i'm very very lucky that i get to help

other people be the best version of

themselves sir david browsford to many

he's one of the greatest winners of our

generation if you can get a little bit

of insight why do i feel how i'm feeling

why do i respond like i do and then you

realize think wow a lot of my behavior a

lot of my life was driven by emotion it

wasn't driven by the real me

the best thing ever if it happened and

if it doesn't then you might be

absolutely devastated but you've got to

leave it as a dream then you've got to

understand that actually worrying about

the consequence of an event is

detrimental to the process and the

performance and the the chances of you

achieving that event

perfection perfection was so far away

that there's no point because we're

going to fail every day so i thought

well let's have a little progression

it's right then what could we do by next

week that we're not doing this week what

little things could we do there's a

million things that could impact

performance and it and it works it works

100 percent it works been 20 years

quick one can you do me a favor if

you're listening to this and hit the

subscribe button the follow button

wherever you're listening to this

podcast thank you so much sir david

brailsford

i've tried since this podcast began to

get sir david brasford to come here and

have a conversation with me so having

this conversation today and being able

to share it with you is one of the

highlights all time in this podcast

history

i don't think it's an understatement to

say that he has worked miracles with

teams taking teams in cycling that were

under achieving and making them

undeniably the greatest team in their

world and maybe of a generation

he's famous for this concept of marginal

gains it's a concept which i speak to my

team about every single day and maybe

that's why

i wanted to sit here with him

today you will understand without a

shadow of a doubt how to build a

successful team that's what you'll come

away with you'll understand how to be

successful personally you'll understand

how to inspire those around you to be

successful

but the surprising thing which i think

you'll also take away from this

is the cost of success

and we don't often take enough time to

ask ourselves that very honest question

is the climb worth the view

but by the end of this podcast

i think you'll be closer in your life to

having an answer for that question

so without further ado i'm stephen

bartlett and this is the director ceo

i hope nobody's listening but if you are

then please keep this to yourself

[Music]

a conscious sense of outsiderness from a

very early age

um you said that once upon a time and it

rang very um true to me as well and i

found it to be a very relatable thing

where did that come from where did your

conscious sense of outsideness come from

uh it's funny when you say that because

it resonates it really does so i was

very young just been born and my parents

my dad really decided to move from derby

where i was born

to north wales and and buy a house in

snowdonia very keen climber and he

wanted to go to the proximity of the

mountains so we moved over there and i

grew up it was a very very welsh uh

dominated welsh-speaking

little village called daniellen i went

to primary school there and grew up

speaking first language well sure my

friends are welch everybody was welcome

pretty much apart from my parents

and and i had this such a conundrum then

i didn't probably realize it at a time

but certainly on reflection you look

back

and you know i was very very much in

this welsh community very very tight

community

and and i'd go home and my parents were

obviously english parents and and

i felt you know my dad didn't really

conform he was there to climb he was

there's one of these outsiders would

come in there to you know

get up into the mountains and um and i

think that that left me

challenged i think because i was so

wanted to be

the same as all my mates same as

everybody else partly try part of the

gang

and yet somewhere inside i felt maybe i

wasn't quite

you know it wasn't i wasn't fully

immersed in it you know it wasn't quite

there and don't get me wrong i i loved

it and i still

i go back then i love it

you know my great friends there my mum

still lives there but i never actually

quite quite got that full sense of i

belong there you know so i always felt

that a little bit

on the outside i guess

you

went on to be a great anomaly in what

you've achieved in your life and success

and i look i always i'm always i'm i

guess i'm a bit noisy but and i did a

little bit childhood psychology when i

was in school so i try and look at like

which

what the parental dynamics were that

might have made someone that little bit

more relentless and that little bit more

hard working and i sat here with eddie

hearn and i go oh your dad i could tell

the way his dad was that ruthless

intensity clearly rubbed off on him at a

young age and i was reading about how

you described your dad and it seemed to

be

dare i say a little bit similar to

yeah he was often very when he was very

young so he lost his mum when he was

five lost his dad when he was seven

and uh of course for anybody that's

gonna have a big big impact and i think

he had a

you know life-changing impact on him and

um i think he

he was then fostered and um

you know he tells the story when he was

he was growing up in a foster family

foster family to eat together and they'd

make him eat in another room

and you know no

it was tough enough i guess

and i think that's had a profound effect

on who he was and

and he became somebody who was very much

uh you know driven to to make his own

way

and i think

you know that was um one of his core

core sort of deep seated drives and

values is that he

he pushed hard and he was always about

being professionals all about working

hard make your own way

you know don't rely on anybody else to

do anything for you do it for yourself

and um and he drilled that into us and i

think we just lived it really and

cycling i you were very into cycling

from a young age i had used to

wait on thursdays for this sort of

cycling newspaper to arrive yeah that's

psychic weekly yeah

yeah little magazine which is a bit of a

cult magazine you know quite a niche

magazine and i used to arrive get

delivered on a thursday

and i'd wait with great anticipation and

and you know it was one of those when

the

the newspapers came round you get your

cycling weekly and then you'd sit there

and read about all the results and who

done what and because there's nothing on

internet there was no there's no there's

no other way of getting the news you

know and

you know in the back there was all these

little sections where all the results

were all the race results

and he looked to see who'd done what and

study all his

he was like a real

you know it's a real

part of the cycling culture and still is

to be fair cycle weekly still going

despite all of the changes in sort of

media and everything else but so for me

it's a real cornerstone of my

growing up with the sport that's for

sure you you then go to school you go to

universe do you go to university did you

no no i didn't enjoy school at all did

an apprenticeship no no no well no i

left school on 16. yeah first i could

leave school i was out i was done yeah i

didn't enjoy school

why

no i just i didn't like being confined i

didn't like i'm just sitting chemistry

lessons and

no i just didn't it wasn't for me you

know i just didn't enjoy it and it

wasn't i couldn't do it so i don't think

i just didn't enjoy the environment i

enjoyed the the pe and i enjoyed being

with my friends and all that kind of

stuff but i didn't

i don't know i just didn't enjoy that

educational i felt trapped i felt

enclosed and um

and i don't know i didn't i wasn't

really motivated to

to learn at that time you know i was off

doing other things really do you think

because you had so much freedom in your

in your childhood home you then

struggled going to places where you

didn't have that same level of freedom

yeah well i certainly like autonomy

there's no doubt about that you know and

i think he's probably there since

childhood you know because i did i did i

enjoyed quite a lot of

freedom going up but i think it's quite

interesting because somewhere in the

back of my mind i knew at some point i

was going to have to go and you know i'd

have to get and

learn or yeah i felt this kind of

responsibility for an education

somewhere but i just wasn't ready you

know and um

and so i thought there was the uh

there's what i should do and what i

wanted to do i think and there's a

little bit what i should do

kind of came along and then in the end i

sort of thought well actually i

i want some freedom i want to explore i

want to go on an adventure or i want to

do something different and so yeah

so many of the guests that sit here

including jimmy cars very reminded me of

him have that moment usually in their

early 20s where they as you've perfectly

described it there's the thing they

should do usually what their parents

want them to do what society's told them

to do and what they want to do and in

jimmy's case it was like quit everything

and go and be a comedian put getting

paid no money because yeah yeah that's

what he wanted to do and take all those

unpaid gigs for you

you set off on a bike yeah to france

yeah yeah yeah breaking out of wales

moment right yeah and i kind of got this

um

it didn't happen overnight but slowly

but surely i started to really really

get passionate about cycling like really

the sport of cycling kind of it had the

freedom maybe

but it was a sport of suffering it was a

sport of sacrifice it was it was a tough

sport and i liked that

and i liked the idea that you were

it was only you you know this

if you could you know it's like the head

and heart really if you if you're

intelligent and and and you could

figure out how to train and then you had

the heart and the commitment and the

desire of passion to suffer a little bit

and how deep could he go and you know

that attracted me to cycling so if you

were good you were good and if you

weren't good you weren't good and then

uh you played a lot of football and in

all the little all the junior teams and

everything else you were growing up and

there you could you could have a great

game and lose or you could be

you know terrible and win the team could

win and i kind of like the

you know this idea that if what you do

really counted in terms of your own

performance as it were that sort of

chime to me anyway i kind of got this

passion for

the tour of france and this sort of

thing that was kind of happening

somewhere in the world and

the more i looked at it it felt quite

quite

gladiatorial and the mountains and the

you know it felt just epic a three-week

race and

all i wanted to do is go and see if i

could watch this race

and i got a chance to go and i stood

there and i got this passion for it and

in the end i thought right i want to go

and try and win nothing and so i sort of

said to my uh mum that right i'm gonna

i'm just gonna jack everything in and

i'm gonna go and

go to france and and see if i can become

a professional cyclist

and uh she was most of all horrified

actually i can't you know what you're

thinking

all this kind of stuff and i said to my

dad i said listen i'm going to jack it

all then i'm going to go anywhere yes i

really loved it yeah that's all i needed

to hear you know once i heard that then

i was like right it's okay i'm going

and so i got a single ticket to uh

grenoble

and got my bike in a cardboard box

rucksack

700 quid and

got a ticket going to banger station in

north wales and off i went i don't think

i'd ever really kind of that's across

remember went across london on the tube

with my bike in a box and looks like

that was a real ordeal for me

got down to dover

crossed on a ferry got to calais and now

sitting there and somebody came along

said you know you want a coffee or

whatever or drinking um you know on the

train and it kind of dawned on me then

so

yes

i've got a clue what's going on here

i was trying to find out i wanted to go

to a place called argentia that was my

destination and um i didn't know there

was two and so there's two argentines

turns out so i went i was trying to ask

this guy and um

to to buy a ticket to ajantia and he was

he's just been awkward

you know he could see i couldn't speak

french and obviously he wasn't making

much of an effort either and then these

two quite young guys came along and they

said oh can we help you you know we

speak french and and english and yeah

thanks so they helped out it turned out

they were polish and they were two likes

trying to defect from poland because

we're still communist and they were

trying to get into university in in

grenoble

and so the very first night i had in

france we slept head to toe sleeping

bags on this thing and these two poets

like they were petrified

so these any kind of steps or something

coming footsteps they'd jump and bumps

up rising like we're gonna get

caught

anyway so i jumped on the train six

o'clock in the morning jumped on the

train to where i thought i was going i

actually ended up in switzerland

yeah i was like whoa by which time the

fun had worn off

so i got to train the same time back to

grenoble again spent my second night on

the same platform the same bench

and then eventually the next day got to

where i wanted to go in uh john's yeah

i was a bit of an ordeal but why were

you why were you going there anyway what

was that what was the aim of when you

arrived at that destination what would

you say i wanted to be a i wanted to be

a professional cyclist you know i wanted

to find a way of getting into a

professional cycling team and you know i

think

there's no how do you do that you know i

mean back in the day when cycling was

very much a niche

sport in in britain there wasn't any

obvious kind of route so the club

structure

the amateur club structure

um in france was very very strong and

and they were like feeder teams sort of

professional teams

so if you get over there and get

yourself in an amateur team and if you

any any good you'd work your way up you

know so i thought right that's what i'm

gonna do did you have a meeting arranged

with an amateur team no no no so you

just showed up so i just went yeah and

then i um so i looked for the end of a

i looked for went to the end of a race

waited until everybody arrived

and you know finished the race and

they're all there's a car didn't have

the buses back in those days so the cars

were there and they came and so i looked

around and chose the nicest kits as you

would

seem like a good start

and uh i went up to them and asked if i

could race and they kind of what they

were like

and um

kind of chuckled and they thought it was

a bit hard and then he sort of passed me

on to the next team and then next team

and the next team and eventually

i spoke to one like a little group and a

guy came over and he said oh look we're

um he spoke english and he said we're

from centetchien

and if you can get yourself over to set

you up and we train his whole team

together on wednesday

he wrote me down the address and said

right coming at nine o'clock on a

wednesday and come train with us

so i started training with them and and

that was it i lived there for three

years then three years and eventually

you know you admit that you realized at

some point you weren't going to make it

yeah you weren't going to win

oh

yeah

yeah

yeah that was a shame but then i look

back on it now and i think if i don't

know now what no you know people say

what would you change you know if i

could go back in time i think if i knew

what i know now in terms of training and

nutrition and everything else i'm you

know i'm pretty sure i could have done

a much better job but i decided for some

bizarre reason i decided i didn't want

to

particularly didn't want to really

reduce my fat intake and just just eat

carbohydrate hardly any protein and so i

stopped um i stopped eating meat i

became you know vegetarian

and then i realized now i just nailed

all the time so i never really

optimized the chance that i had

which kind of makes me think now when i

get younger

you know young

talented or athletes or people want to

try it out and

you can't just leave them alone you know

just talent alone not always going to

get you there is it you know and they

need you need to be in the right

environment same as medication

when i was young growing up i'm i'm you

know i'm a bright enough guy i think

um i just wasn't ready to learn i wasn't

in the right environment to learn i

could have learned but i didn't learn at

the time and i i kind of reflect quite a

lot on that really now

in terms of creating the right

environment but to people

to be able to just progress you know

what's it take for a human being to

progress

and you know

i think my role is to try and create

those environments and support people to

do that really and i think i take a lot

of learnings from that you know

i want to want to

get to some of those key learnings that

you've had um

to to

take a step forward in your story you

then often go to university which is

actually quite surprising you do a

sports science degree for a couple of

years yeah it was early years of sport

science it was kind of developing you

know

and the idea of sports nutrition was

developing the idea of sports psychology

was just developing and i started to

read around this i thought god i love

this stuff i absolutely i couldn't get

enough i couldn't get enough so the idea

of eventually when i realized i wasn't

going to be good enough to you know make

the make the top end of professional

cycling i thought right well i'll go

back now because i will really want to

learn

and so i went back to university and i

was just absolutely wasn't interested in

anything to do with like freshers week

or going out i just wanted to learn and

that was it

so i met every every one of the

lecturers asked if i could have a

meeting and said i want to tell me how

you're going to teach me i want to make

sure that i learn as much as possible

how are you going to do that

and of course i've gone back since and

then

yeah a bit full-on you're into when i

first

and um and so i came out of that

and i i loved i absolutely loved every

minute of being at university i loved it

i loved meeting other people i love

people that got the same passion

it was a topic that i just couldn't get

enough of i loved the psychology and the

sports psychology and and i came out of

all of that and really wanted to go and

sort of pursue the sports psychology

area but it just felt at the time it was

too fluffy it was

you know the top pro teams weren't

really it's too like all too macho to

talk about you know psychology and so he

wasn't getting any traction at times i

thought god i'm not sure if i could make

a career out of this

so i ended up like i worked a bit longer

in um

i went back in and worked

um in the cycle industry

and then i decided to go into an mba i

thought i don't know anything about

business i really don't know anything

about business so i thought oh i'd like

to know about that so i'm back to

sheffield business school and did an mba

and same there i just wanted to i wanted

to learn so i think if you're motivated

to learn and want to learn it changes

something changes in your mind it's

amazing to hear that yeah like

absolutely something changed if you can

i don't know if you unlock the desire

you're not learning because it's uh

you're not learning because you have to

or you know it's not learning because

it's a must-do kind of thing but you

learn because you want to and then

it

the whole process life's learning isn't

it life's all about learning really

and um and so i think if you can unlock

that then then you're on to something

and luckily i think um i think i did and

then

eventually the first contact i had with

the british olympic program it was back

in 1997 with a guy called peter keane

and atlanta britain won one gold medal i

think in the entire olympic games which

is

ridiculously bad i mean yeah it's so bad

it's like i can't even imagine how that

happened you know but they did anyway

and at that point um john major brought

in the national lottery

with a view that half of the money half

of the property was going to go into

culture and the arts and um and the rest

was going to go into sports and the real

kind of goal of sport was to get the

country up the olympic table which was

unheard of you know it's like they were

all amateur governing bodies it was like

a dream scenario and um and cycling was

very very fortunate that they had a guy

at a time called peter king very very

bright guy visionary guy

and he wrote a beautiful plan amazing

amazing plan then i kind of met him

in in and around 1997 and i got my own

little consultancy business at the time

and we started i started to help out and

i got more engaged and i thought god

this is

this is a combination of everything i've

done sort of in my life really you know

got the the sporting side the

performance planning side you've got the

psychology of it all

it's new it's like could be a first time

ever kind of scenario the ambition is

amazing

and there's a bit of business wrapped in

there as well you know so it's i just

saw it and i thought right i'm getting

my elbows out and

i'm not missing that chance you know

it's like i thought right this is my

calling and i'm going for it i love i so

much of that i wanted to pick up on the

the point you made first about learning

it resonates so strongly with me again

um i was kicked out of school but just

exceptionally obsessed with learning as

an adult and it goes to speaks to the

fact that um

the reason my attendance was 30 in

school was i was being

pushed to walk down an alley i didn't

want to walk down yeah exactly exactly

you know what i mean yeah absolutely and

everyone's unmotivated when you try and

get them to do something that they

intrinsically don't want to do right and

this is i think a lot of the problem

with the schooling system but when i as

you were talking i was reflecting all

these messages i get from kids who like

label themselves as unmotivated

but in whose eyes right in the eyes of

their parents who want them to be a

doctor

or in the eyes of society that wants

them to do a nine-to-five but i i reject

the idea that they are unmotivated you

know a million percent i couldn't agree

more you know i've worked with a lot of

people over the years

and um i think you've got to find out

what what's there what's an individual's

intrinsic motivate what's driving

somebody inside what they really want to

do and you've got to unleash that in the

end

you know that's what life's about isn't

it really there's nobody there shouldn't

be any we shouldn't be pigeonholed and

and there shouldn't be lines and lanes

and

i'm very very very lucky that i try and

get to help other people be the best

version of themselves basically

and you think you know it

when you when you no longer compete for

yourself and you think right i'm going

to be judged

on somebody else's performance that's

what people judge me and they go like

well did somebody else win a race not me

i can't you know i'm never going to win

a race but that it's like did somebody

else win a race and then you realize

well if i'm going to be judged on on

somebody else's performance

i better get pretty good at

understanding how to optimize and help

somebody be the best they could possibly

be

and then you think well what what does

that look like how do you that what

where's this where's

why is that you know and that's where

you think well let's take the human

being as a as a as a thing

you think how do you help a human being

be the best they could possibly be are

there certain things that if you can

generally get those things right it

helps

an individual in the main

be the best version of themselves but

the first thing you got to ask is like

is that person what is that person's

internal intrinsic drive because if it's

not aligned if not really committed and

really driven and excited to what you'd

like them to be doesn't matter how much

you'd like them to be if they're not

they're not

and there's nothing you can do about

that you know but if there's a little

bit of a flicker of of of the light

burning there you can turn that up i

think you can turn it down you can very

easily turn it off by mistake or

deliberately if he isn't that way minded

but i think you do

the very essence of people achieving

things is is they've got to be driven or

they've got there's got to be a reward

i mean avoiding

you know avoidance is a very very strong

motivator as well i think and you know

maybe i had to argue that maybe in my

life i was avoiding

failure or you know that rather than

being dragged towards the positive

emotion of winning you know the positive

emotion of winning for me isn't that

great unfortunately i wish it was

but avoiding failure is massive driver

for me so um and so you know either way

you figure out what somebody's drive is

and then you help them then you think

about what you need to do to create the

environment around somebody

to optimize what they're doing and then

and then you've really got to put

yourself into somebody else's shoes

and forget yourself forget your

preconcept really genuinely say right

i'm going to stand in this person's

person's shoes

i'm going to try and see what life looks

like

for them and feel what life life looks

like for them

and really understand regardless of what

any preconceptions i might have

what what does that feel and look like

and what do they need

what would the best thing i could do

what do they need to help or support

the more you go through that

the more you kind of recognize as we're

all different but there are some common

denominators deep down inside i think

and

and if you take the time to listen to

people they might not want to tell you

first and foremost but if you dig away

at it you know eventually people will

tell you

what works for them what they like what

they don't like and if you listen

carefully you know people you get give

them a bit of ownership and they'll tell

you you know and

and and that is probably

one of the most powerful

drivers i think that that exists really

you know you can put a gun in somebody's

head ask them to jump up and down

they'll jump up and down and you it

and you cut the trigger and say jump

higher they'll jump higher or they'll

try to anyway and then you pull it away

and you walk away and they're not gonna

that that is not a pleasant experience

it's used a lot and it's useless in

sport actually and so less so now but

certainly has been in the past

and um but your performance is going to

be

inconsistent i think through that

and it's certainly not going to be a

very pleasurable experience and and i

think by

going down the route of trying to find

people's carrots as it were i mean

you'll have known i'm sure you've i

think you've you've interviewed steve

haven't you still yeah he's been an

amazing guy

and um

and his work i think is just phenomenal

and and something i buy into but i do

believe that it's carrot not the stick

on that point of um finding out what

their true

motivation is what they truly want and

checking that it's aligned with yours as

a coach or as a team

if you ask somebody they'll typically

give you the what they think you want to

hear answer so if i was sat in front of

you and you asked me and i was new to

your team i'd say i want to be a world

champion because i think that's what you

want to hear how do you see past that

i'm asking this because a lot of people

have people in their lives whether it's

a friend or a sibling or a son or a

daughter who they're trying to motivate

to be something and

often failing because they want it more

than that person wants it for themselves

how do you see past that um is there a

technique is it just intuitive

well i think you've got to you know as

soon as i sit down in some in front of

somebody and they think okay this guy's

got some kind of influence over what

happens to me

then it's biased immediately yeah and of

course if you don't recognize that if i

just take face value what people are

telling me now then

that's um

it's naive i think really and i think

you've got to go beyond that like you're

saying i think most people will have a

network

and you know

and and you can identify if you watch

the spheres of influence or the kind of

who's influencing who and the who who

has good relationships with who you know

if i ask you now what your drivers are

in this scenario in the scenario we're

currently in you'll kind of think about

what you're going to say really yeah

yeah whereas i think if you took if i

took give me a give me a couple of weeks

i think i could piece together slowly

but surely by chatting to you chatting

to other people asking the right

questions giving you some time

you know different different kind of

environments and some form or some

informal slowly but surely you you could

piece together a

relatively good picture of where you

think somebody's at

is it a person who's driven by you know

i like order and discipline and process

or is it somebody who wants harmony is

it somebody who wants to be life and

soul of the party and out there and

express themselves

or is it equally somebody who

you know wants to please others

and if it is pleasing others and who is

is the parents quite often i see that

really and then you know you just piece

it all together and once you have that

then you're armed with information

you're armed with something which is you

should really then respond

and and and think carefully about

you know what is this person all about

you know can you draw a map of somebody

can you really map out some of these

drivers who they are what do you think

their their influences are what do they

really want what's their you know what's

pulling them and what's pushing them

and i think when you get into that kind

of realm of high performers and

people who are really pushing themselves

to extreme levels

there's something pulling or pushing

them pretty hard normally and trying to

just understand that and dig a little

bit around that

at least like i say it gives you the

you know

i think it's an obligation for somebody

in in our kind of roles as it were to

make that effort to make sure you do

take the time to fully understand

somebody

have you encountered instances

in your career where someone's got so

much talent but they're just lacking in

drive and no matter what you've done 100

yeah and what do you do in those

situations well in our world you

wouldn't work with them you know i

wouldn't work with them i'd support them

and be very very

you know not not

unpleasant or unkind or everything else

but it's not going to work

that's the you know you have to have you

have to have that commitment

and that drive and you know that's got

to be there if that's not there then

don't go past square one really you know

and um when you're young you know you

can perform and get to a very high

standard on your talent but then when

you get to the top of the top as it were

and there's maybe five or six

people who have this a similar level of

talent and and some can get the best out

of themselves and get that little bit

you know it's like this you can get at a

normal kind of high level of performance

and then every now and again you get

this like discretionary level of

performance that little bit on top

thinking wow that was absolutely me or

you at your best and

and and we're not in the business of

that you know the high level performance

we're in the business of trying to get

that discretionary performance as as

often as possible when it really matters

and that's what you know that's what we

really got to think about and it's

unlikely that you'll get there on talent

alone

and even in the most sort of out there

sort of talents

who can be flamboyant or do the

unexpected et cetera

they've nearly all

it it's

they're all committed and very very very

bought into and driven by what they're

doing

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that word commitment is um the first

letter in your acronym

core

which is part it's a philosophy you're

known for what is this core philosophy

what is the acronym acronym and uh what

does it stand for to be fair to you know

i just mentioned steve peters i think um

you know one of the great things i think

that i've been very very fortunate to to

have happened in my life was that we i

met steve back in i think it was 2002

something like you know around that i

was always into you know i liked

psychology obviously i studied

psychology but

i couldn't quite it wasn't quite input

output enough it wasn't i don't know it

didn't feel quite solid enough at times

and then we had an athlete who had

you know had a bit of an issue and

somebody within our medical team had

been a student

of steve's at the uh school of medicine

in uh in sheffield

and they said well we could ask this guy

to come across and he did and and he did

this amazing piece of work with with his

athletes i thought wow i really got to

meet this guy and so i sat down

uh with steve and his um psychiatrist

not a psychologist obviously a forensic

psychiatrist and he sat down and he said

right well here's my mental kind of map

as it were and this is how your brain

works and this is the different parts of

your brain think differently and you

know you you know you do realize that

this different um your blood goes to

different areas and and then so you'll

be driven by emotion or logic or by past

experiences etc

and i was like okay this is really

interesting and that what i liked about

tim he was like if you do this then

that's and you should do this not that

and he's quite prescriptive

um in a very neutral way but quite

strong and i really like that really

really like that so i thought wow this

guy would be absolutely

dynamite in sport and so steve was still

working in um in the uh nhs and he was

actually working at rampton

at the time as well with you know the

mass murders and the psychopaths and all

that and so i tried to persuade and says

come on you've got to come and work in

sports

and and eventually

you know he did to be fair he came and

worked full-time and it was just an

amazing period really because we sat

down and said right forget cycling for a

minute let's think about the human brain

the human being

and how do we create the best possible

environment for people to perform

and um and that's where the core

principle came from with steve in the

first instance so he was like you know

they see his commitment so let's let's

screen these people for commitment and

he'd do a commitment screen and then

he'd ask people about their homework how

they did their homework and what that

what you know when people had to do

something deliver on something he'd ask

he'd interrogate them a little bit about

that

and then the o of the call was for

ownership

and uh the idea that we we were human

will

perform better and respond better with a

little bit of ownership over what

they're doing so you know sport was very

much a dictate and control kind of

coaching model really and management

model

and

he was very much of the

you know

very very strong that

as a human we like to have a little bit

of control of what's happening to us we

like to negotiate or have a little say

this works that works and

and that's a very powerful kind of

construct to work with

um the r was for responsibility

and accountability and of course we've

all

work in professional jobs in the end and

we've all got accountability and

responsibility in life

and um and so people need to be held

accountable and responsible and then the

eu is for excellence but it's personal

excellence

and as he used to joke about he should

have been personal excellence but it

sounded a bit like corpse

so we stuck with core and um and so we

got all the coaches in and said i i i

bought this 100

really really thought right we're going

to do this and then we'll sort of use

cycling as the kind of

you know not

well it was it was the opportunity to to

do something different you know and i

was absolutely sure

really really sure it was the right

thing to be doing of course he was there

to sort of coach and help and support

and um so we've got the coaches in he

said right guys we're going to change

the way we're we're working here um

we're going to put the the time actually

we termed it going to take the crown

um

off the heads of the coaches and put

them onto the heads of the riders

and they're going to be the come the

kings and queens of their own world

their own destiny and we're going to

support them in that and it was just a

slight change of emphasis

which you know a lot of the coaches

threw their hands in the air well you

would that would be out of control they

weren't training and

you know it was kind of an emotional

response really and of course

you know chris hoy and vicki pendleton

and all these other you know all of the

athletes who were with us at the time

they wanted to perform for themselves

yeah they weren't performing for a coach

they weren't you know

they might have a brilliant relationship

with a coach

because they they were they were after

their own performance or a team

performance it wasn't it wasn't done for

the coach and it was a it was a real

i mean it sounds a bit

obvious now i guess but at the time it

felt like a quite a big deal to be to be

really empowering

a group of athletes and um

yeah enough we went with that really and

um it was an exciting time

one of the things that i've taken from

that many things but one of the things

that i've taken from that which is again

feels really consistent throughout lots

of things i've read about you is this

idea of going back to first principles

to make to create better solutions

and i'll tell you the three touch points

where i've kind of

i've i've seen that in your philosophy

the first is you basically went down to

the first principles of the human brain

there and said how does the human brain

work and let's treat the human brain in

a better way

outside of the conventional way of

treating the human brain to get a better

outcome that's like again with first

principles it's a lot of work no one

wants to do it conventions but much

easier the second thing is just

generally your attitude to breaking down

what you were trying to achieve as a

team into small sections that's where i

see the first principles thing and the

third thing was i read that you hired

younger coaches into your team that

weren't tainted with convention and

again they're much easier to train in in

new ways is that

yes i think in the making that's i think

i do like to break things down into

you know as small as component bars or

first principles anyway it's not copy

and paste yeah you know i read a lot and

and i'm constantly kind of reading and

listening to podcasts and i'm constantly

taking information in

but and i'll use some of the information

but i won't just copy and paste it i

won't just apply it it's contextual i'd

like to understand what's going on

behind it like to understand the theory

and the thinking it drives people mad

actually because

i can talk about

methods and whatnot and models all day

long you know

but

fundamentally it's how it's how i like

to work and um

i think it's like the the true tickets

down to its kind of deepest sort of

simplest level of understanding and then

construct it relative to the context or

the situation how it could best apply to

what you're doing and take the time you

know take the time and effort and the

energy and the

you know i'd like to think about it and

i'll draw it i'll draw

non-stop so i don't write so much i draw

and then i cover my office wall in like

sticky

plastic stuff on the wall and draw over

the walls looks like a mud man's in

there i must admit but it's how it's

what i like to do and it's how i work so

it drives a couple of people a little

bit crazy but um

i think they used to buy now but but i

do like to do that and then and then if

you get a real understanding for

something then you can you can see

whether you really agree with the with

the fundamental principles and either go

with what go with that or question it

and develop your own ideas

and like development if you're going to

develop your own ideas do it

sort of um with originally as it were

rather than necessarily just kind of um

taking something as well and just

applying it you know i'm not don't be a

bit uncomfortable with i think one of

the things that

definitely felt very original when i was

reading about um your philosophy is this

idea of forgetting about the results

because thinking about the results or

the outcome of your performance can

reduce the chances of success in that

performance that's very unusual because

in in teams in

competition in business we think about

the result we think about closing the

deal or you know what and what that will

mean and we kind of imagine ourselves in

that moment of getting the medal around

our neck or that business deal one why

is that not a good idea well if if an

event happens or something happens the

first thing that's going to happen to

you without you even knowing is you're

going to have an unconscious emotional

reaction to it and it's emotion

it's not you're not thinking it through

it's just purely emotion

and that that that's going to be you

know either it's sort of a fight flight

freeze response really and um but that

that emotional

response will happen quicker than you

know it before you can go in and get any

logic or get any rationale enter into it

and of course in um in any kind of

situation like uh

you know what could be perceived as a

threat state where you're putting

yourself in in some kind of threatening

scenario a bit of damage my pride or you

know what people what happens to people

they start thinking well what happens if

i win ones have to lose ones i've looked

ridiculous i don't look ridiculous

i'm under threats and that then becomes

you know very easy to get emotionally

hijacked by that so then you're purely

ringing on an emotion which is

inconsistent it's illogical you know

it's not a it's not a good way for you

to be basing it's not a good place for

you to be basing your behavior

but if you understand that and you think

okay well look i understand that it's

normal that i'm going to put myself in a

threatening scenario so if i worry about

let my emotion take over and i worry

about what happens if i succeed what

happens if i fail what happens if this

what happens if that's

then it's actually a pointless exercise

and if you can train slowly recognize

and train your mind to go okay i know

what's happening here this is just

emotion i'm going to put it to one side

now then

let me separate this whatever i'm doing

out into two things we can have a a

dream i want to win the tour de france

it's a dream

my ability to win it or our ability or

anybody else is to win it is i'm going

to do my absolute best to try and win it

but other people are going to try and

stop me and other people are going to

try to do something it's stuff beyond

our control that could impact on that so

if you set your goal

as i'm going to win

you're going to agitate non-stop because

it actually is out of your control

whereas if you set your dream and saying

this is what i'd really really like to

happen i'll go all in i'll do everything

i can i'm fully committed to that but

let me break it down into

targets which is well it'd be i i could

get to the ideal weight i could do the

proper training i could do the you know

follow a nutritional plan that's going

to give me the optimal energy and

you know i can train my tactics i can be

really work hard to get a fantastic team

around me build good rapport build

confidence in my teammates these are all

things that you can do

and so if you say okay let's leave the

dream over there for a while but i'm

going to go after the things i can do

and you base your plan

around the things that you can actually

control and do you'll be on fire you'll

be on fire you'll be absolutely on fire

and the dream might happen and it might

not then you'll be absolutely oh you

know delighted and

the best thing ever if it happens and if

it doesn't then you might be absolutely

devastated but you've got to leave as a

dream then you've got to understand that

actually worrying about the consequence

of an event

it's detrimental to the process and the

performance and the the chances of you

achieving that event so you park that

go after your targets and go right i'm

going process my outcome and we talked a

lot about process and outcome and when

you catch yourselves you know it's

emotion in the end so of course we do

get hijacked and of course we do get

fearful or you know a bit panicked and

you gotta you gotta have a system

whereby you can talk with yourself a

little bit you can bring yourself back

around and focus on the now and the

process of now

rather than worrying about the future

and then you can come back and

concentrate on the process get back into

the now and you know some of the

athletes would would have a routine

where they'd tie the undo and tie the

shoelaces again or they do they'd have a

little

you know a little process that they'd

tap into and they'd go into that in

internet and bring their mind back into

the present

and stop worrying about the future and

of course the penalty kick's the best

example yeah that's what i was thinking

about now this did their yeah i'm sure

they they bag 100 in training yeah

exactly in the euros final exactly you

know and if you take the crowd out and

take a penalty those guys are so

accurate and the you know signal from

the brain down into the muscle to

contract in a certain way

that happens and the accuracy and the

repeatability of that is is absolutely

massive put a crowd in there and what

changes nothing changes physically it's

all between your ears

and so how can you train that you know

and mental skills can be trained just as

much as you you know we all know that

but we want to get fit and strong and

you go to the gym and you know that

you're going to overload your body

you're going to give it time to adapt

and it's adaptation it's going to make a

little bit stronger and it's the same

with a mind you know you can train your

mind and and i think that's what

certainly working with steve was

was an eye opener

as well as i think probably the biggest

item for most people is it gives you a

once you realize you've got like an

emotional

brain and a logical brain and you know a

bit of a memory

computer side going on then then it

gives you insight into yourself and why

you are behaving and feeling like you

are

and some of the assumptions you're

making about other people then you got

to start with yourself first

if you can get a little bit of insight

why do i feel how i'm feeling why do i

respond like i do what triggers me

what's my best self look like and what's

my sort of you know not the best self

i've got why why am i different

why sometimes am i behaving in this kind

of you know the second or the shadow

version of myself and what are some of

someone's in my best self what's

happening there why can't it just be my

best self all the time surely that must

be doable so take a bit of time to

understand it and pick it and some

people just maybe haven't been educated

i certainly wasn't until really i still

sort of stopped and started to look at

this stuff and then you realize think

wow

a lot of my behavior a lot of my life

was driven by emotion it wasn't driven

by the real me who could be calm and

logical and think things through and

quite you know a lot of passion and

feelings and caring and and yet at times

i could be something else you know

and i think understanding that's

fundamental i think i don't think

there's any excuse for that no okay um

both points sounded very similar in fact

because on one hand you're saying with

your goals only go after things you can

control like really focus on those

things and in the same way when we're

talking about personal responsibility of

self you're saying

you can't control other people

so yeah but the thing that you know

maybe you do have control over in your

life is your behavior how you act how

you conduct yourself and then kind of

leave

the rest uh well i think you understand

how the people are responding and how

they're feeling so you can accept that

if somebody's um you know somebody's in

a very

there's two things really i think first

and foremost ambition is a big thing not

to forget you know what's your level um

you can be incredibly ambitious why

can't we be the best in the world or

something why can't be the first to do

something what's stopping us doing

something that nobody ever in the human

race has ever done before nothing as far

as i can see you know so i think there's

a

it's

um you know you've got to have that

ambition enthusiasm the belief we can do

whatever we want to do you know and

really stretch that and then i think the

next bit really the targets it's more

like the the how to get there yeah it's

more like the boring stuff to get there

you know so it's like head and heart

really

um and i think that

if you understand yourself then you

should be able to put yourself in

somebody else's shoes and if they're

having a tough time or

if somebody else is angry or there's

something else going on with them you

know rather than just dive in

and and respond to the behavior you see

in a face value why not stop and think

about a little bit and is this person in

trouble what's causing this where are

they coming from what's going on you

know trying to understand it and if

they're just responding emotionally to

something and you allow yourself to

immediately respond emotionally back it

doesn't really get anywhere you know so

so you better hold back and wait and

find out and

and try anyway not always easy but not

always easy no no i struggle with that

yeah i struggle with that especially

being in a environment where my my time

is so feels so precious right it's

always there's so many things i could be

doing and i'm you're exactly you're

exactly the same i know i've you know i

know people that work with you i know

you're a very very busy person

so it's it's tough in the moment to stop

and pause and to have patience when the

rest of my life is run on like

efficiency yeah yeah you know what i

mean

it's difficult

yeah i guess in in my world you know i'm

out to try and help people and i do push

people and we've got high standards and

you know you do want a level i don't

like laziness for example i just can't

that that that would really work that

gets me you know but then i have to

manage it and think okay well if they

that's what they want and there's no

problem this just this isn't the

environment for them you know

but

in the main i think understanding

challenges and and

setting standards and

boundaries and working to all of that is

important um you built teams and

developed teams that won over and over

and over again in the same way that sir

alex ferguson did our manchester united

fan so i was lucky enough to be you know

not going so well lately but in that era

to watch our team win over and over

again yeah yeah yeah and the thing that

really um

i find because i just thought that was

normal growing up that my team wins all

the time yeah the thing i find amazing

now when i look back on it is how he

managed to reinvent those teams but also

to get the same team to win again and i

this this idea of like where is your

motivation after victory and how do you

get a team that's just one and then they

win again and i went again to win again

yeah where do they find the motivation

they've stolen the podium they've had

the moment where does that come from

yeah it's a great question that one and

i think um and i think credit to sir

alex and the work that he did i mean um

you know i think now when looking back

there there are those long-serving

successful managers who like you say

whilst it's happening it's an error or

nobody really kind of thinks too much

it's just the norm but then when you

realize it's not actually the norm at

all you know it's it's something very

very special going on and i think the i

think success is interesting in in terms

of what it does to people and you know i

think in sport we're kind of more geared

to failure really you lose more than you

win normally

and

you know we kind of recalibrate the

goals dust yourself down and

redo your plan and off you go again

but when you succeed all of a sudden not

many people have a plan for success you

know what i mean so you succeed nobody's

gotta

nobody wants to tempt i guess but not

many people have a plan for success and

it does it does impact on people

massively in terms of the expectation of

themselves on their in terms of their

hunger going forward you know it does it

does impact people in different ways and

of course you get more

you probably get financially better off

you you

your position society changes you know

who you are legacy whatever whatever

whatever and of course all that all that

can change and impact on your drive and

your hunger and i think fundamentally

that's the bit that's incredible about

the people who stay at the top for a

long time it's not really the reward and

you know what they what they're getting

sort of

financially you know you those are the

kind of sort of

trappings of success i don't think

that's what driving them you know

there's something else deeper down

driving those people forward and they'll

just keep going and going and going and

i thought what um

alex ferguson did ever so well

was he

there's always a challenge with teams

when you've got a generation who grow

together and they come together and

you'll have a two three four years of

amazing success with a group who've

bonded and they're on a journey together

and of course then you start to get

towards the end of that and at what

point you bring

young talent in

and let some of the more established

talent go you know and there's a

transition

and he did that ever so well he really

did that ever so well

and we met and chatted a couple of times

about that just when when i was younger

up in the velodrome in manchester he'd

pop over to the velodrome

and we'd sit there and chat and that was

always one of the big things i wanted to

ask him you know i was like okay what

what are you watching what are you

seeing uh

why are you doing this what you know

what have you seen there that makes you

think that's the right time to change

and you're bringing this youngster in

here you know and he'd say you know he

he quite often say that

um you know people get a bigger voice

they get a bigger standing in the

dressing room they might start to second

you know i'm not so sure about that cafe

you know

and they'd have an influence and

you know there'd be

the celebrity the media and other things

going on et cetera et cetera and

definitely sooner rather than later that

would be right okay

off we go we'd and he changed it

listening to him talk about it he knew

exactly what he's doing to be fair to

him and he was a master at it

you've got to have had moments like that

in your career where you see that

culture

at threat or at risk because of an

individual i've had them in my business

too

and in those moments

very early in my career i would try and

i guess look past when i was a bit more

naive in business look past it or put

things in place to try and mitigate the

impact that one individual the negative

impact that one individual was having on

the overall culture

and as i got older i realized that i

just needed to address the situation

asap before it becomes like a virus and

spreads right yeah yeah what do you do

in that situation where you see an

individual in your company it's a tough

one

it really is i mean it's an easy one to

talk about it's a very difficult one to

do

um particularly when you know that might

be your best

player your best rider your best

performer

and all of a sudden you've got the

hitting the numbers and and the behavior

is not great

and then you've got to ask yourself well

we have to just win in and it doesn't

really matter just win um

and you kind of manage the impact of

that across everybody

or does behavior and conduct and culture

matter and you want to make sure that

you actually got some cultural values

that you're going to stand by

come come what may you know and of

course

those real moments

when they do arrive and you've got to

address it they're very very

stressful

i i kind of get very

introspective and look myself in the

mirror and think it through and think it

through

and everybody works for me and say it

takes me time to make a decision and i

think because i think of every

permutation and i think it through so

much

emotionally i fully i don't think i

can't actually i'm just so engaged with

those things

that i've really really got to think

carefully about them and about to make a

couple of

pretty big decisions along along those

lines and in the end i thought what do i

believe in

is a popular decision

is it a performance decision

in my world you know there's like we

we're trying to win here or

do we want to keep people happy or where

where do we go and you need some kind of

you need to establish your own right

what do i believe in

and without really figuring out what you

believe in you're always going to be

caught in a storm otherwise and it's

always going to be mentally excruciating

i think because you're never quite sure

so i i like like to anchor myself and

write what are my values what i believe

in and how does that apply to this

situation and then okay well that's it

and if it goes wrong i always want to be

able to look back and say okay well i

made decisions based on my principles i

didn't make decisions based on that

particular moment doesn't matter how

difficult it was and i'll stick to that

now but i've had one quite recently

actually or two actually in the last

two to three months which would pretty

challenging

decisions like that and on both

occasions i've gone right back and i

tend to

i thought it was a good thing probably

not a good thing for the people around

me but i got a few you know people i

really value their opinion you know and

they're sort of like you know i'll chat

away to them and i'll ask them questions

and

and i think sometimes i think okay you

know i'm going to make that decision or

he's asking me to make this decision

what i'm trying to do is just kind of

run through my thought processes and

sound it out sounded out and sounded

outstanding

until i get really pretty anchored onto

no i know what i really feel now and

then i'll make the decision immediately

i won't hesitate then but to get to that

point takes me a bit of time i need to

talk about it to somebody i need to i

need to express it vocally i think to

really make sure i understand what i'm

thinking because if i can't explain it

to somebody i'm maybe not quite there so

just thinking about in my own head or

even writing it down for myself

on big stuff i like to try and be able

to explain it to somebody

to then understand fully that i really

if i can explain it to somebody i think

i pretty much got it

whereas if i just in my head explain it

to myself

what the hell i'm talking about you know

so yeah it's quite um it's a quite an

agonizing process but you just need

principles in the end you need the

decision making

framework framework yeah basically you

do yeah so because everyone can relate

to that even if they've not been in your

position i mean we all have we'll face

really tough moments but we kind of

arrive at that that pass and we have to

decide if we're going left or right and

the worst possible thing is making often

making no decision right

making no decision or or making a

decision that you thought was the right

decision because you thought it was the

right thing to do but it wasn't actually

what you thought

and i think we're always fearful of the

consequences of our decision so i think

quite often and i say to our guys

sometimes okay imagine

let's let's imagine we've got a problem

and take away you know we're going to

have a group discussion about something

and imagine that all of our riders

didn't have emotions they were just

robots

and what would you do and they got

simple well you just do this this and

this

okay so now put the emotions back in

then that's that's what's that doing to

you why is that changing your thinking

and then of course you don't you know

got people's feelings and you might have

conflict you might somebody might not be

happy and you know that that then

impacts because we're trying to

second-guess

the emotional response of a group or

he's trying to second-guess how somebody

might feel or whether they're gonna come

at you or it creates conflict or

you know and and so i think it's every

now and again i go right okay let's just

up the robots like what would we do what

was the best thing to do and they go

simple we'll just do this and so that's

that's one thing

i think if you think that right

the consequence of whatever decided

about

nothing bad happens

nothing bad happens

absolutely there is so you can make any

decision you want and nothing happens

nothing bad happens what would you do

and people's mind freed up immediately

they'll make a good decision probably

but it's fear or is there it's the

it's the consequence of this might

happen or that might happen or it might

go wrong or this or that or the other

they might not be happy or they might

not be you know and it impacts your

decision-making really so you get all

these biases these emotional biases all

the time and don't get me wrong

sometimes a gut gut feel is a good thing

you know so but on the other hand i

think if you strip out the consequence

of like nothing bad would happen

and also people's other people's

emotions what would you do

most people get pretty quickly to yeah

where they'd want to be you know i just

bit then in my head about some of the

big decisions i have in my life i

thought there was no if i was dealing

with robots and i could just shuffle

things without consequence yeah what

would i do exactly and that the answer

you're seeing there is probably

the right thing for the objective

exactly but maybe well you could also

say well there are emotion um there's

emotional consequences which might

hinder the objective

so if i really annoy this person or if i

upset the balance here then the

objectives compromise so yeah exactly

and yeah it just helps a little bit

in the end you know it's like it's like

taking out if you've got bad tooth

you've got to take it out i might as

well take it out quick

exactly it's going to hurt just as much

in a couple of months time you know so

might as well take it out now yeah

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marginal gains i do you know what i have

to say

this podcast is doing very well

uh i think it's maybe number one in

europe now but i have to give you a lot

of credit for that

because i think my team are sick and

tired i can see them laughing over there

they're sick and tired of me saying this

phrase we've got to find the one percent

and for us in what we do with this

podcast i mean it's it's in my

businesses as well but in this podcast

it means like really giving a

f about everything from the audio to

these eight cameras that are on us

nobody else does it like we do it with

eight cameras and the robots and this

and the thumbnail the title the way you

were picked up today yeah how you leave

to really make even when you walk in

there we were a little bit slow on it

today but the music to create the right

atmosphere yeah the lighting we've

installed these blinds here because

we're trying to we want you looking at

me because it's about all of these small

things and

i never

heard that directly from you but i heard

it indirectly by you as in my friends

would tell me about this thing called

marginal gains from this guy called

david brailsford and i like adopted it

as a personal philosophy maybe i adopted

it as a personal philosophy or it made

my existing philosophy make sense

yeah okay yeah yeah probably either one

you know sometimes

so thank you for that but i guess my

question because that has genuinely

really helped me communicate

um why small

things are so important but

as it relates to marginal gains how

marginal

huh good question and how marginal was

smiles marginal three the smiles

marginal yeah okay oh they're good i

like people your best marginal gain ever

smile at people more often cheapest and

easier exactly and people like it people

smile back

i wonder what the trajectory

how that impacts your trajectory through

life if you just smiled more a lot yeah

other thoughts so you know you'd be more

approachable people think he's a

friendly person you know just in the

main you know smile at people smile each

other say hello

and walk past you know don't you're not

so that you can't be all so consumed in

your head that you're walking around

with your head down and

ignoring people you know which which was