Paige Onweller - Details Matter
0 commentsEPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Hottie (01:23)
All right, Marginal Gainers, like we said, our guest is Paige Onweller. I think you're really going to enjoy this because Paige really shows how marginal gains starts with planning documents and spreadsheets and details. That's where all this stuff really happens as Josh can attest to. Like you gotta be you gotta write stuff down and map things out and really work on things. And and Paige a large part of her her racing and her life is about details. That's what I kept thinking about Paige as I was getting ready for the interviews.
Man, she's really detail oriented, amazing. I wish I was I wish I was as organized and detailed as Paige Onweller.
So Paige, thanks for being on the show.
Paige, you were prior to racing, a physician's assistant. So I'm wondering, is this kind of a non-cycling question right of the way, or maybe it is a cycling question? Are you the person in the the gravel space, especially on the women's side of racing, that where everyone comes up to and says, ask medical advice, wants you to diagnose them? Is that is that what you get all the time as a as a byproduct of your previous career?
Paige Onweller (02:51)
Surprisingly, the Peloton doesn't really ask me that many medical questions. It's like everyone, like family and people that have known me before. A lot of rash questions or photos of cuts from crashes. Does this need stitches? Does this not need stitches? That's the most common one I get from...
Hottie (03:05)
That's it. Okay.
Paige Onweller (03:06)
...my cycling friends.
Hottie (03:07)
Okay. Well go have at it, Josh. If you've got a medical question, she she apparently doesn't get enough of so feel free.
Josh (03:14)
No, I, I'm laughing my wife's a physician and it it's exactly the same. Like, I get, "can you look at this rash? Like, no, I don't want to see your rash." Although, I will tell comically,...
Paige Onweller (03:23)
Yes.
Hottie (03:24)
Yeah, yeah.
Josh (03:26)
...my my son fell, hit his head on a brick staircase when he was like five, and she's looking at it going, I know it needs stitches, but she facetimed one of her other friends.. "Does this need stitches?"
She's like, "of course it needs stitches." "I knew that. Like, I just didn't want to go." ...So, I just think it's funny that you people with medical, even kind of have the same things that us non-medical people have. Of like, but "I don't want to go to the ER. I don't want to deal with this."
Paige Onweller (03:49)
yeah, yeah, we don't want to go there. Yeah.
Josh (03:52)
So but we also don't...
Hottie (03:53)
Yeah.
Josh (03:53)
...want to look at your rash. So...
Paige Onweller (03:56)
No, please..
...please don't send me those.
Hottie (03:58)
Yeah.
Of course Paige does more
Josh (04:00)
So,...
Hottie (04:00)
...than look look at people's rashes and answer medical questions by a long shot. Great racer with a r you know, really quick coming on the scene here, with with the professional racing scene and the gravel racing scene, Pai. Pretty amazing. But I imagine there was a life before all of this, before being a before being a PA, before being a a professional gravel racer. Where'd you grow up? What was life like before where we are right now?
Paige Onweller (04:26)
Yeah, I grew up in Michigan in Lapier, kind of in the thumb area, you know. I always say we're like twenty minutes east of Flint. Not that I like to use Flint as a reference point, but yeah,
Josh (04:35)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (04:36)
...kind of Midwest roots. and then yeah, I mean I was I was a runner in college and had a pretty simple life. You know, my family we had a log cabin and my dad would have a sawmill. We had us had us peeling bark off trees at a young age, teaching us hard work.
dog sled racing was my first kind of need for speed and athletics in the winters there in Michigan. but yeah, pretty pretty simple upbringing. and then went to PA school and undergrad in Michigan as well.
Josh (05:03)
And so did you when did you pick
Hottie (05:04)
Wait a second.
Josh (05:04)
up the bike kind of in that process? I mean, were you 'cause I I mean, can't imagine how hard PA school is. Are you d is this an outlet for that stress or is how did that come about?
Paige Onweller (05:17)
Yeah, so I've always been, you know, growing up, my mom had us go like pick a sport in school, mostly to like keep us busy, I think, and to stay out of trouble. and so, you know, we were always doing sports growing up and I just took a liking to running. I was really good at it and I did track and cross country. and so I went to college actually on a athletic scholarship and was a runner in college. but I I was injured all the time. I actually had a
Redis or back then it was called female athlete triad, this mismatch of training and fueling and had a lot of stress fractures, four of them to be exact. and I was doing high mileage, trying to run eighty miles a week and just wasn't fueling appropriately. We just didn't have the information that we have now or the knowledge. for example, back then we would have coaches say,
Well, if you lose your period then you're lean enough to be an elite athlete. and obviously that perspective's changed a lot. but because of that I was I was just injured all the time and I g it got to a point where like it was actually during a little after PA school, I was working as a PA and I just got so frustrated 'cause I had another injury, tore my hamstring, and you know, just realized like the running was not working with my body. Like they were not driving well and decided that I would try to
you know, ride bikes as a way to cross train. So of course I like charts as you alluded to. So I had this calculation of how many hours on a bike would get me to ninety miles of running a week. And so I would only run like thirty or forty miles a week and then the rest would just be hours on the bike. but I was, you know, twenty nine thirty at that time and had never clipped in before, you know, rode kids as a b or rode bikes as a kid. But aside from that, really had no experience
as an adult cycling. And so yeah, I mostly started off swifting because the thought of riding outside was terrifying. so my coach at the time, he my running coach, he had an old school felt bike and I wrote it down. it was a felt F90 aluminum bike and it was a it was an eight speed three by at the time I didn't know what any of that meant.
I think I had gator skins on it and you know, I said, Sweet, it's got air tires, I don't know how any of this stuff works. and I just started riding my bike, put it on a trainer, and that's kinda how I how I got started into into riding.
Hottie (07:31)
Little did you know that by the summer of twenty or the spring of twenty twenty six you'd be in a wind tunnel with Josh trying to k trying to get the most out of everything you had and and riding something far from a hundred and fifty dollar Felt bike. But hey, hats off to Felt and that aluminum bike. I remember those days. I mean they were great bikes back then. That's that's all you knew, right? You had your gator skins and your aluminum bike and you were rattling down the road and what the heck. That's a w that's one way and a and a common way, I think, to get started.
Paige Onweller (07:58)
yeah, yeah. But I was quickly ruined because shortly after that I was recruited to race for Team Twenty Twenty Four. They were are T T and Road and Esports. So I like instantly got a really nice bike when I was new to this sport. And so, you know, people kind of tease me now 'cause I don't really have any experience with mechanical or, you know, the older bikes, you know, not being in a sport very long. I just kinda came into high end bikes like right away and was basically like ruined as like that's the norm.
Josh (08:27)
Well, 'cause you but I mean your progression was I mean, you were that was like within a year of you getting on the the bike, right? And you're or I guess help us understand that timeline. I mean you're started riding twenty twenty and by twenty twenty one you're you're at nationals.
Paige Onweller (08:42)
Yeah, so yeah, it's twenty twenty as I started riding. and I everested on that you know, on that aluminum bike like I talked about. And then yeah, that team had recruited me to to race Zwift esports. So I started racing esports and started to like Google the people I was racing and was like, these are professional, you know, cyclists and started to be like
Josh (09:01)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (09:01)
curious.
and so I kind of, you know, the team at the time I I kind of said like I you know I want to ride outside and they had told me like you are gonna be a time trial specialist, like you have that ability and and that's like that's what we wanna get you ready for. and so the fall of 2020, I actually did an ultra run, the rim to rim to rim. Not sure if you've heard of it, but Grand Canyon, you started one side, you go down, across the canyon, back up, back down, across the canyon again,
Josh (09:26)
jeez.
Paige Onweller (09:27)
and then back up.
and then after that they had kind of said like if you want to take cycling seriously, you know, you should probably stop running. And so stopped running, that was October of 2020 after that ultra run. and then 2021 started to focus more on riding outside, trying to learn those things. And I got a coaching exception to race at Time Trial Nationals. And so really that was kind of my first big race, real like not on Zwift.
I did one like local time trial, kind of in the Ann Arbor Detroit area leading into that. But then yeah, I went to Nationals and I mean I'll be honest, I had a bad experience. Like I really just didn't didn't have the experience in riding bikes, T T bar, I didn't really have a fit on that bike. you know, in a time trial you're running an eighty mil front and a disc and a rear. And so, you know, it can feel sketchy, especially as a newer rider
Josh (10:16)
Yeah, yeah.
Paige Onweller (10:17)
and like I just couldn't
I couldn't hold position and at the time the course was at Knoxville, Tennessee, and that course is a more technical T T course.
Josh (10:24)
Hm. Yeah.
Paige Onweller (10:26)
I'd love to race that now because I feel like I would do quite a bit better. but yeah, at that time I just didn't really have the experience riding outside and so didn't really have r the result I think that the team was looking for in the ability that my power showed. and so you know, there was some frustrations there, but I kind of just decided I'm gonna try s
Try gravel and you know, I signed up for Gravel Worlds, which was August 2021. And that was the first, like I did like one or two group rides before that, but that was like my first like pack experience. And it starts in the dark, you know, so there's like rocks flying, and of course I'm I'm in the least efficient position, which is like dangling in the back of the pack. and probably the most dangerous position. I think I set like a 90-minute power record.
16 minute power record, 20 minute power record, just trying to hang on. but I didn't die. I had fun and I was fifth and I kinda said to myself, okay, maybe there's something there. and I just really like the community too. I really felt accepted into that space pretty, pretty early and supported. And yeah, the long efforts really suited me. So kind of transitioned to gravel during that time frame. And then I was second at Barrie Ru Bay that fall.
'cause they changed the Berry River Bay that year 'cause of weather. and then yeah, I won big sugar that next year in twenty twenty two and that's when opportunities kind of opened up. once you win like a big lifetime event, I think more doors open up. and that's when I quit my job as a PA and decided to give this a give this a whirl.
Hottie (11:55)
And you've kind of kept your foot on the gas, except you had a you know, a a bad injury in February twenty twenty four, but you've kept your foot on the gas, you've stayed near the front of all these races, you've challenged yourself in in many disciplines, mountain bike has come into your life, obviously as a lifetime Grand Prix, you g you have to do that. So how have you how are you able to up your skills game so quickly?
Paige Onweller (12:15)
Yeah, I mean, you anyone listening or that knows me knows that I'm like pretty eager, curious, like, you know, detailed person. And I mean, even early on I could tell that like cornering I was losing speed and stuff and just learning how to ride those speeds for me was like so new. And so I would I had a clipboard and I'd go out to these like in Michigan, this this really quiet gravel road.
And I would go out to the corner and I would just like set my tire pressure and have a digital gauge and I'd keep a log and I would try to enter at a certain speed and not grab brake. And then I'd say like, okay, I'm skidding or that felt smoother at the exit. And I would just like take a log of these details and just kind of experiment. And I kind of treated it like I would in medicine where you just like you study something that you don't understand. And that's kind of how I approached
cycling and I'll be honest too I had a lot of really supportive coaches that were pretty awesome and encouraging and helpful and I also I've always hired skills coaches even like when I first was starting. 'cause you know it's funny when you were riding you think you're doing something like yes I'm dropping my heels or I'm doing that. But then when someone else watches you and then shows you what you look like, you're like, that's a lot different.
Josh (13:27)
Mm-hmm.
Paige Onweller (13:28)
so those the skills coaching has been really helpful and I still do that now. Like I have
someone here in Bet and Bill that I use and it's just something to to also keep myself like keep challenging myself. I always say if I'm not putting myself in situations that I'm uncomfortable, then I'm probably not learning. And so that's where the skills coaching comes in hand because it's a safe environment where you can kind of push your push yourself a little bit and the consequences are lower. Like you don't really want to be doing that in a race setting.
Hottie (13:56)
Josh, we've t we've talked a lot on the show about testing tire pressure and how to do that properly, but usually it's in the context of straight line speed, right? It's never in the context of cornering, but I mean that's a great example of how also you can tinker with pressure, right, and optimize and go, yeah, I need to be I need to be grabbing time, I need to be grabbing traction in these corners, not just pure rolling speed.
Paige Onweller (14:18)
Yeah, yeah. I've seen that a lot, like skills clinics that I'll do with people and the first thing I do is just squeeze your tire, you know, and I'm like, Well that's why you can't corner. Your pressure's
Hottie (14:27)
I
Josh (14:27)
Yeah, I think I think we're a sport that is behind a lot of the others in that regard, right? I mean, if you were playing, you know, baseball, right, there's like there's skill coaches for half the positions, right? Football same
Hottie (14:38)
Mm-hmm.
Josh (14:39)
a lot of the the ball sports. and I think cycling we've definitely historically thought of it more as, you know, you get a coach to help you get fitness and then the skills come from the riding. And so I really love the
Just the y again, your detail orientation and and the the thought process through that. I I know when we first met at the wind tunnel what it a year ago or earlier this year, got out time roll like runs together.
But yeah, I mean just listening to you talk through your thought process, it's just so impressive. And I it was funny, I I I said to Paige, said, Gosh, you remind me so much of one of my favorite athletes I ever worked with, Kristen Armstrong. And she lit up and we're like, She's my coach like but but she had that same curiosity. Yeah. Yeah.
Paige Onweller (15:18)
Yeah, she was my first yes yeah, she was my first coach when I s first got into it. Yeah.
Josh (15:25)
Yeah. But yeah, I mean you you both I I think it's so perfect that you've found each other or she found you that that you ha both have that curiosity and then the willingness to put the work in. 'Cause it 'cause that's work, right? The
keeping the notes, y you know, like I I am not a detail oriented person, so that's really hard for me. It you know, and sadly that's like a big piece of my job and what I do and now I'm fortunate to have other people who keep the notes, but but to have that mindset to put it all together i is just so impressive. But also just to have the mindset to see that as a need. you know, I I we have a lot of athletes in a lot of places who, you know, they don't think they need the wind tunnel, much less
a skills coach, right? Or or a bike fitter. Like I know what I feel. Of course we also have a lot of mechanics that don't think they need torque wrenches, but it's a lot of the but again, it's th it's a mindset. and yeah, I loved your line about if you're not uncomfortable you're you're not learning and I th I think that's just a fantastic way to approach these sorts of situations.
Hottie (16:19)
So clearly your success
Paige Onweller (16:19)
Yeah.
Hottie (16:20)
was a you know a a door opening for you as well, saying, Hey, let's
Let's take this thing on full time, which you did. You left your job as a as a PA to become a full time racer, got on board with the lifetime Grand Prix, got a win at Big Sugar in twenty twenty-two, by the way. Amazing win there. then in twenty three you you added some road, I thought was a brilliant move, and I've heard this from like Melissa Rollins did this too, added a bunch of road races to your calendar to try and, you know, get into that groove a little bit and talk about, you know, throwing yourself into the deep end. That's a
way to do it and get a lot of skills and get an understanding about pack dynamics, aerodynamics, all that stuff, right? Getting ready for a race. You do that in twenty three. but the the I guess this would be the biggest setback in your cycling career came along in twenty twenty four, correct? an i ankle injury
That was rather unique for a cyclist, maybe not so much for a runner. and then even though it happened in February, you still had it in your mind, you thought you could race for unbound in late May, June. So take us through that, that that portion of your life. How did that kinda go down and what were your what was your what was your detailed approach, right? Your planning approach to getting getting to the other side.
Paige Onweller (17:35)
Yeah, yeah. So that was yeah, it was pretty rough injury. I was I was mountain biking and basically like yeah, the it was just like kind of a weird crash with how it happened with where my ankle was at and it it felt like I I probably to tried to put a foot down but like rolled my ankle basically. and there was like a big rock drop, you know
situation and at the time I was like yeah I just rolled my ankle. I tried to ride but I couldn't. I had to have someone come and get me. I thought I was gonna have to like be dramatic and get like, you know, the stretcher and the trail to get me out. but yeah then I got home and like something like clicked and it felt better and got x-rays told I was like yeah this is just a sprained ankle. but then I could tell like something was not right because I could feel something like moving.
And you know, I'm a PA, so I kind of was like, this is my peroneal tendon, like going over my lateral malleolus, like the outside of the ankle bone. And I was like, that is not normal. And what that means is you tear your there's a retinaculum, which is like a seatbelt over the tendon. So I had a complete tear of that retinaculum, extremely rare. Like they have even a hard time diagnosing that. and so yeah, I tore that retinaculum, which meant the tendon was just like
hanging out and going wherever they wanted and that was not good. And so I actually consulted with again detail oriented, I consulted with like seven or eight different surgeons across the US who was familiar with this, what was a rehab. And basically I went with a surgeon that told me I was gonna be racing in ten weeks versus everyone else that said it was gonna be like three to six months. And yeah, so I flew down Florida, had surgery with a very progressive surgeon.
Which was terrifying. I had never met the dude until like the day of surgery. so yeah, I went down to Florida, had the surgery, and then from there it was like a really intensive like rehab back and basically like kind of pushing through a lot of pain. and talking with a surgeon almost every day, which is pretty rare in today's, you know, medical arena. But yeah, it was I think what was interesting was like the coach that I had, we
kind of viewed things differently and kind of said, like, we don't know what this is gonna look like. I could race at unbound. I could not race at unbound. We weren't really sure. And so we tried to do everything possible. Like I was doing what's called shadow boxing. I did research and found out that's the quickest way to get your heart rate up. And you basically like s I only could stand on one leg and I would just sit there and do this. And my heart rate would go up to like 140, 150. And just finding ways to be aerobic without being able to pedal.
and we would also do like visualizations. Like I remember specifically I was injured during this was during mid-south and when mid-south day happened, it was in training peaks, like a visualization. I sat there for like 30 minutes and I visualized the race and my heart rate would get really high. I did all this research on mental visualization and that helping athletes return to sport much faster, just the neural connections. and it was fascinating just to like
see my heart rate get up so high just by thinking and closing my eyes and visualizing like the pack and the the pebbles flying up and hitting me. And I think a lot of that mental work helped me kind of come back so much faster because when I lined up at Unbound, it was only twelve weeks after surgery. I mean, I had taken so much time off. I was like, there's no way I'm gonna finish. I was just planning on riding the first hundred miles.
And then after the first hundred miles, I was like, I'm feeling pretty good. I guess I'll keep rolling.
Josh (20:59)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (21:00)
and that was the year it was a separate start. So we had that nine up women's sprint and I was in that sprint finish and I I tell you, I almost won. And if I hadn't started my sprint so early, I think I would have potentially won. you know, of course that's what every everyone says. Like if I did this then I could have won. But it was just
I think a lot it was mental, honestly. Like I had no business being in that group for that long. but it's just I knew I did everything possible during the rehab, and when I got back on a bike, I was just so happy to pedal. Like nothing else mattered. Like the metrics didn't matter and yeah, I was just out there having fun. And I think when you have that and sometimes like you can do more than what your body's capable of, and and that was a good example of that. It was
Hottie (21:43)
Well
Paige Onweller (21:44)
third on the day.
Hottie (21:45)
yeah, and it sounds like had you not been so detailed and so beyond curious about what you could do with this ankle, you wouldn't have been there at all. Like 'cause there were six, seven surgeons telling you, Nope, you'll be in a boot for a couple of months and then at best on the bike by the time unbound is is starting, right? So it's a lot of it is on you and your your approach to whatever's before you, whether it be a race, an injury
I I guess maybe you do you shop like this? Do you cook like this? Is your whole life just this detailed approach?
Paige Onweller (22:16)
No, no,
definitely not. But I mean, I think a lot of it's like details, but I mean another example with the ankles, I had surgery booked here in Arkansas. There was a person down at Fayetteville and I flew my sister from Michigan to come here and help like take care of me. She had arrived and then it was the day before surgery and I had a question for the surgeon about like peddling with the boot and like this to me that was a really important question. In the office they weren't he's like, you'll just have to talk to him tomorrow.
And I was like, this is a red flag, the surgeon won't even talk to me. And I just like kinda sat there and I was having a hard time because a surgeon wasn't talking to the PT. And I basically I canceled the surgery just the day before, which was probably really rude to the office. But it was like this gut feeling of basically saying, like, this is my career on the line and this person won't even answer a question.
So I didn't wanna take that risk. And so yes, all the details, like they were lined up to have surgery, but then I I canceled it and it made a it made me wait another almost two weeks before getting the surgery. But in the long run it saved me a lot of time. So I guess I just share that story 'cause sometimes it's like an intuition, a gut thing. and just like, you know, when this is your career, but even for other people like that may be listening, if it's not your career, it's also still like your love and your passion.
And like it's so important to protect that as much as you can.
Josh (23:38)
Yeah, I think it highlights I like you said our medical system, I mean, you have to advocate for yourself. And you know, it's it's not always patient friendly. I mean, you know, a lot of doctors pe like the people oftentimes are patient friendly, but the systems are not. And and and sometimes
Paige Onweller (23:52)
Yeah.
Josh (23:52)
the people aren't either aren't. But
Paige Onweller (23:54)
Yeah, yeah.
Josh (23:56)
But yeah, I mean that advocating it and it's I I just think it's so impressive. Just take me through the the visualization thing. I just think that's fascinating. Do do you continue to to use that tool now? I mean the thought that you can get your heart rate up by just visualizing a race simulation it is fascinating to me. But have you continued on with that?
Paige Onweller (24:14)
yeah, yeah. I mean, I work with a sports psychologist now and he often will prepare me what's called like guided imagery and so it's basically like he'll type it out after like our conversation like we'll basically have a call leading into a race and we'll go through the cores, we'll go through like, you know, instead of barriers we call them like opportunities, for you know, areas of opportunity and basically we'll kind of go through what those are and
He writes it out, and what I do is I like record my voice, which sounds like really kind of cringy, but I I record my voice so that way I have an audio file and I can sit there and listen to that audio file of the guided imagery to really kind of take everything in and to go through each of those. A perfect example is flatting. So for example, if you are racing gravel and someone flats, you can see them panic and then they're fumbling for their CO2, they're fumbling for
their Dart or their plug and you just like you have all this cortisol release, you have your heart rate just spike up. And then the the athlete will just think, well my day's over. Like it's all lost, you know? And instead, like we rehearse like what we're going to do. When that happens, like you know, you acknowledge the situation, you you have cues for me, I take a deep breath in, la out.
And you just focus on like what you need to do. And so all of that requires visualization in order to like execute it well under such high stress and high stakes environments. and so yeah, it's just some of those visualizations I I still do on a regular basis now and and would attribute a lot of my success to that. Yeah.
Hottie (25:47)
Interesting.
Yeah, we could all stand a little bit of
Josh (25:50)
That's fascinating.
Hottie (25:51)
that. That breathe in, breathe out. It's one thing that I think a lot of people just stop and f they they stop but they they forget to do that, right? Here comes the problem, but okay, let's just wait and think through this real quick. We don't need to need to panic. so yeah, very
Paige Onweller (26:03)
Yeah, and I think
a lot of it's like our autonomic system drives a lot of our stress and heart rate responses. And so these neural pathways in the brain need to be like kind of retrained. Like if you have a bad experience from flatting and then losing out on a race before, like your body is gonna gonna make decisions that you subconsciously aren't even aware are happening. And that's where I think visualization is really important to kind of rewire some of the neural pathways and just to kind of retrain the autonomic system to not like
you know, fight or flight and to kinda calm down as as much as possible.
Hottie (26:35)
Yeah.
So the ankles all good now? Everything healed up? Mm s or so there's still some
Paige Onweller (26:40)
Yeah.
Hottie (26:40)
things?
Paige Onweller (26:41)
Yeah, I mean I don't I don't think it's ever gonna be the same. like I still have a hard time on clipping on that right side. It's lateral movements with the ankle. but I would say for the most part, yeah, I can run, I can jog, I can do plyometrics, jumps, and it doesn't really impact me on the bike.
Hottie (26:54)
Yeah. So an amazing third at Unbound that year. That was a p that was such a fun sprint to watch. It was a great group at the end. Rosa Closer did win it at the end. As Paige just said, she had a real chance at at winning the thing, winning Unbound in twenty twenty four as well. So go back and look at that video, folks, if you want to see I would say the best finish in the history of the Lifetime Grand Prix so far.
Very it was a very cool,
Paige Onweller (27:18)
Yeah.
Hottie (27:19)
very fast finish, and Paige was right there front and center. Now speaking of unbound, Paige, you have you have so at least one or two, two great videos on the race itself on your YouTube channel. I would encourage people to go there and watch them. And in one of them, it's all about preparation, preparing for unbound, and specifically preparing your tires for unbound. So take us through this this tire testing regimen you go through for that race in particular.
Paige Onweller (27:45)
Yeah, I mean, I kind of view the tire testing as like two things. You you do your testing and preparations for when the tire fails, and you do your tire and testing for like your tire selection. Because, you know, unbound, that's always a hot topic is what tires are you running? and so yeah, the the preparations for me for the flatting component is making sure that I can handle how to fix anything on the go. Like you're out there for 200 miles with only two
or three eight stops. So you have to be self-sufficient. And so a lot of times what I'll do is I'll do an interval and at the end of the interval put a tube in or you know fix a flat and kind of like time myself. and so it I'm doing that at the end of an interval because my heart rate is really high and I'm like really stressed and I'm not thinking right. And that's what you do in race. Like a lot of people can fix a flat or fix something on their bike.
when they're in the garage and they have all the tools they need and everything's relaxed. But when you're like in a thick fit, that's when you really need to know what you're gonna do. And so that's like one one area that I like to prepare for. and then yeah the tire selection's like a big one. And you know, I'll use this year as a good example. I I don't have a tire sponsor this year. I'm with bike tires direct so I can kind of run whatever I want which is pretty awesome.
so I had about seven or eight tires that I was thinking about running for unbound this year. And you know, the first thing I do is I look at bicycle rolling resistance and I start a chart. I list out those tires that I want and think I want to run, and I list out kind of the rolling resistance at the low pressure. I write down the thickness of the center tread, the thickness of the sidewall tread, and I make a chart. But then I get the tire.
And I weigh them myself. And I if you look at my bike and bike check photos, you'll always see a number on my tires. That's just how how much the tire weighs. And I do calculations basically, like you know, how much it weighs, and then I measure it for the width. A lot of people don't realize the tire width is not always what is stated on the tire, and it also depends on your wheel, like your internal rim width. If you're running.
wide internal rims that tire is gonna potentially blow out, or if it's a supple tire, it may expand. And so I measure the tire width the first day I mount it, and then I measure on day three, and then I measure it seven or plus or seven or more days after that. And the reason for that is I want to know if I mount a tire the day before race, what's it gonna be, and is there a lot of expansion? And so those are these are some of the questions I'm thinking about.
And then I live in Northwest Arkansas, so I need time on the tires. I need to see what the durability is like on those tires and how it handles. Another way to test or kind of look at durability is just to, like I said, do the measurements of how much the tire weighs and then the width. And then I have my chart and it will basically say the gram per millimeter of tread. And it's not perfect, but it's gonna tell you like how much rubber you're getting for.
the tire width and you can kind of get an ideal an idea of like what the durability or how much rubber there is. Again, it's not perfect, it doesn't relate to rolling resistance, but for me it's a good another number I like to look at. and then paired with, you know, the thickness of the center of or the sidewall. so yeah, I could go on and on about tires.
Josh (30:55)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (30:56)
this is a topic that is very near and dear to my heart.
But yeah, I think I think it's just so interesting. And for unbound it's hard because you have to have a mud tire option and you have to have a non mud tire option. and because clearance is really, really important, that mud just like cakes on. so yeah, that's that's a overview. I could get into the weeds a lot more.
Josh (31:17)
I I am not kidding I when I say and I having talked to Paige at length, I I think you know you know more about tires than some tire companies. I honestly think that. Like like like
Paige Onweller (31:27)
I don't know about that.
Josh (31:28)
the seriously though, there there are companies out there making tires who I mean, they're good at making tires, they're good at production, but they're just I mean, I've had conversations with people very high level
on behalf of athletes we work with and things and and they can't answer half the questions that are in the charts that you keep and so I mean I just think it's the complexity of a tire is so high. You know, like we talk about F one, you know, you can simulate the entire car, the engine, the
turbochargers, the aerodynamics, the all that stuff, we can't simulate the tires. And so there's it it really is a place where the you just have to do the work. or if you you wanna
Paige Onweller (32:04)
Yeah.
Josh (32:05)
if you wanna really, really maximize, you gotta do the work. And most people don't do the work, including some of the tire brands. So but it really it your your knowledge, depth of knowledge is
Hottie (32:14)
Mm-hmm.
Paige Onweller (32:14)
Yeah, yeah. I mean it's
Josh (32:16)
so impressive.
Paige Onweller (32:16)
Yeah. And I I just think it's an area that's still like we still haven't got right, you know, like you know, f take for example, you know, it wasn't until the last two or three years, like during the era that I've been in cycling, which has not been very long, that we've transitioned to, you know, wider tires is better. And, you know, initially, like that year twenty twenty four when I was third at Unbound, I was running like a forty-five mil Kanda prototype, like really, really durable. But I I I guarantee you that tire
would test quite slow, but it was durable. And that's what we were doing is we weren't going bigger, we were going just thicker and like slower. and now, you know, we're starting to see like a wider tire that's really supple. A lot of people like, it's gonna flat, it's gonna flat, it's lighter or just as light as a 45 mil tire. But it's that volume expansion just provides so much more flat protection. And then we're just learning and seeing that it rolls faster too. And
I'll be honest, I did tire testing locally. I have a protocol that I do that's like often on course, like the bigger sugar course. I have certain sections that I test. And I remember putting a two-two tire on, it just feels kind of squishy, you know. And I was like, There's no way I'm running this tire. It's gonna be, you know, slower. And I just learned that it was faster. And I I think, you know, the takeaway and the reason bringing this up is like
The numbers are really important because our sensations often give us wrong information. Like think about a road bike. You're going high speed and you get this chatter, you know, you get the vibrations, and that's feedback to our brain to say, I'm going fast. But when you have a wide tire and you're kind of like floating along and it's really cushy,
Josh (33:54)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (33:55)
your body's like, This feels slow. And so
You know, I think that's really important and I have fallen victim to that. Even this year I made a tire selection choice and I was like, I knew I knew better. I should have went with the the wider tire. but it was a sensation I had during pre-riding. So having the numbers for me is just really important for my decision making and to take less stress away from those days that are closest to race day so I can line up knowing like this was the best option for me on the day.
Hottie (34:23)
Mm. I also noticed you have a makeshift spike strip that you've tested the tires or sealant's ability to is that still in use or did you do did you abandon that project?
Paige Onweller (34:34)
Yeah, so well that was interesting because at that time I was just curious about sealants. and I had theories. so there's a carbon repair guy here locally, Brad, and he would give me like carbon shards and I would basically like add them and see like how much diameter it could seal. Like, you know, if you get a sidewall teared
usually that's not gonna seal. and so yeah, I was just testing different sealants and adding stuff to the sealant. so yeah, I had this board with nails in it and I would just, you know, ride over the the nail board and try to, yeah, basically bust tires and see how quickly they sealed. So I haven't done that in a while because I feel like riding in northwest Arkansas, you're flattening enough to learn if a sealant's gonna work or not.
Josh (35:18)
Okay.
Paige Onweller (35:19)
And so yeah, I haven't haven't needed that 'cause I'm flatten enough to to r have real life testing and and to know. so yeah, I I've retired that, we'll say.
Hottie (35:28)
Yeah. Used tires,
by the way, folks. If Paige wasn't sacrificing brand new out of the box tires. These were used tires, so
Paige Onweller (35:33)
Yes. these were used, yeah. Yeah.
Hottie (35:37)
Yeah, no waste, please. Okay. Very good. Okay, well I'm glad it well I yeah. I'm sure n I'm sure Northwest Arkansas is its own strikes spike strip, right? The the natural environment is there. The way things
Paige Onweller (35:47)
Yeah, exactly.
Hottie (35:50)
run out there. Well,
Paige Onweller (35:51)
Yeah.
Hottie (35:52)
yeah, you're you're clearly
A an amazing detailed person. So I'm interested to hear like what do you do? How how does how do you map these things out? Do you have like favorite pieces of software or kinds of data you like to collect? And how are you a spreadsheet person? Like how does that all work?
Paige Onweller (36:10)
Yeah, I you know, it's funny, I'm on the go so much and we're constantly traveling, even when we're like testing new stuff. And so, I'm taking notes all the time or photos. Like I'll take a photo of what something mounted at and then what I often do then is I'm a big fan of like going back and adding t adding it to a chart so it's nice and detailed for later me to see. so in the moment I'm not always good about like
logging the detail, but then I try to have all that information and go back and put things into charts so that I can reference that. So yeah, basically charts are a big fan of those. But there are like some softwares that I've played around with, like Best Bike Split is an example of kind of doing some analysis of like where aerodynamics matters more on a course. It's hard with gravel because the surface is changing a lot, but you can kind of get a rough idea. So I'll often play around with Best Bike Split.
Especially for time trial, and and kind of play around with that. and then yeah, I mean good old Strava and Rye with GPS, I'm constantly analyzing stuff on there. Like going into a race, you know, I often will look at every segment and know, okay, this is gonna take me eight minutes, then I'm gonna descend for four. And I have I have I'm known for my top tube notes. People will make fun of me and be like, Why do you need all those notes?
But it's just so that I like am aware and I don't have to think as much during the race. And so I'm always analyzing stuff on you know, Strava or Ride with GPS to kind of understand how long those efforts are gonna take. basically how long I I need to suffer. but yeah, those are kind of the main main softwares. I mean, training peaks is another big one that I'm kind of analyzing in and using. and I know there's different softwares for kind of the tire testing.
I probably should look into that because I make charts and it's like really tedious.
Josh (37:54)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (37:54)
but yeah, something I probably should explore a bit more.
Josh (37:58)
N now, having said all that, is it is it true that you don't race with power?
Paige Onweller (38:03)
Yeah, that is true. yeah, so a lot of people think that's weird. but I have some rationale that I that I can dive into.
Josh (38:07)
I love it. I love it. I think it's awesome.
Paige Onweller (38:11)
you know, I think like the biggest thing is there there's definitely some emotional bias to like what I refer like to RPE. RPE is rate of perceived exertion. And so, you know, if you ask yourself what your RP is like immediately during an effort, it's gonna be a lot different than
asking yourself that 15 to 30 minutes after. And you know, there are studies. I looked at this when I was a runner. They did they did research on runners, and I think they've done this on cyclists too, but basically they'd have the runners on the treadmill and they'd have a control group, then it they have a group where they show them their pace and then a group where they aren't showing and then the athletes would trade, et cetera. And almost always the athletes that were not looking at pace would
perform better. And so for me, not looking at metrics is a performance enhancing tool that I use. Now, this works well if you're highly trained and you're in tune with your body. I've coached athletes before where they don't look and then they get carried away and they blow themselves up. But I would say most professional athletes like have that internal meter and gauge of like, okay, this is too much. I need to back off. so looking at those metrics is not important. you know, and the other thing is metrics are
Like heart rate especially is highly variable. Like think about standing at a start line, you're really nervous. You look down, you start riding, you know, the the first effort of the day go day goes off and your heart rate's really high. And there's other factors that are playing a role, but you look down, you see that high heart rate with like maybe a lower power than what you're used to seeing, and automatically you just start panicking and gets in your head. So it's it's a mental thing really. Now, do I love the metrics that I look at all of them?
yes. I am constantly
Josh (39:45)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (39:46)
like after the ride looking through on training peaks, analyzing things, you know, looking at heart rate drift. you know, my coach does all that too. Like the metrics are super important for him. But I also like them too. Like good example is today I I did torque efforts, so low cadence, kinda tempo efforts and you know, I I didn't it's like I have the sensation like once the cadence is set, I just kind of
I kinda just go and I don't need to be looking at it all the time. but then afterwards I'm like kinda analyzing the the file a bit more. and yeah, so for training I'm looking at power quite a bit, but in racing I've just found that it's usually a detriment and it's it's more of a performance booster to to not look.
Hottie (40:26)
So what do you look at during a race? What is on the head unit, if anything?
Paige Onweller (40:30)
Yeah, so it's basically just the map and then I will have distance because then I have cues like mile twenty is an MMR or you know, positioning is important. And so I have map, distance, and then total time so that I know for fueling like every twenty minutes or an hour in I need to have this amount of you know, nutrition in.
Hottie (40:49)
you know, Fatty and I, the other co host on the show, we go round and round on our other podcast about the Leadville Trail one hundred with folks who really want to math out a race. They wanna put their power number in there, figure out where what percentage of that they should be riding, and math the whole thing out. As a coach and a racer, is that
Is that something you generally discourage somebody from doing, or is it something that more people who have less time to train and less time to recon should be doing?
Paige Onweller (41:19)
Yeah, I think it just depends on the athlete and the situation. you know, I I'm gonna pull the it depends answer.
Hottie (41:25)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (41:25)
but I I think a lot of it is if the athlete is really just doing an individual time trial, if Leadville like a solo individual effort and they're not gonna like try to be in a group or worry about any of that, then yeah, like looking at power could be good. But I would challenge them to remove heart rate and just not look at heart rate, if they're familiar with that.
but again, like if they get up to 10,000 foot, you know, 12,000 foot elevation and their power just starts dropping, it's gonna get in their head. so you know, I I would challenge if it's a if it's a well-trained athlete that has that internal RPE metric figured out, I don't look at it unless you need something to limit. I have had athletes where I'll say, Okay, you're gonna look at power on the first hour or the first 20 minutes of this climb.
then you're gonna turn it off because you'll need to have that controlled, you know, pacing in the front if you get too excited. If you're someone that often goes out too hard or blows himself up, then looking in the first hour, first 25 to 50% of the race could be good. But after that, turning it off because by then you should have that internal meter kind of kicking in and shouldn't be tempted to, you know, go too fast when there's all the people around you at the beginning.
Hottie (42:35)
Mm-hmm.
Well, on the new Marginal Games Media channel, you're gonna see a video there featuring our guest, Paige Onweller, and and co-star Josh Porner. Paige, in addition to talking about her career as a racer, was also invited by Josh and the team there to go to the wind tunnel. So I'm gonna get out of way now and let you two talk about what the heck what were the big takeaways from your day in the tunnel. But I wanna make sure you talk about
You mentioned waxing your hair. So just in all your discussion here, just make sure you mention like what what kind of wax? Is this chained wax? What the hell's going on with waxing there? But go ahead. Tell me about the day in the tunnel and the big takeaways there from both for both of you.
Paige Onweller (43:15)
Yeah, I'm gonna let Josh start by saying
and explaining why why you guys brought me 'cause I was the first like kind of female gravel athlete to to be in a tunnel for you guys, which was cool.
Josh (43:25)
Yeah, it was exciting for me. I think, you know, we go a couple of times a year, we take our athletes, we you know, do testing for companies. I mean we we we're in the tunnel a a decent bit. And we try to invite athletes we work with and I I would say strangely or but none of the women we've ev ever invited have come. And and you know
I'd never met you before and and you came. And so I was like, This is exciting. And then the more I talk to you, the more I'm like, man, she is so like nerdy. This is awesome. And so we were on the same I felt like we we were kind of on that same page of like just wanting to learn. and and one of the fun things with the tunnel, 'cause and you can certainly speak to this, but you know, the the tunnel sounds exciting until you do it for like a few hours and it's and then it's just cold and repetitive and hard.
And for the people like, you know, me, I haven't I mean, I put had myself riding in a wind tunnel twenty-five years ago and since then I've had, I don't know, fifteen thousand hour or fifteen fifth a hundred hours of tunnel time and like, you know, as a observant and it's it's boring. and so it's fun to take things though like, ooh, what about this? Ooh, like in my favorite thing from that trip was your hair. We're like, look at her hair.
What is it doing? We could see it getting caught up and whipping in this, you know, clear like vortex shedding area and like
Well, that's interesting. We've never really looked at that before. I mean, we I we've put ponytails in there before, largely to redo the eighty nine Tour de France eight second ponytail. but we've never really looked at what was happening. And so yeah, we did well I mean you take it from here, but we we did we tried a bun, we tried some other things, but the wispy hair as it came out of the bun and started whipping around behind your ears, that was
I don't remember the wattage, but it was a lot. It was like a like a really stupid amount of watts.
Paige Onweller (45:10)
Yeah, yeah. So it's eighteen watts if you do a braided bun. And yeah, like for those of you listening who aren't familiar with the wind tunnel testing, Josh is right. It's actually like not very fun. And I feel like I was a little like I don't wanna say like conned or like not a what's the word for just caught off guard? but I was kind of like, Why didn't anyone talk why doesn't anyone talk about this? Like this is kind of miserable. 'cause you just have this
Cold wind blowing on you and like my eyes were drawing out and you know part of that is you're just you know you're just cold and I remember shivering and being like, I'm ruining it, like this is an awful experience, we're not gonna get any data because I was just so cold. but yeah, through that with all the wind, you know, I started to see, you know, you guys were observing my hair and I could just feel my hair and my bun kind of unraveling. And that's what happens when we're racing. We're out there at Unbound for ten hours and our hair is just kind of unraveling throughout the day.
and you have these wispies that come out through your helmet. And so, you know, we kind of sat there and, you know, I was asking Josh, like, you know, can you see my hair? Like it's it's it's just moving. And so we just kind of pulled it back really tight and then we braided it and then braided it and put it in a bun, and we found that was the fastest one. And it from the wispy bun with the hair kind of falling out on the sides and in the back to the braided bun, yeah, 18 watts, which I just still can't
believe that and so the day after the tunnel, or maybe it was that same day, I went and I ordered like four different hair hair wax products because I was like, I gotta tie these bad boys down. and so then I was like, I've just been experimenting with hair wax. and now I race with hair wax and I tuck everything in and yeah there's no flyaways for this girl.
Hottie (46:54)
Whew.
That's a first. That's a first. Okay. New marginal gain. Hair waxed.
Paige Onweller (47:00)
Yeah, honestly, it's a pretty good product. I think I think more people should use it. it's kind of nice too because sometimes the hair will like kind of get in by the glasses and it just can pull. so yeah, I've I've found that to be pretty nice now. And I'm looking around and I'm seeing more people with like braided buns and I'm like, I bet they they learned from this, which is cool that we're like
Josh (47:20)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (47:21)
sharing the information and that other females and males with longer hair.
can learn like that's a marginal gain that you can easily take advantage of.
Hottie (47:29)
Sure,
yeah. Yep.
Josh (47:30)
Yeah, I just I I think the scale of it was 'cause 'cause like the ponytail, the Laurent Fignon ponytail, I it's a couple of watts, right, hanging out the back, but the I mean, you've got you have a lot of hair. a and so, you know, I think that was really fun to to be able to look at that. 'Cause you think there's just so much energy going into I you can you watch the hair, it's going forwards and backwards and up and down and swipping her you know, and and it's just constantly doing it and
I expected it to be as we were watching it, like like, it's something. Like there's something there. But then when it yeah, that number eighteen. That's that's a ton. I mean, there's there's not much you can do to find eighteen watts of improvement in the in this like
Paige Onweller (48:07)
Yeah.
Josh (48:08)
modern day, right? I mean, it was eas twenty five years ago we'd find that you know, all the time, right? 'Cause like, just wear a size smaller jersey, boom, you know, fifteen watts.
But like things have gotten s kind of so dialed that that that was a really that was a a great one to find. I another interesting one I
Paige Onweller (48:26)
Yeah.
Josh (48:27)
I thought was the the Usweep that we found was
Paige Onweller (48:31)
Yeah.
Josh (48:31)
was fast on Dylan the year or two years prior was actually almost equivalently slower on you, which I think is w one of the ultimate
It depends moments, right? 'Cause so many people wanted
Paige Onweller (48:44)
Right, right.
Josh (48:45)
to take from that, like, the the the pack is faster and well, no, not not on everybody and it might not only not be faster, it might actually be in a a lot slower.
Paige Onweller (48:56)
Yeah, because it w it was 10 watts slower for me with U Suite Pack. And, you know, I I thought about that after the windel trip because, you know, Dylan's a friend of mine and I love, you know, I love what he's doing. And I remember when that came out and everyone's like, sweet, we're gonna race with USui Packs now. Like this is great. And I remember thinking that. So I was like kind of bummed when I found out it was, you know, 10 watts slower. But I also thought to myself, you know, the industry started putting packs in integrated.
skin suits like this year map, you know, they have a integrated bladder. And we tested, you know, the pack also in the back, like tucked in. And what I observed looking at the photos afterwards, because I like to learn, okay, this was ten watts slower, or I had the skin suit with the bladder in the back and it was like fifteen watts slower. So I left there thinking, like why why was it even slower when it was inside my jersey and you didn't have all this stuff outside? And I was looking at photos and you could just see like
It just had this elevated like shelf almost. and so I think a lot of it is like placement, right? in
Josh (49:56)
Hm.
Paige Onweller (49:56)
females our bodies are different and it's one of those things where maybe if we had it a little lower, it would have like Dylan where it did test faster. And so, you know, as the saying goes, you leave the wind tunnel with more questions. but one thing we we really couldn't you know, deny was how fast the front bladder was for me. basically like
the beer belly page was really, really fast. and
Hottie (50:20)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (50:21)
yeah, I think that one was nineteen watts faster. yeah.
Josh (50:25)
Yeah, that one. I hate that one. It's it's always faster and it just looks like come on. It's like it's like the knee high triathlon
Paige Onweller (50:31)
Yeah, it's so bad.
Josh (50:32)
socks, you know, like like they're faster, but I just
Paige Onweller (50:35)
Yes.
Josh (50:35)
nobody wants to see that. But nineteen watts, that's huge, right?
Paige Onweller (50:38)
Yeah, that's where I draw the line. I Yeah.
Yeah, I mean at Unbound I had to make the decision, do I look like a goon and carry two liters of fluids in the front of my bladder? and I did do that, but yeah, I didn't I didn't wear the high arrow socks. I just had to draw the line somewhere.
Hottie (50:54)
You did so you did put
Josh (50:55)
Good for you.
Hottie (50:55)
into practice the the front bladder system, correct? You you
Paige Onweller (51:01)
Sorry, say that again.
Hottie (51:02)
put into practice the front bladder system? And how did you
Paige Onweller (51:05)
Yeah, yeah.
Hottie (51:06)
how did you configure that? How does that work?
Paige Onweller (51:09)
Yeah, so you know, a lot of skin suits will have like a split and the bottom and
Hottie (51:13)
Uh-huh.
Paige Onweller (51:14)
then some skin suits are like fully enclosed. I have both and so what I discovered in training is that if you have the split skin suit or even like a jersey top, the two liter bladder in the front will kinda like sometimes slide out the bottom. So I would just wear it with the skin suit that was fully enclosed so the bladder had nowhere to go. and then I just kinda run the nozzle up. you have to be careful that the nozzle is not like
creating a bold in the front of the jersey because that kind of like defeats the whole point. so yeah I just trained with it. You just drop the bladder in and then yeah you just kinda have the nozzle out and then tuck it back inside when you're not using it. The only problem I had at Unbound with that was that I had mud in my zipper and I was having a hard time. So my feeds took a longer time because I couldn't get things unzipped very easily. But we also found I don't remember the exact number but I think it was like 12 watts.
with this little hydro flask is like a soft flask that you can just put air in. And if you put that in the front of your jersey, it looks not as bad as a two-liter beer belly. and that one tests like a pretty decent amount faster. So I've been testing and and using that in races too. And sometimes I just have air in it so it's not, you know, very heavy. Because the the two liter bladder in the front, the thing that people need to think about
is that you get airflow through your front belly, you have sweating and there's a cooling mechanism that happens. and I noticed my core temperature would be a little higher with the two liter in the front when I didn't have it like frozen or have ice in there. so that's something like to think about too is that there's a cooling mechanism when you block that front panel in your torso.
Hottie (52:44)
And then Josh says she drinks,
Josh (52:45)
Yeah, that's a
Hottie (52:45)
her her watch savings are going down, correct? I mean that's one of the downsides of it.
Josh (52:48)
Yeah. Yeah,
and the thermal issue remains.
Paige Onweller (52:51)
Yeah.
Josh (52:52)
I mean it it it's funny you say that I was on on a call this morning with team principal and technical person world tour level and they're like, We we really think that thermal is the next thing that we we need to understand better and and i I agree. And and I mean obviously you you're talking about it already, so you're you're ahead of the curve on that one. But yeah, I think that starts to get to the next
limit of like how you
Paige Onweller (53:15)
Yeah.
Josh (53:15)
know, w what is the next as as arrow gets ever better and better and it's sort of that asymptote of like you're there's fewer and fewer gains. thermal's big and and certainly can hurt you if you you know, I mean we just have to look back at the latex skin suits of the eighties. you know, s th some of that went
Paige Onweller (53:29)
Yeah.
Josh (53:30)
real bad. but yeah, th that's therm thermal is way more important and I think we're just at the very beginning of talking about it.
Paige Onweller (53:36)
Yeah, and I couldn't agree with you more on a thermal. Like it's something that I feel regularly, like yesterday I did VO two session and it was high heat and it's like I could see my core temperature elevated that performance just drops. But the other thing with the thermal aspect is that like you said, you can get it wrong. And unless you're monitoring and you have all this information, like you can overdo it and then you really have a detriment to your performance. So yeah, a lot to explore there still.
Hottie (54:01)
Hmm. Wow, yeah, that was an interesting session and again folks.
Josh (54:04)
Gives us lots of exciting reasons to go back
to the wind tunnel in the future.
Hottie (54:08)
Yes.
And if you want to see Paige's again, if you want to see her trip to the wind tunnel, plus a lot more on Paige, again, Marginal Gains Media. They have a have a video out they call they're calling those videos, Josh, again? It's escaping my brain. No, Margin of Error. They're actually short films, so beautiful beautiful. Well done. Well done films. well, you may have answered this already, Paige, but now you've been in the game for what, five years, give or take, correct? How how is
How has the racing changed since you started?
Paige Onweller (54:38)
I mean for the females it's changed a lot and I don't I don't think people fully underst like appreciate that. for example, when I first started racing, it was still mass start with the men. And so we had, you know, basically just pure chaos at the start of every race. And then usually you didn't know where your other competitors were. Like, you know, you'd have two hundred people and you didn't know if you were in first or second or fifth or sixth and you didn't know who was up the road.
and also the physiology of how you train to race like had to change when we transitioned to separate starts. So basically in 2024 we kind of transitioned to separate starts. and that has been a game changer for gravel, for the women. And a lot of it is like a we get better visibility because you can actually showcase the women's race, you know, where everyone is at. And us as racers, we're actually racing the other women. And so it's really changed the dynamic of the racing. And so before it used to be like
Threshold as long as you can find the fastest male wheels and then just kind of tempo it all the way home and the gaps were already established at that point. Now you're starting off and it's more tactical, there's more attacks, it's more punchy. and it's just yeah, it's just totally, totally different. you know, I will say and and people might not like this comment, the industry struggled, you know, the last couple years, and I feel like there's probably less support for the female.
side of things. And as a result of that, I actually feel like the women's field depth has actually gone gone in the opposite direction. I don't think we have the same depth of field that the men have. And that's likely because a lot of the women just don't have opportunities. And many of the women in the Grand Prix are still working. and so, you know, and it's just like if you compare the 10th place male to the 10th place female
female, etc., you'll s you'll see the the pay disparities is pretty big. or I would ex I would anticipate it to be. so I just share that because the depth now is just not quite the same and I would say that the the racing's kind of negative. and that hopefully in time will improve as as the depth increases and continues to increase. but yeah it's been a really interesting five years to race gravel as a female.
It's been a lot of positive change for sure.
Josh (56:51)
Yeah, I certainly hope to see the well, we hope for a bunch of reasons the industry comes back and and i and fixes that, right? And and certainly also hope to see the the race promoters, you know, with with the success that they're having have, you know, more at I know we have a handful of relatively equal pay fields, but but yeah, is that trick that needs to trickle back to the sponsors, a lot of whom have had
really either had really terrible years or aren't here anymore. you know, the the last bit.
Paige Onweller (57:15)
Yeah.
Josh (57:16)
So but but yeah, I know that's something we like we strive for is we try to keep everything equal both sides and and you know, and have a lot of people coming, but I need to make this like, well nobody makes that, so sorry. you know, on the men's side
Paige Onweller (57:29)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I
Josh (57:32)
and and and try to keep it yeah, we try to have it equal across the board and
'Cause the you know, the women's racing is is amazing and it's fun 'cause it's it's different, you know, and I I think the number of people I I h talk to say, you know, you say to watch the women's and like, that's good racing. Like, no shit, it's good racing. Like you know, and it's and it's different than the men's race. Like it's
Paige Onweller (57:50)
Yeah, yeah.
Josh (57:51)
not you know, the they're very different in that all the way up to to World Tour. I love watching the
you know, women's gyro or the women's
Paige Onweller (57:59)
Yeah.
Josh (58:00)
rubbe 'cause it's i it's a different type of racing and it's it's fun to see the different tactics and strategies and and things like that. But yeah, we we all need to work harder to get the the the financial situation cleaned up a little bit.
Paige Onweller (58:15)
Yeah, yeah. No, and I I appreciate what you guys do with having the the equal pay for your athletes. And, you know, I I always ask every brand that I'm working with or that I am interested or that I'm talking to. That's one of the questions I always ask is, you know, what's the breakdown of your male versus female sponsorship? Like I don't need to know the numbers, but I wanna know if they're equal and and I usually can tell by how they answer that question what they're what they're doing.
but it's you know, we need to ask these questions and you need to challenge. Like it's uncomfortable to talk about money and to ask those types of things, but unless more people do, then it yeah, it doesn't move the needle.
Hottie (58:53)
Mm. this is probably a good opportunity then to talk about Rosie Up. That sounds like the Rosie Up is kind of somewhat connected to what we're talking about here. You wanna s tell us about that program?
Paige Onweller (59:04)
Yeah, so honestly it's kind of been a a little bit on the pause. so there was a basically a like a startup program here in Arkansas and I had like a grant to help kind of get things started and Rosie Up was basically it was a a way to help empower other women to ride gravel and to race bikes and not necessarily even race, but just to ride bikes and be curious about going faster. And so we held like skills clinics.
And we would help these women learn how to the basic skills, like learn how to paceline, learn how to corner. pacelining was a big one because most people just don't know or they haven't been given the resources. You think about these adult women that are entering into the gravel space and they have no idea and it's just providing like a safe place for them to like try and experiment because that's often the barrier. Like we have an
you know, this was a premise for Rosie Up is that you have the beginner friendly groups that are no drop rides. There's a lot of that out there. That's really good entry into sport. so you have that beginner side of it, but then you have the advanced racy side where, you know, the the racers, the fast group rides, that sort of thing. But then you have someone in the middle that doesn't really know how to execute or to explore that fast group ride. It's intimidating. and so this middle middle ground people like
They don't know what to do. They they they're intimidated to go to the group ride, but they're strong and they no longer they've they've outgrown those beginner rides. And so Rosie Up was kind of you know, created to help that middle ground to say, okay, like you may not be super racy, but maybe you want to go faster than what you currently are and let's empower you to have those skills to do that. so yeah, that's kind of how Rosie Up was was formed and you know, a good example is I just partnered with a local race back in Michigan, Irish Hills.
And we hosted a skills clinic this past weekend and we had 67 people registered. More than half of those were female, and we had more females attend the clinic than who came than than the amount of females that even came to the race the year before. and we did that because the race reached out to me and said, Hey, we want more females to come to our event. Will you help us? And yeah, that's kind of what we did.
Yeah, Rosie Up isn't like formally the branding, and I'm not using that, but we're still doing those things.
Hottie (1:01:18)
Okay.
Paige Onweller (1:01:18)
And the premise is to get more females confident and to yeah, explore. And I always tell brands and you know the community, that's the untapped market, is the females, because there's
Hottie (1:01:30)
Yep.
Paige Onweller (1:01:31)
a lot of males on bikes, and it's so cool to see
you know, an adult female like get on a bike and they'll learn a couple of things and they just start to have fun and they get a girlfriend to join them and it's just it's really cool to see how quickly they can learn.
Hottie (1:01:45)
Yep. Women will buy bikes too, bike companies. They
Paige Onweller (1:01:49)
Yeah.
Hottie (1:01:49)
buy tires and saddles and they need bike fits and they need to go
Paige Onweller (1:01:54)
Yeah.
Hottie (1:01:54)
to the wind tunnel eventually and all of it. Like it's just sitting there for somebody to stand up and go, Yeah, we we want you and that's a market we could certainly help grow. So good for you for for jumping in head first on that.
Josh (1:02:08)
Yeah, we we definitely need more of that around. So yeah, so thanks
Paige Onweller (1:02:12)
Yeah.
Josh (1:02:12)
for thanks for that.
Paige Onweller (1:02:14)
And I've just found that like females are usually just intimidated with the equipment side of things, myself included, when I first started. and even now it's you know, sometimes a frustration point. and yeah, I've just learned that like if you teach them like they can learn these things, but it's so intimidating the technical side of the the equipment. and you can't ride a bike unless your bike is functioning. So there's this equipment barrier.
that's also really, really challenging. And it doesn't help then an industry has like all these proprietary like well this then that and well it depends and yeah, that's just so hard to navigate for a lot of new riders and I felt that not that long ago.
Hottie (1:02:53)
Yep.
Josh (1:02:54)
Yeah, I think we've we've talked on the show before. I think, you know, we've lost the sort of mentorship culture that I mean, I got into cycling like eighty nine and, you know, rode by myself, totally intimidated, then got faster and then showed up on the group ride and you know, it was like, Whoa, you're scary. You know, h here's you know, here's somebody to and I mean literally it was like like, Hey, you're gonna show up every week and I'm gonna show you what to do and what not to do and
and then it was, you know, I mean, quickly had somebody to kind of mentor you into y you know, I think from the from the viewpoint of the group the standpoint of the group, it was like make this person less dangerous. but it it was really a way you know, and then you had somebody to ask questions, well this thing's making this noise or you know, or somebody to say, Ooh, those tires aren't not not that we knew all that much about tires back then, but it it was somebody to help mentor you in and I think a lot of that
has been lost and yeah, I think now like you've nailed it with there's that gap of, you know, you can do the no drop ride or you can go get yelled at on the fast ride because you're not running the paceline correctly or you're you know, you're cornering funny, or y write all those things that just then push people out like, Well that wasn't fun. You know, I just I tried to show up and do the thing and I got made to feel bad and you just really need somebody almost assigned
you know, out of the group, but but I think that's a perfect way of yeah, it's it's it's back to our skills clinics. or or skills coaching, right? But on a larger scale. So no, I I'd love to hear that and I think for anybody listening, we need more of that. So don't yell at
Paige Onweller (1:04:24)
Yeah.
Josh (1:04:24)
the person on the group ride. Help them. if we if all of us would just help
Paige Onweller (1:04:27)
Yeah. I always
Josh (1:04:29)
one person, it would be so much better out there.
Paige Onweller (1:04:32)
Yeah. I always joke that it's the the gatekeepers of speed that are kinda ruining it, you know? They're and
Josh (1:04:39)
Yeah.
Paige Onweller (1:04:40)
that's where it's like, okay, if if you're gatekeeping the speed, like that's not cool. Like we wanna share that and get other people to go fast.
Hottie (1:04:47)
Yeah. Have eyes in the back of your head. Know who's behind you, not just who's in front of you. Especially on group rides.
Okay. Josh, you wanna take us home?
Josh (1:04:57)
yeah, let's wrap it.
Hottie (1:04:57)
We try to give him about an hour page, so
Josh (1:04:59)
All right. Well there you have it. Paige Onweiler. It has been such a pleasure and thank you so much. I feel I've learned stuff and I'm just continue to be more and more impressed with your progression through the sport, your mindset, and keep it going and hopefully we'll see ya here soon again at the wind tunnel.
Paige Onweller (1:05:17)
Yeah, thanks for having me.