To The Max: A Student Guide to Life

In this episode we discuss:

- Richard's Career as a professional Jockey

- The ins and outs of Horse racing and riding

- The best way to bet on horses

- Adventures to the North and South Poles

- How to adventure travel

- Walking 2000 miles across the length of Japan in 101 days

My guest today is Richard Dunwoody MBE. Originally from Belfast, Richard is a retired British Jockey in National Hunt racing. Over the course of his career he won the Grand National twice, the King George VI chase four times, the Cheltenham Gold cup and the Champion Hurdle. Until 2002, Richard held the record for most career wins, at 1874, and received the Lester award for Jump Jockey of the Year 5 times.

After retiring from racing Richard has turned to presenting, adventuring and photography. He has conducted expeditions globally in an effort to raise money for charities. Expeditions which took him from a 48-day trek to the South Pole, on a route previously attempted by Shackleton, to a 2000 mile walk across the length of Japan, among others. His photography of equine in Pakistan, India, Egypt and Guatemala has been in exhibition at St Martin-in-the-fields, in support of the charity Brooke Hospital for Animals.

Find Richard at:

Instagram: www.instagram.com/richarddunwoody6/

Website: www.richard-dunwoody.com

In this episode we talk about the following topics and more:

- Cycling 2000km across Japan and creating a 27 part series

- Eating and drinking in Japan: the highs and lows

- Being a foreigner in the countryside

- How he become ‘Japanified’

- Why he ended up in Japan

- Travelling the country

- Money, crime and discrimination

- Starting out on youtube

- How the channel grew

- Advice to starting youtube in 2020: tech, strategy and promotion

- Clever marketing vs clickbait

- Monetisation and making a living on Youtube

My Guest today is Chris Broad. Having grown up in the UK, Chris graduated from the University of Kent and moved to Japan to teach English on the JET programme, in 2012. Chris started his youtube channel, Abroad In Japan, the same year and focused on talking about his experiences being a foreigner living in the Japanese countryside and sharing stories about the culture. Today his channel has 1.58 million subscribers and over 190,000,000 views.

After a video about a robot restaurant in Tokyo went Viral the channel rapidly grew. After 3 years of teaching English Chris left and focussed on making a living off of his Youtube channel. As the channel gained more and more subscribers, he transitioned into more travel themed videos showcasing Japan and more recently branching into documentary making on topics such as his eccentric best-friend Natsuki, Japan’s biggest Rockstar - Hyde and the Tohoku Tsunami. He recently finished a 2000km bike ride across the length of the country, where he made daily videos, creating a 27-part series.

Find Chris on:

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHL9bfHTxCMi-7vfxQ-AYtg

Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/1dbguTBIriCwhJXlxTITFe

Website: http://abroadinjapan.com

In this episode we discuss the following topics and more:

- What does corona virus mean for business, tech and liberty

- Is there going to be a big technological leap as a result of this

- Could Corona virus lead to a global conflict: China vs USA

- How will the poorest countries deal with Corona

- How are we going to fix the economy and comparison to 2008

- Is it possible to start a business now and in the near future

- How much money do you need to start a business

- Climate change and business

- Why does entrepreneurship play such a large role in your life

- Consultancy as a career

- How important is education and university in the tech world

- The power and importance of failure

- Selling his company for millions

- Advice for prospective entrepreneurs

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Bio: My Guest today is Tom Adeyoola. After studying Economics at Cambridge, Tom entered the world of Business Consultancy holding the positions of Financial Analyst at Three and Senior Analyst at Warner Bros, among others. Also at this time he managed his friend’s Band, playing at venues all over the UK. The band performed at several music festivals, including the 2003 and 2006 Big Chill festivals, and the 2004 Dour Festival in Belgium. Next he moved into the Online Casino Industry at Inspired Broadcast Networks where he devised the strategy to transform the Bingo and Casino industry with networked electronic gaming terminals, later becoming the Casino Business Manager.

After a year and 8 months, he was promoted to Head of Gaming Products at Inspired Gaming Group, a position he held for one and a half years before leaving to start his own fashion-tech company Metail. Metail made clothing fit for all by digitising every garment for every body to try on, through a mix of the development and combination of technologies from AI and computer vision to physics modelling. Metail raised over $32m, had global clients from Puma to Lidl and was acquired by clothing manufacturing giant TAL, who produce one in six men's dress-shirts in the US, in July 2019. Since then, Tom has been looking for his next big thing, while dedicating his time to his family and philanthropic ventures.

In this episode we talk about the following topics and more:

- An insight into the dance world

- What does training to be a dancer look like

- How much of a commitment is it and how difficult is it

- Injury and the effects it can have

- What are the different careers within dance

- What skills and abilities do you gain from a career in dance will you be able to use in other fields

- Growing up in Holland

- What is Holland like - any underrated places for tourists

- 5 most useful words in Dutch

- Difference between a good dancer and a great one

- Highest and lowest points in her career

- How do you then become a choreographer and why?

- Creative process and self assessment

- Creating her own dance company

- Advice for anyone thinking about pursuing a career in dance and then choreography

- Advice for people currently training and how to get into a company

- Particular exercises to work on to help with dance - strength and flexibility

- Nutrition tips

- What does the future look like for Didy?

Bio: My guest today is Didy Veldman. Didy starting dancing from a young age in Holland, training in variety of dance styles. At 17, she joined a professional dance company, that focused more on classical ballet. After 3 years, Didy decided she needed a change and joined a more contemporary dance company in Geneva, where she danced for 5 years. Next, Didy was offered a job in London at the Rambert Dance Company as a professional dancer and a choreographer, a position she loved so much, over time her contract changed from an initial 9 months to 6 years. After that Didy received several offers from international companies to create works for them. This led Didy to the decision to take her career in a new direction as a freelance choreographer, travelling all around the world, creating works for 16 years. After deciding she wanted to spend less time travelling and more time at home with her family, she created her own contemporary dance company ‘Humanoove’ in 2016. Humanoove is a mashup of human, move, you and manoeuvre, words which centrally theme in the companies pieces. The company creates dance works that are engaging, physical, humorous, accessible and in 2019 funding was given to develop Humanoove’s latest work - @Home - a piece that explores the themes of home, belonging, identity and the effect of Globalisation. If you’d like to check out Humanoove, links will be left in the description to the website and instagram.

/Website and Instagram: http://www.didyveldman.com @humanoove /Photo credit: Chris Nash

In this episode we talk about the following topics and more:

- A short introduction into fashion

- Why fashion is important

- How important are qualifications within the industry

- What would you recommend studying?

- What do the different courses cover?

- Working at Vogue

- How important is what you wear within the fashion industry

- Is copying others fashion bad?

- Standing out vs doing your time

- Is it always important to say what you think

- What’s it like being a fashion magazine editor

- What’s the point of fashion shows?

- Why do the clothes worn at shows look so crazy?

- Is all publicity, good publicity?

- How has the industry changed

- The rise and power of influencers

- The Fashion Brand lifecycle

- How hard it is to create a brand and the disconnect between learning and practising

- Can you teach yourself to be a harder worker

- The power of self belief and limiting beliefs

- Starting her own fashion brand

- What are the different industries within fashion

- How to take an idea and turn it into a product

- How much does starting a fashion brand cost?

- Brand marketing

- The future for the industry

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Bio: My Guest today is Sarah Walter. While studying a degree in Fashion Communications and Promotion at St Martin’s School of Art in London and on placement at Vogue Magazine, Sarah was offered a job as a fashion assistant at the company. She took the job deciding to drop the degree and focus on working within the industry. After two years of hard work, she was promoted to the position of Accessories Editor - responsible for 10 pages a month. Next Sarah moved to Africa for a few years and after she returned she took the position of Fashion Director at Marie Claire, responsible for 130 pages. After 7 years, Sarah decided she wanted to leave the journalism side and move into the business side of the industry, joining New Look as the head of Fashion Communications. 6 years later Sarah moved to River Island as the Director of Fashion Communications. After 2 years, she started style-passport her online holiday fashion and beauty brand, which featured in articles in Vogue and many other major publications. She ran the company for two years until she took up her most recent role as Chief Creative Officer at Metail, a tech fashion company, in 2013. The company sold in 2019 and since then Sarah has been focusing on the next chapter of her life.

In this episode we cover the following topics and more:

- Why Vicky Joined the RAF

- Studying Languages at Leeds and how that helped her later in her career

- Traveling around the world with the Airforce

- What kind of person would she recommend the military to and how to improve personal leadership skills

- What she would say to people who aren’t sure about joining up and the Reserves

- Training: Fun, fitness, sleep depravation and the transfer from university to the forces

- Resilience and pre-sign up fitness advice

- Planes, weapons and machinery

- Deployment: Cyprus, RAF Benson, Gulf War and day to day operations

- Being asked to head the military executive lead for the Invictus games

- Military life and the return to civilian life

- Important skills and traits for military success

- Military mindset and dealing with putting your life on the line everyday

- Being called to war and would she recommend the military to her children?

- Impressive and Humbling moments at the Invictus Games and working closely with Prince Harry

- Influences - books and people

- Dealing with stress and risk

- Future goals: GB Snowsport, Fintech and the Rugby Centurions

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Bio: My guest today is Victoria Gosling OBE. Vicky studied French and Spanish at Leeds University before dedicating 21 years to the Royal Air Force. After leaving University she went through 6 months training to become deployable. She rose quickly through the ranks to the prestigious position of Group Captain, deploying all around the world. Her first tour was in Cyprus, followed by the Gulf War, finishing her career as the Base Support Commander for a Support Helicopter Base, leading 2000 in Afghanistan. In 2014 she was asked to become the Military Project Lead for the First Invictus Games, which brought together 400 wounded veteran athletes from 14 nations to compete in London. In 2016 she became Chief Executive Officer for Games, again closely working alongside Prince Harry in Orlando, USA. Vicky currently involves herself with many sporting and social enterprises, holding the positions of Chief executive of GB Snowsport, custodian of the Rugby Centurions, Invictus Games strategic Advisor and Board director for a FinTech Business that provides solutions to social issues, based in Manchester.

In this episode we talk about the following topics and more:

- Are Olympians born or made?

- Why he got into rowing in the first place

- Breakdown of rowing as a sport

- Olympic selection

- How to achieve balance and his philosophy on sacrifice

- Relationship with Steve Redgrave and Mathew Pinsent

- What makes someone a world class rower

- What did training for the Olympics look like

- Athlete funding and having a second job

- Over-training and Injuries

- Training on a rowing machine vs on the river

- How to become stronger and fitter with rowing specific exercises

- Free weights vs Isolation exercises

- How to train for mental toughness

- Visualisation techniques: what, why, how

- Whats it like actually being at the olympics?

- Why did he retire when he did?

- Why did he come out of retirement for one last olympics

- Advice for future Olympians

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Bio: My guest today is Greg Searle MBE. At the age of 20 greg rowed in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, winning a Gold medal at the coxed pairs event alongside his brother Jonny. 20 years later, after being retired for 12 years he returned as part of the men’s eight at the London 2012 Olympics aged 40 and won Bronze. Originally more interested in ball games, Greg started taking rowing seriously after watching his brother win the Princess Elizabeth Cup at the Henley Royal Regatta in 1985. To begin with the brothers trained separately and after realising they worked well together in the boat, they formed a bond that would take them to their first Olympics. Over the course of his career Greg rowed at four different Olympics, with a medal record of 1 Gold and 2 Bronze. After his first retirement as an International rower, Greg moved to New Zealand and joined the British Sailing team for the America’s Cup, competing In 2002 Challenger Series.

Greg's book: 'If Not Now, When?: One man's extraordinary quest for Olympic glory, twenty years after his first gold medal' can be found on amazon at: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1509829350/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_U_N-MtEbP0H21G9

In this episode we talk about the following topics and more:

- What is an Editor?

- Why/how did he get into the industry?

- What a great journalist is

- How do you learn to be good at journalism

- How journalism has changed over the years

- GQ Magazine

- Getting from i-D to Editor of GQ

- Career progression within the industry

- Difference between working at a newspaper and a magazine

- Working to deadlines

- How he changed GQ when he joined

- Music, Musicians and the iPod

- Writing books and the conversion to long form

- His Day to Day

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Bio: My guest today is Dylan Jones OBE. Dylan started his career in Journalism in 1983 at i-D magazine, where he worked his way from interviewer to Editor of the magazine in 1984. After 3 years at i-D he moved to the position of Editor at Arena, while also acting as a Contributing editor at The Face. His next move took him to the Observer Magazine in 1992 and after that he held various positions at The Sunday Times. In 1999, Dylan took over the magazine GQ (standing for Gentlemen’s Quarterly) at Condé Nast and took it to new heights, as he brought in high-quality roster of writers, giving the publication a more modern perspective, focusing on current affairs, mens fashion and culture. In the time since Dylan took position, the magazine has won 34 awards, with Dylan personally being awarded the BSME Men's Editor of the Year Award six times. Dylan was awarded an OBE in the 2013 Birthday Honours for services to the publishing and British fashion industries. When not working on the magazine or playing the Saxophone Dylan writes books, many focusing on Music.

His Recent publication titled: ‘The Wichita Lineman: Searching in the Sun for the World's Greatest Unfinished Song’ can be found on amazon and a link will be left in the show notes or on the website. Can be Found here at: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0571353401/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_U_o2BrEb9Y6B3RD

In this episode we talk about the following topics and more:

- End of first year in practise

- Buying into dental practises

- Poor investment and a failing practise

- Learning from mistakes and his relationship with risk

- Getting involved with training graduate dentists

- Potential business ventures

- Joint ventures and merging practises with Rodericks

- Growing the company and private equity

- Making your own opportunities and mentors

- Management philosophy

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Bio:

From a young age Carlos Clark knew he wanted to be a dentist, he achieved his dream after graduating from Birmingham University in 1991. After a few years practising Carlos bought into his first practise in Windsor and later a second in London. In 2005 Carlos joined Rodericks, which now owns over 75 dental practises across England and Wales, which also specialising in the training of Foundation Dentist. Carlos joined Rodericks as a joint venture partner and brought his practises into the group. Since 2005 he has been responsible for the opening of 40 practises as Business Development Director and has had many other roles. In 2018 Carlos took over as the Director of Professional Development, working two days a week in Clinic and looking after the CPD ands FD training programmes.

In this episode we talk about the following topics and more:

- Science of what your teeth goes through with high cigarette and sugar consumption

- Why did he want to be a dentist

- Standard day training to be a dentist

- Birmingham University and stories from training

- Advice for someone currently training to be a dentist

- Committing to a long degree and first time drilling

- The difference between practising and training at university

- Top dentistry universities and how to choose

- Getting your first professional job

- Financial progression and specialisation

- NHS vs Private

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Bio:

From a young age Carlos Clark knew he wanted to be a dentist, he achieved his dream after graduating from Birmingham University in 1991. After a few years practising Carlos bought into his first practise in Windsor and later a second in London. In 2005 Carlos joined Rodericks, which now owns over 75 dental practises across England and Wales, which also specialising in the training of Foundation Dentist. Carlos joined Rodericks as a joint venture partner and brought his practises into the group. Since 2005 he has been responsible for the opening of 40 practises as Business Development Director and has had many other roles. In 2018 Carlos took over as the Director of Professional Development, working two days a week in Clinic and looking after the CPD ands FD training programmes.