Brad Kearns - Rethinking Longevity-based Fitness Programming

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[00:02:38] Learn more at Matabolic.com. That's M-A-D-A-B-O-L-I-C.com. All right, we are live. Brad Kearns, welcome back to the Future of Fitness, my friend. I know it's been a while, Eric. Time to cover important matters. So we're going to hit this thing hard and can't wait. Yeah, it's definitely been a hot minute, man.

[00:03:05] I think the last time I talked to you on this podcast was like five or six years ago, and maybe you had just set a world record in speed golf. Does that sound familiar? Oh, of course it does. And what a great journey that was. Listen, of course, I talked everybody's ears off so you can listen to that old show.

[00:03:24] But it does represent something cool, which is that I feel strongly about pursuing peak performance goals and remaining, you know, preserving a competitive intensity throughout life, no matter what stage you're in and what your hobbies or interests are. So there's, you know, keeping active and keeping fit. And that's great. But I think there's another step that a lot of people can benefit from, especially the old time athletes, of course, who have a tendency to sit around and tell stories about things back in the day.

[00:03:52] But I think we can all find ways to to push and challenge ourself and get out of that comfort zone that a lot of the other areas of life represent. Yeah, well said. And I think that dovetails nicely in probably the meat of what we're going to talk about today. You and Mark Sisson have a new book coming out, Born to Walk. You guys have a shoe line. There's a couple of different things that you guys are doing right now.

[00:04:14] But the messaging, I think, is the most important, especially for our industry of maybe we go a little too hard, a little too often. Maybe we've kind of misguided our populations a little bit and our clientele and our communities, not necessarily in any intentional way. But it's a good conversation to have. It may be a little uncomfortable for people to hear, but it's a conversation. So we can just kind of start there.

[00:04:40] And let's do this actually, Brad, before we get into all that, as I kind of tease people about it, but reintroduce people to who you are and your background and how you start working with Mark. And then we'll take it from there. Oh, sure. I mean, I go way back as an athlete. And when I was in high school, I became a high level distance runner. I got 12th in the national championships and ninth in the California state finals in the miles.

[00:05:05] So I was really excited about pursuing a career as a competitive runner in NCAA division one. I went to UC Santa Barbara and I got sick or injured five seasons in a row. And it was really devastating to me as a young athlete because I formed my identity and my social community around long distance running. So I had to get this wake up call and learn these lessons about life as well as about athletic training and managing one's competitive intensity in a healthy, responsible manner really early on.

[00:05:33] And then I was sitting here, you know, at the end of the train wreck going, OK, well, I am a super competitive guy. I'm willing to push my body really hard every day to win titles and gain recognition. And that all, you know, blew up in smoke. And so I found the wonderful sport of triathlon at that time back in college. Interestingly, there were some top level world guys that were going to school at that time at UC Santa Barbara.

[00:06:00] So I had this great little transition where I could get guidance and inspiration. And after I graduated from college, there was a great tragedy that occurred in my life. And that was that I had to go get a job instead of hang around the beach and ride my bike all day and all that fun stuff.

[00:06:19] So I worked for the world's largest accounting firm for three months and I was so miserable that I decided that I would just go out on a whim, announce my retirement and pursue a career as a professional triathlete because I was pretty good in the age group divisions. But this was a total pipe dream because back then there wasn't much, you know, income opportunity in the fledgling sport of triathlon. But things went really well for me and it was a great life odyssey. You know, the goal of the dream of a lifetime.

[00:06:48] I wanted to be a pro athlete when I was a kid. It turned out it wasn't the NFL, but I had a nine year career on the professional circuit. And so, you know, getting that deep into it and dedicating myself, you know, tremendously to such a daunting goal of trying to get really good in three different sports and basically training all day and eating and sleeping and the lifestyle goes and then traveling all over the globe. At my best, I was national champion and ranked number three in the world. And so after that, I transitioned into a career of health and fitness.

[00:07:18] So I've worked in the sports nutrition industry and then started in on writing books a long time ago. So that's been kind of my main thrust for many years and pairing up with Mark Sisson to promote the primal lifestyle starting way back in 2009 when the primal blueprint was published. And that really kickstarted the ancestral health movement along with other great leaders.

[00:07:41] But we've had a really great run trying to educate people to, you know, extricate from some of the flawed and dated conventional wisdom that has been, you know, an element of traditional dietary and nutrition advice as well as traditional fitness programming. So that brings us quickly. I think you asked for quickly anyway to present day and we're really excited to launch this new book titled Born to Walk.

[00:08:10] And maybe astute listeners will remember the bestselling book from 2009 called Born to Run. And it glorified the amazing endurance achievements of these primitive living Tarahumara natives down in Copper Canyon of Mexico. And some of the world's great long distance competitive ultra runners went down there and joined them for this race.

[00:08:33] And, you know, it was kind of an awakening for the broad population about the amazing endurance attributes of the human and how we are built and genetically optimized for long distance exercise. But what's happened, as happened with a lot of fads is the core messages about evolutionary biology have been flawed, distorted and misappropriated.

[00:08:58] And we've been brainwashed to think that we are actually adapted to head out every day and go on long distance outings at a steady state. And that is in pursuit of health, longevity and a lean trim physique. And these are now being proven to be disastrously flawed.

[00:09:21] And instead, what we see in the very popular running boom in the running community is a lot of fallout, a lot of broken promises and unintended consequences, as we say in the subtitle, where people are doing what they're told and with great devotion, lacing up those elevated cushion shoes and running out and trying to get to their 20 miles a week or 40 miles a week and sign up for these crazy events like a 26.2 mile marathon on paved roads.

[00:09:50] And it's leading to an amazingly embarrassing rate of overuse injuries, as well as failed weight loss efforts and a lot of attrition. So our message is, yes, it's a little bit slamming the running community and some of the ideals, but it's also a call to approach your fitness goals in a healthy and sensible manner,

[00:10:15] rather than the typical rah-rah mode that we see, not just in the endurance scene, but we could also say, call out the CrossFit scene and some of these really strong cult type of movements where there's a tendency to exhaust the body repeatedly in the name of pursuing these heightened goals.

[00:10:38] Yeah. There's a lot to unpack there, obviously. Right. Um, and we'll, we'll get to a lot of it. You know, I, I, I wonder, cause I'm sure you've thought about this and it's probably even in the book and I have not read it. So I apologize, but I plan to next year. Uh, you know, like with, I was talking to Andrew mentor, he's the, the, uh, founder of Fismodo and he was an Ironman athlete. And, um, you know, I've had conversations new with endurance. I hurt my back in CrossFit. And then I got into endurance for about a year and a half, two years.

[00:11:07] I did the, uh, what's, what's the big half marathon in Santa Barbara that goes straight up the hill. Uh, do you remember that one? Oh, uh, no, straight up. That would be, that would be a challenge up San Marcos pass. Crazy. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, I did that for three years and kind of get into it. I was like, you know what? I don't even like this, but I like it. Does that make sense? Like, I'm wondering if you've thought about this a lot. What is it about endurance or like high intensity stuff like CrossFit? Like I didn't even really like the way I feel, but I felt compelled to do it.

[00:11:36] Um, what is it about those things that attracts certain people or attracts, you know, people, uh, in general, I guess, general population to it that that makes it so attractive when either when maybe we just don't have to be working that hard to achieve our goals.

[00:11:49] Uh, that's really well said. And maybe that'll be the pull quote for the show. I, I, I don't like this, but I like it. And I think everyone can kind of grasp what you're saying there, but modern life in so many ways is comfortable, safe, predictable. And we have this indomitable human spirit where we want to conquer the, you know, the last corners of the earth.

[00:12:12] And we can watch the documentary or read the book about Shackleton going to Antarctica and going 47 days on the dog sleds and all these things. And, you know, the, the, the popularity and the fascination with climbing Mount Everest, it's still there. These idiots are going out there and getting into traffic jams and breathing through oxygen bottles. And don't get me started on that tangent.

[00:12:32] But, you know, we have this drive inside, especially a type, a goal driven focused, uh, you know, motivated person who likes to kick ass in the workplace and have a wonderful, um, you know, do a wonderful role as a parent and a social life as a partner. You want to do the best you can and listen to self-help podcasts and all that great stuff, the journey that we're on. Hey, that's wonderful. And then when it comes to fitness, um, you know, set a goal and accomplish it is a fantastic feeling.

[00:13:01] Now the nature of the goals and the nature of the approach is something that, like you said, we all deserve to reflect upon and wonder, is this really sensible and worth it? And I'm also going to throw in an epic quote from my good friend, Simon Whitfield, uh, Olympic gold medalist in the triathlon in 2000, the first gold medalist ever and Olympic silver medal in 2008. He had a long career on the pro circuit, one of the best ever. And then he was retired and I was interviewing him. And I said, so,

[00:13:31] Simon, uh, you know, what's your fitness regimen and your competitive, uh, goals like today? And he says, you know, Brad today, this is a guy retired from the pro circuit and, you know, trying to live a normal life in Canada. He says today I'm coached by my 80 year old self.

[00:13:48] And I said, Oh my gosh, that's brilliant. So his 80 year old self is watching over him, shaking his head. If he's doing stupid shit, that's going to lead to a hip replacement in 27 years and shaking his head. If you think you're going to keep that flame alive, like you, what you did in your youth. And like what I did on my nine years on the pro circuit, that was a young man's game. That was for a guy that didn't have any kids and didn't have to go sit in an office and then go squeeze workouts in and around.

[00:14:17] All my other responsibilities. So it was a phase. It was a wonderful phase. I will say that it accelerated the aging process of my body profoundly. So in a decade on the pro circuit, I probably aged as we now can calculate and call it biological aging. We could call up Mr. Bionic man, Brian Johnson and put into his stats.

[00:14:39] I probably aged 20 years in 10 years of racing on the circuit, including just the airline mileage. And I would, I would hang out in the lounges with the executives, you know, cause I had so many miles on my Pan Am premier emeritus club. And I'd go in the, you know, secure area and do my stretches and bust out my peanut butter sandwich, making assembly line with everyone looking at me. Who's this clown? How did he sneak in here?

[00:15:00] But I'm trying to make up for that the rest of my life essentially. So when you're training for an uphill 13 mile run, that's just going to, you know, feel torturous for a lot of the training and during the event itself, you know, bucket list items are cool.

[00:15:16] But when we get into the mode where it becomes a lifestyle to regularly exhaust and deplete ourselves through these challenging workouts and an overly stressful training program, that's when we want to take a step back and reflect. And one thing that's problematically into the mix here is the endorphin rush.

[00:15:38] So the harder and longer you push yourself, the more potent and powerful the endorphin effect is at the end. So what's what you're doing is you are not you, Eric, but, or it could be, but I'm saying when one is going for that endorphin high to the extreme, they are becoming by all clinical definitions, an addict.

[00:16:00] And it's much more, you know, it's much less offensive to be an addict to something like endurance training than it is to being an addict to substances that cause true life destruction. And in fact, a lot of clinicians use running as a treatment modality to help people stay off of harmful substances when they're addicts. And so they just transfer the addictive high to something that's less destructive.

[00:16:29] But we still have to sit back and say, you're an addict. And then we like to laugh about that. And people will freely, I see Instagram handles like RNG underscore addict and things like that. But arguably being addicted to something is not the healthiest way through life. And maybe next week your guest is going to be a Zen Buddhist. We'll say attachment leads to suffering.

[00:16:52] And so you kind of hit this baseline where if you feel like agitated or that your day is incomplete, if you missed a workout, that is a huge sign that you are, you know, in pretty deep and is possibly, you know, the need to get to baseline to feel okay is the definition of a substance addict, which is so obvious where they need their fix or they're not going to be right.

[00:17:16] So just getting to baseline with needing a workout, that can be a recipe for emotional as well as physical pain and suffering. Yeah, well said. And I think endurance and CrossFit are very similar as, you know, in my gym, I saw a lot of recovering addicts come into my gym and they did great. They thrived. You know, in my mind, it was a better trade off than what they were doing before. But very much it was, it was, you're, you're implementing one addiction for, for another.

[00:17:46] And a lot of it, you know, I had a lucky that I had a great coach in my life with James Fitzgerald, who, um, you know, really taught me a lot about cortisol and what that meant. And, you know, tapping cortisol and how often, and then, you know, fatigue when, when he came, when he started coaching me, um, peer to peak, by the way, that's the name of the race for a new home. It's peer to peak. Um, he was training me for that race, but I was a mess. We did some blood work and I was a hot mess.

[00:18:11] Like everything, my gut, my cortisol levels, everything was just really, really that. So I had to take about three to six months just to heal. And that was probably not having enough time really. And, and kind of get back to baseline and it made me realize like, wow, you know, what am I doing here in the gym? Like, and I had to change all my programming and, but people still wanted it. Right. It was like this weird place that I found myself in. It was like, am I giving them the best thing for them? But if I give them the best thing for them, it's boring.

[00:18:38] And then they're probably going to walk down the street and they're going to get it from somebody who's going to give it to them. Yeah. And I got another dealer down the street. Yeah. And I think that's the crux of fitness programming in a lot of sense, especially in the boutique or the CrossFit. Or the functional space, whatever you want to call it, hit. Is maybe when coaches do start to educate themselves on the programming, they're like, oh yeah, maybe this isn't the best for everybody. But this is how I make my living. And, you know, how do you get out of that?

[00:19:05] And I, this is why I want to get your, your big thoughts on is like, I was telling you pre-recording. I sometimes feel that as an industry, we overcomplicate things to justify our own existence. Right? So with all your research in this written book, like where, where, where can we start to change? What do we need to change as an industry? And yeah, what are your insights from that? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:19:31] It seems like the, the, the, the programming is directed to justify the expense or the time. And so when you do something really intense and challenging, especially with the personal trainer there to guide you and cheer you on and push you beyond your previous limits.

[00:19:50] Of course, that's a tremendous value and it's a life-changing relationship to have that trainer get someone from, you know, addict to harmful substance to addict of working out and addicted to, you know, orthorexic approach to diet, which means an unnatural fixation with doing what's healthy rather than sort of a more reasonable approach.

[00:20:13] And, you know, we're all, we're just talking, talking about, you know, trying to progress and go up that staircase to living the best life we can. But the fitness industry as a whole is absolutely guilty of overly stressful template programming. And that's the home-based stuff, like the Peloton workouts. How many different workouts are on there? Most of them are going to leave you sweaty and tired and doing repeated high intensity intervals.

[00:20:40] And these workouts can easily become overly stressful and exhausting, especially when strung together too frequently. Now, if you want to go hit it hard once a week and you're a fit, active, healthy person, then you go to the trainer, the organized class, the Tuesday night track workout, whatever it is. And that can have a really nice fit into an overall sensible, longevity-based fitness program.

[00:21:09] I am now obsessed with Masters Track and Field competition and I like sprinting and high jumping. So once a week, maybe one and a half times, like I'll have a really centerpiece workout that's really difficult and challenging where I'm running intervals on the track. And I'm breathing hard and I'm wheezing at the end and at the end of the interval and my hands are on my knees and I'm really pushing it. But that's not going to happen the next day, obviously.

[00:21:37] And so I'm exploring all different ways to be fit and healthy and active in a manner that not only supports these really extreme and lofty goals, but also can keep me healthy and away from this chronic overuse injury. And so the compare contrast to that is the CrossFit enthusiast who's going four and a half or five times a week because it's a great social outlet to go and hang out at the gym.

[00:22:04] And you end up working hard or really hard every time you show up there. And same with the running mindset where you're sitting around after at the smoothie shop and saying, well, what's your weekend mileage now? Well, I was at 40 last year and now I'm trying to get to 55. And so you're constantly prompted to do too much. And so as an industry to grow and expand, I think we need to broaden our perspective of what it means to be fit.

[00:22:28] And, you know, inject, let's say at a CrossFit box, one of those days is going to be a guided breathing meditation dynamic stretching session with Wendy instead of Cindy, the six pack who does the upside down wall-based pushups. That's how I injured my neck at a CrossFit class, by the way, because when you go to failure with an inverted wall-based pushup, there's no place to fall. And so I kind of crumbled on the side of my neck.

[00:22:58] That's an aside. But, you know, there's so many ways to be a guide to a healthy, fit, active, energetic lifestyle as a professional and a well-trained person who's walking their talk.

[00:23:09] And so I'm going to give permission to like personal trainers to say, look, on that Tuesday meeting with your client, instead of going in the gym and knocking around a bunch of iron, go on a walk and learn about the principles discussed in James Nestor's book, Breath, or Patrick McKeown's book, The Oxygen Advantage. Because I've been recently dabbling in this stuff. And it's a really cool additional element to learn how to improve oxygen delivery and carbon dioxide tolerance.

[00:23:38] And it's an element of fitness that doesn't require me to strain myself. And there's so many other attributes that can come into play here too. You know, learning to use the balance items and the bands in the gym where it's still a bit of a challenge, but it's not this blood. Blood, you know, pumping, dripping sweat type of workout. There's even more to unpack there.

[00:24:07] Gosh, I wish I had more time with you today, Brad. But the, I want to get into longevity-based programming for fitness, right? But I want to also address what I think a lot of people who are listening to this who may be coaches or trainers or gym operators, they're thinking, Yeah, but Brad, that stuff's boring. Our clients don't want boring, right? They want excitement. They want fun. They want entertainment, right? Fit entertainment.

[00:24:35] So what's your kind of, what's your answer to that? Or is there a good one? Oh, get ready, people. Get ready. We were talking about Santa Barbara, so I'm referencing my friend Sue McDonald, resident of Santa Barbara, and one of the most extraordinary athletes on the planet today. She's 61 years old, and she now possesses 15 world records in Masters Track and Field competition.

[00:24:58] She's a specialist in like the 400 and the 800, and will enter collegiate meets as a 61-year-old and be in lane seven racing these high-level college performers. She actually ran her age in the 400 at 61. She ran a 61. And I had her on my podcast, B-Rad podcast, talking about her training routine and her lifestyle. And she kind of, you know, made this face when I asked her to describe her weekly routine. She goes, well, it's really boring.

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[00:26:48] Go to podcastcollective.io to learn more and contact me directly. That's podcastcollective.io. And it was such an enlightenment for me, an eye-opener, because I'm trying to model her training and pursue similar goals in Masters Track and Field. She just goes through the protocols every day.

[00:27:13] And she's not out there slamming herself with her hands on her knees after these crazy intervals day after day to set these world records. In fact, you can look on her Instagram. She's doing stuff in her backyard like, you know, mild degree of difficulty bear crawls, followed by one-legged balance swings, and things that just build functional fitness so that when she does go out to the track and throw down on the poor college girls, she can be competent and avoid injury.

[00:27:42] So we need a more boring approach to fitness in order to thrive and to reach those lofty goals that we pursue. And there's so much great content on the internet now to watch Olympic athletes and how they train. I just watched a video last night of Noah Lyles, the world's fastest man, and he shows a full length, you know, the camera's running for his entire one-hour session in the gym where he's doing, you know, some heavy lifting stuff. And then the next thing he's doing is, you know, what seems to be simple jumping up and down off the box

[00:28:12] and doing some lunges and things that aren't terribly strenuous for him, but it's a lifestyle and it's a commitment to moving and exercising the body in an appropriate manner. And some of that is non-strenuous, but can you balance on one leg and go do a single leg Romanian deadlift without falling over? Because if you're falling off that and then you try to go sprint, we're proving that you don't have, you know, good body control and functionality.

[00:28:40] And Kelly Starrett talks about the squat test when people first come into a San Francisco CrossFit, where can you lower into a deep squat or can you fall over onto your butt when you try to go past parallel? Because if you have functional weaknesses, it's a lot of fun and it's a good challenge to try to address those functional weaknesses with targeted exercises. And I've been doing a ton of that myself because I came into the sprinting game late in life and I have a tendency to get these minor injuries that set me back

[00:29:07] because I'm not completely flexible, mobile, functional, and functionally strong in ways that I didn't even realize I was weak when I'm out there running around the track as hard as I can. So I guess it depends what you want to get out of it. And if you just want to get an adrenaline rush and get those endorphins flowing, and that's the narrowness of your appreciation or your focus on fitness, we can't stop that. But as professionals especially, how can I serve my clients?

[00:29:36] Oh my gosh, you can broaden their horizons. And the most simple example when it comes to an endurance athlete is to somehow back off from these overly stressful training patterns so that you have the energy and the willingness to introduce other workouts that deliver a massive payoff in terms of fitness, but you can't do them because you're too tired because you're slogging around putting too many miles in.

[00:30:02] And the most obvious one is to become competent at something that's qualified as sprinting. So brief explosive all-out efforts. Yes, running on flat ground would be the best for bone density and weight loss, but if you're not adapted to that right now, you can start sprinting up stadium stairs or sprinting up steep hills or sprinting on a rowing machine or sprinting on an exercise bike where you're actually doing a true sprint that's only lasting for 10 or 15 or 20 seconds at the most.

[00:30:30] And then you're taking extensive recovery period after. So it's not a high intensity interval training session, which can often be exhausting and depleting, especially with traditional programming, but it's becoming someone who can still put out maximum power with quality technique and then a lot of rest so that you can do another quality effort again. But it's a different workout template than most people are familiar with. And it's like the most widely neglected aspect of fitness. So again, back to the professional listening,

[00:30:59] throw in some true sprint training. Uh, appropriately low impact, no impact, whatever. And that will, you know, help with body composition in a vastly superior manner than putting in hours and hours of steady state cardio. And there's tons of science to support this. Yeah. And it's, uh, you know, I'm still thinking to when people are listening, like, well, especially because I come from the CrossFit world.

[00:31:26] Um, and there was a constant, constant friction of it's not entertaining enough, right? My workouts, I did all the programming for 70, seven, eight years. And my gym was in Santa Barbara. Um, it was, it was constantly had to be entertaining. Right. And I was like, what am I doing here? Am I, you know, and I think that's something too, is like people, trainers are worried that if they serve up boring, effective workouts,

[00:31:55] that they won't be hireable, right? They won't be valued. And I think that's the core psychology of it that we have as an industry. So, I mean, maybe that's true. I don't know, you know, but how do we address that as a, as a pro? Cause every, you're right. I think a lot of people who are well-educated know that the value of sprints is amazing. Like even LeBron James comes out now and says like his weight training, they're like 30 to 40 minutes long when he goes in for a session of weight training, it's not like an hour and a half, two hour thing. Right.

[00:32:24] Um, so people are starting to catch on, onto like, you know, minimal effective dose as a concept. So like, anyway, how do you, how do you address the psychology of it as a trainer or a coach that you're, you're doing the best for your client, but they may consider it boring. Yeah. I mean, it's a, it's a fair point, but I think, uh, a trainer who gets results is going to rise to the top of their profession. Agreed. Same with a work productivity expert who comes over and says, um, use your email for 30 minutes

[00:32:54] and then turn it off for six hours. You know, like Cal Newport's work in his book, Deep Work and many other ones. Um, you know, the, the people that rise to the top are the ones that have effectiveness and, you know, science-based protocols that actually work. And so I don't think a trainer is going to go out of business if they say, look, we're going to shake things up. And I know you have stated goal of completing a difficult, challenging marathon or half marathon race. But, um, for example, Brian McKenzie,

[00:33:21] who launched the, the brand CrossFit endurance, um, he had good results and a lot of interest from people where they said, you know what? Doing those box jumps and those rope climbs can actually help your performance in a long distance triathlon because you're becoming a more functionally fit person. And when your hip flexors blow at mile 20 on your next marathon and you complain and grumble and shuffle through the final six miles, now you can awaken to realize that these other workouts that are challenging, exciting, and interesting

[00:33:50] are going to contribute to your, your success in whatever, uh, competitive endeavor you're doing. Uh, so I, I think that's an easy hurdle to clear, especially with a client who's looking for that excitement and that instant gratification payoff, but also deep down the results. We have to kind of cut through that fluff and say, um, you know, here's, here's the objective for today's workout. And let's see how, uh, competent you are with one-legged Romanian deadlifts

[00:34:19] while you're also counting to 10 backwards and doing things that the race drivers do because they want to improve their, um, their hand-eye coordination and their connection between brain and body. So I think there's ways to make it fun, but, uh, you know, still, if you have to label it boring, like Sue McDonald labels her workout patterns boring. I watch her Instagram stuff. It's not boring at all. It's really, um, uh, interesting and there can be a lot of variation, but I personally, um, I think variation's overrated

[00:34:48] and there's some, uh, justification for saying, you know, get really good at your five favorite sprinting technique drills and just do those. Stefan Holmes said that, uh, uh, Olympic champion high jumper. And I'm like, okay, I buy into that because I don't need to get constantly entertained with, uh, different tidbits in order to stick through my, uh, my workout programming. So I would, I would urge the client to, uh, consider a change in mindset

[00:35:16] that we don't need to be entertained like kindergarten kids. And we're going there for the purpose of, you know, building toward our goals and living a better life and just throw that, that junk away. Um, now I'm, I'm validating your point strongly because we are immersed into a world of instant gratification and, uh, dopamine flooding behaviors. So it's the difference between nurturing a long-term, uh, romantic partnership versus, uh, swiping away and having the constant excitement and stimulation of meeting

[00:35:46] a new person, uh, for drinks on Friday night and then another for a hike on Saturday morning and that kind of life. And so, um, you know, there's, there's so much richness and value to adhering to a long-term, uh, fitness lifestyle where you're cutting, you're checking all those boxes, even perhaps the boring ones in order to receive a higher payoff. Awesome. I think a lot of it comes down to clearly setting expectations with your clients from the beginning, right? And I think that what you're getting

[00:36:15] to is like communicating, educating, preparing them, but also you can do quote unquote boring stuff, but it can still be entertaining if you're with a good trainer or with a good group or have a good community. And I think that's something that's, that's constantly undervalued, um, a lot in our industry. We always want to get to the science and how good we are at our jobs and, you know, all those things. But it's like, you know, a lot of it's just having an environment, right? Like a physical environment that people like to come to. Um, and it's one of the things I want to ask when we get into like

[00:36:45] longevity based fitness programming, have you read a Tia's book? Yeah. Right. It very complicated. Like his, his full on longevity fitness program. I mean, there's VO2 max training, there's rucking, there's strength training, there's all kinds of things. It's like, where does he get the time to do that type of thing? So when you guys look at what you're presenting it, uh, you know, born to walk, like how, you know, cause that I mentioned that book because it seems to have set a framework for longevity, right? That we can all kind of work off of.

[00:37:15] So how do you guys differentiate from that model? Uh, I think you've made a great point that we, we need to simplify this stuff for the people that, um, live, you know, the average fully packed lifestyle. And I do have that same complaint with the, uh, you know, many of the health leaders of today where they're just, uh, spewing out, uh, all this wonderful science, uh, showing that, uh, you know, you're, you're, you're fasting and your red light therapy and your cold plunging

[00:37:45] and your hot sauna. And then your, uh, blood restrope, blood flow restriction working out. And someone just asked me the other day, like, what do you think of blood flow restriction training? I'm like, sounds pretty good. But I also think that not blood flow restricting and getting my butt into the gym, uh, on a regular basis is, is helpful to, uh, peak performance and longevity. So, uh, some of these bells and whistles probably can be stripped down for the average person to say, look, um, a lot of experts are asserting now that if you simply increase

[00:38:15] all forms of general everyday activity, this is a more urgent health lifestyle disease prevention and longevity obligation than adhering to a devoted fitness regimen. There's research from Denmark that we put in the book where they categorize people into four different groups. Um, there was the active couch potato. Those are the people that do go to the gym and work out, but then they have largely sedentary patterns the rest of their life. And there are people that are generally active

[00:38:43] that might not work out that much and so on. And the takeaway was that the people who are generally active, uh, fare better than those who put that hour in at 6 AM. They did their spin class. They did their CrossFit box and then they got on the subway and wrote an hour to sit in an office for eight hours and then take the subway back and sit and watch, uh, you know, TV at nighttime. So that's a pretty easy thing to, uh, throw into the mix

[00:39:13] where get up and take a one minute walking break from the desk, at least every hour. Uh, you can do some functional exercises like just even in your cubicle. If you don't have space and, uh, the venue, you can drop for a set of 20 deep squats, uh, every hour. And guess what? At the end of the day into the end of the month, you're going to have fantastic fitness breakthrough just from sprinkling in what I call micro workouts that maybe last only a minute, but they add to your day and they build,

[00:39:42] they elevate the fitness platform from which you launch whatever formal workouts you do. And certainly we don't want to drift into that category of those formal workouts being too strenuous. Uh, and, and by definition, accelerating aging rather than nurturing it. And you mentioned briefly the super popular VO two max workout. Okay, well, that's fine. You know, go do a four by four by four, and it's better than sitting on the couch. But we also have to acknowledge

[00:40:11] that any type of aerobic conditioning will support your oxygen consumption at maximum heart rate. So a walk is a VO two max workout. And there's absolutely tremendous value to, uh, doing steady state or varied state exercise. That's generally not strenuous. So everyone's promoting zone two. The zone two workout is so important. The science says zone two is awesome. What about zone one? I mean, uh, Elliot Kipchoge,

[00:40:41] the greatest marathoner and one of the greatest endurance athletes of all time. He's published his training log. They've been analyzed by exercise physiologists in detail on the internet. He does 82 to 84% of his weekly mileage in what we would call zone one. But we're telling these ordinary people who are already filled with other stress elements in their life to peg their heart rate at the top of zone two, because that's where you get the most fat burning benefits. Some of this stuff where you throw the science out and say,

[00:41:10] this is the way to do it. I have strong objection to because I have a lifetime, you know, competing as an elite and hanging around other elites and watching what they do. So I think we need to take a page from the people who are doing it at the very best. I mentioned Sue McDonald's boring training regimen. Oh, that's interesting. Maybe I should spend 15, 20 or 30 minutes a day just doing mobility exercises so that my ambitions as a CrossFit athlete or as a runner can come true

[00:41:39] without this constant injury and exhaustion pattern that we see in the fitness industry as a whole. Well said. Well said. You know, it's, uh, my wife and I have very different training. She's now kind of coming off the CrossFit thing. She hates when I talk about her workouts, but I'm just going to do it for now. Sorry, myself. But she, she CrossFit for a very long time. I started working with a new coach on the nutrition thing because she's entering a certain phase of life where things change as a woman. You know,

[00:42:08] Dr. Stacey Sims talks about a lot of these things. And so she's done a great job of changing her programming. You know, she does strength-based programming purely and then she does more of the zone one, zone two. And, um, and she calls it like similar to stuff I do and she calls it boring. She's because she doesn't like to work out with me. I'm boring. Right. But I found that like, as I progress into my late forties now that there's certain things I want to keep. And I'm, I also realized I'm very fortunate that I came from an athletic background. I like sports. Um,

[00:42:39] but focusing on for me, like, uh, the ability to produce power. So some explosiveness in my life. And I think this is where the sprinting comes through. That's been really critical. Like I, I like my favorite workouts of the week. Now I go in, I do some hard med ball throws. Maybe I'll do some RDLs, right. I'll do some power cleans. Um, I'll do a couple of things that just are, you know, more explosive by nature. So I think as we age, I want to specifically talk about power, um, like our ability to produce power. Like, have you guys identified, um,

[00:43:09] in your book, like the importance of power production, um, as we age? Oh yeah. I mean, look, the aerobic system can sustain through aging much more than the anaerobic system. So we lose those anaerobic muscle fibers as we age at a dramatically accelerated rate. And that is the most critical obligation for longevity. The best example is the number one cause of, uh, demise and death in Americans over age 65, which is falling and the

[00:43:38] related consequences of falling. you fall, you break your hip, you're bedridden, you get pneumonia, your lungs aren't strong enough to cough it out and you die. So, uh, it's something like, uh, this is from, from Peter's book, 38% of Americans over age 65 who break their hip are dead within a year. And that fall came from an inability for the high intensity explosive muscle fibers to support body weight with a misstep.

[00:44:06] So to catch yourself before your fall is an anaerobic explosive activity. It's that one step that you, you, you turned your ankle and missed and you had a chance, but there was not that strong, powerful muscle to fire and support all your body weight just on your right foot for a split second. Um, and of course there's all other ways that we can measure, uh, demise, uh, as an association with our ability to generate explosive power and have

[00:44:35] that have that top end working. One of them is called organ reserve, which is the functional capacity of your organs to work beyond baseline when called upon. And that's directly related to, uh, muscle preservation of muscle strength and muscle mass. So when you ask your, uh, quads to do a set to failure, uh, on heavy weighted squats or, you know, high resistance squats, I'm not saying everyone needs to load up. You can do them with, uh,

[00:45:04] straps and things that just bring your muscles to failure for one set. You are also asking your liver and your kidneys and your heart and your lungs to work at vastly above baseline capacity to support this peak effort of, of doing a simple single set till failure. Now think about all those exercises out there that show up at the gym and they get on the stair machine and they walk up the stairs for 45 minutes

[00:45:33] while watching CNN and they're not asking their muscles or anything to perform till failure ever. So they're covering that aerobic conditioning, uh, aspect of fitness and longevity, which is important because if you don't do your steps every day, um, that's a huge strike against you. But when you think about it in the big picture, uh, aerobic conditioning is just a tiny slice of all the attributes that are necessary for, you know, the top score in longevity and functional fitness.

[00:46:03] So we need to maintain, uh, explosive power and the ability of the anaerobic muscles fibers to fire, uh, with, you know, high performance and extensive rest and infrequent as well. So it's not like this huge ask, like every day you need to do 10 sprints so you can, uh, keep your anaerobic system. It's more like once a week with the proper warmup and preparation exercises. And we talk about this in the book. And, um, then you go out there and do, it could be a kettlebell swing for 10 seconds.

[00:46:32] That counts as a sprint sprinting on the bicycle counts, anything that's bringing your muscles to, uh, you know, near maximum with a very short duration and a lot of rest is a wonderful component. And speaking of, uh, the aversion to boring or predictable, these workouts are tough and challenging and they will keep you focused because you're asking your body to go to the max rather than just running thoughts through your head about, what you're going to get at the grocery store. That's not happening when I'm coming around the home stretch, when I'm doing my sprint workouts,

[00:47:02] I promise you. Awesome. Uh, let's play a little game here, Brad. So I'm going to give you like an avatar Susie from accounting, right? Uh, mid forties, maybe played some high school sports, um, stayed relatively fit, but kind of goes in and out of like the normal sequence gets, gets in it, then, you know, loses 10 pounds and gains 15 and, you know, kind of goes back and forth. And so if you're going to put forth like a general high level template for someone like Susie from accounting,

[00:47:32] what would it look like for longevity? Well, the first thing we need to do is, uh, crash your house and eliminate these nutrient deficient processed foods that are part of, uh, the scene for most modern living citizens. Because if the metabolic function is not working appropriately, uh, these efforts toward fitness and exercise and getting in shape are going to be sabotaged. Same with body composition. We know from, uh, the compensation theory and

[00:48:01] work like Dr. Herman Ponser's book titled burn that the calories we burn during exercise don't really contribute to fat reduction in that linear manner that we've been, uh, told to, to believe, or we have on our watches or on our devices. So when you go and burn, we had this old research from, uh, when I worked at the spinning, uh, spinning program, um, the spinning class of 45 minutes, uh, burns 650 calories, uh, give or take for most people. And then when you stop by, uh,

[00:48:31] Jamba Juice after the class and get a medium smoothie and a breakfast scone, it's like 670 calories. So it's a, it's a net, you know, it's a net loss, even though you slammed an awesome workout and rock to the music and spinning. So the way that, uh, fat reduction occurs is through hormone optimization. And that is from a nutritious diet. And then the next thing on the intervention would be, uh, increase in general everyday movement and avoiding prolonged periods of stillness.

[00:49:00] And that is to train the fat burning system to work optimally and burn fat 24, seven, which is the true way to reduce excess body fat. And then the third layer I'd put in there is, um, you know, you need to shock the body in order to change it. And that's where we have a nice justification for high intensity sprint type workout efforts that will generate this, uh, this phenomenon called excess post-exercise oxygen consumption epoch.

[00:49:29] And that is the secret to, uh, rapid, uh, fat reduction where you're, you did your workout, uh, the hard efforts only, you know, lasted for a few minutes, but for the next 24, 48, 72 hours, some of the research says you are burning, uh, fat, uh, at an accelerated rate because of the stimulus you provided when you push your body to near maximum effort. And I'll, I'll keep people, uh, with those three right now because those will have huge payoff and we don't want to overload you with,

[00:49:59] you know, lifestyle change. But what I just mentioned, um, the time requirement and even the energy requirement is really minimal. And just to go back for a moment when you mentioned cortisol, uh, when we embark on a program that more looks like sprinting and walking, what's happening is we are managing our stress hormones. We're still getting in tremendous shape because the sprinting will get you lean and ripped and strong and improve your performance at all lower levels of

[00:50:29] exercise intensity. So you sprinkle in the sprinting. Of course, that's a huge stress hormone spike when you're doing a really hard workout, but it's an appropriate and evolutionary appropriate stress hormone spike that drops back down quickly back to homeostasis because the workout doesn't last for an hour, an hour 15 or whatever, when you get that chronic overproduction of stress hormones and then walking and moving at a comfortable aerobic heart rate, that zone one I talked about

[00:50:58] and or zone two, right? Uh, you are still managing your stress hormones there because that is the essential definition of what an aerobic, uh, paced workout is, is one that has minimal stress hormone production is very comfortably paced. You have sufficient oxygen where you're emphasizing, uh, the burning of fatty acids all the way up to the maximum, the limit of zone two. So zone one and zone two exercise combined with sprinting could be the ultimate, uh, top secret weapon here

[00:51:28] to break through from, you know, these fitness stalls and exhaustion and burnout patterns. Awesome. Awesome. I mean, so it sounds pretty simple. Clean up your diet, move more every once in a while, stress the system. There you go. Yeah. Brad, um, always a pleasure, man. So you guys got the book, um, you have your podcast. Uh, I mean, you guys create a lot of content, like people are listening to this. Where would you like them to go first and foremost? Well,

[00:51:57] you can check out born to walk book.com that'll tell you all about, uh, what's in this, this new release. There's a pre-order bonus items, and then you can visit me at bradkearns.com and the be rad podcast. And I'd love to connect with people, send me a message. We review and answer everything. And we're just trying to spread the word like you, man. Yeah. Awesome. Well, I can attest like your, uh, your podcast, you deliver really good information and insights in a very entertaining way. And I think that's, that's the key to,

[00:52:26] to having great content nowadays. So, uh, well done and man, Brad, thank you so much for joining me and doing this. Uh, and, uh, yeah, man, let's make sure it's not five, six years until the next one. Anytime we can, we can get it going. We got a lot of, a lot of issues to discuss and hopefully, uh, some of this was valuable to get people thinking, thinking bigger than just the pain and suffering approach. And look, I was that guy. Uh, like I mentioned in my college running career was a disaster. And even on the professional triathlon circuit,

[00:52:56] when you're trying for those marginal gains, I quite frequently made the mistake of, you know, dispensing that competitive intensity in an inappropriate manner. So a lot of times those of you listening who are deep into fitness and really driven and focused and, uh, you know, care about your six pack and your, your results on the whiteboard at the gym, um, that, uh, those weapons and those, those powerful attributes of your discipline and focus can become an enemy when you can't regulate them appropriately.

[00:53:26] So the true champion athlete of the planet is someone who harnesses that competitive intensity perfectly. I'm thinking of Cole Hawker in the Olympic 1500. If you saw that where, you know, the top guys in the world, number one and number two, the big showdown of the Olympics, Ingebrigtsen versus Kerr and Cole Hawker just ran in the pack. And in the home stretch, he snuck by on the inside rail and had this magnificent gold medal performance where it was one of the greatest upsets in endurance running that's happened in decades. And it was just because he bided his time,

[00:53:56] trained hard, stayed out of the limelight, stayed out of the trash talking. So you can be that version of the person at your gym where, um, you know, you show up, you perform with crisp technique, you feel great. And when you're not feeling great, you cut the workout in half, you go home, you have the discipline to back off even when it's more fun to get in the mix. Awesome. Love it. Love it. Ladies and gentlemen, Brad Kearns. Hey, wait, don't leave yet. This is your host, Eric Malzone,

[00:54:25] and I hope you enjoyed this episode of Future of Fitness. If you did, I'm going to ask you to do three simple things. It takes under five minutes and it goes such a long way. We really appreciate it. Number one, please subscribe to our show wherever you listen to it. iTunes, Spotify, CastBox, whatever it may be. Number two, please leave us a favorable review. Number three, share. Put it on social media, talk about it to your friends, send it in a text message, whatever it may be. Please share this

[00:54:54] episode because we put a lot of work into it and we want to make sure that as many people are getting value out of it as possible. Lastly, if you'd like to learn more, get in touch with me, simply go to the futureoffitness.co. You can subscribe to our newsletter there or you can simply get in touch with me as I love to hear from our listeners. So thank you so much. This is Eric Malzone and this is the future of fitness. Have a great day.