Iowa Gravel Series

Chris McQueen: Well, welcome everybody to another episode of the Iowa Gravel Series Podium podcast. It’s been a minute, but we are back, getting some wonderful guests here on the podcast for 2025. And really, we’re starting off with probably one of my favorites because he was the one who first kicked my trash in cycling in Iowa. He took me out for a ride and totally blew my doors off, but he said I had an engine, which helped me out. And then I realized I will never probably have the same engine as this man, the one, the true, wonderful Jonathan Wait. We’re so excited to have you, Jonathan. Thank you so much for coming back on the podcast. I think this is your third time, is it? If not, maybe fourth.

Jonathan Wait: It’s third. No, it’s the second time one-on-one. The other time was kind of a panel discussion. So, third time. Yeah.

Chris McQueen: Oh, that’s right. That’s right. Yeah, we’ve done the… I feel like the panel discussion is really, really hard to manage. So, I’m glad you’re willing to come back and do a one-on-one. So, if you have missed it in the past, go and find the older episodes. I’ll put it in the show notes or something like that for Jonathan because he is fantastic. A mountain of knowledge, a whole bunch of experience.

Jonathan Wait: I’m pretty sure my last episode had better numbers than Brian Johnson’s episode by a significant margin.

Chris McQueen: You know, whatever. So, there’s a little bit of a rivalry. I believe Brian lives in Omaha.

Jonathan Wait: So, he he also lives in an inferior state. Not like terribly inferior, but just a little bit less than Iowa. I think we’re we’re safe to say that, right?

Chris McQueen: Yep. 100%.

Jonathan Wait: He lives in Nebraska. We won’t hold just that against him. But Brian is a fantastic athlete in his own. He’s been on the gravel series many times.

Chris McQueen: Um, do I, is this the point where I bring up his mountain bike record against yours in gravel?

Jonathan Wait: Well, uh, no. I mean, he beat me three times this year and I only beat him twice. And this year marks… he beat me more this year than he had the previous 10. But I think grand total, he and I going head-to-head, he’s probably got like five wins versus my… more than five. So over the course of the career, I feel pretty good about it. But this year, goodness, he got me a few times and I did not like that. But we don’t need to talk about Brian Johnson.

Chris McQueen: The whole… Yeah. I mean, how did… I wonder how he did at Little Sugar today? Let’s see. Okay, you look at Little Sugar and then I will say a few things about Brian Johnson. Really, so I can say a few things about Nika. I will say that Brian Johnson and his daughter… So, if you’re not familiar with Nika, it’s the National Interscholastic Cycling Association. It’s a junior DVO mountain biking league. There’s a Nebraska league. There isn’t yet an Iowa league. I would think that actually would be really fun to have. I know there’s some strong DVO mountain biking leagues in Iowa that aren’t part of Nika. In any case, he is a fellow Nika coach and so Brian has my deep respect. Because he and his daughter is super fast and they have a good time. So that’s pretty cool. What, how did he do at Big or Little Sugar?

Jonathan Wait: I don’t know. I’m not finding it.

Chris McQueen: All right. Well, we’ll… if you find it, we’ll come back to it. Okay. Let’s start off with a few things, Jonathan, for your 2024. Because I went through… I don’t usually do this, but I went and looked through your Strava for the year. And here’s my first question to kind of maybe ground this conversation a little bit: What was your core… what was your ‘A’ race this year? Was it Core 4 or Gravel Worlds?

Jonathan Wait: Um, Gravel Worlds was my… Yeah.

Chris McQueen: Okay. That was your A-race. So that was… and that was really… Was that driving a lot of your training and what you were focusing on? Because I mean, I saw a lot of mountain biking at Manawa and Lewis and Clark and, you know, you’re still doing crits and you’re still doing Wednesday night worlds and you’re hitting all the different disciplines. So, I looking up to it, I would have thought the Core 4 would have been something that you were focused on. So tell me a little bit about Gravel Worlds.

Jonathan Wait: So, like I do a lot of things, but that’s really just because I enjoy racing. So I do all the racing I can do, and typically I don’t travel very far to race, and so that means I got to do whatever people are doing. So that’s why I do all the different kinds. But Gravel Worlds last year, I had gotten 12th, which was an unusually good result for me, 12th in the pro field. And I wanted to return to see what I could do. And it was a much stronger field this year. Like much stronger field, it was wild. And I think I got 28th.

Chris McQueen: That’s what I saw in Strava.

Jonathan Wait: 28th. Yeah. Decent result. Whatever. I don’t think I… I didn’t have the standout result this year that I had last year. I feel like my performance just wasn’t as good. But the week previous at Core 4, I had a very good result where I cracked top 10 in that race. It’s Eastern Iowa, and it’s a really interesting course where, of course, you got gravel, and then there’s supposed to be single track, but they had to cut that out because of the rain. But then there’s also like city walkways and you kind of race through the city. So, it was really interesting.

And I had a terrible start to the day and then just kind of rallied over the course of the 93 or 94 miles. And it got really hot, and I tend to perform well in the heat. And so I was able to fight into a top 10 and got to stand on the podium with a lot of these international pros. And the reason I stuck around so late to stand on the podium was because I was supposed to be standing next to Lachlan Morton, the legendary unbound, all the things he’s done. He didn’t stick around. So, I’m just standing next to some… of Canada, probably, that I don’t know.

Chris McQueen: Lachlan didn’t… It was because Lachlan didn’t take first that he didn’t stand around?

Jonathan Wait: I don’t know. Well, I mean, the podium was very late. Like, I remember twiddling my thumbs for like five hours or something waiting to get on the podium. So, maybe he just didn’t feel like spending the time to stand on the podium. I think he got seventh or eighth or something.

Chris McQueen: I think he got eighth and he didn’t feel like sticking around that long for a podium for eighth place.

Jonathan Wait: So, he wasn’t there. That was a disappointment, but it was still a great day, a good event. I’d recommend, you know, it’s the biggest gravel race in Iowa and I recommend everyone get out there and try it. It was really interesting.

Chris McQueen: Do you think the Core 4 format is the future of cycling in the US?

Jonathan Wait: No. You mean like lots of different surfaces and stuff?

Chris McQueen: Yeah, the multi-surface. Like you look at the Trek Checkout that just went out, you know, with its 50 mil of travel in a gravel bike sort of thing. Like I feel like the industry would love to have us do more with that type of bike that’s hybrid. Kind of try and do it all. Push the envelope on the tech. What do you think?

Jonathan Wait: Um, I don’t know. I think my opinion, not being a great bike handler, so maybe I’m wrong, but my opinion is if you’re going to try and make your gravel bike versatile so that it’s able to, for example, handle single track, the single biggest thing you can do is put mountain bike tires on your gravel bike.

Chris McQueen: Yeah, that’s what I saw. It looks like you had what, 2.2 Continental somethings that you’ve been running more on your gravel bike.

Jonathan Wait: Continental Race Kings. Yeah, you can fit those on the Giant Revolt. So, the Giant Revolt is the perfect blend of snappy race bike that still has the capacity to take mountain bike tires. And I don’t know, I’ve never ridden a suspension gravel bike. I don’t think it would make me any faster, but maybe that’s because I’m not really good at pushing my equipment to its limit when it comes to bike handling.

But the Core 4, I think, is a really interesting event. Will it become the format that other events follow? I don’t know. There were some moments where we were racing, and it’s on a Saturday morning and we’re racing on a bike path. And I told the guys I was with, I was like, “I’m not racing right now because there’s old people out on a Saturday walk with their dog, and I just don’t feel comfortable blasting past them at 25 miles an hour.”

Chris McQueen: And like, did they agree or was that controversial as you were on the path there with them? Was were there people like, “Well, whatever you think, see ya”?

Jonathan Wait: No, they agreed. It felt a bit weird racing on the same trail as pedestrians. And that was only a couple of miles of the race and, you know, over a 100-mile race, making the decision to chill out so you don’t run into an old person’s dog, I don’t think is going to win or lose you the race. But at the same time, I think that’s going to be a niche unique to Core 4. I don’t think racing through urban terrain is going to be the next wave of the future.

Chris McQueen: Yeah. I mean, do you think that because the logistics of closing down things… like, would it be fun and be more interesting if it was closed down and you didn’t have to worry… that being able to do kind of all-surface racing? If you didn’t have to worry about hitting grandma, would that be… that would be better?

Jonathan Wait: Uh-huh.

Chris McQueen: It is a challenge. Like as a race director, Core 4, I think, has more… I mean, they’re closer to 600, 800 people. I don’t know what their numbers were this last year, but that’s usually where they’ve been. I don’t know if they’ve cracked a thousand yet, but that’s still a pretty good-sized event in Iowa.

Jonathan Wait: That’s big. That’s big. And let me clarify, I’m not criticizing the event. You know what you’re getting into. They make it clear you’re racing through urban terrain for a small portion of this race, and you just need to… bike racers need to be wise and have good judgment. And that’s why we judged that we shouldn’t be racing on a crowded walking path. And it wasn’t… for the most part, Core 4 was a very safe place to race.

Chris McQueen: It was, and it was great. It was my intent to get out to Core 4 this year and just work-life stuff didn’t make that really possible. But it’s the one that I definitely think would… I think it is interesting from a… like the future of bikes in the US. And I think it is a format that is interesting, even as a race director, because the idea of being able to put a lot of different formats on it, not being restricted to a certain type of terrain, and challenging people in different ways and just novelty for, you know, the 90% of the people that aren’t racing on an event like that…

I mean, this is what I kind of did a little bit of that with Glenwood. Probably not quite as well as Core 4. But you’re the only one… you in the room here, you’re the only one that’s actually raced Glenwood and Core 4. I’ll ask you, would you want Glenwood to be more multi-surface than even it is? Or do you think it’s fine? Because the Glenwood gravel, we went through a park and did some really… I would call it dumb, steep mountain biking parts, you know, some trails, and then went on some other weird surfaces, and then there was some roads. So, what do you think when you think of Glenwood? Is that a good direction to go?

Jonathan Wait: I’m ready to answer. Yes, I liked the Glenwood event. I really did like the portion that was through the park, and I’ve watched cross country races in that park. You could expand how much time we spend in that park zipping around. I think that would be great.

Chris McQueen: Yeah, we’re… I’m also good friends with the cross country running coach in Glenwood with the Peverals. They’re fantastic and they, you know, we’re not quite there yet in terms of like saying, “Hey, how many bikes can I run down the cross country course?” But yeah, so I was trying to be respectful and not tear anything up.

Jonathan Wait: Bikes wouldn’t tear it up. You’d be fine. I liked that part of the course. What do you feel about the hooligans? Funny.

Chris McQueen: You might have to fill in the blanks on what that is in case someone doesn’t know what we’re talking about.

Jonathan Wait: So, periodically I’d be riding and then there’d be a batch of kids at the side of the road squirting me with Super Soakers. That was funny.

Chris McQueen: Um, there was one dude in particular that was really… said it was one of his favorite things to do was squirt you with a squirt gun. It was a Johnson kid, I believe.

Jonathan Wait: No, no memory. No, I don’t know who that is.

Chris McQueen: Can I give a little color to that so that for our audience at home… I I’ll tell my side of it and you can deny all of this if you want. Um, there is… there’s a mutual friend that we have in Iowa. His name’s… well, he’s a young guy. His dad’s Jay Johnson. His son is Ethan Johnson. And for a short while, I believe Ethan Johnson and your daughter Olivia hung out a little bit.

Jonathan Wait: Oh yes. I guess I do remember that young man. Yeah, I remember him.

Chris McQueen: Um, I will say that I directed the Hooligans to not shoot any racers in the face. I don’t know if Ethan kept that rule.

Jonathan Wait: I don’t recall. I would have been happy to have gotten water on my face. Anywhere is fine. I remember I was riding hard and getting hot, so…

Chris McQueen: Oh, good. Good. I had totally forgotten about that now that you mentioned it. Interesting. Um, it was for Glenwood this year. I really wanted to bring a hometown feel to the race. I don’t know if I accomplished that goal, but the idea with the hooligans was kind of fun because we had an opportunity to recruit some of these younger people in the county and everything, and we donated to the cross country team and we donated to the Nika team that’s here in Mills County. And so, thank you for being a good sport with that and participating and letting us do some silly stuff to see if we can just encourage some donations and have a little fun. And hopefully have some of these young people see some really excellent racers like yourself and others out having fun on those roads and going super fast. A lot of them said that that was really cool. So, thank you for being a good sport on that.

Jonathan Wait: Yeah. No, it was fun. Thanks for coming on. It was a good idea.

Chris McQueen: Thanks. Um, all right. So, Core 4 and Gravel Worlds were a part, but Gravel Worlds was the A-race. So, maybe let’s go back to Gravel Worlds real quick because you said 28th, but I believe the probably the big deal was that you beat Brian Johnson.

Jonathan Wait: He started playing games. So, I said, “Okay, road strategy is I’m going to sit on your wheel and we see who wins the sprint.” And I got the sprint. So, yeah. Um, he and I rode together. I was… I got through the mud pit pretty unscathed in, like, I was probably 20th place coming out of the first mud pit. And I was actually on the eventual winner’s, Matt Beer’s, wheel. And he is not human. It was wild.

We take a turn out of the mud pit. I’m like, “Great. I’m gonna just sit on Matt Beer’s wheel. This is like 20 miles in. I’m still fresh. I’m gonna sit on his wheel, and he’s just going to tow me back into this race.” And he leans forward and he just starts putting out probably 500 watts. And I am just… well, I can’t do that.

So, for the next 60 miles, I just kind of tried to find a group, but there was a whole lot of pros who hadn’t gotten through the mud very well who were coming past me, and I couldn’t quite find anyone that matched very well. So, it took me about 80 miles to find a group that came rolling up behind me, which had Brian Johnson in it. And we rode with that group for a while until probably 130 miles. And then that group got broken up, and three of us made it to the finish out of that group together. And it came down to a sprint finish, and Brian Johnson had been attacking me for the prior 10 miles. And so I refused to pull through and I just sat on his wheel, which is the way it works. If you don’t want to sprint, I mean, all you could do is go slower. Work with the person, or if you give them a reason not to work with them, make sure you drop them. And he didn’t drop me, so I sprinted past him in the end.

Chris McQueen: It’s… it’s not the American way, it’s the Belgium way to race. So, tell me a little bit more about the mud. Like, were you running those wider mountain bike tires on Gravel Worlds, or what was it that got you through the mud faster than, you know, some of the pros? They just maybe are just not doing that stuff as much?

Jonathan Wait: My tire choice for Gravel Worlds was 45 mm Continental Terra Speeds, black chili compound, which those tires just won the UCI Gravel World Championship under Florian Vermeersch. I’m sure everyone saw that. The first thing everyone did was scroll in and say, “What tire was he rolling? What tire was he rolling?” Continental Terra Speeds, everyone. That’s why I had them on. I was not rolling mountain bike tires. I have opinions about mountain bike tires. They’re good under certain circumstances, but the gravel around Lincoln, I don’t think you need mountain bike tires. It’s my opinion.

Chris McQueen: It’s sandy, but it’s not… yeah, it’s not probably the best for that. So, you pretty much chalk it up to the tires and…

Jonathan Wait: I got through the mud. Oh, it’s tire clearance. Being able to get through mud… well, the mud around here, it’s not traction, it’s tire clearance. That’s all it is. And so if you’re rolling really, really fat tires on a muddy day, you’re going to feel bad about that. Or if you have one of these bikes… Can you believe there are gravel bikes that only have 45-millimeter capacity? Can you believe that?

Chris McQueen: I mean, I think mine… I put 45s on mine and I have just enough clearance on it. Um, I generally do okay, but I’m also not trying to like race through mud most of the time. Is this… this is on the Giant… the Giant Revolt?

Jonathan Wait: Oh, the Revolt. The Revolt.

Chris McQueen: What does the Revolt clear?

Jonathan Wait: I think the official is maybe 54, but I think my Continental Race Kings are 57. I might be wrong about those numbers, but I comfortably get my Race Kings on there.

Chris McQueen: I feel like I… I feel like I’ve chosen not to have something that wide purely out of aesthetic reasons. And I’m like, “Oh, the fork looks weird when you can clear 50, 55s on the front. It just looks dumb,” which is not a good reason to pick what your frame setup is and everything. I think you’ve got a better reason than I do, but that’s the only reason why I don’t worry about it too much.

The, uh… All right. So, mud. And then you mentioned Matt Beers and some of those pros.

Jonathan Wait: Insane how just easily he just accelerated away from me. I couldn’t stand his slipstream. That was crazy. Those guys are so fast. They make me, you know what they make me feel like? They make me feel like a 40-year-old accountant with a daughter in college and three boys still at home.

Chris McQueen: They made you feel your age. Yeah, Matt Beers… He’s sub-30, isn’t he? Like, he’s not that old.

Jonathan Wait: I don’t know.

Chris McQueen: I’ll have to go look it up. That is hard. Um, so let’s talk about that maybe for a little bit with age. How has it been? I feel like as I was looking back through your Strava, there were a lot of comments about how, you know, 40-year-old Jonathan is beating 35-year-old Jonathan or 37-year-old Jonathan. Do you feel like… is it the lifting heavy helping your back or your ego, or is it actually a time machine sending you back in time?

Jonathan Wait: So, it’s an accumulation of many things that I have been able to put together to maintain the facade that I still have improvements yet to make even though I am getting older. Like I just did a maximal effort and my heart rate I think maxed out at 183. I remember the days where I would go over 200 all the time. So, you know, you see these undeniable evidence of age.

Anyways, you see these, but you’re able to put together details that allow you to maintain good fitness. And it’s all of the above. It’s proper nutrition, fueling, trying to sleep right. That’s the one that I still have a lot of improvement to do on. Um, heat acclimation in a sauna, lifting heavy… all of those things together. Yeah, I can put out a good effort now compared to 10 years ago. Now, if I’d been doing all of those things 10 years ago, I would have been better than I am now. But 10 years ago, I just go and ride and like eat a Rice Krispie treat two hours in and think that that was nutrition.

Chris McQueen: And so let’s start with nutrition. What has changed with nutrition with this year? Like, how are you thinking about it differently?

Jonathan Wait: The carbohydrate revolution.

Chris McQueen: So you are carb doping.

Jonathan Wait: I’m carbing. Yep.

Chris McQueen: How many grams of carbs in a race situation are you consistently striving for an hour?

Jonathan Wait: 120.

Chris McQueen: 120. That’s a lot. A lot. I think anything over 100 people are like, “You are… you’re doing what…” What is your gut feeling as you’re pushing into this more and more carbs?

Jonathan Wait: Are you able… I… it feels great. I worry about the long-term impact of fueling that way, and like, I won’t touch the stuff in the wintertime. But here’s my recipe. Okay, here… I’m going to give everyone my recipe because you can go spend $4 a bottle on Maurten or you can do the following. Get on bulkfoods.com.

Chris McQueen: Are you doing the… you’re mixing your own maltodextrin?

Jonathan Wait: bulkfoods.com and buy maltodextrin. See, I have it sitting right here. I always have it nearby.

Chris McQueen: So, so you’re… what’s your… I mean, if you’re… okay, so the maltodextrin is essentially the carb. And so anything else that you’re putting in…

Jonathan Wait: It’s not… it’s not… that’s… it’s not just maltodextrin. Also on bulkfoods.com, buy yourself some fructose.

Chris McQueen: Fructose. Yeah. Okay.

Jonathan Wait: 44 g… this is per serving: 500 milliliters of water. Not 400, not 600. 500 milliliters of water. To that, you add… you mix your dry together. You mix 44 grams maltodextrin, 36 grams fructose. That’s 80 grams of carbs in 500. You mix them together first. So, you’re mixing your dry together. Otherwise, it’ll clump and you’ll never get a good solution.

Those are the main two ingredients. And then you add half a gram. So, you’re all going to go and get a precision scale off of Amazon. You’ll look like drug dealers, but you’re going to get a precision scale off of Amazon. And in that mix of 80 grams of carbs, you’re going to add 500 milligrams, or half a gram, of pectin and half a gram of sodium alginate. Okay, that’s the… that’s… that will turn it into what we call a hydrocarbon, everybody. A hydrocarbon.

Okay. And then two more ingredients. Two more ingredients. Salt. Sodium is sodium. Don’t buy special sodium. People are trying to sell you special sodium. No, just get salt.

Chris McQueen: Are you getting just straight table salt or… because I have heard folks prefer like the popcorn salt or things like that because it’s just tends to be a little bit finer and so it mixes in a little bit. But I mean, it should dissolve. It should just dissolve and become a solution, right? In theory.

Jonathan Wait: Correct. Correct. I use just regular table salt. And I personally need about 800 mg of sodium per liter of water. Now, salt is sodium chloride. So, I think I… in each bottle, I put about 700 milligrams of table salt. So, and then I put a shot of lemon juice. And so it tastes like a lemonade in my bottle. 80 grams of carbs per bottle. That’s the secret. Stop spending lots of money on your nutrition. That’s all you need. It’ll be 15 cents a bottle.

Chris McQueen: That’s a… that’s a good recipe. I feel like we had one of the Lowen brothers on not too long ago and he shared his recipe…

Jonathan Wait: Is it a hydrocarbon? Did he put in the pectin and sodium alginate?

Chris McQueen: I don’t remember. He might have mentioned it, but I don’t remember putting it down. Um, the pectin is interesting. Does it end up… in your mind, give… like, is that’s just… that’s not enough pectin. I mean, that’s just sweetening it basically.

Jonathan Wait: No, it makes it just… it makes it just a little viscous.

Chris McQueen: Yeah, it brings up the viscosity of it. Interesting. So no sweetness, just sour? Just a little sour? Is that what you like?

Jonathan Wait: Well, there’s 36 grams of fructose. It’s plenty sweet.

Chris McQueen: Plenty sweet. Yeah, that’s true. Interesting. Um, what else do I see? Oh, here’s my other question, is would you ever… like, I’ve seen people also do maple syrup instead of the fructose.

Jonathan Wait: I don’t know. I don’t know.

Chris McQueen: You don’t have to worry about the pectin at that point because it’s already a little…

Jonathan Wait: You… you want it to be a hydrocarbon. There’s magic to hydrocarbon. Do you know why?

Chris McQueen: Give me… Give me the… spill the tea, Jonathan.

Jonathan Wait: Then it’s not just your stomach absorbing the carbohydrates. It also… your intestines get in on the game. If it’s a hydrocarbon, it makes it to your intestines and you’re using all of your metabolic pathways to absorb this insane amount of carbohydrates that we never thought was possible. To prevent gut issues, it has to be a hydrocarbon, everybody. So it can get into… use your whole digestive tract.

Chris McQueen: Yeah. Yeah. And not just sitting like a rock in your stomach before it tries to pass on.

Jonathan Wait: I’m not telling everyone to buy sodium alginate on Amazon because I think it’s cute. There’s a reason you need to have the sodium alginate.

Chris McQueen: Where did you pick this up? Like, where… like, was this something that you picked up somewhere or who…

Jonathan Wait: That is Maurten’s recipe. Maurten… they’re the ones who started in marathon, and it’s $4 or something a serving. I just Googled it and that’s their recipe. So, I use their recipe.

Chris McQueen: There you go. And and we’re sharing it here. This is the type of info that you get and the valuable information that you get on the Iowa Gravel Series podcast. All right, we’ve been going for 30 minutes and so I want to hit a few other things real quick.

Um, so you also mentioned heat climatization with the sauna. How long have you had a sauna in your house and what’s kind of your regime there?

Jonathan Wait: I got the sauna in February and I sit in it as much time as I can spare. So, I’m a busy guy and I don’t get to spend as much time in my sauna as I’d like, but there’s… I feel like a lot of benefit, not just for cycling, but a lot of benefit to sauna-ing. Uh, and I bought… I don’t know, it was like two grand off of Amazon. The real trick, it’s an easy little box, right?

Chris McQueen: So, this is like a one-person, like phone booth sort of size thing.

Jonathan Wait: Two-person, two-person wide phone booth. Two people. And, you know, you just sit in there and think about the way things are going and bake. But the real trick is you need a dedicated 220… I’m all about the numbers, guys. You need a dedicated 220-volt outlet. You cannot plug this into a 110. All of these… they’re all 110. 220s are rare.

Chris McQueen: So, you might… what you would put your, like, your dryer, you would put your dryer into a 220 volt. And we’ve got some in our garage because I wanted to kind of, like, you know, be ready for EV vehicles and stuff like that. And those are usually… How many amps? Like, is this like a 20-amp circuit, 50-amp circuit?

Jonathan Wait: Like… You got me. I was pretending like I knew all this stuff about electronics. I don’t know. 220. I don’t know the amperage.

Chris McQueen: Okay. So, 220 volt. Um, did you have to have an electrician come and put this in or did you happen to have something that worked for you?

Jonathan Wait: I wanted to put it in the basement, and I had an electrician come to tell me how much it would be to wire it in, and he gave me some insane number. I was like, “Oh, uh, also could you check and see? I think I have one in the garage. Could you check and confirm for me?” And he confirmed it was 220. So, I was like, “I’ll just put it in the garage.” Which was a better place to put it because in the summer, I don’t want to be running a sauna in my house where I’m trying to keep things cool. So, I’m actually glad I put it in my garage.

Chris McQueen: Yeah. Kind of heats it. What have you noticed on your electric bill? Have you noticed anything?

Jonathan Wait: I don’t look… I don’t look at my electric bill.

Chris McQueen: I mean, we do live in Iowa. We live in one of the cheapest places for electricity. So, it is kind of a benefit for us.

Jonathan Wait: They’ll just burn a little bit more coal. I don’t care.

Chris McQueen: And we have a lot of wind. Like 60% of all electricity produced in Iowa is wind power.

Jonathan Wait: So, but all the incremental electricity is produced by…

Chris McQueen: Yeah, there’s a lot of coal. Okay. Yeah. No, that… but that’s there. You know, you’re not… we’re not… we’re not straight just, you know, rolling coal in Iowa.

Jonathan Wait: Yeah. That’s why all the Google facilities are built down here, because of the great wind. Oh, no. That’s why… that’s why they’re built right next to the coal-burning fire plant.

Chris McQueen: Right. No, I… Yeah, I know. I know exactly where all the energy from that coal-firing plant on 29 is going. Um, okay. You also mentioned… are you doing… So, I’ve been experimenting a little bit with creatine. And more of what I’ve been doing there is because I’m doing more strength training, because I’d like to climb some mountains and things. And also, I found that is actually really good when I want to get just some mental clarity in the morning, if I’m feeling kind of rough, if I’ve had a harder day or I didn’t get enough sleep. I’ll actually bolus on a 10 to, you know, 15 milligram effort of… or concoction of creatine. And for me, I feel like I have like just a lot more mental clarity. Have… Have you been using creatine? What’s your experience?

Jonathan Wait: Yes, I’m on the creatine. Um, mental clarity, I’m not sure. I’m not sure what that would feel like. But I did notice when I started doing it… I noticed… Now, maybe it’s in my brain, but I feel like I noticed a step function in my deadlifting. Um, and I went… like, when I say step function, I feel like I put up 25 pounds more than I had typically been doing after I had kind of loaded on creatine.

Uh, so you put this… this year was the first year I was doing creatine and heat acclimation. And you put those together… I have a bellwether workout that I do on the bike. And it’s just six 3-minute VO2 intervals. And in my mind, I try and hit 400 watts or more for each of those three minutes with three minutes in between. It’s a very simple workout. And I typically struggle to meet that goal until like later in the summer. Well, after a couple months of heat acclimation and a couple months of creatine and just kind of good training, I was able to hit those targets in that bellwether workout in May, which just blew my mind. I was expecting to hit it for the first four and then start to deteriorate, and it just didn’t happen. So I do… I feel like some of those peripheral things are making a difference at the margins in my training and performance.

Chris McQueen: Do you feel like it’s plateaued or do you feel like you’re still… there’s still maybe growth there now that you kind of go into the off-season and you know, have more recovery? Do you think that they’ll grow or increase or are you more interested in sustaining those numbers? Like, what’s kind of like your goal as you continue with this procedure?

Jonathan Wait: I’d like to get stronger next year versus this year. I am a little… I’m wondering what I’m going to do to get there. Last year at this time, I was thinking creatine and saunas, and I did those. The only thing that I really know I have left is the thing that’s been staring me in the face for years, which is getting enough sleep.

Chris McQueen: So, what’s keeping you from sleeping? Huh? What’s keeping you from sleeping? I know one thing.

Jonathan Wait: I am not able to fall asleep. I can’t fall asleep, like… really bad. One of the reasons… I have a theory about why… when Core 4, I’d had a great day out, but I had a very bad start to my day where I got dropped in the first like six miles from the front group. There were still 30 people in the front group when I got spit out the back. And I think it’s because the night before, I’ve been experimenting with abusing sleeping pills. Because the night before a race, I’ll often toss and turn until 3:00 a.m. in the morning. And so this season, I’ve been trying a little Unisom, and I fall asleep. Uh, is it… am I still trying to get it out of my system while I’m trying to do 450 watts to stay in the group? So I don’t know. I got to find the right combination of being able to fall asleep and not still feel sluggish from the downers I was taking. So, yeah, I can’t fall asleep, but I got to crack that code.

Chris McQueen: I don’t know if this will crack your code, but I will tell you something that I’ve done lately that I… So, we are both members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We’re active. We are card-carrying members. We love our church. We love Jesus Christ. Like, that’s something that… that’s how Jonathan and I met, was through church.

Um, one of the things that is part of being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is that you keep the Word of Wisdom, that maintains that you do not drink alcohol or tea, and you try very hard to make sure that you are doing everything to kind of keep your body as functioning really, really well. Um, so I have never drank alcohol at all. Like…

Jonathan Wait: You start recently? Because I’m feeling some barbiturates would help me out on this one.

Chris McQueen: So, I will say, and this is… this is very… this is like… I’m… I’ve talked about this with a few people in, you know, like just in personal conversations. I don’t… it feels a little weird to say it on a podcast or everything. I have really started to enjoy Athletic Brewing. Have you ever had one of those?

Jonathan Wait: No.

Chris McQueen: So, Athletic Brewing is like… it’s a near-beer. It’s a fake beer. It’s got supposedly less than 0.5% alcohol. It’s a hops and barley drink. Exactly. And so, I really like the IPAs because I do like… I actually like the IPAs and the stouts, which are, you know, darker barleys, and the IPAs are very hoppy. I love hop water. Like, I… I’ve… after 45 years of drinking sodas and stuff, I’m like, I just don’t want anything sweet anymore to enjoy a drink. And so, I’ve started having those on occasion.

And here’s the deal, because I have never drank anything ever in my life. And I don’t know how much of this is just… what… I don’t know what it is. And I don’t think I’m drinking beer, but maybe I am. Because if I have one, just one can at like 8:00, 8:30, 9:00, I get very sleepy, very fast.

Jonathan Wait: This is very dangerous to be saying on a podcast. That’s interesting. Athletic Brew. That’s what it’s called.

Chris McQueen: Yeah, Athletic Brew. Um, if you… it… this feels even weirder to say on a podcast between two Mormons is, uh, “Hey, let me know if you want one and I will… I will hook you up and you can try it.” I don’t know if it’ll work for you, but I know that for me, I’m very, very sensitive to caffeine. It does not make… it doesn’t take much caffeine for me to, you know, be up all night. I’m like a 45-milligram sort of guy where it’s like, “Yep, I’m going to be up forever.” Um, and so I think… I don’t know how much of it’s in my head and how much of it’s like actually the minuscule amount of alcohol content that might be in these athletic brews. But…

Jonathan Wait: There’s no way it’s that alcohol. There’s more alcohol in vanilla ice cream because vanilla is a bourbon with vanilla. You know what I mean? Like, there’s no way it’s the alcohol content. Maybe there’s something else that’s just kind of mellowing you out. That’s interesting.

Chris McQueen: I don’t know what it is. Um, okay. So, now that I’ve like risked my temple recommend getting revoked at my next interview, um…

Jonathan Wait: I think… I think you’re all right.

Chris McQueen: I think I’m all right, too. I… the way the questions are, I feel good about it. I think it’ll all work out. Um, let’s see what I had left in my questions. Okay, here’s my last question before we kind of like start wrapping this up.

What if… for an alternate outside of Iowa/Nebraska training place? Where is… would your happy place be more in Ohio or in Utah? And tell me why.

Jonathan Wait: Not Utah. Certainly nowhere near the Wasatch Front. Oh, that place is the worst place to ride a bike.

Chris McQueen: Are you only saying that because I grew up in Orem?

Jonathan Wait: I thought… You really don’t… it’s a bad place to ride.

Chris McQueen: Because traffic. Why? Because I… I grew up there in that area and I love… I love riding in Utah. I love getting in the mountains when I can. I don’t like traffic. Is that… So it’s just the traffic.

Jonathan Wait: Yeah. I can’t imagine where you would ride. And even like… there’s that amazing trail up canyon. I did that recently with my uncle on an e-bike. Oh, so many people. Like you can’t go more than 12 miles an hour or you’re gonna hit somebody. No. Uh, Utah… maybe out by Park City is all right, but I’ve never ridden out that direction. No.

Ohio. Now, uh, kind of southeastern Ohio, the kind of the foothills of the Appalachians, that place.

Chris McQueen: Because this is where you grew up, right?

Jonathan Wait: I grew up in Canton, Ohio, but my parents currently live in Alliance. So, if I’m in my parents’ house and I go south 40 miles, oh, you couldn’t… you wouldn’t believe just the wild stuff that’s down… just gravel roads, gigantic hills, like 400-foot climbs. It’s wonderful. So, yeah, that part of Ohio is very good. But Wisconsin, Southwest Wisconsin, I think is probably the best. Probably the best. Southwest Wisconsin, west of Madison.

Chris McQueen: Dodgeville. You haven’t been up to Waukon yet.

Jonathan Wait: No, I have not. But it’s the same… it’s the same… What’s that place called? Driftless or something like that. It’s the same region. Yeah.

Chris McQueen: Yep. Yep. Yep. You didn’t… did… You didn’t go up to Nationals, did you? You didn’t do Gravel Nationals this year. Is that something that you…

Jonathan Wait: What’s at the Pisgah race? Weren’t those the same day?

Chris McQueen: Yes, they were.

Jonathan Wait: Just skip Pisgah to go to Nationals? Are you crazy?

Chris McQueen: Okay. Oh, and I feel bad. We have to talk about Pisgah just a little bit because that, as a race director, was so much fun and also terrifying because you nailed it. You called it. Um, we’ll get into this.

So, quick thing, if you’re not familiar with Pisgah and the Soldier Cutoff, um, we had to, for the first time ever, do a rain route. And I was nervous about it. I checked the route several times. I still, you know, still had some concerns about it, but I think it turned out pretty well, given that we couldn’t hit any of the B-roads. And then you and Charles… Charles Ericson showed up and you put on an absolute battle. So can you, in the last little bit that we have here, give us a little bit of what happened from the beginning with you and Charles on that race, and then we can get to the exciting finish.

Jonathan Wait: Yeah, Charles is a great guy. I’ve loved riding with him for years, and he was on good form that day. And I would hit… so my equation is: hit the hill really hard, get a separation, and go as fast as I can afterwards. And there are like a handful of very large hills out in the Pisgah area.

Chris McQueen: How many like big climbs? It’s not death by a thousand cuts like Gravel Worlds, where it’s like, “Oh, here’s another 75-foot climb.” But these are like 300-foot climbs where you sit down and you get a rhythm and you really tap it out for a handful of minutes.

Jonathan Wait: And maybe four of them. And on the first one, I went hard and there were four of us left. And then the second one, I went hard and it was just Charles. And I was like, “Oh, good job, Charles.” And then the third one, I went all out and he’s still there. Like, “Charles is climbing better than I’ve ever seen. I’ll get him on the fourth. I’ll get him on the fourth.” And I went… I mean, I did everything I could on that fourth climb, and I could not break Charles.

And then so I started thinking about what do I want to do on the finale? How do I beat him in a sprint? And taking the last turn, I almost slid out. So I lost a lot of time on the last turn, and he pulled up next to me. And…

Chris McQueen: Is this the last turn? Like as you’re going…

Jonathan Wait: Last turn into the park. Into the park.

Chris McQueen: Into the park. So this is the last… you’ve gone past… you’re kind of going past the ball field, basically. You’re heading due… what would this be? Like, due west into the park.

Jonathan Wait: Yeah. And uh, it was just a drag race into the park. And…

Chris McQueen: Was he on your… was he just sitting on your wheel or you weren’t…? Was he just sit… was Charles just sitting on your wheel the whole time?

Jonathan Wait: No, he was taking pulls. Very much unlike me. If I were in his situation, I’d be like, “Try and break me, dude. Try and break me.” But no, he was… Yeah, he was taking… We were 50/50 mostly, unless it was a climb and I was trying to break him. He was taking… he was working with me. Uh, we… I mean, we went over 20 miles an hour average. You don’t get that if somebody’s sitting in. So, yeah.

Chris McQueen: No. You come in… you come in… the way it’s set up, the finish line is basically kind of a an extra line into the park. So, it’s kind of a natural curve to it. Um, and you guys came across the line just ripping. I don’t… I didn’t look at your numbers, but like, what was your final speed coming in? Did you see what the speed was on the sprint coming in?

Jonathan Wait: No. Uh, no, it was a short distance. We had to accelerate out of that last turn. We were probably going 24. We weren’t like going 35 miles an hour or anything, but probably 24 miles an hour.

Chris McQueen: Yeah. But it’s, you know, it’s flat and there… we’re just standing around. Like, the 50k people had come in, and we weren’t really ready for the 100ks to come in. I was honestly… I think I was estimating another five minutes before people came in. But it’s a shorter course than usual. It had no B-roads on it, so I didn’t really know how people were going to come in.

And then all of a sudden, I see, thank goodness, Charles and Jonathan coming in, but I had zero time to say anything or do anything ’cause you guys come ripping in. You both cross the finish line and we’re just like, “What happened?” ‘Cause you were just neck and neck and it was… it was so much fun. You guys go ripping across the grass. Um, and we’re all just standing around and we’re like, “Okay, who won?”

So, when you crossed that finish line with Charles, in your heart of hearts, what did you think? Before we got to the timing and everything, what do you think actually happened? Like, honestly, what did you think?

Jonathan Wait: I got… I believed you got him. The finish line wasn’t exactly perpendicular on the road. It was a little bit closer to the right-hand side. And I noticed that coming… and I always think, “What do I need to know about a sprint, just in case I have to sprint?” And I knew if I’m sprinting, finish on the right-hand side. He chose the left-hand side. I chose the right-hand side. I knew… I thought I got him, but I was open to the timing chip saying otherwise because it was freaking close.

Chris McQueen: It was freaking close. It was so close that… and I have it set up so that the timings come right up on a screen, but they only go to the second. So they both come up and it shows Jonathan first and Charles second, but their time is exactly the same. And I’m like, “Okay, what is this? Like, how close is this? Like, what do we have?”

So I dig into my timing machine logs and everything because I’m only showing to the second. And so I look at their times, and the tenth of a second is exactly the same: .6. I’m like, “Okay, increase the decimals.” And I bump it up to the hundredth of a second, and it showed Jonathan beating Charles by 4 hundredths of a second. And thankfully so, because… I do… it does track to the thousandth of a second, but you guys were exactly the same there. Like it was… it was just faster than a blink of an eye. And it does have me thinking… if you guys are going to race like that in the future, I’m going to have to put the RFID chips on the front instead of the back. Do you feel like that would actually matter?

Jonathan Wait: I’ll try and not let it come down to a sprint finish in the future.

Chris McQueen: Well, I mean, that’s up to Charles, I think. I think it’s up to whoever you’re with, right?

Jonathan Wait: Yeah. Yeah.

Chris McQueen: Yeah, that was a lot of fun. Like that… that was a moment that I will remember for a very long time. That was really, really fun as a race director to see that and to be glad, frankly, that I had, you know, equipment around that could handle that. And the… you two were gentleman enough to be like, “Yep, okay, that’s what it said. That’s the time. There we go.”

Jonathan Wait: So Charles was a very good sport. You were very gracious. Um, well, it’s a good thing that it wasn’t the other way around. If it was the other way around, I would not have been gracious.

Chris McQueen: You’re like, “No, no interview for you, Chris McQueen.”

Jonathan Wait: I’d have been screaming, throwing things around. Yeah. Would have been really bad. It would have been really bad if I’d had to be the mature one.

Chris McQueen: Would you have broken out a Trump impression or not?

Jonathan Wait: Um, fake results. It’s rigged since the beginning. Big gravel. Unbelievable. And I won by a mile.

Chris McQueen: It’s been fun. I’ve been the neutral start on a few races this year, and it’s been fun to listen to you. I think it was you and Charles on Glenwood and then you again, Charles, and a few other folks on Pisgah and get to hear… I don’t usually get to hang out with the front guys. So that’s about as close as I get, and it’s been fun to hear you guys. I’m glad you guys are having fun. That honestly, like, fills my heart to make sure that folks are having a good time on these races and things.

Jonathan Wait: So I did three events. I did three of your events this year. All three of them… blast. Had a great time at all three of them.

Chris McQueen: Thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah, Silver City, you took first place. Let’s see which one’s the most fun.

Jonathan Wait: Glenwood.

Chris McQueen: Glen… why is Glenwood the most fun?

Jonathan Wait: I liked the course the best.

Chris McQueen: Yeah, the… I liked the course at Glenwood the best. What? I mean, ’cause that’s the… I added the mountain bikey trail kind of stuff through town. Like through stoplights. Like, I really sweated that. Like, I did not want to send you guys through town. But was that a…

Jonathan Wait: Yeah, the front… we just neutralized in the front group because we did that big climb, and then whoever was in the front group at the end of the climb, we all just agreed, like, “We’re not going to race through town. We’ll race once we get in the park again.”

Chris McQueen: Yeah, thank you. Appreciate that. Um, what did you think going through Pacific Junction at the end? Kind of like the different end and coming back on Deacon and everything? ‘Cause the rest of it is kind of similar. We took Raleigh up, and then I had to keep going up Keys as well. So you kind of had to keep climbing up a little bit more from there. Um, but I think Loess Hills Enduro, which you also podiumed this year at Loess Enduro, didn’t you?

Jonathan Wait: Uh, yes. I topped that podium at Loess Hills Enduro, but we didn’t get to go up Raleigh because of rain.

Chris McQueen: Yeah, it was a rain route this year. Yeah. Um, yeah. Uh, what would you… I also started it at my house. I don’t know if I’ll do that again. How did that feel starting at someone’s house?

Jonathan Wait: Cool. It felt fun. I liked it. I liked it. If you don’t want to do it, that’s fine. But yeah, I liked doing it at your house.

Chris McQueen: Okay. Well, thank you. Thank you for being an amazing supporter of the Gravel series. Thank you for being an amazing racer and sharing your secret recipe. I wrote it down.

Jonathan Wait: Thank you for being an amazing race director, buddy.

Chris McQueen: Oh, I don’t know. I’m… Keep working at it. So, we… Yeah, we got some work to do, but…

Jonathan Wait: You’re doing great.

Chris McQueen: Thank you. Appreciate that. Good. Glad you’re having fun. Thank you for sharing your stuff. Thank you. Um, we’ll wrap this up. And if anybody has questions, send them our way ’cause I have a feeling we will see you again on a podcast episode.

Jonathan Wait: That’d be great. Unless I finally find a way to quit racing.

Chris McQueen: Uh, are you going to take up ice skating? Like, what are you… what are you going to fill this void in your life with if you gave up racing?

Jonathan Wait: That’s what I’m trying to find out. That’s what I’m trying to figure out.

Chris McQueen: Well, maybe, you know, your daughter is at BYU, so maybe it’ll be grandkids.

Jonathan Wait: Could be. Wouldn’t that be funny to stand on a podium with a grandchild? Is the grandchild… at my wife… when my wife had her? I’ll be 45. Five years from now, I’ll be 45 with the grandkid. You think?

Chris McQueen: Yeah, that’s not very long. I don’t know. I hope… I hope it’s not too long. What’s the point, right? What’s the point?

Jonathan Wait: That is the point. It is. It’s pretty cool.

Chris McQueen: All right, Jonathan, have a fantastic evening. I’m glad you got your sauna in. Um, go grab an Athletic Brewing near-beer and see if you can get to sleep.

Jonathan Wait: All right, sounds good. Thanks, Chris.

Chris McQueen: All right, have a good night. See ya. Bye.