The Sevan Podcast - #79 - Brandon Luckett

Episode Date: July 18, 2021

The Sevan Podcast EP 79 - Brandon Luckett & Brian Friend @BLUCKETT123 @SEVANMATOSSIAN @BRIANFRIENDCROSSFIT The Sevan Podcast is sponsored by http://www.barbelljobs.com Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/therealsevanpodcast/ Sevan's Stuff: https://www.instagram.com/sevanmatossian/?hl=en https://app.sugarwod.com/marketplace/3-playing-brothers Support the show Partners: https://cahormones.com/ - CODE "SEVAN" FOR FREE CONSULTATION https://www.paperstcoffee.com/ - THE COFFEE I DRINK! https://asrx.com/collections/the-real... - OUR TSHIRTS ... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamex. Benefits vary by card. Other conditions apply. I can't risk it. Brandon, you know Brian? Never met him in person.

I've just seen him on all the documentaries out there. Imagine if your name was Brandon Fuck It instead of Brandon Luck It. It's been used more than once, that's for sure. No judgment. It would make you more noticeable in the crowd. You're right. You'd probably have to spell it with a PH or your shit would get canceled. That's true, yeah.

You're a little bit of a fashion piece from your Instagram. You and your lady like to dress up nice. And then I think, well, I guess you are kind of a doctor. You're kind of a scientist. You are smarty pants. So maybe that's why you're wearing a collared shirt. The collared shirt is required for us at work. But my setup here is better at work than it was at home.

So I figured I'd just do this here instead of, uh, you know, being with the dog and my mother-in-law's at our house right now. So it just wouldn't be very quiet back at home. So I figured this was better. Is she cool? My mother-in-law? Yeah. Yeah. She's awesome. My in-laws are pretty great oh that's cool you're lucky brian you better say something great i heard we either keep someone or lose someone in the first 45 seconds of a podcast so if you're gonna talk say something edgy right now now's your chance i don't have anything edgy it's just weren't were you just at a training camp i knew it

was i at a training camp yeah did you Did you just get back home? Yeah, I was up in Colorado, trained Friday through Sunday last weekend. And then how far is that from where you actually live? Eight hours, but I flew. I was in Louisiana before working with my dad, flew from Louisiana to Colorado, and then flew from Colorado back to Oklahoma and let my wife, her mom drive my truck back up here. Riveting, riveting, Brian riveting.

No, that's not your fault. Brandon, he walked you into the boring zone. All you people out there who always want to ask every athlete, if they're traveling, what they're doing to get ready for the games, he's traveling quite a bit.

That's met. That's minute 40. When I fucking run out of shit to say, I said he was home and I know, I knew he was just traveling. get ready for the games he's traveling quite a bit that's meant that's minute 40 when i fucking run out of shit to say i said he was home and i know i knew he was just traveling so i just wanted to find out those those of you out there who are who are judging people you're the ones fucking ruining everything for everybody you're ruining life for yourself and you're ruining life for the rest of us stop judging shit judging shit doesn't mean seeing someone who's fat and being like that person's fat. Judging someone is seeing someone who's fat and then calling them disgusting

or seeing a big old, you know, 20,000 bugs at a gas station in Florida and thinking it's disgusting instead of silencing your fucking mind and pushing your judgment away and realize it's a signal from the world. Maybe it means it's going to rain in 20 minutes. Maybe it means it's always October 14th. Stop judging shit. Just relax and have fun like the rest of us. We party. Don't be a cunt. Sorry. I know you're a godly man, but I was in the shower this morning seeing all these dumbasses. You know, I don't let my kids say the word. I would have let my kids say the word,000 times before I'd let them use the word disgusting. There's nothing on God's green earth, and I don't even believe in God, that's disgusting. Or very few things.

It's just, I don't know, in the shower. It's a free thought. Yeah, when I was soaping my pubes with a Dove bar. You are, um, you are quite the, the man child. You're quite the catch. You're like, uh, you are handsome. You got a haircut, you're buff, you work hard and you're smart. And, uh, you're a medical physicist. And on top of that um you're probably pretty easy to keep because you're oh man this is tough to say your cohort at work is not going to snatch you from that epic specimen of a female that you've already captured so i mean she's really landed a a good one we both landed a good one i think both landed a good one, I think.

Right, right. I mean, you definitely did. You scored. Where are you from? Are you from Baton Rouge? Where's home for you? I'm from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Yeah, yeah.

You have some super-duper attractive girlfriend, and you could have just ended up with someone with one tooth. There's a lot to choose from down there. Speaking of judgments. Most of them lot to choose from down there. Speaking of judgments. Most of them have all their teeth down there, but if you get outside of the big cities, they lose them. Yeah, it happens when you feed your baby Mountain Dew. Louisiana's not all that bad. I know, I know. The time I've spent there, I filmed a documentary pulling John in Houma, Louisiana.

My sister's husband's from Houma, Louisiana. And it was with a guy named, man, I really liked him. I would even call him a friend. Isn't it weird? Now I can't remember. Molinere, something Molinere. He arm wrestled in 154-pound class. He was a Native American.

Beautiful long hair. God, what's his first name? Anyway, you're going to the CrossFit Games. Yes, sir. You're going to get some YouTube views for us on our YouTube and make Brian and I $18. Well, not Brian. I don't share the money with him.

Sweet. Anything I can do for you guys. You're a good dude. You're a good dude. What's up with your education? What are you doing? Are you done with school? Kind of, yes. I finished my residency on June 30th. So I officially finished my residency, but before I decided or before I ranked OU, University of Oklahoma, in the match program, I kind of worked out a deal with the director of the program here to stay three extra months to study nuclear medicine, which wasn't really a large part of our program. And that three extra months would lead me into the eligibility to get doubly board certified in nuclear medicine and diagnostic imaging. And so I'm staying here for a stint of until September, I guess really until October,

but through September to study nuclear medicine. And where is there? University of Oklahoma. It's the health science center, so it's in the city. The university is down like 30 minutes south in the city, Norman, but I'm up in the city of Oklahoma. I went to Norman once. What a trip that that city exists out there in the middle of nowhere with all those beautiful people. Oklahoma's a crazy state there's not a whole lot of people down here but uh norman's going off is it i've never i've never been to norman there's a huge gym down there

coda crossfit but i've never been down there it is going off it's a trip it's like an oasis in the middle of nowhere and so are you a physician no sir uh so i i got my bachelor's in physics there's like pure physics um and then a master's degree in medical physics and then a residency so it's a it's like a the the path is similar to like a medical school where you would go to a postgraduate medical school and then a four-year residency but um we don't do patient care especially in diagnostic like there's in medical physics there's a few different um like fields of study one is radiation therapy where you actually would have some patient interaction but you're still not a physician but on my side there's there's no patient interaction um so i just have a master's, and they call it a residency because it's clinical training,

which confuses a lot of people when they ask what I do. And I tell them that I'm in a residency. But no, I'm not a physician. What does your residency look like? Yeah, it's two years. At OU, they structure it to where there's know, there's two residents. So the medical physics field is really small. Each program accepts one, maybe two residents each year. There's 14 in the United States for a couple hundred applicants. But I was trained by the second year resident whenever I started. I wasn't trained a whole lot by the professors here, aside from like the courses I took with them.

And then once I finished my first year and the second year resident was done, I became the one to train the first year resident. So that's kind of we learn from a resident and then we teach a resident. And that's kind of like the broad based structure of our program. But I mean, we schedule our work. We work in the clinic with, you know, the staff and the machines that we work on. It's kind of weird because our professors are don't really dictate a whole lot about our schedule. We're pretty free from day one. We're here and really performing the job of a medical physicist in the clinic.

And give me an example of what that is, more specifically. You're not at the photocopy machine stapling papers like when I was a TA in physics in high school. Yeah, so the machines that produce radiation in the medical field, x-rays, CTs, MRIs, ultrasound, they all use some kind of radiation, whether it be like photon radiation, sound radiation, which is, I guess, a type of, it is a type of radiation, like magnetic wave radiation. All of those use radiation to create images, and so i

study the diagnostic imaging um but in that in that idea is the the safety and quality of treatment for patients safety being you know we don't want to give too much radiation dose to a patient just to get a simple x-ray you know we don't want to put them at any kind of risk for any kind of, you know, hair loss or, you know, erythema or anything like that. But we also want to get good imaging, right? And so there's like this balance that we play in the field to optimize that patient visit, you know, the imaging. to optimize that patient visit, you know, the imaging. But at the same time, there's also state and federal regulations that govern, you know, the acceptable limits of radiation exposure to a patient for any kind of imaging. And so we also kind of make sure that every single machine used, you know, x-ray room, CT,

whatever it might be, in a clinic is well under that limit just to ensure patient safety and quality of treatment. Is there a dress code? Are you allowed to show up in board shorts, flip-flops, and a baggy sweatshirt that says, I'm all natural? No. No, because, I mean, we're in the clinic and patients see us, the techs see us, you know, they're, they're in their professional, like, you know, they're scrub attire, but, um, you know, I don't want to walk into a, you know, a cath lab with a bunch of, you know, physicians and techs and nurses and anesthesiologists dress like a, you know,

like I'm going to the gym or something. I want to look professional, especially walking around in the hospital. And then even after that, whenever you're not working for a university and I'll be working for my father, part of that's like a business professionally. You want your clients to think that you're dressed appropriately and you look good. And they want to be proud that you're walking in the doors and walking out the doors, whatever it might be. You'll be working with your father? That's how I got into medical physics. Yeah. What's your father do? He, so he used to be a therapy physicist for a clinic down in Baton Rouge, started doing imaging consulting on the side where you contract out to smaller clinics that might have like,

you know, one MRI, one CT and one x-ray room. So their patient load's not real high. They don't want to hire a medical physicist to be an in-house physicist because there wouldn't be enough work and it'd be too much, you know, too large of a cost for that clinic. So he'd have a little contract for them to go in once a year and run the tests on the machines, um, started doing that on the side. And then it became, you know, lucrative enough for him to step away from being a clinical therapy physicist and doing just the consulting. And over the past 20 years, he, it's just been him, you know, he's got no staff in his company. He's got a single proprietorship LLC, um, contracts out to a bunch of different clinics through Louisiana and Mississippi.

Um, and yeah, I mean, going into undergrad, you know, he and I decided that that's what I would end up doing. Um, cause he had a great lifestyle. Uh, you know, he made his own schedule, worked whenever he wanted to, didn't when he, you know. There was no limit on vacation days. He had a lenient lifestyle, but he worked really hard. And I loved the structure and what he did. So we decided that's what I'd do. And October 1st, I'll be starting full-time with him. Are you excited? Oh, I'm stoked. I can't wait to work. Part of the deal I worked with my university is that my dad does a lot of nuclear medicine work and more work than the university here does.

For example, the university has five nuclear medicine labs here that we do quality assurance on. The first week I worked with my dad in July, we did 22 in two days. So he does a lot of volume, and that can give me a lot of supplemental experience. uh, July we did 22 in two days. Um, so it's, he, he does a lot of volume and that can give me a lot of supplemental experience. And so I did a week with him in July. I'll do a week with him in August. And then I traded my week with my dad in September for the CrossFit games.

Cause I worked out. I mean, I only get three weeks off during this three month stint to work with my dad, but I had to trade one of those to go compete. Damn. There's an Instagram photo of you. You are – it looks like you're – if I remember correctly, you were – you wrote and it looks like you were at the state championships for wrestling? Yeah, that was back in high school.

Yes, sir. championships for wrestling yeah that was back in high school yes sir and you're pointing to your dad and you make a you make a statement basically saying i i didn't do this just for me i did this for my dad tell me about that yeah i mean this is pretty selfish questioning too because i need to learn something here so no detail is too i want my kid to point at me when you win some sort of championship yeah my dad was always there um both my parents have always been the most supportive individuals you can imagine. Um, but my, my dad was like, you know, he was very connected to like the sports side of things. And, um, you know, in school he, he always wanted us to just excel in whatever we did. And it was like, he was hard on us, but super encouraging of us.

And, you know, there's my favorite picture, again, is from high school of me warming up for a wrestling match, you know. But my dad's like right by me, you know. And he was always by my side. And I attribute a lot of my success to my parents. but I think my dad had like a special hand in that because a lot of what I've done has been from his encouragement and especially like now the past eight years the whole goal has been to get back to Louisiana to work for him and help him grow his business and eventually allow him to retire and take over all of his work.

But I mean, he's like one of my, my best buddies, you know, him, my, between my brother, you know, a few friends I got outside of, uh, you know, CrossFit or my family, you know, he's my best bud. Are you very physical with your dad? A lot of hugging, kissing? Yeah. We've always been, we've always like hugged. Um, I don't kiss him on the lips or anything, but yeah, you kiss on the cheek every time I see him. Yeah, bite him. Maybe bite him on the shoulder. No biting.

Just a kiss on the cheek. Not too often. Okay. My kids still bite me, but they're only two four-year-olds and a six-year-old. I get bit a little bit. It's weird. I never knew I liked biting. They found something new in me.

bit a little bit it's weird i never knew i like biting they found something new in me um and when you say he was hard on you um uh what do you what do you mean by that what's that look like he expected a lot of us um i have a little sister and older brother um my brother kind of paved the way for me and my sister because he was a straight-A student in high school, incredible athlete, three-time state finalist, one-time state champion in wrestling, two-time All-American in wrestling. So he was just like a freak, you know,

super intelligent, an incredible athlete, built like a Greek god. And I was always kind of chasing that, whenever i like i saw the approval from my parents you know kind of had like that uh that middle child syndrome or whatever you want to call it but yeah my dad was always really hard not really hard on us but always expected like top performance um and i never really gave that until I got out of high school. I was able to give good performance in sports, but I didn't give a shit about academics

really until I realized that the sports weren't going to get me where I wanted to and the academics would. I switched gears completely in undergrad. He never really took excuses for what they are.

He just, you know, if we lost a wrestling match, he wouldn't be proud of it unless the other guy was just simply better. You know, he knew whether or not, you know, you were out there, you know, driving the pace in the match or, you know, trying to be offensive or whether you're just, like, on your heels and being defensive the whole time. And he was honest about it. Same thing goes for every other aspect. You know, if you made excuses for the C you got in class, you know, that didn't cut it. And so, yeah, I mean, he wasn't super strict, but, I mean, he expected the most. What does he think about this, um, uh, pursuit of yours? They're both

sound like extremely difficult pursuits. I don't know. I don't know which one's harder, probably the CrossFit one, but what does he think about these two pursuits of yours to become the fittest human being that walks planet earth? And then also with this intense education and job training. Yeah, man, I think he's pretty proud of it. But the – that's an interesting question because, I mean, the education was never an option. The CrossFit's an option, right? Right. Even now, like I have a little bit more flexibility now that I'm finally done with residency. The only next steps from my education will be to get my board certifications. Like that's never an option. Like that's got to be completed because that's going to run the next 50, 70 years of my life.

But the sports, I mean, I think you learn so much in sport about yourself mentally, physically, and spiritually, you know, whatever you want to call it, that that was, you know, I guess there's an option, but it was always encouraged. And even like, you know, looking into like the future, he's like, you know, we can make work work for you so that you can keep doing this sport. You know, he runs the whole company right now by himself, does the, does the work of, you know, two people.

But he's like, I mean, once you're here, you're taking over half the work. You're going to have twice as much free time as I have. You'll be doing half the work that I do now. So you'll be able to juggle both if that's what you want. So he like 100% supports it.

I wonder if that's true. I wonder if you'll take over half the work or if the workload will double. That will take some discipline, right? The goal for me is to certainly get my own contracts, expand his business so that we can both increase our field of play. But immediately over the next you know one or two years it'll be a slow growth and i'll take over you know whenever i start i'll take over half you know we've already split up the work um he's already he already knows how it's going to play out i'll take the east half he'll take the west half um wow and we'll start attacking it. Uh, so yeah, I mean, I think things will be a little bit more

flexible, so I'll be dictating the schedule and dictating how things go. But at the same time, I'll also be learning like a whole new realm of business for me. Um, that will also take some time. And so it'll, it'll be not super, I mean, it'll be time-consuming, but he wants to make it work so that I can keep competing for as long as I want. How tall are you? Six foot. Oh, Brian, another one. There are 12 of them, I think.

Wow. And how much do you weigh? 203 this morning. Oh, you're too big, buddy, too big. Pitcher, pitcher, do something else. First base, shortstop, buddy. Too big. Pitcher, do something else. First base, shortstop, something. I think I gotta get a little bit bigger. You're too big. You can't do this. You're never gonna

qualify for the games that big. I know. Have you ever been put in a situation where you had to work and you had to study or work and you had to give up one of your crossfit workouts you had to you had to compromise your training all the time all the time that's that's regular

um it's been a little bit i mean in 2018 i think was my hardest uh stint i qualified for the games for the first time in 2018 um and i was in grad school in Houston at MD Anderson. And at the same time that I was training for the games, I was taking full-time summer classes for graduate school. I had just started research with an advisor, so I was doing full-time research. I had to take the board exams for medical physics like the week after the CrossFit Games, and that required a couple months of studying.

So I was spread thin. I mean, every weekend, all the free time I had, I was in the library studying and then trying to train, trying to eat. And by the time I got to the games i was spread so thin i was underweight underfed unrecovered overtrained um especially from like a hormonal standpoint you know just probably you know hormonal levels through the just through the floor just tanked um especially like adrenal systems and whatnot cortisone probably just all whacked out so that was hard and i even then you know i said i was overt, but I was overtrained because I wasn't properly recovering and hormones were crap and I wasn't sleeping because I was studying all the time. I would drink coffee like six o'clock at night to stay up to study.

And then, you know, you can't sleep well. I mean, I don't drink coffee after 12 now because I can't sleep. because I can't sleep. But going into residency where I can dictate the schedule myself because they give us that responsibility made things a lot easier. But, I mean, even still, there's days where, you know, we're here until, you know, from 9 a.m. until 8 p.m., and I was supposed to train that day, and I simply couldn't. Or I got home and I only had 30 minutes to get in the gym,

and all I can do is lift for 30 minutes. So, yeah, there's always a sacrifice there. What about that sitting in the library? Is that bad, just in terms of your posture, being in a chair, and then also putting your body through all these demands? I was just imagining, like, every time I, maybe this is just me being a weirdo, but every time I hear about a CrossFit athlete flying somewhere, I'm like, man, that cannot be good for it. It's like parking your car on a salty beach. It just can't be good. Yeah, no, it was, I mean, yeah, it's not good for

you. I mean, aside from the posture part, you're also just like expending a ton of mental energy trying to, you know, you're reading, you're remembering, you're stressed out because you're thinking of all the things you can't remember or things you haven't read. And so just from like outside of a physical standpoint, it's like the mental toll it takes on you. Your brain uses a lot of glucose, especially when you're running and gunning, you know, studying. Not mine, by the way. Not mine. Yours does. Mine doesn't. Yeah.

Mine uses a lot of Rodney Dangerfield. Oh, yeah? Yeah. Do you know who that is, Rodney Dangerfield? Familiar with the name. Couldn't tell you any of the music oh you're breaking my heart he's a comedian he's a comedian he's a filthy old man comedian damn it you don't know rodney dangerfield what's the name of that movie brian old school is he the guy who like he's always got a uh like a cigar and whiskey no i think that's your thing at WC Fields.

That's even before my time. But Rodney Dangerfield, his famous line was, I get no respect. And he would like do his call like this. I'm familiar with the line, don't get no respect. How old are you? 26. And how old is your girlfriend? She's 26.

Are you guys married? We are. Oh, your wife? And i like it that you didn't correct me and i don't correct people when they say my girlfriend too because she is your girlfriend also i mean i think they they blend it's a nice blend yeah she's my buddy um i was looking at pictures um of you as um a young man and it's weird because it looks like I mean she was significantly more attractive than you when you were young and it looked like you had you were like one of those kids with

a small fishing pole with like a giant fish on it like holy shit he's just a little boy but he found a woman so congratulations he was out of my league we met in high school but she definitely saw potential in you I mean holy shit you blossomed Yeah. Congratulations. She was out of my league. Yeah, yeah. We met in high school. But she definitely saw potential in you.

I mean, holy shit, you blossomed. You were like, you know, sunflowers always bloom late in the season, you know what I mean? And they're just growing and growing, and you're like, they don't even look like flowers. And then finally, kabam, that hits. Go ahead. Yeah, I mean, I think she had a thing for wrestlers. Ah. So the boyfriend before me was a wrestler. Then we started dating.

She compromised your boyish looks and your mop hair for knowing that, hey, he's building a good foundation. I went through a couple years. I started crossing right after high school. I was tiny. I was 170 pounds and 6 foot. foundation this is it yeah i went through a couple years of like because i started cross it right after high school um and i was tiny i was like 170 pounds and six foot you know scrawny um and i also went to like an all boys catholic school where haircut had to be above the eyebrows off the collar off the ears um so like everyone when you graduated yeah you grew your hair out so i grew a mop and then um i mean it was a mop you have a lot you had a lot of hair it was yeah i was looking back i was like i probably

shouldn't have done that i did it too when i was in high school brandon no worries yeah um and then i also like you know i was trying to get big and strong doing crossfit i put on i got i was at one point i was like 215 pounds you don't get to 215 pounds from 170 like just lean muscle so i was a little i went through like a just a soft phase where i was just trying to put on weight and it didn't look good um uh by the way when you say you were scrawny uh um just so people at home know he he was not scrawny that's just relative to brandon's current status you didn't look scrawny in any of the photos you always looked like you always look like a strong sunflower you just didn't have the flower yet it's becoming one of my favorite parts of the uh we interview the athletes they say i used to weigh 160 165 170 and i was skinny and i'm like well that's me now so you're like wait

brian did you ever use steroids no i'm thinking that might be my only chance at this point you never never in college you never dabbled in any illegal substances never took any dhea or anything like that you're asking me yeah i'm asking you i actually thought of that last night as i was going to bed i was like oh i wonder if brian ever took steroids no no i never i've never even thought about i don't think i've ever been competitive enough to to consider it no epo no very no nothing at all really interesting okay just checking just wondering well i started watching that last night i started watching i can't remember the guy's name john santone or something it's some italian name i said it's from 2016 it's basically

an interview with him and he's basically accusing all CrossFitters of doing steroids. And he says 50% of his clients are CrossFitters. And then they go on to say how naive the people are in the community to think that they're not on steroids. And I'm like, that's me. Because I'm pretty – I think it's – and they think that CrossFitters think they're the greatest people in the world and that they're so amazing. I'm like, yep, that's me. Yeah, I think whenever I first started, I was like wondering if every – because, I mean, before I was ever competitive, I used to wonder if there were athletes doping or whatever it might be, using performance-enhancing drugs. And the more competitive I got and the better I got and the more I met these guys, the more I realized that they weren't.

And these guys just work incredibly hard. And I think you may have mentioned it in another show. I wonder what they could do if they were all doping. Yeah. You know, like where is that ceiling of human potential with like everything allowed? Do you think there's any credence to the thought? I often hear people say that it's not the people that are at the top of the sport. It's the people that are trying to get there that are the most likely to use.

They talk about that in this interview also. Sorry, go ahead, Brandon. I mean, I would imagine that's probably pretty true because it's the guys trying to get there. It's easier to make excuses when you're trying to get there of, I just got to be stronger and I can't do it fast enough. Because it took me i mean i started crossfit eight years ago and i'm still not a strong guy it takes so much time and you just you look at like these athletes who you think got to where they are in a year and after a year of training you're still not where you want to be so you start making excuses of why you aren't maybe and so i think you're yeah i think that's probably got a little bit of uh truth to it of like when people aren't at and so i think you're yeah i think that's probably got a little bit of uh

truth to it of like when people aren't at that level they want to make a statement of why they aren't yet are you have you been drugged have you been drug tested brandon of course yeah i mean that yeah especially i mean all of us get drug tested right after semifinals or regionals if you qualify one random yeah if you qualify i I've gotten one random drug test at the house. Is that kind of flattering? It was, yeah. But I think – You're like, holy shit.

That means that – I'm on the list. That validates me. Yeah, that means that they think I'm a legitimate CrossFit athlete. Yeah. But I think a lot of people got drug tested right before the 2019 games because none of us were at an event where we could get drug tested. So I don't know how many ended up getting someone at their house before competing in the 2019 COVID games.

Wait, 2019 or 2020? I guess that was 2020. The online stage one, right? Yes. Sorry. Oh, that's cool. Don't say sorry. That was good. That was good. Brian, that's cool. Don't say sorry. That was good. That was good.

Brian, he did that on purpose to test you. We talked about that before you came on. That's good. Well done, guys. Well done. He's going to throw in a handful of facts that are off by a few weeks and see if you catch them. Yep. We were interviewing someone the other day, and they were on a team, and their whole team got tested but them, and they told us they were disappointed that they didn't get tested. Who was that? We were interviewing someone the other day, and they were on a team, and their whole team got tested but them, and they told us they were disappointed that they didn't get tested.

Who was that? Do you remember, Brian? No, but maybe it was Colton Mertens. They just overlooked him for some reason. But was he on a team ever? Yeah, he did compete with Cross at Kilo. So maybe it was him. I don't really remember that conversation though.

You don't remember that story? It was a great story. He basically said, yeah, they pulled three of the four aside to test and this person didn't get tested. And they're like, what the fuck? Do I not look like I used? Come on, man. No, bro. Yeah.

Hook me up with the test. Hook me up with the test. So is this thing that drives you is this is this too is this a healthy desire to make your dad proud what's that what's the pathology behind Brandon because I've always said that people have told me you're gonna burn me your kids out seven or they're to resent you one day. And my response to them is I don't give a fuck. My feeling is this, like if I can run them and educate them and make them super capable by the time they're 16, if after that they tell me to go fuck myself, that's fine. When they're 21 and they snap back to reality, they'll be like,

oh my God, I'm so glad my dad taught me how to dance, fight, wrestle, physics. And you know what I mean? It's not my job to get them to like me. My job is just to somehow motivate them. And I'm wondering if that – and I want them to want to make me proud, right? Well, I think that my dad is a very sensitive guy. Like I said, we hug and kiss every time we see each other. He's always said, I love you. He always said he's proud of me. So he was very sensitive. He just simply expected a lot.

Right. That's me, Brian. Look at me. I'm batting 10 for 10. I'm going to walk away from here being like, I'm the greatest dad in the world next to Brandon's dad. Yeah. But the motivation isn't just to make my parents proud. It's because they gave me every opportunity in life to succeed. There was never an excuse for me not to. And so if I would – White privilege. Yeah, yeah, whatever you want to call it. I was incredibly privileged.

By the way, that is – sorry to interrupt one more time, Brandon. That has nothing to do with the color of your skin. That was me being an asshole. It has to do with the fact it's called parental privilege. The only thing you were privileged to have is two fucking parents who stayed together. Your parents are together, right? Yes, sir. Okay.

Sorry. Go on. Okay. So you felt an obligation because of what life dealt you? Yeah, because of what I was given. I was given the best cards in the deck. dealt yeah because yeah because what i was given i was given the best cards in the deck and so for me to not run with those cards and play them and work as hard as i can to be you know good person good you know good student good athlete good son whatever whatever you want to be good at you know

i didn't have an excuse not to be i could have you know screwed around and done drugs or, you know, drank and, you know, not, you know, not worked my ass off, but that would have been the most disappointing thing to myself. Um, and my parents, because I had zero excuses not to, my parents were together. Um, you know, we were financially stable as kids and growing up and I had zero excuses to, to screw up. Did you, so go ahead. No,

you go. Did you have strong boundaries? Did your parents set strong boundaries? Certainly. I was raised Catholic, still Catholic. You know, we prayed every night before bed,

prayed for every meal, went to church every Sunday. You know, if we drank in high school, there were severe consequences. And so I didn't, I was terrified of getting in trouble for drinking in high school. I didn't touch alcohol until I, almost until I graduated. Um, and you know, I just, I never wanted to screw up because I was afraid. Like if my, if my parents said they would do something, if we did something, it was held, you know, there was no, you know, if you sneak out, you're grounded for a week and then we sneak

out and we were grounded for a day. It was like, if you, if you screw up, the consequences are this and they're held. You know, if we say we're going to do something, we're going to do something. And I respect my parents a lot for that. Cause I see it a lot where parents are kind of trying to discipline their kids. And then they take those discipline like they they're not truthful or not. They don't hold on to what they say. And I was you know, it was ingrained in my mind not to do the wrong thing. Ladies and gentlemen, that is the foundation of good parenting. He just told you there is no homeostasis when raising a child. You either shut your mouth or follow through because when you don't follow through, what you've done is taught your child something bad.

your child something good or you can teach your child something bad, but letting them off the hook after you've said something teaches them something bad. There's no middle ground. That's the thing parents don't get. That's the thing people don't get. You have to follow through. I'm so glad you said that. It's enormous. It's enormous.

And in the end, the child feels more safe. Their world is like you've made their world solid and real. They know. It doesn't become then they waste this time always trying to push boundaries that's awesome that you said that yeah yeah and i'm grateful for how we were raised to to work hard help out and do the right thing so maybe you maybe you can't win the games because you don't have like some deep fucked up pathology. Do you know what I mean? Like one, one, you're, you're pursuing something else that's, you know, damn hard.

And two, you're, you're just running, um, on, on good stuff. Like, like, you know what I mean? Like you're, you're not doing it because, um, uncle Buck got you at four and you're saying, fuck you to the world. Um, yeah. You're,

but it might be a shitty thing for me to say, but my goal is not to win. Um, because I know my life doesn't rely on it. Um, I'm not making money from it. I don't make a, I don't make a dime from CrossFit.

Um, and I know what I want to do with my life. But I was given a gift. I was given a talent. I was given the opportunity. And so my goal is to kind of see what that physical limit with the tools I have is. And that might be second to last place or third to last place again at the CrossFit Games. Or it might be top ten, whatever have is. That might be second to last place or third to last place again at the CrossFit Games or it might be top 10, whatever it is.

I'm going to control as much as I can to see what that ceiling is without neglecting work. This sport requires you to be incredibly selfish. I neglect relationships a lot, especially with my wife.

She gets that. I neglect the freedoms that other people do. We eat at two restaurants. Otherwise, it's completely... We don't stay out late. It lights out at 9.30. It lights on at 5.30 during the week. I don't see you Saturday. It's lights out at 930, lights on at 530 during the week. I don't see you Saturday and Sunday because I'm gone, and those are your only two days you see me.

So there's a lot of neglect, but there's things I'm not – like I can't neglect work because that's going to carry me through the rest of the life. And so going back to the statement, I want to see what that potential is without neglecting the things that I cannot neglect. It's interesting. It would be interesting to hear your wife's take on this. But I remember thinking this from a very, very young age. A lot of people like the idea of owning a bald eagle, right? It's beautiful. It kicks ass like everyone wants to own one the problem is the second you put that thing in a cage and you have it in your living room every single aspect that you love about that bird is gone yeah and uh and that's that's an interesting thing because

you are definitely a bald eagle you're You're soaring to the highest heights. You're making the biggest kills. You're diving and getting the largest trout. I mean you're – and so the people around you, they love you for that, right? What a fascinating thing to see and to be so close to a bald eagle. And yet if they try to capture you or reel you in or tell you they want you to stop hunting between the hours of 3 and 6, they're fucking you. They're destroying the exact thing they – and that takes a real wise person to have a relationship with a bald eagle, a patient and wise person. And I wonder if your wife is that she she is and i don't think

she knows it i think it's just that's just how she operates and she's okay with it um i've never heard anyone describe described you know the relationship i have with my wife like that or anyone else um because you know i don't know if i see myself as a majestic, something as incredible as a bald eagle. But no, she gives me every freedom in the world to do what I want, and there's no question about it. And I'm incredibly lucky that she allows me to do this. Without that support, without her desire to see me succeed, then this wouldn't happen. You know, that, um, it would, it would be too painful for both of us if she didn't

want me to do this, you know, and we've had the decision. I mean, we've had the talk of, you know, is it time for me to stop after, you know, to quit after we go home? She's like, you know, that's your decision, but I love seeing you do what you do, you know? Yeah. Isn't it great. Do you like watching her workout? Yes. She hates it. She doesn't like me watching her. I get into it, you know? Um, I it's gotten to the point where like, I don't like to be in the gym sometimes whenever she's training because, or when she's exercising, she exercises almost every day um but i get like you know i want to i want to push her and she like doesn't want to be pushed she wants to exercise to feel

good and be healthy and you know look fit and everything and i'm like why aren't you vomiting after your workout she's like i don't want to feel like that you know i love i love watching my wife work out. You always hear people who can't work out with their wives or whatnot. Since we have kids, we don't work out nearly as much, like almost never. But before we had kids for, you know, 10 years, we did every single workout together. And it's the best. It's so fun watching someone you love move. It's awesome. During the off love move. It's awesome.

During the off season, we have an awesome garage gym here in Oklahoma. And so that's where she works out most of the time. Sometimes goes to her affiliate. But we'll do e-moms together. We'll just be in the same garage together. Those are awesome times. I love those. But then I get kind of into like that

competitive season and i'm like i don't think you're hurting bad enough like that's not my goal here you know um so we've said some nice things about your wife now let's say some bad things Why is she painting a chair in a garage 10 feet away from one of the most perfect human machines while he's doing the skier? I wanted to reach into that video and pick her up like a puppy dog by the neck and just move her and her chair outside. Like, okay, ma'am, you have to take your paintbrush and your chair outside. You cannot. It's a funny story. So that was right whenever we moved to Oklahoma. My mom, she's an ophthalmologist.

She's an eye surgeon, but she loves to decorate and like interior design. And we got a bunch of this old furniture from Louisiana, and she wanted us to paint it while she was gone so that she can come and decorate the house. And so that was a Thursday. It was a rest day. I don't even know if I decided to compete that year yet. I think I was still retired. Um, and I was, she and I were painting chairs and then i saw some challenge thrown on instagram from sean sweeney it's like how many calories can you do on the ski rig in five minutes and i was like i bet i could do pretty well at that so i just went and grabbed the ski rig and started

ripping on it okay so it's your fault you're taking responsibility she was there first we were both there first you know and then i was like let me see if i can do this real quick so you were painting that chair also before just prior to that video yes oh that's amazing and what does she say does she think you're crazy or does she just like put your brush in a can of turpentine and let you go out screw you away i think it's normal for us at this point. The number of times I've walked out of doing things or being with people, whether it's study or train, is more than we can count probably. where we both went to undergrad. That was walkable to the campus. It was like the first game, football game, and tailgating in Louisiana is huge. Like it's an event to go on like a Saturday to an LSU football game. And so we had some friends over at the apartment,

and we were walking over to campus. And in the back of my mind, I was like, there's a lot of physics homework I've got to get done by Tuesday. And so midway walking to campus, I was like, Chris and I got to go back to the apartment and do work. So I was like, I'll find you later in the day, but I got to go get this physics work done. So you know how to prioritize.

I know how to not fail. Wow. Wow. how to not fail wow wow sacrifice I mean I sacrifice isn't a scary subject to me no I don't even really believe in sacrifice but what do you mean by that tell me that it's sacrificing like the easier things right the easier thing would have been to continue walking and going having a good time and having some drinks or whatever and having a good Saturday and then dealing with the problem tomorrow. Um, but it wasn't that hard of a decision for me to say, what if I can't get it done tomorrow? I need to get on it now, give myself more opportunity to succeed. Um, and you know, it's like the snowball, you know, little sacrifices become easy and then

you make harder sacrifices and those become become easy then you make harder sacrifices and those become easy and then you make harder sacrifices and but again it's like it's it's the sacrifices what you want to do to to please yourself or others for what you need to do for like that that long-term goal and and it's really difficult to enjoy a time out where you're supposed to be letting go when you have other stuff that needs to be done. Yes. It's not even – if you can only participate in the party 50%, why do it? Why not just go take care of what you're going to do and hope that that party arises

some other time, right? 100% agree with that. Do you remember the last time that you were drunk? My wedding. And how long ago was that? November 21st, 2020. Yeah. And did you enjoy it?

I mean, I enjoy a party. I mean, I get drunk maybe like three times a year. I've never really drank. There was like a stint after high school where I was stupid for like four months. And it ended whenever I got really drunk. Like first semester in undergrad, got really drunk. And my alarm went off at 5 a.m. to go lift weights with the guy who was helping me get stronger for CrossFit. And I literally couldn't drag – like I was so sick.

I was like, all right, so this partying and being stupid is going to prevent me from attaining the goals and getting better. That's not going to work. So I just – I stopped being an idiot then. Yeah, that's why I smoke a lot of weed. I don't know. This is more than 20 years ago. And then when it's like, hey, I can't read this book right now because I'm too stoned or I'm too lazy to go to the store to do this or I want to go to the beach with my dog, but I'm too stoned. And there became so many of those that finally I was like, this is fucking stupid.

This is actually stopping me from doing what I want to do. And something has to go. It took one of those for me, yeah. I didn't want to. Because that night wasn't that important to me. So weddings, I'll enjoy if they're not in season. Christmas, Thanksgiving, I'll enjoy. But those are the important times to me.

The minutia, the silly things like getting drunk on a Thursday night in undergrad wasn't for me. Yeah. A few times this year I've just had like just one – I used to drink a lot. I mean not like a problem, like you know drunk but i would just drink a lot you know like just consistent every day and then recently i just had to drink i don't know like just one kombucha watered down with ice and i in with like halfway through it i'm like i'm i don't i like the way i feel sober better yeah like yeah, it was weird. I don't know if I, it's just a trip.

And especially someone like you who's taken such good care of your vessel, you would think that like it would be hard to find a stimulant or a drug that would be better than just being in your vessel because your vessel is so good anyway. You know what I mean? It would be like putting a bumper sticker on your Ferrari. It might be your favorite bumper sticker, but it's just still going to fuck it. There's no bumper sticker that is so good that it's going to make your Ferrari better.

Right. Damn, I'm on a roll, Brian. I'm fucking up the metaphors today. It's very good, yes. Thank you. What ethnicity is your wife? Pick a region, man. So her dad was born in Taiwan, mostly Chinese and Japanese.

And her mom, I believe her mom's grandparents were immigrants from Spain and Honduras. parents were immigrants from spain and honduras uh so kristin lu is chinese japanese spanish honduran native american she's got a lot of different ethnicity but i think she's like 55 chinese her her dad her dad's um is he half and half chinese and japanese no uh i don't I don't know what her dad's split is, but his parents were from Taiwan. His dad, so Kristen's grandfather, was an MD in Taiwan, and I believe during the German presence there. So I think all of his doctor's notes were in both, uh, like,

uh, Mandarin and German. Um, but they fled there, came to the United States. He went back to medical school in Boston, moved to St. Thomas, Virgin islands,

um, with the three boys, you know, uh, Mr. Peter or my, my father-in-law and his two brothers. Um,

and so her dad grew up in the Virgin islands until he decided he wanted to go to boarding school in the States. So he left his parents to go to boarding school on the East Coast. I think it was like New York. And then went to Cornell for undergrad, Georgetown for medical school, and then it wound up in Louisiana where he met Kristen's mom. Holy shit. Yeah, it's quite a story. Yeah, there's a couple of amazing – the story is amazing. It's also even more amazing that you know the story.

Can you imagine how big and powerful your brain has to be to do Mandarin and German? Yeah, they're a smart crew. My father-in-law went to Cornell in Georgetown. His brother went to Harvard and Harvard for undergrad and middle school school. And that used to mean something. And that used to mean something. It did, yeah. They're a name school.

I feel stupid around them. Well, it's okay. Harvard's a shithole now, but go on. And then the third brother was Cornell, and I don't remember where he went to medical school. It might have been Cornell as well. Can you imagine you went to Harvard and it's turned into what it is? It's like moving to Portland 10 years ago and looking what had happened to it. I mean, what?

It's like living in Melbourne and being locked down for a year you live in the best best city in the world and now you have to stay in your fucking apartment yeah i when i when i picture australia i just picture beautiful people hardly clothed enjoying themselves on the beaches having beautiful accents hardly clothed enjoying themselves on the beaches having beautiful accents that's a little prison speaking of locking down bald eagles okay so um so your your your dad and mom i mean this is like picture but perfect your mom and dad are so proud and her mom and dad must be so proud that you guys found each other because there's yeah because there's nothing more you would want for your daughter or your son than to find something a giant brain sitting on a beautiful body i mean it's a it's a good we're both very blessed you

know incredibly lucky individuals um and you know i don't you don't even know the words to describe our lives and our luck you know especially with her parents and my parents are really good friends we love our in-laws you know she loves my parents I love her parents

we're lucky are kids in the work? not in the works but Not in the works, but definitely in the future, for sure. Yeah, yeah. No, don't rush it. You got shit to do. I wonder if you're going...

Let me ask this question for Brian. Brian, is he going to get so good? You're 25, you said? 26. 26. I'll be 27 in a few weeks. Brian, does he... Does he have the potential to get good enough?

Can he put another 100 pounds on that back squat so that he becomes tempted to have the hard talk with his dad? Hey, Dad, I'm going to need a year off. Brandon, how long are you planning to stand competitive in the sport? I think I've got to take that year by year right now. I mean, I got to get reconstructive elbow surgery after the games. And then the plan right now is to take the next year to learn the business, to learn, you know, what I'm doing and get into a groove with that to where I can, um, handle a CrossFit game season. But within that year to just lift as much as I can, you know, take a step away from the cardio and the conditioning and allow my body to develop a base of strength that I've never

given it a chance to, at least not in four years. Um, because that, that lifting side of my game is such a huge hole. That's, I believe, keeping, you know, obviously it keeps that roof, the ceiling of potential far down. So until I fix it, it'll keep being an issue. Do you know a guy named Logan Clark? I do. He told me to ask you that. So thanks, Logan.

Fuck. So wait a second. So I asked you a question instead of answering. I thought you needed some more data to answer my question. Is he going to be able to get strong enough, Brian? Help me out here, brother. Help me out. Answer the hard questions.

Is he going to be able to get strong enough to where he's like, i can i i can i can break the top 10 i can get on the podium i mean is that his only hole is that this guy's hole um it's hard to say i mean i've looked at his competition history kind of closely and um you know he yeah the the strength tests like the the singularly strength tests are bad. Like in the games last year, he was last place on the, was it one max front squat? Like last out of third. And if you look at his open performance this year and quarterfinal performance, they weren't terrible, but they were like clearly his worst events.

I think it was the quarterfinals where he was inside the top 66 in North America on everything else and then 565th on the lifting. So it's like a noticeable gap. But the other thing, just being totally honest, when I look at the stage one performance from last year's games, and there's a ton of things I don't know about it, his next worst performance was in the workout that I thought was the the best indicator of overall fitness, which was naughty Nancy. But there's a couple, like there's a couple, there's a lot of stuff that I, that I might not know, but just from a numbers perspective,

that performance to me is more concerning than the lifting stuff. And what, what was naughty Nancy? That was like the five rounds of 400 run, 12 bar-facing burpees, 12 overhead squats at 185 or something like that. And what did you see, Brian? Was it his running? Well, I didn't get to see everyone do it because it was a virtual competition. But when I looked at the tests from stage one, I thought if I was going to pull just one test out of here out of these seven that's the one i would look at to try to have like the best picture of fitness because a lot of them were just singular there was like a single row there was a handstand hold there was a one rep

max um the other ones were like like friendly fran it's it's a fun test but i don't like to me it's not a great indicator of overall fitness because there's a lot of range of motion questions. It's such a short time domain. You could easily get a bunch of no reps on your thrusters, and then that just decimates the workout. So that one I feel like was the best just singular data point from that particular set of tests if I wanted to see someone's general fitness capacity. Because you still have to be strong to overhead squat that 185, but it's a different kind of strength. And the time domain is 20 minutes. And any time you pair running with a barbell, it's going to be tough.

You're adding some burpees in. You have to be fit. Yeah, I think that was a separation workout in the games for sure, like where you really saw the guys who had that gear, that gas tank that other people didn't. And it wasn't a great event for me. Let me throw this wrench into your thought process, Brian. He beat Will Morad at the West Coast Classic in every single workout but one,

but Will finished better than him. He also took first place and beat Colt Sager in the one, two, three, one, two, threeager in the fourth workout. He's less than 100 points. He's 98 points away from first place. I wonder what the average gap is in the semifinals between first place and fifth place. I know it's not comparing necessarily oranges to oranges, but if you compared those. But he doesn't have – usually you see people with these huge holes.

His worst finish is 13th. I mean, that's close to a huge hole, but I wouldn't say it's a huge hole. Scroll left. Scroll left. Uh-oh. Yeah, look at the first event, Savant. The which event? The first one.

I can't scroll left. In the first event, you got sixth. No, to the left. No, I got 22nd in the snatch ladder. On the game set, you can only ever see six events at a time. Ah. It says to – oh. So – oh, okay.

Well, and then there – so then there we go. And that also is a justification. That also is an argument right there. If he figures – can he figure out a snatch in one year? A snatch is – that's a workout he injured his elbow on, which we should ask him about. Yeah. We'll go right there after this. I mean I think that these numbers are promising.

But I'm not the expert, Brandon. I'm the fanboy. Brian is the expert. Well, I have – Yeah, and there's a lot of – Brandon, I mean – There's a lot of Brandon. I mean, there's the, for me, when I was looking at the West coast classic, there were eight, about eight guys that I thought would been solid candidates to go to the games. And he was in that eight and, uh, you know,

it was, uh, I w but I was really concerned after the first event. I mean, I'd like to, if you could tell us what, what was like from your perspective, because for me, he was, you know, very relevant in the conversation. First event, he walks off the floor, holding his elbow and I'm thinking he's done. And then sure enough, he comes back out on the floor later in the day and take sixth place in the next workout. But before we go there, let's start at the end here. I want to ask a question and then we'll go back and talk about that in really excruciating detail. Maybe you could even muster up a tear for us. Shouldn't you be taking the year – you hyperextended your elbow in the first event.

Shouldn't you be taking the year off? Shouldn't you – isn't there a chance that you're going to do more damage to it? Yeah. But there's no guarantee I can ever make it back. Damn. Is that a hard decision? No. Did anyone let your wife or your

dad or your mom tell you that, hey, try to talk you out of going? I think my mom kind of hinted at it. That's a good mom. That's a good mom. She called me on Monday. I finally got an MRI after it, you know, three weeks later or whatever.

She called me on Monday and was like, hey, you don't have a UCL. I was like, oh, oops. What's a UCL? My ulnar collateral ligament is torn in my elbow so i tore my ucl and that snatch is that is that is that something that goes on the outside of your elbow here yep yeah so it's that it's that ligament that pitchers tear tommy john and they get it tommy john surgery but if you hyper extended your elbow wouldn't that one be safe and it'd be one on the inside that's jacked up?

I don't know. Okay. What do I know? Do you have to go? No, sorry. My professor was just knocking on the door. We got clear doors over here so he can see me. Okay.

He was telling you you look nice. Did he point at your shirt and say, give you two thumbs up? Yeah, he's wearing the same shirt actually. Seriously? Oh. What what is that standard issue um okay so so you get to the semi-finals are you pretty pumped and you think you can you can you can finish in the top five yeah you have to believe you can finish you do you have to believe you can achieve the goal otherwise it's out of the question. But at the same time, you're scared shitless. And the first event is what, Brian?

What's the snatch ladder look like? Yeah, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2. Technically, there were windows that you had to hit each of those lifts in. They had to be squat snatches. And for men, it started at 185 and built all the way up to 265, I think, in 20-pound increments. And what was your max snatch going into this event? 280. 280.

Okay. And what were your thoughts about the event? Did you think you could finish it? Yeah. So I did it twice in practice. The first time I did it, it was like I missed 265 twice and 245 once and finished in 830 or so. Did it again, a little more confident.

Had zero misses, finished in 713. At semis, I hit my first 265 snatch, which is the first time I hyperextended it under the pace that I needed to finish and still beat my best time of 713, I think.

Sorry, was 265 the last lift or the second to last? Last lift. Last bar, but you had to lift it twice, right? Okay, so let me slow you down here. So you approach your 2.65 lift, which you have to hit twice. How much time is left on the clock? I couldn't tell you.

Okay. I think I hit the first one under seven minutes. And that's where you're saying you hyperextend your elbow on the first lift? The first time I hit 265. Like I caught it, heard some crunching in the elbow, like snap, crackle, pop. Didn't feel good, but I was able to stabilize it and stand it up. Dropped it, shook off the elbow. And I think at that point it was in my head.

And so I went back to 265 a little bit scared of getting under it because I was afraid of it. I wanted to catch it and be able to press it out instead of catching it with extended arms like you're supposed to. You mean like to protect yourself? Yeah. Okay. So I missed it twice and then that's a bad sign that's a bad sign right there right like i've never heard anyone ever say that i want to catch this thing with bent elbows as soon as you heard your brain say that

you're like uh-oh yeah it's like the engine light going on it's like hmm this is interesting yeah uh yeah so had some internal dialogue was like dude you got to get under this like you can't you can't be soft with it because i mean it's already like closed so close to the one reps only 15 pounds off and um you've done 29 snatches before that you got to get under it and so i freaking dove under it and caught it. And then that was a real, it fucking hurt, um, dropped it.

I was like, I'm done. I just tore every ligament in my elbow. It's gone. Um, went to the tent and they were like, you know, gingerly moving it around and pressing on it and asking if things hurt. But like the adrenaline,

like you already don't feel anything once you're back there. Cause the adrenaline is still pumping. Um, so they put some ice on it. I was like, they're like, take some ibuprofen. I was like, that's not helpful. So threw the ice away, went back, and I was like, they said it's structurally fine. They don't think anything's torn, so let's just take it one at a time and see what we can do. And that's what we did.

In the video, can you see that the arm actually gets into an angle that's like? Yeah, let me see. Do you care if I try to pull it up? No, that would be great. That would be awesome. I think he put a. And then if your medical physicist shit that you described that I pretended to understand doesn't work and the game doesn't work, you could come on and replace Ryan as a producer on our show and you could do this it doesn't pay but i'll think about it i don't want

to take brian's job you're a good dude not brian ryan brian brian's job is i don't want you taking brian's job either um so this is the still shot from a slow motion let me see if i can there it is oh oh my goodness. What are you about to look like? Unless you're throwing a fastball. My God. Okay. Yeah. And so here's the, let me see if I can get the slow motion. Had you seen that before, Brian? Yeah, he posted it. Let's see if we can get the slow motion of it oh you're a good dude you are a good dude you now pass jason hopper is my favorite guest and there it goes yeah your mama doesn't want

to see that and there he goes whoop that falls backward this is what i watch and i'm when i'm there right on the competition floor and i'm thinking man that really sucks brandon's done for this weekend. I thought I was. But I didn't know it was torn. If I knew it was torn, I would have dropped out. I'm going to ask a really stupid question. Feel free to pound me in the YouTube comments, people.

Has any healing occurred? Yeah, like the swelling's gone down, so it bends better. But it still hurts to get in a front rack um i did snatch like 185 this week oh you're out of your fucking mind i mean what else am i supposed to do i mean you gotta go go swimming with that hot wife ears i don't know um like yeah i mean little things hurt um there's there's some things i can do and some things that are pretty excruciating. Are you right-handed? Yeah.

Can you soap your butt still? I don't do that anyway. Oh, you don't? I'm just kidding. I was like, wow. Just use a little bidet. We've just opened up a great subject here. Seriously, can you soap?

Can you reach back there and soap? Can you brush your teeth still? I snatched 185. It's a a functioning elbow it's just not stable it's a functioning elbow it's just not stable yeah like like i mean i hear you i want every now and then and kind of clicks and clunks so like you could reach back farther now like if something felt like was in your back seat you needed it while you're driving with that extra bend in that direction you can you can grab shit better no the extension hurts man it's like that bicep and forearm tendon where they kind of insert into the elbow in the front um yep like through here is really tight still um because i think they're

extra kind of clenching on right now. I'm trying to get that to calm down and trying to build up some strength and stability and everything else around it and some flexibility in my wrists and shoulders so that I can get into the positions I need to be in without

sacrificing stability in the elbow, I guess. I'm trying to take away all know stability in the elbow i guess have you so i'm trying to take away all the stability from the elbow joint and move it into the muscles around and like the shoulder and wrist i don't like this at all um have you have you had anything injected into it um performance enhancing or not i gotta uh so i talked to someone from HQ and they said, I need a medical exemption to get a cortisone shot. So that's the plan to get a cortisone shot for the games. And then. Have you procured the medical exemption for that? I don't know how long it takes. I hope I'm not too late. Brian.

because I hope I'm not too late. Brian, well, you're... I didn't know. Well, that's the first I've heard of that being even a possibility. So I'm just curious about it. Because the timeline of things this whole season, the timeline of things with regards to CrossFit is very questionable. So I was wondering when that communication happened and what the process is like to get that approved.

It was earlier this week that I found out I could get a medical exemption. So today on the to-do list is to see what I need to do to get that. If I don't get it, I just won't get the cortisone shot. Right. You still can compete. But that would obviously probably go a long way. Honestly, the pain is a good reminder that I got to be smart. Honestly, the pain is a good reminder that I got to be smart.

But I mean, because like Savan was asking, like there's risk for hyperextension again because obviously the ligament is not there. There's also like risk for like bone bruising and other things like that, like cartilage damage. For the rest of the weekend, what did you do? You just wrapped it up? Ibuprofen, icy hot. And then like, I kept putting a sock over my elbow because the icy hot was like all over my elbow, just trying to numb it. Um, people are like nice elbow brace. It's like, let's just keep the icy hot out of my hand.

So I didn't get my eyes. Um, but yeah, we had like a little brace for things that I felt like i might need it on which wasn't really too much like the the dumbbell shoulder overhead um and then like i think the handstand push-ups were the only thing i used yeah i was curious if it affected either handstand push-ups or ring muscle-ups at all have any of the announced workouts concerned you specifically regarding your um your the health of your elbow not yet um i was able to do like bar muscle ups the other day although like my shoulder is really screwed up i think partially probably because i caught it weird that 265 it's still been like not comfortable but i mean bar muscle ups are doable ring muscle ups are doable and so that second event whether they're ring or bar, should be safe.

The rope climbs I don't think are legless. Legless rope climbs are hard because it's a weird angle in a weird pool, and it kind of torques on the elbow in a way that I don't appreciate. But, I mean, we'll cross that bridge when we get there. So far, nothing's really scared me in terms of like safety or like do ability. Is any part of this, sorry to beat this dead horse. Is any part of this shitty, like, like, like, like, um, the night of your high school graduation, you can't party. Cause you know, in the morning you have to take your SATs.

I mean, is, is any part of this like just fuck? Like you're like, God no no i mean i don't like it i don't wish that this was like the situation i was in but i mean i'm here to just do what i do see what see what I can do in the situation I'm in with the tools I'm given. You know, that's, that's the, that's the base case with it. Obviously I wish my body was healthy and I was able to do everything without,

you know, second guessing whether it was going to fuck up my elbow or not, but that's not the situation I'm in. And like we said, like if, if I, if I was like, look,

I'm not a hundred percent, I'm not going to compete at the games. I'm going to get reconstructive surgery and I'll try to come back next season or two seasons from now or whatever. Who's to say that, you know, I can get back ever, every season. Like the people are getting, the athletes are getting so good every year. You know, what if Kristen has a kid and I'm not willing to take time away? Or what if the business just grows too much or it just requires too much energy? You mean if the kid's yours?

If the kid's yours? If she has a kid and it's yours? Yeah, if it's not my kid. But there's no guarantee that I could ever do this again. And so I'm not passing up the opportunity to be out there. I've gone to the games once and not appreciated what I got to do. I'm not going to do that again. What do you mean by that?

Yeah, in 2018, I was so embarrassed by my performance there that I didn't appreciate just the opportunity to be there. Seriously, were you embarrassed or were you just using that word loosely? No, I was embarrassed. I mean, I say embarrassed. I came in last in so many events. The first day, I took

a 36th, a 38th, a 40th in the first three events. I was like, so this is the CrossFit Games? These aren't fun. I think what he's saying is he didn't embrace what Sean Woodland always says, which is you don't realize how good you have to be to suck at the CrossFit Games.

Yeah. Yes, but every single one of us out there is so competitive. I mean, that's how you get to that point that it doesn't matter if you're with the 39 other fittest humans in the world and every single one of them is better than you are not. You don't want to be 40th, you know. I mean, Josh Bridges beat me in the CrossFit total with a bum knee. Like basically didn't squat and still beat me in the crossfit total you know it's and no no he didn't you beat him in that oh did i that's the only reason i beat him because he

couldn't squat you know what's interesting is i look at dylan pepper below you at the west coast classic he took second place and you hurt yourself that That's really a testament to your grit, man. Is this the grittiest story coming out of the semifinals, Brian? I mean, honestly, it reminds me of, you know, Vellner's regional when he tore his bicep in event one and went on to qualify. Like, it's pretty impressive you know that i watched that whole regional probably a month before competing at semis i was like that might have been in the back of my head whenever i was at semis you know

velner did it without a bicep tendon so why can't i do it without a little ligament in my elbow let's speak about talk let's talk about patrick Fellner and his bike riding. Yeah. I'm going to tell you what I saw. I'm going to see a buffoon on a bicycle who swerved across the lanes, hit you. First of all, I watched the video 40 times last night. I didn't even realize it was Patrick Fellner until I read down below in the comments. But he looks like he's going to ride his bike into a hay bale.

Then he swerves around the hay bale and fucking hits you. And I'm going to tell you what I read your body language as, and it's only a split second. But, like, he's lucky he kept riding. Like, there may have been an instantaneous – you were a good sport on your Instagram, but it looked like someone was about to get fucking souffle'd suplexed dude i was like get through the in my head i was like get through the first lap don't crash and then start working you know wait for like everyone to kind of spread out a little bit so it's a little bit safer i was like just don't crash on the first lap last turn first lap dude over the handlebars into into the pavement. I wasn't happy. Yeah, you looked pissed.

You looked like a fucking – like you were looking for something to punch. Like as you looked down – did you know it was him right away? No. So I didn't know it was him until like the next day. And funny story, he got a new bike, right? Because his chain popped off. I had my old bike. From that accident?

From that accident? Yeah. Okay. My brakes didn't work, and my my handlebars were crooked but i could still bike um and so i ended up because he had to run to the station and get a new bike and someone had to put my chain back on and got me back on the bike i caught back up with him and uh i didn't know it was him i figured something that happened to him. And so I come up behind him. I was like kind of chatting with him. I was like, hey, let's work together and see if we can catch someone.

So we took turns drafting off each other to conserve energy and bike a little bit faster. We ended up catching a small group of people who had fallen off the back and passing up three or four people. Oh, Vellner's a good dude. What a great redemption story. He at least helped me get back up there. Yeah. What if he would have looked back at you and been like, aren't you the dude who took like a 38th, a 40th, and a 32nd the last year?

Was it that year's games? No, that was my first year of the games. That was the start of my shitty day. What if he would have just looked back and been like, dude, you suck. Get back. Don't talk to me. All right, thanks. I'll just draft off of you the rest of my shitty day. What if he would have just looked back and said, dude, you suck. Get back. Don't talk to me. All right. Thanks.

I'll just draft off of you the rest of the way. So that's fascinating that then the guy who fucking put you down, I mean, he's lucky he didn't go down. Yeah. He's so lucky. I mean, I think he hit my front tire and just turned it 90 degrees. I went over. Luckily, I mean, I think he hit, like, my front tire and just turned it 90 degrees. I went over it. Luckily, I mean, he didn't. But I was glad to take that fall for him.

It was some great drunk driving shit. I mean, it's a great – who took that video? I don't know. Someone sent it to me on Instagram later that day, some spectator. Some of the CrossFit media knew that that turn was probably going to be the biggest likelihood for something like that happening. So a couple of them had intentionally positioned themselves there. It was a wacky turn. It didn't fit with the rest of the course, really.

It's epic. I'm glad I found that as I dug through your... Well, that day must have been pretty brutal. So you have three events that you're not very excited about, and then you have to finish off the day with a just casual marathon row. Yeah, man. Like I said, I finished the CrossFit Games. I was like, I don't know if I like this or not. But after that day, you had a day off,

and you come back and you end up having your best event in event five. That ended up being your best event for the entire weekend. So that, to me, I said some things earlier that may be not such positive, which is okay. But that, to me, is a good sign that you could put that behind you, come back, and say, hey, this is kind of like what you're saying this year. I might not have this chance again. So there must have been something in your brain like that then. Maybe. But, I mean, I was so green.

I didn't know what I was doing out there, man. I mean, I came into the games way over-trained, spread thin, and then competed at the games just under-fed, under-recovered recovered didn't know how to warm up or cool down or did i was i was out of sorts over there so i learned a lot that year um and hopefully i can use that wisdom this year and have a little bit of a better outcome but uh different mindset this year for sure well if i look at your results from that year the some of the better performances are indicators to me that you could, you can do significantly better at the games.

And Battleground is a game style event. Chaos is a unique to the games event. You did, you know, average in the field in the swimming event and the longer events you can hold your own, even in the ruck run, like you're taking a top five at the semifinals. And those are things that are often exposed at the games, but they actually seem to be places where you excel i've been working on those things a lot more i mean we learned a lot um every year and uh i mean last year i wasn't training to be an

individual competitor i was training to be a team competitor all year until I've, until the whole thing went to, I mean, went under the table. And, um, so I mean, this year's training has been quite different from years past for sure. What was it like being on the demo team? I feel like I got demolished. It's so funny. You say that you ruined my punchline you ruined my punchline tell me about that it's so funny um i i told dave that i was getting you on uh the podcast and he goes ask him what it was like getting his shit handed to him in every single workout by the pan chick brother and i go which one he goes i don't know not scott but the other one who made it to the games dave's a sweetheart he's such a nice he is a good dude no um that's so funny that you

you saw it that way too that that there's another piece of you that's fascinating by the way you're very realistic you're very uh you seem very grounded but go but go on So tell me about demo team. Yeah. I was, after the games, I mean, I kind of put off some of my responsibilities at work going into the games. And so after the games, it's like, all right, I got to catch back up with work. I got to schedule a shitload of inspections and things that I've been kind of neglecting so that I could spend a little bit more time training. And so diet out the window, sleep out the window, just like trying to catch up on work. And then like a week before flying out or whatever, someone, one of the guys over there reached out to me.

He was like, hey, do you want to come do like the demo at the game or at the ranch and run through the events of the game? I was like, I mean, how do you pass up that opportunity? What year is this? I've trained like one day since the games, but I'll come. No, this is 2020. Okay. Less than a year ago.

So, yeah. The event ended with Atlanta and had the long run. So I was like, I don't know how you pass up that opportunity. I didn't know who else was going. Got there. Saxon was there. And I was like so man like we were like at chipotle before we started the next day i was like you've been like training a lot he's like dude i've been training really hard for this like i want to show dave that i deserve to be out there and i'm like i'm a really good at

like i was like oh sweet i mean like it took it took me one week to get out of shape, and I didn't, you know. I just like mentally wasn't quite in there. Physically definitely wasn't. And he handed me my dinner every day and told me I could eat it, you know. It was embarrassing. 2018 games were embarrassing but getting your butt whooped by one person on every single event was embarrassing as well but i mean it was really cool experience to be there i mean there was no points or anything so wasn't no one recorded it

except did you guys did you test uh do you test swimming stuff against Yeah, that one we tied on. I thought that might have been a good one for you. We tied on that interval piece, yeah. It was interesting because I would beat him one way and he would beat me the other way by just like a second or two. And so it ended up coming out in the wash and we tied to the second. Who else was there besides Saxon? The girls were Christy Aramo and Andrea Nistler. And how did they do?

Were they tearing it up too? Yeah, they're pretty impressive athletes. Very different athletes too. Because Christy is like a smaller individual and good at gymnastics and longer endurance events. Andrea Nistler is a taller female, really powerful. Just like crushes the heavier weights. So that was like a different – very different skill set each of them had. What's her name?

Andrea Nistler? Andrea Nistler. She's on Rich Froning's team with Taylor Williamson. Oh, okay. Yeah, I've seen pictures of those girls. They are impressive. Hey, Brian, weren't you saying something in a podcast about how people who go to the demo team is, you know, anecdotally the path to the games? I don't know. I don't know if I said that or not. If I said that or not.

I mean, those are my words. But weren't you saying that, like, hey, look at all the people who've been on the demo team the year they're not on the games. And then the next year, look at all these people. I mean, all those people who were on his demo team, they obviously weren't going to the games last year. And now they're all for the names he said are going to the games. Well, no. We all confused at the games last year. They were all games athletes last year. But they just didn't make the top five.

It was such an exclusive group that was able to make that. So, you know. And I think that's a different sample size of demo athletes than most years. And I think you get kind of a hybrid on the demo team where you have people who've made it once or twice and are like close but didn't make it, but Dave knows that they can still compete and therefore give them what he wants.

Or guys that are just on the verge and maybe barely missed and Dave's curious about, but also it's like, Hey, these guys have kind of proven to me that they deserve a chance. So I think you get a little blend. And you may be able to put on your resume that you made it to the games last year.

But in my book, as from the seven podcast, we do not give you credit for going to the game. So it was only five, five. Um, that makes sense. I wonder if God,

I'm just beating up on Brandon, poor Brandon. Now. Um, I wonder if Dave is, I'm just beating up on poor Brandon now. I wonder if Dave, when Brandon came out here, he's like, if he yelled at the guy who called Brandon, like, hey, this guy didn't really make it to the game. What the fuck is going on here? No, he did ask who I was. I was like, thanks, man. You know, what's funny about that is I think he played that game with Danielle Brandon too.

Like he asked her what's her Instagram, and she's like, hey, man, eat a dick. I saw you creeping in my story. You know my Instagram. So he probably knew who you were. I'm interested to know. I don't know if he – he probably knew who she was, but he had – I don't think he had a clue who I was. I don't know if he knows who knew who she was but he hadn't i don't think he had a clue who i was i don't know if he knows who gets picked or what um but i generally don't because he was like have you ever been to the games before i was like yeah in 2018 and he's like oh okay all right you know sometimes he says in interviews that he doesn't he's not like when he's at the games he's

not watching the athletes or the competition he's watching like the bigger picture stuff and and when you hear stories like that you want to believe you almost have to believe well he mentioned something very similar like that um while we were there like well-known athletes he like still didn't know certain things like that you know i feel like the community knows about these guys. It's well-known in the community. I don't remember exactly what it might be. Or he would know certain well-known athletes. What's their deal or whatever? I feel like that's a commonly known thing, especially being the director of what we do.

He definitely is big picture. he definitely does not fall into the weeds and is hyper focused which i think is which i think is good yeah because it's almost like a much more um objective um way he goes about his job there's no bias really um it's much more like data driven i believe and um like created like out of the depths of his mind and not really influenced by what's hot on Instagram. People like to talk about, oh, this game was programmed for Fraser. This game was programmed for Froning. And I've never gotten that sense, especially the more that I've learned little things like that about Dave. I mean, even this year, people are like,

Oh my God, look at how great these first five events are for Tia. They're, they're like messaging me on Instagram. This I'm like, what first five events wouldn't be good for her. She's just a really good athlete. I don't think Dave gives a shit about who wins.

No, I don't think so either. But I do, I do think the year Spieler made podium, that was the only year that the games were programmed for a specific athlete. Oh, that's before my time. That was in like 2011. Wow, we should talk about that some other time, Sav.

But there's no fucking way that guy gets on the podium. There's no way, unless there's home cooking. The CrossFit was young then. So was Spieler. Brandon, do you have any friendly or not friendly rivalries with the guys from the Old South Regional? No rivalries or anything. You don't secretly just like, you're like, man, however it goes at the games this year, I just hope I beat Sean. I feel like you've been talking to my dad.

Nah. My dad's been like, I don't care where you come in. Just beat Sean. I'm like, what you got against Sean? He's a nice guy. He's like, I don't know. Y'all just been, you never beat him on anything. So just beat him this time.

No, I just, it's like, you know, it's the landscapes changed in the sport. And so people like you were in at the regionals for a couple of years and you you know regularly had to compete against and beat the same guys to get there and as it's evolved that's not necessarily the case i mean you and sean easily could have ended up at different semi-finals this year and had totally separate paths the fact that you are obviously friends and have gotten to make it through that same path is cool but i just always kind of wonder if um you're like you know roy gamboa you might have got me at the 2018 regionals and 2018 games but this is 2021 you know yeah no i mean i don't worry about any individual athlete really um and i don't worry about

where they're placing or what they're doing it It detracts from the goal. And I think something I used to do was think way more about my performance, like the outcome of performance instead of like the performance itself. And I think that's a different mindset I've started having in competing, which I think is good, just detracting myself from the result. When you're at the games, could you do me a favor? Depends on the favor. Would you just say hi to Travis Mayer for me if you see him? Just be like, oh, hey, my friend Sevan really likes you,

and just tell him hi. He just wanted me to say hi to you. I can do that. You're awesome. Thank you. You're welcome. No problem. I would ask you to sign something, get an autograph,

but I know you won't have a pen and paper or anything. I would love to ask another games athlete for their autograph for you. Dude, that would be awesome if you could get that, if you could get Travis Mayer. And if you do that and have someone else film that too, that would be great. He only wants two. He wants Travis Mayer and Carolyn Prevo.

Oh, that would be awesome. If you could get a picture of the two of them with you, the three of you together, I would love to post that. I'm going to take a selfie with them in the background, get it printed out at CVS, and then go back and ask them to sign it. That's dope. That would be amazing. I feel like they would both just punch, just punch me in the face.

If I did that in the middle of competing, Carolyn would probably kick you. But, um, have you ever been to her? You check out her Instagram. She's got, she's a,

a, a fourth degree in black belt in Taekwondo. There's some, yeah, yeah, yeah. Protect your chin at all times. Yeah.

It's crazy. Um, and, and Brian, I think you, I think you pronounced her name wrong. I think you pronounced the S. You're supposed to pronounce S? No, you're not supposed to. Oh, I didn't, so thank you. Oh, okay.

We're going to wrap up here, but do you think it's interesting, the fact that you, Colton Mens um justin medeiros um that there's this wrestling pedigree that turns to crossfit and do what do you think translate from from wrestling to crossfit i mean there's there's chris spieler was a wrestler collegiate wrestler alex anderson was and his older brother were wrestlers josh bridges uh jared enderton there's a fair number of wrestlers. Jared Enderton was a wrestler? My God. He was a good wrestler.

Yeah, I bet. He just throws people up into the stands. Probably. Yeah. But yeah, I think wrestling has like, it's a large blend that doesn't really, like, I think there are some sports that require such specific skill sets to be good at them but when they're like when you come into wrestling the skill set besides the physical skill set like is you can have so many different styles of an of a wrestler but like the mental grind that we we go through is very similar to what you got to do

and um like to be a competitive crossfit athlete um like i mean in high school i was waking up every morning to go run or do calisthenics in like my backyard and then i'll go to wrestling practice and i come home my dad would sit in my f-150 and i would push it 100 meters down the road turn it around and push it 100 meters back while he just sat there and steered. It's just that kind of grind mentality that you learn as well as the outside disciplines of diet and sleep and recovery and how to just be uncomfortable. Not many other sports ask you to lose eight pounds in a week so that you can make weight and then go perform. I didn't find CrossFit until I was 34 years old and I didn't play any sports and I wasn't athletic at all. So it wasn't until I was in my thirties

that I started exploring, like, you know, when you, you know, when you're doing a workout and you want to quit and then you just let it go by and then it happens a second time and a third time and you just become, um, you become good at just letting those pass, right? You just kind of watch them like clouds passing through. There's no option, right? And you're just – but you learn that at a young age? I started wrestling when I was in fifth grade. I got good and serious in high school and started like – I cut weight pretty seriously for two years in high school.

And I remember the last time I decided to cut weight because it was, it was taking my performance and I was an unhappy kid. Um, but yeah, I mean, there's like, I mean, how can you not have to push away the desire to eat when you simply can't, you know, you have to, because the other 13 people that are wrestling with you in the tournament rely on you because you got to go and score points, you know. So those those quit factors are always in there. And as a child, do you see them clearly or is it different?

Like there's no option there's no option to like quit because at least for me because if you freaking miss weight like you're a dick but you still hear the voice here isn't the right term you still observe the desire, I guess, and you still have to let it pass, right? I mean, I never had to. How can you not desire to drink water before going to sleep because your mouth is so dry? Wake up in the bed with, like, sweats because, you know, like, sweating at night whenever you – because when you don't eat and your body is just, like, starving for food, it starts going to, like, ketogenesis and stuff. It's actually, like, you can't sleep at all't sleep at all before weighing in and stuff like that. So there's always the desire to like eat.

But I mean you just shove those things away quickly because there's no option. It's weird that you exist in a world where I would say the vast, vast, vast majority of people in this country have no idea what you're talking about because they fulfill every single one of their desires. And even when their desires can't be fulfilled, they fulfill them with a temper tantrum or a complaint. They plug the hole. Yeah, a lot of people do that. Yeah, I think it's...

Right, it's the average. The average person does the average thing and the average thing is to give in to like the quick desires and not do the hard make the hard decision and shove away the easy want i mean even high level athletes find themselves doing that right of course but at least they know i think i think i think the majority of people just don't even know do you know what I mean? They have an excuse. They have a – it's just fascinating to me that I didn't find it until my 30s.

I was basically just fulfilled every single desire in my life until I was in my 30s too. And people would be like, well, I didn't. I didn't get this when I was a kid. Well, maybe you fulfilled it with something else, but you threw a 10%. There's other ways to fulfill your desires by then getting them. You know, you act out, you do something. But yours is more of a, it is meditation. You have to watch it, and it has to pass. You have to, you know, as the Buddha said, this too shall pass.

You develop the skill of letting sensations, thoughts pass as opposed to reacting to them. Absolutely, yeah. thoughts um pass as opposed to reacting to them absolutely yeah i mean and there's a there's countless opportunities to to either give into that desire or not um in every aspect i mean you you want you want to spend money on something you don't need you really want it for a week and then after that week you don't want it anymore you're like oh glad i didn't spend 100 bucks on whatever that was right Right. Didn't really need it. Right. You know? Brian, do you have anything else?

I'm going to ask him one more really obscure question. I do. Okay, go. Who's your coach at the games this year? Who's going with me? Yeah. Trent Lukey. He's the same guy who came and coached me at semifinals.

The guy who programs for me is Seth Page. He used to do Misfits programming. Now he runs Jump Ship. But the guy who's always behind the scenes with me is Trent Lukey. He and I became really good buddies back in Baton Rouge through CrossFit. He's one of my best friends. So he'll be coming from Louisiana and meet me up there. He's in a tough position, man. Don't you think, Brian?

No, no. I'm getting somewhere with this. I don't think he's in a tough position. What do you mean? He's taking the guy there that he should be telling not to compete. No, I don't agree with that. He's the one who made me keep going to the West Coast. Jesus.

You said earlier that your goal is not to win, but I know just based on the type of guy you are, that you're going to try to maximize your performance at the games this year. You can assume 15 tests. I would say it's safe to assume that the entire field is going to do at least 12 of the events. What's the mental approach for something like that as opposed to a semi-final where it's like six events seven events do or die this is like a lot longer a lot more at stake and do you have like the wherewithal when you're competing

on day one that it is actually just day one um i think I will. But also, there's the aspect of taking one event at a time and capitalizing on that event and not worrying so much about what's coming. Because what if I have a really good opportunity in one event? I don't know how I'm going to perform the next day regardless of whether i go 100 or i go 90 um and so i think maybe that aspect will come more in like what's safe for you know the injury but as far as like your performance like you can't worry about what's coming the next day because you don't fucking know what like place you're going to get on events eight through 12. If you sandbag events one through seven. So every event you've got to like optimize in that moment, you know,

and then worry about how you can control recovery and the next event that comes up. So, yeah, I mean, and those components, the recovery, the in between, is that where you think that you guys are at a totally different place than you were a few years ago?

Yeah. Food's in a much better place. Sleep is a much better place. Stretching, the ice baths, the things like that. Those are much more at the forefront than they used to be. And I do want to, I guess, make a distinction. I know you said the goal for me isn't to win um of course the the desire is to to i knew i knew he didn't like hearing that back i knew i knew he didn't like hearing that back you fucked you fucked with he's gonna get you

he's gonna get you he's getting looking leaning into his camera even a little bit but also I mean Sivan made the point that like I guess I'm a realistic guy I mean I'm not I'm not naive to be like you know I can win with the holes that I have and like knowing like the abilities I

have you know and so it would take other people performing sub optimally for me to win that's like that's the case it's like everyone else or people ahead of me who are just better athletes you know i'm not going to be silly but like i can be you know cole sayer and noah olsen from at semis they are simply better like they have the skill sets that i don't they don't have the holes that i have and so for me to believe that I can just fill those gaps in a five-week period between semis and games is a naive thing for me to say. And so I know that that's not where I'm at.

The desire certainly is there, but I don't have those tools. Brian, it's worse than that. When he says stuff like, you know, I'm not going there to win. Fraser didn't go there to win either. Fraser went there not to lose. And this dude has the exact same problem. Brandon Luckett is afraid of one fucking thing. Failure. This guy does not want to lose.

He doesn't care about first place. He doesn not want to lose he doesn't care about first place he doesn't want to lose it's like he he's he's a it's another alpha fucking lion he's a i mean he's a giant bear guarding a cave i mean it's nuts you you guys are all you guys are all fucking nuts and it it manifested every no i mean manifests itself in a different way. They communicate it in different ways, but it's in there in all of them. Yeah. I mean, I don't even know if it's in all of them, man. This guy, this, this, you think this is, I mean, well, I don't know if all of them can articulate it.

Maybe it is in all of them. But when I was doing the research and reading about them, that is the thing, and I've heard Fraser say it too. It's why his second place medal is his favorite medal because it just reminds him, like, hey, the goal is to just not lose. Yeah. And look what he remembers from the demo team even, you know? It's like he's circling around that too, that, that, that has to be fixed.

Yeah. I think as long as I'll compete, I'll keep fixing the things so that I don't lose, you know, which is why I need to take a year off because like Brian said, there's some things I need to work on lifting and, and then coming back in and getting really fit. The pure fitness, something like a naughty Nancy or awful Annie or whatever it was. Hey, does it scream volumes of really how good he is because of the hole? Well, I think there's a fine line here, because when you look at his performances,

if he hadn't hurt himself on that snatch, he probably would have had a top six finish in it. And we know that if it was a one rep max dash, he probably would have been 15th to 20th in that field. Maybe worse, I'm not sure. And then if you look at the event he won, it's a power output event. Biking, moving a heavy sandbag for reps, and he can still get up and down off the ground and over the box on the burpees as a bigger guy. So he actually has some attributes that are very valuable. Like he can move maybe high percentages of his relatively low maxes for a lot of reps. And that skill set is arguably more important than the heavy lift, which might like the heavy lift might set you back on one or two, but being able to do the capacity at the high percentage can elevate you in maybe five or six

events. So that's like a really or six events so that's a like a really i would say it's a really positive thing and if that if he takes two years away gets healthy does whatever and he's still only 28 years old coming back with the experience he already has that now you're looking at a guy who's a potential serious you know serious threat at the games it's crazy that you took first place in an event after that elbow injury fucking insane didn't need it for that one jesus it's crazy that you took first place in an event after that elbow injury. Fucking insane. Didn't need it for that one. Jesus.

Brandon, luck it. Thanks, dude. Thank you both. Hour and 48 minutes of fun. Thank you. This was cool.

Yeah. I appreciate both of you guys for giving me the opportunity to be here. Of course. That was awesome. You see in a couple of weeks up there and, uh, man, I was impressed at sem be here. Of course, man. It was awesome. I'll see you in a couple weeks up there. I was impressed at semifinals. That was a resilient effort and resiliency, mental toughness, huge components of success or not failing at the game.

I'm excited to see you out there again. Thank you so much. We'll see you there. Hey, maybe we can use you as a – if you're having trouble sleeping at night, after day one or day two or day three, we can jump on a call and I can be like, so what's going on? Did you get that autograph with Travis Mayer? We could do a little podcast and help my YouTube channel. I mean get to know you better.