One Tech to Rule Them All - Mike Dawson

In the consumer market, like I would love to be able to have my nutrition data coming in from you know from my fitness or whatever that might be, my data coming in from my workouts, my heart rate and stuff, and my sleep all coming into one hub and then giving me prescriptions based on the mass amount of data it has from all the other consumers at my fitness level or at my age, my gender, all these things, and give me prescriptions and suggestions. This is kind of like the concept that hasn't happened yet that I've been waiting for, and it is coming.

This is your host, Eric Malzone, episode number 143. Uh, I talked to Mike Dawson. So Mike is the director of business development over at Push uh up in Toronto. And you know, it's been a little while since uh done an episode on tech, uh, fitness tech. And uh man, I love geeking out on this stuff. And it was a lot of fun. Mike knows it quite well. I mean, he's uh waist deep in fitness technology, and one of the big topics we covered was uh what's next? What's the next big evolution? You can kind of see and feel in the fitness profession that things maybe have gone a little static. You know, we had a big push of different types of uh of tech, you know, a lot of wearables and things like that. Then you start to notice things pull back. And Mike explains uh his theory and why that's happening is people don't know what to do with the data. And now that we're finding ways to um, or people are staffing appropriately to manage the data, what comes next? Right? Uh things like athlete management systems. Fascinating thing to me. I didn't even know it existed, and uh it's really interesting. So I think you're gonna get a lot out of that. You're also gonna learn a lot about um what he does at Push and where they're um coming to the mass market, uh hitting the general population with um some really cool products and services, um, products, sorry, uh upcoming. And uh yeah, so just great information, great talk about tech. I learned a lot and I always appreciate uh all the guys over at Push. Um they do a great job up there. So without further ado, let's get into it. Actually, more further ado, uh, if you haven't yet, go to Elite Gym Insiders, uh, free Slack community for anybody who's a fitness entrepreneur, uh, gym owner, business owner, online, whatever it is, uh you want to get in there and be part of that community. It's a great place to network and learn, um, meet great people and uh look for partnerships and you know, joint ventures, all kinds of things that uh that we do. And you'll you'll see people like Mike Dawson in there as well. So uh yeah, go to elite gyminsiders.com, fill out the application, let me know if you have any questions, and uh we'll get you in there and we'll start chatting some more. And uh you'll get some discounts on great products and services upcoming, and you'll be glad you did. So elitegiuminsiders.com. Now, without further ado, episode number 143 with Mike Dawson of trainwithpush.com. Enjoy the show. All right, and we're live. Mike Dawson, welcome, man. Hey buddy, how are you? I'm doing great. I'm doing great. Um greetings uh to you from from Toronto, uh, another Canadian, which uh every time I think I've I've interviewed uh at least five Torontonians. Is that is that right? Toronto?

Yeah, yeah, let's go with that.

Yeah, it is now. And it's it's always interesting to me to see like uh you know what what Toronto is all about, which a lot of people I think in in the states don't really pay a whole lot sounds terrible, a whole lot of attention what's going on in Canada, and they should. Um I go in and out of Canada all the time, but you know, what's going on in Toronto is is special as far as like uh the technology scene there and how it's booming. And um, so you know, knowing that you know, you're in the middle of the tech, uh, well, in fitness tech, especially. Um, you know, it's it's gonna be a great conversation. People can can look forward to that. So uh Scott, um I mean Mike, sorry, uh I was just talking to a Scott. Do me a favor, give me a background, give us your little bit of story, how you got to where you are with push and and and all that.

Yeah, um, so I guess from a general fitness, you know, how I've kind of gotten into the space. Um coming in from, you know, at a young age, obviously I played sports my whole life, just as probably most of us or any of the listeners did as well. Um, but coming into lacrosse and hockey were my focus. And then when I turned around 16, lacrosse had the better chance of getting me to where I wanted to go at a high level, so I ended up focusing all my time on that.

Yeah, it's a booming sport, right?

Especially in the US. Like in Canada, in Canada, it's it kind of has its ebbs and flows because it's been so popular for a long time. It's always been like a pretty popular summer game, obviously being the national sport uh for summer here. And uh, but in the US, the explosive growth, I mean it's the fastest growing sport in the US for the past several years. So cool. Um, yeah, that's also kind of reflected on Canada and some improvement here. But um, yeah, so when I was, I think as soon as my dad let me start working out, I started uh hitting the gym. And that was obviously more kind of your typical just uh basic strength training. Um, you know, probably around the age of 14 or so. But I always trained pretty heavily uh for sport and uh and specifically obviously for lacrosse. And I I ended up actually joining, I remember I joined uh, or my dad met a guy through work who was running an Olympic lifting gym out of his barn. And uh he took me there, and I was kind of like, you know, this is way before Olympic lifting was cool and part of CrossFit CrossFit didn't even exist. And uh I went there and remember just being like, oh, I'm not really into this. I was like 15, and then a year later, I was like, you know what, take me back there. I think that might be cool. And I started training competitively, and I was and this place was called Fury Weightlifting, and it was called Fury because there was an old Plymouth Fury car in the middle of the gym that he would work on while we were lifting. Uh it was like so old school and badass, and uh, I mean now Fury still exists. I mean, the Dallas Santavi, who is a Pan Am uh competitor, now his son Bodhi Santavi is the top Olympic lifter in this category in Canada and uh is holds a couple records and is a junior kind of phenom. So um I kind of trained in that world for a little while, and then I started as I progressed in my lacrosse career, I started finding that fitness in general was almost as important and looking toward the off season to train hard again was almost as important as the sport itself. I just have always kind of been obsessed and started self-educating when you know as T-Nation was my homepage from like 16 till you know 20 young 20s. But uh I love it. Yeah, yeah. So uh so yeah, I just uh I've always just been passionate about the space. Uh went off to college, ended up playing or staying in Canada for college. Uh, I was looking at going to the US for a long time, but ended up staying here, won a national title uh in lacrosse here, and then uh and kept playing. But uh once I actually, you know, to get to push, I moved out west, uh West Canada, was working there, and I've always been kind of a serial inventor and an entrepreneur. And I was looking to actually launch a business doing what push does. And as I started kind of doing my due diligence and looking at the space and who would I be competing with, I found these guys at Push uh here in Toronto, and uh, you know, they were at like Indiegogo campaign stage. So they were obviously ahead of me. I was just like in idea, uh, idea phase. And uh at that time I figured, man, like uh if you can't beat them, join them, so I might as well just join these guys. I always plan to move back east. And so I just kind of earmarked it and figured uh you know, when I moved back to Toronto a couple of years from then, this is back five, six years ago, I would call them up, and that's what I did. So I launched my own business kind of in the meantime while I was living at West. And when we moved back here, essentially, as soon as I got back here, I called up Push and was like, I need I'm gonna come work for you now. And uh it's a it's actually kind of a funny story and probably a good story for anyone out there looking for jobs. But when I reached out to them, I got in touch with their kind of HR. I mean, it's a small, we're a pretty small company, so it's kind of their HR slash operations girl. I was like, hey, like I'm gonna come work for you, I'm gonna kind of run your sales and even strategy and help you guys build this business. And and uh she's like, I think we're good in that category. And um, I'm kind of like, okay. Uh so I ended up what I did, I think uh, so it wasn't getting through to anybody at first. And uh I went to the gym and just made this ridiculous chipper workout and uh and I named it whatever, and I took my GoPro and I made a video that showed like the push job application is what I titled this workout on the chalkboard, and then I just went through it, sped it up, put it to music or whatever, and tweeted at them and said something along the lines of, you know, I work even harder outside the gym or something, something corny to that effect. And uh I remember it was like 14 minutes later or something. Chaps uh who you've had on the podcast before called me up and then we chatted, and I think I had a you know, I started working with them, you know, a few days later. So um yeah, it's just funny. It was a good way, I guess it worked to uh to get through because I mean uh we get people reaching out. We're in the sports tech industry, everybody wants to work here, right? So yeah, uh I hit pass or even delete without reading on infinite you know applications and people trying to reach out. So sometimes you gotta do that to get in touch. But that's kind of what led me here. So I've been now with push for two and a half years, and uh, you know, now we're doing some some kind of some pretty cool stuff.

Yeah, what a great story, man. It's so funny. It's like uh, you know, how bad do you want a job? Like you decided I want that. Like, and I'm I'm not basically I'm not gonna settle for anything else, right? Yeah, yeah. Like if you show that kind of conviction, most people just give up so quickly. They're like, well, I applied online. Uh and then it just doesn't work. Uh there's too many applications, and uh it's all about who you know and and how bad you want it and how you can stand out. It's really awesome. There was like uh I used to be a recruiter, was my first job out of uh out of school. And I remember like I would look at hundreds of resumes, like you know, on a given day, a hundred resumes, right? And it just they all start to blend into one. And then I remember it was like someone sent me like this one that was it was in a big red cylinder and it looked like a stick of dynamite, and uh and I was like, what the is this, right? And and then I'm I opened it and I looked at it and it was like, hey, I'm a real firecracker, right? And I was like, wow, you know, like and back when that was back in the day we had social media and all that, and I was like, you know, what a what a brilliant lesson that was. It's like you really gotta do anything to stand out because people uh that's awesome, man. So when you said that you wanted to get into tech like what push does, are are you talking about like um velocity training? Um, like what what how like in what way?

Yeah, more specifically, no, I wouldn't say necessarily velocity-based training. I would actually at that time I wasn't familiar necessarily with the concept of velocity-based training that even in the past three years has exponentially grown. I mean, it was once known by a few select high-level strength coaches, right? Um, at the time, like probably most listeners and yourself, it was kind of when every day a new Fitbit type device was coming out, and I was kind of pumped when that whole trend started happening, kind of the wearables trend in the fitness space, um, you know, fired me up as someone who's interested in tech and obviously in fitness. Uh, and then I'm just realizing every single one does the same thing. It counts my steps at the time. It was step tracking and then heart rate kind of came and then GPS. I'm not an endurance athlete. I mean, sure, I do, you know, I've done CrossFit heavily, uh, but I'm not a distance athlete. And so steps is irrelevant to me. I'm at a level of fitness, like you know, many people who spend enough time in the gym that none of that is relevant to me. And so I was always just like, man, where is the tech uh for me and for this massive group of people that I come and see working their asses off in the gym every day? There's nothing. Um, and I would argue that still to this day there's nothing. Uh, but that was what I wanted to build, and push was kind of building toward that, and we're building toward that now in the consumer space. But I've always just been longing for that technology that finally caters to the massive audience that doesn't just go on the treadmill or ride their bike for 10k.

Yeah, yeah, it's it's interesting, right? Because like what is the what are the metrics that you look at for that type of of training? And that was, you know, with James Fitzgerald, who you know uh as well, you know, we talked about this years ago. It's like, well, what what are we tracking, right? Because you look at any given workout, like um, I don't know, let's use like a benchmark, like uh not Fran, because that's just too high intensity, like a um Kelly, I think it is. It's like box jumps, wall balls, running and something else. Like you look at each one of those, right? Like you get some, you know, you have some, I guess it doesn't have any weight training, so it's not that good. But if you had like a heavy thing and you had to run and then you had a body weight movement, the way your your heart rate varies within a specific workout, and you know, the way you're switching from anaerobic to aerobic to, you know, there's there's no like what what metrics are you guys looking at? Because it's it it's it's a mystery, and I think once it's solved, people will just flock to it. Like, what is that one or two or three, you know, KPIs for lack of better term that help with that?

Yeah, and that's kind of what I've been spending all my time kind of looking at lately. And so uh, I mean, you look at something like Orange Theory that's built an entire business on heart rate. Uh, and heart rate's obviously an important, uh, an important metric to track, and their business model has a lot of merit, um, you know, putting you in certain heart rate zones, and that's great, but that's an internal measure of exertion. And to your point, uh, if me and Rich Froning were to line up for the same workout, our heart rates are gonna be vastly different for doing the same amount of work. Um, and so uh, yeah, okay, you want to get us both into the red, which for him is doing a lot more external work and moving load a lot, hell of a lot faster than me. Uh, but what about measuring the rest of it and what he's doing externally? Um, and so that's sort of the nut that's not been cracked is is measuring external exertion. So, like looking at even a business model like an F-45, um, that you know, they do now have their own proprietary heart rate, similar to what Orange Theory does, but uh, you know, they're kind of if I go to that class, I don't know how many reps I did. I don't know, you know, did I go hard or not? I really am just judging by how much I'm sweating and how deep is my breathing, but they have cardio and they have strength, and which one kind of hit me in what ways? All these types of questions aren't really being answered. Um, and so with push, actually last year in 2018, we launched uh a subsidiary brand and kind of a uh a project that ended up being a bit of a proof of concept of what we're capable of building called Nexus. And we used the CrossFit audience specifically. And essentially all we did was we took the exact same hardware, like our push band uh wearable device, and in the ProSpace it's used to measure velocity of every single rep and the power output. These metrics to your average Joe or even a CrossFitter, really not that relevant. I don't really care how fast I clean if I'm doing hover cleans in the CrossFit space. Um, but that being said, the data that's being collected for us to give velocity and power in the Pro space can be applied to metrics that are far more broad in general and easily actionable by that audience. So with Nexus, you know, we created metrics like uh your total work output. So uh, you know, that was measured in kilojoules, but that could be converted to calories uh in terms of expenditure uh and moving load across distance, whether that's a bar or your body or the wheel of a rower. Uh, you know, we did things like work-to-rest ratio, so how much time you spent working compared to your bent over, catching your breath or grabbing a drink or even chatting or you know, for some people who maybe aren't going hard enough. Uh your round splits, so any endurance athletes used to see in their mile splits, you know, we could do uh you know round splits. These types of metrics are far more easily uh actionable. Uh obviously they're very cross-fit-esque, uh, and that's kind of what we did at first, but it proved out that model. And we had to develop new IP uh that's never been created by any company before, where uh you know, in the pro space, it's kind of you know, get down the bench press, click the band to start a set as you as you're ripping off uh reps of bench, it's giving you velocity live, uh collecting that data, and then you click when you're done, then you take your one, two minute rest. Uh that's the SNC model in CrossFit. I need to be able to do a 20-minute METCON where I'm not looking at a phone, I'm not gonna be messing with clicking any buttons, I just need to go. Uh so we needed to create new sets of algorithms, a new machine learning engine that could differentiate and tell as you move from the rower to the pull-ups to the barbell uh without any need to do anything. So ubiquitous to your training, and then post-workout provide a breakdown of how you you kind of attacked it so that next time you can say, you know, my cadence on my wall ball is absolutely cratered. Uh, I need to break those sets up a little more, things like that. Um, and so that's what we built. And essentially it was, you know, those metrics are an example, though they're kind of cross-fit-esque and maybe even a little too high, you know, high intensity or high level for the average Joe. If that proved out that this tech could be applied down the chain to the broad consumer fitness market, and now that's kind of uh, you know, what we're looking at doing is creating even more general metrics and creating a new system leveraging pushes capabilities uh to come to the broad consumer market.

Yeah, awesome. Yeah, I'm curious, and you guys probably know this research. I mean, I know roughly how many CrossFit affiliates there are worldwide, but do you have any like a general guess? Because it would be hardfelt, but how many CrossFitters? How many like designated people who are really um you know have committed to a CrossFit workout regime for you know any given period of time, let's say like a year? Like do you guys have any ideas on what those estimates would be?

I used to be able to rhyme them off when I was kind of deep in the in the hole of kind of CrossFit when we were building up Nexus and kind of figuring out what we're gonna do with that project. Um I can't say it offhand, but I know you know CrossFit now we'll talk about in the realm of say 15,000 affiliates worldwide. I mean, if I I would say they never like to talk about it, but everybody knows that there's probably another 30% of unaccounted for that are not affiliated with CrossFit, but they're CrossFit gyms, functional fitness gyms. Um, right. And if every one of those has a hundred or a couple hundred athletes, I mean, there's got to be a good, you know, 20 plus million people that would say they affiliate with functional fitness.

Yeah.

Um so yeah.

I was gonna ask, I was gonna say like somewhere between 25 and 50 million. Right? Probably. Um, I'll have to do that research too. So you've um, you know, being deep in the world of tech in in the fitness realm, what besides what you guys are doing at push, but what else excites you about tech in the in the fitness field?

Yeah, there's so much, there's so much going on right now, and there's been a lot of change in the past, call it uh even like three years. Um what was and and really there's a lot of um there's lots of parallels in what's happening in in pro sport compared to now the consumer market. And I've made the comparison to you before because you know, we all are used to seeing like drones and other technology that was in military first, and then it makes its way down to consumer. The same thing happens in sports tech, where instead of military, it's more at the pro level. Uh, you know, it's in the NFL, it's in you know uh Premier League uh soccer, all these things, and then eventually it makes its way to uh Gold's gym and you know, maybe in a different form factor. But that's kind of the trend that typically happens. And back, oh, I would say three years ago or so, there was kind of a time where every single pro franchise had kind of had these initiatives where they were told go out and get data, data, data, data. That was the focus. They all went out and got, you know, sure, there's lots of platforms that have a lot of value, like catapult and GPS, and all these other things, but they were just collecting data points across the board. And then it kind of went like this, and then it hit this peak where they all realized um we don't have anybody on the data science side and we don't even know what to do with all this data. And they'd spent a bunch of money, and then it's sorry, it went completely the other way, where they're like, man, saw all this off. Let's bring it back down to kind of bare minimum that we need, and then slowly build back up more responsibly. And it seems the whole industry has learned that lesson. Now that most teams have like a data science guy in place. Um, and so that's kind of trend happened, and I would say it kind of coincided with the consumer market and the wearable space. If you remember, you know, it was ridiculous the amount of wearables that were being thrown out to the market for a while there. Um, and it's definitely come down and kind of we battled that at push where the consumer market got just overblown with all these promises, especially companies that were coming that never ended up even watching anything through you know, crowdfunding campaigns saying they were gonna do just the most ridiculous scientific things and never even close. Most people in the industry knew it wasn't possible, but there's just so many promises. So that trend has all kind of ended. And now the companies that are remaining, I mean, even in our space, there's been three companies that have tried to come competing with us that have, you know, closed their doors or might as well have. Um it's just, you know, it's difficult. Um, and to do something that actually brings value is is tough. And so that's kind of all happened. And now it seems that the kind of trend is, you know, the right companies are still in place. New companies are coming out that uh have seen what's happened to the ones that failed, so they're coming out a lot more responsibly. The backbone in proper uh sport science is almost a must. Uh, even if it's not part of your brand, if you're not valid, then you go the way of the Nike fuel band, right? The fuel band came out with Nike's marketing, which is a ton, uh was pretty cool in concept, and it gave one number that you were either higher or lower. It's very easy to understand. But as soon as the world found out that it had very little in sport science and the metrics weren't all that valid, it it it quickly died off, right?

And so what was that metric? I mean, I don't even know what the fuel band is.

It was like fuel points, and it was just a metric based on like a combination of heart rate and activity and steps in general, and kind of combine those to come up with a metric that you were, you know, you're either doing more activity or or less, and it was kind of a point system. But it's uh but we've seen that happen multiple times. Um, you know, if it's not steeped in the back end in proper sports eye and it's not valid, it ends up eventually consumers catch up. Um I was just listening to a podcast about microbiome and and the things in probiotics that are happening right now where every single company, like dove soap, is saying making ridiculous claims about you know, it doesn't affect your microbiome of your skin. It's like there's no science, but marketing always leads before science. Marketing will just spew it out, consumers will buy it up, and then eventually it catches up, right? But um, yeah, so in the fitness space, fitness technology space now, uh, like there's a few things I'm uh I would say I'm kind of excited about. Um the big sort of the big one in general concept is that I still think that there is a ridiculous amount of data coming to consumers without any actionable insights. So even with the Apple Watch and some of the companies that are kind of leading the charge and doing, I'd say, the best in the industry, it's still a lot of here's your heart rate, here's your heart rate variability, here's your sleep score. And people are supposed to just kind of understand that's good or bad. Um, there's so many companies showing heart rate variability around as a buzzword uh without saying this is good or bad. So people are just like, they don't understand why am I even collecting it. So now what's going to happen, and what I'm excited for is sort of the prescriptive side of bringing in this data to now that kind of AI and machine learning has kind of been built up and there's a lot more accessible uh technology in that realm that companies can can do using all that data to make prescriptions. So that's the biggest thing that that I'm looking forward to. Um in the pro space, people probably aren't familiar with, but there's something called uh athlete management systems or AMSs. Uh and these companies or these these platforms are bringing together data from you know your GPS on the field, like your catapult, your your doctor, uh sports science doctors on the team and what they're doing for medical uh you know checkups on the players, uh, your functional movement screens, all these different things are all coming into one hub. And every player has a profile. It's very easy for them to see what all these things that encompass what this athlete is up to and how he's he or she is doing. Um, I am thinking, I'm waiting for that to come to the consumer market. Uh, it's been in the pro market for a long time. There's a lot of companies that have come and gone and some new ones coming now. But in the consumer market, like I would love to be able to have my nutrition data coming in from my fitness or whatever that might be, my data coming in from my workouts, my heart rate and stuff, and my sleep all coming into one hub, and then giving me prescriptions based on the mass amount of data it has from all the other consumers at my fitness level or at my age, my gender, all these things, and give me prescriptions and suggestions. This is kind of like the concept that hasn't happened yet that I've been waiting for, and it it is coming. Yeah, that's one good thing.

Yeah, that's really interesting, man. I've been um I've been talking about something similar for a long time, you know, almost like a you know, one dashboard like to to rule it all, where all the stuff that the biometrics and and all of that that are being um taken in can be easily digested by people and and then they know what to do with it. Actual, you know, actionable uh items that they can take into their life. And that's interesting. And I I had a very fascinating conversation. I had an old friend visiting me um over the last four days, and uh he's been working at Verizon for 19 years. He just took uh he took a very nice severance package. Now he's got uh about a year and a half to figure out what he wants to do. And uh very smart guy, very well educated. And he's like, Well, you know, what he's doing is he's taking two months and he's just reading and researching. That's all he's doing and traveling. Um he's got you know, he's got two kids at home, so that obviously keeps him busy as well. But that's his primary focus from occupational. So I was asked, I'm like, well, dude, you know, what are you gonna do? Like you he can literally probably go anywhere. And so he's trying to pick the field he wants to go into, and he's like, uh, data. I want to go into data. And I'm like, God, that sounds so boring. He's like, it's not. He's like, once you once you get into the data, know how to organize it and pull the information out that you want that you're looking for, it's just it's so powerful. He's like, everything's about data and uh and how you manage it now because there's so much. I mean, God, like I mean, apps I'm I have on my phone right now, they're collecting data on me all the time. And you know, it's it's crazy what what we can do with it. And you look at all the different um, you know, biometrics that are coming out, you know, you mentioned a bunch HRV, um you know, sleep, um, you know, genetic profiling for nutrition, uh, all this stuff. It's like individual pieces of tech that are coming out, but it's like what's going to unite them all. And it sounds like the AMS is the thing that we're looking at for something similar to that. Who are some of the leaders in that field right now, Tino?

The AMS field. Oh man, there's there's companies like uh, I mean, there's there's so many Coach Me Plus, Kitman Labs, Kinduct, um, Smartabase. Those are some of the big names in the pro space. Um, there's a new company coming right now that's backed by Microsoft that we're working with uh called Empiricus. Um they're they're they're interesting. Uh what they're coming up with and and bringing to market real shortly, and they're just kind of coming up with their first couple pilot programs in universities, um, essentially is doing what I've been hoping to see done. It's gonna focus first on kind of the elite world and kind of the broad like health market because it's bringing in data from your uh your EMR, like your uh medical record, your your digital medical records from hospitals and your your whole history all into one hub that you as a person own. For example, you know, if somebody gets an ultrasound and they go to a different doctor, someone who's pregnant goes to a different doctor, all of a sudden that doctor doesn't have their ultrasound. It's like, why don't I have my own ultrasound? It's my ultrasound. Yeah, right. It's ridiculous. None of us have our own stuff. It doesn't make sense. So this is putting it in your hands. And the big reason why people don't have it, a lot of it is security. So this company is steeped in security, hence why they're backed by Microsoft and focusing heavily on that side. But um, that is one company that's kind of coming, and there's a couple others that are trying to get into this space and do things differently because it's been a little bit stagnant. Um so yeah, yeah. But I mean, you know, you mentioned all these metrics being split up and and you know, being on your phone. It's like a perfect example is app the Apple Watch will look at your sleep, and Apple's latest iOS release looked at screen on time and being able to limit it and kind of do things like that. You know, why not correlate the amount of time you're spending on your screen and how close it is to bedtime with that sleep data? That seems pretty obvious and simple, but again, no one's bringing this together to give insights.

Yeah. Yeah, there's interesting that I had the guys, um, I don't know if you know Tonal. Um, it's uh home workout equipment. It's all um, you know, it's uh electromagnetic resistance based weight training at home. Yep. And you know, the plans they have. Yeah, yeah. Um, really, really great conversation. And and you know, we had, I don't know if it was on air or off hour, but we're talking about like where where can all this go? And um he's like, Imagine, you know, imagine something where you wake up in the morning, um, you know, you've whatever this AI is is takes in like your 23andE results and knows your sleep and knows your HRV and knows all these things, right? Um, and then so we can say in the morning, we're like, hey, you know, you didn't get enough sleep, your HRV's running high, you know, you're you seem stressed out, um, your nutrition hasn't been on point. Let's uh let's let's take the workout back a little bit and we'll just wax and we're just gonna serve you up a breakfast of you know granola and yogurt, right? Because that's the last thing for you. And then, you know, when you can today take a 20-minute nap. Like a map I'll like mind ex blown, right? I'm like, oh god, like is that where we're going? Is this the full on jetsons that we're gonna be living in in like the next 10, you know, 10 to 20 years? And it could be. I mean, it's all I think all the tech is there, but you know, once again it comes down to the point of like who's pulling it all together and what are they doing and how are they making it digestible, right? Exactly.

I think that's the utopian future that uh anyone in the fitness tech or even wellness tech space is waiting for, and and it will come, it's just a matter of who's gonna be the one to pull it all together because it's a beast of a of uh you know project or business to take on that needs significant funding and and cooperation with every company who's collecting data that is willing to share um, you know, and egos to be put aside in that respect in some way. So I mean, it's a beast. So there's a reason it hasn't happened yet, but it will happen.

Yeah. Yeah. And you, I mean, I do see in in the tech world, and you're you're in it um, you know, knee deep compared to what I am, but it does seem like people are sharing, you know, concepts and ideas. Like it's more of a free open space, right? Like, didn't Elon Musk release all of his plans to the world?

Yeah, I mean guys like that have kind of helped, right? But it's even uh like uh URSA this past URSA uh in San Diego this past year, um that was the trend. Uh I wouldn't say anything was particularly jaw-dropping at the conference, but the trend that I noticed the most was that every single booth was talking about or every company is talking about open APIs, two-way APIs, pull our data in, we'll pull your data in, we want to play nice. That's kind of the trend. If you're not open to giving your data to other companies who want to use it or pulling in others, you're dead. Um, that's just luckily the trend has happened that way. So that's the start, uh, you know, a good start to kind of opening everything up.

Yeah. Explain to people who may not know what is an API.

Yeah, right. So it's uh essentially all it is is uh a way for me, it's sort of like your receptacle for me to plug in the data from you know, your company is pulling all this data from on field. I need to be able to have that data in a way that it can automatically integrate uh with my system and what data I'm pulling, and then put all that data together and do whatever it is we want to do. Um so essentially it's just from a tech standpoint, uh sort of that plug uh to make sure you know you got the right uh plug on both sides that can pull that data in in real time. Um so essentially, companies, some companies will not have an API or it'll be closed or it's not of the openly available, uh, or you have to pay for it and heavily in order to pull in their data. But that trend is kind of changing where now it's sort of like uh, you know, some companies are even just making it publicly available. Come to our site, here's the link to to plug that into your code. Um, and so that's kind of seems to be the way things are going.

So here's a big question, Mike. What does this mean for the fitness industry? The you know, um atypical fitness professional, right? What what do you what do you think the next 10 to 20 years has in store for that profession?

Yeah, I mean, it's interesting. I know the you know, the quote unquote personal trainer space uh sometimes talks about you know some fear of uh of some technologies taking over jobs and these different things, right? But I don't know, I uh I don't really see it that way, and maybe one day, but I think we're really far away from that because the one thing that no system can do right now, and I can't see happening for maybe ever, is critiquing form. Uh you know, sure there's a level of motivation technology can provide by giving you different metrics and maybe even you know some systems out there that are you know real-time people that can see you digitally and give you that feedback live while you're training. Um, but I think the biggest thing is form and a bit of that motivation. And there's something to be said about being in person. Um I like the ideal use case where there's something about being at the gym that for me personally, I don't think can be replaced. There are a lot of people out there though that don't want to take that 10 minutes to get their bag ready, the 15-minute drive, the change in the change room for five minutes, and then they're all doing the same thing on the other side, you know, that makes a 45-minute workout, an hour and a half. That's why systems like Peloton and others that have come to the market is a pretty attractive value proposition. Um, so I think that that trend is gonna continue. That is the space that we're looking to play in and get involved because our technology is the only tech in the world that could, from a weight training or you know, uh physical training off the treadmill or the bike or the rower, where we can actually monitor everything that you're doing. So Tonal's doing it with their specific machine on the wall. You know, we can do that kind of that monitoring and that real-time feedback and collecting that data. We can do that with, you know, moving whatever load it is you want, your body weight, kettlebells, bench press, whatever you have at home. Um, and so we're looking to play in that space as well. But I think there's a lot of companies out there that they know that that is growing, but they're also quite confident that people will still come into their brick and mortar location. They'll still come into the gym. I mean, that's how Peloton got off the ground was opening brick and mortar. They could, Peloton was not growing and things were not taking off. And John Floyd, the founder, has talked about this at length. But uh, you know, what made it take off was they opened a couple studios where people could come and get the experience. Uh, and that's what helped, right? So there's always a place for brick and mortar, it's just changing from just a store to an experience and these different things, right? So the I think the fitness gym is changing in the same way where you know I think that companies are gonna come where they can use technology like our like ours and like heart rate, what's being done by the Orange Theories of the World, and combining that to make an experience that is specific to that style of training. If it's high-intensity interval training, we could have metrics and different feedback happening live that helps you get the most out of your workout, and then you know, post-workout analysis that helps you come in the next time and work on the right things. Uh, but you still need that coach to push you, you still need that to, you know, that help with learning skills. Uh skill learning is gonna be really hard just with a video. Um, and so that's kind of where I think things are are kind of going.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think the big thing that um tech may never solve is empathy, right? You know, just understanding. I mean, you know, you ask anybody who's a personal trainer, uh, they'll tell you that they're unlicensed therapists, right? Because, you know, most of the time you're just talking about someone's life. Hey, how you been? How are the kids? Right. And that's a hard thing to replace uh with that. And you look at like, you know, I think everyone's gonna have different needs at different times in their life. Like my same friend um let's talk about used to work at Verizon, has two kids, four and a half, one and a half, right? For him to make it to the gym is a monumental feat. Because like, you know, for him, he's got a Peloton, so he's like, well, you know, if I put, you know, my both my kids happen to be napping at one point in time, I can just jump on the Peloton and get it done. Right. I was telling him about Tony, he's probably gonna order one. But the, you know, and then there's like there's people like me, I'm very routine, right? No kids, but I I know, like, I can't wait to get to the gym. You know, if four o'clock bell rings in the afternoon, like I'm that's that's where I go. I love the environment. I love the um, I love that it's a place of of self-improvement, right? I don't care like who you are, if you're you know, 100 pounds overweight or if you're someone who's been training for a long time, that's you come there to, you know, to for self-improvement. Most people are happy, right? Of course, people are happy in a gym. Isn't that cool? I mean, I I look around that all the time, like people are pretty happy here because they're doing something for themselves. And maybe they weren't happy the moment that they walked in. Um, but once they start moving and they start doing the, you know, the blood's flowing, the endorphin starts to rise, and you know, uh serotonin can create like all those things happen and and people are happy. And I think there's something about that too. I mean, I mean it's either there or happy hour, and uh which one's healthier, right? Well, which one gives me a better uh lifelong buzz? So yeah, I think it's interesting um, you know, what what's gonna happen, but I do think the human component, and I think part of that is the coaching, right? The cues, the you know, um touching stone in the right area. We're like, oh yeah, okay, shoot, and I'll pull my shoulders back, right? Like it's hard, you can't do it.

No, and you you mentioned the empathy side too. It's like, you know, we're really excited about the potential of what our tech can do in terms of, you know, while you're working out, we can see that your velocity is dropping on this particular movement and you're maybe these other movements that are leg focused, you know, you're you're keeping on an even kill, and this back focused movement uh is is dying off. Well, now we can say, you know, clearly your back is maybe a little bit lagging. Let's make suggestions or let's suggest live with that data to say take off some load. And that's exciting, and we're pumped about that. But that being said, you talk about the empathy side. If I'm with you in person, I can tell from your facial expression, you can tell me, man, like my boss is riding my ass. I'm just mentally not here today, or I'm not sleeping. I have a seven-month-old at home, whatever all these things could be. That's the difference with personal training that they're live in the moment to say, let's scale back your training. Like you mentioned, scaling back uh based on the data that uh Ali from Tonal was talking about. These are the kinds of things that personal trainers can do. And for tech to get to that level, we're, I mean, it's it's a long ways away, if ever, um, that we can get to those kinds of levels, right? So I think it's gonna be supplemental and provide things like Peloton or things like what we're trying to build and looking to build at home will cater to a select audience and a pretty wide audience for convenience as being one of the major factors, right? Um, I could see a lot of people like myself where I would, you know, I would maybe do this type of program at home those two days a week that our work days nuts, or if you have kids, it's just I can't get away those days, whatever that might be. And then yeah, there's maybe another couple days a week. I actually like to go physically visit the gym, see some of the people there, see different faces, see a trainer, whatever. Right. I think that's kind of what the world will move toward.

Yeah. Yeah, I think ultimately too, you know, one of the big factors for a lot of people is is time and friction, right? Like how can you reduce the amount of time or give back time, right, to people. Um, and then how do you reduce friction on getting people to where they want to go? You know, that's that's kind of the the two big things that I think are really gonna be focused on. And I think it's also easy for people who love fitness, you know, people like you, people like me, get super into the tech, right? Love it, love it. Can't wait to the next thing, right? Um, but for most people, overwhelming majority, just starting any type of program is monumental, right? It's it's huge change. And you know, like you and I both have athletic backgrounds, we both, you know, love to be in the gym. It's not a big deal, right? I talk about this all the time. Like, it's not a big deal. We like it. But for most people, just to like, I don't even know, like, well, what shoes do I buy? Right. I don't even know. Like, where do I would I walk in and I see a bunch of stuff? Like, what do I do with it? And I think that, you know, we talk about reducing friction. I think that's part of the technology can help is reaching people where they are um more effectively than having them, you know, waiting for them to get to where you are. Does that make sense? Which is or the training setting, whatever it may be, a boot camp. So I think that's a big part of it too, is how do we how do we leverage tech to get more people um into a health, a healthier routine and therefore, you know, solving a lot of problems that we have. What uh what tech do you use, man? What do you use on a daily, weekly basis? What do you play with?

Yeah, you'd be you'd be surprised at how little I actually use. I mean, we use everything just for testing uh, you know, at all times and we're constantly testing the latest and greatest and figuring out you know how it works and this and that. But for me, uh I think it's also like you like yourself, you know, at our level, uh, which again is not the majority, is a very small chunk of the population. I don't need to track my macros. I eat very much like a paleo-esque kind of diet, but I know I have my diet dialed, I don't need anything to really track it. I don't personally find any real need for me to track sleep because I'm a really good sleeper. So, you know, I don't, you know, I know when I slip bad, I know when I'm not sleeping good, I know how it affects my body. Uh most people aren't in as in tune as you or I with our our body mentally and physically. So for me, I don't actually use a ton. Obviously, I use our technology regularly because we're always you know working on things. Um But yeah, uh, you know, outside of using some different apps and things for even workout programming and and you know, finding new routines and new things to try, uh, I really don't actually use day-to-day a whole lot. I don't wear any tracker right now. I mean, I'm always trying new things for you know a few weeks here and there. But um for me, I haven't found anything at my level that that gives me enough value uh that I don't already know. Um and so that that again is a very small part of the population uh that you know would be like that. I think there's definitely things out there that that help people.

Yeah. Um just a step tracker, right? I mean, how many and just how aware it made so many people of how little they move, right? Yeah. I even bet like if you put it if you put a step tracker on me, I'd be shocked at how little I actually get up and walk every day, right? Yeah.

And it would it it gives you that motivation, right? And that's another project that we have ongoing is uh is kind of uh a new apparel project. And so we have uh a grant from the Canadian government, we're working with our Canadian Olympic team, uh national team for uh for this project. But essentially we've taken the sensor that's kind of about the size of my pinky fingernail uh that's in the pushband, so that IMU chip, which is your accelerometer and gyroscope that's measuring three-axis velocity and acceleration. And so we've taken that, we've implanted five of those throughout a lower body compression garment, so like your compression pants. So we have you know tibia, femur, pelvic, and then you know, tibia and femur down the other side. And now this type of technology can give us a ridiculous amount of data with respect to you know stress factor metrics, your impacts, uh, how your different joint angles are changing as you run, things like that. So right now, you know, on the market, what's available? There's something called, there's a few, but OptoTrack is one of them, OptoJump, which you know, the track is, you know, you could get for about 40 grand, you can get like 40 yards of track that's kind of like lasers across, right? And so it's actually measuring how your heel strike is and these things, and that's what's used in like NCAA and pro track and field, but it's expensive as hell, and that's for 40 yards. So that's only getting the first few steps. You know, our technology, once we bring it to market, is going to be able to track the same metrics and more for a marathon, uh, you know, and that's for less than 500 bucks. And so now, if I can see how how did my running mechanics change throughout the marathon, or if a shoe company can use tech like this to try different types of shoes and tell you how your impact changes to your stress fracture metrics and how your joints are handling impacts based on a different shoe. Here's the shoe for you specifically. Um, this again, this is the kinds of things that are happening uh where the tech is finally getting past step trackers and these things. People are finding ways, companies are finding ways to make tech that's a little more actionable and a little has a little bit more meaning uh to kind of training and day-to-day. So we're obviously excited about that project as well. And it's kind of ongoing and sort of uh, you know, looking about a year out before commercialization, we're very focused on getting it right. But uh, you know, another cool thing that we're working on.

Yeah, you guys are always doing cool stuff, man. I love talking to you and Chappie.

Yeah, yeah. We got a lot of the go.

Yeah, you always do. Right now, well, Mike, where uh where do people find you if people want to find out more about what you're doing personally and then obviously push uh and all the cool stuff you guys are coming up with?

Yeah, yeah. So the push website is very simple, just trainwithpush.com. It's uh train with push is actually our our handle for all of our social social media as well. So um you can find that there and kind of keep an eye out you know through those channels on, you know, over the next call it you know, three to twelve months, depending on how some things shake out uh that we're working on from a financing standpoint and other otherwise uh you know the things that are coming down the pipe. But uh yeah, so I mean, and everything you know on a personal level that that I'm working on, myself, Chris, you know, we're largely a lot of it's through push. And so, you know, a lot of you know, us can can be found there. And you know, if anybody wants to reach out to Eric to get my contact details and reach out to me directly, I'm more than open to having conversations with anybody in the industry because uh, like you said earlier, the more we share, uh, it's better for everybody. Um, so I'm always open to those connections.

Awesome, man. Well, Mike, dude, thanks for coming on. It's always a pleasure. Yeah, thanks for having me, buddy. Yeah, thanks for geeking out. That was great. Yep, blah. Right on. Ladies and gentlemen, Mike Dawson. Thanks. Hey fitness fans, don't leave yet. It's your host, Eric Malzone, and I have a quick favor to ask. Actually, three favors. So, number one, if you're a fan of our show, I ask you to do something that takes under three minutes. Go to iTunes, please, and subscribe to our show. Please, please, please. It means so much to us. It's so important. And then give us a favorable review. We would really, really appreciate it. And uh, I can't tell you how much it means and helps us out. So I know it takes two minutes your day, and uh, it means a lot to us. So please do that. Number two, go to our YouTube channel or Fitness Marketing Alliance, and uh please subscribe to our YouTube channel there. Number three, if you like this episode or any of the episodes that we've released, share it on social. That's huge, that's a big deal for us. And we're we put a lot of work into these episodes, uh trying to give you great actionable content uh for the fitness industry. So that would mean a lot. And that's it. So we have some big plans coming up for this show. I'll be talking about that in the next couple episodes. But thank you so much for listening. It means so much. And uh, if you have any questions, please reach out to me. I'd love to hear from everybody. Eric, E R I C at Fitness Marketing Alliance.com