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Replay Interview with Professor Greg Whyte OBE for services to Sport, Science and Charity and Olympian.
6 Plays2 months ago
Professor Greg Whyte OBE is a true inspiration, and we were so lucky to meet him in 2022. Awarded the OBE for services to Sport, Sport Science & Charity, he is an Olympian in modern pentathlon, and a European and World Championship medallist, Greg is the voice of authority for Exercise Physiology and Sports Exercise Performance in the UK. Especially well known for his role in Sports Relief where he has helped raise over £65 million for charity. Have a listen again to this great conversation, we hope you are as inspired as we were.
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Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Mission
00:00:10
Speaker
Hi, I'm Trent Maxwell.
00:00:12
Speaker
And I'm Lee Mason.
00:00:12
Speaker
And we want to welcome you to our Live, Learn, Survive podcast.
00:00:15
Speaker
Since 2018, Lee and I have travelled the globe and met face-to-face over 26,000 children in six countries across three continents.
00:00:22
Speaker
We've created a series of award-winning children's books.
00:00:25
Speaker
And Max's Rescue Squad are now founders of the Live, Learn, Survive charity, all focused on teaching teens and young adults life skills that not only help themselves, but help others too.
00:00:33
Speaker
We take what we do very seriously ourselves, not so much as you assume we'll hear.
00:00:37
Speaker
So let's spend the next half an hour together with some fun, inspiration and kindness and we'll try and learn something too.
00:00:43
Speaker
It's actually half an hour this week everyone, it's an hour so... Bonus time, bonus time.
00:00:48
Speaker
Welcome Leigh.
00:00:50
Speaker
Yeah, where am I Maxie?
00:00:51
Speaker
I'm sat next to you for once so yeah, welcome you back to the office.
00:00:54
Speaker
It's good to be in Brisbane.
00:00:55
Speaker
It's nice for you to show up at the office for once, put a day in.
00:00:58
Speaker
Yeah, exactly, exactly.
00:01:00
Speaker
So Maxie, today we are incredibly lucky so...
Introducing Professor Greg White
00:01:05
Speaker
Very proud today to welcome a very special person to our podcast, Professor Greg White, OBE, but I'm sure he won't mind if from now we call him Greg.
00:01:16
Speaker
It's really difficult to summarise an introduction to Greg because it's really hard to know what to leave out.
00:01:21
Speaker
So I'm going to do my best to give this exceptional man a worthy introduction.
00:01:27
Speaker
Awarded the OBE for services to sport, sports science and charity, Greg was voted one of the top 10
00:01:35
Speaker
science communicators in the UK by the British Science Council.
00:01:40
Speaker
Can't even say it, never mind that, be it.
00:01:42
Speaker
An Olympian in modern pentathlon, a European and world championship medalist and holder of the Norseman triathlon black t-shirt, which we are going to ask him about today.
00:01:53
Speaker
Currently Professor of Applied Sport and Exercise at John Moores Uni in Liverpool.
00:01:58
Speaker
Director of Performance at the Centre of Health and Human Performance at 76 Harley Street in London.
00:02:05
Speaker
And there's still more.
00:02:06
Speaker
People may know Greg.
00:02:08
Speaker
He's the voice of authority for exercise, physiology and sports exercise performance in the UK.
00:02:14
Speaker
Many people will know him from Sport Relief.
00:02:18
Speaker
And in actual fact, Greg has helped raise over $45 million for charity.
00:02:22
Speaker
That's amazing.
00:02:24
Speaker
Comic Relief challenges.
00:02:25
Speaker
He helped David Williams win the channel, the Gibraltar Straits and the length of the Thames.
00:02:31
Speaker
John Bishop's Week of Hell, which I remember living through with him.
00:02:36
Speaker
And he's got over 18 celebrities at the top of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.
00:02:41
Speaker
He's done that twice.
00:02:43
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:02:44
Speaker
But equally impressive, Maxie, he was brave enough to swim with you at sunrise in Caversham Lakes.
00:02:51
Speaker
So with all of that warmest of welcomes, we are absolutely thrilled you were able to join us.
00:02:58
Speaker
Welcome, Professor Greg White.
00:03:00
Speaker
Welcome, mate.
00:03:02
Speaker
and it's definitely we can call you greg amazing thank you so much please it's so good listen thanks for having me it's great to be on really great to be i love what you guys do i'm a massive fan of what you guys do so it's thanks mate that's that's it done for me i can leave
00:03:22
Speaker
Yeah, mate, I was so fortunate.
00:03:24
Speaker
So people that don't know, I've actually met Greg, or myself and Leah have met Greg face-to-face back in April in 2022.
00:03:30
Speaker
I was going to say 2023.
00:03:32
Speaker
Yeah, no, yeah.
00:03:34
Speaker
But yeah, we went to Cavish and Lakes, had a good swim.
00:03:38
Speaker
We did an awesome swim there.
00:03:40
Speaker
We were doing some charity stuff.
00:03:41
Speaker
We also did a hypothermia video to showcase, you know, a Max Dressy squad of what happens if you do get hypothermia.
00:03:49
Speaker
Absolutely.
Drowning Prevention and Swimming Education
00:03:50
Speaker
I actually did suffer from...
00:03:53
Speaker
mild to moderate case of hypothermia.
00:03:56
Speaker
You did.
00:03:57
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And Greg was there to look after me and help me out.
00:03:59
Speaker
But we had a really good chat and I'll be putting that video back up this week to showcase that great chat we did have.
00:04:06
Speaker
So again, thank you for coming, mate.
00:04:09
Speaker
And it's really good to see you.
00:04:10
Speaker
You're looking well as always.
00:04:12
Speaker
So how have you been, Greg, since April?
00:04:16
Speaker
It's really interesting that you talk about hypothermia because you guys are currently in Brisbane in the sunshine having a lovely time.
00:04:24
Speaker
Today in the UK, it is currently minus 7 degrees centigrade.
00:04:30
Speaker
Water temperature, open water temperature, somewhere in the region of about 1 to 2 degrees centigrade.
00:04:36
Speaker
It's just above...
00:04:38
Speaker
icing over and in fact many many lakes and ponds in the UK have iced over it's only the flow of the rivers that are actually stopping them from from icing over so it's it's it's quite a timely you know timely reminder of the importance of hypothermia and cold.
00:04:52
Speaker
I also know too mate we're so passionate on drowning prevention uh in the UK over the summertime you're very all year round I should say Greg but you're very vocal on trying to get the awareness out there to limit the drownings
00:05:04
Speaker
And here in Australia, unfortunately, there's been 43 drownings in the last couple of weeks just through summer on the coast, inland.
00:05:11
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And, you know, we just need to get the message out there.
00:05:14
Speaker
And we're always trying to achieve that common goal of bringing the numbers down.
00:05:18
Speaker
But just quickly,
00:05:20
Speaker
We're dealing with the summer here, but with the winter there, there's been some tragedies over your way as well.
00:05:26
Speaker
Wasn't there, unfortunately, four young boys?
00:05:29
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:30
Speaker
Yeah, do you want to quickly elaborate on that?
00:05:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:32
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, tragically, not too far from it.
00:05:36
Speaker
And again, I think what I love about what you guys do
00:05:39
Speaker
is that we have a massive problem with learning to swim here in the UK.
00:05:43
Speaker
But really, for me, the bigger problem is actually around water safety education, which I know you guys are so passionate about.
00:05:51
Speaker
And tragically, what we saw just before Christmas was three young lads actually were a pond that had iced over.
00:05:58
Speaker
um as kids do you know we were all the same we were kids they they walked out into the ice unfortunately the ice simply wasn't thick enough they fell through uh and one of their buddies who was on the shore um decided to go out and try and save them and sadly all lives were lost and you know and it's a real i mean it's a real tragedy because it's it's not an issue of of being able to swim necessarily it's just about water safety and knowing that you know don't go out onto ice and thin ice
00:06:26
Speaker
And knowing what to do if if something does happen, you know, go and get get help first and make sure you do the right thing if you're trying to rescue somebody.
00:06:34
Speaker
And, you know, it is it really is all about that.
00:06:38
Speaker
And I think to me, what's interesting is that this year or last year, two million children left school in the UK unable to swim.
00:06:48
Speaker
And it's a statutory requirement of what we call Ofsted, so of the education system that all year six kids, so 11 years old, should be able to swim.
00:06:57
Speaker
But because of lockdowns, because of the engine crisis and closing swimming pools in the UK, lots of kids haven't learned to swim.
00:07:04
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But for me, the critical factor of that is that the best time to educate kids around water safety is when they're learning to swim.
00:07:11
Speaker
And of course, you remove that process, you remove the ability to educate around water safety.
00:07:18
Speaker
And sadly, tragedies like this happen on too regular a basis in the UK.
00:07:22
Speaker
And it's been, you know, like we're in summer now, but, you know, it's been the same here, like literally every day there's been, you know, I think in Queensland last week, there was a headline about a drowning in,
00:07:34
Speaker
five out of seven days in the paper.
00:07:37
Speaker
It's an interesting one, isn't it?
00:07:42
Speaker
Because I think, you know, we talk about hypothermia and cold water exposure.
00:07:46
Speaker
And I think actually what we think is that it is just on, like we've got at the moment, winter days when air temperature is very cold.
00:07:53
Speaker
But actually, unless you're accustomed, unless you're acclimatized to cold water, when you get in the sea, even in Brisbane, you know, when you get in the sea, if you are unaccustomed to that and unacclimatized to that, that water is cold enough to induce a cold shock response.
00:08:07
Speaker
You get this hyperventilation with the waves coming over the top.
00:08:10
Speaker
If you're not a very strong swimmer, if you don't know what the rip and the current is doing, you know, that cold can be as problematic in the heat of the summer as it can be in the winter.
00:08:21
Speaker
In fact, probably in the winter, we're probably more mindful of it because it is really cold, you know.
00:08:26
Speaker
So, yeah, and it's over 50% of drownings in the UK occur in that, you know, what is our summer period between that sort of June and August period.
00:08:36
Speaker
And it's, it's because kids, you know, it's a hot day.
00:08:39
Speaker
You look at the water and you look at it, doesn't it?
00:08:41
Speaker
So in you go.
00:08:42
Speaker
We took the opportunity to come last April because we knew that it was like, um, going to be a much needed, um, after lockdown, people not having swimming lessons, um,
00:08:53
Speaker
We just thought, you know what, the timing's right.
00:08:56
Speaker
Let's just go and just do anything that we can.
00:08:59
Speaker
If it saves one life, then it's been kind of worth it.
00:09:05
Speaker
But interestingly, some of the drownings here, you just said, Greg, about send for help first.
00:09:12
Speaker
Quite a few of the drownings that have been here in the last, what, two or three weeks have been parents going in after a child.
00:09:19
Speaker
The child's got out.
00:09:21
Speaker
The parent's been lost.
00:09:22
Speaker
Yeah, so we're trying to really get the awareness out there that rescuers do drown too.
00:09:28
Speaker
And if you don't have situational awareness, you don't know what to do, you can't swim yourself, you always need to go in the water with a flotation device.
00:09:34
Speaker
So, yeah, we're just trying to get that message across.
00:09:37
Speaker
And the wonderful thing since we saw you in April, Greg, is that now we have our own charity.
00:09:42
Speaker
So we are going to be able to fundraise ourselves and
00:09:46
Speaker
to do more and there's more that we're going to talk about later on to see yeah because then we can be like in direct control you know we don't have very expensive boards or things like that and all their all that that like sort of makes things tricky we can be really um efficient with every dollar we get so that's really exciting for us so um
00:10:11
Speaker
This is about you.
00:10:12
Speaker
So we probably better start by, you know, you're in the hot seat now, Greg.
00:10:16
Speaker
We are like, you know.
Greg's Personal Journey in Swimming
00:10:18
Speaker
You're scared of it.
00:10:19
Speaker
You thought Norseman was tough.
00:10:21
Speaker
You can just wait for this.
00:10:22
Speaker
Max has got his question.
00:10:23
Speaker
Yes, I was saying we haven't even asked a question yet.
00:10:26
Speaker
It's going to be a long night.
00:10:29
Speaker
All right.
00:10:30
Speaker
So, okay.
00:10:31
Speaker
So question one, mate, we've got about close to 20 questions here, but we'll start off with number one.
00:10:36
Speaker
So how did this all begin?
00:10:37
Speaker
What was your first step?
00:10:42
Speaker
Wow.
00:10:43
Speaker
That's an interesting one.
00:10:46
Speaker
I mean, I've been swimming since I was, I mean, competitively swimming since I was six years of age.
00:10:54
Speaker
Those days are sort of gone now, I think, where you can actually be competitive that young.
00:10:57
Speaker
But certainly, I'm an old man, so back then you could do it.
00:11:01
Speaker
But fundamentally, much like it is for many kids, it's actually about parents.
00:11:04
Speaker
And my mum and dad were absolutely incredible.
00:11:07
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:09
Speaker
And what I always reflect on what they did is what I try and do now I've got three kids now, and that is that they were incredibly supportive.
00:11:17
Speaker
They were never pushy, but very supportive.
00:11:20
Speaker
And of course, as a swimmer, I started life as a swimmer.
00:11:23
Speaker
You've got to be really supportive and dedicated to get up at five o'clock in the morning.
00:11:29
Speaker
to go early morning swim training.
00:11:31
Speaker
So, yeah, so, I mean, I've been around swimming my entire life.
00:11:34
Speaker
I think the interesting thing for me was that I do, I mean, as you guys know, but I'm an ambassador for the Royal Lifesaving Society here in the UK.
00:11:42
Speaker
And much of that is because my dad was a lifeguard and an examiner for the RLSS.
00:11:48
Speaker
I became a lifeguard.
00:11:49
Speaker
My brother was a lifeguard.
00:11:51
Speaker
My wife was a lifeguard and now, funnily enough, my eldest daughter,
00:11:55
Speaker
who's 17, she is now a lifeguard.
00:11:58
Speaker
That's amazing.
00:11:58
Speaker
To some extent, I think if you cut us in half, it probably says RLSS all the way through.
00:12:04
Speaker
Amazing, amazing.
00:12:05
Speaker
And same, my mum was an RLSS examiner.
00:12:08
Speaker
So exactly the same.
00:12:11
Speaker
So very similar.
00:12:12
Speaker
I think I grew up on the side of a pool.
00:12:14
Speaker
I think I could probably swim before I could walk because swimming was life, you know.
00:12:21
Speaker
It was such a big thing.
00:12:24
Speaker
It was amazing to see too, and you cut yourself short here, from six years old starting competitive swimming.
00:12:31
Speaker
But, you know, you went to the Olympics twice.
00:12:37
Speaker
It's been a great career, you know.
00:12:41
Speaker
And it's, yeah, I mean, I swam up until, you know, classically up until the age, swimming being my sort of main focus, up to the age of about sort of 14, 15 years.
00:12:52
Speaker
And then, as always happens, you know, it's part of my social circle.
00:12:55
Speaker
You guys know this, you know, when you're part of a life surfing club or a swimming club or any club, you know, to some extent, it's actually a part of your social circle.
00:13:03
Speaker
So I went because my mates were there.
00:13:06
Speaker
You started to see around sort of 15, 15, classically, you see the attrition of your mates.
00:13:11
Speaker
And in that interim, I was lucky enough to find the sport called modern pentathlon.
00:13:17
Speaker
and then I was lucky enough to be good at it I worked incredibly hard to be good at it and yeah lucky enough to become an Olympian and I was a world European medalist so it was a great career but what's interesting here is that some of the highlights we're talking at the moment in January and
00:13:36
Speaker
uh every year as a monopent athlete every year i would come out to us uh and we would have a training camp in in sydney up in the north shores uh in narrowbeam um and we'd come out for a month and then from there we'd go down to melbourne then melbourne onto canberra and compete in the world cup in canberra my favorite win ever uh was actually in canberra in 1989 a long time ago awesome um
00:14:02
Speaker
But it was, it was a great career and it afforded me the opportunity to travel the world and meet great people.
00:14:07
Speaker
It was, you know, I was very, very fortunate.
00:14:10
Speaker
Amazing.
00:14:10
Speaker
Amazing.
00:14:11
Speaker
So that like leads into the question I've got for you next then, Greg.
00:14:17
Speaker
All of that as a career, how do you go about making important decisions?
00:14:21
Speaker
Do you have a process that you go through?
00:14:26
Speaker
It's an interesting one.
00:14:27
Speaker
I think, you know, I think that one of the most important things, and I see this in you guys and we all experience this when we meet people.
00:14:34
Speaker
For me, it's about passion.
00:14:37
Speaker
is that when you are making a decision, I think critically what you've got to be is you've got to be all in on making that decision.
00:14:43
Speaker
You've got to be passionate about it.
00:14:44
Speaker
And I think the one thing, I'm sure we'll talk about it, but working with others is that I think that there's an awful lot you can do for others, but what you can never do is create that passion, that desire.
00:14:56
Speaker
Yeah.
00:14:58
Speaker
And so I think, you know, if you are making a big decision, I think the crucial thing is to make sure that, you know, lots of things about making sure it's right for you, making sure it's structured in the right way, et cetera.
00:15:09
Speaker
But I think fundamentally what underpins all that is about passion and the desire to really achieve what the goal is.
00:15:14
Speaker
Yeah, I agree.
00:15:15
Speaker
That's a great answer.
00:15:16
Speaker
Great answer.
00:15:17
Speaker
Love it.
00:15:18
Speaker
Mate, so there's two here.
00:15:20
Speaker
So I'll start off with the first one.
00:15:22
Speaker
Greatest strength that you have.
00:15:24
Speaker
Greatest strength.
00:15:29
Speaker
It would probably be a different answer if you asked my wife.
00:15:35
Speaker
I'm married too, man.
00:15:35
Speaker
Yeah, we've all got that.
00:15:37
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:15:42
Speaker
Greatest strength.
00:15:44
Speaker
I guess, you know, you could probably see it as a weakness, I guess, but I think my greatest strength is I hate to be beaten.
00:15:51
Speaker
So you're very good.
00:15:52
Speaker
I absolutely hate it.
00:15:55
Speaker
And I think because of that, what that drives is a tenacity,
00:15:58
Speaker
a tenacity to achieve in whatever that is.
00:16:02
Speaker
And, you know, it's not necessarily about winning in terms of sort of racing winning.
00:16:06
Speaker
I think it's, you know, I hate to lose if I set myself a goal.
00:16:10
Speaker
Yeah.
00:16:10
Speaker
So it's like, it's yourself having, um, you're off.
00:16:14
Speaker
Yeah.
00:16:15
Speaker
So, yeah.
00:16:17
Speaker
Yeah, it's a competition with self.
00:16:19
Speaker
I think that's really important, actually, because invariably, I mean, even in sport, you know, one thing I learned through sport is the fact that you can only control.
00:16:26
Speaker
There's this sort of lovely saying that people talk about control the controllables.
00:16:31
Speaker
And I think within that, there's only one thing you could do, and that is control yourself.
00:16:34
Speaker
You can only control what you are doing.
00:16:37
Speaker
And I think, you know, what sport teaches you is that what you can't do is you can't control what the competition is doing.
00:16:45
Speaker
And I think it's a real failure if you try and adapt what you're doing based upon what others are doing.
00:16:52
Speaker
And I say this to my kids constantly, you know, when they come back from having done sport, whichever sport it is that they're doing that particular day, disappointed or happy.
00:17:02
Speaker
The one question I always ask them is, look, did you give it 100%?
00:17:06
Speaker
Because I think all we can do in life and whatever it is, is give 100%.
00:17:09
Speaker
And I think if you have given it 100%,
00:17:13
Speaker
experience tells me that what you can what you'll never do is look back with regret you never regret it because it's everything you had you may not have achieved what you wanted to do uh you know for me personally i never won the olympic medal i won a world and european but never an olympic medal but i don't look back and think you know i should have worked harder because i couldn't i gave it 100 it was everything i had it just it just wasn't enough so
00:17:37
Speaker
And that, to me, I think is absolutely crucial.
00:17:39
Speaker
Give it everything you've got.
00:17:41
Speaker
Give it 100% and you'll never regret it.
00:17:43
Speaker
Amazing.
00:17:44
Speaker
And I'll just say the second part of that is your biggest weakness.
00:17:47
Speaker
And you kind of touch a little bit of base, but would you say, you know, just the weakness of failing to – you didn't want to lose?
00:17:53
Speaker
Of not giving up.
00:17:54
Speaker
Of not giving up?
00:17:58
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, maybe it is.
00:17:59
Speaker
I think, you know, I think what's interesting on that is sort of ages – classically with this, I think –
00:18:05
Speaker
you know, going back to what we was talking about earlier on about that sort of desire piece, actually it's very difficult to accumulate experience without actually doing it.
00:18:13
Speaker
And I think certainly one of the mottos that I have is that, you know, for, for,
00:18:19
Speaker
I'm sure we've all met people who say, oh, yeah, I've never failed.
00:18:22
Speaker
And to my mind, if you've never failed, then you have never tried.
00:18:26
Speaker
Yes.
00:18:26
Speaker
Oh, my God.
00:18:27
Speaker
Who can say that?
00:18:29
Speaker
Success is never guaranteed.
00:18:31
Speaker
And so I think to that extent, you could deem it as a weakness.
00:18:37
Speaker
But I think actually, look, if you failed, what it does mean is you're pushing yourself and you're pushing that envelope.
Learning from Setbacks and Achievements
00:18:42
Speaker
You're moving outside your comfort zone, all those sort of little sayings that we talk about.
00:18:46
Speaker
I think, you know, so is it a weakness?
00:18:48
Speaker
I'm not 100% sure it is, but it's the way that I live my life.
00:18:54
Speaker
I'm not saying everybody else should do that.
00:18:56
Speaker
So would you say then, based on all of that, would you say, Greg, you've had more setbacks than successes?
00:19:00
Speaker
Or when you're on the back of it, do you think you've had more successes than setbacks?
00:19:08
Speaker
I'll tell you what I would say is that I only remember the only one.
00:19:11
Speaker
Exactly.
00:19:11
Speaker
Well, that's right.
00:19:12
Speaker
That's the whole point of it.
00:19:14
Speaker
That's the whole point of it, isn't it?
00:19:15
Speaker
It's like, you know, most people do say.
00:19:18
Speaker
It is.
00:19:19
Speaker
you fail way more times than you ever, you know, but the truth is that you just let those go and you just keep going.
00:19:26
Speaker
You just go for the next thing.
00:19:27
Speaker
You keep going.
00:19:28
Speaker
Don't stop.
00:19:30
Speaker
I think you've got to as well.
00:19:31
Speaker
I think, you know, the one thing you learn with life as you get older is the fact that, look, I can't go back in time and change it.
00:19:39
Speaker
And so therefore, you know, what has gone is gone.
00:19:40
Speaker
I think what we can do and I think what is crucial, you know, and Einstein coined it beautifully.
00:19:47
Speaker
And that is that effectively,
00:19:50
Speaker
to paraphrase it, stupidity is repeating the same thing over and over again and expecting a good result.
00:19:59
Speaker
Now that's it.
00:20:00
Speaker
So I think what we do is that we should, and I think that's what I do, is you learn from those areas when you haven't been successful and
00:20:09
Speaker
But at the same time, what you do is just park them.
00:20:11
Speaker
So you take the learnings forward.
00:20:13
Speaker
But what you do is you don't take the failure forward.
00:20:15
Speaker
Yeah, and back to what you were just saying before about the past.
00:20:18
Speaker
Like I have this thing in my head is the past is the past.
00:20:21
Speaker
You can't change it.
00:20:22
Speaker
It is what it is.
00:20:23
Speaker
It's happened.
00:20:24
Speaker
You know, for good, the bad, the ugly, right?
00:20:26
Speaker
the future doesn't exist yet.
00:20:28
Speaker
All right.
00:20:28
Speaker
So you could set yourself up for a brighter and bigger future by training and doing certain things, but that's not guaranteed.
00:20:35
Speaker
The only thing that is guaranteed is the present moment.
00:20:37
Speaker
I always say this with Lee is, you know, this given step that we've taken, whether it's left or right,
00:20:44
Speaker
you're in control and, you know, as long as you're on the good path, positive path and you're happy, that's all that matters.
00:20:51
Speaker
Yeah, and you've made the decisions for the right reasons and you've thought about it all.
00:20:54
Speaker
You can't do anything else, can you?
00:20:56
Speaker
But it's okay to make, like I said, mistakes and stuff like that.
00:20:59
Speaker
But like you said, you've got to learn from those mistakes.
00:21:01
Speaker
You've got to learn from those things.
00:21:03
Speaker
And what Einstein said, if you keep doing it, expect a different result.
00:21:06
Speaker
Then you're crazy.
00:21:08
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:21:09
Speaker
Exactly.
00:21:11
Speaker
Okay, go Max Maxie.
00:21:12
Speaker
Yes.
00:21:13
Speaker
So how do you deal with times when things go wrong?
00:21:21
Speaker
I think self-reflection is something that generally we're not very good at.
00:21:27
Speaker
And I think the easiest thing, and certainly when we're young, what we do is we like to look around to see who we can blame.
00:21:34
Speaker
And it's something, again, you should never beat yourself up for that because it's just a natural thing to do, really.
00:21:38
Speaker
As you look around and think, oh, it's your fault, it's your fault.
00:21:41
Speaker
And actually, for me, one of the best things I've learned through my career is just take a really close look at yourself in the mirror.
00:21:49
Speaker
You know, what is it that you could have done differently?
00:21:51
Speaker
And it might not be obvious.
00:21:53
Speaker
You know, sometimes there are clear things that, you know, you just didn't, you know, if you're entering a race or something, you just didn't train hard enough.
00:21:59
Speaker
You didn't commit enough.
00:22:01
Speaker
Then that's quite obvious.
00:22:02
Speaker
But actually, there are often subtle things, the way in which you deal with people, the way in which you treat people, the way in which you communicate the various different things to people.
00:22:11
Speaker
You know, all of those sort of things.
00:22:13
Speaker
It's not just the hard skills.
00:22:14
Speaker
It's also the soft skills within that.
00:22:16
Speaker
But for me, I think the most important thing that if you don't get to where you're trying to get to, I think the first place to start is self-reflection.
00:22:26
Speaker
Take a look at yourself.
00:22:28
Speaker
have a long, hard, honest discussion with yourself and then look to see what, in having done that, then look at these areas about, you know, what worked, what didn't work.
00:22:38
Speaker
And I think, again, what's interesting for me is that often what we do is that we spend perhaps just a little bit too much time looking at the things that didn't work, the bad things about it.
00:22:48
Speaker
when actually what we should do is also focus on things that did work.
00:22:51
Speaker
If we're going to go again and we're going to try again, then what we want to make sure is the things that we did really well, we want to keep those and potentially enhance those, whilst at the same time those weaknesses that we've had,
00:23:03
Speaker
we've got is actually work on those weaknesses to improve those what what we're trying to do is just bring everything up to an excellent level rather than let things drop yeah that's awesome you're full of wisdom today you're giving me giving me so much from watching you all week to talking to you face to face like this mate this is amazing so best career decision greg what a career one of them you would say was a really good one
00:23:35
Speaker
Best career decision.
00:23:37
Speaker
Wow.
00:23:38
Speaker
Do you know what?
00:23:43
Speaker
I was the director of research for the British Olympic Medical Center.
00:23:47
Speaker
And I remember I was at a university post at the time.
00:23:52
Speaker
And it was a real punt.
00:23:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:55
Speaker
to go in to take that job in a sense.
00:23:57
Speaker
I was the inaugural director of research.
00:24:00
Speaker
I'd never had a director of research before.
00:24:02
Speaker
They really didn't have a research culture at all at that time.
00:24:06
Speaker
So it was one of those jobs that I could move outside of the comfort zone, you know, a nice academic position, you know, very clear what I was doing.
00:24:17
Speaker
Actually, I love and still love teaching.
00:24:22
Speaker
Into what was relatively unknown, although it'll be in my area.
00:24:27
Speaker
So I took that post and I had four incredible years at the British Olympic Medical Center.
00:24:32
Speaker
I looked after the prep, particularly the environmental prep was one of my specialty areas of five Olympic Games, including summer and winter.
00:24:43
Speaker
And it was just it was a magnificent experience and it taught me an awful lot and actually opened up a huge number of doors.
00:24:49
Speaker
So I think I guess the message in that is, you know, don't don't be afraid to make a change.
00:24:55
Speaker
I think often the best decisions.
00:24:57
Speaker
And you obviously went into a role that, like you say, it was brand new.
00:25:00
Speaker
There was no roadmap.
00:25:01
Speaker
There was probably no.
00:25:03
Speaker
position description, there was no one there to give you onboarding.
00:25:07
Speaker
You probably walked here, there was a desk and, you know, like here we get, you know, and that's like amazing because you can really then put your stamp on it.
00:25:17
Speaker
And there's so many times we say this with what we're trying to do and now like having a charity is,
00:25:25
Speaker
We know we operate a little bit differently.
00:25:27
Speaker
We're trying to maybe do things in a way where maybe traditional education has maybe failed.
00:25:35
Speaker
So it's like there is no regma.
00:25:37
Speaker
We are winging it by every single day.
00:25:42
Speaker
And I can't believe some days that we've done what we've done.
00:25:45
Speaker
for just two random individuals.
00:25:48
Speaker
Two knuckleheads.
00:25:48
Speaker
Two knuckleheads.
00:25:49
Speaker
I mean, Bradvan and Robin, look at us.
00:25:53
Speaker
Like, seriously, you know, we rock up anywhere and just know everybody will have a great day and that's all we can promise.
00:26:00
Speaker
I'm not even a lot of time, mate.
00:26:06
Speaker
But you know, what you have though is what we spoke about right at the very beginning.
00:26:09
Speaker
And that is what I love about you guys is passion.
00:26:13
Speaker
You know, and that passion is infectious.
00:26:15
Speaker
And I think that invariably, that to me, you know, that'll give you 50% of the success you're looking for.
00:26:23
Speaker
We always say people might be as on ability, but they will never be as on enthusiasm.
00:26:28
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:30
Speaker
Yeah, perfect.
00:26:31
Speaker
And that's the way it should be.
00:26:33
Speaker
Greg, there's been plenty of achievements, mate.
00:26:36
Speaker
And like I said, this week, I've seen many online.
00:26:39
Speaker
But what has been your greatest achievement to date?
00:26:43
Speaker
I know it's a big question to ask, but is there something that really stands out achievement wise?
00:26:50
Speaker
A friend of mine asked me this the other day, I was having a coffee with a mate of mine, and he said to me, what is it that yanks your chain?
00:26:57
Speaker
What is it that really gets you out of bed in the morning?
00:27:00
Speaker
And I think the paradox is, and it comes back to what you guys are doing, the paradox is, I would say it's all the work I do for charity, because I do all that work completely for free.
00:27:12
Speaker
um i invariably it cost me money you know i mean i absolutely take no fee and and nothing from that um but it's it's the one area that gives me the greatest uh the greatest joy and and certainly you know obviously with comic relief and sport relief
00:27:28
Speaker
Now with a charity, a big charity here in the UK called Children in Need, I've supported over 36 major challenges.
00:27:36
Speaker
In fact, that figure you gave now is probably up to over £65 million for charity, whatever that is.
00:27:46
Speaker
No, it's 1.2 billion probably.
00:27:47
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:27:47
Speaker
It's a lot of money.
00:27:48
Speaker
Sorry, 100 million.
00:27:48
Speaker
Sorry, go in.
00:27:55
Speaker
I don't know.
00:27:57
Speaker
That's why we have an account.
00:28:00
Speaker
I'll take the 1.2 billion.
00:28:02
Speaker
That's why we've got an account, honestly.
00:28:04
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:28:05
Speaker
That's not us.
00:28:05
Speaker
Keep him.
00:28:09
Speaker
But that, I love that because I've had the opportunity to, as much as you guys do as well, I think there is no greater joy than seeing where you've made a difference.
Impactful Visits and Charity Work
00:28:22
Speaker
And I've had the opportunity to travel to various projects in the UK and around the world to see where the money that was raised has been spent and the difference that it makes to people's lives.
00:28:33
Speaker
And I think there's nothing to my mind, there's nothing better than that.
00:28:37
Speaker
So for me, the best thing I've ever done is.
00:28:39
Speaker
I think, you know, that reminds me of the first time, the first trip that Maxie and I came to the UK and I,
00:28:47
Speaker
You know, it was just a complete random that we ended up coming.
00:28:52
Speaker
I was coming back for a birthday.
00:28:53
Speaker
Maxie happened to be in Europe.
00:28:56
Speaker
Someone invited to open a surf club.
00:28:58
Speaker
No budget.
00:29:00
Speaker
Nothing, you know, just like a bit of a joke, cheeky cheeky.
00:29:05
Speaker
And us two said yes.
00:29:06
Speaker
He will come over.
00:29:07
Speaker
So there we were in Southbourne in Bournemouth.
00:29:12
Speaker
And...
00:29:14
Speaker
This was our, and we still keep in touch with this family and these two little lads.
00:29:17
Speaker
These two little lads from Portsmouth travelled for the day, Zach and Max.
00:29:22
Speaker
They sat on the beach on a freezing cold day, wrapped in a blanket, and their mum and dad just, like, could not believe, like, you know, we had them joining in, we had them playing games.
00:29:33
Speaker
They were running up and down the sand, and we were like...
00:29:36
Speaker
whoa, you know, that was cool.
00:29:39
Speaker
This is the start of something.
00:29:41
Speaker
We didn't even have Live and Survive.
00:29:43
Speaker
We didn't know, we didn't have a name.
00:29:46
Speaker
We didn't have a notebook.
00:29:47
Speaker
That day was like, it was almost like a, actually, you know, and I remember saying to Maxi, you know what?
00:29:54
Speaker
You have a, almost, you have a platform and you almost have a responsibility and I'll help you.
00:30:02
Speaker
Here we are.
00:30:02
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:04
Speaker
and there you are now it's amazing what you can achieve though isn't it because if you're to look back 10 years ago what you achieve now even the last six months in the last three months it's just it's crazy even having a charity we can't believe that we've got that and we've got that because basically an amazing team of lawyers in Brisbane said just what you said oh we love you too we'll help you
00:30:33
Speaker
And it was like, you know.
00:30:34
Speaker
Hey, listen.
00:30:35
Speaker
That's how life works.
00:30:36
Speaker
And we just turn up with cupcakes.
00:30:37
Speaker
That's it.
00:30:37
Speaker
Like, you know, like, you know, so.
00:30:39
Speaker
Well, listen, I'll do anything for a cupcake.
00:30:42
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:30:43
Speaker
And so will our lawyers.
00:30:45
Speaker
So any secrets, Greg, that you can share that might inspire someone else?
00:30:52
Speaker
Anything that's helped get you where you've got today?
00:30:55
Speaker
A little bit of a secret Greg formula.
00:30:58
Speaker
Well, I'll tell you what's interesting, and you've actually just coined it, I think, and that is your team of lawyers.
00:31:04
Speaker
I think life is about teamwork.
00:31:08
Speaker
I have this little saying, and that is, look, nothing great is ever achieved alone.
00:31:12
Speaker
Yes.
00:31:13
Speaker
And even sometimes we look at people who think, oh, they've done it.
00:31:15
Speaker
They've done it themselves.
00:31:17
Speaker
And it's never true ever.
00:31:19
Speaker
You know, when you look behind them, what you see is you see this team of people and it includes family, includes friends.
00:31:26
Speaker
It can include professions.
00:31:29
Speaker
And for me, I think if you are looking to achieve something, I think the first place to start is to identify the team that is going to support you.
00:31:39
Speaker
Now, crucially, it's not just about having a team.
00:31:41
Speaker
You've got to make sure that team integrates well, that it works well together.
00:31:46
Speaker
And I think as important of all of that is make sure that team works for you.
00:31:52
Speaker
And it's not always about the most expensive or the most experienced or the highest profile.
00:31:58
Speaker
It's actually about people that work for you and share your dreams.
00:32:03
Speaker
Yes, they share the vision.
00:32:05
Speaker
They share the vision and the passion about it.
00:32:09
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:10
Speaker
So teamwork, I think, you know, teamwork makes the dream work.
00:32:13
Speaker
And, you know, for me, make sure you've got the right team around.
00:32:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:17
Speaker
And we've been really, we've really, really tread carefully with that because it is, it's like, you know, when you've got the right team, it's magic.
00:32:27
Speaker
It really is.
00:32:28
Speaker
And it only takes one bad one in the team that makes it very not magic.
00:32:33
Speaker
So, yeah.
00:32:34
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:36
Speaker
Yeah, it's true.
00:32:36
Speaker
It's true.
00:32:37
Speaker
And it's, I mean, you know, that's a good point because it is about managing that team, you know, and I think, you know, as, as a leader, you know, you're the leader of the live, learn, survive team.
00:32:47
Speaker
And so, you know, you have to sometimes make those difficult decisions to, you know, to offload some members who just aren't working the right way and then reappoint, you know, and that, and that's, you know, it's not, often people think, oh, you've been lucky.
00:33:00
Speaker
No, no, no.
00:33:01
Speaker
You've worked incredibly hard and you've taken the right approach.
00:33:06
Speaker
And that's why leadership within that team is absolutely fundamental.
00:33:11
Speaker
And what you guys are for Live, Learn, Survive is exactly that, is great leaders.
00:33:15
Speaker
Yeah, we love what we do.
00:33:16
Speaker
We're so passionate.
00:33:17
Speaker
A lot of sacrifice, a lot of travelling, a lot of big days for Lee in the office.
00:33:23
Speaker
It doesn't come easy.
00:33:24
Speaker
But adding on to being leaders and as we get bigger with the charity and more and more people get involved,
00:33:31
Speaker
setting good values within the charity and kind of reflect that onto the people that are joined to kind of follow suit and try and create a positive and great environment for everyone.
00:33:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:33:46
Speaker
Yeah.
00:33:47
Speaker
Mate, back to me.
00:33:49
Speaker
I'd leave by example.
00:33:51
Speaker
100%.
00:33:51
Speaker
Exactly.
00:33:52
Speaker
Walk the walk.
00:33:55
Speaker
Walk the walk.
00:33:57
Speaker
Mate, do you believe it is a good thing to set goals?
00:34:02
Speaker
It is absolutely fundamental.
00:34:05
Speaker
And the first starting point to achieving anything in life is a goal.
00:34:09
Speaker
Now, I think often where we get sort of confused within that is I think that invariably people set goals, they don't achieve that goal.
00:34:17
Speaker
And so therefore it's because they're setting goals.
00:34:21
Speaker
So they sort of give up on the goal setting thing.
00:34:23
Speaker
I think the important thing is to remember that goals themselves, you've got a big long-term goal.
00:34:29
Speaker
You cut that goal down into medium term goals and then into short term goals, all of which should be planned and structured in the way that's going to deliver to this long term goal.
00:34:39
Speaker
And then also each of those goals really needs to be constructed well.
00:34:43
Speaker
I think invariably when you look at failure of delivery of goal, invariably it's because the goal is the wrong goal.
00:34:51
Speaker
So there are lots of different models for this.
00:34:55
Speaker
But, but,
00:34:56
Speaker
different ways sort of to think about how you structure those goals.
00:35:00
Speaker
But there are lots of sort of rules, which I think if you do follow, you can make sure.
00:35:04
Speaker
So, you know, are they timely?
00:35:05
Speaker
Embarrassed what people do.
00:35:07
Speaker
So, you know, we're in the new year.
00:35:08
Speaker
New Year's resolutions are a classic for that is that people set goals.
00:35:11
Speaker
You know, I want to lose three stone.
00:35:14
Speaker
I want to lose, you know, five kilos by the end of January.
00:35:18
Speaker
And you think, well, you know, unless you sever a limb, that's not going to happen, is it?
00:35:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:23
Speaker
Because it's not timely.
00:35:24
Speaker
Is it achievable?
00:35:25
Speaker
Is it measurable?
00:35:26
Speaker
There are all these sort of factors that are associated with it.
00:35:29
Speaker
But I can tell you, without goals, you rarely achieve.
00:35:32
Speaker
Yeah, I agree.
00:35:33
Speaker
I agree.
00:35:34
Speaker
So, basing on those goals, my question is with the extreme, you know, elite level that you've worked at, how do you go from good to great?
Pushing Comfort Zones and Mental Toughness
00:35:45
Speaker
What's that extra that takes you from good to great?
00:35:48
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:51
Speaker
Well, that to me, that's the mark of excellence.
00:35:56
Speaker
I think it's an interesting one.
00:35:57
Speaker
I often talk about this with things like coaching.
00:36:00
Speaker
There are two things about great coaches.
00:36:02
Speaker
Firstly, is that they're able to replicate success.
00:36:07
Speaker
Having a single success with a single individual or a single team is one thing, but being able to replicate that over and over again, that's quality coaching.
00:36:16
Speaker
But I think probably the most important thing about quality coaching is it's the ability to make good athletes excellent.
00:36:26
Speaker
not to take excellent individuals and keep them excellent.
00:36:31
Speaker
I don't necessarily think that's a mark of great coaching.
00:36:34
Speaker
And so I think it's really important that what we do is that we, you know, and from a personal perspective, I think this is why what we need to do is think about pushing ourselves outside of our comfort zone.
00:36:47
Speaker
because it's there where the magic happens.
00:36:49
Speaker
You know, it doesn't, it doesn't, sitting on the sofa is easy.
00:36:53
Speaker
That's the bottom line.
00:36:56
Speaker
It's only when you push yourself, you fully understand what you are capable of achieving.
00:37:01
Speaker
So I think that movement, that movement, fundamentally that movement from good to excellent won't happen while you're sat on the sofa drinking a cup of tea.
00:37:10
Speaker
Yeah, it's the extra.
00:37:12
Speaker
100%.
00:37:12
Speaker
Maita, mindset is so important.
00:37:15
Speaker
How do you keep mentally tough?
00:37:21
Speaker
I'll put you on the right day, Greg.
00:37:22
Speaker
I need to know.
00:37:24
Speaker
You are.
00:37:24
Speaker
I'll tell you what.
00:37:25
Speaker
These are tough questions.
00:37:26
Speaker
You're doing so well.
00:37:28
Speaker
You know, we knew that you would be the man with the answers.
00:37:32
Speaker
I'll take on the Northman again.
00:37:34
Speaker
What was the question again?
00:37:37
Speaker
My answer is so important.
00:37:38
Speaker
How do you keep mentally tough?
00:37:40
Speaker
So how do you keep pushing through mentally?
00:37:45
Speaker
Well, I think much of it.
00:37:46
Speaker
I think what's interesting is that what we like to do, and it may be an excuse that we sort of have, is that we look at people who are successful or achieve incredible things.
00:37:57
Speaker
And what we do is, oh, yeah, they must have been born with that.
00:38:00
Speaker
And we assume it's innate, you know, that actually people are born tough.
00:38:05
Speaker
And so therefore they're able to cope with it.
00:38:07
Speaker
Where I think, you know, there is an element of that, but I think the vast majority of it is it's what we call nurture.
00:38:14
Speaker
It's the learning, the development of that mental toughness.
00:38:19
Speaker
And I think often, much like it is when we talk about goal setting, is that mental toughness is developed and it's built and it's built progressively.
00:38:30
Speaker
What you don't do is, you know, you're not sat on your sofa drinking your cup of tea and the following day, all of a sudden you take on, you know, the English Channel or the Northman or, you know, the Race Across America, whatever it is, is that actually what we understand is that physically we have to progress and we have to overload and all these sort of classic things that we do with training.
00:38:55
Speaker
But to my mind, it's exactly the same thing with the brain.
00:38:58
Speaker
Is that what we've got to do is we've got to develop the brain.
00:39:00
Speaker
We've got to teach the brain.
00:39:01
Speaker
We've got to give it the opportunity to believe that it can achieve.
00:39:05
Speaker
And I think, you know, you do that by challenging it constantly.
00:39:08
Speaker
So you go a little bit longer, you go a little bit harder, you know, and in doing that, it just grows exponentially across time until you get to the point when you've got mental toughness and mental toughness is fundamentally built on experience.
00:39:22
Speaker
Well, it's funny you say that I do.
00:39:23
Speaker
I run a lot and I do all sorts of different exercises, but the amount of times I've been on the treadmill or doing that last kilometer or last mile,
00:39:31
Speaker
And on my watch or my phone, it says, you know, you're finished.
00:39:33
Speaker
But I go that little bit extra just to go, you know what?
00:39:36
Speaker
I'm feeling all right here.
00:39:37
Speaker
Could be at level 16 on the treadmill.
00:39:39
Speaker
And there's something in your brain saying, come on, keep pushing, keep pushing.
00:39:42
Speaker
You can do it.
00:39:44
Speaker
And really for me, it slows my breathing down, makes me feel even more stronger.
00:39:49
Speaker
And it's kind of like a power thing.
00:39:52
Speaker
And I love that.
00:39:53
Speaker
But like I said, I've had to start somewhere.
00:39:56
Speaker
And that was a couple of years ago doing the old block run to running.
00:40:00
Speaker
X amount of kilometres now.
00:40:01
Speaker
And, yeah, I'm so – I love mental toughness.
00:40:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:40:06
Speaker
It's definitely a thing.
00:40:08
Speaker
You are very tough and focused.
00:40:10
Speaker
There's more to go.
00:40:11
Speaker
There's more to come.
00:40:12
Speaker
Yeah, there's lots more.
00:40:13
Speaker
Yeah, Maxie just goes for a run and he comes back 20Ks later.
00:40:19
Speaker
That's like, you know, he just – okay, 20.
00:40:22
Speaker
He goes, yeah, I'll get a text.
00:40:24
Speaker
He'll go, oh, I just did 20.
00:40:25
Speaker
I was feeling all right.
00:40:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:40:28
Speaker
That's all right.
00:40:29
Speaker
All right.
00:40:30
Speaker
Okay.
00:40:30
Speaker
Fine, fine, fine.
00:40:32
Speaker
So speaking about that mental toughness, I loved this in your Norseman film, The Happy Bank.
00:40:40
Speaker
Tell us about The Happy Bank.
00:40:42
Speaker
I loved this, Greg.
00:40:43
Speaker
I think this is such gold for younger people to have this as a thought process.
00:40:52
Speaker
Well, you know, being successful in life requires time, it requires effort, it requires tenacity and dedication.
00:41:03
Speaker
And what you are constantly doing is dealing with ups and downs.
00:41:06
Speaker
You know, often the best analogy I can give you is that when we watch...
00:41:12
Speaker
elite sport, what we're doing is we're watching the end product of that process.
00:41:17
Speaker
And so, you know, you can watch the Olympic games and you watch them stand on the roster and when they get their gold medal and the flag goes up and you think, oh, yeah, I'd love to do that.
00:41:25
Speaker
And what you're not seeing is the, you know, five o'clock in the morning when it's tipping down with rain and you really don't want to do it and you're sore all over, but you've got to go up and go to another session and
00:41:36
Speaker
And, you know, it perturbates.
00:41:37
Speaker
There is success, but also there is failure.
00:41:40
Speaker
There are dark times.
00:41:41
Speaker
And those dark times can be really difficult to deal with.
00:41:44
Speaker
But in my opinion, that's where the greatest growth occurs is by challenging yourself and actually really pushing it.
00:41:50
Speaker
That's that's really what matters.
00:41:53
Speaker
And so I think through through whatever it is that you're taking on, you know, you can adapt this into business or any other walk of life, really.
00:42:00
Speaker
is that it's how well you cope with those dark times.
00:42:05
Speaker
And where the happy bank comes in, to my mind, is that nothing good comes easy.
00:42:12
Speaker
And if you think about your brain as what we like to call the central governor, it's the controller.
00:42:18
Speaker
And its job, fundamentally, is to keep you safe.
00:42:21
Speaker
That's really what the brain is doing.
00:42:23
Speaker
And so with that happy bank, what the brain is telling you, when the going gets tough,
00:42:30
Speaker
When you're on the treadmill and you've still got a kilo to go, the brain is saying, you can stop now.
00:42:36
Speaker
You can get off.
00:42:37
Speaker
Now's the time to ease back.
00:42:40
Speaker
And at that point, it's really, really tough.
00:42:42
Speaker
Now, by pushing through that and actually driving and putting more effort in and just finishing that session off, what you do is you implant into the brain this belief that you can do it.
00:42:54
Speaker
Just squeeze it out a little bit more.
00:42:55
Speaker
I have this other saying that I use a lot on Comic Relief on that, and that is squeeze it out.
00:42:59
Speaker
And the great analogy here is that, you know, in the mornings when you get up and you look at the toothpaste and it's in the tube and you think, oh, it's empty.
00:43:07
Speaker
And yet if you give it a, give it a, just a little bit harder.
00:43:13
Speaker
There's always something in there.
00:43:15
Speaker
And that, that to me is what we are.
00:43:17
Speaker
The humans are like that.
00:43:18
Speaker
It's just squeeze it out.
00:43:19
Speaker
There's always something more to give.
00:43:21
Speaker
But the crucial thing about that is that what you're trying to do is fill this happy bank.
00:43:25
Speaker
You're trying to invest in the brain, the belief that you can achieve this.
00:43:30
Speaker
And so that when you come to a big challenge,
00:43:33
Speaker
And you get midway or three quarters way or even towards the end of a big challenge and you're starting to think to yourself, I cannot do this.
00:43:40
Speaker
I can't keep going.
00:43:42
Speaker
All of that investment you've made into this happy bank, you can then start extracting.
00:43:46
Speaker
You can start withdrawing that investment.
00:43:49
Speaker
And that investment is saying you can do this.
00:43:52
Speaker
You have done it before.
00:43:53
Speaker
You've done the work.
00:43:54
Speaker
And the more of that that you've put in, the more you've invested,
00:43:59
Speaker
the more reserves you've got to withdraw.
00:44:01
Speaker
In other words, the more training, the more preparation, the more planning that you have done, the greater your chance of delivering.
00:44:09
Speaker
It's amazing, Greg.
00:44:10
Speaker
I've had the same tube of toothpaste for the two years there.
00:44:17
Speaker
No, no, no.
00:44:18
Speaker
Seriously, you can't have a trouble with him.
00:44:21
Speaker
And if you do trouble with him, just always take toothpaste because it's like, you know, bring your own toothpaste and bring a spare tube for him because it's like that's just the day it works.
00:44:32
Speaker
There's also another quick analogy.
00:44:34
Speaker
I know we're smashing through these questions, mate, but there's one that I always think too.
00:44:38
Speaker
You know, picture you're 80 or 90 years old on a rocking chair at the front of your house on your veranda.
00:44:46
Speaker
And your grandkids come up to you and ask you, so tell us about your life or tell us a story.
00:44:51
Speaker
And if you just sit there rocking up and back going, yeah, you know what?
00:44:54
Speaker
Life was pretty good.
00:44:55
Speaker
There was no real dramas.
00:44:56
Speaker
Everything was swell.
00:44:58
Speaker
Yeah, a couple of little hiccups, but yeah, it's all good.
00:45:01
Speaker
Your story's over within a couple of minutes.
00:45:02
Speaker
But where people want to hear, the kids want to hear the ups, the downs, the good, the bad, the ugly, the triumphs, the good times, the bad times.
00:45:12
Speaker
And I always think of that as like you –
00:45:14
Speaker
Whenever you're going through a bit of a rough spot, it's just like a movie.
00:45:18
Speaker
It's like there's a crowd going, come on, you can do it.
00:45:21
Speaker
How's he going to react from this?
00:45:24
Speaker
It's a bit different than Toothpaste, but I always do think of that as well.
00:45:27
Speaker
The rocking man.
00:45:36
Speaker
I think you're right.
00:45:36
Speaker
I think the bottom line is interesting people are people who do things.
00:45:42
Speaker
they're not necessarily the people who are always successful.
00:45:46
Speaker
They're the people who have challenged themselves.
00:45:49
Speaker
And just have a go.
00:45:49
Speaker
And in that challenge, they make themselves interesting.
00:45:52
Speaker
Just have a go.
00:45:53
Speaker
So speaking of Maxi, next question.
00:45:56
Speaker
So we're up to question 14 here, mate.
00:45:58
Speaker
So Norseman film, at the end you say, so what's next?
00:46:02
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:02
Speaker
I understand that was back in 2018, 2019, and it's been a couple of years for COVID and stuff like that.
00:46:07
Speaker
But what is next, mate?
00:46:11
Speaker
Well, actually after that, so we went into COVID, it was 2019, so we went into COVID 2020, as you guys know as well as us.
00:46:20
Speaker
And I was planning another extreme try that year in Patagonia.
00:46:24
Speaker
So it was called the Patagon Man.
00:46:26
Speaker
That got cancelled.
00:46:28
Speaker
And so not wanting to lose.
00:46:32
Speaker
Coming back to that.
00:46:33
Speaker
Yeah, we've done all the prep and everything and the team was together.
00:46:35
Speaker
So we went up and did a challenge in northwest Scotland, a place called Torridon, which is where they hold what's called the Celt Man.
00:46:42
Speaker
It's another extreme triathlon.
00:46:45
Speaker
but we went up there and I went up there and went solo with the team we made a documentary and actually this week we're about to release that film this week which is
00:46:56
Speaker
Well, we're going to be sharing it.
00:47:00
Speaker
So people listening to this podcast will be able to see it on our socials and yours as well.
00:47:04
Speaker
So, yeah, I look forward to seeing that.
00:47:06
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:47:07
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:47:08
Speaker
And we also... Well, I'll tell you what, particularly the swim.
00:47:12
Speaker
The swim on that was something... And then this year, yeah.
00:47:17
Speaker
The swim on the Torrigan.
00:47:19
Speaker
It's worth watching the film just for that.
00:47:22
Speaker
Rarely, if ever, am I scared of open water.
00:47:27
Speaker
But what's the film you see?
00:47:29
Speaker
They're not trying to give too much away.
00:47:31
Speaker
Is it, it's not the cold water, I'm guessing?
00:47:36
Speaker
Well, it's cold.
00:47:36
Speaker
I know it's cold, but it's just a little pink.
00:47:39
Speaker
But the cold doesn't scare me.
00:47:41
Speaker
It's darkness.
00:47:42
Speaker
And the interesting thing is that the lock, so this, they call them locks in Scotland, this huge lake, but this actually, this huge lake opened up into the Atlantic.
00:47:52
Speaker
And so in this lock, they actually got whales.
00:47:56
Speaker
And I remember chatting with the with the one of the specialist, the wildlife specialists down there before we did the swim.
00:48:03
Speaker
And I said to him, I said, have you ever seen orca in the lock?
00:48:09
Speaker
And he said, well, it's interesting you should say that.
00:48:10
Speaker
He said, because we do get orca at the mouth of the lock.
00:48:14
Speaker
Wow.
00:48:16
Speaker
Now, for me, right, sharks, I get it, right?
00:48:19
Speaker
But orca, they don't differentiate.
00:48:23
Speaker
If they take a bite, it's definitely over.
00:48:27
Speaker
So I said to him, I said, that's great that you've not seen him in there.
00:48:31
Speaker
I said, but have you looked at five o'clock in the morning and you picked black?
00:48:36
Speaker
He said, no.
00:48:37
Speaker
He said, but on the positive, if you do spot any, you'll be the first one to do something.
00:48:49
Speaker
I said to him, I'm not sure you're completely understanding what the worry is here.
00:48:54
Speaker
Oh, my life.
00:48:56
Speaker
And then you did the Thames swim.
00:48:59
Speaker
We know you did the Thames swim, the Upper Thames.
00:49:02
Speaker
We were invested in that, Greg.
00:49:04
Speaker
I'll tell you what, the times I woke up at three o'clock in the morning worried where you were and how your shoulder was going.
00:49:10
Speaker
I was like, you know, I was like, oh, man, that looked tough.
00:49:15
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:16
Speaker
It was crazy.
00:49:17
Speaker
It was crazy.
00:49:18
Speaker
And, you know, so what I decided to do, and, you know, again, exactly what you guys are doing is actually about raising the sort of profile, as it were, of drowning prevention.
Raising Awareness through Challenges
00:49:29
Speaker
That's the critical thing, really, and water safety and all of that.
00:49:33
Speaker
I just figured that that would be the best way to do it.
00:49:35
Speaker
So I swam what's called the upper Thames.
00:49:37
Speaker
You don't have to swim the tidal Thames anymore.
00:49:39
Speaker
So the upper Thames, 135 miles.
00:49:43
Speaker
And my plan was to do it in four days.
00:49:46
Speaker
So anybody doing the calculations, that is 50,000 meters a day.
00:49:52
Speaker
And so day one set the scene at 53,000 meters on day one.
00:49:59
Speaker
It was an interesting time.
00:50:01
Speaker
But it was a really, really tough challenge.
00:50:05
Speaker
Just I think from a speed perspective as much as anything else really what I was trying to achieve in terms of speed.
00:50:12
Speaker
But so important.
00:50:14
Speaker
And tragically, it was sort of a three-week period of the challenge.
00:50:20
Speaker
And in the UK, we had a heat wave.
00:50:22
Speaker
It's one of our hottest times of the year.
00:50:23
Speaker
And it's obviously in that zone.
00:50:25
Speaker
I swam it in July.
00:50:27
Speaker
And that is the period of highest number of drownings.
00:50:30
Speaker
And actually during that period, 50, five, zero young people lost their lives to drowning in the UK alone.
00:50:39
Speaker
So it was such an important, for me, it was such an important message that we were trying to raise.
00:50:44
Speaker
And as much as anything else, the challenge was great, but actually the traction we got with the message and raising the profile of water safety was enormous.
00:50:57
Speaker
It was a wonderful thing to be part of, albeit incredibly important.
00:51:01
Speaker
When we finished, it was like surreal, really, when we actually, the last day of our trip,
00:51:08
Speaker
in April, we ended up at Clacton and we were with the amazing beach lifeguards down at Clacton.
00:51:15
Speaker
And the reason we sort of knew Clacton was on our radar because even like, say, two or three years before that, we were contacted by a mum who her son had actually drowned under the pier at Clacton.
00:51:28
Speaker
And we sent books to his school in Ben's memory.
00:51:33
Speaker
And mum just sort of checked in with us once in a while.
00:51:37
Speaker
Anyway, we ended up going to Clacton and spent the afternoon with the lifeguards.
00:51:43
Speaker
And Ben's mum actually came down.
00:51:45
Speaker
And we were like right by the pier at the lifeguard station.
00:51:49
Speaker
And she spent a couple of hours with Dee.
00:51:50
Speaker
And she was just absolutely.
00:51:52
Speaker
And she said that that was the first time she'd actually been back to the beach.
00:51:56
Speaker
Mm-hmm.
00:51:58
Speaker
And I said, well, if we've done nothing other than today, bring you back to maybe, you know.
00:52:04
Speaker
Bit of closure.
00:52:05
Speaker
Bit of closure and, you know, walk along the ocean and not be quite, you know.
00:52:11
Speaker
And, yeah, so, you know,
00:52:14
Speaker
Awareness is so important.
00:52:16
Speaker
So important.
00:52:18
Speaker
Yeah.
00:52:19
Speaker
Do you know, I was, my specialty, sort of academically, my specialty is sudden cardiac death in young kids.
00:52:28
Speaker
And I established the first centre for sports cardiology dedicated to that factor.
00:52:34
Speaker
And, you know, we've all sort of seen it and experienced it in the press where young people die suddenly during sport, etc.
00:52:40
Speaker
But I tell you what, if you ever wonder what impact you're having, meeting parents of those that have lost their children.
00:52:49
Speaker
I mean, honestly, I don't know how to get out of bed in the morning.
00:52:52
Speaker
I mean, I just can't imagine it.
00:52:54
Speaker
And I think, you know, if anybody, you know, if anybody listening to this is wondering why they should donate to Live, Learn, Survive, then let me tell you, just meet somebody who's lost a child and you'll see how important the work that you guys do.
00:53:10
Speaker
in making sure that no, you know, or reducing the risk that any other parent will have to go through that.
00:53:16
Speaker
It is truly heartbreaking.
00:53:19
Speaker
But at the same time, and, you know, we do the same thing at the same time by taking action, by doing something, what we can do is hold our heads up in the sure and certain knowledge of what we are doing is we're reducing that risk.
00:53:33
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:53:35
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:53:36
Speaker
So well said.
00:53:37
Speaker
Yeah.
00:53:38
Speaker
And so changing a little bit.
00:53:44
Speaker
Favourite comic relief challenge would be hard to pick.
00:53:47
Speaker
And I, you know, as an English born girl, but, you know, ended up the other side of the planet and been very invested in some of these people and these challenges over the years.
00:54:00
Speaker
Is what you know, what are the nice things?
00:54:02
Speaker
Did you have a favourite or is the one that stands out to you for a reason that we probably might not know?
00:54:10
Speaker
Well, it's a really interesting one.
00:54:13
Speaker
I mean, you know, I've done, as I said before, sort of 36 of them with some truly outstanding people.
00:54:20
Speaker
You know, they're giving up their time.
00:54:22
Speaker
And again, all you ever see is the end product.
00:54:24
Speaker
So you see the challenge itself.
00:54:25
Speaker
What you don't see is the months of training that went in before it.
00:54:29
Speaker
From a favourite perspective, I think generally it's always the solo challenges because they are properly brutal and there is a real desire from the celeb to actually complete it.
00:54:44
Speaker
um and some of those have been absolutely epic you know things like davina mccall when we did the the crazy triathlon from uh from edinburgh down to london and we swam across um lake windermere oh my goodness um it's the first time that the british press actually put a headline they said when will he
00:55:03
Speaker
which I quite like, you know, Joe Bishop and Joe Brand.
00:55:07
Speaker
But I think probably it goes back to the first challenge.
00:55:11
Speaker
And interestingly in Australia, you know, you will know this guy and that is David Williams.
00:55:17
Speaker
And the first challenge I ever did and that Sport Relief ever did was David Williams swaying the English Channel back in 2006 now, a long time ago.
00:55:27
Speaker
And I think what was really special about that was that it was the first one, obviously,
00:55:32
Speaker
But I think crucially, there was a word that was constantly, and I mean constantly, banded about around that challenge over two things.
00:55:42
Speaker
One was that could David Whalen swim across the English Channel?
00:55:46
Speaker
The classic word was impossible.
00:55:48
Speaker
that this cross-dressing comedian on Little Britain at the time, you know, he could never swim across it, number one.
00:55:56
Speaker
And then number two was, because again, nobody had ever done it before, you can't raise money for charity by doing a challenge like this.
00:56:03
Speaker
And this was at a time when nobody really did it.
00:56:07
Speaker
And of course, he became the first man in UK, first man to raise a million pounds on a single challenge.
00:56:14
Speaker
And of course, he got across the English Channel in one of the fastest times across the channel that year.
00:56:22
Speaker
So I think, you know, for me, it's probably my favourite for all sorts of reasons.
00:56:28
Speaker
And the fact that David's still a very close friend of mine now and a true legend in every sense of the word.
00:56:37
Speaker
Yeah, amazing.
00:56:39
Speaker
We watched part of that one today.
00:56:41
Speaker
So, yeah, incredible, incredible.
00:56:44
Speaker
Mate, back to more of a serious question.
00:56:47
Speaker
Drowning statistics.
00:56:48
Speaker
Why do you think education is so important?
00:56:54
Speaker
Well, in the UK, one person drowns every 20 hours.
00:56:59
Speaker
I mean, just think about that figure.
00:57:02
Speaker
We are much like Australia.
00:57:03
Speaker
We're an island nation.
00:57:05
Speaker
We've got 5,000 miles of coastline.
00:57:08
Speaker
We've got 4,000 miles of inland waterways.
00:57:12
Speaker
And yet so many people drown.
00:57:14
Speaker
You know, I mean, it is an absolute tragedy.
00:57:16
Speaker
And, you know, the real tragedy in that is that the vast majority of those are young people.
00:57:25
Speaker
And it sits within that group of eight to 18 year olds.
00:57:28
Speaker
and an awful and the vast majority of them.
00:57:30
Speaker
Yeah, same here, Greg.
00:57:32
Speaker
Same here.
00:57:32
Speaker
Yeah, there's a lot of testosterone, a lot of... And I think... I mean, lots of reasons for it, I think.
00:57:41
Speaker
But at the same time, you know, not all drownings are preventable, but many are.
00:57:48
Speaker
And I think that's why water safety... Learning to swim, number one, should be a life skill.
00:57:54
Speaker
And sadly, in the UK, we simply don't take it seriously enough.
00:57:58
Speaker
Or certainly governments don't take it seriously enough.
00:58:01
Speaker
And I think, secondly, it is about water safety.
00:58:04
Speaker
It's about understanding.
00:58:07
Speaker
To some extent, it's about respect.
00:58:09
Speaker
You need the respect.
00:58:10
Speaker
It's that looking at a body of water and thinking it could be dangerous.
00:58:16
Speaker
And what are those dangers?
00:58:18
Speaker
You know, for you guys on the beach, for us as well with beaches, you talk about Clacton, interestingly enough, is that...
00:58:24
Speaker
It's a notorious black spot around the pier because of the rip.
00:58:29
Speaker
Now, when you look at it on a clear sunny day in flat weather with no wind, you can't see the rip.
00:58:35
Speaker
You can't see any of those hidden dangers.
00:58:38
Speaker
And so therefore, what's absolutely crucial about that is that we educate people, particularly locals.
00:58:44
Speaker
Interestingly enough, many people who die on the shores of the UK are actually visitors to the shores.
00:58:52
Speaker
which is the same the world over.
00:58:55
Speaker
And again, that's why education is so important.
00:58:58
Speaker
But it's also about education of rivers and about flow of rivers, about temperature of water, about underwater hazards.
00:59:06
Speaker
When I swam the Thames, I mean, a great example of this is I swam the Thames and there is a notorious bridge not far from me, actually.
00:59:14
Speaker
I live close to the Thames.
00:59:16
Speaker
And this bridge, kids jump off in the summer.
00:59:20
Speaker
And I was swimming and we were coming past this bridge, a place called Songning, where a former prime minister lives, interestingly enough, who I was talking to about this after we'd done the swim.
00:59:33
Speaker
But I was coming up to the bridge and the crew stopped me and said, look, we've got to stop it, Greg, because there were kids jumping off the bridge, quite a narrow bridge.
00:59:40
Speaker
And they said, we don't want them to jump on top of that.
00:59:43
Speaker
So we're going to go around and stop them jumping off.
00:59:45
Speaker
This bridge is three metres high.
00:59:48
Speaker
When I swam underneath it, I was actually touching the bottom.
00:59:53
Speaker
So the water depth was less than half a metre.
00:59:58
Speaker
and they were jumping from three meters into the water.
01:00:00
Speaker
And that to me is, much of that is about education.
01:00:05
Speaker
It's also about us in the state taking responsibility and actually making it incredibly difficult to jump off that bridge by putting barriers up, by putting signs up.
01:00:16
Speaker
Sadly, what we have in life is that there's an awful lot of reactivity to it.
01:00:20
Speaker
When a tragedy occurs, then all of a sudden we all scurry around.
01:00:27
Speaker
That's when the news get involved, when it's reactive to the statistics.
01:00:32
Speaker
It's funny.
01:00:32
Speaker
Everyone's trying to achieve a common goal by getting the awareness out there, but unfortunately sometimes the people that the media focus on or interview or talk to are
01:00:43
Speaker
experts but experts for yeah i don't know like i don't know like i feel like me and lee we're like we're like the only um well i i wouldn't yeah bits and pieces uh going in our schools and stuff and it's not a competition about who does what but i think the common goal is is to get as much awareness out there as we can and
01:01:07
Speaker
try and get as much media and government support as we can as well.
01:01:11
Speaker
Now that we are a charity, now that we are a charity, it's our right.
01:01:18
Speaker
We need to get it out there.
01:01:19
Speaker
We need to be able to get as many people involved, not just here in Australia but around the world and touching base on how important just water safety is in general.
01:01:28
Speaker
It doesn't matter if it's on the coast, inland, waterways,
01:01:32
Speaker
It's very important for people to understand the hidden dangers, the hidden risks, things that people don't think about.
01:01:37
Speaker
And like you said, the depth could be submerged objects, could be sediment on the bottom, people get stuck.
01:01:42
Speaker
There's all sorts of different things that could happen.
01:01:44
Speaker
But I think a lot of people don't think that will happen to them.
01:01:47
Speaker
That's a problem.
01:01:48
Speaker
And more people drown in land in Australia than they actually do at the coast.
01:01:53
Speaker
Considering we all mainly live around the coast, there are actually more inland drownings than at the coast.
01:02:02
Speaker
Well, you know, and much of that is probably driven by the fact when you look at the sea and the break is big, you're not going to get in if you can't swim.
01:02:11
Speaker
Well, unless you're at one high, then you're definitely getting in.
01:02:17
Speaker
You're getting in anyway, whatever happens, yeah.
01:02:19
Speaker
But it is interesting.
01:02:22
Speaker
And I think some of those areas where we don't often look at, and that is ponds in the back garden and inflatable pools for the kids or having a swimming pool or even tragically leaving
01:02:37
Speaker
you know, kids in baths, it doesn't have to be, it doesn't have to be a big body of water with a tide or a rip or cold for drowning to occur.
01:02:47
Speaker
And I think, again, that message, you know, there's a continuum along which, and it's why specialists, you know, advising and reiterating.
01:02:57
Speaker
And on inland properties here, you know, your pool is fenced to everything, everything.
01:03:02
Speaker
And then, you know, 100 metres to the left is a huge dam.
01:03:08
Speaker
You know, it's like, and water is just like a magnet for kids.
01:03:13
Speaker
They love it.
01:03:13
Speaker
They absolutely are born to it.
01:03:15
Speaker
So, yeah.
01:03:17
Speaker
Well, our first, in our part to tackle all of this, Greg, April, no, not April, May is going to be Live, Learn, Survive's first charity challenge because I don't know if you've read that.
01:03:33
Speaker
So it was done in 2014.
01:03:36
Speaker
But the World Health Organization did a report dedicated solely to drowning.
01:03:42
Speaker
Purely to drowning.
01:03:44
Speaker
And point three, other than, you know, supervision of children and removing water, which is like, you know, pretty impossible.
01:03:51
Speaker
And then the third point of action was educate young children, school-aged children.
01:03:56
Speaker
That was the, you know, solution.
01:03:59
Speaker
And so basically the statistic of 42 people drown every hour of every day somewhere in the world.
01:04:09
Speaker
Our main challenge is going to be what's your 42?
01:04:12
Speaker
So my good friend here, that's where the 42 kilometers, sort of the marathon kind of thing.
01:04:19
Speaker
So Matthew, what's your 42?
01:04:20
Speaker
Yeah, so I'm not doing one, but two.
01:04:23
Speaker
I'm running on the first day of May.
01:04:25
Speaker
I'm running a marathon around Sydney to raise awareness for drowning prevention.
01:04:29
Speaker
And I'm also doing a marathon around Brisbane on the last weekend of May.
01:04:34
Speaker
Yeah.
01:04:35
Speaker
So that's my 42.
01:04:36
Speaker
What's your 42, Leigh?
01:04:37
Speaker
I am throughout the month of May, I am going to be swimming 42 kilometres.
01:04:43
Speaker
And I haven't swam 42.
01:04:46
Speaker
Well, I did my five mile swim when I was like nine years old, Greg, you know, and that's like, that was the 70s.
01:04:54
Speaker
So I've not been as much of a swimmer, but I decided this was going to be my 42.
01:05:00
Speaker
So 28th of December, I hit the pool.
01:05:04
Speaker
I'm between 28th of December and where are we now?
01:05:07
Speaker
20th of January.
01:05:10
Speaker
So I've done 17 K's.
01:05:14
Speaker
So I'm like, right, that's it.
01:05:17
Speaker
I'm putting my hand up now.
01:05:18
Speaker
Well, now I've told Greg, so I've got to be honest.
01:05:20
Speaker
So this is it.
01:05:21
Speaker
I am swimming 42Ks in May.
01:05:25
Speaker
Yeah.
01:05:26
Speaker
So the whole point of it, Greg, is to just watch your 42.
01:05:30
Speaker
And obviously over the years, we want to keep doing these, build up enough momentum around the world and around Australia for people to get involved, to help donate towards our charity, to be able to get our books,
01:05:42
Speaker
Now, our programs in the schools and people part of the rescue squad to learn life skills.
01:05:46
Speaker
However, we want to each year hopefully bring it down to what's your 32, what's your 22?
01:05:51
Speaker
So hopefully over time we see the average drowning, not just here in Australia but around the world, come down.
01:05:58
Speaker
And that's something where we can get on a world scale people involved.
01:06:02
Speaker
And then maybe by the time I'm 80...
01:06:04
Speaker
um it'll be watch your two i might still be able to just do i might be able to just do the two cases you see we've got to set a goal that's the goal and it's not just an extra challenge either you know obviously not everyone can do physical challenges and we understand that so it could be you know uh 42 meditations it could be 42 push-ups it could be
01:06:27
Speaker
42 yeah you know it could be 42 anything so we're going to try and get kids involved as well and if kids do you know what i think this is what what we want to do because a lot of this is getting the books into the schools because they've got the lessons in them and we want them in school libraries and um we've got um i think it's really nice that it say a child raises i don't know 50 that that child then
01:06:52
Speaker
gets five books for their school or whatever, $50 worth of books for their school, because then that child gets the absolute reward for their effort.
01:07:01
Speaker
They've given something to their school.
01:07:04
Speaker
And I think you just said it, you're most, you know, what you're so most proud of is your charity work.
01:07:11
Speaker
So if that child can think I did my hard work, got this for my school library, that's good for kids' self-esteem.
01:07:18
Speaker
And there's so much stuff around that's not good for self-esteem.
01:07:21
Speaker
kids' self-esteem.
01:07:23
Speaker
So, yeah, there's two of us here and then we're like, I don't know what we're going to do.
01:07:29
Speaker
I'm in.
01:07:29
Speaker
Listen, I'm in.
01:07:30
Speaker
So, Greg, can we have you as you're not putting me on the spot?
01:07:33
Speaker
Feel free to say no afterwards.
01:07:35
Speaker
Our unofficial UK ambassador.
01:07:38
Speaker
Yeah.
01:07:40
Speaker
That's it.
01:07:41
Speaker
I'm just sitting there thinking what can I do?
01:07:45
Speaker
But, yeah, listen, I am in.
01:07:48
Speaker
Just say that one more time for me, Greg, one more time that you're in.
01:07:52
Speaker
I'm definitely... I just wanted to play the music.
01:08:00
Speaker
I just wanted to play the music.
01:08:05
Speaker
So now we've just got a few quick questions.
01:08:08
Speaker
We've grilled you enough, Greg.
01:08:11
Speaker
We'll give you some easier questions.
01:08:14
Speaker
Relax a little bit.
01:08:17
Speaker
So if you weren't in your chosen career, what would you do?
01:08:25
Speaker
An astronaut.
01:08:28
Speaker
Love to be an astronaut.
01:08:29
Speaker
I think we can see you there with Tim Peake, actually, having a chitter-chatter in space.
01:08:34
Speaker
Yeah.
01:08:35
Speaker
That'd be good.
01:08:36
Speaker
Is it just looking down on the Earth or do you have an interest in astrophysics or, you know, the space or what's the – why astronaut?
01:08:46
Speaker
I think –
01:08:50
Speaker
multiple reasons.
01:08:51
Speaker
I think the idea of weightlessness and the impact of that, and we did some work, you know, did some research work a few years ago now on the impact on what's called baroreceptor response.
01:09:02
Speaker
So blood pressure control with weightlessness.
01:09:04
Speaker
I think just experiencing that would be incredible.
01:09:08
Speaker
I think the, imagine the night sky from, from the international space.
01:09:14
Speaker
Do you know what I mean?
01:09:16
Speaker
In terms of that stargazing and that sort of stuff.
01:09:18
Speaker
I think, you know, it's not, it's not my area, but I just think.
01:09:21
Speaker
Yeah.
01:09:23
Speaker
We were just in the States.
01:09:25
Speaker
Didn't we have the best couple of hours in the Griffith Observatory?
01:09:28
Speaker
The LA Observatory.
01:09:29
Speaker
Yeah.
01:09:30
Speaker
Yeah.
01:09:31
Speaker
What a place.
01:09:32
Speaker
They had a telescope focused on the sun and we could see the sunspots and all this.
01:09:37
Speaker
It was amazing.
01:09:39
Speaker
Oh, amazing.
01:09:40
Speaker
Amazing.
01:09:41
Speaker
Okay.
01:09:41
Speaker
So go, Maxine.
01:09:43
Speaker
Mates, I've got to hear a book you love or your favourite book that you love, a book that you love.
01:09:50
Speaker
That you think everyone should read.
01:09:52
Speaker
Yeah.
01:09:54
Speaker
You've been apart from mine.
01:09:55
Speaker
Obviously.
01:09:56
Speaker
You know what?
01:09:57
Speaker
You two.
01:09:58
Speaker
I want to ask Maxie's favourite book and he goes, do you want Maxie the Lifeguard 1, 2 or 3?
01:10:03
Speaker
I was like, seriously?
01:10:05
Speaker
Very predictable, boys.
01:10:08
Speaker
I give supply.
01:10:09
Speaker
I want to publish a book called Greg.
01:10:10
Speaker
Give it to us.
01:10:11
Speaker
If anyone wants to.
01:10:13
Speaker
Well, Achieve the Impossible.
01:10:15
Speaker
Achieve the Impossible is the one that sort of covers all the comet relief challenges and basically the way we structure much of what we chatted about today, actually.
01:10:25
Speaker
It's an interesting one when it comes to books.
01:10:28
Speaker
Do you know what?
01:10:31
Speaker
The Picture of Dorian Gray, I think, is, you know, I've sort of set myself a challenge a couple of years ago to read the classics.
01:10:41
Speaker
Yeah.
01:10:42
Speaker
And I've read quite a few of them.
01:10:44
Speaker
The authors aren't alive now, but I can tell you some of them are hard going.
01:10:49
Speaker
But The Picture of Doreen Gray really is really quite an exceptional.
01:10:53
Speaker
Amazing.
01:10:54
Speaker
I'll have to check that out.
01:10:56
Speaker
That makes me sound a lot more intelligent than mine.
01:10:58
Speaker
Well, I'm impressed.
01:10:59
Speaker
I'm ready.
01:11:00
Speaker
I'm impressed.
01:11:01
Speaker
I'll be there.
01:11:03
Speaker
So we both love like a bit of a podcast podcast.
01:11:06
Speaker
Have you got a favourite podcast that you can share?
01:11:09
Speaker
Because we love getting a podcast here.
01:11:11
Speaker
Yours?
01:11:11
Speaker
Well, obviously.
01:11:13
Speaker
Your podcast.
01:11:16
Speaker
Don't pretend that you've ever listened to Audrey.
01:11:19
Speaker
Come on.
01:11:20
Speaker
I love it.
01:11:21
Speaker
Except this one.
01:11:22
Speaker
I always do.
01:11:25
Speaker
No, listen, I do.
01:11:26
Speaker
I do.
01:11:29
Speaker
No, listen, I love your podcast, guys.
01:11:31
Speaker
I think that, you know,
01:11:34
Speaker
Propulsion Swimming do a podcast, which is a great listen as well.
01:11:38
Speaker
And I think what I love about theirs is what I love about yours.
01:11:40
Speaker
And that is sort of the eclectic nature of it is that, you know, I'm not listening to the same thing repeated over and over again.
01:11:46
Speaker
It's different every time.
01:11:47
Speaker
And that's for me that the beauty of a podcast is actually the variety.
01:11:52
Speaker
Yeah.
01:11:53
Speaker
My husband said it's like, well, one, he said, I listen to it because then I find out what's going on in life.
01:11:59
Speaker
And then he said that it's like sitting in a cafe with you.
01:12:04
Speaker
And that's what we want.
01:12:05
Speaker
Like, you know, we got, we know that like there's kids all over the world.
01:12:09
Speaker
And I say kids because to me, everyone's a kid, you know, younger people all over, you know, and it's like, we want them to feel like they're just catching up with a couple of mates.
01:12:18
Speaker
Yeah.
01:12:19
Speaker
It's good fun.
01:12:21
Speaker
We enjoy doing it and we love talking to special guests like yourself.
01:12:24
Speaker
And we actually want to,
01:12:26
Speaker
focus a little bit more this year of getting more guests on to give the viewers or the listeners, I should say.
01:12:33
Speaker
The viewers, all the viewers out there.
01:12:34
Speaker
The listeners that listen in each week, you know, to give people like yourself some really good, strong information to be able to be better in life.
01:12:44
Speaker
Yeah.
01:12:44
Speaker
Mate.
01:12:45
Speaker
I could say there's a couple more questions here, but what we've spoken today is spot on.
01:12:49
Speaker
Absolutely.
01:12:51
Speaker
So this is a bit of a, I'm going to say a tough one, but, you know, a bit more of a reflection.
01:12:56
Speaker
What advice would you give to your 16-year-old self?
01:13:04
Speaker
It will be all right.
01:13:05
Speaker
Oh, I like that.
01:13:07
Speaker
It will be all right.
01:13:09
Speaker
Just don't worry about it.
01:13:12
Speaker
And I think it's interesting.
01:13:13
Speaker
It goes back to what we were saying earlier, but that focus on that focus, not necessarily on failure, but that focus on the things that we can't change.
01:13:21
Speaker
I think, you know what, just keep going.
01:13:23
Speaker
I had this conversation with a mate of mine the other day, and I said, you know what?
01:13:26
Speaker
And I have this conversation with my wife every day.
01:13:29
Speaker
She's like, what's going on?
01:13:31
Speaker
I said, don't worry about it.
01:13:33
Speaker
We'll get there in the end.
01:13:34
Speaker
And I think, honestly, the older you get, the more you realise, just it'll be all right.
01:13:39
Speaker
it will be all right.
01:13:40
Speaker
Just keep going and, you know, be, be the best that you can be.
01:13:45
Speaker
Yeah.
01:13:46
Speaker
And, and you know what?
01:13:47
Speaker
Take, take every opportunity.
01:13:50
Speaker
Like we, we went to the States.
01:13:52
Speaker
We have no idea what we were doing, but we thought, you know what?
01:13:56
Speaker
We'll make some friends and it was epic.
01:13:59
Speaker
So, so yeah, absolutely.
01:14:02
Speaker
So from,
01:14:04
Speaker
I always say that, and I say that to kids, is that often, you know, people often talk about, you know, it's about opportunity.
Opportunities and Resilience
01:14:10
Speaker
And actually, it's not about opportunity.
01:14:12
Speaker
It's about taking opportunity.
01:14:15
Speaker
And that's, you know, that's where it happens.
01:14:17
Speaker
That's where the magic happens, is by taking that.
01:14:19
Speaker
And you know what?
01:14:20
Speaker
Not every opportunity will work out.
01:14:23
Speaker
But that's all right.
01:14:24
Speaker
Because if you don't take it, you'll never know it's going to work out.
01:14:26
Speaker
And you create the opportunity as well.
01:14:27
Speaker
And when someone tells you no, we're big in like, when someone tells you no,
01:14:32
Speaker
I go, I don't know where I get this from or whatever.
01:14:36
Speaker
I go, no, it's a no from you.
01:14:39
Speaker
I'll try the next one.
01:14:40
Speaker
Cause I had four people tell me I would never live in Australia.
01:14:44
Speaker
Well, unless the planet change, I've been living in Australia for a few years, you know?
01:14:47
Speaker
And it was like, no, you don't think I've got it, what it takes to get there, but I'll find someone else.
01:14:54
Speaker
And one lady gave me the finest chink of life.
01:14:58
Speaker
And it was like, that's all I needed.
01:15:00
Speaker
I was like, right, we're going to run with that.
01:15:02
Speaker
Yeah.
01:15:03
Speaker
Run with that.
01:15:04
Speaker
Exactly.
01:15:04
Speaker
Perfect.
01:15:05
Speaker
So what does success look like to you then, Greg?
01:15:11
Speaker
That is very simple and it's happiness.
01:15:13
Speaker
Love that.
01:15:14
Speaker
Happiness, mate.
01:15:15
Speaker
Very well.
01:15:16
Speaker
That is all.
01:15:16
Speaker
That is the only success.
01:15:18
Speaker
The only success that matters.
01:15:19
Speaker
Happiness.
01:15:20
Speaker
I love it.
01:15:21
Speaker
Brilliant.
01:15:23
Speaker
And mate, that, yeah, there's nothing really more to say to that.
01:15:25
Speaker
That's awesome.
01:15:27
Speaker
Mate, there's two more to go.
01:15:28
Speaker
This is the last one.
01:15:30
Speaker
Then the last one Lee's going to say, but if you could be a first responder, what service would it be?
01:15:44
Speaker
Wow.
01:15:46
Speaker
That's a really tricky one.
01:15:50
Speaker
That is a really tricky one.
The Role of First Responders
01:15:52
Speaker
Look, you can base your opinion just on the uniform, if you like, Greg, honestly.
01:15:59
Speaker
I could do that.
01:16:00
Speaker
Do you know, it would probably be ambient, I would think.
01:16:04
Speaker
I could see you.
01:16:05
Speaker
But I think, you know, first responders across the board are heroes.
01:16:09
Speaker
Yeah.
01:16:10
Speaker
You know, there's absolutely no doubt about that because on a regular basis, they put themselves in danger to save others.
01:16:16
Speaker
And I think that, you know, whether it's the fire service, you know,
01:16:20
Speaker
whoever the first responder is, but I think probably just because of my background and where I've come from, I think the ambulance crews, and sadly in the UK they're here striking currently over paying conditions, but the job they do is second to none.
01:16:35
Speaker
And didn't the pandemic show us that the first responders were the new rock stars really?
01:16:41
Speaker
Yeah.
01:16:42
Speaker
weren't they?
01:16:43
Speaker
The frontline.
01:16:44
Speaker
Like I said, you know, Maxie, you know, you're on the frontline, you know, everyone's isolating, everyone's staying home, but you've got to go to work and you're facing the general public day in, day out, the people in the hospitals, the people basically keeping people safe.
01:17:04
Speaker
And, you know, that's really where, like we were in the pandemic,
01:17:08
Speaker
as everyone was, we created the rescue squad because we thought we're online.
01:17:13
Speaker
We don't know how long this is gonna last.
01:17:16
Speaker
This may be something that might inspire the next wave of first responders.
01:17:20
Speaker
And that's where the whole thing came from.
01:17:24
Speaker
And that's why we called it the rescue squad.
01:17:27
Speaker
And again, what I love about what you guys do is, I think the important thing is that young or old, doesn't matter how old you are, we can all be first responders.
01:17:37
Speaker
You know, if you just for some stats, a cardiac arrest in the general population, so outside of hospital, has got a survival rate of about 10%.
01:17:48
Speaker
Not much.
01:17:49
Speaker
Yeah.
01:17:50
Speaker
It'd be about the same year.
01:17:52
Speaker
Yeah.
01:17:52
Speaker
Same here in Australia.
01:17:54
Speaker
Yeah.
01:17:55
Speaker
And yet CPR.
01:17:57
Speaker
that basic life support, all the stuff that you guys talk about, the stuff that we all do for, you know, as part of being a lifeguard and now the RLSS here in the UK have set up what's called the National Lifeguard Academy, which is focused on young people.
01:18:11
Speaker
You know,
01:18:12
Speaker
Giving CPR, being a first responder right there can save someone's life.
01:18:18
Speaker
Whether it's post-drowning, whether it's dad on the beach who's had a cardiac arrest, or whether you're walking through the mall and grandma collapses.
01:18:28
Speaker
You know, we can all be first responders.
Inspiring Future Lifesavers and Final Thoughts
01:18:31
Speaker
We can all save a life.
01:18:32
Speaker
And I think that's the real thing.
01:18:34
Speaker
And that's why we've created the Rescue Squad, again, for people to learn these core skills or these life skills.
01:18:40
Speaker
They'll be able to help themselves and help others too.
01:18:42
Speaker
And, you know, you're not on the head.
01:18:44
Speaker
We've got a girl in the Rescue Squad who's just gone to St.
01:18:47
Speaker
Andrew's Uni doing medicine.
01:18:50
Speaker
And she had one of her first lecture lessons.
01:18:53
Speaker
And she was the only one in the class that you quote the...
01:18:57
Speaker
the correct terminology that knew the difference between, what was it?
01:19:02
Speaker
Basically, she's the only one in the class that knew the correct answer and a tutor said to her,
01:19:07
Speaker
That's excellent.
01:19:08
Speaker
How did you know that?
01:19:09
Speaker
And she said, Maxi's Rescue Squad.
01:19:13
Speaker
Yeah.
01:19:14
Speaker
It's awesome, mate.
01:19:16
Speaker
But you know what?
01:19:17
Speaker
As a first responder, you know, I love what I do and I wouldn't change it as a lifeguard and a firefighter and being on the front line in and out of schools and around the world as well.
01:19:28
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
01:19:30
Speaker
Mate, you've been amazing.
01:19:31
Speaker
Last question.
01:19:33
Speaker
The most important one, Greg.
01:19:37
Speaker
Oh my gosh.
01:19:38
Speaker
Can you give us your go-to song to add to our Max's Rescue Squad playlist?
01:19:45
Speaker
So the one song that you put on that, you know, when you've got to like make a withdrawal from the bank because it's been really tough, the one song that will change your mood.
01:19:55
Speaker
What fires you up, basically?
01:19:57
Speaker
What fires you up?
01:20:01
Speaker
God, it's plenty of them.
01:20:02
Speaker
Let's go with Hootie and the Blowfish.
01:20:05
Speaker
top time it's on uh correct review uh song number eight i even know where it is it's all right it's added added that is your song listen to it it's amazing in fact the whole that was amazing it is in there so it's on spotify maxi's rescue squad playlist
01:20:35
Speaker
the most eclectic bunch of songs, but everyone's like, you know, we got like, you know, kids in Germany telling us and like, you're like, oh, this is somebody new, you know, it's just this real bag of, but everyone's a good, you know, thumping anthem of,
01:20:54
Speaker
positivity.
01:20:55
Speaker
So, so no, it's been, yeah, amazing.
01:20:59
Speaker
Great choice.
01:21:00
Speaker
Great choice, mate.
01:21:01
Speaker
It's added to the squad now, but mate, before we say our final goodbyes, mate, just from me personally, it's been an absolute pleasure speaking to you, you know, from watching some of the amazing challenges you've done,
01:21:18
Speaker
over the last number of years.
01:21:20
Speaker
I won't say too many years because he's still young.
01:21:22
Speaker
He's still looked as good as ever, mate.
01:21:27
Speaker
But we do want to ask you one thing about Western Australia.
01:21:31
Speaker
Oh, yes.
01:21:32
Speaker
So before we – when I met you in Cabocham Lakes in April last year, we did say that we would love to catch up again one day.
01:21:42
Speaker
And I reckon if we can in a perfect world, I know you haven't because you said it's something that you want to do, is the Rotten S swim.
01:21:50
Speaker
Cottesloe to Rotten S swim, the Roto swim.
01:21:52
Speaker
Don't worry, mate.
01:21:54
Speaker
There's not that many things in grey suits, but...
01:21:57
Speaker
If there is ever an opportunity to do it as a charity team, I'd love to do it with you, mate.
01:22:02
Speaker
So the offer's on the table.
01:22:04
Speaker
Don't have to do it.
01:22:04
Speaker
I know we're busy people and we do bits and pieces, but I think over time it would be awesome to be able to maybe see if we can make that happen and Live and Survive will be the charity we can raise some awareness for.
01:22:17
Speaker
And we can do books.
01:22:18
Speaker
And you know what?
01:22:19
Speaker
We can do stuff for going to the UK schools and the Aussie schools and make it like a,
01:22:25
Speaker
You know, like a little big hug of education around the globe.
01:22:29
Speaker
Yeah, we'll see.
01:22:30
Speaker
But just get that in the back of your mind.
01:22:31
Speaker
I know you get a little bit of a thing in the back of your mind.
01:22:33
Speaker
Yeah, just put that if you've ever got a spare February and you think, what can I do now?
01:22:40
Speaker
Oh, Maxi, Roddo, let's go.
01:22:41
Speaker
19.6.
01:22:41
Speaker
Let's do it.
01:22:42
Speaker
No, listen, man, I'm up for it.
01:22:44
Speaker
Do it as a duo.
01:22:51
Speaker
So, yeah, it'll be awesome to do it with you, mate.
01:22:53
Speaker
And I've done it.
01:22:53
Speaker
You can see the bottom the whole way.
01:22:55
Speaker
There's not that many sharks.
01:22:57
Speaker
There's only six people.
01:22:59
Speaker
It's a beautiful part of the world.
01:23:02
Speaker
Didn't you say to me, Greg, I think years ago when we very first emailed, you told me, have you got a mate in Perth and you'd always wanted to do rotto?
01:23:09
Speaker
Yeah.
01:23:11
Speaker
No.
01:23:12
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
01:23:13
Speaker
So I actually took the family out.
01:23:15
Speaker
I was on a lecture tour at UWA.
01:23:19
Speaker
My mate is a prof there at UWA.
01:23:22
Speaker
And we actually stayed on Cotslow Beach.
01:23:23
Speaker
And we took a trip across the road on this island.
01:23:25
Speaker
I mean, it's a fabulous island.
01:23:28
Speaker
Yeah, it's one of those things I've always sort of... In my 50th year, I did 50 swims around the world.
01:23:35
Speaker
And it was probably the one that I wish I'd included.
01:23:37
Speaker
I just couldn't make it work.
01:23:38
Speaker
Yeah.
01:23:39
Speaker
So just one condition, Greg, you've got to bring Ben, because I know that Ben and I have a great time on the boat while you two are swimming.
01:23:50
Speaker
Absolutely.
01:23:51
Speaker
You've got to bring Ben because he's your wingman, you know, and that's like, you know, so, so yeah, it's, it's, so plant that seed, you know, we've got to have a goal, Greg, we'll just plant that one on the, on the to-do list.
01:24:06
Speaker
Pleasure, mate.
01:24:06
Speaker
Good.
01:24:07
Speaker
And our 42 as well.
01:24:08
Speaker
42.
01:24:08
Speaker
Just, yeah, let us know what you think.
01:24:12
Speaker
Put your think caps on, mate.
01:24:13
Speaker
And it would be awesome to have you involved as our UK ambassador.
01:24:17
Speaker
Yes.
01:24:17
Speaker
100%, mate.
01:24:19
Speaker
Thank you.
01:24:20
Speaker
That's brilliant.
01:24:21
Speaker
Listen, thank you for having me on.
01:24:23
Speaker
It is an absolute pleasure.
01:24:25
Speaker
And I am properly a fan of everything you guys do.
01:24:28
Speaker
I think you're amazing.
01:24:29
Speaker
Keep it up.
01:24:29
Speaker
Thanks, mate.
01:24:30
Speaker
Thank you so much.
01:24:31
Speaker
We will end this and then we'll say our goodbyes.
01:24:34
Speaker
Yeah, mate, again, so great to see you and thank you for your time.
01:24:38
Speaker
We love you.
01:24:41
Speaker
You've been so generous with your time, Greg.
01:24:43
Speaker
Thanks so much.
01:24:45
Speaker
Absolute pleasure.