 Oh, this is the best. Hello, my friends, and welcome to a very special edition of Running with Ryan. Today, I'm running with a true legend. This man is one of the most decorated runners of all time. He's the only American man ever to win a gold medal at the Olympics in the marathon distance. He pretty much started the running boom along with some others back in the 70s. He made running cool. He led the US Anti-Doping Agency for years. He started along with another man, Steve Bosley, the Boulder Boulder here in Boulder, Colorado, my favorite race of the year. And he's also the father of one of my best friends. When I was a little kid, I got to see that gold medal of his and it inspired me to become a runner. He just had surgery, so he's actually not gonna be running today. We're gonna be walking. Ladies and gentlemen, make some noise out there for legendary Frank Shorter. All right, here we are. Frank, how you doing, buddy? I'm doing pretty well. Good to see you, my friend. Have a great day. I'm the trail out the back door. That's right, this is our neighborhood. That's right. We were pretty lucky to live here. Are you sure? Anyway, I'd like you to notice that I'm wearing Frank Shorter brand jacket that I got almost 20 years ago in college when I was modeling for the Japanese catalogs back in the day. Yeah, the word's out. You were modeling. You was modeling. All right, so let's get started kind of from the beginning. People are gonna be curious about how you became one of the best runners of all time. Were you a runner as a kid? Did it happen in high school? How did this all start? It started actually as stress relief when I was about 10 years old, I lived in a little town of 22,000 people in upstate New York, and by the way, for those of us from upstate New York, that's anything north of the George Washington Bridge. There you go. It's not New York City. And I started to run to and from school a couple, three times a week and carrying my books. And as an aside, one of the interesting things, if you look in footage of me running, I hold this one hand almost still and this other hand, I move because this is where I carry my books. Oh, no way? Yeah, no backpack. So you figured out a way to run while holding books. Holding my stack of books. I love it. When did you realize that, oh, I'm actually pretty good at this and I like the competitive part of running? Well, you know, this comes around to sort of the vagaries of life, just what happens. My mother in order, I think, to try to save me from the home situation, which was very abusive. Yeah. I was sent to a prep school in Massachusetts called Mount Herman. It's now known as Northfield Mount Herman. Okay. And I arrived my sophomore year in high school and it turned out that this school had a cross country team that were the perennial New England prep school champions. Okay. Every year they would win pretty much. They would win the New England championship. So that year, they also at that school that have been founded by an evangelist named Dwight Moody in the 1890s, he instituted a school-wide cross country race. He was from England, so he brought over cross country in the 1890s. Wow. From England and it was a 4.3 mile race every year before Thanksgiving vacation. Okay. And if you finish this 4.3 mile race, I think it was under 33 minutes, you got a whole pie. Oh really? Yeah. Any flavor you want? No, it was always apple. Apple pie, okay. It was an apple pie. That's a good prize. As far as prizes go. It was called the pie race. Okay. And that race was and still is the oldest continuously run foot race in the United States. Oh, that's a cool story. It predates the Boston Marathon by four years. Wow. And that sophomore junior year, I was second in the All New England championships and fellow finished ahead of me was my teammate. Wow. Who was a senior who had won the race the year before and was repeating. Okay. And so you were 15 at this time or something? Oh, about 16. 16? Wow, okay. Senior year I set a course record on every cross country course I've ran. Nice. With, you know, at all the New England prep schools. Yeah. And over Exeter's St. Paul's. Groton, Middlesex. Yeah. And won the New England championship. So that was it. Yeah. Went to college, ran for stress relief and college I was a pre-med. Yup. Senior year, I'm one of those people that don't get mad at me. I won't, I promise. By spring break of my senior year I basically finished all my requirements to graduate. Oh, nice. So all you had to do was focus on running. And for three months I focused on running. Ran twice a day for the first time for maybe, oh, maybe two or three times a week. Probably three. Okay. And went to the NCAA championships and won the six mile, it was six miles rather than 10,000 meters. Okay. On a Friday and the next day I finished second in the 5,000. Wow. In the three mile. So it just kept going up. I think I was always realistic about really knowing how good I was and the way I put it is what pond I was in. Okay. You know, and as you get better and better you move up and move on to different ponds. Totally. And so once I did well in the NCAAs and went to the nationals and made my first international team where I met Steve Prefontein, Kenny Moore and we all rimmed together and trained together. That is just legendary. But even then I think I was very realistic about how good I was. So I always had in the back of my mind, I may get there, but really the attitude I always took was, let's just find out where this goes. Okay. In other words, how good can I get? Yeah. And I knew I was gonna level off. And it was just a question of where? Yeah. So I was always ready. I know this may sound strange, but I was always ready to be able to acknowledge when I'd leveled off. Okay. Well, I think what it was also, I was my own coach. Okay. After the Olympics, my coach at Yale said to me when I described how I'd trained after graduation to run, he interrupted me and he said, you know, you've been making up your own workouts from the middle of your junior year. Wow. I was self-coached. Yeah. And maybe that's why I had a little bit different perspective. In other words, I kind of sensed when I was improving. So you make the Olympic team for the Munich Olympics and you must have known, okay, my times are up there with some of the best in the world. I'm, you know, I have a good chance at this, right? I could be a gold medalist. In any way, I was a realist, but the way I've always thought of the marathon ever since my first one, I ran the first one in 70. And after that, my first Fukuoka in 1971, which, and that used to be the world championships. Okay. Because that's when the runners from the East, Eastern Bloc would venture out to race. And it was the only time that you could really do that. Okay. And race against the entire world. Wow. Because other than that, they stayed home. So, but I developed a theory very early on, and I don't know exactly when, but it was. In any major race like that at the world-class level, the Olympic level, basically there are going to be 10 people that are going to show up. And don't ask me why I came up with number 10. Yeah. Who has the potential to win. Okay. And three are going to have prepared in a way and timed it so that they have a good day. Yes. Only 30%, only three out of 10 are really going to have a good day. Yeah. And so many other things can happen. And my goal was to work in a way that would make me one of those three. Okay. And then the other part of that was, I never went into the race thinking, well, I'm going to win this. Yeah. It was, if I've done this right and I have a good day, I can be in the top three. Wow, okay. And then let's see what happens. Right? Again, getting back to that. Okay, let's find out. Yeah. That's fun. Yeah. And so, you know, you're coming into the stadium in Munich. At the time, you don't know that an imposter has run into the stadium and kind of blown your cover. The crowd thinks he's the winner. You know he's not. What was that like? Well, I heard the cheer outside just as I was entering the tunnel through this huge cheer. And again, the way my mind works. Track and field, it was one of the last time, I think, that the marathon was not on closing ceremonies day. Okay. But it was on the last day of track and field. And I thought, ah, you know, maybe the high jump is still going on and someone made a height. Yeah. So I go down, I run out onto the track and it's silent. You're like, hey guys, what about me? I just won the marathon. And the thought that went through my mind really was, it is. It was, geez, I'm an American, but give me a break. It was, you know, cause at the time, Americans, yeah, we could win the shorter distance events but we weren't. Yeah. Endurance people. Yeah. Started into the first turn past the finish line and people started whistling. Well, in Europe, whistling is booing. Yeah, absolutely. And so I thought, whew. It's kind of a cold audience. Yeah, yeah. And got on the back stretch and right up against the stands, someone with one of the first rows yells out in this American accent, I'll never forget. He said, don't worry, Frank. You know, I was thinking to myself, why should I worry? I'm winning. Yeah, you're like, this is great. This is the biggest day of my life. I'm winning. Yeah. And then when I started around the last turn towards the finish line, I looked towards the finish and there was something going on. Yeah. So I crossed the finish line and stopped to untie and take my shoes off. And someone came up to me and said, and these were the words. What did you think about that guy? What did you think of that guy? And you're still clueless. No, I knew. Oh, you knew now, okay. I knew what had happened. Okay. And you know, again, you talk about certain moments in time. In a way, people remembered the race perhaps more because of that. And then the other thing that I realized very quickly, I was much less upset than people who saw it. Yeah. And people would still, for years, people would come up to me and said, I was so mad at that guy, I wanted to kick in a television set. You know, it was a 17-year-old high school student. Oh, it was? Okay. Yeah. So it's the equivalent of like a high school football streaker. He's just goofing around, right? Yeah. And he had a buddy who had been driving a golf cart servicing the pop stands around the track and field venue. Yeah, okay. So that's how he got through security. He jumped on the back of the golf cart. Wow. So, and the other thing I realized, and I can honestly know, because it happened to me, was that I didn't run for that cheer. Yeah. That wasn't one of the goals. Okay. It wasn't for the recognition in the stadium. It was to try to win the race. Yeah. And you did. Yeah. Wow. That's a fascinating story. So, Frank, when I was younger, I wanted to be like you. I wanted to be an Olympic champion. That didn't happen. I wasn't even close. But in the last five years, I've gotten into ultra running. What do you think about ultra is, because back when you were running marathons, that seemed impossibly far to people. Now people are running 100, 200 mile races. And I think it's great because I also like to think part of my good fortune was being blessed with a body that was suited to the marathon distance. Yeah. And I don't think my body is suited to ultra. Okay. In my experience over time, and I've, I covered the Ultra's, you know, the Western States 100. Oh, you did. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Did an NBC in the early 80s. Okay. And actually during the telecast, we do it at certain points and I ran part of the course. And I, in that 24 hour period, and I actually wrote one of the forwards to the Western States 100 book. Okay. Because the most miles I ever ran in a, I've ever run in a 24 mile hour period, I ran while covering the Western States. I would run parts of it to the next, say, telecast point. And I really got a very, you know, good feel for it. And I knew it was legitimate because the winner that year turned out to be a guy who worked for me, had worked for me. Okay. It was Skip Hamilton. Oh, wow. Who won the race several times. So I knew what it took, but I also knew his body type. Yeah. And my theory, and I don't, and again, it's just my theory, it's a different body type. It's a heavier body type. And I think it's people, and again, it's not empirical, it's just my thought, I think ultramarathon runners are better fat metabolizers. Okay. Yeah. And I think they have an ability to digest and get nutrients into their body faster. Well, yeah. Because you have to eat so much during a long course of a race. I couldn't imagine doing that. Yeah. And the other part of it that I've always loved about the Ultras is the equality. Yes. I think the longer the distance gets the closer to gender equality and then sometimes even over. And even back when I was in the 80s, and Tracen. Absolutely, yeah. And Tracen. And to watch her compete against the men, man, I'll tell you, I get goosebumps. I think if I were in an Ultra, the last person I would want to see when I turned around to find there would be in Tracen. Oh no. It wouldn't even be another man. She's gonna get me. She's gonna get me. But the other thing that I found, and probably why I never did it, was that I, or maybe it's just rationalization. Yeah. But I love training. Yes. And I don't like backing off and resting. And I don't like recovery time. So I only ran three or four hard races a year, where I really backed off, and it would be one or two marathons and maybe one or two, five and 10,000 meter runs. Yeah. And so I think really part of it was, I didn't want to take the weight away from training. Yeah, yeah. To get ready for an Ultra. Yep. Because I enjoyed training. Yeah. I mean, that was, again, and this goes right back to why did I get into the running? For the stress relief. Yeah. You know, for the good feeling of training and having a session and getting done and going. That was right. Yeah. That was just like in the Olympics. That was right. That was just enough for today. Yeah. I remember you, I think in high school, you came and talked to us. You said for every mile you race, you take a day off or something? Relatively easier day. Yeah. Relatively. So I run 100 miles. I have 100 days off. You see, for me going 50 days of not training as much as I would want to. I didn't want to do that. Yeah. Yeah. So in a way it was kind of, well, it wasn't selfish. It's just my personality. Yeah, absolutely. Let's talk about something that was just very sad, but also a coincidence in your life. You were in Munich when the terrorists came in and kidnapped the Israeli athletes and murdered, yes. And you were also in Boston during the bombings. Right. I was sleeping on the balcony in Munich because Dave Waddle had his new wife in our room, neighbor, and they didn't want to share. So you slept on the balcony in the Olympic Village? There was an overhang. Okay, that's good. But, and so I heard the shots. Wow. And I knew, because I'd been out there for a few days and I said, that's not a dorsal in me. Yeah. Gunfire. Yeah. And so yeah, I was there for all of that. Oh, what a dark time. And you know, the delay, but again, what you learn, thank you, what you learn again, in a way it's good to know how you would react because you know how you're reacting. Yeah, yeah. And our first reaction in Munich was people died, we're all going home. Yeah. Nothing, nothing is worth human life. No, nothing. Being sacrificed. Yeah. And then over time, two or three days, that experience was where we could find out that we went through all those stages you go through when you're in a traumatic event and usually it can take months. We did it in days. Wow, yeah. And that's when I get back to the reframing. The idea, there you are. And by the time we got back from the memorial service the next day, well, it was over the course of two days. We realized that no, because if we don't compete then we're just giving in and doing what the terrorists wanted. Yeah, that's true. And that was the first international act of terrorism on that scale. Yeah. So 2013, ooh, I'm doing the plus a marathon coverage. Oh, and just to finish the story. Yeah. I was talking with Kenny Moore on the way back after the memorial service to the Olympic Village and I said, you know what Ken? The only place that the terrorists, these people can do anything more at the Olympics. It's gonna be on the marathon course. Oh, wow. They're gonna do anything. Huh. And I said to him. Just cause there's so many people. Well, yeah. How are they gonna frisk everybody? Wow. And I said, you know, again, I'm not gonna think about it because if I do, they win. Yeah. And I ran the entire Munich marathon and never thought about it once. Wow. Never thought. So 2013, I'm on my way to a production meeting just before three o'clock in the afternoon and they're still finishing the race. You know, I was, oh, about a hundred yards from the finish and it was crowded and I couldn't get through on the street. So there was a store and it turned out it was the store that had the video camera. It took a pictures of the first bomb and I was right across the street. Didn't know where the first bomb was. Went into the vestibule, the first room and bomb one went off right behind me. So you were really close. I was right across the street but I was inside. I had just gone through one door. Okay. But I'll never forget my signal that no one was moving ahead of me because about where that white truck is there was a guy carrying about 20 feet. There was a guy carrying his child on his shoulders. Wow. And when that bomb went off, my first thought was about that child, that kid. Oh. And what, what? Yeah. And I also knew people were going to be coming in behind me. Yeah. So I went through the store and oh, bomb two went off and we went down to where our broadcast position was which was right near the finish line and watched all the triage of people coming in and I'll never forget it was about from here to my house there. And that's where the finish line was and they were wheeling someone over in a wheelchair and as soon as it got close enough I could see that this person had no legs. Oh. And I, and I, and you know, we just, we just dealt with it. Yeah. But okay, here's again, why things happen for a reason. September 13th, same year, I'm on getting on a plane to fly back to Boston from Denver. Yeah. To run a fundraiser at Suffolk Downs with Billy Rogers to raise money for Boston Strong. Yeah. Otherwise I would not have been getting on that plane. Yeah. In line, I started to talk to someone who is now my wife, Michelle. Really? Yes. I didn't know that story. Yes. Wow, what brought you here? Why are you still here and what do you love most about Boulder? What I love most about it is being able to simply go out your door and run. Yeah. And also have access to facilities to do the speed training. There's, there's still a way to do it. Yeah. And out here it was very easy to find a track and, you know, have access. Yeah. In the weather. Yes. 300 days of sunshine a year. Yeah, we have snow on the ground right now, but it's plenty warm with the sun. Yeah. And, and the other thing is I was one of the first to go to Altitude. Okay. Because my family had moved to Towson, New Mexico in the 60s and I had run there in the summers and then gone back to school in the East and had found, and I knew I could sense a benefit. Yeah. Before they were even. Talking about that. And again, the coincidence, I just happened to have as a coach someone who had been the 1964 Olympic Games coach. Okay. And had actually been an assistant and been at Lake Tahoe with the athletes training for the Mexico City Games and the way he described it was, yeah, our athletes ran like crap in Mexico, but when they got home. Yeah, they were superstars. Many of them set PRs. Yeah. So it was most likely that they were mentally, you know, affected by the altitude, but they'd actually trained. Yeah. And they retained that benefit after Mexico City. Gotcha. And so I knew knowing that and knowing, you know, how I felt. And also, you know, I've always, I think, again, kind of reevaluated situations. For whatever reason, Boulder turned out to be the right altitude at which to train before you reached a point of diminishing return at altitude. Yeah. Much higher over 6,000 feet. It begins to shift. And I realized that because I had run intervals at 7,000 feet at Taos. Okay. This was, you know, 1970, 69. And I had actually, I hope at the ski valley, Taos ski valley had to run at 9,000 to 10,000 feet. And I found, I realized there was no way I could do any kind of anaerobic training there. Yeah. And it was luck that Boulder, in a way, is where it is. It's at the right, not perfect, but right altitude. I think Boulder is, you know, in recent years, maybe taking, you know, a little, taking on a little bit of a bad rap. Yeah. But I'll tell you, when I got here, the feeling in the early 70s in Boulder was, if you want to be good at what you're doing, whether it's sports or business or academics, you were supported here. Yeah. Every subculture, if you want to look at it that way, was treated equally and supported. Yeah. And anyone within any of those subcultures could feel supported to try to do. Again, the sun, just like we have now, being able to live where if you want to take your nice, easy run, you just go out your door. Yep. The only decision you have is, do I do go left or right? I like that. It's simple, because yeah, you can't go wrong in this area right here. Right. So, you know, you're a prominent figure in Boulder and you're also pretty humble. Is it weird that you have, for you to see a mural of you on the Broadway or the statue of you at the stadium, is that stuff? I mean, obviously it's a huge honor, but. I don't really, I honestly don't think about it. Yeah. Well, it's brought up and, you know, for instance, the statue. Sorry for bringing it up. No, the statue was, you know, the donations were from my friends. Oh yeah, okay. So that means a lot more. You know, I think I've tried to always feel in any interaction like ours now, is that in essence, everyone's equal. Okay. We're all created equal. And I am flattered if someone wants to interact with me and, you know, ask me a question. Yeah. And I like to think that I don't give off the idea that I would rather be somewhere else. Yeah. And it's not contrived. Yeah. It's just the way I am. Now the anecdote that, whoo, sort of emotional that shows that when I was 1956, I was nine years old in this town in which I grew up. It was about 60 miles from New York City in the 1956 Yankees. And I can name the entire team. Yeah. Because people didn't shift teams. But Mickey Mantle. Who was the star, we got word, somehow Mickey Mantle's in a house down the street. Oh wow. Four or five houses down. So we all got something for autographs. Wow. Went down, stood outside, waited for him to come out. He came out and blew us off. Oh no. He walked right by us. Your hearts were just crushed. And my thought was, I wasn't crushed. I, my reaction was, oh. He's not as cool as I thought he was. No, but the other thing is, I knew that we had not done anything that deserved that. Yeah, yeah. You know, and we were, and my thought was in a way, you know, we're doing this, at least he could acknowledge the effort that he put in and again, kind of be flattered with the fact that he can be this icon. Yep. Wow. And I think that always stayed with me. Yeah. And so I think that's part of it. Yeah. Is that I've been on the other side. Yeah. At a very impressionable age. Yeah. Well, I have to bring up something right now. And you might not even remember, but growing up, you were one of my idols. I wanted to be an Olympian. I wanted to be a really fast runner. But, you know, I was in a family with a single mom and four kids. We didn't have a lot of money. And in high school, you gave me shoes. I don't remember that. Yeah. You gave me shoes. It was through Alex. He helped it all out, but you gave me shoes because running shoes are very expensive. And so I'll forever be grateful for that act of kindness. Yeah, but I, yeah. And again, I like to think that, I didn't, that I forgot it for good reasons. Yeah. You know, every day things. You're just, that's who you are. And Yeah. Yep. And, you know, Alex just told me and I said, yeah, sure. Yeah. And I was, I will forever remember that. So thank you for that. You're welcome. Yeah. Now I get my own shoes, which is great. See, now the payback is you, you still pay attention to me when I'm old. Yeah, that's right. I sure do. Oh, and it makes me feel good. Now I help young people with bikes and shoes and whatever else I can and, you know, you kind of pay it forward. Of course you do. Yeah. And it's also what it shows is if you're fortunate the way I was and you are now, and I hope I can still be, you can be in situations where doing something like that for someone is really so easy. Yep. And it's a good part of having notoriety. Yes. That you can do things for people that they couldn't do for themselves, but for you it's not a, it's not a huge effort. Yeah. It just, of course you can. Yep. And, oh. And it's a win-win for everybody. Sure. You know. But I like to think it's, that's the way we are. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I think, but it can be, as I pointed out, it can be reinforced by certain experiences. Yes. Let's not change gears to new running shoes and the Nike vapor flies, which are kind of controversial. Kind of. Kind of, yes. Or the Kipchoge, Marathon. What do you think about all this stuff going on in the world of running these days? Well, my wife Michelle, who is a very good swimmer and very good triathlon coach and was a very good age group and still is age group triathlon. She's had under 19 podium winners. Winners and podium winners. Yeah. In the triathlon nationally. Yep. And she didn't skip a beat. She saw that and she said, they're gonna have to do exactly what the swimmers did with the suits. Yeah. With them. And no one seems to think about that. Yeah. But she did. It's, and swimming was smart enough to decide right away. It's such an obvious advantage. Yeah. And in a way, they didn't say, well, show us the statistics. Yeah. They really took the coaches and athletes' word for it. You see what I mean? Yeah. And again, it's with this idea of, you know, full light bands for drug users. Mm-hmm. And if the advantage, I think the irony is, the advantages being held out as in the percentages. One, two, three. I think I've even heard four percent. Yeah. So in a way, the way the Pirates would put it, they're being hoisted on their own pitard. Yeah. Because they're admitting to the advantage that has nothing to do with preparation. Yeah. That the shoe gives. Yeah. And I think just like with the blades, they're just gonna have to be banned. Yeah. And until that happens, and the difficulty and parallel with the drug use is that the percentage of advantage that they're holding out is the same as taking a performance-enhancing drug. Yeah. Okay? Yeah. And that advantage simply cannot be overcome through training. Mm-hmm. Can't do it. Yep. And again, the irony is, if you don't allow everyone to have the technology and hold true to the patent, then you just can't have fair play in the event. It can't be a level playing field. Yeah. So I don't think they have any choice. Yeah, okay. Did you follow the sub two stuff? Did you find that interesting? Do you think it's as amazing as most people do? No. No, okay. That's what I figured you say. No. Nope. It, first thing I'll say, there was no drug testing. Yeah, oh really? No. I don't think I knew that. Of course not. Of course. Well, I guess it was, yeah, it was entertainment. It was billed as like a prize fight. Well, they didn't bill it as a competition. Yeah. They billed it as an attempt to break a record. Yeah. At least they didn't hold out that it was actually a competition. That's true. Yeah. So, you know, and again, that's the way that stuff works. And if you acknowledge the advantage and you're not willing to share it, then there's no choice. Yeah. Do you have a proudest moment of it all? Can you look back and be like, that was the best of the best? And it can be away from running. It can be being a grandpa or whatever. What do you? I'll go with what just popped into my mind. Okay. And what popped into my mind was the day, the race, and the moment in a 10K race in Atlanta that Alex and I started out together. Oh, okay. And we got to about four miles and he started to run away from it. Ha, ha, ha. And I was trying to- And you couldn't hold it, couldn't keep up. And I couldn't keep up. And I knew it. And it wasn't even articulated. It's just he took off and, you know, he, and he found his own way in running. And for him, it's something he still does. Absolutely. But it was never the primary thing. And he was much more of an academician. Yep. And, you know, took that route. Absolutely. So now he's a PhD professor and that's certainly fine with me. Oh, he's incredible. Yeah. And he's still one of my best friends. And I usually, I run solo. I don't really have a running partner. But when Alex comes back to town, we run together. He's like my only solid running partner I've had throughout my whole life. So. That's right. Do you think training has changed much from the days of when you were winning races to now? Well, that brings up another question. I think from the mid-70s, until the first part of this century, a lot of the improvement was due to drugs. Yes. And, but I think what happened, my own personal theory, is that between, say 1975 and 2000, training became more elaborate. And you had to do more, what I call ancillary things, bounding certain exercises. And this was sort of held out as, this is the reason. Well, they had to somehow explain this exponential improvement in time that was brought on by the drugs. And so they added to the training routine so they could say, see? Yeah. That's why everyone's improving like this. Oh, that's weird. So the next Olympics, you get second place to a guy from East Germany who it turns out was convicted of using performance enhancing drugs. And I think from my understanding, it motivates you to get involved and you are one of the founding members of the anti-doping agency. You know, where are we at now with drugs? Cause it seems like the Russian team just got busted again. It's like, are we ever gonna move away from this stuff? Well, it has to come from the top. Yeah. The US anti-doping could be established because President Bill Clinton had a drug czar in Barry McCaffrey, who had been the commander of the first Gulf War and he wanted to do something. Yeah. And so you had White House support and it's a little as known, but I've decided I can finally talk about it. It's been so long. John McCain was instrumental. Oh, wow. It was a bipartisan effort. And he, through the Commerce Committee, when we worked to come up with an outline that became USADA. Okay. In other words, the outline that it would be totally independent and everything else about it. And it would be funded by the government and by the USOC. McCain called Commerce Committee hearings before USADA was ratified. Wow. And we all went and I testified at those hearings and other people did. Yep. And everybody went home thinking, well, nothing will happen because nothing will happen because the IOC doesn't answer to anybody. There's no leverage against the IOC. Yeah. All right. Well, that's what they thought. Barry McCaffrey in early 99 calls over. Juan Antonio Samarancho comes to Washington. They sit down and he hands him the outline of what became USADA. And he said, this is an agency that's gonna be formed by the US Olympic Committee and they're gonna come up with the idea. Yep. This idea. Yeah. And they can have their task force and spend their time deciding this is what they're gonna do. And they can take credit for it. You know, they can claim that they had this idea. Wow. And they're gonna fund it and we in the government of the United States will also fund half of it. And if this doesn't happen by the start, by between if this agency does not take over right after the Sydney Games, which was in 2000, the International Olympic Committee through Barry McCaffrey's Commerce Committee will lose their tax-exempt status for all income from the Salt Lake City Games. Wow, that's quite a threat. Yep. That's quite a threat. Wow, okay. That's how USADA happened. Yeah, wow. The outline of USADA, the answer to your question, if Thomas Bach, the head of the IOC, decided to basically implement and basically clone USADA until every athletic federation, National Olympic Committee in the world, that they had to do this and actually do it, the problem would be solved. Well, it'd become close. Instead, you have the World Anti-Doping Agency, which, who's outgoing president, is also coincidentally on the executive board of the International Olympic Committee, so there's no conflict of interest. Yeah, not at all. It doesn't sound like it. No, no. Sort of like US politics. Yeah. And, hi there. Hi. Hello. Hello. Hi, buddy. How are you doing? Oh, you look sweet. Hi there. Interesting cross. Yeah. And just to comment on the Russian expulsion, it's basically the same thing they did in 2016. But they've actually done it better this time. Travis Tigert from USADA, who's responsible for the Lance Armstrong and Alberto Salazar disqualifications. He pointed out that here you have people who are being banned for tampering and destroying evidence. Yep. And so therefore, many of their athletes and most likely their superior athletes were not and will never be able to be found guilty. Yeah, guilty, yep. And this is the talent pool that can now qualify because they've done nothing for the next games. Ah. Okay? Yeah. It's like. Yeah, it's so frustrating. Okay? Yeah. And they don't have to do it. Yeah. Now the other thing to get another aspect of it is Travis Tigert is also, he's right and other athletes, clean athletes have said, look, bans have to be permanent. Yeah. Because what is not ever talked about is the fact. Not, and no, it's not a fact, but the research is starting to show that if you're on drugs for a significant period of time, performance enhancing. Yeah. And you gain certain benefits. Even if you go off those drugs and then go on a profile program and are tested. Yeah. And don't test positive. You never revert back. Oh, wow. To the point you were when you started taking. Huh, that's fascinating. So the athletes, an athlete who gets banned and then penalized when that athlete comes back, they come back, even if they're clean at that point, having gained an advantage that they never lose. Wow. All right. I didn't know that. Oh yeah. Huh. Well, it's sort of like they haven't gotten that interested in it. And the science is just starting to come out. And as with all these kinds of arguments, it's, well, show me the science. And the problem with it is you can't do a double blind empirical study. Yeah. Putting people on drugs for four years and some not on drugs and then taking them off. Yeah. And then seeing how much of it they retained. You see what I mean? Yeah, absolutely. It doesn't lend itself to empirical verification. Huh. But any athlete will tell you. Any athlete who's been there will tell you. Yeah. Wow. So you think if somebody's banned, they should be banned for life. Yes. Or they've ever come back. Okay. No. Wow. Yeah. I really appreciate you spending some time with me today. I know people are gonna love this. Anytime. And thank you again for everything you've done for me in the past and creating the Boulder Boulder, my favorite day of the year. And I will put some links in the video to some of the amazing articles about Frank. He wrote a book called My Marathon. I'll put a link to that in there if you wanna learn more about Frank. But thank you so much. Sure.