Cameron Hanes - Keep Hammering Collective - KHC 185 - Keith Sivera

Episode Date: March 30, 2026

Keith Sivera - CEO of MTN OPS, a supplement and outdoor performance brand. He’s a former Onnit Labs executive and is known for his background in fitness, business leadership, and his personal journey of long-term sobriety, which shapes his focus on discipline and purpose. This episode dives into Keith’s journey through fitness, nutrition, and personal transformation covering everything from supplements, carb strategies, and marathon training to building discipline and mental toughness. It blends performance insights with deeper conversations on leadership, creating a strong culture centered around helping people push their limits and become their best selves. Shop MTN OPS: Use code KEEPHAMMERING for 20% off https://mtnops.com/  Follow along: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cameronrhanes Twitter: https://twitter.com/cameronhanes Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/camhanes/ Website: https://www.cameronhanes.com Timestamps: 00:00:00 – How Keith Got into Fitness & Health 00:08:28 – Supplementation to Reach New Limits 00:18:35 – Carb Loading for Running Marathons 00:22:07 – Developing the Best Supplements for Athletes and Hunters 00:28:11 – What’s Changed for Cam to Run His Fastest Marathon 00:36:56 – Keith’s Running Goals 00:38:05 – Mental Attitude to Build Strength & a Healthy Body 00:42:00 – Traveling & Sticking to a Clean Diet 00:50:23 – Keith’s Workout Plan & Goals 00:54:23 – Nick the Trainer Dude & Carb Cycling 00:59:25 – Cravings, Fat Adapted Diets, No Carbs, & Testing the Limits 01:05:24 – Helping People Be Their Best Selves 01:08:31 – Keith’s Childhood, Alcoholism, to Clearing a Path to Success in Health 01:11:24 – Big Pharma and the Ozempic Effect 01:16:28 – Community & Authenticity Builds Success 01:27:39 – Building Culture with Employees: Operating with Intention 01:37:04 – F**k, Marry, Kill: Electrolytes, Protein, Creatine  Thank you to our sponsors: Wild Alaskan Company: https://wildalaskancompany.com/cameron use code CAMERON for $35 off your first box Hoyt: http://bit.ly/3Zdamyv use code CAM for 10% off Ketone IQ: https://www.ketone.com/Cam use code CAM for 30% off your first subscription MTN OPS Supplements: https://mtnops.com/ Use code KEEPHAMMERING for 20% off Black Rifle Coffee: https://www.blackriflecoffee.com/ Use code KEEPHAMMERING for 10% your orderGrizzly Coolers: https://www.grizzlycoolers.com/ use code KEEPHAMMERING for 20% off

Every step I take, I move my truth. Every time they tell me stop, I use. Every comment hate that makes my feel, gather up my energy, and boom. I hear them talking, saying the way that I move is so reckless. That is a part of my mind I've been blessed with, giving my blood so I am relentless. This is a Keep Hammering Collective with Keith Severa. Are you the CEO of Mountain Office? Is that your title?

Yeah, so this is a first time. I don't think we've met in person, right? We just had one call. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. That's right. That's where I, okay. I knew I'd, once you walked, I opened the door, I'm like, okay, not what I, not who I was expecting, but I've seen you before and we've talked before. And it's just like I had some different something in my head. But, dude, it's fun to have you here. It's cool to talk about, I mean, just in general. So you're running Mountain Ops. I've been with Mountain Ops since I don't even know how long. It's almost day one. I mean, the early days since we're going into 12 years. and I think you've been with us for 10. Right.

So it's been a while. And my whole thing with when that started, you know, when Mountain Off started, there was, like, I think there's a wilderness athlete that had done some stuff, but it was pretty new in the supplementation for hunters and for mountain athletes. And so it's kind of, it's pretty exciting. It was just like, oh, God, hunters, you know, I've always said hunters are athletes. I've always trained like that. I've always, you know, had that mindset, but to get the industry to buy in wasn't easy. Right.

And then, you know, the Harborsons were got, had this vision or whatever, and they kind of got this going. And I was involved and I think Eva is still involved, right? Yeah, she's a badass. So, and it was like so much buzz and just like, the shows were epic. And it was just like, man, this is cool. Hunters are athletes. And we got, now we got a company like. Mountain Ops supporting it and helping tell that story.

And that was an exciting time. I mean, so tell me, like, what were you doing at that time? Yeah. Like, just so we can build up this trajectory of how did we get right here. Yeah. It's an interesting story how we got to this point where I'm sitting with you. Because I don't have a background in hunting. I didn't grow up hunting.

My first time hunting was with Mountain Ops. But I've been in this supplement space for a while. I started in 2012 or so at bodybuilding. building.com. I had gone through a big physical transformation at the time. I was living in New York City. I lost like 75 pounds. I started working out. I started taking supplements. I started figuring all the stuff out. It was all so new to me. I found it a little bit later in life. And it was the same time I stopped drinking. So I haven't had a drink in over 20 years. Okay. I started working out, started eating right. So what? You're just feeling, were you just at a... It was like a dark point.

You know, I think, you know, everybody's bottom's a little different. And for me, I was, you know, almost unemployable. I worked in the liquor industry and that just didn't jive with my DNA, I guess. And I just found myself kind of as low as I wanted to be. And I had this little window of opportunity to get clean and go on the right path. And I had some history of my family. So this is in your 20s at this time? Yeah, it was like 24. And so I had this opportunity to kind of walk away from all that. And I started going to meetings and I started doing all that kind of stuff. And I replaced going to the bar with getting under the bar. And I just started working out like a maniac all the time. And I loved it. And so then I just started back in my career, you know,

figured how to get back to work and do all those kind of things. I ended up moving in New York City, did a bunch of marketing up there. But it wasn't super fulfilling. Like I was getting it done. I was paying my bills and it was going okay. But I felt like there was more. And I just couldn't stop reading about fitness and exercise and nutrition and all these things. It was like, how do I get those things together so I can really kind of flex on it?

And I clicked on the careers tab of BodyBuild.com one day because that was a site I was using all the time. And back then, if you search anything, about how to build muscle, how to get a six-to-back, that kind of stuff. You were going, you were ending up on that site. And funny enough, they had this job that was perfect for my background. And I think it was like the mix of being the New York City guy and moving out to Idaho, like bringing this, you know, New York marketer out was exciting for them. And I moved to Boise and probably a month and a half after talking to them. So they were in Idaho. Yeah, it was a big culture shift. Yeah. And they're still out there. Okay. And so when I had an awesome run with

Bodybuilding.com, just kind of dove in and did a lot of cool experiential marketing stuff, anything I could get my hands on. And it just kept growing. And I ended becoming the VP of marketing and had a great time there, met a lot of great people, many of which I still work with today, kind of brought them along the journey with me. And I got recruited by a company in Austin out of the blue, which I had been a fan of on it since like 2012 or 13. Heard about it on, you know, Joe's podcast, had bought products. And when they said who it was, I was like, I couldn't get down there fast enough. You know what I mean? It just was perfectly aligned with who I was and what it was all about and got to Austin and just was so much fun. Started as a VP of marketing and

ended up taking over a CEO about the time I left. When it comes to seafood, most people don't really know what they're buying, where it came from, how it was raised, or what you're actually putting in your body. I used to question all of it, nutrition, taste, sustainability, until I found Wild Alaskan Company. Wild Alaskan Company delivers 100% wild caught seafood straight to your door. No farmed fish, no antibiotics, no additives. The first box I got was impressive. Perfectly portioned, frozen right off the boat, and packed with flavor. I've been cooking it simple, panseared, salmon, halbit, and cod, and it's some of the best fish I've had. My favorite is a wild Alaskan salmon. It's rich, clean, and loaded with omega-3s.

Buying wild-caught seafood matters to me. It supports healthy oceans, real fishing communities, and gives you food you can actually trust. And the best part is, it's flexible. You choose what you want, when it ships, and it just shows up ready to go. And there's zero risk. If you're not completely satisfied with your first box, Wild Alaskan company will give you a full refund.

No questions asked. Not all fish are the same. Get seafood you can trust. Go to wildalaskin.com backslash Cameron for $35 off your first box of premium, wild-caught seafood. I've been shooting Hoyt for over 20 years now, and they're a lifetime partner of mine. That's not something I take lightly. I stay with partners that prove themselves, and Hoyt continues to do that year after year. They shattered the industry standards and built the AX-90, the first 90-pound

bow to exist and be offered to consumers. Why? Because they have pioneered more advancements in archery than any other company of their time. That's why I work with them, because they are the best. For me, I want the most energy I can shoot in a bow. I want a heavy arrow hitting hard. To do that, I like to shoot 90 pounds. I shoot a 90-pound bow because I want a hard-hitting arrow delivered with enough force to push through, say, a rib

or the edge of a shoulder blade. Because it's bow hunting. Not every shot is going to be perfect, But when the animal reacts, or maybe I don't make the most perfect shot, I still want to deliver a lethal arrow and a 90-pound bow gives me more room for error. If you shoot 60 and I shoot 90, I will kill every animal you will kill at 60 pounds. But you won't kill every animal I will at 90. That's just the way it goes. That's why I shoot the most poundage I can.

And for me, that's a 90-pound bow. You can't pull 90? Don't worry. Most people can't. Hoyt makes bows for hunters at all levels, and they're all the best on the market. Hoyt will never rest on their laurels and bring subpar products to the market, and that's why I love working with them. The 90-pound bow to multiple iterations, and while I was impatient, they were not. The 90-pound bow took multiple iterations, and while I was impatient, they were not. They wanted it perfected. That's who they are, and that tells you a lot about the people working there. Unfortunately, they don't offer discounts on bows,

but if you want to grab some Hoyt merch or selected accessories, you can use my code, CAM, for 20% off. If you're serious about archery and you want something you can rely on, shoot a Hoyt. Go find one at your local dealer, select the bow rack here down the street for me, and try it for yourself. Get serious, get Hoyt, and keep hammering.

We sold the business in 2021, so it was like this huge learning curve of all this cool stuff. And in that process, I met Trevor and the team over at Mountain Ops. And we had been friendly for a couple of years. We were trying to put a job together in maybe 21 or 22. It just wasn't the right time. We stayed connected, and then it came back around. It was like, hey, what do you think about coming and join the team? And I was like, yeah, I think the time's right.

We worked out this great thing where I get to split my time in Austin. I have a blended family. So being able to not have to disrupt that whole thing that we have going on in Austin and be able to fly back and forth to Utah and bring my experience with supplementation and bringing some innovation to that, but also scaling it. We were talking before we started here about, you know, you can kind of hit that point where you start to flatline a little bit. Yeah. Because I don't know if you get comfortable or like a lot of founder-led businesses, you kind of grab your friends and family and people close to you. And they were super smart people that got the business to where it was just like on it. But then you start growing and adding more to the team to try to punch through those barriers.

And that's kind of where on it was at the time. It was like two, three years in a row kind of flatlining. And then we pumped some juice in there. We got Joe really kind of dialed in and activated in a big way. And then it was just off to the races. And then COVID hit. And we really had a nice boom from that because everybody was training at home. We had all the awesome fitness equipment and everything.

So it just went crazy. And so it took a lot of similar principles with me to Mountain Ops. Like, how are we going to get the word out there? We have a great brand. We're talking to a customer that nobody else was servicing with these types of products, like you mentioned, and what are we going to do to make sure that it's not getting stale? We're driving innovation. We're keeping customers in because 74% of Mount Ups customers had never taken a supplement before.

Oh, really? So they're very new to the whole idea. So we have very approachable supplements at work. But when you get a little more educated and you want a little bit more performance, we found customers were having to go somewhere else. We didn't have something for them. So it was like, well, that's a miss. We don't want to do all the education, you know, get all the conditioning and kind of compliance.

Get them to the dance and then they're dancing. Yeah, all the quarterback. Pretty girls. Yeah. So it was like, all right, we need to step it up. And so that's kind of what we're talking about. You know, we put this line together, you know, with you in mind is really how we built it. This is an apex line that we're talking about.

That's right. So we have a few core products in there and it's really clean products. NSF certified. We're using a lot of cool clinically studied. ingredients that are really going to help drive performance and keeping like the endurance athlete in mind. Right. So traditionally a lot of our products are very sweet.

They're very flavorful and approachable. But when you're kind of in the heat of battle, you don't always want all that flavor bomb. You don't want all of that. You want to be able to consume it and stay on course. So we've been playing around with a lot of different flavor profiles, a lot of different ingredients, and really happy where it's coming together. And I think you're going to be excited and surprised at what we put together.

Yeah. In regard to the flavor, there's a thing called, you can, get palate fatigue. And once you start taking, especially like in the endurance runs along multi-day stuff, you can't be taking the same stuff the whole time. Yeah. It's just like you can't get it down. But just like to backtrack. So as I said, when Mountain Op started, it was like it didn't really matters. It's like it didn't even matter if it was good. It was just, it was just this is just cool. You know what I mean? And then as you as you get more serious down the road and you're like, okay, so what is the purpose of supplements, right?

The purpose of supplements is to make me better, to get my body what it needs. So it's a supplement. It's, there's, I think I look at it differently, maybe than some, but, you know, a supplement would be like if your diet isn't giving you what you need, then you have the supplement that'll do that. That's kind of what people think about with supplements.

But I'm always like, no, I'm getting what I need. I want to get it to the next level. I want to give my body, you know, not just what it needs, but what it needs to excel, to reach new limits. And, you know, when supplements first came on, that wasn't the mindset. It was just like, oh, this is cool, kind of emerging industry. We've got to tell the story about hunters or athletes. Some people buy in.

Some people don't. Whatever. Well, now we're down the road. Now there's like there is a whole fitness industry in hunting, right? But consequently, supplements need to also grow in that same regard with, quality and being a fish, or I mean, effective. So like for me, it didn't make sense for me if I'm trying to perform at a level higher than I've ever been to take supplements that were when I was down here, right?

So that's where we've talked about the apex line where, you know, I can, you know, I do. I research, I test out. I'm like, I know what's out there. I know what the best of the best is. Let's make that too. Yeah. Because we're partners, right? I want this to work for hunters and I want this to work for me and I want to work for other people just like me with big goals that, you know, hunting is a huge part of what we do, but it's not the only thing.

It's we also do these ultra races. We train every day to get ready for hunting. Well, you want to feel good during that whole process, right? And that's where supplements come in. And yeah, so it's like there's been a lot of stuff. You said like bodybuilding.com, GnC, there's all these things where you just go in and you're just kind of looking at this thing. It's like, God, is this good or bad? It's a lot of information.

I don't know. Yeah, I don't know if these are good ingredients or bad ingredients. So you kind of need somebody to explain it to you. And hopefully that's what we can do here with this apex line. In general, it's just the highest quality supplements for regards to what you're trying to do. just live. But I'm also trying to live at my, as I said, my highest potential. And I think that's where these supplements can really help and come in, hopefully. Yeah, and you're not the same athlete you were 10 years ago. You're continuing to evolve. The supplementation industry has evolved. So we're

looking at what are the best ingredients that are on the market today and how can we service our customers. And like you said, supplements fill in the gaps. Like you have to have the foundation set. You've got to do the training. You got to eat right. You're not going to be able to eat a terrible diet and not train and take a supplement and get jacked. Yeah, it's not magic, right? So there's this balance of it. And we want something that is going to be effective, right? But only if you take it consistently, will it truly be effective? So it has to taste good. It has to perform. And there has to be science behind it. So some of these things are like pennies in the bank for a future day as well, like a performance product, like a pre-workout. You're going to drink it. You're going to feel

energized. You're going to have good vasodilation. You're going to get a good pump. You're going to be able to squeeze out more reps. That one's pretty easy to go like, that's working. And then there's other types of vitamins and supplements that you take that you're taking for future benefit. And then you just have to trust us, right? And why are you going to trust us? Well, you can trust us with this line because it's third party tested. We're using ingredients that have scientific background that can show you this actually worked in clinical trials, that it is improving performance. It's improving recovery. It's helping replenish all the electrolytes and minerals that we lose when we sweat. So all the things that are happening when we're training, we're making sure that we're not just baseline, right? Like we're coming in from a deficiency. we're looking to go baseline up. We're looking for performance products. So we're using some of the best stuff that's going to help you feel that, both today and long term.

And so that's what I'm excited about is something that you're going to want to take because you will notice in your workouts, whether you're in the gym or you're out in the mountain, that you actually perform better. I think that's the key is a lot of times people get bought into the hype of something, but then they go and take it and it just sits in their cabinet because it didn't really do anything. So for me, it's always been about, like, can I feel it? even if it's something like I'm supposed to feel long term, I still want like immediate benefits.

I think that's the key is when I take it, something happens. Either I have more energy, I feel like I'm recovering faster. I'm able to, you know, be an old PR. So I'm constantly kind of moving forward in the direction I'm trying to get.

Yeah. There's something about, can you feel it's making a difference? And here's what I've learned. I can't feel if I'm not operating at a high, like pushing myself. Yeah. I can't really tell.

Right. When I push myself, I can tell. So it's like when your body needs something, like I just, I put these, these are like, this is just what I take. Like every day I go on a run, I'm out there for a few hours a day. When you're pushing like that, you need calories. You can't, once you get depleted on your run. So here's the theory behind running, essentially, and ultra running, is you train your stomach to get ready for

these calories as you're taking on this long event. But in training, if you haven't trained your stomach for that, it won't take, it won't work during the race. And then also in training, here's what people, and I have made this mistake too. I would say, I'm going to go running. I'm not taking water. I'm not taking calories because I'm going to train my body to perform when it doesn't have that. Right. Because in the mountains, I'm not always going to have water. I'm not always going to have calories. What am I going to do? Lay down? Yeah. quit, die, or am I still going to hunt? So I'm like, okay, I have to train my body to be at its best, even, you know, in tough conditions. But what happens when you're training, so if I'm on, like,

me and Trude are doing a hard 12-mile run today, we're going to have to take in calories towards the end because if we don't, we can't push to the level we'll need to because our body is depleted. We're not getting the results that we're not getting, basically you can challenge your body in a different way and you get this response from it. And we can't get the response we need if we don't get, if we're depleted and we can't push to get the times we need at that level of the workout. So like the last, the most important miles will be like the last four miles. And we'll have to be able to push at 530 pace for those four miles to get the response our body needs for this training. If we're fatigued or we're down on calories and we can't get to that, maybe,

we run 545, well, we're not doing, it's not working. That's not how it's supposed to work. We're not going to get the gains we would have if we just would give our body what we needed to perform at the level we're intended. So what I do on these runs is like, I just need calories. I need protein. I know that's going to last for a while. This thing, I don't, I don't, this isn't one of my favorites.

I do like the cookie dough one, but, you know, calories are calories. And then I just always have the greens in the morning, too. These are like the three things I have right now. now since we don't have the apex line. And all I care about is, hey, I'm just trying to give my body what it needs to perform at a high level for the entire workout. And you have to think about stuff like that because then if you have that mindset in the mounds where instead of like operating a depleted state, instead you're like more

intentional on like just like in racing, I can't be at my best if I'm not giving my body calories. Well, that goes on a hunt too. If I'm trying to make a 70-yard shot on a bull elk and I have like a fraction of a second to do it and I need to be steady and my brain has to be work, my body has to be responding. I need to make that a precise shot because an animal's life is at stake. What am I doing by not allowing my body to perform at the highest level by not giving it calories? Yeah, your blood sugar is low. Everything shaky and your adrenaline spiking.

And I think there's something to what you said too about also training in non-optimal conditions because we're not always going to be. in the air-conditioned gym on a treadmill, you know, with all these calories getting pumped into us, sometimes you are going to be without. So I think it is good to feel that. And what you're talking about, too, about being ready for those last few miles that you know you have to press or being prepared to take the shot, you have to be prepared. If you're already shaking and losing energy, it's like too late. So you need to be fueling throughout. You're not going to take those calories in the last four miles. You're going to take them before the last four miles so your body can actually use them. So you're going to see in the line we actually have some carbohydrate products,

which for years and years, carbs were the bad thing, right? Yeah. I think real athletes know that carbs are essential to make sure that you can perform. So we're introducing products like that with electrolytes and carbohydrates so you can stay fueled during your exercise. I think a lot of people looked at pre-nutrition, right? Like I'm going to take my pre-workout, I'll get my meals in before, but then I'll have this grueling session and maybe if I'm smart, I'll do my aftercare, right? I'll do some recovery protein and things like that. There's so much important. in between, especially if you're working at that higher level and you're putting that output out there that's going to require some additional calories or carbs or whatever. Especially electrolytes and sodium, I think a lot of people underestimate how much they're losing when they're doing these workouts.

And sometimes when you're not feeling so hot, you're feeling foggy, you don't feel as sharp, your energy's down. Sometimes it's just you're dehydrated. Or it's salt. Yeah, exactly. It's amazing. It's crazy what salt is. There's this old thing. I don't know if you know Mark Bell.

Yeah. Mark Bell used to talk about powerlifting meats using. soy sauce packets as like instead of uh you know you're cramping and all these things you'd have all these soy sauce packets and it was like this little underground thing that they were doing but really it was just getting as much sodium in a short time as possible um but yeah we have something that tastes a little bit better than soy sauce nowadays so yeah we're going to go with that yeah it's uh you know to you know to your point on preloading and things like that so in marathon or any big endurance event there's always been the carb loading the night before you know have you done a marathon

I haven't officially done a marathon. I just gotten a running a couple of years ago to try to keep up with my wife who's a good runner, but it's been a tough challenge. But I can, I'm there now. I can do it now. They're in spirit. Well, you got time. You're young.

You're just a kid compared to me. So, of course, we carb-loaded the night before. But back in the day, like, you know, I've done the Eugene Marathon for decades now, it seems like, or, man, not decades. I've done marathons for decades, but probably the Eugene Marathon since 2007. But anyway, I guess that is decades. Yeah, but it used to be back in the day, you wouldn't even take any calories during the run,

or you might get like a piece of a banana at like an aid station. Like they have a little cup of water, a little banana. That's the only calories, if anything. And then kind of goo started coming on and like goo was tough to get down. It's like freaking cocking around a window and you're trying to swallow and you can't do anything. But the point was, is like, nowadays, you take, like, there are gels, there's some really good gels out there, but you take them basically every 35 to 40 minutes. Yeah.

So, yes, you carb load the day before, but you got to keep those calories going in, those carbs going in. So now there's a whole theory on carbs per hour in these races. Right. And you can't fall behind. And you go to practice that too, like you're saying. Yeah. you don't want to do that for the first time when you're doing the race. No, you shoot your pants.

I worked with a guy who ran his first marathon last year and car bloated but had never done any of that. And then ran the race after, you know, slamming 900 cards or whatever the night before. Did not have a fun time. So like, yeah, we want to practice for all different kinds of scenarios. It's part of the training, you know. Yeah, we do it in the gym. We want to do what we do in the gym so we can do it out in the field. It's not quite as like for hunters.

I use ketone IQ when I need to stay. Stay sharp for the long haul. Long runs, lifting, before I shoot my bow, even when I'm podcasting, anytime I want steady focus without crashing. What I like about it is how it feels. It helps me stay locked in during long efforts and mentally demanding sessions. Not jittery, not wired, just clear and steady. Ketones are your brain's preferred fuel source. So instead of that spiked caffeine feeling, the focus feels calm.

and controlled. It lets me push without leaning on caffeine or sugar. I'm not chasing another cup of coffee or something sweet just to get through a workout or a long day. I can train, work, and think without that roller coaster of energy. Physically, I feel ready to go. Mentally, I'm locked in. That combination matters when you're putting in long hours and real work. Visit ketone.com backslash cam for 30% off your subscription order plus receive a free gift with your second shipment or find ketone IQ at Target stores nationwide in the hydration and protein aisle and get your first shot free. Ignite isn't your average energy drink. It delivers smooth, long-lassy energy, no jitters, plus mental clarity that cuts through the backcountry fog. Powered by amino acids and brain blend

of neutropics and 200 milligrams of clean caffeine. Ignite, keeps you sharp and pushing hard mile after mile. Whether you're glassing ridges, packing in before dawn, or heading to Elk camp, one scoop in your bottle, and you're locked in. It's my go-to, every hunt, every hike, every long drive. And Mountain Ops isn't just about performance. They're mission-driven. Every purchase helps feed families in need through Operation Conquer Hunger. Right now, you can get 20% off your purchase. Just go to Mountainops.com and use code cam at checkout. This season, don't settle for sluggish, ignite the hunt. The reason why it's so your stomach can get kind of screwed up on a race is,

is jiggling all around, right? You're pushing. You got all these calories, kind of got an empty stomach. You're not pushing that hard on a hunt. So, like we talk about getting nauseous or whatever, shit in your pants. That's not going to happen on a hunt. But if we just kind of switch the thought process and be like, hey, I need to start thinking about getting calories in during the course of the day.

You know, because normally you'd, when you hunt, most time you don't even eat in the morning or you might have a Pop-Tart or something that you're hiking to go to find a bull. But you're not really intentional about food, or at least I hadn't been in the past. But, yeah, just having a plan for that just throughout the day, I know it's helped me, you know, ever since I started getting more serious in ultras, I'm definitely more serious on taking calories all day. I eat all day because I have to be able to make those good crunch time decisions. It's work.

And it's, yeah, so I think that, like, the endurance sports really, you know, as I said, we got started in hunting and we're like, we didn't really know module just kind of, hey, this is better than what we've ever had. But now it's like, now we're like really dialing it in. And I just feel like for me, you know, a bow that I use, a broadhead that I use, an arrow that use, it's always the very best of the best, or I'm not using it. my supplements have to be the same. Yeah.

So that's where this apex line, it's just like, I thought, to be honest, once it's true it left, you know, my son worked for Mount Ops for a long time. And the way that kind of the trajectory was going on, on Mountain Ops, I thought, okay, this is about it. I'm about done. I think I'm going to, there's probably like some higher quality stuff I could find, maybe, you know, a company that's, you know, on the come up because Mountain Ops had a good run. and then I was just like, well, this is probably it

because they're about where they're going to be and this is, I need something more. And then we started talking about this, okay, well, I don't have to leave if, I thought I was going to have to make my own, to be honest. But then we started talking about, well, could we do it together and make this just the highest quality, the best product,

the best supplements to allow me, you know, and I am selfish. I want to kill more bull. but you can too. Everyone's invited on this journey, but I just wanted to allow me to be at my highest level. And so that's where this line's exciting. I think that's what works best, right?

You're making it for yourself. And if it works for you, I can promise it's going to work for a lot of other people too, right? Like it's getting put through the toughest conditions. And that's what I think is so cool about Mountain Ops in general is, you know, hunters put these products through the rigors that most people will never experience. Right.

So if you're going to go and have success, there, you better believe it's going to help you run a marathon. You're going to believe it's going to help you on the trail or in the gym or wherever else it might be. Because they're not just for hunters, right? But certainly with that in mind, in the most grueling conditions, that's where a lot of our stuff is battle tested. And then we bring it to everybody else. So I think you've obviously created so much awareness about this hunter athlete idea that, yeah, if you want to go out there and be successful, you better be prepared, just like anything. It's not just about making sure your gears in check. It's about making sure your body's ready for the test that's coming your way,

especially if weather becomes unfavorable, and then now your calories are down and you're having to do extra work that you weren't planning on. You want to be prepared for that. And the supplementation is a piece of it. It's not going to be your solve-all. If you're not having a good day,

it's not like one supplement's going to fix it. But if you're checking the boxes where you're supposed to and getting the right amount of nutrition in, you're getting your calories, the supplements are going to help push you even further. Yeah. I think we're all looking for that. I think something happens, you know,

in your younger years, you know, you're 18 to 20-something where you're just wanting to see what you're capable of. and so there's this growth period and then as you mature there's this longing to not let go of those performance increases you're like well I'm not done yet

I don't want to be on the decline I don't want to be that guy that's like the business isn't staying flat I don't want my capabilities to stay flat I want everything to be progressing and it's not linear so it's going to be a challenge there's going to be ups and downs

but we want to keep pressing and I'm in my mid-40s and feel the same way where I'm like I don't want to stop this isn't just where I'm at like this isn't good enough I want to keep moving forward. And I think supplements are a big piece of that for me.

It's something I find when I'm continuing to take products regularly. I'm like, well, I don't want to waste my money. If I'm going to be taking this, I might as well eat right and do the work and do all the other things that are going to help me be effective. Yeah. And that includes like recovery and sleep. And there's a lot of pieces to it. And you have to plan your day.

You have to be diligent with it. Just like the work you put in the gym, you've got to put work to make sure you're recovering properly as well at all. And then when that's all clicking, that's where I think the magic happens. That's where you unlock. new PRs, you unlock new things that you didn't think were capable. And I know you've experienced that running on broken feet and doing all these things for hundreds of miles. I mean, it's incredible. So just imagine when we get the safety slide in India, you know, anything's possible.

Well, and, you know, to your point, too, but you mentioned your age, you know, and that we're not done, you know, because it used to be like when guys were my age, they were old, dude. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I was like, my dad was old right now. When you see it 58-year-old dude, you're just like, God, look at that old guy. But I haven't done it yet, but I think I'm going to get my fastest ever marathon and I've been running my whole life at 58. So we aren't done. We are, in fact, we're learning so much more,

especially with the science part of it, with the stem cells and the, you know, the peptides and, of course, the quality supplements and the diet that we're learning. And then like even just one quick little thing, I remember I was doing Western States endurance. run is a hundred mile run and um squaw valley to auburn in 2010 and i was at a low spot is coming out of the canyons is like mile 55 for only my second hundred but it was hot i was freaking dying but uh i came out of that um super hot canyons there at like i said 55 there's this guy sean meisner he's like how you feel and i'm like not great he goes he goes here take a couple salt

pills and I didn't even hadn't even really thought about salt but that was you know 16 years ago I took two salt pills and I bounced back right and so it's like there's these little things like such a key mineral to our body and I just know so if I if I think about that then you know we talk about one in the mounds or by herself maybe get some weather in and you want to have confidence you're going to survive sometimes, just like that salt pill change everything, sometimes a few calories. Oh, yeah. You know, you get, you get beat down,

you're cold, you're tired, and you're just like, I don't know if I can do this anymore. Dig around in your pack, grab something. Yeah. Take some, you know, get something to drink, get some calories in. Everything's different. All of a sudden, you're like, you know what? Okay, what do I need to do here?

And you just kind of, you just reset. but our bodies need fuel. You better have it with you. And hydration, we have to have it. And when we have it, then it's a whole different game. But I've just learned over the course of my journey as a hunter and as an athlete that sometimes it's a little things. Yeah, like how was your training change that you are in a position to run your fastest marathon? It's quite.

I think, well, you know, I think probably the stem cells and in the supplements and I think I'm way more educated on diet now than I was. I didn't know anything. I just thought I just ran all the time around like 20 miles a day and I just didn't even think about what I was eating. But now it's like everything. And, you know, Truis helped this too just because he's, you know, he's trying to go for the OTQ and the marathon. which means he needs to run under 216. So it's like this, there's this formula about how much you weigh, how fast you can go, your efficiency, you can do the training.

And so being more doubt in on diet, because he's trying to get down from one of these pull-ups, like probably 30 or 40 pounds less. So then you start thinking about counting calories, and you're like, well, how hard can I train at a deficit? Because you're stealing from your body. So you're like, then you're more susceptible to injury. So he's been like at a 700 calorie deficit every day, which I don't know if people have done this before.

It is hard. It is hard. It is hard to train at a deficit. Most people, they're not worried about deficits. They're way over. They don't know what it's like. Feels to be underfueled and push. But it's, so that's been good.

So I've been getting my weight down to. But then also I think the biggest thing is just the metrics like on sleep, you know, in recovery. HRV. I can get, sometimes I don't wear this because I get too addicted. Data overload.

Yeah. Too addicted to numbers. But this sleep, just because I hadn't ever had the time to sleep because I had a full-time job and did all this other shit on the side. So sleep was the only thing

I could steal from. And I've never really had time to sleep. Well, now, like I sleep like eight hours a day and never have. And my body's just like, thank you. Yeah.

Finally. You're waiting for this. Yeah. And so I think it's just a combination of a lifetime of being active. I haven't. I don't drink. I don't smoke. I don't sabotage myself,

which is what those things do. And I haven't for many, many years. So I think it's just kind of the perfect storm. And like we look at Rogan, he's the same age as me. Yeah. Fricking jacked.

Yeah. Dude. He's like in the best shape he's been in. So jacked. And so there's a, It's just a crazy time in the history of man right now where, hey, we don't have to be old at 58. Yeah, you don't have to hang them up yet. I don't even know when I will feel old, but I don't feel old right now.

I feel very capable. I feel like I'm better than I've ever been, which is crazy. Yeah. You know, so how exciting is that for people? Well, and that momentum, too, I think so much of, at least what I've experienced in my physical journey is, it's so much of it's mental. And if you have that mental block of being beat down, you can have that kind of combat. story but when things are clicking and you feel confident and you're able to make progress because

you're doing all the little things right that that momentum swell can really drive you through to places you didn't think you could go um i was we were talking about running and i just started getting in a running a couple years ago and it started like i could run a quarter mile jog and then walk a quarter mile yeah and it was like so defeating to not be able to just go run i was training every day right and it's like it's just didn't translate over and so but i just kept pounding it and unfortunately because my wife likes to run and she's a great run. I was like, I don't want to miss out on this with her, and she's younger than I am, so I'm trying to keep up, you know? And then it just, like, something punched through.

I think listened to a lot of content that helped motivate me learning a little bit more about the mechanics of it. And then there was this unlock and then the progression of it. You start looking at your splits. And then you're starting to run it further than you could. You know, and when I ripped off like my first 20 mile run, it was like, I cried. I was like, I didn't think this was possible. That's awesome. You know, and then now there's no excuses, right? Like, I don't need a gym. I'm fortunate to have. We have a great one at the office. I'm fortunate to have one at my house in the garage, right? So I don't have excuses, but sometimes you're somewhere and there's no gym,

but you can't not run, right? Like I have shoes so we can get outside. And that's been such a game changer for me, from traveling, what you do when you travel to a new city. But then also the health benefits of it are like nothing I've seen with any other type of training. Nothing's transformed my body more than running. And I feel like I'm more flexible. I have less pains, which I thought would be the other way. Like, oh, my knees and hips are going to hurt from running.

It's like when I'm running more frequently, I feel better all over and I sleep better and all those other things. It's been a game changer for me. And it's like I feel like people are more and more tuning in, especially in the longer distances. I think all the conversations you're having around it are really opening people's eyes to like, I don't want to just be in the gym all day. Yeah. I want to go do something with this.

You know, I think that was a pivot for me too. It was like getting in shape and then I was like, okay, well, now what? What do I do with it? Not just like, I don't want to just look good, better than I used to. I want to go go do something cool. And all of a sudden you unlock all these things that like as a guy that was, you know, almost 80 pounds overweight, I couldn't do those things.

And so now like almost anything is on the table. And it's so exciting. Yeah. What's your goal? I want to do an ultra. I want to do the Bryce Canyon Ultra. Oh, that's my goal. Yeah.

Is that a 50K? Yeah. So like a nice, you know, middle ground, not a nothing burger, but yeah. James doesn't count 50Ks, but we don't, he's an idiot. I count it. That's going to count for me for sure. I count them. And that's beautiful country, too.

I love Utah. I mean, I've done Moab, which is another great run. But yeah, that's exciting too because, you know, I've been a gym guy my whole life. But there's something about fluorescent lights and just like loud music and it's cool and it's like fun. And it's like almost like it was like a nightclub for a while. You'd go. All the girls were there. It's like, this is sweet.

but I feel I don't feel different in the I feel different in the mountains in the fresh air having this whether it's the sun on my face the rain on my face whatever that's feeling yeah I don't the gyms are more artificial obviously yeah it's manufactured it's manufactured I I love you know just the life that the outdoors gives you or or how it impacts my life I guess but But it's all good though. It's all benefit. It's like if you can't, some people live in cities, they can't get outside. They're at work all day.

It's fine. Just go work out, get on the treadmill. It's all good. But yeah, I totally get what you're saying too about, you know, with that, with the running journey, nobody is born great. A great run. I mean, it's like that first run for everybody, it's probably going to be tough. And it's one of those things like, you know, not having a drink for. for 21 years, you start.

And it's like, all right, you're never going to have another drink. Like, you can't think that way. You have to do like one step at the time. It's the same with running where you're like, well, I'm going to run a marathon. It's like, well, we probably should then go outside and try to do a mile. Right. And it's so daunting. And so you just have to chunk it out like little bits and amazing.

When you get a little momentum, you look back and you're like, look at where we are now. Yeah. And so, yeah, any tips for a new runner to figure out how to survive here? Tips for new runner. No, because other than just getting out there. Time on feet, yeah. Just time on feet, yeah. It's like I just, you know, I think jelly roll has a great attitude about it where he had a thing.

And I've said it on here before too, but your self-talk. So even when he was over 500 pounds and there was no running in any of the runs he would do, he would say he's going to go out on his run. Even though he's walking and have to take him. a smoke break during the run, he would say, I'm going on my run. So he was telling himself, he was telling his body, we're running. And he wasn't yet, but those are the words he was using. And so it's just, that's just a perfect example.

Then he would get out and like coming from his house is downhill to the left, uphill to the right. He said he'd always go down, down, down, which most people would do. But he said he decided that, you know, he'd been taking the easy road his whole life, which is how he got to the bad position he was in. So he starts going out of his driveway and going uphill to the hard road. And just little stuff like that, dude, it doesn't have to. Your life's not going to change overnight.

I mean, it might, but mine never did. But every day you make decisions like that. It's not even, well, it's not even every day because there's 50 decisions you can make like that all day. Are you making the right decision? Are you making an easy decision or the hard decision? Are you making the right or the wrong? Are you, you know, are you sabotaging kind of your goal by doing this? So there's all these, and we know.

Yeah. We know whether you're making the right decision or not. You can lie to yourself. We can justify all sorts of shit to ourselves. But when you look in the mirror at night, you know. You know if you did the right thing. So just make the right decision all day. And it's like you're not going to feel good about it because sometimes, like,

Like even me, I'll wrestle, I'll consciously think that I wasn't going to do the right thing there. I had to stop myself and really think about what is going on right here. And so we know. I know. I'm still, I still struggle every day with like, am I being the person I'm intended to be? Yeah, because motivation's fleeting, right? So sometimes you just, you'd make the decision to do it. And I don't think I've ever regretted doing a workout.

I've never, you know, there's those days where like I really don't want to today. I'm fortunate. I feel like where I've gotten past a lot of that where it's harder for me not to work out. It's like I feel worse when I don't. But that time where you're like, oh, something maybe doesn't feel right or I'm a little tired or I got some excuse that I want to give myself with the kids or work or whatever it might be, you make the time you do it. You never go, man, I wish I didn't do that workout.

I try not to let it like impede my time with work or my family to the best of my ability. So it ends up being like early mornings or late nights. So it's on my time, like shorting your sleep or doing those things. So I don't feel guilty like I'm missing out on my daughter's for steps or something like that. But I've never been like, man, I shouldn't have done that workout. I'm always like, even if it was a crappy one, even if like I just moved a little bit, maybe get in the sauna, get and break a sweat. I'm always like, that was better than nothing.

And it's like if you can just do those little things every day. And I feel like it's like that with supplements. Like you're not going to take a pre-workout and that one workout's going to change your life. But if you keep just putting those pennies in the bank and get consistent. with it, you look back and you're like, wow, I've made so much progress by being consistent. And I find if I'm taking those supplements, I make better choices with my diet too. Because I'm like, well, if I'm going to put these supplements in my system, why would I go and then grab this crappy food that's going to make me feel terrible?

It's like I'm going backwards. So when I have all those things, it feels like it's clicking. Yeah. Yeah. Some people wake up when they have to. Some people wake up because something in them refuses to stay still. Spring has a way of exposing that. new light, new ground, new work to be done.

Out with old excuses, in with the new standard. If you're lacing up boots before sunrise, loading up a pack, stepping into the garage gym, or logging miles while the world's still quiet, you don't need soft fuel. You need something built for a rebellion, the discipline kind.

Black Rifle Coffee didn't discover grit in 2026. They were founded on it. Built by veterans who understand early mornings, quiet courage and doing hard reps nobody applauds. The ready to drink cold brew is made for motion. Just black. Clean, direct, no nonsense. Vanilla, smooth, bold, still all business. Throw it in your truck, your range bag, your pack.

It's ready when you are. And when the season demands more, grab grape X or wild frost from black rifle energy. Zero sugar, 200 milligrams of caffeine, no crap. No compromise. This isn't about trends. It's about renewal. Raising your bar. New season, sharper edge.

Find Black Rifle Coffee at Walmart, Target, Kroger, your local Black Rifle Coffee shop, or online at black rifle coffee.com. And use code, keep hammering for 10% off your purchase. Fuel the rebellion and keep hammering. Out in the mountains, there's no room for wheat gear. When I'm packing out meat in the heat, or loading up for a long-range training trip, I need a cooler that holds the line every time.

That's why I use grizzly coolers. These things are bareproof, rugged as hell, and keep ice locked in for days, literally. I've had coolers on the trail, baking in the sun, still holding ice after hauling out out quarters. That's performance you can count on. Whether you're running deep in the backcountry or just stacking meat for the weekend, Grizzly is built for that. that grind. Right now, you can get 20% off at grizzlycoolers.com with the code, keep hammering. And that's all one word. And I'm not going to spell it. Keep hammering. Again, keep hammering one word for 20% off. Don't roll with weak gear. Go Grizzly.

I think, you know, that reminded me of something too. It's every time I travel and I don't know if this is just me or like I said, you know, so dialed in with the diet, but I was thinking, like when you're thinking about even crappy workouts or better than no workouts, and then I was thinking about how sensitive our bodies can be.

So to your point there on even a shitty workout is better than nothing, right? And because what it gives you mentally, it's like, okay, I at least did something, right? So that's a win. But also, and your body is sensitive to that. your body and your mind are tied together. So if you can make your mind or feel better about the decision you make,

your body's going to respond, right? So it's like I'm always like, it's at self-talk. It's like being intentional about why am I doing, what am I doing? But also when I travel, like when you get so dialed in and like all these supplements matter, all these decisions matter, it's proven to me every single time I'm like, I try to eat, Perfect. You know, I don't drink. I try to buy it. If I'm going to buy something at the airport, it's going to be peanuts, right? It's like proteins. Like you can't heart a peanut, but they do. I do this for like a few days, a short trip, come back. I'm five pounds heavier. Just from,

it's just different food. It's not quite the quality. It's probably got more seed. I don't even know what. Seed oils. I don't know. But my body, is sensitive to something changed. So it's just like that's just a precursor to be to like how much it all matters. I think is kind of what I've learned. It's like I thought, oh, I'm getting close enough. I can eat this. I can get away with this.

You can, but you're not going to beat your highest level because your body, your body notices. It knows. It responds differently. So it's like we think about all these little things. And we're talking about these ingredients, these life decisions, these workout decisions. it all matters. It does.

And sometimes I think we try to convince ourselves that, ah, it's not that big a deal. It throws you off quick, like eating different foods. Like, you can trigger a bunch of inflammation and that has this, like, you know, downstream effect on a lot of things. That's why you see a lot of our products come in grab and go. We have, like, stick packs of a lot of our products. That way they can be in your pack whether you're out in the mountain. You can somewhere in your backpack if you're traveling. That way you always have access to your reins.

You can grab a protein bar. You know, you grab the big stick. are 20 grams of protein and that meat stick is awesome. I know, it's good. It's the most protein on the market. It's delicious. I keep like 10 of those in my bag at all time. Like the kids eat them.

I eat them. I don't have an excuse with those. And there's nothing like crazy in here, right? There's nothing bad in there at all. No, they're great. Yeah, they're super clean. We have added six grams of collagen to get that nice protein claim. Yeah.

So you're getting a lot of benefits, not just from the protein helping rebuild muscle, but it's also giving you collagen peptides to help support your joints and ligament health as well. So it's like you can feel good about eating. that. And it's all the whole muscle meat. You know, it's not a bunch of filler junk in there. Right. So I'm like always stuffed with electrolytes, meat sticks, protein bars. Because it's tough. When you're traveling, I'm back and forth to Utah like every other week. So there's

always an excuse for me. And I was like, I was feeling that. The first like six months, I was like, this isn't working great for my, my physical being. Like I'm not getting my training in like, because I have this gym at home. So that's like my, that's my dojo. Like, that's where I have my setup. I can know how to get my workouts in. And then I'd be traveling. And so now what I do is I really emphasize running in YouTube. because it's just a beautiful place to run. And I live right next to this rail line. So you can run for hundreds of miles straight as an arrow.

And there's just no excuse. It's always beautiful out there. But then you come back and you're back and forth. And it was like, oh, I have to prepare. I have to, like, mentally and physically prepare for these changes that are coming my way. If I don't have the right stuff, the right equipment, the right foods and nutrition, I'm going to fail. It's got to be intentional. Yeah, then it's on me.

So, like, I can't blame the travel. Like, I signed up for that deal. So, okay, I got to do that. And I still have goals. I think that's like, you know, most people are juggling that. And I try to remind myself like, hey, everybody's got stuff in the way. Nobody's just sitting around all day with nothing to do other than just train and have fun. You got to make it work.

You know, I also want to have time with my family. I also want to do a good job at work. I also want to be present for my friends and family. And that requires, like, effort, you know, just like anything worth doing. Yeah. You know, I mean, with your bodybuilding.com days, they made famous, like the traveling with the chicken breast. Oh, man. All the little cooler stuff.

We've come a long way. Do you remember the six-pack bags? It was like a cooler bag that looked like it had abs on it and had all these little like trays for your food. And I spent a lot of time with a lot of people that kept a lot of prepared foods, ziplocks of just chicken. And you know, why did they do that? Because they had goals. Because it mattered. Yeah, it matters.

It really does. Yeah. When you're traveling and you're going to these shows and expos, yeah, it's like burgers and fries. And you're going to spend this prep of 12, 14, 16, 18 weeks and then throw it all away. Like, absolutely not. So you're going to eat chicken out of a bag. Yeah. And I was telling you a little bit, we're coming out with some meals that we're pretty excited about on the freeze-dried meal side.

And this is a new use case that I'm really excited about for what you're talking about. It's one, these meals are shelf-stable for 15 years, right? So you can have them ready to go. Good prepper stuff. Prepper stuff, right? But these are like real ingredients. So all stuff that you can read, it's made with homemade noodles. It's got real chicken, real vegetables.

in there. So if you would eat it, whether you're out in the mountain or at home, it's going to be like eating real food because it is real food. But we're also making macro-friendly ones. So you have these ones that are, you know, 500 calories that have 30, 40 grams of protein and at low-fat, moderate carbs, it aligns perfectly with my diet. So I have like no more excuses. All you do is add hot water and you have a great nutritious meal and 10 minutes. So I'm like really excited that selfishly. I'm like, I have no more excuses. I have healthy food no matter where I am, no where I'm traveling. And we can obviously service our customers with a great product that I feel superior than what's on the market. And those are coming out this summer. So those are pretty exciting. I can't wait for you to try

and see what you think. Yeah. No, that sounds really good. I mean, there's those meals I've gotten, you know, just in general have gotten, I used to do MREs back in the days. Those things who are not good. And then you start getting, like I said, this chicken Alfredo. I could, it feels like you could eat that every night when you get home. It's so good. But at home, it's not quite a lot. is good, but out there, man. Yeah, you'll be surprised. I've been serving it to my family as like a secret just to see the reaction from

them, and I've snuck it past them up quite a few times. So it's real food. It tastes good. Kids, yeah, kids can tell. Yeah, they tell me when I overcook the steak right away, yeah, they're not shy on critiquing the chef. Well, I just know when I'd get a McDonald's hamburger and remember those little tiny flakes of onions.

Mm-hmm. I don't want those on there. No one. So it's like, even the little things. So, yeah, kids, like see that little green whatever that is that's an onion get it out of here yeah so yeah if if you're getting to buy kids that's that's good yeah yeah and i was going to say too it's like uh like as sensitive as your body can be is here's one thing like this whole week it's like kind of been kicking my ass this week i've been in the same body weight since friday and like not it's just weird how your body

It just, your body's so sensitive. And it's just like, I cannot, it cannot, my body weight is not moving. And I've put in over 100 miles this week. So it's over 14 miles a day. You know, I couldn't run for a while because I had surgery on my mouth. But so I was out there for hours and hours and hours and no weight loss. And it's just, it's just crazy how it just proves to me over and over how much everything makes a difference, how it matters, how our bodies respond to everything, either positively or positively,

and we just try to learn along the way and make good decisions. You got to throw a curveball once in a while. I feel like your body adapts to whatever the new stimulus is. Probably, there's a set point, I think, on your body too. And I think my weight right now is my body's set point. And to get past it, it takes- You got to change something. Yeah.

I was curious, so what's your workout now? Like, when you're in your dojo, what do you do? It's a lot of hybrid stuff. a lot of like heavy lifting mixed in with various cardio. So we'll do like a lot of rounds training where it'll be three to five minute rounds of an activity barbell work along with sprinting and running and rowing and all that kind of stuff. So your elevated heart rate pretty much the whole time just kind of ramped up. And then I'll do more of a really focused strength day. And then I have a run focused day. So I have kind of like this hybrid day where I do a little bit of everything. I do one

where it's just straight up lifting where we're going to lift heavy. We're going to take breaks in between sets so we can recover and feel like we can get after it. That's like a three to five rep range when I go heavier, work up to that. And then when we're doing like the more mixed, you know, it's much higher rep stuff, just burning it out, trying to redline as much as we can. And then two types of run days, I'll do a longer run or I'll do like some tempo work. Okay. But it's evolved over years where I'm still that fat guy inside. He's outside eating cookies and parking out waiting for me, right? And so for me, it's like as long as I'm interested

and excited to do it, I'm good. And I think throwing in some variability, because if I do the same type of training, all of a sudden my weight just kind of stays. And I'm like, all right, well, we got to mix it up. Either I got to go back to like an intermittent fasting protocol where I'm shortening my feeding window and kind of throw a little curveball to the system there metabolically,

or I need to ramp up my training in some way. And either I just need to do like a ton of running or a lot more lifting and just kind of, I don't know, change it up for my body in some way. And then I feel like, oh, my plateau is gone and I'll smash through it. And then mentally, I think for me, when I run a lot, my weight goes down, which is good. I get really lean, but my strength comes down.

And then I get to that point where I'm like, well, I don't want to lose all of that. I still like being able to handle certain weights on any given day of the week. And I get worried that I'm going to lose that. So it's a little bit of back and forth, but the general structure is, you know, five, six days of training a week with two kind of like recovery active days. And those sometimes get pressed into like real workouts, but there's not a lot of days off. I see. Yeah. Yeah, that seems like, yeah, that's a great schedule.

It's a lot of variety. It's like my biggest hobby, too. So it's something I enjoy doing. It's something I train with my wife a lot. So it's like something we get to do together, which has always been fun. And then back at the Onet days, I mean, we had this awesome gym attached to the headquarters. So there was like no excuse. And what was awesome when you're building a brand like that to have on the other side of the wall of you,

you could hear the gym just like bumping the energy to that place is like through the roof. So it was like, man, I just want. want to get in there. And that really opened me up to a variety of training with steel maces and kettlebells and things that I had never used before. That at first I was like, oh, this seems weird. And then you start using them and your body moves better. You don't have as many pains. And all that like offset load and unconventional training, I found I was getting injured less. It seemed like it would get injured more looking at those movements. Like those seem awkward. But I think when you put yourself in an awkward positions more continuously, you actually respond better to it. Durability. Yeah, way more durable.

So I try to just whatever keeps me interested And lately it's been the running I think I just responded so well to it And there's some sort of like It's like the younger me that couldn't do it I'm like showing him that we can do it And I'm like this weird moment out there with myself Of like really testing myself

And pushing a little further And it's very rewarding. Yeah So as long as it's rewarding I'm into it You know I've done some boxing I've done some different things power lifting And I can put on weight

I mean I can get up to 225 pretty easy And I can take down calories. So I never have... Do we got abs though? Not at 225. You can kind of go like, oh, maybe they're there. I'm better here, like, closer to two.

Then the abs are popping really good. And I think for me, when I lose those, that's hard. I think being the fatter guy, you know, like you see that. You don't want to lose that. They're hard to keep, man. You know, and you're not, I don't know, genetically disposed to have them. Easily, it's like, it's tough when they go away. Yeah, I hear that.

Yeah, and it is tough to keep them. I was curious back in the day, like, you know, because I used to train with Nick the trainer dude, Eric McCorm. Oh, you know Eric. I know Eric. Yeah, yeah. These workouts are terrible. Oh, my God. Bruegel.

I used to come here every night. He broke me in this workout and I had like this, like my brain and body disconnected, you know, and he's talking me through it. And it was like an emotional experience that happened. What were you doing? Do you remember? We did all body weight stuff. So I was like, this is, I can do this.

This is going to be a problem. And I think maybe I got a little cocky with it. And so he was just in my ear the whole time. And you're going through these movements, just like an incredible amount of air squats and lunges. And then he took us through this ab circuit. And of all the things, the abs broke me. And it was just like, I got, unbelievable. Yeah, Bicycles.

Yeah. You know better than anybody. And I was like, golly, I can't believe you broke me doing abs. You know? His abs circuit, dude, it'll break anybody. Yeah. And he's in your ear. and he's like, you know, think of something.

I forget what he said. He triggered me and it made me think about like this emotional thing and it just like lost it and then you're training even harder, but then it's just all shut down. I mean, that guy will take you to the deep waters and back. The goal is failure as many times as possible. Yeah. So whatever movement you're doing, you do it to you can't do it.

Right. And I don't think most people realize what going to failure really is. Most people don't realize they're not training hard until you hang out with a guy like that. And he will, you know, the goal is to fail over and over and over because that's for your body response. Correct. Because your body has to get strong.

Oh, you're going to have us do this? Okay. We got to get stronger. We got to get stronger. We got to build some more muscle. And yeah, he's the best of that. But the point was I was going to say is like back in the day, we used to, they were bodybuilders. They did the shows.

I never did. But we used to lift together all the time. I used to love to lift. But it used to be the carb cycle. So it would be five days of, say, 50 to 75 grams. and then the weekends or whatever two days would be, you'd go up to three or 400 grams of carbs. So you get that metabolism cranking.

Yeah. You take those carbs away. Your body's like, holy shit. I thought we were working here. So now it has to use fat to burn. And you do that carb cycling, like because 50 to 75 grams of carbs dude is fricking. It feels like you're starving to death. Yeah.

And what you do for an apple, you know. Or like, if I used to, if I used to, it was so depleted and I had to go lift at night, I used to be like those one little oatmeal packs. Yeah. Like a little instant oatmeal. That, if you just take, that's what, that's why like this whole training and giving your body what it needs in an adult ultra race is, you can tell because I would do that one little pack of is like 90 calories oatmeal package. And it's like it's like I gave myself jet fuel.

You like fill up. Everything. I got energy, I got veins popping because when you have no carbs, there's no veins. You're flat. Everything's flat. And when you lift, I want to see veins. Oh, yeah. I want to see some. I want to pop, okay? But with no carbs, it's not going to happen. Well, one little oatmeal packet just showed me that, God, these carbs, this fuel, this what we're putting in our body is like, it matters. The bodybuilders, I feel like figured a lot of that stuff out for us years ago. Yes. And now you're seeing it put in a practice.

in other ways, and they do it to an extreme, right, to look a certain way to be on stage in this moment, right? As an athlete, you want to be able to perform all the time, but there's so much to learn from what bodybuilded, I think, paved the way for supplementation, for a lot of different types of training, but then you mix that with the endurance sports and all of a sudden you got rocket fuel if you do it right. Yeah. Because you're right, yeah, if you're depleted in one area or you're deficient in another, it'll affect you in ways you weren't expecting. And you have to get in front of it. And so there's so much more science in literature and just, information out there now of people that have went through it all and tested it, that yeah,

finding the right protocol for you, testing it yourself, because what works for you might not work for me, you know, depending on age, performance levels, whatever it might be. And you've got to figure that stuff out in your training, not in real time when you're trying to perform. But yeah, the carb cycling is crazy. I've watched guys go on stage and be flat. Like they got their timing wrong and then they had their cheat meal after. And then they're incredible.

I'm like, you look better now. than you did earlier, you know. After they messed up. Yeah, suffered so much. Oh, it's so brutal. But yeah, every time they get, they go have their cheat meal, the big burger and whatever,

and then they're just huge. Yeah, garden home veins, you know, everything, yeah. Meanwhile, they're on stage just flat. I feel terrible for them because that, so much dedication. There's so much sacrifice to in that sport. Yeah. It's so much deprivation.

And it's so mental, just like anything, I guess. I mean, endurance is the same way to your body. can usually do more than you think and you just have to power through the mental block of your brain saying stop stop stop please stop what's crazy is like when you get in that again i haven't done the shows but i know what it's like to to walk by and even see one potato chip and not and say no yeah one one potato chip sitting on the counter anyone in the regular life is going to eat that potato chip it's tough doing it in the normal world or

Right. When I first really started losing the weight and getting into it, I quickly transitioned to this job at bodybuilding.com. And so everybody was into it. It was such a cool place to work. Everybody was very like-minded. So you had a lot of people that were packing meals and eating tilapia and broccoli for lunch, that kind of stuff. And we at the time had a frozen meal solution, which I feel like Bodybuilding.com in a lot of ways. And Ryan DeLucah, who founded that company, was very forward-thinking in ways that people weren't even addressing, where that meal delivery system that he created back then would be a, an absolute destroyer today. But like you were eating all these super clean, super macro friendly, bland foods,

but everybody was. So it wasn't hard. Yeah. It was hard, but it wasn't as hard as going to a regular office. Right. And everybody's like in the McDonald's and donuts and this and that. And you're having to be the weird guy where you were the weirdo

if you were eating the junk at that place. So it made it like socially acceptable, which made it way easier. It was a cool place to be around. Yeah, I just like that what we learn along the way because I know, There was a time in endurance sports where keto was like if you could be ketogenic, you could be fueled by keto that or your fat adapted essentially.

As we talked about in marathons, like you have every 35, 40 minutes, you got to take in carbs, right? Well, in an ultra, if you're doing a 200 mile ultra, you can't take in carbs every 30 minutes. You can't pack that much shit with you. Right? So what people had a lot of success with is like, let's be fat adapted. And I tried it.

I did Crazy Mountain 100 in Montana. And I'm like, Mike McNay was helping me because he was like this fat adapted athlete and he was like no carb runner on Instagram. And so I was like, oh, this might be an unlock. I could just burn fat.

And I want to take calories. My body will perform better. But now it's like kind of switched again because now then, have you ever heard of bicarb? So basically, bicarb is just baking soda. Okay.

But runners are using it because... I have heard about that, yeah. Because it can just shuttle in fuel fast, right? So it changed from like, because endurance sports are different than like, say, on the track where it's, you're not going at that pace so you don't need to get fuel burning as fast. Like so fat, even the slower burning can work if you're doing a, 11 minute mile. If you're doing a five-minute mile,

that happened. You need carbs. Yeah. And so there was like this change. It's like, okay, well, how fast are you running these ultras? What type of fuel do you need type thing? Well, now it's like, then bi-carb came on. And now it's like some guys, they're stealing from the Tour de France, basically.

And they're over 150 grams of carbs an hour. Wow. Which is a ton of carbs. On the bike, you can get away with a little more. Your stomach isn't jiggling. right your your legs are just hammering running is harder to get 150 grams but the point is it's like now they're testing all that to see you know they're doing the lactate test on the ear to see what their levels are but there's so much science into it it's just like it's super fast I just love following

all of it and trying to learn and to see you know I try it all I do I do it all because I'm like I want to be at my best I want to be what do I need to be the very best I've ever been so to me I just can't get enough of it. Well, and it's interesting. It's like what you're doing out there in these extreme conditions then feeds kind of the mainstream gym goer too, right?

It's kind of like what you see in racing where you'll see technology come out of F1 that gets trickled into a regular automobile years later, right? It's kind of the same thing. You look to the bodybuilders or you look to the extreme athletes that are testing these things that are already on the fringe. So they're pushing it further than anybody else has.

And then it's like the learnings that come from that, then get adapted into kind of regular day supplementation. Right. And that's really cool. So, like, yeah, being the guinea pig, if you have the mentality for it and the stomach for it, right? You can find a lot about yourself and what really does work, but you've got to put the time into it.

Most people aren't willing. So we thank you for being the guinea pig for us. Yeah, it's just, you know, it is a process. I know, like, Trude, he ran CIM. He was trying to, he did break 230, but he thought that, oh, okay, the big thing was carbloaded, so he tried to get 600 grams of carbs in the night before. Then he was taking all these gels during the race.

His stomach revolted. I bet. And he had to stop. During the marathon, like, come to a complete stop because his stomach was hurting so bad. Still got 229 something. That's crazy. But that didn't work.

So, like, that was an example where we're trying. Sometimes we miss. It's experimentation, yeah. You learn a tough lesson. But that's like with this apex line, I'm really excited just to get this dialed in. And it's kind of like, you know, Truis doing the same thing with, he's got one of his companies that are here. He's doing his own gel. But we're just, we're just trying to be our best.

Yeah. You know, so like we're so lucky. I'm lucky that I'm with Mountain Ops. He's with whoever. But people, these partners that are on the same page. And it's just like, yeah, we want you to be your best, you know, or like Mountain Ops wants me to be successful. Yeah. So you're helping me.

And hopefully everybody else can benefit from that also. But man, what a fun time. Well, and how blessed are we to work and be involved in any way with products and companies that help people? Yeah. You know what I mean? That's something that, like, I've never had the Sunday scleries because it's like, one, I was the customer and I still am.

But it's like we're helping people on their journey, whether it's to be a better endurance athlete or to have a better experience on the mountain while they're hunting or to just be. be like a better dad and be able to play with their kids and keep up the life they have going on, versus like selling some sort of widget that goes inside some machine that, you know, does whatever or potentially even is bad for people. You're, you know, you're making sodas or junk food. Like, those are fun and they have a place, but there's something really rewarding about working on products that help people unlock more potential. Yeah. And I think for me it had such a big impact on my life.

It's very easy for me to think about that 73% of our customers that have never taken a supplement, right? Like they're just getting off the couch for the first time. And that's hard. I've been there. And it's, you know, easy to look to someone like you and be like, that's so inspiring, but it's so far away. And I think what we're doing helps close that gap a little bit. Like, okay, well, let's take one step of time. You know, we're there with you. I think the community piece is a really big aspect that a lot of people miss is like, you know, we're talking about eating at bodybuilding.com's office was easy. But when you work at a regular place and everybody else is eating trash, you're so alone. It's such a lonely journey to like make those, a lot of times

even in your own family, you'll have your spouse or the kids, like nobody else is doing it except you. And they're like, well, you're the one that needs to lose weight. Like, we're fine. But then like they're eating chicken and cheese and you're sitting over there with your chicken and broccoli, you know, right. It's kind of sad. Yeah. So it's nice to have, you know, one, like the content that you put out that people can connect with and be inspired by and feel like they're not alone. You know, Mountain Ops has a community online that people can connect and share their, like, experience strength and hope to help them take the next step. And when new people come into the fold, you watch that community rally around somebody because we're all figuring it out. And a lot of

people have been through maybe those experiences of like having to go to a family party or a reunion or something like that and have to be the guy with their Tupperware. Here's the tools you can do to do it. It's interesting. As someone that didn't grow up with it coming naturally to me, I can really relate to those that are struggling with it. And for me, it's so fulfilling to be able to make products that work that are safe. There's so many of our products I give to my kids, you know what I mean, that I'm like, that's cool, that they like it, the big sticks. I mean, everybody's eating those sticks.

Yeah, yeah. Can't keep them in the house. They're great. It feels good. They're great. Yeah. What was I going to say? Oh, yeah.

I mean, I was just going to say Mountain Ops has always done a really good job on the community aspect, just like from helping with the meals to just like building that community. Yeah. I just think that that's been one of the strengths of Mountain Opses, is just getting people on board, educating them, as you said, from the ground level up. It's been, yeah, it's been amazing to see. I love that part of it. I was curious, like, when you talked about, so how did you grow up or was, was, you know, exercise wasn't part of your family or what? Both my parents worked out.

My dad introduced me to, like, working out in the basement. I was just kind of like those old plastic weights filled the sand or whatever. 8.8 pounds. Yeah, and he had a Nordic track and he'd be grinding away on that stuff. But it just, I don't know, I didn't take to it as much as he did. And then when it came back around, I had a base kind of level of understanding so I could kind of dive in, but it just wasn't really how I grew up. And I think I was just one of those kids that found sports later in life.

I had get glasses, right? And when you're trying to play sports with glasses can be really tricky. Like, I played hockey and things. and it's like they're fogging up while you're trying to skate. So it's just like it was always a little bit harder for me. And then once, you know, I got contacts and started to be able to make other decisions for myself, it kind of unlocked that and was able to go all in. And I think, you know, battling with alcoholism, that was a bigger priority for me,

was being out and partying and drinking than it was to like take care of myself. Yeah. And so once that was removed, it like cleared the path. And I had idle hands. I had all this time on my hands now that I was, you know, was spent doing all these other things where I was like, I got to find a new hobby that's not doing that. and the reward of it. And also, I think for me,

someone that used to love drinking, taking supplements was really cool because it was like, oh, I can take this thing and feel something. I can take this thing and have it help me in a way. So I kind of like replaced that. I just started experimenting with a lot of things to see what my body responded to.

And it just kind of got me hooked on that way. And like you, I just started experimenting. Like I've tried so many diets, keto diets. I've done, you know, different protocols around intermittent fasting or carb loading. Like, I've tried just different things to see what I like and keeps me engaged and doing the right thing

or how I respond to it. Like I find it interesting. It's fun to me. Yeah, I mean, it's no difference than when a new bow comes out. I want to shoot more. Yeah, it's like, yeah, we like just checking stuff out and learning more.

And I think like the key with seeing how your body responds and like pushing those, either it's like new lifting limits, you know, new PRs, whatever, new running PRs. That's cool. Yeah. And you get connected with people. I feel like I've been really fortunate in my career to have access to people that most people just see on YouTube or something like that. And I've been able to work out with people in the space that are exciting to learn from.

And it's like it's not lost on me as a fan first as someone that was on the outside of the space that's now in. It's exciting to me to like have access to that. And it's not lost on me. And I don't take it for granted. So like if I can get a few minutes with someone that can give me some really cool tidbits on how to get a little bit better. I try to soak that up and make use of it because not everybody gets a chance to do that. So it's been a weird world that I've somehow found myself involved in. And it's like it's like a playground.

It's fun. Yeah. Well, no, that's exciting. It's a good time. Hey, do you have questions for us? I do. We'll probably have to cut these out. Actually, I have an interesting one to start with.

See, you guys are just as perplexed by this as I am. These are going to these are going to. be retarded by the way so just get ready just they found that actually exercising general exercise doesn't burn any more calories than if you were to just sit around whatever who's they studies have shown oh i mean there's four out of five dinner survey yeah but yeah so apparently what they found is that the body compensates by the energy you are using by exercising by reducing energy usage in other areas in your body. So at the end of the day, your total caloric usage is roughly the same as what it would be

if you didn't exercise. Now, more muscle mass, obviously, burn more calories. Your daily allotment would be more, but just general exercise doesn't. Is there a question? I wouldn't know what you guys thought about that. Oh. Yeah, what do you think? I mean, maybe there's something in there.

I think our body does like homeostasis, right? like what you were talking about with your set point, there's probably something that, you know, your body will preserve energy to save it for something else if you're exercising or something maybe. I don't know. I used to sit on the couch a lot and play video games and drink beers all day,

and I definitely didn't burn as many calories as I do now. So I don't know. I'm going to call BS on that one. I think it's, are they trying to say like if you're blind, you can smell really good? Yeah. Isn't that kind of how it works?

Yeah. It's big pharma. All I know is so if I So when I did Coca-odona, what did I burn like 36,000 calories? Yeah, that's what I'm saying. You could have just said on the couch. So I could have just laid in that bed in the hotel room and burn? It makes no sense to me personally.

Well, how do you feel about like, you know, GLP-1s? I've had conversation with people where they feel like it's cheating. Is this that was epic stuff? Yeah. I don't, if what I've been seeing is like the Ozympics face, it doesn't look great. Right. It doesn't look like as good for you. Yeah.

There's probably something there. If somebody needs a jump start, like if, you know, you know, jelly roll, he's done it all naturally. But if somebody was like at five or six hundred pounds and maybe that would help him get a couple hundred off to get some momentum going, I don't know. I don't know what that. Would that be a positive? It feels like it, but I don't know. That's kind of like a one-off. I'm kind of into it.

I feel like if there's things that help people start down the path like you're saying, like, okay, this is going to jumpstart me or it's going to help me head towards where I'm trying to go. Just like, you know, years and years ago, we weren't talking about testosterone replacement therapy like we are now. There's more accessibility to stuff like that and peptides and whatever else it might be. I'm kind of all for most of it. As long as it's done under the right supervision, because like you want to be the best version of yourself, right? So you're going to optimize your intake, whatever that might be,

supplementation, nutrition, peptides and things to make sure you can get to the levels that you want to be. And I think we live in an age where we have access to stuff that just wasn't available before. So I think overall it's a net positive thing. Yeah. I think there's other ways to go about it. But most of those people wouldn't have taken that step without it.

So it's like I think it's a step in the right direction. Yeah. When you look at like the obesity crisis in our country, I think if it's helping that, that's a good thing. Yeah, I get that. I just don't know what the side effects of that. Long term, yeah. Is it something you have to do for the rest of your life?

Are you going to develop better habits and use it or use it as a crutch forever? I think if you have a plan to like then get off and then do kind of a normal protocol that allows you to be at a healthy weight, then I think it's cool. Yeah. I was just, I didn't know because remember how the stomach stapling was a thing. Right. And then everybody, they lose the weight and this comes back. Yeah.

You know, so I just didn't know sometimes there's been success stories too. So I'm sure it's worked great, but not always. But I guess that's anything. It's abstinence in any form, right? Like if you're going to, you know, do some sort of program that helps you not drink anymore, you can take away the drink. But if you don't work on the reasons why you were drinking so much, if you don't do that other work with it, you'll just kind of go back.

Yeah. I feel like it's the same. Like if you're not working on better habits or learning more about nutrition or starting to exercise, yeah, as soon as you take away the ozempic or whatever it is, you probably go right back to where you're right. But I would hope that most people are using it more like a launch pad. Yeah. You know, but just like anything, it's going to be abused in some way. Yeah. No, that's, I still think you can't sit on the couch and burn as many calories is working out.

I'm not buying that at all. What else you got, James? So coming from another successful brand, what's one thing that's kind of a constant? that a brand needs to find that success. Yeah, and I've experienced this three times now, both bodybuilding and on it and Mountain Apps have this as community. That's the differentiator.

And I think when you stand for something like that, there's a lot of supplements on the market. There's a lot of pre-workouts. There's a lot of protein powders. Maybe some have cleaner ingredients or some have more caffeine or some have more efficaciously dosed formulas or something. But by and large, they get to be very similar after a while.

I think we have access to a lot of it. So what do you stand for? What are you doing to connect with somebody differently? Mountain ops connected with a consumer base that nobody was really talking to about health and fitness in The Hunter. And I think that that registered really well. That clicked. And I feel like it's an audience that's like, oh, I'm being serviced in a way that nobody was

really speaking our language. And so that community piece is something that, whether it's another brand's on sale or it's got a new thing, it doesn't matter because I'm bought into the lifestyle. and I align with the lifestyle. And then you look at what we do with the do-good, where we donate a meal to families in need. And we've done almost 12 million meals to date. Like that stands for something.

And I think people respect that. When you look at Mountain Ups, first core value is recognizing God, I think a lot of people go like, I like that. I like that. You stand for something and you're proud enough to stand tall and talk about that where not everybody is.

So there's something to align with. On it, very unconventional. I think it was like the fitness misfits. You would go in the on a gym and there's people training with clubs and maces with their shoes off. And it was a different way. And it was like this magnet for other like-minded individuals to feel safe and excited to be in that environment. And Aubrey Marks and Marcus and Joe Rogan created that environment for a lot of people and talked about it in a way that nobody else was. So you had this safe space to kind of explore and play in that world.

BodyBuilden.com had one of the biggest online communities ever in body space. And that site alone was getting almost 40 million unique visitors each month. So it was just a safe space for people to share their vulnerability with that journey. So it wasn't just bodybuilders. I would say the majority of the customers there were people like who I was, someone that was like taking those first few steps and losing weight and trying to learn and make progress. And I had to do it on my own, but I could connect into this community that was also doing it alongside of me. And I look at these three brands and they all have that. They have that backbone of community.

And I think that's what gives you staying power in an industry like this. You have to stand for something. You have to have a group of people that are like-minded that are willing to be in the trenches together. And I think you have to have a perspective on things that people align with. And you're not going to be for everyone. Just the mountain ops isn't for everybody. What we stand for from core values or our core customer, it's not for everybody. And that's okay.

I'd rather be polarizing than be for everybody. I think that's the death to a lot of brands when they get to a certain growth point. Or maybe they change hands in ownership. And then there's this driving force to make it. for everyone. And then I think you end up being for nobody. Yeah. You know, so I like having like a hard edge where you're like, no, this is where we draw the line. We don't, we don't go over there. That's not for us. There's other things over there. And you might even be able to make a bunch of money if you want over there. But that's where we draw the line. And I love that we have those kind of principles.

Yeah, it's a, you know, I mean, it's easy to say like, hey, let's build a community of people. Everybody wants that. Everybody wants that. Everybody wants that. It's hard to do. Every business wants a community that they can rely on where as you said like oh there's a sale and this other stuff we don't care we're we're invested in this yeah i don't care if you're giving it to me for free i don't want it and that's it is tough to do so yeah it's like i applaud mountain ops for doing it so well for so long but i think that yeah as we said earlier you can't take your foot off the gas i mean nothing lasts forever you got you got to keep that pressure on yeah and the game plan changes you can't run the same playbook over and over and over and over and over again you can run it for a

And it works. And you can double down on areas that work well, like community, like conquer hunger, I think is one that continuously to lean into. But if you just make the same products, I don't care what business it is. If you only ride that one product forever, eventually, people move on. Yeah. So you've got to drive some innovation. I think we do a great job with flavor innovation. We're always dropping new flavors, keeping it exciting. So you don't get flavor fatigue or just fatigue in general. There's always something new coming out. And now you're going to see a lot of innovation coming out from us on the supplement side, some of these new categories in the the meals and foods that we're doing. I think that makes it exciting and keeps people coming back. But you're right, community, everybody wants it. Yeah. And back in the day, I remember sitting across the table from the other brands that we would sell and they're like, we're going to be a lifestyle brand now. I was like, what do you mean now?

Like, how does that work? You know, and like, well, you know, our Instagram is going to show more lifestyle images. I was like, that's okay. Not a lifestyle. Like you look at, you know, Ryan DeLucah, who founded Bodybuilding.com, built a brand around the lifestyle that he lived and he lowered the fourth wall. and let people see it.

And it was a magnet for other people that wanted to work there that had that same mindset and a community that just built upon it. It was more like that web 1.0. They had the MISC and all these forums where people could go and connect and talk about this stuff on it very similarly. Aubrey did a great job of lowering that fourth wall of like this is what it means to want to be, I don't know, into total human optimization. And whenever that meant.

And it went in a lot of different areas. Mountain Ops very similar in that same vein. And what all those three brands had in common was community, purpose, and a really strong perspective, which gave permissibility. And that's where I think a lot of other brands get stuck. You know, on it could make kettlebells, you know, with chimp faces on it and sell alpha brain and chapstick, right? Like there was like, it was, there was almost no boundary.

Right. At one point we had to rain it in because it was like, whoa, whoa, we're making hot sauce and we're making kettlebells, you know, like let's pick a little bit of a lane. And Mountain Ops has that. We sell really high-quality gear that can be used out in the field, right? We sell great, like, everyday logo wear, and we make incredible supplements and food products. There's plenty of other vitamin and supplement companies out there, but I don't see a lot of people wearing, like, Centrum T-shirts. Right.

You know what I mean? Like, there's something when you can sell other categories to a consumer-based that you are a true lifestyle, because I think it started that way. Yeah. That's the difference is it started with that lifestyle. It didn't go like, oh, you know, it would be great if we started to try to sell the hunters. It's like it was born there. Right. And it was tested there.

And it's never deviated from that. And I think that's what people are looking for. They're trying to see to catch you slipping almost. And I think we've done a good job of keeping that fourth wall down and showing that we do what you do. Yeah. We are similar in a lot of ways. And I think people respect that. Yeah.

Because a lot of companies, I think you feel like you're getting duped, you know, that there's just, like when I walked in the room, you were like, you know, not what I accept. expected to see, right? Like some bean counter coming from some conglomerate or whatever was here to make better margin and so more stuff. Right? Like, yeah. Yeah. That's just not me, you know what I mean? First off, but I wouldn't want a job like that. And I wouldn't want to work for a company like that. I was dreading a podcast with the old white CEO. So I got a flip chart over here. We're going to talk about some numbers. Here's what are those graphs called? What those? Venn diagram? Yeah. Yeah. Venn diagram. Yeah, no, it's

Yeah, I'm not I'm not big on Yeah, the business part It's authenticity But the business is part of it Right? Of course We have the business so hard as well, right?

We got to make sure the bills are paid And do all the things that allow us to be a successful business And we have to keep an eye on that And that's a big part of my job But I think the more important piece is like Creating something that's authentic and real That people can connect with And because people now more than ever

Can see through all the fake marketing Oh yeah. Real quick, especially because, like, most people can't stay for the long haul. Like, maybe they can do something cool for a minute, but like to really put your money where your mouth is and say, we're going to help feed families in need, even if, like, we're in not the best economy in sales or we're having a fight for every sale and our, you know, our acquisition costs are going up and it's expensive to get new customers. Well, we're not going to cut out feeding families.

Right. That's the non-negotiable. Yeah. You know what I mean? And I think you see that in brands that do really well when they start pulling those things away is when it falls apart. You start, you start designing something for like the guy above you versus the customer. And if you keep your eye on the customer, I think you can, you can stay around for a long time. But you have to innovate and you have to know when it's time to kick it a little bit in the pants and say, all right, it's time for us to do something a little bit different because

we're getting stale. And I don't think we got to that point, but I think we had the wherewithal to say it's time to crank it up. Right. You know, because more people are coming into the space. They saw our success and we're like, hey, we can do that too. And it's like, no, you're not going to be able to keep up with what we're doing. And I welcome it. I love competition. I think competition makes us better. It pushes us to try new ingredients. It pushes us to push our standards even higher because we want to protect ourselves by making a product that you can't really touch that our testing protocols and all the rigor that we put into creating things. It's not easy. Right. You know, it's not, you know, you might be able to start and start creating a pre-workout or something like

that. It's very easy to enter the market, but it's not going to be easy to stay. Yeah. I think we have staying power because we put so much work into it. Yeah. No, that all sounds great. That was a good spiel right there. And it's like, it reminds me of people might want to be in my position. And I'm just like, good luck. Yeah. Come take it. I hope you're on the top of your game because that's what it's going to take. So yeah, we like competition and just makes us work harder. Makes me work harder. It sounds like makes, you know, you work harder. You're just like, it's all good. This life is competition. Yeah.

So yeah, I mean, if you're pushing me or some other supplement companies pushing Mountops, great. We all win. And I look at it that it all, it makes the industry better. Yeah. Right? Which makes it safer for the customer. Yeah, for sure.

And honestly, we, you know, we would have conversations internally about other brands. And I've never really cared. I've always, like, celebrated other brands where it's like, hey, they're doing cool stuff. That's awesome. We do cool stuff. We can do cooler stuff. Yeah. And I'm more like, let's get our blinders on.

We knew what we were going to do. Now let's go execute. If we get distracted by everybody else that does something cool, we're just going to be chasing our own tail. So it's like, yeah, I welcome people to come out with great products that press us to be better. I welcome that. You know, it's like you don't want to run a race by yourself per se, right? Like you want the competition of you pushing you to break new records and push yourself for them.

You can always run faster with competition. I mean, like in a race, if you're being pushed, you're always going to run. harder and better than if you're by yourself. Yeah. That's just how it works. We've got to respond. We've got to, that's how I think humans are designed or designed for a competition.

You have anything else? Yeah. So, you know, you kind of touched on building the community and both external and internal, but more on the internal side. How do you foster a sense of ownership and also a belief in the mission of the company

within your employees and your staff, you know, to make sure that you're all working towards one common goal. I found that gets better, the more you communicate. I found in organizations where communication is limited, where you don't share as much information about the business performance or what our strategic goals are, how we're going to get there, and then how you can contribute to that. When that's all siloed, it never works. When we're in it together, that's when we get really effective.

Because I think a lot of times people get in these little, their little groups or their silos, and it becomes someone else's problem. It's like, oh, well, that's marketing's problem to figure out. That's the sales guy's problem. That's why sales need to be higher. That's their problem. It's not, it's collectively our problem because we're all in the same team. And I think as I've removed that type of friction in those type of conversations to say, like, no, we're all in it.

And we're going to have conversations about directionally where we need to go. Like the buck stops with me in a lot of ways. But I'd like to have at least everybody's voice heard. So when we talk about a direction, we're going to go, I want those opinions to be out there. that way we can talk through it and we can find alignment on how we move forward. So then we can't have a lot of people

after the fact looking back being like, I knew that wasn't the right way. It's easy to be the Monday morning quarterback, right? So I find when you remove all that and you bring everybody into how the sausage is made, we're all like accountable. And I think it helps us rally around the common mission. If you're just making decisions in a closed box,

like who's going to want to go fight with you if you're just calling shots from afar? Yeah. You know, I think if you're in there doing the work with everybody and explaining why you make certain decisions and not hiding behind them, it's almost easy. And what's beautiful about what's been built at Mountain Ops is it's been built on so much ritual. And I think culture is something that happens regardless, whether you do it intentionally or not. It's a byproduct of how you

operate. And if you operate with intention, you have this like predictable outcome of culture. And I think we've built that. That's built around service. That's built around our customers. That's built around a belief in a higher power, something bigger than ourselves. And that allows us, I think, to move in the same direction because everybody's kind of bought into the idea of it all. And I'm sure you felt it when you've been there. It's not just like a place where people work. They are borderline obsessed with it, right? Like people are so into the mission. They're into the brand. They're into what we're doing. And they'll run through walls for it. And that feeling is so exciting. So for me, it's like, don't mess that up. Right. The worst thing I could do is come in as the new CEO and just like take

that away. If anything, I try to move more of the obstacles out of way. So everybody's on that same team. And then we feel the wins and the losses together. And I think that's what the team experiences. It can't just be one guy's winning over here and everybody else is just in the middle. You know, like we're all in it together. So I think it's, yeah, it's communication is like number one. Because I've worked places where like you just don't get to know what the performance is. You don't get to know what the numbers are. You don't get to know what the expenses are. Because when everybody understands how they manage their expenses impacts everything, all of a sudden we're in it together.

Yeah. Yeah. It's, you know, that communication piece that is, I was just, when you're thinking or explaining that, I was thinking about where I used to work for my other son, not true, but Tanner works over there now. And it's like, I remember we'd have our big meetings and our division meetings. And then nobody would say anything. I was like, or the people doing the meeting would talk, all the crews, everybody wouldn't

say anything. then they'd go out to the truck bay. Oh, that's what the second meeting. The second meeting. So I'm always just like, what are you saying out there? Shouldn't we be talking about it in here? Yeah. But that's like so many companies are like that where you don't have the freedom to say what you really want. You get your head ripped off.

Yeah. Or you feel stupid by asking a question. So many people are afraid to ask questions. Yeah. And I love when people ask questions. They're like, this is a stupid question. And I'm in the camp that there are no stupid question. It's stupid to not ask. Because it's funny, like, you know, we all use in business different acronyms.

And depending on the company you work for, you might be talking about the same thing, but use a slightly different acronym. And how many people just like let it slide because they don't want to be like, well, what does that mean? Yeah. It's the worst, right? And then it goes too far and then you can't ask. Yeah.

One thing I've been using in our town halls is this app that allows you to ask anonymous questions. Okay. That way people can like, hey, you know, why did this change? Or what do you, how do you do this? Is this like a company meeting at the town hall? Yeah, so we do an all-company meeting every week. Okay. Every Tuesday, we meet as a whole group.

And then we also have a hybrid. So we have some people that work, like myself, I'm in Texas and in Utah. We have some employees in Idaho. We're kind of spread out. And then we get everybody together. And it's like, hey, open, come on a, let's talk. And you can raise your hand and ask a question, or you can use the app and put it in there. And you can upvote it and people can comment on it.

So I feel like people get to feel heard. Yeah. And we'll open that before the meeting. And it stays open until like midnight that night. So maybe after the content, you're like, think of another question. but you never feel like you're going to be reprimanded. So sometimes you get some spicy ones in there because you have the cloakonym of kinaninity, which is perfect.

And I think it's a good thing. I'm always happy to answer those questions. I'll answer questions even in redundancy. Like if somebody asked a few people ask the same question, phrase differently, like we'll just go through it until everybody feels like they know what's going on. Because I've been in that. Like I didn't just become a CEO randomly, right?

Like it's happened over time. So I've had those different seats where you're like, what are these guys talking about? Why are we doing this? That's the worst, right? So I tried to change that a little bit with the culture and just allow us to feel like we can be in the same boat and that we understand why we're in there. And if you don't understand, I'm happy to take as long as it takes to talk about it. So you do understand.

Yeah, that's, that is important. It's like, that also reminded me, like, we had a great GM at work. And he would, so we had the water division, which is where I was superintendent, then electric division for the power. He'd come down and give us our quarterly update. And I remember one time I told him, I'm like, I said, hey, it's a good update. I said, but all you talked about was electric. I said, these guys care about what they do. This is a whole different division.

We're talking about, you know, buying electricity off the BPA. We're talking about all this, all the stuff that the substations, electric's doing. you know sometimes the GM though he's thinking about all this stuff yeah and sometimes you don't think about like who am i talking to right i have the stuff i've been you know probably agonizing about for weeks like something about you know with electric with the electric division and then you get to water and you start talking about what's been on your mind well it had nothing do with what we do so it's just sometimes it's just like sometimes we can be you know you can't see the to the forest type thing.

But it's like you've seemed very aware on, and I'm not trying to fault our old GM for doing this, but it's just, it's a challenge. It is. It's a challenge sometimes. Big groups of people, different focus. Yeah.

But you've got to be cognizant of it. I try to push our leadership team too to make sure that they're always giving updates from across the board, big and small. Because I think when you don't do that, you marginalize the work people are doing. So it's like, oh, well, I've been grinding on this project or this thing that's important to my role,

but it's never been brought up in a meeting or spoken about. Does it even matter? And I think it's really important that even if it is small and big things, I think are important. So people understand that their contribution is one relevant and matters and that it's also important that people understand what other people are doing. And that's easier. I'm doing that with an organization that's like around 40 people.

That's a lot different than being in some huge company or something. But I think there's a balance to that. people want to feel recognized and that you see what they're doing. I think that's like just a thing in life. It's not even a work. Like you want to be acknowledged a little bit for your existence. And I think that's like a pretty basic need to meet for people. And taking that time to highlight what people are doing is kind of basic.

And you'd be shocked at how much enthusiasm it creates with a team when you just are honest and let people share what they're excited about too. Because yeah, I might be thinking about this thing that's more strategic. That's like a year down the road. But there's so much. going on in today and I can't look past those things either because that's what people are losing sleep over now let's let's highlight all of it yeah and it's just you know hearing that your work is appreciated or that you're appreciated like on a Friday so you think about all weekend you know what I mean

instead of like if something happens on a Friday and you get your ass chewed yeah then you're thinking about that all weekend so it's like these words matter and and these relationships matter but uh Yeah, super interesting. I didn't know that this conversation was going to be so CEO-centric. I love it. I love the business. Just I love business environment and different personalities and, like, different challenges. This has been, I think, pretty interesting.

Do you have anything else? Well, then here's one question that's not CEO-centric. Yes. And I saved this for the end just in case you want to cut it out. We're going straight to HR. But we ask every guest. just a kill. But about, I was waiting.

Okay, okay, good. So about random things. So I think a good one for you is three supplements. Oh. So electrolytes, creatine, or protein. And you got a f-killed them. Oh, all right. Well, I'm going to F creatine because there's so many good studies on it.

And it's flavorless. You can add it to anything. And there's more information that even over the five grams, there's now cognitive benefits. So it's just like, it's the gift that keeps on giving. Wouldn't you want to marry that then? You might want to marry that one.

Oh, yeah, long-term commitment. Yeah. If it's going to be around for a while, that might be, yeah. Put a ring on it. Yeah, I'll put a ring on it. Yeah, I'll put a ring on it. You can have this ring. Oh, yeah.

And so what was the other two? We had protein and what was? Electrolites. Yeah. Man, electrolytes are key. But I think I'd kill protein. Because protein supplements are great. But, man, there's protein and everything now in food, right?

Like, I've got a high protein meat stick. We don't need no powder. We can get, protein in my pasta now. I buy barilla pasta that has like 10 grams of protein per serving in my carbohydrates, right? So yeah, I think protein can go. And we still need it, but I just can get it from so many other sources now. Wait, what did you, electrolytes you were going to? Yep, that's right. Yep. Okay. All right. Well, do you have anything else? No, that's it. Well, Keith, I think that was a great conversation. I appreciate it. Thank you very much for coming.

And yeah, I'm pumped to share this, what's our line called? The apex. The apex line. It's like almost forgot it. The apex line, I'm pumped to, you know, get, just be at my best and share that with everybody. Yeah. Yeah, thank you for coming to. No, thanks for having me here so much.

The old studio in Springfield, Oregon. See, Cameron, guys.