Episode 17- Will Gadd and the Mastery of the Sky through Mastery of Self

Will Gadd taking a break on the Rockies Traverse. Photo Pablo Durana

Will Gadd taking a break on the Rockies Traverse. Photo Pablo Durana

Will Gadd began his flying career in the early 90’s and quickly became one of the most prominent pilots in the world. A Red Bull original gangster, Will is considered one of the best mixed climbers on Earth. He’s a world class whitewater kayaker, mountain guide, speaker, author, journalist, expedition leader and is highly regarded for his views on risk management; maintaining a safety margin; his model of the “positive power of negative thinking”; his studied ability to appropriately assess weather and terrain; and his amazing knack to keep pushing the limits in a unique and pure style. In this information and story-packed episode Will covers a huge array of important topics. Whether you are a weekend warrior or at the top of the World Cup game, this podcast is a must-listen. Just a few of the areas we hit: how to properly assess the day; the most common mistakes people make; creating useful tools to break things down which leads to justified confidence instead of ungrounded optimism; the importance of maintaining a safety margin; flying in wave; how to get rid of fears; dedication vs talent; why having an answer  to why the risk is worth it is so important and a LOT more.

If you listen to one podcast this year, put this one at the top of your list. You won’t be disappointed.

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Show Notes:

  • Will recounts what went wrong in his 2003 X-Alps campaign
  • Will talks about his model of the “positive power of negative thinking”
  • How to assess and be realistic with your abilities
  • How most people get into trouble and why they make mistakes
  • Why it’s so important to maintain a margin of safety
  • Recognizing the dark side of extreme sports
  • The bullshit behind being overly optimistic
  • What’s incredible about paragliding and why having an answer for why the risk is worth it is so important
  • How to remain content in a world where the “hardest, longest, most extreme” yardstick keeps moving
  • If you’re not digging your life, then change it!
  • The unknown “unknowns”- things you didn’t know you didn’t know
  • Will discusses sponsorship and living in a the public sphere
  • The value and importance of learning from the best and getting good instruction
  • Mentioned in this episode:  Steve Mayer, Dave Bridges, John Yates, Cody Mittanck, Josh Cohn, Robbie Whittall, Chrigel Maurer, Gary Osoba, Willi and Chris Mueller, Chris Santacroce, Mads Syndergaard, Dick Jackson, Paul Guschlbauer, Tom De Dorlodot, Dave Turner
Will Gadd preps for launch on the Rockies Traverse. Photo Pablo Durana

Will Gadd preps for launch on the Rockies Traverse. Photo Pablo Durana

 



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Transcript

Welcome to episode 17 in the cloud based mayhem. I am your host Gavin McClurg where it is my job to distill knowledge and excellence from the greatest pilots in the world and pass it on to you so you can be a safer, better pilot. Uh, before we get into today's show at the legendary will GAD, I want to remind you all that I'm still taking questions for an upcoming input in between a sowed, uh, since launching the man podcast. I've been getting more and more questions via Facebook and email and that kind of thing. And I thought it'd be fun to turn it into a podcast on its own. So if you're curious about anything that you think I can answer, whether it be sponsorship or XL ops or filmmaking or cross-country or anything technical or mental when it comes to flying, uh, please ask away.

Uh, hit me up via Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram or the website, cloud based may ham.com and we'll get it lined up in the show. A thank you as always for your generous donations and listening. Our last show with Cody, my tank a was a huge hit. God, this one, our numbers went way up. Uh, seem like people really enjoyed it. So I'll keep that in mind for the future. Uh, if you haven't listened to that one or any of the previous shows, I highly implore you to go back and check them out. Some great information there from guys like Josh Cohen and mad Syndergaard, Tom Dorado, Paul Gushi Bauer and many more. So check those out. Also, one, thank you for your great, uh, reviews on Stitcher and iTunes that really helps us get this out. So thank you so much for your time there. I really appreciate it. Okay. Right before we get to the conversation, just one quick apology for the sound quality in this one.

Um, a few minutes into the conversation for, for whatever reason, I've got this all, all this brand new great audio gear. It's been working really well, but for some reason something went wrong in the conversation with wills. So I had to revert to the backup, which is this app that I use. It's what MPR, everybody uses for Skype conversation. It's pretty good, but it does, it's not as good as having a great microphone. So there is kind of a background hum here and there's some funny edits that it makes you do where it kinda clips part of the conversation I'd done, I've done my best to put it back together. Hopefully you won't even notice. Um, but I do want to just apologize that I am trying to make these better. I realize I've got to put out good sound, uh, for you to be able to listen and uh, but it is what it is.

Hopefully you won't notice, but again, I apologize. And now, uh, we'll get my God, where do I begin? A will was of course my partner for the Rockies diverse back in late 2014. I hadn't met him until the day before the expedition and that next 30 days that I spent with them really changed my life and my view of the world and how I pilot a paraglider and how I think about risk and safety. And you are going to get all of that condensed into a 30 60 minute version here. I promise you, this is just a truly amazing, uh, episode. He is still at the age of eight. He's been a red bull, original gangster. He still, uh, one of the best, if not the best mixed climbers in the world. World-class kayaker. Of course, world-class. Uh, paraglider. He held the distance record in the world for more than 10 years.

We get into how he approached, uh, those records and state records. Uh, what he learned from doing those, where he went wrong in the [inaudible]. Uh, he's a blogger, journalist, public speaker. Uh, the, the father of two beautiful kids. Uh, this guy just knows how to get done. In this episode. We really get inside Will's head about what he thinks about safety and risk and sending it and technique. We hear about creating useful tools to break things down, which leads to justified confidence instead of careless optimism. How to get rid of fears. What's so special about paragliding? Recognizing the dark side of dangerous sports wired desire to see things as we want instead of how they are leads to accidents. And by far this, we got the best answer yet to the pearly Gates question. I've been sending that out to a lot of guys in the past. I think you're going to really enjoy this. So without further ado, please enjoy my conversation with, we'll get

[inaudible].

We'll get it is awesome to have you on the show. I think we've been working at this for almost a year. A good to finally sit down with you even though we're not together. You're in Canmore. I assumes that.

Yeah. Where are you in sun Valley or where are you?

Yeah, and sun Valley just got home a couple of days ago.

Nice look like you're having some good adventures as usual.

Yeah, it's been a, it's been a fun winter man. We're having a banner snow year and I was just out in the desert training some acro over the dirt with a Cody, which was pretty interesting. Got my, got my laundry out a few times for the first time ever. Battle words, man. Yeah, no, it was good. I, I decided after the ex apps that, uh, I needed to get a little more serious about my, my acro skills. Wow. You're, you're basically flying acral all the way across the Alps.

Cause that, was that the video of Cody where he was doing a double reserve or was that, that was somebody else or

no, that was somebody else. Yeah. No, that was just something I found online. Wasn't that hysterical? [inaudible]

yeah, I guess it's hysterical cause it all worked out well. But yeah, that was not a good day.

No, exactly. I think, I think the title of it was mall DIA Yad. No, that was, that was not a good day. Um, Hey, so for our listeners who don't know your history, uh, I'd love for you to just give us a quick background of how you got into this, uh, crazy sport that we're so passionate about. And uh, and tell me a little bit about how that got you to where you are today.

Yeah, it's going back a ways, but I was working as a reporter, Colorado, writing about different sporting events and stuff like that. And I went up and covered the U S nationals in Aspen, Colorado, and I think it was like 91, 92, somewhere in there. And, um, went up there and I was just blown away. I was like, this is a really cool mountain sport. And I already did all the other mountain sports, you know, from skiing per, you know, PEDA skiing, kayaking, mountain running, all of that. And a lot of my friends had gotten into paragliding, which is one of the reasons I went up there. Dave bridges and all these, you know, really good pilots of that era. And, um, I watched the event and I was like, this is really great. I've got to try it. So I went for a tandem with John Yates and scared the shit out of myself and him. And it's been downhill or uphill, if, depending on how you look at it ever since.

And so 91 that is quite a lengthy career. Have you ever had an accident?

Um, I've had a few pretty hard landings and I've had a lot of situations where it could have been a bad accident for sure. But, um, nothing too traumatic have strained my thumb, but I've had some situations which were ridiculous and it was only by relatively good luck and gymnastics training maybe that I walked away from.

And you, you have a, a principle that I want to get into here in a bit. Um, when we were walking up to the first launch, the very first day, uh, the Rockies traverse, uh, you had me pegged pretty quickly as a pathological optimists and you said, you know, you're the kind of guy that looks for the rock that's gonna break the glass. I've been using that joke by the way, at every bam stop. Thank you for that one. But flush that out for me a little bit because you know, when you say, you know, you've had a couple of minor things and you've had some luck. But I also, you know, you've, you've talked about this and for the listener, if you're not familiar with will and his writing, I would highly encourage you to check out his website. We'll get.com. Um, I've been following your writings for years and years and years. You have great things to say about all of this stuff and the more than we can say on the podcast, but um, flush that, that kind of vary that, that difference of, you know, looking for what can go wrong versus hoping everything's going to be right and how that has allowed you to pursue what you have. Ice climbing, you know, relatively dangerous sports for a long time. Relatively injury free.

Yeah. Well, I mean everybody is involved in any of these. Mountain sports is kind of an optimist to begin with. I'm going to fly off this mountain and it's all going to work out. Like you're, you're in a pretty optimistic place to begin with. Or I do a lot of ice climbing. I'm going to climb this frozen waterfall and everything's going to be great. Like you're starting off from a pretty high, you know, it's an act of optimism no matter how you look at it too, to just do something like that. And I think right now in our society, there's this heavy emphasis on the positive power of positive thinking. And I think this is bullshit. It's just gonna get you killed. So what I'm quite into is being an optimist just by doing these sports and, and getting up and doing battle with life every day you're at optimist.

It's a how to, in my view, a useful tool for surviving these sports or, or anything dangerous in life that you want to do a new business, whatever is trying to figure out what can go wrong and why. And using your imagination to break it down into chunks and then solving those chunks. And then when you go out and do something in life, you've got justified confidence, not just this sort of YouTube style belief that I can do it. You know? And YouTube has a lot of videos of people who really thought they could do it on their, you don't want to be that guy. You want to be the guy that's like, alright, I'm going to do something that is, is cool a dangerous out there, but I'm going to break every little chunk down and I'm going to use the best tool I have at my disposal, which is my imagination to figure out in, in sometimes gruesome detail, everything that you think can go wrong and why and work through that.

And what that allows me to do is get rid of my major fears and then I'm, when I'm standing on lodge and you know, it's a bit surly and it's going to be real. I do, I still do that same thing. Even after 20 years of flying. I like break it down. All right, what's the issues here? Can I deal with them or not? And then if I'm still afraid, I pack it up and go home. I run away a lot, but I'm into the positive power of negative thinking and it served me really well for a long time.

I liked that. I liked that a lot. You had an incident, uh, in the ex Alps in 2003. I wondered if you could, um, re recount that because I think that was one of those times where, um, you know, you, you had to eliminate or greatly reduce, reduce your margin, uh, for safety and, and you ended up really not liking that race because of that. Can you go through that flight and I think from, from the Shawmanee day,

ah, yeah, I hadn't, I mean I had a few incidents in the XL. I think anybody who does that race is a, is is going to have incidents. That's if you're, if you're trying to find the XLT, you're going to have incidents, even how I who you are. I've pretty much, everybody has adventures in that race. But yeah, in that race, I, I launched, um, you know, always, uh, I was in the Lee of Mt block and that was okay. But I got destroyed a few times and I climbed out of the league, which was sorta OK cause I was high. Um, but that, that made for an interesting morning. Yeah. There, dude, I got a, I just totally, I got sort of blown by the wind that was coming over Mount Blanca and down into the Aosta Valley and that valleys, uh, it's just not where you want to be.

It's full of high tension lines and you know, power lines and dams and cities and it's just may him in there. And, and I was flying along going 40 or 50 K and thinking this is great, kind of Ridge soaring a bit. And then I looked down, I'm like a hundred meters below me. All the trees were just bent over. And at that time in my career I didn't have as much experience with really strong Valley wins cause we don't get them to the same in the Rockies most other places I fly. And I was like, yeah, there'll be a Valley wind, but you know, 20, 30 K, whatever, it's the end of the day, it'll be fine. And I landed in this thing or I'd go on, I went into this wing and started going backwards up the Valley. It F pretty incredible rate of speed and, and dodging power lines.

And eventually I managed to sort of crash beside the sewer plant. And um, it was, I was fine with crashing into the sewer pond to be honest. That would have been a better option at that point. I would've been great in there. You know, your trip, I think you tried to crash into it. It'll appall on that. I didn't make it though, but I stack it into this, I think it was a couple of minutes, just really horrifying going backwards up a Valley with power lines everywhere. I didn't feel like I'd been pushing it hard that day and it was way out of control and you know, I could have easily been been killed and I landed on the grass and kind of rolled down the Hill side. And I think the guy who ran the sewer plant washed all this and you know, he, I mean he wasn't a pilot, but it was obviously a pretty traumatic situation with the wing balling up left, right. And center and recovering it and then landing and you know, just timing of surges and collapses. It was just luck. And I and I a little, you know, obviously some skill. I didn't stall the wing or lose it, but yeah, crashed there. The guy gave me a beard. I sat on the grass and realized that not only did I have some things to learn about flying in the Alps, but also for me competing in that style of competition was leading me to make some bad decisions. So I needed to modify that.

And you, you did fly comps for a long time. Uh, one nationals, uh, flew PWCs. Uh, and I, I want to also talk about your, your kind of record era. You went out to, uh, break a bunch of state records. Many of them still hold a, your Texas record, which was the distance record in North America held until last year. And you were flying in a seat right here so far, this, and I don't know what kind of, when you were on back then, a Firebird or something, I assume.

Oh, Jay always jaded Robbie widdled design.

Okay. Gotcha. Yeah. Um, what, what led you to that and how does that mesh with your kind of, um, your approach to, to risk you? You said you, you know, when you, when you approach things now in the mountains, you know, it's a, it's, it's a collection of skills and understanding the environment and the ability to, and the, you know, the knowledge of when to walk away. Um, what got you going down the, the record, um, the record momentum, uh, what was the, what was the purp why did you do it and, uh, and what'd you learn from it?

Well, I think for me in life, doing interesting things is about as good as it gets. Like if I'm fired up and interested in something, that's where I feel like our office didn't operate the best. It's like, all right, let's go do something really cool here. And, and I love doing that. Whether it's paragliding or ice climbing or whatever, I'm involved with first a sense of a river or it's just this is going to be interesting and I'm a happier person when I'm in that environment. So with records and paragliding, I was like, how far can we fly? And that was really interesting. That was what it was all about. I didn't really care too much about the the record per se, but it was like let's go fly really, really far and, and that was awesome. It was trying to figure that out. And I started doing that and right away in my career, I mean in the early to mid nineties it was always can we fly over the next mountain range?

And yeah, our, our gear was by today's standards, pretty primitive, but this is the same thing. It's like get up high, go on glide, how far can you get? And a lot of the things I did that people are like, Oh you are the first to do that, are the first to do that. I didn't really think about being the first, I just thought it was like let's go fly somewhere cool and this is going to be great. And then if you just didn't do the negative thing and figure it all out and try and try and be positive and, and learn and learn and learn and learn. And when I almost got bitten off w you know, understand why and apply those lessons, I really spent a lot of time thinking about flying and analyzing it and breaking it down. But uh, yeah. And, and the record thing just grew out of that.

It's like where can we fly the farthest possible distance in North America? And I started looking at where the sail plans were doing their records and the hang glider pilots were doing their records and, and it was pretty obvious that somewhere in the sorta Southwestern South, sort of South central West area of the United States. And then, yeah, I spent three or four years with Josh cone and a bunch of other good pilots chasing records and Hobbs New Mexico, which is a fantastic place to do it. And then Gary [inaudible] came up with a, with Sepata, Texas, which is for on flying. And then, yeah, next thing you know, it's, it's late the evening. And you look at it a world record, life is good,

what's going on. Did you, through all those years will, and then, and then at that, I think you're a lot of the calm flying was both before and after that, but were there any kind of aha moments along the way or, or, um, you know, was it, was it a quite a rapid ascent into flying far and getting good really quick and then beginning or were there things you had to kind of back up into or, uh, were there, were there, uh, did you ever have to tackle kind of areas of progression, um, along the way?

Well, I, th I, I was pretty obsessed with flying. I'd come out of a career as a competition climber and I'd had a really good career as a, as a competition sport climber, but I wanted something different in paragliding. Was that, and when, in the first time I flew, you know, I basically quit competition climbing right then and there. And, uh, and I got stoked and I flew every day that I could and I was obsessed with it. And, and that's what I wanted to do. If I couldn't fly, I'd go ground handle and ridiculous conditions and, and I learned something every single day. And I, I progressed not because I'm any good as a pilot, but because I am quite good at going at it as hard as I can and is learning as much as I can day after day after day. And I mean that first year I spent new year's Eve flying at the point of the mountain with Steve Marriott at midnight just cause it turned off like, dude, we got to go.

We weren't even, I don't think we'd even had anything at all the Drake, we were just so stoked to go flying. And I flew every day in the winter even though there wasn't a thermal to be seen anywhere. And you know, living in Boulder, Colorado and if it was like any hope of, of turning a circle, I was out there on the Hill and there are a bunch of pilots like that and they had the same mentality and we were not competitive. We were very supportive of each other. And you know, trying not to get killed cause it was, it still is a risky sport and, and we were washed out for each other, but it was, it was hardcore about who was in the air at the end of the day, every day out of the day, there are a bunch of guys who would add it with that attitude and being surrounded with people who structured life so they could fly pretty much every day and were good at it and we're motivated to max it out.

It's like who can go farther and man you, you went and it was never a discussion about whether or not to go cross country. It was like somebody was going and, and it was like, okay, who can do the coolest thing with the day? It wasn't a competition like beating everybody else, but it was like trying to do the coolest thing you could with the day and, and stay in the air the longest and go the farthest. And that really structured my attitude toward toward paragliding. It's like you do the most with what you've got. Janet wasn't, I don't think I've got any good at these things cause I was talented at them, but I did obsess about them and restructure my life pretty radically so that I could go fly at nearly every opera, every possible opportunity.

And your stoke after all these years is still really high. I mean, I know you're a lot more versatile than I am. We get pretty passionate about ice climbing and climbing, guiding and other things as well. But, um, what has kept you so excited about, uh, what we're doing after all these years?

Well, paragliding is a complicated sport. Just when you think, yeah, I've kinda got this figured out. You learn something new. You know, I got, I got waived the other day and wound up at a ridiculous altitude above the Rockies and it's like, how does that happen after 20 some years of flying, you know, on a day that I didn't think there were any significant winds aloft that I get waived and I get beamed out in my local Valley here and I'm like, I'm on the moon. I'm, I'm, um, I'm a hazard. Yes.

Okay.

Things like that. A pair of glottic. It's just intensely interesting on a small scale. Like why are the thermals here today? What's going on with that? Why, how does it work? And on a big scale, why am I getting beamed out and, and what's going on with that? And it's just, it's endlessly complicated. And I think that's the real reward of paragliding is solving these intensely complicated questions and understanding them. And there's always unknown unknowns and paragliding things you just didn't know you didn't know that makes it, that makes it engaging in a way that very few sports are. To me it's always the mountain sports that have some of that. But paragliding, it's got more of it than others for sure. So yeah, I'm fired up

then it might, my next question was why is it worth the risk? And you've, you've just answered that sort of so nicely done. You don't even need to answer that.

She look at though, I think everybody who flies, she would have an answer to that question of why it's worth the risk. Then the answer shouldn't be, well I can be saved for that. Anybody else? Cause you know, everybody makes mistakes and errors and, and, and paragliding. Those, those errors are, are certainly likely to put you in the hospital or, or kill you. So you gotta have an answer to that question. I think that's a, that's a really good question. Everybody's answer is going to be different. It's not like one size fits all. But asking that question for me helps me make better decisions about, about what I'm doing, not only in paragliding but in ice climbing or mountaineering or guiding or whatever. I'm doing

well, answer it for me then. How, how, how do you perceive that these days?

Well, it's different than when I was younger. I think when I was younger that it was simply this is the coolest thing ever and I'm going to go do it. And I, I was broadly okay with dying doing it. That's how it works. And I think that's not a bad state to be in actually. That's, if you're, especially as like a young guy, you gotta, you know, there's, you're gonna either turn to a life of crime or do really cool, you're not going to get it. Try to fit into a cubicle, like I'm not going to fit into an average Workday environment. Other people are. And that is awesome. And I'm not trying to denigrate their experience at all, but for me that's not gonna work. So I need more positive things to do with my life and, and, and paragliding certainly fits into that and so does climbing and, and they're beautiful and wonderful, but it has changed.

I look at the days differently now than I did when I was, when I was younger and I'm not willing to take the same level of risk. And I do recognize that all of these sports, you know, can, can and may ultimately kill me. And I'm, I'm still okay with that. It's, it's who I am and how I look at the world. But I've, I've definitely backed down. My tolerance is for risk on, on any given day, a fair amount of what it was in my twenties and thirties. It's, uh, today's a good day to, today's always a good day to, to come back. And that's how I approach every day I do any of these sports. It's like, all of these sports are very dangerous, but today is a good day to do them right and make good decisions. I want to be back at the dinner table tonight and, and that's helped me work with them.

But their magic, you know, in, in total these sports, um, are, are wonderful and I believe that they're magic, but they also have a very dark side and, and uh, you have to also recognize that and be in touch with it and realize that accidents can and will happen to, to me, to you, to anybody who does these sports and then they make better decisions as a result. So in, in total, it's, it's worth it, but no one days is worth getting, getting destroyed for it. You know, I walked down a lot from my local side. If it's not really on or I just can't figure it out, nothing makes sense. I don't become the human probe and hock myself out there. I'm like, right, I'll get it. Today's a good data. I've had a great hike and I'll go rock lie big and back it down. But, uh, yeah,

we'll talk to me about, um, contentment. You, you had this enormous year last year you climbed help Helmcken falls, that thing beat the shit out of you guys, but you pull it off, you climb you, we did the Rockies traverse together, a UN climb the last ice on Kilimanjaro and then you polished it off like by climbing the spray. I sit Niagara by any standard a lifetime in a year. A just amazing. One of the things that I battle with sometimes is you get done with something like that and the need, the desire for, for the next is just huge. What are you going to do next? Uh, you know, because the highs from those, uh, endeavors, you know, the planning and pulling it off and uh, and being fit enough to do it is, is super, at least for me. Super addictive it or do you do deal with a lot of kind of coming down from that or how will you maintain, um, contentment? I don't want, I don't like the word happiness, but how will you maintain this level of contentment as, as the years when you look ahead into your future?

I think you need different things at different points in your life. You know, that was an amazing year and, and from a sheer accomplishment perspective, I'm, I'm probably unlikely to ever have a year like that. So, you know, I had a, I had a fantastic year. I've had some other years where, where I tried really hard and just nothing worked. Right. You know, I went to the Himalaya and if I'd done that route, maybe I would've won a big award for it or just been totally satisfied with doing the coolest route. It by view that was yet to be done at the Himalaya. I didn't get anywhere near getting up, but I got beat down for two buds, the savior. I tried to do a big paddling trip that went nowhere. I mean, I just got, I, I went to Texas, I got nowhere flying. It was like, you get beat down, you get beat down, you get beat down and, and a, you know, and then some years it's like that year everything just went right and, and it was a great year, but it, you know, the, you just can't live at that level over and over and over again and trying to live there probably isn't that healthy.

Maybe. Um, you know, the last year I've done a whole lot of teaching and, and traveling and talking and sharing stories with people and that's been very, very rewarding. It's successful in other ways, so I don't think I need something to look forward to where it's like, yeah, that's going to be cool and, um, do those things. Didn't work. Last year I was at, I was supposed to do a couple of trips that just didn't work out for one reason or another. And, and, uh, it's got some things on deck now going forward. That should be pretty neat. Done, fire it up on, but you just gotta be where you are and get up and keep going forward. And you know, nothing's guaranteed in life. I'm, I, I have zero financial backing from family or anything like that. You know, this is, I've spent a lot of my life washing dishes and pounding nails and every time I get to do one of these trips I'm like, man, I won.

This is great. And uh, there'll be more I guess. But yeah, I think if you're always living, living, you gotta have a future goal. Like this would be cool to go and do this, but just be where you are too. And you know, today I'm going to go for, go for a good Nordic ski and Huck along and that's going to be cool. And then I'm going to hit the climbing gym later and that's going to be cool and trade there for an hour or the, you know, tonight a few friends that are going to get together and that's going to be a pretty great day and a bunch of work and my kids are going to do some fun things and I'm going to take them skiing tonight too. And that's going to be cool. And like, I dunno, I don't, I don't think you need to always, like being rad is very hard work.

The hardest person to be rad for is yourself, right? Like nobody else ultimately really gives a shit in 50 years. Nobody is gonna care. What we did probably will only be 50 years. It'd be like next week. That's shit's all. That's all it really transitory. You know, it's, it's like you got to like where you are and be stoked at what you have going on and then change it. If you don't, I believe that's really, really important is to create a life that you dig and if you're not digging it, then change. And yeah. I love, I dunno, great philosophy on this, but it sure is good to be alive.

Yeah. It sure it, it certainly is. It certainly is good to be alive. Um, on that note, you've, you've lived a very public life. Um, what, what's something that no one knows about you?

Oh, I think I'm probably more of an introvert than most people realize. I need to read and slow down and think and process quite a lot. Um, and, uh, and I dig that. You know, I'm, um, I'm kind of a product of the punk era where you're, you know, stuffs life's loud a meant to be lived and you do it yourself, but you better think about it and try and come up with something that's cool and, and that thinking is really, really important. So as an add child of the age, like I don't think that thinking my life gets really Western and sloppy and I've got to put it all back together so that at introverted time is, is important in life for, for me, for sure. And for all of us, I, you know, I had one thought for you, Gavin, you might get a kick out of this, but you know, on our trip we were continually problems all day. Right? And both quite proud of our problem solving. We were like, yeah, we're doing this. We're making it up.

I was so proud of this for a long time that I was, I was, I was a talk or something. The other day I did and I realized midway through my talk that the reason I'm really good at solving problems on the fly, like onsite clubbing and paragliding, where's the next thermal is my whole life's like that. I was like, Hmm, maybe it's time to spend a little more time dialing the exit. If all you do, if you're really, really good at solving problems, it probably means you create a lot. I thought of you and I was like, Oh yeah, that's sounds right.

Totally Gavin. Yeah, that's totally us. You're absolutely right.

Oh, are we good at problem solving cause we live there. You know, so it's, it's interesting. I thought

that is interesting. That is interesting. When we were up at Banff, we were given a talk after the film and, and an audience member asked a question about sponsorship that I wanted to flesh out a little bit more. Are there any, what, what are the benefits and pitfalls of being a really public persona? Um, you know, your dad told me when we were up there that you've been public since you were born. It's a real gift that you have. Um, but are there, are there, are there pitfalls too to, or are there times where you go, God, you know, I, I just want to disappear.

Well, I mean, I, first of all, I've hung out with people who actually are famous. You know, I've been to some events and so on were hanging out with the a list, like the manager for vanity fair Oscar party or whatever. You know, I'm, all of a sudden I'm like shoulder to shoulder with John Travolta, right? Things I've been in those scenes and those people can't walk anywhere. They can't do anything in public. Like they're there. Like that's just a crazy life. So our level of minor celebrity is like, you know, I'm not, I'm in no danger of getting stopped, you know, like nobody. So I think that's a, you know, there's nothing going on there as far as sponsorship and everything else goes. The, the key distinction for me that's, that's helped me to understand where I'm at and to keep things, um, both ethical and, and rewarding is that I get sponsorship to do things.

I don't do things to get sponsorship and I've seen the careers. Yeah, it's pretty important. So if you're like, I really don't want to go climb the last Dyson in Kilimanjaro and red bull has said no, you know, I think they said no six times to that project. And then finally I like cobbled together plane tickets from one company and a bit of help from another and add a cobbled this trip together. And we went and did it and it turned out to be super successful from, uh, from what sponsors want, marketing and awareness and everything else. Um, but I really, really wanted to do that trip. And I had, you know, if I had like an unlimited bank account, I would, I would, I wouldn't need sponsorship or anything else. I would just go do this stuff. But I don't, you know, I've got like I gotta I got to make it work economically. So I need sponsorship to do things and they need things from me to make it work for them and life's good. But if you're gone right, I'm going to do something cool to get more sponsorship then at that point I think, um, you know, it hasn't worked. And in the careers, the moments in my life where I found myself in that situation and let it kind of get away from me, you know, pretty quickly that you're bullshitting yourself and, and, and not really in the right place mentally.

Cool. What is the, what's the most common kind of, um, you know, in the years that you've been flying and go into sites and competing, um, what's the most common, Oh shit, I wish this guy knew X. What do you see that's the, what do you see that leads to most, if not all of the accidents?

Uh, I mean there's a, I guess there's a variety of ways to look at that, but a, a desire to see things differently than they are. So there's a, as I was really basic Buddhist idea of trying to see things as they are, like, what's actually happening, not what you want to happen or you think should happen or you've been told it's gonna happen. But as it actually is, and we all get to the Hill with these preconceptions, it's Saturday and the forecast has been good and I'm, I'm off work on Saturday or I don't have to, you know, talk or do something else. So I'm psyched to be there. And so it's going to be great. And you get there and it's a bit snarky and a bit messy and ad's going to be great. The forecast is good and this is the only day I've got to fly.

And you launch and it's like blowing a Hooli and, and you go sideways and end up in the trees and it's like, okay, well that didn't work out like I thought it was going to. So in my own career, and generally what I see with accidents is people wanting the world to adapt to them rather than adapting to the world and seeing what it is. And, and often it isn't the way we want it to be. It's like it's windier I'm closer to the Hill than I really should be. Well this is going to be okay cause I've taken an SIV course and I'm really good at controlling my wing. And then the asymmetric is quite a lot bigger and well, hello pine trees. It's just, it's just, it's just, and then, and then that goes for yourself as well. You know, like I'm not Kriegel, I, I cannot fly my wing backwards in a tail slide, 50 feet off the deck with any hope of recovering it.

That's not gonna work. So I'm like, feel pretty good some days. Well, I'm flying, well today I'm scratching out over here and I'm making it happen, but I don't, I have to be realistic about where my skill levels are and, and what I can do and, and uh, and, and not pushed too hard and to leave a margin. You know, it's, I try to always leave a little more room than I think I absolutely need, cause I'm gonna screw it up. Everybody flies or does any of these sports, we screw it up. So you got to have enough margin that you can recover, be that throwing your reserve or big, big banging close to the hillside. And then very rarely you gotta go, right. I feel this is important enough that I'm just going to gamble here. And if you made that decision, then I've got no sympathy for me or anybody that stacks in. It's not a tragedy. You've made the gamble and uh, you need to know when you're making that gamble. That's fantastic. Have you ever thrown your reserve? I've never thrown it in anger. I got it out once and put it in my lap.

I might need this.

It was really odd, really bad. It was, it was in Colorado and I totally screwed up at wild dog, wild up in the Lea and I spent about 3000 feet doing tricks and, and um, I, I decided I was gonna throw it when I was close enough that I could see individual pine trees, but I kept recovering the wing. It was like collapsed, boom, boom. Do some tricks, recover. And I was like, I might not have time to grab the handle. So I actually got it out and put it between my legs so that it'd be faster to throw

a little bit.

I ended up so that I've got this reserve between my legs and I'm like, well, what happens if the reserve falls out from my legs and apply it or out? So then should I just wouldn't crash to just a bushes basically or a logs. It's actually happened twice, but it only got my reserve about once and it, it's amazing the human mind, you know, I fall out of the sky for like thousands of feet and then I had to go do it again to understand how strong the league could really be in the Rockies. We're all at least be of it. I should have learned from that. That took me at least twice, maybe three times to learn that one actually.

Yeah. I love that Lee. As you know, I'm quite fond of it. Um, I don't know about that. Maybe like you said, lucky again and again. Um, tell me about you. Had you had a really interesting hypoxic experience in wave, uh, in your old home hometown of Boulder? Uh, can you recount that? I love that story. I'll try to cover the microphone so I don't laugh. Oh, all

good. But I know I launched in Boulder, Colorado and I was actually flying in golden, which is my home site in many ways. And I'm not golden BC, but would golden Colorado right outside of Denver. And, and it's a good day there if he can get to like, you know, if you get to like 9,000 feet, it's a good solid day. You can go places and do things. The ground's at about 6,000 feet or your, you know, occasionally there you go to like 10 or 11 and you're specked out and it's like, this is awesome. And on a really, really good day there you might go to 14, like once a generation, you'll go to 14 there maybe. Yeah. I basically ended up in the league of the Rockies, probably a combination of mostly way of there too. And, uh, ended up going quite a lot higher than that and watching jets go by me and below me and things like that.

There's a, yeah, a couple, a couple of bits of airspace there that came pretty close to getting involved and yeah, it was not a good day. Um, and I, and I'm, I'm still making pretty good. I think I was making decent decisions. I'm like normally there you just fly straight for a bit. You get out of the thermal you're done. But I think I got high enough to, and that was the first time, second time I'd ever been in any kind of wave. Basically I got into the wave and I'm, so I'm flying down the front side of the Rockies. I'm parallel with the Rockies, assuming that I'm going to hit big sink at any time and I'm not and I'm still going and no, I'm getting really high and you're starting to get pretty hypoxic cause I'm not well acclimated and don't have oxygen and um, ended up trying to kind of breathe really hard to compensate for that.

And you get into this really fun feedback loop, which is, if you've ever been at altitude trying to sleep, it's the same thing with chain stoke reading you, you hype basically hyperventilate, end up with too much carbon [inaudible] blow off too much carbon dioxide and you end up with Auckland blood and at you end up in this crazy cycle where you, there's really three hard to break that cycle. And, uh, so I'm losing my vision, seeing out of the pin holes and I'm trying to decide if I should throw my reserve now, but I'm like, well, if I throw it now and I'm still in the way, if I could go to like 40,000, 50, you know, you could go really high, then that would be bad. And I'm like, well, but if I don't throw my reserve and I don't wake up before I hit the ground, you know, and as I'm pondering all of this, I'm getting higher and higher and it's not so cool.

And, uh, my vision is now down to literally like pin holes. I'm seeing one pin hole and, and I'm like, all right. So one of the things I found pretty critical in anything I do is when it, when things get really wild, you've got to get rid of everything else and just focus. And so, and I can do that pretty intellectually. After years of doing this, I'm like, all right, the key things here are to head North because sooner or later I'm going to get out of this and there's less people to the North. So I've got better options and not getting hit by a jet. Or if I do go really sideways, I'll probably land in like a field or something and not a set of high tension lines. So get out of the airspace. I'm going to keep the glider pointed North and I could tell that where that is by where the sun is and cause I can't really see any moved my hands anymore and I couldn't move my legs anymore cause my blood's all messed up and I'm very, very hypoxic and everything else.

So I put the brakes through my elbows. Um, so I could still control the glider some. So controlling the glider, using just my elbows cause I couldn't do the Jesus Christ pose. Yeah. I'm, I'm, I'm, yeah on that. Only my arms have to be tucked in cause I can't, my shoulders can't go out to the side. So I'm like flying the glider with my elbows over my head, shoot in the pod and it's cold, right? I'm really high so it's really cold. So I'm like, I'm getting covered up in some, my face is just frozen. And anyhow, I keep flying the glider, I don't pass out. I just am looking at the world through the pinhole for awhile and, and, and really focused on just flying the glider North and keeping the glider open, which I'm not totally doing very well, but you know, I get, I fall out of the sky for bed, get reoriented, task is go North.

So I would, and uh, finally after a long time, I flew, I forget how far it was, but I don't know, a hundred K or something like that. And I ended up landing way out in the middle of nowhere. And I get lower, my vision comes back and I get it all sorted out. I go out there and land and I'm like, wow, that really sucks. You know, how am I going to not have that happen in the future and pondering all of this and I pack up my glider and it's super hot on the ground. It's about 105 degrees or so and I start hitchhiking, which is what you do. And it took me a long time to pack up my glider part, took me an hour, I was just totally brain dead and stored all this out and um, pack up my pack up, my glider, start standing beside the road hitchhiking and I'm standing there and I'm like, Mmm, you know, why is nobody picking me up? It's like, yeah, I'm not the best looking guy, but come on, nobody is even like everybody's swerving to give them what is wrong with all these people. This is the most unfriendly people I've ever met. At which point my hands are starting to fall out and I'm starting to kind of like get back with the program. And I realize that I'm still wearing a black Bella Clavio

hello, I'm a serial killer. Pick me up.

You buy a pack that probably has a body in it, like nobody's going to pick me up. It just too, I spoke at a hypoxia conferences. This is all the people like deal with hypoxia professionally, mainly in medical settings for surgery patients and other people with compromised lung function and so on. I spoke at this conference and I told all my hypoxia tails and there's a bunch of them and my question to the audience was, how much smarter would I be if I hadn't have had all these experiences? And the general consensus was about 10 to 15 IQ points. Are you serious? Oh, so I didn't that. I was like, okay, well I wasn't that really to begin with, but uh, you know, it was pretty interesting. But they also said that I could probably rewire my brain and other ways as, as I, you know, as I aged and, and I was still young enough to maybe get away with it, but it was an interesting, they did know that I was damaging myself.

That is, that is really wild. Holy cow. 10 to 15 points that'd be substantial on me man.

I could have been wasted smarter than this. Like God, I could have been something. But anyhow, it was a, uh, it was a, it was a realization so yeah, don't, don't get waved and if you do, um, you know, you gotta turn and fly away from the way of flying in line with the wave was not a winning strategy, but I couldn't turn out and go that way cause the Denver air sport airspace was right there. I basically had to pick a direction and fly it and then I didn't have enough brain power left to make any more decisions at that point

in that, in that vein, let's go to the opposite end of the spectrum. Do you have kind of a standout flight, your 20 something years of flying? Do you have one that's just, that was the one,

you know, I love going flying like so many flights I've had or are just great, great memories. You know the flight we did, um, our final really big flight there was, was awesome. Our flight on the final day or were we just scraped? How far do we go? 30 K or something. And we felt like, like amazing. Yeah, we felt like we'd won and that was, it was late in the year, barely worked, you know? And so I don't, I don't, I don't think there's any one, it's just the experience of flying for all these years and getting to see the world. That's what I love as much as anything is getting a pie and a paraglider and seeing the rivers I paddle and the mountains I climb and just getting to see it all laid out on a, on a, on pretty slow speed event. Like I fly over these mountains and jets all the time and it just dApps by and there you are.

You're at the place you're going and haven't really seen it, but on a paraglider you see it and you know it, you know, and I never really understood the scope of the U S until I flew across it on a, on a para motor way back in the day. You know, we took like 30 some days to fly across the U S and I've got an idea of what it looks like all the way from Ventura, California to kitty Hawk. Um, you know, the, the whole trip. And, and that's, that's the thing that any flight like that, you know, that first flight when I remember the 94 Canadian nationals flying from golden BC down to radium, it took me 11 hours. So my average speed was like eight kilometers an hour. Right. But that was one of the best flights ever because Mueller's like it was my first flight with a very old, I think.

And he was like, when it beeps turn and I took that advice, literally others an hour, like I thought, but I feel like IDK. And I was like, I was so pumped that I was a, you know, I was just so make it beat. I'm sure half the time I was turning, I was going down on in the net of fact. But how great was that? Like where's it awesome light and uh, it was all, it was great. So I dunno, I just like going, why I don't think so many good flights. The world record flight, you know. And that was a pretty cool flight cause we tried and try tried and try and fought so hard for those flights and then to finally have it happened and realized that I was like on glide to a world record. That's, that's like that's all I really wanted was to fly as far as farther than I, you know, anybody thought possible at that time. So I don't know Paraguay, it's great flying at midnight with Steve Mayer on new year's Eve in the air, we spent new year's Eve in a snowstorm at the point of the mountain getting blown backwards and it was great cause early flights with Chris, a crochet the [inaudible] guys. And I don't know. It's been a great ride. I really, really enjoyed paragliding and I've got a few goals for the summer to, to get out and chase. And I wish you the best of luck on your flight. I, I gave you a good reference to match.

Yeah. We just, just, just Skyping with Matt this morning. He wanted to say hello. He's, he's pretty excited. That's going to be, that's something that I've been dreaming about for years. You know, that's gonna be exciting for sure.

All the questions you've asked me, I should ask you, we could alternate

one of these days. Well, it might take us another six, seven, eight months to, to come together on that. But you're saying

I wish you the best of luck with that and I think that'll be a really, really cool, so isn't the XL top but in the summer, is that okay?

Next summer. Next summer? Yes. I'm on kind of a maintenance program right now. Uh, Ben calls it, Gavin's planned to not go backwards and then, uh, picking up in October this next, this next fall. I'll get into the meta. Then the hard training again and yeah, and try to do it again for I get too old.

Who is some guy who was [inaudible] was like 50. Um, the year that I did it, he did it an amazing, or maybe it was the second year that the Alex, I did the X helps the first year and then the second year and the third year I reported on it. That guy was like 50 something. Walter maybe. Great guy.

Yeah. And there's, there was the Japanese guy and then last year Eric Reinfeld, he was pushing 50 and he did really well. This is the sweet. So as long as my knees can hold it together, I'll, I'll keep trying it. It was God, it was fun and it was a pretty, pretty amazing event.

Yeah, that's a, that's a pretty, uh, that's a, that's an athletic battle for sure. That's, uh, that's, I don't know, I couldn't handle the walking on the roads. I just thought it just was not interesting and that it all fell apart for B pretty quickly. But the, uh, th that was a cool event, I've, I sure do. Hope you do. I hope you fly it safely and get what you need out of it. For sure.

Yeah. Yeah. No, me, no, me too. Well let's, that's when I'm doing all this acro training. I have a new profound respect for reserves. After the last couple of weeks I was getting myself in all kinds of problems, but uh, but good stuff. It was all the stuff that I needed to be doing. So, uh, like, cause like you said, I'm no Kriegel either.

Good to realize that in your life. And that was, that was you were okay. Lending on the dirt under [inaudible].

It's quite soft out there. It's a, it's kind of like that Chalan type dirt. It's, it's quite soft. Um, it's, we're just outside of Zion and pretty impressive to watch Cody thrilling, you know, infinities and misdeeds and every, these doing everything and it's, it's, it's pretty impressive. Um, I'm nowhere near that level, but it's, it's fun to try.

Yeah. He's going well. Hey, it's a good pilot.

Yeah, he's going really well. Hey, um, we'll just before I, I want to be respectful of your time. I've just have a few kind of like what I call a well with Tim Ferriss calls. Actually, I'm a podcast junkie, kind of like crossover. Actually. I've got one real question for you and then just some quick ones. Um, and you don't have to answer them quick. You can answer them however you want. But I ran into a guy down at the narco that had a theory about, he was asking me about paddling. He knew I used to be a paddler and you're a paddler and he thought that there was a ton of crossover that he eats. He seen paddlers get good at flying really fast. I just wanted to get your thoughts on that.

Well, I think that's, that's a good theory. And, and I remember the first time I seriously got my body in the sky and there are a lot of people watching at the, at the time and I got destroyed, like did a whole bunch of tricks and thought in the sky for a while. And um, the people in the gunner like, you know, you're, you're, that's terrible. You just did like, you know, a hundred, you like sort that out. Where'd she really scared? And I was like, Whoa. It's just like being underwater and my kayaks except I could breathe. So it wasn't that bad.

And that's sort of true and sort of not, but that it is true that if you are used to being disoriented and taking a beating, then the paragliding ones seem a little bit less severe. And then the way you fly a paraglider is pretty much identical to how you paddle a kayak. So big crossover there. And also in kayaking, you're often dealing with things you can't directly see. You have to feel them and understand and have a theory about how they work. And you know, you just can't, you can't see what's going on with the water or the air. See, you've got to have good models in your head of how those systems work and then, and then adapt your model to reality. But, but that really crosses over. So all three of those things I think are, uh, yeah. If a paddler says, I want to get into paragliding, I'm like, yeah, that'll probably work out pretty well.

If a climber says I want to get into paragliding, I'm like, all right, this may involve an uphill road. You know, kayaking is a very slow sport. Same as like Alpine ski racing and I'll find ski racer wants to get into pedagogic. Yeah, that makes sense. If you're like used to doing, if you're a triathlete, maybe not so much. I mean their brains are wired different ways depending on what we do for sports and kayaking is intensely related to paragliding for sure. So I think your button Minorca had a good point and obviously you've done really well out of kayaking and Nate and a lot of people have come out of those more action flow sports and done well and flying.

Yeah. Cool. Um, if you could place me back at that time, uh, a question people like to hear the answer to, what would be your advice to your 50 hour self and where were you back then?

Well, I was, I was living in Colorado still and, and flying a lot. I think at 50 hours, I don't know if I'd actually let her mold anything yet, but I was really good at guy get up Hills and fly. I don't know. I think it'd be just, yeah, pretty much do, do what I was doing. Like you know, I basically quit my job to fly [inaudible] and put a lot of time into it and uh, and I don't, I don't know if I would do anything radically different. Maybe I pretty much was determined to invent the sport myself and there was a large body of knowledge out there that was the craft of paragliding. It's like there's a really good instruction program now and, and a lot of knowledge out there that you can access maybe a lot more than there was when I started, but there certainly was more knowledge and I just didn't, I kind of went at it very experientially.

Like I was just hurl myself into the pool over and over and eventually I'm going to swim. I'm sure. And learning that craft is really important, like doing, doing the acro courses and watching good pilots and, and learning from them and continually building your, your model. I think I did some of that, but I sure could have done it a lot, a lot better than I, than I did. It just, it wasn't, it was like sort of willful ignorance at times on my part. I was like, I just will learn this and I would just beat myself into a pulp doing that. And I think I probably could have learned it this less violent and dangerous ways, but by listening to other pilots, but some people don't learn that well that way.

All right buddy. Wait, I'm at, we're going to finish it off here with the Proust questionnaire. I love this. Uh, this is just a whole bunch of questions. These are mostly just one word answer, but feel free to answer it however you want. Uh, what is your favorite word and what is your least word?

Uh, yes and no.

Best answer yet. I love it.

Well, Hey, think about it. It's like, do you want to do this? Yes, you look great. I mean just whatever it is. Yes, there's always a a good answer.

I love it too. You might, you might have answered these next two questions then to what turns you on, what turns you off?

Um, interesting things and, and repetitive things, you know, rec respectively for sure. Um, things that are interesting. Great things that are repetitive, probably not going to be so good at.

What sound or noise do you love punk music? Ah, she was still into punk. I love it. And what sound or noise do you hate?

Artificial silence. Like that bank vault sound. I hate that. I like silence when you're out in the mountains or whatever. That's great. But that artificial sort of deadness that, that stuff drives me bat shit. Or the drone of a, like the drone of, of nothingness. That's, that's pretty annoying. There you go. Yeah, we're not,

yeah, I'm, what profession other than your own would you like to do or attempt?

Ah, I mean there's a lot of them I've thought about going back to school for geography or psychology or, or anything that's interesting out there. There's so many great things to do in life. I guess. I don't know. I don't know what I would do. I mean, I was going to be a doctor, but then I met organic chemistry and, and that interfered with my climbing season. So that didn't work out. So then I was going to be a lawyer enough to spend all your time inside the suit so that, that wasn't gonna work either. But I don't know. I think you just have to, the coolest thing is, is to, is to create your own life. You know, it's the, it's the old existentialist, those guys like Satya and all those guys that were, um, you know, believe that you just had to create the coolest thing you could create. And I think that your profession comes out of that and what you do in life comes out of that.

And finally, uh, if heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the pearly Gates,

heaven exists. Um, there's been a mistake. You get to go back.

I will. I love it. That was really good. Oh, I don't think I'm going to be able to ask that with anybody else from now on.

Yeah, I don't know. I've never thought of that. That's a good question. There's been a mistake. Go back and try again. Do a little better this time bud. Tough it up a bit. What did he do it?

That is great. Hey, will, before we sign off, how can people connect with you if they have any questions or advice? I know you're very busy. Uh, so I'm not, I'm not suggesting people just send you blind, so don't give them that. But, um, how can people find out more about who you are and what you're up to?

Well, if in that vein, like I learned to fly from a lot of people, so I feel I owe those people a huge debt as well as the people that you know, from Dick Jackson and Aspen onto the guys the hell look out, whatever. A lot of people put a lot of time into me. So I do respond to emails as, you know, it can take some time, but I do respond to them and especially because those emails are often interesting. They're from people who are trying to figure things out and those do get answered faster unfortunately. So, um, if you just go to [inaudible] dot com there's a, there's a a contact form on there and that's probably the best way to get ahold of me. And, and you know, there's Instagram and Facebook and all the rest of it, but I get pretty buried on there and, and I probably used to direct email off my website would be the best and yeah. Thank you for the questions and best of luck with your, your expedition. Uh, I don't know if you could talk about that one publicly.

Yeah, yeah, that just got signed off on just a few days ago. So you know, as you know, I've been working on that with those guys and over at red bull for a long time. So, um, yeah, that's, that's pretty exciting. We're going to head up the last week, April and put the food caches in and I've got the line all hashed out. Not not to say that that's the line isn't actually going to go down, but in my fantasy brain I've got it all figured it out. So, uh, yeah, that's it should, uh, it's exciting man. It's all coming together. So that's kinda what, where my, uh, energies, energies going right now.

Well, let me know if I can do weather or whatever for you guys. I think it'll be an awesome trip and, and wish you the best with it.

Well, I wish you were calming me. I knew she had more time. I would love to be doing this with you.

I would too, but I, I, I, I'm pretty sure I'm not capable of spending that much time, uh, uh, with the, with unload goals and stuff, but [inaudible]

it doesn't, it doesn't fit the add personality.

No. Oh no, it does. It did. And that's one of the things about getting older. You're like, that isn't going to work, but I think it's super cool. I'm going to

right on, right on. Well, we'll say hi to Sarah and the kids for me and everybody. It's so good to talk to you again and I'm sure our paths will cross in better ways than just Skype one of these days. But thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it. And uh, hopefully the listeners enjoy that. I'm sure they did. And uh, we'll talk to you soon buddy.

Likewise. Go well, take care.

[inaudible] well,

I hope you enjoyed that. Wow. What an amazing talk. A, the legendary will GAD always such a pleasure to sit down with him and get his views on this sport that we love so much. If you enjoyed that or one of the previous episodes as always, always asked for is a bucket show. Uh, we are not funding this with sponsorship. We're just funding it through our listeners. I really appreciate that. Thanks for your generosity. Again, if you can put out a, a rating on iTunes or Stitcher or something like that, I'd also be super appreciative of that. That helps us reach a larger audience. Of course. I realized at the end there will, and I were talking about this expedition I've got coming up, but we never actually said what was, uh, we were talking about the Alaska traverse. Uh, I'm doing another big red bull project and I'm like the rockiest diverse with will but a and also a new announcement.

I'm doing that with Dave Turner. He's going to be my, uh, my buddy on that one. That's been something I've been planning pretty intensely since 2012 so we're going to try to cross the Alaskan range from the West to the East, starting late Clark national park across Denali and all the way across to the ring Cal. So if you have any questions about that or anything else, uh, shoot them to me via cloud-based mayhem or Twitter or Facebook. I'm be doing this in between cast here, coming up. I'm going to be heading to Canada here, uh, tomorrow and be gone for a week and a half, but I've got some great guests lined up. More shows coming your way. I'm more about the Alaska project. Have a fantastic day. Thanks for listening. See you on the next one. Cheers.


Comments

5 thoughts on “Episode 17- Will Gadd and the Mastery of the Sky through Mastery of Self

  1. First, I really enjoy the podcast. I have never flown a paraglider, but have learned so much in terms of vocabulary and information about the sport through your interviews. And the fact that it consistently holds my attention without even having flown previously is a testament to the quality of the interviews and subjects presented. So thanks for doing it.

    I have a question for the upcoming ‘in between’ podcast. I recently started pricing out wings, and was looking into options for entering the sport on a budget since wings seem to cost as much as my car. It seems that the instruction cost is fairly uniform in the US (correct me if i am wrong), so what is the best way to stretch dollars on equipment? Is buying a used wing a bad idea? What do you actually need on your flight deck? Thanks again,
    Jason

    • Hey Jason,

      Dude what a great compliment! I think my girlfriend is the only other person who listens who isn’t a pilot, it’s a real honor to hear we’re keeping you entertained. I just put a new one up an hour ago with Will Gadd, my partner on the Rockies Traverse. You’ll love it I think!

      I will for sure add this question to the upcoming Inbetween Cast- thanks so much!

  2. Thanks, for sharing another great conversation, Gavin. Every second of this one resonated deeply with me. Will Gadd is a total riot!

    When I recently added flying to my mountain adventures, I knew it would be great but admit that I am now completely and rediculously obsessed. It’s great to hear from others with similar personalities and views on mountain sports who can share their adventures and experiences.

    Really great stuff.

  3. Pingback: Killing Complacency- Making sure the luck jar doesn’t run dry | CLOUDBASE MAYHEM

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