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No Such Thing As A Fish

No Such Thing As A Second-Placed Helmet

16 Apr 2026

Transcription

Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.

Chapter 1: Who is Zoe Lyons and what is her background?

1.178 - 19.862 Andy

Hi, everyone. Welcome to this week's episode of No Such Thing As A Fish, where we were joined by the incredibly funny and the absolutely charming Zoe Lyons. If you watch QI, which I bet you do if you listen to this, then you will know all about Zoe. She's always fantastic when she comes on our show. She's also brilliant on all the other things she does.

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20.303 - 42.042 Andy

Mock the week is probably what I mostly associate her with. But yeah, she's a brilliant comedian. She's so funny. She's so nice and so quick. I mean, all these comedians are, but Zoe, honestly, she is so quick off the blocks. It's unbelievable. And actually, what a nice segue. She has a podcast out all about running. Her podcast is called The Running Joke.

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42.062 - 60.219 Andy

It's with her and Esther Minito, and they just talk all about running. You don't have to be a fast runner to enjoy it. It's for everyone, really. Even if you just plod along at your own pace, it's for you. It's extremely accessible. It's extremely funny, as you would expect everything to be that involves Zoe, and I highly recommend you get that.

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60.259 - 72.415 Andy

It's called The Running Joke, and you get it wherever you get your podcasts. While I'm here, like always, I should remind you about Clubfish. Go to patreon.com slash clubfish. If you would like to get involved there, just sign up.

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72.455 - 84.493 Andy

You don't need to give us any money and you will get extra little bits every now and then, like a newsletter that we're currently doing, which has lots of behind the scenes stuff. Or you could give us a little bit of money every month. Help support the podcast.

84.473 - 106.716 Andy

and you can get ad-free episodes, you can get bonus content, you can get merch, you can even get a shout-out on our other show, Little Fish. There's all sorts there for everyone. Go to patreon.com slash clubfish to learn more about that. But in the meantime, please enjoy this show, which I'm absolutely certain you will, with the incredible Zoe Lyons. OK, on with the podcast.

113.163 - 117.703

MUSIC PLAYS I'm going to take a bath automatically. When I take a bath,

123.691 - 131.722 Dan

Hello and welcome to another episode of No Such Thing as a Fish, a weekly podcast coming to you from the QI offices in Hoburn.

Chapter 2: What insights does Zoe share about her podcast 'The Running Joke'?

132.102 - 148.564 Dan

My name is Dan Schreiber. I am sitting here with James Harkin, Andrew Hunter-Murray and Zoe Lyons. And once again, we have gathered around the microphones with our four favorite facts from the last seven days. And in no particular order, here we go. Starting with fact number one, and that is Zoe.

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148.805 - 175.922 Zoe Lyons

Thank you very much. And I've brought a lovely little fact along for you this week. Um, Apparently, researchers have discovered that humans may have evolved to run long distances as a result of their endurance pursuit hunting skills. So the idea being that humans would pursue its prey for long, long periods of time to exhaust it.

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175.902 - 193.237 Zoe Lyons

They'd use a technique of sort of running in the heat predominantly so that the animal would become completely exhausted and suffer from heat exhaustion. Eventually tyre, we don't know how long it would take to tyre, but I'm guessing quite a while if you're a deer.

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193.257 - 210.528 Andy

Over one mile, almost every animal in the world beats us. Yeah. Or at least any mammal. Not like insects don't, but like a house cat would absolutely batter us over a mile. Yeah. But the further and further we get, the closer we get to them. And eventually, over a couple of days, we beat everyone.

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210.808 - 216.796 James

And is that because we've got things like energy bars? And supportive shoes.

216.836 - 219.939 Dan

It's largely Gatorade that has helped us become the dominant species.

219.959 - 227.367 Zoe Lyons

It's because we've got a good audio book going on and we don't want to stop. Whereas cats, silly things, don't listen to things like that.

227.627 - 230.33 Andy

There are loads of different reasons, but it's all due to our anatomy, right?

230.35 - 238.558 Zoe Lyons

Yes, yes. So we've got longer legs. We've got a longer leg. But also we've got, I'm going to say, cracking buttocks.

Chapter 3: How have humans evolved for endurance running?

431.261 - 447.369 Zoe Lyons

But I don't stop at three. I go to eight. And it really helps with the breathing. It's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. And it becomes so meditative. It becomes so meditative. And it sort of tunes into your way of thinking and the sort of flow of your brain and the flow of your breath.

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447.489 - 454.14 Dan

Do you know what might have happened to you during that one run between London and Brighton? At the end of it, you would have been shorter.

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454.12 - 454.941 Zoe Lyons

Yes, possibly.

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454.961 - 473.985 Dan

You would have been about half an inch shorter because your spine gets so compressed as you're running that you literally lose height. So that would have recovered about 20 to 48 hours afterwards. But because of the length that you ran, not only might you have been shorter, but your brain might have been 6% smaller. Wow. Or up to 6% smaller.

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473.965 - 474.626 Zoe Lyons

Really?

474.726 - 475.247 Dan

Yeah.

475.267 - 482.821 Zoe Lyons

Well, I mean, I did question every moment of it after like there was a bit where I was going, why on earth are we doing this?

483.121 - 496.726 Dan

Well, this is it's what ultramarathon runners experience. And it's basically when your body has run out of things to burn or is running out of things to burn. There's a fatty substance in your brain that coats around nerve cells called myelin and your brain just starts eating itself.

496.886 - 497.307 Zoe Lyons

Oh, my goodness.

Chapter 4: What unique characteristics do sharks have?

645.381 - 651.013 Zoe Lyons

So you've got to be careful of the joints and everything. So, yeah, two big bouncy pairs of shoes.

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651.113 - 657.907 Andy

Speaking of bouncy, some people think that the obvious next step from barefoot running is completely naked running. Oh.

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658.007 - 660.673 Zoe Lyons

I'm going to disagree with that and just say...

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660.653 - 682.527 Andy

chaffing chaffing is bad i was thinking there would be less chaffing if there was less clothing no skin on skin is not good it's not good yeah but there are some manufacturers that make something called naked shorts they're about as naked as you can get with but they're still shorts they still preserve your modesty right but they're like you can hardly feel that they're on there

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682.507 - 702.417 Zoe Lyons

I was talking to somebody about this the other day, about naked running, funnily enough. And the thing is, you know, with high-tech running gear, it's designed to sort of pull the moisture away from the skin so you stay drier. But if you've just got sweaty skin on sweaty skin, wherever that may be, whichever bit is touching which other other bit, you will get problems.

702.597 - 711.73 Zoe Lyons

And it's things on a long-distance run, little things that you don't think about, like a label in your shorts can just, over time... You know, take a leg off.

711.75 - 726.906 Andy

And also once it gets in your head, that's the thing, isn't it? It's like you're running. And basically, if you're relatively fit, you can keep running. But your brain is always telling you to stop unless you're an athlete. Your brain's always saying, I'll just get to that next lamppost and then I'll stop.

727.427 - 733.033 Andy

And so if you feel anything, like a little label, your brain is just saying, I need to stop and sort that label out.

733.013 - 750.921 Zoe Lyons

That's a very interesting point. And I've only found out recently there's a technique of running called jeffing, which apparently is what these hunters used to do as well, which is a combination of run walking. And it's after a guy called Jeff Galloway, who was an American Olympian.

Chapter 5: What are the fascinating facts about Eddie the Eagle?

843.228 - 862.212 Zoe Lyons

I do understand. It goes back to what you were saying about saying stop, stop, you must stop. Apparently, if you change your internal monologue, and this goes back, Jeff Galloway apparently trained people to think of positive words and his words, I've written them down. It was really lovely. It was relax, power, glide. Fantastic.

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862.813 - 867.657 Zoe Lyons

So if you have those words going around in your head as you're running, that will help.

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867.677 - 872.421 James

So I'm going to smile. Well, this is why I'm going to start shouting at joggers.

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872.441 - 878.847 Zoe Lyons

Cheer up, love! Why don't you try relaxing? Give us a smile!

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878.867 - 885.813 Andy

Is it the old thing that you used to see on greetings cards, which is like it takes fewer muscles to smile than frown or whatever it was?

Chapter 6: What humorous stories does Zoe share from her skiing experiences?

885.833 - 887.294 Andy

Is it to do with that?

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887.354 - 897.508 Zoe Lyons

It takes fewer muscles still to stuff that card up somebody's arsehole. Shovel that where the sun does shine.

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897.528 - 903.498 James

Very funny. There is, of course, one animal that can outrun all humans. I know you said that almost every mammal is better.

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903.838 - 905.601 Andy

Really? Over long distances? Over long distances?

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905.922 - 908.627 James

Yeah. A heron. Okay.

908.647 - 911.972 Andy

A heron. But that is cheating if you're running with your wings in the air.

911.992 - 927.679 James

No, no, no. This is Camille Heron, who is an ultramarathon runner from France. Hello. And you all walked right into my little trap there. What a disgrace. She's broken various records. She's run, at one point, 560 miles in six days.

928.14 - 929.181 Zoe Lyons

Oh my goodness.

930.063 - 936.073 James

But there's been a bit of a scandal about her. She's lost her support from Lululemon.

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