Dave: 00:00

Okay. We are back. I just have to, remember how to do this. Welcome back to the Chase Summit Trail Talk podcast. I'm your host, Dave.

Dave: 00:09

As you probably know, if you're watching this, if you if you didn't know that and you stumbled here by accident, this is my podcast where I talk about all things fitness tech, wearables, ultra running, GPS watches, and whatever else may be tickling my fancy on a given week. I actually hate that phrase, but I just used it. So today, I'm gonna look at my notes here because I'm very organized. We've got a few things going on. 1st, I wanna do a quick recap on the big Alta 50 k that I raced a few weeks ago at this point.

Dave: 00:40

Talk about what's coming up in terms of, racing for me and for my wife, which is pretty exciting. We're gonna talk about some interesting turns of events at this year's, Barclay Marathons, which was kinda crazy. And if you don't know what the Barclay is, I'll cover that as well. We're We're gonna talk about the Grit X2 Pro, which is a watch I'm wearing on my wrist right now, that's unreleased and I already did a review about it, but I do wanna talk a little bit more about it. We're gonna talk about my experience with the Ultrahuman M1 Live and, some of the other stuff I'm testing as well.

Dave: 01:16

And in between all of that, there will be a considerable amount of banter and unrelated topics because that is what I do here. I apologize. I'm adjusting my mic arm and it probably just came through on the recording. With that, let's dive in. So before we talk about all that fun stuff, couple of things.

Dave: 01:36

First of all, I've totally revamped the chase to summit website. It has been completely overhauled. I spent way too much time on it. In short, I basically moved it from Squarespace to Shopify because Shopify is a little bit better for like selling stuff, which is kinda what the website's there for. And on top of there being a new website, there is also going to be a bunch of new merchant.

Dave: 02:03

And as you can see what I'm wearing right now, I've got a, prototype, chase the summit hoodie. This will be coming in the merch store very soon. I think I'm gonna actually eliminate the white on it here, because I like the way it looks kinda a little bit more subtle when it's just all black. And I get a whole bunch of other merch coming in as well and this is not your typical youtuber merch. Let me clue you in on youtuber merch.

Dave: 02:28

There's a bunch of companies out there by the names of, Printify, Printful, Teespring, etcetera. There's a lot of them and they basically do like print on demand. So when you place an order, this company somewhere in the world is printing out a t shirt just for you. They put it in the mail and they send it to you. Now, unfortunately, those products even though they are super cool looking at first are typically not super high quality.

Dave: 02:54

So what I did say what I've been doing in the past is been print on the on demand except for my hats, which I've been custom making for a long time, but the shirts and stuff I sell have been historically print on demand. And I gotta be honest, I haven't been like super blown away with the quality. It's good, but it's not where I want it to be. So in the very near future, I've already invested a lot of time and money into like authentic chase to summit merch where the tag says chase to summit, where the actual t shirt was designed in conjunction with another manufacturer directly from me, and I'm gonna be buying all this stuff in bulk, inventorying it in my house or somewhere around here, and I will be manually shipping everything out by myself, by hand, packed by me, because I wanna have super high quality stuff. And I just haven't been getting the super high quality stuff from the dropship, so I decided just like my hats, the hats are already super high quality that the rest of the stuff also has to be super high quality.

Dave: 04:00

So I'm talking 1,000 of dollars, tens of hours of my life, maybe maybe more than that. My wife has been yelling at me with how much time I've been spending on this. I've been in meetings with textile mills and designers and there's been a lot. So, hopefully it sells. Hopefully you guys like this stuff.

Dave: 04:19

I also have new logos coming. There's a whole lot in the works, so stay tuned for that. And in in the meantime, go check out chasethesummit.com, check out that merch store, because there's a lot of exciting things going on there. I'm gonna try to roll it out and I'll make a big announcement on it. But for now, only you know people listening to this podcast.

Dave: 04:39

And on top of that, quick shout out to the Chase to Summit Sunrise hat. I don't I have one around here somewhere, I'm not gonna get up to get it. The Sunrise hat was a hat I made a couple of years ago, it's sold out like instantly when I first announced that hat, and because of that a lot of people have requested that I put it back in stock, make it available again. And I've got good news for you, the Chase to Summit Sunrise hat is now back in stock. It's technically not back in stock here.

Dave: 05:10

It's ordered. I ordered a bulk shipment. It's coming from the textile mill. They're manufacturing it now, and it's expected to be in my hands in the next 2 weeks. So I will be shipping these new Sunrise hats in mid April.

Dave: 05:24

And if you want one, check out the merch store. Again, I have a pre order page up right now where you can actually pre order the Chase to Summit Sunrise Hat. And as soon as they come in the door, I'll have labels ready, and they'll be going back out. So if you've been waiting for that to come in back in stock, it's now available. So go check it out, chasersummit.com.

Dave: 05:44

And just for you listeners of the podcast, listen 20 is the discount code. L I s t e n 20 will get you 20% off your order. And I gotta tell you based on what I pay for these things, I basically don't make any money when you use that discount code, but I want you to have the best quality swag that I can offer, and that's what I'm trying to do here. So if you're into the gear, if you're into the hats I offer, go check out the merch store. End of rants, end of plug about the merch store.

Dave: 06:14

And again, before I move on, I do want to give a shout out to the patreon members out there. We've got a lot of people that have just joined patreon. I really appreciate that. And I wanna just mention some names. We got Kyle Mayle, Ron Coiler, Ben Morgan, Adrian Camillerie, and Bill Gilbat Bill Gilpatrick, if I can speak.

Dave: 06:35

And finally, we have Sean Harrison who is one of the longest supporters of the show in the YouTube channel, who's contributed, like, a ton of money towards the show. So huge shout out to you, Sean. I really appreciate it. And if you wanna support this show and you wanna be part of the behind the scenes conversation, conversation, get some sweet swag some free swag every now and then. Check out the Patreon.

Dave: 06:56

That's in the show notes or the description of this YouTube video. And finally, last shout out, I promise, the YouTube channel. If you're an audio only listener right now and you're you're just thinking, wow, he's talking about hats and merch and colors and the shirt he's wearing and I can't see anything, you can see me. You gotta go over to YouTube, check out the link in the show notes down below where you can actually see me as well as hear me because I now record these and put them on YouTube as well. So go check out the Chase to Summit Trail Talk podcast YouTube channel.

Dave: 07:29

It's not the main YouTube channel. I've separated them. There's 2 YouTube channels now. Subscribe to the Chase to Summit Trail Talk Podcast on YouTube. And that way, you can see me and, make sure to subscribe.

Dave: 07:42

Make sure to hit the thumbs up button over there because that does really really help me out and make me feel like I'm validating my time here. Okay. With all that, with all the plugs out of the way, let's move into a couple of topics here. First, we've got the big alta, the big alta 50 k. Now if you follow the main channel, the main YouTube channel, you know, this happened a few weeks ago.

Dave: 08:07

I think it was February 28th was the date, maybe 24th. It's a trail race out in Marin County, California. This is just outside of San Francisco. I talked it about talked about it in the last podcast. I went.

Dave: 08:22

I ran it. It was a hell of an experience and both good and bad. So I flew out early on I think I arrived on Friday. Arrived in like sort of the lunchtime period in California on Friday. Super early flight for me out of Boston to get there.

Dave: 08:41

The flight from Boston to San Fran is like 6 hours or something. And, so when I got there, the Goldwyn PR people picked me up and they drove me over to Marin County to meet up with the other people that would be there as well. There were other there were a few other people on this trip. It was myself, Ryan Clayton who's another, like, trail running YouTuber. There's also Jeff Pelletier, another trail running filmmaker YouTuber.

Dave: 09:08

And also Scott Douglas, a writer for, I think Ultra or Trail Running Magazine, as well as David Hashim who's a photographer for, I believe, Men's Health or Men's Journal. Anyways, quite the squad we had there, and I was just super stoked to meet up with Ryan and Jeff because in my selfish little world, they were both YouTubers as am I or I'm trying to be. And I gotta say so I've met Ryan before. We've we talk all the time via text messaging and stuff. He's got a great channel.

Dave: 09:38

Go check both of their channels out if you haven't yet, but it was good to see Ryan. And, also, it's really great to get to meet Jeff Pelletier because I've been a huge fan of his content for a long time. If you haven't watched his channel, he makes, like, the most amazing, like, the highest production quality YouTube videos when it comes to documenting races. He's got these crazy videos from, like, UTMB and in big, you know, big events that he puts all of his effort into in the production qualities out of this world, they'll open with like a drone shot with a voice over narration, and he gets every little detail about that race, and it makes me ashamed to be a YouTuber to be honest. So it was great to meet Jeff, And just like on camera, he's the same guy in person.

Dave: 10:26

Both Ryan and Jeff were just super nice, humble guys who it was great to catch up with and relate to, and we just had a great time. So on that Friday evening, we first went over to the San Francisco running store where, Speedland, the shoe company, had a booth set up to test out their shoes, and we also were able to pick up our bibs at the San Francisco running store as well. And then check out the store in general. It's kind of an iconic it's like a, you know, an iconic store in the area to check out. A lot of famous runners have been through there, and, it was cool.

Dave: 11:03

It's cool to be there and kind of be in the presence of legends. And just walking around, that area, we saw, you know, numerous athletes, pro athletes, and really competitive athletes just kinda hanging out doing their thing. That night we got dinner, we got to bed early because Saturday morning bright and early was the 50 k. Now this race, the big Alta 50 k was 2 different distances. That Saturday was the 50 k, but the following day was the 28 k.

Dave: 11:33

So the plan was that Ryan Clayton and myself, we'd be doing the 50 k stupidly. We'll talk about that more in a minute. And then on Sunday, Jeff Pelletier, the PR team from Goldwyn, and then finally Scott Douglas, they all ran the 28 k. And that distance was definitely the one to go for. So, let's talk about the morning of first of all, we were given like these swag kits from Goldwyn.

Dave: 12:05

If you're unaware of Goldwyn, they are a apparel manufacturer, they're mainly based overseas, but they're just recently making their presence made here in the USA and that's why we were there to sort of, you know, obviously, they they paid for our flights and for our lodging and stuff to go out there. I wasn't gonna say no, because a, their quality, their their actual gear is very nice, so there's that. They're a brand I could actually stand behind. And then on top of that, I wanted to be there and and run the race. So, Goldwyn paid for everybody to be out there and the the whole idea is for them to get their presence known, be in social media, and get a little bit more promotion, through people like myself and Jeff Pelletier.

Dave: 12:45

So they gave us like a swag kit the day before the race that consisted of a pair of shorts, there's a shirt, and the most impressive pieces to me from the little kit they gave me was the rain jacket which I wouldn't need for the race, but the rain jacket was incredible, still is. I I wear it all the time now. I might do an actual review on that on the YouTube channel if I get around to it. The rain jacket, made out of protect shield air, super thin, super breathable, and then, their race vest, which I had I was very I was a little bit suspect about wearing that on race day. So Goldwyn didn't pressure anybody into wearing anything, they basically gave us the kit and said, if it works for you wear it wear it to the race, if it doesn't work for you wear whatever you want.

Dave: 13:35

So I went, I packed everything. I had my Salomon vest, I had my Patagonia shorts, and my Lululemon gear, and all the stuff I would need to run the race. But when they gave me this Goldwyn stuff, it actually worked out pretty favorably including the race vest, which I was kinda shocked about. Now the the race vest I think is called the Goldwyn Star. It's like the model is the star race vest, and it's very form fitting.

Dave: 14:02

It has a very similar feel to sort of a like a Salomon advanced skin type material, very stretchy, very breathable, very thin, very lightweight, but it actually has a substantial amount of space in the back for carrying a jacket or whatever. And then it's got the 2 water bottle pockets along with a phone pocket and some front storage. And for me, for my frame, for my build, it actually worked out quite well. So I decided to run the entire 50 k on a brand new vest I had never worn before which is a risk. You could end up chafing, you know, there could be a lot of bad things but it worked out really well.

Dave: 14:38

So let's talk about the race. Got there at, like, 7 AM. I think the race started at 8. I kinda forget. We kinda noodled around for a little bit.

Dave: 14:46

We are taking b roll, a lot of cameras out, and, then the race begin. So right off the bat, Ryan takes off. This is the 50 k crowd and it's very very apparent the spectrum of people running this race were all of the elite variety. I mean, everybody took off, and I found myself like in the back of the pack even though I was running a pace that I probably shouldn't even have started the race running. I was moving a little bit quicker than I should have been, and it seems like everybody was in better shape than me, which is probably the case.

Dave: 15:24

And the plan before we even started this race, Ryan and I were talking about this. We were basically like, we're both out of shape. We're both from the East Coast. It's been snowy and wintery. We have not put in a training block for this race, so you're both concerned about it.

Dave: 15:38

And, the goal was to just not be DFL or dead blank, dead effing last. I don't wanna swear because I don't wanna mess up my rating on on Apple Podcasts. So anyways, we started off and everybody just hits the gas, everyone's flying especially the elite crowd, and right off the bat so the course kind of leaves this field at the Marinwood Recreation Center I think it was called, and then it goes up this road where you're immediately climbing up a hill, like right off the bat, and the hill is very steep. In going up this hill I was watching the elite crowd take off. They're probably running like a sub 6 minute sub 6 minute mile up this super steep hill on the 1st mile of a 50 k.

Dave: 16:25

So that kinda speaks volumes of the the field that was running this race. So we are trucking up kind of this neighborhoody rural rural area, kinda get into the trees a little bit on a little bit of single track, and then you kind of burst out of the trees to the most spectacular view. It's hard to put into words how beautiful this area is. The best way I can explain it, and I said this in my vlog video I posted about this race, was it kinda looks like a MacBook Pro wallpaper like when you're walking through the Apple store and there's also all of those like beautiful landscapes and stuff on the the wallpapers of all the computers. That's kind of what this area reminded me of.

Dave: 17:07

Just rolling hills, exposed grassy hills, no trees on the tops of them, so you have this amazing view. And in the distance, you can see San Francisco, and you can see the Golden Gate Bridge, and Alcatraz way off in the distance, and just really cool. So right off the bat I had a hard time kind of gauging when I should have my camera in and out of my vest because I just wanted to film everything just because of how beautiful it was, and it was amazing. So I find I finally like found my pace after a while, just kind of dialing it in, kind of feeling out my fitness level, And this race was incredibly hilly. So, I think the whole 50 k closed in on like 8,000 feet of elevation gain.

Dave: 17:51

I think my watch recorded 75 100 feet of elevation gain. And for me, for the guy coming from the East Coast, it's been very snowy here. I haven't really been getting a lot of elevation gain. The trails are all muddy and wet. It was a little bit of a struggle up front.

Dave: 18:07

And, anyways, I I guess I would say that the first 20 miles, I was feeling pretty good. So I'd say mile 0 to 15, feeling strong and actually pushing my pace quite a bit. And then after that is when the wheels started to fall off a little bit. Just the the relentless hills, climbing the descents, hammering my quads, trying to keep up with people in front of me, and hoping I'm not in dead last started to wear on me. So fast forward, another consideration at this race was there was only 3 aid stations over the 50 k.

Dave: 18:45

And in between those aid stations were like these giant rolling hills. So there could be like a couple of hour gap in between the aid stations. And on top of that, it was pretty warm out. So I think the height of the day in terms of temperature got up to around, I think it got up to, like, 70 degrees Fahrenheit, which for me my winter New England body, it felt very warm and I was sweating a lot. I had a lot of electrolytes coming out of me, it was getting pretty salty.

Dave: 19:14

So my strategy was just to, like, super hydrate. I was taking in a ton of electrolytes. I was actually using, the provided electrolytes they had there by Gnarly Nutrition. It's actually in the background here. I got a couple of bags of it.

Dave: 19:27

It's the, Orange Drink by, Dylan Bowman who's also the race director or co race director of this race. He's a pro athlete, a Goldwyn sponsored athlete. No wonder why they sponsored this race. But, Dylan, in conjunction with with gnarly made up this drink mix which I ended up using for the whole race. Even though I brought my own electrolytes, it was just quicker to use what they had at the aid stations.

Dave: 19:51

So So I was going heavy on that. I was taking down, like, pickles and salt and, a lot of, gels to to keep myself, you know, keep myself moving, preventing the bonks. And I would say I was pretty successful at it. I I wouldn't say I don't think I actually bonked, like, hard at any point of the race. I just realized that I was not in shape to be running a 50 k right around mile 20.

Dave: 20:16

And that was where an interesting turn of events happened where I'm running along the trail. It was kind of in a wooded area. And up in the up in the distance ahead of me, I see a body. Literally, a body just off the side of the trail laying face down on the ground. And my initial instinct was like, oh, crap.

Dave: 20:38

I'm gonna have to help this person out. Like, something's really wrong with whoever this person is. And, as I approached closer, I noticed the hat this person was wearing and it had the Ryan Clayton logo on the back of it. And I feel bad. I hope he doesn't mind me talking about this.

Dave: 20:55

But as I got closer, I realized it was actually Ryan. He was laying on the ground in the grass. I didn't film it. I wish I did in retrospect. I felt bad.

Dave: 21:04

I didn't wanna I don't know. I should have just filmed it and then asked him if it was okay to use it or not. I didn't film it, but he was laying on the ground and because he had just bonked really hard. Like I said earlier, he he came out pretty hot, pretty heavy, and he was moving really well right up until mile 20 just like me, but, he hit his bonk a little bit earlier than me and he just he was fried. He was cooked.

Dave: 21:28

So in his own words in from what I recorded in my vlog video of this race, quote unquote, I'm cooked. So I hung with him for a little bit. I kinda wanted to make sure he was okay. He looked really fatigued and it just seemed like it was too warm, you know, it was too hot for him. It wasn't a, it didn't seem like a training thing for him, he was still moving well, It just was like really warm and maybe he became a little bit dehydrated.

Dave: 21:52

So I hung around with him for a little bit. We kind of yo yoed a little bit as we moved along and then I ended up leaving him behind to keep myself moving so I wouldn't collapse myself. Anyways, the rest of the race was a bit of a struggle right from like mile 25 right up to the 50 k distance. I was basically just walking, still tons of hills, this time kind of in the woods, there's some stream crossings, and everybody there was kind of struggling a little bit just because the elevation gain in the heat. And then right at the end, 2 miles from the finish line, there is this area which Dylan, Dylan Bowman dubbed the whopper, which is this like insanely steep downhill section with really poor footing on like sandy terrain, and it's really hard to even stand upright on it without falling over.

Dave: 22:43

So that was a bit of a challenge, but we all made it. We made it down all in one piece and, during the last leg of the race, right up to the finish line, there's a kind of a segment where you run on the sidewalk along a road. And behind me, there was a guy yelling. He was literally shouting at me, don't let me catch you. Don't let me catch you.

Dave: 23:03

And then he followed up with, don't let this old man catch you. So that actually kept me moving. And right up until the finish line, I went into a full sprint because I didn't want him catching me. And after we crossed the finish line, I got to shake hands with that guy who's behind me, and he turned out to be 72 years old. This guy, Tim, ultimate just savage, 72 year old guy who he did not look 72 years old.

Dave: 23:31

He was in great shape. And I can only hope at that age I could still do these things. Anyways, I crushed the crossed the finish line. Dylan, Dylan gave me a big hug and, asked how the course went. And I think in my own words, I said, what did you do out there, Dylan?

Dave: 23:46

That was really hard. And, yeah, that was that was a tough race. I came in at 7 hours and 15 minutes, Certainly not my my p r 50 k. And for reference, the first place couple of first place people that came in were about 4 and a half hours. They came in at 4 and a half hours, and that was for, Eli Hemming came in 1st place and he was just blasting through that course.

Dave: 24:12

And he's someone I wasn't even aware of up until this race. I was, you know, I I kind of knew the name, but seeing him in person just absolutely destroy that course was unreal. So for me, 7 hours 14 minutes, and that got me, like, lower mid pack. So not terrible, not last, but not amazing, nonetheless. And then after that, I think Ryan came in about a half an hour behind me.

Dave: 24:37

He kind of got his wheels back on and started moving again. So we both finished, and, that was that. So after the race, we got to chill. The following day was much more relaxed. We got to watch Holly from the PR team, the Goldwyn PR team run the 28 k as well as Jeff Pelletier run the 28 k, and it was cool to kinda be a spectator.

Dave: 24:59

And that's something I've learned over the years is that spectating these events is equally as exciting as running them. And it sounds weird because you don't imagine ultra marathons to be a spectator event, but just seeing these people, you know, the front of the pack, destroying those times, running incredibly well, and then all the way in the back of the pack, people who are just, you know, just amazed of what their bodies are capable of in in viewing that, actually seeing them, you know, destroy their goals and and cross that finish line is really it's heartwarming, it's it's community building, and it was just a great vibe overall at this race. Like, at the 28 k, we got to hang out in the grassy area by the finish line and there was a ton of spectators cheering people in. It was a great vibe, great race. And if you're in the market for 50 k or 28 k next year in the San Francisco area, definitely put this one on your list.

Dave: 25:53

I have a feeling it's probably gonna sell out next year just because of how well it went this year and how much coverage it got, but, you never know. So that was the big Alta 50 ks. And, now let's talk about what else is going on. So for me, on my race calendar in this summer, this spring, I don't actually have a lot. I typically book like a 50 k 50 miler for the early season to kinda do a tune up.

Dave: 26:20

Haven't done that, so I think I'm gonna be doing more like personal goals, maybe in the mountains, maybe come up with some personal projects to do. I'm not really sure. And if you've got any ideas for races that have, you know, registration still open for the next few months, or you've got ideas for a personal project in the New England area, or outside of that, I might consider something. You know? I've always wanted to go to the Grand Canyon or something.

Dave: 26:46

I haven't done that yet. You know, shoot me a message or comment on this YouTube video down below. I'd love to hear from you. The only race I have on the calendar right now is in July and that is the Vermont 100 endurance race. The 100 mile long endurance race.

Dave: 27:01

And I gotta be honest, the big alta 50 k really put that in perspective because the elevation gain at big alta was similar, but over a 50 k instead of a 100 miles, and it really got me wondering if I can get myself in shape for Vermont. I know I can. I know I've got enough time. The question is, will I stick to a training plan and get it done? I hope so.

Dave: 27:26

So lately, I've been dialing up my distances. I've been actually feeling pretty good about where I'm at in terms of my fitness level. Things are looking pretty well, and I've been, you know, pushing past. I've been into the 40 mile a week territory these days in knock on wood. No injuries or niggles or anything.

Dave: 27:45

Feeling weird in my legs or feet, so that's a good thing. And, that's all to say that my wife has been a big motivator lately because she is currently training for the Boston Marathon which is coming up in April, April 15th I believe. She got in last minute. She's running the Boston marathon, and because of that, she has been training her butt off. I am super proud of her.

Dave: 28:09

She's up every day 4 AM, 5 AM, putting in, you know, 10, 20 miles even before our kids are awake, and she's just been an absolute beast lately. So it was a privilege for me last weekend to be able to pace her on her last long workout. We hired a babysitter, which cost us, like, $80, but it was worth it. And I got to join her for a last big training run. And if you don't have kids, you you know I mean, if you do have kids, you know how hard it is to, go on a run together with you and your significant other or partner.

Dave: 28:44

It's nearly impossible. Once you have kids, you never get to run together. We basically have to alternate our time. So she does the morning, I do the afternoons. And so it was a pretty unique experience to go on that last training or run with her.

Dave: 28:57

And I really I really enjoyed it. So we ran, 21 miles together on a pretty cold day last Saturday. 21 miles at, like, a 9:15 to 9:30 pace was what her workout called for, and that's gonna be her last, big effort before the Boston marathon. Her goal is to run sub 4. It's kind of a loose goal.

Dave: 29:20

She's been back and forth on that and that's mainly because days after the Boston marathon, we're actually going to Disney World with our family. We're taking our kids on a plane. We're going to Florida doing the whole family thing at Disney. And she knows that's coming. So she's been struggling whether or not she wants to like kill herself at the marathon and then not be able to walk for a couple of days and be in Florida with our family, like, that's gonna be tough.

Dave: 29:46

So I don't know what the answer is to that, but that's her situation so far. And by the way, she is running for charity. She's running for the Crystal Campbell Foundation, which is, you know, Crystal Campbell is a victim in the Boston Marathon bombings. She she unfortunately passed away that day, and now there is a foundation in her name which my wife is running for and raising money for. So if you do wanna donate to it, you wanna help her out, make sure to check out the show show notes down below and I'll I'll drop that link down there.

Dave: 30:16

That's a 100% charity. We're not taking a cut or anything. It's just a good it's a good it's a good cause and I'm proud of her for raising money for it. So check it out if you've got a couple of bucks to spare. Any amount helps.

Dave: 30:31

Okay. That is all that's coming up with us, with me, the banter of this episode. What? We're 30 minutes in and I've only been bantering so far. Now let's talk about some of the news that's happened this week, and I wanna kick this off with the Barclay marathons.

Dave: 30:48

If you don't know what the back Barclay marathon is, it's a 160 kilometer race or a 100 miles and that's pretty loose because the course changes every year and the race director, Laz, likes to joke that this is more like a 120 mile race and no one really knows. It's been dubbed the hardest race on earth and it really takes place in an area where there's no trails. They're basically following they're basically following a map and compass. You're not allowed to use a GPS watch. You're basically in the woods alone.

Dave: 31:24

And to prove that you've hit the right points and waypoints and destinations, you need to tear a page out of a book at every location and turn it into the race director after every loop. So this race is so hard that prior to this year there were only 17 finishers I believe. 18 finishers. And this year at the Barclay marathons, 5 people finished. Now that alone is amazing because that is the most amount of finisher finishers in 1 year at the Barclay marathon.

Dave: 31:59

But on top of that, there was also history made at the Barclay marathons this year. But first, let's talk about those those, finishers. So 4 of them, we had John oh, nope. 1st place we had Ihor Veris of Ukraine, 1st place. Then we had John Kelly, Jared Campbell, Grieg Hamilton of New Zealand, And finally, the history of making person at the Barclay marathons, Jasmine Paris, who was the first woman ever, the first female athlete ever to complete the the Berkeley marathons.

Dave: 32:35

That's unbelievable. This has been something over the years that, the race director actually actually has joked about saying that no woman no woman will ever finish this race. He's kind of, you know, a hard ass and says things like that. And finally, it's been broken by Jasmine Paris. And not only that, couple of facts about Jasmine Paris.

Dave: 32:56

First of all, she's from Britain. She's a British runner. She is 40 years old, which is older. I mean for, I guess for endurance it's a lot older, but kind of impressive. But what I was most impressed with is that she has 2 children at home.

Dave: 33:12

Married, 2 children, 40 years old, first woman ever to complete the Berkeley marathons. Take that all in. So congratulations, Jasmine Paris. I I can't wait to hear what I can only assume will be podcast coming in the future from her and just explaining what it was like out there. And if you can go and Google her finish, you know, there's lots of like Instagram, YouTube people at the finish line, and her finish was unbelievable.

Dave: 33:41

She basically you could tell she put all of it every ounce of her being into crossing that finish line, and just it was unbelievable to watch. She like had drool spitting down her shirt, and she was, like, bleeding and just, you know, a shell of herself, and she crossed the finish line. So big shout out to Jasmine Paris. So that's the news I've got from the ultra running scene this week. Now let's hop over, and talk to talk about the polar Grit X2 Pro.

Dave: 34:13

I'm wearing it on my wrist right now. If you're watching on YouTube, you can see the Grit X2 Pro. So what is this watch? If you missed it I did have a whole, YouTube video about it already on the main channel but we'll talk about it here as well. The Grit X2 Pro is a ruggedly built outdoor adventure watch from Polar.

Dave: 34:35

Polar, has been up to it again and they've come out with a new watch. However, this time around it's a little bit interesting. So the grid x 2 pro is basically if you were to take the Polar Vantage V3 which came out several months ago, hit copy and paste on that and paste it into a new product, that is the Grit X2 Pro. It's got the exact same features, same hardware, same battery, everything's the same. The only difference here is that it's built like a tank, and I gotta say, this thing it's really sexy.

Dave: 35:07

It's probably the best looking in my opinion, it's the best looking GPS watch right now. I really love the look of it. I love the feel of it, and I've been really enjoying having this thing on my wrist. However, couple of issues here. First of all, it is a clone of the Vantage V3, and if you watch my original review of the Polar Vantage V3, you know I ran into some issues with it in terms of, heart rate sensor accuracy, battery life, some GPS accuracy issues, all, like, not amazing for a $600 watch.

Dave: 35:40

In that, all those issues kind of copy and paste over to the Polar Grit X2 Pro because they're essentially the same watch, except this watch is way more money. This watch comes in at $749 here in the USA. That is for the base model. And if you up the ante to the Titan model, which is titanium that I'm wearing here, comes in at $869 so almost $900. And that's where we've run into some issues here.

Dave: 36:10

The pricing is quite high and if you look at the competition like Garmin for example, they actually just put their Garmin epics on sale. The original epics comes in at, like, 549 right now or 599 right now with sapphire. That's cheaper than this watch with a similar build quality and lots more features and pretty reliable accuracy. So that begs the question, who is this watch for? Well, unfortunately I can't answer answer that right now.

Dave: 36:39

So there was a stipulation with this watch. I was part of the early review team, they invited me to a sort of a Zoom call with a bunch of other reviewers, and on that call were a lot of familiar faces you would probably know in the GPS watch scene. And they sort of announced the watch and then told us, listen, the firmware is not done yet, so don't post a quote unquote review about it. Really your first, you know, first piece of content could be like a product highlight. So in my video about the PolarGrip X2 Pro that's on YouTube right now, I was not able to criticize, you know, accuracy, battery life, any of the features because it wasn't done yet, like they're still working on the software.

Dave: 37:22

And this watch isn't technically available right now. It comes out on April 3rd. So on that April 3rd date, Polar will be issuing a final version of the firmware with all the updates included that should make this watch a lot better. And I wish I could tell you about my experience so far, but I can't. So in terms of hardware though, again, it's a clone of the Polar Vantage V3.

Dave: 37:47

The only difference that I think, the only discernible difference between the 2 is that from a hardware level, the Grit X2 Pro has a different intended design, but I think they would have to do that anyway because the Vantage V3 is made out of aluminum and this watch is made out of stainless steel or titanium. They would probably have to reengineer that antenna either way. Not totally sure on that, but that's my take on it. However, that intended design, they did say should improve accuracy. We'll see on that.

Dave: 38:19

And then they made a bunch of software updates on the Grit X2 Pro as well, like a better heart rate sensor algorithm that's supposed to like use, AI and and smarts to sort of correct when there's been a bad reading that should improve heart rate accuracy on these watches. And, they've also added some navigation features like breadcrumb trail mapping. And these are all welcome changes. I'm pretty excited about them, but time will tell whether or not they actually make a difference and if they'll actually validate the the price of these watches. So stay tuned to the main YouTube channel.

Dave: 38:53

I will have a follow-up video about the Grit X2 Pro where I will talk more about what I've actually found in my testing from like an objective level rather than just being like a highlight video like I already posted. That's really all I could say about it. It's a very expensive watch, I gotta say I love wearing the dang thing, like I've it's really one of my favorites right now in terms of, like, just daily wear and and the way it looks and feels. It's a great watch, but the question is, can it compete with these garments that are just so feature packed for their price points? And this was the same conversation we had back when the Vantage V3 came out because that was very expensive for its form factor and price as well.

Dave: 39:34

That is the PolarGrit X2 Pro. Hopefully hopefully you found that helpful. On on top of that, there's more news on the grid x 2 pro front, but not from polar. So there's been a new pair of headphones that's come out from Sennheiser called the Sennheiser Momentum Sport. And I may or may not I don't even know if I can say this, but I may or may not have gotten my hands on a pair of them.

Dave: 40:02

Hopefully, Sennheiser doesn't listen to this podcast. Anyways, I can't tell you about again, there are embargos and certain things I have to do before I could tell you about my thoughts on them. But the idea behind these Sennheiser earbuds is that they're actually going to work in conjunction with Polar in 2 different ways. Let's talk about the earbuds first. The earbuds from Sennheiser, the Momentum Sports are sport earbuds obviously in the name, but what makes them so unique is that they're earbuds that have a heart rate sensor and a body temperature sensor built into the actual earbuds.

Dave: 40:40

So when they're in your ear, they're going to pick up your heart rate and your body temperature, and they'll be able to transmit that out over Bluetooth to a connected device. And that's where it works in 2 ways. So you can either send that Bluetooth signal to any it could be any watch, any Garmin, Apple Watch, your phone, anything that can take a Bluetooth heart rate signal, they'll work with that, but just with heart rate or you can pair it with your Polar Flow app on your phone where where you'll get both bits of information. You'll record, the, you know, the heart rate data in the body temperature data to your Polar Flow activity, and you can see that after the fact in Polar Flow. And on top of that, you can pair these earbuds directly to your Polar Grit X2 Pro or Vantage V3 and get the same information on your watch.

Dave: 41:33

So just imagine mid activity, you wanna know your your core body temperature on a hot workout, you can look down at your watch and get your core body temperature in real time, which I think is really interesting because before this the only way to get that information was with a sensor like the core body temperature from the company CORE, and that came with some drawbacks. It was a separate thing. You had to wear on your chest. It was either stuck on with a adhesive or is on your heart rate strap. Just kind of more complication where if you're somebody who runs with earbuds regularly, the Sennheiser sport earbuds could make could be a really good option if you don't want additional things.

Dave: 42:14

You just have to put your earbuds in, you pair them with your phone or your watch, go off in a run, and you get all of that data. So super interesting and, stay tuned again to the main channel to learn how they how they work and what they do in their accuracy because, there will be a lot more to talk about in the very near future. And with that, let's talk about what I've been testing for the past couple of weeks. So, on the main channel, I already posted a video about this. I've got it under my arm right now.

Dave: 42:44

I've been testing the, Ultrahuman M1 Live System, which is a continuous blood glucose monitor. And the funny thing is well, first, the way this works is basically you wear a sensor on your arm that is actually injected into your skin with a needle which sounds scary but it really isn't. Watch the main video and you'll learn all about that process. But when I got this, I requested 2 kits. I wanted a kit for myself and I wanted, to test this with more than just me.

Dave: 43:12

So I gave a kit to my wife as well for her to test out because she's been really wanting to, like, dial in her diet and get better recovery data and stuff like that. So that's what we did. We both injected them on day 1. And right off the bat my wife is texting me, I'm dying, my blood sugar is low, what do I do? She's eating Twizzlers, and it set her off on a spiral.

Dave: 43:37

And that's what I learned I should never have given her the Ultrahuman M1 Live system because it really it it caused a lot of anxiety for her specifically to use this product. So the way this works is essentially you track your blood sugar all day long using a sensor that's paired through your phone. And all day long, whenever you consume some food or drink or you work out or you you exercise, you log that activity in the app as well. And that way you can correlate your blood sugar levels, whether there's a an event like a hyper or hypoglycemic event that could be blood sugar spiking or dropping, you can correlate that to whatever activity or food you ate prior to that happening. In the the data I got from this was super interesting.

Dave: 44:24

For example, like things I didn't think would trigger me, did trigger me, like, apples and hummus, you know, that sound pretty healthy on paper, ended up causing like a pretty big big spike and a pretty big drop during my testing, and even more oddly was shrimp. You know, the seafood, shrimp. I had some for lunch one day and it caused this huge spike. 1 of the biggest I recorded during my whole time with the Ultrahuman system. And it got me wondering, one of my kids is actually allergic to shrimp, is that like a side effect?

Dave: 44:59

I haven't done any digging on that, but I did find it super interesting. The downside with the M1 Live system is just the price. If you don't sign up for a commitment or buy ahead, you're looking at like $300 a month to keep the sensors because you have to swap them out every every 14 days and they cost about a $150 each. So it is very expensive, but oddly enough, the Ultrahuman M1 system which is the app on your phone, there's no subscription correlated like associated with that. So really all you gotta do is get find a way to find those sensors and you can use it with the Ultrahuman app.

Dave: 45:36

And I I did find it really interesting. If you wanna learn more about this, check out my in-depth review I did on YouTube, but I thought I'd mention it here because it was really interesting. I guess I'll summarize it by saying, if you if if you have anxiety over your health or just having too much data, maybe avoid this. But if you want more insight into your diet and you're somebody who's looking to really get out like that extra 1 or 2% from your performance, this might be a good tool for you. So check out the, video on YouTube.

Dave: 46:10

And finally, one more thing I'll mention is the final thing that's in testing right now, I don't wanna give too much away on this, my hat's really, my hat's really tight on my head right now. Let's loosen this baby up. So the final product I've been testing is the Eatsleep mattress cover. If you're like me and you have if you list listen to podcasts or consume anything on YouTube, you've already seen this product before. Everybody talks about it.

Dave: 46:38

Joe Rogan, Andrew Huberman, and every other big podcasting name out there talks about this product. The Eat Sleep System. And at its core, what it is is a mattress cover that you put over your mattress, obviously. And within that cover, there's a bunch of tubes and channels where water can flow through it. And then on the side of your bed, you've got this, like, box thing which they call the pod that has hoses coming out out of it, plugs into your bed, and it can kind of plumb water through that mattress cover.

Dave: 47:12

And the whole idea is that you can control the temperature of the surface of your mattress from an app on your phone using this mattress cover and pod. I got this. I was very skeptical about it. I I really didn't know what to expect because of all the sponsored content I've seen about 8 Sleep. I've been really a little bit suspect of it.

Dave: 47:36

But I gotta say without spoiling spoiling the whole review, it's it's really good. That just spoiled the whole review. And I I'm gonna talk way more about the Eat Sleep system, but I guess I I'll summarize it by saying my wife you know, I get sent a lot of stuff for the YouTube channel to test out, and my wife told me hands down that was the best thing that we've ever gotten from the YouTube channel was the Eat Sleep mattress cover. She's been sleeping like a baby on it. It's really interesting especially with the app because it actually has like sleep analytics to let you know your duration of sleep and REM sleep and deep sleep, all without actually wearing anything.

Dave: 48:15

You don't need to have a watch or a ring or anything on. It picks it up just from the mattress. From your your heart rate radiating through your body is picked up from that mattress cover. It's really impressive, but it is very expensive. So there's that.

Dave: 48:31

So I'm not gonna dive too deep on the pros and cons or how it's set up because I'm gonna save that for my review video on the main channel. But I did wanna mention that I was testing it because a lot of people have, requested that. And I guess I'll wrap this up, you know, we're coming up on an almost an hour of recording, by asking you what you wanna see on the main YouTube channel moving forward. This is the challenge I've been facing lately. I guess we're gonna go in a deep dive right here.

Dave: 49:00

So Chase the Summit. What is Chase the Summit? What is the YouTube channel? When I started it, it was a place for me to just share my experiences. I was, like, hitting record on my GoPro, going for a run, talking about being a dad, just kind of just expressing myself through video and hoping that it might motivate somebody out there or, you know, just share my story, kinda scratch that creative itch, and that's all it was.

Dave: 49:29

But now, you know, a couple years later, this is my full time job. I do this for a living, and because of that, I get really nervous about what I can and can't post on the Chase to Summit YouTube channel. Like, I really wanna just post silly vlog videos of me running through the woods and talking about random things, but then there's the worry of, like, will brands stop talking to me if they think I'm, like, just a vlog channel? Will, you know, Apple stop presenting opportunities for me to test things out early? That's the question.

Dave: 50:02

And I I don't know the answer to that. I don't think anybody does because I have a lot of friends that do this as well, and it seems like we're all just kind of winging it. But I guess I wanna ask you the question. As a viewer, what do you think the YouTube channel is? What do you think chase the summit is?

Dave: 50:18

Is it somewhere you go for motivation in in to learn more about my story or what I'm doing, or is it somewhere you go just for gear reviews? That's that's the balancing act I'm trying to figure out. And I guess the the the right answer is just to start another YouTube channel, but I don't I don't know if I have enough energy to do that again. And, also, I don't know if enough people would care. I mean, I already have that YouTube channel with, like, you know, x amount of subscribers, and I can already reach that audience.

Dave: 50:51

So why would I start a new one with very similar content just to I don't know. Do you do you know where I'm coming from here? I'm just rambling here, but I want you to drop into the comments on YouTube. If you're watching this podcast or listening to it, head over to YouTube, watch this video and tell me what you think the Chiefs to Summit channel is and what you wanna see on it. Do you wanna see gear reviews?

Dave: 51:13

Do you wanna see vlogs? Do you wanna see training content or something entirely different or a mix of everything? Let me know in the comments down below. And with that, my friends, I think we've made it to the end of this podcast. We're gonna keep this one under an hour this week, And I apologize again for, you know, taking so long be between episodes.

Dave: 51:36

I gotta be honest, it is a challenge to keep up with the podcast, especially with the video format. But I'm gonna just take it I'm gonna take it a lot more casually now and just kinda sit down like I did for this one with notes on my phone and kinda wing it. So I hope I hope you enjoyed it even though it's kind of winged, wung, whatever that whatever that word is. And if you did, make sure to head over to your favorite podcast platform whether that be Apple, Spotify, whatever else. Make sure to subscribe to the podcast and make sure to give it a 5 star review on your favorite podcasting platform like Apple or Spotify, and leave me a comment over there as well.

Dave: 52:14

That does help the whole podcast algorithm. It helps people find this podcast. Share this podcast with your friends and family who may be interested in these topics, and I hope you I hope you found this fun. Okay. I'm bad at outros.

Dave: 52:28

Make sure to check out the merch store. Check out the merch store for all of the new merch that's coming. Check out the, main YouTube channel for all the upcoming reviews. Check out the website for, for all the stuff there. And make sure to use the discount code, listen 20, for all of your upcoming merch purchases.

Dave: 52:46

Okay. I'm gonna go now. I'll see you next time, and I'll try to make it less than a month away next time. Maybe next week. Okay.

Dave: 52:54

Bye.