How did it leave you feeling being out there? What did you uncover about yourself? Are you the same person you were?

Yeah, I think what was interesting about this race was that I had that competitive element taken away from me.

So the question was, would I still enjoy it? Would I still ride hard? Would I still get something out of it? And the answer was yes, I was still able to push myself, maybe not to the same level, but I still rode pretty hard and managed to average about 330K a day.

What I decided was that For my next race, I'm going to wait for something that really excites me.

I'm not just going to sign up for something because I feel like I have a compulsion or a need to race.

I don't.

I don't have anything to prove.

get the chance to ride again and

What's the point? Andrew has Kalamata in his sights, and perhaps an answer to that question too.

I am at the top of the final climb.

It's the most incredible view of the race probably.

The mountains of the Peloponnese are stretching out below.

The climb was beautiful, and I'm kind of starting to process the fact that I started this ride in northern Norway, and I'm about to finish it in the Mediterranean two weeks later.

And I'm finally starting to permit myself to feel that euphoria.

I just sat up in my saddle, stretched my arms wide, and just took in my landscape.

He wouldn't whip out some Descartes, would he? No, he mustn't.

With John long-scratched, Andrew's updates have seen him attempt to answer the question, why race? It seems other riders have, quite literally, been listening.

So I'm halfway up my last climb of the day.

I've booked a hotel in Cuques, which is just down the descent, 12 kilometers away, which feels like a real achievement, even though it will be one of my shortest days.

I did a difficult off-road cut through today to avoid some band roads, which was tough.

really steep some single track, some hike a bike some scrambling through the woods but the thing that I really wanted to talk about was the fact that I've only seen two riders today both of them have obviously been listening to the pod and the first thing they wanted to talk to me about was my own feelings which is kind of funny for me because I'm actually a fair few days behind on the pod and I've not really heard what's gone in and I don't massively remember what I recorded because I've just sort of been doing it in the spur of the moment and saying how I'm feeling.

I'm certainly not pre-planning or scripting anything.

So the first rider I met was a guy called Jim at about 8am this morning.

Has the magic of the Balkans managed to turn that frown upside down?

Aye.

I'm so happy to be

in Bosnia.

Crossed over the bridge from Croatia into Bosnia yesterday and almost immediately the flatlands ended and there was just a bit more colour in the setting sun and a bit more warmth in the local people.

there's water available by the roads i've done loads of little gravel cut throughs i just came up a massive gravel climb which is actually marks as paved on most maps so some unhappy looking riders up there but i had fun and it's just so good to be back in the balkans it feels like this is what it came for and that tcr has really just started so i'm really resolved to enjoy the next four or five days of riding from here down to Kalamata it's going to be hot I think we've got temperatures of like 38 39 degrees forecast but it's going to be worth it for the the culture and the vibrancy and the roadside water and the hills and the landscapes and everything else

It's less a philosophical case of Project Why, why do we take on these ultra challenges, and more like, why? Why won't you let me cross this border?

I am cycling the wrong way up my route because I just got turned back from the Hungarian-Serbian border because the border crossing point that I chose was EU passports only.

Despite the fact that I'm actually an EU resident of Italy, I wasn't allowed through because of my British passport.

And just as I was standing there being told that, a French rider came up and was allowed straight through.

Yeah, thanks, Brexit.

And now I have to ride all the way around to the next border crossing, and I don't know how far it is because I didn't work out the distance between the two routes because I don't wanna know the answer.

But safe to say, I am doing extra miles just because of my passport.

But after losing John to a bout of painful knee knack in Norway, Andrew has been struggling to find the motivation that usually comes so naturally.

[gentle music] Well, I am going through something today.

Started okay, and then I just started struggling mid-morning.

Kind of had indigestion, so I probably wasn't fueling enough.

And then it started raining.

I changed my socks.

And just after I changed my socks, like five minutes later, it rained again and my feet got totally wet through again.

Before we head over to the team in control car two, another dispatch from Andrew Phillips, cap 00A, who yesterday was really questioning his why.

Yesterday was a real slog through Sweden.

It was gray.

It was windy.

Crosswinds, headwinds, rarely a tailwind.

Uh, there was a lot of traffic.

Swedish drivers are very good, so it was never dangerous, but it was just annoying.

Meanwhile, there is another dispatch from Andrew Phillips, cap 00A, who's struggling to find his why without his pairs partner, John.

Uh, since getting off this side, I'm finding motivation a bit of a struggle.

It's sort of been flat and suburban.

Well, not even flat, like, false flat, I guess.

Recalibrating my expectations for the trip there, and couple that with exchanging the fjords for the cul-de-sacs, I'm feeling a bit uninspired.

So I thought, "You know what I'll do? I'll stick a headphone in, and I'll listen to yesterday's podcast." But when I went to get my headphones out of my frame bag, they weren't there.

So I check all my jersey pockets, my saddlebag, and somehow I've lost them.

It definitely-

what-What is the difficult thing about riding as a pair?

Um, I think it's just trying, trying to get the pacing right, and then, and being considerate of each other.

Um, so, you know, sometimes one of you wants to stop and the other doesn't, and sometimes you have to say, "Mm, let's not stop right now." But sometimes you ha- you have to look at your partner and say, "Actually, you know what? They re- they really need to stop.

Um, so I will." Uh, so yeah, I think just, just being considerate is, is the main thing.

So be honest, uh, did your lights reveal more amazing scenery or more potholes than you wanted to see?

[laughs] Actually, the roads were pretty good.

Um, so potholes weren't a problem.

Uh, so I'd say more amazing scenery, but for the fact that it only got a little bit dark last night, 'cause we're so far north.

Andrew thinks he might have spotted a key difference in their approach.

As we were speeding al- along, you were on my wheel, and we were doing sort of 33 to 4K an hour.

I realized that maybe one of my whys is some kind of primal hunting instinct.

Uh, the feeling that the chase is on, and, uh-

Yeah

...

it just feels amazing.

You've got the road ahead of you, your quarry somewhere in the distance.

The aim is to pick up some rider stories quite literally from the road, as well as taking on what they are calling their Project Why.

I spend, uh, a lot of my life either racing or organizing races, and, uh, it's hard not to think about why we're doing it.

Um, particularly this year at Atlas Mountain Race in February, I was, I was really considering my motivations, came back from having broken my leg last year, um, sort of getting back into racing, realizing I'm not as fast as I used to be, um, and kind of reassessing what I wanna get out of it.

Um, and, and Project Why is sort of born out of thinking about all of that, not just my motivations and John's motivations, but trying to talk to some other riders we see along the way as well about their motivations and how they change day to day.

That was one of the things that we talked about, John, was how dynamic motivations are.

And so what is it in this snapshot of the registration day and, uh, yeah, first race day, what's your, what are your motivations? Where's that at?

I feel ginormous.

Okay, so aesthetic for John.

How do you kind of tease out because there's so much so much coming out of you? How do you tease out what therapies to work for your patients?

Well, coming out of fellowship, I mean, you're very comfortable with all the things that you had learned.

And so, you know, I did a lot of the bread and butter injections a ton, right? And did a lot of the like stimulators and a couple other little things here and there.

But ultimately, when you come out into practice, you...

You're trying to figure out how you can make yourself a little bit different than others.

Initially, I would say I really focused on the bread and butter and just tried to build my practice that way.

Eventually, when you start doing that and you get comfortable and your patient population is building quite a bit, um you you find that there is a uh population that maybe is not like touch so for example i started noticing a lot of people that for like stenosis with neurogenic claudication you either have injections and that lasts for a short amount of time or you're jumping like spinal cord stimulator um or talking to a surgeon right so you have these different options but there's this this group in between where where basically we just didn't know um that just become basically um on medications or with other things, you know, a little bit, excuse me, sorry, that you basically kind of get stuck with in the sense that they are basically not moving forward.

When do you decide in that younger patient, how do you decide to offer a therapy like Minuteman to that person in their 40s or 50s with grade one spondy or other types of instability? What's your algorithm there? And I'll ask that to both of you.

For Woodrow

Wilson, once the war starts, there is no interest in joining.

But what he does do is he is trying to flex American muscle as a mediator.

There are many reasons why this does not come to pass.

Partly it is Wilsonian idealism.

Partly it is some of the people that he sends to Europe that are really pushing this idea are not trained diplomats.

But ultimately, obviously, in April of 1917, the United States does join the war.

Again, Andrew Phillips.

To set the scene, I called up Andrew Phillips, curator and director of museum operations at the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library.

Uh, for Woodrow Wilson, once the war starts, there is no interest in joining.

But what he does do is he is trying to flex American muscle as a mediator.

Uh, there are many reasons why this does not come to pass.

Partly it is Wilsonian idealism.

Partly it is some of the people that he sends to Europe that are really pushing this idea are not trained diplomats.

Uh, but, uh, ultimately, obviously, in April of 1917, the United States does join the war, and in his 14-point speech, which he gives to a joint session of Congress in January of 1918, the 14th point is the idea of a League of Nations.

Again, Andrew Phillips.