Ross Edgley

00:00Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. Thank you. My man brought 18 year old. That's good. Woo. That's the real deal. 18 year old single malt scotch whiskey. That's smoky. Delicious. That's smoky. I had a, this is a true story, I had a deal set up for a whiskey deal. Like they wanted to do, you know, they do these things like with celebrities. And I was like, well, a lot of money. I guess I could do it. All right, let's do it. And so they said that they could help me like design the whiskey. I'm like, oh, that'd be really cool. So first I wanted to do it with Buffalo Trace. But Buffalo Trace was like, look, we love you. But the reality is our whiskey takes like eight years in a barrel, period. like this that's the only way they do it oh that makes sense that's why it's so good okay that

01:02makes sense so i tried this whiskey and i was like oh it's pretty good it's pretty good i tried gave it to my friends like it's pretty good and then i fucked up and i had some 18 year old scotch and it was so good i'm like i can't lie if if i'll say this is my favorite whiskey but that will be a lie because this is so much better. There's no substitute for time. No. There's no substitute for time in those barrels. That tastes like Scotland as well, doesn't it? I remember one of the writers, when I was on news radio, he exposed me to this stuff. He said, do you like whiskey? I'm like, it's okay. It's kind of nasty. You just do it to get a buzz, right? He's like, no, no, no. He was very specific. You have a large cube of ice. He's like, come on, let me buy you a $200 whiskey. I'm like, what? $200 for a fucking glass he's like yeah yeah yeah trust me trust me and so he bought me this glass I was like oh oh okay

01:56it was 200 pounds it's a different thing if you drink a 20 year old whiskey it's a very different thing so it cost me who knows how much money because I gotta get out of the deal and they're like what and I was like I can't lie I can't lie and say this is my favorite I could if I was poor Look, if I was broke, I could lie. But I have a lot of money, so I'm like, I'm not lying. To the sanctity of whiskey. I respect that. Because this is, they figured it out. Like, the Irish and the Scotch, the Scots, they figured it out. In Scotland, this is like a religious thing. Yeah, for sure. They don't fuck around. For sure. You get some really old Scotch, man. Really old Scotch whiskey has a very distinct taste. And they're willing to wait fucking 18 years to get that taste. That's crazy. That just reminds me of Scotland.

02:52We had to stop the podcast before the podcast even started because we were talking about so much cool shit. I'm like, I'm going to leave the room because I don't want us to miss any of this. So, first of all, you were telling me you swam around 60 hours in Loch Ness? Yeah. Speaking of Scotland. This is strange because obviously it was seven years ago now when we caught up when I swam around Great Britain. God, that was seven years ago. Weird, right? Wow. Right? And then now I've just been on this kind of strange career trajectory, if you can call it a career, in inverted commas. So we did a 60-hour nonstop swim in Loch Ness. It was going well. So it was all for ocean conservation. We raised so much money. It was amazing. It was going well up until the 60-hour point. Started hallucinating, started seeing things. Basically, the only way I can describe it is you're looking through the eye of a needle.

03:41It's just getting smaller and smaller and smaller, and then it just went completely black. It just went completely dark. Did you black out? Yeah, blacked out. Basically, it was hypothermia mixed with cellulitis. So cellulitis is skin infection. Staph infection. Exactly. Exactly. From the wetsuit that was just getting to my bloodstream. Oh, God. You had a staph infection, and at the same time, you were hypothermic? Yeah. And at the same time, you'd been up for three days? Yeah, exactly. It was a bad place to be, Joe. It was a bad place. That's so crazy. In the middle of life. 60 hours of swimming is so insane. 60 hours of running is insane. But you could stop running and take a nap. You know what I'm saying? It was so bad. with the Loch Ness Monster. It was bad. It was bad. Do you think that's real? I mean, something touched my leg when I was in that. But you were hallucinating. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's true.

04:26I'm not the best person to ask. But exactly what you just said there was strange because my skin was on fire from the cellulitis. But then I could feel in my bones. I was getting so cold. Anyway, long story short. Oh, my God. Blacked out. I woke up and just thought, oh, there we go. Yeah. Oh, there you go. Oh, that's all over your back and your neck. Yeah, you can see. So you're just ridden with staph infection. Yeah, that's how bad it was. Oh, that's horrible. And I think it was that coupled with the hypothermia. So this is going to sound so strange, but it went completely black. I remember waking up, and then I was in the hospital. So did they have to scoop you out of the water? Yeah, yeah. Do you have someone beside you with a net? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We had a team. They were amazing. They scooped me up. I look. I basically open my eyes.

05:08The next thing I know, I see my mom and my girlfriend ahead of the hospital bed. And I just went, oh, it's not gone well, has it? And they were like, Ross, no, it's not going well. You woke up in the hospital room. Yeah. Wow. So the entire transport to the hospital, you were out cold. Yeah. Yeah. How long were you out cold for? They think about 13 hours. Yeah. You were out cold for 13 hours? Yeah, coming in and out. I don't say it proudly, sort of coming in and out of consciousness. I still sort of remember little bits. But then, like I said, the main thing was just being there with my mom and my girlfriend. And they were just, they looked disappointed. I was like, I'm so sorry. So from there, what's interesting, a year later in Lake Tresemino in Italy, we did another swim for charity. It was amazing. Everything was organized.

05:48But because of Italian bureaucracy, they said you have to do it on this particular day. Getting into the water, it was 36 degrees. I don't know what that is in Fahrenheit, but hot. It was a bath, basically. We got caught in a heat wave. So going in there, I had hypothermia before. Now I have hypothermia, so heat stroke. So you're like swimming in a hot bath Basically What is 36 degrees in Fahrenheit? Is that like 90 degrees? Yeah, 96.8 96? Holy shit, that's crazy What is there, a fucking volcano in there? This is it So they said it was the hottest month ever recorded in Italy I got caught in this It's gotta kill fish, no? Yeah, it was, I was swimming past fish that had been boiled alive Oh my god By the way, go back to that picture Jacked jack son that was after i you look like the real live wolverine in that picture it's like if marvel comics if wolverine that's what it looked like you can see the chafing on

06:46my shoulder there but no cellulitis thankfully yeah thank god so this is um that was iceland yeah yeah and i think what's interesting why did you why do you think you got cellulitis from the water in scotland they think because it was fresh water right yeah yeah that makes sense The swim around Iceland, for instance, just as bad. It was so bad. But equally, you just got salt water. Right. But it's not, doesn't have the bacteria content. It's exactly it. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Of course. Boy, fresh water's nasty. Yeah. It's nasty. But especially it, well, it wasn't 96 degrees. But if it was, imagine that. Yeah. Well, I think what was interesting is from then, trust me, so I got rhabdomyolysis there. So that's just muscle breakdown, basically. You got rhabdo too? Bad. Yeah, really bad. In Iceland or in Scotland? Well, certainly in Iceland, but in Italy. Yes. So I said hypothermia and cellulitis in Loch Ness.

07:39Fast forward a year. Then I got rhabdomyolysis and heat stroke in Italy. What's so strange, though? And this is, I'm aware this sounds a little bit twisted, but as a sports scientist, I'd obviously research the theory and philosophy of all this. Whereas actually subjecting my body to it, I was like, oh, cool. You know, this is what hypothermia feels like. And it was the same with rhabdomyolysis. So basically sitting here right now, just chilling, you know, not been trained or anything like that are creatine kinase so that's an enzyme that's responsible for muscle breakdown um so when it's in your muscles basically in your in your blood it says there's been some muscle breakdown sitting here right now it might be about 80 if we had a hard workout maybe 300 if you run a marathon 1000 if you run an ultra marathon maybe getting up to

08:214000 5000 at 10 000 your creatine kinase they are rushing you to a hospital at that point they're really worried about your kidneys that are just working overtime to try to filter it out. They said, Ross, yours is at 19,000, which is so weird for a sport where you are suspended in water. It's not even weight bearing. You shouldn't have this amount of muscle breakdown. So I think, thankfully, my kidneys did an amazing job. Shout out to my kidneys. Filled me out and got me out of the hospital in a few days. But I think what's so strange is that sort of a career then led me to swim around Iceland, where I just knew what rhabdomyolysis, hypothermia, cellulitis, I knew what all of those things were. So as a result, I kind of turned up in Iceland as this kind of bulletproof swimmer who was like, oh, it doesn't matter what it's going to throw at me, I'm going to understand.

09:13Oh, my God, dude, that is insane. And then we swam 1,000 miles around Iceland, which was amazing. When you were getting the hypothermia, they say that before people die, they get hot and they want to take their clothes off. Did you have that feeling? Exactly that. But I think part of that was the cellulitis as well because my skin felt like it was on fire. But then equally at the same time, I was shivering with my internal organs. It's a strange position. Did you take into consideration the possibility of cellulitis before you got into that fresh water? Did you know about it? No. You didn't know about it? I became an expert afterwards. I would want to research, like throw it in perplexity. Like what are the cons? What's the worst thing that can happen here in the water? What are the physical dangers I have to worry about with freshwater versus saltwater? Is the lock monster real?

09:59I should have researched that. I think what's weird, and I'm glad we started our catch-up like this, because I think so often people go, why do you do it? But I think now looking at the anthropology of us humans, the history of us humans across different cultures, different countries, we've always been doing this idea of self-discipline for self-discovery. You look at the marathon monks of Japan, for instance. Over seven years, over a thousand days, we'll almost do a marathon a day. Those guys in Mexico from the Born to Run book? Exactly. Taramaru, whatever. Yeah. They run either barefoot or with small homemade shoes they make from rubber tires and shit. Exactly. They make sandals out of retreaded tires. Exactly. I mean, it's weird as well, even going back further as well. I ended up doing a documentary ages ago. It's about 20 years ago now.

10:46did Irawaska for a week in the Amazon jungle with the Jamanao tribe. At the end of this week, as part of the initiation into manhood, we basically then, this is such a random story, but they kill the snake, and you have to bite the tongue out of the snake. Pass. Hard pass. I'd rather be a boy forever. Fuck you. You can't tell me I have to eat a snake's tongue to be a man. Next thing you know, you've got to suck a pig's dick. You don't suck that pig's dick, you're not a real man. What? Says who? Says some fucking guy in the jungle who doesn't even have Starlink? Fuck you. Fuck you, buddy. How about you get a pair of Nikes? You don't even have shoes, you fucking idiot. I was young and impressionable. I didn't question it, so I did it. I bit the tongue. Joe, I bit the tongue. I would have bit the tongue, too. I'm just fucking around.

11:36I would have definitely bit that tongue, especially if they brought me in and put face paint on me and shit. That was it. I was caught up in the moment. I was caught up in the moment. I got a sidetrack when I was looking up people biting tongues of snakes Men get high from cobra bite on tongue It says they got high for at least a month Why'd you hate your life so much You sign up to get high for a month by getting bit on the tongue by a cobra You're like, fucking take me away, this job sucks I just want to be high We've all done things we regret Yeah, but that's off the charts No, that was bit on the tongue by a Cobra. I'd be like is there a way can I just grab the Cobra venom and put it on a fucking Q-tip It's after the astrologers nightmare advice they did it. Oh Astrologers nightmare advice. This might be a different story. Well, that's a different snake too, isn't that?

12:31That was probably the what I was doing. Yeah Deadly sniked by bit of man's tongue after an astrologer told him that performing a ritual with the serpent would stop his nightmares That is essentially what I did. Bro, where's that guy from? Say that name. Ross, you got it. Go for it. Gobichecheche do Palanum. That might be accurate. That's pretty goddamn good. That's a real world traveler, ladies and gentlemen. That's how they pronounce things. They roll their R's and shit. Can you put that back up, please? That was nuts. This is crazy. So this is the thing. So he wasn't lying. So this is a different snake. This is the Russell's Viper, one of the most common snakes to inflict bites on people in India. During the ritual, the man mimicked the snake's tongue flickering movements, which is when the incredibly deadly snake bit him on the tongue. Yo.

13:20After the snake bit the man, the priest attempted to make a cut in his tongue using a knife, which only worsened the pain. Shocker. I thought that would have fixed everything. The venom from the Russell's Viper usually causes cardiovascular complications, hemostatic abnormalities, renal failure. And is renal failure? What is that? Essentially, I think it's the kidneys basically know how they're doing their job shutting down. So internal organs just go. So like rhabdo. Yeah. Very similar. Very similar. Those who are bitten the treatment immediately. The man was rushed to a nearby medical center. Jesus Christ. Did that guy even get high? This was not. This was in the same. Surgery was performed probably for the cut on his tongue. Yeah, like who the fuck did you let cut your tongue dude also in India they get high off of this so as a

14:05Side-by-side story there. So this is the same snake or the Cobra different different People doing it so this see this makes me feel better, but here's my question. It does make me feel better, too But here's my question. What is the venom like can't you just rub it on your tongue? Can you put it on like a spatula or some shit? Oh Boy fella why no no, I didn't do that No, no, no. Imagine you do that and then all of a sudden you're in front of God and God's explaining the nature of life and the universe. It's a continuous cycle. And you've done this a million times before and you're getting better at it, but you're not done. And when you do get done, you will be God. Bye. That's amazing. I wish I'd have had that experience. Yeah. And it lasts three days. For three days, you're talking to God and God's coming out of a serpent's tongue. That's amazing. But we did that.

14:57But I think what was it, I didn't, as was slightly different to that. So basically after you had basically just, you know, tongued a snake, they turn to you and they go, okay, now you have the wisdom of the jungle, but you cannot speak for 24 hours. So everyone's just like that. Okay, we take a vow of silence. And then for the next 24 hours, one of the things that they had us do was climb a tree. So I disappear about four meters up this tree, holding on like that, completely naked. And they just start smacking the bottom of the tree. Naked. And I just get engulfed in fire ants. But can't make a sound. You can't make a sound. And they said, if you make a sound, the spirit of the snake will haunt you for the rest of your life. But if you don't make a sound, you'll be blessed with the wisdom of the jungle. How old were you? 21. Yeah, 21. Jesus. So was that the beginning of all this self-torture?

15:44I think it might have been. This has turned into therapy. How many times did you get bit by fire ants? Oh, loads. Did they get the nuggets? They get the whole thing? They got all the nuggets. They got all the nuggets. Damn, son. But I think it's interesting that when I talk about my swims... This kills fucking 60,000 people a year in India. What? Oh, my God. I would say you're lucky to be alive, clearly. Wow. Well, I don't know if it's the same snake. This is the Russell's Viper. Right, but he didn't get a Russell's Viper. He was in the Amazon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Mine seemed friendlier. The Indian thing seems insane, though. I don't know what's going on. They let it bite their tongue. I guess India like in certain parts of it life is so hard. They're like fuck it. I'll do anything You know what I mean? Like you see some of this the the scenes online of India and the the pollution in the rivers is so

16:40It's so preposterous You're like how did it get this bad where like entire rivers are filled with plastic? Like you don't see any water at all You just see plastic and they see people just dumping their stuff into that river you like Like, is there no adults in the room? Like, how the fuck did this happen? There's no other way. There's no other way to do this than to dump all the plastic in the river and everyone's in agreement. This is crazy. Like, what the fuck? Give me the snake. I'll take that snake. That's my way out. Let's go. I want to talk to God. How many times do I have to do this? Forever? This is, how many times have I done it? Hundreds of thousands? Oh, no. I thought it was unique. Oh, my God. There's pictures. What do you got? Oh, I don't want to. Show me. Let's go. Oh, boy. Necrosis of the tongue. Oh, no. Oh, God.

17:29These assholes, they get their tongue rotted out because that's one of the things that venom does. That's why, like, when a rattlesnake bites you, it's so dangerous. It's not just the venom can kill you, but it also rots all the fucking tissue around where the bite is. I saw this poor guy. He got bitten, and he had multiple reconstructions of his arm, and he documented it all online. And this was quite a while ago. It was like the early days of the internet. But this guy did this documentation of what his arm looked like from the time he got bit by this rattlesnake to like eight surgeries later. Crazy. Think DraftKings isn't available in your state? Think again. The cage is set and DraftKings keeps the full card at your fingertips in one sports app live in all 50 states. Once the cage door closes, everybody has a pick.

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19:07One non-withdrawable reward redeemable. Terms at dkng.co slash offer. Limited time offer. Nationwide based on sportsbook predictions and free-to-play sports contest availability. Varies by state. So this guy's doing it to his tongue. Oh, I think it's weird as well. This is going to sound so strange, but I think sometimes that, that granted is strange because it's voluntary. But again, this is a weird example, but I was living with the, in Olonyok, so in Siberia, with the Avenki herders out there. And I think so often we've become too civilised. We kind of have civilisation over survival. You know, and there's certain things that they do, whether it's, they rely on the reindeer, they kill them, they have them for their milk, butter, make all sorts out of them. But this one particular story, I'm going to apologise in advance now. but to manage the amount of reindeer that they have in these huge herds,

19:53they basically said to us, look, we need to basically castrate some of the male reindeer because they're fighting. So we still need them, but we need to castrate them. I was like, okay, that's a bit off key, but give me the knife, and I'll do whatever you need to do. And they said, no, no, no, no, we'll stop you there, Ross. We actually do a form of semi-castration. So we just want to make them slightly more docile so they're not fighting as much. They do it with the teeth? Exactly that. Yeah, they grab them from behind, and they bite their nuts with their teeth. That's exactly it, yeah. So when I was out there, they said, would you like to perform it? I'm not proud of it. That's what I did. I understand that they have to do that, like the way they gelled horses. You know, they do that with horses as well. I understand it. But I don't want to be a part of that. I won't even do that to my dogs.

20:38Like I went to a veterinarian once and she literally cradled my dog, Johnny Cash. I had this mastiff named Johnny Cash. He was the best. and this lady cradled his balls. She goes, what are these? Why are these here? I go, well, those are his testicles and he was born with them and that's how his body produces testosterone. And she's like, wouldn't it be responsible to have him neutered? And I was like, why would that be responsible? He's not having unnecessary babies. Why do you want his body to not produce testosterone? Is it because there's a narrative? Is it because you profit off of it? Fortunately for me, I had a doctor when I first moved to Los Angeles, a veterinarian. who was an, I mean, this guy was an animal lover. I mean, he was like a dog whisperer. I brought my dog in and immediately he was like my dog's best friend. And I said, should I get him fixed?

21:27He goes, no, there is no, he goes, you have a fence. Your dog's not going to hop out and make puppies that aren't going to be taken care of. If you're a responsible dog owner, don't get your dog fixed. I go, really? I thought it was like for their health so they don't get cancer. He goes, complete horseshit. He goes, if dogs get cancer, it's most likely probably from really bad food. They're eating shitty food just like people get cancer. You know, not a lot of animals get cancer. It's not a lot of normal. Well, Tasmanian devils do. But they get cancer from biting each other. They're one of the weirdest cases of cancer. They have a transmissible cancer. Like Tasmanian devil from the cartoon. You ever seen those fuckers in real life? Yeah, yeah, yeah. They have the craziest sounds. Anyway, my point is don't cut your nuts off your dog if you're a responsible dog owner. Because they get tired.

22:14Even Huberman, we were talking about Huberman before, he did it to his bulldog and he felt bad, so he started giving his bulldog testosterone. He said, yeah, when I caught up with him, yeah. Is it true as well? Sharks don't get cancer as well. They've got these crazy immune systems. Yeah. Yeah, sharks. Also, they don't have bones. It's like we're so distant from them. They're so old. My God. So, yeah, I went swimming with Great Whites of Tasmania. What? Oh, my God. What? Where? Yeah, you'll be aware of this as well. Tasmania. Yeah. So, outside Australia, the real ones. Yeah. The real ones. Those are the OGs. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They get big. They stop growing. The females, certainly, they stop growing in length at a certain point and they just get bigger. It's just a submarine with teeth. Like New Zealand rugby players.

22:53Exactly like that. Exactly like that. It is nuts. So they explained to me, they basically said they have something called the Ampulli of Lorenzini. So they're able to pick up electrical impulses. Is your heart beating quick? Are you twitching? Do you look like prey? Oh, Jesus Christ. I was down there with some very experienced divers as well. We dived and we swam with them. On the dive, when we went down about 40 feet, what was nuts is they immediately knew that I was the weakest link. They immediately knew that I was kind of out of my depth when it came to diving. And they all just started swimming towards me like that. Oh, boy. And they're just going, Ross, Ross, I'm not saying square up to it, but please stop breathing so heavy and acting like prey. So in that moment, it was just strange how we had a conversation, but it was obviously nonverbal and across species.

23:38that it was looking at me, came straight up to me. I sort of tried. Again, I'm not saying I squared up to it, but kind of was like, can I help you? And then it just went, all right, you're okay. Well, you didn't panic. No. And if you panicked, that might have been the end. Yeah, but just the way that they, like I said, described that ampullae of Lorenzini, that they are just looking at me. There is this apex predator with just like thousands of years, and it's downloading data on me. And it just knew. Ten of us down there, and it knew that I was the weakest link. geez yeah great it's probably so obvious right those other guys are so comfortable in the water they've done it a million times probably have a very low heart rate down there it's a novel experience for you and there's sharks exactly that my good friend adam greentree one of his

24:23buddies back home in australia got his head bit off by a shark he was he was uh spearfishing and he came out of a thing like like a crevice or something in the reef and a shark just didn't even see it coming just didn't even see it coming just popped out and the shark saw something that looked like food that was coming out of the reef because they're you know they're they're in the reefs looking for all sorts of whatever they eat whatever fish fuck up and you know are in the wrong place at the wrong time they're so damn scary because they're ambush predators as well yeah the tiger sharks off bahamas similarly yeah swimming with them and so often it's just enough to look at them as long as they can see your eyes they go okay you've seen me but the amount of time sometimes when we were down there and they're like ross have your head

25:08on a swivel because they were just calming up behind me and had i have not turned around 100 i wouldn't be speaking to you now oh yeah dude in hawaii they're a real problem man they're a real problem for the surfers you know whenever you hear about someone getting got it's a tiger shark there's a crazy video we played on here once this guy he's uh he's in a kayak and he's out in the middle of the ocean fishing and a tiger shark just slams into his kayak and you see its mouth wide open this big fucking head and it knocks the kayak sideways it's terrifying and he's screaming tiger shark tiger shark just here it is watch this watch this watch this speed of them watch this oh no bro fuck that fuck all that that that was a tiger yes yeah fuck all that look at this thing launch up imagine if he was an inflatable if he was in an inflatable that's a wrap you just got

26:05your shit popped by a tiger and now you're floating a mile offshore whatever the fuck is oh it's the same like bull sharks as well the bull sharks are just angry oh yeah experts like friends of mine have just said like they will just come over to you with with a white shark they're they're curious their taste buds are in their throats they'll come over nip you and they're just like oh sorry i didn't realize you weren't a seal the only problem is you're bleeding out. Whereas a bull shark, they'll just be like, I'm just in a bad mood. I'm just going to come over and just miss. Yeah, exactly. I talked to this dude in Florida. He said he will not spear fish anymore. He said they live in central, like central Florida. He said, when you're off the reefs, he said, it's so fucking dangerous. He's like, the bull sharks are all over the place now. Yeah.

26:47Because everybody's like, sharks are amazing. Stop the shark fin soup. Fucking serve it Okay, serve up monster dick soup. It should be everywhere. What the fuck are you talking about? You want to eat beautiful things like cows that are sweet and kind? You want to eat veal, but you won't eat monsters? You should be eating monsters monsters should be on every menu. If you can get fucking veal Scalopini at Italian restaurant, you should be able to get monster dick soup. They should sell that shit everywhere They should become our food. Fuck them Damn, fuck sharks. But further to that point, I would say that then I was completely out of my doubt. I've never felt more vulnerable in that moment. The only other time I felt vulnerable was I broke the record for the world's longest nonstop river swim. So it was 510 kilometers, 60 hours all the way down the Yukon River.

27:37We hit the Five Finger Rapids at one point. I basically kind of just got thrown against rocks, cut up pretty bad. So where does this start? In the Yukon? Yeah, yes. It was Whitehorse to Dawson. I hope I've got that the right way around. Yeah. So are you in BC? Like, where are you in? In Yukon. What is Yukon? It's Alaska. No, no, no, Canada. Canada. But it goes to Alaska. Yeah, yeah. If you continue with the Yukon River, it will eventually go to Alaska. So does it come down? What part of Canada does it come through? Oh, that's a good question. So it's cold as fuck, though, is my point. It's freezing. Yeah. And what time are you going there? We went like... Oh, here it goes. Oh, amazing. Jamie, show up. We went July. So the Northwest Territories. That's what they call it, right? Yeah. Is that what they call it? Yeah. And we just, it was, it's just the wild, wild west out there. And I, we took off, like I said, we started.

28:23Basically, what was so, so strange is for the first 24 hours, didn't see much in the way of wildlife. I got thrown against these whitewater rapids, got hit on the rocks. And that's why the back of my legs are still cut up now. And then from that, the rules are no one can touch you. You can't touch the boat. So I'm like, guys, I can't stop. So I just pull my leg out the water like this. And as I do, blood is just dripping out the end of my wetsuit. literally like clockwork as soon as that happened bears wolves everything i said what's happening and they said ross they can smell the blood you're like an ice cream van you're just advertising yourself to all the wildlife now in the yukon really yeah again now the black bears fine as you know they're skittish and it was so for me strange englishman first time dealing with bears

29:07the black bears were looking just like what are you i don't know a bit skittish the brown bears no they look at you very different so they look right through you so different they're just almost like sitting there just kind of look at and we had like i said a boat full of people we had protection on there and stuff but it just didn't care it was it was i was so aware was the brown bear i i would have no as an englishman who has no experience that i've done it just scarily big for me yeah it was big yeah and i just carried on swimming it was interesting how it was almost like it was looking going you're not a salmon but you're not a bear i don't know i wonder if you're hungry and i'll just i carry on so i turned to the guys i said guys am i okay am i safe shall i keep swimming thankfully one of the team turned around it wasn't even a gun it was like a cannon and they

29:53said ross don't worry if it gets too close to you it'll end up in my freezer i was like right that's what i wanted to hear we just carried on yeah i know you know um statistically you're more likely to get killed by a black bear. Well, no, that's not correct. Statistically, when a black bear attacks you, it's more likely in predation. Whereas when a brown bear attacks you, it's more likely surprised and it's defending itself or it's a mother with her cubs, which is the most dangerous. That's interesting. Just like in real life. You fuck with the ladies' kids. If you fuck with a grizzly bear and you come near its kids, they are terrifying. They run at you full clip. Most of the times when dudes get attacked and killed, that's where you fucked up. You run into a 700-pound mama with her babies and a jaw that could just crush your head like a candy bar. Like, fuck you.

30:50And you can't run away from her and you can't climb up a tree. You can't do shit. And you just zigged when you should have zagged and you got too close to her kids. And she doesn't want to take any chances. So you just became food. Yeah. What was kind of strange? That's kind of, it was so weird going from the Yukon. And then a year later, we did the Iceland swim. And there were some of these old sort of modern day Viking chiefs who basically were explaining about the concept of a berserker as well. Berserker, obviously, just meaning bear shirt. Saying that these berserkers, these ancient Nordic warriors would so often just try to embody the spirit of the animal. And there was even the Ulfhafner, which are. It's called bear shirts. That's what berserker means. Yeah, bear pelt, bear shirt, basically. That's what berserker means. Wow. You learn something new every day, Jamie.

31:37So they would embody, literally, the spirit of the animal. Like I said, there was almost, from berserkers as well, there were almost like subcategories as well. So there were the, I hope I'm pronouncing it right, Ufhufna, which were the wolf warriors. And they were Odin's chosen warriors. There, there's stories of them just running into battle, no armor, basically naked, painted, biting down onto their shields as well and howling into the wind. You know they were also doing mushrooms. I know right? Yeah That was that was one of the things about those fellows berserker comes from the old Norse Berserker most likely meaning bear shirt a warrior wearing a bear skin exact etymology is disputed an alternative interpretation is bear shirt referring to fighting without armor Huh in plain English it means a frenzied warrior I guess you have to be a pretty frenzied warrior to kill a fucking bear back then

32:26You know, there was no rifle son. You had to do it in an intimate fashion If you're gonna kill a brown bear, you're gonna kill especially a male the ones in if you get to anywhere where the salmon live they get gigantic Which brought me to this terrible idea that I had that I really shouldn't put out there in the universe But if you wanted to have like the ultimate Really fucking dangerous jackass stunt you would put these guys in salmon suits and make them swim through when those bears are like catching those salmon that are going up the waterfall and those rivers where there's like nine ten of them i would watch it yeah put put the jackass guys i shouldn't have said it i shouldn't have said it because someone's gonna take i could see steve-o calling his fucking costume designer right now it's so true but it

33:14was so interesting as well because again swimming around iceland you hear stories of berserkers you know the famous one of stamford bridge no oh this is an amazing story 1066 i believe when norwegians were invading england stanford bridge basically the norwegians were retreating and as they were there was just this one lone berserker who just stood on the bridge with a massive axe and was just taking down just soldier after soldier they just wave after wave and took them down eventually it was somebody who actually went under the bridge and managed to stab him from underneath but it was known as the berserker of stanford bridge stab him from under the bridge that's how they got him yeah eventually but he was just like those guys in iceland that win those strongman competitions just imagine one of those guys with a battle axe you know imagine like the

33:58mountain from game of thrones with a giant wood and steel wood and iron fucking huge shield in front of him and an enormous battle axe that you couldn't even pick up and he's just hacking through people and everyone's watching their friends die so they're all in a panic and he's covered in blood and he's 400 pounds it's so true and i think even as well i mean i'm a huge fan of Gunnar Nelson as well. You know, you look at the history of just Icelandic athletes, warriors, and it's nuts. Yeah. Dude, Gunnar beat Jeff Monson in an absolute contest in Abu Dhabi when Gunnar fought in the UFC. I only think he's fought as a welterweight, correct? I think he's only fought at 170. Jeff Monson's like 250. Do you know who Jeff Monson is? Yeah, of course. He's a muscle. He's just muscle. His whole fucking body, like his shoulders start at the top of his head. He's fucking enormous.

34:55And Monson and the hymn, they went into an absolute, which is there's no weight classes in grappling. They still allow that. And he beat him, which is fucking insane. That is crazy. But it traces back to their culture as well. This is one thing that I loved when swimming around Iceland. That, for instance, you know the story of Odin and Ragnarok? Yes. At the end where, spoiler alert for those listening, Odin knew he was going to die in Ragnarok, the Norse apocalypse, but ran in anyway. Spoiler alert, he got eaten by a giant wolf. But this is what I loved, that the Icelandic and Nordic folklore is like, look, you can't control fate. Everybody believed that you were destined. That's already written for you. But it's how you can control your attitude towards it. And I think that's the thing that I've certainly found from Icelandic culture, that it doesn't matter if you are Gunnar Nelson

35:40going up against 250 Patmonster, you will just run into battle anyway. You know, that is your fate, but it's choosing your attitude towards it. Yeah. Yeah, well, that's very attractive to most people. Most men, they wish they could be like that. Damn, all shows like that. It's true. I mean, how many goddamn Viking shows have there been? There's so many Viking shows and Viking movies. Have you seen The Northmen, that movie? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Amazing. Yeah, and quite accurate, apparently, as well. Yeah, I bet it's accurate. Well, except for the supernatural shit. But again, mushrooms. Yeah, yeah, yeah. These guys are high as fuck all the time on psilocybin. Who knows what they were saying? And they – that's what's interesting is because like people assume that mushrooms make you peaceful.

36:21That's why the whole thing is so confusing because they really – for most people, they make you like more connected to everyone around you. Possibly, but it's unproven. The idea is that berserkers ate mushrooms before battle is a popular theory, not an established historical fact. There's no solid archaeological or textual evidence demonstrating drug use. Okay, so what is the – oh, it's Amanita Piscaria. But I've heard it also be psilocybin. I've heard that being proposed. You know, it's in that Viking show, I think. Can you put that back up, please? I think in the Viking show they talk about us or it looks like they're eating psilocybin. It doesn't look like Amanita Muscaria. Amanita Muscaria is like really obvious. It's a bright red with white dots on it. It looks like Santa Claus. The red one with the white spots, its effects don't nearly explain the battle fury.

37:13It can cause delirium, twitching, drowsiness, while violent aggression isn't typical. Yeah, even the delirium, twitching, and drowsiness, the problem with this explanation is it's not really known what Amanita Muscaria does. It's not a normal psychedelic, and it also doesn't seem to be as effective as it was at one point in time. So the theory is like Terrence McKenna's theory was that it's very variable, like a lot of things. are, like peppers are. Very variable in genetics, region, and maybe even seasonally, that you had to get these mushrooms from a very specific area. It's like you want Cuban cigars. There's some mushrooms in a very specific area that contained a much more potent version of whatever they do to you. But it's unclear. I'm going to eat a mascara is unclear. Psilocybin is very clear. No one eats that and goes, oh, I don't see it. But Amanita Mascara, it varies a lot.

38:13I've heard people having insane experiences on it, and I myself tried it, and it was almost nothing. Very little. It made you feel weird. But you're so right as well with that mixed with certainly being out in Iceland when you hear stories of elves, trolls. And then when you're out there, like I said, I started the swim. I had a blot ceremony. Basically just means that they blessed my journey as I swam around Iceland. and at the start they were talking about the different realms of Iceland as well. Do you know the story about the different guardians of Iceland? What are the different guardians? So basically the story goes that back in the day there was a foreign king who wanted to invade Iceland so he sent this sorcerer disguised as a whale to see where they could attack from. Went over to the west coast. There was a huge bull that is a representative of strength and power so you can't attack there.

38:59Went round to the north coast. Over the north coast, huge eagle that represents vision can see for miles. It was like, right, you can't attack there. East coast, dragon, realm of the dragon. Basically, dragons love fast flowing water. So there's loads of waterfalls, the East Icelandic current guns down there. And then on the south coast, there was a massive giant as well. Upon hearing this at the start during the blot ceremony, I was like, OK, that's a cool story. You get around the top of Iceland and all of a sudden birds are just coming down, dive bombing me. Like you get over to the east coast and you see some of the caves and the waterfalls. And I'm like, oh, for sure. If you were on mushrooms, I can 100 percent believe this. Yeah, it's amazing. And even now as well, if you're in Iceland and you see a road that is just like inexplicably curved and goes around, I'm like, what's happening there?

39:44That road makes no sense. It should just be going straight. And with a completely straight face, a lot of locals will say that's going through the elves' sacred land. We had to build around it. And I'll say, what do you mean? And they said we were trying to build a road. And then inexplicably, the machines broke down, the bulldozer broke down. We got some more in. So there's a lot of people out there who still believe in that. And I'm like, yeah, on mushrooms, I couldn't believe it. Well, think about, do you know the popular theory? There's a popular theory that consciousness is rendered, or rather reality is rendered by consciousness. And that consciousness renders reality much like a computer and a 3D game engine renders a game. So like if you're playing a game, like say if you're playing Halo, it doesn't have to render all these maps that you're not in. It's only rendering the map that you're in.

40:37Right. Right. So as you go into the new maps, then it starts to render it. So there's legitimate physicists that are entertaining the possibility that reality is not concrete and that reality is actually rendered by consciousness. And here's my thought. I don't know if this is accurate. I don't know if they're right. I don't know if they're wrong. It's weird and it makes sense, but reality doesn't make sense. Neither does the fact that the universe is infinite. So let's put all that aside. And God made us all in his image. Great. Let's put that aside and just stop and think about what is consciousness capable of rendering when it has access to science. It has access to all these different university courses you can take on biology. and evolution and the nature of the world and what causes the tide and what makes thunderstorms happen and all these different things that we know now.

41:33Now, imagine if those things didn't exist and all you have is just super hyper focused on nature, primitive people who have gods as an explanation for everything and they're on mushrooms. like if if consciousness really does render reality then well then the elves are real right because then because if you've done enough mushrooms you have encountered an entity you've encountered something that doesn't seem like you're making it up it seems like it's there all the time but you don't have access to it and then all of a sudden you're in front of it and if you're in a world where there's no explanations for anything because no one knows how to read okay You have a bunch of fucking weird grunts for your language. You have extra consonants and shit and all your words. Like, this is, and they're warrior people. And you're on mushrooms and you're respecting the elf land.

42:32So much so, you move your road around. 100%. That sounds better than today. I agree. I agree. I love what you said there as well. Because I remember at the start of my swim, I did a training swim. I'm toweling down afterwards, getting out of my wetsuit. and this like old old guy this old fisherman just comes out of nowhere first thing he says to me under the northern lights i'm looking up they're amazing they've just illuminated the entire sky i'm like wow looking up and he just comes over and just whispers in my ear and he just said they're probably deciding if you live or die and i went oh excuse me oh boy i'm sorry this asshole keeps swimming for 60 hours at a time he wants to die they probably saw right through you It just goes crazy. I said, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. What did you say? He goes, they're probably deciding if you live or die. I said, please, you're going to have to explain.

43:23He said that we believe that in an ancient Nordic folklore that basically the northern lights are the Valkyries, Odin's female warriors, and that is their shimmering shields and their swords as they're riding through the sky, looking down at the fallen to see who makes it back to Valhalla to dine with Odin. And I was, again, at the time, I was like, oh, that's a bit off-key. That's a bit off-key. 112 days later we swim obviously through the uh through the summer so there's less chance to see the northern lights because you get 24 hours of daylight and then right at the very end on the very very very last swim northern lights come up again it was weird and I'm on my back just like look if there's the Valkyries if Odin is listening thank you so much well if you again If you lived back then, you would think that your journey is complete.

44:15And so at the end of the video game, you get to see some cool montage of scenes and beautiful sights. And I mean, that's what happens in a movie. This is the end of the movie. You did it. That's what's weird about reality. Like this idea that consciousness is rendering reality. Again, I really don't understand it. I don't know if it's, I don't even know if it makes sense. Oh, there we go. In Iceland, respect the elves or else. Yeah, I'm respecting the fuck out of them elves. Okay, this rock they won't move. I'm not touching that rock the elves don't want to move. Yeah, I think they're real dude 100% I think they're real. I think you just can't see him normally It's a news crews tried to film the rock and every day time they tried to film it like it wouldn't record good Good fuck you Fake news fake news don't film the rock

45:07Yeah, the real news is there's fucking elves are real. They moved us to move the road Even TV crews said their cameras failed to record anything when pointed at the rock. I bet I go there Record the shit out of it with my iPhone Fuck you. How is there a picture of it? Fuck off You got a guy working for you that's an asshole. He's probably got his tongue bit by a cobra two days ago. The guy's tripping balls Fuck off Yeah, well that might have been a different rock. It's just fun. It's look fun Like whoever the guy was saying they're deciding whether you live or die. He's having fun It's a good time. Who is that guy? He was just an old fisherman. Yeah, that old fisherman was fucking with this cocky jack British guy. He's looking at you like, fuck you and your six pack. The elves are going to kill you. He could have been Odin. He's fucking with you. That guy was fucking with you 100%. Odin describes it.

45:55He disguises himself as an old man. Or he's an asshole. He's an old fisherman. He's fucking drunk every night. He's tired of life. He sees this beautiful young Englishman with a fucking manly beard and a six pack, just like a jack, ready to swim for days. He's like, fuck you. The elves are going to kill you. He wanted you to be nervous. He's like, this fucking dork. Fuck him. 80%. In the survey, over 80% of the respondents refused to deny the existence of elves. Wow. And 8% were certain they existed. Well, those guys are dangerous. The 8% are certain. Those are dangerous people. Those are religious fanatics. Put them back up, please. Those guys, they can't be trusted. How the fuck do you know? It's all about respect for nature, which is something Icelanders know is very much alive. I agree with that. Said Gunnel. What an Iceland name. Guy's name is Gunnel.

46:44But when your house can be destroyed by an earthquake, when you can be blown over by the wind, when boiling water from your taps tells you there's lava not far beneath your feet, then you don't mess with nature. Holy shit. They get boiling water from their taps sometimes? Yeah. What the fuck, man? Yes. Can you imagine going to sleep? You know that there's so much lava underneath your house that water is boiling coming out of your tap. You're like, good night. No deal. I wonder what's on Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. You're fucking sitting there staring at Kim Kardashian. No way. Caitlyn Jenner is on TV. Oh, they're all together again. You want this fucking lava under your feet. But that's Icelandic people. They're just hard as nails. I said this. It's like it's just a country that's trying to kill you. When we were there, actually, at the very end.

47:37And so I basically I made it back by three days for the birth of my first child. Congratulations. Thank you so much. That's awesome. That's a life changer, huh? It was amazing. Yeah, it was. But at the end, for instance, so my girlfriend, she's amazing. We've been together 13 years. And the University of Iceland said, look, if you can collect eDNA samples, environmental DNA samples around the coast of Iceland, we can track biodiversity in a level of detail we've never seen before. So we had them on board. We had sponsors on board. We had a boat on board. And then we found out we were pregnant. So I was like, oh. In America, we frown upon that we are pregnant. Oh, really? We frown upon that. She's pregnant? Yeah, she's pregnant. I'm pregnant. You definitely are pregnant. You definitely are pregnant. She's pregnant. And when I say in America, I mean me. I frown upon that kind of talk. She's pregnant. She's amazing.

48:27She just said, look, go, but you need to make it back. So we had that hard deadline. That's a good thing to say. You need to live. You need to survive. The Valkyries. You're about to have a baby. Don't swim for 60 days, you fucking asshole. Oh, my God. You have responsibilities. I know. But I think, and I've heard you talk about, you know, fatherhood and stuff. It invoked something in me, a level of motivation that I've never experienced before. It was just at the end. So we got caught in Hurricane Erin was coming through the Atlantic. So that was over the East Coast. We had 100 miles to finish. And in Grindavik, there was a volcano going off that had poisonous gas. We couldn't get too close to that as well. Inhale it, you're dead. And then here, there was one of Europe's largest glaciers that just sent shards of ice as big as this table. And at night, you just couldn't see it. You're just hitting them.

49:10Oh, my God. The team was like, look, Ross, I'm so sorry. We're going to be here for two weeks. And I was like, no, no, no. I'm so sorry. I need to get back. And it was that form of motivation at the end, just knowing you had that hard deadline. Jellyfish coming off my face, tongue falling off from saltwater exposure. It didn't matter. I was like, I'm not not being back for the birth of my son. I made it back, like I said, by three days. Wow. Yeah, but it got nuts. Well, it's a very primal feeling. It ignites something in you that does not exist in people that don't have children. I don't think. I don't think. I mean, I am very careful about this. I do not think you have to have children. I don't like to shame people that don't want to have kids. I don't like to shame people who never had kids. I think you can be a wonderful person and contribute to the world without children.

49:58But I could just say, for me, it changed who I am. It changed me in a very profound way. And I always bring up this Dave Chappelle quote, so I apologize to people who've heard it before. But he said something very profound once in the parking lot of the comedy store. He said, not only did having children change the amount of love that I have, he goes, it changed my capacity for love. I love that. Yeah, and it did that for me. And it also did for me this other very profound thing. It made me stop looking at people as a static thing. Uh, when I met, if I met a guy and he's 40 and he's an asshole, I'm like, fuck that guy's a fucking asshole. I don't think that way anymore. Now, I mean, sometimes I do if I'm short tempered, if I'm in a bad mood, if I'm, you know, I'm in a rush under stress, I can have slips. I'm not perfect at this. But when I'm at peace, I look at that guy as a baby. That's a baby.

50:52That's someone's little boy and shit didn't go well for him. There was a series of either bad decisions or bad experiences or bad parenting or bad judgment or bad luck. And now here he is. Just a fucking mess. And that's why I have a hard time seeing homeless people. It genuinely bothers me. I never see homeless people and I go, fuck that guy. I'll go fuck that guy if they're like getting close to my kids and they're being aggressive and they're schizophrenic. But most of the time I think that was somebody's baby. That's somebody's baby. I'm exactly the same. It completely changes your biochemistry. I was talking to Huberman about this, and really, hormonally, I felt... I was always a bit selfish, a bit single-minded in my swims and stuff. As soon as he arrived, I was like, that's it, everything changes. It was crazy. I think as well it was strange for me because I lost my dad as well four years ago,

51:44and then I was becoming a dad myself. So the Iceland swim sort of existed in this strange world between the two, and that was really sort of big for me. I even said, you know, in my new book, I talk about how it's kind of this idea that the swim was almost a tribute to everything that my dad had taught me, but equally a letter to my future son. You know, and I hope that they look at that and go, okay, yeah, all the values and everything that I was taught. Well, just living the way you live, just by example, would be an insane role model for your kid. I mean, you're a very unusual person. Your will is very odd. You know, the ability to do those kind of things, I respect greatly. I don't want to do it. I think it's retarded, but I respect it greatly. You know, I'm good friends with Cameron Haynes, and he runs a lot of these really insane 200, 300-mile races. And I respect it.

52:36I don't think it's good for you, but I get what he's doing. He's trying to find out where his breaking point is. He's trying to push himself to his breaking point. That is exactly it. And I admire that greatly because that is a noble quest. whether or not you think it's smart I don't I don't think it's smart but I don't want to do it but it is a noble quest it is a an absolutely noble quest and he is different than me we are all different and everyone has this thing in their head that they need to sort out and sometimes the way you sort it out is by doing something that's fucking insanely hard to find out who you really are I think and I think I like to do it a little bit every day that's my method my method is do a little bit every day when i say a little bit like a couple hours that's what i like couple hours of

53:21torture every day find out who i am and when i take a few days off i get nervous i get confused who am i i don't know i don't know if i could do this anymore you know what i mean you know those feelings yeah i'm sure you even get those as many times if you if you take a few weeks off working out oh and you start working out again you're like oh my god am i really gonna put myself through this again it's so true right am i really gonna go swim for six days again what the fuck is wrong with me you know so true but i was chatting to huberman about this because i i was just i'm so aware that my dopamine system probably works a little bit differently you know in that someone says oh let's go do a you know 24 hour swim i go yeah and then they go oh three days past bears i'm like okay hold my beer i'm in and i think that's what's so weird but but i know you and huberman

54:03spoke about with your anterior mid-cingulate cortex and that's the only way that i can actually for me it was so interesting chatting to him because in my head when your tongue is falling off or or you know you're just chafing cellulitis i think of it like weighing scales and you kind of got grit or quit pain and purpose and at any point the anterior mid-singulate cortex that part of your brain is just weighing them up yeah for me you just need as much pain as it is you just need to outweigh it with as much purpose yeah do that you'll continue if not and i think it's so i mean I love the UFC. There are certain fighters who, if you did a scan, 100% their anterior mid-singular cortex would just be like this. 100%. This episode is brought to you by Visible. As fall hits, we enter another season of change. Time to shift gears, drop the dead weight, and upgrade the wardrobe

54:55for the drop in temperature. But one thing that doesn't need to change? Your phone. The smartest upgrade this season isn't a new phone. It's a better wireless plan. Switch to Visible, the ultimate wireless hack. You get unlimited 5G data and unlimited hotspot powered by Verizon for just $25 a month. That means keeping the phone you already have, ditching your overpriced phone bill, and pocketing some savings for yourself. All the perks of big wireless for half the cost. Switch today at Visible.com. The Visible plan starts at just $25 a month, or get the premium Visible Plus Pro Plan and save $10 on your first month with promo code ROGAN. Terms apply. See Visible.com for plan features and network management details. I was going to bring this up earlier. One of the fighters got pulled from a car a few years back. I can't remember when, but it was because of exactly what you were talking about, like

55:53creatine levels in his blood. And I was like, what? I was confused at the time. I didn't know what that meant. I was like, why? Creatine? What does that mean? He took too much creatine like no his body is so broken down from training. It's not safe for him to fight Like how's that possible? Like how does somebody show up at the actual fight day? Blown out Junior Dos Santos fighting is worth the health risk because it's everything to me was a junior He got pulled from a fight Yeah, so I think they got rhabdomyolysis breaking down Oh, but I don't think that he got pulled from the fight. I think this is just what happened to him in that fight. So that fight, so he had two fights, well, he had three fights with Cain Velasquez. Cain Velasquez has the greatest cardio of any heavyweight that ever lived. They used to call him Cardio Cain. It was a freaky gift that he had.

56:51And it was also his understanding of management of cardio was incredible. He never threw anything full blast. Everything was like 60%, 70%, but with perfect technique. And he would just never get tired, like never get tired. And the first fight, Junior Dos Santos caught him with a big right hand and knocked him out. It was on Fox. It was a big deal. Then they have this rematch. In the rematch, Kane's healthy. The first fight he went into with a blown out knee. He had his knee wrapped up. He fucked up his meniscus like in training. And then in the second fight, he's fully healthy and he mauls Junior Dos Santos. And it's a war. It's a five-round crazy war where it looks like they're both going to— well, it looks like Junior's going to die. It looks like he's going to die. And then he does it again in the second fight. They have a third fight, rather, second rematch.

57:34The second rematch, the same sort of result. Kane just mauls him. Like, Kane was just—Kane was on a completely different level to everybody else when it came to cardio. Guys would get this 1,000-yard stare in the second round like, I can't do this for five rounds. I can't keep this guy off me. It's impossible. And so if he got rabdo from that fight, I would not be surprised. I bet a lot of fighters get rabdo after the fights. Because some of those fights, they're on death's fucking door. They're on death's door. I think one of the worst got to be Lola McDonald, right? Oh, my God. Oh, my God. One of the craziest life or death fights in the history of the sport. And they stared each other down in the final round. How about they're staring each other down and blood is pouring out of both of their faces? Robbie's lip is split halfway open. The whole thing was nuts.

58:27The end of it when I was interviewing him, half of his lip is open like a slice of pie. It's fucking insane. And he's saying how he's never going to quit. I'm going to keep coming and keep coming and I'm never going to stop. And I was like, holy shit. This guy just got through five rounds of the most violent shit ever. Look at the two of them just staring each other down. It was unbelievable. Like, life or death. Like, they got to the death's door. And Rory, when he collapsed, it was like his nose had been shattered. And the pain was just overwhelmed his brain. His body shut off. And he just collapsed. He couldn't take it anymore. It was crazy, too. Yeah. When they're staring at each other before the final round, like, motherfucker. Is that the worst? Look at Robbie. Screaming in the crowd with his arms up. So what I think is going on there, there's a few things. I think there's like stress-induced analgesia,

59:19the way that like an injured animal will bite off its arm to get out of a trap. That must be going on. So just pain suppression, norepinephrine, everything. There's also some fucking genetics. Robbie Lawler's got some caveman genes, son. He's got some warrior genes. That dude, that's in his DNA. I've been watching that kid fight since he was 20 years old. He's a fucking savage. Like a savage to the core. One of the greatest knockouts in the history of the sport happened when Robbie was fighting up a division. So he was fighting this guy, Melvin Manhoof. And Melvin Manhoof is a kickboxer, a very high-level kickboxer, who came out of Mike's gym in Amsterdam. Mike's gym in Amsterdam is legendary. Produced Badr Hari. There's like a series of like wicked kickboxers came out of Mike's gym. And Melvin Manhoof sort of epitomized that style. They were hyper aggressive and Melvin is built like you like look at him

60:19So Melvin in this fight Melvin is chewing up Robbie's legs. He keeps leg kicking him I mean he's punishing his legs Melvin was so fast and so powerful and they get in the exchange and boom Robbie hits with one punch and knocks him out if you and he's just out cold like look at this zoom in on his face He's just he's in the shadow realm right now But if you go to earlier in the fight like what Melvin was doing to him It was a crazy comeback like go earlier in the fight Melvin is all over him I mean he's so dangerous and so fast Like Melvin was putting him in really bad spots. He kept rocking him and When you talk about like high-level kickboxers Melvin was elite like perfect technique ridiculous power and athleticism and just a warrior spirit just attack you from the he would come out for his fights with a dog collar on but he would have like a spiked dog collar and be dancing

61:17getting ready for his fights terrifying human being he's he's scary but i think going back to the berserker um there's such a parallel between him and alex perera you know that idea like with the jaguar style yeah you know embodying the spirit of an animal i mean i don't know about I would be terrified if I was in the cage and I saw Pereira walking out. Well, do you know the team, the Fighting Nerds? Of course, yeah. So the head dude, I'm blanking on his name, but I was just watching this video about Carlos Prates, who is one of my all-time favorites right now in the UFC, in the welterweight division. And one of the things they were talking about is how he has his fighters mimic animals. And he studies animals and animals fighting to the death online, and that it's all about controlling the space. Like they gave an example of the mongoose and the cobra.

62:07And it's not that the mongoose is faster than the cobra or more deadly than the cobra. It's that mongoose is a master of controlling space. The mongoose is like fainting. Like as he's coming into the cobra, he's like moving in a little bit. Yeah, Pablo. Pablo is a brilliant guy. And he's the one, I mean, they really are nerds. Like they really do like data analytics and they study moves that work moves that don't work and what happens at what percentage of time like he's got a very data driven approach to mma training but also like super open-minded because he's like considering animal movements that's amazing yeah and the things that he was talking about was mongooses and cobras and they had this example and it shows like these mongooses they're essentially like juking with the cobra they're fainting they're trying to get the cobra to react and

62:54they move back when the cobra reacts and they slept but they're they're trying to draw this cobra in and get a sense of what the cobra's distance is that's crazy and all of his fighters particularly carlos is a master at controlling distance he's always pressing forward and then when you come at him he slides away and he's pressing forward and it's always you're always in danger you're constantly in danger so you're always like on the defensive and you're trying to get some offense and it doesn't work and then you're back on the defense masterful that's fascinating yeah i think it's almost lost it was the 17th century writer english writer wasn't it Samuel Johnson, who said, become a beast to get rid of the pain of being a man. And I think so often we've lost that. Certainly for me when swimming, in many ways, I was very much inspired by the shark.

63:40You know, when I was swimming very much like the berserk of the bear. And I think some of the best athletes, like I said, I love Pereira and his Jaguar style. You know, both feet on the floor, so constantly generating power. But yeah, Samuel Johnson, become a beast to get rid of the pain of being a man. Love that quote. That's a great quote and very applicable. definitely but for most people like the the journey the path is just too daunting there's the idea of it it's just oh what am i gonna do i'm gonna start out a beginner and just get humiliated all the time fuck that it's just like doesn't seem fun at all you know and they don't want to do it and so then they'll dismiss it and talk and then it becomes toxic masculinity which is adorable that was adorable i think i think also what's what i found so interesting is

64:26again i was trying to hoobin about this but the the different parts of the brain so your ventral striatum the part of the brain that's almost um involved in expectation reward and reality so so to use a fighting example when things are going well for a fighter what's happening the ventral striatum is going okay i've done this and that and i'm winning it's prime conor mcgregor it's prime anderson silver it's modern day iliotopura you know that everything's going well but as soon as that goes wrong, something goes wrong, all of a sudden dopamine plummets, ventral striatum goes, okay, that behaviour is now not working. And I think it's been so interesting seeing fighters, the same way that when I'm swimming, I can get caught in a counter current. There's been times where I swim and they go, Ross, you've got to swim for four hours to swim out of this massive whirlpool. I swim for

65:12four hours, head down, head down like that. My alarm goes off, I look on my watch, I go, guys, how far have we swum? And they go, Ross, you've been swimming on the same spot, you've not moved. You've just been swimming on the same spot for four hours. And I think it's interesting that it's not just losing. It's actually like the brain, the biochemistry just implodes. And I think you kind of saw that. Like I said, I think what happened in your mind when you found that you were in the same spot for four hours? I mean, it's like I said, it's not just a loss. Understanding the neuroscience of it, basically the ventral striatum going, this isn't working. Dopamine is no longer released. All of a sudden it is just like a dark biochemical cloud. and when you understand that you can start to try to process out of it how'd you get out of that

65:56i'm glad you asked there's another part of the brain as well called the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and that's involved in strategy so essentially when you are completely losing ventral striatum goes this isn't working so when i'm swimming tongues falling off necks chafing cellulitis ventral striatum this is not working and then you've got two options again this is an oversimplification but in my head this is how i basically map it out anterior mid-singulate cortex, grit or quit, pain and purpose, discipline. You just do it because you said you were going to do it. You just grit your teeth and get through it. Or dorsolateral prefrontal cortex over here, which is more strategy. And sometimes you can just completely reframe what you're doing. You can change technique and everything as well when you're swimming,

66:36but sometimes just reframing that suffering. You know, a great man said, be the hero of your own movie. And I think looking at the hero's journey as well, I think that's so interesting where Joseph Campbell talks about the idea of just kind of the hero slaying your dragon in the most cave battling. So I think sometimes that strategy is just reframing your suffering when you're constantly losing. And how long did it take you to get out of that whirlpool? I think we were there for most of that day, most of that day. And then with the tide, because basically over the top of Iceland, it's like a giant bay. So you get countercurrents, whirlpools. And eventually with everything that's happening, you'll eventually be able to swim out eventually yeah yeah but you can yeah jamie's dead i'm dead too bitch i'm dead too bitch how much can you swim can you swim good yeah

67:31i don't know i mean what's what do you mean what do you mean like in a fucking whirlpool in the middle of the ocean dog it's 20 degrees out i could probably hand i don't know how strong of I've never been dead in 15 minutes. 15 minutes I'm underwater. In the ocean. I could probably save someone. You could save someone? Depending on the waves. You know who saved somebody? Greg Fitzsimmons. Did you ever hear that story? Didn't he tell it on the podcast? Yeah. I wouldn't go out though. I wouldn't test my thing. Some lady was on vacation. Some lady was drowning. He jumped in the water and rescued her. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. She was offshore and I guess the riptide caught her. and uh greg risked his fucking life went out there and grabbed her and helped her what a legend legend i was like damn dude i'm like did you think at one point because his family was there too he's

68:17on vacation i was like do you think that maybe you wouldn't be able to make it back did you worry about that he's like yeah because it's crazy people don't understand like certainly drowning people are dangerous yeah because they'll hold on to you and you won't be able to like get them to relax yeah and then they won't let go of you and then you're both drowning exactly it's in ice on the south coast it's called reynersfjorda it's considered like literally one of the most dangerous beaches in the world and they have these sneaker waves that just come from nowhere and we were there and i think it was a family i think it was a little girl who lost her life but witnessing it as well there were so many tourists who thought it was fun to run up as close as they could and as the waves crash over they get a selfie and they run and i was like i don't want to be like oh here we go

69:00what the fuck dude that's like some shit right out of lord of the rings look at that that doesn't even look real but the sneaker that looks like mordor the sneaker waves from there they will come from nowhere and they were just absolutely yeah fuck you there you see the tourists there and i don't go anywhere near that shit fuck you oh there you go yes you'd have tourists when we were there and i i felt i was so conflicted because i was i was like look i don't want to be a killjoy or anything there's people taking pictures while sitting on those rocks and then you just saw massive waves we left and then an hour later we saw helicopters overhead we heard ambulances and we knew the worst yeah you can die you can die doing that that is a guy who was a wwe wrestler died a few years ago he got caught in a rip court a riptide right is that what happened

69:44i was thinking it was i was saying like i think that was like on venice beach or santa monica i think you're right i think it was in venice yeah man it's fucking terrifying if you don't know how to swim the ocean is a monster man oh yeah even on certain parts as well when you get wind over tide that's the worst the tides go in one way winds going the other and we get what's called the overfalls and swimming over there it was nuts there's the waves they're not rolling anymore they're detonating that's the only way i can describe it it's just going off around you and when you're swimming in there as well what's happening underneath is all the jellyfish are just getting smashed on the rocks so as you're swimming jellyfish tentacles are literally going up your nose in your ear you're inhaling them as well oh great that's got to be good for you

70:24jellyfish can fuck you up too yeah yeah they'll sting the shit out of you especially the wrong ones. The ones in Iceland are alright, but I think after you take maybe like five or six, they start attacking your lymph nodes. You start scratching under your armpits, over your groin. My youngest daughter got a little bit, just a touch from a jellyfish in Costa Rica. And oh my God, it was horrible. She was in agony. It was terrible. And they keep like stuff on the beach that you pour on them because it happens so often. And people get zapped by jellyfish. It's not, they're not dangerous. They don't kill you, but they fucking hurt like hell. Yeah. Yeah. Dude, The ocean itself is just like – what's interesting about all those people in that photograph, in that video that are watching and standing, isn't it fascinating how people are drawn to that abyss?

71:11They're drawn to the majesty of that water, just the vastness of it. There's something about that that I think is really good for people. I think it's one of the reasons why people like going to the ocean and sitting on the beach. I think there's something about that that just calms people the fuck down because it puts you into perspective. It's like, hey, bitch, look out at all that fucking water. OK, you can't live in any of that. All right. You are so nothing. And that's why I think beach towns are so chill. Like beach towns are not like what? Why is downtown Manhattan? So beep, beep. Fuck you. Everybody's like hyped up. It's because they're surrounded by people created shit. if you're just standing there staring at the vastness of the ocean you're like all right relax and then at nighttime you see the stars too you see the fucking milky way and then there's the

72:00ocean like all right this is clearly i'm not that important a hundred percent i'm barely anything a hundred and like we said with iceland with some mushrooms under the northern lights especially on the last day of your swim it's like the universe letting you know you did it you completed your journey fucking bananas man this is exactly but i love what you said there as well I mean, certainly on the swim, it was so interesting. Sometimes I try to swim with gratitude as much as I can. You know, swim with a smile and you're just grateful to be there. Because I love David Goggins and I've tried his form of motivation where he's, you know, man up, grit your teeth, get through this. But for me personally, after 100 days, I can't keep calling myself a bitch. I'm just like, oh, have a day off. Listen, David is a very unique character.

72:49I don't know anybody like him and I don't recommend it. I don't recommend you becoming him. Good fucking luck. You have to have that demon inside of you like that guy does. He's a sweetheart of a guy though. I love him to death. But that dude, that fire ain't going out. He's 50 years old. That fire is not going out. He does things where people aren't watching. That's what's crazy about David. It's not all these like things where people get to see. It's not. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. He calls it being in the lab. Like every day he's doing it. Like, dude, every day he's out there running 20 miles. He runs with a weight vest on. He gets in from that. He does weights. He does chin-ups and push-ups. Like it's not, it doesn't stop. It doesn't end. And then the next day it's another thing. It's another fucking insane thing. And it never ends. And no one's watching. No one's watching.

73:38It's not being documented. He's just doing it. And then every now and then he'll go out and run some fucking 200-mile race. And everybody's like, what the fuck, man? And he's also got no knees. His knees are completely blown apart. He's got bone on bone on both of his fucking knees. He's had multiple operations where they had to actually, his bone had grown so fucked up that they had to chop his fucking leg in half and pull it down so they could make it level. Because the bone, it's like called, what is it called? Wolf syndrome or some shit? Where they grind against each other so your body tries to protect itself by building extra bone. And when it builds it, it fucks up the geometry of the knees. They don't work correctly. So then you're running like bone on bone with fucked up geometry and you get back pain and all kinds.

74:24So he had his fucking knee sawed off and had shifted downward and then screwed into place. And you know what he did? He just got on a fucking bicycle and he started using a bicycle then. And so he's fucking indoor cycling all day for five, six hours. I had something similar actually. Yeah, subacromial decompression with my shoulder, which so often weightlifters will get it. But they said we've never really seen it in a swimmer. But it was exactly the same. I need to have the bone shaved down to make room again. Holy shit. Yeah, yeah. That was that left shoulder. The right's always been fine. So when they shaved down the bone, did they have to, is your cartilage okay? Yeah, cartilage was fine. And it was, you know, it was just the bone. Yeah, just there. Yeah, just went in, shaved down the bone. How much bone did they shave down? A good amount. Yeah. Did you get like a little cup of it to save?

75:10I should have asked, shouldn't I? You should save that. But I love what you said there as well, because I just think Goggins taps into something that so few people want to almost address. Carl Jung talked about it with your shadow self, you know, that part of your psyche that you don't want to reveal to the world. Are you aggressive, jealous, hyper-competitive? Again, it was Nietzsche, wasn't it? Whoever fights monsters should see to it that they too don't become a monster. Because if you stare into the abyss too long, the abyss will stare back into you. And I think that's what Goggins does brilliantly. Or Jordan Peterson as well. You know, the problem isn't having a monster. It's making sure you can't put it back in the cage. And I think that's what Goggins does so well.

75:47And I did take inspiration from that on certain swims as well where, you know, reading a few comments online, people go, he's never going to do this swim. He's too big to be a swimmer. This is going to fail badly. That is the weird thing about you, though. Like most endurance athletes aren't that heavily muscled. Yeah. You know what I mean? That is very odd. And I've shown pictures of you to my friends. And I want to talk about people who have done crazy shit. And I've detailed some of the insane things you've done, some of the insane swims. And they're like, how is he doing that when it's that jacked? I'm like, that is weird, right? Yeah, I think there's a few different things to unpack. So the first is you just need bulk. So going back to biomimicry, and we're talking about that a lot now. But I think what's so interesting is I want to become more whale-like. You know, I think absolutely.

76:30You look at a pool swimmer, they are poetic in the water. They're amazing. they look like dolphins, a mako shark. That would be useless for me when caught in an Arctic storm. You need strength. Strength and bulk. Yeah, muscle mass being thermic so I can generate heat with every single movement. But equally on top of that, I think it's also really interesting that through my strength training, it's called mechanotransduction, just basically means people think a strength training is improving the strength of the muscles, but it's connective tissue, ligaments and tendons that respond to that mechanical stimuli. So for me, when swimming, I need the connective tissue. The tendons in my rotator cuff need to be bulletproof because that's what's going to give up. This swim isn't going to stop because of my VO2 or lactic threshold. It's going to stop because something tears.

77:15So that's why being like this, I'm not as fast, but I sacrifice that for being more physically robust. That makes sense. And I think finally, this is something as well, which is really interesting at the moment. So I'm a huge fan of Cam McAvoy. He's the 50-meter world record holder for freestyle. And he's just rewritten the rulebook on swimming. Basically, there's a direct correlation between your one rep max on pull-ups and your swim sprint speed. Really? Yeah, really, real strong correlation. So he's now basically doing one rep max with pull-ups with 80, 90 kilos and just speed reps as well, Joe, just ripping. And you see what he's done. He's barely swimming in terms of… 90 kilos? Yeah, he's an absolute savage. Isn't that like 185 pounds or some shit? What is that? Yeah, it's on his Instagram recently, he did it with 80. He's an absolute specimen. And how many chin-ups is he doing that way?

78:06I think he was doing about three. He's an absolute specimen, yeah. Jesus. So that's swimming, that's sprinting. So obviously that's not endurance. But taking inspiration from that, you have what's called your strength reserve. So strength reserve just basically means if you are capable of doing a pull-up with 100 kilos, that means your own body weight is basically a smaller percentage of what you're capable of. Here we go. Is that him? There he goes. 80 kilos. Oh, my God. That's insane. What is it, Jamie? Did we figure out what that is? I'll ask my phone. It's 2.2, so it's like a 176, I think. What is 80 kilograms in pounds? But look how strict and how casual. Yeah, 176. That's crazy. He's amazing. and he's completely rewritten the rule books when it comes to it's like i said 50 um world record holder at the moment oh that's crazy he's doing that three sets of five with 50 kilograms and so

79:02this is just to generate strength for the sprinting exactly that you think about it if your one rep max on pull-ups is so good every single stroke is almost like a unilateral a single lit limb pull down so he's just ripping through the water like that but what's been really interesting is traditionally you used to just swim for miles and miles it was almost we call it like a garbage yardage that you're just swimming swimming swimming he was swimming sometimes in his sets like 800 meters which is my warm-up but it was just all flat out so he's revolutionized swimming so that's sprinting but what i've taken from it like i said your strength reserve basically if you're capable of a huge one rep max on pull-ups it means that every single stroke that you take is a smaller percentage of what you're capable of. I think the best example I can think of like this is a good friend of mine, Eddie Hall,

79:50World Strongest Man, first guy to deadlift, 500 kilos. He entered a CrossFit competition and there was a particular wad. It was 60 kilos. There's a brilliant video if you've seen it, Jamie, but it's 60 kilos and you see these CrossFitters. They're upped overhead and it's a clean and it's a beautiful push press. But because Eddie is so strong and he's got such a big strength reserve, He basically, as you're about to see now, just, I mean, that's a front delt raise mixed with a row. That's crazy. If you don't know, that is so much harder to do it that way. 60 kilos, I believe, 60 kilos. And so, like I said, the CrossFitters, perfect technique. They clean it to the chest and then they are bending their knees and they are pressing. That shit ain't even touching his chest. That's crazy. It's a front delt raise, kind of with a row. That's literally insane. If you don't know, that's literally insane.

80:45But my point here is, I mean, Eddie's an absolute specimen, but my point here is he doesn't train for this. This is completely, he doesn't, this isn't his thing. Clearly, because he doesn't do that movement. At all. If he did that movement, he wouldn't be doing it that way. But he's got an immense strength reserve. And so that's crazy, dude. That's my point, there we go. Actually, it's time when he broke the record. That is so insane. That's so insane that he did that that way. Now, watch a regular CrossFitter do it. Can you show a regular crossfitter to do it? It's not on this video. Well, you can find it. Regular crossfitters, they catch it on their chest. It's exactly it. And then they step back. It's a poetic technique. And so that's my point. Sorry, coming back to the swimming, that as strong as I get when I'm strength training,

81:28it just means that every single stroke over the Arctic Circle is a smaller fraction of what I'm capable of. That makes sense. That makes sense. And then you have to be able to have that fine line between endurance and bulk. It's exactly. So muscular endurance and, you know, but also having strength. Is exactly it. I think also what was really interesting, an MRI scan revealed, so you have slow twitch fibers that are very resistant to fatigue. They're your ultramarathon runners. Then you have your fast twitch fibers that are sprint speed power. And what was so strange is on my MRI, they said, Ross, you have an unusual proportion of fast oxidative glycolytic fibers. So they're basically in between the two. They're able to produce a lot of force, but they're very resistant to fatigue as well. Is that cultivated? Interesting.

82:11They said, I think I had a genetic predisposition for that, but with the amount of training I've done, I've also nurtured it. Interesting. Now, how do they know that you have a genetic predisposition for it if they didn't examine you before you started all this training? It was all theory. Yeah, they said anything. My question is, I wonder how much of it is adaptable. I wonder how much of what we say, oh, he has a genetic advantage. Like, are we sure? Or did this guy's body change because of necessity? It made intuitive sense when they said that. What would you call that, a clean press? What Eddie Hall did? No. It's part of a workout called the Isabella. There we go. It's called the Isabella? Oh, here we go. So this is Noah Olsen, who's an absolute specimen, by the way. I think he's competed in more prostate games. And then using his legs to complete it. So he's doing it awesome. This is perfect technique.

83:02Look at that. Catching it. Oh, so they're not catching it on their chest and pressing it off. So that's a snatch. It's like a snatch press kind of something. Okay, so it's called the Isabella. But do you see the rest, I suppose, between sets compared to the Delros? And like I said, Noah's a good friend. He's an absolute specimen. What is the term WOD? What does that stand for again? Workout of the day. What is it? Workout of the day? Workout of the day. And EMOMS is reps per minute, right? Isn't that what it is? Okay, so this workout of the day is a whole bunch of these? Oh, 30 snatches. I think this one's different, actually. It might be different. Yeah, because it's... Why did Eddie... It said that he did that particular Isabel benchmark workout in 50 seconds. So I think that's... I mean, that's just what I'm going off of. I was trying to find... Interesting. If it's something different, my bad.

83:53No, but yeah, but it does illustrate. Interesting, beating the previous male record previously associated with figures like Rich Froning. But Rich Froning's like way smaller than him, which is crazy that he could do that. Because it's the same weight, right? Is it the same weight they're all using? Yeah, yeah, it will be 60, yeah. That's even nuts that Rich Froning could do that with... Because I don't think his body weight is anywhere even close to that. Eddie Hall's 300 plus pounds, right? He's got a bit leaner now as well. Yeah, he's getting smaller. Well, he's done some MMA fights and shit. Yeah, with Tommy as well. Did you see he went the distance as well with Tommy Fury? Yes, crazy. I think they both won that fight. It was amazing in that... Crazy. Yeah, no one expected him to go that far. You know what I was really impressed with when he had a boxing match with the Mountain?

84:42And what I was really impressed with was the Mountain. I never say his name correctly. How do you say his name? Thor Bjornsson. Bjornsson. Bjornsson. Thor Bjornsson, yeah. He didn't use his strength. Like, he was throwing punches, like, with perfect technique. He was throwing punches like a boxer. Like, he learned how to do... Whoever trained him, they did an amazing job. Because the guys obviously got ridiculous power. But he he's like throwing punches correctly and he dropped Eddie Hall a few times whereas Eddie Hall is just winging at him with these wild power shots Thor is moving around him and look see how he's throwing his technique. It's very clean man. Even his jab Look at that. It's he's not overextending I mean he clearly is like a new boxer But a very good athlete and is figuring out how to use his his technique and and recognize that the power is always gonna be there

85:34because he's so fucking huge. He dropped him a few times, at least once in that fight. I find that amazing when sometimes the laws of martial arts sometimes need to be slightly bent for people that size. Again, having rolled with certain people, you get an armbar and they just stand up with you. Yeah, well, that's a problem. Marcelo Garcia, who's the giant killer, he famously would just go for necks because he felt like Kimura, obviously he knew how to use a Kimura. He's a very high-level black belt. one of the greatest grapplers of all time, if not the greatest. And Marcelo never hit Kimuras. He would just get necks. So he became a neck specialist. So his whole thing was high elbow guillotine and rear naked choke. If he got your back, you're fucked. And that was how he was able to defeat much larger opponents because you can't really defend. If he can get that rear naked choke around your neck

86:25and stop the blood to your brain, that's it. You go to sleep. You can not tap. If someone gets you an arm bar, you can allow your arm to get broken. and I've seen it happen a lot of times. But what you can't do is stop a guy from choking you unconscious. And so Marcelo, being as smart as he is and being a small guy, he's like 160 pounds, he just figured, okay, I'll just get everybody's neck. And he just became a neck specialist. See, I love what you said there as well because I often think, you know, the best athletes are the best at doing what they do best. And what I mean by that, whether it's ultramarathon running, whether it is CrossFit, World's Strongest Man, it doesn't matter. You lean into what you're really good at. You sort of Khabib wrestling, you know, Pereira striking. Sure. It's just you just drill what you're really good at.

87:05I think for me, swimming, certainly that's what I've sort of honed in on. I'm like, look, I'm not going to be built like Michael Phelps. I don't have this poetic, nice stroke. But what I can do is just get crazy strong for an endurance athlete. So my strength reserve is so much bigger. And do something really insane like swimming for three fucking days. Exactly. That's the thing is like most of these guys are just not going to be willing to do that. They're willing to do a race because in a race you just go all out and, you know, it only lasts for a few seconds. And when it's over, it's over. You know, you do that and you can turn around. The shore's right there. Like you have to keep going. You have many days in front of you. And that's just a completely different thing. You know, I think that's it because I've always I was brought up with my dad and my granddad telling me stories.

87:50He's one of athletes, but two, you know, the heroic age of Antarctic exploration when Admanson, Robert Falcon Scott, Shackleton were trying to get to the South Pole. And you know about the Robert Falcon Scott and Admanson, the contrast in what they did, you know, with Admanson, just Norwegian efficiency to get to the South Pole. So it turns up he's learned so much from those indigenous in the Arctic, learned about dogs. All of the crew were gifted in cross-country skiing. in comparison the British guy Robert Falcon Scott brought ponies that fell through the ice mechanical sleds that broke down tinned food terrible what was so interesting as they got there Admanson even knew as he got to the South Pole he had a certain amount of dogs and then on the way back he knew he could start systematically eating the dogs on the way back whereas the British Robert

88:36Falcon Scott refused to do that they were just handling manhandling all of their sleds and when they got there to the south pole they saw the norwegian flag there already then were forced to trek back and i mean one of the most harrowing it was lawrence oates um whose foot was you know badly injured and he just knew that he was holding up the team and then famously as they were caught in a in a blizzard he just turned to the team and just said gentlemen i'm going for a short walk i might be a while and he just walked to his death to try to make sure that his team made it oh my And they didn't, unfortunately. And I think it's that idea of kind of like, you know, civilization and survival. You know, you have to go to a strange place sometimes to actually make it. And I think that was almost the appeal for my career in inverted commas, if you could call it.

89:22Well, that's the appeal to people that are watching, for sure. That you're clearly going to some strange place where you could die. You know, and that's why people like watching your... What would you call it? I almost said stunts, but that's disrespectful. I would say, but they're not stunts. They're, you know, journeys. Yeah, they are. Yeah, in some ways. A quest is a noble way of saying it. I appreciate that. Because it is noble. You're quite right. I always say they're almost these sporting spectacles that we use as a Trojan horse to deliver ocean conservation. So I don't mind stunts at all. Well, that's good that you're doing that. Yeah. I mean, obviously that's good. I mean, I think that there's one area of the world that we really are disrespecting, and that's our oceans. And when I say that, I mean we can't keep pulling fish out at the rate we're doing. It's nuts.

90:11If you talk to fishermen and if you talk – like the people that have done surveys, obviously the ocean is enormous. It's very hard to understand. But the middle of it is not where everything is. Most of the life on the ocean is near the shores or at least reasonably close to the shores. 90 fucking percent of all big fish aren't in the ocean anymore like all these tuna men that used to fish tuna way back in the day and catch thousands it's a lot less now it's and no one is even thinking about it and you know there's regulations that some countries have on the way they're allowed to fish but some countries don't follow any of those fucking regulations you know I mean, it's and what we've done to the, you know, fun fact, this is how Somalians became pirates. So Somalians became pirates because they were fishermen and they were all just fishermen. They were just peaceful fishermen living in Somalia.

91:07And these different countries were dumping toxic waste off their shore and it was killing all the fish. And so they first started kidnapping these people who were dumping these boats filled with toxic sludge or whatever the fuck they were dumping, nuclear waste, whatever they're dumping into the ocean. And demanding a ransom because these people have caused them so much loss because their fish are all dead. And then they thought about it and said, well, fuck this. Why don't we just kidnap people? And so that became their new sport. So the fish are all dead. And they were on that. What is that stuff called? Cat? Is that what it's called? So there's a narcotic that they take called cat, and it's a leaf that you chew. Is it a nut? Is it a nut? Yeah, it's a leaf. It's a leaf? Whatever it is, it's something that you chew that gives you like an amphetamine-like state. Like, look at me. I'm the captain now.

92:05Like, that's cat. You're messed up. You weigh 80 pounds. You've been up for seven days. and now you're kidnapping people. And so that's literally Somalia's history. So when you look at the Somalian scams that are happening in America and you look at this stuff that's going on in Minnesota, how do all these Somalians get involved in all these scams? It all goes back to Europeans poisoning their water. Wow. Yep. Russian, I think Russian poison. I don't want to blame any countries, but someone was dumping toxic waste in their water, and that's what started it all off. That's true, right? I think they called themselves the People's Coast Guard of Somalia. That's how they started off. Wow. They don't have a long history of pirates. They're not like Blackbeard or any shit like that. This is a fairly recent in human history turn for their culture.

92:58And it probably led to a lot of other criminal activity, if you think about it. Like if the core nature of your civilization gets shut off, the core nature is you're a fisherman, right? You live in a village. You all catch fish. That's what you live off of. All that gets shut down. People go into desperation mode. People start taking cat. They're probably taking cat already. But they're doing amphetamines. And then they're kidnapping folks. Next thing you know, you're getting machine guns. You get all that money. Now you got a fucking, you got carbines. You got a 50 cal. Is that cat legal? Can I take that when I'm water tested or? I don't think it is. I think it's, I think it's. Is it legal? I don't know what it is in America. We probably have it scheduled one. How Somalian fishermen became pirates. It's a little old. It's 2009.

93:44It mostly just says that once they lost their government, it became a free-for-all right here. I do think that was part of it as well. The fishermen just kind of got pissed. I think that was part of it as well, but I think there was an aspect of it about poisoning the water. I'm sure it probably came up later because it's just still 2009. This is right when it was kicking off, really. At this time, when this article was written, it said they had 18 cargo ships being held captive. Okay. See, I think this is everything had already started to fall apart, and I think it started to fall apart when the fish went away. If I remember correctly, this was quite a long time ago I read this, but see if you can put it into perplexity. Say, is there a connection between Somali pirates and offshore dumping of toxic waste that led to depleting of their fishing grounds? I didn't ask that exact question.

94:33I just asked what was the reason they started taking ransoms but see if that Factors in see if it says that if you say was there an aspect of it where they were Kidnapping people who had poisoned their water Kidnapping people who poisoned their water Sweet dude isn't AI wonderful I know it's gonna kill us all and not necessarily people they kidnapped were not all people poisoned water right but initially There were serious reports and allegations of foreign companies dumping hazardous waste off of Somalia. However, a UN environmental OCHA account said two years earlier, UN fact-checking missions found no evidence, probably because the UN was dumping. And its post-tsunami inquiries did not identify specific dumping sites. So they were kidnapping people, poisoning their water is much more definitive than the evidence supports.

95:27yeah i don't know if we know um the problem with ai is it's pulling from all these different sources online and this yeah maybe the story i read was biased as well but the story that i well i read was a sort of a sympathetic take on why there's so many uh pirates i don't not sympathetic but an understanding take like they're saying like you need to understand that this is a chain of consequences, a chain of events that took place. And one of those things was people like, for sure someone's dumped toxic shit into the ocean. We know they do that. And so it doesn't seem that far of a stretch to imagine that that initially started off a crash in their economy if their fishing lands were poisoned. Do you want to do a swim there? Go and try and sort it out. I'll do a swim there. Don't do that. Yeah, swim and dress up like a dollar bill. I think I could. I would be there on what? Straight up on me.

96:26In a gold boat. Get yourself in a gold boat and put a sign that says we have no guns and go have fun. That would be amazing. I re-asked and it gave a different answer. Yes, some Somali pirates explicitly described their attacks as retaliation for toxic waste dumping, not just illegal fishing. Previous answer, understated the reporting behind that claim, but it does not establish that the crews they kidnapped themselves dumping waste. They probably just found people offshore and said, you were dumping. I'm the captain now. In 2008, pirate spokesman. Oh, they have a spokesman. I wonder if he was elected. I wonder how he became spokesman. You think he had a campaign? You think people had signs on their lawn? Elect Joanna Ali Jama for spokesman of the pirates. described a ransom demand as a way of reacting to the toxic waste that's been continually dumped on the shores of our country for nearly 20 years.

97:23Oh, shit. 20 years is a long fucking time. But I believe that. The report connected that claim to the captured MV Fina, a Ukrainian ship carrying tanks and military equipment, not a vessel identified in the report as a dumping waste. But what a great ship to bust. Imagine you get a fucking boat that's got tanks. Military equipment now you got yourself a motherfucking army dog Environmental accusations weren't solely a private invention in that reporting UN envoy boy say that guy's name Help me out. No, I'm not even gonna attempt that one. I'ma do Olud Abdallah said the UN had reliable information that European and Asian companies were dumping toxic waste off Somalia UNEP spokesman Nick Natal described some Somalia as a hazardous waste dumping ground but said Insecurity prevented a proper scientific assessment of the problems can't extent

98:20Listen man people love to dump shit in the ocean these fucking assholes like you know You remember when that kid got killed in Egypt. He was at a resort in Egypt. He got killed by a shark I think I saw the video. It's a horrible video because he's screaming for his father. Yeah, he's screaming for his father So what we had heard and we looked into it, it's not conclusive, but it seems like they were dumping sheep carcasses in the ocean. Like when they had sheep carcasses, they didn't want to just land around rotting. So they would put them in a boat, take them out to sea and dump them in the water. So what did that attract? What do you think that attracted? Some sharks. And so then these sharks were in that area and people, there was a really beautiful resort. People go take their families go on vacation in a fucking monster soup. Yeah monster soup right out there

99:13I'll tell you make fucking soup out of their dicks take pull them out of the water serve it up We need to go back to shark's fin suit these fucking people think sharks are their friends Do I so do I need to swim Somalia and sort that out then? I don't think you do I think you should probably stay out of that. Maybe that'll be the one that kills you now Whatever the fuck is in that water Whatever, 20 years of toxic dumping, that's not good. You don't want that in your skin. No deal. No deal. Yeah. Going back to the cardio, I wanted to ask your opinion on this. Best cardio in the UFC, or MMA, actually, in history. Oh, boy. I'm going to put some up there. Merab. Merab is probably... Yeah. Bisping had phenomenal cardio. Bisping would melt people. I remember his fight with Jason Mayhem Miller, who was very talented. Bisping just melted him. His pace was insane. Nick Diaz? Nick Diaz, insane pace.

100:03Nate Diaz also, also incredible cardio. There's a lot of these guys now. We're in a realm now of athletes. Joshua Van, insane cardio. Insane cardio. Joshua Van, who's the flyweight champion in the fifth round, fights like he's in the first round. Insane. The level now is at an all-time high. That's why Cain Velasquez was so weird because it just didn't make sense. Didn't make sense. Demetrius Johnson and the smaller guys, you're just kind of like, yeah, you're not inhibited by gravity the same way. But with Cain Velasquez, you were like, you shouldn't be able to do that. DC told me Cain would take a couple months off of training. He had an injury, had to take time off of training. Come back three months later, fuck everybody up at the gym. He said in cardio drills. He said it was nuts. He said it was nuts. His base was just insanity. Meanwhile, he lost the title to Fabrizio Verdum in Mexico City at altitude

100:54because he was only there for two weeks. and Fabrizio Verdum, he got a place to train in the mountains above Mexico City. So Fabrizio was living at like, I think it was like 9,000 plus feet above sea level and training up there. And so he had phenomenal cardio and Kane actually gassed out in that fight and Fabrizio caught him in a guillotine to win the title. I remember, yeah. Yeah, man, that was a big moment because nobody had ever, not just beaten Kane that way, but beaten Kane with like, where Kane was tired. Like you never saw Cain tired. It just shows you that altitude training is fucking critical, man. If you want to compete at altitude, I was showing you the hypoxia chamber that we have here. The Exalt, I think it's called the Exalt XP hypoxia trainer. It is so hard to work out at altitude. But if you can do it, I did it in preparation for this hunt that I did in Utah.

101:53And so I did it for two months. and I was very rigorous. I was very regular. I was doing two really hard cardio workouts inside that thing a week. And that's all they recommend. They said, don't do more than that because you'll get to a point where you can't recover. Like you want two, maybe three once you've built up, but I never got to three. Made a giant difference. Giant difference. Like I could really, because I go to the same place every year and at the highest point, it's probably 9,000 feet. Sometimes you're at 5,000, 7,000, But, you know, you're walking up like very steep, loose dirt at 5,000, 7,000 feet. It's hard. It's really hard. So you could feel it physiologically? 100%. Red blood cells, hemoglobin. I could feel that I had more gas. 100%. That's amazing. Yeah. A big difference. Big difference. And I only got to do it for two months. And now I'm thinking I'm getting ready for next September.

102:44I'm like, if I can do it for a whole year, if I could do that twice a week for a year, that'll make a giant difference by the time September rolls around. 100%. I think that's going to change a lot of the way – I think that particular type of training, when you're training at – like that machine can crank you up to above 20,000 feet above sea level. I've only done 14. I've done 14.5. That's the highest I've done. It's insanity. There's no air in there, man. There's no fucking air in there. And you're doing sprints on the air dime machine. You're doing sprints on the treadmill. And you're doing kettlebell swings. And it's like when you get out of there, man, it's like your body gets this rush of oxygen. As soon as you open the door, you're like, oh, my God. But then once you recover from it, the next time it's a little bit easier. And the next time it's a little bit easier.

103:30It's like you feel your body adapting because it's like, oh, shit, we got to do this. So in a real world scenario like what we are here, like what is the sea level here? What's the altitude here? 500, 600 feet. It's nothing. It's nothing. You feel like there's so much fucking air you can run through a building. That's what it feels like. And I think that's a game changer. And so many of these, like, really high-level camps have chosen to train at altitude. You know, you have a bunch of them. Obviously, the Dagestanis, they train. I don't know what is Dagestan above sea level. It's in the mountains. I've got to say they're probably 4,000, 5,000 feet. You know, obviously, they have the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs. I think that's above 5,000 feet. You know, and... They have actually both. They go... They have areas below sea level that are down by the Caspian coast.

104:26And they have mountain peaks that... Average elevation is 500 meters, though. Interesting. So it's like 1,500, 600 feet. Yeah. That's enough for an adaptation. Max is what? That's a peak. That's a mountain peak. It's 14,000. Max is 14,000. But some of these mountain towns, like where Khabib is, where's he at? I know they do runs. They do runs at altitude, you know, as does like the guys in Denver. Yeah, in a high spot. What's that? 2,000 meters above, so 6,500 or so. Yes. Sildy. Okay. So he's pretty high. 6,000 feet is high. So if you're training at that altitude, that's akin to Colorado Springs or a lot of these places. You know, Justin Gaethje's coach, Trevor Whitman, he has a lot of his guys. They do runs in the mountains. They do these runs uphill in the mountains. and unlimited water as well some good stuff that's around dehydration that's justin's big thing he

105:20will not drink water while he's training controlled dehydration yeah oh jesus there could be up there that's that view is insane so there there is uh this is a weird story i've got a there is a method that could make you a faster runner um and i'm going to apologize now this is a little bit left field but i was in namibia i was um learning from the sand bushman out there so we were how do you organize that yeah it was a documentary whatsapp yeah so we are out there doing like a marathon a day we for the entire week barely any water it was horrible one particular guy out there and they're amazing they're just gliding across the sand basically as well i'm just like heavy running trying to keep up with them and there was one particular guy in the tribe as well who was um could trace his ancestry back to the curligin tribe so did you know about the curligin tribe

106:06no so it's basically an ethnic group specific to kenya you are you've already smashed yours i'm I'm still working on mine. Come on, dog. What's going on here? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Talking shit. Let's go. Sorry. So basically, Curlige and Drive, ethnic group specific to Kenya, produce more amazing marathon runners than anywhere else. It's disproportionate just how good they are with this particular group of people. And as we're sitting around the campfire, they turned to me and they said, this guy goes, Ross, do you know why we're so good? Do you know why the Curlige and Drive are so good at running? And I said, altitude. And he went, nope. And I was like, barefoot running, some beautiful biomechanics. Nope. circumcision oh you know it yeah and crawling crawling through needles oh you know crawling through thorns you're right and they put the mud as well yeah and they don't pass on yeah so it's

106:51yeah circumcision as a grown boy with uh no no nothing no water no cleansliness no no anesthesia just they cut it i think these these are knife right or a sharp rock well the the the theory goes that he was saying that basically with the circumcision you're basically as a young man in front of the entire tribe, they all come out and they put clay, like mud on your face. And so you have to just sit there. And then basically the guy takes, the chief of the tribe takes your tackle. And then with essentially- Tackle, I like that. Takes your tackle, circumcise you. You cannot flinch. If you flinch and the mud cracks, all of a sudden in the tribe, everyone will be like, oh, he's not very desirable. So you don't basically find a girl, you don't have kids. And only those where the mud doesn't crack, they're considered desirable and they pass on their genetics. So generation after generation,

107:42you're passing on this pain tolerance and in the end you end up Curlijan tribe. Just unbelievable runners. Yeah. I mean, he looked across and said, Ross, do you want to be faster? Pulled out a knife and I was like, I'm good. What if you're already circumcised? What is he going to do? Take it back an inch? Fuck, dude. What does he do then? Like, I want in, but the problem is they did me when I was a kid. I didn't want to ask. Didn't even help. I didn't have to crawl through thorns, nothing. You have to crawl through thorns with your bloody dick. Yeah, yeah. And you can't wince. You can't make any noise. That's the whole point, yeah. Yeah, you can't react to the pain. Those who don't react, considered desirable, they pass on their genetics. Generation after generation, you just get this incredible... Are you going to show me a video, Jamie? How dare you? It's paused.

108:27That's what they look like with the mud on their faces, I think. Oh, boy. Getting ready. Some lady talking about it. Yeah, fun times. And then you just got to remain there. All that just to run. Yeah. I hope somebody beats him that doesn't do that. Well, it's funny you said that, actually. So do you know about Emil Zatapek? No. Oh, my God. This guy, the greatest endurance runner, in my opinion, to ever resist. He's amazing. So basically, to this day, no one's ever done what he did at the Olympics. Helsinki Olympics. Won the 5,000, won the 10,000. And then turned to his coach, and he just went, I think I will run marathon tomorrow. And his coach was like, no, no, no, this is a terrible idea. You should not run the marathon. It's completely different events, you know, over twice as far. Emil, this is a terrible idea. And he turns and Emil just goes, who is the favourite? And it was a British guy.

109:17So it was the British guy. Everybody thinks he's going to win. And Emil goes, OK, no problem. What I do, I will run on his shoulder. And then just at the end, before we get into the stadium, I go boop. And I run around and I will finish. And the coach is like, please, Emil, you've got two gold medals. Please, let's just leave it there. And he goes, no, no, no, no. This documentary is amazing. It then cuts to the British guy who's older and he's recounting this entire race. And he says, I am running and things are going well. And then I feel on my shoulder, I see this Emil just pops up on my shoulder. And Emil turns to me and goes, I'm so sorry, I've never run marathon before. So I don't know if it's too fast or too slow. And I thought to myself, you shit, I'm going to mess with you. I'm going to mess with your head. So I turned and I said, no, no, no, this is far too slow.

110:03We're in trouble thinking that would break in. And Emil just turned and went, no problem. I will see you at finish line and ran and won three gold medals, Helsinki Olympics. The reason I tell that story as well is not many people know. So his training, next time you're down an athletics track, he used to do 100, 400 meter sprints. What? Yeah, a sprint in a marathon. In a day? Yeah, well, not a day, but he pioneered interval training. People didn't think you could train that hard. There he is. Wow. Look, what I love as well is how he ran. He ran like he'd been shot in the leg. That's not Emil. What do you mean? There he is. There he is. So he runs like he's been shot like this. Ugly technique. Bad fire mechanic. Yeah. This, again, I think this is the marathon. So this is after he's already won the 5,000 and the 10,000. And here he is. He looks like he's in agony. Yeah. Yeah. So and the story goes with that as well.

110:52And this is what I love. So with somebody like him, 100, 400 meter sprints. But his wife was an amazing javelin thrower as well. So date night for them is they'd go out and his wife would just like launch the javelin. and he would go and get it like a dog and then come back and be like, here you go, babe. She'd be like, thanks, babe. That's hilarious. He used to run with his wife on his back through the woods and then sometimes when he wasn't able to run because it was snowing too much or conditioning wouldn't allow, famously he would get in the bath and just basically just tread on dirty laundry as well just to try to just clean it as well. So Emil Zatopek, to your point, I always find it fascinating that sometimes when you talk about people who are, you know, I've been training so hard, They've sacrificed so much. I'm like, yeah, that's great.

111:38But I don't want to go against an Emil Zatapek, someone who just loves it. Someone who just date night is running out their intervals, bringing back. Well, have you heard of that race they do where it's a race until everyone else drops out? Of course, Backyard Ultras. Yeah. Yeah. But there can only be one. One person can win. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's amazing. I think Chris Williamson was talking about it. I had a mutual friend of ours talking about Mark Dowdle, who was just basically like hunting and like just stalking the competition. And it was called the Last Soul Ultra. Yeah. And so Mark Dowdle, when this guy stopped to like tie his shoelace, Mark was behind him and just hunting him like prey. And they had them on the night vision. And they're like, what is going on? It's just mind games. And so one person eventually doesn't quit. Exactly. Everybody else quits. Yeah, exactly. How long did they go?

112:27these guys i think there's the current record i swear somebody did something like 91 hours yeah it's just it's just nuts it's just nuts i swear yeah oh my god i think it was phil jamie if you find it but he recently yeah oh yeah go mark dadle that's when he won the last ultra 95 laps 636.5 kilometers the man last soul ultra oh my god but he talks about it as well what i love is he talks about actually collecting their souls so so at the end you're basically given a trinket which has got everybody's soul on it and he's there like some ancient warrior holding it in a way he's kind of right oh there you go yeah he ran for 94 straight hours without sleep to win the last soul ultra 94 hours is crazy like what was he seeing what was he seeing at hour 92 how How many elves did he come into contact with? For sure he saw elves, right? For sure. For sure. There he is. There's him on Loop 72. Oh, my God.

113:35And the thing about him, too, is he's kind of a bigger guy. I believe his background was lacrosse as well. So he weight trains, which goes back to what I was talking about before, about mechanotransduction, strength reserve, that you'd say that doesn't make sense for an ultra-endurance athlete. But, again, I would argue that his biomechanics are just perfect and they won't break down compared to somebody who doesn't have that strength background. So there's a backyard ultra. He's actually doing it at the moment, I think. 94 hours is bananas. Oh, that was an update from now. What's that? That video I just played was right now. Yeah, they're doing it now. So I think it's Team America. Oh, it's happening right now? Yeah. It's on Loop 54 right now. Or this one, two hours ago. And he's just on social media just talking through everything as well. Loop 54. How many days ago was that? This is 20 hours ago.

114:23Yeah, this is right now. he talked about like on the first 24 hours he's just like that's just your ticket you know that just gets you in the race it's now it begins and that's after 24 hours oh my god oh my god yeah i think and also four hours it's crazy it's nuts it's not i mean for me on some of my swims as well just those hallucinations like when they start like probably one of my worst was loch ness and that was before everything went really bad. Loch Ness is basically really narrow and when you look up at night, it looked like there was loads of trees but the trees almost formed the silhouette of like a cruise ship. I remember being like, that's really weird. I'm eating a banana and I'm looking up and all of a sudden the branches start waving and to me at the time, I was like, it looks like people have come to the side of the cruise ship to support me. So my girlfriend's watching and all the crew

115:15and I'm just there eating a banana and I'm going, guys, thank you so much. Your support means, especially two o'clock in the morning. God bless you guys. Thank you like that. And my girlfriend's like, oh, he's talking to the trees. Like he's thanking them for their support. So sometimes, oh, here you go. Yeah, that's when he's stalking him. He's just waiting behind him. And he's like, what are you doing? But what I love, it's all mind games at this point. I'm not going anywhere. Wow. I think the reason I love Mark as well is because he's bringing a level of gamesmanship and mind games that wasn't really seen in ultra endurance. Right. They're all supposed to be super supportive of each other. Exactly. And I think you see it in other sports as well. Yeah, but you can't be super supportive if there's only going to be one person standing. Exactly. Exactly. I mean, one of my favorite examples in MMA

116:01was Yuri and Pereira, where they were talking about no shamanic ritual. And I'm like, look, whatever... Yuri was saying, don't use any voodoo, please. Don't use any magic. I was like, this is the greatest time in the UFC when someone's going, you're not allowed to use magic. I want a clean fight. No magic. It's amazing. I mean, on that note, who do you think is the best at mind games in UFC history? Chael Sonnen. Chael Sonnen is really good, but Conor McGregor is pretty damn good, too. Conor McGregor, when he fought Jose Aldo, he had Jose Aldo in a funk. Because Aldo was a legend and he was respected by everyone. And Conor was just continually disrespecting him and just mocking him. He stole his belt famously at the press conference. He was in his fucking head, you know, but obviously that backfired against Khabib because that shit didn't work on Khabib.

116:54Khabib was on top of him, punched him in the face saying, let's talk now. Let's talk now. He just punched him in the face. Let's talk now. And Conor was trying to say it's only business. He's like, come on, we're talking. This is what I find so strange that if aliens came down to this world and you had to explain to them, like, who is the best mixed martial artist? You'd go, okay, so here's Khabib, devout Muslim, doesn't drink, lives in the mountains. And you'd go, oh, cool. So that's the blueprint. And you'd go, oh, well, no. Sorry, so there's a guy, John Jones, over here. It does coke. It fucks everybody up. There's outliers. There's outliers. There's outliers. It's exactly it. There's always like these Bo Jackson characters that could do anything. There's people out there in the world that are outliers. and it's very unusual when you stumble across them. It's one of the things we love watching an outlier.

117:45We love watching someone who's just so unique and different than everyone else. Like, wow. We love that. Like Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, someone who's just above and beyond. You're like, wow. We love that. That was it. Definitely looking at the hero's journey with Joseph Campbell, good versus evil. And with the whole Daniel Cormier and John Jones rivalry, I was like, oh, this is it. This is amazing. This is the good and evil. And then you have something like Jon Jones who just goes, oh, no, that's not. For me in boxing as well, it was Mayweather, and I loved Ricky Hatton as well. So when you saw Mayweather there, like if it doesn't make money, it doesn't make sense on the bags. And then you've got Ricky Hatton having a cup of tea with his grandma, and you're like, oh, this is it. That's so wholesome. That's a little bit of bullshit, though. Ricky was a fucking animal. He was an animal.

118:29Ricky Hatton separated a lot of people from their consciousness. He was an animal. That was just a skill thing. Right. Okay. But Daniel Cormier is a good one. They're teaching kids wrestling. And you're like, oh, this is amazing. And then. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, John's not a bad guy. He's just an animal. I mean, he's cut from a different cloth. You know, there's people in this world that are just wilder. You know, and it's one of the reasons why he's so good. There's a certain element if you want to be a professional cage fighter. You have to. There's a certain amount of. You have to have all these things. To be the goat like John, you have to have all these things. like perfect technique, incredible work ethic when he does work, amazing talent, and an IQ for it. That's a really underrated factor, because John knows what to do with each part. Famously will not take a fight on short notice.

119:19Even with a guy like Chael Sonnen, who on paper, you can wake John up at 3 o'clock in the morning, he's going to fuck Chael Sonnen up, on paper. No disrespect to Chael, he's a great fighter. But there's levels and I think John is just on a complete and he's a larger man Right, Chael did his some of his best work almost won the title against Anderson Silva at 185 John is never making 185. He's a much bigger man and John would not take a fight with Chael Sonnen on short notice And then when when he did take a fight with Chael Sonnen and he fucked him up in the first round He just annihilated him even with a bad toe and well He smashed his toe in the process He was pushing off the ground so hard that he twisted his own fucking toe around I think we isolated it in a replay where we could see the moment where his toe snapped

120:03And it was because he was delivering ground and pound with such force that as he was pushing off He snapped his own toe and turned it around And to this day when he fights he has to tape those toes together to this day Yeah, favorite John Jones is the the arm bar with Vito Belfort. Oh, yeah. Yeah completely hyper extended Oh, but it's another example of like guys won't tap if you break their arm You know they will hang on and then he wound up winning that fight by Kimura in the next round Yeah, he got through that where most people would have tapped his arm was Fucked and he couldn't fight for a long time after that because he had to rehabilitate that arm his arm was fucked Yeah Going back to the look at that I mean that is and also that's Vitor who was a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt on the Carlson Gracie elite arm bar

120:51And then he wound up tapping Vitor the next round even with his fight with them Gustafson as well it just like going back to that anterior matingulate cortex it just must be massive in him Oh, yeah, who do you think I mean there's obviously Gaethje who do you think is one of the most durable one of the most Gaethje is probably the most durable guy ever Which is like incredible that Max Holloway knocked him out like that But other guys had stopped him before too, but that's just a part of being a human being If you're a human being and you get hit by the greatest fighters in the world you get stopped It's just how it is It's just like there's if you get hit clean no matter who you are some guys are more durable than other guys But no matter who you are Somebody head kicks you if somebody hits you with a wheel kick or something like that

121:33You're most likely gonna go unconscious or close to it. Yeah, that's just a Part of the game a flying knee very few people could survive that It's just it's like one of those things where you get hit and you just set Did you see the fight this weekend or two weekends ago rather with Johnny Walker? Oh, no Yeah. Johnny Walker hit this dude with a knee from the tie clinch. A heavyweight. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And just separated him from his consciousness. And this guy's a massive 265-pound man that he did it to. And it just proves my point. It's like no matter who you are, there's certain things if you get hit with them, you just can't take it. Yeah. You just can't take it. And with the Max Holloway fight with Justin, that was in a five-round war. He had been beaten up because he got hit with a jump-spinning back kick to the face at the end of the first round, shattered his nose.

122:27So his nose bone was broken. So he's compromised from the end of the first round on. And then Max is hitting him with all these shots. And then finally in the fifth round in a fight that Max is winning, Max points to the ground and says, let's just stand and throw. And they just wail at each other. And Max famously knocks him out, like one of the greatest. But that's not indicative of how durable he is. It's like most people would have never made it to that fifth round. He's insanely durable. And that's why you saw that fight with Ilya Toporia. He weathered that second round and came back strong in the third. He's insanely durable, like maybe the most durable guy in the sport and the most calm under fire. Like he never – it never changes his expression. He never looks lost. Even when he's getting hurt, he never looks out of it. He just looks hurt. but he's always like, like he went back to his corner

123:17after the second round with Taporia. Taporia dropped him with a liver shot. He goes, nice liver shot. He said, nice liver shot. He got me with a nice body shot. He was like complimenting his opponent for hitting him in a good spot. He was like that calm. Like, that was nice. Nice liver shot. But I feel it's almost that Emile Zatapek. It's genuine. You've seen in the corner, he's having the best time. I'm just like, oh, you're wired different. He's wired different. Justin's wired very different. He's wired very different. He's very smart. Like, he's a smart meathead. Like, people think of him as being a dumbass because he's, like, silly and he does backflips. And, uh-uh, he's thought it out. Like, he knows what he's doing. Like, he's doing things that are very intelligent in there. And he has a bunch of things that he does that he does better than anybody else. And one of them is the uppercut from the collar tie.

124:04He does this collar tie uppercut and he hits everybody with it because he's a really good wrestler. Even though he doesn't use his wrestling in MMA, he started out as a wrestler. and he's a very good athlete and he's got this collar tie uppercut that he catches everybody with and he pulls you into that uppercut man he fucks a lot of guys up with that that's one of his signature moves but you've spoke about as well with his wrestling in the past i think this is so interesting going back to what we said about the the ventral striatum the part of the brain that when things aren't going well it almost implodes like losing feels so so bad but i think wrestlers are just used to just getting beaten up beaten up yeah one of the best examples on the swim i have a friend who's in the special forces um i was just every single tide every single swim

124:47i was just behind i was behind it was just again like i said just biochemically neuroscience i was just imploding and he turned to me and this this really helped to sort of change my perspective on things he said ross in the special forces uh we're not seeing how well you can win we're seeing how well you can lose time and time again i said well what do you mean he goes there was one particular exercise that we did basically you're on the assault bike heart rate over 180 and they're checking heart rate monitor so you are redlining coughing up along breathing they get you off the assault bike they take you into a room there's a guy there who's like six foot six just huge and then there's a door behind him and they say okay you need to get past him behind that door your friends your platoon regiment are over the other side of the door so they just run in this

125:29guy six foot six is there just holding you and then there's a guy with a clipboard in the corner guy with clipboard gives a nod bang knocks them clean out he's out cold the next thing he knows he's being brought back round with smelling salts and he gets up like that and there's in his face going do you want to quit do you want to quit and my friend at the time was just like no no i'm good and they said they let him up he goes again starts wrestling this massive six weeks ago waits for the signal guy with the clipboard nods bang not down again did it three times brought them back round and then and then they go okay you passed you passed what was interesting is my friend said one guy actually made it past and got to the door only to find it was bolted shut you wouldn't you were never going to win like ever but that's not what they were testing they were testing your

126:14ability to lose time and time again oh that's terrible for you but but that idea of just sheer adversity the idea is interesting however concussions repeated concussions can change a person's life for sure yeah you knock a guy out a big giant guy knocks you out three times that's terrible idea. For sure. You sure they was punching them? He was punching them in the face? The way that the story was told to me, yeah. I know. I mean there's some brutal selection. Some of my friends in the Special Forces, some of the stories they tell me about selection, I'm like that is brutal. But then you you realize that's why they're mentally bulletproof. Do you know who Mr. Ballin is on YouTube? No. A really interesting guy. He's got a great YouTube channel where he tells all these crazy spooky mystery stories. But he's a Navy SEAL, a former Navy SEAL. And

127:01And one of the things that he said about the people that make it through Buds, two people that do really well, two groups of people, one of them is wrestlers because they're just mentally tough. They're training and constantly being dehydrated and tired and just pushing and taking satisfaction, being the most miserable. That's one of the things that wrestlers do. They take satisfaction and suffering the most. They do really well and then water polo players. Yeah, yeah. And then I was like, wow, why water polo? And then I didn't know that water polo players never touch the ground. They're constantly treading water while they're playing that fucking game. Well, you have to be in insane shape to be in water polo. I never would have thought of water polo. You know, that was my background, by the way. I didn't. Yeah, so I played England schoolboys all the way through to international.

127:48Well, that makes sense. No, no, no. But I love that you brought that up because it's absolutely true. Again, there's a famous, very famous match. It was basically called Blood in the Water. And it was the Hungarians versus the Soviets. and they were at war. So they were actually at war. The Hungarians were training under gunfire, bombs going off and everything. They then drew each other. I can't remember the name. It might have been the Melbourne Olympics, I believe, in the semifinals. They drew each other. There's famous pictures where basically the water just went red. Blood in the water, that's what it was called, the match, and they just go at it. So they were at war with each other in real life. Yeah, and then they drew each other. So the Hungarians were at war with the Russians and then they went to war in volleyball, in water polo. In water polo.

128:32Yeah, they got put against each other and they just go at it. It's nuts. I mean, even like you can't see, but under my tongue, it's all a little bit of a mess under there because I remember I was playing water polo. We were in the south of France. I come over the top like that and as I do, I catch an elbow and I just like bite down. My tongue must have been out. And so it cut my tongue in half. And then I remember you then have to defend. It's kind of like basketball constantly back and forth like that. It's that quick. Why you got a mouthful of blood? Oh, there we go. Yeah. Blood in the water. Yeah. Wow. So they're just fighting each other. Yeah. I think Hungary won, I believe, 4-0. You have to be in insane shape. Yeah. To do that game. They're trained. I always found this interesting because I made the England schoolboy squad at 13. And I was playing against under 18. So I was the wrong side of puberty.

129:21And I was just like playing against these just like men who were trained in like water jujitsu. So I would throw a punch and then I'd just be under the water. So you fight all the time in that? All the time. So it's like hockey. It's exactly, yeah. Hockey in the water. It's exactly that, yeah, yeah. So one guy's holding me down. Oh my God, that might be my new favorite sport. Are they still allowed to fight? Yeah, yeah. If you put on YouTube, just put underwater fights, water polo, just put it on and they'll have cameras at the Olympics. Let's go. And it's absolutely, I mean, also. In the Olympics currently, you're still allowed to fight? For sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, look, some of the women's. Are they allowed to fight in the Olympics in hockey? Oh, I don't know. Probably not. Weak sauce. That's part of the game. I mean, I come... They have boxing.

130:02They have boxing in the Olympics and you won't let people fight in hockey. That's whack. Agreed. Yes, back to my tongue. I come over the top. What did you say, Jimmy? Strictly prohibited in the Olympics. Strictly. Certainly not in water polo. You still see it. And the women's... So in water polo, they still get after it. The women's game is worse as well because obviously they've got more of a suit to grab hold of as well. Oh, they're pulling boobs out. There are boobs that come out. There are indeed. I bet they are. But I, yeah, come over the top, bang, take basically, and it splits my tongue in half. And I remember I then sprinted back to defend because there are rows, defend, defend. So I sprint all the way back. And you can imagine now blood is just pumping around my body. My heart is going nuts. And I stop and there's just blood everywhere. Like the whole water has just turned red around me.

130:45But I don't notice. I think it's somebody else. So I go, guys, guys, stop, stop. Someone's been here. And then I look and everyone in the stands is looking at me. and as they did i remember it's almost like you know when you've got like toffee or something in your mouth stuck in your teeth well that was my tongue so i was like i was going like trying to spit whatever it was out and then i looked and it was just flapping and they were like no no no you're done and i got out they sewed it up that's why it's a mess underneath yeah how long does that take to heal well weirdly the tongue heals really quickly yeah so it wasn't wasn't too long i was good in about a week yeah wow yeah it was pretty bad but it's the same in malta as well so it's it's huge in Malta. But out there, they will just put goals in the middle of the sea and just start playing. So we would go out. And if you're in goal

131:30and jellyfish come over, that is just part of the game. Warrior people. Let me see water polo fights. It's not that exciting. It's tough to see. We'd have to curate. Find a good one. It's a lot of dudes in really small bathing suits. It's moving very slowly because it's underwater. Right. Let me see. And it's also in slow motion. Oh, it's slow-mo. Also, they're showing these guys hitting each other in slow-mo. It's really hard to catch it, I think, as fast movement's happening. It's just the amount of endurance that you have to have to play a game like this. How long are your periods? Like, how long are you playing for? Four quarters. Depends on the age group. But, yeah, four-minute quarters, four-five-minute quarters. So, for four minutes, you're treading water and sprinting. It's weird. You're exactly right. It's swimming mixed with BJJ. Whoa. People are like, yeah. It's swimming mixed with like, yeah.

132:24I mean, Hungary are amazing. Oh, they're smacking each other in the face and shit. Oh, that guy's choking that guy. Oh, they literally hold on to each other. Yeah. And then they swing it. Oh, this is crazy. There we go. Oh my God. This is crazy. Oh my God. This is crazy. It's pretty standard. This is just, yeah. This is normal. At a local competition, that's pretty standard. No wonder why these guys make good seals. Yeah. Yeah. You're literally drown-proofing yourself. Like there's sometimes when I'm caught in an Arctic storm, I'm like, it's not as bad as playing Hungary. Like the amount of times I was so close to drowning. That's crazy. Yeah. And I think especially as well, I was always so young. Like I said, I made the under 18 England school boys team when I was 13. So I was the wrong side of puberty. And we were playing against Malta at the time. And they were just like big, like beards, playing against Hungary.

133:14And I just learned very quickly to be comfortable being uncomfortable. You know, that Justin Gaethje stress inoculation training. ever since when I swim now and they're like Ross is an arctic storm I go still got my tongue you know we were talking about uh Carlos Protes and that video that I was watching about the fighting nerds about how the guy like emulates uh animals and stuff one of the things that they were talking about us how Carlos had a losing record early in his career he's like or close to his like five wins four losses or something like that it wasn't doing well the first nine fights of his career. And then he decides to go to Thailand and he flies to Thailand. And the only way to make any money in Thailand is you have to fight. So he winds up fighting like every week. So he fights like six times in a month and he's like fighting constantly. But because of that

134:01constant fighting, then he gets like really accustomed and calm fighting. He has over a hundred Muay Thai fights. So he's fighting all the time and it just becomes relaxed to him. And so when you see him fight, he's always smiling and having fun in there. It's because he's fought so many times that he's sort of that fear of whatever that experience is like for most people it's like this daunting thing they lock the cage door holy shit this guy is smoking cigarettes the week of the fight smoking cigarettes the day of the fight drinking partying just dead relaxed when he gets in there and fucking everybody up like literally world-class fighters like jack della maddalena who was the former world champion beat the fuck out of him at in at his in his home country of australia just beats his ass in a like a ferocious way where you're watching like wow like the level

134:53the gap between them is so vast and he's just essentially a product of that of just like being in the fire for so long you just get forged like constantly fighting see i love that that goes back to like the ancient stoics epictetus famously i love this term he said getting wintered he said that wars were fought in the summer but what you do in the winter has a profound impact on how well prepared you'd be so they would just be doing a cold hard winter's training the spartans as well famously would be given essentially a loincloth and just been told to endure the winter to fight you know for your food you know so you just create these crazy warriors and i think now we're getting modern versions i think the the closest you know our mutual friend liam harrison but he's just he's Why a different? Yeah, I told him he fights like he has rabies. Absolutely, that's the best way to face it.

135:47He's like a little demon. But what I love about Liam is, if anyone's ever spent any time around him, and he won't mind me saying this, but he's like vibrating. He's definitely got ADHD. But now there's so many studies with fighters saying those with ADHD actually process things so much quicker. I don't even believe in ADHD. Oh, you don't? No. I don't think it's a disease. Or that your dopamine works differently. I don't think it's a disorder. I think it's a superpower. I think we are conditioning children to sit in a classroom and do something that's insanely boring. And some people can endure it, and God bless them. And some people are not designed for it, and I'm one of them. And I don't think ADHD is a problem at all. Oh, I agree. Not a problem. I think it's a superpower. I think it gives you the ability to concentrate on things that you love to an extent that most people cannot fathom. I agree.

136:32You get obsessed with things. I could play pool for 10 hours in a row, and I don't eat. I just drink coffee and play pool. And I don't have any problem with that. And everybody else wants to quit. I want to keep going forever. That's ADHD. And I see it in other people that are great at things. Gordon Ryan, for sure, he's got it. He fucking trains 365 days a year. It's both things. It's discipline, but it's also this obsession that comes from if you were in school, they would say you have a disorder. There's something wrong with you. Why can't you sit down and do this boring shit all day? Well, because I don't like that. But if you sit those kids down in front of a computer and let them play video games, look at all the concentration they have. Look at all the focus they have. Look at how locked in they are and what they're doing. I don't believe in it. I believe it's a thing.

137:15I don't believe it's a disorder. And by the way, I'm not unsympathetic to the varying degrees that people suffer from all sorts of disorders. I think for some people it probably is some sort of a real genuine issue, right, where they can't focus it and it's not something they can concentrate on other things that they love. They're just constantly scattered. I'm not talking about that. I think it's entirely overdiagnosed. And I think there's a lot of people that are just people that are just not wired to follow the standard norm of what I think is a very boring structure of most schoolwork and most school – most of what you have to endure when you're a young kid is sitting down when you have the most energy. You just woke up, okay? You were fully rested. You ate breakfast. It's probably filled with sugar. And you're just fucking piping.

138:04You're sitting in that chair going, Jesus Christ, I don't give a fuck about Hitler. Why am I in this class worrying about World War II? I'm 10. I want to go outside. I want to play ball. I want to run around with my friends. I want to do fun things. This sucks. And they'll tell you you need to get on Ritalin. They'll say, Billy can't concentrate. Billy doesn't know how to count. I completely. Because I think to that point, exactly. Friends of mine have said, like, Ross, you have definitely traits of ADHD. And again, I'm the same as you. I don't like that term because I always just say my dopamine works a little bit differently. And what I mean by that sometimes as well is even understanding the sort of biochemistry on 400 milligrams of caffeine and then maybe like cognizant for acetylcholine as well. What is cognizant?

138:45It basically is a supplement, a nootropic that will positively interact with acetylcholine, which is a neurotransmitter that is less jacked up. You're just kind of dialed in and focused. That and Alpha GPC. If I take that combination, I am just dialed in and just swimming. Every single stroke, I'm just there like going, good, high elbow, good. Are you constantly filling up in that stuff? Are you replenishing your stock as you're swimming? Yeah. Alpha GPC, I know Hooberman talks about you have to cycle that, so that I will. But certainly with caffeine and cognizant, I'll be having that pretty much on most swims. Alpha GPC, you have to cycle in terms of how often can you take it? Hoberman talks about every two days and then three days off, I think, that sort of cycle. Yeah, you can build up a very quick tolerance to it. Interesting. Two days and then three days off.

139:33But this other stuff, cognizant, you said, so what is in that? So that's the ingredient. That's the nootropic. I hope I'm getting this right. So it is an actual, it's not a combination of things? No, no, no, no. And that affects acetylcholine, which is amazing just for their just focus. Do you ever take acetylcholine by itself? No, so that's the neurotransmitter. Or alpha-GPC. Do you ever take that? Yeah, alpha-GPC. Yeah, there you go. So it's a patented, branded form of citicoline, a natural brain nutrient and nootropic ingredient used in dietary supplements, energy drinks, and functional beverages. I like that term, functional beverages. Isn't everything beverage functional? You know, you're getting hydrated, you're getting drunk, you're getting caffeinated. These are functional. But will you do that as well, whether you're training or dialed in on something, you'll know how your brain runs.

140:20You'll say, okay, I've got a – Yeah. You know what really helps me is creatine. Creatine is a big one. And I only become aware of that over the last, I don't know, few years or so, that how much of an effect it has on mental focus. And one of the things that they've shown is people with sleep deprivation that when you have – we're sleep deprived. When you take – I think it's 10 or 20 milligrams. It's a lot, right? Yeah. 20? Is it 20 grams? I think it's more than that. Is it? So whatever it is. I believe it's 20 grams or above, whatever it is. Whatever the – let's find out. what the number is just so we can help people. I think it's 20, yeah. It severely mitigates the negative aspects of sleep deprivation in terms of cognitive function, memory, all those different things. And I find that. I've done a bunch of podcasts where, like I said, I play pool a lot. I have a real problem.

141:09And sometimes I'll come home from the comedy club and it'll be midnight and I'm wired from hanging out. Oh, 25, 30? 25, 30 grams for many adults. That's a small study. strongest acute study is large uh okay not a normal daily maintenance dose okay so so if you're tired take 25 to 30 grams and then that's the response and normally i take 10 or 20 that's my normal and you and that's like cognitively then you'll be back to baseline uh allegedly it's hard to know you know i mean we all vary daily i have days where i come in i'm like oh i'm firing today And then other days where I'm like, I can't even remember words. Like, how the fuck am I doing this for a living? Yeah. You know, your brain is very, it's like the fucking Earth's temperature. It fucking fluctuates a lot. That is exactly it. And certainly on my longer swims now. Creatine, I actually didn't do that during the Yukon swim.

142:02So weirdly, there's just a part of me that does want to go back just to actually trial that. Because towards the end of the Yukon swim, I was in pieces. So I would love to see if I could actually, you know, supplement to go that much further. And I think creatine was one that I would love to add to the arsenal. So here's what Jamie just pulled up. It says, part of the study, 15 test subjects were kept awake overnight and had to solve cognitive tasks during this time. Sleep deprivation tends to change, leads rather to changes in brain metabolism that promote the cellular uptake of creatine. Beforehand, the test subjects have received a high single dose of creatine, an important metabolic product that is found in food and can also be produced by the body itself.

142:40Three hours after taking the creatine, a positive effect on the brain metabolism and cognitive performance of the test subjects could already be observed. The effect reached its peak after four hours and lasted up to nine hours. In particular, the improvements in processing capacity and short-term memory were seen. The results suggested that a single but high dose of creatine enhances thinking capacity and causes changes in the brain's energy reserves during sleep deprivation. I wonder what it does if you're not sleep deprived. Like what if you're a kid and you take your ACTs or something like that? Like what would that do for you? That is interesting. Because I think that's the next frontier almost as well. Like I think we've known. Small test subject, right? But it's still if you get a significant result from 15 people and you can measure the changes.

143:27I'd like to see it on a large study, but it's interesting. What are a lot of the athletes using now in the EOC supplement wise? Creatine is for sure one of them. But the issue with creatine is also it helps you put mass on, and a lot of these guys are trying to lose weight. So I don't know what they're doing in terms of, like, there's some guys that are extreme weight cutters. There's guys that are cutting, you know, 20 pounds, 30 pounds the week of the fight. It's really—and rehydrating to a ridiculous extent, like, before the fight. Like, Alex Pereira is the greatest example. Alex would gain 40 pounds when he was fighting at 185 pounds. So he's fighting at 185, and he would weigh in on fight day at 225, 226. That's ridiculous. Which is nuts. Yeah, I always love Rob Whittaker. He's like, who let this guy in? Fair enough. So it's also saying don't take that much. Right. Don't take that much. Even once.

144:19Oh, even once it's bad? It's risky because it can put a heavy strain on the kidneys. It says for the time being, however, it's not advisable for people to take such a high dose of creatine at home as high doses of the substance put a heavy strain on the kidneys and can cause health risks. I wonder if you can mitigate that strain by hyper. So it was temporary, too. It's temporary. Yeah, for sure. It says four hours. But what's temporary? The gain of cognitive effects. Well, for the large dose, right? For sleep deprived people. It just seems risky. Oh, yeah, definitely. Yeah. I mean, I don't think. But I think one dose is probably akin to one night of drinking. Like, I don't think it's that bad. I think the real problem is you can't take that amount every day. no like what is i know people that take 20 grams a day though there's so many people though that

145:07are just redlining and the thing is it's like their their biology might be different than your biology you know some people like they don't have a problem drinking every day like shane gillis can just drink every day he's he got his liver tested he's fine and we were all like what i'm fascinated by this like i said for future swims i think you know certainly at 41 years old I'm kind of as fit as I'm going to be, you know, is that's this is the new frontier for me. Yeah. You know, looking at nootropics. I know where I bet hypoxia training, too. You think that could add? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I really do. I think it just raises your capacity. I think it changes the red blood cell count in your body. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like EPO does. Right. Aggregation of marginal gains. Now I'm just at a point where I'm like, right, where can I just get like one percent here?

145:56Are you using sauna regularly? Not as often I should be. Yeah, that should be a daily for you you think and even doing in there as well Well, yeah, you can I mean that's one of the aspects of the exalt chamber So they do two different types of training in it. One type of training is high altitude. The other type is high heat So I'll do sessions in there at 100 degrees and so yeah, and so but it's not high altitude It's like it's regular altitude. It's counterproductive to do the two of them together Yeah, you'd be a bit because it's blood plasma according to the guys who are smart So the thing you're doing is when you are at high altitude, your heartbeat is naturally lower. It's difficult to get your heartbeat that high because there's no oxygen in the air. When you're at high heat, your heart rate is high immediately. Like one of the things that I do, I'll do bag work. I do heavy bag rounds.

146:48And then after the rounds, I jump right into the sauna. So I go from being exhausted. I give myself just so I'm not dying so I could breathe normal. Like at the end of the rounds, I'm usually like really breathing heavy. I drink some electrolytes. I always bring a big 64-ounce jug of water with ice and electrolytes in it. And then I go in 196 degrees. And I sit in there for 20, 25 minutes. And I wear one of those straps, one of those heart rate monitors. And my shit will be at like 147, 148 the entire time I'm sitting there. Because it never got to go down. So it's jacked up from the workout, right? And then I go right in and I might be at 100 when I step in there and it goes right back up, right back up.

147:35So like 10, 15 minutes in there, I'm just sitting there and I'm at one, especially when I start doing heavy stretches, which is why I do a lot of, I find that you can do stretches when you're in that 195 degree, 196 degree heat that you're just not going to be able to pull off. And so I force my tissue to force it into position and hold it. And that really jacks your heart rate up. Then I'll get into the 150s. Because I love to go on a bit of a tangent as well. Like now there's so many good meta studies on, so studies of lots of studies of ultra endurance athletes, but some of the best now, these aren't guys just like hanging in there. These guys are winning between 35 up to 50. You know, those like grizzly old guys and old women who are just amazing. Don't you think that's mental though? Like your mind gets harder as you get older. This is exactly what I was about to jump on.

148:23So I think there's a few things. One is capillary density, mitochondrial efficiency that you only get after like years and years and years. So it's like when you're younger, VO2, lactic threshold, elasticity of tendons, all of those things absolutely are better when you're younger. And that's why you see so many 100 meter, you know, champions and sprinters. They're always younger. But now I think all of those things that you're talking about now, heat adaptation, hyperbaric chambers, everything like that. and hypoxic chambers sorry everything like that is just trying to create i think now a new generation of older athletes we're even seeing it 39 years old alex pereira yes your romero 49 yeah yeah but he is he's off the charts he makes no sense that's an outlier he's he's an outlier he's another guy he is yeah he's so unusual when you look at him he doesn't seem like he's

149:13aging it's it's insane you know and he's still moves like a cat at 49 years old did you see his bare knuckle fight that he had with darren till crazy i know knock darren till down arguably could have won that fight i know you know it's a very close fight but arguably you could have given the a lot of people online thought yoel won that fight yeah 49 yeah but we're seeing it across the board now as well like uh kipchoge won the very recent marathon was it melbourne i can't Remember, you've got Messi, you've got Ronaldo. Messi's only just retired Ronaldo. LeBron. I think LeBron makes no sense because everything that I just described there, your proportion of fast-twitch fibers reduces as you get older, elasticity of tendons. Yeah. So I understand if you're Messi, who's just amazing, his vision of the game and everything, he can sit there in midfield just spraying the ball. But LeBron makes no sense.

150:01Well, LeBron is meticulous in his rehabilitation. Meticulous. He spends an incredible amount of time, famously spends millions of dollars just on rehabilitating his body every year on massage and all different therapies. And I mean, he's doing everything. And I'm sure he's, I don't know what the rules are in the NBA with peptides and all that other jazz, but I'm sure he's on all that stuff too. Right. I mean, if he's not, I'd be stunned. Like, why wouldn't you be? That's crazy. You know, why wouldn't you be on BBC 157 and TB 500? And if you're allowed to be, you should definitely be on testosterone and definitely be on some sort of human growth hormone either something that pumps it up like some morelin which like naturally makes your body produce more testosterone or more human growth hormone something that allows his

150:48body to regenerate tissue and heal quicker he has to be on something i mean i would imagine otherwise it's crazy that he could perform because one of the things that we talk about a lot or i talk about a lot with cyril gone who's the oc heavyweight champion is that cyril has a background in basketball. And I think that's a factor because I think his movement, his ability to move, it's like basketball, you're doing plyometrics all the time. Peptides are banned in the NBA. What's the rules? Synthetic and growth hormone releasing peptides are banned in the NBA. Are they testing them? What is banned? Gross hormone releasing peptides, growth hormone secretagogues, how do you say that word? Secretagogues? Secretagogues and other synthetic compounds designed to stimulate growth hormone or enhance recovery are strictly prohibited. But what about BPC-157? Specifically, that one.

151:40BPC-157 was weird because it was allowed by WADA and then it was banned. It should be allowed. All it does is regenerate tissue, or rather, help heal tissue. It's banned. Banned in the NBA. It's classified as an unapproved substance on the World Anti-Doping Agency's prohibited list and follows broader anti-doping policies against unapproved peptides and experimental drugs. Listen, man, there's zero studies that show there's any negative effects of BBC 157. And there's a lot of at least anecdotal evidence, first and foremost, that it's very beneficial for people recovering from injuries. But then there's others also studies that indicate that it really is helpful for people. So someone was suspended. No, I was looking this up because last year this player is on the Lakers, Luka Doncic very famously got hurt right before the playoffs started, and he went to Spain to get treated and did not get better.

152:31And what that treatment was was not really publicly talked about. People were saying, you know, get him on stem cells, get him on BPC 157. Right. Get him back so he can play. I don't know. If they are doing it, they have to take time off so they can hide, you know, from tests or whatever it is. Right, sort of like Conor did when he broke his leg. Right, he got out of the doping pool. Right. Yeah, and then got jacked. And they go, fuck, are you jacked? Jack became Wolverine. Super Jack looked like you. All of a sudden he weighed 220 pounds. Fucking Jacked. I don't know if he got that big. But the point is, I think at least peptides that help injuries. Listen, you're dealing with a sport where your primary goal is to create an injury on your opponent. And you're practicing injuring each other all day long. You're going to get injuries.

153:17And anything that would help these athletes get to the finish line, get to the cage in reasonable health. because they're always banged up. Like whenever you see, even at a world championship level, when you see a guy who looks awesome, guarantee that guy's dealing with some shit. Guarantee that guy's got a sore hand, a fucked up shoulder, his knee hurts. Something's wrong. There's no way you get through a 12-week camp with a bunch of fucking trained assassins and you don't get banged up. You're getting banged up. And BPC-157 would help those people. But they're also doing, there's a lot of stuff these guys are doing now. A lot of guys are invested in hyperbaric chambers. They're doing a lot of hyperbaric therapy, which really does accelerate healing from injuries and just general overall recovery from just life itself. I mean, it's incredible. They were amazing for me.

154:07Like we were talking about earlier, when I tore most of the tendons in my rotator cuff, that was after the Yukon. And the doctor was like, how did you not know? And I was like, well, I had hypothermia and I was trying to dodge bears. I had other stuff on my mind at the time. If I was a doctor, I'd be so pumped to talk to you. I'd be like, whoa, this is an interesting study. Right, right. Like, what? What did you say? But it was new stem cells were amazing. And then hyperbaric, red light therapy. I did everything. And that got me back to the start line, ready for Iceland. I think without it, I might have needed them reattached with surgery. So that's how good they were for me. Yeah, it's extraordinary what they can do now. And it keeps getting better.

154:49And, you know, in this country, there's this battle between pharmaceutical drug companies that want to patent these peptides and they want to profit off of them. And then there's also a lot of people who don't want people taking these therapies because it will cost them money in terms of the amount of orthopedic surgeries they get. That's a real thing. And they have influence. And it's a real problem. And unfortunately, people are willing to sacrifice the greater health and recovery of the entire population for their own personal gain. And that's dark but accurate. Agreed. Yeah. And if we were really smart, we would be investing an incredible amount of money into studying these things. And there's not just that. They're helping people with neurological conditions. They're helping people recover from like Parkinson's syndrome or Parkinson's symptoms.

155:38You know, they're doing them intranasally for people that have lung disorders. Like there's a lot of like really good work that's being done with stem cells. Does it mean they all are the same and they all work right? No, it's like there's shady places. This is also part of the problem. Like if you're traveling to some God forsaken part of the world to go do this therapy because it's not legal in America. Okay, well, you got to be real careful where you're going. You know, there's some places like the CPI, which is in Tijuana. It's very ethical and they do everything really great. But there's other places where I've heard people get infected. They have like horrible disease. You know, they get staph infections and wind up almost paralyzed. A lot of fucked up things can happen when you're doing this stuff if you don't go to a good place.

156:22But the bottom line is, though, that's a problem with all medical interventions. That's a problem with surgery. That's a problem with like it's a big one of the main killers in this country. I think we talked about this recently. It's like the number three killer in this country is medical mishaps. Like it is either misdiagnosis or bad treatment or some sort of a mistake that someone makes. It's a problem. You know, so it's a problem. It's like human beings are very vulnerable. And, you know, so it's not a cure all, but it is a very promising therapy. And for people that have had incredible results, and I'm one of them, from stem cells, like I'm screaming from the rooftops, like, hey, let's not just throw the baby out with the bathwater with this stuff. This should be – we can help a lot of folks who have a lot of real serious problems with this shit. That's what they said to me.

157:17They were like, Ross, this would have been a death sentence for your career. You'd have swum around Great Britain. You've just done the Yukon. You're good. You're done. Whereas it's amazing now I've seen it that it's just managed to extend my career just a little bit more. And just also for people that aren't professional athletes, just extend your health. Like so many people that have had like these injuries, like a good friend of mine had a knee problem. And, you know, he's not an athlete. He's just a guy who runs and his knee was in pain all the time. I brought him into Waste Well. He got a shot in his knee. This was two years ago. And he's like, I run all the time. It never bothers me now. I'm like, that's nuts, man. That didn't exist before. Agreed. That didn't exist. Agreed. And I think this is just the beginning.

157:56I think we're at the beginning of this stuff. They keep coming out with new innovations and new therapies that are even more effective. New stem cells being one of the greatest ones that's more recent. I agree. They need more studies, more stuff, more work. This is going to help a lot of fucking people, man. And, you know, we have to be really careful as to what influence we're receiving as to why this is a bad thing. You know, I think this is a real problem in this country in particular because this country is like so ate up with money. You know, money influences so many narratives in this country. It distorts reality. You're looking at everything through a funhouse mirror lens. You know, it's hard to tell what's what. What's good for you? What's bad for you? What should be recommended? What should be never taken? You know. My hospital visit on that note was so bad at the end.

158:44The rotator cups was also like the... How bad was the food? It was pretty good, actually. Really? In Canada, in the Yukon. It was pretty good. Oh, there you go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Pancakes were amazing. They gave you moose meat and pancakes? Genuinely did. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Didn't they give you moose? Yeah, yeah. And jerky as well. Really? Oh, it was so good. That's incredible. Yeah, it was amazing. Fuck yeah, Canada. Yeah, yeah. That's awesome. Indeed. In America, you'd get fucking Fruit Loops. No, no, no. A bowl of Fruit Loops to recover. It was amazing. But we, oh, I'm going to apologize now for this story. But basically, during the Yukon swim, I had a specially made wetsuit. So because I can't touch the boat, no one can touch me. I can't touch land. Going to the toilet was obviously problematic. Oh, boy. Right, right. So you'd have like one of them hatches out the back? is exactly it. Yeah, we had a poo flap made.

159:27A poo flap? Yeah, a poo flap made. So we had a poo flap made on the suit. It worked in training. We took it on the swim. To this day, I think we were honestly about six hours into what was a 60-hour swim. Six hours in. I didn't even think about pooping. Yeah. You don't know, do you? That's what will... The whole expedition will come unstuck because of that. We're six hours in. To this day, I still don't know if the poo flap was in the wrong place or my bum hole is in the wrong place. But I end up going to the toilet. and it doesn't work. Like, what was meant to clear the wetsuit doesn't clear the wetsuit. So it's filling your suit up with poop. Exactly that, yeah. I'm then faced with a decision, and this goes back to what we were talking about, your anterior mid-cingulate cortex. In that moment, pain versus purpose, grit or quit. I'm like, Ross, if you quit, you are going to be known as the guy who soiled himself

160:13and gave up in the Yukon, or do you zip it up and just keep going? So I zipped it up. I kept going. Oh, you're swimming in your own poop. But it was even worse. It was a black wetsuit as well. So it was essentially just baking, you know, like a slow cooker. So none of it got out? All of it was in there? I would say 90% remained. 90%. Could you reach in and grab it as you're swimming? No, no, no, no, no. Clean out the... No, no, no, no, no. There was no reaching in. I'm so sorry, Jamie. I'm so sorry. So anyway, yeah, at the end of the swim when they're taking me to hospital, I turn to everybody and I just go, you know, guys. And again, the people in Canada, the team that we had are amazing. they're from the Yukon you know they kill bears they gut wolves they've seen everything and they're like Ross don't you worry and I said no guys I'm going to apologize now I saw myself in my wetsuit

161:00and it's been baking for what has been 55 hours they cut me out of my wetsuit they cut me out and they go Ross don't worry we're here we're a brotherhood we've been so they did they did they went we're here oh god and they bought so I'm left there with a flannel just covering myself Oh, and you just baked poo all over you. Yeah, so like I said, when they said, how did you not realize you'd torn your tenders in rotation? I was like, because I soiled myself, because bears and wolves were after me. Very reasonable explanation for why you didn't notice that you were in pain. I don't know if I saw a staff in any way, shape or form. Oh, 100%. It weirdly did. All kinds of stuff. Probably sepsis. Sepsis. Who knows what that does to you? That's got to be terrible. You're scratching yourself, and then there's poo all over your butt. Oh, the inside of your legs. Would you have carried on? I don't know. I hope so.

161:51I hope I'd be as strong as you. No one knows until you do it, right? Well, I think that's one of the things that the kind of events that you participate in really genuinely does. It changes people's expectations of what's physically and humanly possible. And they all have to look at themselves and say, okay, maybe I can do more than I think I can. And I think even though these are extremes and I think most people are not going to swim for 60 hours, what they're going to get out of that is this understanding that you're capable of so much more than you think you are. And just raising of expectations or at least raising of the limits of the possible. What is possible? And I think that alone is like a great benefit to people. I'm so glad you said that. That's exactly what I say. I say I don't recommend my lifestyle to anyone. It's a terrible lifestyle choice. It's terrible. it's terrible but I say

162:46that's not my purpose I don't think I think my purpose is people to get them to shift their barometer their own personal barometer just one degree what they think they're capable of yes and if that's what I manage to do then you know I will continue to soil myself in my wetsuit I think you have done that I think you have done that so congratulations and continue on sir thank you very much brother it's very good to see you again thank you so much thank you always good to see you you're a freak you're one of a kind man I appreciate you very much thank you that was awesome by the way Oh, you like it? It was good. Well, thank you, man. You brought it. Yeah, but you crushed far more than me. I was trying. We're having fun. Thank you. It was fun. Thank you. Great fun. Bye, everybody.