Oak: Find Mountain Partners with Dave Searle

There's people who put a lot of time into learning skills, but they don't have much experience. And there's people who put a lot of time into experience, but they don't have many skills. So if you can match the skills and the experience up, then that's very potent, especially with something like Alpine climbing, where there's a lot of different skills or with ski managing, where there's a lot of technical skills that you need. You can learn a lot of those things at home, but then you need to go and get experience using those skills and also decision making and route planning and route finding and just movement skills that you can't learn at home. Welcome back to another episode of the Tactical Alpinism podcast, where we talk with leaders in the mountain warfare space, mountain professionals and mountain athletes, all with the intention of enabling you to go bigger the next time you're actually able to get out into terrain. My name is Mori and in today's podcast, I'm talking with Dave Seryl. He's an IFMGA internationally certified mountain guide based in Shamini, France, and originally from the UK. He has a really awesome educational Instagram platform under his name Dave Seryl. And he is also one of the co-founders of an app called Oak, that is a new way to start finding partners. It's kind of like the way I've characterized it to folks is it's kind of like Tinder, except for doing mountain things, where it's like you're trying to find partners for the things that match your skills and match what you want to get after. If you hop on the app, there's a ton of different regions and it's really popular in Europe, it's starting to grow in the US. The United States is the third fastest growing country for users of Oak currently. And then Canada is the ninth fastest growing country for new users. And one of the things that I encourage y'all to do is if you hop on, you might not find people immediately in your area because it's still growing. Don't stop using it if you've started. Like continue to use it, even if it's just you going to train at the gym or go out to go for a run. Like as more people start to use it, more people will start to reach out. It's still really early in the development of the app. And I think there's a ton of potential for it moving forward. It's also completely free. I'm not getting paid for this. I just think it's a really cool app for finding partners in a cool way like there's a function where you can put your resume in the app and what you've done and what your skill is and what your fitness is. So it closes out a lot of those problems that some of the old ways of finding partners didn't necessarily address. And I just think it's a really neat way to get after the problem of finding partners and events to join for the mountains. If you like this podcast and others that you've listened to, then the one ask I have of you right now is to share one of the discussions you've really enjoyed with at least one other person. Word of mouth is the way this podcast gets in front of more people and grows in the episodes that have the most listens are the ones that get shared the most. So please share it with at least one person. It's all I have for this intro portion of the episode and I'll see you on the backside. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - I just posted on my Instagram, hey, like looking to do a partner finder group community thing and then it had a bunch of people actually be like, hey, Oak is built specifically for that. Why don't you consider using it? So I started looking at it. It was like cool that folks were already like, hey, this is what this thing's already made for, even though it's not as popular in the US. - Yeah, I think it's dying to gain some popularity but it's just like, it's quite hard for us to like remote target that audience. We're just trying to figure out some other ways of like getting the word out. 'Cause I think once people get the key information in there, in their mind and it sits in there that it's like, it's not owned by matter. It's free to use and free to download and there's no adverts and that's like, it's like, yeah, well, why not, and give it a go that way. So yeah. - Totally. Yeah, and I, let's chat with Emilie and he said, you'd be a great person to have on the podcast and I don't know how much you know about like the podcast in my audience, but it's all military or primarily military and like with a mix of US and other nations. So like, I think about 6%, 7% of my audience comes from Europe as well. And so like sort of military focused is what I have. And so I try to bring on experts in the mountain field or people that are actively training mountain warfare. And what I thought was interesting is I initially saw your video just with primarily the tech tips that you do about using like the puzzle connected just or other tools and how to use them a little bit better. - Yeah. - For folks that you do a really good job explaining simple concepts clearly. - Yeah, thanks. Yeah, it's been, it's been fun trying to figure out like how to do it well. And I think a lot of, yeah, a lot of the videos of people have found like a lot of value in them. So yeah, pretty, pretty happy with that so far. - How did, because you're an FMGA guide now, that takes a while to get to how did you get there? Like what was your path into like being a guide? - Yeah, so my pathway into being a guide was, I mean, I guess, so I did like a winter season out in Shemny when I was like 19. And I've met some other people that were like out here trying to become guides. And they told me what it was about. And I kind of like figured out what it was, a little bit more, because the sort of year before that I was doing, I get, that's actually probably the start of my journey was that I was doing like some qualifications in the UK, which are like much lower level, like mountain leader, it was called back there, but I think it's called something different now. And that was, those qualifications are basically for leading groups like hill walking in the UK or like easy scrambling. And the instructor was like, you don't want to be a mountain leader, you want to be a mountain guide. And I was like, what's the difference? And he'd like explain the difference between, you know, what is in like IFMGA guide? And he was like, you just need to do loads of climbing, you need to learn how to ski and you need to like do all this stuff, because I'd never ski when I was a kid. And he was just like, yeah, go away, get loads of experience, and then like aim to do that, because it sounds like more of what you want to do. And I was like, okay, yeah. And I was like, so I went to Shamny and I learned to ski and I learned to like climb in the bigger mountains in the Alps and just started like slowly ticking off all the roots and objectives that needed to be done for the list. And then that kind of like culminated all together in when was it now? Like late 2015 or something like that. I think I started doing the training courses and then it was like, yeah, 2016, 17, 18. And then I finished in 2019 and I was ready to go, like have my pin, ready to guide and then COVID. And then it was like, then we had like really draconian a lot down in France and I couldn't do any work for several months. So that was a bit frustrating, but things are much better now. So yeah. Well, so in the US, the progression, like it's a, you don't have to have a super robust resume to start, whereas like I know like Austria, Germany, it seems like you have to be in France, like you have to be a lot more competitive to even get into the guide training pipeline. Then you do in the US, and in the US, it's like the fastest you can actually do it as three years and many people take five to 10 years to go through the IFMG certification process. So like which country or body did you go through and then what does it look like? - So I did my course in the UK. And again, it's like minimum three years, but generally people take like four years. Most people have like some kind of deferral where they kind of like wait a year to kind of do a reassessment perhaps and that's what happened to me up in Scotland. I had to go back up to Scotland and finish that module. The entry requirements for the UK are, or they were like much harder than they are in France. So in France, like the entry requirements like weren't super difficult. There was like, you know, you had to do a certain number of routes in the mountains, but it wasn't like the same kind of amount that you have in the UK that then their kind of entry exam in France is harder. So they have like much harder entry exams and they have a bigger pool of people applying each year. You know, they probably have like 150, maybe more people applying each year and they have to get that number down to about 30 or 40 people. But in the UK, we get like less than five people applying each year. My year was actually a bit of a standout year because there was 10 or 11 people that applied. And it was really fun actually because I knew most of them and they were all like mates most of them. And then there was a couple of people I didn't know and we got to like know each other through the course. But it was quite nice going through with a big cohort like that. Why are the numbers so different between France and the UK? Is it a function of just like terrain that exists in the country or like the higher more stringent resume requirements? Like what's the, what's your understanding of the why? I think, I think it's a combination of both. I mean like France has a lot of like Alpine terrain in it. And Italy and Switzerland as well, they have like big numbers of guides that are going through each year or they have just a big community of guides. Each country has like couple of thousand guides or more, you know, I think Switzerland's like possibly even like close to like 4,000. But in the UK, we're only like probably two or two to 300 guides, I don't know the exact numbers. But I think it's a combination of the fact that, you know, like the mountains in the UK, although there are parts that are very like rugged and wild and challenging in certain conditions, it's not like big glaciated mountains, you know, they're kind of like 1200 meter peaks up in Scotland. We've got loads of really amazing climbing, but no skiing. So, you know, people who want to do the guides course, they have to spend a lot of time in the Alps. And that's like kind of quite a big ask for a lot of, you know, younger people who are getting into mountain sports, whereas in France, like, you know, it's very easy to live in somewhere like Chamonix or Grenoble or somewhere that's like close to the mountains and you can go and get that list together and get strong and fit at climbing and apply to do the guides course. And that's where they have such a big like number of people applying each year. Whereas, you know, we've got a harder list. They have actually made the French list harder in my, so I've heard which I think would be a positive thing for them because then they can have like maybe slightly more experience people coming into the course. Whereas we kind of have like quite experienced people coming into the course and the course is kind of like, there's some challenging bits, but it's like, yeah, you're already a mountain here. You know, you're already a really accomplished mountain here, whereas the French system, they tend to get a lot of experience on the course. So it's just, it's just different ways that countries do it. And I know like in the States, it's different again. That's like, you guys have like more of a modular thing when you do like the rock exam and the alpine and the ski and everything. And we kind of have that, but it doesn't mean that you can work as a ski guide because you'd have, you need to be fully IFMJ certified to work out in the Alps anyway. So, yeah. And most countries you have to be fully IFMJ certified, but in the US, there's no requirement for any credentialing to call yourself a ski guide or a mountain guide or rock guide. And so on one side that creates some confusion because like what is a rock guide? What is the value of a guide when there's no standard, but then also it creates a lack of a need for professionals to go do it in some cases. I think we're moving in that direction in the US where like some sort of credentialing will eventually be required with the way that some of the land permitting is starting to change. But that could be like 10, 15 years down the road. Like I'd love to build a, like have IFMJ guides from elsewhere come work here. 'Cause like in the US, we had, I think last year we just pinned our 200th IFMJ guide. And for how big the country is and how many people there are in the country compared to France, like that's a pretty small number compared to a few thousand. - Yeah, yeah, it's very different isn't it? And you know, you guys got loads of terrain and loads of options of guiding in there in the States. But what I do see is actually quite a lot of American guides come over to you in the summer because it's like, hey, it's easier to put together like, you know, programs and you know. And it seems that you can actually like make more money as well over in Europe, you know. From what I've heard, I've just talking to like other guides, you know, if you work for like some of those companies in Jackson doing stuff on the ground teetons, like my understanding is like, as an IFMJ guide it's probably about three to four hundred dollars a day or something like that. - Whereas that's fairly standard for a day rate. - Yeah, whereas in, in Europe, you could definitely charge 500 euros a day or more, you know. - Well, the rate is like five to eight hundred a day depending on where you are. But the guide take is about 30 to 50% of that depending on the company. - Wow, so they're really like milking these guides for everything that they're. - And then it's also a function of like the insurance and the liability and the permitting process 'cause like a user day for a permit is quite a decently expensive too depending on the forest. So like there's definitely other functions that play into it. But we have that permitting process, whereas y'all don't have this like as stringent of a permitting process for land use. But you have the requirement to be certified. - Yeah. - Fully IFMJ, whereas I could be completely uncertified and still call myself a ski guide in work in the US. - Yeah, it's interesting the difference that, yeah. - Yeah. - Yeah. Well, to transition a little bit, I'm curious like why you've started to focus on mentorship and teaching. At least that's what appears through your social media and what you put out. - Yeah, so I mean, I kind of like. I've been making content like that for. Many years, actually, way before I was a guide, I was working for a company called EpicTV, which was a, they were kind of like a big media company and then they transitioned to becoming like an online climbing and skiing and snowboarding shop. And I was with them for several years and I was running the Gear Geek part of it. So we were doing, I was doing ski reviews and I was doing climbing related gear videos and my job was basically making these videos and posting it on there, on their stuff. So I got all this experience of that type of presenting and creating those kind of episodes. And I kind of, I did enjoy it, but then the guide scheme came along and I kind of like transitioned into doing that. And then I kind of like. Simultaneously in doing the guide scheme, I was like doing somehow to tip videos on YouTube and then also started to do on Instagram. And people just really liked it and I was getting really good traction with it and it just kind of like. It just led me to continue doing it. And I found that like. It was pretty enjoyable, a lot of it, but there is actually quite a few negative sides to it often, especially if you post something which is a bit controversial or if you're trying to get engagement, sometimes it ends up having to be a little bit controversial or grabbing people's attention in some way. And you know, I've had my fair dose of like pretty harsh comments and you know, sometimes you're just kind of like checking in on what's going on and you find this like super harsh comment. And you're like, whoa. So I've had to get pretty good at like blocking that out and just kind of like getting on with it regardless because I definitely see that there's more people who find value in it than kind of like get super wild up. And it's like, it's hard when your intention is to teach. It's like there has to be a level of like grabbing attention because there's so many people trying to do it balanced against the like, I'm just being in Influency like attention grabbing person and providing no value. Yeah, and I find that to be quite a challenge. Yeah, I mean like, yeah, I mean, Instagram is like, is just kind of like full of people trying to grab your attention right. And a lot of that seemingly content is just kind of, yeah, sort of kind of entertain or you know, to whatever it is, you know, and I really, I don't really buy into a lot of that stuff. I actually really like social media for like the learning that you can have from it. You know, finding these new concepts or these new ideas or just like, you know, I follow a load of like random different channels everything from like mindfulness stuff to like, yeah, climbing and skiing related things or just like DIY and things like that. You know, but I'm using it to like learn and I think a lot of people and I think that's a really positive side of like social media. And I'm just kind of like trying to lean into that as much as possible. But then also, you know, I'm trying to like make some extra money as well. There's though like hiding it, you know, I'm trying to work with brands so I can have like some sponsorship. So I don't have to like, you know, pay for gear and that I can, you know, get some brand deals and like do do some like sponsored content. And yeah, so I'm just trying to keep it like as close to being useful content. But whilst also like satisfying the brands that I'm working with as well, which is a little bit of a balance, but I don't know, still kind of how if you're open to talking about it, maybe it can be about a specific brand or like more generalities. How do you balance that of like still providing the value in like maybe not pushing pieces of equipment that are not great? Because every brand has awesome stuff and every brand has some kind of crappy stuff. Yeah, I mean, I do genuinely love most of the gear from most of the brands that I work with, which makes it a lot easier. And I think like there being like, for example, in RAB, there is a big selection of stuff. And there's things that I wouldn't order and I wouldn't use. And there's things that I use all the time and I really like. And there's things about some of those items that I would definitely improve as well. But you know, that's also part of being an like ambassador ambassador or an athlete for one of these brands is giving them those that feedback on it. Yeah, balancing it is. Yeah, I mean, like trying to create content which is like interesting grabs people's attention and has like some way of leading people into being interested in that gear is that's what I'm trying to do. And I think there's been several videos that have done pretty well with that and some of them don't do that well. And that's fine. You know, you just try things out and do different things. But recently I've been kind of getting really inspired to do more like more like risk management type stuff. I think that's like a subject that's really interesting me a lot more these days rather than sort of like nodding out on gear. Like I feel like my gears pretty well dialed and you know, new things come along and I keep track of that. But excuse me. But yeah, I'm kind of more interested in like in the sort of risk management or that type of stuff at the moment. So I'm kind of like looking more at that. Yeah, like I've noticed that a lot of people love the gear 'cause it's something that I feel like it's easier to grasp or like makes a little bit more sense. And like feels like the thing that'll make you better without really having to do much. It seems like it's missing the point to me. Sometimes when it comes to just like, hey, here's the newest latest piece of gear. Like I'm curious why you've shifted from focusing on gear to a risk management focus at least in the immediate or lately. Yeah, I mean, I think with the sport or with sports that are as complex as Alpine climbing and ski mountaineering, there's so many different areas where you can gain like an advantage in some way of whether it's safety or speed or comfort or you know, just any kind of thing like that. There's so many different ways that you can gain small advantages from being like fitter, stronger, having the right gear, having the right mindset, having the right motivation, whatever it is. And I think like I spent a while really focused on gear and making sure that like I understood like what I was choosing and what worked and what didn't work and I was kind of like on that journey myself and I've kind of hit a point where I'm like, well, I've got loads of gear. I know exactly what it is I need to use on a day-to-day basis. I'm not like bringing excess stuff. I'm not bringing things that don't work. And you know, I can tell what's good and what's bad. So I feel like I've kind of gone through that journey myself and not to say I haven't been through like a risk management journey, but it's just like something that I'm like, well, I've learned quite a lot about this over the years, but there's more to learn and there's more to kind of delve into there. So I'm kind of like, it's just a subject that's kind of interesting me more at the moment. And I think it's something that people are interested in as well, but it's not quite as jazzy and catchy as like the newest bindings or the newest, whatever it is, you know, people are attracted to shiny things and management might not be here. It feels more tangible. Yeah, yeah. Like until you've had that experience of like one of the earliest discussions I did was a gentleman who reached out from British Columbia and was like, hey, I had like four near misses in the past few years. Like, would you be open to me sharing a slideshow about them? And like, I think it's harder for those like those experiences to be like tangible or like as visceral maybe until you have an experience that's similar. Whereas like, you can under, I think it's a little easier to understand like putting your hands on a new ski boot and being really excited to click by. Yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah, you just kind of have to like, you get to a point with gear, right? Where you're like, well, I'm not going to get much more out of like fiddling around and doing things. He's just like, I've got as much performance out of this as possible now, it's kind of up to me. But at the same time, it's a very, in a lot of ways, if you think about all these things that you could gain an advantage with, like the hard ones, like training, aren't that appealing to most people. They're not like, oh, I'm just going to do more training and I'm going to get better. They're more like, well, I've just by lighter stuff and it'll be easier, just throw money at it, you know. But if you can do both training definitely takes good good. Yeah, if you can definitely takes more consistent time. Yeah, yeah, exactly. But if you, if you train and you got to get the light stuff, then you're getting like the ultimate advantage in that respect of like feeling light and strong and being able to do it. I've totally found myself falling into the like, I'm just going to buy the new, the new lightest thing and I'm like, wait a second, I give people a shit for buying the new lightest thing because it's like, you could just continue to train and it's cheaper. Like maybe a little bit more sweat equity and maybe a little bit more time. Yeah, but you could just go do the thing and then you'd be more ready to do it and not need to spend the thousand dollars on the new boots. Yeah. And you also get to hopefully the outside doing that training and having a good time outside and running some laps on your local hill or whatever it is. For you, did this shift in mindset? Was it tied to the development of Oak or like, what was the genesis for like Oak becoming a thing in your world? Yeah, so the founder of Meal reached out to me in the spring. Is it two years ago now? I can't remember. Times flies very fast, but he reached out and he was like, Hey, I'd love to get you on board as a co-founder and I was like, I'm way too busy. Don't talk to me right now. And he's like, no, I really think we should have a conversation. Like this is really interesting. And I was like, okay, fine, we'll meet for a coffee. So met for a coffee and he sort of explained his whole plan and what he wanted to do and what he'd already done. And I was like, okay, you've put like a lot of thought and effort into this. It's a really strong idea. I think people will buy into it. It's probably going to take time. I'm like stoked to be part of it and like sort of, you know, see what I can offer to it. And so we worked together quite closely for like several months and we had some really good conversations and we got some really good ideas together. And we started like getting the whole kind of like plan together. And then I kind of wasn't so much enjoying being in an office. And I was just really missing like being outside in the lifestyle that I had like as a guide. And I just sort of decided to step out of being like in the office and just kind of take a little bit more of a backseat role in in oak and just kind of like be still part of the, like I'm still a big part of the brand. Like we have conversations and we have, you know, I keep track of like what's what they're doing. But I'm not like doing the day-to-day running of it. You know, Emil and the other guys are like doing all that, which is awesome. And I think they're doing a great job. And, you know, we sort of like collaborate a little bit on certain things and things great. And like I think is definitely hitting this sort of trajectory where people are really starting to take notice, note of it. And I think, you know, over the next few months, like as we add like potentially a few more features or a few more elements of the app that are just going to be useful, like a guide marketplace is like one of the things that we really want to develop. I think it's just going to slowly take off and be like the place that people want to go to like find partners and organize things with existing partners or in their clubs and groups and things. And that's really the vision that we have. And yeah, I'm like excited by it, but it just wasn't for me to like work in an office like on that. I think, yeah, I totally get that. Working on the computer and sitting in front of the computer is not the same as going and doing the thing that gets you excited at all. And I'm curious what was or what about that initial vision that a meal shared quite your attention? Yeah, I mean, it was the sort of, I think this sort of scalability of it was really interesting. You know, it's like, this is something that could be a big thing, you know, like as big as as big as Strava, perhaps. And I was just like, that would just be really cool to be part of something that's that, that's that big and being part of that and also trying to keep it like in the right direction in that we're trying to be, yeah, just very like focused on like mountain sports and not like trying to do other things and just trying to be, make sure that we're offering like a good experience for people. But yeah, I think it was just like, it is really difficult for a lot of people to find partners. Post-COVID, I feel like it's even more difficult for people to just like go and chat and kind of figure things out. And and like this sort of this sort of element of being able to organize things and like head out and do a social event or you know, go and do like a social climate people to make friends, it just seemed like a really good idea. And yeah, that was kind of what drew me in. Historically there have been stuff like the mountain project forums, I don't know how used mountain project is in Europe. It's very popular in the US and then like Facebook groups and whatnot for finding different partners and like WhatsApp threads. What about what y'all have put together is different and or better than like those other options and like how did you solve some of the problems that showed up with them? Yeah, so so we don't have the mountain projects in Europe or perhaps we do but it's just not used at all. We do have some other like forums like in the UK we have UK climbing, which is like a website and people post. Excuse me, onto all different like forum topics on there and there's like partner finding and all that kind of stuff. And then in there you have like a log book and a profile and that's like it's like good. You know, you can look at people's profile and see what they've been up to. But with like something like Facebook, you can't really see what people's experience is. So, you know, you sort of chatting with somebody about going skiing but you have to go through this whole conversation of like what their experiences and what their fitness is and what they're kind of like wrist tolerances and what equipment they have and all this kind of stuff. And my vision really with Oak, which I don't think that we've actually nailed it yet. And I think it's something that we're going to be like looking to like vastly improve over the next few years or the next few months even is. I want it to be really clear like what people's level is when you look at somebody's profile so that you can see people's experience and you can see the skills that they have or the skills that they believe they have perhaps because it's very difficult to like. Actually, assess people, although there are some ways that we're sort of thinking about like whether you have like. You know, you could you could upload your call like your qualifications into the app hope, you know, that's something that we want to do is like have you done an avalanche course yet. Great, let's upload it. Let's get it verified that that's actually real and you get a badge on the app so people can see or that you've got this. Qualification and then if people actually start using it a little bit more to log their activities. Perhaps if there's a way that we could make it a little bit more like Strava, perhaps where you're like logging your activities and you're actually actively putting things in there, then you'll be able to see like an actual logbook of things that you're doing and. Yeah, that that kind of stuff, I think we could definitely nail it a lot more and then, you know, when I go on the app and I say, I want to go skiing tomorrow in Shamani and somebody signs up, you know, it's very easy to just see this guy. Excuse me, I've had this sore throat cuff thing for several weeks now, you know, you could see what that person's like level is and what their skills are and what their experiences and you just feel a lot more comfortable about it. And if it's like, if that was really good and really neat and clean and easy to use for everybody, I think that would be the thing that sets it apart from anything else and that's kind of what I want to. I'm picturing like sort of four things crossed together, which is one like I'm interested in doing this thing, who else wants to do a partner finder to a resume. Like my cousin actually was the one that introduced me to this initially, he was he's a glaciologist, he was like, yeah, whenever I post on Facebook that I'm looking for a partner, I share my resume of skiing. And be like, hey, I want you to equal or exceed this resume and please share yours and that was like a great filter for him. And for me, that was a light bulb moments of resume to three would be like the old a day where it's like a logbook and for folks that may not be familiar, like a day was a climbing logbook that you could just like tick off climbs and it gave you points for the difficulty of the climbs that kind of gamified it, but I can like go look and compare myself against Adam, Andra, who I think is still logging a stuff on a day, it seems like yeah, or other people in my area, see what people had to say about the climb and then the sort of fourth is like a community chat forum where like people can talk conditions, you can talk like beta on different routes and sort of like bringing those four pieces together into one ecosystem is like my take from the outside. Yeah, I think that's that's pretty much it, you know, like the communities that we have, they're turning into like almost like message boards and things that people can like, you know, ask questions and chat about things, but yeah, I think there is still some work to do on the like logbook and the resume and other things like that. But it's moving in the right direction. Yeah, for sure. Was it anything that surprised you about like early interactions or like user behavior on the app as it started to roll out and gain some traction. Yeah, I mean, I did it's funny actually like, yeah, you kind of you do notice that people they either like embellish their level a little bit either because they don't really know they've got like a perception that doesn't necessarily match up with reality or it could be the other way that they've actually got like, you know, they've got more experience and they're kind of like downplaying it a little bit. So I think like having a proper, having proper tools to like get people in the right bracket of this is where you're at is good, but it is difficult as well because people, you know, there's there's people who put a lot of time into learning skills. But they don't have much experience. If you can match the skills and the experience up, then that's like very potent, you know, it's like you need to know how to do certain, like, especially with something like Alpine climbing where there's a lot of like different skills or with ski managing where there's a lot of, you know, technical skills that you need. You can learn a lot of those things at home, but then you can also get, you know, you need to go and get experience using those skills and also decision making and route planning and route finding and just movement skills that you can't learn at home. So yeah, I think like noticing that people, you know, maybe that they had like loads of skills, but not so much experience, but they were sort of saying that they were like quite experienced or the opposite way round where they were sort of like I've done, I've done loads. But then, you know, some of the basic skills aren't there, and you're like, huh, that's interesting, like, you know, remember meetings, one of the one of their like ambassadors, I was like running some courses and one of the ambassadors came like we were doing something and he done loads of stuff in the mountains, he's been like climbing all over the place and doing loads of different stuff. And I was like, yeah, just tie in with a cloth hitch there, and he didn't know how to tie a cloth hitch. And I was like, how can you not tie, how have you got to this point without being able to tie a cloth hitch like is so useful. And he's like, I just never really bothered. I just tie an over and where I want it and click into that. I'm like, all right. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of funny. It is really interesting how that's not even, I don't know, I don't know, that's even a good example of it like an old technique that stuck around, but it's really interesting how like old techniques and things like just really seem to hold on. Like one of the ones in the military that just holds on and won't let go is like using a figure eight for repelling. Yeah. I think figure eights can be totally useful. But at the same time, they're way better tools now. Yeah. Yeah. That's yeah. It's funny how certain things do like hold on or it's sort of like indoctrinated into that system. Like it's perhaps like their first experience with repelling is always with a figure of eight because that's what they have in the military. And they're like, well, it must be the best. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Or sometimes when you don't have the figure eights, you'll just do like three wraps around a carabiner and call it good. It creates a really, it twists the ropes even worse than a month or does. I kind of imagine. Yeah. Yeah. Are there or what have you seen from folks you've worked with or like watched out there like that have done it well where like they come in and they have the skills that like once they get into the terrain, they're really just kind of able to launch because they've built the foundation that they need to do so. Yeah. I think people who like, so this is something that I've been kind of like trying to think about a lot more because I've been building out some of my own like online courses. So over the summer, I built an online course for Alpine climbing. It's available on my website. You can sign up. It's like 175 euros to sign up and it's like six and a half hours of videos. And it takes you basically from being like, I don't know, a hill walker or a indoor climber or rock climber in the UK to being able to like go and do your first Alpine climbing trip, you know. So it's like what gear do you need what techniques you need what skills you need and the idea is just to like give you that basis of like knowledge. So that when you turn up and do that in person course, you're not like learning all these things that you could have just been working on at home. You know, like how if you've, if you've never tied a figure of eight, you need to just go and practice and you can do that at home, you don't need to stand at the base for crag to do that, you know. And if you, if you need to adjust your crampons, there's no point in paying a guide to tell you how to do that, you can watch a video about about that. You know, it's a much more efficient way of like learning these small little gear hacks and whatever. So that was the kind of idea with that course. And then from that I kind of came up with this other idea, which is doing a skill tracker. So it was basically making a list of different skills that you need for any given the first one it was for like ski mountaineering. So I just listed out 120 different skills, you know, all different types of things. And the idea is you just go down through the list and you mark like whether or not you have like, you know, mastered that skill, whether it's something that needs practicing or whether you've never even heard of it and you need to like learn it. And I think something like that just gives you real focus on what it is you need to learn. So that you're not just kind of like getting lost down weird YouTube rabbit holes about like ghosting or something that you're never going to use, you know. It's like you can you can just have like a clear focus on on what it is you need those like hard skills that you need to learn. And then the implementing those skills and getting experience, you kind of need like the mentorship from an experienced partner or a guide to be able to structure how you're going to like begin to make dangerous or put yourself in a dangerous environment and make decisions. You know, that's like you need some like shaping and mentorship to do that. But if you can learn those just hard skills, that's something you can do at home. And before you do that course, so you're not wasting time on that course, learning these skills that you could learn at home, that's kind of like my idea with it. It is really awesome. So it's really awesome when somebody should I was going to say it's really awesome when somebody shows up and you're able to like just go instead of having to like show them how to put their crampons on show them how to hold an ice axe because if they've done that already then they're saving or they're making their experience more valuable because they can actually move through the terrain and do the things they can't do at home. Yeah, whereas like you can build your fitness, you could learn how to tie a handshake clove at home while you're like lying in bed if you want to and then you get that much more out of actually going into terrain. Yeah, because you're actually able to apply it and then see different things that you can apply to the same situation. Yeah, and like, you know, if you're let's say, I mean, I've done loads of days out with people where we kind of like head up the midi or we head up the skyway and we go and do some Alpine Ridge together. And if their focus is on like buckling up their crampons and tying into the rope and, you know, tying a clothing and things like that, then you can only cover so so many of those skills in in one day because you also want to kind of do a journey and like move through the mountains, you don't just want to stand around looking at skills. So the more of those like small little nitty gritty skills that you can have in place before you go and do that first journey with a guide, the more you can be then focused on the movement skills or route finding or decision making or those key things that, you know, that's where you really will find a lot of value from being with a guide is learning those things. So yeah, we just encourage people to like think of it in that way and I also like use another analogy, which is like like a plumber who's going to somebody's house to fix a problem. You know, they have like a toolbox and in that toolbox, they have a whole bunch of different tools, some of those tools get used loads, you know, the type that pull those tools out all the time to do certain things. You also got a load of very like specialist tools in the bottom of there that they might not ever use, but it's good to have them just in case they come up with that. Come up against that weird problem, so there is like there is value in having a broad set of tools in your toolbox to be able to draw on in different situations. But that alone isn't going to make you the best climber or the best alpinist, you know, you also need to be fit and you need to be motivated and you need to be experienced and have, you know, good sense of when things are dangerous and when you can kind of turn off and that's just like yeah. I think that toolbox analogy is like just reminds people that you know, yes, there are some really key skills that you need, but there is value in having like these other more complex skills in your toolbox. What what do you see as some of the core skills and then some of the specialty skills for the mountains, you can pick like alpine climbing ski, monitoring, whatever, like whatever subset you want, but like what are some of those key skills that you see vers specialty. I mean key skills are like, you know, things to do with repelling things to do with be laying things to do with, you know, movement techniques on rock and ice and things like that, but, you know, you can only really get those skills from being in that environment. And then the, you know, the more specialist skills are perhaps more like rescue scenarios or dealing with like some weird pendulum or, you know, on a route or some some come up, you're on a ridge and you come across like just a five meter super steep drop. And you could take the rope off and you could put it through the anchor and do a repel and then you could take pull the rope back down again and then you could, you know, put it back on your body and coil up and everything or you could just thread a bite of rope through that my own and repel on the two strands of that bite just to get down that five meters and then pull that bike back through the my own and you haven't taken the coils off and you haven't taken the rope system apart. You've just done this weird little trick to overcome that step and, you know, you've just saved yourself five minutes, perhaps, you know, of like messing around with taking the rope off and putting it back on again. So those types of skills when you start figuring them out and that, you know, that might be that that sort of skill is actually like more of like a top end guide skill that you that you have, but I think, you know, if you're trying to move faster and get better in the mountains having these little things, you know, these little tools that that you can pull out occasionally can can save you a lot of time and energy, you know. So it's things like it's things that save you time and energy and and that you all things that you need in a sticky situation, you know, one of the classic ones that I that I see is like I do a multi pitch rescue course, which is like a one day really intense course and we spend. Probably about an hour and a half to two nearly two hours of that just doing lowering how do you lower somebody from a reversal in guide mode, you know, an ATC guide in guide mode, because it's not as easy as you think, you know, and like, unless you study it and you figure out all these different ways of doing it and when that way works and when this way doesn't work and, you know, how all the ways that you could kill somebody doing it, you know, you have to spend time figuring that out and you can only really do that by reading a book about it or watching some videos about it and then practicing it at home or practicing it in the climbing wall, you know, on the ground with a five meter piece of rope. You don't need to go and do it at the crack you can do it at home and you just nail those skills in so that you it's just there, but it's something that you very rarely ever need, but when you do need it, it's it's really important, you know, so those types of specialty skills are like definitely good to start working on and having having focus on that and I think that skill tracker that I made. And I've nearly finished the alpine climbing what I'm doing and I'm going to release it and maybe next week. That's I think that's a good way to just be like keep focus on those from those different like core skills. Yeah, one of the ones that comes to mind for me that I like love when I'm able to pull it out is the lower client and then counterbalance repel and flip the rope off a horn. That's one of the ones where it's like we don't have as much alpine terrain here the US you don't pull it out that often, but it's like when I see it, I'm like so psyched to build the to actually put that skill into play because it's so slick when you're actually able to do it. Yeah, that one is a funny one. I've actually had I know a couple of guides who've had some pretty serious accidents with that. Broke his back this summer trying to do that. So I think all these types of skills. They can be really fun and they can be really slick, but there's also loads of ways that you can mess them up as well. So there's like as much about learning all the different ways that you could mess that up and and make a real. Either full of yourself or really make something serious, you know, just just on that one like what my friend was like lowered his client down and a little bit of extra rope came down that he didn't notice and that got caught around a rock. Like like a small bit of rock on the ground and he pulled the rope tight like what he what he felt was tight. And then he repelled on the other side, you know, so it's counterbalance, unclips his lanyard sat on the belay device and then that rock. The rope was wrapped around just flipped over and then, you know, an extra like six meters of rope just came into the system and he fell six meters down flipped upside down and broke his back. And he was just like he was so bummed he was so so bummed and we chatted about it and he was just like I know what I should have done and I was like I know that you know what you should have done and I was like why didn't you do it and he was just like I don't know like. But I mean there's the secret with that is just repell on both strands, you know, why why just repell on the counterbalance side yeah yeah so it's like you can still accomplish the same thing but by just repelling on both strands but you know sometimes the counterbalance does work quite well and it's quite important in guiding but it's like it's got to work and it's got to be clear communication as well. But yeah, yeah, the clear communication is in my opinion the critical part and then also kind of like if you're trying to lower say like because typically we don't lower client first in many cases unless there's some specific criteria that are met like you can see where you're sending them to. Yeah, or you like know the terrain really intimately and so that's another one where it's like with advanced skills it's like you want to have more control. And having eyes on is a way of having more control yeah yeah I've been getting into using radios a little bit more. Totally yeah radios are getting to be. But good actually when they don't work it's really frustrating. Yeah, especially when you've forgotten to like teach the rope tug. Yeah, but man it can get rid of so much ambiguity but it does yeah you still need to have that like core how to do it. Without the radio skills so yeah. I really need to have a little drink of water or something yeah totally like a little second sorry yep. Yeah, no I'm I'm able to edit things out pretty easily. Yeah, I just got really tick to the throat. Okay, I'm good so far we've like kind of bounced on our bond standard some skills. What are some things because like I I don't know you and your ecosystem of stuff all that well like what are some things that we might not have hit that you like to talk. To know really I'm like. Yeah, like I said I'm like fairly I'm fairly focused on this sort of risk management stuff. But I'm I'm also putting together this big project this winter big like filming projects in my mind is kind of like very occupied with that these days. I'm super excited for this project is kind of going to be a little bit like Cody towns ends the 50 but in Europe and I've been like. Basically bringing all these companies together to try and like make this this project happen and it was looking like it's coming together at least at at least in a way that I can like get started with it. So what's your role in it. I'm basically the like the Cody of it and then I've got a friend who's like a filmer. Coming along but the idea is to kind of like yeah bring in like other pros and just go out and like discover and ski like the best ski adventures that we have in Europe. So yeah it's like something that I've been thinking about doing for a while and actually like. Part of the reason for like building up my YouTube channel so that I could do something like this and actually make like a video series like outside. So it's something that I've been like working on quite a lot over the last few months and been thinking a lot about and also. These sort of online courses that I'm doing as well so. Yeah I haven't actually been doing like a huge amount of like adventures outside and I think like that that can be quite challenging. I'm sure you're noticing that with like being a new dad it's like when you're used to doing a lot of like things outside and then you kind of go into dad world you like this is intense. But my wife is amazing with the kids yeah we get like we do trade off quite a bit so we can do stuff like at the weekends and we have like childcare through the week. But that's a really interesting part of life these days like figuring things out with kids. How's how's it been being a dad so far. Yeah it's it's been fun and what was cool is because my wife was really understanding like when she felt like a whale when she was pregnant and couldn't do any felt like she couldn't do anything. She understood that like there wasn't much that I could do for her to make her more comfortable than we were already doing and so she was very open to me going like ticking off the boxes that I really wanted to get after this summer. And so I actually managed to tick off all of the things that I wanted to within climbing over this summer to the point of where I sent my hardest project track climb on gear the day before my son was born. And then went into the hospital the next day for my wife to be induced and so like for me one is like I was able to tick off those pieces so that I didn't have to worry about them or didn't feel like I was missing out. Yeah well I now have this intentionally built in like quote unquote rest period. Yeah and then fitness wise it's also helped that my wife is one and she's been really understanding and really supportive she's like get out of the house go do something for two hours. And let get out like go yeah because I'm not a great person to be around if I don't get some sort of movement or training in it's been doubly hard because I have a foot injury right now oh yeah. So like I can't run so I've been like stairmastering and biking almost exclusively outside of climbing yeah which is which is sycophian and monotonous yeah that sounds quite similar to my. I had a I badly sprained my ankle when my eldest daughter was one and yeah that that was that was challenging yeah it's a but yeah it's it's I think it's going to sound funny but I think like once you. You know if you're an outdoor type person you're doing lots of like exercise and activity you are a bad person once you've done something yeah with your day yeah do like it's like I had a day today where. I had a few beers last night um wasn't feeling my my best this morning didn't manage to do any exercise today can't say I had my best day with the kids but we got through it. And yeah that's like it's nice to not have too many of those days and just still get out and get some exercise totally yeah because it's a matter of consistency and like continuing to do the things regardless if you feel great or not yeah what I'm curious about for you is. As because I just got out of the military within the last year and so it used to be that weekends were my time to go do things and now weekends are like my prime time to work in weekdays are my prime time to go do things but all the people I do the things with still have weekends free. Because because like of my partner subset yeah so it's like I'm curious how imagine something similar happened to you as you like transition from epic to guiding so I'm curious how you've handled that yeah we weekends is a funny it's been a funny thing is changed a lot like I you know I obviously. Epic TV I had weekends the same as everybody else and you know got used to that and then going and doing guiding it's sort of like yeah it's a is a prime time to work guiding and then and now having kids like I can't really do. Anything with the week with the weekends because we got two young kids we haven't got any family nearby so we generally are like either doing stuff together or trading off looking after the kids so. You know expecting to do any work or any training over the weekend i've kind of like given up on that which is which is fine it's like. Sometimes we trade off and I go for like a bike ride or I do do some like strength training at home or something like that and that feels good and but yeah I mean it's just part of. Having kids you know the weekends are like time with the kids and yeah but i've had to kind of adapt guiding. Around that as well which is also quite challenging like I do occasionally work one day of the weekend if. My wife is okay with that generally if I asked her and she was you know mentally prepared for it should be totally fine she can easily look after the kids she she's she's an amazing woman she can definitely. Handle it without me it's just nicer doing things all together by trying not to sell too many trips at the weekend but I quite often find that people are coming for a week and you know they'll arrive on a Saturday they'll do like. A warm update themselves on the Sunday or they'll go. Ski around or go for a climb or a hike or something and and then we'll do like you know five days together during the week perhaps and then and then I'll head home again on the Saturday perhaps and that seems to work pretty well yeah. But then in France they don't have school on Wednesdays no child goes to school on Wednesdays so I have this extra day at the moment where. In the middle of the week I'm looking after my eldest Olivia because my wife's working full time at the moment. So I'm really looking forward to that being like going out and skiing and you know getting some time on skis with with her this winter and. And as she gets older it would be easier to go and do things but we've been we've been going to the climbing gym loads and she's really. Getting much better at climbing it's really fun to see. How old is she she's three she's already like going up the auto belays like about halfway up and then jumping off and you like that's cool and she's like you know she's really good at moving around and she she loves it yeah. So like fun stuff that's in the future for you guys so and like anybody out there who's like thinking of having kids or has just had kids it does get easier over time and that's like. An important thing to remember when there's tricky times at the start or. I was talking to some of my friends last night and a lot of my friends are like you know. Shaminy mountain climber dudes you know and not many of them have kids and they you know they're very protective of their time and their activities which you know I understand but. I just kind of encourage them to think about like what life would be like you know in 15 20 years time if they hadn't had kids you know. And if your answer is yeah i'm fine with not having kids then that's fine but if it's like it would be nice to have like. That in my life you know then why not just get on with it because the sooner you get on with it then. The more time you have with them to do fun things whilst you're still in good shape you know that's kind of what the way that I was thinking of it is like I don't want to put it off too long and be like kind of tired and. Over it you know i want to be able to like really ski and climb with my my kids when they're when they're old enough and have a good time you know. Instead of being 70 when they're of an age where they can be out and going and doing things and for me what was interesting is my wife and I were intending for like this year after I got out of the military to be like where she was the primary person working I was just able to go and. Like spend the time doing the things I hadn't been able to do and then two months out from me being done with the military we found out she was pregnant. And so my immediate selfish reaction was oh my god my world is over what my free years gone. Right and then it's it's like been really cool to like sort of have this period of almost I guess you call it stepping back and like nesting. At home because now I'm just I'm getting more excited to go do those things and at the same time I don't have the need to go to them because I know I'll be able to at some point. Yeah and so it's been cool for me to like recognize that change of mindset. Yeah yeah yeah I think like yeah you just kind of have you just kind of have to adapt to you like and yeah I certainly went through this like phase of like oh man this is like such a huge change. And then the second kid came along and it was like I don't know you kind of being through it and you're like yeah this is actually a lot easier the second time round and yeah it's like you kind of used you know you've gone through that big transition and it's like. This is just you know how it is and but I think I've got a lot more efficient with my time. Having kids I'm like generally sometimes I'm pretty inefficient but I would say I would say generally I'm more efficient I'm just like you know get it done you know and also enjoy my my time out like in the mountains fully as well. And trying to really like be very present and engage with the family as well I think like that being. Trying to be as present with everything as possible is is the best way rather than like wishing away any specific part of it because kids are only young for a very short period really. You know there are any babies and toddlers for a little while and then it's a different phase. Yeah actually it's been funny in the past year like a bunch of the guides I'm working with have had newborns and so and then also climbing buddies so we've been doing like climbing. We're really like bring the kids or I'll do like swaps with the kids and like my kid is now like just old enough is gotten like the initial vaccinations and whatnot so you can do that yeah so I'm looking forward to doing more and I've taken to the climbing gym a few times and he just like stairs around it all the colors yeah. And like is like like whiplash head like looking at all the things yeah well he's in there so it's been and it's been fun like looking back from the top of the boulder wall and see that he's tracked me to the top of the wall. With his eyes so like and those are like really kind of silly simple things at the same time it's cool yeah that's fun. Well the because we're over an hour now and I just wanted to respect your time start to move towards a close because I know it's a late where you're at I have two questions that I end with and the first is it might be hard. This is often hard for guides I feel like is what's your favorite router objective it can be one that you've done one time in love or like one that you keep coming back to as like the like any objective. Yeah you can pick like skiing or climbing. But not for necessarily for guiding just like a favorite thing yeah it could be something you you love doing on your own and guiding or it could be something or like whatever comes to mind first. Love the one of the best things that I ever did was out in New Zealand skiing the East Face amount cook and it was just like really calm out in really beautiful face it's right across from the heart. We had just a great day going and skiing it and you know we kind of like bootpacked up the face and ski down in really good snow and it wasn't particularly challenging. It was just really like great day out and I was like just remember like thinking I would definitely go and do that again and still have like a really good experience on that and I think like anything that is like that is is great. I think sometimes you have like objectives that are just like yeah you can just keep going and doing them over and over again like things like the Cosmique's a rep for example in Germany. If I you know I happily guide that. Three or four times a year and it's just like just like a little like a friend you know something like that just go and visit the visit the same sort of thing and it's really fun I think like it's nice going to new places but it's nice to remember that there's these like amazing adventures that you can go and do. Like you know still going to be there. Awesome and I'm curious about the mount cook thing it sounds like part of what made it memorable for you was the people you're doing it with. Yeah I was I was out there with my buddy Ross and me and Ross had skied a bunch together and it was just it's just like we had a good partnership at the time like skiing stuff and. Yeah it was just a nice stay out just the two of us and then the next day a bunch of people flew into the hut in helicopters to to go and ski that face that we just skied. And then we got to like meet all those people and chat with them and stuff and it was quite a nice like buzz in the hut that night because it went from being just me and Ross in the hut to then being about 20 people in the hut. So I just remember that kind of like fun buzz around all that as well. Yeah awesome then the last question I ask a bigger picture is for you what about the mountains keeps you coming back and returning. I just see it is like endless challenge and adventure. You know it's like and that doesn't necessarily mean that you need to endlessly challenge yourself. But there's there is always this you can you know and whatever level you're at whether you know you've just had a couple of kids and you haven't done loads of stuff in the mountains and you'd like want to challenge yourself it's so easy to do that and find like a good challenger adventure in the mountains and like. You know struggle to find other sports or things in life that that give me that kind of challenge. Mashed in with adventure so. I think like that's what keeps bringing me back around well Dave thanks for joining and give given some of your some your night to talk. Yeah thanks so much for having me on. Welcome to the after show for this conversation with Dave surle and I initially brought Dave on to talk about oak and finding partners for getting out of the mountains and how that can be kind of hard. And what was really interesting to me is how the conversation naturally float into us talking about something that we share outside of doing things in the mountains which is having kids and I think that for me that was the coolest part of the conversation because it's something I haven't talked about on the podcast yet and I'm sure that there are plenty of folks who are. Parents or considering becoming parents that listen to this and so that was a neat completely unplanned part of the discussion for me if you want to find out more about what Dave is doing you can find his courses and. Some of his other stuff at Dave surle guiding and I'll link that in the show notes as well and then he's also can be found at Dave surle on Instagram and surle is spelled S E R L E if you want to find out more of what he's doing. For oak I'm using that as the tactical alpinism community and I'm going to be charging $5 per month for access to it or $50 a year for access to it and at least 50% of that money is going to go to fund these mentorship events for the 10th mountain foundation that I'm putting on and then. The grant that they provided for me to provide mentorship to folks looking to get into guiding that money that you pay is going to go for access to the tactical alpinism community is is going to go towards continuing mentorship for people looking to get into either mountain guiding or to just get to do more than they currently are in the mountains. So you can find that group at the link in my Instagram bio or in the show notes for the tactical alpinism group on oak it's there's a chat function so we can talk fitness we can talk beta we can talk okay what's the good time to go to this area you can ask questions of folks that are if you're maybe looking at building out some mountain training for your unit there's going to be a section about tactical training in there they can talk and then. The thing I'm really excited about with oak is that the challenge that I've heard from a lot of folks and I experienced myself is when we move when we PCS. It's can be hard to be ripped out of that community you've started to build and then to be put into another one or not have one where you go and so my hope for the group is that folks from Europe in Alaska. Mountain division and fourth infantry division in Colorado and different bases throughout the United States military. And people connected to the military will start to join the tactical alpinism group and start to join oak so as we move between our different locations we can then find partners that match our skills abilities and desires for things we're going to get after. In the mountains to close us out a little bit of CYA and that is the views and opinions expressed on this podcast and the rest of the platform do not necessarily represent the views opinions or official stances of. Any entity that they may represent. Thank you for listening if you like this episode please follow or subscribe to it on. Instagram or actually not Instagram you can follow on Instagram you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple or Spotify and then you can subscribe on YouTube because these are now releasing as videos on YouTube as well. Thanks for listening and I'll catch you next time.