← The Dylan Gemelli Podcast
The Dylan Gemelli Podcast
Episode #25: Dylan Gemelli on The Well Beyond 40 Podcast with J.J. Virgin! "Reversing irreversible heart markers", micro dosing GLP-1's, A deep look into creatine, Peptide CLINIC, why muscle mass is so critical, NAD+ craze and more!!
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- [00:05]
JJ Virgin
I'm JJ Virgin, PhD dropout, sorry mom, turned four time New York Times Best selling author. I'm a Certified Nutrition Specialist, Fitness hall of Famer and I speak at health conferences and trainings around the globe. But I'm driven most of all by my insatiable curiosity and love of science to keep asking questions, digging for answers and sharing the information that I uncover with as many people as I can. And that's where you come in. That's why I created the well Beyond 40 podcast to synthesize and simplify the science of health into actionable strategies to help you thrive. In each episode we'll talk about what's working in the world of wellness, from personalized nutrition and healing your metabolism to powerful aging and prescriptive fitness. Join me on the journey to better health so you can love how you look and feel right now and have the energy to play full out at 100. Don't miss an episode. Subscribe now@subscribetojay.com to start unlocking your healthiest, most energetic self. Want to listen to this show ad free? Head over to subscribetojay.com and start your ad free experience today. Okay, full disclosure. I've been dabbling over the last two years, I guess with peptides, maybe it's been three years now. And so I'm always interested to talk to people who are further ahead on their peptide journey than me. And so that is what I'm going to be talking to Dylan Gemelli about today. He is a prominent figure in the fitness and biohacking industry. He has got his expertise in health, fitness and performance enhancement. He's also the creator of the Dylan Gemelli Podcast and and he has written ebooks on peptides, Sarms and nootropics. We're going to be digging into peptides and Sarms a bunch today. He's in national association of Sports Medicine, Certified personal trainer. He's fitness and nutrition and weight loss specialist. And I met him over at Eudaimonia this year. He came and took my exercise snacks workshop. That was really fun. It was the first time I'd done an exercise class in, gosh, 25 years. I was like, these are fun. I should do this more often. Anyhow, we are talking all about that, but we're also doing a deep dive into kind of the latest in cardiovascular health, which is such an important topic, one I don't talk about enough. I need to bring some more people on the show about it because this is the number one health risk and we don't Talk enough about it. So we are going to be talking about the latest tests, some of the important things you can do, and then again, a bunch on peptides. So a fun interview kind of goes all over the place. So kind of buckle up for the wild ride. And I'll be right back with Dylan Gemelli. All right, so we've got you. You are a. You're a trainer, you're a nutritionist, you're a cellular health expert. Dylan Gemelli, you're on the show and we are going to dig into peptides, sarms and nootropics. I almost feel like saying, you know, lions and tigers and bears. It's like peptides, nootropics, and sarms. I think what we need to start with is how did you get into all of that? And then I want to unpack them all because I think most people don't know what the heck they are.
- [03:44]
Dylan Gemelli
You know, long story that I'll try to keep shorter. So I kind of had to start my life over from scratch. And 2011, I made a lot of poor choices when I was younger. I. I was modeling.
- [03:57]
JJ Virgin
You're the only one.
- [03:58]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah, right. Really bad lifestyle. I was modeling all over the the world. I was in Italy, Europe. I was acting. And, you know, I'm not gonna make excuses. It was my decisions. I was raised well, given everything, and I was just a jerk. And I got myself into trouble. Started from scratch. And granted, I started from scratch in Hawaii because that's where my parents lived and where I moved. Right, right. So it was 2011 and I literally had nothing but some clothes, a bed, and I was in my mom and dad's basement at 30 years old. So you can imagine going from, like, having everything to nothing, and I mean nothing. So I started to do a ton of research. Just I was figuring out with my life was, I want to be a trainer. I'm all about health. This is it. So I got into bodybuilding forums and started studying supplements, testosterone boosters, and I had studied steroids because of baseball, because I was a big sports fan. And so I got into that world more, but I was more on the side of trying to teach people to not use them and the side effects and in coaching. So what they. I. A company found me and said, we want you to start doing YouTube videos and we're going to push you to the moon. Nobody's talking about any of this stuff and we want you to do it. And I had just gotten out of legal trouble. Right. So I said, well, I said, let me talk to my attorney and see if there's any legal trouble here. And there wasn't, you know, talk about whatever, just don't be a part of selling Stu. Obviously, I'm not going to do that. So I studied my butt off. And when I tell you I studied my butt off, it was. I was up till 2 and 3 in the morning on the computer every night, just reading, reading. Well, in the midst of all of this, I fell into this world of peptides and SARMs that no one had tapped into or knew about. And I used SARMs. And after using them, I thought I found the Holy Grail, right? Because it's like, wow, these have. They're not like steroids. They're not going to cause you all this suppression, all of these side effects. So I just went full bore at them. Peptides at the time were not popular in the bodybuilding world because they didn't put on a bunch of size, they didn't do all of these crazy things. And there was only like 6 or 7 to choose from back then.
- [06:16]
JJ Virgin
And how long ago was this?
- [06:17]
Dylan Gemelli
2011 is when I stumbled upon.
- [06:20]
JJ Virgin
You were so early.
- [06:21]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah.
- [06:22]
JJ Virgin
Oh, my goodness.
- [06:23]
Dylan Gemelli
Well, when you got onto an underground peptide site, there was roughly seven or eight you could buy. And it was like Ipamorelin, CJC 1295, and then Melanitan 2 and. Which I experimented with and basic GHRPs. I mean, the basic basics.
- [06:41]
JJ Virgin
Okay. Most people have no idea what you're even talking about and they don't know what SARMs are. So don't worry, we will define all of this. By the time you leave, you will be an expert like Dylan is. Know which things to try and which things to stay away from. And I'll tell you my funny Melanotown story.
- [06:58]
Dylan Gemelli
We're going to have to go back and forth because I have a horror story for you too. We'll go back and forth, but, you know, it just progressed. And then when the. There was these things called pro hormones. So for people watching, in short, pro hormones are basically steroids that were legal at the time that you could sell. They were designer steroids. They're steroids. Let's just.
- [07:19]
JJ Virgin
And were they?
- [07:21]
Dylan Gemelli
Well, they were sold over the counter. And honestly, they had all of the makeup of steroids with some additives in there to make them on the legal side without actually being a actual steroid. But the way that they were made and methylated, they were worse for you than steroids.
- [07:37]
JJ Virgin
Wow.
- [07:37]
Dylan Gemelli
And they banned them in, like 2014. And after that happened, all of these companies were stuck with hundreds of thousands and sometimes million dollars of raw materials. And these were categorized as steroids. Now, so that was a Schedule 1 drug. If you got caught with these, you were going to prison. Okay? So people stop selling them. So what did they do? They discovered SARMs, they discovered peptides, so they started selling SARMs illegally, marketing them as supplements. Because what we'll get into is sarms and peptides sold could only be sold as research chemicals.
- [08:12]
JJ Virgin
And, and a SARM is what, a.
- [08:15]
Dylan Gemelli
Selective androgen receptor modulator, meaning it's selective to the androgen receptor. So it's very selective on where it goes, where steroids can cause you all of these harms. Because SARMs are selective and go to a certain androgen receptor, that's mitigating a lot of the side effects. Basically, in, in short easy terms, we could get more scientific into it, but we're looking at far less side effects. Like for instance, prostate's a big concern with steroid use. You're not concerned with prostate, with SARMS use, because it's selective. But what happened was they start putting these into capsules and selling them, and then this big SARMS explosion has taken off ever since. The problem was a lot of these places were putting their pro. More pro hormone powders into the sarms and selling them as sarms. So now you've got all of these articles everywhere that sarms caused these problems and that problem when people were taking pro hormones without really knowing it, there's no testing here. They're not FDA regulated. You don't know what you're taking. Just like a lot of the supplements we take now, you know, some are good, some are regulated, and some are just thrown in and you don't know what you're getting. So I've went through this whole evolution and then that brings us closer to today where peptides started to be prescribed, you know, 2019, 2020s, when people started kind of prescribing them. And then you, you know, now the last two years, it's just blown through the roof where you got more biohackers and more doctors. And it's just readily talked about and discussed and with good reason, by the way. And so I have gone through this whole process and evolution and now I'm on the doctor side. I was invited to speak at Mr. Olympia, and that's where I transferred into the biohacking community after October this year. And I've just, it's been a big splash for me because it's like who I really am. I've been in this world of bros, and that's not who I am. You know, it's. It's what I had to be to find my niche. And now I'm around the. And I love those people, don't get me wrong. But that's not who I am. And now I'm around the people that I really, truly am. And then I get to meet people like you and, and I relate with so much better and I could talk to all day. And now my focus is kind of on the cellular health side and the biology side and the health side. And I do a lot of. I didn't get into this with you before, but I, I found a heart condition on myself, so I have. The last two years, I have put so much time into cardiology studies and, and cholesterol, lp, apob. Real in detail, intricate stuff to help people.
- [10:46]
JJ Virgin
Ooh. Well, let's break into that too, because, you know, it's interesting to me that cardiovascular health still gets the least amount of attention and it's the number one killer. It's like, you know, especially when you talk about women's health, it's breast cancer, it's osteoporosis, these are important, but heart disease is what ultimately kills the majority of people. So, you know, I definitely want to unpack that as well. So. And I'd love to talk about it in the context of peptides, SARMs, nootropics, like, you know, what all we can be using before we get into that. You define SARMs, define what a peptide is and what a nootropic is as well, just so we have that baseline.
- [11:29]
Dylan Gemelli
So, you know what I'm going to do here too, because I have my ebooks here and I get into these too. But I mean, peptides are really just, they're just amino acids and they, they're, they're, they're composed of single chains of amino acids. And that makes a relatively large peptide. Right? I mean, that's all that. If we're just keeping it as simple as we possibly can. That is literally all it is. It's just amino acids formed into a peptide chain. And so there's different numbers on each one and all of that, but it's, it's, it's not as difficult as it sounds. And a lot of these, like for instance, we know BPC 157 is the most talked about peptide in general right now at this time. And I can confirm that on sales of underground sites because I get all the data from owners because I study and keep ahead and that's, it's just produced naturally in your gut. Now we're taking it exogenously when we inject it. But it's, it's something natural. It's a lot more safer and optimal. Most of these peptides, they really aren't going to cause you harm unless you absolutely abuse them. Now we, you and I have discussed GLP1s and that's a different story on misuse, but we're talking just in general. The safety and efficacy of these are incredible. And there's years upon years of study and I am such a big proponent of them more than I ever have been. It is just, I mean, you can attest to this. There's so many that do so many different things, and I am fully behind them 100%.
- [13:06]
JJ Virgin
Where do you think they fit in? Because I kind of have my hierarchy of health. And I'm hoping with the new administration things are going to shift because they've been this underground thing and sort of like making supplements underground, like, it's ridiculous, you know, and my only thinking is that it threatens the pharmaceutical companies because literally, if you were eating well, exercising, exercising, dealing with your stress, believed in a higher power, had great relationships, you know, did the food basically what you needed, use supplements to correct any deficiencies, use peptides where you needed. Like, I don't know that you'd ever really need pharmaceuticals at all. So therefore, you know, I see the people don't listening, probably don't realize that a lot of these things have been taken off the market that I remember my first time buying some of these things because I wanted some very specific peptides for my son with his traumatic brain injury. We had to use Bitcoin and buy it from this Russian company. And I'm like, for experiment, it was only for animal use. Like all this ridiculous stuff. I'm like, what is going on here? But similar to like even stem cell therapy, some of the stuff I was able to do for my son, you couldn't do. And you know, I have friends now going to Buenos Aires to do certain things. It's like, it is crazy what we're not allowed to do. So where do these fit into your. Like, let's walk through your hierarchy of health and, and how you would utilize these.
- [14:34]
Dylan Gemelli
I, I'm so glad that you brought up not hopefully needing pharmaceuticals with the use of things like this, because that is exactly where I was going to go with this. If you go down a list and like you're talking right now. So if you try to go get certain Things prescribed. There's only so many things that you can get prescribed anywhere from any clinic or any doctor or anything like that. Your list is going to be quite short on what they can actually prescribe to you. There's hundreds and thousands of peptides to choose from. Now. Sifting through where to buy them safely is a whole nother thing that we can discuss as we go on. But in terms of my hierarchy, I'm always going to start with your basics. Your nutrition, your sleep. You're just like you like with nutrition, the amount of protein intake and having our macro and micronutrients correct. But then if we're looking past that and we're looking at supplements and think there's basic things like creatine that I think everybody should take and we can talk about ages, but I think there's such a gap there that you can safely do it. And I believe, like I have my mom in her 70s on it. I firmly.
- [15:43]
JJ Virgin
Amen. Get her on Chia Teen.
- [15:45]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes, that's. I already do. So finally back.
- [15:49]
JJ Virgin
I know. It's like sold out.
- [15:51]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes.
- [15:52]
JJ Virgin
And over again.
- [15:52]
Dylan Gemelli
Well, luckily I had a few ahead of time. So I, you know, me and my wife took it and then I gave the rest to my mom. My mom, I like powder, she likes capsules.
- [16:03]
JJ Virgin
So we've got plain powder coming out next. We've got all sorts of stuff coming out.
- [16:08]
Dylan Gemelli
I'm looking forward to that.
- [16:09]
JJ Virgin
You know, it's interesting, I think that when you look at something, because I always look at orthomolecular first. So our body makes creatine and then we should get some from diet. So why wouldn't this be something you would be starting from a young age, you know, and if. Unless your kids are eating fairly rare meat and fish, which likely they're not.
- [16:32]
Dylan Gemelli
Right.
- [16:33]
JJ Virgin
Something you'd want to throw a little bit in their smoothie.
- [16:35]
Dylan Gemelli
Absolutely. And. And you know this. It's funny because when I was in high school and I mean I'm not old, but I mean, I'm 43, so I mean, we're talking in the later 90s, we were. That was what we were starting to take. I was 14 when I started taking it. I had some gaps in between there when I was partying too much. But in general, I've taken it most of my life. I mean, that's.
- [16:55]
JJ Virgin
The guys. The gals weren't the same.
- [16:57]
Dylan Gemelli
No, no, no, no.
- [16:58]
JJ Virgin
Like, we did not touc. It was a bro thing.
- [17:01]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah. No, no, it honestly, I would say just in the past few years is when we really started talking about females taking it like more universally and it becoming more of a mainstream thing where it's like doctors and biohackers and people are talking about it now, it was, you know, this, it wasn't talked about.
- [17:19]
JJ Virgin
Like that at all. And you know, I still talk women off a ledge with this. I still talk women off a ledge with putting muscle on, you know. Yeah, but creatine, you look at all the different things beyond just, hey, it helps you work out harder and recover better. I mean, besides just. And I mean, your cellular health, like just the energy that you can produce because of it. But the brain function piece of it.
- [17:45]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes, you know, 100%. That's one of the things. But I was looking at the brain function and then, you know, what else is like the menopausal help. Different aspects of menopause, whether it be, you know, sometimes with the emotional side effects, the cognitive function, and then, you know, this, the bone health with the definitely bone degradation starting at that point in time, I mean, even before that, possibly as we age. But you know that in, in menopause it's really starting to hit. So, and, and even for teenagers, I mean, there's such a wide spectrum of good use here, but absolutely for females. Now, granted, the dosings may be a little different, but still, it's still something you should use firmly behind that. So that's definitely. If we're talking supplement side, that would be number one on my list of supplements that I would recommend that people use. Now I'm a, I'm big on heart health, like I said, so I'm there with Coq10 that I think that most people should be looking at or considering taking. And I like to protect the liver. And then we know magnesium is very important. Electrolytes in general need to be looked at and viewed and taken very seriously because when you throw those off, your heart rhythm can go off and then there's a slew of other problems. So then we've got those basics right, Your, your vitamins that you should get a lot of from food if you're eating properly. I don't like to depend on too many things for the nutrients that we need. Those are supplements for a reason, supplemental. But then, you know, peptides are gonna fall right after that. For me personally, we'll get into the nootropic side of things. But that's a little different when we're talking about health because that's more like cognitive and sharp function, which I'll talk about. But there's so there's so many multitudes of peptides and things that we have. So I'm just going to name a few.
- [19:29]
JJ Virgin
Yeah, it's like, so how do you sort through all that and go, which ones would be the top ones to focus on?
- [19:35]
Dylan Gemelli
So let's think about, okay, as we age a little bit, you know, and so we're looking at like 30 years old, we know our natural growth hormone levels are going to drop. So something like an Ipamorelin. I like Tessa Morel in myself, it's more geared towards fat loss while still adding lean muscle. So I like it. It's just very expensive. IPAMorelin and CJC 1295 are good growth hormone releasing peptides where you're, you're not taking exogenous growth hormone, but they're releasing your growth hormone, you know, because we know HGH itself is quite expensive and there's a lot more side effects that you got to worry about.
- [20:13]
JJ Virgin
I gotta tell you, back in the day when HGH was a big thing and I remember I was living in Palm Desert, there was a doc there who taught, he still does, teaches all over the world on growth hormone. And I had a lot of his clients coming to my gym. They all became insulin resistant.
- [20:28]
Dylan Gemelli
Yep, that's what I was gonna say. And that's the problem aside from the possibility of like acromegaly and, and things like. And when I say that, like your heart growing or your facial features growing and things, and that's from misuse. But then there's like, there's a sodium potassium ratio. So people will complain about, oh, I got this. Water retention. Well, there's a thing called sodium potassium ratio where in general, when you're having those problems, it means you're lacking potassium and eating way too much sodium. And the scale is 3,500 to 4,700 milligrams of potassium and no more than 2,300 milligrams of sodium. Well, you and I know this. Most people have way more sodium than that and like a fraction of the potassium. And everybody thinks that you eat bananas for potassium, which couldn't be further from the truth. There's a million other options. And bananas are not even close to.
- [21:22]
JJ Virgin
The best choice, by the way, for the win there.
- [21:25]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes, there you go. But, okay, so let's look at some other ones. You, BPC157 and TB500 are your healing compounds. And those are the ones that get the most action right now and the most discussion. And with good reason. I mean, these are on a different level of rapid healing. But there's others. So epitalon for sleep, which is amazing. MOT C for like cellular and mitochondrial repair and function. GHKU, copper peptide for anti aging. PT141 for like erectile dysfunction or libido issues. I mean, we could go on and on and on.
- [22:06]
JJ Virgin
What does. So, and this is. I remember listening to another lecture where this guy just started rolling through him and everyone's eyes glazed over. Hey, so for someone who's listening to all this, how do you make sense of this and go, where would I start? Do you go work with a peptide, doc? Like, what. What's the process? Because a lot of these things are injections. Some. Some of them are orals. Yeah, I've been doing a BPC157 oral. I know it's not as effective, but I'm not going to inject myself three times a day. So I'm just annoying. Let's be real. I'm not doing it. Yuck. So you know which things. How would someone listen to this and go, what do I do?
- [22:49]
Dylan Gemelli
So that's where the problem lies. There are some very, very intelligent people that I revert to. You know, we all have mentors and people we go to. There is like, I'm getting certifications. I'm going to be going it with the SSRP Institute, which is Dr. William Seeds. That's going to be the.
- [23:08]
JJ Virgin
Oh, he's amazing. He's got me. It got my brain shifted on GLP1s and made me realize what I could do to bring my son back with his traumatic brain injury and how much that could help. I am convinced GLP1s in a microdosed fashion, like Dr. Tina Moore teaches, are the ultimate longevity hack. Improving insulin sensitivity, reducing systemic inflammation. Not overdosing them to shut your appetite off. Using a super low dose to, you know, kind of get you back to where you would have been if your gut microbiome hadn't been trashed.
- [23:47]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah.
- [23:47]
JJ Virgin
Using what you should be producing. But it's made a huge difference in my son and I Learned that from Dr. Seeds.
- [23:54]
Dylan Gemelli
So here's where I'm going to give you some credit on something you taught me that you don't even know you taught me. I mentioned Dr. Elizabeth Youth to you prior. So she's right with Dr. Seeds. And so she's one that I discuss a lot of my questions. I go to her and I met her when I was speaking at the Mr. Olympia. She first told me we had big long and we're actually going to do it again because she's going to do a controversial NAD plus conversation with me. But she was the one that got me onto the microdosing with the GLPs. And then about two weeks later, I went to Eudaimonia and listened to you confirm that for me. And so after you confirmed it and she said it, two people that I held in such a high regard, I spent. One thing you'll learn about me is when I want to go learn something, I'll do it relentlessly. I'll stay up at all hours of the night. And I just put so many different studies into it. I tested it on some clients that wanted to use it and I told them, look, we're going to do it this way, we're not going to do it your way, we're going to do it my way. And everything that I've seen confirms what you said, confirms what she said. The ability to not just degrade, you're in that sunken face. And the loss of sacrificing of the muscle, the complete and utter loss of appetite, which could go along with misuse and using too much. And I've seen not only people hold their weight in terms of their muscles, still lose fat in the process, but feel great and look great. And I have no reason to believe that there's. I haven't seen any blood work problems.
- [25:32]
JJ Virgin
Because I had amazing improvements.
- [25:34]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah.
- [25:36]
JJ Virgin
In people using it. APOB finally coming down where nothing else would. Would help.
- [25:41]
Dylan Gemelli
Yep.
- [25:41]
JJ Virgin
So, yeah, quite incredible. Which I definitely want to talk APOB and LP as well. But, yeah, it's. It's been amazing. I just know that we're doing it that the way they're using it started out in diabetes, so that was a different application. And I think the biggest application probably is to turn around metabolic health. And what people don't understand that was what I was talking about at Eudaimonia is when someone is insulin resistant or diabetic and has been in that situation for a while and now all of a sudden you're saying, you know what, you just need to eat less and exercise more. Well, try to exercise when you've got chronic inflammation and you can't access, you know, glycogen because you're so insulin resistant now you're supposed to move more and eat, but you're hungry all the time because you can't access stored fat for fuel. Like, that's just mean. Throw them a life raft, let them get through this, give them a little bit of help as they work through it. So anyway, I know, we're on the same page with that. So again, it sounds like, I think the bigger takeaway for people listening is there are these compounds out there that, you know, start with the basics first. I always want to see where people are with the basics to know how well they're doing. Like if you're eating well, you know, optimizing your protein, eating a lot of plants for the gut, microbiome diversity, getting in healthy fats, eliminating seed oils. Well, hydrating, exercising, doing your movement, doing your resistance training, doing your hiit, getting your good sleep, you know, doing something for stress management, having great relationships, all the things. And then, you know, repleting any micronutrient deficiencies. Next step up. Sounds like, okay, let's look at what peptides for where your not really going, you know, where you're struggling.
- [27:32]
Dylan Gemelli
Right.
- [27:33]
JJ Virgin
And then that would be working with someone who is an expert in these.
- [27:37]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes.
- [27:38]
JJ Virgin
And that's going to be the biggest challenge, is finding the expert. Sounds like you are focused on really becoming that expert. So that's great.
- [27:45]
Dylan Gemelli
That's what I do. Yep.
- [27:46]
JJ Virgin
Yeah. So because there's a gazillion of them and you could get yourself completely overwhelmed and spend a whole lot of money and not get to where you want to be. So that would be the next step in this. What about, you know, you mentioned you really had done a deep dive and I feel like we kind of are with weight where we've been with cholesterol. Like I remember back in the day everyone was focused first on total cholesterol numbers.
- [28:16]
Dylan Gemelli
Yep.
- [28:17]
JJ Virgin
Which we now know. It's like, well, that's dumb. And then it was LDL and HDL and good and bad. And then we knew that wasn't right. And then we were like, well, it's the size and the fractions. And then I was like, well, no, maybe, maybe it's lp. Well, wait, it's apob. Or it's like, well, is it plaquing? So there's all this stuff and I look at it very similar to weight going. You can't have someone step on a scale and make any kind of clinical decision. You have to know what the weight's made up of, need to know where their fat's located. You need to know how much skeletal muscle mass they are. To me, cholesterol is the same. It's like cholesterol is this stupid story that we can't seem to get away from. When you're looking at heart health, how do you look at it?
- [28:55]
Dylan Gemelli
Okay, so you brought up some really good Points. I always look at all of the numbers just to get a gauge. So when you go to the doctor and you get a metabolic panel or a cholesterol panel, whatever they want to call it, you're going to get some basic tests. You're going to get ldl, hdl, total cholesterol and triglycerides. Those are the four that you're guaranteed that you're going to get. You might get a couple like different ratios and things, but those are the four you're going to get. Those are fine. I want that data, but that doesn't tell me anywhere near what I need to know. I need to get a comprehensive, some will call it like cardio IQ panel. It's just a comprehensive cholesterol panel is all it is. I literally just had my checkup today, this morning, virtually because I have a doctor out of state who's the best in the United States that I go to and I can explain my condition and why I go to him, but he's in Connecticut, so I have to do it virtual. So. And literally today was my checkup. We went through all my, my panels and everything. And I'll get into the medicines I take as opposed to a ridiculous statin, but I'll also talk about that too. But the, the main function that he looks at when it comes to cardiac risk is apob. Now, I've taken a, a deeper dive into LP because that's the condition that I found myself to have and there's not much data on it as there is on other aspects. So that's where I have put the majority of my specific time. But APOB is going to be the one that gets a lot of the most. Look, it plays a really crucial role in your lipid metabolism and your cardiovascular health. So let me, I want to try to make this as easy as I can and not get too, so people can understand. So APOB is just basically a component of lipoproteins. And these are the particles that are going to carry fats like cholesterol and triglycerides in your bloodstream. So it's, it's really, it's essential for the recognition and binding of lipoproteins to your LDL receptors on the surface of your cells, and that allows them to deliver lipids into cells for energy or storage. So that's what it is. Now, elevated levels of APOB are going to be associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. And what, what generally is going to happen is that's going to contribute to the formation of Plaque atherosclerosis, essentially. And they're going to be elevated when you have, like, hypercholester, hypercholesterolemia, hyperlipidemia, things like this. And, you know, some people, it can be caused by a multitude of things. Genetics play a role. Your diet plays a role. Your lack of exercise, you know, what you're doing plays a big role in that. There's some things that can certainly be helped and some things that you just kind of, you know, it's. You got the bad. You the bad cards in the deck, but you can certainly control a lot of this by your own actions. Now, the LP little A is a completely different story because you can't control that with your diet, you can't control that with your exercise. This is a genetic thing. That's an inherited problem. And it's. I would say it's a far less understood problem. I mean, there are plenty of people that have an understanding. But I'm going to tell you a story after I get into, like, LP with you. It's lipoprotein little A, basically, and nobody really tests for it. And one of the problems with it is that when you get this test, like for instance, when I went in and I told them I wanted this test, they tell you that, oh, you're only going to test this once. You never test it again. And it is what it is. I just did not accept that. To me, that is nonsense, garbage, and I never accepted it. And I've proven with my score dropping 250 points that you can make some adjustments and fix this. So don't let somebody tell you that you can't, first of all.
- [33:05]
JJ Virgin
But that is the running school of thought. This test, you test once it's genetic.
- [33:10]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah.
- [33:10]
JJ Virgin
Just seeing if it's higher, not if it's higher. Greater risk.
- [33:13]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah.
- [33:13]
JJ Virgin
Nothing that you can do to lower it.
- [33:16]
Dylan Gemelli
It's a marker. No. And that's. That couldn't be further from the truth. Just like they tell you you can't reverse plaque in your arteries, which I can tell you I have spoken with and seen firsthand that you most certainly can. And I've spoken with some of the most intellectual doctors in the world that will confirm that you most certainly can. So I don't buy when they tell you you can't. I. I'm not a take. I don't take no for an an. You know what I mean? Like, I don't. I don't operate that way. I will find a way. And so basically, like I said, the LP is completely different now, you know this, I know this. A lot of people know this. You go in there, you have any sort of elevation or anything there, the immediate thing is put you on a statin. I don't care if you're like, like this, a SK mark, that's what they want. Now let's talk about a statin here in terms of what it will do. So you take a statin with an lp, which is what they tried to tell me to do, that will increase your LP number, first of all. Second of all, if you go get a calcium score, it will increase your calcium score and the amount of gauged plaque. Now, it's hardening your soft plaque, which is a good thing, but it's still increasing the score and it's causing a slew of side effects, as we know. And if you really sift through the studies and analyze them and understand them, the rate of like cardiac occurrence is like 0.1% difference on what it'll actually do to help you. And I've seen far more people still have occurrences while taking it. Muscle like, pain constant, you know, liver problems, elevated alt, AST, and other numbers. I mean, I could go down the list. So of course they put me on that. And I get in the car with my mom and my wife and drive four hours to the Mayo Clinic, supposedly the best doctors in the United States, in Minneapolis, where it's the highest rated Mayo Clinic. And I went up there with the idea of, hey, I want to take PCSK9 inhibitors. I don't want to take a statin. I want to address the lp, which I found myself. And they told me it would be bad practice to put me on that. There was not enough data on lp and basically, oh, you're fine, you're in great health, you're in great condition, you eat great, you work out, there's no problem. My calcium score came back 141. And I had a CT Angio that showed I had 30 some percent blockage in the specific.
- [35:43]
JJ Virgin
And you were how old?
- [35:44]
Dylan Gemelli
42. Yeah. And I'm telling you, I mean, I train. You don't want to know how I train and how I don't. I don't drink, I don't do drugs, I don't do anything right. I live the life of what I coach.
- [35:57]
JJ Virgin
Did you have a family history here of this?
- [36:00]
Dylan Gemelli
That's what I found. My dad had a heart attack at 59. I. My mom has no LP score at all. So I started to do some digging. Here's what happened. I started to work for A doctor. This is a doctor that cut a bad video on a steroid video. I did. So I called him and I said, hey, I think you got this wrong. Anyway, we got to talk. And he said, I want to hire him. You. And he said, all of my. My workers, I have them go do a calcium score. He said, I'm sure you're fine. Just go do it. I said, okay, I'll do it. I went and did it, and my score came back. It was 140, and I went into a panic.
- [36:33]
JJ Virgin
Now, give people who are listening where you know you want. Zero.
- [36:37]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes.
- [36:38]
JJ Virgin
Which I just thought, yeah. And that's what the goal is. And what's the range so people understand.
- [36:45]
Dylan Gemelli
Well, I mean, she's you. I've seen people with scores in the thousand. I mean, you. When you start getting AB, like 50. So basically, this is. It's an assessment. It's gauging an estimated amount of plaque that is built up in your arteries, and it's kind of giving you the locations. And of course, mine was near my lad, which is the worst spot you can get. It's called the widowmaker because it kills you. Like, for most people, if you have an event and no one's around, you're not going to make it. I mean, chances are slim.
- [37:14]
JJ Virgin
And that's 50% of people, the first time they find out they have heart disease is they keel over and die.
- [37:19]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes. Yep, that's right. And you know why? Because they're not checking any of these other tests. They're not. They. They go in and get a stress test that tells you nothing, or they'll do. Even an EKG is only measuring your heart rhythms. It's not telling you anything about anything else. So you, like, you could go in with a perfect echo. Echocardiogram, a perfect ekg, all of this. And have issues and never know it if you don't go through this rigorous process of understanding. So when I found that I had the calcium score, I immediately started to dig and thought, like, what the. Like how? How? And then I started learning about the blood test, the comprehensive blood test, and I went and ordered them all myself at Quest. I did it all myself. I did everything myself because nobody knows. Clearly, there's a complete negligence on this aspect of. Of health. And there's a. Numerous others. And then I got the little out. My LP. Little A score was 330. So I immediately knew, okay, your LP score in the measurements, I had maximum 75. And that's where you're getting into the. The yellow Stage and then over a hundred and over 100, you're in the the red zone. And so then I found that PCSK9 inhibitors were the only things that would possibly help this. They have about a 25 to 30% ability to help you. And then I was coached on niacin being something great for it. And then as opposed to taking a statin, I was looking at red yeast rice, which is a natural statin. Now red yeast rice can have a lot of side effects and I stopped taking.
- [38:55]
JJ Virgin
You still have to do. Yeah, if you're doing that, you still have to do all the mitochondrial sport like CoQ10 and GG because everything have the problems.
- [39:04]
Dylan Gemelli
Yep.
- [39:05]
JJ Virgin
It's like people don't understand the drugs came from somewhere.
- [39:08]
Dylan Gemelli
So the good thing about Vascepa, which is one of the ones I was taking, is that is just like the purest form official that it's like all natural and that is just shown. And then I take repatha twice a month. It's just a simple injection. It's a very quick one. And I just got my LP score recently and I mind you, I was at 3:30 and they tell you it's not gonna go anywhere. And my Last score was 96. So I'm taking a clearly test in probably June because I have to go out of state to do it. And that's going to give you an accurate assessment of how much soft and hard plaque that I have in my arteries. And I'll see if there's been any regression since I started doing everything I'm doing. So for instance, pomegranate juice is one of the things that can reverse plaque. And then I'm taking urolithin A, which.
- [39:57]
JJ Virgin
I say so is the pomegranate juice, is it the urolithin A that's reversing the plaque?
- [40:03]
Dylan Gemelli
That's my hope.
- [40:03]
JJ Virgin
And yeah, yeah, let's shout out to mitipure with this. So pomegranate juice can create a like help with a postbiotic urolithin A. So it's one of the things some people and probably genetically you're one of those people that just does not make urolithin A. So pomegranate juice, walnuts, raspberries, can 40% of people apparently actually do this? Well, I'm not one of them. So I take. And by the way, even if you did it well, who's having that much pomegranate juice?
- [40:36]
Dylan Gemelli
No, no, no.
- [40:37]
JJ Virgin
Right. Or it's raspberries, walnuts, some other stuff. But I was like, none of this stuff am I eating that much of anyway to make sure that I'm actually getting this. So I. You know, there's so much data now on urolithin A and what it can do. A ton of sense. But I didn't know that it did this piece too.
- [40:56]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes.
- [40:56]
JJ Virgin
Which is great for my. My husband's dad died of a heart attack in his early 50s, and he'd had, like, open heart surgery in his 40s, and Tim had an elevated apob. So I was like, on it. I've been on it. You know, it's like.
- [41:11]
Dylan Gemelli
Right. So my hope is, because I'm doing a thousand milligrams now of my TO pure.
- [41:17]
JJ Virgin
Yeah. So are we.
- [41:18]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah. Everybody listening. Might appear is just the purest form of urolithin A that you can get. And timeline nutrition makes mitopure. And me and JJ stand firmly behind them because we've seen and we know, and the data speaks for it.
- [41:30]
JJ Virgin
I used it for a year, actually, probably two years before I started working with them. And I just was obsessed with it. Like. Like, there's. There's a few things that creatine, qualia, NAD plus things that you take. You're like, whoa. Qualia senolytic. That's another one. Like, things that you take. And you're like, okay, I actually can tell a difference from this. Do not take it away from me. So. And it's interesting, over the years, Dylan, I used to take a ton of supplements. I don't take as many supplements now. D and K fish oil, magnesium. But I do take senolytics. NAD plus might appear. Those are what I'm doing. I'm spending more time on these types of. Of things. And creatine, of course. Like, you know, creatine. I think everybody should be on. Should be on anyhow. All right, so we're going to see then from the. Clearly, this is a fun experiment because you're proving everybody wrong.
- [42:31]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes.
- [42:32]
JJ Virgin
On this. Which it makes sense that you should be able to do this.
- [42:36]
Dylan Gemelli
It does. You know, I. I am on a mission to show in the most positive manner just how far off a lot of these people are and to show people there's hope and to teach them how to do it without completely eradicating their health.
- [42:54]
JJ Virgin
Yeah.
- [42:54]
Dylan Gemelli
You know, they rob Peter to pay Paul with a lot of these drugs that they make you take. And they might fix one thing, but cause 10 other problems so they can put you on something else to create more problems, to fix one.
- [43:06]
JJ Virgin
Right.
- [43:06]
Dylan Gemelli
It never ends well.
- [43:07]
JJ Virgin
It's not, it's not root cause medicine as we all talk about. I think the worst offender of all is cancer drugs. Like, you know, I watched that just kill my dad. I went, dad, you know the statistics for these drugs you're putting on and not taking the drugs, the statistics are actually the same, right? Just one, you have great quality of life and one, your life sucks from all the side effects, but wouldn't listen to me.
- [43:31]
Dylan Gemelli
So no, I'm with you 100%. And you know, that's the sad thing. But one of the things I've learned in all of my cellular learning is that that everything you know, originates in your cells and the degrading of your cells, your cell membranes and your mitochondria. That's where all the diseases are originating from. And that's why if we can address that, get those fixed, get those repaired, start that mitophagy process that is going to mitigate and eliminate diseases from starting and forming, which is going to allow you to live longer and, or a better quality of life and you're going to age slower.
- [44:09]
JJ Virgin
I just wish there was an easier way. Like it just feels like the challenge there is that for most people that's they don't understand that when you say you know, your mitochondrial health and mitophagy. And it would be so cool if there was a way you could actually measure these things. You could measure your zombie cells, you could measure your, and I know me screen the thing that Himalaya like they did that one. But I just feel like it's still early. Like wouldn't it be great if we really could assess your mitochondrial health?
- [44:42]
Dylan Gemelli
So I don't want to speak out of turn because this is fresh stuff that I just learned. But we're measuring.
- [44:47]
JJ Virgin
Got a big grin over there because.
- [44:50]
Dylan Gemelli
I just learned this in class a couple weeks ago. So we were looking at redox balance and going through does that mean, okay, so redox. And I'm going to read this because I don't want to speak out of turn. Redox oxidation, that's the, the heart of cellular energy production. So this involves the exchange of electrons between molecules influencing overall self help cell health and function. And so like okay, for instance, what's the role of redox in aging and disease? And, and right off the bat we're looking at NAD plus and nadh and these two are going to regulate metabolism, DNA repair and cellular resilience. So when, when aging and redox decline and this happens as we age, your NAD plus levels are dropping. Right. And so that's going to be a cause of impairing your mitochondrial function. And so that's going to lead to oxidative stress. Now, one thing I can tell you without looking at anything is when we were learning about oxidative stress is how bad it is. But you do, there needs to be a little bit of oxidative stress. It's when it starts to become too much that becomes a problem. But if you totally eliminate it too, then there's also a problem. So chronic everything. Right, right, right, exactly.
- [46:12]
JJ Virgin
So here, build down breakup, build down all the way through.
- [46:15]
Dylan Gemelli
And that, that's like with a lot of guys when they're doing steroid cycles, for example, and they get elevated estrogen, but then they take aromatase inhibitors and crush it it. And then there's a big problem too. So there's a fine line. Right. So you're right. It's with everything now here. Redox imbalance and disease. Chronic redox dysregulation contributes to conditions like cardiovascular disease, neurodegeneration and diabetes. So there you have it. But there, there were, we were discussing in here different tests that we could take to look at redox balance. And glutathione is a big one here because we were talking about that being a master antioxidant. And glutathione is another one, you know, and you could, could, you could go get glutathione injections. I'm big on glutathione and vitamin B12 injections if you're going to go do those things. Some of those places they put too much in their cocktails and they're throwing so many different things at you. But you know, there are things that are good and glutathione would be one of them. But you can over antioxidant yourself too, like with anything else. And you don't want to do that either.
- [47:18]
JJ Virgin
You know, it's funny though, on NAD shots, IVs, patches or supplements, I'm hit and miss.
- [47:28]
Dylan Gemelli
That's what I want you to listen to when I talk to Dr. Yearth about Nad, because she's kind of gotten on that. I think it's important to be in balance and I think it's obviously important if your NAD levels decline, like we just said, you're going to run into problems.
- [47:40]
JJ Virgin
Well, they're going to decline with aging. Yeah, I have, you know, I and all my friends were going and doing IVs and they're like, and I threw up and I felt like, why are we doing like, I'm not Doing spending four hours getting an iv, then I walk out dizzy and puking. But I have been taking Qualia's NAD now for a year.
- [48:01]
Dylan Gemelli
Great company.
- [48:02]
JJ Virgin
And Qualia's amazing. Like, the owners came over to my house after Grant got hit and kind of walked me through how they could help me with their nootropics. And they're just, they're just crazy brainiacs. But the guy like, you know, Greg Kelly, who created the senolytics because he saw that it was something he wanted and they, the company kind of did it to appease him and now it's their best selling product. And it makes so much sense.
- [48:26]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes.
- [48:27]
JJ Virgin
But the NAD plus, like, it's crazy. Like, it increases blood levels of NAD plus 67%. The way they put this formula together, so smart. And it's oral. I don't have to inject. You know, it's like there's a couple things I inject, but I don't want to inject more things if I don't, I don't enjoy it. You know, it's not fun. So I want to. When you can feel.
- [48:52]
Dylan Gemelli
I'll touch on something you brought up earlier, though, with the peptides and the injections. You know, they are working feverishly right now on develop and I sat in at a for M on a conference on this and they're really working on making more topicals, making them more efficient, making more capsules. You know how you said you use the BPC pills? I use a BPC TB500 gel and I love it. It is so nice. And it, it. Oh, and it's so nice to not have to inject. It's more effective than the pills. I don't, I, I believe that. I do firmly believe they're effective. I've seen it. I've used them. But the gel, to me is the most effective, aside from we, we know the shots. The most effective. But this is so close. It really is.
- [49:34]
JJ Virgin
That's interesting.
- [49:35]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah.
- [49:35]
JJ Virgin
Which company is that?
- [49:36]
Dylan Gemelli
That there's, there's a few that do it underground pep. I mean, honestly, I know of all of these companies because I. That's been my world for so long, so I can always make recommendations. Peptide Pro is very, very good company. I do a lot of work with the owner there because he's. They go an extra mile on what they do. So that's a really good one where you could, you know, get those gels and things like that. I can talk to you about it later too.
- [50:05]
JJ Virgin
That's good. I've been Using. Have you heard of healthgevity?
- [50:08]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah.
- [50:09]
JJ Virgin
Yeah. So I've been using their thymosin. Thymosin A is. It was. It's the TB500. And then I've been using their BPC157 pea mix, just because I'm being a big baby about not having. I admit it. But the gel sounds like an interesting one.
- [50:32]
Dylan Gemelli
Oh, it's great.
- [50:33]
JJ Virgin
And they're Pepti Strong. Like, I'm obsessed. Obsessed with. They are using a product from Neritis that was developed that's called Pepti Strong, that helps with muscle. Totally noticed a difference with that. I really think that the most important thing we can do, especially for women, especially for women who've tried to lose weight their whole lives, which means they've just destroyed their body composition, is to try to pack on as much muscle as possible.
- [51:03]
Dylan Gemelli
I agree. You know, it's hard because I understand some people like to just look at the scale. I've been that way. I've had eating problems, body dysmorphia. But let me tell you something. It's very common knowledge and sense to understand the more muscle you build, the more fat you're dropping. So the scale might not reflect it, but your pant size will, your DEXA scan will, and your quality of life and the way you feel in your blood work will, so. And I. Which.
- [51:30]
JJ Virgin
And. Which matters.
- [51:31]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah, yeah. And. And, you know, having some tone and some muscle looks a hell of a lot better than just being thin and skinny, fat or whatever you want to call it, it doesn't look good. I've looked at some videos I've done in the way I've looked, when I've looked that way, and I don't ever want to look like that again. So. Yeah, you want to have. You don't need to. You're not gonna. You and I talked about this on my podcast. If you gain two or three pounds of muscle and hold it in a year, you have done something. You really have.
- [52:00]
JJ Virgin
I know. So don't worry about getting big. It would be, like, an amazing accomplishment. Everyone would want to study you. You know, it's like I kill myself to try to hold on to everything that I've got.
- [52:13]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes.
- [52:14]
JJ Virgin
So. And if I could add a pound or two a year, I'd be overjoyed at this point. Like, I just want to make sure.
- [52:20]
Dylan Gemelli
I'm not losing exactly. You know, one of the problems, I always run in with the steroid guys and the guys that I've coached that are, like, pro bodybuilders. That are training Mr. Olympia and things that guys that are running to run cycles or just the bros is that they don't understand. Yo yoing up and down. You take these steroids, you lose most of what you gain, you're getting a quick fix and there's no long term benefit or residual there. In fact, most, more often than not, not only are you going to lose a lot of what you gained, but then you're just totally degrading your health. Whether it's, you know, your natural testosterone production all the way to your liver, kidneys, prostate, all of that, the risk is never worth the reward. And you, you're not, you may gain 15 pounds, but a lot of it's water weight or bad weight or sloppy weight and you're going to lose it as soon as you come off. More often than not, you're going to lose the majority of that just based on you not being able to physiologically handle that kind of weight or keep it on because it was being used by something exogenous that you're taking. So there's, you know, like I said, if you gain two to three pounds and hold it and you continuously do that, you have really, really done an accomplishment.
- [53:33]
JJ Virgin
Well, you, I mean, it's what you just said about men with muscle is the same with women losing weight. You know, it's like they, they go, they starve, they lose weight, they lose 40% as muscle, then they come back, they gain weight, they gain mainly back fat, they go, they do it again and you look at what happens over time and you've just destroyed your body composition and metabolic health. So, you know, really, muscle's the way to build it all back.
- [54:00]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah.
- [54:01]
JJ Virgin
All right, well, so you mentioned you had a podcast. I know that I was on it. We'll put it into the show notes too, which we'll put@jjvirgin.com Dylan D Y L A N. Thank you. And it is. What is the name of your. I think it's Dylan Gemelli podcast.
- [54:18]
Dylan Gemelli
Right, that's it. I keep that simple. Yeah. Right.
- [54:21]
JJ Virgin
And is your Instagram Dylan Gemelli?
- [54:24]
Dylan Gemelli
You know, all my socials because, you know, I have TikTok, I have X Facebook. They're all just Dylan Gemelli. I was blessed to be able to not have anybody steal my name at the time. And so that's very.
- [54:35]
JJ Virgin
I had to buy mine back.
- [54:37]
Dylan Gemelli
Oh my God.
- [54:38]
JJ Virgin
Not as aware of the terrible people out there.
- [54:42]
Dylan Gemelli
Yeah, no, I know. I was way ahead of the curve on everything and I got, you know, good people that taught me don't ever leave your name on anything. Buy it immediately if you're going to do anything.
- [54:52]
JJ Virgin
So I did well and you're not Joe John Smith, so All right, well, I appreciate you. Thank you for downloading all this and being also very authentic about your own journey. And you know, I know that you've also got great peptide ebooks, etc. So anything you can give us to link on over to, we will. And I look forward to seeing you wherever I'm going to see you next, because I know we're on kind of the same circuit now.
- [55:19]
Dylan Gemelli
Yes, 100%.
- [55:26]
JJ Virgin
Be sure to join me next time for for more tools, tips and techniques you can incorporate into everyday life to ensure you look and feel great and are built to last. Check me out on Instagram, Facebook and my website jjvirgin.com and make sure to follow my podcast@subscribetoj.com so you don't miss a single episode. And hey, if you're loving what you hear, don't forget to leave a review. Your reviews make a a big difference in helping me reach more incredible women just like you to spread the word about aging powerfully after 40. Thanks for tuning in and I'll catch you on the next episode. Want to listen to this show ad free? Head over to subscribetoj.com and start your ad free experience today. Hey JJ here. And just a reminder that the well Beyond 40 podcast offers health, wellness, fitness and nutritional information that's designed for educational and entertainment purposes only. You should not rely on this information as a substitute for, nor does it replace professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. If you have any concerns or questions about your health, you should always consult with a physician or other healthcare professional. Make sure that you do not disregard, avoid or delay obtaining medical or health related advice from your healthcare professional because of something you may have heard on the show or read in our show notes. The use of any information provided on the show is solely at your own risk.