The Fitness Lab Podcast

The next time you find yourself in the middle of a heated argument, with opponents at each other's throats with no common ground to be found… Feed them pork belly steam buns. Especially if they came out of Chef Trevor Budny's kitchen. It sounds crazy but it just might work. The human brain can't process hate and love at the same time… and everybody love's his food. Now, pork belly steam buns aren't the cure for all the problems in the world (although he does throw out an idea for that in this episode), but it seems like a pretty good start. Food is as close to a magical substance as you can find on this planet. Food can be healing. It brings people together. It evokes emotions. In fact, if both people on a first date rate the food as "excellent," they're 72% more likely to go on a second date. (That's based solely on my own experience, but I bet it's not far off the truth.) In this episode, we talk about Trevor's philosophy about food… How he gets farmers to grow specialty crops just for him… How he translated what he learned working at Subway into building healthy Paleo meals… And Trevor reveals "the cure to every problem in the world."

You can learn a lot about a man by the way he shakes your hand. The first time I shook Will Schlucter's hand, I learned that he could probably break all 27 bones south of my wrist if he really wanted to. It felt a little like sticking my head in a lion's mouth and knowing it was just being polite by not clamping down. Then he put me through an hour-long kettlebell workout at gym, Will Power Strength and Conditioning, and I figured out how he got that strong. But Will doesn't just swing kettlebells all day. He's also skateboards, paddle boards, and competes in Jiu Jitsu tournaments. By anyone's standard's he's got this fitness thing figured out. Oh… and he has Cystic Fibrosis. Cystic Fibrosis a genetic disease that causes a thick buildup of music in his lungs. Every morning he as to wake up early and put on a special vest that essentially beats his chest to break up the sludge in his lungs so he can breath normally. He's been living with it since he was a baby. Will is 26. The average life expectancy of someone with CF is 39. Luckily, that number is climbing rapidly. And it's not like he's letting it slow him down anyway. "Rather than let the Cystic Fibrosis define what my athletic limitations are. I said lets see what an athlete with Cystic Fibrosis can look like." So what do those limitations look like? As far as I can tell, he hasn't found them yet. In fact, in 2 weeks, a man with a genetic condition that affects his lungs will be running the New York City Marathon.   I asked him why. "My goal is to bring awareness to CF, raise some funds that are going to go right into Cystic Fibrosis research… but also show other people with Cystic Fibrosis that you're not limited by this disease." Will is an inspiring guy, a great athlete, and a living example of what you can accomplish when you refuse to accept the limitations you're handed by the genetic lottery. If you want to support Will and Cystic Fibrosis research, you can donate through his link by clicking here. 

Rich lives his life with a unique combination of intensity and positivity. It's what makes him such a good athlete and coach. In this episode, we talk about how he qualified for the Spartan Race World Championship. How to convince yourself that you like running so you stick with it (and why, once you convince yourself you like it, it becomes true.) How a tennis ball can improve your foot mobility (and exactly what to do with it). We get into the biggest injury risks for runners and how to avoid them. And who should consider getting a running coach in the first place.

I sit at my desk for at least 8-10 hours a day and it's killing me. I mean... according to CNN, it's literally killing me. So I asked mobility coach Nick Perugini what I could do about it. He told me to squeeze my butt. "I think the easiest thing that you can do is set your alarm for thirty minutes, stand up, and squeeze your butt as hard as you can for five seconds, and do that ten times... I really am a fan of squeezing your butt. It's one of my overused cues, and honestly, I don't care, because I think it's that important that we have the ability to squeeze our butt." It works. I don't know if it's doing anything to delay my imminent death that CNN has predicted, but it's really helping my low back feel better and I think it's unlocking some built up tension I have in my hips. Of course, that could be the mobility classes I'm doing with Nick every Sunday too. Nick is a great coach. And in this episode, he shares a lot of good and practical information that you can put to use.

The first time he did a CrossFit workout, George Caroulis was hooked. So much so that by the end of the class, he made up his mind to do CrossFit for a living. In this episode, you'll hear George's story, how he designs workouts to bring out his athletes' competitive nature, and how he finds - and helps his members find - their internal motivation. 

I've been using Dave's macro's diet for 4 weeks and lost 18 pounds... and I'm doing it wrong. In this episode, Dave walks me through how to create a healthy macros based weight loss (or gain) plan.  

A car accident almost cost David his left leg. But with a little help from some functional fitness experts, he was able to salvage his life and even break a few weight lifting records. David tells his story and shows you how to achieve optimal fitness no matter where you're starting today.