Welcome back or welcome to the Single Track Podcast.

I'm your host, Finn Milanson, and this is another edition of our Sunday conversation, though we are publishing it a few days early so that it doesn't get buried in Western States coverage.

In this one, I have the pleasure of interviewing Francesco Puppy, a professional trail runner for Hoka based outside of Lake Como, Italy.

Francesco's resume includes wins at CCC, OCC, Lovarado 50K, Kianti Marathon, Transgrant Canaria Marathon, Lake Sonoma,

Chuckinut. For many fans of the sport, his debut at the 100-mile distance and at Western

States in particular

has been long anticipated and it's finally here. We cover the usual topics around preparation,

mentality, and racing strategy for the current moment, but I also wanted to take the opportunity

to ask him about current anti-doping efforts in the sport, European versus American Trail

media, and his impressions of other

superstars in our sport. One thing we didn't cover, which I promise we will address in a follow-up

interview, are some of the statements that he made around Kokodona earlier this spring,

which prompted widespread discussion around how we even define trail running. That said,

you know, as I mentioned earlier, we covered quite a bit in this one. Let us know what you think. Shoot us a DM on Instagram

or comment on the YouTube version of this episode. And yeah, at the time of this recording,

we're, I mean, I'm driving to, I'm driving to Olympic Valley on Friday morning, which I'm super excited about.

I'm going to take in all of Broken Arrow.

We're going to get our studio ready and then content kicks off Sunday night.

Hope to see all of you out there.

If you're in Olympic Valley, if you see me running around, if I see you, let's say hi.

Great time of the year.

Francesco Poopi, it is great to finally host you here on the single track podcast.

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