#62 Putting in the Work to Win, with Jason Khalipa

Gentlemen, welcome to the V Man Podcast.

Today, super excited to have a conversation with Jason Khalipa, who is the was the CrossFit Games World Champion, among lots of other things.

And we're going to dig in and have a rad conversation here about, well, the holistic approach to being a man and now your big shift in focus to what you're doing now.

It's super bad.

So Jason, so happy to have you here with us, brother.

Why don't you?

Start giving us just giving us a background.

Give us some of your story.

Yeah, so I was.

I was really raised in the fitness space.

So I found the commercial gym, regular gym at like 1516.

I started working at front desk there.

I then when I was in high school, I ended up.

Starting to, you know, become interested in the sales side.

So when I graduate from high school, I didn't really apply myself as well as I should in high school.

I didn't really understand life that well and I just kind of like coasted.

I ended up going to a junior college for two years instead of going to play football.

And during that time I was like, oh, I got to get my stuff together.

So I ended up working full time at the gym, going to school full time and doing sales at the gym.

Well, after a couple years I ended up transferring to the four year university my my, you know, my girlfriend at the time.

Was going to We ended up graduating from college at the same time.

So long and short of it.

I graduated from College in 2008.

I also won the CrossFit Games and I started our business all in 2008.

My wife and I, we met when we were 14.

So we went to high school together.

We then went to college together and then we graduated together.

And at that time, you know, I won the CrossFit Games.

I ended up competing for about a decade in the CrossFit Games.

I opened up a you know a global fitness organization and over the last, you know decade.

So for about a decade, I competed professionally in CrossFit I.

Was on the podium 3 * I competed for Team USA 3 * I I I I accomplished quite a bit there and you know at the same time obviously grew our business and grew our family.

In 2016 my daughter was diagnosed with leukemia.

At that time I stopped competing professionally across it just could not be a priority at that time and ended up finding Jiu Jitsu around that same time.

Started really diving into that, really opened my mind and now here we are.

What, 2023, and over the last, you know, so many years, a lot has changed.

You know, here I, you know, when I first got into CrossFit, got into fitness, I was young, I was 21.

I was fired up to just trying to be the fittest on Earth.

Now I'm 38, I have two kids.

I've built my wife for 20 years and my goal is to train so I could provide for my family, not only work, provide, right?

Like I want to be financially successful to provide them.

But also provide them experiences and be able to go do anything with my son.

You know, every day my son comes home from school, let's go do this, let's go do that, let's go do this.

And it's like I want to be able to provide those experiences and always say yes.

And having fitness is critical to be able to do that.

And I also want to be able to protect myself and my family.

And when we think about protect, I think that people instantly think like combatives or guns and stuff like that.

And yes, I train a lot of firearms.

I train a lot of Jiu jitsu.

That's not necessarily what I'm talking about.

What I'm talking about is the ability to jump, climb, climb, lift, run, Sprint.

All of those things really become a major factor in your ability to protect yourself and your family.

So where I'm at my journey is, you know, I own a fitness company.

It's called NC Fit.

We own and operate gyms.

We also service gym owners and coaches.

And we also have a new brand called Train Hard that we're launching, which is really designed for the men that want to train hard.

To be able to protect themselves, protect their family, look the part and act the part.

And that's where I'm at, man.

It's been a journey.

It's been fun.

Love that.

Look the part and act the part.

Yeah, man.

I mean, I could talk all about that, but yeah, go ahead.

I want to, I want to jump back to just one little thing you said and I think it'll lead to to the what you said at the end.

Sure.

Somewhere you just said, hey, I got to get my stuff together.

What was the catalyst for that?

You're just rolling along and just kind of maybe doing whatever and maybe talk us through that you're you're just kind of rolling along and then a few years later you're winning World Championships, bro.

And and like the training to get to that level, we'll dive into that is huge.

But what was that catalyst that you're like, I got to stop just just existing or doing whatever?

Yeah, I mean, I think in high school, you know, it's almost like, I mean, it's not, it's no one else's fault of my own, right.

But at the end of the day.

I just wasn't applying myself.

I was able to just get by.

You know, I went to a private Catholic school.

They're able to kind of like shift you through the, you know, the freshman, sophomore, junior, senior, etcetera.

And at the moment in time where you know the the, the kind of life kind of hits this point and you're either at that point, I was, I was consistent with my peers and I would get, you know, decent grades.

I got 3.0, I was whatever.

But then all of a sudden, when we were getting ready to go to college, you know?

Mediocracy wasn't good enough and I didn't get accepted.

And so when I went to junior college, first day of junior college, it's a true story.

I show up for my first day of junior college.

At the time, like, I was pretty popular in high school.

I was playing sports.

I was pretty successful there.

I didn't apply myself fully to go to the next level.

I had some opportunities that just didn't really work out.

So I show up there and I I feel like I'm like already kind of like an outsider.

I'm like, what am I doing at this junior college?

First day of class, we're introducing ourselves.

Hey, I'm, you know, John, I've been here for two years.

Hey, I'm Mary.

Whatever.

And I I I kid you not.

This woman next to me, she's like, hi, my name is Sue.

I don't remember her name.

And this is my 7th year at West Valley College.

That's a junior college.

And I remember saying to myself like, holy shit, if I don't get my life together, it could be me 7 years from now with not even an associate's degree.

Nothing.

And and and.

Look, if that's the journey you want to take, like, that's on you, like, and that's and that's fine.

Like, I don't, I don't judge anybody.

But that wasn't the journey that I wanted for myself, right?

I did not want to be the person who spent seven years at junior college and didn't accomplish what I wanted to accomplish.

So that same day I go over to the, like, administrative office and like, look, I got to get the hell out of here as fast as I can.

What do I need to do?

And the guy kind of mentored me and he did a good job.

He's like, look, you need to do summer school.

You need to do this.

You need that.

So I ended up applying to Santa Clara University, which is where I ended up going to school.

I applied out of out of high school.

I got denied.

My mom worked there.

Check this out.

My mom worked there at the time.

My dad was formally on the board of engineers and went to school there.

My sister had gone to school there and went and got her masters there and I got denied in as a senior.

I applied so that's how she migrated for.

I applied again as a freshman in junior college.

I got denied.

I applied again at the end of that year.

I got denied.

Finally, after two years of junior college, I had applied now three times on my 4th time applying.

It removed my high school transcripts.

I got accepting in Santa Clara, which is where I went and got my four year degree.

Oh, I love it dude, what a story I guess.

No sitting down next to someone like and again, no judgement on her for whatever she was doing, but like, that's not where I'm going.

That's not where I'm going.

Yeah, that's not where I'm going to be.

That's so powerful.

And and you know, that was kind of my experience too.

I ended up a broken family.

I ended up out of my own 16 and living in a bad, bad part of town, just looking at people that have been there for decades.

And I had the same experience.

I'm like, dude, I'm not staying here.

I will not live like this.

I don't care what it cost me.

I'm not staying here.

Yeah.

So then, so then you went like, I'm going somewhere.

I'm getting university.

But then brother, you went to another level of of hunger and endurance and drive and and arguably beat out some world class athletes like what gives you an advantage, man?

I mean, I think it's a mindset.

You know, there's a lot of guys that are good in the garage but or the gym, but when they step out on the competition floor, they have a tendency to not do as well.

And I think for me, I'm not like a naturally super athletic guy like I just right before I got on this with you.

I just finished a 40 minute emam in the garage with a bunch of like really hard charger guys and I ran up here and that's why I jumped on.

I'm like alright, let's let's go.

But it's like I just got this twitch in me that just wants to.

I love the idea of training hard.

I love that I love it because it makes me a better husband, it makes me a better father.

It makes me show up better.

You know, I I just hit this 40 minute workout and now my wife and her her friends are in the garage and it's like that's how we show up better.

That's how we show up better for everybody around us and.

Back in even 2006, 2007, you know, when I was just a gym rat, I would show up better when I would go down and just hit a pump.

And I just, I loved it.

I fell in love with the idea of training and the expression of my training came at the CrossFit Games.

So for me, I never got into CrossFit for money, fame, fortune, whatever.

Like I ended up, you know, making those things through sponsorships and all kinds of stuff as the sport grew.

But that's not what drove me.

What drove me was.

I'm going to train super hard and I want to see where I stack up against my peers.

OK, OK, we got a we got a deep dive here and kind of double click, double click into this training thing.

I love that the expression of my training showed up in the games.

There's this awesome quote, I'm sure you're familiar with it by Archilicus, he said.

We never rise to the the level of our expectations.

We fall to the level of our training, right?

The way I like to say that is like we don't live at the level of our hopes.

We live at the level of our habits.

And so for you that and I'm right with you on this the the hard training is how we show up and it's that day-to-day grind that I love.

That became the IT just was an expression.

It came out in in a competition.

That's right.

Yeah.

And and yeah, go ahead.

You know, what was the question?

How do you, how do you get into that brother?

Because like what?

What is it that that separates you out from, like, the average man but but even even great athletes, that competitive advantage, maybe even like what's?

I would love to know.

What's the dialogue?

What's what are you saying to yourself?

What are you thinking when it's an early morning workout and you're hurting and you just keep going?

Like, wow.

I mean, there's so many different ways you you could look at this so many different ways, right?

You could look at it as, like, I get to do this, right?

Like, so for example, like I was in the garage at 6:00 AM with my daughter this morning.

So this is, this is true.

I this there's This is 100% factual.

Every morning during the week, my daughter and I are in the garage at 6:00 AM and we are working out.

And then she goes in the cold lunch.

And after that I typically will get my mind right, get some coffee, whatever, and I'll have some hard chargers will come over and we'll crush it.

And my wife will also have some hard charges if her friends come over and crush it.

And later on I'll probably get on the mats or do some wrestling or whatever.

And you got to ask the question like, why do you do that?

What?

What?

Why do you do that?

Well.

I I My perspective on it is that I am blessed to have the opportunity to be able to do this.

Yes, my job allows me to do these things because fitness, the part of what I do for a living, but the same time I'm doing it before most people are even awake anyways.

And so it's like I'm prioritizing my health and my fitness because I know that I show up better for everybody around me when I get to go put in my fitness.

And that's something that's very important to me, micro doses of adversity.

Are the most critical thing that we could expose our children to and ourselves to.

Because life will come and crush your soul sometimes and you have to be ready to take that on.

And the only way you could take that on is if you've exposed yourself to little dose of adversity within your control.

So for me with my children, I'm trying to expose them as much as I can to adversity.

So when they get broken up by their girlfriend, boyfriend when they face some type of trouble.

They are more prepared to take that on and that's what fitness allows me to do.

Fitness is bigger than just a six pack abs and health markers.

Fitness is bigger than just being strong enough and fit enough to protect myself and my family.

Fitness is about this idea that it holds me in between the ears and allows me to show up better, but also have these micro dose of adversities that when or if life throws me a curveball, I'm better prepared to handle them.

Yes exactly.

And man it's and it has to be a proactive deliberate approach to this and I look like micro dosing right And we can, we can I love to do this too.

Talking about it's like you micro dose on a daily basis and then everyone saw you macro dose.

You go do some huge endurance event you go do something really challenging but the micro dosing is what builds that that capacity and I love it that you're bringing your kids into it too.

I do the same thing.

We have seven children and I get kids in there working out.

We're climbing huge mountains right now.

We're training to climb Kilimanjaro.

Yeah, dude, that's badass.

There's some pain, right?

There's some How old are your kids?

So the oldest is 21 and the youngest is 6.

Wow.

Yeah.

I mean, so you know, look, there's a lot of different ways you expose your children adversity.

I am not saying all you have to do is work out with them.

I think that's a great way because as a parent, as a dad, it shows them what hard work is.

Like here's something most of your audience is like, is it mainly like men and dads?

Primarily How the question I would ask most of your audience if you're listening.

How do you show your children hard work?

Because most people, most of the time, work hard.

I believe that most men want to work hard for their families.

But a lot of times we've lost the trades in terms of most people work on a computer, most go to work and they're at a bank or they're at somewhere they're not typically like building.

Exactly.

So the point I'm trying to make there is that if you want to say, oh, dad's working hard, it's like, OK, that's cool.

So but what if I can show them that on a regular basis?

I don't need to tell my kids anything.

Because when they walk outside and they see me and a group of friends sweating our ass off doing burpees, they're like, OK, that's what hard work is.

And then they can equate that concept, that idea, to what I'm doing at work.

But if you never show them that, I think it's something so visual, so beautiful to be able to show them what that hard work is.

So if you're not doing something, I think, I think you're missing out on on a really cool secret skill, one 100%.

And this is, this is actually a pretty easy way to let your kids, whether they're really young or getting old or whatever, they see you sweating and pushing and pushing your limits and hurting and still going right and hopefully doing it with a good attitude.

That's that's one thing I'm like like show your kids how to struggle with a good attitude.

Yeah.

And I mean, I think, like, climbing mountains is such a beautiful analogy.

That's something I really want to do.

We've done it a little bit on a small level, but on a big level I want to do with my kids.

Because it's it's such a symbolic thing like hey, we're going to climb a mountain and our goal is to summit.

That's where we're going, that's our goal and we're going to work hard to get there.

And I think it equates really well.

It's like goal setting, especially big goals, things like that.

But if you can't get out and go climb, I think, you know, obviously group sports are tremendously powerful.

Learning how to win, learning how to lose, learning how to compete, learning how to defend yourself.

I think all of those things are incredibly important, especially for our youth and our young men in particular.

Absolutely do you.

Are your kids involved in jiu jitsu with you?

Yeah.

So a prerequisite in our house, I look at self-defense kind of like I look at brushing your teeth.

It's not something that you have to do.

I mean, excuse me, it's not something you might want to do, but you have to do it.

And it's it's a little bit of a, you know, it's not as easy for me with the like with fitness and with sports, it's pretty easy.

With both my kids, I have a 12 year old and a nine year old.

Pretty easy.

With with self-defense, it's more of like the kids know that on a regular basis, they're going to come train with me once or twice a week.

We're going to set a clock for like 30 minutes.

We're going to spar, we're going to do combatives and we're going to work on grip breaking and all these kind of things, primarily as a tool set that they need for the rest of their life.

But they they know it as that.

You know what I mean?

Like they're not like fired up to do it, but they know that it's like what they need to do Same and and and your kids are still younger.

Where like I, my kids were same thing, same kind of journey.

We were doing Krav Maga and some Taekwondo and other things, and and as they get, they kind of went, oh, I don't know, And then man, as they became teens, they flipped the switch and they can't get enough of it.

That's awesome.

There's all over it.

So it's the same mindset.

Why?

Yeah, I mean, especially for young, for young men.

So with my daughter, I I train my daughter much different than I train my son.

So I I train my daughter in such a way where.

I don't need her to learn how to get somebody inside control.

I don't need her to know how to mount somebody.

I don't need her to even learn how to armbar.

Maybe some of your nakeds a joke, but but what I work with Ava is grip breaking, getting out of someone, grabbing you, getting away as easy, as fast and as aggressively as possible.

Like what we work with Ava is if someone puts their hands on you and you don't want them on you, you need to work with such aggression.

And such speed that they instantly regret ever touching you.

And I I want you to act with such violence that that's why I work with her, right.

But the idea is act with violence and get away for her.

For my son, it's a little bit different.

You know he's already pretty big guy.

He he's going to be a big boy For him.

It's more like teaching himself defense skills so he could stand up for himself and also stand up for somebody else who might be getting bullied and learn how to control somebody.

And keep his temperament down because he knows he has a confidence to just stay calm.

And it's just a different beast, right?

Because one of them is, you know, Ava is going to be 115 pounds.

My son's going to be 250 pounds.

It's just a completely different animal, you know, I love it.

How does this come into your reality?

Because because I I mean, I mean guys all over the world.

I get.

I get to work with people on five continents and it's it's actually pretty rare to have this kind of priority and focus on self-defense and preparedness.

Like where where did this come into your journey?

Why is it so important to you?

It's 'cause this is rare and awesome.

I I'm and I'm right aligned with exactly what you're saying.

I think I started becoming really interested in combative.

So I I was interested in Muay Thai a long time ago I got into Muay Thai.

Then I started subleasing space when I was doing CrossFit for a long time I subleased space Jiu Jitsu.

I used to love watching.

It was like a game of chess, but I never really did it because I was competing professionally cross.

I didn't want to get hurt.

And what I've done over the years is I've travelled the world teaching seminars, all do different types of things.

And I've met with a lot of different law enforcement groups I regularly train with.

Like right now we service Customs and Border Protection and we serve as different law enforcement groups.

Like, I work with all kinds of them and I've seen kind of the underbelly of, you know, dude, life could be tough.

Like there there are some bad people in this world.

And as a parent, As a dad.

What I think about is, am I best preparing my children to be successful?

And that's in so many realms, right?

Am I sending them to the right school?

Am I introducing them to the right things?

Am I exposing them?

Like if my son really wants to be, you know, reach his potential at football, am I giving him all the tools to help him get there?

Am I supporting him?

And that same thing applies with self-defense, right?

I don't want to look back and God forbid something happens 1020 years from now and be like I did not do the best I could to prepare my children because life is going to be hard.

Yes, yes, man, one of the most fundamental things I teach.

I learned it from utterly failing in a triathlon, and I just realized when the time to perform has arrived, the time to prepare has passed.

That's it.

It's done.

And if you're not ready, that will be one of the worst days of your life 100%.

And when you talk about self-defense, especially in this day and age, like dude, there is no take backs like you either.

And and I don't even feel like my kids are anywhere near where they need to be right?

But we're on a journey.

Just like I'm on the same journey, you know, Like I'm on the same journey to be the toughest, most capable badass in the room.

And I want every guy that I surround myself with to be on that same journey.

And because the more capable we become as men, the more we could just have the self-confidence just to chill and just be relaxed and just know that we have the skill sets to be able to do these different things.

But we choose to be loving, caring, compassionate.

You know, because those are core values of ours.

That doesn't mean you still can't be a tough guy on the surface, you know, in addition.

Yeah, some of I love, I love hearing you say this because some of the guys I get to train with and work with are some of the most serious, badass, dangerous men on the planet and they are so chill, especially the ones that are like black belt jiu jitsu.

They're just like, no, it's all good bro.

Like they're so relaxed because they've like been in on the on the mats, so.

Often and for so long, they they just have the total mastery.

It's a really beautiful thing to see, dude.

Yeah.

I think that if your son, if your listeners and your son has an issue with bullying kids or your daughter if send them to a jiu jitsu class and allow them to become humbled and in an appropriate fashion and allow them to to.

The reason why kids bully each other is is because of a lack of confidence.

If we could build up self-confidence through sports, through training, through all of these different things, I find that the they will be the least likely to ever bully somebody else because they are comfortable within their own skin.

And I'm already seeing this at my son's age.

You know, there's they're nine year old boys they're trying to posture up because they are in their own right, insecure and they don't really realize it yet.

And that's what I'm trying to build and foster is like this sense of comfort in knowing that you're OK, you know?

And it man, it's interesting that grown men still get stuck in that same thing, that deep insecurity that was never developed.

And and it's the posturing and and the bravado and all kinds of stuff that gets us into so much trouble where if we train again like get into the training, the training keeps you in a good spot 100%.

I mean training is what it's all about.

Like, obviously I, I work in a fitness space, but I believe that fitness is, you know, the number one thing that we could do to to not only prepare us physically, immensely emotionally and all that kind of stuff, like just to act the part and look the part.

I mean, think about it.

If you walk into a room and you got a group of dads.

So on Saturday I, I host these things called Train Hard Men's Club.

On Saturday we're running hill sprints, dude.

Those guys, like not all of them are super jacked, but like their dads that are pretty jacked.

Like you walk in, you're like, damn, that guy looks good, he looks young, he looks healthy.

You know he might be in his 50s and he still looks great, right As an example.

And they have the ability to act the part they can run, they can Sprint, they can climb, they can do all these things like that's what I want for every man indefinitely.

Like that's that should be the goal.

And I think that if you could look the part you could also avoid some potential issues really easily.

Like you know, if you look, you know what I mean cause bad guy's like hey man like I'm gonna go to the next.

Guy A guy's fit, right?

He he's confident, He's carrying himself well.

He's fit.

And they're like, well, yeah, I'm they're looking for somebody who's weak.

They're gonna pray out weakness and just being alive and looking the part.

Acting the part is gonna keep you out of so much trouble.

Yeah, yeah.

So that's that's what we're working on.

You know as as a train hard brand.

You know, that's something I'm really passionate about is NC Fit was originally Norcal CrossFit.

I've been around for for a long time.

We've opened locations all over the world.

We've really done some amazing things.

We've been an incredible team.

But as as as anything, right?

I've evolved, right?

I've evolved as a dad, as a husband, as an individual.

And I want to try and help, particularly men, just provide them the tools to to to be able to look the part and act apart.

Because I don't think it's that complicated.

Just a lot of people don't know what to do.

Yep.

Exactly.

So when you go work with like.

Police forces or border or wherever?

Are you working on both like kind of self-defense skills, like jujitsu skills and fitness, or is it primary with fitness you're trying to get a functionally fit man.

What like when you go down and work with somebody like that whose life is literally being at risk often?

What's your focus with them?

Yeah, it's it's it's 100% fitness.

So in my journey I will also, you know, I also work on like tactical type training 'cause I'm going to be competing in a tactical games.

I do not teach firearms.

I do not teach self-defense.

I yes, I only teach fitness because that's what I'm most qualified to instruct and for me it's at the base of the pyramid.

So if you look at like a pyramid that every man should look at, This is something I've been reflecting on a lot by the way, and you, I'm open to debate on this.

This is more of a conversation than like a hard set rule that I have.

At the bottom of the pyramid originally was mental and physical fitness.

Meaning how are your physical fitness, right?

And how's your mental fitness?

So if you're looking at in terms of mental and physical fitness, like where are you at on that journey?

If you're depressed going through whatever, like dude, you're not you're not you're not up appropriate protector, right?

Because you're you're you're lacking certain things.

You got to go, you got to go talk them out.

You got to go get through that, right?

If you're, if you're not mentally in a good place, like that's a problem, right?

If you're not physically in a good place, that's also a problem.

Like I don't care what kind of firearms training you have or what type of combative training you have.

If you can't breathe, you're in a lot of trouble.

So the baseline is mental and physical fitness.

We got to work that.

Then above that, originally I had combatives in my pyramid, but I actually changed it.

A friend of mine, his name, I don't know if you know who Tim Kennedy is.

I was with him and I was talking about this idea.

He's like, dude, I think first aid goes above goes before love.

It got it.

And I thought, I thought, that's interesting.

And he goes, he goes, Jason, he goes, when's the last time you shot somebody?

And I was like, I was like, I haven't shot somebody.

He goes, you know, when's the last time you got in a fight?

I was like, dude, long time ago, whatever, like outside, right.

And he goes, when's the last time you had to perform some type of basic first aid, right?

I was like, well, it was like, you know, I saw a car accident.

I had to apply a turn kit.

What?

I didn't have to apply a turn kit.

I had to like, go help him out, Whatever.

He's like, you're more likely in daily life to to have a first aid component than combatives or firearms.

So his pyramid that he recommended to me, which I'm leaning into, his mental and physical fitness, above that is your capacity to perform basic first aid, including turn kit, pressure, dressing, whatever.

Above that would be combatives, jiu jitsu, whatever.

And then above that would be firearms training.

And that's the way I look at like my trajectory.

And I only help with the base of that.

I do not coach or teach anything else.

I love it, dude.

I love it.

I actually went and got my EMT for that very reason.

And then, oh really, dude, we've How long did that take you?

It no, it was like a it was a three or four month course and it was like 4 hours, two or three nights a week do 100% worth it.

And so my my wife, well, my wife and I, we took our kids and we started traveling in 2007.

We've traveled extensively now through like 55 countries with all of our kids.

So many times I've had to use those, those medical skills, that's really.

Interesting.

So I'm I'm doing your pyramid.

I'm like Yep, Yep, Yep Yep.

And it's just been spot on and that's been our life experience as we've we've traveled extensively and just been out and about in the world with with life happening.

I I love your pyramid, brother.

It's beautiful, dude.

Yeah, the EMTIDI hadn't really thought of that.

I mean, I I get, I've gone to multiple like day long, you know, like emergency medicine.

And I I carry an IFAC in our car and I I do all that kind of stuff, right.

I have an AED at the house, 'cause we also have people train here.

Huh?

I hadn't thought about that in terms of like taking an EMT class I'm not looking at.

That there's like AT triple C1 they do there's the they called it a woofer wilderness first responder.

It's a great course that's like a three day one.

But the EMT was another level 1 and I'm man I'm just so grateful I did that and so I trained my kids to do it.

So we're doing, we're doing, we're doing the pyramid, brother, and we're living it and experiencing it in real world, real time.

Where I've I've literally saved lives in the wilderness, up on big mountains in Ecuador.

Out in Utah.

One time there's a rockslide.

I mean, so it's a car accidents, motorcycle accidents.

It's been real time.

So that's that's fascinating.

I love that.

Let's let's I want to hit something.

You've repeatedly said that you surround yourself with these friends who are are driving you and pushing you.

Talk, talk to us more about that.

I mean that.

That's been a fundamental part of your journey and still is.

Sounds like every day.

Yeah, yeah.

So like early on in my career, I was just surrounded by great coaches that taught me a lot, a great community from there.

You know, as I started competing professionally in CrossFit, I was always surrounded by hard chargers in the gym.

Always.

It was just they gravitated to me and I gravitated towards them.

So, you know, we for many years we were like probably the number one gym in the country or in the world to train at if you want to compete across the games for many years.

And so you just had like a group of like 10 people that would just come and just crush their souls in our gym and they would come in my garage at 5:00 AM we would do fasted cardio for an hour.

It's always easier to do things if you'd share that suffering with other people around you.

So I did that for a lot of years and you know during COVID and and and during some stuff you know some of that stuff started to slow down and obviously when I go take class at our gyms it's it's always great.

But as of you know, the last, I don't know year or two, I've been hosting specifically like these jiu jitsu guys who are essentially there's a group of jiu jitsu guys that I know really well who are trying to compete professionally and like at the highest level in jiu jitsu.

And it's great because I can work with them on fitness.

And I'm at a if I was trying to teach them CrossFit and have them compete in CrossFit, I couldn't really do the workouts with them because it's at a little bit of a different level than I desire to be AT.

And then I'm currently at like I'm I'm not putting up world class CrossFit numbers right now.

But if you're a pro jujitsu athlete and you're coming to train with me, that's going to be like, that's a great person for me to train with because they bring the mindset and the tenacity.

And then I could also push them with the fitness side and I could get myself pushed.

So those are who I've been lately training with, But surrounding myself with men who want to get after it is very important to me because I feed off that energy and it fuels me to just be better, not only as an athlete but also then talking about things like being a dad and things like that that.

Was going to be my next question.

Are these guys the only guys?

Like they're just like they go after it in the gym and that's it.

Or are they guys who are going after it?

In a in a like a whole life holistic approach.

I mean I find that the people that show up to like our train hard men's club meetings like if you're if you're willing to come on like this last last Saturday at 6:00 AM in my garage we had 10 dudes crushing it.

If if you're if you're a guy who's willing to come to my garage at 6:00 AM on.

A Saturday.

On a Saturday, you're you're probably working hard in other areas of your life to be the best you can.

Yeah, there's a carryover, isn't it?

Huge carryover.

Like, you know, that's why it's it's hard, man.

Like if you're a guy and you're really out of shape, it's hard because there's also like this instant stigma, whether people realize it or not, that like if you don't take care of yourself, they start questioning like, are you taking care of other areas of your life?

And it's it's, it's sad.

And I don't.

I try and be sensitive to that because I know that everybody has a different story in a different situation.

But just speaking, like, for me, it's like when I see a guy show up to my garage at 6:00 AM, I'm like, dude, this dude, he's he's for real in all areas.

He doesn't even need to tell me what he does because I know that he's probably successful.

Exactly.

Yes.

It's just it's a formula and and I'm with you.

I think it's the first piece because well actually as I've thought about it's like, look, your body is your vehicle, it is your one vehicle for the shot and everything you do in life is in that vehicle from sleep to sex to service.

Like everything is in that vehicle and if that's the one fundamental thing, if you can't take care of that, I think it's pretty accurate to say there's going to be other areas you're also slacking off in and starting point that that it cascades to other areas of life.

Well and look this is not like I, I, I again, I'm not trying to I I have very strong feelings on men being fit.

But at the same time, I want to have compassion, understanding that shit happens, life happens.

And that's OK, right?

But if you're not where you want to be, you got to make some changes.

Like if you're at a point in your life where you don't look the way you want or your spouse doesn't, you don't look the way your spouse wants you to look.

If you're OK with that, like if you're OK with that and they're OK with that, that's fine.

And it's none of my business.

But if you want your spouse to find you attractive and they don't because you're overweight and you care about that, go make a change, right?

If you care about that enough, go make a change.

If your kids are asking to go play games or sports and you physically are too tired to do so, but you care enough to say, then go do something about it.

But if you don't care, I mean, that sucks and you should care.

But if you don't care, then nothing I say or nothing I'm going to do is going to is going to change your mind, right?

It won't change you until you start caring.

Yeah, you got to care.

You got to be the guy this is.

Where I reach and I'm like, dude, start caring.

Your kids are watching.

Let's go.

Yeah, but I mean you know what I've learned the hard way, man, is like you can only say so much.

You need to meet people where they're at.

And you know I've, I've pushed people away because I've been too aggressive about it.

So for me, right now it's like, look, if you want to come and crush with me, if you want to be a hard charger, if you want to act the part, look the part I got you.

If you don't, just keep rocking and rolling, man.

And when you're ready, you know where to come because you know, shaming somebody into getting fit is not going to be a long term solution.

They need to come to terms that that for them to reach their potential as a dad, as a husband, they need to be fit.

Like you know what?

You know what I think about all the time and this is, this is, this is, this is like a a fact.

I think about Greg.

It's like you only get one shot at parenting.

You get one shot.

There are no redos.

And you got to ask yourself, 1020 years from now, when you're 5060, whatever, did I do the best I can as a husband, as a father, That's that's for you to.

That's for you to reflect on.

And if the answer is you didn't like that sucks.

And you and you got to sit with that, that could because like you're saying there's no do overs, there's no do overs.

Now when your kids have moved out and you have to reflect on that, there's no do overs, that's right.

And if you have micro check insurance every day, that's how you, I think, have no regrets.

Like, there's been times I've been better and there's been times I've been worse, and that's just a fact.

But if I could check in every day, I'm not going to have these major epiphanies a year or two from now that I've been a shitty dad.

You know one. 100% man, as I love, I love to teach people.

I'm like, look, it is so hard, if not impossible to get lost in life.

If you check the map every morning, dude, 100%.

It's almost impossible because that's right.

Absolutely.

And and fitness is that thing.

And I think there's a lot of men that want.

I find it hard to believe there's any man, especially any man listening to this, who does not have the desire to to be fit.

I just, I I, I, I would, I I don't know any guy who if you said, hey, you could take a pill and he could get super fit and super jacked, that wouldn't do it.

Right, so you got to find a deeper why to to push you to put in the work, 'cause like there is no money and no pill that'll get you there.

Right.

And and to getting like on that, like really getting jacked.

I mean, there's no shortcut.

Right.

And when guys come to you, let's say, let's say somebody rolls into you and they're maybe £20 overweight out of shape and they want to get seriously fit, yeah.

How hard do you push them?

I mean, not hard at all.

I I don't, I don't.

I know I start off light.

It depends on what their lifestyle is.

So like, let's just say you came to me, you're like, bro, I want to gain £10 of muscle.

I've been active my entire life.

Like I exercise regularly.

Like, I get it.

I just want to put on more weight or whatever.

I'd be like, all right, let's go let's change your nutrition plan.

Let's add you, let's put, let's put you at a caloric.

You know increase.

Let's, let's, let's try maybe whatever.

Well, there's a bunch of things we can do and I would like, I would go pretty hard with you.

But for most people most of the time I error on the side of low key.

So if there's someone, I mean dude, I've owned gyms for 20 years.

I can name thousands of people that came into our gym fired up with life changing results that stick for a month and then never come back again and again.

It's because you need to create habits and it takes time.

So what I would tell them is like, look bro, you want to get jacked?

Hell yeah.

Me too.

Or I want that for you too.

Come in twice a week, right?

And I've even done this before.

I say, hey, if you come in twice a week for a month, I'll give you the whole month for free.

If you come in three times the next month, I'll give you that whole month for free.

You come in the next month.

Putting them in, just leaving them in, bro.

I'll give you the whole thing for free.

Like dude, I I've I've had, I've done so many things like with one of my friends a while ago I said hey man, if you come in our gym three days a week or 12 * a month, your membership is free.

If you do not come in 12 * a month, it's $1000 a month.

It's up to you like because I just want enough where they could get a dose so they could build consistency and build habits and then we can start layering on.

People want to come in 5-6 days a week, eat paleo, eat zone, eat carnivore and it's just too much too quick and they end up quitting.

So, OK, so with thousands of people you worked with over 2 decades, with all these gyms, I'm sure you've seen a few, and the numbers are probably small.

Of people who came in and legit made the complete transformation and maintained it, what what was different in in those few individuals?

Like what did you notice?

Like, dude, there's there's something different in this path.

They were at the end of their rope.

Meaning like I've I've watched people I wouldn't say countless but many lose 100 plus pounds in our gym like many.

And you know when you meet them you can see it in their eyes and the way they describe things like they've hit the end of their road and there is no path forward other than to get in better shape.

Like they have already done the got fired up, locked off 15 times and they finally hit this point where they're ready to make a life change and you can see it And you you, you empower it.

And that's when I've seen it be successful.

But it's very rare.

It is.

It's very rare.

It's very rare if you go from zero to 100 and be successful, unless you're in one of those situations.

Now, if you're a guy who's exercising twice a week regularly and then wants to ramp it up, that's a completely different situation.

I'm talking about someone that gets off the couch.

It's such a transformation that that like is an inside job and an inner game that is so challenging.

Yeah.

And here's the thing, right?

Is like, there's cheat codes to this game if you find them.

Like there's cheat codes to any game.

So for example, I'm interested in bow hunting, right?

I'm going to talk to Cam Haynes.

I'm going to talk to John Dudley.

I'm I'm if I'm interested in firearms, I'm going to go talk to the best in that.

If I'm interested in this, I'm going to go talk to him because they have cheat codes that the average person takes decades to learn.

And so I think what's important is identify experts in your area and get the cheat codes now.

So for example, if you want to get jacked, you got to get the cheat codes.

The way the cheat codes work is you cannot ride the elliptical for an hour and think you're going to get jacked.

It's a waste of time.

You cannot just go for walks every day and think you're going to get jacked.

It's a waste of time.

Walking is great, going elliptical is better than nothing, but it's not going to get you jacked.

If you are going to walk, put a heavy load on your back anyways.

The way you get jacked is you got it.

Add an external load and you need to move a large load a long distance.

You have to do that.

You have to do things like back squats, benching, deadlifting.

You have to move the load through long range of the motion.

You can't just do calf raises and tricep extensions and expect to get jacked like you need additional things.

And you need to do 12 to 20 minute amraps and E moms and and four time workouts that put you in the red.

Like if you're not getting the red in some way, shape or form, your body is not getting stimulus enough to create adaptation and change.

You have to get into those zones, expand A.

Little bit on the red for people who might not understand that piece.

Yeah, and so think about it on an RP scale, By the way, if I'm talking like, you know, like Greek to you right now, if you're like, what the fuck is this guy talking about?

That is the reason why you need to go find an expert, right?

Or come work with us or whatever.

Because these are things that just should be.

Common knowledge is that large load, a long distance, produces power, and power stimulates muscle growth.

Time under tension stimulates muscle growth.

And when you start doing that, especially in the big muscles like your legs, they produce more testosterone, you just get more impact.

They're going to be way better.

But back to the red zone.

The red zone for me is an RPE 10.

So if you think about rate of perceived exertion in terms of like running.

So if your jaw, if you're walking, that's an RPE one out of 10.

If you're jogging, it's an RPE 3.

If you're jogging a little bit faster, it's RP 6.

If you're dead out sprinting like 40 yard dash, that's an RP10.

You cannot continue it for a long time.

So if you think about your rate of pursuit exertion, you want to you want to adjust that throughout the week.

So sometimes you want to go 10s, that's red. 8 to 10 is red zone, like you want to be in that, but you also want to be in sixes and sevens sometimes.

And when you're lifting it's the same thing.

You can be at an RP6.

So it's like moderate, right?

Maybe for threes and fives, or sometimes you go pretty heavy.

Maybe you go tempo for a set of five that just you're coming out of the pocket and you're just shaking.

That's OK too.

That's all stimulating you to create adaptation to create changing your body.

Beautiful.

It's so awesome.

OK, I I want to shift gears a little bit and and all your like skill sets, experience like everything you learn in in competing at the highest level in multiple things.

How is that translated into marriage, parenting.

Family life.

Like what does it?

What does it look like now, running businesses and and being a husband and father?

Yeah, I mean, I think that the greatest gift across the games ever gave me was just the ability to overcome adversity.

The understanding of positive self talk, recognizing what was in my control versus out of my control.

Those are really important lessons.

I'd say that from a So I met my wife at 14, right?

We've been together ever since.

That's wild.

And you know, we have two kids, We've gone through COVID, owning a fitness company.

We've gone through our daughter being diagnosed with leukemia.

So those are not easy adversities to overcome, right?

And the way that we did it is by a few things, #1, taking things that stress us out.

Putting two circles on a piece of paper.

Write down the things that are in your control.

Write down the things that are out of your control that are in that particular situation.

Right.

And what happens more times than not is that the thing that's stressing you out is you're focusing too much on things outside of controllers.

There's nothing you can do about it.

So instead, choose to focus on what's in your control and it'll definitely help you out.

And that goes for like across the games.

I'm worried about my competitors, I'm worried about the events, I'm worried about this.

It's like, dude, instead worry about your warm up, worry about your nutrition, worry about your tying your shoes, worry about things you actually can make an impact on and it'll calm you down, right?

Positive self talk is another one.

And you're in the garage, you're working at the gym.

You're instantly saying to yourself, like, do my lungs hurt, my legs hurt, whatever that correlates in a real life, like something happens, like, oh shit, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Instead, try and reinforce that with the way you would coach somebody through a workout.

So you'd coach them by saying, hey, you know, find your heels, keep your chest up, you know you're doing great, whatever.

Try and think about ways to positively coach yourself through a workout and then translate that into real life.

So let's just say something's going on.

You can instantly reframe the negative thoughts into positive thoughts, and you could develop that through fitness.

So that's the, that's the second piece and the third one I'll add on.

Well, I mean, I could talk about.

I'll pause there for a second.

Beautiful.

I love that and and well and life.

Life is this series of adversities I had.

I don't know if you know Charlie Angle.

He he runs like he ran literally across all of Africa, the Sahara.

I mean, just he he was a like, serious drug addict alcoholic for years and years and then dropped everything.

And and he did it really similar message where you're saying he's like, I learned how to suffer and his suffering is running.

And he, he, he runs across the Death Valley, right.

And I mean just the guy is amazing.

And he says the same thing.

He's like, I push myself voluntarily so hard into suffering that when real challenges come up in life, and they will.

He's like, hey, you know, I got this.

I know how to do hard things.

I know how to.

I know how to reframe this.

I know how to talk to myself.

And you push through it.

What about?

Oh, go ahead.

Well, yeah.

And just from a mindset perspective, you know, something else I think about a lot is this idea of AMRAP mentality.

So when you think about an AMRAP, it's as many reps or as many rounds as possible.

And I think that at times in life you are one foot in, one foot out too often, right?

Like, I'd be on a podcast with you, but I'd be scrolling whatever or I'd be on a conference call and riding an assault bike.

And I think that that's actually the detriment, You know, like right now I'm.

I've been fully present with you the entire time because this is what I'm committed to at the moment.

So the AMRAP mentality is this idea of as many reps or as many rounds as possible, whatever you're doing at the time, working hard at it and then switching gears throughout the day.

So I go from training the garage to be with the kids, to back to training the garage to being here on this podcast, to after this.

I'm not going to think about this anymore.

I'm going to move on to work.

After I do work, I'm going to focus on something else and I switch gears throughout the day.

So with each facet of what I'm trying to do, I amrap.

It is the mentality and when you get introduced to AM wrapping and fitness it makes a huge impact.

That same thing can apply greatly into your life.

Especially in business, brother, 100%, yeah.

What I hear you saying is like, where wherever you are, like be there, be all in, fully present, fully engaged, like giving it your all.

How many times have you finished a conference call?

And then you've asked yourself like, oh, what do we even talk about or whatever, right.

It's like I would always be on like trying to do workouts and take conference calls with Asia when we were expanding there.

And I would always ask myself when we were done, like, wait, what?

Did I do a good job there?

Did I even reach my potential?

It's like, no, I did a shitty job on the conference call and I did a worst call, a worst job on my intervals workout.

Yep.

Might as well just wait.

Yeah, exactly.

Job in both spots.

I love it.

OK.

Any last thoughts?

I mean, you're running businesses, marriage, parenting, fitness, reaching men.

Any any last thoughts?

We didn't touch on anything.

Hey, you know this.

This is a message I need to share.

This is a message that men need to hear.

I think men need to value date nights with their significant other.

So I think if you're not doing that right now, you're missing out and you need to do it.

You need to prioritize it.

And you need to prioritize it because life gets busy.

Start talking about the kids, especially with seven of them and business and you're just, you're talking about business, you're talking about kids and you're never talking about you and you're never dating and you're never keeping your relationship 1st.

And I think that keeping your relationship in one is critical because if you're not tight, how can the rest of the family be tight?

So I'd recommend that immediately and I think that's been super successful for us.

Exactly.

It it seems so small, so elementary, so simple, and yet it's so neglected and and marriage is just growing.

Gradually fall apart and grow apart because of that very thing.

You're spot on, brother 100% man.

And aside from that, yeah, I mean any dad's listening right now.

Any any men you know, visit my website, join our newsletter.

It's just a weekly newsletter.

We put out motivation.

We put out workouts, put out things that we're working on, you know, and yeah, that that's the biggest thing is, is visit my website, Jason Klepa or or find me on Instagram.

And I'm just constantly just putting up content, putting up stuff that's firing me up and that's it.

I.

Love it.

Jason, thanks brother.

Thanks for your time and thanks thanks for what you do like you and I were on a a very similar a mission and journey of just helping men be their very best self.

So.

Thanks brother for what you're doing and thanks for being here sharing your message, man.

Absolutely.

Thank you.