Hey, welcome to the Borderlands trail and Ultra running podcast.

My name is Josh Rosenthal.

Did you know today's guest ran his first ultra at the age of 52?

I absolutely love that borderlands.

Somehow we're still not learning borderland.

We still suck at running.

My guest today is Niko Lume from Hamburg, Germany.

He just ran his 1st age of 52.

We became friends.

He listened to the podcast.

He reached out.

We've stayed in touch, really enjoyed getting to know him.

We've talked about other ideas that he has.

He's something of an idea machine and one of the most connected people I've ever met.

If you liked the interview with Seisky founder Lars Pedersen, Niko sort of helped set that in motion, helped me find him.

If you liked my interview with the two danish gentlemen talking about running in Europe, Niko helped set that in motion through some connections.

Just a very connected person.

But more than all of that, I'm just stoked to hear that he ran his first ultra at the age of 52.

In this episode, you can expect to learn about german ultra running culture.

Three amazing ultras in northern Germany that after Niko explains them, you'll probably want to run them.

Niko has a take on running races in the former eastern Germany.

He grew up when east and west were still separate.

And toward the end of this episode, he goes into really interesting detail on what it's like now to go run and what was, when he was younger known as East Germany.

But none of this is possible without path projects.

Super thankful to have them on as a sponsor.

They just dropped a lot of new stuff.

With more coming, it's super impressive how much they're doing.

Go to the link in the show notes.

Path projects 10% off borderlands, ten at checkout.

If you're not on the market, at least go check out all the new stuff.

Super, super inspiring.

Also, if you're looking for an ultra in the spring, I'd love to have you come run the Salt Lake foothills trail races.

We're doing a lot of fun stuff.

Just really excited about what we have in the pipeline for that race.

I think it's safe to say that a lot of these ideas, if implemented, will be the only race that ever has them.

We're going to unroll these ideas as they come, but if you're looking for one, come join me May 31, 2021.

Path projects is also the sponsor of that.

It's gonna be a great race.

It's gonna be a great weekend.

And now here's my conversation with Niko Luma.

Who ran his 1st age of 52.

I think you're gonna enjoy this conversation.

I've spent time here in Europe.

I've thoroughly enjoyed just finding races that aren't UTMB.

And that's not a slight against UTMB.

It's just when we're in America, all we know when we think of Europe, we mostly think of utmberal.

They're a great organization.

They're a big organization, but just like in America, there's western states, and maybe that's what Europeans think about.

There's still a thousand more races in America.

Well, in Europe there's even more.

So as I've gotten to know some of the race directors and gotten to know more runners here, I'm just learning and learning and learning as much as I possibly can.

That's why I went to Cirmlands last week.

I wanted to see a swedish race up close.

I want to see as many races as I can up close.

And not long ago, today's guest, Niko, messaged me on LinkedIn, and we've been going back and forth a lot.

If you liked my interviews of some of the danish people I got to interview, it's because Niko was connecting me with someone who connected me with someone.

And I just get the vibe that that's kind of a big piece of who Niko is.

So Niko just ran his 1st age of 52, so I wanted to hear all about it.

I want to get to know him a little bit better.

I want to introduce you all to german running.

I'm going to learn about germane.

Happy to be here.

But, you know, when you talk about german running, actually, I'm from the diaspora of german running.

I'm from northern Germany.

There's no hills here, so it's a bit different.

Do that.

Let's go there.

How would someone inside Germany really, really think about northern versus southern?

So northern is it.

It's flatter, it's more.

You know, it's the same as everywhere else.

The south is weird, and I'm from the north, so.

No, actually it's, you know, the.

All the hills or the mountains are on the south.

The Alps on the way south of Germany, at the end of Germany, bordering on Switzerland and Austria, obviously.

And here in northern Germany, it's flat.

And, I mean, you just lived in Denmark for a while.

Northern Germany looks like Denmark, it looks like southern Sweden.

You know, it's lots of forests, nice small rolling hills, but, you know, the first real mountain range we get about three and a half hours south of Hamburg and Hamburg is.

Is located in the north, and it's the second biggest city of the third biggest economy in the world.

So it's a fairly huge economic powerhouse.

And I'm actually from the northernmost state of Hamburg of Germany, which is called Schlesing Holstein.

And Schlesing Holstein used to be half danish and half germane.

And they did a treaty like 600 years ago that they will be forever undivided, regardless of who's ruling the rest of the country.

So I always think of Hamburg as the southernmost tip of the Nordics because the whole baltic region really has a different feel when compared to the rest of Europe and obviously to the rest of Germany as well.

And, you know, I think there's more similarities between people in northern Germany and Denmark and Sweden, Norway, Finland, than, you know, people in Bavaria.

That's like a weird place, far away where I need subtitles to understand the.

People, you know, I spent that time running in Denmark when I was there for six weeks and then even going to see Sirmland.

And it's, you know, relative to where I'm from in the mountain west of the United States, lots of mountains, it's hard to avoid hills, but out there it was, I mean, hard to avoid mountains and incline and decline.

But for the Nordics, it's like outside of Norway, I suppose, at least Denmark, Sweden.

And now what you're saying, northern Germany, even when you're trail running, you're mostly running.

In America, there's a lot of hike.

And two oceans.

We have the North Sea and the Baltic Sea, so we have lots of wind, which can be a pain as well.

You know, if you have to run against the wind, it really sucks.

But we have, as I said, a ton of lakes.

And so you can run down to the lakes, up to the lakes again, and up from the lakes again.

So there is some verb, but it's really not a whole lot.

And we have this thing called the Habog hills, which is.

Or Habog mountains, as they call them, which is just south of Hamburg.

And, I mean, the highest peaks are 120 meters, so that's nothing, you know, but if you go up and down often enough, it adds up to some work, you know, but it's.

It's all runnable.

And hiking poles here just for people doing nordic walking.

Post on Strava.

Or maybe you shared it with me that you just ran your 1st 50k just south of Hamburg and you're 52 years old.

And I just wanted to first celebrate that because it's one of the things I love so much about this sport is that there's always, you can, you know, we can start doing this whenever, you know, anybody can jump.

Not anybody, but you can jump in the sport and you can just kind of keep going.

And it's, it's a.

So it's a thing first, that's worthy of celebrating, but second, I just want to hear from you, like, where did the itch come from?

Are you a lifetime runner?

What's your journey to this 50k that you just did?

Yeah.

You know, as a kid, I dabbled in a lot of sports, obviously, soccer, which is football, as we call it here, which is something every boy plays, and now most girls as well.

But it's just something that is part of the tradition here in Germany.

Every little village has a soccer field.

That's the normal thing you do.

It's soccer, which obviously involves some running.

And I then went to different sports.

I did some equestrian gymnastics stuff as well, which was kind of weird, but also did european handball, which is really rough.

Played basketball for a long time, obviously did skateboarding when I was in my teens.

And I always liked running.

And I hated running in school because in PE, all we did was stupid track stuff and like 100 meters dash and all that, and I hated that.

And when we did a little, the teacher called a round through the gorge, which was nothing in terms of hills, but, you know, it was like a nice little 2345 kilometer run.

I liked that a lot.

And so I started running in the afternoon just on my own through the fields and forests of my hometown.

And I grew up in a small city which is about 10 km away from where the old border to East Germany was.

So in the middle of really nowhere at the end of the world, because at that border, the world ended in the seventies and eighties.

And as I said, there are lots of lakes.

So I ran around the lakes and liked that.

But, you know, never did this in any competitive way.

I just liked it.

Also back then I did some cross country skiing because we still had snow, but, you know, I always liked running.

But then when I went to university, I kind of stopped it.

Stopped doing sports, did too much computer stuff, got married, had kids.

My wife stayed thin, and I put on weight with every more kid that we got.

And finally, when we got our fourth child, I decided that I should do some, some weight loss thing and started doing running as well.

And so.

Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention that I did a marathon when I was like 28 or something.

Or something.

Or 24, 25.

I don't know.

It's a long time ago.

And then there was some years of inactivity, and then I started running again, like, I don't know, seven, eight years ago.

And now I'm running about 50 week.

At least I'm trying to.

And did a marathon two years ago, I think so, or three in Hamburg.

Did a marathon two years ago in Des Moines, Iowa, and was the fastest German in the marathon.

Yeah, also just the only one, but still, I think fastest Germans just sounds amazing.

And I always wanted to run a longer distance because I thought, you know, this could be fun.

And as much as I like marathons, because of all the atmosphere, the people, and, you know, here in Hamburg, we have a great marathon with, like, 25,000 people.

And so the whole city is packed, and it runs around my neighborhood.

And, you know, you recognize people that are cheering and it is a lot of fun.

And, you know, the one in Des Moines was amazing because I got to run through my old neighborhood where I spent my time when I was there as a senior in high school.

So that was all cool.

But I just like nature so much more than running in an urban environment.

And stomping on concrete or asphalt all the time is not really that much fun.

And so my last marathon attempt was a DNF because I had an issue with the disc on my back.

And so I couldn't really walk anymore, which was a bummer.

But, you know, I straightened that out, did some strength training, and I figured that I should do something longer for a change.

And I talked to my, you know, as I said, I'm 52, so there's always some weird problems that you have some new ailment with, you know, your feet or legs or whatever.

And so I'm.

I'm at the orthopedic quite often.

And so I was there sometime in the February or something of this year, and he's like, so, are you doing the Hamburg marathon again this year?

And I said, nah, I don't think so.

And he said, oh, there's finally some sense coming into you.

That's good.

I said, no, I want to do an ultra in the summer.

And he's like, you want to do what?

I said, I want to do 50k.

Instead of.

He's like, okay, when is it?

Should we schedule an appointment right afterwards?

That won't be necessary.

But, yeah, I said to go back to home last week because of some stuff with my foot.

But anyhow, so, you know, I always wanted to do a longer distance.

And as I said, you know, northern Germany is kind of like the diaspora of trail running, because we don't have mountains here, we have some old fashioned, really long ultras that go around in circles somewhere in the Baltic Sea, which doesn't sound like so much fun because it's a rather boring track.

But then there's this ultra that started four years ago, I think, in a small village called Rosengarten, in a place that's called the Hauberk mountains, which is a hilly section just south of Hamburg.

And it has some, some heath section to it, which is beautiful in August.

And then you have like sheep everywhere.

And it's just, you know, it's a really beautiful landscape and it's a nature reserve.

And it's right on the.

On the border between Hamburg, which is its own state, to the next state, which is Lower Saxony.

And it's a half hour drive from where I live, so it's as remote as it get, or as wild as would get that close to the city here.

And so, you know, the race is a typical volunteer based race.

Like, we have them all over Germany.

It's organized by the local sports club.

And I don't know if you know about the culture of german clubs or associations.

It's a thing, whenever seven germans get together, they start a club which is tax deductible.

And so every German is in at least probably three or four of those clubs or associations.

I don't know, I'm probably in five or six, whatever, and I pay my membership fees and get tax credit for that.

And that's how germans organize.

It really is.

There's the saying when you have to be at least seven people to form a club.

And so the saying is, whenever seven germans get together, they form a club.

The volunteers.

Seven german runners are running together.

They are.

You're able to do something.

You're able to form in some sort of formal way to where you get some.

We do associations and clubs, and you have to be at least seven people to do that.

And if you do that, you know, you're nonprofit and then you get tax deductions for your membership fees and all that.

So that's how we organize stuff.

And that's how, you know, most afternoon activities for kids are organized.

You know, we don't do that in high school.

We do it in sports clubs.

And those sports clubs are locally run by volunteers.

And it's different than in the states.

You know, kids get home from school a little sooner and don't have other sports stuff attached to the local high school, but it's in local clubs.

We have local leagues and whatnot incentivizes that.

I have my take on America.

Like, there's a book called Bowling Alone in America, essentially about how Americans used to do stuff together.

We were incentivized to do stuff together.

We were on bowling teams together.

We were all sorts of clubs and associations.

And that's almost entirely gone in America.

Is Germany trying to incentivize, like Germans getting out and being together, as opposed to just.

Part of the german culture for the last couple hundred years.

So it's really deeply ingrained in the culture that, you know, whenever you do something on a regular basis, you form a club.

And, I mean, the Americans do lots of volunteer stuff as well, but it's organized differently.

It's probably a little looser from the organizational standpoint, but sure, there's, you know, a society cannot function without volunteers who devote some time and energy to do something for society.

And so that's incentivized here, and it makes sense, I think so, you know, and, yeah, that's how we organize sports.

You know, it's in local clubs, local leagues, or regional leagues.

And one of those clubs is organizing a yemenite run every year with, you know, a little kids run, then a five k, ten k half marathon, and now an ultra.

And it's all located in the part of the Hauberk mountain range, which is tiny, but it's lots of rolling hills, and it's in the middle of a forest, and there's some.

Some heath and sheep and all that.

So, you know, it's beautiful.

And I went there for the first time, and I really enjoyed it.

You know, they have like, aid stations every 5 hand out drinks and gels and all that, and little pretzels.

Aid stations.

You know, my favorite question as I'm meeting people, and I know it was your first ultra with aid stations maybe being like buffets or something like that, but was there anything unique about the aid stations that was, like, unique to Germany?

Not really.

I mean, it was just like an aid station at a marathon or ten k, you know, just said drinks, bananas, energy gels.

They did have a partnership with my favorite energy gel, which I really loved.

It's called Aerobee, and it's honey, and it's honey from bees up on the Baltic Sea coast.

So, yeah, and, you know, it's, at the end of the day, it's honey, but it's still really good.

And they have it with like, I think there's some honey, lemon flavor and other stuff.

So it's good stuff.

No, but what I liked is, you know, they had nice people at those aid stations everywhere.

And I remember this one aid station which was really cool because it was at the beginning of a loop, like a five kilometer loop or something.

And so I went by and chatted a bit and thanked them for standing at the age station at 09:00 on a Sunday morning in the middle of a forest and thank them for the selection of pretzels and whatever they had.

And it was really nice.

And then I came back from the loop and I was standing there and also chatting and all of a sudden people came flying by because it was part of the five k road, different pace.

I mean, I was like at kilometer 25 or 30 and then all of a sudden you have people just going by the aid station like, oh wow, where did those guys come from?

You know, that was kind of fun.

But yeah, other than that, what, what sucked?

There was one thing that really sucked about the race.

When I got in after 5 hours and 45 or something minutes, they had no food left anymore in the whole, of course, this little area for finishes and whatnot.

And the only thing they had was non alcoholic beer.

But, you know, I would have to like buy some, some brats or whatever at the, at the food station a couple of meters away.

But, you know, of course I was hoping for, you know, some bananas, some, some bread, whatever, some, some apples, you know, something that had some carbs in it and, you know, and I was really annoyed by that.

But of course I brought some food with me so it wasn't that big of a deal.

But still, you know, I expected a little more food at the end of the race.

Yeah, but you know, other than that, you know, I don't think you can complain if you pay like €80 for a nice Sunday morning in the forest with lots of people with a nice, really a nice route through the forest.

And the only thing that was really, you know, and it was, it was just, you know, from temperature and everything, it was just really good, you know, it was a sunny summer Sunday but not too hot, like 24 degrees or something celsius.

So really, really good weather.

But the couple days before it rained heavily and they also sent in the harvesters to get out some trees and so there were some sections where, I mean, it was just mud for like a kilometer or so.

And, you know, I was really afraid that I would just fall and be all muddy for the remaining 45 km, but thankfully that didn't happen.

And at one point I was also afraid that I would lose my shoe in the mud, because, you know how, you know, you just want to do the next step and you just kind of feel like something is holding back your foot and you're like, no, I need my shoe.

You know, that also didn't happen.

I also didn't fall down at all during the race, which was something.

Yeah, I mean, I ran in those mountains before, and on two occasions, I decided that the view was awesome.

I wanted to take a picture.

And then, of course, I missed a route because there are gazillion routes, and I mean, no, no, like, technical terrain in terms of rocks, anything but plenty of routes.

And I missed a route, and I did that twice.

And I just, you know, fell on my.

On my face, on my hands, on my knees twice and came home like, you know, covered in blood.

And so now whenever I go running, my wife talks to me as if I'm like a senior, senior, and she says, don't fall.

You know, it's like, thank you.

I'm 52 and not 85.

Yeah.

So tell me about the starting line.

Like, what's going through your head running your first one?

You got some experience running.

You're an athletic person for life, it sounds like, but here you are at the starting line, and you're about to go further than you've ever gone before.

What were the emotions?

What was going through your head at that time?

Well, it started with the practical stuff.

They had enough toilets, which was nice.

Yeah, exactly.

And, you know, which I hate at those marathons, when you're like, you know, you're standing in this line that doesn't move, you know, and you're like, you know.

But no, that was good.

They had three different starts, and I chose to be in the middle one.

And it was also really limited.

I think it was just like 150 people or something because it's a nature reserve and they have restrictions on how many people are allowed to run through the forest.

So it was just about 150 people.

So three heats with 50 people each or something.

And so it was early in the morning, and a bunch of people were standing there going like, okay, this is going to be fun.

And then, as always, I stand somewhere in the back.

And then, as always, I'm annoyed that people are going slower than I expected and then have to run a little faster to get ahead of them.

But it was nice.

Did some chit chatting.

Some guy pointed out that we were having the same pair of shoes, no balance hero, which were really good for that, that run.

And other than that, you know, I wasn't really worried about anything I knew the terrain.

I did.

Did a couple 30, 35 kilometer runs before, like in my training session.

And, you know, I don't have a structured training session.

I run mostly 10 km, sometimes 15, and then I do a long run, 20 or 30.

That's it.

You know, I don't need to achieve something.

I don't need to do.

I don't have the time to do like speed work or, you know, focus on whatever.

I'm just running.

And do you live in the city?

Like, if you have just a short time for a run, are you running on.

Well, I'm right in the middle of Hamburg, which is the most beautiful city in the world, as we usually call it.

And it is, it is, it is.

And it has this really interesting layout.

There's one big river that comes from the Czech Republic and flows into the North Sea.

And on that big river called the Elbe, there is a huge port, which is like the third biggest port in Europe.

And so that's one big river.

And then there's another tiny river that flows in from the north and that thing forms into something that looks like a lake, but it's a river, but it looks like a lake.

And so if you run around the lake, it's 7.8.

From where I live.

It's exactly 10 run from my house around the lake and back.

And the lake really borders on the inner city.

And to put it into a different perspective, if I get on the subway here at my house, I'm downtown in ten minutes and it's green and it's wonderful.

And I love to run there in the morning and it's mostly gravel stuff around the lake.

And then, as I said, there's the river flowing in from the north.

And I usually run on the weekends.

I run in the river valley up to the north and then just turn out and back and it takes me about 15 minutes and I don't feel the city anymore.

It just feels lush and green.

It's a nice little green belt.

And then I can run for hours there and it just feels like you're in the middle of nowhere and you're still in the middle of the city, so that's kind of cool.

Yeah, but I usually run in the city.

I do have some american jeans in me and I take the car everywhere, but I prefer not to go to take my car to some trailhead somewhere and then go running.

I usually just run from my house and back.

Yeah, because it saves time.

That's one of the things that in our move to Europe that was one of the things I was looking to get away from.

I just, you know, I.

When you're in America, you got a house, you got a lawn.

Like, I just wanted to come live in the heart of Paris, in the heart of Denmark, in an apartment without a lawn, no cars, where public transportation can get me everywhere that I want to go.

And I, that way I can just like really give my brain to, entirely to my family and to my work instead of managing a house and managing a car and all of those things.

And it's, it brings its own challenges.

But I really love that.

The, you know, the mountain range in the south of Hamburg, I can get there by public transport.

It's like a good, I don't know, 30 minutes, 40 minutes from here.

And I did that before just to, you know, go down there and then run on the trades there to another city and then get on a train and come back.

That's interesting.

That's kind of fun.

So you can do point to point.

Yeah, yeah.

There's, you know, there's, as I said, this, the section that has a lot of heathen, you know, this really, it's a small plant, very stubborn, and it doesn't need a lot of, a lot of sun, doesn't need a lot of, doesn't need anything.

You know, it just grows there in this part of Germany and, you know, there's nothing, there's some, some trees and lots of heath.

And they have a region that is a couple hundred square kilometers.

So it's really huge and it's just the same terrain.

And they have a trail system there that spans like, there's like one trail starting in Hamburg that goes down for about 180 km.

So what, what they've set up is you can do this, you know, on a, on a daily hike, you can do like, you know, a couple of stages.

And the first one from Hamburg to the city is exactly like 35.

Ran that before and then I wanted to do the second one.

So go to that city and then do the next one or two stages.

But then it gets complicated because you're like in the middle of nowhere and then public transport is limited and they do some, some weird bus system.

And then my wife keeps telling me that I have kids and a family and that I should try to be home a little on Sunday and spend.

My whole day instead of just running to other cities.

Yeah, yeah, I mean, so that's something I talk about a lot around here at borderlands is like all the plates that we're spinning and the stuff that we're juggling.

And so, yeah, I mean, with you mentioned that you have kids.

I mean, like, what are all the plates that you're spending?

I know that you write a newsletter.

I don't know how you think about it, but a substack, that's very enjoyable.

And I don't know how you have the time to even put that together because you put out a lot of issues and I highly recommend it.

I'll put it in the show notes below, spanning from running to politics, AI, technology, all this sort of stuff.

It's a really good read.

I mean, because you, you pick out, like, each time you call it five things, and each time you pick out five articles or five things worth noting and, and all sorts of crazy industries.

So that's not easy to put together combined with running.

But then you talk about having a family and then you also, through all this, we're not even yet talking about that.

You also have a day job.

So I spoiled some of what you do, but tell.

Tell what?

All plates.

Yeah.

So I'm married with my wife.

We have four kids.

912 1821.

And a cat and a dog.

And, yeah, you're laughing, but, you know, as I said before, I was at this phase where I was just totally overweight and unfit.

And so first thing I did was I got a dog to, you know, get outside more.

And then I started running again, which really helped me tremendously.

Yeah, I do have a day job.

I run a company small, I would say a boutique consultancy.

So we help corporations be more innovative by working with startups.

We help startups grow by connecting them to corporates.

We help them fundraise, you know, yada, yada, yada, all that stuff.

It used to be an accelerator.

We ran an accelerator program for eight years with lots of teams from all over Europe and Israel, which was great fun.

And then the pandemic hit, and then all of a sudden, people were less interested in innovation, so we had to pivot a bit.

And that's.

It's fun.

It's also very stressful because innovation budgets are really tight at the moment.

First of all due to the pandemic and then to the russian war on Ukraine that really hit the economy hard here.

Everybody's holding on to the money, which is bad.

But, yeah, that's my day job.

As I said, I have four kids.

The oldest one moved out.

She currently studies in Uppsala, Sweden, which is really cool.

And, yeah, she did Vienna before that, which was also kind of cool.

And, yeah, I actually went running with her when she was in high school, and she wanted to do, she wanted to just run.

And so I said, yeah, that's fine with me, but I run before, at that time, I ran before I had to wake up the kids.

So it was 530, and she's like, okay, fine, let's do that.

So we ran 6 km in the morning at 530 around the local park, and I had a really good time talking to her at 530 in the morning on a run, on a nice conversational run.

And she was like, dad, I really love talking to you, but it's too early.

And so after, after a couple runs, she decided it's not for her, and she wants to do yoga instead, which is fine as well, you know.

And my, my twelve year old actually goes to a track and field club and has track training once or twice a week and enjoys that.

And, you know, I don't want to push them into running, but, of course, a gentle nudge every once in a while, you know?

Yeah, but, you know, that's what I do.

And, you know, I've been in hamburg for, yeah, I mean, I grew up around here, as I said, and I've been in Hamburg for all my professional life.

And, you know, I studied political science and history in gotting in Germany and in Berkeley, California.

And so I have a deep interest in politics, obviously, and I have a deep interest in the United States and politics going on there.

And, you know, when you spend a year in high school, you know, your, your heart is always connected, at least in my place.

It's connected to, you know, to Iowa, to Des Moines.

You know, there's a big chunk of midwesternness somewhere in my heart, you know, and it's, it's just, you know, it doesn't make things easier all the time because you always have, like, two things to worry about.

But, you know, that's, that's, that's who I am.

And I'm really connected as well to the german political scene.

I started a club, as we all do, about 1112 years ago, called D 64 center for Digital Progress, and has about more than thousand members now.

And we're like a nonprofit think tank focusing on digital issues like the policy making process, and, you know, lots of leading politicians left of the spectrum in Germany.

So progressives, Democrats are a member of the club.

And it's a fairly nice success story that we did, like, on the side.

And a friend of mine who I founded this with is now the leader of the Social Democrats in Germany.

So we kind of helped, you know, push the agenda, the digital agenda, forward.

And so, yeah, I'm deeply connected there as well.

Yeah, I mean, that's, that's amazing.

So my guess is then that your skill set is in because you have your hand in so many different things that your skill set, you're, are you more of a big picture guy and not in the weeds and the details on all this sort of stuff and you've, and you surround yourself with good people or like how.

Oh, yeah, that's, that's at least in theory what I'm trying to do.

Yeah, no, I mean, as I said, I studied political science and history, but I then worked for the first eight years or so as a CTO because of a tech background.

And I'm not really good in doing the details.

I'm really good at thinking about stuff and trying to get a setup.

And then I need specialists to fill in the blanks.

So I'm a generalist, but I try to understand what's going on and see how the market is shifting, how politics is shifting and how technology is shifting.

And then I try to find out, you know, what's the direction and where do we have to focus on and, you know, the classic Wayne Gretzky quote, you know, try to be where the puck will be and not where the pug is, you know, that kind of thing.

And, yeah, it's, you know, I like working like that.

I'm nothing, I'm not really good in a corporate setup.

That just annoys me.

But I know that people in big corporations need to be more agile.

They need outside support, they need somebody who can just quickly do stuff.

And that's what we do.

Instead of trying to solve a problem yourself and spending a gazillion euros and taking a lot of time, they talk to us.

We find the one startup that does exactly what they want to do and then we connect them and they fit in like a module and then they can move forward on that, you know?

Yeah.

And, you know, it's called venture clienting and it's something that is, you know, makes a lot of sense in the german or european market because we don't have that money.

That many startups that went to become scale ups or grownups that have incorporated this way from the start, you know, Germany has lots of old companies and they are used to just buying stuff, you know, either off the shelf from Microsoft, SAP and others, or getting stuff custom developed from large development companies.

And then you usually have overpriced crap that doesn't work, you know, but since you spend so much money on it, you have to think you horn it in.

Yeah.

And, you know, and everybody's frustrated and you just, you can't move forward and that's hopefully where we come in and provide the service that they need, you know?

Yeah, I gosh, I love that as someone who dabbles in the startup world more of a little bit more of a small business guy than a startup guy, but just that I have a ton of like part of what I'm doing here in Paris is I'm connected with all my old startup friends and to know like, they're building really interesting niche stuff.

And so then you're saying, you know, you're aware of that in Germany.

You're aware of the people who are doing that unique niche stuff, and then you're also connected to the big companies and you're like a liaison that's like a, like plug and play, sort of like you need this.

I know this startup.

Yeah, it's a great way to serve both sides.

I think it's a really cool thing.

You'Re doing to, yeah, me too.

It's just, you know, it's not as easy as it sounds, you know, it sounds like, oh, simple matchmaking, but, you know.

Yeah, but hey, I don't want to complain.

And I love working as an entrepreneur myself, you know, it has a gazillion advantages and also some disadvantages, obviously.

But, you know, I'm working from home now, which I enjoy tremendously, you know, because when my kids come home from school, you know, I can listen to their stories, I can give them something to eat and, you know, I can walk the dog whenever I feel like it.

I can do my calls while walking the dog, you know, it's just, it's really cool, you know, and it's such a, a jump in quality of life, you know, if you, if you don't have to commute to your office and then you're stuck in your office and all that.

So I can just, you know, do it the way, you know, I just organize my, my day a little better, you know, and I can fit in running, you know, before that, when we had our office, we had our office in the, in the old warehouse district in the harbor and they renovated the office just for us.

And I had to put in a shower.

And so I did run commute, which was like 7 km each direction, or I did a run through the tunnel underneath the elbow to the other side of the harbor, which is, you know, it's like northern Europe's largest industrial zone, you know, a great place to go running.

I mean, it's, it's an industrial zone, but, but still, it's the harbor, so it's kind of nice, you know, I mean, yeah.

And I did a ten k during lunch break there oftentimes, which was really nice, you know, and, you know, I think that's, that's the big advantage if you're, if you're an entrepreneur yourself, you know, you're a little more able to, to adjust your schedule according to your own needs and you're not in this corporate mode where somebody always needs you to be on a call or, you know, blah, blah, blah, you know?

Right.

Well, one last question here for you as we wrap up.

I mean, I related to your 50k is would you do another one?

Well, of course.

All right, perfect.

Yeah.

And, you know, as I said, you know, we're here in the train running diaspora as we don't have mountains.

So there are a couple options.

I mean, first of all, I have to do a shout out to my favorite one, which is the Advent slough in Ratzeburg.

Germans are crazy about advent time, which is a concept you guys don't have in America.

So the four Sundays before Christmas, those are the Advent Sundays.

And that's when you sit down and have tea and cake and, and whatnot, and you light a candle on an advent wrath.

And so it's one candle, two candles, three candles, and then four candles, and then Christmas, hallelujah.

And so that's, that's really a thing.

And we do advent calendars where you count from one to 24 and you have a little thing every day.

We do that for our kids and.

My wife, we do all this as well.

We get very into it as well.

Yeah.

And, you know, we started that when we had one kid, and now we have to pack 96 little packages.

Just crazy.

And so anyhow, on the first advent, this started in 1990, there's the Advent run in Ratzeburg.

Ratzeburg is a small city just north of where I grew up in Maine.

And I went to school in Ratzenberg.

And from, and my school obviously is from 1492 or whatever.

Yeah.

But they rebuilt it a couple of times.

And so it's located somewhere up on a little hill, and you can overlook Lake Ratzeburg.

And on the eastern shore of that lake used to be East Germany.

So while this was like the training grounds for the national rowing Academy and, you know, lots of sailing going on, you couldn't go onto the eastern shore.

And I did.

I learned windsurfing there.

And whenever the wind was coming from the wrong direction.

I was in sheer utter panic that I would end up on that shore, because we all had those stories about people being questioned by the east german police for, like, two days and two nights and whatever, you know, so you didn't want that to happen.

And the border on the east german side was about, I don't know, like 5 km deep, and had, you know, was like, like the north korean border, you know, like, really, really, really intense.

And so that's why I said, that's where the world ended.

And so that's where I went to school.

And, you know, you could never go to the eastern side of that stupid lake.

And my biology teacher, who used to run triathlon and was really into sports, which was good to know because we always ask him about stuff like, could you tell us something about running shoe rotation?

And he was like, yeah, I can see.

It's one of my favorite topics.

And you're like, okay, running down the clock and biology class.

No, but so he started that run in 1990.

I mean, he discussed with east german authorities before the reunification of Germany happened.

He discussed the race and was the first race director, and they still do that.

And reunification happened in 1990.

So it's 34 years now, but still, when I run this and when I run on the eastern side, it is so emotional, you know, because, you know, that was foreign territory.

That was where the world ended, and I could not go there, you know?

And now you can run there.

And at first, of course, we were all scared that there would still be landmines, but they took care of that, I guess.

I hope.

Yeah, but, you know, so that's the Adventzlav, which is on the first advent Sunday, and it's 26.

It's usually two degrees in rain.

And it sucks because it's just cold.

And it's a cold that runs into your bones, and afterwards you get some nice hot soup and cold beer, and then you're fine again.

It's amazing.

I'd like to come out for that.

Yeah, do that.

But I mean, you know, you have to sign up soon because it fills up quickly, or it has, like, 800 people registered the last time I checked.

And then there's a race that I want to apply to, which is, I think, end of February.

It's 85 ish kilometers from gotting.

That's where I studied.

It's in lower Saxony, and it's from gotting to the Hutz mountains.

So you run north from gotting to the Harts mountains, and there is a mountain called Brocken which the loose translation would be chunk.

And it's thousand meters high, like 1100 or something.

And according to the folklore, that's where on St.

Walpurga's night on like April 30, the witches convene, at least in the medieval times, and now they probably don't do that anymore.

But anyhow, so that is a mystic mountain thing.

And also that used to be in East Germany.

And when we spend winter in the Harz mountains, we would be on the other mountain looking over to that mountain, but we couldn't go there, you know.

So whenever I go there, it's also emotional.

And the idea of running there is really interesting, especially because it's the end of February, so there will be snow, there will be lots of wind, and it will be ugly when you go up that mountain, and the organizers advise you to bring spikes.

So, yeah, so that is something I want to.

And you have to apply because it's again nature reserve and they have a hard cut off at like hundred people or something.

And.

And then there's another one which used to be in UTmb race.

I don't know if it's still a UTMb race.

It's the North Sea ultra, and it takes place on the island of Sylt, which is the northernmost island in Germany on the North Sea coast bordering on Denmark.

And Sylt is like the Hamptons, so it's a posh island for people.

In Hamburg, we just call it the island.

And so, you know, when people say, I'm going to the island on the weekend, you know where they're going.

And I did some summer vacations there, I did some running there.

It's wonderful.

Except for when you get the wind in your face, because then you're not moving at all.

And Zeult is where the windsurfing world champions World cup has one stop every year in like four.

And it's just crazy because it's so windy.

And when I was running there, there's a little section where they have a dam, and that's on the inner side of the island, so facing the coast.

And on that dam I had winds coming from in front of me and I just couldn't move.

It was insane.

And so, you know, it's 111 km or something and it will be just, you know, no word, but just wind.

And yeah, I'm thinking about applying there because it's also show notes.

The website is beautiful.

Yeah.

Itself this is.

And it appears to no longer be connected to UTMB.

It is just a well done website and instantly makes me want to run it.

Yeah.

Wow.

The beautiful beach that you're running on.

Yeah, that feels like.

Feels like what I saw in some of northern Denmark.

It looks pretty similar.

It's the same kind of territory.

Yeah.

Wow.

Well, Nico, report back when you do those.

It'll be fun to hear about it.

And I'll make sure and put your five things link in the show notes.

I really think that's a worthwhile read because you take really complex things or really useful things, and you give it a bite sized chunk to start with, and then you can click and dig in deeper.

But I really open every single one.

I really do.

And it's a good read.

You're the one who's reading it.

It's me.

I'm the one.

But I especially love, obviously, the running ones.

Like, you just.

It's good stuff.

So thanks, man.

Thanks for your time today.

Appreciate all the insight on german running and all these races that you're naming off sharing your story.

Yeah, I appreciate you guys giving me the time to come here and talk about that.

Yeah, it was fun.

Let's do it again.

Let's.