Jeff Pelletier | 200 Mile Racing Insights, Running YouTube, Business of Trail Running

Finn (00:00.854)
Jeff Peltier, it's great to have you on the show. How are you doing today?

Jeff Pelletier (00:04.539)
I'm doing well, thanks. Yeah, good to be here.

Finn (00:06.806)
I'm excited to have you here today. I mean, your interests and your experiences, they align almost perfectly with the ethos of this show. You're on the frontier of racing, dabbling in the 200 mile scene. You're experimenting with really cool storytelling formats on YouTube and you're making a living directly through the sport. And this is all of the stuff we love talking about. Um, the first thing I think we got to cover is, is what just transpired at, at the Moab 240. I have so many questions, but first what.

What draws you to that distance?

Jeff Pelletier (00:38.839)
Well, I've done a couple of 200 miles before I did Tour de Jean was my first one back in 2018. That's in the Italian Alps. I then did the Swiss Peaks 360 K in the Swiss Alps. And those are you know, those are like big, big mountain races, right? They're they're a little bit different. But I always wanted to do an American 200 because they're, you know, they're supposed to be relatively faster and they are the cutoff times are much are much shorter.

And so, yeah, I kind of had unfinished business. I wouldn't say I'm a 200 mile specialist by any means. They take a lot out of you emotionally as well as physically. But I felt like I had unfinished business. So I really wanted to do an American 200 miler and I love the desert. So I was drawn in the lab.

Finn (01:19.698)
What is particularly interesting about the Moab course? Like you mentioned, the love for the desert, but from what I understand, it's a pretty multifaceted course in the sense that you get to pine the mountains at times, you are in the desert. Talk about that.

Jeff Pelletier (01:23.519)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (01:29.471)
Mm hmm. Yeah. And that was actually a surprise for me. So we went down to Moab a few weeks early and spent some time there. And I really just want to acclimate and, you know, get a feel for the for the drier weather and for the terrain. And the first thing that stood out to me, I mean, first of all, we got there at the perfect time. The fall colors were just popping. We drove through Colorado to get there. And the thing that's really special about Moab, and I think it's a surprise for people, is how diverse the terrain is. You do start.

down in the Moab Valley and you kind of go up onto a plateau, you're going through some real kind of desert, red rock terrain, but pretty quickly you make your way over to Shea Mountain, which is up above 10,000 feet. That section was actually added this year. So the Moab 240, it turns out, wasn't actually 240 miles. It had been measured with some older GPS devices, and I think they had to do some minor course changes over the years. So basically they added another 10, 12 miles this year to bring it back up to 240.

And I think my understanding is that's one of the sections there around Shea Mountain that they added. So you climb up quite high, about 10,500 feet. And it's this sort of island of mountains there. It's sort of just in the middle of the desert and it's completely different terrain. Beautiful trees, beautiful forest, beautiful fall colors. Then you drop back down and you're running through the desert again. And then you make your way over to the LaSalle Mountains, sort of on the Colorado border. And again, you're back up into the...

You know, the sort of subalpine there in the trees back up over 10,000 feet and it's beautiful again. So it creates these chapters to the race. Not only, you know, you have your days, you have your nights, you know, night one, night two. But there's also these milestones around the types of terrain that you're going through. So I think that makes Moab pretty special.

Finn (03:13.206)
I love that thinking in terms of chapters on Strava. I was looking at your Strava file for the race. It looks like this massive, beautiful loop that you do. I don't know if this is like a stereotype of 200s or any of these like super big races, but at any point did the course feel contrived to you or did it feel like throughout the day or throughout the multi days, it followed this like meaningful, like naturally progressing type route.

Jeff Pelletier (03:21.461)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (03:38.385)
Yeah, definitely the latter. And that's, that's what, uh, that's one of the things that was drawn that drew me to this race as well. And that's usually how I pick my races. I love a really good long point to point or a massive loop. I love the feeling of, you know, like you're traveling somewhere, like you're going the distance and you're going through different types of terrain. I can't stand a contrived course or out and backs and things like that. So, um, all of my big races have been big loops, big point to points.

And this one was exactly that. It was incredible. You really do circle the entire Moab Valley and end up back where you came from days later and you feel like you've been on this huge journey, which of course you have.

Finn (04:16.622)
I'm sure there are a fair number of differences, but when you compare and contrast European 200 races like Tour, like Swiss Peaks, to a race like Moab, what struck you as the most different parts of it?

Jeff Pelletier (04:31.491)
The biggest, the kind of most superficial difference is going to be in the terrain. So again, most of these, at least the 200s that I've been drawn to in the past have all been in the Alps and you just get a lot more elevation change and you have also elevation altitude to deal with. So that's the most obvious difference. The climbs are huge, the descents are huge. That makes, you know, they can be quite difficult to train for, especially if you're coming from a flatter place.

But I think the other difference and the difference that I really wanted to experience was the cultural difference. You know, races in Europe are big, especially like Tour de Jean. You're getting up to 900 runners compared to a couple of hundred in these smaller, relatively smaller American 200 mile-ers. And I should say North American because I want to give a shout out to the Divide 200, our first Canadian 200 now that's on the on the circuit as well. So North American 200s, which...

Finn (05:21.12)
Yes.

Jeff Pelletier (05:24.979)
You know, you have this more grassroots, you know, hard rock 100 feel versus UTMB. So the cultural difference is real. I'm not saying one is better than the other. I mean, you know, running through the Osta Valley again through Torre de Jean is such a special thing. You know, you're going through these towns and people are out there supporting you. Whereas with Moab, you're out in its wilderness. You really do feel like you're in the middle of nowhere. Um, and I suspect that would be the same for like, you know, Bigfoot and Tahoe and the divide.

So, um, yeah, it's, it, the train's different, but the culture is different. Um, a little less competitive. And, and, and by that, I mean in a good way, it's not just that the fields are maybe, you know, not quite as deep, but I think people are out there just to have a good time and have an experience. Whereas again, in Europe, you have that kind of a little bit more of a cutthroat kind of competitive feel at the front of the race, maybe. So, uh, definitely there's, there's a cultural difference and it's, uh, it's, I think, I think they both have their pros and cons.

Finn (06:19.73)
Interesting. One thing I want to get into is sort of the spectator part of it. And I can't imagine that there's a one-to-one comparison to a race like UTMB, which is like the Super Bowl, but were you surprised at all going back to like Tor, how much fanfare there was throughout points of the course compared to a race like Moab where it might be, I'm assuming more desolate, you're more like out there on your own.

Jeff Pelletier (06:40.455)
Yeah, and I would say Tour des Gens is the UTMB of 200s. It starts out with just this huge, huge mass start. You're going through the town, and you end up getting bottlenecked pretty quickly hitting that first trail. And the first day of tour is like that. It's a lot of bottlenecks and it's kind of waiting. But the nice thing about that, in comparison to UTMB, is that eventually by day two, you're pretty much running on your own. And I remember having a feeling like it was just me and maybe...

couple of dozen guys who are racing and a few women and sort of towards the front of the field there, which was kind of perfect. Whereas UTMB, you never quite get out of the crowds. You're always kind of still in those bottlenecks. So I think Tour des Jeans has that kind of, you know, it's the masses, but it's a long enough event that you do eventually string out. And whereas with Moab, I mean, you're kind of, you know, from the start, people start to spread out and that's kind of...

That's kind of you, especially when you're sort of more towards the front of the field. It's, you know, you don't really get a sense that you're racing more than a dozen people.

Finn (07:46.206)
You mentioned that heading into this race, there was unfinished business. Is the, is the business finished now, or are you going to go to a race like the divide 200 or the coca-dona 250? Like, is this going to continue to spiral into more 200s?

Jeff Pelletier (07:58.679)
Yeah, I think this did spark something. It rejuvenated something in me for the longer distances. But also because there's a sweet spot here, you know, finishing and I finished Moab in just under 71 hours. Some of these races, I think Tahoe, maybe it would be more in the 60, mid 60 hours that I might look at a finish there. And that's very different than 113 hours that I ran at Swiss peaks where you're getting into the fourth and fifth day. You get

Yeah, that fatigue that drowsiness really compounds, it really starts to compound. So if you can get done in three days, these races are actually enjoyable.

Finn (08:37.81)
Interesting. And actually, I want to get like, I have so many questions just on your overall strategy. And for context, I listened to your interview with Derek Lido, where you give a pretty solid and race report, but I have some questions off of it. I guess beginning with the sleep like you said two interesting things that interview said a You can sleep too long because your body starts to get into recovery mode. And you also really have to make a decision early on about how early you want to sleep.

Jeff Pelletier (08:59.124)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (09:05.634)
So talk about that alongside your comment of like, all of the compounding fatigue and the incentive to finish, you know, obviously as early as you can.

Jeff Pelletier (09:15.059)
Yeah, so I think a sleep plan is something that every runner needs heading into a 200. Even if your plan is to not sleep, that's a plan in itself. I wouldn't recommend that, but you do need a sleep plan. I think you want to look at the A stations that are available, the sleep stations. There might be some that are at lower altitude. They're going to be a little bit warmer. There's definitely going to be preferential places to sleep. In my case, I was lucky. I had a crew vehicle, a killer crew.

crew vehicle is it was a luxury camper truck that we got sponsored by the Ross Monster Baja. I'm so lucky it was so cool, but it was also great for my crew. I mean, crewing is a lot of work, right? So it was the least I could do to try to facilitate, you know, having a good vehicle for my partner Audrey, who, you know, my girlfriend who crewed me and she worked her butt off. And so at least it was a little bit more comfortable for her as well. But my sleep plan going into this was very specific. It was something I iterated on over

Finn (09:45.986)
The Ross Monster. Ha ha ha.

Jeff Pelletier (10:12.199)
again, a few races. And it was based on my experience of not wanting to sleep too soon because I've done that in the past too, where I tried to sleep after maybe 24 hours, I laid down, I couldn't fall asleep. I was too wired. I was too, you know, too jazzed up and it's a waste of time, you know, just gearing down and that's 10, 15 minutes I wasted. So you don't want to sleep too early, but you also don't want to dig yourself into a hole, you know, trying to go 48 hours say without sleep.

Most runners I think find they dig themselves into a hole. So for me, the sweet spot is around the 32 to 34, 36 hour mark. And that was my plan on this race. And that's exactly what I did. And I went down for 45 minutes. I also learned that, you know, 15 minutes can be fine for a quick rejuvenation, but these kind of 45 to 60 minute naps seem to be the sweet spot for me where you're getting a bit of a, you know, a bit of a REM cycle, but you're not totally going into recovery mode like you would after two, three hours where your body starts to

you know, get maybe swollen and sort of sore and stiff and things. So 45 minutes to 60 is about the sweet spot for me. And I ended up sleeping three times throughout the race, starting on the second night. So a total of two and a half hours.

Finn (11:22.942)
It's interesting that maybe 45 to 60 minutes is sort of that internal threshold for your body where it's like anything over that, it starts to mistake the scenario where it's like, oh, maybe the race is over, my work is done, and it gets into recovery versus like, no, we're still in this.

Jeff Pelletier (11:30.749)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (11:34.688)
Totally.

Well, think about an afternoon nap, right? You go down for 45 minutes, you wake up, maybe have a coffee or back into your day. Whereas if you sleep for 90 minutes, you know, you're getting some brain fuck. It's a lot of carbon dioxide, I think that builds up in your blood as well.

Finn (11:50.694)
You also mentioned in that conversation with Derek, just how much of like a team sport these 200 mile races become in that one of the areas you were looking to improve the most on at Moab was the logistics of it, the crewing part of it. When you think about the crewing aspect, where did you fine tune things and like, yeah, what was like the before and after of your thinking on how important a crew is and where they play a pivotal role?

Jeff Pelletier (11:57.685)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (12:13.815)
Sure. I mean, you don't need a crew. You don't need Pacers. You know, in Europe, you don't get Pacers. And in Europe, the races tend to be very difficult to crew. But it definitely helps. It definitely helps. My first race tour, I had no crew. And there was just a lot of wasted time. And what ended up happening there actually is I got adopted by some other runners who did have crew, who I was running a lot with and their families and friends would see me. And they'd go, hey, Jeff, come on here. Let me get you some pasta while you, you know, just sit tight or let me pop that blister for you.

And then Swiss peaks, Audrey did crew me there and it was, it was a lot of work for her. I mean, those, those big mountain races, there's a lot of driving. Um, you know, you might drive a thousand kilometers, you know, 600 miles to cruise somebody doing a fraction of that. Up and down these valleys. And, uh, we didn't quite have it nailed there mainly because she had a sedan. We were trying to rent hotels for her. And after that, we said, no, the way to do this is a camper van. You know, that's, that's the way to do this. Make sure the crew stays mobile.

and can sleep when they can sleep, you know, at the, at the aid stations. And that's what we did this time. We had this, the Baja, the Ross Monster Baja, and, uh, we had a fridge and a freezer, so I was able to keep, you know, some of my nutrition products in there. My ketone IQ shots. Um, we had, uh, you know, spare clothing. There was a course of bed, um, sleeping warm is really important. You don't want to be too cold. Um, you know, a lot, a lot of people will take these dirt maps on the side of the trail and I try not to do that.

Finn (13:25.3)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (13:38.707)
One of the reasons is because typically they last five to 10 minutes because you wake up shivering, your body wakes yourself up because it's like a survival mechanism. It's just too cold to sleep on the trail. And, and you know, I had just the absolute best case scenario. I had this warm, heated, comfortable truck with my sleep mask, my, you know, my noise canceling headphones, all that stuff that I've been using for the last couple of races and yeah, couldn't have worked out better.

Finn (14:02.338)
You know, it's interesting in not to pivot too far away from the strategy, but you mentioned Ross Monster and I had never heard of them prior to watching some of your videos and in your social media and the lead up to the race. Obviously, if you think about ultra running and you go to any, any pre race like packet pickup setting, you see all sorts of these, you know, uh, various camper vans in the parking lot, but I had never realized that there were brands out there in the space that were.

interested in getting directly involved in the sport and working with athletes like yourself. Can you talk about how that partnership came to be?

Jeff Pelletier (14:36.499)
Yeah, I mean, this was something that their PR team had reached out to me. I think they were a fan of my channel and this was actually a couple of years in the making this opportunity. And we were just waiting for, I've been spending a lot of time in Europe doing adventures and racing. I hadn't done a race in the States for a while. And so when Moab came up, it was the perfect opportunity to finally work together. And Ross Monster specializes in custom conversions. This happened to be out of the rental fleet. They do have a rental fleet as well, but they do really cool custom designs of

of trucks and vans and I guess they saw an opportunity to tap into a new market here. So they're based in Colorado. We drove it from there to Boulder to Moab. But you can bet that when I get into Hard Rock, hopefully next year, we'll be working with them again, hopefully.

Finn (15:13.215)
Yeah.

Finn (15:23.355)
and they just give you like a ready-made, fully outfitted vehicle to use.

Jeff Pelletier (15:27.827)
Yeah, so this one was from the rental fleet. It was their show vehicle. So this is the one that they would take to, you know, expos and stuff to show off. But typically they'd be completely customized for their buyers, for their customers. Yeah.

Finn (15:30.83)
Okay.

Finn (15:40.846)
Very cool. Okay. Well, I mean, I'm always fascinated when I come across new, I shouldn't say new brands, but relatively new brands. I think it's kind of cool that it's like, it's, it's partially endemic, partially non endemic, I find it fascinating. Coming back to like the strategy of the race, though, like thinking about pacing for a second, I look at a lot of these, quote unquote, shorter races hundred miles and below and we're and we're seeing in the data that increasingly as a sport gets more competitive.

Jeff Pelletier (15:46.485)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (15:52.384)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (15:58.333)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (16:07.406)
So many of these races are dictated right from the gun. Like people have to be in it very early. But I look at your example in a lot of these other 200 mile races where things develop much more so into the second half of the race. So, so talk about what you've experienced and noticed there. Like, are we still at a point in time where these 200 mile races are very much like second half type races in the first half is something different altogether?

Jeff Pelletier (16:20.061)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (16:32.395)
I mean, all I can speak to is my own sort of strategy and sensibility as a runner. And I really am the type of runner, actually just published a video today where I talk about this on my channel. I see these longer races, especially 200s, as a process of discovery. You start running and those first 10, 20 miles are just, you're just getting not even warmed up. You're really just trying to feel like, how's that little niggle that I had in my Achilles feeling? Okay, it's not too bad. How is this feeling? My stomach, did I?

You know, you're really just feeling things out and that kind of continues for me in that process for the first 50, maybe even a hundred miles. It's how am I feeling through the first night? Like, did I sleep well enough the night before? How's my stomach doing? Just really checking in and feeling things out. And again, it's a, it's a process of discovering how this race is going to go for me and in that second half of the race, then I can apply what I've learned. Okay. I'm feeling good. I've got the legs. Let's layer it on a little bit more. Um, I'm not trying to force anything.

You know, so while I do have a plan, it's a plan with room for movement and for change. But again, I really like to sort of let the race unfold. And that usually for me means starting off a little bit slower. I think though, one of the things I, I tend to start too slow. I'm not, I'm not an aggressive runner. I'm not typically even a podium runner. I just kind of just go out there and do my thing. I'm usually filming, right? I'm making, I'm always filming, I should say, when I do races.

bit of a distraction. I'm a top 10 percentile. I'm good for a top, you know, top five at a local 50k and you know, yeah, top 100 at tour that kind of thing. I'm consistent. I've never DNF'd. So yeah, I create a plan and I stick to it. But sometimes I think I could be a little bit more aggressive over runner, I could take chances. And I don't take those chances very often.

Finn (17:59.262)
You're a good runner though, you're like a top 10 percentile runner I would say. Yeah.

Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (18:25.063)
You know, if you look at a race like Moab, I finished five and a half minutes behind Jesse, Jesse might've had more in his legs too, but I definitely finished feeling like I could have kept going for a while. And it made me realize that I could have probably layered it on a lot sooner. And, uh, maybe that needs to be part of my plan moving forward is to go out a little bit more aggressively.

Finn (18:34.498)
Wow.

Finn (18:43.422)
I can't remember where you said it, but you said it and it struck me as fascinating. And maybe it does have to do with just like how you've approached the sport over the last 10 years, but like heading into this race, you said, I didn't feel one lick of loss aversion. Like you said, it was this process of discovery. And for a lot of runners that are in your position that are at least generally on the more like competitive, successful side of things, they do tend to feel this obligation to uphold a certain image of themselves.

Jeff Pelletier (18:57.984)
Yep.

Finn (19:13.154)
There's this pressure to replicate results that they've had in the past. And it seems like you, you kind of came into this race totally free. So, um, how did you make that happen?

Jeff Pelletier (19:24.443)
Yeah. And that's, I think, I think some runners prefer to run scared, you know, get out ahead and just try to hang on and other runners prefer to hunt. And, um, I think running scared, it can be motivating, but, uh, I can only imagine. I mean, Jesse was fighting for first, that was his to lose. You know, he was, he was in or fighting for first the entire race. And, um, that's that sort of sense of, you know, loss aversion that he must've been fighting and that's stressful. And that can affect your decision-making, you know, maybe his naps ended up being shorter than they.

could or should have been, who knows? And did that affect him? But inversely, maybe, my, you know, maybe I could have shaved off 15 minutes here or there. And if I did have that pressure, maybe I would have made better decisions. But of course, that could have come back to bit me as well as bite me as well. So it's hard, it's hard to know. But there's definitely two styles of runners. And I do tend to more come from the back, especially in these longer races. And I just again, I just do my thing. I don't typically race other runners as much, I kind of just run my own race and

let things happen. Um, so really in this race, I mean, I was, I think I was like top 15 maybe for like the first half, but you know, even that I was chatting with different people and just kind of just, you know, biding my time. And I really, I wasn't in the, even into the top five, I don't think until the last hundred miles. And then I slowly chipped away and made my way up to second place all of a sudden with about 70 miles to go. And for me, that's where I had to switch my race strategy and think, okay, now I'm actually racing here. Now I am running scared.

who was in third at the time, wasn't too far behind me. Eventually put some time on him and I felt like I had a pretty comfortable lead. And then it became a question of how can I, how or can I catch Jesse in first and had I waited too long? So again, I'm reevaluating some of these things and this is why I feel like now maybe I'll take another crack in another American 200 where I can go out there and just run and you know, maybe it's coca-dona, maybe it's, I'm not sure if it's, coca-dona is a pretty deep field, but you know.

Finn (20:55.926)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (21:21.279)
divide 200 potentially and go out and see what I can do and maybe put more on the line, take a bigger risk and risk having my first DNF maybe. I mean, that's not the worst thing in the world.

Finn (21:32.67)
as a fan of yours, if I have a vote, the vote is the Cocodona 250. I think that'd be such a cool one. But I guess maybe one more thing on the competition piece. So if I got this correctly, you moved from, I think it was like in 10th position to second position all in the last 70 miles, which again, I think speaks to just how much of a second half race these events are at the current moment. But maybe one of the things that...

Jeff Pelletier (21:36.911)
All right. All right. Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (21:55.264)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (21:58.759)
prevented you from winning this thing was you said you didn't have a first place strategy. Like you had planned for every single outcome except for first place.

Jeff Pelletier (22:04.071)
Yeah. Yeah, I had a plan. I had a plan for everything. I didn't have a plan for what would happen if I was gunning for first. You know, that should have been my plan D or F or whatever. And so I'm not sure that I knew quite how to execute. I mean, for example, the last aid station, Porcupine Rim Aid Station up on the top of the rim, you have 20 miles to go. It's a non crew accessible aid station. I got there right as the sun was coming up and pull my headlamp off. I go in there.

Grab a bit of food and water. I filled my bladder there. And in hindsight, I didn't need my bladder filled, but when I pre-ran that section, it was much hotter. It was, it was later in the day. And I ended up drinking like two and a half liters during that running, that section in my training and I ran out of water and I didn't want that to happen. But in the end, I drank basically no water chasing down Jesse. And so halfway down the hill, I'm dumping out my, you know, my water thinking, I don't need all this weight. And I'm thinking, why else it didn't need to spend a minute and a half sitting there, filling my bladder.

So that's a good example of where, you know, I was still acting like I was pacing this longer race when in reality we only had 20 miles all downhill to the finish to go. And, um, I could have probably shaved off a couple of minutes right there. Um, so those are just little things that, um, you know, these split second decisions ultimately that, that can cost you minutes, you know, that really add up, especially towards the end of the race. Um, and I think I probably would have.

looking back at my, you know, this, uh, truck camper was amazing, but it might've been, it might've been a double edged sword because maybe we spent a little bit too much time. Maybe I got a little bit too comfortable in there sometimes. And whereas the guys who were out there shivering and the, you know, just working from the drop bags, probably got that got in and out, right? Maybe they saved five minutes here, five minutes there. That could add up real quick as well. So I need to reevaluate that as well. I need to maybe look at not going inside the truck, use the truck, but work outside of it. For example,

Finn (23:36.925)
Interesting.

Finn (23:46.35)
Thanks for watching!

Jeff Pelletier (23:59.719)
so I don't get too comfortable. That would be one way to maybe shave off a few minutes.

Finn (24:03.446)
Maybe in the next conversation with Ross Monster, it's a slightly more stripped down version of their RV. What do you recall from the conversation at the finish line with Jesse Haynes who won the race? Did you guys share any just interesting like back and forth there?

Jeff Pelletier (24:07.603)
Yeah, that's right. That's right. Yeah, exactly.

Jeff Pelletier (24:20.147)
Yeah, I mean, we, um, I asked him right away. I said, were you looking at the tracker that whole last like 30 miles? He's like, dude, yeah, tracker in one hand, refresh, refresh. I mean, we basically got cell service heading up towards porcupine Graham. And from there, it was like, we both had too much information. So I'm chasing them down thinking like, okay, let's speed up a little bit. I'm looking like, is he speeding up? Like how is our gap not narrowing? You know? And, uh, he, and he was, I think he was responding to what I was doing as well. So, um, yeah, that was definitely one.

one thing we kind of joked about. And I think at one point as well, I had a sense he might've been hiding his headlamp from me at one point when we were, you know, we had maybe a half mile gap heading up, up towards that final climb and his headlamp kind of disappeared a couple of times. And I admittedly, I was doing the same thing for Aaron behind me. So, uh, yeah, we definitely were playing games a little bit, but, um, no, I think we were both just, I think he was a little surprised that I had kind of come out of nowhere basically, because he,

You know, he even said that, um, I think it might've been geyser pass aid station where somebody said, you know, just right behind you here. He's just sleeping. You better get out of here. And I think he said like, no, you mean Taylor, right? And they said, no, no Taylor dropped. It's it's Jeff. He's caught up. And so he's like, who's Jeff? Like, like where did, where did he come from? I didn't think I was racing him and I had never actually, we had never met either. So when I crossed the line, the first thing I said was it's nice to meet you. Finally. Cause, uh,

Finn (25:37.497)
Ha ha

Jeff Pelletier (25:46.811)
I haven't even seen his back. I think I saw him once on the trail right towards the end. Otherwise, he was just a dot on the tracker for me.

Finn (25:53.806)
couple more questions about this race and just about this part of the sport in general. What's it like to, because given that you've had experience at a bunch of different races in our sport, different distances, terrains, et cetera, what's it like to recover from a 200 mile race versus a hundred? Like, is it a longer process, shorter process in some weird way? Talk about that.

Jeff Pelletier (26:10.735)
Yeah, I mean, it's not unlike a hundred miler in that it's not so much that your legs are sore. It's a deeper fatigue. You know, your immune system's just shot. You need a lot of naps. You eat a lot. I've been eating a lot and mostly more frequently. You know, I'm just always a little hungry. Pretty dehydrated as well, although that's mostly I think from the dry environment that we're in. But this time my recovery has been pretty good.

And I was surprised because in those final miles, I mean, we really were running hard, much harder than you normally would at the end of a 200. And I remember thinking, I'm, this is the, I'm doing damage right now that I wouldn't need to, you know, this is going to delay my recovery. This is like, yep, this last mile, that's another couple of days recovery. That's another couple of days. Um, but I feel pretty good. I feel pretty good. I don't have a lot of, um, often you get a lot of water retention as well. I didn't have much of that. My, my one ankle is a little bit swollen.

Dorsal flexor was a little bit aggravated. So that got a little bit inflamed. But in the past, I've had a lot of water retention and swelling and I had a little bit of that, a little bit of night sweats as your body tries to rid itself of all that, but not too bad this time. And I attribute that to a pretty heavy intake of protein. I was using NAC products, a Canadian company, who are all, I mean, I say they're Canadian company, they're now the official sponsor of UTMB. So I'm sure everybody's heard of them.

Finn (27:18.222)
Mmm.

Finn (27:27.736)
Yeah.

Finn (27:32.91)
Yep.

Jeff Pelletier (27:34.255)
And their products have protein and amino acids. And that was something I picked up on my second 200 miler, learning that you do need protein. You know, you need other macronutrients during these multi-day races. You can't just live off sugar and carbs. And that also helps with your recovery quite a bit.

Finn (27:51.206)
You've got, if I understand correctly, of a movie coming out about this race somewhat soon.

Jeff Pelletier (27:55.495)
Yeah. So I mean, I film all my races and again, probably could save a bit of time if I wasn't messing around with my camera all the time. But that's just part of my journey. That's just part of my kind of what I do. And yeah, so I have a YouTube channel, I've documented all my all my big races on there, starting with tour de jambe. And the one from Moab is going to be special because it's got I worked with my buddy Derek Lytle, one of the best in the business and

He got just some incredible footage of me and drone footage of me just in the middle of nowhere, you know, just running down these secluded roads and things. Uh, he got a lot of stuff at me at the aid stations, which helped. I didn't have to feel myself like I usually do. I could focus on what I was doing. And also we're telling Audrey's story of crewing this thing. So it's really the logistics. It's the whole kind of thing, you know, the whole how to crew, how to run, how to pace, how to, how to do the whole thing, you know, you'll hear from my pacers, my crew.

Um, hopefully like a pretty detailed picture on how to, I think, execute pretty well in a, in a 200. I think we, I think we nailed it in most aspects on this one.

Finn (28:59.306)
As a consumer, I find these films in the sport about the 200s particularly awesome. Like before this interview, I watched the one that Eric Senceman did before Coco Dona, the Sally McCrae one there. She's done a whole series for these American 200s. And there's, I think because of the distance, it takes on sort of this reality TV show type mentality where like every single day is different. And there's all sorts of intentions and obstacles and perseverance that comes into play that isn't...

Jeff Pelletier (29:09.918)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (29:19.284)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (29:22.612)
Yeah.

Finn (29:28.402)
Always there's not enough time as weird as that sounds in a hundred mile races to develop. So I'm excited for this to come out to see what happens.

Jeff Pelletier (29:32.214)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, there's a real story arc that can develop in these 200s. And there's, you know, people can, you know, you have multiple lows, lots of lows, you have highs and you can come back and you can, you know, you can fade and then and make your way back up the field. So a lot can happen in these races. So it definitely lends itself to storytelling. My film hopefully will be ready. Let's call it mid to late January.

Finn (29:55.634)
Awesome. Yeah. And we'll make sure to link to it when it does come out over time. Awesome. Well, I do want to also talk about your channel specifically, your filmmaking background, your approach in this arena. And I think I want to start with sort of your entrepreneurial origin story, because I've heard a lot of things I've heard that, you know, you've got this video production agency, you were when, even when you were like a teenager, you were, you had like a web based business that you were kind of jamming on, went to film school, like, like talk about all this, like how did, how did all of those events lead to where you are now?

Jeff Pelletier (30:18.943)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (30:24.147)
Yeah, I mean, I've been pretty entrepreneurial since I was a teenager and I've been working in media really since high school. I graduated in 99, right before the dot com explosion, but I came out of that with having some success in the couple of websites. And I then transitioned into video production. I've been making videos in high school as well, you know, my grad video and things like that. So I always had a camera in my hand. But I always thought I would...

make documentaries say for like Nat Geo or something like travel films. That was nature films say. But I, early in my career started a corporate video production company. That was kind of what we were told was a quick way to make a few bucks. And I ended up building that business. It took me a lot of years. I've had that company now for almost two decades. That's pretty much been my entire working career. But that business has given me not so much the financial resources, but the time, because I have a great team now.

and it allows me to work remotely. It's a part-time job for me, it's still my full-time income, but that's afforded me the time to then transition to telling my own stories again. I could have never known at the time that instead of making travel films for Nat Geo, I'd be making them for YouTube. I mean, YouTube has only been around for so long. But there was kind of just this, I started running as well in my late 20s and pretty naturally as a marketer at heart and professionally,

started telling stories through that. And eventually those two things just converge. And I realized, you know, I can apply what I'm doing with my video production work to my passion, this new passion of mine for running. And it's only been the last couple of years that I've seen that become something where it's actually generating revenue to help me travel and to pay for all these trips and races, and potentially could become my full-time job as well. So that's really just been the last couple of years that things have kind of converged and...

Finn (32:15.96)
Wow.

Jeff Pelletier (32:20.871)
Again, that all started with fortunately having a business that afforded me the time and flexibility to do that. Whereas I think other YouTubers struggle in that it's, you know, either they have a full-time job that they're trying to balance it with, maybe even a family, and they're trying to approach YouTube as a money-making thing from the start and they have to really just chase the views, say with gear reviews and things like that. I've been afforded that freedom to kind of just go with

you know, experiment and tell stories that I care about them that I'm passionate about. And that's kind of led me, I think, into this niche of sort of longer form adventure and race documentaries.

Finn (32:59.506)
you've got more sustainable incentives.

Jeff Pelletier (33:03.623)
Yeah, exactly. Like I don't need the views. I don't need the revenue. And at this point now, I pretty much just reinvest a lot of that. We traveled a lot this year. And so YouTube, you know, affords me those opportunities now. And but again, I do still have my business on the side as well. And so I don't have to. Yeah, I don't have to chase the views necessarily. And having said that, there's definitely I saw some success with my film from UTMB. It did tell me that there's certain races.

Finn (33:12.235)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (33:32.967)
I think that are going to be more successful on the platform than others. That's pretty clear.

Finn (33:39.758)
That's something that I want to talk about in a moment too, is like how you choose your races and how you choose to create content. Do you fall into sort of the lane of capturing pre-existing demand or creating demand? But first, I got to go back. What kind of websites were you building back in the 90s?

Jeff Pelletier (33:59.479)
Oh, it was, um, we had a couple of like humor based websites. This was before, before social media web one point. Oh, it was like sharing contents, like shareable stuff. People would share it through their email addresses and we'd basically build up a massive newsletter list farm people's email addresses. And there's a lot of banner advertising, put it that way.

Finn (34:05.39)
Okay.

Finn (34:18.498)
That's awesome. Okay. But yeah, coming back to now, like I think it's, you make a really interesting point about incentives as a content creator and having the freedom maybe to pursue the stuff that you truly wanna create versus feeling pressure to create stuff that may have more immediate payoff. And I'm, I mean, as a creator myself in this sport, as a podcaster and doing like race coverage and stuff, I am certainly not immune to this. I have definitely at various points,

felt the pressure, whether it's to get a certain sponsorship or to create a certain piece of content. I can look at the metrics, I see what immediately resonates, what I thought was good, but didn't resonate with the audience. So do you keep that video production agency as sort of like the backstop that gives you that freedom? Is that how that works?

Jeff Pelletier (34:50.994)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (34:59.589)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (35:07.751)
Yeah, I mean, that's exactly it. Like the business is, like I said, I have a great team there. So that's sort of it's doing its thing and we'll continue to do so. And so I don't need to stress as much about generating money from YouTube. And it means that, I mean, I basically make films, the films that I would want to watch. I edit for myself. I'm my own audience. And I know there's enough people out there like me who might want to watch the same thing when it comes to pacing, when it comes to topics. I mean, a good example is I like to do a lot of fast packing.

And I'm trying to lean into that more moving forward. Cause I think it's a bit of a niche I could carve out for myself on YouTube. Um, even the term fast packing isn't, you know, it's not a very popular search term. Um, and, uh, you know, it's an example though, of, of an area that I think if I play the long game, I might be able to really help to grow that side of the sport and again, maybe own that term to a degree, um, but it won't pay off immediately and so, but I'm, I'm sort of committed to helping to grow that side of things and to educate people on the gear and you know, how to, how to do it.

Finn (35:56.749)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (36:04.871)
because I think it's just a great way to enjoy the trails.

Finn (36:08.19)
I think for anyone that listens to this show that is a creator, what you just said there is interest in this idea of owning a term. Talk more about that.

Jeff Pelletier (36:15.091)
Yeah, well, I mean, very specifically, tactically speaking, like the term fast packing, if you search for it, there's it's a very low search volume. And that's something you would look for when doing SEO. You look for search volume. How many people are literally searching for that word? Um, you know, what I call my film running the tour de Montblanc or fast packing it. And I do AB test those titles, uh, admittedly, but, um, well, it depends. So I want to grow the term fast packing and grow that, grow that niche. And, and again, own that, or do I want to sort of overlap with, you know,

Finn (36:22.797)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (36:45.339)
other topics and areas. So yeah, I think it's, it's sort of, it's that long game versus immediate kind of payoff. Even even in the industry, I mean, there's some brands who use the term fast packing, but it's only a couple. And most companies don't. And I think even that's an opportunity for some brands to really, to really own that term. And that's something I'd like to maybe work with, you know, I'd love to develop my own fast packing pack one day. That's really just dialed in.

Finn (37:00.531)
Yeah.

Finn (37:14.717)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (37:16.06)
And that's definitely an opportunity that I think is so far left untapped. There's some okay packs, but no great packs out there.

Finn (37:23.306)
I don't know if this is like a good one to one comparison or, you know, adjacent example, but like maybe for listeners and viewers, like when Karl Meltzer was one of the first trail athletes to sign with Hoka, he made a very early bet on that brand, got the speed go dissociated with it. Or like, I mean, we just talked about the 200s, Mike McKnight.

Jeff Pelletier (37:38.806)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (37:42.166)
very early on in his career saying like, I'm going to be the 200 mile guy, I'm going to invest in this race here. So I'm going to build my athletic reputation around it. And maybe those are like adjacent examples to this whole like fast packing percent. I find that fascinating.

Jeff Pelletier (37:42.614)
Hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (37:54.619)
Yeah, I think so. And also it's, um, you know, for me, the ethos of fast packing really is adventure. I like to, when it comes to my training, I like to trick myself into training. I don't like to go out there and do, you know, if I do a hundred mile a week, a hundred plus mile a week, it's not because I'm out there doing hard tempos every day. Like it's because I fast packed some route, right? You know, I did some big adventure that just happened to be a hundred miles. That's typically how I, how I, you know, some people race to train, some people train to race and I adventure to race. That's how I train.

Finn (38:05.282)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (38:23.211)
Um, I want my running to be inspiring. I want my training to be a story in itself. I want it to be part of the journey. I want the journey to be the most exciting part, not just the outcome, not just the race. And so fast packing allows me to do that. Um, and again, I think it's a really interesting style. It's basically just, you know, it's a combination of backpacking and, uh, and running, and especially when you go over to Europe, I mean, you can do it with the 12 liter pack, you can go hut to hut. And that is just an incredible way to see the Alps.

Finn (38:51.486)
I was studying your YouTube channel before this in prep and correct me if I'm wrong, but it looks like it was the tour de géant video that sort of opened the floodgates of growth for you. If that is true, talk about that moment and did that like inject extra confidence for you or motivation to maybe get more regular at content creation on the channel from there on out?

Jeff Pelletier (39:01.92)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (39:14.271)
Yeah, yeah, you nailed it. So I mean, I launched my channel years ago. I had a trekking video from the Annapurna circuit to Nepal. But I didn't have a strategy. I would sort of drip out a video maybe every couple of years. And I ran Tour de Gio in 2018. I then ran the Swiss Peaks 360K in 2019. And I actually didn't publish either video until early 2020 by the time I got around to cutting those two. And so really, it was kind of heading into 2020 that I launched those two videos. And Tour immediately got some traction.

I think mostly because it's well, it's a big race. It's a difficult race, but it's also a hard one to film. You know, it's really hard to have the wherewithal to capture races like that. And I think that's maybe a competitive advantage I have on YouTube is content creation, video production is so second nature to me. I don't have to think about it. And in fact, sometimes when I'm in the worst place in a race, when I think, oh, I should get a shot of this, it snaps me out of that.

And it just brings me back to life and I can, I'm running around getting establishing shots and closeups. People are looking at me like, are you racing? Are you in the race? Like, because it's so second nature. I've been doing it for, you know, almost 30 years. If I had a camera in my hand. So, um, with these longer races, like in tour being one of them, I think it's my content stands out a little bit there. And again, tour just happens to be a really big race. So that did get me a lot of views. It got me some credibility as well.

Finn (40:14.573)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (40:39.879)
And most of my content has stemmed from that and from my other events where I'm not coming into this saying I'm an expert in anything. I don't claim to be an authority. I just say, this is what worked for me. And people are asking me, what shoes did you use for that race? What was your, what pack? How did you train for it? And I'm okay. Here's how I, here's how I trained. Here's the shoes I used. And so as I've continued to do some of these adventures and some of these races and had again, okay results, you know, top 10 percentile, I get more questions and I get a little bit more credibility as well. I think.

as far as those responses go. So for me, it's been an organic process, just kind of responding. And again, it's only been the last year or two, really during the pandemic, that I sat down and thought, I think when travel resumes, I can really lean into this content production thing. And it's only been the last year and a half where I have now, I've got lists, I've got Gantt charts, I've got everything planned out, I've got content planned out for months at a time, sometimes up to a year at a time, especially when it comes to some of my product integrations.

Um, but it was, uh, it was a very organic process to get there. I kind of stumbled into it. Um, kind of like my 200 racing strategy. I sort of discovered that alone.

Finn (41:49.098)
I'm really interested in the present day cohort of creators like yourself, people like Ethan Newberry, Billy Yang. Do I understand correctly? Did you work with Ethan on a few of his films in the past?

Jeff Pelletier (41:56.191)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (42:01.127)
Yeah, early on I helped out. I shot all the on course footage for wonderland, his film about Gary Robbins, FKT and the wonderland trail. So I did all the running footage on that. And that was back in the day with a manual steady cam. This was before DJI Ronin's and you know, before GoPro was a usable camera. I did help out a little bit on his Barclay film as well. Some interviews here, but that was kind of around the time I was sort of stumbling into this idea of maybe launching my own YouTube channel, but I still hadn't really committed to it yet.

Finn (42:29.906)
Is there, and obviously, you have a ton of experience in film production, storytelling, but from people like Ethan, maybe even other fellow YouTubers out there, is there anything that you've been inspired by or you've picked up from their approach to choreographing the sport?

Jeff Pelletier (42:48.083)
Yeah, I mean, I think for me, I had to build the confidence to get in front of the camera. I've always been behind the camera professionally. So learning to be a little bit more vulnerable. You know, I think Ethan was, he was a first, he had a first mover advantage for sure. But he was also very good at that. He was good at being vulnerable and putting himself out there. The storytelling part is still something I'm learning because it's a different type of storytelling, telling your own story.

And I think moving forward, I could see incorporating other athletes and other people a little bit more and telling their story, but from my perspective. So I would always still be a bit of a character in that. But, um, more lately though, I'm kind of moving forward. I I'm looking more towards traditional television production for inspiration. You know, for the formats of, um, getting away from the logs, for example, and really adding production value, um, Anthony Bourdain style, say the, you know, applying, applying that to trail running. So travel and, uh,

you know, meeting people and telling, telling their stories and me kind of being a facilitator or a host of that. Um, I can see getting a little bit more into the science of trail running. And again, maybe I'm the Guinea pig and I'm experimenting and learning these things as I go. Um, so I do actually look more now to work outside of the sport for inspiration. Um, because I think that's, uh, you know, why, why reinvent the wheel? There's content formats that work and have worked for, for a lot of years. They work really well. That can be applied back to our sport.

And part of that, I think is just a bit more higher budgets, higher production value, quality over quantity maybe as well.

Finn (44:16.558)
And you seem to fit in this category perfectly, but it seems like a lot of the best new ideas for our sport have come as a function of looking nowhere inside our community, but outside our community to other sources, like you said, like Anthony Bourdain. And then you bring back those ideas to our community and like that becomes innovation.

Jeff Pelletier (44:38.683)
Yeah, well, I mean, I learned this lesson early on with my video production company, my communications agency, where clients would come to us and you know, you're working with the roofing company, they say, we want a video like this other roofing company. And we're like, no, let's look at other industries. You know, there's people doing other things aside from your direct competitors. And I remember that get having that lesson, you know, early on, which is you need to look outside of your immediate circle. Because every problem has been solved before. And there's so many opportunities out there. And again, I think content,

format and themes and approach. This is a good example of that. I take a lot of inspiration from travel documentaries and how I can apply that to my trail running films. Cause for me, destination running, traveling, getting to meet new people, explore new cultures and new places. That is one of my favorite parts about trail running. So I definitely try to bring that to my films as well.

Finn (45:28.298)
on a side note, and this is a bit of an inside ongoing joke on the podcast, but you pronounced it V-log. I also pronounce it V-log, and I've been getting made fun of for months that it's actually vlog and not V-log, but you validated my experience. I agree, I agree. Right, exactly, exactly.

Jeff Pelletier (45:39.015)
Well, yeah, I mean, I would say vlogger, but I think I think V log sounds better than. Yeah, yeah. I wouldn't say be log. I would say blog. But anyway, yeah.

Finn (45:50.922)
Well, one more thing on that front. So you said like, you know, you could see yourself getting into sort of the science of trail running, which I think is super cool, like, you know, becoming a guinea pig and end of one and people take from that, whatever, whatever they will, there's a guy and this is super far out, but his name is Brian Johnson. And I just listened to this podcast. He has this website called the blueprint where he's essentially trying to become immortal. And so he's with all of the existing science, he's taking all the certain supplements, eating a certain way, sleeping a certain way, all this experimental stuff.

Jeff Pelletier (46:00.864)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (46:07.391)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (46:13.483)
Yeah.

Finn (46:20.278)
He's just documenting his path to immortality if that works out for him. I could see a similar type of series take place in trail where it's like based on all of the latest research around coaching and nutrition and sleep, I'm gonna live like the prototypical like cutting edge way to like PR to 200 or something like that.

Jeff Pelletier (46:41.607)
Yeah. Well, that's just it. I mean, I am a very like, I'm a cerebral athlete. I'm not a natural athlete. I need to think my way through the sport. That's what appeals to me about the sport. The longer distances you can think your way through it. This is why I don't run, you know, vertical kilometers and stuff. Cause I, there's not enough time. Um, but I, I troubleshoot, I, I sort of, I iterate. And, uh, so that sort of approach I think is something I naturally do. I'm always trying to learn. I'm curious, but I'm not an expert.

Finn (46:58.828)
Yep.

Jeff Pelletier (47:10.659)
by any means. So I think learning from other people is the approach is my approach. And yeah, I think that kind of content would probably be interesting for other people as well.

Finn (47:21.674)
I think you kind of already answered this, but I want to bring it up again. Like when I think about the trade-offs of being like a, like a traditional YouTuber versus more of a traditional filmmaker at heart, you look on the YouTuber side, high publishing cadence. They don't do much in post-production. A lot of them are algorithmic algorithmically motivated. That's it. That's a big word for me. Um, but like you don't seem like you're, you give into those pressures.

Jeff Pelletier (47:42.825)
Mm.

Finn (47:48.342)
Do you feel any trade-offs there? Do you feel like you're making any sacrifices in the process?

Jeff Pelletier (47:52.527)
Yeah, I mean, of course, I'm sacrificing channel growth. I've had very slow but steady channel growth. And it's sustainable, I think, but it's not growing at quite the rate it could be because I'm not doing the click-baity stuff. I'm not doing the, you know, and having said that, I have a lot of ideas for those kind of videos. Really what it is, I need somebody to help me with that kind of stuff. I have, you know, I'm already so backed up just for my adventure films from this year, yet alone trying to take on other topics.

Um, but, uh, I'm sort of, I'm in it for the long haul when it comes to content production, um, YouTube happens to be the platform I'm focusing on right now, but I see myself as an outdoor adventure filmmaker, first and foremost, not a YouTuber. And I say that because I don't even see myself as a trail running filmmaker necessarily long-term. I mean, 20 years from now, I might not be running as much, but maybe I'll be doing other kinds of adventures. And I think the same type of storytelling can apply, um, to multi-sport events. Maybe, you know, bike packing is something I would like to explore.

Um, and, and potentially just travel in general, where we'd go and do other types of adventures that maybe aren't running related, uh, for now though, I definitely am, I love the crossover with my running. So I definitely, I'm not going to abandon that anytime soon, but again, having said that I'm an outdoor adventure filmmaker, I happen to be focusing on trail running and happen to be, um, investing in the YouTube platform at the moment.

Finn (49:14.418)
This is a super hypothetical question, but like if you were in a different financial position and like this channel had to work, it like had to be, it was your economic well-being was hanging on it. What, what would you be doing differently with your YouTube channel? Do you imagine?

Jeff Pelletier (49:29.967)
Yeah, so if that was the case, I would then lean into the more click-baity stuff. I mean, I do know it works. I resist it a lot. I've worked as a YouTube strategist for businesses in the past and definitely just observing other creators in the space. I'd probably be going for more of the quantity over quality approach, to put it that way. A little less storytelling, a little more, probably educational type stuff, a lot of how-to, a lot of tutorials. I do know that stuff would work.

Finn (49:49.673)
Okay.

Jeff Pelletier (49:57.467)
I think there's room for both. I mean, I could see, I'm hoping heading into the New York to hire, to start building a team around me. Working with Derek as a filmmaker, not only helped, I mean, in that case, it helped to elevate the production values of my film. And I think that's something I will definitely do, again, moving forward with some of my big events and things is I'll bring in outside talent. But when it comes to scaling my content production as well, I could definitely build up a team of editors and, you know.

people to help me on the back end as well, try to get out some of this content a little bit quicker. And that might be where I have, I still focus on my storytelling. That's the stuff that I personally work on, but on the side, I'm putting out a little bit more of the tutorial type stuff, maybe even some gear reviews.

Finn (50:41.034)
What type of person would your first hire be? Is it like a Swiss army knife type? Is it a specialist in editing? How do you think about that?

Jeff Pelletier (50:49.043)
Yeah, I mean, I have a lot of experience working, like hiring, building a team. So I, um, I've thought about that. I have room for both. Um, I have sort of administrative tasks, like creating subtitles. It's a silly thing that somebody needs to do and it takes an hour or two for each video and I, I do them all the time for every video. I have a lot of, uh, English as a second language viewers. Um, thanks to some of my European films. And so that's an example of, of just a small thing that could be delegated to.

Finn (51:02.772)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (51:17.223)
somebody with a good eye, but they don't have to be a Swiss army knife. They can be sort of a, you know, a B player who is maybe a remote worker. Um, I think there's room on my team for both. And I think eventually, you know, I'd love, I'd love to build up a content, a media team around me so that in say three to five years, we're just a power house producing great content, but a lot more of it quality, quality with quality. That's kind of my, my dream.

Finn (51:42.426)
in the moment it's escaping me and it could be the case that something like this already exists, but in your mind is there a sort of content house that already exists in the sport or would you be creating something that maybe deserves to exist and should exist for a lot of reasons but isn't there yet?

Jeff Pelletier (51:59.175)
Yeah, I don't think it exists in the sport. Again, I look outside of the sport. Um, I mean, Jamil's team is great. Don't get me wrong, but they're, they're very much, they're doing live streaming. They're in a lot of places. They're not, uh, and the production values, I mean, they're good, but they're not investing quite as much as I could see. You know, I would love to create content that's Netflix worthy and potentially could get broadcast and could get picked up on, on maybe streaming platforms. Um, and so I know, I don't think there's anybody.

Finn (52:07.872)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (52:27.871)
doing exactly what I have in mind, which is a really professionalized production approach to trail running.

Finn (52:34.57)
You could be the guy looking back, you know four years from now that brings the drive to survive for trail running to Netflix

Jeff Pelletier (52:41.287)
Yeah, well, maybe I mean, I should say Bo Miles, I think is the closest example. Bo Miles, he he's a great filmmaker, he's a great storyteller. But he the reason why I hesitate to mention him as an example is because while his quality is great, the quantity isn't there. He only publishes a film every couple months. When he does they get millions of views because they're guaranteed bangers. And he hires a crew. He doesn't shoot and edit himself. He writes and directs.

Finn (52:46.702)
Thanks for watching!

Jeff Pelletier (53:09.627)
But he's a professor. He's you know, the filmmaking side I think is more of a hobby for him He doesn't have a profession of production background So I think he's got the quality side just not the quantity side that I envision for this kind of thing

Finn (53:23.27)
if you because you mentioned earlier like if you did or when you make that transition to also telling other people's stories Are there any particular athletes you have in mind or groups? Um, is that still kind of fuzzy right now?

Jeff Pelletier (53:30.28)
Mm.

Jeff Pelletier (53:36.691)
Yeah, I'm not too sure. I mean, I think I don't want to just be making films. I think my, my friend Billy Yang is probably the one guy who's managed to really walk this line where he makes a lot of mostly films about other athletes. He does some more vlog type content, but it's mostly other people's stories. And yet he publishes it on his own channel under his own banner and people recognize it as Billy Yang work. Whereas most people you do that and nobody knows who made the film. I mean,

Finn (54:00.748)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (54:06.235)
Sally's films, you mentioned Sally McRae, like her films, she's got a great team. The filmmakers that were, I saw them working down at Moab, they're killing it with, that's right, yeah. But I think that 99.99% of the people just think of them as Sally McRae films, even though there's this team behind her producing that work. So you gotta walk that line. I wanna build a brand, I wanna continue to build that presence under a single channel and have a consistent story. So it's less about

Finn (54:14.062)
True Darby. Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (54:35.767)
It's not that I want to be no one in the sport necessarily. It's more that I want each film to feel like part of a bigger story. So there's a progression to my story. There's a progression to my trail running to my adventures for better or for worse. Even as I get older and I get slower, that's part of the story. And I think when you make films about other people that can feel very disparate, you lose that through line. And now, I mean, when we talk about storytelling, yes, there's a story in each film, but there's also this consistent narrative that can exist that can connect those stories.

And I think that's the power of having a channel, a YouTube channel, is there's a through line there and people can follow you for years and see your story evolve. And I think that again, the risk is that you end up making just films about different people and there is no through line. And so I want to try to walk that line. Um, again, I think Billy's done a good job, but I, but even that, when you watch his films, he doesn't put himself in it in the way that I probably would. Um, so maybe it's more, I'm pacing somebody in a race and so it's their story, but it's me they're telling it.

you know, that might be the extent of that.

Finn (55:38.566)
You mentioned the situation with Sally McCray and how there are these amazing people behind the scenes that are creating a movie for her, but when the audience thinks about the outcome, they're really, the attribution sort of goes to Sally. And like, I know the guys behind that, like Tyler and Drew, they're amazing. Here at Singletrack, I work with a guy named Scott Hickenlooper who's just created like absolutely banger films for us in the past. Thinking...

Jeff Pelletier (55:52.053)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (56:03.106)
from the vantage point of a lot of these videographers and photographers who do a lot of great work for brands, they do a lot of great work for creators, is there any advice you have for how they can sort of go to bat for themselves better or get more credit in the process? Or yeah, I guess just get like a bigger share of the pie so that not only is their end product coming to life and creating so much joy in our community, but yeah, they're just maybe profiting from it more or something.

Jeff Pelletier (56:33.779)
Yeah, to be clear, I don't think it's a bad thing necessarily. You know, these filmmakers are getting credit. It depends on their goals. If their goals are to be getting more opportunities to go and make similar work, to make films like that, then they're on the right track. They'll get those opportunities. But if their goals are, you know, for me, I want to be invited. I want it's not the money for me, it's the opportunities. I want to be invited out to do some cool, you know, amazing adventures in the future.

But I don't want somebody to say, oh, and by the way, we just want you there as a camera guy in the background. You'll be riding in the car. It's like, well, no, I want to I want to run across the Sahara. I want to run across the air. I want to be doing the adventure as well. So, you know, it depends what you want to do. If you want to be, you know, in the crew vehicle, filming from the crew vehicle, if that's the opportunity you're looking for, then that's fine. If you want to be a character, if you want to be experiencing that adventure for yourself, then maybe behind the scenes isn't the right place for you. So I think it really depends on your goals.

Finn (57:31.395)
Yeah, I know that some of these questions I'm getting super in the weeds, but there are a fair number of people that are like athletes that are thinking about sponsorship operators in the sport. So I think it's worth going down the rabbit hole. Coming back to YouTube for a second, like you think about like the slow but super sustainable and ultimately impressive growth you've had with the channel. When you think about the ROI, like year over year of adding 3000 or 5000 subscribers to the channel.

Do you feel like that number on its own like significantly helps contribute to add revenue or sponsor deals or is it part of like this longer term change where all of that adds up and like it's more like 20,000 subscribers over three years is more life changing or situation changing.

Jeff Pelletier (58:15.431)
Well, I think subscribers as a metric is mostly a vanity metric on YouTube, meaning that it doesn't always translate into tangible results, whatever those results might be, you know, if results are ROI, if it's, I mean, it doesn't even translate into views. I definitely see a lot of channels with a lot of huge subscriber base where most of their videos don't get many views, maybe the odd video does. And that tells you that there's something, something's wrong. Their audience isn't very engaged. And then you see other channels, maybe like mine, where the

the views are very consistent, consistently high relative to the subscriber base. Um, I think that's a result of a couple of things. One is the, there's different audience types that maybe don't subscribe, like don't actually have a YouTube account and hit the subscribe button. And yet when they see that you've posted a video, maybe on Instagram, they click over and they watch it. Um, and then I think there's a lot of, um, changes in the algorithm over the years where

You don't need I mean, first of all, if you've subscribed to like 300 channels, which a lot of us have on your home page, when you go to YouTube, it can't show 300 videos from 300 different channels. It's picking the best ones anyway, the ones that it thinks you're most likely to watch. So there's an algorithm even behind your subscriptions. And the algorithm has evolved to a point now where it doesn't even care if you've subscribed, because if you've subscribed to something, you never click on those videos. It's going to go, you know what? I don't think this guy's really interested in these videos anyway. I know he's subscribed, but.

I'm going to show him this instead because I think he's going to be more interested in the new Billy Yang film instead of this. So it's all about the algorithm at the end of the day. Subscriber count is just a vanity metric. Having said that, subscriber count, I think can help to attract sponsors and things, partners. There's definitely a threshold there. And also something I've noticed anecdotally is that subscribers...

we get more subscribers, there's an acceleration that happens because there's a social proof I think that happens where, you know, if I stumble on a film and it's like, wow, this is good. Like I wonder what else this person has. And I look down at their name and they've got a million subscribers. I just subscribe because I just assume they're probably pumping out good content all the time. Whereas if I stumble on a film that's really good and they've got a thousand subscribers, I'm like, hold on a second, are they a brand new channel or is this still an anomaly? Because why do they only have a thousand subscribers?

Finn (01:00:24.558)
Hahaha!

Jeff Pelletier (01:00:37.587)
And I usually click over and I look and sure enough, maybe it's a channel about productivity and they happen to make one running film or whatever. So having a high subscriber count can provide social proof that can help grow your channel as well. So I do, I should say I do target my, I do measure and have goals for subscribers, but it's not because I want the subscribers themselves, it's the secondary benefits that it provides. So views matter and then the third kind of thing, though skipping ahead.

ahead of views, it's engagement. Are people commenting? Are they sharing? And are they watching? Are you getting the viewer retention? And that's where storytelling comes in. And the longer, I mean, the better you can tell a story, the more engaging you can make it, the longer the video can be. And to say it like it is, the more ad placements you can put in it. And ad placements, the number of ad impressions, not just the number of views, is what really turns into revenue.

Finn (01:01:31.79)
I find this next thing fascinating when I when I look at a lot of the especially the professional sponsored athletes in our sport ultra trail running. Almost everybody I might even say everybody with like one or like Claire Gallagher is an exception she's off social media but almost every pro athlete is on Instagram. Very few are on YouTube as well and yet YouTube is a place where you can like measure demand you can like really easily tap into your audience.

What do you have any thoughts on why there's such a difference there between, uh, you know, uh, saturation on Instagram versus YouTube for these, these athletes.

Jeff Pelletier (01:02:09.915)
Yeah, I mean, it's barrier to entry in terms of creating the content, creating long form video, which is what YouTube really is intended for long form, meaning over five minutes, say five to 10 minutes and longer, uh, that takes a lot of work. And, um, that's, I think that's it. I think that's the main thing. It's so much easier to just put out a few images. And as far as I think satisfying sponsors, I mean, I've worked with sponsors who I won't name names, but some of my better partners I've worked with for years, they have these platforms that you plug your, your socials into. And that's kind of how they

they monitor their athletes activity, there usually isn't YouTube on there. And so I go, hey guys, what about me? Because I have some Instagram followers, but I'm mostly focused on YouTube because they don't expect their athletes to be professional, almost full-time content creators on YouTube. It really is a full-time job. So I mean, that's it, it's time. And it's too bad because YouTube is so much easier to monetize and it's also much easier to create a much deeper.

connection with your audience. It's like podcasting, right? Where Finn, I've got you in my ears for hours at a time while I'm running and I feel a connection to you. Long form content does that in a way that short form doesn't. So there's a huge benefits in long term content, especially video content for YouTube where you can really monetize. I'm not sure how you would monetize Instagram aside from doing the odd little sponsored posts, which can't pay much. And it's also, I find very intrusive for your audience.

Finn (01:03:10.848)
Yeah.

Finn (01:03:36.81)
Yeah, you're gonna laugh at this number because obviously you bring it way more, but I get right now 300 bucks a month in AdSense revenue from YouTube and it's awesome. I use it to pay groceries every month, it's excellent. It's... Ha ha ha.

Jeff Pelletier (01:03:48.083)
Yeah. It's not nothing and it can scale. They can scale. So, um, but again, it's that deeper audience connection, longer forum. I remember a few years back, somebody saying, uh, podcasting is dead. I thought podcasting is dead. Are you kidding me? I listened to hours of podcasts a day. And again, the, the ROI, that intangible audience connection you can develop is huge. We're now doing hosted tours. Now we bring people on trips. We went to Patagonia.

Earlier this year, we ran the Tour de Mont Blanc with a group. Had a lot of fun. Next year, we're going to Ecuador, and we're going to Iceland. And then Audrey's gonna lead a women's only group on the Tour de Mont Blanc. And all of that is as a result of a deeper audience connection that we've developed on YouTube, where people trust us, and maybe they wanna hang out with us, but I think more just they trust that we'll put a good group together, they know us, they like us, and they trust us. And that's as a result of that deeper connection that we've achieved on YouTube.

Finn (01:04:33.524)
Mm.

Finn (01:04:45.706)
When you think about sort of like the categories of revenue, so like AdSense is one, maybe Partnerships is another, Patreon, fan subscriptions is another one, do you have goals for which ones should be your primary source, or are you happy to see it coming from any direction?

Jeff Pelletier (01:04:51.403)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (01:05:04.467)
Yeah, I mean, I'm sort of in the experimental stage. So I do generate revenue for my channel. I mean, I do have an accountant's and I do write things off. Like I'm at a stage where it's real money, but for now I'm mostly experimenting. So I do a fair number of product integrations. And to be honest, part of that is I'm just experimenting with having fun with it a little bit. I do have a marketing background and I do this for a living, working with brands and making marketing videos. So.

It's more of an experimental process for me. So I wouldn't say I necessarily have goals for them, but I am trying to diversify. And I think that's something every content creator should do on any platform is, well, first of all, diversify your platforms. And part of that for me is making sure I build up my newsletter in addition to YouTube. If I was to get banned from YouTube tomorrow, that would be a huge hit to my brand and to my revenue. And at least if I had a newsletter base, I can maybe bring them over to a new platform. So that's, we call that

owned land versus rented land. You know, you don't want to build all your property, all your homes on your own rented land. And the second piece of that is diversifying your income streams. And so as a YouTuber, the obvious ones are AdSense. Those are the programmatic ads that show up throughout your video. I place them manually. I choose where those go, including pre and post role. Then there's the product integrations, the ones that are sort of, you know, this video is

Finn (01:06:25.035)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (01:06:27.507)
Then you have the sort of more traditional sponsorships I have as a runner, uh, working with companies like Solomon, um, where they kind of more sponsor me as a runner, but really it's, you know, they're, they like the fact that I get views on YouTube. It's not so much that I get results at races. Um, you have affiliate marketing links, you know, when I do link to products on Amazon, for example, I get a little bit of commission there and that adds up. It's not huge, but it does add up.

So there's different ways you can piece that together. And again, we're now doing these hosted trips, which are completely separate. Those are real life things we're doing. And that's all, of course, an extension of the channel as well. And that brings in revenue. So yeah, it's piecing it together. You know, it's making small moves, incremental improvements and diversifying as well, just to lower the risk of any one channel or any one sort of revenue stream getting, taking a hit.

Finn (01:07:15.342)
Well, I really appreciate all the insights there because I think, like I said, there's a certain audience that listens to this that gets a value from that. But also I think just as the sport gets bigger, as it gets more professional, as there are more people attempting to go full time at it, these types of conversations can be instructive. But before we close up though, I do wanna make sure we kind of come back to your approach to storytelling and creating these videos and the scripting that goes into it and the research that goes into it.

Jeff Pelletier (01:07:33.024)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (01:07:44.414)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (01:07:45.666)
Um, and I think maybe starting with the research and the scripting, like, and I'll tell you a story on my end to kind of illustrate, like when I, when I think about a lot of the videos that I've created in the past, mostly the only consideration has been the cinematography piece and sort of creating these, like, you know, this montage of glamour shots that kind of captures the ambiance, but not these, you know, trials and tribulations of the athletes or anybody in the videos. And you're, you've taken a really interesting approach and like really

thinking carefully about character development, stuff like that. So talk about your research and your scripting process first.

Jeff Pelletier (01:08:21.095)
Yeah. And I mean, I have different types of content and again, I'm still experimenting to see what works. I have I did two different series based on two different stage races I did with Racing the Planet, one in Namibia, one in Georgia. And I approached those really like, you know, what if these felt like a TV show? You know, there's a recap at the beginning. There's characters you meet throughout. And I really wanted to feel and a lot of the comments are people saying, oh, this could be on Netflix and stuff. And I say, well, yeah, that's the point. I'm trying to make it feel like a Netflix show. Right. Like it's.

Finn (01:08:46.561)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (01:08:51.327)
I didn't quite get the traction on those. I didn't quite get the ROI considering how much, how many hours I put in. And it taught me that maybe that format, maybe there's a happy medium there. I actually get better traction, I think maybe with the algorithm on longer form as opposed to episodic. So that might just have something to do with the algorithm. But some of those, you know, took a lot of research as well because I'm really going into the, you know, researching the place as well.

So it's almost part travel vlog or part travel film. Um, that's obviously a lot of work and I'll usually do that research and script that in advance and have a shot list before I go to a place. Then there's other ones that I'm sort of discovering. So a little more documentary style. I'm taking notes. So I ran the Bob Graham round back in June. That was a big project for me. Big investment as well financially. Um, spent the entire month in England, but it was spec, just a great experience. And part of that is I'm, I'm.

I was traveling, so there's a travel component, but also learning about the Bob Graham, the history, you know, the culture of there. And I'm making notes and scripting as I go. So now that I'm back here, finally ready to edit, I do have the foundation. I have a script, you know, I have some very specific voiceover written already. But I also kind of have a storyline kind of scripted and written and ready to go. So it kind of depends. It depends on what content.

I have this kind of like bi-weekly vlog style thing I call my training diaries. Those I script in the sense of I use a teleprompter. So it's word for word scripted. And that's just partly, that's just who I am. I'm kind of a bit of a bit of a perfectionist. I can't wing it. I'm just not good at doing that. So, but also sometimes I'm well, thank you. Also I'm trying to typically convey some very, very specific information and I want to be concise. I want to be on point. I don't want to make mistakes.

Finn (01:10:26.41)
Yeah, yeah. I mean, you're crushing it in this conversation.

Jeff Pelletier (01:10:42.391)
And I mean, even part of this is like, ah, man, this isn't a complaint. Um, you know, I love all my viewers and I appreciate all the constructive feedback, but I get a lot of comments about pronunciation and I do my best and I work hard at pronunciation and I still get it wrong. And so a lot of this is researching in advance how to pronounce, how to pronounce, pronounce things and making notes for myself, you know, I apologize. It's not Nevada. It's Nevada. It's a, you know, I spent a lot of time learning how to say Azores islands. It's not the Azores.

And even the Bob Graham, I was corrected. It's Bob Graham around, not Graham. I'm always learning, right? So, and those are things that, you know, you can't be just winging this stuff all the time if you wanna be continually improving. Again, looking at traditional content production, it is all scripted. That's how you iterate. That's how you start creating cool transitions. That's how you plan your scenes out in advance. That's how you get permits to film in certain places that you wouldn't film otherwise.

So I'm definitely moving towards a more scripted place. But that's obviously very different than, yeah, running a 200 mile race. I mean, that's not gonna be a scripted film. The intro will be scripted. Some of the scenes might be, we had notes on the wall for the sponsors that we had to make sure we filmed. But otherwise it's, you know, I'm documenting the adventure.

Finn (01:12:02.594)
So with this next question, I got to preface it a bit. And it's all around sort of like how you think about character development, you being the protagonist. Before I got into trail running, I was sort of a political junkie. And one of my favorite shows of all time is The West Wing, Aaron Sorkin, who's a great writer. And I watched this interview he did where someone asked him, you know, what were his storytelling techniques and how did he think about character development? And his answer was, quote, I worship at the altar of obstacle and intention. There's this person who,

Jeff Pelletier (01:12:09.853)
Mm-hmm.

Finn (01:12:32.574)
wants to achieve this end result, but there's something standing in the way. And my whole script is them just fighting through that to get to the promised land. And I found that so simple, but also like the truth. And I guess in your case, do you think along those similar lines? And is it weird that you are that person that you have to sort of write for in these in these films?

Jeff Pelletier (01:12:41.349)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (01:12:55.687)
Yeah, I mean, it's that Lord of the Rings format, right? And the funny thing is that, because I have thought about this and I've thought about, I should really be unpacking my character development and things and taking a more analytical approach. And then I realized, well, hold on, this is all built in. We're characters running a race, trying to overcome a challenge. It's literally written into the format of documenting our race. I mean, you don't have to go much further than that. And I think that's where we're lucky as trail running filmmakers.

Finn (01:12:57.716)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (01:13:25.563)
It's right there for us. We're going on a journey and there are obstacles, some foreseen and some unforeseen. You don't really have to think too hard to find the story in a trail running film. And I think where it gets really interesting is when you find people with different backgrounds and you do bring in, there's a thing about how,

Star Wars, you know, Empire Strikes Back, there's always an internal struggle and an external struggle. You know, you have to fight the bad guys, but you're also dealing with some kind of personal thing. And so when you can find tell stories where there's also a second layer, an internal struggle going on. And again, I think with Trail Running, we often have those internal struggles as well. And I think Sally's films, again, going back, Sally is a great storyteller herself. And I think she tends to really do a great job of showing the struggle and

Finn (01:13:48.873)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (01:14:16.027)
Sometimes it's both internal and external sort of that doubt. Uh, you know, can we finish, uh, the external, the weather, the blisters, you know, stomach problems. So that stuff's built into the sport.

Finn (01:14:18.808)
Yeah.

Finn (01:14:28.718)
To the extent that you do consume other content in our community, when you think about what we're doing really well and where you see possible areas of improvement on sort of like the YouTube side of things or just like the filmmaking side of things, where do you see us really already being strong and where would you like to see evolution or change?

Jeff Pelletier (01:14:36.107)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (01:14:54.647)
I like personally learning about the process. I mean, I would love if there was more, we always see Killian say bang out these incredible things or Jim Wamsley who famously hides his Strava and things. And I wanna see them in the process. I wanna see the training. I wanna see how they got there. And unfortunately, I don't think we're always gonna get that from the top level athletes. But that is what personally appeals to me is learning more about the process. It is that sort of the journey.

You know, uh, again, Sally does a great job of that. She talks a lot about her strength training and her buildup to these races. Um, so I think the stories that we tell could, could be as much about the process as a result, as much about the training, as the racing and some of the struggles that come up there. I would love to see more of that.

Finn (01:15:40.686)
I think, and this has been such an awesome conversation, I appreciate the time. I think the last thing I wanna ask you about is just, I think you've already sort of addressed the long-term strategy plan, which is, you know, I think maybe getting more into the fast-packing scene, scaling yourself, building a team around you. But when you think about like self-improvement and just, not even just areas of your running, but like your filmmaking, how do you, how are you looking to get better at your craft in the next 12 to 18 months?

Jeff Pelletier (01:15:54.973)
Mm-hmm.

Jeff Pelletier (01:16:09.191)
Yeah, I mean, I see every video I make every film as an opportunity to improve, to iterate. When I when I see people, there's a there's a rut that a lot of creators get into a lot of my fellow creators. Of you know, we talked about chasing views, for example, and you'll have the adventure runner who starts making reviews and those reviews start performing really well. And before you know it, their channel is a review channel. And once in a while, they make a

They make a film about a race and it doesn't perform as well because their audience has been primed for say watch reviews. And I think the saddest part about that is that there's an opportunity cost. And I think about opportunity cost a lot in my life and all aspects of my life. And the opportunity costs there while they might be making money off the ads that are running alongside those watch reviews, the opportunity costs is that had they stuck with those adventure films, every time they made a new film, every, every video would, they would have improved a little bit, a little bit, a little bit.

And maybe by that time, their adventure films would have been getting traction and they would have been really good at doing that, assuming that was their goal. And often I think it is, often I can see, I can hear it in their sort of in their voice when they talk about their work that they wish they were doing more of the adventure say as opposed to reviews. That's just one example. So I think that that's that long-term versus short-term. So for me, every film I try to improve a little bit, try some new technique.

whether it be some camera technique or experiment again with a new ad format, because I'm just, I'm interested in marketing. But really see every video, every film that I publish as an opportunity to try something new to improve. Never going, cool, I've got it figured out, I'll just pump these out now. Because that, while that might be a good way to rest to my laurels in the short term, it's not gonna get me to the place I wanna be, I wanna have my channel, and again, maybe this vision of a production house in three to five years.

I should also say just when it comes to monetization, when it comes to, you know, again, ads and product integrations, I know there's probably some people who watch, especially YouTube content where it's less prevalent, I think on podcasts, I think are pretty, pretty commonly have ads now. Most podcasts, most podcasts have ads, but most running podcasts do as well. And while a lot of YouTube channels have product integrations and ads,

Finn (01:18:19.658)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (01:18:29.483)
The running YouTube channels still tend to be a lot of hobbyists who are just publishing films about races and so they don't bother monetizing necessarily. And I think you have channels like mine where I have been experimenting a lot with paid partnerships. And part of that for me is I'm trying to make it sustainable. So I am trying to see what works. I'm not always going to be working with different, you know, every revenue stream necessarily. I might try merchandise. I don't know. Well, you know, we'll try different things. But part of this is trying to make this sustainable.

And I, you know, I think for viewers who sometimes push back a little bit on that kind of stuff, it's the question is, do you want your creator to be around in five years and not burned out? Like, do you want them to be able to hire people to help them, editors, camera people to make a living off this, maybe quit their job and do this full time, because that's the way professionalizing the content creation process is the way to make it sustainable. I think it's, it's maybe a little selfish to wish that you're, you know, how dare they try to make money off their craft? They should be doing this for the love of it. Um,

Finn (01:19:10.103)
Yeah.

Jeff Pelletier (01:19:25.843)
It's just not sustainable. People burn out and they disappear. And you think what happened to that creator? Well, they couldn't quite keep it up. They couldn't quite keep up the pace, you know, the workload, the late nights. And when you're significantly other is like, what are you doing? Like, you know, for what a few hundred views, but if you can say, no, we're making a living off this now, this is the business, this is a business and it's generating revenue, then you can, you can lean into it and it can become a sustainable thing. So I do selfishly. Advocate.

Finn (01:19:41.176)
I've been there.

Jeff Pelletier (01:19:55.563)
that we should be encouraging people to professionalize their work and work with sponsors. And you can skip the ads, whatever you want. You don't have to buy the products, but celebrate when people do get these sponsorships and things because it's showing that they're on a path towards sustainability.

Finn (01:20:13.474)
I think we've talked on the edges about this before on the show, but I think that was the first time someone has articulated the reason, the value proposition of helping creators and athletes go more full-time is there actually is an opportunity cost. There is a long-term downside to operating in the mindset of doing it for the love of the game or doing it as a passion project because there are a

There are other, you know, stress is stress. There's other areas of your life that get affected, that, you know, get less investment as a result. So I'm glad you put that there. I also like what you said about the consequences of priming your audience, both in a positive and a negative direction. And it is wise to think thematically about your content and where you wanna go long-term because, I mean, I have to assume that every single time you put out a piece of content, whether it's an Instagram post or a YouTube video or a podcast episode,

when your audience listens to it or they consume it, it's a thumbs up or a thumbs down sort of vote of confidence for the next time around as well. So brilliance all around, but I'm glad you mentioned all that.

Jeff Pelletier (01:21:22.079)
Oh, thank you. I'm glad I could bring up some points. And again, it's not about the money. It's about what the money affords you to do. And when it comes to being an artist, it allows you to do your work, to your craft, to practice it full-time, if that's what you wanna do.

Finn (01:21:30.207)
Yes.

Finn (01:21:37.518)
Jeff, it's been a pleasure to have you on the show. We can't thank you enough. A lot of value. We'll make sure to link to all of your social media and the show notes, especially the YouTube channel. I'll reiterate again, you have a this film about the Moab 240 coming out hopefully this coming January 2024. I always like to give the guest the last word. Do you have any final thoughts or calls to actions that you want to leave listeners and viewers with before we go?

Jeff Pelletier (01:22:02.827)
No, I mean, you know, if you want to learn more about kind of my fast packing adventures, I'm not the most experienced fast packer, but I do have a fair bit of content. Uh, check out my channel. I've got a few adventures there and we've got, uh, we had a big, we had a big season this year. We've got a ton of content coming out. Uh, we invested a lot. We invested a lot in our travels and trying to bring, I wanted to bring my audience to some new places and on some big adventures. So we've got films coming from the O circuit in a tourist Alpina national park, Patagonia from Slovenia.

I'm doing some fast packing there from again, the Bob Graham round, all the documentary on that. So, um, yeah, so check it out and, um, you know, uh, hoping to inspire people to explore more and in some cases to explore their own backyards. Cause I think sometimes I've, I've gone places and had people comment and say, I didn't know my backyard was so nice. I didn't know we had such beautiful mountains here. So that to me is a win as well. When I can kind of encourage people to go and check out their own backyard as well.