Phil Gaimon: Worst Retirement Ever
Mark Riedy and I just recorded a podcast episode with Phil Gaimon, a former pro cyclist and now a popular content creator. So I’m putting the transcript here as a blog post, in case some people would prefer to read it.
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SOB: Alright, greetings, Phil Gaimon, how are you?
Phil: Great, how are you guys?
SOB: Great, doing awesome. Thank you for making the time for us, we’ve been wanting to catch up with you for quite a while. Phil, today what we want to cover is, you know, your transition from being a successful pro cyclist for a long time into being a YouTube personality and creator. And we just want to like understand that. And I think, can you just give us a snapshot of the end of your pro cycling career and how you ended up as a content creator and in YouTube? Like, how did that transition go, where’d you lead into that from?
Phil: Sure, I always say like I would love to think I was smart enough to have done it on purpose, or to know it was a thing. I was 30 when I was on Cannondale, I was still World Tour and that year, I mean all the years were tough and that year I got the feeling pretty quick that Vaughters was going to pull a ghosting on me because I’d been there before and it just wasn’t looking good on the pro cycling market at that time. And I was, so like pretty much all year I was, you know, having these conversations, having those calls and wasn’t, I was going to have options like in the kind of Pro-Continental the second-tier teams. And I just, that’s just like not a great life when you’re 30, I sort of knew what my arc was and I didn’t need to do the Tour of Azerbaijan as an adult, no offense to Azerbaijan.
SOB: Yeah, you better be careful with the Azerbaijanis.
Phil: Yeah, you know, just I’d done enough like Asia and South America and it’s not safe and it’s not lucrative and the direction of my career was clear, and but I was going to have to take one of those was sort of how it looked. Gravel racing wasn’t really a thing then, at least not as like the cliché path from World Tour to here you’ll just do this gravel stuff now. And I’d been pitching a TV show in Hollywood, my idea was like a travel show for two or three years then. And the fair question from all the producers and studios and whatever agents was who are you to host a TV show? And I was like, well okay good point, so I’ll just start doing one on YouTube with these bike ambassador things in the meantime. And at that point like Castelli was a sponsor and they had, they had just hired a camera guy named Sam Smith who had done videos for Jeremy Powers, Jeremy’s Behind the Barriers series was, would have been huge if it happened six years later, maybe ten. But it was like formative for me and I was tight with Jeremy and had been in a couple of those, so I was like, and Castelli was cool that I was like, you know what, I was like, you’ll make these for me, you’ll produce and edit and pay for the filming and they didn’t pay me cash but like we’ll, and I was like and I’m going to own these, you know, that’s my point, they’re like, yeah no problem, like alright, suckers!
SOB: Right.
Phil: Right, I own the content and they were just featured in it, and they ended up working out well for off, but it was definitely like just me throwing something at the wall as a sample to pitch a TV show. Basically just from living in the pro cycling world, like that’s how all my deals were structured, that’s how the sponsorships were, and it’s been great. It’s been hard, it’s super hard, but it’s been awesome.
SOB: And how when you started that at that point how mature was the YouTube ecosystem? Like were people using the word creator, was it still being figured out? How was the ecosystem at that point?
Phil: It’s funny, that’s like a pep talk I give people a lot is this was 2016 and I was like it felt late, it felt late. There were people like but if I look at it now like it was early, I mean YouTube had been around for 10 years and GCN, you know, they GCN started with a million dollars of Google seed money I think probably 10 years before that, but it was still like very Wild West on, you know, there were still a lot of people just like uploading Letterman episodes they didn’t have the rights to and making money on that, you know, that was also going on there. So but yeah I was just, you know, doing as basically an audition for a network TV show.
SOB: Phil, I know, you know, cycling is deeply a part of your life and your content, I know you train really hard, I see you out on the road all the time.
Phil: We do a lot of waving.
SOB: We do a lot of waving. And I’m curious like even though you’re a creator you’re also an athlete. Do you still consider yourself a pro athlete and I would ask would you, are you closer on two ends of the spectrum, are you closer to Remco Evenepoel or are you closer to Mr. Beast on the other end? Like where do you fall on that spectrum?
Phil: I think I’m definitely closer to Remco because I don’t make money on the subscribers, the YouTube revenue just from the business angle, the YouTube revenue is trash. And it’s funny like YouTube tells you they do a good job and this is something that I think my whole generation has been a victim of, trying to, sorry you edit right?
SOB: Yeah.
Phil: Yeah. I think my whole generation or at least at least myself I’ve been a victim of the propaganda of the dreaming and the dream job.
SOB: Yeah.
Phil: So YouTube does a really good job of telling you about the seven-year-old who makes $1,000 a month, $100,000 a month doing slime videos.
SOB: Yeah.
Phil: Or unboxing toys or something, all of that and like I’m sure that exists, they make you like YouTube, you know, made sure Mr. Beast and his success is well known, but I for sure have like a top 1% channel on subscribers and viewership and like I’m, you know, most months like I get $1,000 a month out of YouTube, but like it’s not a living thing, and so so my sponsorships are what brings it home and the side businesses and stuff like that is kind of how it works. Yeah to rely on YouTube I don’t even know what that would look like.
SOB: Yeah. Do you think that your career as a cyclist and, you know, probably before you were World Tour how scrappy it is and how you have to work so hard, do you think it set you up for success in something like being a content creator or how do you think it affected it? ’Cause I think that’s like a unique part of your formula.
Phil: I think yes, I think like it forced me to hustle and not be ashamed to hustle and which for better and for worse. Like my pro cycling following tolerated and came to enjoy my ads for Bisell vacuums to my 800 Twitter followers at the time and in my blog, you know, that was kind of just an inside joke with everyone and and it’s that’s now I guess scaled to a point.
SOB: Yeah.
SOB: And Phil as you go from being paid solely to ride your bike and try and win races into a creator, you have to pick up all these other skills like video production. Tell us about how that’s gone, like all these other things you had to learn.
Phil: Fits and starts, slower than it would be a lot a lot of patience from me and from my audience to be honest looking back at like some of the videos, so I I had an editor I had the guy from Castelli for many years and those were those were great and it would take a long time for him to edit those, that’s just like how production goes and it’s turned into I kind of taught myself to edit in 2020 I got a new clothing sponsor with The Black Bibs, so I I hired my own video guy and that didn’t kind of work for a lot of reasons but 2020 was one of them, just leave that there. But I taught myself how to edit on like iMovie and you know so like that went from for a long time like I didn’t know how to do voiceover, so it would just I would just put text on the screen where the where the joke was and then you know a year in I was like oh I could just like add a little clip of myself speaking and every time I learned how to do something better with video, good news the video’s better, bad news it takes longer to edit the video. So now like now it takes me three weeks to edit the video that’s 11 minutes and and it looks better I don’t know if anybody noticed. And the audience has has gone on that ride with me too and just like man he f’d up that one, it’s like funny in the comments I’m like ah crap I did I’m sorry.
SOB: You mentioned having a blog and having Twitter probably early in Twitter, is there something about your personality that you’re just naturally a storyteller that you wanted to be out in front? ’Cause a lot of people wouldn’t seek that out but it seems like you really thrive on telling your story.
Phil: Yeah I I guess I’ve always been a storyteller I was an English major the blogging was kind of like an early way for me to make a living in like the the amateur and the even though like low-level pro days in the US, I was getting like $200 a month from bicycling magazine to write their blog and a Velo News column like freelance writing was what kind of got me through. So there was that and I also just like there was a lot that people didn’t understand myself included so I go back to the the propaganda where you know I’m 21 I’m like man these guys on Jelly Belly are killing it, like that looks so cool they’re so pro, and then 23 and I’m on that team and I have a bike with my name on it and I’m in the team bus and my salary is $2,000 and I’m like I’m I wasn’t mad about it it just felt dishonest to to kind of live that and that was all the way through to the World Tour when now like yeah I’m World Tour like there’s all this staff and we’re staying at the Little Nell in Aspen you know and it was like it felt like lifestyle forgery. And I think I think that still goes on and I just kind of had to zig just like I’m not making six figures, I’m making $50,000 a year and they’re spending a thousand a month on my hotel room I don’t know why.
SOB: Why is it working this way.
Phil: Yeah and it was just like that kind of honesty came through and didn’t always make me friends on the you know on the team or in the cycling community I think I kind of outcasted myself in some ways but they came full circle at the end with you know the the audience and whoever was following that journey and it’s grown.
SOB: Hey Phil, I know you have a number of sponsors and you have had through the years dozens and dozens I think sometimes they change sometimes you keep them with you. What what do your sponsors expect from you? What are you selling to them and what problem do you solve for them?
Phil: The best way for me to put it is like I do what a pro cycling team would or should and I kind of structure that the same way. And it was a lot like so actually on Garmin-Sharp it’s a good example like they would have you know they have sponsors they care about that they try to maintain that they work for. And then there would just be a lot of especially the time like you know social media was kind of new, they they didn’t want to do that, the teams didn’t want to do the social media stuff. And I would get these like hey you know Kinetic trainers are in town I’m so sorry you’ve got to deal with this but like you know they’re asking for you to do a video with them at the service course tomorrow. And I’d be like cool fine and you know I like I came up with an idea and we drove around the service course and we did some fun stuff like it didn’t bother me and that was how the bread was buttered, but like the teams I think the there was a lot of friction between the teams and like you know you only have so here’s your here’s your protocol if you want to talk to a guy on Skype, you know like you gotta wash your hands six times you’re not allowed to have their direct phone number you go through their PR, there’s like a lot of red tape and a lot of we’re too good for and and I kind of never was. So my so that’s part of it and then a lot of them they don’t have the bandwidth do the creative, they don’t have the budget do the creatives. My my deliverables mostly are like the teams are selling I have access to the Tour de France, we’re going to be on this big stage and we’re going to win these races and we’re going to you know for that you’ve got to give us five million dollars to roll over and bed, and mine is I’ll make this cool YouTube show, Worst Retirement Ever, and your stuff will be in it, I’ll do cool stuff with your stuff all year. And then the specific deliverables would be generally it’s like one Instagram post per month just about your product or like heavily featuring your product and whether that’s like a direct sale or whatever they can they can tell me like hey we got a sale on the 17th make sure that’s your post this month cool. Otherwise normally it’s just like here’s a cool opportunity of you know I I would have got a flat today my Silca sealant saved the day and I’ll post about that and I’ll check that off the box for February.
SOB: Can I ask a follow-up question Phil, like do you have affiliate links or how do you keep do you try and keep track of the success that you create for your sponsors and look I helped you sell so many bikes and so many black bibs, do you try and like track that so you can like kind of package that and sell it to other sponsors later?
Phil: Yeah most of them have a lot of them want to do like a coupon code, affiliate there’s a lot of what they really what everyone wants to do is an affiliate deal where it’s like hey you’ll you’ll get 10% of every click you make and I’m always like I don’t know what sucker would fall for that ’cause they’re buying direct from you and a bike shop gets 40% so like if I want if I want 10% I’ll like that those deals might work for Mr. Beast I don’t know you just use the word affiliate and that’s something that like athletes please please don’t devalue yourself with.
SOB: Yeah I mean most of the time like we run affiliate programs and most of the time for people like you it has to be cash plus, you know some baseline level of cash and then this is like icing on the cake.
Phil: I respect the need for brands to want to track something, but if you’re only getting a direct percentage as a direct sales that effectively values your endorsement zero.
SOB: Yeah and it’s interesting I’ve never heard anybody think the way you think which is like I don’t know the wholesale margin on product is 40 to 50 points, like why do I only get 10 or 8 or whatever the deal was.
Phil: Yeah and there’s and it’s funny it’s interesting like I’ve seen a lot of it too the first year I mean the good news was I was waiting for that job at Wasserman so it gave me a lot of like freedom I didn’t care. So like I was willing to do stuff for free or to experiment, it didn’t it didn’t really matter and I didn’t know what I had. So I remember like I did a video on like Wahoo sent me their new Bolt and I’d been on Garmins forever and Wahoo was pretty fresh then and I was like oh this is super cool how you don’t have to like like there’s an app that connects and you can do all the pages and settings in the app and I was so sick of all the years with the Garmin like just the the UI was all in the Garmin. Remember just like I did a video about it and drag and drop I didn’t edit anything back then and I think like 35,000 people watched me talking about a Wahoo I was like s*** that’s worth something.
SOB: It’s like wait a minute.
Phil: And so now I’ve seen all that evolve too where I think brands now they sort of expect to pay or I’ve had some that do affiliate but it’s 100% shopping cart, because they’re just looking for customer acquisition um for subscription stuff and I’m like that’s interesting.
SOB: Like 10% is like a decent deal on that, but 100% shopping cart like that’s a conversation. Now it depends now I’m incentivized yeah it’s all you know it’s one at a time it’s make it up as you go and so are they.
SOB: Yeah yeah everybody’s trying to figure it out I think.
Phil: Yeah yeah. So so there is tracking and there are like I have enough examples, it’s been one thing that’s cool is like I guess my niche is kind of like newish products people don’t know about and I can kind of put them on the map if they have a small budget or they don’t have access to like the world tour kind of thing and I’ve had this is like a couple every year where I’m like their first marketing spend and they just see pages of sales the minute I talk about it. So I have that in my deck now you know and it’s just like here’s the you know the the more recent one was like the Viere Recon well the state road bike I guess the state carbon bike people like holy f*** I can’t wait to buy that ’cause this they didn’t know state would do that. But like the little mini USB pump and they’re like oh crap that worked, that’s the Viere Recon like they were the first ones kind of do that and they’re like holy crap I just you get text messages dude they’re flying off the shelves today keep doing that.
SOB: Yeah.
Phil: And I’ve had enough of those over the years that like I don’t I don’t sweat the specific tracking anymore. And what’s funny too is the and I’ve said this to some brands like hey if I’m I know this has worked for these eight or nine brands when I talk about it and if I’m doing that for yours and it doesn’t sell, that reflects on you or your messaging more than me because I’m doing like what I do is working to an extent, so you know like you can’t be mad at me it didn’t sell because somewhere that like you don’t control that right. Some both of us yeah my job is to get the messaging across and the conversion is is on you and something isn’t landing about your product by the way like good to know ’cause I just taught you that lesson for a good price ’cause you could have just worked on that for 10 years and not known that something about your product sucks.
SOB: Yeah. And do you usually structure your deals for a year or or like how do you like to do it like what’s your your preferred way to engage?
Phil: Most Worst Retirement Ever sponsors are one year or two year exclusive, so you know I’m on the state bikes you won’t see me ride another bike that kind of thing. And that was something too was always funny like when I was when I was racing they have you know they’re all exclusive sponsors and so like Garmin-Sharp Cannondale good example they’re sponsored by New Balance. And I was like cool like I got 30 shirts and you would just never see me in another pair of shoes anywhere on Instagram ’cause how hard is that, but it was weird like they’re teammates would you know get in trouble for wearing their Converse All-Stars. I’m like why would you buy shoes? It’s not that hard. Like hey I can’t afford shoes and be like that was just one of those like I but the brands appreciated it and you know they they would come to me like hey can we send you more of this um yeah it’s all all interesting.
SOB: Phil, tell us about your media ecosystem, of course you’re on YouTube we’re talking about that, of course you’re on Instagram ’cause I feel like most of the cycling community is there. But I want to talk to you about Strava which is like its own thing and has been very important to you for several reasons and are you on any other channels like TikTok or Threads or anything else?
Phil: Sure um I’ll answer the first ones first the I was on TikTok it TikTok drove I mean everyone’s chasing TikTok. So TikTok started and people like oh you need to do short-form video content and it was interesting like I hated it for I hated the idea of TikTok for a long time and then once Instagram realized they were TikTok, I I had to adapt and it became like kind of a fun muscle like alright how can I like tell a joke in eight seconds.
SOB: Yeah.
Phil: So like how can I go from this thing that like used to be complicated like how can you make it that tight like I’m a writer I want to write a book but so I put that I started doing that on Instagram and then the YouTube shorts they’re also TikTok itself I was using to like test stuff ’cause their algorithm was so good I would throw something on there and see I didn’t have the big following to like sell it. And then when I don’t know if you remember during the last election there was a point where like Trump had banned it and then one day he changed his mind because somebody paid him for something and like I opened TikTok and there was like a pop-up like hey we want to thank Donald Trump like it was a pop-up thing that every TikTok user saw I want to thank Trump for saving our app.
SOB: Yes.
Phil: And it was like he was the one who jeopardized your app and now he and I just I just deleted it was just the most sinister thing I’ve seen as an adult.
SOB: Yeah.
Phil: I was like I can’t I’m not even going to pretend to participate, that yeah that bothered me. Ownership of TikTok has changed to Trump’s friends to yeah and it’s not like I’m a fan of Zuckerberg or whoever’s in charge of YouTube either it was just like somehow like that was a line and it wasn’t worth anything to me to to access it so I just I just did so I’m out on TikTok and um Threads I use I was addicted to Twitter like like everyone else or at least I know yeah and I was too. Yeah I was and I I could thank Elon for making it so evil it cured me of that addiction.
SOB: Yes.
Phil: And I was like wow I didn’t think I could like I tried to get off Twitter for so long and then when he took it over I was like oh wow I’m done. Like no amount of 12-step could have done what what he did it just like bringing the Nazis to go on there and.
SOB: And how do you think of those things all fitting together like short-form video long-form video things like Strava which is just data and you know I don’t know maybe it’s a deeper engagement even because people see you every day on there or like how do you think of that?
Phil: Strava’s its own beast in like a really interesting fun way, I mean they’re all their own thing I think Threads is a little bit more and it’s not like I don’t really monetize Threads anymore I just don’t have the following I don’t think it’s worth it and I don’t know what the algorithm does. Threads is shouting into space which can be fun and the people that I shout at and with can be entertaining. So I guess that one’s for me and like I’ll just probably more like politics on there than than anything else. I’m not on there with coupon codes trying to sell bikes or pretending it’s just not it wouldn’t be worth anything for that. And Strava is one it’s funny ’cause like I think I was the first one to monetize Strava, if that’s right it’s not like Strava pays me but I was first one to sell sponsorships for it and and I might kind of still be the only one and it might just be there’s only room for one dude doing KOMs on Strava, but it’s a very valuable audience and it’s the same as Instagram you can put pictures on there you can put you know coupon codes and whatever and it’s very engaging. The engagement there is multiples of Instagram.
SOB: Phil, Strava is its own unique category because it has KOMs it’s really about your ride and you have gotten I don’t know as many KOMs as anybody on the platform and I think Peter Flax wrote an article about you a few years ago about your quest to beat the guy’s KOMs who was a doper here and I think that was like Bicycling’s most read article of that year or something. And tell us about like your approach to KOMs and Strava like how’s all that going?
Phil: Yeah you you nailed it that’s exactly like that campaign at that point pros were all too cool for Strava myself included, like I remember being in the pros and just like like you just look over there at Strava like you guys are just a bunch of competitive dorks and you all suck and like we could all drop you and it was true. There was just like every time you look on Strava it’s like dudes competing over KOMs that I could get with one leg and like you know we would do a ride and like I I wouldn’t even know where the segment ends like if my interval ends I’m going to stop pedaling, like that’s it’s that and that’s how all of them work. And I went on there honestly like I just created the account to build an audience for my Cookie Fondo which that was the first year we did that, it was like my business partner there was like dude you gotta do this thing, he might have even created the account for me and then I just started putting my rides on there and getting every KOM in LA because it was low-hanging fruit competitively. Now it’s a lot harder but you know you’re competing against dentists. So at the time the Peter Flax article was yeah I guess the story was I went you know an early ride on Strava and I had Strava a couple months and I did the Nichols group ride and I got the KOM on Nichols Canyon which was one of the most coveted in LA you know and I didn’t know where the segment started and ended but like I’m world tour how hard is this. But the the guy I got it from was he was everyone knew the Strava name and he had from the bottom of every hill to the top like a really ludicrous volume of KOMs and he had this fake name and this like he never posted his face. And I forget who it might have even been Peter uncovered his actual identity was I’m not going to say his name but he was a he was a masters racer who got caught for EPO and banned and I believe he was caught I forget exactly the details but he was he tested positive at like Masters Nationals and and then he pivoted to Strava with like a fake name and and really a wild body of work in like Griffith Park you know just like some strange like the amount of work he put in to get he’s probably creating segments it’s just like you know there’s weird people out there and he was one of those but there was a lot of like built-up anger in this you know one of the biggest cycling markets in the world is LA. Here’s like funny things align in my life but like I’m I have world tour fitness I’m 30 I have nothing better to do and I’m waiting for this job that’s about to start so like I’ll just go get one KOM from this guy every day. People love it like it was getting kudos like all my friends would be like holy crap like I got more text when I got the Nichols KOM than when I won Redlands. So it’s like alright I guess that’s that’s a sad state for pro cycling that I’m worth more doing silly stuff than there but like that’s their failure more than I kind of see that like pro cycling’s failure to like actually engage with people more than my ability to connect or or call it a tie. But yeah I had a lot of fun with that.
SOB: And how much in your mind how much harder has it gotten to get KOMs? I know for mortals like Peter and I it’s impossible but for someone like yourself like is it really difficult for you or are there ones that have gotten taken that you want to get back?
Phil: The the ones in LA are like all world-class now, like once the like you know Sean Quinn comes here in his off-season and hits it, Geraint Thomas was training he wasn’t going for segments but like you just look like the power that I was doing at my peak is they’re none of those are attainable now. It’s like the top segments on Strava, it’s been pretty cool how much the level’s been raised. There was I did a few years in 2020 beginning of 2020 before the pandemic hit I went to Bogota and did Patios, which super cool like huge cycling community in Colombia but like none of the pros were really in Bogota, Bogota’s 10,000 feet they were all in Medellin and whatever else, but I remember Patios was nuts too, this is like a fun story but there was like a there was like a truck protest, there was like a union thing, 18-wheelers parked there with the and it was like you’re just inhaling there’s no oxygen in the air anyway 10,000 feet but you’re just inhaling carbon monoxide like it was just parked trucks and I had to put my foot down at one point, but it was the most contested segment in South America, it was like 50,000 people had attempted it or something and I got the KOM after putting my foot down by like 15 seconds. And since then 20 like I don’t even know if I’m the top 10 anymore ’cause every world tour guy I believe Bernal has it and it’s so much faster than my time and it’s just cool how like the level’s been raised. And I think so like I’ve had to get more creative with the KOMs that I go for, ’cause my whole time like I entered this with no ego, I already knew who could drop me, back then it was 40 guys and now it’s probably a couple hundred. You know that was the level that I got to, so like I’m not proud of my Nichols Canyon ’cause I train with Dan Martin three weeks ago and you know I know he could like there’s no my ego was removed surgically from pro cycling. So now it’s a little more creativity and a little more like so I can get the KOM on Mauna Kea ’cause that’s been attempted by some high-level amateurs but amateurs and the day it’s worth Tadej’s time is the day I lose that. So I can tell the story and it’s fun to share my notes too like Matteo Jorgenson is talking about going there next year and like I’m going to tell him what tires to run, I’m going to tell him what bikes to ride and like I think it’s fun like let’s see what the limit is, let’s see what we can do, you know it’s an evolution.
SOB: Hey Phil, where do you go from here? How old are you now? You’re.
Phil: I’m exactly 40, my 40th birthday was my Mauna Kea attempt this year that was how I celebrated.
SOB: Nice, happy birthday, amazing. Looking ahead 5 years, 10 years, where’s Phil Gaimon in 5 or 10 years and what are you doing? Still the same thing or do you evolve?
Phil: I’d love to think I knew, A I saved my money ’cause I don’t know, the bike industry is like even when you’re doing like my performance has been consistent and one thing that I’ve learned about and I’ve like talked Justin Williams about this is like it’s not so much about how good how well you’re doing it’s like you know you can pick your stocks really well but if the market’s down the market’s down. So part of it’s just like being able to ride the industry however that looks, like I’ve learned that the hard way. But I’ve also it was funny I was talking to like well when I was pitching my TV show there was and I’m still pitching it, so it’s not just I have the meetings every six months and and it’s they always go great and then nothing happens and that’s fine I’ll be over here. But one of the Hollywood guys I talked to, it’s funny like when you just talk to really smart people who have who I don’t know and I have access to before this guy was like oh yeah I’ve been following you for a while like you’re the guy who figured out you could be a pro cyclist without a team. And I was like oh that is what I figured out like I did I figured that out. But that was five years and I was like yeah you can be a pro cyclist without being on a team and just with telling so if that’s that’s what my 30s were is what I’m realizing and I and from that conversation and I don’t even remember who that guy was I could picture him, but I think the next chapter would be like can you be a pro cyclist without being fast? With just being your best and storytelling and being professional with your training and your equipment and your goal setting and all of that and I I think the answer is yes, I’ll find out what that’s worth compared to Remco.
SOB: Yeah. Alright I mean one question I wanted to ask on that ’cause I’m 57 and I’m not getting any faster and when I think back you know you mentioned a minute ago like when when you were at your peak how much have you like how much has your level dropped? Can you can you feel a difference physically from 10 years ago um at this point in your life?
Phil: Yeah the best way to put it is like I’m as good as I ever was but not as often. So like my first couple years retired it was so funny how much fitness I had and like I I was looking at the Olympic Road Race course and the the finale it finishes up in Griffith Park and like of course I have the KOM on that. And I just clicked on I don’t remember the day or anything but I was like god 520 watts for 4 minutes and 50 seconds, Jesus Phil! It’s like I can’t do that no more. And that was just like a Tuesday riding with my buddy I was like yeah I’m going to hit this I’ll see at the top. So I can still do like I did Mauna Kea I I don’t think I’ve ever done better four and a half hour power than what I did on my 40th birthday but um I can tell you I couldn’t walk the next day and I wasn’t training the next week whereas the first time I did Mauna Kea like I was on a road bike I was running a lot ’cause I was I had all the wrong equipment didn’t know what I was doing and and I finished it and I was riding with with with Kevin Systrom, the Instagram founder that day and I because it was his idea to do Mauna Kea, wasn’t even mine I I never heard of the thing, it was like his bucket list, so I I got to the top got the KOM drove back down to like the beginning of the dirt section and did it again with him ’cause he was still coming up.
SOB: Because he was still coming up.
Phil: That was no big deal for 29, 30-year-old Phil. I was like yeah give me two slices of pizza and a glass of we got some Dom in the car and I’ll go rip it again and do 16,000 feet today. That wasn’t happening a couple weeks ago. So I just think it’s going to keep going in that direction but then like the ones I do more often like Peter will know like I do all my intervals on Piuma or I guess Rock Store those are the two really nice smooth climbs nearby, it takes me 40 minutes to get there that’s my warm-up and I have the live segment in my Wahoo and like last week I had like a four-minute max effort, so I went to Piuma I did the bottom four minutes and I was slower in my four minutes than I was doing the KOM which is 18 minutes ten years ago. Like I was still I was behind my time and I gave up at four minutes and so it’s just like there’s some undeniable like yeah we’re not doing 450 for 20 minutes anymore.
SOB: Yeah I I would say I’ve noticed the same thing where and not that you and I are the same but I just I can’t predict when I’m going to have a good day really. Like I can do all the right things to make sure that I do my best but I can’t predict when it’s going to be like I’m going to feel really great, it just happens once in a while.
Phil: Yeah.
SOB: Phil you obviously you travel the world riding your bike you were just talking about Colombia, I know you go to France you were in Hawaii you travel around the United States you have your own events, you’re plugged into the community all over the world. When you zoom out a little bit from sort of the bike industry or the bike community at large, are there things that the bike world is missing right now to grow participation and get more people into the sport and the recreation of cycling? Like what’s going on out there, what what are your insights from riding around the world right now?
Phil: I mean it’s probably the same stuff that that you would know or you’ve talked about. Cycling is so Eurocentric that I think like a lot of those brands forget about America and think that like if they’re present at the Tour de France that’s enough. And I notice like a lot of my audience just doesn’t follow that or pay it’s just not on the radar. I think the US is is neglected in a lot of ways and and then like the market there, I mean we have more people we have plenty of people buying bikes but cycling is cooler there it’s just that plain and simple. I remember like you know talking to people who run events in Europe and they’re like oh what does Malibu pay you to put on your Fondo there? I’m like no no it’s the other way around you got that would be nice. No no, they they put up all the roadblocks and and we pay double overtime for the police and the police are still d***s to the riders half the time. So yeah so that’s just like what we’re up against I guess. Yeah I think they focus too much on racing and performance, I think it’s I think the bikes are too expensive that’s always bothered me from I I still go back like the college student who like just everyone I knew was buying the Cannondale aluminum bikes, you know that was it back then ’cause I can’t afford carbon fiber $5,000 for a bike you kidding and now it’s obviously multiplied. But that’s why like State Bikes was a really good alignment for me it’s just like you know that’s going to be like a sub-$4,000 absolutely raceable carbon bike and the they did with the the marginal gains and there’s an audience for that people love it. I can’t deny but it’s just like I’m past that part of my journey as far as you know worrying about the half water of rolling resistance that just the people who dork out on that I’m just like for what like I’m going to drop you on this bike, you know like what I don’t I I get my analogy was always like I think the bike industry makes if if car dealers acted like the bike industry you’d walk into the dealership and they only sell F1 race cars for a million dollars a pop. And I just like I don’t know why the bike industry and I’m sure they have their reasons I think a lot of it must just be driven by guys who like buy a new bike every year and it goes on the wall, you know. But like I want I want more people riding bikes I want bikes to be cooler and not like exclusive and I don’t I don’t like a bike to be a status symbol, I there’s just like never spoken to me. And to yeah I hope I hope that’s where it goes. At least I’ll that’s where I’ll be trying to steer it whatever that’s worth.
SOB: Bit of a regression but back to you know your performance now and this is maybe not a fair question but if you jumped in a World Tour race right now like a race that any of us would know that you were suited for, do you think you could stay in the group or how do you think you would do at this point in your life?
Phil: It’s a fun question, I wouldn’t get I wouldn’t get dropped from a pack. I mean that’s yeah that’s a sleigh ride. I don’t think I’d finish a Grand Tour, but yeah it’d be fun. I don’t know. I would not win Redlands. I’ve had like teams like people forget people just don’t realize how old I am or or they just watch the YouTube and they think whatever and like every year someone asks me to race Redlands with them and I’m like look I won that like I won that twice and it wasn’t worth s*** for me then. Why would I do it now? It was good like it got me got me a $45,000 salary there’s no upside for me to go in there and get spanked. I honestly think the same about gravel I think the level of gravel now is developed enough that that even that would be super hard like I I could I could handle it. But yeah no no interest in the experience or the competition or the crashing like that chapter’s closed.
SOB: Yeah. Okay Phil, first of all thank you again for your time today. We just want to wrap up with one final question, can you tell us about your first bike, what was your first bike ever and tell us about it?
Phil: This is this is good you know like as a kid you just got a Huffy kind of thing. So there was there was those I’m sure I had some Huffys. My my first my first race bike I guess the one that sticks in my head ’cause I still have it. When I was in college they were doing like this is Florida and they would do like fixed gear training like cadence drills kind of thing. And so I bought I wish I had it here I like brought it to Big Bear, but it’s is a steel Miyata and like by now the seat post is rusted into the frame. I might have changed the bar tape twice but like that was my that was my go around campus bike and it’s got like skateboard like not skateboard like freestyle pedals on it like sticks to your shoes a little bit. But it’s I just that bike makes me happy and and it’s I got like a granny gear on there so there’s it works for flat neighborhoods but in Big Bear like going down to to my house or to the village there’s like a pretty steep hill. So I’m just doing 180 RPM trying to stay on top of my pedals and the brakes don’t really work ’cause it’s a fixed gear and they don’t really need to but it would help. I might have a little buzz on by the time I’m going home sometimes but that’s kind of the bike that like yeah it’s just an old steel one one thing that like I’d love to do a YouTube video on I’d go around Girona and do a feature on everybody’s town bike. ’Cause all those guys have a version of that bike that sits in the apartment that’s the grocery getter, some you know rust bucket piece of crap that’s the only bike they’ve had more than six months ever, you know, that they’re actually attached to. So yeah that’s the not my first bike but that’s that’s got to be the answer.
SOB: That’s cool.
Phil: Yeah.
SOB: Alright well Phil Gaimon thank you so much Phil where can we find you you’re of course on YouTube you’re on Instagram are you at Phil Gaimon?
Phil: Yeah on all the things yeah I’m I’m painfully easy to find. I make that easy.
SOB: Okay thank you again for sharing your story with us have a seven-minute hill and wave at me like we do three times a week.
Phil: Yeah. I’ll wave yeah.
Phil: Great thanks Peter.
SOB: Thanks Phil.
