Barbell Shrugged - Real Chalk  — The Awakening w/ Marcus Filly  — 30

Episode Date: July 3, 2018

Marcus Filly is owner and head coach at Revival Strength. He started his athletic journey as a child, playing multiple sports including soccer, baseball and golf, which eventually led to a collegiate career in soccer at the University of California, Berkeley. There he earned his degree in Molecular and Cell Biology with an emphasis in Nutrition and Physiology. His interest in both athletics and human health and performance eventually led him to CrossFit in 2007. Marcus has gone on to compete at the CrossFit Games 6 times, three times as an individual (2016 12th fittest) and three times as a team member (2012 6th fittest team). Marcus was also the captain and member of the Phoenix Rise in the NPGL. For two years he has been voted to the all GRID league team, in 2016 earning 1st team honors, and in 2015 earning the award for leadership excellence. Marcus has been a health and fitness coach for 8 years since leaving Medical School in 2009. He was formerly a CrossFit facility owner for 5 years, has completed all 5 of the OPEX CCP courses, and has coached clients remotely from all over the world. He has coached athletes at the CrossFit Games as well as several Regionals athletes. In this episode, Marcus takes us through his journey in fitness and how an injury changed his perspective. He also talks about his experience with James Fitzgerald, what's OPEX and how it has influenced him, how Functional Bodybuilding and ATS started and where it is going, how he uses breathing and cadences to stay aware during workouts, how he was able to branch out from being just an athlete to now being a business owner, gym owner, dad, and much more. Enjoy! - Ryan and Yaya ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Show notes: http://www.shruggedcollective.com/rc_filly ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ► Subscribe to Shrugged Collective's Channel Here http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedSubscribe 📲 🎧 Listen to the audio version on the Apple Podcast App or Stitcher for Android Here- http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedApple http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedStitcher Shrugged Collective is a network of fitness, health and performance shows that help people achieve their physical and mental health goals.  Usually in the gym, but outside as well. In 2012 they posted their first Barbell Shrugged podcast and have been putting out weekly free videos and podcasts ever since. Along the way we've created successful online coaching programs including The Shrugged Strength Challenge, The Muscle Gain Challenge, FLIGHT, Barbell Shredded, and Barbell Bikini. We're also dedicated to helping affiliate gym owners grow their businesses and better serve their members by providing owners tools and resources like the Barbell Business Podcast. Find Shrugged Collective and their flagship show Barbell Shrugged here: SUBSCRIBE ON ITUNES ► http://bit.ly/ShruggedCollectiveiTunes WEBSITE ► https://www.ShruggedCollective.com INSTAGRAM ► https://instagram.com/shruggedcollective FACEBOOK ► https://facebook.com/ barbellshruggedpodcast TWITTER ► http://twitter.com/barbellshrugged

Ahoy, mighties, and welcome to a brand new episode of the Real Chalk Podcast. You guys are tuned in to the Shrug Collective. I am Yaya, and I can't even begin to tell you guys how excited I am to bring you this episode with Marcus Philly. I've honestly been a huge fan of Marcus for years now, and it was super hard not to fanboy out completely when we met him people always say don't meet your heroes they're never going to live up to what you think they are and with Marcus this was the absolute opposite meeting him one of the coolest experiences ever and he's even cooler than what you can imagine and yes his hair also does look that good in person. I really hope Marcus doesn't really need an introduction. Multiple games appearances before getting injured before the Open in 2016.

Also set out 2017 Open due to having a child. Or sorry, 2018 Open. So I moved both those dates back one year. Due to having a newborn child just before the Open and wanting to focus on family but he was able to make the best out of that situation building something very great that we're going to get to in a little bit but before all that happened Marcus worked very closely with James Fitzgerald who some of you may know from OPEX and became an OPEX certified coach himself which means this kid actually knows what the fuck he's talking about.

That shaped his mind into always thinking outside the box and just pushing the boundaries of fitness in his own training and also in programming for others. He now owns Revival Strength up in San Rafael, California. That's where Ryan and I went, spent an awesome weekend up in San Francisco and then drove over the Golden Gate Bridge to go see Marcus. It also runs the ATS, the Awaken Training Series, which is the functional fitness that he coined. You can follow that stuff online.

And me and a couple of dudes from CrossFit Chalk actually did and had an awesome, awesome, awesome time with it. Just a great pump, but you're also staying functional at the same time. And that is what Marcus is all about. So when we went out to San Rafael after the podcast, we were actually able to throw down with him for a little bit. And he absolutely crushed us with one of those Zeus ropes from RX that is like super duper heavy. Definitely a very humbling experience.

But even better than that, even more important than that, after the workup was over, Marcus gave Ryan and I one of his proteins from his own supplement company called Revive RX. And guys, I can't tell you how much that stuff blew me away. I don't really am into protein powders. I'm not really into supplements at all. I try to get all my stuff through food. But when I find a good product, I believe in it. So this stuff, he mixed together his vanilla protein powder with his strawberry protein

powder, and it tasted exactly like when you have Captain Crunch and there's a little bit of milk left over in a bowl and you drink that bowl. That's what that protein powder tasted like, which after getting crushed by a workout is exactly what you need. So ReviverX has two products out right now. They have a recovery, which is a post-workout, and a rebuild, which is just straight-up protein. Super awesome stuff, specifically designed for high-intensity functional fitness athletes. Marcus takes the stuff himself um runs the company with his cousin and they are all about keeping their stuff as clean as possible

no artificial flavors only uses the simplest ingredients and you guys get to check this out for a discounted price now because we love you guys so much. So you guys can just use the code SHRUGGED10. Head over to ReviverX.com and go get your baggie. Go get that protein. Go get the vanilla and the chocolate. I promise you guys you're not going to regret it. Half vanilla, half

strawberry, and that stuff is going to absolutely blow your mind. SHRUGGED10 over at ReviverX. And I'm going to let you guys dive into the episode other than that are we good yep we're excited yeah yeah yeah fish is tweaking out about the cleanliness of this gym right now i know i really like it i'm really excited we'll talk about that on the show yeah for sure i can still feel like a little bit like hey man your gym looks so clean i'm like yeah we're six weeks old you know yeah it's doable though you can keep it if

yeah you're the one who. Oh, totally. And if everyone's kind of on the same page of like, if we respect the space, it's going to attract more people over time. People always told me that. They're like, oh,

your gym looks good for now. I'm like, dude, four years later, it looks the same. Yeah, totally. Yeah.

Your gym is fucking super clean too. For four years. All right. You ready? Yep. All right, kids, here we go.

Yaya here with fish uh we're in san francisco yeah had an awesome time and we're standing on the turf brand new turf right brand new turf made it myself into brand new uh revival fitness we're here with the man himself uh the best hair in fitness mr marcus philly uh welcome to real chalk brother thanks guys excited to be part of it i actually didn't realize how nice his hair was until we were at fitness, Mr. Marcus Philly. Welcome to Real Chalk, brother. Thanks, guys. Excited to be a part of it. I actually didn't realize how nice his hair was until we were at OPEX. That photo that you have that says, lay your hair down.

Yeah, man. Oh, yeah, with the snatch. That's a sick picture. I've got a big shot of that in my office. That was a gift from a client at the last gym. That was at the games, too, huh? That was actually at Granite Games 2013 when they, like, kind of got on the map. You know, they, like, flew out me and Tommy Hackenbrook and Andrew Ager and some other, like, you know, games-type athletes. And, yeah, that was a good picture.

I went to Granite Games, like, two years ago. It was brutal. It was the hardest competition I've ever done in my whole life. Oh, with, like, the programming just. Oh, my God, it was insane. That was when we had to carry the sandbag like this? Yeah, for, like, 200 yards. But you're running 400s and stuff in between. Right. And then the day before we did 15 squat

clean and jerks at 185. Yeah, I remember the workout. Immediately into 15 squat cleans at 205. But no, and jerks, and jerks. And then immediately into 15 squat clean and jerks at 225. Yeah. And then the next workout was 200 dub blunders, 100 dumbbell squats snatch with a 70. Yeah. And then the next workout was 200 dub blunders, 100 dumbbell squat snatch with a 70, and 200 dubs. And then later that day, we had 405 deadlifts and legless rope climbs. I was like, oh, my God. You for sure have PTSD from that competition because you talk about it all the time. It's the one competition. I'll never forget how terrible that was.

I remember it was grid season, and I had two teammates that, like, in the middle of grid season, which is brutal, were like, we're going to fly out to the Granite Games. We're going to do this competition. We're going to come back and join you guys. I was like, have fun. I'm not going. Oh, man. I think this is such a great start because actually what I want to talk about with everybody

is kind of like the evolution of fitness and where everything's going because everybody wants to know what the next hot thing is or they want to know what should we really be doing for ourselves and what's going to benefit us the most to thing is or they want to know like you know like what should what should we really be doing for ourselves and what's going to benefit us the most to get the most out of our workouts and as we get less and less time in the day spending that hour or 90 minutes or whatever you have is really really important and you should be doing the most beneficial thing that you can or the most bang for your buck exercises so Marcus has developed something called functional bodybuilding which if you haven't heard of that, that's kind of weird.

Being that you're on the Barbell Shrugged episode and you're probably into CrossFit and you probably know me, you probably know Marcus. Just be worried if you didn't hear that term at some point. And if you haven't or if you did hear it, this is the man who really developed it. So let's talk about what functional bodybuilding is and let's talk about how or why people might want to do it.

Okay. Let's talk about it. I mean, I think just to set some context, it's important for people to understand, like, where it kind of came from. And, you know, I think with most things that end up being, like, somewhat successful or resonate with a lot of people is that it comes out of trying to solve an issue or a problem that's out there. I had an issue and a problem that I needed to solve at a very specific point in my training after the 2016 season. You know, I had kind of just put together a number of back-to-back competitive, you know, CrossFit and grid seasons that were long and intensive. And I was kind of in that like burnout phase for myself.

Injury in the shoulder, low energy, motivation drive to train was like diminished. And just sort of like at that kind of crossroads, like, do I continue to do this? If I do, there's no way I can do it the way I did it before. Because I'm pretty much, I'm just can do it the way I did it before. Um, cause I'm pretty much, I'm just smoked from like, you know, inside out. So that was, um, you know, kind of what, what led to needing to rethink the whole design of my training, which was, you know, in large part, the, the brainchild of my coach, Mike Lee, who you guys know from OPEX fitness. Um, and just the, our relationship and the communication between us my coach, Mike Lee, who you guys know from OPEX Fitness.

And just our relationship and the communication between us was like, okay, well, how do we change this so that you can first and foremost start to feel good again? Because that's what I got into fitness. Just like most listeners, it's like we want to look good, feel good. And that's why I started. And here I was like six, seven years later after the CrossFit kind of journey. Like, yeah, I might look good, but I feel like crap. I don't really want to do it this way anymore.

I can't, you know, I got a baby on the way. I got a new business. How the heck can I handle all that by feeling as tired and beat up as I am? I feel like so many people feel like that too. Well, it's getting to that point now, right? Like I feel like we kind of went like you guys both of you guys joined crossfit so early and did it so extreme like right away that you kind of hit that wall a lot sooner now a lot of people that just casually do crossfit and they maybe got into it like two three four years ago something like that but they only do maybe like their class workout

plus like a little bit before and after they're just now getting to that wall they're just now hitting that slump where they're and i'm in the same boat where i'm just now hitting that wall where i'm just like fuck i don't feel like going to the gym anymore i don't feel great after i get done working out and now i'm starting to have like aches and pains my shoulder my back my knee like the little things like you talk about we get into working out to feel better and then all of a sudden it's actually taking you to the opposite spectrum where now you feel you're starting to feel worse right well and you said it too it's like unless you really know how to program you do enough of this high intensity training and fitness like you're gonna everyone's gonna hit some burnout and i was

getting the right type of training and even on top of that competing in the sport of fitness it doesn't matter whether you're following the right periodization program and you have the right coach and you have the right you know recovery methods in the off season like it just it just adds it adds up it takes a toll especially if you're trying to do it year-round which you know too many people are are really thinking is possible and they find out after two years like oh i can't compete every two months and and last it's all these big competitions fall you have granite games waterpalooza now the dubai fitness championships is huge yeah i actually went to the very first one yeah um that raised actually like probably a quarter of the money i had for my gym at the moment um i got a lot of money from that competition

yeah but then it kept going and it kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger and like now it's if you're a professional crossfitter you don't really have time for anything else in your life no and um it's interesting. Like, right now, there was a post from CrossFit Games about Con Porter. And it said, you know, what changed between last year and this year? And he said, well, last year, everything revolved. Or my training was around everything else I was doing. And then this year, everything is around my training.

So, like, training is number one. And I personally believe training should never be like number one like your life your goals like you're like the things that you want to accomplish should be number one and then training should be like supplemental to that and if you make it to the game is great yeah well i think i think probably most people resonate with that i resonate with that that philosophy as well you know and as the sport grows, just like, you know, professional sports, NFL, NBA, you know, Major League Soccer or Euro Soccer. I mean, there are people that are going to make that their whole life because it does provide for their families. You know, it does provide for their life.

It's a select few, though. It is at this point, you know, and eventually it'll be, you know, a bigger group of people. But, you know, I also don't like, you know, let's say, let's just be honest that that group is the smallest, tiniest percentile, you know, of people out there. And that if we're all not really. In almost any sport, honestly. Yeah, we've actually talked about it's a better chance of going to the NFL. Honestly, there's more NFL fans than people going to the games. If you're in high school right now, you've got percentage-wise, you've got a better shot

of going to the NFL than going to the CrossFit Games. Yeah. Which is crazy. And I mean, at the end of the day, it kind of comes down to like ROI, like as stupid as that sounds, like how much time are you going to put in and then what are you going to get out? And at the end of the day, if you make it to the Games, great. If you make it to the podium, even better.

But if you make it to the Games and you finish 28th, right? Sure. Monday is just Monday. Like no one cares. Your life doesn't change. Yeah. I think it's about also being realistic about the timeline that you dedicate 28th, right? Sure. Monday is just Monday. Like no one cares. Your life doesn't change. Like, yeah. I think it's about also being realistic about the timeline that you dedicate in that way to the sport because you, you know, uh, guys and girls in their early twenties who maybe haven't like, you know, they're not thinking about like longevity and their future and their

career and a family yet. They're just like, this is where I'm at in life. And they're going to go and dedicate and learn about themselves. I mean, we've learned so much about ourselves through competitive fitness, which I think is great. It's when it turns into this, like, never-ending, I don't know where I'm at in my life. I've kind of neglected setting up some safety nets and an actual plan of action for when, like, it clicks. You know, that, oh, shoot, I'm 29 years old. I've done seven years of competing. Yeah, it's like I'm 30, and I don't have a business. I don't have a real career, you know, prospect,

and I actually didn't ever make the games. And, oh, my gosh, I don't have a lot, you know. And that's what really, like, doesn't scare me. It just, like, upsets me. Yeah. Because I feel bad for those people because I was almost there. I felt like I just really, really wanted it, and I was, like, the alternate, like, the one place away, like four different times. And I was like, oh, felt like I just really, really wanted it and I was like the alternate, like the one place away,

like four different times. And I was like, oh my God, but if I just make it, everything will be different. And in reality, when I look back at it, like just everything I did to try to make it was really like the best part of my days. Yeah. And all of that and all the people that I met

and then all the connections and everything just turned into what I have now. And I never thought that any of it was going to happen. Sure. It just kind of happened on its own. And I think that's the right way to do it too. I mean, no disrespect to you guys whatsoever, but you never won the games.

You never were the crosser person, but you were fit enough to kind of stay in the spotlight for a little bit, but you took advantage of the opportunity that was given to you. Another person that pops into my head right away is Brooke Entz. The things that she, even after her injury, and then she took a year off from competing, but what she was able to build over that year going forward is going to be so much more valuable.

She's in, like, Hollywood movies now. She got this, she got that. She got so much other stuff. And Miranda with street parking. She got so much other stuff going on that that's going to be down the road. Yeah, and the thing I think we all have in common, too, is that, like, you know, at the time, I don't think any of us were, like, strategizing how this was going to pay be down the road. Yeah, and the thing I think we all have in common too is that, like, you know, at the time, I don't think any of us were, like,

strategizing how this was going to pay off in the end. It was like we had this desire to see what we were made of and to push ourselves as much as we could in the sport. And by following that passion and being committed to it and, like, doing it to the best of our ability with some talent behind it, it gave us, like – and then the other connecting part to that is having a little bit of a mind for what's coming next. You know, like I never felt comfortable completely neglecting my career as a coach or my businesses that I was a part of.

You know, it would be this like stressful time of year where I was like, okay, I'm doing the open, but I also got, you know, 40 members that are doing the Open. I have to support those clients. And I wouldn't allow myself to, like, shut that down because I knew at the end of the day, CrossFit's going to last me as a competitor for only a defined period of time. And after that, what's next? Yeah, nowadays, in order to be successful, you have to neglect basically everything else in order to, like, make it to the top. Yeah, yeah. basically everything else in order to like make it to the top yeah yeah and it's and i wouldn't even even call it neglect because those they're making a a very you know neglect has like a negative connotation to it it's like i see a noah olsen out there who's like living and breathing being a professional crossfit athlete and i think he's doing it in a great way and he's you know a great ambassador of the sport and he made that conscious choice and he's and he's making something

of it and he seems happy with it you know like it's up then it's, and he's making something of it. And he seems happy with it. Totally. It's totally your choice. He's one of those who like you, though, but for sure. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, then let's jump back to that. So you kind of get into the point where it's becoming a drag. Sure, I get to that point where – so we start to experiment with our training

and my program, what my training looks like. And it just – so it was designed around kind of healing, right? So what does that looks like. And it just, uh, you know, so it was, it was designed around kind of healing, right? So what does that look like? It's like simplify, take down the intensity, take down the volume, you know, get away from like more flashy stuff and get into, you know, more foundational strength conditioning. And, um, and that was really when like, it clicked for me that this was not just for like the broken and, you know, burnt out, but it was for people that there's a wide audience that was going to connect with it. And the reason was that my social media platform, Instagram, just took off.

And, you know, going from like somebody who was, you know, getting high placements at the games, at regionals, posting hard, you know, training workouts for regionals. A couple months later, posting videos of me doing like lateral banded walks and landmine presses and things like that. Right. You know, the views and the likes and the engagement was, I'd never seen it. And I was like, this is getting 100,000 views. And I did like a dumbbell row, you know, or something very, very fundamental. And so I just kind of played with that for a little while. And, and somewhere in there, a lot of, you know, followers were like, Hey, what's, how do I get to do, how can I do this? You know, this is pre online program.

This is just, I was an individual design coach. That was it. You know, I had clients around the world. I'm like, well, I can't, I can't handle this many new people as like an individual coach. So I wrote a templated program. This is like functional bodybuilding. You know, at some point along the way I was doing a training session and it's just like, I was like, I got the super pump going on from like one of my training sessions, but it wasn't bodybuilding and it wasn't like, you know, CrossFit, it was somewhere in the middle. I was like, oh, let's call it functional bodybuilding. And I like wrote the you know, I wrote the hashtag on on one post. It was like October 2016. And then from there, it was like October 2016.

It was exactly what it was like October 17th, 2016. He actually has that printed out somewhere hanging up in here for sure. I'm ready to show it to anybody. He actually has that post printed out somewhere hanging up in here for sure. I'm ready to show it to anybody once again. And so, yeah, then I experimented with writing a program with the help of, you know, someone who became kind of my business partner, Satya Khan. And she helped me kind of do the back-end work and to deliver a program to a wide audience. And we just rolled it out.

And then people were like, this is great. I love it. And it's helping me in all these ways. And so then it just kind of took off from there. Do you feel like the population of people you have are mainly CrossFitters? Are some of them in 24-hour fitness and golds? How many people are you getting that are from, like, regular Globo gyms? If you had to guess a percentage. I would say that initially it was, like, predominantly a CrossFit audience.

Those were my followers, the people that were, like, following the regionals and the games, you know, growth that I was having. But over time, the percentage has climbed. So I would say it's probably like growing to like 10, 15% are, are non CrossFit box people, people that are, Hey, can I do this at like a global gym? How do I, you know, what do I substitute for an assault bike? If they don't have that, I see you, I see you use like a ropes and sleds in your program. You know, we don't have that. And I'm like, okay, it's only like 10% of the program

and you'd be able to do it without it. But yeah, it's definitely something that we're trying to expand our audience, you know, because there's a crazy number of bodybuilders out there that are like itching to get into the functional world and they're intimidated. But they still want to be cool in the gym too. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And they're not like ready to just like drop everything and go to a you know the local box and just do the wad you know they want to like get a pump they want to hit biceps a little bit and um you know in in your average you know box they're gonna kind of shame you for wanting to do curls which yeah for sure yeah so the reason it's super fun the reason I was asking is because I have my online program as well, and a lot of people all the time will email me. I get a lot of emails from people who are like, hey, man, I'm just in 24 or I'm in gold. What can I sub for this or that?

And I'm always interested that I get those people to sign up. So I've actually made an e-book that has, I call it, high-intensity bodybuilding. Nice. Perfect. Literally, there is cardio. It's like interval weight training withbuilding. Nice. So it's perfect. It literally, there is cardio. It's like interval weight training with bodybuilding movements. So it's similar to kind of like what you do, but it's a little bit more crossfitty. And even those people are from 24 hour fitness too. And you're like, Hey man, how do I do this? I'm like, well, dude,

you can just run on the treadmill and then, and then hop on the deadlift bar or whatever it is. Yeah. To me, I think it's great that we're exposing, I mean, I don't want to say we're the only ones leading the charge, but exposing that audience that's out there that is still the majority of fitness people in the world. CrossFit's huge, but it has not eclipsed your globo jimmers. It's like two ounces of a one-gallon which you know i mean we'll see where it balances out in in time over the next 10 to 15 years but um there's going to be more people looking to do thoughtful training in both sectors because there's kind of chaos happening on in both sides it's kind of one is like intensity with chaos and the other is kind of like low intensity just wandering around the gym kind of looking at yourself in the mirror

and not getting a lot of effective training. Actual work done, yeah. So where are we going to meet in the middle? So I think it's cool too that it's always cool to see and look at the fitness world and kind of see it go through like the trends and this wave is cool now and that's cool now, right? And I think Zumba, yeah, Orange Theory. I still can't believe that was cool.

The cool thing. Have you taken a Zumba class before? I've. I still can't believe that was cool. The cool thing. Have you taken a Zumba class before? I've actually never done it. You have? I've taken one when I used to live in Utah. Oh, yeah. I actually watched Chris Spieler become Chris Spieler. I went to school at University of Utah,

and I trained on the Olympic team for a skeleton in Bob's lab for like six years. Yeah. And I remember seeing this little guy doing doing all these like weird pull-ups. Like I'd never even seen a butterfly pull-up. And like he was always asking me to do this fucking workout, 21, 15, 9, thrusters and pull-ups. And I'm like, what are you talking about? That sounds terrible.

And then he like shows me a video one day on his phone. And he's like, look at this competition I went to. And it was the games like in the dirt. And I'm like, dude, that looks cool, I guess. And then it turned into like this huge thing. So you guys were in like, the games, like, in the dirt. And I'm like, dude, that looks cool, I guess. And then it turned into, like, this huge thing. So you guys were in, like, I guess, yeah, because the Olympic Training Center's in Park City. If you've ever been up there, there's, like,

a Whole Foods in Kimball's Junction, and then across the street there's a place called Basin Recreation Fieldhouse. Okay. And that's where I was a gym attendant. Got it. Before all of this became what it is now. Interesting, yeah. I paid my dues. Yeah. Totally. But, yeah, I think the cool thing is that you have the, you have the bodybuilder guys that are like a 24 hour fitness. You have

the CrossFitter guys and they're on such opposite spectrums. But at the same time, I think the one thing that everybody's trending towards now is just to be healthier overall, right? It doesn't really matter like what kind of programming you do. I think people are now getting more conscious of like, okay, longevity and all that stuff is now coming into play where it's not just about getting the biggest pump over here or having the best friend time over here. It's all about like, how can I be healthy and still do what I want to do? And I think that's where like the high intensity bodybuilding, the functional bodybuilding, whatever it is, just perfectly fills that void.

Yeah. I think, you know, that term healthy is also something that can get – Yeah, definitely. It's totally mixed feelings about that and what are people actually referring to. And I think it's just like, oh, I'm fit. I want to be fit. It's like I want to be healthy. Well, let's get a little deeper into that.

They think healthy is aesthetics. Yeah, right? So it's like let's name it. Like people want to look good. And they, I think they want to like, just generally feel well. And what feeling well is like, I wake up and like, I got energy and I can do shit today. Like I don't feel, you know, restricted in life. And I think in both of those camps you just described, you know, too much of the wrong type of thing is going to take you further away from that. You look at the, you know, the bodybuilders, like, you know, and I'm not talking like sport bodybuilders. I'm talking about people that like go to the gym and

do chest tricep, you know, they do arm day, they do whatever kind of like a little, you know, bad positions over time. They're not getting like, they're kind of getting muscle bound. Maybe they're like imbalances here and there. Maybe they've gotten like, they've masked, they've gone through a massing program. Like I pulled, I bulked up, but they're just kind of getting muscle bound. Maybe they're like. Yeah, imbalances here and there. Maybe they've gotten like they've masked. They've gone through a massing program. Like I bulked up, but they're just kind of fat, you know, and they're big. And they're like, oh, I don't feel like I can move. And so that can happen in a traditional like, you know, sets and reps of chest and tris and back and legs and whatnot. And then on the other side, you know, we just talked about it.

It's like too much intensity. What that can do to a competitive athlete. And what can it do to your like average gym goer? Who's like, I came in here to like feel good and get a six pack. And here I am like crushing myself on year three with, you know, four intense workouts a week that are kind of leaving me tired. And like, I'm getting some belly fat. Like, I'm starting to, like, see, like, the body fat go the wrong direction. And a lot of that's hormonal. Totally. A lot of people just don't realize.

Yeah. Yeah, completely. And you hit the wall in the afternoon and you get home and you're tired and, like, you can't play with your kids. And, like, it's all not – nothing's right anymore. Like, it doesn't make any sense anymore. Yeah. There's for sure a point in my CrossFit career where I was –

you'd be like, you want to go on a hike this weekend? I'd be like, no, dude. Yeah. No way. Yeah, no way. Just no way. No way. Yeah, I mean, fuck, that's such a a point in my cross-country career where I was, you'd be like, you want to go on a hike this weekend? I'd be like, no, dude, no way. Yeah, no way. Just no way. No way. Yeah, I mean, fuck, that's such a good, like, point.

Can't have fun. Yeah, dude, who's going for hikes? Who's using their fitness? Like, no, man, I had a crushing workout on Saturday morning. I just want to lay. You can't do anything because of how fucked up you are. Yeah, nothing. And I definitely have learned, because we had a baby a year and a half ago that, like, that's real.

Like, at 5 o'clock when I get home, we just picked her up from daycare. We got an hour and a half of, like, time with her to feed her, get her clean, you know, bath time, bedtime, like, spend some time with her. Like, if I, you know, I don't do too much high-intensity stuff, but periodically we'll still hit, like, a tough workout. On those days i'm just like that is like the death march from like five to six thirty i'm like babe like i need some help you know and if that's every day like no way you know exactly it's not the point it's yeah what is your function like you know what are you trading for exactly um so i actually started doing the functional

bodybuilding on the last cycle that you guys started nice that was like right after the open yeah and it was perfect timing too because i love the opening the open is fun but um still stressful it's like a stressful time in a year and i don't compete for anything but you still you know especially being a coach at the gym like you want to do friday night lights and you want to show off a little bit and you have the best score next to fish and then but afterwards like super burned out just like tired and i loved it it was fun but tired and broken and i just needed something else and then um your program started like pretty much right after the opening yeah like a few weeks or so so i actually took some time away from the gym and then right after that the functional bodybuilding stuff started and i absolutely love it dude like

it's so much fun perfect timing yeah um perfect kind of step back i've been doing crossfit for like almost three years now so it's like a nice little change of pace yeah um the question though that i have for you and i ask um i think we asked james with cheryl with this too somebody at opex and they were like just ask marcus like he'll be better to answer that question how do i transition back into crossfit because at the end of the day, I'm still a CrossFitter. I still want to do CrossFit because it's my favorite. It's out of all the options that I have. Like, that's still what I want to do.

So I love the functional bodybuilding, but I don't see myself doing functional bodybuilding all year round for the rest of my life. Like, I want to do this as I can change the pace and then go back into. So how do I transition? Because I did, like, a team workout at CHOC last week i was gonna say tell them why yeah it was it was my struggled it was my buddy's uh birthday and we do always like team workouts on saturdays and he

was like let's just do the team workout together i was like all right fine and dude i hit a fucking wall like it was terrible and you were sore for like a week yeah i literally couldn't move so i was like fuck how do i go from here to being back into – because I feel like I move better. Yeah. But I can't move as fast anymore as I would like to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and I think it's a great question, and I think it's a perfect transition for the conversation. Because to me, you know, one of the things I talked about like down at NC Fit last week,

and I gave a talk to their coaches, like incorporating functional bodybuilding your training is not like a hundred percent all or nothing kind of thing like you don't need to we're not i'm not expecting people to be like i'm giving up crossfit you know like and as a matter of fact i recognize and i still love crossfit and i still love to you know hit a hard workout periodically and you know perhaps compete in in the future. You care about it enough to leave functional in the name. Totally. So it's like how do we just get people exposed to it? And the mission for me was always, like, I wasn't actually planning on writing an ongoing training program. And as a matter of fact, there's only 48 weeks of training that we offer,

and there's no, like, plan to do plan to do like you know the next 48 weeks and an ongoing program so that that kind of lends itself to like well people are going to transition into something else and the hope is that you take whatever lessons you get from our training program and you're like okay well that really resonated with me i understand that there's a there's a reason to slow down it's like right now maybe we slow down five of the five days a week of training. Like we're not going high intensity really any day. There's like two days that, you know, of the training program that push you into some uncomfortable zones, but the rest is relatively comfortable for people. Um, so then it's like, okay, well, you know, is it five days of like moderate intensity with like a lot of, you know, functional strength built in?

Or is it five days of high intensity? And that's not, those aren't the only two options, you know. So transitioning out of that is to say, okay, well, I'm going to take my two days a week. And I'm going to like start to incorporate more intensity into my training. Whether it be like high intensity aerobic intervals. Or if it's like pure lactic work that you're going to start doing or if it's a mixed modal, you know, sweat fest, beat down, team workout. But you start to build that in consistently.

So it's like now you're on this 12-week template, which is five days a week of this kind of training. Perhaps you keep two to three days of that ongoing for a period of time and you incorporate two tough workouts, you know. And then after that, okay, we're and you incorporate two tough workouts you know and then after that okay we're gonna incorporate three tough workouts a week and then it's four and then we're prepping for the open and I'm actually doing CrossFit four to five days a week to get ready for that and that's the cycle and that's actually how we progress awaken training series so we have four series the first one is very foundational and it's meant for people kind of I released the first one ever right after the 2017 Open, being like,

okay, we're going to totally bring it down, and we're going to build you up over the course of a year. So ATS2, ATS3, ATS4, there's slowly an incorporation of more kind of classic mixed modal training, CrossFit that you would see, as well as a foundation of like doing, you know, some classic bodybuilding and unilateral work throughout the entire training. Because like even in the buildup right to the open in the past for me, there was always some of that.

I'd never just abandoned doing unilateral work and that kind of thing completely. Awesome. Yeah, that sounds great. Like I'm definitely going to try and do exactly that. Good. The other thing too that I am 100% going to incorporate into my training from now on is your warm-ups. I completely fell in love with the warm-ups and the functional bodybuilding stuff. I've always thought that a warm-up, I kind of have to get my heart rate up and do some cardio and do some running and do some bike or something to go fast like spike my heart rate so I can then work out and with the functional bodybuilding stuff it's more like super slow and controlled movement that like very slowly kind of raises your body temperature more than it raises your heart

rate yeah and I love the way I feel after that kind of warm-up then going into the workout dude that that's yeah that's music to my ears because that's really something that we've gotten that feedback from a lot of people and it's something that I use like that's, yeah, that's music to my ears. Cause that's really something that we've gotten that feedback from a lot of people. And it's something that I use, like, that's still something I use every day in my training. And that's one of the most creative times that I have in training is doing a variety of different movements that are, that really have that, like that scream functional bodybuilding, you know, it's three sets of three to four movements, you know, and build your pace as you go. And that always makes me feel like I'm ready for training.

It makes me feel like I'm, you know, getting to practice some skills. Also, like, work some of the stuff that I wouldn't normally. I certainly don't want to do after training because it's like we're getting some core work and some skill training in the warm-up. Which people always say, I'm going to do that as my finisher. And then they're totally smoked. And they're like, nope, I just want to shake up my shake and get out of here. So it's something that, you know, I'm glad to hear that. And, you know, just coincidentally next week, we actually put together a warmup product. That's going to have like 60, 60 unique,

you know, functional bodybuilding warmups that i've spent some time writing we put together this online platform where people are going to have access to it forever rather than like the ats which is like after 12 weeks you don't have access to anymore but you can buy this and it's got video demos it's got instruction it's got you know best practices like if you're doing jerks today here are 10 warm-ups that are good for that you know and so it's it's tagged in a way that people can use and uh yeah have for a long time to come. That's awesome, especially as a coach. That would be, like, a great resource to have, too,

because I hate always doing the same workouts when I'm coaching. And I've tried to incorporate the functional bodybuilding stuff into my warm-ups more and more, too. People are, like, kind of hesitant now still because a lot of the warm-ups usually that we do is, like, all right, do a 10-caliber bike, 10-caliber ski, 10 air squats, 10 push-ups, do that do is like all right do uh 10 cal bike 10 cal ski 10 air squads 10 push-ups do that for three rounds and then we're good to go and now i'm like having them do planks and they're like how the fuck is this gonna warm me up get me ready yeah but no i think the proof is in doing it like people experience it and they're like damn that that actually feels really good and and you're right that's that's another reason why i felt like it

was a worthwhile project to spend some time on was that getting tagged in videos from around the world of group fitness coaches leading functional bodybuilding warm-ups. It's like 10 people doing a landmine or a half-kneeling dumbbell press, and then they're doing a carry of some sort, and then they're doing a side star plank. I'm like, oh, I recognize that. That's something that – and they're excited about it. By the way, dude, that side star plank, like into workout, whenever – oh, my God, dude.

When you're like breathing already. It's so – you're shaking all over the place. It's fucking terrible. But, yeah. It's rough. I think it's funny how many people don't know how to warm up. Yeah. Like a lot of the programs that I sell and stuff, people always say the same thing.

Like, how do I warm up? Like, what do you think I should do for a warm up? And I'm like, honestly, I need to know more about you before i tell you how to warm up usually and i think i mean if you have like 60 different movements that's probably what they need to figure out while they read after yeah through all of them and then coaches too like are always going to be like oh how do i get my classes ready for this or something like that i'm like oh my god like you shouldn't even be coaching then i feel like you know what i mean like you don't have to warm people up like properly like or all of your coaches do the

same warm-up or something. That's just so crazy to me. That blows me away. Well, and it's like maybe we take for granted that we came from a sporting background where it was like, you know, we got exposed to a lot of different types of training and warmups prior to getting into a model where we're now coaching 10 people to do something.

You know, it's like, I remember given my, uh, it was like early mid two thousands., it was over 10 years ago, I was like just starting fitness coaching and I was like take a group of friends down to the track, you know, and doing all these different track warm-ups. Why did I do track warm-ups with them? Because that's what I did when I was warming up for, you know, collegiate strength conditioning. That was like what they did. They're like, okay, line up.

All the skips, right? Yeah, I still do the football warm-ups that we we did like the little high knees butt kickers i do that stuff all the time because it worked for me so right and and you know nowadays like there's coaches that are just getting into fitness and their first exposure to fitness is crossfit you know it's not they played sports growing up they had organized like coaches that understood strength conditioning they've they've never even done like you know know, I had the collegiate strength and conditioning. I had these, you know, Czech-certified instructors that I worked with for two or three years who, like, did every form of plank and, you know, stability ball and banded thing known to man.

I was like, this stuff is great. It really actually works in getting your brain and your body prepped. So I brought all that into, like, coaching. And I remember, like, those first group classes I was coaching at CrossFit,Fit like I was the line drill guy and I just made people do line drills like to warm up every day and people would just be like drenched in sweat and I'm like okay now we're ready to go and do something like you guys actually are ready for training took a complete burnout after five minutes of warm-ups I did some warm-ups with um the guy that owns Power Athlete and CrossFit Football.

The huge dude. Oh, yeah. John Welborn. John Welborn. He always has the craziest warm-ups ever. And you would be dead. Like, dead. But like Marcus said, I think it's such a potent time, too, to warm up.

And I know you always write in your programming as well. Like, really feel like your muscles working and all that stuff. So, like, that, like, mind-muscle connection, like really feel like your muscles working and all that stuff. So like that, like mind muscle connection, like I think is huge. And I think it's one, something that I did, especially when I first started with CrossFit and you mentioned this, like people always say they're going to work on this after I get done

training, right. I'm going to do this after, well, I started doing it before. Like I literally did handstand walks like every day for a warmup. Right. I did double unders every day for a warmup,

like the little skill stuff. And it's so much more potent. I feel like, because because you're not burned out like you're able to make those connections you're able to see the little things like oh okay if i do this then this works better yeah and in the warm-up it just feels nicer and doing it after you all beat up yeah that was another point i made when i was talking to jason's coaches at nc fit, you know, we kind of have to, when people come to the gym for their workout in a group setting or individual setting, whatever, like there's an excitement to get to training, like they're still fired up, you know? So if we can take that time where they're like engaged, enthusiastic, and like sneak in some mind muscle connection stuff, which is just like

motor control work, which just refines people's movement and gets them to elevate their skill, not their strength or VO two max or whatever. Uh, then it's like a win-win cause like, they're just like, okay, I'm just doing what you tell me to do, but can't wait for those back squats, you know? But in reality, you just like taught them how to move better. You gave them a chance to like, you know, activate muscles that maybe have been kind of shut down, like, you know, glued activation, activation, hip openers, whatever, that kind of stuff that you want to add into their training, it's a perfect time to sneak it in on clients. And then once people realize, like, this is good stuff,

like developing skill of handstand, like, yeah, you can do it in a non-fatigue setting before you're trashed from doing, you know, 100 push-ups and 50 pull-ups in a workout, and then, oh, I'm going to try and handstand walk after training, and it kind of turns into a shit show. I can never understand when people do that. I see people all the time do handstand walks for 20 minutes after a workout, and I'm still on the ground.

We all saw how hard those handstand walks were. I'm like, how are you doing that? I'm upset with them. I actually don't like them anymore. I don't like them. They're dead. You're dead. You're dead to me.

We all saw how fucking hard those handstand walks were in, what was it, 18.4, the deadlift? And then you do that, and then you start handstand walking? Yeah, that's why you do handstand walking after a workout, so you can be ready for 18.4. Dude, that workout was hard. I barely finished. Dude, I kicked up for my first handstand walk, and I came right back down. I'm like, yeah, I'm going to need a minute. Oh, actually, at the end, you collided with another. He's on his last handstand walk.

He almost finished the workout, and he collides with another member. Oh, no. They handstand walk right into each other. Who went out of their lane? They both did, I think. Yeah, we were like – But the best part was I thought – We really didn't have a lot of room.

Like, it was like finite lights, and the gym was super packed. So we thought we figured it out that it's just like we literally had to like go like this like with our feet almost touching and i think both of us just so franquished they were just like the best part that was at the end i was like dude are you upset about that he's like it couldn't have happened at a better time like he almost finished it but he did it because he hit the other guy and i was like dude are you bummed like you're gonna do it again and he's like dude i was so ready for that workout to be over. Couldn't have taken another step, dude.

It's like I'm glad I ran into somebody because I can use that as my excuse for doing this thing. I would have finished. I would have nailed it. I was laughing for so hard. Do you remember how hard I was laughing at that? That's good. That was really good. So you mentioned before we started talking, you also have the supplement company going on. You've got a baby. You're working out. You supplement company going on. You've got a baby.

You're working out. You've got your gym. You've got private clients. What does your normal day look like, like your routine on an average day? I wake up sometime between 4 and 4.30 and just get after it. I read Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willing. Have you heard of him? Oh, Jocko.

Yeah, Jocko is the best, dude. He's such a savage. Dude, our favorite thing, like we always fucking laugh about this, bro. We talk about this all the time, actually. All the time, dude. He was on the Tim Ferriss podcast. Yeah. And, like, Tim Ferriss always, like, super big on, like, morning routine.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, all that stuff, right? So he asked Jocko, he was like, so what does your normal morning look like, right? Yeah. And he goes, I wake up, and my first thought is about the enemy. Yeah, right. The guy in the cave. Exactly. He's like, the enemy's out there, and my first thought is about the enemy. Yeah, right. The guy in the cave.

He's like, the enemy's out there, and he's coming for you. And Fish and I are like, dude, that's every day? No, I saw him respond to a comment on every day. Every day you just wake up super stressed out. He does those selfie videos on Instagram early in the morning, and his eyes kind of dart around. He's always looking off into the side. Someone asks him, like, what are you looking at? He's like, I'm just fucking checking my six.

I'm like, I never know who's coming. I'm like, anyway. He's such an interesting person to look at, too. Oh, my gosh. He just looks thick. Nick has his voice set as his alarm on his phone. Oh, no way. He goes up to more like, get up, get your ass out of bed.

Get up. Yeah. Well, he's also, like – What he said, he came into, like, Bud's at, like, 178, and he's, like, 240 now. So the dude's, like – Oh, my God. He's, like, a man. He's, like, full-on Tank Savage, like, muscular.

But that's not why I wake up at 4 30 because, um, you know, we got the baby and she gets up, you know, I've always loved having time to myself in the morning. It used to be from like five 30 to seven, but now she wakes up, you know, well, she wakes up closer to six 30 now, but, um, I just like to have a couple hours to myself. And so, and we, and she goes to bed at six 30 at night. So we were 10, we tend to be early to bed anyway, like 8 or 8.30. So that's just a good time for me to start my day. And it's like wake up, pull an assault bike out of the garage, do a little blood flow, go for a walk, something like that. At 4?

Yeah. At 4.30? Yeah, I come into the kitchen and I'll get my supplements and coffee prepped and ready to go. But then it's like just move something around. And then there's a hot tub at our house, so I do a tub every morning. Oh, nice. And then it's like stretch, coffee, supplements, breakfast. Do you look at your phone at all?

Yeah, yeah, definitely. I have my phone. I usually listen to a book on the, or a podcast on the, um, on the bike. And then, um, I start to answer social media stuff like DMS and, and things that are going on. Like I'm so jealous. I want to do this. I want, I've been wanting to do this for so long. Like I have time in the morning and we've been talking to a bunch of different people who are into like holistic lifestyle and not looking at your phone at that time. Yeah. A lot of different things, but I just can't get to bed at, like, 9. I just can't do it.

What helped you transition to get into? The baby. Oh, the baby, yeah, because you're hot. Yeah, I mean, we were, like, I was kind of, like, even when I was competing, it was, like, 9 or 9.30 was, like, the latest. Like, I needed to get some sleep, and I always was an early person, like, get up earlier. But, yeah, when we had the baby, like, when she finally started sleeping,

it would be, like, 6 o'clock, and had the baby, like when she finally started sleeping, it'd be like six o'clock and I was just like done. And I almost be able to go to bed at like seven, like really full on, like pass out. So that's just kind of transitioned to where it is today. But, and yeah, I was kind of into that too. Like listening to a lot of people be like, don't touch the media, no social media, don't get on your computer. Don't even have your phone in your room when you're sleeping. Yeah. Well, I definitely agree with that. But, like, they're saying, like, don't pick up that stuff until whatever time. And I tried to fight that for a while.

And I was like, you know what? That's just not me. Because at 6 or 5.30 at night, I shut it down. Like, I don't look at my phone. Like, people send me text messages that I get in the morning that are from, like, 7.30. And I didn't look at them because my phone was away. So I'm kind of the opposite yep um as soon as family time starts that's when I'm like disconnect from from media as much as I can and then um yep then it's like to the gym you know

what a big part of that too is I think the whole like getting away from your phone and stuff it's just that you guys love your job you love what you do you know what I mean so I think a lot of people they just do not so they wake up and they already got emails and texts that stressed them out a lot. So you wake up and immediately it puts you in a bad mood. But if you get to wake up and you get to go into your DMs and you get to interact with your fans and followers and just talk to people, that's not putting you in a bad mood at all. So I think it's just about setting the mood for the day. A lot of people don't want to start yet with bad emails, bad this, bad this. I do love what I do and all my messages and stuff.

They're usually always a plus for my day. Yeah, for sure. Someone's always stoked about something. Yeah. And I also have that inbox anxiety of if it gets too full. If I look down, I've got like 20 DMs. I'm like, I've got to get to that. I've got to figure that out.

Dude, I literally can't have any notifications on my phone. Like if I open my phone and like any app, like I don't even care what app it is. It has like one little red dot. I go nuts. And then it's the worst when you have apps that like you click on it and it doesn't even go away. You know what I'm talking about? You're trying to like go through the settings. You're like, how the fuck do I make this little red one go away?

I delete those apps. Yeah, for sure. They're gone. I'm one of those people too where like I feel, and you can definitely attest to this, like I feel like I can do everything apps. Yeah, for sure. They're gone. I'm one of those people too where I feel, and you can definitely attest to this, I feel like I can do everything still. Yeah. And I don't have a lot of help. And it's crazy.

We've been here only for a day, and I'm sure you've seen me just connected to my phone the whole time. Yeah. I do all the emails. I put all of the things into a spreadsheet. I put everybody into my nutrition challenges. I program everything for the gym. I answer all my DMs. I do this. I do that. I everybody into my nutrition challenges i program everything for the gym i like answer all my dms i do this i do that i run also my in the gym instagram yeah and all the dms there and i make videos for everything live videos facebooks everything yeah and it's just like to you definitely to learn how to like delegate a little bit better

you need to have a kid you'll really you'll find out just get somebody pregnant just get somebody pregnant that's how people pregnant. Help people in mind. I mean, that was me, like, last year, you know. And just something, eventually something broke, you know. I started breaking down a little bit. You know, it was a strain on my relationship to my wife just because, like, I was so attached to this thing. And I realized, like, okay, I'm thinking, like, where do I want to see myself in five years? Like, I don't want to see myself doing this.

You know, I got to start somehow come up with a plan. So it's still a hard process because you want to be engaged. You want to, you know that like, okay, I can do the best job. Like, I'm the best person for this job. But if you try to do 10 of those things, you actually end up not being the best person for it because you're only bringing your like B game. You know, it's like, okay, let me do these five things, A status, and then delegate five things.

And I know you've heard it all a bunch of times. No, for sure. Like I'm always interested in hearing that stuff because I have such a hard time delegating stuff because I'm like, well, I know if I answer these, it'll be so much better than if that person answers it. Sure, sure, sure, sure. So like was it easier or not easier? Like how did that feel when you gave those delegations away?

I mean, it was hard, but I think I went through a good process of, like, what are the things that make me the happiest and what are the things that have the most impact, you know, on the people that follow what we're doing. Those are the things I want to keep, right? Like, I'd never want to give up my you know interaction with my fans on social media because that's what got me started and

what gave me all of the inspiration for what I'm doing today so it's like oh you have like people are like oh my god I can't believe you is this really Marcus are you really responding to me I'm like yeah yeah totally and it's look at the time stamp it's 4.15 in the morning I'm really good about it solely because you were doing or no we were both doing and it's look at the time stamp it's 4.15 in the morning but I'm really good about it solely because

you were doing or no we were both doing one of the movements like where you're holding the kettlebell and dumbbell presses

you remember that? that's right yeah and I have a girl who works the desk at my gym and she tagged us and she goes hey is that Marcus Philly

and you wrote back you're like totes and you put like the hand and I was like holy shit he commented back on that like that's I mean this whole podcast

only got started because I sent you a message on Instagram. And within, like, less than an hour, you responded to me. And we're like, yeah, dude, fuck it. Let's do it. Totally. So I think it's a great thing. And you guys, both of you guys, I think are really great on social media as far as, like, being real and being able to connect with your fans.

Like, it just feels like there's a real person behind the account. You know what I mean? Like, if all of you follow Ryan, like, we've talked about like scheduling posts and he's like, well, it's just not me. Like, it's just, I just need to be like in the moment and actually post what I'm doing.

Yep. Yeah. I agree. And you can feel that. I really think like it, for some reason you can feel that interpersonal. And what bothers me about what you just said is that people will still follow someone who is so incredibly fake to me and I'm,

and like everything that they do i know is not their real life like what you're saying is good but like it's just amazing to me that people can be on social media and they just get fooled by like and everything's a plug and everything is like trying to sell something i hate it so much for sure it's a tough balance to find like you know because on the one hand you just like go and be the realest person that's out there it's like okay you are super real and, and you don't even have a business that functions. You're not actually making any money. So you're like the CrossFitter that's doing CrossFit all the time every day,

and it's not impacting their livelihood. I have a hard time following those people. I have to unfollow them. Yeah, and it's like there's people that are Instagrammers that just Instagram all the time. It's like when are you going to get involved in your life or use that as a tool to grow something? Yeah. You know, that's always my goal is like everything that I post. Well, for me personally, I'm a little bit different. I either like either either super funny. know about that spot? I need to go there. He was so excited to go. Oh, I'm sure.

I mean, that's good. Well, I didn't want to actually get the cookie because we're doing the vlog. And then he's like, you have to get the cookie. I'm like, dude, it's $8. I'm not spending $8 on a penis cookie. That was a cookie. It looked like an ice cream, like a formed ice. Dude, it was like a coconut macaroon. With coconut cream inside.

Oh, money. It was fucking delicious. And you actually have to go to the counter and ask for the white penis cookie. There was a black one, too. Oh, God. Solid. So, yeah, if you guys want to see what the fuck we were just talking about, for sure check out the vlog from our San Francisco trip.

You'll see fish and the white penis. anyway i usually try to do either something funny because that's just like my side of yeah who i am and then or something that adds to your day in either an educational way yeah or just like adds to your day where you're like oh man i'm happy i saw that yeah yeah like every time i look at your page i'm like oh i'm probably gonna learn about a movement or it's gonna be something that i probably am gonna want to do I don't ever like if I ever looked at it enough or I was like oh I've already done that or right preaching to the choir type of thing then yeah then maybe I would might keep going through my feet sure yeah I I think it's um yeah social media started out to me as a as a place to just kind of share my journey as an athlete so that that's been a consistent theme for me. It was like

showcasing what I do on a regular basis. And then over time it transitioned into now I want to like, I'm going to selectively showcase the stuff that I believe will impact people, you know, like, cause I used to show all the workouts, you know, the, the super hard, like, you know, regional prep workouts that, you know, 1% of my viewers could actually do. And now it's like, okay, well, I'll show less of that because I think this is going to add more value to what people are seeing. And this, you can actually go do this today. Um, and it exploded for you. Yeah, exactly. Saw a massive increase. That's really cool. And I think it's so cool to talk about like the more people would talk to about, because there really is no real like guide or like a rule book. Like this is how you handle you handle social media or like this is when you're on your

phone this is when you're not on your phone you know everybody has like different strategies and different techniques and this just worked for you like you mentioned you started posting the functional bodybuilding stuff and the views just went up and you just went well this is cool but there's really no no recipe you know so the more people we talk to it's just really cool to see that there is no real way yet like you can still figure out whatever just works for you. Totally. I mean, do you guys ever think about like what if the internet broke tomorrow? Dude.

I kind of – I've had a little bit of that in the last couple months, not from like anxiety like, oh, it creates a ton of fear for me. But just like if I think worst case scenario, like that all terminated and it was just like, okay, we're back at, like, how do we call people on the phone or actually, like, go and, you know, reach out to people in person. That was me in high school. Right. It's like. Probably you, too. Yeah, you got to. honest to think about like how how much the reach that i have right now is closely tied to things like social media and internet and email lists and whatever websites that we have um but it makes me

appreciate it for sure and it makes me want to be like okay let me put something that's quality out there not just like fill people's feeds with garbage i feel so bad for like there's so many gym owners out there who will hit me up and they're just like, Hey man, like how'd you get your gym to get to like where it is? Or, um, they'll have questions about social media or something like that. And I'm like, you own a gym and you don't have an Instagram account. Yeah. Like you own a gym and you have no social media outlet at all. Like that's crazy to me. Like, it's like, yeah, that's like being alive and not having a cell phone. Like you don't have a phone number. Like I can't call Marcus. You know what I mean?

Like that's so crazy to me. Like the first thing I want to do, like even just coming to San Francisco, if I want to like find things to do, I go to Instagram and I visit San Francisco. I go to Thailand tomorrow, visit Thailand, and I'll just see all the coolest things. And I'll just be like, cool, bookmark, bookmark, bookmark. I'm going to do that when I get there. If I want to go to a gym, I want to go click on it, and I want to see the culture inside the gym like via some video or something like that when I get there. If I want to go to a gym, I want to go click on it, and I want to see the culture inside the gym via some video or something like that.

I completely agree. And there's – let's see. This guy that just walked in the gym over here. His hair is killing it, by the way. The other one over there. Just the other day, we were talking about Instagramming hair. They're like, what's that? I'm like, dude.

I mean, they knew, but they don't have that. That might be okay for But it's also generational too. And it's like, oh, my target market in what we're doing on site here with individual programs and individual design is actually slightly older. And it's like, they're not connected to social media in the same way that our generation is, which I have to recognize. It's like, okay, I've got to hammer social media for this part of our business, but that's not going to get to Evan, and how am I going to get to Evan? Actually, Facebook is a lot of that crew. A lot more, yeah, Facebook.

So it's like people are like, I've got this. They spend all this time on Instagram. I hate Facebook. Oh, it's so not what it used to be. I just hate it. I, Facebook. So it's like people like, I got this, they spend all this time on Instagram. I hate Facebook. Oh, it's so, it's so not what it used to be. Yeah, I just hate it. I hate being part of it. I hate like having to post on it.

I'm like, I know, I hate it so much that I don't post on it. Yeah, I feel like only my mom is on Facebook, bro. Like that's the only person that's so close.

Yeah, but your mom might want to work out here. Yeah, exactly. That guy on the bike needs a partner. Yep. Totally. My mom's married, bro.

She's a nice lady. Leave her alone. I mean, we talked She's a nice lady. Leave her alone. I mean, you know. We talked about this the other day. Yeah, well. Anyway, we only made it through like. We're at about 7.30 in the morning. I was going to say, we only made it to like 7.30.

Should I continue or are we off that topic? Let's keep going, dude. We always jump all over the place Cool No one's listening at this point Anymore anyways It's just background noise So at this point The internet does not exist

This podcast We gotta hit them with We gotta hit them with Something so good And be like You must listen to Minute 54 37 seconds

Exactly That'll be the teaser You're actually really close It's 52 14 Damn I got that internal clock Going It's cause like I time n. I got that internal clock going.

It's because I time naps in my head when the baby's napping, so I've gotten really good. That's scary, dude. I wish I could nap. I can't nap. That's scary. Like you go to sleep and you wake up. I'm going to wake up in 20 minutes. I know roughly how long she sleeps.

She sleeps on average like an hour to 75 minutes on her nap, so that's kind of what I – I thought you were going to lay down and be like, okay, I'm waking up at 20 minutes. I'm good. Exactly, 20 minutes later you wake up. Yeah, no, she has to get to daycare. We take her to daycare at 7.30.

I'm at the gym by 8 every day. And then it's like an hour of emails and just maybe a consult. I train from 9 to 10, work from 10 to 12 on online stuff for writing programs, train from 12 to two. And then from two until I leave,

you know, for home at five, it's more, it's either meetings, online stuff, you know, media, whatever,

whatever online things I need to do. And then it's home for the day at five, which is like, I already said, it's like make dinner, get a bath, you know, for my daughter and then put her to bed and then watch a show with my wife and, you know, go to bed at 830.

Awesome. Does your wife help out with any of this stuff? She does. She's involved a little bit. She's got her own career as a psychologist, so she has a practice in a neighboring city, and she's full-time there. She helps with education of our coaches. So much of, like like individual coaching is about

relationship building and uh she plays a big role in in teaching our coaches you know how to build authentic connections you know through their their work with their clients um and she leads a monthly coach's education where we do mock consultations and people just get better at asking questions and and like kind of listening to cues from people yeah it's super cool and it's like it's something that i think is really missing in the fitness you know community with coaches they're so focused on being good technical coaches and you know they get so caught up in like oh i need to i need to teach the right snatch progression. I need to know exactly how to, like, give people the right cues and stuff.

And it's like, dude, if these people are with you for the next five years, you're going to be able to teach them how to snatch. But how do you keep them there for five years? They need to trust you. They need to believe that you care about them. You need to show empathy. Like, you need to have all these other skills that you're not learning at the weekend seminar on, you know, ollie lifting.

And so that's what she's, like, bringing to the table for us. So she helps out there. And then, of course, she always, you know, if there's big decisions that need to happen, like, she's kind of a person I bounce a lot of ideas off of. I feel like that's good. It's important to have them be involved a little bit. How weird is it dating a psychiatrist?

Do you ever feel like she's just analyzing you whenever you guys are in a fight and she's just completely manipulating your brain waves? I don't think. I know she is. She definitely is. Marcus, this is part of your childhood. We can come back to this. Exactly.

We all know where this is coming from. But I think that's the point that you were making is huge, and it's huge at Chalk too where the interpersonal stuff as a coach is so important just to build the culture as well. Yeah. And I think that's what really, at the end of the day, what makes a gym, what keeps people in the gym. Getting them walking to the door might be like your social media, might be this, might be that, might be a cool sign on the wall. But then to keep them there is like the real deal. And I think that your coaching and your just being able able to talk to people understand why they're actually there is

huge yeah you don't get 400 members at a gym from you know having the right program or knowing how to coach you know the lifts the best it's like my my programs too like after i write something there's like a paragraph of why you're doing it yeah i do it all the time like yeah because like i know that they're like i don't want to do this but i'm like here's why you're doing it. Yeah. I do it all the time. Yeah. Because I know that they're like, I don't want to do this, but I'm like, here's why you're doing it. Yeah. You know what I mean?

And I want you to know this. It's like, that's important to me for people to know that there's different things out there besides just death. Like 20 minute or under death. You know what I mean?

Another thing that is always super huge on Instagram too is just like breath work and breathing and how to breathe through workouts and all that stuff. And we talk about that stuff all the time. It's something that's been getting more and more important to me. Started with, like, meditation and then kind of integrating that more, like, into workouts as well and just seeing what huge impact that can have on your performance.

So if you want to talk about that for a little bit. Yeah. your performance so if you want to talk about that for a little bit yeah i mean i i'm watching it all like evolve and become i don't want to say mainstream but like just a conversation point for so many people and it's funny it's like i i kind of had my own experience with it pretty early in in my crossfit um journey when i like hooked up with james fitzgerald and he became my coach it was this notion of like – He's so interesting. He's so interesting. When you're talking to him, he's just like inside of you. Yeah, dude. He's looking inside like –

So you guys had him on the show. I interviewed him too, yeah. Did he hit you with any of those like really good like long extended silent moments? Oh, yeah. Yeah, all the time. Oh, yeah. I'm like – But it's not just silent.

He's silent and staring at you. Yeah. He's like – It's just, dude, the entire time when you're talking to him – i don't know if you got this feeling too but the feeling that i had the entire time it's like he knows something that i don't yeah like just something about the world the universe or like he knows something i just don't like there that i was super attracted to as a as an athlete so i had him coach me and um felt that way ever since like for the for the whole time we were like working together it was was like, okay, yeah, he sees something like big picture

that I know it's going to be awesome. And I want to be part of it. Yeah, sure. Why did that even come? Oh, breathing, yeah. Because you're breathing heavy thinking about him right now. Yeah, he just would like, you know, it was simple. It was like stop trying to control your breath when you're

when you're training and when you're doing fitness like like i was that was like people like i'm trying to stay calm i'm trying to keep my trying to control my breathing it's like why like that's how you get you know life force into it's like oxygen and co2 out and like that's the nutrient you need to get to your tissues to, like, move. And so it kind of started this, you know, because I came in as more of a power athlete than, like, an enduring athlete. I was a goalkeeper in college for soccer, which was, like, sprints, jumping, bounding, like, you know, fast, explosive stuff. Didn't really need to run for distances, although they made us anyway, which was painful. But, yeah, so then, like, learning how to, like, be an individual in the CrossFit sport was a total, like, shock to me.

Because I was doing team for three years, and I was really good at team. I could, like, go hard and then chill and then hard and then chill. And, like, okay, you go and I go. And I was, like, really, really good. I felt like I was excelling and then it was like i said it all the time too i played football in college and i'm dude i love doing team workouts because i can like go all in all out like and i'm doing it for other people too like the whole team mentality and then i get to step back i get to catch my breath and then i get to do it again yeah you know that's it's for sure up my real house just because football has been a part of my life for so long and i've always

hated it really i don't like team workouts oh because football has been a part of my life for so long. I've always hated it. Really? I don't like team workouts. Oh, because it's just like you've got to rely on somebody else. I've always been like individualized. And then I watch someone like doing something and I'm like, oh, just get out of the way. I can do it. You just don't like being in control. Like when we were driving here, we got off the bridge and we got like a Lexus. And, dude, it's one of my favorite cars.

I've always wanted to drive. So we got like the Getaround app, which is, like, super rad. Have you used that? No. It's like you just get to rent a car. We'll tell you about it after the show. It's cool. You just get to rent a car with the app, and, like, you just walk up to it and, like, unlock it with the phone.

Like, it's super rad. Oh, so this is, like, someone's car from the city that they're – Yeah. Yeah. Nice. They're renting out. Yeah. And I hit the turn a little bit too fast, and he started freaking out right away.

I feel like I'm going to die. And he's like, I just don't like not being in control. I'm an interesting character for sure. Definitely. Well, your essence as an athlete would lend itself well to being able to do short bursts. And you probably can appreciate that first couple years and be like, how am I going to grind out a 15-minute workout where I've got to keep my breathing rate high the whole time and really produce power for extended lengths.

Like that was foreign to me. And then, so that was this, like this work with James is just be like, learn how to breathe while you're moving. And then like, don't, don't try and bring it down.

Like try and bring your, your, you know, your respiration rate up to match what you're doing in, you know, a cyclical thing or in a, you know, a pull up or a kettlebell swing, like matching the cadence of what you're doing in, you know, a cyclical thing or in a, you know, a pull-up or a kettlebell swing, like, matching the cadence of what you're doing with your breathing, which, so that was kind of for me, like, early on, and it really stuck with me for a long

time, was just, like, using the, using breath to enhance my performance, and then now, of course, with, like, you know wim hof and and some like you know he's crazy thought leaders that are out there that are like using breath to expand people's you know vo2 max and you know decrease their total stress in their body and activate immune system for recovery and um i have not i i haven't gone too deep into that, played around with some, like, Wim Hof breathing, but it's not something I – I've tried it. Oh, yeah. It's brutal.

It's hard. But it's not something I incorporate regularly. Okay. Yeah. So it's more just, like, during workouts? Yeah. Like, this morning I was doing these, you know, extended aerobic intervals, and they were certainly, like, on the edge of my threshold,

and I was just like, okay, what can I focus on right now that helps me to, like, keep going? And it's like I need to get my breathing rate up. And I need to, like, focus on that a lot. And once, you know, that always helps connect me to, like, the moment what I'm doing. That's so interesting because most of the time, exactly like you said, people are like, okay, you have to stay calm. You have to do this. So you're, like, doing an all-out sprint on the bike, but you're trying to breathe way slower than what your cadence is, and at the end of the day it just doesn't make sense.

Yeah. Because you're not getting the oxygen that you need. You're not getting the CO2 out that you need to get out. Yeah. So, yeah, no. I actually never thought of that, but it makes sense. Fish just holds his breath the entire time while he's working out. That's actually a secret.

Depends how long it is, but yeah, sometimes. Different schools of thought. A lot of sprinters, though, actually hold their breath for the entire 100-meter dash. Yeah, I've heard that too. I can imagine that. It's only fucking nine seconds or whatever it is. It's crazy, right?

It's only nine seconds. For us, it's like 29. I'm at the 60 at about nine seconds. Still working on getting down there. It's only nine seconds. For us, it's like 29. I'm at the 60 at about nine seconds. Still working on getting down there. All right. Well, anything else you want to hit? Yeah, I definitely got a couple more questions.

I think you kind of already hit this, and I think this answer is obvious, but maybe there's something that we haven't touched on yet. And James actually took this question to a super cool area, so no pressure. You're just up against the edge right now. Nice. Over the next 5 10 15 years whatever it is where do you see the whole fitness world evolving to well i mean a lot of what i think james probably said is something that i like i believe in i mean i'm super aligned with opex in in their vision of fitness delivery i mean we're trying to, we're using a lot of their philosophy

and their model here at Revival Strength. But it's, you know, I think it's creating stronger, putting the coach, putting coaches, fitness coaches, like professional coaches into a category of, uh, you know, people that command respect in the, in the world and the community, the fitness community. So rather than, you know, people going into fitness or looking for, for to go consume fitness, like, okay, what's the thing I need to do? What's the thing I need to do? They're going to be like, who's the person I need to trust to give me my information?

So instead of, yeah, because like I don't know anything about, I know I'm very limited like when it comes to financial, you know, investments. Like I know a little bit, but I don't want to spend all my time thinking about it. So what do I do? I don't go and like pull a little from here and try and piece it together myself. I don't have the time for that. I go to a person who I trust, who's worked and developed trust with me, a financial planner, and I'm like, okay, what should we do and help me understand why? I still ask questions and I still like challenge him on things from time to time,

but that's a relationship that I built. And that's where fitness should be. It should have always been that way. And when I see people that are like, okay, I'm gonna go try this, I'm gonna go try that. And they are just going around the Ferris wheel of like random stuff for years. And what they end up at is something that they didn't want

and they're like worse off than when they started. And it's like, okay, who should you be like? If they had trusted the person from the beginning who had knowledge, who was dedicated to this as their career, that could have led them, then that's, you know, I would wager a lot of money that they'd be in a better place after five years than when they started. And that's what I want to create with our coaches here. I mean, I certainly want to be, you know, somebody that people can seek out and trust for, like, quality, you know, fitness education information and training for a long period of time.

So that's my hope, certainly. And I also think that that will be, you know, that charge will be led by people like James at OPEX and other influential coaches who really honor the craft of coaching. And they're not just like, what's the next cool thing that's out there that I can... Right, the next hype and trend. Yeah, totally. Yeah, I wish a lot of people

weren't looking for the next best thing. Yeah, it's always a secret pill, right? Everyone's always looking for a secret pill that's going to get me super jacked in 60 days or whatever it is. But I think people are getting away from it and people are thinking more long-term and more longevity-wise. Even gyms. I wish people just – I always talk about this all the time.

I'm like, can you please just check out every gym within like a 10-mile radius of where you live? Yeah. Go interview the people that are there, like the coaches. Even if you think you love your gym, just go. Like I guarantee you might find something else, and everyone will give you like a free week to work out. Yeah. And at the end of like a month or two, like you'll have such a better outlook

on like what you're actually looking for. Yeah. I think people get stuck with their friends wherever they're at, and they're just like they think that that's it. Or especially doing CrossFit, you do CrossFit maybe here in San Francisco, you move to Orange County, and you go to one, and you're like, oh, this is just CrossFit. It's like, no, no, no, that's that's uh revivals crossfit revival or whatever yours was called or it's just like it every single gym is so much different every coach is so much

different programming is different yeah community is different like you have to really like dive into each gym with everything you have and try to absorb as much as you can and hope that it's the right fit for you yeah and if you when there's where there's a good community and where there's like good programming behind all that there's like a good person a solid you know leader and it's like those those are the people that need to get highlighted and when when fitness consumers or people out there that want to get healthy like like attach that to a person, they say, okay, that's, that's the person that's going to help. That's where we're going to move, you know? And I think CrossFit is doing, doing that well too.

It's like, of course the brand of CrossFit is the thing that they're promoting the most, but within that there are, you know, subject matter experts, right? Oh, like, like Chris Hinshaw, for example, it's like he's growing as this like knowledge, like, like Chris Hinshaw, for example, it's like, he's growing as this, like knowledge, like this person that, you know, is trusted, has knowledge and can impact people in a positive way. And so like, people are committing to his plan, like, oh, I want this person to help me versus like, I'm just going to like grab a little bit of his plan. I'm gonna grab a little of this. I'm gonna go do this. It's like, no, just, just trust somebody and like, let them do their thing. And then, yeah, maybe you stay with them forever. Maybe you stay with

them for 12 weeks and then you learn something and then you move on. But it's like, you know, I don't know. I hope that's where it goes. Yeah, for sure. All right. Last question from me. This was like the most asked question underneath Ryan's dick pic from yesterday. I really, that got so many comments. That was crazy. Yeah. 250. He's got like 4,000 likes right now. But some were very inappropriate. Yeah. Some were actually geared towards the podcast.

Okay. So the most, let's say, geared towards the podcast questions at least. We ever going to see you compete again? I knew that was coming. Yeah, you're going to see me compete again. Okay. I'm not sure what it is. You know, I mean, I'll be 34 in October.

So I'm right around the corner from like Masters Division in CrossFit. That's going to be awesome. Yeah. How old are you? I'll be almost 32 soon. Okay. So I got at least like a year or two. Do some work there before you go.

Well, my biggest thing is the only reason I don't compete anymore really is because my knee is completely shot. So I don't think anybody will see me compete anymore. Unless something really cool happens with, like, knee reconstruction. I need, like, a full replacement right now. Oh, really? Go straight cyborg, dude. That's why you're into the kettlebell swings. Not a lot of knee flexion.

I love kettlebell stuff. Yeah, so that would be kind of – I'm aiming for that. I've even had, like, you know, daydream conversations with my coach being like, we're going to win 35-39. It's a good group right now. Dude, it's solid. Super solid. Kasserbauer.

I mean – Ben Alderman's in there now. Maddox should be in it. So should Bridges. Maybe he'll do it next year. No, Maddox is 40. Yeah, he's super old. But he did individual this year.

Well, yeah, but he's still going to the... Oh, yeah. Even if he went older, he'd be in the 40 range, yeah. Yeah, he's going to go. I mean, he's going to be... He's the top-seeded. And then my buddy Danny Nichols out of OPEX. You just saw him the other day? Oh, yeah. But he says he's kind of done. That's what he said. He just qualified for the games. He's going to go do it. I don't think he's done. Especially if I come and he said. He just qualified for the games. He's going to go do it.

I don't think he's done. Especially if I come and I'm like, hey buddy, I think it's time to go head to head finally. He'll believe, and I hope he's listening. He thinks he could beat me probably in this Masters division. I'm like, yeah, let's try it. So yeah, but that would be fun.

I look forward to that, for sure. I like that. Those are good. That was a good way to end it, I think. Cool. I love the flow of the conversation. We started with the crazy competition stuff and then just went straight into proper training. Yep. Yeah.

And then ended it with a bunch of – Dick cookies. Got some dick cookies in there. Could never go wrong. And then we just touched on being old. So, you know, over 30 crew. Yeah. Yaya doesn't know anything about that yet.

So, it 30 crew. Yaya doesn't know anything about that yet. Yaya, I got to say, what's interesting is that my nephew and my niece, they couldn't say the word dada when they were younger, so they called their dad Yaya. Look at that. I knew something like that was coming, something like that always comes. Ryan just calls me no-no all the time. But yeah, if you have anything to add, where can people find you? Revival Strength, ATS.

Yeah, revivalstrength.com and functionalbodybuilding.net are our two websites. They both have unique email lists that you can be a part of and we send out weekly content to both lists that are educational uh kind of like free workout or free ways to experience what we're about and what we're what we're doing um and then of course like links to like any events or or products that we have that are out there and i i don't know i put a lot of energy in every week with um with my partner satya to you know deliver some value there. So people are looking for good content. They can certainly go to my Instagram, but those are other great places to go and sign up for our email list

and get some free training programs and a cool nutritional guide. Cool. Awesome. Sounds good. Awesome. You're a good fish? Yeah, I like it. You uh want to see what yaya yaya and i are up to at any point you can check up check us out on our instagrams yaya's view and ryan fish yep um i hope you guys love that that was a great podcast i'm really really excited about it i hope you guys learned a little thing or two and we will see you on the other side all right thanks marcus thanks guys all right that'll wrap it up did i fucking promise too much or what that was an awesome episode the workout afterwards was even more awesome um if

you guys have any more questions that we didn't answer i'm sure marcus will be happy to answer them as he mentioned in the podcast he's very active on his instagram and with his fans so just shoot him a message at marcus philly or just hit up ryan and i either me at yis view or ryan at ryan fish on instagram we always always love hearing from you guys so just let us know what you think what you liked what you didn't like maybe some topics some guests anything that you guys might want to see on the episode and don't forget about the deal that we have going on revive rx userug 10. You guys get that milky Captain Crunch protein powder.

You guys need the vanilla. You guys need the strawberry. Just mix them together half and half. Their stuff is honestly awesome. Designed for the high-intensity functional fitness athlete, which I'm sure most of you guys are, or at least consider yourself are. Just kidding. I'm sure you guys are all super duper fit.

You guys are going to get even more super duper fit with this protein. So head over to ReviveRx.com, use code SHRUG10, and let's get shredded. I'm Yaya. Love you guys. See you guys next week.