What’s up folks. Thank you for tuning into the podcast. Today’s guest on the show is Albert Al is the owner founder of Promix nutrition, which is pretty much the only supplements that I take. And he’s also a friend of mine. Uh, we went to the same high school, which he tells the story at the beginning on the show. But so we’ve been friends. Since I was what. 1617. , and I got to watch his whole journey through college sports and finding his way into exercise. Fizz science, uh, owning a gym in New York city.
And then. Uh, probably about 10 years ago, 15 years ago, or so started pro mixed nutrition and got to watch. The whole journey there unfold. For him. He’s also an entrepreneur. At heart, uh, which I think is amazing. And so our conversations over the last five to 10 years have been around. Building teams and businesses.
He’s incredibly smart. And I looked to him for advice. Uh, in the business world a lot, but also rely on him heavily in the body maintenance world as well. Um, on the show, we pinged the audience. And so a lot of the topics near the end of the show are themes on those questions.
We got so many questions. There was like 50 or 60, I think. That I batch them into themes. And so we discuss the majority of the themes that you guys wrote in about. So thank you for doing that. I always appreciate it. And. At the end of the show, hooked us up with a discount code@premixnutrition.com.
So if you type in progression, In the discount code window, you will get a 20% discount on anything that you order there. I don’t know how long that’s going to go on, but there. Proteins. Amazing. And that’s what I take. That’s all. I take a protein in collagen. So check that out.
I meant to have this podcast out a little while ago. Just been super busy, but we still have a lot of great shows. Coming out here very soon. And the only promo I’ll do for us is that. We’re about sold out pretty close on this last batch of enigmas, uh, 5, 2, 5, 6. Is that I talked about on the last show?
There’s a couple left. I think so if you’re interested, check out portal flight designs.com and shoot us an email. Get on the list. So, um, and then the jellyfish models coming out soon as well. That’s pretty much all I’m writing lately. On the foil drive and loving it for 3 26 liters is the one I’m writing.
We’re going to have a bunch of different sizes in that as well. Uh, Mike’s got one that he’s going to start testing here in about a week or so that he redesigned a little bit for his air game. And so it’s going to be really cool to compare notes on that shape when it comes out compared to kind of what I’m writing right now.
So.
And one more note before we jump in, I just got a message from cocky a couple of days ago that their week three Voyager camp still has a few spots left. So. That’s going to be absolutely epic. And I believe the first two weeks are already sold out. Got instructors like foil wizard, cane. COO. Jack Simeon, it’s going to be all time.
So, uh, if you guys are interested in learning down, when I know Cooper, Paul Cooper is going to be out there for a couple of the weeks. I’m not sure about week three, but you know, teaching foil drive. So if you want to get dialed on downwind, It’s probably the best way to do it. And I can’t think of just more rad folks to be around and just learn through osmosis. The mental, So hit up the Voyager crew. On Instagram, if you’re interested.
I hope you guys are well and sending it and. Thanks.
Erik: Al, thanks for coming on the podcast. How are you, man?
Al: I’m great. It’s great to talk to you, man. It’s been a minute.
Erik: It has, it has. I love our catch ups, so why don’t you give a history of who you are, but how we know each other too. I think it’d be fun to hear it from your side.
Al: Oh man. Well Eric is definitely the coolest kid in high school. That’s how no yeah, man, I remember back in high school as a little guy and Eric was a big fish on the swim team and had, yeah, he had the cool car, all that stuff. But no, man, I remember just,
Erik: are you five years younger? Were you seventh grade? And I was a senior. I was six and
Al: I think so. It might’ve been six and 11.
But yeah, no, I mean, I remember you just being a good mentor to me you were doing you had your band you were swimming and you’re really into fitness and all that kind of stuff and Yeah, it definitely was. It was a good role model for me to emulate and you, I think the same way you are now, man, you’ve always been super encouraging of people around you and the path that you want to go on and you’re happy to rip it down that path and, the stuff you’re doing with foiling and all that.
I know you, you got into it super early and I’ve been really pushing things forward. So it’s cool, man. It’s been, it’s been fun to know you and see your growth and yeah, you, you set a good path for me.
Erik: I truly appreciate that. That was, that was actually really cool, man. I enjoyed that, like that was a time in high school when. I like, so I guess I did, it was the swim team and then I was a peer, like the mentorship program that our school had. We had a, we went to a cool high school. And so as a junior or senior, you could get paired with someone in the middle school because it was a middle school and high school.
And so I was a peer counselor. I think that’s what it was called. And. Yeah, you like after the swim team and we became friends on the swim team is like a little mini me like a little blonde and he’s now huge out, by the way, so much bigger than I am. But but yeah, that was really fun. And my favorite thing about it was I used to get to go to y’all’s P and just blow you guys up at dodgeball.
Al: Oh yeah. Dude, I remember, yeah, that and body slams on the high jump mat.
Erik: Yep. That was so good. Well, right on. Tell us about you because these guys know a
Al: Well, yeah, man just being in sports growing up and being in Gainesville, where so many people are into running and outdoor stuff I continued running ended up in at university of Florida running track there. And that was definitely like a big step up going to a school like that, there’s some great runners.
And so, I was always just trying to compete and nutrition was nutrition recovery, or just one of the ways where I was like, man, I got to, do whatever I can on this side of things, because, your genetics are, are what they are. So, yeah, I was trying to do anything I could to just get a little bit faster, get better in practice or whatever.
So, I, I was studying pre med undergrad, which was like, all right, let me pick the hard thing, and then I can always kind of, Move laterally or move down from there. So I knew I was interested in health pre med covered a lot of that and left doors open. And then as I went through that basically my senior year, I was starting to shadow some doctors and go on rotations and also had had I had an injury in college, my sophomore year where I got, Basically tripped in a race and ended up tearing the labor in my hip.
And going through that process was one of these times where yeah, I started doing my own research a lot. I had been, but. When you have some kind of injury like that, maybe it’s not super straightforward or whatever you, a lot of people end up going down a rabbit hole and then you start to see behind a lot of different things.
You’re like, Oh man, like this person, I thought that had all the answers. Like maybe it was just going with whatever the status quo is, or not really pushing the boundaries or just doing what they’ve done for 10 years. So, I started once I found that out and I went through this, I found a really great doctor that did the surgery and came back and was able to run after hearing some kind of mainstream opinions that were not great.
I started doing the same thing really in nutrition too, or, all right, well, mainstream thought is this, or, I’m just going to, Eat whatever’s in front of me because I’m told it’s good to go like the layer deeper and understand how the industry works behind it, where, where ingredients come from all that.
So that really pushed me more to the nutrition side of things. And I felt like being in the hospital as I was like, this is the end state you want to try to not get in the hospital, that’s definitely the goal. So I wanted to kind of like, I guess, work. Up the chain to be like, all right, if I can help people nutritionally or physically, I want to do that.
So we can just avoid the hospital thing altogether. And basically over the next 10 years I ended up moving to New York and I went to grad school exercise is And here performance focus. And I did a second bachelor’s in food science, human nutrition and specialized in dietetics. I really wanted to understand basically from, food grown on the ground to if it’s processed at all, how that impacts it.
And then once you eat it, how does your physiology and. Your body use that for energy or whatever it is. So trying to be like what I would consider like full stack on the nutrition side. And that ended up being a really cool skill, a skill set where I understood kind of product formulation stuff, but also understood the sourcing.
Growing up in Gainesville, we have lots of good farms. I would go visit farmers, understand that process. I go to food science conventions, understand the whole, big agribusiness or however you want to look at it behind the food products that are made and where ingredients come from.
And ended up in New York and I continued to. Kind of work on products. I started making stuff in college for myself and then working with a couple of professional athletes that were still training in town. I lived in Atlanta for a bit and was making products for them. And it just naturally grew from there.
While I was in New York, I opened a gym. So it was really, my two passions were training people, working out and fitness and then nutrition. And I started to lean heavy into the nutrition side because it was a bit of a different time, but it was less scalable to reach a broad audience and demographic with a fitness concept.
And the nutrition side, I had this really simple concept in my head is you can’t get everyone to work out, but everyone’s got to eat. So I was like, if I want to really get low hanging fruit and try to make the best impact, broadest impact I can, I want to do, I’m going to choose nutrition because number of people I’ve, tried to help with fitness and workouts.
You know how that is like. You can’t, you can only bring a horse to water. You can’t get them to drink. So, but everyone’s going to eat and especially can make stuff that is healthier and better for them and helps them, give more energy or just eat better overall. So that’s. At a super high level where I ended up and my focus in, in making nutrition products or food products for people.
Erik: Yeah, well, I remember when, I think it was shortly after we hung out, when you came down to Costa Rica. or right around that same time when you were starting Pro Mix and you told me the story of how you sourced the whey for, the Pro Mix whey product. And I thought it was brilliant. Can you recount that real quick?
Cause I think that’s just such a cool story.
Al: Yeah. Yeah there’s been a lot of twists and turns over the years. I’ll give like the, the way back context too, was I started to realize like kind of anything in today’s world, a big thing that’s lost is like nuance and, if it’s in, talking big picture ideas or whatever, or just when it comes to.
Dairy for what we’re talking about here. And I remember a few times in my life when I had really good milk and it was one guy in Gainesville actually that had a Jersey cow that he just had one cow and he just used it for his family and friends and having fresh milk from a Jersey cow is like a completely different experience.
I was like, wow, I didn’t even know milk tasted like this. And then another time I was working with a cycling company and biking through Austria. And I stopped at this little farm and got some milk. And it was again what we think of milk in the U S is just, just unbelievable. Like at a mass scale, there’s great dairies in the U S, but what you get a typical big chain grocery store is a completely different thing.
And so that was kicked off for me in terms of like really thinking about sourcing and like nuance to where ingredients come from. I ended up working with the farm in Northern California. When we first started and it was just. It was unbelievable. I mean, there’s a couple of places in the world where you can have exceptional dairy cows are affected by the weather, just like most kind of animals and livestock.
And so if you’re in a place where they can be on pasture 90 percent of the year where it’s moderate temperatures and good grass and doesn’t get too hot or too cold. So Northern California and then places like New Zealand and even parts of Florida are, are pretty close to that.
So, Yeah, I started working with the farm in Northern California and we’ve grown and now I’m starting to talk, fast forward to where we’re at now I’m talking to farms in New Zealand and different places like that where as America changes to and the political landscape of what we allow here and what other countries don’t as far as pesticide use and everything like that I’m always trying to find the kind of the best source for the ingredients we use.
So hopefully that was somewhat on, on with what you’re thinking. Yeah.
Erik: that I remember was something about, I think it was the, the farm in California, but essentially they were making cheese and the byproduct was, they didn’t have anywhere to go with the way. And so you optioned the whole lot, like basically before you had a company, just YOLO’d it
Al: Oh, yeah.
Erik: I’m going to take all of this and we’ll see what happens. So at the beginning, I just love that you had your own protein company, but you had to sell the rest of it to other companies just to, just to make it work until you could start slowly taking up all of the way. And side note, Ever since you got me on pro mix, it’s the only protein I’ll take.
Al: I appreciate it. Yeah, that was, that’s something I’ve done consistently, which is yeah, I got to be like a dog with a bone. If I find the best kind of ingredient, I get so excited about it. And I’m like, man, this is it. It’s it really is that difference of having milk straight from a cow somewhere and drink it off the shelf.
Like it’s, it’s It’s really like a revelatory type feeling. So when I had the opportunity to get that to get away from such a great farm, I was like, I gotta do this. And it was, far outpaced. We’re from exploited the business. And so I said, yeah, I’ll, I’ll sign whatever contract I need to to make it happen, and then you just get in hustle mode.
And I think in general, like I’ve found that, I think you probably feel the same way where if you take on a bunch of responsibility you usually, you figure it out, you rise to the occasion, you, you start working harder, you’re thinking smarter. I think it’s good to have that kind of pressure.
Erik: I, yeah, I, I love diving in the deep end and seeing where you end up one of the most important things you can do. And that’s why I love that story so much. It hits that on three different levels, which I think,
Al: Mm-Hmm.
Erik: so the audience here is, Is a group of predominantly hardcore foil surfers.
And yeah, I know you don’t foil, but you know, a lot about foiling. Cause we’ve hung out a couple of times and talked about it a lot since I’ve been
Al: I’ve tried it.
Erik: You have.
Al: It’s definitely not the easiest. Yeah. Mm-Hmm.
Erik: And so essentially I pinged the audience on what type of questions themes we should discuss. And they’re centered around diet specifically for the type of workouts that we’re doing.
And which is long downwinders, essentially doing a series of box jumps over. I mean, that’s probably the best way to describe foiling in some ways. Doing a series of box jumps over, 20 minutes too. Two hours, three hours, generally how to hydrate for that, how to eat during pre post and then also for recovery and injury prevention, a lot of questions about like, how should we train for these sports because what I have found, and actually this is an interesting, I’ll give a kind of a little anecdote here
To preface my mentality and how it’s switched a little bit. I didn’t, I don’t think I’ve realized how much I have been overtraining for the last three years. I was just given a foil drive, which I’m frothing on right now, which is essentially like an e foil when you want it, and then not an e foil when you don’t want it.
And so instead of just pumping as much as, as you possibly can to catch waves and, Hit training to an extreme, like it’s pretty common that, I’m talking to my buddy Mike today about it. It’s like pretty common that you’re seeing stars as you’re connecting your last wave you’re pushing your heart rate all the way up max and then, calm resting, getting down.
So like heart rate range for a session, like a prone session for me is probably like 70 to 185. And on the foil drive, I’m probably 85 to 130, 150 if I’m pumping around connecting a lot of waves, but I’m never hitting that red line. And what I have noticed, now for doing this for almost a month, is that I have a lot more energy.
I’m spending more time in the water, I’m catching more waves, but I have a lot more energy for the rest of my day. And I’m wondering if I have just been overtraining hugely for the last few years. And this is just showing me how much I’ve just been sucking the life out of myself. And so like maybe talk through, what I just said right there, and then we can start a conversation and preparation, diet recovery for a sport like ours.
Al: Yeah. That’s cool. Yeah, there’s some interesting I’ll try to go in my like bag a little bit with the physiology side of things, but I mean, yeah. It’s, it’s a really unique sport in terms of what you described without the drive. Where, you really got to pump, maximally to be able to connect everything and keep going and you’re getting to really like, all right, next step stuff like that’s so much more tiring and really in training If you go, if you’re hitting nine out of 10, even in training, not even 10 out of 10, but like that one 85, it’s for sure 10 out of 10 or very close to it, like that’s so much harder on your body.
Like your body is really good about. You can, you can throw a pretty good amount of volume at it if you’re like below that 8 out of 10 type thing and the effort and exertion to get to that above 8 to get to 9 out of 10 or 10 out of 10, like so much more tiring. Physiologically you’re, you’re past your lactate threshold and stuff.
You’re like. accumulating lactate, you’re going to get way more fatigued and it’s just overall stressful. Like your hormones get really pushed when you’re going to that red line all the time. It’s if you’re, you’re basically, yeah, I would say like from some degree of over training because, if you’re trying to, you, you’ve lifted weights through your ears and did all that stuff.
It’s you can’t max every day. And what you described, it’s pretty much like you’re, you’re maxing every time you go out there. And so, Yeah, combine that with the fact that you’re out in the sun and the heat and everything like that. It’s a pretty tough environment. So, yeah, I’d probably lean towards you’re probably redlining it pretty often and would totally zap you.
Yeah. I mean, it is, you’re just out in the sun for a couple hours. So put yourself out in the sun a couple hours, constantly going over kind of lactate threshold. It’s that’s pretty tough.
Erik: And the funny thing is about foiling it will on prone. You just always want the next wave. So you kick out and you see another wave coming. You’re like, ah, I’m going to do it. And then down, you never want to come off foil. So it, cause it takes a lot of energy to get back up. So you push yourself way past where you would like one of the jokes, Mike and I are always talking about is you would never go for a run and be doing sprints and push.
Within, 80 percent of what we’re doing because you would tap out, but it’s the carrot is so good
Al: Yeah.
Erik: that you keep doing it because you’re addicted to this or you don’t want to come off foil. You’re trying to beat your buddy or,
Al: Yeah.
Erik: yeah, it’s not. And I don’t think I really realized it until this last month.
Al: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it sounds exactly like what’s happening and I totally get that. Like you can definitely, it’s just, I mean, I’ve personally found, I think you’re the same way, very competitive and the best training is not, I think a lot of times this is like a different, higher level conversation, but applicable where the best athletes are Are actually usually a bit lazy and you have to be pushed.
If you’re built, like you are, like you’re competitive and you’re going to go beyond kind of like, you’ll, you’ll go beyond every opportunity to keep that line going or whatever it is. So I think Yeah, you probably were over training. I think having that kind of extra boost that you don’t have to redline it every day is very helpful.
Mm
Erik: frame this conversation then on diet and recovery based on the fact that probably most people listening to this are overtraining.
Al: Yep.
Erik: I mean, if you have access to foil and you’re doing it on a daily, you’re probably red lighting pretty frequently. So I mean, how would you, how would you approach that given the fact that none of us are probably going to change our ways too much?
Al: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly. And that’s honestly I’ve trained people for so many years. It’s I always try to get, change the least amount of kind of their habits or lifestyle or whatever it is. And make the biggest impact. So I think knowing that you’re like, alright. I’m going to keep pushing it.
How do you work around that and, feel your best and do all that. One of the big ones would just be there’s a couple different ways you can work at it, but one would be around your like weight and Keep an eye on that. Like I know when I was running too much, like you just, you, you won’t be able to maintain your weight or you will have gotten to a point where you’re, you’re very lean and if you’re lean for a really long time, you’re going to start having.
Kind of hormonal issues and things you need to carry around a certain amount of just body fat. And so, I think just in practical terms one way to look at it is try eating more. And you might be surprised I’ve seen people where if you are over trained, your body’s just really not, over training is like you’re, in simple terms is, You push yourself and then you’re recovering, but you’re not recovering back up to that baseline.
So you start from a little bit lower each time and you keep trying to push yourself to that same line. So, if you do that for too many days in a row, you now, your baseline is starting off really low and you actually have to exert way more to get back up to that kind of red line thing.
So, breaking that down, like. Think about like in practical terms, eating more and see if your weight doesn’t change because that is a good indicator to me that you’re probably actually chronically under calorie. And I think most people that do foil and do sports and all that actually eat pretty well, but a lot of times it’s just purely just not enough calories.
So if you’re covering your protein bases, and so I’ll break that down where if. If you’re looking at your training a good way to go, they, for most people, if you’ve got a ton of extra body fat look at your kind of ideal weight. So if you’re thinking in your head, all right, I’m 20 pounds overweight, but that ideal weight in your head and where you want to get and for most guys, it’s, somewhere 10 percent body fat, if you’re trying to be a, an athlete but say between eight to 10 percent body fat take that weight in pounds and just.
Get a baseline goal of one gram of protein per pound of body weight. That’s the most simple formula because if you’re training every day you’re definitely going to get to that requirement. And the way that you described the type of training, which is foiling you’ll need that. And then beyond that, you’ve got that protein base and then you throw in the other big macro nutrients, which are fats and carbs.
And given that you’re going to red line every day, there, there is benefits to for certain people over carb diets and things, but definitely not if you’re trying to redline every day, like to get high energy output from things, you have to have carbs, your body is super adaptable, it’s definitely.
There is a difference too, in terms of, know, you are redlining with foiling, but it’s a longer session. And so if you had to max, max one run on a foil and it had a cap time on it, you are going to be able to push a little bit higher. But you’re getting, 90 percent of the way there, that extra little bit is not going to be that difference.
To where having enough carbohydrates is going to be a big driver. So protein based add fat and carbs on top of that. Oftentimes just to get to your calorie goals, cause I know you can crank through burning a ton of calories during the day and probably wear a loop or different. Thanks. It gives you some feedback on that.
But oftentimes what I found was when I was training a lot, training with USA triathlon and just torching calories was, it’s almost hard to even eat enough calories from the carbs. And that’s where you got to start throwing the fat in because one, it balances everything out. It supports your hormones more having fat in your diet, but just literally the density of the calories.
Cause Again, the basic level, you get nine grams of calories from nine calories from one gram of fat and then four grams of calories from one gram of carbs. So it’s a lot more kind of dense and efficient way to get in calories. So add those three things up, protein, fat and carbs, and you get to your calorie goal.
So I would tell a lot of people initially address. What if I just ate more and see how your energy changes because your weight can, you can eat a lot more and your weight won’t actually change because that extra calories where your body was just being efficient and saying, I’m not gonna, reveal this muscle and things like that.
I’m just going to maintain stasis, even though I’m underfed. So, you may add 500 calories to your day. And you’re like, I don’t know, I’m, I don’t know if I’ll gain weight. I, you probably won’t and you’ll probably just recover better. So that’s like an interesting thing to see and try to address. If you’re feeling over trained is up your calories, literally 25%.
And see how you feel. Cause a lot of people feel a ton better when they’re just getting more calories. Cause your body’s now not in maintenance mode. It’s I’ve got enough to work with. I’m actually going to recover better. And especially with chronic injuries and things like that, that’s, that’s Oftentimes like to that same point, like the body’s not recovering.
So it’s saying, I don’t have access to make repairs. And so over time, if you’ve got something that’s been twingy on you or whatever muscles aren’t feeling pliable or whatever it is, like a lot of that’s just not enough, just calories in for your body to do what it needs to do. That was long winded, but that’s one big pillar of it is.
Yeah. I don’t know if you want to redirect me there. I can try to break it down into some different areas as well.
Erik: No, I’m just thinking about, I mean, there was a lot in that and I’m just thinking through a few of those because there’s still a few of them seem very relevant to my last couple years. One, I used to love doing keto diets. Like I would always like a, a few months of keto every year. I haven’t been able to do it in the last few years since I’ve been foiling.
I just, after about a week, week and a half of doing keto, I’m just destroyed. That makes sense. And so I started a new diet that no one else has really caught on to yet, but it’s called keto carbs. So
Al: Yeah.
Erik: I don’t know if you’ve heard about that, but it’s basically you do mostly keto and then you just crush tons of carbs right before you go to bed.
So you get your glycemic index back. In the form of popcorn or beer or whatever,
Al: Yeah. Yeah.
Erik: that actually has always felt really good when you do that. As long as you keep the beers below the threshold of feeling bad. Yeah. So if any,
Al: I agree with that, to be honest, too. I’ll just interject yeah, that, that honestly has worked. It’s, if you’re, you’re out there a lot when you’re boiling, like it’s hard to eat a lot of calories. And oftentimes it’s like your body’s kind of cooled off for the day and things and gotten things sorted.
You’re also living your life. You got kids in there and work and all that kind of stuff. So, if it’s the end of the day and you’re like, dude, I’m going to have a couple of beers and eat half a pizza, like that’s you getting in what you need and your body’s going to be able to figure that out.
There’s not going to be any. Massive health effects, or I don’t, I think people over way of, I know people over index on trying to split up the meals or whatever you’ve got to work with and like, how do you feel and your day,
Erik: So I know at one point you were eating a ton of ground beef. Are you still doing that
Al: I am in yeah, like context wise, I’m my nutrition over the years. It’s changed a lot. And the biggest thing I did was I wanted to try everything because I really wanted to speak from, if I’m talking to somebody about a vegan diet or raw vegan or keto or whatever it is, I want to try all that stuff myself.
So I have some kind of context on it. What you described with, you can go low carb for a while, but if you’re doing what you’re doing, like the wheels just come off at some point and you just don’t have any gas. The other thing I was going to mention around, yeah, yeah.
Erik: It was like failing mentally. Yeah.
Al: yeah, yeah, yeah, and all that stuff’s connected, like you’re feeling like the overtraining stuff aside from the physical change and not there’s a couple, I think you probably dove into like symptoms overtraining heart rates, a big thing.
I think it’s hard for people to. And, people are lazy and guys, especially well just unless something really breaks, you’re just like I’m gonna, I’m gonna deal with it. I don’t feel great today. I’ll have extra coffee. I’ll get out there. So I think trying to check your heart rate in the morning…
It’s honestly, most people aren’t doing that. But where I noticed it was when I was swimming a lot and running and cycling. I couldn’t get my heart rate up. And that’s where I think that’s an interesting one where if you’re out boiling and you’re just like, dude, I just can’t even, I can’t get my power up to where I want to, I can’t get just literally the power out of my legs to, to pump hard enough or whatever.
That’s a really good sign of retraining. That was always a key for me where I was like, I feel like I’m. Go and turn on the jets. And there’s just I’m just at this moderate pace. That was a big one. Sorry. I, I redirected off where you’re going, but
Erik: that, that, that makes a lot of sense. I find that when I, if I feel like I’m, if I’m sending it really hard and then I get a bad night’s sleep or something like that, I’ll feel really tired early, but my max heart rate is really low
Al: yeah,
Erik: narratively and like my resting heart rate over the last month, which I would say is like the easiest month I’ve had in a few years probably is like really low upper, upper forties again.
And the month before I was probably chilling around the, mid to upper fifties is probably, resting heart rates down about 10 beats a minute, I would say.
Al: yeah. And that’s a good sign that you’re getting a little bit more recovery. And for sure, if you’re arresting heart rates a little bit elevated, it kind of like, I don’t, I won’t be able to tie this directly to study or something, but I think in general, you see it where that baseline part way goes up a little bit and then your top end is cap.
So you’ve kind of like moved into this, like a little bit more of a, a median range of you’re not getting down to the lows when you’re not fully recovered and you can’t get up and reach the highs. And you have more range when you’re actually recovered. Yeah. Mm hmm.
Erik: That makes sense. How do you feel about eating pre during and post like session? And you can look at. So I would say that downwind runs are probably a little bit more like running a marathon. Maybe not quite as long normally, but you know, like ours are normally 30 to 45 minutes off. High heart rate. I, some of our runs I’ll average, the, the ones that are grinders I’ll average, one 50, one 60 beats a minute for the whole run. ones for me are like in the 120s. I know some of the guys out there, there’s also a wide swatch of your demographic of, of athlete in this, we’ve got guys like Edo and Oscar who are probably, almost like Olympian level athletes
And there, Josh Kuh, they’re doing downwind runs, at 115, 120 beats a minute. There’s also guys like, me, mid 40s, 44, or it’s in a very different league from the guy who’s 22, 23, I feel like. So, so maybe talk about, The, so you’ve got the downwind, which is more like a marathon…
You’ve got the prone surf, which is more hit training, three minutes, all out, rest for five minutes, three minutes, all out, repeat for a couple hours. How would you approach diet going into, right beforehand, you crushing carbs or you do anything hydration and then, energy packs during, how would you approach those?
Al: Yeah. In, yeah, there’s two big points to kind of like frame the conversation. One is your body is super adaptable, where, you know the biggest thing, same with, you know, if you’re going out and you haven’t surfed before, done any foiling and you’re, you’re doing like a, a hit workout, kinda like you said to get on a wave or whatever it is.
Or you come to the gym the first time and you start doing a bunch of squats or big, multi-joint. Heavy heavy movements like you end up getting lightheaded because your body’s not able to regulate your blood sugar. Well so if you’re well trained your body can’t handle it for the most part and then the overtraining thing comes in because Long term if you’re not giving your body what you need it’s gonna it’s gonna make you rest through injury or fatigue or whatever, but Yeah.
Like the, the other side of it is the other frame is around the duration. So, regardless of your training, the more trained you are, the faster your body’s able to incorporate in using fat for fuel over carbohydrate. So if you’re brand new your body’s going to be like, I need quick energy and I’m not well conditioned to this.
I’m going to. heavily reliant on a carbohydrate source. And then for everyone, the longer, the duration, the lower percentage of. Your energy from carbohydrates that’s used. And basically that crossover point is typically at 75 minutes to 90 minutes. If you’re more trained, you tap into that earlier and it’s always a hybrid.
So, you start out zero to 20 seconds or sorry, I’ll give you zero to 20 minutes of a workout, it’s going to be primarily carbs as you get longer and longer is think of like X and Y axis. Like your carb usage for energy is going down and your fat usage for energy is going up. So that’s like kind of the other big frame but then so think thinking about that and having that context carbs are helpful One, like through your 24 hour cycle around nutrition and nutrition post workout becomes really important if it’s, you’re doing multiple sessions in a day, like if you ever hit a morning session and then if you got busy with work, you didn’t eat or whatever, you try and go hit an evening session and you haven’t had a good amount of carbs and protein, like right after your training, you’re going to feel super flat.
So that’s where like that kind of post session window is super important. If you’re going to hit. A session within a 24 hour, like in less than a 24 hour period. So you’re not getting basically like a sleep in between where your body’s recovering a lot. You really got to think about during. Your session and right after having enough carbs and protein.
Other than that, say just in those two examples you gave is someone doing like a 45 minute kind of more consistent kind of long runnish, moderate, intensity type thing. That’s going to be, a mix of carbs and carbs and fat. It’s going to be something that, you know, less than an hour Again, if you’re training and do another session later in the day, I would say probably wouldn’t be at bad high like a goo or just some kind of carbs on you.
You don’t need to think about protein. During your sessions because you’re just, burned into energy at that point. You’re not really focused on recovery. And then if you’re doing a longer session, you do need to just start thinking about maybe some fat in there at some point. But again, like the higher your intensity, the less you’re gonna want to eat.
I would say for the surf kind of thing where it’s more like a hit workout and you’re popping up and yeah. Chillin and then going max. If that’s a 90 plus minute session, I would say again, just having some, some carbs during that training. If you take a break at all on the board and you eat something more substantial, you can do that.
Everyone’s a bit personalized with that too. So, yeah, I think like it’s a little bit around what you can handle, what you can bring with you, what you like. Some people just have honey. Some people have cookies, whatever it is. But in general, like it’s helpful to, there’s no real downside as long as it doesn’t upset your stomach that having some additional kind of carbs during the session prior to the session it depends a little bit on like.
Sometimes, like you were describing it, if I had a big barb fest the night before I wake up and I’m probably pretty good. Like maybe I have a coffee Bulletproof coffee or something like that in the morning. But maybe you’re not feeling like I don’t really need any thing. Maybe if you get out there after 45 minutes, you’re having some honey or doing something like that, but.
A lot of it’s kind of like, what’s that 24 hour period? The biggest takeaways are, get enough calories overall. And that’s going to come obviously not all from your session. I mean, the biggest one is if you are doing multiple sessions in a day, or it’s going to be over like a 90 minute period, having something during your session is going to be really helpful.
And if you get a time where you’re like hitting the morning session, and then you’re going to do afternoon, evening or whatever, having enough protein and carbs, like in a big way after you’re off, you’re, you’re on the shore or whatever, getting something in. Otherwise that the second session really does take a hit for
Erik: like actually I just did two hours of the water and then I was running late. And so I had A couple of Welch’s gummies that the kids had snack packs for lunch. And that’s, I think, I’m going to crash really hard this afternoon. I already know that. What about caffeine?
And this was asked, I posed some questions to the, to the Instagram crowds. What about caffeine B vitamins?
Al: Yeah. And that whole, what you just described was just as like an aside that’s the whole reason I got into protein as my first product with what we were doing, because I was like, yo, I can bring fruit with me, fruit snacks, whatever it is, I can even bring I want to bring some fat or, you can have all oil cheese, like you get some But you can’t have, it’s really hard to pack protein with you.
You can’t like have a piece of fish or like a piece of meat in your bag all day, like it doesn’t work. And so that was the one thing I couldn’t solve around. And so that’s why I started with protein was I was like, I can usually pack a bit of run jelly or whatever it is, but that had no way to get protein.
So if I was doing a hard session and I’m running to class or running to work or whatever it is, there’s just not going to happen unless I had like a shake. And so that was that was a big part of it for me was the multi session thing. But with caffeine and B vitamins, now you’re getting into what people think of it’s or good genetic aid.
So things that actually confer like a performance benefit when you’re training caffeine is definitely like extremely well proven and study, just alertness their blood flow, like you’re just, you’re going to be able to get some more power out of things for sure. And that’s a combination of like mental and physical effects of caffeine.
And then the B vitamins, like the, if you went strictly by the clinical research, like there’s not an overwhelming amount of evidence, but a lot of people do feel better with it. And I would say anyone that’s training like the way that you described your training, like the best thing about B vitamins is they’re water, water soluble so you do not have a overdose risk, if you’re taking the fat soluble.
Fat soluble vitamin, like vitamin A, vitamin D, vitamin E you can over index on those and you, you want to keep an eye on that stuff. With that said, most people are like, you guys, because you’re in the sun might be okay on the vitamin D, but you know, the vast majority of Americans are deficient in DNA and all that.
And those have huge health implications in the negative way if you, if you don’t get enough of those, but yeah, caffeine definitely is helpful. You can’t do too much, if you are really like dialing it in, you can give yourself caffeine breaks and. And all that in general, 200 milligrams is amount that people look at, which is basically like a big cup of coffee or, a couple of shots of espresso.
You’re going to get around there. A lot of Starbucks drinks, if you’re getting like a medium or something like, a big cold brew from Starbucks is definitely like 400 milligrams plus. So that’s a lot like, again, people get conditioned to, and just like alcohol, like people have different kinds of tolerances and things, but the performance kind of angle is around 200 milligrams.
Anything beyond that, like if you’re getting all jittery and stuff, like it’s too much, it’s not really helping you. And then the B vitamins, like it’s not gonna hurt you. Some people really benefit from it. And a lot of people are deficient in B vitamins. So having those I think is, there’s no negative to it.
And for some people, they really feel it has some benefits.
Erik: Yeah, , I’m months off of caffeine now and love it.
Al: Wow.
Erik: like caffeine for me is great for a couple of weeks and the effect starts to go away and it’s negative and I actually feel like more lethargic. If you like looked at how I feel throughout a day drinking caffeine, I’m more tired more often throughout a day than I am when I just have zero and Yeah, it’s like probably the fourth or fifth time I’ve decided to go completely and I’m months into it now And I’m like, why do I ever do this?
I just feel so good.
Al: No tea, no, no chocolate, like anything or no.
Erik: So I’ll eat some chocolate, but I mean not not a lot, but that’s the ambromian, right?
Al: Yeah. There’s some caffeine in chocolate. I just remember a time when I was like way over training and over working and everything and just not getting any sleep. And I started pounding chocolate like, this makes me feel better. And I think that there’s, it was partially like I was getting a decent amount of caffeine through like dark chocolate, but also like through bromine and there’s some different compounds, alkaloids, caffeines, like a molecule that’s part of the family of molecules called alkaloids and some of the Other compounds and coffee have similar effects caffeine.
So, but yeah it’s interesting. I was just wondering, could some people like switch off 1 and, they’re getting caffeine some other way. But yeah, it’s cool. I’ve talked about that and I, when I have caffeine, I usually have it with some kind of. Or something, because it does seem to want that spike and drop that you get.
From just having caffeine.
Erik: Yeah. I in Costa Rica, I used to just buy raw cacao nibs and just crush all day. Like I wouldn’t put caffeine, but man, I love like raw cacao. And here I think Coco via, I think, but it’s more of the alcohol, alkaloids, is that what you said? It is the the theobromine, I believe, but, but I think that, I think that theobromine and nicotine are probably the two best drugs out there.
I’m a huge.
Al: Yeah. Actually. So that’s a good point. So are you, have you switched to a snooze or anything like that without the not having the caffeine, but you have that?
Erik: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m crushing his in right now.
Al: Yeah. Okay. So, all right.
Erik: grade.
Al: Yeah, there you go. So yeah, I think either one of those, like you’re going to get some benefit from, from a performance standpoint.
And yeah, I mean, the number of people that I know that. Use it like as in for just honestly cognitive type stuff and it seems pretty effective There’s a ton of interest you I know you’ve dove into it But there’s a cool there’s a lot of cool health effects from nicotine and health protective effects and mental benefits and things It’s pretty cool.
Erik: Yeah. It’s really just about delivery. Like I feel can just figure out a way to get the cleanest nicotine possible. And you’re one buddy, I’ve talked to you a bunch just on that path. I think it’s so cool. He just needs to hurry u
Al: Yeah Yeah Yep. Mm hmm
Erik: Um, let’s see, let’s talk about training for a sport like this. If you’re constantly over trained and imbalanced, because there are some imbalances that happen in foiling, because it’s a unidirectional sport. And actually one of the jokes, it seems like people have started to figure out how to tune setups to be more balanced, but at the beginning, like every foilers back leg was much bigger than their front leg.
And now, like I’ve gotten mine to where looking at them right now, they’re pretty darn close. I’ve recovered a lot of, of that imbalance, I believe. And I’ve talked to Eric Goodman a lot, foundation training. It, and there’s exercises there. Foundation training is brilliant. I’m like. His biggest disciple that possible.
But what do you think about imbalances training when you’re kind of like, literally when I’m, it’s, it’s a struggle for me to get in a 15, 20 minute workout on weeks when the surf is good, every couple it’s because I’m tired and I want to save my energy for what I want to
Al: yeah, totally.
Erik: but I know that’s not the best thing to do.
So how, how would you, advise people move through?
Al: Yeah. Same, same application before, like the framework I have is just what’s the, the least amount we can do for the biggest benefit and I think what you described, which is. Everyone’s got a certain amount of imbalance, like this kind of perfect symmetry and perfect balance of strength between left and right side is really not there with anyone.
And that’s why there’s a lot of strength coaches and stuff that really don’t do a lot of bilateral or using your both your legs for different exercises, they really prefer unilateral stuff where it’s just right leg. Left leg, that type of thing, because then you expose those weaknesses, you’re challenging your balance more and all the little stabilizers.
So I would apply that. I think I know you’ve done a lot of different stuff with kettlebells and things, but like doing, I would say for foil guys the leg that’s not getting the work in doing some single egg split squats and things would be super helpful. And those are like, again, in this framework, like wickedly effective, like you could do, three to five rounds of some Bulgarian split squats two or three times a week, and you could probably fix a lot of that imbalance and, or at least.
Really limit the injury risk from that imbalance. So that would be like my number one thing. The other one I would say, which is pretty common with a lot of sports, like They’re kind of like, I don’t want to get into like different planes and things, but you’re not doing a lot of pulling with foiling.
So I would say like either single leg or bilateral, just standard kind of deadlifts and things would probably be another one that is super helpful for people where you get to really work posterior chain and stuff for postural reasons and different things like that. But honestly, if you, if you’re doing a single leg Bulgarian splits quads.
And getting more work out of that non dominant leg and then doing some deadlifts. And if you hit literally just the circuit of that stuff, maybe you’re doing some rows and stuff like that, like some supplementary upper body stuff as well. Two or three times a week, like you could have a 20 minute kind of lift that’s pretty focused and get 90 percent of the benefit of a more complicated program.
That’s what I would say.
Erik: Yeah, no, I love that. That’s pretty close to what I try to do. I tend to not really do much in the way of legs except for foundation training type. Exercise just to keep my lower back as strong as I can. I find that hamstrings, my hamstrings are, are, are the biggest they’ve ever been. I feel like somewhere in that they nice, such a gym, bro.
Al: Yeah. Sick. Sick. Yeah.
Erik: I feel like somewhere in the pump mechanic. You’re doing a lot of hamstring work. I don’t know exactly where that is. Maybe it’s the, the leaning forward, like like micro hinging a lot,
Al: Yeah.
I would say that, that’s cool. I mean, you, yeah. Do you feel like you actually, you do pull up on the board as well or is it all just push?
Erik: it’s all push, but I feel like you’re hinging forward and then pulling up,
Al: Yeah. Cool.
Erik: a little bit forward. It’s it, hundreds of like little micro deadlifts, I guess.
Al: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think yeah, I would, I would still say even, you Because the reason I went to a split squat one, you’ll get in a deeper hip angle, which I’m assuming you don’t get at a crazy hip angle. What would say your range, like from one 80, like standing to a 90 degree sit, like you’re in between that range most of the time or all the time.
Erik: Yeah. Probably right in between that range. 135.
Al: Yeah. Cool. So I think that’s, I mean, you do a lot of mobility and that foundation thing, you training, you mentioned is. Epic with that stuff. But yeah, putting your putting your muscles through a little bit more range. So I like that split squat because I have a hip injury and I can’t squat bilaterally deep with a barbell on my back or anything.
But if I do So it’s squats. I can get in some good hip range of motion. Your body can shift around it if you’ve got some kind of limitations, but you’re able to work a little bit towards those end ranges, like you never want to get people get over index on I’m going to go like maximal into a squat or whatever and load it.
You don’t have to do that, but getting to 90 or getting a little bit below 90, whatever’s your biomechanics allow, but I think that’s great. Also get in your glutes a bit more. And then I like the deadlift. From even if you’re getting the hamstring work deadlift is one of those where you get such hormonal overall benefits from a good, like being able to load your nervous system with a lot of weight.
Cause you’re, you’re moving a lot of repetitive relatively lower weight to what you could maximally deadlift while you’re foiling. And if you can get your body and your nervous system turned on two or three times a week, especially as you’re getting older and stuff this applies to everyone like getting it.
Good heavy lift in keeps your overall muscle mass on and, and really does help your hormones and stuff. So the deadlift, I think you get a little bit of a different range on the hamstrings, but also there’s always a kind of other like second order benefits that I wish everyone was able to get, but I think applies very well to foiling too.
Erik: How, how heavy do you have to go to get the Whole body, nervous system benefit, hormonal. And
Al: I mean, it’s definitely, again, like everything, like you were describing younger guys and where their heart rates are when they’re doing long stuff, like it is a bit different from, yeah, how you’re set up anthropometrically, if you’ve trained before, whatever, but I would, everyone should be able to do a body weight deadlift, that’s like baseline table stakes, definitely be able to do that.
If you’re not doing that. There’s definitely pieces in your chain up and down your body that are not strong enough engaged enough where you’re going to end up with injury. Oftentimes it’s like in somebody’s back or something. Like you said if that’s something that boilers typically deal with Honestly, the best kind of exercise you can do to help your back get stronger is doing deadlifts because you’re also, your core is really working a lot.
If you’re lifting heavy deadlifts, like your core is maximally engaged. That’s like a sub point that is really important where, if you’re doing abs, don’t stop doing ab exercises and do heavy lifts where your abs are doing what they’re supposed to do, which is. Reduce or limit portion on your spine.
And that’s really the goal is like your abs are like a brace for your back. And so your abs prevent your back from getting hurt. If you lose form in a deadlift or something like that, where you hurt your back, it’s because your abs didn’t engage enough and you’re, you’re actually making your back do all the work, which shouldn’t be happening.
Your abs help stabilize your spine. And so, back to the weight goals for a deadlift, I would, I would Like everyone to get to, if you can two extra body weight, if you’re not, if you’re a heavier guy, like that might be, all right, let me try to do some kind of equation around, additional fat mass and things.
But for the most part, the two X body weight deadlift is, is a good baseline, even as you’re getting older to try to maintain and hit that would be like the high level answer. I don’t think you have to go too much beyond that. It’s time or attention thing. So if you can get. Ideally you’re, you’re getting to a weight where if you hit five reps or something like that, three to five reps, and it was pretty challenging.
Maybe you get one or two more in the tank, but trying to get to the place like that is, is helpful.
Erik: so like a five rep to failure, you’re hitting the hormonal benefits
Al: I’m trying to think of another analogy. I mean, it’s kind of like, after you really went for a wave and you pumped it you feel like, I’m like blown out, that kind of feeling like that’s your nervous system being like, did I just tap the gas pretty hard?
If you can get that out of lifting a couple of days a week where that, that will really pay some dividends and it’s in a way that. You can keep it to a pretty succinct kind of dose where it’s not going to wreck you for your training, even your training a lot, if you can do two deadlifts a week, or even, even once a week, we’ll, something is better than nothing.
If you’re like, all right, I just don’t have enough time to get in the gym. I’m not going to do it at all. I really want people to just say, nah, man, if you can get 20 minutes in once a week, that’s worlds better than zero. And if you get twice, that’s probably great. And if you get three, like that’s extra, but so somewhere where you can just.
Get a couple of sets in and it can be pretty quick. But yeah, I think a lot of really help.
Erik: right on. I am looking at all the questions we have. Are you good for about another 20 or 30 minutes now?
Al: Yeah. Yeah, for sure.
Erik: So, oh, one note I had about hip mobility. I find, and I’ve worked with a lot of guys surfing and coaching and whatnot, and I find that, generally speaking, a lot of folks have hip mobility issues and it’s limiting.
For pop ups specifically and prone pop ups. If you’re on a small board, you have to, with a four forward foil position it requires a good bit of hip mobility. And I actually just had a session where I was wearing like a PFD that was limiting maybe about an inch or two. Of my, my hip mobility.
I have pretty flexible hips
Al: Yeah, you do.
Erik: years of training got goblets. So that’s where I was going to go with this as goblets spots. But it, and it was really crazy how much more difficult it was with just losing like an inch or two. It made it really difficult on a, on a small board. And so what I find probably the most beneficial is goblet squats.
If you don’t do goblet squats, you have hip mobility issues. Like just learn to sit in that I find. And is there any negative to that? If I’m giving out fitness advice without any.
Al: That’s good. You’re, you’re way more qualified than most fitness people are. The
Erik: college, I was a gold’s gym registered trainer. I did the course.
Al: Yeah, so yeah, I mean, and that’s a really good point to bring on is, Goblet squats are amazing. If you’re going to do one type of squat, like I love Bulgarian split squats for the unilateral side of it. But that front loaded goblet squat position is, it’s very, very safe. If you’ve got any back issues, like you can’t hold something in front of you, the way that you position a goblet and not have your core engaged, like it just doesn’t work.
And so, and your core is going to give out first in a way that you won’t hurt your back or you it’s very, very unlikely. So. It’s one that’s like what I would have everyone do, like the number of people that you only ever need to back squat if you like it, if you’re training for Olympic lifting or something like that, where it’s more specialized, but.
99 percent of people have not maxed out where they can get with a goblet squat. At some point it is your arm weight and stuff. But your point around mobility, like it just puts you in the right position. A lot of people have like their hips hiked in a certain direction too much, holding something in a goblet position brings your hips in, in alignment, under your shoulders where you want to be.
It puts you in a neutral spine position. It shifts your weight forward a bit and allows a lot of people to get in a better range of motion and squat. And, if you’re not used to getting there and you haven’t loaded your body in that position, and again, it’s not, let’s see how much weight we can put on in a goblet squat at the bottom of your squat.
That’s not the goal. Some people kind of like fetishize it and try to get really extreme with it. That’s lessened, I think to a certain degree. And I know foundational training does a really good job with all their stuff. But yeah, just letting your body get in those positions and have it under a little bit of load allows you to access that when you’re actually like training and, I have limited, very limited hip mobility on my hips and it’s terrible, like trying to pop up or something.
It’s just it’s awful. And I think for you, yeah. Having the the flotation on like just a little bit changes your whole mechanics of how you get up and balance and everything. So, yeah, goblet spots are great, man. If you can get in there and not have any pain. There are a lot of people that have different little, I know you’ve probably had little tears in your shoulders and different things over the years or hips where you can, you feel a little crunchy or something’s not comfortable.
So if you get in that bottom, you feel pain trying to move to a position where you’re not feeling that. You shouldn’t feel like. Inflamed anything after you’ve been sitting in there a lot, so building up to that over time and kind of like, you don’t have to go straight to the bottom. From just training perspective, like looking at a mirror on, on a parallel to you is a really good way to just see where your hips are at.
If you feel like your, your butt’s kind of really ducking under, like a duck butt. So think about your butt. Coming under your shoulders too much in rounding. You don’t want to sit that low. It’s, it can be fine to do that unloaded, but especially if you’ve got weight on, you want to keep your spine neutral and you don’t want to see that curve at the bottom.
So that’s like the basics around, obviously pain. And then if you are looking sideways. Sideways on in the mirror is a good way to check, like, how, how is your hips. And if you see that kind of duck butt where your butt’s curving under, come up a little bit in your squat and find that point where you’re able to hold that kind of neutral spine and hang out there for a bit and probably over time, like things are loosened up.
Erik: Right on. I think maybe I go too deep in it, but I have a spondylolisthesis, which is a weird thing. And for me, it’s, it just unlocks me. It like pulls apart. My lower feels really good. If I start getting a lot of sciatica or something. All right. So let’s dive into some questions and we’ve got. About 40, and I’m not, we’re not going to go through all of them, but I’ll pick out some themes.
Austin Tobey, so good buddy Austin, asks, Best intermittent fasting split to get the benefits while maintaining muscle mass? 16 8? What do you think about intermittent fasting? Yeah.
Al: of your sessions and like your training. But in general you can figure it out, it’s it’s in the scheme of what’s your overall day like. So if you’re able to get in the calories you need within that window and you’ve trained your body to perform in that other window.
And. You can do it. I would say again, like the multiple sessions per day, it’s tough. If you’re in that window and you hit a morning and an evening, you don’t have any kind of nutrients in between. I think you’re going to suffer performance wise. Like the thing I’ve noticed too, is really you, you don’t know, it’s very slow or it’s not a noticeable decline in performance. Do you think you’re performing the same? This happens with the overtraining thing, if I touch on that again, it’s just sometimes you don’t realize you may have experienced this where you’re like, man, I think I’m pressing hard and you’re like, damn, I like, I’ve lost five pounds over the past month or something.
Those are those things. So I would say anyone that’s doing it and same with keto, like maybe it feels awesome. Like you said, like I think you’ve done it a few times to where, when it’s too much. And that’s what I would tell people is like that intermittent fasting thing might feel really good and might actually be beneficial for a certain amount of time.
But then you should test that theory and say, all right, what if I don’t do that? I’m going to have, breakfast before I go or lunch right after or something like that. See if your performance changes, because it’s good to check in because a lot of those things are helpful. You get some benefit for a certain amount of time, but then over a longer period, that’s not sustainable or best for your training.
Erik: Yeah, when I was doing Keto the last time, and I was just really drained one day, and I was like, I wonder how I’d feel if I just crushed a bunch of carbs and I had a huge bowl of popcorn, and it was like life came back to me, and I was like, well, we might not be on Keto right now.
Al: for sure. And that’s it. Yeah, dude regardless of what I say or whatever you should always go with what your body knows, and there’s all kinds of stuff that you can’t even factor in and wouldn’t even tell someone who’s supposed to be helping you with your nutrition. You’re like, Oh, man, well, yeah, I guess when you come to think of it, I was up because my kid was sick or I did actually, I have to move in some stuff, my buddy’s place.
And there’s a bunch of this other stuff that you’re not taking into account for. So if you’re, if you sit down and you’re just like, dude, I’m so hungry and I feel so much better. And you’re like, but I don’t know if that’s what I’m supposed to be doing. Definitely don’t let your mind override your body.
As far as that, I think people who are good athletes are used to being like, tell their body what to do and be like, I got one more. But when it comes to nutrition, if you, like you said, if you sit down, Yeah, I just. I’m gonna eat this whole pasta right now. Probably should do it more, more than not do it, mm-Hmm.
Erik: Yeah, I’ve started listening more and more to my body, and there was a period of time where I would just crave salmon all the time. And I started taking fish oil probably six, eight months ago, on the daily, a couple grams a night. I never crave salmon anymore.
Al: Yeah.
Erik: You
Al: I think there’s a lot to that. Thought I’m gonna cut you off there.
Erik: no, well, it’s just happened in a few different realms lately where I’m like, man, I’m just like, and meat, red meat a lot lately.
Al: Yep,
Erik: I’ve been wanting on red
Al: Yeah. Yeah. There’s a, there’s again, like the nuance factor, like there’s a big difference between oh, I’m just getting my protein in. Fish versus beef, like there’s a lot of nutritional differences there and dependent Definitely go with what your body’s craving, you know Like that’s your body knows a lot more than your brain knows about what you need A lot of times like if you’re not addicted to something or you’re not feeling addicted to sugar and you’re like you’ve gotten to a healthy state where your body’s Yeah, I really need some red meat or I need some more fat today.
Or I like, I need to just chill. I don’t want to eat. I’m just gonna have fruit today. Go with that. Realize that your body does know what’s doing. And I’ve never, whenever I’ve leaned into that man, I don’t feel good today. I’m just eating light today or I’m super hungry today.
It’s always worked out. Like your body is smart.
Erik: How do you feel about eggs? I mean, I eat a lot of
Al: Oh yeah.
Erik: Yeah.
Al: Yeah, I,
Erik: as far as
Al: yeah,
Erik: So I know you can eat a million, like I ate this morning before I surfed, I had an avocado and a three egg, five white omelet or three yolk, five white omelet. Like how many yolks is, I try to keep it to three oaks a day.
Is, is that healthy? Should you do
Al: yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I would say would say that I definitely have eaten so many eggs in my life. I got to a point where I ate too many eggs. I don’t know if it was like you, you can definitely burn yourself out. Like you probably, everyone’s probably experienced it where if you’re training a lot, like maybe it’s a flavor of a bar drink.
You like, you’re like, dude, I literally, I will vomit if I have that again. Like I’ve just had it so many times. I can’t do it. I got like that with eggs. Cause the point where I was like, I feel like I’m like allergic to them. Like it just bothers me. But in general, like health wise you’re going to be fine.
Like three’s fine. Yeah, most people aren’t going too much beyond that, but there’s definitely not either like a a negative two, three or five or whatever, I would say you’ve got some play there where I don’t think you’re going to be, housing eight to 12 whole eggs a day. If you are like, Even a lot of people are going to be fine with that.
It’s more so the yolk’s got the fat and stuff. You may get to a point where you’re just like, that’s throwing off my like digestion or whatever, if you have too much fat at one time or, or whatever like that. But yeah, three a day is totally, totally fine.
Erik: So let me think here. I’m looking through the questions. Hydration. Pre hydration fueling strategies when you don’t have on the water access.
Al: Yeah. So I would say again, like it is, it’s a good thing to mess around with. I think some people have gone on different sides of. When it comes to hydration, like the sodium component, like I know I’ve, I’ve tried different things too, where it’s like, Oh man, like I just drink water.
I’m good. And that may also work for a little while. And there is probably an in between that works, if, okay, I’m going to have three, electrolyte packets a day or something like maybe that’s too much, but I would say in general getting enough water in and making sure you are getting some salt with it prior.
So, I mean, for me, when I wake up, I drink a lot of water. So I think that’s baseline is like getting enough hydration beforehand. Like again, like if you’re going into something and you’re feeling thirsty, like you’re buying a bowl there, like you, you already haven’t gotten enough in.
So having enough liquids in the night before if you’re waking up, definitely getting a lot in prior to, and then during you’re kind of like, you’re never, if you’re training and you’re, you’re doing a session, like you’re never trying to refuel. Fully ever while you’re training, you’re just trying to like, lessen the depletion and extend a bit.
So that’s like a good framework. Like it’s never going to be a one to one, like you can’t infinitely just fuel and continue foiling. Just think about it. Like I’m getting some supplementary either calories or hydration in there. Just to kind of like extend my window of performance rather than I’m actually going to replace one to one.
So keeping that in mind. So really The most benefit is coming the night before, day before And, and that morning is the time where I really try to get a lot in and set myself up for success during the session or something.
Erik: Gotcha. Stretching on the beach. Are you a fan of pre workout stretching?
Al: Yeah. The, the, again, it’s a bit like, it is a bit personalized. Like some people feel good doing different things or if you’ve got some kind of specific kind of injury or whatever, there’s different needs there, but on the whole, and like what quote unquote, like kind of research Yeah, you’re not trying to do long static stretching prior to.
Any kind of fitness or in this case especially not explosive type activities where you’re trying to generate a lot of power in a short period of time. Like you’re really focused on general warmup stuff. So I think about the same application. If you go in the gym, like you don’t want to skip the heaviest weight or try to go super fast initially.
So just getting your body, part of it’s just getting your body temperature up. That’s a lot of these, there’s all these like just nuanced effects to different things that you’re told to do or that research that is that there’s actually like an underlying part to it. So it’s I mean, you could look at a lot of stuff and be like, honestly, the stretching part, if you’re trying to correlate it to performance or injury risk or whatever it is, it’s more just I’ve got my system on.
And that means like your body temperature has gone up a little bit. You’ve gotten some blood flow going. That’s really what you should be focused on. So, temperature up, blood flow. If those are your things, that stuff is not good. If you’re going to do going through some body weight squats and stretching your shoulders and doing some shoulder rolls or moving your body around, that’s, that’s what I’d be focused on and getting that in before you shock your body with Oh shit, I’m going to fucking go from driving my car for 20 minutes to, flat out intensity. That’s where I think you’d one, not get the performance you want, but to open yourself up to injury risk if you’re trying to go from sedentary stinting to max effort.
So doing. Nothing long, but just getting your, getting some movement going before you train and be the best.
Erik: Yeah. That’s an interesting point you made there. The causation correlation point. Yeah. And that, my buddy Alex, and that’s something that we talk about all the time. And he has a lot of these really cool kind of beliefs around that. Like one of them is vitamin D actually to
Al: Yeah.
Erik: vitamin D, the sun is actually really beneficial for you and raises your vitamin D levels.
And he thinks that, supplementation never gets you to the actual benefit of sun. And I agree with
Al: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that’s, that’s you always got to handicap it or whatever, but just, I mean, like the, the beefers salmon, like the un, the, the lacking nuance view is well, proteins, protein, like it doesn’t matter, but there’s so many other things in each of those things.
And similarly, like you taking a vitamin versus Being outside and get in the sun and there’s so much stuff that we don’t fully capture or understand Physiologically and the processes that having that sunlight actually turns on are completely different too. So yeah, I agree.
Erik: I’m a, I’m a big advocate in any day at sunny. I get at least 20 minutes. Feel like, yeah, it’s just crazy good for you. And I like the red light therapy as well. I try to do pretty regularly. What’s your take on ice baths? That’s a
Al: Yeah Yeah Getting clicks Yeah
Erik: phase like years ago,
Al: yep.
Erik: funny to see it like so popular. Now I’m a huge, I love sauna and
Al: Yeah, yeah,
Erik: for sauna to ice bath.
Al: yeah, totally. I think yeah, it’s very mixed. It’s really mixed and it’s kind of like, I would say I’m not. So I’ll just be from personally I’m not the hugest fan at all. I think it’s kind of like, there’s, there’s a lot of, there’s benefits to it for different reasons.
And I think everyone’s looking at a different way. I think a lot of people get a lot of good mental benefits out of it. Like the gen pop is, I think, likes that because it’s cool. They see professional athletes doing it or people they, they like. And it’s cool to be able to get better at something.
People love to get better at stuff. And ice bath is just like a skill where you tell your body, Hey, I’m not going to die, chill out. And getting over that mental hump is really cool for people. So I think that’s the hook and the reason that most people like it. And other people are just selling, selling ice bath, but
Erik: I think it gives you like a pretty cool chemical cocktail, like you, you feel good afterwards, but I feel like it’s yeah, I feel different after sauna. Like I, I think sauna has like a, for me anyways, much more better.
Al: Yeah. I would. Yeah. From, so like a non, so there’s definitely science on kind of both sides of the ice bath for recovery or different performance things. I haven’t found it. It’s been something that I love all the time. I would say sauna is more so what I’m looking for as far as one, I find it, obviously I think most people would say it’s more relaxing than an ice bath.
And so you’re like down regulating yourself. And so if you’re training a lot, like that’s really important, like overtraining stuff can come and often does come from. It’s maybe not just the training, unless you really live like a monk, like bubble life, but it’s yeah, a bunch of other stuff happening, family, kids, work, whatever it is those are real stressors on you that do compound with your training.
And if I spat, I spat with definitely like another shock to your system, whereas the sauna for most people, it’s like actually a relaxing experience. And again, turn in. Not your sport into a sport is never a great idea. So it’s if you’re like, dude, I’m going to go hotter and longer in the sauna, like definitely not helpful or necessary.
And that’s a separate thing. If you enjoy that, that’s, that’s your own thing. But I think the sauna too, when you look at just traditionally what’s been used, and I think there’s real validity in that when you look at the, it’s newer in the U S but either Asia or the Nordics or Russia or whatever it is Those people have been using Saunus for a really long time for various health benefits and also like performance stuff.
But I think there’s a big aspect to the down regulation and just blood flow in a non kind of intense stressful environment. Where the ice bath, I think you get a little bit, I think there’s some stuff that’s helpful, but you, one aspect to it is kind of like, I don’t want to get into it. Speak too hard on like physiological side, but your body’s meant to have that stress.
Heat stress is definitely a thing. The I’m thinking of heat shock proteins and things that are present after training and things like a lot of times that is. What your body needs to adapt, like that’s important. You’re not trying to blunt necessarily the stress response. Like we got back to a training, like it’s a stress recovery cycle, and if you get out of balance there, it’s not great, but part of the stress or like kind of you, you are in fact, damaging your body or like pushing your body while you’re training, your body is meant to get those signals and recover.
And there’s been interesting stuff similar too. Cold plunge type therapies, where if you take vitamin C with too much or something with training, you’re not actually allowing your body to like up regulate its own kind of ability to like deal with that stuff. So your training response can be blunted because you’re like assisting your body in a certain way
So I think certain things like that, like it’s very situationally dependent, but I would be in your camp of for me, and I think for most people like the sauna is like a nice relaxing thing where you’re, you’re getting good, easy blood flow. And then a lot of times the cold plunges. You may be not seeing a benefit or you can feel stiff or it’s like more kind of that constrictive type feeling than that relaxed, blood flowy type feeling.
And a really basic level. Yeah.
Erik: What about creatine?
Al: Yeah. That’s in that same camp of, if you’re going to pick two things that it’s hard to argue that they improve your performance would be creatine and caffeine as again, like in the ergogenic aid camp. The one thing I will say, I mean, we have creatine, so I’m not talking about book here is like the If you get in, if you get a lot of protein you are getting a decent amount of creating in that, if you’re eating a pound of beef, you’re getting a couple of grams of creatine.
So keeping that in context, like I think a lot of people benefit from creatine because the vast majority of people simply don’t get enough protein. So it’s like. You’re at least getting one of the components of protein. And that’s the thing too, like when you think about whole foods and things I, we do nutritional supplements and it’s exactly what that says, which is like the supplement.
So if you’re like, dude, I got time to eat a whole, piece of salmon instead of having a protein. Jake or something like dude, you have to be some salmon. So I think it’s the same thing where creating is great. If you’re like, dude, I’m just, I’m literally definitely not going to eat enough sake or make enough time in my day where creating is going to help your, your muscles at a baseline.
So there’s two things I’ll say really quick creatine phosphate system is your energy system below 20 seconds. That gives you higher it gives, it’s like the power. Energy system for the short burst. And so if you have creatine, the concept physiologically is you’re topping off your creatine stores in your muscles that allow you to get an extra rep.
And that’s the basis for why creatine is performance aid. Is it. It tops out that energy system by, ingesting it through a supplement. You’re able to get like an additional rep or an extra, couple pumps through a session or whatever. And then your body responds to that and gets stronger.
And you build on that base. And then I think the resurgence and interest in it has also come from, there’s now a lot of like the nicotine side of things, where there’s a bunch of neuro protective cognitive benefits. To have increase in as well, which I think, again, if you pull that back into a whole food there’s all these other, benefits from more protein in your diet.
Because I think we’re out of whack right now, as far as, overall society in terms of. Protein intake relative to obviously most people, if you’re not an athlete or having too many carbs. Yeah. Yeah.
Erik: my get your bell rung protocol is creatine and ketones. I ever get hit a little bit too hard in the head. I feel like both of the research I’ve done seem to be pretty good. And I’m actually just starting creatine again. For some reason, I’ve been off for a little while, but I’ve always done like a Five three to five gram a day regimen of it and like it and I do feel the nootropic factor, which I like
Al: And, and well, you just said a great point around like situationally if you get, yeah, head injury, like there’s been some good studies around going on, no carbs, ketogenic type diet, creatine cold therapy, like massively helpful, like you’re really just trying to limit any kind of swelling inflammation.
Erik: Yeah, or just exogenous ketones. I believe get the same benefit from a neuroprotective standpoint
Al: Yeah,
Erik: From what I read. All right, let’s dive back in a couple more. How you doing?
Al: I’m good, man. Yeah.
Erik: don’t want to over, I don’t want to over,
Al: they’re good, dude.
Erik: actually, let’s talk your book a little bit. You mentioned your book there. I’m a huge fan of pro mix nutrition.
I used to be sponsored by pro mix. I’m no longer sponsored, but now I buy a lot of it. That’s a test of how good it
Al: you back on. Thank you.
Erik: Our family. Always has collagen and always has white in the house. And I love that my kids make smoothies most days and they’re doing one scoop of collagen and one or two scoops of white in them.
But both my kids are pretty athletic and, and I like that they’re eating good foods. What else do you guys have? Anything new coming out? I mean, I know there’s staples on this and you guys always have the fancy, like bars and whatnot. There’s actually, there’s been a couple questions on the on the gram of, what’s the best way to get protein?
If you’re going to take protein with you, what’s, what’s the best way to do it? What do you guys have like protein on the go?
Al: Yeah.
Erik: yeah, I’m going to pull up your,
Al: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that’s, those are like the staples. That’s when I think about what, it’s like putting wheels on the car or whatever, like putting gas in the tank, like you got to get the basics in. And I think protein again, that’s where I started. And that’s where I saw training people for 10 plus years talking to thousands of people about nutrition and stuff.
It was like, if I could fix one thing, it would just be around protein intake. And there’s, the. segments within that category of are you doing a whey protein or you need a vegan protein or think you need a vegan protein or prefer, non dairy stuff or, ethical or whatever reasons or collagen if you’re under a lot of stress joint wise and things like that as you age to needing more collagen.
So those are good foundational things. Again, with like how I look at it with kids or for a lot of people Even making a shake is too much to ask. So like having a bar is the next thing where it’s you’re like, man, I’m really out here, I’m like on my bike or whatever.
I’m not going to make a shake and stop or I’m training or whatever it is, like a bar you can usually eat. So we made some whey based bars and pea protein based bars. And then beyond that, we started to get into, well, we’ve gone It’s there’s more awareness around it. And I think it’s a reflection of, what we’re eating and the quality of the food and everything.
And is gut health stuff. So, my co founder, Devin he got really into gut health and he was in Africa and he found Baobab. And his stomach was upset and they had to meet bail Bob and talking to him about all the benefits. So we ended up coming out with a bail Bob beverage called people.
It’s, it’s got bail Bob and it has three strains of probiotic and there’s 5 billion active cultures in it. And with probiotics, like it’s a crazy whole different set of science and. Gut biome and all kinds of stuff you can get into. But on that product, it was really around what’s like. The word is like technical word is like heat libel.
Like what, what’s going to be able to actually get where it’s meant to go in your gut, what’s going to be able to be shelf stable. What don’t you have to refrigerate? So I think that’s always been like one aspect of things is is this probiotic actually alive? Is it actually getting where it’s meant to go?
So the D boat drink we have has that combination of prebiotics from the Baobab and then a good dosage, 5 billion. You have a range of either it’s purely a probiotic or. It says it has probiotic in it, and it’s usually either like negligible, or it’s not going to actually give you a benefit, or it’s a more clinical dosage.
And so this is like a good dosage where you will get a benefit from that, especially on like daily basis. So we’ve gone into that stuff. We do different, for me, I always look at it like one, I’m not going to come out with a product unless I think it’s, It’s truly differentiated and better than what’s currently available because otherwise I’m just going to use a product that already exists.
And there’s some other, there’s some great companies out there. So, that’s one gating thing. And then it’s around can I actually draw a very clear line to research and like performance benefit? So we also go into sports specific things like the pre workouts where I think from like the gym world, people have a certain view of that.
But when I put it together, you’re asking about ergogenic, it’s I’m just going straight to PubMed and reading a ton of journals and then putting it all together, finding it’s hard to, again this is like in the weeds, but it’s, it’s tough, like even other companies or if it’s called plunge or whatever, like you are reading, they’re, they might be citing a journal article, but you’ve got to actually look at the context of that article and be like, well, yeah, dude, like this is not applicable to me because you’re studying a non athlete population that was.
Starting out at zero baseline. And now you’re giving them something and you’re saying it’s conferring this massive benefit. And then you’re leaving out the part that like the placebo had 70 percent of that same benefit. And again, you’re targeting this completely untrained. Population that’s not applicable to me.
So like
Erik: yeah,
Al: try to, I try to really go in and say, all right, let’s look at the ingredient and then let’s look at, try to find all the studies we can and say was this, is this as close to a one to one as the end user? So it’s like we put L citrulline in something like I’m reading everything I can about that, finding the right dosage.
A lot of times it’s also what’s practical. It’s oh yeah, well this works, but yeah, you just have to take A gram per kilogram of body weight. And yeah, just, you have to keep that up while you’re training. And it’s okay, dude, it’s not going to happen. Like I can’t actually ingest that while I’m training.
So this is a moot point. Like I’m not in a lab where I’m being fed like a tube of something. So there’s so much in the industry around like these just non. When rubber meets the road, like there’s no practical application of some of the research. So we stay in a pretty narrow lane of I gotta feel really good about an ingredient being in there.
One that we’re,
Erik: I’m going to cut you off there
Al: yeah, yeah, go for it.
Erik: one of my favorite things about ProMix is that I’m looking at the whey right now. This is the way that we take, we like the chocolate and ingredient list is grass fed whey, organic coconut sugar, raw organic cacao, and sunflower lecithin.
And that’s
Al: Yeah.
Erik: It’s you’re not getting, I mean, I grew up on muscle milk and weight gain or
Al: Yeah. For sure. Same man.
Erik: I’m like nervous about all this stuff. I ate when I was a kid. Right. And it’s nice. Cause like all of your products are like, that sounds like an ad, but it’s like pro mix and foundation trainer, my two staples for the health world.
And I just, I happen to know you and Eric really well to throw you guys into the same category, which is a really it’s my top fitness category there. Which is I just trust everything you guys do and I think it’s, it’s important to be able to, to know what you’re buying. And I think it, for me, it was the Jersey cow story at, 15 years ago, probably now, maybe longer.
And knowing like the lengths you went to, to get a certain type of way. And you’re like, basically I’m going to have a business around like just buying the best stuff and doing it. I was like, all right, cool. I mean, that’s what I’m going to take for forever now. It’s so
Al: that’s awesome. Thank you.
Erik: Yeah. True though.
Al: yeah, yeah. And yeah, I, there’s, I appreciate it. That means a lot. But yeah, we, we keep it simple. I think probably I’ve talked to Eric before and yeah, there’s, it’s all pretty straightforward. There’s a few big, basic pillars that you can do. And then there’s all this kind of extra that you can put on it that, for some people, it’s cool to do because it is a mental benefit.
You got to get yourself motivated and all that. I mean, I remember you probably a lot of people the same way where you have a shake after you work out and you feel better, it’s does it help you? Yeah, in a lot of cases, probably, but it’s also like a mental thing of Yeah, I did it.
Like I love having a chocolate shake after I work out or whatever. That’s, there’s that reality too, of having something that keeps you motivated and you enjoy. But I was going to say this one side story, my, so Devon, who’s my partner, he’s crazy guy, phenomenal athlete, just overall.
And like real deal when it comes to he’s not on anything, he’s, he’s really out there, has a wide range of athletic ability, but he’s climbing Everest coming up here and we’re doing like a blood pro product with him. So that’s just like another area where there is actually some good science around.
Basically precursors to nitric oxide and basal dilation, basically in effecting and improving blood flow in your body. So, and that again, it’s it’s cool because you can get 90 plus percent of the benefits from like just be beats, it’s a natural source of precursors to nitric oxide in your body.
So if you have, beet juice or. Take a beat powder. Like you’re going to get you should really truly get some performance benefits from it, which is cool. So if you want to tinker around with that It’s worth trying.
Erik: Oh, that’s, that is cool. I feel does cacao have similar benefits like the cocoa products?
Al: Yeah. Totally. Yeah. That’s like another one of those improves blood flow and different things like that. But yeah, there’s, yeah. But you know, again, like there’s all these compounds in these things that are actually cool. And a lot of times, you can, a lot of the nutritional supplements out there actually just isolate those things.
When I was researching the blood flow product, there was a bunch of studies on different compounds and when you break it down chemistry wise, I’m like, okay, so this is just. A component within a B powder, so I’m just going to keep using the B powder because all you’ve done is isolate a compound and then you’re going to put it in there versus just having the whole food.
And sometimes you need to isolate things to really get, caffeine, for example obviously you can pull that out of coffee and just have caffeine as a molecule. But I think again, like there’s some. There’s a lot of different health benefits to coffee and different compounds in the cocoa or whatever it is outside of the main molecule that you’re focused on.
So, wherever we can, we try to go with a whole food based thing and then we will like secondarily put isolated components in there if we see like a very clear benefit to what you’re trying to do.
Erik: So, so you mentioned that there are some other good companies out there making good products. And I mean, that’s the one drawback of pro mix right now is you can’t buy it at your gas station on your way. If you have to buy something at the grocery store or the gas station, who are you looking at? I mean, the only other thing that I really eat pretty regularly are RX bars.
Are they okay? Are they on the list?
Al: Yeah, I would say yeah, going RX bars, like things where you can look at it and you’re like, this is and that’s where one of those categories where, again, back to the thing I couldn’t doll for was around, they, there are a lot of decent bars out there that they’re not protein focused, but they have some protein, but it’s mostly just a good kind of energy source, but it’s simple.
It’s like dates and like the nuts or something like that. That’s totally fine. I will say I think some people it’s. Certain people look at an RX bar and they go, okay, cool. It’s got nine grams of protein. It is a big difference. And again, like back to the salmon versus the beef, like there’s a big difference in protein quality from those things.
And the, what makes protein quality unique is like the bioavailability, which allows you to digest it, but it’s really like the amino acid score and that’s how proteins are differentiated. So I can. The way versus the collagen, like they had different effects on your body because of the amino acid score that makes them up.
So, the whey proteins and eggs and things like that are typically looked at because they’re high in essential amino acids and specifically branched chain, which research points to that. When you’re doing a lot of physical activity, those are exhausted to a higher degree, and you need to replace those through nutrition more so than a lot of the nonessential as your body can manufacture.
But then again, like collagen, like tired, different like glycine and different things like other amino acids that for benefit to the joint health and stuff like that. So, sorry, that was a long winded way to say our X bar is going to definitely give you some like pretty clean calories, but it’s not going to really check that protein box for you.
I look at a lot of times, like even, it’s not going to be like, okay, these are not the same cows, but like buying a stick of cheese or a little block of cheese at a gas station. That’s still like a pretty, pretty close to a whole food based product where you’re getting some protein and some fat in there.
That’s a good balance too. If I was going to be like making a gas station snack pack, it would be like, yeah, grab like an RX bar, like a kind bar, like one of those type products. And then if they’ve got there are better quality, like jerky’s a lot of times now in the gas stations, you can get a jerky, you could get a stick of cheese or something like that.
Those are good. And then, again, not maybe the, the best quality milk, but you know, if you get a fair life or one of these like mass distributed companies, like that’s going to be a lot better than having a really crappy protein bar, I would try to get less process in that route where I feel pretty good, even if I don’t know where the cheese came from there’s only so much you can really do to like a cheese stick or, mozzarella or something.
Erik: The milking thing. So when I was like a junior, Junior summer to go into senior year of high school, I gained like 15, 20 pounds. And I was drinking a gallon of milk a day and basically just couldn’t drink milk after that year, couldn’t drink milk for 15 years, dude, like it was
Al: Yeah,
Erik: so bad.
Al: it’s real, man.
Erik: It worked though.
Al: Yeah, it does. It definitely works. You get a lot of protein, you get some fat, you got some carbs and then again, like there’s a bunch of factors in dairy proteins that are like meant to help like growth and recovery. So, that’s like the nuance to a lot of stuff where I think if you can have animal proteins or dairy proteins you do get a better kind of benefit out of them.
Physiologically.
Erik: Right on. All right. Well, I feel like I’ve taken up an abundance of your time this afternoon.
Al: Oh, man.
Erik: What do you want to leave first off? Promixnutrition. com is the, is, is the site where you can order it. You’re on Amazon and stuff too. I think we just get it off, have a recurring order now going on, on Amazon, all our stuff The whey, the collagen, both fantastic.
The only thing that like, I, I have not reordered was the electrolyte stuff, it tore up my stomach. I don’t know why.
Al: Which the unplayed or the grapefruit one or the, you remember? Okay. Yeah, it’s my 2 seconds on that was like around It’s not sweet. Like it’s definitely salty. So I think for a lot of people, it’s if you’re used to having something that’s got some more sweetness to it it’s, it’s an adjustment.
And I’ll say overall, like our products are less sweet. You probably noticed that with
Erik: Oh yeah.
Al: but I’m trying, I have a big mission around to getting people, most people, their palate is sensitized. You get crushed with like really sweet or really salty things. And trying to get people, it’s mainly off sweet stuff because that stuff like.
You probably, I’ve adjusted over the years, what I eat and cleaned up my diet and when you’re used to having a Coke every day, like you just want more sugar, if you have sweetness and things like that it really affects like your overall eating decisions. So my goal is trying to get people to like, Ratchet down, like what they find sweet I think has a lot of health benefits just overall,
Erik: Yeah.
Al: I’ll, yeah, I’ll, I’ll, I’ll send you some kind of code or something too, for everyone that’s listening, just so you guys can get a discount.
Erik: Front of the show. Happy to do that. And what do you want to leave folks with, Hal? I always give guests the last word. Sometimes inspirational. Sometimes hype. Whatever you want to use it for.
Al: Oh, thanks man. No, man, I mean, it’s fucking cool to see what you’re doing. I think people who are in the sport that you guys do are, you’re truly got a good community because people are doing what they want to do, they’re not. Jason, a bag necessarily, or you’re doing something that’s anytime you’re in the water and outside, like things are usually going pretty well.
I would say anyone that’s yeah, trying to figure out nutrition wise, like definitely try different stuff. Try not to get dogmatic with it about what you hear or whatever. Like most of it’s noise. Most of it is trying to sell you stuff. So keeping it simple you don’t need a ton of variety, get enough protein.
If you’re feeling crappy, try it. Okay. Try eating more to start with, especially from training side. I think that’s something that if you’re real, really into your sport and really pushing it all the time and gunning it a lot of times it’s, You’re not getting enough calories in and I think that can change how you feel dramatically.
And a lot of people get fixated on a certain, you might not even be at your right weight. You might be like, man, I actually, dude, I get such better power when I’m a couple pounds heavier and you might be trying to over optimize or something like that. So, just trying different stuff on your self and not being too locked into where you’re at.
And listen to your body first before reading shit online.
Erik: Awesome. Wow, thank you so much for the time.
Al: Yeah, man. For sure. Appreciate it…p.