Mark Bell on Fat vs. Carbs, What’s Really Making You Fat?

Summary

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The Dr. Gabrielle Lyon Show

Episode: Mark Bell on Fat vs. Carbs, What’s Really Making You Fat?

Air Date: April 28, 2026
Guest: Mark Bell (powerlifter, coach, entrepreneur)
Host: Dr. Gabrielle Lyon

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Episode Overview

This episode features Mark Bell, renowned powerlifter, coach, and entrepreneur, in a deep-dive conversation with Dr. Lyon about the evolving definitions of strength, misconceptions in nutrition, the balance between fat and carbs in the American diet, issues around “artificial exercise,” and the rising influence of drugs, peptides, and supplements in health and longevity. Mark shares a holistic view of strength, both physical and mental, as well as candid personal reflections about movement, nutrition, kids’ health, and resisting health “dogma.”

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Rethinking Strength

• Multiple Definitions of Strength:
  • Mark Bell: “I didn't really realize there's so many different versions of strength. I was mainly thinking about powerlifting..." (00:00)
  • Examples beyond lifting: gymnastics, calisthenics, life movements.
• Functional vs. Gym Strength:
  • Strength should encompass mobility, explosive power, and practical movement, not just lifting heavy weights.
  • Mark: “Most of the attributes that we lose as we get older are...the ability to produce force...you lose all those abilities.” (04:02)
  • Dr. Lyon: “Most people leave muscle on the table...Are we over indexing on strength?”

Memorable Quote:

“Strength is never a weakness. Weakness is never a strength.” — Mark Bell (02:28)

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2. Exercise for Longevity & Everyday Life

• Brain-Body Connection through Strength:
  • Maintaining power and coordination into older age benefits physical and cognitive health.
  • Mark: “If you can run a 100 meters in 15 seconds...that would be highly unlikely your brain would be deteriorating...” (07:02)
• Artificial Exercise:
  • Modern gym routines are “made up” to replace natural movement lost to automation and sedentarism.
  • Mark: “We need artificial exercise, which is the gym, which is fitness.” (37:27)

Memorable Moment (On movement):

“The best mobility drill you'll ever do is just to sit on your own floor.” (36:41)

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3. Advice for Beginners and Sustainable Habits

• Start Simple & Enjoyable:
  • Beginners should begin with movements they enjoy for habit formation.
  • Mark: “What do you like to do?...Oh, you don’t like training legs? Guess what we’re not doing?” (22:27)
• Focus on Consistency Over Intensity:
  • Mark: “Find the shit that’s the easiest to do, not the stuff that’s the hardest to do.” (20:54)
• Efficiency over Balance:
  • Instead of “all or nothing,” find a flexible, repeatable routine.

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4. Physical Activity & Kids

• Creating a Movement Culture at Home:
  • Early exposure to activity and moderate “forcing” of participation are beneficial.
  • Mark: “Parents should not only encourage, I think they should force [kids to move] a little bit...” (39:23)
• Parental Responsibility:
  • Food environment and activity culture at home are parent-driven.
• Modern Stigma & Overprotection:
  • Pushing activity is not shaming—modern culture is too sedentary.

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5. Nutrition: Fat, Carbs, and Overconsumption

• Main Problem: Overeating Fat—Not Just Sugar
  • Mark: “Most people want to lose weight because...they spent too many years eating too much fat...Fat is a bigger problem than is understood.” (44:48)
  • Modern meats are bred to be fattier; “lean meat” from stores isn’t what it used to be.
• Protein-Fat Connection and Practical Intake:
  • Increased protein awareness is positive, but fat often comes along with protein sources.
  • Dr. Lyon: “Americans consume around 11% saturated fat...we’re eating essentially a sedentary animal.” (48:07)
• Personalization in Diet:
  • Dietary guidelines should be tailored; not everyone has the same carb or fat “problem.”
• Overconsumption & Food Engineering:
  • Most hyper-palatable foods are high in both fat and carbs (donuts, cookies, etc.), making them easy to overeat.

Notable Quote:

“Overconsumption is a huge factor...just because they're so easy to overeat.” — Mark Bell (50:32)

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6. Modern Drugs & Peptides: The New Normal?

• Rising Use Across Society:
  • Mark: “There’s more people on drugs than ever, you know, whether it’s a housewife or whether it’s an NFL football player.” (58:34)
• Effectiveness, Risks, and Unknowns:
  • Peptides/steroids work because “you actually feel them,” unlike most supplements. (41:41; 58:05)
  • Nuanced view: these can be tools but have side effects, long-term unknowns.
  • Mark: "I just think we're heading in some interesting times where we're going to see more and more gravitate towards [drugs/peptides] because it solves a problem pretty quickly." (53:03)
  • Dr. Lyon: “We don’t have a ton of data on their efficacy in humans...is there a risk? Are they dangerous?” (56:53)
• Drug Normalization:
  • The lines between performance-enhancing drugs for athletes and lifestyle drugs for the masses are blurring.

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7. Supplements and Testing What Works

• Blood Work as the Gold Standard:
  • Mark shares he takes supplements based on repeat blood testing, adjusting accordingly.
  • Mark: “I take the supplements that [Stan Efferding] suggests...got retested, and sure enough, my labs were way better.” (64:45)
• Anecdotes on Peptides:
  • BPC-157 and TB500: Maybe sped up tissue recovery but hard to say definitively.
  • Retatrutide: Blunted “food noise” (cravings), slightly improved blood sugar.

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8. Mobility, Movement Patterns, and Siloed Thinking

• Medicine & Fitness Both Silo Too Much:
  • Dr. Lyon: “Do we have it wrong in the way that medicine silos things?...we do bench, we do squat, but there’s not much thought into what’s outside of that.” (30:05)
• Movement Patterns Over Movements:
  • Training should include a variety of patterns, flows, and daily movement—not just isolated muscles.
• Normalizing Mobility for Kids:
  • Mark’s realization: stretching wasn’t "normalized" in his upbringing and in powerlifting culture.

Notable Quote:

“We think we're free, but I think…we have something that's more like boxed free will.” — Mark Bell (72:25)

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9. Personalized Health and Physicality

• Personalized Physicality:
  • Everyone’s preferences and capacities differ. Find ways to integrate movement that suits your body and psyche.
• Embracing Enjoyment and Interest Over Goal Fixation:
  • Mark: “Follow what you’re interested in. Period.” (13:45)
  • Trying too hard or setting arbitrary goals can result in less happiness and adherence.

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10. Cultural Forces: From Smoking to GLP1s

• History of Health Guidelines:
  • Reductionist heart disease prevention missed the impact of factors like smoking.
  • Dr. Lyon: “One of the number one contributors to heart disease is smoking…But no one talks about smoking like the elephant in the room.” (51:39)
• Modern Analogs:
  • Now, society rushes to use drugs/peptides for intermediate health “fixes” (e.g., GLP1s), perhaps repeating history’s mistakes.

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• 00:00–04:30 — Strength in all its forms
• 04:30–09:30 — Strength training and cognitive health
• 13:00–18:45 — Motivation, goal-setting, and the pursuit of strength
• 20:54–24:34 — Consistency, efficiency, and advice for beginners
• 36:41–38:00 — “Artificial exercise” and the role of natural movement
• 39:23–42:58 — Kids, movement culture, and physical confidence
• 44:48–51:02 — Nutrition, fat vs. carbs, protein, and overconsumption
• 53:03–61:02 — Peptides, drugs, effectiveness, and risk
• 64:45–68:40 — Supplements, bloodwork, and anecdotal results
• 69:33–77:00 — Mobility, set points, and boxed free will
• 76:00–79:28 — Parenting, culture, confidence, and closing reflections

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Notable Quotes

• “Most people leave muscle on the table.” — Dr. Lyon (06:47)
• “Find the shit that’s the easiest to do, not the stuff that’s the hardest to do.” — Mark Bell (20:54)
• “There’s a lot of different things you can do. I don’t think there’s any one thing that anyone particularly needs to do.” — Mark Bell (33:03)
• “You actually feel [drugs and peptides]. You don’t feel protein powder…nothing feels like taking testosterone, nothing feels like injecting trenbolone.” (41:41)
• “We need artificial exercise, which is the gym, which is fitness.” — Mark Bell (37:27)
• "Parents should not only encourage, I think they should force [kids to move] a little bit...because in today’s culture, we don’t have the kids do enough stuff physically." (39:23)
• “Overconsumption is a huge factor...just because they're so easy to overeat.” (50:32)
• “Follow what you’re interested in. Period.” — Mark Bell (13:45)
• "We think that we’re free, but I think that we’re...boxed free will.” — Mark Bell (72:25)

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Conclusion

Mark Bell and Dr. Lyon present a refreshingly honest take on the fitness, nutrition, and health landscape. Shifting from dogmatic advice, they advocate for a personal approach founded on curiosity, pragmatic habit-building, and a nuanced understanding of the modern world’s temptations and pitfalls. The episode challenges listeners to redefine strength, rethink their approach to movement and nutrition, critically assess “magic bullet” health fixes, and take personal—and parental—responsibility for health.

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If you want thoughtful, actionable advice and a deeper look into the “why” behind health choices, listen to this episode—through the twin lenses of both physical and mental strength.

Transcript

[A]

I didn't really realize there's so many different versions of strength.

[B]

Strength is never a weakness.

[A]

Weakness is never a strength. I mean, there's a lot of different versions of strength. I was mainly thinking about powerlifting, bench, squat, deadlift, just going to the gym and doing something on gymnastics rings or somebody doing calisthenics, pull ups. I was thinking about my version of strength.

[B]

You've been very involved in bodybuilding. There's a lot of discussion on anabolic steroids. Is there still the same drug utilization?

[A]

There's more people on drugs than ever, you know, whether it's a housewife or whether it's an NFL football player.

[B]

The thing is, why are people feeling like they need it? I do think that we're going to see more and more peptides, but then the question is, is there a risk? Are they dangerous peptides?

[A]

When it comes to these drugs, you actually feel them. You don't feel protein powder, you don't feel collagen, creatine might be something, maybe, maybe you feel a tiny bit. But when it comes to these peptides, when it comes to these drugs, nothing feels like taking testosterone, nothing feels like injecting trend balloon. And some of these peptides that are coming along, I think they're not all always going to be felt, but they're going to be seen.

[B]

Bag. You've been coaching people, you've been involved in the nutrition space for decades. What do you think the biggest mistake

[A]

is in terms of longevity? Like, maybe the best thing for Americans is.

[B]

Most people think powerlifting is for a certain type of person, a certain size, a certain age, a certain level of crazy. Mark Bell has squatted over a thousand pounds, bench pressed over 800, and spent over three decades learning what the human body is capable of. But what he has found working with athletes and beginners alike is that the same principles that build world record strength are the exact same ones that build longer, healthier and a more capable life. Today we're going deep on what strength training and just what overall strength means and the impact it has on your body and how to train more efficient and why muscle is not just something you see in the mirror, but it might be the single most important organ you're not paying enough attention to. Mark Bell, glad that you are here.

[A]

Thank you.

[B]

Your motto, which by the way, I wish I had come up with is strength is never a weakness.

[A]

I think it's important to be strong, to acquire strength takes a long time, but over the years, I guess something that I, that I didn't really think about originally, you know, because I was thinking about my version of strength and I didn't really realize there's so many different versions of strength. Somebody doing something on gymnastics rings or somebody doing calisthenics, pull ups. I mean, there's a lot of different versions of strength. And when I phrased that said strength is never weakness. Weakness is never strength. I was mainly thinking about powerlifting, bench, squat, deadlift, just going to the gym and being a meathead. But I don't think the gym is a great place. It's great to go to the gym and have all your stuff kind of be there and spend an hour there or 45 minutes, however long you can delegate to do that stuff. But I also think that it might be more helpful for people to realize that there's a gym kind of all around us and you can do step ups and stairs and all kinds of stuff in your home and all around if you open your eyes up to it.

[B]

One of the ideas or the goals people have, we were looking at some of the statistics and we pulled this statistic that 42% of Americans say getting strong is their number one fitness goal in 2026. Do you think that they're getting it

[A]

wrong by a slingshot? No, they're, I think they're on the right track because I think that, I think that strength connects to your brain a lot differently than, I mean, there is mind muscle connection. There's definitely a crossover between bodybuilding and strength training. So it's not like, it's not like bodybuilding or sets of 10 or sets of 12 or even sets of 20. It's not like they don't impact your central nervous system. But most of the attributes that we lose as we get older are you lose a lot of explosiveness, you lose the ability to produce force. So if, if, if we were to evaluate someone at 70, we might say, oh, wow, look, they can, they can walk and they can walk a few miles. That's awesome. That's great. They get up and down the stairs. Okay, like that's pretty cool. They get in and out of their car really well. But that's still all normie stuff. That's still all normal people stuff. Like, what can you really do regardless of your age? And I'm not suggesting that someone at 70 just go out and try this randomly, but you should be able to get on an assault bike and produce some watts. How many watts? I, I don't know. Depend on the sex of the person, it depend on their strength levels, depend on previous training and their body weight because a bigger person is going to be able to get on the assault bike and really crank it up. Yeah, Your ability to produce force, your ability to throw stuff, your ability to throw a punch, swing a baseball bat, throw a ball, throw, sprint, jump, we lose all those abilities. People that are sometimes even just over the age of like 40 or 50 really struggle just to even just to jump at all. They might be like, well, I don't, you know, just to do a pogo hop, like just standing and jumping, just landing on your own feet, barely leaving the ground. They might think like, hold up a second. I don't think that's safe for me. So I think strength is, is really important. The thing for those people to look at that 42% that has their goal to be stronger. It's cool if they're thinking about doing more weight with a curl or deadlift or something like that, but hopefully they're thinking about strength maybe more overall rather than just some arbitrary lift in the gym. Because those numbers you've talked with like grapplers or fighters or something, they'll tell you, or football players, they'll tell you usually the strongest guy, the weight room guy, he's not, he's not like, you know, quote unquote, functionally strong a lot of times. So hopefully you're thinking about strength in many different ways because there's many different ways to do it.

[B]

And I've heard you say that most people leave muscle on the table. And what I'm also hearing you say is that potentially we're over indexing our focus on strength.

[A]

The gym is awesome and I encourage people to go to the gym and I like that idea of people working out. And I think the, the typical kind of bodybuilding workout or the typical strength training that is usually talked about is a giant pool to dump all your overeating and all your carbohydrates into. So it can really help make up for some things and by building some muscle mass that also helps build a better metabolism. And those are things that we should probably work on for basically as long as we can try to hold muscle mass into later years and stuff. But again, if you just go back to the brain and you go back to how many people are suffering from things like dementia and those kinds of things. And I don't really know the stats, I don't have any real information on it, but I'd imagine if you can run a 100 meters in like 15 seconds or something like that, or run a 40 and even like six seconds, that that would be highly unlikely, that you would be, that your, your brain would be deteriorating because your central nervous system is really strong and robust. There's a lot of other stuff you can do, you know, to, there's like coordination, there's juggling, there's all kinds of stuff that you can do that to challenge your brain. Crossword puzzles and things that are like, more relaxed, that aren't necessarily geared towards strength. But I think that strength is where it's at. I mean, just this morning I heard a woman talking about, they tested these women and they got, they saw a profound impact on the growth of their brain. And then I wrote like, oh, my brain must be out of control because, well, I mean, the idea of a

[B]

dumb jock is not accurate, right? Because so I've seen some of that data as well.

[A]

It can be. So here's where it can be though is because the person that is the jock, that's probably where they spend the majority of their time. So they don't maybe have to be as academic and so they chose not to be. But it doesn't mean that they are forever locked into. And you can say the reverse about someone that never played a sport. Just because you didn't play a sport when you were 10 or 12 or 15 doesn't mean that you can't later on in life become an athlete. And right now, for me, like, I've been an athlete my whole life, but I feel incredible with the stuff that I'm doing. I feel great to run and walk and work on jumping and throwing and all these aspects of strength that I wasn't working on for a good 20 year span because I was primarily a powerlifter.

[B]

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[A]

Did you Smelly?

[B]

Was it really?

[A]

It's just my nickname.

[B]

That's where that came from.

[A]

Well, no, my brothers. I got two older brothers, and they made fun of me as a kid, and I was just always playing outside and loved doing all that stuff. And so with them being older, they were a little. You'll get there with your kids.

[B]

No, no, they're already there.

[A]

They were more into hygiene, and I was a smelly little kid. I didn't want to take a shower.

[B]

So you went from. So that's true. It was. It's smelly. Okay, well, we'll talk to Chris, Chris Bell about that and probably come up with another nickname for him. You went from professional wrestling to elite powerlifting to. You now are an entrepreneur. Have been an entrepreneur for a long time. Is there a through line to all of that?

[A]

I had the motto, my brother always thought this was great, was to never show up on time.

[B]

Terrible.

[A]

I didn't show up on time here today. I was a little bit.

[B]

You did get lost. I mean, a side note, I don't know if you got lost. Mark and I, for you guys listening or watching this, Mark and I have been good friends for a very long time. Actually going on. It's over 10 years now. Can you believe that?

[A]

A decade.

[B]

Oh, man. And I went to the Bell family reunion with my family. I did forget diapers. This was, I think, when Aries was little. And Mark's like, okay, well, I'm gonna go for a walk. And we were gonna all do something after. And two hours went by. I think we went on. Three hours later, I was gone. And then you came back. And just today, as we're podcasting in Houston, I said, oh, I'm just finishing up with a patient, and I don't know, texted. I got lost 15 minutes after the timer's supposed to park. Start the podcast. And you're like, it's okay. I'm. I. I've gotten lost.

[A]

Well, I get lost sometimes just in. In my own. Just in my own thoughts. Like, I love going on walks. I do it all the time. I try to get over 10,000 steps every day. Sometimes I'm a little overzealous and get like, 15 or 20. I know your dad walks a lot.

[B]

Yeah, he's here can't wait to go walking with you.

[A]

I love, you know, just walking to places or sometimes just even just going on a walk. But I very rarely will bring headphones with me. My phone is with me, so I might mess around on my phone a little bit, but for the most part, just working on being more comfortable with myself and just being in my own head.

[B]

Many people will say, okay, I want to become this. I want to do this, I want to become this. And again, over the years, you and I have known each other for over 10 years. I don't experience that with you. It's not. It comes really from a place. Again, this is just my own experience. And I'm curious because I think it can benefit myself. And the listener is. It's not about the end result. It seems to be about following what you're interested in and following the next best thing. But not necessarily this is the goal. I'm going to hit the goal and I'm going to do this. I'm going to drive forward.

[A]

Yeah, follow what you're interested in. Period. That's pretty much what it is. And again, I have. I grew up with great parents, and so I owe it to them that they provided a life to where I could even think that way. Because some kids have just such a poor upbringing that they are worried about their parents beating them or their parents neglecting them, or X, Y, and Z. So I grew up in a. Really. It wasn't just my parents either. It's my. My. I have great grandparents. I have awesome aunts and uncles, and I have a huge family, as you got to see many of them. Both sides of. My mom's side of the family had nine kids, and my dad's side of the family had nine kids, and they grew up down the street from each other. So it was, as you can imagine, you know, Christmas and Thanksgiving and all that stuff was a. Was a big deal. And so I was able to, I guess, maybe dream a little bit more than some other people. Maybe don't have the same. The same opportunity. So I feel. Oh, I always feel like I have to mention that because I'm grateful for that and that that gave me the. The opportunity to kind of think the way that I think. But, yeah, I just mainly follow my interest and I sometimes forget that. I sometimes forget that powerlifting was just something that I did. It's not. It's not necessarily. It doesn't necessarily define everything about me, but it is something I loved. It's something I did. It's something I excelled At. But I also was never really trying. I just happened to start it when I was really young. And then. So by the time I got to be. I started when I was 12. By the time I got to be, like, maybe close to 30. You know, sometimes people would come into the gym, people would ask me for, like, a meeting because I started doing, like, business stuff, and I was like, okay, let's meet me at the gym. That's where.

[B]

What kind of business was this from?

[A]

That's from. Or something before that, it just might have been like. Andy and I, we started a magazine a long time ago called Power Magazine, and we had that magazine for, like, five years. So one of my friends, he. He wanted to advertise in there. He had a local business, and he wanted to have his business, you know, grow. And so I was like, oh, well, let's talk. You know, and so just little things like that where I was just like, oh, it'd be easier for you just to meet me at the gym, because that's where I'm always at. And just the way my brain works, I'm like, well, I'll just be, like, in the middle of working out. It won't be any big deal for me to, like, chat with them a little bit in between my sets. But at. At that time, I think I was doing £500 on the bench for, like, sets of five. You know, I'd go do a set of five, get all cranked up, get all fired up. And, you know, you. You get, like, kind of emotional, or at least I do. I'd get, like. I'd get intense for a little bit, and I'd go lift. And I would just be normal and talk to him, and he's like, I've never seen anything like this. This is. This is crazy. And he's like. He's like, what are you doing? I was like, oh, I'm just. I'm just working out. So I have to remember that with a lot of other things that I do, and I think that is kind of the through line, is that it's been helpful for me to not try too hard. When I try, I see I tend to make things. I tend to be almost worse at them rather than just doing what I enjoy just for the sake of enjoying it, just for the sake of liking it. Sometimes once something becomes a thing to me, then it. It gets to be thrown off track somewhere. I don't know where. I don't know where, but it's like. Like getting into, like, a little zone with something and feeling really awesome about it and then all of a sudden not being as excited about it anymore.

[B]

It is. It's counterintuitive to the things that you hear out there where it's set the goal, attack the goal, go after it and just grind regardless.

[A]

Well, when you talk to clients, you try to help them with their goals, but a lot of times you're probably trying to say, actually the goal that you have in mind isn't even necessarily in your best interest. Let's go over this and let me explain why. And here's. Here's a direction you might want to consider a little bit more. And they probably go, oh, yeah, I don't really know why that was a goal. Sometimes they really don't know. It's just something I heard or something they maybe feel pressured they have to do. Running is the greatest example ever. I got to run because I need to lose weight. Oh, that's awesome. You're identifying that you want to lose weight. Well, did you know that one of the worst ways to lose weight is probably through running? Not. Not always and not for everybody. Some people that have a history of running, some people that are efficient with running, sure, they can probably, if they were running in high school and college or something like that, and they're now 40, they want to knock off £20. They probably still have a capacity to run decently to where when they run, it doesn't have such a negative impact, doesn't alter their hunger so much that they overeat. But for me, I was doing the

[B]

Boston Marathon with my husband. With your husband, who's also doing Boston

[A]

again as part of my training. For that, I went from 230 to 240 because I was running more and more and more and more, and my appetite just went. And I obviously it wasn't intentional. I was thinking like, hey, when I go do this marathon, it'd be way better for me to do it lighter. But I was gaining weight in like a 12 or 16 week time frame. Now I can run efficiently enough with my heart rate where it's not through the roof to where running, you know, does have a nice impact on me. But anyway, just back to the main. The main thing there is that we need to be able to sort of define. You got to define words and define what you're. What, what you're actually trying to do. And for me, with powerlifting, it was like, I think the sport is cool. This is really fun. I understand that this takes a really, really, really long time to be strong. So I'M not going to try to do anything all in one day. And if you apply the same thing to weight loss, I've lost 110 pounds. And people are like, how long does that take? I'm like, it took 12 years. Like, it's taken a long time because you have to get to a certain length of time to know that it even works before you gain the weight back. And we're seeing that a lot with the GLP1s, where there's these massive rebounds and people gaining weight back. So even the word work, somebody's like, I tried that diet, it didn't work. Like, hold on a second, let's talk about. Let's try to define what the word work means. You said you lost 20 pounds and you did the diet for three months, but the diet stopped working when you stopped the diet. Which is, of course, that makes sense. But also we do need to review and try to figure out why did you stop the diet? So maybe that's what you meant by you felt like the diet didn't work is the fact that you're no longer doing it. And that's the real key. How do you find something that you can lock onto and do day in and day out? What are the. You want to find the shit that's the easiest to do, not the stuff that's the hardest to do.

[B]

What do you mean by that?

[A]

Find stuff that's really easy and simple and repeatable. Like, you know, add a little bit to your day with just a little bit of walking. We know that a little bit of walking isn't going to do anything in the beginning. It's not going to do anything. But if. What if you stay consistent with it for a long time? What if while you're doing some walking, you're also working on other aspects of your fitness and you're doing all of that over and over and over again. But if you're like, that's Monday. That's it. No carbs, going to the gym every day.

[B]

There's a level of neutrality, and it sounds like there, and I don't really want to use this term, but it's not balance. It is not all in, but not all out. It's. Yeah, I guess it is more neutral. Right?

[A]

It's efficiency, you know, like, you know, the best way to continue to spin plates, like if you're spinning a bunch of plates is, you know, turn the plates to where they're plastic. So if they fall and they don't, they don't break. You just all of a Sudden they're going to start working out on Monday.

[B]

Yeah. So the 40 year old who is listening to this and they've never worked out a day and they're thinking, okay, I'm going to start. What I'm hearing is strength training and cardiovascular because of course this is the items that they've always heard about. What would your advice be to the 40 year old who's never trained?

[A]

Why don't you review the things that you think you're interested in? What do you like to do? Oh, I've always loved to go to the gym and train some arms. Oh, you don't like training legs? No, I hate training legs. Guess what we're not doing, we're not training legs for a little while. At some point we're gonna have to train some legs. This is like church. I'm gonna bring you in on Sunday and then when I bring you in on Sunday, I'm tell you about Wednesday and I'm gonna tell you about the Bible study and then we're gonna be communicating all the time about Jesus and about the Bible and all that stuff. So I think that's the way that fitness needs to be presented. It's like how to just get the person in the door. My brother in law recently, he tweaked his back a little bit and he just started getting excited about running. And I was like, oh man, we're gonna lose him to running. Because he is a former distance miler swimmer in college. And so he has a proficiency just like Andy. I was just thinking this crazy, you know, this crazy endurance tank where they can just go and obliterate themselves. But he got hurt and he was like, man, my back, it's like, it's really bugging me. And he's like, went to run the other day and it kind of bothered me again. I said, do me a favor, just don't run. And he was kind of like, like he's like, like he knew that was the right answer, but he's like, no, like I, I want to, I want to run and, and people want to run slower and stuff. I'm like, no, just, just don't run. Just, just walk. And then so he went and did a couple workouts. He was walking, he discovered he put the treadmill on an incline and he had these killer workouts because he's walking at like 3.6 or 3.8 miles an hour and the treadmill is at like 10. It's like, that's actually still really intense. So it's intense. It's difficult. It has all the qualities that you're looking for. Your heart rate goes to almost the exact same spot as if you're doing some crappy jog. If you're not efficient as a runner. And so I think those are the things that you. Those little small tweaks. And then just the other day he's like, oh, my back's a lot better. I said, hey, why don't we go on a run? And we, we did a, a run walk where we went.

[B]

I've done those with you.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, we went the same, same, almost same exact trail. We went like three miles. It's manageable, right? I know you hate running.

[B]

Yeah, I hate running. But it, yeah, it was thanks to one of the sponsors of the show, amp, because I can walk two doors down and get a great workout. And if you've ever walked into a workout and thought, am I lifting too heavy? Am I not lifting enough? Where is the weight? I can't find anything. And is this even working? You are not alone. Seriously. The uncertainty is one of the biggest reasons why people do not see results and they stop. Strength training is an essential daily routine and AMP was founded to introduce it into everyone's life, home and ambition. That's exactly why I've been using amplify. What makes it different is it removes the mental noise. AMP AI uses your resistance to adjust sets and reps in real time. So you are always training at the level that your body needs. No second guessing, no wasted time, and by the way, it has everything that you need. Your body responds to progressive stimulus and you need to do that correctly. You don't want just random workouts that you find out online or you find online. It mounts to your wall, takes up almost no space and gives me access to hundreds of movements from strength training to high intensity work. I am telling you, I love this technology. It is beautiful. It is on my wall and it is a system that meets me where I'm at, regardless of the day. If I need some recovery, it's there. If your goal is to build muscle, get stronger, no more guesswork and be consistent, go to AMP AI. Check it out. That's AMP AI. Training should be effective and it doesn't have to be complicated. It makes me think of the time when I was at super training. You and Nyseema were there and you were. What I thought we were going to do was a tricep extension and I don't know what, you took the rope and you guys were. Let's just say it was not A form or it was almost a interpretive dance move. And it was outside of the scope of any. It wasn't even in the what not to do.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And you said to me, gabrielle, well, I'm training patterns. Your body can move all these different ways.

[A]

Yeah, I love exploring different things. Some of what I was doing on that particular day is from a guy named Naudi Aguilar. He's the biggest heel in the fitness industry. Pretty much everybody has their own thoughts about him, but I've always thought that he has a lot of brilliant techniques. And I don't care who somebody is, and I don't care a ton about my personal views or anybody else's views on what a particular person does outside of the information that I'm trying to gleam for myself for my own selfish reasons. He has great information, and I think he does great things. And so I just. I just adopted some of them, and I found them to be really powerful. Now you start to see, like, there's more people doing twisty stuff on Instagram. I think, you know, I think people owe it to him. You know, he. He's not the only guy to ever take a cable and twist with it, but he's done a lot of great things with that. So his whole. One of the things that he talks about is he talks about increasing your capacity for just being able to move properly. And what he considers to be proper movement is just your gait, just like walking. So, you know, a lot of lifters, you know, a lot of former military, you know, people that parachute out of planes and stuff, and those people that do those activities for a long time tend to. You tend to stiffen up. And even just with, like, bodybuilding movements and stuff, you can stiffen up over the years. So we're like, hey, this kind of training is really great. And then you go to turn around and walk, and you're kind of like moving like a robot. Your hips and your. Like. We certainly don't move. Don't move like a gymnast. You don't move necessarily like a dancer. I'm not saying that everyone needs to be able to move that way, but oftentimes we end up with symptoms. Sometimes we end up with our backs hurting, our hips hurting, our knees hurting. And again, those other sports, gymnastics, and they all have their fair share of injuries, but being able to move properly and being able to figure out ways of decompressing your body, I think is really important. So most. Most of what you do in the gym is going to be kind of compressive. It's going to be things that are going to strengthen ligaments, tendons and so on. But a lot of times, though, they're also. It could be in some cases at the sacrifice of movement. And you would think, oh, if I just do things with a full range of motion, that I won't really lose those abilities. But sometimes you still do. I've always squatted to parallel or slightly below parallel. And then I, you know, I have issues with my mobility. Like, it just. My mobility has never been very good. I've always been pretty tight, and that's probably why I chose powerlifting in the first place. But anyway, I do some of these things, rope flow and some other things that people might see me do. I do these as a practice to work towards being able to move better.

[B]

Do we have it wrong in the way that medicine is interesting? It silos things. And part of training, I think this idea of muscle as the. This organ system is. It's very siloed. We do bench, we do squat, but there's not much thought into what's outside of that. It's training the muscle group as opposed to training the pattern, per se.

[A]

I think we do have it wrong a little bit in this case. We already have. We already have bodybuilding, we already have powerlifting, we already have Olympic lifting, we already have CrossFit. And we can't help to continue to identify the way those people look. And we have, like, an obsession with that. I think we do have it wrong in a sense of, like, isolating muscles and things like that. Might be more helpful from the beginning if we just had an understanding that if I do this all the time, always and forever, without integrating something else into the mix, I could end up feeling worse. And exercise is supposed to mainly help you to feel better. I know so many people, they really, really love lifting and they love all the different stuff. I sell the slingshot and the elbow sleeves and knee sleeves, but they're outfitted head to toe. They got the knee sleeves on, the elbow sleeves, and they can't do anything in the gym without all that stuff on and.

[B]

Because it hurts.

[A]

Yeah, because they're in pain like their body is. And pain is a weird thing because the way that your body moves, they don't always go together. There's people that are super flexible that are in pain. There's people that are really tight that are in pain. Neither one is great, but being somewhere in the middle is usually better. There's a lot of things that we identify with our eyes that are hard to put into words. But when you see someone that's really aesthetic, it's like, beautiful to you. And you can't just. You can't really tell 100 what it is. It's not. The person isn't always heavily muscled. The person isn't always, you know, six, five. The person. Some of these things might be true sometimes, but it's not always the same exact things. You just watch someone walk, and you're like that person, they walk. When they walk, they walk really nicely. And then maybe they do a movement where they jump up onto something and do it smoother than everybody else. To each their own. You know, if you want to bodybuild, then bodybuild and do it to your best of your ability and. And all that same thing with powerlifting. But it would probably be wise to think about an exit strategy out of it at some point, because how long are you going to do it for? I mean, you could do it your whole life, I guess, if you really wanted to, but is it going to compromise your life?

[B]

Are there training modalities that you think everyone should be doing beyond, say, powerlifting, which obviously not everyone should do, but strength training, Are there things like, I mean, again, I've seen you do flow. I've seen you over the years experiment with many different things.

[A]

I think there's a lot of different things you can do. I don't think there's any one thing that anyone particularly needs to do. I also think, like, in terms of longevity, like, maybe the best thing for Americans is just not to overeat. I'm not a fan necessarily, of, like, you know, making yourself super hungry. I actually think that there's. There's more on the other side of that. There's more on the, on the side of the move more, eat more. But not everybody is going to, like, gravitate towards that because that it's a time commitment to be able to move a lot.

[B]

Training is fun mostly. And if we are thinking about all of the different modalities, it takes a lot of time, right? You're waking up and you're doing maybe some cardio, and then you're doing some training, and then maybe you're going for walks and then maybe you're doing some rope flow. I mean, at the end of the day, how many, for example, how many hours a day are you moving?

[A]

I move all day, much every day, except for, like, stuff like this where I've, you know, even my podcast is standing.

[B]

Yes, I know. I, I'm standing on a box, but it's fine.

[A]

We had to boost you up a little bit.

[B]

Yes, we did.

[A]

Yeah. Just moving. Moving all day. It's like. It's like my go to. But I also. I also can understand that I could simply just probably eat a little bit less, but. And probably have similar results with maybe less movement.

[B]

But is there a minimum effective dose of movement?

[A]

No, because it changes all the time. So there is a minimum effective dose, but then it goes up because that's the way your body works. Your body kind of needs more stimulus as you continue to go. But I do want to add to this a little bit. I think no one really has to do much of anything. When you talk about. When we talk about longevity, the problem is just modern times. So we talk. We're talking right now about moving all day. Well, that's what we would have normally done. I have these numbers in my head. I don't know where they came from, but sometimes shit just pops in my head that I can't explain. But I've always felt that everybody within normal age ranges, like 18 to 70, has like, 5 to 7 miles of stuff to do every single day. Doesn't necessarily mean you need to walk five to seven miles, but you need to do the equivalent of something that would equal that every day. Otherwise. I think that's where anxiety and I think a lot of things stem from that. I think a lot of things get created from that because we're meant to move. We're creatures that are. We're creatures of the sun or creatures of the light. We're creatures of outside, either evolving through cold or either evolving through heat. And so, as crazy as it sounds for us to talk about, like, just training all day or, you know, having businesses and having different things that provide you a life to where you can just go train whenever you want, and you can dedicate a ton of time to it. A ton of time has to be dedicated to it somehow, since that's our biology. I didn't make that up. I didn't. You know, I didn't do that. A bigger power than me designed us that way. We're supposed to move a lot. We're supposed to be outside. If you go and examine some animals, you know, just walk through some of these parks and you just. Birds are. The birds are only inside by mistake. You know, like, we. We are different. We do need, like, shelter. It's helpful and. But we have, like, everything is cushioned. Everything is so. Even just sitting, you know, even mobility drills, like, you don't need to do mobility Drills. You want the best mobility, the best mobility drill you'll ever do. It's just to sit on your own floor. Sitting.

[B]

Why is that?

[A]

Because when you sit down. Because it's not. Yeah, getting down, getting up, it's uncomfortable. Like, it's comfortable at first, right? And then you sit for a few minutes and you're like, oh, my butt cheeks. Falling asleep. And then you got to kind of move to the other side. You got to move the other side and you got to, you know, move. Like, for me, because I'm not, like, super mobile, I don't have as many options as far as sitting goes. It's like, you'll see people sit and their leg will be up here. And the more options that you have, the better off that you are, because you can kind of keep moving and even the floor just while you're watching TV or something like that can be a form of exercise. So in modern times, we need artificial exercise, which is the gym, which is fitness.

[B]

That's really well said. And I've never heard of artificial exercise. It makes me also think about an exercise deficiency.

[A]

We have to remember that all of exercise is made up. The bench press, for example. You know this. Your audience already knows this. George Hackenschmidt, he's the one that made the bench press famous. He also made the hack squat famous. That's why people probably heard that name before. But yeah, all the exercises in the gym, they're all made up. Lateral raise, all these different things. Lat, pull down. There's even machines for a lot of stuff, right? And there's people that are nutrient deficient. There's people that are exercise deficient. But the exercise deficiency just comes from the fact that in modern times, we don't. We don't really, like, need to exercise. I don't have to go and do

[B]

that when the kids are moving well and they're young, and we've seen that, and then it's like we move less as we get older. Part of what you have said is that we don't have to move as much. Totally agree with that. But there's also been a lot of stigma around all of this stuff. So, for example, kids shouldn't train when they're young. I don't know if your kids trained, if you've thought about that. But what I've seen is I, you know, Leonidas is 5, and I just watch him continue to move.

[A]

Well, I can't wait to see him.

[B]

He's like, the best. But because we don't do electronics and we do a lot of outside time. I'm watching them move and develop as opposed to some of his classmates who I know are not nearly as active or on an iPad. And it just makes me think of this next generation. Because if we talk about exercise deficiency or artificial exercise, I don't know if we have a choice.

[A]

I think it's incredible to try to start your kids off as best that you think that you can in terms of physical culture, have a huge advantage. It might sound mean or callous, but if you're fat, it just, it's very limiting. You know, if you're 12, if you're 12 year old boy and you weigh like 150 pounds or something, yeah, maybe you're playing football or maybe you're doing some of the other stuff that like a bigger person would do, but your confidence in yourself and, and it just, it wrecks a lot of things. It also might make you more shy. Like it just, it causes too many problems. So as a parent, you're the one driving to the store, you're the one buying the groceries, you're the one paying attention. And it doesn't mean that your kid has to, you know, only eat chicken breast and broccoli and, and rice. It doesn't mean your kid has to eat like a bodybuilder or anything, but you should just teach them about nutrition and teach them about, try to get fruit around them, try to get lean meats, vegetables, try to get good choices around them. And then also they can still have their normal kid stuff. But this idea that like forcing a kid to do something is bad maybe unusual isn't correct. It's actually like the opposite. Because in today's culture we, we don't have the kids do enough stuff physically. But yeah, physical activity, you know, both for male and females, obviously it's tremendously important. And I think that parents should not only encourage, I think they should force, I think they should force their kids a little bit when the kids are young, when, when, when appropriate, you know, as your kid gets older, you know, you, then as they get older, you might want to give them options, you know. Now, okay, you can play one of these three sports, but I'd like you to play some sport during some part of the year and they might say, oh, it's too, too much. I, you know, I don't have time for my friends or okay, reasonable, like sounds like we can have a discussion and try to figure out what she can play or do. But even aside from a sport, there's nothing wrong with a kid getting on a treadmill. There's nothing wrong with a boy or girl. There's nothing wrong with an 11 year old girl being on a treadmill. That doesn't mean that somebody fat shamed her or somebody's being cruel and saying mean stuff. It means they care about her and they want to see when she's 14 or 15 that she has a lot of great opportunity.

[B]

Yeah, it's much more difficult, I imagine, if a child is not fit when they are younger because you hear that kids shouldn't be lifting weights and all of that. That's not evidence based. But I also believe that you should, for lack of a better word, force your children to be active. Because if they get to 10, 11, 12 and they are surrounded by a culture that is very sedentary, it's going to be much more difficult. Think about, you know, as we were growing up, it's much more difficult to break these habits when you're in your 30s and 40s and beyond than it is to be forced to make your bed before to do these things. So it becomes ingrained. And that, I suppose would make many people outliers because what's considered normal is, here's the iPad, here's some Cheetos, and go ahead, get after it and play these games. When it comes to nutrition, you've written a book. It was Jacked and Tan. We had Jacked and Tan Carbores. I still have that book.

[A]

Oh yeah, War on Carbs.

[B]

Yep, War on Carbs. Carb Wars, Carbicide. I still have that book. You're in a militia. It's very funny. Is that even still available?

[A]

Shooting donuts? It is.

[B]

Okay, well, we gotta link it because it is. It is pretty funny. This episode is sponsored by Branch Basics. One thing I've become much more aware of over the years is the impact of the environmental chemicals on our food and also inside our home. If you're a frequent listener, you know we spend a lot of time talking about nutrition and muscle health, but beyond that, we should be thinking about what we're exposed to every day through things like cleaning products. Now, I started using Branch Basics when I was pregnant to of course limit my exposure to harsh chemicals. Their products are made with plant and mineral based ingredients and their premium starter kit uses a single powerful concentrate that can replace almost everything in your home from laundry detergent to bathroom cleaner and even get this produce wash. I like that. It simplifies my cleaning routine and removes any concern of exposure for myself and my little ones. If you're also worried about the chemicals you are using in your home. I suggest you try Branch Basics. You can get 15% off the premium starter kit at branch basics.com with the code Dr. Lyon. Again, that's 15% off branch basics.com with the code Doctor Lion. The best part is your pictures. But you've been coaching people, you've been involved in the nutrition space for decades. What do you think the biggest mistake is for weight loss? How about that? Well, I'll give it a specific target.

[A]

Most people want to lose weight in the first place because I think they spent too many years eating too much fat. When you look at like a donut, yeah, there's sugar in there. There's a ton of sugar in there. But they couldn't even pack a donut with enough sugar. It just would turn into something else for it to equal out the amount of calories that come from fat. Ribeye steaks and the different foods that we have in modern times, they're not real foods, they are manufactured foods. So we might want to say like, oh, I'm only eating single ingredient food. But it's like, yeah, you, you're having single ingredient food, but that's a, a ribeye from Costco and it has 60 grams of fat. Like, that's a lot. If somebody's going to have 60 grams of fat, that's the equivalent of probably what they might want to consider having for the whole entire day. Or, you know, if it's a bigger person, maybe, maybe they could tolerate a little bit more. I think fat is a real, is a bigger problem than is understood. And I think a simple way for people to lose weight would be if they turned all of their meat into being as lean as they can possibly handle without, without them thinking it's disgusting and without ending up binging. Because if you don't have any fat in your diet, there's gonna be price to pay at some point. It's gonna wreck your hormones, first of all, and secondly, it's going to make you tremendously hungry. So I'm not advocating for no fat, but I think that the carnivore diet, keto diet, the war on carbs, a lot of those diets, they took some of the carbs out and you replace it with some fat, which is normally fine when you're on a lower carbohydrate diet because you need some form of energy, right? But just in modern times, with the standard American diet, I just think even though they don't eat enough protein, we know that protein is A big factor too, for the amount of protein that sometimes Americans are trying to consume. Because now the word is out. Finally, people talking more about protein.

[B]

I feel like that door is now, yeah, it's good. Now I can move on.

[A]

So people are understanding and they're. At least they're in the ballpark. At least people are talking about like, maybe they're not, you know, eating as much as we would still like to see them eat or whatever, but they're, they're getting better. But you have to be careful with protein because protein and fat come together and in again in modern times. So if we were, you know, gonna hunt something and it was like a long ass time ago, normally the meat that you would get, it would only have so much fat in it. There'd only be so much availability of fat fat. And you can say, oh, you know, they killed a buffalo and they got deliver and they got. Yeah, but it's like the, to harvest the whole thing and to do the whole entire act is like, it takes a lot, takes a lot of manpower. It takes a lot of calories burned. There's a lot that goes, goes into all that. But now you can just go and, and grab 80, 20 ground beef from the store. And the only way that that would make sense to eat is if you were somebody that is on like a carnivore diet or a ketogenic diet.

[B]

It's a, It's a very delicate b. Americans consume 1.1 grams per kilogram, which is good. I mean, you and I would like a little bit more. I would say that the ideal range would be 1.2 to 1.6 grams per kilogram. And then if we recognize the importance of protein, which we do, it does become tricky because there is this fat issue, and I've spent a lot of time thinking about this. So the 10% saturated fat has not changed from the guidelines. And we're not talking about the guidelines per se, but that number, 10% saturated fat was pretty much plucked out of thin air. Right. Americans consume around 11% saturated fat. Maybe in the 70s, I think it was around 15. But the other component is it is total caloric density. Right. What you're saying. And it is much easier to over consume, especially if animals are bred to be more sedentary. They have more intramuscular fat. Intramuscular fat. And so we're eating essentially a sedentary animal.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And it becomes challenging. And I do agree with you. Typically choosing a lower fat option is great. And I have one other thought. I'll Share with you that some people. So, for example, if this idea of saturated fat should be less than 10%, let's just say, which I don't think that that is true for everybody. That recommendation is really a medical intervention. Here's what I mean. If someone has, and I won't go off on this tangent, but I just want to mention, if someone has an LDL cholesterol greater than 130 milligrams per deciliter, that would indicate treatment that's 25% of the population, which means 70% of the population doesn't have a LDL cholesterol problem.

[A]

Right.

[B]

But we're making these recommendations again with saturated fat, and it's more of a medical intervention. So is it a medical intervention or is it dietary guideline? And then with carbohydrates, not everybody has a carb problem.

[A]

Right.

[B]

But if someone has elevated triglycerides or they're not moving, then maybe we have to address carbohydrates. So it comes down to personalization. But also over total caloric load.

[A]

Yeah. And also, what does somebody like? What do they like to eat? What do they like to do? You know, what you like, I think is a little bit like it. You know, obviously you'd be like, well, I love donuts or I love cookies. And that'd be great if you could eat those often. But realistically, you have to keep an eye on foods like that. Just again, because they're so easy to overeat. The overconsumption thing is, is a huge factor. I didn't know it was 10%. That's actually really interesting. They believe that's like Hunter gatherer. That's like how much saturated fat they would get.

[B]

You know where the initial studies of saturated fat came out of? And I just recently learned this. So in the 1970s, they were trying to address heart disease and they were doing that with this idea of go low fat and reduce cholesterol in the 70s. And, you know, heart disease takes years to develop. What you didn't hear about. And so then they created the free guide pyramid because of heart disease. But I don't know if you Knew that almost 30% of the population was smoking. You know, when we talk about in this space, no one's talking about smoking.

[A]

Right.

[B]

In the cohort that was born in 1920. So if you go from 1920 to 1970, that's what, 50 years. So the people in their 50s now having heart disease, 80% of that group of smokers.

[A]

Damn.

[B]

But that's never discussed. And One of the number one contributors to heart disease is smoking. So they created the food guide pyramid. They reduced fat, increased carbohydrates, and what happened? Everybody became obese. Right now, 74% of Americans are either overweight or obese.

[A]

That's pretty crazy.

[B]

That's insane. And this was the origins of that were to address heart disease. But no one talks about smoking like the elephant in the room. That we forget about the past and then look at the present as if it's in isolation.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Makes me really think about now, the era of GLP1s. So the people born 1920, 80% were smoking. 30% of the population in the 70s they were smoking GLP1s in the GLP medications. I wonder how many individuals will eventually be on them and if it's going to be a smoking issue. Meaning are we going to find something. For the longest time people thought that it was benign. And listen, I understand that JLP1s have been around for 20 some years.

[A]

So I mean, I think, you know, the future is full of drugs and there's, they can solve a lot of problems for people. And if they can solve the intermediate problem of solving something for now, I think a lot of people are okay with that. There's still, you know, a lot of lawsuits and stuff like that. People are like, oh, I didn't know it was going to do this or that. They're still going to run into a lot of that. But the, you know, big pharma has deep pockets and they already understand that's the price of doing business. And the drugs will get better, you know, they'll have different versions of them. And I think in terms of, I mean what you're seeing in the peptide space and what you're seeing like in the bodybuilding space and bodybuilders using performance enhancing drugs, utilizing steroids and being on steroid cycles is just going to be like it already is common, it's already happening. Steroids are interesting because the, like the, you know, the altering of your hormones and obviously there's peptides that can do similar things. They can alter your hormones, but they don't seem to shut you down the same way that testosterone can for, for a man type thing. So I don't know, I just think we're heading in some interesting times where I think we're going to see more and more people gravitate towards that because it solves a problem pretty quickly. It helps people to instantly look, look better. What's actually going on, I don't quite know yet, but what from what I'm hearing from most people is like they have improved blood work and things like that. But I don't think blood work is like the answer to everything. But, yeah, I just think around the corner is just more and more and more drugs.

[B]

What kind of peptides? And for those people that don't know you and are being reintroduced to you, when you say peptides, what are you talking about?

[A]

Everything from, you know, like copper peptide to BPC to TB500 to retatrutide or triple triazepatide or so. Everything from the DLP1s to the GLP1 2s and 3s. And, you know, they believe that retatrue tide is like a triple agonist. Right. That one helps with, you know, hunger signaling and so on. And then there's all these other ones that people believe can help your, like, mitochondria be more efficient. There's some that people think can help with your insulin sensitivity activity. And there's supplements that you can take too that do certain things like that, like berberine and things of that nature. Supposed to be able to help a little bit with, like, insulin sensitivity, even supposedly help a little bit with cholesterol and maybe heart disease some extent. So, yeah, I just think that that's the route we're going. And I think that more things are going to be made that way because there's. There's a lot of money to be made. The peptide companies. A friend of mine started one up and he was just telling me some, like, his numbers, and I was like, holy crap.

[B]

The thing is, is why are people feeling like they need them? And I think people feel as if they need things because their lives are not engineered in a way that is as supportive and as healthy as they could be. That being said, I do think that we're going to see more and more peptides come out. Again, we don't have a ton of data on their efficacy in humans. I mean, obviously this is just a broad statement. But then the question is, is there a risk? Are they dangerous?

[A]

I mean, someone might think like, okay, well, this one's associated with thyroid cancer, right? But they're like, but I'm fat. I don't want to be fat anymore. Like, I want to. I want to move on from this. And I. And I'm. I'm stuck, you know, and I feel like I need help. And there's some people that, I don't know, maybe they just, for whatever reason, maybe they can't turn the corner that way. And then maybe these Drugs can assist, help them to go in the right direction. And then maybe if they do end up with the cancer, they're like, well, it got me, you know, 15 or 10 good years where I was able to live my life differently than the way I was when I didn't like myself as much. I mean, who's to argue with that? I don't, you know, I don't know. So it's just, yeah, it's interesting times. Hopefully, you know, people, hopefully people try to research stuff the best they can. But that's really hard to know if you're researching things because so many people are tied to these things financially. Like, hey, these, you know, this works really great. This is what I did, this is what I took. And you're like, okay, well that worked for now. It was like a 12 week thing that you did. But what's the ramifications of that 12 years from now?

[B]

You've been very involved in bodybuilding, right? It's kind of, you've been in this space, you've watched this. Obviously your brother produced bigger, stronger, faster. There's a lot of discussion on anabolics, anabolic steroids. Again, it carries a really heavy mark just from use because of abuse. Is there still the same drug utilization now?

[A]

I'd first off say that there's just like there's more people on drugs than ever, you know, whether it's a housewife or whether it's an NFL football player. And one of the reasons why is I think that a lot of these drugs are working. Supplements. You know, we said earlier, define the word work. You don't feel protein powder, you don't feel collagen. There's so many of these things you

[B]

don't feel, you feel nice.

[A]

And you'll feel that for sure.

[B]

Citrulline and arginine.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

To make sure a nice pre workout stack. Yeah. Make you all beta alanine. You feel that?

[A]

Make you all red.

[B]

Terrible.

[A]

But people don't really believe in stuff that they can't feel or see. You know, there's, there's all these things that are messing with our biology. Blue light, WI fi, all these other things people barely believe. They barely believe in it. They don't want to believe it because it's like it's too much for people to, to dive into. So they'd rather just, you know, kind of sweep it all under the rug. And it's not harmful, non native emf, but it's, it's a thing. But when it comes to these peptides, when it comes to these drugs, you actually feel them again. Creatine might be something, maybe you feel a tiny bit. You know, if you've been natural your whole life and you throw in a couple scoops and you take it for a few weeks, maybe you feel like a little boost from it, but you're not really going to feel. Nothing feels like taking testosterone. Nothing feels like injecting trend balloon. Nothing feels like. And some of these peptides that are coming along, I think they're not all always going to be felt, but they're going to be seen. So you look at yourself in the mirror and you go, holy. Like this is really making a big difference. And recently in Davis, there's a Planet Fitness that opened up over there and I, I have gyms everywhere. I have a gym in my house, I have like two gyms at my house, I have a gym at my studio. But my son and I still go to Planet Fitness every once in a while. And when I'm there, it's obvious of the people that are like, they're using a little bit of stuff, they got a little extra, they got a little extra something going on on the side just because they, they're just like in slightly better shape. The only other people that you see that are in like amazing shape like that normally are people that are in like their 20s. And so, yeah, I think that we're just going to continue to see more and more and more of it and hopefully it just gets refined and hopefully we figure out ways to make it safe so people don't get hurt or sick or killed.

[B]

You know that feeling after a really hard training session where the last thing you wanna do is sit down and eat a full meal. Yeah, I get it. And I'm not about forcing down a steak when my body just isn't ready for it. But here's the thing. Intense exercise and really all exercise is catabolic, meaning it increases muscle breakdown. So to protect my muscle and build new muscle and recover, I consume essential amino acids around my workout. This helps with the recovery. Body Health Perfect amino helps me hit the protein threshold. I need to stimulate muscle with minimal calories and not a huge digestive burden like a large steak. The workout was the hard part, but the recovery doesn't have to be. Head to bodyhealth.com and use the code Lion20 to get 20 20% off your first order. That's a body health.com and use the code Lion 20. It's unfortunate that in medicine we're always trying to fix a problem as opposed to how do we optimize a result, if that makes sense. For example, and I don't know if you've thought about this, but the. I'll just throw it out there. LDL numbers. It's an LDL number to not have heart disease. But what about the LDL number to have good energy, good brain function? We don't actually know those numbers. And maybe because it's an arbitrary target.

[A]

Well, and sometimes those LDL numbers are from people that have already had, like, events, and it's like, well, if you're trying to keep it really low for someone that already had a heart attack, that's totally understandable. But maybe not everyone. Yeah, right.

[B]

And we don't have these targeted numbers because it's the way in which we frame things. Just like exercise. You go, you do your resistance training, you do your cardiovascular activity, as opposed to this idea of thinking that we have artificial constructs of how we have to engineer our life so that we can reach some baseline level of fitness to not have an increase in mortality. I believe that you are always thinking about and curious about the next new thing. Do you think that there's the next new thing?

[A]

Well, we're getting close. I think with cancer, there's the guy from UCLA who believes he created a vaccine. I do think that it's great that we continue to learn more. And the studies and stuff, I think sometimes are as much as they are off and as much as you can probably take almost all. All of nutrition science and probably just throw it in a trash can.

[B]

Not all of it, but.

[A]

Well, because a lot of it, I don't think it's really gotten us anywhere. I mean, it's like stuff that your great grandma would, you know, your great grandma would be like, hey, like, don't eat too many of these. Right. Like, she would just know. Right. But I agree, it's not all in jest. I think it is helpful and it helps us get closer. But I think usually what we learn from a study is, oh, we should actually try to set the study up this way. And then you get closer with each. With each study afterwards. Like, oh, it would have been better if it's conducted this way.

[B]

A collective body of research is, I think, really what you're getting after. One of the other things is supplementation. Right. And you and I, again, we've been friends for a long time. We've gone through.

[A]

Oh, I have a whole room of supplements. Yeah.

[B]

In fact, it has its own area. You should probably name that area. Daisy guards the supplementor but have you experimented with anything that you think really works? And I recognize that this is more anecdotal, but you're always looking, you're always thinking about these things.

[A]

12 years ago or so, I got some blood work done and then I had Stan efforting read it. And Stan's learned a lot too since that time. But even at that time, he was pretty knowledgeable and pretty good at being able to assist me and stuff with the blood work. And then he was like, you know, hey, try, you know, some of these. He's not a big supplement guy, but he was like, try some of these supplements. Basically just vitamins and minerals and things like that. And I was like, okay, so I'll try these, you know, six or ten different things that you recommended and get my blood work again. And if my blood work is good, if it's better, then I'll continue the supplements. Otherwise I'll just. It doesn't seem like it makes sense to continue them, you know. So I take the supplements that he suggests, do a couple other things that he suggested. Just maybe be more cognizant of like, sleep and just trying to value my sleep a little bit more along with a couple other things. And then I, you know, took those supplements, got retested, and sure enough, my labs were way better. And so I'm like, damn it, now I have to do this. So that's why I take, you know, I don't know, I probably take like, some days I might take like 40 different things.

[B]

Oh, gosh.

[A]

Other days I might just take like 10 or 5. But it's like magnesium, vitamin C. Like, it's just stuff that. And I don't take all of them all the time because sometimes I'm like, my diet already has that or like vitamin D is something I go back and forth on all the time. But I'm like, I'm tan, it's summertime or the sun's coming out. I don't think I'd really need vitamin D. But then when we're. We don't have as much sunlight and stuff like that in Sacramento, then I'll maybe take a little bit more for a little while. But yeah, just trying to go not based off of my thoughts or my feelings, just based off of mainly my blood work supplement wise, you know, I don't. I mean, I just believe in my. The stuff that I have, you know, I have the Steak shake and the Total Carnivore and those things, and those have titrated into them basically multivitamins, because it has organs, has liver, kidney, heart, spleen, pancreas and all that stuff. And I take those daily. But that's not something that you're. I don't think it's something you're necessarily going to really, like, feel or you're not going to be like, oh, my God, I benched, you know, 40 more pounds or something like that. Those are just. It's just protein powder, you know, and I. I've always liked protein powder. It's just a way for me to kind of control my sweet tooth. But, yeah, in terms of. And then in terms of the peptides, though, I. I do like some peptides. So I've used Mot C, I used TB 500 and BPC, but those two, I didn't really feel like it. I couldn't really tell if it did much, but I did tear a hamstring not that long ago. I know you had a hammy issue a while back, and it seemed like it did help for my hamstring to heal faster. So that was kind of cool. Like, it healed up in maybe about five weeks or so, as opposed to it maybe taking a little longer. But I don't really have a test, so it's still.

[B]

So it's still to be determined. So, Motsi, for someone who's listening to this, it's been around for actually quite some time. One of your family members came to see me and we were talking about it, and that was over 10 years ago.

[A]

Oh, yeah, it was a long time ago.

[B]

Yeah. MOT C for mitochondrial function.

[A]

Right.

[B]

TB 500 people will say tendon and bone for recovery. BPC 157 is another peptide that's good for, depending on how you take it. Stomach, joints recovery, they call it. Again, like you said, the wolverine stack.

[A]

I tried the copper peptide, but it just seemed to hurt more than anything.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And then RETIT is one that I've also used. I started using that about three months ago, and so far I like it a lot.

[B]

What do you notice?

[A]

Just the food noise. You know, people always talk about food noise, like just having cravings and things like that. So that's a lot less. Sometimes, though, in a bad way, it makes me not want to eat. So I need to just figure out, I guess, like, the right dose for me. Seems like everyone's a little bit different on that. And then some of my blood work came back better on retreat. My, like, fasted glucose. A couple things like that were just small, small improvements, but improvement nonetheless. So I'm interested to kind of see you know how that will kind of

[B]

continue over the years? You've been in fitness since you were, I don't know, 11, probably before that. Circling back to 2026. Are there any major myths that you were like, man, I got this wrong. Static stretching.

[A]

I think, like, kind of on that topic of stretching, I think that that is maybe, like, if you think about a lot of sports where stretching is, like. It's like, part of it. Like, gymnastics comes to mind. Like, stretching hasn't really ever been, like, a huge part of anything that I've ever done. Even though I did do some track and I did football and stuff. It wasn't, like, a concentration. But as we were saying earlier with our kids, like, if. If stuff is normalized for the kids, if it's normal for your kids to, you know, learn how to climb a rope or do a bunch of crazy stuff in the backyard, throw the football around with your husband, tackle each other, if. If more stuff is, like, normalized and it's easier to do. And I think for myself, with something like stretching, and it would be. That would be great if that was, like, more normalized for me to do. So I'm trying to figure out with everything, you know, how do I. Just simple things, like setting up my living room so that's easier for me to get on the floor. Just so there's, like, not stuff in the way that I have to move out of the way. Like, you don't want any hurdles, you know? And I think something that I wasn't necessarily wrong about, but something I think that everyone can kind of take from this show is have a kettlebell on your living room. And I don't mean that you necessarily literally have to have a kettlebell in your living room, but have stuff that's in close proximity that you can just get to so that you can. So you can practice some of these things often. So for me, in my living room, I have a bunch of different things for, like, myofascial release. Just these different balls and different things like that that I, like, roll on. So, like, I'll watch tv, and sometimes I'm just, you know, sitting on the floor. Sometimes I'm, like, rubbing on something to try to, like, get something to recover. And Andy will do it, too. Like, we're both in. In fact, we were on vacation, like, not too long ago. Everybody was making a big deal because her and I were on the ground. Like, why don't you guys take the couch? We're like, no, we don't want the couch. We, like, Being we like being on the ground and so things like that, I just, I, oh, I've been aware of them and I know that I've, you know, should have been kind of like working on some of those things,

[B]

but do you think you can catch up?

[A]

No, not really. I think, I think I'm, well, I could, I could catch up, but that would, that would mean that I would have to stop doing some of the things that I like to do because your body won't, your body won't really won't change. You know, it's not going to change massively unless you massively change what you're doing. So I'd have to for me personally, not maybe not for somebody else, but for me personally, I'd have to basically stop lifting. Stop lifting and just work on mobility all the time and have that be my new, have that be my new training and then I would, might be able to put my shoes on easier.

[B]

I wonder if there's a mobility set point. There seems to be a strength threshold. Yeah, I wonder if there's a mobility set point.

[A]

I think when it comes to exercise, I think it's easy to think that everyone has like free will, but I think we have something that's more like boxed, it's boxed free will. So boxed free will would be like, you enjoy exercise every day because you're you. I enjoy exercise every day because I'm me. But what if my, what if my powerlifting career, what if it ended by me breaking my leg, okay, and I'm 330 pounds, and then my leg doesn't really work as good. I kind of have just like a little hitch, a little limp. Well then maybe I would never have been able to get back to this because I have that physiology now. I, I, I'm more limited. So then you end up with this kind of like you end up with these, you end up being like stuck in a box. And even with, even if your thoughts, if I said, hey, you know, think of, try to be as creative as you possibly can and do this search on your phone, just pick whatever you want. Be creative. You can only be so creative because it's a byproduct of everything you've done in the past. It's a byproduct of all these different things. I grew up where I didn't feel like I was smart when I was, when I was in school and had some struggles in school. And so what, I build myself up bigger. You've always been petite, you've always been a smaller person. So you. I am build your, build your muscle up and have some tattoos. Right? So there, there. We think that we, we think that we're like, we're free, but I think that we're, I mean, that just kind of goes back to what, what we were talking about, about stretching and stuff. What, like, why, why is my body tight? It's tight because I don't want to stretch. You know what I mean? Like, I don't. It's not, it's not something that calls to me. I mean, I do stretch, I do some mobility stuff, but I don't do a lot of it because my body doesn't love it. And that's the same thing that we might get frustrated with a family member or friend. We're saying, hey, you really gotta, you know, you really gotta do something. You gotta start moving. We gotta start getting you to do this. And we don't understand why they don't want to do that. It's because they have their own. But then you have to figure out like, okay, well, what's within that box that we can sort of unlock.

[B]

It's personalized nutrition. If you take the framework for personalized nutrition, that's. This is personalized physicality, the movements. You know, there's a ton of variability in the human body. Like you said, I'm petite but jacked. And you know, you might be not so petite and jacked, but all kidding aside, your movement patterns are perhaps some way. Because that's the way in which you would gravitate. So that's the thing that you do. Conversely, the things that you don't do, like ballroom dancing or, I don't know, yoga. Although you might be doing it later with the kids. Maybe you don't do it for a reason. Or those that are hypermobile. So maybe there's a inherent wisdom, potentially

[A]

tend to like things that you're good at too. Right? So if you're like, mark, try this dance. I'll probably be like, nah, because I know I'm going to like, look foolish or whatever. Or maybe I don't have a problem with doing it with you and your kids because we all know each other, right?

[B]

And we all look foolish together.

[A]

Yeah. And then maybe I saw you guys dancing the other day. That's why I brought it up.

[B]

I mean, we do, at 5pm we do a dance party every, every day. We have to get creative in movement. I was, I was thinking about this as a parent. You know, we've got Father's Day, we have Mother's Day, all these Things. And the best gift anyone could give us as a parent is healthy kids.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

How do we get our children healthy? And I've come up with this idea that there should be a parent playlist. The songs are embarrassing enough that your kids are interested. So we have. We're really into Paula Abdul right now, but only partially because we've been watching Zombies, that you're gonna get a dose of Zombies shortly. But we're the Top Gun song truck.

[A]

Oh, nice.

[B]

Yeah. And it's embarrassing enough where they're interested, but then they want to do it. And this is kind of the way in which we get them moving and create a culture, a movement culture within that.

[A]

I love that, you know, and I. I want to go back to that word we said earlier, force. You know, like, some people might be like, this guy's a dick, talking about forcing his kids to do stuff. I, you know, I'm the least likely person to force my kids to really do anything. I don't. I don't necessarily believe in forcing anything yourself or necessarily, in most cases, forcing people to do stuff. But you think about. With your kids, you are forcing everything. You're just forcing them to sometimes just put on clothes every day. You're just. There's certain things you're like. I mean, it's against the law for your kids to not go to school. Like, so they get. They get forced. They're either homeschool, like there's some type of schooling is going to happen. Like, they're forced. There's some situations in life where you yourself might need to force yourself to do certain things, and you yourself might need to force your kids to do something. It's. It's protection, really. You're. You're. You're trying to. I think ultimately with your kids, and it's not the same for everybody. It's not. Everybody wants to have kids. But you're trying to make great parents is ultimately what you're trying to do. Or try to make your son or daughter be strong with what they do. And it might be harder for them to be strong if they're. If they're behind. You know, if they're behind physically, then maybe they didn't really develop the way they needed to mentally. And so you're hoping that they have a good mesh of both, because if they don't. If they don't feel smart, that's going to show, and if they don't feel strong, that's going to show. And so you don't want. It's a hard balance Right. Because, like, every kid is something. Every kid is too skinny, too short, too tall, too big, too fat, too what? You know, insert whatever word. So you can't really necessarily protect them for everything. But what if you're a kid that's undersized? What if he knows jiu jitsu? That might have him be a little. Maybe he's not, you know, going around hurting anybody, but maybe he's, like, a little bit more confident. Maybe the bully at school goes to push him and he just pushed them back. That's the end of it. Because he's like, oh, I can't really, Huh? I can't pick on that kid. I'm not sure why. He's a lot smaller than me. But I wasn't able to pick on him the way I wanted to.

[B]

Mark Bell, thank you for coming on the show. And I just want to.

[A]

Thanks for having me.

[B]

I just want to end with one thing, is that if you are listening to this show, I would encourage you to go back and listen again, because there's two ways to take Mark, the words at which he's saying through the lens of physical strength. And I want you to listen to the episode one way through that, and in addition to listen to it one more time through the lens of mental strength and just something bigger than ourselves. So thank you so much for coming on.

[A]

I appreciate it. Thank you.