The Tim Ferriss Show - #349: LeBron James and His Top-Secret Trainer, Mike Mancias

Starting point is 00:00:00 At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking. Can I ask you a personal question? Now would have seen a perfect time. What if I did the opposite? I'm a cybernetic organism living tissue over a metal endoskeleton. The Tim Ferriss Show. This episode is brought to you by 99designs. 99designs is the global creative platform that makes it easy for designers and clients to work together.

Starting point is 00:00:32 From logos to apps and packaging to books, 99designs is the go-to design resource for any budget. I've used 99designs for many, many years now. I've used them for book covers, for instance, mock-ups for The 4-Hour Body, which went on to become a number one New York Times bestseller, illustrations for my multi-volume The Tao of Seneca, and other graphic design projects. And I've been really impressed by the quality of their designers and the designs that I've ended up using. Most recently, I used 99designs to update the illustrations and layouts of my five morning rituals ebook. This covers my most consistent morning routines and rituals.

Starting point is 00:01:13 And I offer that as an incentive for people to sign up for my newsletter. So this is a PDF bonus that acts as a carrot to increase the number of email subscribers. The illustrations inside are gorgeous, and I loved working with the designer who we selected for the project. So you can check it out. Take a look at that at 99designs.com forward slash Tim. That's the number 99designs.com forward slash Tim. And you can see exactly what I'm talking about with a real world example of what has come out of working with them.

Starting point is 00:01:46 99designs designer search tool connects you directly with one designer based on design category or industry specialization, style, skill level, availability, and more. So you can really check all the boxes that you need and see who matches up. Or you can start a contest. And that means you invite the entire community to take a shot at your project. Then you pick your favorite. Right now, you guys, my listeners that is, can receive a free $99 upgrade on your first design contest. So check it out. To see what it looks like to get your first free upgrade, please visit 99designs.com forward slash Tim and click on the link in the landing page. So again, check it out 99designs.com forward slash Tim and click on the link in the landing page. So again, check it out 99designs.com forward slash Tim. This episode is brought to you by

Starting point is 00:02:34 Peloton, which I've been using probably for about a year now. Peloton is a cutting edge indoor cycling bike that brings live studio classes right into your home. You can also do on demand, which is what I do. We'll come back to that. So you don't have to worry about fitting classes into a busy schedule or making it to a studio or gym with a hectic or unpredictable commute. I, for instance, have a Peloton bike right in my master bedroom at home, and it's one of the first things I do many mornings. I wake up, I meditate for a bit, then I knock out a short 20-minute ride in my undies.

Starting point is 00:03:05 Hard to do that at the gym. Take a shower, and I'm in higher gear for the rest of the day. It's really convenient and has become something that I look forward to. So you have a lot of options. For one, if you like, you can ride live with thousands of other riders across the country on an interactive leaderboard to keep you motivated. There are also up to 14 new classes added every day with more than 8,000 classes on demand. And you can pick based on length, 45 minutes, 20 minutes, whatever, music, hip hop,

Starting point is 00:03:31 rock and roll, or say low impact versus high intensity or interval. You can pick the class structure and style that works for you. And in my case, I quite like Matt Wilpers and I tend to do on demand and listen to a lot of and watch many of the same classes over and over, but I'm kind of promiscuous and also enjoy classes from a lot of the other instructors. They have Peloton, an amazing roster of incredible instructors in New York City with a whole range of styles and personalities. So you can find what you're in the mood for. You also get real-time metrics that you can use to track your performance over time. And that will help, I would say, catalyze you to beat your performance over time. And that will help,

Starting point is 00:04:05 I would say, catalyze you to beat your personal best. Now that all sounds good, right? Gamification, yada, yada, yada. I didn't think that it would work for me or in any way incentivize me, but they really 100% hit the nail on the head. I was very, very impressed with how motivating it was. And it worked tremendously to keep me pushing, which quite honestly takes a fair amount. I can get quite lazy, particularly with anything that edges on endurance, which is kind of more than five reps of anything for me. So check it out. Discover this cutting edge indoor cycling bike that brings the studio experience right to your home. Peloton is offering listeners of this podcast a limited time offer. Go to

Starting point is 00:04:45 onepeloton.com, that's O-N-E Peloton, P-E-L-O-T-O-N.com, and enter the code TIM, all caps, at checkout and get $100 off of accessories with your Peloton bike purchase. So get a great workout at home. Anytime you want, check it out. Go to onepeloton.com and use the code TIM to get started. Hello, boys and girls. This is Tim Ferriss, and welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show. This is a very special episode because it represents the first time that LeBron James has been interviewed alongside his very below-the-radar, some might say top-secret, athletic trainer about details of training, recovery, diet, and even how much longer he hopes to play in the NBA. And I did not have, as you might expect, with King James, the usual two and a half, three,

Starting point is 00:05:38 three and a half, four hours. So it is a neat 60 minutes, might come in a tad under that, and I was nervous and perhaps even a little over-caffeinated to make the most of the time. So you have that going for you. LeBron James, who is that? At King James on Instagram and Twitter, LeBronJames.com, is widely considered one of the greatest athletes of his generation, and is regarded by some as the best basketball player of all time. This interview was recorded the day after he passed Wilt Chamberlain's all-time scoring record. LeBron's accomplishments on the court include four NBA Most Valuable Player Awards, MVP Awards, three NBA Championships and three NBA Finals MVP Awards,

Starting point is 00:06:20 two Olympic gold medals, and an NBA scoring title. He is the all-time NBA playoff scoring leader and has amassed 14 NBA All-Star Game appearances, 12 All-NBA First Team selections, and five All-Defensive First Team honors. Throughout his career, James has used his platform to inspire and empower others through his LeBron James Family Foundation,

Starting point is 00:06:41 which you can find at lebronjamesfamilyfoundation.org, that helps at-risk students in his hometown earn life-changing educations, culminating most recently in the opening of his iPromise School, which you can find at iPromise.school. He's also involved with Spring Hill Entertainment, the entertainment company he co-founded with Maverick Carter, that produces compelling and aspirational content for a cross-cultural audience on a variety of platforms including digital, film, and television. And Uninterrupted, a digital media company he and Carter co-founded that provides athletes with a platform to tell their stories. LeBron has a really diverse business portfolio. We won't be able to get into all of it right now, but includes all sorts of innovative endorsement deals and have established

Starting point is 00:07:25 him as one of the most influential figures in all of sports. James has appeared on Forbes list of the world's most powerful celebrities, Times annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world and Bloomberg Businessweek's 100 most influential people in sports. And now, LeBron, along with Arnold Schwarzenegger, Cindy Crawford, and Olympic gold medalist Lindsey Vonn has founded Ladder, a health and wellness platform and brand that is launching today. The site, weareladder.com, is a resource for reaching fitness, nutrition, and health goals with tools and scientifically supported insights for addressing any frustrations or roadblocks along the way. Ladder also offers a community of experts for holding you accountable

Starting point is 00:08:06 and nutrition products that are all NSF certified for sport, which is considered the gold standard for sports testing and approved by all major sports teams and the IOC, that is the International Olympic Committee. Ladder products contain no artificial ingredients, no artificial sweeteners, no fillers, and no proprietary blends. Now, allow me to introduce the other person in this interview, and then we'll get right to it. Mike Mencius.

Starting point is 00:08:31 Mike Mencius, at MikeMencius1, that's M-A-N-C-I-A-S, on Instagram and Twitter, is LeBron James' athletic trainer and recovery specialist, a position he's held for 14 years and counting. A veteran in the world of training professional basketball players, his experience also includes working with NFL, MLB, PGA, and top NCAA athletes. Throughout his tenure with LeBron, Mike has quietly developed a winning human performance blueprint that encompasses everything from preventative medicine, strength training and rehab, nutrition, and the latest in recovery techniques, some of

Starting point is 00:09:05 which we talk about in this interview. Mike's philosophy is one that is now commonly accepted by many athletes and trainers as the ideal 360 degree approach to wellness and performance. It was through this focus on nutrition, performance, and recovery that Mencius aided in developing the latter brand and its products. Originally from Brownsville, Texas, Mencius attended the University of Texas Pan American and graduated with a degree in health education. He's licensed and nationally certified by the Accredited National Athletic Trainers Association and is a 14-year member of the National Basketball Athletic Trainers Association. That is the introduction. And without further ado, please enjoy this wide-ranging conversation with none other than King James, LeBron James, and Mike Mencius.

Starting point is 00:09:53 LeBron and Mike, welcome to the show. Thanks, Tim. Thanks for having us. Appreciate it. Thank you for having me. My pleasure. I am thrilled to have the two of you on, in part because it is so difficult to do research on the two of you together, which is fascinating to me. Mike, you're like the Banksy of elite trainers. I see your art that is the product of the work that you do on television and everywhere, but you are like Batman. It's impossible to do research on you, which is really exciting for me as someone who's made a job of doing that. So I thought we could jump right into questions on my mind and

Starting point is 00:10:30 questions on many minds. And we'll begin with a little bit of context. And maybe LeBron, if you want to take this, how did the two of you first meet? You seem to have a very special relationship. I'd love to just get a little bit of background and your thoughts on what makes the relationship work so well. Yeah, my second year in the NBA with the Cavs, Mike was interning with the Cavs at the time. And every day, I was trying to figure out a way how I could be more consistent with my training and be more consistent with, you know, just trying to make the jump from my rookie year to my second year. And, you know, not only from afar, but from up close, I saw the demeanor and the laser focus in Mike every single day on what he was doing. And I kind of resonated with that. And I just, you know,

Starting point is 00:11:27 we started to have conversations, we started to talk more and more every day. And the relationship started to grow every single, single day. And, you know, I believe, you know, the rest is history at this point. So you two have done so much together spent so much time together mike i'd love to dig into i suppose more than a few things but to begin with recovery and injury prevention i mean lebron you had such a momentous evening last night so congratulations of course on that and uh you're a bit of a unicorn in the sense that you've played more than, as I understand it, 50,000 minutes in your career. Most hit a wall and deteriorate after, say, 40,000. So you're defying all the predictions of player decline.

Starting point is 00:12:17 So, Mike, maybe you can give us a window into some of that. And I've, I've in the course of trying to do research, read about say recovery between games, which I I've, I've picked up, maybe not true. Electro-stimulation machines, air pumped compression sleeves, soft tissue. Could you walk us through some of the tools of the trade and the approaches that you use to help with recovery in between games? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think with, with LeBron and with any elite athlete, I think the one thing that we all as trainers and therapists have to keep in mind is that recovery never ends. Recovery never stops.

Starting point is 00:12:57 You know, if LeBron plays 40 minutes one night and he plays 28 minutes one night, we're still going to keep recovery as a number one focus, whether that be in nutrition, whether that be in hydration, more flexibility exercises, stuff in the weight room. It's a never-ending process, really. And I think that's the approach that we must take in order for us to be successful and provide longevity for these guys. And if we look at just, say, the first few hours after particularly intense games,

Starting point is 00:13:35 what is some of the triage that you pull out of your bag to use? Well, we'll do like a quick Q&A in the locker room. I kind of get a quick assessment as to, okay, how did the game go? You know, how was this feeling? How was this feeling? Et cetera. And LeBron will give us some feedback on how we felt after each and every game, believe it or not.

Starting point is 00:13:55 So we'll do that, number one. And then we'll start our process of hydration and nutrition, you know, because he does spend a lot of energy out there. So we need to make sure that we feed him the right calories, calories in like a protein shake, et cetera, you know, a water or a sports drink. And number one, frankly, is just some good food, some good high-quality food. So that's number one, right off the bat after a game. It's nutrition. From there, we go into cryotherapy, either a cold tank, ice bags, cryotherapy chamber,

Starting point is 00:14:34 whatever may be available at that particular night. Mm-hmm. And if we're looking at general injury prevention, are there any particular, and I'll give one example, I've interviewed a number of Olympic sprint coaches, and in some cases, they'll take something like the deadlift, but they'll modify it so that they're only lifting to the knee and they'll drop so they're not risking hamstring injuries with the negatives. Are there any particular exercises that you feel are tremendously important for injury prevention, uh, or any that you avoid because you think that they could produce injuries? Um, well, I think with that question, I think,

Starting point is 00:15:12 uh, every athlete is different, you know, based on their, um, you know, just, just based on their, on their body makeup. And so we have to, number one, you know, before we even prescribe any exercises, we have to do a quick assessment of their body. Do they have any factors that are limiting their range of motion? We'll start from the very bottom, and that's the big toe. How much movement do you have in your big toe? And then you go up the chain, the ankle, the knee, the hip, the low back, and the shoulders, et cetera. Once you get a quick assessment, then you can start to, you know, kind of tweak your workout routine by adding or subtracting, you know, different exercises.

Starting point is 00:15:53 The second part of that is, okay, who are you dealing with? You know, LeBron's been in the league. He's starting his 16th year in the NBA. He's played a lot of minutes, you know, high-quality minutes. And so you just have to be smart as to your prescription. And LeBron, do you think that if you look at, for instance, the big names that came into the league around the same time that you did, it's staggering to see how few of them are still playing, and yet here you are playing as the best in the NBA. Are there any particular approaches you've taken or things that you attribute that to?

Starting point is 00:16:36 Well, I can't speak on any other players or anybody that came in around my time or a little bit after me or not too far when I came in. But I know me personally, I've just been very consistent with the process. I've been very consistent with training my body, rehabbing my body, you know, eating, you know, you know, having my body be very clean throughout this journey because I've always wanted to have a long, you know, long career or as long as I could be, you know, in this in this in this in this space. So I've always kind of, you know, some a friend of mine when I was like 13 years old, he's always tell me, you know, play hard, have fun and stretch, you know, every game, always play hard, have fun and stretch. And that kind of always kind of stuck with me to when, even when I got in the NBA, like always stretching and keeping my body flexible, keeping my limbs flexible. So, you know, I can contribute to that and doing it consistently, just like leadership, you know, leadership is not a one day thing or you do it

Starting point is 00:17:42 for two days or two months. leadership is consistent, you know, and I believe, you know, having longevity in the space that I'm in is also consistently as well, not only on the floor, but off the floor as well. So I'm glad you mentioned leadership, I was going to get to it. But since we're already on topic, I spotted a picture of you with a copy of Leadership in Turbulent Times, which is a book by Doris Kearns Goodwin, who's also been on the podcast. And I've had a number of people ask me to ask you about leadership. Are there any particular leaders you admire or look to and study who come to mind? You know what's crazy, Tim? I never grew up looking for other leaders and saying I want to be them or using what they did to incorporate it into me. I believe that it was put on me before I even wanted to be a leader.

Starting point is 00:18:47 My grandmother passed away when I was three years old, and she was kind of the staple of the home. And my mother had me when she was 16, but she was still in school. So, you know, being the only child, being one of the few men in the house, I kind of had to grow up and be kind of one of the leaders of the household very young before I even wanted to, before you were on any cow, any child to become a leader. And then once you get into team sports and you find some success, but you see how you're succeeding, you understand that it's not just about you. You understand that, you know, in order for you to continue to be successful, everyone has to feel important. Everyone wants to feel like they had something to do with the success and be a part of it. And I sense that, you know, at an early age and it's just continued until, you know, my adulthood as well. So I can't even sit here and say that I look, you know, for leadership throughout others.

Starting point is 00:19:40 Now, I've admired leaders like, you know, Martin Luther King is one of the greatest leaders I've ever had an opportunity to just read about and watch from afar, obviously, you know, Muhammad Ali as well, you know, as one. Barack Obama is another. And then my mother. I mean, I believe my mother is one of the greatest leaders. And just in the fact that being a single parent mother in the inner city without any financial stability and being able to raise a kid on her own at age 16. So I had, you know, those examples. But for me, I've always kind of learned it on the fly as well. Your mother, the more I've done research, the more incredible your mother seems to me. How has she impacted the way that you think about parenting or being a father?

Starting point is 00:20:35 Well, from the beginning, being a part of a single parent household, when I decided I want to have a family, I was like, I'm always going to be a part of my kids life. And no matter what, what goes on in my life, I just can't, you know, have my kids have some of the same why questions that I had when I was younger. And then it's about, you know, the perseverance and the patience of being a parent is what i learned from my mom my mom was just so persevering um and to for for me she never um had me in a situation where i felt like i wasn't special like i wasn't uh one of the the best kids in the world and um and then from you know the that like i said that leadership standpoint she was just always a rock no matter what was going on was just always a rock. No matter what was going on, she was always a rock and very patient with the process. And I've taken that not only to being a father, but in life in general, I always preach this process thing because I just fell in love with it. I fell

Starting point is 00:21:36 in love with the process throughout my whole life and throughout my basketball career to a point where I don't like to look at the ending, you know, because I like to just live in the moment. And it's the, I think the consistency, which is such a focus for a lot of, at least my listeners, when they're looking at your career, it's been astonishing to watch over time. And many people want to know about the habits or the reminders, things along these lines. And one of the things I came across, I don't know if it's true, you could tell me,

Starting point is 00:22:12 but did you at one point have Theodore Roosevelt's man in the arena quote in your locker? I still do. You still do. I write it on my shoes every game too. Why is that important to you um it's important it just hit home for me at a point in time where um i was listening to people that i shouldn't have been listening to meaning you know there are always people out there they're

Starting point is 00:22:37 gonna judge you and critique you and say that you should do this or you shouldn't do that. And at that point in time, you know, I wasn't mature enough to just believe in the decisions that I've made. And I'm a true believer in the more and more that you listen to things like that, then it'll creep into your mind and you start to believe it. And once I started to study some of the great leaders that we've had in our time, I ran across that that quote from theodore roosevelt the man in arena and it basically um for our listeners that don't know about it's basically saying that it it truly doesn't matter uh what anyone says um because they they've never stepped inside the arena they've never had the blood and the sweat and the tears or paid their dues inside the arena. So they can't really understand or critique you about what's going on in your life.

Starting point is 00:23:32 And that hit home for me. And that stuck with me to this day. Yeah, it's such a tremendous, tremendous quote. Mike, I'd love to come back to something you mentioned earlier, which was recovery never-ending. And I'd like to talk about the, I suppose, third of our lives or so that we spend asleep. How do you think about sleep? And is there anything you do to optimize sleep or to help LeBron and others to optimize their sleep? By the way, Tim, he gets on me every single day. Hey, how much sleep did you get last night? How much sleep?

Starting point is 00:24:12 How much sleep? You get to eight hours, you get to nine hours all the time. Yeah, hey, Tim, by the way, that muffling you hear in the background is LeBron actually removing his ice bags. Oh, yes. No problem. Like we just said, recovery never stops, right?

Starting point is 00:24:30 Well, we're sitting here doing this podcast in Los Angeles, and LeBron is continuing to ice his knees and the rest of his body right now in the middle of this podcast. So, Mike, I'd love to hear your thoughts on sleep. This is something that a lot of people struggle with, and it would seem to be a very important potential asset for someone who is taxing his body as much as LeBron is. Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, you know, we've always learned, and we've always told LeBron about the body does recover,

Starting point is 00:25:02 and it heals itself while we're asleep, while we reach our REM sleep and our deep sleep. So any athlete, you don't have to be a professional athlete, whatever athlete at whatever level, you can be a businessman, a doctor, lawyer, etc. You need your sleep, guys, and you must sleep in order to recover from whatever it is, either playing an NBA game or a big night or a big day in the courtroom, you know, in a hospital room or whatever. You know, sleeping is when the body heals itself. So it's very, very important.

Starting point is 00:25:37 Are there any particular techniques or tools or recommendations that you found to be helpful with athletes or that you've tested and found effective? Yeah, you know, without giving everybody all of our secrets, right? You know, number one is be very, very comfortable in that room. You know, just create an environment. You know, for us, it's always, you know, for LeBron, it's always in his hotel room, making sure the temperature is set at a particular, probably 68 to 70 degrees is probably optimal. Making sure the room is completely dark, you have no distractions.

Starting point is 00:26:16 Trying to turn off all your electronics. TVs, all that stuff. Your televisions, your phones, et cetera. Just turn everything off probably a half hour to 45 minutes before you actually want to go to sleep and just really committing yourself to that. You know, we all love to scroll on the Internet and our social media accounts at night, you know, to catch up on everything. But, you know, you owe it to yourself and you owe what's your recovery uh just to just to commit to just uh creating an environment um again um the room at an optimal temperature uh a dark dark room uh you know a comfortable bed etc and um you know some people even use uh sleep apps you know like uh you know like soft music or uh you know i music. I love a nice sleep app.

Starting point is 00:27:07 What do you use, LeBron, currently? It's an app called Calm, actually. I'm the guy who picks rain on leaves. I love it. That's what

Starting point is 00:27:21 goes on on my phone throughout the night. There you have it, Tim. There you have it. Rain on leaves. Rain on leaves, the secret to success. I love it. And LeBron, what has become more important to you from a health or wellness perspective as you've become older, more seasoned?

Starting point is 00:27:42 Does anything come to mind as mind as having become more important? Yeah, absolutely. This is what we're talking about right now, the topic that we own, sleep. I mean, it's nothing more important than optimal REM sleep. And that's exactly what we're talking about right now. That's the best way for your body to physically and emotionally be able to recover and get back to 100% as possible. Now, will you wake up and feel 100%? There's some days you don't.

Starting point is 00:28:12 Some days you feel better than others. But the more and more and more time that you get, those eight, if you can get nine, that's amazing. Sometimes I even get 10 hours of sleep. And if I don't get those eight to nine hours at night, then I'll go home. I'm going to tell you right now, Tim, when I leave here, I'm going to go home and take me a nap for probably about two and a half hours, too. I just think that's just the best way to recover. I mean, I could do all the ice bags and the Normatex and everything that we do that we have as far as our recovery package while I'm up. But when you're getting that good sleep, you just wake up and you feel fresh. You don't need an alarm clock.

Starting point is 00:28:56 You just feel like, okay, I can tackle this day at the highest level that you can get to. One thing I've also seemed to pick up just as a pattern is your willingness to experiment. And I'm sure that goes for both of you. But the topic of diet is one I'd love to discuss, because it seems like you've tested many different diets, ranging from low carb to probably high carb and everything in between. Could you give us an example of where you are now? Let's take just yesterday. Could you tell us about some of the meals that you had or some of the food that you consumed yesterday, what that looks like? Hold on, let me think about it. Yeah. Yesterday I had a egg white om with the with smoked salmon and gluten free pancakes with just berries.

Starting point is 00:29:53 That was my breakfast for lunch. I had whole wheat pasta, salmon and vegetables. And right before the game, I had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. And at halftime, I had uh apples with almond butter on top um right after the game mike gave me a protein shake uh to put in my system right after i downed that right after the game last night and then um for dinner i had um i had chicken parm with a rocket salad and a beautiful glass of Cabernet. You have no idea how happy that detail makes me. Thank you for that. That was my full day of, yeah, that was it right there.

Starting point is 00:30:37 You also have a very good memory. And I've been meaning to, I wasn't sure how to shoehorn this in, but you gave me an opening. You enjoy your wine. I do. Do you have any favorite wines that you can mention or types of wines? I have so many, Tim. I can't sit here and say what is my favorite. But I am definitely a Bordeaux fan huge bordeaux fan um there are some

Starting point is 00:31:08 um you know cabs that i love as well um but there's some brands that i love as well i love you know we get to the higher level as far as you know like uh um screaming eagle um you know uh king thorelli um you know uh rothschild um there's just like a whole uh latour um there's so many different uh wines that i actually love um so we we'll be sitting here all day if i get you the fullness of my salad that I got going on at home. That's round two. King James Sommelier. That'll be the next episode. Is there anything that – and this can go out to either of you guys – but anything that you will not touch? besides the obvious kind of out-of-bounds illicit stuff. But are there any foods or drinks, anything in the food realm

Starting point is 00:32:09 that you really just try to avoid 100%? Yeah, I think right now what we try to stay away from, and I don't want to say even try to stay away from, we haven't had in a long time, is artificial drinks, artificial sugars, and fried foods. I know we kind of stay away from the fried foods, at least during the season. And that's the both. That's the both accounts.

Starting point is 00:32:32 You know, I have, you know, artificial drinks, you know, from time to time in off season. But during the season, I pretty much don't have any fried foods and I don't have anything that's artificial we want to keep it as um you know as you know just natural sugars um and you know the foods as much as possible just try to be clean as possible throughout the season when i'm burning so much and trying to get the recovery back it's uh tim it's uh it's all about less is more as far as nutrition goes you know we just uh keep it simple so uh We try to stay organic the entire year. Again, like LeBron just mentioned, no artificial ingredients. You know, and just hydration.

Starting point is 00:33:15 I think one thing that we talked about yesterday is game day was that every time I saw LeBron, I had a bottle of water in his face, making sure he was drinking. That's one thing. Mike, to come back to one thing that LeBron mentioned, I would be very curious to know if you have post-game, if you have a preferred type of protein. It doesn't have to be a brand, although it could be. Are you providing whey protein isolate? Are you providing a mixture of different proteins? What are you giving him in that protein shake?

Starting point is 00:33:49 Right after a game, I try to go light with it. I don't give him a heavy whey protein because his body is in a recovery phase, right? And he needs to absorb everything that he can, everything clean, like we just mentioned. So I try to give him a plant-based protein powder, you know, with like an almond milk or something like that, with some fruits. And just clean calories to him, just give him clean calories because the first 30 minutes after activity, you know, after a game, after a practice, et cetera, you know, the body's like a sponge and it's going to absorb, you know, the, the body's like a sponge and it's going to absorb, um, you know, what,

Starting point is 00:34:25 whatever you give it. So I just try to stay clean, stay away from my animal products, uh, for the first hour, um, you know, after, after, uh, you know, high calorie competition. Thank you. LeBron, I would, uh, love to chat about, uh, self-talk for a minute because, uh, I, because I've watched you playing, I've watched video footage of you throughout your life. And it's obvious to me, at least it seems, that there's quite a bit going on behind the scenes, meaning in your own head, and that you're very good at centering yourself. What do you say to yourself, or is there anything in particular that

Starting point is 00:35:05 you say to yourself as you're getting prepared for a big game or right before a big game or after a hard loss, for instance? Yeah, I think for me personally, before a big game, I'm pretty consistent with my routine. And I try to do the same thing every single day on a game day because that's just how I lock in. And so right before I run on the floor, I'm just basically thinking about the game plan that the coaching staff has given us. What do I need to do personally,

Starting point is 00:35:38 not only for me to be successful, but for my teammates to ultimately be successful and how I'm going to lead these guys throughout good times and bad times throughout the course of a game because that's what happens. It's inevitable that that's going to happen. And then to your notion of after a bad loss, I'm kind of rethinking about and replaying the game into my head. What happened throughout the course of the game that made this loss become a bad loss. What did I do? What did I not do? What did we not do? You know, because I want to be better. I don't want to dwell on that loss, but I do want to know what there were things that I could have done or we could have done to prevent it if it happens next time. Because I always preach, you know, the best

Starting point is 00:36:25 teacher in life is experience. And it's okay for you to experience defeat. But when you're at a position where you may have to cross that threshold again, do you approach it the same way or do you learn from that? And that's what I try to do. I try to put myself in a mental state of how do I learn from that defeat? How do I learn from that loss? And you're the leader of guys on a team who are all multimillionaires, some of the best athletes in the world with all sorts of different personalities. How do you think about supporting them when things go sideways or when people get frustrated? How have you learned to be most helpful and effective in those circumstances? I think the number one thing is patience. And I think when I talk about patience, it comes back to being a father. I have three kids

Starting point is 00:37:20 and I want the best out of my kids, just like any parent in the world. But what I've learned is that to get the best out of my three kids, I can't approach them all the same way because they all have different personalities. They all are different. And I had to find out how do I tap into each one of my kids to get the same result, but teach them differently. And that's the same with being the leader of a basketball team uh the leader of a franchise you may not you can't you can't express or talk to everyone the same way and expect to get the same result or get the most out of them because every personality

Starting point is 00:37:59 is different so one thing i may say that one player may trigger a certain different response than another player and that's where the patience comes in tim because you have to learn that you can't go in and say this is how i'm a lead yes i'm a leader but there's ways to lead because you have to learn those things that you can you know how do you approach this matter if this happens you know how you can speak to him you know how you can speak to him. You know how you can speak to to this player, to that player, to get what you want to get out of them. So it comes back to that, that that patience of learning their mindsets, learning how can you get the most out of them? What triggers them to be best, to be their best? What triggers them to not be their best? So you learn that over time. And in the case of your own pregame routine,

Starting point is 00:38:48 I'm fascinated by the repetition of routines that work. As it stands right now, what do you have in your pregame playlist? What is the music that you listen to? It's going to be hip hop, for sure. Any specifics? music that that you listen to uh it's gonna be hip-hop for sure any specifics no there's you know what's crazy tim there's no specifics it's like when i when i once i start my routine was basically once i get to the arena that's when i start my routine as far as music it's just it's a feel for an artist that particular time that i know is going to get me going. And it could be an artist from New York. It could be an artist from California. It could be an artist from Florida, from Texas, from the Midwest.

Starting point is 00:39:33 It all depends on what artist pops into my head that I know is going to get me going, get my juices flowing, and get my routine going. So I don't have just a set game day routine. I'm all over the place. And that comes also from being a historian of music as well. What is your tattoo? I've wanted to ask this. There's no real obvious segue for this, but I've wanted to know, because it seems to be an important theme in your life, the tattoo that you have, loyalty, on your side. Can you explain what that means to you? Yeah.

Starting point is 00:40:13 And on my other side, it says family. Right. So, you know, it's basically self-explanatory. You know, when I talk about my family, you know, my family is everything to me. And it's a personal mantra of mine to always be loyal know my family is everything to me and and it's it's a personal mantra of mine to always be loyal to my family you know not you know you're gonna have ups and downs um with your family that happens um there's gonna be times where you you know you don't like what your family do or your family don't likes what you do but at the end of the day we're all loyal to to one

Starting point is 00:40:41 another and you know and that's okay that happens that's what a family is. A family, you know, is not a bed of roses. It comes with thorns. And you have to understand that. But at the end of the day, we will never let someone else infiltrate those thorns. And, you know, so when I got that tattooed on my on my ribs, that's basically what it came down to. Family loyalty and us always sticking together, no matter the trials and tribulations, the turbulence, the good, the bad, the ugly, the sunshine, and the thunderstorm. So that's what it came down to. And Mike, if I could use that to lead into a question for you, how do you support your athletes when they're going through a difficult time,

Starting point is 00:41:25 whether that is an injury, an unexpected setback, psychologically having trouble contending with something that has happened, whether it's on the court or off the court? Are there any particular approaches that you've found to be helpful, uh, whether it's in the last few years or just over the course of your career? Yeah, I think, uh, I think the, the number one thing for me has always been remain consistent, remain consistent through the ups and downs and everything in between as, as LeBron said, um, you know, cause they're, they're, if there is a setback, if there is, you know, something going on, you know, I always have to remain consistent with my job and with what I do. Now, I can always add or augment, you know, something that I feel might be beneficial. You know, if it's something as small as, I don't know, a certain gift of kindness.

Starting point is 00:42:25 You know, just asking about the family. You know, are things okay outside of basketball? Are things okay outside of, you know, the athletic realm, the athletic world? And just try to be there for them. Just try to be there for them through, again, it's all great when, you know, we're scoring 45 points a night and doing all these wonderful things, but is the athlete okay? Is the athlete doing well mentally and spiritually? And so I try to address it in a multifaceted fashion.

Starting point is 00:42:58 And for you, Mike, in the offseason, how do your priorities change, if at all, for, say, LeBron in terms of training and anything else that comes to mind? I think in the offseason, we have to be smart. You know, LeBron gives everything he has for these nine months. Um, you know, and so my, my job was to be, uh, is to be smart about what we're doing, uh, as far as the volume of training that we're doing, um, you know, and, and how, how much I see him, uh, although we do, you know, tend to see each other pretty much, uh, every other day in the summertime, but it's, it's what we're doing and it's, uh, you know, managing, engaging his body throughout the summertime. Yeah. He's a lot more calm than I am Tim in the summertime. He consistently tells me, lot more calm than I am, Tim, in the summertime.

Starting point is 00:43:50 He consistently tells me, hey, listen, man, you need to take a little bit more time off. We just went for nine and a half straight months, and I'm like, no. Yeah, we had to pull the reins a little bit sometimes. Do you, LeBron, have any particular favorite exercises or forms of physical recreation in the offseason? I've read about yoga, Pilates, VersaClimber has come up a lot. Are there any particular ingredients that you like to regularly inject into your offseason? Yeah, besides the VersaClimlimber i actually really like running on the football field um for two reasons um you're outside um which is always a cool way to to exercise and then it kind of takes me back to my high school days of playing the game of football

Starting point is 00:44:38 yeah you know and um and i just have a huge deep love of the game of football so you know get being able to get that conditioning and get that cardio, being outside, but also being back on the football field, it just does something for me personally. And what might one of those workouts look like? Are you doing 400-meter repeats? Are you doing long, steady, and slow? What type of workout? It's more like 100-yard sprints, you know, from end zone to end zone. And we don't never have like a set number of how many we want to do.

Starting point is 00:45:08 But we do enough to we want to get our heart rate going while we're out there. And how do you decide when to stop? Because that would seem to be really critical for… Well, like you said, you hear Mike just say he pulls the reins. He says, okay, like you said, like you hear Mike just say he pulls the reins. He says, okay, now that's enough. Mike, a name that's come up a lot in doing research for this conversation is Tim Grover. And could you explain who that is and what you've, what you've learned from him? Well, uh, me growing up, you know, uh, I'll take it back a little bit. You know, I was a big, uh, Jordan fan of the big, you know, Chicago Bulls fan. Um, and so I was doing my own research,

Starting point is 00:45:55 you know, back when, uh, you know, all you had was, uh, you know, you know, press instead of, uh, in, in, uh, the internet. And so I was doing uh just asking around you know reading uh you know reading up on on jordan and the stuff that he was doing for his body so his name came up a lot of times and so i finally uh i gathered the stones to uh to to get to reach out to to tim um you know just some somehow i tracked down his number and i told him what I wanted to do. I wanted to learn from him. And he says, okay, well, why don't you come up to Chicago and kind of intern for us for a couple of weeks. MJ will be with us. He'll be getting ready to work with the Washington Wizards.

Starting point is 00:46:41 He just signed his deal with the Wizards. And so I'm in the middle of doing that. So you're more than welcome to come up. And, you know, thank God that I caught Tim in a great mood that day. And so, you know, so he invited me up to Chicago, and I spent a few weeks with him and along with MJ. And I learned a lot. I learned a lot in those two weeks. I learned, you know, how to work with an elite athlete of Michael's stature. So it was invaluable.

Starting point is 00:47:11 I learned what to do, what not to do, stuff I should stay away from, stuff I should really augment. So it was a great educational experience for me. In terms of things to stay away from was there was there anything that sticks out in your mind as a as a key learning or takeaway in that department or it could be one of the other categories but is there any anything specific that that that comes to mind um anything specific as far as an athlete training working with it with an athlete of that caliber is to remain consistent, to remain consistent. You know, there's no particular exercise. There's no particular stretch.

Starting point is 00:47:50 It's all about your own mindset and your own confidence working with someone like Mike and now obviously working with someone like LeBron. So it's all about how to approach it mentally and how to be consistent for that athlete. Again, just be that rock. Consistency. So this is a good opportunity. I'm sorry, go ahead.

Starting point is 00:48:12 And available. And available 24-7. Yeah, I may wake up at like 3 o'clock in the morning and want to get a workout in. Yeah. On demand, which I think is a good window to start chatting about a new collaboration that you're both involved with. I mean, LeBron, you've become a very active businessman and investor over the course of your career, and there are many things we could discuss related to that. But one that I think is very relevant to our conversation right now is ladder. And there are a lot of people out there who are constantly asking themselves, and every time they get to New Year's, make resolutions related to loving and not dreading fitness and wellness and trying to, trying to find a way to attack it that leads them to passion

Starting point is 00:49:08 and not feeling burdened with responsibility. Could, uh, could you guys, uh, and either one of you can, can grab this, uh, explain what ladder is and, and what is, what is the purpose behind it? Um, I think with, uh, with, with the whole idea behind Ladder and starting this company, it started way back probably around 2014. We were kind of in the crossroads of, okay, what else can we add to our routine as far as nutrition goes? I felt like we were just beginning to scratch the surface as to what was available out there. But unfortunately, we found that, you know, some of the stuff that's out there, you know, they all these big companies have all these proprietary blends. And we weren't sure, you know, OK, what what exactly is in these proprietary blends?

Starting point is 00:49:59 And so, you know, we will start we will start with the company. We'll start with something off the shelf that was NSF certified. But, you know, we just didn't didn't want to take the chance of, you know, to continue to use these products. And so, you know, we got together with LJ and said, you know, let's really do some more research as to what what is out there that that that is not available for us um and and why not and so we started to do some more research um after 2014 when unfortunately he experienced uh you know i think the the much publicized uh and critiqued uh cramping game in 2014 during the finals um you know that's when when leBron and I really got together and said, okay, what are we missing here?

Starting point is 00:50:47 Why are we cramping here? We're doing everything we can for hydration. Now, let's dive deeper into this because it's obviously affecting our performance and our productivity. Maybe to some degree, it costs us a championship. We started doing, like I said,

Starting point is 00:51:04 more and more research as to what's out there. And just we finally came up with the right ingredients. And you know what? Like we mentioned earlier, we kept it simple to them. We kept it really, really simple and very transparent to the public as to what's in these products. Right. And you mentioned a few things that I want to underscore for folks also. The NSF Certified for Sport, which is effectively considered the gold standard for testing and approved by not only the major sports teams, but the IOC and so on. for any number of reasons. And for people who are looking for supplementation or tools to augment their physical activity,

Starting point is 00:51:56 you've also assembled a very strong team of founders. So I was wondering if you could chat a little bit about the people involved and why that particular team has been assembled for this. Well, I can talk about that, Tim. Obviously, two of our founders are Arnold Schwarzenegger and Cindy Crawford, and I can speak upon Arnold. for one, we've been in business for quite a while now together through a mutual friend of ours. And obviously his history of what he's done in his career as far as nutrition and training and things that goes without even talking about. We know how unbelievable he's been um in his career so

Starting point is 00:52:45 that that makeup and that match fit perfectly and also the same with uh cindy crawford as well you know she's um you know been doing um the wellness and the health and and the training and everything she's been doing throughout her whole life and it made sense uh for her to be a part of the team as well. And we also have, you know, Lindsey Vonn as well, you know, one of the greatest, you know, athletes of her genre and her craft as well. So we wanted to be able to assemble not only people that actually live this life, but also people that people can relate to as well. So it all made sense for all of us. And looking at the materials that I reviewed, the message in effect of life is a workout and recognizing that the physical part of your life is really part of everything, right? I mean, it is the vehicle for everything else. And your mind is part of your body.

Starting point is 00:53:46 So if you want to care for that, you also have to care for the overall package that is your physical totality. LeBron, you must have thousands of opportunities come to you and get pitched to you, I would imagine, on not just an annual basis, but a monthly or weekly basis. I mean, you could drown in the number of pitches you would receive. Why is this important to you? Well, I think it goes back to what Mike was speaking upon. You know, we had that moment during the finals. We were kind of mind boggled because we know how much we take care of the body. We know how much we put into the body, what we put into our body.

Starting point is 00:54:28 We know how much liquids and throughout the whole day. And for that to happen at a very important moment in my career, we were searching for answers. And for us to get to this point now where we found the answers, I told Mike, listen, you go out and do the research. I trust you. I've been with you for over a decade plus now. The only thing I ask is that we make sure that everything is clean because that's what's most important in anything. I've trained my body. We've trained our body throughout this whole process. And you know my body more than I know it. So that's how it all got started. And I think, you know, everything that I've ever done, Tim, has always been authentic to myself. I mean, you know, authentic to what I do on a day-to-day

Starting point is 00:55:17 basis. If it's from, you know, a few years ago, having a bike-a-thon in my hometown, it all stemmed from me training, riding mountain bikes in the summertime for getting back into shape. So that's how that came about. If it's anything that I've done in my career, it's always been authentic to who I am. You look at, like you said, some of the things that I'm doing now, as far as the production of TV shows and things of that nature, it stems from me loving TV and loving the fact that being able to engage people's mind and emotions and things of that nature is authentic to myself. And that's what Ladder is all about as well. resource component because of the the uh the url we are ladder.com um as i understand it is is also going to have a lot of answers to questions with scientifically supported uh responses to topics

Starting point is 00:56:18 ranging from you know fitness to nutrition uh to various types of of health problems how do you uh envision you know mike maybe if you want to chat yeah on that side problems. How do you envision, you know, Mike, maybe if you want to chat on that side of things, how do you envision that serving people and what would people go there to find? Yeah, I mean, it's, you know, we want to provide a one-stop shop for athletes and for, you know, for everyone else, you know, who's interested in maybe getting some sort of gain from not only a product, but from just a lifestyle stance here. We could all

Starting point is 00:56:52 improve in whatever field that we're in, whether we take it by leaps and bounds or we take it by inches. We could all improve and part of it is creating that environment. By environment, I'm meaning that website, the social media stuff where athletes can go in and tap into our resources.

Starting point is 00:57:15 And our resources, it's going to be a panel of experts in their field, and not only athletic performance, but, you know, social behavior, psychological behaviors, mental stuff. It's all vital. It's all vital. And it's more about the athletic realm. It's about living your best life, I guess, you know, and improving. This is something that fits a very particular sort of Venn diagram for me, which is something that was born out of the two of you scratching your own itch, right? You mentioned the cramping in 2014. And I'm always most interested when a service or product is born out of an unaddressed need, an unmet need from one of the founders themselves. And it seems like you'll be making tools available to people that would otherwise, well, perhaps be limited to some

Starting point is 00:58:15 of these high-level athletes you mentioned. And that's exciting. I would also be remiss if I didn't ask you, LeBron, and I know we have just a few minutes left here, but how many more years would you like to play? I would love to see the floor with my son. Amazing. My son is in the eighth grade now. If he continues on the path that he's on right now, he could possibly be in the NBA in five, six years. So that would be that would be an unbelievable moment for not only myself, but for my family, for my for everybody. So we'll see.

Starting point is 00:58:57 Obviously, taking care of the body is number one and we will, you know, do that. But more importantly, taking care of the mind. If your mind's not fresh, then your body will fall at the waistline. So through the grace of the man above and through everything that myself and Mike and my support team do, that would be pretty dang cool if I'm able to be on the NBA floor with my oldest son. That would be amazing. Well, I look forward to watching that. And you guys have been very generous with your time.

Starting point is 00:59:27 I appreciate you making it happen. And I'm very excited to see what both of you do and what Ladder does. People can find Ladder at weareladder.com. Of course, LeBron, you're everywhere, at King James on Twitter and Instagram, LeBron on Facebook. Mike, I'm not sure, Smoke Signals,

Starting point is 00:59:47 Carrier Pigeon, how should people find you if there is a way to find you? Or should they just watch your good deeds through the athletes that you work with? You know what? I think our body of work together, with LeBron on the court. I think that's proof in itself. If you do want to follow on Instagram, it's MikeMansius1. And I think I have the same Twitter handle as well. Perfect. I'm pretty sure. It's all good.

Starting point is 01:00:21 It's all good. It's an exciting journey for me. Absolutely. Beautiful. And I will link to journey for me. Absolutely. Beautiful. Yes. And I will link to everything we've discussed, people listening in the show notes as per usual at tim.blog forward slash podcast. And LeBron, we didn't have time today to get into the Family Foundation, but you're doing incredible work. And I want to just thank you, among many other things, for doing so much for the kids of Akron.

Starting point is 01:00:42 I think it's really tremendous. I've looked very closely at it myself for inspiration for things I hope to do. So I appreciate you putting that much time and effort and care back into the community that you came from. I appreciate it, Tim. Thank you very much. All right. Well, guys, I will let you get running. You have icing to do.

Starting point is 01:01:01 You have who knows what else to get done in the meantime. And I wish you both the best of luck and look forward to seeing what you guys do. Thank you, Tim. Take care. Thanks very much. Bye-bye. Hey, guys. This is Tim again.

Starting point is 01:01:17 Just a few more things before you take off. Number one, this is Five Bullet Friday. Do you want to get a short email from me? Would you enjoy getting a short email from me every Friday that provides a little morsel of fun for the weekend? And Five Bullet Friday is a very short email where I share the coolest things I've found or that I've been pondering over the week. That could include favorite new albums that I've discovered. It could include gizmos and gadgets and all sorts of weird shit that I've somehow dug up in the world of the esoteric as I do. It could include favorite articles that I've read and that I've shared with my close friends, for instance. And it's very

Starting point is 01:01:57 short. It's just a little tiny bite of goodness before you head off for the weekend. So if you want to receive that, check it out. Just go to 4hourworkweek.com. That's 4hourworkweek.com all spelled out and just drop in your email and you will get the very next one. And if you sign up, I hope you enjoy it. This episode is brought to you by Peloton, which I've been using probably for about a year now. Peloton is a cutting edge indoor cycling bike that brings live studio classes right into your home. You can also do on-demand, which is what I do. We'll come back to that. So you don't have to worry about fitting classes into a busy schedule or making it to a studio or gym with a

Starting point is 01:02:34 hectic or unpredictable commute. I, for instance, have a Peloton bike right in my master bedroom at home, and it's one of the first things I do many mornings. I wake up, I meditate for a bit, then I knock out a short 20-minute ride in my undies. Hard to do that at the gym. Take a shower and I'm in higher gear for the rest of the day. It's really convenient and has become something that I look forward to. So you have a lot of options. For one, if you like, you can ride live with thousands of other riders across the country

Starting point is 01:03:01 on an interactive leaderboard to keep you motivated. There are also up to 14 new classes added every day with more than 8,000 classes on demand. And you can pick based on length, 45 minutes, 20 minutes, whatever, music, hip hop, rock and roll, or say low impact versus high intensity or interval. You can pick the class structure and style that works for you. And in my case, I quite like Matt Wilpers and I tend to do on demand and listen to a lot of and watch many of the same classes over and over. But I'm kind of promiscuous and also enjoy classes from a lot of the other instructors. They have Peloton, an amazing roster of incredible instructors in New York City with a whole range of styles and personalities. So you

Starting point is 01:03:40 can find what you're in the mood for. You also get real-time metrics that you can use to track your performance over time, and that will help, I would say, catalyze you to beat your personal best. Now, that all sounds good, right? Gamification, yada, yada, yada. I didn't think that it would work for me or in any way incentivize me, but they really 100% hit the nail on the head. I was very, very impressed with how motivating it was and it worked tremendously to keep me pushing uh which quite honestly takes a fair amount i can get quite lazy particularly with anything that edges on endurance which is kind of more than five reps of anything for me so check it out discover this cutting edge indoor cycling bike that brings the studio

Starting point is 01:04:22 experience right to your home peloton is offering listeners of this podcast a limited time offer. Go to onepeloton.com. That's O-N-E Peloton, P-E-L-O-T-O-N.com and enter the code TIM, all caps, at checkout and get $100 off of accessories with your Peloton bike purchase. So get a great workout at home anytime you want. Check it out. Go to onepeloton.com and use the code TIM to get started. This episode is brought to you by 99designs. 99designs is the global creative platform that makes it easy for designers and clients to work together. From logos to apps and packaging to books, 99designs is the go-to design resource for any budget. I've used 99designs for many, many years now. I've used them for book covers, for instance,

Starting point is 01:05:11 mock-ups for The 4-Hour Body, which went on to become a number one New York Times bestseller, illustrations for my multi-volume The Tao of Seneca, and other graphic design projects. And I've been really impressed by the quality of their designers and the designs that I've ended up using. Most recently, I used 99designs to update the illustrations and layouts of my five morning rituals ebook. This covers my most consistent morning routines and rituals. And I offer that as an incentive for people to sign up for my newsletter. So this is a PDF bonus that acts as a carrot to increase the number of email subscribers. The illustrations inside are gorgeous. And I loved working with the designer who we selected for the project.

Starting point is 01:05:56 So you can check it out. Take a look at that at 99designs.com forward slash Tim. That's the number 99designs.com. And you can see exactly what I'm talking about with a real world example of what has come out of working with them. 99designs designer search tool connects you directly with one designer based on design category or industry specialization, style, skill level, availability, and more. So you can really check all the boxes that you need and see who matches up. Or you can start a contest. And that means you invite the entire community to take a shot at your project. Then you pick your favorite. Right now, you guys,

Starting point is 01:06:37 my listeners, that is, can receive a free $99 upgrade on your first design contest. So check it out. To see what it looks like to get your first free upgrade, please visit 99designs.com forward slash Tim and click on the link in the landing page. So again, check it out 99designs.com forward slash Tim.

The Tim Ferriss Show - #349: LeBron James and His Top-Secret Trainer, Mike Mancias

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.