Massenomics Podcast - Ep. 373: David Tao of Barbend

Episode Date: May 29, 2023

Big David Thomas Tao of Barbend joins us for this one. We talked about media coverage in strength sports, the rise of Barbend, and what it’s going to be like now that they have been acquired by Pillar4. We also talk about Lord Calvert and Nathan’s hotdogs. Don’t miss our new “meet day” drop if you’re a competitive powerlifter! Juggernaut AI: juggernautai.app and use code MASSENOMICS to save 10% The Strength Co: https://store.thestrength.co/ BearFoot Shoes: https://bearfoot.store/ and use code MASSENOMICS to save 10% Swiss Link: https://www.swisslink.com and use code MASS to save 15% Spud Inc: https://www.spud-inc-straps.com/ Texas Power Bars: https://www.texaspowerbars.com/

You know, thanks for what you do with your podcasts and all the rest. You're doing a great job. Hope everybody keeps tuning in. You get a lot of good info, a lot of insights, understandings on how to get strong, how to stay strong, how to use your strength. You do a great job, dude. You make things better than they are in real life, I think.

If you don't follow Massanomics, y'all do it. Social media, website, everything. Massanomics! Massanomics! website everything massonomics welcome back everyone here we are for episode 373 of the massonomics podcast the lifting podcast about new finn my name is tanner and my name is tommy recording live from studio 6.9 tonight uh just like riding a bicycle isn isn't it, Tommy? It feels like we've done this a time or two before.

I think it's more like riding a tandem bicycle, you know? Ah, yes, yes. One of us is just pedaling, the other one's steering, taking the other person's life in your hands. Do you see those things for kids where you've got a bicycle and then it's like a tandem bicycle, just like it attaches off the back? Yeah, I have seen i think i think you're the one that's uh made me aware of those okay and sometimes i think they might have pedals even and i don't know if they

do anything i can't remember to believe that they would do something yeah i don't know the mechanics of how they would do something right of the thing you attach to your bike. I mean, technically, I'm sure there's a way. I just don't know if it makes the most sense. Yeah, right. 373 of the Massonomics podcast, and boy, we've got a banger tonight. We've got a big guest to talk about the history of bar bend and their recent acquisition, big David Thomas Tao. Before we get to that, we've got a whole bunch of other fun

topics, including talking about our new release, talking about a new giveaway gift for all of our supporting members. And then we got a whole bunch of interesting topics in there to probably get to some before and some after that. But before all of that, I wanted to make sure to talk to all of you about juggernaut ai for anyone that doesn't know about juggernaut ai i would ask where the hell have you been you idiots have you heard of the internet uh juggernaut trading systems is the leader in strength having helped thousands of athletes from beginners to world champions maximize their results and reach their goals. They deliver principle-based coaching through cutting-edge technology to help you get the best results of your life. And that cutting-edge technology that they're referring to is the Juggernaut AI app. It's the very app that we

use for our training and that at least half of Massanomics gym uses for their training and a big majority of our, or a big group in our Massanomics podcast supporting members are all on Juggernaut AI. So what I really like about it is several things. One is the tracking of your lifts over time. Two, how it adapts to you over time based on your inputs. And maybe three, another one I'll throw out there,

it's just like the usability, the user interface and like the ease of use for, it's so easy a caveman could do it, I think is their slogan. So check it out. And as long as we're listing off things, I'll say number four, the best thing about it is you can use discount code Mastanomics and that'll save

you 10% off the lifetime of your membership. But in order to do that, you can't sign up through the app. You have to go onto the web browser. It's juggernautai.app. That's where you'll get signed up. That's where you will use discount code MASSANOMICS to save. Today's episode is also brought to you by Swiss Link. In 1995, Maurice Big Mo Huffman founded Swiss Link with the mission to bring authentic Swiss Army goods to the United States and into the hands of those yearning for quality gear at uncompromised prices. Now, for nearly three decades, Big Mo has been traveling far and wide in search of the best items from military forces around the world. Big Mo doesn't only find authentic military clothing for Swiss Link, he brings in everything you can imagine from Swiss military rangefinders to Italian police tracksuits. Swisslink.com is also home to the Swiss Link

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That's code M-A-S-S to save 15% at SwissLink.com. I can vouch on those wool blankets too. They're the real deal. They're the real deal. They're the real deal. The real McCoy. They really are wool and they really are blankets. Both. You were like worried you were going to get a wool towel actually.

Like, nope, it's a wool blanket and it's wool like Landlin sheets. Well, you can tell it's more of a square than a rectangle. It's clearly, clearly a blanket. Yeah.

So not a, not a enormous towel yeah otherwise what is the difference at times uh it's a great question we had some exciting stuff in the world of massonomics happen today tanner oh that's putting it mildly i would say well you know i like to kind of downplay things so yeah uh what what thing are you thinking the drop that we had big news yeah big new drop this is our what do you call this is this our meat day drop our comp uh comp outfit drop yeah this is probably the meat day accessory pack really yeah you know that's true so what do we what do we bust out with uh starting from smallest starting with smallest okay starting

with smallest we have the new and improved massonomics headband and i'm not lying this thing as little as it is what 12 12.99 is that what this headband costs 12.99 i am genuinely shocked how nice this headband actually turned out uh i had high expectations but it turned out even better than i thought the last headband was there's two styles of headbands uh the last one was the much taller headband it was probably like four or five inches tall it kind of actually goes up on top of your head a little bit it's covers up your lebron james hair fade it does it does where this is more of a traditional headband width it's like not quite three inches and it just man it's like the right size i and

the print turned out amazing on it the fit's great i love how this headband turned out and for 12.99 i don't know how you couldn't throw one of these in your cart the next time you're on the website i don't know if you've noticed tommy i'm over here i don't know taking notes what's going on there well i this is paper this is pen and i don't know if you see what i'm doing here i'm putting pen to paper i see that to paper oh i see all right the calculations are going okay yep yes okay I just put pen to paper. $12.99. You can't freaking afford not to buy this thing.

I just ran the numbers right here. Pen to paper. It will literally cost you more to not purchase this headband than it would. And pen to paper verified right here. He did the math so you don't have to. I don't know if you can read this but can't afford not to it's i mean it's right here and pen on with pen verified with pen and paper so that that's in there and you can wear if you're on the fence don't be anymore yeah whether you do a power lift you meet or not this

is just a great item to have uh for all purpose life so make sure you get one of those it is really nice you will not if you want to maybe even get a couple there's been there's been several people that are throwing a couple in their cart which i think is a smart move these are yeah especially at that price yeah these are good to go don't make me get out the pen and paper and decide if making yeah two is the right choice don't don't make him go there all right so that was the first item uh moving up the scale in size would be our but down the body but down the body down the body up the scale in size would be our down the body, but down the body, down the body up the scale would be the deadlifter,

the deadlift socks. Yeah. And these have been a long requested item. Do you have any deadlift socks on you? Well, yes, I do hear they're on the floor here. I got some here too.

We're both dramatic pause while we both grab deadlifts. Yeah. I was walking around in the garage with these today. So they're kind of dirty, but yeah, uh, holding them up. They are in fact, a long tube sock.

They're not going to stop mid shin. These are long. These are the same. If you own our crew socks, these are the same construction and fit as those just have a, uh, I'd like to say it has a longer shaft than the than the crew socks this does have a lengthy shaft yeah which is key it is key for the deadlift socks

the shaft length i i would say you know if you wanted to get specific these are jefferson deadlift socks although you can they can be worn for any deadlift variations but right preferably the jefferson yeah that that almost goes without saying i think yeah but yeah we have a little red that's why we didn't name them the jefferson socks because it just goes without it's it's redundant right uh has a red cuff at the top the massonomics logo on the on each side of your calf going down you had the red red heel red toe and you got massonomics written uh down the side of the foot on both sides so uh solid item there too socks so you know socks and protect your shins yeah and as uh we're recording these have been released already and both are selling well and as they should be. So don't sleep on the headband or the socks.

I tell you that right now. Don't do it. Don't eat dinner or sleep on those. Now moving up in size and also up the body, we are on to the meat day shirt. We're in the middle of the body now. We hit it from the top and the bottom. Finishing right where it counts, right at the heart. And we got the meat Day shirt, Comp T.

This has been something that's probably been on our to-do list for, what, three or four years? Yeah, I was going to say three years. I thought probably, actually, it's probably been in writing for three years. And we released it in two colors, in Masonomics Red and in Black. And the T has on the upper center chest it has the massonomics m logo on one sleeve it says lift hard on the other sleeve it says live easy you know to give out that out that right vibe on meet day you got to get that message out there and it is available in red or black so depending on your color choices your your color, I should say color preferences, your singlet color, you can either make things pop with that red or you could probably go all stealth with black.

You know, it's whatever you're into. That's right. Yeah, you heard him right. You can get this shirt in absolutely any color that you want as long as it's red or black. And I don't know what else people would ever want besides that, you know. That's, there is nothing else else there is no other color so yeah things have uh the drop has gone for the most part you know it is stuff that is relevant to competing and being in a meet and the drop is going good so it we're we're happy to see that and the i guess the final other piece to the drop

would be the singlet. And with everything going on, can we still say that? Are you still allowed to say that in 2023? No, I think that's a permanent excuse. Okay, good, good. Yeah, I think we get that used all the time on us still. But yeah, with everything going on, the singlet is not quite ready. As of recording right now, it is May 25th.

We're really hoping that singlet is ready by mid-June. Yeah. It will for sure be ready by the time the Massonomics powerlifting meet goes on. So people can show up in that. But yeah, we're hoping to get that thing out like mid-June-ish so that people have plenty of time to check it out, order, and have it for any meets that you could possibly be doing in like late July, you know? Yeah. And we could have put it for sale now, but we just want to verify, you know,

have a good grasp on sizing on this because it's not our typical item. If it was a t-shirt, we could have handled it maybe a little bit differently, but we want to help people make sure that they're, you know, getting the right size for what they need. And this is a more expensive item than normal. So we do think it's going to be a very nice singlet, but with everything going on, everything went on. Yep. You just can never be too safe. That's right.

All right. That's the drop. Hell of a drop. Yeah. So if you haven't bought anything yet, like we said, Tanner did put the pen to paper. Make sure you go do that. Stop the podcast. Stop driving your car. Pull over.

Order now. Do not make me get my paper out again. I swear to God I will put my pen on it. Yeah, you don't want to do that again. I swear to God I'll do it. Yes. All right. Should we start looking at the list here?

Because we got a few little things going on. Yeah, I think we should, before we forget and before we delay any longer i should tell i think we should tease people on the very exciting news that's going to be coming up for mass yes yes god i'm glad you actually said that because i would have skipped right past that again i think we should uh let people know so everyone knows about our supporting members we've got this group uh you can you can choose to support and we'll we'll talk about some of those supporting members later in this episode. But periodically, we like to do these giveaways for everyone that chooses to be.

I don't know if giveaway is the right word. That almost sounds like it's a random drawing. It's like everyone that is a supporting member gets in. It's like a little token of our appreciation. Yeah, there you go. Like where we send out an exclusive thank you to our supporting members members and we've got the next one is in the works it's going to happen really soon actually um we don't know the exact date but i guess what we would put out on that if if you've been thinking wavering on deciding whether you're going to join become a supporting member or not

do it immediately right now because there will be a line in the sand where we're going to send out this gift. Item. Yeah, items, even where everyone that is a supporting member as of that date will get in on it and at no charge, no additional charge. So do sign up as quickly as possible so you can get in on that because once we've crossed that line in the sand date, you'll be SOL for that particular one. You can still please join up, get signed up, but you might just have to wait till the next cool giveaway to get in on it. So as of the time you're hearing this, you for sure, if you're listening to this within the first week of it coming out, you've got enough time to sign up still get signed yes so go to massonomics.com join pick your support level

and uh you're in the cool kids club you'll be any support level will be you will get in on this uh this particular gift so sign up at any level there you go go. We'll put a couple of reminders out there on that. Big Nate asked if everyone has already joined up to be a supporting member yet. Not everyone, but it's a lot of people. It's getting to be a growing club. So when we do these giveaways are getting more and more intensive for us with the number of people. But that's awesome. That's what we want. There's more and more work and they're becoming more and more uh intensive for us with the number of people but that's awesome that's what we want there's more and more work and they're becoming more and more expensive but we do think that they're worth it like we do we do like giving back so and these

are usually fun in some way and like the just the exclusivity of it is kind of cool you know like everyone has something to show for it and uh i'll be i, I'm as excited for this one as any of them that we've done, just because I think we've got some fun, just some fun, very massonomics things wrapped into this. That'll be really cool. For sure. All right.

One thing. Okay. I made a few notes here, Tanner. One thing I feel like we got to get, you know, we've been on a bit of a language pronunciation kick lately. And like the whole podcast, basically, it's been really, really coming up a lot the last few weeks. Our pronunciations on certain things have become

infamous, you could say. But there is one that I was not aware of until very recently. Aluminum. No, no, not that. Not that. I was not aware of until very recently. Aluminum. No, not that. I was not aware of until very recently and I was reminded when I was listening to the Unpaid and Underrated podcast about this pronunciation and that is, do you know how people in Canada say Z?

It's not Zed, is it? They do. They say Zed. They do say Zed. They read? They do. They say Zed. They do say Zed. They read out the alphabet. They say Zed. Yes. I don't know if they're reading the alphabet if they say it,

but like, let's say, I think your camera is like a ZF1 or something. I believe they would say ZF1. And Joey, when he was describing, when he was spelling out his name, he goes like M-E-C-Z-f-r-m-e-c-z no i can't even do it m-e-c-z-c-o a whole bunch of consonants oh so many like words that like letters that don't make any sense together but he said the z and i'm like ah yeah people really

do do that that's crazy because that does not exist in america no no i've heard that before obviously like because I knew that. Oh, I see it in the list. I actually didn't even pay attention to that being in the list. But no, I've never heard anyone that says that on purpose. I wasn't aware of it until very recently because I like to watch a lot of car YouTube. And there are several car YouTube guys out of Canada. And Z is a letter used in car names a

lot. And they always say, do you think Z is a jazzy letter? I don't know. You could also argue that Z is used a lot. S is used a lot. F is used a lot. Like, I mean, there's only 26 letters to pick from. So there's certain letters that just get used a lot. And I mean, Z is used a fair amount and they say Zed. And it's always so, for a while, I thought maybe there was something wrong with my brain that I was hearing this wrong. And then I did hear one of them call attention to it. Like, yeah, because we're in Canada, we say Zed.

Some people, you know, like you will use the military alphabet to describe things a lot, you know, like they, but that's different. Yeah. I, that to me feels like a different application or if you're just always using that in casual conversation, then like maybe you're trying too hard. That's what I would argue. Like you don't have to do that all the time. Yeah. Yeah.

You're not making life really easier for anyone. You could argue you're actually making it harder for everyone but yourself there so yeah yeah yeah what do you got a can over there or something i do and i'm quite thirsty you know i'm still back to the raspberry right now um i've been on a big modelo kick lately okay and the fridge is just taking up with modelo so once again i had to go into like the 90 degree garage to get this hot, hot raspberry bubbly out. I got something really interesting right here. Wow. This one's noteworthy.

We've got a blackberry lemonade Waterloo. How about that? Put that in your smoke and pipe it. One of those crazy minds at Waterloo? What are they going to do next? That was not a particularly crispy crack. It was a thud. I could hardly hear that.

It was very thuddy. It's not what I'm after. Very thuddy. Minus 0.5 JD powers just for the lack of crispiness on the crack. just for the lack of crispiness on the crack. This is one that would, had I been guessing the flavor, would be damn near impossible to get anything right about it.

It doesn't quite hit that way. Blackberry lemonade. I think there's no possible way someone would taste this and come to any of that conclusion. I would never, like usually though, I would never get blackberry. Blackberry is always the hardest flavor. Lemonade though, usually lemon you can pick up, but maybe the blackberry has said enough.

I think it's the combination is just a little, it mirrors the, or it throws you off the lemonade trail, I think, a little bit. Right. It is good. There's nothing bad about it, but I just don't love it right the the flavor profile is just a little they're in the three and a half three area but because of the lack of crispy crack i'm going to give it a three jd associates award that makes sense yeah obviously like it's so So obvious. Obvious. I picked up on some big gym news in the eastern, southeast South Dakota region.

You kind of are the Massonomics. You've become the Massonomics podcast look into the commercial gym scene. I'm the mole. The commercial gym mole. That's probably what was missing in you know maybe the first seven years of the mass comics podcast we didn't really we had no commercial gym like yeah we didn't have an inside guy to get the scoop on what's going on in the great world out there we were just stuck underground in our sheltered little uh basement you know there

yeah so these okay this these numbers i'm gonna throw at you are kind of crazy kind of mind-blowing uh you're a guy that's familiar with running the gym the numbers that are involved with it so i've just become aware and i will start this by saying i'm i'm not gonna go to this gym so there's there's there's no uh i i don't care about this at all but it's not there's not like a conflict of interest here no no i don't care about this gym all. There's not like a conflict of interest here? No, no. I don't care about this gym at all. It's just from a noteworthy standpoint, it's worth bringing up. Okay, are you familiar with Crunch Fitness? God, I've heard that.

Am I familiar with it? Like just in the way that I feel like I've heard the name, but otherwise, no. Like have you spent a lot of time in one before is what I'm asking. Is it anything like Crunch Candy Bars? I think that they're very closely related, if I had to guess. Like a crispy wafer inside a thin milk chocolate bar. I'm assuming there's a lot of crispy wafers involved in this gym. Okay, then yes, I'm pretty very familiar with this.

Yeah, really the only thing, I remember seeing this logo before. That was really the only thing that stuck out. It's like a hand grabbing the word crunch. So what is it, crunch fitness? Crunch fitness, yeah. Is this a chain? It is a chain, yeah didn't actually know that this was that okay that was the case okay so they are opening um they're going into what was once a what was the oh it was the old gourdman's building in sioux falls i don't know if you know where that is like just south of the mall okay so it is south of the mall okay it is a 60 000 foot gym is what this will be when it's

all done 60 000 60 000 square feet which is a huge large gym and they are claiming that the build out is six million dollars it's like those are dr evil numbers what so it is the how many members are they gonna have 10 000 monthly members i and i here's the crazy thing um okay how much is membership that was the thing that didn't add up and then i realized oh it's like the special for the first month that it was something like membership for like the first 100 people is like because i saw the thing it said like membership ten dollars i'm like how many members do you have and then i realized it was like for the first 200 people to sign up or something right but if you look at the pictures it is like this does not look like this speaks to me in any

way like it is the most massive cardio yeah equipment room i've ever seen in my life like i didn't actually know gyms had that large of cardio areas in them i don't know like this row in this in this mock-up here and then this picture of other locations i mean elliptical machines i don't know is there 50 of them in a row and then the next row after that there's 50 treadmills and then they're after that there's 50 like stationary bikes like that's so much cardio equipment it's hard to believe that that can still get people into gyms how many um members do you think a gym like that gets i mean it's got to be thousands i i mean it would have to be you'd have to get 3,000 members to even start to, right?

Wouldn't you or not? Like, I just like that amount of outlay and like. I don't know. What do you say? Do you assume his membership 50 bucks a month? Yeah, I think you got to assume 50. I mean, that's 150 grand a month in just. At 3,000 members.

Yeah, at 50 bucks,000, $150,000. But even there, like I've- But you're going to have one hell of a mortgage to pay back. Yeah, six. Or, you know, like what- Well, just your build-out is $6 million, and then like that building- Your equipment loan, I guess. Yeah.

Yeah, and if you have that many people, 3,000 people, well, but that's the thing. If you actually had 3,000 people thrashing on your stuff- Oh, you could never, but the theory here has to be that like 10% of the membership. Yeah. You have 3,000 members and only a couple hundred of them ever show up. And then those couple hundred that show up, most of them aren't actually really doing anything. So that's where the numbers work out. But it is.

We're just. The massonomics gym is just so far from the spectrum that it's it's hard to even comprehend that that business model actually does exist out there you know wow that's wild that's so much money dumped into a gym it's nuts like when you think about it so does that include are they buying the building or like this says the building this says right here, the $6 million buildup will include cardio equipment, a large free weight section, classes, multiple turf areas,

areas, hydro massage, a hit zone, boxing, UV tanning, and a babysitting area. I mean, for as expensive as stuff is,

I do see how things could add up. And when you, yeah, but I don't know pieces of cardio equipment, but I'm not totally sure if they actually own that building though, or if they just lease it, you know, I don't think you, I don't think like a lot of big box

stores own their buildings right and things like this like you're just leasing it from the right so that means they still have probably quite a rent bill every month you know right like i would assume i'm i don't know how they couldn't for 60 000 square feet and then just the mate that's the heating on something like that, it's got to be, I mean, your heating and cooling has got to be crazy on something like that too, I think. But maybe, I wonder, maybe that just is such a draw for people to come in and get memberships.

But I'm also like, where's the 3,000 people that don't already have memberships, gym memberships? There is so many gyms in this town. And also, I don't know, I'm new enough that maybe I don't get it, but I don't know if that's actually the most convenient location from a residential standpoint. It's where a bunch of commercial stuff is.

And I shouldn't even say commercial. It's where a bunch of retail stuff is. It's not like there's huge office buildings in that area. But maybe people drive to that. I don't know. It's clearly not for me, so I don't got to worry about that. But yeah, it's that sort of thing. Ain't my bag, baby.

This is not my bag, baby. So was that was that Sioux Falls gyms or commercial gym look? Oh, I have another one here. OK, OK. Yep. I forgot. I put some of these in here. Okay. I forget that this also exists because everyone at massonomics gym, this is a bit of, this is, this maybe sounds like

ranty. I don't know actually what this is. This is observations. I should say everyone at massonomics gym, even the guys that don't like legs still do train legs, you know, like they all do. There's some that don't like it a lot less than others yes and there's some guys like everyone knows there's a few guys that really don't like it but they still do it you basically have to they do like they'd get called out a little too much if they they just take too much shit if they never did legs right uh but i forget that there is that like it takes me back to the ymCA days of guys that have arms that are bigger than yours,

bigger than yours, Tanner. And they have legs that like, look like they belong on like a 150 pound high school boy. Like, yeah. And man, is it a funny,

just contrast seeing that. And it had been a while since I had, I had witnessed that in person. And I, I did, I did see that recently and it just, it kind of took me back i had to give it like one of these double takes like oh and you know you do one of those and like wow

yeah that is a thing it is a rare sight especially like when you walk into a mass dynamics gym you're you'll never don't see someone like squatting or deadlifting never not like there's always somebody squatting or deadlifting that corner of the gym is always being used yeah the only time it's not being used if you're the only one in there otherwise you can it's safe to assume someone is over there doing something yeah yeah that is funny you don't really come across that no i don't come across that yeah it's been so many years since i've seen that uh so yeah in case you're wondering, that look still does exist a little bit out there. And there's nothing wrong with it, but it does look odd. And if you're spending time in the gym, you might as well do some leg work.

I get it. I get it. Like some people don't like leg stuff, but find something, you know. Maybe you don't have to do squats. Maybe you just, I don't know, maybe you just do leg extensions. Yeah. It's not the mirror muscles, is it? Yeah.

Got to do something though how about a little supporting our supporting members how about it um wait a second where did i did i just uh did i get rid of supporting our you did just mark that as complete can we uncomplete that uh yes there is a way filter on the top it says filter incomplete tasks uh do you see that little filter button yeah so i'm now i'm on this has never happened before history of uh the mass dynamics podcast kind of messing up the yeah notes i was really gonna really about ready to head into supporting our sporting members here. Did you find it or not?

It's probably so old. Oh, right. It's not at the top. In the top right bar, there's a search button. Oh, do you see that search up there? Yeah. Okay. Where are we at now?

Supporting our supporting members. Okay. Got it. We're good. Crisis averted. There's a lot of them here. I'm going to uncheck it. For anyone behind the scenes, this is...

Okay. This is confusing me. All right. I found it. So this segment is something we do for our supporting members that choose to support us. We just talked about that earlier in the show. We'd love to have you sign up.

We've got things like upcoming gifts coming, that sort of thing. We also, you do this, you get to watch the podcast live if you want to. You get access to our very active Discord community. You can become a crew member. Now we call it CRU with the umlaut. That's what you become, a MathSynomics crew member. You do that by becoming a supporting member and then also each week on the podcast we like to give back a little bit to any of the supporting members that we see out there doing anything that's noteworthy or that we think is cool.

And this week we had several of them. Big Johnny, Big Johnny POV, he competed at New York's Strongest Man and got second overall. And he did that including first place in the car deadlift event. So good job, Big Johnny. Big Sam F competed at a strongman competition, and he did it in lift jorts. In lift jorts for the bonus points, and he ended up getting second on the car deadlift event and overall did very well.

Big Matt S and Big Eddie W. I don't know why I'm just using last initials here. Eddie W, I like that. I don't know why I'm just using last initials here. Eddie W. I like that. Competed together, two crew members in a Highland Games. I saw them throwing some things. Yeah, Big Eddie, of course, a Highland Games veteran. Big Matt, his first one.

They were both decked out in the kilts. Both had Massonomics insignia on their kilts, so you love to see that. insignia on their uh kilts so you love to see that and then we get into the garage gym competition uh entrance of of this over this last week all the ones that i caught there's probably more out there let me know if you don't didn't get mentioned last week or this week but here's some of them big tyler he did it uh in highlight there he did his je, or he did his Deadlift Jefferson style on a one-wheel, a la Big Mikey. Yeah. So he did a 275 Jefferson on a one-wheel.

Props to that. Just the fundamentals, right? Let's keep it simple. Big TR, he did it at 49 years young. He turns 50 here soon, and he did a 475 squat 350 bench and 455 deadlift. So hashtag Masters keeping the Masters dream alive there. Big David, one of

the Davids, he was in on it. 350 squat, 205 bench, 420 deadlift. That was a deadlift PR. Big Scantz, speaking of Masters, 425 275, 476. Big Jen got in on it. I don't have her.

And then I got a whole bunch of people where I don't have numbers listed. But Big Jen competed. Big Alex P got in on it. Big Mini, Big Mini Action. He did it. He put up some big numbers. Yeah, 377 bench in there. He said that was a one-kilogram PR.

Big Moto Guy submitted. Big Bremi Strong, who's made pretty sweet J-Cups that we got at the gym. He competed. bench in there he said that was a one kilogram pr big moto guy submitted big bremmy strong who's made a pretty sweet j cups that we got at the gym he competed in it uh big chris d loves the d uh draw gym competition got in on there big uh andrew the cookie man the cookie monster big andrew he did andrew Andrew B, the B's for basketball. The B is for basketball and for drink spotter. He got in on it

and then the original supporting member himself, the grand daddy of them all, Big Scott Dodzilla competed. Damn, I kind of feel like I missed out on that party. Yeah, it was a lot of good competing there, wasn't it?

Yeah, it really was. Yeah. So now how do I get back to not this thing that I'm in here is what I would like to know. Okay, fixed it. Okay. Do you want to read an ad? I'll start kicking people out because our guest is waiting.

He's waiting. Okay, good. I will read a quick ad. Actually, I'll start kicking people out because our guest is waiting. He's waiting? Okay, good. I will read a quick ad. Actually, I'm just going to tell you about the Strength Co. The Strength Co. plates have become the go-to plates of Massanomics Gym. When I say that, I mean that in the sense that they are the plates that fill all of our important squat racks by our big deadlift platforms. Everywhere where you're going to be lifting heavy weights, we've got a full sets of Strength Co. They've got everything from hundreds, 45s, 35s, 25s, 10s, 5s, 2.5s, 1.25s.

They've got them all, and we've got them all, and we love them. They're our favorite plates in the gym. There's no doubt about that. They are the plates that members go to when they walk in. A number of reasons, smooth, easy to grip they walk in number of reasons smooth easy to grip made in america veteran owned uh big grant is just a good all-around guy so we like supporting a company like that and uh another cool thing on strength coat plates update this year they drastically reduce shipping costs they've become some of the uh probably i don't know if this is true, but outside of companies that are maybe offering free shipping, in which free shipping, that means the shipping price is already baked into the price of the plates.

Outside of that, they probably offer the cheapest shipping on plates, especially the 45s are just a steal, which really brings the dollar per pound on these plates down quite a bit. So anyways, check out the Strength Co. We love them. We'd love to have you get some and let them know that your good friends at Massanomics sent you. This episode is also brought to you by Barefoot Shoes. Most shoes harm your mobility by over restricting your foot's natural movement. Barefoot shoes are designed with minimal restrictions so your feet can move the way they're supposed to. Move with more strength and confidence in every step.

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on instagram it was a video of jimmy butler uh who's a pretty good basketball player if you're not jimmy buckets playoff jimmy we do need to talk about NBA playoffs before then. Oh yes, we should. Yeah. Yeah. And they had a video of him walking into, I believe it was pregame walking into the arena and he had a pair of the barefoot loafers on, which is pretty crazy. Like how did that, I'm not, I think it's a great product, but I just don't picture a guy like that in the NBA who probably has a shoe contract with Nike or someone in some way or another wearing barefoot shoes into the arena. We'll have to ask our friends to the north here how that connection happens.

So if that guy who has unlimited footwear options and is actually financially incentivized to wear other brands is picking barefoot, I think that says something about him. Himmy Butler, he's him. Himmy Butler. He's him. That's right. Okay. Should we get our guests in here?

Let's get them on the horn. Okay. I'm going to admit him now. I'm going to, here we go. Oh boy. We are, we are doing it. We are we go. Oh boy. We are, we are doing it. We are doing it.

Big David. Is that you? It's a medium, moderate David. No. When you're here, you're big. I'm big.

It's, it's, I mean, that's, that's from pumping iron, right? Where he addresses everyone as big X. No,

it's from the Macedonics podcast. Yeah. It's a, we, we that, much like everything we've ever done. But there's nothing new under the sun, to be fair. So I feel really bad, guys, because normally behind me, I have my whiskey library set up because my side career is I'm a professional whiskey taster. But I'm actually hosting an industry event upstairs today. So they're up there drinking i actually have a pour here what we we gotta know what that is so i this is this is we're oh yeah no so this is uh jack daniel's coy hill release the highest proof thing they've ever

released they released it two years ago so this is like 145 ish proof jack daniels basically so instead of like the whiskey library behind me you get my kitchenaid i was i was waiting to point out the kitchenaid mixer so i like the color let me tell you this baby this teal green oh it pops oh my goodness oh my god to be fair you don't met i mean it doesn't get better than the kitchenaid mixer though in terms of mixers i think right i right? I mean, that's the gold standard. I hope not because that's what I bought for Christmas. So if it gets better than that, I'm going to feel real low class. No, I think it's the gold standard.

I just sold a company. I want the best mixer. Right. Yeah. Yeah. You have I sold company money. So you got to have the best mixer. It would be a disservice to yourself. Mixer money, basically, is is between two and $300. So we do have big, big David Thomas towel with us

of a CEO, well, founder of bar bend. And we'll get into more details of everything that's going on there. First question would be maybe for anyone that's listening that doesn't know, we obviously know, we're in the know, but we might have some people that don't know, what is Bar Bend? What's your elevator pitch on what is Bar Bend, if someone asked you? That's changed a lot over the last six weeks,

but Bar Bend was, until like a month ago, was the world's largest independent media company for strength. So strength sports results, news, training, reviews, analysis, op-eds, you name it. We were the biggest independent publisher of that content in the world. And just for reference, in 2022, we had over 31 million users on the website. People come to the website reading, interacting with the content. We recently got acquired, so we're still one of the biggest. We also own breakingmuscle.com. Some folks might know that site from way back in the day, we relaunched it about a year