Jason McCarthy - GoRuck & The Critical Role of "Social Fitness"

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[00:02:21] We are live. Jason McCarthy, welcome to the future of fitness.

[00:02:24] Thanks for having me.

[00:02:26] I mean, I was just describing to you.

[00:02:27] I've been a fan of GoRuck, I think since I was in a tiny little 800 square foot spot

[00:02:33] in my gym back in 2009.

[00:02:35] We just kind of came across GoRuck as a brand and it's like, this is cool.

[00:02:40] We should get involved in this and we affiliated with you.

[00:02:43] Man, since whatever your reception, I think it was 08, how far GoRuck has come

[00:02:47] as a brand, as a community, as a business.

[00:02:50] It's treat-o's.

[00:02:51] Well done.

[00:02:52] So I'm excited to highlight you here and get into that story a little bit.

[00:02:54] So let's start with this, Jason.

[00:02:56] Give us a little bit of your origin story into how GoRuck got started, your background

[00:03:01] and then we'll just see where that takes us.

[00:03:03] Yeah, sure.

[00:03:04] So I mean, I joined the army after 9-11 because 9-11, I was just after graduation from college

[00:03:10] and you're 22, you're supposed to have everything figured out and I had nothing

[00:03:13] figured out.

[00:03:14] I wanted to do something special with my life, but I didn't know where to start.

[00:03:18] I didn't know what to do and 9-11 provided a moment of just absolute clarity to me.

[00:03:23] I say absolute clarity, but it still took me another two something years to actually enlist

[00:03:28] in a time of war and went through all sorts of crazy fun training.

[00:03:32] It doesn't have to be fun to be fun, right?

[00:03:34] Crazy fun training.

[00:03:35] I learned the way of the Ruck in special forces training where rucking is just the

[00:03:39] foundation of everything that you end up doing.

[00:03:41] You're carrying weight long distances by yourself with others.

[00:03:44] They stack on tactic.

[00:03:45] They make it more complicated because you have to, but at its essence, you have

[00:03:50] to be able to just move weight and don't be weight lighter last.

[00:03:53] And I was doing that at the same time that my wife was in the CIA.

[00:03:56] So she was posted to West Africa when I was in Iraq and, you know, I was in a

[00:04:01] different part of West Africa.

[00:04:02] It was pretty, it was pretty crazy, right?

[00:04:05] In a way that we didn't even realize at the time, crazy and got a couple good

[00:04:08] stores out of it, I suppose.

[00:04:10] But one of them is Go Ruck.

[00:04:12] They came out of it.

[00:04:14] Visiting her in war-torn West Africa, just after having been to war in Iraq, my

[00:04:20] team and I just kind of did what I knew and built her a go bag or what we

[00:04:24] would colloquially call a Go Ruck where, Hey, here's some stuff.

[00:04:26] Put this stuff in and have it with you in your car, at your house, the

[00:04:30] embassy, whatever the case may be.

[00:04:32] And that was really at its core.

[00:04:33] That was taking the special forces way of life, the special forces mindset

[00:04:37] and applying it to more than just special forces dudes, if you will.

[00:04:41] And so that sentiment has sort of endured and led me down a path of, you know, go

[00:04:46] put an ad in Craigslist New York City for a backpack designer because didn't

[00:04:50] really like the bag that I was repurposing for her use and how hard can

[00:04:54] this be?

[00:04:55] All these terrible questions, right?

[00:04:57] That if I knew the actual answer, never would have started to beat down

[00:05:01] the bat, but that's where life magic and mystery comes to the benefit of

[00:05:06] sometimes in our naivete.

[00:05:07] And so, you know, focused on the gear first and kind of that was two and a

[00:05:12] half years out to say 2010.

[00:05:14] And then at that point I had some gear, nobody wanted to buy it.

[00:05:18] I drove around a 48 state, went to small men's stores and other retail

[00:05:22] centers all around the country.

[00:05:24] Drove around with my dog and a couple other people.

[00:05:26] People didn't last as well as the dog, I'll say, other than me.

[00:05:29] And, uh, you know, I felt a tale for another day.

[00:05:33] And, and so, but at the end of the day, it was like, man, this,

[00:05:36] this plan is working.

[00:05:37] Though came up with an event called the go-rock challenge, which was like

[00:05:40] fight club with backpacks.

[00:05:41] Hey, meet me on the street corner at 1am.

[00:05:43] Detail is not worth coming.

[00:05:44] You'd show up.

[00:05:45] I'd issue you a rock and a slab of bricks or a paver wrapped in a hotel

[00:05:50] towel that I stole from some hotel that I probably didn't even pay to

[00:05:54] sleep at, but crashed their breakfast buffet or whatever I could scram.

[00:05:57] They didn't have any money for anything, you know?

[00:05:59] And, uh, you know, those are the places that I go and pay

[00:06:02] this little price at now.

[00:06:03] We're pretty correct.

[00:06:04] Yeah.

[00:06:04] Full circle.

[00:06:06] Yeah.

[00:06:07] But, you know, it was just, and that was the genesis of anything that we've

[00:06:11] done was we brought people together and we had this great experience.

[00:06:15] And I didn't really have a business model, even though I was in business

[00:06:18] school, I didn't really have a, or I didn't have a one that

[00:06:21] I gave a shit about frankly.

[00:06:23] It was more, Hey, you know, I really believe in this, bring

[00:06:26] people together, do hard stuff.

[00:06:28] And we just kept stacking gear against that.

[00:06:31] You got to figure out operations and finance and all that stuff.

[00:06:35] But at its core and of course, still with this very pure, pure

[00:06:39] shing company movement experience revolution, dare I say, where it's

[00:06:45] about bringing people together first and foremost and the rock is

[00:06:48] just the means to that end.

[00:06:50] Yeah.

[00:06:50] I love it.

[00:06:50] There's, there's a lot of to unpack there.

[00:06:52] I think the one of the things I want to get you to expand on

[00:06:55] is the special forces mindset.

[00:06:58] Uh, large majority of people out there listening to this show have

[00:07:01] not been in a special forces, right?

[00:07:03] So how do you describe that mindset?

[00:07:05] Well, it's important.

[00:07:06] I think sometimes to kind of look at the landscape, what people have

[00:07:10] seen or what they might know.

[00:07:11] And a lot of people would say seals and Delta forced and British SAS

[00:07:15] and army special forces and Rangers.

[00:07:18] And you hear all of these kinds of phrases.

[00:07:20] What, where I came from was army special forces.

[00:07:23] And anytime we talk about this, it's important for me from the

[00:07:26] outset to state what I owe, which is everything I owe my life to the guys

[00:07:31] that train me, I owe my life to the guys that fought with me and I owe.

[00:07:36] My future to kind of preserving and paying forward the

[00:07:39] lessons that I learned from them.

[00:07:40] So the question becomes, how can such an experience have such an impact?

[00:07:46] And I w I was thinking I was going to join the army and sort of check

[00:07:48] box, you know, like they did more work too, or, you know, they went over

[00:07:51] they fought and they all came home in a thin boat and like they went

[00:07:53] into do other stuff in life.

[00:07:55] And I didn't realize the full picture that you always pay that

[00:07:59] for, for the rest of your days.

[00:08:00] So the important thing about army special forces though, to kind of

[00:08:03] differentiate is we, we really don't do unilateral operations.

[00:08:08] I mean, it's not just green berets, which is synonymous with army

[00:08:11] special forces going and after a bad guy, right?

[00:08:16] You there's other units that do that.

[00:08:17] You know, the seals famously gotten their, their super secret

[00:08:21] helicopters and went and got bin Laden by themself unilateral operation.

[00:08:25] That is, it's a very, I won't say easy, but the easier part about doing

[00:08:31] unilateral operations is that you train and you fight all together.

[00:08:35] You know exactly how you, how you you're all the same to some extent, right?

[00:08:40] But you will die for the guy next.

[00:08:42] All the time.

[00:08:43] And he will die for you.

[00:08:44] The difference with the green berets, which it's just a different

[00:08:46] complexity, a different challenge not to take anything away from anybody else.

[00:08:50] Our, our mission that we work by with them through partner forces.

[00:08:53] So we go in and we work with local police forces from that country or

[00:08:57] local Afghan, local Iraqi, and we train the trainer.

[00:09:01] We work by with them through them.

[00:09:02] So if we're going after bad guy, they're the first ones in the door.

[00:09:06] We send them in to go and deal with the problem that's in their country.

[00:09:10] And yes, there's, there's, you know, sometimes there's a big house

[00:09:12] and you end up going in the door first, but, but the goal is to, to

[00:09:16] train them and to be communal with them.

[00:09:20] And so that becomes an extension of our community, the community of,

[00:09:24] of a green beret, the 12 man.

[00:09:26] And this is when I boil down the special forces way of life, it comes

[00:09:30] back to this small team and you care about each other, you spend time

[00:09:35] together, you get to know each other.

[00:09:37] This is all in the real world.

[00:09:38] You train together, meaning physical fitness.

[00:09:41] You do tactical training together.

[00:09:42] You jump out of airplanes together.

[00:09:44] You rock together, you run together, you live together, you lunch together.

[00:09:47] You have parties for your kids together on the weekend.

[00:09:50] Your families know each other.

[00:09:51] You care about each other that strengthens the bond and it, it's your

[00:09:55] definition of how a community should operate to me, and then you branch that

[00:10:00] out and say, okay, well, even though I hate the team next to me, they're,

[00:10:03] they're okay right in the grand scheme of things, right?

[00:10:06] And cause they have their community and then you're part of a larger

[00:10:08] community and this is how America is at our best.

[00:10:12] You've got, you know, your, your neighbors like good fences might

[00:10:14] make good neighbor neighbors, but sort of good neighbors.

[00:10:17] And so you have this idea of, okay, well I'm around these people.

[00:10:20] Let's do something that benefit all of us and then spread that out.

[00:10:24] And you've got a great community city state country, right?

[00:10:30] So inside of all of that though, that's kind of some of the

[00:10:33] kumbaya side of all this, which I think is vital frankly, but to be

[00:10:37] a great teammate, you first have to be a great individual.

[00:10:40] And so you have to be absolutely dedicated to the relentless pursuit

[00:10:44] of excellence in everything that you do.

[00:10:45] Good is not good enough.

[00:10:47] There's no room for kind of half measure.

[00:10:49] There's no room for compromising ideals.

[00:10:52] There's no room.

[00:10:52] There's just no room for that team and the regiment can't

[00:10:55] function if that creeps in.

[00:10:57] And so, you know, you're, you're just committed to something that's

[00:11:00] about a lot more than you and you're, you prove yourself to be a great

[00:11:05] individual and then importantly, and this is an important step.

[00:11:08] It's a conscious step.

[00:11:10] You have to submit yourself to the team.

[00:11:11] And once you do that, you're unstoppable.

[00:11:13] Once everybody is in that same boat, you're unstoppable.

[00:11:16] And that's the, that's the beautiful part about taking that with

[00:11:22] right here in my heart, you know, and then giving that out to the world.

[00:11:26] It turns into kind of turned go rock into my love letter to the world

[00:11:31] and the way that we view this and all emanates from, from

[00:11:34] the special forces way of life.

[00:11:36] Yeah.

[00:11:37] Thank you for that.

[00:11:38] That was really a, it was very eloquent description of what, uh,

[00:11:42] what you mean by, you know, special forces mindset.

[00:11:44] You know, a question of curiosity when you, you started the Navy or

[00:11:48] you started the army, sorry.

[00:11:49] Uh, army.

[00:11:50] Do 20.

[00:11:51] Yeah, right.

[00:11:52] Well, right after this, I promise maybe he became a green beret, right?

[00:11:55] So in that journey from enrollment to green beret, was there ever a point

[00:12:00] where you're like, okay, this is the target.

[00:12:02] Like I have a friend, Dave Stillerman high school teammate.

[00:12:05] He knew, I remember him reading like our junior year in high

[00:12:08] school, he was bred at steel team six, right?

[00:12:10] He's like, I'm going to be a seal.

[00:12:12] Like that was it singularly focused, did it work way up the ranks.

[00:12:15] When did you think like, okay, maybe I'm going to be a green beret.

[00:12:19] Like when did that happen in your journey?

[00:12:20] So I backed into it.

[00:12:22] So the first KIA in the post nine 11 world, the war in Afghanistan

[00:12:27] with guy named Johnny Mike span.

[00:12:29] He was in the paramilitary branch of the CIA and there

[00:12:33] were a lot of publicity of his death.

[00:12:36] There was a prison uprising.

[00:12:37] If you remember John Walker, land was it was the American notes.

[00:12:41] Like part of it.

[00:12:42] It was all sorts of messed up, but he died in that and Mike span did

[00:12:48] John Walker, Lynn would later go to jail, but Mike span died in that.

[00:12:53] And I remember there was a lot of press around it.

[00:12:54] And you know, it put a face to the sacrifice into what is being asked

[00:13:00] of people and in the name of our country and what we hold dear

[00:13:04] and the values and I just felt like I needed to do my part.

[00:13:07] So I went through the whole CIA track, the interview process

[00:13:11] and all of that, and you know, I didn't know anything, man.

[00:13:13] I was totally naive.

[00:13:15] And so I came to find out eventually, you know, a year into the

[00:13:18] interview process there that there was this guy in the process and

[00:13:21] they're just great people that work there.

[00:13:23] And he was like, look, we just don't train up our paramilitary

[00:13:26] branch, you have to go to special forces or something.

[00:13:28] And then you come over here and I was like, damn.

[00:13:31] All right.

[00:13:32] So let me get back up on a different horse and figure that out.

[00:13:35] Even then it was, you know, I graduated college and you know, I

[00:13:39] I should quote, quote be an officer.

[00:13:41] And so I went down that path and so many people were going after

[00:13:44] so few spots that it kind of turned into the wars were passing me by.

[00:13:48] It was late 2003, the war in Iraq, which kind of a confusing time for

[00:13:53] me, but the war in Iraq had kicked off and it just seemed like it

[00:13:56] was all passing me by while I just sitting there on the sidelines.

[00:14:00] And I just wasn't comfortable with that anymore.

[00:14:02] So I looked at a couple of the places, you know, um, the seals,

[00:14:07] all the branches and the army had the most kind of attractive offer in terms of

[00:14:11] I could go straight from the street to special forces training.

[00:14:14] The only catch was I had to just keep passing everything.

[00:14:16] What most people end up not doing that was something that at the time,

[00:14:20] I didn't want to talk about what most people don't do.

[00:14:23] I just wanted to kind of get my shot at the title and,

[00:14:25] and see if I had what it took.

[00:14:27] Yeah.

[00:14:27] Interesting man.

[00:14:28] Go rookie.

[00:14:29] You know, so now you start in oh wait, right?

[00:14:32] So it's been 16 years.

[00:14:33] You've been, you've been doing this business.

[00:14:36] In its current iteration, like what are the legs of the business?

[00:14:39] I mean, I know you have apparel, right?

[00:14:41] You have events.

[00:14:42] Like, yeah, give us, give us the full scope of what go Rick is today.

[00:14:45] I mean, big goal.

[00:14:47] Rucking will be bigger than running.

[00:14:48] Carry weight on your back.

[00:14:49] That will be bigger and I can list you out a bunch of reasons we could

[00:14:53] spend hours talking about why that's so good for you, right?

[00:14:58] And it's at the end of the day, it's a kind of a new fitness category,

[00:15:02] but we're not inventing anything.

[00:15:03] So this has gone on since hunter gatherer days all the way through

[00:15:07] the militaries of antiquity.

[00:15:09] It was pest for the Roman Legion.

[00:15:11] You know, it's been proven throughout special operation 22 FAS out of

[00:15:15] Britain that that ported that over to the U S the foundation of

[00:15:20] infantry training it it's been go this is kind of carrying weight

[00:15:24] on your back as a form of fitness and a way to prove yourself has

[00:15:28] been going on forever word is kind of tapping into it and also say

[00:15:32] 10, 20 pounds in your neighborhood.

[00:15:34] That's also rocking and you know, that's kind of part of my

[00:15:37] mission of paying forward what like I think took to have served

[00:15:41] in the military and to now be a veteran.

[00:15:44] I feel compelled to break outside of just that realm, even though

[00:15:47] veterans are near and dear to my heart.

[00:15:49] And if you, you know, we love to support veteran causes and we do

[00:15:53] and we have, I think we're also trained and capable of serving a

[00:15:58] broader mission inside of America would come down to physical fitness

[00:16:01] and community building and all the things that was taught while I was

[00:16:04] in the military, so rocking being kind of where we naturally started.

[00:16:08] And, but on the gear side or sorry, on the business side, we

[00:16:11] started out with gear, right?

[00:16:12] So gear means rucksacks that worked in a sort of fan bags,

[00:16:15] kit carry that way type stuff.

[00:16:17] Right.

[00:16:17] And, and train in the same dirt field, the way of life that I used

[00:16:21] to train when I was in the Q course, which, you know, was how

[00:16:24] we did cross fit in a dirt field.

[00:16:26] And, you know, we had boots on and big bag, big, big backpacks

[00:16:31] and pull up bars and nature sandbags.

[00:16:33] That's how we did, you know, quote crossfit at the time.

[00:16:35] The business though, rucksacks is where we've really kind of driven

[00:16:41] the marketplace because while shoes may be the most important part of

[00:16:44] rucking, if you really get into it, you can't rock without

[00:16:47] burying something and that's been what we started out with.

[00:16:50] The first marriage that we made was with the event side to bring

[00:16:54] people together, 1 a.m.

[00:16:56] details, knock work coming fight club with backpack, the team event,

[00:16:59] you know, follow me type stuff.

[00:17:01] And, and, uh, so in the early days it was rock and it was events

[00:17:07] and the money from the event side was completely chopping up my ability

[00:17:12] to order gear that would eventually come there with this kind of a bit

[00:17:17] of house of cards, unless you're playing it like we played it where

[00:17:20] it was a bad model, but it was kind of financing a good business.

[00:17:24] I think event businesses are basically terrible businesses.

[00:17:26] I mean, if you're out there, I hope that you want to start

[00:17:29] a rucking events business.

[00:17:30] I generally, I think all of them isn't, they're bad, but, uh, anyway,

[00:17:35] we've used it to kind of really double down on people in community

[00:17:39] building and it also got us out there.

[00:17:41] The events are what kind of helped us break through from zero to one.

[00:17:44] And, and then that we were able to sort of more monetize because

[00:17:48] people found out about go rock and we haven't to build really great

[00:17:51] gear that durable, that has a lifetime guarantee as well.

[00:17:54] Right?

[00:17:54] So without the sort of commercial tasks to any of this, like I'm just

[00:17:58] trying to give a little bit more of the, the, the background to say

[00:18:02] that RuckSapps have financed and been the main driver and then shoot,

[00:18:07] I don't know, we started getting some inquiries from other companies

[00:18:10] to kind of partner here, partner there, and we kept running into

[00:18:13] problems with other businesses where a normal company would be able

[00:18:17] to go to an apparel provider and say, Hey, let's partner on this.

[00:18:21] And nobody wanted to touch us because we could build, we

[00:18:23] could actually build gear.

[00:18:25] So if someone made a backpack, they were completely unwilling to work with us.

[00:18:28] So I was like, all right, fine.

[00:18:29] We'll build our own apparel.

[00:18:30] So we found this apparel shop in Boca and Washington at one of the

[00:18:33] best performance apparel shops in America.

[00:18:35] There are not that many, but the ones that have remained

[00:18:38] are really, really good.

[00:18:39] And so that's been a great relationship for about a decade.

[00:18:42] Not extremely scalable to do all your manufacturing in America.

[00:18:45] So we've kind of taken to a hybrid approach on that front and no

[00:18:48] America remains our quality kind of control and development and some scale.

[00:18:53] And then we're able to kind of scale broader units abroad.

[00:18:58] Shoes is a, is an interesting one, you know, for us, I think we got into it

[00:19:03] 2017, I want to say something around, around that.

[00:19:06] So it's been, been a minute and we were in talks with Reebok about

[00:19:10] working with them on the event side of the business and them getting

[00:19:13] behind rocking and kind of doing what they had done for CrossFit,

[00:19:16] Spartan race and some others.

[00:19:19] It ended up just kind of, there were some great people that were there.

[00:19:21] It just ended up not being a good fit for us at the time.

[00:19:24] And, but we kind of got this idea of footwear.

[00:19:27] We'd kind of started to go down that path and eventually the guy that

[00:19:30] was running the advanced concept group who had started to work with

[00:19:33] his name was Paul Littfield.

[00:19:34] He had been a Reebok for 30 years and he's one of us.

[00:19:37] I mean, he's just the, his nose is crooked sideways.

[00:19:40] He's got his thick boss and accent.

[00:19:42] He plays hockey.

[00:19:43] He loved the, he's like, ah, strolling gloves with someone 30 years younger

[00:19:47] than me this morning, cause that's what he wanted.

[00:19:49] It's like, did he want that Paul?

[00:19:50] Or maybe you did?

[00:19:52] I don't know.

[00:19:52] You know, he used to be a power lifter and you know, anyway,

[00:19:56] he'd done a bunch of go-rock events and we just became buddies.

[00:20:00] And those are the fun people to work with.

[00:20:02] And he also did things like invent the Reebok Tomp and he designed

[00:20:05] shoes that have sold over a billion pairs with a B.

[00:20:08] And so he knows what he's doing, which also means he knows he has

[00:20:10] factory relationships you can get into good factory.

[00:20:13] It's a little bit like Good Sellas, you know, when he's talking about

[00:20:15] how do you get the best ingredients at your restaurant?

[00:20:18] Like you got to know the people and stuff from the, into the poor.

[00:20:20] You got to do all this stuff.

[00:20:21] If you're, if you're at the front of the line, then you're going to get

[00:20:23] better ingredients to make a better product.

[00:20:26] And footwear is no different.

[00:20:27] If you're just small and starting out, nobody wants your business.

[00:20:31] And that's kind of across the board.

[00:20:33] Nobody wants your business because you're probably going to go out of

[00:20:35] business and these places are spending a lot of time to kind of start any

[00:20:39] relationship or learn your product.

[00:20:41] And then how many do you want again?

[00:20:42] Oh, you want a hundred.

[00:20:44] I got nothing for me.

[00:20:45] If I'm a factory, like you want 10,000 this year.

[00:20:48] Okay.

[00:20:48] Maybe we'll talk.

[00:20:49] Well, when he starts saying 10,000 units, like you have the cash for that.

[00:20:53] So that's, that's where, you know, we've been able to kind of spread

[00:20:55] the needle with a lot of this because we've never taken any outside

[00:20:59] investment and only minimal inside outside of what my wife and I put

[00:21:03] out of our sort of deployments and stuff.

[00:21:06] And so, so where it kind of puts on a trajectory that's a little bit

[00:21:09] different to kind of rounded the head to toe.

[00:21:12] So you've got footwear, which is a hugely growing segment inside of the business.

[00:21:17] Apparel we've just started to scale overseas.

[00:21:20] So that's starting to, to grow not quickly, but we're just

[00:21:23] because we've had, but where more scale will come from the dream

[00:21:26] that we launched in and gear remains the, the B spot that everybody

[00:21:30] knows us for absolutely.

[00:21:32] And then we're having to kind of educate people that we took the

[00:21:35] same magic thoughts of testing and proving and why to the footwear

[00:21:39] that we did to the gear and that part.

[00:21:41] No matter what you do, then that's hard.

[00:21:43] So events, we still put on, you know, 400 events a year all over the world.

[00:21:49] And that's a fraction of what we used to do.

[00:21:50] So it feels a little bit, sometimes it's a little sad.

[00:21:55] Come on people, don't you want to show up and do hard stuff?

[00:21:57] But we've also kind of decentralized a lot of the activity to Ruck

[00:22:01] Club and Ruck Club leaders who are out there in cities all over

[00:22:04] the country in the world and then, Hey, you know, organize your people.

[00:22:07] Your driveway, you don't owe us anything.

[00:22:09] Just please do it right.

[00:22:11] It's good for you.

[00:22:11] It's good for them.

[00:22:12] And there's the social connectivity and all the values that we hold

[00:22:15] dealer or dear or sort of expressed through that.

[00:22:17] And ever since COVID, I think all or most event companies had kind

[00:22:21] of revisit their assumptions and kind of figure out how to reinvent themselves.

[00:22:25] And we're fortunate that our business is not dependent upon the economics

[00:22:29] of just the events business.

[00:22:31] Yeah.

[00:22:31] Yeah.

[00:22:32] Well, I mean, I can, I can say that most people I know who have an active

[00:22:35] lifestyle, uh, the go-ruck pack, the backpack is just core.

[00:22:40] Everybody has one what you have and it needs kind of be in your, your, your

[00:22:45] class, like it just needs to be part of your gear if you do a lot of stuff.

[00:22:48] I mean, I've had multiple ones and they hold up forever.

[00:22:52] I just recently got a pair of your guys' shoes.

[00:22:54] I love them.

[00:22:55] I've gone through a lot of trainers.

[00:22:56] As you know, I owned a CrossFit gym.

[00:22:58] I've gone through a lot of different shoes.

[00:22:59] I used to sell shoes.

[00:23:01] Feel hot.

[00:23:01] It was a very high quality.

[00:23:03] Well done.

[00:23:04] So I encourage people to, to, you know, like just pick up a, you only need one

[00:23:08] go rep pack, uh, and you'll, you'll have it for life, but you should have one.

[00:23:12] And the events are really, uh, there's something man.

[00:23:16] I mean, I've, as I told you in a different conversation, like Jala Shah's,

[00:23:19] uh, dear friend of mine, she works with you guys.

[00:23:23] She's gone through the kind of the big bad mother of all the events,

[00:23:26] the selection, I actually coached her for four out of six of them.

[00:23:30] Uh, and that was, you know, just getting to know how challenging

[00:23:33] those events are.

[00:23:33] I mean, you know, because you're a three, it was like, man, I can't believe

[00:23:36] I'm writing some of this programming out and you know, she's going to do it.

[00:23:39] And it was kind of a balance of like, don't try everything you can not to

[00:23:44] let her go into the event broken, um, from training, but then again,

[00:23:47] you have to be pushed so hard that you can mentally go through that.

[00:23:50] Maybe talk about that event.

[00:23:51] Cause that's, that's really something of what the selection is.

[00:23:54] And then, you know, give us kind of a cascade of events

[00:23:57] that go, go down from there.

[00:23:58] Well, I'll start off frame this and say we have this event.

[00:24:02] It's the only event we run where we try to get people to quit.

[00:24:05] We've put on 10,000 events to date over 10,000 and we'd put on guys.

[00:24:10] It's 2020.

[00:24:12] It is weird thing where we now put on this is the

[00:24:15] 25th version of go rock selection.

[00:24:17] I mean, 25 times we will have done this as of this year.

[00:24:21] Right?

[00:24:22] This event is not, is not the same as all the others where we try to do

[00:24:26] everything we can to make sure that you, you've finished, we've put

[00:24:28] everything from five K's to 26 twos, the 50 milers do, you know, two to

[00:24:34] three hour workout dial event.

[00:24:36] And those are all very accessible and very doable based upon where you are.

[00:24:40] There is this other event that they would call go rock

[00:24:43] selection that is not accessible.

[00:24:44] And I do not recommend that you sign up.

[00:24:46] And I'm very conflicted about this event, mostly because it drives up some,

[00:24:51] you know, there to be the cadre, the one kind of enforcing

[00:24:56] the standard at this event.

[00:24:57] Like it's, it is methodically ruthless to a standard and most, most, or a

[00:25:03] lot of the classes, nobody finished.

[00:25:05] So the pass rate is sub 1%.

[00:25:07] It's 48 hours.

[00:25:08] You'll have 45 pounds on your back just to start.

[00:25:11] And then, you know, later on in the event, you'll have 120 sandbag

[00:25:15] pound fan bag back on top of that for period or an 80 pound fan bag

[00:25:19] where, you know, you'll end up doing three hours of get ups with

[00:25:23] pack on your back at hour 30 in the event.

[00:25:27] Who knows, right?

[00:25:28] You don't know that's for sure.

[00:25:30] And so, you know, the arc of the event that is largely, you know, a

[00:25:33] lot of people show up and by the first morning there's two or three left.

[00:25:36] And at the 24 mark, there's one or two people left.

[00:25:39] And by the end there's zero or one left.

[00:25:42] And it's just, you know, you have by the end of it, you've got six

[00:25:45] or seven or eight special force cadre.

[00:25:48] I mean, making sure that you're doing what you're expected to do.

[00:25:52] And so how do you know what, you know, what people are capable of?

[00:25:56] It's like, that's the subjectivity of it.

[00:25:57] It's so unfair that it's fair.

[00:25:59] We can look into your eyes, we can look at your soul.

[00:26:01] I mean, winning is the standard, right?

[00:26:04] And so if you start to give up, we start to push harder.

[00:26:07] If you, you know, we can sense it.

[00:26:08] You can just smell it.

[00:26:09] And so at the outset, it pretty simple because there's a lot of

[00:26:12] people and then, you know, once people start to realize that they

[00:26:16] under train or that the person next to them is doing better, then

[00:26:19] they start to play all the games in their head about I should have done

[00:26:21] this and I should have done that.

[00:26:22] And that just peeps in and then you're done.

[00:26:25] Right?

[00:26:25] It's just a matter of time.

[00:26:26] And you're just waiting for kind of the real, the people who have really,

[00:26:30] really trained for this well and have a certain mental aptitude for it or

[00:26:35] mental attitude for it, I should say that they can pass.

[00:26:38] And when I say mental attitude, I don't, I don't mean that to be

[00:26:41] just, Hey, if you have this, you're a better person.

[00:26:45] I mean, it takes a certain kind of person that's not always that great

[00:26:49] in order to pass it kind of an event.

[00:26:51] Like you have to have almost unflappable, which make it's usually people that

[00:26:55] have low emotional intelligence or, you know, they're just kind of

[00:26:59] flat line in times of chaos.

[00:27:01] Like they're able to stay really, really calm and you don't get a

[00:27:04] lot of people that get freaked out.

[00:27:06] You don't get a ranny, you know, it's kind of the same type of person

[00:27:10] that makes it through the Q course where all of a sudden you get all of this

[00:27:15] energy and all of this kind of adrenaline dumps and you're forced to

[00:27:20] perform and then can you still recover?

[00:27:22] Can you say what happens when that were gone?

[00:27:25] And then, you know, you have to keep going and you have to keep

[00:27:27] picking yourself up against no, no matter what the cadre say, because

[00:27:31] it's never going to be planned for you.

[00:27:32] You're just at the mercy of the plan and we've got the plan down.

[00:27:37] We've run through many of these now, it's like clockwork and you

[00:27:40] can just, we almost, and I said almost why you played a game, not rigged.

[00:27:45] We've almost gotten to the point where we can walk around the

[00:27:48] beginning of the event and look into people's eyes, know who's got any shot at all.

[00:27:53] But that's why you play the game.

[00:27:54] Everyone's why you get surprised.

[00:27:55] Yeah.

[00:27:56] Wow.

[00:27:57] Uh, Jason, the word community is thrown around rather loosely nowadays.

[00:28:03] I think, uh, then the fitness and wellness side of things, you know,

[00:28:06] obviously the last four years have changed so much as far as people's

[00:28:09] health, uh, how people are connecting, you know, people work from home.

[00:28:13] Like I, you know, I work from home, but I have to find ways to get out

[00:28:17] and do things with my friends and community and socialize and, you know,

[00:28:21] have those connections.

[00:28:22] You know, I feel like if there's above all things that go Ruck offers, it

[00:28:27] offers healthy community activities that build stronger bonds, friendships,

[00:28:33] relationships, all under, you know, the, the umbrella of doing challenging

[00:28:38] somewhat challenging to very challenging things together.

[00:28:41] And I feel like that's missing quite a bit in kind of our modern

[00:28:44] society is just one man talking.

[00:28:46] But, you know, I want to get your thoughts on like how critical is

[00:28:50] what go Ruck is doing to, you know, for, for really the health of our

[00:28:53] nation, you know, mentally, emotionally, physically, and how, and how do

[00:28:57] you see you guys playing a part in it?

[00:29:00] Well, my personal journey is that, you know, when I was getting out of

[00:29:04] the army, it was, I was like, man, I'm not going to do any of

[00:29:06] that army stuff anymore, not for me.

[00:29:09] You know, because there's this kind of revolts against the detail

[00:29:13] that are let come the waking up at Oh Dark 30, the PT that the physical

[00:29:18] training that maybe I didn't want to do.

[00:29:20] I want to do only the thought I want to do.

[00:29:24] And part of that is just a react into something that is kind

[00:29:28] of you're forced into it.

[00:29:30] And, and, and the interesting thing that I came to find out pretty

[00:29:33] quickly was that, you know, the great part about the army are the

[00:29:38] camaraderie and the people and the time that you get to spend with them.

[00:29:41] And physical fitness is just foundational to all of it.

[00:29:44] When you wake up in the morning and you go meet that meet your

[00:29:47] team and you do PT together, pretty simple.

[00:29:49] You take it for granted until it's ripped away.

[00:29:52] You know, on the weekends we meet my driveway every weekend,

[00:29:56] Saturday and Sunday, anybody's welcome.

[00:29:59] Right.

[00:29:59] We work out for 30 minutes or an hour.

[00:30:02] Yes.

[00:30:03] Right.

[00:30:03] You can do it slick.

[00:30:05] So no body weight or no added weight.

[00:30:07] You can do it with 20 pounds.

[00:30:09] You can do it with a hundred pounds.

[00:30:10] Nobody cares.

[00:30:12] It's kind of show up and do what you're capable of.

[00:30:14] You got kids doing it.

[00:30:15] You got, you know, 75 year old doing it sometimes, right?

[00:30:18] When we're done, we drink some beers and talk about the world.

[00:30:21] And these are, these are my friends and these are people in our

[00:30:24] community that I look forward to seeing at, you know, when we, when

[00:30:27] we bike our kids to school, I see them at drop off when we're, you

[00:30:30] know, at the coffee shop and see them and you end up talking to them.

[00:30:33] When you're at public, the grocery store, it's like, these are

[00:30:37] the people that I run into.

[00:30:38] It's like, Hey, what's going on?

[00:30:39] You know, you know something about their life and they

[00:30:41] know something about yours.

[00:30:42] And while that's not the same as fighting a war and a

[00:30:45] far away land with somebody.

[00:30:47] It, it replicates what, what and who we are.

[00:30:50] And a hundred percent of people, here's a fun stat for you.

[00:30:53] A hundred percent of people come from hunter gatherers, right?

[00:30:57] A hundred percent of hunter gatherers were tribal in nature.

[00:30:59] They lived together.

[00:31:00] They fought together.

[00:31:01] They shared things.

[00:31:02] There was sacrifice for each other.

[00:31:04] And that is core to who we are and to what we need.

[00:31:08] And I don't mean need like, I need my Amazon package to chill up today or

[00:31:12] else I'm going to have a breakdown.

[00:31:13] I mean, need deep inside of the madboss hierarchy of me, right?

[00:31:17] Is this sense of belonging and my take on language matters.

[00:31:22] It's important to read books.

[00:31:24] It's important to get smart.

[00:31:25] It's important to understand how you're, how other people use

[00:31:29] language that might impact or affect conversations and affect them negatively.

[00:31:33] Because just because, just because someone keeps calling their thing

[00:31:37] a community doesn't mean that it is.

[00:31:39] Right?

[00:31:40] So when I hear things like the Facebook community or the Reddit

[00:31:44] community, or kick your online forum, because it's a forum, if it's exclusively

[00:31:50] online, it's not a community, but community is about people coming

[00:31:54] together in the real world, that that is an absolute definition for me.

[00:31:58] It must be in the real world.

[00:31:59] And then there are levels of that, right?

[00:32:02] I personally think that physical fitness is the single greatest way to build

[00:32:08] community across a broad array of people.

[00:32:11] I've seen it through just physical fitness in my driveway.

[00:32:15] I've seen it in the army where it doesn't, nobody cares who you voted for.

[00:32:20] Nobody cares if you're black or white or pink or purple or Democrat

[00:32:24] or Republican or gay or straight or whatever, right?

[00:32:27] It's like, you're just there together.

[00:32:29] You get to know the people.

[00:32:30] You spend time with them in the real world that humanizes them and

[00:32:33] you are humanized to them.

[00:32:35] And that becomes this foundational thing for having real world

[00:32:39] conversations instead of, you know, going on Facebook where you learn how

[00:32:44] to play crush candy and hate your friends, that's not community.

[00:32:47] That is not a community at all.

[00:32:49] That just makes us angry and makes us divided.

[00:32:51] And so coming together with people in the real world with the purpose

[00:32:55] of getting healthier and frankly, I don't really like strength.

[00:33:00] I love to be on my feet, bike.

[00:33:02] I love to swim.

[00:33:03] I love to rock.

[00:33:04] I used to love to run all those kinds of things, right?

[00:33:08] I love all those pick up heavy stuff, move heavy stuffs.

[00:33:11] Well, it doesn't have to be fun to be fun.

[00:33:13] That's an important one, but it's not that I go to yet.

[00:33:16] You know, you get into, okay, well, it's also healthy and I probably

[00:33:19] should do it, but that doesn't mean I want to do it and I don't do it

[00:33:22] by myself, I do it because I have the accountability of the people in my

[00:33:25] neighborhood that I look forward to seeing on the weekend.

[00:33:28] And that's really important to me to, to see them and hang out with them

[00:33:31] and be a part, an active part of our community.

[00:33:35] And so, you know, what we're doing at GORUCK is we're living the life

[00:33:40] and you know, if it's not for you, maybe it will be someday.

[00:33:44] And if more people find out about this or more people get invited

[00:33:48] by their friends, then better, maybe all the better, maybe someday you

[00:33:52] will show up and join them in their driveway or whatever the case may be.

[00:33:56] But we can't sit here and, you know, just preach at people all day long

[00:34:00] and say like, you got to do hard stuff or else or fear-mongering or all that

[00:34:04] stuff, it just doesn't really work.

[00:34:07] I think the important part is to make it meet people kind of where they are

[00:34:12] and live a life that encourages them to join you.

[00:34:16] And for us, it's just maintaining a lot of accessibility to that.

[00:34:20] And sometimes less accessible, like I don't know some of the events

[00:34:24] that we put on are not very, that's okay.

[00:34:26] 24 hour event, no sleep, lots of weight.

[00:34:28] Right?

[00:34:29] Some people need that including me.

[00:34:31] Some people need that, but by and large, the scale of things, you know,

[00:34:35] you're a stranger here, but once we've got stuff you can borrow and if

[00:34:39] you want to do it with body weight, just come join us.

[00:34:42] If you want to tell them.

[00:34:43] Yeah, I love that.

[00:34:44] And I mean, I look at, I reflect on my life and the strongest bonds

[00:34:49] I have with friends, even, you know, let me say my wife, it's, you know,

[00:34:54] they've always become stronger or, or really solidified during times of

[00:34:59] shared discomfort borderline suffering.

[00:35:02] Right?

[00:35:02] Now I'm not going to be the guy that'd be like, Hey, you know,

[00:35:04] you got to go out and like do incredibly hard things like 20,

[00:35:08] like you're talking about like a 24 hour fitness challenge.

[00:35:10] You notice like you can, that's there for you.

[00:35:13] I mean, that's, you know, anybody can give that a shot, but even

[00:35:15] like somebody who, you know, maybe, uh, you know, walking in their first

[00:35:19] five Ks is very, you know, there's a lot of discomfort in that.

[00:35:23] Right?

[00:35:23] You know, if you're doing it with somebody else and it kind of breaks

[00:35:26] down the barriers of what Jason does for a living, how much money he makes,

[00:35:31] what neighborhood he lives in.

[00:35:33] Right?

[00:35:33] Like it just breaks down to this basic human component where

[00:35:37] it allows people to really bond.

[00:35:38] I mean, the strongest bonds I've had are people like I played

[00:35:41] water polo within high school.

[00:35:42] Cause we have one of the hardest, most successful coaches

[00:35:45] in the country of any sport.

[00:35:47] And it was just brutal.

[00:35:48] Right.

[00:35:49] And then, you know, stuff like CrossFit, you know, like you

[00:35:52] look at the end of a CrossFit class, people can say what they want, but

[00:35:55] when people are kind of laid out from drown wedding, right.

[00:35:58] Huffing and puffing.

[00:35:59] They're exhausted.

[00:36:00] You look around the room and you're like, I just bonded with these people.

[00:36:03] I don't care if, you know, he's a Wall Street guy or she's a dentist

[00:36:07] or whatever, it doesn't matter anymore.

[00:36:09] Right?

[00:36:09] It just breaks that down.

[00:36:10] I think having that physical exertion in a group is, is just

[00:36:14] critical to build really healthy bonds, which we all know now,

[00:36:17] you know, with the mental well, you know, health crisis that we have

[00:36:20] in this country that people need connection.

[00:36:22] And one of the things that you mentioned in a conversation we have

[00:36:26] preparing for this is, you know, social, social fitness, right.

[00:36:30] Which I think is a really good name for the category.

[00:36:32] So when you say social fitness, Jason, like maybe describe what

[00:36:37] exactly it is that you mean by that.

[00:36:39] Well, social fitness is just fitness that you do socially with other people.

[00:36:43] Right.

[00:36:43] Which is also core way to build community.

[00:36:47] Right.

[00:36:47] I mean, the community is two or more, right.

[00:36:50] And it in times of need, it can be you and your damn dog.

[00:36:53] Right.

[00:36:53] I've been there, you know, and then as you look out at kind of a health

[00:36:56] pyramid, liken it to those old food pyramids that we used to have, right?

[00:37:00] Like this many servings of this and this and this, you know, I would put

[00:37:03] physical health at the bottom foundational.

[00:37:06] If you are physically healthier, you will feel better.

[00:37:09] Everything it's better to be strong than weak, better to be healthy than sick.

[00:37:13] These are said without judgment.

[00:37:15] These are set as facts.

[00:37:16] Right.

[00:37:17] At the top of the health pyramid, you put mental health.

[00:37:20] I'll put spiritual health and, and anything that goes on in your coconut

[00:37:24] upstairs, mental health, right.

[00:37:25] In the middle and not talked about at all is social health.

[00:37:29] What is the connectivity to anything?

[00:37:32] Right.

[00:37:32] I mean, it's, it's our connection to other people.

[00:37:34] What are you going to think about on your death?

[00:37:36] You're not going to think about how many pushups you could do, and you're

[00:37:38] not going to think about, you know, your mental acuity for processing, you

[00:37:42] know, data and spreadsheets and bank account numbers and all that stuff.

[00:37:46] It's going to be about the relationships that you formed.

[00:37:49] And so that is a social process.

[00:37:52] You need to be around other people to deepen those relationship, do more things

[00:37:56] with them and sometimes they're hard.

[00:37:58] I mean, traveling hard too.

[00:37:59] Right.

[00:38:00] I mean, there's lots of ways to do this stuff.

[00:38:02] It doesn't have to be just exercise.

[00:38:04] We just be more active.

[00:38:06] That's what I kind of tell myself is to have a bias for activity.

[00:38:10] Say yes.

[00:38:11] Right.

[00:38:12] And if you're not getting enough invites and invite somebody else, right.

[00:38:15] Nobody needs anybody anymore or so we think.

[00:38:18] So you don't invite people, you don't ask for help.

[00:38:20] You don't, you know, it's like, it used to be that you'd go to the neighbor

[00:38:24] to ask for sugar or something or whatever.

[00:38:26] If you're out of it now, it's like, Oh, I'll take the, I'll be, I'll

[00:38:29] be right back from the store 45 minutes of your life later.

[00:38:32] It's done.

[00:38:32] You could have gone next door and borrowed some damn sugar.

[00:38:34] You just have to knock on the door or not sugar, pick something

[00:38:38] healthier people, right?

[00:38:40] Whatever, you know, whatever the case may be, but you know, it's,

[00:38:43] it's just that kind of side of it.

[00:38:45] And when you start to think in terms of that, what do you want to invest in?

[00:38:50] The time with your family.

[00:38:51] That's your most important community.

[00:38:52] Right.

[00:38:53] And then you, you branch out from there and, you know, show me your

[00:38:57] calendar and your bank account and I'll tell you what really matters to you.

[00:39:00] Awesome.

[00:39:00] Awesome.

[00:39:01] I love it.

[00:39:01] And you guys have a somewhat recent partnership with CrossFit.

[00:39:04] They've come up a couple of times in this conversation.

[00:39:06] Maybe outline that for us.

[00:39:08] Like what was the impetus for it and what do you guys do with them?

[00:39:10] Well, proudly we've been associated with CrossFit since the beginning,

[00:39:14] you know, those early days of fight club with backpacks mean there was a

[00:39:18] fair amount of outbound hustle for me.

[00:39:21] And then a couple more people when as it grew just a little bit, where

[00:39:25] if we were going to a city, say who are the kind of people that'll do

[00:39:29] this weird fight club stuff?

[00:39:30] And so we, we made a point to contact every CrossFit box owner via any way

[00:39:36] that we could, you know, Facebook call the gym, call whatever the case may be.

[00:39:40] Hey, we're doing this thing.

[00:39:42] We'd love for you to show up.

[00:39:43] I think it'd be good for your box.

[00:39:44] And all of that stuff.

[00:39:45] And, and so in so many ways, GoRuck was kind of built on one community CrossFit

[00:39:51] showing up to do this community building thing that we were putting on.

[00:39:56] And I was really comfortable in that world.

[00:39:57] I mean, I had started doing CrossFit in 2007, 2007, 2008 in the

[00:40:02] special force qualification course.

[00:40:03] Very simple.

[00:40:04] We were in a dirt field.

[00:40:05] It was dark out.

[00:40:06] There was a lot of pushups and pull-up bars and we had heavy

[00:40:09] rucksacks and makeshift sandbags and with rucks in the middle, there's

[00:40:13] runs and sprints and all that stuff.

[00:40:14] It's very simple.

[00:40:15] And, you know, that was new back then.

[00:40:17] It wasn't just go in the gym and go for a run, kind of what it was.

[00:40:21] That didn't apply quite as much.

[00:40:23] So there there's really, you know, as I think back to CrossFit

[00:40:27] and doing that where I was at that point in my life, there's no other

[00:40:31] brand that can, that has that level of impact on my life.

[00:40:35] Like a lot of the guys that I trained with are not here anymore.

[00:40:38] We did CrossFit again.

[00:40:39] You know, they, they died in war, right?

[00:40:41] A war that I was also serving.

[00:40:42] And so there's just this kind of, we bonded together through

[00:40:46] physical training and fitness.

[00:40:48] We got to know each other and love each other.

[00:40:50] And CrossFit was a part of that component.

[00:40:53] And so that's, that's sacred to me, the time that we spent doing that.

[00:40:57] And so we've been around CrossFit for a long time.

[00:41:01] Uh, and you know, CrossFit headquarters, you know, it was

[00:41:05] always kind of a complicated thing.

[00:41:06] I didn't really know how to deal or work with it.

[00:41:09] We had our gear and that was cool.

[00:41:11] And it's like, Hey, we're just sort of around and we're supporters of anything

[00:41:14] that social fitness community building do hard stuff and, you know, Dave

[00:41:18] Castro put rocking in the games in 2019.

[00:41:20] That was kind of our first exposure really to inside of CrossFit HQ universe.

[00:41:26] And, you know, Bill and Katie at Rogue have been friends of ours for a

[00:41:31] really long time, like well before that from their early, early days

[00:41:34] out of Columbus, like there, the, the Rogue headquarters was like an

[00:41:37] hour and 15 minutes from where my dad lives, where I was born.

[00:41:40] Right?

[00:41:40] So I've been up there a bunch and they're fantastic people and friends.

[00:41:44] And so, you know, sometimes life is, Hey, you've got to kind of force something

[00:41:49] or you've got to keep knocking on doors and hustle and all this.

[00:41:53] The way that CrossFit came about was, you know, I kind of go back with

[00:41:56] Don as well, Don Fowler, CEO, military guy, we've kind of been

[00:42:00] in the same circles, we knew each other and CrossFit all of a sudden

[00:42:03] was looking for a new partner for the games and the athletes and all

[00:42:08] of the stuff that they're doing.

[00:42:09] And, you know, we had developed a great pair of shoes that happened to work

[00:42:13] fantastically for CrossFit, the Ballistic Trainers, which allows

[00:42:16] some, some business upside, right?

[00:42:19] To say, Hey, we can help monetize this and figure out a partnership around that.

[00:42:24] And, you know, the apparel is also like, we can do that.

[00:42:28] And, you know, the brand's good, right?

[00:42:30] The brand aligned, the people aligned.

[00:42:32] Then, you know, it's never as simple as, okay, this should work out.

[00:42:36] That's not how the world goes around, right?

[00:42:38] So we had to talk with them about how to form a true partnership because we're

[00:42:43] not, we don't have a bunch of other people's money.

[00:42:45] In fact, we have zero other people's money and we've never had

[00:42:48] any of other people's money.

[00:42:49] So it's, we have to kind of do things a little bit more creatively, you

[00:42:54] know, buy with and through partners, which is where I come from as a

[00:42:57] Green Beret and that it happened remarkably fast though.

[00:43:01] And, you know, it was mostly because it was there easy to talk to

[00:43:05] and, and the culture of our places is similar.

[00:43:09] And so it made it, you know, you know, when you get say, say you're

[00:43:13] working with someone or you're, you're forced to work with someone

[00:43:17] and you see their name pop up on your phone, it's such a telling moment.

[00:43:20] Right?

[00:43:20] He can't lie.

[00:43:21] So can't lie.

[00:43:23] Are you excited that this person is calling or is this like,

[00:43:26] this is going to be just a drain.

[00:43:28] And you know, CrossFit and Don and that crew, I, I looks forward

[00:43:32] to chatting with them and working with them.

[00:43:34] And it's always kind of how can we serve this higher mission together?

[00:43:38] And you know, then you got to build a good business model around it.

[00:43:40] And we have, and we're really.

[00:43:42] Yeah.

[00:43:43] Yeah, that's awesome.

[00:43:44] And that's really funny about like the cell phone test, right?

[00:43:47] When someone's name pops up, we used to do it in the gym or

[00:43:49] we kind of evaluate our clients is like, what's the first thing that

[00:43:55] pops out in your head when you see them walk into the gym, right?

[00:43:57] And they come through that front.

[00:43:58] Yeah.

[00:43:59] You're smiling.

[00:43:59] Are you excited?

[00:44:00] Are you like ducking into the office?

[00:44:02] Like, what is it?

[00:44:03] You know, uh, that's just a really run away.

[00:44:06] Like they're going to talk to you.

[00:44:06] They're going to make your ears bleed.

[00:44:08] They're going to talk at you so much.

[00:44:10] Yeah.

[00:44:11] Whatever it is downer, right?

[00:44:12] Some people just don't have the energy.

[00:44:13] Someone's positive, right?

[00:44:15] Oh man.

[00:44:16] Kind of forced.

[00:44:17] You just can't kind of wait to be around it.

[00:44:19] Great.

[00:44:19] Yeah.

[00:44:19] Yeah.

[00:44:20] It's it is, it is great.

[00:44:21] When you, uh, when you're talking to the fitness industry here, and this

[00:44:25] is one of the last things I always like to cover Jason is like, what are

[00:44:29] the challenges that you're facing currently at GoRuck and then as an

[00:44:33] industry, how can we help you?

[00:44:36] I mean, look, we, we have a big mission and it's one that we believe in

[00:44:41] deeply and it's tied to how we live our lives and, you know, are we

[00:44:46] in a big group of people?

[00:44:48] Are we healthy?

[00:44:49] And I don't just mean numbers at the doctor's office, although those

[00:44:52] are not headed in the right direction.

[00:44:54] I mean, you know, how do we kind of reclaim the path that we're supposed

[00:44:58] to be on like for each of us individually?

[00:45:00] And then that becomes kind of collected.

[00:45:02] How do we have more kind of national, national moments of like,

[00:45:07] Hey, we're in this together.

[00:45:08] And so, you know, instead of trying to become some, you know, smoke

[00:45:13] and mirrors politician or something, we're just kind of starting at a

[00:45:16] grassroots level and saying, Hey, you know, work out with the person next

[00:45:20] to you, put the weight on your back or don't right.

[00:45:22] Go play pickleball.

[00:45:23] You something, right?

[00:45:24] Do something, get more active because there's so much.

[00:45:28] Consumption of other people, algorithm in media right now.

[00:45:32] And it's a very slippery slope.

[00:45:34] Like we are free.

[00:45:35] We are free to stare at our phones all day long and we're free to live

[00:45:39] the life that we're meant to lead.

[00:45:41] And you only have so much time and it's sacred and practice.

[00:45:44] And so it, the choices that we make that the, that

[00:45:47] determine the outcomes, right?

[00:45:49] You don't, you know, the world has a vote.

[00:45:51] You don't like a hundred percent of us are going to die someday.

[00:45:55] Right.

[00:45:55] But we have the time that we have and make the most of it.

[00:45:58] So the biggest threat to our mission is, is just this, this kind of inactivity

[00:46:05] and that kind of Debbie Downer attitude and just like almost people

[00:46:10] silently giving up on too much.

[00:46:15] I think, and I don't say this to be pessimistic.

[00:46:17] I'm extremely optimistic.

[00:46:18] It's just, it's going to take us kind of living the life without,

[00:46:23] I don't want to stand up and preach.

[00:46:25] I just want to kind of share the stories that are working for us and throw

[00:46:30] a party that people want to show up to.

[00:46:31] We have to start meeting people and inviting people to things that

[00:46:35] they're willing to show up for.

[00:46:37] And we got to get a little bit outside of the norm.

[00:46:39] And since the beginning of time, you know, the norm was probably

[00:46:43] not a great place to be in it now is no different when you look

[00:46:46] in the context of history, right?

[00:46:48] We have been a lot more divided than we are right now.

[00:46:50] There was, you know, the civil war, right?

[00:46:52] A lot more divisive in the civil war.

[00:46:55] It wasn't that long ago either, right?

[00:46:57] There was, you know, the sixties and the seventies people getting

[00:47:01] just gunned down in the streets, right?

[00:47:03] I mean, race riots all the time, not to downplay anything

[00:47:07] that's gone on now, very serious.

[00:47:10] But there's been real times of social unrest that has led to

[00:47:15] massive amounts of violence, right?

[00:47:17] And, and just like, okay, everything's not great.

[00:47:21] Welcome to it.

[00:47:22] What, what can we do?

[00:47:23] What can we do?

[00:47:23] Like be a good neighbor.

[00:47:25] Be a good husband or a good wife or, you know, open the world.

[00:47:28] I live in the South, right?

[00:47:29] Like open the door for somebody.

[00:47:31] Hold it open, right?

[00:47:32] It's okay.

[00:47:32] And be okay.

[00:47:33] It's be the, you know, and take care of yourself, right?

[00:47:37] Like that's what I do weird thing with my background because there's

[00:47:42] this virtue of selflessness, but you also have to, you have to

[00:47:46] maintain the machine, you have to take care of yourself to take care

[00:47:49] of others.

[00:47:49] It's like airplane as a kid, I never understood they're like, you

[00:47:53] know, apply the mask to yourself first and then your child.

[00:47:57] I remember as a kid, I'm like, doesn't shouldn't you put

[00:47:59] the mask on me first?

[00:48:01] Right.

[00:48:01] When I was a kid and you become an adult and you're like,

[00:48:04] okay, I get it.

[00:48:04] I would rather put the mask on my kid first, but you know,

[00:48:08] I have to take care of myself as well in order to take care of others.

[00:48:12] And that's for each of us to figure out kind of what that means.

[00:48:15] But I think it's just really important to become really, to, to, to

[00:48:19] remember how much of a gift this is and to have fun doing it.

[00:48:22] And we're kind of just out and after that.

[00:48:24] Yeah.

[00:48:25] Well said Jason.

[00:48:25] And you know, I urge people to, I, I, I, one of the things I love

[00:48:29] about where I live now is this it's small, you know, whitefish

[00:48:32] Montana is small, we have, you know, six, 7,000 people in the winter.

[00:48:37] This swells up to 15,000 in the summer.

[00:48:39] So it's even then to be really small, but the local hyper

[00:48:43] localization of the community, right?

[00:48:45] Like people really focus on their neighbors and what's going on in

[00:48:48] community, local government and things like that.

[00:48:50] And I think that's something, even if you live in New York City, you can,

[00:48:53] you could still be hyper local and work with people and you know,

[00:48:57] just be a, be a better community member.

[00:48:59] So I think that's something you guys provide some glue with when,

[00:49:02] when, when doing that.

[00:49:03] So I applaud you guys and Jason, thank you so much for the people

[00:49:06] want to get ahold of you.

[00:49:07] Jason, you still there?

[00:49:08] Yeah, I'm still here.

[00:49:09] You?

[00:49:09] Yeah, I don't know.

[00:49:10] My internet just dropped, but I think it was my internet.

[00:49:13] Yeah.

[00:49:13] You froze on me.

[00:49:14] I, you never know me and ghosts in machine, but yeah, you, so,

[00:49:18] yeah, well let's just, we'll take it up from there.

[00:49:20] We'll wrap it up there.

[00:49:21] Jason, I really appreciate you coming on.

[00:49:23] I loved hearing the go-ruck story.

[00:49:25] Uh, there was a lot that I actually didn't know.

[00:49:28] Uh, so it was, it was really cool to learn.

[00:49:29] And I think you guys are doing great stuff.

[00:49:31] And like I was saying, I don't know if it got caught

[00:49:33] in the recording, but we lost power.

[00:49:34] You guys provided glue, right?

[00:49:36] Uh, to help communities build and people to form strong relationships.

[00:49:40] So I love what you're doing.

[00:49:42] Uh, I know a lot of people in the industry, especially on the media side,

[00:49:44] uh, really appreciate what you guys are doing.

[00:49:46] So if people want to get hold of you or they want to partner, or if they

[00:49:49] just want to get involved there, um, uh, a direction you'd like to send them.

[00:49:54] I mean, we're at go rocket pretty much all the things you can, you can

[00:49:57] email us it'll funnel for the right place, you know, team at go rock,

[00:50:00] all that, all the things.

[00:50:02] Awesome.

[00:50:02] Awesome, man.

[00:50:03] Ladies and gentlemen, Jason McCarthy.

[00:50:05] Thanks for having me, man.

[00:50:08] Hey, wait, don't leave yet.

[00:50:10] This is your host, Eric Malzone.

[00:50:11] And I hope you enjoyed this episode of future of minutes.

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