California raised Dusty Nabor is a man of many talents and interests and he is currently very involved in triathlon, but that is still not all that drives this age grouper.
Slowtwitch: Dusty thanks for your time.
Dusty Nabor: Sure, no problem. I’m excited to be asked to do this.
ST: You have an incredible array of interests and tried out lots of things since you were a kid. Was it your parents who encouraged you to change it up or a somewhat natural development?
Dusty: Well, when I was much younger my parents did encourage me to play sports. I played Pop Warner football and ran track when I was in elementary school. Middle school is when I switched to more unconventional sports and away from ball sports. However, I did return to football at the encouragement of my dad when I was a junior in high school. I played for two years and was really happy I did. I found something that I had never experienced before and that was how hard work and dedication can bring an incredible sense of pride and fulfillment to your life. You know, football practice day in and day out can be very tough and not very fun most of the time. Everything I was doing outside of that at the time, mostly surfing, was for the pure enjoyment of each and every session. Football wasn’t that. It was hard and I wasn’t a very big guy. That meant I was literally getting the shit knocked out of me every day. But, at the end of my senior year, our team made it to the CIF Playoffs for the first time in like 10 years and, at the time, we were the only other football team from our school to accomplish that. Of course we drew the #1 seed in our first playoff round and lost but damned if we didn’t put up a solid fight and a good game. I had a feeling after that season that I’d never had before and it was as I explained earlier…a tremendous sense of pride for what we as a team suffered through together and were able to accomplish. I think I take a lot of what I learned in those two short seasons into how I approach every endeavor I choose to undertake.
ST: You talked about the joy of surfing, and skateboarding and surfing as a youngster seems fairly normal for a Southern Cal raised kid. But are you still efficient at either of these activities today?
Dusty: Skateboarding no, absolutely not. Every time I step on a skateboard now, I think I’m going to die. Surfing, yeah, I suppose. I don’t do it very often and sometimes now it’s on a long board for fun. Whenever I do find some time to go surfing, I’m pretty satisfied with my level of proficiency. I will say that I’ve surfed a hell of a lot more than I’ve skateboarded in my life. I only skateboarded till I was about 12 and never competitively. I started surfing at 12 and that went well into my 20’s at a pretty competitive level. So it kind of makes sense that I would be a bit more proficient at it. Plus, I still do it once in a while. It also helps a ton that when you fall on a surfboard, it’s in the water and not on concrete.
ST: What was it about surfing though that kept you interested that long?
Dusty: I love surfing. There is nothing like it that I’ve experienced in my life. For one, it’s an extremely difficult skill to master. Going surfing for your first time used to be a horrible experience. Granted, nowadays with gigantic soft boards and SUP’s, it can be a much more pleasant experience. But back when I started, those things weren’t around. You started on a short board and it was extremely difficult to even stand up. But once you reach a certain level, there is simply nothing like it. The ocean is such a powerful thing and to be able to harness even a micro fraction of that power is very awesome. It is one of the more addicting things you can do in your life. Not too many people ever leave surfing altogether. I’m a little bit of a strange breed as you’ll see when we move through the sports and hobbies I’ve done. I love learning new things about new topics and mastering new skills. So I tend to move on after a period of time to something new. But I doubt I’ll ever completely give up surfing.
ST: Motor sports though seems like a big departure from the surfing world. What was the catalyst for the change?
Dusty: Mostly a certain set of friends. I had one group of friends that were surfers and one group that were into motocross and desert racing. I was first exposed to desert racing in my late teens. I had a Toyota truck that I set up like a Pre Runner and used to go to the desert with my friends and drive like a crazy madman out there. While I was driving, they were all riding their motocross bikes. I really fell in love with SCORE racing which is the organization that puts on the Baja 500 & 1000. That’s what I really wanted to do. But, obviously, the cost of fielding a car or truck was WAY more than I could ever hope to afford at that time in my life. So, I decided to get a dual sport bike first and learn how to ride. I could race Baja on a bike just as easy as in a car. That quickly turned into me going to the desert on my own, riding a gazillion miles an hour (again, on my own) through the desert at every chance I got. It wasn’t very smart or safe. I never did race Baja on a motorcycle because, as I do with most things, I evolved over time as I began to learn and become entrenched in that sport. I eventually wound up with a full motocross bike and my focus turned to that - the track. I still loved and raced off road and desert but the majority of my racing was on a motocross track. I made so many friends in that time and became a staple at the local tracks. Even going so far as to become a magazine test rider as well as testing products from different motorcycle and performance part manufacturers. The closest I got to a car was co-driving a 1600 buggy in a couple of SCORE races. I remember that we flipped our car like 3 times the first 30 seconds of my first ride. I should have been driving.
ST: You had a Pro license and raced, so what was your best result, plus maybe the one you are most proud of?
Dusty: I was always “better” at offroad riding than I was at straight up motocross. That was probably a function of a little less depth of field at offroad races more so than my superior talent at the other discipline. I think I would have to say my 10th place overall in the Hamel 100 at the Lake Elsinore Grand Prix in, I think like 2000 or something. It was the premier race of the weekend and it was a really long endurance type race. It was much longer than a standard Grand Prix of 45 minutes. I think it took about 3 hours if I remember correctly. That race was kind of my specialty and I was really excited about that finish. Turns out I also made $50 that day and it was my one and only “Pro” paycheck. The real reason I held a Pro license was not so that I could compete as a Pro. I really wasn’t that good. Actually, in the class right before Pro, called Intermediate, I wasn’t all that good in that class either. But in motocross, high level Intermediates are basically kids waiting to go Pro and likely just as fast as most B and C level Pros. The real reason was the benefits of holding a pro license. I was able to go to every Supercross and Motocross race with all access and do the track walks and always have a pit pass. This was super convenient and much cheaper than buying a pit pass at every race and had much more access than any pass you could buy. This was also later in my career when racing was not that important to me. So, I figured, what’s the difference. Get my ass kicked in Intermediate by a 16 year old or get my ass kicked by a 30 year old Pro….Same thing. I do think that they’ve cracked down a little bit on the qualification standard since then.
ST: Maybe it is also about benefits when we see the massive number of pro triathletes on the KPR list.
Dusty: I’m sure it is. I can speak from experience (from Motocross) that when you are teetering on whether to be a really good amateur or a low level pro, it’s always more beneficial to be a “Pro”. That doesn’t, however, take into account the competition itself. If you want to be battling for the win or at least in contention, probably best to try and race the competition that allows for that. If racing the competition and placing well isn’t a main priority, then yeah, being a Pro, as long as you qualify for it, has all kinds of benefits. You just might be running around by yourself for a lot of the race.
ST: The next activities were golf and poker and those seem rather mellow compared to what you did before. Plus the folks partaking are likely very different too.
Dusty: Very different folks and very mellow for a specific reason. I can remember the exact moment I gave up racing motorcycles competitively. I was driving home from Mesquite Nevada after crashing my brains out at a WORCS race. I came out of the dust chasing someone and hit a gigantic square rock that was apparently bolted to the center of the Earth. Over the bars I went and separated my shoulder badly. I had a 4th degree separation to be exact - although I didn’t know that at the time. I had to have someone help me load up my bike as I couldn’t push it into my van. While I was driving home, 6 hours, I had plenty of time to think and the overwhelming sentiment was, “what the hell am I doing?” I was so sick of getting hurt trying to race young kids and then having to go into the office on Monday. It simply wasn’t worth it anymore and I decided to find something more suitable for an aging individual. That’s when golf came along. I discovered a really great thing about golf. You can do business and travel all over with the specific intention of playing golf. It’s like the one sport where you can do it and be doing business instead of taking time off from work to enjoy it. But, of course, I couldn’t leave it at that. I had to go to the range every day, find a coach, start playing after work, learn everything about it, get on the correct forum boards, etc. It just snowballs with me. Golf was definitely one of the more frustrating sports I’ve taken up. I got pretty good but only played a couple tournaments. For some reason with golf, I was more concerned with bettering my own personal game than competing with others.
At about the same time I took up poker when the online boom hit. I never really looked at this as a sport or anything like that. I did get pretty into the poker world however - shocker, I know. I played in the World Series a couple times but most of my play was online. In my opinion, again, my opinion, the worst part about poker is the people. You get some really miserable folks playing poker and that’s tough for me to deal with. It can be difficult when your only objective is to literally take someone else’s money. It’s one thing when it’s a casino’s money and the games are rigged against you, but it’s another thing when it’s another person, who you might know and maybe know their situation and it’s not a good one, if you know what I mean. I got out a little before online gaming was banned in the US and I don’t ever really play anymore. I have no desire to sit in a smoky casino for hours upon hours.
ST: And then car racing and triathlon. How did you juggle that?
Dusty: First was car racing. Golf and Poker weren’t really satisfying my desire for action and competition. I decided that I didn’t want to do anything really dangerous but I still wanted to race. So something with a cage around me would be really good. My first thought was to go Rally Car racing. But after finding out all the costs involved with that, I had to think of something else. There were “affordable” ways to do it but that’s not really why I get into stuff. I like to take things fairly serious and do them at a fairly high level. I had a buddy who suggested Time Attack….ummm, ok, no clue what Time Attack was. I found out that this was a race against the clock and not wheel to wheel racing. That’s good from a cost standpoint because there’s not a lot of rubbing and crashing. It’s basically a drag race on a road course. Fastest lap wins. Awesome. Sounds good, how do I get involved? Well, my buddy introduced me to the previous year’s series champion car builder in the Unlimited Class. I bought a couple Subaru STI’s and sent them over to have them built. We lined up a boat load of sponsors before our car was even built or had ever seen any track just because of the great job we did promoting what exactly we were going to do. Our car was featured on the cover of Dsport Magazine after it was completed and was also featured in a documentary when it had it’s first track test day. Shit, this is going to be easy! Wrong! Good old Murphy decided to implement law #1. I mean everything went wrong. If you looked at the car the wrong way the engine would blow up. If you leaned up against it, something would break. It was bad and was like shoveling money into a fireplace. Looking back on it, it was really fun even though we made a lot of mistakes. I would do it completely differently if I had to do it over again. But, no regrets and I’m glad I got to experience it. It’s probably something I might revisit later in life on a different level. Perhaps a different type of racing with a different type of car.
During all this Golf, Poker and Racing cars, a weird phenomenon started to happen….I started to get fat. It’s so weird that when you don’t do anything physically active, you start to pack on the pounds. I didn’t like it. I decided I needed to get back into shape. That’s when my entrance into running, then cycling and then swimming happened.
ST: You are not racing cars anymore, but are still into cars. I guess that won’t go away and likely has been part of your life long before you raced.
Dusty: Yes, I’ve always been into cars for as long as I’ve owned one. As mentioned earlier, my first car was an old Toyota truck that I used to work on myself all the time. I would save up just enough money for that next part I needed and then install it myself. I would go driving on weekends just to go driving. I loved it. I enjoy pretty much all forms of motorsport too. I love the struggle to go fast. It’s one of the things I love about any form of racing. The engineering behind it.
ST: We are putting final touches on the Pros and their Cars feature, and maybe we should look at an age group one too.
Dusty: Sure….although I do think it’s way more interesting to see how the people you follow from afar, like pro athletes and celebrities live their lives. You could probably wrangle up some pretty awesome age grouper cars though!
ST: Talk about triathlon, and who first introduced you to the sport?
Dusty: No one. I found it on my own. I can’t really pinpoint the moment I put all three activities together and said, wait a minute, isn’t there a sport that does all three of these but I do know it was sometime in the beginning of 2010. I signed up for my first tri in Pasadena. A reverse tri…and I was hooked. I do remember car racing and training overlapping a bit and having to go for runs while I was at the track. I actually ran a couple times around the outside perimeter of Auto Club Speedway….lol. Now triathlon and work pretty much dominate my life. Karin, my girlfriend, and I both have a passion for the sport. We’ve got a great setup that allows for solid training and racing. Our lives are basically engineered and designed for that purpose. A lot of times my work does get in the way but right now, it’s the priority and sometimes triathlon has to take a back seat. Having said that, I think it’s as close to optimal as we can make it for someone who works full time.
ST: What work do you do?
Dusty: I’m the managing partner of 101 Pipe & Casing, Inc. which is a company my Dad started in 1988. It’s a family steel pipe business based out of Southern California. In the last couple years I’ve taken over the day to day operations of the company but my Dad is still heavily involved. My two sisters also work for the company.
ST: Your coach is Brian Stover and I believe you started with him early on. Why did you think you needed a coach?
Dusty: Because I knew what I didn’t know. I had to find someone that could teach me and show me how to structure things. I had been in the sport just long enough to decipher through the BS and figure out who knew what they were talking about and who didn’t. What made sense to me and what didn’t. So my goal in finding a coach was to find someone who had the same philosophy about training as I did. Brian fit the bill perfectly. What’s funny is that even as much as I’ve learned over the last few years, not much has changed. This really is an incredibly simple sport to train for. I think I take more people to task for making it overly complicated than anything else. Now, Brian and I make a fantastic team. He knows me as well as anyone can from a training standpoint. Our relationship is seamless at this point.
ST: That sounds like a good thing.
Dusty: Yeah, it’s one less thing to worry about. It allows us to react very quickly to issues because we both understand my life and how my body reacts. When something comes off the rails, it is identified quickly and adjusted for. It also makes planning a lot easier with more predictable outcomes. That doesn’t mean we don’t try new things, though. It’s refined but hardly perfect and something that needs to be dynamic. Always adjusting, nurturing and cultivating the process as best we can.
ST: What is your favorite race?
Dusty: Desert Tri - by far and away. I love this little season opener. I get to see all my friends who have disappeared over the winter. I’m the freshest I’ll be all year having not raced in months and the course suits me perfectly. It’s just a fantastic race for me. I always do really well here and beat or come close to beating folks who will go on to kick my ass the rest of the year. It’s always the race I look forward to the most.
ST: Where do you think you can still improve the most?
Dusty: Energy management. I train hard and well. I’m doing the best I can on that front. In the past couple year’s, I’ve struggled to keep my overall energy up throughout the year. Changes at work over the last couple years caused a lot of stress. But I’m actually getting much better at handling it recently. I’ve realized and changed a few things that I think are really helping. Hopefully, that will lead to improvement in this area.
ST: So what is next?
Dusty: Don’t know. I’m still really enjoying triathlon for now. I also love the fact that when triathlon gets boring, frustrating, or you get injured or whatever, I can break off and do single sport activities that I also really enjoy doing. Swim meets and open water races, running races, cycling events. I mean, there are whole worlds in each of the three disciplines that you can also explore. That makes it really nice.
ST: Anything else we should know?
Dusty: My new hobby is wine. I’m doing my best to learn about that now and, of course, meet and befriend all the important folks responsible for the best wines.
