Well, hello ladies and gents. Robert Sykes, Keto savage.com. Today I've got special guest Kaylee Herring on the line. She is a West Point graduate in the Army. She is a Harvard Medical student, and she is going to be running her first ultra marathon with a ketogenic low carb
approach in just a few weeks. So I wanted to bring her on the podcast to talk about that, dive into her fueling strategy, talk about her motivations for going through the Army, going into Med school, what she's planning on doing that with that going forward and just learn a little bit more about her. She's doing some awesome things. I've got no doubt that you will take something from this. So that further delay sit back real nice to the conversation with Kaylee.
We are live. Kaylee, how are you? I'm doing well. How are you? I'm doing wonderfully well. So we got in contact through Nick. Y'all both Harvard Med students, correct? Yes, Nick's a good friend and classmate of mine, so it was really a pleasure that he was able to connect us. Awesome, awesome. He's been. He's been blowing up on social media. Right now he's doing all kinds of kind of provocative experience. Yo, yes, Nick always has something up his sleeve.
I I enjoy watching all the things that he accomplishes and I'm always waiting to see what he's got got next. Always something. You get quite a few things up your sleeve too though. You got a ultra marathon coming up this month, correct? I do in two weeks. Actually the countdown, it's we're almost at the taper phase. Nice, nice. Well, give me some some background on that. What? What got you an ultra running? Well, this will actually be my first ultra marathon, which I'm super excited.
But I guess kind of stepping back, I first started getting more into running in medical school. I ran my first marathon, let's see, September of 2021. I just finished up a lot of my clerkship rotations and I really found some clarity and peace and training for hard things. I've always played sports growing up, played rugby in college, so it's just a natural transition for me I guess to start running marathons. And the ultra was a little bit
more spontaneous. I've been following a lot of just ultra athletes that I look up to and I'm like, well, you know, I've got to give this a try. So then all of a sudden I had an ultra on my calendar for July. So I'm just super excited about that. It's kind of just been a new thing for me in the past year and a half, so. I love it. I love it. So when it comes to to fueling for these ultras, you're you're going about it from a totally fat adapted approach. That's that's the goal, right?
Absolutely. And I think that was something that's I was a little bit nervous about at first. I mean, I've, I've never eaten truly ketogenic and that's more so from a lifestyle perspective. I guess it's it was hard for me is in college not having a kitchen where I lived, I lived in the dorm all four years and in medical school. It's expensive just eating in general and it's you have to be
very flexible. So I've never been able to truly go keto until I guess now it's been about half a year. And I guess, I mean, I don't have to tell you, I feel, I feel amazing. And I didn't know how that was going to translate into some of these longer endurance events. But it's been great. And I feel like it's actually given me an advantage in that I'm not coming across a lot of the GI issues I see a lot of other runners encounter.
My energy is phenomenal. And in terms of fueling for this ultra, it's been, it's been pretty easy. I've been not having to require gels every 30 minutes or anything like that. So I've I've just been really loving it and it's really cool to see how an unconventional approach can benefit by me personally so much of my training. So I'm just excited to see how it continues to help me as I keep progressing and hopefully keep getting better and better. Yeah, no, I'm, I'm super
excited. So the marathon that you did, I'm assuming that was more of a conventional fueling strategy. Yeah, it was more conventional for sure. I would definitely was not targeting a fat adapted state per SE. It, it ended up being a very, very big learning experience, we'll call it. I think the only thing I ate during the entire, the entire race, mind you, not in a fat adapted state was a couple of fruit snacks. So I definitely paid for that
one. And the end of mild 20/18/20 I, I hit a really big wall and I was like, OK, something needs to change. I'm, I'm, I don't like to eat really well. I run. I prefer to just focus on the activity I'm doing and not have to worry so much about trying to temper my energy based on what I'm able to take in. And keto was just the perfect solution to that. And I've run, I've run a marathon since then and had a completely different experience. So I was. I'm obviously doing something
right. No, for sure. I, I, I am not a runner by any means. I've done a marathon, I've done a few 50 mile marches. I did like that David Goggins 4 by 4 by 48 ordeal. So I've done a few endurance things, but I've never, I've always done, you know, from a fat adapted standpoint, it's like I've never tried to eat intra run.
But I would imagine that would just cause a whole host of GI issues and just like distractions, like if I'm running a marathon, especially like I feel like if you fuel properly beforehand and you're, you know, on top of your electrolytes and your hydration that there should be really no need to eat during a marathon distance running.
Absolutely. And I mean that's one thing that's so fascinating about the marathon is as you go for faster and faster goal times, the margin of error is so much lower. So if you can eliminate a lot of those variables like the GI distress or all the different gels and like you said, just be on top of your electrolyte intake and really come at it from a fat adapted approach, you won't you won't need to take anything in during the race.
And that's exactly what I experienced and didn't hit the bunk as you might have might hear in some like running communities. So that was definitely made the marathon more fun and definitely makes me excited to try this ultra. No, totally. I I never bonked either. My issue was always just my feet. Like I don't since I don't run really. My feet were not conditioned for the pounding that they took. Like from an energy standpoint, from a fueling standpoint, I never felt a lack of energy
there. But man, my feet were just destroyed. No, I, I totally feel that. I think the time on feet is something that's gonna be the biggest unknown for me going into this race 'cause I did a practice 50K this week and endurance wise, feeling great, fueling great energy was great. But my feet, like you said, I was like Wolf, I've got to do another basically another 50K on top of that. So it's, it's gonna be fun for
sure. I'm excited to see where I can go in terms of the mental, the mental battles I'm going to be facing. What do you do to prepare your your body for something like that? I mean, I guess with time on feet, it's just simply a matter of getting more time on your feet. That's pretty much the only thing you can do. Absolutely. I mean, it's tough to log as many miles as I would as I think I would want.
But having never ran one of these before, I don't actually know where my optimal mileage is at. But being in the hospital certainly helps. I'm on my feet all day living in Boston. I walk pretty much everywhere. So that's helpful from just a day-to-day perspective. But in terms of the actual training side, I've been focusing on just becoming comfortable in the long runs and just quieting my mind and staying patient in just the slow, the slow burn essentially.
And that's allowed me to build a lot of a lot of strength and hopefully that'll that'll be enough to get me through get me through this event. I like it. I like it. I'm always curious. Like how people, like I said, I'm not a runner, but I've, I've dove into running as a sport and technique enough to be dangerous, so to speak. And others like multiple different styles of running, different modalities for running, like the pose method, things of that nature.
Do you subscribe to a certain mentality when it comes to how you how you structure your running form, or is it pretty much just one foot in front of the other? I think, I think somewhere in between. I think while I'm running, I try not to overthink my stride per SE. I've I've studied some of the different different tips, text techniques for running, read popular books, born to run and things of that nature.
But what I've really found that works for me, especially someone I've had a couple of ACL reconstruction. So taking care of my knees and hips have been very high priority for me, especially as my mileage gets higher. So I think one thing in terms of running form that I found really helpful is just to find a stride that feels comfortable for me.
And by staying in that comfortable zone and you kind of feel when you're getting out, I'm sure like for you, if a lift doesn't feel quite right, you know, you kind of know you need to adjust. And I just try to make those micro adjustments as I'm going. And I think just with my overall fitness, my running, my running form has improved and I just feel better after runs that previously wouldn't have been the case. Yeah, no, it makes total sense. What kind of What kind of shoes do you use?
I recently switched. I've really been loving the Saucony Endorphin elites right now. Those have been those have been nice. I don't I'm not going to wear a carbon plated shoe for the this ultra marathon. I think it's a little bit too long, so I'll just be in my Saucony trainers, but I found that they've they've really held up well in the past. I've I really liked Tokas but since switching to Saucony I don't think I'll be going back until I find till I find
something better. I've I've seen the Saucony, I've never tried those. I have tried the Hocus. So is, is that like a super? Is there is there much of A an arch support or drop in that you know shoe or or is it pretty well zero drop? They have both brands have different different styles in terms of the arch support and
the drop. And I think the differentiating factor more so for me is when I put on a sockony shoe, it just you can feel the quality of like I almost want to say plush of the cushion, but it's not it's not too soft versus when I put on a hookah, it feels more, I don't want to say less high quality, but I'd say less soft and comfortable on my foot. So I think it's just if you try on a Saucony and then maybe, maybe you'll be able to see what I mean.
But I think and then in terms of how they hold up, the Saucony has been taking the wear and tear a lot better than my Hocus have. So must be something different in the materials they're using. Yeah, no, it makes total sense. So I've tried transition all of my footwear. Like I've literally gotten rid of everything that I own that is not a zero drop wide toe box shoe. So I could try and let my foot be more a natural foot. It's taken a little bit of getting used to for sure.
But I enjoy it. I think it's good. I think it's good for my feet. But it it does take a transition period for sure. Yeah. So talk to me a little bit about about the race itself. So it's in two weeks. What's the distance on this one? So there's an ultra I guess starting out is any technically anything longer than a marathon and the courses are designed
either by distance or time. So this is a time based course and it's going to be at a a small little campground in New York State and you can either do the 12 hour or the 24 hour event and it's a one mile loop and essentially you have either 12 or 24 hours to complete as many laps as you can. Nice. And what what did you out for the 12 hour? 24 hour. My husband convinced me to go for the 12 hour for my first
one. I've definitely had my name on the sign up for the 24, but I'm going to start with the 12. Especially since what I'm really gearing up for is a marathon in October. So I don't want to overstretch here with the first altar. Just kind of getting my feet wet and seeing, seeing where I want to go from there. Do you have like a a predicted distance for that duration that you're striving for? I think my goal is to be over 65
miles. If I could get over 65 in 12 hours, I'd be super happy with that. So that's the goal. And with that being a single mile loop, like you can, I'm assuming like you can, you know, walk to the center, take a break, just do whatever you need to do. It's just as long as you're running that entire 12 miles or as long as like you track your, your distance over the 12 mile span, you can pretty much do whatever you want to to recover, refuel, etcetera, etcetera.
Yeah, exactly. And that was one of the attractive things for starting out with this is my first ultra because one of the biggest challenges within the sport of ultra running is navigating aid stations and making sure you're properly packed and ready for treacherous terrain if you're doing a mountain course. Whereas this one, I know I'll always be within less than a mile to the aid station. So my husband is very generously offered to crew me.
So he will be there at the main start finish line with any electrolytes or fueling that I'll need. And there's like a bathroom stop there as well. So for me not having done one of these before that, that was really comforting to know that even if I mess up, I, if I can run the rest of the mile, I can get to whatever resource I may need at that time and kind of correct it. So people when I tell them about this course, they're like, Oh my goodness, you're going to run a mile in a circle.
How are you? I would never want to do that. How would you ever want to? And I was like, well, I mean, I think it's great. And and while you're running, I just kind of lose. I lose track of things and can really just go in my own head and the world gets quiet. So whether that's a one mile loop or a point to point course, but yeah, I'm really excited for this format of race. And I think it's going to be, I think it's going to be really
great. And the the extra twist is that it's a candlelight ultra, so it will start at 7:00 PM and then go through the night. So I'll be running most of it in the complete dark. Interesting. OK, so I was going to ask you about that. So I've got, I don't know if you're familiar with Mike McKnight, but he's one of my good friends and he does all kinds of crazy ultras. He does like the coca Dona 250 and and just all this, not like just insane stuff.
And a lot of the challenge there is, you know, figuring out sleep during a multi day event through mountains, through different time changes, all that good stuff. So with you doing this at night, how are you going to structure? Like, how are you like, what's what's the play my play for your fueling strategy, your sleep recuperation? Like, what do you think you're going to do going into it? Yeah, absolutely. I mean those two hundreds, those are those are a whole different beast.
Thankfully for me, I won't, I won't have to worry about sleeping per se during the 12 hours. Even if I did the 24 option. I think unless I was really needing it, I wouldn't plan for sleep. I guess that's one advantage of being a medical student is used to kind of work in night shift and crazy schedules like that. So in terms of sleep, I don't, I don't plan to sleep. I think I'll have some caffeine on standby if I start to hit a low kind of in the middle of the night and I think that'll be
helpful. But I feel I feel pretty prepared from that standpoint. You can try to sleep a lot more the prior day. What was that? You're just going to sleep a lot more the prior night. I'll try but my body is very regulated on sleep. I imagine I'll get up at my normal 5:36 AM and not have not be able to go back to sleep. So I might just have to take the L on sleep for that one night. I guess one one night won't kill you. One night won't kill you. Exactly what? About what?
About fueling? What are? You going to do there? Yeah, that is both a strategy and what I'd call a game time decision. I have a couple of foods plan that I know work well for me. And honestly they're not that different than what I would kind of be eating day-to-day. I don't plan to eat that much per SE. I don't have a calorie goal. I really go off of feel and that's what I've been doing for my long runs and that's really worked for me.
I think the biggest thing for me is going to be staying on top of my electrolytes because that's something I've noticed as I've gone, as I've gone low carb and keto, that if I'm not on top of that, I can start feeling very poor very quickly. So I'll definitely have, I really like the chewable salt tablets. I'll have plenty of those on hand. I have low carb electrolyte packets which are also really great and I'll keep them in a vest, so I'll be sipping on that as well.
And then in terms of pre race, I'll probably just eat how I normally would throughout the day. I'm very animal based, ketogenic diet, lots of red meat, animal fats, butter, things of that nature. And then during the race, there's a couple, there's a couple things I anticipate I want, I'm having my husband cook up some bacon. So I'll be very excited for that. Keto bricks, of course, I love, I love the keto bricks during and after my long runs.
Actually after the marathon, the first thing I asked for, I was like, where's my keto brick? It's in my, it's in my bag somewhere. So that'll be on the table as well. And then still still got to see what other things I can really pack some calories in. But I mean, in my experience, I haven't really required that
much calories. I mean, obviously more will be better to have on hand, but I'm really going to let how my stomach is feeling and how I'm feeling overall throughout the race dictate kind of what I'm taking in and out. Yeah, now that makes total sense. I feel like a lot of people have this notion of what they're supposed to be consuming and it's often times so far removed from what their norm is that they're that they're going to
inevitably have some GI issues. Like I think like I, I don't know what the traditional format is, except for you hear about people carving up, you know, it just significantly the night prior with pasta or something like that. And I would imagine that would be disastrous the next day during a long endurance event. Yes, I certainly would not would not want to have to run this out on a full stomach of pasta that is. That is for sure.
Yeah, not good. What what is the the norm when it comes to people that are using a carbohydrate based approach when they're using those goose? Like, I don't even know what's in that. Is it just like straight sucrose or what? What is in that stuff? I'm, I'm not exactly sure honestly. I know it's a combination of multiple different sugars and I hear a lot of other runners talk about just pallet fatigue and then by like hour 3 they're not
even able to get down gels. And to me that sounds absolutely miserable. I don't know if you've ever tried one of those gels, but they're gooey and they're super sweet. And I am not, I am not a sweet person at baseline. I definitely prefer more savory salty things. So it's hard enough for me to even eat one while I'm not running, let alone in the middle of mile 40 trying to force down a gel.
I can't even imagine. So I think from what I've seen, that's the gels are what the high carb approach really typically relies on, especially as it's harder and harder to get down. Like no one's going to be eating a bowl of pasta. Well, maybe during during the race itself, but yeah, I'm glad that's not something I really even have to think about. Yeah, I think like chowing out on some bacon mid run sounds much more appealing.
Sounds delicious. Sounds like enough motivation for me to keep going in that mild loop. Yeah, absolutely. So, So what are you doing with the medical school is what's, what's your, what's your career path there? Yeah, I'm on the back half, which is really crazy to say. It's been, it's been fast and slow. I'm entering my 4th year of medical school and basically just doing a couple of rotations now and finishing up some coursework to see where I'll ultimately go to residency next year.
So pretty excited about that. It's been, it's been long, hard, good, bad it's but I'm really excited to start a new chapter of life and start my actual medical practice. That's awesome. Do you have any ideas to, I know a lot of people wind up figuring out their actual, you know, focus once they're in residency, but do you have any idea kind of where you're leaning? Yeah, So I'll be applying to
radiology residency. I just love the diagnostic puzzle that reading all the different images kind of brings on. And with almost every diagnosis now in medicine, relying on almost any patient that comes to the hospital gets an imaging study. So I really like the idea of being that doctor that gets to touch all different kinds of patients and really influence
their care. So that's kind of what drew me to radiology and but in terms of long term, I'm not exactly sure where that'll take me in my career, but I think that's something I'm definitely going to figure out once I start practicing. Nice, nice. And you're in the Army too, is that right? I am, yes. I graduated from West Point before coming to Harvard, so I am on the Army Medical School scholarship program essentially, and I will be entering residency as a military officer. Gotcha.
What was the the motivation behind going the route of the military medical school? What was the the motivation about any of that? Like, is that something you just knew that you wanted to do from early age? Medical school was definitely something I knew I wanted to do from an early age. And then when I kind of got to the process of figuring out how I can make that happen, I really found a fit in the military and the service academies
specifically. There's one for Air Force, Navy and Army. And when I kind of visited all three of those academies and ended up applying, I ended up choosing Army because I felt like that's where I best fit in. And I really liked their medical program. And I knew I had the chance to speak with other Army physicians who had kind of gone through medical school through that route, and I thought that would be a great fit for me. And yeah, here I am. Awesome, awesome.
What's been the biggest headache or hurdle or obstacle in going that path? Like, has there been, like, just moments where you've been hitting your head against the wall seemingly and asking yourself why in the world you're doing this? Yeah, I, me and my friends often joke that I, I kind of took the hard way to medical school. The The Academy Is very great, but very different from any other sort of traditional university.
So I had a lot of focus on military tactics and leadership, obviously, which didn't leave as much time as I otherwise probably would have to pursue my medical studies. So I learned early on how to really prioritize scheduling and optimizing my time, which I think has served me really well in medical school, which was another complete transition and something completely different than what I experienced at the Academy, but a whole new set of challenges and just amazing
other people to work with. So I really feel like I've gotten a full breadth of experience throughout my training, and I'm excited to go back into the military and bring back what I've learned from getting to study in a place like Boston, and then bringing that back to the soldiers and military families that I'll be serving. So I think I've gotten a lot out of it. I definitely could have done it in an easier way, but I can't imagine the person I would be without I'm going through all
the steps of that journey. That's awesome. So you plan on staying with the military then post Harvard graduation? Yes, I'll be with the military for at least the next couple years. I do owe some time a service obligation from the Academy and then also from medical school. Nice. Very cool. Very cool. You haven't got to. All of my friends are in one branch of the military or another, and most of them are in the Army. So that's that's pretty awesome
that you're doing that. And then also simultaneously going through Harvard Med school. I feel like you are the quintessential example of someone that does not know how to sleep. I never get sleep. I try, I try my best to sleep. I will say I've gotten a lot more sleep since coming to medical school. I feel like I have a lot more time there than I did at West Point. But still still working on the sleep thing. If there's one thing in my training that could be improved,
it's probably done. Yeah, and that's definitely why I fall short as well. So when it comes to to medical school, and I guess not Harvard specific, but just medical medical school in general, I feel like the ketogenic diet is, I mean, there's a bunch of studies being done in regards to, you know, fat metabolism, ketosis, things of that nature.
But I feel like as a whole, that's still relatively countercultural to mainstream thinking, which is probably one of the reasons why all of Nick's posts are gaining such popularity relatively soon, relatively quickly. Because they kind of he he doesn't pretty cheeky stuff like he'll do like the, you know, Oreo cookies, beats statin, you know, comparison things of that nature.
But with you being in medical school and also following a ketogenic diet, have you gotten much pushback or has has there not been an issue there? I would say I've gotten much pushback. Often my peers are just interested because it's really, I wouldn't even say it's
counterculture. It's something that's just almost not even addressed within our curriculum, which was kind of surprising to me. So really all of the pushback I've seen is actually more in the social media space and seeing, like you said, some of those, the discussions on forums of those different studies coming out. But in terms of my medical education, I don't think there was ever a point where we formally broke down the benefits of the ketogenic diet versus more traditional medicinal
approaches. And it's certainly not something that I see implemented regularly in the hospital setting in terms of a holistic approach to patient care. So I guess does that, does that answer your question? It's just it's something that I feel like I've really had to seek out and really educate myself. And I mean, Nick spent a huge part of that and kind of not now my own experience actually living a ketogenic lifestyle, but that's really how I've been learning about it.
And that's really where most of my touch points come from. It not from medical school, per Southeast. So it's more so like an absence of information about it. Then there is like a, you know, a stance one way or the other against it or for it. Absolutely. Gotcha. OK. What was your motivation for pursuing that person? Like was there any ailments that you were having following a traditional carbohydrate based protocol or what was your reason
for dabbling into keto? I think, well, what drew, I don't know if there was any ailments specifically that drew me to keto, but one thing for me in terms of nutrition, I've always highly prioritized what I've put into my body and Whole Foods, whether that was carbs or not. But one thing, I guess I started keto just cause more. So I was curious. I saw some of the benefits of us having for patients. I'd seen some studies you'd mentioned and I was like, huh, wonder if I give that a try, if
I would actually feel different. And then once I was like, wow, I actually had ailments, as you said that I actually initially didn't even identify. I noticed my, my energy now is so much more Even so much more consistent. I don't feel starving in between meals, I don't feel crashes throughout the day. I wasn't running quite as much before so I can't really speak to. I certainly wasn't taking in gels or doing anything like that while I was running, so I don't know how my gut would
necessarily respond to that. But since, as, as I've said multiple times since starting keto, I haven't experienced any of that. So I'm glad I've kind of bypassed ever having to. But yeah, I think the energy is really what I've noticed that's been the most beneficial for me. And it's certainly something that is compelling enough for me to continue living this lifestyle because I find it very
sustainable and very fulfilling. Yeah, I would think from just a practical use case scenario in and of itself, especially if someone's got a busy, you know, day-to-day schedule, someone that's in medical school, someone that's not able to just, you know, take a break whenever and get something to eat. Like simply been able to maintain a high degree of mental focus and physical ability for significant periods of time
between meals. Like that alone I think gives it a leg up on any other dietary protocol. I mean, like for me when I'm out West hunting, for instance, like I don't want to be able to packing a pack a bunch of food with me and I might go 1012 hours between meals. And that's relatively easy to do when you're fat adapted.
But if you're not, you've got to bring all these types of, you know, MRE's or goose or just like additional weight in your pack and you kind of stop all things before moving forward so you can eat. And that's just not really realistic if I'm trying to optimally perform it anything that I'm doing. Absolutely, and that's what you described perfectly describes my experience.
Yeah, well, hopefully as you're doing this 12 hour ultra marathon, people are seeing you just passing by, lapping them with a bacon in one hand and keto working the other and start asking questions and maybe bring some more awareness to this. Yeah, absolutely. I think that'd be a pretty legendary photo of me running around with a couple pieces of bacon in my hand. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. So that's in two weeks. What is the name of that event
again? It's called the Candlelight Ultra Marathon. Nice, and where is that at? It's in New York. I'm pretty. The name of the town is escaping me, but it's about an hour away from where my husband's currently stationed at SO. Very cool. So that's in two weeks, you've got medical school concluding, you're on the home stretch of it now, but what is the date on that? The date of graduation will be May 2025 S next spring. Nice, nice. So that is something we're
celebrating for sure. And then you're gonna go back to the Army, and then you're gonna be a physician practicing position within the Army pretty much right out of graduation of Harvard. Correct. Very cool and with a focus on radiology, I love it. Yep. Well, that sounds like an exciting next few months. Next few years for sure.
I think anything like I'm always excited when I talk to people that are in medical school or practicing physicians that are, you know, willing to adopt more of a low carb quote UN quote ancestral base dietary protocol, because I think it just makes the most sense. And if I that would probably, you know, cure a lot of people have a lot of ailments. So anytime I see somebody that's going the traditional route of medicine pursuing that as a lifestyle, I'm, I'm 100% bought
in and on board. So I think it's great that you're going into the medical space with this, you know, background. Yeah, absolutely. And I hope to bring kind of some of this this mindset and some of the lessons I've been able to learn and hopefully apply that to military medicine and maybe just how we approach fueling our soldiers in general. Because like you said with with hunting, I mean in combat, it's it's a similar situation. You don't know when you're going to eat.
So we could definitely potentially benefit from a more fat adapted approach in that regard. Well, the, the nutrition for, for soldiers is totally abysmal. Like it's honestly, it frustrates me because I've got, like I said, several friends in different branches of the military and like the food that they offer at the mess halls is pretty, pretty rough. And then the MRE's, I mean, I'll tell you how bad the MRE's are. They're they're not even food, really. Oh my goodness, yes.
I thankfully didn't have to eat an MRE at my most recent training block because I did have the keto brakes and that was enough to get me through a lot of the field time we were doing. So I'm very thankful for that. But yeah, those MRE's are tough. You you look at some of the the Skittles and things of that nature that are in there and I'm like, OK, I'm supposed to now have an optimal athletic
performance. Yeah. And what's frustrating is, you know, I've had several people that are either clients or friends or whatnot that have reached out to me and they're trying to maintain a ketogenic diets. But if they're out in the field and they're only able to eat Mr. ES, like you couldn't really even do it. Like you would have to just fast. But I mean, you can only fast for so long and still maintain some degree of performance.
So like they the military doesn't really even give people that ability, from what I've gleaned at least. No, I mean, that's spot on. We have vegetarian options in the MRE, but I don't think there's enough low carb components of those meals that you could even string together one or two ketogenic friendly meals, which is, yeah, very frustrating for someone who who's trying to maintain that lifestyle and feels good from that fuelling.
I did a there was there was. I forget what university it was, but the the keto bricks were in a study for the military and they were comparing and they were trying to find like viable options for, you know, ready to eat meals for people in the field. And they were comparing the bricks to Clif bars for like a weighted ruck to kind of like replicate what would be potentially, you know, exerted in the field. And the bricks beat out the the
Clif bars calories equated for. And I'm, I'm hopeful that like enough momentum keeps gaining on stuff like this that, you know, people can find other options, whether it's the brick or something else. Like I just want people that are in the military to have better options. Like I know Phillip, good friend of mine, the, the owner of Carnivore bar, he was in the military and that was his motivation for, for building the Carnivore bar.
It's like when you're in the field and you're only have Mres at your disposal, like you simply cannot perform optimally. You're not going to be healthy. And if you're like, we got our men and women out there, it's like you want the, the Creme de la Creme nutrition for people that are on the front line. And it's definitely not what you're finding an MRE.
Absolutely. And I hope somewhere within my medical practice I can be a part of kind of pushing that change forward because that's something I so strongly believed in. And it's, it's really great to hear that the effort is there.
So it's it's good. Do you think it's like, is the the military interested in pushing, you know, for, or is it mostly just they're bound by financial constraints on what they have a budget for and the budget's not really going to be, you know, prioritize towards soldier nutrition? Like what is the bottleneck on that?
I think there's many constraints and many that I wouldn't even necessarily think of, but I think ultimately it's going to come down to getting this in front of the right people, in front of the right decision makers. And I think once, once they can understand the benefit and the benefit it will have for the fighting force, it will be something that can kind of push past a lot of constraints. And I think, I think there's hope is what I'm trying to say.
I think it's going to be a slow process. Anything, anything in the military move slowly. But I think we're going to have to adopt, we're going to have to change what we're doing because how we're fueling our soldiers right now obviously isn't isn't optimal. Yeah, totally. Well, it makes me all the more excited for what it is that you're doing, the background that you're bringing to the table, and then hope for the lives will be able to change with that information.
So we need more people like you out there fighting the good fight, Kimmy. Appreciate that. Well I'm definitely excited for the Ultra in a few weeks. You have to keep me posted on that for sure. Is there like, are you pretty active on social? Can people follow along with how the run goes? Yeah, I'm, I'm pretty active on Instagram. You can follow me at Haley under score Fit and I'll be posting all my race, all my race preparation is posted on there.
I'll be posting updates throughout the event and certainly afterwards. So if people kind of want to follow along, that would be the best place. Awesome. Well, I will definitely link out to that Kelly and make it easy people to find you and I, I don't know what you're doing, how, how you're stashed on Brexit doing, but I'm going to send you some more in preparation for that run so that you don't have to worry about that. Oh that would be amazing.
Yeah, yeah, no doubt about it. So I'll get you hooked up on bricks. Hopefully your husband will have you hooked up on bacon and you'll be just making some waves out there and not bonking. Maybe I'll run the full 24 hours with all that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, dude. I mean, I guess if you run in 12 mile or 12 hours, if you opt to keep running like with like, do you have to sign up for that in advance or could you in theory just keep going?
I'm sure they would let me keep going, but I think in terms of my actual timing chip, it would stop at the 12 hours. Gotcha, gotcha. That's still a pretty, I mean the farthest you've run up to this point is a marathon, right? So, you know, going 65 miles is pretty significant jump from that. Yeah, I mean, it'll, it'll be a challenge for sure, but I guess I could have jumped to 100 miles. So I in my mind this is a smaller step but. Hey now, I'm stoked for it.
I've got no doubt that you can, you can hit that goal. So definitely keep us posted, definitely post on social. I'll make it easy for people to find you on Instagram. And if there's everything you need from me, Kelly, you just let me know. That, that sounds great. It was a pleasure speaking with you. Thanks for having me on. Hey, the pleasure is mine. Thanks for what you do. Keep changing lives and keep in touch. Absolutely. Take care. Take care.