Transcript of 'The Interview': Kílian Jornet on What We Can Learn From Pushing Our Bodies to Extremes

From the New York Times, this is The Interview. I'm Lulu Garcia-Navarro. Imagine yourself on an isolated mountain pass. The wind is whipping, the air is thin, there's nothing around you except the sky and the sound of your feet hitting the craggy ground. Many of us have experienced the wonder and exertion that comes with being in the world's wild spaces. But for Kylian Jornet, it is much more than that. Jornet is a professional ultra-marathoner whose life's work is to literally run up mountains. But even in that world of elite athletes, he is exceptional. He holds the fastest known time for scaling Mont Blanc and the Matterhorn, to name just a few. He's gone up Everest twice in the space of a week, and he did it with no supplementary oxygen and without support. His physical stamina has been studied by researchers, and he's pushed the limits of what is considered physically possible. Then, just last fall, he completed his most radical adventure, which he called States of Elevation. He climbed 72 of the highest peaks in the Western United States over the course of just a month. For good measure, he also cycled between all of them, a ride totaling over 2,400 miles.

I mean, I'm exhausted just imagining it. But as I discovered in our conversation, he also is a deep thinker who has important lessons to impart about what our bodies and minds are capable of when we push them to extremes. And the joy and danger that effort can bring. Here's my interview with Spanish ultramarathoner, Kylian Tournet. Kylian, I am not a athlete, certainly not an elite athlete, and I find what you do so incredibly unusual. When you tell people what you do, how do you describe it?

I always said that I just love to be in the mountains. It's where I feel home and it's where I feel connected with the landscape and the environment. What I do is to explore them. I think running or climbing or biking, it's just tools to explore those mountains. As humans, we are made to walk and to run and to do that for hours. That's what we did for thousands of years, just hunting. Now we don't need to do it. We find the sport as the excuse to continue moving our body. But really, for me, it just like to be out as long as I can in the It means.

You've written in your book that what made me fall in love with traversing mountains at high speed is the feeling it gives me of being naked and inconsequential, unrestrained. It brings me freedom and connection. What are you connecting with?

I think in the first essence, it's to connect with oneself. We live in a society that we are over connected with so many things. Every second, we are getting information in social media, on the news, on everything, on things that they are very far away. We don't find often the time to connect with our self, with our body, with our mind, and with the people that we love. Often when I go to running the mountains, it's to to find this connection. It's through this connection with the landscape that we find ourselves.

You've been connected to the mountain since you were a child. You grew up in a mountain lodge in the Pyrenees. Your father was a mountain guide. Your mother was a teacher. What did your parents teach you about how to be in nature?

What's funny is that both my parents, they were really far away from competition. They had the background of classical mountaineering, and it was never about competing and winning, but it was always about exploring. I remember when we were kids, often before going to bed, we were going out to the forest with my mother and we were going out for a few minutes and then we were closing our lights, our headlums, and then we were getting back to the pad to the lodge. At the beginning, we were very scared. Me and my sister, we don't have any light. How we will find our lodge? My mother was there saying, No, just listen to see the nature through other senses, like with the wind, with the sounds, and we get more comfortable there. What they probably teach us was to accept the environment, to accept to be there. Often we see nature like something that is external and we go there to visit and to take pictures and say, Wow, that's wonderful, and then we go back to our safe place that it's like cities and urbanizations. Probably what they teach us, it was just to feel calm there, to feel comfortable because at the end, it's just like other creatures like us that are living there.

Even though your parents didn't instill that competitive drive in you. You seem to have had it innately. You said that as a teenager, you discovered you had masochistic tendencies.

Yeah, I was very competitive since a child. I love to suffer. I was really loving just to get out and push my body. It's not many kids that like to do that, especially as a teenager. I love to go out and cycle for 6, 7 hours. My dream was like an upheal that never ended. I just wanted to be climbing on my bike or running in an upheal forever. I was going with grownups, all my friends were in their 30s or 40s because it's what not many kids like it to go and do that. I remember many days I was going to school running and it was like 16 miles one way. I just love that feeling of pushing the body.

I read a story that when you were in school to test your body, you stopped eating for an entire week, only drinking water. Then five days into the experiment, you passed out mid-run. Where does that impulse come from?

I think it's our nature to explore. We explore landscapes. It's also about exploring ourselves. Probably my curiosity went there on trying to explore my body to understand it better, to understand how this physiology works. That I did at university. I remember, well, I was just Telling a friend, Okay, you take all my food from my dorm. If I don't pass out, don't give me anything, even if I really beg you. For five days, I was just training normally. After that, I passed out. It was like- Did your roommate tell you you were insane? Well, he knew me well, so he was like, Okay, whatever. Just like, Yeah, do your things. But yeah, I think that curiosity has been always there.

Let's talk about your body because that is the thing that makes all of this possible. I just want to give a few statistics. Every year, you put in over a thousand hours of training. You climb over a million vertical feet But you're also starting with some real physical advantages. Like your body, it's small, it's very light. You have this incredibly high VO2 max, which is a key indicator of aerobic endurance. In fact, yours is one of the highest ever recorded. How do you know how far you can push yourself? I mean, how calibrated are you to what your limits are?

I think physically, with experience, you get to know your body pretty well. That's very connected with the mind, too. That is where it gets tricky. I was two years ago in expedition in Everest, in Himalaya. I was climbing not the normal route, a different route. I was alone. At 8,200 meters, I got hit by an avalanche and I broke some ribs. I had a long way down. I had more than 15 hours to get down from that point. It was not good weather. I had not been eating for, I don't know, 15 hours, and I was completely alone. If you look to the physiologist, okay, normally you need carbohydrates to be able to sprint or to get the energy at that level. But somehow you find resources in different ways. That's how a parent can live so much heavier way than he or she would thought if their child is in danger. How in life-threatening situations, we are able to develop strength or endurance in a way that we are not Thinking of being capable. The limit is something we don't want to reach because it's probably death after that. It's a very fine line.

Kylian, can I just note that you have told me a terrifying story? Were you scared?

I wasn't scared. I was alert, I would say. I I think it's important to be afraid many times. Then I say, Okay, the conditions, they don't look right or I don't feel ready for that, and I turn around. I think it's very important to listen to the fear But when these situations come, I try to be as calm and just accepting it. Of course, it's a lot of adrenaline and it's a lot of tension going on, but to leave all the panic because that's only making me take bad decisions. The same comes from euphoria. Another time I was going up to a summit and I was climbing and I was feeling super strong and super good. I was doing things that technically were at my limit and I was surpassing all the dangers. I came to the summit and I felt like superhuman. I felt like, wow, I feel incredible. I feel that I can do anything. The euphoria was there. The euphoria is as dangerous as the fear I would say, because then you are blind and it's important to... It's very anticlimatic, I think, mountaineering because you are doing something that is very extreme on the emotional side because you are sometimes very close to death.

You climb a summit and you just want to be there super excited. And your reason is saying just breathe and be calm and not think that you are strong, just be reasonable. Probably it's one of the most exciting sports that exist because you are able to live and to view so many exciting things. At the same time, it's very anticlimatic because you are not able to enjoy it at that point. You enjoy back home when it's already passed.

That's fascinating. Are you religious? If you don't mind my asking.

Yeah. No, I'm not religious.

Because it sounds very Buddhist in a way. It's like meditation where you're taught to watch your emotions, watch the pain in your body, but look at it at a distance and not let it overtake you.

Yeah, exactly. I think I'm not a religious person, but I would say the climbing mountains, it's a meditation on that aspect that you are often very present on the moment, on thinking, okay, you cannot think. It's really like you are focusing on the present. It's moments where the past and the future don't exist because you need to focus so much on the movement that you are executing that nothing else exists and that meditation. I always joke that I'm not a smart person. I cannot do meditation. Normally, I need to climb mountains and expose myself to find the same piece that you can do probably just sitting and meditating.

Have you been to Tibet ever?

Yeah, I have been to Tibet.

Because I spent a long time in Tibet, and you know that their religious practice is actually movement. They do circumambulations of holy sites, Mount Kailash, others. It is that exact practice of movement and focus to actually reach a state of enlightenment, if you will.

Yeah, exactly. In terms of sport, it's the same. I mean, it's It's some things that you can't explain rationally. I remember when I was crossing in the Pyrene and in the Alps in the last year, I had a lot of episodes of deja-boos, and deja vu. Deja vu is that they lasted for a very long time. I remember one time climbing in Himalaya. I was completely without any nutrition. I had not been drinking or eating anything for more than 30 hours. I was at 1,200 meters. I was in the middle of a storm and I was hallucinating. I had a vision of a second person that it was following me and I couldn't see what was this person. I knew that it was an hallucination, but I somehow needed to save this person. I felt very responsible of this person. I'm happy that I had this hallucination because somehow having the responsibility to save this person, I didn't give up and I survived that day that if not, probably I would be dead in the mountain. Sometimes it feels that it's our unconsciousness that it's finding tools to keep us moving, to keep us alive.

Some people would say it was a miracle.

Yeah, you could say it's a miracle. You could say that it's just that when your rational is not working anymore, that your unconsciousness is taking over and acting for you. You can call it whatever, but then there is some ways that we have to keep going and that normally in our daily life, we are not able to activate.

What are you thinking about when you're putting one foot in front of the other and you're in these wild spaces? What is on your mind?

I I mean, if it's a very demanding or very technical route, then it's really like you are just thinking about the next movement. It's just like, if I go this direction or this direction, if I do this move that way, if I What's the danger in the next two steps? It's not really any deep thoughts. But then it's like, I would say most of the time it's just enjoying it. I was doing the past September, a long project here in the US, from Colorado to Washington.

States of Elevation.

Yeah, exactly. I was biking and running, and mostly on all these national parks. It's so wild, the nature. It wasn't technically demanding, so I could really enjoy the landscapes and just arriving to a summit and seeing a nice sunrise and the shape of the and having an encounter with an elk or any wildlife like goats in the summit. It's just like having those encounters and being amazed. Every day, I go up and I He looked around and he's like, That's beautiful.

It's funny that you said it's not technically demanding. Let me just describe what you just did. This fall, in just over a month, you ran up 72 of the tallest peaks in the Lower 48. If that wasn't enough, you biked between them. Basically, as one newspaper described it, you ran a marathon and rode a stage of the Tour de France every single day for a month. That wasn't demanding?

It was very physically demanding. I mean, it was very demanding for the body, but technically, it was not dangerous and it was not technical climbing with the skills that I believe I have. But physically, it was very challenging, mostly because it was so big Sometimes in this journey, I was for more than almost 60 hours without passing any village. Then you need to carry a lot of things. That's very physical demanding. The first week, I was feeling horrible. It was the altitude plus the dry air plus the physical effort that I was doing for more than 20 hours every day. I was on my edge. Then suddenly, I really felt that my body stopped to to fight those things and started to adapt. I don't know how to describe it, but I really had this feeling of my body opening up and accepting what I was putting on it. At the end of the trip, I could continue for another month. My body was feeling that's the new normality of this guy. It find the ways to change the physiology to adapt to this effort.

How are you sleeping?

Well, I have three They are very young. Actually, we're joking with my wife, You are taking a vacation there. I think I average sleeping 4-5 hours per night, which is the same I do home now with the kids. Probably that's something that I'm lacking I see that I don't need much sleep to recover. Normally, my average over the year is around 6 hours of a sleep per night, 6, 6: 20. I'm not a great sleeper. We often think that we need to treat the body well, but sometimes if we try to protect our body at every cost, if we are never thirsty, if we are never hungry, if we are never tired, if we are never stressed about something, the body will not develop the capabilities to fight those things. I think it's because I have been exposed very often to these things since I was a kid that I have been developing the capacities to adapt.

Before I go on, I want to note I read that you drink olive oil while you're in the mountains so you don't lose weight burning so many calories. I mean, that sounds pretty gross. I'm not going to lie.

I merged it with water. It was not like pure olive oil drinking that. It was Just a bit of olive oil on the water.

Do you think of it as a sacrifice when you have to ingest that stuff just to keep your physical self going?

Well, I don't know if it's a sacrifice. You're very hungry also. I mean, after 20 hours running, you can eat everything. It doesn't matter. I mean, at some point, your body feels that it needs calories. I was using around 9,000 calories per day. That's a lot of calories that I need to eat to not lose capabilities day after day. Of course, you want a very nice meal, but at some point, you don't care at all. It's just like, Okay, I just want to eat.

One of the things that happened during the States of Elevation is that different athletes joined you along the way, and one of them described you as, quote, full of peace. We've talked about the meditative parts of what you do. What is it like doing that alongside other people?

I think especially Actually, in this project, it was incredible to share with people that they are from these places. I had, I think, in the project, half of the summit I did alone and half with people. They are very different experiences, but Doing it with people from there, you get a much deeper connection with those places and those landscapes. The funny thing, it was I was doing the first summit, Longs Peak, in Colorado with Kyle. He's from He has the fastest snow time to climb Longs Peak. He's been spending years and years on that mountain. Climbing with him, he was just telling me everything about the mountain, everything about the possibilities, saying, This is the most beautiful mountain on Earth because you can do that and that and that and see the rock. Everybody had this deep connection with those landscapes. If you ask me the most beautiful mountains on Earth are the ones I see from my house because I develop a relation with them and I feel connected with them because I can play much more on them because I have a deeper knowledge. To be able to share those mountains with people that have the same connection, you really feel feel they love.

They carry it inside of themselves, that knowledge of place.

Yeah, exactly.

Another endurance athlete who has been in the mountains with you wrote that it's frankly not a great idea to rely on his, meaning your judgment if you want to have a safe and fun time in the mountains. I think he was talking about risk tolerance. How do you think about the risks you're willing to take in the context of knowing your limits, understanding your body, understanding your own mental strength and training, and the risks that you're not willing to take?

I think it's That's one that I'm still trying to figure out because I know that my risk tolerance is high. It's something that I'm aware. It's something that I try to be very analytical when I'm in the mountain to try to analyze well the situation and to know not what I'm good at, but what I'm not good at to see if I'm capable of doing something or not and to turn around. But sometimes it has been happening that I have been just continuing in situations where I knew that I was rationally not comfortable with it, but somehow I felt okay with it. It's something that I don't want to experience much more because I know that the mountains, a big part of surviving is luck, but you cannot be relying on that all the time.

I can hear you grappling with this. People have You have died doing what you do, and people close to you have died doing it. In fact, your friend, Stefan Broza, died right in front of you in 2012. Can you recount what happened there?

We were in a Mont Blanc area in the Alps, and Stefan was first an idol. When I started a ski mountaineering, he was winning all the races. It was something that I look up to. Then he became a We were living nearby. We started to do some projects together. We had this project of crossing the Mont Blanc range in one push in the skis. We were before last summit, so we were almost finishing. We were happy. We were just in the summit enjoying. It was some birds that they were flying around and we were just like... I remember we were smiling and laughing about where we were and how fun it was. We were walking on that ridge and we didn't notice that we were walking on a cornish. It's this snow that with the wind, it forms in the ridges. Because the wind is strong, The snow is compact, but it's not holding into the rock. We were walking there and the snow break in between our feet. He fell like 600 meters. I was in the and I stayed on the snow. For me, it was the first time. I grew up in a family of mountainers, so I knew about the risk.

I knew about what death is. But not until that point that it really happened close to me. I really understand that that's something that is real and that it It's happening and it's happening here. At that point, I was 20 years old. He was 40 years old with a family, and I felt like it would be so much easier if I died instead of him because my parents would I'm really sad, but I didn't have that many connections. It took me a time to accept that, and probably the years after, I was taking too much risks in the mountain just to try to see if it was a mistake that he was dying instead of me.

What do you mean? Can we just stop here? Because it's interesting to me that you didn't deal with that death by taking a step back. You actually pushed yourself harder. Why?

I don't know. I think it's like, probably for me, it was more like to try to see if it was a mistake. If it was me that was mean to die in the mountain that day and he was just in the wrong side of the ridge. Somehow, like mountains is the place where I felt connected, where he felt connected to. It's not a place that I would abandon because it's dangerous. I think I was just dealing like the grief and I was young. At the same period, I was racing and after every race, I was going to the party of the race and drinking a lot of alcohol. I don't like alcohol. I don't like the flavor. I have never I think. For a couple of years, I was just getting drunk a few times a year after the race season. It was just ways to try to escape and to deal with the grieving.

We've talked about controlling fear, but I do wonder, after that experience, are you afraid to die?

I think I I'm more afraid to die now with kids. If something happens, I remember last year, I was doing this crossing in the Alps, and one day it was just... The mountain was falling apart. It was with the melting of permafrost, the mountains are just collapsing a lot in the Alps. It's big blocks of rocks, like size of a car that they collapse at some time just because the ice is melting inside the rocks. I was doing this crossing, and for many hours, I was exposed to those things. Some rocks were falling very close to me. I ended up that day and I was feeling, Why I'm so stupid? Why I didn't turn around at the first point where I saw that that was going to happen. I was feeling, I really want to... It's not just to want to see my kids growing up, but I see them and just for them to have a father. I know that the activity that I'm doing, the activity like my wife is also doing mountaineering. It's activities that we do that they have the risks. I'm not afraid of the feeling of dying, but I'm most afraid of that, of my kids losing a father.

I don't know if it makes sense, but it's more like that, what I feel.

Since you mentioned your children and we talked about how you were raised, how are you raising your kids?

Well, we are lucky. We live in a nice place. They can go outdoors, they can play outside, they can do things, and that's something that we want them to appreciate. We do hikes every day, every holidays, every weekend. We are going to the forest or to climb a summit or to do long hikes. They can They walk a lot, they can do a lot of activity. But mostly it's just this appreciation for nature. They are six and four years old and the youngest is seven months. But the six years old and the four years old, they can name all the berries. We can go to the forest and they pick the berries and say, No, this one we can eat, this one we cannot. We can tell them, Can you go and grab some mango or some rucola or some mushrooms out in the garden or in the forest, and they can go out and identify the species and things. I think that's what we are trying to do, that they feel that connection with the landscape where we are living.

Kilian Jornet, thank you so much. We'll speak again.

Thank you very much.

After the break, Kilian and I speak again, and we talk about his doubts about the purpose of what he does.

When you are helping others that are in need, it's about giving. And sport, mostly, it's about taking. Hi, Lulu. How are you doing?

. What's the weather?

Actually, it's pretty nice weather. It's been snowing. We have a foot of snow in the backyard. I just came back, actually, now from skiing. We can start skiing from our place, from our home. I was doing two hour of a ski touring. Then this morning, it was my wife that was skiing and I was with the baby. We were switching roles to go training and having the kids. I was enjoying a lot the powder today.

I'm glad you mentioned your home life. Your wife is also a professional ultra runner, right?

Yes, she is.

How do you divide up the responsibilities at home with two top-tier athletes having to go out and train and figure out your day?

I'm lucky that we are in a part of the world where the culture is very equal on that. I would say that we spend Half of the time it's with the kids and the babies, and it's the norm here with the house site is a structure. We train most of the time from Monday to Friday when the kids are in school or kindergarten. Then the weekends, We train much less. We just go to the activities out with them, and then we do one session each, either early in the morning or in the evening when they are sleeping.

I mean, it sounds very equitable.

Well, yeah, I think it should be For the last two years, I have been doing projects and racing, and my wife have not, mostly because it was first the pregnancy and then just the month after giving birth, that she couldn't compete. I would say now it's time for her to do the things that she wants on a sport, and I need to prioritize less my goals in this next year.

I I'm curious about this because we've talked a little bit about how dangerous your job is and how being a dad has made you think about that more. Is there anything now that you've decided not to do because it's too risky?

Not really. I think I have always been trying to analyze pretty well what I'm doing. I have been taking risk on in my life many times. I would lie if I say that now I'm not taking them, but you are never on a risk, zero situation.

Yeah, because I used to be a war correspondent. But after I had my daughter, I started to think more about the dangers of that job, and I just didn't feel like my own head was in the right place to be able to do it anymore.

Yeah. For For me, I don't think it hasn't been when the kids came. I think it has been with age, too, and with experience. I don't know. I think the arrival of the kids didn't affect that, but I think more the lose of friends over time. It's something that... I don't know how it's in the wars. Somehow, after a moment, it felt that you get used to death and you get-Same. Yeah, people dies and you normalize it. You normalize it in a way that it's... I wouldn't say it's sane because it's just something that you really accept at some point that it don't surprise you. I mean, It's just- Right.

It's just part of what you do.

Yeah, exactly. It's a point that you say, Okay, I normalize that, and it shouldn't be normalized. Maybe it's the time to take a break and stay a few months or a year in activities that they have not this high risk because I think that your attention level, it goes down because you get more and more comfortable. Then is when you can make more mistakes, too.

Does it feel like culture shock when you come home? Having to take care of the kids, having to spend your weekends, changing diapers?

Yeah, maybe that's the least, I think. I think the time with the kids and these routines is something that I really, really I think it's coming down from something that it's very simple life. You are focusing on one activity and it's tiring and it's difficult and it's stressful, whatever, but it's somehow simple. You come from this environment to something that it's much more complex on the things that's happening. But also the consequence is much lower. Going to supermarkets is like, Okay, should I It's like pasta or rice? Or I'm going to having a meeting. If I say that or that, it's not that you are going to die. The consequence of the actions are much less. I think probably this rise of adrenaline, you are missing them like this consequence of what you are doing. I think that's the hardest to come down from.

I think this is related. I am curious about how you think about the value of what you do, because in the spring of 2015, you You were in Nepal and two days away from starting an attempt of Everest when there was a devastating earthquake, you immediately abandoned your plans for the summit, and you instead threw yourself into the relief efforts for weeks and weeks. You said competition at that point felt dirty. Can you explain what you were feeling then and maybe how it's changed your view on things?

Yeah, I think I'm racing, competing, it's the ego driver activity. When you are helping others that are in need, most of the time it's because it's natural, it's human. You see someone in difficulties, you try to help them. It's about giving. And sport, mostly, it's about taking.

Does it feel selfish to you?

Yeah, it is selfish. I think It has a meaning to society, and I understand that the health and mental health role of a sport, it's clear. But I think for most of the athletes, and for me too, it's something that is secondary, that it comes with. It's not something that... Mostly we do that because it's selfish. It's because we want to perform, we want to win, we want to progress. That don't mean that it's something that is harmful, but it's not something that is directly helping others.

Have you thought about what happens when you get too old to be an ultra athlete?

Well, yeah, I think I've seen, for example, my mother, she's always been very active. She's never been competing, but she's very competitive with herself. She had a struggle when she started to get slower and She's saying, Now I'm taking longer time to do that, or I'm not able to do that anymore until she accept it, and now she's enjoying a lot when she goes out in the mountains. I think it's probably hard at some time when you see that your body is not responding as it used before. But I really admire. I have these friends that they are 70, 80, 90 years old and they still go out. I I mean, it's not about performing. It's about just doing what you can, what will you have. I hope that I can accept that. I think so. I think I will be able to just accept that I'm going slower and I enjoy the same. I know that the body don't respond as good. Maybe now it brings me 100 miles far, and then it will bring me 50 miles far, and then 20 miles far. But to able to enjoy just to be able to enjoy, just to be able to move, I think that's what we need to learn when we grow older.

Kylian, before we end, I have this question reading about your life and listening to you, and it made me wonder about indulgence. For me, part of the joy of life is also not doing hard things. But you've talked about how you've only managed to spend one day on a beach relaxing before having to be on the move again. You've talked about never eating in restaurants when at home, you don't really socialize. I mean, what does indulgence look like for you?

No, I think it also comes with what I really like. I don't go to restaurants, but I don't really enjoy it. When I go to a restaurant, it's not what I want. I think many things we do it because it's socially accessible accepted and it's socially the norm. I think that before I was trying to force more those things, but now I think I'm very... Today, I was going to skin the powder and it's like, that's pleasure. Now, I think in a point of my life that I really do what I want to do and try to not fit onto what people expect me to do. If I have a gala and a dinner, now I can say, No, I really don't want to do that because I enjoy to go early to bed and just wake up early and have a quiet morning and see the sun rise. So many times, it's just embracing this beauty.

Thank you so much for talking to me. I appreciate it.

Thank you very much.

That's Kylian Jornet. This conversation was produced by Wyatt Worm. It was edited by Annabelle Bacon, mixing by Sonia Herrero. Original music by Dan Powell, Pat McCusker, and Marion Lozano. Photography by Devon Yalkin. The rest of the team is Priya Matthew, Seth Kelly, Paula Newdorff, and Brooklyn Minters. Our executive producer is Allison Benedict. Also, we have a YouTube channel where you can watch lots of our interviews. Subscribe at youtube. Com/@symboltheinterviewpodcast. Com. Cast. Next week, David talks to filmmaker Chloe Zhaou.

I have been terrified of death my whole life. I still am so afraid.

And because I've been so afraid, I haven't been able to live fully. I haven't been able to love with my heart open. I'm Lulu Garcia Navarro, and this is the interview from the New York Times.