Mark Bell's Power Project - Mark Bell's Power Project EP. 188 - Arnold Classic Wrap Up, the Documentary Transformer and Insecurities

Episode Date: March 11, 2019

We are back from Ohio and the Arnold Classic. Today we're recalling our experience at the expo and how great it was meeting all of you. We talked about Brian Shaw and the World STrongest Man competition and how Andrew accidentally punched a dude. This, the documentary Transformer, insecurities and much more. ➢SHOP NOW: https://markbellslingshot.com/ Enter Discount code, "POWERPROJECT" at checkout and receive 15% off all Sling Shots Find the Podcast on all platforms: ➢Subscribe Rate & Review on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/mark-bells-power-project/id1341346059?mt=2 ➢Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4YQE02jPOboQrltVoAD8bp ➢Listen on Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/mark-bells-power-project?refid=stpr ➢Listen on Google Play: https://play.google.com/music/m/Izf6a3gudzyn66kf364qx34cctq?t=Mark_Bells_Power_Project ➢Listen on SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/markbellspowerproject  FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell ➢ Snapchat: marksmellybell Follow The Power Project Podcast ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/MarkBellsPowerProject Follow Nsima Inyang ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/  Podcast Produced by Andrew Zaragoza ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamandrewz

You ever go against someone that's just, I mean, it's probably uncommon because you're in like a pretty structured environment, but you ever just go against people like some people that are just fucking crazy? People that are crazy. Maybe like super unorthodox and just have a ton of energy. Yeah. Yeah, I have. If it's ever because I like when I roll with upper belts, right, we're going at each other. So it's like, it's not that crazy, but they do, they put a lot of energy forward, but it's controlled. It can get a little heated too, right?

It can get heated, but it's still like, it's still controlled because like they under, like, you know, you're both trying to tap each other at a hundred percent. You're not always trying to hurt each other at the same time, but trying to go as hard as you can. percent you know i was trying to hurt each other at the same time but yeah trying to go as hard as you can but when you roll with like a white belt right um and it usually tends to be maybe bigger white belts uh that they they don't have much experience rolling so since they don't have much experience they're doing a lot of just crazy stuff that's when you can you'll you'll probably run into some some like crazy unorthodox because somebody might get hurt. Yeah. So somebody might get hurt and it's, it could be them because a lot of times also white belts don't know how to escape stuff. So you'll be doing something and they'll escape the wrong way, which will make it tighter. And you'll have to kind of let go because if they don't escape the right way, they could hurt

themselves. So it's usually guys that are newer, um, that you tend to run into the crazy stuff or, or people that are new coming to your school that are like let's say they are an upper belt but they they want to kind of sizing you up a little bit exactly yeah yeah yeah then they'll they'll they'll come with some heat like some maybe some unnecessary heat when i was when i was boxing that was a hard thing to deal with is like you know i learned a lot of technique and I wasn't like, you know, I wasn't so good that I was like this polished veteran or anything. So, you know, I'm sure if I was, and I, if I did it longer than I could probably figure

out a way to deal with anybody. Um, but you know, I was two or three years in and I, you know, practiced quite a bit, put a lot of time into it, but every once in a while you go against someone who's just nutty and, and uh they would throw like unorthodox punches and they were just uh for lack of a better term just kind of a crackhead and you just you like were like damn like i'm not and then even when you hit them you're like i like i hit the guy pretty good and i'm able to throw some pretty good shots i'm like i don't even think that bothered him i don't i think I don't think that hurt him at all.

Like now what the hell do I do? And then they also, um, they just, uh, you know, just had endless amounts of energy. So like the stamina side of things was kind of crazy too. I was like, it was hard to figure out like, what am I gonna do against this guy? He's like, he's not, uh, South Paul and he's not, you know, he's not, he's not left-handed or right-handed. He's just like fighting whatever way he can. And he's just, he's like in a fight.

And I think that's kind of the difference. And does jujitsu get that way sometimes where it's like a, like a fight or is it pretty like, is it more tactical? It, no, it gets that way, but it's extremely, i think it's extremely tactical all the time whenever you're you're rolling with people that have experience just because there's so many different things and that's not saying like with boxing there isn't but with jujitsu like there's so many different positions and i mean if you're going at like a hundred percent the whole match uh it gets kind of difficult to do that because Because like if you're, if someone has you mounted and for people that don't know, like

mounted is when they're on top of you, you can't be wasting all of your energy, you know, trying to break out of that mount, especially if they have you pinned down in position. You got to wait for a specific opening in a specific small two second period where you can break out of it. So it can be at a hundred at 100 but it's super tactical so even if even if someone is even if someone is going crazy you would recognize it and be like i'm just gonna i'm just gonna wait for this to pass because there's kind of like holds in jiu-jitsu as opposed to boxing where yeah you can kind of like in fight and you can get close to each other and

hug each other and things like that but it's way way different now. Like if, if I was on top of you and I'm just trying to go donkey Kong and trying to act all wild to try to sneak in a cheap victory or whatever, um, you would just be like, okay, well, Mark's not that experienced and I'm just going to kind of hang here and wait for an opening. He'll probably get tired. Yeah. And you're going to kind of, uh, what, like, um, keep poking around and seeing where there might be like an opening, right?

Exactly. A lot that that's how a lot of it happens. Like, so even though I'm out of control, you're still controlled enough and eventually the fight will be controlled and I'll probably end up being controlled and probably end up being over, right? Exactly. Yeah. A lot of that, that is a lot of what I do and a lot of what I see a lot of other people

doing jujitsu. Like there are certain parts of the fight where it's back and forth and you know just a lot of back and forth but there are certain parts where you'll just have to i'll just have to chill if i'm in a bad position i'm just gonna have to chill for a little bit and wait and wait and wait and then boom there's a moment i can go and then i can go but uh yeah it's that that's just it's super tactical that's why it's really that's why people call it like a chess game because you know there's this there's the scrambling portion of it then there's when a person gets into certain positions like they hold for a while and it looks like nothing's going on but there's a lot going on um but that's also why i think it's sometimes it's difficult for it to be

a spectator sport uh i don't know if you i don't know if you've ever watched any recent jujitsu but a lot of um no gi jujitsu that's no gis when you know they're not wearing the gi or whatever you know they're wearing like spandex the the leg lock game is super popular now so you know tapping people from the knees and the ankles that shit is so boring to watch um and it's just it's, it takes away from the spectator aspect of the sport, but, uh, yeah, it, it, it's, it's super tactical. Well, I think after, uh, well, I don't even think I'm just going to do it, you know, after this, uh, bench meet April 7th, uh, hopefully the week after I'll, I'll pop in and try some jujitsu. Maybe I'll go over to your place and, uh, try it out. I, you know, something I I've been

wanting to do for a long time. And I, I did it when I was younger, but I only did it for just a couple of weeks and I didn't really, you know, I didn't know what I was doing or anything, but it's something I'd like to get into more. And, uh, I just, I need to, I just need to switch gears. I need to like do something different. And, um, I've tried to do some different things and it, I have, uh, pretty much failed miserably. I always get pulled back into powerlifting, which will probably always happen. Of course.

Probably happen my whole life. Uh, it's just kind of part of who I am, but I'd like to try some different things and I'd like to, uh, you know, still work on being more mobile and, and stuff like that. And I think jujitsu would be fun. It would be. You'd have no problem with this,

but man, you just got to be patient. Yeah. Especially when you start out, because like there's so much. It takes me a really long time to learn stuff. And even when it comes to, you would figure on a physical level, you'd figure that I would adapt

to those things pretty quickly. But when it comes to that, it still takes me a lot of figuring because I remember in jujitsu, uh, I mean, shit, it was like, it was like doing like long division, you know, it was like doing these really hard math problems where it wasn't, you know, just addition and subtraction. There was a lot of steps that were involved in like getting these different locks or getting out of something and then, you know, gaining position. So I would get someone like halfway into something and I was like, I don't remember what the fuck else to do. Yeah.

And I would just like hold onto something and I'm like, ah, I forget, you know, the time has passed. Now the guys, now we're three moves into something totally different, you know? Yeah. Like Casio says, it's called the invisible technique. There's a, there's a way to do something. And then there's these, all these little small intangibles that you don't realize until you can, until you really know what you're doing, then you know, oh, wow, the thumb actually

needs to be facing up for me to armbar this guy in an easier fashion. It's, it's really, really, really cool. But that's the thing. It's like. Some of it's really complicated and some of it's really simple. Like if I can just make this guy squirm and make this guy like be in pain, then I can probably get him in whatever hold I want. So that's when you dig your elbows and knees into somebody.

Yeah. That's some of the more simple stuff. But that's not even really common sense, right? Oh, here I am. Yeah. Look, check out this mobility. I'm like trying to figure out how to move my hips. I'm like, how did he do that?

When was this? This was when out how to move my hips. I'm like, how did he do that? When was this? Uh, this was when we went to on it about two years ago. Yeah. A year and a half ago. The one you told me about where like it goes out. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. Yeah. And the other guy was like rolling with me and Kyle got pissed off at the guy and stuff. Yeah. Anyway, we just came back from the Arnold classic and, we had an amazing time out there in Columbus, Ohio.

Uh, amazing to get out there with the team and amazing to get out there. Um, you know, and, uh, you know, it's, it's like freezing cold out there. It's snowing and all that stuff. And it's just so much fun to meet so many different people and meet so many fans of this show, uh, meet so many fans of super training and have slingshot. And, um, it was, uh, it's a lot of work, but you know, those trade shows are always something I'm always trying to figure out how to improve upon. How do we make these better? Um, but when I think about the amount of money and the amount of time, the amount of effort that goes into it, you know, I, I can't help, but like reflect back and think, man, it really doesn't matter what it costs or how much time it

takes. And it doesn't matter how many people we have to bring because it's worth it because of the fans. You know, we meet some of these people that have these incredible stories. I met countless people that, uh, have been inspired by this show. I met, uh, a number of people that lost a hundred pounds. I met a number of people that lost a hundred pounds. I met a number of people lost 30 pounds. I met another, a lot of people that were just starting. They were like, Hey man, I just got your book, got the war on carbs and I'm just getting started. I met a lot of people that said that I got them into powerlifting, which that never gets old. I can hear that all day long. That makes me feel amazing because it makes me think back

to who got me into powerlifting which was ed cone which ed cone now just hangs out you know he's just like hanging out and i'm like this is uh this is like michael jordan just like randomly hanging out with uh you know some kid that got inspired to play basketball from him you know that's the equivalent for me i'm always so excited to see him and i always wish i had more time to even chat with him because at those shows, things get a little, a little crazy, but the response from the fans, uh, was that an all-time high, like even just trying to leave the booth and trying to get somewhere starting to become, uh, more and more of a challenge. And then once I get recognized by one person, then it's kind of like game on. And I, I kind of get swarmed,

which is a good feeling. It's all, it's all very positive. I didn't have any, any negative interactions at all. You know, it is kind of weird. You know, you're trying to like do certain things or go to the bathroom or, um, and I, I've learned like, you know, I have my own time and then I have time to meet fans. So, uh, you know, some people that I may have passed, I apologize. I just simply don't have time to meet fans. So, uh, you know, some people that I may have passed, I apologize. I just simply don't have time to stop for every single person. Um, and I try my best to make time, but I've just, I've always wondered, you know, when I was a kid and like a baseball player would say, no, sorry, kid. I'm talking, you know, I was always like, man, what a dick.

Yeah. And now I, I mean, you know, if it's a little kid, you should always stop for a little kid. But, uh, now I kind of if it's a little kid, you should always stop for a little kid. But now I kind of understand. It makes a lot more sense. You literally don't have, you just do not have time to do that 24-7. But it was outstanding. A lot of fun. Yeah.

Yeah. I feel terrible because I wish I could remember his name, but somebody was waiting in line, you know, just like everybody else. He got right up to the front and that's right when Team Cup powerlifting was in there so i was like oh hey mark check it out and then uh so like you guys are chatting i'm taking pictures and i just hear andrew dude what the heck and i'm like what what's what's wrong he's like i was about to meet mark and you pulled him away i'm like oh shit dude let me go get him and then you know like that's when uh charles glass showed up and just like one after another somebody kept coming back i was like charles glass came with the lady so that was distracting yeah and so i just and i looked back and the kid was gone so dude sorry

man yeah podcast feedback was really cool too yeah a lot of people were like talking about like how much they're enjoying the nutrition information from it, which is cool. It was really fun meeting everybody. It's wild, right? It's so cool. I got to take from this room and blast out to someone in Michigan. Or I met some fans from

Canada. They're just like, yeah, we came in for the Arnold. I didn't know they had reception up there. I guess they do now. Maybe it's a new thing. Because the natty professor fixed our crank yeah i was about to mention yeah yeah we got extra wattage now but yeah a couple came up took pictures with them and it was just like dude like yeah it's like what the hell like what's going on here this is crazy but it was super cool yeah have you signed any autographs yet no no i did not but you've taken pictures with people pictures yeah and um i punched a dude oh good yeah how did that happen so uh did he get turned on from it no uh he got kind of upset

no i um i was helping him with uh elbow sleeves oh and so like you know i was like you know push it up his elbow and you're getting stronger now so you gotta be you know so as i yeah as i'm i'm lifting it up and over it slipped and wham just right right in his mouth like an uppercut yeah to the like not not like a like a proper uppercut but just like a upward punch to his face worse and i was like oh shit uh he didn't buy him i't know why. So I was upset that I didn't make the sale. Like, dude, there's a lot more punches where that came from. You better buy these fucking sleeves. Yeah.

I was pretty upset that he didn't buy them, but I would imagine he was pretty pissed off that he got punched. Bunch of crap. Yeah. But other than that, I- He didn't punch back. No, no, no. So all I did in the booth was just piss people off and crush people's dreams of meeting Mark.

That's all I did. A lot of people are getting pumps this weekend with that bench press. Yeah. Oh, yeah. The gym bros are just like, what's the challenge? Like, dude, there's no challenge. It's just to try out the slingshot. What do I got to do to win it?

There's no contest, dude. Yeah. Just get in here. Hey, what's that thing do? It makes it harder to bench, right? Yeah, there was a lot of that, too. You're like, oh, dude. Yeah. Just get in here. Hey, what's that thing do? It makes it harder to bench, right? Yeah. There was a lot of that too. You're like, oh God.

Yeah. Shout out to Matt winning for bringing the bench. That was a nice bench setup that we had in there. And, you know, it's great to kind of go back to the basics. That's what we used to do. We used to have a bench in the booth and then we stopped doing that for a while because we figured enough people have seen the slingshot, but there's so many more people in fitness. I mean, I can't even try to put a number on it, but it seemed like it seemed like three years ago, we reached most of the people that we thought we would reach.

And we reached most of the people in like the strength community. But, you know, now there's so many more people that have jumped in, we're not even close to reaching everybody. So there's a lot of people that came in that have never seen the product before. Yeah. And it's great to get them to actually try it and actually feel it. No, like I was really surprised because like a lot of dudes, you know, they come up, they're like, I've seen this before. Like a friend of mine has this, but I don't know what it's used for. I'm like, wow, you still haven't used the slingshot.

friend of mine has this but i don't know what it's used for i'm like wow you still haven't used the slingshot so whenever you see somebody's face though when they hop on the bench with the slingshot on and they're like oh my god this is this is great it's it's it's really cool you know it it's that's pretty dope yeah i helped a girl she she had never tried it on either or tried the uh slingshot out and so i go to her friend i was like hey do you want to try one too and she's like oh no i got one why don't you let your friend use it you know and i think they lived in different areas but like she's like yeah she has no idea what it is and what it does so i wanted to try it out i'm like okay well that's cool because then it's like referral yeah she did buy it everybody share your slingshot with a friend that doesn't have one. Just do it. Yeah, share a slingshot and this podcast. It's pretty simple.

You can do what employees of this company have done before. You can use a pair of gangster wraps to get a little something something from a lady. That's right. It seems highly interesting. Maybe we'll leave names out. Yeah out yeah no we don't need to

name any let's just say somebody associated with the company may have you know like that was like the icebreaker was like here's a you know gangster rap they use their street cred and then some street cred and then what happens at the arnold sometimes should stay at the arnold my cousin was my cousin was all into that too my cousin was all into like getting the fragmented uh ladies you know from the popularity of the booth he was like i ran into some pretty hot chicks and he's like they asked me if i knew you i'm like i'm his cousin they were like really they're like oh what do you do i was like damn i'm like hey man like full advantage yeah yeah yeah right that wave right rave of wave of yoga pants oh yeah there was a lot of yoga pants i didn't notice

yeah no no i didn't i don't even know what andrew's talking about i looked at everyone in the eyes too yeah yeah i mean keep yeah no i it was totally normal it was super fun jesse jesse burdick said that he's like i just want to go up to some of these Yeah. I mean, keep, yeah, no, I, it was totally normal. It was super fun. Jesse Burdick said that he's like, I just want to go up to some of these girls and say, listen, I appreciate the full view of your vagina in these high-waisted, he called them high-waisted vagina pants. I was like, that's what they should be. They should just be called that. Yeah. He's like, he's like, they know, right?

They know, like we can, they know we can see everything. Yeah. I was like, everything yeah i was like oh yeah they told yeah i think so there was sure they totally know yeah there was the i mean it's not like they don't have a mirror yeah i'm checking themselves out before they leave and they didn't take 14 pictures right oh yeah there was the the chicks that were bouncing up and down on those like springy other things i'm like you can only do that here at an expo yeah outside of an expo you're kind of an asshole if you're jumping around on these things and he's like um you can see that girl's asshole when she jumps up oh my god it's so bad it was great expos have the like most interesting clothing especially especially the bodybuilding one the olympia that that's where

you see some wild shit because like they're all you know physique athletes and everyone's wearing the most minimal amount of clothing they can manage a lot of skin yeah it's wild it's wild it's amazing though because someone will have a stringer tank and they'll be like five five and they'll be like 140 and you're like have you not seen the other people walking around i mean there's professional bodybuilders walking around. Yeah. Maybe you should cover up a little bit more than that. That doesn't really, it's not really working that well for you.

You do it for the culture, man. It's, it's not for how you look. It's because you're no, you're no bodybuilding expert. It's for the culture at that point. Yeah. And then some of the boots just have people just wearing paint and like almost nothing. I saw that. Or pasties.

Yeah. Yeah. That, those were pretty cool and then do you do you see bang what they were doing over there how can you miss my god that was a headache dude that was that was a party that was a sick rave for like 10 hours every day for three days straight how did they do it yeah they had a lot of bang energy yeah there were legit people like there was a crowd of people like dancing and stuff in front of their booth because like they had a guy on stage

and it was a whole long thing, but that was, my God. A lot of people were like, that was so stupid. I'm like,

I think it's brilliant. It is smart. I think it's great. It goes along with the product that they have and they made a lot of noise.

Yeah, Jesse was like, I dare you to walk down this aisle straight through all the way to the end and back he's like you can't stop until you get to the end and like what is he talking about and then also

okay so i got close to the bang booth and i was like i can't get through there's no way like there's just too much going on good for them it's complicated for those big companies you know they need to spend a lot of money i mean they had signage purposes and stuff but i don't think they were even selling anything i think they're just giving stuff away yeah dang someone said the uh the ceo of bang crowd surfed like shit there was enough people to do that for sure yeah yeah there was i mean they had signage everywhere though like the entire place company has they got some they have that red line shit man that like anyone that loves pre-workout they always talk about how much they love pre-workout how intense they love the pre-workout

to be or how strong they love their coffee to be and then you mentioned red line they're like oh no i don't fuck with that like no no no i'm not gonna mess with that one you know how much caffeine's in that i've never had a red i'm not sure but like it tells you it tells you to only drink half yeah and it's a good recommendation anything tells you to only drink half. Yeah. And it's a good recommendation. Anything that tells you only drink half of this is not a good idea. What about those kratom extracts, huh? I'm a fan. Oh, yeah.

I am a fan. That was some good shit. So everybody was high as a kite. Was that the first day? I think it might have been the second day. I had it on the second day. Yeah. Natty Professor was so happy. Jessica was like, oh, shit, I'm high. uh i think it might have been the second day i had it on the second day yeah natty professor

was so happy that was jessica was like oh shit i'm high you know like when you when it hits you when it hits you bro so that was like super concerning for me because i'm like uh i talked to his name was tom at the urban ice uh booth yeah and he's like how many how many capsules do you normally take i'm like oh just like one to two. I don't really get much out of it. And then so he's like, okay, don't take more than half. And as you said that, all I can see is Encima taking a whole bottle.

I can see Jessica taking a whole bottle. You're trying to say no. And then so I'm like, you know, I got back to our booth and I'm like, whatever, dude, I don't want to be a wuss. I'm going to take the whole thing. I took the whole thing, felt nothing. it's like damn do it maybe i take way more than i like let on that slow hit but then i did the next day and whoo i felt it so for some reason the first day didn't feel nothing second day i was like i was i was a chatty kathy anybody

that came up to the booth i was like how you guys doing enjoying the show like didn't even care about making the sale or anything it's just like going did you have an empty stomach that first day or not uh i believe both days i had an empty stomach yeah man that first day yeah no i uh i took it i had an empty stomach already had some coffee and for like 30 35 minutes like huh i'm not feeling anything and then it's legit it's like huh i'm not feeling anything and then it's legit it's like you just see your eyes open and you're just like i was so fucking it was it was so good though like it wasn't even like i i was still you know talking to everybody but i was just like hey it's a good feeling it's weird how long it takes yeah that's a weird thing about kratom you know it takes like 30 minutes sometimes it takes 40 minutes yeah uh and then if you have any food in your stomach it might take like an hour to hit how long it takes. Yeah. That's the weird thing about Kratom. You know, it takes like 30 minutes. Sometimes it takes 40 minutes.

Yeah. Uh, and then if you have any food in your stomach, it might take like an hour to hit you or it might not even hit you at all. So it's kind of, it can be unpredictable a little bit, but when you, when you have it on an empty stomach, you usually feel it pretty good. Yeah.

Jesse took it and he said he didn't feel anything either. But me and Jess, we took the whole bottle and we were, uh, we were, we were good. Nice. Some good stuff. But, uh, we, uh, you know, at the Arnold, we also, uh, got to watch some strong men and, uh, got to watch, uh, Hap Thorpe Bjornsson kick some ass again.

Unbelievable. He's just an absolute monster. Keep, it seems like it just keeps getting bigger. It seems like it keeps getting better. But unfortunately our boy, Brian Shaw ended up, uh, getting a hamstring injury on the, uh, on a deadlift. And it gets to be really hard cause you're in like direct competition with these other athletes.

And so it's really hard to stay in your lane. It's hard to like, you know, like Brian probably shouldn't have took that deadlift. Uh, but how do you not? Cause like that deadlift would have put him ahead of Thor and then Thor would have had to make his, uh, third attempt deadlift deadlift which which he was probably going to make anyway but um you know how do you not how do you not compete as hard as you can how do you leave something on the table but at the same time with five events it probably makes sense to leave something on the table for every event except for maybe the last one right and to try to pick up points and

to try to be really strategic it's so easy to say that after the fact so easy to say that oh yeah i should do it this way um yeah but unfortunately brian ended up uh you know pulling a hamstring i think with like a thousand fifty yeah like yeah so he yeah he he he nailed 1021 and then the next one the 1050 or i think it was like even 1049 or something but because the kilos they couldn't quite get it right but yeah that's when he and it's so frustrating because it's like he could have foregone is that how you say it yeah okay skipped it he could have skipped it and he still would have been second because thor missed his next one but you're right how do you know like you you do not know it's impossible yeah okay skipped it he could have skipped it and he still would have been second because thor missed his next one but you're right how do you know like you you do not know it's impossible well then

thor also took like a huge jump because he tried that 1102 which he wouldn't have if brian would have made his so they're trying to jockey for position and everything but whatever the case is there it was pretty amazing to uh be that up close to the action and to watch these guys do what they do best. Brian Shaw has been competing at a high level for probably about 12 years, maybe a little bit longer. And then this was his 10th Arnold, I think, in a row. His 10th Arnold in a row. And he's won a few of them as well. I want to say that he's won probably at least three or four of them.

And, uh, in one year he won the strong world's strongest man. That's a great shot right there. Thor and Brian. Um, right now Thor's got the upper hand and, and Brian, you know, has his back to the wall because, uh, Thor has won, uh, the world's has won the World's Strongest Man. He's won the Arnold. I think he might have won World's Strongest Man. He may have won World's Strongest Man twice in a row.

I know he won the Arnold twice in a row. I think he only won World's Strongest Man once so far. You're probably right. Yeah. But he won the Arnold last year. Then he won World's Strongest Man. And then he won the Arnold this year. And now they're going into World's Strongest strongest man again which I think is probably 10 12 weeks

away from now and uh I ended up having I had some really just wild conversations uh in the booth with with many different people during the show like stuff that like stuff that takes time to recover from like like, because the emotion of some of the conversations I had with people, some of these things, um, you know, I'm like, fuck man, I need to like go somewhere by myself for like 10 minutes because, uh, you know, people are telling me about like deaths in the family and people are telling me about how they had, you know, addictions to drugs or alcohol or all these different things.

And, um, it just gets to be, it gets to be overwhelming. But my favorite conversation, uh, of the weekend was with Brian Shaw, where he and I had a very real conversation about family and about, you know, what he's trying to do. And, um, you know, his, his, uh, goal to be world's strongest man again, and to be back on top. And, um, Jessica Smith was actually standing right there for a lot of these conversations, which I thought was great. Cause Jessica's really young and, um, she gets to kind of hear these, these

conversations that are, that are deep, that are, that these things matter. And these things are, they're way different than anything. It's just about like lifting weights or just about, you know, losing 10 pounds of body fat or anything like that. And, uh, the conversation I had with Brian Shaw was basically like, I just think in order for you to do what you need to do next, which is beat Thor. Um, I think the only way that that's going to happen is if you just try something different, you know, not so much with the training, but just

maybe take some time off, you know, take a couple of weeks and just don't lift. Maybe just, it's hard. It's hard. It's hard to like, Hey man, just relax. You know, you, you lose a tournament in jujitsu. It's easier for your coach to come over and say, Hey, you know what? I think you should take like two months off. You'd be like, no man, I'm back to training tomorrow.

Yeah. Cause you're so hungry for it. But I think in this case, especially when you've been doing something for so long, it's time to shift gears a little bit and just, uh, give yourself some time to reflect, give your body, mind, and spirit some time to, uh, recover. So my advice and, you know, I hopefully, hopefully he takes it to heart. My advice to Brian was just, you know, take, take a couple of weeks off, re-evaluate where you're at and be open and accepting of the fact that maybe, maybe it'd be a good idea to forego world's strongest man for this year, which is like impossible for a guy like that to do. He's been there the last x amount of years

he's you know super excited about you know being on top and i'm sure when world's strongest man comes around he'll his hamstring probably feel better yeah he'll probably feel strong but i feel like if he just gives himself time that that time will allow his body mind and spirit to heal enough to where he can come back and win another World's Strongest Man. Yeah, he'll be able to attack it with more vigor. It's like, I mean, I don't want to even, can't use this comparison, but when you're thinking of like a power lifter

that's competing every single year, it's not taking much time between competitions, you know, usually you see that from the higher level because maybe they know that they don't need that much time to increase the small amounts of strength but when you've been on top like shaz been he's won four times right you've been competing for so long that little break might allow you to come back the next year so much stronger you know but it like you mentioned it is super hard for a competitor that's there all the

time and is the top guy all the time to just be like, okay, I'll be out, but I'll be back. You know, um, I, I don't doubt that he has the a hundred percent capacity to just leave for a little bit and come back much stronger if he gives himself some rest. But I think what's going to take even more courage is actually doing that. I think it's, I feel like it's going to take more strength for him to not compete than it will for him to compete. Yeah. Yeah. Cause he, it's like,

he's so used to competing and it's like, it's in him. Um, that walking away just for a little bit, I, that's going to be the hardest thing. And it's a great picture, Andrew.

Yeah. Thank you. Did you take that, Andrew? I took all these pictures. My God. Wow. That's badass.

That is, that's really sick. I, I saw it and I, I, it, it took me about 50 shots to get it right though. Yeah.

Um, You nailed it. That's yeah. Uh, being, being a part of all this, like, um, it's crazy. Cause like, um, Chris Griffin and I, you know, we had media passes, but that doesn't mean that they're going to just roll out the red carpet for you. You have to bulldoze your way to get into like the, the like media pit basically. Yeah. And every, every time it's like, dude, how are we going to do this?

And then we figured out, you know, I just get right behind Chris and we just keep pushing and then we always end up right. It's kind of exciting, right? It's, it's yeah, dude. And then like, we ended up right in the front and it's like, oh my gosh, dude, like, I can't believe we're here again. You guys were front and center. Yeah. You were like right there. Right there. Right in the middle and it's like, oh my gosh, dude, I can't believe we're here again. You guys were front and center. Yeah.

You were right in the middle. It was awesome. Yeah. And that comes with the experience of going there this last three years in a row now. But it sucks, man. I hate seeing Shaw get hurt. Yeah. But then seeing Thor go crazy, it's like, oh my gosh.

But then seeing Thor go crazy, it's like, oh my gosh. And not that he didn't have my respect already, but when Thor went for the, uh, like the world record or whatever on the elephant bar, he already had everything in the bag. He could have saved all his energy and he could have went and just like, oh, I'm going to just go to the next event. I'm going to forego this. Yeah. And he went for it and, you know, anything could happen. And I know there was like a $50,000 check on the line the line but like he would have tried it either way probably yeah yeah exactly

you know and then it's like dude like man that the risk reward it's like he doesn't care he's gonna go for it yeah and so it's like you know the respect i already had for him is just like through the roof you know it was so sick and then just like i said just to be there hear the crowd behind you because you're right in the middle so you hear all sides coming right towards the stage and it's just like oh my gosh like this is crazy it's you know because i'm taking pictures it's it's silly but you know it's it's it's really cool frustrating thing is people have better seats than me are just on their phones yeah yeah it's funny too because the whole expo, like I was at the booth, but like whenever they were on the elephant park doing the deadlifts, the whole expo pretty much kind of like stopped

and started looking at the screen. So you just hear everything die down and everyone's staring at that screen. Yeah. That was pretty crazy. But you guys know more about basketball than I do, obviously. When Jordan left, I think he left for what, two years to play golf or something? To play baseball. Baseball.

There we go. Baseball. When he came back, did he win any more championships or no? I think he did for what, two years to play golf or something? To play baseball. Baseball. There we go. Baseball. When he came back, did he win any more championships or no? I think he did. Oh, yeah. He did? Oh, yeah. You know, I'm not saying they're the same athlete, but it's very possible, especially

because like, even though Shah is older, it's not like athletically, like he still has that capacity. You know what I mean? It's not like he's ages taking its toll on him. It's just like, you know, he could really just like take a little bit, keep training, you know, take a little bit of a rest in terms of that, come back, kill it and be right back on top. I really feel like he could do that, but this is just coming from your average athletes. we're not we're not uh of that of that caliber that's for sure yeah yeah you know it's it's it was amazing to watch thor go for that uh 1102 deadlift which would have been an all-time world record deadlift and and um to try to compare that to anything in another sport is actually really hard because it's like um i I don't even know an analogy.

Like it just doesn't make any sense to like roll the dice with such a dangerous thing. Um, you know, like if, if you were to, um, if you were in competition, uh, you know, in a, in a track meet or something like that, And they said, okay, you can go for this because this will be all time world record, but you already won a gold medal. It would be, I mean, I don't, I don't think anybody would choose to do it, you know, like in most cases and, and to really watch these guys, um, you know, pour so much into it was, was really, was really crazy. And Thor is just, you know, he's just going after,

you know, things that he thinks will make him great. You know, he's trying to be not just good. He's trying to be great. And he's trying to not only be great, but he's trying to be one of the greatest of all time. And he's starting to, uh, definitely kind of fit into that category. But yeah, that conversation with Brian was great. And, uh, you know, he and I went back and forth and stuff. We talked a lot about family. Um, he's got two very very young children he has an infant uh an infant son and then i think uh his other son is uh maybe like three or something right it's like three yeah braxton right and so you know not to make excuses for the guys. I'm sure Thor has tons of responsibilities as well, but being married with children is, uh, is, is another aspect of the game that, that has to be kind of factored in there. And so that's kind of what, that's part of the reason why I mentioned,

you know, maybe taking some time off, maybe reevaluating, uh, maybe some conversation with the wifey about like, Hey, what is this? You know, when we go for this next year, what does this look like? You know, Brian mentioned how, you know, uh, uh, at the Arnold, uh, you know, he's been there 10 years in a row and how he doesn't feel like he always gets treated well. It's like, well, you've been there 10 years in a row and, uh, the likelihood of that changing is, years in a row. And, uh, the likelihood of that changing is, is probably low. So because you know that you either a do no longer compete in the world's strongest man, uh, or B you, uh, think about a different way to approach the event, a different way to, uh, go to the event. Um, you know, those kinds of things. So you, you kind of prep yourself for, uh, conditions that maybe, uh, that you don't

feel are ideal or you just completely remove yourself from it and say, you know what, I'm just not even gonna, I already have negative connotations going in and I don't know how to get rid of them. So I'm just not going to go again. Again, that would be hard. Yeah. Yeah. At the Arnold.

Um, you know, again, that would be a tough thing to do, but, uh, to me it makes, it makes some sense, you know, and it would, um, but it's probably too hard to do because then people are going to say, yeah, he's probably not showing up because Thor beat him last. You know what I mean? And then you got to deal with a whole nother side of things. But I really do think, uh, you know, taking some time to kind of reevaluate, um, not so much the training, but just reevaluate, you know, how you're going to attack this thing almost as a family. Cause it does, you know, a lot of people, they don't give credit to the wife. They don't give credit. The whole family's involved. I'm sure like his parents are involved.

Her parents are involved. Um, it's, it takes takes an army it takes an army to get these guys on these platforms and to have them uh become world champions like this so that's why from that standpoint i think it'd be a great idea just to kind of slow everything down and say let's try to let's try to figure out what this is going to look like for for next year but let's take a few weeks out you know a few weeks off yeah there's been uh i'm i don't know i don't know if it's already known but like worlds being possibly in california i don't know if i misunderstood that or not well strongest man yeah they've been talking about los angeles possibly i think do you think that's going to factor into shaw deciding to do it because it's like man it's

normally like a pain in the dick to get out to wherever it is and now it's like if it's here man that's gonna be really hard to pass up yeah i think i think just taking a little bit of time like a pain in the dick to get out to wherever it is. And now it's like, if it's here, man, that's going to be really hard to pass up. Yeah. I think, I think just taking a little bit of time off will help him to reevaluate and then he'll know how bad the hamstring is and stuff. Then he can kind of make a decision.

So when you say a little bit of time, you don't mean like take a year and skip all these other events. Yeah. I just mean like take a couple of weeks. Okay. Kind of reevaluate how you feel get back into training and if the hamstring is garbage and it's not feeling right then you probably need to you know not do the arnold or not do the world's strongest man because it's probably too close

you know yeah you know he i mean you got to assume that like a guy like him who's won it so many times is going into this with the intention of winning so he he's smart enough to like see okay if i have if i know i have the capacity to win i'm gonna make this happen i don't i don't know if he's going into like he's not going into play second or third he's going to try and win so we'll see what decision he makes but i'm i'm excited to see him compete again let's just say that. Yeah. I want to see him win so bad, man. Yeah. The year he won the Arnold, I hadn't spent any time with him yet.

Yeah. And then the last two years I'd have, and now I'm just like, come on, man. Yeah. Like, I'm invested, you know? So it's like, to see him get hurt on that deadlift, it's like, oh. That was special that we were there for the year that he won the Arnold because he won it, you know, he, he barely had to do like the last event, which was kind of cool. Like he, he had it in the bag the whole time. He was very dominant.

And then that year he also won the world's strongest man. So that was like, that was special to, to watch, uh, all that unfold. Um, but you know, I think, you know, these, uh, these conversations I had at the booth and stuff like my wife and I have been trying to figure out like, what can we do at these shows? That's different. And we have some ideas, uh, that we want to do some things differently for next year's Arnold, but we're not exactly sure what those things are. It's a full year away.

I know we want to do more podcast stuff. And it was something that we've been kicking around was to, you know, rent out a nice like lobby or lounge, uh, somewhere in a hotel or conference room and, uh, you know, really, uh, try to shotgun through a lot of, uh, podcasts with a lot of great people. You know, I would love to do like collaborative stuff. Um, you know, when I went to rogue, it was like a crossfit wonderland it was unbelievable how many crossfit champions were in there yeah it was just insane and then uh bill henninger was in there too i mean it's like you know this guy's like pioneering you know how manufacturing equipment

is going i mean rogue products are in every gym in the country um he mentioned something the effect of like uh i'm not sure if i i think he said a hundred i think he said a hundred thousand pounds they're going through a hundred thousand pounds of steel a week it was something wild like that and i was like just can't even yeah boom brain exploded but the facility that he has where rogue fitness is and they also have other facilities too still is bigger than where the arnold was i mean it's bigger than the convention center it's huge and now they're building like a rogue stadium so they're gonna have events there and stuff it was just it was insane but when i went when i went I was like, man, how amazing would it be to do a podcast with,

uh, rich Froning and Matt Frazier, who are just sitting right here, you know? And they're so, they're so nice and they're so humble. It's like, it's unbelievable. You know, I'm sitting there watching a Matt Frazier go through 19..2 which maybe you can look up what the workout was andrew but this motherfucker's doing cleans with 315 like it's nothing at the end of a workout and it's like i think they went for 20 minutes straight doing toes to bar and double unders toes to bar double unders cleans toes to bars double unders cleans and the weight increases as you go through it yeah he's just he's just sitting in a giant puddle of sweat and to watch him like, um, to watch this like self mastery happen, like to watch this guy know, okay, I can do two reps in

a row here. Hmm. Okay. I better rest and watch him just kneel down on the ground for a little bit huff and puff get back up okay i can i can gut out three reps okay time's getting close you know i'm gonna do two reps and then rest and then do one rep and then rest and do two reps and then i'm done you know like and just to watch him just and there was no you, he's fired up. He's excited, but there's no like grunting. There's no show.

There's no, it's just him. Just he's in his own world. I mean, there could have been no one else there and he would have been going at it just as hard. Um, and then, uh, on top of that, you know, rich froning is there, uh, doing his own workout. And me and Jesse are watching all this unfold. And we're like, we're watching Rich Froning doing, uh, single leg squats, but he wasn't doing a pistol squat. He was doing it with his leg, uh, back behind him, almost like a single leg, uh, static

lunge. And he was going like to depth with that. Yeah. He was going pretty low with that. And me and Jesse were like, he's doing that in between um in between doing uh sit-ups on the glute ham raise and in between like doing something on the bike um but me you know meanwhile he's sitting there having conversations with people he's like talking in between his sets because he was just doing like his own his own workout he wasn't like you know really killing himself with

it but i was like man he's so. He's getting through so much stuff. Meanwhile, he's snapping pictures with people and he's talking and he's, he just keeps going, you know, through the circuit and everything. And it was just really cool to watch. But I was thinking, man, how cool would it be to podcast with those two guys and ask them like, what does it take? You know, what does it take to be a champion? What does it take?

You know, Rich Froning did it a slightly different way. He was a four-time champion. I think matt frazier is going on three but uh rich is married and has a few children and like even like the last crossfit games that he won as an individual athlete he's like on the plane like we were just talking about brian you know going to these shows with his kids and that might be uh that might be something that is is stressful possibly i don't i don't know a situation but um i would imagine it would be it would be stressful for me if i was trying to like win a world championship and i had a bunch of babies with me it'd be tough but here's rich froning on the plane like holding his infant child and his wife is next to him with

you know with their other their other kid that's like under the age of three and he goes out to crossfit games and whoops up on everybody again and then now he's retired and uh he does uh the team team events and he still wins yeah his team wins every year that's crazy so if i'm if I found the right one on an eight-minute clock, as many reps as possible, but it's 25 total bars, 50 double-unders, 15 squat cleans at 135 pounds, 25 total bar, 50 double-unders, 13 squat cleans at 185. And if you complete that before eight minutes, you add four minutes,

and then you do 25 total bar, 50 double unders, 11 squat cleans at 225. Finish that before 12, add four minutes, do 25 more total bar, 50 more double unders, nine squats and cleans at 275. If you finish that in time, you add four more minutes, 25, 50, and then seven squats at 315. So he got to 315. And he was doing it. Yeah, he was doing it like, you know, he minutes, 25, 50, and then seven squats at 315. So he got to 315. And he was doing it.

Yeah. He was doing it like, you know, he's just cranking through it. And I like at the end of this, it says stop at 20 minutes. No more. Yeah. That's it. You know, it was, was, you know, people just have, people get too negative about these different forms of fitness, these different things that people try.

And if you ever been around these high level CrossFitfit people um it's it's amazing it's outstanding to watch and they're they're as serious about it as anybody else is serious about their aesthetics or anybody else is serious about their strength training power lifting olympic lifting um the the the other people watching him they're all encouraging him and then on top of that he's got a coach who's like he's got like a notepad he's like recording you know the numbers he's getting and this guy is like uh you know down in a squat position like watching every move that he makes and it's a very it's a very serious thing so i i get annoyed sometimes when i hear the negativity i understand you, you know, people don't always understand what the heck a CrossFitter is doing.

Like why are they, you know, why are they jumping around so much and why are they, uh, you know, uh, standing on their heads. Yeah. But it's just a different form of fitness and it's a, it's a great way to get in shape. Um, the females that are in CrossFit, I don't think it's, I don't think it's even a question. I don't think there's females in better shape. No, you're right. I mean, I might be able to point out some, uh, some women that do some track and they,

they would be comparable to women that do sprints. Like fit, like visually. Yeah. But like the question is, I don't think they, even sprinters, you know, who look that way, at least if they haven't had experience, wouldn't be able to hang in some of those crossfit workouts yeah most people can't yeah have you ever done any crossfit stuff no i haven't and i'm not laughing um as it was a joke just like it it's i there was a time that i wanted to years ago um but it'd be interesting it would be interesting but i know i know it's commitment i think you'd be pretty good at a lot of it. You're, you're, you're heavy though.

So that's what I wonder, like, um, you're, you're in good control of your own, your own body and stuff. So it's not like that would crush you, but it might be hard, you know, like just cause you weigh like what? 240? 240. But like with it, like with anything, it would just, it would take me a long time to adapt. Just like it took me a long time to adapt to the stress of jujitsu and lifting.

It took me a long time to be able to just like do that well yeah be the same thing with crossfit i wouldn't be able to pick it up immediately and be good um and i would have to be committed to get to the level that i'd want to be at it's like with it with like you know when i started jujitsu i started so i could get really really good if i started crossfit it would have it wouldn't just be for fitness it'd be be like, I want to get really, really good. I think that's my problem with certain aspects of fitness. It's like, if I do something, I want to take it there. But CrossFit, all that running is the thing that gets me.

That miles of running in between certain workouts, that'd be interesting. When I was at Rogue, I was bench uh, when I was at Rogue, I was benching and I was doing like 365 and I was just doing some sets and reps and, um, it just wasn't feeling great. So I didn't go any heavier than that. And, uh, Rich Froning's like, you're just going

to keep using the weight that I use. He's like, you're not going to go any heavier than that. Dang. And I was like, well, you know, it was funny cause it's like, I'm not taking that bait, you know, and I'm going to go over there and add weight. I've done what I've done.

And I know that he's just trying to, you know, get a rise from me, but it was, it was, it was awesome. I deserved it. You know, it was, it was, it was good, but like that guy's strong. He's super strong. I don't know if he can press 365, but I've seen him before handle 315 fairly easy. And he does a lot of, um, a lot of power lifting type stuff. I've seen him do floor presses before. Um, I know that he

actually for a while was routinely using floor presses because he liked the movement because it wouldn't get, uh, too deep into, uh, his chest and wouldn't make them too sore. Um, and a lot of these guys and girls,'re super open to uh learning about strength you know what while i was in there you know i i was like hey i was like i felt like a dork because i'm like i want to get everybody together for a picture they're like we want a picture with you and i was like oh this is this is cool yeah you know because i don't even i don't even know if they know who i am you know what i mean i'm just like i'm in a different world than they're in um i follow what they do but they're clearly following what a lot of us do a lot of power they follow a lot of power

thing they follow a lot of strong men um and uh they were even asking questions you know about like deadlifting about squatting and about it's like well no wonder why these guys and girls are so good and why no wonder why they're so fit they are are open to learning, uh, anywhere they can be, which we should all be. Right. Yeah. We've talked before about kind of the, uh, white belt mentality, right. The, this idea of, you know, it's great that, you know, a lot of stuff, uh, but to acquire, you know, all, which is knowable is going to be a, uh, a life journey. You're never going to know it all. Casio who can whoop up on just about anybody over at your, uh, at, at his jujitsu school. He doesn't know it all.

You're right. He knows a lot. Yeah. He knows a lot more than you do. Right. And he knows a lot more than, than many of the people in there. And maybe knows more than a combination of everybody put together, but he still doesn't know it all. And,

uh, even like a hoist Gracie, uh, multiple time UFC champion and, uh, sort of the godfather of jujitsu in some way here in the United States. Um, even he doesn't know it all. Yeah. Right. You got to have this, this, uh, understanding and this idea that, uh, you don't know it all and you should be open to something, you know, something else that somebody else might suggest to you. Most definitely. And I think that the hardest thing about that is putting yourself around people that do know more than you or wanting to put yourself around people that know a lot more. Yeah. So you're not just the top dog. Exactly. You know, that's why I found like my biggest jump in strength came when I first started coming here to train.

And I guess the thing that allowed me to progress that way was really not having an ego about not being as strong as some guys in here. here still wanting to talk to certain guys that I knew may have a little bit more technical knowledge, even though they might not be as strong as lift as I am to see what else, what they see about that lift, you know? Uh, and, and I just, I think that's been like my, my biggest strength when it comes to progressing at certain things. I'm all like, I'm always asking questions. Um, and I don't care if like like I'm asking too many questions. Like over at Casio school, when he's teaching technique, if I have to ask two or three questions to get something right,

even if people are waiting there, I'll do it. And it's just because like, I know that if I, if it, I think people are scared of asking questions because there's, they're scared of what everyone or else or everyone else around them thinks about them asking a certain question, right? You know, they will like, oh, wow, everyone thinks I'm dumb or everyone thinks

I'm not getting this. That's fine. But if you need to ask more questions to understand something, you're going to get it much better than everybody else. Even when you get to a high level of something too, still being open to taking criticism or, I guess, advice from the other people around you who may be better and potentially may not be better. I think that's where that whole thing, you know, lies. I even see you,

you know, getting tips from certain people in terms of like your deadlift, even though you've been doing this or certain movements, even though you've been doing this for tons of years. And that's, that's huge. You know, that'll,

that'll just allow you to get to mastery of whatever it is at a much faster pace. But even when you're there, you know, you still have a lot more to learn. There's, there's a lot there. I think asking questions, uh, is a way to really advance your career in a lot of ways, no matter what it is you're doing. It shows other people that you care, you know, and, um, it may be like, maybe you're not even asking a question to advance yourself. Maybe you're just asking a question because you're curious on like what the other person likes to do, but asking questions is, is a really important thing.

Uh, obtaining knowledge about what somebody likes to do, what's their favorite movie. Um, all these things, they're all things that will help you advance because at least it shows that you give a shit and in this case you know we're kind of more talking about like fitness and and that kind of stuff and maybe even advancing um in in your career and being able to make more money um but once you start asking questions that way then i already know oh and seem as like inquisitive, like he cares, you know? So like when he, so when you go to do a deadlift, I might be watching you more.

Maybe, maybe other people that you've asked questions to in the gym, maybe now they're all invested in, in watching you because they have an understanding that you care because you took the time to ask a couple of questions, you know? And that's kind of the same thing with like, it's a little, uh, off topic, but even, um, investing your time into somebody in either a helping them or be just encouraging them, just putting your hands together and clapping for somebody when they're about to go, Hey, let's go. You can, you know, you can do it.

Let's, you know, just, you may not even want to be vocal. That might not be you. Like you might not feel that comfortable with that but that's where you go outside of yourself a little bit and say this isn't for me this is for them and this is the support like i'm hoping that people are watching me when i go i hope they're making some noise for me when i go i hope they're cheering for me who knows might be that little tiny thing that helps maybe somebody tells you something right before you hit the platform and it just eases your mind a little bit, helps you concentrate on what's important and you nail

the lift. So all these things are, are little cheats, little secrets into advancing yourself. You know, Uriah, you know, Uriah Fibber, everyone knows who he is. Um, so Casio used to work with Uriah when Uriah first started jujitsu way early on. And Casio always mentions how Uriah was the, literally the most inquisitive person he's ever worked with. Even though Uriah had a really deep wrestling background before he started jujitsu, when you start jujitsu, it's very different from wrestling. So every time Uriah would roll with somebody, whether it was an upper belt or lower belt,

he'd always ask questions after that roll. Every single roll. It doesn't matter if he beat them or not. He'd always ask questions. What did you notice here? What did you notice here? What did you notice here? And that's the difference between him and a lot of other athletes.

Like you see where he ended up in terms of the UFC. You see what he's been able to build. And that's because like he's had that mentality all through his athletic career. He probably also has that as far as business too. But being extremely inquisitive and trying to figure out every possible way to get better, looking around you and seeing what other people notice about what you do, no matter what their point of view may be, may be extremely helpful towards progression. You know, so it's learning how to like not be insecure about asking questions, not being scared of doing that.

And if you can't, you know, if you can't necessarily because I know not everybody, for example, as far as the gym goes, you can't always find a gym where everybody's stronger than you. Then you might just have to pull a Bryce Lewis. You know how Bryce Lewis is like he's super strong. He trains in his garage all the time. Lewis is like, he's super strong. He trains in his garage all the time, but he's always obviously figuring out what he can do to improve in terms of strength, et cetera, on his own. Maybe he's just, maybe he's even just asking himself questions. Exactly. Like you have to be able to, if you can't get it from other people, you gotta be willing to seek out that information. And like, if you are the best in the room,

then you have to be the one to always seek that information out that information. And like, if you are the best in the room, then you have to be the one to always seek that information out for yourself. It gets, I think, I think that's harder in itself to have to do that on your own without other people around you. Um, but you're going to have to do that. Well, a lot of the answers are, are within, you know, if you really just ask someone, Hey, like what are two or three things you think you should do? I've learned this from, from some really, uh, high level people that have just executed really well in business. They're the kind of people you'll get around and they make you feel so dumb because you'll ask a question and then they'll just answer your question with another question. They'll basically say, oh, and Seema, okay, so you want to double your income

from last year. You want to do that over the next two years. Okay, cool. So what are three things that you think you should do to do that? And then you'll say, well, I could probably be more organized. I could, you know, ABC, right? You'll have three answers probably pretty quickly. You know, I could maybe, you know, maybe in order to make the money that I want, I'm going to have to go to jujitsu less. Maybe there you know maybe there'd be a couple things right boom you're done and then

my response would be well you should go do that that'd be great and the answers all came from within a lot of times we sort we we at least sort of know the answers the problem is we got that other side of our brain that just talks you out of everything all the time. Because then you're like, well, yeah, I could do that. But then somebody else said this, so I should try it this way. Yeah. You know, well, yeah, I could go to jujitsu less and make more money because I could put more time into a couple other things. But no, I like doing it this way you know but then you're just you're talking yourself out of

it's like it's either the priority or or it's not or it's secondary right so then you have to try to make make a decision on on where it lies but the main thing here is just to keep you know keep at the front of your mind is that you should always be learning. You should always want to learn new shit. I'm either lifting in a meeting or I have headphones on pretty much all day or with my family pretty much all day long. And I'm, I'm not just like, well, I'll listen to music here and there, but I'm not just listening to music. I'm usually listening to something that will give me information. Sometimes it's more, sometimes it's more stuff that I want to listen to, but a lot of times it's heavy shit that I don't want to listen to. But I'm like, I know in here, there's going to be a crumb.

There's going to be a crumb in here. There's going to be some, uh, some, uh, little silver lining in here that I can find that I can use that can help me out or that can help me help somebody else. Yeah. And I'm like, man, this is boring as shit. You know, some of the stuff I listen to is awful. And I'm like, I don't want to listen to this or I don't want to listen to this audio book, but I know that it's good for me.

So the trick is to try to balance out between the things that make you happy versus the things that have the opportunity to make you great versus the things that can, uh, just even just make you better. You know, how, how do you, you don't always want to be so obsessed with, you know, great. Um, because that's who even knows what that means. Yeah. Then you got to kind of determine, okay, well, what does that even mean? Well, let's just say better. Let's just say you want to be better.

And even say you want to be better than yesterday may be too big of a burden. Like that might be too much of a responsibility. But how about you just work on being better overall over a period of time, whatever period of time you want to, you want to be better than you were last year. That might be a little easier to consume than, uh, because we try to be better at everything each day. That's a lot. That is a lot.

You try to be better, you know, a better, uh, uh, a better person in your relationship. You try to be a better leader. You try to be a better coach. You try to be a better son. Now it's like, okay, well, we're really piling up a lot of stuff and maybe we should just start out with, uh, something a little bit more simple. And maybe we should just start out with something a little bit more simple. I'm just going to gravitate more towards the things that are going to make me better rather than just the things that make me happy.

Things that make you happy might be things that are entertaining, going to a movie, going off your diet plan. And then there's other things you can get into, which would be like drinking or porn or some of these things that are like they're uh kind of quick i guess quick fixes but they're all part of uh well they're not all part of everyone's life but they're they're they're all uh things that are enticing things that are like there then things that are always but if you spend all your time if you spend all your time, if you spend all your time whacking off, you're not, you're not going to be. And basically, I mean, you can kind of look at it even further, but if you spend all your time like fantasizing, then you're not really in reality and you're not really working towards the things that you should be working towards.

You're not really putting in the work. You're just sitting there thinking about it. Yeah. They're the distractions, right? Yeah. Yeah. And if you spend your time being distracted, you're not really putting in the work you're just sitting there thinking about it yeah they're the distractions right yeah you know if you spend your time being distracted you're not going to get anywhere then that's tough yeah because everything's distracting yeah there's a hard balance there like you know especially when you're thinking about wanting to be great at something and wanting to get much better at something a lot of times that and it's not necessarily even bad if it becomes an obsession, right? But you could really just like gas yourself out. And then, you know, when

people are heading towards those goals, when I'm heading towards those goals, sometimes I'll just find myself just sometimes exhausted. And like, I just had to take a day or whatever and just like, you know, recharge with that. So, you know, you got to find a balance, just like when you're talking about Matt Frazier, when he was, uh, how impressive it was to see how he was able to handle himself during that workout in terms of knowing where he needed to stop, knowing where he needed to rest, knowing when he needed to kneel down. Figuring that out for yourself, like knowing when you've got to put your foot on the gas, knowing when you've got to slow down just for a little bit so you can recharge and you can have the energy to keep going at it. It's a very difficult balance for people to figure out, but everybody's different when it comes to slow down just for a little bit so you can recharge and you can have the energy to keep going at it. That's a, it's a very difficult, you know, balance for people to figure out, but everybody's different when it comes to that. Some people can just go and go and go and go and go. And we all want to be like that, but we might not be able to all be like

that individual. There's different ways that we can go about it that we've got to figure out for ourselves. How many hours a day can you realistically dedicate day in and day out to being better at jujitsu? Me personally, like two, two, two and a half hours. Yeah.

That's what, yeah. That sounds very reasonable. You know, like if you were to say, you know, six hours, eight hours,

maybe that's, you know, so maybe you spend an hour or two at jujitsu, like physically at jujitsu, and maybe you spend an hour, half hour watching some videos. And if you start to spend a lot more time than that, then it starts to consume and impede upon some of the other things that you have in your life. And maybe, maybe that causes more stress and doesn't even make you better anyway. Uh, also too, if you're not getting the sleep, um, and there's a lot of research that backs this up. If you're not getting the sleep that you need, you're not even really learning

and really truly absorbing all the stuff that you just practiced. I mean, you'll, you'll know it and absorb it something to the effect of like 60% better if you're just getting proper rest, which is like, you know, it's probably a little different for each person, but I would say, you know, eight hours is what most people are probably looking for. And on top of that, maybe occasionally even getting a nap. There's a lot of research showing, uh, a sleep, you know, some sleep, um, before and after. I don't know if you ever messed around with that,

but it might be something to play with is Michael Walker, right? Matthew. Matthew Walker. Yeah. Yeah, the sleep guy. He talked about, you know, getting some sleep before and after. It might be something to mess with for jiu-jitsu. Like right after the session?

I don't know if it has to be like right after. So the idea behind it is it helps, um, push things from short-term memory to long-term memory. So when you learn something and then you take a nap, it kind of forces it to go into the, whatever part of your memory bank. He talked about it as if you were like,

literally like clicking on something and dragging it into a folder. Yeah. Huh? Yeah. It was pretty, it was, it was pretty cool. Yeah.

It was really good. But yeah, so like with, I could send cool yeah it's really good but yeah so like with i could send you like one of the clips about it so with jasmine like when she has a uh a test or something um she'll study for and then we make her go take a nap and then she takes the test after her nap and she does way better why did i forget about this i used to do that in high school and college all the time. I don't know why I stopped doing it. I never thought about that during exercise though. Like I always knew that it was like good for like retention of stuff.

I never thought about that for exercise and stuff like that. Yeah. It's really awesome. So I'm going to hit a bench, take a nap in between sets and come back. Michael Hearn. I mean, he, he,

he does that. I mean, he, he, he does that. I mean, wakes up at, at, you know, three and, uh, trains at four and he's in the gym from four to six and he goes back and he eats, he has like a big old protein shake and then he eats food and then he just takes a nap, you know? And it's like, maybe there's, you know, maybe there's something, maybe there's more to it than, you know, him just waking up early and being maniac you know maybe there's maybe there's some uh really restorative things that are happening maybe he's like locking you know quote-unquote locking in the gains you mentioned

how you know these things are going from short-term to long-term memory well maybe it's possible that these things are going from uh being things that stimulated your body for this short period of time that help burn calories but now because you're recovering and maybe putting your hormones in a good balance, you know, maybe you can retain 1%, 2%. I mean. Locking in the pump. Wow. Right. Like that could really, what if you could lock in 2% more in every workout? Yeah. I mean, I don't, I don't know what's possible, but, um, it sounds to me like that's what Matthew Walker is pointing out is like that these things can work that way. That'd be dope.

I need to finish that book. I have it. I've only gone like a third of the way through. Oh man. Put it down for something else, but I got to finish that book. It's so good. On that topic of books, you know, I'm somebody that I don't, I don't like to read, right? But you can consume everything that you want to consume through YouTube.

And so recently I've been watching a lot of Matthew Walker stuff, and I'm not against books by any means. If you want to read and you love reading, then go at it. I just struggle with reading. My retention for reading is not great. If I hear something, it's a little bit better. And for some reason, if I hear something and it's got music to it. And, uh, for some reason, if I hear something and it's got music to it, it's even better. Um, just the way my brain works. And if I take notes on it,

now I'm even, uh, doing even better. And if I take notes on it and I go back and read those notes, now I'm really, uh, in the driver's seat and I'm going to remember some of these things. Um, but all these things are consumable, uh, via YouTube. And so if you want to look up something specific, if you wanted to just search, like use YouTube as a search, don't use Google. Google's crap. I mean, people are just paying to get to the top of the list, you know, but I'm sure they're doing the same thing on YouTube. I think they're owned by the same company or whatever. But the point is, is like, if you type in Matthew Walker, you type in long-term, uh, memory, you'll get three or four videos that are probably just 15 minutes each.

And say, I'm going to watch this one. You know, I'm going to watch these two for today. It's a half an hour work. It's a half an hour of, of consuming something for the day. Oh, I heard, uh, you know, and SEMA and Mark, you know, talking about, talking about flexible dieting. I'm going to look up flexible dieting by Lane Norton. Oh, look at that. There's two videos, both of them are 15 minutes. That's it's a half an hour. It's not going to take you very long. And if you listen to something and you're not digging it and it's not vibing with you, shut it off. Right. Whereas a book, I feel like, you know, I personally feel a little bit more trapped by it. You know, I feel like, man, I got to like, okay, I got to really pay attention and I got to. You know, I feel like, man, I gotta like, okay, I gotta really pay attention and I gotta, you know, I gotta really focus and hone in on it. Um, I'm not the

kind of person that a lot of people are though. A lot of people will sit down with a book and it's like relaxing for them, almost meditative maybe. And, uh, you know, maybe depending on the type of book that they have, it helps take them to places that they otherwise wouldn't be able to go. And it's like an adventure and stuff like that but for me this doesn't work that way so anyway that's my two cents on youtube and it i agree with you like it's first off it's really cool that you were able to figure out the best way that you do learn it because a lot of people do think that oh if i want to learn about all these things i could go pick up a book and read it and some people that's just not fun but the a lot of books just stay on the shelves right like you Like you said, you didn't finish it, right?

I didn't finish it. I only went through a third of it so far. You kind of half-assed everything in life, Natty Professor. Oh, by the way, my Instagram name is Nsema Eang now. It's just my name. But back to the subject. There's no hidden reason behind that, by the way, Mark. I knew your brain was going to go there.

There's kind of a reason behind it. All right, I'm going to come back to what we were just mentioning about the book thing. Okay. I'm going to remember to come back to this. So the reason why I changed my IG name from the Natty Professor to Sima Yiyang. Yeah, it is because of the creatine. It's just because we had this conversation.

When you have Natty in your name, people automatically think you're not Natty. And I don't want it like everybody that comes across the name to be like, ah, he's blah, blah, blah. So I'd just rather, you know, I'm still Natty, but I'd rather just have you look at the information. The lifter formerly known as the Natty. He'll be a symbol pretty soon. I'd rather have people just like look at the information and take the information rather than focusing on whether I'm Natty or not. Yeah. I'll tell you I'm Natty if you whether i'm natty or not yeah i'll

tell you i'm natty if you believe natty or not here i come it doesn't matter you know just that's it it's just my name plus now like people know my name instead my name's not easy but you know just in sema it's easy i think i think it had a lot more to do with the fact that there was a couple beers going around the hotel room it was like it was like 2 a.m and then and so he was just laying down on the bed with his phone over his head it i think it hit your head or was that someone else yeah no my phone hit my head yeah he dropped it right on his face and it was a loud thump but then you know like so this was the the last night of the arnold um our flight was at i think 6 a.m oh you guys got killed so So, and then, yeah, that was terrible.

But, you know, we're still up, and he's like, guys, I think I'm going to change my name. And then we're all just like, just do it, man. Just do it right now. You know, we all, you know, we had a little bit of the confidence sauce in us, you know, a little bit. And just do it. Just do it. And then it's like, damn, guys guys it's like 3 a.m we got to wake up in one hour to get out of here like what an awful feeling right it was i mean it was

fun hanging out but yeah that whole next day and then with the delays of the flight it was but so i think that's what it was not nothing you just said disregard everything i mean i've been wanting to change it for a while. It's just my name. It's not a big deal. It's just my name. That's what I told you. Because I'm like, I remember you brought this up a while ago.

And like, so how long have you been thinking about it? And you said, you know, some time now. So I'm like, yeah, then, I mean, shit. Just like what Mark was saying, you have the answer within. You know, like, shit, just do it. Oh, man. Yeah. So it's cool that it's your actual name just my name yeah

and see him at yang but yeah back back to the book thing because that that that took a little dovetail um there are so many uh actual like cool channels on youtube that take large books and give you very just like yeah the big summaries from these books. And if you're really trying to get like the information from some of these books or like the big, big concepts that are going to affect you the most, you don't have to read the whole thing. You can legit go to a 10, 15 minute video that will give you all of the big concepts to take away from the book. And if you can utilize those great, you know, you don't have to read all of those books. Um, so that, that, that's the cool thing about

it it's just like there's so much long form and short form information out there for you to find you just got to figure out what works best for your for you to intake and what works best for your time maybe you don't have the time to read a 400 page book or you you don't you know you're not going to finish it quickly so just go find yourself a good summary on it and, you know, take it away. You know, who asked a lot of questions is, uh, Ed Cohn, Jake Cutler, uh,

and, uh, Ron Penna. Like they'll just, you know, Ron Penna is, uh, one of the original founders of quest nutrition and this huge ass company.

Ed Cohn, obviously one of the greatest power actors of all time, Jake Cutler, and one of the greatest bodybuilders of all time. Jake Cutler is like he he actually asked more questions than anybody i ever met in my life he just hammers you with questions what kind of stuff does he ask did he ask he he just i don't even know if he knows he does it but he asks you a lot like he'll ask you about your diet he'll ask you about your training um He'll ask you about your training. Um, and, and I think like he, um, you know, he has his own, his own kind of theories on, on nutrition and stuff. And,

uh, he asked a lot about like, like keto diet. He asked a lot about like intermittent fasting and, um, like the last conversation we had, he asked a lot, asked a lot about, you know, lower carb. Cause this is like a guy that would eat a thousand carbs a day back in his, uh, in his heyday. And I was like, yeah, you know, I just don't think, I think that carbohydrates are a great like weapon, but I think that in general, I think most people could probably, uh, use a lot less of them and, uh, they'll have like a like a really good impact when you kind of like reset your body and you start to pull away, you know, some of this, you know, processed foods and sugars and things like that. And if you're somebody that's already eating healthy, I think that you,

you'll probably quickly realize you can probably run on a little bit less carbs. I can't make that blanket statement for everybody, but I just think in general, I think a lot of people would find that they, you know, they're like, wow, I'm only having 200 carbs a day or a hundred carbs a day. And things are still going pretty good. And I think on top of that, I said, I think people can probably add, add a little bit of fat because now we got to kind of replace some of this energy, you know, source. And he was like, man, he's like years ago. He's like, I would think that was total bullshit, but he's like, I I'm starting to kind energy, you know, source. And he was like, man, he's like years ago, he's like, I would think that was total bullshit. But he's like, I, I'm starting to kind of, you know, see some of that, you know, myself. And he's like, this is just what worked for me

and my bodybuilding. You know, I, I was, you know, consuming these enormous amounts of carbs, but he's like, my stomach was always bothering me. And he had multiple awesome poop stories on the podcast. Um, but he, uh, yeah uh yeah he asked he asked a ton of questions well even just how's your brother doing how's how your parent you know he follows all this stuff and it's just i don't know it's ridiculous to me i'm like this is jay cutler like he's like an idol of mine you know and same with ed cone ed cone always asks like ed cone is um ed cone ed cone is a lot more uh uh like sensitive he's more personable he like really cares about not that jay cutler doesn't but ed cone really cares about people and so ed cone's questions

are very rarely going to be about lifting yeah um of course that comes up because that's his passion but he's always like how's your brother how's your brother? How's your mom? How's your dad? How's, how are your kids? Kids doing, you know, he, and he, he'll look you in the eye and really ask you. And like, he really, uh, he really cares, but he's not asking. And then like thinking of a bunch of other shit, he's asking and he's listening. Yeah. And that's another key factor is if you're going to be asking questions, uh, you know, don't a lot of people go up to a guy like in CMAs in great shape and they'll be like, Hey man, like I just want to lose some body fat. What do I got

to do? And then as soon as he says, well, you know, here's, you know, five steps. Well, once he's into step number one, you're already checked out. Cause he didn't tell you about like some fat burning supplement or whatever, right? That happens a lot. And people will say, well, here's what I do. And it's like, I don't care what you do. You asked me how you thought you should go about losing some weight. I'm trying to give you advice. And now you're telling me what you do for it, which is not working, which is the reason why you asked me in the first place. Right. Yeah.

So people need to actually listen and pay attention to. Yeah. All these questions. It's like, I mean, it's just like taking a, when you take that answer, it's like you have a filing cabinet. I think that's also why like all these individuals you mentioned, they do ask so many questions because I wouldn't say that it's, yeah, maybe some things they don't know, but they're just like probably thinking of all this information and finding correlations between certain things that work. You know, like the, I never thought a few years ago, learning about like flexible dieting and macros, et cetera, and hearing about keto a few years ago, I never thought it'd be something I'd ever consider as being a viable, you know, dieting concept. I think there were times I could like, there were times I could think of that I was more closed off to, let's say, learning about different diets because I thought this is the way to go.

This is the way that all people should do it. I did pigeonhole myself in that way. But it is like with all these different diets, there's so many different ways to do the like to get the same result. open, especially I think people that are from the flexible dieting community, we need to be a little bit more, we need to be a lot more open to a lot of these different diets and see how they can work for different individuals. Because I mean, the whole higher carb flexible dieting deal that typically people do doesn't and shouldn't work for everybody. And there's just so much that's not known about nutrition already that you need to be open and you need to be just like open to taking different anecdotal stories from people and to understand why it works. Like Saladino that was on with the carnivore thing, you know, you got to be open to all those anecdotes and seeing why they work.

And because maybe that could work much better for somebody else who maybe has IBS and is eating excessive amounts of carbs. Maybe carnivore would be the best type of deal for them. But taking that evidence, not just from research and utilizing it, it's going to be, I think it's hard for a lot of us, me, myself too. It used to be, but I'm becoming more open to that. You know, I think the biggest thing also is when you think you're, I used to, and I still think I have a decent handling on my nutrition and the nutrition of my clients. But when you feel that you're an expert on something, you tend not to be as open to wanting to learn more things. It's when you realize that you're not really an expert or when you allow yourself to believe that you're not that great at something all the time i think that that's going to that's something that's really beneficial i think we've

only been maybe doing this podcast with you on here for a couple of weeks yeah like a month yeah i don't know a handful of episodes we'll say i think even in that time i've noticed that your mind has opened up to some other possibilities. Like even just when we had, uh, some of the different people on the show and when we had conversations, I think you've kind of been like, oh, like I understand that. I understand that side of things. And I think that's, you know, that's an important value, um, just in our society. So it's like understand each other. And I think that, um, we we have a tendency like we don't

understand something you get like mad about it which doesn't really make it it's like that's so irrational you know it's so irrational um to you know not understand somebody else's culture and then you're you're mad about it um like why would I be mad that somebody's kneeling in the corner, praying to some doll? Like it was nothing to do with me. That's their own thing they got going on. Right. Like maybe that, maybe I, maybe I'm not cool with it, but to be like violent towards it, like that's where it starts to get crazy. Or you see like, um, when it comes to nutrition, you know, you see all the comments or when it comes to fitness um i think i saw chris duffin a couple days ago posted a a picture just of his like body he's

like i'm getting in better shape again or something like that and then somebody was like you have a horrendous physique and i was just like and and maybe this is a guy that's like, I don't know, uh, follows people that, uh, have a more aesthetic body and have a smaller waist and bigger shoulders. So I don't even know. Yeah. But it was just like, just, it's like, man, like that's just completely negative. It was just a, you know, and yeah, look, he looks, he looks jacked. Yeah. He looks, he looks amazing and so um it it's just i don't understand you know

why we have that side of us it it's um it's super annoying and i see it happen in too many different areas you know in our culture and um you know unfortunately i didn't get to run into uh janae crock at the at the show at the Arnold, but she was there. And, um, you know, I was part of the movie. Uh, the movie is called transformer. You can check it out on Netflix. Um, you know, I, I do wish the movie would have explained more stuff about that community and about like, um, the different terminology. Cause I'm so naive to a lot of these things.

I don't even know, uh, the different terminology, but I think that the more there's some people that don't care to know right there's some people that are just like no like i fuck that that's gross i ain't part of that and there's some people that they just don't want to know there's some people that just want to be racist there's some people that just want to be against people being gay and that's the way they are. But I think that our society is in a pretty good spot where a lot of people, especially younger people, they want to understand. I want to know, I want to know, like, I don't know what it's like to be black. I don't know what it's like to be Mexican. I don't know what it's like to, uh, uh, be born a boy and want to be a girl. don't know anything about it i also don't know the terminology so i wish that this movie i thought the movie was good and i thought it was it was a

good um it showed a lot of uh what janae crock has went through to um going through this entire process but i also wish that like it explained some of the terminology and some of the different um just things that go on because i don't even know like what how what a lot of it means you know when they say uh transgender or they say gender fluid um or now there's all these abbreviations associated with it and stuff too so i just i was kind of hoping that the movie would have a little bit more of a tone of like, uh, just explaining and presenting like, you know, here's, here's some of these facts,

you know, and then, and then like, let, let you kind of determine your own, your own take it. Either one of you guys seen the film at all? I haven't seen,

I only saw the previews for it. Yeah, no, I just found out it was on Netflix, so I want to check it out. So we'll see. Yeah. How do you guys feel about some

of that stuff i mean like i'll just be totally transparent like i'm a little weirded out like by like i've been friends with matt crock right i'm a little bit weirded out by seeing like janae is fucking big you know so i'm a little bit weirded out uh seeing my old friend as you know a female um and and being like imposing you know being like being so jacked right um it's different for me i'm not against it it's just uh kind of shocking to me i'm like whoa like hey we're like if andrew came in dressed as a girl yeah i would be like, whoa, like what's going on here? You just got a raise. Yeah. You look hot as fuck.

But, you know, so like we're talking about, you know, being open minded and closed minded. And that's kind of why some of this kind of popped in my head. What are some of your thoughts on this? I mean, it definitely. Yeah. When I seen the Power Magazine cover of him or her seat. Right. Right. Sk skipping all of it uh the only part that like uh just does concern me is yeah i don't want to offend anybody right you know i i don't know like i don't want to mess up the him hers or right them they yeah and like i don't

want to be a dick but i also don't know how do i come out and say like what like if i go up to somebody like what do I call you? Like, that's, that's, that sounds so rude. It's like, I can't do it,

but you're like, I'm just like, yeah, I'm totally, I'm fine with anybody doing whatever they want. Like it's, that's great thing about this country is that, you know,

you can do whatever you want, but there are some people that are going to be dickheads to you. But like with, um, like my daughter, like I, I shot a gay wedding, um,

a couple of years back. And I remember I wanted her to see me working on the photos. Like, yeah, this is a groom and this is another groom. Like, they're in love. And that's fine. This is totally okay. And she was just like, huh? Like, she didn't understand it at first.

But she was just young because it was supposed to be a guy and a girl get married. That's how you have a wedding. Right. But I'm like, no. Like, I wanted her to be exposed to it right away to know this is fine. And you're going to see it more when you grow up. Yeah, your friends might have two moms or whatever, right? Yeah, exactly, yeah.

And it's not something to stare at or anything. It's just like, hey, they're going to have kids too, and they're going to be parents just like me and your mom. And that was huge for me to be able to do that for her because you know my parents they're fairly old school they're they're fine with it but you know they'll make comments and stuff but i see i think so to make a comment to somebody in person is like disgusting i think it's like over the top right but to have your own thoughts on it and if you are kind of old school i mean it's it may not be it may not be right but i think you're entitled to it because somehow some way whether it's wrong or whatever you you learn this this shit habit

you know and it's unfortunate and i don't think there's a lot of room in this world for that much hate but i do think that that like in the movie uh janae crock's uh mom while while she's there says you know matt died the day that you told me about all this and it's like oh man like that's some heavy that's some heavy stuff but at the same time like you know what i think i think the mom's entitled to think that way. Like she thought she had a son and, uh, turns out, I guess she didn't. Right. And it's very confusing and it's got to be very hard for everybody. So I think, um, I think both sides need to be understanding of each other. Yeah. I think that's how we can move forward. You know, everybody's just different, you know? Uh, you know everybody's just different you know uh i just go by i i don't i generally try not to i don't judge people on their decisions if someone feels that they are something else if someone

like feels like they're a woman in a man's body okay they feel like they're a woman in a man's body don't don't go analyzing the psyche of this individual if that's how they feel let them do their thing whether you you agree with it or, because they're just another human being trying to live their own specific existence. And that's how they feel that they need to live it. So all of this, I guess, hate and phobia over these people, like, what are they doing to you? If you are truly like, I guess, transphobic would be the term, what are they doing to you? That's impeding upon your existence? Are they like, are they over here harassing you or something? No, they're just

living their own life, which is why I frankly don't really understand the amount of hate that goes upon this group of people. And it's not the same thing, but what is it? It's been what, 70 years? It hasn't been that long. 60, 70 years since segregation. It hasn't really been that long. Right? I think it really hasn't been that long. Right?

So, you know, we're going to be looking back at some of this and seeing how some people are acting towards these individuals and think in a few decades, wow, it's kind of crazy how bad some of these people were being treated, you know? And that's why, like you just mentioned, Jasmine, you know, a lot of this stuff's going to be normal to her. It's abnormal to some of us since we haven't lived through it in childhood, but in a few decades, it's going to be normal to those kids seeing a lot of this stuff. So, I mean, it's just let people do their thing. That's their life. Don't go putting your moral views up upon it. And that's coming from, I'm a Christian. I grew up going to church.

I still go to church. I'm a Christian. I have love for everybody. Just because my religion doesn't agree with certain things doesn't mean I don't have love for people and support their decisions to do certain things. Right. It's,

and that, that's one thing because, uh, you know, a lot of people think, for example, Christians feel a certain way about things because they've heard Christians say things about gay homosexuals or,

or trans people. And that's not, that's not most of us. Most of us just have love for people. You know what I mean? And, and just because the Bible says something, it doesn't mean we don't have love for people and have let them do their own thing. So it's just a, it's a, I guess a difficult subject

for people to talk about just because everyone comes from, I don't know, everyone has their moral view. They've had things that they've been brought up being taught and it's just, it's let people live their own lives i think we're in a pretty you know interesting time though i think people that are between the ages of like about 20 to 40 um are have a similar frame of mind where yeah they don't really care too much about you know white black or or otherwise they also don, they're not offended or don't think anything weird about a white person being with a black person or an Asian person being with a Mexican person, uh, or, uh, people being homosexual or, and then also even like on a political side of

things, I think that people, you talk about like identifying with things. I don't think people even identify anymore with being like a Republican or Democrat as much as they used to, you know, most of the country is like kind of down the middle on sort of everything. And you got kind of old school people who will say, well, that's, you know, you don't want people that are down the middle on it. It's going to, you know, cause the whole world to, you know, to burst into flames, uh, which who knows could be the case.

I don't know, but I think we're at a good time and I, I hope that people can, you know, better understand each other. I had a friend the other day who said something that was just like, uh, it just, uh, it just kind of blew my mind. You know, she's, uh, she's Asian. She's married to an African American. She's having, she's having children. So while she's been, you know, dating this guy and they're, they're married and stuff.

Uh, it took her parents like three years to get used to and to be comfortable with him being African-American. Yeah. At first they dated and it wasn't that big of a deal, but then as they progressed, they were like, well, what if you have children? She's like, well, what if we have, like, have like we're in love like i want to have children like this guy this is the best guy i ever met it's the kindest guy i ever met and then uh a lot of the stuff that they would say would be like yeah you know he's they're like we're surprised he's really cool for a black guy she was like can we leave that she's like do you guys not understand like you guys have been

on the other side of racism yourself yeah she's like do you not understand but they just didn't even know like you know they're just they're ignorant they haven't they haven't rubbed elbows enough with the with other cultures to know uh it's it sucks it's unfortunate but what she said was she said that on martin luther king day her husband said she said hey we should celebrate martin luther king day and she was like cool she's like all right and uh she didn't she didn't even she didn't ask why or anything she just said okay it sounds fun and then they went out to eat and she said and he said he toasted and said you know we wouldn't be together if it wasn't for him you know we well legally like we might not be able to get married and she's like i almost cried because she's like i didn't eat

she's like i'm so dumb i didn't even think about it but he's like he's fucking right you know it wasn't for him yeah we probably legally wouldn't be able to get married still or who knows where we'd be you know so i just all that stuff is really uh interesting to me and i just i hope people can uh find some more even ground because we're all human beings everyone everyone feels happy everyone feels sad everyone feels mad everyone feels all these different emotions and in the end we all are born and we all fucking die it It's all very similar for all of us, no matter where we come from. Yeah, this is a tough question to ask, but his name's Jason. He just asked it.

If you didn't know Matt before or after, what do you think you would have felt seeing the transformation? I mean, is there any way you could, uh, simulate what, how you would feel about it if you didn't know her? I'm from a very like small town, like small city. Like, so I haven't been exposed to a lot of these things. I mean, I, I, I'm somebody who doesn't mind being very like open about my feelings. Like if I see two guys kissing, I'm still uncomfortable with it. Like, and I don't know, like maybe I'm, uh, you know, maybe I'm abnormal for that, or maybe more

people feel like I do, but they just don't say it. Um, I feel as uncomfortable with that as if I see somebody missing an arm, like I'm going to kind of look at it and be like, Oh, like shit, the guy's and then I don't know how to act after that. yeah i haven't been exposed to a lot of these things uh when i was young the school that i went to we had one black kid in the school from the time i was in elementary school all the way through it was the same kid you know the entire time um i had like two or three asian kids in my class and the rest was all just white hillbillies pretty much. Um, and so that's, you know, that's my upbringing. That's what I know. Uh, my grandfather was racist. I've heard him use the N word countless times. I'm not proud of that, but that's just, again, I'm not afraid to be transparent and just to be open. Um, so, you know, I kind of was a

little sheltered, uh, towards some of that stuff. So to even being friends with Matt, it's still weird to me. It's still strange to me. However, I'm not against it. I'm for it. And whether I knew her before or whatever, I would still feel the same way. I'd still be for it. Like I wasn't exposed to these things when I was young, but as I got older and as I got

exposed and seen more things, I was like, well, this doesn't make any sense to act this way towards other people. Like there's no truth based in any of this. There's no, you know, the things that people thought about African-Americans or the things that people thought about Hispanics. I'm like, this is ridiculous. There's absolutely no truth to any of this. You know, um, same thing with the things that we thought about. I mean, how many times we're going to do this? Same thing, the same things we thought about women, like women shouldn't be able to vote. Like really? Like what? That was a thing? Like,

that's embarrassing. Like that's, that's complete to me it's completely embarrassing but uh it is part of our history it is part of where we're at but yeah either way you know i'd be supportive of of janae either way man i thought that was a great question and that is a great yeah uh just because it was a good question same guy he wanted to shout out someone else named jason who has a meet six weeks out from now, but I figured he earned it because that was a dope question. So good luck to your buddy, Jason. Yeah. Go get it, buddy. Yeah. What else you guys got? Yeah. Last thing I want to end with is, you know, again, these amazing conversations I got, you know, at the booth and just the different people I've heard

from. I know you guys heard from a lot of people mentioning they were impacted by the podcast and losing weight and stuff. And one of the guys, the guys uh brought the fact that he's just very insecure and he wasn't really sure on how to get like momentum and how to feel uh stronger and how to feel better uh andrew i think that you would be good to answer some of these questions like what were some things that um that got you started and not only started but like ignited enough to continue and to keep, and to keep going. Yeah. Um, well, damn, I wasn't expecting that. Uh, I mean, I, cause you're fired up now. Like there's no, there's no turning back for you now. Yeah. Well, I mean, shit, dude, I, I'm not going to lie. Like when, when somebody gives me a

compliment, I'm still like looking for the camera, the camera like okay who's setting me up right now because i'm being punked yeah exactly like um somebody came up to me today who was it i but we had posted a picture we trained at matt winning's gym and we did a group photo and he's just like man your arm looked jacked i was just like thanks dude i appreciate it man like yeah i'm working like all right where's smoky yeah i'm, did he put you up to this? Yeah. So it was Josh. That's who it was. Um, intern Josh. And, um, so like that, that, that's, that gives me huge motivation. Um, yesterday I, I, uh, had a abbreviated back workout, but I had like a pretty good lap pump. Uh, I was going to take a shower and I took my shirt off and I was like, I try to like flex, you know? Damn yo,

who's that? And then so right away I'm like, babe, get in here. Hurry. I still do that to my wife. I'm like, you gotta check this out.

There's a new vein. Yeah. And I'm like, dude, check this out. And like, I got the light right. And like,

it just popped out so good. And she bit it. She bit your lap? Yeah. Yeah. So obviously that's a huge motivating factor right there. Yeah. But where it all started is, is i've always been the skinny guy i've always been the guy who was uh super like unathletic even though like i tried to play sports and stuff but you know once i hit junior high

everyone was way bigger than me and instead of like using that as motivation to push me right then and there it pushed me the opposite direction and And you want to talk about insecurities, you're in junior high, everyone's bigger than you. You're, you're about height wise. You're pretty good with everybody, but like skinny and, you know, awkward, you know, everyone at, you know, as a teen, you kind of have like the lengthy arms and stuff and you're a little, you know, hunched over and stuff. Uh, so there was that. And then as I got older, know i i didn't i still

didn't train i didn't have any like uh guidance or anything like that so like when i start like hitting the age where you're bar hopping and stuff it's like why the fuck is every time we go out somebody's messing with me yeah it's like oh because i was always the smallest guy at the bar you know and so that was really frustrating so i i ended up taking some Muay Thai classes and stuff, but like I didn't like pursue it or anything because what happened there, when you start sparring with somebody, oh, I want that guy. And then it's like, okay, I'm going to just go all out because I know he can't do shit to me.

So that pushed me away from that too. But once I started, like I found the gym you know because i got with stephanie we did crossfit first and then once we actually got a gym membership i started putting on size and i started feeling better um so some of the insecurities went away but then when i look at the numbers that i was putting up versus like the smallest guy that i could see in the gym just like damn that guy's lifting like twice as much as me. Was there any like videos or books or was there something like, did you check out like bodybuilding.com? Like,

did you like find some information and that inspired you to kind of push forward? Yeah. Um, so we, we got involved with, uh, one of the like,

uh, direct sales companies. So they had some things that were like helping with like supplements and stuff. That's what it was. It was like selling supplements. So I found Rich Froning. So I would like just get all hyped up over CrossFit and stuff like that.

But like I didn't love doing CrossFit, so I didn't pursue that at all. Yeah. So I went to YouTube. Rich Froning's jacked. Yeah. And he was super jacked. So I'm just like, man, whatever that guy's doing. I followed Elliot Hulse quite a bit.

Yeah. C.T. Fletcher was the first guy that i would like ct fletcher right you hear this all the time right yeah but i followed him for motivation but for like instructions it was uh yo elliot yeah like trying to learn how to deadlift from him yeah yeah so that was that was a huge help um and then it was just, who was it? I don't know if you guys have heard of Joseph Rakich. Joseph Rakich? Yeah. Never heard of him.

I just randomly popped up on, I think, Instagram or maybe it was YouTube. Yeah. And he was selling, you know, fitness plans or whatever. And I mean, I knew nothing, right? Like there's probably like at that point thousands of free ones that were better but i was like whatever screw it okay it's like it was like 100 bucks for a year of like monthly like alternating plans or whatever yeah so i did that and that's what really carried me on to like really falling in love with fitness um i would always get hurt i would get into a good groove for like a month or two and then like my back would start bothering

me and then like I give up like anytime I get momentum like this is just me this is my body and I would give up on myself then photography would take off and then that would slow down then fitness would pick up again but um as far as in-person coaching or training there was nobody available yeah um I you know i would ask around a little bit but i was always real timid in the gym like whenever somebody was lifting big i would just be like oh man like like how did you get to you know live so much and i think you know because i was so timid i would like whisper and like they couldn't hear me and so like oh that guy's just a dick he doesn't want to talk to me but it, well, you're not really being an open person to, you know, want to like,

nobody wants to hang out with that guy. Yeah. So it was tough because I had nothing to offer them. Did you like, did you get frustrated and like, you know, you, because like lifting takes a long time and like to show up, especially if you don't know much about like nutrition, especially if you kind of don't know much about like nutrition, especially if you kind of don't know how to train. So did you work out, work out, work out, and then be like, um, like not any different than

I was, or were you making enough progress where you felt pretty good? No, it was, uh, it was extremely frustrating because I have like, literally doesn't make any difference. You can lift and it like, you sometimes won't see anything unless the nutrition is there to support it yeah i have some before pictures when i first started and that's the other thing so i technically like i started going to the gym when i was 27 and i have pictures of me at 27 you're gonna be like it's older than natty professor right yeah so imagine yeah never going to the gym to this day ever. Yeah. You know, so that's, that's the, uh, the, the canvas that I was working with. But I, I mean, yeah, 160, if I was lucky at this height.

Okay. You know, and all 160 right in my stomach. Yeah. You know, it was like skinny arms, skinny legs, but having zero like idea what the hell to do, at least early on until I did buy that program. And then I had at least something to go off of, which was huge, but super frustrating because like I said, I would see like a, like a high school football kid would come in. And just 315 for reps. Like nothing. And I'm just like, dude, I, I genuinely,

like, I remember getting stuck under the bar at 95 pounds like looking around like oh it's just like all right no just come on let's just go oh and it fall right back on me so like jordan peterson had the same story oh really yeah he got stuck under like 65 pounds wow something like that yeah he mentioned that once yeah and then he just slowly that he was talking about how like getting better at that helped him with a lot of other things too. Now he benches 500 pounds. I'm on my way. But yeah, then having to dump that weight.

And of course, when you dump the weight in a gym, everyone stops and looks at you. I'm just like, oh my gosh. Yep. Do you think this past year, right? Do you think this is the best like serious training you've had out of like your whole how long how old are you by the way so i'm 33 now 33 now yeah so like this past year not in like like full year compared to like your years of training before is this the best year of training you've had so far absolutely because like i think i've seen the

most growth out of you physically within like the past year and it's like like you have all this progress you're going to be making yeah like how in terms of that insecurity thing do you feel that like that physical change that you're seeing now has helped you out a lot or is it like how is that no it absolutely has because another one of the the huge biggest insecurity things and i'm gonna get a lot of shit from this, but whatever. It's just what actually happened. You know, I'm with my girl all the time. If a dude sees a chick that's hot and she sees his, she's, he sees her man and he's this like tiny fucking tetherball pole thing.

She doesn't actually have a boyfriend at that point. fucking tetherball pole thing. She doesn't actually have a boyfriend at that point. So there'd be dudes that would come up to her and just like, I'm standing next to her and they just completely ignore me. And I'm just like, what the fuck is going on here? Yeah.

So that was another driving factor. Um, but now things are way different. Um, you know, nobody looks there. Oh, I mean, they still look,

but then they see me now. Um, so that's huge. A lot of that too is like some of that might be going on but it's so amplified in your own head because of your own perception of yourself outwardly right yeah and then once you feel better you know once you feel more secure inside uh then less of that like exists like maybe that happens to him and maybe that happens to me, but like maybe we don't even notice it because you feel, you feel so comfortable and you're like, yeah, my girl's not going anywhere.

Yeah. That's actually, she ain't gonna find anything better than this. Yeah, no, that's actually, that's very true actually. Yeah.

Um, and then as far as like the, the, the physical weights themselves, like, I mean, Mark can tell you how like in my own head I am. Um,

it's getting better, but early on it was just like, oh, I don't know, man. I don't think I can like, oh, it's important to know though.

Everybody is, it just depends on the weight, you know? So, so somebody else, it might, you know, be a higher weight,

but, uh, a lot of self doubt is going to creep in, especially any, any negative reinforcement that you ever have with anything just creates more negative reinforcement to be sitting there. You know, you miss a lift, uh, because of, you miss a deadlift because of like your grip, the odds of you missing the next deadlift.

Cause your grip are probably pretty high. Cause you're like, oh, I tried that before and my grip gave out. And you're thinking like, what have I done for my grip training? That's going to be like, yeah. Or last time I tried that, I hurt my shoulder. And then you're halfway down with the weight on the bench press and you're just like, take it.

You know, because you told yourself that your shoulder hurt and now you're screwed. Yeah. You're really screwed. Yeah, having that doubt. I know training by myself a couple times closer to the SD Classic. I had some numbers because Mark gave me that I wanted to hit for whatever day it was. And I remember I got close to 300.

It was a 295 deadlift. And I looked at it. I'm like, all right, let's do this. And I put my hands on the bar. I'm like, fuck, I don't know if I can do this. And I went for it. And I missed it. and then i got sick and like just this whole like domino effect of things happened yeah i was like dude why did i even like stop and question like i should just let go of the bar and called it a day or something because like it was it was bad

so that's you know i'm always in my head so being being with mark it has definitely been the most beneficial thing obviously because you know most of the time he just calls the weight for me um but now that i kind of have a better understanding of where i'm i'm at strength wise um it i have the confidence to actually push myself because before i didn't and i would hit like a plateau so i thought yeah but it's just because i'm in my head thinking like oh like exactly he said like you know the last time i tried that i i couldn't push it or i couldn't pull it or i hurt something i you know whatever it is but now it's like no i've done that i can do more now um and that that's been another thing because as mark will tell you it spills out over into everywhere else in my life, which is huge.

You know, what else is cool is like a lot of times rather than him asking, he'll like halfway tell me slash ask a question. So, you know, maybe like for a deadlift training session, he might say, um, you know, I was thinking about, uh, doing the trap bar, you know, because, uh, I haven't done it in a while. And I was thinking about going for, you know, kind of see what that feels like for today. And then I'll just give him a rep, rep range to try to follow, you know? And so rather than like him saying, Hey, what do I do? You know, he's like asking, like, he's got a couple of suggestions cause he already knows halfway, at least what he should be doing. Um, and then he might be like, okay.

And then after that, I'll finish up with some hamstrings and a couple other exercises and maybe some lat work and like, yep. Yeah. Check. Yep. There you go. You got it. And that's, you know, back to what we've said on previous podcasts about education, you know, coming from within having to be drawn from within and it's like, how are you going to ever truly learn anything unless it's kind of, uh, something that you're really attracted to and something that you're, uh, that you are drawing from within. It's like how you're going to ever truly learn anything unless it's kind of something that you're really attracted to and something that you're, that you are drawing from within. And back to what we said earlier in the podcast, like you probably know two or three really good ideas towards what are some things that can get you better? What are some things that can get you towards your goals? I would imagine that, you know, those two or three things better than anyone in the world, better than, uh, you know, better than asking, uh, Gary Vanderchuk or, you know, right. Better

than asking anybody else in the world, better than asking your dad or your mom. I mean, those are great people to rely on too. Those are great people, great resources, and you should ask questions, but no one's going to know better than yourself. So it's like, what do you need to do to get bigger arms? I mean, you probably can list out a couple things pretty rapidly. What do you need to do to lose 15 pounds? Again, you, you probably know. Yeah. I think it was, uh, Andy Galpin. He, when he says that, uh, you know, people come up to him like, ah, man, I I'm trying this diet and it's just, it's not working. And like, I don't know what I'm doing wrong. And he just stares at them and be like, okay, well, like, like, yeah, I guess. Yeah. You know what? I haven't been hitting it like 100%, but man, I'm close. Do you think I

should do this or this? And he just stares at them and he's like, all right. Yep. You're right. You're right. You're right. I'm going to go do this. Whoa. Whoa. He's just, he's just like looking at them and not saying a word. Yeah. Yeah. Stares at them harder and harder. Yeah. You know, it's just like looking at them and not saying a word. He just stares at them harder and harder. Yeah. You know, it's just like, yeah, you know. Honestly, that is the funniest thing I've heard all day.

Because, I mean, he's so knowledgeable, right? So people want to go to him and ask for like, you know, advice on nutrition and whatnot. Yeah. But he just will sit there and stare at them. And he was like, they know exactly what the answer is. They just want somebody to tell them, you know, this way or that way. He's like, but they all know. He's like, they have it within them that's so no that's very true a lot of time like we are waiting for the the person that we feel is more knowledgeable than us to tell us the thing that we already know so that we feel confident to go and do that yeah reassurance

absolutely yeah yeah yeah like leading up to the st classic i was having we have insecurities yeah yeah i was having a hard time pulling the damn weight up off the floor. So I'm like, hey, Mark, is it cool if I do reverse bands? And meanwhile, I mean, we had never done reverse bands ever. This whole, like, meat prep. And it's just like, it's a good idea. And it was because I was insecure about

my damn deadlifts. I wanted a little boost off the ground. Yeah. And it worked out really well. A huge goal for everybody in each and every day that you have is is to work on like your number one priority should be how do i feel how do i how do i help myself feel really good for today and sometimes like in your strength training in your in your goals to get leaner and stuff you might need to figure out a way to like throw yourself

some underhand pitches, make things like, it's great to make things hard and it's great to be disciplined. But if you're starting to find yourself, that's all that you're doing is always being so strict and so disciplined. It might be time for a little bit of a change. And in your, in your lifting, uh, it might be a good idea to like, you're trying to get stronger in a squat and it's just not happening. You've been trying for three months and it's just, you're just stuck. Well, it would be a great idea just to forget about it in some sense and try some different things. Um, try some, uh, walking lunges, try some, uh, higher rep squats with shorter rest periods,

try some bodybuilding for a few weeks, try some leg presses and some different movements. Just get yourself, get yourself away from that and figure out what is something challenging enough that I can do. That's still going to be fun. Uh, maybe, you know, with Andrew's example, maybe you do a reverse band squat. Maybe you squat with some knee wraps on. Maybe you do some box squats that are like a little bit high just so you can handle some weight just so you feel whatever way it is that you're trying to feel. Same thing with a bench press. Maybe use a slingshot for a few weeks in your effort to lose body weight.

Well, maybe you've been in a caloric deficit for two years. I know people that do that. People are just riding out these 1800 calorie diets for the endless amounts of time. Maybe it's time to say, you know what? I'm just going to, I'm going to take like, you're not going to die. Take a week off from your diet. Sounds like forever when you're, when you've been strict for a while, take a week off. You'll be surprised.

You might even actually lose weight in that week and by the time the week gets towards the end of the week you're you're pretty much through most of the junk foods that you wanted to hit up anyway and you'll probably start to be more reasonable with your food but you know try to figure out some things that are going to make you not necessarily just like happy but make you feel good put you in a good mood and then you can get back to being strict, but get back to being disciplined and back to some of the things that we mentioned earlier, uh, which was this kind of idea of, you know, working on things that make you great, working on things that make you better and not always just gravitating towards things that make you happy, but you're going to have to figure out

a little balance with some of that. Like what's something that's going to put me in a good mood. I know for me, instantly a good mood, hang out with my kids. Automatic. I mean, every once in a while, it might drive me crazy, but it's almost automatic because they're going to say something funny or they're going to say something off the wall. It's going to make me laugh. And it's like, okay, there we go. Boom.

We're in a good spot. Now let's go, let's go for a frozen yogurt or let's go on a walk or let's do this or that. And it instantly puts me in a good mood. There you go. What else you got? As far as insecurities or just anything? Just anything. Anything.

I took my, well, speaking of hanging out with the kids, I just took my daughter and some niece a niece and a nephew to sea quest it's like a uh like a aqua petting zoo basically yeah i think where is it at it's in folsom it's pretty dope because they had like stingrays all over the place oh shit and so like you like walk like those things are crazy yeah it's weird so i just i couldn't help it i made all kinds of silly stuff on my instagram on my ig story so it just yeah but it was it was tons of fun man and are you big into embarrassing your daughter uh not too much because she's she's really hard to embarrass oh um if uh if stephanie starts singing she gets a little like come on mom but no dude

she's so outgoing she's like if i i don't know start like fortnight dancing or something she'll just jump up and do it right next to me you know like she don't care yeah great yeah i know if anything it's gonna be the opposite man because she's so outgoing i'm just like oh my gosh here we go again but yeah it was a lot of fun i think uh i was telling april about. And so I think she should take her kids because they'll love it. Oh, that's cool. Yeah.

I never heard of it. I know that's the thing. My Instagram story, people were like hitting me up. Where the hell are you? Like Jessica Smith was like, what's like I said, I got silly with my IG story.

So she asked me about it too. And she hadn't heard it. I don't think she heard about it either. Pretty dope spot. Yeah. A lot of stuff is popping up about it either. Pretty dope spot. Yeah. A lot of stuff is popping up in SAC. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

The SAC. The SAC. All right. I think that's all the time we got. Strength is never weakness. Weakness is never strength. Catch y'all later.