The Sevan Podcast - John Brzenk | GREATEST Arm Wrestler Of All Time

Episode Date: November 20, 2023

Welcome to this episode of the Sevan Podcast! 3 PLAYING BROTHERS - Kids Video Programming https://app.sugarwod.com/marketplace/3-playing-brothers/daily-practice ------------------------- Partners: https://capeptides.com/ - CODE "SEVAN" FOR FREE SHIPPING https://www.paperstcoffee.com/ - THE COFFEE I DRINK! https://swolverine.com/ - THE SUPPLEMENTS I TAKE! BIRTHFIT Programs: Prenatal - https://marketplace.trainheroic.com/w... Postpartum - https://marketplace.trainheroic.com/w... Codes (20% off): Prenatal - SEVAN1 Postpartum - SEVAN2 https://asrx.com/collections/the-real... - OUR TSHIRTS https://www.vndk8.com/ - OUR OTHER SHIRT https://usekilo.com - OUR WEBSITE PROVIDER 3 PLAYING BROTHERS - Kids Video Programming https://app.sugarwod.com/marketplace/... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is an advertisement from BetterHelp. Everyone knows therapy is great for solving problems. But turns out, therapy has some issues of its own. Finding the right therapist, fitting into their schedule, and, of course, the cost. BetterHelp can help solve these problems. It's online, convenient, built around your schedule, and surprisingly affordable, too. Connect with a credentialed therapist by phone, video, or online chat. Visit BetterHelp.com to learn more.

That's BetterHelp.com. Sick of the cottage chaos? Beach? It's time for a reality check. An all-inclusive beach break with Sunwing Vacations can actually be cheaper than a staycation. Let's be real. Cottages sound good until you realize you're the cook, cleaner,

and kids entertainer. Say no to inferior, more expensive vacays and yes to kids clubs and all-you-can-everything. Book with your local travel agent or... Country or what?

Just whatever. I talk to you every couple years and it's always a new location, but I i recognize this spot yeah no i've been here almost 10 years now um i don't move around very much i've lived in three three houses pretty much my adult life i only i only talk to you every 10 years right yeah it's been a while how long every video i've seen of you you look like you're 100. Now you're back to 40. What happened? You go back into your house. You turn into a young man again. I look like I'm 40.

I can't believe how young you look right now. All the videos I've seen of you, you look like you look like Zeus. Now you look like a little like a cherub again oh yeah i did this crazy uh fasting uh weight cut from alexi baboda match to this recent match that i had last week i i crazily went to uh tried to make a two well i actually did make 209 but so i lost almost 30 pounds so that probably has a lot to do with it yeah that's nuts i was i was i was watching that interview of you sitting on the couch with that guy talking about it. Oh, yeah. Ray. Ray. Coach Ray.

Yeah. Where did you go wrestle? Tell me that whole story. By the way. Hi. Good to see you. Thanks for doing this. Yeah, no worries.

I think I had two phone numbers in your. I think somehow in my phone, I had too many phone numbers for you. So when I was texting you, they weren't going through. Okay. And then Travis was like, hey, maybe he doesn't like you anymore. I'm like, dude. Shut up. He loves me.

I love him. What are you talking about? So are you still doing kind of the fitness? I'm just doing a podcast, dude, and raising my kids. That's it. Okay. Yeah. But I mean, what's your fitness, the podcast dude and raising my kids. That's it. Okay. Yeah. But I mean, what, what's your focus on the podcast still pretty much with CrossFit or healthy, you know, this workout guys, crazy guys that are doing crazy fitness things.

Yeah. I mean, I would, I'd like to have other people on here. I had a, you know porn stars, businessman, politician, flat earthers, I'd like to expand my... Do the full Joe Rogan thing, right? Yeah, but occasionally, yeah. Exactly. A little Joe Rogan with a little Howard Stern. A little mix.

God, I don't even remember what year it was. Did did pulling john come out in 2004 six boy he would know better than i i thought the filming was probably maybe the early 2000s but yeah i don't know when it actually came out did it come out that yeah i guess it did come out so the footage was probably what late 90s to early 2000s because it was five really five six years between the footage and the and actually coming out yeah okay so let's let's just for a sake let's say it's somewhere between 15 and 20 years and then the climax is us going to poland right and you were 209 then right right i went 209 yeah and and then you were with them

oh those monsters travis alexi what was the other big guy's name uh from colorado uh mike matt girdner matt girdner damn how do i forget that matt girdner and then uh and you guys wrestle and it's it's kind of absurd because you, you meet Alexi in the overalls, right? Yeah. Yeah. We were different weight classes. So we, uh, you know, at the time they had, uh, what they call an overall. So they take the champions or whoever many people want to basically participate in the overall after the tournament to see who the top, you know,

top dogs are throughout, you know, uh, no matter what the weight class. So yeah, I didn't pull him until the overalls. And then you had that crazy match with Tadas, right? Tadas, yeah, he was also in the overall. So yeah, there was a bunch of tough guys to navigate before I worked on Alexei or tried to do anything with Alexei. And in that match with Taurus, it went probably as bad as it can go for a match you won.

He completely pulled you over, and basically you had to just completely bring him back. Yeah, completely. Yeah, he took my hand. He top-rolled me, and so I had an arm muscle at a very awkward position. And, yeah, it was ugly but um i was successful at doing it uh but yeah and then whose harebrained idea was it for you

15 or 20 years later to wrestle alexi again how did that happen? I don't know. I think it was more Alexi's doing than my doing. We never really searched him out. He decided to make a comeback to the sport. He made a little comeback about, I don't know, five, six years ago and pulled Tim Bresnan. I don't know if you saw that. I didn't.

That was something that Igor set up. I think Alexi's kind of a busy man. He's been doing a lot of things outside of arm wrestling, but things have calmed down a little bit. So I think he just decided that he's always been kind of a, you know, very, obviously a very athletic and strength oriented guy. So I think it was just fitting that he finally decided he wanted to make a

real strong comeback after, I guess it's been 18 years since we last pulled. That's what I was told. But, yeah, so it was more his doing, saying that he wanted to come back. And, you know, what would be more fitting than to, you know, give me a shot? I've been arm wrestling now since, I don't know, about two years now, two and a half years. So I made my comeback and um i i was you know a good challenge you know formidable but yet vulnerable to to still possibly getting beat i was maybe winning 80 of my matches so um yeah uh indian i think initially lined it up and then we ended up going over to Dubai and doing it with the king of the table.

So, so here's, here's what, here, here's where he is. This is how big he was the first time you pulled him. I'm guessing he was closer to 300 than 250 when you met him. I'm thinking 265, 270. I don't know exactly what he weighed, but yeah, I'm going to say two, 270 um versus when we pull I think he weighed in at 245-ish 250 so still really good size individual he he definitely put some uh some meat on the bone from when he was completely out of the sport you know he had gotten I think close to probably more 220 225 uh uh while he was out of the sport completely.

But yeah, not as big as he was 18 years ago, but still a formidable, strong human being. Two-time Olympian, I think, Judo and bobsledding. Oh, I never heard about the Judo. I didn't know that. Judo first, I think, and then bobsledding. Yeah. Hurt his knee in judo or something. Okay.

Yeah, no, he is still in just incredible shape. I mean, all around, just not arm wrestling shape, just an all-around, just agile athlete. I mean, could probably do anything that he wanted to do. And Travis told me you had no chance that's what people were giving me pretty much no chance a lot of people were giving me no chance um yeah i saw some polls too the polls were in your favor i was doing okay um having some decent matches against i would say top tier guys top 20 guys uh you know little bit of success a little bit of occasional missteps uh but you know the footage that he was putting out there

he was doing you know typical crazy you know strength arm wrestling related lifts so based on that i think people kind of gave me no chance. Like he's just he's back and he's strong as ever. And, you know, but yeah, and it was kind of played in my head, too. Like, OK, here we go again. I'm getting myself into something a little bit way over my head. And but once I got there and looked at him and we kind of hung out a little bit and, you know, I just got more and more confident as I was, you know, as I was there. I thought, well, if not now, then never. I mean, so like I can't, you know, can't be hesitant.

I just got to go full bore. I mean, it's best shape as I can be in at this point in my life and to see where it goes. And luckily enough, it went a little bit to my side of the table and I was able to hang on and, you know, secure the victory. I'm going to ask you a question that you're not going to like. Okay. Was it easy? No, I mean, it could have went either way. You know how arm wrestling is.

I mean, arm wrestling. You made it look easy. No one's arm wrestling is a matter of just, just micro, you know, starts and timing and refereeing and all these things. People think, Oh, that doesn't matter. That doesn't matter. But it could look easy and then you could get beat the next match. I mean, that's how, that's how that match went. It was like, if the start was a little bit better for him and it's just a little bit hair more on his side, even though he did get the jump on me in the first match, it makes it makes all the difference in the world.

So what seemingly looks like I'm in total control and is easy is like just borderline could easily have gone the other way. If it was easy, would you would you tell us? have gone the other way. If it was easy, would you, would you tell us? Yeah. I mean, you can see on my face and the way I approached it, that, that everything had to be perfect for it to go that way. And it, and it, and it's still, if it was super easy, I would have controlled the match when I tried to hook them. Like I think the third or fourth, I think it was the fourth match. I tried to hook them and he, he, uh,

even though I was close to still beating him in the hook, um, he still out muscled me and so he was stronger uh so yeah no you can tell by that that that it wasn't i wasn't in total control things could have definitely gone wrong easily gone wrong when when you pull someone like that or let's say like when you go down to 209, you would never get under a bar, a back squat bar, and the person's like, hey, I'm not going to tell you how much this weighs. Right. But we're going to pull this lever and the weight's going to sit on your shoulder and you're going to have to squat it. Right.

And if it's 1,800 pounds, you're dead. Right. Right. I don't. Do you ever have that fear that you go up there like against like what? Like if you go against like a siplen cough or. Yes. Yeah. I'm like that scenario. If you maximum stop your arm, he's just going to snap your arm off. I don't know. Like I'm like your scenario of having a building fall on you. I mean, I still kind of know in the back of my mind how strong somebody can possibly be. I've been around long enough to know that the very, very best, the very strongest are still manageable. It's not going to be like, you know, complete destruction.

So, yeah, you know, I have that in the back of my mind that, you know, I can still, you know, manage it. I mean, the worst case scenario is it takes you badly out of position. Your arm goes down. You know, I'm I've never been one of those guys that can mentally overcome what my physical abilities are. And, you know, and those kind of guys ended up hurting themselves, breaking their own arms. But so I even though I occasionally think that way occasionally because I've gotten older and I'm thinking, OK, is this going to be the time that I've, you know, I push it and end up hurting myself because I'm, you know, getting older. But I've been I've been able to, you know, escape that so far. So what's the giant guy's name? Levon? Levon Shagnasvelia.

He's from Georgia. Georgia guy. There he is. Yeah. Even with him, as strong as he is, the most difficult part about him is just his enormous size. It's like trying to arm wrestle, you arm wrestle a tree trunk. I mean, you just can't really get a hold of him to really exert your full pressure. So, you know, pulling someone like that, I mean, until you can get you strong enough where you can have

some type of control to really exert full pressure, he's going to beat you and just really not going to seem like you put that much effort into it because he just takes you so badly out of position and here he's pulling Ernie's Gasparini he's probably probably got one of the best uh Travis uh Badgett style top rolls in the in the business right now and um kind of effective he was able to you know the back pressure definitely negates a lot of that cupping strength that uh Le levan has but he's he's by far probably the best um as far as cupping strength goes in size to be able to control that back pressure but this was a good match there's no fear you you you get up there there's not like okay this i'm i, this guy's so much stronger than me that I need to be ready to catch and not attack?

Yeah, well, I mean, you want to always have control of the match and put yourself in the best angles and the best position. When you're up against someone like LeVon, it's really difficult to do because he's normally dictating the match. But yes, I mean, I guess, you know, Hermes has put himself in some pretty awkward position he's he's way out leveraged he's in a horrible position and he's still not mentally giving up and he's he's he's going to try to fight through it and this is a

dangerous you know the way he's pulling is very definitely very dangerous that he could he could end up tearing something or or uh but still i always go back to you break your own arm. You have to mentally be strong enough to do it to yourself. It's not the other person that's going to overwhelm you with some type of a jolt that's going to make the difference. If you're still mentally clear and aware of what's going on, you should be able to hopefully get that signal that, oh, that's, that's more than I, my body can handle. And for me, it's always been, you know, even if I'm mentally saying, hang on, hang on as hard as

I can, my arm still, um, typically the tendons will just give away and my arm will open up. And maybe my bone structure and my frame is over the years has developed to the point where that's never going to be a risk. But yeah, luckily enough for me, my attachment points seem to be stronger than my, my ability to statically hold some of those, some of those angles. John, you said that you made a comeback two and a half years ago. About two and a half, three years ago. Yeah, no.

It seems like just yesterday, but it's been almost a couple years, plus years. What were you doing? How long did you take off? I stopped after my match in Las Vegas against Devin Lorette in 2015. Shoulder was just getting to the point where it was just aggravating me enough where I couldn't really practice just the inflammation, the arthritis that I just decided, ah, I'm just done. I just can't really put a full effort into it. And I can't train the way I used to train. And so I gave it up and yeah, five, six years later, I decided

I'm just going to fight through it and manage it the best I can and continue to compete at the level that I possibly can with my situation. It's been fun. I'm glad I did it. It's been fun. It's my family. You can't stay away from family too long, right? Then you start missing people. I know thousands of people through arm arm wrestling so it was really difficult to be away and not be competitive and when you say manage it you're talking about the shoulder just shoulder yeah well I have to manage a lot of different things now it's mainly the shoulder is still a limiting thing that really keeps me from pulling the way I used to and be able to apply the side pressure that I used to shoulder is such a key component for keeping your elbow tight to your torso. And that,

that separation there is, is, is it, you know, have that as, as key to being successful at arm wrestling. But yeah, and I have all the little aches and pains of finger, the finger joints, the wrist joints, now the hand, the elbow is the, the elbow, just typical inflammation, arthritis, whatever you want to call it, age-related issues that I try to deal with and overcome as best I can. I mean, is there anyone from your – you started when you were 18? Yeah, I broke my arm when i was 13 so i'd already been really kind of arm wrestling in my early mid-teens but not professionally until i was 18 17 18 years old any of those guys still around no no no i i started you know back in the early 80s i was pretty young there wasn't too many guys that i was competing against that were as young as I was.

So most of the guys that I knew in that era are long gone. And is Cobra still arm wrestling at all? He's still dabbles in the sport with somewhat fair amount of success. I mean, he's still going to beat 90% of the walking around public. But when he starts going up against you know competitors in his weight class his weight class is super tough though those those flyweights are are incredibly strong and it's so deep there's there's probably a i was going to say thousands of guys with probably hundreds of guys that are

are just animals at that weight i was just thinking in terms of someone the the because i mean he was around in the 90s right 90s yeah maybe even the late 80s it's hard but anyone from the old footage that i've seen who i still see now is kevin still arm wrestling at all no he doesn't arm wrestling you know ron bass still arm wrestles crazy he's a year or two older than i am and he has fairly he's fairly successful at it still so and it's possible i mean todd hutchins who's currently world champion just beat the best one of the best the best guy at 105 kilos um is only you know two years younger but of course he started in his you know late 30s early 40s so he's doesn't have quite the wear and tear but that really shouldn't matter i mean we're talking about you know typical age

issues of um you know arthritis and that but some people so i think some people are lucky in that respect and some people aren't as far as um you know what they have to deal with when they get older it's it's crazy the crazy the work Todd's put in. Has he been wrestling just since? Yeah, no, he's definitely there's definitely no lack of effort from Todd Hutchins.

I think he's for me, I've attempted to do some of the things that he claims to do and I break down really quickly. So it's not for me, I'm tempted to do some of the things that he claims to do. And I break down really quickly. So it's not for everybody. But his training regiment is intense. If I try to do his training and people will say, oh, you just need to keep fighting through,

fighting through. Baloney. You know, when you're on a team like this and getting worse and worse and worse to the point where you're almost being a cripple. Well, when it when it's a turnaround, you know, so what he's able to do is is unique, I think, to to his nutrition, his genetics. I don't know. There's a few people that are out there that are like that. Devin's like that right now, just seeming like seeming like he just can't overtrain. I mean, the more he trains, the stronger he's he's's getting and he's, he's healthy and he's not feeling, you know, the aches and pains and the negatives from it. So, uh, but yeah, Todd, Todd definitely puts in a lot of work, but he's,

his body's able to handle it. Um, I was looking, I was looking at, I'm going to pull up this clip of you and Devin. This is from, funny is, this Gary filmed this, but you can see me in the background here. This is, I remember this. I remember filming this. All right, Shahilus. Yeah, that's right.

Well, good memory, John. How do you remember that stuff? And that's me holding up the camera in the background. And then on the right is Devin Lorette. And then you're on the left. And I remember when you were facing this guy, this was the first time I had seen Devin, but I had heard all these rumors of this guy who was just insane.

Right. Canada. Right. So this was not, this was 1999, 2021. Really that, that early.

Cause I, I met Devin and pulled with Devin a little bit, I think right and left in the Worlds in Japan in 99. So if this was only a year or two later, I knew of Devin. So yeah, we already kind of... And Marcio was there too. Do you remember that?

Marcio? Yeah. A couple other decent pullers. I think there was like an eight-man class or six-man class. I can't remember what. I think it was eight-man class. And I think he had had a war with Marcio, right? Yeah, he drew Marcio first.

And I think I pulled the other champion from Canada. And I can't remember what his name was. I think Luke. Was it Luke Riemer? I can't remember. That name sounds familiar, but I can't remember. That name sounds familiar, but I can't remember. So anyway,

yeah, they kind of wanted to separate us. They didn't want the Americans pulling the Americans and the Canadians pulling the Canadians the first round. So yeah, he ended up pulling Marcio. And then I think I got him the second and there wasn't that many rounds. I mean,

there wasn't that many people in the class. It was kind of like a, you know, who's who round Robin type of a setup. And when we started filming Pulling John, I want to say maybe you were 40 or late 30s, and you were talking about retiring. At that time, my shoulder wasn't bothering me. It was my elbow.

I had just tendonitis in the inner elbow. I think arm wrestling was kind of at a low point. Arm wrestling kind of has gone through cycles, right. You know, big promoters that come out and, you know, have these big tournaments and you know, give it a go. And then a few years later they're there, they disappear and it's, it's failed and there's been kind of a lull. And I think at that time, that was what, what the case was. I can't remember who was promoting big at the time, but been kind of a lull. And I think at that time, that was what the case was.

I can't remember who was promoting big at the time, but it kind of faded out. And I just was like, okay, yeah, maybe this is a good time to maybe slow down and stop doing it. And then I got the call from you guys and kind of prompted me back into the hanging in of the sport. On the go here, could you share with us for a group that knows nothing about arm wrestling but but is able to understand human movement and the important importance of it

the what you're doing what maybe like what muscles you're engaging the actual directions you're pulling what you're doing with your fingers as we start here so i think i think this is built or no who's the who's that that's a great arm wrestler there the ref too what was you're pulling, what you're doing with your fingers as we start here. That's a great arm wrestler there, the ref too. What was his name? The little black guy. He was amazing. Dave Hicks,

right? Yes, Dave. Arm wrestling is mainly hand and forearm. All arm wrestlers are going to have huge forearms because hand control is so important in the sport. Here, not so much, but you still have to have that cupping ability to force this match into what we call a hook and inside wrist. Did he force that or did you?

I think I forced it. I think this was the second match that we're looking at where the first time I ended up pronating outwards and then taking the leverage advantage outside and doing what like what we call a top roll but here again it comes what's the most important is the hand strength to be able to lock down this this cupping and then from that point if you can secure that then rotating this way puts and opens you know it opens your opponent's hand and puts them at a huge leverage advantage so arm wrestling isn't so much um you know bicep you're not doing a lot of pulling this way there's a little bit of back pressure but um it's more the hand strength being

able to lock it down, and then that rotation. So that pronation is super key to be super effective in taking your opponent's arm to the side. But it's really not illustrated in this match. This match is about shoulder strength and pack and keeping that elbow tight to your torso and dragging more sideways. But here again, it's not so much arm. It's hand and wrist to maintain that position, and then it's lat, shoulder, back, keeping that elbow tight to the torso, and then basically just rocking your body sideways to open your opponent's bicep.

So when he says go, are you not attacking you're just trying to get hold the static position you're just trying to basically be like hey you're not coming through here um yeah i mean i'm i've got to definitely i've got the upper ground here because i've got the advantage his hand is turned underneath mine's on top um he would he would require a lot more shoulder commitment and side pressure to get my hand to be more upright. You say your hands aren't even because your knuckles are pointed up? Now we're fairly even. I think at this point that you're showing, we're pretty close to even.

But we're just kind of waiting each other out. I didn't realize how good Devin's endurance was until after this match. how good Devin's endurance was until after this match. And I felt like, oh, I was dominant enough to maybe make this match last to the end where he basically quits, which wasn't the case at all. You let him get into position there, right? Yeah, you make little surges, and if it doesn't go all the way to the pad, if you don't break down that tendon connection and they basically open up and break uh then you have to reassess and then come back up

to center and compose yourself and um by applying full offensive pressure all the time it saps a lot of energy out of you it's like it's like doing a curl curls in the gym if you're actually moving the weight it's a lot more energy than just statically holding on to the weight. And it's the same with, you know, it applies to arm wrestling. By holding on in a defensive position, you definitely can conserve energy, especially if your opponent is actually trying to exert a little bit extra to offensively move you. And then, John john in about six seconds you try to come out of the hook is that what i'm seeing can you explain that to people like so

you're in this position i'm guessing you don't like it because he's got it looks like he's getting changing up the muscles so i'm going from a from a shoulder tricep back you, going to the side two, turning into a reverse curl pronation, applying pressure on his fingers to see how strong his forearm and hand, see if they're blown up yet where I can attack. And here I go with attacking the fingers by putting back pressure. So completely different direction. Wasn't effective, so I ended up turning into into the hook, but it gave my arm a little bit of a little bit of a break from, you know, having to maintain the side pressure. Then I turned back into into holding sideways. And you look up at him. Why are you looking up at him to just assess his fatigue? Why are you looking up at him to just assess his fatigue?

Just to assess, to judge, to see how much he's exerting, see if I can get any kind of clue like he's about ready to give up or not. And that definitely was not the case with Devin. And to learn that, like I said, after this match and years later, I realized that the, you know, try to outlast Devin is not the proper approach. You need to be a very aggressive and hit hit off the go. Get rid of him quick. But, yeah, that's a smaller version of Devin. You know, he he's definitely gotten way bigger, way stronger throughout the years.

So wouldn't be nearly as effective. God, 20 years ago. And and you nearly as effective god 20 years ago and and you pulled him a couple years ago a year ago yeah um six months or a year into my comeback um yeah we did a rematch yeah because i think when i left the sport he was probably the last guy that i that i beat in 2015 it was at the walAL event in Las Vegas and and and how much was he and he was huge then um he's you know when we pulled at the WAL right here holy shit yeah I'm big I'm I'm 245 250 biggest I've ever been in my life is right here in this this photo so you were going for it.

Yeah, I was going for it. I was like, you know, I hadn't really had a lot of, you know, a lot of time to really get the tendon super hard, but I definitely, you know, shed the gloves and said, okay, I'm going to get as heavy and as big and as strong as I can possibly get for this match. And he's probably 20, 30 pounds heavier than me. But I made it close.

I made it as far as weight goes. But he was way stronger. Yeah, no, he's – I blew up way too quick, too easy. I had a little bit of a chance on the first match. Good surge, close to the pad. We struggled for probably 15 20 minutes 30 minutes maybe even for the setup on the first match which typically doesn't go well for uh devon's opponents um but um yeah no i was happy with my performance um you know can't win them

all but um i felt like at least i was in the fight with him and uh yeah so here i got him got him close just couldn't quite surge it maybe i should have thrown a little bit of a shoulder roll to try to press it the rest of the way but it's not something that i typically practice i'm not very good at it so i elected to just try to stay outside do you think that's the best person you've ever arm wrestled right there that devin lorette 2000 yeah the current devin lorette is is definitely uh the the strongest arm wrestler that i've ever arm most complete arm wrestler that i've ever arm wrestled and and probably strongest um maybe not the most explosive uh which he's never gonna you know achieve that with with training he is who he is, but yeah, he's definitely developed into

one of the very best, if not the best arm wrestler that's ever walked this planet. Yeah, isn't that... LeVon is the only other guy, but I've never hooked up with him, so I've never arm wrestled him, so I can't really say

where LeVon's at. But, yeah, Devin for sure. And he beat Devin handedly, right? He did. And it's almost a year, year and a half or so ago. But here we go, arm wrestling. It looks like it was easy for LeVon, but it could have easily gone the other way. I mean, Devin, I think, hurt his arm after the first match,

at the beginning of the second match. So that pretty much made it look really easy. But, you know, if Devin hadn't hurt himself and he was able to somewhat stick it like Ermes did at the very bottom there, that match could have turned completely different. Devin could have came out victorious even that day so um what seemingly looked easy for LeVon and controllable for LeVon could easily not you know made it to the finish line is there talk about those two getting back

together again I think so yeah I mean Devin's pretty much beaten everybody and proven that he's the next in line to take a shot at LeVon again, and I think he will continue to do that until he gets a shot again. I don't know if you're into the sport that much, but LeVon ended up hurting his wrist six months ago, a year ago or so, so since their match, he's ended up having an injury, which we all have to figure out. So we'll see how strong he comes back after that. Yeah, so I expect them to probably pull within the next year again. It is kind of a trippy sport in the fact that the people who drive it are people who are passionate about it, like people like Ingen Terzi. Yeah. And that's why it has those cycles.

There may be some ruling body, but the real pushes have been people like – what was the guy from Poland? Igor Mezurenko. Igor, Ingen, just these promoters that come in. I don't know the guy's name, but the guy who was doing the wall, WAL. It's just- Yeah, the UConn. The meme before that, UConn Jack, the UAL, Robert Trank. I mean, there's a dozen promoters that have come and gone

and have attempted to make a run at the sport and make it popular enough where big sponsors might come and they could continue to build on that. But I think the situation now is a little different with East versus West. It's being supported by arm wrestlers and arm wrestling fans. So I think this is the first time that it's self-sustaining based on wow interest right of just not just it's not a rich and i'm not poo-pooing this at all but it's not some rich guy who's like hey rich guy that's investing a ton of money hoping to recoup it at some point and you know realizes a couple three years later like oh this is this is draining me and it's not really going like i expected it's

not it's not progressing like it should progress this This situation now is self-sustaining. As long as we don't lose our audience and the participants that are excited in pursuing the sport, I think this one might be long-term. What's crazy is how the community's niche it's small um but it's ravenous so like when you go live on your youtube it's crazy the numbers you get or the numbers travis gets or the number this arm arm wrestling whisperer gets it's it's the the people are hungry um for content and they

show up in hordes and they're, they're crazy committed. You guys have a crazy committed audience. Yeah, no, it's, it's a little different than I even imagined myself that, you know, I'm, I'm used to what was the sport 10, 15, 20 years ago. And it, it really has changed dramatically. Uh, the audience is, is changed tremendously, whether it's because of the ease of access to YouTube or what, but it definitely, it definitely has a much broader, deeper, bigger audience. I mean, I, I always get a kick. I occasionally even now get people recognize me just on the street, like, Oh, Hey, yeah, yeah. recognized me just on the street like oh hey yeah yeah you know so it's crazy to me john a friend of mine was showing me that like the crossfit games this year it's a big spectacle right

and the total views for all the crossfit games events was eight million and then someone showed me this video of marble racing and it was just someone who lines up marbles right right right and it had 14 million views this one marble racing video had more views than the entire everybody plays everybody plays marbles yeah that's that's the thing i mean only the elite elite do crossfit you know or some of the crazy sports that we do but something like this a kid's game you know everybody's everybody's excited and they going to view that marble league. It's not surprising to me, but yeah. Well, even like video games, how many, how many millions and millions and millions of people will participate in the,

in the video game thing. Massive. Um, when you say the crowd, you're shocked to see the crowd. What are you, What are you referencing? Like more girls than boys or younger people? It's mainly a guy thing. I think, I mean, the girls that are involved in the sport are normally girlfriends of guys that are the arm wrestlers, right? There's exceptions, of course.

But I'd say probably 90%, 95 percent of the audience is still male. It's not, you know, what do you see that's different? Younger, like when you say you look at the audience and you see it's different, is it? Well, not even so much the audience. I just think when I say audience, I mean people at home on their on their easy chair, you know, watching it on the Internet, on YouTube or what have you. on their easy chair or, you know, watching it on the internet, on YouTube or what have you. So, yeah, it's, it's, I,

I don't know where they're coming from or why they're coming, but they're obviously there. Those event, remember when we would go to North Lake Tahoe for those events? And there was kind of that crowd there, like the Kenny Hughes and Tom and you. Do those events still happen? I think Leonard and he still do events throughout the country, small events like that, but I haven't participated in one now for, you know, seven, eight, nine years. So, but yeah, I'm sure they still exist.

And they need to exist, right? That's the grassroots, you know. And when you don't participate in them because you're trained and do you do any tournaments or you only do one-on-one matches? The difference for people, just so you know, tournaments, what you think it is, it's double elimination.

Everyone goes into a pile. It's in weight classes and everyone works their way up to the top of the pyramid. But what John's been doing is these, Hey, you show up to the arm wrestling table and you, it's like, it's like a boxing match. You fight a match and then you get, what's the rest? How much rest you

guys get? Uh, two minutes, I think is East versus West. That's not much. Okay. You get two minutes and it's best out of five, right? Right. Do you do any more of the, uh, double elimination? There just hasn't been the, the matches haven't been there. No one's promoting it that way anymore, except in the small, you know, amateur style format. Yeah. But if somebody were to have a big, big tournament like that with big prize money, I think you would see a lot of the great arm wrestlers show up to try to, you know, try to win that thing. But it just hasn't been available. The promoters have gone with the supermatch format to make it more of a show.

So the best guys in the sport, beginners used to be able to put their hands on the best guys in the sport. So you would show up to Tahoe and there'd be a guy and he might get you in the first round and he can say hey i arm wrestle john brzenk those days are over those days are pretty much over they've been over for you know a while now yeah interesting wow when is the last time you did a double elimination tournament you know uh it probably was the wal without they were still using that format when I pulled Devin in 2015. It was a bracketed tournament.

I heard we're coming back, so maybe the WAL will be the league that brings that format back to the sport. You heard the WAL is coming back? I've heard rumblings that yes, they're making an attempt to bring it back to the United States because it gets a little taxing to travel all the way to Turkey every year. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Another month. Have you gone several times in a year? I've been to Turkey maybe eight times, seven, eight times.

Yeah, in the last couple of years. So it's been almost every two, three months. Always to arm wrestle, never to commentate. It's always arm wrestling. I went the one time to commentate when Devin pulled LeVon. Oh, so you got to see that. I'm not Devin and LeVon. Devin and Ermias Gasparini.

I'm sorry. I didn't get to see the Devin and LeVon. Devin and Ermes Gasparini. I'm sorry. I didn't get to see the Devin and LeVon match. Do you like doing that? Did you like going out there and watching him? Well, you know me. I mean, I always enjoy the arm wrestling. I would have liked to have been stage side and, you know, with a good, clear live view. But once I got there, I ended up into this uh hot booth and and commentating

watching a tv screen so it wasn't as as enjoyable as it could have been but it was still worth it for me to be there are you still at delta i am no shit i know really what else am i gonna do i don't i retire i don't know. Play with your great. I've thought about it. Yeah, I think about retirement a lot lately. I just need to really have some idea what I'm going to do with my time. Yeah, I took four months off voluntarily when COVID went on. And I was able to find stuff to do, and I enjoyed it.

So I shouldn't be that scared of it, but I'm still five years away from Medicare, so there was always that. And there's a lot of things to consider as far as completely leaving something that I've done for the last 40 years. So it's always a little scary. You're so practical. Yeah. I don't know what it's going to take to push me out the door, but I'm hoping it's going to happen soon. So same routine, get up in the morning, drive, park in the parking lot, walk over to the planes.

Groundhog day, every day, five days a week, Monday through Friday. Yep. Pretty much it. And what do you do with the planes again, John? What's your role? I'm a mechanic, so I just basically keep them moving. They come in, and it's my job to make sure they leave happy and safe. You just graduated from aircraft mechanical school. You go to your first day of work at Delta Airlines. A man approaches you, extends his hand to give you a handshake and says hello i'm john brzenk i'm your manager

where did you find this caleb this is awesome this is a right i literally just looked looked up john brzenk delta airlines and this is the first thing that popped up must be a real moment that probably a few men have experienced or imagine your first day at prison and Dave Chafee's your prison guard. Chafee a prison guard? He is. Oh my God. That's amazing. Did John freeze?

Yeah, I think he did. He got stuck in one position about to sip his coffee. Oh, that's awesome. So, so, so, so John, so basically everything, everything, anything to keep from the, from the windows to the engines. Yeah. I mean, you know,

we try not to do too much heavy maintenance throughout the day because the most important thing is getting the airplane out on time. So, yeah, normally it's like little things, little trim pieces, seatbelts that need to be, you know, dealt with or, you know, whatever. But we do our safety walk around when the airplane arrives to make sure that, you know, there hasn't been any weird things happening throughout the flight, you know, leaks and burst strikes and, you know, make sure the tires and brakes are good. And the landing was, was a good landing. And, you know, what's the, have you seen anything where you're like, Ooh, I'm good thing. I caught that. That would have been really bad. Of course. Of course. Yeah. Anything you want to share?

No, I mean, you know, the, the big ones have been, you know, bird strikes, you know, but occasionally mechanical things happen. And yeah, it could be a problem. But it's, it's, it's, there's a lot of holes that have to line up in the cheese for it to be a real major problem with the, you know, the airline industry. It's, it's,'s as you know probably one of the safest things that anybody can do so it's it would take a lot but um yeah and and we're so critical even the the tiniest little things uh you know get treated like it's the going to be the end of the world so so um uh land landing tires on the landing gear like if there if there's any question the tire gets changed. Yeah. We have limits. Everything's spelled out on a book. Everything is pretty much defined what can

and can't go. It's that way for everything on the airplane. If there's a new plane, do you go away for a month to plane school? You have to learn a whole thing. Recently, I just spent three weeks in atlanta um getting trained on the the new airbus 350 that we're we have and we're getting supposedly getting more of even though it hasn't come to phoenix yet i'm i'm fully trained on it already so oh yeah delta that was the airline where the guy in atlanta

where the guy pooped on the aisle and they had to turn the plane around. Did you hear about that, John? I did not hear about that. This flight, I think, was taking off from Atlanta to somewhere overseas. Flight attendant told me he had to sit down because they were landing. He was like, no, I really have to go. No, sir, you're going to have to sit down. I was like, you're right. Yeah, this dude was making diarrhea all the way through the airplane

to get his deltas. The guy was running from his seat to the front of the plane and left the trail. Yeah, what'd he do? They turned the plane around. Yeah. Well, it's kind of a big deal, right? It's a little biohazard.

That's what they called it. A biohazard. A biohazard. That's what they called it, a biohazard. Some scented candles and incense just can't cover it up. I don't think you could be right. I don't know what would be... Is that worse than somebody actually getting sick? I've been on airplanes before when people have spent

a little bit too much time at the bar being afraid of the flying and have i've lost it and uh that's that's another a bad flight i i would i was landing once coming back from i don't know where it was an international flight i want to say it was india or china and i was and i was sitting i was by myself and as the plane i the whole plane I'd had, flight, I'd had this crazy fever, crazy, crazy fever. And I was shivering. I was sick.

And right as the plane was making its final 20-minute approach, I realized, oh, I'm going to throw up. I have the barf bag. And the kids in front of me, there's four kids in front of me, and they know I'm going to throw up. And they're making barf sounds to fuck with me. And eventually I vomited in the bag and felt like a trigger a chain reaction the whole aircraft could be you know reminds me of going into a theater with the uh the old i think mighty python movie i can't remember which which one it was but there was a scene in there where this the big monster guy was eating and eating and eating and then you know they were he was throwing up, throwing up, throwing up.

And when I walked in, I had no idea that scene was, you know, in that movie. But walking in the theater, thinking to myself, why does this theater smell like, you know, oh, vomit. But then realized during the movie, like, oh, some people just could not handle that and lost it. It triggered them. Wow. You actually had it so no need to watch it because if you remember this movie or no i don't remember this movie yeah did you see this this was in the theater huh yeah yeah probably i don, yeah. Probably, I don't know, 20, 25 years. It might even be 30 years ago. I don't know when this came out.

I remember hearing this story many years ago you told where a guy was parking a plane and two wings hit. Yeah, we've had incursions like that. Yeah. Poles, wings, trucks. Yeah. I mean, accidents happen. I mean, it's, there's, there's not, you would think a complicated system like an airplane would have like a collision avoidance system on the ground, right? Like, no, you're too near hit the brake. That's the type autopilot hit the brakes. You know, Tesla type autopilot. Hit the brakes, kid! Right. But it doesn't. So, yeah. It would be crazy

unsettling, I would think. Yeah. It's like dropping a rock on your Bugatti. Yeah. Yeah. It'd be tough, I think, to sell to the crews to allow the airplane to have that much control over what's going on, too. So, yeah, they want to have a final say of when to stop and how to stop.

You and Travis came to my mom's house one time. And we were in my the three of us were in my bedroom. Maybe there was someone else in there, too. I can't remember. And we were we had, the three of us were in my bedroom. Maybe there was someone else in there too. I can't remember. And we were, we had the monitors up. Right. And we were doing the editing for the logging or whatever, whatever you're doing. Yeah.

We were doing the commentary. We had shot that, um, the arm wrestling championships, like on some boat in Kansas. And we brought the footage back and we edited it to make an ESPN show. And then you and Travis and I were going to commentate it. Right. Okay. Yeah, no. So that was the, uh, the nationals, right. That you're talking about. Cause we've done a couple of editing things like, uh, I think we did the UAL one for ESPN, right?

We may have done that one too. I don't know if that one ever even aired. Yeah, I think it did. It didn't have the, yeah, it didn't have the reruns like the one you're talking about did. Yeah, that one was crazy, right? Yeah. So maybe I'm conflating the two, but that's irrelevant. You and Travis were sitting on the edge of the bed. It was a big bedroom.

And you guys started getting into a little bit of a wrestling match. Right. And I remember thinking, oh shit. Like I, I, I'd never seen like two grown men, like start doing that. And I was like, panic. I don't know if you remember me. Like, I was like, no, stop, stop. You guys go through a while.

Yes. Yes. Yes. How, how, how, do you, do you remember that? Yeah, yeah. And I don't know what transpired to lead up to that, but probably, you know, this from one side. It was just all in good fun.

I mean, we were just. It was all in good fun? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We were. Okay. It was just, you know. Because I was like, holy shit, in good fun. Yeah. Yeah. We were not, we were, okay. It was just, you know, cause I was,

I was like, holy shit. This is like, this could be not, not that I thought it was like angry or fighting, but I was like, this could, this feels like it could quickly escalate. Like a computer,

small, small, fine space like that. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. We're in our ponders getting tossed around. Definitely can go through drywall pretty easy.

Yeah. Um, has, has the sport left Travis behind? Travis Bajan. Travis can make a comeback anytime he wants to. His focus has just been on his son. I mean, I think he's been completely committed and supporting Tyson with the football. So I think his focus just hasn't been on arm wrestling and maybe rightly so up until maybe the last year and a half, two years, uh, really hasn't been a tremendous amount going on to really, you know, have that type of commitment, um, in the sport. So, um, but I think he's going to make a comeback. I think, uh, you do a little bit that I've talked with him. He's, he acts think he's going to make a comeback. I think... You do?

From the little bit that I've talked with him, he acts like he's secretly getting stronger and pulling on a regular basis. And I know he's trained a few times now, so he's definitely in his head that he's going to be back.

Is the left-handed scene still big? Or is it big? Maybe not as big as it once was, but still there are left-handed matches to be made, for sure. Because that's where he would be his most potent, right? Yeah, for sure. Are you pulling with both hands?

I occasionally do. The left is still so fragile. I mean, it doesn't take much for me to cross that line and be injured for months with the left. So I try to avoid pulling with it very often, but I occasionally will if the situation is light enough where I feel like I'm not going to hurt myself. I'll try to dabble in it just so it's not completely lopsided. But, yeah, I don't competitively arm wrestle with the left. And I guess that's one of the things with the double elimination gone. If there was double elimination still, you could assess the crowd and be like, okay, I'm going to enter left.

Yeah, no, I would probably most probably not. Exactly. To do it. I'm there anyway. I'm in Chicago. Yeah, no, I would probably most probably not. Exactly. I'm there anyway. I'm pulling right. There's a class and there's a prize money to be had on the left. I mean, even if it was a small chance, I would probably put myself you know.

Wherever you're going, you better believe American Express will be right there with you. Heading for adventure? We'll help you breeze through security. Meeting friends a world away? You can use your travel credit. Squeezing every drop out of the last day? How about a 4 p.m. late checkout?

Just need a nice place to settle in? Enjoy your room upgrade. Wherever you go, we'll go together. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash yamx. Benefits vary by card. Terms apply.

When your celebration of life is prepaid in advance, it becomes a gift from you to your family later because no one should have to plan for a loss while they're experiencing one. Paying in advance protects your loved ones and gives you the peace of mind you deserve. Let us help you plan every detail with professionalism and compassion. We are your local Dignity Memorial provider.

Find us at dignitymemorial.ca. In the mix to take that chance. So a couple weeks ago, you flew to turkey to pull 209 pounds 209 pounds yeah um so initially well long story but anyway uh i want to hear about the weight loss and why you did it and when the last time you weighed 209 i think that'll be the part that's most 209 was probably the last time i probably weighed 209 was when i pulled the legacy back 18 years or so ago. I mean, I don't know. I haven't, I haven't had really had the need to make 209 since the PAL. And even back then it was not a huge struggle, but I was always walking around at 220. So it was always a little bit of a water cut for me to make 209. Yeah, no, it was just, I don't know. I just crazy personal challenge that I started, you know,

started heading down that road. And at one point, three weeks in, four weeks in, I told myself, I'm just, there's no way I'm going to be able to do it. I told Ingen, I said, I'm not going to be able to make the 209. Making the 209 was going to make it a for the world title the guy that i was pulling against was the 95 kilogram champion in the he was the world champion and ingans the promoter and he was setting up the match yeah yeah and and asked you to do it or were you like hey ingan i can was going to pull this guy five six weeks before i decided to lose to 95. And we agreed that I could be a hundred kilos. So that was, that was my, and that was still going to be a challenge for me because I was probably 108, 109 kilos when I pulled Alexi. So, and it was five weeks later, six weeks later,

I think five weeks later. So to even just lose to a hundred kilos was going to be a little bit of a challenge, but I started right away after I got done arm wrestling. Alexi went on this super low calorie fasting diet of just basically eating hardly anything, nothing, no carbs. I was completely carb free for the five, six weeks. So just meat? Just meat? Just well, I was basically just that's where cholesterol, when I went in for my physical, my cholesterol was crazy high.

I was just basically eating scrambled eggs in the morning and then, you know, maybe a protein shake at, at night and that was it. So, uh, but yeah. And how long did you do that for that diet, eggs and protein? Pretty much the whole way up leading up to the match. A few days out, I was still 216, 217. So I had to lose, you know, seven, eight pounds of water weight. And, you know, and that was not super easy either because I was already kind of depleted of the water because I wasn't

eating any carbohydrates. But yeah, two weeks away from the tournament, I decided I wasn't going to be able to do it. Well, I think it was three weeks away from the tournament. I had pulled in a practice in Georgia and I could tell I was really depleted and fatigued quite easily. So I thought that it's just not worth it. I'm not gonna be able to do it. But then a few days later, I was like, come on, John, you big sissy. So like I said, it became just a kind of a personal challenge. It was more important to me mentally, I think, to make the weight than to actually go in thinking that I could, you know, win. So, um, yeah. Do I regret it? No. I mean, it was fun. It was a challenge and I, I accomplished it. And, um, You got on the scale naked? Uh, no, I still had a, I had still had a Jersey and shorts on.

I think I took my shoes off, but, um, yeah, no, I made it clear as could be. I probably was a pound or two less than what I needed to be. And then how soon after you weigh in do you get to your pool? And I'm not an expert on doing that, but I just started drinking a lot of sugary water, apple juice, orange juice. Afterwards? You mean when you got... Completely afterwards. I think breakfast that morning, I basically just ate bread because I wanted to make sure that my stomach wasn't going to go haywire and I was going to be

having to run to the outhouse while my name was being called you know a day later so um basically just just nothing but carbs so honey and and bread and and and water and i didn't actually weigh myself the day of the match but i'm i'm guessing i probably gained you know that back up to two maybe two and a quarter, 220-ish. Wow. Yeah. And then how was the match? Did you feel like you had energy or no? Did you feel like you had energy?

What I remember more than anything that was kind of a negative, it's not that I ran out of gas, but I was mentally kind of in a fog. I almost felt faint after the first match. I was like, I was like a little dizzy, like, okay, make sure don't fall on stage. Don't pass out. So that was the biggest scare for me. But yeah.

Yeah. You know, our wrestling is a little different than other sports that require, I think that, that sugar store that energy, you know, because as you know, arm wrestling is more static and,

and, and frame and tendons. So I was hoping that I could have enough strength to, you know, to overcome his lock, to make it a quick match. It wasn't the case. He was strong enough to stop me um and then

then then the the factor comes in well how long can you hold your breath and hang on at that high level without you know feeling feeling faint and tired but um yeah no so it was it is what it is i'm you know i'm done with it. It was a fun challenge. I don't know if I'm going to think about pulling 95s again, but you never know. The way I understand it is basically your mitochondria can use two types of fuel. It can use ketones or it can use glucose. Right.

And your mitochondria is what's what's you know uh with some relationship with atp because what allows us to be animated as human beings right so we're not dead and so i'm thinking like if you're just eating eggs and protein shake your body was burning ketones you were you were in what they call ketosis i mean i've never seen inside the human body i'm just regurgitating just shit to you now. Right. But if you do start eating all that bread right before the event, then all those little billions of mitochondria or whatever inside of you that were using ketones to burn, you know, you were a diesel engine. And then the night before the show, you switched to a gas powered engine. Right. Is that your understanding, too, of what you did?

That all of a sudden you're asking your mitochondria, hey, start asking your mind hey start burning glucose i don't know how long that takes i mean i i don't know i guess on carb loading like is is it maybe even beneficial to to deplete yourself of carbs right like like doing a water overload to do a water cut um is it is it something that is it something that you could deprive yourself from? And then two days before the event, because I waited on Friday morning and the event was not until Saturday night. So I didn't have 36 hours, 40 plus hours to try to get myself back to a normal condition. And I'll tell you what, I mean, I had probably three thousand calories of honey and bread and between the point that I weighed in and the actual match. And it still didn't seem to, you know, correct the the damage I had done, you know.

Five weeks of being or six weeks of being in ketosis state. five weeks of being or six weeks of being in ketosis state. So I don't know. I don't know the science behind that, whether or not it's, it's something that is worthwhile or feasible to do, or it's just impossible. How old are you? I'm 59.

And do you have another match lined up? I am scheduled to arm wrestle Krasimir Kostadino. He's from Bulgaria in January at East vs. West, January 20th. And when you say scheduled, you're flexible. if he hurts himself or I hurt myself between now and then or something happens where we can't follow through with it. But yeah, as of right now, that's my next super match. And they're all televised on CoreSport? CoreSport, yep. How is that working? The couple times I've watched stuff on CoreSport,

it's not been easy. I watched an arm wrestling match and a boxing match. Okay. I don't know. Well, the production keeps getting better. The production looks great. The production looks great. I just mean the wonkiness of getting on the website and knowing where to go

and giving them your money. I've only done it a couple times because because i've normally been there participating right but my wife who knows nothing about computers seems to be able to do it pretty easy i don't know it's definitely been a lot easier than some of the things we've had to deal with in the past uh like the like the wal the vLi, that was, to me, seemingly a nightmare. And I wasn't real happy with the security that they had because it seemed like the one time I ended up using it, my card, maybe it was a coincidence, but my card got compromised. Like, okay, this is over. So, but yeah, I haven't really heard any negative on on the ability to to you know get

the pay-per-view on core sports i you know it's still probably a little difficult on tvs um i know renee had a hard time figuring it out and i don't even know that was it maybe that was it i had to get it on my computer and then beam it over to my tv. Aired it to the TV, right? So it's easy on the computer or on your cell phone, but I think that the app or the program that is required to make it work on these smart TVs is probably still a little bit, you know, ahead of its time. But I, but I guess the participation and the, is enough to is positive because they keep doing it. People are actually purchasing it.

It's the amount of pay-per-views are making it, are allowing them to continue to, to make the sport better. Oh, that's awesome. So you, the feedback you're hearing is, is like, yeah, it's lucrative. Yeah, no, it's, it's, they're not running in the red. I mean, occasionally I think they do. There has been a couple that have gotten close or have maybe slightly gone into the red but um i think the uh majority of them are in the plus side where there's a little bit of a

kitty there to to to sustain it yeah that's awesome because i think people are more likely to do an impulse buy if they could just obviously just plop on the TV. Yeah. And push buy. Yeah. Well, I've always thought that too, but that or even a little easier than like the YouTube, right? Where you could just easily just do it through PayPal or your Apple account or whatever. Right.

Definitely be a little easier for people to be impulsive like that. But like it was pretty, pretty, pretty straightforward, pretty easy to be impulsive like that but like it was pretty pretty pretty straightforward pretty easy to be able to do it okay good because i would say half the boxing matches i bought i've told myself do not spend 79 and then it's like seven o'clock at night and i'm like fuck right right right especially if it's so easy like it's an account that you don't really it's like you're yeah a fake play money account like PayPal. Or to me, some of those things, you know, accounts that I have Venmo or like, it's like, ah, whatever. It's just, you know, it's money I'm not really counting on or. Easy, easy, easy purchase.

Your grandfather. My grandfather. Yeah. How many? Two and two. I have four grandkids. And that's, yeah. Three girls, one boy.

Do you like that? Oh, yeah. I've loved it. Yeah. No, it's the best. You know, I don't feel like I was ever the greatest dad for my own two kids. I don't feel like I was ever the greatest dad for my own two kids, but I find I have just a tremendous amount of joy with the grandkids. So, yeah, grandkids are the greatest.

What do you think that is? I see that with my dad, too. My dad has endless energy for my kids. like so when you different mindset i guess if you've grown into not being so worried about your own you know your own life and your own career and all the stresses and stuff that that you're that you're going through in your 20s and 30s with your own kids um yeah it's just just a completely different outlook um yeah i'm a completely different person with my grandkids and I than I was with my own kids. Do you if they come over, you just engage them right away? Um, maybe not so much engage them, but just just have that,

that feeling of joy. Just just sit back and just, you know, watch them and just enjoy them. You know, I don't have to engage to just to enjoy it um travis when travis mentioned to me something you said to him about um when you were at the chicago game and you were watching tyson that you felt like that was your son yeah and isn't that isn't that a weird phenomenon yeah yeah no super excited for for him and i mean i've met tyson a few times back in early years and um but really haven't had any any contact with him but just knowing travis and how i guess it's knowing travis so well and knowing how excited that he must be and feel that

it just creates that automatic excitement. I used to be a Bears fan. I'm from the Chicago area. So when he got drafted by the Bears, it was actually extra exciting for me. Like, oh, the Bears finally have a decent quarterback. I thought to myself, oh, this will be great. But yeah, no. Yeah, super exciting.

And I've become a huge fan. I never would ever think about going to a live game. I was just like, oh, I wouldn't anybody go. But the little bit of exposure and experience I've had to be able to watch and play, I'm hooked. I mean, I'm going to spend all my allowance money on going to live games um after i went to the game in in san diego uh los angeles and then and then i get back the next day i'm talking to travis and he's like yeah so john didn't want to leave his seat i go what are you talking about john was at the game i'm like shut the fuck up john was like dude he was at the 50 yard line no it was awesome that's so i'm like

dude you didn't tell me i would have gone up and said hi to him or i would have like he's like dude he was just completely in hog heaven so you had an amazing seat huh yeah it was amazing it was amazing experience and renee's not a huge football fan either. And she's like, I'm ready to go back. You know, it'll never be like that again. It was such a good experience. We had a blast. That stadium's awesome. The game was awesome.

Everything about it was awesome. So, yeah. So, did you fly home that night? No, we spent the night. We spent the night at the Sheridan there near the airport And then just buzzed out On Delta On Delta yeah

In and out Yeah Go ahead Today they're playing in Detroit I was hoping that maybe he'd still play one more game Because it's easy for me to fly to our hub. So Phoenix to Detroit, I had it all planned out. I'm going to leave in the morning and be able to get on the evening flight back.

But it sounds like Justin is going to play today. John, you've been in the limelight for a long time and you have friends like Travis for a long time. Do you have any thoughts on friendship and, and the important to keeping friends and, and, and forgiveness and longevity of friendships and acceptance? And like, what do you think has changed about you through the years? Or do you have any insights into the importance of friendships or keeping friends and i bring that specifically because of travis i know me you and him we've spent a lot of time together you've obviously spent more time with him than me but i spent a lot of time with you and a lot of time with him and there's ups and downs and yeah i mean but i would say we're

all very close on some level yeah this last night thinking you know i'm pretty much a family guy. My life has been pretty much being a loner, an introvert that I don't really seek out that friendship and to be around other people when Renee's around. kids uh my my oldest has got tickets to the formula one in las vegas so they were gone for an extended weekend um i find myself sitting here alone without her i'm like what do i do i mean i didn't even really have anybody to go you know all my friends are you know from out of the state you know arm wrestling friends so um but yeah no i you know friends are definitely important and when I'm around them I enjoy it but I don't I don't normally you know seek that companionship out when I'm when I have you know family around we normally just do our own thing how long have you been married Boy, good question. Thirty, thirty-eight years? Coming up on 38 years? Does that seem right? I don't know that. You're 59.

85, 85. So yeah, 24, 38 years. Yeah. My whole life. Yeah. Wow. That's great. i won't even marry my whole life the chore check north answer all of it how many pushes can you do all of them uh what about that so so that's your friend that that's that's your ultimate friendship then then the one with your with this is my comfort zone it's it's who i'm most comfortable with and that's really all i all i need but um yeah even close friends sometimes are a little for me can be taxing could be draining can be difficult i enjoy it the experience but it's not my it's not my calm place, I guess. And, um, and in the secret to the, or maybe secrets,

not let me think of a better way to phrase it. So it's not so cheesy. When I think of my relationship with my wife, I think of it as kind of like one of the crowning achievements of my life. I've been married. I've been, I've been with her 38 years. Yeah. An achievement. No, it's not, it hasn't been work for me. I've been, I've been with her 38 years. Yeah. An achievement. No, it's not,

it hasn't been work for me. I, I, it's not work, but that it's, you know, a lot of people can't fucking just keep a relationship. Yeah.

Like that because of expectations you put on people. Yeah. No, well, it's not, it's never, it's hasn't been completely super easy, but as I've gotten older, it's not it's never it hasn't been completely super easy. But as I've gotten older, it's become a lot easier.

I mean, it's just, you know, I can't imagine my life without, you know, my relationship with her. So whether it's the, you know, our kids and the grandkids and the whole family thing, it just seems to have kind of all gelled. And it's like, it's, it is my life. It's everything. Yeah. It's everything.

You're like around. Yeah. Yeah. Hey dude. Well, thanks for coming on. Great. Appreciate you having me.

Yeah. Keep track of your, I should watch a few more of your podcasts to see is it a weekly thing you do just on sundays dude every morning 7 a.m oh you do every single day what a workaholic you are yeah every single morning 7 a.m live show damn yeah well good for you yeah thank you i'm having a blast and i'm stoked that i've lived a life where i get to meet and know people like you. I appreciate you coming on. Next time I'm in the area,

I'll try to look you up. It's still up in... I'm in Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz. Okay. I have a feeling we're going to run into each other sooner than later at a football game. That sounds good. I'm looking forward to it. My mom says,

Hi, John. All right, Simone. My mom says hi, John. She says hi. All right, brother. Good seeing you. Good talking. Yep. All right.

Take care, my friend. Bye. Bye. I found him on the internet. I contacted him. I said, hey, can I make a movie about you? I went over to his house. He's like, are you fucking crazy? Don i make a movie about you i went over to his house he's like are you fucking crazy don't make a movie about arm wrestling now look at him

oh christine why why you probably don't want to tune in why christine why would you say such uh hello mr chapman oh man my back is fucked up really yeah what'd you do such a bummer do that 10-year workout god i mean i seriously thought i was never gonna have to do that it's been years it's been five or six years since it's been like this i thought i was never going to have to do this it's been years it's been 5 or 6 years since it's been like this I thought I was never going to have to go through this ever again because I'm so fucking smart and I just fuck

what was it? the burpees or the running the 2 hour drive in the car and then getting out and I never work out in the morning because I really have to be warm that's why I ride the assault bike so much i i have to be pouring sweat and completely warm before i start working out absolutely two hours in the car 15 minute warm-up not enough and i knew as i was warming up i'm like this doesn't feel right yeah yeah he went to a gym exactly yep i went to a crossfit gym exactly that's why it has to be

completely at my own uh pace fuck but but i but i did good in the workout i pushed through i did good i think you guys would all been proud of me i saw pool boy pushing you yeah it was a it was a big it was a big class i think if i i know if if if i would have been behind me i know if i would have been warmed up um with me and him would have there were 100 people there i bet you we would have won it that was like the biggest saturday morning class i've ever seen it was cool yeah it was crazy it was wild and everyone was cl what was crazy is how close we were to each other but it still felt good yeah i didn't feel crowded at all, no.

It was a great group. All right. That was cool. That was a little weird for me because I hadn't talked to John in forever. Really? How long? Normally, I don't know, since the last time he was on the show, a couple years. But normally I don't like to talk to people before they're on the show,

but probably I should have talked to him. I felt like there was too much insider stuff. Like if you don't arm wrestle, maybe half that shit went over your head. That's when I saw him come on, I was like, I hope somebody will explain the top pressure, the back pressure, like that stuff. I should have someone on who can just explain all that. Uh,

I don't have any, I'm out of peptides. I'm out of peptides. I'm all out of peptides and tent. I'm all out. I'm all out of peptides. I'm all out of coffee too. I'm all out of peptides.

Caleb's had a coffee. I'm out of peptides, man. You know what I did do though, peptides. Caleb's out of coffee. I'm out of peptides. Man. You know what I did do, though, that I've never done when I have an injured back? I rolled it out with a tennis ball. And so, actually, last night I slept the whole night through without

any, like, pain, which is crazy. Oh. Why, thank you. Oh, looks like Paulina's got me, too. Oh, shit. Look at that yeah ask and you shall receive oh jake chapman i'm all out of chocolate dicks i happen to have right there um couple things uh don't forget about friday uh black friday it's the friday before thanksgiving no friday after thanksgiving and um you want to go over to paper street coffee it's three for one

it will be a very small window to get their new line of teas don't forget to go to swolverine also they're having a 30 off on black friday uh birth fit i don't know if they're having a 30% off sale. My, probably shouldn't. I was going to tell you, one of my friends just got, I was going to tell you exactly who it is. But one of my friends who is a professional athlete just got a cjc 1295 and did a round of it they they want more one of us one of us loved it they absolutely loved it

a professional athlete steve on is that legal fuck i don't know i'm just telling you professional athlete i know they absolutely loved it. All right. That's it. I'm going to go for a walk now. Loosen my back up. I'm going to pop a couple, I don't know, three Advil. And I'm going to roll in the tennis ball. And then I'm going to go for a long walk. And then I'm going to roll in the tennis ball and then I'm going to go for a long walk.

And then I'm going to be gay this Friday. No, I'm going to watch the Chicago bears game at 10 a.m. Pacific standard time. Are you watching it? Yeah, I'll watch it for sure. I'll probably throw it up on painting at the Shattuck.

Yep. So you're not painting the ceiling. I don't think so. Somebody did send me some pictures. I think I said that and I like it, but i don't think i'm ready to do it yet to not paint it yeah i don't want to paint it yet i did put up two ceiling fans though and that was terrifying wow do you do you um because you're afraid you were going to get electrocuted yes and i thought I was going to fall off the ladder

and break my leg or something. When I saw that ladder... Is there a video coming out with it? Yeah. When Taylor sent that picture of him on the ladder, I had already installed one fan, and I was like, damn, I don't want to put on another. I don't want to climb the ladder and do it again.

But then he sent that picture, and I was like, all right, I got to climb the ladder and put up the other one. That ladder was gnarly. Yeah, I have a better ladder than that. And I'm still scared. There's something I want to read to you. Paint the ceiling before you do. Yeah, I know. I don't.'s a that's a down the road thing i had this great comeback on youtube um damn it was on the flat earther podcast

oh the comment yeah there's some there's some fucking I just saw that today too are flat earthers assholes why are they all assholes it's never like like some guys some guys like hey I can tell that the guy in the CEO

shirt on has a controller. He's so controlled. Damn. He just went off for like, here we go. Yeah, I had a great comeback. Your mom comeback. I wish I could find it. Here we go.

Damn. Hey, that guy came on so fucking aggro. Like, I'm totally open to the Earth being whatever shape he wants it to be. Yeah. I don't know how I'm going to. I found it. Is my comment. I got your mom.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay, man. You man you oh thank you i want to share this with you i'm so proud of this this is this morning man you can see it on the ceo guy's face the controllers got him he loves that fake narrative open your eyes yep we had him on the show because we wanted to test the control of our controllers you nailed it now how about you do another line of meth and look deeper into my eyes and see the reflection of your mom on these nuts? Thank you. So proud of that. He came out so hot.

He just started throwing comments down. I can't believe people are still. Dude, this one and the UFO one are just always giving. Yeah, it's great. They're podcasts that people just keep going back to the well on. Same with the first Dave Castro one I did. Hey, what's crazy too is this dude, dude, you hit all caps. What's going on with you?

She's Reese. Dude, I'm totally, what are you talking about? I'm totally open. You're the one who has your controller on. You're the one who knows something. I don't know nothing. I'm dumb.. You're the one who has your controller on. You're the one who knows something. I don't know nothing. I'm dumb. Just call me dumb.

You don't got to get like into the whole controller thing. I'm just dumb. That's the truth. All right. Good to see John Brzee. The shortest podcast of all time you like that one Bernie the flat earther one that guy was

fucking hostile as shit it's like how about you just walk us through it like you believe in something so much like the flat earther god or something but you can't explain it calmly to someone it's like dude he was just automatically on the defensive yeah how about give us a little tutorial i still haven't like like i like you know there's that camera you can get you can go out and take a picture and it'll

show you that the horizon line's flat or you can go on an airplane or i haven't i haven't done any of the things um you have to take if what i don't even know if you took his word for everything if you could um still know that the believe that the earth is flat but i'm open to it i'll try it when i fly out. What I'd really like to see is someone go to South America? No. Antarctica? No. The South Pole? Wherever the wall is that you have to cross to see the other continents and shit.

Probably Antarctica, I think. Yeah, I want to see that. Jake Chapman, you're not awake enough yet you're an idiot you don't know it already they've got you i'm open to them having me too i'm like open to it is that is that what i'm supposed to say if they got me that i'm open to them having me them having me uh clock none of them believe it they're assholes because even though they're pretending they start taking the resistance personally this happens to low rent trolls oh

oh wow I could see that that was my favorite part I'm not gonna waste my time explaining it to your listeners that's literally the reason you're on the podcast he spent he spent three hours talking about how he wasn't going to explain it to everybody who was asking questions and you're an idiot if you don't get it it's like come on bro we already know we're idiots that's why we're having you on enlighten me please and. And I mean that. I've never loved Sebi more than right now.

Text me your phone. Text me your address. Maybe you'll get a Slack block in a couple years. My kitchen table is just piling up with Slack blocks. I wasn't going to give you a slack. Slack. Slack box. I was going to come over. You're so creepy. Seve.

I know. Like I. Oh. That didn't feel good. Is that your back? No. That was this handle. Slip.

Because I was stretching my back. Azusa hated us hating on him. I thought they were complaining that Azusa had a go at him. I'm stretching my back. That guy actually posted on Suze's Instagram account and was saying shit along the lines like I have to stand. He was saying shit along the lines

of you're basically, Suze, you're a pussy for coming after Hibbler after he got off the podcast. Can I make this go? Maybe I, Oh shit. Should I start doing the podcast standing this way? I wonder if this handle goes up even more.

Hmm. Oh, Bye guys, thank you See you tomorrow Tomorrow's Monday Who's on the show tomorrow? Tommy G Oh, that's gonna be crazy

Oh, awesome Alright Tommy G's been on the show a few times Tommy G oh that's gonna be crazy oh awesome alright Tommy G's been on the show a few times Tommy G uh if you want to let me take you here really quick yeah so tomorrow let's go to Tommy G's can we go to his YouTube channel Tommy G

and let's go to videos inside Houston's death defying street racing scene America's gangster ghost town Gary Indiana investigating the most Muslim place

in America oh shit awesome the booty girls Atlanta's a mask vigilantes wow Latin Kings inside Chicago's game oh no oh yeah okay Chicago's massive migrant crisis holy shit this is gonna be good I'm gonna watch all these today

sick wow look at this white boys in the hood with Ohio's at this white boys uh in the hood with ohio's sketchiest white boys 1 million subscribers announcement no shit 1.1 oh my god tommy g what a boss most people bail on this podcast as soon as they get that big most people bail on this podcast as soon as they get that big all right that's cool god this guy is cool he was just in san francisco too all right so we got tommy tomorrow and then of course i'll ask him about real estate so if you're he's big into investing in real estate so pick his brain there too

what a cool dude. He was just in San Francisco. I can't wait to see those videos. All right. Yeah, congrats to Tommy G, right? That's cool. Christine Young, I love him. What do you mean? Why are you invisible? All right, guys. Thank you. Good to see you guys.

Bernie Gannon, Sebon, before Pedro scoops you, answer the rumor that CFL, Sousa Palooza, Mom Matosian is leaving CEO for HWP. Before Pedro scoops you, answer the rumor that CrossFit. Oh.

That Matt Souza and Rosemary Matosian are joining HWPO? Yeah. There are... I have been in talks with... there are there are I have been in talks with HWPO to become their official podcast they have recognized they finally

recognize me as the largest podcast in the space and I think I think it's because Tyson has been coming on that now that they want to bring me into the family so I appreciate you Bernie for leaking that you dickhead. I'll be actually doing some skinny dipping with Matt and O'Keefe this upcoming weekend.

That's how they bonded HWPO naked skinny dipping. So there you go. You like that Bernie is that good QL QL release videos on the ready state Q God I don't know I don't know how to even understand

these posts Suza workout don't you have to be queer to join them i don't i i don't know what you're talking about. But I wish I did. Alright. There is all sorts of stuff shaking behind the scenes. Always fun stuff bubbling up to the top.

Podcast is killing it. Thanks for you guys' support. Can't wait to get my peptides. anyone get hey if anyone if anyone that was kind of controversial the other day when we were talking about terzipatide terzipatide if anyone ends up getting that from california peptides it's like 700 a bottle and wants to talk about it like tell me after you use it for a few months i'm curious we talked about it for a long time i'm curious if anyone bought it this bottle right here i'll see if i can pull it up uh if they got all bunch of new peptides california peptides and this bottle down here if anyone ends up doing this and they want to share their experience, I'd be really curious to hear it.

Terzepatide. Any of these bottles. If anyone does any of these bottles and you want to share your experience, I'd be curious. DM me. I want to know. Look at this. Some of these are available on subscription all right

i know don't panic anyone i'll be fine my back will be fine don't don't know no seriously i'll be fine oh no