Dr. Stacy Sims - Hormones, HRV, and Heavy Lifting: The Science of Training Women Over 45

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Thanks. I'm excited for today. It's going to be fun.

It is going to be really fun. Here's why it's going to be fun. Well, number one, I enjoy our conversation. I really enjoy the dialogue. And I know that our audience gets a lot of value. And, you know, the people who listen to this from the industry are people who are just really curious about their own fitness and wellness and kind of what's coming around the corner. You know, you've been paving a new path for quite some time. So that's going to be fun. Number two is I'm doing something I don't really do very often, is I sourced questions. So I'm not a woman. I have many women in my life, and a lot of people are within the industry. So I kind of picked three, you know, lack of better term, avatars. So the coach, trainer, practitioner, right, who follows you, the educated consumer, uh, someone who, you know, follows probably most of your content and reads your books and stuff like that. And also an industry, a wellness industry executive, um, a CEO, actually. So I'm not going to mention their full names, but I source questions from them and different perspectives, different angles on the industry and what they want to know from you. So we're going to get through that in a little bit, but I think first and foremost, happy birthday. And yep. And maybe, maybe tell a little of us what you did for your birthday. And I know you did something pretty fun. If the weather was permissible.

Yeah. I uh recently bought my dream gravel bike and I went out for a big adventure. Just no time. People always ask, what do you want for your birthday? It's like, I don't want anything tangible other than no timelines and time for my friends. Time with my family and good coffee. That's what it is. It's about riding in the sun, even though it's freezing with friends, and then yeah, catching up with family and having good coffee along the way. It was like perfect. Beautiful.

Awesome. Yeah, what's it what kind of what kind of bike did you get for those who are gravel bikers?

Oh, I got a crux. Less crux. Yeah, been looking at that for quite a few quite a few years, I'd say, and watching the evolution of it. But the other thing is it's like one of the only bikes you can get that's not black. But that's not why. I'm gonna get it wrapped and get it nice and blingy, but no, it just rides like a dream. It's one of those where you actually put pressure in the pedals and it accelerates rather than you trying to fight to get it to accelerate. You're like, oh, look at that. I push my heel down a little bit more and off it goes. Beautiful. Handles well, fits well, everything. Yeah, it's great.

As you know, I just got into gravel biking about six months ago because I signed up for my first race here, which I'll hopefully have completed by the time this airs, all things. You have to update me on it.

Yeah.

But it's a it's a great way you know, for you to get outside. And you know, I I don't run as much because I got some kind of recurring injuries, but it's a little it's easier on the body. But man, you can get go get cover some miles and get to places where no one else gets to you really quickly and really easily. And yeah, I think I've I've fallen in love. So yeah, I'll I'll keep you updated on that for sure. Let's dig into the interview here, Dr. Sims. So it's been about a year and a half, I believe, since the last time you were on the show. The field of women's health, science, research, it's moving very quickly. There's a lot of stuff going on. A lot of people are very interested in the field for good, obviously, reason. So maybe give us an update. Like, what are some of the big headlines or movements or data has come about over the last year, year and a half that you find are notable?

There's been a huge upturn in FemTech, which is really interesting because now all the major companies are really starting to look at their wearables. And are these algorithms appropriate for female physiology? Most of them find no. So we're starting to see some that are taking more of a female lens to developing things to give accurate information. But what I'm finding really interesting in the research world is that there is becoming more and more robust research that actually has been designed for women by women. So the research coming out is pretty robust. And one of the big things that we've been talking about is the hormone aspect and ovulation and how we're tracking menstrual cycle and bringing the qualitative and quantitative, and it's finally catching on in the research world where you can't just go, one point in time, let's check that. It's we have to see what's going on. Did someone ovulate? How are we testing that? What are the ratios of estrogen progesterone? So it's really giving a lot of insight into the different hormone flux. And most people go, oh, well, you're have menstrual cycle dysfunction if your menstrual cycle changes or you have an ovulation. We're finding that's the norm. So we need to start changing the language and say there's variations within what we call normal. And these are the normal variations. It's exciting because we're getting more and more true objective insight for women to be able to really assess where they are and how it's affecting their health.

With the data that you're getting, I mean, you mentioned like, you know, information about the menstrual cycle, I presume wearable data. Is it mostly in a clinical setting, lab setting, or is this happening out like in the field where people are attracting everywhere?

Yeah. So we're getting robust databases. I mean, there's so many data points out there from all these wearable companies. And with the current climate, especially in the States, with the lack of research funding, the freezing hold, all of the things that are happening right now. There are really intelligent researchers who don't have funds to answer questions they want. But yet they have really intelligent questions. And then there's all these data points that aren't being used by industry. So connecting them and being able to dig into those data points to be able to answer questions is really cool. But now that's part of the feedback where the researchers are saying, hey, wait a second, this isn't set up right. You didn't actually look at what you're saying. So there's a lot of the review coming out, and people are wanting to opt in for more research. So that's a really good way of tying industry and academia together. And it's a good merger. For the first time ever, we're seeing that they're being copacetic. And then when we're thinking about lab-based stuff, people are being very conscious that most of the research has been done on women has been on primarily white upper socioeconomic women. And now they're trying to get more diversity in, which is great because if you're thinking about that small population, privileged research, it doesn't really hit out to all the people that it needs to.

And when you discuss this research for um people who aren't in the world of science, like where do you recommend they go? Is there like particular areas or books that have been published? Or um yeah, like where would you go if you were going to suggest that they kind of research on their own at a basic level?

At a basic level. Oh yeah, that one's still hard because we have things out there like consensus AI, which is pretty much uh chat GTP that's been put over PubMed, but the algorithms again aren't looking at all the nuances. So you get a general summary, but it's not really digging into is this true or not? It's just saying saying what are the high impact journals, what's the review? So it's a it's a high touch point. But in order to dig in, there are really specific questions you have to ask yourself when you're looking at it. Like, what is the internal external validity? Meaning that is this applicable to me, because you might have a headline that says this workout's fantastic for everyone, but when you start looking at it, it's like, well, that doesn't really work for who I am as a person, my life, my environment. So you have to take that with a grain of salt as to look at the initial population. Is it a clinical population? Because we're seeing a lot of things, especially from the GLP one, from the clinical population and the lack of muscle mass and bone density things that are cap happening with that. And then they're transferring it over for microdosing into like the athletic world. It's not really a generalizable. So you have to be very specific of what the population is. Not only that, you have to look at the sex and the biology and all those kinds of things. But it's really being a little bit more critical of where the research outcome is coming from. Because as we're seeing in social media, all the nuances are missed. So yeah, that's the problem. Because you'll get one biased idea and it flows through, and then it just keeps regurgitating and regurgitating. You can trace it back to where that first bias comes from.

That's a very gentle way of putting it, where all the nuances come. Okay. Let's move on to some questions from our listenership. So I'm going to start with, I think a good way to start this is to start off with the educated consumer, right? Which I think is actually a lot of people within our industry educate themselves. So there's three or four questions from everyone. This comes from Marcella P. She is in Whitefish, Montana. Uh, what are your thoughts on restrictive dietary approaches like carnivore carnivore diets for active women over 45, particularly regarding longevity, hormone health, and muscle maintenance?

Yeah. So when we look at something like this restrictive dietary approach, we have to look at what are we trying to do with it? What are we looking for for a health span perspective? For short term, any of these kind of restrictive diets are going to work. Because if we look specifically at what's happened, is pretty much all the ultra-processed foods and all the mistiming of food intake is kind of dissipated. All of a sudden we've clean up our diet, we're being more focused on what we're eating, when we're eating it, and we become more in tune to how we feel. But just like any, it could be carnivore, it could be vegan, it could be anything. When we become more focused on a diet, our diet inadvertently cleans up. If we clean it up, we feel better. But the longer term repercussions of the restrictive dietary intake is malnutrition. And of more importance for health span is a disruption of our gut microbiome and the diversity of it. Because we see what happens in the four to five years before that one point in time, menopause, where all periods have stopped for a year, is a significant decrease in our gut microbiome diversity. And that's associated with a lot of the issues that we see in late perimenopause with our weight gain, lean mass loss, cognitive issues, immune issues, soft tissue issues. But if we have a precedence of taking care of our gut microbiome, which is a lot of fiber, then we start to see an attenuation of those issues. So if we're talking about Marcella and she has all of a sudden gone more carnivore and is finding that she doesn't have as many hot flashes, well, maybe she's eliminated one of the triggers of hot flash. Maybe it was one of the nightshades, or maybe it was, you know, some something else that has a lot of nitrates in it that causes vasodilation. So it's it's those things that we have to be very particular about. Like short term, anyone's gonna have success. But we have to look at the longer term repercussions.

Yeah, awesome. The other question, another question Marcella has how critical are supplements like creatine, collagen, or leucine for women over 45, training hard and aiming to preserve, build, lean mass?

Creatine is probably one of the non-negotiables. And that's across the board. It's not just older women, it's almost all women and men too, because of the way that diets have evolved. But the rest of them, if we are looking at nutrition first, food first, and especially if she's doing the carnivore diet, right? She's gonna have plenty of collagen and leucine. She doesn't have to worry about so much. So again, it comes back to what are we doing from a dietary perspective? Are we nailing all the things we need to do with diet? And then we can look at where we might be losing out. Do we need vitamin D? Most likely. Even in the summer, we're still using sunscreen, long sleeves, being inside a lot. Vitamin D is one of those things that's coming up more and more in the research, is really important for preserving lean mass, which is bone and muscle, for immunity. There's so many things from a vitamin D perspective that is beneficial, that creatine and vitamin D tend to be the two that are almost non-negotiable. The rest of them, it's a case by case. And when we're seeing all the stuff that's coming out, like collagen, yeah, it works for joint pain, but does it work for hair, hair, and nails? Skin? Don't know. So there's lots of things to think about when you're talking about supplementation. The biggest thing about preserving our lean mass and our bone is what kind of training stress you're putting on, right? Are we doing our plyos? Are we doing our heavy strength training? Are we doing our intensity work? How are we recovering from that? Are we bookending our training with food? Are we being conscious to get enough protein throughout the day to meet what we need from our life phase perspective? Those are the big rocks. And then the supplementation are the ones that you go, oh yeah, well, I'm doing a really heavy, heavy training block leading up to this race, and I can't eat enough. So yeah, I'm gonna supplement.

Vitamin D, there's a lot of missed, or I guess a lot of different information on the actual dosage of vitamin D. You know, I know like I live up north and in the winter, I take a lot of vitamin D. I now I've had a few years of my aura data as well. It's very obvious how my HRV dips when the sun goes away. It's shocking. I'm talking like cut in half, right? So I'm going like 20,000, 30,000 per day of vitamin D. Is that crazy? What would you suggest for different people, different times and different climates?

Yeah, the best is to get a baseline blood test to see where you are in the normal range. If you're in the low end of normal, then we see that dosing up to 8 to 10,000 international units is helpful the winter time, um, especially with really, really low light. When we start getting into more summer orientation, drop it down. But you really do need to have your baseline blood test to know what's going on. Because some people will overdo it. Their blood levels shoot way super high. And we actually don't know what the toxicity level is with regards to how long a high level can affect things, because right now they haven't found an upper limit. But that's not to say to keep taking more and more, it's just they haven't been able to determine what is a maximum amount to take for X amount of time.

Okay. Okay. I'm gonna self-experiment then. So regarding hormone tracking, what are the key hormone-related signs women should track to optimize training and avoid overtraining during perimenopause specifically?

This one's really hard because it's not like hormones, a lot of people think that they're very linear. It's like, you know, we have a baseline amount that happens during our low hormone phase, and then it it beeps up over ovulation, and then we have a an elevated state over the course of our luteal phase. That's not really what's happening. We're seeing pulses throughout the day. So, for example, after ovulation, if you were to measure progesterone on day 21, which is the day that they say measure progesterone to see if you have adequate progesterone levels. If you measure it at eight, 90 minutes later, it could be eightfold different because of the pulse of the progesterone. So we don't know. You can't have blood tests. We have to look at our trends over time. So you're talking about HRV and how it changes from summer to winter. So for women with perimenopause, it changes almost weekly because we see that there's so much stress on the body. So we really have to look at the trends over time and not look specifically and say, oh, it's because I'm perimenopause and these hormones are doing XYZ. We know that they are, but we can't go day-to-day variation. We have to look at the trends over.

And when you look at stuff like HRV, resting heart rate, I mean, just because those are really accessible metrics for most people. Do you do you suggest you look by week, by month? Like what do you think is the best trend line or unit of time to really look at that, the changes?

Well, you can go week, you go one week and see what's happening and then compare the next week. Because when you first start, right, the more data you have, the better it is. The biggest view is to look trends over time over three to four months. But not everyone can go back retrospectively right now and do that. Because you also have to know what are the stressors across it. Like, was I sick? Was I traveling? Um, was I up with a bad night's sleep? So all of those things come into play. So if you start tracking and you put notes and say what's happening, then it gives you really good, robust, objective data to say, oh yeah, I see what's happening. And I see when I have a really bad night's sleep, the next day my heart rate variability and recovery score is like 20. So I know that if I have a bad night's sleep or I'm gonna have a late night for work, then I better not plan on doing a hard session the next day. So you start to see those trends.

Awesome. So here's a last question from our educated consumer. Should women manipulate training phases based on menstrual or perimenopausal hormone fluctuations? It's a tough word for me. Or is it or is consistency more important?

Consistency, yes, definitely. We want to be consistent and show up. When we start talking about hormone fluctuations and how it makes us feel, this is the layer that is really nuanced because we know that when you have a regular menstrual cycle, then there are days, specifically within your patterning, where you're not going to feel so great. And you can pick those out. But with perimenopause, it's so variable. We don't know. So this is where you really have to I pull women back and say, let's not really look so much at all the data, but let's look at how I feel. Let's become intuitive with I wake up and mentally I feel like I'm an eight. Physically, I feel like a two. Maybe if I warm up a little bit more, I have a coffee, I go through things, I do some mobilization. That physicality comes up to a six or seven, then boom, I can do a hard session. But if it doesn't come up, or mentally you stay low, then you might want to manipulate a little bit. And with perimenopause, it could be a week of feeling really flat and awful. And if that starts to play out a little bit longer, then you might want to do just a couple of high intensity just to wake everything up and see how that makes you feel. Warm-up becomes a little bit longer, but again, we have to bring it back to how I feel and mentally am I capable, physically, am I capable? And give ourselves permission to say, you know what? I need a day just to back off. Because when we're thinking about fitness and coming from a training perspective, there's always that you need to just push through. And we know that that's not right for men or women, but in particular, highly stressed, highly active, working, you know, primarily perimenopausal ones.

Yeah, that's a hard one for many people to swallow. Right. Yeah. Especially depending if you train, you did athletics, sports your whole life. It was always just get up, sunshine, get out there, get back in the pool, get back on the court, whatever it is, get back in the gym.

I know. I've had learning experiences through that recently too. It's like, okay, yeah. I've had injuries, I've been traveling, and I'm just like, okay, just give yourself permission to say this is a temporary blip in time. Let's find one thing to focus on instead of trying to be the best at everything, which is how we've all been conditioned to get in the pool, go for your run, go for your ride, hit these metrics, try to do all of the things, and it's not quite right. We can't keep doing that.

Yeah, I can't promise I'll stop doing that. I will try. I will try that. Okay.

It's hard.

It is.

Especially with bike love. It's really hard when you have bike love.

It really is. It really is. Um okay. So we're gonna move on to uh Scarlett Kay. She's uh a coach, an athlete, trainer, and she's also out of Whitefish Montana. So she had some very specific questions about heavy lifting balance. So more women are embracing heavy weights. Thank you, Dr. Stacey Sims. Um, but some only do low rep, high weight work. What's your take on cycling heavy strength sessions with lighter, higher rep work, plus balance and stability training?

Absolutely. Is that a way to say it?

Yes, please.

Yeah. So when I first started coming out talking about women need to lift heavy, it is because we had this big idea that strength training was high reps, like the pink dumbbells, let's go do a boot camp, let's go do some weights and core power yoga, all those kinds of things. But really opening up and kind of banking on what CrossFit was opening up to with Olympic lifts and heavy lifting, and then talking about the physiology of let's get central nervous system and all this, it's great. But the examples were always five by five or three by five, and that's just a short period in time. So we have to look at the bigger picture. Like, how do we phase into that for one? Two, how are we periodizing that to get progressive overload? And three, we need to have deload in order to really solidify the work that we put into the heavy lifting. And then other things is like for cyclists or runners or other people who have more power-based stuff within their endurance, we have to look at things like French contrast training, where you're doing heavy and then into a plyo into a lighter weight so that you can really encompass all the things you're getting from central nervous system with heavy lifting into a plyo. And that's periodized in. So if we're talking about how are we getting balance and stability, you can do balance and stability as a warm-up into a heavier work. And then we also look over the course of four weeks. What are we doing in that four-week block? And then do we bring it down? And then in the next four-week block is going to be more contrast type work. We're working on power with the strength. So it's definitely something that people don't talk enough about. The periodization, progressive overload, how do we incorporate that with heavy lifting? So, yes, we have to do some phase in of lighter weight into heavier weight, some plyo work, some explosive work with heavier weight. So, yeah, it's a whole thing where we're like, let's talk about periodization over the course of a year and how we get stronger and more powerful and incorporate that into our everyday life and our sport too. Because if we talk about endurance athletes, like, I don't want to do heavy lifting because it interferes with my cycling legs. Well, maybe we do some heavy lifting and mobility and then go ride up some hills and something like that. So, yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, that's that's always, you know, as a former coach and trainer, having that communication being upfront and consistent about this is why we're doing it, this is the long run. Just do what I'm let's just go through the plan, execute the plan, right? Because everyone wants to like, no, no, but I just read this blog by XYZ and I was I follow this influencer, and this person said this. And you're like, no, that's not the plan. This is the plan we agreed upon. The years of the expectations, let's execute, reassess over time. You mentioned uh French contrast training, is that right?

Yeah.

Tell me about that. That's not new, that's new to me.

You're gonna have to try it because it's amazing. So the idea, if we talk about like the the actual aspect of our strength and our our ecenter concentr concentric muscle activation, right? If we're always doing that concentric work of heavy lifting, we're never really maximizing the stretch and power cycle. So this came from the idea of athletes who need to be strong but get into like a cutting motion or some other plyo type, really fast, powerful motion. So it's doing three to four really heavy lifts right into a plyo move. And so you're capturing that central nervous system activation from that really heavy, heavy lift to bring it right into a power move. So it could be, you know, five really heavy, heavy squats right into pogos or into some broad jumps, so you or box jumps. So you're taking it and putting it into explosive movement. And then right after that, you get into some more endurance, like higher rep stuff. So you kind of go through the entire range within one set of activity, but it's maximizing and polarizing the ends of the muscle activity. So I use it a lot for my cyclists and my my mountain runners or my ultrarrunners because they have to have that power within some of the fatigue. And so if you're really working on that contrast work, then when they get halfway through a race and they need to find some power, they're able to generate it.

And is that a uh would you say that's a gen pop? Like is that more of an intermediate up trainee that you would work with? Like it's not, it's definitely not beginner because you have to have strength and power, right?

Yeah, exactly. It's just like if you start implementing plyometric moves, you have to have really low jump and maybe assisted pogos and things first before you get into full Clio. It's the same thing, it's definitely more advanced, yeah.

Awesome. So this I think this is a question a lot of coaches and trainers face daily during programming, but and this one's more specific. A 45-year-old perimenopausal client can only strength train twice per week. So plus Zumba one and a half times weekly would be the this particular person's routine. Should those sessions be purely heavy lifting, or is there value in dedicating time to functional training and plylometrics? I'm kind of touched on that a little bit, but this in a specific case.

Yeah. So if you can only do meet with your client twice a week, then you want to scope it to be able to hit the plan. So if you're having the plan of like heavy lifting, then maybe you're spending the first 30 minutes working on the squat function. And that's the main bulk of the session. But before that, you're warming up with mobility work, balance, trying to activate all the muscles, get all of that kind of prep work done through functional movement. And then you can finish with some plyo work or some sprint work. So you can hit all of it in one session, but the focus of the session is the heavy lifting, but you're bookending it with some of the functionality balance. It keeps it fresh for the client and it also maximizes the time as well as helps progress so many different avenues of that one fitness component.

Awesome. Great answer. So we actually, I don't think you and I have talked about this a lot, but for senior training. So this is for women, you know, 15 to 20 years plus uh postmenopausal. So in this particular case, like age 80 to 85 or over, what rep ranges should we prioritize in group setting? So any specific considerations for this particular population?

So this is an exciting question because of an article that came out yesterday. Very excited about heavy loads, low rep versus our lighter loads, higher reps. And one of the problems we have, well, shouldn't it problems? One of the issues with older population are joint and mobility problems as well as bone density. So they're looking at what's the best rep range to improve muscle quality and function as well as bone health. And they found that the heavier loads and lower rep range helped with the strength, the quality of the muscle, the proprioception, and bone density. But for people who had joint issues, they would still benefit from the higher rep range, just not as much. So if we're looking at a group setting, it depends on what kind of class you're doing, right? We want to encourage heavier loads for the older population. We have to phase them in. We have to make sure they're not going to get injured. So I know from my passive teaching in in the gyms and things, like you're gonna have a core group that comes and they're gonna be consistent. It's part of the social constructs, it's part of, yeah, this is my 930 class, and I love the instructor and there's great vibe. You can take that core group and progress them. But you're always gonna have modifications. So if someone else comes in and not part of that core group, then you drop it, right? You're like, okay, we're gonna still do the same rep range, but maybe instead of heavier weights, we're gonna add a band to the lighter weights. So you get some progression through it, but you're not putting the really heavy load on the joint. You're just adding some more resistance to what they're doing. So they could stand on a resistance band and wrap it over the dumbbells while they're doing some curls or overheads. Or maybe they're just using the resistance band as increased resistance. So there's ways to modify within that group setting, but the idea really is the heavier that we can get the load we see now from really cool research that's coming out, the better it benefits all of the lean mass aspects that we need to develop in the older population.

Yeah. Awesome. Awesome. And that article is out where on your website?

No, it came out, I think it in JAMA yesterday. I'll source it out and I'll send it over.

Okay. Okay, great. Yeah, we'll add it to the notes. All right. So now we're going to move on to Brynn. She is a uh wellness industry executive and she's got some, you know, I guess more of the high-level industry perspective, um, which is which is excellent. So let's start with this. So as far as research evolution, what is driving the democratization of women's health research in the past five years? What finally opened the floodgates after decades of women being underrepresented?

Me? No, kidding. But no. It's more of a vocal conversation. Women have more of a safe space, I think. They feel like now's the time they can actually have a voice. And it really is the generation that, you know, were born in the 70s and 80s and now have a profile. So we talk about all of the high-profile movie stars that are talking about menopause and they have money to put behind it. We see companies like Momentus that are really trying to put money where their mouth is with regards to taking care of women. We see an upsurge in femtech and the conversations around how we need to get this more accessible to everyday people. We see a misstep in healthcare. And so people are trying to lean on wellness through other means. So it's just this whole global kind of aspect in Western society where all of a sudden we're seeing women who are talking about things, companies that are putting money into it. We're seeing this need and desire for more objective information and data points so that we can affect our own wellness without going through the healthcare system that's pretty broken wherever you are. And so it's just been this whole tipping point where now we're seeing all of these things are coming together at the right time. And we're getting this massive projection and growth, specifically in women's health.

And the funds pouring in, are these where's most of it coming from? Is it coming from industry? Industry.

Coming from industry. And we also see private donors. Like we look at Michelle Kang, right? And she's put in 50 million plus into women's soccer for research and getting more grassroots and more information in there. We're seeing things like Melinda Gates Foundation, who is opening up more privatization of research, but it's a it's a it's open to all researchers, but it's not government funded. There's no restrictions from government funding. So we're seeing a lot of big pockets opening up to really give back to enhance women's health research to help close that gap.

Uh, Dr. Sims, if I had a million, a hundred million dollars, which I don't, but if I did and I was going to provide it to you for research, is there any like a couple areas that you would really want to dive into hard within women's health?

Yeah, there are actually. There's the two ends really. We look at puberty and we see so many things that are affecting our kids from an increase in childhood obesity, the lack of safe spaces for exercise, the lack of education with regards to physical activity, the increase in mental health issues because of social media and comparisons and isolation. So there's a whole bunch of research that could be done to improve the lives of our young people across the world, doesn't matter what socioeconomic status. And there's a colleague in Sydney who has a thing called Kung Fu Social, and it's an app where it's looking at how do we verbally protect ourselves and be able to feel robust and strong in confronting things like bullies, and it's really reducing anxiety and depression. And then the other end of things is there's a lot of money right now going into things like PCOS and endometrial research and cancer and stuff for women, but there isn't a lot in just our gin pop who's suffering because we see like the norms are shifting because we have a sicker population. So when we're measured against the norms, if you're an active person, those norms don't work for you. So resetting the norms and really looking at society as who is general pop, who is active, you know, so dividing it up, and then the other end. Like we're looking at all the information that's coming out in the peri and post-menopausal space and the confusion within that. If we could have some really robust large-scale trials that are on the scale of women's health initiative, but not as polarizing as that, and having pockets of let's look at people who are out in community versus those who are isolated, and how are we looking at all of those qualitative and quantitative scopes? So basically, your $100 million would probably go to fund just a couple of studies. We still have a lot of work to do. No, not at all. But I would take it. If I had 100 million, I would probably do the same, but I don't.

Yeah. Well, I hope you take it. Let's see. Okay, so science literacy is the next topic here from Bryn. From a researcher's perspective, what should consumers and industry professionals look for when evaluating scientific claims? What are red flags for bad science being used for marketing? Oh, that's a that's a tough one. That's a full hour. That's a full hour.

The basic premise is know that marketing is stronger than science. And they'll put a little asterisk saying these have not been backed by science, or you're looking at white papers. And again, it comes back to really asking those key questions of the claims. What is the population? Who is it, who is this marketed to and for? And is it applicable to me in my life phase? And then you have to also ask yourself Am I checking all the boxes of lifestyle for me? And then is this going to benefit and add to what I'm doing from a lifestyle check? Because again, we've been bombarded with so many messages, we forget to ask ourselves these questions because we think it's going to be like the bullet because we're so used to immediacy. So you get an injury, take this, it's going to make you better overnight. We know that's not true. Thing with peptides, right? Peptides are going around and there's lots of really cool research is coming out about peptides. But which ones are really appropriate, which ones aren't, you can't really discern that until you dig in and look at the populations. So yeah, it is it's unfortunate that we have to really take a step back because we can't trust what's being put out in the marketing labels because we've been so bombarded by false messages.

You know, I would say that on an optimistic note, it's it is very messy. It's messy out there.

It is. Yeah.

But what I've seen over the last like five years, especially, is that the demand for good information from the consumer base, from industry folk, is very high. People are taking this very seriously now.

Yeah.

And I mean, literally, snake oil was what they sold, you know, 100 years ago. And, you know, there's still some of that around. But I think people are really, really searching it out as best they can. I think a lot of that is long-form content. I think people you can get a better sense of things versus just, you know, a little article where you who knows or wrote it. But if you're getting long-form content, especially in audio or video form, you can be a little bit more uh critical, I think, of the things that are coming up.

It's the nuances, right? Because you see all the quick bait and you'll see short form on social media, and people take that and they don't understand the context. They take things out of context, and that's the big problem. It's like you have to dig into the long form, you have to find the source because you're going to get a lot of disconnect from the original concept and the original nuance if you don't.

Yeah. I mean, one of my early mentors in the coaching world was James Fitzgerald, OPAX and 2007 CrossFit Game, CrossFit Games champion. James. But he always said, like, the only true answer to most questions is it depends. And so that's what you got. It's true. It's either I don't know or it depends. And they're pretty similar in many ways. So yeah.

Yeah.

There we go. So this one's great as well. So as far as from from industry evolution, right? So a fitness and wellness industry, how has your own thinking evolved in the last five years? What key learnings have changed how you approach women's protocols? Pretty wide open question.

Yeah, it is a wide open question. So coming from an academic background, it's really learning science communication, which is a skill and understanding that there are different pitch levels to talk. So if I'm gonna go talk to like-minded colleagues who understand the deep depths of things like uh myosin and actin phosphorylation, then we have conversations about that. If I were to go on, you know, like a keynote stage, I wouldn't say that. I'd say it's the way that your muscle proteins pull together for contraction, so making it accessible and understanding your audience. That's really important. It's it's the communication, again, because of the noise that's out there. I've also learned that you can't assume that people actually know things because we're seeing a dumbing down of society, and so things that are for me just part of general knowledge, it's not. So you have to be very clear to set the stage before we start a conversation. And then when we're talking about things like approach to women's protocols and how we're talking about it, we see that everyone thinks that the star of their own movie, but we also know that no one's watching. So when you say something and people are like, but that's not me, you have to remind people that there's this bell curve, right? And so when you're talking generally, this is where we are in the bell curve. And you might be an outlier on either side. So again, it comes back to it depends. Where are you in that bell curve? And if I'm talking about heavy lifting, like we were talking about earlier, give me an example. This is an example for someone who understands what heavy lifting is, has a uh you know, a big background in lifting and wants to change what they're doing to improve their performance and optimize their health span because they're already super active. But if you don't fit in that, then let's look where you are in that bell curve. And maybe you need to phase in, maybe you need to do some more periodization to maximize those effects. So that is something that I've really learned. Like we have to really incorporate that bell curve. Here's here's what I mean for this specific population. This is my niche. These are the women I work with. If you aren't in this niche, then we have to look at how we can phase you into that niche or how we can pull you across. And if that doesn't work, then let's find someone else that's on the same page as you to guide you to where you need to be.

Yeah, well said. Well said. Well, that is that is it from the questions from the from the audience. I thought that was awesome. Well done, Marcella, Scarlett, and Brynn, which are all very cool names, by the way.

Yeah, they are.

So to wrap this up, what's um what's one of your biggest initiatives right now, Dr. Sims, and as an industry, like what can we help you with?

I'm really interested in the whole conversation right now about health span and longevity. Because when we're saying it, it's not taking again, it's missing the mark for women. Because there's so many things that start on the chromosomes themselves that can affect the way women age. And so when we're hearing all this stuff about longevity and what we should be doing, again, it's from the male lens. So I'm really trying to encompass women to understand that we have to again take that step back and I'm digging into the research to see what is going to optimize our health span. So that's one of the big, big things that I'm I'm working on at the moment, as well as trying to help wearable and other data-oriented companies understand that because we see all these things coming out, and again, algorithms aren't right. I'm very worried about the healthcare system because of the algorithms that are trolling through existing data and just reiterating the biases. That's a big, huge project that's going to take many years to get through. But right now, it's really trying to get women to understand longevity that's being put out there and all the books and things that are coming out on longevity. It's still missing the mark for women. So we have to be conscious of that.

Is there anybody you'd like to give props to in that space who thinks doing it really well besides yourself?

I don't think I'm doing it really well. I have a voice, but I have a whole bunch of colleagues who are doing research in the background that I can kind of either take the brunt of haters or be able to, you know, disseminate their message. Boots on the ground, people that I love what they're doing is Abby Smith Ryan and her lab over at UNC. They're doing amazing work. Also see a lot of like Mel Strong with Next Ventures. She's really pushing the narrative in in the fine financial backing world to make sure that it is equitable and closing the gap. Rebecca Rush, as well, from Boots on the Ground in a Sporting Context and her new podcast. They're all helping pushing the narrative to be more aware of what's happening for women in longevity, women in the business world and the research world, and really trying to move that needle forward.

Fantastic. Well, Dr. Sims, it was uh it was a real pleasure. And I think there was a lot of value that we uh were able to extract from you over the last 45 minutes. So I think the industry will say thank you for doing that. And yeah, it's been uh it's always great. Really appreciate all the work you're doing. Uh, any new books or anything that you're you publish recently or promoting? I never I should have asked that in the beginning.

Yeah. Um, we have two books in the works. Celine and I are working on two more books, but I can't really tell you what they're about yet because we just signed the contract. But I am really pushing our next gen course that we put out, trying to get people to understand how to keep girls in sport and keep girls active. I think it's gonna take a lot of of work to break again, break the barriers that the boy is the norm and the girls are the anomaly. We just have to look at it differently. So those are the things.

Yeah.

Awesome. Well, thank you for joining me. I really appreciate it. Thanks for having me. It's always a pleasure. Ladies and gentlemen, Dr. Stacey Sims. Hey, wait, don't leave yet. This is your host, Eric Malzone, and I hope you enjoyed this episode of Future of Minute. If you did, I'm gonna 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 episode because we put a lot of work into it. 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.