Better Living Through Fitness Science

shenanigans and we're just tickled pink to have her. We we certainly are. Thank you, say my favorite God. So we are continuing today to talk about fitness. We wanted to to talk more about the the science and what we know and what we absolutely don't know, and how exciting all of this future research is going to be. One thing that I think is amazing about fitness is this is such a basic issue and there's so much that like we're still discovering and still haven't things we

still haven't settled. Blows my mind. Well, sure, I mean we've basically been human beings the way that we think of human beings for you know, tens of thousands of years I think years that and and we're still really mystified by how our bodies work, which is I mean partially because of the fact that all of our bodies are very slightly different, which MUCKs things up. And there's

a lot of factors involved. You know, what we're eating and where we're living and uh frog, science is unanimous that the best thing for us is to sit at a desk and watch YouTube all day. Well, then I am set. Fortunately, actually that is not what science agrees is the best for us. No, and we went into that in depth in the last episode. But Joe, can you recap it for us? Really brief recap? Okay, So everybody needs exercise. You already know this, but just be

assured it is a true science fact. Exercise is good for you. The US Health Department recommends that all healthy adult individuals get a minimum of a hundred and fifty minutes of moderate intensity aerobic activity every week, or seventy five minutes of vigorous activity. So basically what that means is like a hundred and fifty minutes of of modern intensity walking, say where your heart rates elevated a little bit or or lighter tasks like you know, gardening and

stuff stuff like that. Um or seventy five minutes of like hard running or intense sport playing something like that, plus two sessions of strength training per week. And how

are we doing? Well? We're not quite getting there. Less than as of the first six months of twelve, less than half of American adults were meeting these we're meeting just the goal for aerobic activity and about what was it twenty point seven percent of Americans between twenty five and sixty four are meeting both of these requirements for

the aerobic activity and the strength training. Uh so, so we're so we're doing We're doing kind of all right, not not not could be great great, Yeah, but we'd like to talk a bit about, um, how science may inform the way we make fitness decisions in the future and reach our fitness goals. And uh it achieved greater performance and utter excellence and mystical power. I can't wait, can't wait for my mystical powers to kick in. Tell

us about your mystical powers. I'm going to keep running and running and running until I can alter space with my mind. Oh wow, that sounds pretty good. You have you have a much bigger goal I have. I think I have like a like actually work out that that couple of times a week that Joe was talking about. That's my main goal right now, not not ending the time space continuum through my workouts. Well he promised you

mystical powers. Hello, Okay, I'm working on a trick where I do push ups, but I'm staying in place and moving the earth. I think when you get there, I want to witness it. It's going to be cool. All right. So this does all tie into to the science of motivations. Um and uh like, like we said a little bit in the last episode, Um, you know, these these are really important for how much exercise you wind up actually getting. UM and and all sorts of things like like the enjoyment,

the challenges. You know, personal motivators like like appearance and weight management and stress management can all be reasons that people work out. Um. Those first to the the enjoyment and the challenge of it tend to be really good indicators of adherence to exercise, which basically means that we should all be playing sports or gamifying things. Again, like we were saying in the last episode, that's pretty rad um.

The the prefrontal cortex rules a lot of how motivated we are about stuff, because that's that's where we reason

and make choices in response to stimuli. Unfortunately, this can kind of work against us because being physically unfit means that it is harder to exercise and that people want to do it less um and and as you know, conversely, as you get more fit, you have better motivation because you're probably you've fallen into a routine, you might have some kind of social contract going on, you're having fun,

and it also just feels better at that point, right. Sure, times, the startup has a lot of eggs and pains to it, whether you have extra weight or not. Even people that look very fit sometimes aren't. In the startup is just painful and awful, and it's hard to sustain, you know, those first couple of weeks, No, I really want to keep going. But once you're into it and your body's accustomed to the movement, it feels better and you want

to do it more, right right. A lot of people talk also about the adrenaline rush that you'll get from pushing your muscles to a certain point. The runners high. Yeah, that's real. I'm not kidding that you read about it the first time. It actually happened to me. After I started running, I thought I was having a stroke. I'm not kidding. Like, I pulled my car over because I was like, there's no reason I should be this giddy for no utter, I'm just driving down the street. Um.

It was very bizarre and wonderful. Now I know what it is, and I know I am not experiencing a cerebral event of concern. It's amazing. It feels like I felt it. It feels like life is good and I want a burrito. Mine was more like screechy happiness, like when you creshed a roller coaster. Like, like, it was very bizarre. You see why I pulled over. It's like I might not be fit to conduct a vehicle at this time. Um, But then it passed. It was getting okay.

So so so these are all These are all kind of in brain hormonal sort of things going on there. There is research that motivation might have a genetic component. Um. There is a study done at the University of Missouri with two groups of rats that that through breeding they created one that really loved to run a lot and

the other were just a little ratty couch potatoes. UM through through a series of ten generations of of tracking how much rats and each breeding group enjoyed running, Like how much given the chance to they would just run on their own and uh and interbreeding um the two the two groups to greater exclusivity. So, I mean that's with rats. Rats are not people. It's a little bit

more complicated with people. Rats don't have as much you know, like Buffy reruns to go through, for example, But you just set it up so you can be on the treadmill and watch the Buffy. That's what I do. I do. I turn on things that I want to watch and I and I bought around my living room with freeweights. That is my basic exercise mode. If you're a wild rat, you really need to be getting exercise a lot. I would think, right, your choices of your behavior option. Yeah,

Like there are no cats in America. We were wrong. Where are these rats getting their information? I don't know. The streets are not, in fact paved with cheese. There were no cats in America. We were lied to live. I thought they get to be catch potatoes and were wrong. It's a secret covert cat operation to misinform rats of other countries to come here, go to America. It's awesome. Well, unfortunately we've really shut down the the rat population intake

through Ellis Island. It's really hard to the rat to get papers there anymore. Um changes, which is awful. Mousko it's anyway, um uh so so so so. Genetics is certainly a factor to to not only how good we are based level at exercising, but also to whether or not we're motivated. But other motivators Again, like we were talking about in the in the last episode, is that

emotional support thing? Um. A meta of you done by the Community Preventative Services Task Force of the CDC found that social support led to people being physically active in longer, more frequent sessions, and that they wound up improving their aerobic capacity, confidence and knowledge, and decreasing their body fat percentages. So when so, I mean that sounds like basic knowledge,

but it's a science fact um and uh. Furthermore, a series of four studies conducted at the University of Georgia here in Town UM published in twenty and found that self control, or the lack thereof, is contagious across behaviors um, which basically means that if you see people, Joe, you were talking about that a little bit in the last episode wherein um, you know the that color color effect, color effect right where wherein Uh, if you're among a

group of people performing better than you, it helps you sure um And and lots of other research backs this up. The Framingham Heart Study, which if you guys have never

heard about, is my personal favorite medical research study. I get super excited about the outcomes from it because, Um, this is spanning a community of over fifteen thousand people in Massachusetts from on and and so, I mean, all of these families living in this one town have just been tracked a whole bunch of their weight and health indicators forever and and yeah. And there was one segment of research that occurred from two thousand three finding that

obesity and healthy weight both appeared in social clusters. Um that that you had an increased at seven percent increased chance of becoming obese if you have a friend who becomes obest within this time period. That's a lot significant. UM. Yeah, way significant, hell is significant. Um. If you're sibling, if your adult sibling became abast seven percent, if your spouse became abst and so yeah, um so so so that

that social motivator is really intense, is what I'm saying. Yeah, it's amazing that we're still learning these things right, right, and that you know, and that it was a it was a huge surprise when this research was published. It was like, oh, oh dear, oh my goodness. I shouldn't have taught that class on how to make mayonnaise, Like, you know, you should always teach a class on how to make but you all know when mayonnaise was invented. I do not. I don't either, but wonder about some

magical magic somewhere in France long ago. Yeah, so we're still learning things like that. Like I Holly told me about something that absolutely blew my mind. Apparently the question is not settled yet what should you wear when you're running? Well, oh it's settled. It is settled by science now. But this is a recent thing. Actually, let me correct, lots of people don't know, which is shocking to me, but only because I crave comfort in all things explained clothes.

And by the way, Holly explained earlier that she has a real love of the history of underwear. So maybe this will inform your I don't know that it will, except I do have a in history. I really love undergarments. I think they're fascinating as an indicator of cultural happenings. But in terms of fitness and running specifically, which is what I do, a lot of cotton is rotten, and there is this thing where people tend to think that now tural fibers must be better their natural fibers, for

heaven's sakes. Um but heads up, not so much when you're running, because cotton is very absorbent, but it is not so good at drying out. But it comes from a plant. How could it be bad? Because if you have a wet thing rubbing up against you for thirteen miles, I'm going to put a safe bet that it's going to start to hurt and become uncomfortable and potentially give you a rash. Also, it's making that fabric heavier, which

is lame. Yes, I scientifically lame. I have taken on a lot of water during a run when I was wearing a costume, and I could tell you by the end of it there was a lot of weight and pain. I have a friend on one of his longest runs ever that he was sort of forging new territory and and he ran a very long run that he had done before, and at the end is nipples were not

in a happy place. I know. That's pretty common. This is one of those things that when if you get into running, there's this whole secret world of information about how that could go horribly wrong. Yeah. And then many many kinds of products that are that are sold to perhaps lubricate things like your inner thighs and your nipples that might get you. Yeah. The big one that most runners that I know us is called body glide, and it's basically like a uh it looks like a deodorant stick.

It's like a bomb type thing that will keep things from chafing so much. I have heard from friends in the military that they just use deodorant. It works exactly the same. So okay, test as you will. But the thing about textiles and cotton in in particular, is that it will As I said, it takes on water, but it doesn't it's not very good at getting rid of that water, so it's just rubbing up against you and

causing blisters. If you have cotton socks, um chafing on your clothes and so it really has been this huge advancement in the last couple of decades in uh what is called sort of tech textiles UH and basically they're made to wick away water. They pull it off of your skin and then it evaporates quickly so you're not dragging it around or living in it. This is due to the wonder of plastics. It is. It's due to

the wonder of plastics and of weaving. They're actually woven in a way that they will channel water in the most dissipating effect, so it keeps water from bulking up anywhere on the garment. It will getting a surface area great enough to to maximize that evaporation effect. Yeah, there's actually like the way that the the we've comes off of the loom, and it's usually with polyestro fibers, often

with nylon involved. They're actually tiny tubes in the textile weave that kind of pull water uh away from anyone's spots. So it's always on the move. And once you're running and that water is getting dissipated into thinner and thinner layers, it's evaporating much more quickly. UH. There will often be an effect where it's kind of a clear thing to test it. So there are two things that are going on. One is this this movement of water where they're circulating

the water away from anyone space. And two is the air circulation around you that's bringing it off, so that as you're running normally, you're creating wind currents around yourself

and that's helping. But if you ever want to test like this actually functioning with and without the wind portion of it, uh, if you run in a small room on a treadmill, you are not going to dry off as quickly because there's just not as much air movement around you, whereas if you go outside and do the exact same run in the exact same temperature, in the same wicking garment, you will be dry much more quickly. Uh. And those will help keep you from getting horrible chafing misery.

It helps with the nipple thing that boys get sometimes women usually are wearing sports bra so it's there. There's a whole other set of physics work there. Um. But yeah, and the textile industry is constantly sort of working to keep these uh, these fabrics advancing and getting better and better at their jobs. And some will keep you warm and cold climates and others will keep you cool in

hot climates. UM. It's very fascinating and good stuff. The some of the stuff I'm excited about, I think I think that you edited an article about this fair how stuff works, Holly was UM people who are integrating some of the UH bio sensors into garments like this and and using so that you can wear a shirt that will a wick your moisture away and be track your activity. Is that there are some there are experimental. There's nothing on the market UM for anybody that watches Project Runway.

Many seasons back, there was a designer named Diana Ang and she's actually from a science background and she's done a lot of really interesting stuff working with UM various sensors and technologies. She worked on a hoodie some years back that had a camera in it that was in the top of the hood so if you're wearing the hoodie, there was a heart monitor attached and when your heart elevated past a certain rate, it would automatically take a picture.

And her idea was one of an artistic concept of like, when you are excited, it will be taking a record of the things that excite you in your life. UH. There are potential military applications to it that I think

have been kind of investigated. I remember when it first came out, there was talk on various um kind of nerdy textile message boards about the potential um application of having people that were, for example, on parole, wearing something like this so that if it looked like they were likely to um knock over once again, like go into a life of crime, theoretically their heart would rise and

it would do it. But textile message boards, there's everything and anything you could ever imagine on the Internet in message board form. I was going to say, is another quick aside that some of this technology, and I think this is on the market in Japan or Korea, that there are ears and tails that they sell that have little little little mini rots and then that will will here, okay, that will react to your heart rate when when you get excited your your tail awag or whatever. You can't

they have them some anime conventions you'll find them. So, but that is getting away from that's like a fun, fun thing, right, But from the fitness angle, it's a very short walk to envision things like that being integrated into your clothes to kind of track how you're doing in your health that you're doing it in your performance. And they're even clothes that are allegedly designed to keep

you warm enough that your basil metabolic rate increases. It's like that you're burning more, more calories faster at all times, even when you're still I haven't tested them. I don't know some some some of those we're going to get in in a minute into some of the kind of what I could do, waste of money sort of things that I'm going to talk about bad exercise science too, and that that that sounds like it's arranging very dangerously

close to. But I want to talk about another issue I've heard about, and this is funny because people have opinions about this one well, about everything related to fitness. There is apparently some debate between people who favor running with shoes on versus people who favor running barefoot. Christopher McDougal,

what have you done to us? I I believe. I believe that if all tell me the science facts, all the terrible understatements that we make on this show, that is maybe one that I'm the most personally familiar with and terrified by. I don't even like saying the word barefoot on the internet anymore. It's like saying Nazis. It's just it's awful. I mean people get up in arms, Um they do so. So so how are you're you're

you're entrenched in running communities? Do do you do? You have a personal recollection of when this whole thing got started? And uh yeah, I mean when it really exploded was when Christopher McDougal's book, which is called And to Run, came out and in it it is a book that's about running but also about cultural anthropology, and in it he talks about the Tatahumara tribe of Mexico and they

are just culturally runners. They run four hundreds of miles at a time wearing nothing but like basically a piece of leather strap to the bottom of their foot. And this sort of launched this big discussion about how no, our bodies are actually designed biomechanically, with without big crazy shoes made in a factory. You were made unner, made to be a runner, and so this must be the right way. These people run all the time, they're injury free,

they must be doing it correctly. This started this huge movement where people were like, I'm throwing out my shoes. Um. I mean I personally have a brother of a close friend of mine who is an ultramarrathon or he will do hundred mile races and this is a great idea, and he ran out and ran like twenty two miles and got a stress fracture because his body. While bio mechanically we may be designed to do that on some level.

If your whole life has not been spent that way and then you start running that way, that's not what your body does anymore, right, sold, just as an outside observer, I mean on that that evolutionary adaptation argument. I mean, they're all kinds of states of nature in which we are evolved to do certain things. But certainly we're healthier if we do them a different way or or or at least more comfortable, or it's what we're used to. And I think that what we're used to is a

larger factor most of the time. I mean, okay, So, so the the actual biomedical end of this is is that people who push for barefoot running say that it's that the most efficient way to run is to land on the fore foot or slightly into the midfoot rum. Rather than he'll striking, he'll striking being Um what a lot of these very padded shoes that became especially popular in the nine eighties, and they really didn't become popular

until the nineteen eighties. Things like checks uh Converse were very popular as actual exercise shoes through the nineteen seventies. Those really were for basketball, right, like heavy impact activity and not for hipsters like me. Right yeah, I mean they didn't wear them to the office or I mean, I guess they could have. But wearing them right now, I am. I mean they're great, they're super comfortable, but um but I cannot imagine running in them. I do

not want to do that now. Um And and proponents of bare foot runnings say that we are right like, more likely to strain our tendons and ligaments and wind up causing either more immediate injuries or long term skeletal issues by doing all of this crazy heel striking. Um and they also will say that our feet would naturally be stronger and able to handle our own weight if we had not munged them up by wearing shoes all

the time to train in right. Okay, So, so the actual research says that yes, minimal running will encourage you to strike in the fore midfoot more so than is actually my natural stride. That's awesome. That is maybe why you are better at running than I am, are more motivated to rent. I have really good natural endurance, and I think it's because I don't tend to get injuries from it. I get some other injuries, but uh, yeah, I haven't had like impact issues. I haven't had shin splints.

That's yeah. I my knees are terrible. But and and and also other I don't know. I'm making Joe laugh when you said other injuries. I just imagine from like you know, knife tricks. I can tell you I do get running injuries. I have tendonitis, and it's because I way too much to run as much as I do. Okay, it has caused some things to tighten up in ways they shouldn't. And I have tendonitis. Well, uh and a

really good physical therapist well excellent science. Um and also walking studies have found that for people, um, I mean these these these studies have been done in people with arthritis and rheumatisms involved in their feet, legs, and knees. Uh. With knees in particular, you should you should walk if you've got issues with your knees in particular, these studies say you should definitely walk barefoot as much as possible because any any kind of soul is going to lead

to UH, to worse impact and more injuries. So so that is those are the two things that I've seen people agree upon everything else, including whether or not it causes less strain or potential injury and the short and or long term, and it's it's I've seen research that

says it both ways. That UM. Some studies say that the four foot strike will help you disperse the impact of running better and and therefore let you run better on harder surfaces without discomfort, but some found increased arch strain and UH plantar flex or force, while four foot striking UM, however, less achilles tendon strain and ne flexation. So it goes both ways. Milner for schitis. Right here

there you go. There is also sort of an interesting middle round that doesn't have so much to do with the footwear running UH, and it kind of has been around much longer than this whole barefoot running thing which exploded, and the idea behind that is very pro four foot striking, midfoot striking really and kind of about handling where your your body weight falls during your stride, But they are not telling anyone to throw their shoes away, so it kind of is a meet in the middle place for

a lot of people. Are right, sure, it's it's more correcting your stride and and working on that, working on being aware of your stride than trying to use shoes or the lack thereof to change it artificially, which is where I think that I mean because research has definitely showed that if you make a change and expect to just go out and run the way that you always

have been, that you're going to hurt yourself. So yeah, and even proponents of barefoot running will say, oh, absolutely right, run half a mile even if you are a marathon or only run half a mile this way at first, and build up because it is a completely different set of muscles that get engaged in the in your foot

right right um. Part of this debate also gets into whether or not it's more bodily economical um in terms of your oxygen and calorie usage to to run um barefoot or not, and that also has to do more with where the foot is striking than anything else, and research also disagrees on whether or not for foot versus hind foot striking is is going to do that thing? Um and and even pro nation, which is a thing

that people have been talking about. Prenation is how much your foot rolls when you land and um and or I guess when you land and then uplift again. It's basically your whole stride cycle from where you impact the ground to leave the ground. But it's a it's a side to side role more than a front to back roll and um and and and even that you know, which we have been taught for years that you know if you over pronate or under pronate, that you need

special shoes. Science is like a my personal experience is

not a but but again, I'm a pronator. Yeah, and I will say uh, for any boy that runs, if you've never been fitted for running shoes, that is a fabulous technological adventure because they will literally like put you good places that do it, and running shoe stores will often have this tech on hand and they'll do it, and they'll put you on a treadmill and videotape you and then they'll still step through that and show you where your foot is moving at every portion of your

stride and then they'll put you on a balance board to see where your body weight naturally distributes anyway, and you get to see a beautiful readout display of the hotspots where you're heaviest on your feet, and then they will help you select shoes and for me that made a big difference. Um, but again, your mileage may vary, as with anything involving fitness, it's these these results are not reproducible in laboratory settings, I think, is the official line.

So yeah, well, and part of that, I think is you would have to monitor the subjects for years and years and years, which is part of, yes, the problem, and that no one has a Framingham heart study of of running a lot. Yeah, especially you would have to get runners just as they're starting to get into running and five years later and ten years later, and how their injuries have or have not happened, which is great. Somebody do that study. I'll read it in ten years

when you're done. Okay, So I want to talk about one more controversial frontier. What no, I'm I'm excited about controversy. Have you all heard of the drugs? The drugs, the drugs. Someone in the corner the other day was telling me about those. Yeah, sometimes drugs can help you get better gains in exercise, but obviously most or all of these drugs come with bad side effects that are worse than

the gains you get in your performance. And the question is, are there any drugs that are basically innocuous enough and helpful enough to be on the whole good for your health? Actually, I think I think caffeine is maybe something that most people could agree is generally okay for boosting your your performance a little bit. Yeah, you will be able to go a little longer, um, push a little harder. In terms of percentage, I don't have an exact number, but

it's not crazy. We should it's a single digit. I think, you know, we should absolutely preface this discussion by saying we are not doctors, we are not health professionals, and we are absolutely not making recommendations. No, no, before you, before you make any dietary or certainly drug related change to your to your self, your whole regiment. Right, had a pro in the mix to talk to a physician,

a nutritionist, a priest, whatever you need to do. Um and uh no, no, but but but the caffeine has been found it has not been found to improve your your oxygen capacity, but right, like Holly was saying, it can. It can let you to train a greater power um and or for longer. It also doesn't have an effect on maximal strength, but can increase your endurance or resistance to fatigue. So, um, that's why my endurance is so good. I drink like tank cups of coffee a day. She does,

It's crazy. I think you meant awesome. We all misspeak. It's fine. Um but uh and and it's also been it also has not been shown to have a significant de dehydration effect on athletes. So because usually you're guzzling yeah, right, as long as you are in taking enough water, which is really important and you should do anyway, Um, then

you should be totally fine. Um. And And furthermore, the amounts that most athletes would take are not at the range that people would start talking about doping and that I mean, I mean, it's all doping, but it's it's not the kind of thing that the Olympics committee would have to get into. Well, they even sell for endurance athletes. You know, you will often buy little gels or goo or some sor whatever food pack that you will have like at some point during your long distance training or races.

And they even make jelly. Belly actually makes these things called sport beans that have like your electrolytes and you know, you get a sugar boost, and they actually do make a caffeinated version of them for runners. They Bertie Bots has not told me anything about this. This is the sport beings of the sport. But I always have some sport beans for a race because I like them because they're easy to handle, you know what I mean. And there's and they sound less gross than the gel packs.

The gel packs are pretty gread. I can't stomach the gel packs. Okay, So y'all seem to basically be saying that, as far as you're aware that there aren't any major medical risks to using caffeine to enhance your workout, somewhat not at the level that you would want to use caffeine at. I think, like anything, if you and and and you know and clearly something like straight caffeine is more effective than drinking a cup of coffee or whatever.

But um, but yeah, I mean I think that you would have to consume way more of it than you would want to to really have a negative effect. Okay, let's go to the other end of the spectrum and talk about some stuff that I think the verdict is in on and they say you really shouldn't use these. How about anabolic steroids. Oh, I had a bunch for lunch. I think I would not. Uh, yeah, I know those

are bad kids. Well if sometimes they can be prescribed for medical reason, well, absolutely, and and steroids are actually extremely useful in um people who have again those diseases in the arthritis and rheumatism kind of categories for helping your joints. Um, it's an anti inflammatory, so it's it's going to help all of your your bones and joints work more smoothly, and um decrease inflammation in them, which

is rad for everybody. Yeah. Um, but those are in extremely, extremely small and occasional amounts, and even those doses sometimes people have negative mood swings are not uncommon. Like with quartercourse, steroids are often prescribed for an inflammatory issue. UM. So even in the small amounts that aren't maybe physically dangerous in anyway, there's still some negativity to them. So once you get to the heavy hitter dosages that we're discussing

or about too. I think, uh, you're really looking at some danger zones. Yeah, I've got a list of risks associated with anabolic steroids. Uh. In a in a little rundown by the Mayo Clinic, they say that some risks both men and women might experience severe acne um, risk of tendonitis or tendon rupture, problems with your liver or tumors. Uh. Basically putting your cholesterol levels exactly the opposite of where you want them. So increasing the bad cholesterol and decreasing

the good. UM. Cardiovascular problems UM, high blood pressure definitely, hypertension UM, and aggression uh, as well as we don't need you any more aggressive. Job pretty Yeah, I know I scare people sometimes. So steroids have two basic effects on the body. You've got the antabolic effects, which promote the muscle building and are going to affect your your

cardiovascular system and all that kind of fun stuff. And then you've got the androgenic effects, which are affecting uh, sexual characteristics and depending on how your chromosomes lay out and so for for example, men can develop prominent breasts or shrink and testicles or infertility or impotents. Women can develop deeper voices, enlarged torus is, increased body hair, also baldness. It's I mean, unfun times super delightful side effects generally

not so much for most. I mean you might be into that I and I absolutely do not want to pass any kind of character judgment. But most people do not want those things. I don't think that. Yeah, yeah, the juries in do not take annibolic steroids unless they've by your doctor. Cent really a huge news flag. Um what about have you all heard of creatine? Oh? Yeah, right, your body makes it naturally, so it has to be good for you as much as possible. Sell it in

health food store. Should should Okay, so this is another Uh, this is sort of the middle of the road, right, this is an anabolic steroids. It's not something that that's this big scary thing. Okay. So so what creatin does in your body? I believe is it it helps your muscles make more a t P. Which is a really long word, t's it's it's it's stuff what stores and transports energy in yourselves? Yea at dinner scene triphosphate excellent. Cool.

Your powers of reading are stronger than mine, Joe, thank you? Um, and so so sometimes because he's been hitting the creatine, he's really at the ready. So so people will take it to provide themselves with with bursts of energy for say like weightlifting or or other. Usually I think it's strength intensive. Yeah, folks who I don't know many endurance people that have even ever discussed it, right. Usually when I have heard it mentioned, it's amongst my friends that

are really going for strength gains. Yeah, it is. It is naturally you you in take it through things like like meat and and other proteins and um, and your your your body, your liver produces it naturally. And we'll also get rid of any excess, which I think is above kidneys. Yes, yes, yeah, above like two grams per day is what your body is Like, that's enough, guys. Yeah.

And so because this is one of the things that your kidneys have to get rid of is that you know, you pee it out you if you take too much of it, this can put you at risk for problems with your kidneys and potentially with your liver too. Um. And so that's a potential risk. But this is another

thing where it seems to be somewhere in the middle. Um, it doesn't seem like it's just this obvious, big no no. But I'm not sure if we could say it's clear that the benefits outweigh the cost, so it's probably best to just talk to your doctor about it, right, especially since some of those costs can decrease your athletic performance, you know, by giving you stomach and muscle cramps, nausea, diarrhea,

and weight game. But in addition to those, I mean, you know, basically the jury is out on and you know, sometimes literally on on what larger doses of this can do. There have been a bunch of lawsuits recently about you know, people have had very adverse effects and have sued some of the companies that create some of the supplements. Yeah, but there well, there seems to be there's apparently a link between UM creating supplements and alleged resulting kidney failure.

I think this is not fully understood yet. UM and we and the thing is, we apparently don't know the long term effects of using supplements. It's like these and especially the danger would probably be in using large amounts of them. But in any case, it's definitely something that again you would want to talk to your doctor before using, and especially certainly in large doses. Yeah, yeah, did you

have did you have any others? Any other exciting another interesting one, Um, if y'all heard of a drug called mo daphanel, it rings a bell, but I couldn't pro vigil that make you extra vigilant, basically, Yeah, it's so you can read about this drug all over the web, and they're the web is full of maybe some of those kind of creepy people, but but you know, people

who are judgmental. See I was going to say, no, not online never, so some some bio hacker types, people who are interested in messing with their bodies to see what they can do. And so this drug originally was designed that the generic term is modaphanel, and it was a psycho stimulant designed to treat anarcolepsy and sleep disorders. Um, but what ended up happening is that people started discovering apparently. And I haven't used this drug or anything like, so

I can't comment from personal experience. People report that it has benefits apart from, uh, just helping with the sleep disorders. People in fact treat it like a kind of life enhancing drug, so they claim that they use it to get all kinds of crazy work done that they couldn't get done otherwise, but without a lot of the negative side effects that you'd experienced from a traditional stimulant. UM. Again, we want to stress, do not take our our little story here and say, oh, I'm gonna go get some

of that. Uh. This is something that uh definitely should be prescribed by a doctor UM if you're going to use it and it but it also apparently manifests in terms of gains in endurance with exercise. There was a two thousand four study UM called the Effects of Acute

modefanitel Ingestion on exercise time to exhaustion. And what this found is that this drug, which apparently again they're these apocryphal reports are it's pretty safe, apparently without a lot of known side effects, UM causes people to get much better workouts before exhaustion. Like it it's sort of delays the onset of perceived exhaustion. People don't realize they're fatigued, so they can go farther, get more exercise, get a better workout each time, which has its upsides and downsides.

There are a lot of I mean, I'm I'm and I think that Holly is pretty pretty with me on the crazy hippie stance of of you should do what's pretty natural for you when you're exercising. Um, you have to do it in that voice though, Um but uh, but a lot of people will say that, you know, if if you're your pain centers are what tell you

when you are hurting yourself. And that sounds obvious, but sometimes a lot of the Fitzbo kind of thing that happens if Fitsbo being fitspiration being that entire concept of pasting a photo up on your fridge of a fitness model with the saying like when it hurts, hit it harder, something like that. Um, And you know, of course, the hilarity being that fitness model is literally paid to look like that, and unless you are also literally paid to

look like that, probably you're not gonna. Um, that might be retouched, and it might be retouched. Furthermore, you don't probably people you know, right, they probably kick puppies. Well, I'm reluctant to say yeah, because there is a level at which you know, you want to be comfortably uncomfortable, like you want to be pushing past absolutely comfort and delight to a belay where your body is challenged because

that is how you make fitness gains exactly. Um, but there are people that take that to a very extreme level and kind of become really delighted in self abuse. And I think when you're talking about a drug that doesn't let you register where your body is actually at in terms of exhaustion, and that sounds like that. Yeah, it seems like a recipe for potential just disaster. Yeah. Okay, well that's another perspective. But you really here is the subtext of Joe going hippies. No again, I am not

recommending people use this drug. I just found it interesting and I'd like to read more research on it. Yeah, I wouldn't. I'm curious, since it requires a doctor's prescription, how many doctors are willing to prescribe it for its AWF label use of this sort of life hack approach. Yeah,

there was. Actually there was a New York magazine profile about modefanel use from this past spring, and it commented on how apparently, uh so, that the there was a great increase in use of this drug over the past decade, and what's estimated is that apparently most of this was for off label use. Yeah, there probably was not a correlating increase in cases of circles in New York. I would I would hope not. If if there were, then I really want to run some social factors on what

was causing UM. Alright, so we've talked about a bunch of stuff that you shouldn't do for exercise. Is there anything that people can do safely that we want to Actually, I mean, as much as we're not doctors, we were not fitness professionals, we can't make actual, literal medical recommendations to you. I mean up to up to an including like, um, don't use weight loss pills and electric shock belts, y'all. Oh yeah, yeah, there's a lot of there's a lot

of crazy stuff on the internet. People are trying to sell you about how to get fit and lose weight. And you know, I hate to say this because I'm sure this will cut out some some totally decent stuff too, but just in general, if it's on an ad it doesn't work, don't don't look at it. It's just going

to stuff. Yeah. Yeah, anything being sold to you in an infomercial, UM, anything very expensive or overly complicated is probably just that it's probably a gimmick, and you know, being used to sell something rather than to actually make people more fit. One weird trick, well, those come up on the Internet all the time, and specifically on social media.

The the one thing that gets rid of belly fat and they want you to click through and yeah, I mean, and I can tell you what the one giving them money. The one weird thing that gets rid of belly fat is eating less and exercising more. And I know that that information sucks. I know that nobody wants to hear that you have to eat fewer calories and burn more calories in order to lose weight. But that's basically what it is, you guys, And you know, like, like I said,

Holly and I are kind of hippies. I personally recommend working out with mostly your own body weight as the resistance. I'm really into that kind of thing. I think. I think it's great to use less equipment that you're you're cutting out potential for injury and overwork if you do. UM. But I like weight training body weight to you, but some weight training, I mean, it depends on what what

effects you're trying to get. Um. You know, the downside of course to resistance training is that you will only ever have as much weight to work with as you carry on your body, which can be a downside if you want to get if you want to lift more than your body weight. Um, what if I want to lift a refrigerator, I need to practice with a refrigerator. Okay, we've we've learned some things here. We've got some good stuff. We've got social reinforcement is good. You've got gamification is good.

You've got textile science advances. Use your wicking materials, right, Yeah, we've got Uh, we've got a debate that's probably not settled about what you should do with your feet. But I guess do what works for you. Basically, do what works for you is really good advice for that one. Um,

we've got a strange discussion about drugs. The generally, I just say, the best recommendation is probably avoided and less for some reason, your doctor tells you to take some kind of drug, and make sure that's a real doctor, not like a duck that you doctor doctor voice right now? No not uh? And and yeah you know like like like reward yourself, Um, not not with food. If you are trying to lose weight, that can be less than effective.

Cut yourself slack. I mean, you know, like like Holly said, sometimes it's easy to get into a pattern of not working out. But if you miss a couple, don't worry about it stressing yourself out as the opposite of the point. Um, my horse, it's fine, you know you can. You can help yourself be on the horse with with by writing down your hands and tracking them. Fitness fitness trackers can help with that. Um, do a little bit here and there rather than really stressing yourself out about doing all

the exercise at a prescribed time every day. Uh and yeah, do it with friends, have fun doing it. Yeah, which sounds so easy. But we'll all be fit and able to run marathons in the future, in the incredible future. Well, if you want to join us there, I think this pretty much wraps it up. Yeah yeah, so so yeah. So you can go to forward thinking dot com. Um that is where you can find all of our other

audio episodes, videos, blog posts. You can let us know what you thought of this very podcast and um yeah, also also on Twitter and the facebooks where you can find us forward Thinking and we will talk to you again really soon for more on this topic and the future of technology. Can visit forward thinking dot com AH brought to you by Toyota Let's Go Places,