America’s Angriest Trainer Vinnie Tortorich

Buckle up people! America's Angriest Trainer Vinnie Tortorich joins the podcast today to pontificate — in the way only Vinnie can in his unfiltered and uncensored way — on a wide variety of subjects, including: * His career as an ultra-cyclist and racing the Furnace Creek 508; * What fuels his 15 hour training rides; in other words the popular & oft asked question is posed, “what do you eat on the bike?” * His opinions on aerobic zone training versus the currently popular CrossFit / Mackenzie method; * Fitness and weight loss in general; * What it's like to be a celebrity trainer in Hollywood; * His evolving perspectives on nutrition; * His Angriest Trainer Podcast; and * His upcoming book “Fitness Confidential” NOTE: Vinnie veers into a bit of explicit language a few times. Nothing crazy, but just a heads up if you're blasting it at work or unusually squeamish. And if you have a moment, we'd love it if you could toss a quick review up on the iTunes page. Thanks for the support and enjoy the show! SHOW NOTES * Generation UCAN SuperStarch Nutrition Products * SaltStick Electrolyte Products * A Conversation with SaltStick Inventor Jonathan Toker – Slowtwitch * The Angriest Trainer Podcast * VinnieTortorich.com * Vinnie on Twitter @VinnieTortorich * Vinnie on Facebook HOW CAN I SUPPORT THE PODCAST? 1. TELL A FRIEND! (Self-explanatory) 2. SHARE ONLINE! (Also self-explanatory) 3. SUBSCRIBE & REVIEW the show on iTunes, Stitcher and Soundcloud and TuneIn. 4. DONATE: Check out the DONATE button on the right hand margin or click HERE to learn more. We even accept Bitcoin! 5. DOWNLOAD THE NEW MOBILE APP! Now you can access, stream, download and share the entire RRP catalog in the palm of your hand on any iOS mobile device (iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch) with our new mobile app. Never miss an episode, plus special announcements, discounts, giveaways. Already downloaded? Awesome. When you have a minute, and it feels right to you, do us a solid and give the app a review in the iTunes Store. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Rich Roll?

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• 0:44Rich Roll?

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• 1:08Rich Roll?

  The Rich Roll Podcast.

• 1:12Rich Roll?

  Yeah, people, welcome back to the podcast. Episode 12, back in the saddle, back from Kauai, back from Yertville, our little experience living on the organic farm on the north shore of Kauai at Common Ground, and kind of re-acclimating to life here in Los Angeles. Sorry it's been a little bit since the last podcast. We're just having, you know, we just got back in town and we're just plugging back into society. And so, we just had to kind of acclimate to being back here. So, it's been a little bit, but we're back. And today, I have a great guest for you. My buddy, Vinnie Torta-Rich, is coming on the show. And we talked quite long.

• 1:55Rich Roll?

  Our interview is basically two hours. So, I don't want to bog you guys down with a bunch of introductory, you know, advertisement nonsense and the like. So, what I'd like to do is just introduce him and roll right into the interview. Vinnie's a great guy. I met him back in 2008. He is sort of the local ultra cyclist in my area here in the Calabasas area. So, it wasn't long before my kind of magnetic antenna found him. We have some mutual friends and... Vinnie and I have spent many an hour out on the bike, training together. He's an amazing guy, a really fun guy with a unique point of view.

• 2:39Rich Roll?

  He knows a lot about training, a lot about nutrition. He's participated in some crazy grueling ultra endurance cycling events like 24 hour mountain bike racing and the Furnace Creek 508, which is a 508 mile cycling race in Death Valley that he's done, I think, four times at this point. So, he's full of great information and also, he doesn't pull punches. He pretty much tells you, calls it like he sees it and shoots straight, which I love about him. And if you enjoy him on the podcast, he has his own podcast, which you should check out. It's a lot of fun. It's called The Angriest Trainer Podcast.

• 3:19Rich Roll?

  Find it on iTunes or you can go to his website, which is vinnietortorich.com. So, without further ado, let's just roll right into this, so I don't take up too much of your time today. I hope you enjoy Vinnie as much as I enjoy having him in my life. Take it easy. Vinnie Tortorich. What's up, Vinnie?

• 3:49Speaker 02

  How you doing, man?

• 3:50Rich Roll?

  Good, man. Thanks for coming down and being part of the podcast, man. I appreciate it.

• 3:55Speaker 02

  Actually, you know, I want to thank you for waiting for me because you called, you know, we had talked about this when you were in Hawaii. I think you sent me a text and we were going to do it last week and then I got sick.

• 4:08Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 4:09Speaker 02

  I didn't get sick, I lost my voice.

• 4:11Rich Roll?

  Well, that's cool, dude. You're here. You lost your voice because you're yelling at people too much.

• 4:16Speaker 02

  I'm always yelling at people. And, you know, I just got through doing four hours of my own podcast.

• 4:21Rich Roll?

  Today?

• 4:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, just now.

• 4:23Rich Roll?

  Oh, wow.

• 4:24Speaker 02

  I was driving from there to here and when you said, "Let's wait until 2 o'clock," it gave me an extra 40 minutes to kind of get my voice back and so here we are doing it.

• 4:33Rich Roll?

  It's podcast rules. You have to have, you know, it's funny. I listen to a lot of the comedian podcasts like Corolla and Rogan and

• 4:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:40Rich Roll?

  They all have the same guys on. It's like, you know, Ari Shaffir, Brian Callen, like they just wrote, they make the circle Greg Fitzsimmons, like all the top podcasters, they all have each other on. So we gotta do the same with the fitness podcasts.

• 4:51Speaker 02

  Exactly. And you know, it's crazy, but you know, a lot of those guys other than Corolla, and I have this on good measure, most of them don't make a lot of money. You know, what's his name does? You were on the show, Rogan does.

• 5:04Rich Roll?

  Rogan, yeah.

• 5:05Speaker 02

  But some of these guys have, you know, 10, 12,000 downloads a day and they're not making any money.

• 5:12Rich Roll?

  Well, it's, it's still, people are still trying to figure it, figure it out. I mean, Rogan, I'd actually be surprised if he, I mean, he usually has one sponsor and then he has his on it company. That's his supplement company that he's a partner in or whatever. His, he's got to have crazy mad downloads though. So whatever ad he's putting on there, he's probably making a nice return on. But Corolla seems to be the only one who's turned it into like a business in the kind of radio way. Cause he does it five days a week. I mean, it's like, it's a job.

• 5:41Speaker 02

  He does it every day and he has other shows on his network and he's on almost every show. The guy, um, he's like a machine. Which is, you know, good for him. Uh, I like Adam. I listen to the show from time to time. As a matter of fact, I heard his show just the other day. When he had Leo Laporte on.

• 5:59Rich Roll?

  I heard that too. Yeah.

• 6:00Speaker 02

  That's pretty scary stuff.

• 6:02Rich Roll?

  Yeah. It's interesting. Um, for those who don't know, for the listeners who don't know out there, there's this thing that's occurring right now. And I read about this in Wired magazine, um, a couple of months ago. I don't think it's the current issue. I think it's the one that was just before. There's a new kind of trend in technology where the, there are these bottom feeder groups of people that are picking up.

• 6:24Rich Roll?

  These obscure technology patents that have to do with strange little

• 6:29Speaker 02

  Right.

• 6:30Rich Roll?

  Technology procedures that no one's even aware of. And they're starting to file lawsuits against companies and users of these patents and people that don't even know that they're using it. And the first one that I read about, they were suing, um, this group was suing a, a large corporation.

• 6:46Rich Roll?

  And it had to do with employees using their copying, copier machines.

• 6:51Speaker 02

  Right.

• 6:51Rich Roll?

  Scanners.

• 6:52Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 6:52Rich Roll?

  And so every time you scan something, you are, I guess, arguably violating this obscure patent.

• 6:59Speaker 02

  You are breaking the law.

• 7:00Rich Roll?

  And they wanted a licensing fee for every time that you scan a document in your copy room or whatever. And this, they're, they sound ridiculous, but they're winning some of these suits. And so now, long story short, um, this movement has found its way into the podcast world. And there's some kind of strange little piece of technology that has to do either with uploading content or the distribution of, of content across the, I guess it's the iTunes platform.

• 7:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 7:25Rich Roll?

  I mean, I'm not sure. I don't know the details.

• 7:27Speaker 02

  Well, they're going after iTunes because it's the biggest platform. And of course they're naming Adam Carolla in that suit because he's the biggest name in podcasting.

• 7:35Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 7:36Speaker 02

  He, you know, but the bottom line is some judge somewhere is going to have to stop this and stop these people. And, uh, they, they're going to have to pay punitive damages to, to, just to let them not know that they can go to court and waste everyone's time and money and everything else.

• 7:52Rich Roll?

  It's completely predatory and, and also like, shouldn't they go after iTunes or, or Apple before someone like Carolla? Like if you're the end user, you're just plugging into this system unawares of whatever, you know, you, I guess it's the same with the copy machine and the scanner.

• 8:07Speaker 02

  Yeah. Well, I, I think they go after everyone. They go after the money and, but you know, if they beat the money, guess where they're coming next? You and me.

• 8:14Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I know.

• 8:15Speaker 02

  Without them.

• 8:15Rich Roll?

  So everybody who's podcasting right now is in jeopardy. And I liked what Leo had to say and, and Adam about, you know, the podcasters have to unite and let's, you know, get our own Kickstarter going or war chest to defend against this because I don't want to get sued. And we're just, you know, you and I, we have these little podcasts or whatever, but you know, if you're Chris Hardwick at Nerdist or these people that are running these networks or one of the big guys out there. I mean, that's scary, especially when they just won like an eight million dollar verdict against Apple recently, I guess.

• 8:44Speaker 02

  Yeah. And Apple didn't back down. They actually went to court and they, they lost that case. So, you know, what's going to happen hopefully is going to be fixed before it ever gets to you and me.

• 8:54Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 8:55Speaker 02

  But, but we don't know that. I, I find this to be a great outlet for anyone to, to spew what they have to spew. And I'm happy it's here. I, I would hate to see it go away, but that could very well happen.

• 9:13Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I know. I think, I think some actions are going to have to be taken to protect this little universe that we have, which is so fantastic. And it's really just starting. I mean, it's really the Wild West still. And, you know, there are a couple of big players that were early adopters, but, you know, there's still, I mean, I don't know about you, but I still get like emails from people or tweets like, how do I, what is a podcast? How do I find a podcast? And I'm like, really? Like, it's just one click on iTunes, but still a lot of people are not aware of the medium and they're not a user.

• 9:42Speaker 02

  Well, yeah. And it's not, you know, you would think that it's some idiotic person living somewhere in the deep south. But it's, you know, I can be at a party and they'll say, hey, I hear you have a radio show. And I'll say, no, I have a podcast. And before the word cast comes out of podcast, they're already glazing over.

• 9:59Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 10:00Speaker 02

  You know, wait, what?

• 10:01Rich Roll?

  I'm never gonna, yeah.

• 10:02Speaker 02

  Is it like a radio show? And you, you just know right there, you're going to lose.

• 10:06Rich Roll?

  Well, it's so ridiculous too, because I, what I don't understand is terrestrial radio. Like, I never listen to the radio. I don't see any purpose in it when I can download all the podcasts that I want and curate my, you know, like a zillion hours worth of radio program, custom tailored to what I'm interested in. So when I'm driving around on the highways of LA or out on a long run or whatever, I'm, I'm listening to the subject matters that I'm, that are specific to my interests.

• 10:32Speaker 02

  But, right. You, you know, what I did before podcasts, because, you know, we'll get into it in a minute, but, you know, doing all the ultra stuff and spending all that time on a bicycle over the years. I learned that once MP3 players were a real deal, meaning the iPod, I started downloading books because you can only listen to music for so long on a bike for 12 or 15 hours. So I would download books of information, you know, and that was, you know, the audio files were just great. But now we have podcasts and all I do is, you know, just take my iPhone and listen now to you and to Corolla and Leo Laporte and anyone else I want to listen to, you can

• 11:16Speaker 02

  just sit there and listen, sit there, meaning riding a bike for hours on end. And it's just great information. And the thing that always amazes me is when I go back to the radio, sometimes if my phone's not with me or my phone is going dead or something, I'll turn on AM radio. It's just not the same thing.

• 11:35Rich Roll?

  No.

• 11:35Speaker 02

  It's the same three guys complaining about the fact that we're going to build some railroad here going into nowhere here in California, you know, and they talk about Vierigosa and they call him Tony Villar and that's supposed to be a big joke. And I'm sitting there going, God, there's a reason why I haven't listened to you guys in two years. You haven't changed anything.

• 11:57Rich Roll?

  Not only that, they still, it's, it's all sound bites and it's all sort of, you know, for ratings and you feel like you're getting preached to and, and there is no long form conversation. I mean, you can listen to Terry Gross on NPR or something like that, but those, that kind of programming is few and far between. And I think that with podcasting, you know, originally, I think a lot of people kind of jumped into it and they're, they're trying to adhere to the terrestrial radio model of, okay, it's top of the hour. And if you're just tuning in, you know, I have Vinnie Tortorich with me, like, well, why would you be just tuning in? I mean, if you downloaded it, you know who you're listening to, it's ridiculous. You know, those rules don't apply and you can make it whatever you want to make it. And so, you know, I like it when it's just open-ended and the conversation goes wherever it wants to go.

• 12:42Rich Roll?

  And when it's played out, you're done. You know, it's not like, oh, we have 15 minutes and we have to be done by this time because we're going, we need to tell a joke or go to the weather.

• 12:51Speaker 02

  Well, you know, as you know, I started off on real radio, on actual terrestrial radio and you know.

• 12:56Rich Roll?

  I know, let me just interject. Vinnie is like Forrest Gump. The more time, the more time I spend with Vinnie, he's, he's, you can always peel back these layers and he has all these past lives, like, oh, well, I, I used to write children's books. Oh, did I tell you about the time that I was?

• 13:10Speaker 02

  I was on Mount Everest. Yeah. You've done many things in your life, Vinnie. I wasn't on Mount Everest, by the way. When I had the radio show back in the eighties, you had to hit time marks because at thirteen after the hour, you had to go to some national, do, do, do, do, and then they would play some kind of national news. And you had to hit these marks and you had to have a producer there and you're talking and somehow he would start holding up fingers and you gotta drop it right on that mark. Not only that, you know, because I'm very, I speak very openly about what I believe in and what I don't believe in. Yeah, I can't imagine a program director being very happy with having you in the studio. Oh, I was in trouble on a daily basis.

• 13:52Speaker 02

  I mean, I only did the show once a week, but I was in trouble all the time. Because I would go, "Ice cream is crap," and they would come in and go, "But we have Haagen-Dazs as a sponsor." And I'd go, "Oh, God," you know. Right. You know, not for my show, but for the rest of the station, they didn't want me calling Haagen-Dazs crap. And I would sit there and call everything crap, which means I was always in trouble. And the only reason they didn't fire me is because people were actually listening. I was bringing in ratings, which was good for the station. If I, if I was not, I would have been gone. But it was this constant battle of, you know, what do we do with this guy? We can't shut him up. We can't tone him down.

• 14:36Speaker 02

  But on these mics, we never have that problem. So podcasting is like Christmas morning for you? Oh, every time I go on. Because you could just mouth off all day long, whatever you... I walk, I walk in. Do you have sponsors? Are you trying to monetize it? Are you, are you trying to turn it into a business or... You know, I've actually said very often, the answer to that is that we would like to now because we have an audience. I didn't realize I had an audience for a long time. A long time meaning we started back last May. And I was doing it because, as you know, I wrote another book. This time not a children's book, I wrote a book on fitness. And

• 15:11Rich Roll?

  We're gonna get into that in a minute.

• 15:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, we'll get into it, but for that reason, I started a podcast and

• 15:18Speaker 02

  you know, I didn't think anyone was paying attention. I would open a show by talking about my co-host, talking about her breasts because she has huge boobs. I didn't think anyone was paying attention. And then one podcast, I didn't say anything about her tits. And people started writing, you know, on Twitter, you didn't mention her breasts. Really? I gotta do that now? That's my lead?

• 15:42Rich Roll?

  You're imparting all this fitness wisdom and really all they want to hear about is

• 15:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, Anna's boobs. And I mean, it's the most sophomoric thing you can possibly do, but if I leave out the best lungs in podcast radio, they go nuts. We open a show with, she's got the best lungs in podcast radio. And I always say podcast radio, even though it's not radio. Because we're trying to get people to understand that it's like radio. But it's not.

• 16:09Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 16:10Speaker 02

  So we

• 16:11Rich Roll?

  The best of both worlds. Cool, man. Well, let's take it back. You know, we, Vinnie and I go way back. I think we met in around 2007 or 2008.

• 16:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, I thought it was before that, like 2006, maybe? It's somewhere around there.

• 16:27Rich Roll?

  No, I did. Well, I did Ultraman for the first time in 2008, so I think I met you through Mayron, like maybe a year before that, but it was it was right around the time that I had just gotten a bike and was starting to ride. So that would have been late 2007, early 2008.

• 16:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:47Rich Roll?

  And all I knew about you was like, you're the crazy ultra cyclist, dude. Right? And after I, and I was afraid of you and I was afraid to ride with you. So I think I had to, I was on the bike for a good six or seven months until I felt like I could even, you know, be in your little Saturday morning Peloton.

• 17:04Speaker 02

  And by the way, it's a very small Peloton that moves very slowly, as you found out.

• 17:09Rich Roll?

  But I didn't know that at the time. I didn't know that at the time. And so yeah, Vinnie and I got to know each other a little bit. At the time, you were training for the Furnace Creek 508, which for people out there who don't know what that is, it's an absurdly long bicycle race. It's a 508 mile race that most of which takes place in Death Valley, right?

• 17:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, it starts off in You know, and 29, it ends up in 29 Palms. It starts off right in Santa Clarita, and it goes through the Mojave Desert, and then it crosses right through the heart of Death Valley and comes out in 29 Palms.

• 17:45Rich Roll?

  And how many times have you done that race?

• 17:47Speaker 02

  I have done it four times. I have DNF twice, and I completed it once as a solo and once as a team.

• 17:58Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 17:59Speaker 02

  I love the race. I adore that race. You know, before that race, throughout the 90s, there was a thing going around, and it's kind of broken up now, but there was 24-hour mountain bike racing.

• 18:13Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's what you were doing before you got into the road cycling, right?

• 18:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, I started off road cycling after college in New Orleans, back in the early 80s, and I fell in love with, you know, I was trying to lose weight, so I parked my car, I bought a bike, I was watching what I was eating.

• 18:29Rich Roll?

  Well, let's just, why don't we just back it up, because, let's go back, because you were a football player in college, right? So let's just take it back to the beginning and your kind of introduction to sports and your athletic history.

• 18:41Speaker 02

  I played, I was on a football scholarship at Tulane University, back when Tulane was actually a real college football threat. I don't think they can beat St. Mary's School.

• 18:53Rich Roll?

  That was true. That's a true statement. They were a football threat. When was this?

• 18:57Speaker 02

  Back in the early 80s. We're talking 30 years ago. It's hard to believe now, but the last two years I played, we beat LSU, and the last time we beat them, they were going to the Orange Bowl, and we went down to LSU Stadium. We went down to their house. They had already had the Orange Bowl bid, and we were to, we upset them 31-28 in the rain, in front of 93,000 of their people.

• 19:28Rich Roll?

  That's pretty exciting.

• 19:29Speaker 02

  So Tulane was, you know, we, we used to beat the likes of SMU when SMU was a threat. Back then Miami wasn't a threat, if you can imagine that. The world was way different back then. Alabama was always a real deal. LSU was always a real deal. Ole Miss used to be a big team. But, you know, I was a, you know, I was a middle linebacker for Tulane University and I played at around 235 pounds. And I noticed that every year, whenever the seniors would graduate out, they would come back a year later to maybe see a game or something.

• 20:05Speaker 02

  They would always be fat. You know, these guys that were these hulking, you know, molting muscle piles were now, you know, these fat guys with guts. You're talking 22-year-old fat guys. And I said, that, that's never gonna happen to me. I'm gonna always pay attention, but when I-

• 20:24Rich Roll?

  A lot of guys say that.

• 20:26Speaker 02

  And, and I was serious. I, I was not gonna get fat, but one year, not even one year, six months after football, I went from 235 to 270.

• 20:36Rich Roll?

  When, after, after you'd retired from college football?

• 20:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, when I was done with football, I was still going to the gym and working out, and somehow I made it to 270 pounds.

• 20:46Rich Roll?

  I can't even, looking at you now is so hard to believe, 270.

• 20:49Speaker 02

  Well, I have pictures of it. I have, you know, the gut and the whole deal. I mean-

• 20:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you gotta, you gotta send me an email of that photo. I wanna see that.

• 20:56Speaker 02

  I, I gotta put, as a matter of fact, I need to digitize that photo because we're gonna use it for-

• 21:00Rich Roll?

  Oh, you gotta, yeah, you gotta have that in the book.

• 21:02Speaker 02

  Yeah. Um, I, I look like a porn star because back then I had a mustache and a gut and the whole thing. I didn't have the cock to be a porn star. Otherwise, I would've had a different career.

• 21:13Rich Roll?

  And the podcast just went explicit.

• 21:15Speaker 02

  Yeah. You, you don't do explicit, do you do explicit?

• 21:18Rich Roll?

  Well, we will for this one.

• 21:19Speaker 02

  And you're gonna have to put a little marker.

• 21:20Rich Roll?

  It's alright, yeah.

• 21:21Speaker 02

  Sorry, I-

• 21:21Rich Roll?

  And no, it's good, man. That's K. It's podcasting. It's not radio.

• 21:27Speaker 02

  Anyway, uh, you know, I gained that weight and my, my girlfriend at the time, Jamie Friedland, um, uh, we were having lunch. I was having a hamburger and, you know, I said to her, I said, you know, I think that the, uh, the dryer is shrinking up my jeans. And she said, well, what do you mean? I said, well- These jeans, I can't button them anymore. And she started to smirk. And I said, well, what's wrong? She said, sweetie, you're getting fat. And I literally did this. I flexed my arm and said, look at these guns. Look at this. You know, I still had big giant guns. And she said, yeah, your arms are big, your chest looks great, but you're putting on a gut.

• 22:10Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 22:11Speaker 02

  I went home and looked in the mirror and it was the first time I'd ever noticed a gut.

• 22:15Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's weird how, uh, it's weird how the human mind works, you know, denial is a funny thing. I say it all the time, like, you know, I was putting on weight, you know, I never got up to 270, but I was putting on a good five or 10 pounds a year. And honestly, and even when I would look in the mirror, I still would see that like collegiate swimmer. Like in my mind, I still weighed 165 pounds and I, you know, I could still jump in the pool and, and kill it. And, you know, you don't, until somebody calls you out or you have like a reckoning moment, you're unwilling to like, see what's right in front of your face.

• 22:48Speaker 02

  That's exactly what happened to me.

• 22:51Speaker 02

  And, you know, what I did was I took about one day to come up with a plan. And I've always been very careful with money and I allot money for different things. So I literally had a pizza budget. And I also had a gas budget as to how much gas I can put in my car.

• 23:07Rich Roll?

  You had a budget specifically for pizza?

• 23:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was called, it was my dating. Girls offer pizza. I called it the pizza budget, but hamburgers, pizza, whatever. Couple of hundred bucks for that. I had money for gas. And I was always weird about allotting money for different things. And I said, you know what? If I take my pizza budget and my gas budget, I can probably go out and buy a bicycle. And I did, I bought a bike for 175 bucks. And I didn't even have to deplete both of my budgets to do that. And I told myself, no matter where I go in New Orleans, I'm going to go on that bicycle. And that's, that was the beginning of the bicycle.

• 23:46Rich Roll?

  Right. So, so you get on the bike and then something clicks and obviously you decide you like it because you become a bike fanatic.

• 23:54Speaker 02

  Well, it wasn't, it didn't, I loved riding the bike. I would ride at the class. I would ride it around New Orleans. I would take it where, I, I found out that in a city like New Orleans, uptown, you could get places quicker on a bicycle than in a car because there's no traffic. You know, it's all these jammed up streets. It's a little kind of European town. So the bike got me around quicker for one. But then I realized that if I wanted to visit my parents, who lived 80 miles away, I would have to ride a bike to their house.

• 24:25Rich Roll?

  So you didn't even, you didn't even have a car?

• 24:27Speaker 02

  I still had my car, but it was parked. You know, I decided not to use my car.

• 24:32Rich Roll?

  Not for any reason at all?

• 24:34Speaker 02

  No, emergency. If I had to get to a hospital or something like that, it was fueled up, ready to go. And I would start it once a week to make sure that it was still running. But other than that, I just didn't touch it. I just left the car alone and took the bike everywhere. And then I realized in order to get to my parents' house, I would have to go 80 miles through the swamps of Louisiana.

• 24:57Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 24:57Speaker 02

  And that was the beginning of, this is kinda neat, you know? Although I did get hit with a bunch of beer bottles on the way home.

• 25:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I can imagine.

• 25:06Speaker 02

  Rednecks up and down.

• 25:08Rich Roll?

  So would you ride there and then like have dinner and ride back, or you do that the next day?

• 25:12Speaker 02

  That was the idea. That was the plan. But when I got there, I was just, I, I

• 25:17Rich Roll?

  Toast.

• 25:18Speaker 02

  I was done. You know, I couldn't do it. And my dad gave me a ride back because I had to get back that day.

• 25:25Rich Roll?

  So then when does the idea to start racing come in?

• 25:31Speaker 02

  You know, there was some, and you all know this, there were some groups, some cycling groups, and they did criteriums. And I got into some of those where you don't have to have a lot of endurance strength. You just have to have a lot of, you know, anaerobic strength. I guess today we call it like zone four.

• 25:49Rich Roll?

  Right, but you're still, you're in the weight room, you're still a big guy. You're not, you're only a couple of years out of playing football, right?

• 25:54Speaker 02

  I was down to, I don't know, at the time, 220. I got down to 220 in like six or eight months.

• 26:00Rich Roll?

  50 pounds off the, you know, just from riding your bike around.

• 26:02Speaker 02

  And I looked like a bodybuilder now. I didn't even look like a football player. I was, you know, I was lean and muscular. It just looked weird. And I ended up buying some cycling shorts at one point. That came in handy, that changed everything. Then I got baskets because they didn't have toe clips.

• 26:24Speaker 02

  I got a pair of baskets for cheap off of some guy and yeah, I was just, and I took the kickstand off of my bike because that wasn't cool.

• 26:31Rich Roll?

  Right, I can't imagine what this bike looked like.

• 26:33Speaker 02

  It was a Fuji, it was a maroon Fuji that I just kept taking pieces off of. It used to have the idiot brakes, you know, up top.

• 26:41Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 26:41Speaker 02

  So on the hood you had brakes and you can grab them.

• 26:44Rich Roll?

  The ones you could pull, right, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 26:46Speaker 02

  Took those off, I kept stripping the bike of weight. And some guy told me about these criteriums and, you know, being a football player for 13 years, I had a lot of fast twitch muscle and, you know, I was pretty good at it, so I kept doing the criteriums every time they came around. Never won any, but I would always be in, you know, at the sprint at the end, I was always up there, you know, I didn't get dropped. Which is kind of cool for that kind of racing. But that led into other things. By 1985 or 86, I had read about Pete Pinseers in a race across America and I was fascinated with the whole idea of humans being able to, because at that time I started riding down to visit my parents all the time.

• 27:30Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 27:30Speaker 02

  Eating lunch and riding back. They thought it was the most incredible feat they had ever heard of, you know, going 160 miles in one day.

• 27:38Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 27:39Speaker 02

  And.

• 27:40Rich Roll?

  So you're getting the endurance bug. What do you think that is? Like, I mean, because I, obviously I caught it, you know, what do you think that is that goes on in the, when somebody taps into that and decides that that's something they want to do? I mean, for a lot of people it sounds nutty. For me, it just seems natural and you, it sounds like you just gravitated towards it because you enjoyed it.

• 28:03Speaker 02

  You know, it's more natural, when you started doing it, it became more natural because more people were doing it.

• 28:09Rich Roll?

  But back then.

• 28:10Speaker 02

  Back in Louisiana, I mean, I'd go out for jogs and people would stop and go, hey, let me give you a ride. It's like, no, no, I want to be out here doing this.

• 28:18Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 28:19Speaker 02

  You know, think back then. They were really, you know, Nike was just in his infancy stages of, you know, jogging shoes and, you know, the, you know, the shorts. You couldn't just really find jogging shorts all the time. As a matter of fact, I used to use my old football pants. I would cut them off because my thighs were still so big that they would rub in the middle.

• 28:40Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 28:41Speaker 02

  And football cutoffs were the best thing to wear because it would rub against itself and it wouldn't rub me rough.

• 28:47Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 28:47Speaker 02

  That was my actual jogging clothes. So it wasn't like today and we all wore high socks made of cotton.

• 28:53Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 28:55Speaker 02

  It was all, you know, it was way different back then. But at one point, someone told me about a triathlon. I think this was around eighty, it was early on, before eighty-five, before I was out of college, eighty-two, eighty-three. And I said, what's a triathlon? He goes, oh, it's this thing they did in Hawaii and now they're doing it everywhere. And there was a triathlon in New Orleans and I just, I, I signed up and did it. It was, if I remember right, it was, I don't know, quarter of a mile in the water because that was the length of this bayou that they could do it in.

• 29:32Rich Roll?

  Right. I mean, most of them back then were super short.

• 29:35Speaker 02

  Well, they were all wacky distances. There was no such thing as Olympic distance or short course or, you know, half Ironman or Ironman.

• 29:43Rich Roll?

  It was just whatever the terrain.

• 29:45Speaker 02

  It was whatever the terrain allowed. So in some cases, the run would be as long as the bike. You know, so it was this whole craziness of whatever they could do. And I remember saying at the time, this will never take off. There's no way that this sport's going to take off because people were literally changing their clothes underneath towels. You know, you just, the way surfers do it, where you wrap a towel and then take your swimsuit off and pull on cycling clothes.

• 30:10Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 30:11Speaker 02

  It was a whole kind of Chinese fire drill back then. You know, it was so.

• 30:17Rich Roll?

  But you did it and did that kind of lock into you as something fun? Or, I mean, what was that?

• 30:23Speaker 02

  That wasn't so much fun for me because, you know, I sucked at swimming.

• 30:28Speaker 02

  I wasn't you in the pool, that's for sure.

• 30:32Rich Roll?

  I can't catch a football, so.

• 30:35Speaker 02

  Me either. I could just catch the guy with the football in his hand. Yeah, it's a funny thing. The bug, let's get back to the bug.

• 30:44Rich Roll?

  Right. Because that's what I'm interested in. I'm interested, you know, and people always, and it's sort of like, well, what do people want to know? And, you know, people always say, well, like, why do you, you know, why do you need to do these things? Like, why don't you just work on your 10K time? Or, you know, what is it inside of you that feels compelled to chase after these crazy, long races? And, you know, I want to get into your training too, because as hard as I've trained, I've never seen anybody train on the bike like you have. So, you know, you have it inside you the same way that I do, and I'm still trying to understand what that is.

• 31:19Speaker 02

  A real understanding is almost impossible.

• 31:23Speaker 02

  It's like a massage. I think of it as most people go for a massage to relax. I'm not relaxed until I'm six, seven, eight, nine hours into a ride.

• 31:37Speaker 02

  And when I say relaxed, I'm not talking about my body relaxing. I'm talking about my mind.

• 31:44Speaker 02

  It never shuts off. And I learned early on that when I'm on the bike, or if I'm running, I can shut it all off and just do that and not worry about anything else. And I think it was the love of, you know, just being out there alone. As you know, I train with the, as I call them, the Jews, you know, Jonathan, Steve, the same guys for 20 some odd years. And they'll ride with me for four or five hours. And as you know, I don't stop talking during that ride.

• 32:17Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 32:18Speaker 02

  But then they'll peel off and go have the rest of their life. And I'll go for another 10 hours by myself.

• 32:24Rich Roll?

  Just to put it into perspective, what actually goes on here is Vinnie gets up at like 3:30 in the morning. It's about right, right?

• 32:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 32:33Rich Roll?

  About 3:30 in the morning, you'll drive your truck over to the commons and park it. And you have all sorts of nutrition in the back and then you'll start riding and you'll do these, I don't know, three or four hour loops that bring you back to your truck. So you can refuel with your maltodextrin or whatever and get something to eat. And then around seven, you pick up Jonathan and the boys. And they'll ride with Vinnie for a little while. And what Vinnie does is Vinnie's like, I love riding with guys that are slower than me. It's the best because every time we hit a hill, you'll ride up, you will ride ahead and do your cadence and you know, your speed up the climb. And you know, where we live in the Santa Monica Mountains, these climbs can be four or five miles long or half a mile, depending on where you are.

• 33:18Rich Roll?

  And then Vinnie will crest and then he'll come back down and join the group and then do the climb again. And then circle back down and join the group and do the climb again. So quite often you might've done that climb three, maybe three and a half times.

• 33:31Speaker 02

  Right.

• 33:32Rich Roll?

  More than the group and then you'll ride with them for three or four hours until they're done. And then you will continue to ride until like it gets dark, like nine o'clock at night in the summertime or whatever. So you're literally going from 3:30 in the morning till nine o'clock at night when you're getting ready for 5:08.

• 33:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, when you're doing that kind of.

• 33:52Speaker 02

  And you know, people, you know, have said to me over the years, why do you keep riding with Jonathan and Stephen? It's like, they're the best training partners in the world because who in their right mind would crest a mountain? And then come back down and crest it again and come back down. When you have those guys that are keeping you accountable, they become coaches. You know, you have to keep doing it.

• 34:14Rich Roll?

  Rex, and they're like, why aren't you riding ahead, Vinnie? Come on, you're slacking.

• 34:19Speaker 02

  That's literally what goes on and. I enjoy it. I enjoy their company when they're there and then kind of the rest of the day, I think about them. I think about the crap we talked about and you know, it's kind of neat. I've always liked it like that.

• 34:33Rich Roll?

  There's a bonding that goes on when you're on a long ride with someone and I think in, you know, maybe golf is that way for some guys or whatever, but you know, in our culture, it's not normal for, you know, two, three dudes to hang out for the better part of the day and talk about their lives. You know, it just doesn't really, it doesn't really happen. And when you're, there's something about the bike, maybe it's kind of that low grade elevated heart rate and just being comfortable with some guys. And I've had the most amazing conversations on the bike where I get to know somebody better than, you know, better than you would ever imagine. And then people start telling you all sorts of stuff about their life and opening up and I do the same. And there's an intimacy

• 35:14Rich Roll?

  and that, that occurs that creates a pretty, you know, deep friendship with people that you ride with.

• 35:22Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 35:23Rich Roll?

  It's a special thing.

• 35:31Rich Roll?

  But getting back to, also getting back to that thing about, you know, what is it about endurance sports and ultra endurance sports? I mean, I can definitely vouch for that. And you know, I was saying to a friend the other day, like, you know, if I just go out for an hour or two hours, that doesn't do anything for, like, I don't get that feeling. Like, I want to quiet my mind. I want that feeling of being, like you've been burned in the fire, like purged and cleaned out completely. And that, that quiet that you get, that you can only get, I guess if you meditated in a cave for two weeks or something like that, but just something about being out on the bike all day for a really long, solid effort and you come back and you're like a different person.

• 36:13Speaker 02

  It really does. I like that you used the word purging there because it really is that sort of thing. There's a guy that started something, he started it a long time ago and it started to get traction a few years ago.

• 36:27Speaker 02

  It's that interval training where he has you lifting heavy ass weights.

• 36:32Rich Roll?

  Is it the CrossFit guy, Mackenzie?

• 36:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, Mackenzie.

• 36:35Rich Roll?

  Mackenzie, I was just talking about him with Ben Greenfield on an episode the other day.

• 36:40Speaker 02

  I listened to the first half of that interview. I can't wait. Did you guys get to that?

• 36:43Rich Roll?

  We talked about it a little bit and I'm actually, that was one of the things I really wanted to talk to you about.

• 36:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 36:48Rich Roll?

  Because I've always been kind of a math atone guy. Like I need the volume, you know, I believe in zone two training. I've experienced tremendous results and rapid improvement by adhering to aerobic zone training with, you know, hard intervals. It's sort of, Ben describes it as, I can't, I can't remember the exact term he used, but you know, you're either training and you're, you know, on one end of the spectrum. And then you train on the other end of the spectrum. And when you combine the super intense efforts and the, the sort of Z2, you know, miles, that's when you're going to get a good result. And it takes time. If you're going to put all that volume in, you're putting in a lot more time. But now, you know, this CrossFit craze is upon us.

• 37:30Rich Roll?

  And I think in large part due to kind of the advent of the paleo diet and you know, it's very, very popular right now. But this guy Mackenzie and others are saying, you know, if you want to train for a marathon, just forget about all that volume. You never have to run more than 13 miles. And you do this super hard efforts and you're going to hit the, you're going to do the CrossFit super hard. And you're going to do interval work on the track. And you know, you're going to actually get your PR in the marathon. You're going to improve. And like, I have a hard time. I mean, I can't speak to it personally because I haven't, I haven't done that. So I can't say I did it and it didn't work. But I know myself well enough for being a, you know, an athlete that I don't think that that would work very well for me. And so as a trainer, you must get this question. You know, people are, well, should I do it this way? And what are your thoughts on that?

• 38:14Speaker 02

  You know, of course you get that because it's a too good to be true type. And you know, this is going to be interesting because as soon as I leave here, I'm going to go listen to what Ben has to say about it. And Ben's a trainer I actually respect. There's not many that I do respect.

• 38:27Rich Roll?

  Yeah, he knows his stuff.

• 38:28Speaker 02

  As much as he. But I'm going to give you, it's going to be interesting because I'm going to give you my piece. And it'll be interesting to see how it relates to someone like Ben and what he thinks about this type of training. I'm going to come right off and say, it's no good. It's no good. And, and I'm going to give reasons as to why it's no good. First off, people, you know, when you have people who aren't really athletes and they haven't trained in this form and they don't really know how to do power moves, you could cause injuries right off the bat. Just, you know, that alone is going to cause enough injuries that will probably stop these people from doing anything else ever again.

• 39:07Rich Roll?

  But McKenzie says, and if you want to learn, if you're not familiar with what we're talking about, there's an article, I think it's in the latest Outside magazine about him and his methods.

• 39:16Speaker 02

  Oh great, so he's getting more press.

• 39:18Rich Roll?

  Yeah, he's getting a lot of press and Tim Ferriss is a big believer, talked about him and his book and all that kind of stuff. But he's saying this is a way to avoid overuse injuries for people that, you know, have problems because they run too much.

• 39:32Speaker 02

  Well, yeah, you see, he's taking an inkling of truth and turning it into something else, but my feeling is, is when you start mixing anaerobics with aerobics, you're not going to give your body the break it needs. And when you start adding any, any extra aerobics to the fact that you're burning yourself, I'm trying to use as lame in terms as I can, you're going to burn out and you're going to cause stress fractures, you're going to cause, you're going to cause muscle tissue damage. I mean, I could go on and on and on and on.

• 40:07Rich Roll?

  It's pretty similar to what, to what Ben had to say about it. I mean, he said, you know, basically McKenzie's kind of saying, this is a way to avoid overtraining and it's for the time crunched person, obviously. But there is a different kind of sort of stress and over, because these workouts are very difficult. They're short, but they're very difficult, but they, they create, you know, a different kind of stress on the body that also leads to injuries.

• 40:29Speaker 02

  And ineffective creates overtraining. So, the thing you're trying to avoid, you're going to actually fall into, I'm a big believer and, and I know you are because I, I see you going up and down the road a lot. When you see someone up and down the road a lot, the only way they could do that is to be in zone two. You know, I believe in a big giant base, just the hugest base you can get.

• 40:52Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 40:52Speaker 02

  I believe in starting early in the year, build up that base, find out where your zone two is, and stay there and just build a big giant aerobic base that's going to serve you well when your long distance races come along.

• 41:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah. You can't, you really, I mean, I guess it depends on what your goals are, but I think if you really want to kind of break, break the glass ceiling on your, your performances, there really is no end run around putting that time into that base and really dialing it back and, and, and getting that, you know, those aerobic miles in. And look, if you just want to complete a race and you don't have much time and you're, you know, you're a super busy guy, maybe, you know, that CrossFit, Mackenzie method might get you to a certain level of proficiency or fitness, but you're not going to reach your potential doing that.

• 41:42Speaker 02

  I, I would rather see people undertrained for an event than to do a CrossFit to try to, you know, because your body, our bodies know how to go the distance. I know, I know I like to put the time in, just because I like to put the time in. My buddy David Holt, who's a big time ultra cyclist, he loves to put the big miles in. I think we all do it more for our head than anything else.

• 42:07Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 42:08Speaker 02

  But even if you don't have the, you know, you could probably do your long ride on a, on a, you know, on a, an Ironman, your long ride could probably be between 70 and 85 miles, and you can do that. You know, your, your long run might be as much as 16 to 18 miles. You don't have to put in a full marathon to do it. You swim, God only knows how little you can swim and still make it through that swim.

• 42:37Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 42:38Speaker 02

  And the cutoff time. I think, I think too many people worry about the amount of time they're going to be on that course more than they should. Same with bikes, you know, Serena used to say when she first met me, she said, well, you never go any further than three, 350 miles in practice, yet you do a 500 mile.

• 42:56Rich Roll?

  You realize that sounds insane.

• 42:58Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. And I would explain to her, I was like, as long as I get 60, 70% in, I'm good.

• 43:03Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, you can't go out and, I mean, if you're training for a 500 mile cycling race, you can't, you know, you can't, you're not doing, you know, race simulations and you're, you just can't, it's not physically possible. So how much are you going to be able to do?

• 43:16Speaker 02

  It's physically possible, but it's not gonna.

• 43:17Rich Roll?

  Right. It's not gonna make you better.

• 43:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's not. Some years I've never gone more than two, 250, and I've done just as well.

• 43:26Rich Roll?

  Well, you also have years and year, decades of base behind you of doing this.

• 43:30Speaker 02

  Brain knows how to get there, the, you know, my, my, you know, the cells in my body know how to get there. There's only so much training you can do.

• 43:39Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 43:40Speaker 02

  You know?

• 43:41Rich Roll?

  Right. So, uh, the other thing I love about when you do 508 is you just gun it right out of the gate, you know, like you go hard, you know, I've never seen anyone, like you just go for it and you're out on the front and, and hitting like a really aggressive pace early on for the first 100 miles. I mean, I've done some crazy endurance stuff, but I also know what my body feels like after I've put, you know, 150 miles in, on, on a bike. And the idea of going 350 more is, is beyond me. So I still, I don't know how you, how you do it.

• 44:17Speaker 02

  Um, for that race, a lot of us, that, you know, I, my feeling is if I'm gonna go out there, I'm going out to win, or I'd rather burn, that's why I've DNFed so much at that race.

• 44:29Rich Roll?

  Yeah, he's DNFing not because, you know, he was out of shape or whatever, it's because he's going for it, you know? And it's either gonna work or it's, or it's gonna go down burning.

• 44:39Speaker 02

  And I've gone down burning and, and, and one time I gave it up at the 400 mile mark and I hurt my knee and there was nothing else that I could do. There was no continuing on. Another year I went 320 miles and that was it.

• 44:53Rich Roll?

  But why don't you just, I mean, I've said this to you too, like, why don't you just pace out that first 150 miles and take it easy? You obviously have this huge base, you've been doing this for a long time.

• 45:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 45:03Rich Roll?

  I believe in your ability to, to kill it in that last 50, 100 miles. Why don't you try it that way one time and see how that goes?

• 45:12Speaker 02

  You know, if I do it again, and I probably will next year, not this coming year, but the following year, that's going to be what I'm going to do because, you know, we all race to Trona. That's about the 150 or 60 mile mark. We want our cars to be in Trona first because it assures our chase vehicles getting gas and not being held up. I like getting to Town Pass. That's a 12 mile, 11 and a half mile climb with 12 and 13 percent grades. I like getting there in the daylight. I like getting to the top of that mountain in the daylight and I like getting down the backside of it into Death Valley in the daylight.

• 45:54Speaker 02

  Most competitors, other than the first two or three or four people, see the whole thing at night. I like to be over that hill. And, you know, you're talking about the speed. I'm a 50-year-old man now and last time I did that race, I was 48. And I'm still hitting the 200 mile mark at nine hours and 15 minutes. Which means, you know, you're doing back-to-back 100-mile runs at four hours and, you know, whatever, 40 something minutes.

• 46:23Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 46:24Speaker 02

  And, you know, in your mind, you keep hanging on to that. You know, you don't want to give up that you can go the first 200 in way under 10 hours.

• 46:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah, but you're losing the forest for the trees, especially as you get older.

• 46:38Speaker 02

  You're absolutely right.

• 46:39Rich Roll?

  You know, your strength will naturally diminish, but you can continue to build that aerobic engine, you know, and rely on that, and rely on that in a bigger way.

• 46:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, I've learned a lot from my buddy David Holt, who...

• 46:54Rich Roll?

  Tell everyone who David is because I don't, you know, I mean, I know who he is, but he's quite the cyclist.

• 47:00Speaker 02

  David is now 60 years old and he can still go out and hang with the Young Bucks. He'll go out, he's always a threat. He had the record at the Hoodoo 500. It's a 500-mile race, 40,000 feet of climbing in Utah. He held the record twice there. The overall record, not the 60-year-old record, the all-out, won the race, had the record.

• 47:24Rich Roll?

  How long ago was that?

• 47:25Speaker 02

  Uh, two years ago.

• 47:26Rich Roll?

  So he's, he's literally fifty?

• 47:28Speaker 02

  He was in his late 50s.

• 47:30Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 47:30Speaker 02

  Um, he, he's never done, the first time he did 508 was when he was 51 or 52. He's never finished worse than eighth overall, and he's finished second once and third twice. I mean.

• 47:45Rich Roll?

  That's crazy. And he, didn't he, didn't he go for or hold the 24-hour record?

• 47:50Speaker 02

  He held, um, the 24 hours of Sebring record, I think.

• 47:54Rich Roll?

  But he did it in the velodrome, too. You, you were crowing him that one time.

• 47:58Speaker 02

  There was another friend of ours, Big Al Schmuts, was going for that record. And he had stomach issues at around 15 or 18 hours, and that ended that, right there.

• 48:09Rich Roll?

  Right. Right, right. So, but you're taking the, you've taken the, kind of the year, you're not racing this year. You're focusing on your training, you're training other people. We're going to talk about that. And also, um, and also your book. So, uh, I want to talk about your book, man. You got a book coming out in a couple of weeks. So as a little bit of a background, uh, in addition to being, you know, a ridiculous, uh, cyclist. Um, and on that note, one thing I wanted to mention, too, and this is important, I think, for everybody out there. When Vinnie goes out to ride, and he can hang with anybody on the bike, believe me, uh, he, uh, everyone's out there, especially in Malibu and out here, they got their super fancy

• 48:53Rich Roll?

  bikes with the fly rims and the, you know, the latest Garmin and like the whole, the, you know, the SRM and the power meters and the whole thing. Vinnie goes out, you've got a couple of bikes, but I think your favorite bike is your old Serata Steel Frame bike.

• 49:07Speaker 02

  DeRosa, it's a DeRosa.

• 49:08Rich Roll?

  Oh, DeRosa, yeah, DeRosa. I mean, what year was that frame made?

• 49:13Speaker 02

  That frame is a 1980. Um, um.

• 49:16Rich Roll?

  Just got a nineteen eighty steel frame and he has the Brooks leather saddle on it. You know, you seem like that you see on like a commuter bike, whatever, the one that that's the brown leather.

• 49:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:28Rich Roll?

  And then you load it down with about as many water bottles as possible. You got like four on the back and two on the frame.

• 49:35Speaker 02

  Yeah, I usually have five, um, twenty five ounce bottles. That's a hundred and twenty five ounces of water on the bike and sometimes another one in my jersey. And of course I have that big pack I carry.

• 49:47Rich Roll?

  And then he wears a, you wear a fanny pack. I don't even know what you have in there, like a toolkit.

• 49:52Speaker 02

  It's loaded with everything. Because over the years you learn, you you break down out there. I have every, I'm the most neurotic cyclist in the world.

• 50:00Rich Roll?

  So in other words, you know, he's, he's riding on a bike that probably weighs twenty, well, I mean, with the bottles on it, it probably weighs thirty five, forty, fifty pounds. I don't know, you know.

• 50:12Speaker 02

  Very heavy.

• 50:12Rich Roll?

  Right, so he's going all day on this bike. He's trying to make it as heavy as possible and you see other people out riding and they're, they got their race, you know, configurations on and everything. It's like, you know, it's the same thing with in swimming. We used to wear, like, you're not going to wear your skin suit to swim practice, see how fast you can go. You want to slow yourself down, right?

• 50:34Speaker 02

  Right.

• 50:34Rich Roll?

  We used to wear, I can't even believe I say this, but when we were in high school, we would wear pantyhose. We would wear pantyhose to swim practice because it, the drag that it creates when you're swimming makes you swim like twenty percent slower. It makes it very difficult to swim. So I don't know, I wonder if swimmers still do that. But I can remember telling my mom, like, you gotta buy pantyhose for me for swim practice to slow me down.

• 50:58Speaker 02

  It's kind of, you know, you, when you think about swimmers wearing pantyhose and then you use the word drag, you know.

• 51:04Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's bad.

• 51:05Speaker 02

  I was sitting there going.

• 51:06Rich Roll?

  Well, we are.

• 51:07Speaker 02

  What kind of team were you on?

• 51:09Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it is, this is an explicit podcast today.

• 51:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, you gotta put the sign on it anyway.

• 51:15Rich Roll?

  But anyway, you know, the point being that like, you know. Vinnie's tough as nails and he's going out there trying to make his bike as heavy as possible when everyone else is out there trying to make it as light as possible.

• 51:26Speaker 02

  Well, in practice, I mean, who wants to win a race in practice?

• 51:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah, because you're training. You're training, exactly.

• 51:30Speaker 02

  And of course, then when you grab the little light piece of carbon fiber bike and go out and race, you just fly up the hills. I mean, you know, you go from 35, 40 pound bike to a 15 pound bike. It makes a big difference.

• 51:44Rich Roll?

  And you are a weight, I think I remember you telling me you did something with like the nuts on your, the screws that you are screwing in to hold your water bottle cage under your frame, you were shaving off the ends of them to save like, you know, one one hundredth of an ounce.

• 52:03Speaker 02

  It's even worse than that. I take one, you know, I don't even leave the two water bottle cages on, I just leave one on because I figure you have a car following you, they can always hand you anything you want. Why have two waters on your bike? But the one that I take off, I don't even put the screws back, I just cover it with a little piece of tape, just to keep those screws out. And the other two screws holding the other one, I actually shave them down.

• 52:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 52:29Speaker 02

  So, but you know, it's

• 52:30Rich Roll?

  That is, that's insane.

• 52:31Speaker 02

  But you know,

• 52:32Rich Roll?

  That's more insane than wearing pantyhose.

• 52:34Speaker 02

  It is, but you know, it comes down to, does it really do anything? Only in your head.

• 52:39Rich Roll?

  In your mind.

• 52:40Speaker 02

  And that's where it matters. It's the same reason we shave our legs and everything else.

• 52:42Rich Roll?

  Because you know, you're the only guy who is like, you know, in his study late at night shaving down those little

• 52:48Speaker 02

  Oh yeah, sitting there going, look at this, I'm gonna shave it down, no one else is thinking of this.

• 52:53Rich Roll?

  Like a crazed maniac, so.

• 52:54Speaker 02

  And you're shaving your legs and everything else, it does all matter, not a whole lot. Grant Peterson, the guy who has Rivendell Cycles, he and I, we've had conversations about this, he can actually make an argument to the fact that we're faster without tow clips, you know.

• 53:13Rich Roll?

  Meaning the cages on, using the cages on your pedals instead?

• 53:17Speaker 02

  No, just using nothing, just pushing pedals. Because when you think about it, we really don't lift up on those pedals.

• 53:23Rich Roll?

  Well, you do a little bit when you're trying to have a really smooth circular pedal stroke.

• 53:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, so he makes that argument. I'm not making that argument, but Grant Peterson, who has been designing bikes, he designed for Giant back in the day, and of course he has Rivendell Cycles and the whole thing. He's got a book out right now called Just Ride.

• 53:40Rich Roll?

  Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I've seen that book, yeah.

• 53:42Speaker 02

  He poo-poos all of it.

• 53:44Rich Roll?

  Interesting.

• 53:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:46Rich Roll?

  I read that book. Cool.

• 53:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:48Rich Roll?

  All right. So, training. We got to talk about you as the Hollywood celebrity trainer. I just saw you. I just saw you on, what was it? Access Hollywood?

• 53:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:58Rich Roll?

  With Billy Bush and Howie Mandel. I know you trained Howie. So, you know, Vinnie's a guy who's been around town here in Hollywood for quite some time. So, in addition to being this lunatic ultra cyclist, he trains a lot of people, you know, average people and celebrities alike. And he's got a book coming out. So, I just, how did you get into the whole training thing?

• 54:20Speaker 02

  I started it in, well, I started working out when I was 10, which is, you know, when you think about 1972, there was no gyms around. There was a guy in my hometown that had a gym. So, before even football took hold, you know, I was always into fitness and working out. And by the time I was 16, I was actually, you know, we built the gym in my hometown. So, a small town with an actual gym. And I was the only employee in that gym. So, training people started way back. When I was at Tulane, getting my degree in physical education and my background in exercise physiology, they needed someone

• 55:00Speaker 02

  to teach weightlifting. And I was the guy. I also became the assistant at Tulane after my football career was over with for health and strength for the tennis team, the swim team, girls' basketball, and men's basketball. After that, I got hired on by Newman School. That's where all the Manning kids went to school. I didn't have Eli, but I had Cooper and the other one, Peyton.

• 55:33Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 55:34Speaker 02

  You may have heard of him.

• 55:35Rich Roll?

  Never heard of him.

• 55:36Speaker 02

  Anyway, you know, I just kept on with fitness. And by that time, I had training clients. You know, I was training people. Back then, training didn't exist as a career.

• 55:46Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 55:48Speaker 02

  So, they called me the exercise guy. Because trainers, as you know from college, were guys who would tape you up and ice you down.

• 55:55Rich Roll?

  He's like the old guy like Burgess Meredith chewing on a cigar and that.

• 55:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was those and they actually have degrees to become trainers. So to call myself a trainer, I didn't have a training degree. So, you know, I called myself the exercise guy and I was going into people's homes there. And that continued in, you know, for 10 years until I moved here back in 91 and started doing it here.

• 56:19Speaker 02

  Uh, the original question was.

• 56:21Rich Roll?

  Well, so, so you, well, I guess, I mean, you answered it, but you know, so you move here, you, you move here to develop the training business? Is that was the idea in moving to Los Angeles?

• 56:32Speaker 02

  Yeah. And at first I didn't know a soul here. I just moved here. I just, I wanted to be where I could ride more and, you know, it'd be sunny year round. So I moved here without knowing anyone. I had no way of making a living here. Someone introduced me to an agent who turned me into a model. And that's literally how I made my money for the first two years of, of living out here.

• 56:55Rich Roll?

  Do you have any of those pictures?

• 56:57Speaker 02

  Tons.

• 56:58Rich Roll?

  I gotta see those.

• 56:59Speaker 02

  Oh, you've never seen any of those?

• 57:00Rich Roll?

  No, uh-uh.

• 57:01Speaker 02

  And when you look at it now, it just looks so wrong.

• 57:05Rich Roll?

  Is it online anywhere? Is there a link I could put in the podcast notes?

• 57:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, you can find stuff. Um, I'll, I'll, I'll send you some stuff.

• 57:10Rich Roll?

  All right.

• 57:11Speaker 02

  But I did that and literally, um, I was making a lot of money. Uh, but I was already in my 30s. So I was like, how long can this possibly hold out? You know?

• 57:21Speaker 02

  So I got back and, you know, the whole time I was trying to find clients to train.

• 57:26Speaker 02

  And I found my first client at Playboy. And, uh, there was this woman who lost, uh, you know, she was 300 and something pounds. I took 120 pounds off of her. That caught the eye of some of the playmates who, after they do their playmate stint in the magazine, Playboy has a contract with them for two years. And these girls start to gain weight. They start partying a little too much.

• 57:49Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 57:49Speaker 02

  So I started working with those girls and that led me into the Hollywood community.

• 57:54Rich Roll?

  You gotta keep them game fit.

• 57:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 57:56Rich Roll?

  So you're, so, so basically what's happening is you fall into that and you're calling your friends back in New Orleans going, you're never going to guess what's going on here.

• 58:04Speaker 02

  In a million years, you're not gonna guess this one.

• 58:07Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 58:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was kinda that cool.

• 58:10Rich Roll?

  That story alone should merit buying this book. I hope there's stories about that in there.

• 58:16Speaker 02

  Well, we actually opened the book talking about, as a matter of fact, I went to your agent first before I went to any agent. And she read the book and she literally had a visceral reaction to my book.

• 58:30Speaker 02

  And she, she basically sent me the equivalent of hate mail.

• 58:36Rich Roll?

  Really?

• 58:37Speaker 02

  Oh, it was horrible. And she called Dean because I wrote my book with a very well-known author, Dean Laurie, who has written, I don't know, eight or 10 books. He's one of the writers for Arrested Development, My Wife and Kids. He's written movies, Adam Sandler movies. The guy's been around Hollywood forever and he's a well-known writer.

• 58:59Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 59:00Speaker 02

  She called Dean and said, "You should know better."

• 59:03Rich Roll?

  She did not.

• 59:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 59:04Rich Roll?

  Really?

• 59:05Speaker 02

  Dean said, "What are you talking about?" She said, "No one writes a whole book and puts it out there. You should have written a synopsis and we could have sent the synopsis out. You wrote a whole book."

• 59:15Rich Roll?

  Well, I think, I don't know. I think a lot of people now are writing, are writing whole books. You know, the business is changing. You know what I mean? It's sort of like, you know, I did it the very traditional way, which was I was introduced to Carol, who's my book agent. And I told her my story. What happened was a guy that I swam with in college,

• 59:38Rich Roll?

  I was talking to him on the phone and he's like, and this was way before the book. And he's like, "You know, that's a great story. Have you ever thought about writing a book? You know, I should introduce you. This woman, Carol, I used to rent, rent a house that she owns in San Francisco and she's a book agent and she's Dean Carnaz's book agent. And she probably, you know, dig talking to you." And I was not attached to it or whatever. I said, "Cool, but that sounds, you know, yeah, I'd be happy to talk to her." But I didn't really think much of it. I ended up talking to her and she's like, "This is an interesting story. You know, I don't know that there's a book in this or not. You know, maybe there is. It's, it sounds interesting. I'll tell you what, like you're, you know, you need to write a proposal."

• 1:00:20Rich Roll?

  I'll help guide you through it. You know, I can help find some people to help you write it, to show you what it, you know, what a real book proposal is. And then we'll, you know, figure out if there's something here or not. So I actually busted my ass on a proposal for like four months. So, and that was what kind of set everything in motion and made the book happen. But, you know, publishing's changing, man. Those, the big publishing houses are more and more conglomerated, just like the television networks.

• 1:00:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, and I want to get into that in a second, but so, go ahead.

• 1:00:48Rich Roll?

  No, I was just gonna say, so, it's sort of like, you know, if you're a screenwriter, if you're not bringing the next Twilight, or, you know, Iron Man, you know, or some kind of comic book franchise to their attention, they're not interested. You know what I mean? So you have to thread the needle in a certain way. And that, that basically eliminates, you know, a lot of interesting, you know, intelligent projects. And the same thing is going on in the publishing world. Like, they can only publish so many books. There are only so many publishing houses. The indie publishers are kind of falling by the wayside, or getting scooped up by the big ones. And there's never been a better time, particularly for somebody who already has an audience like yourself, to, to self-publish and, you know, cut out

• 1:01:31Rich Roll?

  the middleman and distribute directly. And if you do it right, and so many people on the internet are telling you, here's how you do it right, here's how you can do it, here's how you can leverage the audience that you have, you don't really need that.

• 1:01:43Speaker 02

  You know, it's interesting, because you and I were writing books at the same time. I know you were writing yours, because I saw you every day in Starbucks writing yours.

• 1:01:51Rich Roll?

  Right. Most of my book was written in Starbucks.

• 1:01:53Speaker 02

  I couldn't, I couldn't do that. That would distract me. The way I did mine, you, you got a deal and then started writing your book.

• 1:02:02Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:02:03Speaker 02

  I decided not to get a deal and write the book. And we did it at exactly the same time. And, and by the way, speaking of books, if you're listening to this podcast, there's a good chance that you're, you're a fan of Rich Rolls, but- You don't know anything about Rich Roll until you read this book. I listened to the whole book on tape. I bought it and listened to it.

• 1:02:25Rich Roll?

  Bored by my voice on that.

• 1:02:26Speaker 02

  Actually, you know, when I heard the first five minutes, I went, oh, I gotta listen to this jackass for another six hours. I fell in love with your voice. I know it sounds a little gay, but I fell in love with your voice.

• 1:02:37Rich Roll?

  Hey, I'm the guy who wears pantyhose, so.

• 1:02:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, so maybe. That doesn't make you gay. It just makes you a drag queen. It's a, I think it's a marked difference.

• 1:02:46Rich Roll?

  Very different things, very different.

• 1:02:47Speaker 02

  But I remember every day, I went, okay, I'm gonna listen to another hour of your book. I would go out to the Amundsen Ranch and start jogging, and then two hours later, I would find myself still listening to the book. I remember exactly where I was when I read that piece about the girlfriend and the marriage, the woman you married.

• 1:03:07Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:03:08Speaker 02

  And really, really feeling your pain, four, five, six times in that book, from high school, the high school pain, the pain with alcoholism, you know, because, you know, I have a family member that is an alcoholic. He's been clean for several years. And just going through that pain of what you had to go through, this book is a great read. If you don't like Rich and you don't like endurance sports and you don't like anything, read it for that reason alone. It's a great journey. And the whole time I was, I was reading it, actually listening to it, you know, I kept going back to, I wonder if he was writing

• 1:03:51Speaker 02

  this that day when I watched it to Starbucks.

• 1:03:54Rich Roll?

  Maybe.

• 1:03:55Speaker 02

  You know.

• 1:03:56Rich Roll?

  But thank you for that. I appreciate that.

• 1:03:57Speaker 02

  No, it really is a good book. And even if you bought the book, go back and buy it again. Do you make a buck if they buy it on?

• 1:04:03Rich Roll?

  I don't know. I still, here's, here's another reason to self-publish. I'm still not in the black yet. I think I've sold.

• 1:04:10Speaker 02

  It's crazy.

• 1:04:11Rich Roll?

  You know, they're really happy with the sales. It's been selling like crazy and,

• 1:04:17Rich Roll?

  I think I've sold over 30,000 copies. That's net like as bookstores return. I think gross, it was, it's like 45, 50,000 or something like that. But a lot of bookstores end up returning a lot. And they're all super psyched on that. But it's still, I still haven't sold enough to be in the black because I got paid in advance. So I'm still not, you know, I've never gotten a

• 1:04:38Speaker 02

  You haven't covered your advance.

• 1:04:39Rich Roll?

  No, I haven't covered my advance too.

• 1:04:40Speaker 02

  By definition.

• 1:04:41Rich Roll?

  So I gotta sell, excuse me, I gotta sell some more books.

• 1:04:45Speaker 02

  Please buy his book again, folks. I'm gonna go home tonight and buy another one of your books. And if you're gonna buy his book, go to his banner at richroll.com, click at Amazon.

• 1:04:55Rich Roll?

  I wanna talk about your book, man. This is, anybody who's, anybody who's listening is prior.

• 1:05:00Speaker 02

  I'm trying to monetize your site.

• 1:05:01Rich Roll?

  I appreciate that. But we're here to talk about you, man.

• 1:05:03Speaker 02

  My book, here's what we did.

• 1:05:05Rich Roll?

  Well, it was called, first of all, it was called Confessions of a Hollywood Trainer, right? But you've changed the title.

• 1:05:10Speaker 02

  Well, the original title we wanted to go with was Fitness Confidential, and we've gone back to that. We, we put the book out, the second agent I spoke to took the book, loved the book, and she went out to 22 of the top houses, and you know that it's basically the only top houses left.

• 1:05:31Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:05:32Speaker 02

  You know, Harper Collins, Crowns, Simon and Schuster, the whole slew. And they all got back to us pretty quickly. Here was the interesting thing. Usually when you get a turn down from a book agent, because I've been through this before with my children's books, it's one sentence of thanks, but no thanks. You know, we, we, thank you for getting in touch. We were getting two and three paragraphs of information back on this book. Only one agent hated it. One agent, you know, who is this guy? Tony?

• 1:06:07Rich Roll?

  My agent?

• 1:06:08Speaker 02

  No, no, no, only one publishing house.

• 1:06:10Rich Roll?

  Oh, one publishing house.

• 1:06:11Speaker 02

  Who is this guy? Tony think he is, thinks he is? She didn't even get my name right.

• 1:06:16Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:06:17Speaker 02

  Is Vinnie that interchangeable with Tony? Is it really that bad?

• 1:06:20Rich Roll?

  You Italians.

• 1:06:21Speaker 02

  Italians. It's like, you know, if a black guy's name is Tyrone, and you call him Leroy every time you meet him, it's almost like that. And

• 1:06:31Speaker 02

  Tony, he doesn't know what he's talking about and he's all wrong. It turns out that she's Jillian Michaels' book agent.

• 1:06:37Rich Roll?

  Ah, interesting.

• 1:06:38Speaker 02

  And I have a lot to say about Jillian Michaels in the book.

• 1:06:41Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 1:06:41Speaker 02

  So, obviously, she didn't like the book.

• 1:06:43Rich Roll?

  Ah.

• 1:06:44Speaker 02

  But the other 21.

• 1:06:46Rich Roll?

  You talk about Jillian on your podcast a lot, too.

• 1:06:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, we don't, we don't sugarcoat anything.

• 1:06:52Rich Roll?

  No, you don't.

• 1:06:53Speaker 02

  On my podcast, um, it's, it's, it's very raw, if you will.

• 1:06:58Rich Roll?

  Right, I love it, it's great. Yeah, totally unfiltered, uncensored, Vinnie raw, all the time, all day long.

• 1:07:05Speaker 02

  And, and you know what's crazy?

• 1:07:06Rich Roll?

  And great information, too. It's not like you're just complaining. I mean, you're, you're imparting a lot of great information.

• 1:07:10Speaker 02

  No, it's not. People think that I'm gonna be angry. It's almost like this, you know, I just get on the air and say, what's the truth? You know, I'm not gonna lie about anything.

• 1:07:19Rich Roll?

  It's a catchy, you have the catchy, you know, America's Angriest Trainer, so you think it's gonna be like, uh, AM talk radio, or, you know, Fox News or something like that, where you're just gonna be screaming all the time. But it's, it's not really, it's not really that, it's not that you're angry, and it's not that, you're just, you just call it like you see it, you know? Whether people agree or don't.

• 1:07:37Speaker 02

  We say at the top of the show, and we say it in the book, "I'm angry because your good intentions have been stolen. You've been lied to. You've been told that Gatorade is a good product." And that's just an example of what we go off on, and we talk about it.

• 1:08:00Speaker 02

  But getting back to the book, all of these publishing houses wrote to us and said, "We love your voice, we love this book, but we're scared of this book." You know, "We can't sell a book like this anymore because the world has changed."

• 1:08:15Rich Roll?

  Meaning, what do you, what does that mean exactly?

• 1:08:17Speaker 02

  They literally wanted me to take my book and cut it in half, and just give the prescriptive form of it. So the book you did, where you talk about two things, your ultra-life and your life growing up and the whole thing, they don't want that anymore.

• 1:08:31Rich Roll?

  They just want the how-to.

• 1:08:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, if I was a celebrity, they would take the other part. But since I'm a non-celebrity, they just want the, you know, like a magazine article, "10 Ways to Make Your Butt Tight", "5 Ways to Make Your Gut Tight." And I said, I won't do that. As a matter of fact, three of the bigger companies have come back to me and said, fine, since you won't cut your book in half, will you write us a different book?

• 1:08:56Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:08:57Speaker 02

  So I'm in a process now of writing a second book.

• 1:09:00Rich Roll?

  Oh, interesting.

• 1:09:01Speaker 02

  Before the first book is sold. But in this case, I'm gonna write exactly what they want, but I'm not gonna pull any punches.

• 1:09:08Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it might even be smart to wait on, on releasing your first fitness confidential until the other book comes out because your audience will be so much bigger that you could release that second book and, and do better on it. Or I guess you could always re-release it.

• 1:09:24Speaker 02

  The problem with that is you know how long it takes.

• 1:09:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:09:27Speaker 02

  To release a book. That's one of the beauties about, you know, I'm getting this first book professionally edited. We're not pulling any, any, uh, we're not, you know, saving the horses on this. We're spending a lot of money on a professional edit job. Uh, we're spending a lot of money on cover art and we're gonna spend a lot of money on, um, actually, uh, promoting the book. So, um, I think the book is, you know, hopefully the book is gonna do well.

• 1:09:50Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:09:51Speaker 02

  Uh, the way, and at the end of the day, we get to make most of the profit.

• 1:09:55Rich Roll?

  But you're, and, oh, of course. Uh, that's, that's the whole thing, right?

• 1:09:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:10:00Rich Roll?

  So, but you're still, you're planning on getting it out there in the next month or two, you said?

• 1:10:03Speaker 02

  We're looking at, um, I did a piece for Oprah, uh, that, for the OWN network and I'm gonna try to go out on the heels of that.

• 1:10:11Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm. Um. When is that airing?

• 1:10:14Speaker 02

  That's, that's in October.

• 1:10:15Rich Roll?

  Oh, wow. That's amazing.

• 1:10:17Speaker 02

  And tomorrow.

• 1:10:18Rich Roll?

  So let's talk about that. Hold on a second.

• 1:10:20Speaker 02

  Wait, when is this podcast coming out?

• 1:10:21Rich Roll?

  Hold on a second. This'll come out, I'm gonna try to get it up tonight.

• 1:10:23Speaker 02

  Because tomorrow, I'm gonna be on, um, Access Hollywood again. They're rerunning my show.

• 1:10:27Rich Roll?

  Oh, you are? Oh, cool.

• 1:10:29Speaker 02

  So if you didn't see me in a tutu the first time, it's gonna be preempted by the inaugural, the inauguration, but at 1 o'clock LA time, they're running that piece again of me in a tutu.

• 1:10:39Rich Roll?

  Right. I like it.

• 1:10:41Speaker 02

  On Access Hollywood.

• 1:10:42Rich Roll?

  So, so who's the cross dresser now?

• 1:10:43Speaker 02

  Uh, me? Maybe me?

• 1:10:46Rich Roll?

  Yeah, there you go. All right, so, uh, so, but let's talk a little bit about, about what it's like to be a celebrity trainer, and I know that's, that's a big part of the book, not all about the book, but, uh, you know, why don't you, why don't you like sort of pull the shades back for the listener and, you know, spin a yarn or two about, you know, what it's like to deal with these celebrities and, and, you know, when you, when the movie studios call you and say, you know, we got a guy who's going before the cameras in fifteen, you know, in three months or whatever, and he looks like hell, and you gotta clean him up, and I mean, is that kind of like a typical scenario that arises?

• 1:11:21Speaker 02

  Yeah. It, it is. Not so much today as it was back when. Most of them try to stay in shape all the time now. They, they see the, the benefit in doing that. The worst case I ever had, and, uh, as you know, I don't mention any of my, my clients' names, but Howie gets mentioned because we're actual friends in real life. I'm, I'm not friends with most of these people. I go in, I do a job, and I leave.

• 1:11:49Rich Roll?

  Right, so it's not a tell-all, tattletale, you know?

• 1:11:52Speaker 02

  Right, I'm not, I'm not sitting there telling all about, you know, this celebrity, and Britney Spears does that, and, you know, so and so does the other thing. It, um, you know, I think I mentioned Howie in the book by name because we're actual friends outside of...

• 1:12:05Rich Roll?

  You've been training him for a while, too. By the way, he looks fantastic.

• 1:12:09Speaker 02

  He looks better than ever.

• 1:12:10Rich Roll?

  I couldn't stop looking at you and the tutu, but when my eyes did gravitate over to him once in a while, I, I noticed that he does look like he's lost quite a bit of weight.

• 1:12:18Speaker 02

  He's lost some weight, and I've put a lot of muscle, he wanted to add some muscle, but now we're worried that he's not gonna be as funny, because, as you know, when comedians like Carrot Top put on too much muscle masks, they're not as funny.

• 1:12:29Rich Roll?

  There's a direct proportion between, uh, how fit you are and how funny you are.

• 1:12:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, so we gotta...

• 1:12:35Rich Roll?

  It killed Joe Piscopo, too.

• 1:12:36Speaker 02

  It killed his career. He just got too big and too muscular. Um, so we talk about that all the time. But, you know, you know, I had, uh, I want to say it was about fifteen years ago, where, you know, um, Weight Watchers, and I'm mentioning, it was actually Weight Watchers, I'm mentioning it by name, as I would on my own show. They used to give celebrities just a shitload of money, you know, like millions of dollars to say they lost all this weight on Weight Watchers. Well, what actually would happen is they would give the fat celebrity, they would take pictures, and then they would hire a team. And I would usually be part of that team. They would hire me, they would hire chefs, they would hire dietitians, and they would

• 1:13:21Speaker 02

  get all these people in to work with the big fat celebrity for the better part of two or three months, get them down, get them to look good, and then have them do a ton of ads.

• 1:13:34Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:13:35Speaker 02

  And they would pay them millions of dollars to do that.

• 1:13:37Rich Roll?

  Like the Christie Alley's and the people like that, right?

• 1:13:40Speaker 02

  Exactly. Oprah, I don't know if Oprah's ever done it for them. You know, you see.

• 1:13:45Rich Roll?

  Didn't they have the princess or the Duchess of?

• 1:13:48Speaker 02

  She did it for a while for Nutrisystems. They all do a version of it.

• 1:13:53Rich Roll?

  And they inevitably end up getting fat again.

• 1:13:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, every time, because I leave, the chef leaves, the dietitian leaves, everyone leaves, and no one's paying for us anymore, so we walk out and they get fat the next day. We actually had one, I went in, huge celebrity at the time, big in stature and big in the world, and they had given her a million dollar check to get in shape and to do the whole thing.

• 1:14:23Rich Roll?

  That's insane.

• 1:14:24Speaker 02

  And I went in on day one, and I said to her, I said, "Which drugs are you using?" And she said, "Well, I use Ativan, and I use this, that, and the other thing." I said, "Which illegal drugs do you use?" And she goes, "Well, I do some coke and this and the whole thing." I said, "Okay, all of that has to stop, or I can't help you. You can't be coked up, and you can't take Ativan, you have to stop." Or I can't help you. And well, she did what she would do. She fired me.

• 1:14:52Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:14:53Speaker 02

  So they called the next trainer in and, you know, I knew the guy said, ask her about the coke. Of course, she, I use coke.

• 1:15:00Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:15:01Speaker 02

  He got fired. She ended up giving the million dollars back.

• 1:15:04Rich Roll?

  Ah.

• 1:15:05Speaker 02

  She wouldn't do it.

• 1:15:06Rich Roll?

  Shoot, that is a, ah, I love it.

• 1:15:08Speaker 02

  It's that type of story where-

• 1:15:10Rich Roll?

  That's an addict after my own heart, man.

• 1:15:12Speaker 02

  It's like, I'm not stopping this. Here's your money.

• 1:15:16Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's the insanity of addiction, man.

• 1:15:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:15:18Rich Roll?

  You know, I, I can relate, you know, unfortunately to that.

• 1:15:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:15:23Rich Roll?

  So, um, you know, I'm sure that's not, uh, the only case of something like that going down.

• 1:15:30Speaker 02

  It, it's all the time. I mean, some of the big ones that use the drugs and do the whole thing, I can't be part of it. And, uh, you know, it's tough because you, you know, especially in this economy, you know, you're giving up money, but I'm not going to be part of someone killing themselves while, you know, while I'm on watch.

• 1:15:47Rich Roll?

  Right. And part of it is, you know, you can kind of come in and when you're on the payroll and there's that accountability and you show up and you're there in person and they're going to work out. But like, what happens when that kind of ends? I mean, is it all, you know, I, I would imagine that a big part of your practice is trying to teach the tools to create a sustainable lifestyle change that will, you know, sort of perpetuate beyond, you know, you being involved with them.

• 1:16:13Speaker 02

  You know, I, if, God, you, you let me right into this. In the book, in the very first chapter, we tell a story of a client. And, uh, and basically I'm telling the story in the book because I'm trying to get, you know, most books start with, the reason you should listen to me is because I have a BA from this school and, you know, a doctorate from that school and I went to Stanford and I went to Harvard and I'm the greatest guy on the planet. I hate reading those first chapters. So I decided to get the audience to understand who I am. I actually did a story, it's a true story that happened where I'm sitting in a meeting with Disney execs, with the manager, you know, it was Galen Mori at the time. Maybe I shouldn't mention that, but all these people are sitting around the table,

• 1:16:58Speaker 02

  attorneys, suits, Disney, everybody's there and, um,

• 1:17:03Speaker 02

  They are getting ready to create a sitcom for this character and she fails her her screen test. So this is how the book opens up.

• 1:17:14Rich Roll?

  Because she's overweight or?

• 1:17:15Speaker 02

  Way overweight and her face is heavy and the whole thing. So all of these people are looking at me. I'm standing there, I'm sitting there and t-shirt and shorts and all these suits are looking at me going, can you take 30 pounds off of her? They didn't tell me who it was. It started with, can you take 30 pounds off of someone and, you know, and I said, well, it depends. And they said, well, it depends on what? I said, well, does this person have 30 pounds to lose?

• 1:17:41Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:17:42Speaker 02

  And they huddled up and they're talking and whispering and they come back and they say, yeah, well, yeah, we think so. Well, I do take on this case and we talk about it in the first chapter. And we go back to this at the end of the book and talk about it again because I actually failed. Even though I ended up getting 50 pounds off of this woman and she looked fabulous, she ended up getting fat again.

• 1:18:07Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:18:08Speaker 02

  And I looked at myself as a failure because I didn't teach her anything. I just did what I had to do because they were handing me big giant checks to do it.

• 1:18:18Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:18:19Speaker 02

  She learned nothing. Did she want to learn anything? I'll never know. I will never know. But we talk about it in the final chapter. You know, I was a failure because this woman learned nothing.

• 1:18:31Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:32Speaker 02

  You know, I, I told her what to do. I didn't teach her what to do.

• 1:18:35Rich Roll?

  So it's, you know, it's giving somebody a fish or teaching them how to fish. So, you know, so what do you think when you, and I want to get into this more, but what do you think when you watch like The Biggest Loser or you see this sort of, you know, reality TV culture around weight loss and, and fitness?

• 1:18:52Speaker 02

  It bothers me a lot. And I, you know, I make Gillian Michaels the, the bad guy. She, um, she's just a bad trainer. Um, you know, any good trainer wouldn't sign up for a TV show. They have enough clients to sustain themselves. Of course, she turned herself into a big deal and good for her. Uh, but she's not the problem.

• 1:19:11Rich Roll?

  She's like a whole industry unto herself.

• 1:19:13Speaker 02

  She's become an industry. Um, good for her, but the problem is more systemic than than that. Um, you know, we, we, all they care about in those shows is for the camera to see someone who's very heavy and then see a substantial weight loss. It's all about the camera of, you know, showing this and just how drastic these changes can be. And because it's done on camera and it's done over 13 weeks, we, we're, we're teaching people or they're made to think that you can lose a, just a ton of weight.

• 1:19:45Rich Roll?

  An unbelievable amount of weight, a very unhealthy amount of weight in an incredibly short period of time.

• 1:19:51Speaker 02

  It's very unhealthy. Um, and, uh, you know, I fundamentally, I have a problem with that. Um, not only that, I know a little bit about what goes on with The Biggest Loser and, uh, I know some of the doctors involved. They're basically starving these people to get them down and it's not right. They're not teaching them anything.

• 1:20:11Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that was my question. Are they, you know, I don't even watch the show, so I can't even.

• 1:20:15Speaker 02

  Oh God, no. They're not teaching them anything and they're not teaching the audience anything. I can't watch. I watched for a couple of shows and I said, you know, I can't watch some dumb broad just yelling at people. These people, they have hearts and they have families and they have, you know, you, you don't do this to people. It's not how you handle people with a real problem. Their problem is not that they're fat. Their problem is that they're misinformed. That's how they got fat. Uh, they're not teaching them anything. And, you know, we live in a society where, you know, no one will ever say, hey, look at Rich Roll. He's in great shape and, uh, he's a vegan and he, he lives his life on a straight and narrow. What they want to hear is that you were really fucked up at one time, that you took drugs and that you got fat.

• 1:21:00Speaker 02

  You know, that's why we love Jared so much because Jared will always trot out those big pants and go, look, I used to be 600 pounds and I, I ate this Subway sandwich and now I'm thin. It's not reality and that's what we're teaching.

• 1:21:14Rich Roll?

  Yeah, exactly. I mean, with my book, like my before picture, you know, the whole thing with my before picture that's in my book is I don't look that bad. You know, like I'm not even that fat.

• 1:21:24Speaker 02

  Serena goes, I think he's a hunk. I mean,

• 1:21:27Rich Roll?

  I mean, I was chunky. I looked different.

• 1:21:30Speaker 02

  Looking her.

• 1:21:31Rich Roll?

  I was like, I look, you know, I was clearly, I'm chunky and I look different and my face is rounder and all that kind of stuff. And, but it's not like, oh, he's a guy in the, we're so programmed by The Biggest Loser to have this expectation that somebody's going to look like a circus act, like they weigh 300 pounds. And for me, yeah, it's sort of like, oh yeah, I was 50 pounds overweight. It's a hook, you know, it's sort of a marketing hook. But for me, it wasn't, it wasn't really about the weight and weight loss was never really the focus. It's more about how did I feel? What were my energy levels like? You know, was I, was I depressed? Was I lethargic? You know, was I setting goals and looking forward? No, I was none of those things. It was so, so the weight, like me transitioning my life, the weight came off as

• 1:22:14Rich Roll?

  a byproduct of a systemic lifestyle change. And I think if people were to kind of refocus on that, I mean, we're so focused on weight loss. Weight loss is everything. Weight, you know, at the expense of health, you know, in the case of maybe The Biggest Loser, I can't speak to that directly. But in many cases, like people are losing weight in an unhealthy way and in a non-sustainable way. And that's why people have these rubber bound, you know, rubber banding situations. So, you know, what is it? And I know the answer to this, but like, what, you know, what are some of the things, I want you to speak to this because I know you're passionate about it. You have really strong opinions about it. Like, what are some of the things that, that, you know, we can do to address this so that when we go to the

• 1:22:58Rich Roll?

  airport in Detroit or Dallas or wherever, it doesn't matter where it is. Every time I go into an airport, it's just abounding with like extremely overweight people riding, you know, who are, who are in their twenties and thirties riding around in wheelchairs and in motorized vehicles. And it's, it's, it's ridiculous.

• 1:23:18Speaker 02

  Well, you know, we talk about this in a podcast and I always go back to it all started right at or before the Great Depression. You know, this country, we were an agricultural society before people moved into cities and we became industrialized. And during the Great Depression, we had to keep, the government had to keep the country running. So we started subsidizing wheat and grains. And we found out that if we just kept growing wheats and grains, the government stayed in the wheat and grain business. And because of that, we started, our wheat and grain are sold the world over.

• 1:24:02Speaker 02

  So it's in our best interest to keep, you know, selling wheat and grain. Our country basically, you know, we're in bed, our country's in bed with the wheat and grain farmers. They subsidize it to such a level that we're able to basically charge people little or nothing for food that should cost five times as much. When you go to a McDonald's or you go to Taco Bell, I remember in college, you go to Taco Bell and they had dollar tacos in college back in 1981.

• 1:24:31Rich Roll?

  It's still a dollar.

• 1:24:32Speaker 02

  No, now it's 49 cents. So how can everything else?

• 1:24:36Rich Roll?

  It's half what it was 35 years ago.

• 1:24:38Speaker 02

  Right. When everything else has gone in one direction, you can now get a taco for less than half the price of what you paid for it when I was in college. And the same with McDonald's. Everything else, you go anywhere and get a good hamburger, like a real beef hamburger, and you're gonna pay eight, 10 bucks for it. Not at McDonald's, 69 cents. Well, how can they do it? Well, the bread is less than free. It's reversed. You know, the thing that they're putting it in so they can, you know, and look at soft drinks, you know, we, you know, people barely drink water anymore. They're, everyone's drinking not only a soft drink, but if you don't have a soft drink in your hand, you have what we're calling a sport drink, or you have a juice. It's all the same thing.

• 1:25:21Speaker 02

  It's all just a big giant bottle of sugar.

• 1:25:24Rich Roll?

  Right. But in fairness, I mean, there is a difference between high fructose corn syrup and, you know, inorganic orange juice.

• 1:25:30Speaker 02

  Not a whole lot. Not a whole lot. I tell people, if you're gonna drink orange juice, put it in a blender and blend it. Add a little water to it. You gotta keep that fiber in it. Once you squeeze the juice away from the fiber, it's gonna cause the average person just to get a glycogen spike. And if you get that glycogen spike over and over and over and over during the day, you become insulin resistant. This isn't me talking. Look at the statistics. We have more type 2 diabetes in this country right now than we ever had in history.

• 1:26:04Rich Roll?

  Oh, it's insane. I mean, when we were kids, did you, you know, like, diabetes was something that, you know, no one even ever talked about, at least that form of diabetes.

• 1:26:14Speaker 02

  Something else people never talked about was heart disease, because we didn't have it in this country. No one knew what their cholesterol number was when I was a kid. Now, everyone can recite their cholesterol number, and everyone's on statins. Why is that? Well, because they told us we needed statins. Did we really need statins?

• 1:26:32Rich Roll?

  Which are only treating the symptom and not getting at the cause. So, you know, if you're worried about heart disease and you're taking statins, you're not, you're just masking, you know, a symptom and you're not getting at what's causing. That problem will continue to persist or grow unless you address the underlying cause.

• 1:26:49Speaker 02

  You know, I had a whole town get, I wish I could remember which episode, if people wanted to listen to this one episode of my podcast, this one to listen to, I went back to my hometown in Louisiana, Donaldsonville, 7,000 people. And I came back and did a podcast on it and got a whole town pissed at me when I said everyone in town was fat and everyone I spoke to told me they had type 2 diabetes. Well, when I left town 30 some odd years ago, nobody was fat, no one had type 2 diabetes. What happened in the meantime?

• 1:27:21Rich Roll?

  It's soft drinks and fast food.

• 1:27:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:27:24Rich Roll?

  And processed snacks, you know, chips and stuff like that.

• 1:27:28Speaker 02

  And by the way, all the juice you get in the store is exactly like a Coca-Cola. It's all processed. Some of it has more sugar and corn syrup added to it. You know, it's not the natural stuff you and I drink. I tend to drink everything with the fiber in it. Like, I won't go to juicy ladies because they juice it out. You know, they squeeze it out and you're getting just a big hit of sugar. And once you get that big hit of sugar, you want more sugar. I'd rather blend it up in the Vitamix or the Bullet and then drink it like that.

• 1:28:00Rich Roll?

  You get more of the fiber in it.

• 1:28:01Speaker 02

  You get all the fiber, you don't, you never get that spike and you get all the nutrients, all the phytonutrients that you need without, you know. But how many people are gonna go out and buy a Vitamix?

• 1:28:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah, there aren't, it's too expensive.

• 1:28:12Speaker 02

  Or one of those cheaper.

• 1:28:13Rich Roll?

  Exactly.

• 1:28:14Speaker 02

  You know, they, everyone wants everything quick and easy and they, you know, if I can buy it and drink it and it's full of sugar and it's a real problem.

• 1:28:24Rich Roll?

  What do you say to the fruit, you know, are you familiar with the fruitarian movement? These are like, this is like a subset of the plant-based nutrition people who are really focused on, I don't know, you know, I don't think they eat 100% of their diet isn't fruit, but like a huge percentage of their diet is fruit. And there are certain people like Durian Rider, who's very outspoken on the internet, has a YouTube channel, who's essentially fruitarian. And there are some athletes too, like Michael Arnstein, who's a pretty successful ultra runner, is doing really well on this fruitarian diet. And I have some other friends too, who seem to like it and are experiencing great results with it. And what they've said to me, I've never gone full fruitarian, but what they say to me is, first of all, they're, I don't, I don't know that they're juicing,

• 1:29:09Rich Roll?

  they're eating the whole fruit, but they're eating like, you know, like 50 banana, you know, like crazy amounts of fruit. Yeah, they're eating like fruit all day long. But, but, but what I understand is that they will take their blood sugar and, you know, an hour later, whenever it's supposed to peak after eating a lot of fruit, that it's not really as high as you would think. I don't know whether that's the fiber in the fruit or whatever it is, but that they're able to like, they're, they're able to like, you know, do well on this program.

• 1:29:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, and then there's the other side of it. There's the idiots like myself and the guy who just won Western States 100, I can't think of his name, who's doing it in the opposite direction, eating meat all day and eating high fats.

• 1:29:52Rich Roll?

  Right, the pale, yeah, like, and I want to talk to you about that, like, those sort of low carb, high fat, paleo, bacon and eggs for breakfast and all of that. I'm interested in your perspective on that.

• 1:30:02Speaker 02

  You know, you have people going to both sides of the extreme. You know, I think, you know, it's, I can't imagine it's good for you, just your body trying to digest all that fiber all day, you know, all those bananas and all that, it just seems like just a ton of fiber for your system. I can't imagine that that's good for you.

• 1:30:22Rich Roll?

  And what about the sort of saturated fat, you know, bacon, paleo kind of thing?

• 1:30:27Speaker 02

  Um, that's, that's something that I actually do.

• 1:30:31Rich Roll?

  Right, I know. And you're, you're kind of a low carb, no grains.

• 1:30:35Speaker 02

  I'm just no grains, no sugar.

• 1:30:36Rich Roll?

  No sugar, no grain, no sugar, no grains is your big thing. You wouldn't, would you characterize yourself as paleo or?

• 1:30:42Speaker 02

  No, because I don't really know what paleo, you know, I don't like to jam myself into any group. But I guess if you look at the pure form of paleo, I guess I'm there, but I just don't eat sugars and grains. I eat everything else, you know, and it's funny because people, you know, they'll see me eating a ton of vegetables and they go, wait, I thought you were the meat guy.

• 1:31:03Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:31:04Speaker 02

  Because everyone wants to fall into a camp somewhere, and I'm not that guy. We joke about me being the carnivorous vegan on the podcast because I eat more fruit and vegetables than I do meat, but I believe meat is a staple. That's just the way I roll. I just stay away from sugars and grains. If that makes me a paleo guy, I guess it does.

• 1:31:31Speaker 02

  I don't know, I just think people that are just doing one thing all the time and just eating a ton of fruit every day, I can't imagine that that's all the way healthy. Are you thinking about going in that direction?

• 1:31:42Rich Roll?

  No, I'm just interested in different people's perspectives on it, you know, and of course, I'm plant-based and I believe in that and that's worked very well for me and I have no, you know, desire to change that, you know, all I want to do is to learn how to do it better and to kind of continually, you know, evolve and refine my program. But I'm, you know, if all I did was have vegan guests on this podcast, I'd run out of guests pretty soon, you know what I mean? So, you know, I'm trying to create a safe, open environment where people who have different points of view, particularly with respect to fitness and nutrition or whatever, can come in and we can talk about that and have a good conversation about it, whether we end up disagreeing or have different perspectives on it, that's completely fine.

• 1:32:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:32:25Rich Roll?

  So, I like hearing from the paleo guys, and this is something that came up that, that I did the Joe Rogan podcast, and I think I talked about this on the podcast before, so I'll keep it short, but, but that was a result of Joe having Rob Wolf on the show, who's a big paleo guy, he wrote, he wrote a big paleo book, and some people, including myself, were like, hey, Joe, why don't you have a vegan athlete on or two? And I ended up on the show, and then there were all these people trying to, after I was on the show, and I felt like I acquitted myself fine, people were saying, oh, you should have, you know, Joe, you gotta have a show where you have Rich and he's gonna debate Rob and, and, you know, you should get it, you know, turn it into this big, you know, sort of thing where we're gonna, what we're gonna like have a boxing match and beat

• 1:33:09Rich Roll?

  it out of each other and at the end of the day, somebody's gonna win. I mean, you know, and I like Rob, and Rob and I had some emails back and forth, and I was like, I don't know if that's really in either of our interests. I mean, we both have the same goals, we want people to be healthier, we have different ideas about what that means, and, you know, what works for me and what works for him, and I think that there's room for, you know, there's room for us to both have our opinion.

• 1:33:35Speaker 02

  And, you know, it's funny because I'm right in between both of you guys because I truly believe that humans need to have a ton of phytonutrients, meaning a lot of green, we need a lot of color in our diet, and for that reason, I make what I call the fat shake every day. It's a ton of kale. It makes me sound like a vegan. There's a ton of kale in there. There's broccoli. I'll eat broccoli before chocolate.

• 1:34:06Speaker 02

  You know, I throw everything. I throw nuts in it. I throw coconut oil in it. You know, I just make what I call the coconut oil is what gives it its fat.

• 1:34:15Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I mean, it sounds like something I would have in the morning.

• 1:34:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, and that meal stokes me more than any other meal I have all day.

• 1:34:23Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:34:23Speaker 02

  Because it's got the fat in it. It's got all the phytonutrients. It's got all the vitamins I need. But then again, I'll have a big hamburger patty for lunch. No bread, just a big, you know, real patty, not some crappy from McDonald's patty.

• 1:34:41Speaker 02

  Because it's my belief that humans need animal fat. We need the creatine from the meat. We need the nutrients from the meat, just like we need the nutrients from the vegetables.

• 1:34:53Rich Roll?

  But I've been, you know, I'm going on six years now without that.

• 1:34:58Speaker 02

  And you're doing just fine. Yeah, yeah. So there goes my belief. You throw it right out the door just by, you know, your being and what you're able to do. And your family looks healthy and Julie looks healthy. And so who am I to say that eating meat is the way to go?

• 1:35:18Speaker 02

  You know, I've thought about going vegan, not just vegetarian, but total vegan a lot in my life.

• 1:35:26Speaker 02

  But I love meat and I think meat is a staple.

• 1:35:31Rich Roll?

  What about dairy?

• 1:35:33Speaker 02

  I eat dairy, but I don't eat a lot of dairy.

• 1:35:36Rich Roll?

  Have you ever tried to go without dairy? I mean, just, I'm only saying that because for me, that was when I experienced the biggest change in my energy levels.

• 1:35:44Speaker 02

  I've done short periods. And when I say short periods, never more than two or three weeks without dairy.

• 1:35:51Speaker 02

  But let me qualify dairy. Dairy is cheese on an occasional basis.

• 1:35:57Speaker 02

  But more so heavy cream, like heavy whipping cream. So it's basically an oil. It's not, I don't drink a lot of milk. I don't drink any milk.

• 1:36:08Rich Roll?

  Because you like it or because you think there's a nutritional benefit to that?

• 1:36:12Speaker 02

  Well, I call, I call heavy cream my, my go-to fast food. Because it's, it's a heavy oil. I can stick it in coffee and I can go on. I can almost miss a meal by drinking a coffee with heavy cream. And as you know, I go through a busy schedule of, you know.

• 1:36:33Rich Roll?

  That's like the Dave, you know who Dave Asprey is? The Bulletproof Executive? He has this whole thing where he makes a coffee called Bulletproof Coffee. But it has like, it has like grass-fed butter in it or something like that. And his whole thing is that the fat content has something to do with improving the, I don't know.

• 1:36:53Speaker 02

  See, I believe fat content is very important. I think people, and I think you and I are on the same side of the street with this. I think people get too much protein or they care about protein too much.

• 1:37:04Rich Roll?

  There's so much emphasis on protein and it's so misplaced. And, you know, I think if people just forgot about that altogether. And, you know, there's a lot of emphasis on, on low fat. And I think overall low fat is good, but it doesn't mean no fat. It means choosing, you know, your fats properly and making sure that you're getting healthy fats. And I certainly don't eat a no-fat diet. You know, like I feel like I need some healthy fats, like coconut oil in my smoothie or whatever to, to, to power me.

• 1:37:32Speaker 02

  Yeah. And when you're on a bike and running as much as you do, I couldn't imagine you not having enough fats to carry you through.

• 1:37:39Rich Roll?

  What do you, when you're out on your long rides, what do you usually take with you for nutrition?

• 1:37:44Speaker 02

  Well, for years, and this is where I've changed over the years, it's like a mutation. I used to use a lot of, you know, the, like the Hammer products. Not so much the gels. I've never been a gel guy.

• 1:37:56Rich Roll?

  You were the guy who got me off gels. If you read my book, you remember I talk about Vinnie.

• 1:38:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:38:00Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Cause I was like, well, I was just starting and everyone was doing gels. I'm not, I'm actually not a sweet tooth. Like I don't really have a problem with sugar. Like I don't crave it. I never was a big soda guy. Like I'm like a french fry, greasy. You know, nachos and pizza kinda guy. That's what I crave. So, sugar was not a big deal for me, but it seemed like everyone was using gel. So, I would just use gels. And when my volume started to ramp up and I was starting, you know, I never, my rides were never as long as your long rides. But, you know, I'd go out for eight hours and you were like, dude, you cannot do that all day. There's no way you're gonna make it.

• 1:38:32Speaker 02

  Can you imagine sitting on a couch and just every hour squeezing it every mouth? You would be sick in the third hour.

• 1:38:38Rich Roll?

  I know. And I think a lot of, you know, in a race context, there's some argument for it. But I think it's a big reason why a lot of these Ironman athletes have GI problems and stomach problems. Cause they're, they're out there for eight hours and they're just killing the sugar, you know, like nobody's business.

• 1:38:52Speaker 02

  I talk about that a lot in the book and I talk about it a lot in the podcast. What I would do, you know, you talked about me circling back to the commons to my truck to get more product. And I would have an ice chest of stuff ready to go. So, I wouldn't have to stop. I can just stop, drop one off, grab another one. So, the question is what's in that bottle and how it's changed over the years. It used to be, I would, I would start with a base of Hammer Nutrition. Now, that stuff is mostly multi-dection. I'm talking about the sustained energy.

• 1:39:24Rich Roll?

  But perpetuum and, and

• 1:39:26Speaker 02

  I never liked the perpetuum. The original sustained energy was the one I would use. The perpetuum somehow gave me so much gas that I would get sick way quick. Is that dog gonna go out?

• 1:39:36Rich Roll?

  No, he's fine. Yeah, our dog is wondering. No, he never goes out. He's too lazy. Don't worry about him.

• 1:39:40Speaker 02

  Alright.

• 1:39:41Rich Roll?

  He does all much.

• 1:39:44Speaker 02

  Anyway, the, he's going out the gate.

• 1:39:49Rich Roll?

  Hold on a second. No, he's just gonna, he's going for a look. He's fine. He's gonna come back.

• 1:39:53Speaker 02

  Alright. Are you sure?

• 1:39:54Rich Roll?

  I'll keep an eye on him. You talk. I'll keep an eye on him.

• 1:39:56Speaker 02

  Alright, thank you. I, I started, it would be just perpetuum. And then I would add,

• 1:40:03Rich Roll?

  He's fine.

• 1:40:04Speaker 02

  I'm really worried.

• 1:40:06Rich Roll?

  This is important.

• 1:40:06Speaker 02

  I can't even think straight.

• 1:40:07Rich Roll?

  You talk, I'm gonna go get him, because this is, honestly, this is what people want to know. So I want to really.

• 1:40:12Speaker 02

  Can you cut it for a second and we bring it back on again?

• 1:40:14Rich Roll?

  All right, there he goes. Yeah, we're gonna pause for one second. Sorry about that. The dog's fine.

• 1:40:19Speaker 02

  Yeah. As you know, I almost lost one of my dogs last week.

• 1:40:25Rich Roll?

  I heard about that.

• 1:40:25Speaker 02

  Very interesting, man. You know, there was a supplement in the house Serena was taking that raises serotonin levels, something you can buy in any health food store, 5-HTP.

• 1:40:37Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:40:38Speaker 02

  And a bottle fell onto the floor and she ate the bottle. Apparently it tastes good to dogs. And she ate it and started, you know, she, she literally died on the, I was taking her to the emergency room. She evacuated. She was dead. I brought a limp dead dog in.

• 1:40:53Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 1:40:53Speaker 02

  And they somehow got her back and, you know, a bazillion dollars later, I have my dog back. Anyway, I want to go back. We were talking about what I eat on the bike and it used to be a lot of, you know, sustained energy from Hammer because, again, just like everything else, it's convenience. And there's a lot of sugar in the product.

• 1:41:16Rich Roll?

  Well, it's maltodextrin, which is a more complex, lower glycemic value sugar than, say, eating fruit or a gel, right? It's more like a slower burn.

• 1:41:27Speaker 02

  It's slightly better. The problem is, when you're taking in 300 calories of it every hour, you end up with, you know, the same problem, you know, 10 hours, 11 hours in, you're throwing it up. Or you're trying to fight from throwing it up, so you can have some nutrition in your body.

• 1:41:45Rich Roll?

  It's not that sweet. It's more like, for those who've never tried it, it's kind of like pancake batter. It's not the best tasting stuff, but it's not super, it's not like a syrupy, sweet thing like a gel either.

• 1:41:56Speaker 02

  It's chalky, if you will, so.

• 1:41:59Rich Roll?

  And it's a grain. It's corn, right?

• 1:42:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, and again, I have some problems with that.

• 1:42:04Rich Roll?

  They make a non-GMO, they make a non-GMO version of it.

• 1:42:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, good luck keeping that going. The way we're putting, you know, we're turning everything into Monsanto GMO type. Again, my podcast has a lot to say about GMOs.

• 1:42:18Rich Roll?

  We could do, yeah, I could do a couple hours on that.

• 1:42:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, you know, if you ever want to have me back in for the GMO conversation.

• 1:42:23Rich Roll?

  What I'm thinking is like, I want this podcast to kind of be about who you are and your background and all of that. But you have so much to say. I'm sitting here thinking like, I'm gonna have Vinnie on like every, you know, like once, yeah, like, like every couple of episodes, you just come in with like Vinnie, you know, like let you blast, blast off for like 10 minutes on your latest, you know.

• 1:42:42Speaker 02

  Yeah, what's pissing me off.

• 1:42:43Rich Roll?

  Whatever's, whatever's pissing you off. Bring you in and make you a recurring guest.

• 1:42:47Speaker 02

  It's funny because I just did four hours in another studio and here I am. I literally got up from one mic and I'm sitting in front of another mic.

• 1:42:56Rich Roll?

  And we're all doing this for free.

• 1:42:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's all for free. This is my Sunday, just doing this, you know, all day.

• 1:43:02Rich Roll?

  Well, you can ride your bike for, for 15 hours in a row.

• 1:43:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, I do everything, like, you know, everything is overboard or nothing.

• 1:43:09Rich Roll?

  Feel you, brother.

• 1:43:10Speaker 02

  But, you know, the bottom line is, you know, I started changing my mixture. I started adding a little whey protein powder to my sustained energy. And I found that not only did I not need it as much, I didn't get as sick. You know, I was always working with.

• 1:43:28Rich Roll?

  Because protein is not really an efficient energy source.

• 1:43:32Speaker 02

  No, but it would cut the sugar. I'm guessing. I don't know what happened, but it would cut the sugar. It would somehow give me some nutrition without causing me to lose energy or power. I wouldn't bonk. So after adding some of that, I went, hmm. I wonder if I just throw a little fat in here, what might happen? So I worked with several different oils. I worked with coconut oil. I worked with macadamia oil, which is a good one, but expensive. Grape seed oil, which is pretty good.

• 1:44:05Speaker 02

  I would start adding oil to the mix and then pulling out more and more of the.

• 1:44:12Speaker 02

  You know, you know, sustained energy.

• 1:44:15Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:44:16Speaker 02

  That led into me going to a totally different product called, um, uh, you can generation you can. Have you seen this stuff?

• 1:44:25Rich Roll?

  No, I've never heard of that.

• 1:44:26Speaker 02

  It's basically, uh, the guy took corn storage and somehow micronized it. They, they want to advertise on my show. I haven't allowed them yet. Um, uh, but Peter Attia talks a lot. Peter Attia uses it too.

• 1:44:40Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:44:41Speaker 02

  But you can literally take in 50 or 75 calories of it. It doesn't cause any glycogen spike. It almost acts like a fat, but it's a carbohydrate. I would actually add more oil to that. So I, I would have that carbohydrate mixed with an oil.

• 1:44:55Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:44:55Speaker 02

  This is getting complex, but I'm getting through rides now where I used to take in 300 calories an hour. I might take in 50, 75 calories an hour. Now there's one caveat to this. If you're going to stay in zone two, you can do this all day, never bunk.

• 1:45:13Rich Roll?

  Literally. I mean, after years of kind of doing this aerobic zone two training, like, you know, if I don't, if I don't feel like it, like, I don't really have to, I can go for hours and hours and hours just on, you know, some electrolytes, you know, electrolyte tabs and, and water because you're in that fat burning zone. And my body's become efficient enough in that zone where, you know, I don't need to be taking in 200 calories an hour. Although, you know, I'll be more tired the next day if I don't, you know, it's better if I take in at least, you know, 100, 150 calories an hour.

• 1:45:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, but you could get away with a lot less than people thought before.

• 1:45:48Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:45:49Speaker 02

  The one thing I find though, is when I try to climb with that mixture, if I'm three hours into a ride and I tried to do stunt road, the way you've seen me do stunt road,

• 1:45:58Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:45:59Speaker 02

  You'll be at the top way before me. You, you'll dry off before I get there. Um, what I have to do at those times is what I call trickle sugar. And I'll take the gel, the stuff that I told you never to, to have. And I won't squirt 100 calories of it in my mouth. I might squirt 10 calories, 15 calories and just trickle a little sugar a couple of times up a climb and you get the same result.

• 1:46:24Rich Roll?

  Well, a lot of that is because, I would imagine, I'm guessing, is that, uh, The taste of sugar triggers your brain to tell your brain, you're okay, you're, you're, you have nutrition on the way. So even if your body doesn't actually need the sugar, a lot of times you're, and Ben, Ben Greenfield talks about this too. And he talked about the other day, but you know, if you can let your mind know that you're going to be okay, then it will tell the body like, okay, go for it because you're, you have more nutrition on the way and you're not going to get into trouble. So it's just the taste of it alone.

• 1:47:00Speaker 02

  That's all you need, just a little something in your mouth. I've told people, you don't even need to buy that. If you buy the old Jolly Rancher hard candies, stick it in your mouth, let it sit in your cheek for about 20, 30 seconds and then spit it out. It works. I've tried, I've done all kinds of candy with this.

• 1:47:16Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:47:17Speaker 02

  Uh, little tiny red hots. Remember those?

• 1:47:19Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:20Speaker 02

  Put two little BBs in your mouth and just let them soak in. You're done.

• 1:47:25Rich Roll?

  Interesting.

• 1:47:25Speaker 02

  It really works that well.

• 1:47:28Rich Roll?

  I have a, you know, I, you know, I use the Hammer products, the perpetuum and the sustained energy and all of that. And I've never really had like gas problems or anything like that. The only thing that happens with me is if it gets hot, it gets gross.

• 1:47:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:47:42Rich Roll?

  And I'm just sick of eating it, you know, like, but I have experimented with putting a little coconut oil in there and that seems to work well for me. Obviously I'm not using whey protein, but if I mix a little bit of, uh, of fats in there, that seems to be.

• 1:47:55Speaker 02

  Hemp protein will work just as well.

• 1:47:57Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Hemp, hemp. So I wouldn't, I don't know that I want to be doing hemp protein while I'm riding because it's kind of a chalky. It's not, it's not the most absorbable, like whey is very absorbable when you're in, when you're in an active state. I think it's probably easier for your body to metabolize that. Hemp is a little trickier, I think, but I don't know. I mean, I'm more prone now to experimenting with whole foods. Like rather than have a bottle with a, you know, perpetuum in it, like why not eat a, eat a sweet potato?

• 1:48:26Speaker 02

  I've done sweet potatoes in races all the time. Serena makes these incredible sweet potatoes and they hand them to me in Ziploc bags. That's, it's hard to do when you're training to constantly have. I do use a lot of nuts.

• 1:48:41Rich Roll?

  Nuts while you're training?

• 1:48:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, nuts while I'm training.

• 1:48:44Rich Roll?

  That would seem, I would think that would cause intestinal problems.

• 1:48:48Speaker 02

  Not on me. I can do, and I'll do raw nuts.

• 1:48:51Rich Roll?

  Cause they're hard to digest.

• 1:48:52Speaker 02

  I know, and I'm okay with that.

• 1:48:54Rich Roll?

  Like almond butter, I get that, but like chewing on almonds or walnuts while I'm riding? I don't know.

• 1:48:59Speaker 02

  Stick a few in your mouth and start chewing. It changes everything.

• 1:49:02Rich Roll?

  Maybe I'll try that.

• 1:49:03Speaker 02

  Try macadamia too. Seems to work fine with me. The problem with the heat, you know, we had a hot summer last summer. I'm with you on the perpetual and all that stuff. When it gets hot.

• 1:49:15Rich Roll?

  Oh, it's gross.

• 1:49:15Speaker 02

  It's just bad. Nothing is good. The problem is if you have oil with you also, that can go bad pretty quickly.

• 1:49:22Rich Roll?

  Gets rancid.

• 1:49:23Speaker 02

  And that's when the nuts kind of come into play. You know, you have those nuts in your back pocket.

• 1:49:29Rich Roll?

  And the easier oxidized oils like flaxseed oil or whatever, that's not good. You don't want to be, you don't want to use that.

• 1:49:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's rough. You know what else I've tried?

• 1:49:39Rich Roll?

  And what about electrolytes?

• 1:49:41Speaker 02

  A ton, a ton, tons of electrolytes.

• 1:49:44Rich Roll?

  What's your go-to electrolytes?

• 1:49:47Speaker 02

  I like salt stick. I've used Hammer. I find salt sticks seem to have more product in it than Hammer. S-Caps I love. Do you have one that you like? I mean, I'm always S-Caps, salt sticks, Hammer.

• 1:50:01Rich Roll?

  Salt stick. Salt stick's a little more expensive, but Jonathan, he's a local here, local triathlete, the guy who owns the company, he's a good guy, so I like to support him.

• 1:50:10Speaker 02

  Yeah. I never knew who owned Salt Stick. So he's around here?

• 1:50:14Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. He lives around here. He was a professional triathlete in Canada and he lives actually on Lanago.

• 1:50:21Speaker 02

  Oh, really?

• 1:50:22Rich Roll?

  He still rides. Yeah, I ride with him and swim with him once in a while.

• 1:50:25Speaker 02

  I'd love to have him on my show.

• 1:50:26Rich Roll?

  He was a scientist at Amgen and left and started this company.

• 1:50:33Speaker 02

  Huh.

• 1:50:33Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:34Speaker 02

  I had no idea where it was from. We talk about his product. I don't even sell his product.

• 1:50:38Rich Roll?

  Jonathan Toker. Yeah.

• 1:50:40Speaker 02

  I sell it on the, I tell people, you know, go to Amazon and buy salt sticks because I get

• 1:50:44Rich Roll?

  We gotta get you an affiliate relationship. Throw a few nickels in your pot, man.

• 1:50:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:50:49Rich Roll?

  Keep your bandwidth going.

• 1:50:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:50:51Rich Roll?

  I'll put you in touch.

• 1:50:53Speaker 02

  And I appreciate it. Do you have him here? Are you just pushing Jai seed or?

• 1:50:57Rich Roll?

  Uh, no, I mean, I'm not, I have no business relationship with him. I just like supporting him.

• 1:51:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, but tell them I love his product and I go out of my way to push his product.

• 1:51:08Rich Roll?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:51:09Speaker 02

  I have no idea. I figured there's some company somewhere. I just knew that they made a superior product and, you know, I love it.

• 1:51:16Rich Roll?

  It is, it is good. I think he's, he's, you know, he's trying to figure out how to grow it. I mean, you can find it in your local tri shop. I think it's in most places, but it's, you're not going to find it at the supermarket.

• 1:51:27Speaker 02

  You can find it at Amazon.

• 1:51:29Rich Roll?

  Oh, it's on Amazon. Yeah. And I think his website's just saltstick.com.

• 1:51:32Speaker 02

  Well, you know, if you go to Amazon through Rich's site to do it, uh, it's probably the cheapest price because, you know, if you go to the local shops here, like I go to the one on Nagora, that running store.

• 1:51:44Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:51:44Speaker 02

  Because they always have a supply. Amazon is maybe 17 or 18 bucks for a bottle and it's 25 there. So it's, you know.

• 1:51:53Rich Roll?

  As long as you click through the banner ad on richroll.com, right buddy?

• 1:51:57Speaker 02

  You look.

• 1:51:57Rich Roll?

  Do you have that on your site?

• 1:51:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:51:59Rich Roll?

  You got that, right?

• 1:52:00Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:52:01Rich Roll?

  Everyone's doing that.

• 1:52:02Speaker 02

  Yeah. And Amazon pays nothing. It's like, I'll look.

• 1:52:05Rich Roll?

  It's not like, I mean, I, for those of you out there, like, what does this mean? I think I made like 60 bucks last month off that.

• 1:52:12Speaker 02

  It's crazy. I'll look and it'll be like I've sold $10,000 worth of Amazon stuff. And I'll see the check I get and it's like, are you kidding me?

• 1:52:21Rich Roll?

  I know.

• 1:52:22Speaker 02

  Are you kidding me?

• 1:52:23Rich Roll?

  I know.

• 1:52:24Speaker 02

  It's like 2, 3% or some crap like that.

• 1:52:26Rich Roll?

  And then everyone's accusing you of selling out, right?

• 1:52:29Speaker 02

  Yeah. It's like, oh yeah, it's supposed to be free. No, it's free. We're not asking for any money here. We're not asking for anything, but if you're gonna click through, and people do click through.

• 1:52:37Rich Roll?

  No, they do. Yeah, actually, people are great. And I love it when they like say, hey, I bought this and, you know, I know Jay Moore on his website, he opens up his podcast every week by like, reading like some of the funny stuff that people have bought, you know, when they click through his, you know, it's like so and so bought a, you know, some crazy product or whatever.

• 1:52:57Speaker 02

  Well, at one point, the most books, they were buying your book and Gary Topps' book. That was my two biggest sellers for a while.

• 1:53:04Rich Roll?

  Yeah, right on.

• 1:53:05Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah, I made a few bucks on you, man.

• 1:53:08Rich Roll?

  Good. I'm glad. I'm glad. Now, I wanna, I wanna help you get your book out too, man. So let's get back and talk about your book a little bit.

• 1:53:17Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:53:17Rich Roll?

  So are you gonna launch it just on your website? Is that the plan?

• 1:53:21Speaker 02

  It's gonna be on the website. We're gonna do Kindle. We're gonna do, you know, and you have to format for every one of those things.

• 1:53:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I know.

• 1:53:27Speaker 02

  Amazon has its own format. Kindle is its own format. Everyone.

• 1:53:33Rich Roll?

  But then you're gonna, you're gonna have a printed version too? You're gonna have a hard?

• 1:53:36Speaker 02

  A printed version, both hardcover and, you know, softcover at the same time.

• 1:53:42Rich Roll?

  Right. And what, so tell me a little bit more about what's in the book. Like what, what's, you know, what is somebody gonna find if they buy your book?

• 1:53:49Speaker 02

  It's, it's gonna, basically, you know, it tells a story. It's kind of like your book. It tells my story. But it also, you know, we spoke of Dean Carnese a bit ago. And one of the biggest criticisms of his bestselling book, by the way, the guy wrote a great book. I love this book. And he told how he became this, this, you know, ultra runner. But the one glaring omission from the book was, he didn't really explain how he got there. Yeah, we heard these heroic stories about he was eating pizza and ordering pizza and they were dropping him off on a street corner so he could keep running, but you didn't really learn how the guy got there.

• 1:54:33Speaker 02

  And in this book, we talk about. You know, ultra sports, but we also talk about my job as a trainer and it's all pulled together and there's actual exercise routines. That's, that's what the

• 1:54:47Rich Roll?

  So there's a lot of how to and takeaways.

• 1:54:49Speaker 02

  It's a ton of how to, it's a ton of eat this way, exercise that way. If you want to be an ultra person, you do it that way. It brings it all together in one book.

• 1:54:58Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:54:59Speaker 02

  And I couldn't have done it by myself. I had written, I want to say 45,000 words, so just in notes. And my buddy Dean and I got together and we started formulating those notes and we, we ended up trimming it down because we didn't want any extra fat in this book. We ended up with just under 73,000 words. What was your book? Do you remember?

• 1:55:21Rich Roll?

  I don't know. It ended up getting cut down quite a bit. I don't know what the word count is. It ended up, what ended up coming out is pretty much what the publisher wanted to be the word count, but when I delivered my manuscript, I purposely overwrote everything.

• 1:55:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:55:40Rich Roll?

  Because my editor doesn't know my whole story. The only way he's going to know is if I over explain things and include

• 1:55:45Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:55:46Rich Roll?

  Stories that I know are probably going to get edited out, but at least I have something to work with. You know what I mean? Like it's sort of, okay, here. So I think when I handed in my manuscript, it was maybe, maybe almost 100 pages longer than the book and ultimately ended up being. And I did that purposefully, knowing like that we were probably going to end up cutting, you know, maybe 60 or 80 pages. He, it ended up getting leaner and leaner and leaner. I had a great editor and he, you know, there was some stuff that I really didn't want to cut that I think ultimately it did make the book better just by making it read easier.

• 1:56:19Speaker 02

  Well, that's what they're good at. And you know, my book is going through an editing process right now. We, I hired a jackass to go through and edit my book, you know, to make it even more readable.

• 1:56:29Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:56:30Speaker 02

  And so I'm, I'm paying a guy a lot of money to kind of screw up my words, so to speak, but You know, I couldn't be that narcissistic. I had to bring someone else in. But the book is an amalgam of two books and that's the problem that the book companies had.

• 1:56:46Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:56:47Speaker 02

  They wanted it just to be the prescriptive. And they wanted me to somehow keep my voice in there because they liked the voice that the book was written in. But we put it all in there. We explained, you know, why people were not fat 50 years ago and why they're fat now. You know, we talk about how the world's changed from, you know, the industrial revolution taking hold and how we kept subsidizing wheat. But in between all of that, we give people something real that they can, you know, hold on to. That they, you know, it's a real takeaway.

• 1:57:21Rich Roll?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:57:22Speaker 02

  And when they get the book, they'll say, I'd like to come back on, you know, at some point, if possible, when the book comes out.

• 1:57:28Rich Roll?

  Yeah, when you're ready to have the book come out, you should come back on and talk about it. But I think, you know, it is that thing like, oh, well, does it, you know, fear the publishing house? Is it in this box or is it in this box? And when you come to them with something that is a little bit of each and maybe not one or the other, then that creates confusion and it's just easier to say no.

• 1:57:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:57:49Rich Roll?

  And I struggled with that in my book too, because it's predominantly memoir. But I do have, you know, when I was writing it, I was like, well, you know, I've got to address this plant-based diet in some regard. Because if I don't, and they're going to be like, well, you talked about how this diet changed your life and then you don't tell us what it is.

• 1:58:08Speaker 02

  What's the diet? Right.

• 1:58:09Rich Roll?

  But then if I make it too how to, then it detracts from the story. And so, you know, ultimately the diet stuff all kind of had to get pushed into the appendices, which is fine. But just trying to find that balance so that, you know, when you're telling, you still have to tell your story and, you know, pretend you're going to a movie. It's got to have a three act structure and there's a hero's journey. And there are certain things that have to happen at certain periods to keep the reader engaged and and sort of emotionally connected to what you're doing. And, you know, if it's too much on one side or the other, then you start to lose people. And so figuring that out took a lot of time for me.

• 1:58:46Speaker 02

  Yeah. And, you know, the frustration was getting those letters back where they were going, would you please do this for us? To the point where three of the houses, as I said before, said, okay, since you won't change this book, would you write us a different book? So I'm actually working on a different book right now with my same agent.

• 1:59:06Rich Roll?

  That's great. So what can you talk about that? Or is that all top secret?

• 1:59:10Speaker 02

  It's not really top secret. I'm going to basically do the prescriptive version. It's going to be, bottom line is going to be what I've given the Hollywood community, so to speak. You know, the same people that are walking the red carpet, you're going to get their program. Whether it fits you or not, that's what they want. You can try to make it fit you. I'm going to try to make it universal enough. So that someone who's sitting on a couch might go, hey, I can do that. Or someone who's in good shape and want to take it to the next level, they can go, wait a minute, I can use some of that, too. That's very difficult to do. And that's going to be my job to figure out how that's going to work. And hopefully, they won't screw it up.

• 1:59:50Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 1:59:51Speaker 02

  But it's that Hollywood thing where it seems like I'm failing upward on this one. You know, we know a lot of people who fail at something and then they get a bigger gig.

• 1:59:59Rich Roll?

  Right. Well, that's Hollywood is built on that.

• 2:00:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm failing.

• 2:00:02Rich Roll?

  The only way you move up is to get fired from your job, right?

• 2:00:05Speaker 02

  Yeah. And we both can probably sit here and name five, six, seven, eight, maybe even 10 names each of situations where people have lost a job only to get a better job.

• 2:00:16Rich Roll?

  It happens all the time. Yeah. That's the way this business works. So, and who is, do you know which publishing house you're going to do that book with?

• 2:00:26Speaker 02

  No, no, no. She's got three of them on the hook. And that's fine, because they can, they can fight it out.

• 2:00:32Rich Roll?

  Cool.

• 2:00:34Speaker 02

  And it's funny, because now I'm, you know, I'm doing the podcast, that's work every week. And then on top of that, I'm doing a newsletter that goes with the website. That's work every week. I have to sit down and write that. I'm trying to finish the edit on the book that we are going to put out in about two months. And now.

• 2:00:54Rich Roll?

  And you have your training clients. There's no time for you to ride the bike, man. Come on.

• 2:00:58Speaker 02

  That's why you haven't seen me on the bike.

• 2:00:59Rich Roll?

  I know.

• 2:01:00Speaker 02

  You know, people, you don't ride anymore. It's like, no, I'm writing. I'm not riding. You know, it's like, I'm just sitting around writing all day long.

• 2:01:09Rich Roll?

  But if I'm not writing, then my writing is not as good as it could be. Like, it's always about finding that balance. Like, I think I don't have time to train. I gotta focus on writing and then, you know, and that will work for a little bit. And then I'll hit the wall and go, I gotta get back on the bike. It's like, I'm just always doing the extreme, you know? And it's finding that balance where it's like, you're getting enough of each of these things. That mixture is, it's tough.

• 2:01:34Speaker 02

  If you ever find that balance, give me a call. Because Serena's actually looking at me now going, you know, she came in my office the other night and she said, how long do you think you could keep this up? Because literally, I'll write until midnight, get in bed, wake up at 4:15, start training clients by 6. You know, I'm, I've become one of these people with the iPhone, you know, the thumbs, you know, constantly writing and tweeting and...

• 2:02:01Rich Roll?

  You gotta take care of yourself first, buddy.

• 2:02:02Speaker 02

  And I'm not.

• 2:02:03Rich Roll?

  Because you're just burning it. You'll just, you're just gonna crash into the wall eventually.

• 2:02:08Speaker 02

  I know. It's getting there. You know, it's, it's getting there. And we have to figure it out. Like I said, if you come up with any solution...

• 2:02:17Rich Roll?

  Well, I got one solution. You and I are gonna get out on the bike at some point this week.

• 2:02:21Speaker 02

  Just don't kick my ass.

• 2:02:24Speaker 02

  Please don't kick my bike.

• 2:02:25Rich Roll?

  I'm just getting back myself, so. But I've had you, and we're coming up on like, two hours here, so, I know. So I don't wanna, uh...

• 2:02:34Speaker 02

  That's six hours of broadcasting for one day, by the way.

• 2:02:37Rich Roll?

  I could go two more hours, buddy, believe me. I'm just getting warmed up with you.

• 2:02:40Speaker 02

  Let's do it. Let's see how long we could go.

• 2:02:41Rich Roll?

  No, we gotta let you get, get home to your beautiful Serena. But, but, you know, I wanna give you an opportunity to kind of leave the, the audience member with just a couple, you know, one or two nutrition or fitness tips that they can take away. I mean, what do you think, you know, are some of, I mean, we've talked about sugar, we talked about grains, but what are some of the things that are, would be easy fixes for people that they might not understand, that they could incorporate into their life in an easy way that could have, you know, a dramatic impact?

• 2:03:15Speaker 02

  Interesting. Just going on a knee jerk right here. If you're into fitness and if you're listening to this podcast, obviously you are. And if you're interested in getting into ultras, rest is more important than actually spending time running or riding a bike or swimming or what have you. Make sure you get the proper amount of rest. You know, we talked earlier about the guy that does the CrossFit.

• 2:03:41Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:03:41Speaker 02

  I think the biggest problem with CrossFit is it doesn't give your body the proper amount of rest. It's more important than actually spending time doing the sport.

• 2:03:50Rich Roll?

  Yeah. I agree with that completely.

• 2:03:53Speaker 02

  You know, so get rest. Number two, if you want to go long, you can't go hard. You know, we even talked about that. I do all this training in zone two. Just preparing a huge basin and I'll get in a race and hurt myself by going too hard.

• 2:04:11Rich Roll?

  Mm-hmm. Especially this time of year. It's winter time. You know, most people aren't there if they're getting ready for a race, they're keying up for a race that's going to be, you know, at the earliest in the spring or more likely in the summertime. At this time of year, you should be working on your core, getting a little gym work in and then building that base, that aerobic base.

• 2:04:31Speaker 02

  Yeah. And, you know, don't, you know, just, you know, people get confused about nutrition. And I get that. People fall into camps in nutrition the way we fall into camps in religion. Just be open-minded about it. It's not, it's not as cut and dry, if you will, as people would think it is. I wish I can say the vegan lifestyle is the only lifestyle or being a paleo guy is the only lifestyle. There is no cut and dry on that. Just, you know, listen to your heart and if you follow something, just, you know, keep your mind open.

• 2:05:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:05:07Speaker 02

  You know, there are other ways to do it.

• 2:05:08Rich Roll?

  That said, you know, try not to eat so many processed foods and get rid of the soda.

• 2:05:13Speaker 02

  That's the one thing you should cut out.

• 2:05:14Rich Roll?

  About that. I think there's consensus on that.

• 2:05:16Speaker 02

  Yeah. I don't think any guy would go against that.

• 2:05:20Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:05:20Speaker 02

  If it's processed, don't eat it.

• 2:05:22Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 2:05:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:05:24Rich Roll?

  We can agree on that.

• 2:05:25Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. Everybody can.

• 2:05:26Rich Roll?

  All right, buddy. Let's wrap it up.

• 2:05:30Rich Roll?

  Anything else you want to say?

• 2:05:31Speaker 02

  No, I'm good.

• 2:05:32Rich Roll?

  All right, man. The angriest trainer podcast. Is it, is it America's angriest trainer podcast? Or no, the angriest trainer podcast?

• 2:05:40Speaker 02

  You could put in angriest trainer. You could put in Vinnie Tortorich. You could put in America's angriest trainer. Anywhere you do it, it will come up to me.

• 2:05:47Rich Roll?

  Yeah, or if you go to my podcast, it'll probably be at the bottom saying, you know, people who listen to this also listen to this. So I'm sure we have overlap in our, in our audiences. It's a great show. How often are you doing it? Once a week now?

• 2:05:58Speaker 02

  We do three a week.

• 2:05:59Rich Roll?

  Oh, you're doing three a week?

• 2:06:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, we pop out Monday, Wednesday, Friday every week.

• 2:06:03Rich Roll?

  Oh, man. That's my, that's my goal is to try to get this up to at least twice a week. I'm just, I've got to get like, I've got to pick a day where I know I'm doing it at that time every time.

• 2:06:12Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's kind of what we do. As a matter of fact, when I, when I wanted to go to three a week, Anna wanted to drop it, Anna's my co-host. She wanted to drop it to once a week.

• 2:06:21Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:06:22Speaker 02

  You know, as she was, we were doing one and a half to two a week.

• 2:06:25Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 2:06:25Speaker 02

  And, well, I, you know, I wanted to go to, I wanted to go to five a week. So we decided on three.

• 2:06:31Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 2:06:31Speaker 02

  But that's my personality. If one is good, five has to be good.

• 2:06:35Rich Roll?

  Well, she, yeah, me too. I'm like, I gotta do it every day, you know?

• 2:06:38Speaker 02

  It's a good thing I never did drugs.

• 2:06:40Rich Roll?

  It was funny because Brett Blancker from the Zen and the Art of Triathlon Podcast, he's, he emailed me there the other day because I, I sort of publicly proclaimed I'm doing this three times a week, but then it, the evidence showed that I was actually doing it like once a week. And he's like, yeah, I knew that would happen. He's like, you know, you get excited and you want to do it because I love it, man. I'm having so much fun doing it. But I really have to like, I'm looking for like a cheap office space where I can, or like a garage or something like that where I can set this up and just make it the dedicated podcast place.

• 2:07:10Speaker 02

  This is not a bad area right here.

• 2:07:11Rich Roll?

  It's good, but you know, there's a lot of activity. We're in the, we're in the garage right now back at our house, but there's a lot of in and out and other stuff going on. So sometimes it gets tricky.

• 2:07:21Speaker 02

  Just keep doing it, man. I love the show and it's great. So just keep doing it.

• 2:07:25Rich Roll?

  Right on.

• 2:07:26Speaker 02

  Something right.

• 2:07:26Rich Roll?

  Thanks, man. It's been fun. And if Anna doesn't want to go three times a week, then just come over with me, man.

• 2:07:32Speaker 02

  I'll pull you in.

• 2:07:32Rich Roll?

  I'll sit across from you anytime. We'll just, we'll bang it out. How about that?

• 2:07:36Speaker 02

  Sounds good to me.

• 2:07:37Rich Roll?

  All right, cool. So also, in addition to the podcast, your website is vinnietortorich.com.

• 2:07:43Speaker 02

  Vinnietortorich.com.

• 2:07:44Rich Roll?

  And you host the podcast. You can listen to the podcast there.

• 2:07:46Speaker 02

  You can listen to it there. You can't download it there. Can you download from your, from your site?

• 2:07:51Rich Roll?

  Yeah, on the player, I think I added like a little plugin feature that allows you to also download it. But I mean, most people go to iTunes, right?

• 2:07:59Speaker 02

  We know, most people go to iTunes, but we get well over 2,000 a day that come to the site.

• 2:08:03Rich Roll?

  Oh, you do?

• 2:08:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, so people do listen to it at the site.

• 2:08:08Rich Roll?

  It depends on what, we're going to get all geeky. Are you on WordPress?

• 2:08:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, WordPress blog.

• 2:08:14Rich Roll?

  So there's, there's, there's a plugin. I don't know what plugin you're using for your audio player.

• 2:08:19Speaker 02

  I don't either. I got a guy.

• 2:08:20Rich Roll?

  I can, all right. Well, I can talk to him or Anna or whoever. We'll, we'll sort you out. You should be able to have a little function on the player that allows somebody to also download it.

• 2:08:29Speaker 02

  Well, that would be cool because I know the ones that listen to it, I get a feeling they're the ones sitting in an office in a cubicle.

• 2:08:35Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 2:08:36Speaker 02

  You know, like it's not most of them. Most of them go to iTunes, but there's, you know.

• 2:08:42Rich Roll?

  Some people are anti iTunes though. People email me and they're like, tell me another way to get it because I don't like iTunes or.

• 2:08:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, I get that too. I get that email a lot.

• 2:08:50Rich Roll?

  Why are people anti? I don't understand. I don't know.

• 2:08:52Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 2:08:52Rich Roll?

  It's free. It's not like iTunes is making any money off it.

• 2:08:56Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. It's, you know, I don't get any of it. I just know, you know, I see the numbers and.

• 2:09:02Rich Roll?

  Are you on Stitcher radio too?

• 2:09:03Speaker 02

  No, you're on Stitcher though, right?

• 2:09:05Rich Roll?

  I am, but I know a lot of people are kind of not into that because I think there's something about, if it's streaming on Stitcher, then it doesn't count as a download from, so it, it undercuts your total downloads.

• 2:09:17Speaker 02

  Well, that's what happens to, I think, my WordPress. It undercuts iTunes.

• 2:09:22Rich Roll?

  Interesting. Well, yeah, but yeah, it undercuts iTunes, but ultimately you still have, are you on Libsyn? Is that where you're hosting your?

• 2:09:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:09:30Rich Roll?

  So, I mean, it'll still count as a download on Libsyn, so you can show that as your full downloads to advertisers, whatever.

• 2:09:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:09:37Rich Roll?

  I can hear people unsubscribing right now.

• 2:09:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, they're going.

• 2:09:41Rich Roll?

  They're going, what are you talking about?

• 2:09:43Speaker 02

  Click.

• 2:09:43Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 2:09:44Speaker 02

  I'm done with this guy.

• 2:09:45Rich Roll?

  Enough of this.

• 2:09:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:09:46Rich Roll?

  So, and also on Twitter, Vinnie Tortorich on Twitter.

• 2:09:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:09:50Rich Roll?

  Facebook page, all that stuff, whatever.

• 2:09:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, wherever you could be, I guess I'm there and I'm doing something.

• 2:09:56Rich Roll?

  All right, man. Anything else?

• 2:09:58Speaker 02

  I'm done.

• 2:09:59Rich Roll?

  Cool. Let's get out on the bike.

• 2:10:02Speaker 02

  Let me know.

• 2:10:03Rich Roll?

  All right.

• 2:10:04Speaker 02

  I'm there.

• 2:10:04Rich Roll?

  Tomorrow?

• 2:10:05Speaker 02

  No.

• 2:10:06Rich Roll?

  No, tomorrow's my rest day. Not tomorrow, Tuesday?

• 2:10:09Speaker 02

  Let's go rest together.

• 2:10:10Rich Roll?

  We could do that.

• 2:10:11Speaker 02

  Let's go have a coffee.

• 2:10:12Rich Roll?

  We could just do another podcast tomorrow. That's rest, right?

• 2:10:15Speaker 02

  I'll show up. I mean, you know, if I don't have a client, I'll come in and give you an hour.

• 2:10:19Rich Roll?

  All right, cool.

• 2:10:20Speaker 02

  All right.

• 2:10:20Rich Roll?

  And also, you're on Access Hollywood tomorrow. What time?

• 2:10:24Speaker 02

  I think it's 1 o'clock. They sent me a message literally today.

• 2:10:28Rich Roll?

  But the show's on at like dinnertime, right? Isn't it?

• 2:10:31Speaker 02

  They do Access Live in the morning. I learned all this two weeks ago when I was on the show. Access Live in the morning, and then in the afternoon, or the evening, they do another deal.

• 2:10:41Rich Roll?

  All right.

• 2:10:42Speaker 02

  I haven't had television in years, so.

• 2:10:44Rich Roll?

  Okay.

• 2:10:44Speaker 02

  I'm doing Oprah, and I know she has an own network. I have no idea how you get to own network.

• 2:10:49Rich Roll?

  Well, we all figured that out with Lance, right?

• 2:10:51Speaker 02

  Serena got it.

• 2:10:52Rich Roll?

  I watched it on the, yeah, I just streamed it.

• 2:10:55Speaker 02

  We could come back tomorrow and do another hour.

• 2:10:56Rich Roll?

  We could talk about that. Yeah, we can.

• 2:10:58Speaker 02

  If you really want to lose subscribers.

• 2:11:00Rich Roll?

  Right, exactly. All right, guys, that's it. Thanks for, thanks for being here, Vinnie. It was great to have you.

• 2:11:07Speaker 02

  Thanks for having me.

• 2:11:08Rich Roll?

  So, you got all the good stuff, and where to find Vinnie online. I'll keep you posted on his book. You want to find out more about what we're doing, go to my website, richroll.com. Or check out jylifestyle.com. I've got an e-cookbook up there. I've got a protein powder supplement, B12 supplement, more stuff coming. Also, if you subscribe there, you get a free seven recipe downloads. So what the hell, right? Check it out. I'm at Rich Roll Twitter, and whatever, I don't want to do an ad. I'm done. Let's get out of here. All right, we're out of here. Peace. Plants.