That was how much notice I had before I needed to run the fastest marathon of my life.

There was one more wrinkle:

I had to start at midnight.

And if I didn’t beat another Tribal athlete running at the same time, everyone on my team would lose the gear prizes up for grabs in the Tribal 200 - our latest team challenge.

No pressure.

That midnight marathon ended up being one of the experiences that moved the needle for me this month.

For the past few months, I’ve been doing a quick look back I call Chief Debrief.

At the end of each month, I identify four things that moved the needle in my fitness and mindset:

• an endurance session

• a strength session

• a durability check

• something I learned

This isn’t a training plan or a list of assignments.

It’s an after-action report on the workouts, experiences and ideas that taught me something - and stuck with me.

I’m sharing it because something that moved the needle for me might do the same for you.

Steal what’s useful. Scale it to where you are. Ignore the rest.

Here’s the debrief.

Where I Stretched: The Midnight Marathon

The assignment was simple:

• Run the fastest marathon of my life.

• Start at midnight.

• Do it with three days notice.

I didn’t have time to build a perfect plan. I had done zero marathon-specific training sessions.

I wasn’t tapered.

But I needed something simple that would give me a chance to perform at my best for longer than I was trained to go.

My plan:

• Run 2 miles.

• Walk 30 seconds.

• Repeat.

The walk breaks were long enough for my heart rate to drop by more than 20 beats.

They let me to sustain a running pace I wouldn’t have been able to hold straight through.

I walked at the 2 mile, the 4 mile, and so on. Then went back to work.

The strategy didn’t just break up the physical demand. It saved me mentally.

I didn’t have to run 26.2 miles.

I only had to run two.

Then two more.

Then two more.

That strategy carried me to a 15 minute marathon PR - on 3 days notice.

Steal the Workout

Pick a duration or distance that stretches you.

Then repeat:

• Run 2 miles

• Walk 30 seconds

Run the two-mile segments at a controlled tempo effort.

For me, that was approximately 7:45 per mile - about 45 seconds faster than my normal Zone 2 pace.

Bonus points if you do it at night.

Running while the rest of the world is asleep gives you an edge.

It shakes up the rhythm of your routine and launches you into offense the following day.

What Made Me Stronger: Full-Body AMRAP

One of my favorite strength sessions this month was this simple full-body circuit.

20 Minute AMRAP

Complete as many quality rounds as possible:

• 250-meter row

• 10 atomic pushups

• 15 sandbag wall balls — 35 pounds

• 10 sit-ups

Equipment Swaps

Swap in 60 seconds of jump rope or running if you don’t have a rowing machine.

Use a towel on the kitchen floor for the atomic pushups if you don’t have a scooter board or floor sliders.

My wall balls don’t actually hit a wall. I just launch my 35-pound sandbag kettlebell into the air, catch it and repeat.

Don’t complicate the setup.

Move continuously. Use the cardio as active recovery between the strength movements.

Bonus points if you sneak this inside a 30 minute window between work or dad duty.

What Kept Me Honest: The Run + Carry Durability Check

I’m 12 days out from my first backyard ultramarathon.

I’ll be running Prairie on Fire with more than 15 Tribal athletes.

This training cycle is the first time I’ve consistently included sandbag carries in my protocol.

Most of those carries have been on trails with vert, but one run-and-carry session through my neighborhood stuck with me.

Run + Carry Durability Check

Complete:

3 rounds:

• 10-minute run

• 5-minute carry with an 80-pound sandbag

Then:

• 20-minute run

• 5-minute carry

• 5-minute cooldown run

I covered 8 miles.

The workout tested my running pace, aerobic engine, grip strength and total-body durability.

One minute I was running steady and relaxed.

A few minutes later, I was gasping for air while trying to find some form of leverage - rotating 80 pounds of sand between my shoulders and a front carry against my chest.

Then I had to put it down and immediately find an efficient running rhythm again.

That’s why I think of this as a durability check rather than a traditional fitness test.

It isn’t only measuring speed or strength.

It’s measuring whether you can continue functioning as fatigue accumulates and the demands keep changing.

Make It Yours

If you don’t have an 80lb sandbag, you can use:

• Two dumbbells

• Two kettlebells

• A backpack or rucksack loaded with something heavy

If 80 pounds isn’t appropriate, use less.

But it should be challenging within the first 60 seconds.

What Changed My Thinking: Jason McCarthy on Community

The best thing I listened to this month was an interview with GORUCK founder Jason McCarthy about building a business through community.

I listened to it three times.

That never happens.

What stuck with me was that GORUCK didn’t just make products and then go looking for customers.

Well, they did. And no one bought (or cared).

Everything changed when Jason created opportunities for people to do hard things together.

People would sign up without even knowing the full details of what they were getting into.

Ironically, that’s exactly what happened with the Tribal 200 - and what happens with every Tribal challenge.

The unknown is part of the point.

The GORUCK events strengthened the community. The community strengthened the brand.

And the gear became connected to experiences people were proud to have shared.

The interview left me inspired to lean more into that.

What I’m Carrying Forward

This month reinforced three things for me:

1. Simple plans survive pressure.

When I had three days to prepare for a midnight marathon, I didn’t need a complicated strategy.

I needed a repeatable one.

2. Strength should be tested in motion.

The run-and-carry workout showed me more than an isolated strength test or a clean running time could have shown me on its own.

It was also much more fun than trying to max out my bench press.

3. It’s okay to build events without a clearly defined outcome.

If you’re the kind of person who needs to know every detail of a GORUCK Challenge before signing up, you’re probably not the kind of person who does a GORUCK Challenge.

That gives me good permission for what we’re building with Tribal.

The unknown isn’t a flaw in the experience.

Sometimes, it’s the entire point.

Come Do the Next One With Us

The next Tribal Challenge is designed around exactly that idea.

It’s a chance to step outside your normal routine, test yourself and do something difficult alongside other people who chose to show up.

The Tribal Games begins October 1.

Get in now.

JOIN THE TRIBAL GAMES

If you try one of the workouts from this debrief, reply and tell me what you did.

Send me your duration, rounds or distance.

I want to know what moved the needle for you.

—Ryan

P.S. Here’s the equipment I used:

This is the 80lb sandbag med ball I used for the durability check.

This is the 35lb sandbag KB I used for the wall-balls.

Like this month’s Chief Debrief?

Send it to a friend and challenge them to do all 4.

Share

Click.

I glance at the clock.

10:06 am.

Next call is at 10:30.

Summer travel. Flights with two kids. My three year old just started preschool.

In this season of life, I value a little extra sleep.

AKA - I haven’t trained today.

I have 24 minutes. 3 options.

1. scroll X and ig

2. try to context switch and finish a biz project (that really needs full focus)

3. bang out a 20 minute workout

Option 1? Dead time.

Option 2? Can work. But usually feels like forcing a square peg into a round hole.

With a full afternoon of calls and work ahead of me, Option 3 is how I master my day.

Every Workout Needs a Plan

I decide on a 20 minute AMRAP.

• 250 meter row

• 10 atomic pushups (on the new scooter board I got on Amazon for $25)

• 15 wallballs with my 35 lb sandbag KB

• 10 situps

I physically write it down. This is important for me.

If I wing it on tight time and just start doing a bunch of random stuff, I’m never satisfied.

On the other hand, when I make a plan, commit, and execute it, it doesn’t matter how small the effort was.

It feels great on my mind.

6 rounds. I’m dripping sweat.

Click. Stop. Save.

2 minutes to grab a water, towel, and dry off my face before my 10:30.

Define Your Active Lifestyle

Ironmans, ultramarathons, monster training days in the mountains.

I love that stuff.

But you know what jazzes me up just as much?

The Tuesday where I’m in my tri kit all day. I’ve worked out 3 different times. One was a bike ride with my kid.

I’ve juggled work calls and moved business projects forward through it all.

With a 3 year old and a 6 month old, 2+ hour training windows are tough to come by.

And it would be a major stress on my family if I tried to force that.

So instead, I’ve gotten at finding two or three ~30 minute windows throughout my day.

Equipment That Helps

I’ve gotten hooked on these short sandbag, jump rope, and bodyweight circuits.

The sandbag medballs are from GoRuck and the weighted jumprope I use is from Crossrope.

Both these brands make great stuff. And both hooked up the Tribal team with prizes for our recent team challenge, the Tribal 200.

I have the GoRuck 80 and 100lb sandbag medballs + the 35lb sandbag KB.

My Crossrope jumprope is their 1/4lb weighted one.

After 7 years of endurance training, it’s become very rare that I have the desire to be in a gym environment.

Fluorescent lights. Sitting around between sets.

It’s just not for me.

I like to move my body outside.

These training tools have been really helpful for building strength, feeling like an athlete, and getting more overall activities in.

AMRAPs and EMOMs

I’ve messed around in a few Crossfit classes. But my gym bro days were more about 5 x 5 lifts than consistent calisthenics and circuit work.

So this style of training is a new adventure for me.

Here’s how I’m doing it:

AMRAPs (As many rounds as possible)

I like this pattern:

• Cardio → bodyweight → weighted full body → floor for core → Repeat

For example:

Jump rope → Push ups → Wall balls → Sit ups

The cardio piece is relaxed effort. Enough recovery to do the strength work well.

EMOMs (Every minute on the minute)

I like these for heavy sandbag movements that need recovery.

My favorite workout:

• 10x sandbag cleans for 10 minutes

With my 80lb sandbag medball, it works out to about 35 sec of work and 25 sec of rest. And by the end, I’m working my tail off to do the reps well.

The real skill is fast transitions.

The only way the 20 minute workout happens in the 24 minute window is if you can get started fast.

Sixty seconds to grab my crap, pick the workout, and hit start on my watch.

Twenty minutes of work.

Two or three minutes to get my heart rate back down before my call.

That’s the whole system.

If those 60 seconds turn into ten minutes of changing clothes and deciding what to do, the window closes and the workout never happens.

Get good at getting started.

When you get that right, most of the rest takes care of itself.

Lower the bar, raise the execution.

Putting in a quality 20 minute workout.

Then another window opens in the afternoon and I run a 5k.

Now I’ve gotten two sessions in. I’m doing more activities. I’m doing more variety of movement.

This is what an active lifestyle means to me.

I look forward to the next season of 3 hour rides in the mountains. But I’m not waiting around for them to stay on offense in the season I’m in.

Summer travel. Kids starting school. Football season. The holidays. End of year push at work.

Don’t sit around waiting for more time.

Make the most of what you have right now.

A lot of guys inside Tribal are in the same season of life.

Most of our team calls lately have come back to one question:

How do you stay consistent with the short stuff now, and still be ready when the big adventurous stuff comes back around?

If that’s you, I have two spots open for calls next week.

Free. No pitch. We’ll talk through your goals and the season you’re actually in.

You can grab time with me here.

— RD

My buddy Charlie’s wife is 10 days past her due date.

He thought about sitting out the latest challenge we’re doing in Tribal.

But he decided to go for it.

And on Day 1, he ran the most miles he ever has in a day - in his life.

21+ total miles.

• 10 on the treadmill in the garage before his family got up.

• A 4 mile walk

• Two more one-mile runs mid-day

And a 3+ mile run with his daughter in the stroller in the evening to wrap it up.

When is the last time you just… found a way?

The Tribal 200

Here’s what he’s part of.

Two teams of 8 (Team Axe vs. Team Arrow) racing to see who can complete 200 miles fastest.

It’s relay style. One athlete carries the torch per day.

But there’s a catch.

Each day has to beat the day before. Every person on the team has to take at least one day.

Runs count. Walks count. Hikes count.

I built this to take two or three weeks. And I planned to drop a surprise mileage reset somewhere between days 10 and 14.

But as soon as the small team chats were made, I watched what people do when a team is counting on them.

Both teams are now tracking to finish this in eight days.

was Team Arrow’s Day 1.

Team Axe sent Stephanie.

Stephanie is on a cruise right now. She logged 17+ miles on laps around the pool deck.

She didn’t wait to get home. She didn’t say “I’ll start when life calms down.”

She just made it happen.

Same as Charlie’s treadmill.

Same principle as the family bike ride I did today (hold that thought).

Now the part I can’t stop thinking about.

Day 1 almost fell apart.

Here’s a detail I never actually spelled out in the challenge rules:

Do treadmill miles count?

One of the guys on my team kept sending in screenshots of brutal air quality in Washington.

I thought he was being soft.

So midday, I made a call. No treadmills.

There was one problem.

Charlie had already logged 10 on the treadmill (he just hadn’t sent his miles in for the day yet).

So now what?

Do his miles count? Does he redo the biggest day of his life? Does someone else step in?

For a few hours, Day 1 was up in the air.

Then something I didn’t see coming.

The two teams - the ones competing against each other - worked it out themselves.

They cut a Peace Treaty. Each team gets one treadmill run. One wildcard.

Charlie already spent Arrow’s. His 10 count.

And Brandon, out in Washington, gets to hold Team Axe’s.

Rivals negotiating terms for physical competition on Day 1.

You can’t put that in a training plan.

People counting on you > More discipline

I gave both teams a Captain.

On purpose, I picked people who’ve never led anything in Tribal.

Their job:

• organize the team

• build a strategy together

• decide who runs which day

• keep everything on track

One of those captains had fallen off. His training had gone quiet for a while.

Now here’s the strange part.

Earlier this week, we sent out some training stats to the group of athletes doing our next team race.

Within five minutes of the email going out, he sent a message into the chat saying - “hand up, I have not been consistent lately.”

A prior version of me would’ve messaged him a mix of encouragement and honest nudging.

“You gotta get back out there, man.

You can do it.

Get it done early in the day and don’t think about it.”

More often than I’d like to admit, that doesn’t work.

So I tried something different.

I didn’t kick him. I handed him a team.

He changed overnight.

The second people were counting on him, a stronger version showed up.

He facilitated a team strategy call. He had a whole AI site built that helped us do the math on miles and plan out who could take what day.

Not because he was pushed harder — because he now had something to lead.

That’s Tribal right there.

Leadership through endurance.

You may be thinking that things are different for you.

That it’s not right for you in this season of life.

Or that 20+ miles is impossible.

Here’s the truth: we all feel these things in some way.

Charlie did when he signed up for the challenge three days ago.

Give someone a team - and a reason - and watch what they’ll do while their wife is ten days overdue.

Oh, and my Day 1?

I had a ride planned.

I could’ve gone alone and told my family I’d see them in a few hours.

Instead I put my three-year-old on my bike and told my wife to meet us with our 5 month old at the coffee shop.

And I brought my mom, sister and aunt + cousin who are in town visiting. It turned into a full family adventure.

Training didn’t cost me the morning with my family.

It became the morning with my family.

That’s what we actually train inside Tribal. Not just endurance. The skill of rising up for yourself and pulling your people with you.

Same muscle you use to parent well. To lead a business. To chase the goal you keep putting off.

We just build it through endurance, challenge, and doing it as a team.

The next challenge kicks off in October.

Same idea. Rally with a group. Strategize. Set a plan. Feel the team relying on you.

Then give more than you thought you had and feel what it’s like to punch through with people who won’t let you quit.

To be in it, you have to be in Tribal.

I’m capping the new October group at 5 spots so every captain can actually lead their team. When it’s full, the next window isn’t until 2027.

Come try it.

Give Tribal 30 days — if it’s not the group you’ve been missing, I’ll refund you.

No hard feelings.

👉 Signup here (we will get on an onboarding call right away)

As for the Tribal 200?

Day 2 is already going to be bigger. It has to be.

— Ryan

P.S. These challenges aren’t just for bragging rights.

The Tribal 200 has over $1,500 in gear on the line from Crossrope and GoRuck.

Every Tribal challenge has real stakes. October will too.

Each week I am joined by studs in the endurance world (aka Tribal athletes) for short segments on recent races, training, and what’s happening inside Tribal.

These aren’t your standard long-form interviews. Instead, they’re quick bites of what’s most alive in endurance for us - and what you can take into your own training.

This week’s lineup:

🏊 joins the show after completing his first Ironman. We unpack:

• Why the Ironman is the pinnacle of endurance (sorry ultra boys)

• The #1 mindset strategy that saved his race day

• What it’s like to lose 50 lbs in 3 years and run down the red carpet with your kids cheering for you

🚴 shares specs from his Ironman Wisconsin build:

• 4 Week Threshold bike progression

• Long brick workouts

• Benefits of training with power and pace

• Not going too data-heavy and having some sessions that are just about going hard

⛰️ talks about leading Tribal’s plunge into big cycling events:

• Triple Bypass

• Copper Triangle

• Why adventure rides are the perfect blend of the speed you get in triathlon and the vibes you get in ultras

🏃 gives an update on Backyard Ultra training:

• His mental goal for each loop (that isn’t about pace or fuel)

🪓 We also preview the Tribal 200, our new team endurance challenge, and introduce Chief’s Orders - our new monthly challenge inside Tribal University

If you’re an endurance athlete - or someone trying to build a stronger, healthier life - I think you’ll enjoy this new sports radio format.

Hit play, and if you want to train alongside us, join Tribal University.

Get more from Ryan Dreyer in the Substack app

Available for iOS and Android

Get the app

“Dadddyyyyyyy!!”

I reach into my pocket and grab my phone to check the time.

8:52 pm.

My toddler was supposed to be asleep an hour ago.

But he’s in his room screaming like he just got his leg blown off.

“I have to go potty!”

“I’m scared!”

“A dinosaur is biting me!”

The sleep coach said to put his potty in his room. So his delay tactic is no longer an excuse to go in.

“Wahhhhhh”

My 3 week old just breastfed for 30 minutes straight. But she’s screaming like she hasn’t eaten since she showed up on Earth.

My father-in-law, his wife, and my wife’s childhood friend are sitting on our couch.

They’re visiting from Boston to see baby Anna for the first time.

“Ohhhh Ry… Jameson just threw up.”

I turn to the corner of our living room and see a wet volcano of dog food piled up in the corner as yellow bile drips from my dog’s mouth and he hacks up the final few heaves.

This was March.

I was not putting a 70.3 on my calendar.

I still needed something to work towards though.

Without a race to point at I drift. Not dramatically. I’m still consistent.

But without an understanding of where today’s work is being applied (and potentially exposed), I lose my edge.

So I signed up for what I called the race of the century:

A 5k at a random brewery 7 minutes from my house.

It was my first time racing a 5k since getting into endurance sports.

I cared about it. I get value out of taking things seriously - and I wanted to see what I could do.

At the very least, it was an opportunity to give my best.

The day before the race was Jack Jack’s third birthday party.

We rented a gazebo for 10 bucks at a local park and invited a handful of friends to come hang out with their kids.

Slides. Balloons. Cake. It was great.

That evening was a brewery celebration for my sister’s birthday two days later.

Cake again. Burgers and beer at the brewery.

Without a race - in a stressful season of life with a newborn - I’d have said yes to all of it.

Just one slice.

Ok, one more.

I really shouldn’t have 3. But is anything bad really gonna happen??

With the race looming, I said no to it all.

I saw the race as a chance to get a win. I could even set a lifetime PR.

I skipped the sweets. Ran the 5k. Got the PR.

And I was back at the same park on the swings with my family by 10 am.

There is no better feeling than rising up for myself, and showing up for my family, all in one.

Through the “newborn block”, something shifted in my fitness that I hadn’t fully felt through six straight years of Ironmans.

I wasn’t just fit for a race I’d been building towards.

I was sharp.

In prep of Anna arriving, I traded long rides for focused and specific run training.

I knew I could up my run volume while cutting back on my long stuff.

It was working.

Then Jonah called.

He’s a friend and fellow father/athlete.

I had asked him to ride for an hour or two. He had an idea to take it one step further.

“Can I interest you in a gravel ride to Gold Hill?”

One of the iconic Boulder gravel climbs.

Big elevation. Relentless threshold sections. 3+ hours of fun and suffering.

I had a 10 mile tempo run on my plan and was gonna ride easy for a bit.

But the opportunity was too good to pass up.

I woke up at 5 am, ran the 10 miles before my family woke up, and coordinated for my wife and Jonah’s wife to hang out with the kids so Chelsea wasn’t stranded at home with a newborn and a three year old.

Then we rode to Gold Hill.

One of the guys we rode with had to bail midway. I was fine.

Four plus hours of hard exercise. Run then bike. And I felt good at the end of it.

I drove home from Jonah’s with one thought:

That was about as long as a 70.3 would take me.

I knew I’d already be in Chattanooga to coach. We had 14 Tribal athletes set to do the 70.3 as our team race for the 3rd consecutive year.

I’ve already coached here the last two years.

Everyone loves this course and I haven’t gotten to experience it.

Should I just throw down with the team?

I didn’t sign up.

I made myself do one more thing first.

I didn’t need more fitness. I needed to know if I was willing.

If I couldn’t mentally commit to finding four hours to ride - it didn’t matter how fit I was.

That would be a sign I wasn’t in a spot to race.

I cleared a Tuesday morning, arranged for my wife to drop Jack Jack at the nanny, and went out for a four hour ride.

I took off on the ride and felt fantastic from the jump.

I stopped at a coffee shop 2 hours in and signed up from my phone.

The “build” sucked.

Once I signed up, I wanted two key sessions between 2.5 and 3.5 hours to dial in my race pace and get a feel for that level of effort.

I tried to do them on days with childcare lined up, but between arranging space in my business, family needs, and Colorado weather - I moved them both multiple times.

It made me face that part of race prep where you think: none of this shit is going to plan.

I got them done. Imperfect. But done.

Three sessions over three hours in the entire build.

That was it.

Race morning was chill.

70.3 has become my favorite distance to race.

After 6 consecutive Ironmans and a bunch of 12+ hour ultramarathons, my mind sees 2.5 hours of biking and 1.5 hours of running with the knowledge - “I can go hard for that long.”

What was once a “Can I do this?” is now an experience of max sustainable speed inside of endurance.

Riding hard and fast. Constant gear shifting through rollers, taking corners tight, conserving on climbs, attacking descents.

Running with rhythm and pace - instead of just plodding along.

It’s like a fun, hard workout with one goal:

In the final 30 minutes, experience the version of myself that is a complete savage.

But it takes a shit ton of endurance to get to that point.

The swim course felt long.

I joked after the race that they turned the current off in the river.

Later, I found out the dam was literally closed.

The bike was harder than I expected. I thought I’d be flying down these rolling descents effortlessly at 30+ mph.

Instead, it was hot as fuck, I didn’t get half the descending relief I expected, and I had a headache until I popped a 200mg caffeine pill at 30 minutes and said a prayer.

I still rode well, but I had flashbacks to full distance Ironman with how badly I was dying to get off that damn bike by the end.

I dumped an entire gallon of water over myself in transition, ignored a volunteer that tried to stop me, peed for 60 seconds straight, and took off on the run with my hat backwards, not knowing which version of myself was about to show up.

The first two miles I feared I was going to mail it in on the run.

Coast at a pace that would look fine on paper. Not really work for it. Just kind of… do it.

I didn't override that voice. I just let it sit there and leaned on my data.

Run targets:

• 7:30-7:45 for the first 3ish miles

• Keep my HR under 145

I had a training run that told me if I was over 145 too early, I would not be able to sustain that effort for the whole run.

My pace was right in that range, but my heart rate was high since the run course starts with a 300 yard hill that feels like 3 miles.

But as I crested the hill and the course leveled out, I saw my heart rate normalize in the upper 130s with that same pacing.

The voice of doubt still tempted me:

Is your heart rate too low?

Do you have the leg power to get it up??

I got to the first aid station, doused myself with cold water, felt a visceral shock that told me my body needed to chill the fuck out.

I got through the aid station, saw 7:40 pace and 140 HR.

Now knowing I was 10 minutes into the run and settled into the effort, I informed the voice of doubt that we would be sticking to the original plan of: don’t be a bitch

I’d used Maple Boost all day. No gut issues. Nothing.

With five miles to go, I took a Maple Boost and shifted gears.

• Mile 9: 7:29

• Mile 10: 7:15.

• Mile 11: 7:44 (running up a massive hill)

• Mile 12: 7:06.

• Mile 13: 6:38.

Negative split.

Fastest bike and run combo of my 70.3 career.

This is the fourth straight year Tribal has done a team 70.3.

Fifteen men showed up to Chattanooga.

A handful of veterans. 5 guys doing their first 70.3. 4 guys who’d done a 70.3, but this was their first time doing one with Tribal.

All of them doing hard things inside real lives with real demands.

The first thing I ever posted when I got into endurance training was a photo of my new bike with the caption:

Sharpen the Axe.

The old story about Abraham Lincoln says if you give him eight hours to chop down a tree, he spends the first six sharpening the axe.

Well if you give me 8 hours to chop down a tree, I’m spending:

• an hour hacking the shit out of it

• 10 minutes asking a lumberjack for technique tips

• an hour hacking at it again

• two hours showing other people how they can cut down trees

• an hour sharpening all of our axes together

• an hour building a business that sells trees

• and then kicking it with my family for the rest of the day

A sharp axe on a 45 minute ride beats a dull axe on a three hour slog.

A focused 5k race effort teaches your body and mind how to compete in ways that your 90 minute Zone 2 run never will.

A four hour ride that began with organizing child care and 5 am emails to potential Maple Boost investors?

That ride keeps your mind sharp in ways a six hour ride in an open life never will.

Sharpen the axe.

It was always the right tagline.

I just needed the right constraints before I could demonstrate it.

The 30 Day Tribal Challenge starts June 10. Two slots left.

www.traintribal.com/challenge

I look at the clock in the top right corner of my screen.

5:16 am.

I’ve been up since 4:25. On a Saturday.

Water. Coffee. A bible verse. Open the laptop.

It’s not a perfect routine.

But it’s what I can manage right now.

I have business projects that need moving forward and a mortgage that needs to be paid.

My daughter Anna is one month old today.

My two year old was supposed to sleep until 7. Looks like that’s not happening.

A text from Chels pops up on my screen from the back room.

“Do you hear Jack?”

“Ya, let’s leave him in there.”

We’re clawing our way out of a sleep regression with a strict protocol: don’t go in when he’s crying.

He comes out when the Hatch light turns green.

Another text:

“I changed the Hatch from 7 to 6.”

“Perfect. I’ll get him then.”

It’s 5:22. I have 38 minutes.

Two hours of work and a two hour workout are both waiting.

I pour another cold brew.

Update training plans. Answer athlete messages. Move a content draft forward. Order more Maple Boost ingredients.

My mind ping-pongs between Claude, Telegram, Gmail, TrainingPeaks, iMessage.

Is this the right way to run a business? I’m not sure.

But the mortgage needs to be paid.

At 6 am I’ll take toddler duty so Chels can get some extra rest with Anna.

That’s three hours of dad duty before I get another window.

What I’ve learned in the first month as a family of four: my workout times are less flexible in the first few hours the family is up than they were when we were three.

Chels can’t just hang with Jack Jack on the couch and read books while I take off for an 8am run.

She’s feeding a newborn. And Jack Jack wants to do backflips off the couch.

I’ve also learned something uncomfortable about myself: by hour two of morning dad duty, I start to suck as a dad if I haven’t gotten exercise in.

In years past that meant 90 minutes on the bike. When you’re chasing a sub-10 hour Ironman, 60 minute rides feel like not enough.

But a family of 4 is a new playing field. And I’ve lowered the bar on what a morning win looks like.

It’s 5:36.

24 minutes to go.

Jack Jack is still crying.

I’m in go mode till that Hatch light turns green.

I throw on socks, shoes, and my heart rate strap. Sit down on the rower and load up an interval workout.

I have exactly 22 minutes.

And I forgot to mention: this was our first week as a family of 4 without family in town to help out. It tried to kill me.

Point being — I wasn’t looking for a smooth and relaxed Zone 2 effort.

I needed to release aggression before I succumbed to the needs of my family pulling me from the thing I need to move forward to provide for my family.

500 meters on / 1 minute rest.

Click.

I press start, settle into the first set and decide my plan of attack:

• Make each one faster than the last.

• Do as many as you can in 22 minutes.

• Go be dad.

The overhead light of the garage shuts off.

“Ha. Fuck. I forgot to turn on the main light. Not getting off to fix it.’”

By the 6th set I was gasping for air in the pitch dark, which meant the final set was about to be fantastic.

Full send. Stop my watch. Take a picture of the data.

“Goooooood morningggggg Jack Jack”

I managed 9 hours of training last week.

Only 3 individual sessions over an hour. Lots of combos. Lots of shorter stuff stacked throughout the day.

Puzzle piecing it together.

My friend wants to start a business.

Like many who begin something new in their 30s, with kids, a high pressure job, and a mortgage they wish was half as much, he was asking the question:

“When do I do it? Where do I find the time?”

He wanted the window. The time block. The space for deep work.

He bought the new notebook, the special pen, his backpack was stocked.

Then I told him:

Those can be great. But that’s not how I built Tribal.

I built Tribal by puzzle piecing it together.

5 minutes here. 30 minutes there. Sending messages mid-run. Recording voice notes on the trainer.

When there’s consistent forward momentum, you know exactly what to do when the deep work window does open.

I see the same pattern when guys are considering Ironman.

They obsess over the 5+ hour rides.

“How am I going to fit those in?”

Meanwhile, the guy riding for 90 minutes on Tuesday is already on his way to becoming an Ironman.

When the need for the big window shows up, he’ll have become the kind of person who knows how to make it happen — and what to do with it.

I’m experiencing something like the opposite.

In my training right now, I don’t have 2 hour blocks as standard weekday windows.

My weekends aren’t blocked off for 3-4 hour rides.

But my fitness hasn't fallen off. It's just built differently now.

Whether building in business or fitness, it’s easy to glorify the big effort.

But it’s the 22 minutes sandwiched between another priority and your kid waking up that make the difference on the most important piece of the puzzle:

Identity.

When you become someone who shows up, no matter how it looks, pipe dreams become paths to victory.

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But along the way, something strange happened.

Outside of Tribal, the training tactics got buried.

The workouts, frameworks, and tools I actually use with athletes ended up:

• sitting in old emails

• scattered across YouTube

• parked on landing pages I don’t actively promote

I’m fixing that.

Today I’m launching The 5-Hour Athlete - a new Substack publication built around one idea.

Five hours of training per week is enough to do things that will shock you.

It’s for the dad or ambitious professional who wants to chase real athletic goals without blowing up work, family, or everything else that matters.

Every post answers one question a busy athlete actually asks with

• a program

• a framework

• a tool you can use today

The first two posts are live now.

The first post introduces the system and the athlete who proved it works - 4 kids, Ironman, 70.3s, ultras, running a biz, a new W2 - all on 5+ hours per week.

The second gives you 3 tracks to choose from, exact programs, and what workouts actually looks like across each track.

If that sounds like you, come read it.

The 5-Hour Athlete

The 5-Hour Athlete: An Introduction

The most impressive people in endurance sport aren’t the fastest…

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6 months ago · 11 likes · 2 comments · Ryan Dreyer

Read it here:

— Ryan

Sleep is fractured. Family needs are sporadic. Training windows are whatever I can steal between diaper changes, calls, and boys adventures with my two year old.

I needed something I could do in 10-30 minutes, right in my garage, without needing to be anywhere.

I emailed my coach and asked: treadmill or rower?

He said he had a rower sitting unused. He’d just bring it over.

A few days later Justin showed up, helped me carry it into the garage, and spent thirty minutes walking me through everything.

Then he watched me row and coached me up in real time.

What followed reminded me of every beginner mistake I watch new endurance athletes make. (And the ones I made myself too).

Turns out I was making all of them. Again.

The Damper Was at 10

Before Justin showed up, I’d been using the rower at my gym.

Damper (the 1-10 dial on the side) cranked to 10. Maximum resistance. Because lower felt like admitting weakness.

I lasted five minutes every time, gutted to 10 minutes a few times, and couldn’t picture ever going longer.

Justin told me to drop it to 6. Here’s what changed immediately:

• I couldn’t grit my way through it anymore

• Going easier revealed all the sloppiness in my form

• I started feeling where I lost the rhythm and where I defaulted to muscling through

The lower setting didn’t make it easier. It made it more honest.

The damper is not a difficulty badge. It’s a tool to control resistance.

I Was Pulling Like I Was Starting a Lawnmower

Justin gave me two corrections that changed everything.

#1: Don’t bend your arms until your legs are fully extended.

I’d been pulling everything together at once - turning what’s supposed to be a lower body dominant movement into an upper body grind.

#2: Slow the stroke rate to 22-24.

I was defaulting to 30 s/m because faster felt harder. It wasn’t. It was just sloppier.

My form still isn’t dialed. Some sessions I feel the sequence.

Legs, hips, arms → Recover in Reverse → arms, hips legs

It’s smooth.

Other sessions my upper body creeps back in and I have to find my legs again.

That’s what being a beginner feels like.

Touching flow for a second, then exploring the intricacies of the movement to get it back.

The Minute of Rest Was the Whole Thing

After a week of rowing at my gym, I had a new personal best:

21 minutes, 5,000 meters, continuous effort. And it required all kinds of mental tricks to keep going past 3k.

Then I tried intervals. 500 meters on, one minute off, repeat.

I went 12 rounds. 36 minutes. 7,000 meters. A smashing new personal record.

The rest wasn’t just recovery. It was re-patterning.

Every minute off I reset my posture, found my breathing, and went back in with my form intact. The break let me find it again before fatigue made wrong feel normal.

The session after that: 8,000 meters straight.

I see this with new runners constantly.

The goal becomes don’t walk — as if walking is failure. So they slog through miles with deteriorating form, wondering why it never clicks.

They don’t need more grit. They need permission to pause and reset.

The Defaults Don’t Care How Experienced You Are

I have six Ironmans under my belt and have been coaching endurance athletes for years.

I still cranked the damper to 10. I still defaulted to 30 s/m. I still couldn’t row for more than 10 minutes.

Experience doesn’t protect you from default settings. It just helps you spot them faster in new domains.

I see the same pattern in the early-stage brand builders I coach.

They chase ads, followers, more reach. It feels like working hard. It looks like progress. But it’s the same thing as rowing at 30 s/m.

• High effort.

• Low efficiency.

• A mask for the slower, more intentional work of maximizing what's already there.

The guys who are ready to grow aren’t the ones with the biggest audiences. They’re the ones deepening what they already have.

The repeat buyer. The subscriber already in a real conversation with you. The customer who just needs to be asked.

Slow the stroke rate down. Feel what’s actually happening. Get more out of every rep before you add more reps.

That’s not beginner advice. That’s the whole game.

They’re not.

They’re the arsonist.

Not because they’re careless. Because they keep managing decisions that need to be made.

I know because I’ve done it myself.

The Wrong Problem

A few years ago I onboarded a new coaching client. Let’s call him Tony.

Tony signed up for 70.3 triathlon coaching.

He was fired up. Big goal. Real commitment. Or so it seemed.

Then the first few weeks went by.

His bike was on backorder. His trainer was always getting set up “next week”. He hadn’t sorted out pool access.

He was training maybe two hours a week. The programming I was sending him wasn’t getting touched.

So I did what any good coach would do.

I rewrote the plan.

More flexibility. Lower volume. Better structure around his schedule. I accounted for everything I could think of.

It didn’t matter.

A few weeks later we were in the same place. Two hours of training. Untouched programming. A goal that looked good on paper and wasn’t moving in real life.

So I rewrote the plan again.

This went on for months.

And the whole time I kept thinking the problem was the plan.

It wasn’t.

The Wrong Identity

Here’s what I didn’t want to admit.

I kept rewriting Tony’s training plan because that’s what he hired me for.

Triathlon coach. That was my identity in that relationship. And that identity was the arsonist.

Every new plan I wrote was solving the wrong problem.

And I knew it.

But as long as I kept coaching triathlon, I didn’t have to ask the harder question.

What is actually going on in Tony’s life that has no room for this?

The day I finally asked that question, everything changed.

The Real Constraint

Tony managed commercial real estate and rental properties.

His phone never stopped ringing.

Dishwasher breaks at 7am - Tony’s problem. Tenant dispute on a Saturday - Tony’s problem.

Every operational fire in every property went straight to him first.

He wasn’t struggling to follow a training plan.

He was struggling to have a single uninterrupted hour in his own life.

No plan I wrote was going to fix that.

So we stopped talking about training entirely.

I started asking about his days. His stress. What was taking his attention before he even got out of bed. What he’d need to remove before training could even exist.

One conversation. Completely different question.

He hired an Executive Assistant.

She became the frontline defense on every incoming communication.

The calls stopped going to Tony first. The dishwasher calls went somewhere else. And for the first time in years he had enough mental space to actually show up for himself physically.

The training didn’t fix Tony’s life.

Removing the friction did.

The Goal Underneath the Goal

Here’s where it gets interesting.

Once the noise cleared and Tony started moving consistently, something else surfaced.

The 70.3 quietly stopped being the point.

Not because he gave up. Because he got honest.

We started talking about why he wanted to do a triathlon in the first place. And what came out wasn’t about fitness or competition or proving something to himself.

It was about his kids.

He wanted them to see him do hard things. To watch their dad show up for something difficult and not quit. To want to be part of it with him.

That was the real goal. The 70.3 was just the proxy he’d reached for because it sounded like the kind of hard thing a serious person would do.

Once he knew that, everything reorganized around it.

He did a 10 mile trail race instead.

His son started lifting with him.

He opened his barn gym to his men’s group at church and started hosting community lifting sessions.

Now he’s down 30 pounds.

And his son is next to him for all of it.

No finish line photo. No finisher medal. No sticker on the back of his car.

Just a man who figured out what he was actually training for.

And built his life around that instead.

The Same Unlock, Different Domain

I was working with another Founder. Different problem. Same pattern.

He was struggling with his diet. Inconsistent eating. Too many decisions in a day. No real system.

I didn’t build him a meal plan.

I sent a framework to his Executive Assistant.

She has his food ready every morning before he gets to the office. Same inputs. Zero daily decisions. Problem dissolved.

The diet was never a nutrition problem.

It was a decision fatigue problem.

In both cases — Tony’s training, this Founder’s nutrition — the solution wasn’t more information or a better plan.

It was identifying the real constraint and removing it entirely.

That’s the unlock that lives underneath almost every problem that isn’t moving.

The Fire You Keep Flaming

Here’s the question worth sitting with.

What problem have you been managing for months that actually needs a completely different question?

Not a better plan. Not more accountability. Not another framework.

A different question.

Because the fire you keep flaming is rarely the real fire.

Trace it back far enough and you find a decision that wasn’t made. A constraint that was never identified. A role you keep playing that is solving the wrong problem.

Tony didn’t need a better training schedule.

He needed to find out what he was actually training for.

The moment I stopped being his triathlon coach and started asking real questions — that’s when the real coaching began.

And the outcome was better than anything a 70.3 finish line could have given him.

The Actual Fix

Stop managing the symptom.

Find the constraint underneath it.

Ask the question you’ve been avoiding because it might change everything.

Because here’s what I’ve learned from years of coaching athletes and Founders through hard things:

The problem that won’t move is almost never the real problem.

And the person who keeps trying to solve it the same way - rewriting the plan, adding more structure, pushing harder in the same direction - that person is not a firefighter.

They are the arsonist.

Most people will read this and think of someone else’s problem.

The best ones will think of their own. If that’s you, forward this to someone who needs to hear it.

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Busy dads. Professionals. Guys managing careers and kids and mortgages and training.

And I was counting who showed up to a Tuesday night video call.

It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize I was looking at the wrong scoreboard entirely.

The right scoreboard was transformation.

Guys finishing races they never thought they could even start. Staying consistent through seasons of life that would have broken their old selves. Showing up for their families in new ways because of what endurance training taught them about hard things.

That was always the real measure.

I just wasn’t looking at it.

The Call

I got on the phone with one of my athletes a few weeks ago.

He’d been carrying something heavy into the call.

A business he’d poured years into hadn’t panned out the way he wanted. A client had stiffed him a significant amount of money. He’d made the decision to take a W2 job to protect his family and keep the business alive on the side.

By the scoreboard he’d set for himself years earlier — entrepreneur, building something, fully his own — he felt like he lost.

Like his dream died.

And then almost as an aside, like it wasn’t the most important thing he’d said in the whole conversation, he mentioned something.

His son’s athletic director had pulled him aside recently.

This guy was a former SWAT team director. Not someone who hands out compliments easily. And he told my athlete that his son was the kind of young man other kids look up to. That his own fifth grade son specifically admired him. Called him out by name as someone who was kind and good.

My athlete shared it quickly and moved on.

I stopped him.

“Do you hear what you just said?”

What Winning Actually Looks Like

Here’s what his scoreboard said:

Business failed. Now has to answer to a boss. Entrepreneurial dream dead.

Here’s what was actually happening:

Fastest promoted guy at his new job. Still running the business on the side. Debt free after years of grinding. A son who other kids look up to because of who his father modeled being every single day.

He was winning by every measure that actually matters.

He just couldn’t see it because he was looking at the wrong scoreboard.

The Elephant Mountain Climb

Last year, I coached this athlete through Elephant Mountain 50 miler.

There’s a section in that race I’ll never forget.

Mile 20. Back half of a 13 mile stretch between aid stations. Heat of the day.

And out of nowhere the course threw us into a dry red desert canyon.

Steep. Technical. Exposed.

We hadn’t seen it coming.

Our pace dropped to over 20 minutes a mile. Moving but barely. The watch saying we should be somewhere we weren’t. The aid station feeling impossibly far away.

In that moment everything in your body is telling you something is wrong.

You’re behind. You’re slow. You’re struggling.

But you’re not losing.

You’re mid race.

The climb is part of the course. The slow miles are part of the process. The suffering isn’t a sign that something went wrong. It’s a sign that you’re still in it.

His life right now is that climb.

Not the penalty box. Not a timeout. Not failure.

Mid race on a technical section he didn’t see coming.

And he’s still moving.

The Reframe

Here’s the part we never pause to admit.

There’s another guy out there in the exact same situation who made different choices.

Who went into business debt to keep up appearances. Who lied to his wife about the credit cards. Who let the wrong scoreboard drive him into decisions that cost him everything that actually mattered.

This athlete protected his family. Stayed out of debt. Kept his integrity. Kept building.

And raised a son who a former SWAT team director specifically called out as a young man of character.

You don’t get that result by accident.

You get it by living your values out loud every single day in front of your kids even when it’s hard. Even when you feel like you’re losing. Even when the watch says you should be somewhere you’re not.

That kid sees his dad do hard things and not quit.

That’s the whole lesson.

The Question Worth Asking

What scoreboard are you using right now?

And did you actually choose it?

Or did you absorb it from a peer group, a family expectation, a version of success you decided to chase before you knew what you actually valued?

Because here’s what I’ve learned from years of coaching athletes and entrepreneurs through hard seasons:

The moments that feel the most like losing are almost always mid race.

Not the end.

Not failure.

Just a climb you didn’t see coming on a course that’s longer and harder and more worth finishing than anything you originally signed up for.

Keep your eyes up.

You’re still in it.

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Most ambitious people are running toward something they don’t actually want.

Not because they’re stupid. Because they never stopped to ask whose finish line they were running toward.

I watched it happen in real time a few weeks ago.

The Confession

I hosted a private retreat here in Boulder.

One founder. Two days. Four sessions.

By the end of day one, we weren’t talking about strategy anymore.

We were pulling thread on something more uncomfortable.

“Where do your standards actually come from?”

Not what are your standards. Where did they come from.

He went quiet for a second.

Then he started talking about his dad.

Who talked about American education and business success like it was religion. Who drilled the expectation in so deep that his son spent the next twenty years trying to live up to it without ever questioning whether he actually wanted to.

When this guy got into Harvard Business School, his dad’s response was: “Where did you get the idea that we were going to pursue that and actually get in?”

His dad didn’t even remember planting the seed.

The son ran toward a finish line his father didn’t know he’d drawn.

I didn’t say anything for a second.

Because I knew exactly what he was talking about.

Growing up, my family had a hero.

My uncle.

Ivy League school. Wall Street. Making it big in a way that made every report card feel like a subtle audition.

Nobody ever said be like him.

They didn’t have to.

The way people talked about him said everything.

The reverence in the room when his name came up. The way certain accomplishments got celebrated and others got a polite nod. The invisible scorecard that I absorbed without ever being handed it.

I spent years running toward a version of success that was never mine to begin with.

The Reframe That Changed Everything

We were listing his warning words.

The patterns that pull him out of his best self.

Prestige came up as a candidate.

He sat with it.

Then said: “It’s not prestige. It’s belonging.”

That’s the whole game right there.

Prestige is what belonging looks like from the outside.

When you don’t feel like you fit into your family’s expectations, your peer group, your industry — you reach for the signal.

The credential. The company name on the resume. The finish time that makes people say, “damn, that’s impressive.”

But here’s the thing nobody tells you.

Signals don’t satisfy the underlying need.

They just raise the bar for the next signal.

So you chase harder.

Instead of the business school acceptance, it’s getting into YPO.

Instead of starting the company you dreamed of, it’s exiting for an amount that looks impressive.

And meanwhile, the gap between what you have and what would finally feel like enough stays exactly the same size.

I’ve seen this pattern destroy people who look extremely successful from the outside.

The Test

Here’s how you know which one you’re chasing.

Ask yourself this:

Does the building feel like enough?

Not the outcome. Not the exit. Not the moment people finally take it seriously.

The actual daily act of building it.

I’m building Maple Boost right now.

It’s not a multimillion dollar company yet. But I think it can be. And I’m working toward that.

But I’m not waiting on that number to feel like I belong.

I belong because I’m in the game.

Jack Jack stealing stickers in the kitchen while I pack orders.

Hiring local kids and teaching them what it actually looks like to build something from nothing.

Taking risks and putting myself in rooms with people I can learn from.

My hands are in it. My family is in it. My heart is in it.

The mission is real to me right now, at this size, today.

That’s the test.

Prestige needs the outcome to validate the effort.

Belonging makes the effort worth it regardless of the outcome.

If you’re building something and the only thing that will make it feel real is when it gets big enough for other people to notice, that’s a warning sign.

If you’re building something and the daily act of building it feels like the most like yourself you’ve ever been, that’s belonging.

That’s the thing worth protecting.

What This Looks Like in Endurance Sports

A few years ago I was training a group of 13 athletes for Zion 100.

Early in the training block, three hour runs started showing up on the plans.

The race was still months away. No one watching.

Just a long slow effort on a Saturday in December with nothing to show for it afterward.

Three people tapped out right there.

They wanted to have run 100 miles. They didn’t want to run 100 miles.

That gap exposed itself on a random Saturday morning and they were gone.

The remaining 10 made it to the start line.

Only 3 finished.

But here’s the thing.

Every single one of the 10 came away from that experience with something the 3 who tapped out never got.

Belonging.

Shared suffering. Unexpected breakthroughs. The kind of bond that only forms when people go through something real together.

The finisher medal didn’t create that.

The experience did.

Prestige lives at the finish line.

Belonging lives in the miles that get you there.

And sometimes in the miles that don’t.

The Actual Fix

This isn’t a case for wanting less.

It’s a case for getting brutally honest about the origin of what you want.

Pull the thread on your standards. Where did they come from? Whose approval were you trying to earn when you first set them? Are those people even in your life anymore?

Because once you find the thing that’s actually yours - the mission, the work, the identity that feels like home - you feel a shift.

You stop performing ambition. You stop chasing prestige.

You just start moving.

And the gap that never seemed to close no matter how much you achieved?

It doesn’t close. It disappears.

Not because you got more.

Because you finally stopped chasing the wrong thing.

Most people will read this and nod.

Then go back to chasing the wrong thing anyway.

If that's not you, forward this to someone who needs to hear it.

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I went because something has bothered me for years.

How do the same people keep showing up in winning brands?

• Kane.

• Ketone IQ.

• Ten Thousand.

• and a dozen others.

Different products. Same people. Same outcomes.

At some point, it stops being luck.

So I went to figure out what they’re actually good at.

Not the Instagram version. Not the buzzword version.

I treated the weekend like a field study.

• I watched how content actually gets produced.

• I asked what brands actually pay for when they sponsor events.

• I tried to understand what a company like Maple Boost needs at this stage, and what the next level looks like.

These are the notes I came home with.

Lesson 1: Content Is The Currency, Not Reach.

I walked in thinking follower count was the leverage.

It’s not.

The leverage is content infrastructure.

Brian Mazza doesn’t “create content.”

He runs an operating system.

Here’s how the event works.

A two-person content team shoots the entire weekend.

But they’re not there for the vibes and recap reels.

They’re there for the brands.

They capture.

• clean, staged product shots

• real-use action shots

• Short, tasteful testimonial clips filmed in the moment (pre-run, post-workout)

Everything gets delivered raw and edited into individual brand folders inside a shared Drive.

This is what the system looks like in practice.

Here’s the part I had wrong.

I assumed brand content was a side effect.

It’s not. It’s the whole point.

Attendees get photos. The event gets documented.

But brand partnerships are treated as the priority, not logo placement.

This was the leverage.

Then there’s what happens off the event.

The at-home content system.

I asked Brian how this part works.

The same two-person team goes to his house twice a month.

A few hours. Tight focus.

Same principles:

• Product shots.

• Real-use footage.

• Testimonials recorded with structure. Multiple hooks. Pain points. Clear CTAs.

Then came the detail that made everything click.

Whitelabel ads.

Brands don’t just receive content to post on their page.

They get access to run ads directly through the creator’s Meta account.

That removes the manual lift for the creator while giving brands immediate distribution.

Layer that with:

• Monthly posting commitments

• In-person events

• Community access

• Affiliate commissions

This isn’t free gear.

It’s a full-stack partnership.

Lesson 2: Events Are Distribution Engines

HPLT isn’t just an event.

It’s a distribution engine that happens to take place over a weekend.

The event compresses four things that usually take months to build:

1. Content creation.

2. Community activation.

3. Trust transfer.

4. Distribution.

All of it, concentrated in two days.

From the brand’s perspective, this is what they’re actually buying.

They get:

• Community-generated content in real environments.

• Direct access to a trusted audience.

• Raw and edited media they can reuse for months.

• Testimonials captured when people actually care.

Once I saw this, something clicked.

I’ve already done this.

At Chattanooga 70.3, we ran the same system.

We had structured Google Drive folders for:

• Race Day content

• Quillkeepers

• Chunk of Love

The only difference?

The brands were mine and my brother’s. Not outside sponsors.

The infrastructure was already there.

I just hadn’t seen it as real leverage.

Lesson 3: Brand Partnerships Aren’t Sponsorships

This lesson came from a mindset flip I didn’t realize I needed.

I kept asking the wrong question.

Why would a brand give us free product if neither I nor our athletes are likely driving sales just by posting?

That question assumes brands care about reach.

But they don’t.

What Bobby helped me see is that brands care about access.

His job isn’t convincing brands to sponsor events.

It’s helping them get closer to real people inside real communities.

The value equation changed.

Here’s what brands actually get from a well-run event:

• Community-generated content, not influencer content

• An email list tied to a real experience

• Raw and edited media they can reuse across ads, email, and social

• Live testimonials in real use cases

Someone wearing Kanes after a 70.3 or an ultra is worth more to a brand than a random customer filming a video in their kitchen.

That kind of content is hard to manufacture.

Events make it easy.

I was thinking in terms of audience size.

The correct lens is content quality and context.

Once I understood that, the model changed.

I’m not asking brands to take a chance on Tribal.

I’m offering them something they can’t buy from ads alone.

How This Changed the Way I See Our Events

Once that clicked, I immediately saw how this applied to Tribal Team Races.

These aren’t sponsorships. They’re lifestyle support.

I told Bobby about last weekend’s Team Ultra and, in about 20 seconds, rattled off partner ideas:

• Men’s Journal for writing workshops

• Sleep masks in shared rooms

• Socks on race day

• Recovery shoes at the finish

• Recovery creams the next day

None of it would feel forced. It would improve the experience.

Brand partnerships aren’t about pushing products.

They’re about reinforcing the lifestyle your community already lives.

When it’s done right, it doesn’t feel like marketing.

It feels like care.

Lesson 4: Access Collapses Friction

This is the real value of an event like HPLT.

• Not the talks.

• Not the workouts.

• Not even the content.

It’s access.

Most partnerships are hard for one reason.

You’re starting cold.

In a room like this, that friction disappears.

You’re not an inbox.

You’re a person in the room.

This is what access actually looks like.

Over one weekend, I had conversations with:

• Founders running scaled brands

• Operators managing national activations

• People running events right here in Boulder

• Decision-makers for brands that align with Tribal

That changes the equation.

You’re no longer breaking in.

You’re already inside. The conversation starts on third base.

Once you see that, the ticket price stops feeling expensive.

It starts feeling like permission to play a different game.

Why This Matters for Tribal

Tribal doesn’t need mass exposure right now.

It needs aligned relationships.

• Founders.

• Operators.

• Event builders.

People who understand how brands integrate into real experiences.

Events like this don’t just teach you how the system works.

They introduce you to the people already running it.

And that only happens if you’re in the room.

But over the years, I’ve learned a different way to handle big efforts.

A few years ago, ran 200 ultramarathons in 200 days.

When she finished, everyone expected her to shut it down.

Instead, she ran a marathon on Day 201. Then she slowly reduced volume. Ten miles a day. Then five.

Then she kept a five-mile-per-day streak for over a year.

This weekend at the HPLT Summit, she shared what she calls a “reverse taper.”

An abrupt stop after sustained effort can cause a healing crisis.

I’ve seen the same thing happen in business, leadership, and identity shifts.

Especially right after momentum peaks.

And it’s exactly how I got to Brian Mazza’s HPLT Summit in the first place.

What Not Stopping Looked Like

The weekend before the summit, we ran our Tribal Team Ultra: Oracle Rumble 50-miler in Tucson, AZ.

Full team house. 13 athletes. Leadership and mindset workshops. Bible studies. Team meals.

Then we ran 50 miles through the desert.

It was the kind of breakthrough experience that’s easy to sit in for a while.

I flew home Monday and thought about how nice it would be to relax.

But there was huge momentum to capitalize on:

• Launch the 2027 Team Ultra

• Book and sell the Team House experience

• Fill Maple Boost the night before the summit

But it wasn’t just “grind it out.”

I wanted to chill. To soak up the 50 mile and team accomplishment and take my foot off the gas.

I even caught myself thinking:

“Fuck. I know they don’t do refunds.”

I’ve learned this about myself:

When I extend effort slightly after a peak, a small amount of work creates a massive return.

So I kept going.

How I Even Ended Up There

A few weeks earlier, I was in Miami at Josh Payne’s company offsite.

I’d flown down, hosted team-building workshops and workouts, and spent the weekend serving in a 1-on-1 capacity.

By any reasonable standard, it was a huge win.

I could have mailed Friday in as a travel day. Coasted on the momentum. Let it settle.

Instead, I chose to keep riding the wave.

A new Tribal application came in while I was going through airport security, and before I was at my gate, I was on a sales call.

Once I was on the plane and the wifi kicked on, I did what I’ve learned matters most after a good outcome.

I kept momentum alive by connecting with people.

On the final morning, Josh and I were post-run talking Maple Boost as we packed our bags.

Josh gave me very simple and clear advice:

“You need to leverage other people’s audiences.”

• Get on podcasts.

• Send free product.

He rattled off a few names of key players in the health and wellness supplement space.

One of them was Brian Mazza.

Now here’s the strange part.

I had already been doing some of this.

The difference was urgency.

I’d gotten Sahil Bloom to use Maple Boost during his 35-mile Misogi run, and he gave great feedback. But I was still moving slowly.

When Josh said it, I treated it like marching orders.

I’ve noticed a simple rule I follow.

When someone ahead of me gives me advice, I act on it immediately.

So once I got on the plane’s wifi, I sent DMs to ten people I already knew who had real audiences, offering to send Maple Boost.

Then I took a leap and messaged Brian. He replied instantly.

"Are you in Boulder?”

“Yes”

“Why don’t you come to the summit? Bring the product. Have people test them. Feb 5-7”

I was in.

There was just one detail I hadn’t accounted for.

The ticket was $3,000.

The brand package normally costs $10,000+, but he offered to let me bring Maple Boost and talk about it without paying for that upgrade.

I’d actually looked at the summit weeks earlier and passed because of the price.

Following Josh’s advice put me face-to-face with the thing I’d been secretly avoiding:

Getting in a room with real players in the health and wellness CPG space.

A few messages later, I was looped into a text thread with Brian’s ops person. An invoice hit my phone.

I had $2,700 in the Maple Boost bank account. Paying this would wipe out every dollar of profit so far, and then some.

The three zero zero zero stared back at me like a black iron gate in front of a version of business I’d always assumed was out of reach for me.

I hesitated.

Then I told myself the truth:

“This is where the old version of me would stop moving forward.”

If Maple Boost died tomorrow and all the effort so far only got me into a room like this, it still would’ve been worth it.

I sent the money.

What I Wanted Going In

I went into the summit with two clear goals.

First, I wanted to see how Brian runs events.

I wanted to understand the operating system and the brand partnerships.

That part happened exactly how I expected.

I watched how everything worked - from pre-summit comms to welcome packages to workouts to meals to speaking sessions.

I was a sponge.

The second thing I wanted was help with Maple Boost.

That part didn’t happen the way I thought it would.

And that mattered.

What I Didn’t Get (and What I Did)

Here’s the part most founders won’t admit.

I thought giving up a few percent of the company could buy me relief and easy growth.

That was the fantasy.

Anyway, that didn’t happen.

Instead, what I got was certainty.

I don’t want to build Maple Boost living out in front of my skis, always stressed about cashflow, going too big too fast.

I don’t want a brand that exists entirely on spreadsheets, outsourced manufacturers, and fulfillment centers I never see.

I want to build this with patience, consistency, and durability.

Through real relationships.

With my family involved.

My vision is a place in Boulder where Maple Boost lives physically.

• A ranch my family lives on.

• A small warehouse or facility.

• A casual coffee stop for bike rides.

A space where my hands are still in the business.

Packing and shipping orders. Letting Jack Jack steal stickers. Hiring people to help me run it while teaching them how to build something real.

Creating opportunity instead of automating it away.

That’s not the fastest path.

But it’s an evolution of the path I’m already on.

And I want to stay on it because I already find it fulfilling.

How I Think About Continuation

After any peak effort, there’s a narrow window where stopping feels responsible.

That’s usually the exact moment where continuation has the highest return.

The Real Lesson

Going to HPLT wasn’t another peak effort.

It was a continuation of a much longer journey.

Like Candice’s reverse taper, growth doesn’t come from going hard and then stopping.

It comes from intentional continuation.

Not pushing harder.

Just refusing to stop.

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I pressed end on the call and glanced at the clock.

9:07 a.m.

I’d been up since 5.

Back to back work. Morning dad duty. Hand-off to my wife for nanny drop-off. A coaching call squeezed in between.

This was the first quiet breath of the day.

And I had exactly 53 minutes before my next call that kicked off a full afternoon of client work and business building.

I also had a 45 minute run on my plan.

There was enough time to get it in.

But if I hesitated - even a little - I’d miss my shot.

My mind immediately started making its case.

• You need to hydrate.

• You need to change.

• You should probably make food after.

• You’ve got more calls back-to-back.

• Then kiddo pickup.

• Then dinner.

Can I even fit this in?

What if I just do it tomorrow?

My mind was in a full-on hostage negotiation.

And I’ve learned something about negotiating with doubt.

It keeps me standing still.

So instead of solving it, I moved.

Fast.

• Shorts.

• Socks.

• Shoes.

• Heart rate strap.

All on in under a minute.

I threw my hat on backward. Out the door.

By the time my brain caught up, I was already running.

Speed silenced my doubt.

Hesitation Is The Real Problem

I see this pattern everywhere now.

• In training.

• In business.

• In creative work.

People don’t hesitate because they’re lazy.

They hesitate because they let doubt drive the car.

• They wait for clarity.

• They wait for confidence.

• They wait for conditions.

But clarity doesn’t come first.

Speed does.

Speed Protects Fragile Ideas

In the fall of 2024, I went through David Perrell’s Write of Passage cohort.

Best writing program on the internet.

I got a scholarship and took it seriously.

Toward the end of the program, a crazy thought landed:

I can teach this too.

Not someday. Not after another year. Not after a certification.

Right now.

That was the dangerous moment.

Because that’s when doubt showed up pretending to be wisdom.

“Are you ready?”
”How are you going to teach this?”
”What if no one shows up?”

I’ve learned the success of an idea has little to do with the idea itself.

It has everything to do with how fast you move on it.

So I moved before my doubts had time to catch up.

On December 31, 2024, I posted the launch for the Tribal Writers Workshop.

No perfect funnel. No polished sales page.

Just forward motion and simple organization around an idea I was willing to act on.

Once I moved, something unexpected happened.

The fear went quiet.

Not because I reassured myself. It was the opposite. Now I had to actually do the thing.

But now I had real problems to solve.

Okay, there’s interest.
What do these people actually want help with?

I need a simple intake form.
A few questions. Nothing fancy.

The call is scheduled.
How do I want to run it?

Do I build prompts?
Do I put them on slides?
Do we workshop live or write quietly first?

Once I was in motion, there were endless ways to get my hands dirty building the thing.

The part of my mind that told me I couldn’t do it was quiet.

Not permanently defeated. Just muted.

Because I had real problems to solve.

It Still Felt Like A House Of Cards

The launch didn’t feel clean in the moment.

It looks obvious in hindsight. Simple and straightforward.

At the time, it felt fragile.

Like every decision mattered too much.

Like the wrong call time, the wrong prompt, the wrong framing could crush my dream. In public.

That’s what doubt does.

It tries to convince you that motion is dangerous.

Turns out standing still is the only real risk.

Over a year later, the Tribal Writers Workshop has evolved into Tribal Quillkeepers.

More than a dozen guys inside Tribal have launched Substacks, Podcasts, YouTube channels, and public writing projects through it.

And it’s generated over $10k of annual recurring revenue.

None of that was visible on day one.

None of it could have been planned.

If I had waited to feel ready, there’s a good chance none of it exists.

Saying Yes Before Certainty

Once I started trusting speed, this pattern showed up everywhere.

• Running a 50K with less than 24 hours notice to create Tribal’s first team ultra

• Stepping into offsite speaking opportunities on short notice without over-preparing

• Committing to Brian Mazza’s HPLT Summit as a Maple Boost sponsor before I could fully justify it

(The HLPT Summit is next week. I’ll share what comes of it.)

None of these decisions felt comfortable.

All of them felt aligned.

And that’s when it clicked.

Speed wasn’t recklessness.

Speed was faith in motion.

This lesson didn’t just help me.

I’ve watched it unlock people around me.

The best example is Phil Lee launching his spice business, ENAK Seasonings.

Going from homemade samples to manufactured product in 3 months. Leaving his W-2 within a year.

It wasn’t that he eliminated fear.

It was that he moved so fast he forgot his doubts existed.

He was busy finding manufacturers, making purchase orders, organizing fulfillment, and more.

Speed unlocked real skills that fear would have kept dormant.

Action Turns Anxiety Into Information

There’s a reason action feels calming.

This isn’t motivational fluff. It’s physiological.

Anxiety thrives on inaction.

The moment you act, your nervous system gets feedback.

You’re no longer spiraling in fight or flight hypotheticals.

You’re responding to reality.

That’s why nerves disappear once the gun goes off.

• Once the meeting starts.

• Once the email is sent.

• Once your feet hit the ground.

Action creates information.

And information turns fear into something workable.

Waiting Is the Trap

The people who struggle most aren’t unmotivated.

They’re stuck waiting.

• Waiting to feel ready.

• Waiting to feel confident.

• Waiting for the perfect window.

But the window never opens.

You just learn to run through it.

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Get to the big waterfall.

It’s about two miles from our house.

Jack Jack started squealing immediately.

“We’re going to the big waterfall!”

Over and over. Full joy.

We didn’t make it far before the excitement multiplied.

“Ooo — are we going into the circle neighborhood?”

“Yeah!”

“Ooo — a fire hydrant!”

“Yeah!”

“Are we going to cross the train tracks?”

“We are!”

“Ooo — the big red barn! ANOTHER big red barn!”

Each one became the moment.

By the time we reached the waterfall, it was just the cherry on top.

That ride quietly reset how I move towards excitement.

As a dad, I stopped trying to manufacture joy at some end point. I stopped treating the destination like the reward.

Because here’s what I noticed:

The fun wasn’t at the waterfall.

It was in motion.

• In naming things.

• In paying attention.

• In celebrating what was already happening.

The Airport Makes This Obvious

Last fall, I watched the same pattern play out again.

My wife, Jack Jack, and I flew to Nice, France for the Ironman World Championships.

France was the headline. World Champs was the story people would ask about.

Jack Jack was two. He didn’t know what any of that meant.

He was excited about the airport.

He loved his Busy Busy Airport book. And he was about to be inside it.

• Packing bags.

• Driving to the airport.

• Parking and riding the shuttle.

• Scanning tickets.

• Riding the tram.

• Airplanes everywhere.

We talked to TSA agents. Loaded bins together. Ran laps on the moving walkways. Watched luggage carts on the tarmac. Pointed out planes getting loaded.

It didn’t feel like we were waiting to get to our gate.

It felt like magic.

The Destination Was Never the Point

Here’s the part I didn’t expect.

That posture didn’t stay confined to fatherhood.

It followed me when I started traveling alone too.

Lines stopped feeling like obstacles. Security stopped feeling like something to get through. I didn’t need conditions to be ideal to feel calm.

Eventually, something even stranger happened.

I stopped evaluating moments as ideal or not ideal at all.

I stopped scanning the environment for how easy it would make my life.

I just moved through it.

Unbothered.

This is why TSA PreCheck is for suckers.

Because most people treat airports like obstacle courses.

• Get through security as fast as possible.

• Get to the gate.

• Then you can finally relax.

They think peace lives on the other side of efficiency.

But watch them.

The people sprinting to save five minutes are still tense once they save them.

They skip one line just to stand in another.

Peace of mind is always waiting at the next checkpoint.

Which means it never actually arrives.

Not having TSA PreCheck isn’t about preferring the long way.

It’s about choosing to enjoy whatever way unfolds.

• Long line.

• Short line.

• No line.

It doesn’t matter.

If I’m alone, I enjoy the stillness.

If I’m with my family, the line becomes part of the experience.

Signs. Lights. Conversations with airport workers.

I’m not trying to get through the process.

I’m bringing it to life.

Kids don’t live at the destination.

They live in transitions.

In noticing. In naming what’s happening right now.

Like gasping that the moon is still out when I buckle Jack Jack into his car seat at 8 a.m.

Or stopping everything to say “come look!” at the bunny sitting in the yard. The same bunny that’s there every day.

Somewhere along the way, adults train that joy out of themselves.

We start believing life happens after the checkpoint.

• After the line.

• After the arrival.

• After the finish line.

It doesn’t.

Calm doesn’t live there.

Calm lives in being unbothered by whatever is happening right in front of you.

That’s the real upgrade.

Not TSA PreCheck. Not short lines. Not leaving your shoes on.

Once you have that, perspective changes.

You are never late.

You don’t feel behind.

You refuse to be rushed.

You move with ease.

And that’s when you realize the uncomfortable truth.

It was never about skipping the line.

It was that you forgot how to stand still.

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I learned this by getting it wrong first.

Last year, I decided to learn how to hunt.

I also briefly convinced myself it could become a business.

I didn’t grow up hunting. No family tradition. No built-in knowledge.

Just years of consuming Cam Hanes content and a growing interest in sourcing my own meat.

Luckily, I became family friends with a guy who’s obsessed with hunting. He does it the “old school” way and had real interest in teaching people like me.

This wasn’t about booking an elk hunt, paying a few thousand dollars, and being driven around on ATVs.

It started with land conservation. Understanding animal migration patterns. Seasonal rhythms. Habitat.

Real Teddy Roosevelt stuff.

I was hooked.

We spent a lot of time one-on-one.

Classroom learning first. Then time at the range. Then trips to the gun store.

I went to hunter safety school, got my license, and within weeks I was tip-toe sprinting through the woods, holding my breath, trying to cut off a buck that had just vanished over a ridge.

It was the exact interest-to-experience arc I’d dreamed of.

And along the way, something else happened.

We felt momentum.

We realized there were other guys like me. Men who were interested in hunting but didn’t grow up around it. No on-ramp. No clear path in.

It felt aligned with everything else I was already building around endurance, outdoor adventure, self-reliance, and growth.

So naturally, I thought:

Maybe this could become something more.

We planned to turn my experience into a repeatable three-day retreat. Something we could generate revenue from.

In my head, this was going to be one of those “of course this works” ideas.

I told myself I was prepared.

I already host events. I organize in-person experiences. I’ve seen what works and what doesn’t.

But I made a familiar mistake.

I assumed adjacent experience meant transferable leverage.

When Alignment Isn’t Enough

The idea was simple on paper.

A three-day experience:

• Day 1: classroom fundamentals

• Day 2: range work

• Day 3: a guided duck hunt

An on-ramp for beginners. Education, experience, confidence.

We even ran a no-cost Day 1 with two local guys. And it was great.

Then reality showed up.

Scheduling became messy. Coordinating multiple days was hard. Getting people to commit early was harder.

Facilitating the experience felt natural.

Marketing, selling, and planning it required far more attention than I expected.

And that’s when it clicked.

Just because something is aligned doesn’t mean it’s easy to turn into a business.

I wasn’t failing at hunting. I was succeeding at learning it.

What failed was my assumption that curiosity and momentum would naturally turn into a clean, revenue-generating offer.

I confused curiosity and momentum with a viable revenue stream.

What the Experience Became Instead

Once I stopped trying to force it into a business, the experience made sense again.

It became:

• A personal frontier

• A credibility builder

• A story I could share honestly

• Proof that I keep stepping into new things, even as a beginner

It didn’t need to carry revenue. It didn’t need to become a core offer. It didn’t need to scale.

It strengthened the main thing instead of becoming the main thing.

That distinction matters more than it sounds.

Not everything interesting in your life is supposed to become a product.

The Pattern I See Everywhere

That pattern shows up everywhere.

I’ve been working through something similar recently with a client who’s been creating consistently and is now on the brink of building revenue around the value he brings.

He has real interest in monetizing his work.

He’s built a strong creative foundation. He publishes. He has readers and listeners who resonate deeply with his message.

But like many creators, he’s hit a familiar plateau.

Not because he lacks creativity. Not because he needs more content.

But because the next constraint isn’t creative anymore.

It’s business.

More specifically, it’s internet business - where followers and views feel like progress until you try to turn them into something real.

This is the game I’ve been playing for the last seven years.

I’ve watched people build momentum, stall, pivot, and start over - usually blaming the idea, the platform, or the timing.

It’s almost never that.

I know because I did the same thing.

Here’s what’s actually happening.

The Creator → Builder Bridge

I started using a simple exercise I now call The Creator → Builder Bridge.

The goal isn’t to rush into monetization or force an offer.

It’s to take inventory.

Step 1: Creative Skill Inventory

List all the creative skills you’ve built since you started publishing online.

For example:

• Writing (short and long form).

• Solo podcasting. Guest interviews.

• Filming. Editing. Publishing. (YouTube, Reels, One-Take Videos)

• Storytelling. Turning everyday experiences into lessons.

Most people underestimate how much they’ve already trained here.

If you want to be precise, break this down by format or platform. But don’t overthink it.

Step 2: Group the Skills

Now group those skills into four buckets:

• Expression — clarifying what you think and believe

• Distribution — consistently getting your work out

• Audience Building — turning attention into real relationships

• Authority Signaling — earning trust through experience and process

If you’ve been creating at all, you probably have strength in all four.

That’s not the issue.

Step 3: Business Skill Inventory

Next, list the skills you’ve built around actually creating and selling something:

• Identifying a problem worth paying for

• Packaging a clear solution

• Pricing

• Finishing and shipping an offer

• Making a direct ask

• Handling rejection or no response

• Enrolling people

• Running a program

• Getting feedback and improving the process

For many creators, this list is short. Or empty.

That doesn’t make you a failure. But it does explain why things feel stuck.

And why a new creative path suddenly looks so appealing.

Side note (worth noticing):

Once you see this, you’ll start noticing how many people online have impressive followings but little real business behind them.

Their content gets engagement. Their audience looks big.

In endurance spaces, they post solid race results and look like an authority.

But behind the scenes, there’s no book of clients.

No repeat customers. No real-world experience serving and working with others.

Here’s what I’ve learned:

Be careful chasing someone else’s creative success if your actual goal is business.

One well-trained business skill can leapfrog years of content momentum in the metrics that actually matter.

Why This Gap Matters

Shipping creative work feels terrifying in the beginning.

You worry about judgment. About sounding dumb. About people you know in real life discovering the strange things you suddenly care about online.

Eventually, you get over that.

Business skills are the next wall.

They make you vulnerable. You have to ask. You will hear “no.”

Sometimes that sucks.

But you know what’s worse?

Wanting more freedom, more revenue, more leverage - and telling yourself the answer is a new creative mission.

It isn’t.

You need online business skills.

Lower the Bar, Raise the Execution

The answer isn’t to suddenly become “salesy” or overhaul everything.

It’s to get into real conversations with people who are already interested in your work and explore how you can actually help them.

Lower the bar on what building needs to look like.

Raise the execution on serving real people.

What my hunting experience taught me is this:

Not every aligned interest needs to become a business.

Sometimes the work isn’t creating something new.

It’s sharpening the skills required to support and grow what’s already working.

A Question Worth Sitting With

If you’re publishing online and want your work to generate income, ask yourself:

Am I building things that look good and feel productive?

Or am I connecting with real people and helping solve real problems?

One feels good. The other creates impact.

You don’t need to fix it today.

But seeing that difference clearly is how you start crossing the bridge.

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No thread or summary. Just a passing reference.

Within ten seconds, it was already in my Amazon cart.

In my head, the story was already written.

This is it.

This is the book that’s going to help me stop operating under pressure.

This is the book that’s going to loosen the grip of goals and expectations.

This is the book that’s going to let me feel free to create without risk.

Side note: I’ve done this before. With other books.

And somehow I keep falling for it.

Which is ridiculous, because I already know the only book that actually gives me those things.

(The Bible. Every time. I still forget this.)

Tiny Experiments showed up two days later.

I never opened it.

It sat on my desk for months. Spine uncracked. Pages still crisp.

And somehow, I still got what I needed out of it.

The realization

Just seeing the title was enough.

Tiny experiments.

Small bets. Low pressure. Nothing permanent.

Learn something true. Decide what to do next.

Without realizing it, I had already been running them.

Quillkeepers

Earlier this year, I launched a writing program inside Tribal.

I love writing.

Guys inside Tribal write. Or at least like the idea of writing.

And after taking David Perell’s Write of Passage course in Fall 2024, I had the extremely dangerous thought:

“I can teach this too.”

At the time, I didn’t think of it as an experiment.

It felt like a calling.

A pull toward something creative that had been quietly building for years.

Here’s what I got wrong.

I thought I was testing whether people wanted it.

In reality, I was testing whether I did.

Week after week, I found myself lighting up during the same moments.

• Pulling ideas out of people.

• Helping them untangle a half-formed thought.

• Turning a vague dream into one small, concrete action they could take today.

That part felt natural. Energizing. Euphoric.

What drained me was everything else.

• Chasing people who weren’t creating.

• Dragging momentum forward.

• Convincing people to show up when they hadn’t decided the work mattered yet.

The experiment surfaced a truth I couldn’t unsee.

I love coaching creative work. I don’t love carrying people who aren’t committed to creating.

That clarity alone made the experiment a success.

And it’s shaping exactly what Quillkeepers becomes in 2026.

Maple Boost

Maple Boost started differently.

It wasn’t born from identity. Identity eventually wove into it.

But it started more like a thorn in my side. Questions that kept surfacing:

“Do you have what it takes?”

“Can you build a product business that scales beyond you?”

“Can you deal with inventory, shipping, packaging, margins - all of it?”

Some parts surprised me.

I love iteration. Packaging decisions. Storytelling.

Getting customer feedback. Shipping something real into the world.

Talking about a physical product feels fundamentally different than talking about my Tribal services.

It’s more objective.

There’s a lower barrier to trying it.

The pain points it solves are easier to see too. (Like shitting behind a tree in your neighborhood). Easier to measure.

Other parts were exhausting.

Operations friction. Supply chain delays. Automation workflows refusing to sync into place.

The Maple Boost experiment showed me something I didn’t fully expect.

I love having a real product to share with the world.

• Not a digital product.

• Not a service reframed as a product.

• A hold-it-in-your-hands kind of thing.

It feels honest and true to me.

Talking about it’s benefits feels natural, because they’re concrete.

• You either like the taste or you don’t

• Your gut feels light, or you’re still crouched behind a tree

Maple Boost also clarified the other side of the equation.

It’s taught me exactly which business problems I enjoy solving - and which ones I don’t want to live inside.

Running it well means playing offense against my weaknesses.

Designing the business so those responsibilities are the first things I outsource when the time is right.

Experiments that missed

Not every experiment clarified through success.

Some clarified through friction.

Tribal Trail Fest was one of those.

It was supposed to be a big, family-focused gathering in Colorado.

In my head, it felt generous. Expansive. Meaningful.

In reality, it stressed me out.

Recruiting became a job. Logistics multiplied. The thing I thought would feel life-giving started to feel heavy.

So I pivoted.

Smaller. Simpler. Built around the people who were already coming.

That shift revealed the lesson.

I don’t enjoy planning large, destination-style experiences.

I do enjoy building something exceptional around one or two people already in motion.

The same thing happened with Ironman California.

After three years at Ironman Florida, I thought changing locations would re-energize the team.

I noticed some interest in California. A little Florida fatigue.

And I wanted to give our west coast athletes something closer to home.

I also wanted to prove I could “refresh” something that didn’t need refreshing.

The result was not what I expected.

Attendance dropped. Momentum was harder to build. Guys I assumed would race didn’t.

I thought the change would expand what was possible.

Instead, it clarified what actually works.

Driving distance matters. You can’t force an Ironman every year.

Anchoring to races people are already doing works far better than trying to manufacture excitement from scratch.

So next year, we’re going back to where it all began.

Ironman Florida with and the Do Hard Things group.

It’s familiar, aligned, and already in motion.

Both of these experiments failed for the same reason.

I was trying to manufacture momentum instead of joining it.

Where the experiments did work

What made Trail Fest and Ironman California frustrating was friction without momentum.

I felt blocked.

And once I saw that, a few counterexamples snapped into focus.

In February, two guys reached out about coming to Colorado to train.

No grand plan. No event page. No big vision.

They were already coming.

So I said yes and wrapped intention around it.

We turned it into a Run. Write. Build. Training Camp.

Runs, writing, structure, shared meals.

It worked immediately.

Not because it was perfectly designed. Because it already had motion.

The experiment wasn’t “can I create demand.”

It was “can I amplify something that’s already alive.”

Same thing in September.

A group of athletes were already signed up for Prairie on Fire backyard ultra.

I wasn’t running in it. I wasn’t organizing it. I wasn’t recruiting for it.

I just showed up to coach at the event for the first time.

I brought intention. Guidance. Helped guys think clearly when things got hard.

That experience was deeply energizing.

And it revealed the pattern I’d been missing.

The actual rule

The experiments that worked best didn’t start with me trying to manufacture momentum from scratch.

They started with momentum already present.

• People already traveling.

• Something already happening.

My role wasn’t to create the thing. It was to enter it and elevate it.

When I try to build from zero, I feel like watering a tree with no roots.

When I join something already in motion, growth takes care of itself.

That’s the real lesson Tiny Experiments surfaced for me.

Pay attention to where energy already exists.
Step into it early.
Add structure, intention, and care.
Let the experiment bring more of you out in the process.

I never read Tiny Experiments.

But it changed how I see the year.

None of these were bets on big outcomes. They were ways to move closer to truth.

• What gives me energy

• What quietly drains me

• What I want more of

• What I’m done forcing

I don’t need every experiment to succeed.

I just need them to tell me the truth.

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