Matthew Pritchard - From Dirty Sanchez to Vegan Chef

Full transcript: Matthew Pritchard on London Real

3:33 This is London Real. I’m Brian Rose. My guest today is Matthew Pritchard, the Welsh professional skateboarder, endurance racer, entrepreneur, and chef who achieve worldwide fame on the MTV show Dirty Sanchez touring the globe performing Daredevil stunts and creating havoc. You’ve since transformed your lifestyle completely channeling your energy into fitness and nutrition. You’ve completed in several Iron Man races and last month you completed the continuous Decca as in 10 Iron Mans which involved a 24 mile swim 1120 mile bike ride and a 262 mile run. This year you’re back on screen with your BBC television show Dirty Vegan going back your roots as a chef to promote the benefits of a plant-based diet. Matthew, welcome back to London Real. Thank you, Brian. Thank you very much. Good to be back. It’s been four years, right? Four years already. Yeah, since all that happened. First of all, I love your shirt, man. It’s from your brand, Sleep When You’re Dead. Yeah. And what does it say on the back? There’s a dictionary definition of endurance. Endurance. For those for whom drinking drugs no longer work, It’s pretty, pretty true, I think.

4:40 Is it pretty true? Well, yeah. I’ll tell you. Yeah. I think you’re on to something.

4:45 I’m thinking drugs don’t work anymore. So you have to go into the endurance. Yeah, exactly. Good. I want to talk about that a little bit because I had some experience with a half Iron Man last year and a crazy guy named John Joseph.

4:56 We’ll get into that. First of all, what’s it like coming to London? Do you like coming to this city? Because you’re from Wales and maybe you can tell the whole world what’s the difference between England and Wales because a lot of people don’t get it I mean when I say to some Americans and they say where you from listen I’m from Wales Oh London right it’s like no no Wales different country but I love it I love London it’s great I mean I couldn’t live here I submit to a chaotic for me I’ve got to that age now where I like have my peace and quiet and London to me is chaotic but I like coming in seeing a few things do what I need to do and then get out so Yeah, and I mean I’ve been coming to London for years and how would you describe Wales for people who’ve never been to the UK?

5:39 Well, it’s absolutely beautiful. It’s green. It’s mountainous. I haven’t seen you earlier. Oh look I yeah, I’m lucky I am to live in Cardiff in South Wales because I’ve got I’ve got the city on my doorsteps. I’ve got restaurants and bars and clubs and stuff and literally 45 minutes of my house I’ve got the Brecon beacons so I can go up into the mountains of my dog and then And just about half an hour west, I’ve got some of the best beaches.

6:06 So I go surfing, go swimming in the sea. And I’ve just got everything on my doorstep. And when it comes to training for Iron Man and stuff, I’ve got all the hills, I’ve got everything. So I really am lucky living in South Wales. And the whole of Wales is just a lovely place.

6:20 Wow. You know, I’ve never been to Wales since I’ve lived here for 17 years, and that’s a crime. I should be shot for that. But I’m going in two weeks. I’m going camping up in Snowdonia.

6:30 Whoa, Snowdonia is amazing. Yeah. So good. I’ve gone with my buddy, Timothy Sheef, who’s been on the show a bunch of times. And he’s taken me out.

6:37 We’re going seriously hardcore in sleeping bags and tents and all that stuff. Are you going to climb Snowdon? I don’t know. I hope so. That’s the highest point in the world.

6:45 Does it take a while? I’d say if you went and slammed Beddersroot, it’s a nine mile up and down. But it’s beautiful. If it’s a clear day, you can just see if you lost. I’m excited, man.

6:57 Yeah. I’m super excited. And there’s a good lake in the bottom And of course, Lynn Parter, really nice, like this one. Freezing, well, it’s good. Well, let’s talk about your endurance stuff, because last time you were here, I don’t think you’d done an Ironman yet, I don’t think, in 15.

7:13 Yeah, I did. My first Ironman was 2011. Okay, all right. But you weren’t as hardcore into it now as you are. Yeah, I sort of, I did the one in 2011 in Bolton, and I did another one in Bolton, 2012.

7:27 And I just slowly started building up. I think since I’ve seen you last time, I actually did 30, half I am in the 30 days. Yeah, I saw you do that. Yeah, so I started just, I mean, with anything I do where I start and then I get really addicted and get into it. And I just keep pushing it further and further and further and see how far I can take it.

7:48 Let’s talk about this addiction. So the back of your shirt says, it’s for people who drink and drugs no longer works. What is the correlation between this because I’ve met a bunch of people who do Ironman. Rich Roll, you know, the vegan who did the Ultras, he had a whole history with alcoholism. John Joseph had a great couple of years on crack cocaine in New York City, right?

8:10 Got off that and got into this. You know, lots of people I met when I did my Half Ironman last year were kind of recovering, I’m recovering as well from my old days of heroin in the past. Like, why is this a progression, do you think, for people? It’s really quite interesting because I spoke to the people at the event that I’ve just done. And there’s a few of them in the same boat as well.

8:33 It just seems like these people with addictive personalities and especially drugs and stuff, I think you just know you can’t, you just can’t keep doing that drug thing and the alcohol thing because it’s gonna be curtains, it’s gonna be game over. So you sort of try and find another way of get in your buzz. And it’s just strange, we all seem to find this journey of like ultra malathons or ultra triathlons and stuff. And for me, I just sick and tired of, don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy a drink, but I just didn’t like, I’m just done with it. It doesn’t take me to a nice place, it doesn’t make me happy, it takes me days to recover, it’s not productive, it ruins everything that I have, all these plans that I’ve got in my head, they all go on hold for like a week until I recover after a big blast, but to go cycling, swimming, running, the endorphins and everything, the feel-good fact that I get off doing stuff like that, it just outweighs everything else and it makes me happy hmm I think Keith Pritchard said in his autobiography he said I didn’t quit drugs drugs quit me it was an interesting way like or he said maybe I didn’t quit cocaine cocaine quit me as if the drug was almost sick and tired of him coming back it was just like are you I’m tired of you it was that bad you know yeah you get I said I found when I was doing cocaine and and you end up you you do a load and then you sort of go into yourself and then you can’t, I’ve done so much I can’t speak and stuff

10:22 In like this you can’t really socialize at parties because you’re so fucking high and you always think I’ll do another one now make me better it doesn’t just makes you worse and it’s just yeah the relationship you get the relationship by one side with drugs was just not the same relationship I was I was getting and it’s almost like that thing this says it’s time to give up right it’s time to stop. When was that for you? When was it really obvious? I haven’t touched cocaine now for, I remember the last time I touched it I had such a bad experience and it went really dark place and I just said that’s it and that was I’d say about eight months ago. Okay. So it’s pretty recent but I wasn’t, it was only on special occasions. Right. Like I once in a blue moon I go on it but that time I’ll never forget. I was just like that’s it done ever since don’t touch it Wow And I didn’t even like it too drunk anymore either really but why just cuz doesn’t feel good anymore because I know that if I after I don’t like being drunk because I don’t like being So and I do have too much I then The cocaine sobers me up so I know one thing leads to another than that leads to days So I enjoy a few drinks and when I get to that point I stop and I went to Ibiza recently with my fiance and that’s exactly what I did. Went to Ibiza for the first time and come back with a fresh air.

11:55 How was that? I was brilliant. I was actually waking up and enjoying the days rather than being in a pickle. So on my last night we had a few more drinks than normal but yeah it was good. And the endurance stuff you like because you can push yourself. You can really try to go somewhere. You’ve always been pushing yourself your whole life, right? Whether it’s Dirty Sanchez or anything you do, you like pushing it a little to see where you can go, right? I mean that’s the whole point of life for me. I think once I get into something, if I really enjoy something and I get into it, that’s it. I love it. So I try and see how far I can take that, whatever it is.

12:42 And yes, it’s the same with everything I do, really. I just try and push it as far as possible. And I’m still with triathlon and enjoying stuff. I’m still to this day, pushing, pushing, pushing. And yeah.

13:00 The 30 half ironmans in 30 days, like that got my attention because I did one half ironman last year and you know I spent 90 days training for it and I got into the whole culture and there is something beautiful about the training you know I mean it’s the endorphins I think there’s a lot of personal work you’re doing on yourself like therapy that’s what I got I mean I was I was 20 k’s into Iran and I’d have tears streaming down my face like crazy stuff you know processing old memories and like I don’t know if you ever get that kind of stuff but yep I was getting a lot of that yep I sure do I think it’s the journey as much as actually doing the competition because you you set yourself a goal you give you you give your life for purpose like I’ve signed up for this now I need to train to get to that thing and like you said you know sometimes I get moments of I guess so high on endorphins in life that sometimes tears come through my eyes, tears of happiness and that happens quite a few times and yeah with the thirty-half eye mends and thirty days I was just, I was amazing man, it was eight so I just, it was tough but it got to like day fifth, I actually broke my rib on day 11 trying because it was windy and I tried to put my foot into the clip on the pedal and the wind blew me over and I broke my bloody rib and I was just like nah, so I just had to keep going and I’d say that after day 15 I Just felt really comfortable. I started getting faster because my body sort of got used to what I was doing and then

14:40 Yeah Was ace. David Goggin says like if you tell your body what the new normal is at first it resists And then when it realizes that’s no choice. It kind of gets with the program. Yeah, do you find that’s true with endurance? That’s completely true. Yeah And, yeah, it’s just, it’s just, your body won’t give up.

15:05 It’s that, that. If your mind, your body’ll keep going. As long as your mind tells it to keep going, it’ll just keep going. And you’ve got to keep feeding it as well. Obviously you’ve got to keep fueling it with the right foods and stuff.

15:15 And you just keep going. And I think, yeah, when you turn your body into doing something repetitively, your body gets used to it. and we’ll just keep rocking. I find the worst thing when doing such long and joyous events is when you stop. Because every single day is being, you’ve got a routine every single day, and you’ve been getting legal highs, not natural highs, sorry, every single day in dolphins, and dolphins, and dolphins, and all of a sudden, oomph, stop.

15:52 Then your body’s, oh. And I find you sort of slip into a little bit of a depressive state. So when you stop training? When you stop training, yeah. So I know that now, so I sort of try and keep myself busy and active and doing things rather than sort of going into my shell and getting down.

16:15 Yeah, yeah, I kept running after my Ironman. And then I went and ran a marathon like about three or four weeks after. Because I was like, I think I can do this. So I just went and ran one on my own, I forgot. Cause I had done like 23K to practice and then I had done like 30 and I was like 12K more and I got the marathon and so I just pushed it and tried it.

16:35 But there’s something beautiful about those long endurance pieces, but you kind of need a goal to push yourself to do the training, right? Yeah, of course, yeah. Yeah. But it’s going, the good thing about insurance is for me anyway, it’s going into, I’d go into my mind for hours and hours on end and I’m quite happy on my own. Just in my own thoughts.

17:00 After doing this deco now, it was just, I had so much time in my own mind. It was, like you said earlier, it was therapy. Just away from the outside world and just you and your own mind and your own thoughts. And where do you go? Oh man, I go all over the place.

17:19 What’s in the mind of Matthew Pritchett? I don’t really want to share it, it’s just my stuff, there’s a lot of people that keep me going, whether it’s people I don’t like or whether it’s people I do like, there’s many, many things that just keep me going, stops me from giving up and I go into, again, Sometimes I go, I get so, I get so happy, I start, you know, I cried a few times on the deck on the run and put music in my ears as well, that’s another way of switching off because I was in so much pain running, I was in pain literally from halfway through the swim the pain started, the pain did not ease until 10 days later, until I finished, crossed the finish line and it was just non-stop pain, it was just, I mean paracetamols and and stuff were barely touching the sides.

18:21 And when I got to the run, I stuck my earphones on and I put Motorhead on. That was the best power set of all I think I ever had because I completely forgot about my paint and my head just went into this music. Next thing, I’m like fucking Mo Farah running around because it was 1.2 mile circle and I was just overtaking my competitors and they were just like, what the fuck is he on? Has he been taking drugs? But it was just, I just got into the music and yeah, I paid the price when I stopped.

18:54 I think I did about half a marathon and then I was like, whoa, I was fucked. But it was enjoyable, it was nice. Was it the same song over and over or like an album? No, it was mugged live at Wacken, I think it was. So yeah, it was good.

19:09 And so, well first of all, like why Iron Man in the first place? What attracted you to that? I started, I did the Cardiff Half marathon when I was 15 and then I decided to, after all the years of Sanchez and the partying and stuff, I decided to sort myself out and I said, let’s see if I can do the Cardiff Half again. So I trained for that, loved it, then And I thought, wow. Is this the one where you were smoking crack the night before?

19:43 Yeah. Okay. That was one of them, yeah, to kind of ask. You told that story. Yeah, yeah, told that story.

19:50 And it just… But it shows your determination. Yeah, it just escalated. I really got into it. I found something which I enjoyed, which made me happy.

20:00 So obviously the next step was Iron Man and my friend, Butsey Butler, he sent me a video Rick and Dick Hoyt, the disabled son, father, and he did an Iron Man, you know, he swam with him in a dinghy, picked him up, put him onto a specially made bike, cycled with him, pushed him in the wheelchair for the run, and I was like, wow, this is amazing, and it’s just, it inspired me then, I just went, right, that’s it, if he can do it, I can do it, and I signed up and I did there was Bolton 2011 and as soon as I have that no full full the whole first time was a full full time was the first time of the fall yeah how was that accruing cuz he was the first time I’d done it and it was 12 hours yeah what 13 and a half hours I finished it and uh I loved it I went back for more and I never looked back so I carried on yeah I carried on doing various things I did the traffic of Wales last last year swam from Pernath to Porthcore which is like a 20-25 mile swim and then cycled the circumference of Wales and then ran down off his dike down to Cardiff and yeah I was just thinking about all these crazy things that I could just keep doing and I just, yeah, just all of it.

21:28 It was epic, huh? Yeah, it was good. So I think Iron Man started like in the late 60s in Hawaii, right, when they were like trying to find out who was the toughest and they’re like, okay, guess what? We’re gonna combine these three things and see if anyone even shows up, right? And then a few people actually did it and then it grew and grew and grew.

21:45 And I didn’t know much about Iron Man until last year when John Joseph came on the show, lead singer of the Cro-Mags, vegan for 30-some years, used to be a Hare Krishna monk, and he basically got in my face and said, ”Brian, come to New York City.” And when I went to New York, he took me swimming, pushed me in the round in the pool like I would if I was in the Ironman race, and then he took me for a run on the Brooklyn Bridge, and then he had his Ironman trainer put me on a bike ride. And then he said, ”Brian, I’m doing a half in Chattanooga. Why don’t you do this with me on a plant-based diet.” So I did the whole thing.

22:20 He made a movie about it called Iron Mind. I went and faced some of my old addictive demons from 2001. I just told Matthew about my heroin addiction. In 2001, he almost fell off his chair. Well, yeah, you’re the original Wolf of Wall Street.

22:34 I didn’t know that, and I just thought, Christ, Lord Mr. Rose. Nobody knew that. Nobody knew that. I’d like to hear some more stories of that.

22:41 It was during the training, so I was in New York City, and I was on a bike test, which is like a six minute, I think, max cardio test that his trainer did, and she had me pushing so hard and my crew was filming me and I started like tears coming out. I had all these flashbacks of all the bad shit I did in New York City, all the bad people I left down, how I almost died, blah, blah, blah. And it all came out, so it all came out for the movie. But it was really therapeutic, man, the whole thing.

23:03 And I really fell in love with the training. I’d never swam distance, I’d never ran distance, I’d never cycled distance. And I was like, I really respected what was going on and I learned that, you know, endurance is kind of a skill set in itself and the stories you have to tell yourself And just when you think you need to stop, if you just kind of keep going, you realize that passes, right, you know? It’s a game of highs and lows, and one minute you’re up there, next minute you’re down there, and like you said, just keep going, they’ll pass, and then you’re back up there again.

23:37 Yeah. That’s exactly what it is. Very much so. And then a lot of people give in, and some just keep going. There’s some darkness in there, Matthew, that keeps you going, doesn’t it?

23:50 I mean, I know there’s something in me, and everybody on that race, there’s something deep down inside that’s dark, right? Yep. I mean, I went, I mean, doing the decker, I went to some dark places, you know, I mean, everything was just hurting, my feet, my back, just everything, and some monotonous As you’re going round in circles, you’ve seen the same lamppost, you’ve seen the same blade of grass and you start talking to yourself and just anything to amuse yourself just to keep going.

24:25 Before you just… Do you choose the dark places to go or you just go there? Yeah, you just, I don’t know, it might just take you there, doesn’t it? Does it take you places that maybe you don’t know you want to go there and it’s like, okay, now it’s time to go back to this thing that happened when I was five years old and maybe let’s have a conversation with my dead father or like was that the kind of stuff that happens? I wouldn’t say it gets that ad-co you just you just I try and think of positive things in my head and it’s just nice things that make me happy but then sometimes when the pain gets so bad you just yeah you You just, it’s horrible.

25:15 What do you do when the pain gets so bad? Like how do you stop from stopping? You just keep trucking and you really wanna stop. You just gotta fuck this, this is fucking stupid. This is fucking, you just gotta stop it.

25:34 And then something in you just says you can’t stop, you’ve signed up for this, you’ve gotta keep going. And you just you just keep going who don’t you want to let down yourself myself, but also you don’t want people to say Oh you quit I’d say there’s a bit of everything in it. Okay. Yeah, but personally, I don’t want to let myself down I’ve set this goal in my head And I want I want to finish it and I know I Know this this is something I can do There’s a lot of things in life I don’t feel any confident in doing, but I know I’m pretty confident in doing this kind of stuff, and I, yeah, there’s a lot of, for me there’s a lot of proving people wrong, you know, I’ll prove to you, I can do this, I’ll prove to myself I can do this.

26:32 Was that always a thing, since you were a kid? Yeah, pretty much, yeah, I mean, I may not get into all the sob story shit and everything but a lot of people said that I would never make anything of myself and I’ve always, I’ve been pretty open about that before and you know I was never very academic in school and but I knew I could do when I started getting into this I thought brilliant I found something I can actually do and that’s another reason I just yeah I’ll show you I can I can do this I won’t give it So there’s a little bit of that. Who was doubting you, the kids in school or the teachers or parents?

27:18 Quite a few people. Everybody in Wales. I wouldn’t say everybody in Wales, not everyone in Wales. People in Wales are cool, but when you’re young, you just… Again, I don’t want to get into all that soppy shit, but I was bullied and…

27:38 It just sort of makes you that kind of stuff is what it makes you the person that you are when you’re older and I think Me I’m constantly fighting to prove that people look I can you know, I Can do this I’m not gonna let myself down I can put me now. Yeah Because I’m trying to make sense. Yeah, so you can tap into that in a good way Yeah, and use it for something and and to me it’s and it’s and to me it’s therapy as well I just I love being on my own Doing that kind of stuff I don’t really get on with the outside world. I hate it. I don’t really like people.

28:16 I know that’s a horrible thing to say. There’s a fairly few people I really enjoy and enjoy their company in life. But I don’t really like humans. So for me to spend time just going up and down the simple Going around the circles in the bike right now circles on my feet Sort of in my own little prison away from everybody Amazing perfect perfect. Yeah, it’s strange for people to hear that a guy that is known A lot of people know you as a performer, right? Well from dirty Sanchez But even like the BBC you write books you have businesses to know that you’re so introverted Yeah, I mean, I’ve given out that thing that I’m a flamboyant in the past.

29:11 I’m this kind of flamboyant character, which is, you know, it’s just an act. I’m not really that kind of person. And I’m just my closest friends. Well, no, I’m not that kind of person. I really am, yeah, a quiet, shy person who likes to be on his own really.

29:30 And I think that’s just sort of come some kind of front that I put on mister Yeah, but you and you must have enjoyed doing that I didn’t enjoy doing it. It’s an alter ego It’s my old my alter ego Yeah, be that guy for a while and it serves a purpose somewhere for you must inside or you wouldn’t have kept doing it Right. Yeah, I you know, I did. I really did enjoy being that flamboyant That flamboyant character, but as soon as I go back in my house, this he’s off, do you know what I mean?

29:59 That guy’s a pretty, Pritchard is your crazy guy. Yeah, Pritchard’s my oldie ego, yeah. I had fun with him, he was a good laugh. But in that with Pritchard comes the drugs, the booze, because I can’t be that person unless I’ve got the drugs and the booze. Is that true, you can’t be him sober?

30:17 No, not really, no. Okay, he’s gotta be. I suppose I can a little bit, but it was more or less, Those are the days, my party days, my flamboyant days. But now I’m just, they’re gone. And yeah, I’m just, I’m enjoying being Matthew just quite, with me and my dog, it’s great.

30:40 Nice, simple. Yes, simple, simple life. That’s what you like. Yeah. Why don’t you like humans?

30:48 Why don’t I like humans? Yeah. Oh, they just get on my, they just get on my tits. They just, they fucked me off. Apologize for the language, but I’ve been let down so many times and I’ve been walked over.

31:04 And again, I don’t want it to sound like fucking crybaby, but I have, you know. I’ve been walked over so many times I just don’t trust anybody at all. And it’s a bit of a pain in the ass even because as soon as somebody comes into my life, I’m doubting them straight away. And that’s what a horrible situation that is to be in. I can’t feel, I don’t feel comfortable with anybody until it takes a while, a long while for them to prove themselves to me.

31:37 Like years. Yeah. Like, you know, you’ve got to earn, literally got to earn that, they’ve got to earn my trust. Because there’s so many snakes out there. And I’m so nice, I’m so much of a nice person.

31:51 I just let so many people in and they see people take, what’s the word, they take my niceness as a- Kindness as weakness. Yes, my kindness as weakness. I mean, there’s very few people in my life that I trust.

32:20 My family and my fiance. It’s also hard to do when you’re kind of famous, right? Because then people want to be around you for that kind of energy. Yeah, but I’ve learned, I mean, from the Sanchez days, there was a lot of people, but blah, blah, blah. You know, I mean, with the Dirty Vegan stuff now and all that starting to kick off, I just keep, I still just keep myself to myself.

32:42 I don’t really let anyone, try not to let anyone in, that I don’t, that I don’t know. But I’m lucky I’ve got these, my friends, One of two of my friends are really close to me, and they’ll tell me that person. My fiance will tell me, watch that person. They can smell him in my life. Okay, because you can’t.

33:02 Yeah, because I can’t, I can just, yeah. But they can, so as soon as they tell me, I’ll know. And then they sort of give me that warning, be careful. Okay, well, that’s reality, right, you know? It is reality, yeah.

33:18 And you just, shit happens, and that’s just the way it is. Let’s talk about this Decca, and then I wanna talk about a few other things. So you decided to do the 30 halves in 30 days a couple years ago, right? And that was because regular Ironmans weren’t enough for you, and you wanted to see if you could push it harder. Yeah.

33:38 Okay. And I did a half after I trained 90 days for that, and it was, you know, an ordeal. I’m just thinking, I gotta wake up the next day do that again and again and again. What was it like, besides breaking your rib? I really enjoyed it. It was, again, it was just great. I was doing something I really enjoyed. I had a routine going, I’d wake up before, jump in the pool, I’d eat properly, jump in the pool at six, do my 1.5 mile swim, get out, put my bike stuff on, do the 57 mile bike ride. We did it in conjunction with an estate agent called Peter Allen. So they’ve got like about 30 estate agents all over Wales. So the bike ride then took me to a different estate agent every day. So I cycle to that estate agent after doing 57 miles. I’d get changed into my running year. I do half a marathon, finished there. Luckily I had Agile Therapy, they sponsored me so I’d go and have a massage off them, iron me out. The local vegan restaurant Annaluca, which is not far from my house, they sponsored me as well so then I’d go in and see them, they’d feed me and I’d go home and I’d go to sleep at four o’clock morning and repeat repeat repeat and it worked really well it was it was it was tough but but yeah it was good I was just soon after day 15 and if when I started my body sort of started getting used to it it’s good man your times got faster yeah a lot of people kept having whoa whoa slow down slow down you got injured fights yeah okay turn up myself started going a

35:34 Do you like it because for so for 30 days, basically your mind doesn’t really have to go do anything because you’re just so fixated I gotta do this. I gotta do this and there must be something nice about that, right? Simple. I My fiance always says you need a routine because if I am gonna routine it like from a lab Never stresses you out right? Yeah, mine wanders or problems happen when you don’t have a routine. Yeah Yeah, and I had the routine for 30 days, so it was simple.

36:03 I woke up, did this, yeah, blah, blah, blah, blah, tick, again, tick, yeah. So it was, yeah. Perfect. Yeah, it was perfect for me. So the broken rib didn’t stop you from swimming and all that stuff?

36:17 It hurt, but you just keep going, don’t you? Okay, to someone who’s listening right now who says, I could never do an Ironman, I hear this to people all the time, I can’t swim, that’s the one I hear all the time. I always hear this and I was thinking, you know what? I think anybody could do a half Ironman if they just decide they want to do it. I really think they could.

36:36 Maybe it’s six months of training, anybody. I think most people could. What do you say to people? You can do anything. Anybody out there can do anything.

36:46 But you need to want to do it. If you don’t want to do something, you’re not gonna do it. It’s as simple as that. But people say to me, I could never do an Ironman. So you can, we can all do it, it’s just, it’s all in there.

37:02 Like if you don’t want to do it, you’re not going to do it. But if anyone out there is wanting to do a half-life amount or even just a sprint distance triathlon or Olympic triathlon or anything, I honestly go out there and give it a go. You’re not gonna regret it. Just the journey itself to the event of training, going out, going cycling, going swimming, going running, and eat it healthily, see the difference in your life, see the difference in your life completely change, rather than sitting on the sofa and watching mindless, numbing TV and just, you know, nothing wrong with sitting on TV, sitting down on the sofa.

37:39 Once you’ve done a lot of work. You’re gonna have firemen that day. Yeah, it’s a treat, you know, once you’ve done something, it’s a treat, sit down, chill out. Earn it. But you know, and then I’m not having to call anyone out there, but there’s, you know, A lot of people just waste their lives and sat down watching mind-numbing TV, set yourself a goal, go out, do it, and honestly, just see how mentally and physically better you’re gonna feel by fitness.

38:10 And I do believe fitness is the answer to a lot of problems. Depression. Depression, mental health, health in general. It’s just, I can’t stress enough how good fitness and healthy eating is good for us. Yeah, so often people just kind of say, yeah, yeah, yeah, because I guess it’s a physical thing and we don’t think it would really help you mentally.

38:39 But like I had a lot of guys in that chair who suffered from like serious depression and they all have now a physical practice, you know, from Frank Bruno to Eddie Hall, strongest man all these people have major bouts of depression and now it’s the physicality every day that like keeps them straight you know yeah I think I think people like Frank Bruno you know and a lot of sportsmen they’ve been in that they were at the height of their game and that’s what they did every single day and then all of a sudden their careers end and it’s like you know that’s a big pill to chew that is. They add it all and I think that’s where the mental health comes from. I think people like Gazza and stuff, they loved that life and then all of a sudden it’s gone. And I think by keeping training and keeping on top of things, that’s That’s just my, I may be wrong, but yeah, just keep training, keep that brain ticking, keep doing something.

39:48 As soon as you sit in your ass and just forget about, yeah. I think a lot of professional athletes, they think, oh, that was my job. So then when they stop, they’re like, I don’t do that anymore. So you see the fighters like Jake LaMotta, they get massive, but they don’t think, wait a second. was my job but that was also the reason I stayed grounded and happy and all that and they separated that from who they are so they got to get back into it you know when I was training for Ironman man I learned so much about myself but man I just felt better all the time because I was pushing myself every day my appetite was good I was going through these long runs I was processing stuff and you know I had Dave Goggins on here the other day and the next day I went for a half marathon because I was just like I’m gonna I hadn’t done one in like six months and of course the time I’m listening to his book in my hair so I can’t quit because obviously Goggins can’t hurt me but afterwards I was like so calm and I forgot how good I used to feel after a long session you know like after you bust out the half marathon and you ain’t got no problems for an hour you know you’re exhausted you process stuff it’s like one of the calmest feelings you can have and how easy is it to go out for a run literally all you have to do is put your trains up open the door and just go for a run that’s how easy it is doesn’t It doesn’t have to be our fans,

41:03 It doesn’t have to be a full mountain, maybe just five miles, two miles, whatever, whatever your ability is, and come back feeling so much better than what you were when you sat down. It’s true though, isn’t it? It’s true. It’s so true, it shows up. And it’s just, yeah.

41:17 And like you said, you can process things in your head, and some of my best ideas come from when I go running. I love it. Yeah, that’s great. Yeah. And you said anybody can do it, and all you have to do is not quit.

41:30 That’s the only thing these people do, they just don’t quit, it’s almost that simple. It’s just like, you just choose, you don’t quit and you keep going, you can slow down whatever, but you just don’t quit. Yeah, I mean, if you need to walk, walk for a bit. And then start running. All right, so you did the 30 in 30 days, the 30 halves in 30 days, which is amazing.

41:51 Talk to me about this Decca, because that’s pretty intense. I mean, I’ve heard about like Rich Roll doing five Ironmans in five days in five Hawaiian Islands. that was something we did years ago. But like, what’s this all about? It’s, I remember years ago, my brother, cause my brother does all this kind of stuff for me as well.

42:11 And he said, oh, there’s an event called the Decca. I said, what’s that? He said, I am in 10 days away. And this is back in when I first started doing it. I thought, Jesus, fuck that.

42:25 But then now, eight years on, Claire from Brutal Events, she does all doubles, triples, she does really good events, sort of events, look out the box kind of events, and she put on a decade a few years ago, and she put on another one up in York, and there was the continuous which is the 24 mile swimming one, 1120 mile bike riding one and then the 262 mile run in one and then there was the other format which is an Ironman a day for 10 days. So I decided to go for the continuous and you know it’s a big ask and I hadn’t really trained for it because I was so busy with the dirty vegan stuff and and everything else that was going on in my life. I was a bit dubious of whether I could complete it and I thought, saw that I’m gonna go, I’m not gonna beat myself up if I don’t do it because I haven’t done the training but let’s just go in and see how we get on. And there was 11 people in the continuous from all over the world, there was like, there was a dame in there, there was an Indian, American, somebody from France. It was a mixture of us and we went to the pool and it was a 25 meter pool and I had a wet side choose to wear the wet side, it was really warm in there and 24 miles swim so we just up and down until we did that 1,520 laps I think it was 1,520 laps yeah just and all of you were in there doing it yeah we’re all in there all in different lines. Just bush, bush, bush and I just thought, oh man, this has got halfway

44:21 And for fuck it’s a long way to go and my shoulders, I did have a dodgy shoulder time as well and my shoulders are aching and I was getting really hot. They were tipping cold water down my top and as soon as I saw two laps left they got plunked under the water and I finished it, finished the swim And I thought, right, that’s that out of the way. And of course, at the same time, when you’re in there for so long, you can’t. You’ve got to get out to go for the shit.

44:52 You can’t, shit in the pool. And I got out, my face was burnt. And I had chlorine burns all over my face because I’d been in there for so long. For 14 hours. 14 hours and 45 minutes.

45:05 And then got out then, got changed, got into my bike stuff and started my mission to do the 1,120 mile bike. And that was eight mile loops. So you’d go over the time in Matt at HQ and you’d go out, you’d do an eight mile loop, come back, eat over the time in Matt, back out. So you did that, how it worked out. I was on the saddle for 20 to 21 hours a day and feed in as I come back in the thing.

45:37 And then I’d have three to four hours sleep in my camper van, wake up, back on the bike, Repeat, repeat, and that was four, four to five days. How do you function on that little sleep? I just don’t know if it’s… This sounds worse than an Iron Man every day. It was, it was.

45:57 How do you swim for 14 hours? Like seriously, what’s going on in your brain? I don’t know. Are you just a fish at that point? That’s crazy.

46:04 I can just, I can just, I got this ability to daydream and switch off. Okay. And my teacher said in school that he needs to learn how to stop daydreaming. So I thought I’d put it, I’d put it to good use, you know. It was, we were lucky because we had good weather, but it was also the hottest day, one of the days was the hottest day Britain has ever seen.

46:25 And my, so I couldn’t pedal too hard because I didn’t want to get sunstroke. And at the same time, my undercarriage was ruined. I mean, when I say ruined, all the skin had come off, it was red raw, it was just a mess. So I had to try and keep that, my hygiene had to be, because I didn’t want to get infected down there. So as soon as I finished the night, I’d intercept, soothe the cream, wake up, do the same thing again, just keep on top of it.

46:54 And as soon as I finished the bike, I had a haze, I had a haze over my eyes, and I was seeing double, and I thought, fuck, I’m losing it here. And the medic called me, and he did blood tests and stuff, and I did all the tests that I needed, and he said, are you fine? and I started getting the feverish, hot and cold sweat. So I went, I sort of listened to my body and went and had my first proper sleep before starting the run. And then I woke up and then I started the run, the 262 mile run, which was in 1.2 mile loops around the lake.

47:30 And a lot of people said, you’ve got it. You’ve done the swim, you’ve done the bike, you’re in the bag now, you can just walk and rest. And it’s just like, this is where the decker starts. You know, running 262 miles is a long way. And my aim was to do- 10 marathons.

47:46 10 marathons, yeah. So my aim was to do two marathons a day and anything extra was a bonus. And I sort of stuck to that. And I did listen to my body. I said to myself, my body, say I’m going to sleep, I’m going to start again.

48:02 So I kept to that rule. And then one day I woke up, I could see the, I didn’t go to compete, I went to complete, because I didn’t really train. So, I was quite happy with where I was and then one day I woke up, I went to bed at nine, woke up at 12 o’clock, 12 a.m. And I just went, put my head torch on, just went running, headphones on, music. I’m fucking gone.

48:28 I did 20 miles before 4.30 in the morning. Power nap, got up, another full marathon. an apple. I think I did about 70 miles on Monday and then I got quite far up towards, I think it reminded me of about third place and then next day it was fucked because I’d done 70 miles but it was sort of like one walk, one walk, one walk. That was the hardest part. Yeah I just couldn’t I didn’t wait, I just, yeah, it was a hard work, man.

49:06 You just had enough at that point. Yeah. How do you stop from going crazy and like telling yourself I’m gonna stop? Or are you even thinking straight the last two days?

49:19 Of that run, I mean. I was, I knew I was coming in to see you. I knew I was coming in to see you and I was just all these things going on. It’s all brilliant now when I come in. I had all these things in my head, they’ve all gone blank.

49:33 But it was just, my back was just in constant agony. My feet, the soles of my feet, I had blisters on the soles of my feet. No one needed as bad as some of the contestants. Their feet were in ruins. But every time I woke up, I couldn’t walk.

49:51 I literally could not walk on my soles. So it took me about one or two laps before I could sort of get into some kind of motion. And then, I could smell the finish then. I think I had like half a marathon left to go and I knew it was, I wasn’t going to bed. This was my last day and that feeling was amazing but the closer you got to the finish the longer it just got to get there because I knew I could smell the finish but I’m so far away.

50:23 And my brother was there and he’s, come on, you’ve only got half a marathon left to go. You can do it, you can do it. I’m so fucked. You just pick yourself up, come on. And then the last lap then, you do it in reverse.

50:39 So you get to see all the other contestants, give them high fives and a hug and everything. And that’s when everything started to get quite emotional. And you know, we’ve all been, everyone, every single person dug deep to try and get to that finish line. And there was four DNFs and it was just nice passing everyone and just giving everyone high fives and trying to stop myself from crying. It was weird, man, it was that, yeah.

51:05 I mean, I feel quite emotional now talking about it. Do you not like crying? Is that a bad thing? No, it’s not a bad thing at all. I crossed the line to give my brother a hug and I started crying, yeah.

51:13 Wow, and why are you crying at that point? Because I just put myself through so much shit. Mentally, physically, just, yeah. For me, it’s 10 high men in 10 days. Yeah, my body was fucking, and I’m not exaggerating, my body was fucking screwed.

51:36 My mind was screwed by then, and I just wanted to finish. And I just, I had the Welsh flag draped around me.

51:46 It was fucking, yeah, it’s weird. I don’t have quite motion on those, I think it works. Hardest thing you’ve ever done? Oh, completely, yeah. By far.

51:55 Oh, by far, by far. How old are you? How old am I? Yeah. And a lot of people said, you can’t do that kind of stuff on a vegan diet and a plant-based diet.

52:08 You’re going to be weak. But again, I did it, I’m fine, I’m absolutely fine. So it just goes to show that I can’t be done. And are you thinking about all this in your head? Are you thinking about the naysayers and bullies at school and the teachers and the people watching?

52:27 All that kind of stuff goes through my head, yeah. Which is good, because it’s fun. Yeah, it’s good, yeah, because I’ve done it. And there’s nothing better for my years than for somebody to tell me I can’t do it. That is music to my ears, that is.

52:44 Because if somebody says I can’t, I’ll go, I’ll show you I can. And if anything, that’s, yeah. That’s the kind of stuff I wanna hear. And what’d you learn? What do you think you learned from doing the Decca?

52:59 This is what, ten days ago? No, five days ago, no. Five days ago. It’s still quite fresh in my mind. So, my feet are still screwed, but I learned a lot from it.

53:08 I know that I can do anything. I can literally do anything. And I think by doing something like that and putting your body and your mind through such physical exhaustion, if you can do that, you can do anything. do anything. I didn’t give up and I think that’s very important. I never chucked a towel in once even though there were times where my mind says chucked a towel in but I wasn’t going to. And I think that helps with other things in life as well.

53:42 Do you ever play games with your mind saying like after this lap I’ll chuck it in and then when you get to the lap you say okay maybe I’ll do another one. Do you have to play these weird games with your mind? Yeah sometimes I see a tree in the distance and I’ll go and run to that and then I’ll walk and then I’ll run to that and nah. Anyway, failure wasn’t an option unless something drastic happened, unless I got such a bad injury I couldn’t keep going or my bike had broke or something. I was going to keep going.

54:15 And I’m just, yeah, so glad when I crossed that finish line, it was amazing. And I said to clear the organizer that said I don’t ever want to see you again and then no four days later I hear they’re gonna be doing a double next year so I’m thinking about doing the double next year but that’s the that’s gonna be the one-a-day format so there’ll be an Iron Man a day for 20 days but early days yeah and what makes someone say I don’t ever want to see you again and a week later you’re thinking about doing the same thing times everyone else is the same thing yeah right I’ll speak to you next week and see where you go see we’ve got to say but you know I know all of these people who do I mean there was a level 11 people of us and guaranteed a lot of them and say well they’ll be back and that’s another another thing I like about these events is there’s so very there’s not that many people who do them I mean there were 11 on continuous and they were eight on the one a day all these faces they’re all familiar faces and the faces that we see at different events.

55:25 It’s almost like a little family and everyone’s sort of looking after one another and we see everyone at another event somewhere else and that’s what I like about it. With Iron Man, I love Iron Man because of Iron Man, it’s thanks to Iron Man, it’s what I’m doing now. But with Iron Man, you’re the number. With these events, you’re part of the family and it’s nice to come into those little areas where you’ve and and for me to finish that your crew is very important because I had a crew of people feeding me, watering me, making sure my clothes were clean, making sure everything’s ready for the next day and every single other athlete have got a crew as well. So as soon as you come into the the circle with on the bike you’ve got all these people looking after the looking after the athlete and making sure they can get to another lap. So it’s nice. It’s a nice place to be.

56:28 So you like those humans? I like them humans, yeah. Because they’ve proven to you that they’re going to exist. Yeah, there’s a lot of them. I’ve seen, you know, we do doubles and triples, Iron Mans and stuff in the past, and they’re almost the same kind of faces and stuff.

56:47 No bullshit faces. Yeah, and I know they’re going through the same shit as me. We’re all going through the same shit. So, you know, you sort of look after one another, make sure everyone’s cool. When you do something like that, does it make you look at the rest of your life and think, how am I limiting myself with my own brain?

57:05 What things I could do? Or do you think they’ll look at the world and say, how are we limiting ourselves as a human species with just by telling ourselves we can’t do something? Yeah, you’ll never know what you’re capable of doing unless you actually put yourself in that situation. I think we can do it, the human body can do so much. And I think you need lunatics, I guess, a lot to keep pushing those boundaries and to see what we can actually what’s actually possible. I mean Matt Bumont he did around the world in 80 days on a bike and he actually did it in 78 days. Doing an average 250 miles a day for 78 days. Man that’s and it’s like my mate went to see one of his talks and he said well how much do you want it? Stas, you can tell with him how much do you want. If you wanted that much you’re You’re just going to keep going on you.

58:13 You’re not going to give in. So that’s the question you got to ask yourself. How much do you want? How much do you want? Which is why you say only do it if you want to do it.

58:20 Yeah. But if you really want to do it. Yeah. I really wanted to do it so I wanted to finish it. Yeah.

58:25 If I didn’t really want to do it I’d give it a half-assed effort. My trainer for the Ironman, Samantha Murphy, she said the same thing you said right when we started. She said the brain quits before the body. Always. Always.

58:37 And it sounds simple and it sounds obvious but when you really think about it you’re like, Oh, so when I think my leg hurts and my knee hurts, it’s all bullshit, basically. It’s your brain just trying to save your body for another day. Yeah. Which is not necessary in this situation, right? No.

58:53 Yeah. And there’s a lot, when we’re doing the Decca, there’s a guy there called Decca Dave, a very famous Decca triathlete who’s won and competed in many Deccas around the world. And he said, when you come into the cycle thing to speak to your crew, you’ll find any excuse to try and make conversation, rather than go back out there on your bike, because you know it’s gonna be agony. So the best thing to do, shut the fuck up, get the food down your neck, hand your drink down your neck, piss off, because as soon as you get comfortable, the whole point of the deck is not being comfortable, is being happy, being uncomfortable, and making pain in your friend, because the moment you sit there and start chatting with people and having a laugh and stuff, you’re wasting time.

59:44 And it’s getting worse. Yeah, just go, go, go, go. How do you make pain your friend? Yeah, how do you make it? Say hello to her.

59:51 I like that, or you do it? I do, you just, good question. How do you make pain your friend? Just make friends? And pain?

1:00:03 You have to, you’ve got no choices. And pain’s a weird thing because like pain doesn’t stay constant. Like your feet, you can’t even walk in the morning, but once you do two laps, the pain goes away. So pain’s this weird thing, right? You can kind of…

1:00:17 Yeah, I mean, it doesn’t completely go away, but it’s better than what it was when you first woke up. Yeah. But as soon as your body starts waking up a little bit, it’s a little bit better. I’m always watching the conversation my brain’s having me when I go on those long sessions. It’s always like, oh yeah, your knee hurts.

1:00:32 Oh yeah, you didn’t eat well this morning. Yeah, we’re only gonna do 10K, and it’s always coming up with all this bullshit. And then after I did a few of them, I was like, oh, I see what you’re doing. You’re giving me that bullshit. And then it’s just like, so then I go another four or five K, and it’s telling me another story.

1:00:48 And then it’s just like, then you realize it’s just a little game you’re playing with your head. But then once you realize that you fought it and come back, you’ll be happy then. Yeah, yeah, it’s amazing. Yeah, and then you realize, well, wow. And then you realize, well, then I did stop, and then maybe I had 10K more in me.

1:01:03 And then he started playing with you, you know, and the good thing about doing distance like I was one you’ve been Open the fridge and eat where you want. Yeah. Oh, yeah, I lost weight I was down to 73 kilos by the time I did the Ironman what they do It’s like six kilos less than when I started. I just couldn’t keep the weight on it because I don’t know I’m just training all the time When you train all the time as well, you you read you’re always hungry. Yeah, your body’s craving nutrients and You mentioned veganism.

1:01:32 Talk to me about your journey with veganism. I went 100% plant-based last year. John Joseph pushed me to do it. I did it. He said, Brian, you’re actually gonna feel better and you’re not gonna get injured.

1:01:44 And I thought he was out of his mind, but I didn’t, and I couldn’t believe it. I mean, I was pounding my body. I think I counted up. I was training like 13 times a week, you know, of different training sessions, running, bike, swim. I didn’t get it, knee injury.

1:01:58 I didn’t get any injuries. So tell me about your relationship. Why did you go vegan? What is your thought on it?

1:02:09 I noticed there was a lot of ultra endurance athletes. Well, not just ultra endurance, for a lot of people doing IMN and stuff like that. They were vegans, there was a lot of vegans. And I wondered why. I was quite intrigued.

1:02:22 I started doing some research and why they were vegan why they chose to be vegan and the more I kept looking into it the more it started making sense to me and you know I’m an animal lover always have been I’ve got a dog Lemmy love him to bits I would not eat him and what is the difference between a dog cat a cow a pig a chicken a ways the ways this was this line that says that they’re edible in these things and it really started opening my mind and somebody told me to watch a documentary called Cowspiracy on Netflix and I watched Cowspiracy and wow I was just like I never knew there was that much to veganism I just thought they just don’t eat milk they don’t drink milk or eggs or eat beef or meat and I just couldn’t believe the fact and I was just like wow this is unbelievable and thanks to that documentary it’s completely changed my life because the next day I went vegan straight away so I’m like that’s it I’m not eating meat I’m not eating eggs I’m not gonna eat milk and that was three and a half years ago I think it was and ever since I ever looked back and yeah.

1:03:51 Did you have to make adjustments? Was it difficult? I mean because I left school and I went to Catean College so I knew quite a bit about food than your average person so that helped and my meals have obviously had to change So I started looking at YouTube for recipe ideas and stuff, little hints, little tips, and whilst doing that I was just, I looked at a lot of the YouTube stuff and I thought, Christ man, this is fucking boring. I reckon I could do a cooking show on YouTube, obviously going back to my roots from what I used to do many years ago.

1:04:36 And I spoke to two guys, James Threffell and Peter Pickford, and I told him my idea, and they said, ask this brilliant idea, let’s do it. And at the time, I was just, because I hadn’t been on TV for a while, my confidence was pretty low as far as that went, and, you know, I was a bit rusty with the cooking, because obviously I hadn’t done it for years, and it’s just one of those things that I’m either into it, I’m not going to do it. Jumping in the deep end, let’s go for it. So we did it and I had so much fun. It was hilarious. We just hired an Airbnb kitchen, although everyone thought it was my house but it wasn’t my house. Hired an Airbnb kitchen and we just started filming and we had such a laugh doing it and then we launched it, I think it was two years ago and everyone really enjoyed it and from there then BBC called me in and that’s how Dirty Vegan happened. Crazy. Yeah. Now it’s the big time and when did the cookbook come out?

1:05:42 We were filming, we got the green light off the BBC, BBC Wales and we started filming the first episode, the first series of Dirty Vegan and then I got told that we’ve got the go-ahead for a book. So I thought, well, I never thought they’d ever have a cookbook out. And so I was filming from seven in the morning sometimes, to eleven in the night. And then I literally go to bed and start again. So I thought, I’m going to do a book whilst doing all this filming. So Rob Andrew, Bob, they call him, the chef from Riverford. He sort of, he helped write the book and I sort of used my recipes that I used for YouTube. So they said, what’s the measurements? I thought I don’t cook with measurements. I said you’re gonna need measurements to put in a cookbook because there’s a lot of people who can’t cook and they’re gonna need measurements. So in between filming I had to try and find all these measurements to start writing it all up and doing little bits and bobs to book so yeah it was quite the it’s quite a busy time but yeah between myself and Bob we managed to get the book out and this it came out December 27th last year and it sort of companyed the series there when it came out to be Gary sure what’s your style of cooking like what or how would you I don’t call myself a chef I I just call myself a cook. I just enjoy I enjoy cooking I’d say my style of cooking comfort food. Really. What’s your favorite dishes?

1:07:26 Chili. Yeah, I loved I just love chili because when I was when I was younger my Mother used to make amazing chili and when we used to come back from school or wherever it was We used to say almost for dinner every time she said she was like, yes, she so that’s what I fight being chilies in there Okay, obviously, I used to eat meat years ago, right? No, I use beans instead Okay, and people are loving this stuff right? I mean the plant-based movement is big right now and People are looking for recipes and ideas. Yeah I when I when I started doing this I didn’t want to be I did I didn’t want to be that vegan that shoves my my agenda down people’s necks and I’ve got nothing against people doing that you know I’m not an activist that you know and if people want to do that that’s cool I’m just I’m just me I’m a vegan I don’t eat meat I don’t eat dairy and I don’t eat eggs and I wanted and if you’ve seen the show it’s quite light-hearted it’s not just for vegans for meat eaters and everything as well and I just wanted to make it a bit of fun and educational and I do I really do believe that if you’re an adult and you educate an adult on why I don’t eat meat dirty and eggs and if they take that on brilliant they’re old enough to make their own decisions and I think that if I keep ramming them I my my thoughts my my vegan agenda down there next, I don’t think they’re not gonna, they won’t take it in.

1:09:12 So my approach is just education. I have a bit of a laugh at it. And you know, it did work because the show came out and a lot of people said, you know, they really enjoyed the show and they now arrive in two to meet three days a week. So it’s a start. And a A lot of people have gone vegan off the back of the show with the book as well, which is brilliant, which is a really positive thing.

1:09:38 Yeah, I had a really interesting experience last year. You know, I’d had like meatless Mondays before, but I’d never actually really gone all in. But once I had to, first of all, my wife freaked out, and then she’s like, I don’t know what to cook, but then she started buying all these books, like there’s a lot of great books out there, and she started making all this amazing stuff, and she still makes amazing dal and amazing stuff, and so I went there, I had to eat more, is what I had to do.

1:10:01 But I like fell in love with vegetables again. I mean, there’s so many tasty things out there. I mean, I’ve been doing almond milk for a long time anyways and so like I got to a point where it was good. But at the end of the year, I just said, okay, am I still doing this because I’m just really super dogmatic or is this still the right diet choice for me? And I couldn’t actually come up with a decent answer.

1:10:19 So now I’m not 100% plant-based but I still eat a lot of plants and sometimes I prefer plants. I feel lighter and I feel better but I don’t know if it’s the right diet for me. If it’s, I mean, if it tastes nice, what’s the beginning? If it tastes nice, but if you don’t really need meat, I don’t need meat, I don’t need. Do you think the vegan diet is right for everyone?

1:10:45 Why not? I don’t know. Well, I don’t think it’s good for me. I’ve had people on the show that were vegans for a while and then they stopped because they’re like, look, I don’t think my body’s responding well to this. I think I need some type of animal protein in my body.

1:10:59 I think veganism is good for everybody. You just need to know what to eat. You need to have knowledge, I think. But, yeah, we’ll see. I don’t know.

1:11:13 I mean, spending time with Bob, Rob Andrew, Bob the chef, we did a thing at Riverford. We did an evening cooking for, we had like 70 covers, like a dirty vegan evening. We had a takeover and I was working in this family because working with people like that, because I haven’t been in that kind of kitchen since I was in college. So spending time in the kitchen with him from nine o’clock in the morning until service was just amazing. Just his knowledge on vegetables was just unbelievable.

1:11:47 And some of the stuff, it was one of the best, best things cooking wise I’ve done for a long time. It was hard work. and imagine it was back breaking and I forgot how hard it was but I loved every minute of it and they said well when the customers come in you could sit down and eat with us I was like no way man I’ve been in the kitchen all day with Bob and his staff and his team I said I want to be on the pass serving the food and and that’s what I did and it was just it was so such a great day And so satisfying seeing the customers with happy faces and giving compliments at the end and saying they had a really good meal I was ace and then Went to the pub then had a few beers as a proper well-earned beer as they were It was ace. Harder than an Iron Man cooking in a kitchen. Pretty close It’s just yeah And I learned a lot from him as well. He’s yeah, he’s such a good chef Amazing. So this is a brand new career for you? Yeah, I’m enjoying it. I’m literally just about to start filming the second series next week. Okay. We’ve got a few good things lined up. That’s for BBC. For the BBC. Have you still got a YouTube channel? YouTube channel’s about to start again. Okay. So we’ve got another four episodes coming in BBC Wales with four different types of people which I can’t say but it’s gonna be funny okay and yeah and then and the second book is finished written and that will be out very soon as well you’re gonna take

1:13:28 The show on the road go to the states I’ve done some uh yeah some cooking demos and stuff at various festivals and everything and another thing which is completely new to me I never thought I’d I’ve been, from going on stage, shoving drumsticks up my ass and smashing bottles at my head to now going on stage, cooking seitan and cooking food, it’s funny man, but I was quite nerve wracking because I’ve never done it, you know, it was all new to me, but again you need to put yourself in that situation, put yourself in the situation, do it over and over again, I’ve done a lot of speaking work recently as well and something which I’ve been absolutely petrified of in the past. And with the help of a few people, Rachel Lavelle, she helped me put a presentation together so I could give a talk on how I went from a chef to 30 Sanchez to an ultra endurance athlete to a vegan chef. And having people like that help was brilliant.

1:14:39 So I can actually get on stage and talk. It’s still, I still find it quite nerve-wracking. Because it’s Matthew on stage, it’s not Pritchard on stage. Exactly, yeah. And you used to be able to just go up and stick drumsticks in your ass and do crazy shit, but now you gotta be you, or you gotta cook, and that’s scary.

1:14:57 Yeah, but that was, the Sanchez stuff was alcohol fuel. And sometimes drug, well, not drug food on stage, it was more alcohol for your long stage, but this time I allow myself two beers, that’s it. So I’m more or less going out in front of a load of people. It’s over. This is speaking in front of people?

1:15:19 Speaking, yeah. Okay, so. The more I, such a buzz coming off stage, knowing that I’m not drunk, and I’ve just done what I’ve done, and I’m just like, yes, yes, yes, and I really enjoy it, yeah. It’s a great buzz. It’s one of the best street legal drugs there is.

1:15:38 That’s all my students, like, you know, it’s scary, but when you do it, it’s one of the greatest feelings. Yeah, and the more you do, the better you get. And you know you can, like if you mess up, you know next time you brush up a bit more on that part and slowly be sure you just, I wouldn’t say become a factionist, but there’s still a lot of work to do. Yeah, I always make the analogy of like a fighter like going into a cage fight in the UFC. Like the first time you go in, you’re just trying to remember like jab cross and like, you can’t remember anything, you can’t see anything, it’s this fight.

1:16:12 But then your second and third fight, you’re like, wait a second, I can throw a hook in. Actually, I noticed the crowd, I can hear my coach. And then maybe like the 10th fight, you’re like, okay, I can have a little fun and I can enjoy this experience. And I think that’s what public speaking is like for me. Hit the nail on the head there, yeah.

1:16:28 Yeah. Because I think one of the first or second times you sort of go and do it, and you come backstage, you know, what the fuck have I just done? Don’t remember it. Yeah, don’t remember it. But then after a while, you sort of start taking it in a bit more, start enjoying it.

1:16:43 Yeah, and then even being able to be calm when you’re nervous, and then even maybe have a little fun up there, and maybe you forget what you’re gonna say next, normally it’ll freak you out, but when you actually, then you can be like, okay, I’ve just forgot what I was gonna say next, and that’s okay, I’m just gonna smile, and then I just remember what I was gonna say, and then like you get a little bit better at it. Yeah. Tell me about the Sanchez days. Like when you think of it now, how do you think of it back then?

1:17:09 Now that you’ve had 20 years to process it, you know, 15 years to process. I really, at the time I really, it was brilliant. You were young. You were a skateboarder, Wales. Skateboarder.

1:17:23 Talieskout found you. Yeah, and yeah, we just, I mean, what was, what wasn’t it like, We were young and we were getting paid to get wrecked and have a laugh with your mates at that age. And you were a skateboarder at the time? Yeah, we were. We were all skateboarders.

1:17:39 And what was that culture like that people don’t understand? What was it, you know? What, the skate culture? Yeah. I mean, back in the day, skateboarding was, I’d say it was a very small group of people.

1:17:52 It wasn’t as popular as what it is now, it’s massive, no. But back in the day, it was almost a little bit like the endurance walker in the world, really. You’d go to competitions, everyone knew everyone, you’d have a laugh. And that’s what it was back then. And it was- There was no X Games.

1:18:09 It wasn’t a popular- There was no X Games, there was nothing- Nobody made money off of it. No, it was just, we just enjoyed doing it. I mean, me, Danes, Joycee, Panche, you know, we’d meet at the comps and we’d skate, we’d have a laugh. And, you know, we created this thing called Dirty Sanchez. I think Jackass was happening in the medic at the time, but me and Dayton made a video coverage of his picture versus Dayton.

1:18:35 Joyce and Pancho were in there, me and Dayton finished it with a fight, and… Were you inspired by Jackass? Was it kind of a separate thing? No, we weren’t inspired by Jackass at all. Okay, you were doing your own thing.

1:18:45 We were just doing our own thing. And skaters always had cameras on them because you guys were always filling your stunts. Yeah. So it was this weird culture where you had the camera, and then all of a sudden… It was a skateboard thing.

1:18:55 Yeah, because you guys had cameras. Yeah. Otherwise it wouldn’t have happened, right? Because I’d say jackass, because bam, I’d see KY. Yeah, I remember Camp Hill yourself.

1:19:04 I used to watch those. That was like, what, 99 or 98? 98, yeah. Yeah, I remember watching them. Those were like 30 minute things and they would just do weird skits and stunts.

1:19:14 And again, that was like skateboarding and doing weird stunts. And it was the same with P versus T. We had skateboarding and then we were doing, We were sort of doing stunts and fucking with Pancho and all that kind of stuff. And I think they just, they got the jackass thing first in America. And then of course that happened and then somebody, obviously MTV UK would look in for something similar.

1:19:38 And obviously the picture of us, the video was out. Where was it? Because there was no YouTube back then. No, there wasn’t. It was like Napster, right?

1:19:45 How the hell she got hold of the video, I don’t know. I used to download this can’t kill yourselves on Napster when I was in New York City, like 99 in 2000, and I would have all of them, and I used to watch all that Ben Marjaz stuff, and it was stupid and funny, and it was like pre-jackass, pre-kind of produced stuff. It was pre-jackass, and I think Johnny Knoxell is gonna, Johnny Knoxell did stuff with Big Brother magazine. Yeah, he did a couple things where he shot himself in the chest, and a few things for Big Brother taser.

1:20:14 And he tasered himself, and I think they all sort of merged then. And together, right. But Johnny wasn’t really a skateboarder. No, he wasn’t. No, he wasn’t, no.

1:20:22 And he brought that kind of fuck weird thing. He everybody brought something a little different to that. Yeah, okay I think Johnny Knox over there. They I don’t know. They found him. It’s just at the time I think he was just some crazy fucking redneck. Yeah, but he was in print So he was probably had more of a platform than the other guys But then the guys were making videos. Yeah weird combo and then jackass happened. I mean that was weird, too. It was a good It’s a good decade. I wasn’t it was it was I mean I mean, you can see crazy stuff like the flick of a hat these days on the online, on YouTube or Instagram or whatever it may be.

1:21:00 Yeah. What do you remember most about those early days of Dirty Sanchez? Do you remember the first time you shot something for MTV and then it came out? I think the first stunt we did was the ladder stunt when they stood on top of the ladder and think was going to go, well the name was to go through the ladder fast and I was going to land on my feet but it didn’t really work out and I almost broke my neck but that was meant I think that was the first stunt but I just remembered it just being just fun just absolute chaos from start to finish brilliant and then just traveling around the world and just because, yeah, time in the world, just having a laugh, it makes it brilliant.

1:21:46 Anything bad about it? What do you mean, bad? I don’t know. Anything bad about that whole experience, you know? Downside, is it bad being famous?

1:21:59 Did it hurt with drug and alcohol addiction? Yeah, I mean, like I’ve said before, it led to a lot of drinking, a lot of drug taking, which was cool to start with, it’s a little bit of fun isn’t it? But when that kind of stuff sort of starts taking over a little bit and that’s when things are not as fun then. But that’s what made me who I am today. I saw myself go downhill and I did something about it and that’s when I decided to run the the kind of fire because I just looked at myself and my Christ will have ever become but there’s no taking away the fact that we had an amazing laugh and I’m very lucky to be able to sit here and share those stories from back in the day because they were so still I look back and think what the fuck because I think Even I did that.

1:23:09 It was the stupidest thing you did. Stupidest thing I did? Yeah. Fuck, good question. I know.

1:23:16 Shot at point blank range, jumping his stinging owls. You got shot with a shotgun, right? Yeah. And they missed or something, right? No, no, they hit me.

1:23:25 But then the camera man said, oh, can you do it again? Because I didn’t press record. I was like, ah, I’m not doing that again. But I’d say the most stupidest thing I did, which was off camera. And that’s when they said before, when I took 33 pills, I still look back to that this day and just think, what the hell was I thinking?

1:23:44 Cause I could have easily killed myself. That was ecstasy. Yeah. 33 pills. It’s just fucking daft.

1:23:49 There’s fear. So, yeah, that’s it really. But, you know, I’m here to tell the tale. What happens when you take 33 pills? What happens when you do that?

1:23:57 I look like an absolute, just look like a write-off. Cause they filmed it. No, no, nobody filmed it. That’s what I’m saying. The worst thing I did, stupidest thing I did was off-camera and that was the City of St. Paul’s, there was so much cocaine and a shed load of alcohol and I thought it was a great idea to go and watch Wales versus New Zealand at the Millennium Stage in Cardiff on my own. I seem to have been the, I seem to have been more interested to everyone in the national game because they kept looking at me, my jaw was all over the place. You remember anything about that?

1:24:33 Well, yeah, I remember pretty much just getting my face off. Did you get anything? I know you did drink some ayahuasca for one of your things. Yeah, that was Sanchez’s get-high, that was. Right.

1:24:46 Did you ever get anything like life lessons out of that stuff? It’s a good question. At the time, I think I did, but looking back, I remember dating, telling me, I think I saw or was it the ayahuasca or somebody? I seen a shame and I said, look, I just need you to try and stop my cocaine addiction. And she did something to me.

1:25:23 And I went to, I finished filming Sandra’s Get High and I went to Ibiza and I did some cocaine and every time I did, I started puking up. Every time I did cocaine, it was really spooky. So after asking her to do that, I did cocaine, and I was being sick. And I just thought, whoa, man, this is weird. She’s diastolicuring me of it, and this is just making me sick.

1:25:51 But in my head, I thought, oh, you’re not gonna beat me, so I carried on doing it until I… Of course you did. So I carried on doing it until my body said, oh, I’m all right with it now. Yeah, fucking idiot. What would you say to someone who’s like right now struggling with a drug addiction and they’d like, they’re tired of it.

1:26:10 It’s getting to where it’s no longer fun and they look at what you’re doing right now. I mean, 46 years old, doing fucking 10 Ironmans in a row and you’re obviously happy with the choices you made now. I mean, you must have friends at different points in your life that have been addicted. And they’re like, what do I do? My advice should just be just, just stop it. I mean I can’t, I’m not here to preach, I don’t like preaching or anything, but if anyone’s out there who really does want to kick the habit, sorry my phone was going in my pocket, if anyone really wants to kick the habit, just stop doing it man. I know it may be easier said than done but honestly You’ll just the benefits of not doing it It takes a while didn’t just happen overnight. Just just stop it and just look find exercise exercises Exercise so is the answer you need a new goal, right? Yeah need a new plan and you Yeah, new goal and for you that marathon that first half mile on him. How fine?

1:27:22 Half marathon. Yeah, that’s you just looked at yourself and you’re like, I’m just tired of being this guy But I was still sort of burning the candle at both ends then, it was back then because I thought well if I did all the training I’m allowed to have the party and that’s how I looked at it. So I was sort of burning the candle at both ends and then that’s when I realized I couldn’t really, once I got into the IMN and all that kind of stuff, I couldn’t really burn the candle at both ends because it was, I was getting older and it was getting harder but.

1:27:51 Yeah and transition. Yeah. A lot of the guys from back in the day are silver now, right? Steve O from Jackass is silver and yeah I think BAM is not I think he’s in and out of it, you know BAM’s fighting his demons I think yeah, not that I know I don’t but it looks like by the way he’s talking online and stuff Do all those guys have similar demons, you know? performers and crazy and a lot of it was fueled by drugs in the past and Like you guys all have similar personality types. They’re not introverted yet extroverts? I don’t know. Good question. There’s got to be something there, don’t it? Yeah. Because we all seem to be doing the same kind of thing.

1:28:32 Taking it, well, the select few I suppose, taking it a little bit further than most were. Yeah. Part and parcel of… I think finding a routine in your life would would sort of stop that because I’ve got businesses to look after now and I’ve got so much on my plate I haven’t got time to mess around with that kind of stuff. And I think once you’ve got a meaning in life and you’ve got stuff to do and you’ve got other people relying on you, you can.

1:29:12 You can’t do that. You’ve got to, yeah, you’re not number one anymore. You’ve got to look after other people as well. Yeah, that’s what it was for me. It was just like my life wasn’t just about me anymore.

1:29:24 Other people depended on me and I had a meaning and a purpose for what I was doing. So my work wasn’t just about me either. It wasn’t just about me making money or me being famous or something. It was like I had to inspire people and now people are watching you and it’s just like, are you just gonna let them down with your bullshit or are you gonna actually, you know, inspire them with what you’re doing? Yeah, because you’ve got stuff.

1:29:43 Yeah, you kind of, and if you’ve got stuff, If you, yeah, you need to inspire your staff and you can inspire your staff by being an absolute wreck. I think if you, you know, you’re doing eye management, you’re doing positive things and stuff, people, you know, that rubs off on other people, I think. And yeah. What do you make of the YouTube prank equivalent? I mean, is there an equivalent of what you guys were doing now on YouTube?

1:30:14 I’m sure there is, but I don’t, I’m sure there is somewhere, no, there’s a YouTuber, there’s a washer there, isn’t there? I don’t know. I don’t watch it really. I mean, I don’t, I don’t, I haven’t got a TV anymore, I got rid of my TV from two years ago. Me too.

1:30:33 I still watch, if I want to watch something, I watch a documentary on Netflix or something when I go to bed and it’ll take me a week to watch it because I keep falling asleep. But I don’t, yeah. Don’t really. You don’t follow it. Even though I got a show on TV, but don’t really watch it.

1:30:50 And is Turdi Sanchez dead? We’re getting together on December the 12th in Cardiff in the tram shed for the first time in over 12 years. Four of us. So it’s like a little reunion. We’re gonna show the movie and then we’re we’re gonna have a spoken word and a Q&A and yeah we released the tickets and it sold out within a week so that was and then we’ve done we set another date in Sheffield as well which I think is the 14th in Sheffield December so that’s two dates and that’s me done then that’s you’re done. Forever. I think you told me this a few years ago you were done. Yeah I think, yeah but it’s not doing, I’m on about, when I say done I’m not, I can’t go back to fucking shoving shit on my arse and smashing bottles on my head again, no chance. No chance. But it’s nice to go, because me and Dayton did a spoken word tour, we went around just sharing our stories about our years in Sanchez and how me and him got together and now we started 30 centuries and you know that was really it was good it was nice to go on tour and be backstage just having a few quiet beers rather than knowing you’re going to go on stage and just go like a mental so me and him just sat there just chilling having a chat and then we just got on stage and had a chat with everyone in the crowd and we shared some video footage that we that nobody’d ever seen before and everyone really enjoyed it and then we thought well let’s get

1:32:32 The photos together so we asked the other two if they were up for it and then released the two dates and yeah they’re both sold out so looking forward to that. Is it weird not performing when you’re up there and just talking? No it’s good yeah yeah and no one expects you to. No no no I mean we make it pretty clear this was spoken word and it was look quite a few good questions as well yeah we’ve all got different lives now as well so okay it’s nice to share that with with. And the crowd were like an older kind of crowd so they were the people who followed us from when we were younger so they yeah. So they’re in their forums now too and they’re looking for life lessons and stuff now. Yeah. What are the rest of the crew doing? What are their lives like? Things doing a lot of stuff. He does a lot of filming, editing and stuff for companies, corporate stuff and everything so he’s doing really well over that. Joycey does pretty much the same kind of thing I think and I think pantshows, I think pantshows working with kids with autism in Bristol so yeah we’re all doing our own little thing which is cool. I think I know Dayton’s involved in skateboarding quite a bit as well. And how has skateboarding changed?

1:33:47 Oh massively. Do you still skateboard? I mean I’ll have a little go but I I really love skateboarding. Skateboarding made me the person that I am today. And I’ve always said that.

1:34:00 It’s like skateboarding, absolutely brilliant. I really enjoy skateboarding. I really… What is skateboarding? What is it?

1:34:10 Like what is it about skateboarding? What is it about skateboarding? How do you describe skateboarding? You know what I mean? Skateboarding to me was a lifestyle.

1:34:20 It was something that I was involved with from the age of 15. And it was my release when I was a youngster. I just, you know, it stopped me from hanging out on street corners and just getting up to no good. I had something which I loved. I slept, drank it, ate at it.

1:34:38 That’s all they ever did was just skate. Absolutely loved it. And like I said, it made me the person I am today. I got all my friends that I’ve got today who’ve got through skateboarding. And it was a counterculture, like a rebellious culture, like we’re gonna do it our way.

1:34:52 But at the same time, you’re not hanging out in the street corner, you’re not getting in trouble. You’re focused on a skill. Yeah, well, we were on the street, but we were focused on a skill, and it was quite rebellious, yeah. Yeah, and creative. Creative.

1:35:07 Yeah. Yeah, and it was, like I said, all my friends are from, that I’ve got today, yeah, skateboarding. And how has it changed till today? I mean, it’s an Olympic sport now. I mean, I’m not really involved in it anymore.

1:35:25 Like what I used to be to be able to give my input, but I know it’s an Olympic sport. It’s got pretty big, that all the corporate companies are involved in it now. There’s a lot of arguments with people being against Nike being involved, Adidas being involved and all this kind of stuff, but I’m not gonna get into all that, but. But skateboarders are still cool. And you could go hang out with a skateboarder and you’re always gonna, you’re probably gonna like them.

1:35:47 Yeah, skateboarders skateboard. But it’d be quite interesting to see it in the Olympics, to see people talking about skateboarding in the Olympics. It’d be quite strange. So it’s in the next Olympics? It’s in the next Olympics.

1:36:00 Yeah. In Japan. Like, what? Like, vert? Street?

1:36:05 Street. Street courses and stuff? Yeah. Okay. Let’s go.

1:36:10 Tony Hawk went to my high school. So that’s like what I know of skateboarding, you know? Yeah, you took the opportunity to the gumball quite a few times as well. Yeah, he did, right? Yeah, he did.

1:36:18 Yeah, five times I’ve done a gumball. That’s pretty crazy. I love the gumball. Iced tea does the gumball too. Yeah. Quite a few people have done it.

1:36:28 It’s still happening? Is every year? It’s still happening. It was the 20th anniversary two years ago and this year they went from Mykonos to Ibiza. Is it 3,000 miles? No. Yeah, 3,000 miles driving.

1:36:41 And party all night, drive all day. I sort of, I sort of try and stay away from it these days. Because it’s just, man, it takes about two years of my life. How long does it take to finish? Seven days.

1:37:01 Seven days, okay. And for people who don’t know, it’s like everybody, how many cars are there? 120 cars. Okay, and you go 3,000 miles in seven days. There’s a lot of partying, a lot of people breaking laws, and going fast and…

1:37:12 I wouldn’t say people break laws. Okay. Yeah. It’s just, it’s not a race, it’s a rally. So at the end of the day it’s people winning the spirit of the gumball.

1:37:20 Some people, people who’ve been involved in it. And you know the character. The characters or the team or whatever wins at the end. And it’s just a lot of people get together. A lot of rich people get together.

1:37:33 And I’m not rich, but a lot of rich people get together. They start at one point with a party. drive to a checkpoint, have lunch, drive to the next stop, have some food, party all night, start again, start again, start again, until you get to your destination. It’s so much fun. And some of the people on there, they’re just good laugh as well.

1:37:56 Crazy, crazy cars, crazy people. Only 120, huh? Yeah. It’s bonkers. It really is bonkers, yeah.

1:38:06 When was the last time you did it? I think it was three years ago. Okay. What’s next for you, man? What’s next?

1:38:13 Yeah. What are you doing in 10 years, honestly? I know you weren’t going to do this. I mean, you wouldn’t have known this was coming. Oh, fucking you tell me 10 years ago that I’d have a vegan cup of tea on BBC and just would have laughed in your face.

1:38:26 But, you know, I’m very grateful for everyone who’s made it happen and the people who, you know, the team behind me and everything have got me to where I am today and my aim in 10 years time is hopefully to be in my villa, in my orca, with my dog and my fiancée, riding bicycles, swimming and running, but tired. But can I sip my ass that long? Doubt it. After you’ve done the double decker, probably by then you’ll have done the quadruple decker. Yeah, yeah. I mean the iron cowboy did 50, didn’t he? I’d like to beat that.

1:39:11 Was that 50 and 50 states? Is that what he did? He did 50 and 50 states, yeah. I mean it’s on Netflix now. Really?

1:39:21 Fair play to him after he finished the decker. He sent me a video message congratulating me which was nice. That’s super cool. Yeah. Are you really gonna leave Wales? It seems like that’s that’s part of who you are. I’d still I Mean, I’m just having my house refurbished now. I’ve literally just got a new kitchen I’ve always wanted a new kitchen in my house. I’ve had my dream kitchen, which is good. So I can start Be doing my YouTube videos on that and Yeah, just I’d like to get a house next to beach maybe two houses, okay When am I going? I just love Mallorca.

1:40:02 Mallorca’s nice. I like… Not a beefy thing. I want to move… Ah, there’s temptations on the doorstep.

1:40:08 Okay. But I just really enjoy hot weather. Just nice countries. I just love Spain. I hate the rain and I went to Bali recently and it was just the best place ever.

1:40:24 You like Bali too? Ah, amazing. People and the food it was so many vegan choices everywhere, and it was just days And you go to my york a lot anyways. Yeah, I got some friends in my yorker Okay, I haven’t been for a while because I’m be so busy so okay, and what else you’re gonna be doing You’re still gonna be doing the Ironman’s you’re still gonna be doing I don’t think I’ll ever stop Doing ever yeah, I just that’s what keeps me happy I’ve got my training training and doing that kind of stuff is my medicine It just keeps my mind from going mental.

1:40:57 What happens if you stop, you think? I just go into a deep, like, me and my own mind just, yeah. I just start thinking too much. But exercise keeps me fit, healthy, mentally healthy. OK.

1:41:17 You’re going to run for office? Run for office? Politics. Member of Parliament? Strangely things, the Peaky Blinder guy is a Member of Parliament now, so…

1:41:28 Pritchett, Pritchett of the Prime Minister? I reckon that sounds pretty good. Stranger things. Christ almighty. Not other countries already know that.

1:41:43 And tell me about your businesses. What’s your advice to people who want to start businesses and be an entrepreneur? Because you’ve got the barber shops, tattoo shops, you know, you’ve got quite a few things going on out there. Yeah, I’ve got quite a lot on my plate at the moment. but you know what I think for when I first started my first business it was really really scary and I’m sure anyone when they first started on business it’s a big step and luckily for me I you know it’s been successful from my tattooing barber shop now in Canada for five years, six years. I’ve got one in bar grade as well and literally just about to open dog groomers after my dog Lemmy’s called Lemmy’s Chop Shops. It’s sort of like the the doggy barbers to the my sleeping your dead barbers in town. And I think it’s this it’s just one of those things you’ve just I’ve I have I’ve got loads of other ideas in my head as well but I’ve got the idea and it’s just it’s just invested in it. It’s quite scary. You just got you just got to do it and just see what happens. What makes successful entrepreneur. Do you know I’m as far as if I’m not I wouldn’t really call myself a good businessman I got good ideas but my business partner I’m very good very good friend Adrian Ruck he he’s like the back he’s he basically came in and he’s really really out my business work I’m too nice he’s The bad cop, but he’s fair. So he’s when I’m a wage with all my stuff

1:43:27 He’s there looking after all my business and everything’s I know and I trust him a hundred percent so he’s there looking after everything whilst I concentrate on my other stuff and Yeah, and it’s thanks to him that Everything’s ticking over quite nicely and everyone in the shop he works in the shops as well and all and the all the staff of respect for him and And yeah, he’s played a massive part of my life. And he used to be our tour manager through the Sanchez years. So he’d seen me at my lowest and I can tell him anything he tells me, everything.

1:44:06 And it’s always nice to have somebody like that in your life. So. If I was to ask him, like, what’s Matthew’s superpower? Like, how are you able to do all the things that you do, what would he tell me? Like, what would he say the thing is that makes you able to do all the stuff that you do?

1:44:23 What would he say that it was? Fuck it, that was a good question. Are you woefully saying he’s a fucking idiot? Well, it’s more than that, though. No, I don’t know what he’d say, to be honest with you.

1:44:39 You’re determined. Huh? You’re determined, right? I am determined, yeah. You have a plan.

1:44:44 But when I have a plan, and I’m fucking determined, I won’t give up, yeah, this determination. Not giving up is pretty much almost the whole thing, right? Not giving up in life is how you can kind of get what you want, right? Yeah, I mean, it’s not going to kill me, it’s not going to, you know, there’s financial or risks, or businesses and stuff, but if they fail, they fail.

1:45:26 What can you do? Yeah. And like I said, it’s not gonna kill me, is it? You just start to pick up the pieces, start again. You ever think that training’s gonna kill you?

1:45:33 Training? Or the competing’s gonna kill you? If you were to sit on the bike, you thought you might be in heat stroke, you had to dial it back. You ever worry? Oh, you always doubt, don’t you?

1:45:43 You ever worry you’re gonna get that heart attack when you’re out there? I had to cross my mind. I can’t believe you just said that. Because I think that was just my mind playing tricks on me, though. Just getting a bit paranoid.

1:45:55 Was this on the run? I think it was on the run, yeah. Okay, a few days in. Yeah. Okay, I’m getting numb.

1:46:04 I was like, oh, I’ve changed my pass. I’ve got pains in my chest and, I shut up, just got a mess, I shut up, no. You’re like, it’s just my mind playing tricks that was fine. Is that how you want to go? I don’t want to go. I don’t want to go.

1:46:22 There’s more, there’s more than me yet. What was the best day of your life and the worst day of your life? Best day of my life? It’s a good question. I’ve had quite a few good days of my life, thankfully. I’d say seeing myself in the cinema, on the in a film. I never thought that would ever happen. It’s a book, I’m gonna cook a book out, I just thought that would never happen. There’s been quite a few actually, I feel quite lucky. The worst, when I get rock bottom I think, when I just, yeah, when I just thought everything was just It was all going to end, finish.

1:47:31 When was that? It really, and I was actually just back when I spoke to Adrian, my friend. And, yeah, sold. He, yeah, just thought it was game over for me. But, you just fight back.

1:47:51 I’d say that was probably my worst. and sharing that with my fiance and Adrian, because they’re the two people I go to when things are good and when things are bad. And you told them you were at a low. Yeah. You’re like, I don’t know if I want to go on type of low.

1:48:13 Yeah. What’d they say to you? I think it, I don’t think I actually told my fiance, I just told Adrian, because I didn’t want to really scale of that match. I think she sort of knew. But yeah, the little, really bad. I remember locking my, yeah, I just remember locking myself in the hotel room and just taking it. Yeah, just, yeah, it was horrible.

1:48:52 Just really dark, depressing, and drugs don’t help them and get worse. And at the time I had a massive bag of cocaine, I was shoving it on my neck like I didn’t care, with a big bottle of whiskey and stuff.

1:49:12 And you got some necessary stuff for people to hit, or for you to hit? I mean luckily I didn’t do anything stupid, which is good, and it was horrible telling, sharing that with my friend but I knew I could share it with him because I know he’s been really good to me and you know my fiancé as well she’s been really good to me those two helped me get through a lot and I think You know, I suppose when you go that low, there’s only one way to go and you just pick yourself up and start again. Luckily, I’m here and I’m doing all right again.

1:50:13 Was it close? Yeah, it wasn’t nice, it wasn’t nice at all. And for people that are going through that, should they just remember that like tomorrow’s was a new day, and even when the reality looks so bad.

1:50:35 Even though it gets that bad, you can always pick yourself up and start again. You can always win me a look, I did it. At the time I thought it was game over, and it’s not, you’ve just got to knuckle down and just tell yourself everything’s going to be all right and I think if you’re surrounded by the right people as well that really helps and for me being surrounded by my family and my fiance and Adria that that you know they helped. And then you helped and then you started changing your behavior right I mean you ended up doing And I went to see various people, I went to see, I went to a CBT therapy, cognitive peer therapy.

1:51:40 I did a few sessions with somebody, that helps at all, I’m still not 100% but I’m a much better person than what I was and I look at things much differently. that allows you to kind of analyze how you feel in certain situations and try to address how you feel to see if you can interrupt that pattern, that kind of thing. Yeah. Okay. You know, and I don’t, like I said, I was eight, like eight months since I touched cocaine last, and as far as I’m concerned, I won’t be going back with it again.

1:52:19 That shit is just, that is not the answer at all. No. Literally is not man. That stuff is fucking evil. It’s just a big dark black hole. Yeah. Yeah, I enjoy a beer my friends and stuff and that’s it and I like said to Said to my fiance is you know when when I go and get stuff I leave If I’m at a party, but at least I go you go always go say hello say, you know be nice socialize And you know when that’s that’s kicking off. It’s time to time to go and just listen and wake up then next day and be proud of yourself that you’ve not participated in it and going back to a dark place again that that’s the aim really fingers crossed I said to end so far I’ve done really well so yeah no it was never my drug but I knew buddies that did it and it was just always bad and always dark and just a big dark hole man it’s really hard to get out for those guys, you know.

1:53:24 But the thing is, once you start, once you have won, you just keep going until, well, I did anyway, until I can’t bloody go anymore and then you just collapse. All the kind of things 46 year olds would be doing. No, probably not. I’ll stick to my ultra endurance triathlons instead. What scares you?

1:53:51 What scares me? Spiders. Do they really scare you? Not as much as what they used to scare me, you know. What scares me?

1:54:00 Good question. I don’t know. People, I’m just trying to think. Does failure scare me?

1:54:26 I don’t think anyone likes failure, to be honest with you, but I don’t know. I honestly don’t know. What would we be surprised to learn about Matthew Pritchard? something you do that would just surprise us. We wouldn’t expect you would be doing that.

1:54:45 I think I’ve done a lot of things to surprise a lot of people, I think. Because I don’t think a lot of people would think I’d be able to do half the stuff that I’ve done today, so. I think by achieving what I’ve done, I think I’ve surprised a few people. And what keeps you awake at night? What keeps me awake?

1:55:03 Yeah, at night. Quite a few things keep me awake, and like my mind, because I used to, when I was going through a bit of a bad time, couldn’t, I wouldn’t sleep, wouldn’t sleep for the night and then the second I could sleep and then, if I think I’ve pissed somebody off that will keep me awake. Something, oh I shouldn’t have done that, just little things like that. If somebody’s really pissed, like I tell my fiancé this, if somebody’s reading, if I’m going through like a bad time, if it happened recently I’m not going to and not mention any names or anything, but something recently was really hard to deal with.

1:55:56 And yeah, that was, that drove me fucking stir crazy. And like, I wasn’t sleeping at all. And that was keeping me up all, I was keeping me up all night until I was physically exhausted and then I’d sleep again and then I would repeat it. But now it’s all done and dusted and it’s been sorted, so it’s all good. But just things like that, really.

1:56:22 I’m not really good with confrontation and having to deal with problems. I’m just not very good at dealing with problems. Really shit, because I just think, well, it doesn’t need to be problems. If only life was, you know, if everyone was just fair, if you treated me nice, I’ll treat you nice. I’m not going to treat anyone bad.

1:56:52 There’s just little things like that to go, ah. There’s no need, no need for it. I don’t, I just don’t get it. What I’m trying to say is I think, I think I want the world to be like one big happy place, but it’s not, is it? And I find it quite hard to deal with certain things.

1:57:13 And that kind of stuff keeps me awake. What about the world when you look at the world? It doesn’t look like the happiest place sometimes. Whoa, man, the world’s in a mess. And, yeah, the world’s in a peck of length, as far as I’m concerned, the world’s, aww, it’s grim.

1:57:31 And do you know what, I don’t watch TV, and I don’t watch the news, because the one that seems to be watching news, there’s nothing ever good in the news, it’s just depressing. So I don’t watch that, maybe not until the blue moon I watch it, so I can’t say never do, and then that’s bad enough. And I think when I was doing the Decca, I was turned off from everything. I dapped my phone in my hand because I listened to music once, maybe one or twice, I’d just have a little quick through social because I sort of turned everything off really until I finished.

1:58:06 And that was so satisfying, not knowing what was going on outside Decca, turning all that off. I knew that was one of the most fair, scariest things was knowing that I’d finished the decker and I’d have to go back into society again and back into the big bad world of emails. Emails make me anxious as well. I don’t blame you, man. Because there’s some emails.

1:58:37 It’s just like, ah. Yeah. But the things when you don’t answer them for a week, like, it’s okay. You know what I mean, it’s like, when you’re in it, it’s like, ah, but when you turn it off for a while, everything’s okay, nobody dies. No, and then you come back and then you know this is, yeah.

1:59:02 It’s good you know that you can step away, you know? Yeah. Matthew always asks a question, a couple at the end, I wanna ask you, if you could pick up a phone and call up the 20-year-old Matthew Pritchard and give that young man some advice. Are you Dirty Sanchez in it, 20 years old? No, skateboarding, skateboarding, skateboarding then.

1:59:23 If you could give him some advice, for what you know now, what would you tell him? I’d still be there telling him. I’d still be there telling him. Right, no, you need to do this and you need to die. You can’t do this and you can’t do that.

1:59:40 I’d be there for Christ, I’d be there for fucking hours. What would you be telling him? Oh, giving a lot of advice on women and girlfriends and how to deal with them. Giving, not, you know, it’s not a bad thing to have a go at women or anything, but how to deal with all that kind of stuff. How to deal with people.

2:00:05 Well, I’ve always seen that, I still don’t know how to deal with people. How to drink, essentially. I don’t know, there’s loads of things I tell them. But like I said, I don’t regret anything. So if anything, I’ve learned from it, so.

2:00:25 Yeah, second part of that question, best advice you ever received? Could have been from one of your fellow members of the Sanchez or a friend, mentor, anybody. Best advice you ever received about life. The following success secrets are only available inside the London Real Tribe, where you get exclusive access and insights from our high-performance guests on wealth creation, productivity, leadership, morning routines, health, and well-being. To join our tribe community, go to londonreal.tv forward slash tribe.

2:01:00 Now, let’s continue with the show. Matthew, congrats on the Decca. That was a big thing, man. Thank you. You really played it down quite a bit until you really started getting into it and I realized how epic it was, you know.

2:01:17 That’s a serious accomplishment, man. And it’s great to have guys like you about there that are showing people what can be done. And I just said, what’s your advice to the 20 year old kids out there? All they gotta do is watch you on what you do with your life. You’re living proof of I can go do this and it’s just your mind because you’re not an athlete by training, but you just get it done, right?

2:01:41 Yeah, just do it. Turn them the fuck off and just do it. Simple. And the same with this too, man. I mean, this happened by you just going for it, right?

2:01:55 Yeah. And being you. That’s the other thing, you’re always you. You’re authentic, right? Yeah, don’t, yeah, just be yourself.

2:02:02 Don’t be somebody else, just be yourself. It’s as simple as that. Nice. All right, so second season’s coming out, then grab this book, other places, right? And the second one comes out very soon.

2:02:14 Dirty Vegan book two’s coming out as well. Dude, that’s big, congrats. The businesses, congrats. Thank you. to the double decker next year.

2:02:23 We all come down and throw some water at you. And you made me think more about the full Iron Man today, so thanks for that as well. But look, man, it’s always great hanging out with you. Always like your vibe and style and everyone likes hearing your story. So thanks for everything you do, man.

2:02:40 And thanks for being honest. I know I asked you to get a little emotional here, so I appreciate it. That was cool, man. Thanks, man. Cheers, right?