Mark Bell's Power Project - Power Project EP. 85 - Douglas Fruchey

Episode Date: July 18, 2018

Douglas Fruchey is an AFPA certified personal trainer and coach. He is also a super heavy weight power bodybuilder and a Physique Inc. athlete. Douglas provides in-person and online consulting for diet, cardio, weight management, and contest prep. ➢SHOP NOW: https://markbellslingshot.com/ Enter Discount code, "POWERPROJECT" at checkout and receive 15% off all Sling Shots ➢Subscribe Rate & Review on iTunes at: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/mark-bells-power-project/id1341346059?mt=2 ➢Listen on Stitcher Here: https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/mark-bells-power-project?refid=stpr ➢Listen on Google Play here: https://play.google.com/music/m/Izf6a3gudzyn66kf364qx34cctq?t=Mark_Bells_Power_Project ➢Listen on SoundCloud Here: 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 Podcast Produced by Andrew Zaragoza ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamandrewz

seems to work the best for me and especially for a guy doing it himself who doesn't have all this you know all these other competitors that they've dieted down and you know have all the experience and stuff it's like well it's much easier if you keep it simple and watch your body change and just kind of maintain it that way and then you don't have to do the carb up the depletion and stuff like that i mean when i did the west coast this year it was the easiest prep i've ever done it was amazing yeah you know with bodybuilding it has a very specific there's very specific path and if you talk to veteran bodybuilders and uh you know you ask them kind of newbie questions they're like they just shake their head they're like no no

kid like that's not the way it works it's hard to understand because especially this day and age, there's so much new information flying at your face all the time about, uh, branch chain amino acids and intermittent fasting and fish oil. And just, you just see all these things, right? But when you talk to the old timers, they're,

they'll talk to you very kind of calm, very slow. And I'll say, no, it's six meals a day. And you're going to have your protein your carbs and fats it's going to be broken down a little differently for some people but in most cases we're going to strip away a lot of the fat that you're going to eat and we're going to probably keep the protein very high and then the carbs is where we get some individual depending on how much

somebody trains or how much somebody trains or how much somebody how much cardio somebody needs their background like if you're a fat kid maybe you're not eating as many carbs right but that's and and two a day training is very common whether it's uh both for lifting or for lifting and cardio and like that's the recipe and there's it doesn't get any more complicated than that, but it's very hard to do all that. It is. It's a lot of work.

I always, you know, it really is like your mind has to be there. So, you know, when you ask somebody, hey, when are you going to compete? They're like, oh, I don't know. You know, you're like, yeah, I get it. You got to know when you're ready. Because, you know, when you approach something like this, it is, it's, you know, you may give yourself a Sunday where you rest a little bit, but other than that, it's Monday through Saturday. You're up at the same

time, generally early, especially if you have to have a job to get there and get the day started and then work. And then when you finish with work, you train and you eat all day long. I mean, it's a, it's a lifestyle. It truly is, you know, okay, I'm going to live my life in this monk-like fashion for just a little while, or as long as I want and see what kind of shape i can get in but it really is those are the only things that are required i mean i think all the intermittent fasting and the tricks you know keto dieting and or you know carb cycling all that stuff probably works pretty well you know i feel like the one thing that is required is consistency and hard work and i and really that's just about it right there because you said it probably works pretty well which gives me the uh insight that

nobody's really messing with that when they're getting ready for a bodybuilding show maybe not nobody that's not not the right word but yeah most people are not messing with some of those little tricks going into a show, right? Not unless you're paying somebody who does it consistently for a lot of different people and has a system down. I mean, those people are messing with it, and they get pretty complicated. But, yeah, most of the guys that I know at Gold's, they're not messing with that stuff. They're just eating their meals, doing their cardio, training. Now, off-season, you might try some different things. Maybe you bulk up for a little while. Maybe, maybe you bulk up for a little while.

Maybe you don't even diet for a little while. What does some of that look like? For me, the way I use the off season is exactly that. It's like, for one, you start an off season with, okay, this is the things that needs to change with my physique. You know, for example, for me, it's my lower lats needed to come in. My upper chest needed to get bigger. And of course, just fullness to the arms and shoulders, stuff like that. So I

pick those things. And then that time, your off season is a time where you kind of experiment, you know, whether it's diet for fullness slash hardness slash metabolism, or, you know, all the different stuff you do in training. I always feel like that's where you experiment and find out, answer all the questions that you had from your last prep and start developing a plan for your next one. And so that's what my off season has always been is improving the physique. Obviously is, I mean, that happens all the time. We look at ourselves all the time, every day and, you know, I mean, in the mirror window, I passed reflection of the car yeah carlin any window any window yeah whatever now what about when you get a little fluffier i try not to get very fluffy my rule of thumb is

if i wake up in the morning and you can't see that i have a six-pack i'm too fat so that's that's what i try to do plus you know going back to the whole the whole thing about consistency and stuff i really feel like you hear that andrew if he can't see his six pack, he's too fat. In the morning. Right out of bed in the morning. If you can't see your abs. You got to start doing sit-ups, bro. You're too fat. You know, it goes back to consistency.

One thing I really find is I don't like to eat anything really but diet food. My body doesn't function right. And since I'm crazy addicted to training, if my training doesn't feel good, then my day doesn't feel good. So I just kind of keep it pretty clean in the off-season too and don't necessarily get all that fluffy. At least I try not to. Usually I don't. I don't have much problem with that. What would be the main difference, just a caloric surplus maybe?

Yeah. Maybe you're not weighing stuff. Yeah, that's probably it. Handfuls of chicken instead of eight ounces of chicken. Probably more ground beef or denser protein, stuff. Yeah. I've some, yeah, that's probably it, you know, handfuls of chicken instead of eight ounces of chicken, you know, probably more ground beef or denser protein, stuff like that. Um,

the meals are obviously much bigger. And so a lot of times it would go down to like five meals a day instead of six, but those five meals are just bigger and it takes a little while for digestion and stuff. But, uh, that's really the main difference food wise. I got really good advice from rico who rico mcclinton yeah he's training with charlie he always told me he said you keep the muscle

the same way you got the muscle so training never really changes i don't really change my training very much i mean you adjust it basically to be safe but you go as heavy as you can and you really try to hold yourself to that same level of intensity you know like 20 conservative so you're not benching 600 pounds every day but you know my rule is i try to make sure that back day chest day and leg day i always touch 405 somewhere that way i just make sure that i'm still doing something heavy you're handling something how do you how do you uh when you're prepping for a bodybuilding show i know you're a very strong. You and I talked in the gym a little bit about some of your numbers. And I think you said you benched over 550 pounds or so, somewhere in that range.

How do you, as you're prepping for a show, even though you're excited and you want to lift heavy and you want to lift with O'Hearn or some of these guys. And I saw some videos of you pushing around some 108 150 pound dumbbells i think and some things of that nature how do you like avoid getting too excited and and keeping the main goal in mind the main goal is not to bench press these dumbbells the main goal is to look good on stage my training partner usually i have a pretty good training partner who kind of like hey no chill out a little bit. One thing that I do to just kind of make myself calm down is I just slow down the tempo of everything. And so, you know, I really try to not explode as much when I'm in contest prep. So, you know, you come down at like half speed pause and then really slowly try to move the weight.

I mean, you're still powerful, but I use the term slow is smooth, smooth is fast, you know, and you just kind of really squee. And so but I use the term slow is smooth, smooth is fast. You just kind of really squeeze. And so if I change the mentality, you can't go as heavy, and then my joints seem to stay happier because that's really where it hurts for me. It's like you go 500 pounds on a bench press, your elbows and shoulders feel it for like three days. And you can't do that when you're already carb depleted and doing extra cardio and taking supplements that dry your body out a little bit more and stuff

like that. I just, that's just not smart. Do you get a blood work done? I know a lot of bodybuilders are nowadays are getting blood work done and really trying to check in and see how healthy they are type thing. I do. I get blood work done usually once to twice a year. I am guilty of waiting until I feel like there might be something wrong before I really start thinking about it. But I get blood work done at least once every six weeks. My girlfriend's a nurse, so she insists on it. Oh, cool.

That's kind of a nice thing is she can read it, and I know enough people that I can take it to them. But probably not as frequently as would be advised by a health care professional do i do blood work but i do mean you know i i keep an eye on myself well look you know it's it's pretty obvious right like when we we go in the gym we smash the crap out of ourselves if you were to look at the inside of your knee like we know that the even if your knee doesn't hurt we already know that there could be they could say hey the cartilage is worn like they're you know same thing with what's going on inside your

body with all the excess things that go into trying to become a professional bodybuilder you already know like blood pressure is going to be up and like certain times a year certain things going to look a certain way and i also think the blood work thing has kind of gotten a little overblown. Like I, it's, it's very important. I do. I do think that we want to keep people healthy.

I want to make sure we're not using, uh, losing people young in bodybuilding, powerlifting and strong man. I want to make sure everyone's, uh, staying as healthy as they can. But your blood work is just a snapshot of what's happening at that moment,

and it may not really mean much of anything. Especially depending on when you got the blood work done throughout your day and who's reading it, you know? Right. A lot of different things. I had some blood work done not too long ago, and my C-reactive protein, which is a, you know, marker of your heart health, right? It was, or I'm sorry, a marker of inflammation.

And it was like through the roof and they were like, but all my other blood work that I've ever had done, it's never been high. So it was like, well, I did tear a muscle in my calf. And they're like, I might play into it a little bit, but it shouldn't. And the next time I got it done, of course, it was normal. So anybody listening to this or anybody thinking about getting blood work done, just realize it's a snapshot. There's no reason to panic.

If you feel good, things are probably okay. And you want to try to make those changes. But it comes back to what you said already in the beginning, which was being consistent. Yeah. Having a lot of consistency. A lot of consistency. I mean, that's the only way you're going to be able to tell what's going on with your body at all is if you're consistent. Yeah. Having a lot of consistency. A lot of consistency. I mean, that's the only way you're going to be able to tell

what's going on with your body at all is if you're consistent. And that's in anything, whether it's training, diet, health. I mean, like you said, blood work is just a snapshot. Well, if you haven't eaten the same thing for two days in a row and you get blood work done on two days, that blood work is going to show up differently. And who knows what it's going to affect, depending on the food, you know, who knows.

They tell you to get it done fasted, right? Like what if you didn't get it done fasted? It's going to be different, right? Exactly. So your blood work changes a lot. I always, you know, I always feel like if you really are consistent and in tune with what's going on with your body, it'll tell you if something's wrong.

I truly believe that. I feel like if you're feeling good, and that means all around feeling good, you have to be pretty introspective. Like, how's my digestion? Do I have any indigestion? How soft is my shit? All of this stuff.

When you think about it like that, and it's like, well, do you have a rash on your skin? Is everything clean? All of those things are indicators of whether or not a system in your body is working or not and that's kind of you know like i said it's probably a little bit half just making myself feel better and half actually you know spot on knowledge but whatever we'll see bodybuilders are insanely uh detail oriented when it comes to their training when it comes to the nutrition um but a lot of people kind of view it as quote-unquote bro science and i and i whenever

i see that like a lot of that popped up on my uh youtube recently because i had hanny rambod showing me you know through some stuff and people like this is bro science this is bro science i'm like man what does that even mean like what are they talking about and what they're calling bro science is stuff that has really worked really well for a long time for a lot of people so i'm like why would they discredit or discount any of these methods these are great in my opinion personally that is our human testing i mean it bro science is at least done on humans over a good period of time maybe it's not annotated correctly and done in the scientific method but you know if that guy did something and he got himself in really good shape and he still feels good and he's not dead well that was probably a good thing he did right you know otherwise and if you think

about science well that's just chemicals tested on rats by people who have no idea what fitness is in the first place more than likely i shouldn't say that thing about no idea but you know understanding fitness but you know that's not done in. But that's not done in a gym. That's not done in the same environment. And I mean, yeah, we're pretty – I don't think anybody who knows bodybuilding and knows bodybuilders would say that we were stupid. I mean, they might say a lot of other things that are true, like short-sighted, selfish shit like that.

But we're not stupid. We pay pretty good attention to what the hell we're doing. And, yeah, I would take the advice of a bodybuilder over over charles glass over a doctor you know right and pretty much any aspect yeah you know mike o'hearn was taking me through some of these exercises and uh anybody that would look at it would think man that's going to tear your shoulder apart you know some of these motions these side lateral raises where you go all the way up and over your head and things like that. And everyone's like, oh, you're going to tear your rotator or this or that would kill my shoulder. Well, it would kill your shoulder if you didn't use the appropriate amount of weight.

But you find a weight that's appropriate and actually try the exercise. And then you were like, oh, my God. Like, I got to admit, I thought when he was showing me certain things, I thought they were kind of stupid too until i did them yeah i tried them and i was like ah i was like i get it yep move your body around in a much many different planes as you can and for each person it's going to feel a little different yeah well and mike you know mike he really said i think one time he was talking about those same shoulder raises one of his videos where you come all the way up over your head with your palms facing out. And, I mean, yeah, that's a rough motion,

and a lot of people's rotator cuff wouldn't like that very much. But he made the point that, you know, you want to stay athletic. You know, you want to stay mobile. And it's not like if you're not mobile, you're going to be able to go pick up those dumbbells and do that motion if you're not already prepared for it. I mean, this is, you know, Mike's been training like that forever. But over time, I believe anybody can develop that sort of flexibility

and control through the range of motion. You just have to be structurally set up for it, loose enough to do it, and understand what position to put your body in, which, I mean, that's training. He's had no major injuries. Yeah. And I take a lot from mike when it comes to that stuff one of the exercises that i think a lot of people think is crazy is when they do the behind the head shoulder press where they come all the way down

like that and you know mike does it with what 315 pounds 405 pounds something like that that looks like it's going to throw his shoulders off of his body but if you arch your back right and really sit in the chair the right way, it's comfortable as hell, probably more so than a front shoulder press. And that's what I find. I find it amazing. And forcing yourself into those positions, very similar to a squat. I think if you're going to really be an athlete, you have to be able to squat. You have to be able to squat to depth with your back straight because that's what athletes do athletes do i mean we're able to move our body like that and if you can do that and still get stronger you'll never have those problems and

i think you will be preventing injury right consistently you think that's important also to kind of get into your quads the right way to be able to really be able to tap into your quads if you're doing more like a powerlifting squat maybe you're not really hitting the quads the same way oh i think the squat, I feel like I have a pretty unique view of the squat because it's completely self-taught. I mean, I was a basketball player. And even still, I just barely bought my first pair of Vans.

I've always squatted in basketball shoes and everything. And so I really, the only reason I started squatting was because I said, okay, I'm going to do this bodybuilding thing. I'm not going to be one of those six foot tall guys with no legs. So I'm going to have to do this. And I remember I hated them at first. And now literally they're my favorite thing to do at all, period. It's so challenging.

It is. You live and die in that thing. Like Tom Platt says, which don't get me started on that, but it's very true. You know, you, you do, you go to war when you squat, but I have really felt like if you learn the way your legs are supposed to move and the way that they cooperate, the muscles in your legs cooperate with one another to catapult you out of that position, you really kind of understand the physics of the squat and how it works. And you can use it to hit your quads. You can use it to hit your hamstrings and glutes by themselves.

You can do all kinds of stuff. And that's, I mean, yeah, the squat. But you have to have full range of motion of motion otherwise that's when the joints get fucked in my opinion no full range of motion your hips get tight your knees are tight and then everything's just screwed have you seen the ronnie coleman documentary by any chance i haven't watched it yet i just heard you could watch it i didn't even know it was out yet so that's yeah it's on my list it's it's pretty damn cool and it's cool to see that you know the weights that he used to throw around stuff but there's there's a scene in the film where they they talk about how

you know he finished 15th over here and he finished 10th over there and 15th over there and everyone's just like like everybody just thought he was a mess they thought he was like a mass monster you know they but they know that they thought he sucked like a mass monster, you know. Really? I didn't even know that. They thought he sucked. Like, they're like, you know, Sean Ray was like, I just don't even know why. I just don't know why the fuck the guy travels around with us and tries to compete because he's terrible. Like, he's not winning. He's not learning.

And they actually asked him. They just said flat out. They're like, why are you still doing this? Because he didn't have the same money as the other guys. The other guys would fly from spot to spot.onnie would jump on trains oh well and figure out a way to get there lugging his food around and everything and um he was like what do you mean he's like i love bodybuilding you know that was that that's a big deal because it means that he's so passionate about it he didn't even see what was going on he didn't care yeah and he really

was trying to put everything into it that he could but he was just a raw talent he didn't even see what was going on he didn't care yeah and he really was trying to put everything into it that he could but he was just a raw talent he didn't know how to really he didn't know how to get to that next level you know but there's uh i won't give too much away but basically ronnie coleman he learns and then he becomes you know he becomes the king right he becomes the greatest of all time what are you going to need to do to go from being an amateur to being a pro and not only being a pro but being a pretty damn good one? I'm still putting that together right now. That's kind of the fun part of this year.

You mentioned earlier about bringing up your upper pecs and bringing up your lats. How much do you weigh? 270, 275. Yeah, it's a crazy thing to say like that things on your body are still small and you're 270 pounds and you're lean as hell. Yeah, I mean it's such an interesting journey bodybuilding is for me. And, you know, yeah, there were muscles that have to come up.

But now as I've, you know, really dieted down and I competed in June and so I've been in shape for a while and people have been seeing me in shape for a while. I really feel like what needs, you know, what, what, what needs to happen for me to be a pro is to present myself like a professional. You know, I feel like I have done the work, um, thus far and in, I am in the best shape I've ever been in by far. And I do think I have, you know, a really good package to show in July. But, you know, one thing that has really been made clear to me, and it started last year, at the end of the USA's last year, I was having a conversation with my mother and I said, mom, I'm going to do this again. You know, but I don't think I'm going to use a coach again. I think I'm going to try to

do this on my own. It's just, it was too much stress. And, you know, there was nothing wrong with my coach. He was a great coach and, you know, he did a great job, but it was just, I just never was comfortable not making the decisions myself. And so it really mentally, I was just, you know, not happy with it. And so I told my mom this and, you know, my mom, she's not into bodybuilding. She's never, you know, lifted weights or anything, but she said, well, Doug, my mom was really good at good advice, but she said, well, Doug, you know, it seems to me that's kind of what a professional is, is somebody that knows seems to me that's kind of what a

professional is, is somebody that knows how to do this on their own and can present themselves accordingly. And I just kind of said, well, shit, mom. Yeah, I guess you're right there. I don't have any argument at all. And that's what I've really been thinking about all year is just living the life as a professional, which I feel like I've done. I mean, I'm a personal trainer at Gold's gym and I train at Gold's gym, and I mean, I live at Gold's Gym. Yeah, this is what Flex Wheeler did. This is what Chris Cormier did. I'm doing that, and I feel like I'm doing a pretty good job.

I'm excited. Posing is something that is not my forte. I'm not necessarily the most artistic guy, nor do I really think, you know, I have some creative flair, but I'm still getting used to it and getting comfortable with it. But yeah, that's my main focus here is when I go in, in Vegas in July is to present myself as the professional that I aim to be all around. And that's, I think, what will get the job done. No, that's huge. I urge other people to treat themselves as professionals too. When it, when it comes to anybody that I ever coached or anybody that I ever just give

life advice to, like we were talking a little earlier about the types of food that you put in your body, you know maybe not treat yourself like a professional may not apply to everybody, but treat yourself better, treat yourself better today than you did yesterday. Yeah.

You know, let's try to get rid of some of the alcohol. Let's try to get rid of some of the partying or some of the, whatever it is that, uh, you kind of fall into these, into these pitfalls and traps, you know, in bodybuilding, the amount of dedication that it takes is, is just off the charts. I mean, it's, uh, people might look at it and go, Oh, it's a 12 or 16 week thing to get ready for a show but it's really a year-round process oh yeah and it's a multi-year process you know you were mentioning

how you had to be in shape last year and that got you to a certain spot you got you know you're in better shape this year and now as they see you more and more you're more and more polished every time you come in exactly and if you didn't diet down and if you didn't get as lean as you are now then you would never really see the flaws you wouldn't and you wouldn't have the knowledge that you have on how to get there you know mentally and physically you have to develop you know your physique and the way you develop that physique i mean mentally is just as important that's one thing that I think is so important about competing is every time you do it, you learn at least 15,000 things about yourself that you didn't know six months ago. And all of those things can be

applied to better that physique later on. And I feel like that's true about any adversity that we put ourselves through or, you know, end up getting thrown into regardless of how it happens. Through all of that, we learn 15,000 things about ourselves that we can then apply to life down the we put ourselves through or end up getting thrown into, regardless of how it happens. Through all of that, we learn 15,000 things about ourselves that we can then apply to life down the road. And so kind of like you touched on with bodybuilding, it goes everywhere. And I feel like bodybuilding is just kind of like forcing yourself with a sledgehammer to be a better person

because you take away all of the distractions and all of the things that could possibly throw you off and put all of your eggs here in this basket but you still have to conduct yourself outside of that with that same level of discipline and focus and so it carries over i mean i have never been a more successful businessman since i started bodybuilding simply because you have that mindset all the time do you have to be selfish to be a bodybuilder? I think there's no way to do it without it. A lot of decisions that some people make, even as simple as what to eat, right? A lot of times you make that decision

with the group of people you're gonna go out with. But if you're the bodybuilder, you're like, nope, we're going here because they got that. But yeah, you have to be kind of selfish. Yeah, you and I talked in the gym about like safe environments and you're like well you know like whole foods they'll cook up your salmon for you like it's pretty convenient actually i got a i don't know if you know about the uh well shit what was it called now i can't remember what it was oh the tilapia ceviche you ever had that

there i haven't but i know that they have it that's amazing doesn't have any oil in it or anything really but it's hard like when you find stuff like that it's a huge uh score oh yeah and where i live in sacramento you're not going to really find that and no one gives a fuck you know like in most parts of the country no one cares yeah and you say no oil or whatever they're going to dump oil on it at least out here in certain parts of los angeles go to some of the nicer restaurants or some of the restaurants that are near the gym yeah they've heard it before they know the bodybuilders like no oil keep everything dry no butter yeah i was really actually you know when i moved here i found i was really encouraged that it was so easy to do that like and and it was

part of the culture here people are like oh yeah i could do that for you and you're like really yeah you know you're you're like, really? Okay, cool. You know, you're like, you walk into a breakfast place, and they're like, oatmeal and egg whites or whole wheat pancakes and egg whites? You know, which one do you want? And you're like, really? Sweet, this is awesome.

You know, there's three restaurants that have a bodybuilder menu, not just the Firehouse. There's two other restaurants I've been to that have the same kind of like bodybuilder menu. And it's like, wow, this is great. But yeah, when I go home to New Mexico, I really realize it's like nobody even, I like you said they'll dump oil on half the time you tell them hey i can't have any oil in there and they're like well which part is the oil

you know they don't even really understand what they're cooking half the time yeah no they don't know and they don't even understand that the the vegetables and different things there's point they pour oil on everything yes yeah Which is understandable because it makes everything taste. Yeah, it's great. Makes everything. How else do you cook in a pan? Yeah, right. It makes everything else taste good.

It's easier. It doesn't stick all over the freaking place and everything. Just use olive oil. That's all people need to do. Just use a little bit of olive oil. You're from New Mexico. I am. I'm actually from West Texas.

I was born in El Paso. But I grew up mostly in New Mexico. Yeah, in Albuquerque. Football. How did you get into this whole weightlifting thing? Basketball was my thing. I played basketball all four years of high school. And then my senior year of high school, I played some football. I got into weightlifting while playing basketball in high school. And even then, that's basically how I ended up on the football team was the football coach was in there while the basketball team was working out one day. They're like,

who is this guy? I remember I was like a junior and i was benching i think it was i mean it wasn't much it was like 235 but at 16 17 years old i was pretty good and they were like wow so they pulled me out on the football team and then i i had fun with that um then i joined the army for a short while right out of high school um and i still lifted weight i mean i knew in high school i was like yeah lifting weights is weight. I mean, I knew in high school, I was like, yeah, lifting weights is what I'm going to do. This is cool. You know, I knew that I had a draw to that early on and I kept it on a little bit, but I never got serious. And then when I got out of the army, I actually got in some trouble with the law and, you know, kind of

messed myself up. And in that, in recovering from that, started going to the gym with my cousin. And there was an older bodybuilder there. His name is Brian Rafael from New Mexico. He still competes every now and then, I believe. He approached me one day and was like, you ever thought about bodybuilding? I was like, no, I'm much too tall and much too skinny for that. No way.

He was like, you're wrong. Then did a little bit of research, and I think a week later, I was like, okay, what do we got to do? Let's get this started, and that's it. It was just something about, like you keep saying, it takes so much discipline and so much dedication. A lot of people, that's a common thing. Everybody talks about that. When people talk to me about that, I really say,

it's not necessarily dedication. I mean, there are times where I have to sit down and be like, okay, Doug, you know, we're going to focus on this. Like, no, you said you want to be a pro. Like, let's do it. There are times. But for the most part, for the last seven years, I have woken up excited about doing this every single day.

And to me, I feel like there's really no other choice of a way to live for me. I've tried the other ways. I don't enjoy them. I literally enjoy every single day doing this. So maybe that's just, I'm blessed. Maybe that's like the same as genetically good biceps is genetically enjoying the process, you know, but truly that's, that's how it's been for

me since day one of trying. It's like, oh, so this is how it works. And I remember every moment from, oh, if I could just be 210, I'd be happy forever. You know, that'd be great. And then just be 220, you know is how it works. And I remember every moment from, oh, if I could just be 210, I'd be happy forever. You know, that'd be great. And then just be 220, you know, the same evolution. I'm sure everybody who's listened to this can relate in some way or another.

Yeah. It wouldn't be a whole lot different than somebody that loves like fishing. You know, you're not really going to say, oh man, it takes so much dedication to go out there, you know, so early and, and, and to fish. But the guy would be like, no, well, no, not really. I just, I love fishing. Exactly. It's exactly that. And like, but you work all week and then you know so early and and and to fish but the guy would be like no well no not really i just i love

fishing exactly it's exactly like but you work all week and then you wake up super early on the weekend and you fish every week you know every weekend and you spend all this money on these on the boat and all those different things and like i never even thought about it right what else i'm gonna spend it on that's what i want to spend it on yeah it's just finding something that you uh that you love and I think, is the true blessing. And as I've realized a little bit more this year how much I truly love this and how rare that is, I guess, I feel like that's really the thing is in life,

if we could all just find that thing, that's it. That's really the goal. I'm just happy that mine became fitness. Well, it's almost a love for it rather than just the pure, like, dedication and you being a savage. Yeah, I mean, I love being, yeah, I love being strong. And I love the work being displayed, you know. That's what I see. In a physique, you see the work that's been done for that physique.

That's something that's earned, almost like badges on a military uniform military uniform you know like you walk around and you're displaying that and to me it's just the fact that i mean i've built this you know some people have nice cars i always say this is my ferrari and i wouldn't fit in a ferrari anyway you know it's like it's it's an interesting thing because like you know when it comes to certain body parts like calves for example you know i i know that you can build your calves. I know you can make them better, but you're kind of just stuck with the calves that you got sort of in some way, right? I know there's different things that people are doing nowadays that can alter some of those things, right? Um, but when somebody has got like a really big back or somebody has got really big hamstrings or quads, the other bodybuilders will flip out.

Cause they know that like, yeah, you might be born bigger than the next guy or whatever, but you got to really work for those things. They can't be outsourced. Exactly. I can't, I can't have somebody else do that shit for you. No, those, especially those quads, hamstrings back. That's like, I think legs and back, period, in the story. You see a guy with big legs and back, you know he worked his ass off to get them.

Yeah. And he's strong as shit, you know, especially a big back. That's one of my bigger indicators. What are some things that fitness and bodybuilding has kind of kept you away from? You mentioned like getting in trouble. Yeah. has uh kind of kept you away from you mentioned like getting in trouble yeah um you know i i have you know i'm a drug addict definitely and have struggled with that for years i say i'm a drug addict because i always feel like you don't really get away from that you just learn to live with it

and function with it um there's always a pull huh yeah you know i had somebody explain to me really well and the way i always thought of it is your sobriety is a hundred carat diamond that you carry around in your pocket with you at all times. So, you know, you got to keep, you think about it like that. It's like, if you had a hundred carat diamond in your pocket, you know, not protected or anything, just sitting there, you check on that shit all the time. You're like, is that still there? Is that still, okay, good. We're good. And you get, you know, no, I can't go in there and something might fall out of my pocket, you know, stuff like that. But yeah, that's one thing I think that I'm a pretty impulsive guy. I'm a really passionate guy. I'm a really emotional guy. And bodybuilding has given me the, the channel

for that, for all of the passionate, it has taken up a lot of that. And also the physical energy. I mean, some people, myself included, I'm really a pretty high energy guy. If I don't go to the gyms, you know, what am I going to do with that energy? I don't know. And so, but that's really, bodybuilding has, I always say it saved my life. You know, it really, and every step of the way you have lived for it. And so it really, it's been, it's part of me. How did you fall into some of those pitfalls? Did you just not have a lot of direction at that time in your life? You mentioned kind of being close to your mom. Yeah. My family has always been pretty good for me, no matter how hard I tried to make them not. Um, I would say that I fell into most of my, my problems through self-constructed adversity. You

know, I was a stubborn kid that wanted to, you you know i was an adult by the time i was 14 at least i thought so but really i was an engineering degree so bigger stronger smarter just i was always at a young age yeah i was always going i was always wanting to do something different and i was real stubborn and and uh you know it just took me a long time to kind of realize that hey you know you can't just make everything the way you want it. Sometimes you got to just kind of settle in and play the game. And, you know, but, yeah, stubbornness and just I made shit hard on myself when I was younger and then spent a good amount of time overcoming that same adversity, which I think is half the reason why I'm able to push through so hard. Some of the other stuff that I have accomplished is simply because, well, I had practice. Right. Do you think about some of those things when

you're training sometimes? Yeah. You know, one, one thing lately this year, as I have found, you know, a little bit more happiness and can, you know, being a lot more content with life and excited about life rather than feeling like it's such a struggle is I think about those things a lot just to simply look at where I'm at now and what I'm doing now and the people that trust me with their physical fitness now. I mean, sometimes that really touches me that like these guys, they'll pay this kind of money to come work with me six days a week because they think I can really change their life. And it's like, I mean, I can, and I do, we, I love it every moment of it. And so, you know, when I'm training other people, I think about it. And then myself too, you know, I look around and I's like i mean i i can't and i do we i love it every moment of it and so you know when i'm training other people i think about it and then myself too you know i look around and i'm like

i'm a gold's venice you know i come on that's right that's amazing where was i and now i'm here i mean shit i'm sitting on mark bell's podcast you know this is crazy stuff and that's what i really think about this year i have let go of a lot of negativity but it did push me quite a bit going forward you know just it's almost like every rep was digging me out of a hole and so i've always kind of looked at it like that this kind of work and this kind of consistency will will keep you focused and on the right path um you mentioned uh you know happiness like you would think we think being like when people talk about like partying right like doing drugs and going like a party right or drinking going to a party you're thinking

man that'd be that'd be a blast like it'd be so much fun just to get high and just fucking chill and you that's the way that if you you view it right and you think that a lot of happiness is going to come with that and a lot of these cool other things going to happen that happen out at a after parties and things like that right and of course there are some cool things uh but oftentimes when you talk to someone that was addicted to drugs they weren't happy at all oh no there's a lot of negativity there's a lot i mean there's so much that goes into the whole thing where it can get murky and it can get dirty. Well, and you're changing the chemistry of your brain in a real way. So, you know, real quickly, once you go down into that rabbit hole and start spending a few days on mind-altering substances, I mean, you're not even dealing with the same person.

But you make this mistake of thinking that you are. And, you know, all your decisions change everything changes i mean there's so much i can sit back and be like man i can't believe i was in that position and i did that what the hell how did that even happen because your chemistry has changed right um but yeah i've lost a lot of people because of that you know and it's and it sucks and it's just so good to hear people talk about it because it's like hey man let's just get it out there let's have more's just so good to hear people talk about it because it's like hey man let's just get it out there let's have more people that can relate to and they go what yeah wait a second this big guy he's 270 pounds on stage he's you know on his way to go and get

his pro card he was addicted to some shit i've been 175 pounds in a jail cell before you know i mean shit's crazy how long ago was that i was a good while ago now thank god six seven years yeah right at the beginning i mean that's right before bodybuilding yeah you know um it's not even that long ago really not even that long ago life changes quick it does and you know thank god it's far enough away that i don't even really think about it anymore did you have to go through a rehab rehabilitation process? I did. I spent a good four years on probation with the state of New Mexico. And gosh, I'm probably the only guy that's ever been on probation that'll say this, but thank God for

those people. I mean, the rehab that was made available to me, it took me a while and they make it very difficult. I mean, they're like, oh, you don't have a car. You have a have a job cool i need you to come down here at like 10 a.m three days a week to pee in a cup it'll be random though so your new job with your new boss you're gonna have to tell them that you know like i gotta go downtown in five minutes i'll be back in two hours but you know keep that job you know stuff like that but i mean you want to talk about forcing you to wake up and realize what you got to do in life to be a normal part of society? They did a good job of that. Well, that kind of stuff, it just makes you realize how hard and how stressful it is to live a lie.

Oh, God. Because when you're addicted to drugs, that's all you'll do, right? Because you're addicted. You can't help it. And like you said, it's not really you anymore. At some point, it becomes further and further from you the further and further you go. Yeah. Yeah, I mean.

With my brother, my oldest brother, Mike, who passed on from drugs and alcohol and whatever the hell else he was into. From the life. Yeah, from the lifestyle. Once I kind of realized that it was no longer him the whole process was a lot easier for me not not with his death obviously like that's always sucks but when he was here when he was still around and when we communicate uh i could understand when he was

actually calling me like as my brother as we as I knew him as a kid and when he wasn't, you know, and it wasn't always about him necessarily being high or not high. It was just him going through these, yeah, him going through these like phases, you know? And it was my wife who pointed it out to me. She said, cause I was just really upset one day I was bawling and I was like, I just, I was like, I can't take it anymore. He's fucking just killing me. It's so stressful. You don't i don't like i don't know what to do and she said you know i think the only thing that you can do is to stop applying rational thought

to somebody that will not be and cannot be rational and i was like oh my god okay that makes yeah trying to get water why am i trying yeah why am i trying to apply my principles to him when he's on a totally different page or chapter of his life he he doesn't have the ability yeah to be rational that's gone and i was like wow okay that made everything a lot easier i think that's one of the main steps you know even as the addict um trying to recover from something like that that's one of the main steps you know even as the addict um trying to recover from something like that that's one of the main things that has to happen is realizing that yourself like whoa i am actually that messed up right now like you know i really don't have any control and

there's a moment i feel like every single addict who's been there who has made it out even if he you know made it out come back in whatever We always realize that at some point or another, we all have a point where we're like, whoa, this is too much, man. What's going on? You know, I think it's just, and that's part of really realizing what's scary about drugs is when you actually realize that even you, the most powerful and, you know, smart and intelligent person in the world who you've been telling yourself you know for weeks at a time that you're not like everybody else you can continue to do

these drugs and continue to be fine and everything's good when you finally realize that even you got you know poked in the ass by this that that that was one of the main things that really was a paradigm shift for me to be like yeah maybe not so much anymore you know yeah my brother used to always say like uh you know i'd ask him how something was going so much anymore you know yeah my brother used to always say like uh you know i'd ask him how something was going or whatever and you know and he was in and out of jail and out of rehabs and stuff and uh he's like man he's like it's so depressing around here it's like i'm in you know i'm in this cell with all these dirt bags and and i'm like well that's what society is thinking of you right now you know what i I mean? Like you, unfortunately, you need to look in the mirror and kind of realize that yourself

is the one that continues to put yourself there. Yeah. You know, but he was just never able to really turn the corner. Now, you've known Chris for a long time, right? Yeah. I mean, I was, you know, I met him at Gold's and was real excited to meet him. I've been real excited to meet all you guys, you know, as soon as I see y'all. But yeah, I've known Chris for a while.

And Chris actually helped me through my last, one of my last time, my second to last, you know, battle with drugs. He was there for me. Yeah. And I had not talked to him about it before. And a friend of a friend connected us and we had a good phone conversation and that was really kind of how our friendship started. Wow. didn't even know i didn't know i don't i mean i don't even know if he he may not even really know that it was me that he had that conversation with because it was you know right when i almost when i first came to gold's and i surely wasn't you know as as known

as i am now so i mean he may not even remember that was actually me but yeah he took time out of his out of his night. It was like 11 o'clock at night or something and I was gone. Right. But, you know, he offered some real help and some real kind words and yeah, but I've known him for a while. Oh, that's cool. And you've been at Gold's Venice for the last about six, seven years, you said, something like that, right?

Five years? I moved here march 18th of 2015 oh okay yeah i guess now about three three and a half years yeah yeah three almost three and a half so i came out here and competed in a show pretty much right away uh i actually competed in the excalibur which was december of 2015 and i won the overall there and then i tore my achilles the next year oh shit yeah i. Yeah, I was actually going to do the USA's, the same show, two years ago. That usually takes like a full year, right? To be an athlete again, yeah, definitely.

Like if you were a football player that tore your Achilles, I can see how it would take a year, but not for a bodybuilder. It took me, I mean, they did the surgery pretty quick. Then I was in a boot for two, or a cast for two weeks and a boot for four weeks. And then I was back walking around. Painful? Yeah.

It was, it was, it felt like, it felt like getting hit with a hatchet on the back of the ankle. How'd it happen? I was playing basketball like a idiot. 260 pounds, you know, running around. You're like, I could still do this. Oh yeah. First I went outside to shoot, just shoot around.

And I was like, oh, this is nice. Maybe I could do a little bit of this for my cardio. I'm in good shape. You know, first full court game i played that's what happened oh man i hung my head for a while on that one um when uh when that happens my understanding is that it will roll up right it will roll up right to the back of your knee not quite that high mine rolled up about halfway up my shin and it took my gas truck the inside part of my calf and pulled it backward under my knee so it kind of rotated my calf towards the outside a little bit um but yeah it was a complete terror i remember the scariest thing was right after it tore you

know it takes you a while to kind of like a few minutes to kind of figure out what the hell happened and then i went to step on my bad foot and it was like i couldn't even feel the ground like it was like my foot you couldn't tell when it hit the ground when it didn't not that scared me i just fell down i was like oh my god am i gonna be paralyzed forever am i gonna be one of those guys that has one of those limps and oh that was rough going through all the things that you went through in the past especially you know overcoming the drug addiction and everything do you feel like it gives you some sympathy and some insight into the pitfalls that your clients may fall into with their food?

Food and drug, it's not the same exact thing, but that pulse for people that are heavy, for people that are obese, that are not in the shape that they want to be in, that habit that they that they reinforce nightly you know when they're alone with their own thoughts and they they got the cabinet and the cupboard to go to rifle through and have cereal and ice cream and whatever else it is that they they want to have does that do you think in some way that might help you to be able to communicate with them better? It does.

I think one thing that my main goal, and I am probably not the best diet coach because a lot of times my advice is, well, just do it anyway, you know? And I know that, you know, I do, I see that as some people really have a different relationship with food than I do. And so they may struggle with that, but it's all about just developing the habit. And it's that way with drug addiction too. Once you become sober, you now have to develop the habit of staying that way. And, and it's the same with food. Like once you decide to, to change the way you eat, you have to develop that habit. And so one thing that I've told people is like, look,

okay, the first step is to just take your breakfast. Well, your first step is to make sure you're eating a breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Okay. Let's try that for two weeks. Once you do that, now take your breakfast, cut it in half and eat, eat it two hours later, then take your lunch and cut it in half and eat it two hours later. And then take your dinner and do the same thing. Once you do that for two or three weeks, then we can start looking at what you're actually eating. And so it's, that's how I kind of look at it because that's how like two months went by. Yeah. And you're like, and you lost 15 pounds, feel a lot better and didn't even notice it because you're eating the same food and coming to the gym three times a week. I mean, I feel like I don't care who you are. If I could get you to do

that, you'd be sold for life. And your, your mind would change about food. As soon as we started to show you, okay, now that you're eating like this and your body's would change about food as soon as we started to show you okay now that you're eating like this and your body's processing food now let's put better fuel in there and watch how much faster you go when they're already going faster and already then it's to me it's like how that's the easiest sell in the world when you start to eat that way it's no longer oh my god i'm so hungry i just am dying for like a burrito yeah or whatever the whatever that craving is the the problem that happens actually more often than not is like two three hours went by and you're like fuck i gotta eat again yeah that's and that's that's

the thing i really don't even almost feel like eating right now well people just aren't used to sitting down with a knife or even with a fork six times a day you know that's something most people reserve for probably once a day then they eat breakfast in the car on the way to work and lunch that's actually a really powerful statement because i've heard recently so jay cutler came on the podcast he said he eats seven times you know he ate seven times a day for like 10 years right and he's like fuck that i don't do that anymore but you know he still eats like five or whatever but you know i i thought wow like what an incredible amount of discipline so i researched it

more and i tried to look up you know how many times a day the average american eats and some of the information you know scattered it's the internet it's hard to find the right information but you know one of the reports said that it showed that the average american consumes calories 15 times a day minimum okay so not not even eats right per day but consumes calories but what you said about sitting down with a fork that's a lot different than what the average americans do because they have kind of finger foods or are just snacks that they're reaching for or candy bar yeah you know having a fork and a knife implies that you're probably eating some sort of meat of some kind meal right an actual an actual

meal and that makes a big difference and that's gonna that's gonna um curb a lot of the appetite and a lot of the things that are going on that are driving you crazy where you're just thinking man i need to have chocolate i need to have pie or need to have ice cream oh yeah well and it's the the chocolate and the pie and the ice cream one thing that i've really found is important is just eat a lot of it well yeah eat as much as you can um kind of like that trick with you know back in the back in the day if you got caught smoking cigarettes your dad will go buy you a carton and make you sit there at the table and smoke it all. Maybe that's what we should do. Yeah, have all the chocolate cake you want right now. No.

But, you know, it's that first week, getting over those first things. And the other thing is maintaining your blood sugar. I think a lot of people, they get those spikes at night simply because our metabolism is so all over the place and inconsistent that, you know, if you haven't eaten since breakfast, your blood sugar is probably going to, I mean, even if you had the biggest, most wonderful breakfast in the world, your blood sugar might be high for four or five hours, then it's going to crash. And that's when we want those sweets and stuff. When you diet, you know, and I use the word diet, but it's really when you just eat on a plan, you know, when you're consistently giving yourself nourishment through the day, your blood sugar is much more stable through the day and those cravings go away. And that's one thing that I've, you know, everybody says that they

crave sweets at night. And it's like, well, that's just because you didn't eat enough during the day and your blood sugar's crashed and your body's hungry and wants some stimulation. Well, also too, if you're not going to be a bodybuilder, you're not concerned with being like totally shredded, there's some options. You don't have to eat chicken and rice for every meal. Yeah, there's other options. I mean, even just having something that I did for a while,

even while on a keto diet, was strawberries and some heavy whipping cream. I would eat like five of them though. It's not like I'm eating this giant bowl of strawberries and dumping honey and whatever else on it yeah or eating with ice cream i just had a couple of them and i was like well i feel good and i'm going to bed yeah because i've had that fat boy craving for a really long time i think another thing that happens people don't understand is that the littlest thing can trigger it you know sometimes it's something that's really uh a really

salty meal can kind of trigger it and sometimes um i noticed uh even something like uh crystal light so you know artificial things that have artificial sweetener it kind of like puts you down that path and almost gets you thinking of some of those things not that those things are that you can't have them it's just that you should be aware of it. Well, a lot of people don't realize fake sugar still triggers an insulin response, just not as big of one as real sugar. So you still get an insulin response from, you know, aspartame or sucralose, something like that.

And it probably will drop your blood sugar even more because there's no sugar there. And there's a lot of things that will also just, when your insulin goes up, you're going to be hungry yep and those those uh ghrelin releases and all that stuff yeah yeah the crave the cravings are gonna um are gonna creep in so you have a show uh coming up in how many weeks is it well less than three now 19 days july 27th 28th how you feeling i feel fantastic you know really, I've been given that answer to everybody that asked, but it's really the truth. I really, diet's great. I mean, it was really cool to come off of a show that I was successful at

and then know that basically it's just maintaining that. You won a really big show, right, recently? That's a pretty big show. It's the West Coast Classic. Chris Minnis and Lonnie Teeper put it on. It's in Riverside. Yeah was that was an awesome experience i prepped for that and won that june 23rd so i had five weeks took about a week to decompress and then started back up on the prep for another four weeks and now we're about halfway through that

and uh as the show gets closer about how much more weight you think you'll drop we'll see what happens you know i weighed in at the West coast classic at two 69.8. Um, I really didn't come off plan that much after the show. My lady made me a lovely lasagna, which was so good. And so I ate that and then we had breakfast the next day and then I was back on the plan.

Um, so I really didn't gain much weight. I think now I'm sitting close to two 80 this morning. I was about two 280 right after cardio So a little bit of water But if I could come in If I could come in at 268 to 266

I feel like I would be almost Inside out and that would be awesome Because that would be just a little bit sharper With hopefully a little bit more fullness From the last show And that's about the improvement I can make do all bodybuilders uh utilize cardio training no not all of them i do very little most bodybuilders do quite a bit more than me i probably started cardio about three to four weeks before the west coast classic so and that was like a 12-week prep but i really

didn't do cardio for the first eight. Um, I do, I am pretty fortunate that I stay pretty lean. I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that I don't have much of a problem dieting aggressively. Um, have you ever been fat before? No, I was always like pretty much a mesomorph right in the middle. I was a strong kid with big bones, but not fat. Would you say most bodybuilders are probably kind of falling into that category, meso ecto right i would think so yeah i mean i mean i'm talking like the higher up guys you know yeah the higher up guys you know it's it's pretty rare like dexter's dexter jackson's probably the best example of a guy who came from a skinny skinny guy to a bodybuilder and i don't really know that i can point out many others you know i'm not there's not a lot of guys

i don't think too that were that were just fat you know because because accumulating a lot of fat um at least my understanding of it is those fat cells never really go away they just shrink right that's what i've heard i mean i'm i'm pretty big in the bro science so when it comes to the yeah you know all that stuff i i really don't know what happens to those fat cells i just you know yeah i guess you're right i know dallas mccarver was actually a pretty heavy dude. He was like an offensive lineman. Right. And he got himself pretty lean. Who's your favorite bodybuilder of all time? Oh, I probably have three. I would say my top three are Dorian Yates, Kai Green, and probably Charles, Charles Glass. I really, I really value the bodybuilders that embody the same ideologies that I do.

Basically, I've picked those guys because I've learned the most from them. I mean, everything I know about training legs almost started from videos of Kai Green. Yeah. I told him that when I met him. I was like, look, man, you basically are responsible for these things to an extent. And then Dorian's view on the lifestyle is unmatched.

And I shouldn't say unmatched. I relate to it the most. The way he talks about how he lived, I'm like, yeah, I can see that. I'm the same way. I love them on Joe Rogan's podcast. I don't know if you have a chance. I don't think I listen to that. Oh, you need to listen to it.

Okay. Yeah, you would absolutely love it it was it was really really good he just talked about like he just didn't fucking care you know he just wore these big baggy clothes and he knew he was getting in better shape and he was getting leaner but he he kept everything hidden it just wasn't his style like you know wear a tank top or pull a shirt off he's like he's like i pulled my shirt off for a living i got paid for it you know so i did it on stage when it when it mattered most i always just had a really cool mindset i've always that's one thing bodybuilding wise that i've i've never been that guy i've always kind of half admired and half not understood that mindset like my i have

my roommate cyrus is a bodybuilder and he's kind of the same way i don't think that guy looks in the mirror at all you know he you know and it's like but i mean for me i've always been yeah i want to train in the tank top hell yeah not even for other people i want to see what i look like as i get pumped up you know i've always been that guy but it's motivation you start to see the shoulders coming out you see the veins coming in you're like okay well good there's improvement um for me it would be hard to not to not you know, the improvements are there and very black and white and very visual. And so like with strength and power lifting, like you, you would see it, Oh, there's an

extra plate on the bar or an extra 10 or whatever it would be. Yeah. Results. But with bodybuilding, that's, that's one of the interesting things I always talk about bodybuilding as opposed to other sports for the people that call it a sport, you know, sports for the people that call it a sport, you know, um, there is no like come from behind or there is, you know, the sports drama is, is still present in powerlifting. You know, the fact that the presence of will, whereas in bodybuilding, that's like the one sport where, man, I don't care if you want to win more than the other guy on show day, if you didn't do the work for the

whole 16 weeks, you know, you're not going to come There's no upset really You know It is weird right I mean if you If you didn't eat properly You know six weeks Six weeks Six weeks is a long time

If you didn't eat properly six weeks before the show And probably even deeper into that Then there's a good chance that you fucked up your placing Yeah I mean I don't know. You don't want, I wouldn't want to say that just because I don't want to be like, there's no recovering from it. Yeah. Right. But, but yeah, I mean, if you lose consistency for two weeks, eight weeks out from the show, you're kind of up shit Creek, you know? I mean, if you miss a meal or two, you can recover from that. Sure. No problem. I mean, it's not acceptable. Don acceptable don't you know don't think that that's acceptable for my bodybuilding life because i wouldn't think so but you know

yeah if you like you know say something happens and you get in a car accident and you lose a week and you can't get i mean you're kind of fucked do you get really crazy with it like i mean you know you do have to weigh a lot of things um i mean i've seen people whip out scales before at restaurants and things like that like do you get pretty nutty with it or i mean i i trust my ability to to eye eight ounces worth of protein good enough you know for one i don't i'm not i'm not like you know 8.0 only you know if the chicken breast is 8.4 well i'm going to eat the whole thing right you know stuff like that i mean i i weigh my food and i portion my food, but not at restaurants, you know, I mean, you can always ask, well, is that a half pound patty or a quarter pound patty?

Okay. I want two of them, you know, stuff like that. And it may not be a hundred percent accurate, but you're not going to tell, you're not going to convince me that 8.5 grams of protein is going to work differently in your body than 8.0. Right. You know, I mean, come on, maybe it will a little bit, but are you going to notice? Probably not.

Well, and it's about, you know, it it's it's about the long haul too right it's not about it's not even about the one show like it always feels like it's about the next show or the next thing but it's not it's about yeah further down the road for you this show you know it's a big deal and and you want to get your pro card and you know for the moment it feels like it's everything but even just the act of becoming a pro. Yeah. Well, now you got a whole nother stack of problems on your hands. Yeah. That's what we, I remember when I won the West coast, I told my girlfriend, cause we

were really excited and, and it was just such a great time. We had such a great time. We rode really high. And one of the things I looked at and I said, you know, check this out. This is literally the starting point and we're already this excited. Like that's what's cool. I think the best way to explain bodybuilding is, yeah, it's about the long haul and it's about consistency, but you have to forget about that and just do every day. Perfect. And then the consistent, then the long-term plan will fall into place exactly how it's supposed to.

So when you're going through the process, you're like, nope, I got it. You know, I always look at it like, all right, your day starts off at 100%. You miss a meal. Well, you're automatically down 20%. You got an 80% day. You miss a workout. Well, then you're at a 50% day, but you still got a chance to get 50% by getting all your food in.

So that's kind of how I maintain it. It's like, all right, that was 100% day. Good. Let's try to get 100% day tomorrow. And it's not easy to do. No, it's not easy to do. But the more 100% days you string together in a row, that was 100% day. Good. Let's try to get 100% day tomorrow. Not easy to do. No, it's not easy to do. But the more 100% days you string together in a row, that's what I keep count of. And I'll be like, man, this was a great week.

This was 100% week, Monday through Friday. Well, you know. Yeah, try that on for size, 100%. 100% week. And that's what I told my clients. I have a few clients that are like going on this prep journey with me right now. And even if you're coming from being 50%, 60%, and you're doing 70% the whole week, that's still a great week.

Oh yeah. It's improvement. It's an improvement for sure. And you will see that difference. It will manifest itself in your physical appearance and your performance. I tell you, you know, it will. And if you sit back and watch that happen, what more motivation do you need to continue to be consistent?

That's really what it comes down to for me it's like you see consistency working that's all it takes now just keep going just ride that way uh we talk a ton on this show about losing weight and about getting lean getting ripped you know people are always asking questions about you know losing some body fat give us a good rundown on how to get big because you mentioned you were you were a little thinner when you were younger and stuff like that i'm going to use the bathroom for one second but you can just keep uh rolling through it but just tell us you know some of the some of the principles of from the time you were you know a teenager into now getting bigger okay well um yeah doug's getting bigger let's see the first step really i always i always took into account was, you know,

you want to try to eat like the guy you're trying to be, almost like dress for the job you want. And so I'd go, you know, I mean, when I first started, I was a young kid and I was gung-ho, and so I went as many freaking calories as I could eat. I would wake up and my breakfast was, you know, like eight eggs and oatmeal and protein powder. And I would blend it all together and just slam it on my way to work.

And then what I would eat for my meals in the middle was I would cook. I remember like it was yesterday, four cups of rice, two pounds of ground Turkey, a can of green beans and some kidney beans. And I would cook it all, put it in a pot, put a little bit of salsa on it and put it in a big Tupperware. And then I would eat it one third at 10 o'clock, one third at one o'clock, one third at five o'clock. And then I would go to the gym and then I would come home and I would eat dinner. And I basically played around with those ideas food wise until I found something that worked for me. And of course I had coaches and did my reading and did my research and, you know, and tried a and did my research and, you know, and tried a whole bunch of different things, you know, steak and potatoes at night. Well,

that's really not a good idea to eat a ribeye and potatoes at night. You're going to get fat, but you know, I tried it for a good while and it put on a good amount of weight and, uh, and you know, I, I got bigger and, and as it progressed, you know, you get bigger and kind of softer and then you sharpen it up a little bit. And as you as it progressed, you know, you get bigger and kind of softer and then you sharpen it up a little bit. And as you build muscle, you're automatically going to sharpen up a little bit just because it burns more calories. Um, but food wise, it was basically the beginning was that, and you know, this I'll organize it like this so that it goes, we'll start with the beginning. And then we'll talk about later on as we got a little bit more intelligent when it came to bodybuilding.

But the very basics was that for food. That was probably a good two years of my life working six days a week selling computers. I'd cook that big pot of food and I would eat it in three pieces every day. There were a lot of times I'd go get like four double quarter pounders with cheese from McDonald's and eat those and then go train. You know, like I said, I was 21, 22. So didn't have to worry about getting too fat at that point. Um, I have always loved to train heavy and not necessarily like a power lifter, but you know, pyramiding up, pyramiding back down, you know, heavy. And I've always loved the old school lifts. I was always attracted to old school

bodybuilding methodology from the eighties and 90s and stuff like that. So, you know, bench press, squat, barbell row, deadlift, anything where you're moving your body through space rather than moving weight through space. I realize that some of those, of course, are still moving weight through space. But, you know, you're moving weight around your body or moving your body around weight, less machines, less isolation. I feel like that's, that's how you really build the real dense, hard, muscular physique. Like, you know, a great example is like Chris Cormier. I mean, that guy was just big, full and strong. And these are the kinds of guys like, look at any guy who has, who they talk about able to incline press 500 pounds. If you know a guy that can incline press, you know, five wheels, he's probably pretty big, pretty hard, pretty strong, you know, same with, you know, like you

just look at these guys that have over time performed these heavy compound movements. That's, that's how you get big. In my opinion, that's how you get big in my opinion that's how you get big and the less steroids growth hormone and insulin you can use to get big the more natural and flowing your physique will look now that doesn't mean you shouldn't use any doesn't mean you should i'm just saying the less of that the more like a normal human you'll look like in my opinion but just a bigger more powerful one um less like a troll you know something like that yeah a lot a lot of uh a lot of people just uh they kind of write off bodybuilding a lot of times i'm like well it's just and even the guys that help with diet you know some of the comments

i saw on youtube from about hanny and stuff they're like oh you just he probably just helps everybody load up on tons and tons of drugs and it's like well that of course you, of course, you know, we already, that's not, it's not really secret. You know, we saw it. We all saw bigger, stronger, faster. We know what happens in that movie. And I would say, if you have to ask that I'm doing something really wrong, if you have to wonder whether or not I'm, I'm natural or not, then I'm not very good at this.

You know? Right. Right. And, uh, you know, I think that a lot of people just kind of push it off to that but like you were mentioning uh earlier you know you make make the progress and uh it's very simple like to gain size to gain mass is actually very simple trying to lean out and stuff not that it's complicated it's just that it's difficult because there's uh much convenience of food. You can get food at any store, any gas station. It's all over the place.

And the urge to want to eat more is always there. And the food tastes, everything tastes really good. So trying to abstain and trying to pull way back on your food is actually a really difficult thing. But to get big, you know, you eat big, you lift big. You've kind of heard people say that for a long time rest rest and get some good sleep like like lee haney he's real famous for saying this is all bodybuilding is you feed the muscle train the muscle and rest the muscle i mean that is as simple as that stimulate don't annihilate you know there's all kinds of i will disagree with you in saying that getting big is not simple i I don't feel like it's simple at all.

I feel like there is just as much importance in your off-season nutrition as there is in your pre-contest nutrition. Maybe that's where some people are going wrong. I think it really is because these people that get big, like, you know, how many times have you met a guy that says, oh, man, I was 260 once and it was just so heavy I couldn't even walk up the stairs. You know, and you're like, well, okay, you probably shouldn't have been 260 at that point in time then, you know, because I truly believe our body wants to be comfortable. No matter what it's doing,

it's going to prepare, it's going to perform better when it's in a state with lowered inflammation, lowered stress and good digestion. So, you know, when you're you know trying to you know eat a surplus of 2 000 calories a day so that you can grow the challenge becomes what 8 000 calories am i going to be able to digest this day where i can still get up and eat tomorrow my stomach won't be so bloated and i won't be so gassy and i can actually walk up a flight of stairs let alone squat 600 pounds for eight reps, you know, something like that. It's like, you got to be ready to go to war.

I mean, the off season is when you go to war. So yeah, you have ample calories, but you know, you got to, you can't tell me you're going to eat a pizza and then go fight a street fight against Brock Lesnar, you know, which, I mean, that's what we're doing. We're moving 400 pounds around. It's serious business. So I really feel like, you know, there's just as much work in the off season as there is

pre-contest. It's just a little bit more comfortable work. I mean, personally, I mean, I'm so, I believe this so much that I actually would prefer to be on a pre-contest diet than in the middle of a, you know, aggressive bulking cycle any day of the week, you know? You just get so tired of, of, get so tired of consuming all that food. Oh, yeah, man. I'll tell you. Last year, it got to the point in which I was eating a dozen eggs for breakfast

with two cups of oats, two scoops of whey protein, and then the four meals I had in the middle of the day were 12 to 15 ounce portions of protein with at least 150 grams carbs in, you know, four times within an eight hour period. And then dinner of, you know, a 10 to 12 ounce steak with eggs and spinach, you know, but yes, it's a challenge to eat all that food because it's clean. Yeah, I could go ahead and go get a burger and that would be much easier to eat than,

you know, 12 ounces of ground beef with two cups of rice and six ounces sweet potato you know and then some olive oil or whatever else is in there because but my body can digest all that and and that's what i eat to go to war there's a guy named uh blaine sumner who's a power lifter he's squatted over 1100 pounds and he's just yeah oh he's a monster monster really big dude really strong but he uh makes a lot of like shakes that have meat in them you know yeah he'll blend up like and i know that bodybuilders they they gotta again bodybuilding specific they do things a certain way for certain reasons but this guy's a power lifter they'll take like avocados and chicken and steak and he just he just fucking throws it all in there together

and the one of the guys that made it famous was uh derrick poundstone who used to be i remember that guy yeah he used to be a strongman athlete and actually at 300 pounds was was was pretty lean i remember seeing him i thought he was heavier than 300 pounds at one point he was probably like 350 at some point i remember seeing him doing a doing like 20 dead hang pull-ups at 350 pounds i was like that's just ridiculous yeah he he was a monster but yeah he made it he made it famous the chicken shake where you just like blend up chicken and everybody thought it was so gross and he shot videos of him uh drinking this chicken shake people like that's disgusting he's like you think that's gross he's like you're lucky you never saw me drinking the tuna shake he's like that that made my mercury uh go through the roof so he had to he had to stop doing that but it's

like you just figure out a way yeah i mean i i've tried the when i worked at the computer store i used to do that for i remember i'd get instant mashed potatoes green beans and chicken breast and put water in there and blend it up they call it my gravy shake you know and it really tasted pretty good it's not a big deal you put that shit in the microwave it's like soup right you know but i remember yeah i've rich biana talks about you used to talk about yeah you know his egg whites and oatmeal i swear to god i've been doing that for five six years yeah you know there's it makes more sense than anything. I mean, even still post-workout, my shake, right after I finished training, I have two scoops away, a cup of oats, and I take a whole 16 ounce thing of egg whites and dump it in

there, shake it up and drink it. I drink that at the gym every day. And people are like, you drink egg whites? I'm like, it literally tastes like watered down 1% milk. Yeah. I mean, come on, people, you're crazy. It doesn't, it doesn't have much flavor. No, not at all.

It just sounds disgusting, right? Well, and it's just like, I mean, water, don't get me wrong, water is very important, but if you're going to drink a protein shake, you might as well get as much protein in there as you can. Right. You know? Yeah, it's hard to consume, you know, that volume of food and try to clear it out.

It is. It's time. And to get your body in shape to do it i feel like it there's a level of fitness you know call it whatever you want gastric wellness or you know digestive fitness whatever but there's a level of conditioning that comes with it and you know you know that that's true when if you're a bodybuilder and you eat like that for a while and then you take a couple days off and you're like shit i'm hungry shit i'm hungry shit every every two hours on the dot because your body gets used to it your metabolism starts

going crazy with that amount of food you got any poop stories for us oh man i got a couple here's a good one this actually it doesn't have to do with the amount of food but at one point back in the day i had a neapolitan mastiff his name was name was Flex. And he was a 200-pound dog. He used to sleep on my bed with his head on my chest. And at one point, I had gotten a bottle of this carnivore blue raspberry beef protein. Oh, my God. And it did not sit well with me. I remember I drank a big shake before bed, and then I went to the bathroom, and my shit was bright blue just like the blue raspberry shake i mean literally it's like i didn't even digest it it just went right through i've had protein powder like that before did the same thing to me oh my god it was terrible and i guess i went to the bathroom didn't flush the toilet whatever i go back lay down in bed and i

wake up in the morning and my dog's head is on my chest with blue shit all over my chest because he's neapolitan massive you know it's all over his oh my god it was the most disgusting in the world i have not ever touched that protein again you had to give the dog away too no he was i love that dog so much i kept him but i was pissed surely closed the toilet bowl for the rest of my life oh my god that scarred me for life. Sorry, muscle meds. What do you got coming up next? I know you got this show, and you said it's towards the end of this month.

Yeah. Yeah, towards the end of this month is that, and that's where my, I mean, I don't really think past that. Right. Obviously, a lot depends, as far as competition for the rest of the year, a lot depends on this one. that right obviously a lot depends as far as competition for the rest of the year a lot depends on this one um you know i i really we'll see what happens i just i say this all the time i don't even really have a plan necessarily i mean obviously i have a goal i want i always tell

people i want that olympia sweatsuit you know i don't the trophy sure that'd be great and everything but i want to be one of those 20 guys that gets that sweatsuit every year, that gets to sit there and be part of the paramount of their professional environment. Yeah, that's awesome. That's my main goal is to do that. But the beauty for me is, and every day I learn it more and see it more, the beauty is literally in the journey.

I mean, this is a perfect example, this podcast here. Literally, from being at Gold's and training hard the journey. I mean, I mean, this is a perfect example of this podcast here, literally from being at Gold's and training hard and just doing what I love to do opportunities like this come to me. And I just try to take advantage of every single one and just explore, you know, live the journey and shit. I'm kind of trying, I'm finding out that some people actually like to hear what I have to say. So sure. We'll talk more, you know? Um, but it's just about doing the best you can every single day. That's what I think about.

Well, people love to hear from people that are just doing stuff. Yeah. I mean, I do. I listen to it all the time. When people are being productive and they're doing shit because we need it. You know, we need the motivation. There's a lot of things distracting us one way or the other. distracting us one way or the other.

How do you kind of avoid some of the pitfalls of social media or just your phone in general to really get and buckle down with your training? Because you do have to communicate with a lot of people. You do have to text back and forth. And so you got any kind of rules of thumb on some different things that you do with that? Well, I mean, I've never really been a big social media guy. I mean, I like social media and I use it, but it's been very easy for me to literally consider it a business thing. And so that's where you put like business hours into it.

And that's kind of pretty much it. When I'm home with the lady, I try pretty hard to put my phone away. You know, I get up at 4 a.m. So it's not as though I'm up late. So a lot of times people text me at like 730 and the next morning I'll get it and be like, what the hell are you doing? Text me in the middle of the night. But then I'm like, no, it's not as though I'm up late. So a lot of times people text me at like 7.30, and the next morning I'll get it and be like, what the hell are you doing texting me in the middle of the night? But then I'm like, no, it's only 7.30. You know, but as far as, you know, like when I'm training,

I'm lucky enough, Phil is one of my good trainers. I train with Phil and Charles, both great dudes. But Phil is, you know, his profession is he's a commercial director so he directs you know advertising commercials and he's nice enough to film most of the stuff that we do in the gym while we're doing it so i don't even really have to think about it much and then i get him exactly yeah it's beautiful it's beautiful so at the end of the day you know after we're training i usually get some whatsapp messages with pictures and videos and then i just kind you know, I just try to think during the day about what I want to post. And one rule of thumb that I use for the things that I do post is you don't look for something

to post. You finish your day and then you think, what was something that, that I experienced that I think is worth talking about? Yeah. What is something that I want to share? And so in doing that, I feel like, I feel like you're, you put a little bit more thought into what you're doing and it's a little bit less for, for like the amount of likes you get. I mean, of course it's always really cool when you post something, you get, you know, two, 3000 likes, you're like, yeah, this is awesome. But you know, that's, it says on my thing, it's a personal blog.

That's what I'm doing is talking about what I'm doing. So when, when I look at it that way, it's a little bit more of like, what are these people going to, you know, what happened today that people want to know about, that people might also experience? And I've just looked at it that way because, you know, as a trainer, I always tell people, I've already made these mistakes. You don't have to.

You know, I mean, that's kind of what we do is, you know, the trainer has already made these mistakes and these pitfalls. So we show you how to avoid them and get better at what you're doing. So these are just my mistakes or the culmination of not making mistakes is what I display on Instagram. Have you shared some of the stories that you shared with us today? Actually, no, this is the first time I've ever talked about that publicly, the substance abuse. And, you know, it's good to talk about it. Like you kind of said, it's good to get it out there. And I do feel like I have something to offer there. You know,

I actually had a real close friend call me yesterday saying he's struggling with opiates. And I found myself really fervent about giving him advice. You know, I was like, look, I know that you probably don't want to hear this right now because I've been in your shoes and I wouldn't want to hear it either, but I'm going to tell you anyway, cause I love you. And you have to know that one thing I told him was, look, man, you got to know that pretty much every guy that you go talk to has had this experience or this struggle in one way or another in his life and is not going to think you're as shitty as you already think you are. And that's what I think is one of the biggest things about, for one, it's one of the biggest

things about life is just understanding that, you know, we can, we're pretty hard on ourselves all the time. And that's why we don't do things is because we don't think we're worthy of them, or we don't think we're capable of them.'s like it the more you talk about it the more you see you know everybody else doing all this stuff too it's almost like the four minute mile principle like you were saying we need to see more people doing good because that just makes us believe that we can do good and the least the less perfect the person is that's doing good the better because that's more and more relatable so yeah i mean that's a big thing but no i've never shared that before so wow uh what was it like when you when you shared that with your mom

because you talked about kind of people being you know not not not basically people feeling like shit about trying to opening open up um you know i'm sure your mom was like disappointed but i'm sure she didn't like stiff arm you right well you know i mean one thing that was nice it wasn't difficult to share it with my mom because well i was begging for her help at the time you know i mean she found out on her own um and my mother handled it in retrospect i think it was the absolute best way to handle it and i've encouraged my mother to also share this with other mothers in these situations because, you know, I remember I was in jail and I called my mom and you know, the jail, they make you pay, you know, you got to buy the phone card or whatever to talk on the phone.

But the first call is free. And so I call my mom, mom, I'm here. This is what happened. Blah, blah, blah. She goes, well, I'm not going to put any money on this card. You can write me letters if you want, but I need you to know that you're there and this is on you. When you're ready and you're good, you can come back and I'm here for you. I love you like nothing else. And I want you to write me. I want you to talk to me, but you're an adult and this is on you. She did the same thing when I was in high school. I was ditching school. I was sitting at home one day and she opens the door and says, huh, give me your key. And I was like, what? And she said, well, you're too smart to go to school. You're damn

sure too smart to live at home, huh? You know, that's the way my mom raised me. But looking back, that's the best thing she could have ever did for me because, you know, the harder a mistake feels, could ever did for me because you know the harder a mistake feels the less likely you are to do it again you know but uh my mom and i i really really really tried to to destroy that relationship through my young my late adolescence and young adulthood i really did I was really an asshole. And, uh, but now she is my, you know, she's my main counsel and she's, I talked to her probably twice, three times, four times a week. You know, she's the most important person in my life and she has never judged me. That's one thing that I always say is, you know, my mother never wants browbeat me or judged me, you know, but she always was like, I don't think that's a good decision, but you go ahead and make it if you like. These are the consequences that I can see.

And they're the consequences you will feel, not me. So do what you like. I mean, that's, but you know, yeah, that saved my life. And I feel like if I ever have kids, I'll do the same thing. Look, this is the knowledge I have to impart for you, but you are your own person. So you make that decision. Yeah. My brother my brother you know he's my best friend and he you know he wouldn't share a lot of what was going on with him uh you know four years four or five years ago and he wouldn't he wouldn't really tell my oldest brother we always kind of knew he had he had a variety of different problems but with chris you know he didn't want to say anything because he just thought it'd be so disappointing yeah and it's like that's actually the last thing

that i would really i i wouldn't i would be upset that you're in a bad position and i would be upset that maybe i wouldn't have all the right things to help or whatever that that's that that would be the extent of it and i'd be like okay let's let's figure this out together and ultimately that's what we did you know when he finally did come to me and kind of you know told me but it was his girlfriend that saved that saved his life his girlfriend lauren she called me and we communicated and uh i was getting you know stuff from his friends were texting me every once in a while man he's in a bad spot and then i'd call them and uh they're like oh you know what he's doing a little better because he was really up and down yeah his alcoholism was uh was actually now that we know more it was typical but it just wasn't uh what you visualize when you when you watch tv yeah and you see what how they

paint the picture of an alcoholic he was not that standard typical alcoholic he would just get hammered like he's a binger he's a binger yeah it would be just periodically as he goes six weeks without and he'd be fine and then bam that's that's what my that's exactly how you know i say my recovery but you know that's how my addiction has always been as always go as hard as you fucking can until either you stop you run out of money or you get arrested and then you're good for a while you keep it together and then the wheels fall off and there you go again yeah i can relate to that yeah and so i mean once you know once we were able to get the information together it was like well let's just get a game plan

together let's figure out you know and send the rehab and the rest has been it's been a huge recovering process for him and i think that's uh wise of you to to look at it as you're still you're always you always live with that i feel like that's it's kind of like you know just like depression or man you know bipolar disorder something like that i always, you know, in the 1930s and 40s and 20s and the 1800s, I mean, those mental disorders and chemical imbalances were obviously still there, maybe not in the same amount or something like that. But people just lived with them.

They either died or fell off the earth, you know, fell out of society, or they didn't. And I think we've got to forget that this is still a choice you have to make, even as an addict. You know, it's not like one day, you know, your desire to party is going to go away. I mean, and you really have to be honest with yourself.

Doing drugs is fun when you do them. You know, I mean, yeah, that's why we start doing them. But we have to understand that, man, that's just not the hand. I mean, I look at it like this. That's just not the hand I was dealt. I don't get to be that guy, you know know because i'm not able to function in society that way

and i feel like that's how i've you know why people should we got to live with that you know yeah it sucks i'm sorry just like people that live with other disabilities and diabetes yeah that shit sucks but do you want to live or do you want to die you know pick because those are the only two choices you have and there's only one person who makes that choice and that's you when it comes down to it you have to work through it you must got to do the work got to do the work and this is i mean these are all things you can apply to every every aspect of life in general got to do the work eat what you kill you know do the hard stuff, all of it. Just do the work. Where can people find you?

I'm at Gold's Gym Venice pretty much every day. Instagram at Douglas Fruchet. I have a Facebook page called Fruchet Training. Don't use that one as much. It never took off. So right now it's still Instagram. I'm working on a website, but I'm also working on a national championship. So that takes precedence.

Yeah. Yeah. And you have a YouTube channel? yet no okay you know all this stuff kind of just on instagram and facebook there are some cool youtube videos that we've put up uh me and lance keys did some you can see i mean one or two of them with michael hearn that's always great yeah um but yeah no channel yet it's coming though it's coming you got any sponsors you'd like to thank or anybody you want to plug on your way out here oh yeah definitely um other than slingshot slingshot definitely i tell you i have a slingshot in the bottom of my gym bag i used it there's a video of me benching 500 pounds in albuquerque new mexico with a slingshot on youtube i gotta find that yeah um let's see sponsors house of

pain has been really cool they're not like i haven't signed with anybody but you know house of pain out of St. Louis, those guys are awesome. They really love the bodybuilding lifestyle. Sent me some cool clothes. Definitely love representing them. Chaos Nutrition, they're out of Arizona. It's just a bunch of guys that used to be

with 5% Nutrition and really carried that mentality from the 5% Nutrition when Rich was still there, which I really identified with, just community and uplifting. So those guys are really cool. You can find them on Instagram. mentality from the 5% nutrition when Rich was still there, which I really identified with just community and uplifting. So those guys are really cool. You can find them on Instagram. And then a local company here, Coast Cryo does all my cryotherapy. I actually trained the owner, but he's on Washington. If you're local in LA, Washington, just West of Lincoln, Coast Cryo. And of course, just, I mean, gosh, if you haven't been to Gold's Gym yet, I mean,

they don't sponsor me. I don't care. I love that place and you got to go there yeah it is it's not it's an awesome spot i always tell people that's why i moved here i don't even like the beach that much you know i love gold's venice have you been in the ocean i have i was just there yesterday all right that's all the time we got strength is never weakness weakness never strength catch you guys later