300. How to Build Muscle After 50: Protein, Leucine & Amino Acid Timing - Jim Stoppani

Jim Stoppani, PhD, joins Gary Brecka to explain anabolic resistance, why leucine decides whether a meal builds muscle at all, and why he takes his branched-chain amino acids 30 minutes before eating instead of with the meal. Plus protein absorption from whole food versus whey versus free-form aminos, cardio versus weights when time is short, and how to train after 50 without getting hurt. CLICK HERE TO BECOME GARY’S VIP!: https://bit.ly/4ai0Xwg Join Jim Stoppani's Workout Programs!: https://bit.ly/4wYU50G Connect with Jim Stoppani Website: https://bit.ly/4y3e5A0 YouTube: https://bit.ly/4gD5IFP Instagram: https://bit.ly/4i9QjOp Facebook: https://bit.ly/46wKcwl TikTok: https://bit.ly/4cmnSZM X: https://bit.ly/4i4S9jy Thank you to our partners A-GAME: “ULTIMATE15” FOR 15% OFF: http://bit.ly/4kek1ij AION: “ULTIMATE10” FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/4h6KHAD AIRES: "ULTIMATE20 " FOR 20% OFF: https://bit.ly/4a3Duze BAJA GOLD: "ULTIMATE10" FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/3WSBqUa BODYHEALTH: “ULTIMATE20” FOR 20% OFF: http://bit.ly/4e5IjsV COLD LIFE: THE ULTIMATE HUMAN PLUNGE: https://bit.ly/4eULUKpCYMBIOTIKA: "BRECKACYM30" FOR 30% OFF: https://bit.ly/4tjyluP GENETIC METHYLATION TEST (UK ONLY): https://bit.ly/48QJJrk GENETIC TEST (USA ONLY): ⁠https://bit.ly/3Yg1Uk9 GOPUFF: GET YOUR FAVORITE SNACK!: https://bit.ly/4obIFDC H2TAB: “ULTIMATE10” FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/4hMNdgg HEALF: 10% OFF YOUR ORDER: https://bit.ly/41HJg6S PEPTUAL: “TUH10” FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/4mKxgcn SNOOZE: LET’S GET TO SLEEP!: https://bit.ly/4pt1T6V WHOOP: JOIN & GET 1 FREE MONTH!: https://bit.ly/3VQ0nzW Watch the “Ultimate Human Podcast” every Tuesday & Thursday at 9AM EST: YouTube: https://bit.ly/3RPQYX8 Podcasts: https://bit.ly/3RQftU0 Connect with Gary Brecka Instagram: https://bit.ly/3RPpnFs TikTok: https://bit.ly/4coJ8foX: https://bit.ly/3Opc8tf Facebook: https://bit.ly/464VA1H LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/4hH7Ri2 Website: https://bit.ly/4eLDbdU Merch: https://bit.ly/4aBpOM1 Newsletter: https://bit.ly/47ejrws Ask Gary: https://bit.ly/3PEAJuG Timestamps 00:00 - Intro of Show 04:48 - Creatine as an energy molecule 07:04 - Creatine's brain and memory benefits 07:48 - Creatine and sleep deprivation 08:35 - Monohydrate vs hydrochloride 11:17 - Why creatine wrecks your stomach 16:02 - From Yale to Weider magazines 19:16 - Buzzword labels and underdosing 24:22 - The five pillars of supplementation 26:14 - When to take creatine 28:41 - Building muscle after 50 29:08 - Anabolic resistance and leucine 30:24 - How to actually use BCAAs 34:24 - Whole food vs shakes vs aminos 36:25 - Weights vs cardio on a time budget 41:32 - Myostatin and gene therapy 51:19 - Is the anabolic window dead? 54:15 - Three protein meals beat two 56:21 - The must-have supplements 58:39 - NAD, NMN and aging 1:00:14 - What it means to be an ultimate human Disclaimer: This podcast is for informational purposes only and does not provide medical advice. It is not intended for diagnosing or treating any health condition. Always consult a licensed healthcare professional before making health or wellness decisions. Gary Brecka is the owner of Ultimate Human, LLC which operates The Ultimate Human podcast and promotes certain third-party products used by Gary Brecka in his personal health and wellness protocols and daily life and for which Ultimate Human LLC and / or Gary Brecka directly or indirectly holds an economic interest or receives compensation. Accordingly, statements made by Gary Brecka and others (including on The Ultimate Human podcast) may be considered promotional in nature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

  So many companies are taking advantage of consumers who just read creatine, beta alanine, that don't understand you need a certain dose of each one of those ingredients for them to be effective.

• 0:10Speaker 01

  Supplement manufacturers just throwing things on the label like creatine, but putting it in dosages that if someone that wasn't, didn't have the background that you had saw it on the label, they're like, okay, then this must be a good supplement.

• 0:20Speaker 00

  But what's the dose? Every ingredient is only going to be effective at a certain dose.

• 0:25Speaker 01

  Your background in the supplement industry, your background as a writer, educator, and having a biochemistry background means that you can take the practical application, muscle building, fitness, exercise, and bring it all the way down to the cellular level.

• 0:38Speaker 00

  As you're aging, what is important? Mobility, maintaining muscle, metabolic health. I would say for the middle aged and older, you want a more well-balanced fitness routine. In fact, there's research suggesting that those who work out with more variety have more longevity.

• 0:58Speaker 01

  What is the secret to maintaining a muscular physique and not getting injured when you get into your 50s?

• 1:05Speaker 00

  The secret to building muscle after 50 is...

• 1:23Speaker 01

  Hey guys, welcome back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. I'm your host, human biologist Gary Brecka, and today we're settling the score on one of the most debated topics in health and fitness, supplementation. My guest is Dr. Jim Stoppani, a PhD in exercise physiology, Yale-trained researcher, and the man who's built training and nutrition programs for The Rock, Dr. Dre, and LL Cool J. Jim is going to break down creatine and why up to 30% of people can't even tolerate the standard dose, and what to take instead. We're going to dive into protein, leucine, and exactly what happens to your body's ability to build muscle after 50, a phenomenon called anabolic resistance, and what you can do about it starting now, no matter what your age.

• 2:05Speaker 01

  We'll even get into the cutting-edge myostatin gene therapy and the future of muscle growth. Whether you lift, or you just want to still be strong and independent, decades from now, this episode is required listening. Let's get into it. Hey guys, welcome back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. I'm your host, human biologist Gary Brecka, where we go down the road of everything, anti-aging, biohacking, longevity, and everything in between. And today's guest is actually going to answer a lot of questions that are all over the media right now. We're going to settle the score on supplementation, creatine, cognitive function, what you need to do now, even if you're in your twenties, to reach older age and still be healthy, strong, and thriving. And before the podcast even started, we started a mini podcast in the kitchen.

• 2:50Speaker 01

  I'll share that with you guys in just a moment. But Dr. Stoppani, Jim Stoppani, welcome to the Ultimate Human Podcast.

• 2:57Speaker 00

  Thank you, Gary. Pleasure to be here.

• 2:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm really excited to have you on because you see people that are walking the walk and talking the talk, and then you see people that really have their arms wrapped around the science. And I think you're that rare breed hybrid that has both.

• 3:15Speaker 00

  Thanks. I think I would say the same. Yeah, that's my passions of the science, but also the real-world application of it.

• 3:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, clearly it's working. For the record, he is substantially older than I am. He's two years older than I am. I want to get that out of the way early, when he was like, I graduated high school in 1986. I was like, yes, graduate in 1988. So I was a sophomore, you're a senior, you're so far ahead of me. But you can live your carefree younger years through my eyes, but I feel like if I had a sleeve, I might look more jacked. But it appears that those are real muscles and not tattooed. But I'm so excited for this podcast because you know, your background in the supplement industry, your background as a writer, an educator, obviously getting your doctorate

• 4:06Speaker 01

  and having a biochemistry background means that you can take the practical application of muscle building, fitness, exercise, and bring it all the way down to the cellular level.

• 4:17Speaker 00

  Right.

• 4:18Speaker 01

  So I would love to start with what I think is the hottest topic in supplementation right now, which is creatine.

• 4:24Speaker 00

  Of course.

• 4:25Speaker 01

  And creatine's been around forever.

• 4:26Speaker 00

  Forever.

• 4:27Speaker 01

  I think it felt, you know, when I was in like college, it was like the bodybuilding...

• 4:32Speaker 00

  Mid 90s is when it really took off.

• 4:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was the, you know, all of the bodybuilding rage, I assume, because it helped to retain some water in the muscle. But now it's starting to emerge with cognitive benefits.

• 4:45Speaker 00

  Yes, and that's why we're hearing people talk about it.

• 4:48Speaker 01

  And that's why we're hearing people talk about it. So could you, first of all, what is creatine? How does the body make it? And then let's go down this debate between monohydrate and hydrochloride. Why is one better than the other? Are they about the same? I know we have more data on one than the other. But you know, I have my parents on it now for cognitive function, and they're in their 80s.

• 5:11Speaker 00

  I recommend everyone literally should supplement with creatine.

• 5:15Speaker 01

  So creatine is a what in the human body?

• 5:19Speaker 00

  It's an energy molecule. You know, everybody thinks it's this muscle-building supplement.

• 5:24Speaker 01

  And we make it in our bodies, right?

• 5:25Speaker 00

  And it's one of the most critical energy molecules in the body. And the reason why is because it provides what's known as a high-energy phosphate. And if you know what ATP is, right, or denosytriphosphate, a little maybe, a little too technical, but that's our energy currency, right? And so to contract muscle, to run, we need ATP to fuel all that, every process in the body.

• 5:49Speaker 01

  Even to think.

• 5:50Speaker 00

  And creatine helps to make ATP, and it helps to make it very quickly, which is why it's so important for like, when you're lifting weights.

• 5:58Speaker 01

  That do we naturally, like a lot of things in aging, does our capacity to produce creatine decline over age?

• 6:05Speaker 00

  Possibly. It's not really one of those, you know, even though we do make it, it's not like, say, DHEA, where as we get older, it starts decreasing, right? But what we do know is that to really maximize the benefits it can provide, what we get in our daily diet and what we make is not enough.

• 6:31Speaker 01

  Where would we get creatine from in our diet?

• 6:33Speaker 00

  So you get it from meats, like animal, beef, fish.

• 6:38Speaker 01

  I assume you're a meat eater.

• 6:39Speaker 00

  I am.

• 6:40Speaker 01

  Great, I am too. So, sorry vegans.

• 6:45Speaker 00

  It's a complete protein. I worry about my leucine intake.

• 6:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, so why is it now crossing the boundaries into being, you know, no longer just a bodybuilding supplement? I mean, what are the, where does the data fall on cognitive function, neuroinflammatory conditions?

• 7:04Speaker 00

  Yeah, there's a lot of interesting, a lot of interesting data on creatine, not for muscle building. And one of the most discussed is the brain benefits. And so there's research, you know, single studies, meta-analysis studies, where they take a bunch of studies and sort of look at them all and see that all the results kind of come out the same, right? That's what it meant. It's a study of the studies. And what the studies of the studies show is that taking creatine can provide some cognitive benefit, improving memory, right, recall. And there was a recent study showing that if you're sleep deprived, a high, a large

• 7:49Speaker 00

  dose, and again, this was almost 30 grams of creatine, 25 to 30 grams.

• 7:53Speaker 01

  In one shot or over an entire day?

• 7:56Speaker 00

  In one shot, decrease the sort of cognitive hit that you get from...

• 8:02Speaker 01

  So mitigated the effects of sleep deprivation? And is this something?

• 8:06Speaker 00

  And acute, but now, what we know about creatine in muscle is a lot. What we know about creatine in the brain is very little. It's early, but, so we know it takes about three to five grams of creatine per day to provide benefits to the muscle. For the brain, it may, we may require a little more, maybe closer to 10 grams, because it's harder to get past that, you know, blood-brain barrier.

• 8:35Speaker 01

  Right. And what about the forms of creatine? You know, there's a big debate of monohydrate versus hydrochloride. My understanding is that the HCl version is a little more water soluble, but the monohydrate is where there's a lot more data.

• 8:50Speaker 00

  Yeah, so let's talk about the form. So if you're, if you thought about creatine in a lab somewhere, let's say a scientist studying creatine, and he's got a jar of it, right, in his lab, right? What would that form be? It would be creatin monohydrate. It's just its default form.

• 9:07Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 9:08Speaker 00

  Okay, and so, so the very first study was done using creatin monohydrate. And so when scientists want to replicate something to see if, oh, well, that study showed results, will it now show results in women? Will it show results at this dose, right? They want to go back and use the same form that was used in the original one. So since it's its default form, right, that's the form that's been studied in thousands and thousands of studies. What is creatin hydrochloride? It's the same thing. It's providing creatine, right? And you're attaching something to it, okay? With creatin monohydrate, there's actually a water molecule attached, even though it's dry, there's a water molecule attached.

• 9:53Speaker 00

  With the hydrochloride, what's attached to it is not a water molecule, but a molecule of hydrochloric acid.

• 9:59Speaker 01

  Salt.

• 10:00Speaker 00

  Exactly. It's a salt, right? And so what does the hydrochloric acid do to the creatine? It increases its solubility. So have you ever seen someone or mixed a glass of creatin monohydrate and water?

• 10:14Speaker 01

  Chunky.

• 10:15Speaker 00

  And it's, you know, you've got all those particles in the bottom. You drink it, it's kind of gritty. So...

• 10:23Speaker 00

  Creatine is, goes in the solution very poorly, even though it's hydroscopic, which means it pulls water to it, it takes a while. Okay? So when you drink a glass of creatine, because creatine pulls water to it, that's why you hear about water weight, right? It goes into the muscle.

• 10:39Speaker 01

  Which is the bloating that especially women want to avoid.

• 10:42Speaker 00

  Yeah, but it pulls it mainly into the muscle. So it's not really like, you know, extracellular. It just makes the muscle look bigger, right? It's more volume.

• 10:53Speaker 00

  However, if the creatine has not pulled water to it while it's in your glass and you drink it and it sits in your intestines, those particles are going to draw water to them while they're in your intestines. And that's the explosive diarrhea you hear so much about with creatine monohydrate.

• 11:13Speaker 01

  You're gonna look great, but you're gonna have explosive diarrhea.

• 11:15Speaker 00

  And so there's somewhere around, I think, 20 to 30% of people can't tolerate five grams of monohydrate.

• 11:24Speaker 01

  Wow, 20 to 30%?

• 11:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, 20%. And then if you go up to a 10 gram dose, it's something, a single 10 gram dose, it's something like 50 to 60% of people cannot tolerate that.

• 11:35Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 11:37Speaker 00

  And so that's the benefit of the hydrochloride. It's for those people, I can't tolerate five grams of creatine monohydrate.

• 11:46Speaker 01

  Really?

• 11:46Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 11:47Speaker 01

  So you take the HCl?

• 11:48Speaker 00

  So I take the HCl.

• 11:49Speaker 01

  I take the HCl version too.

• 11:50Speaker 00

  And that's the only, that's the only difference is that it goes in, when you mix creatine hydrochloride in water, it instantly goes in the solution. And so it's not pulling, it's not pulling any water while it's in your intestines. And so not only do you get fewer stomach issues, but you absorb more of it. So it takes a smaller.

• 12:12Speaker 01

  So you're not taking a bioavailability hit, you're not taking, right? So it's not that one crosses the blood brain barrier, one doesn't, one is more bioavailable, one's not, it's just that one has more clinical data than the other one, but at the end of the day, creatine is creatine.

• 12:27Speaker 00

  It gets into the muscle. It's, it gets into the muscle as creatine and it gains that high energy phosphate. And that's what it does.

• 12:36Speaker 01

  And where do we suppose that some of the cognitive benefits are coming from? From what I've read, if you don't have enough creatine, because it's also like methyl donor, if you don't have enough creatine, the, you know, to donate methyl groups, then the body's gonna grab methyl groups from somewhere. So it's gonna grab them maybe from SAME, as the dinosylbenamine.

• 12:58Speaker 00

  Yeah, yes.

• 12:59Speaker 01

  And so when, when the body is deficient in anything, it doesn't go without, it just takes it from somewhere else, right? I mean, like when we're fasting, we, we're not eating, but our body is, it's just eating us. And hopefully it's eating you from the weakest point forward, the senescent cells, breaking those into energy or breaking them into amino acids, so it can still build structures in the body, which I find just so insanely innately intelligent. It's why I always say, man, the more I study the human body, the more I believe in God. We don't have to go down that road. But, you know, it's, it's, our body's just so intelligent. And so from what I can gather, the line that I draw for creatine and, you know, neurocognitive

• 13:44Speaker 01

  decline and, and the memory studies and also the sleep deprivation is that if you don't have enough of these methyl donors or creatine, the body's still gonna get it from somewhere. So it's stealing it from places that you might not want it to steal from.

• 13:59Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 14:00Speaker 01

  Is that a fair assessment?

• 14:00Speaker 00

  Of, for sure. There's so many, so many ways that it's working, you know? And at the end of the day, it's providing energy to the nerve cells. So just like a muscle now can do more work, right? So can a nerve cell.

• 14:17Speaker 01

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• 14:58Speaker 01

  Visit drinkh2tab.com, that's drinkh2tab.com and upgrade your hydration today. Now let's get back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. Sure. And I mean, and at the end of the day, all of these, you know, advanced memory decline, you know, diagnoses, Alzheimer's, dementia, early onset cognitive decline, memory loss, cognition issues, these are all at their root, neuroinflammatory issues, more circulation, trapped histamines or cytokines or what have you in the brain. And I guess the evidence is that creatine can cross this blood brain barrier in high doses and maybe mitigate some of those effects.

• 15:41Speaker 00

  Exactly, yes.

• 15:42Speaker 01

  So would you make the blanket statement that at a certain age, everybody should be on a certain dosage of creatine? Or not quite yet?

• 15:50Speaker 00

  I, I would, I mean.

• 15:51Speaker 01

  I would too. I mean, I would totally agree with that.

• 15:54Speaker 00

  I would, I would, I, I think most people should consider at, at least a five gram dose per day.

• 16:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, and I'd love to talk about, you know, when, when we were in the kitchen, we were talking about your transition from pure academia, you know, into the practical world. And it started with, which a lot of our listeners are not gonna know, with like Joe Weider and, you know, back in the day when bodybuilding magazines were like the only access that, you know, young athletes or young bodybuilders had any real information.

• 16:33Speaker 00

  That's a good point, you know?

• 16:34Speaker 01

  On how to build muscle.

• 16:35Speaker 00

  That really, yeah. Where else would you learn about metabolism or macronutrients or?

• 16:43Speaker 01

  So what was your departure from academia like into, let's just call it the real world? Right, right? The practical real world?

• 16:52Speaker 00

  It took a while to get, you know, to get used to, to be, you know, going from.

• 16:56Speaker 01

  Where did you land out of academia?

• 16:59Speaker 00

  Yeah, so I left, I was at Yale School of Medicine and I landed at Weider Publications in Los Angeles, which, you know, Los Angeles was the mecca of bodybuilding at the time. And I worked for, you know, Joe Weider's Muscle and Fitness, we had Shape Magazine, many people may remember.

• 17:20Speaker 01

  I remember that one too.

• 17:21Speaker 00

  For women. We had men's fitness. And then we had this hardcore one called Flex, which was like IFBB bodybuilding, it covered all the contests and whatnot. And so I would write for all those, you know, different audiences, you know, some were more hardcore, some of them were just fitness oriented.

• 17:42Speaker 01

  Yeah. But you know, at the time, you know, bodybuilders were kind of leading the charge on hormone therapy, supplementation, nutrition, because, you know, these guys shared a lot of data, they're very open about their, you know, their stacks and their cycles and what was working and what wasn't. And even then, you know, they were checking biomarkers long before people were even doing annual blood work. Most people got their blood worked on every maybe five years and then something was wrong.

• 18:10Speaker 00

  Isn't that crazy?

• 18:10Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, now it's sort of become the norm. But, but bodybuilders back then were not just flying blind. I mean, they were experimenting on themselves, like is this hurting my liver? Is this hurting my kidneys? Is this causing my inflammation to go up? And, and I remember, you know, even back then, reading before I even knew what biomarkers was, it was even before I had my first biology degree. But there was a lot of good information in there that was coming from that. You know, coming from the bodybuilding community. So you, you, so then you gravitated towards actually creating a supplement line. I think it was born out of need when we, when we talked about your, your background.

• 18:51Speaker 01

  Because here you are as an editor for these magazines, trying to provide quality information to the reader. And, and you seem to get very frustrated by the lack of disclosure that was going on in the supplement space. Or, or what we call proprietary blend, right? And also, you know, supplement manufacturers just throwing things on the label like creatine, but putting it in dosages that.

• 19:16Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's what I call buzzwords.

• 19:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, buzzwords.

• 19:19Speaker 00

  Yeah, you know, creatine, beta alanine.

• 19:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, sounds great. Like I want both of those, you know? And, and if, you know, if, if it's someone that wasn't, didn't have the background that you had, saw it on the label, they're like, okay, this must be a good supplement.

• 19:33Speaker 00

  But, but what's the dose, you know? Every ingredient is only gonna be effective at a certain dose. And.

• 19:41Speaker 01

  Creatine is one of those, right?

• 19:42Speaker 00

  Yes. Like I said, I'm recommending about five grams per day for most people. And I was reviewing supplements that had 250 milligrams of creatine or 500 milligrams.

• 19:56Speaker 01

  So 1/20 of a dose.

• 19:57Speaker 00

  Yeah, like 500 milligrams is half of a gram. And I'm telling you, you should have five grams, they're giving you a half of a gram. And, and you know, that's what was so irritating to me, that so many companies were taking advantage of consumers who just read creatine, beta alanine, that don't understand you need a certain dose of each one of those ingredients for them to be effective.

• 20:22Speaker 01

  You know, I, I, I feel the same thing going on in the biohacking space. You know, I told you, I have a great part of like red light beds in my, in my garage downstairs. Was very astounding to me how some of the leading brands, you $100,000 red light beds, for example, very often did not have the nanometer wavelengths, the milliwatts of irradiance, were not creating a therapeutic dose. And if you accepted the manufacturers publish, you know, data, then, you know, and of course, if you're paying $100,000 for, you know, red light bed, you expect that it's going to work. And what I found was a lot of these were just red light bulbs. Like you might as well stand next to a Christmas tree. And

• 21:03Speaker 01

  it was frustrating for me, too. And I feel like as someone has a large audience in the space, we have an obligation to

• 21:10Speaker 00

  Yes, exactly.

• 21:11Speaker 01

  Stand in between the consumer and a lot of these manufacturers and say, this is valid and this is not. And the same thing in the supplement space. And so for you, that led to you formulating your own supplement.

• 21:21Speaker 00

  Yeah, you know, I had, you know, like, I would be telling people what to look for, and it was almost impossible to find, you know, which was, you know, ingredients that you know, studies behind them, and it lists the actual dosing. And that, trying to find supplements like that was very difficult.

• 21:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, things like natural flavors, proprietary blends, those are sort of buzzwords for we're not telling you.

• 21:50Speaker 00

  Yeah, exactly.

• 21:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, we're not going to disclose.

• 21:52Speaker 00

  And so, instead of just telling people, this is what you should look for, I provided the example.

• 22:01Speaker 01

  And then how did that go for you?

• 22:03Speaker 00

  Very well, because, you know, I had been, you know, I had already been teaching people how to use these ingredients and how to build their own, you know, before you work out, what you want to take after you work out, whatnot. And so, the formulas already existed. So, when I manufactured them, those same formulas were still there. And so, the consumer already knew they were taking it, just making it on their own. This was going to work, because they're already taking it.

• 22:33Speaker 01

  Right.

• 22:34Speaker 00

  Just mixing it themselves. Now, this is actually flavored, one scoop.

• 22:39Speaker 01

  And in one spot. So it ended up being a really good

• 22:41Speaker 00

  Very successful, yes.

• 22:44Speaker 01

  Journey for you. And it ended up in GNC and

• 22:46Speaker 00

  Yeah, it was a very popular brand. Again, because this was in 2013, and at the time, most supplement companies were not telling people how many grams of creatine, or whatever was in there. And so, you know, this was somewhat groundbreaking in the supplement industry.

• 23:07Speaker 01

  And I think you find this, you know, not just in the supplement industry, but also in like, you know, equipment industry. And you see a lot of, or like, I see a lot of good data provided by a certain clinical study, and then everyone just borrowing that data, but not really following the threshold doses. Or, you know, we talked about this in shake plates, for example. Not all shake plates are created the same. I mean, there's certain concussive forces you have to create to improve bone mineral density and drain lymphatics. But the consumer doesn't know that, you know, one vibration plate is different from another vibration plate. They just think all vibration plates are the same. And they can cite, you

• 23:49Speaker 01

  know, the outcomes from a different product, and just sort of borrow that data, and allow the consumer to assume that that data is valid in their product when it's not. You know, you have to meet certain threshold standards. What do you think is the biggest hole in the supplement industry right now for the consumer? Like, where are they going wrong? I mean, what's, how does a consumer, in other words, pick something up off the shelf, you know, a supplement, and kind of ensure that they're getting what they're, what they're expecting to get?

• 24:22Speaker 00

  Yeah, well, you know, the, I created this sort of paradigm that I call the five pillars of supplementation. And so, it's based on, you know, a solid nutrition foundation, because you can't supplement a bad diet, right?

• 24:38Speaker 01

  Right.

• 24:38Speaker 00

  First thing you need to do is create a stable, proper diet, whatever that's going to be for you, right?

• 24:44Speaker 01

  Right.

• 24:45Speaker 00

  We could debate.

• 24:45Speaker 01

  Whole food based.

• 24:46Speaker 00

  Exactly, right? But a whole food based, right? Once you have a solid nutrition plan, then you can start looking at supplements to help take your performance or body composition further, right? And so, the first pillar is the ingredients. And that is, do they have clinical research supporting their effectiveness, right? The second one is the form. What's the best form of that ingredient? Is it going to be the creatin monohydrate or the hydrochloride, right? The third is, what is the dose?

• 25:21Speaker 01

  Minimum effective dose.

• 25:23Speaker 00

  Of that ingredient, right? Is it, is the dose on the bottle, at least the daily dose you're getting, similar to the daily doses in the literature and the published studies? Fourth is, are there any synergies in that formula? Ingredients that may work together, right, and support one another? For example, if you had bran chains in creatine together, leucine can increase insulin to some degree, and creatine requires insulin to get into the muscle. That would be a good synergy, right?

• 25:56Speaker 01

  Right.

• 25:57Speaker 00

  Are there any synergies that are going to promote the ingredients themselves even further than they can by themselves? And then the fifth pillar is timing. When do you take it, right? When is the best time to take the creatine?

• 26:12Speaker 01

  And is that, yeah, that's, when is the best time to take creatine?

• 26:15Speaker 00

  Well, with food.

• 26:17Speaker 01

  With food?

• 26:18Speaker 00

  Yes. Because like I said, to get into the muscle at least, right? Brains is a little different. We're still confused about brain. But at least we know about muscle, right? And it requires insulin. Insulin helps to shuttle creatine into the muscle.

• 26:32Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 26:33Speaker 00

  So if you have creatine with a meal,

• 26:35Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 26:36Speaker 00

  Right? Protein and carbohydrates, you're going to have an increase in insulin that's going to help to drive that creatine to the muscle.

• 26:45Speaker 01

  So creatine isn't something you should take fasted?

• 26:48Speaker 00

  Creatine with a meal, you could, but with a meal, you'll take up about, it's estimated around 30% or 40% more creatine you'll take up.

• 26:57Speaker 01

  Oh, wow. Okay. So you could take it fasted, but you're just getting it less, less of a dose. Because I work out fasted. I take something called Perfect Amino, which is just all nine essential amino acids. I don't like the full feeling, but I eat right after I'm done working out. You know, working out, I mean, eating before I work out, for me, is just not something that works for my body. And I don't get the blood sugar crashes, you know, sometimes I, we work with, with these guys at my son's house, and there's guys passing out and throwing up all the time because their, their blood sugar's tanking. So they probably should eat before they work out. But let's, let's actually talk about a good, because rarely do I speak directly to, like, the middle aged men my age, we're

• 27:42Speaker 01

  both in our 50s.

• 27:43Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 27:44Speaker 01

  You're clearly holding a lot of muscle for a guy in your, in your 50s. So what is the secret to maintaining, you know, a muscular physique and not getting injured, you know, when you get into your 50s? Because I think, I think you're so smart by the time you get in your 50s, because you realize you can actually get hurt. Like, my son doesn't think he can be killed by a bullet. Neither one of my sons, just because they haven't been really hurt yet. And like, you know, they haven't blown the discs, back squatting or anything.

• 28:15Speaker 00

  I used to race motocross.

• 28:16Speaker 01

  Oh, did you?

• 28:17Speaker 00

  Now when I race.

• 28:18Speaker 01

  So you know you can get hurt.

• 28:19Speaker 00

  Now when I watch motocross, I'm like, what, how, I didn't, why was I, why would I do that? Like, you know?

• 28:26Speaker 01

  So many ways to get hurt, you know?

• 28:29Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 28:30Speaker 01

  Now we're like, bungee jump, hell no.

• 28:31Speaker 00

  What was I doing?

• 28:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:32Speaker 00

  How am I still alive today?

• 28:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:34Speaker 00

  I have no idea. But yes, you know, you think you're, nothing's going to hurt you, you know, until you get older. But the, the secret to building muscle after 50 is protein and leucine. So, so as, as, once you hit 50, you're in anabolic resistance.

• 28:55Speaker 01

  Mm hmm. Circopenia, right?

• 28:57Speaker 00

  Well, not even just circopenia. With anabolic resistances, it means if

• 29:05Speaker 00

  Uh, how old are you? What, what? Sorry.

• 29:07Speaker 01

  Max over there?

• 29:08Speaker 00

  Yeah, Max. How old are you? Twenty seven.

• 29:10Speaker 01

  Little youngin'.

• 29:11Speaker 00

  If Max eats a steak, and let's say it provides thirty grams of protein, and I eat that same steak, right? We sit down in your kitchen together.

• 29:23Speaker 01

  I offered you a steak. You turned it down for the record.

• 29:26Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 29:27Speaker 01

  He's fasting right now.

• 29:29Speaker 00

  If we both ate that steak, you know, muscle protein synthesis is right after, after you've consumed protein, right? Muscle protein synthesis spikes up. Well, the muscle protein synthesis that Max will get is going to spike up probably about forty to fifty percent higher than mine will spike with the same meal. Why? Leucine. So our intestines steal more leucine.

• 29:58Speaker 01

  They do. Okay.

• 29:59Speaker 00

  And leucine is the key that turns on the muscle building.

• 30:02Speaker 01

  Cause I've always seen in branched chain amino acids, leucine, isoleucine, valine. And leucine is usually in a two to one to one ratio. So leucine is, is double.

• 30:11Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 30:11Speaker 01

  Isoleucine and valine. And I assume that that's because there's good research behind that.

• 30:17Speaker 00

  Yeah. And it's what sort of, it's how it is in the muscle. It's typically at a two to one, one ratio as well.

• 30:24Speaker 01

  Okay. So that's where that ratio comes from. And then, but I've also heard that branched chain amino acids on their own is sugar water.

• 30:30Speaker 00

  Well, yes and no.

• 30:32Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 30:33Speaker 00

  Right? And so when you do a study, you can bias a study before you even do the study. And so the studies on branched chains saying it's basically flavored water is comparing branched chains to essential amino acids, right? Branched chains are essential amino acids, but it's only three of them, right? So they compare, they take people and put them, have them fast, and then they consume either branched chains or essential amino acids. Right? And then they see muscle protein synthesis.

• 31:08Speaker 00

  Well, it goes up more with essential amino acids because the essential amino acids are also providing the branched chains, but it's also providing the seventeen other.

• 31:18Speaker 01

  Right.

• 31:19Speaker 00

  amino, right? But that's not how you would use branched. Nobody would wake up in the morning, fasted and go, I'm going to take some branched chains and call it a day.

• 31:27Speaker 01

  Right.

• 31:28Speaker 00

  Right? So here's how I use branched chains. So I was saying the leucine, right? So leucine gets stolen by your intestines. The older you are, the more leucine, it sequesters. And that's why the muscle protein synthesis isn't going up as high. So why not take more leucine with your meal, right? And when you want to take leucine, you want to take branched chains because of that two to one to one ratio. Okay? The leucine works best when the isoleucine and the valine are there, okay? Because they do other things. Well, leucine turns on this process called mTOR, right? The, the, the valine and the isoleucine do other things that help with the muscle protein synthesis.

• 32:13Speaker 00

  So they work better together. So what I do is I take the branched chains, not with the meal, because research has shown, and get this a little complicated. The research has shown that when you take the branched chains with the meal, the branched chains never show up into the blood for some reason. They still get sequestered. So I, what I do is I take branched chains about thirty minutes before I eat.

• 32:37Speaker 01

  Ah.

• 32:38Speaker 00

  So that the branched chains can get through.

• 32:41Speaker 01

  Right.

• 32:41Speaker 00

  They turn on the muscle protein synthesis. Then you have the whole food providing the rest of those essential amino acids that the, the, the leucine is now going to use, right? Cause it turned on muscle to build the protein.

• 32:55Speaker 01

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• 33:41Speaker 01

  So are you still a big proponent of get the majority of your protein from whole foods or?

• 33:48Speaker 00

  Yes and no. What's interesting, what's interesting is, right? And, and we all say, I even said with the, with the, with the five pillars of supplementation, you want a solid nutrition foundation, right? And that's typically whole foods. But what's interesting about whole foods and muscle protein synthesis is that

• 34:11Speaker 00

  when you

• 34:14Speaker 00

  consume a steak, and let's say it has two grams of leucine in it, and then you consume just two grams of leucine by themselves. Okay? Not only does the leucine by itself get into the blood faster than the steak for obvious reasons.

• 34:30Speaker 01

  Right. Cause it's coupled.

• 34:31Speaker 00

  But twice as much leucine shows up in the blood from the amino acids as it does from the food.

• 34:38Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 34:39Speaker 00

  Twice as much. And so it's estimated that a whole food, say a steak will only provide you somewhere around fifty percent of those amino acids. A protein shake may provide closer to seventy

• 34:58Speaker 00

  percent of those amino acids.

• 35:00Speaker 01

  Like a whey protein.

• 35:01Speaker 00

  Free form amino acids will provide probably about ninety to a hundred percent of the amino.

• 35:06Speaker 01

  You just took the amino acids themselves, right?

• 35:08Speaker 00

  Okay. So looking at that, right? You would,

• 35:13Speaker 00

  you would say, well, it'd be better to just take the leucine or a protein shake than the whole, but remember, what else is in the steak that you're not getting?

• 35:23Speaker 01

  B vitamins, all kinds of, right?

• 35:24Speaker 00

  Right? So it's comp, it's, it's complicated. And so both are, for me, both are important. You know, and it's using both properly. And like, like I said, I'm going to take the branched chains right before my whole food meal. Like I said, thirty, twenty minutes.

• 35:44Speaker 01

  Before your whole food meal.

• 35:45Speaker 00

  And then I'm going to have my, my whole food.

• 35:47Speaker 01

  So what is it, what is a typical day in the life of Jim Stabani look like? I mean, clearly you're, you're, you're doing resistance training. And would you say that, especially for middle aged men, if I only have thirty minutes or sixty minutes to work out every day, cardio or weight training? Or is it important to do cardio and weight training? Because I have actually seen some very prominent folks that I have a high level of respect for, well credentialed, say, if you only have thirty to sixty minutes, weight training beats cardiovascular training hands down in every clinical study that they had ever read.

• 36:25Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 36:25Speaker 01

  And so if you only had a certain amount of time, and also people that don't think that weight training can actually give you a cardiovascular benefit are not weight training, right? Right? Just like you're just lollygagging around the gym.

• 36:34Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 36:35Speaker 01

  Sometimes I want to take a knee.

• 36:37Speaker 00

  You're doing like five reps on the bench press and then sitting on your phone for five minutes.

• 36:41Speaker 01

  Right. Right. If you keep a pace.

• 36:43Speaker 00

  Try, you know, super setting or keep your rest periods shorter.

• 36:47Speaker 01

  To get your heart rate up.

• 36:49Speaker 00

  Depends on the goal, but you can, and like you said, if you had one or the other, I would pick resistance training because you're going to get the resistance for the muscles, which are critical with sarcopenia as you're aging, right? Quality of life, but you're still getting cardiovascular.

• 37:08Speaker 01

  Right.

• 37:09Speaker 00

  It's not like there's no cardiovascular. And again, depending on, on how, now I'm very fast paced. I superset.

• 37:15Speaker 01

  Oh, you do?

• 37:15Speaker 00

  All the time. Yeah. So I'll do a chest and a back, you know?

• 37:19Speaker 01

  So a push pull?

• 37:20Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 37:21Speaker 01

  Okay. Is that, so, so how are your, like some takeaways for my audience? You know, how are your workout structure? Do they work? Are they structured? Push pull? Is it one body part per day? So many different regimens out there. Is it, do it, do you go almost to failure, stop one rep shy of failure? That seems to be a lot of evidence around that. Do you do drop sets? Try to fatigue the muscle through the full range? Cause there seems to be evidence around that.

• 37:48Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 37:49Speaker 01

  There's progressive resistance. I do all of it.

• 37:53Speaker 01

  You're not helping me, Jim.

• 37:56Speaker 01

  I went the one best way, dude.

• 37:58Speaker 00

  There's no one, there is no one, that's the great thing about resistance training. There's a million ways to do it. You know, there's a million different modalities. You can use free weights, bands,

• 38:12Speaker 00

  pneumatics, you know,

• 38:15Speaker 00

  what have you, right? Still going to provide similar benefits. You could train heavy, you could train light, you could train fast, you could train, you know what I'm saying? Depending on your goal, it's going to provide benefits.

• 38:27Speaker 01

  Right.

• 38:28Speaker 00

  You know, for overall, for me, right now, like you said,

• 38:33Speaker 00

  I change up which muscle groups I'm doing in a workout. Right now, I split my body into two different workouts. I have a leg and shoulder day. And then I have a, everything else, basically chest, back, arms.

• 38:50Speaker 01

  Okay. And you're doing all of those on the same day?

• 38:53Speaker 00

  No.

• 38:53Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 38:54Speaker 00

  One, so two workouts, two different days. And then I typically train either four times a week with resistance training.

• 39:04Speaker 00

  Or sometimes even more.

• 39:07Speaker 01

  Five times a week?

• 39:07Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 39:08Speaker 01

  And are you, are you intentionally doing cardiovascular training or are you getting that through your weight training?

• 39:12Speaker 00

  I get a bit of it through my weight training, but I also do, you know, I like hiking, do.

• 39:19Speaker 01

  Well, that's the best way to get it.

• 39:21Speaker 00

  Yeah. Interval training. I, you know, I mix it up.

• 39:25Speaker 01

  For the greatest hypertrophic effect in the least amount of time, where does the research say the greatest benefit is from? Training to within one rep a max?

• 39:34Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 39:35Speaker 01

  Drop sets, what does it say?

• 39:36Speaker 00

  Yeah, I would, and again, it's just going to depend on the, on the individual, right? Somebody who's advanced is going to want to do drop sets and go to failure. Somebody who's got a year or less under their belt, close to failure is, is plenty.

• 39:54Speaker 01

  And, and, and you're a big fan of consistency over time versus high intensity for short periods of time. And you talk about programming for the middle aged lifter is way different than programming for the twenty two year olds.

• 40:06Speaker 00

  For sure.

• 40:07Speaker 01

  So how do those differ?

• 40:08Speaker 00

  So I, I would say for the middle aged and older, you want a more.

• 40:16Speaker 00

  Well-balanced fitness routine, right? Like when you're young, you might have like, oh, I want to be, you know, stronger or faster because I play pickup basketball or, you know, whatever it is, right? I skateboard, I do some of this. As you're, as you get older, I'm 50, right? Will I be able to get my biceps any bigger? Probably not, right?

• 40:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 40:41Speaker 00

  Will I be able to bench press anymore? Probably not. Will I be able to run any faster than I can right now? Probably not, right? So instead of trying to focus on like one goal and maximize that whatever it is, whether it's the strength, right? As you're aging, right? What is important? Mobility, right? Maintaining muscle, metabolic health.

• 41:10Speaker 01

  Not getting hurt.

• 41:11Speaker 00

  Right?

• 41:11Speaker 01

  It's a big one.

• 41:13Speaker 00

  Right? And so the older person, I think, needs more variety. And in fact, there's research suggesting that those who work out with more variety versus I just lift weights or I just run have more longevity.

• 41:33Speaker 01

  So it's actually the variety. Yeah. And another, I think, really hot area is gene regulation research. And I know you have some core competency in this myostatin inhibitors and some folistatin gene therapy. And these seem very promising to me. I don't know where you fall on that, but folistatin, for example, inhibiting, you know, myostatin, which is what stops our muscles from growing, for lack of better words.

• 42:02Speaker 00

  It's a governor.

• 42:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, governor.

• 42:04Speaker 00

  It's like a governor on muscle growth.

• 42:05Speaker 01

  Yeah. So taking the governor off of muscle growth, where do you fall in some of these gene therapies? And do you see those becoming a little more mainstream?

• 42:14Speaker 00

  I think it's very exciting. I don't know about it becoming mainstream anytime soon, but who knows?

• 42:19Speaker 01

  But what are you excited about?

• 42:20Speaker 00

  What the future?

• 42:21Speaker 01

  In the gene therapy?

• 42:21Speaker 00

  Well, you know, when I was a teenager, I used to eat fertilized eggs. Do you know why? Because of the folistatin, which reduces myostatin, right? And so all these bodybuilders, because no one else knew, right? Swore you had to buy fertilized eggs.

• 42:42Speaker 01

  What is a fertilized egg?

• 42:44Speaker 00

  Egg that's been fertilized. That's, you know, that can grow a chicken versus the ones you get at

• 42:50Speaker 01

  Right, okay.

• 42:51Speaker 00

  At the grocery store, right?

• 42:53Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 42:54Speaker 00

  Because of the folistatin.

• 42:57Speaker 01

  So how do you buy fertilized eggs?

• 42:59Speaker 00

  Very exciting. In fact, there was a company that came out with a myostatin inhibitor

• 43:07Speaker 00

  from egg yolk, right? That's what they got, the folistatin. However, was it defective, right? There's research that shows if you take a myostatin inhibitor, like folistatin, like this one supplement company, the exact, the exact product, it dropped myostatin by about 40%.

• 43:32Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 43:32Speaker 00

  In middle-aged men, right?

• 43:34Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 43:35Speaker 00

  Impressive, right?

• 43:36Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 43:36Speaker 00

  However, the product didn't sell that well. I tried it, didn't do much for me either. Why? Well, I'll tell you why. Do you know how to lower myostatin? Working out.

• 43:50Speaker 01

  Lowers myostatin?

• 43:51Speaker 00

  In creatine, by about 30 to 40%.

• 43:54Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 43:55Speaker 00

  So if you take a person who's already working out, already taking creatine, they've already lowered their myostatin levels by 30 to 40%. Will this ingredient lower it anymore? No, it doesn't appear to. Will gene therapy? Yes.

• 44:13Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 44:13Speaker 00

  That's different, right?

• 44:15Speaker 01

  Because that's a direct shut off of the gene.

• 44:18Speaker 00

  Turning on and off.

• 44:20Speaker 01

  Right.

• 44:20Speaker 00

  Versus trying to.

• 44:23Speaker 01

  Because I, you know.

• 44:24Speaker 00

  Turn it off. So I'm very excited. I'm very excited about, you know, and you've seen the the case studies of these infants that have, you know, both myostatin genes have been turned off, you know, and they're like.

• 44:38Speaker 01

  Muscular, yeah, yeah. Little infants, you're right. Yeah.

• 44:42Speaker 00

  So I'm, you know, very excited. I wish I had that.

• 44:47Speaker 01

  Access to. So are there any good folistatin gene therapies that are really available today? When I went down the rabbit hole of it, it's like, you gotta go to Nicaragua or like, there's one place in the world where you can actually do these because they're not approved.

• 45:01Speaker 00

  It's just too early in the game, you know what I mean, to really pinpoint where, but it's exciting, you know, it's, it's exciting.

• 45:08Speaker 01

  What else on the gene front are you excited about, if anything? Because I've heard Dr. Mike talk about some of these new gene therapies and I don't profess to remember the names of some of these, but about how these could potentially replace a lot of these anabolic steroids that bodybuilders are using to gain this kind of muscle mass.

• 45:31Speaker 00

  Insulin growth factor.

• 45:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, instead of the old school, just Anavar and Tren and testosterone and Deca and all of these other things which have clear side effects, especially the long term.

• 45:45Speaker 00

  Yeah, but we don't know what, you know, changing this gene could also.

• 45:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, it always freaks me out a little bit too. Like CRISPR kind of freaks me out a little bit. It's got a lot of promise to like delete genetic mutations, but then how far do we take it when we start like designing the genome?

• 46:00Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 46:00Speaker 01

  And, you know, against our, you know, the natural intention for this replicatory cycle.

• 46:06Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 46:07Speaker 01

  You know, and it seems like every time we really mess with mother nature, something really bad happens. I remember growing up, I grew up on the Chesapeake Bay and there was, you know, they, they, they wanted to add, get more oxygen into this estuary, which is a mixture of like saltwater and freshwater. And so it used to be fertile for like oysters and crabs and, you know, Maryland crabs. I mean, I grew up on Maryland crabs. And so a bunch of scientists put this algae into the bay, coated the whole bottom of the bay, blasted the oxygen content up in the water, and then dead fish were floating everywhere for years. I mean, it just jacked up the whole ecosystem.

• 46:46Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 46:47Speaker 01

  And I feel like we might be going down that road in human beings if we, if we jump on the bandwagon too soon.

• 46:52Speaker 00

  You know, that's why, you know, I always have concerns. Anytime there's something promising, it's like, well, what else is it going to do is, is what I always think, you know?

• 47:02Speaker 01

  So, so in general, let's get back to the middle-aged male versus the 22-year-old male. Because I'm middle-aged and I work out with both of my sons who are in their early to mid twenties. And I love working out with them and I actually feel great. My joints don't hurt and I perform in these workouts and I love.

• 47:20Speaker 00

  I say the same thing. I feel very lucky that I have very few joint issues.

• 47:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, because I've had them in the past. You know, I've had an ACL injury, I've had low back injuries. I mean, that is the worst, right? So I mean, for me, number one is like, don't get hurt.

• 47:32Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 47:33Speaker 01

  Because that, and then that sets you back, I mean, if you get an injury, it sets you back six months. It's a year before you really get back to where you were.

• 47:39Speaker 00

  Especially at this age.

• 47:40Speaker 01

  Yeah. So what are, what are the big hallmark milestones of, you know, middle-aged, let's call it 45 years and older versus early twenties for workouts? Is it volume? Is it weights? Is it the complexity of movements? You know, I own a CrossFit gym for a while and I saw a lot of people getting hurt doing complex, you know, Olympic lifts. I mean, those are not necessary either.

• 48:03Speaker 00

  No. Not in, you know, not in that design. You know what I mean?

• 48:08Speaker 01

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• 48:48Speaker 01

  A-I-O-N gear.com. And you can use code ULTIMATE for 10% off and start training smarter today. Now let's get back to the Ultimate Human Podcast.

• 48:58Speaker 00

  That's, you know, as an exercise scientist, you know, those are the things that are frustrating. It's like. I have many CrossFit friends, you know, and it's like, I, I, I love the value of CrossFit. What, what I think CrossFit did well is it opened up Olympic weightlifting to everyone. Now, on the flip side, do we want to really open up Olympic lifting to everyone? Because you have to be very proficient at it to, you can't just.

• 49:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, form is so critical.

• 49:30Speaker 00

  Go in there and whip out 30 reps while you're, after you've run a mile around the gym, you know, like.

• 49:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 49:37Speaker 00

  That's not how Olympic lifters train, you know, because you can get injured that way.

• 49:41Speaker 01

  Right. Yeah, and I saw it.

• 49:43Speaker 00

  You know, there's a better way to do it. Um, but anyway, but yeah, so on the middle age, you know, like I said, I'm more about being more proficient in all levels of fitness, your flexibility, your mobility, right, your strength, muscle mass, because we, we, we want to avoid as much sarcopenia as possible.

• 50:07Speaker 01

  Which is age-related, most of the time.

• 50:09Speaker 00

  Yeah. And so I'm, you know, as far as the actual workout design, obviously it's not just about age. It's also where is this person, are they just starting? Have they been working out for a year? Have they been working out for five years? Have they been working out all their life, right? Those are different, even though they're all 50, right? These are all different. Uh, they would require different workouts because it's more about, about the individual. But on a, you know, on a basic breakdown, I would say a variety of repetitions. You want to do some heavy stuff, right? Because that's going to activate those fast stretch fibers.

• 50:50Speaker 00

  I think you want to do some lighter stuff as well for more endurance based, right? And, and lighter weight now is finding to be more hypertrophic, better for building muscle, right? But then I would also include yoga in your routine. I would also include cardio as well, so that you're getting all those areas. You're getting mobility, flexibility, cardiovascular, muscle, uh, building, strengthening, et cetera.

• 51:19Speaker 01

  Where do you fall into post-workout nutrition? Cause that's, that's, we have talked about an area where people get paralysis of analysis, the anabolic window.

• 51:28Speaker 00

  Right.

• 51:28Speaker 01

  Like, which I have heard has totally been thrown out.

• 51:30Speaker 00

  And so Brad Schoenfeld is the, is the one, and Brad is a friend of mine, you, you probably know the name.

• 51:37Speaker 01

  I do.

• 51:39Speaker 00

  Who, who published that study? Now, it's, it's a study of studies, as we talked about, right? To conclude that maybe the post-workout window isn't as important as we once thought, right? But the studies are only as good, the, the study can only be good as the studies. And the problem with sports nutrition research and bodybuilding research is there just hasn't been enough of it done, you know? Most of the research that's done, like with carbohydrates and, and post-workout is for endurance athletes and looking at if they have carbohydrates immediately after, how do they perform the next day?

• 52:18Speaker 00

  And, and so we've taken all this indirect data and tried to apply it to how a bodybuilder should train and eat, right? And so Brad did this meta-analysis on all these studies in post-workout nutrition, finding that maybe it doesn't really matter. However, in the same note, he will say, I would never tell a professional athlete to not eat immediately after they work out. I would never, this is, this just means the average Joe and Jane who want to go to the gym, do not need to down a protein shake as soon as they're done working out. Okay?

• 52:59Speaker 01

  To catch the better, uh, anabolic window.

• 53:02Speaker 00

  As long as they eat within, you know, an hour is fine, right?

• 53:06Speaker 01

  Right.

• 53:07Speaker 00

  An NFL lineman, would I say the same thing to him? Brad would say, no, I would tell him to eat.

• 53:15Speaker 01

  As soon as he could.

• 53:16Speaker 00

  You know, and so the, the, the whole, the post-anabolic window is dead thing has been overplayed because it's really, look, if you just want to be fit and healthy, you don't need to run home and get your protein shake ASAP. Does a professional athlete want to do that? Probably.

• 53:40Speaker 01

  Right. Okay. That makes a lot of, that makes a lot of sense to me.

• 53:43Speaker 00

  And that's Brad's own, that's Brad's own words.

• 53:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. And then.

• 53:47Speaker 00

  And, and, and I parrot that. Would I tell somebody who wants to gain an extra quarter inch on their biceps? Is that important to them to not eat right after? No, I would suggest eat. And, and the other way to look at that is to build muscle, right? You need so many times in the day where you spike muscle protein synthesis, right? And, and what the research is showing is three meals is better than two. Okay? Four might not be better than three, but three appears to be better than two, right? So you need to get at least three good, high protein meals in a day to maximize. So if you work out and then wait three or four hours to eat,

• 54:33Speaker 00

  that's going to lessen the number of windows you can have. So my take is eat right as soon as you can.

• 54:42Speaker 01

  Right, as soon as you can.

• 54:43Speaker 00

  You know what I mean?

• 54:43Speaker 01

  So what are the, from a supplementation perspective, what are the important ones to get the timing right on?

• 54:50Speaker 00

  The, the timing right would be, and again, it, you know, it depends on the goal for all these. Cause like, you can argue with creatine, right? I would take it with a meal. However, many people take it on an empty stomach and, and it serves them well. Like I said, there's a difference of about 30 or 40% more uptake into the muscle when you have it with a meal.

• 55:12Speaker 01

  Okay. Okay. So maybe increase your dose if you're taking it fasted.

• 55:16Speaker 00

  Yes, you could still, right? You could still get benefits from it.

• 55:22Speaker 00

  Something like beta alanine, for example, right? Which helps, it helps buffer, uh, acidity in the muscle to help prevent fatigue, right?

• 55:33Speaker 00

  That one I would take before you work out, okay? Because of what it does.

• 55:39Speaker 01

  Beta alanine?

• 55:39Speaker 00

  Yes. Beta alanine, I like taking before, um, because.

• 55:44Speaker 01

  And what's the dosage for that?

• 55:46Speaker 00

  You want to get about around three to four grams per day.

• 55:50Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 55:50Speaker 00

  And it's kind of like creatine where you want to take it repeatedly because you need to reach a certain level, right? But despite that.

• 55:57Speaker 01

  Not the three or four grams first thing in the morning, saying gram, gram, gram.

• 56:01Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 56:02Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 56:02Speaker 00

  But it also, um, is a bit like caffeine where it gives you a little bit of a pick-me-up, a slight one. And so people who take it at night may notice they can't go to sleep. And so I'll typically recommend that one either earlier in the day or before they work out.

• 56:19Speaker 01

  Okay. Beta alanine.

• 56:20Speaker 00

  Things like that.

• 56:21Speaker 01

  So if the FDA were to outlaw all but three to five supplements tomorrow, which would be the, which would be the three to five that you'd say, these are kind of must haves? If you're on this strength training journey, I think that the data is very clear now. Muscles are metabolic currency, leg strength, grip strength, VO2 max clearly correlated to longevity, decrease in cardiovascular risk, you know, um, mitigating a lot of the major risks of older age. Falls being probably the greatest.

• 56:57Speaker 01

  So what would be those three or four must haves to sift, sift through the noise? Sounds like creatine is one of those.

• 57:02Speaker 00

  Definitely for.

• 57:03Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 57:04Speaker 00

  Top of the list.

• 57:05Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 57:06Speaker 00

  Definitely creatine.

• 57:07Speaker 01

  Beta alanine.

• 57:07Speaker 00

  Safety and.

• 57:08Speaker 01

  Safety and effectiveness.

• 57:09Speaker 00

  Beta alanine, uh, for an athlete, I would probably say yes. For someone who's just looking for health and fitness, I don't think it's that critical.

• 57:21Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 57:21Speaker 00

  Something like fish oil, right? I would say that's not as critical because you can get that from whole foods, right? Something like that.

• 57:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm a big fan of omega three.

• 57:29Speaker 00

  I would say branched chains or essential amino acids. I, I would put on that list because as we talked about, you're only getting, you know, maybe 50 to 60% of the amino acids from your whole food meals, right? And so for somebody who's older, who just wants to spike your muscle protein synthesis more.

• 57:49Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 57:50Speaker 00

  Being able to take those, like I said, branched chains or the essentials, which are providing the branched chains as well, is going to be important. Um,

• 58:00Speaker 00

  what else do I have on that list?

• 58:02Speaker 01

  I also want, well, I'll let you finish that list and then I want one, one final question for you on one particular nutrient.

• 58:10Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's hard to come up with a list because like you said, supplements are more goal-oriented, right? So it depends on the person, you know, like it would be different for an athlete versus a 60-year-old who just wants, you know, to maintain longevity.

• 58:27Speaker 01

  So then.

• 58:28Speaker 00

  However, creatine would be the one.

• 58:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, creatine. Don't let them outlaw that one.

• 58:32Speaker 00

  You know, is really the, the list, you know, that, the one that everybody should really.

• 58:38Speaker 01

  Must have. Um, where do you fall on, or do you have an opinion on NAD? NAD plus?

• 58:46Speaker 00

  Yeah, I think it can be very effective.

• 58:49Speaker 01

  Do you take it?

• 58:50Speaker 00

  As NMR, right?

• 58:51Speaker 01

  Nicotinamide mononucleotide?

• 58:53Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 58:54Speaker 01

  Or nicotinamide riboside?

• 58:55Speaker 00

  And if you infuse it or orally.

• 58:58Speaker 01

  Well, let's take like an oral.

• 58:59Speaker 00

  I would do it.

• 59:00Speaker 01

  In your supplement stack, right?

• 59:02Speaker 00

  I would do the NMR versus NAD.

• 59:04Speaker 01

  Nicotinamide mono, uh, nicotinamide riboside?

• 59:08Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 59:08Speaker 01

  Nicotinamide mononucleotide, the NMN?

• 59:11Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 59:12Speaker 01

  Uh, NMN. Okay. So NMN. Um, I think I would absolutely agree with you. I think Dr. David Sinclair would agree with you too. Like increasing our body's ability to make it naturally rather than just taking it in. And I think there's some.

• 59:26Speaker 00

  And that's, as you were talking about, as we get older, that's one of the things that will decrease.

• 59:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. The liposomal versions I see from like symbiotica and some are phenomenal. Those are the ones that I notice and they actually, I think the liposomal deliveries for, for nutrients like that are critical because a lot of those are just denatured, first-class metabolism. You'd probably agree with that too.

• 59:49Speaker 01

  So I, there's, you know, I appeal to so many audiences, but I rarely talk to the guys that are like my age. And I actually want to look more like you look than what I look, so I'm, I'm going to follow your advice.

• 1:00:02Speaker 01

  Maybe I'll even start taking some of your supplements. But I wind down all my podcasts by asking my guests the same question. And there's no right or wrong answer to this. Um, but what does it mean to you to be an ultimate human?

• 1:00:14Speaker 00

  What it means to me to be ultimate human is to perform at my best that I can at that time, right? Whether, you know, I may have certain injuries or limitations, right?

• 1:00:29Speaker 00

  It's the performance, but it's also about how I treat other people. I, I think it's just being kinder to people is important to me.

• 1:00:41Speaker 01

  We could use a lot of kindness in this world right now.

• 1:00:44Speaker 00

  Right.

• 1:00:44Speaker 01

  For sure. Well, I've got a lot of VIPs waiting for you in the other room. That got a bunch of questions for you. If you're interested in becoming a VIP and joining my VIP community, getting one-on-ones with me and getting into some of our private chats and using the Gary, Ask Gary Anything AI, which I can look at your blood work and look at your gene testing, evaluate your supplement stack. You can head over to theultimatehuman.com/vip and join my VIP community. I would love to see you in there. Jim, this has been, uh, amazing because you're, you're clearly walking the walk and, and talking the talk. I think your background is very unique in the industry.

• 1:01:19Speaker 00

  Thank you.

• 1:01:20Speaker 01

  And, you know, your grasp of supplements and what's effective, what's not. I definitely want to continue to follow your journey. I hope you'll come back on the Ultimate Human Podcast at some point in the future. And until next time, guys, that's just science.