Brian (1s):
Coming up on the GET LEAN, Eat Clean Podcast,
Brad (3s):
Fat Max heart rate, that's the maximum rate of fat oxidation per minute. And if you were to go faster than that, you burn fewer fat calories per minute in favor of a distinct spike in burning glucose calories. And what's happening physiologically is when you get to this pace where you don't have enough oxygen to emphasize fatty acids, you have to switch over to the quicker burning fuel source of glucose. And of course, there are benefits to training the glycolytic systems, the glucose burning systems with high intensity exercise. But what happens when you kind of go a little bit too hard over and over again as your routine exercise pattern, that's when you can fall into these patterns of breakdown, burnout, illness, and injury.
Brian (51s):
A way to calculate that zone two max. Yeah. Is that like 180 lesser age? Is that right?
Brad (55s):
So if you take 180 your age,
Brian (58s):
This week I interviewed best selling author and former national champion, and number three, world ranked professional triathlete, Brad Kearns. We discussed his new book with Mark Sisson, Born to Walk along with Problems with traditional shoes and a sedentary lifestyle, the Benefits of Minimalist shoes, How to Build an Aerobic Base, the right way to do high intensity training, and much, much more. Really enjoyed my interview with Brad. I know you will too. Thanks so much for listening and enjoy the show. All right. Welcome to the Get Lean, Eat Clean podcast. My name is Brian Gryn, and for the 10 time Brad Kearns is on the podcast. How do you feel, Brad? Oh, it's so
Brad (1m 36s):
Great to be back with you, Brian. We always have fun stuff to talk about, both, both on and off the recording. So luckily today we're just getting rolling. We got a lot of business to take care of, especially with this forthcoming book and the compelling premise that Mark Sisson and I present. But it, it's, it's, it's always a pleasure and we have so much passion for living a healthy fit lifestyle, delaying, aging, all that great stuff. So I appreciate the good work you're doing.
Brian (2m 4s):
I appreciate your podcast as well, the B Rad podcast I listened to quite a bit. And now you're, how many, And now you have a book coming out. And what book is this number for you? Is this your third or fourth book? I mean, you, you had cookbooks back in the
Brad (2m 18s):
Day. I'm over 20 now. Oh.
Brian (2m 19s):
In my career, I'm
Brad (2m 20s):
Way off of, you know, a, a co-authoring with Marxist and quite a few over the last 16 years. So we've had a great run as, as a dream team, you know, putting together these ideas. And it's really interesting how some of this stuff takes shape and it's very organic in, in our sense. So we're not like on some publication schedule and we have to force a book, you know, squeeze out some book because we're, we're on the clock. But instead, we kind of let time go by and we think about things that are of most interest to us. And this book, born to Walk was just emanated from, you know, a renewed interest in walking as the centerpiece of a healthy, active, energetic lifestyle.
Brad (3m 5s):
And of course, as you know, mark launched the PVA five toe minimalist shoe brand about a year and a half ago. So we're encouraging people to, you know, get your feet back into the game, get out of those elevated constrictive shoes, and wear these barefoot style shoes. And in hand, in hand with that is the obligation to just move more in general everyday life. And now it's come out that the leading experts in, in health, fitness, exercise physiology, disease prevention are asserting that just moving more is more beneficial and more important to longevity and disease prevention than adhering to a devoted fitness regimen. And of course, you get all kinds of benefits from being in the gym and being out there doing your cardio and living a long, healthy, strong life.
Brad (3m 52s):
But the sedentary patterns that the modern human is in is the number one public health problem possibly in the world, along with eating crappy food and all the topics that you discuss on your show and getting good sleep. But even people who are in the fitness category and go to the gym and put in their weekly mileage, nevertheless, have these disastrous patterns of staying still for hours and hours on end. So you have like the, the runner who's training for Chicago Marathon and running 30 miles a week and then up to 50 before the race. And then every day they get on the subway, they go to a tall building, they sit at a desk, they ride the subway home, and they sit and watch Netflix at night.
Brad (4m 34s):
And so they're in this category of what scientists have called or coined the active Couch potato syndrome. And there's a study from Denmark that we referenced in the book where they categorize these four groups of citizens and they ranked them according to their health and disease risk factors. And the people who were just generally, well, the people who were generally active and had fitness of course were the best, but the active couch potatoes, people that went to the gym and maintained a fitness level but were otherwise sedentary, scored below the people who just walked around a lot during the day and perhaps did their gardening and walked their dog. And it's kind of an eye-opener to think that you're not protected from these diseases of sedentary living just because you slammed out that 6:00 AM spin class and then went about your, your very mellow quiet day.
Brad (5m 26s):
Yeah,
Brian (5m 26s):
That's a different, yeah, it's a different take on things. I mean, you hear like non-exercise activity thermogenesis, right? Like, and how beneficial that could be. Those are the things that you do outside of your workout. And so I guess one way of calling it is a, what'd you call it? A the couch potato, active couch potato, right?
Brad (5m 43s):
Yeah. Yeah. I mean this goes, you know, this is, this goes back to evolutionary biology and the genetics of the homo sapien species. And we know from research with modern day hunter gatherers, the hazah in Tanzania, which has been widely touted, the human has a critical obligation to be in near constant movement throughout the day in order for the body, the hormones, the metabolic system, the hormonal system to work properly. And so if we're seated, research shows that in, in as little as 20 minutes, we get a measurable decline in glucose tolerance and a rise in insulin resistance in as little as 20 minutes of sitting around.
Brad (6m 27s):
And we also have a decline in cognition in our, in our cognitive powers from being still. So the assignment for modern human is to get up and take little breaks when you're, when you are seated in front of a screen and of course sprinkle in a properly designed fitness program. But that, that first objective is to get up and, and move around more. And that's a big one. And I think to understand this best, I have a little anecdote in the book about the Panera Leo that's the African lion and the genetics of the lion mandate that that lion sleeps for around 20 hours every day. And then it launches an all-out attack that never lasts longer than 30 seconds.
Brad (7m 12s):
And they get their prey usually at dust, they have to lay around all day because they don't dissipate heat well. So they're supposed to sleep. That is the lion living his or her best life according to their genetics and contrast to the human completely different species that needs to puts around and move around and move their body and move their joints all day long.
Brian (7m 33s):
Interesting. Yeah. And you know, you see these standing desks, which is, or like even the treadmill desk now, where you're just sort of, I just had, I had talked to someone who has, like, you know, they walk at like one, you know, very low level walking, but they just, while they're doing their work, is this something you think you would recommend someone? Or is that a little bit overkill?
Brad (7m 52s):
It's interesting point. 'cause of course you're going to get benefits from standing up and you're gonna avoid some of those real problems with sitting where you lose functionality in the hamstrings, the hip flexors and the glutes and all those associated problems. But like Katie Bowman talks about with her nutritious movement programming, what we really want to get away from is repetition. So if you're standing up at your desk all day long, it's possibly better than seat sitting. But again, you're gonna feel sore and stiff and you're gonna feel pretty crappy if you're just standing in one spot for eight hours. So the idea of variation in the workplace is something that I embrace and that Katie talks about a lot.
Brad (8m 35s):
We have a, a digital course called Don't Just Sit There that's on my website where we can learn the exercises and the drills and how to set things up. And you know, a lot of people talk about like the ergonomically correct position for working where your wrists are supposed to be at 90 degrees dropping onto the keyboard, and your elbows are at 90 and your torso is standing still and all that kind of thing. And that is, you know, likely safer than twisting and contorting and hunching over as you're typing on the keyboard. But any position that you hold for too long is going to be unhealthy. So the objective throughout our day and our life is to just engage in a lot of variation and be on the move.
Brad (9m 16s):
And perhaps what I do during the day is like, I sit down on the ground, Brian, for long periods of time, and so I prefer working. I have this little, it's like a TV tray that I put my laptop on, so I have a seated workplace position. I of course have a standing desk where I have the laptop, you know, up on a, up on a stool, and then I have a, a, a chair and a desk as well. And then I sometimes will go chill on the couch and relax and have all the pillows around me. So all that stuff is okay and none is, you know, it's not necessarily one better than the other to brag how many hours you stand up versus how many you sit down. It's just the idea of keeping things move, moving and varied.
Brian (9m 55s):
Yeah, I mean, I'm kneeling right now. You could never, you would never know that. But I actually, I
Brad (9m 58s):
Didn't know that. Yeah. I can't believe it. Wow.
Brian (9m 60s):
Do you think I'm the only person in this, let's just stay in the state of Illinois who actually kneels at their desk besides
Brad (10m 6s):
The, those in the priesthood? It could be, you know, you could be an outlier.
Brian (10m 11s):
I mean, think about that. I'm like trying to set a trend here. No one knows about it. And I'm actually kneeling. I Now I have a thick pad and it actually need to replace this one soon. But
Brad (10m 21s):
You're wearing holes in the, in your desk pad. That's great.
Brian (10m 24s):
Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, I like, I like it. I think it helps me with posturally and get out of hip flexion, you know, extend my hips, use my glutes a little bit. And in the beginning it was, it took some time to get used to, but you know, maybe, maybe I can start a trend, Brad,
Brad (10m 39s):
That's great. I'm gonna try it. I really am interested in that. 'cause my position on the ground is, you know, sitting with my back against the wall. But it's called ground force reaction, and that counts for you too. And what happens is you're now obligated to support your skeletal weight when you're kneeling, or even when you're sitting with your butt on the ground and your legs on the ground. And so your muscles and your connective tissue are actually getting stimulation. They're being forced to support body weight rather than when you plop into a chair and then you deload the important muscles, joints, connective tissue. And that's when you get that atrophy and that weakening and that hunching over of your spine and all that stuff that happens when you, when you allow yourself to enjoy the, the fruits of, of modern convenience.
Brian (11m 27s):
Let's, let's sort of dive into a little bit about, like, I know your book, and I think there's maybe a bit of confusion because you have, on one side of the coin, you have these minimalist shoes that are coming out. And I actually have a buddy who wants to make 'em for golf shoes. That's, he hasn't done it yet, but that would be a cool one. But, you know, I wear, I wear Vibrams. I've, I, I've tried the PVAs and they fit a little bit differently, but they're very similar to like the Five Finger PVA ones. I'm not, I'm not sorry, the five Finger, what's the brand Vibrams, I think. But anyways, what is, what is the deal with these cushion shoes that some people swear by, and I'm trying to think of the name, the hookah are become popular.
Brian (12m 8s):
What's the, what's the big issue with, with having too much cushion?
Brad (12m 11s):
Well, what we've had in modern life, actually for hundreds of years now, are these designed elevated cushion shoes for work and for leisure. And recently, in the last 50 years for sport, especially the advent of the running shoe back in the seventies by Nike. And so this, this comfortable elevated cushion shoe. And now today the super cushion shoe hokas a leading brand like you said, but all the brands have these really, really huffy shoes that are high off the ground, and they enable you to run down pavement with a sensation of comfort. And so without those shoes, it would be very difficult to run more than a few minutes because of the pain immediately inflicted into a, a body that's ill prepared for an activity.
Brad (13m 1s):
So the invention of the cushion shoe 50 years ago basically launched the running boom and allowed generally unfit, poorly adapted people to be able to shuffle down the road and do a 10 k or do a half marathon or do a marathon. Now, getting sedentary people off the couch and into any activity is obviously a positive thing, but what the book talks about is how we've kind of been socialized and, and sold a, a, a fabrication and a ruse that running is actually healthy for you and that wearing these shoes are good for your body and help protect you against injury and impact trauma. And actually the research is very clear that the opposite is true.
Brad (13m 44s):
So when you put on an elevated cushion shoe and run down the road, you have a sensation of comfort because the proprioception is cut off, the awareness of the impact is muted by that giant cushion soul. So what happens is people who are poorly adapted to run are running with horrible form and exerting a lot of impact trauma into the body, into the muscles, joints, connective tissue throughout the lower extremities, and getting injured again and again. So the shoe feels good because it cuts you off from the sensation of how your body is landing on the ground, especially a hard surface. And so you can plot along, and the stride that we see generally with the jogging community is this overriding heel striking, breaking, jarring pattern rather than when you look at an Olympic runner running around the track, they have this beautiful, graceful stride where they're landing on their midfoot over a balanced center of gravity over the, over the center of their body and running with great efficiency and minimal impact trauma.
Brad (14m 49s):
So that's the problem that we have today with these shoes. And it's a difficult thing to extricate from because you mentioned the brand brm that came out about 18 years ago now, and then the book Born to Run our book is kind of a tongue in cheek takeoff on that title with ours being called Born to Walk, but Born to Run, you know, glorified the amazing ability of the human to engage in endurance exercise. And they featured these primitive living Tara Humara natives down in Copper Canyon in Mexico, and some great western runners went down there to participate in their events. And it was really a celebration of the humans amazing genetic attributes for running long distances.
Brad (15m 35s):
Now that might be all well and good, but for the average person who has spent years and decades in sedentary patterns and not being athletics since their high school days were over, what happens is they put on these beautiful modern shoes and they go and get themselves injured, not to mention burnt out, exhausted, fatigued from running at too strenuous a pace. And I'm sure we'll talk about that part a little bit later. But yeah, the shoes are the driving cause of running overuse injuries. And this is, again, strongly validated by research, but all we have seen against that over the last 50 years is marketing hype and flawed and deceptive advertising.
Brad (16m 19s):
And this was published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine where they said the flawed and deceptive advertising represents a quote public health hazard because they're pitching these shoes to help con control pronation or minimize injury risk. And there's never been a single shred of data to show that running shoes help prevent injury. Instead they promote injury because they allow you to run with crappy form and that jarring breaking stride.
Brian (16m 46s):
So if someone wanted to get into the minimalist shoe, what do you recommend? Like obviously you don't, you gotta sort of ease yourself into this thing, especially if you've been using the, the thicker SOS for a long time.
Brad (16m 57s):
Yeah, great follow up question. Thank you. Because when we wanna do these specialized activities that are very difficult, like go and play pickup basketball, you're not gonna go into the gym barefoot and post up on a guy who's taller than you and try to, you know, try to make a basket. So when you're doing these challenging activities, of course you need the appropriate footwear that makes it, you know, safe and possible for you to do it. So the idea, especially the one that we're promoting directly with the PVA movement and in the book is to just get to a more barefoot inspired lifestyle in a careful and graceful manner, which means walk around your home as as often as possible barefoot or other safe areas like if you're going to the beach or wherever you can, but then wear these minimalist shoes to get more walking into your life.
Brad (17m 50s):
It's no injury risk to walk around barefoot or in a barefoot style shoe because there's no impact Trauma beyond one times body weight, right? You, your, your foot's on the ground, one foot's on the ground always when you're walking. So it's one times body weight impact. In contrast, even a, a slow jogger is imparting two to three times body weight impact on every stride. And you can look at the data from the lab and discover that even going on an easy five mile jog, someone weighing 150 pounds is imparting 2.3 million pounds of impact trauma into the lower extremities. And because they're likely wearing these elevated commission shoes, they're running with poor form and that impact trauma is inappropriately dispersed.
Brad (18m 33s):
So that's, that's the problem. Like the shoes are the necessary evil in order to go out there and jog on the sidewalk, but they're also the cause of injury. So to fight back against that, you want to get more into this barefoot mode where you're putting a lot of time in walking around barefoot or in minimalist shoes. And then if you insist upon running and insist upon training for these events that are by and large, unhealthy and too strenuous, then you're gonna mitigate the damage that's caused by cramping your feet into these shoes every time you run.
Brian (19m 5s):
And if someone was wanting to get into running, I know, like for people that don't know, obviously you were professional, right? Triathlete, right? For how
Brad (19m 14s):
Many years? Yeah, I was a runner in high school, in college, and then I became a triathlete was on the pro circuit for nine years. So same with Mark SISs and my co-author. We were old time endurance guys and we lived and breathed these sports and they were a huge part of our lives. And we had, you know, ambitious goals and, and trained our butts off for many, many years. But now in reflection, and this is what we get into right away in the book, is that running is an extremely challenging and grueling activity for the human. It's not that humans are born to run and we can all take off running. Like it's nothing. It takes a lot of adaptability and conditioning and general functional fitness foundation before you should even aspire to take off down the road and run for more than a a a mile or two.
Brad (20m 1s):
But unfortunately, again, because of the shoes, it's possible for someone to shuffle along pretty soon and, and spend, you know, 5, 10, 15 miles out there doing something that is generally too stressful for the body and is going to lead to injury inevitably. And the research on the rate of running injuries among regular runners is absolutely stunning. Yale University School of Medicine says 50% of runners get injured every year, 50% of regular runners and 25% of runners are injured at any given time. Which is is that, it's, it's embarrassing. I mean, it it's like what is going on when you're not getting tackled out there, when you're running on the lake shore or in the trails in the woods by your house.
Brad (20m 44s):
There's something wrong with this picture.
Brian (20m 46s):
Is that be, is that a combination of bad form or is that because of, partly because the shoes obviously as well, right?
Brad (20m 54s):
It's, it's a good question. You set me up good there because here's what's going on. The reasons that runners have poor form is lack of general fitness capabilities. So you don't have strong enough hip flexors, we don't have the hamstring flexibility, we have poor ankle flexibility so that you're not getting the full power out of your stride, nor are you absorbing impact appropriately due to muscular insufficiencies and, and lack of experience, right? Since it's been five, 10 or 20 years since you were running around the playground as a little kid, whatever. Now because of the shoes, they allow this shuffling, breaking overriding pattern that is kind of the default stride and the default gate pattern for someone who's not super athletic.
Brad (21m 38s):
And again, go and compare to the Olympic runners and watch how they run with that amazing force production on every stride. And the ability to maintain a level pelvis, for example, when they impact the ground rather than, there's this tendency, it's called pelvic drop. And so on an average jogger, you'll see them jogging through the park and their pelvis is unstable with every impact because they're not strong enough. And that is probably some research believes that's the single biggest indicator of someone who's about to go and get injured is they have this contralateral pelvic drop. They're like, they, they can't absorb the impact well enough. And the whole thing can be solved by simply slowing down and putting in that time as a cardiovascular fitness enthusiast with walking or with pedaling a bicycle or doing a rowing machine or any of those machines that are low or no impact in the gym where you don't have this, this danger and this destruction of impact trauma from the simple act of jogging.
Brad (22m 39s):
And I'm, I'm talking about even very slow jogging. So if someone's listening going, well, I'm not an extreme runner racing at the front of the pack, it's the entire pack that suffers from this overstriding pattern. The research from Dr. Lehman at Harvard contends that 80 to 95% of all recreational runners exhibit this overriding heel striking pattern. And here's a quick fix, Brian. This is a fun one where if you wanna realize what it's like to run with correct form, you can take your shoes off, go barefoot and go to a safe surface like an indoor wooden gymnasium or hard floor or a sidewalk and take off running for several strides on the gym floor or the sidewalk.
Brad (23m 23s):
And what will happen immediately, no matter adjust, no matter how fit you are, no matter how overweight you are and how poorly adapted you are, you are going to run with a beautiful grace of a deer as light as possible because your brain right away, when you're barefoot and you have that proprioception, that connection with the ground, you are going to immediately exhibit a graceful midfoot landing over a balanced center of gravity because it's simply too painful to do anything but run with perfect form. We have the intuitive ability to do so. Now that doesn't mean I'm saying to, Hey, leave your fancy $200 shoes at home and start running barefoot, because that's what happened back, I was saying it a bit earlier, like when the, when the five toe shoes came out and when the book came out, people were all celebrating this idea that, you know, minimalist was the way to go.
Brad (24m 13s):
And the author Chris McDougall did a fantastic job ex explaining that yes, the, the foot works better when you don't have that padding and when you're able to use the, the natural functionality of the foot and the, the 26 bones and joints and it's, it, it's a, it's a per a quarter of all the bones and joints in the body are in the foot. It, it's worked, it's designed for shock absorption, it's designed for forward propulsion and you can let that all come into play. But if you've spent your whole life wearing shoes, you're gonna be very, very poorly adapted to run in minimalist shoes. So it's a huge, you know, a challenge to try to drift away from these cushioned shoes and trend toward minimalist shoes.
Brad (24m 58s):
But runners are doing it everywhere and there's a lot of popular brands that are now doing this. It's called a zero drop shoe, where there's not that elevation of the heel, the heel and the midfoot are at the same level that allows your achilles tendon and your arch to go through their whole range of motion. But it's, it's a delicate process that's best facilitated by doing a lot of walking.
Brian (25m 18s):
Yeah, well I talk about walking a lot on this podcast, so you're, you know, I three dogs, three dogs, two dogs, but three walks a day for me.
Brad (25m 26s):
Oh, that's so cool, man. Yeah, yeah,
Brian (25m 29s):
Yeah. So I'm getting out there. And what would you say, like, you know, so building an aerobic base, right? I know you talk a lot about that and how do people know what, what they should do as far as building a rope? Like is that like a, a, a certain percentage of your max heart rate? How do people sort of navigate that?
Brad (25m 47s):
Yeah, good question. 'cause we're, we've talked about the impact trauma and the propensity for injury with the shoes. And then the other destructive aspect of the running scene and the running boom is that by and large, most people are training at a pace that's far too strenuous to really deliver the proper health longevity, disease prevention benefits. And instead the running act becomes another form of stress in a already overly stressful modern lifestyle. So the proper way to build aerobic conditioning is at a comfortable pace that emphasizes fat burning.
Brad (26m 27s):
And if you are doing steady state cardio at a pace that's faster than this optimal zone, what's going to happen is you're putting in a lot of stress into the workout and you're emphasizing glucose burning instead of fat burning. So you become what we call a sugar burner who comes home from the workout and feels a little depleted And, you know, foggy and, and and light. And then they want to go hit the fridge, the freezer, immediately to pound a pint of Ben and Jerry's because of this repeated glycogen depletion from these workouts that are slightly too, significantly too stressful. And so what happens is, instead of developing into an endurance machine, a fat burning machine that can go all day at a decent pace, you become like a, a, a jalopy that you put, you know, high octane fuel in and you can go And, you know, drag race and then you're, you're kind of beat up after a while.
Brad (27m 22s):
So instead of building that fat burning engine, jogging at a pace that's slightly too, too significantly too stressful will inhibit your aerobic development and kind of turn you into a, a, a sugar burning stress head. And oh, the other thing of grade interest is that when you train too hard, you do not reduce excess body fat. In fact, you send the genetic signals to preserve excess body fat and even add a spare tire, the visceral fat, which is occurring because of overly stressful lifestyle patterns, including overly stressful exercise. And that becomes real trouble because you develop this skinny fat physique they call it in the running scene where you see someone who, they still have a little punch but they're emaciated otherwise and they're not carrying a lot of muscle mass because their training is too, too stressful and catabolic.
Brad (28m 13s):
Alright,
Brian (28m 13s):
So you're saying that as far as running is concerned and building a solid aerobic base, you should be doing that at a slower pace than what you think and, and if, And you know, if you wanna do some more intense workouts, it probably depends on the individual and their background. You know, I'm sure some people can push it more than others, but you don't want to, you know, let's say like I started actually doing a little bit of sprinting but only sprinting. I know like even talking with who is, you've had him on the podcast, the high intensity repeat training
Brad (28m 47s):
Craig marker.
Brian (28m 48s):
Yeah, Craig marker that you want to, if you're gonna do a sprint, you want to come back and do that next sprint just as fast and as powerful as you did the last one.
Brad (28m 57s):
Yeah. So,
Brian (28m 58s):
And so that's sort of my mindset. My thought around when I do sprints is, you know, I'll go for eight to 10, 12 seconds, but then I'll make sure that I can recover. Let's just say it's a minute at least, and I can come back just as strong the next time around.
Brad (29m 11s):
Yeah, that's great. I mean, the objective for the human to develop total body functional ness for longevity is to achieve not just this aerobic conditioning, but also to be strong and, and put your body under resistance load frequently with strength training and then to do brief explosive all out sprints. Not many people are gonna go do this on the football field where they're running high impact on flat ground, but you can sprint on a stationary bike or a rowing machine or in the swimming pool or up the stadium stairs rather than on the flat. So you can find a way to do brief explosive efforts that are near all out. And that has by far the best return on investment of any exercise.
Brad (29m 54s):
So a sprint workout where the accumulated effort is only a couple minutes of, of really hard stuff can deliver better payoff, especially for fat reduction than doing a cardio workout that's five or 10 or 20 times as long. Like the cardio is generally catabolic, especially the way most people do it, where the sprinting is sending the anabolic signaling to drop excess body fat build and maintain lean muscle mass and get that sculpted physique that people are dreaming of when they're burning all these calories running down the road. But to answer that question back when, when you said, you know, what, what pace should I go at to develop aerobically? That's entirely individual because what we wanna measure is your rate of fat burning per minute And what we call fat max heart rate.
Brad (30m 43s):
That's the maximum rate of fat oxidation per minute. And if you were to go faster than that, what would happen is of course you're gonna burn more calories the faster you go, right? You're gonna burn more calories sprinting than you are jogging. But there's a, there's a point you can, you can put it on a graph when you're in exercise physiology lab, but I'm gonna tell you a way to just measure it by heart rate. This fat max heart rate is your maximum fat burning. And if you were to speed up, you burn fewer fat calories per minute in favor of a distinct spike in burning glucose calories. And what's happening physiologically is when you get to this pace where you don't have enough oxygen to emphasize fatty acids, you have to switch over to the quicker burning fuel source of glucose.
Brad (31m 34s):
And of course there are benefits to training the glycolytic systems, the glucose burning systems with high intensity exercise. But what happens when you kind of go a little bit too hard over and over again as your routine exercise pattern, that's when you can fall into these patterns of breakdown, burnout, illness, and injury. So to take your pace back to Fat max heart rate or bone low for the vast majority of your endurance exercise, the vast majority of your cardio workouts is gonna help you feel refreshed and energized afterward. You're not going to kick into these compensation factors that occur when you train too hard, which is your brain telling you to eat more food and to be more lazy throughout the day.
Brad (32m 18s):
That's what happens when you push yourself too hard with these, these steady state chronic cardio workouts we call them. Instead you're active, energetic, and that walk around the block with the dogs makes you feel alert, energized, oxygenated without the drawbacks of a workout that's slightly too stressful.
Brian (32m 37s):
And someone a way to calculate that sort of like that zone two max. Yeah. Is that like 180 lesser age? Is
Brad (32m 44s):
That right? So if you take 180 lesser age, a 40-year-old person is gonna be 180 minus 40. One 40 is their estimated fat max heart rate. And you can also find this ventilatory threshold in a lab by paying a hundred bucks and doing the test with your mouth breathing through the, the, the oxygen tubes. But 180 minus your age is a widely respected formula from Dr. Phil Mone. And it's a really good guess for maximum fat burning. The shocking thing for most people if they're not used to measuring heart rate or regulating their pace is that it's very, very comfortable pace. And you can certainly feel fine even as you exceed that fat max heart rate and drift into the more glucose burning heart rates.
Brad (33m 31s):
But the point here is to over time continue to build your conditioning and your efficiency with fat burning such that your pace gets faster at that same fat max heart rate. So if a 40 year old's going out at one 40 beat per minute and looking at their watch and setting their beeper alarm and they start jogging and the thing starts beeping, that means they're constrained to a brisk walk right now because that's where their maximum fat burning occurs. And if even if they try to jog, they go into sugar burning to oversimplify the message. Now, if you adhere to this for three or six or 12 months, what's gonna happen is one day, because you're improving your fat burning capabilities, you will be able to proceed at a slow jog while still holding onto that one 40 beats per minute heart rate.
Brad (34m 21s):
And it's not very well received by the endurance community to put it lightly, to tell everyone slow down in order to train your body to a higher level in order to go faster. However, this is the type of training strategy that has been exhibited by the leading endurance athletes in every sport for the past 60 years, dating back to Arthur ards, runners in New Zealand, breaking world records and winning gold medals by going slow and and working on their strength and their aerobic capacity. So we must honor the examples of the world's elite athletes and generally we have a widespread obligation to slow down and build that aerobic system properly.
Brad (35m 2s):
But then you talk about the other pieces of the total fitness pie, which are sprinting and strength training. So if you're able to slow down and not exhaust yourself with your 30 or 40 or 50 miles a week at, you know, non aerobic heart rates, then you have the energy to go into the gym and get some good work done with your X three bar or with your machines or whatever you're doing as well as once in a while, once a week is plenty to do a proper sprint workout where you're working that top end, that anaerobic explosive performance. And that's super important for all of us as we age because we lose our anaerobic power and the anaerobic muscle fibers, the type, the type one fibers, the type two fibers go away much more quickly than the aerobic endurance fibers, which we have the ability to preserve pretty well through aging.
Brian (35m 53s):
Well I can tell you I just did my sprint workout chasing my dog through the forest. I, every time it happens I'm like, I better, I better get this guy. But you know, it's like, talk about an all out sprint trying to chase a 30 pound beagle in the forest.
Brad (36m 9s):
Those guys can get quick.
Brian (36m 10s):
Oh my god. Yeah.
Brad (36m 11s):
So that, that's the key is like doing something where you're truly outta breath and you might even feel a little bit of that muscle burn and then extensive rest afterwards. So the anaerobic system is best responding to high intensity, fewer reps and long rest periods and infrequency as well. So you go out there and you have a fun sprint with the beagle in the forest once a week. That's plenty. And the sprints need not last longer than 10 to 20 seconds. That's Dr. Craig marker's message where it's, there's no such thing as, you know, doing a workout where you quote air quote sprint for 30 seconds, 10 times with 32nd break in between another 32nd sprint.
Brad (36m 53s):
And that characterizes like a common spin class where the instructor's cranking up the music and say, okay, we're gonna end up with a bunch of sprints 'cause we got a bunch of hills coming. And that's more of a high intensity interval training session, which by and large can also be risky because most of that programming is setting up for the average participant to get exhausted and depleted. And so a true sprint is when you're constraining to very short duration and really using good power and technique and explosiveness and not having that regression and performance over the workout because you're getting tired. That is not a sprint session. And a lot of people mess that up, especially applying the endurance mentality to something that is completely different and the anaerobic system working differently than the aerobic the endurance system.
Brian (37m 41s):
Well put, well put. Well I will just tell you that I was chasing my beagle. I was not, this was not a purposeful run. This is me chasing him. So
Brad (37m 51s):
An escape convict.
Brian (37m 53s):
Yeah, exactly. What is your, I mean I've had you on a bunch, Brad, and what's your routine look like now? Eating, working out? You know, you're how old? 55?
Brad (38m 2s):
Oh my gosh, I'm about to turn 60 and mofos better watch out next year because I'm in the, the, the 60 plus division. Oh my God. In master track you're gonna
Brian (38m 12s):
Field gonna dominate, you're gonna be like the tiger woods of plus 60 plus.
Brad (38m 17s):
What's amazing out there in the masters track and field scene is you see some of these outliers who are so amazing in magnificent to see what the human body is capable of at the age of 60 or the age of 70. My friend Sue McDonald, who was a guest on my B rrAD podcast, she set 15 world records in the female 60 plus division. Wow. Including running her age in the 400 meters. So at 61 this summer, she ran a 61 in the 400 meters. So if you're not familiar, this is a woman who shows up at college meets and gets an invitation from the meet organizers to line up in the lanes with collegiate female runners and holding her own even at 61.
Brad (38m 60s):
She was a college athlete back when, and it was an Olympic trials pole vaulter and had a great career as an athlete. But being able to preserve this incredible level of performance into the older decades is so inspiring for all of us. But to finish my, my quip here, the field is not that deep, unfortunately. So, you know, the seventh place finisher is hunched over and shuffling across the line and raising their arms that they made it one lap around the track. But you know, the top people show really what's possible. So, you know, I'm, I'm gunning for my own, you know, personal, new, new best times even as I age. I, I just want to, I just wanna stay competitive. But that has, you know, caused me to completely evolve not only my workout patterns, but my mentality.
Brad (39m 45s):
Because as a lifelong endurance athlete, I was a pro triathlete for nine years. I was deep, deep into the extreme endurance performance and, and training so hard in so many hours. And I kind of have to say goodbye to that and realize that I need more fluctuation in stress and rest patterns in order to develop that explosive anaerobic system. And so sometimes the best use of one's exercise budget are some days that are really super easy and resting and regenerative and nourishing. I have, you know, a lot of nagging minor injuries that come up because I'm old and I'm trying to do crazy stuff like compete in the high jump. And so I have to be really careful about not applying that endurance mentality where every day you wake up and say, oh, how many, how many hours or how many miles can I accumulate today in service of my fitness?
Brad (40m 36s):
And instead say, okay, this is I'm, I'm in, you know, I'm in rest mode and when I come back I'm gonna do something really impressive because I'm gonna harness my energy rather than dispersing it out every single day as is commonly seen in the endurance community.
Brian (40m 52s):
So, God, you don't look 59 Brad,
Brad (40m 54s):
I appreciate that. It's, I was gonna say it's, you know,
Brian (40m 57s):
You look maybe around 50.
Brad (40m 59s):
So I, I think we're, we're socialized now to accept this disastrous tailspin of accelerated aging in modern society. And one of the most disturbing stats, I think we talked about this on a previous show, is the decline in the average testosterone level of the male. And it's declining at a rate of 1% per year since the eighties. That means someone who's 40 today has 25 or 30% lower testosterone than grandpa did or than dad did. And the blame is cast around to a lot of the plastics and the estrogenic compounds in the environment as well as the global obesity epidemic because bad body composition will tank your, your adaptive hormones.
Brad (41m 46s):
And So we, we have this urgent obligation today to fight this battle with everything we've got to stave off the accumulation of the spare tire around the midsection, which is such a common notion of aging that we seem to think it's normal. But when you start to add this special kind of fat called visceral fat or abdominal fat to the body, it's an indication of hormone imbalance and it drives further hormone imbalance and further accumulation of visceral fat. So it's a slippery slope downhill because when that fat starts to collect around the abdominal organs, it releases this unfortunate inflammatory cytokine agent into the bloodstream and that will antagonize testosterone and, and actually it's called aromatization that will convert testosterone into estrogen, causing you to get a bigger spare tire and get a little softer and then have less energy and less motivation to go out there and slam on those weights or hit those sprints up the hill in order to maintain that youthful physi physique and youthful testosterone levels.
Brian (42m 53s):
Now your routine, what's that look like? Now? You know, you're 59, I thought you were 55, but you're 59. You're 59, you look great. I what have you changed or what are you doing now as far as eating and workouts? Thanks
Brad (43m 5s):
For the question. Yeah, I mean, over the last five years I've really been obsessed with these peak performance goals in track and field. So high jumping and 400 meters are my favorite events. And so I'm trying to create a schedule that's much like a sprinter. So you can look on YouTube and watch Noah Lyles as these slamming weights in the gym and doing these challenging sessions. But when I go out to the track now, unlike the old days when I was, you know, trying to hit the endurance goals, I'll do some hard efforts like running for 200 meters at 95% effort. And then you walk and take it easy for several minutes because like you said earlier, a true and proper sprint workout is where you come back to the line and deliver another exceptional effort.
Brad (43m 51s):
So it's not like my tongue's hanging down to the ground like the old days and I have only three more to go and then I'm gonna do, I finish all 12 of my quarter mile repeats. That's kind of the endurance game where you're just trying to build that body to withstand and endure. And so now I'm working on my technique, my explosiveness as I like to joke. You know, I, I used to being like an Ironman guy, so my race competency extends up to nine hours. But today my event, my favorite event literally takes one second, or I guess you could say four seconds when you're talking about the high jump approach and then the one second jump into the air over the bar. So I want to be maximum power and explosiveness and I don't think this is really aligned with my genetics.
Brad (44m 36s):
Obviously at my prime I was a pure endurance guy, but now I'm trying to be the guy who's sky high over the bar And you know, trying to touch the rim when I get inside a gym and have fun indoors. So it's been kind of a fun transition. And the best part of it for me is that now my goals and my training methods, I believe are strongly aligned with longevity because I'm, I'm keeping that anaerobic explosive system robust and strong. I'm working on my balance and things like that that people in their sixties have to start worrying about. And I'm de-emphasizing the exhausting training patterns that I believe accelerate the aging process.
Brad (45m 18s):
And I'll tell you from my time on the pro circuit when I was traveling all over the world and training like crazy and racing at the highest level that that decade from age 20 to 30 when I was on the circuit, I feel like I literally aged my body on a biological level 15 or 20 years. So the 10 years that I spent on the circuit, it cost me 20 years of lifespan, maybe even more. And all I've been trying to do since the day I turned 30 and and retired from the pro circuit is unwind that and do nurturing behaviors and fitness adaptations that promote longevity rather than directly compromise it like they do when you're doing extreme endurance stuff.
Brad (46m 1s):
So
Brian (46m 1s):
A lot of, a lot of like fast explosive exercises for you. You're obviously doing resistance training a few days a week, I'm assuming.
Brad (46m 9s):
Yeah, the track athletes. I mean, what's so funny at this age and I, anyone who's listening that's getting on the serious level of trying to be good at playing on the, the, the community basketball league or, or doing something crazy like the track and field goals that I have, you realize that the preparation and the, you know, the, the mobility flexibility and general strengthening and foundation work takes so much time and are so important that they're basically everything. And so if you're gonna ask me what are my goals for the coming season, I'm gonna say like my number one goal is don't get injured. Yeah. My number two goal is don't get injured. My number three goal is the same.
Brad (46m 49s):
And then number seven on the list is, hey, I wanna improve my high jump from five one to five three. I really think I can do it, but not if I'm injured. So its all about this, this broad based approach where I'm working on my balance and I'm doing the band work to, you know, engage my glutes and get all prepared before I even try anything crazy. And that's so funny 'cause like, you know, 20 years ago I would come out of the stands at the end of the middle school track meet and I'd go take a bunch of high jumps from sitting and watching the kids compete. I could just go right down there, put the bar up before they, you know, took everything away and get my six jumps in. And today it takes me probably an hour of preparation before I'm gonna take even a single practice jump.
Brad (47m 32s):
Yeah. Because it's so jarring and, and and traumatic to the body.
Brian (47m 36s):
What's one thing you've, you sort of changed your mind on over the last, let's say 10 years?
Brad (47m 42s):
Well, I think from your previous podcast, guess Jay Feldman, he had a big influence on me and other people in the same realm. Dr. Tommy Wood was a great spokesperson for this too, but I'm realizing now that my mantra for the future is perform, recover, perform, recover. And that is how I want to live the rest of my life as I want to maintain as high level of fitness peak performance and then be able to recover from these efforts to promote longevity, you know, maintain and preserve that lean muscle mass and that vo O2 max power and all those things that now are being touted as great markers for longevity. So what that means, what that mantra means is that I want the vast majority of my stress capacity directed toward peak athletic performance and recovery.
Brad (48m 33s):
So I have strongly deemphasized any other stressors that are introduced in the name of resiliency and adaptability and, and biohacking and so forth, namely fasting. 'cause I used to kind of routinely fast until around midday and then I'd make my meal. And there were so many benefits touted with fasting. And I've written about this at great length in the books that Marxist and I wrote, how your body works best in a fasted state. It's anti-inflammatory, it's antioxidant benefits, the autophagy, the cell repair, all these great things are happening because you're fasting or you're following the ketogenic diet. And so you're making an alternative source of fuel for your brain and it's so healthy and so awesome.
Brad (49m 14s):
But the thing that we have to remember in the big picture is that these are stress mechanisms. So starving the cells of energy through fasting or starving the body of carbohydrate through a ketogenic diet trigger genetically programmed survival mechanisms. And that is the mechanisms by which you obtain these health benefits. So when you starve yourself, the body goes, oh crap, I'm starving. I better kick into antioxidant anti-inflammatory cell repair state. Now for the vast majority of the listening and reading audience, I take back nothing that I've written in any book because most people today eat too much food, too much crappy food and don't do enough movement.
Brad (49m 58s):
So any transition away from an overfed inferior activity state is gonna be a huge health benefit. And that might mean time restricted feeding because you're gonna by default consume fewer calories throughout the day. But Now I personally am going for maximum cellular energy status at all times. So I no longer engage in fasting. And in fact I go outta my way every morning to make a huge B rrAD super fuel protein smoothie along with a big bowl of fresh fruit. And I eat, you know, incredibly nutritious and highly selective foods, but I eat pretty much as much as I can and still, you know, not get fat from overt stuffing, which is also nearly impossible when you're eating a really, really clean diet, by the way.
Brad (50m 46s):
But now I'm going for that maximum fueling status so that I can perform and recover to maximum capability. And I love those quips from Jay Feldman where he says, you know, we talk about cold plunging and hot sauna and high intensity workouts and fasting and keto, as you know, these triggers, these biohacks to help you develop resiliency. And they're called hormetic stressors. But he says, how come no one ever says arguing with your girlfriend on the same list? Because arguing with your girlfriend or your mean ass boss or whatever those stressors are, they activate the same pathways in the body as your sprint workout or as your fasting session in the morning. Right. The same exact
Brian (51m 27s):
Pathway. It's like, like that stress, the stress bucket, right?
Brad (51m 29s):
Yeah. It's han sale, the fight or flight response. It's very simple and known to science that when someone cuts you off on the road and you get lit up, it's the same as doing that fourth interval on the track. And so when I say that I want all my stress capacities directed to my performance, I don't want to get in any arguments with my lovely wife. I don't want to have stress on the workplace or deal with, you know, situations and dysfunctional lifestyle dynamics. And I'm also adding fasting onto that list for me because I have favorable body composition and I'm not concerned about my accumulation of visceral fat. I don't need those sort of interventions where if you're listening and you're struggling with, you know, unfavorable blood markers or body composition, yes you want to activate these powerful tools like getting lean by eating clean and so forth.
Brad (52m 19s):
But that's my answer to what have I changed my mind on. That's a kind of a major, a major transition in thinking and philosophy.
Brian (52m 27s):
Yeah. Yeah. Jay's come on a bunch And you know, paying attention to the stressors and like you said, like, you know, I can cold, I put a cold plunge in the house and I use it. I I've been using it more strategically than ever. I don't think I ever like abused it, but I think people can. And I will, I will say there's been times where I've used it and yeah, I feel great, but then like, I don't know, few hours later I'm like, cashed out. Like, yeah, so right. And, and this is on a day where I didn't do anything else really. So I, I I try to use it strategically, not go in there long, but I still enjoy, you know, there are some benefits to it, but like I think if you abuse it, that's when you can, you know, sort of, sort of can work against you.
Brad (53m 13s):
Yeah. Very well said. I, I like that term cash out because I've, I was, I felt that too when I've combined a sprint workout Yeah. And a cold pon session now in favor of cold plunge. You know, I'm a big enthusiast and I have a, a course about it and I've been deeply involved with the, the game for a long time. Most of us have a embarrassing lack of temperature stress in modern life. So a little bit's pretty good. And if you wanna go walk the dogs tonight in the Midwest and the weather's 37 and you're putting on a light jacket and you come back after 30 minutes and you're a little chilly, that is gonna be I think a net health benefit to keep you a little bit adaptable and resilient.
Brad (53m 54s):
And I just heard some research being touted about cold therapy. You know, more and more research is coming and they're saying that one of the best benefits is psychological resilience. And so if you can do that and get used to it, maybe you're gonna get less stressed about that person that cuts you off in traffic or the boss, you know, giving you a hard time or dispensing criticism because now you're more badass because of some of these regimens. So that's a huge vote in favor of things like therapeutic. I love when they use that term in front of it, therapeutic cold exposure, not dumbass cold exposure where you're on a dare at the fraternity house who can stay in the tank longer because that's just a huge stressor to the body and that has, you know, minimal health benefit.
Brad (54m 37s):
And the same goes for exercising and doing too many sprints instead of sticking to a more reasonable template or doing too many weekly mileage when you do have a mean boss and a mean girlfriend and you also like to fast and go keto. And we've seen, like in the CrossFit community, a lot of the females trying to build that six pack, like the superstars they see on tv. And so they're doing CrossFit and they're doing the ketogenic diet. So they're doing these high glycolytic workouts and then they're not eating carbs after, guess what's going to crack in that scenario. Yep. Your thyroid function, your adrenal function, and that's the part that we need to graduate from and say, Hey, you know, be good to your body.
Brad (55m 18s):
Throw out some challenges on a regular basis so that you can be a strong badass person, but don't overdo it, especially in that biohacking realm.
Brian (55m 26s):
Yeah, yeah. All great points. I mean, I like your point about psychological resilience, I think, yeah, I like getting in the cold and doing something that's a little more difficult. 'cause we're all in our comfort zones all the time. I think there's nothing wrong with that. It's just when you overdo it, and I think nowadays it's all about, you know, it's clickbait. People want people to click on their, on their, their Instagram profile or whatever is So they, they do crazy things because of that. And so I think we just gotta be careful with that. Yeah.
Brad (55m 52s):
And you know, what's, what's cool now is like Peter Orilla is banging this drum really hard too, is like fitness and muscle strength is the number one longevity predictor, right? It's more so than how badass you are and how many minutes you can spend in the cold water. And so if you can direct most of your stress capacity toward getting and staying fit, that is gonna be the biggest payoff, even more so than tightening up your eating window from a 16 and eight to a 20 and four and all these things that people have dabbled in, in the name of health, of course, and well-meaning. But it's a certain point. It's like, look, if you're not able to lift your body weight with a deadlift, or if you're not able to break eight minutes or nine minutes in the mile at the Famous Cooper Institute study that predicted longevity, they, they time people at age 50 in the mile and their results were very strongly predictive of their ability to live in a healthy manner and make it till age 85.
Brad (56m 51s):
So if you're not hitting those fitness markers, we gotta, you know, recalibrate some of the energy allocation and just simply get in shape. Love
Brian (56m 60s):
It, Brad. Well, another great episode. Always grateful to have you on. Born To Walk, right? Yeah. We
Brad (57m 6s):
Have a website, born to walk book.com. Mm. And you can pre-order the book now. We have all these incentives and, and free gifts for you. The book official shipping date is January 7th, but it's kind of a two part message where as we, as we touched on a little bit, we, we kind of take down some of these flawed premises and unintended consequences of the running boom and then have another part where we're extolling the benefits of a movement oriented lifestyle. How to aerobic condition properly and include more walking and all other forms of general everyday movement into your life. Return your feet to proper functionality by, you know, trending toward a more barefoot inspired experience and all that fun stuff.
Brad (57m 52s):
And then finally talking about the stuff we talked about just, just now, where, you know, you can pursue broad-based functional fitness rather than just being a cardio freak who's good at going in a straight line for 13 or 26 miles, but again, can't lift, you know, a a, a few sets of bicep curls or can't stretch that orange band on the X three bar to save their life.
Brian (58m 14s):
I've taken the break from the X three, but I mixed it in from time to time. I might actually do one today, but I've been doing traditional lifting.
Brad (58m 21s):
Right
Brian (58m 21s):
On. Yeah. Yeah, good to mix it
Brad (58m 23s):
Up. Yeah, that's a good little comment there because people ask all the time like, what's the best protocol? What should I do? And the single best workout that anyone can do is the one that they enjoy and that they'll stick with, right? So that's whatever environment you need or whatever, you know, contraption or training partner, set yourself up for success by getting involved in things that are really enjoyable to you.
Brian (58m 45s):
Yeah, no, that's a great point. All right, Brad, well, I'll let you run. I know you got a busy schedule. I appreciate you coming on. We'll put Links in the show notes, born to walk book.com coming out soon. When is it coming out, did you say? Or you're
Brad (58m 58s):
Not sure? You can order right now pre-order copy, and then the ship date is January 7th, so January 7th.
Brian (59m 2s):
Oh, perfect
Brad (59m 3s):
Timing. Whenever you air the show, we're talking 20, 25 people. It's time to turn the corner and get the proper approach to fitness, especially if you love that steady state cardio. I just want you to do it right. I don't want to take away your joy if you're, if you're training for next year's Chicago or New York Marathon right now, but there's a right way to do it, and then
Brian (59m 21s):
There's a very stressful and destructive way to do it. Yeah, well put. All right, Brad, well have a great rest of the day and thanks for coming on. Thank you. Thanks for listening to the Get Lean Eat Clean Podcast. I understand there are millions of other podcasts out there and you've chosen to listen to mine and I appreciate that. Check out the show notes at Brian Gryn dot com for everything that was mentioned in this episode. Feel free to subscribe to the podcast and share it with a friend or family member that's looking to get their body back to what it once was. Thanks again and have a great day.
