Zane Griggs stops by the show to talk about kicking ass after 50—which also happens to be the title of his new book!
As the host of the podcast Healthy AF (which stands for After Fifty), Zane and I have a lot to talk about and we dive into a few topics related to the subject of healthy aging—the necessary recalibrations, monitoring what he considers the most important metric (sleep), and the importance of looking at the big picture obligation of aging gracefully and managing stress so we are excellent not just in our fitness endeavors, but also in our ability to relax, unwind, and have some down time.
Enjoy this easy-to-follow conversation as Zane reveals how you can prioritize your daily behaviors effectively while keeping your fitness, health, and cognitive peak performance humming along nicely, as well as why he stopped adhering to his previously restrictive diet!
Keep up with Zane online by following him on Instagram, and check out his website, Twitter, and YouTube channel.
TIMESTAMPS:
Recalibrations are necessary in monitoring your aging process. [00:45]
Zane, a personal trainer, has spent much time learning about diet noting the ways our government has been misinforming us and learning about the pros and cons of the other diet theories. [05:29]
You need to let yourself change and modify your lifestyle in order to accommodate where you are right now and what your body needs. [09:05]
The tools in your toolbox are there for you to learn to handle stress, sleep better, manage your diet. [11:19]
Processed food companies have the money and are the second largest lobby group in the country, second only to big pharma. That is why we have trouble getting rid of the processed foods that are promoted. [14:15]
The specialized diets are stressful to the body and your body has to learn how to respond. [18:40]
It is very easy to overtrain and get injured. [23:47]
Work smarter, not harder. [31:12]
The gym should not be the place where we ultimately judge our performance [34:48]
How does sleep become the centerpiece of Zane’s training program? [39:50]
How does technology give you insights on the status of your health? [46:33]
You need some time where you have cleanup, you have repair, you have time just to kind of clean house. [51:47]
What are some of the trends in the older people Zane trains? You have to take a complete lifestyle approach. [58:29]
A calorie is not just a calorie. It is what we eat that needs to be looked at. [01:07:58]
LINKS:
- Brad Kearns.com
- Brad’s Shopping page
- B.rad Whey Protein Isolate Superfuel
- ZaneGriggs.com
- Kicking Ass After 50
LISTEN:
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B.Rad Podcast:
Zane (00:00:00):
No one can eat just one, right? I mean, you just keep, you’re gonna, you’re not gonna eat two chips, you’re gonna finish the bag.
Brad (00:00:06):
Welcome to the B.rad podcast, where we explore ways to pursue peak performance with passion throughout life without taking ourselves too seriously. I’m Brad Kearns, New York Times bestselling author, former number three world-ranked professional triathlete and Guinness World Record Masters athlete. I connect with experts in diet, fitness, and personal growth, and deliver short breather shows where you get simple, actionable tips to improve your life right away. Let’s explore beyond the hype, hacks, shortcuts, and sciencey talk to laugh, have fun and appreciate the journey. It’s time to B.rad.
Brad (00:00:45):
Hi, and listeners, please welcome Zane Griggs to the show Kicking Ass After 50. And indeed, that is the name of his new book. He’s got a new podcast called Healthy AF. Yes, that stands for after 50. And we are going to get into some important topics, in particular for those of us interested in aging gracefully. And so, Zane’s gonna talk about some of the recalibrations that are necessary, uh, reflections and monitoring what he considers the most important metric, which is sleep, which is so interesting ’cause we usually monitor our fitness progress with our time in our favorite running distance, or how much weight we can lift at the gym. But we have to look at this big picture obligation of aging gracefully and managing stress in all ways such that we are not only excellent in our fitness endeavors, but also in our ability to relax, unwind, and have downtime.
Brad (00:01:48):
So Zane is walking his talk. He’s a magazine cover boy. You can see all about it on his great Instagram content. Uh, his podcast is pretty hard hitting, and he comes outta the gate with a series of shows that are just him in narration form, taking to task the pillars of conventional wisdom that have destroyed our health over decades. So he has some choice words for the food industry, the pharmaceutical industry, and I like people fighting this battle. But as we start the show, he sets some important context that, uh, the infighting that’s occurring in the progressive health movement is kind of silly, which I would tend to agree. I think we all need to unite and realize that the major enemy are the marketing forces and the habits that we have built around processed foods, inactivity, sedentary patterns, overly stressful lifestyles, addiction to technology and so forth.
Brad (00:02:42):
So I think you’re gonna get a nice easy to follow conversation that will help you prioritize your daily behaviors, uh, effectively, it’s not gonna get overly scientific or confusing or over your head. It’s just a guy who’s been working with clients for decades as a personal trainer. He’s based in Nashville, Tennessee. He moved there before it was cool to move there, and has been working with, uh, peak performers, executives who aspire to not only excel in that narrow area of life that is career, but also to enjoy themselves along the way and keep their fitness and their health and their cognitive peak performance all humming along nicely. So, and I also think you’re gonna appreciate how Zane describes his journey of constant reflection and recalibration. In particular, he was a huge enthusiast of the popular, restrictive diets of the day, fasting, low carb keto, and realized especially as an extremely fit peak performer, working really hard in the gym and with his fitness endeavors, that it’s very easy to stack too many stressors, overdo it, and suffer adverse health consequences, in particular, your sleep patterns.
Brad (00:03:57):
So I love how this conversation is evolving in the ancestral and progressive health space that we have these wonderful tools such as restrictive diets that can deliver instant and validated results. But we always need to zoom out and look at our stress factors in the big picture in order to not push ourselves too hard and over the edge into unhealthy practices in the name of checking all the boxes and being super healthy and fit and organized and focused. Zane Griggs from Nashville, Tennessee.
Brad (00:04:30):
Here we go. Zane Griggs Kicking Ass After 50. And yes, that is the title of your new book. So I’m so enthusiastic to discuss this subject that of course I have great passion for. And you listeners, if you’re under 50, you all better listen up. And if you’re over 50, y’all better listen up. So we got some, we got some issues to handle. We got your positive energy, your coverboy on the fitness magazine and, and the great Instagram content. So, uh, I can’t wait to get into it. Thanks a lot for, for joining us.
Zane (00:05:05):
Oh, thank you Brad, for asking me on. I really appreciate it. This’ll be fun.
Brad (00:05:09):
So I found out you’re from Nashville, and unlike all these super cool people who have moved there in the last two and a half years, you stake your claim a long time ago. So tell us about your journey going from, uh, the west coast and then, uh, a long time immersion in the fitness industry, and then what you’ve been doing lately.
Zane (00:05:29):
Well, wow, that was, that was quite a ways back. So acuallu it was in the 90s or so, I was I would grew up in California. I had traveled around a bit. I was there like, I need to start over, and I wanted to go somewhere where I could make a living and still hang onto it. So I, I had a buddy invite me out to visit Nashville. What am I International? I’m not a musician. Why, why would I go to Nashville <laugh>? But I got here and I loved it. And it was, it was like this very entrepreneurial city, great place to network and make things happen. Everyone’s just kind of, you know, really grooving and connecting. And it was, it was a little bit smaller town, easier to connect back then than it is now. It’s really grown up a lot.
Zane (00:06:06):
But, uh, I was just getting into fitness as a personal trainer. I’d been in, been part of part of my life for many years at that point, for 10 years or so. And I wanted to just do something I was passionate about. And, uh, so I, I had been doing a little bit in California, and I came out here and just kind of started. And I really, that’s when I really started digging in and, and, and, and think, you know, understanding more about low carb dieting. And then, uh, maybe in, uh, 12 years or so, experimenting with some intermittent fasting, uh, and really found that, you know, those kind of tools were helpful for people who under reverse disease. But they’re also part of my own life. They’re also part of my own, um, my own practice. And, uh, ’cause I wanna be able to, you know, teach from experience, uh, and then really connecting in the last few years around the animal-based community, just trying to get everybody to connect who, who understands that, uh, people who, you know, the, the guidelines we’ve been handed by our government, they don’t work.
Zane (00:07:17):
And vilifying animal foods, vilifying, low carb diocese if they’re dangerous, or ketos if it’s dangerous. You know, those kind of fasting, even fasting considered dangerous. Uh, you know, th many thousands of years of, of this practice cultures all over the world. And suddenly it’s dangerous, uh, that in, you know, we, we, there shouldn’t be any infighting in those of us in the alternative health who are trying to help people. We need to be, uh, a community that, that supports each other and understands our, our enemy, our true enemy. Our pushback is these false ideas that are leading people in all direction, that are, that are really been, um, codified by our federal government and paid for by processed food companies, all their money behind the research. And in academia, uh, that’s the true enemy. So fighting between, between someone who eats fruit, someone eats a few more carbs, it’s like silly.
Zane (00:08:10):
So I have podcasts. I try to, I try to, and kind of explore these ideas, invite people on from different from different, I would say dietary platforms or, or whatever, and really just say, Hey, what’s working for you? And why is it working for you? What have you found? So, uh, just to give room for, for people to have that, the, the real, you know, play in like what works best for them, but within, you know, like a whole food setting. And that’s, that’s, that’s where I, you know, not, not to try to get too dogmatic about a particular dietary, you know, set group of, of, you know, small parameters. And, and that’s where I am now. But in finding even more so as I get older with a, you know, AF kicking, kicking after 50 healthy af things change even more.
Zane (00:09:05):
So as you get older, as you’ve probably found out, <laugh>, you know, like you can’t, you can’t handle as much stress mm-hmm. Uh, certain stressors when you get older. Like you go to, you know, a 50 is very different than 40. And, uh, you, you need to let your body let yourself change and modify your lifestyle in order to accommodate where you are right now and what your body’s needs are, and not be so tied into a.by that you’re not paying attention to what your body’s telling you, what the feedback you’re getting from your body, you know, and, and in regards to your health. And that’s, that’s real. I’m right in the middle of that. Right. You know, really experiencing that over the last several, like I’d say three or four years
Brad (00:09:45):
Experiencing what the changes and the, uh, the various Yeah. And yeah,
Zane (00:09:49):
Where I couldn’t really, you know, push the needle as much with fasting and fasted workouts and staying low carb without seeing, um, some downside when I was overdoing it. Like, I was really pushing it to the point that I, I was over training. I was, my sleep wasn’t so great. My blood work was showing high, um, sex hormone low, you know, showing up that, which is a result of, of stress and high cortisol. So, so I realized, okay, I’m over. All these things are good when used in the right context. They’re great tools for reversing disease. They’re helpful for, you know, autophagy for, uh, creating a certain degree of stress just like a workout is, right? But they can all be overused. And if you’re putting ’em all together, you have, you have to consider the context of the entire environment around your workout, how it’s affected by your diet, how that affects your sleep, and then where you are in your life with work stress, family relationships, all those other, all those things create stress that we have to manage. And if you’re pushing the needle on all of ’em too far, you’re gonna feel that your body’s gonna push back and say, you know, can’t handle all this. It’s gonna try to shut you down and say, slow down, you know, put on the brakes we’re, you’re overworking us. So I think you found something similar, uh, in your experience.
Brad (00:11:19):
Yeah. You, you open up an important context here and the individual variation. One of the variables is your six pack, man. So if you’re using these, and I love how you call ’em tools, which is a great characterization of the, popular dietary and fitness, I guess we, we can call everything a tool in the toolbox. But when you start overloading and you’re already lean, fit, active, healthy, and energetic and the research shows this, especially with the ketogenic diet, it, um, it benefits people with metabolic dysfunction vastly more so than someone who’s already metabolically healthy. And I think, um, there’s been a lot of great success with people who are, um, you know, trying to recover from standard American diet and living practices. And there’s also been a lot of success with people going for that last five pounds.
Brad (00:12:16):
And I’m sure in your career as a trainer, you have people walking in the gym who are very enthusiastic. They watch what they eat, they work out, they just want to optimize and go from level eight to level nine. And that’s where these tools, again, can come in handy. But another thing you said, uh, going back is that, um, you know, we’re doing infighting. We’re debating the particulars. We’re we’re splitting hairs, we’re obsessing and possibly bringing on more actual stress in life because we’re so keyed up about all these things. And the starting point for the conversation, I’m imagining like, Hey, you can’t come into the, into the theater unless you have a ticket. And the ticket says that I’ve ditched processed foods from my diet, then we don’t have there’s nothing else to talk about if you don’t have that ticket.
Zane (00:13:05):
Exactly. Exactly. I mean, that’s what the real enemy is. That’s what the processed oils, excessive processed sugar, processed grains, you know, to a degree that they’re the, they take up the majority of the average American diet. Right? 65%,
Brad (00:13:17):
71% says ordained. Uh, okay. Like, holy crap, uh, 71% of foods that didn’t exist in paleolithic times. And, um, uh, Andrew Wild says that, um, 20% of all the calories in the American diet are from soybean oil alone, not to mention the other oils that you list on your Instagram. So we can all keep track. And so it’s, you know, it’s, it’s such a disaster that really any departure from mainstream is gonna deliver huge benefits. So I, I can’t see the books on your bookshelf if you’re watching on the video, but like, if you grab any diet book off a bookshelf, even one that’s kind of goofy, uh, yeah. You know, the, the brown rice and kale smoothie 30 day detox, guess what? It’s gonna deliver sensational results in a short time in 30 days, because you’re off of the Ben and Jerry’s, uh, and the, you know, the, the, the really truly poisonous and toxic foods,
Zane (00:14:15):
Right? Yeah. Boxed cereal. I mean, you probably saw there was a, a lawsuit, uh, a couple weeks ago, the threatened by the, the cereal companies. They wanted to, they’re threatening the FDA for lowering, for, wanted to lower the, the allowable amount of sugar in what was considered a healthy food. And their argument was, well, that’ll eliminate 95% of the cereals in the grocery store. Yeah. Healthy foods. Exactly. ’cause they have five times more sugar than they wanna allow for healthy foods. But the processed food companies have enough money that’s the second largest lobby group in the country, second only to big pharma. Mm-hmm. And it’s like, they have a lot of, they’re funding these research, studies, you know, they have a lot of pull with our, you know, our academy nutrition dietetics, you know, they have a lot of power with the U S D A.
Zane (00:15:05):
And so that’s why we have guidelines in your doctor might be saying, oh, no, keto might, you know, give you heart disease. Might be a, may be a danger, it might be a, you know, don’t go, don’t go too hard. Just eat less, move more. Because that allows you to eat whatever you want. Hmm. You know, and who can really, when you’re eating those foods, who can really moderate that very well, ’cause they’re so addictive and they’re so, they stimulate hunger, they stimulate your insulin levels, they stimulate your blood sugar. No one can eat just one. Right. I mean, you just keep, you’re gonna, you’re not gonna eat two chips. You’re gonna finish the bag. It’s the idea that you can eat just a little, I mean, few of us, we, we satisfying food, we whole food, you know, meat and fruit and, you know, whole foods.
Zane (00:15:52):
So we get, we get those satiety markers hit, and if we wanna let in a little bit of something that we enjoy small amount, we can do that without going crazy. ’cause we’ve hit our satiety markers with our, with our whole food. Mm-hmm. But if your diet is 65% or 71% processed food, you’ve got these things that are stimulating insulin and, you know, affecting your liver’s ability to, to process fat and sugar. You are, you’re probably pretty helpless as far as willpower goes when it comes to, you know, limiting how much of these processed foods you gotta be eating, you know, that you, you’re at the, you’re fighting a bigger vow than someone who’s 5% of their diet is processed food and trying to limit how much you eat. Hmm. I mean, like you said, you gotta eliminate it right. To, to really let your body change and let your hormonally go back into balance.
Zane (00:16:48):
It’s not just calories, it’s hormones affecting our hunger, our blood sugar, uh, how we process fats. Right. So I, you’re dead on. As long as the ticket says get rid of processed food, then you can accurately, I think, find your balance, find what works best for you. And that may change over a year, two years, five years, 10 years, depending on where you are in your health and your age and your activity level. You know, and we have to allow for that. I think there’s, there’s a little too much of, well, I had made my Instagram handle with carnivore in it, so I better stick to carnivore. You know, you’ve written books, the two, you know, Two Meals a Day, The Keto Diet. And yet here you are very happily say, Hey, guess what? I feel so much better when I have fruit first thing in the morning, or I’m eating, start eating, you know, first throughout the day to fuel my activity level because I’m healthy and I’m active and I feel good. My blood work’s all great. I don’t need to be overly restrictive because I’m not trying to reverse anything. I’m trying to perform
Brad (00:17:59):
Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.
Zane (00:18:00):
And that’s, I think that’s awesome that you’re, you’ve taken that stance and that you’re, you’re, uh, giving people the opportunities to allow themselves to like, okay, I don’t have to brow myself into this overly restrictive diet for the rest of my life. You know, after I’ve corrected my disease, my insulin resistance, I’m fit. I’ve changed my lifestyle. I’m sleeping better. I’m, I’ve got more movement in my life and I want to do more physically. And, uh, I think that’s awesome that you’ve, that it’s kinda like, oh, it’s okay to talk about that <laugh>. You know? I think it’s incredible.
Brad (00:18:40):
Thank you. And again, it’s like once you punch your ticket to a clean eating lifestyle, then we can start to reflect on the importance of, you know, having your stress markers in check. And if we make a scoreboard and we realize that the ketogenic diet, intermittent fasting, low carb, all these things are, by definition, they’re inherently stressful to the body. That’s the mechanism by which they deliver the benefit. So when you’re in a fasted state, your anti-inflammatory gets boosted, your immune function skyrockets immediately. Um, the amazing cellular repair process of autophagy is upregulated because you’re not eating. That’s the body’s response to the perceived stressor and Right. You know, um, the same thing happens when you’re lifting heavy weights or doing a sprint workout or going long on the weekend. And so that stacking, it sounds like you’ve dabbled in, you know, pushed it out to the outer edges. So I’d love to know how the journey has gone for you, where you were you know, getting results with fasting with low carb and then finding that experimentation and layering in your peak performance goals and, and adjusting and optimizing over time.
Zane (00:20:00):
Well, it’s constantly optimizing that <laugh>, it’s always looking at it, it’s always paying, trying to pay attention. Uh, you know, with a, with a big, I, I think my biggest, or or most the indicator I’m paying the most attention to is my sleep. And I’m monitoring it with the ora ring. I’m saying, okay, am I getting enough deep sleep? Why not? Was my sleep disturbed? Was I waking up me lot? If I is cortisol suddenly shooting up at 3:00 AM waking me up? Um, it’s like, okay, so what’s going on? Am I, am I over training? Did I overdo it that day? Did I work out too late? Did I eat too late? But then also, I know on days, like I try to do once a week just to keep myself disciplined and to keep, and kind of keep myself in check after a weekend.
Zane (00:20:40):
Like usually Monday I will fast until dinner. Okay. So that’s a stressful day, and I’ll make that day, I’m gonna push it. I’m gonna drop some water weight. It’s gonna, it’s, it’s like a little metabolic workout for me. Instead of a, a hard workout that day. I’m just fasting till dinner and I drop, you know, two, three pounds of water easy that day. Um, and I know that night’s gonna be oftentimes not my best night’s sleep because of the stress of that day, because of the cortisol and so forth. And that’s okay. ’cause I’ve, I’ve accounted for it, but at the next day, I’m like, okay, I’m gonna start my day eating a little bit earlier. I wanna make sure my workout is a little try to, you know, a little earlier in the day, uh, so I have time to recover from it, and I can get my body back into a parasympathetic state before I go to bed.
Zane (00:21:30):
So it’s that kind of thoughtfulness about I understand these, these stressors. I’m also not, I’m not doing as many fasted workouts as I used to. If it works in my schedule, and I could get done early enough mine, but several years ago, if I didn’t work out till one or two in the afternoon, I, I wouldn’t eat first. I would, I would wait till one or two in the afternoon workout, and then I would start eating that day at that time, maybe it’s a 17, 18 hour fast, and then have dinner. And sometimes if I was busy, that could happen three, four times a week. Ah, well, that became, I know that that just element, I’m overdoing it. I think I’m pulling that lever a little too hard. And so if I thought, okay, I’m not gonna work out till two. I better have, I’m gonna go ahead and have some breakfast.
Zane (00:22:12):
I’m gonna break my routine. I’m gonna break this thing that I really believed in, which really appreciate it, the fasted workouts, and say, I think this might be more beneficial to me at this level of leanness at my, you know, I’m, I’m insulin sensitive. What am I worried about? What am I, what am I trying to accomplish here with this? Mm-hmm. Is it better performance in my life or is it, am I, am I really thinking I’m trying to lose weight or improve my fasting insulin? Well, those, I’m not, I’m not trying to lose weight. I’m not trying to improve my fasting insulin. I’m not trying to get leaner. I want to improve how I perform as I get older and maintain muscle mass and maintain, you know, um, have a good night’s sleep, which means I have to manage my cortisol levels well. I’m creating enough stress between my workouts, the occasional fast eating, fairly low carb. I have enough stressors. And so, and you have to work that in with your work life, your schedule, your, you know, your family schedule. And so, uh, it’s constantly seems to be moving, but I, but I just noticed that, um, I kind of hit a wall at one point a couple years ago where it was like the sleep was not good. Oh. I was kind of, I always had that achy burn going on. You know, I’m talking about that lactic acid is just there. You fi
Brad (00:23:31):
You 50 plus athletes know what he’s talking about. Yeah. That little bit. Yeah.
Zane (00:23:34):
Yeah. And it’s just, it was like, what, what am I doing? I’m doing everything right. Doing too much.
Brad (00:23:43):
You’re doing too much. Right. <laugh>
Zane (00:23:44):
Too much. Right. You’re scoring to all
Brad (00:23:45):
Gold stars. Yeah.
Zane (00:23:47):
I mean, and that’s the thing. It’s like we kinda get caught in our head with this little bit of ego. Mm. It’s like, no, I can keep doing this. Yeah. I keep doing what I was, I was doing this five years ago. Why can’t I do it now? Mm-hmm. You know what I mean? And, um, it was, it was an ego check for sure. It’s like, okay, it’s okay to not have to hit a little throttle on every single one of these stressors every day, or, you know, three or four or five times a week. Let’s, you know, there’s in season, there’s outta season for athletes. They don’t just, they hit stress all the time. When they go into season, they back off on other things. They have an outer season time where they allow their body to recover. Then pre-season they do, you know, a different type of workout and they feed themselves differently. And like, a lot of it’s in the fitness and we just go the same hard, you know? Yeah. Hard at it year round.
Brad (00:24:38):
That’s a good compare contrast because, um, you know, I’m coming from the athletic background my entire life in the competitive setting where I have a peak performance goal, for example, now I’m going for high jumping and 400 meters, and I’m very interested in my performance in those things. But in the fitness world, it seems like there’s also a, a realm where you’re fit just for the sake of, let’s say, looking good or being fit. And fit is dramatically different than being healthy. But for a competitive athlete in the major sports or in track and field, if you’re not healthy, you’re gonna fall apart. Uh, but if a fit person still has a six pack when they’re disastrously unhealthy, and we know now that, that the information is leaking out about longtime CrossFit enthusiasts, you know, that saying where you can tell a CrossFit person from across the parking lot, uh, but then you can tell ’em up close because of all the scars from the surgeries on their shoulders or knees or whatever.
Brad (00:25:40):
I think that’s kind of, uh, I don’t mean to denigrate the entire, right, you know, protocol there, but in my experience participating in, in not very many CrossFit workouts, but just, uh, talking to people and coaching people, um, about half of the workout is super awesome. And I totally support that broad-based fitness competency and the challenge of running around the block 400 meters and then coming back and climbing the rope. And I feel like around halfway through, I conclude that is the absolute optimal workout even for a fit person like me. And the rest of it’s just getting me tired at increasing injury risk. And I think that’s the same for a lot of traditional fitness programming where the first 23 minutes is badass and super, you know, stimulating, uh, peak performance breakthrough. And then for some reason you can maybe come in as a trainer, um, are you trying to earn your full dollar amount for the hour? So you gotta work the person hard until the hour’s up.
Zane (00:26:35):
Yeah, exactly. And that’s kinda like people, people almost expect to be dragging out of a gym or outta a session <laugh>. And then maybe that’s, if that’s their only one or two workouts a week,
Brad (00:26:48):
Hmm. Different,
Zane (00:26:50):
Maybe that’s a problem as well, <laugh>. It’s like, what else do you do? And he, yeah. I mean, it’s just when you’re babysat by a trainer,
Brad (00:26:56):
You’re not even active. You’re not even doing a baseline level of walking the dog and then you’re going and slamming with the trainer. That’s not gonna, the trainers, that’s not a win-win. The trainer can’t help you too much.
Zane (00:27:09):
No, no, but I, I agree with you that my, usually my best workouts are, I, it’s something where I’m going hard at it for about 30 minutes. Huh. Maybe push in 40 sometimes. But usually that last 10, 15 minutes, I’m like, it’s more of a, it’s more about movement or about working on particular movement that I wanna improve. But it’s not hard. It’s like something that’s more thoughtful and, uh, rotation and, and things like that. You know, working on those kind of things. And I’m working much more, especially over the last couple years since I got older, more mobility where I’ve replaced some of my strength training workouts with a mobility workout, or I’m doing 30 minutes of mobility, floor work, you know, trying to animal flow, that kind of stuff. You know, working, like moving like on the floor with like, you know, the, the animal movements or just stretching and, uh, maybe hanging from rings and just trying to open up the shoulders, the hips. And because we start stiffening up, you know, we, and you’ve seen the old guys, older guys, right ,in the gym who are just in the gym doing heavy work, all the, they walk like robots. Yeah.
Brad (00:28:12):
How about the runners saying, how about the marathoners? Yeah. They’re, they’re hunched over robots hunched over a
Zane (00:28:19):
Especially
Brad (00:28:19):
Robot. Yeah. Yeah. And
Zane (00:28:22):
So it’s, uh, it’s, it’s like, no, I didn’t want that to be me. And so I started looking at these young guys who are doing, I try to learn from ’em. There’s all this new movement, these flow movements coming out and all this stuff with mobility that’s, it’s like, it’s amazing. And you just move better. You feel better. And I think, you know, there’s strength training certainly has it’s place every week, but to try to hit it hard four or five days a week at my fifties, like I did in my twenties, it doesn’t make sense for me, especially trying to do four or five hours of that, I, I just won’t move. Well, I’ll start to get little aches. Things will tighten up hip flexors you know, soaz gets really angry and, uh, the mobility stuff is still a workout. I’m still, my heart rate’s up. Um, I can feel the burning in my shoulders and my triceps and, and just moving that way, but it’s like, I move better. Things are more fluid, you know?
Brad (00:29:19):
Yeah. You don’t have to kill yourself essentially to be super fit. And I’m referencing my occasional workouts with this great trainer in Los Angeles, Jeff Page, and his client, Jeff Rouse, I, I piggyback. And the first few workouts in there were so easy compared to mine when I’m going to a gym and just busting myself and Jeff, the trainer is saying I want you on the mat for 10 minutes doing, uh, this protocol with the exercise ball to activate, mobilize, and all these terms, like mm-hmm. <affirmative>, wait, I can’t just walk right in and do a heavy bar deadlift? And I think a lot of people, um, maybe they, like, they don’t perceive the trainer’s role appropriately. And they characterize the trainer as the, the rah rah person. Just, you know, from, from the movies. Come on, one more.
Brad (00:30:11):
You got this. But really, a great trainer is so comprehensive in their approach and, and looking at the needs of the client and, and varying the, the workouts where only a small piece of the pie is raw energy, expenditure and output. And the rest of it is like technique, mobility, flexibility, and, you know, working on competency, there’s that term technical failure, which I was a new one because I always do 20 reps of my, um, 45 degree dumbbell raises. And Jeff Page is behind me going, you’re done. I’m like, no, no, that’s only 17. He goes, no, you’re done. You just broke because my pinched shoulder blades, the position I wanna maintain starts to cave a little bit on the last three reps. And it’s like, oh. So those don’t even count as reps because you just broke technical failure. And these awakenings have been wonderful, even for me, you know, doing this stuff for a long time. There’s always more you can kind of Realize how to tone down competitive intensity and do. Right. Especially when you’re AF <laugh>. Yeah.
Zane (00:31:12):
Especially when you’re, ’cause who wants, takes a lot longer to recover from an injury. And we don’t, we don’t wanna waste time, we don’t want downtime. We wanna do it right. Work smarter, not harder. It’s, and that’s what it really is about. So avoiding injury and being able to recover becomes much more of a focal point. The older you get recovery is like the gold <laugh>,
Brad (00:31:35):
You know? Yeah. And also, um, you know, I’ve been an elite athlete myself back when I was young, and of course you could get away with a lot more, but when you actually study the elite athletes and look behind the curtain and, you know, realize what’s going on, they are so genetically talented. They’re so well-trained. However, they never, ever bury themselves in training to the extent that the average CrossFit enthusiasts will. And so you can look up Elaine Thompson’s workout on the internet or Iliad Kipchoge, and they’re like, wow, they trained so incredibly hard. But for them, it’s like the average person doing, um, you know, five second wind sprints and then walking for a minute and doing four of those and their workout’s over, comparatively speaking to how much, you know, stress that prompted on the body. Same with Kipchoge. His easy day is 18 mile run at six minute pace.
Brad (00:32:27):
And you’re like, whoa, whoa. Who, what at altitude? Holy crap. But guess what his marathon pace is? Oh, it’s four minutes and 32. So he’s going a minute and a half slower than his marathon pace, which for the average marathon runner is gonna mean you just went down to a brisk walk instead of a jog on your easy day. So we don’t even reference this beautiful example of the elite athletes correctly because we fail to adjust for these variables. Like they’re more genetically the talented than you. They have, you know, more capability for stress and they’re not even stressing themselves as much, even though they have higher capability for stress.
Zane (00:33:06):
Right. They’re training at 70 or 80% of what they can actually
Brad (00:33:09):
Accomplish. Yeah. And you’re like, accomplish, wait, wait, 70 or 80%. I’m, you know, making these calculations when I go out to the track. ’cause I have a tendency to overdo it. ’cause I get pumped up, I get excited, I feel great at the time. Then the next day I realize when I’m limping through the house, oh, I might’ve overdone it a little bit <laugh>. But it’s like, if you take your best time, or I guess in the terms of weightlifting, you know, you take 80% of your single rep max, you’re looking at quite a modest effort. And it’s hard for the average competitive minded person type A driven person to think, what am I doing in here? Especially paying this guy to watch me as I do dead lifts with 175 pounds instead of 240 or whatever you’re good at, you know?
Zane (00:33:51):
Right, right. Exactly. And that technical failure, I think, point, uh, is something that is totally overlooked when, when people think failure is when your legs are shaking, can’t stand up and you’re, and if, Hmm, I yeah. Function, it has to be functional, you know? And I think as the older we get, the more so we have to think about functionality. What is this really helping me do? But I do like your comparison to athletes. They train what the, the amount they need to train to help performance for a particular sport or activity. And then they judge their performance or they judge their success based on the performance in the activities. Not judging the performance in their training as far as in the gym with the weights or with a, it’s more about, okay, well how does this facilitate better performance in my sport or in my given favorite activity?
Zane (00:34:48):
And or, and if, and if, if you don’t have that, how about in your life? So we have to look at what are your performance indicators, whether that’s your sleep, it’s your mood, how well you’re doing at your career. Are you run down when you’re going to work because you’ve been pushing it too hard? Or are you hitting that work, you know, your business like an athlete? Are you getting it with that full swallow? ’cause that’s where do you wanna perform? I don’t think the gym should be the place where we ultimately judge our performance. And
Brad (00:35:22):
Unless you’re, unless you’re going for the pro power lifting. Right? But I mean, if that’s you,
Zane (00:35:27):
If that’s your sport, yeah. Then judge it for that, for your sport. But I mean, even those guys take time off where they’re like working on technique, speed, you know, they’re going with a lighter weight to, to like, like how, how quickly can I move this? So they can’t even, those guys aren’t doing one to three maxing or one or three rep max every time they go in the gym. They might do that, you know, periodically. But then they’re, they’re doing what’s 80% of that? And let’s work on speed. Let’s work on four, let’s work on, because if they’re hitting one rep max at their top end a hundred percent every single time they know they’re gonna overdo, they know it. But that’s what the average person does when they go in the gym. They hit maximum level every time they go in. And they, over time they do that. If they, if they get that going off it enough, they’re gonna overtrain or injure themselves, like you said. Yeah. So, um, I think that is a paradox shift we need and to change, again, more mobility. I’ve seen you, you have your own mobility routine as well. That’s, you can’t under, you shouldn’t underplay that. You shouldn’t under, people shouldn’t think, well, that’s just stretching, or that’s not really a workout. That’s not really, that doesn’t count as my No, that counts <laugh>,
Brad (00:36:42):
<laugh>
Zane (00:36:43):
That counts. I mean, you make, I would say you make that count. You had to shift time, you had to make time for that. You had to make energy for that. Correct. I mean, you,
Brad (00:36:50):
Yeah. I think one, one big adjustment in the older age groups here is that I’m doing so much more under the radar type of activity and much fewer badass workouts where I’m going in the gym and kicking butt and shuffling out. And those feel good to the ego. They give you that boost of endorphins where you’re in this pain killing euphoric state after pushing yourself. And again, the harder you push yourself, the more endorphins are flowing, the more you’re gonna be on this chemical high afterward, however, the consequences are much more severe. So I continue to make this mistake today where I, I dialed it up a little too many notches, <laugh>, and then I experienced maybe it’s a three day, um, you know, delayed recovery or in the case, I, you know, I had foot surgery last November, as the listeners are probably aware of.
Brad (00:37:43):
And so I look at that with, you know, a big giant l on my forehead. Like, you idiot, you obviously overdid it because you don’t go into the surgical room unless you made mistakes in your training protocol. Mm-hmm. And my mistake was going to the track and feeling great because it’s so fun to push yourself and challenge yourself and set goals and time yourself. And I thought I was doing fine, because at the time when you get, uh, inflamed, uh, joints and connective tissue, they feel fine, even if they were a little achy and creaky beforehand. So now, like one of my new insights, you’re talking about sleep as a metric, and I wanna talk more about that. But like, one of my insights now is like when I get outta bed first thing in the morning and walk down the hall, that is my most important assessment of joint connective tissue function and status. Not 27 minutes into my morning routine when everything feels fine and is warmed up and my stiff lower back is now, you know, feeling okay. And, um, boy, that’s kind of an awakening that Dr. Gollotto said quote, the tendons fool you when they become inflamed, end quote. And I’m like, holy shit!. Of course they do. Because every time I went to the track and worked out, I wasn’t having this horrible aching heel that was only the next morning after my workout where everything warmed up and felt fine.
Zane (00:39:04):
Mm, that’s true. Yeah. Once they warm up all the, the fluids flowing in the joints and it’s warm and blood flow’s going. Yeah. It covers up the pain by necessity. It’s like survival really for, if you were, you know, a human trying to like patch food or run away from a predator, you, it was no time for pain. You had to, you had to get your thing done, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But yeah, that, that morning, like, what did I do now? Kind of question. It’s just like, you know, why does that hurt this morning? What did I do in the middle of the night? Now? It wasn’t what you did in the middle of the night, it’s what you did yesterday or the day before that’s catching up with you. Everything cools down and that you’re right. That’s a great indicator of where you are.
Brad (00:39:50):
So tell me about how sleep has become the centerpiece of your evaluation of your lifestyle, your training program and everything put together.
Zane (00:40:00):
Well, it’s definitely a work in progress, I’ll tell you that. I’m still figuring it out, but I’m looking at, I’m using an aura range. Whoop is a good one too. But I think some, we need some metric just to say, okay, I was in bed for seven hours or eight hours. I don’t think that’s enough. I think we need to start looking at qual sleep quality. And so there’s a lot of metrics measured by those things like body temp, burn rate, um, restlessness, right? Your oxygenation, time in deep phase of deep sleep and then time in REM sleep. And I, I’ve seen that many men, especially as they get older, they start losing that deep sleep gets much, uh, much narrower. They get very, very, they get less and less deep sleep, or it’s random. They randomly get in the right, which you want about 10 to 15% of your sleep time to be in the deep sleep phase.
Zane (00:40:51):
And many of us are coming up short at like 3 or 4%. And we’re not feeling recovered. We’re feeling a little sluggish. We’re not recovering from our workouts. And I, there’s a lot of things that can affect that, like alcohol, right? Eating a big meal too late can certainly affect that. Staying up too late, the whole Netflix and, you know, let’s just watch one more and push your bedtime back an hour, hour and a half, two hours when and you, if that window of time for deep sleep is, is early in your, usually early in your, uh, sleep schedule in your, in your night of sleep. Mm-hmm. So you can push, you can disrupt that just by staying up too late. Over training can certainly affect that. So, I’m try to judge, okay, why, you know, I gotta look at it. What happened?
Zane (00:41:39):
What disrupted my sleep? Have I been pushing the hard workouts too much? Okay, take some time, just do some walking, some activity, you know, you know, light activity, stretching, try to stretch and nasal breathe before going to bed, hot showers, those kind of things to help with getting your body ready for that. And, and those and, and those other indicators like body tip, if it’s not getting low enough, if your heart rate is staying too high, all those things, they’re one, they’re, they’re affected by what you did that day or maybe the previous days. And they’re effect, and they have an effect on the quality of your sleep. And so, um, I, since recovery is really the, the focal point that keeps you moving, keeps us moving forward, right? It allows us to keep, we can push through it if we want to. But, you know, the question is, should we, how are we recovering?
Zane (00:42:32):
Especially as we age, that’s what’s gonna keep us outta the hospital, out of the surgical room, you know, out of keep us moving forward and performing well at our given careers is our ability to recover. And too often that is sabotage. And I think sleep has, we say, oh yeah, you definitely need sleep, but well, how do we measure that? And so it’s easy to measure food. We have all these food trackers, our workouts, you know, we, it’s, it’s obvious ’cause we’re awake, but when you’re, you really don’t know how you’re sleeping <laugh> when you’re asleep, when you’re in bed, unless it’s just obvious that you didn’t do it. And so looking at these metrics, I’m trying to look to say, well, what had the negative effect without positive effect? And getting in that parasympathetic state prior to bed seems to being, uh, the key rather than going go, go, go, go, go.
Zane (00:43:23):
And then, like, some people keep, you know, you keep working, you keep talking about work after work, taking work calls, working, you know, at your computer right at the time, you know, 10 minutes before you go to bed, you’re no wonder your brain won’t turn off, right? It’s having downtime, not putting a heavy meal in your belly. Not try to, you know, have a heavy workout, right? We’re going to bed. I mean, you wouldn’t do that. We, we know better than that, right? We’re not gonna go do deadlifts an hour before we go to bed. That doesn’t make, you’re gonna, you’re pumping your body up. So, um, but all of these factors I think have been underestimated. At least they were in my life. Uh, they’re the impact of these factors on our, on our sleep. And so moving my evening meal, making sure I’ve got that evening meal done by a certain time, making sure my bedtime fits in a certain window, getting away from the phone and getting away from work a couple hours before, you know, work related activities, at least two, maybe three hours before bed, blue light blocking glasses to try to keep out any kind of LEDs and, you know, just light the, the full spectrum light coming into your eyes limit as much as possible.
Zane (00:44:32):
Those kind of practices, which would really emulate maybe if we were just, you know, 200 years ago working on a farm. Well, when the sun goes down, uh, can’t do much more work. You might read by candlelight, but you’re not gonna have a lot of light blazing in your eyes. You’re not gonna be doing heavy labor. You’ve been doing that all day. And, as you know, getting up and getting some sunlight in your eyes, first thing also impacts the, your quality of your sleep. So get outside, see the sunrise, get walks, get, get outside in some way to get sunlight in your eyes during the day. And those little things have a big impact in your body’s understanding of your circadian rhythm and, and in knowing when to get in that parasympathetic state. But I think in our current lifestyle, especially in the West where it’s very career driven, it’s very go, go, go, go.
Zane (00:45:24):
It’s a hardcore, it’s like, well, I haven’t got my workout in yet. It’s so 7:30, I think I’ll, I’ll just try toque it in now, uh, and then try to be in bed in two hours. It, it’s, it’s, it’s, we’re over again, over leveraging these stressors. And it’s gonna, it, it, it definitely has an impact on our sleep quality. And so I have, I, I’m saying I’ve got it figured out, but I can certainly tell like, oh yeah, I could, I, I overdid it here, here, and here’s the, here’s the, uh, the results. Um, where I ate too late that night, or I was up too late doing, working on a project and my brain just didn’t turn off. So I woke up at 3:00 AM staring at the ceiling with my heart going, boom, boom, boom, boom. You know? Mm-hmm. So it’s again, a work in progress, but I’m paying attention to it. I’m monitoring it, <laugh>, trying to manage it. Um, but I’m finding it more and more important and more as I get older to, to make sure that that is something I pay attention to so that I can perform well and, and recover. And it’s become more vital to me now than than ever, you know?
Brad (00:46:33):
Do you think the technology gives you additional insights beyond waking up in the morning and feeling okay or feeling a little drag?
Zane (00:46:43):
I think it helps, it gives me some insight in that, okay, what, what metric was off? So was my heart rate too high? Heart rate’s, okay, okay. Body temp is a little high. Maybe that’s ’cause I ate too late or, um, it, it, it’s, it helps. I mean, I, you could argue maybe you got too many metrics to worry about, but, um, for me, the metrics helped me look back and say, okay, what would’ve affected this particular thing that’s off? Or do I feel good because of the amount of time I spent in bed? Or was it because my deep sleep specifically was a little bit longer that night? Um, and what did I do? It allows me to see what I did. I did, right? Like, look at the day and okay, what did, what went right? What was the effect? What went wrong? You know, without a bad night of deep sleep, okay, what did I do that may have affected that? And it’s allowed me to look a little closer at like, just how sensitive, uh, my deep sleep is to certain lifestyle habits. I had to try to put, connect them together, you know, to as, as a far as in terms of timing, you know, that for that day. So, I mean, I’m a geek on this stuff, so I just try to, you know, metrics are kind of fun in a sense. Yeah.
Brad (00:48:05):
That’s also an important statement because you hear people averse to it, my man Mark Sisson is touting himself as the anti-tech guy. And I kind of have a lower tech approach to training just from my history of going around and riding my bike before we had wattage meters and things like that. And, you know, just being like reluctant to fill up with more technology. However, the, the mere, um, fact that you’re a geek about it, I implies that you have, you know, a heightened interest and awareness to getting optimal sleep and also good critical thinking ability to realize that yes, that late night meal with the alcohol did indeed adversely impact your sleep. It’s kind of an obvious insight, but the fact that you’re tracking it and noticing it, and you have your beautiful little graph with a bunch of smiley faces and then a frown I think we all deserve to be more connected to the importance of health rather than just breezing through our days, weeks, and years with, you know, putting it on, uh, number seven on the priority list.
Zane (00:49:10):
Right. Well, I mean, and I, I, I respect actually, Mark Sissons figured several things out. He’s 70 years old and our attorney 70 this year, I think he’s, he’s, he’s a, he’s like the epic, you know, 70 year old man right now. I mean, he, you know, he’s just a, he’s a study. He’s been the leader in all these things. And I certainly would respect his decision, Hey, if his sleep is working for him and he doesn’t need to manage it with tech, God bless him. You know, uh, I envy him. I hope I get to that point. For me it was a point of, of it was my, it was like my Achilles heel. It was like the thing that was affecting my ability to really recover, um, or it wasn’t, or was a good indicator of what my lifestyle, my choices were creating.
Zane (00:49:54):
And so I wanted to get eyes on it because a little closer and get a little more geeky about it because it was so important. And I had been missing it. I had been missing it for missing it as a indicator or as a, uh, for so long. It’s like, okay, what am I doing? How close, how much do I need to thread this stuff back? How much do I need to pull back on the fasting? Do I sleep better when I, I sleep better when I have breakfast? Imagine that. So I have a full breakfast, maybe a workout and then, and a meal after workout meal and then dinner at a early hour. Oh my gosh, the schedule affects my, improves my sleep more so than trying to push an 18 hour fast four days a week, you know, and pack in two giant meals with a workout before the first one that’s, you know, high stress work.
Zane (00:50:42):
So it may be, I, I dunno if it gave me, I would say it gave me the reason to throttle back, but it gave me the metrics I needed to say. Okay. So everything I’ve been, you know, going full throttle on is because of my level of, of, you know, diving into those things it was, was having a negative impact. And I needed the metrics to show me what having a more moderate routine in those regards, you know, allowing myself to be fueled before a workout, allowing myself to get fed early in the day, really had a benefit to this area where I was lacking. And so it was almost like gave me the, the excuse to not have to go so hard. It was like, give you the excuse to, to take care of myself and not feel like I had to pound my head into the wall with every single thing I was doing with my diet, with my exercise and, and say, okay, it’s, it’s good to have recovery days.
Zane (00:51:47):
It’s good to have more moderate workouts. It’s good to, to feed, be, it, it, so most of, I see most of fitness, I, I see this for a time, especially with the bodybuilder world. Everything’s about anabolic. It’s gonna be anabolic, anabolic. So you see this overfeeding, overfeeding, overfeeding and I’ve always thought, you know, we, we can’t truly have anabolic response. You need some catabolic in there to create that kind of your slingshot, right? You need to pull back. And then you either you have catabolic, it’s a balance. You gotta, if you have, if you’re just fed, fed, fed, fed, fed, that’s like say high insulin, high insulin, high insulin all the time, well, obviously we know you get ultra growth, you get, you know, tons of growth. Well, that’s not always good devil. You need some time where you, you have cleanup, you have repair, you have time just to, um, to kind of clean house, so to speak, and to make insulin more, making body more sensitive to insulin. It needs a time when it doesn’t have it hidden it all the times, but I was going too far anabolic. And so it’s finding that balance between anabolic and catabolic that we all want, where we have the health and longevity benefits from the catabolic state periodically, and then have recovery within the anabolic and growth and performance. And it’s, it’s, it’s again, fighting that balance. And, uh, sleep, just, I just found sleep to be my, one of my better metrics for determining if I was hitting that balance,
Brad (00:53:13):
Right? If you’re just measuring fitness, fitness is a fight or flight engagement to see how how much you can lift the bar up or how fast you can run around the block. And that’s not gonna be <laugh> relevant to your overall state of, you know, stress, rest balance and, and long-term, uh, wellbeing because we haven’t checked in on the parasympathetic side. And, uh, seeing if you’re nurturing that. So I like that you can go track your fitness during the day and then track your sleep at night. And, um, hopefully those things will trend together in a, in a positive nature. They, they have to,
Zane (00:53:53):
They need to for sure. And, and again, I think as we age becomes more and more important to, to pay attention and, and make sure that’s happening because, I mean, it’s just not, it, it’s not, it’s not easy. That’s what he said. It’s not easy as we get older to stay healthy, to stay fit, to have that motivation and your motivation can be affected, your mood can be affected. If you’re a rundown, if you’re constantly running yourself, I, it’s gonna affect your mood. It’s gonna affect your performance in that workout, your ability to stay focused, your career, your family. You don’t wanna get moody with the wife because you’re working out too much. That’s not a good idea, <laugh>. So, uh, you have patience. You wanna be able to enjoy, uh, your life and not just think you’re, you have to beat yourself into some sort of submitted fitness, you know, God of some sort.
Zane (00:54:43):
You know, this is not, well, we can’t be Marvel superheroes, so it’s because we’re just pounding, pounding, you know? That’s, that’s, um, it’s, we, we have to, we have to live in these bodies and we want ’em to last a while, you know what I mean? Mm-hmm. The joints, the, the nervous system, the, you know, your, your hormone, like you said, the parasympathetic balance. Those are all important things to nurture. And, and as you said, it seems like it’s all been about fitness, the gym muscles, strength, you know, the, the weight on the bar that has been the primary metric for so long that I think where we were missing, we’re missing what it’s really for, you know, which is to perform it on the performance side, and that’s your everyday life. How does that, how is that affecting how you engage with people and complete and finish your goals for your life on a regular basis?
Zane (00:55:41):
And I think, think about, I mean, there’s a lot of people who are completely neglecting their fitness, and they may be looking at us thinking, those people are crazy. They’re just beating themselves up. Yeah. But, but if you think about getting yourself in a healthy state in your fifties and sixties, what that would do to your career, what would it mean financially or personally to add 10 more years, healthy years to your career life when you’re at the peak of your career, when you’re at the point of your life, you have the most wisdom and insight and experience, and yet your body’s falling apart. Yeah. And you can’t put it to work. You can’t leverage that. Hmm. I mean, we need to think about how do we make these things come together where you have a healthy body, great sleep, your career is, is still, you’re pushing forward and accomplishing whatever goals it is you wanna accomplish, and you have the energy to go have fun as well in these, in this time of your life, when you probably have the means and the time to do so, more so than you did in, in your thirties and forties, because you’ve created some level of success.
Zane (00:56:48):
There’s a benefit to, to health that, that a level of health that would keep you out of the hospital, off the meds, and really able to function on a high level at the same time, you’re at the peak of your experience and wisdom.
Brad (00:57:05):
Yeah. Usually those maybe don’t match up too well.
Zane (00:57:08):
They don’t. They kind of pass each other Right. About 43, 44, they gotta go, you know? Yeah. And so to keep, be able to keep going with that, I think that if we start posing fitness for people our age and that light, like what does that mean? What would that mean to you to have 10 or 15 extra years in your career? We think about life expectancy going to 80 and 90s. Well, maybe we need to change our paradigm about what fifties and sixties need to look like and what kind of health and fitness we need to be in, in our fifties, sixties, and seventies. Um, when our life expectancy is being pushed out 10 or 15 years as well.
Zane (00:57:51):
You know, maybe in your work life, work at what you want to do, work as much as you want. Maybe you can pull back, you know, work as often, but to still have those things you can, you’re able to do because you want to do them. You’re working at things that you enjoy and that keep you busy and keep you ch you moving towards goals that are bigger than you that you wanna achieve into your seventies. How awesome is that? Like your buddy Mark launching a shoe company at 69 years old, you know, I mean, that’s epic. I mean, who watches companies at 70 years old? So, yeah.
Brad (00:58:29):
So with your clients over the years, what are some of the trends that you’ve seen? Like what are they coming in looking for at first? Do they respond to some commentary like you just provided? And, you know, what are some of the challenges you’ve had to work against when we’re, we’re looking at, you know, average people coming into the gym, well-meaning, well-intentioned, somewhat of goal-driven and, and motivated en enough to, to hire a trainer, and then we, you know, try to bring ’em to the next level.
Zane (00:59:02):
Hmm. Yeah. Changing it makes some lifestyle changes is often difficult because, especially depending on their, the level of fitness. But many times they have their, they’re at a point in their career. Many of ’em are successful. I go to a lot of people’s homes, so they have a home gym situation. They are experiencing that. They, they want to keep going their career, keep charging hard, but their body’s starting to pull back and it’s changing their diet, maybe pulling back on the alcohol, those kind of things. I mean, they’re, they’re willing to put the work in to do the workout, to do a workout a couple times a week, and then maybe add some walking in, maybe some moderate activity. But I think diet and lifestyle where they’re like, you know, they’ve been having fun, right? They’ve been enjoying this time in their life.
Zane (00:59:47):
They have a little more, means a little more time, and they can afford, you know, a little bit of, you know, better, better food, better wine, that kind of thing. More fun time having, having a little more fun. And it’s understanding that, you know, they can still enjoy their life without having to have everything such a, you know, rich level of, you know, indulgence. You know. And I think that they’re, they’re actually gonna, they’re gonna feel better and they’re gonna, their blood work’s gonna improve, but just by making adjustments in their, in the frequency of which they enjoy that alcohol or how late they’re eating or maybe shutting down their work life a little earlier in the evening. So they’re not on the phone 15, 16 hours a day trying to close deals. It’s like, you know what, let’s, how about can, can you still be successful and keep it to a 12 hour day, maybe <laugh>, you know, I mean that’s, the, it’s those kind of habits where that, what got them there.
Zane (01:00:50):
So the level of output and the, and the work level that got them to that point of success, um, it has become a habit. And they often, it’s kinda like, what, how we might’ve been with fitness. You have to allow ourselves to go back, throttle back a little bit and understand that, uh, that level of stress at, to the point it’s gonna catch up with you and it’s causing increased cortisol levels. It’s gonna, it’s gonna affect your heart, it’s gonna affect your insulin levels. It’s gonna affect that visceral fat building up under, under the belly. And, uh, that alcohol. Yeah. You cannot drink like you did when you were 35. You’re gonna have to scale back. That’s affect the visceral fat cortisol levels. You know, it’s your sleep. And there’s those reality checks where, uh, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s hard sometimes hard for them to, to understand as well.
Zane (01:01:47):
They can’t just, they want to just go in and do a workout and feel like that’s gonna fix it. And you really need to take a complete lifestyle approach where you’re looking at, you have to prioritize your sleep schedule. You need to, you know, like I was doing where you affect with your meal schedule, what is your, you know, how often are you drinking, getting away from, from work a few hours before bed to let your body calm down, to get a para- sympathetic state. That’s be much harder as we get older. You know? So it’s accepting that, um, your age has an impact and your, these things you’ve been, you’ve accustomed to, they brought you this level of success that for the last 15, 20 years, maybe that level of work isn’t, isn’t benefiting you right now. It might benefit your bank account, but it’s not benefit
Brad (01:02:41):
Being, you’re being so gentle, kind and loving, hitting the, hitting these guys with the, you know, the reality insight, dude, wake up. Yeah. It may not be benefiting you. Possibly not. Yeah,
Zane (01:02:54):
Yeah. Your body, your body’s pushing back. Let’s look, look at your blood work. Look at that gut, how, you know your felt, you know, that it’s unnecessary to, to be there at 55, 65 years old. We know this. ’cause there’s, there’s healthy people in those age groups. You don’t have to, you can still be successful. Yeah. And not, and work hard without being unhealthy in your fifties and sixties. We know that now, that way may not have been the model or the paradigm in the seventies and eighties.
Brad (01:03:25):
Yeah. But it is, well, um, he, he, yeah. You know, the, the, the executive, uh, legend Jack Wells from GE and his, his autobiography, and one of my favorite passages in there, most memorable, was how he was talking about how the, the leading executives were all expected to come in and work on Saturday. It was just part of the culture at GE. And he didn’t think anything of it. We wanted to dominate the world and all that. And he says, I missed out on a lot of life experiences, uh, due to that, you know, corporate culture. For example, my children, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It’s like he used his children as a, for example, or a for instance, like, let me think of an example. Oh, my children. Which, you know, for me as a parent, like my kids were the centerpiece of my life when I was raising them.
Brad (01:04:10):
I couldn’t imagine, you know, missing out due to the corporate culture of being expected to show up and work another day after we worked five hard days already. But it was so funny as he just like enlisted that as, as one of the examples besides his golf score, <laugh> and his, um, whatever else, you know, time watching movies and his children. Whew. Rough man. But yeah, we’re, we’re revolving now to realize that we can excel on different platforms and that they, you know, weave together and an executive’s physical fitness is certainly gonna support their cognitive performance and their overall, you know, management of the stress of running a business or, you know, excelling at a high level in career.
Zane (01:04:49):
Right, right. And, and, and, and for longevity, I mean, to continue to be able to continue to do that. Yeah. Beyond the army,
Brad (01:04:56):
It’s like longevity. You’re talking about extending your career peak performance, but like, what about if you are a badass and you get to retire <laugh> and you’re a broken down piece of crap with all this money, it’s like, what was all that for? You know?
Zane (01:05:09):
Right. Right. Now you manage your meds and you’re, you know, <laugh>,
Brad (01:05:13):
You move closer to, you know, people are moving and referencing that. There’s, there’s good hospitals in the area. I’m like, holy. If that’s one of my protocols, <laugh> for where I wanna spend my later years. Right. Um, you know, just, just slap me in the face.
Zane (01:05:27):
Right. Right. That should, yeah. There’s good healthcare nearby. Oh, oof. Wait, brutal. What? Yeah. Oh,
Brad (01:05:31):
What about a gym? Is there a good, any trainers around <laugh> either there, ask the realtor. Show me. Yeah. Can you show me some trails instead of a hospital? Oh my gosh.
Zane (01:05:40):
Yeah.
Brad (01:05:41):
Well, you’re fighting a good fight, man. Uh, tell us a little bit about your relatively newly launched podcast, and especially how you came out of the gate swinging with these great, you know, uh, orations where you’re, you’re taken down. You’re, you’re taking on the big pillars of conventional wisdom and, uh, kicking out of the gate really nicely there.
Zane (01:06:02):
Well, thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah, it’s called Healthy AF, which stands for Healthy After 50. Now <laugh>, if, if AF wants, do you wanna interpret that as after 40 or, and fabulous or as whatever you wanna put on there, that’s whatever motivates you. But for me it was healthy after 50, ’cause I’m 52. And I like, you know, maintaining health longevity long-term. That’s what it’s about. So like you said at the first of the podcast, you know, whether you’re under 50 and you wanna be healthy after 50, listen up. If you’re over 50, you got some catching up to do. Definitely listen up. This, so I did, I wanted, I packed it about six episodes for launch that were just me talking about some of my basic pillars, like avoiding seed oils, understanding why our nutrition guidelines are so skewed in the wrong direction, taking us for, for so long because of the, the influence of processed food companies on our, on our, um, on those who, who make our guidelines.
Zane (01:07:00):
And, uh, just, and, you know, movement, sleep, diet, you know, those big three pillars. If you can manage those levers, you’re, you don’t have to get too, you don’t have to tinker too much. If you get those three things in line, you’ve, you’re 80% towards perfection. I mean, you really have, um, those are, those are your biggest levers. So I wanted to come out with some kind of basic rules, or I say rules, but mantras that I follow and then make them, make them how they work for you. You know what I mean? They have to fit into your lifestyle. And that’s why I did do the one episode, as you mentioned about let’s, let’s just avoid processed food, seek to whole food, and be, and understand who the real enemy is and be on the same side. You know, understand that a, you know, this plant-based diet stuff that’s coming at us right now is leaving out a very important group food group that, that provides health for us that we cannot recover from.
Zane (01:07:58):
And we cannot live long-term in a healthy state without animal foods. You know, that I, that is my opinion. I don’t think that they’re replaceable. And so I’m okay with saying, Hey, animal-based or some level of, you know, animal centric foods, those, those should be part of our, our whole food diet. Uh, but you know, how much, what that, what that looks like, how much plant, you know, whole food versus animal, whole foods, you have figure that out with your lifestyle. So those kind of things where it’s like, let’s not, let’s not get too dogmatic. Let’s set down some pillars, but understand what the real enemy is. And it’s these toxic clues that didn’t exist 200 years ago coming into our system. And that’s where we’ve seen the changes in, um, metabolic disease over the last a hundred years. Starting, you know, 1911 with Crisco and moving on to soybean oils.
Zane (01:08:49):
And then we see the, the beginning of heart disease showing up in our, in our western culture over the last a hundred years, we see diabetes starting to get tracked. Not until the fifties we didn’t even have evidence of type type two diabetes until the thirties. Obesity level was 1% 1900. Now it’s at 42 heading towards 50. And even in the seventies, that was like in the what, 10, 11%. Wow. Seventies. And so these are new things. We aren’t dying from famine, war, infectious disease anymore. We created our own diseases out of our diet and our culture and, uh, of, of, you know, quick, easy food, highly processed food. Restaurants using these processed oils. And this is, we have to call out what the real enemy is here and not think that a calorie is a calorie, you know, we can just scale back on the amount that we eat, but what, what we choose to eat is, you know, kind of just, just depends on the, what the, the calorie count, um, that’s led people in the wrong direction for at least 50 years now, <laugh>.
Zane (01:10:01):
And, so that’s what I kind of came outta the gate swinging with and, and I’m looking forward to having more guests on. I wanna have you on for sure, love to, but to, because, um, I just, oh, again, I’m seeing, I’m seeing a lot of people responding who are in their thirties and forties, uh, to the healthy, a healthy after 50 message because they’re, they want that, they want, they know they gotta start now in their thirties and forties. If they want to be truly healthy when they hit 50, keep going. That’s not something, it’s really, it’s not really easy to turn that around once you’re in your fifties. Mm-hmm. You’re much better off starting that lifestyle, uh, ahead of time and just cruising into 50 with like, okay, I’m making some minor adjustments to adjust for age, time recovery. Right. And tinkering like you and I are, um, because we’ve had a, a, a lifestyle that was focused on, uh, on our health.
Zane (01:11:00):
And, uh, even for us, we have to make changes. You know, we, we, we we’re still learning. Um, but I, I wanted to be that kind of create that place where it wasn’t just, um, a a place for dog dietary dogma, but more like, let’s get on a journey. Figure out what, here’s some things that I found that work really well. Weave these into your lifestyle and, and make adjustments that that work best for your level of wherever you wanna reverse disease or your maintaining a healthy metabolism and your activity level and what’s that? What’s that, you know, doing to your, your sleep and your career? And really make it more of an open community of let’s, let’s just, um, share what we’re learning without being dogmatic <laugh>,
Brad (01:11:53):
That’s not the same. Yeah, that’s great. Uh, people go over and listen to Healthy af Healthy After 50 podcast. Zane Griggs, thanks for joining me. I look forward to being on your show someday. And, uh, thanks for listening, everybody. Zane Griggs,
Brad (01:12:09):
Thank you so much for listening to the B.rad Podcast. We appreciate all feedback and suggestions. Email podcast@bradventures.com and visit bradkearns.com to download five free eBooks and learn some great long cuts to a longer life. How to optimize testosterone naturally, become a dark chocolate connoisseur and transition to a barefoot and minimalist shoe lifestyle.
