← The Thyroid (and Hormone) Fixer Podcast: Thyropause, Menopause, Metabolism and How to Fix It
The Thyroid (and Hormone) Fixer Podcast: Thyropause, Menopause, Metabolism and How to Fix It
537. Five Minutes to Boost Thyroid and Burn Fat
00:48:49
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- [00:00]
Dr. Amy
Welcome to the Thyroid Fixer podcast, where.
- [00:02]
Ulrich
I'm all about helping you lose that.
- [00:05]
Dr. Amy
Stubborn weight that won't come off no matter what you do. Get off your couch at 2pm and.
- [00:11]
Guest Speaker
Get through your day with energy and.
- [00:13]
Ulrich
Stop counting the hairs that come out of your head.
- [00:17]
Dr. Amy
I'm your host, Dr. Amy, and I'm.
- [00:19]
Ulrich
Here to help you get optimized with your thyroid and your hormones. It's all part of living our mantra. Better thyroid, better hormones equals a better life.
- [00:30]
Dr. Amy
So let's get you back to being being the badass human that you're meant to be.
- [00:34]
Ulrich
Let's approach it from a thyroid and hormone optimization standpoint. Between myself and my guests, you will.
- [00:42]
Dr. Amy
Be loaded down with information to take.
- [00:45]
Ulrich
Control of your health and get back to being you.
- [00:48]
Dr. Amy
So let's get started.
- [00:50]
Ulrich
We're all looking to support our thyroid naturally, boost our immune system, and just really have more energy. I have found Purality Health. Now, the only problem with Purality Health is that it tastes so good. All of their supplements, from the Mind.
- [01:05]
Dr. Amy
Boost that I'm going to tell you.
- [01:06]
Ulrich
About to the vitamin C, tastes so good, you want to eat it every day. You want to take it every day.
- [01:13]
Dr. Amy
It's crazy.
- [01:14]
Ulrich
I'm addicted to it. I'll tell you more about that. But let's start with the thyroid, something I talk about all the time. As you know, Purality offers a wide range of products that can assist you with thyroid health. But specifically, my favorite is the adaptogenic mushrooms in Mushroom Mind Boost.
- [01:29]
Dr. Amy
It tastes like chocolate.
- [01:30]
Ulrich
I will put Mushroom Mind Boost on a spoon with a little bit of.
- [01:33]
Dr. Amy
Peanut butter, and it's literally a treat.
- [01:36]
Ulrich
But not only that, it's a liposomal blend of functional mushrooms like Reishi and Cordyceps. Now, Rishi and Cordyceps, they help regulate.
- [01:44]
Dr. Amy
Your body's stress response.
- [01:45]
Ulrich
We know we need to balance our stress, balance our cortisol, so T3 and T4 can work, and so T4 can be converted over to T3. Then another amazing product to support the thyroid is the liposomal Lion's Mane. That gives us focus, clarity, cognitive support, again, bringing down stress. Lion's Mane can help boost nerve function, support your mood, both of which is significantly affected when thyroid levels are imbalanced. Now there's the vitamin C, oo, vitamin C for our skin, for our immune system, for our adrenal support, oxidative stress reduction. And it tastes like you're eating a starburst.
- [02:27]
Dr. Amy
It's incredible. I put in my water and it flavors my water. It's amazing.
- [02:32]
Ulrich
Since the thyroid is incredibly sensitive to inflammation and cellular damage, vitamin C protection is crucial. And here's the best part. Their patented liposomal delivery system makes all of these ingredients highly absorbable to your body. Is actually using what you're taking.
- [02:50]
Dr. Amy
Bonus, right?
- [02:52]
Ulrich
So if you're ready to finally feel like yourself again, you want to head to purality health.com forward/doctor Amy and enter the coupon code Dr. Amy to save up to 45% off. So you're going to go to P U R a L I T Y H E a l t h.com forward/d r a M I E and use that same code D R A M I E. Get your 45 off because.
- [03:22]
Dr. Amy
Your body deserves more than you know.
- [03:24]
Ulrich
Just okay.
- [03:25]
Unknown Speaker
Health.
- [03:26]
Guest Speaker
Have you ever wished your brain would just like cooperate? Yeah, same here. So that's why I've been using something that actually works. Transcription. Specifically blue canadine for focus and then.
- [03:39]
Dr. Amy
Trocom for for stress, which there's been.
- [03:41]
Guest Speaker
A lot of lately. And let me tell you, these are not your average supplements. They actually work.
- [03:46]
Dr. Amy
They are bugle troches, little blue squares.
- [03:49]
Guest Speaker
That you place between your cheek and your gum. And they are absolutely effective. So let's start with blue canadine. It's like this amazing fuel for your brain. Clean, controlled, zero crash. And within 15 to 20 minutes I am locked in. No fog, no distractions, just crystal clear focus. Actually going to go get some right now. I use it when I need to power through a big project.
- [04:11]
Dr. Amy
Record back to back podcasts or just.
- [04:14]
Guest Speaker
Get out of my squirrel brain add mode. It contains methylene blue which you've heard so much about. Nicotine, caffeine and hemp crystal. All precision dosed, pharmaceutical grade and formulated by physicians. Now I know what you're thinking.
- [04:29]
Ulrich
Wait a minute.
- [04:30]
Guest Speaker
I'm supposed to be avoiding nicotine and caffeine.
- [04:32]
Ulrich
No, no, no.
- [04:33]
Guest Speaker
Nicotine in and of itself when combined with methylene blue actually helps protect against cancer. Lights up your brain. I've been using it throughout my cancer journey as well. And a little bit of caffeine does not hurt. There's no reason why we avoid caffeine in the correct amounts in the right form. Then there's Trocom, which is saving more times than I can count. Especially before a high pressure meeting podcast those days when my nervous system is just on edge. I can feel my cortisol surging and one trochee and I feel like I can breathe again. No sedation, just grounded calm where I'm still productive but no longer buzzing with anxiety. And that's thanks to ingredients like B3 and GABA and calming mushrooms. Delivered in a way that actually hits fast, like 20 minutes because it bypasses your gut go straight into your bloodstream. That's the magic of TRO scriptions. Physician created precision dose delivered in a way that works. So no guessing, no waiting around for hours for may something to kick in. So if you're doing all the right things and you feel like your brain is lagging behind or your stress is through the roof, try the blue canteen and the TRO calm. You will feel the difference. So you're going to go to troscriptions.com forward/doctor Amy.
- [05:52]
Dr. Amy
You're going to use the code Dr.
- [05:53]
Guest Speaker
Amy at checkout for 10 off your first order. Let me spell it for you. T R O S C R I P T I o n s.com d r a M I E. And use the code D R A M I E at checkout because midlife, the time we're in right now, not a time to guess, just a time to feel good.
- [06:16]
Dr. Amy
I've been very open speaking about the detrimental effects of long cardio and why you need to stop being a cardio queen and why I stopped many years ago being a cardio queen and just kind of some top level information. Then we'll break it down on this show. But that long duration cardio and you know who you are, you're getting on the treadmill, you're going for long runs, you're getting on the elliptical or the spin bike and you're doing these 45 minute to hour long classes day after day or bike rides or run or whatever. You're doing long, long cardio day after day, hoping and praying that you're going to change your body composition and lose excess body fat. And then of course, you know, okay, well, there's the benefits of the cardiovascular training on my heart. We've all been in that mindset and ladies, you are the worst. You're, you're worse than the guys we tend. And I'm going to put myself in this category. We tend to still believe those thoughts of, you know, the, the Jane Fonda aerobic days and you need to do two hours of CARD to burn that body fat. And that's just not true. When we actually look at the science and we break it down and we look at what that long cardio does to the body and we look at what short interval bursts do to the body, the science is there. And that's what we have to rely on, we can't rely on our 1980 and 1990 workout tapes anymore. We need to break out of that. So the big overarching message that we're going to break down today is that that long cardio will lower your active thyroid hormone, T3. It can actually hit the thyroid pretty hard and slow the thyroid glands production of T4 and T3, and then slow the conversion of T4 and T3. It's going to increase your cortisol, the stress hormone. Increasing cortisol can impair thyroid function. It can also hinder blood sugar. It can basically create a blood sugar spike that's just gonna stack upon your weight gain. You're not gonna lose weight when you're in an insulin resistant state or when you're in this high cortisol state. Your body will hold onto fat and store it. You're gonna break down your muscle, you're gonna cause inflammation and oxidative stress and you're not gonna feel your best. So that's why I brought on a very special guest today, my dear friend Ulrich. And he is going to break down the differences of this. We're going to really deep dive and talk about what long cardio could do to your body and what are the benefits of really focusing on the right workout, a short burst workout that is really made for you and what that can do to your body with the benefits. So, Ulrich, thank you so much for jumping on today.
- [09:17]
Unknown Speaker
Thank you so much for having me here.
- [09:19]
Dr. Amy
So I know that was a really long intro to kind of set up our conversation, but I'm so passionate about this because I was a cardio queen and especially back in my competition days, I was doing cardio two to three hours per day. And now my routine looks completely different. I only do the Carol bike that we're going to be talking about. I only do short, very intense bursts of cardiovascular training. And I will tell you wholeheartedly, I look better now at 51 than I did all of my 20s, into my 30s because I was competing in fitness modeling well into my 30s. And I know how hard it was to put on any kind of muscle, to have that really sexy shoulder cap and the six pack abs. And I fought for it, and I fought for it. I could never get it because I was doing too much damn cardio, cardio and basically burning my muscle away and causing my body to be inflamed and hold on to fat.
- [10:24]
Unknown Speaker
You know, I thought that at least many people, the general public, had actually moved on from this 80s cardio mindset. But it seems things come and go in waves. And there has been recently really a resurgence of people talking about really long cardio sessions. Zone 2 training as the basic fundamental thing that you need to do to improve your cardio respiratory fitness, which is obviously very, very important. Your cardiorespiratory fitness is super important. It's one of the strongest predictor of your life expectancy, your VO2 max. But the debate about that and what's being proposed at the moment goes beyond what we think is reasonable and takes us a little bit back where I thought we had moved on from. So I think it's a very relevant discussion even today.
- [11:21]
Dr. Amy
Yeah, and I agree because if you go into any gym, you're going to see all the cardio equipment just packed. So anytime I pull into a gym and it's busy, I'm like, oh, damn it. All the machines are. Wait a minute. No, no, no. Because all of these people, they're going to be on the treadmills and the ellipticals instead.
- [11:38]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, no, and that's right. And there are a few very, you know, big name influencers whose voice reaches far who propose these 60 to 90 minute session and not, not just two, three times per week, but up to four or five times a week to build your cardio base. And there's some rationale behind that. It trickled down out of, from, from athlete sport like really top athletes who train for stage cycling tours like the Tour de France or. So they actually do that. But there's a specific reason why they do it. And the translation to the general public and what the recommendation should be is in our view quite speculative and probably not very well based in science and based in fact, but just what people presumed. And I think there's a lot of very questionable advice right now out there about long cardio sessions.
- [12:39]
Dr. Amy
Yeah. And I agree. So if you're, if you're training for a purpose, if you're training for a marathon, if you're training for the France, of course you're going to be doing those long cardio sessions to mimic what you're going to be doing in your event. But day to day, as, and I'm going to say women again, but okay, as people, because I know you guys do it too, as people jump on the cardio equipment hoping to burn fat. And that's really what I want to kind of unpack because that's really the majority of the reason why people do cardio. You know, people are not jumping on a treadmill for 60 to 90 minutes. Going, I'm really going to improve my heart today. Like, that's not in their mind. They're jumping on there because they got a beer belly and they're carrying an extra 10, 20 pounds. And they believe, because we've been taught this for decades, that getting your heart rate up is going to equate to more of a calorie burn. And maybe when we're looking at it in a, in a lab setting and we're hooking people up and we're actually measuring and calories, it's, it's a unit of measurement of energy. So when we're looking at the energy burned during a 60 to 90 minute long run, okay, sure, you might get 1200 calories of energy burnt, but how does that equate to fat? How does that, and there's no way to actually measure this. There's no way to say, okay, when we do an hour of cardio, we are burning a pound of fat and maybe 2 ounces of muscle. No, we don't, we don't know that. And the calorie burn and the energy burn can be both muscle and fat. So I think that's really where I want to focus is because the majority of my listeners are doing cardio to burn fat, not necessarily for cardiovascular health.
- [14:26]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I think that you're, you're entirely right. And that's a, I think many of our users have that objective also in mind. One thing, and this is really, really important for weight loss. Obviously nutrition is like your first and most important factor. And if you work out for an hour and then have that mega, whatever latte or so and a donut, it's all for nothing because that has just such so much more influence on your calorie balance. And if the, the exercise leaves you starving and leaves you hungry and you can't control it, then that's also pretty, pretty much useless. But exercise does support weight loss. No question. If you have, if you have the right calorie burn and if you, if it helps you to become metabolically healthy and metabolically flexible and you can actually burn both fat and sugar, you can access, you're not insulin resistance resistant and find it really difficult to access energy stored in your fat stores, then that's a really positive thing about exercise. So it's a very positive supporting strategy. But number one has to be nutrition.
- [15:37]
Dr. Amy
Oh, yes, I completely agree with you there, because right to your point, whether we're talking calories of fat versus muscle, all of that, if you're putting in garbage, you're Going to be burning garbage. I mean, that's the bottom line. So it all has to work together. Now in your research, when I'm looking at, let's say, short bursts of getting your heart rate up, so when we say cardio, I think about it and I kind of define it in my mind as, as the period of time where your heart rate is in what we call a cardio zone. So if you're wearing a little apple watch, it'll be orange, maybe it'll float into the red. It's when you are pushing your heart rate to a higher than, than normal, higher than resting, higher than even walking state. And you're holding it there and then bringing it down, holding it there, bringing it down. So in your research of the short burst with some form of, of resistance, it's not like you're just, you're just spinning on a bike and pedaling your, your feet to no end and there's no resistance or you're just, I don't know, on the elliptical with no resistance, just floating away when you're actually doing those intense sprints with some form of resistance. And it is hard. How in your research, how does that, how does that affect the body and specifically fat burn?
- [17:00]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, so it affects the body in very profound ways. And in many ways you get something that's substantially more important than just weight loss. So with very little volume, very little time of exercise, you can achieve dramatic improvements in your cardiorespiratory fitness in your VO2 max. And that is the most important health marker. It's the strongest predictor of your life expectancy. And yeah, one really, I think quite shocking statistic is that low cardiorespiratory fitness, a low VO2 max leads to more avoidable deaths then diabetes, smoking and obesity combined. All those three. And those are studies with tens of thousands of participants followed over decades. So it's very, very robust research that shows if you do something for your cardiorespiratory fitness, in terms of your health, your longevity, you get a massive return and it goes way beyond weight loss. Now you, if people are motivated by weight loss to exercise, perfect, do it. But you'll get a lot more than just that. So what the research has shown is if you do the right exercises, you can get so much more out of your time compared to doing traditional long steady state cardio. So the, and there's, there's now a wealth of studies really, really well designed and analyzed following all the gold standard procedures that have shown that with as little as five minutes Three times a week you can get double the cardiorespiratory fitness benefits compared to two and a half hours. Yeah. 150 minutes of jogging of the steady state cardio exercise. And in addition to it, you don't have the deleterious, the harmful effects that you've described in the beginning of increased cortisol levels of maybe even a catabolic. Yeah. That it reduces your muscle mass that it creates. Yeah. So. So you get in a very, very short period amount of time if you do it right. Very, very high return and, and very, very substantial benefits out of this.
- [19:28]
Dr. Amy
And to your point, I want to piggyback on that because you said something very profound. When you look at the amount of time, and I don't even know if you knew you were saying this, but I picked it up. When you look at the time. Okay, let's say we have 60 minutes out of our day to work out whatever that workout looks like. If you're spending that 60 minutes doing a long run, let's say you're not building any muscle. There's no real resistance to that. So your muscles themselves have to have some form of resistance pushing back against them in order to grow. And in addition, we can't be always breaking down. There has to be that time for rebuild. So in a 60 minute workout session, if those 60 minutes are nothing but pounding pavement or pounding the treadmill, you're not going to be building muscle. And you may or may not burn body fat because there's a whole slew of physiological changes that happen when we are doing that, that long cardio. And number one, since we're on the topic, I'll kind of jump in and talk about it. The reason why we actually may or may not burn body fat is because those long cardio sessions do down regulate your thyroid like I said in the beginning. So less T3 is going to be equal, a lower metabolism, increase cortisol that you said that is going to increase inflammation in the body. And, and I alluded to this earlier too, that increased cortisol will increase blood glucose. That puts us in a very inflamed state and that puts us in a fat storage mode, not a fat burning mode. But we're storing or our bodies are, are hoarding and holding on to that body fat for dear life because this person apparently is trying to kill us by doing an hour of cardio every single day.
- [21:28]
Unknown Speaker
Exactly, exactly. I'm about to starve. I better maintain all the tissue that stores energy and I get rid of the tissue that burns Energy. So that means you're putting on fat and you're reducing muscle, so that can't be a good thing.
- [21:43]
Dr. Amy
Exactly. So what if we could spend five minutes of those 60 minutes doing something very beneficial to our health and to our heart and like you said, for longevity over a long period of time, and then spend 55 minutes doing resistance training and strength training. That to me is a much better profile workout and will result in maintenance of our lean muscle tissue improvements and putting on more muscle and then burning.
- [22:18]
Guest Speaker
Of stored body fat.
- [22:21]
Dr. Amy
So that, that's the equation to really have the best body composition in my mind.
- [22:26]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah.
- [22:28]
Dr. Amy
So in, in your studies and with all of your knowledge, what do you find when we're talking about muscle and metabolic health overall? What is that correlation? Exactly.
- [22:40]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah. So at the other thing that is a real major benefit of doing the type of cardio you can do on a Carol bike is that you're actually also building muscular strength. And because the forces you exert, even though it's very, very short, so high that you get a really meaningful increase in muscular strength. So on average that's about 15% in improvement in your squat. So that's how it's measured. One rep max for your squat. And our users see on average 15% increase just from doing these cardio sessions over a six to eight week period. So that's very substantial. And this is because it is, you actually give your body something to work against that's also meaningful for strength training. So that's, that's a big deal. And then the third thing is around metabolic health. So that's your risk of developing things like type 2 diabetes, becoming insulin resistant and so on. That risk drops dramatically. There's something called the METZ score. It's a clinical risk score. You can measure that. And our academic partners have done that in randomized controlled trials, peer reviewed and so on. And they found a risk reduction of 62% in only eight weeks with minimum time required. So you can do that five minutes in one workout, and you do that three, three times a week. So that's 15 minutes total. And you get these really substantial benefits around your cardiorespiratory fitness, your metabolic health, your leg strength, and then there's a host of other things too. Just because exercise is so beneficial without having the downsides of these long, drawn out cardio sessions that, you know, for some people really do more harm than good.
- [24:48]
Dr. Amy
Oh, definitely. And those stats that you just gave, I mean, not even medication has that kind of result. When we're talking about overall Metabolic fitness. I mean, that, that is incredible when you're talking about 15 minutes per week and kind of expanding a little bit on the Carobite so people know what we're talking about. And I'll describe my experience with it. It's really, it's the only cardio that I do that is it. I mean, unless my heart rate gets high as I'm lifting something heavy to actually do a cardiovascular workout on a cardio machine. I use the Carol bike because I know the benefits and the most, the biggest eye opening thing for me, and I've been using the Carol bike now for two years. So the biggest eye opening thing for me is that that resistance that occurs. So I'll be starting off just on the gentle pedal. And then as soon as that sprint kicks in, and let me tell you, everyone listening, you don't have to, you don't have to decide when. So you know when you're, when you're kind of doing a hit workout, you're like, okay, I know I need to pick up the intensity right now. I just really don't want to. No, no, no. The program counts down and you know exactly when that sprint is coming. As soon as that sprint kicks in, it's like, oh, I'm going through quicksand or mud. I have immediate resistance. And all of this is AI powered, am I correct?
- [26:14]
Unknown Speaker
Yes, that's right. So our AI, our algorithms basically tailor the workout to take you to your maximum resistance. And it's really clever. You, you start building up pace at a very low resistance, so it's very easy to build up, build up a high pedal speed and then the machine will apply your optimal resistance at the optimal time. You know, the first few seconds feel like you feel quite all right, but that's when you hit your peak power and you, you really go to maximum intensity and then you have a sprint is only 20 seconds long. That's all it takes to trigger that adaptation pathway and get the training stimulus going. And throughout that sprint, then you fatigue. And it definitely feels harder towards the end of it, but at least you have all the time. The end in sight. The light at the end of the tunnel is there from the very beginning. And so it's very, very easy to push to your limit, to go to maximum intensity and then push through those 20 seconds. And you have to do that two times. So a workout is very gentle. Warmup, first 20 second sprints, then a little bit of recovery, second 20 second sprint, and then a short cooldown and the warmup recovery and cooldown are all done at very low and gentle intensity. Almost like you don't feel that you're. You're pedaling, but the sprints there, you're really pushing to your limits. And that momentary act of momentarily pushing towards your limits, that does really create a very, very powerful training stimulus and does profound things to your body.
- [28:01]
Ulrich
Are you not on Hashimoto's fixer? Why not? It's part of the no dust supplement list. Now, Hashimoto's fixer, or Hashimoto's support by the fixer to be exact, is black cumin seed oil with 3% thymoquinone. Why is this important? That's the active ingredient in Hashimoto's fixer that lowers your Hashimoto antibodies. We have had reports of people going into full remission when they bring in Hashimoto's fixer, literally dropping their antibodies to zero. Now, black cumin seed also works on other autoimmune conditions. So if you have antibodies for Crohn's disease, rheumatoid arthritis, if you have psoriasis, it's going to help across the board with all autoimmune. It's going to help decrease inflammation. It helps with all of the symptoms of low thyroid function or symptoms of your thyroid being attacked by your own body, like hair loss, weight gain, fatigue. As we lower those antibodies and push them down to zero, what we end up seeing is this full body improvement because then your thyroid works better and your blood sugar bounces out, nutrients are getting where they need to get to and is actually one of the only supplemental ingredients that we can say prevents cancer. They're so my gosh, you better have studies behind that statement if you're going to say it out loud or the FDA will slap you. Well, the FDA can't slap us because there are multiple, multiple studies on this amazing Nigella sativa plant in Hashimoto's fixer that actually decreases your risk of cancer.
- [29:46]
Unknown Speaker
Wow.
- [29:47]
Ulrich
Amazing. Boosting the immune system, reducing swelling, lowering that allergic reaction that we have in the spring. That is why I say black cumin should be a no dust supplement. It should be part of your life every single day. Because we all have inflammation. We all need improved blood sugar control. We all need better cholesterol levels. Well, that's what black cumin seed does. Even reduces hypertension. How about that? So add in Hashimoto's support by the fixer. We'll put the link in the show notes. But you can always go to betterlifedoctor.com and peruse all of the fixer supplements and then click on hashimotives and we got you covered. Add this in daily as part of your no DA supplement list and you'll see the benefits working as your inflammation goes down, antibodies go down and your providing that extra layer of prevention for cancer and it even has been shown to fight cancer. Why not take it daily?
- [30:42]
Dr. Amy
Okay, I want you to expand on that because I know that there are people listening going no way, there's no way that I'm going to do two 20 second sprints in five minutes and, and get the results of, and I've heard this from you before, of a 45 minute run. So get a little bit geeky with me and get into the science of why that AI powered resistance. And the bike learns you by the way. Like I always try to beat my last score and go a little bit more intense than I did before, but it learns you and it will meet you where you're at. So yeah, dive into the science for me.
- [31:21]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, sure. So what you do when you push to your limits is almost like simulating an emergency situation where you have to say run for your life because that's, that's the only other case where you would really push to your limit. We don't do that in everyday life. We don't even do it when we exercise usually. But with the Carol bike it's, we make it as easy as possible to really hit that max intensity. And as you do that, you actually force your body to mobilize lots and lots of energy glycogen. So that's a storage form of sugar to get ready for that emergency. And your body doesn't know how long it will be exposed to that, so it just mobilizes lots of it. And bound to the glycogen are certain signaling molecules. The main one is amp that gets released with the glycogen activated to ampk. And that activates further downstream another really important signaling molecule called PGC1alpha, which is the body's master regulator for mitochondrial biogenesis. So you have in extremely short period of time, 2 times 20 seconds, you set off a signaling cascade that triggers a very, very strong, very potent training stimulus and essentially tells your body to get fitter and stronger, to grow more mitochondria. Those are the powerhouses in your cells to a number of other things. So your blood plasma volumes increase, your muscle capillarization increases, your cardiac peak flow, your cardiac stroke volume increases. And that's a cascade that you kick off, that you trigger with just these very, very short Sprints, they're really interesting. I mean there's many things interesting about it, but it really seems to be a switch. So you have to release those signaling molecules. You have to tell your body that it has to get fitter and stronger, that it has to grow in certain respects and it's enough to flip the switch and pressing it harder or longer. We have really robust data that does not lead to greater benefits. So if you were to do. You're super motivated and you want to do like six or eight high intensity intervals and you don't want to do just 20 seconds, you want to do 40 seconds or 60 seconds, it doesn't lead to greater benefits. And in fact it seems to be, it leads to less benefits.
- [34:02]
Dr. Amy
Because if it's, if, if it was longer, you don't have the same power. Like even at the end. Yeah, you just don't.
- [34:10]
Unknown Speaker
That, that's exactly it. That's, that's what we believe happens is that if you have more sprints or longer sprints, you pace yourself, you ration your energy, you don't go all out and then that means you're actually not flicking the switch anymore. Yeah. So. And it's more effective to just press it once hard, get all the signaling molecules out and, and send this really strong signal to your body, then doing something much longer much. But at. Yeah, not 100% but 90% or 80% and. And it feels harder, you get less benefits. That's a lose lose. So if you want the maximum return on your investment in terms of time and effort, you're much better off to push to your limits momentarily and do that in a very, very short period of time instead of like drawing it out.
- [35:05]
Dr. Amy
Yeah, absolutely. And it's much more fun that way instead of drawing it out anyways. But I do like that that the Carol bike has programs in it that let's say you are a long distance, you're preparing for a long ride or a long whatever and you're trying to get that extended cardiovascular fitness in. It does have the kind of like you can do your own program or if you really want, you can. Oh, there was one program I did one time I damn or died, but it was a multitude of very quick, maybe six second sprints. But they were coming, they were coming at me really quickly. I don't even think I made it through them all.
- [35:48]
Unknown Speaker
Yes, that's right. So it's a very versatile bike and you can do. Because who are we to tell people exactly how and what to train? We, we give you the tools and our most popular workout are these really short and intensive sprints. That's, that's what sets us apart. That's something you, basically, you need a special bike for it if you want to do that. And, and the Carol bike, to our knowledge, there's no other bike like ours, is the only bike that's really optimized for that type of exercise. But you can do, in fact, like a very wide variety of scientifically validated workouts. And if you want to do zone two training, and there's, you know, I, I see the irony in it. I would argue that the Caro bike is the most advanced bike or piece of equipment to do zone two training. Because if, if you do want to do zone two training, if you, if you think, if you, if you have the time, then the bike will guide you to the optimal intensity to get zone two training exactly right. So you stay just under what's called your lactic threshold, where you're in the moment metabolizing the maximum amount of fat versus sugar and where you train exactly your capacity to metabolize fat. Now, we're not big proponents of that because we think in terms of bang for your buck and return of investment on the unit of time that you put in. These short, high intensity or maximum intensity sprints are just so much more valuable. And that should be really the top priority of everybody who, who thinks about, oh, I should do some cardio. But on the other hand, if you, if you want to do the longer workouts, then you might as well do them right and get the optimal intensity to do those.
- [37:47]
Dr. Amy
Yeah, and I agree. I mean, it's one of those, like, listen, if you love doing the long workouts, well, Eric and I do not recommend doing them all the time. And that's the whole purpose of the Carol bike and everything we talked about today about the detrimental effects to long cardio and the benefits of these short burst rehit workouts. But if you want to throw it in, it's at least there for you. And I like it that you make that available on the bike so that people don't have to have a whole other separate training bike for their long rides and then have the Carol just for the short rides. It's very versatile.
- [38:19]
Unknown Speaker
Yes, yes. This was one of the things where, well, if you can do it, why wouldn't we so Exactly. That you can even do things. If you're really into that, you could do things like the, the peloton classes with peloton digital because we don't lock you in to Just do our things. You, you can use the bike also with third party apps. And so there's something for everybody. The motivation for that came out like few people have two bikes at home and often a bike is used in a household with somebody wants to do really time efficient workouts that give you like, that are scientifically validated to give you maximum results in minimum time. And others want to train alongside celebrity coaches who have like nice soundtracks and that's, that's okay. There's. We know what we prefer.
- [39:07]
Dr. Amy
Something for everyone. Exactly. Something for everyone. And then you can pick your workout. Now I want to just dive in to specifically my, my Hashimoto people out there. When you have a thyroid problem, when you have Hashimoto's, it's really hard to recover from a workout the next day. And many of my listeners are right now going, oh, amen, I have to take three days off every time I do one workout. And again, this is going to be of such tremendous benefit to Hashimoto patients out there because of that recovery. And I'll, I'll leave the science to you. I'll tee it up and then I'll hand it over to you. But my whole thought is when you are keeping your cortisol low and you're keeping that inflammation low from doing the short bursts and you know, I said earlier, okay, you could do the five minutes and then go into 55 minutes of strength training or you could do five minutes on the carol bike and that is it, that is your workout for the day. Or you could do five minutes on the Carol bike and do 10 minutes of lifting something and then call it a day because you don't want to overdo it because you're keeping that cortisol low, you're keeping your inflammation low, you're going to have much better recovery from day to day where you're not going to be feeling totally wrecked. And is that also something that you hear even from your non thyroid, non Hashimoto customers that oh my gosh, I don't have to take a day off. My muscles aren't burning and tired and sore. I can get right back into it the next day?
- [40:46]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah. So what I can say is just the, what we skipped in the beginning. These workouts have a specific name. They're called rehit and that's reduced exertion high intensity interval training. And the emphasis is really on the reduced exertion. So we talked about going all out and going out to maximum intensity. And that's right. So momentarily they're very, very High intensity, they're maximum intensity, but you only do it for two 20 second sprints. And that means overall amount, the overall level of exertion is very, very low, which also means they're very well tolerated and you recover from them quickly. So the presumption, and I don't, I don't have data ready for this immediately, but the presumption is if people struggling to recover from workouts, that this would be a useful thing to try at least how quickly you can recover from these short, like intensive but very, very short intervals and see how, how that works for you. And the other thing just to emphasize this is not something you have to do every day. So for, there's a, it depends a little bit what your objectives are. If your primary objective is around cardiorespiratory fitness, you want to improve your VO2 max. So your ability to burn oxygen, it seems two times per week is enough. That's, that's what the data suggests, that two times per week is enough. If metabolic health is your primary objective, then three times a week, every other day would be the recommendation for you. So you, we definitely want you to leave intervals between the workouts to give yourself time to recover and to give yourself time to grow, to give you the time to get fitter and stronger. Because it doesn't really get stronger during the workout, it gets stronger in the, in between during the recovery. And so yes, I think this is a very interesting strategy for, for people to explore whether that's helpful for them.
- [43:00]
Dr. Amy
I love that because it's so easy. It's like who can't do it? And again, piggybacking on your, your muscle recovery and growth and repair. When you are doing those quick reheat burst workouts, you're going to improve your glucose uptake and your insulin sensitivity in the muscle. So that's kind of tying back to what you mentioned earlier about seeing these huge improvements in, in metabolic health overall and reduction in diabetes. Of course improvement in insulin resistance that ties right into it because that's pre diabetes. So when we, when we improve glucose uptake, when we make the muscles, the muscles themselves more sensitive to insulin, more nutrients are getting into the muscle. So that's only going to support growth and repair.
- [43:46]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. I mean one, one is if you, if you empty out those glycogen stores, the body has actually somewhere to pack the like sugar that's not adipose tissue. And the other thing is around these glycogen stores are really your body's emergency energy reserve and you want to have those, how should I say, you want to have those charged, you want to be ready for the next thing that comes at you. And so your body will try to recharge them, fill them up again as quickly as possible. And that is a process regulated by insulin. Insulin sensitivity plays a great role in that. And so that's part of the mechanism, how it improves your metabolic health. Because the body wants to just make sure it's ready for the next thing coming at it.
- [44:36]
Dr. Amy
Yeah, absolutely. And then even as we age, I think that that response of getting ready for the next thing starts to slow down if we're not properly taking care of ourselves, if we're not properly exercising for our body. And this is going to kind of tie into, and you may have already mentioned this, but I'll, I'll let you expand on it as well, that mitochondria adaptation that occurs from the rehab from the 22nd sprint and it's literally your muscle cells being more efficient at producing energy. Now you had mentioned the, did you say ATP or did you, were you going, were you going into the Krebs cycle of muscle? You mentioned it earlier, but I believe that that ties into that whole mitochondria adaptation that's only going to help us as we age.
- [45:19]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, so I didn't go into the Krebs cycle, at least not in full detail. So what happens is like mitochondria are the parts of your cells that burn oxygen. Therefore they determine one side of the equation of how much oxygen you can, you can burn. So your VO2 max and the oxygen utilization side of the equation. The other part is oxygen delivery. That's your heart and your lungs. How much oxygen can you deliver to your muscles? And with rehit you release the body's master regulator. That's PGC1 alpha for mitochondrial biogenesis. And that means you develop more mitochondria, you develop larger mitochondria and they work more in efficiently. Yes, mitochondria are the, the parts of your cells that create ATP. So that's the primary source of primary fuel for your muscles and therefore give you the ability to perform and give you energy. And so if you have more of that, not only will you live longer, your life expectancy increases, but you're also just much more capable. So quality of life goes up. And so that is very profound and you get marked improvements. So the scientific studies show, and that's pretty consistent around a 12% average improvement in only eight weeks of doing three of those five minute workouts per week. So you spend 15 minutes per week over eight weeks get a 12% improvement. If you think about a 12% improvement in one of the most important biological, if not the most important biological markers, that's, that's, that's a big deal. Yeah, Imagine you, you weigh 200 pounds or 180 pounds and you, you lose 12% of your body weight. That would be, that would be massive. You lose like what, 20, 25 pounds. That's a, that's a big thing.
- [47:27]
Dr. Amy
Right.
- [47:28]
Unknown Speaker
So it's very noticeable. The Caro bike will give you your stats and you'll be able to track it. It's very quantified, but in a way you don't even need to because you feel it. So you, you'll just feel fitter and everyday tasks will, will be, be just easier to perform.
- [47:48]
Dr. Amy
And everybody is, is so focused on their mitochondrial health right now too. And we have this big talk on longevity and obviously biohacking. This is one way to biohack and mitochondrial health that I love that this only improves it, it only adds another layer to all of our biohacking tools that we can do, simplifies our workout. Takes a lot of, let's face it, takes a lot of stress and pressure of getting in that hour long cardio because like I said in the very beginning, that was me all day long. That was me. Unless I, unless I got in at least 60 minutes, 60 of cardio, I didn't feel complete, I didn't feel accomplished that day because in my mind I thought that this was so important for maintaining proper body composition and maintaining a good body fat percent and it wasn't, it was working against me. So this really is the, I'm just so excited to talk about the Carol bike because for me it's been a game changer. I can see how it's such a game changer for a lot of my patients and just followers have gotten it and giving me feedback on it that oh my gosh, now I can actually lift heavy like Dr. Amy says to do because I'm not spending 45 minutes to an hour doing my cardio and then I don't have any time left. So I mean to me this hits health on so many different levels that it really is a no brainer to get as part of your overall exercise routine for at home. I mean it's, it's just absolutely perfect. And quite frankly, even if you go to the gym, you hit this three times a week, you don't even, this isn't going to be at your gym and you don't want to get on the elliptical and the treadmill. You want to do your quick five minute burst of cardio at home and then, and then do your other resistance training wherever. Oh, the other thing. And I know I'm talking a lot, but I have to throw this in. You can do it on your lunch and you're not going to get so sweaty that you have to take another shower and redo your makeup, ladies. So literally, I mean, there have been busy days where I've been in my office doing recordings, doing interviews, and I'm like, I didn't have any time this morning, but I have a half an hour right now. I don't have a full hour to reshower and do my makeup, but I don't need that because I can just jump on the Carol bike for five minutes and not get off. A sweaty disaster.
- [50:16]
Unknown Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, so we, we, we don't promise that, but it is actually. No, no, no. Here's the thing, here's the thing. So it does work for, for most people. So I would say 8 or 9 out of 10 can do this workout and won't sweat. And there's a very simple explanation for that. Like, you sweat if your body temperature goes up. You sweat in summer if it's, if you stand in the sun, even if you're completely motionless. And with these rehab workouts you don't, like, during the workout, burn enough calories to increase your body temperature to an extent that you start to break like a, a big sweat. And so that works for most people. However, here's the caveat. There are some people who just have to look at exercise equipment and break a sweat. So, yeah, true, there's the, there's the, the odd 1 in 10 who does. But yeah, certainly. And, or at least you don't need to have all your makeup redone and another blow dry, which if you think about it, then that adds like, you're not only doing your hour cardio, but you're having, but then suddenly it's like two hours out of your day, depending on how much time it takes you to get all those done. So it is really. We have our bikes and offices. I've got one in my office. And it is something you can do during your lunch break, during your coffee break without everybody just looking at you strangely afterwards.
- [51:46]
Dr. Amy
That is very true, Very true. And then one thing, I checked with you because I know you've had this for, you've had this offer for a long time. I mean, number one, we're going to Put the link in the show notes and people can use the code thyroid to get a hundred dollars off the bike. So right there you get a discount. On top of that you give people 100 days to try this out. So can you talk a little bit about this guarantee? Like basically you'll love it guarantee and you even come and get the bike if somebody's just like, yeah, that's not for me.
- [52:20]
Unknown Speaker
So it is, right? Listeners are very welcome to use the code thyroid and they get a hundred dollars, the best available promotion at the time. So if they use that, they can be sure they get the best deal that's available. And then yes, we have probably the most generous trial period or return policy, however you want to call it in the market. So if you order a Carol bike on our website, that's carolbike.com and you purchase the bike, you have 100 days after you receive it to use it to see whether you love it, see whether you can stick to it, see whether you get benefits from it. And thankfully most people love it and can do their workouts and see the benefits. Otherwise we couldn't do this. But if you don't, if for whatever reason it's not for you, we take it back and you get a full refund. So that lowers the risk to get it Carol bike quite substantially. It makes the decision maybe a little bit easier.
- [53:21]
Dr. Amy
So much easier. I mean, to me that's an absolute no brainer. You have nothing to lose. Like you're either going to love it and get a lot out of it, but I do remember talking to you before and you go, yeah, we don't get many back like if at all. I mean you just don't because it's great, it's fantastic. And people are going to become addicted to it because it's so easy. And it's one of those things that you really do have to try. I mean, we could sit here and explain it all day long, but once you get on it and you try it, I mean, I remember my first time, I went, oh my gosh, this is crazy because it did kick my butt, but in a beautiful, very short way. And then it was done. And like you said, you.
- [53:58]
Ulrich
The light at the end of the tunnel.
- [54:00]
Unknown Speaker
Exactly, exactly. And you understand immediately why and how this works and you'll feel the results and you see the data. So yeah, that's, that's just a very good thing.
- [54:09]
Dr. Amy
Well, Alaric, thank you so much for jumping on and having this very passionate, lively discussion because I'm very passionate about helping my people not be cardio queens. It's only going to help their results, but showing them what the alternative is and really how to do it the right way and the benefits associated with the Carol bike. So thank you for jumping on and and having this discussion with me. All of the links that we talked about and all the discount codes, we.
- [54:34]
Guest Speaker
Will absolutely put those down in the show notes.
- [54:37]
Unknown Speaker
Thank you so much.
- [54:43]
Ulrich
The information shared on the Thyroid Fixer Podcast is intended solely for informational and educational purposes. It is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always consult with your physician or other qualified healthc care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition treatment or before making changes to your healthcare regimen, including medications, supplements or other therapies. Use of the information provided in this podcast does not establish a doctor, patient or client provider relationship between you and the host or between you and any other healthcare professionals featured on the show. Any medical opinions or statements made by guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the host or affiliated parties. Statement regarding dietary supplements or health related products mentioned in this podcast have not been evaluated by the fda. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Some episodes of the Thyroid Fixer Podcast may include sponsorships or affiliate links. The host may receive compensation for discussing or promoting certain products or services. Any such sponsorships or affiliations will be clearly disclosed during the episode. All opinions expressed are those of the host or guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of any sponsors. The inclusion of a product or service does not imply endorsement by any health care professional featured on this podcast.