Barbell Shrugged - 144- 61 Years of Training and STILL Learning w/ Dr. Fred Bisci

Episode Date: October 1, 2014

This week on Barbell Shrugged, we interview a man who's been training for 61 years, Dr. Fred Bishi. Hey, this is Rich Froning. You're listening to Barbell Shrugged. For the video version, go to barbellshrugged.com. Welcome to Barbell Shrugged. I'm Mike Bledsoe with Doug Larson, Chris Warren, CTP behind the camera. We're here in beautiful Vermont hanging out on Joe DeSantis' place. I don't even know what we're doing up here anymore. We're just having a good time. We're hanging out here with Dr. Fred Bishi. That's it. Yeah, I got the name right.

I'm pretty excited about that. We were hanging around, and Joe said we need to hang out with you a little bit. And we started learning a little bit about your history. And we're like, this guy is amazing. He didn't say it like that. He said, you have to meet this man. That's what he said. What did I say?

He said, you have to. He said, come on up. He said, do it. Just trust me. Do it. Well, I think he was talking to Doug, so I don't know exactly what happened. I'm just making up stories at this point. So we've got to talk to him. Yeah. You've been in the game for a long time you have you have quite

a history so uh on your note you said he has quite a history like you have more history than anyone I know in the strength conditioning world well I you know I've been at this uh I started working out the weights when I was about 14 years old and I'll be 85 years old in 10 days. We were feeling like we had been in the game for a while. Yeah, I've been training for like 17 years. You're like, it's been like 60-something years. Yeah, I've been like 22. How long have you been in the game, Doug?

16. Yeah, so we feel 17. Well, I'm a little different. What happened, I was really excited about working out with the waist, and I trained very, very hard. I was explaining excited about working out with the weights, and I trained very, very hard. I was explaining to him. I devised a way of training I called the overload system. And for the days that I lifted weights, it made me very, very strong. So I used a special power rack that I built,

and he actually trained in an old barn. We dug a hole in the floor, so I used to stand in the hole and do this. You heard about it? Do deadlifts out of the hole. We used to do partial deadlifts with 600 to 700 pounds. When I was 17 years old, I was 200 pounds already so training very, very hard.

Then we had a power rack. We'd hold things over our head. Just take it that much out of the power rack, much more than you could, than you could jerk. Everything I did was to build tendons, not only muscle strength, but tendon strength.

And I used to train to exhaustion, then I would not train again for another five or six days because that's how long it actually took. Do you mind if we go back and get notepads and shit

so we can write down these are great, these are great old things. What's amazing is what you're describing right now is what's amazing Is What you're describing Right now Is people use These methods

Like cutting edge Yeah yeah They'll say This is new There's a new thing No no It's like Because they're using

You know We now have racks That are built To where you can do Exactly what you're describing The whole thing It's interesting It's like

Someone goes I don't have The proper equipment It's like Have you tried Digging a hole yet Well that's what Paul Well you tried digging a hole yet? Well, you want to really laugh.

Some of the weights we used to use, they used to come from the old railroad crossing. They would count the weights. Some of them were this thick, and they weighed like 250 pounds, so to bring up the railroad crossing. So we used to actually take them when we were kids. So we had the most primitive setup in that barn that you ever saw. But we used to train. There was a group of us.

We used to train like crazy. And we had a weightlifting club called the Donovan Hills Barbell Club, and we always competed at a higher level. I mean, we were poor American kids. We used to come into a meeting. We used to look like a bunch of ragamuffins but we always I'm telling you we always placed you know.

We always did. Did you ever happen to train with Paul Anderson because he used that same hole in the ground technique for squats and good mornings. Paul Anderson? Yeah.

I knew Paul Anderson when he was the heavyweight champion in the world. Good lord. He worked with Sir, that's an honor. York Barbell Club.

Yeah. Yeah. Paul was really a great guy and he So for those that don't know Paul Anderson's general regard I guess is to strong this man York Barbell Club. Yeah. Yeah. Paul was really a great guy. So for those that don't know, Paul Anderson's general regard, I guess, is the strongest man in modern history. He did a squat.

He could squat with over 1,000 pounds. I don't know exactly how much. He did it like every day for a long time, just for show. So for the record, this is- He was enormous. Is this the 50s, sir? When was Paul at his peak? I can't remember the exact date.

Let me think a minute. Yeah. I think it was more in the 60s after the Korean War so he was rumored to have squatted a close like 1100 I mean the conditions are it's hard to say you know depth and all this stuff but he could put it on his back he could do amazing feats of streak that the back lift was my favorite one he used to do like a whole audience on his back he was first of all he couldn to do. He would lift up a whole audience on his back. First of all, his legs were so big, he couldn't go down below parallel. It was impossible. So he could just barely squat down to parallel.

He could do a push press with over 500 pounds, maybe like 500. I don't remember the exact numbers, but he used to just a slight dip, and he used to push it over his head. This is the days when Olympic weightlifters were some of the best. They were the best pressers in the world. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And the only thing about Paul is that he used to use Knox gelatin as a protein supplement, and that's not really a good thing to do.

Wait, what is that stuff? Knox gelatin. You make, when you go to the- Oh, like you make jello out of it. Make jello out of it. And I think that, He was funny, and my wife just felt like it.

What was in it? Gelatin. It was made from the bones of like, you know, diseased animals and all kinds of stuff. It really wasn't a good idea. Like it's collagen basically? Collagen based.

And it cost, a box cost maybe like, on those days, 15 cents I guess, you know. So he ended up a sick guy. What's that I guess you know so he ended up a sick guy he ended up getting sick

from it is that what you said huh he ended up getting sick is that what you said yeah he ended up with very bad diabetes and he

he didn't look to be a ripe old age is that from the gelatin or just because he was an enormous guy I think the gelatin had something to do with him getting sick

and then of course he was I forget what he weighed about 340 pounds. He developed diabetes, you know. And it wasn't like they were watching their, you know, other levels of vitamin D or omega fatty acids at this point. They were just eating whatever they could find,

and then living a hard life. In those days, what people did was, I mean, there was nothing to sit down and eat a couple dozen eggs and eat 10 hamburgers And a bunch of french fries And drink everything You know Go out and

Drink a quarter beer And they ate everything Just to Pack on the muscle You know And they were They were some strong guys They drank beer for recovery

Yeah A lot of guys We've experimented With this method doctor And it's Can be quite beneficial Sometimes When you're in your 20s, maybe.

I know what you're saying. So legend has it, speaking of digging holes in the ground, that Paul would- Listen, what we got to remember here is- Never mind. What's optimal for strength and size is not optimal for longevity. What's optimal for health, it might not be the most conducive thing to be a big guy, a strong guy, but you can be strong

and eat a very, very good diet and you can be well built too. So I think the answer is really for young guys today that want to have massive builds is the middle of the road is to try to give up the process. If you can give up the processed food, whatever you eat, most likely you're going to be a very healthy person

because what's killing people today is the processed food. Processed food is absolutely a modern-day curse because I see it in what I do. I've been a clinical nutritionist now for 50 years. Wow. I'm a PhD in nutritional science, and I see a lot of people today are getting cancer and getting really, really loose.

You've observed the rise of this firsthand. You've seen every stage. I saw when they started using growth hormones like Dianabol. I saw guys, they were eating out like candy, and they got so big so fast, and then they started bleeding from their nose and their rectum. You've taken too much D-ball when you bleed from your rectum. So that's steroids for anyone that doesn't know that the animal is a steroid.

Yeah, it was a steroid. And there was something, you know. If you start bleeding from the anus during a squat session, you have overdone the drug. And they were eating massive amounts of cheap quality protein, you know, real lousy stuff, you know. Like powder proteins that were just bad quality? No, they were, you know, all kinds of, you know, ribs. Not that there's anything, they're bad, but a lot of these guys just ate, the food was so processed. If you ate like grass-fed beef

and organically grown chickens, you ate the amount of protein that they ate, you probably would be okay. It wouldn't be a problem. And then they didn't eat enough vegetables. They weren't getting enough minerals. They weren't getting enough of a lot of nutrients that people are well aware of today

what you need to be a healthy person. They were just worried about the protein. They weren't worried about anything else. They were just worried about the protein. They weren't worried about anything else. They were just worried about being strong. Well, to be perfectly honest, what they were worried about is being massive, having 19-inch arms, being able to squat with 500 pounds. And, of course, when you're eating that type of diet, you had the libido of a Mongolian warrior.

So that's what they were really focusing on. See, to be bookmarked this part of the interview, we're going to put that on a shirt. That's what they're really after. And, you know,

that happens. Listen, when you're a young guy, you're 21 years old, and you're all souped up, and you're walking down the street like a praying lion, it comes from that type of a diet, too.

You know, we've got to be honest here. We're all sitting here like we have no idea what we're talking about. Nothing wrong with that. No idea. Never been there. I don't think I had as good of a game as you. I don't think I ever felt like a praying lion picking up the chicks.

I was trying hard enough, man. Oh, I was trying hard enough. Striking out a lot. Trying and failing. You know what I think is important today for guys that are lifting weights? What I found over the years, what I've been doing, I think a lot of people are missing the boat or they don't fully understand detox. I think everybody should be detoxing periodically

because our environment, we're swimming through a pool of every toxic environment. Even some of the chemicals on our grass, in our carpets when you buy a new car, in your house, what's in the air, there's all kinds of problems going on. I think a lot of people don't realize what happens, even if you're eating a healthy diet, that you should be detoxing maybe two or three times a year. If you could do just do like a seven day juice fast and cleanse your bowels. Of course, I believe that I see a lot of people that have cancer and I believe that cancer is beginning in a GI tract, you know, up and lower GI tract, especially your upper GI tract, which a lot of people don't focus on,

and your lymphatic system. Your lymphatic system is like the septic tank outside your house. That's why a lot of people have problems with their lymph nodes, and they have cancer, they have swollen lymph nodes, because their lymph system

is just being overwhelmed. And your lymph system doesn't have a pump like a heart that circulates your blood. I'm sure you guys, the way you work out, that your lymph system is constantly. Pristine, doctor. Pristine. It should be. If you're eating healthy all the time, do you still think that's something you need to do?

If you're eating like really clean all the time? Yeah, absolutely. I do it. And I really eat what I think is a really very healthy diet. You know, I'm pretty sure it is. You eat a lot of raw foods, is that correct, these days? Yeah, I do. But what's in the problem is that what you're not consuming yourself,

you know, what you're breathing, what you're exposed to. It's not just what you're eating, there's environmental toxins. Yeah, but heavy metals. I bet that everybody that got tested here would probably find some heavy metals in your system. It's almost impossible. Mostly gold for me. Mostly gold. Michael's been drinking.

This guy's made of gold. Michael, this guy got a bottle. Don't tell people this. I'm going to tell them. No, fuck you. I'm telling them. He's got a bottle of gold liquid that an alchemist gave him. Oh, yeah.

He puts it on our tongue. He's like, I'm not going to tell you what this is. Try this. And your mouth fills up with a very bizarre metal flavor. And he goes, I just, he said he dosed me with something else. I got excited. But he said, I got this from an alchemist.

It'll make your body work better. And we were very confused by his statement. Well, there's a lot of alchemists. By the way, it was kind of joking. I know, but you look, listen, a lot of people are serious. A lot of alchemists are serious about that. No, no, no. I mean, I, I, there might be something to it. That's the thing is like, I'm like, all right, well I'll try it.

You know what I mean? Like I couldn't find any research on it at all. So I'm like, I'll try it. That's a silly modern thing. I'd be curious to see some of the things you are now seeing in the modern strength community and modern fitness community that you find to be a little bit ridiculous based on your extensive experience. Like, what are we doing now that you've seen us make these mistakes before? Any modern trends, any kind of equipment that you're looking at? You say, man, they should just go back to the barn, you know?

Well, I'm not the most knowledgeable guy about the new equipment that's out there, you know, because I haven't been in the gym in a long time. And probably, I'd say a long time, maybe about 10 years. But I did some, I still was training up into my 70s. And I don't remember when, I don't remember exact specific dates. But I was in my 70s, I was still able to do three sets of 10 and the squats, you know, down to parallel with 300 pounds. So you can be thin. I'm very thin.

I'm well aware of that. But you can be thin and be very strong. Absolutely. And based on the type of diet I follow, it keeps you very, very thin, keeps your arteries clean. But I'm also into Ji Gong, the martial arts, you know. And the breathing, I think everybody should be doing some type of exercise, no matter what you do, like Ji Gong, because of the breathing,

how it's the most revitalizing form of... That's the name of the breathing exercise, or that's the name of the martial arts? Ji Gong is a form of martial arts. What I do is the exercise, it's the breathing. It's very, it's similar to Tai Chi, where there's very slow movement and where you're breathing. And Rory's been doing it for 16 years.

It's a very strong guy. You'd be surprised how strong he is. Breathing plays a huge factor and being able to, I mean, if you're doing something, even like say a CrossFit workout or something like that, guys that are breathing in between sets and stuff like that, that's all your recovery right there. I want to ask you, first off, what were your thoughts on Alchemist? Because you started saying something about Alchemist. No, I didn't.

Listen, I'm not a dogmatic guy. I'm very open-minded. I've seen some Alchemists do some pretty amazing things. I'm not a specialist in that type of thing. My exposure to Alchemist is like zero. My buddy was like, check this out, guys, from Alchemists do some pretty amazing things. I'm not a specialist in that type of thing. My exposure to alchemists is like zero. My buddy was like, check this out, guys, from the alchemists. I'm like, I'm going to screw with my friends. I would say. And I'm going to try it out myself.

I'm not taking that. That's what I would have told him. Well, I'll tell you something. There's a much better way to approach it that's scientifically proven. So I don't put anybody down. And I'm not a dogmatic guy. At this point in my life, I told you, I'm 85. I'm still learning dogmatic guy. At this point in my life, I told you I'm 85. I'm still learning every single day.

So the key is nobody knows everything. And actually, to be honest with you, the older I get, the more I've learned, the more I realize I don't know very much because there's so much knowledge in the world. And I try to learn from everybody. I know I'm learning just by speaking to you guys because I could see that you're very good at what you do and this is an opportunity for me to learn something and maybe we could, I could, hopefully I'm going to be able to,

you can learn from my experience. But what happened to me is that when I started eating a raw diet, which at one time, this was about 50 years ago, there were some people that were talking about eating a diet that was 100% raw. Being that I was traditionally trained and I was 200 pounds, I thought that was ridiculous because the guy was speaking to me, he was a very thin guy, but I watched him.

He was amazingly strong. He had great endurance. And I'm saying, this guy must have something here. But looking at him visually, it wasn't very appealing to me because I thought he was too thin. He was thinner than I am, you know? So I kept thinking about it, and I did a little bit of research. There wasn't a lot of information around.

There was no computers around. So I decided to, the only way I could find out, I could start, you know, doing the kind of research by reading books. And it was the information that came from Germany by Dr. Ragnar Berg, who was a Nobel Peace Prize in biochemistry. And he had fasted over probably 40,000 people in fasting retreats. Then Otto Buchinger, and then Dr. Carl Otto Ali. And if you look up the Stockholm Fast March,

there were 11 guys that drank water for 10 days and walked 333 miles. So I said, how can anybody do that? Not eat. We would say the same thing. Like, oh. Well, look it up on, go on the internet. So I said, the only way I could find out how much validity to this is for me to do my own,

being I had a clinical background, to do my own experimentation, in which I did. I started right from the beginning. I did all the water fasting. I lived on juices. I did a lot of, you know, it's not truly a fast. I lived on juices for many times over 100 days. Found myself to be fully functional. You know, you'd be surprised what you could really do

because I, you know, my body was trained from eating a raw type of a diet. Then I had my own television show called Eat Your Way to Health with Dr. Fred Bishy, won an OVA award. So we used to have a lot of people on it, guys that lifted weights and doctors. We had a lot of healthy discussions, not arguments, and we were going back and forth. And people learned from that. So at that time, at one time, Dick Gregory, I don't know if you ever heard of Dick Gregory, he was a political activist. And he had fasted 57 days on water

and walked and ran 100 miles. So people said it was impossible. So it wasn't impossible because I had done similar things. And while I was in a health food store and some guy said, I don't believe that. I don't believe it's possible. He said, I'd like to see you do something like that. I said, well, I'm not going to go on a long fast, but I will fast 10 days. And then we can go to Cloth Lake Park and see how far I could run. So that's what we did.

I fasted for 10 days. I had to believe I did it, but I really did do it. People know that knew me. And we went to Cloth Lake Park and I ran 10 miles through the hills. So you can do unbelievable things. You know what I'm saying? And we're all very unique individuals and we can only evaluate something on our own experience. Now, when I was lifting weights and going through what I was going, I thought that was insanity. I didn't think anybody could really do that until I start doing it myself. I lost, you know, over a period of about a year, I lost 70 pounds. I went from over 200 pounds. I did a lot of long-term fasting. And then I thought I shot

myself in the foot. I thought I made a tremendous mistake. But then as my body became more biologically efficient, I started to work out again. I started to put on some muscle. And I actually got to the point where I looked reasonably well also. But I found out I was dramatically more healthy. I had unbelievable. One thing is when you do that type of a diet and you're getting enough carbs

and you're not eating the amount of protein, that's one of the reasons why you're not getting bigger, you know. You have unbelievable endurance. So that's when I did a lot of endurance work and I kind of made a major mistake. And later on at that time, I believe it was a major mistake for me, I kind of drifted away from resistance training

and I got into the long-distance running, and I ran, you know, two ultra-marathons, two 50-mile races, and 18 marathons. And I ran through the prevention marathon, which was below zero. People got, I had a very bad force bite. But you know what? How I look at that now,

I look at that as being temporary insanity. I should have, there was no real, you know, what was to prove. So I learned from all that. And then as the years went on, as working as a clinical nutritionist, I ran into a lot of people from different walks of life with different diseases. I worked with one guy that was, came in second and missed the universe, 280 pounds at 6'5", with at least 21-inch arms, enormous, enormous guy. But he ran into severe problems from growth hormone, you know, steroids.

And I couldn't convince him that he had to really readjust what he was doing to his diet and he could actually come back. But he tried it and he lost about 15 pounds and he said he couldn't afford to lose that much weight because this guy would have still looked enormous. Right. It sounds like what you're describing a lot of is a lot of people create these mental barriers and assumptions of what they can do, what they can't do.

Yeah, that's true. And what they have to eat and how big they must be. Right. I mean, I'm really fascinated by what you're saying because I myself am eating. I'm not trying to follow any kind of restriction, but I find myself just not wanting a lot of the food I used to. Usually I won't really eat much breakfast or food, period, until 10 or 11. Yeah, that's fine.

You can do that. I've started realizing if I don't want food, I won't eat it. And if I want to train light, I will. And if I want to go heavy, I will. If I want to run around or swim, I will. And one thing I'm starting to see in my training is I'm getting stronger than I've been in probably the last three years, and I'm getting smaller and smaller.

You're kind of blowing my mind a little bit with some of this shit. No, you're not, Dr. Well, what happens, you're becoming more biologically efficient. So you can actually lose some weight, become more biologically efficient. I mean, there's a certain cutoff point. If you go, you're a big guy.

I'm a beast, yeah. So if you went down, say you lost 40 pounds, I doubt if you're going to be as strong as you are. You never know, though, because it was hard for people to believe that when I first lost weight and people that knew me, they thought I was out of my mind. They thought something happened to me and I got sick or something like that. Are you okay? Are you sick, doctor? Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, you know. But I found out you can be very, very strong if you just, if you try to follow the same type of diet and you give up the processed food, you're going to become denser. You know, you'll look more ripped. But there's a very good chance you might be a little bit stronger than you are now because I ran into one guy that followed this type of diet that was here today. And he said he actually got stronger, but he didn't have the discipline to stay with it. So you have to try for yourself, you know, you know. Yeah. Don't do anything that's you know you're smart guy you're intelligent guys you got a great background in doing this

you know maybe by you know cleaning your chemistry up a little bit you might see a difference you know technically I've seen my chemistry up quite a bit I used to be a hundred pounds ever let's take a break real quick there's a few things I want to touch on when we get back I want to talk about raw diet, what detox actually is, and then also I want to talk about your weightlifting experience when you were younger. This is Andrea Ager

and you're listening to Barbell Shrug. For the video version, go to barbellshrug.com. Barbell Shrug is brought to you by you. To learn more about how you can support the show, go to barbellshrug.com and sign up for the newsletter. And we're back with Dr. Fred Pesci.

Bishi? I want to say Pesci. I'm here with Joe Pesci. It's the accent. Oh, man. Yeah, so you were kind of, you started talking about something that was really interesting and talking about people who are outliers,

someone who may not exactly take care of themselves, but they still perform at a really high level. Oh, I knew a number of guys like that. As I said before, I know one guy, he ended up being a world champ. And I remember when he first, he was a young kid. He was about, let me see if I can remember. He was about 16 years old, and he just caught everybody's attention.

Then he joined the New York Barbell Club, and I can't remember the exact age and dates. By the time he was 18, he was the national champ. But he was in his early 20s, he was the world champ. The Russians were developing a great weightlifting team. A lot of those guys were into steroids legally. They went to special schools. They had special training.

They used the most advanced training methods, even more advanced than we were using in this country. But I remember I saw him start to, I was competing in a contest, and I was hoping to do pretty well. I certainly wasn't in his category, but he came in and he was, I mean, the guy was, he was legless drunk, you know. So I'm looking at the guy. And this is weightlifting, like Olympic weight.

Yeah, Olympic weight. Press snatch and clean and jerk in those days. So they made a huge pot of coffee. They poured this coffee into the guy. He comes out and as I said before, he wiped the floor up with everybody. He won, hands down. But as time goes, it didn't take him long, though, where he got to the point where he was getting injured, you know,

and joint problems because his lifestyle. And his lifestyle, I mean, he was a good-looking fella. His lifestyle was just over the top, you know what I'm saying? He was so gifted that he swandered his gift on a long type of thing. And he made his mark. He was the world's champion. I knew a number of guys that were that way. Is that the big risk that if you do push things to chase performance

and you think you're getting away with certain things because you feel good and you're lifting good, you're powerful, you've got good endurance, if you're not carefully, carefully, carefully assessing how you're getting away with certain things because you feel good and you're lifting good you're powerful you get your good endurance if you're not carefully carefully carefully assessing how you're going about it you could end up in territory where you can't really get back to healthy you may go too far and you realize maybe you've cost yourself too much and there might be not any going back from that yeah what happens a lot of guys develop you know uh joint problems you know from some of the bodybuilders from doing wide grips, bench presses, and bouncing tremendous amounts of weight off their chest. They got all kinds of joint problems.

They can't even comb their hair. And a lot of guys who went into powerlifting had developed tremendous injuries, high blood pressure because they were so big, and only God knows what they were really eating. So what happened, I was— I've heard what some of those guys eat. It's not good. Well, you should see me eat.

Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, the sad thing about it, because I still love weightlifting, and I loved it when I was young. You were a champ, right? I was a champ, right. And I loved it when I was young,

and what made me, I felt bad because I kind of feel like they perverted a wonderful sport. It shouldn't have happened like that, you know. Of course, there were a lot of dedicated old-timers that were really one of those type of guys. There was another guy that was an Olympic champ, and he was definitely into the steroids. And there was a picture of him on the back of the news, and he was competing in either the world championships or the olympics and he had a clean and jerk over 400 pounds and he had the weight over his head he had locked out and his arm just broke

it snapped because of the steroids he didn't have the skeletal frame to support that kind of weight he didn't have a much bigger skeletal frame than I did. So the steroids gave him the ability to get the weight up in the air. He couldn't hold it. It's amazing. He built the muscular strength. I trained with a guy. Right.

I trained with a powerlifter who left college football. He was, you know, this is a big athletic guy. He wasn't using anything then. But he might have been like a 220 pound linebacker a small university he could probably squat 600 bench press 450 he's a strong guy but he went into power lifting and within maybe a year and a half or two years he was up to over 900 squat he could pull 800 his bench press was 700 something he was into the juice he got right there to the peak so quick i was like this guy's amazing i did a incline bench press workout with him one time.

We were doing dumbbell presses. We had 150-pound dumbbells. I did like five of the most difficult reps I've ever done in my life. I almost blew myself out. He did like 15 or 20 reps with it. And then right about that, he blew out his back. It was over because he didn't have the joint integrity to keep doing that. No, yeah.

Listen, doing dumbbell bench press with 150 pounds, you're a real powerful guy. Incline presses. Deep incline presses. It was almost a military press. Oh, no, that's awesome. In my day, nobody could do that. There wasn't guys that could do that.

That started to happen when they started. And plus, they got more knowledge about how much protein to eat to make you stronger. What years did you compete? 1954, I was in the Navy. I was United States Navy weightlifting champion. So after I came back from Korea.

What weight was that back then? Because the weight classes have changed over the years. Well, I was 210 pounds, so that was the heavyweight. Now it's like super heavyweights and things like that. I competed as 175 pounds, 198 pounds, and as a heavyweight. But my best lifts were pretty close to what yours was. 330 clean jerk, 275. But of course, the way I'm built, I was very quick.

Well, the rules were different, right? The bar couldn't touch your body on the way up? No, you couldn't touch your body. Yeah, see, the rules are different now. For me, it's so much harder. Yeah, what you were doing was harder than what I was doing, what I do. Oh, it's different now? Yeah, because the bar can touch your body on the way up now.

Oh, okay. So what we do now is we pull the bar off the ground, it makes contact at the hip, and we snap underneath it. You're talking about the snatch? Snatch and clean. Oh, yeah. In a clean and jerk, you're allowed to bring the bar up to your chest, and then you did another dip, and then you put it up.

Yeah, but we're, yeah, it's the same way, but we now hit our thighs and hips. On the pull. On the way up. Oh, okay. So it's a two-stage pull kind of. So for those of you who don't know, the bar used to not be able to touch your body until it got,

for your clean and jerk, until it got to your shoulders. Oh, exactly. For a snatch, it couldn't know, the bar used to not be able to touch your body for your clean and jerk until it got to your shoulders. Oh, exactly. For a snatch, it couldn't touch your body at all. Exactly. So the lift was completely different. And that was actually one of the reasons you guys did splits instead of... People didn't squat because... Do squat snatch and clean... And they didn't squat when they lifted

a lot of times just because it wasn't, you know, if you're already having to keep the bar away from your body, the split might be more efficient. Yeah, I know what you're saying. You're right. But a guy like me with my type of build, long legs, short torso, long arms, I was able to do a squat clean, but I was in such an unusual position. And being I had a very, my back was strong from doing all those deadlifts.

So you were able to like split snatch like 260. You're building a deadlifter. 275. 275. Press and 275 snatch and 330 clean and jerk. And these are all split lifts, not squats. Split lifts, yeah. I couldn't squat.

I mean, I could squat, but I'd be leaning way, I couldn't, I can't get, can't get up and down when my body's up and down. Guys with short legs, longer upper body, are able to squat down and keep their body upright. I can't do it. I was able to squat. Make sure you're pushing the microphone. Yeah, you're coming off the mic.

I would have to catch the, kind of catch the bar right here on my delts and catch them right here with my arms, you know? Yeah. That's fascinating. We need to break out some videos. We'll find some Wi-Fi somewhere. We can look at how the lifts used to be and how they

are now. It's changed quite a bit. We should share videos. That'd be fun. Do you know Jack LaLanne? Oh yeah, I know Jack LaLanne. Was he a buddy of yours? When I was in California, I worked out in the San Jose Y. He was a class by himself. I mean, he could do – he only weighed 148 pounds.

He could do a seating dumbbell press with 120-pound dumbbells, I think it was. No, he was – Just sitting there pressing dumbbells straight overhead, military press stops? Well, together, not alternate, together. He'd just sit there and do them. And he could also... He could work out

for hours. Mm-hmm. Hours. A lot of big guys couldn't keep up with him. He must have had those shoulder pads in his suit

that gave him the strength. He was a strong guy. Yeah. Endurance-wise, he was unbelievable. And I'm sorry to say he should have never died. He died when he was 93, 94. He got pneumonia, and somebody that was into health

told him not to take the antibiotics and the ammonia. He should have took the antibiotics. A guy I knew in California said, he asked me if I would call him. I said, I don't want to just call him. I don't know if the guy wants to hear from me. I said, if I was you, I would tell him to take the antibiotics. Antibiotics

are no poison. In a life-threatening situation, you got to take them or, of course, you could end up the way he ended up. Especially for 93. I mean, antibiotics are something that's commonly over-prescribed, but there's still a time and place. The medical world does a really good job of treating short-term

acute conditions. You break your arm or you get pneumonia and you need antibiotics, but chronic conditions is where most people have an issue treating diabetes and heart disease and obesity. The medical world doesn't do a great job of treating those compared to the fitness wellness world. It's a long-term problem that needs a long-term solution,

but a short-term problem, like a car accident, needs a short-term solution. You've got to go in there and fix the arm right now. I work with a lot of doctors. I have doctors that are friends of mine. I believe they should be, where they should be really utilized is emergency medicine, surgery, and chronic disease, you know, should be left. I mean, I work with a lot of people who have chronic disease.

And it's not really hard to deal with chronic disease if you understand lifestyle change and how to manipulate a person's chemistry and take their body to clean it up so it's not a good host for bacteria proliferation. I agree with you completely. You were talking earlier about detox. Could you describe to us what happens during a detox? A lot of professionals, a lot of health professionals throw the word detox around. Sometimes I'm wondering, I don't even know what they mean.

Right, exactly. Well, to be perfectly honest, I think detox is the most poorly understood aspect of a person becoming healthy, especially in the natural field. Now, when I talk about detox, I think it depends upon what the situation is. If you have a serious chronic disease or an acute disease, in order to have a chance of your body overcoming it, either with the help of a physician or without a physician, the best way to detox is like, let's start from a basic understanding of what a detox is. If you're smoking crack or snorting cocaine, what's start from a basic understanding of what a detox is. If you're smoking crack or snorting cocaine,

what's the best way to detox? Stop doing that. Stop doing it. I was like, I'm trying to draw on my experience of cocaine use. Of course, stop doing it. And your body is detoxing 24 hours a day. Once you stop detoxing, your limb system, your body chemistry is going to be

overwhelmed and you're going to get sick if your body stops. So when you fall behind from your lifestyle, whatever you're doing that's wrong, what you have to do is to, you know, either clean up your diet and then there's things you could do to, you can go into fasting, you know, like I've had, I had an extensive background in water fasting. So if you're not eating anything and you're just resting and you're drinking water,

your body, within three days, your body goes into a detox. In other words, it starts to feed off the, whatever's in your bowels, it starts to feed off the, feed off the weakened dying cells, the aging cells. Then it'll go to like maybe cyst tumors and even rents and it'll start to feed off that.

So your body knows how to detoxify itself. You don't have to take some potent drink and sometimes you can do things like that. You just sold me. I've never heard anyone describe it that way. Or you can go on a juice fast. If you go on a juice fast, it's very common now. I'm a consultant for a big bunch of juice bars in Manhattan, and everybody's doing like a, to do a,

guys like you could do a 30-day juice fast like it was, would be nothing. I don't think so. Michael would be very grumpy. Yeah, I would be grumpy as hell, I think. Yeah, but the reason for that Is because you'd be detoxing After three or four days

For instance I have a daughter My daughter's a You'd be surprised what you could really do Yeah I'm wanting to try it now I'm like man when can I do this Well why don't you try it Oh here we go

He's going to set a deadline for me Are you challenging him doctor No I want you to we go. The first- He's going to set a deadline for me. Are you challenging him, doctor? No, no, no. Because I want you to challenge him. No. The first- I'm telling you right now. The first 24 hours, you're going to be a grump.

Mm-hmm. Okay? And you're going to be irritable and everything. Then, once you get past the third day, you're going to start- And drink seven, eight juices a day. Don't worry about the protein. Just get to drink the juices because your body's going to, through the process of autolysis, the weight you

lose is going to be recycled as fat and protein. You have to look up Dr. Ragnar Berg. He's the most brilliant guy. So am I going to be super lean at the end of this? No, at seven days? No, after 30 days. I'm trying to time this for the beach.

Well, in 30 days, you probably would lose, if you drank nine juices a day, if you're drinking juices, you're not going to have to go to bed. You're going to have a tremendous amount of energy. You're going to be shocked. After about the fifth day, your energy is going to start going through the roof. You want to try this, Michael? I'm trying to think about what day I could do this.

In about 30 days? Well, why don't you just try a three-day juice first, the first time? You're going to be grumpy the whole three days, though, based on what you told me. My wife is not liking hearing this. What's interesting is the detox word, when anybody says detox, we all go to like, it's a taboo word, it's a gimmicky word. You think, you're're gonna push me on some product but really isn't it if we think about what's quote unquote i'm using my quotation

fingers what's most natural in the vast span of of our physiology as a species there's going to be times where we would catch something we'd have bounty there's times when we're gonna catch shit and we're gonna have to work that whole time for a long stretch with very little if a little bit of water but maybe nothing else for maybe maybe a month is our would you say our physiology is sort of programmed coded to be triggered by these situations and go into a different gear absolutely to me that is very intuitive listen your body knows how to do do this intuitively you're 100 right there's no mystery to this you don't even have to have a clue to what you're doing. Your body knows intuitively in its chemistry how to keep you healthy and restore your health. We have to get out of its way. The whole problem is to stop doing what we're doing.

We're intoxicating ourselves so much today from the standard American diet. That's why more and more people are getting cancer. Type 2 diabetes is out of control. Arthritis is out of control. It has a lot to do with our lifestyle. I hear people, if you go on the internet, there's so much confusion about what kind of diet people should be following. You hear people talk about the raw food diet now. There's a macrobiotic diet, the paleo diet. You name it, there's a coconut diet, whatever diet you can think about. These wackos. But the common denominator in all these diets is to leave out the processed food. Yeah. I hear a lot of people that they kind of malign the paleo diet. It's not that bad a diet

at all because they're eating, first of all, there is no paleo diet. Paleolithic era was between 10 million years ago and maybe a million years ago. So if you lived up in Alaska, the paleo diet couldn't be the same as what you're eating in Central America or Costa Rica. Up in Alaska, they're probably eating a lot of moose, a lot of bear. They're able to eat some root

vegetables. But were they healthy? Yeah, they were healthy because they weren't eating any processed food. They didn't have cell phones. They weren't drinking all that booze and all the stuff, and smoking cigars, you know, Cuban cigars. Or just go a little bit more to the extreme, that environment, and the whole diet of that culture would be fat, seal fat, a little bit of meat, but they would also be healthy.

But again, it's the absence of the other thing. Well, healthy fats are not, listen, a lot of people are going to get mad at me for saying this. Healthy fats are not the worst thing in the world. Well, we all are on this page. We're saying absence of the other thing. Well, healthy fats are not... Listen, a lot of people are going to get mad at me for saying this. Healthy fats are not the worst thing in the world. Well, we all are on this page. We're saying that's a good thing. That's one thing that people are accepting now is true, is that at least we're getting people to eat butter again, doctor.

Good, high-quality butter. Well, try to give them the raw butter with what's called the Factor X. The Price Pottington Foundation is very heavy into people eating, you know, plenty of animal protein that's pristine because of what Dr. Pottinger said. But, you see, I can take people way beyond that. But I try to meet people where they're at. I know where you guys are coming from. And if you ask me to help you, I could tell you.

I know you're not going to you know get into anything radical I know you don't want to get as thin as I am but you could be supremely healthy and maintain the same type of bills that you have now by eating clean food you know if you're eating beef you got to eat grass fed beef because it's got all the hormones the pesticides

the chemicals plus the urea. Whenever you're eating, you know what urea is. You know what's going on. So you got to try to eat as clean as you possibly can, no matter what you're eating. When I was in Australia, we were talking to some Aborigines. They lived on grubs. Which is very good for you.

Yeah. Much better than eating cold cuts from your local belly down in Manhattan. Cheaper. No doubt about that. Sure. So even though you're kind of a raw foods guy now, when you consult with athletes, MMA fighters, or even cross-bath athletes, you don't push just raw foods on them necessarily. Absolutely not.

It depends on what they want. I tell them, listen, here's what I tell them. If you think you got cancer, and a doc tells you you got cancer or you got some serious, you know, like MS or something really serious, they're not going to try to get them to come in this direction because you really can help people. It's radical. But, you know, it's very, very therapeutic.

It's definitely the ultimate form of detox while you're eating food. And your body detoxes naturally. So, of course, form of detox while you're eating food. And your body detoxes naturally. So, and of course, there's things that you could do. You know, you could get into an infrared sauna. You can use a hyperbaric chamber. Guys that work out should be able to avail themselves to a low pressure hyperbaric chamber. Of course, it's absolutely amazing. So, um. Never done that. Yeah. Y'all know anything about that? I've got a couple of friends that have played around with it, but I personally have not.

I've never used it. Well, a lot of professional athletes have low-pressure hyperbaric chambers in their house. I hear about it for sleep in a hyperbaric chamber where the pressure's lower so you can hopefully bump up your red blood cell count so when you're running you have more ability to transfer oxygen. Why not for endurance sports? But you're referring to that for health you're talking about the opposite you're talking about the opposite yeah you're you're talking about increasing the oxygen under pressure yeah

it helps you i i have uh i used to work with guys that uh that uh one guy in particular was a uh international ironman triathlete star and um used the hyperbaric chamber on him for recovery and he recovered in almost two days rather than taking a week a lot of a lot of pro football teams will have a couple hyperbaric chambers absolutely yeah and they'll uh they'll throw the guy especially if they have injuries they throw them in there and the injuries happen real fast. It's just increased partial pressure of oxygen. And, yeah. Very rapid recovery.

There was a guy that played football. I think it was for Philadelphia, and he broke his ankle. And six weeks before the Super Bowl, you remember his name, Rory? Yeah. So what happened, they said he could never play in the Super Bowl. But he went out and bought, somebody got him a low-pressure hyperbaric chamber. He healed, and he played in the Super Bowl. And he played well.

So there's so much to all this, you know? Let's go get our juice, Mike. It kind of goes both ways, yeah. Let's drink some juice and get in the chamber. We'll see. Yeah, absolutely. Have you ever heard of CrossFit? Oh, yeah. Did you pay much attention to it? Yeah. Well, I don't know that much the chamber. We'll see. Yeah, absolutely. Have you ever heard of CrossFit? Oh, yeah.

Did you pay much attention to it? Yeah. Well, I don't know that much about it, but I've certainly heard of it. What are your general thoughts about it? Since we have a lot of CrossFitters that watch this show. So you might want to watch yourself. You're talking about CrossFit training, right? Yeah, CrossFit training.

Diversifying your exercises. Yeah. Absolutely. I'm all for it, 100%. I mean, I used to ride a bike, I used to run and do a lot of stretching. Yeah. The more diversified you're, you're going to create better balance, less chance of injuries, you know?

Yeah. Yeah. Variety is generally a good thing. Oh, absolutely. So you eat a raw diet. What exactly does that mean? I mean, I know some people are raw vegan. I know some people are raw as in like, I've heard of, I've heard of people going, just eating raw beef.

Yeah. There's some people, there's a guy in California advocates people eat raw meat. That's, that's not for me. It's not necessary. You know what I'm saying? My diet consists of fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, juices, smoothies. And some of it is actually delicious. People don't realize I, I'm a consultant for a juice bar in Manhattan called Juice Press. If you ever went in there and ate the food, you could sit down and eat a cheesecake, and it's really, you know, it's actually. Twist my arm, doctor. It's really good.

It's called Juice Press? Juice Press, yeah. It's like 20-something stores in Manhattan. You don't eat any meat? No, I don't eat meat. How long have you not had meat for? About 50 years. I haven't eaten any cooked food at all.

Zero in 50 years. Holy shit. Do you have like a cheat every once in a while? Never. Never. I can't. See, that's what people don't realize. You can't because if I ate something

that I'm normally not eating, I would feel like... If I ate a piece I'm normally not eating, I would feel... If I ate a piece of meat, about an hour or two, you'd probably have to call an ambulance because my body can't... It's not... You just don't produce the enzymes necessary to digest that. I have no desire

to eat it, although when I was young, I used to love to eat a steak or something like that. So logistically, do you bring most of your food with you when you travel or when you go to a restaurant, do you just order off the menu and just tell them what to bring you? How does that work? Or do you just go to the grocery store and just buy some stuff and call it good? No, what I do, when we travel, Rory and I, Dr. Rory Dean that works for me,

we usually bring our own food. We have a cooler. We bring our own food. And unless I'm coming to a place, a lot of places I go to speak, that's what they're feeding people. So I really don't have trouble eating because if it's not available, I don't eat. I'll go someplace and buy it if I have to. I'll go buy something that's not organic.

I'll go to a supermarket. But we always, always manage. It's not a big problem. And believe it or not, as bizarre as it sounds, some of the way the food is prepared and some of the type of dishes that we eat, it really is delicious. It's like eating dessert all the time. But you have to be used to it. You have to have that mindset to do it.

And plus, with me now, it's a question of survival. Here I am at 85. If I start eating some of this other stuff, I won't be around very long, to be perfectly honest with you. So I feel wonderful at this point in my life. I feel as good as I did when I was in my 50s. And I survived a very serious, you know, near-death situation about a year and a half ago. And not too many people thought I was going to survive.

But bounce back, I'm ready to go. I bounce back. Oh, hell yeah. I bounce back too. Care to share what that event was? What? back. Care to share what that event was? What? Do you care to share what that event was? No, I have no problem. What happened is I had never been sick.

I don't remember being sick. I had some dental work done. I didn't realize I have a very small throat. So what happened, I wasn't, because I was so busy, I wasn't masticating my food as well as I should and some food got into my airway and it went down into my lung. The airway is in the front. Your esophagus is right behind it, right?

There's a sphincter here called the glottis. When you chew your food, your tongue goes into your roof of your mouth. It's an automatic reflex and it just pushes it over the glottis. The epiglottis slides open and closes it. Right. It wasn't working for me. It went in there, right? Oh, right.

And I was gulping the food down. I wasn't chewing it down. It went into my lungs, and I started to cough, and the cough just got more and more violent as time went on. Finally, I said, something radically wrong. I knew. So I went to a local doctor who was, he wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer. I come to realize.

It's a bad sign when your life's on the line. So he said, he said I had athletically induced asthma. I says, listen, doctor, I don't have, I think I have pneumonia here, you know? So he says, no, you don't have it. I don't know how they made that mistake. They gave me an x-ray and I went home. I got sicker. Then a guy, a friend of mine wanted me to go see a doctor in the city. I went to see the doctor and as soon as he looked at me, he said, I want you to go see a pulmonologist at Mount Sinai Hospital with a woman. I went to see her. She gave me an

x-ray and she says, you have to go into a hospital immediately. I said, can't you give me, because I never was in a hospital, can't you give me antibiotics and I'll go home? She said, no, you can't do that. So I went into the hospital, and what happened is that they started to treat me. They gave me antibiotics, which I never had, which ended up making me real sick.

My legs swelled up. I had all kinds of problems. And they sent me home, and when I never had, which ended up making me real sick. My legs swelled up. I had all kinds of problems. And they sent me home. And when I went home, I got progressively worse because I was trying to eat some food. And every time I put food in my mouth, I would go like this to cough, and the food was going into my airway.

Wow. So then I got to the point where I knew I was dying. So I told my wife, I said, I got to go back into the hospital. Well, my whole family was shocked because they know I wouldn't do that unless something was radically wrong. So I went back into the hospital. They put me in the critical care unit. The first day I was in there, the guy next to me died.

They were coming in. They were looking at me, and I know the way they were looking at me, it wasn't really that good. Like the crows were circling. Huh? The crows were trying to circle you. Yeah, right. So what happened to him, I ran into one doctor and he come in and he said, can I talk to you? I want to come in. I have to come in early in the morning about four o'clock. I said, okay,

I'll be awake. He come in and he says, you know, I have a feeling you have aspirational pneumonia. Bingo. As soon as he said that I knew he was right. I knew exactly that the guy was right. So what they did is, in order to take that test, they made me wait seven days. I didn't eat.

I had no food, and they wouldn't let me water, drink water, chew ice, which was kind of ridiculous. I couldn't even get into any intravenous fluids. Of course, my legs had swollen up. So I did that. I think that's called the dry fast.

A lot of Russian people, you know, I've done some dry fasting. I thought they knew what they were doing. They didn't have a time slot to put me in, and they didn't want me to eat in between. Why, I don't really know. So what happened is that that's what I had. I had aspirational pneumonia. They put me on massive amounts of

intravenous antibiotics which really took its toll on me and I went home and I recovered from the pneumonia quickly but what was done you know the I had to take they gave me I did a bronchoscopy and they gave me a general anesthesia which did affect my short-term memory and had some real issues so i survived man i survived yeah i was really lucky but that's the only time i've ever really been sick and i bounce back i feel good i'm back into working out again and everything you know sounds like how do you i was gonna say how do you work out these days you're back and working out yes i'm back into work now what i do is uh i do ji gong. I do, like Rory does it too. He's much better at it than I do.

I am. That was the martial art you talked about earlier. Martial arts, right. So I get up in the morning. I do sit-ups. I do all kinds. And I have some light dumbbells that I work out with. I do my ji gong.

And then I live in an area in Staten Island. There's a lot of pits and a lot of hills up there. So I eat. Some days I run. I do repeats like up the hills, you know, run back and forth. You run hill sprints in the morning? Pardon me? You run hill sprints? Not every day. Some days I walk. It depends upon how I feel. I'm getting stronger now. So I keep telling Rory I plan on getting back to some heavy running.

This is an amazing attitude. That's badass, by the way. I want to run a hill sprint to 85. That's awesome. I could still sprint, though. I could still run. You know what affected me the most being in the hospital, though? My equilibrium is off.

Oh, yeah? Yeah, so it's coming back, but I don't know what. Balance is a little tough. Yeah, yeah. It's harder for me to come down a staircase than to go up it. You know, because when I go down, but it's getting better.

So if that gets better, I'm going to get into a lot more stuff, you know, to... You don't have to be a listener, but he just said, I'm 85, I'm looking forward to getting stronger.

This is incredible. Anyone who wants to knock anything about, like, raw diet or anything, I mean, you've been doing it for a long time, you look great. No, you can't knock it people are not could have an experience if they listen I'm for more than willing to say it's not for

everybody in fact it might be for just people that are really you know striving for the highest ideals and everything and that's my my philosophy is not to settle for mediocrity in anything I do. So that was one of the reasons. Shit, man, this guy's so amazing. That's one of the reasons I got into eating a raw food diet. And in the beginning, as I told you before, I thought I shot myself in the foot. But now, am I glad I did it? Yes, I absolutely am.

I believe that somebody that knows how to do an all raw diet, that gets into it, I believe you have a very good chance of living 100 or beyond. So that's what I always kid. I always tell people I'm kind of living in a debt zone now because this is where a lot of people die, you know. So I want to see what a lot of people are waiting, and I'm waiting to see what's going to happen to me. But what I'm really doing is I tell my grandson,

what I'm doing is I'm planning for the next 30 years, I want to watch him grow up more. So I'm kidding, of course, but whatever happens. Why not? Yeah. I don't put anything past you, sir. I think you can definitely make it. Listen, I have an attitude of gratitude.

After what happened to me, that was kind of a humbling experience because I was, I wouldn't say I was cocky. I'm not that type of a person, but I always figured, nah, listen, I'm not going to get sick. Well, when that happened to me and when I I always figured, listen, I'm not going to get sick. When that happened to me and when I went through that experience and when I was laying in that bed, I said to myself,

oh boy, this is going to be a close call. But, you know, I got a lot of faith in God and I hung right in there. I wasn't scared. A lot of people, sir, would have not had this mindset and would have not made it out of that bed. Most this mindset and would have not made it out of that bed.

Most of the people would not have made it out of that bed. Probably just because they would see the writing on the wall, they'd probably give up. I don't give up. Listen, I'm not the type of guy to give up. Everything I do, I don't give up. I just don't. It's not my nature.

I ran through a marathon once. It was 10 below zero without the windshield factor. Got severe frostbite. And the state trooper comes by and says, hey, listen, you better get in the car. He says, nobody's on the road anymore. So I says, how far is the finish line? He said, about four miles.

I said, I'm going to make it. And I made it. I could have given up. My ear had very bad frostbite. It was leaking. It was stuff my nose. It was all black here. I had a bullseye around my nose.

And when I went home, my wife says, is that you? What happened to you? I'm not going to give up. Every time I come up to Vermont and hang out with Joe DeSantis' friends, I feel like a pussy. That's amazing. Do you have a pussy. Oh, that's amazing. Do you have a book you want to promote? Yeah, my book, Each Way, Your Healthy Journey.

Can we have a copy of this book, sir? Because I'm reading this shit on the way. Okay, that's for you. Thank you. Hard to say no when you ask him in front of everyone on the show. No, I wouldn't say no. Your Healthy Journey, you read that book. You guys should read that book. You guys should read that book.

You can create your own diet. You can create your own diet and keep doing what you're doing and maintain the same size, the same amount of strength, little by little, kind of prepare yourself for later on in life.

Don't forget, you're all young guys now. And I remember when I was, I don't know how old you are. How old are you? 31. 31. Okay, 34. You're all are, how old are you? 31. 31.

34. Okay, 34, you're so young. How old are you? 32. 32. Okay, listen, to be honest with you, there's an arrogance in youth. When I was young, I thought I was indestructible.

But as you grow older, you realize, and you see people die, I've seen people die, I've seen people die, you realize we are not indestructible. So the key is you want to make yourself so you give yourself your best chance to live, have a long life, but not so much to live a long life, to have a long life with quality, to not be, I know guys that are younger than I am

are walking with walkers. That's not for me. So the key is to prepare yourself by cleaning up your diet as much as you possibly can and still avoid the processed food if you can. And everything else could be the same. Just clean. Try to eat grass-fed beef.

Try not to eat whatever you're eating. And you'll see. And even as good as you... If you do it, you leave out all the processed food, you'll go into a detox. Trust me, you really will. And even as good as you, if you do it, you leave out all the processed food, you'll go into a detox. Trust me, you really will. That's awesome. I think you've won some fans here today.

It's been fantastic. Can I ask one more question? Sure. For all the people who will listen to this and they have aspirations to get strong, like we talked about the limits, but be smart about it. For people who want to get strong, they're going to do it the right way. What's your best advice for somebody who's getting the CrossFit, maybe they're early 20s, maybe they're going to try to compete in Whaleton,

but the mindset may be a little raw and new, and they might not know about going about it. What is the mindset, in your view, to be as strong as possible in the best possible way? Well, I would say to, and be as healthy as you possibly can too. Okay, it's to clean up your diet, right? Make sure, don't be afraid of eating fruits and vegetables.

Whatever the amount of protein, the animal protein, or whatever source of protein, you can get plenty of good plant proteins that'll promote growth too. Try to make it about 10% more than you need to maintain your body weight. Remember, protein and fat is not as good a source of fuel as carbohydrates. So when you're eating just basically protein, that's why years ago people just ate protein and drank water. They got so ripped, but some of them would pass out. They actually, guys actually passed out.

I remember once a guy, I won't tell you who it was because he's still alive. He actually passed out. I remember once a guy, I won't tell you who it was because he's still alive, he actually passed out on that type of a diet just to get ripped. They were preparing for a bodybuilding contest. So what I would recommend for a guy like that

is to clean up your diet, eat the amount of protein, whether from a vegan source or an animal source, just maybe 10% more so you're gaining muscle. You're not going to have an excess of protein, and some of it's going to be converted to body fat.

You don't want to do that either. So clean up your diet. Eat fruits, vegetables, animal proteins. You don't even need the grains, you know. So we just stick to heavy barbells and forget all the silliness? Go get a thick barbell with lead shot in the ends or dig a hole in our backyard and quit fucking around these gyms, doctor?

Well, I don't think you're going to see those kind of... I trained in a gym that... They didn't even have an Olympic barbell set. This was many years ago. And all the barbells were like giant kettlebells. They had very thick handles. They didn't have a ball-bearing swivel on it. You have to have a grip, like a it. You had to turn it over.

You have to have a grip of like a vice grip to actually turn it over. And you would load the bells at the end of the barbell and the kettlebells. You had to load them, but they had buckshot. They had a big thing of buckshot and sand. You load it and you did the exercise. Nothing fancy is required, folks.

If you're worried about what equipment you have or what you're lacking and you're using that as an excuse to be weak or to have results you're not happy with, you're kind of lying to yourself, huh? I remember guys that did chins and dips and push-ups, had fabulous business. You know, you do a lot of wide grip chins, underhand, overhand chins, do high repetition push-ups, do jump and squats, parallel bar dips, you're going to have a fabulous body.

We love you. Yeah. Look at any gymnast bar dips you're going to have a fabulous body we love you yeah look at that gymnast and you'll be strong there was a guy named Marvin Eden he used to do parallel bar dips with 300 pounds

strapped to his waist oh my god yeah he's kind of strong I used to I used to strap weights and do dips to my waist

I used to love to do all that type of stuff yeah the only problem is you could damage your front deltoids. You went too far. You went down.

You shouldn't really go down. Your arms were below parallel. A lot of guys used to go all the way down to get a stretch for their pecs. What they were doing, they weren't stretching their pecs. They were tearing their front deltoid muscles. But there was a lot of guys that were... I don't think there's... I mean, from what I hear from the younger guys like yourself today,

there's guys out there, I never heard of anybody doing bench press for 600, 700 pounds. Nobody could do that in those days. I remember the world's record was held by a guy by the name of Bob McCune. Don't ask me what year, I don't remember. But it was about 400 pounds. That was the world's record. So today, a lot of college guys are doing that,

repetitions in the gym. We only know it's possible because guys like you and older lifters paved the way, and just like the four minute mile with Roger Bannister, they made it a thing you could achieve. Like this guy's doing that, I could do that. He's nothing special, I could bench-board this guy. And it goes the same, the clean and jerk and snatch, it just started escalating. I think as that. He's nothing special. I could bench one of those guys. That goes the same with a clean jerk and a snatch. It's just

sort of escalating. I think as long as we keep that mindset to push our limits, but we don't do anything that we know is going to be excessive and compromise our health, I think we've got a good strategy. Well, a lot of barriers I think are mental. I think a lot of it is mind. Somebody tells you, listen, nobody in the world

could lift a 400 pound. Can't be done. I think mentally, when you start to get, you're doing something, you're approaching 400 pounds, I think you're not bringing all the quick twitch muscles into play because you're, you know, subconsciously or unconsciously, you're trained to think that you're reaching a barrier that you can't suppress. So if you're not bringing enough quick twitch muscles into play, you're not going to be that strong. People just don't realize that. And that's why I remember- You remind me of John Wilborn's quote.

Oh, you know, I remember when I was lifting, you're not going to laugh. A lot of guys used to do a lot of breathing, you know? And when I used to get over that bar and I was getting ready to do a snatch or a clean and jerk or anything I was doing, I would do a lot of breathing. And I knew people say, what good is that? They thought it was a show. What you're really doing when you do that, you're actually going into the fight or flight response. You're pumping out adrenaline.

So if you do it enough, you're going to be that much stronger because you're going to be secreting adrenaline. You're in a fight or flight response.. You're in a fight or flight response. When you're in a fight or flight response, you can be unbelievably strong. Yeah. And breathing, same thing in the martial arts. When you know how to breathe, you'll be surprised if you're breathing correctly and you have the energy, the power you can have.

Even a thin guy can have immense power. Doug, let him punch you in the stomach. Let him punch you in the stomach. The whole thing of the show. So make sure to check out Your Healthy Journey. That's a book you wrote. Yes. And do you have a website that people should check out?

What's the website? Leave it out. Leave it out? Any doubt? Uh-huh. Leave it out. Any doubt, leave it out. And you can buy the book on anydoubtleaveitout.com. Yep. Check it out. Leave it out. Any doubt, leave it out. Any doubt, leave it out. And you can buy the book on anydoubtleaveitout.com.

Yep. Check it out, folks. We'll make sure to share all this. Make sure you head over to barbellshrug.com. Sign for the newsletter, and we'll notify you any time we post these things. Sir, it was an honor. Thank you very much for joining us. Yeah, it was a lot of fun.

I enjoyed myself. It brings back a lot of memories. Thanks for having me on. We're going to come see him, man. Do this again. Oh, yeah. We're going to come and train with you. Yeah, absolutely.

You bet. Thanks, Fred.