[00:00:00] I’m not a professional athlete. It’s for professional women cyclists because it’s hard as a woman pro athlete to earn a living and cover your living expenses and actually do your races and stuff is near impossible. It’s really tough, I mean, for men as well. For women, it’s, I think, even worse. So this is just it’s called the Home Stretch Foundation, where it just gives women a base where they at least don’t have to worry about rent.
It’s a good communal environment, which is why I said there’s like two beds down here. It’s a kitchen upstairs. It’s another massive kitchen, more beds. It’s like a really cool place. Anyway, I popped them a message to say, like, “Can I come and stay for the summer season?” And they’re like, “Okay, yeah, for sure.” And I come through and I was like, “Oh, that was really like easy.” And then I thought, Yeah, you’re actually going to be the only person.
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Jesse: [00:01:39] Welcome to the Smart Athlete Podcast. I’m your host Jesse Funk my guest today. I think we’re going to have a really good conversation because she is a full-time cartoonist, speaker, and endurance cyclist. You can find her, her work, all kinds of cool stuff on her Instagram @TeganPhillipsComics. Welcome to the show, Tegan Phillips.
Tegan: [00:01:59] Thank you for having me.
Jesse: [00:02:01] Yeah, thanks for joining me. Before we were officially recorded and we were talking about – So if you’re not on the YouTube version, you’re in the audio-only version. You’re missing the interesting layer slash lodge slash, restaurant-looking accommodation that you can stay in at the moment. But there’s lots of like interesting architecture in the background that seems to be going on and the cat that may bite her at some point in time. So if she yells randomly, it’s because there’s a cat wandering around. So don’t don’t mind that.
Tegan: [00:02:37] I’ll try not to swear.
Jesse: [00:02:39] The swear is okay. I think that’s a good thing. You get hit by a cat. It’s probably appropriate. But so I had thought you’re still in South Africa. And then we were figuring out time differences before we got going and you’re like, no, it’s it’s only 2 hours different for me, though. Like, “Oh, wait, wait, what?” And so you decided for an impromptu, I guess, impromptu trip to the States for a few months?
Tegan: [00:03:04] Yeah, relatively impromptu. Yeah. I applied to I needed to train for this trip that I’m doing in October and it’s winter in Cape Town. And I kind of remembered like years ago seeing a documentary about this place in America that women cyclists could go and live and train. And I had no idea what Tucson Summer was like. I was like summer, warm, cycling house. Like that would be great. And I, I applied.
[00:03:42] I just sent a message to be like, I’m not a professional athlete. It’s for professional women cyclists because it’s hard as a woman pro athlete to earn a living and cover your living expenses and actually do your races and stuff is near impossible. It’s it’s really tough. I mean, for men as well, for women, I think even worse.
[00:04:02] So this is just it’s called the Home Stretch Foundation, where it just gives women a base where they at least don’t have to worry about rent. It’s a good communal environment, which is why I said there’s like two beds down here. It’s a kitchen upstairs. It’s another massive kitchen, more beds. It’s like a really cool place.
[00:04:22] Anyway, I popped them a message to say, like, “Can I come and stay for the summer season?” And they’re like, “Okay, yeah, for sure.” And I come through. And I was like, “Oh, that was really like easy.” And then I thought, You’re actually going to be the only person that’s so interesting. Like, I wonder why, but it turns out it’s very hot here.
Jesse: [00:04:44] Yeah. You’re going to be the new person because it’s like, what, like 115 degrees, I guess. I don’t know what that is in Celsius. So for if you’re listening to South Africa, sorry, I don’t do the conversion very quickly in my head.
Tegan: [00:04:57] High 30s, low 40s every day until until late at night. But yeah, absolutely. I really loved it. So it’s been good heat training.
Jesse: [00:05:11] So you out you’re – I think you’re saying before we got officially recording that you’re going out with people. You’re not just riding by yourself, are you?
Tegan: [00:05:20] Well, at the moment, I mean, I’m actually staying here by myself with the cats. There were a couple of girls still here when I arrived to, for athletes, and it was really cool to do a little bit of riding with them behind them. But there’s such a big cycling community in Tucson, I believe it’s bigger in the winter, but even still, I mean, you know, there’s group rides with a couple dozen people almost every day or very often.
[00:05:49] I’m doing a lot of riding, not by myself, but in terms of actually, like, I think to be here in the winter is so cool. And it’s something that I would say, if you are a woman cyclist, it’s worth applying. I think it’s pretty tricky to get in because there’s obviously limited spaces, but to be able to just literally live with other athletes who are training and eating and stretching and it’s got everything like a bike garage and yoga mats and stretching. And to have that in a kind of like communal environment is just I think it must be so awesome because being an athlete, I think it can be quite lonely.
[00:06:33] Like my friends who I’m not a proper pro, but the friend, I’m not a pro at all. But my friends who are pros, I think it’s it’s hard like you’re not unless you are riding in a team. And even if you are riding in a team, you are all doing individual stuff, right? So a lot of it is is super – You just feel, I think a little bit isolated and you’ve got a coach and you’ve got your bio and nutritionist or whatever, but it’s not the same as like going to an office and there’s a whole bunch of people around you and you’re working on stuff together.
[00:07:06] It’s kind of like you’re having to do stuff that’s pretty monotonous, pretty exhausting, and you just learn. And it’s stressful obviously, because you’ve got the pressures of like you have to perform your whole job relies on your body. And I think that’s that’s super stressful because you can’t, you can control it to a degree. But like I think we all know our bodies just work out sometimes and like, anyway.
Jesse: [00:07:34] Yeah. No, I would think. I mean, so long-time listeners know that I spent a considerable amount of time trying to become a pro in triathlon, which basically means training like a pro, even though you aren’t necessarily performing a pro yet. And I know that there’s a small group of kind of elite amateurs here in Kansas City. There’s, I would say 5 to 10 of us at any given time. And I would not no longer include myself in that group, since I’ve kind of pieced out back to just running.
[00:08:08] But, you know, I see the guys, we all know each other, I’d see the guys at races and they go, “Oh yeah”, like “Come, come to this training thing with me at 7:00 or 8:00 at night”, and like, you know, trying to get that social connection. And I’d always turn it down because I’m like, man, by, like, I finished my second workout by like two in the afternoon and I’m done. Like, I don’t want to wait till seven or eight at night to do another workout.
[00:08:32] And just there’s that, there’s that need for like individualization and taking care of your own schedule, what your own workout needs to be, your own recovery routine. And I would think that only gets like more exaggerated as you become a pro and a better pro being. Just like I’m very dialed in. This is exactly what I’m doing. I’m not, you know, I’m not screwing around with this or that thing because performance matters. Like it is important to enjoy it.
[00:09:08] But you also have to know that, like, if I don’t perform, you know, maybe sponsors don’t like me as much anymore. I’m not going to get pre-Games. I’m not going to get podium placements. So it’s. At least from my, I guess I’ll say, limited experience as a aspiring pro. It’s definitely isolating and it takes some adjustment if you don’t have a team around you anymore.
Tegan: [00:09:36] Yeah, 100%.
Jesse: [00:09:38] So we were talking about this before we got going. I have kind of aspirations I’d love to be able to put together a team at some point for the company or something in the future when we just have money to throw at it, which not that big yet. I think part of that just comes from like, my own, I’ll say high school and collegiate experience with the team and just knowing how much having those people around matters. Just a mere morale day to day like you’re suffering, but it’s like communal suffering.
Tegan: [00:10:15] Yeah, exactly. And I think that just that emotional support of like all of the different stresses that you’re going through to be able to have that kind of emotional support, even if it’s just in the WhatsApp group, to have people, you kind of know what you’re doing and to be able to support them and they support you. I think that’s a big part of what makes the athlete life kind of like go from just being survivable to actually enjoyable.
Jesse: [00:10:44] Yeah. Thinking about that, though I know, or I’m fairly certain you had originally had a different life plan. I think my assistant had told me you had originally planned on trying to be a lawyer and somehow you found yourself in a basement in Tucson, Arizona. And so instead of the courtroom, it seems like very divergent paths. One would certainly. Right now you’re socializing with cats that seem to be aggressive if you don’t pay enough attention to otherwise, you might actually have fellow lawyers or coworkers to talk with. So how do you find yourself taking that road that leads to this basement to Tucson, Arizona?
Tegan: [00:11:36] The last time somebody asked me that, I gave about like a 20-minute answer. I’m definitely not going to do that.
[00:11:46] Basically what happened is I was studying law and actually really enjoying it. I hadn’t planned to study journalism, started studying journalism, didn’t like the kind of very aggressive nature of the sort of hard journalism that I was studying, switched over to law. I was loving that. And interestingly, I actually I came top of my law class in the second year and one of my professors said, you will never be a lawyer, which not in a bad way, but just kind of like saying this is not going to be my thing.
[00:12:28] My dad had been doing his environmental-focused executive MBA and he’d started getting interested in cycle touring. And basically he introduced me to cycle touring by just showing me a video. I’d never seen or heard of it. Like, we don’t have a big cycle touring culture in South Africa. So for me, I was 21 or something and I was just like, What is this thing like that bicycle that bicycles are not supposed to look like? I had only just started cycling a few months before. But he showed me it was Tom Evans video of him trying to cycle around the world.
[00:13:13] And the next day, after watching that video, I — So on Tom’s Twitter, through reading, my dad’s Twitter showed that Tom was running a competition where you could win a bicycle that he had used on an adventure and a tent and everything. And I kind of spontaneously decided to enter that competition, which I then and to end to enter the competition to kind of make my competition entry stub out a little bit. I made a video of cartoons that I had stolen my boyfriend at the time he’s had an iPad 1 and I just drew some cartoons with my finger, made it into a YouTube video, and that video won me the bike.
[00:14:01] I went to England and did a bike tour and that is kind of the big wrong wrong did. But the big deviation from the lawyer path that I’ve just continued on that deviated path not to end up spending the last couple of years just adventuring and climbing, making and now being here in Tucson, I’ve just sort of made a career out of it, I suppose.
Jesse: [00:14:33] So are you technically speaking? Are you still drawing on an iPad 1? Do you have a stylus yet? You still using your finger? But how does the creation process go?
Tegan: [00:14:44] I have this iPad. I have no idea what model it is. It’s my iPad 1.
Jesse: [00:14:49] I wouldn’t I wouldn’t know either so.
Tegan: [00:14:51] It was like a brick. And I used to get so cross with my ex because he would just sit on it for so long. And he was obsessed with this giant iPad is like the Nokia 3310 of iPads. Anyway, but I do still draw with my finger. I bought so many styluses, I learned how to make a stylus myself, which you can make by basically just wrapping some tinfoil around a pin and then some cotton wool and tape. And you waited and then also I bought an apple pencil. And then in the end, I just still use my finger. It’s just I think I’m just used to it.
Jesse: [00:15:31] Look, I’ve got I used to have — It’s not on my desk anymore. I had. Like I had this like metal stylus, almost like a metal cap that screwed on and off of it. I can’t remember why. God, I got it for some drawing purpose because I have a little bit of an art background and I feel like I had oh, I had a tablet for a while. I used it on that.
[00:15:59] It was the weirdest thing because it like. You’re talking about, like, just an odd end with tin foil and a cotton ball. It had this, like, plastic disc on the end of it that somehow that would activate the screen. And it was just it worked. But it doesn’t feel like if I sit here with a pen or a pencil and try to draw it, the tactile sensation was kind of kind of nice, but also just a kind of odd adjustment. So I’m just trying to imagine, like trying to draw with a cotton ball and like the how would that feel and how does that adjust like how your hands moving.
Tegan: [00:16:43] Yeah. No, there’s a lot of different ones. I must say that apple pencil is really, really good. If I’d started on that, I would probably still be with it. Now it’s just a decoration.
Jesse: [00:16:54] So, I mean, there’s do — This is one thing I don’t know that I’ve. Really pulled out. But do you feel like your comics have a central theme or is it just like, this is what I feel like comicing about today?
Tegan: [00:17:13] I think like looking back at the time, it always just feels like my whole professional life was just like. I have no idea what I’m doing. There’s no kind of bigger plan. It’s kind of just like, I want to make this thing going and try to make it fit in with everything else. But looking back, I would say that the sort of theme that runs through everything that I make is it’s trying to capture. I think sort of what I’m experiencing.
[00:17:48] But with a theme of this kind of the spirit of adventure, if that makes sense. And for me, adventure, what I’ve realized is definitely it’s something that’s not it’s not necessarily about being outdoors or using your body. It’s literally just a way of experiencing things in the world as being interesting and exciting and challenging and kind of like, I suppose, looking at things the way that a kid who’s never experienced them before looks at them, which is maybe I mean, it’s partly because I have so little experience, I guess, with all the different things I’ve tried to do, like whether it’s merch or new sports or even like in the sport of cycling.
[00:18:35] I’ve gone from cycle touring to then a bit of road cycling to riding in a team training ultra endurances. And so it’s always I feel like I’m constantly in these new environments. So that sense of wonder is genuine. I’m like, this is genuinely new to me. I have no idea.
[00:18:52] And, and being able to really like, I thrive off that. That feeling of just like. This is so interesting. This is so cool. And obviously you’re making massive mistakes the whole way because if you don’t have experience in something, then you’re just thumb sucking like, how do I respond to this new environment and these new challenges and 90% of the time making the wrong decision.
[00:19:21] And I think the sort of adventure mindset is just seeing the kind of the fun and humor in that of just being like, this is a story and it’s a funny and interesting story as opposed to just having I think a lot of adults in the world have a mindset of, if you’re not doing something the right way, then it’s just wrong and it’s just bad.
[00:19:47] And it’s kind of like things are going good or they going bad, and when there’s problems, then it means that they’re going bad. And if it’s going good, then a lot of that is just almost sort of ignored as just being like, that’s the default, this is an automatic mode, and that sense of wonder is just not there.
[00:20:06] I think part of it is because — I don’t know, perhaps being very much future-focused and being like I’ve got I’ve nailed this element of my life or this element of whatever I’m experiencing, and now I’m just thinking about the next thing. And so it’s, it’s a kind of very non-adventurous way to live and to look at things, which is, I suppose a long answer, but I would say definitely in the different themes of my work, whether it’s mental health or the environment or cycling or travel, it’s that feeling of curiosity and wonder is in everything.
Jesse: [00:20:42] I wish I knew. Thinking about the idea of wonder. I know one of my psychology professors in college. Her main focus of study is on the phenomenon of wonder. And now I’m just like, I wish I had like, I wish I had this been ten years ago now that I was in college. So I wish I had followed up and I had more like. Good info from her on what happens and why we feel that way.
[00:21:06] But talking about — you said I’m going to paraphrase you because quote, it’s going to be wrong. But I’m talking about the idea of if things aren’t done like a certain way, then it’s wrong. Like either as an adult, like there need to be this way or they need it. And it reminds me of you have a comic about like the reality of what non-attachment means and how non-attachment is related to love, which it’s a topic that I, I like to talk about. I click with these philosophies and I have since I was a child, but just like I feel like that all goes together, right?
[00:21:50] It’s almost like the inability for self-love if you’re attached to the idea of like, you know, I must go to college, get a job, find a spouse, have two, four kids live in the suburbs. If you don’t live with the narrative, then you won’t be. It’s like, “No, not necessarily.” There’s — I always like to say, especially right now with our very divisive political climate. The breadth of human experience is so vast, like, and I think we need empathy to understand that all of us come from different places.
[00:22:35] And if you become unattached or non-attached to the outcome of it must be this way. And if it’s not, then therefore it’s bad. If you become unattached from that, then you can begin to believe, love yourself in your own circumstance and empathize with somebody else’s circumstance and say, “Oh, if that’s what they are and they’re happy,” like good on them, that’s maybe it’s not what I want. But if you want to hang out in a basement in Tucson, Arizona, and that fulfills you. Go for it. Like, who am I to dictate your human experience?
Tegan: [00:23:20] Yeah, I think 100%. And I think it’s such a big part of what you’re saying there about being able to have empathy for other people is two things. On the one hand, the sense of universal compassion, of really, really, really internalizing the idea that if you were them, you would do what they did. What they do. And it’s so common, you know, we all did like I do it all the time where you kind of assume that people have the same values and not.
Jesse: [00:23:54] To project your own ideas on them and —
Tegan: [00:23:56] And then what they do doesn’t make sense. And you’re like, well, obviously that they know that it’s wrong or it’s bad or whatever. And I think and so on the one hand, being able to like, I’m always trying to remind myself like there’s no change in that. Like they might change on their own and that’s part of life.
[00:24:13] But they are who they are. And whether it’s people you know or don’t know, just really realizing like they’ve that way for a reason. And I would be that way if I had all of those things. And so it’s, it’s fully, fully accepting that and giving, having an attitude of love towards that. And then at the same time realizing that if you’re feeling feelings of resentment or whatever it is towards them, then it’s on you to change sort of the role that you’re letting them play in your life.
[00:24:46] So if somebody is, say, a friend and they’re really irritating you, the common reaction is to just say “This person, they’re being bad, they’re doing something wrong, they must change.” And until they change, I have no choice but to just feel so upset and to realize I actually know they are who they are. And okay, yes, you can sometimes give feedback or input and make them aware of how you’re feeling, but after a point it’s sort of accepting, like all of these other people, they they’re going to be who they are.
[00:25:18] And if I have an issue with that, I have to change sort of how much I’m emotionally investing in them or how much I’m relying on them or having expectations. And I always try to think about it like if if you own a business and you have, say, a head of marketing that you’ve hired and they’re not doing their job properly in the way that you want for your business, it’s up to you to say, look, this isn’t working and you kind of let go of that contract that you have with them, or you’re like, I’ll give you money and you give me work.
[00:25:53] Or, you know, that it’s up to you to make sure that the people in your business are doing their jobs in the way that you want to. And it’s up to you to file higher selectively. You can’t just sit there as the CEO and say this person isn’t doing their job and I’m going to sulk until they start doing it better. Like it’s taking on that personal responsibility for your own life while also having immense compassion for people in their lives.
Jesse: [00:26:21] I think what makes it difficult. Is that there’s so much — well, a couple of things, but firstly, there’s so much nuance to so many situations and I think like natively our brains kind of like a it’s this or that, like it’s one or the other. No, there’s none of these shades of gray horse crap. Like, it’s just, it’s black or white, right? But it’s not. And in knowing what to do with all that nuance, I think is very difficult.
[00:27:01] On top of that, as you mentioned earlier, what I think shades that conversation further is like this. Projection of beliefs and then like living inside your own head, like not even being able to see yourself and your own actions objectively. Like, if in the easiest way I know to do this is like, take your story and tell it to yourself as if a friend is asking you about it, instead of saying because then you kind of take yourself out of the situation. And even doing that is an exercise in itself is not easy to do because you’re in the situation, you know.
[00:27:44] But that’s it’s the closest thing I can say to like is how do you remove yourself from that. But there are other comics I want to ask you about, because you got you’ve got all kinds of stuff going on. You know, there’s like so I look through some of your recent ones. I don’t know whether I should ask you about poop or not. That’s always it’s always a good conversation topic for endurance athletes.
[00:28:11] But what I like there’s a quote from your like, persevere. I won’t read through your whole perseverance comic. So if you want to check that out. Tegan Phillips comics on Instagram. But you said something about like the idea about perseverance. Just like always check, you don’t just need a nap. Like, whether you’re going to quit or not to just maybe you’re just a little tired. You need, like a small break, and then you’re going to be fine. I think I find myself there from time to time because I always take on too much. And so it’s such a simple piece of advice, but I think it’s profoundly useful.
Tegan: [00:28:45] Well, that exact phrase was inspired by a friend of mine telling me he was doing the so great modern race, which is that ultra-endurance like really, really tough bicycle race in Kurdistan. And he — I don’t know, he was a few days in or something like that and just was finished. He was absolutely finished. It was terrible. Weather conditions are really hectic and he ended up scratching from the race and then after a couple of hours, suddenly feeling better. But you can’t —
Jesse: [00:29:24] You can’t unscratch.
Tegan: [00:29:25] You can’t unscratch. And I remember he and I were talking about that after I I’d done the Sedgefield 500, which is a 500 kilometer, quite intense sort of gravel race in South Africa. And I also I went out really hard. It was hot. I got saw saddle sores and it was just and then by the sort of day through the night and the next morning, I was riding like a few meters and then having to take a break in a few meters and having to take a break.
[00:29:57] And I phoned my dad and I was like, you know, I don’t think I’m going to actually finish this race is within the cuddle. And he said, okay, I’m on my way. And then I said, Just, just give me 10 minutes. And then he phoned me in 10 minutes. I said, Just okay, just ten more minutes. And eventually I went, I ended up just going and having a nap on a restaurant floor for a couple of hours and bumping into some friends and getting some food and water and then feeling 100%.
[00:30:25] And I was I felt great for the rest of that race. I finish so strong. And for me, that was just such a big lesson is that — let’s try first just try to have a long break before you quit. And yeah, it’s often just like you need a bit of sleep and maybe a bit of food, which I think is kind of does also translate to life, whether it’s like you’re working on a book or a project or whatever, it’s the temptation to quit is so often. Then we feel like that feeling of wanting to quit isn’t going to go away, but it normally does.
Jesse: [00:31:05] Yeah. Well, it’s like. I know — Like I said, I often bite off more than I can chew, in part just being ambitious. And sometimes being an endurance athlete, you know, the mentality is like just one foot in front of the other. Just keep on plugging away. But life is unrelenting. It is not like a race where there is a finish line at the end of the race. You know, you have to make your own finish lines or points, rest breaks or rest stops or aid stations. You have to decide where those are.
[00:31:47] And again, talking about nuance, like figuring out that internal sense of like, how do I feel? Should I take a break? Am I fine? Do I really need to quit, you know? And then you go through, like, moments of self-doubt and then you’re like, No, no, things are fine. And they’re like, Are they fine? And just the whole weird internal monologue you deal with. But, you know, people talk about this in other scenarios, like before you make rash decisions, sleep on it, like whether it’s a nap or whether it’s an overnight thing.
[00:32:22] Sometimes your brain just needs a reset and then you’re like, “Okay,” I don’t know how many times after the end of when I was pursuing a professional license, I would just pull my insides out, basically trying to work as hard as I could on these like half Ironman races, trying to get kind of placement in that professional license. And I would be so out of it at the end of a race. I mean, I ended up in the medical tent more times than I should have three or four times. I didn’t do that many of them.
[00:32:56] And I’d say my coach was like, I don’t think I shouldn’t do this anymore. Like I shouldn’t do this. And he’d always say, like, you’re too emotional right now. We’ll talk about this later. And I always invariably come back to the point of, “All right, let’s keep going.” And so it is. Yeah. Like you said, I think it’s a great point to consider when you’re doing a big project, working on something work, doing something athletic, whatever it is, maybe you just need a nap, figuratively or literally.
Tegan: [00:33:33] And it’s often I think there’s an element of ego as well that comes into it because sometimes you want to quit, not because we think we’re not going to finish, but it’s because you’re like, I’m not going to be able to get the result that I want.
Jesse: [00:33:45] Right.
Tegan: [00:33:46] And when I’m —
Jesse: [00:33:46] Speaking about attachment.
Tegan: [00:33:48] Yeah, literally, which I mean, it’s also something that we’ve all experienced. And like with that sensual race, realizing like, okay, I’m, I was at one point coming second overall and realizing like, I’m probably going to come somewhere near the back now. And then in that race when we set off, there were five guys off the front hammering it and I think three of them had quit before the end of the first day.
[00:34:17] And I remember sitting with them at the shopping center in the evening where I was stocking up to start riding through the night. And they were because it had been really, really hot. Everyone was dehydrated. And they were two of them were there and they were waiting to get pitched. And I was like, “Guys, you’re fine. Like, what are you doing?” And they’re just I think that, you know, that they were strong cyclists and they were like, If I’m not going to come first, I’m not going to do it.
[00:34:46] And I think that’s such a big part of this thing, especially in sports. But again, like in life is — if you’re willing to kind of adjust your goals and say, like, I can still finish this, I’m just going to have to think about things in a different way now and kind of humble myself a little bit. And maybe it’s not going to be like this, but there’s still so many options. And then we kind of give ourselves the opportunity to have this incredible experience and learn all of those lessons because you’ll know that it’s in those races where things go wrong and maybe you don’t get the result that you want.
[00:35:26] But just in that persevering and finishing, you learn so much, whether it’s about nutrition or rest or kind of like little hacks that you can do to keep going when you’re tired. And if you stop as soon as you’re not winning, you lose all of those lessons and that feeling of accomplishment of when you do cross the finish line, whether it’s in last place or not, and you’re just like.
Jesse: [00:35:51] I think for me, one of the lessons like this race that just went horribly, absolutely horrible. 70.3 Santacruz, I didn’t have enough food and I ended up with like tunnel vision. Like, like literally not in a figurative sense, in a literal sense. Like blackness was like coming into my vision as I was going through the run. I had like 60 year old guys finished passing me near the end of the run. I got to the end.
[00:36:20] And looking back, I think of two things. One, I probably should have like just stopped and walked at aid stations and taken in fuel somehow. But again, I was pushing to try to make these times and stuff, but so like I learned that lesson. But then on top of that. One of the things I took away from it, for better or for worse, because again, there’s kind of some downside to this. I felt more confident in myself.
[00:36:49] I was basically knackered like I was out of it. And I felt like if I could, if the core of my being would not let me stop that, like I can get rid of doubts anymore. And so that’s I did not I obviously did not finish where I wanted to, but I did finish. And it was a big source, I guess, of pride, at least for a while. Even though I’ve said other times of the podcast, I talked about this particular race, like maybe not the smartest thing to have done to push that far. But if I were to do it again a second time, you would hope I would have my fuel figured out better.
[00:37:39] It had to do with a messed up bike wheel and I had to just transition and get set up. And I almost missed the entire race and the whole thing is why I didn’t have the fuel. But to do it a second time. Maybe not, but just. You know. I tried to let go of that attachment to, well, you know, I’m not going to get the placement, but just to finish and see how we are. And if I had not done, I wouldn’t have gotten that kind of truth or whatever about the core of who I am or maybe who I was. I don’t know about who I am anymore, but at least at the time.
Tegan: [00:38:20] Yeah.
Jesse: [00:38:21] Yeah.
Tegan: [00:38:23] It’s an important thing to having your identity like I’m a person that finishes things.
Jesse: [00:38:27] Yeah. Yeah. Tegan as we’re winding down on time. I’m going to ask you this season’s question. So I have each season of the show, I have a question I ask every single guest, and it varies every single season. So this season’s question I like to ask you is how do you celebrate your wins?
Tegan: [00:38:53] That. You know, I have no idea.
Jesse: [00:38:59] And that’s why I’m asking it.
Tegan: [00:39:02] You know, I think maybe. All I can think of is an adventure, you don’t really have wins. You know, an adventure is an adventure and that I’m not to say that I’m not competitive, but I don’t think that anything that I do really has a winning or losing element. It’s everything is just an adventure. So it’s the — to be honest, I think this is going to sound cheesy. But going on the adventure is the celebration and getting to the end of the game.
[00:39:40] Maybe some champagne is nice when you get to the finish somewhere. But yeah, it’s just that I would say that the process in general is like, I don’t hold back on cheating myself, I’m doing stuff. So yeah, the whole thing is just a celebration of being able to do stuff.
Jesse: [00:39:59] No, I think that’s a perfectly great answer. Tegan where can people find you if they want to see the comics catch up with you, any of that kind of stuff?
Tegan: [00:40:08] Instagram’s probably the best @TeganPhillipsComics. T-E-G-A-N P-H-I-L-L-I-P-S Comics.
Jesse: [00:40:17] Awesome. Tegan, thanks for hanging out with me today.
Tegan: [00:40:19] Cool. Thank you so much.