Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2047: How to Become One of the Highest Paid Trainers in the Fitness Industry With Don Saladino

Episode Date: April 6, 2023

In this episode Sal, Adam & Justin speak with Don Saladino, trainer of Hugh Jackman, Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively and many other Hollywood A-Listers. “You are all expendable.” His origin story in the health & fitness space. (2:19) Working with celebrities compared to athletes. (18:14) Dealing with ‘snake oil’ actors in the business. (26:22) How using data points can become weapons. (33:49) The craziest celebrity transformation. (37:33) Why he stays away from performance-enhancing drugs. (41:05) How he managed the 2008 market crash. (46:26) Surviving the pandemic and going digital. (49:04) Why did his original app crash and burn? (52:40) The “vanity metrics” of social media, and why you shouldn’t build your business around it. (54:27) The obsession of wanting to get better at your craft, and the power of relationships. (1:01:12) Breaking down his revenue streams. (1:08:55) The Barn Saladino. (1:13:40) His relationship with fitness. (1:16:13) Fitness is a perfect vessel for growth. (1:21:20) The evolution of his relationship with money. (1:26:17) Leading by example with his children. (1:30:57) Related Links/Products Mentioned Visit Seed for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Promo code MINDPUMP at checkout for 25% off your first month’s supply of Seed’s DS-01® Daily Synbiotic** April Promotion: MAPS Anabolic or MAPS Split 50% off! **Code APRIL50 at checkout** DON SALADINO : Coach & Fitness Entrepreneur DON SALADINO ON TRAINING CELEBRITIES, RUNNING A GYM, AND GETTING COVER-READY IN 30 DAYS Red Sox Announce Restructuring of Major League Medical Staff Omegawave: Assess. Analyze. Optimize. Mind Pump #2042: The Essential Habits You Need To Move Freely & Live Fully With Kelly & Juliet Starrett Mind Pump #2017: The Best Peptides For Fat Loss With Dr. William Seeds Playbook | The #1 platform for fitness trainers, athletes, coaches Challenges — DON SALADINO Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources Featured Guest/People Mentioned DON SALADINO (@donsaladino) Instagram Hugh Jackman (@thehughjackman) Instagram Ryan Reynolds (@vancityreynolds) Instagram Blake Lively (@blakelively) Instagram Liev Schreiber (@lievschreiber) Instagram ATHLEAN-X™ | Jeff Cavaliere MSPT, CSCS (@athleanx) Instagram Scarlett Johansson (@scarlettjohanssonworld) Instagram Sebastian Stan (@imsebastianstan) Instagram Dwayne Johnson (@therock) Instagram   Michael Boyle (@michael_boyle1959) Instagram   Kelly Starrett (@thereadystate) Instagram Frank Sepe (@frank_sepe) Instagram   THE BARN (@thebarn_saladino) Instagram Mike O'Hearn (@mikeohearn) Instagram Dr. Gabrielle Lyon (@drgabriellelyon) Instagram Jordan Shallow D.C (@the_muscle_doc) Instagram Kelsey Heenan (@thedailykelsey) Instagram Paul Chek (@paul.chek) Instagram

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. You just found the most downloaded fitness health and entertainment podcast in the world. This is Mind Pump. Alright, today's episode, we got to interview one of the best trainers in the fitness industry. Don Saladino actually became quite known for training. Hugh Jackman, you know, when he got ripped for Wolverine,

but he's actually known also for training lots of other celebrities, but he's been training people, every day people for a long time. This was a great conversation. You actually get to learn how a fitness trainer became one of the most successful fitness trainers in the industry.

Very smart guy, great guy too, awesome person, great human being. We had a lot of fun in this episode. So if you're a trainer or if you're looking for a trainer, you're going to want to listen to this episode. By the way, you can find them online on Instagram at Don Saladino, Saladino spelled S-A-L-A-D-I and O. Now, this episode is brought to you by one of our sponsors, Seed. on Saladino, Saladino spelled S-A-L-A-D-I-N-O. Now, this episode is brought to you by one of our sponsors,

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Use the code MindPump for 20% off your your first months order of seeds daily symbiotic. Also, we have a workout program sale going on this month. Maps and a ballic and maps split both very popular muscle building programs are 50% off. If you're interested in either one or both, go to maps fitness products.com, click on the program you want, and then use the code April 50 for the 50% off discount. And again, you can use that code more than once, so you can get both programs for 50% off. Once again, it's mapsfitinistproducts.com, and the code is April 50. All right, here comes the show. You are known as being one of the more successful trainers that's out there, quite well known.

I think it's a culture. I wanna go back to how you started. You started breaking more to like we did, and you've done it for a long time. Take me back to, and you start, you do this in one of the hardest markets. It was tough. In my opinion, in the world, in New York City.

It was, take us back to that one. It was tough. I mean, so I went and worked for Equinox back in 99. Spent a year there, saw it get taken over by the first private equity firm that bought it from the Erika family. So I think six months in, this firm came in and bought it from the Erika's for like 150 million bucks.

So I actually saw Equinox go from a mom and pop organization to corporate, which is one of the most valuable things I've ever witnessed in business. And I come from a catering background. My family, you know, Bar Mitzvah, sweet 16s. I was sweeping floors at seven years old. It's like, I was always in that blue collar mentality.

And I think that's why I love to work hard. Watching a GM walk into the room one day, though, and look at all of the trainers and go, you're all expendable. It was the first words out of her mouth. And my jaw hit, I mean, my jaw hit the four. It was probably one of the worst deliveries I've ever seen, but also one of the best messages I've ever received.

Not something you'd ever say to an employee, especially 40, but I've just drawn. Oh, that's what I was thinking. That's what I'm laughing over here right now, because I'm like, I'm quite honest. People on one day like that, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, but for different reasons though, at least because we experienced something similar, we started with 24 fitness, I'm laughing over here right now because I'm like, I'm fired up on this team. People on one day like that, I don't say it. Yeah, but for different reasons though,

because we experienced something similar, we started with 24-Fitness and we saw them go from their heyday to getting purchased by these organizations that need nothing about fitness. Yeah, just kidding. And there was a common thread, it's interesting. They saw the trainers as not being valuable. Now, those of us who ran gyms, I ran gyms for a long time,

knew that the trainers were like, that's some of the most valuable people in the gym by far. So they came in and they said that to the trainers and what happened. Yeah, and I don't get it. I still to this day, the trainers are your lifeline. They're the people that are in front of your clients the most amount of time.

They're the ones that have the most amount of touch points with the members. Like, I don't understand how they keep devaluing them or paying them less. And it just makes them, no, completely, other conversations. Well, it's crazy. I mean, we had, I don't know if you guys had these stats, but we, I remember when I first saw these stats of a member who does not get a personal trainer, the average fall off rate was within the first three to six months that person stops coming to the gym.

They keep paying for about another seven months that was the stat. If they saw a personal trainer for just five sessions, that the average client would go for three plus years. That's huge. Especially when you have some, you're monthly paying every single month. So the fact that somebody would think

that the trainers are something that you could just get rid of in a gym businesses. You know what it was? You know what it was, is that people who think that the trainers are something that you could just get rid of in a gym business. You know what it was? Yeah. You know what it was, is that people who used in the model in the current big box model, people who used the gym a lot cost more money because they used the equipment, they show up, they crowd the place,

they're paying 20 bucks a month. Like the other guy who's paying 20 bucks a month who doesn't show up except for maybe once a month or never and they don't crowd the place that it is for you. You're free not to show up. That's the model, that's what happened. I get it, but I want people talking about their experience. I want them happy, I want them walking into a party,

and everyone saying, oh my God, look at you, you look amazing, what are you doing? You're doing so, yeah, it's, so yeah, I mean, I think from a business standpoint, I get it, but I also don't, it's the one thing in fitness I just don't agree with. I think we got to put more love into the coaching. We got to take better.

So what was the outcome? What happened after? I started seeing that the trainers just started breaking off and they started getting rid of a lot of us. I was let go six months later. Our price points were too high on those coaches. They ended up actually hiring me back. I think a month later, I got a call.

I think that GM was let go and they hired me back. At that point, I was already making triple when I was making at the club and I was like, oh my God, this is great. I control my schedule. I was at a one-on-one facility. I went down to the Ritz Carlton battery park. I had a client of mine who built that one, that facility.

And I went and I became the head trainer there, the only trainer there. At Ritz Carlton? Yeah, at a Ritz Carlton down in a battery park in New York City. And I would pull my car up front, I'd head in the dorm in 20 bucks, he'd watch my car for four or five hours, I was charging at the time, 125 bucks an hour.

Young kid, well, I've been in that time, that's a lot of money. It was that, I think when I was 22 years old, and I could talk, I don't mind talking about this, but I think I made 200,000 bucks when I was 22 years old. Yeah, I did pretty well. But I was also, you know, like what you were talking about this, but I think I made $200,000 when I was 22 years old. Like I did pretty well, but I was also, you know, like what you were talking about in your past life and business, I wasn't feeling fulfilled.

There was this entrepreneurial piece that was missing. And at that time, there was no social media. There was like, there was no digital space. I mean, if we talk about what we're doing now here 20 years ago, people would be like, what are you talking about? I'm running a podcast. I'm selling online programs. I've got a global reach on the web, like none of these terms really existed,

which I think is interesting, but back then it was opening a gym. So I knew nothing about the gym space, but I did know people, so I went to angels and I raised five million bucks at 20. As a kid? No, at that point I was 25. You're a kid.

I'm still a kid. You was a kid. I opened young men. So then I started, I didn't open my first club till 2005. So I think I was, I think I was, Okay, we said back up. So okay, I mean, you obviously had to be, okay, a couple things would come to mind right away from me.

Yeah. Yeah, you had to be a hell of a trainer. Yes. Cause I'm sure that you also have to be. Yeah, probably one of your superpowers is your ability to build relationships. Yes, but they wanted me to have my own thing. And you know, that's really how someone in your life that wants that sees that you, not I want to say the word deserve more, but you have more to offer.

Then people start believing you and they start putting weight behind. It's like what you guys, like 10 years ago, if I told you you'd be doing this now, you'd be like, what are you talking about? Like this is the dream. I mean, it really is. What you guys have created is impressive. 20 million downloads, I think, is the dream. But no one 10 years ago knew what this was about.

So I raised the money and I start going and I'll never forget this is actually, I mean, I'm embarrassed even at Metis because I've never said this once anywhere. But I remember going out with a broker, not dating, actually going out to look at space and he was showing me different spots and he's like, well, what do you want from a square footage standpoint?

And I was like, well, the more feet I have, the more square footage, the more equipment I can fit in, right? He's like, uh, so back then, like I literally like I understood business, but I didn't know what I wanted yet. So I ended up going to a term sheet with a broker in New York City, 1440 Broadway. It was Broadway. It was like, okay, this is great. And I end up losing the term sheet seven months in. I think that I was indicted. And I lost, I think I probably lost a year and a half of my life when I came down and looking for the space, going to a term sheet for so much.

And I stopped looking for locations. So I immediately started getting really smart. I was like, all right, I am never gonna stop looking. Like even, until it's signed on the dotted line, I don't care what deal, I don't care how much money is being thrown at me, I'm gonna keep keep looking, I'm always going to pursue it. And I did that and I found 495 Broadway, which is a 15,000 square foot. It started out as a golf fitness training facility.

We had indoor simulators, I got a liquor license. It's a wine beer or a whole? Wine beer. Hard alcohol, we're really supposed to have it, but we kind of did it. The balls to get a 15,000 square foot place. I don't know if the balls are stupidity. I really don't want to be honest. They probably go ahead and handle it.

I did think I was invincible. I was like, oh, I'm not going to lose, right? So we started, I'm not going to lie. We were printing money out of this place because we were doing corporate events upstairs for Goldman Sachs, bare stirons, Lehman Brothers. You know where I'm going with this?

So I'm getting on the phone with this. Real good to know. Yeah, real good to know. Exactly. You know where I'm going. So I'm sitting there. My brother and I, my brother was a professional golfer turn back amateur. We went through all TPI training.

We were the first TPI level three's Greg Rose. I don't know if you know who he is. Out of TPI, he was one of my mentors, but I went through their training 18, 19 years ago. So I wanted to take with TPI, the Titles Performance Institute did, and I wanted to bring it to your city, but I wanted to bring a little flair to it. I want to have entertaining. I wanted to start doing corporate events, bachelor parties, whatever it was.

So we had the gym downstairs, which was doing well, but upstairs we'd have a corporation walk in and host a three hour event. You'd make cash. Now it's all guys. Now I'm going, wow, there's no women here. What am I going to do? So I do a deal with Ford modeling agency. I'm like, I'm giving 60 year models or 50 year models, all free memberships, but I need them here on this state. So the real guy started walking. Oh, this is so brilliant. It's so, but it's so stupid because I over did it. Like, so all these guys from Goalmen are walking in and I had like four rows of cardio

and there must have been like 30 women, gorgeous. On the elliptical, everyone's like, and I'm sitting there like, oh, this is so obvious, man. This like, everyone's gonna know I'm a fraud here but I was trying to fake it till I made it. So, we went and we did this for a while and they know 708. Hey, and I looked at my brother and I was like, holy shit dude, like we got a serious problem here.

I'm like, we gotta redo our whole business. So we started, so wait a minute, I wanna know some numbers that is so. At that time, like about what is the gym doing? Where are most the reads, the revenue coming from? What's going on in the place? So I think rent, so I started at low 20s of foot and then with taxes, I could tell you my last year I was paying 750,000 rent.

I was paying 15,000 a month in real estate taxes. Big knot. And then I had my overhead. So I think when I sign my, I'm gonna get these numbers wrong. I thought I was paying like mid 300s for rent when I signed, but you had your typical escalations and your real estate tax. Okay, so you got a pre-seers overhead.

So as most of the money coming from the monthly membership, so it's the corporate things you're doing, where's the revenue coming from? It's like probably a half and a half thing, probably a little heavier on the corporate event side of it. Which is why when that happened, you're like, oh shit. Yeah, we're like oh shit.

So we bled, the probably the dumbest decision I made in my life was we went PG on it. So we had a personal guarantee on it. So I couldn't throw the keys in. I had a ride out the life of the lease. So it was either, okay, hand the keys over fine, you're going to be on the hook for I think at the time it was like a three million dollar probably hook So they were gonna wipe my brother and I out so 0708 hits corporate events go to complete shit. She's my language and

We start believing about a hundred grand in cash a month So my brother and I had the idea to turn around and go to some of our really good members who had a lot of money I mean this is like the cream of the crop. And I said, listen, we're in trouble. I'm not gonna lie to you. You love this place, we love this place. I said, could you front load your year? So if John Smith, I'm making that name up, comes in

and trained and spent $100,000 last year, would you give us a hundred grand, we'll give you the membership you're helping us out? Bro, he did like a 24-feet as flip. That's what they do. He did a flip right there. I pulled in a million bucks, and I worked off a million dollars in training

over the next few years, me personally. You just worked it off. I worked it off. I was doing 40 to 60 sessions. Oh, shit. I was waking up at 3.30 AM to get into the club before four. I've trained over 40,000 one hour sessions in my life. I figured the math on it, and I did this for a while.

So when people are like, it's four black belts. But when people like, you guys had to go through, I'm sure there were moments for you guys turn around and you were like, am I doing the right thing here? Let me add something to this, because people who don't train people for a living don't understand the difference between a regular 40 hour a week job and training people for 40 hours a week. Oh yeah.

When you're at a normal job, 40 hours a week, you're really only on, you know, 20 hours, maybe 25 hours. If you're training 40 sessions, you're on the entire time. You can't relax or chill. You're with the person in front of you and you got to perform every single time. It's exhausting. And it's exhausting. It's like you're not going, you never with a person in front of you and you gotta perform every single time. And it's exhausting.

It's like you're not going, you never went and they said, oh, what are we doing in it here? Like, no, you're going. And the, I mean, part of being a great trainer is the being able to be a chameleon to each one of them. So you've got, you know, energy. Oh yeah, so each person, you're changing almost like your character and personality,

eight, 10 times of death, exhausting. So then we, then Hugh Jackman walks into my club one day and the story I told you guys earlier. Was he referred by somebody? He was training with a friend of mine and Hugh came over, started having a conversation with me, asked to work with me. And I was like, you're working with my buddy

and then my buddy came to me, he's like, no, I'm having triplets, I'm leaving. I'll give him props, his name's Rico, great guy, great, great coach. And I end up working with you for the year. There's no social media at the time. I was... Was this some preparant to prepare for?

Yeah, for Wolverine. Okay, so I think it was Wolverine in Australia, which the movie Australia with Nicole. Is this physique went viral? Yeah, for that movie. It was sick. He came off the boy from us. He was 175 pounds.

People wanna say he put on 30 pounds of muscle. There's no way he put on 30 pounds of muscle. It's be very clear here. He did not put on 30 pounds of muscle. I mean, he put on muscle, but he also put on fat with that muscle. And, you know, he got bigger and he got stronger. And but really the secret to our training was

he had no lower body at the time. And I'm like, we gotta build your legs. And he said say but my upper body like we got to build your legs like so We taught him a squat we taught him the deadlift all the basic stuff I really have more of like a power building back. I love power building. I love I love the big lifts and I love doing Mobility work. I love car. I love it all type of thing But he needed lower body training so we really focused a lot on that we focused on his mobility and his body came. And listen, we had food coming to him. And I knew every hour he was eating, every hour he was sleeping.

And we built him up. Now, so you're responsible for that physique that was in the first training, I should say? I was like to say I was a part of it. Listen, and again, I think it goes back to you're all expendable. Like I think that's why I've done well in this market is I understand that I'm expendable.

And though I have some great relationship like Rhymer and I'll just put a post up and tag me on it. My boy for 14 years is like a brother to me, like his wife, his wife's like a brother to me where he's joke around because she's like, you know, she's kind of like a dude, right? And you want to think that, but she's awesome. And I think there's always been this respect

that even though we're friends, I'm there for a job and I'm there to help get them to a certain point. And I think what happens in the industry is people start getting too comfortable and they want to be in that world and they want to be next to that person and a part of it. I'm like, don't forget why you're here and what you're doing.

So when I started working with you, no social media, it did not exist. And I remember looking at me asking to do press, like let's do some press. I'm like, no. He's like, what are you talking about? I look back at him, I was like, what is I doing? I was like, idiot.

But he's like, let's do some press. And I'm like, no, I'm like, we're getting you right. Oh my gosh. I'm like, no, let's get you ready for this role. This is about you. This is not about me. I also think it was that attitude that was quite love that too. And I think the next thing you know,

I guys, every single week I'm not even kidding like, hey, it's Michael J. Foxx, hey, it's Sandra Bullock. Dwayne Johnson's working out in the club. Like all these people were coming in because they realized that it was a safe place. I saw a woman who had one time holding the phone low. See, what a great, you know what a great, I mean, we laugh for you, you know, kind of joke like. I feel like it was smart safe place. I saw a woman who had one time holding the phone low. See, what a great, you know what, what a great, we laugh or you, you know, kind of joke. I feel like it was smart.

Yeah, you know, you that, you know, oh, man, what a dummy. I didn't do the pro, but really though, it was long-term thinking. Yeah, I could have played it a little bit, I'll be honest. That's sure. One article, no problem, but remember, we got to get back to it.

I'm going to play it a little bit, but you know what, listen, you're, I'm also a kid at the time. I'll be 46 next month, so I've been in this business now 25 years. I mean, you learn what to do and what not to do. But, yeah. So, that, so training him is what introduced all these other people working with you. Now, what's it like working with somebody, you know, a lot of coaches and trainers? This is like a dream, right, for a trainer, like, oh my God, if I could train celebrity,

then I could really get into it. They got to do what I say, they're getting ready for roll. But is it different than working with an average person, a regular person, and if so how? And what are the challenges? I think how, because the question I get asked a lot, because I've worked with a lot of athletes all, so it was what's harder?

What's different? I was like, you know what? Athletes, we have a controlled schedule, right? Like we know when the games are, we don't know if they're breaking an arm during a game, naturally, but my actors, like Ryan does a lot of his own stunts. Like I've seen Ryan break his back. I've seen him break limbs and get concussions and you know, so they get they get hurt. What I the reason why I'm just say working with a lot of these actors becomes more of a challenge is because there's no control over the schedule, right?

Like I'm working with Leo Schreiber who's Ray Donovan and he's got three days where he's shooting all day and then Friday, Saturday and Sunday, he shoots overnight in Brooklyn. So suddenly that schedule is completely changed. He's got two children. His wife's shoot is his ex at the time was was shooting a movie off in a in another location and that to me gets really challenging when an actor actor of mine is on a set and a camera breaks down or one of the stars, mom passes away and everything gets put on hold and there are two time zones away from their family, it becomes a challenge.

You know, when you have to remove these people from their environment with their kids and suddenly put them off and do buy for six months, it becomes a challenge. And their lives are so volatile, like volatile. They don't know what they're shooting in six months. They don't know the location yet. Like I'm training right, I'm helping Ryan with Deadpool

to they have all the locations. They have some of them, but they also don't have a lot of them. So I think there's this level of uncertainty when you're working with a lot of these actors that at least with athletes or regular people, yeah, you have the majority of the time. What about their motivation, right? Like I would think obviously if you're an athlete,

you're very motivated, especially a professional athlete, you're very motivated to increase your performance, actors are probably passionate about their acting. So do you find yourself having to motivate them more to do the things you need them to do? Or are they equally motivated to come in? You know, I think, God, I mean, most of the time, I've been pretty lucky, I think, because when they're coming in, they understand this is part of their job, and this is their level

of being believable. And I think that's why a lot of the actors I've worked with, they don't want to walk around, you know, all job. I'm like, you look great. Why don't you just stay that way? Well, I have to be believable, and I have to be able to transition into a role. So I have to come down from this. Like the most Brad Pitt and Fight Club. Brad Pitt and Fight Club. Yeah, I got it. No, right? Like in the fitness world, like in your world,

like you were pro at one point, right? It's like Brad Pitt and Fight Club wouldn't have placed on stage. Like it's nothing. But in the Hugh Jackman and Wolverine, he looked good. No, no offense. I love you. But like in the bodybuilding world, like who the hell?

Like, okay, funny, deadless, 450 pounds, like everyone here can do that, like another, right, but so I think some of them have this, you know, this switch where they're just like, I need this to be more believable for the role. Once in a while you run into an actor who might be a little flaky and they're like, all right, what do I have to do, I'm not sure, and then you have to kind of hold their hand and kind of, you know of never had to fire an actor. Um, uh, you don't have to say the day. I wouldn't say fire. I would say separate myself. Yeah. That's what I mean. I the reason why I asked that because that's a very, that's a reality of, of, period. Especially when you get really good

and you don't need every single client, there comes a point where you have to have your own boundaries that you set and your time is valuable. And so you could be helping somebody else if you're not really truly helping this person. I had this conversation on Friends with Jeff Cavaliere, the Apple X guy. So Jeff and I, he invited me on something

with Gunner Peterson last year. And I called him up one day, I Jesus. He's like what I'm like man I'm just having a tough time like saying no like I just I got a call He's like by who and I told him the name and he's like oh I can see how that's tough. I'm like I can't do it I can't drive 90 minutes to work with this guy spend an hour with him and his wife drive 90 minutes back It's just not like we're trying to evolve and we're trying to build something else And there's another part of my life now that I'm really excited about. This is my past. So I got to hand these people off. Do you ever go through this and he's like, Don every day. He's like, every day I get reached and he

started dropping names of people who reach out online. He's like, I just, you don't have the time. At a certain point, you got to make business decisions. And you got to say, all right, is it my ego answering questions? Or do I believe in a specific path that I'm taking and I have to follow that path? And it's tough. You guys transition from coaches to building something that's great. And I'm sure sometimes you guys

are putting the same situation. It's time and energy. Did you ever travel to sets and locations? What's that like? A couple of times. I didn't do it a lot because, you know, I had 29, I had, I'm sorry, 30 years old, which is 16 years ago now, Jesus. I had my daughter, so. Oh yeah.

I think I was also running drive, and that was so, for me to pick up at the time and travel at Scarlett, Johansson over to, you know, wherever, overseas for three months, it's not happening. I'm not going and doing that. But I would take short trips with people that I love, like Ryan Blake, like those are my people. Sebastian Stan, like these are still a few people,

like Seb, Seb's doing my next month's challenge with me. We raised money for the Ronald McDonald House. I think we've given away in two hours of Zoom calls. I think we donate like 50 grand. Something great to the Ronald McDonald House, and we go to the house. So I'll do these celebrity challenges just to bring awareness to the person's favorite charity.

And I travel to Atlanta for like two days. And Ryan, I was in Atlanta also. I met the rock there. That's where I met Joanne Johnson. He was incredibly friendly, but it's how it's- How is Ryan is cool and as fun, as funny as his personality is like the character he's he's been him and his wife in business in my career they probably been the single most important person

to me and I can't even begin to tell you how many things they do behind closed doors for charities and people and they seem very intern I mean, I mean, the context of celebrities, they seem like they're very grounded. Amazing. Okay. For them, it's about their family, it's about charities, it's about building business, building opportunity. For them, businesses really about opportunity,

can they give more opportunity to people? And I'm telling you in the 25 years I've been in business, I've never met any couple like them. They're amazing. Ryan is definitely more, when in've been in business, I've never met any couple like them. Ryan is definitely more, in person, more business. He's to see what he's done with business, Rexham, and to see what he's done with Mint Mobile, and to see what he's done with Aviation Gen in a short period of time.

He's a marketing genius, but behind every great man, Ryan, it's Blake. Ryan will be the first one to tell you breaks. Blake's probably half the ideas and her mindset is, I can't tell you how many great, how many great ideas. Actually, one funny story I don't think I've ever even mentioned on air, but it was during COVID. They were, we were training a bunch through zooms

and Blake was like, I got this idea. You should do this funny skit. Everyone's doing these, all these reporters are doing in their underwear. They're like on the radio and the background, you see them in their underwear, you remember this? It's like, all right, let's see something fun. So she's like, I listen, man,

like you gotta get some tanning stuff because your pills go as something. Like on Amazon or in tanning stuff. They're in COVID, right? Which actually arrived shockingly. And we set up this whole skit and I filmed it. And I don't know where I looked down at my phone. Spent way too much time on this.

She spent way too much time on this. We're just like probably bored out of our minds trying to figure things out. And look at my phone. It says, Ryan Zaymon, and I answer, and he's face-time, his face is as close, and he's like, listen, man. And I'm just looking at him.

He goes, if I had someone years ago, tell me not to do Greenland and I trusted them, I would have listened, don't do this. And I'm like, five clicks, and I just delete the video and be like, there's only two. It's all I got out of this. I love that he makes fun of himself and I'm gonna be all the time.

It's so great. It's brilliant. It's so brilliant, but that's them. Dude, I have to ask. You say, so I had the experience of like training a professional athlete and kind of went through that process. It's just kind of a random thing that happened through network and whatnot.

But what I found was just like the crazy experience, the snake oil type trainers that they had previous to me. And so I have to ask like in terms of like that, that world, right? Like, just everybody wants to be a part of that world of like being terms of like that that world right like Everybody wants to be a part of that world of like being able to have that opportunity and that chance and then Like have you heard stories at least from your clients like of their past experience with somebody and I've seen it. I tell stories. I launched an app I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I it. He goes, well, I trained six hours a day. I go six hours a day. I was like, okay, so I'm just sitting there looking at him. This guy is Proble. Proble. I said, well, what are you doing? He goes, well, I

start my training. I start with MMA. I go into my MMA work. We go into the field. We do agility. We do our strength. And then I finish with power, and then I go. Like everything is just a hole. And I'm sitting there and I'm shocked. And I remember calling up my buddy, do you know Charlie Wyngroff? Have you heard of him? Charlie's probably one of the most brilliant PT's.

I know on the planet, and he actually worked with me for 12 years. And I called Charlie, and I actually had like a bit of a meltdown. I was so blown away that this marquee athlete had such poor direction. Then I was like, well, six hours, you're stopping for lunch, right?

Or like massage. He's like, no, we bring up your protein bar out and I'm like, chop, and everything that could have been went wrong, went wrong. How's your body feeling? He's like, I'm getting pain down here. Now, I'll start for some reason. My shoulders hurt me in here.

And I'm like, all right, all right, all right. And then a couple months later, you saw this athlete go through some major hernia issues, AC joint issues, and you're sitting there like holy shit, like what happened here? Well, now you obviously know what happened here, but that is more common than not. And I think it's because the players union can't,

I don't get it. Like if I'm the owner, if I own the New York Yankees, sure, I'm gonna bring in Eric Cressy. I'll bring in someone who's got a well-known name, who's gonna establish a well-known board team, call what you want, of Strandt coaches, and I'm going to build it out there. You're investing $50 million, $30 million into a player, $100 million of dollars into a player. You want to know that what they're doing in their off season is good. The fact that they can't put their finger print on, for me, makes no sense.

I don't care what the argument is. I'm going in and I'm paying my trout $400 million. Like, I wanna make sure that he's not, he's a bad example. I wanna make sure that he's not training with some goofball cousin who's just running him around. I don't know Mike's training, which would be very clear. I'm just using him as an example, but I think we see a lot of that

and that's the question. Do you think it's more, they don't know that they don't know? That's the only thing that makes sense to me. Because I think, I mean, those are, you're talking about more that they don't know that they don't know that's what I that's the only that makes sense to me because I think you're I mean those are you're talking about people that only is get these you know NFL and MLB teams I mean very brilliant You know successful archbishop bill. I think they're very smart guys, but they know nothing probably but they're starting to know because I

I'm good friends with Mike Boyle. He's one of my mentors and when Boston hired Mike, I was sitting there like yeah Yeah, yeah, and I hate mentors. And when Boston hired Mike, I was sitting there like, yeah, yeah. And I hate Boston, I'm a New York guy. So let's be very clear. But Boston, people are so well, you're gonna, you're gonna, you're gonna attribute Boston winning a championship to Mike Boyle,

like maybe I don't know, like, they seem to have been healthy. They seem to be, they have a good place. Cool pain, one of the best train coaches on the planet, a million dollars a year, two million dollars a year. I don't give a shit what it is, bring them in

and make sure that your team has got the proper training. But they're not doing that. Every player on each organization is training with a cousin or a brother. I've met more pro athletes. Off air we'll have this name drop with each other because I'm so curious if there's that story. You just told me to take one of it to say Percy.

Yeah, I got approval for, I remember the first time this happened to me, we were having sushi together. This is an, all I'll say is a nineer, pro bowl guy, super bad ass, had some knee surgery, and I saw the video I was actually having lunch also with his trainer, and we're all hanging out. And he's like, you know, one of his high school buddies

who, you know, got his kines degree, and like, that's his, that's it, that's kines degree. And that's his background. He's like one year out. And I see this stuff that he's doing it, and I'm going like, and you can't, I mean, I'm not going to offend the guy. I'm not going to say anything. So I'm just sitting back watching.

I'm like, oh my God, dude, someone who's this valuable to the team that is this talented, and you're getting trained this shitty, but that's what it is. It's always like some friend or cousin or a brother who, they got the credentials. And so it's just like, okay, I'm going to hire them. It's always like some friend or cousin or a brother who, you know, they got the credentials. And so it's just like, okay, I'm gonna hire them, you know. Doesn't make any sense.

Yeah, I think it's what you said. They don't know, they don't know, because you're dealing with such a high level, a high pedigree of athlete, that the capacity is so high that their body can deal with so much garbage, and they're already performing at a high level anyway. So they probably have the attitude,

well, I didn't broke, you know, so it doesn't seem to be broken. But the problem is they don't know what they could be doing with proper training, you know. And you get away, like I said, he's working out six hours a day, the average person would know right away, this is too much.

Someone at that level, he can get away with it for a while, and sure. Or you can get away with it's not what's optimal. I had a friend of mine, Laundrov guy, can't mention his name, but he had some of the highest numbers on the long drive guys are they're swinging the club, you know, 150 miles an hour. Like tour players like Tiger swinging at like 120 to 150 miles an hour, their ball speed

is up north of 220 miles an hour. Dustin Johnson, when they had him in that commercial, I think was at like 186. This is giving you some context on how big a lot of these guys are and how juice those some of them are also. This is pretty funny. But one of them come to me, that was like a farm boy. Six, six, ex-pitcher went through his numbers with me and I was like, Jesus, I'm like, what's the what's your program? He goes, I don't work out.

So I'm looking at him like, oh, and he turns me, goes, but I want to get in a program and I'm like, I may not want to do that. Yeah, I don't think I want to mess you up. You're like, it's just too good. We were Charlie and I were laughing about it. And yes, there is something you can give him, but he went down south and he got on the wrong program.

We just saw his numbers plummet. And just because he did stuff that's trying coaches would be like, oh, those are good things, but he started doing too much of it, too much volume. You know, now you're feeding into the athlete or the actor who's like, no, man, I want to work. I want to push. I just text someone, like sometimes 100% is not going 100%.

Sometimes you got to recognize that you're an athlete and that more, more, more is not the name of the game for you. Your golfers are tough because they're, they don't have an off season. If you think about it, most of these players that are trying to make it, I'm not talking about the Tigers. I'm talking about the majority of the tour. They're playing a 10 months a year. So when's their bulking phase? That's the end point. So they, so they, they don't so for me,

those years of me trying to have so and so peak at the US open, I threw that shit out. I mean, that's done. I wouldn't even try and progress a program for a year because suddenly they're on a plane in Malaysia and they get food poisoning and they're puking for two weeks and I know, guess what, they missed that and like now what? Now they're in a bad mental spot because,

oh, I ruined the program and I didn't do like, all right, let's step off the ledge here, right? And that's really cool insight right there. So share about what that transition looks like because we talk about people get questions and we call it a call in and ask us about a sport and kind of how we would lead up to peak or like that.

Yeah. But that's such a great point. A lot of these professional athletes, there is no real offseason. They are playing at such a high level so much. A lot of them aren't. So how has that changed the way you look at the programming when you go to write something?

I always have a template, right? I have a program, but I explained it under they have to deviate off of it. And there were years where I was using, have you heard of Omega Wave? Omega Wave is really probably the best way on the planet to measure readiness, but it's not like through my ore ring who I've been working for where it gives you your readiness,

but you know, it's, I pay more attention to it for its sleep. Well, megawave is your laying down for three minutes, and they're putting a head sensor, a wrist sensor, a chest strap on. You've got to be in a dark room, and it's basically, a megawave has figured out this algorithm. That's going to let you know where your readiness needs is for the day where your CNS is for the day and then it can sign to you. Where does your training need to be? If you're a golfer and your readiness is here, well, maybe you shouldn't be working on driver today because that's more power. Maybe we need to work more on short game and putting. So now you're able to actually really determine where the practice needs

to be. Is that what Kelly started? I know. know. Kelly, well, yeah. Remember he was joking about how he would have his, he would go and he need to lay down right after he woke up. Has to be a megawave. Has to be. And his kids would come disruptive and he's like, and it's something you're like, oh my God, Kelly. He can't talk to me, he can't talk to me. He made me a joke all over again.

Yeah, I just spoke with Kelly. I just spoke with Kelly out in Munich. He met him for the first time, he's awesome. Yeah, yeah, they were just here. Him and his wife were in a great conversation. And he was sharing a story. I don't remember what. Yeah, I'm the most totally was using it.

But he made the point of like he had to get all hooked up and lay still for a certain amount of time. So I made the mistake years ago giving it to one of my tour players and we started measuring their readiness. Now years ago, what happens on a Thursday when they're waking up to play and they wake up and they look in their in the red. Yeah, freak out.

Oh, man, come on, man. Like so these things can become weapons. Like when you look at whoop, when you look at mororing, when you look at some of these other divide, and I work for Or, and I love them, but I use Or for sleep, I use Or for trends, I use Or to be able to determine my behavioral change. How do I need to adjust things? And it's data. It's just, what a good point because a huge part of performance

is your physiology, but you cannot separate that from your mental state and how you believe you're gonna do. And I mean, this is why athletes are so superstitious is because we're in the same socks or doing the same routine before the game helps me perform better. Well, he believes it or she believes it does,

then it does, then it does. How do you separate the team? I'm in spite of how you feel a lot since, yeah, I would never let the, I would never give it to the, the, the athlete, I would only be able to read it and then I'd lie to him. Yeah. Yeah. 100.

That's perfect timing. A percent. I feel that for a percent. That's what I ended up doing. I don't care. Yeah. I'm all in Morgan Hoffman was, who's, who's, who's my boy who's on the tour and he's like, how am I, you're dude?

You're God. Dude, go shoot 60. That would be my line. I want to tell me he's great. I mean, dude, you're in a great place. Go shoot 60. That's all I would say. You know, fires off in 80s.

What happened? Well, don't worry about it, man. Come on, we'll bounce back tomorrow. It's all about coaching at that point. It's all about this at that point. It's all about this, right? It's it really is. It's my whole thing with athletes is, and I would use golf as an example,

because I think it's a great example. I don't care if the golfer hits the ball 320 yards or 320 five yards. I don't see the, I honestly, I don't know, the juicing worth the squeeze. It's not gonna, I want them to just become resilient. Like my thing with athletes is I want them to just become resilient. Like my thing with athletes is I want them to wake up every day with energy and resiliency and being able

to wake up feeling in the best possible place. That's my goal with every. Consistency. Yeah, that's it. Across what? When you work with celebrities, are you working alongside? Because I imagine somebody signs up for a role. They're going to have a trainer. They're going to have a nutritionist. They're going to have maybe a doctor. It's going to optimize their hormones or use peptides. They're gonna have, are you working together with a team? It depends. Some yes and some no, and it depends on the individual.

Okay. It really is what, how do they want to approach it? Some of them it's like, what are we training for? Right? It's, you know, I was talking to someone last night that I'm helping out, and he's preparing for a really big role. And I'm like, listen, man, you don't have to look like Pat Bateman and American Psycho, right?

That's not what you're playing a doctor. Like you're actually right there. I just need you going in this role in a good frame of mind, feeling healthy. We don't need to go so overboard because then it also gets to a point where it's like it's not believable. I've worked with actors where we've had to fatten them up. We have Shriver for Chuck. That must be interesting.

Chuck, you remember the Chuck Weppner story? It was the whole Rocky story. Yeah, that's what Chuck's inspired. He played that? Yeah. Oh my God. Yeah, so he came in and I'm looking at him and I'm like, you don't look like Chuck, but we got to stop training.

We didn't stop training, but I was literally like, do you go out, like you like those little burgers at the Royal Tennis again? I was like, oh, go., like you like those little burgers at the Royal Tennis, I guess. I go, go, go. Go away. Go away. I want to put a vodka back in. Joy, vodka.

That's the most, most radical transformation you've seen with one of your, when the people we wear are celebrities, I guess. Probably you would be one, it has to be one, Hugh Jackman. Yeah, he would be one. I mean, what's been cool about Ryan is you, you see his body over time getting better.

Blake, Blake lively. Sorry. Blake lively when she delivered and then she literally months later shot the shallows in a swimsuit. She looked like, she looked like a victim to the chicken. Are they fitness fanatics anyway? No, okay.

No, Blake, Blake is it. Blake is like, Blake's not, let's just put it that way. But she gets it more enjoyable though. Yeah, and you actually get to show that. But she talks about, she's like, no, I struggle with this. And she put up a post of me in her years ago. I was like, hey, I got my body back and only took me, I think she said like 17 months. You know, and then I'm sitting there

like putting a little smirk on the thing. I don't care. I don't sell quick fixes. I don't sell 20 day detoxes. I sell long-term approaches. I want to change someone's lifestyle. I believe in metabolic flexibility. I believe in carbs and fats as energy.

I believe in calories as energy. Use FMS as a screening in the beginning. This is something I appreciate listening to. So some of your other interviews is just the approach, even with actors, because you think they're just in it for the hustle of getting ready for that one thing, for the most of the time. How hard is that for you to sell to them? That, you know, here's, this is a lifestyle thing, and I'm going to try and fix your movement

as well as get you looking good. I actually had an individual walk out of me once because I don't know about performance in hand-sick substances. Guys, I don't know. It's just, your lifetime natural, yeah. I'm lifetime natural. It doesn't make me any, I gotta go on right, it does not make me any better than I just have not had a need for it.

It's, I'm not training for a stage. I'm not training for a powerlifting meet. I'm not training for something that I need that to be able to perform. I also understand that there are doctors out there that are really smart at this stuff. If you have questions about it, go to them for it. I've had no need for me to even educate myself on it. If someone asks me a question, I'll say, you know, go to Dr. Soento or this doctor and that's a person you should be talking to. But I just, it's not my

wheelhouse. I believe in surrounding myself with a team of people and, you know, allowing everyone to handle their facet of the of. Integrity. Are the performance enhancing substances as prevalent in the celebrity world as they are in the professional sporting world? Oh God, I don't even know how to answer this. I just, I'm not around it. I mean, I know of actors that are taking it. I just, you just handle the training.

I just handle the training and, but I have had actors that I've worked with come up to me and they go, what do you think of this? And I said, well, for what you're trying to create, I don't know why you need it. And I try and talk, I had a really bad experience with my best friend and my head trainer, I found dead in his room back in 2010.

He got addicted to testosterone and he wasn't getting it from a doctor. And I saw him, I met him when I was 21 and I think so that was probably around 2000. So by 2010, I came home from Vegas. I was with my visiting my in-laws in Vegas and I landed and I went to drive and he wasn't there. It was like 6.30 in the morning. Tommy has a session at 6.15.

Where is he? So he didn't come in. German guy, no family. I had a coast sign, his cell phone, his lease. He had no one. Like it was it was us like we were his family. And I freaked out and ran up to his room. We ran up to 23rd Street between 6. and 7th. And we had to get let someone the cops came. I called and do something was wrong. And you know, I made the phone call by the time I got up there. The ambulance was there. Holy cow. So, um, and then when heart failure, heart failure, he had, he had triple bypass surgery at 37.

He was coming in to work. White as a ghost. I mean, he would be, you know, he'd be up with a woman all night, like trying to, you know, do his thing and wouldn't be able to finish up three hours. You such a lunatic, he would take a break 90 minutes in to go drink a protein shake. You leave the woman laying on the wall. He was just, he was mental when it came to the stuff, but his testosterone, I had to go claim rights to his body. So that was a two week process where I had to go down

a city hall because it, what happens is if, if, if you die and you have no one claim the rights of your body And you're not getting a proper burial they put you in something called plotters field Which is for like the no-names type of thing. Oh, so he knew something was up a year prior He's like dude if something happens to me you got to handle this and we were I was like nothing's gonna happen You were gonna get you and I hooked him with some doctors and we couldn't we couldn't help him out so Two weeks I had to go identify his body two weeks later Which is the hardest thing I've ever had to do in my life. If you have to identify someone two weeks after they've died, I would never talked to anyone about the only way I was able to identify, I was right, them showing me his teeth, because I couldn't

tell he was all green. And then we, and then we gave him a proper burial and, um, his testosterone when he died was north of 3000. Okay, so he was just cranking it the whole time. I was in daddy at the time, because we got tested months earlier, and I was at like 700. Yeah, normal healthy. Normal healthy range, but I just watch him go through that process. So when people ask me about it, I'm not quick to say, oh, don't do that. You don't need it. I'm quick to say, well, maybe there's some lifestyle changes you need to make.

Maybe it's the three-hour sleep or the drinking six nights a week that's costing your tea to drop and you guys know this stuff. But I just want people to think about it. And I also want them to think about it as at a young age. If you do it at 20 years old, what's going to happen when you're 30? Is it going to be exposing something in your body? Is there something that's going to, you know, is there cancer? Is there something going on depending on what you're taking?

I'm very broad right now, but I think you guys get where I'm at. No, that's how we presented to people, especially if you're that young. If you're that young and you have low testosterone, you must check all the other boxes first. 100%. You have to check the sleep, check the diet, check the stress, check all the... You do, you do, it'll impact a huge... But you, I believe, there are great doctors out there, and there are individuals that need it.

And you know, you're hearing all the sudden, I mean, peptides aren't, they're very different. I'm really curious about the whole peptide thing now that I'm trying to get educated on. We're all going around, yeah. We're all going around, yeah. It's like, okay, well, what is this? Like, okay, are there any, I had a buddy of mine,

one of the guys I trained with who started taking them and he just started getting a massive amount of cramping when we were you training. He'd be sitting there, I'm nowhere as packed with spas out on him, he'd have to stop training and all this stuff. So I don't know, but I'm here an incredible stuff from him. You still want to work with a doctor? Unfortunately, you can buy them online as research chemicals.

That's a big deal. Oh, really? It's so crazy. Oh my God. You still want to work with a doctor? I had a professional athlete walk in once and start asking me questions. One of the most well-known baseball players in the world.

It's all I can say. Oh, well. And I just said, listen, man, I don't know what to tell you. I just don't. It's not my real house. And you walked out. I never heard from you. Yeah, if people only knew that what they could accomplish without the use of any of that stuff and how big of an impact it actually makes, I think people may, you know, I used to think that the difference between a pro and everybody else was that, but it's not. It's not that. It's the work, it's the genetics, it's the consistency. That's like 5%.

The 95% is everything else. We're not looking like Chris Bumstead, if we all get on what Chris Bumstead's on. Ronnie Coleman natural was a top 10, Mr. Olympia. Before he became Mr. Olympia when he finally went on to get the greatest Olympia of all time. Yeah, 100%. Mike draft.

Yeah, that's it. So how did you make the leap from doing this to that to now going digital and building your business? In other ways. In 2020 rolls around. I'm trying to renegotiate my lease with my landlord. I caught him a check in March or April. So, Jim's were forced to close March 16th.

Monday and March, before we get to the digital thing, I want to know how you handled the O8 crash and how you had to kind of like. Good question. Okay, great. So, take me from there. I had a good view. So I had to burn that down. So we burned that money down.

We restructured our business. Now we started becoming more of this superhero, you know, body transformation, body comp, which is a way bigger market than golf. So I think if anything, it was a huge blessing. Cause my brother and I, we knew what we knew, we really got into strength and conditioning. And we were trying to be like the smartest guys in the room at the time with, you know,

kinematic sequencing and 3D swing analysis and doing all this stuff. But there was a small market for that. So I actually think it was, trust me, it was a tough few years for me. And but I think it ended up being a blessing because then it opened the door to something that became very global.

But it took us a few years to climb out of that. And it was tough, man. We were actually, God, man. I remember Hurricane Sandy hit. So what year was that? Hurricane Sandy was what? 12, 13. Maybe.

This is how long after we went through. I remember even going to 12. All right, so I remember in 12, so that's four years after. I remember Hurricane Sandy wiping out our building that I own a unit in downtown, a beautiful two bedroom. I remember selling our apartment, and I remember my wife and I moving into a little, like, small little guest house behind my parents house, rent-free for a couple of years,

I remember living off that money and not collecting salary because we were just at the end of pulling out of that. So there was this, listen man, and that's why now, even listening to coaches, like guys, come on man, like. I've been doing this for six months, when I'm making a video. Get on the floor, train, clean up weights.

I don't care, like, train, clean up weights. Yeah. I don't care. Like, get uncomfortable, take internship programs. Get your $2,000 for free. Stop worrying about what he's charging or he's charging or he's charging. Get yourself out there. I don't care if you take less money. I turn to a coach once he was charging $600 an hour.

And he was like, I charged $600 an hour ago. How many clients do you have? And he was like, three or four. I'm like, great. Why don't you do this? Why don't you charge 200 an hour and train triple the amount of people? Why would I do that and work more?

I said, because working more is gonna give more opportunity. It's gonna put you in front of more people. And it gives you more. Right. So stop thinking, stop trying to think like this, entrepreneur, like, work less, make more money. Like, it's horse shit. Even now with my programs,

I run challenge communities because I wanna be in front of people and I enjoy being in front of people. And I want, there's 10,000 people who are part of my community to become 20,000. I wanna put myself in front of these people more and more. So I got through 12th and now we're starting to run a real business. Now I'm going to renegotiate my lease,

and I can't remember, I believe I've ever remembered these dates, it was December of 19. I went to my landlord and he just wrote back to me, rejected. I was on an offer, I gave him a nice offer. I was in that space, 15 years, and he wrote, rejected. I said, okay, fine. Then we start hearing about this COVID, then what COVID? What the hell's COVID?

We're like, no, it's nothing, right? And then it becomes real. March 16th, Cuomo said, all gyms are closed. I sat up on my wife and I ran into living room, like a tornado was coming into the house. Like we were literally ripping rugs off and pulling couches out and we shot a four week bodyweight program.

Dude, it's hilarious. I had like, sleep like a self-cut sleeveless shirt. My hair was like out to here at the time. And I'm literally, I built this four-week program. We shoot, we sit up all night, we shot like 50 videos, I wrote the program, we put it on a template. The next day I start getting a call from every publication. Would you give an ab workout? Would you give a bicep workout? I'm like, I'll do better. How about if I give you a free four week program for all of your viewers? So wow.

And they were like, really? Where do you have to do? Just send them to my site to get it. So I collected 200,000 emails in four weeks. So that's when I turned around and I was like, all right, we might be on to something here. The next month, I offer a free challenge. What does that mean?

All 200,000 people that we now have emails to, I want you guys to join us for another month, and I'm gonna coach you now, and I think I did it for free. So then I started converting people that every month the number just kept doubling, tripling, it was like, oh my God, by the time I roll around, so I kept, I got PPP money, I pay off my landlord $180,000,

done. Great, have to leave the equipment in there in September because we can't legally get trucks in there and move it out. And the entire time I'm like, man, I don't want to do this. I'm like, I'm literally, my whole life revolved, like my level of significance revolved around these clubs that I had another club to, that I ended up selling. But all my significance, I felt like was in this club

and I don't want to go back. Like, this is what I want to be doing. So I sat with the landlord to renegotiate on different terms and I said, listen, we're going to have to do something on net profit. He didn't want to do it. And we moved on from there. And Dino Brands was launched. But I was proud to say that with PPP money, I left the trainers on for probably at least

six months and I had them try to do some work digitally. I left my manager on for a year. It was able to pay on for a year, was able to pay her for a year, she was with me for 12 years. My head cleaning guy, I found two jobs for in November. Like we really wanted to make, my whole priority was to make sure everyone was set up,

and they're all doing great now. And ironically, I have great relationships, even with my coaches today, I'm sending them clients, because I'm not taking clients anymore. So they love me, because I'm calling them off every week. Like, hey, I've got someone for you, prepping for this movie, they're like, oh my god, thank you. But they all hung with me, and they did right by me, so I'm gonna make off every week. Like, hey, I've got someone for you. Prepared for this movie, they're like, oh my god, thank you.

But they all hung with me and they did right by me, so I'm gonna make sure that I do right by them. So, it's pretty cool. Yeah, it's funny because someone like you who doesn't know this or people who don't know your story, maybe like, oh, he came out of nowhere. Look at this, he did this real fast. Yeah, no, man, it's a 25 year-old.

Buddy, my, yeah, buddy, my, I said, man, you're a 20 year overnight success, and I said exactly. Yeah, so it's 25 years and listen, I mean, I had to go through what I went through. You guys had to go through what you went through, right? We have to and we can't erase that. Nor do I want to erase that, but even looking back on the moments of, you know, driven apps going to complete crap.

And I mean, what I say, we were printing money. I mean, we were number one in the app store at the time when like apps were becoming big. So we did the MTV of cribs around apps in these athletes. So we were literally every day, we're like, oh my god, oh my god, and I'm like, oh my god. And the example I gave us when you're at the top of that roller coaster and you start like, it's like riding something down that hard

is something that I hope most people don't have to do. How, tell me about the fall off, how fast was it and how dramatic was it? I'll tell you, it was epic, man. Really? Oh my God, it was like crashing and burning. I mean, it's like, when you hear these Wall Street stories of like businesses one day being gone,

it was like, we were selling this company now for pennies on the dollar. Wow. And it was like, oh my God, all that work, all that money that we raised. I raised a million three and like five days for this project. It was so easy to raise money. And then it was gone. a million three and like five days for this project. It was so easy to raise money. And

then it was gone. But the reason why that company did not continue to grow was one word and it was called engagement. And it was at a time where you're dealing with these agents that they want their 10%. Their attorneys want their 5%, they want guaranteed money. Anytime I even talked to some, I've slept clients and they call me up about deal structures. Anytime someone is trying to put, like, oh, how many posts are they gonna do a month? Like, just forget it. Like, it's not, like Ryan Reynolds

is not sitting there buying a company, like saying, I'm gonna do this amount of posts a month. Like, he's an owner. He's building that company. He's on the phone with truck drivers to get deliveries done. Like, that's what he did with aviation. Like, that's, like, imagine getting a phone call.

Like, hey, it's Ryan Reynolds, like, like, like, the read-on thing, so. But to understand how many celebrity deals go south because their agents are sitting there going, well, they only wanna do one post a month, it's done. Don't even bother, I've had brands call me. How do you think? They only wanna do well, they only want to do one post a month. It's done. Don't even bother. I've had brands call me. How do you think?

They only want to do this. They're not your person. You need someone who's going to get involved and they're going to engage. They're going to sit there not asking, well, I hit my requirement. How can I over deliver my requirement? How can I be there more?

And that's why that company did not continue to grow. Yeah. So now you crush in the social media digital space and you're seeing all these people starting businesses in the social media digital space. And in my opinion, because we all started brick and mortar like you did, in my opinion, there's a lot of misconceptions

that somehow the old rules don't apply anymore. Like for example, we've talked to coaches and trainers who are like, only have 3000 followers. And I'm like, you know, when I owned a gym, if I had, you put 3000 people in front of me, that was incredible, that was amazing. You lived it.

So yeah, their mentality is a little different. So talk about how it's all the same. I wish I had a grind of rotation. A friend of mine just put a presentation up and they showed 3000, 10,000, 20,000 people packed into a stadium and what it looked like. You're like, that's a lot of people. I understand the importance of social media.

It's been amazing for all of us. But I also think, I call vanity metrics sometimes. It helps, but I really believe that the email list far surpasses the social media. Oh, so you're already trying to show up here. Yeah, I mean, I'll have the biggest following out of all of us on social media and has been, well, I mean, just recently back on,

but it's been off of it for all, for a damn- Congratulations. Thank you very much. Where's the badge of honor? Yeah, for almost, I don't know, 10 months or whatever it was and the business never slowed down its growth and never, like it's a nice to have,

it complements everything else we're going. But it's, the figuring out this whole algorithm thing, like I want to put up content that people value and they enjoy, right? I can't, I put up stuff that is phenomenal and I'm like, oh wow, that was a really good piece of information and it gets 300 likes on it. You know, I got almost whatever my following is, 300 something thousand. I put stuff on that's complete crap.

A buddy of mine, Frank Sepi. Yeah. Frank's a very good friend of mine. We train a lot. One of the most photographed fitness models of the last three years. Oh man, I used to fall that guy back in the late 90s, early 2000s all the time.

So if you guys are ever out in New York, I want you to come by the barn and train with us. You'll have a blast with Fiji, you guys will love it. You saw a picture you know who he is. Oh, he's named to you. I guarantee you seen him on Muslim fitness flex a whole day. He's a monster. Him and I, one of our best performing posts, we got dressed up in like a co-oper Kai, like tight outfit, and we worked out together into some stupid music.

And I'm like, really? Like, this is where we're at now. Like, this is what is, this is what my life is. That's the standard. But you also got to understand that like, am I chasing that or am I trying to build a business? So. That we're at now. Like this is what is, this is what my life's, the standard. But you also got to understand that like, am I chasing that or am I trying to build a business? So. That's him right there. I'm sure you've seen before.

Yeah, you're in love with the place. Oh, see, see the, the right, he's in my gym. He's doing flies. Or am I able to sleep in my gym? Yeah. But he's, but he gets the joke. I mean, he understands that he, he doesn't like take himself too seriously,

which is what I love. But Frank's 51. Is he really? He won. Holy cow. He looks amazing. Yeah, he does look way looks phenomenal. Looks phenomenal. Good, he looks healthy too. Because he was a pro bodybuilder back in the day. He was 315 pounds. Big guy. And he'll even talk about like there was a time where he went natural. Like he was on a lot of stuff and he said he almost like died at a show. Oh, wow. And he finally turned around. He's like, I'm not doing this.

Like I'm gonna, he's one of the few guys that I saw transition from being like, he won the match, he won, I think the Eastern's or something, he won a few big shows. And he's one of the few guys that actually transitioned. Yeah, that's funny. And I mean, look what he looks like. I mean, he's healthy and shape. I mean, he's, you know, he's a happy dude.

He's funny about it. That's incredible. Yeah, you know, back to the social media, you know, he's a, he's a happy dude. He's, he's funny about it. That's incredible. Yeah, you know, back to the social media, you know, the other part of it is they have, it's like, you think you own your business, but you don't. They do. I mean, I got booted off Instagram and it wasn't anyone doing great. Oh, what God. You know, we're not talking about it.

It's close to memes. No, you know, no, it's, I'm not talking about it. I mean, during the whole, you know, the, the last election, I would put up some political commentary. Nothing really crazy or anything, but obviously some people at Instagram didn't like some of the stuff I had to say. So I started getting throttled, I started getting restricted.

Then next, you know, they went through stories, you know, how stories disappear after 24 hours. Yeah. I was getting notifications for stories that had posted two years before warnings. You can't do that. I'm like, this is two years ago. It's not even up anymore.

So I knew they were coming after me and then they kicked me off. But if that was my whole business, it would have been over, right? Instagram would have been done. I had a friend who their business revolved around Facebook ads and his business went from a few million dollars a year to they changed the algorithm to $75,000.

Yeah, it's overnight. So I tell people like this all the time, like social media is great, but you build it all around that. That's not your business. Whereas email lists, you have way more control. Way more control. But I still believe that you need to focus on relationships.

Like in the beginning on social media, I took one woman who is almost 900 pounds. It was one of my biggest success stories ever. And I'm still. 900 pounds? Yeah, 8.72. She was weighed on a meat scale. And how do you train somebody like,

Oh, you teach him how to walk again. Yeah. That's the training. You teach him how to walk again and then you start focusing on nutrition. That's it. I mean, she couldn't walk. So she just broke 400 pounds recently.

Wow. Seven years. She dropped to 360. She had a setback, went back up to 4.30. We got her back down. And it's a battle. I've a guy I worked within since since May, it was 5.25, he's lost about 100 since then,

but he was walking four to 600 a day. Steps, last week he got, I'll give you the math on it, he got over 42,000 last week, that's in 10 months. So yeah, in the beginning, it's not rocket science. I'm not, but again, that dual adjustable pulley that you saw Frank on, his workouts are starting there. Like like you know why? Well, you can't do legs like suspension trainer squats. Oh, the staircase. Can we get up and down there? Oh, it took five minutes. Yesterday, he ran up in 10 seconds. So now you start doing these, I call them non-scale

victories. You start quantifying success or things that we take for granted every day, but someone like that gets afraid like his John told me the other day and I can talk about this. One of his biggest goals in life is to walk into a restaurant and not be afraid to go sit at the dinner table because he'll know as he can fit in the chair. We don't think about that. No, you know, in the satisfaction you get,

as I mean, for me personally, the most satisfaction I got was when I started training people in advance stage because of that right there. So it wasn't like, they're not breaking records in dead lifts and PRs. They're not losing 30 pounds getting shredded. It's like, oh my God, Sal, I could reach up into the top cabinet and grab a glass.

And I wasn't able to do that before, or I went up the stairs by myself yesterday. My daughter didn't have to help me. It was a huge, such a tremendous thing to hear as a trainer. So I'm sure you feel the same way when you. It's why we got into what we were doing, right? We didn't get into this business to become multi-millionaires,

like hopefully some of us do that. It's a terrible idea. This is the worst place to get into, I have family members that work in tech and finance. Oh yeah. And then like, okay, you guys are making money on the guys and that, you know, fresh and so. But no, we get into this because of a feeling

and you guys know what I'm talking about. When they leave that session and then you know they're in a better place. When you do something that? You have a question. But no, we get into this because of a feeling. And you guys know what I'm talking about. When they leave that session, and then you know they're in a better place. When you do something that's life-changing individual, and to this day, you guys still get that. So I'm doing it. You said something though that we share in common, this obsession with wanting to get great at your craft.

And it doesn't matter how much you're getting paid. They think, you even shared, I don't know, how many years when you were like 12, 15 years into your career and had that huge hiccup and you still put yourself out there, give everything for free. Train, I mean, that mentality is the reason why we were really successful, is the reason why you wrote it. Because, and I was just, I just had this call with,

I don't know, I was like 30, 40 trainers on there and I'm coaching them and they get to ask me questions and stuff. And they're all asking the wrong questions. I'm like, and I explain to them. I'm just, how do I charge? How's my charge? Did it just like, yeah. How long have you been training people for?

I'm in my third month. I'm like, go get your 10,000 hours. Yeah. So when your gym boss says, hey, do you want to work on Saturday and hold this webinar there? Or you want to do this Saturday and hold this webinar at the air? You want to do this? You want to go out? Oh, we have this corporate event.

And you're like, and if you ask questions like, well, how much are you going to get paid? You have the wrong mindset. It's like, hell yes, I'll do that. I mean, that was our attitude when we started this podcast. We knew nothing about media. We all knew we weren't going to be good at it. You know, we got 2,000 something episodes in and we're still only at 5,000 hours. We're still, I wouldn't even consider us good at this yet.

And that was, you guys are good at this. Well, you know, and I was talking to a group of people that I said, you guys don't, you guys said, everyone in this room right now knows who I am. But you only know me in the last three to five years when we are getting better, but you know, you didn't know me when we were terrible and we were getting our reps in, like, and that's what made us here.

So that's where you should be focused. You do not understand the power of relationships. I've been on a dozen covers. The first time I was on the cover of muscle and fitness had nothing to do with my body. It didn't, because there are a billion people out there that probably look way better than I do with their shirt off.

I can accept that, no problem. I'm fine where I'm at. But I remember reaching out to editors Becoming friends of them bringing them in all I was focusing on was their training They went to pay me. Don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. I got to do something. No, you know Don't worry about I just I'd like hanging out with the people They were good people. We had good conversations one of my good friend Sean Perine who passed away a few years ago He the first cover of muscle and fitness I got on

was the last cover he chose before he passed away. We had a meeting with him. He thought he had pneumonia in October. He was dead of cancer in December. And it was the last cover that he chose. And that cover was not because I won, you know, classic physique, no, right? That cover was because they wanted to see me win.

And they wanted to see me win because I went in there with a good approach and I just wanted to help people. That has been my business plan, seriously. And that's what most people are forgetting out there. They want, what's my session rate? Because the session rate doesn't matter. I can go through my session rates, people would be like, holy shit, it doesn't matter.

You charge $100, you raise your rate to 125, that'll wear off in about a year. You won't feel significant anymore. You're not going to be happy about that. There's, you know, with me, it needed to be more. And for you, it needed to, you were making, you were crushing it, right? You were talking about it. You weren't feeling fulfilled. So we got to start asking ourselves, what are we doing this for?

Otherwise, you're going to be one of those coaches that's sitting here 56 years old continue to do the same thing You know it don't I gotta add to that though because someone's gonna hear you and they're gonna hear okay So if I want to get More from people I got to go and just give them free stuff But it is it's got to be genuine unconditionally got to be genuine That's right because you're not going into it thinking now this guy's going to give me, I'm looking back on this now going, wow. That's right. So my buddy, John, who's, I just told you 100 pounds,

I'm a charge on John. Why am I doing this? John can't give me anything. Laura can't give me anything, but satisfaction. They don't think they can give me as fulfillment for me doing that. And you know what, if something good happens of it fine, that's not why I do.

You're sharpening your sword. The way I said it in the meeting was I said, listen, I go with that same attitude with relational ability. I recognize I'm going to give the shirt off my back to 10 people and nine of them aren't going to do shit. That's just how it is. That's how it happens. And you got it, you got to expect that and not care. Because you're not doing it to get something in return. But one out of those 10 people, you fundamentally change their life and they become your cheerleader for the rest.

You just stole my line because I was going to say my batting average probably is terrible. It's probably batting under 100 with the amount of free stuff I've given. But I'm fine. I'm fine with, you know, the nine out of 10 people, if you're not fine with it, then you're doing it for the wrong reasons. Because if you're going to sit there and you're going to be better, that someone did not just do it because you you're doing it for the wrong reasons. Because if you're gonna sit there and you're gonna be better, that someone did not, just do it because you think that it's worth investing into. But let me add to that too, because that passion that you have, which I could, it resonates, right?

That passion that you have is what drove you for those four years after 2008, when you went from crushing it to nothing. And someone may be thinking, how the hell did you last four years? And by the way, if you hadn't done those four years, you wouldn't be where it at right now. Now you're killing it, you're crushing it all over the place. What drove you was this belief in this passion

and what you did. So that's the value, the value is it's gonna get you through those tough things. And it's gonna bring, and it's gonna bring you that meaning into what you're doing. Otherwise, it's worthless, right? I also had a lot of help. And that's something I think a lot of us are afraid to admit.

Like, guys, I'm not self-made. Like I hear people talk about self-made, I don't even know what that means. Like I don't, because every person I've ever spoken to, Calvin Klein, I can go through some of the biggest names that we know globally, they've had some sort of help, they've had someone believe in them, they had someone give them an opportunity. Maybe it was an uncle that lent them 50 grand

to get something started, maybe it was something. I've gotten a lot of help. When I was in that trouble, the fact that a group of people turned around and gave me a million dollars, they knew the risk, they didn't do that because they didn't like me. So I got a lot of help so along the way,

it's okay. If you're, I've had coaches that have actually burned bridges with me because they've wanted to prove they can do it on their own because when they left drive, oh, I can do this. F him, I don't need him. I don't know. And you know what?

Fine, then I turned around and some of the biggest names in Hollywood, I didn't hand to them. And then they came up to me years later and they were like, I'm sorry. Like dude, it's fine. Don't worry about it. We're all doing our best here, man.

It's like, I made a ton of bad mistakes. I'm sure everyone did in this room. It is what it is. Yeah, but the power, I mean, that's the thing with you and I have definitely in common. I value relationships so much. And so much of the success of this business that nobody knows about BonneCene's

is built off of all the relationships that we have. And what's beautiful about learning this early when you're young is it compounds. So even though you're batten 10%, you know, one out of 10, and nine people don't do shit for you, that's a lot of work for not very much return, but that one person becomes a lifelong cheerleader for you,

and then you go through another 10, and you get one more of those,, and you get one more of those, and then you get one more of those. And then 10 years goes by, and you got 100 of those people that are rooting for you, and truly want to see you successful, and they don't just do it once, they do it forever, because of how much you've fundamentally changed their life,

or what you've done for them, without expecting anything in return. And then, one day, you wake up, and you're 40 something years old, and you got a lot of people that, you know, would take care of you. Hopefully it goes. Listen, we all hope it all goes, keeps going in a good direction. But again, listening to that line, you're all expendable, that left something in my head. It really kind of messed me up a little bit. I'm like, this might like, it's great now. Where's it in a year? And I

think that's also what enables you guys to stay hungry. Like you guys have probably one of the best podcasts in the world, right? I mean, you guys built that. You guys should be proud about that. But I'm sure it's in the back of your head. All right, how do we keep building and developing this and moving forward and evolving? You want to evolve.

So don't share with me. Like what do the revenue streams look like for you? As far as like, do you do reoccurring? You do. Okay, so tell me how what I do is not what I recommend most people to do, because a few things fell on my lap years ago. So I have an app, I'm partners in a company

called Playbook and we've, Jeff Crahal's the CEO, it's been an app, it's been around eight or nine years. I was brought on as the chief science officer years ago, it's a fancy name, while I throw it around. But you know, that's your Netflix model, monthly subscription. And it's a clean app, we load about 10 workouts on a year, we got some engagement on that, the tech's amazing.

Not my biggest revenue stream. My challenges is what I started during COVID, my challenge community is gonna be close to 10,000 people in April. I put a lot of my heart and soul in there because I can coach. So every morning they get access to 10,000 people in April. I put a lot of my heart and soul in there because I can coach. So every morning they get access to my morning Facebook video where I answer all their questions, they get their workout, they get their nutrition.

And is that live with you or pre-recorded? It's pre-recorded, but I'm answering their questions daily. So if I have 200 questions come in, I'm answering 200 questions that next morning. Got it. I put it like this morning, I was, it wasn't 200 questions this morning, thank God. But I was able to get a lot of that done. So that's two, three I sell programs globally, like you guys do. Four on partners in about a dozen brands that I help with strategy. Are you an investor too?

Yeah. So it could be, I could be an investor, whether it's sweat equity or my own money. It depends on the deal. I also, a lot of public speaking, we have our online courses that my wife, who handles a lot of the back-end, your wife's the one woman we were communicating with. Probably. Awesome. So my wife, Mel, is the one who handles a lot of the back-end stuff, the computer stuff.

We have a team at home like you guys have here. Oh, cool, cool. Kind of doing all that stuff. And we have the barn. So I built the barn two years ago. You guys have to come out, too, by the way. Yeah, we got to make guys have here. Kind of doing all that stuff. And we have the barn. So I built the barn two years ago. You guys have to come out to you, by the way. Yeah, we gotta make a lift. Yeah, next time you guys in New York,

I'll have food, cold plunges set up, sauna set up, six session, it'll be awesome. Yeah, I would love to do that. Are they, are those, are they pretty evenly distributed or is it like one or two of those is the bulk of the business? Like I'd say the pro grant. I think the weakest out of them are probably the subscription.

Yep. You know, that's why we didn't go subscription, by the way. I'm going to, but you know, it draws money for us. It does well for us. For some reason, people don't like committing to that number. Now, no, playbook does great and he's's got a great formula, and it's brilliant tech. You get a ton of volume. You know, I like you sharing this though,

because this is actually a belief for a lot of people. A lot of trainers think that this is the model, is you build up a little bit of a network, and then you go, you transition right into this subscription model, because of the Netflix's and all these success stories. Yeah, but that's Netflix, right? Exactly. And that's why I try and explain to them.

It's like, you're not Netflix. You're a good trainer, and a good coach is helping out. Engage them. It's like, you're not Netflix. You're a good trainer and a good coach is helping out engage. Yeah, engage. Again, we're getting back to that word. Why am I putting a video up every morning because I'm answering a lot of the same questions. Or I'll bring on Dr. Gabriel Line once a month

or Dr. Dwayne Jackson, or I'll bring on a sex therapist or a breathing coach, or someone to talk about mattress quality. I'm just finding, so I do that. I try and engage. I try and add value. I'm hosting my third annual Don Con. I did not think of the thing. Con Con get it.

It's a natural fit. It's a natural fit. We rented an island off a port of Iarge last year. We had 70 people from over 15 countries show off. 50th year. We'll have 150 people from over 25 countries in two. In the future, we'll have 150 people from over 25 countries in two weeks this summer, already committed.

So that's great. It seems to be a fun thing for you more than it's probably a major revenue maker. I mean, it does well. Oh, it does, okay. So surprisingly for two weeks, it's like, it does well, but it's fun to get everyone in there. And what I found out is that, you know,

people come from all over the world and they may not have the greatest life at home or they may not have the most ideal situation at work. You get everyone in a room together. Everyone's got the same problems. Everyone's laughing, crying, doing their things. And we train together. It's all body weight stuff for two weeks.

I'll be taking a boat to Port of Iarta till I try and get a couple lifting sessions in maybe, because I'll just be charmed on my fingernails. till I try and get a couple lifting sessions and maybe, maybe, because I'll just be chawing on my fingernails. But that to me was something that's sprung out. I gotta pat my wife on the back for that because we committed to Costa Rica three years ago, 35 people, I'm like 35 people are not gonna come

to this rented place. We stole that in two hours, shocked, blown away. So we went to Costa Rica, it was great. The following year, she's like, well, we got the opportunity to do 70 now, but we got to rent this island with six figures to reserve it. And I'm sitting there, I'm like, holy shit, I'm like, fuck it, let's just do it. You know, but again, like, risk or stupidity, it's like,

let me fun and do together. That would be a, that would be a, that would be a, that would be a totally gay show. Tell us a little bit about the barn. How does it work and how does that bring in revenue? It was a big deal. So that's where I shoot all my content. So I don't train any people out of there. Once us a little bit about the barn. How does that work? And how does that bring in revenue? It was so good. So that's where I shoot all my content.

So I don't train any people out of there. Once in a while, I'll have like a big name come in and we'll do kind of an overhaul on them. But it's a 2,000 square foot multi floor. I don't have any pictures up there. Oh, some guys are standing in front of it. I got to get good pictures from inside. Oh, that's it with the snow up there.

Okay. But I literally built this house in my backyard. I love it. Life is just in Hammerstrain, Keeman. I mean, we got dumbbells up to. Okay. But I literally built this house in my backyard. Life is just in Hammerstrain, Keman. I mean, we got downbills up to 150s. We got kettlebells up to 48 kilos. We have a full cardio curve treadmills, motor treadmills, step mill, everything. Downstairs full line of Hammerstrain, power rack, leg press, hack squats coming in extension curls, shoulder press, everything. I mean, do we have preacher benches down there? It doesn't matter.

I've got, oh, wait, this is it. Is it going to be a tour of it? I mean, this thing is sick. I've actually seen this already. Jim Krib's, tell me how, okay, how much total invested in this thing? Because I would love for those. Or does it give you all the equipment to get featured?

Yeah, see, there's the win, guess what I thought. Yeah. So, yeah, so we, you see, I kind of jumped off and look, oh, yeah. So, no, life in, this has been a great partner. We actually have a couch there right now. It's changed a bit. It looks a little bare. But so, yeah, so I think to build out the structure, I think it cost me like a half a million

bucks. And I got about 300 grand in equipment, probably a little bit more. So, yeah, so I would have figured about a million dollars what I would have. And the idea is for media. Yeah, it's for media and for me, like, honestly, what a little bit more. So yeah, I would, I feel about a million dollars when I would again. And the idea is for media. Yeah, it's for media for me. And for me, like, honestly, what we, what we love it for is like, if you three were to come in,

like it's red carpet, man, like I have a huge ego with this stuff, like catered breakfast. You guys are coming in training. What music do you want to listen to? Cold Plenty of song. For example, three, four hours. No, no, I'm on the screen now.

I'll send the car for you guys. I don't even care. But it's one of those things where I like people I'm going to sell it now. Three, four hours. No, I'm on it. I'll send the car for you guys. I don't even care. But it's one of those things where I like people that I love being around having great experiences and just establishing. This is, by the way, this is like every trainer fitness person's dream is successful enough. They get a $4. They own their own gym.

They drop a million dollars under your gym. Look at the medicine ball. See other out of line. That pisses me off. That could have 10 mils gone. Hammer strength has a step mill in there now. There's so much more equipment in there. Did you design this yourself?

Did you have someone design it? My wife did the reclaimed wood and she did the beam. Beautiful. Beautiful. The equipment, at least a while, that life, it is in hammer. That curved treadmill is gone now. Oh, there's a step mill. And yeah, man, we've got that new HD air bike,

that air bike's gone now from Shwin. Hammer strength got me a whole bunch of these. They've been a great, they've been a great partner. I think your personal relationship with fitness developed just for yourself. Wow. You get me teary-eyed right now. I think we have a lot of similar things in here.

Yeah, that's why I'm asking. It started with some heavy insecurities. I had a terrible stutter problem. I had a terrible hearing problem in the second grade. Even now, you'll hear the stutter go on me a little bit. I embrace it, I actually love it. But I think second grade, I remember coming home and I was having a tough time.

They put us into a special like class, like five of us. Fuck what are they thinking? They put five kids into a class. Every day at lunch, they have the same five kids rolling out while all the classes are coming out at the same time. You can imagine what we had to go through. So my father was a big baseball player, you know, in high school growing up, started having cash at me and I became in love with baseball.

It was just my thing. It was our way to connect because he was in the catering business working 40 hour weekends, you know, weddings, bar mitzvahs, I was working in kosher kitchens at 10, 11 years old. I just understood that whole entertainment, but my father was in a round for games on weekends. Then I started playing a lot of ball at my dad, got to a little league team, and then started going to the school.

We started having pickup games, and I remember coming home and being like, mom, better than everyone. I'm good at something. She's like, Donnie, you're going to be good at a lot of things. And I think that's when the drive to become, so that was what allowed me confidence. So that I felt like I didn't have it in school at the time. I felt like my, whatever it was,

it was a disability or not. I have no idea, but my hearing problem, my stutter, all these things that were working against me, I started using baseball as my, you know, thing. So I went off to play college baseball, I played division one baseball, I had a great four years, I was a two year captain at my university, I loved it.

But when I was at school, I was training, it became like the major. I was majoring in business, but I was, I remember one time we had a game in Albany where we had like a four hour ride and I remember going through a full squat session before the game getting out of the van and like literally like dragging my feet to home plate. I'm like hitting third, my coach is looking at me like shaking his head. He obviously only got a didn't have to work out with the team because he just knew I was

nuts. So when I had a bunch of tri-outs afterwards, Metz Mariners, I got picked up to play over at some team in Italy, and I already had my job in the city, and I was like, at that time I didn't want to go. So I didn't go. My love turned into fitness. The only thing in my life, I felt like I had complete

control over. I don't care how much I had or how good of a player I was. I saw Griffey strike out three or four times in a game. I just felt like he couldn't get that return off of anything that I could do with my fitness. So I felt like, well, the better I ate, the more I slept, the smarter I trained, the outcome became better. Wow, like this is special. This is kind of cool.

And now I was like, well, how do I do this for work? I didn't know about trainers in 99 when I graduated. I'm thinking about becoming like an FBI agent or a cop because I'm thinking, well, they have to train. My mom looks a bit like a guy who's a cop because I'm thinking, well, they have to train. My mom looks to me and she's like, oh, they have these trainers. And I'm like, they do. They don't make money. She's like, don't worry about the money. I told you this when you were younger, you'll be good at anything that you do. So I literally like that day, I've drove into the city and

I drove all over the city, New York Sport Club, Crunch, this place Equinox opened up, this place La Pouestra, Pat Menocchi, a very smart, very smart fitness guy hired me and I decided to go with Equinox and that's kind of where my past started. And at that point it was just this whole thing. But it all, this all derived from my insecurities and the things I went through. I saw Michael her in on a cover when I was 13, 14 years old, and I was like, that guy looks awesome. And then I'm training at Bedfranc's Powerhouse,

and I'm looking at the sky 300 pounds. You just moved well. He was big, but he just moved well, Frank Zepi. Mike and Frank, I'm like good friends with, I train with them both now. So it's funny to see some of your long-time idols turn into friends. I was just on Mike's podcast.

I grew up reading about him. So lunatic and the bodybuilding magazines and then I'm sitting in front of him. He's interviewing me. Like this is weird, man. I told him that I had to read your articles and shit and try and train like this. No, Mike's a lunatic.

But Mike's also a freak. I mean, look at the kids. Oh, that doesn't make it. Yeah, that doesn't make it. He makes no sense whatsoever. Especially when you hear what you do when he was like 16, 17, his lips are like, okay. This guy was, he's a mutant. He is lifts, like, okay, this guy was,

he's a mutant. He came out worked out with me a drive one day and he was like, I'm off this week, I'm like, I'm, you're off, like what the fuck is, like I'm just, I'm taking him, like, when we're all taking time off, I was like, you commit to it and you're in. What do you mean you're off?

He's like, all right, man, maybe I'll do arms to you. I'm like, I cool, that's two arms. He, he unwrapped 315 on a close grip reverse grip. It started running, that's something like this. This is his off day arms. I got you 25 on it. I'm like dying and he's sitting there with 315 for sets of 50. Yeah. He's so he's going to come up he's going to try and come up here sometime in April. He's like, we'll get a workout like no. My ego can't handle this. He's evolving a lot now. He's not I he's

stuffed. You know, Mike, I love you, but he bikes full of shit. Like I know things are evolving now, and he's starting to do some different things. I see some of the movements he's doing. And I met his wife, she's amazing. Oh, Mona, Mona's great. Moan's stronger than him. Oh, she'll kick my ass.

Oh, she's like, you can work out Mona, she'll kick my ass. Yeah, I'll work out Mike. I'm not working out Mona. Mona's a psycho. That's a good stuff. That's a good deal. Fitness is a great vehicle for personal growth.

Yeah, because you had to stay insecure through what it it would have never worked. Right. You had to kind of work through that through, I talk about this all the time when I used to train kids, you know, 14, 15 years old, because their parents would bring them to me. I remember you said blow me away, because I trained them with exercise and then they do better with the school work. They'd start making friends, they'd start becoming more confident. And it wasn't because their bodies were changing. It was because of what you just said. And I used to point it out to them, like you did five pushups last week, today you did six.

You know what that means? That's awesome. I'd say you're a different person. And it's the lights go off and they're happy. They're like, I am a different person. And that's a great line, mother. They were really easy. Oh yeah, I used to tell the kids,

and it would go the way. And so, finished is just a great vehicle for growth. I know Arnold Schwarzenegger talks about how that led to his success in business, but it's the same principles. It's exactly the same business. It's ironic sometimes when you look at someone who's so successful in business and how they got there and they can't do it in health.

Exactly. It's like, well, did you just, I'm sure Mike Bloomberg didn't wake up one day and was like, oh, I'm going to start a business. I'm going to start Bloomberg. And you know what? We're just see what we have today. Like, he had a plan. He surrounded himself with a team.

And in the beginning, and I wanted to say this earlier, but the most people don't know, it's not their job to know. They're looking at influencers out there and they're like, like, I got a grab, one's got a great body. It's not their job to know, right? And I think that's why a lot of people are misled. And that's why it's important for me to see guys

like you doing what you're doing. I mean, to sound like an old man here, but like, you know, you guys are leading, but you are, because there is a lot of crap out there. So I think now, in the industry, when I talk of people like shallow or Gabrielle or people who are really good at what they do and they take pride in what they do,

when you hear them talk about individuals, it's the same thing. Like, I'll create his people. Mine pump guys down to the best. Like you got to hook up with them. And it's because we want to now see that message be portrayed more. Because we want that example to overflow. I mean, I think all of us, old guys,

were slow to the party, but I think we're starting to arrive. I think the young generation adopted the social media platforms first and early, and there was a lot of early success if you got in early for the way you look. A lot of us old funny studies are trying to figure out how to do all this stuff. How do we communicate to all these people all over the world? And now that we're figuring that out, we know that the message I think that we're all presenting is a better message because it comes from a better place.

But it's your message. You're not like trying to create something that's fake. That's why you guys are coaches. You guys have great coaches. This is what you've always done. Just tell your story. And I think that's why you guys are successful because it's actually, I'm not saying it's easy,

but it kind of is. You guys are on here. It's like, all right, this is what we did. Well, you know what makes it easy is checking the box and the stuff that you talked about earlier first is putting in all the hours of the practice and sharpening your sword because a lot of the success of the show is sharing all the shit we did wrong. You know, it's opening up and being vulnerable and being like, yeah, I thought this was a good idea.

I thought this was a way to train. So when I thought and we share all. And together we learn and I think that none of that happens with three months of figuring out how to hack an algorithm or posting awesome. It's like you got to go put those hours in. You got to go work. You got to go fall on your face before you get that. It's fun to sit around people that want to see you win, right? Like there's, I've had plenty of questions about things in the industry where I'm like, well, I'm Dennis Hinen, Kelsey's, I don't know if you guys have heard of the Daily Kelsey.

She'd be a great guest for you. She's dealt with some eating disorders and she's built an incredible online business but her husband Dennis is like a marketing, he's a genius. He basically was the one who taught my wife everything she's doing now. And now we're trying to add as much value

to their life as possible because they've done, we're hosting a course together this Saturday with Luke Gohosever and we're going in and we're trying to add as much value to their life as possible because they've done is we're hosting a coast of course together This Saturday with Luke a host of her and we're we're going in and we're gonna have fun We make a lot of money. I don't even know what we're making off of it. I don't care Like we're going in there to educate. We got 20 coaches coming in We're gonna try and give them all the nuts and bolts things that we wish we were taught 15 20 years ago. I wish I had a podcast like this to listen to 15 20 years ago. I was you know, why don't we listen to, I'll just send a Paul check, talk about organic farming.

I was just seeing the Pollock win. I was reading stuff on Arthur Jones. I was, you know, from the bottom back there. Yeah, so I was, you know what? Yes, I was reading Teenation 15, 20 years ago. Every morning, I could not get past breakfast without sitting there eating my oatmeal, you know, reading TV and you sit there and you want there and you want that type of information now,

the fact that young kids have access to this. Oh my God. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Unfortunately, it was all mixed in too. For me, I would read those guys too, but then it was mixed in with muscle and fitness, flex and I could be a good man. I still did that stuff.

Yeah, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'm interested here, man. I did a lot of the wrong shit. I probably took every supplement, I'm sure I've spent a hundred and a half years. I don't know if it was wrong, I'm interested here, man. So I do love the wrong shit. I probably took every supplement. I'm sure I've spent a hundred dollars. I don't know if it was wrong, but I mean, you can also say that you did certain, like I've done some crazy training,

like volume stuff that's not, so I would never have anyone do today. I'm glad I did it. Yeah, you look. Don, share with me your journey with money. You've, you obviously have had tremendous success. You've also been struggling to give pie. And listen to you talk and communicate your passion for health and fitness and the way

you are that you don't do a thing because, oh, this is going to return me X amount of dollars. How did you get there? What is the evolution of your relationship with money look like? I really think it came down to my grandfather. I started with him. I mean, I used to roll my eyes to things when I was 12 years old.

He'd be talking to me about, you know, in the restaurant business. You know, he was an Italian who lived in the attic of the catering hall that he started because his mother sold the house for them. That $5,000 to start this restaurant with him and his brothers. And, you know, that's whole story.

They're all living in an attic together. And, you know, they all, even to the day he died, my grandfather was the fastest year I've ever had. Grandpa, slow down. She's really fast. That's why my grandfather just passed away. Same thing. You want to say that?

Oh, no, three bites. And he would eat a whole bowl, really piping hot pasta. But I thought his mouth was made out of his best though. What was his reason? Well, so, he's telling me to give you his reason. He's telling me where it was the same. I don't know if it's the same, but my grandfather, the reason why he ate telling us to talk to you his reason. He's telling us to be real time. He's the same, I don't know if it's the same,

but my grandfather, the reason why he ate, like he grew up very poor, so he grew up poor and Sicily. And, Whoever finished first got seconds, he had to eat it fast because if he didn't, he didn't get no food. Dude, I can hug you right now. Wow, that's the same story.

Wow, same exact story. So he's sitting there like the beast from beauty, the beast like, oh, oh, grandpa slow down. He's like, it's my whole life, and he's like, I had two brothers. He goes, I had two brothers. We were all around the same age. We only had food.

Whoever finished first can get seconds. That was it. No, my God. My grandpa, and he could not. That's totally. He did not know how to eat slow, after that. So keep going. So he's obviously made a huge influence on me.

You would tell me all this stuff, and I would love it. Did you think he was making shit up half the time? No, but it's like you're a young kid, like Don, you know, it's the wealthiest man in the world, like oh, who goes to the man who finds peace of mind. Yeah. And I'm sitting there like,

yeah. Yeah. Okay, no, no. So I'm gonna post yourself. Then we're not like bleeding money back in, oh, eight, I'm thinking, God, God please, I just want to use my- But peace of mind, it's giving some peace of mind. Peace of mind means financial success, health, my to use my- But peace of mind, it's a peace of mind. Peace of mind means financial success, health,

my gym's good, please peace of mind. I think he instilled these things in me that I did not click till later on. If you were to drop a billion dollars on my lap right now, I probably wouldn't go buy it for a re, it wouldn't be my, it's not my thing. I have a boat, it's arriving in a month, I'm sorry. I have some little things like that.

I've got a beautiful home that we're renovating. I got my barn, when we travel, we travel well. That's it. I'm good. So do you remember moments though, when the old wisdom started to click for you? Because I have, you know, I'm, yes. I mean, you could have told me anything

that was full of wisdom around money when I was 16, 17. But because I'd came from very little, I had to go figure it out for myself. So did you have a similar thing? Where you were driven that way. One thing's went to shit. Yeah. Look at a lie.

Most people are in church when things go to shit. Yeah. You know, it's the truth. Like, listen, I try and go to Mass every Sunday. It's something that my mom instilled in me early on. I assure it my church, other story. I don't wanna pat on the back for it. I'm not a goody-two shoes, but these are,

it makes me feel good. But man, when things were tough, I was going every day. So we're the God, man. I was walking in every day. I was sitting in front of Mary and praying. Like, please, get me through this. Every day coming home from the train, because I drove by the church. It was scared. I was scared shitless. I was going to bed at night

scared shitless. That's what racing. And so it took that that scares you shitless. Then you come up again and on the come up are you are you telling yourself okay when I'm coming up this time I'm gonna invest differently or I'm gonna save differently. Are you thinking like that or, I'm gonna invest differently or I'm gonna save differently, are you thinking like that, or maybe I'm gonna take less huge risks, like what's going through your head? No, what's going through my head now

is I'm like, I'm gonna be all right. Yeah. Oh, I see. I can handle, I can survive in here. Yeah, I'm gonna say, I'm not saying, I'm not gonna put away this, about college, no, I'm gonna be all right, man. Cause you know, at the end of the day,

we're all, we're all, every one of us in here 50 years, man. Yeah, sorry, I don't mean to get depressing, but like we're not, like jobs in Steve Jobs and get married with this, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, buried with his, uh, bank account on this tombstone. Right. It's like when it's over, it's over. Like let's go for it.

That's my thing. Like I'm good at, I am going to take risk, but I'm also going to put, I'm going to also minimize the risk as much as possible. Like if I believe in something and I'm like, okay, this is not putting my family in harm's way, I gotta call the go-hally skiing recently. I was like, all right, no, I'm going to Austria in a week. That's fine.

You still born in Austria for a week with a buddy of mine. But there's certain things I just don't need to be doing. So, Don, you're also a father. How do you teach these? Because your kids are growing up, successful dad, privileged in that sense or whatever. How are you instilling some of these things in your case? He still think they're dads a trainer.

Okay. So when people ask them what their father does, they're like, oh, he's a personal trainer. They think they're dads broke. So they haven't had any good show up yet. Hey, this your dad on the, no, no, no, I mean, they get it. I mean, they, you know, they, they get it. But they also understand this blue collar type mentality that I have.

They understand that I'm on calls at a certain time. But, you know what man? Like I just took my son to the University of Louisville. He's a baseball fanatic. We had a weekend together. My, my daughter, you know, we're, we're probably just shopping the other day, you know, where my family is my, it's my number one.

That's it. But, um, they also understand that their dad's not sitting, you know, no offense behind a desk at a bank, you know, wearing a suit every day. They know that I'm in the service business. My, my son the other day came in to do a session with me in Blake Lively. He sees me running around, grabbing weights,

doing the things that trainers do. And I'm glad. I'm really happy about that, you know, and I try and teach him the value of the dollar. And I also, with your kids, I believe you got to lead by example. So when a pair calls me, they're like, I can't get my kids to eat good. How you getting good?

Yeah. This is fucking what you're doing. What do you call me up to the day? It goes, my kids commented on my drinking. So what's that telling you? It goes, don't need, I got to stop drinking. Yeah, yeah. So, so kids are smart, man.

It's 10 year olds telling me hey dad You should probably get rid of the booze so this goes down a little bit Yeah, you have your 10 year old. They call me a ball pissed off You know, he's whatever, but yeah, I think children. It's I think we got to leave by example How's your parents must be pretty proud, huh? They are they they both have COVID right now I called them right now. Oh, they're in they're in Florida I'll have COVID right now, I called them this year. Right now? They're in Florida. They're doing well, they're 77.

I think they're in the chapter in their life right now, where they're really starting to think and differently. And I love them to death. I haven't seen them in a couple of months because they're down south, but we live really close to each other. They're probably three miles from my house. So I get to see them a lot.

I try and stop in as much as possible. I can look at my life so far and say I've been a pretty good son. I'd probably skip the shit out of them a lot, but they are proud. That's a good man. Great story. I'm glad we had it on the show, don't I? Well, listen, man, this is great.

I mean, there's not, I flew in a day early to see you guys. Obviously, I think pretty highly of the three years. So keep doing what you're doing. Keep leading my example. And you guys are in New York, man. Please come the three. So keep doing what you're doing, keep leading my example. Thank you guys for your New York man. Please come, come, come. 100%. Yeah, we'll come.

The whole gym talk, you spoke to my soul. Come on, come on. Thanks, Tom. Thanks guys, thank you. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance,

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