Hi there, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Cloudbase Mayhem. Got a really fun show for you today. We had a lot of laughs with this one. And there's also just a ton of good content with my great friend down in Valle, Stefano Salgado, who is an amazing culinary trained chef. And so I love him just for the food alone. But he and I have been on the task committee for ages and ages every year at Monarca. And this year, he and his lovely wife, Natalia, were part of the support crew for Tanguy for the X-Alps. So I saw him a bit over in Europe. And it was really fun to see him just handle all of that and get his perspective on what it's like to be on the support crew and what he saw and the madness that is that race.
So as you all know, if you listen to the show regularly, you hear me talk about the Red Bull X-Alps quite a bit. It's one of my favorite topics. But this one was really fun to just get it from his perspective. But we also get into the work he's been doing with Nick Greece and Julian Garcia, the head of the French team and the coach for the French team for a very long time. I've gotten to know Julian quite well over the years. And he's, of course, been on this podcast. But he has been offering these trainings at various competitions. Well, this might have been the first one. The first one for outside of the French team was down in Valle for the Monarca this year. So they did a few days of training before the race and then during the race. And it was pretty much just Julian's show.
And they did a lot of game theory. I got to fly with them once before the comp, which was fantastic. But kind of putting control theory into place and not just talking about it, but going out and trying all these various things to show those. Of us who are slow to figure this stuff out, how it works. And it was awesome. And it was awesome to see their students put things in place and get it figured out. So we talk about that and also talk about his PWC win a couple of seasons ago down in Brazil. Might be. I didn't research this, but we were both thinking he might be the only North American that's won the World Cup.
That's probably ridiculous. I'm sure there's others. But. At least in recent memory. And so, yeah, he just had one down at Andradas in Brazil and won that World Cup. And Julian was there feeding his headspace and giving him tactics every day. And he basically just followed it. And what do you know, he won the World Cup. So we talk about that. Just the mind space required and how you want to approach competitions.
Obviously, you've got to have the skills in place to begin with, which is definitely something that Stefano has had forever. But like me and many others, kind of flies like a cowboy and gets out front and presses really hard. And sometimes that's not the way to win. So we get into all these things and had a lot of fun. And it was I've been wanting to get Stefano on the podcast for ages. And we finally did it. And you get to receive all the benefits from that. Enjoy.
Hey, buddy. How are you? Hey, how's that? How's
Baie? Baie is great. Delivering every day. High cloud base at the moment. Have you been flying much? Not at all. I'm a chicken now. I'm old.
Yeah, you said you said we've been chatting a little bit lately, talking about wings and that kind of thing. You said you're not super motivated right now. What's the is you just more motivated, more, more motivated to go sailing with with Nat and Cook? And what are you motivated for right now?
No, I'm motivated. I'm motivated in flying, but with all these things about new rules and everything, so I'm kind of waiting, I'm expecting like an expectation to see what's what are the new rules coming out for the new gliders and to see what's going to happen with the with competition with CC competition. I think I'm going to do a couple of open class SRS, like zero class competitions this year. We have one in Tapalpa in November, so I'm excited about it. And maybe go to Europe and do some in Europe this year. So I think the CCC open class competitions for me this year will be very few, just Monarca in Valle.
And I think we might have a PWC. That's what the words say in the end of the year. Cool. So if that happens, well, for sure, I'm going to put my ass to train and be 100 % ready.
Yeah, we got a few things I want to chat with you about for sure competition. And, you know, you've been working with Julian Garcia, the French coach, you've been pulling him into your, your business with Nick with guiding and you guys did a really cool kind of comp training before and during the Monarca, which I got to do with you guys one day, which was really interesting. And you guys kind of did these kind of a war game, I would call it. But scenario where it was really neat and war is not the right word, but it was, it was really cool to just not just talk about, you know, control theory and stuff, but go out and test how these things work. So definitely want to get to that with you, but I'm excited to talk to you first about the X-Alps.
You, you and I both have our hats on here. Yeah. We got to see each other not nearly enough during the X-Alps. Yeah. You were doing my thing. You were doing your thing. You were supporting Tangi's team and the French team and you were cooking. You had your own vehicle. You're with Natalia. I'm sure it was a blast, but we had this funny kind of interaction at the end of it when we were at the lake at the finish. And I remember you and Natalia just being kind of blown away by the whole thing. Destroyed. Yeah. You were destroyed. You were exhausted like everybody is. But also I think it'd just be fun to hear your perspective. You know, because I've had a lot of athletes on the show talk about it over the years, but not many teams.
Well, it's, it's very interesting to look at it as a, as a supporter and also as a pilot, because once you understand what's happening in the air and once you understand like what more or less the kind of routes they're taking and also your job as a supporter in the ground, it makes a very fun mix of understanding the competition on the ground every single day. You know? Yeah. A lot of us that we've watched the XLs in the past years, we've looked through the computer and like, yeah, this is what these guys are doing. But there's a whole world behind the athlete that is happening for that guy to be able to start at five o'clock in the morning, and to be able to run during the whole day and be in a hundred percent like physically, mentally, and also the motivation of the team.
how the energy of the team is managed, how every little member of the team makes a very important job to be able to produce this effect on the team, on the athlete. And it was very interesting analyzing, for example, how Chrigel's team was in the camp before starting the camp, how they were eating small pieces of very energetic foods during the whole day to be able to build up reserves in the body. And then how these rookies, they were coming and they were asking their other.
Your team's like, what should I do right now? And it was like, it's almost 12 hours from the start and you're still asking what you should do. So it's very interesting of looking at the whole perspective from the very, very experienced teams to the rookies. And us, I think we knew it was going to be hard. We knew it was going to be a challenge. But I don't think we even we like we thought maybe from the 1 % of what. It's going to be really at the end at the end, it was it was like over our expectations, we had to drive, we were starting to drive at six o'clock in the morning, and we're ending to drive at six o'clock in the afternoon. And they asked, we were in charge of food.
So we had to, we had to go to the supermarkets while they were flying, but also an interesting thing for me was that because of my, my competition. Background and flying background, I was able to not help them in the strategy, but to be able to be communicating with the team in a certain way that that my information was taking in a certain way. And, and it was a very, very nice team that we made with the with the team and then and all the other guys and see also how like the supporters, the runners. The people that that the porters that take the food and the water up to the mountain, we
have one, one of the guys, one day we like I remember with nothing he run with with Tangi up a mountain. And when when he came and land and we pick him up, he was completely yellow, like he looked like Bart Simpson. Yeah, he was crazy. He was like in full ketosis. I don't know how you say it in English. Wow. And the and and you could see like. Dude, you really need to eat something right now, not your you're going to you're going to break. Wow. So, yeah, it's a it's very interesting to be able to look and normally I'm the one competing in regular cross country competition. But now I was in the other side and I was like, see, this is not paragliding. This is nothing that we've seen before.
These guys are like aliens.
How you guys had a really big team. What was that like from a man? Yeah. From a management perspective, because it seemed like when I did tie in with your team, which wasn't very often is something, you know, sometimes you just end up with teams a lot and other times I hardly saw you guys. But how was that from a management perspective and just managing all the different vehicles and people?
Well, food wise was kind of hard because we had three different vans and I had the food in one van. So most of the days in the morning I would prepare breakfast for everyone. And I would prepare some kind of snack or sandwiches to give the other guys and to have Tanguy with with snacks. And also like he it's also very hard to cook for Tanguy because it's like cooking for a five year old kid that doesn't like to eat like my nephews that they eat. They eat more things than like they're five years old and super picky, right? He just likes
fast food and stuff. Oh, I can't. What a shame.
Yeah, he likes very picky. But in the other hand, you have, for example, team and Pedro. That the team likes he's he's a foodie man that that guy is like he should write a cookbook and then and then Pedro, the other one of the other supporters, that guy, he's like he's crazy about tacos. So every day he's like, is this going to be taco night?
Yeah, so it was it was super fun. Just one day I was not able to deliver food myself. To the team, we were coming down to Locarno and, you know, we are used to to American like this, like Western roads, that they're big, that a car can fit. Yeah. And we were driving these like not 20 foot van. So it's big. So so I don't know, 20, 19 foot. I don't know. And the and we're driving up the mountain of Locarno from Locarno going up to the mountain because supposedly Tanguy was going to walk up and we're going to feed him. There. And then he was going to go to the next landing that was like more towards the. The.
So I don't know. And but there was a storm coming and I'm not used to driving these type of roads. So we go up with Natalia and he's like, what's going like, how are we going to go down this road? And they're like, you're turning on one road, one one wheel is in the hill and the other one is falling down. I mean, like then there's a truck coming down. I like. So we arrive up to the mountain, like shaking like this with Mati and it's like, OK, we made it. And then we arrive with Tim and they're like, no, he's not going to stop here. He's going to go and eat over there to the next day in the next year. Shit. And then there was a storm coming down, like coming down the valley. And I thought that is like either we go down right now or we're not going to like we're not coming down this road.
So we drove down.
This was the day that had the huge. Massive overdevelopment, right? And Tanguy had taken that crazy line all the way to the south of the Alps, into the Rhone and came back around. He had a really good day that
day. I think so. Yes, because there were two very big overdevelopments. One was coming down to Locarno and the other one where it was with where he got sucked by the cloud. What's his name this day? Yeah, Tim Malonghi. Tim Malonghi. Yeah, that was crazy. The day he quit. Yeah. And but this day he. Yeah, but this day he. Tanguy went up. Well, he was he was driving up. So so we spoke with Tim. OK, I'm going to drive down. So I'm right at the landing when he arrives and I can have like hot food and ready food for him. No, I go down the mountain in the middle of the storm. It was not nice. And suddenly they call me, hey, he's not going to fly because of the storm. You need to go up again.
I am not going up that road again. So I went to the bottom of the mountain. I cooked everything. I called an Uber and
this girl from like meet your like Eastern Europe, I don't know where comes in an Uber with ferry wheels and like like these like a domino things hanging from the like it looked like a very pinky Uber and I look at her and I tell her, have you ever been up there? And she's like, yeah, OK. So I gave her a call. I gave her the bags and we delivered food to the top of the mountain and we slept in the bottom of the mountain. That was the only day I was not able to be. They were not very happy, but yeah.
How about Natalia? Did she I mean, you guys had just gotten married in March. Yeah, she almost divorced me. That's going to say that's an odd vacation, man.
Yeah. Honeymoon. What are you going to do in your honeymoon? We're going to be chasing Red Bull athletes. Around the island. Driving for 12 hours a day.
But every time I saw her, she was laughing and having a blast. Did she like the experience of seeing it? Was it kind of just mind blowing? Was it boring? What do you think?
Hey, I don't think she would do it again. Yeah. My wife, I don't think. No, I think I would do it again because I like these kind of things. Yeah. But the the the the hardest part is that you're. In expectation all day long. So like people is like, Oh, you're driving in the middle of the Alps. No, you're driving. You're you're going to every single parking lot in the middle of the Alps. Yeah. And waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting. No, that's that's really the life of a supporter in when you're cooking and then you're driving and you arrive and then you have to cook very fast. And many times like Tanguy or a team or like I don't know how many kilos the team lost during this competition, but I had to be chasing.
him with a ball and like be stuffing food in his mouth like, yeah. So yeah, it was the... it was interesting when
When you, maybe at the time, or since then, what, what's, what was the kind of most surprising thing was, what was the thing that was that you weren't prepared for, that you were just kind of, whoa, I had no idea it was going to be x that fast, or that kind of pace, or there
Were many times that because the outs are this huge, massive, like, we like, you all guys know, these massive, like, chains of mountains that you don't have a lot of connection roads between the like crossing from side to side of now So even if, if the athlete was 40, 50 kilometers away, but he was in another system, in another valley system, you had to drive like six hours to go around the mountains and go to him. So the point of, uh, of like the, the point of my job was to, and, and that was my stress was to be able to be on time every single time he would land, I would have some kind of, some kind of food for him. No, and the, and I tried to make like, I made him gnocchi's and I made him pasta and I made pasta every single day.
And now they eat these weird things, you know, these, these Frenchies. They are very famous for their food around the world. But these kids like to eat something called oeufs bananes.
That it's basically, you grab a banana, you smash it, and then you, you make like scrap, like very soft scrambled eggs, like, like very mushy scrambled eggs, not cooked all the way. Yeah, and they just like grab and pound that. Supposedly, is like super big in the fitness the world, and it's full of calories and energy. And so, yeah, they had me like, "F banana, banana," oh.
God, yeah. Oh, f...
f okay
Gotcha. Oh, man, yeah.
x with banana, and so yeah, cooking that at four o'clock in the morning every single day, that was, I think, the hardest of everything. I was like, "Dude, like, you have a trained chef with you, like, or like, you can, or like, you want French toast? You want pancakes? You want waffles? You want, like, like, you, you want to like a burrito? What do you want? Like, no, you want like a burrito? What do you want? Like, no, like, no shit, okay, so much.
talent put to waste there. But I mean, if you—I wish I was still doing the race, because if you could have been on my team, I just—I just wouldn't have even raced. I would say, you know what? Let's just, yeah.
We would just stay, we would just like grab a nice lake and just
hang out at the hon and come and let everybody go and we just, yeah, just
Don't be the last one, so the the race continues, yeah.
Exactly. Just stay ahead of the last place; that'd actually be a fun goal, just to not get eliminated, yeah.
I just don't want to get eliminated, but that's it, but
You would do it again, and I think you'll do it again. Yeah, it's pretty wild, isn't it? I, I've never experienced another event that's like it. It's, it is, it is amazing, yeah.
I spoke to to the organizers about making, uh, the the Red Bull XL taco truck, so instead of cooking for one team, I could go and cook for the rest of the everyone and be chasing like you do when you go and chase with pizzas, and you go with everybody chasing like do the same, but like having like this little taco truck chasing the athletes and just like, and you can feed tacos to the athletes and to the crowd, and it would be nice, it'd
be cool to have a culinary channel. No, that'd
be really fun, yeah. And it's, it's, it's, it's nice to see because every single team has their, like, they grab a big ball, like plastic ball, and they just like add stuff and they're just like running and eating off a ball like that. And I understand there's, uh, there's a time issue, but at the end you could see like there were teams that they were resting a lot and they would be arriving at the same time as the teams they were hurrying up, like these night passes, for example, they don't work, yeah. They like the next day they're so tired, like they don't, they don't like their performance, the night passes.
the night pass works works against you for sure. Yeah, I was amazed. One of the things that that I never saw when I was racing that I saw this time that I was quite impressed by. I mean, if I ever did the race again, I would try to emulate it more. But the last day, the day Chrigel and Lars and Simone and Aaron made it in, uh, on their way to Laramos, I took off with those guys that morning and they had about 70k to go to Laramos and then they had to land and then hike back up again and then finish the race. So they had a big day. I think they had to fly, you know, 250k or something that day. So I mean, I had a big day, but when I got, I got up to the launch before anybody arrived.
Simone, Simone was the first one up there. And back in my day, I would have been antsy. I would have, you know, had all my shit ready to go and been just waiting for the first little puff of wind and taken off and bombed out because I was... it was always just such a race. It was, I was in that mode of, you got to go, you got to just kind of keep moving. It's so fast all the time, and they were up there just laughing and telling jokes and goofing off, and uh, they were in no hurry at all. And you know, when I would have, I would have definitely taken off a half an hour before they did, but they were, they were really casual. They were, they knew they were going to have a race later in the day, but they knew that between there and Laramos, they were all friends. They weren't going to race, they weren't going to fly fast.
They had to get there, not bomb out, not waste any energy. They were, they were veterans. They were, they were taking their time, and they, they looked fresh as daisies. You know, they just, they didn't look tired, and it wasn't the weather—was great this year, it was not representative of a typical X-Ops. So I mean, they, they only really had the two bad days, and so yeah, so they had flown a lot, so they weren't worn out, but it was just interesting to see.
that veteran presence, you know, that that kind of mindset of of incredibly being incredibly calm
I think that's—that's a—what's—what's the name of the guy that won? Is the Italian? Aaron? Aaron, I think that's—that's really what the last—the last day of the ex-alps, you could see the experience of Aaron as a cross country competition pilot. He didn't fly a as an exiled pilot, yeah, he flew like it was the last day of the Superfinal and he had to win that day. And you could see his truck just climbing and gliding, climbing and gliding, climbing and gliding, and he was—he was not taking times and crossing valleys to try to go to the mountains and cruise around. That—that guy was just like hauling ass, like he wanted it bad.
Like, if it would be like 150 kilometer tasking than any other day of a cross country competition, and I think that was a big difference in the mentality of the last day between Aaron and the rest. Chrigel is also a great xe competition pilot, but Aaron, I think that's where he was above the rest in exactly that day, because the rest was regular xe xe ex-alp conditions, nowhere you had reading everything, but the last day was very marked, was like couple of turnpoint you had to be, and Aaron just just kick their asses like, like yeah I
think Aaron's, Aaron's mindset that race because I at le carno when I tied in with him, he top landed up there. The place you're talking about, you were with Tangy and and I was running along with him as he was running to the turn point and I said "Aaron, what's your what's your mindset? What are you thinking about right now?" and he looked at me like I was an idiot and he went, "Yeah, what's my mindset is to win, you know?" and this was, yeah, I guess that was just the day before. I mean, they were really hauling ass at that point, but uh, yeah, I mean he was in that mindset and I think that last day it was, "Hey, I've got to take the riskier line here. I can't take the obvious down to the south and because that's way further, I got to take the especially for him the riskier line because it it demanded navigating a lot of airspace and Aaron sucks at airspace. He hates airspace." No, they just went around
yeah yeah
but he had to go, you know, to stay under that one and make the crossing across the valley. That's tricky airspace through there, and he just, yeah.
Yeah, but he had to go, you know, to stay under that one and make the crossing across the valley.
Decided, okay, I have to go this way if I'm gonna win, you know? So he was willing to gamble, which was cool to see, yeah.
No, no, it was—it was great to see that last, that last, uh, that last day. It was like, because it was, it was like watching a very intense Superfinal task. No, like, you had these pilots, and also Griegel had a big disadvantage with his gear. His gear, yeah, his gear. Like, I don't, I don't remember what's the name of the canyon, but they were like doing sled rides in the morning, and it was a little canyon with power lines, and they had to fly from the top of the canyon, and we're sitting in the middle of the canyon, and you could see the performance of the glider perfectly. It was like testing the glide of a, of a big, oh, from
Trey seme at that day
too, I don't, I don't know, coming out, so they were, they were flying and you could see, I don't fly, and then you could see, and then Griegel, when he landed, when he took off, he was like, "Yeah, he was flying and he was, was gliding." Okay, but he landed maybe like two kilometers short of the other guys, though, and that's what he
Always talks about, I mean, his magic over the years has always been making two kilometers on everybody all the time. It's just these little bits, a little bit extra flying, a little bit extra fast, a little bit extra, one more little move, you know? And that with the when the weather is good and to be on gear that is less, I just mean he didn't, it wasn't stacked up for him this year, which was cool to see. I mean, it was great to see air and just throw down.
Yeah, since the first day he arrived to the top of the mountain, we're in the top of the gondola where the first takeoff is, and everybody arrived. This guy just came in, put his pants down like his wiener was all over the place, and he was like, he was like, you know, a dog that comes to a post and pee on the post and say, "This is my territory." That motherfucker did! I was sitting with Natalia looking at the takeoff and so, okay, we're gonna have a show, okay? Okay.
He just went like, full on, "Okay, it's his territory, it's his competition" since the first day. Ciao, that's awesome, that's awesome, yeah.
See, these are the stories you don't hear on Instagram. That's great. Uh, cool, man. Well, hey, let's switch gears. I want to take us to Brazil. So, yeah, a couple years ago—it was two years ago now, right, when you won 2023? Okay. Oh, three years ago now? Okay. Uh, where was that? Was that Castello?
It's breaking. What? Where was that? Where was it? In Brazil? Andradas, Brazil? Andradas? Yeah, I've never flown there. Uh, you, you won, you won that World Cup. So we're talking about mindset. We're talking about anybody who's flown with you knows, you know, you fly very, you, you, you're very bold, you're very cowboy, uh, you're
very uh
You know, you, you let you love to lead out a ton. You, you fly your own lines. What was the mentality there in Brazil? You know, it tends to be softer. It's not like Valle, right? It's not strong.
No, not Andradas. And what happened really is that I, I'm Mexican, but my mother is, I'm also French because of my mother. No, so thanks to, to that, and because the language barrier and everything, it's easy. I, I've been training a lot with the and talking a lot with the French team, and I became very, very good friends with the Julian Garcia, the coach of the French team. And in that specific competition, Julian came to Andradas, and it was only Julian, Arthur, and two other, two other pilots, and and that's it. No, so I was able to participate more normally.
I'm there, I'm just listening. I don't do questions, I listen, and that's it, right? I try not to interrupt a lot. And the, you're talking about
Julian's briefings every day that he does? Yeah, yeah, okay.
So that that time he was able to coach me more personally than than the rest of the times I was in competitions with him, and I think my best position before that one was like 70-something, and the so I said, "Okay, I've been flying for that time for 20 years, 20, 19 years, I don't know, and I've never won a World Cup, and this guy is telling me how to win a World Cup. I think I'm gonna shut up, listen, and do what he do what he says." So I did. I, I did every single day what he told me to do. He was like, "You need to do this, this is a strategy, this is how we're gonna fly." Every single day I had him in the back of my head just like reminding me what to do, and surprise, I won the World Cup.
That easy, that easy. So you just had to basically box up how you normally do, throw that away, not
Not, not completely okay, but I had a great glider. It's, it's the only glider sitting inside my house that doesn't see any, any humidity or anything. It's right there.
That's the magic glider, yeah.
I've never gonna sell that glider; it's gonna stay with me for the rest of my life. So I had a, I had a very good glider. I had a very good trim on the glider, completely the opposite of all these new trims people are doing like super, super aggressive. And the, I spoke to Ross at the time, he was like, "No, because of your weight, because of everything you should in the place, you should trim this and this and this like that." And the, so I was, I was feeling that I, I had a huge advantage in the climbing. So you trimmed it kind of slow instead of fast. I trimmed it, I trimmed it very slow in the middle, very close to zero, then a little bit faster on group two, and then as fast as possible on group three, completely the opposite of what they're doing now that they go very fast in the middle, then slower in group two, and as close as possible in group three to avoid the tip collapses.
But because I have natural ballast with me, I can do it the opposite. You
Yeah, that's why every single time I hear about these equalizers and these are like, dudes, like, stop inventing shit. Just come with me, I'll adopt you for a couple of months and I'll make sure you fly the right size glider, okay?
Hand up for that one. I want that just to eat your food. I don't care how much weight I gain. Perfect, I'm in.
So, so Brazil, was that Brazil? And also, I think I, the my, my way of flying, it's very, I, my advantage, I, I can say is that I, I think I can read the lines quite good. So, Andrada, especially, it's a place where there's huge convergence, huge like 20 kilometer line convergence, and you had to be, you have an airspace on top, so you have to be very, very careful of not getting sucked into the airspace because they're at those conversions are atomic and the, so I was able because of the also the place I live in Valle, and it's, it's not that smooth here, it's a little bit turbulent.
I was able to, to speed up all the time in the convergence and then, yeah, fly fast. And then we had a couple of the Brazilians that they had the pressure of being locals that they were living always on the bottom, so the control theory that we've been working a lot with the with Julian, we were able to apply it perfectly. And there's not that much, for example, in Monroe, you have a lot of laterality, so your angle of control, it's very difficult than what Andradas is. Andradas, you don't have that much laterality, it's more, you have these convergence lines, so the pack gets compressed into a certain line, so if you have an
advantage in the climbing, you have an advantage. And then you have, I, I'm fast because I'm fat, and it gives, so that way I could, I could control them very, very easy every single time. And I think once you go above the same pilots over and over and over and over after the second day, they dream about you, you know? So every time they, you, you, yeah, every time they, they look at you, they go, "No." And it's, it's exactly what you want them to do, you know? It's exciting, like, but you have to be calm and done by the hook.
Yeah, yeah, you have to, you have to keep your brain turned for me in that position. You got to keep your brain turned off. You get, don't get excited. Don't, don't think too much, just stay on top, just stay on top. Don't take any and
That's, and that's exactly what we're doing now that we're, we're talking, we're talking before with a, we're talking before with a with Julian, no, we with Julian, no, we with Julian, no, we, we were able to convince him, we were able to convince him to start the coaching and spreading the love to other people and we partner up with him and we've made, we've been making very good progress in this partnership and we did the first clinic in Monarca, I think it came out pretty good. We had and third place overall, we had first place in teams. We had first and second in women, first and second in cereal, and that's it.
Yeah, that was great. We still need to win the overall in the clinic, but I think it came out pretty nice.
What can you say to this audience, which is a big audience, just in terms of the generalities? I mean, I was talking to Matt Beechinor. Farmer was over here the other night, and I was sharing with him the experience I had with you guys that day where it was kind of control theory, but it was you let Pete go five minutes first. Pete's flying lights out right now. He's flying really fast. He attacks. He's often lead gaggle. And so Julian set it up that he would leave. You set a course. You set a task, and he would leave five minutes before. And then the rest of us would – how long would it take for the rest of us to chase him down? And it was one climb. It was – we got him in the first climb. And then you reset it again where I think you and Manuel and Pete and Violetta, maybe a couple of us, then more people got to leave early, and then the rest would chase.
And it came out exactly as he predicted and we all thought would, right? When there's one person, you're going to get them. In other words, it Doesn't make any sense. It
doesn't make any sense
to go be a rabbit. You're going to get chased down.
Yeah. Well, I think more and more and more, like if we put an example as like racing in bicycles, like Tour de France, La Vuelta, Giro, all of those, you see how the gaggle, how the peloton stays together. And maybe you have one or two that they run away, they go. But it's very hard for one of them to win the whole stage. They go more like. Like for very specific wins during the race. And most of the times, the winner of that race in the Tour and the Giro and all of that comes from the peloton and it's a little sprint at the end, no? So, it's more or less that same theory in paragliding, which is have tiny different budgets in research and technology as the cycling world.
Yeah, a little bit.
No? And so, it's 10 miles. 10 miles, 20 miles, think better than one mind. It's been a long time since a cowboy has won any big competition in the world. It's very hard to win a competition by winning every day. So, it's faster. You can cover more terrain. You can climb better. Gliders are gliding more or less the same nowadays. You don't have this huge difference in gliders. So, back then. Back in the day where you had these gliders that there was a lot of difference in the glide and the people escaping were on those gliders, then that strategy of flying by yourself would be different.
Because every single glide, you would be winning advantage. I think now, for me, the difference, it's more in the climbing, how fast you can climb than the rest. Because when you're gliding, even if you're by yourself or you're with a group. That with a group, you can cover better lines, you can see how the other gliders are moving, you can adjust your line and glide better.
It's more like when you're mapping thermals and you're with a group that you can climb fast, that you're 10, 15 pilots and you can climb fast and you can chase the pilot in front of you faster, that it's climbing only by itself, no? So, it also depends a lot in the place that you're in. All strategies change depending on the area you're flying, no? Monroe, it's a very, very, very weird, specific place to compete that we're not used, many of us, we're not used to flying those kind of conditions. We're more used to places like Valle or places like the Alps or everything. It's very different areas, no? So, the strategy changes, the base of the strategy is the same, but you need to adapt that strategy.
Different conditions. And that's exactly what we did with this first clinic we had. We were, we had the chasing the rabbit, no? Based on, then you had to be the king of the, king of the air that you had to out-climb everybody and you had to be on the start above everybody, no? So, you had to climb, climb, climb and you had to be on top. And as soon as you were on top, you had to leave the thermal and go in the bottom of the thermal and then climb again. And be on top again. So, that was another example of what we did. Another one was that we were not, another game was we were not able to attack the peloton, the gaggle, if you were the one on top.
You could only attack the gaggle if you were the one in the bottom. Okay? So, we could train how to control and how to control and how this rotation is all the time, no? What I thought was interesting. What's interesting
about that, Estefano, was the, was kind of the marrying that with the Brazilians and their, their distance records because that's, that's what I learned from Donizete. So, when we were down in Texas flying together with Cody and we were, we were trying to break the world record, he had this whole thing where if you were at the top of the, you were the top of, and there's only a few of us. It's not a big gaggle. There's only a few of us. But if you were at the top, the bottom person had to lead out. That, they, they were the person that had to take the risk. It wasn't the top person. It was the bottom person. But in a competition setting, am I wrong? The, the bottom person must lead out, right? If you're in a weaker position, that's how you get back to a stronger position.
But do you do that without being in control of somebody? Isn't Julian's thing, you always have to have somebody under control?
You have to have somebody under control. And the, the. This was, uh, a game we were playing to understand that control. Okay. So there's a, the thing is that let's say you, you, you make a polar, no, you make a little triangle and you're on top and then there's another guy in the bottom. This guy would go here, but this guy has all of these angle of control over him. As your control line starts flattening. Like for example, these guys start goes out and then it starts going. Going up and up and up, but you're still here climbing, but you're in a very weak thermal. And there is a moment where your line of control is flat. That's when you fuck up.
Yeah. Yeah. You should have moved. You should move. Yeah.
Okay. Okay. So you need to, it's, it's very, very, it's not very complex at the beginning. There, he starts talking about all these numbers and things and that, and he's like, shit, what is he talking about? But it's. It's we're flying paragliders, man. We're not fucking sending rockets to the moon. Like, no, it ain't, it ain't rocket science, right? So I always tell the people, yeah, I always tell people if I can do it, man, believe me, you can do it for sure. No.
So,
so what is the, was, was your win in Andradas when you look back on that? Uh, it sounds like the. Conditions were the, the wing was great. You had a great wing, great trim, great conditions for you. You know, you, you know how to fly convergence.
Uh, but was it because he was in your ear? What was it? Was it really actively flying different or was it a matter of you being able to fly your strengths and not, not play to your weaknesses? Were you able to remove your weaknesses? Which, which I would, which I would say is kind of like Manuel, you, you and Manuel love to go for it. That's been my weakness for 15 fricking years. I can't seem to learn this. You know, I just, I love to put the gas on when I'm in a good position. It's very hard for me to back off and be reserved and stay in control. Like I'm in the position I'm going, you know? Um, but I imagine that anyway, what do you think?
I think, I, I think what I, what I did specifically is to put my old me inside a box and leave it in the hotel. Hmm. And just, I had, I had the. The skills for flying, like that doesn't change, but I just, I was like, okay, I, I, I really want to go to the, I want, I want, I really want to do this with this guy. I have the chance to listen to him. I have the chance to get trained by him to get coach and the, so I'm just going to listen and see, see what happens. No. And the, and the, and it worked, it worked. Another example. One of the guys that was in. Our, in our clinic, this, uh, winter in Monarca, Pablo Robles, he'll Mexican guy.
He went to Columbia to do the Columbia tour competitions. He, he ended up, he like, he, he never finished in a, in a top competition. He never finished in the podium. No, he won the senior class in the British open. Wow. That's a big competition. First competition after the clinic. Wow. That's okay. Okay. So, so he, he like, if, if. It's if you are, how do you say is the, if you obey the rules, if you analyze the rules, I'm not saying that you're going to go into a clinic and you're going to be the next world champion, you know, he doesn't have a little stick and he's not a magician, but if you understand the rules and you, and if you know the basics of flying and you under, like in the understand the basics of competition and you start doing it slowly, your improvement of level would raise impressively.
Mm hmm. Mm hmm. And the, he also, what, something else that he does is that a lot of people, a lot of pilots think that debriefs should be done right after flying, no, should be done. You went, you finished the day of the, of the competition and you should go straight to a computer and to a map and spend your whole afternoon looking to the map, analyzing every single turn. No. And he explains that, that it's a lot of our sport. It's feelings and it's, uh, euphoria and it's your, your state of mind in the moment. Mm hmm. So if you analyze your, your flights and you analyze your data with that rush of adrenaline inside your head, you will not do it correctly.
Mm hmm. Okay. And, and that's, for example, why I think. In the ex Alps and these Austrians in the ex Alps and these are on Duragotti, German, Italian, they keep everyone's ass all day long because they have cold blood inside their bodies and they can analyze every little thing without feelings. No, not the emotion. Exactly. Emotion kills performance. Uh, yeah. So, so this is something else that was very interesting. Of working with Julian, how, how, after a flight, you put that emotion down and you make an objective analyze analysis of, uh, of your, of your performance, and then you have a briefing with him the next day, or he sends a little like work on these work on that work on that.
No. So it's, it's also very interesting that pre and the post that's, for example, when we do the clinics, we do four days before the competition, then we do all these games. No.
And then during the competition, we wake up, we go to take off, we have a briefing. Okay. We explained the task. We do everything. We fly and we don't talk. We, we, we go have lunch, whatever. But then he spends all afternoon and most of the times all night because he needs to, to analyze 10, 12 tracks and he goes turn by turn. He's like, it's incredible how he does it. And he ate the next morning. He gives his briefings to like individual briefings or, or group briefings, depending on what, what the situation is. And it's great to understand without emotions, without the, in a very objective way, how or where you did good or you fuck up.
No, it's like the same thing happened with us in the, in the ex-Alps with the, with the Tangi. There was a point where we're going to the last turn point in the South. I don't remember that one close to the Maritime Alps. I don't know. And the Tangi went to the other Valley and he fuck up. So we had, we had a talk. I spoke to him, to Julian that day, even if he was coaching the other guys. And I spoke to him and was like, how, how, what should I tell these guys? And he was like, well, now you have to, they have to understand that you have to celebrate every single win. Every like, don't look at the gross. Objective know, and that things happen also in cross country competition.
You have to like every single time you have like in a, in a, in one task. Okay. I want to be on top of everybody. That's my first week. So celebrate your first one. Okay. I want to be on gliding. I want to be in the middle of the pack on top of everybody controlling everybody. That's your second one. So you have to be winning. You have to be motivating yourself by controlling this. And once you start feeling. That you can do it, that you can control the rest. I, for example, I started laughing at the air. I'm like, oh, you're fucking up. Oh, you're pushing too much. You know, like, oh, I am sorry for you because I'm normally the one pushing a lot in front of fucking up.
But you're, you're talking about staying in the present and it's really hard. You know, when I noticed that when you're just focused on process, which I was, what I loved about Julian and playing that day. With you guys were, you know, executing these games was it's, it's not just talk. It's, it's going out and, and performing and seeing the process in action. But also, you know, when I had the good comp at, at Menarche a couple of years ago, when I won it, finally, I was so in the moment all the time. And I was just, I was so stoic that I didn't let anything bother me. I didn't, I just, the whole time it was just, I just kept repeating. The same thing, calm and confident, calm and confident, calm and confident. And I didn't get ahead of myself.
What, what typically happens to me is 20, 20 K from end of speed. I'm in great position. I start thinking about, I'm going to win it. Uh, and then that's for sure. That's when I started saying, you're going to fuck it up now. You, why did you, why do you think about that? You got 21 K stay right here. Do what you've been doing the last 40 K. Why do you? Yeah. So that's, I liked that about the men, the mental side of what Julian. Is that what was helping you in Andrade's just having that regurgitation every morning? You know, here's what you're going to do.
Here's what, like I told him, like he went, because first we spoke about our objectives. Now, what are, what's your objective in this competition? I was like, my objective is to qualify to the Superfinal. I, I've never, I, I did a Superfinal in Mexico. I got a like, and that's it. No, but I wanted to qualify for the next Superfinal. And the, I was like, yeah. Okay. Okay. Let's work on that. So what's, what do you need to be? You need to be top 25. Okay. So you don't want you, you want to finish top 15, top 20, every single day, and then you will qualify for the super perfect. So you don't rush, don't push. And as soon as you're progressing, as soon as you're like, okay, I I'm finishing top 10, top 12, top five, every single day.
And so they're like, oh shit, I'm six. Oh shit. I'm fifth. And then there was a point at one of the days. That I was like, okay, I'm in the point where I can win. No, I had it. I had it clear. I saw Manuel gliding in front. He fuck up. I saw the other Brazilian going front. He fuck up. And then I had the chance to win. And then I was like, okay, I can still control, but I've still have my old me inside myself, you know, I still, I still have it. Time to take him out of the box. To take it out of the box. And, and I hold that and I, uh, and I won, I took, I took them like for a couple of minutes. I think. So you need, you need, you need to have that balance in, in, in flying, you know, he's like,
Hmm. What, what's, what, what is the kind of overall best takeaway that you see with your students? You see the people that are taking the course like Pablo, what, what, what, what's the main thing that gets drilled in? Because I think you'd be an idiot to have raced for as long as we have and not understand at least the foundations of control theory. I mean, I've known, I've known this. For years, but actually putting into practice, um, learn, you know, playing these war games. I, it, it just put it in a different light for me. It just listening to you. I didn't even do the course, but I, what do you think is the main thing that's hitting home with people? Uh, I
think, I don't know, just every single mind works different and, uh, every, everybody, I don't know if I understand. The, the, the question correctly, but like what, what does people take off the course?
Yeah. What's the, what's the main takeaway in terms of, and maybe, maybe it's just totally different for every independent person, because I mean, I think, you know, early on in your career, you need the technical skills to fly with the lead gaggle, but, but eventually it becomes, you know, according to Julian, I believe it becomes much more of a mental thing. I mean, my weakness. Forever has been lack of discipline. I mean, Ross, I mean, Russ always said that Gavin discipline, discipline, discipline, and that's control theory, isn't it? I mean, it's staying in control, not going to be the rabbit, but it's also, but yeah. Anyway. So what, what do you think is the main, you know, if you could do a survey after one of these courses, what's the main during these
clinics? There's a, there's a little, it's, it's a little bit more challenging than it's not the same as training, for example. If you would be the U S team, everybody's at the same level. You can talk the same language, no, or the French team, everybody is like as good as it gets. No, but when you're, when we're doing these clinics, we have to cover all the levels of the pilots flying. For example, we had a little frustration with V one day. It's like, yeah, I know about this, but I want to like, yeah, but everything is going to arrive to the point and you're going to, it's going to arrive to a certain understanding where you have. To one, you have to talk to Julian specifically each day, one-on-one. And that, that helps a lot.
These questions for different pilots, the personal debriefs with him. And the, because the theory is the same for everybody, but then it's, how do you adapt that theory to the next level? And that's something, for example, the French Federation does perfectly. It's like you go to college and you want to fly paragliders. Perfect. You, you're at certain level. They send you to the university and you choose paragliding as your sport. You don't choose basketball. You don't choose football. You don't choose anything. You choose paragliding and you have just another pilot. It's not that bad. It's called Maxime Pinot. He's quite okay. Pilot is more or less, you know? Yeah. He's all right. Yeah. He's all right. And he's, he's coaching the kids.
He's coaching the young kids. And then you have in the Alps, you have another coach that he's also quite okay. Charles Casso. No, he's like. Yeah. Not bad. He kind of knows a little bit the, the sport. And then every, everything is overseen by Julian. So the structure from learning from the moment you start flying competitions to the next level, to the next level, to, it's like baseball, minor league, second league, like major league baseball, whatever. No, they, they do the whole process. Like they, like, and that's, that's, that is a reality. Why they've been winning the world championship for the last, I don't know, 15 years.
I don't know where, when was the last time, like someone from another country won. In my memory. Yeah.
So, and, and, and there is no secret. There is no secret to the rule. You need to work, you need to train and you need to focus. No. And these are, these are the only guys that they do it professionally in the world. Yeah. So that's why with the, with our company, we decided with paragliding guys, we decided to, with my relationship with Julian, with our friendship, how can we grab that very intelligent brain and how can we spread that love to the, to the world? No.
No, I mean, rising tide raises all ships. Right. And I mean, it'll make everybody better. You know, there's the saying that Natalia would like, you know, a rising tide raises all ships. I mean, it's going to make everybody better. And I, I really appreciate this, what Julian's doing because, you know, it, when you isolate it just to the French team, they, they will also be pushed by the Swiss and the Americans and the Mexican, everybody getting better and they'll get better. You know, they've, they'll just create more and push more and, and it'll make everybody better.
You know, Manuel and his, his words, no, he's, he's a savior's word. And he says that you can be a crocodile in the pond, but once you go to the ocean, you're a fucking sardine.
Exactly. Exactly. No. So yes. Yeah. I'm the national, I'm the US national champion. I'm the Mexican national champion. And. Yeah, exactly. Once, once we, once we go out to the real world, they kick our asses like always. You're
a sardine.
Yeah. Yeah. So what's the only way to. To raise our level, it's to train, it's to learn from the best and to compete with the best. And that's something the US team has the, the, the female US team has done amazingly. I think that's the best example of performance and the, and, and the will to raise the level of a team. I don't think there's a single team in the world that has raised their level as fast. As a US women team. Yeah. And that's a, and that's really an example for the rest of the world. Yeah. Because, uh, yeah, they've done an insane job. Violeta, Galen, Jenny, Alexia, all the girls they've been like, they've been raising that level like crazy.
Let me ask you something that's, uh, you know, not off the record, but just, this is an interesting thing for us to, to talk about. Do you think it could be maintained because you know, what's, what's happening there with the women's team? The women's US team is really independently driven. These are very driven women who have decided that this is what they want. And, uh, and you know, to do it takes an enormous amount of time, money, dedication, you know, it's different when you're the French, when you can declare this as your major and go to school and this is your sport, this is a legitimate undertaking. I mean, something that I have struggled with a lot over the years. Is, is just the, the why, you know, why put all this time into it for, you know, no one is going to remember who wins the Superfinal four years ago.
No one does. I mean, even at that, even at the highest level, there's no money, there's no fame, there's no real glory. There's nothing really in it, in it except personal value. But, you know, it can, can it be main, can these women maintain this level of dedication for something that's. I mean, what I'm saying is in France, it's legitimate. This is a legitimate undertaking in life. Uh, but anywhere else, it's a personal hobby. Really?
We're the, the only, the only country in the world that is professional is France. Yeah. The rest of us were amateurs. Yeah. It's a, we're weekend warriors. Really? You know, exactly. And, and, and, and it's, it's sad to say, but in, in a capitalism world, like the one we live in the U S. In Mexico, the only ones that can go up, that can go out and compete are the ones that have the budget to do it. So it's maybe, maybe there is a lot of talent in the, in, in the place, but because there is no support, you guys in the States have the free flight foundation that works amazingly and, and supports a lot.
And you don't get us as we do. You don't get shit from the government. But, uh, it would be great that like, I, I did an interview with a, with a TV channel when, when I won the world cup and I was like, when was the last time Mexico won a world cup in soccer? I don't know. Never. And how many millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars it's invested in that sport and they don't win shit. And the same thing happens to like every other athlete in Mexico that it's not soccer. No. So it's a, it's a, it's a whole different topic and the same in the States. But if we could get the sport recognized by our federations and we can push the same scheme that the French have in Europe, in France and, and adapted to ourselves, it can work a little example, not, not in the size of the, of what's happening in France.
But in, in Mexico, we have a, in Valle, we have a school in Peñon called Sky Rides run by Potro, our friend Potro that runs the hangar. And the, this guy, he's helping all these new kids with his son Andres that now he's a new gunshot in Mexico and soon he's going to be the new gunshot in the world. Yeah. That you see how he supports all these kids with gear, with the knowledge. With classes, he takes them to take off. And the only thing he demands is that you will be, you will be a, you need to, to show me your, your, your, how do you say your school results and you need to show me that you're going to school every day.
And that way I will be, I will give you and I will help you to fly. Okay. That's awesome. So it's a little example. And what's the result? Well, Andresito is kicking everyone's ass and he came out of that school. No. Wow. And the, and then you have, they have these new kids, Ben and then you have a new generation. They're like 14 year old kids, 13 year old kids are coming out of the same school and Andres is helping them and they're starting to do, go through the same steps as Andres. And the, so it's, it's, it's working, you know, and it's working. Not with a lot of budget, it's working with a very small budget, but with a, with a lot of passion and heart.
That's awesome. So, yeah.
And that's kind of what they've done in the UK, right? With the juniors program. And they, they also create a lot of good pilots, you know, as it's, it starts when you're, when you're young and it's not just self funded. Yeah. It's an, I mean, it's just, it's, it's an interesting global perspective when you kind of pull back and look on it. It's, you know, that I think what many of us struggle with is that we're not, we're not as, it's not really seen as a legitimate undertaking, you know, like the French have.
Yeah. I think, I think what we need to do us as new as not all generations, but past generations coming to a point where new generations are coming to take our place that we had. It happens in every sport and we have to accept it is that now our time is to help these new generations. And to see the struggle. We had to go through everything we want and to see how we can help these new generations have a smoother path and a more professional path. No. And, and if we have the chance of learning from the best pilots that they're doing it and we can share this knowledge to the new generations, that's, that's really what we need to do.
You know, it's like we had our time as high. Like I, I'm not saying I'm going to retire. I'm not going to let it that easy for this, these fucking youngsters, you know, but I want to, I want to help these new generations to see how can we, how can we help them go further than we did? No, it's like, okay, I, I, I've been, I'm the only, I don't know if in the U S has been a pilot that has won a world cup, but the, I think I'm the only one in the whole continent that has won a world cup. And the. So, yeah, it, it took me, it took me so long to do it by myself and I didn't win shit and it took me one cup coach by this guy.
And then I was like, Oh, it's that easy. No. So now we have pilots that they've been learning also from him. They're learning about his strategy. They're learning about, so, okay, how can we help these new generation to transmit that knowledge? And how can we raise the level of our area by creating these, these, these new techniques of, of flying because competition, a lot of pilots are like, yeah, but I'm a free flyer. I don't want to, I don't care about competition. Perfect. But this is not, not only for like, if you want, if you want to reach soaring Torrey Pines, perfect.
Be the highest in the pack of Torrey Pines and go the furthest you can go. And so like, it's not having huge goals, it's having normal goals, but be the best on any, any, any goal you can have.
Yeah. Yeah. And that's what I like is really framing it in a way of, of training and otherwise you're, you're, you're static, you know, you're, you're only going to get better by luck and you're not getting better by really, you know, you got to play these games. You've got to work together. It was, it was cool to see. And I'm glad that. You guys, you and Nick have decided to blow this up a little bit and congratulate. We're doing more. Yeah. Great. Good. I appreciate you, buddy. Thanks, man. This was a lot of good, a lot of good things. I'm glad we were finally able to do it. I miss you and I miss your food. We need to
do new expeditions.
Yes, please. Let's do it. Thanks, Stefano. Appreciate it. Thanks, Gavin. Ciao. Ciao, bud. If
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