Modern Wisdom - #249 - Mike Thurston - Traveling, Steroids & How To Build An Audience

Episode Date: November 23, 2020

Mike Thurston is a YouTuber and Fitness Model. Mike is one of the biggest fitness YouTubers in the UK and a good buddy of mine, given that we're both in Dubai right now, it made perfect sense to catch up for the first time in years on the show. Expect to learn Mike's thoughts on the steroid accusations, his core principles for training, where he sees the future of social media going, what he's learned about relationships from travelling the world, how he grows his social media channels and much more... Sponsor: Get 20% discount on Reebok’s entire range including the amazing Nano X at https://geni.us/modernwisdom (use code MW20) Extra Stuff: Follow Mike on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mikethurston/  Follow Mike on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzGLDaTu81nJDtWK10MniGg Get my free Ultimate Life Hacks List to 10x your daily productivity → https://chriswillx.com/lifehacks/ To support me on Patreon (thank you): https://www.patreon.com/modernwisdom - Get in touch. Join the discussion with me and other like minded listeners in the episode comments on the MW YouTube Channel or message me... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ModernWisdomPodcast Email: https://www.chriswillx.com/contact  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello my friends, welcome back. My guest today is none other than Mike Thurston, long time buddy of mine, we're at university in Newcastle over 10 years ago now and we've been meaning to record this for quite a while. Bumped into each other in Ibiza this summer and made a promise that we were going to find time to get this episode recorded, given the fact that we're both in Dubai at the same moment the stars finally aligned and we got to do it. Mike is one of the most popular YouTubers in the UK, his physique is ridiculous and always has been even when we were at uni together and he was a couple of years younger than me. And his insight into training, traveling, life,

relationships, steroids, the way to build an online audience, how to grow a YouTube channel, all of this stuff was questions that I know a lot of his fans and me have an interesting. So today we go through it all. It's an extended version and if you want to go and check it out on YouTube, you will be able to see I'm recording in the beautiful Dubai Marina on the 25th floor of my Good Buddy Nick's apartment. So go and check out the

YouTube version if you want to see us in all of our, all of our full glory. I didn't even have video guy Dean with me. Did it on my own? Here's one I prepared earlier. I filmed it myself. Kind of. But for now, it's time for the massive and wonderful Mike Thurston. Oh yeah, PS, I accidentally on purpose missed my flight back from Dubai last week, so I am staying here for another week. I need to warn you some of the episodes that we have coming up, have some slightly weird stuff in the background like the sound of a mosque doing prayers in the middle of the afternoon, which you might be able to pick out in this one, And a little bit more echo than you might be used to, but I promise this episode and some of the others coming up over the next couple of weeks are literally the best that

I've ever put out. There's so motivational, so insightful, so unique, fantastic humans, brilliant stories. So I appreciate you putting up with this while I'm away. I couldn't have got these guys if I was still in the UK. So the price that we all need to pay is a little bit of mosque singing in the background and a tiny bit of echo. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back and joined by the one and only. My team's building, Michael first and how are you? We're good.

I'm loving the life of the buyer right now, can't complain. So good to see the last time that we saw Richard, the one was that. Is there a beef? A beefer. We keep bumping into each other in fuckboy cities, something. So Richard, the one was that? Is that a beef? A beef? We keep on bumping into each other in Fuckboy City, the same thing. Ha ha ha.

Yeah, it was a, it was a brief meeting up, but obviously, a beef was very different this year, so. How long were you out there for? From July until mid-October. It was, it was definitely an interesting year. But in a way, it was a good thing because there was less temptation, I get to explore the island and train, keep on track with my eating, sleeping. So it was a nice little break from Dubai. Yeah, now you're back here six months.

Yes, until May at least. The plan is Dubai is going to be on base for the next few years because I do like it. It's got everything I need. Very suitable for why I want my lifestyle. The only problem I have with it is the summer is absolutely brutal, like it is so simple. I'm very well. Yeah, and I'm type of person that likes to be outside, I like to sit outside, walk. And you can't really do that when it gets too hot. So from, definitely June until August August it's not the best place

but you so I kind of dip out and we'll most likely return back to your. Got any ideas where you're going to be next year? I'll explain a lot but I'm going to plan closer to the summer because last year or this year should I say I planned everything way too far in advance and obviously all this madness happened and It was just chaos. I basically paid for my combination in Ibiza upfront Expecting to have the best some of my life as I turned 30 years old And I'm like oh my god, what the hell am I supposed to do now? I don't even know if I'll be able to get into Spain because they closed wars until July

But because I'd paid for my accommodation in Spain for that apartment, I was like, well, I'm gonna make it work, make the most out of it. I feel like I did what I could with, you know, the situation we had. It was a good summer, but not quite different than some of that I'd expected. Yeah, we've known each other. I'm trying to work out how long we've known each other. I think it's like 12 years. Through it, you need to gather. Yeah. We must have bumped into each other

my first year of uni when I was in the uni gym. Yeah, when I was 18, 18 years old. A much smaller version. A very small and IQ T.A. exactly. Yeah. And when did you pivot from being in the UK? So it was a period you were owning a gym, going to gym in the UK, did a bunch of other stuff, and then when did that pivot happen?

The change, yeah. I think that was when what I left Newcastle, I moved to London because there was something about London, which I feel was calling my name every time I went to London, I got a buzz of being there. And then when I made that transition from training people in person, personal training, to online coaching and stuff on my YouTube channel, I was then free to do my job. Anywhere the world, as long as I had laptop, camera, obviously a gym. So that's when I started doing a lot of travelling, 2018,

2019, I probably did the most travelling. And then this year, obviously not a huge of traveling 2018, 2019, I probably did the most traveling. And then this year, obviously, not a huge amount of traveling, but just living in a different country, ever been in the UK since 2019. So what's a typical day look like for you? Everybody that watches you vlogs will know that there's sometimes you're in a Lamborghini driving through the desert or you skydive in or training with Larry wheels or doing whatever But what's a typical day or a typical week walk us through? Every I would say every day is different. I think one of the things which I like most about my life now Is that a wake up and I can decide what the hell I want to do with that day

So if I'm like right or I make a video, I want to do a collab or something new and exciting. I'll go off and I'll do it but if or make a video, I want to do a collab, I want to do something new and exciting, I'll go off and I'll do it. But if the opposite is true and I'm like, well, you know what, I just want to chill today and just go to the pool, go to the beach, relax, listen to a podcast or audio book, take it easy, then that's what I'll do. So what I do on a day to day basis is dependent upon my mood and what my schedule looks like, YouTube-wise. I guess YouTube is sort of taking what I'm doing in my life at the moment. And what I'm trying to do is two videos a week.

Sometimes I don't always stick to that schedule. It just, I don't wanna put, I don't wanna rush something and put something out to some mediocre, I don't wanna spend more time on it and then put out a good video. But yeah, every day is different. How do you keep yourself disciplined? Because I come out to Dubai and my schedules all over the place. I don't know what time it's supposed to be getting you, all of the structures and the routines

that I usually rely on to make sure that I'm continuing to progress in different areas of my life in the gym, in reading, in meditation, in recording, everything, the difficulty level has been increased. How do you ensure that you don't just get totally blown away by a party lifestyle or a distraction lifestyle or a sightseeing, new experience? How are you keeping yourself disciplined? I think the hardest thing I've found now is as my sort of following has grown, you get more and more people reaching out to you, more people that are wanting to meet up with you, and particularly in places like Ibiza and Dubai, there's a very active social scene, you know, party scene. And one of the biggest things which has been a game

change for me is just a lot of time just not drinking. Drinking is a recipe for just ruining everything. My productivity, my gym workouts, my sleep, everything. So if I do go to any of these events or whatever, I'll most likely not drink most of the time. That's helped massively. I've also found that usually what I'll do in the morning is I'll write a list of things which definitely 100% need to get done on that day. You got any idea of what that was today or recently, can you think of a list that you're room? Yes, so I'm trying to think of yesterday. Yesterday was to film a workout with Guy called Bren Harding and then after that was to do a little bit of video editing. Then to shoot

some content for my protein because Black Friday's coming up and I do some promo for them. And then there's some boring admin stuff like emails and things like that. What I try and do is not make the list too long because I'm so good at making lists Quite terrible at Yeah, I just think I just do three or four things. Just make sure they're done try to get the hardest things done first I try I find that I'm like way more productive in the morning when I wake up I Can well to tip the wake up time. I know it might change based on whether you've been out or not But so when do you aim to get up for luckily for me?

I've awake at one and I don't have an alarm like I wake up when my body wants to wake up and the goal is to try and get 7 to 8 I'll sleep And the thing which I've noticed about the body because the sun sets quite early the days are short so I Because there's a lot of going on on night, I don't want to be staying up too late because that means I don't wake up later and then there's less of the day to stay advantage of. So I am trying to wake up at 9 o'clock. It's not going very well. You messaged me last night at half four in the morning asking if we could push this

back by four hours. Yeah. So this is the crazy thing about Dubai because we were, it was me, Louis and then a Sunday guy were like, oh no, I'm sorry. Someone to eat. And there was this one place which I've never tried before. It's called London Project, which is just a walk away from mine. And I'd met someone in the gym who's invited me to go there because she knows the owner. I was like, okay, cool. So I dropped a message and said, oh by the way I'm going here, you know, kind of hoping that she would message the owner out there. So here we went there. The owner turned out to be there, he introduced himself and then he gave us this like unbelievable service, food, drinks, like they're coming out of cocktails, even though I don't want to

drink, I maybe had a few, but my friend Louis, he had quite a lot. And then it was like amazing and that's when the night should have stopped. But the owner then came with like one of his co-workers and he'd had quite a few drinks and he was like, come, come and sit with us. I was just like, no, like this is more time to this. This is probably about 12-30. Going on time. Yeah. So obviously I don't want to be ruined like, okay, well, that's it now. And then we all sit down, it's probably about eight of us just chatting away. And it turns out he's this massive big time guy

from Australia who is the son of probably one of the wealthiest family, wealthiest families in Australia. So we had this like unbelievable chat about so many different things. He's like doing lots of things, wants to get me involved, get Louis involved. And then the night just carried on until about 3, 30 in the morning. And I kept saying to him, I was like, look, I've got a podcast next day, like I need to go. And he was like, five more minutes. And I was just like, this is just typical divide.

All I wanted to do was just go out for a nice meal and then you went to this place, getting looked after and then meeting someone who is... Somewhere in. To a lot of people, that sounds like a dream world, right? But I imagine that when that becomes consistent, you must get, do you ever get sort of anxiety or a level of frustration that you can't knuckle down and do things

quite easy? I was, I was so straight last night, so like I, I once got to bed, like because I have stuff to do tomorrow and I know that if I don't go my sleep or if, you know, I drink, I'm, I'm no one knows product of the next day. I don't feel like I've wasted the day, but I feel like I can come and do not hell a lot more in that day. And if you compound that over a couple of weeks, a couple of months before you know it, that becomes your life.

Yeah. And the thing with that is, especially with what I'm doing, my physique is almost my business, the way I look. I take a lot of business, the way I look. I take a lot of pride in the way I look and I put a lot of work and effort into sculpting my physique and looking at a certain way. And doing things like that, going to bed late and drinking alcohol,

it's absolutely terrible. To pull around my direction for you to do. Drinking, if you drink like more three drinks, it can massively drop your testosterone levels. It takes like three days for you to go back to normal sleep as well. So many Disadvantages are not getting enough sleep And I am aware of them. So make it even worse. Yeah, I'm just like oh Yeah, here we go. How sick are you of people asking if you're natural?

God now at this point I'm used to it because I've been getting for like a decade. Like, but what I have noticed is a lot of it is really dependent on the type of content which I put out. So when I'm doing vlogs and day-to-day stuff, not many people talk about steroids or anything like that because the focus is on something else like just happening video. When it peaked recently was when I did a full week of training in Ibiza,

my current split. And I was at the gym training topless. I'd mostly get myself on top, probably one of the best conditions I've been in for a while. It's not that I was bigger, it's just that I was leaner. So obviously when you get leaner you have the appearance of looking bigger. But because when I was in the gym I was topless I was like seriously pumped up because my physique changed a lot from you know me. It's like to pump to pump to pump to. So I was just like Jesus, like that looks pretty damn crazy and then the whole argument comes with IZ natural is not natural and then a few other big youtubers Started making videos on whether I'm natural or not Derek from all plates modates. Yeah Greg dessert

I think Greg dessert like three videos. I mean this summer, which is easy views man Yeah, so in a way it's good because I get simplicity from him but You know if someone thinks I have taken something most of the time, they're always you know, think that it's not really much like a do to change their mind. But the thing that annoys me is when people message me like, oh, you know, you I just think you've such a role model, but now that I know that you're not natural,

I just, because of some guys video on YouTube. Because he has a proper cult following. People believe everything he says. And... What was his justification for while you're on gear? Because of... The supposed low levels of body fat which I have. He said I had six percent body fat which is not true.

No way do I have six percent. Why? I would say most of the time, hovering around 10, 11, but it's the distribution of where I hold my body fat. I don't have a huge amount unlike my abs or like my torso area. It's like a lot of it's on my thighs and lower back. But he definitely I'd that up wrong. And I think a lot of people assume that I hold, you know, that peak condition which I was in, they assume I'm like that all the time, but I'm not, you know, if I,

times when I'm not looking my best, I just don't show it. I don't like, when I'm looking like, a little bit chubby for me, I'm not gonna take a picture of myself like that. I'm gonna find like the lighting where I look the best and then I'll show people. That's what people need to understand,

like when they see me in, especially Instagram, if you see pictures of me topless, that is me when I'm looking my best. If I'm in possession, if I be in the gym, got a pump on or I've found the right lighting, you know, I'm picking the best picture out of like 20, something. With a photographer. Yeah, somebody who knows what I'm all to get.

So there was that. Does it take you? Does it get to you? It does what people say that I'm a liar. And the thing is, I've never made a video addressing this, because there is no universal test to prove it, someone is natural. It doesn't exist. There's things you can do. You take like the light test test, you get blood work done, there's a few other things you can

do as well, but it doesn't prove that you have never ever taken steroids. If I've done all those things, people are like, okay, well maybe you're natural now, but maybe a year ago, from the age of 22 to 26, you were public textiles. It's a builder foundation, and now you're not. So it's annoying. I wish that universal test did exist. We could take it. So I could take it if you- I would take it 100%. And I would want everyone to take it because it would be nice to know who actually is natural and who's not.

Imagine how much Larry Wheels would break that test. I know. There's a lot of people that break that test. I do think there are some athletes out there who are natural and they look unbelievable. But there is also a hell of a lot of people who are taking stuff from the fitness industry. It's a very competitive industry and people

are trying to look at very best, people are willing to take or do whatever it takes. Do you understand why people think that given the sort of condition that you're in? Yeah, I think if I was looking myself I would definitely think it's achievable to get.

I don't think I'm like freaky. I think everything's like improp to get. I don't think I'm freaky. I think everything's like, improportional. I don't have crazy delts, I don't have spots or anything. But this is the thing which is interesting, because I have friends, a lot of friends who have taken stuff. You know, guys, you've been business with, they've just taken quite a lot of stuff, and he didn't look very good.

Like, didn't look that impressive. There's a lot of people who are taking gear and they don't look that great. Now, let's say for example, I'm one of those people, I'm taking a lot of gear and I look okay. And then I see it for Zeke like, my, and I would be like, God, if this is what I look like and I'm taking a list, imagine what he's taking. They cannot comprehend that I'm actually not taking anything at all. So that's something which I imagine if anyone who's taken steroids, and they look at my physique,

and they're like, anywhere near, is good, then they will naturally just assume that I'm taking something. And that will trade them. Yeah. And what I always like to show, I'll send his picture, you may put on the, do you do it? make it appear now. there's a picture of me 10 years old, and like I have very strange development of like,

I've got abs, I've got like my calves, I've got biceps. And I'm like, look, this is me at 10 years old. before Pietti. yeah, for topspin. so obviously I'm not a normal person. like genetics are definitely in my favour. Because this is my biggest passions, it's my career, I've dedicated my life to it for the past decade, I've been training for 12 years, then yeah, I'm going to look quite good.

One of the things I always find funny about it is that because we've known each other for so long and I still know you as the guy that we used to spot me in the gym and we used to train together and do whatever at the university gym and training upstairs at the seat, center for sport and excellence in the cos of the uni and seeing that trajectory you've got sort of linearly bigger pretty much since I've known you. So maybe plateaued a little bit over the last like sort of four years, conditions maybe improved a little bit. But essentially you just got linearly bigger. Yeah.

From when we've known each other. Yeah. And I appreciate why people on the internet who look and see the end result think that that's ridiculous. But I put a photo on my IGD, Meg, here now. Yesterday of us when we were working for Globe Girls, doing like hosting and very, very oiled up, yeah, very slippery.

And like that, and that's just this sort of slow and steady way progression. Another thing as well, I've been made with your X-flatmates, your X-girlfriends, and also them watched your progression, I guess, into YouTube. None of them. You would have to have such an unbelievable conspiracy network to keep everybody quiet about what it is that you're on, for no one amongst that. Even an ex-girlfriend is the patient zero for the person who would want to call out the thing that would rumble their ex and she never did.

And then the only other thing, like if anyone's got questions and this is what I always say to people and they're like, you and this, what are you on? I'm like, he travels to a lot of different countries. How effective at smuggling drugs, not only is he a YouTuber, but he's also like a top level drug runner. He's like smuggled testosterone and growth hormone and insulin, especially last year. The amount of places I went to last year, like effectively trying to do that would have

been a bit more. So yeah, I think when did it get worse or when there a period before you're now quite equanimous and relaxed about it? Was there a period where you thought I'm gonna have to address this? Where I started YouTube. That's when a lot of the rooms came about. And I wanted to address it.

I wanted to put a video together, but I was thinking so many times I thought how to do this properly. It must be an accentation. Because I've seen other people do it and they failed miserably. I've seen Simium Pandan. He tried to make a video claiming that he was natural. And he got so much hate for it, so much hate for it. What did he do wrong?

I think people just don't believe him. They look at it's physique and they're like, no, it's not possible that you're natural. Do you think he is? He could be. I don't know. This is the thing, I don't know what all these people are doing. You're just assuming. And all these people that make videos about me,

it's like, you don't know me, you don't know what I do. This is just you making a assumption based on the way I look. It's what everyone is doing. With Simmy Pander, like, he does look, it's what everyone is doing. With Simu Pandit, like he does look, he looks crazy, he looks freaky, but he could be a genetic freak. You know, there's billions of people on this planet, there are going to be some genetic freaks out there.

And, it's been a while since I've seen that video, but he did a lie detector test, if he did a few other things as well. People just straight up refuse to believe it. Like, and if I were to do the same thing, try and make this video do all these tests. If somebody is in their head convinced that you take steroids, it's almost impossible to change their mind. That would be an interesting one. So if there's people watching who think that that would be a good idea for a video, I'd love to know in the comments what level of evidence they would accept to believe. Like if you were to do a thing and independently administered

this test or whatever, because I think you're quite right, it's kind of like the boy that cried wolf happy to continue to accuse you of using pens, but also there is no level of evidence that they would be happy with to accept it, you're not. Yeah. And even, let's say for example, I was trying to imagine a world where there actually was a test, then I would imagine people would be paid, could possibly pay huge amounts of money to cheat the test, because that would have a huge impact on their career and then maybe how many programs this sell. So I can never, I honestly wish they'd never been

invented. I wish there was didn't exist because you wouldn't have to be like a pig. And I never want to be, and there wouldn't be all this shit and all this like Pointless debates I used to argue with people I used to get to argue with some people online and try and prove You know the comments like no, no, I'm not sure because I learned it Just a huge waste of energy I spent all day every day arguing with people is Really on YouTube. Yeah on YouTube on Instagram whatever it might be and I'm like this not productive whatsoever Can't change the mind Waste time. Have you ever intended to take steroids?

I've been curious to know what I would look like, but I think I would just look freaky, like too big. I don't want to be that big. Like I've actually, I've been very content with the way I have looked in my progression. And I think now, like, you know, it's kind of plateaued. I've kind of looked the same for the past few years. If I wanted to take my conditions to the next level, what would have to happen is I'd have to live a very monk life existence. The social life would take a hit. Everything would need to be very regimented. I'd probably need to have a coach. Every session would need to be so unbelievably brutal. My nutrition would have to be

on point every meal prepped, no alcohol, no parties, eight hours sleep every single night. And yeah, I would look better, I probably got on a bit of size, but that's not a life I want to live. To pricing, I prepared to pay. Yeah, I could beat twice before. And did you? Yeah, 2014-2015 WBFF. Okay. And it was a good experience to

To actually go on stage and to go through the whole process of competing. I didn't like it It was the first time in my life where I was like really not happy with my physique Because I was just like oh god like I'm just not leaning on it. Even though I was fucking shredded I was like oh you can't see like the striations in my ass. Like who the hell cares about that? But that was like the weird mindset that I was getting into. Are you concerned about having a physique like yours and putting it out online about what sort of body dismore for you that might cause downstream?

For me? For other people. For other people? Er... Yeah. Because I think there's a lot of people who would want to look like me. And it's it. I don't want to be like brutal, but I want to be realistic with people. I think anyone should go out there with my set of try to achieve their dreams

and not like anything stop them. But if someone is like, you know, they've got like kids, they're working like a really stressful job and they have at the end of the day really ship genetics. Like, they're going to have a very, very hard time coming close to looking like me when my whole life is dedicated to looking like this and I've got good genetics as well. So it's tough and that's why I never ever say my videos, you can look like me, I've never said that once. Most of my videos have been put out there to just help people to stop making mistakes which I've made, like to just help them eat better, eat the right things, and to just, more importantly, just lift good prop technique.

Technique is massive, form, execution, intensity. Most people lack that when they go to the gym. So if everyone's focused on that a little bit more, they would be a hell of a lot closer to looking the way they want to look, or the best that they possibly look. I think that's a good insight that when people do the comparison game, we're not all starting from the same base point. Yeah. Like I am as much of a like shit talker and a critic as well be, but I believe that you're natural

and given that fact and given the way that we've both seen friends of ours, mutual acquaintances, jump on huge cycles and then come off and not make that much difference. So, there's a physique, you have to think like, there's something in you, I know that your passion is lifting weights. There's something in your particular physiology, composition that doesn't actually want you to be that big or that lean. And the fact that that can be true means that sadly some people's passions aren't actually what they're going to be good at. You can love lifting weights, but if your love of lifting weights is determined by the outcome,

i.e. end goal for Zeef, that you get at the end of it, some people are putting themselves into a situation where the only outcome is disappointment. Yeah, exactly. I should have felt a smaller. Yeah, because a lot of people say I should do what you're really passionate about, but sometimes you should just do what you're really good at the end of the day. When I got into personal training, I never thought that I would be like a good teacher, a personal training, I never thought that I would be like a good teacher, but it turns out that after years of training people, you have thousands of hours of clients, I got

quite good at breaking down, quite complex terms or movements, just making it easy for people to understand. And that's what helped grow my channel in the first place, doing tutorial videos and execution videos and people are like, oh my god, it makes so much sense now. I don't need to use technical terms to try and convey a point. Just talk about it in simple terms for the basic person to understand. And then we're like, oh, it didn't work.

So let's get on to that because after all of this time traveling so much to the environment, that it doesn't matter how good the gym in Dubai is it can't compensate for a 4.30 a.m. finish. And you're distracted with offers for collaborations with different people, a lot of which won't involve eating rice and broccoli and being in the gym. So take us through like the principles

that you use for training now. So I think the most important thing for me is just get the session done. Go into the gym and have a good session is the most important thing. The nutrition side of things, if you're eating restaurants or cafes or you're on the move, it's not going to be optimal. And that's, you know, it's just the way it is. I will try to get my protein in, you know, what you're in for. Around two, two, 10, two, 20 grams of protein a day.

And what do you weigh? 90s, 95 kilograms at a moment. So it's about the roundabouts too. Yes, 2.2. I have two grams per kilogram body weight. So if I get a good session and get my protein in, my overall calorie intake for the day, I won't know it exactly, but if I can hit roughly the right figure, then I'll be okay, I can maintain. So you've got compliance, intake your protein.

It's the consistency of going to the gym. That's what most people suck at because they go weeks or months with not going or they have a shitty session. Does that get the protein in? Overall calorie intake in, I don't like the fats in the carb ratio, that can vary, does a Mar or a huge amount, do I, do I, do I, do I, do people get stressed out about that? Protein overall calorie intake is the most important thing in my opinion. And then get it, actually, a lot of people underestimate power of sleep.

And if I can do that, I can continue to look good. Well, you have to touch. I would also say the quality of food has a big factor on the way you look and feel it before. And one thing which I would say is not good for me is eating highly processed foods and sugar. What are the places you fall off with that? What do you mean?

Like you commonly eat like a quasson. No, I'm really good now because I think about, I think one step ahead, you know, I'll think God, I would really love to eat this cookie, but I'm thinking about, okay, well, how am I going to feel after I eat this cookie? And I know that when I eat something really sweet, I'll have like a bit of a crash. And it makes me crave more of it afterwards. Like that's messed up my pal at the rest of the day, but I was hoping to eat something sweet. I'm like, right, well all I want now is sweet stuff. Sugar's like cocaine.

Yeah. You want more and more and more. So I know for a stay-away from sugar, then actually don't create sugar. So we haven't talked once there, the compliance or consistency with your training, the hitting your protein, getting it from the right sources, getting enough sleep and hitting your calories, not once that we talked about push-ball legs, level of intensity, supersets, wraps, weights, any of that stuff. And that's purposeful. Yeah, I don't have to think that's... whether you do

in the drop set or superset or anything like that means you're getting more technical, but I think that's, to those of the higher archivin' portments, that's like at the bottom. Okay, and then moving into training, what do you rely on now? So let's say that your normal life with an okay level of availability, what you, what a typical sort of week of training look like for you. So what I try and do is I'll, I'll design a split for myself in a follow-up for a few weeks, then I'll change it up and obviously I might not stick to it all the time if I'm doing like, like workouts with other people and stuff, but I'll have, like, I look at my physique and about, okay, so for the next month, I'm gonna focus on,

like, maybe my hamstrings. I'll focus more on my shoulders. There's like two or three muscle groups, which are the focus, and I try and hit them more frequently. So, overall, the volume is higher compared to the muscle groups, and then I'll change that up, you know, the next month. But the most important thing, which I try and do is, obviously, to grow a muscle is to overload that muscle. And when it gets to a point where I actually can't lift any more,

then that's when I incorporate the other forms of manipulating intensity, such as partial rep stroke stress, success, things like that. You spoke about form and intensity in workouts. How do you make sure that you've constantly got that happening? So This is this is funny. I'm like if I go into the gym and I train alone and listen to my music. I am in the zone like I like that is the one point my day Well, I'm like really in my element. I couldn't be happier like I'm very passionate about music when I'm listening to music I'm in the gym. What do you listen to? Most of time it's like UK rap or grind I don't know why it's just like how to relax to that? No yeah I will not be sat at home on my computer listening

to that so like that's too intense. Enough, don't think. Yeah. So whatever that is, that's a lot of time. I'm especially out of the way. Those people want to train with me. And I'm like, yeah, OK, we'll train together. And depending on everyone is very different. I have some people who I train with who have a mad session with them. Usually they're the people who are stronger than me.

They're bigger than me. I like training with them because they're lift heavier and I'm more likely to want to keep up with them and they'll help spot me and so on. If I'm training with someone who lifts lighter than me or just lifts the chat, I don't like training with them. I find it really difficult to train people who don't show the hell up like the talk all the time

because the session needs to be intense. I really need the, for an hour, so I need to make a count. And if someone's trying to have a proper catch up with me, between sets, you're just talking to him. Did that bother you, then? And if you have the energy to have a foreign conversation after a set, then I really question how intense that set was. So in terms of intensity, if you're working in a rep range of like eight to 14, but you're bending yourself on that, you must be overloading quite a lot. Yeah, it's very taxing on the body. What I will usually try and do

is maybe like the first or second set, like yeah, I'm pushing myself, it's not quite to failure. And the last set, that's the one where it's like all out complete failure. This isn't sort of a spot, taking me beyond concentric failure. And I'm like literally being to the point where I can't even in love the way. Like is that intense? And usually, yeah, I'll come out of the gym, I'll be pretty drained. And that's especially at my level of training, that is what is required for me to maintain or to even grow further.

Do you think is that the most common error that you see people making when it comes to training in lack of intensity, a lack of overload? Yeah, I think people try to lift. There will be a lot of people who will try to lift as heavy as possible, but the form is crap. So it's like, okay, you try to let's say for example, grey chest, but all attention is on you to get a shoulder and try it. So you're not really going to be doing it a whole lot for your chest. You probably injure yourself at the same time. But I think a lot of people,

they either struggle to push themselves to take themselves beyond that point of discomfort and pain and go into that new horrible world and just stay there for a bit, particularly when it comes to the lecturing. And then a lot of people just there's chat too much in the gym for too long and out of half two hours, which is there's no needs to be there for that long. Who is the most intense training partner that you've trained with? God that was a good question. Go after that is a good question There's one I did recently it's guy called blessing the Boogeyman. I forgot to say oh yeah Yeah, so he's like his form is pretty atrocious, but in terms of intensity he's pretty like that I'm crazy

God and then I did a session once with Don Yates. That was good fun. Like when he's like coach, I didn't train with him. He was coaching me. But when he's there coaching and you just like, well, I don't want to like a bitch in front of Don Yates. So I'm going to push myself. I really want to have a leg day with Tom Platz.

Like, I watch him train and I've seen how it pushes other people. I think that would just be, I would certainly take myself to a completely different level of intensity that I've ever experienced before. And I like that. The thought of it actually scares me. But I would come out of it thinking God, that was so good. So Tom Platte is on the wish list, who else would you have on the train?

Kalimom Moga, I think he's a cool guy, likes to do a club with him. Simium Panda, I've checked him before, we've just not been in the same place at the same time. And then in terms of celebrities, a few people ask me, who is the one celebrity you'd love to train with? I'd love to train with the rock, I think that would be pretty cool. That would be a big session. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've had some pretty brutal training stages in my time.

A lot of the really intense ones, they're just being like, not influences, just the typical hardcore bodybuilding. It doesn't give a damn about social media or Instagram. Some of that's proper rough people from Newcastle, Jordy's. Tourant. No, no, no, no, just like not even,

I've had some good sessions with him, but like just these probably rough. So when you're finding gold stars, they basically go to men at work, like just like for everyone who doesn't know what men at work is it's 50% of the people that train in there, the guys that train in there are still in their rigour boots and their high viz jacket from work.

They were the same outfit every single session. All the benches are covered in dust from graft and they still got their boots on. Yeah, and they'll just completely take the piss out of me because obviously I'm there, my nose can nice outfit. Yeah, looking like a pretty boy in the body. Yeah, you know how this is?

And later on, we like a pretty boy. They're like, you know how this is? Later, we'll see some horrible sessions. I just remember like doing legs and just feeling sick, like looking in the mirror, covering the sweats, like pales and ghosts. And like, obviously the form wasn't perfect to anything like that, but it was just pure, raw intensity, like just keep going, keep going. Have you ever considered training in different sort

of training styles? Have you ever considered functional fitness, crossfit, any of that sort of stuff? I've tried it, but honestly, just don't enjoy it. I know you've done some crossfit, but it's horrible. Like that style of training, like not one else in my body enjoys that. It's brutal, like proper brutal. I don't know why people do it.

I mean, the best thing about it is when the session is finished and you're like, God, that was really hard and I pushed myself. And it does turn you into a condition savage. I will give it that. The session itself, and I'm doing it, I don't like to do anything in George's based. Like, once I've kind of hit the 15 rep mark, I'm like, my heart then starts going, boom, what about like a presenting jujitsu? I'd be quite interested to do that. Like even martial arts, just something about self-defense.

Yeah, like learning a new skill. I did some work with Brad on the pads, and I actually realized how useless I was at like throwing a new skill. It's some work with Brad on the pads, and I actually realized how useless I was at like, throwing punches and combinations. Like just how quick you have to be and to position you have to get your body into when you throw a punch and protect yourself. So I wouldn't even think about like,

you know, when I was doing a leg, I've got myself to a few scraps, but that's like, that's not proper fighting, that's just like swinging a monkey punks. So that's something which I definitely want to do. There's a few skills which I would like to have under my belt. I need to stretch more. That is.

I was going to say in terms of pre-hab, re-, rehab protecting your body, you don't do anything. No, and that's like, the reason why I'm staying in injury free is because I know what my body can handle. I don't do stupid one-wrap maxes, or like complex movements or movements, which I know my body is not comfortable with doing. And the form is always slow and controlled. So in that sense, I'm kind of protecting myself

because I want to be doing this long term future until I can't basically kind of imagine my life without lifting. But I would imagine if I do stretch, the joint health will be improved, mobility much better. I think, basically, with leg movements, I'll be able to get a great, arranged emotion. But it's just pure laziness as to why I don't do it.

Must seem mad for some people listening to look at your physique and think that there's areas of your training that you're lacking in. Yeah. You know, you've got laziness still in there. Yeah. I think it's because I'm not needed, because I know I can get away with training without needing to do it.

I just think, well, I'm not going to do it. Path of least resistant. But it's one of those things where I know if I did do it and I was consistent with it, it would be highly beneficial. But not as beneficial as maybe another night out or another vlog or a bit of work or whatever it is. It's a lower down there. But you can, I can make time. I would never say I don't have time if there's something I really want to do I will make time to do it Like love that Traveling a lot over the last few years and obviously building up an audience with 1.1 mil subs on YouTube now, etc Does that change your view on relationships?

obviously you consistently in cities with very Trans-actional Relationships in the exotic women exotic women consistently in cities with very transactional relationships in them. With exotic women. Exotic women. What has that changed your opinion on relationships or do you point what have you learned about relationships? What I've learned is I have not a point in my life right now to be in a relationship. I had the experience of being one, probably like the first series one I've had for a while, started this year.

She literally was so sound, like she tits all the boxes, like whitey material, but I just, I wasn't ready for that. I had the experience of almost what life we'd like being sort of married. Because of the whole lockdown situation, particularly here in Dubai, you people who weren't actually the house. So we were in a relationship.

We've seen each other. And then all of a sudden it just got really intense because I was like, well, come and we might as well stay together because she had a very small part of it and she would have, God, if she'd had to stay there, I'd have met a horrible friend. So she moved in and it was really good, but it was the most intense thing I've done in terms of relationship. I've never lived with a partner, let alone being with him 24-7, not being able to leave the house, like, for two months it was absolutely ridiculous. And I was like, this life isn't for me. And the

weird thing was, was like, because I was with her for so long. I didn't like fun sizing about being with like other women. It was weird, like it was, there was that. And then the fact that when I went over to Ibiza, I almost felt like I was free again, I could do what I want. When I left Dubai, we said, you know, we'll see how it goes. But I had no plans for it being very long lasting, because I've been, I've done a long distance relationship before, and it was brutal. Like, going extended periods of times, not sleeping with that person, anything like that.

Like, I just didn't like it. And when I went to Ibiza, like it was like starting from fresh, wasn't in a relationship, I could do what I wanted to, whoever I wanted to, and then I was like sleeping with a few girls. And I was like the happiest I could possibly be. When I left Dubai, I wasn't really that happy. I don't know. What of everything. Like it definitely was not her. It was a combination of just post lockdown. The buy was a weird place. It wasn't the fun to buy, which I'm used to. A lot of my friends who I'm very close with who would have been in and out of the city weren't, because they weren't like tourists. So I actually missed socializing and meeting new people and with the lifestyle which I

live at a moment you know I'm traveling all over the place or doing cool things every day or you know in situations where there's lots of deals around me if I'm like a boat party or doing something else or talking about relationships I wouldn't be able to be my true self because I would always be thinking, right, I need to be respectful to my girlfriend. So I have to behave in a certain way or I shouldn't be in the situation in the first place. Shouldn't be with Chris Gale. Yeah.

Like, being at like a pool party or being on a boat, in my opinion, that would be disrespectful to my partner if I was in a relationship. And I don't want to make someone unhappy. So I think for in that situation, she deserved better than me because I was not given her the proper boyfriend partner experience, but she deserved. Because that's what she wanted. She was, she's not going to haveying doing anything like that. She's once a man to be loyal, true, respectful, treated the way she deserves to be treated. And I think it came to a point where I was like, I'm not the person to provide that for her. What would you change about British culture? If you could. Like we've still got a lot

of buddies who are back in the UK, you've moved around, been Newcastle, spent a fair bit of time there, not only being a student but starting a business, then moved to London and then still will be in touch with a lot of friends and family. Are there any elements of yourself that you've changed over the last few years that you wish you could red pill those people on back home as well? Mmm. I don't know because like, because I'm not in the UK, like I don't mind, it's like they can do what they want to in the UK and affect me.

But I think a lot of people in the UK they just par with you, it's hard. Like they live to just get on the drink. The problem I had when I lived in Newcastle, I had the best group of friends ever. Like I was just a laugh with them. We all had each other's back and it was a hell of a lot of fun. But they just partied too hard. Like the alcohol, the drugs, and me being in that circle, it was not good for where I wanted to be in my life. Like

that would just pull me away from my goals in so many different ways. And what I noticed is I had all these ambitions and goals for my life and they didn't share those same ambitions. That is how people are probably gonna be in Newcastle for the rest of their life and will probably be doing the same thing for the next few years, five years, ten years, like they're not gonna massively grow or evolve.

But they're cool with that, like they're content that's their life. But that's not what I want for myself. So one of the hardest things I have to do is to just leave them all in pursuit of me going to chase my own goals. Is that a difficult decision? Yeah, like I remember what I left the new castle, it was like I hate it because I after being there for like eight years I had so many friends there moving to London, didn't know anyone in London the bias for best made Brad Tyron, like that was horrible.

And I still listen to this day, like proper, proper good mate mate, but it was just something that needed to be done in order for me to, you know, to move into London was the best thing I could have done. Because there was less of the party seeing, less of the temptation, I was for the first time living by myself, there was no distractions, so I could just, the productivity went massively, and from then

on, you know, within that first year me starting YouTube, I got like 300,000 subscribers in the first year, and that was just from grafting my out of. I didn't really do much on a weekend, just kind of stayed in, but I think after experiencing what that was like, you know, just staying in, not really doing much, editing all the time of like God, there needs to be more to life than this. And I think that's what kind of pushed me to want to travel. So you've tried, you've traveled both sides of the extreme there. You've gone straight to the monastic. There was the period in Newcastle where it was like fun, it was crazy. And then I decided I need to get away from that, move to London,

and then it was the complete opposite. There wasn't that balance. I was way too heavily involved with work and not satisfying that other side of life, you know, the enjoyment pleasure experiences and things like that. And that's when I decided, okay, yeah, I need to. Not necessarily work less, but just switch a few things around. That's the hardest thing personally, is someone who wants to build a platform, who wants to do things that I care about and achieve things that I'm proud of, also wants to live and enjoy life. Yeah, that's that, by far that's the hardest thing I experience as well.

Because if you're an ambitious person, you have all these goals for yourself, and you know what, you need to do in order to achieve those goals. But, some of the best times of my life and the things I look back on are just the laugh at, I just think, oh my god, that was so good or so funny. There the times when I was like either out partying or I was just doing fun things with my friends or maybe like with a partner, basically something which is not

work related. Despite the fact that you enjoy work. Yeah. And I just remember a few times which I've worked related, I think, down that was like a really good day, whether we had a cloud wasn't like that. The best and funniest times have been not work related. And you know, if like, say, for example, there's a holiday or there's an event coming up or like something which may have all alcohol or parting. One side of me is like, I should avoid that because it's not going to help me achieve my goals during this that or whatever. Maybe I'll be hung over the next day. But then another side of me is going to be like, this is going to be absolutely hilarious and new and your friends are going to be talking about this. The rest of you are like, so I'm just like, this is gonna be absolutely hilarious and new to your friends, and we're gonna be talking about this the rest of your life. So I'm just like, I'll just do it.

I think it's the eight, 20 rule. If eight percent of the time you are working, you're doing something to help you progress towards your goals. You know, if 20 percent of the time you're having fun, doing whatever, then you need to be it. So that's the rule that you rely on. You try and aim for like an 80, 20 split. Yeah, but sometimes it's so weird. So that's the rule that you rely on. You try and aim for like an 80, 20 split.

Yeah, but sometimes it's not quite the one way. Sometimes it's 50, 50. What other lessons do you wish that you could tell yourself 10 years ago? It's funny, I've been asked a few times, and I think where I am right now, I'm so happy with my life that I wouldn't really get back in change much because what has happened in my life is nothing to this point today. What I would probably say is that I would just say look social media

is going to be huge get on that straight away. I think when Instagram became popular, I didn't take advantage of that as much as could have. I go on to it, rather than the early compared to a lot of the influences, I thought it was a bit of fun, so I was just like, post-basic pictures. And when really I should have dedicated a lot more time each day to create content for that platform, to help me grow. The same thing with YouTube, I've procrastinated for about a year before I started YouTube because of my despair in being on camera, which is like absolutely useless in being on camera.

If I'd started that earlier, I feel like I could have been a little bit further ahead than where I am now. And I think this is one thing which I spread years training my clients. Probably three years training clients day in day out. I wasn't earning a huge amount of money like the Newcastle, it's not almost an affluent area, I'm probably making 30 pounds a day now I'm training the client. And I'd bust my balls all day every day because I, whenever I train a client, I'd like to give them 100% of my time and effort.

And when you do that with 5 or 6 people at the end of that you just wipe that and doing something like that you can't scale. There's a cap on how much money you can make and it's very time intensive and it took me far too long to realize that this isn't the way forward. The moment I made that transition from training clients to bringing out a cheaper service, like a training program, whether it be e-book on app-based training program, you can sell an unlimited amount, passive income. You make money and you sleep, your job was just to market it. That was the biggest game change for me. That's when my income went like, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that. That's when my income went like that, but I was like, why the hell did I not do this soon? But I

think all those thousands of hours which I put into training clients, that made me a better coach. Like that would make me better talking about things on YouTube and breaking things down. There's a lot of people now in social media or who are proclaimed online coaches Never trained clients in the line. How would we be an online coach? You never trained someone in person or we don't have that experience under the belt and I see it a lot now There's a lot of people out there who you know, they have hundreds of thousands of followers or like millions They're offering like customized programs

It's like you are not you are not doing these programs. You are paying somebody else to put the programs together. You might not have even built the programs yourself. And I just think like how can you do that? How can you be selling people a program which you say you've made but you haven't actually made you just paid somebody else to do it? That's why I always pride myself and stuff I do. Like any program which I've sold or any plan I get to someone, I've sat there and I've like put it together myself. And there's a lot of people out there who

they are in a position they are because of either the way they look or just very successful marketing. And the problem is the certainly people that they're just goable or naive. It's hard to tell the difference. Yeah, they just fall into the trap. Somebody who is very convincing, there's a good salesman, saleswoman, and has good marketing, they're going to get that customer, they'll get that client.

There's a lot of coaches out there who really know that stuff. You just don't have the following or they don't get the income they deserve because they're not either taking a short coat or they're just not really that great amount of team stuff. What's the main advice that you give to a fledgling content creator who wants to start making money online or start vlogging vlogging on YouTube, or on Instagram, what are the things that you would say that they need to get locked down? I would say, first of all, understand what you get yourself into.

Like, to create content, good content, it takes time and thought, particularly like YouTube. I don't think a lot of people understand the amount of effort that goes into putting videos together. I don't see many people that are like, yeah, I've starting YouTube channel, they part out a few videos and they're like,

not doing that. But you told me before we started that you're most recent blog and taking three full days of work to just fill them, then you're editing time. Yeah, well, the editing is kind of within that as well. But I just thought like God, that took like quite a lot of time and even I was questioning like is that route was that really worth it? If my video gets over 150,000 views or 200,000 views, then why can't he ask me? It's more than half a million I'm like it's very good

Because like more than a million that's like, yeah, that's a really solid video Okay, so we've got the you need to know what you're getting So you need to know what you're getting yourself to call. So you need to know what you're getting to, you need to at this stage, you have to figure out a way to stand out. Like now is like the most saturated market ever. You have to ask yourself, how are you gonna be different?

You can't just try and copy someone else. What do you think makes you different? I think one thing I'm going to lie, I think has helped me to be a bit of a way of looking. Having a good physique can help, but that is not the only thing that's important. You can be the type of person that provides very informative information, like if you just provide good information, and it makes sense, then people will like that. Even if you don't have a great physique, people will be like, yeah, I'm learning a lot by watching

this guys videos or content. You could have a great personality, be very charismatic, be very entertaining. If you are, what, if something about you which is very engaging, people just want to watch more, then you are are you'll be successful. I think with me, like I said, there's been my physique, but I think I stayed very true to who I am, and I'm honest, and I just say it how it is. I've never tried to be someone I'm not not like what you see in the video is me. Like I honestly just feel like a normal person. I don't try and be like super funny. I don't try and be like you know I don't try to talk about things I don't understand. If I don't understand a essay or you know I don't really know or just don't talk about it. I don't talk know, or I just don't talk about it. I talk about things which I myself understand. And then just share from experience, I think it,

one thing which kind of helped me grow or like, say I don't know if that's the wrong word. But people felt more of a connection was when I opened up a little bit more. So when I talk about my life, my problems, mistakes I've made, just sharing my thoughts I think that can be quite good as well. It's very rare to find online the vast majority of content creators that I see are fitting and mold that they think are the people want to see and for the most, that involves a bit of a

meta game where they're projecting this version of themselves. This is podcast Chris, this is Vlog Mike. And totally correct, some of the most engaged bits of content I've ever seen on the internet. When people genuinely open up about, there's the vulnerability about their concerns, about their hopes, their dreams, all of this sort of stuff. And that's certainly one way that you can stand out. You said you need to find a way to stand out. That's a fairly easy way to stand out to just aim for honesty.

Yeah. The things everybody is different and each person is unique in their own way. I can't try and be somebody else like Like, I am Mike Thirsten. There's only one Mike Thirsten, so just be Mike Thirsten. And yeah, like I said, I think, especially now, I just, I don't care anymore.

Like the older I get, I just don't care about anything. So I'm more than willing to just talk about things I've done in the past. You are concerned if one of the videos, if you were to release 10 videos in a row and all of them hit less than 150K though, how would that make you feel? Yeah, that's a weird one. That would I would be disappointed, but I think what I would have to say to myself right, I see this all-time now people blame the algorithm. It's not the algorithm, like people just bored of the content you're putting out.

So I would reevaluate, okay, so what is it that I'm doing because something which I'm saying or doing the video people there, starting to tune out, it's either, it's just not valuable content, or it's getting a bit repetitive, or it's getting boring, so I need to switch up. And I think this is something which I kind of did,

especially recently, I used to do very specific videos on training and nutrition. It, you know, not much personality, just me being a coach. Some of the videos did well, but as a lot of other people start to go onto YouTube, everyone's making these videos about meal prep, food challenges or like, house building chest, full workouts, things like that, and I'm like,

God, what am I gonna put up on another workout video? Like, people are just gonna get bored with this. So that's when I kind of transition a bit more into vlogging and lifestyle. Because your life is, your life is no one else's life. And if you're giving people insights to your life is no one else's life. And if you're giving people insights to your life, and I think realistically, my life is... Sometimes I think, why the hell people watching me,

but I'm in Dubai doing quite a lot of mad stuff in the day basically. I'm like, oh, maybe this is quite interesting. So I just document it. There's certainly one part of YouTube that I feel quite uncomfortable about coming from a podcasting background. My goal with recording a show is to try and give the people that listen a unique insight that helps them to understand themselves or the world around them, even if someone listens

who has no dreams of becoming a bodybuilding, YouTube-ing, traveling person. But they go actually, that's really interesting what Mike said about how he had to have faith that his goal's long term or what he wanted to do, and he need to sacrifice something in the short term, like that, or even if they just entertained, but my goal is not to look at an episode you've done, have you even been on a podcast before? Yeah, how long time have you been? To look at that podcast and go, right,

that podcast did well, I'm gonna try and recreate that podcast, but you see these trends like COVID-19 working their way through YouTube world. Oh, so if we do how much did I own from this video video? Yeah, everyone starts to do it or can we do a special forces selection video and then that trickles down Or can we do it like a go and see Nile Watis face the guy that does gymnastics and then he'll go and do it here And he like I don't get me wrong. It's a good idea and views of views and clicks and clicks. But for me as a content creator, waking up on a morning and looking at what someone else

had done and thinking, okay, that's what I'm gonna aim to do. It's like being all show and no ground. That's why sometimes I try not to watch other people's YouTube videos, because I don't want to get influenced by what they're doing. I haven't treated this to why something will all be on the floor. Sometimes it's a thumbnail, it's the title, it's the algorithm. Like, YouTube will, depending upon maybe the watch time, whatever it might be, they just decide to recommend a video to complete strangers.

And for whatever reason that video just gets lots of views, you can't predict that that will happen a lot of times. It's very sort of hit and miss, but you're right. You shouldn't structure your content based on what other people are doing. I think you have to just sit down and just try and think of unique things to do yourself. Makes me really uncomfortable that. I would love to just get endless, or like a hundred titles for YouTube. Like the craziest like titles that would make you think,

God, that would be a good video. Because if I have the title, I can go off and make the video. The hardest thing is to think of the title. So is that how you do your video? You begin with the title. I am trying to work back from that. I used to.

Sometimes I will do because if it's a banging title, I'm just like, what's a banging title that you've done recently? How to walk yourself to 10% body fat. Okay. And I like over half a million views. Focus on, I'm going to guess like neat. Yeah, so it's basically how, if you can increase your daily step count, do a consistent thing,

I'll still do another things you can reduce your body fat. But the title is, I like an interesting title in specific, because walking 10% body fat is like, oh, those two. Yeah, sound like a juxtaposition. Yeah. So you've got that and then you speak to your video guy, put a little bit of stuff together in there. So it's the title and then I have like the bullet points

of how I'm gonna do it. Sometimes if it's like the vlogs, I'll pick the title based on the most interesting thing that happened in that video. But sometimes it's hard, like I'll have like, it's an interesting vlog and cool things have happened in it, but you have to think of a title and it's like, I hate being clickbaity.

I don't like, you know, we're having a title which we have to do with a video or maybe it has like 10 seconds relevance to the video itself. And at the end of the day, if you do have a relatively boring title, people are just gonna be like, no. So it's always a fight between being page three or being so subtle that no one clicks on it. Yeah, it is. I don't want to be this hyper person that makes videos to get attention to do dramatic things in order to

get the views in. I'd rather people would be like, I don't know what that video is, I might put it out, good content. And I won't have to fall into that need of doing those dramatic clickbait titles. You got fairly far without having to rely on Louis and being in a Ferrari and stuff like that. How much of a difference do you,

because obviously people are gonna get all, it's easy for him. He's got a videographer, he's able to rent, like borrow a car or a jet ski or do this sort of stuff. How much of that is making a difference now? Is it only once you get to a particular level? I think it just makes it easier. The hardest thing I found was getting some of the shots.

And I didn't like all the time just having to talk to the camera. Not with that thing. Yeah, so it's nice when he's there and he can just capture things naturally. That's what I like the most just capturing my day naturally. I hate him when things are staged where, you know, if you meet somebody I've seen for a long time, the most natural meeting is the first meeting. We're like, oh, I've got to have some information. Imagine feeling again on video and you're like, oh, we actually need to film this again for the video and it's just like,

oh, hey. Like, I hate doing an intro to a video and then the other person has to do the intro again. And it's like, it's almost like you wanna set and everything is just staged. I'm like, it's really, what? Like, I want things to be as pure as real as they possibly can be. So the good thing about Louis is he can be there in the background and he's filming and

I can do my stuff. But I think some of the most viable content which I put out and when I open up is when nobody's around and it's just me and the camera because there's no distractions and if I mess up then I can do stuff again sometimes if I Try to speak to the camera and there's so many distractions around Not concentration. You'll get nervous on camera. Well, there's 200 300 videos in there I think the hard thing I hate the most is doing introductions to a video

I don't know why it's like So here's I hate the most is doing an introduction to a video. I don't know what it's like. So, hey guys, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's like, like, that's one thing I don't like. And I think, yeah, if I would probably get a little bit nervous if I'm doing a collab with someone huge or someone I've like, really looked up to. Who would that be? Who would you get most nervous doing an intro

to a video in front of? I don't know. There was a few people who are, this is the weirdest thing I find, right? So if you're doing a collab with someone you've never met before, it's weird because you've never met each other and you're trying to act like you are like friends and like the chemistry is really good. And it's very different. You've met each other three seconds ago. Yeah.

And it's like, you don't even know this person. So that's why it's sometimes good to do a met each other three seconds ago. Yeah, and it's like, you know this person. So that's why it's sometimes good to do a collab with someone who you've already met them a few times, and it's more natural. Or doing a collab with someone who is very charismatic and has a big personality. To say, you can't have a killer of attention. Yeah. You just vibe off each other. Yeah.

So anyone that you think that would make me really nervous to be in front of them? If you sat me down with Rogan, I'd probably put my pants, just here and there. Oh yeah, three. Yeah, yeah. If I went on the Joe Rogan experience, I would just be like, oh my god, there's a million people and the first five minutes would be so cringing, probably. I've spoken to, I've got a bunch of buddies who've been on the show, just friends that I've met through doing this,

who've been on Rogan a number of times, and they said the first time, if you could see under the table, their legs just going, bubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubbubb getting rid of this identity. Yeah, incredibly dumb, shet, sweaty hands, desu, we try not to touch anything. And then obviously like the root one solution if you're on Rogan is to just have a split or a beer. We don't do that either because of what if you fuck up and say, yeah, yeah, it's that's a level of of pressure that I think. I think it's also quite tough as well. I remember it was just one time I did interview with Louis Hamilton. This is what I did it's also quite tough as well. I remember there was this one time I did an interview with Louis Hamilton. This is when I did it, like Matt Collab with Puma,

where they got me involved and they just wanted me to do a short interview with Louis Hamilton. And it was annoying because I didn't really get to ask the questions which I wanted to ask. They just gave me some questions which I had to ask. And anyway, we've got there. He obviously came up, she was hand, a little bit of a chat. And then we sat down, and I know I kid you not as about 30 people just staring at me.

Cameras, everything, silence, and I was just like, like, this God. Bro, my second ever episode for this show, is with Dave Castro, the director of the CrossFit Games. This is a guy that I've looked up to, and I've been a fan of CrossFit for like 10 years. And it's for Reebok, brand new shoe that they're releasing, exactly the same thing.

So we just finished your workout. I've been myself in heart rates like 180. And I'm like, right Chris, we've got about six minutes and then Dave's gonna be over there ready to go and I'm thinking, right, I need to get my heart rate. I somehow need to get it down, but it doesn't want to go down now, whether I'm recovering or not.

And, yeah, sat down in front of this big group of people, and they asked about what's your favourite Reebok shoe, and he just basically said, I don't really care about them, and I saw the market in direct, different Reebok or like this. That's a nice find of things. I'm trying to balance all this stuff, so yeah, I imagine Lewis Hamilton's another level of that. Yeah, guys please. I think it depends on the person as well. If they're quite a serious, intense person, I would be more nervous and just be like, I need to be careful. It's difficult to break the ice, right? But if it's somebody who's just like proper,

easy going and they've got a good chat, I think it's definitely a lot easier. I don't really know. Yeah, we're going on that one. So we're just on one angle now. Two questions left. The first one is, what's your prediction for the next five years, platform-wise, content-wise?

What are you thinking is going to continue to be? But you're tempted to do a TikTok, you're thinking YouTube's going to continue to grow. I think YouTube will still be around for next few years. The thing is, the whole censorship thing, I think it's getting a little bit too strict with what you can't say. Like the free speech, I think it's going a little bit about the window. Like now, if you're talking about sensitive subjects or conspiracy theories of YouTube and just taking video down it's a bit like well that's a bit harsh. Have you been popular on your desk stuff yet?

No because there's things I want to talk about. I'm like, just don't say it Mike. It's best not to say it sometimes particularly if it's something which is quite a touchy subject because you are going to have people who will agree or disagree and it's mad how people will just not like you because you have different opinions because you picked an opinion yeah basically it's mad that's why I'm slightly a statement statement like that Instagram I imagine to be around for a while TikTok I've not I don't know much about TikTok I've thought about potentially getting on to it but I just thought the problem is now you're doing a doing a dance, I'm a bad one.

I would much rather be on top of my game and focus on like two platforms rather than trying to do five and just overwhelm myself and not put out the best content. So YouTube is going to be my focus. Instagram obviously, my focus as well. I should probably place more focus on Instagram if I want to grow. But I was possibly thinking about podcasting. It's been toying with my mind over the past few years because the thing with my YouTube videos is most people will tune into YouTube video, average view length, six minutes, eight minutes. What do you think? About 10 to 15. Yeah, 10 to 15. I don't think.

So you're like a 33% like a Trish and Rack. Yeah. But there's like, it's annoying because when I've cut videos, I'm like, all this information is useful. But people will tune out what's not visually pleasing. This isn't the right platform for this content. And the best platform that's beyond would be a podcast. And what I get a lot of satisfaction out of is having conversations like this with other

people who on the same level, they got the same ambitions, but they are an expert in their own field because I know not only will I benefit from the conversation because I learn, but the audience benefits as well because they learn. And I think that would provide me with a hell of a lot of satisfaction. But the thing is, if I am going to do it, I have to go all in, I have to fully commit to it. I don't like doing things half-assed. And particularly with the way my life styles we had over past two years, I think trying to do a podcast would have been overwhelming in terms of the workload, maybe the YouTube would have suffered

or I certainly would have had a lot less free time and I like to have my free time, but I think in terms of me going to that next step, you know, I'm 30 years old now, I feel like I've gained a lot of experience. I certainly have a lot more to talk about than I did when I was 25. I think I first toyed the idea when I was 26, but what I could talk about now, I think it's going to be a hell of a lot more. I've got more influence now in terms of the people I could reach out to.

And I think in terms of just keeping my, you know, my brand and me in the game as being a person of influence and importance Having a solid podcast would be hugely beneficial and I don't necessarily because you know what I said with the YouTube videos You know I can spend like a lot of time going out there trying to get the visuals Maybe second for a 30 second edit my god That was a lot of effort. I'm happy with the results, but there's a lot of effort. And it hasn't actually necessarily developed you as a person. I like it.

And it's just like doing the same thing over and over again, just to get that shot. Whereas a podcast, you don't need the man visuals or anything like this. Two people sat in a room having a conversation. I wouldn't do personally any of the editing on filming at high someone, set everything up, switch the angles and then I can have that conversation with someone and then that's that, they go. I think you do well man, I tune in, I'd subscribe. You got one subscribe at least.

And I'd obviously, I think the most challenging thing which I'm sure you have figured out, is just becoming a good conversationalist and asking the right questions, keeping a conversation flowing. And I would imagine one of the hardest things is just reaching out to people, where if you got to email them, message them, have that conversation, and then try and find a place where you can both be at the same time, and then scheduling time. And there are a few times you've met with me and I've like this has been being proper flaky in just it's on for three years You know, so like I'm sorry for that. There's obviously a lot of time and effort which has just been wasted because I've Not well when you are jet setting around the world. Yeah, it's just trying to grab a grab a little help on you

But no, I think that you are right. There's certainly I wonder how many youtubers would Incre increase their stock by adding a podcast onto that arm of their YouTube channel. And I wonder how many YouTubers would get totally rumpled. Yeah, I have nothing to say outside of a script. Yeah, because I think there's a lot, there's a lot of people who don't go onto YouTube from Instagram, the big on Instagram because they look good and their content is good,

but they don't have a huge amount to say, or that it's even not that intelligent. There's a lot of YouTubers who maybe have more to say, or they're good at the visual side of things, but they can't carry a conversation. So yeah, I think definitely there'd be fewer people in the YouTube space who would be able to maybe do that long form. And I don't know if I would be successful or not, I think if I put my mind to something, I will figure out a way to make it work. That's like the mentality of how to put my entire life. So if I was to do this, then I would have to go all in. And I would put in the effort to go and just learn to be a better conversationist and how to actually conduct a proper podcast.

Because I know for a fact the first few ones would be... Shit. Yeah, we... No podcast has done a good first episode ever. Last question, what are your goals over the next year? Have you got anything that you're working towards at the moment? Is there anything that you want to try and develop? So there's always, with me, I always like to see growth

in all the areas of which sort of working on. So it's nice to see the YouTube views, subscribers go up, same like Instagram, things like that. It's always a revenue, like yeah, I wanna be making more money, who the hell doesn't wanna be making more money. I have a new app, which is coming out in December. So I've got a company called Jennifer, they've basically put it together and that's going to be a subscription based

app which is something which I'm really happy about because for the first time ever I can offer people like a platform where they can choose how many days per week they want to train, they can almost choose their split and it will be the most sort of user friendly, almost like I'm there to help conduct their session. So there's that which when it comes out there will be a lot of work which goes into marketing that. Is that going to be called? Don't know yet. I was going to go up first but I don't think that's... This is the clothing line.

I don't think that's got a ring to it with the app itself. There's the clothing brand which has been up running for the past year. That's been mostly firmware focused but now it's gonna branch out into gymwear. So I have a new launch for that in November and then we have like tracksuits. Accessories, more things coming out in, I think it's February. But the sky is the limit with that one. Like, that has the potential to be huge. But in order for that to grow, I need to build a team. Because I've got so many things going on at the moment.

The way it's kind of been running in the past year, it's not had my full attention. And I've tried to do a lot of stuff myself. So I would need to, I think my next step is to build a team to grow a team, have them handle all the things which I am either not good at or just don't have the time to do and then me continue to do what I'm best at doing. But this is something which I don't have a huge amount of experience in. I've said this for the last year that if someone could create a course on how to find,

train and integrate a VA or PA, I'd happily pay two grand, like overnight. How do I source someone who is great at responding emails, dealing with guest requests, paying all of the, making sure that the advertisers have paid their invoices on time. I know that Rogan doesn't have a PA, but his life is so distributed. He doesn't also handle his own advertising, he doesn't have to make sure that Jung Jamie sent the audio file off to the video editor so he can get loaded on the Spotify. So I think there's a lot that I like about being an independent creator and being in control. I really enjoy being the person that reaches out to my guests. It gets for message to you and so when can we do stuff?

But like chasing up advertisers for invoices and all that sort of stuff. Have I paid out the splits from YouTube ad revenue to the people that need paying? Like that really could be done by anybody. Yeah, and like, like you said, I like screen control and when I do something, I do my best ability. I would be very tough to give that responsibility to something. You limit your ability to scale that. Yeah, exactly. So it's, like I said, it's just finding that that one person or the first few members of staff who would just see your dream members of staff who just do everything and they're a pleasure to be around.

Where the hell do you find them? So I was talking with Stephen Bartlett, a CEO of Social Chain, and Stephen went for dinner with him and a bunch of his guys the other day and his new manager is two weeks old. He's been with him two weeks, not two week old. And he, Steven just put out a post on his socials saying, I need a new manager. Here's the email address. Send me what you think I need to know. So you receive 6,000 email, right? So he's going through and I, George, my buddy asked him, so how did you filter through 6000 emails? So the first thing I did was just go through them like next next next and just do it based on formatting Like if it was formatted well

Then it got moved if it was formatted badly got deleted And then filter through filter through filter through Sure enough this guy now is Flattie was in Dubai the day, because Steve was out here in Dubai, then Steve's got this meeting with the CEO of Hule because he's going in house with Hule to do all this sort of stuff. And this dude's just been dropped into a bottomless pit of graft, but he's there and he's ready to

do it. Yeah. So yeah, I think certainly, in fact, like if I was to put a story and just bought the point, points of the requirements of what I would need. There may be quite sort of struts with it to eliminate the... Riffraft, yeah. Maybe I would have less emails, but I know there will be a lot of people who see my lives that I would be like, I just want to be on that apart. I get people, I get people, I get people, I get people, I get people, I'll come and work

for free. You don't want the guy that's free. No. I really do appreciate that. When people reach out to content creators and say that they want to contribute, but the problem is, price is an indicator of quality. The person who will reach out and say, mate, I will make your life 100 times easier, but it's going to cost you 40 grand a year.

You're like, oh, okay, now there's a conversation to be had. That's why I never ask for anything for free because I know, if I was to go and train someone for free, I wouldn't put in as much effort because I know I'm not gonna pay for this. So, you know, like what's the point? And realistically, you know, if I ask a cameraman or whatever, like, what can he come and do is for free,

they don't put in the same amount of effort. So even if someone's just like a favorite or anything like that, I'm like, look, I'm gonna pay you for this. Don't worry, and they'll always, they'll put in that extra effort, which is what I want. It'll be interesting to see what happens over the next year, man. I think we're certainly gonna see,

it feels to me personally, like Instagram's kind of hit, it's peak, I just can't see that. Facebook's already on that route down. Twitter's had like an interesting resurgence which has been quite like maybe powered by people like Donald Trump. I suppose as a place to go for short little clips of mues, I certainly think Longflown is going to do well. TikTok, I'm not convinced on whether or not that's going to stay around. Maybe, maybe not. I certainly don't think it's going to push in the world of age brackets, though. So we're like outside of the observable universe of that. Like we're not getting younger.

Yeah, I'm not around for me now. I'm in, I'm probably having my prime now. I don't know how many years I've got left to kind of rely on my looks and my physique. That's not going to last forever. So, you know, once I get past 35, I'm 40. Yeah, I want to still look good for me, but... Not gonna look as good as you did. Yeah, that's what I needed.

Maybe start relying on some of the others. Hmm. Man, thank you so much. People wanna check out your stuff, where should I go? Just YouTube, Instagram, search for Mike first, and you'll find me if you want any training programs Mike this and that, put it in case. And bestroomshorts in the game, firstway.com.

LinkedIn, eShore, and Twitter. Thank you. It's been a long time for me. Bye. Peace!