Francesco Puppi: Logic, Pain, and the Reality of Ultra Running

Olivier Bernhard's Achilles wouldn't heal. So he and a friend who was an engineer glued pieces of garden hose to a running shoe. He waited until dark to try it, and ten steps in, he knew. Every brand he pitched it to said no. In this episode of Frodeno Going Mental, Jan sits down with the co-founder of On Running in Kona, an island Olivier loves and says he was never made for. They talk about finding triathlon at 13 in a village with no club, eight wins at Powerman Zofingen, the long mountain hike that turned three friends into business partners, why he goes looking for the problems people call impossible, and why he calls the money "only paper." Jan, who fought his own Achilles problems, knows exactly where this story starts. A conversation about letting go of control and trusting what you feel before anyone else agrees. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For six years, Mark Allen was often in the lead late at the IRONMAN Hawaii, and he fell apart every time. He came to believe the island had it out for him. Then he won it six times. In this episode of FRODENO GOING MENTAL, Jan sits down with Mark Allen in Kona. They talk about the pickup truck that hit him on a ride and took away his reason to race, the 1989 moment his mind went quiet, the shaman whose image returned to him then, and why, at 68, he takes his coffee outside before he picks up his phone. Both came to triathlon from surf lifesaving, and Jan asks how a swimmer who calls himself very average built the engine to win. They talk about what the island tried to teach him: give everything you have, even on the days you only have 60% of it. Enjoy this episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For Kat Matthews, the mindset is just about removing the barriers. What's left, in her words, is to get a bit fitter. In this episode of Going Mental, Jan Frodeno sits down with Kat three weeks out from Kona to find out how she got there. She explains the load bucket she uses to decide when to back off a session, why she started calling consistency boring, and what changed when she handed her coaching to her husband. They get into Cautious Carol, the part of her she would have to let go of to race past her limit, and why going mental, for her, means waking up in the night six weeks before a race, wondering if she should have tied her shoelaces differently. A conversation about what's left once the mindset work is done. Enjoy this episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Molly Seidel calls her Olympic medal the coolest experience of her life. She also says it didn't fix anything. She poured everything she was into it and came out the other side the same person. In this episode of Frodeno Going Mental, Jan Frodeno sits down with Molly Seidel— in town for UTMB and to talk about blowing up at mile 55 of Western States and finishing anyway, why she left the marathon before it broke her again, the coach whose real job is to pull the reins rather than push, why she gaslights herself on every descent, and what a year of pretending to be retired taught her. A conversation about why she keeps going back out when she already knows the medal won't be the answer.

What does it take to try the same trick 500 times — knowing that the next one could still go wrong?