Flying along with Davide Giardini
Davide Giardini has a passion for fast sports – swimming, skiing, kite surfing and most recently triathlon. At 70.3 Texas he surprised many with a superb sub 2-hour bike split, on the day that many called ideal for breaking records. But in 2014 as a rookie he won the SuperFrog Half, earned the runner-up spot at the Bahamas International Tri, finished 3rd at Challenge Rancho Cordova and was 4th at the Pacific Grove Triathlon, so he really did not come out of nowhere.
Slowtwitch: Thank you for your time.
Davide Giardini: Thank you Herbert, it’s an honor to be on Slowtwitch. And by the way, what was up with that phallic looking bike you covered recently?
ST: Expect the unexpected. Well, how have you recovered from Wildflower?
Davide: I am actually not that beat up right now, probably due to the fact that my run was more like a walk.
ST: You had a great swim. Was your goal to be first out of the water?
Davide: Yes, it was. Open water swimming has always come natural to me. At Boulder Peak last year I got outswam by a fraction for the swim prime, and at all other races where I was always near the front, there were no primes, so why bother? There are not many races offering premiums, so I went for the swim and bike [at the top of Nasty Grade] premiums at Wildflower.
ST: Nice bonus money?
Davide: I have yet to receive those checks. At this early stage of my racing, any money is good money!
ST: I meant bonus money from sponsors.
Davide: Sponsors? What sponsors? Jokes aside, thanks to Blueseventy for making speedy swim gear. I'm also stoked on my new Easton Aero55 tubeless wheels and Rudy Project Wing57
ST: But unlike other triathlons this one has a huge transition run. Did you push hard or did you and Brian Fleischmann try to save legs for the bike segment?
Davide: The swim was wetsuit-legal, which I don’t favor much, since I’m not the swiftest transition person. Brian and John Dahlz were ahead of me going up the steep boat ramp, but then I caught John on the flat trail, closed the gap to Brian, and then exited transition with the bikes just ahead of Brian. It was flat out. No time to save energy!
ST: Unlike Texas were you had a monster sub 2 hour bike split and beat all on the bike, at Wildflower your bike split was about 3 minutes slower than the time of Jesse Thomas who had the best split of 2:19:18. What happened?
Davide: Every race is different, and comparing one race to another is like comparing apples to oranges. Long story short, I was cooked from that effort. 6 days in between races must have not been enough recovery time for a beast of a course like Wildflower. Definitely underestimated that. Long story long, a variety of factors [played here.] First, Jesse is beast, and second, on the bike I had a solid 2 hours with me, myself, and I, solo at the front. No lead vehicle, no media motos, nothing. It gets pretty lonely up there. Nonetheless, I pushed very good watts for those 2 hours – not as good as in Texas, but it was rolling terrain, which I find it harder to maintain a steady output. When Jesse caught me at the bottom of Nasty Grade at around the 2 hours mark, I got the bike premium, we rode to the top together, exchanged a few comments, and then I simply lost my mojo. My NP for the remaining 25ish minutes was 80w lower than the first 2 hours. Third, it is worth commenting that Jesse took off on the long downhills. Those Dimond bikes seem fast! Disclaimer, I’m not sponsored by Dimond. But I might as well be. Hint, hint. Fourth, it’s a brutal course, my batteries weren’t fully charged, I didn’t get my nutrition in properly. Fifth, I don’t know what I’m doing in this sport half the time, so there’s that. #TriExcuse.
ST: Fellow pro Thomas Gerlach had called you out in a forum thread on our site about that Texas bike split and you responded fairly calmly. He ended up beating you at Wildflower by more than 10 minutes and finished 4th while you were 14th. Did that sting extra hard?
Davide: For one, I don’t know Thomas. Second, each race is a whole beast in itself, and everyone has strengths and weaknesses. When caught in the rollercoaster of emotions that is life, I like to remind myself the following: “Sometimes you're flush and sometimes you're bust, and when you're up, it's never as good as it seems, and when you're down, you never think you'll be up again, but life goes on.”
ST: Oh I see, you are quoting Blow.
Davide: Yup.
ST: Did you two talk in person before, during or after Wildflower?
Davide: Again, I’ve never met nor spoken with Thomas. I’m new to this triathlon scene, and outside of the Boulder peeps that I train with, I don’t know many others. I see racing as a race with myself and not much against others.
ST: I understand that you had not met before, but I thought that you might have wanted to seek him out, or he you.
Davide: Well, that didn’t happen. A friend told me that someone on the ST Forum, which I didn’t know existed, was trying to downplay my performance at Texas 70.3 and insinuating things. So I jumped on the forum and simply described the race as it unfolded in Galveston. On one side I am flattered to see interest in my race, but on the other it feels weird to have strangers who don’t know you and weren’t there talk about it as if they do [know you.]
ST: Let us talk about that Texas race. Many expected Lionel Sanders to set the pace on the bike as he had done in Oceanside, but it was you who surprised everyone in what was described perfect bike record conditions.
Davide: Funny enough, I was running with Leon “Mudgutt” Griffin after Oceanside 70.3, and he told me Sanders passed him in the race on the bike like he was standing still. Nevertheless, I went to Texas with the “nothing to lose, throw it all on the line” attitude. Plus, I had done a few TT efforts with Rudy Von Berg and Tyler Butterfield, and I knew I was on form. After swimming with Potts, I bolted out of T1 and put my head down hammering out the long straight away to the 45km turn-around. It was humid and overcast, a slight cross-wind, and a perfect straight out and back road. My power meter died 25’ into the ride, but I was holding good watts till then, and simply tried to maintain the same RPE the whole ride, which was fairly easy task given the course layout. At the halfway turn-around, I was pretty shocked to have such a huge lead. I rode the same effort back. Heading back into T2 there was actually a very sketchy narrow section with Age Groupers going out. Had I come in 10” later, I would have crashed into them.
ST: Treacherous just for you?
Davide: No, it was a treacherous section of the course for everyone coming back into T2 with incoming Age Groupers going out.
ST: You got off the bike with a huge lead and held it for a while, but eventually were passed by three guys to finish fourth. Were you still happy with your effort?
Davide: When I got off the bike with a 7+ minutes lead, I was exuberant and started high fiving people. I ran the first of three laps at a comfortable 3:45/km pace, but then faded really bad, and could hardly make it home. I’m still new to this triathlon game, and especially 70.3, and I’m playing around with my nutrition and training. I’m self-coached.
ST: Was California simply too soon?
Davide: Oh yeah, absolutely. The week after Texas leading into Wildflower I hardly moved and I wouldn’t even call it training. In retrospect, Wildflower is too much of a brutal course and 6 days is not enough. Simply put, I have lots to learn in the sport. I only started triathlon in 2012 on Oahu, did my first “real” amateur season in the mainland US in 2013, and turned pro in 2014.
ST: Do you still ski?
Davide: Ah, no! I have not skied for years now. Since I started doing triathlons, that’s all the sport I can manage to do!
ST: But you are in Boulder, and surely there is plenty of snow in the winter.
Davide: Oh yeah, that there is, but there are also plenty of pros to train and stay motivated with.
ST: Talk about growing up in Italy.
Davide: I was born and raised on Lake Garda, in northern Italy, where I grew up alpine ski racing and swimming competitively both with my older brother. My older brother was a multi FIS National Junior Champion in Super G, my younger sister was on the Italian Ski Team and a multi FIS National Junior Champion in Downhill. I competed at the international level as well, but I was always the more chill, fun-loving, less competitive type. My true passion growing up has been water-sports, in particular freestyle windsurfing and kite surfing, sports for which Lake Garda is well-renowned for. After college in New England, I landed a job in Hawaii, and – hard to believe it – that’s the place where my passion for water-sports faded and I became fond of triathlon. I became good friends with local pro triathlete Tim Marr, whom I looked up to because he was the first person I met up until that point who truly LOVED his life, was a genuine no-frills fun-loving happy person, and the stress of everyday life didn’t seem to bug him. After some time, I moved to Boulder to purse an MBA degree and to fully embark in triathlon.
ST: In 2011 Tim Marr was sanctioned for a doping infraction. Wasn’t that about the time when you met him?
Davide: I met him a few years after his sanction for Adderol. Tim – as people who know him know very well – loves to have a good time and is just a wild but super genuine Hawaiian dude, and that Adderol accident was the result of a night partying with friends with a bit of a weird sense of humor.
ST: Have you learned any lessons from his story?
Davide: Sometimes being too carefree can cause problems and unlucky situations, even with no bad intentions.
ST: Talk about your sponsors.
Davide: First, I owe it all to my parents who allowed me to move to the US and have been very supportive. They don’t really “get” triathlon, but that’s another story.
Second, I represent (and help manage) a pro triathlon team – Off The Front Multisport (OTF)– which was founded a few years ago with the vision of then 21-years-old Stephen Wright to financially support young student-triathletes in their dream to race professionally.
With the help of major funder Team Psycho, OTF has been literally exploding with talent, and has contributed to the success of many. Katie Zaferes, current #1 in the ITU World Triathlon Series ranking; Lindsey Jerdonek and Jessica Broderick, both of whom have achieved World Cup podiums; Chelsea Burns, the 2014 USAT SuperSprint National Champion; Summer Cook, a neo-pro who is already winning ITU ContiCups; Rudy Von Berg, whose list of results is too long to remember, but off the top of my head I remember he just qualified for ITU U23 Worlds, and is a repeat ’14-’15 USAT Collegiate National Champion; Chris Braden, a serious swim-bike weapon who just raced WTS Cape Town and whom I’m trying to hold off from racing 70.3 for my own good, and many more up and coming pros and elite development athletes.
On the personal side, I receive product support and the occasional bonus from a handful of companies (Blueseventy, Clif Bar, Easton).
ST: Is there anything else we should know?
Davide: Outside of training, I work as the CO territory manager for Nutrex Hawaii – producers of BioAstin Hawaiian Astaxanthin (www.itakebioastin.com) and Hawaiian Spirulina sold all over, even Costco – a company based at the Energy Lab in Kona and of which even The Man himself Dave Scott is a big fan of.
You can follow Davide on Twitter via @DavideITA878 and his website is davidegiardini.com
