Episode 167 - Brandon Marcello: Discussing Exercise Science & Technology - D&D Fitness Radio Podcast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:14):
Welcome to the D and D Fitness Radio podcast, brought
to you by your hosts Don Saladino from New York
City and Derek Hanson from Vancouver, Canada.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
Derek, how do you? How do you like any Olympics?
Would you do that? Two hundred? Gabby Thomas is incredible?
Found you four hundred Yeah, crazy crazy Stuffy Thomas.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
Dude is legit.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
She is no joke. I love her. She's fantastic.

Speaker 3 (00:48):
And neurobiology, global health, that's what I studied, citation in French.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
Whatever, Holy holy, how you been man?

Speaker 3 (01:01):
I'm good good, Yeah you Yeah, it's good.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Can't complain, you know, I thought.

Speaker 3 (01:06):
I mean, I don't do much on social media, so
I kind of know more what's up with you than
you know what's up with me, because I follow you.
So it's like, okay, I know what Don's doing.

Speaker 2 (01:13):
Yeah, just work, just work, work, work, work.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
Every time I see brand and it's like I see
an airplane wing or an airport or.

Speaker 3 (01:21):
Oh, that's when I finally remember I should post something,
and I usually do it after I get back. That way,
nobody knows when I'm gone.

Speaker 2 (01:27):
Yeah, that makes sense, and mostly that's part of your business.
Like people don't understand what my business like. It is
very social and email driven. It just is it's just
part of what I do. So but you got to
ride the wave, right And that's something I think I
had to learn to embrace over the last probably fifteen years,
because in the beginning, it's like, I don't want to
do this and I don't want to like the celeb
angle and this and that. But when you start like

(01:51):
looking at when they're riding a wave, or if the
people you're working with are in a premiere, like, you
got to put your foot on the gas and you
have to. You have to try and build off of that.
And and once you learn how to do it, it's
it's fascinating the growth that you can, you know, enhance
in that period of time. I mean, it's just it's
really as well, Yeah, it's work.

Speaker 1 (02:13):
When a new Deadpool movie comes out, I'm like, oh
my god, it's like everybody's gone to it. And then
they don't keep movies up as long anymore. They go
straight to streaming. So I want to see stuff in
the theater.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
I know, you know, the only time I ever go
to a theater now is is premier is I never
go on my own. I just am too comfortable on
my couch. I don't want to go. I don't want
to go sit in a chair and in some freezing
movie theater. It's like, but like I go to probably
four to six premiers a year. I'd say, yeah, it's
a decent amount, so more than I go to a year.

(02:51):
Good stuff. So Brandon man, talk to us. What is
going on in your life right now? This is just
like we've never had a guest on I think three times.
I mean, this is like we we love you. No,
not at all, No, not at all, and I gotta
be not at all. Derek and I run this podcast.
This is not something where and Derek will be the
first minute. We're not like trying to heavily monetize this,

(03:11):
like this is just right. We purely do this out
of enjoyment that we like talking to each other and
we like interviewing and fascinating people. And you know, we
don't you know, we just we just do. We just hang.
It's just fun.

Speaker 3 (03:24):
No, yeah, I mean the only thing that's kind of new.
We just got back from La speaking and perform better right,
and I spoke on recovery and regeneration and I completely
revamped that talk wow, and revamped it because of what
I'm seeing on social media as we're talking earlier, right, Like,

(03:45):
I think we've become too binary in our profession. This
is good, this is bad, trap bar is good, trap
bars bad. Speed training is good, speed training is bad.
Ladders are good, ladders are bad, protein is good. Right,
all of these things, we don't have to be ironery.
So the question shouldn't be is coffee good or is
coffee bad? Because coffee is on the top ten things

(04:07):
that prevent cancer and coffee is also on the top
ten things that cause cancer. Right, so the question should
be is coffee good for me? Right now? And I
think that's how we need to approach everything instead of like,
and the post that really sent me down this the
event might talk was like on cold plunge, right, like
are we done with this? We shouldn't be doing cold plunge.

(04:29):
This is a waste of time. Just look at the evidence.
So why are we still doing this? Still doing it
because there's a benefit, right, Like, what is your goal?
Is your goal hypertrophy? Well then maybe then I say
maybe because the evidence really isn't that good that says

(04:50):
it really prove it blunts.

Speaker 2 (04:51):
Yeah, they're saying it blunt side perjurc. But then my
next question is is is it bad on it off day?
And you start weighing out, well, what am I doing
it for? Like, I use it on my off day
because it regenerates my body and my mind and I
sleep better, and then I come back in and I
have a good training. Such Monday morning, I did something
I normally never do. I woke up Monday morning, did
not feel physically great, stat of the couch all Sunday afternoon,

(05:15):
just relaxing, eating pizza, which I can't tell you the
last time I did that. Woke up, fell completely off.
I jumped in a cold plunge, I took a shower,
I stretched, I ate breakfast, fell like a million bucks.
Who's gonna tell me that's bad now? Right?

Speaker 3 (05:28):
Right, it's we get caught up in this again, this
binary type of thing. Like you talk about pizza. I
always talked about donuts like I love donuts physically, I
know they're bad for you. Right, we all can agree
that it's not a health food. But my mom used
to take me for donuts Friday mornings before school. I
take my kids for donuts once a week, and that

(05:49):
is more. It fills my cognitive bucket, my social bucket,
my emotional bucket. So I probably get a net gain
even though I take a small hit physically, may not
even impact infect me physically, because I'm getting all those
positive benefits in the cognitive physical or cognitive, social, and
emotional worlds. Right, So I think we just have to
we erode the context from things and we get caught

(06:11):
up in this like good versus bad, and it's yeah,
it's irritating. That's why I changed it anyway.

Speaker 1 (06:19):
I don't know, Derek, it's I know because I get
I get these couple of newsletters that are research based
newsletters medical performance obviously, and that's what you see even
in the research. You see the research says this is
really good, like semi glue tide. Oh great for these patients.
Semi glue tide. Now people are wretching all over the
place and have analleakage or whatever. But it's just it's

(06:41):
all over the map. And I was like, maybe I
should just be ignorant. I don't know, like it does
this bipolar sort of you know presentation that we get
on everything. It's just so and it's obviously it starts
with politics, right, but it's it's very hard to take
because the pendulum just keeps swinging and and I just like, A,

(07:01):
I don't want to hear any of it at all
at some point.

Speaker 3 (07:04):
Yeah. So a lot of it's just kind of adding
in the context of things like talking about sauna, Like
I'm like, okay, what's your goal? Is it A and
S modulation? Is it longevity? Is it decreasing cholesterol? Is
it general cardiovascular health?

Speaker 2 (07:17):
Like?

Speaker 3 (07:17):
What is it for what you are trying to look
And then we can prescribe the actual protocol that meets
that instead of like is it good? I don't know
what do you want to do?

Speaker 2 (07:33):
Right?

Speaker 3 (07:34):
An I have a pendicitis not a good idea? Right, Okay,
let's add the context back into it and figure out
what's happening. And then the other thing and Derek, you
and I go talk about this, right, is like speed training,
there are a lot of people that do not believe
and buy into speed training. Right watching the Olympics, there

(07:55):
is a whole host of people in the track and
field community that have made a very good living off
of helping people run faster, and what we've found or
I've seen is probably people think it's a waste of
time because the way they have coach speed has not
yielded the results that they had hoped for, so rather

(08:19):
than try to reevaluate it, they're like saying, it's a
waste of time. Right, But if movement is a skill
and speed is a skill, like lifting weights is a skill,
and teaching people proper technique when lifting weights to teach
them to apply force in the best in the ground,
the best way possible, would then apply to running. Right.

(08:39):
So I think sometimes people just dis miss things because
they're not very good at doing it.

Speaker 2 (08:45):
I completely agree with there. Now, I think I'm also
going to take it a step forward further. I'm going
to say that I think a lot of coaches are
being irresponsible with their information because you know, we understand
what clickbait is now, and everyone launts that catchy phrase
that you know that's going to grab someone and pull
them in. And I hear a lot of intelligent coaches

(09:08):
that have been into business for a while, and I'm
shocked because they can't start a sentence without saying the
reacherch The research says, The research says, The research says
over and over and over, and I don't know about you,
but I've seen a lot of contradictory research decades later.
I'm in the business now, twenty six years, So what
are you saying, Like, what about the thirty years you've

(09:29):
been in the business, What about the thirty years of
trial and error that you've gone through, or the people
that you've worked with? And you understand that, you know,
a modality like this could be great. But someone out
there now who's got a massive following, is putting information
out there. An example I'm going to give right now.
I'm not going to mention the guy's name because I
don't want to give this person any light, because that's

(09:49):
what a lot of these coaches are looking for also.
But it was Aura the other day. I've become very
friendly with one of the one of the largest private
investors of AURA, and he sent me an article. This
coach broke down why he thinks AURA is not a
good idea. Okay, all he can talk about in this

(10:10):
article was how it's benefited him. But what ended up
happening was he started obsessing over the numbers so much
that it's something that was very positive for him. Became
negative and I and I get that, But isn't that
obsession on him? Isn't an obsession on how he's he's

(10:31):
you know, taking in this information, And isn't he a
bit you know? Is it? Now? Isn't he bashing a
company that I believe is doing a lot of positive
It's giving us a lot of positive information. I've been
wearing it now for I've been working with him now
for six years, a lot of positive information? Is it
for everyone? Probably not? But isn't he turning out In
the same sentence he went, it has done so much

(10:52):
for me. But I am pretty much against this now.
Don't you find that irresponsible? Yes?

Speaker 3 (11:00):
And it does provide a lot of benefits. We're using
it now with like our military groups. Right. Part of
the one of the projects I'm working on is the
OHWS program, which is optimizing the Human Weapons System to
try services project, and we outfit our soldiers with wearable devices,

(11:21):
one of them being an or ring, and it's to
inform them of their behaviors, habits and choices. So how
do their decisions cognitively, physically, social, emotionally impact their physiology
so they can learn from that, right, It's numbers don't lie,
and numbers can educate. And yeah, some people wear it

(11:42):
for a little bit bit, some people wear it all
the time, some people, and they all do it for
different reasons. Right, I wear mine every day. I don't
wear mine. Actually I wear mine every night. I don't
wear mine during the day. Right, I know that it
doesn't give me chronotype because of that. I know my
readiness score is not accurate because I don't wear it
during the day, because it doesn't have that information. But

(12:04):
I'm okay with that. But sure, there are people that
are going to obsess about the data and obsess about things.
I mean, we've seen all that in the athletic world.
I mean, Derek Kee's seen a thousand times. Right, Like,
they don't want to see a bad readiness score on
game day because they might freak out. Am I not ready?
They might be questioning themselves. Sure there are people like that. Right,

(12:27):
Washing your hands is a good thing, but there are
people that obsess over washing their hands over and over
and over again. To your point, don it's not the
washing hands which is the problem, right, It's something else
and one thing that this social media world has done. Right, Well,

(12:48):
let's talk about social media is right, you're comparing your
insides to other people's outsides, which is never a good thing. Right.
And then what people do is it's hard for them
to look introspect actively and own things. So we rather
take our sand and put in other people's buckets. Right.
So it's just easy to deflect that way instead of

(13:10):
saying one I was wrong, right, because that's what scientists
do all the time. Science is a search for the truth.
That's why we replicate study post exercise protein shakes, remember those.
You had to get it within the metabolic window based
upon John Ivy's research at Texas and that whole book
nutrient timing. I'm right there with them making shakes. Come on, guys,

(13:31):
they're already lined up. They get you down there, let's go.
We got metabolic windows, closed windows.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah, exactly exactly. I love it.

Speaker 3 (13:39):
And then what we learned later on because we replicated
studies and other people replicated next thing. You know, twenty
different groups did the same study, or like, we didn't
find anything, did you find anything? Oh, we didn't find anything.
Did you find we didn't find anything? None of us
found anything. That's weird. So what we now realized there
was no, metabolic window doesn't make us bad practitioners, no,

(14:03):
only if we don't change the way we educate. There's
nothing wrong with having a post exercise shape to this day.
But to tell your clients, it's because there's this magical
window in which you must consume it. Now, that's not
being a good practitioner. Right, So it is tough to
stay up with the research, and it is tough to

(14:24):
also own your mistakes and be able to say that
as a practitioner. Right. Hey, I once did this, but
I was wrong, right, But now this is why I
do it this way because we've learned more, and that's okay.
And I think people will latch onto you more and
appreciate that more than you know dying on a hill

(14:44):
because you believe in there's a metabolic window that's not
there anyway. Hey, I got a tangent here.

Speaker 1 (14:52):
I had to say it because Brandon was talking about
washing your hands obsessively as I was watching the open
water swim in the Olympics last night, and I think
my son's like, oh, some guy did not wash his
hands for a year to prepare his immune system for
swimming in the sand. And I'm like, oh, geez, And
I looked at a couple of articles and there are

(15:12):
people actually talking about swimming and encountering turds in the
water and all that. What do you think of that?
They made these people swim in the one of the
most polluted waterways in the world, and they're all, you know,
and you know, they're going, oh, equal eyes good now
now now now, now, our window get in the water. Right,
It's just crazy what they made them do. Any thoughts

(15:32):
on that?

Speaker 3 (15:33):
Yeah, no, it is right. I mean there's there's some
danger with that. Somebody I don't know who set this
acceptable level. But there's an acceptable level of equal eye, right,
I mean we have that everywhere. We think we have
acceptable levels of arsenic in our foods, right, that's okay.
It doesn't mean that was trying to poison us. It
means there's we can excrete it. It's not dangerous, right,

(15:55):
But there are acceptable levels of all sorts of things
in our water that we drink, right.

Speaker 2 (16:02):
At.

Speaker 3 (16:02):
Somebody arbitrarily sets based upon maybe science, maybe not, I
don't know, but yeah, like I would want more real
time monitoring of the water.

Speaker 1 (16:14):
Yeah, they had surfing somewhere else, like in the Polynesian
Islands or something like that. Why wouldn't they have swimming
somewhere else where it was safe. And that really bothered me.
I mean because I'm seeing them, they're doing this marathon
swim and then they're passing them little things where they
can drink or eat or whatever, and they're in the water,
and I'm just like, you know, I'm.

Speaker 2 (16:34):
Just ill watch it.

Speaker 3 (16:35):
It is gross. And I'm a germophobe. So like when
you talk about washing it so it's funny. Is like
when I have to get fingerprinted for work, right, Like
they always have a hard time reading my fingerprints. So
they say, it's like one of two things. Either they're
they're one of three things, either like we either do
some really squirrely stuff like clandestine stuff and or you
work with solvents and or you just wash your hands

(16:58):
a lot. I said, well, it's three. I wash my
hands a lot. So as a result, like I have
like very little fingerprints, but so I always get I
always have a hard time finding them because of that. Anyway,
I owned it, Brandon.

Speaker 2 (17:11):
I got to ask you a question, I mean, pivoting
back to the to the wearable conversation, are you are
you seeing that that market now is kind of leveling
off because there was such a massive boom in the
amount of product coming out there? Are you one seeing
that that's leveling off now and the big hitters are
are the ones that are here to stay? And uh?

(17:31):
Or are you seeing anything else coming out that I
think is really interesting you?

Speaker 3 (17:36):
I think I stand by I think me last time
I spoke right the same thing. I think we're going
to see what we're What we're seeing more is ability
to again the quantified self, right like I think, And
now it's moving toward analytes like you have continuous glucose monitoring. Right.
That's huge, right because now going back tying it back

(17:58):
to double tailing with the research piece, now I can
see exactly what does white rice do for my blood
glue coast level and what does white rice paired with
chicken do for my blood glue cost level. Instead of saying, well,
I'm going to follow the glycemic index or glycemic load
that looks at the population like that and makes the
assumptions that I'm in the middle. Now I can really

(18:18):
understand how my body responds to these things in real time.
That's amazing, right, So what you're going to see is
more of these different analytes that they're want to be
able to be capture on you.

Speaker 1 (18:31):
Right, which are brandon are non diabetics using those types
of devices to monitor?

Speaker 3 (18:38):
Wow?

Speaker 2 (18:38):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (18:39):
Yeah, now you can go buy them over the counter.

Speaker 2 (18:41):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (18:42):
Right, So it's fun. Right, you can get feedback into
your nutrition and those things that really make things individualized. Right,
So now you're quantifying you.

Speaker 2 (18:50):
Without having us to have a needle in your arm
for two weeks.

Speaker 3 (18:53):
Yeah, exactly, you can have something on there and then
what you'll notice though, like and you'll learn this if
you do it, like you'll start to see some erratic
levels and that just means your battery is dying. So
it's like, oh, okay, it's not really my nutrition. I
need to pull it off because it's reaching the end
of its life. Because you'll notice it, Okay, why is
my why is my nutrition responding like that? Or where

(19:15):
is my my glucose response? Not that it's just the
monitor's going it's reached its end. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (19:21):
I didn't even know they were coming out with that
because I've tested CGMS three times and three different times
where I had to wear it for two weeks and
I mean personally got like nothing out of it, Like
it didn't it didn't give me any feedback it like anything.
I mean, fortunately for me, a lot of what I
put in my body on pretty level and I never
really get it in his spike and right. So, but

(19:42):
when I when I took up one off recently, I
wore one probably a couple months ago because the company
was talking to me and I took it off and
left to scar my arm for God's sake, like looking
at my my my tricep and there's like a black
like filled in a hole on my tricep now, and
I'm like, oh my god, like this is this is
really intrusive, Like they're going to have to figure this out. People,

(20:05):
can't you know what happened in the back of your arm.
I'm like, Oh, I wore a CGM. It's like, oh,
I'm not wearing one, Like it's going to scare the
hell a lot of people. So it is actually refreshing
to hear that they are that they're going to be
launching that hopefully soon.

Speaker 3 (20:16):
Yeah, I mean there's that there's people and things I
spoke about last time. I think you know, nearrables are
are certainly already here, right, Like you go to consumer
electronics show and you see it. You look in the
mirror and your vital signs, right, so I can get
my giving my heart rate. You'll I think the blood
pressure might already be out by now, right, body temperature,

(20:38):
all these things just by looking in the mirror in
the morning, right, and then all of a sudden they'll
pair all these things together, so that with an aura
with your toothbrush with you know, it's really just trying
to encompass everything. So and where the money is being
made is going to be in the monetization of that data.
Right what can people do with that data and who
wants it, who's going to pay for and what can

(21:00):
they do with it for good or for bad?

Speaker 2 (21:02):
Right?

Speaker 3 (21:04):
So, I mean these devices aren't going away anytime soon.
We're just going to be learning more and more about ourselves.
And to your point on about being intrusive, that's what
these things do.

Speaker 2 (21:13):
Right.

Speaker 3 (21:13):
You can go now you can buy is it withvings?
I think whvings has a whole suite of products, right,
blood pressure scales, everything. I think they even have it's
either Abbot or its wings that has like a disc
that you put in your toilet and can measure your urine, right,
so you pee alaw, yeah, and it'll give you feedback

(21:34):
on you on your urine. Not like a full ur
analysis that you would get in a lab, but enough
you know that it moves the needle might give information.
They have smart toilets, right that can give you insights
on a few people in your home and look at
your you know, your feces and look at your health.
I mean, that's how they're monitoring COVID. Right. They're looking
at wastewater because it's very detectable in waste water, and

(21:57):
you can see exactly from what neighborhoods they're having pea
because they can see it. So I mean there's just
a plethora of data to be pulled from the human
that people are curious about. Right, We're curious about ourselves.

Speaker 2 (22:14):
So yeah, are you worried about all the technology and
in fact the effects of the brain? I mean Elon
Musk recently turned around and said that the whole earpiece
headset thing is complete BS, there's no danger to it. Like,
what are we where is your belief leading you to?
Right right now? Should we worry about that?

Speaker 3 (22:36):
The current research indicates that there really is nothing to
worry about. But again, we also had current research that
said drink your protein shake within a thirty minute window. Now,
grand the level of rigor on those research studies compared
to the protein ones are completely different and much higher.

(23:00):
But I mean, there are people who are sensitive to
electromagnetic frequencies. There are there are people that you could
blindfold them and walk them through your house and they
can tell you where the router is or where your
smart meter is. There are just people that are very
sensitive to those things. Whether they can hear it, whether
they can feel it, I don't know. But they're out
there right, so we can't discount it. But I think

(23:26):
it's definitely worth watching for sure.

Speaker 1 (23:30):
No, doesn't this I mean this this whole discussion, like
I was thinking even about like COVID and how it
affects people differently, and it's it's out there right, like
I remember hearing about California has a big, you know,
large number of COVID cases recently, and but this individual
variability issue is is so important, Like even when dealing

(23:53):
with athletes or whoever, how much how much is that
at the top of your head when you're just thinking
about like, Okay, this technology, this type of training nutrition,
Are we spending enough time looking at individuals rather than
just trying to come up with blanket statements about what
to do and what not to do.

Speaker 3 (24:10):
We should be spending more time looking at individuals one
hundred percent. What's interesting is this, this individuality thing. I
started thinking about. This is gonna sound crazy. When I
was nineteen years old, I had my appendix taken out
and it burst, and they gave me some pain meds
and they gave me darvas set and I remember taking

(24:33):
it and they're like, this is a very strong pain.
Pain pill did nothing. It didn't. It felt like I
took I don't know, a sugar pill for all I knew.
It didn't do anything, and I'm like, this didn't do anything.
So then the doctor then prescribed I think it was
like vicotin or whatever. It was right floored me and

(24:55):
I started thinking, then why is that? And that always
was in the back of my head. Then a study
physiology and taking different classes, I always had that question
in the back of my head. And then I finally
took a class from Rob Knight, who used to teach
at Colorado. Now he's in San Diego at UCSD and
he was talking about them. I took his classes about
the microbiome, and he started talking about how different people

(25:17):
will have different responses to foods, medications, all different things
based upon their bacteria. And the light clicked on and
answered that question that, Okay, it must be my genetics,
how well I chose my mom and dad, coupled with
the environments in which I've lived, coupled with how I've eaten,

(25:37):
and all of those things that created this bacteria that
didn't allow this medication to work very well, but allowed
this other one before me. Right, So it was fascinating.
So what I'm saying is is that we need to
think individualized, right, Like these blanket training statements just don't
move the needle, right, Like giving everybody the same type

(25:59):
of training. Even film rolling, for instance, just doing generic
film rolling may not be good for that specific person
because you're wrong direction. Right, It can be very much individualized.
So the wrong exercise to the wrong depth, at the
wrong time, at the wrong vector, the wrong tension can

(26:21):
bring about a completely different and maybe undesirable response. Right.

Speaker 2 (26:28):
I wonder what percentage, right, what percentage of people if
you do go out to the masses and say you
are like, I sell on my programs, but I also
I'm also offering a coaching solution to that. So when
people join my challenges, they have access to me literally
to meet five days a week. I could have fifteen
hundred people on. If you ask me a question, I'm

(26:49):
answering it the next day, it doesn't matter. And I'm
finding that probably maybe I don't know three to five
percent of the people. You have to figure out a
different type of road that for like, Okay, this isn't
going to work. Okay, you know what you you you
have adjusted your macros a thirty five thirty five thirty,
where's your sodium, where's your water consumption? What's going on?
It's not, it doesn't it's not it's not full proof.

(27:11):
I mean, we know that, but I'm curious to start
exploring what percentage of people is that? Like an accurate number?
I believe in my community, three five percent is that low?
Is that high? Because listen, you got to admit, if
you offer a program a solution, most people are going
to get on it. They're following it, they're doing the
thing you be doing. They will probably have a good

(27:33):
response to it. But every once in a while you
run into this roadblock of Okay, there's a problem here.

Speaker 3 (27:39):
Right, absolutely, And I see it more, you know, with
the population, the sports population, right because these people are
like I mean, look at the Olympics on right now, right,
people are using by one hundredth of a second. I
mean look at that files of the second with the
Lyles winning against Les. That was five hundreds of a second, right.

Speaker 1 (27:58):
Five one thousands.

Speaker 3 (28:00):
I've one thousands, thank you, five thousands of a second, right,
Like five blink of an eye is three hundredths of
a second. Right, So it's like, you know, a lot
is on the line. There's a lot of work, a
lot of training for that, and you know what can
move the needle one way or another is immense. Like,

(28:22):
you know, I look at the stuff like my wife
is doing right now with her clientele. You know, she
works in with has more concierge business, has a lot
of Major League Baseball players. She had an Olympic swimmer,
her swimmer with two gold and silver. I think that
she was working with and you know, her job is
to kind of help these people achieve afamal movement. So

(28:45):
she's working with pictures and she has some position players,
but it's like it is all fine tuning. It is
all like you, you can't do this exercise. This is
going to take away from this. And what's fascinating how
she can do it is she uses force plates and
all these other things to check her work. She doesn't

(29:05):
use them to tell her how to program uses them
to validate her programs. So she's like, I should be
seeing this, this, and this in a force plate and
she'll see it. Great, my program's working. Or I should
see this, this and this on a force plate. Ah,
yes it's working. I should see this on their velocity
or this on their curveball, and I should be able

(29:25):
to see this with their hips. And sure enough she
can show it. She can show direct contribution to skill,
which I think a lot of people in the sports
performance world have a hard time doing.

Speaker 2 (29:37):
Right.

Speaker 3 (29:37):
We make leaps. If I get you stronger, you can
run faster, jump higher. It's not necessarily true. If I
make you stronger, you're more resilient to injury. Also not
necessarily true. Your assumptions and when you stack assumptions so
many of them, now you have a bad game of Jenga,
and those things are going to come falling down. So

(29:58):
you know, for the general pop relation, absolutely, I think
general health, general fitness, general wellness, that's going to get them.
Going to your point, don absolutely when we're talking about.

Speaker 2 (30:08):
That that niche, Yeah, that niche, right, yeah.

Speaker 3 (30:11):
One hundredth five thousandths of a second, big time, that's raair.

Speaker 2 (30:18):
Now I'm with you one hundred percent. Actually I wanted
to jump in. Have you guys seen this yet? This
is a company that just it's called back I keep
I'm actually gonna get it messed up. And again they
need help with their marketing because they just put b
I think it's ballasting ballast. What is it ballasting? It's
a force plate. Chew. It's not made it's not made

(30:38):
to run with. You're not supposed to run, you're supposed
to walk. So and it's it's obviously we know what
force plates do. But you know, it was interesting because
I put it on and you go for a walk
and it lets you know your weight distribution, and you know,
it gives you all that information, and you know, you
look at a company like this, I'm like, wow, this
is this is great information. But any of these companies

(30:58):
that I see launching now it's almost like all right,
like are people ready for this information yet? Like I
believe that maybe ten, fifteen, twenty years, this will be
in everyone sneakers and it will immediately spit out information
that becomes valuable and completely user friendly. But they have
to start somewhere. So it's interesting for me to kind
of test this out and try it and see what
it offered, and also for me to understand that like wow,

(31:20):
like not a lot of people are going to buy
that right now, right, but maybe they work on the
tech until one day it's in all our sneakers. It's
but they've got to go through that that that stage, right,
they do.

Speaker 3 (31:31):
And the other thing is, but I mean, what do
you can do with the data?

Speaker 2 (31:34):
Right?

Speaker 3 (31:34):
Like what do you what? What does that information tell you?
It's like it's like all the COVID tests right when
that came out, we have all these tests that tell
you have COVID. Now what.

Speaker 2 (31:44):
Right? What?

Speaker 3 (31:45):
We didn't have anything? Then you only have tests and
tell you have it?

Speaker 2 (31:49):
Well, what do I take? It's like you write it
out right.

Speaker 3 (31:52):
How do you handle it?

Speaker 1 (31:52):
What do you do?

Speaker 2 (31:53):
Right?

Speaker 3 (31:53):
And everybody's coming up with their own things, right, So
it's like, great, Now, what what do you do with
what's the vention? And how do you read that and
how do you assess it? And I think that's where
kind of like again, you have those two tiers. You
have a sixty percent solution and then maybe a seventy
or eighty percent solution, and then you have that top
elite solution, which is kind of like it's different. It's

(32:17):
not just foam rolling before workout because you have to
be delivered about the direction and how you're doing it.
It's not just doing things on both sides to even
things out. That can be a potential mistake, right, Right,
It's not just about trap bar deadlifting. That could be
a mistake, right Because what we're doing is we're taking

(32:39):
these Olympic based protocols on Olympic based people from Russia, right,
people doing translations with that and maybe some endecrinte support.

Speaker 1 (32:54):
So you didn't like Soviet sport review and I remember.

Speaker 3 (32:58):
Those I do, right? So who did the translation? Who
left out the stuff with endocrine support? And who left
out about what these athletes were built like, right, because
that's who these workouts were tailored to was for them.
They're just telling you what they did for them, and
that may not work for someone like me or Derek

(33:22):
or Don or whoever. Right, So it's worth thinking about,
is my point.

Speaker 1 (33:29):
I remember talking to somebody about Soviet Sport Review and
they were from Soviet Union and they're like, well, yeah,
a lot of those studies people just made up results
because the more sensationalistic it would be, the more it
would be published. And it was just everybody trying to
one up each other after a while. So yeah, there
wasn't a lot of integrity there.

Speaker 3 (33:50):
Sure, sure, right like the East Germany Sports Review, take
the blue pill, you'll be fine.

Speaker 2 (34:02):
Oh my god, what what are the testing protocols right
now for the Olympics. I'm just curious.

Speaker 3 (34:07):
I don't know what I know. I mean, it's I mean,
I haven't been involved with the program since two thousand
and eight. That was my last time I was with
the delegation where I was actually on site. But I mean,
I'm sure it's probably very similar to Derek might know more.
But like in the United States, you can be tested
any time. You have to let them know where you're
going to be, where you're traveling, how are you going

(34:29):
to be there. You could be don you could be
a perform better. You could be Olympic athlete, you could
be a perform better in Chicago, and they might show
up there and say you're getting tested.

Speaker 1 (34:38):
But he does get three strikes, Brandon, And that's been
that's the that's the wriggle room.

Speaker 3 (34:43):
A mistest is considered a failed test.

Speaker 2 (34:48):
So wait, what do you mean straight you get free strikes?

Speaker 1 (34:52):
So yeah, if you if I say I'm going to
Jamaica for holidays or whatever and I'm actually in you know,
Saint KITT's or whatever, and they show up, that's one
strike against me, so I got I get another one.
And so that's the way people have been manipulating the
system right now, is like you get three strikes because
it was just one. It's like one false start. You're

(35:13):
out now right when it used to be you get two.
But you know they're gonna have to I don't know
how they're gonna fix that, but but people are manipulating it.

Speaker 2 (35:22):
So no, I don't know. I mean, did you see.

Speaker 1 (35:28):
The Tour Hard Times. Guys like the guy on the
Tour de Fronts, he was like killing Armstrong's times and right,
and he's like, oh he's good. Yeah, he's not taking anything.

Speaker 3 (35:42):
Nothing to see here.

Speaker 2 (35:44):
It's also I also think it's like impossible, right, Like
it really is impossible to keep up with entirely. I
remember the whole Major League Baseball fiasco that happened. You know,
we're looking we're going on that twenty God, it's twenty
something years ago, right, It's it's how do you how
do you start turning over those stones? There's just too
many people like, how do you how do you start

(36:05):
putting asterisk next to certain names? How are you going
to expose a couple of people from Jamaica, a couple
of athletes from Jamaica, when you know that maybe a
few other athletes from another country you know, are definitely
taking it, right? Is it? It's a luck thing, It's
a timing thing. I just I don't know. I just
I just think it's impossible to maintain. You know, do
you do you think they should just leave it alone?

(36:26):
Do you think they should just allow athletes to make
their own decisions and do what they want? I mean,
and now, especially what about all this hormone replacement therapy
that's going on now that's legal. Doesn't that become a
gray area? Isn't that well? Hold on, it's being prescribed
by my doctor. I have low testosterone. Does that mean
I can't compete if I'm supplementing it into my you know,
into my daily regimen. Like it just seems like a

(36:47):
complete cluster.

Speaker 3 (36:48):
Well, I think there are certain and not say the
rules are perfect by any means, but there are certain
rules for certain sports, right, Like a beta blocker is
not allowed in shootings sports, but it's allowed in other
sports because a beta blocker would be a you know,
give you an advantage to performance dancing drug in shooting, right,

(37:09):
because it drops your heart rate and calms it down. Right,
like my apthalon for instant the Winter Olympics, you're not
allowed to take a beta blocker, right. I mean there's
certain levels of caffeine that you're not even allowed to take, right,
No one would ever reach those You have to drink
like ten cups of coffee within one hour to reach
those levels. Right. But you know, it's a tough balance

(37:30):
between the spectacle and the the optics. Right, You're trying
to manage both the optics of a good, fair, clean competition,
but also the spectacle of very fast, tight close races
competition in those things, right, and that's where sometimes the

(37:54):
people forget there are two sides of every sport. There
is a entertainment side, which is all sports is it's entertainment, right,
and then there's the business side, and they feed one another,
and sometimes not in a good way. Right. It's like
the NBA and having people sit out. Right, there's the
entertainment factor and that's driven by the business side as well.

(38:15):
That's saying, well, we're losing money because Steph Curry's on
the bench. He needs to play. We can't do this
load management crap anymore. And then there's a health and
player where a welfare side saying, well, this is something
that we were concerned about, right, how do you bounce too?
I don't know, same thing with the Olympics, right, So,
wells business.

Speaker 1 (38:37):
And then you find out that those NBA players don't
train in the off season, so they're out of shape.
So that's why they need load management because they're not
in good enough shape. Right, Like it's it's it's crazy
what's going on these days?

Speaker 3 (38:47):
Yeah, exactly right. And they don't have to because you know,
the Players Association all these things and you can't monitor
them and you can't do these things they want to be.
You know, it's really interesting sing it everywhere. The whole
landscape of everything has changed, even college sports right.

Speaker 2 (39:03):
Nuts now, Oh my god, especially with these athletes taking
what they're showing. Two athletes the other day that's kind
to deal with a Lamborghini really both had to brandia.
They two one had to bring a Lamborghini SUV and
you don't want to have like an actual like a
Lambert like a Lamborghini. And it was there. It was
like signing bonus or something.

Speaker 3 (39:22):
People are leaving like good schools, like really good schools
and going to just like not to knock on the schools,
but they're not really academically known. They paid a million
five by a for ni L. Sure, I'll skip, I'll
go to wherever right instead of going how right, like

(39:49):
a good prestigious school, and they'll go to like whatever.
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (39:57):
I'm waiting. I'm like, what school are you talking about?

Speaker 1 (39:59):
THO, because I was at I was at a school
a couple of weeks ago, big basketball school, and they
were saying it's probably about two million for a player
that's not going to make the NBA. But they're good.
They're good, they're gonna you know, we need that player.
They'll probably start on our team but won't make the NBA.
And the minimum masking price is about two million per year.

(40:20):
And then as part of that, what's happening, it seems,
is that that's the priority. So if somebody says, hey,
we need a new uh you know, training room upgrade,
or we need a weight room upgrade, or we need
a new floor in the gym, that comes second. Now,
any capital expenditure is secondary because we need the players

(40:40):
first and foremost.

Speaker 2 (40:42):
Absolutely.

Speaker 3 (40:42):
That's It's funny, like I remember that from my college
days being in college sports. It's like, hey, we need
a strength coach. Sorry, not in the budget, but men's
basketball can hire a fifth video guy, no problem, go ahead, Right,
It's like, what just happen? What they have? How many players?

(41:04):
And they have a staff of like sixty, Like I
need one.

Speaker 2 (41:10):
I'm more curious right now because this this money call
what you want incentive in college sports is still fairly new. Right.
How many years are we talking about right now? Three
to five? Well? What is it? Where do we at?
Not even right? So I'm curious to see what's going
to happen with the performance of these athletes, right, Like,
are they going to start losing that level of hunger,
that level of fight? Is that work that piking to

(41:32):
dip egos? Are ego is going to go through the roof?
Are these players going to start now again? Like I
have my opinion on professional sports, like I do not.
I think if you know, I think, if if an
owner of an organization is investing ten twenty thirty fifty
million bucks into a player, I think they should have

(41:52):
some say in the offseason about where they're going to train.
They have say on whether, all right, well, you know what,
if you go skiing, you break your leg, You're not
getting paid. So why can a team say that? But
then they can go have this athlete trained with his
cousin who knows jack shit about anything training wise, And
in the next thing, you know, they're being put their investments,

(42:13):
being put into a compromising position, and then you know what,
they're getting hurt. And I've seen this. I'll never I
don't know if I've ever even said this story, but
I did a collaboration with an NFL MVP years ago,
and I went in there and I had to kind
of oversee the training that he did, and we had

(42:35):
to put together content and YadA, YadA, YadA, And I've
never seen someone who just he was an absolute freak
of nature. He was demonstrating his hand clean on a
scale of one to ten. I'd give it a one.
All of his lifting techniques. We were looking at his
front squad on a scale of one to ten, maybe

(42:56):
a three. I mean it was. It was, as Charlie
would say, offensive. It was flat out offensive. But the
guy went up and grabbed two one hundred pound plates,
you know, like the big Ali ones, and literally pinch
gripped it with two fingers and walked at least one
hundred feet across the gym floor. I couldn't grip it
and hold it. I mean, freak show. So like there

(43:18):
is this and then asking him what is your training? Like, well,
I trained six hours a day, Well what do you mean?
Lunch is mixed in there, like his recovery mixed in there,
Like what are you guys doing? He's like no, we're
starting with MMA, And I'm like mma, Like, I mean
everything that you could have scripted if you wanted to
make a joke out of this, and you wanted to
try and design something that's going to ruin an athlete

(43:39):
and we were to sit down and put it together,
no problem, speed and power. At the end, at the
end of six hours, what are you eating? I'm eating
a pure protein bar. In that six hour period of time,
Everything that this athlete could have done wrong, he get wrong,
but no one's there to manage it. And in fairness
to him, is it really his fault? Is it? Like?
Does he does he really know? Like that? Does he
know the answers to these questions? Is he trying to

(44:01):
take care of his cousin? But if the owner of
the organization actually had the strength and conditioning coaches and
they were paying good people to turn around and say,
manage this process, what starts happening to now the life
expectancy of these athletes in their sport.

Speaker 3 (44:16):
Yeah, that's but that's the thing, that's exactly what happens.

Speaker 2 (44:18):
Right.

Speaker 3 (44:19):
It's like teams athletes do not feel that teams have
their best interests at hand. Most of them don't, right,
And that's because like they don't hire quality people. They
check a box. Why do they not hire quality people?
Maybe they don't know what to look for, right, because
everybody brings their own experiences with them. So how I

(44:41):
perceive a strength coach is different from how somebody else
perceives a strength coach because we all have different experiences
interactions with them. So, like you go to baseball and
they see baseball players and these teams, it's like, one
they're understaffed. Two they're underpaid, and because they're underpaid, they're
not going to get really great, top quality people. So
that's why I wife has a job, right, because people

(45:02):
will want will go to her because she's better than them.
She used to work for teams and she's like, I'm
not doing this anymore. Right, So that's why guys have
their guy or gal in this kid because just not
quality people, and they don't trust them either, Like what
are they going to tell the front office? Right, there's
this huge like barrier of mistrust and distrust there that

(45:28):
you know someone's gonna take their sleep data.

Speaker 2 (45:32):
Right.

Speaker 3 (45:32):
I remember talking to a team and Major League Baseball
team and the guy's like, I don't want my front
office seeing my sleep data. Like why, well, I don't
know they're going to use it against me. They're not
going to use it against you. Right, If you're batting
four hundred and you get two hours of sleep, nobody's
gonna care. If you're getting ten hours of sleep and

(45:55):
hitting two hundred, you're getting cut. It has nothing new
with this sleep. It's because you so at your sport.
Right to make them get rid of you is your
performance on the field. They don't care about how much
you sleep off the field. Right. But there is a
blame game, don And I remember this from the college

(46:15):
days where I wanted to hire a strength coach for
men's basketball, a specific one, and the head coach wanted
to hire someone else. We didn't agree, and the athletic
director called me in and said, Brandon, what I'm about
to tell you. He doesn't leave this room now. I can
tell you this story because none of these people are
even at that school anymore. Okay, he said, I know

(46:35):
that you want to hire this person. Said yes, I
believe that you know who was best for this program.
I'm like, I appreciate that. He goes, but I can't
let you hire them? Like why? And he goes, that's
because after next season, I'm going to fire our head
basketball coach. And what I don't want him to say
is the reason we had a terrible season was because

(46:55):
you wouldn't let me bring my guy in. After next year,
I fire in everybody, then you can bring in whoever
you want. Like that was a real conversation, right, sense, right,
But that's the thing. So like if I'm an athlete
and I want my cousin and then the GM says, no,
I need to use their guy, and then I get hurt.

(47:18):
Now what you made me take him? I'm hurt because
of you? Who knows that have nothing to do with it?

Speaker 2 (47:26):
Of course, of course, Okay, it works both but it works,
but it works both ways.

Speaker 3 (47:30):
It works, absolutely does, absolutely does. But it's only when
it's convenient for these people, right like course, yeah, like
the one person who has probably the most to do
with injured prevention never gets blamed. Or you never hear
anything about the groundskeeper, Like technically right, if we're talking
about like a field sport, no one ever you don't

(47:53):
see the groundskeeper saying, you know what, I'm responsible for
this this few injuries because I've done a great job,
it's probably true.

Speaker 1 (48:00):
Or the shoe supplier, right, yeah, there you go, another one. Yeah,
crazy this I'm gonna entitle this episode things you don't
learn in school.

Speaker 2 (48:12):
We gotta we, we gotta continue this. This is too good, Brandon. No,
we we love having you on. We'll make your regular
if you're down, Brandon, Thank you, man. And I know
you're not big on social so we'll we'll, uh, we'll
still Brandon's got an interesting Yeah, we've still got a
pump Is tires a little bit. We're still gonna do that.

(48:33):
One day is gonna come around. You're gonna end. You're
gonna land some massive contract one day where they like
they want me to build by social media and profile,
and I'm gonna be like, here we go. That's so
bunny having help.

Speaker 3 (48:46):
All right, I love it.

Speaker 2 (48:47):
Brand It's great seeing you. It's always man, Thanks for
your time, Thanks for having me. Good. Are you? Are
you in Providence?

Speaker 3 (48:54):
I'm in Providence.

Speaker 2 (48:55):
Okay, I'm gonna see you in Province. Hopefully we're not
talking at this Derek. You should come at the very least.

Speaker 1 (49:02):
Let's do something live, you guys, do something live or
do something, you know, record something while you're there.

Speaker 2 (49:06):
Oh, I'm coming to his talk anywhere. I was coming
to his talk, So I'll be there all right, brother,
Thank you, Brandon, Thank you for everything.

Speaker 3 (49:13):
Man.

Speaker 2 (49:13):
I'll see in a few weeks.

Speaker 1 (49:14):
Yeah, thank you for having me take care fellas.

Speaker 2 (49:17):
Thanks Eric,

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Episode 167 - Brandon Marcello: Discussing Exercise Science & Technology

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Episode 167 - Brandon Marcello: Discussing Exercise Science & Technology