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Dec 17, 2019

This week we tackle training plans, gravel camps and the oldest gravel in America with Hunter Allen, founder of Peaks Coaching Group.

Peaks Coaching website 

Peaks Coaching Instagram 

Automated Transcript, please excuse any typos:

 

Good day everyone and welcome to the gravel ride podcast. I'm your host Craig Dalton as we're in the middle of winter 2019 2020 I thought it'd be a good opportunity to talk to a coach, so this week I've invited Hunter Allen from peak coaching group onto the podcast. Hunter's got a background in professional road cycling as well as experience coaching thousands of athletes. At this point, we wanted to dig into some of the different elements when preparing for gravel events. Looking at your 2020 calendar, I was curious not only to explore structure and power workouts, but also the notion of grit and overcoming adversity because I think you simply can't Excel in gravel cycling if you're not prepared to have a left hook thrown at you at any point during the event, whether it's loose gravel, technical terrain or anything's going to take you out of your zone. You've got to be both physiologically prepared for these type of events, but also psychologically prepared to attack whatever's thrown at you. It was a great conversation with Hunter. He's based out in Bedford, Virginia, and is also producing a gravel camp in 2020. So let's jump right in with Hunter Hunter, welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me on

For sure. As is customary on the gravel ride podcast. Let's start by learning a little bit more about how you came to gravel cycling. And maybe just for the listeners perspective a little bit more about your background as a cyclist in general.

All right, excellent. Yeah, so I mean, I live here in a really beautiful place in Virginia with lots of beautiful mountains and small roads and you know, it's we've got all these incredible paved roads, but then we've got these amazing gravel roads too, which you know, just for years, ever since you know, I've been riding on the road, just kinda did, right. I mean, it was just, they were little connectors between other paved roads and such. And then all of a sudden, like gravel riding thing became a thing and it's like, wait, Oh wow, I can get a bike that's more specific to this and actually seek out these roads now and go have a lot of fun. So that was, that's kind of this the way that I discovered him.

And did it start to take over more of your interests and mileage?

You know, it's probably evened like a, I still love the speed of pavement and in our little country roads that we have here. And but it's probably even now, I mean for me, I can jump off a jump out both, you know, my office where my house and jump on a gravel road within two or three miles of, of either place. So it's kinda like, well, what's the mood? What am I, what am I in the mood for? To be honest. We're really fortunate that way.

Yeah, you're lucky to have that option. And people should look at where Bedford, Virginia is just to get a sense of the type of roads and terrain that a Hunter's got in his backyard.

Yeah, absolutely. You know, just a little of my background, you know, I came from a, I started racing BMX when I was a kid, so race, BMX all the way till I was 18, so have lots of that kind of a, you know, jumps and you know, background from, from thrashing on a BMX bike and then a race mountain bikes in college and rode bikes in college and was fortunate enough to get a pro contract in the middle nineties with the navigators team and raise for them for a few years. And, and I had a lot of fun and after that started the whole coaching thing. So it was a, it's been quite an evolution, but at the same time it's a, you know, cycling is the thread that has woven itself throughout all of my life, which I'm very fortunate and thankful for.

So in your coaching career, obviously with a professional road background, I imagine your earliest clients probably came from a road background or had intention of writing and performing well on the road. Did you start also training mountain bike athletes back in those early days? Yeah, for sure.

I mean, and actually my very first client ever in 1995 while I was still a pro and not on navigators, was a mountain bike or a local guy. And Chad Davis is his name and he came to me and said, Hey, you know, I really want to be a pro cyclist, a pro mountain biker, what do I, you know, would you take me under your wing and teach me and coach me? And I was like, yeah, sure, I'll do my best. And so I started coaching him and training him and, and you know, he went from like male sport all the way to, you know, basically pro in a couple of years. So, and then he started telling all of his buddies and everything. And so it was like, Oh, wow. You know I actually might have a future in the coaching world,

Right. On and back then, given the sort of tools that were available to you, was it more about structuring workouts and intervals and less so about technology? I imagine?

Yeah, for sure. I mean, and that was back in the day of the fax machine of course. And you know, it's like okay, type out a workout and then fax it to him because nobody had email. Then of course so that was, that was the way it was and, and you know, and then, then there was no such thing as workout libraries where you created, you know, libraries of different workouts that you can reuse and stuff. It was, it was okay, well I'll just type it all out here in a word document and keep building it from this. So it was very labor intensive and at the same time, very, very personal because it was like, Oh, wow, if I'm going to write a training plan, this is going to, I'm going to sit down here and take, you know, a couple of hours to make this thing happen. So thankfully we have some tools now that make it a lot less labor intensive.

Yeah. How has that evolved

Over the last decade? Say, how are you working with athletes today? Obviously the power of email and the internet and a lot of great programs and software that's available is making, sharing whatever a lot easier. Right. Well, I mean, that's been, I mean, I've been very fortunate in that I was one of the founders of training peak software. I, myself and a guy named Kevin Williams created cycling peak software, which is the desktop analysis software to analyze power data. And then we merged that company with a company that Joe Friel, Dirk Friel and a Gary Fisher founded called training bible.com after Joe Friel, the cyclists training Bible. So training Bible and cycling peaks became training peaks. And I was one of the, one of the founders there and one of the owners for many, many years. And that was a lot of fun and had had a hand in developing a lot of the tools that allowed us to, to create calendars and drag and drop features and here's different collections of workouts that we called, you know, a library where, okay, well here's all my anaerobic capacity workouts, or here are all my FTP workouts and and then build on top of that.

So and then of course all of the power training stuff that came along with that training, stress score, FTP, performance manager charts, you know, so, so all of those, those, you know, cutting edge pieces you know, I've had a little hand in some of them. I've had a little tiny pinky finger in some of them. And it's been fun. I've been really very blessed.

And how do you find that as translated to your relationships with your athletes and what you're able to kind of work with them to achieve?

You know, it's been really interesting. It's a great question. Actually. Nobody's ever asked me that question. So bonus points for you. That's always fun to get a question you ever gotten for the, so one of the ways that it's changed is before there was a lot of, a lot of my coaching time, right? Because when you hire a coach, you're essentially hiring their time as a coach. You only have two things to sell, right? You only got two things to sell if your knowledge and you have the access to your knowledge and that's it. Like that's all I have to sell. And so a lot of that time that I spent was spent writing the training plan instead of you know, doing the analysis of what happened afterwards and then also really spending time showing the athlete what their data means.

And then thirdly, really getting to how they feel. Right? Because before, you know, when we had all these, before we had all these tools, it was, didn't really have a way to understand the data, right? There was no quantitative way to see if one was the athlete doing what I asked them to do to, they were responding. And so you spent a lot of time writing this plan and then you talk on the phone and you hope that through conversation you got out of them what you needed to adjust the plan for the next one. And now it's like, well, I got all this data. And so I know exactly what they did. I know exactly how they responded. I know if they're fatigued or not. And so I can show the athlete that data and I can show them, okay, here's where you are.

You know, and sometimes you got to convince people to take a rest. Sometimes you've got to convince people to train harder. And, and sometimes you got to convince people like, okay, you just need to maintain right now. But the other thing that I would say that's been interesting is because you have that data, like that's a known, right? That's a known, the unknown is, again, kind of back to what we did a long time ago. How do you feel? So those are the things that you know, that conversation is always there, right? That conversation is always there and now I have a chance to spend a little more time in that conversation and get better feedback from the athlete about how they're feeling or their muscles sore, how are they sleeping? And we've got some other tools that help us too. But you know, it's been a change across all of these different spectrums. So to speak.

Yeah, it's interesting. I, in my cycling career went through a period where when HeartWare rate was the sort of big metric, we were always looking out before power meters that I got really burnt out on the data and felt like the joy of writing was getting sucked away from me and I wasn't a competitive athlete at that point. So I realized, you know, for me, backing away and riding for the joy of riding was going to get me out more and help me enjoy it. But everything I've read and friends who are riding power meters, it's clear that those data points are useful in many ways. And I like how you're describing that. You also have to layer on that how you feel. And I think any good coach athlete relationship, there's going to be some give and take. And it'd be, I'd be curious to know, you know, I imagine you train athletes from young ones who are coming up and really aspiring to be professional athletes to older masters athletes who are just looking to get the best out of their own personal performance. I imagine in that latter category, you've got people who may come in with certain, you know expressed expectations about what they're going to be able to achieve, but the data, their life and what they're mimicking back to you and your conversation really shows that, Hey, we gotta dial this program back and we need to fit into what you can achieve in your life.

Yes, yes, I agree. And, and that's not always easy, but that's probably the one of the key parts of creating the right plan for the right person. Because one, you've got to match up three different things. One, you've got to figure out what the athlete's good at, right? What are your natural strengths and weaknesses and what are those strengths and weaknesses that are developed? You've been riding for a long time. Then you really develop those strengths and weaknesses, you know, and, and we know, okay, you are a sprinter or your phenotype is a time trial list, climber, stage racer or endurance person. And then we've got to take what we know about you, so your unique physiology and then match that up with your goals. So once we say, okay, well, you know, what are your roles? Well, male, my goal is to do the, the DK 200 next year.

Okay, well does that actually fit with what you can do? And well this year your longest ride was 60 miles. And why was it 60 miles? Well, because you have this stressful job that you worked 50 hours a week, you got three kids, you know, you travel on planes and you know, the maximum you can train per week is seven hours. And that's like a really good week. And so all of a sudden it's like, ah, you know, I don't really think that even though you have the, the phenotype or the strengths and weaknesses to actually achieve this goal realistically in your life, you're not going to be able to achieve this unless something changes. Right. Unless we, we, we completely re re rejigger your, your life. And so we try, I'm always trying to match up those three things and say, okay, goals have to equal, we have to be realistic. You know, they have to equal what you can actually do in your life.

Yeah. Yeah. I think it's a fool's errand to try to say you can train 15 hours a week when realistically you're going to max out at seven. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So with the rise of gravel, was there a moment in time you started seeing gravel specific athletes come to you for training advice?

You know, I think that, I mean, that's just started, I would say in the last year. So that's been something that's just happened in the last year. I mean, we've had people come to us and talk about all this, you know, and, and say, Hey, what do we need to do? What, is there something specific we need to make happen? Is there anything that goes from that perspective? All of those things are, are really the new wave of, of gravel riding. And then also thinking about it from a physiology perspective. Is there something different physiologically we need to do?

Yeah, I'm curious to explore that in a bit. As I was, I've been thinking about coaching. It's, you know, it's winter time around the country here in North America and looking at 20, 20, it's a great to be thinking about your 2020 calendar. And for me, oftentimes, you know, the, I might put one big aspirational event on the calendar, unlike maybe a period of time when I was mountain bike racing or the brief period of time I was road racing where you're looking to race, you know, 30 times a year we gravel, you know, it may only be these tent pole events that you end up participating in. So I gotta imagine that the journey to get there, like to a DK 200 or, or one of these other big events is, is quite a monumental feat in many ways.

Yeah, no, I, I completely agree. I think that's a, and that is a big event and that I think that a lot of these goals are you know, you just have to be realistic and make sure this is a reachable thing, right? This is something that I can do. And, and you know, it is I love gravel riding, not because there are these big APIC events. I think that's, that's the, those are aspirational events. And I like your idea of having one big goal and I call them you know, my big hairy goal for the year, right? My big hairy goal has to you know, have four components. One, it has to be travel, right? Cause I like traveling and I have to be going somewhere, right? Cause this, you know, I've got a time commitment involved. It has to be money, right?

I have to outlay some money and I'm like, Oh crap, I'm going to spend a bunch of money on this. And then it has to be an event that's hard enough for me that I can't just, you know, do it right. I can't just like, Oh well my current fitness will be fine and I can do it. Just kind of maintaining, right. I have to train hard for it and I can train out of my norm and do something more. And then the fourth thing, you know, it has to be something that, that truly motivates me. You know, like, wow, I really want to see this part of the world, or man, I so want to go and do this dry Bianchi and Italy and be in Italy and see the pros do it and ride on that road and eat Italian food. You know? And just like, you know, that has to be something that's, that's, that's like a really exciting and motivating for me. So if I can accomplish that and my big hairy goal with those four things, then that's my one for the year. Then I have to break them down into four into three other quarterly goals that are also have start to have all of those four components but need to have two or three of those components that are also inspirational for me to keep me motivated to get to the fourth one, if that makes sense.

Absolutely. Yeah, spot on. That's sort of my mentality to a T I need something that encourages me to get off the couch, right a little bit longer than maybe it's easy to fit in my schedule and have enough of a fear factor of failure that I'm going to get out there and put the time in and for sure I love travel as well. I think that's one of the things we explore on this podcast a lot is just how many great events in different parts of the country there are and how unique those experiences can be and how embracing the cycling and particularly the gravel community in those destinations can be. And if you put one of those on your calendar, you're rarely going to be disappointed.

Yeah, totally agree. Totally agree. That's great.

So let's talk about some of the things. I mean, you know, as a coach of a road cyclist, you've probably got these very fundamental things based on power that you can explore with a rider. And if it's a hilly course, you can figure out how they're going to perform. But gravel has a, has a tendency to throw left hooks at you all the time. And you know, whether it's your wheels spinning out on a steep climb because the gravel's too thick or it's too, it's technical and you're going a lot slower and you've got a really balanced power with skill. How have you evolved your discussion with the athletes to really make sure they're prepared to Excel?

Yeah. no, great question. So I think that the, there's a couple of things. One, you always have to consider. I mean, number one you know, the, the principles of exercise physiology are the same, right? There's nothing that's changed internally in the body. Whether I'm coaching you as a mountain biker, a triathlete, a road cyclist, or a gravel rider, those principles are all going to apply. And so that's important to always keep that in mind. Now the second thing that you have to keep in mind is the evolution of this. And we learn this when we first started training with the power meters is how you create power is different. Okay? So remember, you know, power is just how fast you peddle your RPM multiplied by how hard you pedal. Okay? So I can produce a thousand Watts and my 53, 12 at 40 RPM pushing our really big gear that really slow or I can produce a thousand Watts in my, you know, 32, 28 pedaling really, really fast, but really easily on the pedals.

Not a lot of force on the pedals. So how you create power is really important and gravel racing. Cause like you said, right? If you're creating too much force on the pedals, you're just going to spin out, right? And if you're pedaling too quickly, then that may not actually be able to get you where you need to go in a efficient manner or that may cause you to also spin out. So there is this balance that occurs in gravel cycling that we see a touch of in mountain biking. We see a touch, not so much in road biking, we don't really see it in, in a, in triathlon. We also see it in cyclocross racing. So it has this blend of, okay, I'm on this bicycle that's a very fast bicycle. It's made to go fast. Now I'm on a lessen ideal surface for that fast bicycle, even though I've got these nice cushy knobby tires that, that are, that are helped me in there.

But I also need to find that place of balance more than I normally think about balance. Where on the seat should I be aligned and keep my center of gravity? How does your hand position make a difference in terms of just cornering or steering, right? Cause the difference between cornering is that's where the bike angles and goes around and turns steering is where you steer it like you're steering your car. And then you also have to consider you know, will, will, how, what are the demands of that actual event because and, and this is kind of somewhat a retrospective look, right? Sometimes you just have to go and do the event and then you look back at the data and you see, Oh wow, in order to do that climb, I had to do X. I had to have this certain power at this certain cadence. So I did that climb and it didn't spin out or whatever. And then all of a sudden you're like, Oh, well I need to train that. Right? I need to be there. I need to train in what we call the, the, in the quadrant analysis plot. What different quadrant of power and cadence relationship, those long winded, sorry.

Yeah, no worries. No worries. I mean it's, you know, it's, it must be fascinating to kind of look at the science and physiology within your athletes, but I also got to imagine that the psychology and the grit of the athlete comes into play in these events in a, in a rather unique way. Yup. Yup,

Yup, yup. Absolutely. Absolutely. And and I think that that's where when we analyze the data from it, it is very interesting because there are a couple things that jump out and how that's different from road and mountain biking. Number one, the, the power that you produce is lower, right? You, you're, you're just, you know, if your FTP is 300 Watts on the road and you can crack out 300 while it's going up, your favorite climber on the, in a time trial or whatever you're not going to be able to do that on a gravel road. Because traction is a factor. You know, turns, rots, rocks, all these things are a factor. So the power that produce on a gravel road is going to be lower. And you know, it could be anywhere from 20 to 30 Watts.

Lower is what I've been seeing. So that changes a little bit of how you think about the training, right? That you need to do for it. Like if I'm going to go and I'm going to ride on a gravel road and I'm going to do tr, I'm going to train, I'll just go and ride. I'm going to go do some intervals and go fast and work on everything, you know, not only just cornering, but I want to get some FTP and arose out of that. I'm not going to strive to try and not hit 300 Watts because I, that's impossible. But if I can do two 70 to 80 and get to that same place, then I know that I'm training my FTP and doing my best that I can, I can do in the given situation. So that's, that's another way that it kind of changes a little bit.

Yeah. I noticed that you've introduced a gravel camp and I'm curious to learn more about that camp, but also curious if, you know, if you're just coaching a, an athlete remotely, I gotta imagine you're seeing them on the gravel and seeing their skillset is gotta be super illuminating in your ability to really customize a program for them?

Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. You know, and I think that that's you know, it's not easy. You know, it's, it's one of these things that you have to learn the athlete, right? And, and then, I mean, everybody is different, right? I mean, and everybody responds differently, so it's not like I have a magic wand and be, you know, Oh, I've seen this a hundred times. I know exactly what it is. Well, sometimes maybe it is, but that's just experience, right? That's just from coaching thousands of athletes. Then it appears that you have some magic wand and it's like, well, not really. This is just the experience of doing it over, over and over and knowing what you're looking at. Just like when you walk in the doctor's office, the guy can, you know, you give him the symptoms, he's like, Hey, you got this right. Well how do you know that? Well, I'm saying it a hundred times, you know, I know exactly what it is. So I, I think that's where for me to, to, to capture that person, like all of the pictures, all the pieces of the puzzle and that takes time. Like, you know, I mean for me it, it takes a season to really get an athlete dialed in and then that second season is like, man, we are killing it. You know, now we are really humming. So that's, I think that's pretty normal.

Yeah. As we were talking about offline, gravel means so such a different thing to athletes depending on where you are. And with this notion of traveling to a destination to experience a big gravel event, it could be dramatically different than your home gravel. And that's where sort of the raw just off road skill set and your bag of tricks come into play. I see it time and time again, as, as road athletes kind of go off road, men and women who can way have way more power than I do on a climb just simply fall apart when there's obstacles in the way. And imagine like over your conversations with athletes over the years, you start to develop that understanding of like, okay, got it. You're, you're, you're going to be great at altitude, at an event like Steamboat gravel. But if we throw you in respite suits up in Vermont where they're throwing everything with the kitchen sink at you, you may have some troubles and that's probably good to know as you evolve. And those events that they pick for the subsequent year are in different parts of the country.

Yeah. You know, and, and that's great. That brings up a great point, right? One of the key principles in in, in coaching and in training an athlete for any event is to define the demands of the event, right? So we define the demands of the event first. And, and if you have an event, right, that is you know, got all kinds of really crazy gravel roads that go from big, thick gravel to, to, you know, almost flat pavement, you know, super smooth going 27 miles an hour kind of stuff with rocks and roots and, and like you said, everything, and then in the, in the kitchen sink, then you need to seek that out and training, right? I mean, don't think that you're going to get good at that stuff by riding the smoothest, easiest, fun gravel in town and then show up at a race that's going to have all these other factors in there.

You've got to seek that out. You've got to go find that that gravel, that terrain and figure out those demands so then you can train for them. I mean, it seems kind of crazy, you know, to think w that somebody wouldn't even think about that, but we don't do it so much within the sport of cycling. But you know, if he put it in another analogy and say, okay, well Hey, you know, I'm going to go train volleyball and I'm going to crush that gravel race. It's like, well, no, you're not training the demands of the event. You're going to get really good at volleyball, but not good at gravel bike racing or riding or doing an event or whatever. So it's the same thing where, and I think that's, to me, one of the, you know, Craig, one of the greatest things about cycling is that we have this amazing diversity within the sport. You know, it's just like, wow, this is really cool. I'm learning something new.

Yeah, no, I'm excited. As event organizers explore the different possibilities of the terrain in their necks of the woods, and I'm excited that courses evolve naturally based on the terrain in their locale. And I think you're going to start to see from a professional side of the sport that you're, some are going to be, some athletes are going to be good at one thing and others are going to be good at another. I personally love the events that make, make, force you to have a wide skillset because I think it keeps gravel interesting. I don't like the notion that, you know, professional roadies can come over and, and not be challenged by the terrain. And fortunately most of the quote unquote monuments of gravel, I think have enough curve balls in them that just because you're super fit and can push a big gear is far from a conclusion that you're going to win any of these events.

Yeah, no, I, I think that's great. I, I agree 100% as well. And I think that's where you know, it does make it a unique discipline in and of itself. And I think that's what that again, continues to make it fun, exciting and and, and refresh your energy for it. Right? I mean, it's just like, wow, this is great. I mean when riding bicycles for 40 plus years and all of a sudden it's like, man, you know, I haven't been this excited about getting a new bike as I was getting about my, my gravel bike as I have been in 10 years. I mean I've gotten some pretty cool bikes in the last 10 years. But man, Oh man, I wa I had been really, really, I was really excited. I was like, man, this is awesome. I got this whole new group sad, I got this whole new bike, this is gonna open up all these great new places for me to ride. And I kinda like examine that a little self examination. Like wow, you know, I haven't been as excited in a really long time about a new bike cause I have about this gravel bike. So pretty cool.

Yeah, absolutely. I feel like it just sort of, the light bulb goes off the moment you have a proper gravel bike. And as you were saying earlier, the idea that you can ride some of your favorite roads, but take that detour onto a dirt road. It really just makes your home area new again. And that's, that's brilliant for anybody who needs extra motivation and kind of get out there and enjoy the sport.

Yeah, no, I totally agree. Now I have a question for you. Because I've been looking at all these things and, and thinking about handlebars, what do you think about all these different handlebars? Do you think we need specific gravel handlebars or can road handlebars work or we do need more like mustache bars? What's your, what's your opinion?

That's a great question. And actually just recently on the podcast, we had the guys from the wave handlebar on the podcast.

I saw that. Yeah. I didn't, haven't listened to it yet, but I saw that and I was like, huh, interesting. And, and I think what it,

That conversation in earlier conversations with them, with the notion that, you know, why hasn't the bar evolved more? And I understand that there was different things that were more gating for gravel to explode than the handlebar. But at this point we are starting to see, you know, across the board from wheels to saddles to everything kind of customized for the demands of the sport. So to specifically answer your question, you know, I have been a fan of the flared out bar. I find that when I'm descending in the drops, it gives me more security. I feel more comfortable that I can go faster and faster with it. I think it stands to reason that as we are riding on the hoods and on the tops of the bar that different shapes are going to come to bear and provide benefit when you're getting jostled around. And I remember back when pros were modifying their bikes for a Perry Renee by double wrapping the bars. It's little tweaks like that that can save your body from a fatigue level. I'm beginning to believe that in these long events that you've got to consider that.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. All right. Excellent.

That's excellent. I appreciate you throwing a question back at me and that's fine.

Well, you know, I've been, you know, I'm on my bike right now. I just have normal road handlebars, you know, and, and I've been contemplating mail making a change and just, you know, it was kinda thinking about, well, what, what is, what's, what's the best one out there to make a change for? And you know, would it, would it make a big difference? You know, so yeah.

Yeah. I remember seeing a, you know, the guys from envy and, and talking to Dave Zabriskie who obviously spent a career on the road and learning about his love for the flared bar. And that left me thinking, gosh, if, if he's been holding onto the handlebars on the road as long as he has, and he's a fan of the flared bar, there's something there for sure.

Your point. That's a good point.

Yeah. Well, Hunter, this was a great and timely conversation. Again, as people are going into the winter here in North America, I think these are all super things to think about. I'll put a link to your coaching services and the gravel camp and a link to Bedford, Virginia in the notes because I think it's cool for people to look at that. And look at Appalachia as just a different cool place that they should put on their, their agenda to go hit.

Absolutely. You know, and we're, we're advertising our gravel campus, rotting the oldest gravel in America. You know, so you will be on some of the original gravel roads that were put down here in the 16 hundreds. Now, I don't know if the gravel is going to be flat, the roads will have been around since the 16 hundreds. Or maybe even earlier when you know, when, when this wonderful country of ours was created. So a incredible history here from, from you know, just all the settlers cause everybody, you know, when they came across from England, they settled here in Virginia predominantly. And and so we've got some pretty cool roads that we're going to be on a gravel camp.

Yeah, it's a fascinating state. A lot of fun. As I mentioned earlier, I've done some mountain biking in Virginia. I went to school in Washington, D C so I definitely recommend it for people who haven't been to that part of the East. There's great riding and I've, I've no doubt in your neck of the woods. It's Epic gravel.

Cool. Awesome, man. Can't wait. Thanks so much for having me on your podcast.

Yeah, thank you. Big thanks to Hunter for spending some time with us this week. I hope you walked away with a little bit of knowledge that you can put into your body and your mind for 2020 as you approach whatever the big event, the big hairy event on your calendar tends to be. As always, I welcome your feedback. You can hit me at craigatthegravelride.bike or on our social media channels, particularly Instagram at the gravel ride underscore podcast. As always, we welcome ratings and reviews and feedback. It really helps us grow the podcast. So if you have a minute, click through on your phone to your favorite podcast app and drop us a rating. We'd love to see it. Until next time, here's to finding some dirt under your wheels.