police about the extent of their relationship. I know Colin had like changed Mo's name in his phone so that Kaitlyn wouldn't know who he was speaking with or texting.

• 22:31Adam Skolnick?

  Never a good sign.

• 22:32Rich Roll?

  There's another source that told the police that, you know, Kaitlyn was extremely upset about this relationship and had said some things that turned the police's eye on her as well. So this is a crazy story.

• 22:47Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, she said, she's quoted as saying that she wanted to, like a friend of hers tipped the cops that she said that she wanted to kill Mo, I think.

• 22:56Rich Roll?

  Right, exactly.

• 22:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 22:58Rich Roll?

  And so this story now has become like a big mainstream story. It's not just a story within the insular world of gravel cycling. There's a New York Times article about it, the New York Post covered it pretty comprehensively. The Daily Beast covered it, E Online has covered it. At this point in time, we're recording this on Monday. My understanding is that they have not yet picked up Caitlin, like they can't find her at this moment in time. There's an arrest warrant out for her, but she's not in custody.

• 23:26Adam Skolnick?

  Tommy Lee Jones and the crew are trying to find her.

• 23:29Rich Roll?

  Exactly. It is the US Marshals are like on the hunt for her at this very moment. So.

• 23:35Adam Skolnick?

  This is a yoga teacher who did this.

• 23:37Rich Roll?

  Right. She was a yoga teacher and Colin and her were had a business together where they would renovate trailers like Airstreams, I think. And she was also, she's also a real estate agent in Austin. So this is just crazy, you know, by all accounts, Mo is somebody that was pretty beloved. Everybody really adored her and she had this huge, you know, life and career ahead of her and her life was taken. A violent act of murder. It's just unbelievable.

• 24:06Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 24:07Rich Roll?

  So I don't know. What do you make of this?

• 24:10Adam Skolnick?

  Well, I make of it two things. I don't want to make, it's not political, but to me it's like anytime I see a gun story, I think, wouldn't it be great if it was harder to get guns? Because typically if there was no guns involved, if this was a country like New Zealand or Australia and Caitlin couldn't get the gun, maybe it would have been more like Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan and like a crowbar to the leg or something, but something that she could survive. So I guess that's the only thing I can take away from it other than, you know, it just shows you that you just don't know who people are because I can't imagine that Colin would have been with somebody that he thought was capable of something like that. And so that's a little scary because

• 24:52Adam Skolnick?

  it makes you wonder like, you know, it just makes you question what we're all capable of. I had that feeling the other day, not to get into dark, like I go from the gun control to dark in their darkness, but I do think we all have a darkness inside us and we all are like every human being is capable of shit. We can't even imagine, I think. And just a lot of us are a lot better at managing ourselves. And this is obviously somebody who was troubled. So I'm very sorry to hear it and crazy story. And hopefully they find Caitlin and, you know, there's some sort of justice for the families and I feel bad for everyone involved.

• 25:32Rich Roll?

  Colin issued a statement. He basically said, he admitted that they had had a brief intimate relationship in October of 2021, but that it was over and their relationship is currently, or was currently platonic. But there does seem to be some questioning around how honest he's being about the extent of their relationship.

• 25:54Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 25:55Rich Roll?

  The rage that Armstrong kind of held speaks to something different. And there is this video evidence here in this e-story. It says, "Police noted in the affidavit that a surveillance video showed a dark colored SUV bearing a bicycle rack stopped near the home one minute after Wilson entered it." I mean, that's pretty damning. And Armstrong had confronted Mo about dating Strickland, like there was an altercation

• 26:22Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 26:22Rich Roll?

  on some level, prior to this. So there's a bit of a history. So, yeah.

• 26:28Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. But it's one thing about being dishonest and running around behind your partner's back. And I'm not saying that that's great behavior, but like,

• 26:35Rich Roll?

  And murdering somebody in cold blood.

• 26:36Adam Skolnick?

  You know, it's like, it's like, you know, Colin, Colin said that he hadn't talked to Caitlin also since like, May 13th or something. So there, obviously, there was something before this that was a breakdown. I just feel bad for him. I feel bad for him. I feel obviously horrible for Mo's family. I thought that they have a very classy statement at the end of that Daily Beast story, I think it was, where they're just saying, you know, as tragic and horrible these events are, you know, please remember who Mo was and what she chased her dreams. She was, had a positive energy and they take heart that people are mourning with them. And, you know, you really can't respond to this any better than that. So kudos to them.

• 27:19Rich Roll?

  I believe there's a GoFundMe set up also to raise money for the family. Final thing, one of the better articles about this is in the Boston Globe. And there's a piece in it about the person who called the cops, who had a relationship with Armstrong and said that Armstrong became furious and was shaking in anger when she was made aware of Strickland's relationship with Wilson. Armstrong told the caller Armstrong was so angry, Armstrong wanted to kill Wilson. Armstrong then proceeded to tell the caller Armstrong had either recently purchased a firearm or was going to.

• 27:58Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 27:58Rich Roll?

  So that doesn't look good.

• 28:00Adam Skolnick?

  That's why I say it comes down to access to firearms. Now, she probably could have gotten a permit anyway, because if she didn't have any background checks, but if you look at, we're not going to talk about Buffalo today, but if you look at that situation where that person was red flagged, they had gun control laws, still could get it. It just shows that even those laws aren't enough. And, uh, and, cause like, nobody would, it's, it's the Gladwell argument. If there were no guns, nobody would be dead. You know, like it's bottom line. Like he, he uses that argument with, uh, in his last book about suicide. If you don't have the means to do it, most people would, that impulse would go away and they'd survive. So it's like, he's, he's shown that and it's the same true with this stuff.

• 28:41Adam Skolnick?

  Like the darkness that she felt might have passed if she didn't have a nine millimeter sitting at home.

• 28:48Rich Roll?

  Right. During that rageful moment.

• 28:49Adam Skolnick?

  Right. So that's not an excuse for her, cause she made the, you know, that's, that's, it's a horrible act and I'm not making any excuses, but, uh, but you know, we can't take that out of this.

• 29:00Rich Roll?

  Sure. So more will be revealed. At some point, the US Marshals are going to find Armstrong. So this story will continue.

• 29:08Adam Skolnick?

  And we'll be reporting it here for you folks.

• 29:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah, we will.

• 29:10Adam Skolnick?

  At, uh, what do we call in the, what's this segment?

• 29:13Rich Roll?

  Our collab, yeah. Like true crime and endurance.

• 29:17Adam Skolnick?

  True crime and endurance.

• 29:18Rich Roll?

  Hopefully this, this, this, uh, is not going to be a recurring segment of the show. Um, all right, let's, let's move on, uh, to kind of switch, uh, gears on this whole thing. There was this piece in the New York Times, written by your editor, I believe.

• 29:34Adam Skolnick?

  Yes, Talia Minsberg. Shout out.

• 29:36Rich Roll?

  These 90 year old runners have some advice for you and it's pretty great.

• 29:39Adam Skolnick?

  I love it.

• 29:40Rich Roll?

  Like this video of like these old dudes on the track, like throwing it down. Um, and interviews and incredible portraits with these elderly people reflecting on their running careers. And, uh, I just, I just love this piece. I think it's great. Like, look at these portraits.

• 29:56Adam Skolnick?

  Amazing.

• 29:57Rich Roll?

  Of these guys, you know, guys in their eighties and nineties.

• 30:00Adam Skolnick?

  Eighties and nineties and women.

• 30:01Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 30:02Adam Skolnick?

  Uh, there's like two women that always face off in like, in every event or something like that. They just go at it.

• 30:08Rich Roll?

  I know, I know.

• 30:11Adam Skolnick?

  And they all basically say, just keep moving, right? That's the idea.

• 30:14Rich Roll?

  Basically, yeah. This, this woman, Lillian Ashley, is 93.

• 30:21Rich Roll?

  She says, I guess you just have to have the love to race, the determination to just do it. I love, there's a consistent thing when you talk to older people and you ask them questions like this, their answers tend to be pretty straightforward and, and simple. It's like, just keep moving, don't think about it, you know? Just gotta get out and get after it.

• 30:43Adam Skolnick?

  I think about like, the La Jolla Cove has a group of old timers that always swim the Cove. And you see them and, and sometimes they'll like be limping in and limping out, but then they get in the water and they're like free, their bodies are free and they can like move. And they come out and they're so stoked, you know? And there's this story, my buddy, John Moore, who I swim with a lot, or used to prior, when I had the time to swim more often. Now I swim when I can with him. But he loves this story where he was there and he watched this happen, where this old, old timer comes out of the water. It was like a 57 degree water day and he's, you know, of course not in a wet suit. And someone says, um, how was it? Oh, it was great.

• 31:28Adam Skolnick?

  Did you see anything? No, no, no, the visibility was terrible. Oh, okay. And what was the water warm? Oh, no, no, no, it's freezing right now. Okay, but, but was it, was it nice? Oh, it was great. It was just like beaming.

• 31:43Rich Roll?

  That PMA.

• 31:44Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 31:44Rich Roll?

  Positive mental attitude.

• 31:46Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 31:47Rich Roll?

  Don't underestimate it.

• 31:48Adam Skolnick?

  I, I feel that with these photos.

• 31:49Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty cool. I just saw a little video on Twitter this morning. Somebody had posted it, I can't remember, but it was a video clip of the Masters 100 yard dash. And some guy, I think he was 60, ran like a 13 one. And there's a video of him running and he looks like a pro, like he's throwing down.

• 32:11Adam Skolnick?

  13 one on 100?

• 32:12Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 32:12Adam Skolnick?

  Jeez.

• 32:13Rich Roll?

  We'll see if we can find that.

• 32:14Adam Skolnick?

  Do you think I could beat one of these guys in the 100?

• 32:17Rich Roll?

  Probably.

• 32:18Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 32:19Rich Roll?

  Depends on your zone.

• 32:20Adam Skolnick?

  I looked at the times. I'm not, I, I, not fast.

• 32:24Rich Roll?

  You looked at the times?

• 32:26Adam Skolnick?

  I wanted to make sure I could beat them.

• 32:27Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I don't know, maybe not. Maybe not.

• 32:30Adam Skolnick?

  They're, they're more seasoned competitors.

• 32:33Rich Roll?

  All right, let's talk a little bit about this sub seven hour Ironman attempt.

• 32:37Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 32:37Rich Roll?

  Uh, people that listen or watch the show know how fond we are of the Norwegian experiments. Uh, Christian Blumenfeld, Gustav Eden, uh, Olaf Alexander Boo.

• 32:48Adam Skolnick?

  Mmm.

• 32:49Rich Roll?

  I just scheduled Olaf and Christian for the podcast. It's gonna be, it's gonna go down mid-October.

• 32:56Adam Skolnick?

  Beautiful.

• 32:57Rich Roll?

  I'm gonna record separate episodes with both of them, so I'm looking forward to that. Um, but right now, the next big challenge, this is coming up soon, right?

• 33:05Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, that's supposed to be, I mean, I, I saw dates online for June 5th, June 6th, but they, I'm not sure if they have confirmed the dates yet, uh, but yes, it's coming up. It's, uh, akin to the Kipchoge, um, experiment, so they can have pacers and they can have, and they can draft in the cycling leg.

• 33:22Rich Roll?

  So the idea is to attempt to go under seven hours in an Ironman, using all of these otherwise illegal devices. And there was an article in Cycling News the other day, um, that Alex Dauset is gonna be pacing Alistair Brownlee.

• 33:39Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 33:40Rich Roll?

  Alex is an outstanding professional cyclist. And, and, uh, it just kind of talks, sets the stage for this event to come. I thought it was just Christian, I didn't know that Brownlee was doing it as well, so.

• 33:51Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, it's a.

• 33:52Rich Roll?

  Are they the only two?

• 33:53Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 33:54Rich Roll?

  Competitors?

• 33:54Adam Skolnick?

  As far as I know, they're the two, yes.

• 33:56Rich Roll?

  Right, so these guys are stacking their teams with professional cyclists to rotate in and out and pace them, um, throughout this. And Christian has his own team, I wasn't familiar with the, the guys that he selected. And it's going to, it's sponsored by Zwift. It's happening, where is it happening?

• 34:15Adam Skolnick?

  It's happening in Germany.

• 34:16Rich Roll?

  In Germany.

• 34:16Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, in Germany.

• 34:18Rich Roll?

  On a 5.85 kilometer fixed circuit, at least for the bike leg.

• 34:23Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, it's all going to be laps, I think. That's part of the way they make it easier and like account for conditions.

• 34:30Rich Roll?

  And to put this in perspective, these guys are going to have to maintain a speed between 45 and 50 kilometers per hour over the entire 112 miles of the bike leg.

• 34:41Adam Skolnick?

  That's crazy.

• 34:41Rich Roll?

  To hit the target.

• 34:42Adam Skolnick?

  That's crazy.

• 34:43Rich Roll?

  Which is crazy, right?

• 34:44Adam Skolnick?

  And then, and then after that, run a very fast marathon.

• 34:46Rich Roll?

  Very fast.

• 34:47Adam Skolnick?

  Like, like sub 230, I think, like 220, right?

• 34:51Rich Roll?

  I don't know exactly how that balances out. So anyway, I hope this is going to be livestreamed somewhere.

• 34:57Adam Skolnick?

  It will be, it will be. And, you know, I think at this point, it's like one of those fun things to do. I wonder how it, you know, plays out there. I don't think they're tapering, they're not like, I don't know how much of a priority is for either of these athletes.

• 35:11Rich Roll?

  You talked to Olaf recently and he was saying this is like a blip on the radar in terms of how much they're focusing on it.

• 35:17Adam Skolnick?

  I mean, you know, they, they are happy to be involved in doing it, but it's not the, they're not orienting their season towards it. Because they can't, because the season is, they just did the Ironman.

• 35:26Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 35:27Adam Skolnick?

  And then, and he just won it. And so then they have some 70.3s lined up, the Olympic World Cup race in Bergen in late August, and then Kona. So that's kind of the points that they're orienting towards. And this just, this is going to happen when the sponsors can figure out the best timing. And because of that, I think because it was a moving target, it's hard to aim for.

• 35:48Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I don't know, man. I think things like this go a long way towards really engaging the broader public in a sport that normally they overlook.

• 36:02Rich Roll?

  If I was scheduling this, I would try to do it at a time where they could put a little bit more focus and intention into it because it's such a spectacle. I mean, look what, look what the sub two project did for Kipchoge.

• 36:14Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 36:14Rich Roll?

  I think it put his name in a lot of people's brains who ordinarily would never have heard of that guy. Like, it was so mind blowing to watch him do that.

• 36:22Adam Skolnick?

  And it made his Tokyo win that much bigger.

• 36:25Rich Roll?

  Right. A lot more people were invested in that. So from a PR perspective and from a sponsor investment perspective, I think things like this, I think we need more stuff like this. Like, this is not dissimilar from the Chris Chavez, Malcolm Gladwell, you know, Miles showdown. It's like, these things aren't really part and parcel of like, the traditional sports competition sphere, but it's things like this that I think a lot of these sports need to get other people interested in what's going on. It makes it more fun.

• 36:59Adam Skolnick?

  Hmm. Yeah, it elevates the whole sport by doing this thing. I mean, I, I, the question is, does the marathon is this thing everyone can relate to, the Ironman, you know, it's tough to, to know. And plus, I don't even know if there's the Ironman involved in this. You know, they, they don't like.

• 37:15Rich Roll?

  No, this, this has nothing, I don't think this has anything to do with Iron. I'm sure they can't even use the word Ironman.

• 37:20Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 37:20Rich Roll?

  Because they police that trademark.

• 37:22Adam Skolnick?

  That's what I'm saying. So it's like, it's, that makes it harder. But I hear what you're saying. Yeah, absolutely. It's, it's like, it's a collab.

• 37:28Rich Roll?

  It is. Yes, it is a collab. It is a collab. That is the theme of this podcast, is it not? Um, well, I'm definitely going to be tuning in for this.

• 37:36Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 37:37Rich Roll?

  I think it's, I think it's super cool. I wonder how they're gonna do the run, because the way they did, like, the Kipchoge thing was on the, that, uh, Monza track in Italy, right?

• 37:48Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 37:48Rich Roll?

  Or it was on a, it was on a, uh, an auto, an auto track.

• 37:51Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 37:52Rich Roll?

  And it was just one giant loop.

• 37:54Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 37:55Rich Roll?

  So for this, is the cycling loop the same as the, the run loop? And what, what is the swim situation?

• 38:03Adam Skolnick?

  Good questions.

• 38:04Rich Roll?

  I don't know.

• 38:04Adam Skolnick?

  I don't know. I have not deep, I didn't do the deep dive.

• 38:07Rich Roll?

  All right.

• 38:08Adam Skolnick?

  Um, but we can, we can look at that because I think there's gonna be a roll on right after this, right?

• 38:15Rich Roll?

  Hopefully.

• 38:15Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 38:16Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 38:17Adam Skolnick?

  Here's an idea. Because those guys are coming here right after Kona or right before Kona? Right after, right?

• 38:22Rich Roll?

  Uh, right after.

• 38:24Adam Skolnick?

  It's perfect.

• 38:25Rich Roll?

  I think, yeah.

• 38:26Adam Skolnick?

  What about Roll On On The Road in Kona?

• 38:29Rich Roll?

  That could be interesting.

• 38:31Adam Skolnick?

  Some real time reporting in Kona.

• 38:35Adam Skolnick?

  Get Talbot.

• 38:36Rich Roll?

  Could think about that.

• 38:38Adam Skolnick?

  This is how.

• 38:39Rich Roll?

  We would have to compete with Breakfast With Bob. You know about Breakfast With Bob?

• 38:43Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 38:44Rich Roll?

  So Bob Babbitt, who's a legend in Iron Man.

• 38:47Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 38:48Rich Roll?

  Been around forever. Bon vivant. Everybody loves Bob. He does a show called Breakfast With Bob where all the, like, the ballers like sit down with him and do a little interview. So I don't want, I don't want to encroach on Bob's territory.

• 39:02Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 39:03Rich Roll?

  We don't want to do that.

• 39:04Adam Skolnick?

  We'll take, we'll take it after, after that.

• 39:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that could be fun. I'm going to think about that.

• 39:08Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 39:08Rich Roll?

  And anybody who's listening or watching, would that be something that you would be interested in?

• 39:13Adam Skolnick?

  Hey, would you like to see the RRP go on location?

• 39:17Rich Roll?

  Yeah, we could get a hype house.

• 39:19Adam Skolnick?

  Yes. If only we knew someone who had a hype house in Kona.

• 39:24Rich Roll?

  I don't know. All right, I'll think about that.

• 39:26Adam Skolnick?

  Okay.

• 39:27Rich Roll?

  Speaking of hype, the last little story that I want to cover here, which is super interesting, is the Australian World Championship Team Trials just took place, selecting the Australian Swim Team for the World Championships this summer. And very interestingly, Cody Simpson landed a spot on the team, swimming 51.9 in the hundred fly. I think he went 51.7 in the prelims.

• 39:58Adam Skolnick?

  Wow.

• 39:59Rich Roll?

  So for people that don't know, Cody Simpson is a pop star. So to wrap your head around this, this would be the equivalent of like Justin Bieber making the Olympics. Like this guy was a huge musical sensation.

• 40:11Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 40:12Rich Roll?

  He's spent quite a bit of time in Los Angeles. He lived here. He's done a little bit of training here. Last I heard when he was living in LA, he had a relationship with Miley Cyrus. I think he was living with Miley Cyrus for a while. He's dated Kylie Jenner and Gigi Hadid.

• 40:27Adam Skolnick?

  Wow.

• 40:27Rich Roll?

  This guy is like a legit celebrity.

• 40:30Adam Skolnick?

  That's mega.

• 40:31Rich Roll?

  Who had a background in swimming. He was a very good swimmer. Then he was focused on his music career. I know that when he was in LA, he was swimming down at USC, training with some of the guys who were training for the Olympics because I was introduced to him through some mutual friends. And I think he had made a stab at making the Australian Olympic. He competed at the Australian Olympic Trials, didn't make the team.

• 40:52Adam Skolnick?

  He's 25.

• 40:53Rich Roll?

  25, wow. And then comes back and lands a spot on their world championship team and crushed it. I mean, that's a wild story. It's pretty rare.

• 41:04Adam Skolnick?

  I've never heard of a story like it. It's the only thing that I can think of even recent times is Jake Paul becoming like a good boxer.

• 41:11Rich Roll?

  Right, but he's not, he's not going to the Olympics in boxing.

• 41:14Adam Skolnick?

  No, he's not making an Olympic team and he's not, he's also.

• 41:17Rich Roll?

  It's stunt boxing.

• 41:18Adam Skolnick?

  And he's also not a mega star. So it's like, you know, he is, but through YouTube. So I don't want to rank people, but you know.

• 41:26Rich Roll?

  I can't think of another athlete who is like a huge talent and celebrated for that talent and is also like an extraordinary athletic talent.

• 41:37Adam Skolnick?

  No, you sometimes get these athletes that like Jim Brown was at the height of Jim Brown's fame as an athlete, he was the best football player in the world. He started to do movies and he was in some big movies in the 60s. So, you know, like that's probably the close, but that again, he got the fame that made him a movie star. It's totally different when you're the movie star that then has to actually go through the, through the grind of becoming an athlete.

• 42:00Rich Roll?

  But who else now is like around 25? All right, back to Timothy Chalamet. It would be like if he suddenly made the world championship team in the, in the 10K, in the 10,000 meters or something.

• 42:11Adam Skolnick?

  Right, right. It's crazy.

• 42:13Rich Roll?

  And swimming is so all consuming. Like, you can't really do anything else if you're gonna compete at that elite level.

• 42:19Adam Skolnick?

  And he looks like a brick house. I mean, he looks, yeah, yeah.

• 42:21Rich Roll?

  Completely jacked and he's got a massive, like, Instagram following. And, you know, this guy's like a global celebrity.

• 42:28Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 42:28Rich Roll?

  For his musical talent. So, that's wild.

• 42:30Adam Skolnick?

  I'm gonna pitch a story on it. Maybe I can, uh...

• 42:33Rich Roll?

  It's a great story.

• 42:34Adam Skolnick?

  Latch on to the back of his entourage and get five minutes of FaceTime.

• 42:37Rich Roll?

  I think you could drum up a pretty interesting story about this guy.

• 42:40Adam Skolnick?

  I'd have to get the access. That's the key.

• 42:42Rich Roll?

  You can, you can swing that. You got connects.

• 42:44Adam Skolnick?

  I'm married into an Australian, uh, into the Australian...

• 42:47Rich Roll?

  That's right.

• 42:48Adam Skolnick?

  Nation.

• 42:49Rich Roll?

  That's right.

• 42:50Adam Skolnick?

  That's right.

• 42:51Rich Roll?

  Australians hang close to each other.

• 42:54Adam Skolnick?

  Yes. Australians have more camaraderie within, within the nation.

• 42:58Rich Roll?

  Well, especially when they're expats, like in America and places like that. They flock together, for sure. The other big story coming out of the Australian trials is Ariana Titmus, who set a world record in the 400 free, swimming 356.4, breaking Katie Ledecky's world record. I'm not sure, but is this the first one of Katie Ledecky's world records to fall to somebody else?

• 43:21Adam Skolnick?

  I think so.

• 43:22Rich Roll?

  I think it is.

• 43:22Adam Skolnick?

  I think so.

• 43:24Rich Roll?

  You should probably know the answer to that.

• 43:25Adam Skolnick?

  But you know what? It was amazing watching that, cuz her, she was at, way out front the world record. And then, watching the world record line creep up, you could almost see the, you could almost see Katie Ledecky just trying to track her down, you know, cuz she closes so strong, Katie Ledecky.

• 43:38Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah. Her, her back end was stronger.

• 43:40Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 43:40Rich Roll?

  Ariana went out a little bit faster.

• 43:44Rich Roll?

  Kyle, Kyle Stockwell on, on Twitter is a great source for swimming news. He reports like a fiend. And he posted, like, he could, the comparative splits between Titmus and Ledecky. And it was pretty interesting to see how they differed.

• 44:01Adam Skolnick?

  He posted a great video of, uh, Titmus's coach, which was...

• 44:04Rich Roll?

  Oh, yeah, I saw that. Yeah. Yeah, that guy was losing his mind. He was like, I got the Jeff Spicoli haircut.

• 44:10Adam Skolnick?

  He looked like he was, like, seeing his favorite rock star. Like, he almost looked like a rocker from, like, AC/DC just showed up.

• 44:19Rich Roll?

  I know. And I shared a little video clip of her swimming and there's this underwater camera view of her stroke.

• 44:26Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, yeah.

• 44:27Rich Roll?

  It's just so powerful.

• 44:28Adam Skolnick?

  So amazing. Her swol is better than mine, I'm pretty sure.

• 44:31Rich Roll?

  I think she has a good swol.

• 44:32Adam Skolnick?

  A good swol.

• 44:32Rich Roll?

  I still don't know what that is, but I'm sure hers is very good.

• 44:35Adam Skolnick?

  But you know a guy who can test it.

• 44:37Rich Roll?

  I do.

• 44:38Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 44:38Rich Roll?

  I guess this thing on my wrist might be able to do too, but I don't know about that. Anyway, that's it for Endurance Corner. Let's take another quick break and we'll be back with some thoughts on the art of memoir. All right, before we get into the next thing, two thoughts. First of all, Davy during the break was quick to add that Master P played in two NBA games. One for Charlotte and one for Toronto. Is that right?

• 45:14Adam Skolnick?

  How'd he do?

• 45:15Rich Roll?

  So that's in the ballpark, sort of. I don't know.

• 45:18Adam Skolnick?

  But you still don't know because he was already Master P. So you don't really know, would he have made the squad had he not been Master P?

• 45:26Rich Roll?

  Hmm.

• 45:27Adam Skolnick?

  Whereas this guy, like, that's the great thing about swimming. You can't make it.

• 45:30Rich Roll?

  The clock doesn't lie.

• 45:31Adam Skolnick?

  You're right.

• 45:32Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Who knows?

• 45:34Adam Skolnick?

  They say in basketball, the ball don't lie. And in swimming, they say the clock doesn't lie?

• 45:38Rich Roll?

  Is that what they say? Who's they?

• 45:40Adam Skolnick?

  Rasheed Wallace. Ball don't lie, baby.

• 45:42Rich Roll?

  Well, if there's anyone else out there that we're not thinking of, like, hit us up in the comments and let us know. The other thing is, we're discussing the possibility of going to Kona during the break, and it took Adam a nanosecond before he inserted freediving into the conversation. We could do freediving podcasts and go freediving.

• 46:00Adam Skolnick?

  I got since-

• 46:01Rich Roll?

  And suddenly it became all about freediving.

• 46:03Adam Skolnick?

  I got certified at Kona now as a freediver. And there's, they drop a line and it's about forty-

• 46:09Rich Roll?

  Who's the guy there again?

• 46:11Adam Skolnick?

  Uh, well, I, I went with Kirk Crock. There's a guy named, um, God, why am I spacing on it? Is it Brett, is it Brett LaMester? There's a guy who has another freediving school there that's not Kirk Crock. I did.

• 46:23Rich Roll?

  When I was there, like a year and a half ago, I think I hit you up because my buddy Anthony Irvin was like, oh, I'm gonna go.

• 46:29Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, right. Kurt Chambers.

• 46:30Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 46:30Adam Skolnick?

  So the other guy that, the, the third guy that is someone who I'm the most connected with, but I never trained with him. Um, so there's two freediving schools that regularly do that in Hona now. And Kurt Chambers has his own business and he's all over the islands. He's like the number one guy for training people in every island in Hawaii.

• 46:48Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 46:49Adam Skolnick?

  And it's also the best freediver of all of those guys. He's a hundred meter plus freediver. And, um, and so.

• 46:56Rich Roll?

  He has a cool Instagram as well.

• 46:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, great Instagram, great photographer and videographer. So he's in the Philippines right now, freediving. So Kurt Chambers, that's what I was thinking. We could go dive with Kurt Chambers.

• 47:06Rich Roll?

  Right. So suddenly, what if we go to Kona during Ironman week and all we do is go freediving and interview freedivers?

• 47:14Adam Skolnick?

  What if, that seems like a, a bad use of budget.

• 47:17Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Anyway, um, all right, switching gears here, uh, this week, again, it's the 10th anniversary of Finding Ultra, my first book. This has given me, um, a moment to kind of reflect on this journey, uh, which has been a really cool journey. That book really set in motion all of the things that I get to do today. And I'm very grateful for the experience of writing that book and, and, and sharing that story with the world. And, uh, yeah, I just kind of wanted to reflect back on that and celebrate it. I posted a tweet thread on Sunday with a few things that I've learned along the way as a result of writing this book.

• 47:55Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 47:55Rich Roll?

  Um, not the least of which is, you know, often when I get interviewed or I see press about myself, it says, New York Times bestselling author. And I always laugh. It's like, this book was not a New York Times bestselling book.

• 48:06Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 48:07Rich Roll?

  It never made the New York Times. It didn't make any of those lists. Like it came out, it did fine. Um. And it found a little bit of an audience.

• 48:15Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 48:16Rich Roll?

  And from there, it's just been a very slow build. Obviously, the podcast has been helpful in it reaching more people. But just this kind of steady uptick year after year of people finding the book and enjoying it and sharing it, which is kind of like this podcast and is really emblematic of like every success that I've had. Like, I haven't had big viral moments. Like I said in the tweet thread, I haven't been on Ellen or the Today Show or, you know, done a lot of mainstream stuff. I mean, maybe the most mainstream thing was the New York Times article that you wrote about me, which I'm very grateful for. That was many, many years after this book came out.

• 48:54Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 48:55Rich Roll?

  But, you know, everything that I've been able to achieve has been a really slow burn. And so it was kind of a meditation on leaning into that.

• 49:03Adam Skolnick?

  On the long game.

• 49:04Rich Roll?

  Yeah. It's all about, and as an ultra endurance athlete, like, it's fitting.

• 49:09Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. I love that tweet thread. I thought it was, it was cool. You say that the book has sold better each year since it was published.

• 49:17Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I don't know if that's entirely accurate. I know it continues to sell and I would have to go back and look at the specific numbers. I'm sure there's been, you know, ebbs and flows with that. But yeah, I mean, you know, I just know from getting the quarterly statements or whatever that, you know, it continues to sell as well as it ever has. I mean, obviously, the first week it comes out, like, you're going to sell a lot because it includes those preorder numbers. And then after that, there's a huge dip. And then from there forward, it's just been kind of a solid growth curve.

• 49:49Adam Skolnick?

  Well, do you mind if I ask some probing questions?

• 49:52Rich Roll?

  Sure.

• 49:53Adam Skolnick?

  On the record? There's no off the record here.

• 49:56Rich Roll?

  Never with you? Is that, is that what you tell all your sources?

• 49:59Adam Skolnick?

  No, what I tell them is, anything you want off the record, just let me know. But not you, Rich.

• 50:05Rich Roll?

  No, okay, I'm game.

• 50:08Adam Skolnick?

  So tell us a little bit about like where you were in your life when you decided to write the book, because you've already done these amazing feats. You've already kind of, you're on the path, you've already, you're sober, you're, you're an endurance athlete again, you're, you're fit. So like, what, where were you, how many years after Epic Five? How did it all come together?

• 50:28Rich Roll?

  It came together fairly shortly after Epic Five. I'd come back from that and was trying to figure out what I was gonna do next.

• 50:42Rich Roll?

  And it was a challenging time, like we, I was still a practicing lawyer at that time, but I had lost so much interest in pursuing that, that I wasn't really making very much money doing that, and was really struggling to, to pay the bills and to figure out how to provide for my family. And, and the way it came together is, is kind of a cool story. There had been a little blurb about me in the Stanford Alumni Magazine about how I had done these races, and it mentioned that I had been sober for a while. And in the wake of that article coming out, I got an email from a guy who had been a swimmer at Stanford, who was somebody I didn't know, he was, he was several years older than me.

• 51:26Rich Roll?

  And he just said, listen, I saw that article in the Alumni Magazine, I'm newly sober, and, you know, it would be good to be able to talk to somebody, could we like, talk on the phone? And I just called him up, or he called me. And this guy had recently gotten out of treatment, he's CEO of a large company, nobody on his, in his company knew what was going on with him, and he was trying to navigate like, early sobriety and all of the kind of, you know, challenges of that. And I just was there to be of service to this guy and share whatever I could to, to help him, and that was it. And we had a number of calls, talked every couple of weeks for a period of time.

• 52:10Rich Roll?

  And at some point, he said to me, like, you know, you have a pretty cool story, like, have you ever thought about writing a book? And I hadn't seriously ever thought of writing a book. I had thought like, maybe, you know, maybe that would be a cool thing to do, but it wasn't like I had ever taken any active steps towards pursuing that in any meaningful way. He's like, oh, I know this book agent, you know, I should introduce you. And he did. And that led to me being on the phone with Carol Bidnick, who became my agent at the time. And I told her the story and she said, well, you know, books like this are hard. You really have to thread the needle. I'd be happy to read a proposal and happy to help kind of babysit you through how to put a proposal together.

• 52:55Rich Roll?

  If you're interested, I can't make any promises. And that was kind of that, but it was, it was like a little crack. The door cracked open a little bit. And I've just learned over the years, when you have that little opportunity, like those don't come around that often. So I was like, this is something I'm going to take really seriously. And I worked really hard for like three or four months on a proposal, which entails, it's like writing a business plan for a book, as you know, because you've done it. You have to create a, create a marketing plan and you have to synopsize the book and you have to write a couple of chapters of it and you got to outline the whole thing. Like you got to kind of spell out the entire project. Yep. And also make the case for why it's viable in the marketplace.

• 53:37Rich Roll?

  And I'd never done anything like that before, but I worked really, really hard on it because I knew like, this is a shot that doesn't come around that often. And when it was done, sent it to her and she said, this is, this is good, but again, like this is really hard and I've got a couple, you know, publishing potential buyers here who I think might be interested in this, but like, you know, we'll see. Like she was very tempered in the whole thing. But she said, I'm going to slip it to a few people and I'll be in touch. And literally like within a day, I'd gotten interest from Random House, Rick Horgan, who's an editor there, is a big editor.

• 54:16Rich Roll?

  At Crown at the time was interested and Carol's like, let's do a call. And I still remember the call. I was like at the, at this, at the, at the Calabasas Commons, which is like this outdoor mall, like walking around when this call was scheduled. Cause I didn't have an office and I couldn't work at home. We had young kids and all that kind of stuff. And I would like go to the Barnes and Noble, which had free wifi at the time to work. And so to do this call where it was quiet, I remember like going behind some bushes to like, do this pitch call.

• 54:47Adam Skolnick?

  Yep.

• 54:48Rich Roll?

  And, you know, he just said, you know, tell me about this project in the book. And I just laid it on thick and like threw down the best case that I could make on the phone. And within 72 hours, we had a deal that he took it off the table. And like, we were like off to the races. And Carol was like, that never happens. You don't understand, like this is always a much more protracted, challenging situation. So it was unbelievable. Like I was, you know, I couldn't believe that this was happening. And so there was another kind of crack, you know, door cracking open. Just because you write a book, doesn't mean it's going to be good or successful.

• 55:27Rich Roll?

  So I really busted my ass for like a year to put this book out and make it as good as I could.

• 55:34Adam Skolnick?

  Separate yourself from your law practice entirely during that year?

• 55:37Rich Roll?

  No, I was straddling both because I got like an okay advance for a first time writer. But as you know, you, you see like, oh, it's this much money. But it's like, okay, you get 25% on signing and then 50% when you deliver the manuscript. And then the other like whatever percent when the book comes out. So this is spread out over a long period of time. And when you take out taxes and agency commission, like it was, I was incredibly grateful for it. It was huge, but it wasn't a situation that was going to be able to sustain my family over a period of a year and a half. So I had to supplement my income with still practicing law at the time. I didn't, I didn't pull the plug on practicing law until the book.

• 56:22Rich Roll?

  Came out and then I was like, I'm not renewing my bar membership.

• 56:26Adam Skolnick?

  Fantastic. So after, after the book came out.

• 56:29Rich Roll?

  Yeah, then I was like, I'm done. And that was scary too, because you would think like when the book comes out, oh, all these opportunities happen and like, you know, you're, you, you got to be this guy and go tour with the book. And it's like, yeah, I did a little bit of, I did a couple of appearances. A few people came to them. It wasn't any big deal. And then it was like crickets.

• 56:51Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 56:53Rich Roll?

  You know, and part, one of the lines in the book is when your heart is true, the universe will conspire to support you. And I was like, my heart's fucking true. Like,

• 57:00Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 57:01Rich Roll?

  The universe will conspire to support me. I believe that. What I realized is that it wasn't going to be on my timeline.

• 57:07Adam Skolnick?

  Not on your schedule.

• 57:08Rich Roll?

  Suffer for quite a long time before things started to turn around and, and I was able to like, create a vocation out of what the book, you know, began.

• 57:17Adam Skolnick?

  So the book comes out, you, you cancel your bar membership. So what are you doing like in that time? Because even if, even if it was selling well, but you said it was doing okay, but it's not like you're going to be able to live off of that.

• 57:28Rich Roll?

  I mean, it was, it was dark, dude. Like we, that was the period of time, and I've spoken about this many, many times before. So we don't need to go into detail around it, but you know, we had cars repossessed. I couldn't pay for our garbage removal. So our bins got taken away. We were driving around in a completely beat up minivan that had like 200,000 miles on it. That smelled like garbage because we had to put our garbage in the minivan and then find an empty dumpster somewhere to dump them. Like it was humiliating and emasculating. Um, but you know, I'd get the occasional 500 bucks to go speak somewhere. Or, you know, some little opportunity would come along, but it was dark and we were drowning.

• 58:10Rich Roll?

  And that's when the opportunity to go to Kauai and work with this guy, Chris Jabe, came along. He threw us a lifeline to help him figure out, uh, how to make use of this amazing property that he owned on the North Shore of Kauai. And we moved to, The Honolay area and lived in yurts on his organic farm. And I worked with him for three months, trying to help him as best I could. And he paid us and that allowed us to like pay our bills. And it was like, I'm so incredibly grateful for it. It's confusing and weird in that like, I don't know why he thought I could be the, I was the right person to

• 58:47Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 58:48Rich Roll?

  Fill this, you know, strange role that he wanted filled. But I'm extremely grateful to him because he, short of that, like, I don't know what we would have done. But it was during that period of time, which was the winter of 2012, that I started the podcast there. And that's kind of what led to everything that's followed.

• 59:10Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, right. You started that there. So it's, it is related to this, to the book in that regard, right? The book happens, you leave law and then, and then, um, you know, things kind of tailspin and you end up landing in Kauai softly in a beautiful place and then start this podcast.

• 59:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And to be clear, like, the podcast was a fun, creative, passion project. It was never considered to be something that would, you know, generate money that, that would allow me to support my family. And for a snapshot of what podcasting was like in 2012, it's nothing like it is today. Like, it wasn't cool to start a podcast. I didn't know anybody other than myself that listened to podcasts. It was difficult to download a podcast. This was before the iPhone and streaming. You had to download it on your desktop or your laptop and then bounce it to an iPod to create these like playlists. It was, it was a thing.

• 1:00:07Rich Roll?

  And, and at the same time, it was also a moment in time where, you know, no, it wasn't like people were starting podcasts all over the place.

• 1:00:16Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:00:17Rich Roll?

  From the very first episode, we were able to make an impression on iTunes and solidify like a position in the charts and the health space. And that, that I think opened the door for us to develop a listenership. In a way that would be much more difficult today.

• 1:00:34Adam Skolnick?

  I can relate to thinking, you get the book come out, you think you you made it to a certain level and you have because it is an establishing thing for you because there is a perception around it, especially if the book has either sold well or been reviewed well. But even not, you know, just if it has some sort of anything around it, like in my case, the book, my book didn't, One Breath didn't sell as well, but it it had really good reviews in some places. And so then, but then afterwards, you're trying to, you know, you're trying, you have to then keep making a living, right? And for some reason, you take your foot off the gas. I did, I took my foot off the gas a little bit because I wasn't like, I didn't want to sell myself that hard.

• 1:01:19Adam Skolnick?

  I didn't, I didn't really push the the PR as hard as, like, if I, to do it again, I think I would do things a lot differently and I never would take my foot off the gas. But you have to go through that to know that.

• 1:01:28Rich Roll?

  You have to be utterly shameless in that phase. And that's not really in the wiring of most writers.

• 1:01:33Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:01:34Rich Roll?

  Like, they write so they don't have to interact with people. They, you know.

• 1:01:37Adam Skolnick?

  No, they write because they are ashamed.

• 1:01:41Rich Roll?

  Well, like many artists, it's, it's like, I did the thing, you go push it out into the world. Like, I already created my thing, like, and, and, and sometimes there's an expectation that the world is awaiting this great work, you know, like, nobody's waiting for your thing. You know, you gotta make it happen. And I remember getting counsel from, from some people who were like, you have to do everything in your power to make people care about this. And I treated that like my job, did the best that I could with the small sort of interest, public interest that I had at the time. But yeah, it kind of comes and goes. And it, it's a weird dissociative experience because on the one hand, like, I couldn't believe I was being given the opportunity to write a book.

• 1:02:24Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:02:25Rich Roll?

  And then that book, you could go to Barnes and Noble and see it on the shelf. It's like mind blowing.

• 1:02:29Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:02:29Rich Roll?

  It was like, I can't even believe this, this is like so cool. Like, travel to a different city and go into a bookstore and your book is there. Like, wild, right? And the fact that 10 people would come to, like, hear me talk about it, like, who are these people? Like, that's crazy.

• 1:02:45Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:45Rich Roll?

  You know, so, so that was all. Gravy and amazing, but I think there's a public perception that if you're a published author and your book is in a bookstore that like you don't have to worry about paying your bills. And I can tell you that that's certainly not the case.

• 1:02:59Adam Skolnick?

  The opposite is true. You're, the writing style itself, like obviously as a lawyer, people know lawyers write a lot, but they don't write in this particular way. They're right. A lot of lawyers write in stilted, highly specific ways. You were able to, in your first crack, like, like I write all the time. So like, it's part of my musculature. You do now as well, but in, you know, often for the podcast, but for, for this book, you weren't coming from like writing every day kind of background.

• 1:03:31Rich Roll?

  Well, yes and no. I mean, first of all, have you read my demand letters from my lawyer days? I would not call them stilted. Writing a great, snarky demand letter is an art form in and of itself.

• 1:03:44Adam Skolnick?

  You should do, you should do a collection.

• 1:03:46Rich Roll?

  Yeah. There's some great ones, like, you know, I am in receipt of your, I assure you that my client, you know, and whatever. No, I was a, I was a creative writer long before I was a lawyer. Like I did a lot of writing in college. I always loved it. And, and law school and being a practicing lawyer, I think only enhances one's writing skill because it lends, you know, structure to it. It provides like a framework for making an argument and supporting that argument. As long as you hold on to whatever creative flair that you have. So, but just the practice of always being writing when you're a lawyer, I think keeps that muscle strong. But I think a lot, you know, the, the sensibility of

• 1:04:30Rich Roll?

  the book has less to do with writing skill and more about like a willingness to be vulnerable and tell stories that most people would maybe be too uncomfortable to.

• 1:04:45Adam Skolnick?

  Right. But you tell them as if you're, you know, right, you're writing as you talk, which is what you should do. And so it's very natural voice in the book.

• 1:04:51Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I mean, I don't know about you when you're writing, but for me, the approach with this book is, was to.

• 1:04:59Rich Roll?

  overwrite it, like just write everything and then figure out what the salient stories are and like cull out everything that isn't moving the story forward. And I work with it, you know, Rick Horgan was my editor, but I also worked with another editor because I think you need that, that sounding board or that feedback because you're too in the middle of it. Like it's your story. So having perspective is, is important as, as well. But I think most memoirs suffer from lack of editing, like there's too much in there. It's, it's not like, if you're telling your quote unquote, life story, you're not supposed to say, you tell every story that ever happened to you. That's, that's interesting. Like what

• 1:05:40Rich Roll?

  is propelling the story forward that pivots on the themes that you are, you know, finding most important and telling that story.

• 1:05:49Adam Skolnick?

  Well, let's talk about the craft of memoir. What do you think makes a good or great memoir?

• 1:05:56Rich Roll?

  It's a good question. I want to throw that to you as well. As somebody who's written memoirs, I mean, for me, you know, my, my, my book kind of falls into the sports memoir category. And I think most sports memoirs suck. They're terrible because they're, they're vainglorious. Like they're, they're generally written by a ghostwriter in the twilight of a certain athlete's career as an exercise in extending that particular athlete's brand viability. And so they tend to focus on all the great stuff that they did, but

• 1:06:39Rich Roll?

  they rarely paint a full picture of that person's life. Like they, they don't, they don't typically have the level of candor and honesty and vulnerability that I think is, is critical to connecting with a readership. I mean, there's exceptions to that. I think Andre Agassi's memoir is exceptional for that reason. So for me,

• 1:07:04Rich Roll?

  I didn't want to be influenced by that genre. So I didn't go out and read a bunch of memoirs and try to deconstruct what would make for a good memoir. I just tried to tell my story as openly and as honestly as I could. And, and the framework that I used for that is sort of the what happened, you know, what, what it was like, what happened and what it's like now, which is like the 12 step format of sharing your story.

• 1:07:28Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:07:29Rich Roll?

  And as somebody who's sat in tens of thousands of, of 12 step meetings and listened to people share their stories and I've had the opportunity to share my own many, many times. That was really more of where my head was at. Like, how can I, how can I tell my story in an extended version of, of that format? And to do it as, as honestly as I could.

• 1:07:52Adam Skolnick?

  So that's interesting. That's kind of a storytelling workshop for you in a way, the 12 step.

• 1:07:56Rich Roll?

  Oh, big time.

• 1:07:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:57Rich Roll?

  And as a, and as a podcast host.

• 1:07:58Adam Skolnick?

  The bridge between, the writing bridge from undergraduate all the way to the book, but the storytelling, the creative writing, the storytelling and the memoir aspect is kind of like, um, you know, you're soaking it in and all these meetings.

• 1:08:10Rich Roll?

  Right. And when you are in a position where you're telling your story a lot.

• 1:08:14Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:15Rich Roll?

  It starts to tell you what it is. And when you have an audience, you, you can gauge in real time, like what people are responding to, what's important, what's not.

• 1:08:23Adam Skolnick?

  I think, uh, David's, that's why, one of the reasons that you wanted to spin it back, but Can't Hurt Me was a success, uh, a large, large part, uh, because David had been telling versions of that story in his recruitment, uh, for the Navy's recruitment, um, speaking gigs during the Navy, when he'd go to high schools and colleges. And he'd been telling it on podcasts, you know, obviously starting here and then, and then, uh, other podcasts as well. And so he was able to do that and he was a master of that story. By the time he got here, you know, you'd think you're the, I think you were one of the first podcasts he was on, but he'd been telling that story and versions of it.

• 1:09:00Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:09:00Adam Skolnick?

  Said for 10 years already.

• 1:09:01Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:02Adam Skolnick?

  And so he was a total master of it. And so when, when I got linked up with him, you know, my, my job is just to be the, the blank channel and to try to channel as much of pure David into it.

• 1:09:12Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:09:13Adam Skolnick?

  So it's interesting because like it's the same idea, you know, you hear the story and the story starts, you refine it and it, it becomes almost an organic process.

• 1:09:21Rich Roll?

  So when you were writing that book, were there? Other literary reference points that you were trying to, to, you know, mimic in some way? Like, what were the inspirations beyond just David himself?

• 1:09:35Adam Skolnick?

  Well, I mean, I think David, I'd have to put that at the top because his story is so epic that you knew is going to help a lot of people if it's done well. You know, like, it's just an incredible story. It's a real-life Rocky story. So like, how often does that fall in your lap?

• 1:09:49Rich Roll?

  Sure, but in structuring it, I'm sure he told you some incredible stories that didn't make it into the final version of the book.

• 1:09:55Adam Skolnick?

  So how you structure it was, um, you know, I'd have to think about it, but I, what was really, in terms of my, my approach, the only, um, I didn't think about anybody else's memoir, really. The only one I can think of, of a ghost-written memoir that I really loved was The Autobiography of Malcolm X. And so that's, you know, that's Alex Haley wrote that. And so I thought, you know, first of all, when, before David even came around, when someone asked, when Bird asked me if I would be interested in ghostwriting, I thought, well, if Alex Haley could be interested in ghostwriting, then I certainly could be interested in ghostwriting. And so, you know, that book is one of my favorite books of all time. I think it's the GOAT when you talk about memoir.

• 1:10:39Adam Skolnick?

  I don't think there's a better memoir ever. And so certainly there was that, but I didn't go back and read it. I didn't like think about structure in that way because I think what I was mostly concerned about was telling his story properly and keeping it true to him. And so it's like, as long as that's your, your focus is on making that story great, um, then, uh, yeah, I didn't, I didn't think of it any other way.

• 1:11:01Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:11:02Adam Skolnick?

  And I just tried to rely on, how did I write? Cause I, I still, even though One Breath didn't sell as I'd hoped, I knew it was a good book. So how can I take what I learned there and apply it to this and, um, and write something that's good? So that, that's really my whole approach, but I didn't have any sort of, you know, uh, feeling how it would go or how it would turn out.

• 1:11:23Rich Roll?

  And when you look back on One Breath or, or even the, the Goggins book Can't Hurt Me, Do you look at it and think, I should have done this, or I should have changed that? Or are you able to just say, yeah, those are great?

• 1:11:37Adam Skolnick?

  Well, you know, it's funny you say that. With One Breath, there was, when I'm at, my first book proposal with One Breath, included me as a part of the investigation. So like the way Krakauer did Into the Wild. And which is how most people do, well, not most. There's been a period of time where it's in vogue to do that way or not to do it that way. I always thought that you should tell it that way because it gives the reader someone besides the protagonist to relate to. And so, and those were some of my favorite books, Into Thin Air especially, but he's obviously on the Klein. That's almost part memoir. But Into the Wild, him investigating it as part of the story. So I thought that was going to be it. But then when we got the deal,

• 1:12:20Adam Skolnick?

  the editor at Crown didn't want that. He wanted it to be more like Shadow Divers, which is this story where the journalist is, is the channel, but is not in the story. And then I read a book called Behind the Beautiful Forovers by, I think it's Catherine Boo, which is a masterpiece. And that was kind of one of the first nonfiction books I'd read in a long time where there was no, the journalist wasn't there, but obviously was there. It's all about the Mumbai slums and the people that live in the Mumbai slums, but it's a beautiful book. And so I thought that, that she's the ticket. So I paid attention there.

• 1:13:01Adam Skolnick?

  But in terms of memoir, I didn't, I didn't do it. I mean, I, I've liked, I've loved some memoirs. Love Eat, Pray, Love. Obviously, you know, with Gilbert, I think she's set the standard and, and a lot of books that we've seen since then owe their existence to Eat, Pray, Love. Heartbreaking work, a staggering genius by Dave Eggers was monumental. Love that. I love The Zanzibar Chest, which is probably out of print now by Aidan Hartley, which, which was great. A journalist that worked for, in the nineties in Africa, all the wars in Africa uncovered those. So, you know, there are definitely some memoirs I loved, but I didn't really look at them when I was taking on David's.

• 1:13:38Rich Roll?

  Was that a conscious decision?

• 1:13:40Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I mean,

• 1:13:44Adam Skolnick?

  I don't, you know, it's a good question. I just didn't think that they had, I didn't, my, I needed to tune into David. You know, it's different, you know, when you're writing a book, that's your byline and that you're taking on, I think you have more, there's more latitude, but this time I needed to, I needed to tune into David.

• 1:14:01Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:14:01Adam Skolnick?

  And, um, and so that's what I did. So I spent all my time tuning in there.

• 1:14:06Rich Roll?

  The book that I would add to that list, which is a great list, is Murakami's What I Think About When I Think About Running.

• 1:14:13Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:14:14Rich Roll?

  Which is definitely a touchdown for me. Uh, but I think I, you know, the other thing that was going on when I was writing this book is, it's kind of funny, is that around the time that my book was announced, it was also announced that Scott Jurek was writing a book.

• 1:14:30Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:14:31Rich Roll?

  So Scott Jurek, you know, being the reigning, you know, king of ultra running and also a plant-based athlete, was a pretty heavy blow and semi demoralizing to me. I mean, nothing but love for Scott, but I'm thinking, we're writing these, these, these like dueling memoirs at the same time. Like, why would anyone read my book? Like, they can read Scott's book. He's the king. I've never even won a race. I can't even believe I have a book deal. Like, given that I'm not like a world champion athlete or anything like that. It was confusing. It's like, oh, I'm going to write this book. Like, what is the way in? Or what is the reason that I can give somebody to read this book?

• 1:15:11Rich Roll?

  And I, I realized, or I settled on this notion that I think was really fundamental and important, which is, the success or failure of my book would be directly correlated to the extent to which I was willing to be vulnerable. Because the story I wanted to tell was a more relatable human story, an aspirational story versus an inspirational story. And, and my ability to connect with the reader, that connective tissue would be forged through kind of sharing things I'm not proud of in, in hopes that that would like breed some. Some level of of recognition like some so that so that anybody reading it

• 1:15:56Rich Roll?

  who's harboring some kind of pain or secret themselves could say, well, wow, I relate to that guy, or there's a part, even though the details of this is another like 12 step thing, like even though the details of that story are very different from mine, like I identify with the feelings and the emotions. And so I use that as kind of a north star.

• 1:16:14Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, that's why, like, I, you know, it's funny, I mean, it's very different book, but Eat, Pray, Love kind of came to mind when I was reading this because she, that's one thing I think that made that book so successful.

• 1:16:24Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:16:24Adam Skolnick?

  And so you followed in that track, which I think is a great track.

• 1:16:28Rich Roll?

  I love that book.

• 1:16:29Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:29Rich Roll?

  And I, I think Liz is amazing, and I know she's a friend of yours, like, I just think she's the best.

• 1:16:35Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:35Rich Roll?

  She's the coolest.

• 1:16:36Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:16:36Rich Roll?

  Especially when her and Rob Bell get together, like, it's unbelievable. But she got a lot of shit for that book, right?

• 1:16:42Adam Skolnick?

  Later, but like, at first, it was.

• 1:16:45Rich Roll?

  Was that because of the Oprah thing, or the movie, or what was it?

• 1:16:48Adam Skolnick?

  Well, I think, I mean, first, the book was a cultural touchstone.

• 1:16:51Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:16:52Adam Skolnick?

  So, so I think, I think anytime you get so big, the haters come.

• 1:16:55Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:16:55Adam Skolnick?

  So I think what happened at first was the book came out, it made the list, it was doing all right, she was going around the bookstores, just like we described, and, you know, I went to a reading at Borders when, I don't even think it's still there, on La Cienega, and maybe like 50 people were there, so it's not a bad turnout at all, but it wasn't like, and then, like, I think six months later, or maybe several months later, she told me she was with, you know, the, a publicist going to a reading in San Diego, and she had just done Oprah, and there was like lines around the block, and that's when everything changed for her, and she became, it became monumental. And so for a long time, it was, it was very, I don't think there was anything negative. And then I think maybe that backlash came later. I don't know what it was.

• 1:17:37Adam Skolnick?

  It was like, you know, she was, it was missed, she was misdefined as like, being some rich person who had gone on this trip.

• 1:17:44Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:17:44Adam Skolnick?

  And which was not true. You know, she had, she, she was doing fine as a writer, because she's a great writer, but she wasn't like, this, she wasn't not self-made.

• 1:17:53Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:17:53Adam Skolnick?

  So, so there was, there was a lot of bullshit backlash, but that comes, I think, when you get certain, when you get big.

• 1:18:00Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:18:00Adam Skolnick?

  And that's what happens.

• 1:18:01Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, speaking of, of bullshit, let's talk a little bit about the publishing world.

• 1:18:07Adam Skolnick?

  Well, I wanted.

• 1:18:08Rich Roll?

  Because like. I did not have the experience of going on Oprah and having lines around the block. I had a very different experience. But I think it beckons like a little bit of discussion around like how publishing works. And this is a little inside baseball, but I think it's interesting. And I think people who read books would find this interesting if they're not already aware of it. Yeah. As I mentioned, like my book didn't make the New York Times bestseller list. It's had this slow build. It continues to, I mean, it's still like in top categories on Amazon, particularly the audiobook. Like it's still number one, two or three in cycling and running and triathlon and stuff like that. Amazing. Which is great, but on the whole like New York Times bestseller thing. Right. Like, you know, I know from going through this process many times and also by dint of hosting

• 1:18:53Rich Roll?

  authors who have books coming out on the podcast, because now podcasting has become like a de rigueur stop on the book publishing tour. Like you have to go on these shows. And then we try to work with authors so that the episodes come out around the book's release. And I do the best I can. I can't always commit to that, but you know, I understand that they're here, you know, to try to get their book out into the world. And I certainly don't begrudge anyone that. Like I'd be doing exactly the same thing. So the way it works is there's a preorder period and then there's the publishing week. And all book orders during that preorder period and including that first week after publication, all books come out on Tuesday for some weird reason. Right.

• 1:19:38Rich Roll?

  Are counted towards first week sales. And that first week sales number is what gets fed to the New York Times and has a lot to do with how they crunch the numbers and decide who makes that, who makes it onto the list. What people don't know is that this system is very easily gamed. Like you can literally buy your way onto the New York Times bestseller list and many, many people do it. I don't know. I know that like now people are more aware of this and perhaps the New York Times and other people that compile these lists have precautionary members to weed out bad actors. But. At least the last time, or when Finding Ultra came out, like there's, there's like companies

• 1:20:20Rich Roll?

  that you can cut them a big check and then they go and purchase the book through all the varying outlets at specified periods of time. So they take your money and they use it to buy your own book. And the way it works is you can't just bum rush Amazon and buy a ton of books. Like you gotta spread it out through all the different online retailers, et cetera, so that it doesn't look like there's a bad actor, you know, and these, there are people that know how to do this.

• 1:20:46Adam Skolnick?

  Do you burn your own book?

• 1:20:47Rich Roll?

  I don't know.

• 1:20:48Adam Skolnick?

  Who gets the book?

• 1:20:49Rich Roll?

  I mean, I can't imagine doing this, but a lot of people do this so that, you know, they have huge numbers during that pre-order period and during first week. And then they end up on the, on the bestseller list. But it's a complete, it's like fake news, right?

• 1:21:04Adam Skolnick?

  Right, right, right.

• 1:21:05Rich Roll?

  Like they've just bought their own book and so their book disappears the following week. No one's ever heard of it again. At the same time, like I know a lot of CEOs or high net worth people that put out books, particularly like business books or how-to books. They can, because they're high net worth people, can just buy their own book and then like either give it to their staff or resell the book when they do public speaking appearances. So they're like, they double dip on it, but they buy a gigantic stash that they sit on and can kind of sell over time. And that has the similar, has a similar effect.

• 1:21:39Adam Skolnick?

  Interesting.

• 1:21:40Rich Roll?

  So it's crazy. So that's why you'll see a book appear and then you'll never hear about that book ever again. That's a pretty good indication that, and I would imagine that the New York Times is probably much better at trying to figure out who's doing this and who isn't.

• 1:21:54Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. Also, I think, I'm pretty sure, I don't have, I don't know for a fact, but I'm, I'm, I'm pretty sure, almost positive that also the New York Times doesn't have like, it's not just about who sold the most. They have like certain criteria, like they, they, they're skewed against.

• 1:22:09Rich Roll?

  There is a weird subjectivity that gets injected into that.

• 1:22:11Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. And I don't know what it is, but like, it's not really just straight who's sold.

• 1:22:15Rich Roll?

  Exactly. It's not pure numbers.

• 1:22:17Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:22:18Rich Roll?

  And also, what is the current status or their stance on self-published books, Adam?

• 1:22:24Adam Skolnick?

  Right. Well, they, I mean, I don't think Can't Hurt Me got a fair shake on that list at all.

• 1:22:29Rich Roll?

  I mean.

• 1:22:30Adam Skolnick?

  You know, like, like it was.

• 1:22:31Rich Roll?

  So they, did it, was it ever on the list?

• 1:22:32Adam Skolnick?

  It was. It was on the list, but it was, it was like. So they have an audio list and it was never on the audio list, even though we were, you know, we're still, we're still getting like this is one of the top listened to audiobooks still.

• 1:22:47Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:22:48Adam Skolnick?

  And, and you know, Audible is the main platform and we were at the time like number two for months.

• 1:22:53Rich Roll?

  It was like you and Michelle Obama.

• 1:22:56Adam Skolnick?

  And then, uh, so I don't think we got a fair shake there. We didn't get a, it was, it was on the general list maybe once and then it was on the self-help list. And so it was nice to be on the list and be recognized, but it wasn't a fair shake because, and I don't think it was reflective of the sales.

• 1:23:09Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:10Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah. It's interesting how that works. I mean, cause, cause I, I just remember when it first came out. I mean, obviously like it was selling like crazy and it wasn't on the list.

• 1:23:18Adam Skolnick?

  Still.

• 1:23:18Rich Roll?

  But I believed at that time, they had a policy that, that self-published books were not eligible.

• 1:23:23Adam Skolnick?

  Exactly. And maybe that's over because they're starting to cover self-published books a little bit differently. But like, um, you know, what I loved about your thread was, and talking about the long game is it ultimately doesn't matter because what mattered more is like what you're building towards. And you said it yourself on your thread that, you know, looking back, that, that vanity phase doesn't even matter when you're talking about actually, influencing people and having people read it and, and enjoying the book.

• 1:23:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I mean, I'm really proud of the fact that it has become a perennial seller.

• 1:23:57Adam Skolnick?

  Yep.

• 1:23:58Rich Roll?

  And that's, that's very meaningful. Like can your, who's buying your book 10 years later? Seems like a more important metric, but less sexy because I can't call myself a New York Times bestseller.

• 1:24:09Adam Skolnick?

  Very uncommon though, 10 years later, you know, very. But, but what, is there anything you would do differently? You know, looking back in terms of, uh, what you included in the book, any passages that stand out or things?

• 1:24:22Rich Roll?

  A hundred percent. I, I don't think that you've grown as a human being if you can look back on a creative work and be satisfied with it. I mean, I'm proud of it. And I'm not about to rewrite it again, but and I don't, I don't go back and crack it because there's a certain cringe factor with that.

• 1:24:41Adam Skolnick?

  You can't be seen doing that.

• 1:24:42Rich Roll?

  I don't listen to my own podcast.

• 1:24:44Adam Skolnick?

  You can't have your children running to you, reading your own book.

• 1:24:46Rich Roll?

  Yeah, no, I mean, look, I don't need you, but yeah, there's tons of stuff that I would change. I think as you grow and you mature and also you get a sense of like what was important about that or meaningful and what wasn't. And, you know, I had an opportunity to comb through it a couple of years ago when I rewrote it and I took out a ton of stuff that I couldn't even believe that I included the first time around. And I think today, if I was to go back and rewrite it, the main thing I would do would be to just make it a pure memoir and get rid of all the appendices and all the kind of lifestyle stuff and, um, and that, because that's almost like a second book.

• 1:25:23Adam Skolnick?

  Hmm.

• 1:25:24Rich Roll?

  And just make it a pure memoir as opposed to this hybrid memoir kind of lifestyle guide aspect that it has to it, which I think is helpful to a lot of people.

• 1:25:34Adam Skolnick?

  But that might've got the, that got people interested in, in, that probably helped you sell it.

• 1:25:38Rich Roll?

  But maybe it should have been, maybe, you know, maybe, um, but maybe that should have been a second book. Um, maybe the title isn't great and maybe I shouldn't, uh, be running on the cover. There seems to be some, some conflicting opinions about that. But I think when, I think it suffered from the fact that when it came out with its title and the title image, that people thought it was a book about running, which it kinda is, but it really isn't.

• 1:26:01Adam Skolnick?

  No, right.

• 1:26:02Rich Roll?

  So I, I don't know that it really sells the, the crux of what the book is about. And perhaps that was a barrier that prevented it from breaking out a little bit more broadly.

• 1:26:14Rich Roll?

  At the same time, like, you know, I don't know. I think I would, I mean, I think I have a better grasp on the story and with some maturity, I have a better understanding of some of the things that I went through and I could like write to that a little bit more eloquently and maturely than I did at the time. Because distance always creates that. I wouldn't change it whole cloth, but I think I would take out any, like the first time, the first edition of the book that came out, I had like, you know, here, you can find my protein powder here, like stuff like that. I was like, that's, I can't believe I put that in the book. Like that had no place in the book.

• 1:26:51Adam Skolnick?

  Hmm.

• 1:26:52Rich Roll?

  Especially if you want to write something that's going to stand the test of time. Like get rid of all that nonsense and just write a great story.

• 1:27:00Adam Skolnick?

  Hmm. What about any plans for a future book by Mr. control through the publishers? I know you're putting out these great books.

• 1:27:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I really do want to write another book and I definitely have another book in me. The challenge is my life is so busy and full. Like when I wrote Finding Ultra, I had nothing going on. Like I was like, I'm writing this book and I would just write it all day. Now, like I'm occupied all day long, every single day. I can't imagine being able to carve out time to write a book. I don't know how people with busy lives do that. Like, there's no way it's going to happen without help.

• 1:27:38Adam Skolnick?

  That's where the ghostwriters come in.

• 1:27:39Rich Roll?

  I know.

• 1:27:40Adam Skolnick?

  But then I'm not a big fan of this.

• 1:27:43Rich Roll?

  I'm gonna have to write with, I'm gonna have to work with, but then it's the control thing. It's like, I'm a writer. Like, why would I have somebody else help me write a book?

• 1:27:49Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:27:49Rich Roll?

  But the reality is, yes, you may be, consider yourself a writer, but like without, it's either like, hold on to that and never write another book, or accept help, work with somebody else and get another book out in the world.

• 1:28:05Adam Skolnick?

  You, I don't, I don't love this trend of social media star with huge following, plus ghostwriter formula, because I don't think that produces books people want to read that much. But I mean, obviously I understand why publishers do it because they're trying to get sure things, but I'm not sure. I want, I would love to see like an audit, how well that does for the publishers, like. But in your case, no, I mean, I think, I think you can have a ghostwriter and, and, still write, obviously still write something that people want to read, because it's a matter of how you tell the story. And, and I don't think that, you know, I think that having been through that, my, you

• 1:28:46Adam Skolnick?

  know, my job is to stay out of the way and channel, you know, as much from, from whoever's telling me the story, who's really the author of the book and the author of the story and who lived that life and be blank. And so I think, you know, if you find someone who can do that, but I just don't think that always happens.

• 1:29:05Rich Roll?

  I think it's, you know, to your first point about people with social media followings and ghostwriters, it depends on the individual, like how interesting is that person, what is the story they're going to tell. And most people aren't writers, so they benefit from having a really good writer help them crack that story open. Like what you do, what Neil Strauss does, like they elevate every, you know, everything, you elevate everything that you're involved in. So there's a real value to that. I think the ghostwriter thing could be a little bit more transparent in certain cases. You know, I don't like it when you see somebody who's a celebrity or somebody with a big following and they, they pass it off like they wrote the entire book and I know that they didn't, you know, because

• 1:29:48Rich Roll?

  I know from behind the scenes that they got help from person X, Y, or Z. Just be honest about it.

• 1:29:55Adam Skolnick?

  Well, I think Barack Obama outed Michelle Obama for having a team of ghostwriters.

• 1:29:59Rich Roll?

  Did he?

• 1:29:59Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:02Rich Roll?

  What happened there?

• 1:30:04Adam Skolnick?

  He was trying to explain.

• 1:30:05Rich Roll?

  I don't know this.

• 1:30:05Adam Skolnick?

  I think he got, he got, he was trying to say like why it took so long for his book to come out while her book was just dominating the charts.

• 1:30:11Rich Roll?

  Oh.

• 1:30:12Adam Skolnick?

  And he's like, he's like.

• 1:30:13Rich Roll?

  Cause he actually wrote it?

• 1:30:14Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:30:14Rich Roll?

  Cause he, I mean, he wrote his first book when he was in college, right at law school?

• 1:30:18Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, he wrote it. Yeah.

• 1:30:19Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So I don't know. But so, so that's kind of the, I mean, if I was going to write another book, what do you think that book should be?

• 1:30:27Adam Skolnick?

  You want me to pitch you your next book?

• 1:30:29Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:31Rich Roll?

  I won't tell you where my head's at with it, but I want to hear what you think.

• 1:30:34Adam Skolnick?

  True crime.

• 1:30:35Rich Roll?

  True crime.

• 1:30:36Adam Skolnick?

  Lean into true crime.

• 1:30:40Adam Skolnick?

  You know, that's interesting. I think it would be, it would be the second phase, you know, like what, how do you, you know, what happens, um, you know, in the years after Finding Ultra, building the podcast business, an inside look at what the podcast, because I think there hasn't been that book yet, describing early days of the podcast business and how that goes. And you can do that while at the same time, um, kind of, you know, turning 50 and being in, in, in that and, and, and having that, kind of dealing with even your injury that you're dealing with now. And I think all of that would result in some interesting kind of storytelling.

• 1:31:15Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I don't know how to crack that open.

• 1:31:17Adam Skolnick?

  But don't you think that that's the subject matter?

• 1:31:21Rich Roll?

  I think it would be, I don't know. I mean, is there enough story there?

• 1:31:25Adam Skolnick?

  Right.

• 1:31:26Rich Roll?

  I think it would, I think it would be more along the lines of picking certain subjects or topics from longevity to gratitude to acceptance to

• 1:31:39Adam Skolnick?

  Oh, like one of those.

• 1:31:40Rich Roll?

  Kind of doing some storytelling.

• 1:31:42Adam Skolnick?

  Not memoir.

• 1:31:42Rich Roll?

  Doing some storytelling within, like, you know, having each chapter be on a different kind of concept.

• 1:31:48Adam Skolnick?

  Like a Blue Zones, but with multiple concepts.

• 1:31:52Rich Roll?

  I don't know. Blue, no, there's no travel involved to Sardinia. I don't think.

• 1:31:59Adam Skolnick?

  You're gonna say Malibu.

• 1:32:00Rich Roll?

  The Blue Zones of human experience.

• 1:32:04Adam Skolnick?

  Blue Zones of Malibu.

• 1:32:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah. See, here's the problem, Adam. I don't know.

• 1:32:09Adam Skolnick?

  You haven't figured it out.

• 1:32:10Rich Roll?

  I, yeah, I have.

• 1:32:11Adam Skolnick?

  You can always just go.

• 1:32:11Rich Roll?

  I know that, listen, I know there's another book in there. I have yet to crack what it is. And I, I think that I would be asleep at the wheel if I didn't figure out another way to, you know, birth another project.

• 1:32:24Adam Skolnick?

  But you just told a story about being broke ass and having to take your own garbage out in the minivan. I mean, and then starting a podcast.

• 1:32:31Rich Roll?

  A little bit about that in the revised and updated version of Finding Ultra, which you would know if you didn't went sitting there with the old version.

• 1:32:39Adam Skolnick?

  I read the, I read the one, I, I tried to order that protein powder.

• 1:32:42Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I know, right? I still get emails like, where can I get that thing? And I was like, I discontinued that a long time ago. I can't believe I put that in. I'm so ashamed of that.

• 1:32:50Adam Skolnick?

  No, it's whatever, dude. Like, your editor could have helped you.

• 1:32:55Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I don't know, man. But, you know, look, I'm really proud of the book. I, I, I can't believe that, you know, people are, it's still finding audiences 10 years later. And, uh, you know, as I said in the, in the tweet thread, it is indicative of kind of everything that I've been able to succeed at in life. It's just this idea of staying true to who you are and doubling down on your instinct of what's right for you and being patient and not getting caught up in externalities. Because we do overindex on accolades and starting line benchmarks and we mistake them for meaningful predictors of, of long-term success

• 1:33:36Rich Roll?

  while we remain blind to the greater opportunity to, you know, kind of patiently and persistently build a solid foundation for, for sustainable success over time. And You know, I would have loved to have come out with a splash and had a, you know, Liz Gilbert experience. That's not what happened. And I realize in retrospect that, what happened was supposed to happen. And I'm very grateful for the way that it unfolded. Also, you know, I wouldn't have been able to emotionally handle that. And I probably would have imploded. Had I had that kind of success.

• 1:34:10Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah.

• 1:34:14Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, I mean, that's like once in a, that's, that's once or twice in a generation type success, you know, like Oprah's, you know, nobody is, makes books like that anymore, like with a touch of a, of, of, of their signature. Help open up a whole audience for, for books like, I don't even, I mean, there's several people that are doing it. Reese Witherspoon is doing it in her way.

• 1:34:36Rich Roll?

  She's sort of the heir apparent.

• 1:34:38Adam Skolnick?

  There's book, book Instagram influencers, like in that world, they're doing it. But I don't know if the, anyone, if there will ever be another time like Oprah had with the Oprah's Book Club where she really, she really had an incredible influence on a lot of people, which is, you know, speaks to the trust that she created through her audience and through the work she'd done for her whole life. So it's cool that that happened. But in the end, the book has to be great, or you're not going to get someone like Oprah interested. And, you know, like she was recommending great books. So, you know, she really, she was really reading them and really loving them. So, you know, there's also that. It's not, it wasn't contrived.

• 1:35:16Rich Roll?

  I feel like Reese Witherspoon is, is really shouldering that mantle.

• 1:35:19Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, yeah. She's the closest. Yeah. But I don't think you can accurately say. She did help with, I think, Crawdads, which is a, what's, let me make sure I get the title right, which is one of the best novels I've read in a long time. Well, Where the Crawdads Sing.

• 1:35:38Adam Skolnick?

  By Delia Owens. I thought that might have been a, that might have been an Reese recommend, but I'm not a hundred percent sure. And that is a magnificent book.

• 1:35:49Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:35:51Rich Roll?

  Cool. Any, any final thoughts before we close this out?

• 1:35:53Adam Skolnick?

  Well, no, you've got a giveaway, right?

• 1:35:56Rich Roll?

  Yes.

• 1:35:56Adam Skolnick?

  Tell us about the giveaway.

• 1:35:58Rich Roll?

  So, so first of all, I just want to thank everybody who has taken a chance on this podcast or taken a chance on, on this or any of the other books that I've put out or my wife and I have put out together. I, I, I just can't even believe that I get to like, do this thing and, and live this life. Super grateful for everything, all the hardships and the successes. I just get to wake up every day and come and, you know, be here with people like you. And it's, it's, it's a gift, man. It's such a gift. And I have to like, remind myself of that when it gets hard or I get grumpy or I don't sleep well, or my back hurts or whatever. But it's really all

• 1:36:37Rich Roll?

  because of you guys, the audience, who have, you know, basically allowed me to, you know, continue to do this. And it's, it's, it's incredible, man. So I'm super grateful and thank you. Also, I should point out though, that although the book, you know, continues to sell, it's still, the readership for Finding Ultra is still a tiny fraction of the podcast audience. So there's a lot of people who listen to or watch this podcast who have not read the book. And so maybe this 10 year anniversary celebration is a good reason for you to finally check it out. There's a lot in the book that, you know, stuff I don't talk about on the podcast. And I just think whether you're an ultra runner or a plant-based person or not, or

• 1:37:20Rich Roll?

  you struggle with addiction, it's really a story of trying to find out who you are and overcome obstacles in your life to, you know, be more authentically you. And the template is ultra endurance and the template is recovery. So the facts of my experience may not be any, you know, even the least bit similar to your lived experience, but hopefully there's something emotionally in there that you connect with. And like I said, the 10th anniversary of the book is a good time or excuse to check it out. And to kind of sweeten that, we decided that we would do a giveaway. So I'm going to give away. 50 personally inscribed copies of the book to 50 winners. If you would like to enter the giveaway,

• 1:38:05Rich Roll?

  you need to subscribe to my newsletter. To do that, you can go to richroll.com/subscribe. Basically, you just provide your email address. You join the mailing list. And then in the next couple of days, we'll send out an email to everybody who is a subscriber with further instructions on how to like, enter the giveaway. We've set a deadline of June 9th to secure an entry. There's no purchase necessary. We have official rules that will apprise you of. So anybody can be entered to win without buying anything. Again, richroll.com/subscribe. And I should say on that point, we've had an email

• 1:38:49Rich Roll?

  list for quite some time and historically, we've used it just to send out an email every time there's a new podcast out and then occasionally an email about like a rebate or a deal on the Plant Power Meal Planner, or something like that. But I think I'd like to figure out a way to make more productive use of this email list and the subscriber base. So I'm interested in what you guys, the audience, the listeners, the viewers would like to see. Like, would you like to receive an email from me? And if so, what would be included in that email that would be valuable to you? And I think I've been reluctant to pursue this, A, for bandwidth reasons,

• 1:39:30Rich Roll?

  because like it would be additional work for me, but also at the same time, I'm sensitive about sending people emails. Like, everybody's email inbox is overflowing at this point. But we're also in a period of time where people are creating Substacks and, you know, kind of subscription newsletters. So there is a receptivity to receiving something that would actually be helpful and valuable. And I'm interested in trying to figure out what that might be for all of you guys. So if you have some thoughts, you can tweet at me, @richroll, or, you know, send an email through the website, or DM me, or leave a comment on the YouTube video.

• 1:40:09Adam Skolnick?

  See, listeners, other people say, "Don't @ me." Rich says, "@ me."

• 1:40:14Rich Roll?

  Right. I mean, I'm not saying I'm gonna get back to everybody, but I'm interested in soliciting everybody's input because I don't want to create something and send it out if that's not what people are interested in. Because I don't want to be... Um, you know, I, I, I don't take it frivolously.

• 1:40:30Adam Skolnick?

  No, no, no. Yeah, it should be valuable.

• 1:40:32Rich Roll?

  Thought out if I'm gonna do that.

• 1:40:34Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah, not, it's not just about like putting something out there. It's putting something out there that could be of use.

• 1:40:39Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:40:39Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:40:40Rich Roll?

  And uh.

• 1:40:40Adam Skolnick?

  Love that.

• 1:40:42Rich Roll?

  I think that's it, dude. Did we do it?

• 1:40:43Adam Skolnick?

  I think we did it. How about that?

• 1:40:46Rich Roll?

  All right. Well, we'll be back in two weeks with another Roll On.

• 1:40:50Adam Skolnick?

  Yes.

• 1:40:51Rich Roll?

  In the meantime, be well, everybody.

• 1:40:54Adam Skolnick?

  And roll on.

• 1:40:55Rich Roll?

  Parting thoughts.

• 1:40:56Adam Skolnick?

  Me? Um, no, I have zero parting thoughts. Uh, let's see, do I have parting thoughts? I think, uh, what am I, what am I, oh, you know what? I got into succession. I finally did it. I finally started liking it.

• 1:41:08Rich Roll?

  So we haven't outlined like what we've been enjoying. We didn't get to that today.

• 1:41:12Adam Skolnick?

  No.

• 1:41:12Rich Roll?

  I got a lot of, a lot of wrecks and lots of pics.

• 1:41:15Adam Skolnick?

  We gotta get, next time.

• 1:41:16Rich Roll?

  You're in a deep cut, though.

• 1:41:18Adam Skolnick?

  Next time. I'm, I'm, I'm, dude, I'm like, I'm like in the, in the office all day into the night.

• 1:41:24Rich Roll?

  You're on the grind right now.

• 1:41:25Adam Skolnick?

  I'm on the grind, but it's gonna be worth it. And then we can talk about it some stage.

• 1:41:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah, maybe next time we'll share what we've been enjoying. I've been enjoying some cool stuff at the moment.

• 1:41:33Adam Skolnick?

  Right on.

• 1:41:33Rich Roll?

  And, uh, with that, I bid you adieu.

• 1:41:36Adam Skolnick?

  Adieu.

• 1:41:37Rich Roll?

  See you in two weeks. Peace.

• 1:41:40Adam Skolnick?

  Blatz.

• 1:41:41Rich Roll?

  Namaste. You hear that beeping? I wonder if the mics are.

• 1:41:43Adam Skolnick?

  Can you hear that?

• 1:41:44Rich Roll?

  There's a truck backing up.

• 1:41:44Adam Skolnick?

  You guys hear that?

• 1:41:45Rich Roll?

  For the last two hours, there's been a truck backing up.

• 1:41:47Adam Skolnick?

  Yeah. That's Brogan out there trying to back his way in here.

• 1:41:51Rich Roll?

  I know. Once again.

• 1:41:55Adam Skolnick?

  I'm Brogan.