Mark Bell's Power Project - Mark Bell's Power Project EP. 193 - Could I Have Done it without PEDs?

Episode Date: March 20, 2019

Mark Bell didn't do it without them, Arnold wouldn't be Arnold, drugs in general open doors to new paths. Would your favorite writers be your favorites if they didn't have access to psychedelics? How about your favorite comedian without weed or alcohol? All this and more in today's Power Project Podcast ➢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

270. Yeah, he was bigger than me. Way bigger than me. That's true, huh? See, like his genetics are just top tier. Maybe he's... Might have some West African in him. Maybe some Simone or Tongan.

Or maybe he's like Haptor. Icelandic. Yeah. Oh my God. Baby seal on the front pants. Front of his pants. It was Viking. Well, it's not Viking genetics or...

I think it was Vikings. It's Vikings. Vikings we were talking about, yeah. his pants. It was Viking. Well, it's not Viking genetics or I think it was Viking. I think we were talking about Jesus Christ. Hapthor is insane. I just don't, I don't get how you, you do that. That bone structure too. Like you see pictures of him when he was like,

you know, 15, 60, we were talking about this. He's like a stick. And then it's like his bones just get wider and wider and wider. But that's what growth is. I mean,

that is kind of interesting. You know who was really wide like that was Sean Frankel. We had him here not too long ago. Really awesome powerlifter. Competed at like 220. When he competed, when he was at the top of his game, he was like the biggest powerlifter I've ever seen even though he wasn't heavy. But his shoulders were so wide. I was like – he benched like 875 or something you know

obviously in a bench shirt um but yeah he was a mutant i wonder like what what's part of that you have wide shoulders yeah i mean i've had wide shoulders forever and like same thing duane johnson too you remember that picture when he's like 15 years old in the chair and it's like shoulders from here to here even though he's a stick what's the uh basketball player is it uh and his shoulders from here to here, even though he's a stick. What's the basketball player? Dwight Howard. Dwight Howard.

Yeah, Dwight Howard. People used to call me Dwight Howard in high school. Oh, really? They used to compare us in high school. Yeah, because of the... It's just something about the bone structure. Yeah, Dwight Howard's shoulders are like six feet apart. That's why he was nicknamed Superman. Yeah, yeah, he was a mutant, man.

He was a pure mutant. Well, that's a little bit of today's topic. Are we going already? Yeah. Yeah, we're going. Oh, my God. You got the thing to start up? No.

Oh, I didn't. And Seema's not helping with that. He said he was going to help. I did fix it, but he broke it again. No. Well, the thing is, we fixed the podcast machine, but now the internet machine, the YouTube tower, all that. Internet's busted. Internet's busting.

It's gone to shit. I'll get on that right after we finish. All right. So like what Mark said. You can donate to our podcast below. Yeah. GoFundMe link. Yeah.

Only in. Go fund yourself. Donations of $100 more. But yeah, we're going to have to get the YouTube tower from the old gym and bring it over here somehow. The cool thing is about if you sponsor the show, you get a free invisible balloon sent to your house. Oh, wow. Yeah. We've been working on that too. We don't have the money to mail that yet, but we're working on that part of it. Isn't there like a song that they get saying with it also? Yeah. You can't hear it though. Okay. Yeah. You need special headphones.

That's shipped through Amazon. Oh yeah. Jeff Bezos will get on that topic. He's good. We've got it. Yeah. I was listening to that podcast where Rogan was going off about Thor and he was talking about the freaky genetics. Yeah. And genetics are a crazy thing and your heritage is a crazy thing. And like what I've always said about, you know, like PEDs and stuff is like, and Barry Bonds is not a good example because Barry Bonds was more than likely on stuff, especially like later on in his career. But like I always kind of say, like, I don't have a pedigree like that where my grandfather and my dad played professional baseball.

grandfather and my dad played professional baseball um and some people just have they i mean look the manning you got the you know peyton manning and his dad played and then uh both of peyton's brothers were really good and eli manning was obviously or eli manning still in the league he's still playing um archie manning was amazing uh you know these kind of like just great genetics get passed down and maybe i have great genetics for certain things, but it's not to be a massive mutant. So therefore, like if you're trying to get in a strength sport, it's like maybe some people kind of feel like they need it because they don't have maybe something that somebody else has.

So that's a little bit of today's topic that I wanted to talk about today because I was just thinking about it more. We had that big black coffee conversation, the BBC genetics. People are – first of all, they're so quick to just pass judgment on someone who is enhanced, but they're also quick to pass judgment on someone who has genetics. but they're also quick to pass judgment on someone who has genetics. And it's like, well, which one would you rather see? Like,

and what, and which is, um, do we want people just to naturally have it without working for it? Is that not acceptable? Cause you hear that too. People like bones Jones, you know,

you didn't work hard. And it's like, I doubt that that's true. I'm not gonna, I'm not convinced of that. There's, there's no possible way that he doesn't work hard. Maybe it doesn't seem like he works hard because maybe he is gifted and maybe he makes it look easy.

But I don't think there's any question. I mean, how could the guy get away with dominating and not working hard? He makes it look so easy because his technique is so fucking amazing. He's just unbelievable. Yeah. Which doesn't really mean that he's not working hard. It might mean that maybe he doesn't have to work as hard, just like when you're in school, you know, maybe one kid's got to study a lot more than another

kid. Maybe one kid's got to go up and swing the baseball bat 400 times before he's, you know, a little bit more comfortable in the batter's box. And maybe another kid, you know, gets three pitches thrown to him and he knocks all three of them out of the park. Right. So it's like, uh you know gets three pitches thrown to him he knocks all three of them out of the park right so it's like sometimes there's a kind of a natural a natural base to the whole thing but yeah i'm really interested in in some of uh we got in a text thread the other day we were talking about a little bit of this stuff and um you know if you if you if you think about peds and then you start to think about well what's performance enhancing um then you start to think about, well, what's performance enhancing? Then you really start to go down a weird rabbit hole because I remember Sugar Ray Leonard. I think after he was done with his career, he came out and said, you know, most of my career I was on cocaine.

And then people felt sorry for him. They're like, oh, man, that's terrible. You know, hopefully he can figure out a way to get over this. But they didn't revoke any titles. Is being on cocaine an advantage in boxing? If it was a huge disadvantage, would he snort cocaine before he fought? Maybe not. Like if it made him throw up, made him lose, made him lose all his money, made him lose his mind, made him lose, you know.

And so it's really interesting. And then you also have like Lawrence Taylor. And you watch the way lawrence taylor played you're like wow like he never seen anybody move like that before never seen anybody that aggressive and he was on cocaine as well and i think crack and much other things he got into um and then when you think about you know actual like peds like what people usually are referring to with steroids. People want to get bigger, stronger, faster. You have guys like Barry Bonds and you have guys like McGuire, Jose Canseco, a lot of these guys that have been accused of

taking stuff and some of them have come out and admitted it. I think Jose Canseco was the one who kind of fessed up to everything and the one who kind of also ended up ratting, you know, ratting everybody out. But, you know, some of this kind of started because I've seen this comment before about myself, like on social media. So sometimes someone will say, oh, I think it's so cool that you, you know, do stuff with your family and that you're showing these different things and that you're transparent. But, you know, you got this, you know, from, you know, being big and strong from being on steroids or whatever. Right. But I'm like, first of all, how do they know that? They know, they know that because I've shared that many times before. Yeah. And so I have been open about it. It doesn't really dismiss it,

but I have been open about it. I doesn't really dismiss it, but I have been open about it. I have talked about it many times before. And I make no mistake about it. I'm not delusional. I'm not in the spot that I'm in without them, but I'm also not in the spot that I'm in without powerlifting. You know, there's a lot of things we can go back

and we can, I'm not in the spot that I'm in without my wife. I'm not in the spot that I'm in without my children. There's a lot of things that shape your life and that make, that end up kind of putting you in the position that you're in. But if we look at it even further, you know, Arnold's not Arnold. And I don't know the Rock's personal information, but I would assume the Rock is not the Rock. If you go back and watch a lot of his old wrestling matches, he clearly had what they call bitch tits, gynecomastia which is normally from

taking steroids i ain't trying to call nobody out i'm just saying this these are some of the things that i've seen right um and if you kind of look around and you start thinking well maybe joe rogan's not joe rogan because joe rogan like i don't know if joe rogan uses uh testosterone or anything like that he might he's pretty jacked. Uh, but you know, he does his show. He always talks about being high during his show, you know? So it's like, you know, what are we, what are we really looking at here? You know, and a lot of great music, a lot of great poetry, um, a lot of things have been, uh, discussed and done while people are high or discussed and done. There they are, puffy nips. A lot of the things are disgust and done when people are smoking weed or having some drinks.

And so that's what we're trying to unpack for today. So let's dive into it. What are some of your thoughts on this, Natty Professor? Well, I mean, I think it comes down to like culture. The rock and wrestling, when you're looking at those guys and they're doing their thing in the ring, you don't care if they're on something or not. That doesn't come to mind.

You're just enjoying what they're doing and you want to see some mutants in there doing it. You don't want to see some kind of skinny, maybe kind of big dudes. You want to see some cartoonish looking superhero, sidewalk stomping dudes in the ring, fighting with each other. So it doesn't matter if he was or if he wasn't. It doesn't matter. But I think the main issue comes if you're looking at a Lance Armstrong, right? And all of these years, everyone's under the impression that you're not using anything,

especially since in that sport, you're not supposed to, right. It is against the rules. For me in natural bodybuilding, when I was competing, it is against the rules to use those things in those federations. Right. So I think that people start to get problems when like, for example, John Jones, it is against the rules to have that stuff in your system. That's why he's getting hate. You know, if it wasn't against the rules and everybody was OK, cool, that that that wouldn't be an issue at all. But if you're doing something and it's found out that you're using something that you shouldn't be using at that point in competition, then that I think that's when people really start looking down on it. in competition, then that, I think that's when people really start looking down on it.

Every other case, like, I mean, even, even Arnold back then, that was all part of bodybuilding culture, you know? So, I mean, there's no reason to look down on any of them because everyone was doing it, you know, everyone's doing it to get massive. And I don't, it's not, when we say, would Arnold be Arnold without steroids? To be perfectly honest, okay, maybe he wouldn't be as big or anything, but he'd still probably be an extremely successful dude. You know, Arnold was in real estate while he was, he made millions in real estate before he made any type of money in bodybuilding. He wasn't like, bodybuilding wasn't making him money. Yeah, he got Mr. Olympia and stuff, but he was already rich as hell from real estate. So that guy was driven. You know, he came here not speaking English, learned a second language, learned how to do business and then move forward. Yeah. The, the

steroids and all that stuff, but that, that, that doesn't have to do with his success. Maybe there wouldn't be like a, an expo or an Olympia. Some of it, some of it does, does pop up some questions. I mean, like I said earlier, like it's hard to say, cause these are all like pivot points in your life. Like you don't, you don't randomly just out of nowhere, uh, start smoking pot. You don't rant. Like there's some thought that goes behind it, whether it's because you're depressed or you have anxiety, you want to sleep better. Like there's some thought process, even if you're young. I mean, it might just be that you don't want to be left out. You want to, you know, like you're hanging with your buds and you want to, you know, you want to do a hit because everybody else is doing it. Um, or you just want to be left out. Yeah. You want to, you know, like you're hanging with your buds and you want to, you know, you want to do a hit because everybody else is doing it.

Or you just want to have fun. Like there's always something behind it. But in Arnold's case, you know, part of part of what got Arnold here was him already being Arnold. Like he was already jacked. Like that was kind of part of something that got him here. John Cena has been a longtime friend of mine. He's somebody that has always said he's natural. He has,

when you go to his gym, he's got all these drug tests on, he's got like 200 or 300 drug tests. Really? Because the WWE still tests. And I think even before that, I think he would just get tested every year just because. I didn't know they test.

Yeah, they actually, we can get into that too. But anyway, you know, with John, it's like like if he didn't have that big stature like that, and if he didn't look the way that he looked, my brothers and I would have never asked him, you know, to be a professional wrestler. And he would have probably, if he came in, he was a lot smaller. And like you said, he didn't look like a freak.

They might not have ever, they might have ever accepted him in the first place. But part of John coming to California, many, this is many people's story too. There's a, I guess you'd just say like, I don't know if he's a bodybuilding promoter or just a fan or what he is, but he's really well off. And his name is, I think his name is Jeff Connors. I hope I'm getting that right. And he supports bodybuilding and he's a huge fan. He's got this giant house and he takes in bodybuilders and like four or five or six of

them will live there at a time. And John was one of them. There's a lot, and there's, there's a lot of success stories like that from a lot of these, uh, I forget who else it was, but, uh, some of these guys ended up becoming very famous, uh, bodybuilders and stuff like that. And the guy would just, you know, he would allow people to stay at his place. But like, you know, even that opportunity, you know, might not pop up if you're not, if you're not jacked, if you don't really look, if you don't really look the part. So it's yeah, it's like what opportunities come like for me, like I definitely would say it's possible that I don't power lift as I don't take power lifting as far. Maybe I don't ever tear my pack and maybe I don't invent the slingshot.

Yeah. But it's hard to go back in time. All we have is is kind of what has happened. Right. But I think something interesting that that just I just thought of when you were mentioned in John Jones is if John Jones, of when you were mentioning John Jones is if John Jones, you know, if any of these things are true that these minerals or these not minerals, these substances have been in his body, what would make John Jones think that, you know, that he might need something to get an edge or, you know, maybe he just doesn't even, maybe he's unsure exactly what he's, what he's what he has taken. But if you're if you're gonna if you're gonna think like man a guy like that who's competing at that level

if he has any doubt that he might not be able to beat the other guy without doing a little something extra then what does that say for the rest of us the rest of us really have a lot of anxiety towards you know what we're going to be able to produce, I guess, in some ways. Yeah. And what Insima was talking about with the wrestling and how we want to see giants and monsters and all this. Well, since they started drug testing, you can see they got a little bit smaller. And then now I think from what I've heard from people who are like, oh, I used to watch, me included, used to watch wrestling when Undertaker, The Rock, and all these monsters monsters and now it's like i can't name anybody and i don't know if

that has to do with because they are you know kind of normal thing out a little bit or maybe i'm just not excited to see these smaller guys and i mean when i say smaller of course they're still giants like we had seth rollins in here and he's super jacked but when you compare that to like cane back in the day or the ultimate warrior or something yeah even better example yeah so it's like now the complaint isn't like oh these guys are just all roided up now it's like wait where did my roided up guys go yeah bring them back yeah yeah so what they've done with uh WWE is they brought in like this wellness program this was after uh Chris Benoit you You know, he had that. There's that tragedy of Chris Benoit.

He killed his family and then he took his own life. And he definitely had some mental issues along with a lot of drug abuse. And some people that take steroids will be like, that's not steroids. They had nothing to do with it. I would disagree 100%. I don't think that now you don't take steroids and kill people because if that was the case i would have some some deaths underneath my belt too right like it doesn't just happen that way you're not like you take a shot and you go crazy and you kill somebody however i don't think it helps you know especially if you already have that person yeah i don't think messing with your hormones is probably a great

idea and then plus he was probably on other drugs plus how many concussions has the guy had and we've seen all the results from uh from concussions and stuff like that but yeah the wwe they brought in a wellness program and uh i went uh backstage a few times uh when i worked for wwe but also uh after they installed the wellness program and i went back there with kelly stirret um he and i got to do a, actually they brought Kelly in and Kelly brought me with him, which I was grateful for. That was a lot of fun. And basically it was a part of their wellness program. They brought in Kelly to talk about health, to talk about nutrition, to talk about how these guys can, you know, keep their nutrition, stay hydrated, ways for them to try to figure out

how to sleep. That was actually the hardest part. These guys were like, Hey man, like we just, we don't get a chance to sleep. And it's like, I don't have any advice for you then. Cause if you can't sleep, then, then you're, then you're screwed. So that ended up becoming more of a conversation of like, you know, talking about stimulants, you know, do you take, do you take any stimulants before you do a match and stuff like that? And a lot of them like, yeah, I drink monsters and I do that. It's like, all right, man, it's going to be really hard, but I think chopping that out, you'll be tired as shit at first. But then when it's time to actually go to bed or when you have a minute to just fall

asleep in the back of a car, when you're driving somewhere or to fall asleep on a flight, then you'll be able to fall asleep a lot easier. But yeah, the, the, uh, wellness program with WWE is amazing. The, the food that they had backstage, uh, the wellness program with WWE is amazing. The, the food that they had backstage, uh, there was tons of fruit, there was tons of fresh meat, there was tons of vegetables. Um, and yeah, they still had like cake, they still got some cookies and stuff, but the culture of it, you're not really seeing a lot of the, especially the performers, like none of them were eating any of that stuff. Uh, it was more like, uh, some of the people that like fix the ring and the refere uh, some of the people that like fix

the ring and the referees and some of the people that get to wear a shirt on TV, they, they were okay with, uh, throwing down some cookies, but they, they did a great job of bringing in a wellness program that they take very seriously. I think I would imagine, you know, at some point that they have, uh, maybe loosen some of that up. I think at first it was like really tight and really strict and you couldn't even get a script. You couldn't even just take like a low dosage for TRT. But I think at some point I think they may have let some of that go. But that was a message to try to get rid of all drugs because they're like, well, we can't really draw that line. And that's kind of what i'm talking

about right now it's like where do we draw the line in terms of something that's performance enhancing and uh you know like should we not care should we give credit to somebody should just be part of the way that things are you know eminem uh you know raps a lot in this first album about being like on mushrooms and stuff yeah and it's like i i love eminem you know i'm not gonna sit back though and say man this is dumb because he would never came up with that he wouldn't be nearly as creative without mushrooms i'm thankful for mushrooms yeah you know yeah i'm thankful for that music comedians and comics you know especially stand-up they always talk about like you know whether i mean ryan rogan talks about weed all the time but like so does all his buddies and then you know alcohol is a part of it too yeah you know

so it's like is that performance enhancing that's the thing that where do you draw the line i don't like that's a line really can't even really be drawn because there's already a there's a there's a cultural stigma that's been put on top of using certain things for art, like the way Rogan uses LSD and all that stuff to become more creative or an artist uses different types of drugs to be more creative. That's, that's not seen as a problem, even though those things can be very dangerous, even in very low doses for a lot of people and cause a lot of mental issues. It's not seen as negative you know but when an athlete does use performance enhancing drugs in a sport like and they're not supposed to people it it is cheating it is seen as negative and it's not overall accepted for every athlete to do it because

you know you you always hear people like people love to say every athlete in the nfl is on steroids every athlete and this is on steroids. Or they'll say 95 percent. You're like, sounds like a lot. Yeah. Like 95 percent. Like not like, OK, there are probably a lot of NFL players on steroids. But to be perfectly honest, I don't think that's I don't think that's 90 something percent of them.

And like on your note about Jon Jones, it's like, did he feel that he needed to take this to be other people? Even so, even even though like if you watch his fights, he's not winning on brute strength. I'm not saying Jon Jones is a weak guy, but it's not like he's not looking like a Brock Lesnar where he grabs you and he just pounds you to death because he's a he's a he's a bear and he has that strength. Jones is strong, but it's not like he's that strong. You know what I mean? His wins are coming from that. His wins are coming from technical efficiency and dismantling the tools of his opponent.

And that doesn't come from steroids. It's all strategy almost. I think that's also why John Jones has a very divided fan base. If he was like a Brock Les lesnar i think um he doesn't have as much or he has more support than brock lesnar does yeah that's true yeah because people see the way jones fights one his demeanor right now is is pretty golden too because like when they interview him he says the opposite like like i think i think there's a lot of people that are waiting to like get be mad at mad at, be mad about him.

And, um, you know, at the end of the fight, they're like, man, he really dominated and he like plays it off. He's like, man, I worked really hard. It's like, but that was a tough opponent. He's like, and I got to give credit to that, that guy. He came out here and fought a good fight and I give credit to God. And you're just like, so people are just waiting to be like mad about something, you know, like they were waiting for him to like almost talk trash. And the only time he'll really kind of talk trash is about Cormier yeah you know

who he's beaten twice but then people were like well he tested positive both times yeah and even when you look at those fights to be perfectly honest like I mean I think it sucks that Jones did take stuff but Jones dismantled Cormier better technically cormier is stronger i think absolutely than jones even if jordan jones has stuff in his system you know it's not like i'm a fighter so i guess i can't talk super knowledgeably on that but when you look at cormier you look at jones you kind of assume that cormier has more power than jones you know what i mean yeah but he dismantled him technically okay so if he doesn't fight if cormier doesn't fight jones again that's just that's going to be a big stain on his legacy you chose not to fight this one guy that continued

to kick your ass every single fight but that's the thing again jones has so much support because you can tell that he's extremely skilled even if he even if he had was hyped up on a bunch of drugs which he's not um it wouldn't take away from the fact that he's built such skill. But even like his most recent fight, like his opponent was like, yeah, I expected him to test positive. Yeah. Yeah. And I don't know the exact. Pico grams.

It's like, yeah, pico grams aren't leaving his system, apparently. Yeah. They never go away. Right. It's nothing new. Yeah. But even between him, john jones who's been who's who's pissed hot i don't know how many times now yeah and then dc who's never yeah why

it's it's john jones has so much like a such a bigger fan base like you hear nothing but people talk crap about dc all the time yeah you know i like dc i was gonna say except for us here we all really like him yeah oh yeah I love him too he's the best I think people get frustrated with him because he talks a lot of crap

but he's not good at talking crap that's why he's really bad yeah you can't read good yeah he's kind of

he's kind of silly with it almost yeah I think it's probably just because of his sense of humor I think he's just a little could be

but anyway Cormier you gotta give that guy credit too because that guy's announcing. Yeah. And he's doing all this other shit. And he's got a bunch of kids and stuff. And you're like, how in the hell is this? He's on like Fox and he's like reporting on stuff. And then he's in a suit. And then he's out there like in somebody else's corner coaching them.

Yeah. And then he's fighting. And you're like, how's that humanly possible? Yeah. And they said he's got just crazy energy. Like when he's fighting and when he's working with people, I guess that's kind of the culture that they built down there where these guys just they got a huge, huge tank. They can just keep going. Yeah.

The thing is, I don't want to like Jones. Whenever I think about Jon Jones, like, I don't want to like jones whenever i think about john jones like i don't want to like you like i don't want to like because like you're you're obvious you're kind of fucking everything up all the time like you're doing so well but you're fucking up all the time but at the same time you just see what he does and you're just like you can't help but marvel at it yeah you know um it's like uh oh man i can, I think it was Jamie Foxx and he was talking about some athlete, but he was just like, just go sit down. Like, go sit on your hands, Jon Jones. Just go sit down.

Don't do anything. Just train, fight, and sit down. Don't go out. Because every time you do something, you fuck something up, man. Yeah. But what do you guys think? So what I see a lot, especially on Mark's post or whatever, and you guys can flip subjects if need be, but I always see like, oh, hey, Mark, it's great that you're so strong, blah, blah, blah, great form, whatever technique on the bench. I would pay attention to you more if you were natty, though. Yeah.

if you are natty though yeah you know it's kind of what mark was talking about earlier about kind of throwing everything off to the side oh it's because he's on steroids or whatever but when i see that i'm like are you fucking kidding me dude like he's only been training his whole life like what why does that what does that have to do with anything yeah that's that's that's how it comes down to like the individual because okay again there's a negative stigma on drugs if apparently if you're on drugs everything's easier for you or you know like obviously yes it does help you get stronger etc and you people look at it like it's just a fast track to success in everything you know what I mean especially in strength um but it's not like like for example when when a lot of people that are natural like look at mark and he's giving

nutrition advice and he's giving training advice and advice on getting lean it's not you know he is he does know all this stuff he's utilizing all this stuff but you're not going to change the mind of the individual who already believes that everything that he knows and everything that he is and everything that he's achieved is because of drug use. You're not going to change that individual's mind. I don't think there's, there's ever a possibility to do that. You're not going to convert them. You're not going to be able to. And then that's obviously not, not even your goal. Your goal is to convert anybody. Your goal is just to put out the information right um but you know you know it's not like you did anything in a sport where you weren't supposed to you've always been

open about it you've never been like oh i'm totally natty yeah i'm not trying to compete in the usapl which is drug tested federation you're not trying to do all that you're just putting out good info um you know when guys look at like omar es stuff and Omar puts out amazing information, he has in terms of his, like he has a good physique, you know, he's built to actually, he's built a very good physique.

He's built a very good level of strength. Um, and when I look at a lot of the comments on like Omar's videos and other guys like that, you know, people look at him as the, I guess the peak of what can be achieved naturally or somewhat of the peak that can be achieved because he's been training for so long. And I mean, I don't I donima has because in truth, that is very determinant on your genetics.

But at the same time, it's like if you look at an Omar Esau and you say, okay, he's been training for 10 years and he's here. I see this other person that's bigger. That's where all these assumptions come in. There's one more thing I'm going to mention here. come in. There's, there's one more thing I'm going to mention here. There are all these videos on YouTube about, uh, I think it's, uh, your genetic potential or genetic limit, um, et cetera. Right. And a lot like there's this guy, I forgot his name, but Omar's done some videos and there's this other guy from Canada who's done them too. And I always watch these videos and this is going to be kind of a kind of odd, but, but um when they're putting all these examples of like like limit and what what you can achieve they're always using and it's just

the truth they're always using a bunch of these pictures of white guys like straight up and that that's what they're using all these pictures of really jacked white dudes um when you look at like tongan individuals or even individuals from different ethnicities, there are somewhat differences athletically on the top end of some of those individuals. So I think that the internet has kind of pigeonholed what they think people can actually do. what they think they can, what they think people can actually do. And if anybody's outside of that, then they're on roids and they shouldn't be listened to, which is partially what's going on with you that you are on roids. But at the same time, that's just potentially taking everything away from you for some reason. Well, if you look at the, if you look at Caucasian people that are strong, that are, that have a,

you know, a crazy build or crazy physique. A lot of times it has to do with their heritage as well, where their grandpa was their farmer. Their dad was a farmer and that like Brock Lesnar, it's, you know, it's no surprise he's from the middle of the fucking country and he bailed

hay his whole life. You know, it's like, Oh, that's a big shocker. Right? Like he, he looks like it he he looks like it right he he he looks he looks like he's strong he looks like he's meant to like carry things i think what has happened to our society is a lot of us have been generations removed from activity we've been generations removed from activity and so um and this is not any like i'm not trying to stereotype or or label

anything any one way i just think like in my grandfather he built his own house and he knew how to like build cars and fix cars and stuff he was very handy and he was very um like he was outdoors a lot and he was doing a lot of physical stuff. He worked on a railroad as well. My dad decided like I ain't doing that because my grandfather provided my dad opportunity to say, like, I'm kind of born with like shitty knees and shitty hips and I like sports and stuff, but I'm going to use my brain. I'm going to go to college. My dad got a degree and worked for IBM. You know, my dad knows how to fix stuff. He knows how to do some things like that but he's not a manual labor person and so therefore I'm pretty far removed from it where my grandfather even though he did some manual labor it wasn't like his it wasn't

like everything depended on it later on in his life when he was when he was like fixing cars and stuff like that he was doing some manual labor, but it wasn't really moving a lot. And it's not crazy physical activity. I guess the main point there is like, I think that if you come from a family history where there's no obesity and there's a lot of movement, probably off the bat, you're going to have a little bit better shot at anything athletic than the next person. I think you're going to have a much bigger shot and not even if you come from a family, you could, your family could look a certain way. But if you look at the way most people live now, and even not even just like 10 years ago, people are way less active in general. Like, yeah,

people go to the gym, but most of the day people are sitting around. Right. All right. So you're not, you're not moving around. You're not walking. You're not running. You're not sprinting. Maybe you're working out at the gym and doing nothing else. That'll play a big effect in what you're going to be able to look like over time. You know, um, if the environment's huge, the environment is a huge thing. I mean, your family history obviously plays into it, but the environment and just like what's normal. Just imagine if it was always normal every time you got groceries to walk to the store. Just imagine if that was normal. Imagine if every time you did that, even if you lived like two miles away from the grocery store, which still isn't that far, you walked four miles.

You walked two miles there walked two miles there, two miles back every time you went. Well, it would limit the, first of all, it would limit the amount of shit that you want to carry back with you. I was going to say, you buy a lot less Pop-Tarts that way. Yeah, you buy a lot less stuff that you don't need, right? And also let's just say that expense-wise, like you just don't have the money to like, you know, overbuy.

So now you are, you're carrying less stuff around with you the whole time, but, and maybe you're making frequent trips to the grocery store so you can go every other day or whatever it is. You're not carrying 20 pounds of bags every time you go back and forth. And if that's part of your culture and part of like what you normally do, the kids will probably do it. Their kids are probably right. And it's, it's something that's going to always help

um with like calorie expenditure and it's just going to always it's going to be ingrained into what you do all the time yeah and nowadays though you know i was just thinking about this the other day we are so lazy and when i say we i'm pointing to myself aggressively over here i am so lazy that if i don't see something in the fridge i just assume it's not there if i don't see it right away i'm so fucking lazy that i won't even move something out of the way i'm like oh that cheese was in there probably probably not even in there anymore i close the fridge and i'll ask andy i'll be like where'd that cheese go she's like probably right behind the cottage cheese or like probably you know it's probably behind did you

move the eggs and i'm like wow i'm fat. Like that is such a fat guy move. I couldn't even just take one thing and just move it out of the way, much less go and walk to the grocery store. Yeah. No, we like as, as a society, like we need to start moving more in general. You know what I mean? Especially with, we're all getting office jobs, especially on even entrepreneurs where, you know, you're sitting at a desk andrew's sitting there having to edit for most watching his ass get wider you know you know like and no it's not gonna get wider on its own even ain't gonna build itself gotta do something yeah this damn fit t does not work even me i have to sit on my computer and work so i have to make sure i can force myself to get up

and move because that's really really important but if you start working out later and I want to get back to this because if you start working out later in your 20s or whatever, right? get bigger faster. You're, you're doing more research and you're kind of like, you can still get big over time, you know, without any drugs. Right. Um, but you're going to be more inclined to want to use stuff. And number one, I don't think that I want to preface saying that I don't think there's anything wrong inherently with using drugs. If you're not entering a sport, right. Where that's bad. Um, I was lucky enough when I started lifting to not have any influence around me to influence me to do anything, because I can I can honestly say that if I was lifting and I was younger. Right. And let's say I started lifting when I was 18 years old and I got immediately into bodybuilding and someone said, hey, man, everyone's doing this. And I's, let's say I clearly wasn't as big as I actually was when I was 18, when I had five years of training experience, I might've done something right. Because I, that, that would be what's around me. That would be okay. Well, be a little bit more normal. It'd be normal. Everyone does this to get big. Well, maybe I

should do a little bit of this and a little bit of that. I may have done it. I was just lucky enough to have started younger, not had any influences by the time I was 19, I was just lucky enough to have started younger, not had any influences. By the time I was 19, I was already 200 and something pounds. And when I do find out that type of stuff, I'm like, I don't need it at this point. You know, it's just, um, it's, it's more difficult for people to make that choice. And I also, you already had, I had enough knowledge too about like there. Okay. There's bodybuilding. That's what like Jay Cutler does.

Yeah. And, uh, that's what Ronnie Coleman does and stuff like that. that and then there's and then it looks like there's a different category of these guys are getting tested at least right and so yeah maybe guys are like messing around with this or that but i'm gonna do this my way yeah and i'm gonna compete in this and yeah if you didn't if you didn't like get the gist of some of that and yeah you were younger a little bit more impressionable yeah i didn't have money like but like, you know, that, that, that's the, that's the thing. It's hard when you're in your twenties and you have all of this around you and you want to either make the choice to, you know, do it naturally, which I think you, you should live for a few

years without taking anything. Um, or you make the choice to take stuff and speed, set things up, you things up a little bit. I think also, though, there needs to be more education for people in terms of using that type of stuff. Because one of the big reasons why I never have, and I really don't think I will, I highly doubt I will, is because, first off, I don't know how to. And number two, I don't want it to. Yeah, I have a resource right here but like i'm i'm more i've heard that people like they have to when they use that stuff they use that stuff for the rest of their lives it can affect your hormones it can affect a lot of things um and i don't need i wouldn't want that extra stress on myself you know um so that's a great point you bring up i

think a lot of us care about it too much and uh when you have when you talk about like you know um so that's a great point you bring up i think a lot of us care about it too much and uh when you have when you talk about like you know kind of needing it um it just kind of would depend on like you know how you would quantify need and and for you that would be true you would need it because you would have the need to want to be as big and strong as you are when you're on it and if you look at uh when we had the guy from Mind Pump on, we had Adam on here. Adam was a IFBB pro bodybuilder, and he talked about his usage on the show a little bit, and he doesn't use anything anymore. But he had to kiss that goodbye.

You know, he's still in good shape. He's still trains and everything, but he doesn't look like he used to. And that's something that you would have to be okay with, which is like, you know, for us, that's kind of hard. How are you going to be okay with that? It's going to be pretty tough. So more recently, we – let's see how much information I want to share here. More recently, we've been testing some stuff here at Slingshot as a business. And, you know, we have some different athletes.

I just won't use any names. That'll be easier. We have some different athletes. And in one case, we have a drug, what I believe to be a drug-free athlete. You never know what people are really up to behind closed doors. I'll just say that I believe he's drug-free. And we have another one that's not. And one that's not is a freak of all freaks and somebody that has huge engagement and people love to watch and people get really excited to watch their information and, and to check all these things out. And the one that is Natty,

out and the one that is uh natty um he he has way less engagement it's not even it's not even it's just not even close the engagement is is is uh way way way less now in terms of what we tested out here is we tested out this affiliate program and when we went in and looked at the numbers the numbers were a shocking landslide for the guy who's natural and my theory on that was just as you kind of pointed out with omar isaf um when somebody is watching omar isaf's channel they are yeah perhaps they're inspired they're excited omar's strong yeah omar's lifted some big weights they actually get enough credit for that. Omar's very strong. But he's not like world championship power lifter strong, but he's very strong, especially given his body weight and stuff. He's very strong.

People are going to his channel though for information. So if Omar says, hey, I take this drink during my workout because I noticed a good energy boost and it makes me feel good. And I've actually noticed I'm recovering from my workouts a little bit more. People are going to buy into that a lot more than if I was to hold something up or this other athlete that we're talking about was to say, hey man, I use this. And you're like, really? That's what that, okay, that's what you use to bench 578 pounds? Like, we don't believe you, Mark. So I think that that's a big part of it.

You know, people will, and it's like why they're watching though too. It's not necessarily, it doesn't necessarily have to do with the drug usage only where you could make the argument, maybe a younger athlete that's checking in and wants to know, like, is this guy natural? Because if he's not, I'm not going to listen to him. Like, I totally understand that. Cause I was the same way when I was a kid. Most of the people in my

gym use stuff. And I was always like, well, of course that guy deadlifts 800 pounds. He's on a bunch of shit, you know? And I learned about it it pretty young but at the same time those were the only guys around to like teach me how to lift so they they kind of showed me how to lift but at some point i was also kind of frustrated with it and i was like well that seems like uh you know cheap way out that seems like a shortcut that's just because i didn't really understand that those guys still worked out for two decades to get that 800 pound deadlift it wasn't like it wasn't like they took it in a year later that boom they were just smashing everybody in every lift right it's still it still takes a lot of it still takes a lot of time but i think that you know when i look at that example of the that affiliate program that we set up and when i

think about like why someone's watching somebody same thing with like a hot chick right somebody's somebody's you know 20,000 likes on every post that they make uh maybe people aren't really invested in that girl talking about knee sleeves they're invested in her butt they're invested in their butt did you hear that Andrew he's talking to you yeah no I was saying that they're they're they're hitting like not because they like the person, but because they like the person's butt. Yeah. Yeah. That apple bottom. I haven't heard that in a while.

I know. Yeah, no, I mean, I could totally understand it. I was paying attention to channels like Omar channels, like Chris Jones, Matt Ogis, Elliot Hulse, these guys, because these guys are natural and they had good information and I wasn't planning on doing anything else. Right. So I was like this, like this is working for them and they're not using anything extra. I know I can trust this. I can totally understand that. Um, because I can, I've also seen channels of guys that you could tell they're on but i knew that their information was kind of bs right the truth like the thing is is like it's not like drugs can give you everything but they in terms of muscle

building they can definitely give you an advantage even if you're doing a lot of the wrong things in terms of nutrition and this and this and that you can still get a lot of muscle right what i mean um but the difference between like yourself and the stuff that you're putting out here is it's like the nutrition information isn't because you're on steroids. Like, like it's like. Well, I think that's why people do get attached to nutrition information from me, because that's something very clear that they can see and they can say, oh, yeah, maybe the steroids played some role in it because I'm holding more muscle mass.

But they saw me go from 330 30 to two 30. Right. Yeah. They clearly saw that. And that's what you saw with like Omar and some of these other guys you saw at some point, like they were squatting three 15. Now they're squatting five plates and it is it. I mean, you know, there's absolutely no question. It is harder to gain strength. Uh, when you're a natural athlete, there's, there's a lot more to think about. And for somebody to make even just a couple of a kilo jump from one competition to the next is huge, where it's actually very common for someone who uses stuff to go from one contest one year to another one the next year and maybe increase their total by 80 pounds or 100 pounds. But with a natural athlete that's been competing for a little while, that's going to be more rare unless the time elapsed between competitions is greater. Yeah.

It can take time. It can. It definitely can. And then bulking and cutting is hard too. So, and that's another reason. I mean, that's a huge thing that steroids do that people leave out a lot of times is the fact that it can increase your body weight so much. And that's the hugest part.

So, like if you took something and you stayed the same body weight obviously you'd get a lot stronger yeah but if you if you weighed 280 your strength would be nuts and we'd be like dude what's going on with the natty professor we gotta change his name he's 25 again lean like and no the big thing is that that that's one thing you mentioned in terms of cutting. Like drugs can make you get lean fast. That's why you see a lot of guys in the IFBB that can do 12 week cuts and get like shredded. When I say like my cut back in 15, 2015 from 262 down to 230, that took me 40 weeks, 41 41 weeks it was legitimately a 41 week cut i remember when you were telling me about like how many weeks your your cuts were and i was like you probably thought i was messing around or i was like that's ridiculous well because i always used to joke

around i'd be like oh i'm 100 and 108 weeks out from a show you know because i was fat you know but yeah and then when you said that i was like oh my god but yeah it makes sense because you don't want to lose muscle exactly like you you have to do it in a way that you're losing slowly enough where you're not you're you're you're focusing on losing body fat if you do it too quick i could get i could lose 30 pounds quickly but i would not be holding nearly as much muscle as i was then drawing that cut out for a long time and losing that weight extremely slowly like that's the difference you didn't you didn't need to do a 40 week cut, you know? But at the same time, it's like, I think that when people are listening to this,

the main question that they're asking is cause like when we started off, we're like, did drugs make the person? No, I don't think drugs made the person, but like what people really want to figure out is should I, or should I not? And what are the advantages for me personally in the disadvantages? You know, I think it really just depends on what you're getting into when we're talking about like guys like the rock and Arnold, these are guys doing extremely high level physical feats. You know,

if you're someone who is going to do that and you're going to go into a sport where like you're not tested, okay, maybe it isn't a bad idea. Just get some education on it. You know, I really don't think there should be such a bad stigma if you're going to go into a sport where like you're not tested okay maybe it isn't a bad idea just get some education on it you know i i really don't think there should be such a bad stigma if you're entering something where it's not like against the rules and you're working with somebody who knows how to do it yeah i feel like there are a lot of i feel like i know that there are a lot of uh guys that work with bodybuilders and the NPC that give them things that are putting these people in danger because they don't know what they're doing. I've seen it happen to thyroid medication and clenbuterol like right off the bat and stuff.

And you're like, can't you get the person on a diet first and see how they do with that? Start there? Yeah. Maybe, you know, I think the problem is like the reason why we see all these things happening is because people are getting their information from individuals who don't know how to share that information safely. That's why it's seen as such a big set, uh, nutrition information, um, and training. It set it back like a decade. And the reason why that was said is because, you know, a lot of people were just training on machines, um, and just, you know, eating chicken breasts and broccoli and rice, and they were, you know, getting these huge outcomes. And I think that the, the truth of

it, the truth of that is it's going to be really hard to build muscle on just some chicken and some rice and some broccoli. You're going to probably need a little bit more, a little bit more fuel than that if you're not enhanced. And then also you're going to need to do more than just some chest flies to, you know, to get a big ass chest. You're going to need to be able to push, push some weights and real body. But I think the problem too becomes like, there's such a difference between, uh, you know, some just kind of jabroni bodybuilder, right. For lack of a better term versus somebody that really knows what they're talking about. You know, there's a huge difference between those two and any bodybuilders that we had here, whether they've been natural bodybuilders or whether they haven't been natural these have been determined individuals that that

get after it like the workouts the workouts these guys do are intense either way they're intense now you might have to be more meticulous if you're naturally to pay attention a little bit more to exactly what everything it is that you're doing and if you're taking stuff you might be able to get away with doing a few extra sets you might be able to get away with a little bit more to exactly what everything it is that you're doing. And if you're taking stuff, you might be able to get away with doing a few extra sets. You might be able to get away with a little extra training, but usually the natural guys are so excited about training. A lot of times they're a little bit newer. And those are the guys that really have to be careful with overtraining because they just inherently want to overtrain because they want to be bigger. They want to be bigger like right now. And they were trying to make it happen right then. Whereas some of the people that take stuff, usually they've been in the gym for a while and they know like, I better take my time

with this process. I better just, I'm going to get in three or four exercises for this body part and I'm going to get the hell out of here. Yeah. It's the recovery aspect of things is so crazy to me. Um, you, you can't work with nearly as much volume, you know, and you recover so much slower if you're, if you're not enhanced, it does make a big difference. And then again, I think the biggest aspect is, is if you're natural, that, that acceptance that it's going to take years, like legit time, you know, um, I mentioned Matt August before, but he's been training for what like 12 13 years now he has very he he looks amazing he gets shredded yeah he does get

shredded but you know when when you watch that content and you're like 19 20 21 you see that he's 27 26 you're like i can get there in five years no you can't you're like you can't like give yourself i mean a decade and that's that i i you know it's so depressing it's it is depressing man because like i don't even remember the first time i noticed anything on myself do you no that's the thing because it took so long yeah just took so long i don't i don't recall it i'm not like oh there's that day where I saw like a delt pop out or something. I remember the first time I noticed it, but it wasn't because I noticed it. It's because a girl at school called me over to the tree in the middle of campus and I was wearing a brown T-shirt.

Right. And she was with a group of friends and I came over with my friends and she's like. Take off your clothes. No, not even that. She's like, see, my arm is looking pretty big. And I was like, really? But I was like, I think I uh 15 or 16 at that point so i was like three or four years in these old things kidding me yeah yeah but like i didn't realize that i was actually uh like i actually somebody else pointed it out someone else pointed it out then i really noticed

oh snap this gym stuff is working right you know so like but when you're nowadays yeah that that August is ridiculous but nowadays because you're getting fed images all the time on your phone of all these dudes you're looking at yourself in the mirror every single day and you're like why can't I do that and the patience you got to be patient as a guy that's not taking drugs you know what I mean you got to be patient but it's hard so much harder nowadays than it was for me back then. All this stuff, it is a very long process. It takes a long time. It takes a lot of kind of ups and downs.

And I think we've talked about this many times on this show. First of all, when you're going to embark on a diet, and this is aside from whether you're taking anything or not, when you're going to embark on a diet and you're not a veteran to dieting, do not start out in a caloric restriction. Do not just start out right off the bat. Don't even start out with the intention of losing weight. Start out with the intention of being healthier and wanting to feel better. What will happen in about two or three weeks,

maybe even about a month's time, you get used to the food, get used to meal prep, you get used to shopping and figuring out how much things cost. And you, you learn is there's a lot to learn with all that. You don't just start, you know, cooking out of nowhere. And like, it takes time to figure all these things out. What are you going to cook it in? Uh, what are you going to package it up in to get to work? I mean, there's a lot of, a lot of things to think about when it comes to that. It's going to take a while to learn all that. Once you get that down, once you start to feel better, then it starts to get easier to eat a little bit less.

You actually will probably want to eat less. And more than likely, you'll probably lose a little bit of weight. I've never been like a calories in, calories out person because I think that the calories can be swayed one way or the other without making a huge impact on your weight one way or the other. And I'm not talking about like a crazy swing. I'm talking about maybe like 500 calories, like maybe like an extra meal or one meal less.

I think in the grand scheme of things, it probably doesn't matter that much. But when you're first starting on a diet, if you're not used to dieting, don't make yourself be hungry all the time. I know we've talked a lot in this podcast about being hungry and the benefits of it and how it can help you lose body fat, but if you don't have any willpower, if you don't have any discipline yet,

that's not a good time to test that out. You want to build that, and the way that you're going to build it is build some success by getting used to the food first. Get the nutrients that your body needs. Read a book. Read something like The Vertical Diet by Stan Efferding. There's some great information in there.

Once you start to piece together that this is a macro and a micronutrient puzzle, and when those pieces of the puzzle are together, you'll be like, hmm, I don't really feel like overeating. Oh, I don't need to have a meal at 9 o'clock at night right before I go to bed. I feel pretty good. I'm just going to go to sleep. You'll start making those decisions a little bit more naturally, a little bit easier as, as you go along. Yeah. I definitely think that, you know, everybody should really try to learn this information. It's almost like you want to,

I think coaches are beneficial. I'm a coach, but at the same time, I think you should want to be your own coach because you know, if you want, if there's a body you're trying to get to or, or a strength level, you're trying to get to more so from the nutrition side of things. I don't see you wanting to work with a coach for the rest of your life. Maybe you want to, and maybe you want that, you know, maybe for a little bit extra accountability, but there is a certain point where you're probably going to be want to take the reins of everything. And I do believe that everyone can have a decent enough understanding of food to be able to manipulate their body the way they want to. It just like, it takes time outside of whatever else you're doing to learn about it and learn how it's going

to affect you and how this food is going to affect you. Learn if you like fasting, learn if you like carnivore and actually learning about it. And that's the difficult part. You know, you gotta, you gotta educate yourself on it because this isn't some like thing where you're just gonna go to a textbook and figure it out. You know, you, you gotta find certain sex of information that work for you. So yeah, I think, I think, you know, when it, when it comes to, you know, this, this topic of, of trying to figure this all out, what most people are after is they're trying to get either to a strength level that they want, or they're trying to get the body that they want. And both things are hard to figure out. They're, they're hard to get.

And it's going to take, it takes a lot of discipline either way, whether you take something or not. But I think when it comes to this particular topic of, you know anabolic steroids and peds i guess the way that i was looking at it was you know is it opening up doors for people that maybe otherwise wouldn't be open maybe some of these doors would be shut maybe some of these doors would be closed it's just it's hard to figure that out because like i don't't know, I don't know what my life looks like without them because I used them, you know? So, and I, and I use them, you know? So I don't, I don't know. Um, I don't know anything different than that. Uh, but I will say that like it, it has opened doors for me. Um, but you can also make the same argument for maybe a book that

somebody read, or how about this this this is even more in line just the way somebody looks you know isn't sema gonna get the door held open for him a little easier than maybe somebody else probably like when you're a good looking person you're gonna get you know you get treated a little differently yeah like you get a free neck pillow just for looking like in sema at the airport no she's a sister she's like nah we were well hey i mean hey there you go i don't have i don't have that you know skin tone yeah so she looked at me and was just like looked at you i'm gonna help this guy out right now well look you know a lot of times i help him out hook him up sorry we're generalizing here so go ahead

and beat me up as much as you want on the internet here. A lot of times if someone's really beautiful, someone's really good looking, male or female, maybe the rest of them's not as developed as the next person because maybe they didn't have to, right? Yeah. That happens, right? That happens a lot. Yeah. I mean, there's a reason why they make all those jokes about blondes and stuff like that, right?

I mean, they exist for a reason, you know? And so I do think that, you know, your looks ultimately will make a big difference. It'll have an impact on the people that you interact with. And so if somebody has someone who's 240 pounds in front of them, that's much different than someone who's 180 pounds. in front of them. That's much different than someone who's 180 pounds. And so this, you know, back to this kind of principle of, you know, are these PEDs going to open up doors? They could potentially, they could potentially open up doors. And I don't think there's any reason to deny it. Doesn't mean that everyone should take them. It, you know, I'm not going to promote any drugs of any kind, because as Nsema pointed out, like, look look you have to be on these the rest of your life

and to try to weigh out the pros and cons i think becomes uh one of the one of the harder things to figure out yeah the it's so this is such a rough topic to talk talk about from my point of view because i've had like clients that i've that i've, I actually had a client I worked with. Um, he's from China, uh, and I'm not going to, I'm not going to his name, but I, he talked to me about it and he's like, you know, I want to compete in these bodybuilding competitions. And he already had a good physique. He has a good physique at that point. Like he was, he was decently big. He wasn't taking anything, et cetera. And he's like, um, you know, I think I want to, he was telling me that he wants to do this. He was telling me how big he wants to get.

And he was like, well, what do you think in SEMA? And then I was like – I might not be the guy to go to for that. It's like – and he wasn't asking me – he wanted to know if I could do that for him, which I couldn't. But when he told me his goals, I'm like, well, dude, I don't – I can't say if you're going to get there without or with it. I think that if you do want to make that choice, you need to find someone who knows what the hell they're doing. And you need to find someone who can help you do that safely because a lot of people can put themselves in danger doing this. But the other thing is when someone says, hey, how long do you think it'll take me to get to your weight or whatever? I, you know, when you see certain people, you're like, well, I don't know if you'll ever get to my weight if you don't take something.

Right. But the thing is, is just like. I can't. I can't weigh in on, on, on an individual's choice in that way. Cause if you do want to get to looking like close to like the rock or something,

he is an absolute outlier in terms of the way he looks, even if you weren't on right. Six, five. And even, even me, like I'm an outlier in terms of the way I look. Right.

And if you want to look like me, this is going to – I think it's a really just crappy thing to say, but a majority of the population won't be able to without drugs. Yeah. A majority of the population won't be able to without drugs. They'll be able to reach an extremely good, big, respectable physique that looks better than like a majority of people that don't work out. But you won't look like me and that's not an that's not saying i'm amazing or great or whatever because this sounds extremely cocky i don't want it to sound that way but that doesn't mean that you can't reach something respectable without but if you want to then you just got to find the right person who can help you do that. So you don't hurt yourself.

Yeah. I don't think any, anybody would disagree with what you just said though. It makes sense. Yeah. But, but at the same, it makes sense,

but it's not something that people want to hear. Yeah. It's, it's, it's, it's not, you know, people want to have a goal and say,

I can like, people want to be like, I can get there. You know, I can definitely get there. Like if you're, if you're five, five and you weigh 150 pounds, it's going to be hard for you to weigh 220 210 yeah 200 even 200 it might be it

might it might be really hard um could you use some stuff and maybe get to like 180 yeah probably yeah probably but can you start to get above that and at that height like i mean you know it's just there's huge variants that we have in how we grew up, uh, what we've been exposed to when you're young, you were exposed to soccer when you're young, maybe you've been exposed to soccer when you're young, uh, helped you to never really acquire, you know, a lot of body fat. Yeah. So, you know, most professional bodybuilders, it's really rare for any of them to ever have really been excessively fat at any point. They never even develop the fat cells.

So when they shrink down and when they bring everything in tight, their waist is usually pretty small. And so there's a lot of different variables that are connected to all these things. So it's not an easy thing to 100% figure out. But back to your point about your size and your body weight and even like your body fat percentage, I made this statement a long time ago, probably like 15 years ago when I used to write on EliteFTS.com. And I talked about – because people were asking like how do you know if somebody is on stuff? And I said, well, that's really, really hard to determine. You can't really truly determine it, but I would just say,

and obviously your height plays into this somewhat. So if you're six, five or something, it's going to throw everything off. But if you're of normal height, if somebody's two 20 and they're below 10% body fat, it doesn't mean that they're on stuff. It just means that you kind of raises an eyebrow a little

bit yeah and if they're not on anything it just means they have fucking awesome genetics but most of the time when you see somebody of that size there's you you got to kind of say okay that guy's that guy's probably it doesn't mean anything doesn't necessarily mean that they're on anything but um just from what i've seen you know just from what i observed over the years that's that's a pretty significant amount of body weight um on a relatively lean frame yeah you know and for you i mean you're what 240 right 240 above 240 so i'm like 245 you have no idea of body fat percentage probably you don't know well i mean I'm probably between, I'd say nine and 12, but definitely nine and 11, I'd say. Right. Somewhere in there. Yeah. And so even, and even given that, I mean, it's, you're doing jujitsu, you're fast, there's a lot of effort, you know, it's not like,

it's not like you're trying to get like shredded, but you're trying to be fit. You're trying to be in shape and trying to be strong. So you're piecing together all the micronutrients, all the macronutrients that we talked about earlier. Um, and you're also utilizing fasting because it's helping kind of heighten your senses when you're competing and all this different things. But, you know, I, I made that statement a long time ago and I think that it's, it's fairly true. It's just, you're not going to really get to those kind of positions without either A, having great genetics and environment, or B, using some stuff. Yeah. And people are going to think I'm absolutely stupid and ridiculous for this, so the internet's probably going to cheat me out too. But that's why when I look at a guy like michael hearn which you make

jokes about all the time right and i see uh his pictures from when he was younger i see how long he's been at this game i see his quality of how he executes his movement and how consistent he's been um you can tell when he was young he was gonna be a big motherfucker you could tell god it's massive like and and this and i doubt he was on anything when he was 16 or 15 years old maybe but i doubt it but he still looked like just a ridiculous just a ridiculous mutant of a kid right so with him having what he had right he still puts out great information for lifters and he's not saying he's not telling everybody you know if you do this you can look like me but he's like if, if you work consistently and you have these concepts in terms of nutrition, you're lifting, you can get to your best body.

And your best body is going to be something you never thought you could achieve. But I look at him, I'm like, you know, for what he had, for what he was gifted and the work he put in, I think it's possible for him. I think it's possible for him. Well, when you get to know Michael Hearn more and you're around him, it's just, it makes you scratch your head because you're like, fuck man, maybe he is telling the truth because he never misses a meal.

He leans into the resistance of life like harder than anybody I've ever seen him before. You know, if waking up early um, you know, if, if, if waking up early is hard to do for somebody, uh, you know, he's leaned into that. He's at the gym at 4am training. He, he works really hard. I mean, he's even tried, you know, different things with like fasting. And I know like he would fast on the weekends for a while. He was like, I just found myself, I kind of was, uh, pigging out on the weekends a little while he was like i just found myself i kind of was uh pigging out on the weekends a little bit and so he's like i just got rid of food all together i was like

screwed i'm just gonna fast then kind of um maybe just as of a couple months ago he got in like some of the best shape of his life he got super super lean for his 50th birthday then when his 50th birthday was over he was like i'm gonna bulk up he got up to like 285 he's just massive but he moves moves up and down he's able to move up. He got up to like 285, just massive. But he moves up and down. He's able to move up and down in his body weight. But a lot of it is he's – when he and I were lifting together, he's benching 405 for some reps on an incline. And he's like, man, he's like, I just can't believe what food does for you. And regardless of whether there's some input from performance enhancing drugs or

not he's 100 right anyone who's ever started to like pour on some more food and started to eat a little bit more and they go in and train hey you feel like a tank sometimes you feel real you feel and you just grab the 45 and you're like that's the right weight like it feels like a 25 or you lift something you're like you think you you had a you know let less weight on the bar you're like that's 405 like move really fast that felt really easy and so you know mike's discipline is is on point and regardless of uh whether you're gonna you know have a life where you're choosing not to do them or they're gonna have a life where you choose to do them there's gonna have to be a tremendous amount of discipline that goes into it if you ever want to really look like you lift

and if you want to be able to lift some heavy ass weight yeah and and this is also the thing with mike he's not just some guy who's working out all the time and spitting out shit information he's a guy who is who knows what he's doing on the nutrition aspect of things sleep hydration working out technique um all these different types of things to help you gain more muscle all these different little techniques to do that he has literally everything on point um never been hurt never been hurt longevity like people really need to like remember mike is like you said he's 50 years old he still looks the way he does he's still lifting the way he does he's not just some meathead that's like if some people think he takes for he's not just a meathead that took roids and got big without really paying attention

to a lot of things because some people do just do that they work out and they get great results but he's he's he has all his ducks in a row those duck eggs but he has all his ducks in a row that was good um i think it'd be really really scary for like sport and power lifting if a lot of power lifters took that much dedication into everything else than just their lifts they took that much dedication their technique their nutrition their hydration their sleep i think there would be a lot that much dedication into everything else than just their lifts. They took that much dedication, their technique, their nutrition, their hydration, their sleep. I think there'd be a lot of, uh, a lot of strength athletes that are like in the shadows that would pop up out of nowhere. They really took that stuff seriously. Building muscle and building conditioning on top of

building that strength, right? That'd be insane. But athletes treat themselves like athletes. They don't look at themselves like a coach would look at them. They're like, I'm just an athlete. I'm going to go do this. You know, that would be crazy. You know, when you think about some of these different athletes and you start to think about who you would listen to, you know, some, somebody that, um, somebody who had to really work for it, you know, comes to mind more so than somebody who was like gifted being gigantic, like, uh, like Thor, like, right. Like, uh, and, and Thor, you know, it might be, it might not be the smartest move to like,

ignore him. Cause he's a, he's a world champion, but it's like, I'm not 6'10 and 400 pounds, so I don't know how to like, is what he's going to show me even equate to me? And I think that's ultimately some of the stuff that we're talking about here. When somebody uses stuff and somebody looks like a Stan Efferding, somebody might think like, I can't compute with that.

I don't understand what any of that looks like. I don't know how to ever get built like that like he's a fucking rhino yeah you know i can't figure that shit out uh but maybe they can be maybe they can figure out how to look like omar how to look like nick wright or how to look like uh elliot holtz right like like elliot holtz is in really good shape but like that's that's a really good uh aggressive but perhaps attainable goal to look like that right it makes and it makes total sense it's like you're not going to be working with same training volumes as stan but elliot matt chris uh what's in chris jones all

these guys like you and myself like i try to make sure that like and they all try to make sure that the information they put out can be used that was what i was talking about i just i had to look wow his shoulders are wide though when he's young though too yeah they were pretty wide when he was young yeah yeah i had to check a couple different like sources i didn't believe that that was actually him the first time i didn't believe it either you know he got Dude, I'd love to just set him free on a fucking football field. Wouldn't that be wild if he was like,

why not? Just bring him up to like Oakland and see, you know, just be like, hey man, he wants to play defensive end.

He's not sure which way to go. Tell him which way to go and just let him loose. Just do it like Bobby Boucher. Yeah. No one could tackle him and take him down, I think. Yeah. Fucking half doors like Bobby Boucher. Yeah. No one could tackle him and take him down, I think.

Yeah. And half doors. Talk about opening doors. Yeah. Dude. Yeah. He ripped the door. Ripped all the doors.

Ripped all the doors right off the hinges. Yeah. Well, yeah. Look, you know, he's on Game of Thrones and stuff. But like for him, I mean, a lot of that has to do with just his height which is um you know he he uh chose some good parents i guess he did chose some good icelandic uh relatives right yeah you know i i find like it's it's it's a difficult decision for some like someone especially let's say someone in their mid-20s or 30s right and they're looking and obviously testosterone doesn't have all to

do with it but if like your natural testosterone is super low. Right. And there's nothing you can do about it. Just do what you'd like. Take some testosterone. You know, I mean, if like it, I like it. My testosterone is fine. So I don't need to do that. But if somebody needs to do that for themselves, for their health too, because, I mean, there have been a lot of links to low testosterone, depression, and a bunch of other things that cascade on top of it. You got to do what you need to do so you're healthier, you know. So I think that's something that's still seen as taboo for some people or for them to even think about doing that. And the other thing is, is like when I look at natural bodybuilding federations and guys that want to do natural bodybuilding and they like, they do have really, really, really low levels, but they can't do that and compete.

Then maybe they just shouldn't compete. Maybe they should take their health into their, their, their health matters more. So get what you need to get so that you can get yourself to a normal place. It's, it's a hard decision, but it's something that needs to be thought about. And training, nutrition, and supplementation might be able to help too. So it might be a great place to start and then see if some of these things improve.

But you really don't. Yeah, like if you have those things in line, right? If you have those things in line and everything's still all jacked up, then maybe you need to think of something else because you lack something hormonally. You just lack. Yeah, you just don't. You ain't got it. Yeah, I'm pretty interested to see what mine comes out to be.

I'm actually getting tested tomorrow. I think I did a test a while ago. I got to find my results. Yeah, the last time I did it. You're going to be so mad. All your blood's going to be totally normal. Yeah, absolutely. Not one thing's going to be gonna be wrong you're gonna be a picture of health yeah the last time i got it tested you're like damn it i remember somebody got it they uh somebody in the

gym got theirs tested recently and they were a thousand whatever points over where my testosterone was and mine was like uh just barely on the uh the low side of the spectrum yeah so it was high enough to where the doctor was like ah you're fine so i'm like oh are you sure i'm fine like can i be a little bit better than fine he's like no you're good all right fine i think i have my results from like last year on my phone i'm gonna look those up later on that the range is wide you know it is yeah the range they give you is pretty pretty damn it's like 300 to 800 or something yeah and i was like 370 i think i was like 450 or 500 i think that's where i was that's yeah i'll check it out again it's on like the moderate to low side right it can be as high as

1500 or something right yeah yeah but that that's wild yeah i guess the uh free testosterone too is part of i don't know how it all works i don't know how it works but yeah the person that got tested i've seen his results and he was at 13 something so i'm like yeah all right i took a shot every day for like 30 days and then got it tested one time it was pretty pretty did you break did you break the record was it a high score yeah it was like i don't know the doctor like circled it he's like we need to talk about this number you get to put your initials on the board i know it was 5 000 something i mean it was awesome damn right back in the day yeah that's awesome handling 800 pound benches every week

made it a little easier still hurt really bad yeah so do we think the drugs made the men though you know i i guess you know the main thing on some of this is like just from some of the comments that i see when somebody when somebody like outwardly attacks me about some of these topics yeah it's weird because it's like well who the fuck else are you following and how do you know what they do and what they don't do yeah you know if you're listening to joe rogan you're following the rock and you're i mean all these people there it doesn't you can find you can find a uh you can find drugs in just about every person's life of some kind some sort of stimulant uh marijuana mushrooms fucking steroids

i mean you're gonna find everyone's on caffeine that's a motherfucker that you're gonna start to find let me some of that you're gonna start to you know you start to unpack some of that and you're gonna start to find a little something in everybody's closet

I think you know yeah just like Barry Bond says you know go ahead and clean out your closet before you go cleaning out mine

very true damn I love that I didn't even hear him say that it's in bigger stronger faster really yeah yeah

it just figure out what works for you what you need personally I like my coffee I didn't even hear him say that. It's in bigger, stronger, faster. Ah, really? Yeah. Yeah. Just figure out what works for you, what you need personally. I like my coffee. I like my stimulant, right? So that's my current drug of choice, you know? Thus the name change. Thus the name change. Not.

Not thus the name change. My name change is just me. I'm still not taking anything that would be deemed drugs i don't know about that okay there were some mentions of creatine on here previously vitamin multivitamin i heard multivitamin i don't take multis i take i take specific ones i'm trying to add up what i remember yeah creatine vitamin d fish oil oh now we get to the fish oil i have a calcium magnesium zinc that was oh shit mentioned from stan efforting um and uh and he's hanging out with stan efforting now it was in the vertical diet he's that super training he was in the vertical diet starting to add up all this stuff anyway yeah so it is what it is i don't know about this i don't know about this guy you I I've tried to figure it out but I can't

do it's jacked he doesn't really he's not killing himself in the gym every day he doesn't even work out I do work out doesn't does he once every two weeks just comes in here and accumulate some strength and leaves he just takes it all the energy out you don't work hard bro just rip for no reason. Yeah, that is frustrating. Oh, man. I saw your picture the other day. You're shredded up. Yeah.

After a jiu-jitsu. Yeah, that was after a jiu-jitsu. You lose a lot of water weight when you do that. Yeah, dude. When you're rolling, I mean, you must, right? I sweat a ton. I sweat a ton. Like, I look really lean afterwards.

I mean, you're in that fucking gi, right? Yeah, it makes a big difference. Like, I'll weigh 247 before I come off the mats weighing 242, 241. So it makes a big difference like i'll weigh 247 before i come off the mats weighing 242 241 so it makes a big difference your head looks large i love that yeah my head is huge that's why this hat is so tight even though it's the biggest one you guys have cutting off the circulation yeah yeah so you're uh going out of town? Yeah, I'm going out tomorrow. That's competing on Thursday, but I'm leaving tomorrow morning to go to Pan Ams. Chad Wesley Smith's competing.

So that's going to be awesome. I really hope I get to roll with Chad. That's going to be awesome. He lost a lot of weight, man. Yeah. But he's still big. I think he's still like 290. His Instagram profile still says 300 pounds of twisted steel and sex appeal.

So it might still be 300. But yeah, Chad Wesley Smith. There's going to be a lot of other great competitors there. Where's he at? He's a blue belt. He just got his blue. So I think he just got his blue. And then immediately after he signed up for Pan Ams because there was a cutoff date for Pan Ams.

Right. And I think Chad got his blue like a week beforehand. So it's like he got it and he's going to a big tournament. So I really, that'd be awesome to be able to compete against a guy that big and that strong. I saw some videos of him. I was like, damn. I was like, he's moving really well. Monster.

He's a monster. And then like I mentioned, there's this other guy, Jason Shirley, who won Pan Ams last year. You were saying he's a football player, right? Yeah. Won Pan Ams and he won Worlds last you were saying he's a football player, right? Yeah, won Pan Ams, and he won Worlds last year, too. NFL, former NFL player. He's like 6'6", anywhere between 290 and 310. Damn.

Crazy. I guess weight class-wise, you're screwed no matter what weight class you're in, right? Ultra heavyweight, you're like, it's ultra heavyweight to gamble because it's 220 and above. So you could be a 220 guy competing against the 310 guy. And then right below that's super heavy, which is like 208 to 220 or something like that. So the ultras are great. And in jiu-jitsu, they claim that strength and weight doesn't matter, but it matters, right?

It always matters. Oh, that's a lie. Strength and weight matters. It's a big deal. There are, okay, so in jiu-jitsu, there are total- It wouldn't matter if you weren't skilled, then being jujitsu, there are. It wouldn't matter if you were if you if you weren't skilled than being big and strong. I'm sure it wouldn't hurt you. But but it's probably not going to help you against a black belt.

Not good. Yeah, probably. If you don't have technique, it wouldn't help you against a black belt. The thing is, is like, what is that technique? This is showing how much he or how easy he can move his get off the ground. Yeah. Chad can move. Get off the ground, yeah. Chad can move. But you see the viral videos on jujitsu about the little guy who he's, maybe it's the absolute.

The absolute is when all the winners of the weight classes compete against each other. And the little guy beats the massive guy. But the thing is that massive guy wasn't as skilled as that little guy. He just wasn't as skilled. But there's also advantages too. If you're really, really big and a guy's really, really small, he can snake his way around your body and you might not actually be able to control him. So that's actually a little bit of advantage if there's a large size disparity. But typically though, in jujitsu, if you're just as skilled and you're bigger and you're stronger,

you're probably going to win. Awesome. I think this is our last show for a little bit, right? Because I'm going to Italy. Yeah, you're probably going to win. Awesome. I think this is our last show for a little bit, right? Because I'm going to Italy. Yeah, you're going out of town, you're going out of town, and I'm not going anywhere. You're stuck here? So maybe we can do something over Skype,

but as of right now, yeah. Smokey won't let you go? He won't let you leave? I got one day. Damn, Smoke laying down the hammer. Damn, dude. Whoa. The leash doesn't the hammer. Damn, dude. Whoa. The leash doesn't go far. That's right. I thought you'd be into that.

Okay, he is. All right. Strength is never weakness. Weakness is never strength. Catch you guys later.