For the 100th episode of Epic Begins With One Step Forward, Zander Sprague celebrates this epic milestone with Danny Lehr—author, coach, and master of making extraordinary achievement accessible to everyone. Danny shares how he went from a PE teacher to building businesses, training alongside Olympians, and even transforming a used beach cruiser into a bike capable of conquering 72 miles around Lake Tahoe. Drawing from his book, Win Your Next Hour, Danny breaks down his blueprint for success: Words, Invest, Note Your Wins. Together, they discuss what billionaires, athletes, and everyday achievers have in common—and how anyone can apply these principles to their own life. This inspiring conversation proves that greatness isn’t reserved for the elite; it starts with your next choice.
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Episode 100 Special: Turning Goals Into Reality With Danny Lehr
Unlocking Your Epic Journey: Meet Danny Lehr
It’s a special day. It is the 100th episode and what a milestone that is. It is truly epic. I am so happy I get to share it with Danny Lehr. Danny, thank you for being here. Tell us who you are and what you do.
Thanks for having me, Zander. I am stoked to be here on episode 100. What a treat. My name is Danny Lehr. I used to be a PE teacher and then I had to quit teaching when I started a business and it just took off. After that, I’ve spent the next decade traveling around the country spending time with ultra-high achievers. What I mean by that is I know someone who built a business and sold it for $1.6 billion as well as spending a substantial amount of time around Olympians, including an Olympic gold medalist and his coach.
Through spending time with these people, I realized a lot of them say the same things and think the same way. How they do that is something that all of us can apply to whatever we’re trying to accomplish. I’ve seen it in smaller feats as well. My favorite barista quit her job when she started a coffee cart that ended up taking off and becoming a full-time job. She followed those same steps. I’ve applied my own life in different ways. One of them is turning into a cyclist. I haven’t ridden a bike other than my beach cruiser around the neighborhood.
However, there’s this right around Lake Tahoe and it’s a fundraiser for the leukemia society. I have a friend that did it and he said, “You could do it.” I thought, “Let’s give it a shot.” I followed these exact steps that I teach in my book, Win Your Next Hour and accomplished that bike ride, 72 miles around Lake Tahoe at elevation. I had a blast doing it.
In Win Your Next Hour, I basically teach people how you can accomplish whatever it is you want in life. Whether that’s growing a business, starting a business, some athletic feet or endeavor or even just a little thing off this side. Whatever you want to do, they’re step by step instructions. It’s not a theory. It’s a blueprint that anyone can follow to accomplish what you want to do.
Now, I’m going to touch on quite a few things but I’m guessing that was the team in training that you did that ride with.
You got it.
Although, I did not do the Tahoe ride. I did a four seasons team. About a decade ago, I ran two fulls and two half marathons. I, too, am a cyclist. I can appreciate it. I went from running to cycling. It’s a lot easier on the body. I do love getting out there. I will admit I have not been on my bike in a while but that’s because my riding partner had some issue of injuries and stuff coming over. Riding your bike by yourself, although possible, isn’t nearly as fun as when you have company.
For sure. Anything you’re going to be out there doing for 3 to 5 hours, it’s more fun with other people.
From Beach Cruiser To Tahoe Conqueror: The Power Of Investment
I got to ask. What bike are you riding?
That’s part of the story. As I said, I had a beach cruiser. I thought that’d be tough. Anyway, I went on Facebook Marketplace and I bought this 2008 Giant OCR 3. It’s like an upper level, entry level or upper beginner bike. This guy had. It was one of those things where his uncles lived out of the state. It was at his mom’s house and she had passed away. The uncle said, “Sell everything. Get rid of all and give the money to charity.”
He was just selling this old bike on Facebook Marketplace and it needed some work but I bought it. I did all the work on it myself. I could change a tire but I didn’t know anything. I’m not a bike expert. Over the course about a year, I changed basically everything on the bike. Now, I bought the frame because that was part of the thing.
One of the things I teach as far as the way to accomplish something, is you have to invest in one way or another. Maybe that’s money or time or effort or energy or learning new skills. That was part of the whole bike ride adventure. That was my way of investing. I only spent $150 on this used bike. I just piece it together. It probably cost me between $40 and $80 a month, , replacing one component at a time. I’d watch a video on YouTube and I’d open up ChatGPT’s voice feature, so when my hands are all greasy I could talk to it.
Now, as I said, I replaced and started off at the bar tape. The simple stuff. I replaced all the cables, the brakes. Not just the pads but the entire calipers, the derailleurs. It has even different tires and wheels. The wheels were the biggest difference. It has a new seat. Almost every single component of this bike has been either replaced/upgraded. Fast forward, performance wise, it’s as good as a brand new $3,000 bike.
What I invested was time and learning these new skills and everything in order to put into that. That was a lot of fun. I like it, too. If something goes wrong like if I’m riding and the chains off the inside. I can only not just pop it back on. I can also get out my little multi-tool and you take the L screw a quarter turn and fix it myself and not have to worry about it.
I get to say, although, I know how to do some things. I don’t know if I could do all of those things on my bike. I get it. I also have a Giant I love. It’s the only road bike I’ve had, Giants and I love how it rides. It’s so funny. When I wanted to get into road cycling, I went to my local bike store and they were great. I test rode a Cervelo, Giant and Specialized. I chose the Giant because it felt better. I’m sure the bikes were, component wise everything very close but how does it feel to you? There was one that just fell a little too stiff. Another one felt too twitchy. I was like, “I’m going to wreck.” I get it. It is amazing how some of the things that you change out, all of a sudden, change your whole ride.
It’s like you change out your cassette. I know we’re getting into the weeds here with all the technical bike talk, folks. I’m sorry about it but changing your gearing. For those of you don’t know, on the back, you have all your sprockets that are your different gears. You can have a 28 or a 32 and that makes all the difference depending on what gears you’re using and what you need.
What blew my mind was the wheels. You would think, “The wheels, of course.” It’s the biggest game. I got a pair of like middle aligned wheels. I bought a used pair on eBay for $250. It was the most expensive thing I bought the entire bike, which ironically costs almost twice as much as I bought for the whole bike to start with, but then I’m riding. I’m like, “We’ll see if I feel the difference.” Everyone says I’m going to be able to and these are pretty good. The spokes are going to be able to tighten, so you get more power into the wheels. I realize as I’m going, I’m doing these the same rides I’ve done before and I’m in like two gears higher than I was before.
That’s when I realized I’m going up this hill. I was like, “I was in my bottom gear on this before,” and I was two gears up. I was like, “This is nuts. I’m able to do this exact same hill two gears higher.” That was when I was training for that ride. Now, I’m not out as often. I’m arguably in worse shape than I was before and I’m still riding this thing two gears higher. It’s crazy how just changing the wheels out makes so much of a difference that quick.
I did the same. I had the same experience. I changed my wheels out and all of a sudden, I feel like I’m riding faster. I feel like getting up the hills was a little easier. Not to be a weight weenie, but honestly, your wheels are two of the heaviest things on your bike, aside from you.
Also, where it’s distributed. If the weight is distributed towards the edge of the wheel because the centrifugal force multiplies the weight. That’s part of the reason why the weight in the wheels matters more than other places. It’s funny because I’m the same way. I laugh alone and people talk about the weights. You spent an extra thousand dollars because this bike is eight ounces less or something but then this guy’s 40 pounds overweight. I’m like, “You could have saved $1,000 if you just lost 1 pound of body weight.” There’s other ways to get this weight down.
The WIN Blueprint: Investing Beyond Money For Success
Anyway, there are epic lessons there. I talked about it in my book, it’s about commitment to your goal and it does take work. Any of these epic things that we want to do require work. You can’t just mail it in. If you do, you’re not going to have the results.
In Win Your Next Hour, WIN is an acronym. W stands for words, I for invest, and N for note your progress but that’s that invest part. A lot of people take that invest and think it has to be this large financial outlay. Don’t get me wrong. If there’s a large financial outlay, that is very motivating and that works very well but there are other ways to do it. As I said, I bought this bike for $150 and I spent basically $40 a month buying one component at a time. I was investing my time and my energy more than anything.
I was investing three hours on a Saturday and a lot of times, another two. It’s like you go to fix your sprinklers. You go to the hardware store three times. It’s like that. I’d buy the thing. I’d start getting on there and something would go wrong. The next day, I’d have to finish up the job. It was probably six hours a month and $40. Over the course of a year, it adds up. I learned skills and now it’s fantastic but that was motivation to make sure that I was doing this thing and getting it done.
I got kids that have things going on. I have work to do and stuff. Taking that time and putting that energy into doing that, instead I could have gone and paid someone else to do it. That would have been an investment of money. When I bought it, I had this idea. I said, “I want to do this myself. I want to learn. I’m going to learn and learn how to do it.” That’s part of the journey. Also, the time training. It didn’t cost me anything to go ride with the team and training.
What it costs me is, if it’s 3 to 4 hours on Saturday morning. I’m waking up on Saturday at 5:00 in the morning because my wife’s a nurse, so she was working. I have to drop my kids off at my parent’s house or my in-laws and then go out to the ride where we’re meeting up and this whole thing. You’re not back in the afternoon until 1:00.
Running was great. I loved it. I liked it when I did it. I did have a good time. It was hard. This body does not run fast but it does cover the distance. That’s the big point, but you could go out and do a 10-mile run and be like, “I’m running a half or whatever,” and I’m back. If people who don’t know about road biking and you hear these distances. If you’re going to ride your road bike, a short ride is honestly like 25 or 30 miles. When you’re training for what you were training, I trained for centuries and stuff. You have to go 40 miles, 50 miles, or 60 miles. That’s just going to take you time.
There’s no way about it. Especially, if you’re doing it for century rides and stuff and also if you want to mix it up a little. You want to get to somewhere where there’s hills. There’s not hills right by your house. It might be ten miles until you get to the hills or you might drive. You might be driving 30 minutes or 60 minutes to go to a different spot to do a different ride somewhere. Now you’re driving 45 minutes away to go on this four-hour ride to drive back. You start to realize it takes you ten miles just to warm up. It takes 45 minutes before you feel loose, before you feel good on the bike.
I can tell you. I live in the Bay Area. There’s no lack of hills. There were times where I was meeting people and they’re like, “Let’s meet here.” I knew where we were starting and I’m like, “I’m going to have about a half a mile,” before I had not a particularly steep but a longish hill that when you’re cold, very hard. I’m like just going super slow because I do not want to burn myself out in the first 2-miles on this 40-mile ride.
Olympic Insights: What High Achievers Really Do
Again, I make jokes like, “This does not climb hills well but goes down very fast.” I find that climbing the hill takes forever and somehow going down the hill goes by just like that. You’re like, “That was fun, but now there’s another big hill in my way.” Anyway, it’s great. You said you did Olympic level training.
I competed in Olympic weightlifting, which is the sport. Weightlifting is a sport that’s in the Olympics. A lot of times people refer to it as Olympic weightlifting. I never competed in the Olympics, but I traveled around the country at a national level. I’m competing at the National Championships and American Open. I did compete in one Masters World Cup. That was a little bit later. We’re competing internationally a lot more frequently than that.
When I joined this weightlifting team, those out of San Ramon, it’s called California Strength. I started training with this team. I had two teammates that had just won national championships that in three months, we’re going off to compete in the Pan Am games. I’m training side by side with people that are going and competing internationally at world championships, Pan American Games, Pan Am championships and all that type of stuff.
Eventually, one of my teammates competed in the Olympics in 2020 at the Tokyo games then again in ‘24. Spending time with those guys. Again, you learn the way they think, things they say and the things they do. You start connecting these dots like, “These are things that anyone could say and do that would lead them to success.”
One thing you said in your introduction is you work with and travel around the country working with high achieving people. I can tell you my reaction. That’s awesome. Those people are way up and the rest of us are down and yet that’s not accurate. Talk to me for a moment about like we can all be high-achieving. We just don’t give ourselves credit for our high achievements.
That’s the biggest misconception. You watch people on the football field on Sunday and you think they’re not human or they’re different than you are. They might think a little differently because at some point in their life, they learned to think that way. They may have worked a little bit harder a little bit differently because at some point in their life they learned to work that way. The truth is, these people that you might idolize in one way or another. The vast majority of them are just like you. They’re just people.
I mentioned there’s this guy who sold his business for $1.6 billion and then got involved in another business, which I was related to. I didn’t know him at all. I just know this guy who bought the company. At one point, there’s something going on. A lot of people didn’t like what was going on, but I 100% knew why he was doing it and I understood that. I was in a position where I thought I could help him out and I just reached out. I just sent a cold email.
I sent like three or four emails to what I thought his email address might be. I fired off 5 or 6 and said, “I want you to know that you guys just announced this. I know a lot of people are complaining about it. It makes sense. However, I can tell you why they’re upset if you haven’t figured that out. I would just love to help anyway I can. If you ever want to hop on a call. I’ve been in this industry for many years. I know a lot of other people. I know and I understand where they’re complaint is and this could have been presented a little bit differently. I get what you’re doing and if they understood it like I understand it, then they would love it. Let me know.”
Two weeks later, I got an email, a reply from his assistant, which said, “He wants to hop on a Zoom call and talk about it.” This person who again built and sold a company for over a billion dollars and you think they’re going to be out of reach. It was a cold email and I just introduced myself. I said, “I’d love to talk. I think I can help.” They get back to me. We hopped on a Zoom call and we talked for 90 minutes. They’re like, “Can we talk again next week?” It was a normal clock. This guy has a wife and kids.
You have more in common than are different. It’s a normal conversation with a normal dude. Nothing about him other than his track record and some of the things he would say. I’d be like, “That’s interesting, that’s how you see this or that’s how you view this.” You start to realize. A week later in your life, something happens and something that he said pops up. You’re like, “That same idea can be applied here.”
You start realizing that he is just a normal guy. He just tried stuff and some stuff worked and some didn’t. He did those things that worked, he would do more of and those that didn’t, he would do less of. Those shaped his thought process and his actions and got him where he is now. He’s just like anybody else. He’s just like the guy you sat next to an English class during sophomore year. There’s people. These NFL athletes.
It’s funny when I was training at California Strength. These guys were all in there and they’re lifting weights and everything and training for combined prep. That’s one of the things they do there. They bring in a dozen college players that are going to go into the NFL combine. That was part of this me realizing these people I’m spending time around. Every year, there was a fresh crop of guys. Here’s another dozen guys who are all, if not the best, one of the top five players on their college team and they’re entering the NFL draft.
I started talking to these guys. You realize they’re kids. They’re 21 years old or 22 years old. They just played college football for the last four years. I’m not saying they didn’t earn their degrees but like a relatively cuddled experience from their fluoride scholarships and that type of stuff. Most of them are nice guys. There’s nice normal guys. When I was a teacher, I taught high school PE. I’m like, “Did any of these guys could have been one of my students?” They’re normal and down to earth. You would have never known.
They go on to catch touchdowns in the Super Bowl. You’re like, “This guy caught a touchdown in the Super Bowl years ago. We’re at California Strengths.” What happened is, they did their workouts. On Friday night, we would do max out Fridays, where we’d go and that’s for the real big weights to be lifted. We go back to their lifts. Those guys would show up to watch. These guys are going to be playing but they’re coming down to watch us lift weights and they’re amazed by that.
They’re amazed at how much weight this guy’s snatching or cleaning jerking. It blows their mind. On Friday night, that blows their mind. Fast forward three years, this guy catches the touchdown of the Super Bowl and it’s a whole thing. It changed the way you think. You’re like, “These guys are just human. They’re just people just like everybody else.”
Embracing The Struggle: Lessons From Clip-Out Fails
Honestly, the difference in any of that, whether it be business, sports or whatever, is they took that first step forward. They decided that they wanted it to go do something. They started to do it. Along the way, they had detours. They had unexpected things that happened like injuries. That they’re like, “Am I going to come back from this?” “Yes, I am.” All of that. I was an entrepreneur for many years. There’s things I’ve tried that I thought, “People are going to like this,” and they don’t.
One thing that I’m sure you and I deal with every day, the social media. I put out stuff. There was no rhyme or reason why this video does well and another video doesn’t do very well. There is some mystery to it. The people who will come and go, “I can help you hack the algorithm.” You can’t. There are things that we can do to make it better. That’s true, but there is stuff that just happens because we worked hard. I love the book, The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle.
He’s talking about basically 10,000 hours. The way we get good at something is because we put the time and the effort. Frankly, the most learning happens when we struggle. In riding a bike, you start off in a struggle but then you learn stuff. There’s stupid things like clipping in and clipping out. I don’t know about you, but the first month, every time I had to clap out, it was terrifying. I did not want the clip out fail. I had them but didn’t want them. Normally, you come to a stop. You just can’t get your foot out and then you just slowly tip over.
There’s nothing you can do. It’s just happening.
Brace for impact. For those of you who don’t know, clip out fail means, on road bikes, our feet are clipped in. It helps us pedal and generate power. If you don’t get your foot out to put your foot down, you’re tipping over. It’s not ideal but it happens.
The funny thing about that is, there’s lessons from this too. I had my clips pretty loose because you can tighten them or loose them. I had the pedals a little bit loose, so I wouldn’t have this clip out fails. I’ll be able to get my feet out quicker. I tied up a little bit over time. On the Tahoe ride, I’m going uphill. I’m putting some power down and my foot comes out. I just hammer my ankle bone on the inside. That thing hammered into the pedal so hard and it didn’t feel very good. Anyways, now I’m bleeding. I’m like, “Here we go.” I’m looking down and it’s pretty deep but it’s fine.
I’m like, “I’m just going to have some bloody socks here for the next however long.” I’m not going to bleed out from my ankle but anyway. There’s a scar. There was a scab on that thing for like two months because it was so deep. Anyway, the first thing I did and I got home was, I got an Allen wrench. I tighten those up. I’m like, “That’s it. I’ve been doing those long enough. I’m not necessarily having a clip out fail.” What I never want to happen again is for my foot to slip out of the clip on this climb when I’m putting all this power into the pedal and jack myself up.
My ankle hurts just hearing you. I’m like, “I know it’s coming.”
That’s just a clip out fail in another way. Again, it’s a little thing. That’s just like a small thing that I was trying to avoid. By trying to avoid it, it made it worse. Sometimes you just have to bite the bull and go for it and learn the lessons the hard way.
Sometimes you just have to bite the bull and go for it, learning the lessons the hard way.
Win Your Next Hour: Your Blueprint To An Extraordinary Life
You do, but failure is part of the journey. You’re not going to be successful at everything. If you wait for your epic dream, whatever it is, be it Olympic weightlifting or business or running a marathon or riding a century. If you wait to say, “I need all the answers before I start.” You’re never going to have it. You need to just start. All those people that we see, those sports stars, recording artists and professional speakers. You’re like, “I’d love to do that.” I’ve been fortunate to meet some of the top speakers. I got to meet Zig Ziggler. As you said, just like you and me, he has all kinds of great advice.
He’s kind and generous with this time those years ago. I had a chance to meet and I’m going to spaced on his name. Anyway, the lead singer of the Gin Blossoms. I was talking to him like, “What is it like to be this big recording star?” He’s like, “Honestly, the most annoying part is that when I meet people, they tell me my name as if I forgot who I was like, “You’re Paul Newman. You’re Margot Robbie.”
He’s like, “I know who I am. I haven’t forgotten and I appreciate that you’re excited to see. A word to everybody, we know who we are. I know you’re excited but you don’t have to tell me my name.” This is a faster ending. I’m sure you and I could talk about bicycling and all of that. How could people get a hold of you? What if they want to be extraordinary?
The book is Win Your Next Hour. I teach the basic system. It’s a blueprint, the step by step that you can accomplish whatever it is you want to do in life. It’s if you lose 40 pounds, hike the Appalachian Trail or start a business. Whatever you want to do. You can do it by following the simple blueprint. If you go to, WinYourNextHour.com, there’s links everywhere from there. It’s on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Kindle and anywhere you buy books. It’s also on Audible. If you want to get in touch personally, Instagram is the social media I use the most and that’s @Danny_Lehr.
Thank you so much for being my 100th guest, Danny. How special. I want to thank everyone for tuning in. If you’re ready to begin your epic journey, go to EpicBegins.com. Remember, epic choices lead to the epic life that you want.
Important Links
- Danny Lehr
- Danny Lehr on Instagram
- Danny Lehr on LinkedIn
- WIN Your Next Hour
- The Talent Code
- WinYourNextHour.com
About Danny Lehr
Today’s guest is Danny Lehr—a sought-after speaker, entrepreneur, author, and former competitive athlete who’s obsessed with helping people accomplish their biggest dreams… one hour at a time.
He’s the author of Win Your Next Hour, a high-impact guide for getting unstuck and taking bold action when life feels overwhelming.
As the co-founder of the lifestyle brand Caffeine & Kilos, Danny has built a multimillion-dollar business, coached elite athletes and high performers, and shared stages with leaders across business and sport.
He’s here to help us understand what it really takes to stop procrastinating, take control of our time, and start winning the next hour—and every hour after that.