Barnabe Delarze Interview
It’s time to bring you our first ever European athlete on the show today as we sit down with Swiss Rower Barnabe Delarze to talk about his amazing career and his amazing Olympic experiences! We find out from Barnabe the unique journey he had from playing rugby into discovering rowing and why it wasn’t exactly a sport that he took to straight away. We also find out just what the rowing scene is like in Switzerland and why so many people travel there to setup a training base in the country. Added to this we find out just why Swiss rowers are maybe some of the best partiers in the world, why finishing third in a race was up there as one of the best moments in his life and learning more about the unique event that is the Indoor Rowing World Championship. It’s an entertaining chat that you should already be listening to, so get to it!
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Please note this is an automated transcript that may contain errors.
BEN WATERWORTH: It is Off The Podium, An Olympics Podcast coming to you today for another episode with an interview and an exciting interview today. I'm very excited to bring you today's guest. For the very first time, we're going to Europe to speak to our very first ever European athlete on the show from the great nation of Switzerland, Barnabe Delarze, who is a rower, our only second ever rower. Can you believe it? We have not had a rower on this show since Kim Brennan way back in 2016, talking to us about her then gold medal, fresh gold medal win in Rio. And this is a fascinating and fun chat with Barnabe, because we learn a lot not only about Barnabe, but the sport of rowing in Switzerland, how he ended up in rowing from a very different sport that is not in any way related to rowing and just everything else in between. Barnabe is a great guy, great entertaining guy. And you're going to learn so much about him and just Switzerland. There's Roger Federer references, because of course, it couldn't be anything talking about Switzerland without Roger Federer. Thanks, Channel 7, and just everything else in between. And I'll tell you one thing, after this interview, I'm getting on a plane to Switzerland, because it sounds like a country that I need to visit, and I hope to get there very, very soon. So, without further ado, here's our chat with Swiss Olympic rower Barnabe Delarze.
BEN WATERWORTH: I'm very excited for our next guest on Off The Podium today. Obviously, as a co-Canadian Australian podcast, we have a large focus on athletes from both Canada and Australia. We've sort of delved outside Canada and Australia a bit. We've talked to Americans, we've talked to New Zealanders, we've even talked to Jamaicans, but we have never gone to Europe, and that means we've never gone to Switzerland. And I'm very excited for our guest today to break that duck and finally learn a little bit more about that part of the world. And the sport of rowing, too, is a sport we haven't featured on this show since 2016. Our guest today is a world championship silver medallist, a European championship medallist, a World Cup medallist, junior World Cup gold, so many different medals across the way, and a two-time Olympian having just returned from Tokyo as well at his second Olympics. And I'm so excited to learn about the journey and everything else in between. Barnabe Delarze is his name, and he's with me now. Barnabe, first of all, welcome to Off The Podium. It's a pleasure to bring the European flavour to the show for once.
BARNABE DELARZE: Thanks a lot for bringing me along, and it's an honour to be the first European and Swiss on this show, so it's exciting.
BEN WATERWORTH: More important, the Swiss aspect, that's kind of where we need to kind of...
BARNABE DELARZE: Is that even Europe? We're not sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I don't know.
BARNABE DELARZE: Geographically, it is, but we're not in the EU, so...
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, wow, just all neutral, right? Just out of everything. Kind of sticking to that. I'm actually really fascinated by your career, your journey sort of into rowing in the Olympics, because I love reading your bio and the fact that it seemed like... I usually ask, what sports did you play as a kid? I kind of want to ask what sports you didn't play as a kid, because it seems like you just kind of had a bingo card, like, I'm going to play this, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this. I mean, was there a sport you didn't play as a kid, Barnabe?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, so you found out on my website, or...
BEN WATERWORTH: Great website, too.
BARNABE DELARZE: It's all in French, is it?
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, there's a magic of translation. I'd like to pretend I speak French fluently, and we could just start doing this in French, but I'd probably get about three words in and have to start going, okay, back to English.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, I was... It's on my list, I have to translate it into an English version, but that's when I have a bit more time. But yeah, as you said, I've tried a lot of sports, but I've never really stuck to one because, like, up until I started rowing, so I started at like 13 years old. And then before that, I was in a school where... So in Switzerland, like, there's no really... There's no such thing as school sports. So there's no school team, especially in the... So the state school, public school, yeah, the one you don't pay for, there's nothing sports-wise. And up until I was 10, I was in a private school. So we had more offers to try out sports. So every year I picked one or two and had to go at it. But it was never... I was never competing, really, for any of them. And then I moved place, came, arrived in Lausanne, so my hometown. And I started rugby. And that's the first one, even though it's pretty small or very small in Switzerland, especially compared to you guys in Australia, obviously. But yeah, it's the same spirit. It's really great, cool guys, cool atmosphere. That's the first sport I would say I stuck to, really, for a couple of years. I competed a bit at the Swiss level, which wasn't great. Yeah, and as I said, it was pretty small, so there wasn't a lot of training. There wasn't even a lot of competition. And especially in the winter, there was almost nothing, especially for the younger guys. So I was living by the lake, and I thought I would give rowing a go. And at first, it was just a way to have a bit more training. I was doing both for one or two years. And again, as rugby was really small back then, it's still small, but it evolved a bit since then. But yeah, there wasn't a lot of going on. So I slowly stuck to rowing and went from there. But the first two years, I was really shit. I came last at Swiss Champs, which isn't great. And then after two years of being last, I thought it was enough and I would start training properly. And then it went from there and never looked back, really.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which it's fascinating to kind of have that journey when, you know, we have athletes on the show who maybe started in one sport, go to another, and you can kind of connect them. But yeah, rowing and rugby, maybe not two that I associate too much with each other there. So it's kind of I don't know how many rowers out there, Barnabe, have kind of started off in rugby and then ended up in rowing. I don't know if there's a select squad of you guys.
BARNABE DELARZE: Probably definitely not in Switzerland, maybe a bit more in England, for example, or even maybe in Australia, because at least in England, it's the main sport. So it's not uncommon to see some switch back and forth to those sports. And they both have a kind of British culture. And so that's how they would be linked. But other than that, and also, I'd say you have to be quite big, quite tall in both sports. So that's maybe the connection between them. Yeah, other than that, it's pretty different.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's interesting to kind of hear sort of the Swiss rugby scene, because I mean, there's a whole interview on that in itself, kind of just, you know, talking a little bit about that, because, yeah, it's a sport that when I'm thinking of nations of rugby, and particularly in Europe, you know, Switzerland is not exactly one of the first countries I think of. So I mean, is it sort of one of these sports that, as you're saying, sort of it's very small, but it's growing, like this is something that rugby sort of taking off a little bit more in Switzerland?
BARNABE DELARZE: It's definitely growing, or it has grown since I started. For example, back in, so it was 10 years ago now, even more, 15 actually, there wasn't any championships for up until like junior, so under 18, I'd say. It was just like small games on the weekends, small tournaments. We would play shorter games against multiple teams in one day. And then, as I said, in the winter, there wasn't any training. And now, hopefully, they introduce a championship in every category, so all the way to the kids. And yeah, but it's still quite small. And the national team is nowhere near the top, either in league or sevens. But we have a few guys now which are taking it a bit more seriously. And especially if you go to Geneva next to the French border, there's one or two teams. I think there's a team in Geneva who play in the Pro D2, so it's the second league of the French championship. So that's the only one which is like semi-pro, I'd say. But other than that, the culture of rugby, I think it's mostly brought from the expats who are like, who used to play at a good level either in France, England, and sometimes overseas as well, like Australia or some of the island, like Samoa or something like that. And they come here for work, and they still want to play rugby. So we have a lot of expats playing with the elite, well, not elite, but the main team. And that's kind of, we go from there. And then, yeah, most of the guys from Switzerland, they start late and they join the team. And if they fit, they get the game quite fast. And then, yeah, there's a cool championship, but we still have a long way to go. And unfortunately, the football is way bigger than rugby. It's a shame, but I wish it was the other way around.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, I mean, I remember when I was living in New Zealand and working for a newspaper, I did a story, the coach of the Georgia national team was a Kiwi, and sort of learning a lot about how rugby developed in Georgia. And of course, you know, they're quite a big powerhouse in Europe, they go to the World Cup and everything. So I mean, I guess there's that room for growth, that if it's sort of it's moving forward that way, that a country like Switzerland could, who knows, eventually qualify for a rugby World Cup, maybe an Olympics in sevens.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, that would be amazing. But I think we still have maybe 10 or 15 years to go before we see that at least.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, it'd be interesting to see that. But as much as I'd love to keep talking about Swiss rugby, we're obviously here to talk about your career and rowing. I mean, sort of through all the sports, I'm seeing on your website here that you tried things like skiing, basketball, rock climbing, football, judo, karate, fencing, sailing. Now, one thing I'm noticing here is they're all Olympic sports, obviously rock climbing, you know, technically with sports climbing. So was there kind of a harbouring ambition then deep inside Barnabe? Is it, hey, an Olympics, maybe this is what's going? Or did this sort of only come when sort of the rowing started to take off?
BARNABE DELARZE: No, no, honestly, well, I've always watched the Olympics because I've always liked sports, but never really thought about competing in them at least until I was, I'd say, 17 or even 18. Even when I started rowing, I was just, you just started sports, you have a few friends, and you do it because of your friends mainly. You're not thinking about going to Olympics at 13 or 14, or at least I wasn't. And also when I started rowing, I'd say the Swiss team was also a lot. There was, so the Swiss team was really good in the late 90s, up to 2000s. We had a few Olympic medals with Xeno Muller in the single who won in 96, and we had a lightweight bubble who also won in 96. And then in 2000, Xeno came second, so it still was pretty good. But then we had a big period with like no results between 2000 and 2012, 16. And so that's where 2012 is, I was last my last year as a junior, and that's when I really started to do that as a professional, as a main occupation, I'd say. But yeah, so it was, there wasn't a lot of, you couldn't really refer to any good rower, and you didn't have really a vision of how it would evolve. So that's why I didn't think about the Olympics back then, but then I started getting better. I won a junior medal in 2012, the World Championships, and that's the first time I realised, as a Swiss, you actually can win medals on the big stage, even though it wasn't really done before, not in my lifetime. So yeah, I realised I could be good. And then, yeah, I really invested everything into it. And I went to the pro team or elite team, and yeah, we qualified for Rio, and we were really young there. But another boat, the Lightweight 4, they won in Rio, so it took off, really. And then since then, between Rio and Tokyo, we had a lot of medals for small nation, as you said, world champs, world cups, Europeans. So now it's way bigger than when I started.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which that was actually one of the questions I wanted to find out about how rowing is in Switzerland. And just in the preparation for this interview, I actually looked up the Swiss medal tally at the Olympics when it comes to summer sports, and that rowing actually is Switzerland's second most successful sport, only behind gymnastics when it comes to overall medal tally. So there's obviously a bit of history when it comes to Swiss rowers. I mean, obviously Switzerland, we know it is a land of beautiful scenery and kind of mountains and everything, but I can imagine then that lakes must be abundant there in Switzerland. Then if kind of you've got sort of a history there and kind of, I mean, it must be a beautiful place to row then, if all of a sudden you're just kind of surrounded by this epic vistas and scenery, you know, no better place in the world to row maybe than Switzerland.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, definitely. Like I've learned recently that we have over 1500 lakes in Switzerland for a really small country. And a lot of them are small lakes. We've got Lake Geneva, which is huge, and Lake of Zurich and Lake of Lucerne. They are the three biggest lakes, I think, which aren't great for rowing because it's quite wavy. But other than that, we have so many like mountain or valley lakes all around. And it's true that if you ask internationally, are the rowers, what's their favourite place to row or compete? Like three quarters of them or 90% of them, they're going to say it's the roadside in Lucerne, because it's a natural lake just over two kilometres, which is the racing distance. And it's like in Lucerne, central, surrounded by trees. You've got the scenery, views on the mountains. And so yeah, we're really lucky. We don't always realise it because we just happen to live here, and we're used to it, but it's true. And so where we train, it's in Czarnoń, it's cold. It's 20 minutes away from Lucerne. And it's a 5K lake, and it's always really flat. There's hardly any motorboats on it. It's surrounded by mountains and quite protected from the wind. So yeah, pretty much a perfect place to row. And as you said, the history of rowing, as I said, there is quite a big history, and it was especially in the last century or even at the beginning of the Olympics, the modern Olympics, where we had a lot of medals there. But again, from 2000 to 2016, we had a big gap without any medals, and now hopefully we're going to keep going and continue the tradition.
BEN WATERWORTH: When you made that switch and began the sport, I mean, what was it about it that you kind of felt like, okay, this is something more, this is something interesting, I like to kind of pursue this a little bit. Was it just down to a talent? You felt you were suited to it? Was it just being out in the lakes? You loved it? Kind of what was it particularly about rowing that made you, I guess, really take to it?
BARNABE DELARZE: I guess at first it was mainly to get shredded. No, but I don't know. I live by the lake. There was a pretty good club there. I just showed up. I said, Hey, can I start? Can I try? And then at first I just like, I don't know, just the team, the spirits. And then, as I said, my first three years, I was really, really bad. So I didn't see any big potential in me. But that really quickly changed when I started training quite seriously. So when I was 15 or 16, I started training every day, once a day, which is quite a lot for 15 years old. And then the results came really quickly and the progress as well. And I think that's what kept me going to see that it's a sport. When you put in the work and you get the results, quite not fast, but you get them. And so you don't have necessarily to have a lot of talent or skills, because, yeah, it's just the more time you spend in the boat, the most time you spend on the Nergo, so the rowing machine, the more time you spend in the gym, the better you're going to be. And it's not a matter of, let's say, football, where you have to have the talent, you have to have something else. Yeah, so I think that's the main reason why I stuck to it, because I really like putting in the hard work and then seeing the results.
BEN WATERWORTH: And when you're getting those results, and obviously that helps along the way, and sort of mentioning some of those medals at World Junior Champs, European Championships, all that kind of thing. I mean, does that, all of a sudden you're going, okay, well, the gym's working, I'm doing this, I'm doing that. So then you just take those medals at extra motivation. So maybe you're training once a day, but then you amp that up to twice a day, or kind of, you know, you increase the time on a certain machine, or add a couple of weights there to the machines. I mean, that kind of, it's an extra motivation. Well, clearly this is working, and I can just take this from here.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, exactly. We have a lot of things we can measure in rowing. So especially in the rowing machine, you have your score, and it's really easy to see your progress, even on a weekly basis in training. You don't even have to compete to see the progress, especially when you're younger. Obviously now the results come much slower, and sometimes you have two or three years where you don't make any step, and then suddenly you make a big step. But especially when you're young, it's really, really cool to see every week you're beating your scores. And then obviously you start training more, and that's the whole thing about any sport, but especially about rowing, you can add volume and time and intensity over the years. And I started training three times a week, and then every day, and then twice a day. And now in the senior team, we train between two and three times a day.
BEN WATERWORTH: Wow, that's insane. And I tell you now, whenever I go to a gym, and I go on the rowing machine, it's kind of one of my least favourite machines. Whenever there's a circuit, I'm like, oh.
BARNABE DELARZE: It's boring. It's boring. Even for us, it's boring. But yeah, we put some good music on, and we're good to go.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which I actually discovered in kind of researching a bit about you, there's such thing as an indoor rowing champion. Now I was like, how is this possible? You're putting a large body of water in front of the thing, but then I realised it's just you're on a rowing machine, and you're basically like, how does that work? How do you win the indoor rowing championships?
BARNABE DELARZE: When you do the fastest time, over 2000 metres. So yeah, that's quite a big part of rowing actually, especially in the winter season. And so the rowing machine is a really big tool that we use almost every day or at least every week for sure. And on the water, there's a lot of factor who can influence the time. So if there's a headwind or tailwind, times are going to change massively. So if you take the same crew, it's always over 2000 metres, but if you take the same crew top level, they can race. The race is about six minutes long, depending on the boats, but it's around that time. And the same crew with the same shape can do 30 seconds slower from one day to another, depending on the condition, over six minutes. So it's not really accurate. And so that's why we do a lot of testing on the rowing machine, because there's no wind. It's always the same machine everywhere. It's really standardized. And that's how you... That's basically how we test our fitness. So obviously, underwater, there's a lot more of a technique, components on the rowing machine. There's a little bit of technique, obviously, but the main part is fitness, physiology. And that's why everywhere, worldwide, they're all going to test on the rowing machine. And then we have a few, like two or three of those tests every year. And in Switzerland, we have... One of them is the Swiss Championships. So basically, it's the same, but you just with a lot of other people in the same room, and you link the rowing machine to a software, and then you have like a little graphic with little virtual boats, and you can see the progress. And the first is the same principle as in order to the first crosses the line, wins. And then now it's evolving a bit, especially as well with CrossFit because they love the rowing machine. And yeah, we even have now World Championships as well. For the indoor rowing, which I did in 2019 and came second.
BEN WATERWORTH: Wow, okay.
BARNABE DELARZE: Obviously, it's not the same as on the water, but it's pretty cool and it's really useful. Definitely, even if it's no proper competition, every row is going to do testing on those machines.
BEN WATERWORTH: Wow, I'm going to look at one of those differently next time I'm at the gym then. I'm like, okay, well, there's a World Championship for this. Maybe I should try harder.
BARNABE DELARZE: And this is pretty cool as well because you get people, non-rowers who can also compete. Because as I said, it's easier to... Well, you can find that one in any gym. The technique is not that complicated. And so you see more and more like crossfitters or just like big guys who just want to see how fast they go. And they can take part in the World Champs or the Swiss Champs or any championship they want. And it's a good way to mix non-rowers and to introduce them to rowing in a way.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, get them out in a boat. Like, you're pretty good at this. Like, have you ever thought about getting out on...
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: Getting off the machine and into the water, kind of going that way.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, and it's also a sport you can learn pretty late.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, there's hope for me then.
BARNABE DELARZE: But it's interesting we don't get that often. But for example, in the UK, they have... It's called World Class Start, and they have dates where anyone can show up and they get tests on a few different factors. I don't think it's on 2K, but it's shorter distance, and they look at specific things, and they look at your size, your span, etc. And then if you're good enough, they take you in for four years, I think, or three years, and they say, OK, we're going to develop you into a rower over the next three or four years, and we're going to fund you, pay you something, if they see potential in you, and you see people coming from other sports, or just because they're big and they have a big cardio already, and they start quite late. They can start at 20 or 22, 24 even. So you see it's something you don't see really in other sports, people starting really late and getting really good as well. Yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: I like hearing that because again, I'm getting on a bit, Barnabe, and I'm just trying to work out that ambition of making an Olympics. So I'm just, okay, well, I'll research it, find out, get some help from our guests, and eventually, I've got a home Olympics to look forward to in 2032. So I'm just, okay, well, I've got 11 years to work on this, so who knows where I could get? Who knows? I'll keep training on that. You mentioned the UK. You took a trip to the UK and spent a couple of months there sort of throughout your career, and it turned out to be a bit of a turning point for you. Sort of what was the idea behind this trip and sort of what was it about that trip that really kind of helped you towards what would lead you to Olympic Games?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, definitely. So as you can maybe tell, I've got a pretty big influence from the UK because growing up, my family had a lot of British friends. We used to go and see them in the UK and London every year and skiing as well in Verbier, the pretty famous ski resorts in the Alps, and there's a lot of British people coming there. So I was always been surrounded by English people, and that's also why I started rugby in the first place because we had all those English friends who said it was such a great sport, and my mum said I should try, and I tried, and I liked it. And with the rowing, it's kind of the same because it's the home soil of rowing. It's the UK. And so after I finished high school, it was in 2012, I just won a medal at World Championships, Junior World Championships. And in Switzerland, we have to do the army. Every guy has to do the army, the military service. It's four months, about four months long. And then you have, over the years, you have to do two or three weeks of courses until you have a certain amount of days, compulsory days, which you have to complete. And since 2007, we have this in the army for athletes, elite athletes, which basically you can do your military as an athlete. So you have a very basic military formation for the first few weeks, and then you basically train full time. But you're paid by the army.
BEN WATERWORTH: Sounds pretty sweet to me.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, it's still quite small as well. You see maybe in Italy or in Germany or in France even, they have a huge army and police based system where most of the athletes or at least the rowers, they're all employed by the army or the police for their sports. And in Switzerland, it's way smaller than that, but it's growing as well, and we have a few opportunities for athletes to do that. And so as the military is a compulsory anyways, I thought I might as well do it or try to do it that way. And it was starting in October, so I had between the end of high school and the beginning of the army, I had a few months to kill. And I said, why not go to the UK, to London, and improve my English, take some English courses. And at the same time, I was rowing with the Imperial College Rowing Club, which is one of the biggest university teams in the country. And so, yeah, going there, seeing how the system was there, and it was a much bigger team than in Switzerland. Everyone knows about rowing. Everyone is pushing each other every session. And there's a lot of excitement about it. So that really, as you said, was a turning point, because I really discovered another face of rowing and a more fun face, maybe even though the training is just as hard and just as tough, but everything around it, the partying as well, I'm not going to lie, it's just a wall for itself. So it's in Putney, in London, it's a neighborhood, and there's like 10 rowing clubs next to each other. And everyone in this neighborhood knows about rowing. Everything is about rowing. The curry place is called Raja Rowing Curry Place. The cafe is around there. The breakfast place, they're all rowing related. So it's really a small world in itself. And that's, yeah, I saw how fun it was. And that was a turning point. And then I joined the army thing and I turned pro, as much pro as you can get with rowing since then, even though I'm still studying on the side. But yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: I've got to not let a question go here. Who parties better, the Brits or the Swiss?
BARNABE DELARZE: I must go with the Brits.
BEN WATERWORTH: There's a huge Swiss reputation we didn't know about.
BARNABE DELARZE: You do have a few exceptions in Switzerland, and there's a few good party plays, but it's a different spirit, for sure. And the Brits, they're more laid back, and they just grab a six pack of beers and party in the club, in the rowing club, I mean.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which, you've got to come to Australia, then you think the Brits are good.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, I've heard that. We party every year after the World Champs or the World Cups. There's usually a big party. Obviously, with COVID the last two years, it wasn't that big, but usually there's a big party and everyone comes together, so you get to see all the different nations and who's the best at partying. And most of the time, the good rowers are also the best at partying.
BEN WATERWORTH: Is there a secret to that? Is there a reason behind it? Is it because you're training so hard, you've got to let your hair down harder? I mean, kind of why is that? Why is the best party?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, I think that's it. Because when I say we like the party are really cool and pretty big, but they're not that often. So in the winter season, everyone back home has a few nights out, but still the training is really tough. You train every day, four to six hours a day. So you can't get smashed on the night out and train the next day, obviously. And then after the big competition, you have some time off, and that's where everybody comes together and let's go off the whole year being serious, and then all hells break loose on the party, and then you can afford to have a hangover for a couple of days afterwards.
BEN WATERWORTH: You've been hard at work. I think you deserve that basically at that point.
BARNABE DELARZE: Exactly. Work hard, party hard, as they say.
BEN WATERWORTH: Exactly. The thing that I love about rowing is there's so many disciplines, but at the same time, I can imagine the choices to kind of choose for them is an interesting one. I mean, how, when you are out there and you're competing, can you choose, say, between single skulls or going to a double skulls or a coxless four or the eight? Does it come down to ability? Your coaches are going, okay, you're going to be more suited to a quad than you are for a single. You might be better at the eight than you would the quad. I mean, kind of how does that work? And what were you finding you preferred the best when you were kind of making your way up the ranks?
BARNABE DELARZE: So it depends a bit on the nations, but most of the time, you're not the one deciding. It's the coaching team and the staff who decides because you have, over the winter, you have a lot of testing, individual testing. So you know exactly where you're leveled at, and the coaches know where your level is at. And then you have, in most of the countries, you have, in March, April, you have final trials, as we call them, and the whole team who's been training together the whole winter, we just race against each other. We start, usually we start on the rowing machine to have a physical baseline, and then we test on the water and we test in singles, then we have a ranking of the single, and then we start testing combinations in crew boats. And then, so we do a lot of racing and we swap seats, and then you can see which combination works best and which doesn't, and you go from there. In the big nations where they have a really big pool of athletes like the UK, Australia, New Zealand, they can choose from everything basically, and it's not always the top two people individually who end up together in the doubles, for example. It's more like, yeah, how they fit together, and then so the coaches can decide from there. And in Switzerland, it's, or the smaller nations, it's a bit different because you won't be able to do every boat. So there's 14 Olympic boat classes, seven for the women, seven for the men. And obviously small countries, we don't have enough people to fill all the boats. So we have to choose, and most of the time, it's pretty straightforward because you have like two guys, let's say for, in my case, for example, we had two guys over the five past years who were really close to each other. So that's me and my teammate from the double. And it was a straightforward fit, I'd say, because we were a lot ahead of the other guys, and no one was ahead of us. But also neither of us were a lot ahead of the other ones. So we were close together, and it was logical to put us in the double. And for Rio, so the last cycle, it was the same, but we were four of us who were really close to each other. So we ended up in the quad. And that's also the difference in rowing. There's with one oar or with two oars, and that's still the same sport. You can save switch, but it takes a few months to make the switch. And usually when you start rowing, it's really depending on your club and on the policy. But some clubs do a lot more sweeping. So sweeping is with one oar, and some of the clubs do a lot more sculling. So that's with two oars. And then you learn that, and usually you stay with that for the most of your career, even though you see every now and then some switches back and forth. But usually, we don't test the sweepers against the scholars. It's like two separate classes, and they're tested in those separate classes. And then to make it even more complicated, I'm sorry, but...
BEN WATERWORTH: You're answering questions I had already, so keep going. I like this.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, we have the light weights. So until Rio, it used to be a light weight four and a light weight double. So double with two oars each and the four with one oar each. So there was six places for light weights available. And then Rio, after Rio, they cancelled the four, so now there's only the double left. So if you're light weight, that's for the men, it's under 70 kilograms, and for the women, it's under 57.
BEN WATERWORTH: Wow, that's very light.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, especially most of the oars are pretty tall.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah.
BARNABE DELARZE: But yeah, so that's the only two boat classes for the light weights, and so the 12 other boat classes, which are single, double, pair, that's two with one oar, two with two oars, four and quad, that's also one oar, two oars, and the eight, which is only one oar, plus the cocks, that's all for open weight, and most of the guys, they're going to be over 90 kilos, up to 105 or so. So that's the typical weights, and for the lightweights, obviously under 70 kilos. So in my case, it wasn't a choice, because already as a junior, I was 90 kilos, so definitely couldn't lose 20 kilos. And yeah, then you go from there, and you get all the testing done, and you end up in a boat class.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which I can imagine. I was going to say, I can imagine when it comes to then the management, like weight management, that comes down to a good diet, a good sort of weight training regime. Because I mean, I can imagine you kind of got to, you got to keep that target weight. Does that sort of add the difficulty to sort of the training aspect?
BARNABE DELARZE: Well, I'd say for the lightweights, it's definitely really hard to keep the weight. And in the winter, they're going to walk around at anything from 75 to 80 kilos for the guys. And then they're going to go down to weight when the summer approaches and the racing approaches. And they have to weigh in two hours before the race. So it's not like in combat sports where they have a full 24 hours and they can lose all their water and then gain it back until the fight. In rowing, it's really, they introduce that to protect the athlete's health in a way, because like that, they have to go down to a stable weight, I'd say, even though most of them, they would sweat like one or two litres before the race just to get those last kilos down. But yeah, they have to go down progressively, and it's a bit more healthy for most of them. Some of them struggle, obviously. But again, if your normal weight is like, say, 78 kilos, you don't have a lot of chances against people which are 95, 100 kilos, and also taller than you. So they go for that. And then for the heavy weights, for the open weights, it's mostly the other way around. We have to make sure we don't lose weight, because rowing is an endurance sport, for sure, but it's also a strength endurance sport, so there's a lot of strength factor in it and leverage as well. So if you're taller, you've got big levers. That's an advantage, for sure. And if you're a bit heavier, you're going to have more power. Obviously, you don't want to be 120 kilos or 150 kilos, because you're going to sink the boat, but yeah, you want to be in that 90 to 100 kilos range. And with the amount of training we do, it's mostly a struggle to keep the weight rather than go down to weight. So for me, for example, in the winter, when it's colder and so it's hard on the system, I really have to, every meal, I overeat basically when I'm not hungry anymore, I take another plate or two, so just to make sure I keep the weight. And then in the summer, I just eat normally until I'm not hungry anymore, and I go down a couple of kilos naturally, but it's not an effort, it just goes down by itself. So yeah, it's also a struggle to keep the weight almost as much as to lose the weight.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, it explains that you mentioned to me, you're fair about the whole second breakfast and the second dinner. Now it makes complete sense.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, we eat like four to five meals, proper meals a day, anything from around five to six or even more thousand calories a day. So, and as well, it's harder when you try to eat healthy, because it's easy to get six thousand calories of McDonald's in, but if you try to eat pretty clean and you have to, because especially when you get older, obviously when I was 20 or 18, I could eat lasagna, pizza, whatever, and it was fine. But now I notice if I eat too much junk food, I'm going to feel it the next day. So I try to eat kind of clean, but to keep the calories up, you have to eat some biscuits or some chocolate or whatever in the evening. And it's good, but sometimes you would rather not do it.
BEN WATERWORTH: I can imagine. So there's no stacking up the trays in the Olympic Village of the McDonald's basically in between events.
BARNABE DELARZE: No, but after the event for sure. But now it's gone, I think, this year.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, I've learned that in Tokyo, they didn't. I don't know, probably not the first Olympics ever. I'm sure they didn't probably have McDonald's back in Antwerp in 2020. But I mean, it's for the first in a while that it seems McDonald's wasn't in the Olympics.
BARNABE DELARZE: They're not the sponsor anymore.
BEN WATERWORTH: Right.
BARNABE DELARZE: That's why. Yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's a partnership that you think would live forever, the McDonald's and the Olympic. I used to remember when every Olympics was on, you could go to McDonald's and for like an extra dollar, you got like a glass with a different sport on it. They were great. Those glasses lasted for years. You got one in the cupboard. You know, they were great.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, that's gone now. That's gone.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, geez. That's sad to learn. You're talking about sort of the coaches deciding everything along those lines of selection. Does that also work the same for the position in the boat? So, for example, in Rio, when you're in the Quad Sculls, are you positioned third, second, third? Like based on how that will help the team? And how is that decided?
BARNABE DELARZE: Well, depending on the boat, but again, it's the coaches who decide or they have an idea of what they want. And then we try it out. And if it works, we keep that way. And if it doesn't, we can always discuss. And obviously, the team always has a word to say. If they feel from the inside, it would go better with other positions. But basically, in the end, it comes down to technical ability, power, and character as well. Because in a double, it's a bit more... You can switch around a bit easier, I'd say. But for example, in the quad, usually you would put the more technical and the lighter guy at the bow, so at the back of the boat, or at the front of the boat in the travelling direction, but at the back, because we don't see him, like he's at the back of the boat. And then you would put, most of the time, the two most powerful in the middle, because we say it's like the engine room, and then at the stroke seat, so the one who's giving the rhythm, it's either he's either really technical or he's a bit more crazy than the other guys because he has to lead the boat, and it's up to him to raise the stroke rate when he matters. Yeah, so I was, for example, back in Rio, I was put at stroke, even though I was one of the most powerful guys, and I wasn't that technical, but I was the youngest one, and I wasn't scared to go out hard and be a bit arrogant in a way that I didn't care who I was racing, even though they were much more experienced and much older than us, I would just go out and do my thing, and that's probably why I was put at stroke. And now in the double, I wasn't at stroke, I was in the bow seat, and so Roman was at stroke, and that's because it just worked better that way, and in the double, it's more... you can switch, like, it doesn't matter that much, I'd say it's just matter how you're most comfortable, and Roman was... so my teammate was... or he is more technical than me, he's got a little bit more feel, and I have a lot more power than him, so I could learn from him by following him, I could learn the technique a bit, and at the same time, I could really power the boat along, and he could feel my power, and that was a good combination. But that's like fine-tuning details, and sometimes it just clicks in a way, and it doesn't click in another way, and you have to try out a bit sometimes, and sometimes you just sit in the boat, and it goes, and you don't change it anymore. So it's not that specific, but there's a few factors who can influence.
BEN WATERWORTH: How important is strategy when it comes to rowing? You're talking about all those influences, air technique, power, and everything, but do you go into every single race with a certain mindset, particularly maybe in the quad, that there's four of you there, so the strategy is let's lead from the front, let's go all out and then bring it back, or is it let's maintain that energy and go there, or does it again depend on the regatta, depend on how you're performing? How does all that work?
BARNABE DELARZE: Rowing is kind of a stupid sport because it's six minutes, and you just go all out, all out start, hang on to it, and see if there's anything left in the end, basically. But obviously every boat has a race plan going to the race, and I'd say the bigger the boat, the more important that is, because as you said, you have to coordinate four guys or even eight guys, as opposed to when you're alone in the boat or just two of you. So if you're alone, obviously, it's just you, so you can do whatever you want. If you're in a double, you can feel the other guy really easily, so it's easy to adapt when there's a change. But in a quad or in an eight, you've got a lot less feedback from what the others are doing, so it's important that everyone is on the same page. Basically, to start, everyone's going to try to start as hard as they can, and then it's a matter of how you settle in the rhythm. Kind of rhythm, it's not really sustainable, but as much as we can for that amount of time. And then if you decide to have a big push at the halfway mark, you've got to make sure all the guys in the boats are going to go on the same stroke, because if you don't go on the same stroke, it's going to be a lot of wasted energy, and the boat's going to respond a lot less. So yeah, you do a race strategy, a race plan, as you say, and then someone in the boat is responsible for making the calls, and that's going to be just like one single word, and it's going to be maybe four to eight of them in a race, not more than that, because you're too much, you're worried about breathing more than talking. But yeah, there's definitely a little strategy, but in the end, you can't influence the other boats. You have to race your race and go as fast as you can from point A to point B. And yeah, it doesn't matter what... Theoretically, it shouldn't matter what the other boats are doing, but then when you're in a race, obviously, you're going to look around, and you can sometimes be... You have to adapt your plans.
BEN WATERWORTH: We in Australia are obviously big friendly rivals with the Kiwis, probably the Brits as well. Who's Switzerland's rival? When you're out there in an international regatta, is there one country that you're just like, screw France, we're going to beat France today. We're going to beat Germany today. Who is it that Switzerland always want to beat?
BARNABE DELARZE: We're neutral. We don't want to beat anybody.
BEN WATERWORTH: Oh, come on. There's someone. There's someone, Barnabe.
BARNABE DELARZE: We need the money. We can't upset them. You know what I mean?
BEN WATERWORTH: Such a Swiss answer.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, well, it's true. It depends as well, because Switzerland, as you might know, there's four different languages. There's one really tiny one, which no one speaks. No, I speak two of them. So this one is called Reto-Romance. It's like a mix of Italian, German, and French, or whatever, but no one speaks that. It's like a little, little place. And then there's Italian, which is the second smallest one in the south. And then there's French, which is my side of the country. And it's like 20 to 30% of the country. And the biggest part is German speaking. And so that's a challenge, first of all, for us to understand each other. But the training centre is in the German part. So I had to learn German. Well, it's a good thing now I can speak German and Swiss German, which is different than German. A lot different, actually. So thankfully, I can speak that now. And so everything I do in the Swiss team is in German, or most of it. But with that, there's also a lot of cultural differences. So the French speaking guys, we're more chilled. I'd say we're more like Latin or we're more like France. And the German speaking guys, obviously, they're a bit more like Germans, Swiss Germans, so it's a bit more straight and strict, I would say. And so depending on where you come in the country, you've got maybe more rivalry with the country. So, for example, the French speaking part, we kind of have a big rivalry with France, but it's like love-hate relationship because we speak the same language, we understand each other, we've got more or less the same culture. And we, for example, the double who won in Tokyo, they're French and we really like the good friends, I'd say. And then if you come from the German part, maybe you're going to want to be the German a bit more. So it depends a bit. But for example, I don't know if you followed the Euro in football this summer. So when Switzerland beat France in the eighth final, it was a big, big thing in the French part of Switzerland because we like the small brother, you know, or France is like the big brother. And they always say, oh, the small Swiss or whatever, and especially in football, obviously, because there's a big football nation and we're not that much. And so when we beat them, it was, even though I don't like football really that much, we all celebrated. It was a big party, especially in the French part.
BEN WATERWORTH: Switzerland always do well, I swear. Every World Cup and everything, Switzerland doing quite well. So for a small nation, kind of, you're always punching above your weight when it comes to these tournaments.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, in football, they're all right. It's the most popular sport here, along with maybe the skiing and ice hockey, because obviously...
BEN WATERWORTH: Has tennis taken off because of Roger? I mean, is tennis now like the nearly a national sport based on how successful it is?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, well, that's just because of Roger, yeah. Yeah, yeah, definitely.
BEN WATERWORTH: And Belinda, we should mention Belinda, gold medallist in Tokyo. We shouldn't take away from her. The one thing that we always laugh about here on the show is opening ceremony, you know, you've got your commentators, you know, the country's coming out, like, let's give some stats, let's talk up their athletes. The network here in Australia that airs the Olympics is kind of our main tennis broadcaster. So every single time there's anything Switzerland related to do with anything at the Olympics, some commentator, you just, you count the seconds. Okay, where's the Roger Federer mention coming in? Three, two, one. Oh, and Roger Federer is from, says, oh, thank you, Channel 7. We know that. So I needed to fit in a Roger Federer reference purely on the fact that it's an Australian tradition that anything Swiss we have to bring up Roger Federer.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, that's how it is all over the world, really. Like, he's such a global star. And it's so funny, like, even when he plays in Wimbledon, he would play against a British guy, and the crowd would be cheering for him instead of a British guy. So he's like, he's something else for sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, absolutely. Do you remember that moment, Barnabe, when you knew you were going to Rio, when you officially knew you were an Olympian, and what was that moment like?
BARNABE DELARZE: That was one of the best moments of my rowing career for sure. So in rowing, you have to qualify the year previous at the World Championships, and you have to do a certain placement. So in my case, in our case, in the quads, we had to come top eight at the World Championships. So then those eight boats, those eight nations, they get a spot at the Olympics the next year. And then you have also this last chance regatta, which happened in May just before the Olympics. But you don't want to count on that because there's only one or two spots for each category, and that's really stressful and not really nice to race in. Hopefully, I haven't had to race in that in my life, and I hope to continue like that. But so basically, you qualify world champs, and yeah, I remember we were the youngest by far in the field. I think we were about 21 or 22 years old on average in our quads. And rowing is, as I said, an injury in sports, so you get more like most of the guys or the girls are around late 20s to 30s when they're in their top shape. So we were really young. We all were under 23s. We had won the under 23s in 2014, so that was just a year before that, the world championships under 23s. And in rowing, there's a big gap between the under 23s and the senior level. So it's not because you win the under 23s that you're going to win the seniors for sure. You're not even going to medal at seniors when you win the under 23s, most of the case. And then so we had these world champs and we had done all right, but especially the first two years, 2013, 14, we were even younger. And we kind of surged into the scene. We won under 23s both years and we did some, we came into the final, senior final in 2013. So it was a, yeah, we had a lot of potential and we're really excited because we had a big way to go. And then 2015 season, we kind of, we had, yeah, it wasn't going well at all. Basically, a Kiwi coach came to take over the head coach place in Switzerland. And we had a tough time going, going or being coached by him.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's New Zealand for you. That's standard. Come on.
BARNABE DELARZE: Well, he definitely is doing something right in some boats. Like his training plan was really good, really tough. If you survived it, you would be so fit. But a lot of us got injured as well. But if you survive the plan and you do what he does, you do what he tells you to do, you're probably going to be quite good. But the problem is that he was a sweeping specialist. So with one oar, and we were sculling with two oars. And so that guy coached, he was head coach, he was writing the plan, but he also was our coach and the lightweight force coach. And obviously it worked wonderfully for the lightweight force because they won world championships in 15 and the Olympics in 16. And then the same coach went to Australia and now he won the four with his guys in Tokyo. So I'm not going to say it's shit, but it just works for certain people and it doesn't work for other people. With us, it didn't work. So the beginning of the season, we did really bad. We came seventh at Europeans. And when you know there's going to be the Australians, the Americans, the Chinese, the Kiwis, all going to add up at world championships. If you're only seventh at Europeans, then you have to do top eight at world championships with all those other boats. You're not in a good place. And then the last World Cup of the season that was in Lucerne, it's like six weeks before the World Champs, we came, I think, eighth or ninth even. So it really didn't look that good. And then hopefully we got our another coach, our old coach back. He came back and he could, yeah, he could coach us the second half of the season. And we made some really good progress in the lead up to the World Champs. And then we arrived there and we won our heat. And then when you win your heat, depending on the book class, you're directly qualified for the semifinals. And so that's what that was our case. And the semifinals, it's six boats across. There's two of them. And the top three come into the final. So when you know there's eight places to grab, if you're in the final, your top six are good. And then in rowing, we also raise the B finals, I would say, and the C finals, so all the small finals. And so the B final, you race for rank seven to 12, et cetera. And so most of the time, it's quite useless to raise the B final, except for that...
BEN WATERWORTH: Master qualification spots there, the first two places.
BARNABE DELARZE: And you know if you end up in the B final, and there's only the top two places who qualify for the games, you don't want to be in there either, because it's going to be a dogfight, even more than usual. And so the semi-final was more or less our final, because we knew, okay, if we make top three, we're going to be qualified at the games for the first time in our lives. So yeah, it was a really good race. We were leading for the most part, and then the Australian came through, but it was neck and neck the whole way. And then we had the Ukrainians who were world record holder and world champs from 2014 side by side with us. And then the Lithuanians came like surged, like crazy in the final sprint. And we ended up four boats on the line for three places in the final, and the Ukrainians got peeped out. So the defending world champs didn't make the final, and Australia, the Lithuanians, and us made the final within that much. And then we just... And then so that was such a tense moment. And also usually I'm quite nervous before the race, but when the race starts, I just forget about nerves, and I'm just full focus on racing. And that's the only race in my life I can remember when I was stressed during the race, because I knew every boat had a chance, and I knew the Eastern Bloc had a really big sprint, and I was really scared of them coming back at us, and I knew the Australian was really strong. So it was like so stressful, and then we crossed the line in third, but just we were so relieved and so happy because we made it, and then we had the final to race, so that's all bonus from there, and also had a decent race in the final, but came sixth, just missed the medals. Came fifth, sorry, just missed the medals. But yeah, the one that stuck was the semifinal for sure, and that was, yeah, amazing.
BEN WATERWORTH: Best third place ever, basically, from that point on, because you're in Olympia, they can't take that away from you.
BARNABE DELARZE: Exactly, in the semifinal, most of the time, just about not fucking up, just don't fuck it up and go through, and then in the final, anything can happen, so it doesn't really matter if you come first or third.
BEN WATERWORTH: Do you then soak up? I love hearing stories from our guests who, particularly their first Olympics, soaking up that atmosphere. Do you remember just the village? I don't know if you did the ceremony or not, if you were able to. Everything along those lines, just outside of the competing aspect. In Rio, what was that like?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, it was a bit mixed feelings, because in the lead up, I got injured, and I was out of the boat for four months, from Christmas to April. And then, yeah, at the games, we didn't really perform. Yeah, we just weren't consistent enough. We had some really good rows and then some bad rows. And if you do that at the Olympics, you're going to miss out. And we missed out. Again, in the heat, we missed out on a direct place in the final, and we lost by 0.5 of a second to the Australians, who then won the silver medal in the final. So we were that far, but it just wasn't enough. And so I was really disappointed. So it's kind of a bitter memory. But then again, I remember before that in the village, I was like a child at Disney World, basically, because you see all the athletes, you see some stars, you see Usain Bolt, Serena Williams, Chris Froome, Raphael Nadal. So all the big names, apart from the American basketball team who were staying in the yacht.
BEN WATERWORTH: As you do, why wouldn't you?
BARNABE DELARZE: But other than that, most of the, even the really well-known athletes, they're also staying in the village, and everyone eats together. And there's this huge dining hall with food, 24-7, of any choice you can think of, really. There's something for everyone. And you're all mixed up together. And then you go into the gym. There's also a big gym in the village, and you see people training. And it's amazing to see the weightlifters doing their thing, and then the combat sports guys sweating out and being really explosive. And then even the track cycling guys with huge legs, or the gymnasts so flexible. It's a freak show, basically. You can recognise most of the people just by looking at them and tell what sports they're doing. Apart from the rowers, they're in between, in the middle of everything.
BEN WATERWORTH: But surely then, though, in the gym, you're all Olympians, you're all competitive. Yeah, you've got the boxers on the boxing bag, you've got the cyclists on there. But surely you can just kind of, again, they can't recognise you as a rower, so you can just kind of sit down, get on the rowing machine, and all of a sudden, I don't know, Michael Phelps pops in, hey, Michael, how are you doing? You want to go? Let's have a race. What sport are you competing in? Oh, you'll find out. And then you just go to town, start rowing, and yeah, suck it, Michael Phelps, I can beat you in something.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, I haven't thought about it. Maybe I do that at the next Olympics. But no, because when you're there, it's your racing week, it's the highlight of your career, so you're not really joking around too much. You can chat with people and stuff, but you're not going to race someone in the rowing machine. Actually, in Tokyo, we were thinking the same with our teammates, and we were like, oh, there's the biggest guy, and there's the tallest guys from the basketball, and there's the most flexible guy, the smallest guy from the gymnast, or whatever. And then we looked at us, like rowing, like we're nothing special, like we're just in the middle. And then we were thinking, oh, yeah, this guy, he's the fastest guy, and then this guy is the strongest guy, and he's the, yeah, whatever. And we're like, oh, well, we can pull pretty hard, but not too hard for pretty long, but not too long. That's our sport. And then I think the... If I had to point out one distinctive feature of the rowers, it would be... I'm pretty sure we are the ones who can injure the most pain out there, because it's really painful. And so we're some of the toughest, for sure, mentally, I think. So that's a trait you're not going to recognise physically.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which is a good one to have, I think, kind of.
BARNABE DELARZE: You can use it in your life afterwards. Rower, they don't really complain. Well, they complain all the time about the training, because we say it's hard and we don't get paid enough money and stuff. But in real life, anytime there's a tough situation, we hardly complain. It's pretty cool. We're pretty easygoing, and we can adapt pretty easily. So that's, I think, a feature of the world. But as I said, in the village, you've got so much freaks, and it's great to see that. And then also, we were all excited, because we were young, and we knew, are we going to get that Samsung Olympic edition phone? And where can we get that? So we run around the whole village trying to look for that. Actually, we learned later that we were going to get it in our rooms anyways. And yeah, there's all sorts of goodies you can grab. And there's the whole village, which is kind of magical, especially at night when you see all the lights and the buildings. So yeah, that was the nice part of it. And then the racing wasn't that nice. And then the after parties were pretty good as well.
BEN WATERWORTH: That Swiss partying that we were talking about before.
BARNABE DELARZE: Well, that was more Brazilian partying, which is quite nice as well.
BEN WATERWORTH: We're talking about partying nations. Which I guess kind of, are you glad that you sort of got to experience that aspect of an Olympics when Tokyo obviously was so different, given that, you know, you experienced it sort of without restrictions, kind of you were so a lot more free, whereas Tokyo a lot more different kind of restrictions.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, that's for sure. So in Tokyo, in the village, I was pleasantly surprised. I expected much worse. I thought we wouldn't be able to leave our room, and we would get our foods on trays in our rooms, which wasn't the case, like in the village, we were free to walk around freely and just with the mask. But that was fine. Even the dining hall was, well, there was those plexiglass walls between us. But other than that, it was kind of the same as in Rio. But yeah, for sure, the rowing is on the first week of the Olympics. So it's pretty cool because you get all the racing done, and then you can stay in the country or in the village, even depending on your nation and the policy of the nation. But you can stay around for the rest of the Olympics. And in Rio, even though I was disappointed with the result, it took a few hours or a few days to sink in and to wash the disappointment away, I'd say. But then when I was ready to get into the mood of farting, it was great, like you could go farting at night, watch the other competition during the day, sneak in into the athletic stadium. A lot of things you can do and enjoy the Olympics from another point of view than when you're racing yourself. And that was great. And obviously we didn't have that in Tokyo, unfortunately. And we had to leave 24 hours after our race. So all the, I'd say it was much more as a world champs, or yeah, it was just you come around, you race, and then you leave. As in Rio, you do that, but then afterwards you also have some holidays, and you can enjoy the Olympics and the country.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which I can imagine then come Paris 2024 to put that pressure on you now, Barnabe. I mean, it's close to home. It's sort of the French. You've got the language down. I mean, I don't know how the French party, but I mean, you know, hopefully, in three years' time, we'll be back to normal, right?
BARNABE DELARZE: Hopefully, yeah. We'll see, fingers crossed, yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: We still don't know. It's kind of one of those things where we're thinking we were a year ago, we're back to normal, but yeah.
BARNABE DELARZE: Exactly, yeah. But I think Paris can do it pretty well as well. So I think it's going to be good.
BEN WATERWORTH: Now, in that period between Rio and Tokyo, you go from being in the Sculls to the Quad Sculls to the Double Sculls, with Roman, World Championship, Silver Medal, kind of lead up into the Olympics. They're delayed by a year, everything that sort of happened. But when you head to Tokyo, sort of talking about that disappointment from Rio, I mean, kind of, how did you go into Tokyo? How did you and Roman think like, okay, Silver Medal, pretty good. We're out there with the best in the world. Was it a case of we can medal at the Olympics? This is what we're going to go for. We're going for that medal.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, 100%. So after Rio, the four of us had different plans. Me and Roman, we just kept training. Basically, we had a few months away at home, but we still trained at home. Roman actually went to Australia for three months, I think, and trained with the Australian team because he also wanted to learn English, which was a really weird choice to me to go and learn English in Australia, but whatever.
BEN WATERWORTH: We don't teach very good English here. Like, it's not the English you want to learn.
BARNABE DELARZE: Exactly. So whatever, he did that. So he was away from Switzerland, but he still trained. And I just made some steps in my studies, but I still train as well, recently. And then we had a new coach, and everyone was looking pretty good, and we both made some good progress. We were fresh mentally to go again. And basically for me, as soon as I crossed the line in Rio and I didn't make the A final, I knew I would go for another four years because I couldn't leave it there, for sure. The decision was made instantly. And so I knew I even trained in Rio at the Olympic Village. Anyways, so yeah, we trained. And then the two other guys from the quad, they took a bit of a break. And then when they came back, we just were too much ahead of them to go back into a quad. So it was just logical to stay in a double. And then, again, it didn't really work out with our coach. Our old coach came back to coach us, and from then it was really good. And 2018, we won the silver medal at World Champs, and then 2019, we still had Europeans. We won the World Cups ranking. We won two World Cups. So we were on our way to be on the podium all the time. And then we kind of messed up the World Champs in 2019. We were favourites going into them, because, as I said, we won the last two World Cups of the season, and we were second at World Champs the year previous. So we were the favourites, and that was the first time it happened to us in our career, going to an event as favourites. So, yeah, we didn't really manage that pressure very well, and also the lead-up, the training plan wasn't great. So we ended up fifth, still qualified, so that was checked. But yeah, we were disappointed, but on the other side, we knew where we fucked up, and so we were set to correct that in 2020, and then, as everyone knows, what happened happened in 2020, so it got delayed. Thankfully, we still had the Europeans to row in October, so they were postponed, but we still were able to race there, which was really nice to do, and we came second again there, so we were like, OK, well, we kind of got it back from that last race in 2019, so it's going good, and then we had the whole 2021 again to train, and I must admit, it was a bit tough mentally, not so much because of the training, because I like the training, but it's just 10 years I've been in the Swiss system, and it's centralized, so you don't have a lot of freedom. You have a set training plan, you have a set schedule. The lake where we train is great, it's nice, but it's a shithole, basically. You don't have any action. You can't go out and not party, but just have a cup of drink with a mate. You will be the same people all the time, same structure, so it was a bit heavy on the mind. Then I got COVID as well in December. Took me off training for two months. Came back decently, good shape, did the Europeans, did all World Cups, and we won a few medals. We were up there, but we were confident that we could make a big step in the last lead up. And yeah, unfortunately, definitely we were going for the medals in Tokyo. We were going for the win, especially that in this category over the last few years, it was so dense and so tight. So there was always someone else was winning. So it was up for grabs. And yeah, on the day, we just didn't have a good race and came fifth, unfortunately.
BEN WATERWORTH: As a comment, fifth seems to be your place. You seem to always be getting fifth.
BARNABE DELARZE: Let's take the number five. Actually, I kind of like the number five, but not in a race.
BEN WATERWORTH: Not in a race, no.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, it's just tough because... So this one was even tougher than Rio to process because in Rio, we knew we had an outside chance of maybe a medal, at least a final, but it wasn't like we had a lot of potential still, and we were the youngest. And in Tokyo, it wasn't like that. We knew we had beaten everyone in that field at some point, so we knew we could do it. We both improved so much from Rio. Physically, I was the best in the doubles field, for sure. Technically, we were right up there. And we just didn't have a good performance in the final, and that was really gutted. So, yeah, big disappointment, but that's how sport is. And now we have to reassess and see what we can do differently if we want to go to Paris. And if we're going to stay together or do a different boat, who knows.
BEN WATERWORTH: And is it just really at that early stage now, given that we're talking only a few weeks after it, that it's too soon to even think what they are? I mean, do you have sort of a thought process of how it might go ahead of Paris? Do you want to stay with Rowan or kind of?
BARNABE DELARZE: It's really tough to say now, but what's for sure is that I'm leaving in three weeks to Oxford, to the UK to do a master, an MBA. And as you may know or may not know, but there's a big race between Oxford and Cambridge every year, the boat race. So that's, for those who don't know, it's a huge race. It's two eights, a duel head to head on the River Thames. It's about, I think it's 4.2 miles, whatever the fuck that means. 6K, around 6K with the stream in London, about 200,000 people watching on the banks and about a million watching on TV. So that's, for rowing, that's really big numbers. And so I'm going to do that. I'm going to study in the UK, in Oxford. I'm going to try and qualify for that eight. And the funny thing is that Roman is coming as well, and it wasn't planned, but we ended up going at the same year. He does a different course, water science management, and I'm doing the MBA. So not the same course, but we're both going to try out for the rowing team and keep training at a good level. And then after that, it's one year only master, so I'm going to be done in September 2022. And from there, it's only two years to Paris, so it's going to be really tempting to go for it for sure. At the moment, if I have to give an answer, I'm saying yes, I'm going for it, but I have to see how and with who and how I do things. If I want to make a medal in Paris, I have to change some things for sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I think just, you know, as I said before, it's so close to home, right? I mean, it might be the closest you'll ever get to sort of like a home Olympics. So I mean, kind of you get a lot of Swiss fans, I can imagine coming along to cheer you on again if fans are allowed by 2024. Which, I mean, again, I know we're obviously talking to you only a few weeks after it. You mentioned sort of the disappointment, but do you think it's something that in the future you can look back and go, well, we finished fifth in an Olympic Games. I mean, that's something that, okay, it's not a medal, but I mean, it's still a pretty, got a nice ring to it. But fifth in an Olympic Games is no mean feat.
BARNABE DELARZE: Well, maybe in 10 years. But as I said, hopefully I can correct that in 23 and 4 and come away with the medal. And maybe then it's going to give me a sight on my full career. And obviously, I'm going to be really happy. But even if that doesn't happen, or if I decide to quit rowing after the master at Oxford, I'm sure I'm always going to be disappointed at the results, for sure. But another thing which is sure is that my sporting rowing career shaped me in who I am today. And I can take that with me my whole life. And that's definitely something I don't regret and definitely something I'm proud of. And that's part of me. And that's going to, as I told you, like the rowers, we're pretty tough and we're pretty adaptable. So we're hard working. So that's something you learn in the process. And that's something you can use with anything you're doing really. So obviously, that's all good. And then the end result is going to be disappointed. But that's force and that's a high level. It's not easy.
BEN WATERWORTH: One thing we're going to wrap up this interview with a series of fun questions. I'm very excited to actually hear your answers from, because as I said, you're a first European guest on, so I'm intrigued to see how this will go. But one thing I'd love to quickly find out from you. On your website, you've got one of your hobbies is cooking. Now, give me an idea of what Swiss cooking is like. I mean, is it just cheese fondue, or is it kind of, is there more to it than that? Like, I mean, if you're cooking a Swiss feast for an Australian, like what am I eating? What's on the menu?
BARNABE DELARZE: Well, if I'm really going to go Swiss, I'm going to have to go with the fondue, but that's not what I cook on a daily basis, 100%. That's not even cooking. You just put cheese in the pot and you melt it, so it's not really easy. But no, I like, well, it's pretty practical because I have to eat a lot, and I like to eat, and I like food, and I like to cook it. So that's a good thing, because if I didn't like food, it would be even tougher. But I really cook anything. I don't have a to go, a main dish to go. I just, yeah, I like Asian stuff. I like spicy stuff, a lot of flavour, a lot of herbs, like a good piece of meat, obviously. So, yeah, just having fun in the kitchen as much as I can.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's good. Well, I've got to say, you guys have the best cheese in the world. I mean, come on, Swiss cheese.
BARNABE DELARZE: Well, that's for sure. 100%, yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: Actually my favourite cheese, like not even a word of a lie. I had a former radio show where we ended on dumb questions, even dumber than the ones I'm about to ask you. And the first question we would always ask was, what is your favourite type of cheese? So I always got excited when somebody said Swiss cheese. I'm like, yeah, you're right. Best cheese out there.
BARNABE DELARZE: Hold on there because Swiss cheese doesn't mean anything. We have hundreds of different cheese.
BEN WATERWORTH: That's just called cheese for you guys. No, no, it's like you can't.
BARNABE DELARZE: No, we don't call cheese cheese. We call it by the names. For example, it's funny because just yesterday I went out with a mate for lunch and we had the, you know what the raclette is?
BEN WATERWORTH: No, I don't.
BARNABE DELARZE: So it's also melted cheese, but it's not so fondue is where you put the cheese in the pot. You melt it. You put your deep bread into it with a fork. And raclette is like a big wheel of cheese. You cut it in half, and then you put it under a heater, like a small grill.
BEN WATERWORTH: You've told me already, I want this. Sounds amazing.
BARNABE DELARZE: The heat comes from above on the half wheel of cheese. You melt the top and then you pull it with a knife and it goes on your plate and you eat it on top of some potato or something like that.
BEN WATERWORTH: You're making me just want to come to Switzerland even more now.
BARNABE DELARZE: And so we had that yesterday and it was a place which serves especially that and they have so many types of cheese, but it's all the same. You will call it the same cheese, but there's a subtle flavour change depending on where you buy the cheese from and you could just go as many as you can and ended up having 17 of them. So not the whole cheese, but 17 slices or whatever.
BEN WATERWORTH: 17 whole things of cheese.
BARNABE DELARZE: But yeah, so I was really Swiss. I was really Swiss yesterday.
BEN WATERWORTH: At least you've got this guy. What can I offer you? Have some Vegemite. No one likes Vegemite. That's crap. I'm liking this. I want to have some sort of cuisine from Australia where we can give that to the world.
BARNABE DELARZE: Well, you're pretty good on barbecue, aren't you?
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, true. That's true. And then meat pies. We're good at the old meat pies, which are very stable here. As I said, Barnabe, we're going to close out with a series of fun questions now. These are based on a Team Canada questionnaire that they asked their athletes ahead of Rio and Pyeongchang. And just some interesting ones here. As always, I offer the chance to our guests to complete some homework. There's a drawing element if you want to. Don't have to. But if you are a great drawer, by all means, there's some- Okay. All right. No hidden talents going on there. Now, I usually like to choose an athlete from the same sport, but sadly, the website doesn't have any rowers. So I've chosen someone from rugby because I thought, well, that's close. So it was as close as I could get there. So we'll see how we go. All right. If you could choose any Olympic host city, where would it be?
BARNABE DELARZE: Summer or winter?
BEN WATERWORTH: Give me one for both. If you like, I can imagine maybe more winter for Switzerland, but I'm sure there's some summer possibilities.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, I have to go. I have to go with Stag Moritz for the winter in Switzerland because we've tried a few times, but it didn't work out the last few years. And then summer. Oh, that's a tough one. Actually, Tokyo was a really good one if it wasn't for COVID.
BEN WATERWORTH: So go to Tokyo again?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, I'm going to stay with Tokyo. Yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, yeah. I mean, listen, what had the youth, was it the winter last year from memory? Did they not? And you've got the Olympic Museum there. So I mean, it's kind of...
BARNABE DELARZE: We're in the... I'm currently in the Olympic capital.
BEN WATERWORTH: It was meant to be then, Barnabe. It was, you know... Exactly, yeah. Is there something in the water there that they just have to produce Olympians in because they're the capital of the Olympics, basically? You know, it's like, you must produce all these Olympians, and we're moving the museum to Athens. Kind of produces that way. I think that would be interesting. In your spare time, what do you most like to do?
BARNABE DELARZE: Skiing.
BEN WATERWORTH: Skiing?
BARNABE DELARZE: Freeriding, skiing, yeah, 100% if I can.
BEN WATERWORTH: I tried skiing this year. I've told this to skiers. I just embarrassed myself, but I got on skis, and I'm like, yeah, I'm Australian. I don't know how to do this. So are you just born with skis on your feet in Switzerland, or is this just like, hey, welcome to the world, have some skis?
BARNABE DELARZE: Pretty much, yeah. At least for me, for sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: It's got like in Canada, they're born with skates on their feet, right?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, I can't go as much as I can now anymore, but up until I started rowing seriously, I was going every weekend and every holidays all the time. So I still have a pretty decent level, and I really enjoy it, like in the fresh snow, powder, jumping cliffs. Yeah, if I can choose one thing to do, I would do that for sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: What is the weirdest instruction a coach ever gave you?
BARNABE DELARZE: Um, don't roll like an angry muppet.
BEN WATERWORTH: I mean, yes, I can see why that would be problematic. So, um, hmm, okay.
BARNABE DELARZE: Oh, there was a running gag as well with my coach. So the muppet was from the Kiwi guy, and then from the Swiss guy who coached most of our career, he always used to say, just while in French, but just don't fuck it up. Thanks for that one. We didn't think about that one.
BEN WATERWORTH: I was fucking things up before, but now he said that. Okay, well, that's it. All right. Thank you, coach.
BARNABE DELARZE: Cheers.
BEN WATERWORTH: I can see why you had to like get rid of him all the time and keep coming back to him.
BARNABE DELARZE: It's kind of like, you know, he was leaving and we wanted him back actually.
BEN WATERWORTH: Right. Okay.
BARNABE DELARZE: No, he was pretty good, but he had a few funny ones like that.
BEN WATERWORTH: Avoid the Kiwis. That's what we're learning. What is your favourite workout?
BARNABE DELARZE: I like a good old pump session, but that's not really good for rowing, actually, unfortunately. But if I have to pick a specific rowing one, we have this one, a pretty standard one that a lot of people do across the world. It's 30 minutes on the rowing machine. Stroke rate 20. So you're not allowed to go higher than that and just pull as high as you can. Pretty short, a lot of power involved, pretty efficient. So yeah, like that one.
BEN WATERWORTH: Again, I'll try that one out at the gym. I'm going to take some notes actually to see how I go. I'll send you my numbers and you can be embarrassed and go, Ben, don't get into rowing. You've got no future in it. If you could have lunch with any one person, who would it be?
BARNABE DELARZE: Let's say, if it's an athlete, I'd say Conor McGregor. Yeah, that would be pretty fun to have lunch with him.
BEN WATERWORTH: A few choice words at that lunch. Learn some English there from Conor. Some new words to use there, basically.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, it's definitely entertaining, that's for sure.
BEN WATERWORTH: That would be fun. What is your favourite sandwich?
BARNABE DELARZE: We're not that big on sandwich here, but it depends on the bread, really. The bread, that's why everything happens. I'd say classic ham and Swiss cheese with good breads.
BEN WATERWORTH: Sounds good. The bread is the important factor.
BARNABE DELARZE: Exactly.
BEN WATERWORTH: You've got to have the good bread. It's right there in the sandwich. Bread, yes, absolutely. If you could have any superpower, what would it be?
BARNABE DELARZE: Um. Let's say, teleportation.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, makes travel a bit easier, kind of, kind of, you know.
BARNABE DELARZE: And I'm kind of a, I'm pretty impatient, so like to be there quick.
BEN WATERWORTH: Works very well, I like it. What is the best candy in the world?
BARNABE DELARZE: Swiss chocolate.
BEN WATERWORTH: Swiss chocolate, yes. Can't go past it, right? Yeah, easy answer. That's what I was saying, cheese and chocolate. Like, I mean, that's the best, like, again, go back to Australia, Vegemite. Wow, like, I mean, come on, like, if you, food you want to be associated with, cheese and chocolate, like that right there.
BARNABE DELARZE: Does that count as a candy, though?
BEN WATERWORTH: Well, I'm counting it, absolutely. I mean, chocolate, chocolate candy, everything, you know?
BARNABE DELARZE: I don't like, like, I don't really eat any, like, candy, like, just, you know, like, proper candy. So, but I always have Swiss chocolate with me.
BEN WATERWORTH: Always have it there.
BARNABE DELARZE: Always bring it with me on training camps and everything.
BEN WATERWORTH: This interview is maybe the hungriest I've ever been. After every interview, I'm going to have to go chow down some stuff after this. As a kid, who was your favourite sports team?
BARNABE DELARZE: Ooh, I go with the English rugby team.
BEN WATERWORTH: We're not too fond of them after 2003, but, you know, we've got an excuse for that, right? I'm sure the French aren't too keen on the Swiss football team right now.
BARNABE DELARZE: Not at the moment, no, probably not.
BEN WATERWORTH: People have grudges, all right, we have grudges. Australia, we don't like the Italian football team based on the 2006 World Cup, so we hold grudges in this country. Don't worry. If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?
BARNABE DELARZE: Long term, I'm pretty pleased in Switzerland, so I'm going to stay with that, but that doesn't mean I don't want to live a few years abroad. But I mean, here, as you said, it like the scenery, the mountains, the lakes, the life quality. We're pretty spoiled.
BEN WATERWORTH: You're pretty lucky there. I think the thing that I also love about, I've not been to Europe, but I love hearing stories from travellers in Europe and that is that, again, like how many hours is it for you to go to France or to Germany? Like, you know, a couple of hours, you're over a border and it's, it's unique.
BARNABE DELARZE: You drive there.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, exactly. I'm sure you can walk in there, depending where you live, whereas I'm from an island state in an island country, basically in the middle of nowhere. So I'm that weird person who, even if I go to the States or Canada and I cross a border into another state, I'm weird. I get too excited. People are like, why? You've just you've gone from, you know, there to there. Like, what's so exciting? But you realise where I'm from. So make the most of that. That's a pretty cool thing to have. So, you know, it's it's interesting. I like the fact that you can just go anywhere. I mean, you wouldn't even call that barely going to another country. And I'm sure you're going to France. You're just like, yeah, it's just going to France for the day.
BARNABE DELARZE: France, Italy is pretty, pretty close. Pretty common.
BEN WATERWORTH: Just kind of works that way. Um, when you were little, what was one thing that you always thought? That might be the best answer I've had to that. It's a standard answer. That works. Simple. It's a very deep question. And then it's like a simple answer. Perfect. I love it. Last one. And I don't know if this is something that you like, if you're, if you're the joker in the team or kind of works. What is your favourite joke?
BARNABE DELARZE: Oh, I don't have a go to joke. I just make joke as they come, but yeah, like just joke on the situation stuff. Yeah. But I'm kind of a joker sometimes.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah. So there's not like a standard Swiss joke that you can just sort of, you know, not really.
BARNABE DELARZE: That's that's the old fashioned in it. I have a go to joke.
BEN WATERWORTH: Go to the national joke of Switzerland.
BARNABE DELARZE: The latest one has to be, but it's not funny, but it's just because of the context. There's a French, a Dutch, and an English in a bar. Where is the Swiss?
BEN WATERWORTH: I don't know. Where is the Swiss?
BARNABE DELARZE: At the quarterfinals. Yeah.
BEN WATERWORTH: I like it, I like it. Tell you what, if you ever get a New Zealand coach, again, hit me up. I'll tell you some good New Zealand jokes that you can really piss him off on. So that's one for a future time. Barnabe, before I let you go, if people want to follow your journey, kind of stay up to date, social media. I know you're a fan of getting the followers on Instagram, so make sure you hit that up. And also, again, plug your website. It's a great website.
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah. So Instagram, definitely, Barnabe, on the scroll, D. I just took a break from it since Tokyo, but I'm definitely going to get back to it eventually. And then the website, it's www.delarze. Scroll over, yeah, DashRowing.ch, so my surname, DashRowing.ch.
BEN WATERWORTH: Hit it up and read all these fun facts that I couldn't have got to on that.
BARNABE DELARZE: I'm more, definitely more active on my Instagram.
BEN WATERWORTH: Which I saw the little video that you and Roman did, and sort of the this and that sort of one, and they asked a question about who has more Instagram now. On that video, you had, I think, 6,000 followers you mentioned. You're up to 7,500 now. So you're trying to crack the 10k?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, but it's a struggle in rowing. It's not a very popular sport. So like the most known rowers, they have like 30, 40k, which is peanuts compared to other sports.
BEN WATERWORTH: So, but yeah, it's just fun and we're going to crack this. So Barnabe, like this is the thing. Like you talk about this, like let's make rowing great on Instagram. Like, yeah, exactly.
BARNABE DELARZE: Let's make rowing great.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yeah, exactly. Hashtag make rowing great on Instagram. That works. And then trend it. And then we can get you to 10k.
BARNABE DELARZE: Hashtag more is more.
BEN WATERWORTH: Yes, yes, that works. Barnabe, it's been an absolute pleasure learning about your career, your Olympic journey, everything else in between. And Switzerland, too, I really want to come there and eat a lot of cheese. But we really do appreciate your time. Best of luck moving forward for Paris and everything else in between. And we'll get you back on after 2024 with a gold medal around your neck. How does that sound?
BARNABE DELARZE: Yeah, that sounds great. Up to me then. But thanks a lot for having me on. And yeah, it was great talking to you.
BEN WATERWORTH: And a massive, massive thanks there to Barnabe. Just a lot of fun learning so much about him and the sport, and check his website out, it's a great website. And I really do want to go to Switzerland now. What can I say? It is a country that really has just shot up the list, and makes me want to go there. So Barnabe, maybe you should get a job working for the Swiss Tourism Board, because you're helping, you're helping sell the country out there to Australians. I mean, cheese and chocolate, what's not to love? That's enough. You don't need the world's best tennis player. You just need cheese and chocolate. And sign me up. I am there quicker than you can say fondue. So thanks again to Barnabe. A lot of fun. And we obviously look forward to seeing him come back bigger and better than ever in Paris in 2024. We've got so many great guests coming your way in the coming weeks. So many more to bring you that I can't even begin to let you know who's on, because I want to keep it a surprise. We want to kind of keep it open-ended for you to find out who is coming on the show. And we'll just give a bit of a teaser that we've got some great athletes coming, of course, on the show, but even that we have some sort of non-athletes that you're going to be very, very fascinated by. Of course, we've spoken to some broadcasters, some journalists, but we're going to learn a little bit more about Olympic marketing soon. So that's an episode that you won't want to miss. It's a very fascinating chat, speaking to a very prominent marketer who is renowned as one of the best marketers out there when it comes to the Olympic Games, and not just the Olympic Games, but bids for the Olympics and sort of the process involved with that. So a bit of a teaser there for you real Olympic geeks out there that want to learn a little bit more, not just from the athletes, but the people behind some of the Olympic bids and everything along those lines too. So stay tuned for that. And the best way to stay tuned for that is by hitting us up on social media, search Off The Podium, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. Leave us a message. We'd love to hear what you think of the show. If there's anybody you would like us to bring on the show, we are always open to hear who you would like to hear from. And also while you're online, hit us up on all the podcast platforms. Subscribe to the show, subscribe and leave the feedback. We want to see the ratings and feedback. Everything helps us along the way and spreads the show out there a little bit more as well. Big thanks once more to Barnabe, and a big thanks to you for listening to the show. My name is Ben. This has been Off The Podium, and we'll speak to you next time. Good night.
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