0:00:00 - Speaker 1 International man of mystery. Content creator, ultra marathon runner, foodie, bestselling author. What I forget here man?

0:00:10 - Speaker 2 Dude, just, I think just Aussie.

0:00:12 - Speaker 1 Yeah, you gotta put that on the list for sure, Dan. Welcome to the show, man.

0:00:15 - Speaker 2 Thanks brother, appreciate it man Really really cool.

0:00:18 - Speaker 1 You know, I had something in mind to kind of kick start for this episode. But, true to form, as we sat down just to kind of shoot the shit and talk about life, we kind of got started on something that I think is very necessary right now and it seems like both of us are kind of finding it in our lives, and that's this new. I hate to keep saying the term modern masculinity, but right now I feel like a lot of guys, a lot of men out there, are having this longing for acceptance beyond just hey, what can my body do, what can my profession look like? Can you kind of shine a light on what your experience has been on this stuff recently?

0:00:55 - Speaker 2 Yeah, dude, it's crazy, like I've found I think I was just disclosing this to you about five years ago what we see with young men today and their vulnerability is just, it's vastly different and to the point that they're now becoming super open to either following a creator, following you know, a chef, or someone that aspired to be like, and then inspired to do the same acts.

And I think it's really really cool because we obviously had these macho men you know fathers, parents, whatever it is growing up, and then you got this like alpha person and as a result of that, you couldn't have this ability to actually shed the light on who you truly were sometimes and maybe the pain that you and every other young man goes through. So it's really cool for a lot of people now that are realizing who my true audiences, as I'm sure you have you developed over time. Learning Young men are just super inspired by what you know people like myself do, and it's really really cool because at this point now I will know when someone's like who doesn't know what I do, never know me before but I can have a connection with them in a conversation, knowing that you've made an impact because you know exactly the same pains they're going through in life in health, in relationships, lack of being able to cook at home, whatever it is. But yeah, it's really really cool, man, really really cool to say considering how a master's changed in five years.

0:02:16 - Speaker 1 You know. The word true in true audience, I think, is the key term here in what you're putting out and what I think Let me know. I think what your audience, what these guys are kind of reciprocating is looking for truth is feeling this kind of safe container where you know what, whatever you're doing and how you're doing, it is allowing my true self to also kind of be present and feel safe. Would you agree? And if so, how do you kind of convey your truth and what you do to allow truth and safety for others to kind of come meet you? Yeah?

0:02:49 - Speaker 2 it's a really good question. I think, first and foremost, you got to look inside yourself and say what are you comfortable with? Like it's easy for me to now be at this point in my career and be like, okay, well, I'm very open to sharing a lot, but you may not be at that stage of life.

0:03:04 - Speaker 1 And that's like it's taken you work in years and time to get to this point.

0:03:07 - Speaker 2 Yeah, I think you know, over time, you know there's things I was not happy with, in terms of where I was professionally, for example, and so, like you know, you take this honesty with yourself going okay, am I going to open up and tell people, like, the stages of my journey right now, or am I just going to do my thing and then maybe reflect on it later?

Some people are super okay about sharing the problems they faced at the time of facing them before, like getting to the position of success that they may feel they're achieving. But, yeah, man, like I think, open, like straight up, dude, it's like the biggest thing that I have learned is, as soon as you're genuine, your genuity is something that reflects so well across, you know, media, social media, the things you write, the captions you write, and it's not about the likes numbers, it's about the quality of like and so, like I think that's something that's really important for people to take away as well is, your story may not connect directly with the thousands of people that follow you or the hundreds of people that follow you, but there's going to be someone that does, and that person is going to be a true ambassador for you. So, you know it's okay to be vulnerable. It's just more important to be genuine.

0:04:11 - Speaker 1 I believe yeah yes, man, I'm curious if you could kind of take a second and think back. Was there one thing that you did, maybe a habit that you maintain or created, or maybe even something that you dismissed, that was no longer serving you? If you could credit one kind of practice, or even put your finger on one thing that gave you the most safety to be your true self and to put out this messaging, what was that for you?

0:04:37 - Speaker 2 Yeah, dude, I think I think honestly, having a habit or a morning routine just in itself we talk about this a lot. You know it was good. Just have a moment of the day to be selfish and before we do anything else for the day, before we rush off to work and say we're going to hit the gym in the afternoon, but don't make it because we get too many things bogged down or something comes up, you had the moment at the start of the day to make you feel that you looked after you, and I'm always talking about this it's so important that you take care of yourself before you take care of anyone else, and that includes, maybe, a physical ability to like go work out. It could be breath work, it could be mindfulness, it could be writing something down, it could be just sitting having a coffee with your dog, it could be whatever it is the point is just carving out that space.

Yeah, that was the biggest moment for me Since coming to America. You know my habit completely changed from growing up in Australia right Different morning routine but I really realized and relished that when I was able to get into a routine. That's what kind of catalyzed this all for me, to the point that when I now travel for work I still have to have some sort of morning routine and then when you come back to a new which was the old but the new habit again or whatever it is, you really have to put that first. So I think that was kind of pivotal for me in just making sure I had me time and that made me reflect on all the things that we're talking about now.

0:05:57 - Speaker 1 Beautiful man. Actually, this was part of kind of the questions I had in mind. Now getting into, I'm so curious. Someone that is such a high achiever, you know you really do prioritize so many aspects of life, of relationships, of your physical self, of business. What does a typical day look like for you when focusing on performance and by performance I mean, hey, maybe you're really fucking pushing yourself hard in the gym or you just know you got to grind something out of work. If it's on day for Dan Churchill, what does that look like, man?

0:06:28 - Speaker 2 Not going to lie, dude. Every day is on day. Yeah, it's crazy to say that I was even having this conversation with my team yesterday and it's like it's actually really hard in some capacity to have such high standards, you know, and it is, but it's also like I'm not changing.

0:06:49 - Speaker 1 You've got to tell us what good feels like. Yeah, dude.

0:06:51 - Speaker 2 But just also, like I want to impact the world. I don't want to impact the city, I want to help people, like across the globe, and like I want to cook. If I'm going to be, you know, taking over a restaurant, I want it to get a Michelin star. Why wouldn't I want it to be? Because, like that's for me, it's like I want high standards for the things that I set.

0:07:08 - Speaker 1 It's a great another restaurant. I can't get a reservation. Yeah, I think you know a guy now.

0:07:13 - Speaker 2 Bro, you're good yeah like I think my performance, like the first thing I do throughout my week, is I schedule in the meantime and what that looks like every morning I'm going to have me time because I get up early. Ironically, I got up early when I was with my girlfriend when we first started dating and then she started to get love the habit of getting up early because I got up early. And so then all of a sudden, I'm like I'm going to get up even earlier to have my me time.

0:07:40 - Speaker 1 I love you, babe. I'm trying to. This is for me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Luckily my wife is not a morning person, so I get all my morning time, that's great.

0:07:48 - Speaker 2 It's honestly true, though, like that's another thing. It's like when you start, a lot of guys are facing this issue of and women as well, obviously. It's like we reach this point where we start to date someone and we start to be in a relationship and you're staying over each other's houses. Then you're living together and your routine for the selfish you You're giving it taking a little bit more Exactly.

And then I think it's so important to set boundaries, and so that was another phase of life that you go through. It's like, okay, look, sweetie, I adore you and you're the most important thing in the world to me, but I just need to have this moment in time for me every day so that I can give you the best of me. And that was never a verbal conversation, but I just between. But she needs it as well, just like I do. She needs it, and I think that's so important for everyone listening. Now it's like you're going to get to that point in your career and your life where you're going to be like oh, it's going to be a tough conversation. I really want to spend time, a lot of time, with you, but I still need to do me time. So I set that time in every single week, whenever I travel, whenever I'm working, whatever it is, and that's a non-negotiable.

0:08:47 - Speaker 1 Okay, now I want to shift into. I know you said every day is on day for you, but, man, you got to recover. And especially I know more in the physical aspect with what we'll get into soon about this huge, daunting 100-mile-hour. You got coming up, you got to recover. So what does a recovery day look like for you? Physically, mentally, spiritually, whatever.

0:09:05 - Speaker 2 Yeah, cool dude. So I a recovery day, so I'm pretty much doing recovery every day.

0:09:11 - Speaker 1 I would, oh, every day's on, every day's performance and every day's recovery. You have to. Okay, I got to hear this.

0:09:17 - Speaker 2 I got to hear this Because like, if you're going to have on days this is dynamic. Yeah, if you're going to have an on day every single day, then you got to have an off day just as much, if not more. Right, because, like, and what I mean by on and off, it's like every day for me is I'm I'm pushing and I'm growing. That's like. My mentality is I'm always playing offense. My team and I use sport analogies, like, if I'm playing defense, I'm never going forward, never going forward. If I'm playing offense, I'm growing. Right, I'm taking risks, you know. So for me, I'm always going to be doing the on and saying that there's still the recovery. You do have to play at some point. The defense team has to come onto the field. So for me, how does that look? So if I'm going to do that every single day, I'm going to carve out.

You know whether it be an ice bath two to three times a week, some sort of stretching, some rollouts and compression work, better sleep, a nap, really increasing my hydration for maybe a day or two, that would be outside of that doing. I think it's so important that you factor in sleep's most important, most controllable thing compression, work, meditation, even just movement in general, all these factors taking place. So for right now, where most of my active time is just time on feet running, I have to support myself by getting the compression work done straight away and also being mindful of how much food I actually have to have to support my activity too. So in a nutshell, I would say dot points. I would probably ice bath three times a week. If I can Sauna three times a week. If I can Sleep really intentional sleep, particularly during the week, like I'll say no to crucial sleep.

Yeah, really tough with NBA playoffs. I will say it's really tough, particularly on the East Coast. And then, yeah, plenty of water and yeah, dialing my nutrition. Obviously, it's what I do for a living, exactly so that's got to be paramount.

0:11:01 - Speaker 1 I'm sure Hundred percent, and by now you've probably got that most squared away.

0:11:05 - Speaker 2 Yeah, like that's that's been dialed in for, like, I'm always evolving, I'm always reading research papers and speaking to people in space, but yeah, that's been dialed in for a very long time and I think I'm most interested right now is is continue to grow in like hormone health and, as a young male, we definitely shy away from understanding our, our markers in our testosterone levels, and I think it's really important that anyone listening in right now, as a young male like you know it's, it's totally fine and quite affordable relative to you know finding out later on in life what your levels are and what you should be. Oh my God, yeah.

0:11:34 - Speaker 1 I'm so glad you brought that up. Actually it's funny timing, while we're on this trip right now I just had, so we're both, you know, using homeways with bloke Mm hmm, blokes, just this full bottom, as mobile, full bottom as came to our place. They did this comprehensive and I mean, I'm not weird guy too, I love watching needles go into me. So I was, I was lit, I was, she was like doing eight or nine kind of vials. I get my readings done, I think later this week or next week, awesome, and I'm getting the full comprehensive, the full shebang. But look, no matter what probably the thing I harp on most for anybody guys here, once a year, get your labs, just get a, even just a baseline metabolic panel, cholesterol, glucose, c, reactive protein, check your omegas. Just, there's so much value to be had in that preventive knowledge. Spend what a hundred bucks on a lab. It's going to save you a hundred thousand dollars in 10 years.

0:12:28 - Speaker 2 Yeah, dude, also, it's like think about your family. You know, like there's there's so many factors in play that the idea behind going to the doctor was either men are like oh, I can't be bothered to do that, or like it's not me, I don't, I'm okay, it's okay to go check to see where you're at.

0:12:42 - Speaker 1 And it's going to get help as weak, exactly, back that open how you will.

0:12:45 - Speaker 2 Yeah, dude, like it's, it's, it's crazy to think that that's the mentality, yeah, so definitely get that checked. And nutrition wise man like I, you know I have. Have you heard of athletic greens, oh yeah.

0:12:57 - Speaker 1 If you want, I travel with them. Use them for years. Yeah, yeah, sick, okay.

0:13:00 - Speaker 2 So like I have that obviously once, if twice, a day as well. So things like looking after your probiotics, looking after your daphthogens and all those things, all those kind of things that are essential, that I think nutritionally we kind of shy away from, not because it's not because it's like not what we want, but we just don't know much about it.

0:13:20 - Speaker 1 Oh yeah, that's why.

0:13:21 - Speaker 2 I, like you, know things like a g1 can be so helpful, so I'm really dilated on that kind of stuff too.

0:13:24 - Speaker 1 What's your favorite adaptogen?

0:13:27 - Speaker 2 Oh dude, which mushroom do you want to talk about? Like?

0:13:31 - Speaker 1 we're going to get along really well. That was awesome.

0:13:33 - Speaker 2 Yeah, race is good. Quarter steps like all of them, man Like.

0:13:36 - Speaker 1 I love.

0:13:38 - Speaker 2 I think they're all sexy dude. Like I'm a chef, mushrooms are my jam.

0:13:42 - Speaker 1 Oh my God, I was at a restaurant last night, SMA.

0:13:45 - Speaker 2 Oh yeah, dude, oh yeah.

0:13:46 - Speaker 1 And on the menu, Lion's Mane.

0:13:47 - Speaker 2 Yeah, crazy Crucial. Did it come out like, looking like it was a coddle as well? Oh yeah, oh yeah.

0:13:52 - Speaker 1 So good. Actually, in my coffee I drink this company called Strong Coffee Company and they've got so many great functional mushrooms in there. See, they got a black coffee version that's got ashwagandha in it.

0:14:01 - Speaker 2 Ah bro.

0:14:02 - Speaker 1 Ashwagandha is a godsend. It's wild to me how, especially in coffee or infused with caffeine like you're getting stimulated, you're getting caffeinated, but man, you're just balanced out so well. It's like this internal kind of like reishi for me, yeah, but ashwagandha, especially for guys too, clinically proven to help contribute to improving testosterone levels, yeah. So I think you know a lot of us are go, go, go right now. Ashwagandha can help us chill, chill, chill. But support homeostasis, immune system and tea as well, yeah.

0:14:32 - Speaker 2 Yeah, like I think the world of adaptogens is coming in. Has been around for a few years now.

0:14:37 - Speaker 1 Thousands of years? Yeah, well, likely, but for us, yeah, we're lazy to the game.

0:14:41 - Speaker 2 Yeah, exactly, and I think, like trying my job, my job is to really help people truly cut the bullshit and like understand what it actually means. So I think, in a nutshell, to like bring this back to you know, dot points and takeaways is, you know, obviously, sleeping right, make sure you have enough hydration. Doing ice and hot therapies can be crucial for, you know, lymphatic drainage, amongst other things, and nutritionally, having your having, like obviously, the right macro nutrients, the right water intake, the electrolyte balance, but all these things around factors that can help with our neurotransmitters, such as these adaptogens, which truly just help balance you out, level you out. You know we have so many effects on our adrenal system and being able to like just chill it, relax a little bit bring it back to a steady state is what these adaptogens can do.

So for those listening in, it's a great natural way to do so.

0:15:41 - Speaker 1 For everybody listening. I'll make sure to drop in the video notes and show notes. I've done so many episodes with you know I don't think I've done any solo, but definitely with experts, botanists, herbalists, the chief mycologists from Forseigmatic all about mushrooms and adaptogens. I'll make sure to link that for you guys. Which brings me into talking a lot about nutrition. Man, this is your jam, this is what you do, it's what you know. We all love following you for and reading your work. I recently heard you say that quote food is the universal language.

And that really got me thinking. I couldn't agree more. I would either say food or love. I think if you put food in front of somebody, or love, we all know what that looks like, Right? So if that's true, why then does our communication seem to fall so flat when it comes to the food on our plates? It seems like too many of us, I'm going to say here, are shit talking, Talking about food is language right? Or shit talking our way through nutrition instead of creating a meaningful dialogue with it. How would you kind of navigate that? How would you expand on? You know what do you mean by food is our universal language.

0:16:43 - Speaker 2 So I look at, I look at food through not a fuel lens, I look at it through more like a happiness and enjoyment lens. I always have done that. I'm obviously that's kind of like ironic, because I'm in a world where part of my job is to help people improve their performance using the food around them. But I'll come back to the impact of food on recovery in a second. So when I talk about food as a language you kind of addressed it earlier I don't speak a word of Japanese, I don't speak any Cantonese, but I could go to those countries and put certain foods in front of them and I can enjoy a meal, we can have people smiling and we would all be there for the same purpose.

Last night I you know, I was on the I got a new chef who was on the grill, speaks very small amount of English, very good Spanish. Obviously I've got very his. His English is better than my Spanish. So we worked on, like you know, a couple of small words. Anyway, he knew what I wanted because based on the food. So every time I asked him to fire a dish which means, like you know, start working on it he knew exactly what I wanted.

And every time I look at the dish and we smile. We look at the food. He knew he was happy. So like that to me is beautiful and that's what universal language I mean. I didn't, we couldn't communicate through the actual verbal dialogue of language. We could connect through the food and that's why I believe you know it is truly universal language. So, going back to this other lens around fuel right, and that I don't believe that's a language, it's more of a, it's more like a necessity and I don't look at food as a necessity. When I've traveled with some of the best athletes in their field across the world, my job is, I would say, 30% on nutrition. The rest of it is giving them the ability to rest and recover and be in a state where their body is truly chilling.

0:18:36 - Speaker 1 Let it do its. Thing.

0:18:37 - Speaker 2 Yes.

0:18:38 - Speaker 1 I mean, I really love to not only hit homeostasis. But man, if you've got the conditions right, it will thrive.

0:18:43 - Speaker 2 Totally. You look at like if I said to you what are the if you're here in New York, what are the things you're looking forward to? I would say top five. At least one of those things would be food Related.

0:18:52 - Speaker 1 Going to dinner for dinner right.

0:18:53 - Speaker 2 So it's so important that we truly recognize food for what it is, outside of just the flavor and, trust me, the flavor is awesome. But like sitting down with your family, sitting down by yourself, whatever it is, having your U-time, having your family time, it brings actually a lot of hormonal benefits, like your serotonin firing, all these kind of things in your endocrine system are having a good time. So that is going back to the original point about, like my lens. I really see if that enjoyment factor, the fact that I can, you know, prescribe the right nutritional breakdown- for you is an additional benefit and I'll get you where you need to be.

But for all these people who, like are positioning food in a matter of you know, necessity and numbers and taking away the romance of why we eat, you know, good for them. I completely disagree and I think that's why we have such a big stigma around you know, physical attributes in food.

0:19:50 - Speaker 1 So you're kind of a unique guy here because you love food, you eat it for enjoyment, you eat it for performance, but you're also on the creation side. You do it, you create it, you're a cook, you're a chef, you know, you write books about it. You're going to be doing a lot of other great things in the industry with it soon. What is your biggest pain point? Someone who kind of sees the whole picture here? What is the biggest pain point, let's say, especially in the food industry, eating out, where the consumer? They're trying to do the right thing, they're trying to have a happy and joyful environment, but maybe they're just missing the mark on the food choices or being misled in terms of what's on the menu. I guess what I'm trying to ask is, from the food industry side, is it really possible for somebody to go out to eat and nourish their bodies, or are they just really fighting an uphill battle?

0:20:41 - Speaker 2 One of the things I always say is to control the controllable, and that truly relies on the fact that every time you go out to eat, you go to place to eat. They're only going to have a select thing on the menu. It doesn't matter how vast that menu is, you're only eating whatever they have in-house and that's fine. So if you go out to a Chinese place, come to my restaurant, whatever it is, you're basing your decision on what to eat from a conformed menu. So you're controlling what you can control on that menu. If you're going out to eat and it's a time to celebrate, I want you to enjoy yourself, but if you're at home and you're like, okay, now I should be dialing back in, you can control where you go for you to get the groceries or those kinds of things. So the stress people put on when they go out to eat and it's a big one, I think, young males is eating disorder. There are more men having eating disorders than we know about.

0:21:34 - Speaker 1 Really.

0:21:35 - Speaker 2 Especially around the age of like 18 to 30, because it's not an eating disorder of like you know your anemic, or you know you're making choices that affect your ability to actually eat the foods that maybe-.

0:21:49 - Speaker 1 Maybe being more restrictive.

0:21:50 - Speaker 2 Oh yeah, you wouldn't eat before going out to dinner.

0:21:52 - Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:21:53 - Speaker 2 I used to do that when I was like 19. I didn't realize at the time Like I just, but more so like it's a decision where it starts to build into your mental state. There's a lot of guys who, like, start counting the food they won't have, certain things, and I think a lot of guys can relate to that. And that's fine. And for, like you know, if you're trying to like I'm just trying to lose a bit of weight for some or something, but when it becomes a habit, it's really bad, then that's a concern.

And so we build up this idea that we can't enjoy ourselves, can't go enjoy a chocolate or an ice cream or whatever it is and still live a nourished life. That is the biggest misconception I would say. Then, when it comes to the food industry, I can't go around to every chef and say you can't put seed oils or you can't use refined sugar. It's also part of the cycle of the food industry that we also enjoy. It brings up the spectrum of food enjoyment. So, like I would just say, go enjoy those foods, don't not ever have them, but just know that when you have the ability to control where you're getting your food, how you're cooking it, how it's looking. You make the decisions that are more appropriate for you on a more consistent basis.

0:22:58 - Speaker 1 Yeah, when did all this begin for you man? Was there a major catalytic event that just got you so enthralled, especially in food and nutrition? Oh, bro, like I've. How'd you get here?

0:23:09 - Speaker 2 I'm middle of three boys.

I love food, you know, like dropping the northern beaches of Sydney, you know, very active like rugby, and so for me it was like a very easy choice to want to make food for myself because one I loved it, loved the, you know, working my hands and like making dough and things like that.

But it was like, truly, when I finished high school, went and did a master's degree in exercise science, that I saw the correlation between the excitement of home cooking and like seeing, like what chefs are doing on TV or whatever. And then the performance side, because I love fitness, I love activity, I love performance. So I was interning as an S&C coach for some codes of rugby in Australia and realised a bit of a disconnect between nutrition and applying it at home for some of these players and so I just decided to be the person who can help solve that problem. Then over time it got me to jump into kitchens, have a restaurant and then, you know, I moved to New York and I just love. I love the intricacies of when someone's I love to help people improve their percentage of performance by like five to 10%. That excites me, like being part of someone's team to do that, just a little bit can go a long way, Even just 1%.

0:24:21 - Speaker 1 Sometimes you can dial it up 1%, 100% and performance, energy recovery, sleep. I mean it's wild 100%.

0:24:28 - Speaker 2 The other side of it is I love, I love being a chef. I love seeing people enjoy my food. I love the idea of just cooking at home for myself. I love the idea of cooking for my friends. So it always a catalyst for me when probably that day when I walked into the room in Sydney and I realised that a player could not understand how to apply the information that nutrition was given to them. Simple as that.

0:24:51 - Speaker 1 Tim, even at that level they're still such a big disconnect.

0:24:54 - Speaker 2 Yeah, this is like 10 years ago. But yeah, man, like, oh, it was even more than 10 years ago. But yeah, it's like a huge disconnect because you're given plays, you're given like you know, you're given numbers. We all get given numbers. We refine food around how many macro nutrients you should be having, and that's like, is that true? What food is? Is it a number? And so what I did was I was like, hey, I know what you're trying to get you to eat. Here's a recipe it's going to dial you. In. Over eight week period, we actually were able to control and see, we had a control group and a test.

0:25:24 - Speaker 1 Oh, you like, fully tested all this. Yeah, okay, great.

0:25:26 - Speaker 2 And the guys who are in the test group improved their performance.

0:25:31 - Speaker 1 Damn. I mean, I know you work with a lot of amazing people. You were talking about kind of how you got here through. You know working with athletes, and I know you work a lot with the guys over at center the app and training.

I mean to be I don't know if it's a daunting task or a rewarding task man, but to be responsible for people such as, like Chris Hemsworth, getting ready for, you know, movies and training and all this stuff. What is it like when you've got a task like that, when you've got a platform like that, when you've got a project, a deadline and there's a lot of people and a lot of money riding that line of performance and aesthetics? How do you kind of rise to that occasion and is your approach any different?

0:26:12 - Speaker 2 Yeah, I think it doesn't change between individual, whoever it is. I think that's really important. Like I think you got, treat everyone as an individual and that's the same for their diet, right, and I mean in the sense that the program is the same. You always do an initial review. You ask them what they like, what they don't like, you find out how long you have for a deadline and then you know. Ultimately, your job is then to provide them an achievable way to get there, whether they have a chef or they don't, your plan is to do that. It's never. It's funny. There's things that I got nervous about. There's a lot of things I got nervous about growing up. I'm really scared of flying, like I really am, but I'm not scared of jumping on a morning show or, like you know, doing the shows that I get to do. I love that.

0:26:57 - Speaker 1 Isn't it a while? What? Either we're naturally gravitating towards or we want to stay away from most. Like you're, you're ready to just hop on in front of hundreds of thousands of people and just go.

0:27:08 - Speaker 2 It's crazy, but yeah, that's, I love it, it's like. It's like. I always say, it's like Super Bowl for me. Yeah, it's like. This is what I love doing, and doing that like with one person you know millions of people in the morning. Whatever it is, it doesn't, I'm not concerned about that, but for other people you would be. Conversely, a lot of other people would not be scared about jumping on a plane, or they would.

What is something that may be in my perfect like I think definitely part of it is when you work in a kitchen environment where your deadlines are less than the seconds and you got to time it. You got like, say, you got four kitchen team members. Each person's got to time their dish to be coming to the past. At the same time, if one person f's up, then the rest of them have all got to restart their dish again. Then you got percent 100%, because for you guys to get the perfect fish cooked, there's a timing on it, right? So I think that heated environment, coupled with rugby and, you know, being in that environment of performance, really helped me understand, like the things that I'm prepared me for, not being scared of some of those high pressure environments, conversely something that's not as pressurized. I'm scared of it's funny.

0:28:17 - Speaker 1 We are who. We are right, yeah.

0:28:19 - Speaker 2 You put me right by like a height. Yeah, I'm going to be scared. I'm really scared of heights. So scared of heights, scared of flying. I've jumped out of a plane once. I probably never do. I never, never want to do it again. So, but that's like again, that's like one of the scariest things I've ever done.

0:28:34 - Speaker 1 It's pretty wild. It's pretty wild. Yeah, I love it. I love it. So you're getting ready to do something. I think a lot of people will be afraid of speaking of fear. You're embarking on your training for a hundred mile marathon, right? You're saying about the ultra, right, ultra. Why, first and foremost?

0:28:49 - Speaker 2 Yeah.

0:28:50 - Speaker 1 And how are you preparing up here and how are you preparing this, how are you preparing the mind? Because that's got to be a lot of resiliency and mental fortitude to just embrace the suck on that kind of journey. But also, what are maybe you doing? Are you doing anything differently physically, or is it just more religiously, more regularly, or how does that work out for?

0:29:11 - Speaker 2 you? Yeah, dude, so you're talking about Leadville 100.

0:29:13 - Speaker 1 Yeah.

0:29:17 - Speaker 2 It's a race through. It's a 50 mile out and back loop, so you run for miles and you come back. It starts at 9000 feet of elevation. I think there's like a total of 12,000, I gotta work it out 12,000. Total gain Could be more, I don't know a bit.

0:29:31 - Speaker 1 Elevation is a whole, nother little level, yeah, so like running 100 miles in general sucks.

0:29:35 - Speaker 2 Running 100 miles at elevation sucks and then running 100 miles at elevation on a trail that it's a suck inside of a suck.

0:29:42 - Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah.

0:29:42 - Speaker 2 And this place if you didn't know, leadville and the mountains can have all four seasons, so it can be like 80 to 90 degrees and then by the morning it can be 38. It could snow, holy shit, it can rain.

0:29:54 - Speaker 1 Are you also fighting bears and are sharks jumping out at the same time?

0:29:57 - Speaker 2 I'll let you know, man, I'll let you know how I go, but yeah, I'm sure, I'm sure like I don't know, darth Vader probably will come down and, you know, probably zap me with his light saber, whatever it is. But yeah, no dude, it's a very intensive thing. I was fortunate to crew my friend, adam Klingklaas. Yeah, he did it. He got to 87 miles and his body literally shut down. Like his mind was there, his body shut down. But back to the question as to why they get this a lot. We're like why would you do that? Why are you doing it?

And there's a lot of things I do, definitely for other people. You know like I started running the marathon in New York City every year for City Harvest, which is the charity that I'm associated with. Leadville is for me and I'm so proud to say that because we don't do enough for ourselves. First thing to go during the week, whenever we're busy, is our health, and for me, doing Leadville isn't about running the miles every week to get me prepared and, by the way, we're going to call them kilometers. We're going to start calling them kilometers. It's not like clock in the case. It's actually about doing something for you to get to a position of achieving something that you set up for yourself and through the process of training, I'm really getting into a meditative state when I'm running. Is it easy?

0:31:05 - Speaker 1 Nah.

0:31:06 - Speaker 2 God no, I went for a 100k run on 62 miles on Saturday. Yeah, so I ran to like a random no-transcript A couple of months ago. It was pretty funny. A couple of months ago I ran from Sleepy Hollow, which is an upstate in West Chester, down to Wall Street with a bunch of people and that run is the longest because Broadway is the longest street in New York City or New York.

Straight street all the way down. So we did that race and I was like that's pretty cool and it was like going into like 31 miles, that's gonna be awesome, and then like I'm gonna run that back though. So what I did was I started at Wall Street this time, ran up and then ran back, and so it was really interesting. Your mind is an amazing thing. My buddy who was doing that race with me, he said he was only gonna do like 30 miles or 20 miles, whatever of the race. So he did, he did, he did about 25. And then he had to go somewhere and like he was ready, he was done.

But for me, at that point, at 25 miles, just about six miles from the turnaround point, I was like I'm good. And it wasn't because and previously at 31 miles, I was absolutely screwed. When I did the 31 mile one, oh, I bet yeah. And it wasn't for me because of I was better physically prepared per se, even though I had a bit more months of training, is more of a case of the expectation I set in myself before I started. So if you, well, I was gonna run 62 miles, no matter what. So my head space is when I'm at mile 10,. I'm at mile 20, I'm at mile 30. No matter what, I'm still running 62 miles.

0:32:45 - Speaker 1 Clear goal.

0:32:46 - Speaker 2 Clear goal in my head. If I was the same thing for 31 miles, which was the first one, my pain at, say, 28 miles would be the same pain I would have at the 56 miles. Because my head space is like I'm only got this percentage left to go, and I think that has been one of the fundamental things that I've realized no matter what, when I run that 100 mile race, I'm at percentage of completion. My head space is gonna be pretty much at the same point of like when I'm 10% to go, it'll be the same as 10% to go on a marathon, 10% to go on a 10K, 10% to go in a half, whatever it is. And so for that reason I'm like, all right, I've gotta get the volume in and it's, but I'm no longer. I'm no longer. And this 100K is was amazing because it really set me in good state and I felt pretty confident coming out of it. But I'm doing this for me and no headphones zoning in. Oh, wow, wow, it's apparently people-.

0:33:47 - Speaker 1 All natural.

0:33:47 - Speaker 2 So you're a psycho, apparently, if you do with no headphones, I'm doing with no headphones. It's just much better, damn.

0:33:51 - Speaker 1 Yeah. So real quick, kind of take us inside the mind of Dan Churchill when you're crossing these crazy mile markers and no doubt the body is like shit, shit, shit, you know, oh. So then the mind has to kind of kick in and go okay, body, we got this, we got this. What is that self-talk? What is it like inside your head when the body wants to quit? How do you not quit?

0:34:15 - Speaker 2 You know, I reckon one of the hardest things we battle with on these events is actually the boredom. Like, have you spent 12 hours with you? Like just you running, you gotta be fine. My body and my mind wonders it goes. I need stimulation. Like I need stimulation all the time. My body, Devon, needs stimulation all the time, right, and I think that's like what's going through my head is like I need something else to stimulate me and I've had to learn to calm that down. So, like the milestones along the way, I remember the pain I felt from my first marathon the day after was three times as worse as I felt after this 100K.

0:34:54 - Speaker 1 Really.

0:34:55 - Speaker 2 Yeah.

0:34:56 - Speaker 1 Crazy Interesting.

0:34:57 - Speaker 2 So I loaded my body correctly, I hydrated better, I was dialed in better and I slept well.

0:35:03 - Speaker 1 Okay.

0:35:04 - Speaker 2 But I also think like part of it's like mentally now I'm just way better prepared.

0:35:08 - Speaker 1 Well, your brain now has kind of that relation, point of hey, we've been there before, we know the pain, the suffering Exactly. We have a familiarity which I think, and no matter what we're talking about here, we have familiarity in relation to a pain point. Somehow, some way we can endure this again.

0:35:24 - Speaker 2 Yeah, you know. It's funny, though, like I remember growing up at primary school, the big race you had every year. The cross country was two kilometers, just over a mile, and I remember every year it was like comments like dreading going oh my God, I have to run two kilometers.

0:35:37 - Speaker 1 Yeah, we had that growing up too at elementary school. The one mile run, yeah you're like, oh, go run one mile.

0:35:43 - Speaker 2 And now you're like, okay, that's kind of like a chilling thing we do, and, like the last couple of years, before doing the ultra, you're doing like 10K runs to prepare yourself for the marathon and that was like, okay, cool. Then you have like a 21,. Then you eventually doing 30Ks and these are, like you know, relatively, you know, 18 mile races and that, to me, was pretty intense. Now I'm crossing like I did a marathon on the weekend. Then I'm like, oh, just did the marathon, cool, awesome, let's keep running.

I got to the second marathon, which is the funny part. I got to 84 clicks, shit, or like what was it? 52 miles and I was like it clicked over 84. Okay, we got 10 miles to go, because that's 16. And then, oh my God, 84, it's two, yeah right, two marathons. So you kind of like you're just kind of doing it and it was pretty funny Cause you think about it. If you say to yourself, right now I can't do, there's no way I can run 84 or 56, 52. A lot of people would say that. I think most people would say that. But it'd be really interesting to see over time, as you start to get into a better mental state to go well if I'm setting myself a task of running two marathons, no matter what that's that task, and at halfway point still the same, halfway point of a 10 mile or not.

0:37:00 - Speaker 1 And that's the whole point, not to repeat myself again, but like that is such an important point, that's the whole point I'm talking about here on NeverFord radio. To live a life ever for it is, you got to embark upon hard things. You have to choose. First and foremost, you have to have the choice to I'm gonna do this and then when you do it and you go through the suck, you, like I said, then have that relation point so that you can reflect back on, not on anybody else's achievements or their forms of success, but your mind and your body knows hey, we've been through this shit before, we have some familiarity, we know how to better navigate this, even if it's not the same obstacle, the same task. But look, pain and suffering is pain and suffering Physical, mental, emotional, spiritual. It all just comes back to our choice of are we gonna put ourselves back out there again?

0:37:48 - Speaker 2 Yeah, 100%, man, like you said it exactly Instead of instead of bar that you is achieving, but instead of high. You know you'd be surprised what you and your head space can get through.

0:37:58 - Speaker 1 Hell. I mean, if you choose, all right, I'm gonna do a 100 mile race. What if you only make 30 miles? Well, you know what do they say shoot for the moon, aim for the stars, or aim for the stars, get the moon. I'm fucking it up. But basically, if you set that really daunting task and you're gonna get pretty far, whereas you set a closer task, I mean you're only gonna get incrementally far.

0:38:18 - Speaker 2 I also think there's the controllable things you can keep accountable to. We do this in my team. It's like you know, we wanna hit a million subscribers on YouTube. Right, we want to do that. So going every week to say we wanna do that it's actually not the action step. In order to get to a million subscribers, you gotta be putting out content that's, you know, relatable and consistent.

For them to you know, want to follow you right. So what are the controllable things that we can do every single week to hit that goal? I think there's actionable goals and outcome goals.

0:38:46 - Speaker 1 So true absolutely.

0:38:48 - Speaker 2 And so it's so important that when you're setting a task, set it high but then have accountability for the actions that hit that goal. And I liken this to like a lot of guys like they reach out to me and talk about like how do you get started, how do I get to where you wanna be, and, like you know, it's the same in everybody. It's like you know some of these actors who were like Ryan Reynolds, started out doing you know everything before he got to where he is today.

0:39:11 - Speaker 1 Right, and I'm not comparing-. Well, shout out Don Saladino. Don helped a lot on that. His trainer, I sat with him in the room next door my last trip here.

0:39:19 - Speaker 2 I mean, yeah, I mean, but set a high goal and get help along the way 100% dude, like, and I think for me and on the path that you see for yourself and I'm very lucky I always knew my North Star was very early age, so I'm still working towards it. But yeah, man, like, I think it's so interesting when we do this and we, if we don't set a bar at all, I think you're like it's very hard for you to see a path. But if you set a bar that's like really achievable, not really aspirational enough, then you know that's, that's up to you, but that's what I would say. And then the third thing is what are your actionable steps to hit that goal?

0:39:56 - Speaker 1 Yeah, what is the role of star man? What's your why for what you do, how you do it?

0:40:00 - Speaker 2 Yeah, man, it's. I've always been inspired by chefs who are doing things for greater good and generally it's like they're doing stuff cross platform to share their added value, whether it be recipe related stuff or you know. Ultimately for me, it's get to a position where I can have enough impact that can lobby or help, you know, have it advise nutritional government, you know groups to have the right panels for our schools Amazing and then find ways for our schools to get more affordable and realistic nutritional work on both ends there.

0:40:38 - Speaker 1 That's amazing.

0:40:38 - Speaker 2 Yeah, dude, like, if I can do that, and then ultimately the one that was like the tip of the iceberg is to eventually, you know, build kitchens in third world countries and have doesn't have to be my name, but I know, I've realized all this along the way. Like, what Jose you know is doing is amazing. It's because of his brand that he's built, that he's doing and his actions. But it's really hard to do it behind a brand, it's more behind a figurehead, and so I like people like that. Jamie Oliver is one of my greatest day, in suppose. So getting a position where, like, obviously you're, you're, I guess your persona, your profile has gone enough. You know trust from everyone that if I say something then maybe we should consider listening in.

0:41:20 - Speaker 1 Yeah, that brings up another point. I was going to get to my last question, man, but I love what you just said about developing this level of trust and what we do and how we do it.

We kind of it's come in full circle. It's kind of what we talked about in the very beginning. If you could give one piece of advice for somebody to to follow their North Star, to lean into their why, but also be aware of. I need and it's important If I want this all to really work out in the end, the way that you know, not only to affect me but the world how do I really develop and keep and nurture trust along the way with even just one person, much less a large audience?

0:41:57 - Speaker 2 Yeah. So once you kind of like trust your gut, understand what your North Star is, I think it's real. I know it's really important to go back to that point of genuity. If you know what your core values are, maybe you should identify this. If you know your core values are, it's so easy to stay on your path and your core values could be. You know this wide.

So if anything comes to as an opportunity your way is not fitting in this parameter, it's a no Right. So if it's a no not in here, every time you say yes to something it's got to be fitting within here. What's great is that helps grow the people within your space to trust you, given this situation, and you can system, be consistent with your content, but make sure it's a round of value of added. You know benefit and say no to things that are nowhere near and remotely close to your values. I've turned down very early on, when I had no money, lots of deals that were worth you know six figures that contained high fructose corn syrup or supported some sort of fast food chain. That clearly would not be something that.

I would relate to Good on you, yeah, yeah, like, thank you, yeah, but ultimately, like I, it's also. It was a very intentional decision. I couldn't stand there and present myself in front of this brand and be like, oh, that's, this is. I believe in this because I didn't, but now, over this time, it's taking longer to get there because it's a harder road.

0:43:23 - Speaker 1 Hard ride over easy wrong Dude absolutely.

0:43:25 - Speaker 2 But I've got there. I haven't gotten there yet, but I'm getting there to the point where, like, people trust me as you know, you'll have me on this podcast now because I'm becoming top of mind in the food nutrition space as a chef, and that takes time to build your credibility. But guarantee you, the moment you do something that is not you, your audience will know about it and they're gone, and I'll even say you know it, you know.

0:43:47 - Speaker 1 you know it, when you say yes or no to something, how it feels down here in the gut you know even in your heart and I can tell you anytime over the last several years you know I've been doing the show now and in the entrepreneur space for about lower six years and thankfully, maybe I can count on one hand times where I've compromised, I'll say on my core values, because it was, let me just say yes, because it's easy or maybe it's a good opportunity. But something inside of me was just like this isn't 100%, hell yeah. And every time those things either don't work out or I wind up feeling some kind of way about it, or I just completely distance myself. I'm like I don't want to do that ever again. So just I echo everything you just said, man.

0:44:34 - Speaker 2 Well, you know Chris Aschendon, the founder of athletic greens or AG1, he asked me this question every time.

I sit down with him. He said, dan, what lights you up? And it's amazing because I always know it's coming. Every single time I'm like, oh, here we go, the question from Chris. I know I'm going to answer, but it's so true, he's so right. If you're not lit up about what you're doing or an opportunity, it's very hard to say it's genuine and you're therefore not going to benefit long term from it. You may get some cash in the bank, but it's not realistically going to help you long term.

0:45:11 - Speaker 1 Well, man, I think that does bring us to the final question here. Perfect way to kind of get into how you live a life ever forward, kind of sharing with you my backstory and the origin of the show. I always look for the through line in my guess you know, you do you and you got an incredible way of doing you and helping your world and the world. But to bring it home to the theme of living a life ever forward, when you hear those words, man, what does that mean to you?

0:45:36 - Speaker 2 You know, for me, when I'm looking at this kind of stuff, I always say if you're not playing offense, as I said earlier, if you're not playing offense, you're not growing. So if I'm moving forward and offense doesn't have to be professional Am I learning? Am I doing better to improve the relationship? Am I adding value? These are the kind of things that I've always looked at every single day, and when I get up in the morning, have my coffee, it's like that time is also for me to learn sit down, read, article, study, even just what's going on in sport, whatever it is, am I growing? And so you know I love learning and I think learning is the heart of growth for me. And so going forward, as you said, or moving forward, is all about playing that offense, beautiful man.

0:46:22 - Speaker 1 I always say there's never a right or wrong answer. I always appreciate everybody's interpretation. So those, those firemen, appreciate you. I appreciate you, dude.

0:46:29 - Speaker 2 Thanks for having me.