 Dale, how are you brother? I'm fantastic mate, how are you? Yes, firing mate, firing. It's great to chat. Always good to chat to a fellow Royal Marine. But in this case we've got a boxer, Jordan Reynolds, hello Jordan. Who came on the podcast the other day to thank for putting you and I in touch. Yeah, what a great lad Jordan is. I'm sure you had a blast with him. We had a really good chat, he's so grounded. He's super switched on. When I first met him, I remember the first time I spoke to him we were kind of doing some general work and he was talking about some books he'd read, like personal development books and stuff like that. And I was thinking fucking hell, this guy's like, I think he was like 17 or 18 at the time. He's already thinking, probably somewhere where I'd be thinking maybe 10 years in advance. He's well above his age at the time in terms of his thinking and his mindset. He's carried that all the way through his career like England, GB and now professional and he's going to go far definitely. Yeah, you're a really nice bloke. Hello again Jordan. I remember I bought my first personal development book. I was either coming from Limson to home or the other way around and was in Exeter train station and had one of those cat book carousels. You don't see them that much these days and there was one book it was like I don't know how to be the best you can be or something. I mention it mate because why is it that some people have that? You know they want to seek knowledge. I don't know, I think I honestly believe it's internally driven. I don't know whether it's like a lot of times when I talk about things I talk to my patients about things. I try and bring it back to an evolutionary perspective like why do we behave in certain ways and how does that relate to kind of evolution? It's obvious when you talk about why people binge eating stuff and how the potentially evolutionary aspects of that we didn't maybe have access to food for long periods of time. When we come across carbohydrate, fatty foods it would be a good idea to take as much on as possible in order to store fat and carbohydrates in the muscle and then we can go long periods of time without food for instance. You can understand it from that standpoint but in terms of personal development I think maybe it's about trying to be the best version of yourself so you're able to be the most useful person in terms of the community. Humans are community species. Even though I like to think on independence stuff I do also want to be useful. I work in healthcare I help people recover from pain and injury get back to sport. I think it comes down to that I think it comes down to being capable and being able to handle situations that we maybe would have come across historically in our evolution and it's a survival mechanism where the most useful capable person maybe attracts the best mate maybe can fight off the lion get the food all that type of stuff so I think it's an evolutionary drive and I think it's stronger in some people than it is in others and it seems to be quite strong in the bootlegs. Yeah we're a rare breed mate aren't we? It seems like if you go online go on Instagram or something like that and the amount of bootlegs that are doing amazing stuff around the world is insane. You can just like you can't list them endless amounts of bootlegs that just left the core and gone on to amazing things physical feats psychological stuff businesses whatever they've decided to get stuck into they've typically done really well and I don't know whether it's once again it was an internally driven thing that does that type of service attracts certain types of individuals initially who already have these traits or is there something about the training that allows for these traits to develop especially if you join at a younger age where you're more plastic and malleable where you could be influenced and when you're around other people that are similar in nature and similar in kind of mindset and actually behave as long term I think it's all interesting stuff I don't know particularly the answers but there seems to be certain traits that bootlegs have that is potentially an advantage and long term. Yes and you just said something there it's interesting isn't it that a lot of people would be surprised at this but the average career of a Royal Marine is seven years and I think there's kind of like a split not a physical split but a metaphysical split of people that went in for the experience and when they've had it there's just other stuff they want to do in life isn't there and then you get your career you know your professional career soldier or Marine and it's kind of like a different thing again but I mean there's Marines out there there's Marines hosting TV shows and that's just this kind of stuff in the media there's also an awful lot of Marines just doing bloody good stuff that we don't get Just day to day stuff like running charities doing stuff in the community the amount of things that I see they just pop up on my timelines and stuff and they click on to it and then it's just it's really inspiring but I think you're right I always joined for the experience I was never going to be I never decided that I was going to do it long term if like if you kind of as you go through my history you'll see that I'm very much an experience driven person I want to do stuff that's hard that's challenging that's going to test me but I don't necessarily want to do that forever I want to do something else I want to find where's that next point where I can be pushed whether that's physically, psychologically, emotionally wherever it is so I think there's certain bluenacks that are like that as well I don't know whether it's some sort of ADHD issue we can't stay in one place too long you know get itchy feet or something like that but there's certainly something there that makes me kind of want to where's the next challenge, where's something else I can get stuck into and get focused on Yeah definitely and I think background for a lot of us I think this might surprise people to know but you know so many so many of us come from quite damaged backgrounds that it gives you a certain mindset and approach to life that I think you want answers Yeah it's interesting because I think a lot of lads that I was in with they didn't really have anyone at home like home home so like when they joined the court that was their home I was very fortunate to have had a really good upbringing we weren't welfare or anything like that to be honest it was money was tight when we grew up but as we were like loving family I had a mum and a dad both living together we went to school every day all of our needs were looked after I had three siblings so we had lots of fun in the house he was really happy house, busy house with friends coming around and stuff like that so my background wasn't damaged at all I'd come from what happened was I was in the final year of school and I never had any ambition to join the armed forces up until this point so I was 16 this was like Christmas time and I was talking to one of my mate's brothers mate who was in the Royal Marines he joined and just passed training chatting to him also I was kind of seeing all the stuff from the news with the bootnecks were in the news and I was like it was really interesting I went onto the website and started to like flick through and I was looking at some of the like and I knew about the Royal Marines I'd been interested in them before seeing other stuff and I never thought that I was going to join but I started to look through the website and I was like this is really cool and at the time they were running the you've hit your wall get over it do you remember the campaign on TV the athlete with like on the sole course and then like the guy gets to the wall and he's like struggling to get over it and then I think there was a bit where like on the endurance course going through Peter's pool is this when you know this is your breaking point type thing and I was like that's really cool and so I looked at the requirements and it was like the three mile test you had to do on the PRMC so I was training in terms of like I was doing some weight so 16 and I was playing football and rugby and all that type of stuff I was like let's go out and go for a run and see if I can do it I never used to run just for running sake at that point I had a little loop around my house and I went out running and I was literally dying from the first like you know first first half a mile running but I ended up doing three miles and I just got in just in time and I was like I have got in I pulled the line had the cardiac event getting round but I managed to get round and then I decided I went and spoke to my mum she was like no you're not I was like no no I am joining the women she was like you're joking right I was like no no I'm joining she was like no you're not joining because I'm not going to sign the papers to join and I was like well if you don't sign the papers I'll just sign them next year when I'm able to like you can sign them when you're 17 I believe at that time so she was like okay and then we got to the negrity and stuff but I was really academic at school I played like football team rugby team stuff like that but I was never like super there was a lot more people that are more talented than me physically but I was really academic, I had good memory so I was lucky to be able to retain information and I got to and I was like all of my teachers and stuff were they were pushing me to go into university so like everyone assumed that I was just going to go straight to university but there was like this like gifted and talented scheme at school for all the people that were bright all the bright kids and we got to go and visit loads of universities like Oxford, Cambridge like Loughborough as you were interested in sport all this type of stuff so I was on all these visits to the university and I was being groomed to go to university and then I dropped the hammer on them and I joined the Royal Marines and I had this like I remember I had this like intervention of teachers that brought me in and just like tried to convince me not to join the Royal Marines which was out of madness but I still remember it, it's quite a fond memory to us Your story is so similar to mine I was homeless and living in my car at the time and my mate did the PRC it was before they called it the PRMC with the PRC and he went off to London and he came back and he was buzzing and he was firing and he'd had like 30 guys rock up for this PRC and three of them passed or something, it was one of those Yeah and he said these are mortal words to me, he went yeah, it was tough but of course you couldn't do it I was like, I fucking can We'll see about that Yeah, just like you I looked at the brochures and I went I can do 50 press ups I can do 80 sit ups I can then want 6 pull ups I can do like 30 pull ups, right? So I set myself a challenge because I wasn't a runner either and I run around there's a rock on Dartmoor called the rock that some people might know and it was half a mile from my home around the rock and back and I thought right, if I can run around the rock, sorry it was a mile if I can run this mile around the rock and back and without stopping bang, I'm going to go to the recruiting office on it's actually Christmas Eve or something and I'm going to go to the recruiting office after the holiday and I tell you what it killed me it killed me I did that first half mile and I wanted to die and there was this voice in my head and it just said, Chris you've got two options here you can give up for life or you can hang in there and those recruiting office doors are going to be open for you and that was it I'd say that's probably my first epiphany in life I speak to my patients about this all the time, about quitting lots of it probably goes back to evolution as well it's it's been so hard for humans throughout our history that we now and we've always seek to have comfort right at the moment sometimes now when we need to dig in we've made this comfortable life for ourselves in terms of sanitation it's safe education we don't have to be particularly physical the way we design the life so when things do get tough sometimes we struggle with it I speak to patients about quitting actually no one knows that you quit so if you try and do something you quit for instance if I was doing a race I could go out there and I could do the race I could quit on course on social media that something was hurting me I blew up there's nothing I could do about it but I might know that actually I didn't really fancy it that day or I could do the race I could complete the race even but halfway around I could slow myself down because it's hurting me a little bit and I'm struggling but actually I know that I've got more inside me but I can just quit or in that situation nobody would ever call you a quitter you've went and done what you were supposed to do you've done the race, you've finished it so you haven't quit as such because you quit halfway around when you could have dug in a little bit and your goal might have been to dig in and push a bit harder and you did it so I think the rally is about quitting is interesting sometimes it may be the right thing to do in terms of if you change your mind really change your mind really that's not your goal anymore but in a lot of situations people typically quit when it gets hard and unfortunately although people don't maybe don't know that you quit or they might be aware that you quit you have to live with that personally and I feel like every time that you are able to overcome those feelings of wanting to quit you get a little bit stronger internally and what it does is over a period of time say for instance it might be something as simple as I set my alarm in the morning for five o'clock and I snooze to six o'clock every morning and actually I want to be up at five o'clock in the morning and every time that you keep snoozing and get up at six you chip away at your ability to be resilient later you're chipping away at your your it's almost like a trust in yourself to do certain things and every time you set alarm you get up at five o'clock you're building confidence in yourself and your ability to do stuff and that the sum of that and how that compounds over a period of time is amazing how it changes you as a person so unfortunately for quitting you may be the only person that has to deal with it may not be an external face but that internal feeling that you get can eat people up and I've seen you see a lot of people that have left the core that go back and rejoin right they didn't pass training for whatever reason maybe they got injured maybe they had some issues with some of the skills or whatever it was and ten years later they rejoined the core because it's all that every day for that period of time it's been eating them up inside and you see the same with with boxes that they kind of come back after a period of time and it's like it's this internal driver to want to achieve certain things they could have done better and they want to get back into it but for me I don't like living with the feeling of quitting it's kind of against the person I think yes I've only ever met one person who left the Marines and just said Chris I'm really glad I did I'm not friends at home we're not trying to sell the military here I'm just saying that most people tend to be alright Chris yeah I was in the Marines I got to week 23 in training and it just it's eating me up my whole life I'll say to everyone well I'll say to everyone we had our 30 year reunion our troop and we went to Limestone and they said do you want to go and speak to the fresh recruits in the they call it the foundation block now it was the induction block when I was when I was there and so I stepped forward to these youngsters and I just said listen don't fucking quit it's that simple unless you absolutely decide now actually this isn't for me I really don't want to that's fine that's fine because it's not the be all and end all to be in the military or get I fucking hate it training I hated it I was literally like I was never going to quit but only because I wasn't going to quit I was going to pass the course no matter what it killed me in the process I was going to pass the course I hated it I drew when I was 16 scrawny little 16 year old skinny Levenstone I was fit I was strong for my age you start slapping on the bourbon on my back my body started to break down I was super fussy eater I lost a load of weight in training because I was like I get up in the morning and I wasn't used to being up early in the morning I couldn't eat and then like I was going doing all these kind of all the stuff you do day to day I was getting really fatigued with beating up from it all the admin stuff I'd been like I was fortunate that my mum my mum done loads of stuff at home I was a kid still so I was having to learn all this stuff and I enjoyed different bits of it like like some of the like learning some of the soldiers give us all that type of stuff there's bits the lads but and I could see myself like the job I could see it was like I quite liked it but hated every minute of being at Levenstone hated it like and I was it was just I was my body was just breaking down like I was and even to the point where week nine I got this really real bad chest infection ended up in hospital on IV antibiotics and managed to do that it was like gym pass out on a Saturday everyone done it on Wednesday or something if I missed it and I managed to do it on Saturday and just like let me just like do the bare minimum on the bleep test and the pull ups and stuff just to get through to the next week and then they and then I got to we commando tests and that's the thing at that point all that matter to me was getting that green lids right it was like and oh and getting the green lids to me right now single-handedly the most proudest moment of my life to this point it's meant it's that it's been the biggest thing because I've realized how much it took for me in training to get like there's been nothing ever that since then that's that's challenged me like that and I've done loads of stuff and there's nothing that took so much from me and like Wolverine's training because I've really found it tough so I was in Commandos this week woke up on the Saturday and I was and I've got like big chin right so I was I was sort of half-sleeve and sort of splash my face when I went into the when into the headstep of Shave I got into sink and I was crimped up my face I started shaving and like rather than like having like corners around like my chin it was just like one smooth kind of circle all the way down to like my chest so I sort of like rubbed my eyes, looked at me and I was like fuck and my face had like my neck was swollen like this this was on the morning of the endurance course and I was like no and what happened was there was mumps going around in my home town and I had gone back maybe six weeks before so I don't know when when I had gone back but I ended up coming out in mumps and I had so I had to come do the commandos test with mumps and I did the endurance course and I set off in the second group of three right, so right in front and as you know as you go through the endurance so if anyone doesn't though the faster lads go at the front because otherwise on the endurance course you'll hold everyone up so I set off on the second group of three and you go through in the group of three until you get to a place called the sheep's dip where you dip each other under this kind of like water tunnel and then you can go and do your own thing so I started running this group of three and the lads were going, Dale, hurry fuck up what are you doing? so I was always blowing I was struggling to keep up with them to the point that the groups behind us I believe probably started a minute later maybe they were catching up with us what are you doing, hurry up anyway got to sheep's dip, went through and they ran off and then as I was doing endurance course I had to watch person after person and I was on my way back I was always blowing I've never felt pain like it I could hardly breathe I was running shuffling whatever I was doing and I got in and I was expected to get in about 63 minutes based on performance previously and I believe there was like 73 minutes cut off time we had I remember getting in and I was like I failed this so many people had come past me along the course I couldn't even come in everyone was there seemingly everyone had passed me I was just going to keep going as hard as I can I got there and my P.T.I was there with the kind of stopwatch it was like fucking hell hard where have you been well done anyway good effort over there on to the range 72 and a half minutes so I got in by half a minute I lost maybe 9 and a half minutes just from being here and then obviously I can't remember what order it is now so is it the it's the 9 miles speed march next right and then it's the yeah isn't it Tarzan Assault on the first day endurance on the Friday 9 miler on the Saturday and then we definitely did the endurance first because I remember waking up on the Saturday going that's how I remember but anyway when it was on Tarzan was definitely after because when I went and done the Tarzan I remember my training team pulling me aside and saying what the hell is going on like I remember having a conversation with them they pulled me aside and said what's going on and they said look we can see what's happening so I said to them about the neck and they were like what do you want to do do you want to pull off or do you want to carry on and I was like obviously I'm going to carry on stay away from the lad in the showers stay away from the lad in the showers you're doing this at your own risk and I probably shouldn't say this but you're an adult make your own decisions right here and that's what I love about the court self responsibility you're an adult here one of my mates who makes me laugh if you want to act the big man at night you have to also be willing to act the big man in the morning as well so I think you have to be able to deal with the consequences of your actions if I end up giving myself a big problem that's my fault I made the choice I ended up doing it and got through a test but struggled like hell to get around but we got through and obviously that meant a lot to me that whole airtime period in my life is passing warm-up training and getting my green bra still the proudest moment yeah mine was passing the PRC funny coming from a challenging background to actually achieve something of that what the time to me is holy grail when they say put yourselves on the back gentlemen you've just entered the Royal Marines and a load of lads have been sent off home because they failed the PRC going back on the train I was buzzing I was absolutely it was just still is to this day you know the most memorable moment in my life and Dale Afghanistan how many times did you go there twice I went in Charlie company in 2006 that's 40 command we were couple just five months just as a section as a company a company group and that was during we've been here free so when the powers were in Sagan and that was like a bloody tour for them as we were in when it was kind of a lot of patrolling IED risk not a lot of small arms contact it was a little bit of like public order stuff it wasn't particularly like heavy compared to what we then experienced in 2007 2008 when we deployed as a group and well four commander deployed with I believe the rifle and we weren't part of the brigade we were deployed separately but I think after us the four commander attached someone else I spent seven months in Afghanistan and then we were done I was in Naazad Kajaki, Sangin all places that were pretty interesting pretty hairy life there was lots of contact there was war fighting going on there wasn't a lot of locals around there was a lot of Taliban it was kind of some IED risk but a lot of small arms RPGs like all the indirect fire 707s all this sort of proper fighting stuff that went on that tour so it was a bit of a different tour but twice overall it's pretty beautiful up by Kajaki is it not? absolutely amazing stunning you've got these so there's the Kajaki you've basically got a dam there and it's like really mountainous and hilly but you've got a couple of observation points in the hilly bit that overlooks Kajaki town and then you've got the Kajaki I don't know what they call it now probably called it the FOB maybe I can't remember what they called it DC or something they've got a Kajaki main camp sort of thing just below but you have these kind of fast sport positions that overlook everything and you could within Kajaki what you could do was because the lads had eyes on that whole area and now I think about it it's mad you could leave the camp on your own with a weapon and then go up to the fire sport positions as long as you had kit review burning weapons so I was near my wife now mother of my children but she was my girlfriend at the time we'd split up so I started training so I was just going up and doing loops of this circuit up and to the hills back down and just checking them with the lads but I kind of like think back I think that's a bit risky really like anything could have gone wrong there but it was lads were doing it but there was the main risk from the enemy was kind of to the north so like we'd have to push into that to get contacts and stuff so I don't think there was much risk locally but there could have been someone could have snuck in all sorts of stuff it didn't happen that way but it could have been I could have been shot at when I was doing that but it never happened that way but yeah Kajaki's insane absolutely stunning beautiful we could even go a couple of times go swimming in the dam a little bit and like freezing cold water but absolutely stunning amazing sounds incredible we had a the chap I shared my room with in the northern island where Artora northern island is called Dave killed himself another sad military statistic but what he used to do he started I was going to say knocking off then and I'll forget that I can't use such terms when you're 52 he started to have liaisons with a girl in the naffy and because he was a section commander or 2IC he had a radio and he used to just tuck it in his jacket hop in the boot of her car she'd lock him in the boot and he'd drive out of camp and he'd go and spend the night at her place that might not sound much to people listening but when you're in that camp every single minute of every day you're waiting to be killed we got mortared we got the back gate bombed we got sniped going out the front gate and you know yourself if the Taliban had ever got hold of you it wouldn't be pretty it was the same in Ireland if the IRA had got hold of a Marine that wasn't going to end very well and Dave he didn't give a shit I thought it was one of the bravest things I've ever seen he could have been big trouble he would have been probably dismissed if anyone had found out not even that there would have been at least a few worries you don't want to get called by the IRA in someone's house and you're a British soldier at that point in time it's just the same for his name we were actually like I had the mission to go up it was fine but even then it was brutally risky but I think the reason why the military works is that you've got young fish strong males that aren't risk averse their tolerance to risk is low sorry hi don't mind risk it's one of those inherently risky careers it probably explains some other stuff I've done like combat sports I'm willing to physically take risks but I think I've probably changed a little bit since having kids actually yes it does it does make you reassess completely changes the when it's just you I didn't really think of any of the behaviors as risky as such I never really thought about it I just kind of dumbed them and enjoyed them and stuff and did things but when you have children do you really want to go down to the gym and get punched in the head every day you know is that you know I obviously want to be kind of be able to have conversations when I get older but also as well I want to be around for my children I don't want something to happen I watched one of the lads from my gym it wasn't like a good buddy of mine or anything like that but he was good mates with some of my training partners went to watch him fight I was literally right outside the ring like literally he's in this absolute war with this guy the guy's a monster and the guy ends up landing a big right hand and then left hook knocks out our training partner he just didn't get up he was on the canvas he was just like boom he was lifeless fuck that was terribly bad and this was right next to it it was just in front of me it was on the stage on the seat looking right next to it and it happened just in front of me and he's like I was thinking I was looking around at the lads and I was thinking fuck he's not getting up and anyway the ambulance was in there and they were trying to revive him he was down to about 30 minutes on the floor then he gets spoiled and bored out bringing the ambulance to hospital he ended up having a huge bleed in the brain they managed to save his life but he's now physically unable to do most things psychologically unable to do he's at his mental age he's kind of like a young child type thing now he's like he'll have to rely on care for the rest of his life and that's when doing the sport he laughed and we were at the risk but since having kids I'm like do I want to do that even with cycling there's nothing that pisses me off more I'll go out and cycle it I love cycling it's part of the sport I do at the moment and it got in the road and it is brutal out there you are it is kind of a numbers game drivers are reckless they don't realise how close they are to killing you every time they do something stupid and I've seen loads of that that have been seriously injured from cycling people have died and stuff and I'm out on the road going for a Sunday long ride you know what I mean just a casual ride and some lunatic tries to take me out and then they try and blame you like you've done and they don't give you the risk even now I do a lot of my cycling now indoors like on the subway train I typically go out maybe once a week or once every two weeks just because I'm not I'm not looking to get taken out by some knobbed in the car I don't get road rage in the car but when I'm on my bike I get pretty angry pretty quick I just can't help myself because I know that if I'm in the car someone does something stupid we have a little collision it might not be that bad but it's serious so it could potentially be very serious so I'll get angry quick on the bike and everyone's probably thinking shut up mate you're wearing lycra but if you put it on your car we'll have a proper discussion they do this thing I don't know if this is country wide but they do it down here the drivers are afraid to cross the white line even when there's like nothing coming in the opposite direction they see it as like their mission is they've got to squeeze past you on the bike but not go over the white line and it's it makes you wonder how how people can be that stupid but I put something on my social media the other day saying that they should make every driver about once every two to three years cycle 10 miles on a bike on the road just so they know what it feels like to be on a bike do you know what I mean expose everyone to it obviously it would never happen but in my little fantasy world that would be the best thing put the fear into them when you're on a bike you feel extremely exposed cars coming past you and cars pull out and stuff the other day I was in the aero position 25 mile an hour I was kind of like middleish of my lane going through a place called Helo there's cars parked up on the right hand side of me and this lorry has come out onto my side and he's heading to me head on all I can see is this coming towards me and I've had to swerve barely got out of the aero position I still had one arm in the aero bar I've grabbed my handle bar almost hit the curb and I'm pretty sure he didn't even see me I don't know if he saw me or not and then I just sat up and I slowed down for about half an hour I was just like what the fuck is this I almost died then I was like head on collision with this lunatic in the lorry he's just not paying attention I've got no idea I don't think he did but I suppose it doesn't help being in the aero position you're a bit smaller and you're moving maybe a bit faster than what people would expect a cyclist to move but at the same point in time it's like come on mate open your eyes and look so it is it is brutal they should fit a device to all drivers but if you come within 5 meters of a cyclist you get a 90 million volt shock to your balls or your bits that would stop these fuckers it's only happened three times I don't know why people think this is a good idea and the interesting thing it's happened twice on one night so one night last summer I was going out on my cycling around the local lanes on my bike having a good time cycling beautiful weather and some knobbets two young lads in the car as they drive past they screamed at me to try and spook me so I've gone like this on my bike because I'm like what the hell is that and then they laugh at me I tried my best to catch up with them about 20 minutes later it happened again I was like what are people drinking tonight I believe it was in the I think it was in the maybe in the World Cup there was a World Cup last year mate now you're asking maybe it was a World Cup maybe last year or a year before but it might be around that sort of time there was quite a few people in pubs or maybe the weather was really nice but it happened twice on one night and then it happened again about two weeks ago this guy on a moped has come part he's overtook me and he's like and shouted to try and spook me but I didn't really react because I sort of looked but he's on a moped he can only go 30 mile an hour or 40 mile an hour he can't go that fast and I was like why have you just done that so I started bombing it on my bike to catch it I was like I was so angry I've actually not had a fist fight in like in normal life civilian life type thing I've obviously done competitive stuff but since I was a kid since I was like 18 or whatever but I'm angry right now and this guy I'm so angry I can see in my head visions of me booting him off his bike as I catch him just so he understands there's consequences to actions I think that's another thing inherently any consequence to doing stuff like that normally people just let it slide if people didn't let it slide people would understand actually I shouldn't do stuff like that to people you know the way I saw it was okay in your head you're only shouting at me right you're only shouting something at me in my head is your shouting could cause me to crash which could kill me I've got children and you could potentially really impact their lives that's how I'm seeing it so it's super personal to me anyway he just about managed to get away I got caught up behind some traffic that was moving slow couldn't get past it and he disappeared off into the distance down this hill it took me about probably about five minutes from a blood pressure to come back down when I carried on site I just don't understand some people really we're gonna call you Ronnie Pickering have you seen that have you seen that bitch no I haven't seen it no no oh mate get on YouTube Ronnie Pickering bless you Ronnie if you ever get the chance to watch this for some random I'm like super chilled right I'm like really relaxed person like takes I would very rarely get angry at anything that's done to me I think the the big change where I feel like something's gonna impact more children that's what's changed previously if that happens to me I would just laugh and probably give them a little finger and say go away mate I just think it's quite funny since having children I just think I don't know whether it's not even like a conscious thing it's just straight away that's personal to me now because I feel like that could essentially impact my children's life and it's just it's crazy how your physiology can influence and take over Howford should start selling Milan anti-tank missiles that you can fit on your handlebars that would sort it all out wouldn't it yeah I mean I mean even like some sort of like slingshot type device on the aero bars I could aim that towards them and then pull it back that would be enough aim it at his stupid p-head but yeah I'll just balance that people sometimes please yeah so I mean even with all my training I'll just try not to spend that much time on the road one for my own health and safety and probably now after this discussion for other people's health and safety as well yeah best thing get out five in the morning before everyone else is awake 100% good blast then back to Afghanistan Dale did you have any memorable contacts yeah I've asked this question to some people on the podcast and they were like yeah like every single day yeah we had a lot yeah I mean I think the so when I was in Kajaki I was I was on more line so we were sort of protected right we were within the within the within the kind of compound but the lads would be getting the lads in Kajaki would be getting contacts all the time and we as a more line we fired so many rounds we fired our more line bare of mine has put us in the line fired about 30,000 rounds in the in the tour which was a lot of rounds and they brought these kind of air burst rounds on that tour which we were using and there were so many contacts but when I went to when I went to Sangit my role was I was attached to a section of the brother company on the ground with them and I was doing the 60mm hand held role so we were in some quite few hairy moments I mean then even stand out I mean the thing I have the most the most memory of because there were some hairy moments of course but the thing I have the biggest memory of is we were it was the first time that so I fired towards people before I never knew that any of my rounds had killed anyone I knew that we were in contacts and stuff and fired towards people but I never knew before that my rounds knew I didn't know why so I knew in the more line as a collective we had many confirmed kills as a more line because it would be reported over the icon scanner after we after we had been in contact we were in huge contacts but then when I went on this I was in Sangit and we would go out with these patrols we would get in contact and stuff like that but one day we was in the Sangit DC and we started getting some indirect fire 107mm rockets and there was kind of like a big building in Sangit DC that started using the fire support position and the tankies that were up in the fire support position could see the guy that was that was firing the rockets he was in this kind of tree line they could see him but they couldn't engage him he was a bit too far away so they got into us on the radio and it was basically me and a lover lover lad there wasn't a 81mm mortar barrel in Sangit there was a section in Incomon which was a little bit further away maybe 5k north of Sangit but there was nothing in Sangit so we just had this hand held I remember the lads basically giving us the general direction where the guy was on my own in that far in this 60mm hand held over I couldn't see the guy because there was a compound ward between but in the direction of the tree line which they gave me they gave us a distance I put the charges on the round and fired it we just missed him but then they gave me a slight adjustment and bearing in mind I'm like it's a barrel that you're holding like this so you control the elevation and the direction of it you make a correction it might not be as accurate as you think it it's not like on the site on the 81mm where you can make smaller corrections it'll be more accurate I think I fired the 2nd round and it took the 2nd round Airbus round took him out and confirmed and I just remember that was the first time I had ever had that single me responsible for that if that makes sense rather than it being a collective people firing towards someone or the mortar line you know I was a member of the mortar line I was on the barrel I was putting another 2nd or 1st I remember thinking it was just like the tankies buzzing down the radio like it was hitting him like a complete sort of thing and I remember thinking it was just like a weird feeling it was just like fuck it felt kind of good but not good it was just a weird feeling do you have any difference of feeling now that you're can we say older and wiser or I guess what I'm getting at is a big thing in it to kill someone and I've said this to lads not on the podcast but lads that I know I've seen them really battling like PTSD and I'm yeah it's what I think it's what I think not I would say the point I was making I said to these lads listen you leave the past behind it was a conflict and they're like oh no Chris I won't bother about killing the enemy fucking fuck them my mate died I'm like I'm a sort of humanitarian I think everyone's equal we shouldn't be killing anyone but I'm the same I think for a lot of lads that I know that have had issues with PTSD and stuff it's kind of like a feeling of almost like some people would say like maybe they could have done something right someone died maybe they could have influenced the outcome one of their mates but really the situation is you're in a war fighting situation there's not much you could maybe you could have made different decisions but it's in real contact that's not a nice burden to carry but I don't have an event like that in terms of the killing of people I'm kind of like it depends on like it depends on once again I don't think anyone should really die but I think it depends on the context of it so it's like you're there doing a job and they're firing towards you you're just kind of defending yourself it was self defense in that situation firing into the camp there's other people at risk and it just it doesn't weigh on me quite the way it would if it was like I don't know like say for instance I went on a night out and I wouldn't fight on the night out but went on the night out and I'd end up punching someone and killed them that would weigh on me a lot more that makes sense because I'd feel like in that situation that person's probably not a quick everyone thinks they're a bit tough on the night out but after a few beers but the reality is situation I know from being the combat sports background and doing professional fighters for years the average person is ill-equipped to combat on the street so they're confident but they're compromised in terms of their ability to fight back so me hitting some drunk person on the night out that would be against the way I would value my values in the first place but if something then seriously happens that person that would really weigh heavy on me that wouldn't be a nice thing to live with because you just know that person is kind of even though they've been a bit of a twat they're a sin but a crime easy target but then again if say for instance if something happened you're surrounded by people and it was like for every reason you're thinking shit I'm in trouble here I could potentially get seriously hurt here and then if something happens and you seriously hurt someone once again it's like it's almost internal for humans to try and survive and once again thinking about now inside of me I've got children etc so maybe in that situation if it was I wouldn't feel as bad I think it's all context based yes yes exactly of course it is and the powers that be if we can call them that I've got a responsibility to a duty of care over the military I think that's been abused in the last 20 years but that's another that's another road that we don't need to go down for this podcast because I'm really fascinated Dale to chat about your Ironman stuff but before we do shall we just give Chris Harrison a mention yeah so Chris Harrison was like closest mate when I was he was he was in my moral section we we spent a lot of time together on the piss for a few years together as good mates and when I left in 2009 your fat like just so in 2009 I left in 2010 just before Chris was deployed to Afghanistan we actually went out on the piss and then he went on tour and then I was I sat at home one day and I get a phone call from one of the lads Neil and I was looking at my phone thinking like why the fuck is Neil ringing me but I haven't spoken to him in ages like and I just knew straight away I was like looking at the phone dreading answering the phone fucking like this he's not ringing me for a good reason I was like Neil what's up he's like they all got some bad news I was like what's the news mate and he's like it's Chris and I was just like I knew I knew that weren't going to be like he's like he's just lost a limb or something and that sounds like trivial right that sounds like just because I've seen so many lads that have done that and they've been around him and stuff I knew it was just by the time of his voice I was told that it was like it was like it was not it was more serious right he's like mate Chris yesterday yesterday was blown up in Sagan he basically died and the arms weren't allowed to last fucking hell so just and then obviously we then he was brought back and went to a funeral and he left like his wife behind and the year before his wedding and just like and I left at that point and it kind of pushed me away from military stuff for a long period of time maybe about five years or something where I just was like do you know what I just want to park that and not have to deal with any of that stuff and it went until like a few years later I could start to deal with it in fact like I'm not really like a grave visitor if that makes sense like so like Chris obviously went to the funeral and all that type of stuff but then just I'm not a sort of person to go and visit graves I didn't for a while until more recently a few years ago where I started to visit his grave more regularly just because I probably had other stuff myself I had to deal with right and it's just like for me it's just not going it's just going to these places don't seem to help me it's the same with my old man I swear a few years ago but going to his grave doesn't seem to help me that much it just I don't know just don't get some people get stuff out of that I just don't get a lot out of it although I do go and visit of course but I just don't go as frequently as many people would do because it's just I don't know to me it's just that his memories there and you know if I want to kind of like have some sort of internal conversation with him for my own sort of time I don't need to be in that sort of thing but yeah Chris Harrison literally anyone that knew Chris he was the one of the nicest guys you ever meet really larger than life character epic of a night owl we used to just think of an atomic lunge on the dance floor like he'd know he was known for it big larger than life guy really big guy carried at least a bit of muscle mass and he was like one of the he was a great booneck and he was definitely he's definitely been sorely missed by everyone that knew him 100% yeah god bless you Chris um yes funny in it we join up for that job and that's part and parcel of it and yet you don't even think about that do you when you when you've said yeah it's just and I'm now being a bit older and I kind of I mean I left the court behind many years ago I left in 2009 and 2022 now so Christmas in 2010 but at the time like I Christmas 25 I believe when he passed away and I was younger at the time and I kind of you know seeing him it's kind of almost like a big brother type thing like you know it was like it was like losing the family basically say exactly the same as that losing losing someone who was super close to his life that to me that was the most like significant trauma death that I'd ever had to deal with basically the closest person to me that I've ever had dying at that point that's died later but there's also like a different feeling like like losing Chris was like losing the brother then losing your parents different type of thing it's going like they have different emotions attached and stuff but he he was a great guy but I just remember thinking like going back to it now like I remember thinking he was like he was 25 a few years old a couple of years old a bit of time or a few years old a bit of time I remember thinking like like because I was young he was older type thing if that makes sense now I look back I'm thinking fuck 25 right he's 25 year old that lost his life in Afghanistan like what that's just such a waste of a life especially some of the life that's so vibrant and so much energy honestly like anyone that meet him or met him or meet him would say the exact same thing larger life personality like literally brought energy to every room like and if you know bootlegs are known for the ability to be sure yeah but in and in ship situations but also they could drip a little bit too but like Chris was like literally like in terms of morale if you're looking for morale Chris would provide it he's just that fucking guy yes big respect Chris so Dale tell me what came first then the MMA the mixed martial arts fighting or or triathlon and MMA came first and although you know I've done elements of triathlon stuff previously but not like triathlon and you know but MMA came first when I left the core I needed something that basically was going to keep me I want to do something that was hard that would keep me engaged with training and keep me super fit and healthy because you build up all this strength and I was always into my fit so I always when I was in the core I would be training 2-3 times a day every day we'd have the opportunity to so I would make use of the time to train so I was super fit super strong and I was like I need something to keep me fit and go along that path so I started doing mixed martial arts I've done a little bit of combat sports before but as I started going to classes getting like I'm enjoying this going more and more I just like training so I just train in a lot started getting pretty good I should do some amateur competitions I should do some professional competitions and all of a sudden I'm fighting in arenas it was mad really I never had any plans to compete and all of a sudden I was fighting in front of thousands of people so it was cool, I enjoyed it but then triathlons come a little bit later in terms of like triathlon I had to after having my children having children I had this period of time but in fact I circled back a little bit when I started my business I was so busy building the business initially I was working stupid hours I was only doing a little bit of training and I've always trained all the time I used to train every day normally and I started my business I went from training every day to training like two or three times a week just ticking over but I still fit and healthy and strong but then when my kids come along like first my son sleek went out the window it was carnage for like a year or something like that and my training went massively downhill and then my door came along there's two of them I started training again it's falling apart I've got an inflammatory joint condition that's like flaring up bad I could put on weight it's pissing me off, I was getting like down I'm not a sort of person I've usually used exercises to control my emotions my weight, my health and I was getting well frustrated because I wasn't doing it so I was like, you know what I'm just going to book an Ironman and start training for it and then so I booked the Ironman and started to train and that's what got me into triathlon but for circle back a little bit before that in 20 fame had this like major hip surgery from an injury that I had from combat sports so I ended up having some bone taken out of my hip a load of cartilage removed part of the labour was removed and I ended up starting to rehab and it's what put my MLA career to an end really because I had the surgery and then it took me about two years to fully rehab it to the point where I was comfortable doing a lot of the stuff and at that point I was busy with work and business and I was just like pfff it was just hard to get back into it at that level, like I missed everyone I was here with was here now so it was hard to play catch up and I couldn't because I was competing at the top of Europe and MLA there was no place for me just to insert back into fighting some people that weren't experienced so I was going to come back and fight on bigger shows against bigger opponents and I just weren't ready for it so I just parked that and at that time I remember my surgeon telling me I shouldn't be doing combat sports anyway but I carried on doing it but he also said to me to never run again he actually said to your hips look at this thing, it was your hips like an 80 year old's hip there's no, we took and basically taken all of the most of the cartilage on the acetabular surface the label was removed you need to be doing low impact stuff not running I was like look, I want to run it was one of the main reasons I had the surgery so I could get back to doing all this stuff we were talking about it, it was like when we went in there it was a lot worse on the MRI, we couldn't see some of this stuff on the MRI, it looked worse when we went in there we had to take more cartilage out fortunately I was in the right profession in terms of what I do every day is help people recover from pain, injury rehab and stuff, so I started just to rehab myself and fortunately I didn't take the surgeon's advice I didn't take anyone's advice I knew what my body was I knew what my body was about I knew what I could do I knew professionally what I did with people previously and seeing how they recover and stuff like that so I knew that there was more variable to play anyway, yeah I've been able to get back and do some really good stuff since then Yeah, good stuff we could talk about the alternative side of therapy for ages I don't know if you noticed but I'm always like shifting in my seat, it's because my back excuse my French folks it's fucked but oh yeah, I have an avid interest I'm trying to avoid surgery at the moment Dale, tell me it's a big old thing to step into a is it a cage in MMA it's a cage fighting, right? Did you did you see that series Kingdom? No Mate, you're missing a trick it's about these cage fighters in Los Angeles right in the heart of that fighting scene yeah it was about I think it ran for two series it doesn't really matter but it was bloody brilliant it was just brilliant it was all into it wasn't just about fights it was about their personal lives about their party and their all like mad party heads and it was just you know, all the wearing the bin bags in the sauna and all this stuff yeah it's interesting because I mean that sounds epic and I have obviously been in that sport I have I've been around that sport for a long time and no loss of fighters competing at a very high level myself so I'm very like desensitized to all of it if that makes sense people look at fighters and be like they're putting on this kind of pet store this guy is like beast but I just I just look at them as normal, I don't even I know so many fighters I work with them professionally now in terms of helping them recover from injuries and these people are literally killers, they're so physically talented with their ability to do combat but because I've been around it so long I've been desensitized to it it's all normal behavior to me so people, you know drastic weight cuts some fighters are wild they're literally they've got that personality type which enables them to go and fight people and most people would think that's a bit crazy I ain't going to go in there one on one with someone who's trained to fight and go and fight them, it's a bit like why would you do that doesn't really make that much sense but you have to have some sort of element in your brain that allows you to do that but yeah, I'm desensitized to it but I would definitely enjoy that documentary everyone used to say like a lot of people would ask me and they assumed that it would be the case did you get scared before you used to fight? that was the one like did you get scared or I used to shit myself before fights I was completely fine all through training camp almost like obsessed right? as soon as you're doing your normal training normal training, bang your book of fight and then it's just like I can't think of anything else all I can think about is the fight my opponent, what I'm doing with my training all of a sudden your whole life becomes because at the end of it you have to go and fight someone I don't even get a little bit like that around training in general but nowhere near to the level you would when you've got a fight coming up because you're going to fight this person who you don't really know their skill sets you know you know what you've seen shown publicly like in competition so you know that people know much more than what's being shown because you're fighting against another skilled opponent so you can't do everything that you would do in the gym against a skilled opponent you're having to gauge what their skills are on the move whilst you're doing it so these fighters are obviously much more skilled than what you can see when you're watching a fight but as you find throughout training it will be a very obsessed find up into the way I get to the day of the fight I turn up to arena and I'd be like what the fuck am I doing but this makes no sense whatsoever I start thinking Dale you could do anything other than go and fight some other good guy that's been trained to fight another young, athletic, powerful person that's been training day in day out to beat someone like that so I think to myself what the hell are you doing this is not normal but anyway I get super nervous I do the warm up and stuff and real anxiety before the fight to the point you're warming up and you're getting out of breath throwing a few punches and you're adrenaline is so high and you're just trying to control it and breathe and the coach is like come on relax now and you kind of get into it and then my sort of nerves and stuff used to peak the last probably four or five fights we'll film, televised so it would be like behind the curtain ready to make the walk music and you'd be waiting there for a couple of minutes before you kind of make the walk and it's all camera in your face sort of thing you're walking on that is the moment where I'm just like this is real I'm going to go and fight someone like you kind of feel like is there any way to me to go run out the arena sort of thing but it's just something that keeps you there and you're going to go and do it anyway and you make the walk, nerve wracking facilely not get into the cage, lock the door just you, your opponent the referee thousands of people around you in the arena but at that moment it's like none of it's like you're not computing any of it you can just see the opponent and the ref and then it's like peak nerves when the bell goes as soon as the first conscious phone nerves are gone there are no nerves that it walks you're fighting right you're in the situation now now you have to at this point you can't there's no option to flee there's no option to leave or anything like that you have to deal with it in front of you and it just goes away it comes very much like oh no I do this in training in training if we beat each other up this is kind of and it becomes quite normal but it's that build up because bear in mind MMA is not like you've got shin guards, you've got tiny little gloves on you can elbow each other knee each other punch, kick submissions, grapples, wrestling throw each other the rules allow for a real diverse amount of fighting to happen right so you know if for a fact you could be getting elbowed even ahead of that I had both my two front teeth knocked out and then they fight and I jumped up with a knee and it smashed me straight in the mouth knocked my two front teeth out and I carried on fighting but I was having to fight with my teeth swelling around my mouth other times you know big positions like you get cars or wherever it is it's a it's a mad game but it's weird it's kind of like when you do it when you train it a lot you kind of get desensitized it's only for me it's just peak fight day where I feel all the nerves and stuff Yes it's a bit different to my scenario because people ask me if I get nervous before doing a big charity stunt whether it's like run the country I did four Iron Men in one go once which is quite interesting I did it with eight weeks training though having come last in my first ever triathlon which kind of but the thing is I always say to people like if you're running at say half marathon we don't need to be nervous because it's not odd until the second hour see the mayors will wait an hour to be nervous and when that hour is done you'll be so into it you ain't even thinking about nerves you're thinking about dying so but in your case it's the complete opposite the moment you step into that cage bang there could be something to be nervous about yeah it's interesting because a lot of people might be nervous throughout their whole camp fight like they start feeling those anxious and I was lucky that I got condensed into that period of time on the day rather than kind of like a prolonged anxiety nervousness throughout a lot of people need help fighters need help with managing those nerves sports psychologists are in good business with fighters 100% it does really affect your performance even to the point where like so you know they're in there they're fighting but if you're going to land a shot you have to commit to landing it right and when people are a little bit unsure they won't they won't quite commit so they're safe but they're not effective right so it's one of those things that it's like that holds people back and it infects their performance so yeah I mean four Iron Man's in one go and that sounds, that sounds real yeah it was one of them ones where I almost thought I'd put a bit off more than I could chew and I started to feel a bit stupid but then I just persevered and I would say smashed it out it ended up with for the last day of my Iron Man I'd entered an ultra 100 mile ultra called the Robin Hood race in Sherwood Forest and to add insult to injury I kept missing the signs and going the wrong way so when I checked my tracker at the end of it I'd actually run 108 miles 100, I'd done 8 miles in the wrong direction after doing a quadruple Iron Man but mate what, you wait I mean you were a professional that's a achievement I mean it's just the way it works obviously I worked exceptionally hard to get to that level I put a lot of training out and stuff but I also had it was a sport that I was quite gifted at it's contact sports are kind of it's it's physical one of the physical attributes now I come and play out of the core I was very strong, very fit I was able to wrap that up again to suit me for combat sports another thing I was very disciplined and trained in so I was able to train again just keep showing up to classes learning, adapting fortunate to be in high pressure situations in the armed forces there's high pressure situations you have to make decisions quickly there's consequences decisions you make I've always been quite there's a skill element and my skills just improved over time I was more physical than skillful so I was able to get by I was fit and strong and just like bully bully my way through it because I was I trained for years but then as time goes on you can't do that against skilled opponents they get found out pretty quickly my skills got better and better but where I had an advantage I think was that those things I spoke about the psychological attributes helped me but also I was quite like I'm a follicle I'm kind of like my brain's good at understanding decision making processes I just feel like I could almost outsmart them a little bit my fight IQ was high relative to my skill set so I was more intelligent with my fighting and I'd use what worked well for me I could identify areas in the opponent that I could exploit type things rather than being actually probably 90 pretty much most of the people I fought or in fact all of them all of them would have been much more experienced than me all of them probably had a bigger range of skills than me when I was fighting they probably had more of that but I was just able to use the ones that I knew would work better against them that kind of thing I was able to do that before fighting I was able to look at them and see what kind of they had and then also in there as well on the move I was quite good at identifying patterns and seeing how they would respond to certain things and then making an adaption I think that's what helped me more and then my skills were just improving alongside that but once again as you go up the level of skills are improving anyway for everyone else I was great to have a professional career in a sport I never at school I was an average athlete so I never fought I couldn't even just say I used to be a professional athlete coming out of my mouth that sounded strange because I was never a professional athlete at school it's just the better it's over time it's probably just the crossover the kind of crossover but the accumulation of training over years and years and years that allowed me to be able to do that physically at that period of time and I was quite I always liked combat anyway when I was a kid you probably struggled to find a picture when I wasn't like this I just loved like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles I loved like Thunder Cats and anything that was like when it was like fighting involved it was just like action it was just superheroes I loved that so you know when I got to do it real life doing it I enjoyed it and it was fun and like I said I got to fight big things big shows and fight against really good opponents and you know I got to fight sports and channel 5 and all this type of stuff which is once again I'm removed from it now I'm doing triathlon I'm a dad bot doing long course triathlon right now so it's a completely different situation but it's cool to look back at mate let's come on to that incidentally I'm going to send you a box set of the 6 billion dollar man 6 billion 6 million we were so poor back in the 70s yeah 100% yeah 6 million dollar man if you like a good bloody fight you missed out on that because you're too young 6 million dollar man and then he went it was Lee Majors starting it it was this astronaut dude that got blown up on the launch pad or something all landing from space and they said we have the power to rebuild him Steve Aston the 6 million dollar man and he had a bionic eye bionic arm and bionic legs anyway what was I going to say what was your sort of grandest title what did you win I mean in mixed martial arts I won a British title professionally I also fought for the the Bama title which was a big lost to a guy called Stevie Ray who went on to have like 15 fights or so in the UFC so I mean we went to the decision so that was kind of like my biggest fight I fought some big guys on cage runners and stuff I was like I was ranked in the UK was that a good level very good level I'm going to talk the career further I believe but injury and then it just didn't happen to go that way and like I said I've never really circle back I like to do different things I never really had long term goals it was never my dream to be a professional fighter I just happened to go with the journey that it took me on and then when that journey came to an end injury and then I kind of moved on my life set up business and stuff that was just moving on to the next stage of something else now I get to work with fighters in a different capacity and I get to do other physical stuff that challenges me so for me at the moment I am hands about just like pushing my boundaries and like seeing sort of seeing what I've got at me at the moment I just want to feel like that hard that hard chip when I'm training and when I'm competing I want to feel like the point where I want to quit I want to be at that point and I want to feel like how do I how do I get through it I want to kind of just experience it how do I navigate it how do I push through it I feel like that's it's always been in me to want to feel that it's kind of you get to I feel like by doing stuff like that you really get to know yourself It's a shame I didn't know you back in the fight in Korea because I would have taught you the ultimate trick in the fight double punch mate double punch or if you're French the doublé puncher doublé puncher like this do you know what I was holding my hands up from the door earlier and she was doing the doublé puncher she knows it she's gone a long way she's obviously heard my reputation yeah I mean she has she's been on Instagram and YouTube a little bit so maybe it's something to do with that yeah mind you the other side of the coin is if you need to avoid the double punch you just turn sideways quickly turn sideways I mean that's how you avoid any punch actually triathlon the word that sinks fear into the heart every man and woman how did that come about I needed something to get me motivated again in terms of training after having my children because I was kind of training sort of fell off fell off course it wasn't where I needed to be I was feeling a bit shitty about myself putting it on weight and energy was low and stuff like that so I just decided to book an Ironman I was like let's get stuck into this what's that about how did you swim in it's one of the ones I do a lot of swimming because I was crap at it so I have to do a lot of it and slowly improving getting better I'm much better equipped to swim this year and it was last year for instance but I'm still pretty crap but I only sort of started realizing recently that actually it's important to get out of the war in a good position to rely on the bike to pull me through last year I ended up gaining 400 places on the bike because I was that far back to get out of the war you just make things hard for yourself so this year I'm hopefully come out in the water hopefully a little bit further ahead in the field and that makes things a little bit easier maybe the weather conditions a bit better this year are you naturally buoyant? no I'm guessing no, no I think real badly I can't lie in the water and float my wife she's like for years on HoloLens she's like everyone she's her thing she lies in the water she's like everyone can float I was like Debbie she goes you can, you're just not relaxing I was like I'm relaxed my legs are sinking I'm going to drown if I carry on with this she was adamant I'm a buoyant I sink to the bottom I need to keep my legs moving otherwise my legs would just drag along but being in the wetsuit helps me significantly I've got a zone 3 mate it's like having a life jacket on it just keeps your head above water really friends at home triathlon wetsuits is specifically designed so that the fabric on the arms is something ridiculous like one mil it's too rubbish if you're in cold war you start shivering your ass off but on your front and on your back and on your legs it's five mil and that in itself means you don't even have to swim it you bob you bob about there but I remember in the marines my swimming test we jump off the diving board you've got your kit on, you've got a rifle you've got a swim down a pool swim back hand it all off to someone without touching the side that was my hardest that was actually harder than an endurance course for me that I didn't pass it until the fortnight of the pass and out parade yeah I was alright I could do the fresh stroke I found out I was pretty strong with that but I don't know what it was I had a couple of experiences when I was younger I almost drowned I felt like I was going to drown I had to be dragged out of the water once when I was a young kid and there's something about having my face in the water I didn't feel like I was panicked but my breath told me something completely different so I would get super out of breath really quickly as opposed to being out of the water the breath stroke was okay because you dip it in and out but when I started doing front crawl it's almost like the downward facing looking towards the floor the bottom caused some sort of panic response but over time I got used to it in fact even last year in a triathlon it was a mass start it was only pretty about 300 or 400 racing but in a mass start for some reason my position was right in the middle why shouldn't it be in the middle I should be off to the flank a little bit for the start and get tucked in in the middle of the figure things crappy swimmer everyone starts belting along and I'm like let's go, let's go, we're racing and all of a sudden it was just like chaos couldn't see anything and I just started swallowing some water and then I started panicking I was like fuck and the worst thing you can do anyone knows in that sort of situation is stop swimming because everyone just swims over you there's this mass crowd of people so anyway I started looking around obviously you've got goggles on you're looking around there's lots of people splashing and then everyone started swimming over me I was getting pulled under the water literally I bore the line and had to take myself off to the plank and get out of the water but I managed to breathe a little bit and just a little bit of fast brush stroke in and I managed to get my breath back but I was danger close to just putting out massive panic response from swallowing the water and people swimming over me I know better now like next time just like keep swimming a little bit just don't get crushed by everyone else but yeah swimming is not my much better than what I was but it's not naturally swimming I was like 47 I think and I realised I couldn't swim obviously I swim a bit because you've got to be able to swim to be in the marines but when it come to front crawl I could do like a length and it all went to ratchet so I signed up for my local swimming pool and I thought right I'm going to do an Ironman that's it and I'm going to learn from these YouTube videos and slowly little by little I did one length and I did two then I did ten then I started to do hundreds of you know like 80 lengths or something the two things for anybody listening I would highly recommend is if you do have a problem with buoyancy and you're training for a triathlon is you can buy buoyancy shorts yeah near print shorts and they just keep your core up a bit and it's not a cheat or anything because you're obviously allowed to wear a wetsuit for an Ironman and the other thing Dale is I wear the goggles that go all the way across your eyes almost like a diving mask but without the nose bit and they're wicked you get a perfect seal yeah I started thinking about it recently because sometimes I've got these like magic fives they're like they're kind of like shapes they're quite small goggles you scan your face and they shake them don't get on with them at all like the ones that are kind of more like sidewalk style I just feel like your vision will be so much better in the open water like I swam in the other day I went to a lake and I was swimming and I wasn't even busy I was trying to sign and I was like I can't see anything I don't even know what direction I was swimming in really I've only got like to go off little bits that I can see I'm broadly swimming in the right direction because the lake was wide I wasn't sure whether I was meandering or what I was doing because the boys were tiny you couldn't hardly see them anyway plus the goggles are tight to your face I felt they weren't they don't give me that much vision so I don't know I'm kind of considering changing because at the minute it's just like maybe it won't matter next week I'm just going to get tucked in behind someone and hope they're swimming in the right direction like there's like a massive so basically this year like last year it was like you had to swim in anti-clockwise this year is the same lake they're swimming clockwise out of the lake for me I always brewed to the right to the left from swimming competitively because I'm just much more efficient right breathing so when I'm practicing I'll breathe both sides but a lot of the time when I'm competing I'll just breathe from one side if it's quicker so because it's clockwise this year it's better for me because I can position myself slightly on the outside edge and I'll be able to see everyone in front of me whereas last year it was anti-clockwise and like I couldn't see that sort of round then sort of like and I had to position myself right inside everyone and then I was being all slightly weaker swimming I was getting more caught up in bits so I didn't want to be in really because I had to position myself on the inside but this year I can position myself on the outside so I think that in itself will help me swim faster this year but we'll see I use those goggles and I use the little fog spray stuff yeah stop some mist I've never had a problem with that how many Ironmen have you done? just one, one last year was that 12 hours as I see from them? yeah that I'd done 12 hours 35 seconds it was like a bit slower than what I would have wanted it's a hilly course Ironman UK which is fine if I'd have had a good day I could have got a lot better but the whole field was slowed down to be honest because the weather was atrocious the weather on the bike was biblical rain it rained for four hours straight and Ironman UK loads of steep climbing up and down so it made the bike course really treacherous and people were coming off and it was dangerous so people had to slow down basically and also bad people's legs just made it much harder to work on the bike but I've done pretty good in the field overall for my first effort it was good I'd like to definitely see an improvement on that this year but we'll see Chris mate I'll literally have to go in two minutes yeah no worries mate I was just going to say you did 12 12 hours 35 I would probably have done that in 12 34 I reckon you could have done it in just under 12 mate given your aesthetic group probably could have done it in an hour mate it's a show in often yeah yeah and I mean you don't want to upstage professionals it just wouldn't be right Dale it's been absolutely fascinating mate thank you so much for coming on the show thanks for having me I haven't done so much of the fighting bit I'll leave that to my little boy but he does his taekwondo he's almost a black belt now which I'm very very seven years old it's a junior black belt I've been very very proud of him but yeah we have we've a lot of parallels in our life and it's great to chat about so just stay on the line so I can thank you properly but Dale thank you ever so much and we'll put your Instagram below so people can jump on that and strongly suggest folks even if this is an inkling in your mind that maybe you want to do this one day or some just follow someone like Dale and just get started you can do a triathlon in a day if you set yourself a run around the block cycle up to the shopping bag and then just go to your swimming pool and swim at five lengths boom it's a great way to get into this sort of stuff but yes losing my voice now Dale massive thanks brother to everybody at home big love to you all if you could please like and subscribe I hope you've enjoyed this as much as I have and we'll see you next time thank you very much