Tristan Cardew, aka @tristantakephoto, sold everything and moved from Sydney, Australia to Girona, Spain to build a life that revolved around cycling and visual storytelling. Five years later, he’s racing gravel and road at a high level and has built the creative career he dreamed about making happen. His YouTube channel, TristanTakeVideo, has more than three million views and is built around training with Tour de France stage winners, interviewing the world’s best riders and going behind the scenes with teams at the top level of the sport. Tristan is also a standout documentary filmmaker and when I saw his self-shot doc about racing the Atlas Mountain Race, one of the toughest bikepacking tests on the planet, I knew I had to have him on Choose the Hard Way. The race is more than 800 miles long with 65,000 feet of climbing across remote and absolutely brutal terrain. Completing it is a feat. Making a compelling self-shot documentary while racing it is a next-level achievement. 

I was excited to have this chance to talk to Tristan about his path as a creative, the story behind his Atlas Race doc, explore the question of how much is enough, and to get a preview of his upcoming documentary about racing the 466-mile Badlands gravel race in Spain. Find Tristan on Instagram @tristantakephoto and check out his YouTube channel, TristanTakeVideo. 

Choose the Hard Way is a podcast about how doing hard things is fun and builds stronger humans. If you haven’t done this already, now would be a great time to help me help you. To do that, just hit subscribe and rate the show five stars on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and share this episode with someone you care about. Go to choosethehardway.com to sign up for the newsletter and shoot me a DM @hardwaypod or send an email to [email protected] to let me know what you dig in this conversation with Tristan. I love hearing from you and appreciate everyone who has reached out, keep it coming!

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