Justin BEST is BACK - Pt. 2

This Transcript is Autogenerated:

Justin Best  0:02  
It's not a fun sport to train for sometimes. And it's not very easy to convey that to people because they see the boat say you're out on the water, oh, it's fun, but like you're doing anaerobic threshold where you're just feeling horrible. And the last thing you'd want to do is to continue that, but like through your like mental throughout the rest of the day, I feel like so having that like, it's just another added benefit of just kind of like I will focus on something else until the next training session.

Kristi Wagner  0:30  
Welcome to the other three years, a show for anyone who has an Olympic sized dream, they want to turn into a reality. Hi, and welcome to this week's episode of the other three years podcast. This week is part two of my interview with fellow USA national team member Justin best. If you missed part one last week, be sure to go listen to it because it was a really good episode. And I think it'll probably make this week's episode make a little bit more sense. So be sure to listen to that one. But then come back and listen to this one, too. So this week, Justin and I talk about the importance of building a career outside of rowing, and how even working on that career During training has been really helpful for him. And I really agreed with him, and how having a career outside of sport is helpful, also. So it's not to overthink things in rowing, and be able to focus you know, on your work when you're at work and on rowing when you're rowing. And Justin and I also talked about what he's looking forward to next in his own athletic career and how he plans to show up at his best for the upcoming Olympics. So part one was really good, but part two is even better. So I really hope everyone enjoys this conversation with Justin. But before we get into that, here is an update on what's currently going on in my training. So it's Monday after the head of the Charles which is always a little bit of a tired day. Because the head of the Charles is a marathon event I had I'd say like an okay performance at the head of the Charles I came in fifth in the single and then our Scullers eight came in six than the eight and the champion on Sunday, my friend Michelle won the single which was so exciting, and I'm so happy for her and she crushed it, she went out really hard and set a really, really fast pace and kept it up, which is like what you have to do. And I'm really happy for her she works, you know, super hard as everyone, everyone works really hard. But, you know, I know Michelle really well, I've spent a lot of time with her this year. And I really feel like whoever was gonna win who's gonna deserve the win. And I think that's really true. So I'm, I'm very happy for her, I kind of felt like fine with my own performance. I don't think I had a bad race. I think that I especially how I've been feeling like the past couple of weeks in the single I was actually pretty pleased with it. And I think I've done probably the best job of my rowing career. So far, having a relaxed fall, and actually taking time off and actually giving my body and maybe more so my mind a chance to rest. I feel like I had a really kind of emotional and hard spring and summer and put a lot into rowing, obviously, which I had to do. And so I think coming into the fall and coming into time off like it, I had to just take some time and not care about things as much and, you know, live my life, as you may say, it's never fun to lose, because I'm a really competitive person. And I wanted to finish higher and I wanted to do better. But I think that knowing the work that I've put in and the work that I can continue to put in, I feel good about where I can go from here. And, you know, it's also, I think, sort of good because it's always like a little bit of fire in the belly when when you don't do as well as you could have done. And I think that fire like that's really the last race I'll do for this fall. I'll race at the head of the fish this upcoming weekend, which I'm running. But that's a little bit different of a race than something like the head of the Charles. So I'm about to do quite a bit of training. And I think that I just have a really clear understanding of like, what I want to accomplish and the speed that I personally would like to go, you know, in the single on the ERG, like the things that I can control right now. And I think that I just want to have a lot of fun making myself into, you know, the best version that I can be athletically and you know, hopefully personally and it's crazy like it was really fundraising on Saturday and Sunday in the Scullers ate we had a really rough start I think we got it together I was pretty upset right after which I felt bad about it's I think was a long weekend and I was a little tired and but I think that it was a fun weekend. But I like also didn't see a lot of people I wanted to see. So I've sort of decided next year, I think just the alumni eight and then I can see my friends because the head of the Charles is so fun and the single is fun, but it's like I don't know. It's really hard. And when you don't roll on the Charles all the time, you don't ruin the single all the time is really hard. I give so much so many kudos to everyone but not just rowing in the Champs singles in every singles event. It's it's a slog, it's like a 20 minute slog. So I'm really impressed with with everyone and all my competitors and all my friends. And I'm so grateful that everyone you know, in our scholars eight did it, I think that it was really kind of brave of us. We didn't practice or anything. And we went out there. And you know, it probably wasn't very pretty. But you know, we had a lot of fun. And we tried really hard. And I think that's all that you can, you know, say and all you can you can have. So I was I was really proud of us. Even though I think maybe some practice would have helped I was a little anti practice. But now that we did it, I'm like, I think a little practice would have actually been good. Yeah. So looking forward this week, I'm about to work a whole heck of a lot in rowing, but also just in work work because we are hosting the head of the fish regatta in Saratoga Springs this weekend. And I Mr. regatta director, so I'm in charge the head of the fish is so fun, but it is a lot of work, we will race almost 2000 boats over two days and put in perspective, the head of the Charles I think Greece is about 2400 boats and they have like a whole staff of people they have their production. I mean, we are not the head of the Charles but in terms of like the boats racing down the course we are pretty comparable. And we just do it on a compared to them a skeleton crew, I have like the best coworkers, the best volunteer force, and it's really just so awesome to see, like our community come together and put on this race that, you know, has been an awesome fixture in like the Northeast rowing community for over 20 years, I feel really lucky to be so closely involved with it. Because it's really, like so many people come so many people race, we really try to make it as accessible as possible, so many different kinds of events and something for everybody. And you know, you can race multiple times. And it's a shorter race, it's like a little over 3000 meters. So it's pretty repeatable, you know, for people to race a few times during the day, and we have, you know, a really iconic trophy in our fish heads. So I'm really excited. It's also fun to see, you know, all the coaches come in and park their trailers and I get to see all the teams and I think it's really fun and it's it's actually really refreshing to not wear my you know, national team athlete hat for a little while and just be kind of one of the many in this, you know, regatta and and get to put other people's rowing careers and other people's race experience at the forefront instead of mine. And it's just so awesome. Like, I think it's so cool that rowing has the community that it has and that I get to be involved in this way. So it's worth long hours that we're gonna we're gonna have to pull this week, but of course, it will train and then we've got some good workouts coming and it's gonna be a good week. It's gonna be a long week, but it's gonna be a good week. So now that I rambled on for a while, it's time for part two of my interview with Justin best. So here it is my hope you like it. In terms of like training coming into this cycle, obviously you had been living in Oakland, were you just like, Okay, I'm definitely going to keep living in Oakland like your training there. Yeah, so maybe you can talk about like Oakland a little bit because it's obviously a little different.

Justin Best  9:05  
So moved out to Oakland, California, specifically Alameda is where I currently live. It's the island barrier that kind of protects the channel between the city of Oakland, the Big Island, Alameda, and then it's just like the San Francisco Bay, and we row kind of between Alameda, the island and Oakland, the city. It's just a strip of water. I think it's like 18k before you have to get out into the actual bay where it gets pretty wavy. So for this morning, for example, we went out in an eight because we have a bunch of guys who are training and we did like 25 26k just for the morning session, but if we need flatwater to do like timepieces on we can just drive up like 20 minutes and we have access to a reservoir in Brioni. So it's a pretty great spot to train because a lot of the time sub northeast like the ISIL just How to make it impossible to train. I'm sure you know, and Saratoga gets a nice thick layer of ice that, you know, you ice skating on, which is great. But we're rowers. So December, January, we can live lots of meters out here. And I've really enjoyed it. And I think a really good setup that that we have is our coaches kind of stagger our practices so that we have like early morning practice, and then like a 5pm 6pm practice. So throughout the day, we can work. So I work for an investment bank over in San Francisco. And so I'll finish up rowing shower at the boathouse, and go into the city, work my work my job, and then take it back and then go right to the boathouse for the afternoon session, it's long days, but I think, seeing kind of like the progressive build, it's definitely worth it. And if you gotta get used to it, and gotta get used to the different tricks that you can do to kind of like maximize your time, because it is very much like a full day between 545 in the morning and 8pm. At night. It's just, it's you're either growing, or you're working.

Kristi Wagner  11:05  
Do you feel like it's sustainable? Like, do you feel like you can manage, like the training and working regimen,

Justin Best  11:15  
I personally find it pretty manageable. I think that I couldn't do this for many, many, many years. If that makes sense. It does. Sometimes you get home, you're just so exhausted, and then you wake up, like you feel like you were just exercising. But I do think that in terms of longevity of like the athlete, having that ability to develop yourself professionally, have a little bit of an income so that you're not compromising yourself, you know, years down the line, or like working till you have past 65, because you're giving up so much income between your 20s and your 30s. I think that from that lens, it makes a lot of sense. But it does feel like sometimes something has to give, but I think if you periodize, what is important. And then you also have like, hopefully you can find places of work that are accommodating and sort of understand you can strike this fine balance that but can make it sustainable, and then also not feel like you're compromising one or the other. Fortunately, I've been able to kind of find that situation in my position. And I know, a few of the other guys have kind of similar setups where you have your expectations, but so long as you communicate your training needs, everyone is like, yep, works like. And I think I approach work as like, if you get the job done, you don't need to punch in punch out, if that makes sense, right? If you have your tasks, and you can be diligent and you can get them done, like you don't need to, all right, well, you, you have to you have to have be at this office at this desk at 9am. And then you have to leave at 5pm on that, like, you know, having that understanding of like, okay, what is expected of me, I will get that done. And I think that's just kind of as rowers, like you put out a task in front of us, and if we will attack it with what we have, and kind of like compartmentalize how we best make things efficient. So I think that's something that we like are pretty good at. And then at Drexel, I did this kind of another side, I did a Co Op program, where six months of the year if you work an internship, basically. And you do that while you're rowing. So I literally did this exact schedule when I was a sophomore and a junior in college actually interned at us rolling Fun fact, for six months, I was a membership services intern was one of my internships. And another one I worked at a public utilities company. So the practice that like 615 to 630, and then you go down and you work, like I'd already done that for two years. And so getting out here is just kind of like Alright, let's see how we can make this even better, you know, work on the efficiencies and hopefully you can try and get between seven eight hours asleep like that's the name of the game is like maximizing the sleep in order to you know, be recovered. So you can hit your next session with with as much intensity as you need to. Yeah,

Kristi Wagner  14:11  
I know for me, obviously, work I work for the reasons that you said like the financial reasons and then I don't want to be in my mid 30s starting a career but I also feel like personally, I find it really helpful to have something that is not rowing. Like oh my everyday way mentioned that but yes, I completely agree. Yeah, I was gonna say like, do you feel like it's kind of helped you to be able to just like leave rowing and rowing and, you know, not have to think about it all the time.

Justin Best  14:48  
Yeah. And what ends up happening is if I'm only doing we would joke about Gladstone calls it pro row where you're just throwing, he's like, Oh, we're pro row. It Have you do that? Like, I find myself just kind of overthinking things too much, because all of a sudden, there's nothing to distract you So, and growing can be such a granular sport, like you're looking for centimeters and, and like, Okay, this is how this felt on that piece. And like, if you don't have that distraction for too long, you kind of just go and you get into like, almost this negative feedback loop of, Am I doing enough? Am I making the changes I need to where I feel like a sustainable way of like, just get through the training. And then you can focus on like work and I don't think about rowing for a couple of hours a day. I think that's so critical, especially given the nature of our sport versus the long repetitive the droning that of high intensity. It's, it's not a fun sport to train for sometimes, which I feel is is understated. And it's not very easy to convey that to people because they see the boat, say you're out on the water, oh, it's fun. But like you're doing anaerobic threshold work, you're just feeling horrible. And the last thing you'd want to do is to continue that, but like through your like mental throughout the rest of the day. I feel like so having that, like, it's just another added benefit of just kind of like, I will focus on something else. Until the next training session.

Kristi Wagner  16:24  
Obviously, you're very busy, but you find time to be like a social media content creator as well. So how did that start?

Justin Best  16:35  
And yeah, so so so All right, I love memes. Just in general, like, well, always have just for whatever reason, but I am on my phone and I go like, like, you know, like the little exasperation like, like, you're just scrolling, you see stuff that's like, that is so good. It's the immediate hit of dopamine and you have nothing to do no effort, am I addicted, that's a whole different conversation, do another podcast, but but I thoroughly enjoy them. And I always felt like, you know, I have a pretty good finger on the pulse of like, you know, this could be funny, this cannot be funny, and obviously doing rowing enough, like kinda like pick up all of the nuances and the random, like, one off references and like, if you know, you know, type things, and this February, we had our winter speed order trials in in Sarasota. So I've made a few, like kind of just Haha, just funny put together some videos and text means but I haven't made like a true like other piece of content with a rowing related text where there's like, I'm not featured in the video or whatever. Until after racing, we were kind of celebrating and we were at the garage, right in Sarasota. So it's like the course. And then you drive into the little like, circle where all the restaurants are. And I was just like having a good time. And there's a scene from the unbearable weight of massive talent. It's what it's called, where Nicolas Cage and Pedro Pascal are in a car, and they're having a great time. And someone had put that to a soundtrack. And I'm completely drawing a blank, but it's make your own kind of music. And I saw that, and you know, I'm having a good time. And I was like, put a little text on it. And it's like, fired away. So it was just like making fun of like, increasing the rate at the at the end of the race. And I don't think anything of it, I post it. And I get on a flight back to California. And I get off the plane and it's got like 3000 likes, and it's been shared, like 800 times. And I'm like, What? What is happening? And then sure enough, it's been viewed, I think somewhere like 300,000 times, it's got like 15,000 likes on it. So I was like, I think I have something there. And so I've just been making these beams just because I feel that's such a niche sport, but we all have these common like experiences through it. And I'm not trying to make memes that target specific people or target specific clubs, slash universities or country's like, I don't really want to do that, because I feel like it's my face on it. You know, I I'll leave that for like an anonymous meme page. But I feel like keeping general like shared experiences and just kind of meme them with, you know, tools through pop culture. So like I made one the other day, where's Vince Vaughn? And I'm drawing a blank on that actor as well. But I made it about a pair and we're on a pair because he's like, you're a problem. You're a real real problem. And like, I'm just looking at that and like, I've seen this before, but like in our sport, you know, so I have a really good time with it. And I've heard positive things, you know, coming from people, and at the end of the day, if I can get one person to go in see that that's all I needed, you know? Yeah. And I'm sure there's a bunch of group chats out there for like, you know, JV boys winter group chat that send that to them and be like, Yo, this is this is Brent, or This is Jake, you're like, you know, whatever it is. So I try and keep them pretty general. But like having that understanding, like, if you know, you know,

Kristi Wagner  20:25  
one of the varsity boys in Saratoga asked me if I knew you, and I was like, yeah, and he was like, No way. You really?

Justin Best  20:34  
Yeah. You'd be like, yeah, by the way. podcast.

Kristi Wagner  20:38  
Yeah. So that he listens. Awesome. Yeah. So what do you think of us growing burner? Yeah. See?

Justin Best  20:45  
See, that's, that is the line that I will cross is because he puts like, names. I'm

Kristi Wagner  20:52  
assuming it's very pointed. Yeah,

Justin Best  20:54  
yeah. It could be a group of people too. I you know, that's, that's also a theory is like, it's multiple people with access to the same account. I don't plan on being that pointed, you know, at any point, but that makes some good stuff, I think, you know, pretty on the nose stuff. And I do like the extremely pro America undertones. And not even undertones, just like overtly pro America. I think that's pretty awesome. Yeah, but yeah, so that's, I It's very funny, though. I have seen other rowing athletes making memes now. And like, I'll be swiping through and I'll see like, I recognize that person that it's just a meme. And so I'm like, okay, all right. I, maybe, maybe, so I don't want to, unless, unless I'm wrong. And there's another like high profile international rower who was like making just straight up memes, like nothing to do with like a hype video or something like that, like, just want to put that out there.

Kristi Wagner  21:56  
That's awesome. I think it's fun to do fun stuff

Justin Best  21:59  
like it is. And I think like, it doesn't take too much like away from rowing. Like if I was like, really putting like a lot of time into it, and was almost distracting. That'd be one thing, but it's pretty easy. I have kept cut. And then I also have my laptop I can edit on. So if I'm in Italy, in between sessions, and I'm in that hotel room and hanging out with Oliver bub, we were like shooting ideas back and forth. You know, and it is collaborative, like people will send me something and be like, Yo, this could be a good idea. Like, I try and credit them, you know, but I think it's good for the sport in terms of like, we all have that collective agreement. I think there's a there's a page called Friday beers, which pretty overboard faiz, like, alcohol consumption, but they just do it's so funny. lightwei I think we can. I was like, yeah, why can't I do this for rowing? You know, like, just make people laugh about our sport, right? Like, who? Who's overrating? In the in the piece? You know, like, we I'm sure we've all had that issue, right? So if someone can laugh about it, or send it to a teammate be like, Haha, this is you. Like, I love it.

Kristi Wagner  23:07  
Yeah, no, totally. I agree. I agree. We have to make fun of rowing. Because people think that we're like, absolutely serious.

Justin Best  23:15  
I want 100% Do that.

Kristi Wagner  23:17  
I did just want to like ask about racing this summer. And kind of, you're like, looking ahead at this year. You know what, what your goals are, if you have your sights set on one boat class or another? I

Justin Best  23:30  
think so. So this this summer, I was more than happy with kind of the results, I think there was a lot of kind of ups and downs leading up to that. So in the spring, I didn't make the straight four. So I raced a pair at the Second World Cup, which I thought was really, really great. Peter and I got fourth in that world cup in a pretty good field. So like we raced the world champions, the second place, vote, and then an Australian pair that folded into their eight that ended up taking a bronze at Worlds. And there were a quickie. So like, we were up against a pretty world class competition at that World Cup, and then ended up coming back. And I was fortunate enough to kind of get another shot at for made that. And then I wanted to give a shout out to Mike, Liam and Nick, that was an unbelievable training block that, you know, we just kind of were like, this is this is what we're going to do. And hopefully it comes out that we have a good result. But like, we all kind of like sat around like a table collectively and like, we're gonna hate our lives over the next few weeks. We're gonna put ourselves so far in a hole. It's 97 degrees in Princeton, like we're not going to want to do it. But you know what, we're going to do the work like Casey gave us the training program, and he's like, here are your splits and we're like, okay, we're, we're going to do it. And there was a lot of days that were pretty grim. Especially going over to Italy and in a heat wave. I felt like I just couldn't recover. Because my heart rate was always up, but ended up being worth it and we came away second place closest boat to the Brits, I think all season I'm not sure about the world cups but certainly close the gap between World Cup two and World Champs so I think right now is I'm back to training and for my personal goals, I would like to get to a 546 today or also an under 18 46x. So that's like for me personally and then I think I see no issue in doing a run it back, if that makes sense. Like that would definitely be a goal of mine is continue to build momentum and see if we can't close that margin and make a silver or a gold at Paris, I think that would be a great culmination of that effort. But with that being said, I'm more than open to kind of anything, if we hop into an eight, and we're like setting the world on fire, like Yeah, I wouldn't be in that eight or five row pair with someone and we go like 612, which is an unbelievably fast time in a pair. And this is gonna happen, but would be more than open to those avenues as well. I don't want to just like be siloed to one thing, pretty, pretty open minded and excited to just attack training and see how far we can push it in the lead up to Paris because it's 285 days. Got my countdown countdown. So a lot can happen between now and then. But I'm more more excited now going into this, then I think I ever have been at the senior level, and I can't wait to just attack.

Kristi Wagner  26:36  
That's awesome. Yeah, I feel like that's a really good, like Outlook to have. And I feel like I also just like you know, control your controllables set intermediary goals and like have an open mind and make the boat that you're in go fast. And then like doors will open. And if you just say okay, no, my goal is to sit in this seat in this boat and finish in this place. Like I mean, we've all rode long enough, no season has gone the way that I like, yeah,

Justin Best  27:06  
I would love to just kind of have a path forward. And you and Sophia can just be like, Yeah, this is it. But that's not how our sport. So like, no, if there's a knock on wood injuries, or like, you know, you hop into a combination with someone else, and it goes really fast. Or there's like a quad that you guys get out in like, I don't know, sounds pretty good there. Yeah. Yeah, that's great to hear that you have kind of the similar, but you also are at the same point, kind of like you have a good momentum block to kind of jump from,

Kristi Wagner  27:39  
right. Yeah. Well, I feel like that's something that we can all like. I mean, I agree with you. Like, it was really frustrating after Tokyo, like, obviously frustrating for all of us to not like achieve goals, you know, in terms of like meddling and stuff. But at the same time, like, I worked really hard to achieve that. And it sort of felt like the way that people were writing articles or talking about it was like everything that you've done is wrong. And like us rowing couldn't be more wrong and right, like, and so sort of, for me, it was like, Okay, well, I've been listening to all of these people who hypothetically like, are the best coaches in this country and know, all you know, and so now it feels like, okay, the right people are in charge, and we're doing, you know, like, they're leading us down the right paths, and we're doing the right things. And that's not saying like one person is all knowing or anything like that they've, of course brought together a good group. And like, you know, we can do what we're supposed to do, and we can like, train hard and work hard. And then, you know, hopefully the results will come and that's just like, such a more optimistic place to be like, as an athlete, then a, okay, well, I did everything you guys said to do. And I hit the targets you said? Yeah.

Justin Best  29:05  
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think Pete read GV like gold medalist, he kind of, I don't have the exact quote. But essentially, he said that their system was the best at removing the barriers to the athletes to do what they need to do, if that makes sense. And so whether that's transportation or food or lodging, or the more barriers that you can remove, so that the athletes can show up at their best to do their best on those trainings. That cumulative like amount, ends up on the starting line at the Olympics. Like that's, that's what the cumulative ends up and I feel, we're in a good spot where personally speaking, and I'm sure like you kind of set it as well. We're in a good spot where that is achievable. And the bet a lot of the barriers are just kind of like I don't have to think about it. And that's what's you know, exciting so that we can show up Ben, do the control of control the controllables. And, you know, perform what's expected of us?

Kristi Wagner  30:06  
Yeah, no, totally. So

Justin Best  30:08  
like the press, like, come on those guys. I know. Right, that stuff are so far removed and like, I feel the sport has changed in in the distance has not but the level of competition is I think under appreciated. Oh, so much. So like, you know, if you went 98%, GMs pretty consistently in training, and I'd say, you know, the early 2000s, you were gonna get a gold medal, a few bow classes, that could be an exception. Now, it seems like if you're not at 98%, across all bow classes, both genders, like, you could be a fifth place group, you could be a sixth place group. It's really like that, that maybe the world records aren't falling every single like year, but show me one event across any Olympic sport that that's

Kristi Wagner  30:59  
happened. Yeah, you at the

Justin Best  31:03  
top is getting that much like smaller and smaller ones.

Kristi Wagner  31:06  
Yeah. Yeah, you have to be training, gold medal standard, less to be at the top level, like you have to be consistently going that fast, which I think is awesome. Like, I think it's really cool that we're seeing in the sport like, in that in this time, but

Justin Best  31:25  
Right, right. And this because we're at this exact blend of sports science, right? We know more about our sport now and have more measurable data points now than they've ever had. But also the population has exploded in the sport, you know, like I, at least unless this has changed in the past two or three years, rowing has been growing for the past 20 years in the United States, the amount of clubs, new members that US rowing has seen come in and I can only imagine this is the case in many other countries across the world. The the amount of people that have access to the sport now is only like getting greater and greater. And then also you have this wave of sports science and like methodologies that back them up. Yeah, we're gonna see a lot of really, really tight competition. I think like using vo to max lactate, you know, having the exact written specifications using peach systems, like things of that nature, just only like create like that tighter and tighter margin. And I hope is exciting and translates to a positive viewership as well. In Paris, get some kids excited about rowing? That'd be a great way to kind of like See, see the end of the summer? Yeah,

Kristi Wagner  32:39  
no, totally. Well, I really appreciate you taking so much time. So thanks for listening. And thank you so much to Justin for taking the time to speak with me and share his experiences and insights with all of you he had so many great things to share. And I hope that you all got a lot out of it. I know that I did. So before I leave you for this week, I just wanted to share my quote of the week. It's from Babe Ruth. And every strike brings me closer to the next homerun seemed a little fitting for my performance from the Charles so yeah, thanks for listening. And we'll see you next week. Have a great week and maybe we'll see at the end of the fish. Okay, bye.

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