Order of Man - DUSTIN DIEFENDERFER ｜ Are You Tough Enough？

00:00:00.000 Tough is an adjective we often associate with our perception of manliness, but in the relative ease of modernity, men are becoming increasingly soft and pathetic. 0.96

00:00:10.980 Being tough is no longer a matter of survival, but a matter of choice. And why wouldn't you want to be tough? It's rhetorical, I know, but why are so many men weak? 0.89

00:00:20.060 My guest today, founder of Mountain Tough, Dustin Diefenderfer, is a man who knows what it means to be tough. He's also training thousands of men to do the same through physical fitness that matters not only in the mountains, but everyday life.

00:00:34.760 Today we talk about the importance of brotherhood, the reason every man needs a purpose, passion, and plan, taking quote-unquote tests to quantify your progress, what he calls the 10-year rule, and also we go over what he calls the Spartan effect and so much more.

00:00:51.760 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time.

00:01:01.920 You are not easily deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, or strong. This is your life. This is who you are. This is who you will become.

00:01:11.580 At the end of the day, and after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man.

00:01:17.240 Men, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Michler. I'm your host and the founder of this mission to reclaim and restore manliness.

00:01:23.800 This is called the Order of Man Movement. Glad you're tuning in.

00:01:27.300 It's my goal to bring on fascinating, interesting, and successful guests on this podcast, introduce them to you so that we can extract some of their hard-fought wisdom, knowledge, experience, lessons, perspectives, ideas, etc., and distill that information into usable information that we can actually apply in our lives.

00:01:46.800 I've got Dustin on the podcast today, but we've had Chris Williamson, Jocko Willing, David Goggins, Ben Shapiro, Tim Tebow, Tim Kennedy, Andy Frisilla.

00:01:56.820 I could go on and on and on. We've had, I think we're close to 500 incredible men on this podcast at this point, and I'm really glad that you've allowed me to do this by listening in.

00:02:06.600 But more importantly, I'm excited that you're actually applying the information that we're teaching and that these guys are teaching.

00:02:13.280 So I am going to get into the podcast very quickly. Very fast, though, I'm going to introduce you to my friends and podcast sponsors.

00:02:23.360 These are the guys over at Montana Knife Company. You've heard me talk about them for months now, and I've been friends with these guys for years at this point, introduced by a good friend, Burt Soren, who's also been on the podcast.

00:02:37.720 And I'm telling you what, if you need a good high quality knife and you love America, which really should be every man listening to this podcast, you want a knife because you're a tool wielding person and you believe in American made, then check out Montana Knife Company.

00:02:55.900 They're making some incredible knives. They're doing very cool collaborations with some of the best hunters in the world. And I use their knives every single day.

00:03:05.460 In fact, I've got hunts coming up that I use their knives for. I use their knives in my kitchen. I use their knives if I just need to cut a piece of string every day.

00:03:14.500 I use their knives. And again, if you're looking for a very cool, a very useful and powerful product, then check out Montana Knife Company.

00:03:25.840 Now, if you do go over there, use the code ORDER OF MAN, all one word at checkout, you'll save some money.

00:03:31.140 And it also lets them know you're coming from our movement here. So Montana Knife Company, and then use the code ORDER OF MAN at checkout.

00:03:39.060 All right, guys, let me introduce you to my guest. His name is Dustin Diefenderfer. I know it's quite a mouthful.

00:03:45.580 Him and I have some common heritage coming from Germany. Now, he is an avid bow hunter. He's a fitness enthusiast.

00:03:52.540 He's also the founder of Mountain Tough, which is a fitness training company dedicated to improving the physical fitness of men, not only for the mountains, but for everyday life.

00:04:01.640 He did grow up in the mountains and realized quickly there wasn't any training specifically catered to men who want to perform in the wilderness, but also in the home and in the walls of their business.

00:04:12.480 So he created it like we often talk about here. He now works with thousands of men across the globe, including CEOs, members of special operations, Olympians, and backcountry hunters.

00:04:24.380 The man's passion for fitness and mental fortitude is second to none. You'll hear it in the podcast today.

00:04:31.640 Dustin, what's up, man? Great to have you on the podcast. I know we just ran into each other several weeks ago at the, where were we?

00:04:38.860 Oh, the Hunt Expo in Salt Lake, but man, it's good to have you on the podcast. This has been a long time in the works.

00:04:45.520 For sure, man. Great to be here. I'm excited.

00:04:48.520 How was the, how was the Expo? That's something my boys and I do every year. I think for the past seven years now, we missed one year in there, but I think for seven years, other than that, we've been going and man, we enjoy that Expo a lot.

00:05:01.640 Man, the Expo is something else. I remember last year was actually Mountain Tough's first time going and we'd heard about it for years and everyone always kind of told us we, we should be there.

00:05:15.240 We'd gone to sheep show, but I hadn't been to Western Hunt before. And I was blown away by how big it is, how many hunters are there, how kind of engaged everyone is.

00:05:27.060 And then like those peak audience days on Saturday where the, the hallways are full person to person, shoulder to shoulder. It's, it's crazy.

00:05:38.180 I usually don't stick around for Saturday and Sunday. My boys and I made the decision that, Hey, we're going to go, we're going to check it out.

00:05:43.900 I have a lot of friends like you and other people with mountain knobs and Jack car and a bunch of people who attend and, uh, canvas cutters. Another big one. I'm good friends with outdoor field solutions.

00:05:55.020 I feel bad naming names cause I'm going to leave somebody out, but I've got a lot of good friends there and I always like to go visit the vendors.

00:06:02.700 So we go Thursday and Friday, but we never go Saturday and Sunday. Cause I just, I don't want to be in that environment. I really don't. I like going to the show. I like being able to talk with my friends and people I like and care about Montana knife companies, another one.

00:06:15.600 Um, but I don't want to be, you know, butt to nuts with a bunch of other dudes checking out a bunch of hunts and things like that.

00:06:24.300 Saturday is just a blur that you can't, you can't talk to anyone. It's just chaos.

00:06:29.400 I know.

00:06:29.760 It's crazy.

00:06:30.220 I know it. Tell me a little bit about the form.

00:06:32.520 It's good.

00:06:33.100 I mean, it's good. You get, you get a lot of opportunity to, to meet people and, and they're, everybody in the community is amazing.

00:06:38.920 I've only been hunting for about eight years and man, I think the community, the hunting community has probably been outside of maybe jujitsu has been the most welcoming community of, of men who are excited and passionate about what, and women too, uh, about what they're doing, uh, about conservation, about giving back about family values.

00:07:01.040 Because I love the community and I love the community and I'm really curious about your introduction into the world of hunting and specifically with a company, you know, mountain tough with what you guys do with regards to fitness and how it might differentiate from your typical fitness coaching that is so prevalent in, in society today.

00:07:21.520 Yeah, for sure.

00:07:51.500 And we were really, we were really, really outdoorsy family.

00:07:54.980 So we spent a tremendous amount of time backpacking, backpack, fly fishing, fly fishing.

00:08:02.060 We spent a lot of time in the, the Bighorn mountains outside of Sheridan, Wyoming.

00:08:08.700 And a lot of that came from my dad's family.

00:08:12.620 He was one of nine and seven out of that nine of his siblings were boys.

00:08:19.220 So I had all these uncles plus my dad and we were just hunting, fishing, camping all the time.

00:08:26.620 Um, and that kind of was just what we did.

00:08:31.160 We were always every single weekend looking for an opportunity to be outside on some adventure as a family, no matter what the year is, the seasonality changed, but we were still either snowmobiling, skiing, uh, snowshoeing.

00:08:48.020 So every weekend it was an outdoor adventure.

00:08:50.760 And as I got older, right around middle school, my dad became obsessed with archery and it wasn't at first archery hunting.

00:09:02.740 He was deeply, deeply, deeply passionate about competition, archery shooting.

00:09:09.100 Okay.

00:09:09.840 And he actually was going through a divorce with my mom and archery became an outlet.

00:09:18.200 And it also became this brotherhood.

00:09:20.360 There was like these group of guys at the bow shop every day at noon that he shot with.

00:09:26.080 And it was kind of like his support network getting through a really difficult time.

00:09:32.500 And so I, in that middle school, high school era, I'd meet him down there all the time to, to shoot bows.

00:09:39.620 And we were surrounded without really even knowing it with all these local Montana legends that just hung out at the bow shop too.

00:09:48.240 And they were always pushing us and mentoring us and inspiring us to take the archery and really apply it out in the real world as archery elk hunting, which they were doing a lot in addition to their indoor shooting.

00:10:04.300 And so that, that took us down this whole other journey of palling around with those guys and kind of traveling the Rocky Mountain West as September being the climax of the year, like the September archery elk, our life started revolving around that for a while.

00:10:23.440 And it's because it's such a challenge and it's such an adventure with, with bulls just screaming at you in September.

00:10:31.540 And that was our passion since I was 14.

00:10:36.960 It was, you know, Rocky Mountain, Western States, archery elk.

00:10:40.680 And when I got into college, because that passion had been building for so long, I, I'd always like right around that college age, I'd started really being a gym rat.

00:10:53.560 I was really interested in the gym, but it was a unique twist to my story because the guys I started working out with were gym rats as well, but they were wildland firefighters and a different breed.

00:11:10.520 Yeah.

00:11:10.620 They didn't want to be bodybuilders and I didn't either.

00:11:14.120 I wanted to focus a lot in the gym, but focus that training to see how I could be better in the backcountry come September.

00:11:23.820 And they had the same intent.

00:11:25.520 They're like, I want to, I want to push myself in the gym.

00:11:28.300 But as a wildland firefighter, they were pushing themselves to be better in the mountain for the summer fire season.

00:11:35.900 And so these mountain tough like ethos were building through my childhood and through my college years and becoming an adult without me really ever knowing it.

00:11:47.560 So it was, you know, outdoors, archery, elk, archery, and then this gym training around the mountain.

00:11:55.280 At that same time, I met my wife and my wife is a really passionate runner.

00:12:00.840 So I, I'll run, but I don't like running.

00:12:04.060 She's the type that will like get the runners high. 1.00

00:12:07.200 Those are the weird ones, man.

00:12:09.160 I don't, I don't understand all the power to them, but I don't understand those people.

00:12:12.680 I'd rather go just pick up heavy objects and put them back down and do it a bunch of times than go run all day long.

00:12:19.740 Yeah, for sure.

00:12:21.340 But it was cool because like in, in support of her and our blend of passions, we started doing marathons and half marathons and ultra marathons.

00:12:32.960 And so I had this cardio foundation going now with her running plus my gym foundation focused on training for the mountain.

00:12:42.680 And at first I thought it was going to be the perfect way to train for September elk.

00:12:51.600 I thought if you're running ultra marathons in the mountains all summer, a lot of times you're running in the same exact mountain range that you're going to get to hunt in a few months later in, in Montana.

00:13:04.720 I thought it was perfect.

00:13:07.980 And it kind of was, I remember going into that season after a very heavy couple of years of running and ultra marathons and you, you are lean and you're mean and you're able to kind of fly through the back country, but it actually, it ended up being the worst pack out of my life.

00:13:26.400 Why, why do you, I'm curious as to why that was, it was definitely because there was too much focus on running and cardio and not enough focus on strength.

00:13:40.440 And that's really what makes the back country hunter so unique is they are unlike any other athlete where they have a multiple day extended event.

00:13:51.700 And the biggest amount of work they're going to have to perform is after they're successful.

00:13:57.480 And that's on the tail end of their event.

00:13:59.860 So the mountain kind of beats you up for three to four days on a back country hunt.

00:14:05.300 And then if you're successful after you've been beaten up by the mountain, you have to do the heaviest workload, which is your pack out.

00:14:13.960 And especially walking around with your boat is not as difficult as having hundreds of pounds of, of meat on your back.

00:14:21.000 For sure.

00:14:21.920 Yeah.

00:14:22.560 Especially, especially back country elk.

00:14:25.380 I mean, all, all hunting is special and hard, but the elk are so big.

00:14:30.860 And if you're hunting with one buddy or yourself or two buddies, most of these Western state hunts, you're, you're three, four, five, six, seven miles back.

00:14:41.120 And if you have an elk down, that's four 80 pound loads for, so you got to come off the mountain four times with an 80 pound load.

00:14:51.820 If you were to be alone.

00:14:53.200 By yourself, right.

00:14:53.760 But yeah, but that's seven miles out with 87 miles back in light is 80, the seven miles, 80, the, the, the magic number.

00:15:02.400 Why not like a hundred?

00:15:03.400 Why not one 60?

00:15:04.960 I mean, obviously it's heavier, right?

00:15:07.240 But why 80?

00:15:08.720 Why not 50?

00:15:09.480 Like, how do you come up with that number?

00:15:10.920 It seems pretty arbitrary.

00:15:11.860 I think that is the, that is probably close to what a hind quarter with like your back straps on your pack is going to weigh. 0.95

00:15:25.060 Some guys will definitely do like a hind quarter and a front shoulder, which is going to put you at about 120 pounds.

00:15:33.500 But you're, but you're deboning all of this stuff, aren't you?

00:15:35.920 If you're doing backwoods stuff, like you're deboning them, aren't you?

00:15:39.540 Most of the time you're deboning.

00:15:40.620 And so that's even, that's even with the bones pulled out, or I should say the meat pulled off the bone is probably a better descriptor.

00:15:46.780 Correct.

00:15:48.620 Okay.

00:15:48.840 Yeah.

00:15:49.140 So the meat pulled off the bone, you're in it.

00:15:53.160 What, what, what we usually talk about out West is like, you will pack out a front shoulder and a hind quarter if you're fairly close to the truck.

00:16:03.820 But if you have to cover seven or eight miles, uh, usually that 80 pounds is kind of your sweet spot.

00:16:10.580 Well, and it's different.

00:16:11.160 Seven or eight miles in the treadmill in the morning on a Wednesday is different than packing 80 pounds out up and down these, just the Rockies essentially, you know, and, and all the variability that comes with the elevation, lower oxygen levels, ups and downs of the hike itself.

00:16:30.540 And then the being not so stable with the unsure footing of, of rocks and loose gravel.

00:16:36.040 So it changes the game.

00:16:38.120 I, I, I, a lot of people think, oh, I can run so much so far on a treadmill.

00:16:42.120 I'm like, well, that's cute.

00:16:43.200 But when it comes to the real world, there's a little bit of variability that you need to take into consideration.

00:16:50.620 That's what I love about it so much though.

00:16:52.880 It's so cool because the, like the NFL, the NHL, MLB, uh, the military, the military athlete comes close to a back country hunter for sure.

00:17:06.980 But if you look at elite professional sporting organizations, it's not even close.

00:17:13.720 There's so many factors that make what we're trying to train for really unique and special.

00:17:20.140 So, and a lot of that is high elevation, rugged terrain, you got steep climbs and descents, you got slippery, loose terrain, but the extended event makes it very, very unique.

00:17:39.080 You think about like a football or a basketball game, um, a fighter, they're going all out for less than an hour, sometimes 90 minutes, but a hunter needs to be able to perform for three, five, six, seven, eight, up to 10 days.

00:17:56.300 So it does make what we're training for very unique.

00:18:00.440 And that's when that light bulb moment went off that ultimately ended up leading to the creation of mountain tough was because that pack out was brutal.

00:18:10.060 After doing all that cardio, the light bulb went off in 2016.

00:18:14.920 And it was like, someone should do mission specific training for the back country hunter.

00:18:20.140 And no one in 2016 was doing that, but that is what all other elite sporting organizations do.

00:18:27.540 They look at what are the skill requirements required to be successful at this job?

00:18:32.820 Whether you're an operator, an offensive lineman, a wide receiver, those coaches are going to coach to those training requirements that make you successful.

00:18:44.660 And no one was doing that for the back country hunter.

00:18:47.660 And so that's, that's what we launched in, in 2016.

00:18:51.580 And it's just evolved and gotten better ever since.

00:18:55.100 Yeah.

00:18:55.140 I mean, you guys are doing a phenomenal job and I've, I've incorporated some of your training for a little while.

00:18:59.900 I want a full disclaimer.

00:19:01.080 I'm not using it now.

00:19:02.020 Um, I do a lot of strength training, but there's other components to go back to what you were saying about being in the mountain that you wouldn't necessarily receive if you were in maybe the military, to your point, certainly not baseball, MLB, basketball, football, none of that stuff.

00:19:16.340 But it's three, these three factors that we didn't address.

00:19:19.180 Number one, dehydration.

00:19:21.060 You're not, you're not getting the hydration you need.

00:19:24.060 Uh, malnourishment, right?

00:19:25.620 You're not getting the nutrients you need because you're eating off freeze dried food if, if, if, if you can.

00:19:30.780 And then the level of exhaustion over sustained periods of time, you know, you're not, you're not, you're not going to work on eight hours of sleep.

00:19:39.720 You're going to work on four hours of sleep if you're lucky in the cold and the discomfort of having, you know, this half inch, quarter inch air mattress.

00:19:50.340 Again, if you're lucky, so they're, they're so, but you know, the other thing I was thinking too, is I'm sure you talk about in 2016, there really wasn't anybody doing this, but then you have guys that I think have come onto the, into the spotlight since you've started in 2016.

00:20:06.100 And I don't want to take away anything from what this particular individual has done, but he's really gained a lot of traction over the past, I would say five years.

00:20:16.480 And that's Cam Haynes.

00:20:17.340 And, and, and again, that's not to take away anything he's been doing over the past three, four decades, but over the past five years, there's really become, uh, an emphasis and a spotlight on him.

00:20:30.940 And he, his motto is run, lift, shoot, right?

00:20:34.420 So he's running every day and he's running marathons on his lunch break kind of thing.

00:20:39.140 He's lifting heavy every day and he's shooting his bow.

00:20:42.000 Like this is somebody that from the outside looking in, and I know Cam a little bit, but from the outside looking in is, as he would say, working to become that apex predator.

00:20:52.400 And I, I think that probably draws a lot of light to what you were doing.

00:20:56.400 Like, yeah, we talk about that all the time as a staff and with, with the mountain tough team and my general consensus is I, I'm like really proud of what Cam has done and what he has done to inspire people has been one of the coolest things ever.

00:21:17.180 Like him pushing the limits over decades and pushing his body through a lot of those difficult runs and marathons.

00:21:26.920 And then just the discipline it took to do a marathon on your lunch break, have the time to strength train and shoot your bow that day is so inspiring.

00:21:37.940 That it did take a lot of people and kind of turn their ceilings into floors.

00:21:44.620 So people were able to look at what Cam was doing and get all of this inspiration lit inside of their belly.

00:21:52.340 And I think you can't discredit how amazing that was for the, this generation of hunters.

00:22:00.600 I think the, the only thing that was missed and I don't think it was really missed.

00:22:07.580 It was just not part of his purpose, passion, or plan was he didn't give anyone an achievable step-by-step plan to how they could get close to his level or get from beginner to intermediate or from intermediate to advanced.

00:22:25.740 And so he was kind of highlighting this advanced elite level of human performance, but he wasn't saying like, Hey, if you have never worked out in 20 years or you're just getting off the couch, here's a few ways to start or a few things to think about.

00:22:42.660 And so I think the inspiration was, was a game changing.

00:22:48.840 The inspiration inspired like hope and dreams and so many people.

00:22:52.780 And I think that there was just, it left some people looking for a practical approach.

00:23:00.120 Like I can't even run four miles.

00:23:02.320 How am I going to run a marathon on my lunch break?

00:23:04.400 And, and that's what we've tried to do is we started training a lot of elite athletes.

00:23:10.840 Like in 2016, 17, 18, 19, our mountain tough programming was really hardcore.

00:23:16.180 And we were pushing mountain athletes and hunters really at an elite level in our lab.

00:23:23.980 And then that was going into our digital content, which is something I'm really, really proud of, but I'm, I'm almost more proud over the last couple of years, how we have focused on how do we get a beginner to intermediate?

00:23:40.600 And I think that that is where that big life transformation happens.

00:23:46.060 And it's been really, really cool to kind of broaden our lens a little bit and focus on elites like we've always done.

00:23:54.740 But I think helping someone get into the back country is a lot more about life than it is about hunting.

00:24:04.980 So we always talk about hunting is not the end game.

00:24:08.660 A hunting is just an event, but physical and mental toughness training does create a life transformation and back country hunting creates the urgency for that to happen.

00:24:23.960 So if a, if someone who's never has hunted before gets inspired by Cam Haynes and they apply and draw a Colorado elk tag, that gets me so excited because this whole life transformation is going to start to happen.

00:24:41.240 We tell people all the time, like if you're struggling with anxiety, depression, suicide, a lack of, or if, if you're struggling with those plus complacency and passivity, one of the best things you can do is just go in the back country for four days without your phone, because all these magical elements are going to start to happen.

00:25:03.680 And, and that's what back country hunting is doing for this generation.

00:25:07.560 And I'm really excited that it's gotten more and more popular.

00:25:11.240 Like we see at the Western Hunt Expo, like it's so popular and you can't discredit how, like how much the back country is doing to change people's lives.

00:25:20.380 But it's not really about hunting because they become better fathers, husbands, friends, bosses, employees.

00:25:27.960 And so I think that we're looking for more of that life change than that, that inspiration.

00:25:35.280 Yeah, I can see how valuable that is because when you were talking about that, the only thing that came to mind for me was testing in, in academia, right?

00:25:44.140 So you, you have a test every quarter or every trimester or whatever it is, right?

00:25:50.340 At the end of the year, certain benchmarks, you have a test, but really the real value comes in learning to prepare for that test.

00:25:58.880 Who cares about the test?

00:26:01.700 Like, sure, you want to get an A, you want to pass the test, but it's everything that you've done up to that point.

00:26:06.680 And what I'm hearing you say is the hunt is good.

00:26:09.460 There's a lot of value in the hunt itself.

00:26:11.200 You're providing for your family, you're achieving goals, you're feeling good, you're developing self-confidence and self-worth.

00:26:17.520 But what, if I've got a hunt this fall and I'm spending days and weeks and months preparing for not only physical, but the mental aspect of a hunt,

00:26:30.180 and then I go out and have a successful hunt, it wasn't the hunt that did all the work for me.

00:26:36.680 It was everything leading up to the hunt that made me a better human being.

00:26:40.560 And then I was able to successfully complete the hunt as a byproduct of everything that I learned leading up to it.

00:26:48.300 Man, I'm just going to step away from our conversation very quickly.

00:26:51.980 I just came back last week from my home in Maine and I brought the rest of my inventory back to Utah.

00:26:58.740 So I am happy to announce that the Order of Man store is officially back up and running.

00:27:04.720 We've been closed and had limited stuff for a very long time, but we've got hats and shirts and battle planners and decals and patches and a whole lot more.

00:27:13.040 So if you're looking for a way to support the mission to reclaim and restore manliness like we're doing here,

00:27:18.260 this is a small and simple way to do it and also look good in the process.

00:27:22.440 So if you head to store.orderofman.com, you can check out all of our newest gear and also our most popular merchandise that will help you look, feel, and perform well.

00:27:35.320 Again, that's store.orderofman.com.

00:27:39.420 All right, guys, you can do that right after the conversation.

00:27:41.760 For now, let's get back to it with Dustin.

00:27:43.060 It's so accurate.

00:27:46.180 I mean, some people articulate that as the Spartan effect and the Spartan effect is really powerful.

00:27:53.640 They usually don't talk about it in terms of hunting, but a lot of ways you'll see the Spartan effect articulated is someone will say,

00:28:01.900 put a Ironman on your calendar or register for a jujitsu competition, sign up for a marathon.

00:28:13.060 Because the Spartan effect of signing up and dedicating yourself to doing something 6, 9, 12 months down the road,

00:28:22.220 it changes your mindset as soon as you register.

00:28:25.860 So like if you register right now for a jujitsu competition in October,

00:28:34.040 your desire to train and your timeliness to train, your intensity while you're training,

00:28:40.260 it's going to tick up the second you run your card and register for that tournament or that event.

00:28:47.700 And that's what's happening a lot with these backcountry hunts is someone's drawn a tag,

00:28:53.960 and now it's like, oh, man, I can't miss that workout.

00:28:58.420 Like their whole intensity changes.

00:29:00.380 And that's really, really cool because you're 100% accurate.

00:29:05.080 The hunt is the highlight that is creating all of that life change in the discipline.

00:29:13.400 But sometimes that season of training is more special than the actual event or the hunt.

00:29:20.660 We saw this all the time with running ultramarathons in Montana.

00:29:25.300 And so there's a really famous one right outside our door here in Bozeman.

00:29:31.300 It's kind of this legendary, iconic race, and it's called the Ridge Run.

00:29:36.200 And it's on the Bridge or Ridge that you can oversee the whole town of Bozeman from there.

00:29:43.000 You're on a spine the whole entire time.

00:29:45.540 And so my wife and I used to register for that and run it.

00:29:50.800 But the most beautiful thing ever was you trained on that ridge all summer.

00:29:56.880 And so you're up there doing shorter runs all summer.

00:30:01.480 But if you look back at those seasons of your life, it's like the race day was pretty cool.

00:30:07.760 But spending all summer on that ridge was way cooler than the race itself.

00:30:12.760 Well, and I think about, you know, again, I haven't been hunting nearly as long as you have.

00:30:18.680 But a successful kill is really valuable.

00:30:22.560 You know, there's a sense of pride and satisfaction that comes with that.

00:30:25.740 You completed the objective.

00:30:27.920 But my best stories are stories with the guys.

00:30:32.980 You know, stories of hardship or not even making the best shot.

00:30:38.180 Like making the worst shot of my life. 0.50

00:30:39.820 And then everybody, you know, laughing at me or whatever and busting each other's balls about it. 0.97

00:30:44.620 It's not so much even the kill itself.

00:30:48.140 It's the camaraderie, the brotherhood, the accountability like you're talking about now.

00:30:52.580 The stories, the memories, the failures, the setbacks.

00:30:54.940 And then learning how to deal with all of that and overcome those challenges that have been so meaningful to me.

00:31:00.420 Don't get me wrong.

00:31:01.280 I really enjoy that venison or that mousse when I eat it for dinner with my family or friends.

00:31:06.380 But all the stories I have are more related around other people and their involvement in what I'm doing.

00:31:14.800 It's so cool we're talking about this because we've had Randy Newberg in the lab this year.

00:31:20.660 Where we've been training him for this August McKenzie doll sheep hunt he has. 0.93

00:31:27.180 Where is that?

00:31:29.360 That's in British Columbia.

00:31:31.060 Okay.

00:31:32.200 And it's – Randy's 59 and he's had the privilege and like honor to hunt all over the world.

00:31:41.980 But for some reason this is his biggest bucket list hunt and he's going into the biggest dream hunt of his life with some injuries and a little bit out of shape.

00:32:00.040 And so it's kind of like the biggest dream hunt of his life.

00:32:04.280 He has the most work to do to make it happen which is really interesting with how many places he's got to hunt.

00:32:12.080 But when we first sat down with him it was really cool because he said that if more people knew how hard hunting was it would be good for them to know that on the front end knowing that it's a process.

00:32:30.720 It's not just about killing an elk on your first year, the first time you tried.

00:32:37.180 But Randy who is a hunting celebrity in his category, he acknowledges that it took him like 10 years of trying to successfully kill a bull elk with his bow.

00:32:52.380 So, you know, looking at him now, he's a professional hunter and content creator.

00:33:01.980 But there was 10 years where he was unsuccessful that no one ever sees, that no one ever talks about.

00:33:08.340 But when you talk to him and others like that, like even Bert Soren has a talk on the 10-year rule.

00:33:17.160 Most people are putting in 10 years of hard work behind the scenes before you ever know what they do or what their name is.

00:33:25.640 But Randy talks about how special that was because it's the process.

00:33:33.100 It's the process of becoming a better outdoorsman, meeting a lot of really good friends through that process.

00:33:40.760 But it also makes that special moment when he did finally harvest an elk with his bow that much more meaningful and powerful and special.

00:33:50.420 We talk about it all the time that the hardest things in life are the best things.

00:33:57.140 And a lot of times people think that's like a really hard hunt is the best hunt.

00:34:03.020 But sometimes it's a hard 10 years to create a really special moment.

00:34:08.340 Yeah, I can attest to that.

00:34:11.740 You know, I think a lot of people look at it.

00:34:13.400 Again, I've only been hunting for almost eight years now.

00:34:15.860 And I think a lot of people from the outside looking in think, well, you just get a gun, you go shoot it a few times, and then you just go out and find an animal and take a little pop shot and it's done.

00:34:26.500 I'm like, that'd be really nice if that were the case.

00:34:29.920 And maybe sometimes it works out like that.

00:34:31.740 I've got a friend in Maine who a couple of years ago shot this deer off his back porch.

00:34:38.380 He was having some coffee, if I remember correctly, in his kitchen.

00:34:41.820 He looked out and he saw this incredible buck, grabbed his rifle, got on his back deck and shot this deer, and it ended up scoring third in the state that year for harvested deer.

00:34:51.980 Look, that happens.

00:34:53.220 But also the guy's been hunting for 30 years, you know, and what are the odds of that happening?

00:34:57.980 You just got to go in and put the time in.

00:34:59.580 And I think that's what people see on social media.

00:35:02.280 And I love social media.

00:35:04.000 This movement wouldn't be what it is.

00:35:05.680 I wouldn't have the opportunity to share my voice and my thoughts with people and develop great friendships like you and I have.

00:35:13.160 I love social media.

00:35:14.800 But the downside is everybody just sees the best of the best because that's what most people post.

00:35:22.340 They post the successful hunt.

00:35:23.900 They don't post the arrow pegged into the rock or the ground that doesn't have any blood on it because they missed a 20-yard pop shot.

00:35:31.360 Like, nobody posts that.

00:35:32.480 I wish more people did because that's the reality of the situation.

00:35:35.940 Then everybody gets this false sense of what it actually means to go out and hunt.

00:35:40.920 And they just think, oh, it's easy.

00:35:42.040 You just go shoot an animal. 0.96

00:35:43.060 And then it becomes ruthless and cold and calculated.

00:35:47.500 And it paints a bad light on the hunting industry in general.

00:35:53.340 Yeah, I was just talking to Remy Warren.

00:35:57.200 And we were talking about this exact topic.

00:35:59.880 And he's like, some year, someday, I want to make a film that just shows failure after failure after failure after failure because that's really what most of hunting is, which is funny.

00:36:14.540 It's what most of life is.

00:36:16.060 Like, we are failing every day at everything in different ways so that we can be better at them.

00:36:23.700 And hunting is no different.

00:36:26.040 And so, like, with Remy's content channel and people seeing his films, when they see a film, they see him going out and being successful.

00:36:36.100 Because most people wouldn't watch a film of just, like, hiking, hiking, glassing, glassing, hiking, hiking.

00:36:44.080 Because they can do that in real life.

00:36:45.940 They don't need to live vicariously through somebody else to fail.

00:36:49.700 They can do that on their own, myself included.

00:36:52.860 Yeah.

00:36:53.100 So, I think, like, just knowing that behind all these great moments we see on camera, there's thousands of hours of failure.

00:37:02.920 I think the more, you know, people can realize that and acknowledge it and acknowledge that it's okay.

00:37:08.660 Like, life is so supposed to be hard.

00:37:11.520 Like, hard is good.

00:37:12.760 Yeah.

00:37:13.760 It makes it a lot better experience.

00:37:16.580 I had a rough hunt last year on one of my favorite hunts of the year in Minnesota.

00:37:20.960 It's a whitetail hunt.

00:37:21.960 I've been for probably, I don't know, six years now.

00:37:25.580 And this big buck came in.

00:37:28.820 I heard him.

00:37:29.560 I heard him grunt.

00:37:30.540 I'm like, oh, that's a big buck.

00:37:31.840 I can tell.

00:37:32.720 And he came in fast.

00:37:34.200 I'm like, oh, sweet.

00:37:35.120 Here he is.

00:37:35.860 And I took a shot. 0.98

00:37:37.400 And I thought I hit him.

00:37:39.640 And he ran off.

00:37:42.580 And I never found my arrow.

00:37:45.720 So, I'm like, well, maybe I did hit him.

00:37:47.220 Maybe I don't know what happened.

00:37:48.660 Maybe I did hit him and it's pegged in him.

00:37:50.160 I didn't know what happened.

00:37:51.960 And I spent that night looking for him.

00:37:54.620 I woke up early the next day.

00:37:56.460 I didn't even, I don't even think I hunted the next morning.

00:37:58.600 I think I actually went out and looked for him.

00:38:00.580 And I just could never find the thing.

00:38:02.760 And the next night I was sitting in a stand, same stand.

00:38:06.380 I'm like, well, maybe he'll come back in.

00:38:07.900 Maybe he's injured.

00:38:08.640 He'll come hobbling back in and I can finish him off.

00:38:10.840 And it was getting dark and a doe came in. 0.99

00:38:14.260 And so, I'm like, well, I'll shoot this doe. 0.64

00:38:16.060 I have a doe tag too. 0.99

00:38:17.020 So, I shot the doe. 0.56

00:38:18.820 And she ran off. 0.99

00:38:20.880 I went back to the lodge.

00:38:22.140 I'm like, I'll go back and get her.

00:38:23.220 I know where she's at.

00:38:23.940 There's a good blood trail.

00:38:24.780 So, I go out and I go to find her.

00:38:31.740 Long story short, we find her.

00:38:33.760 The buddy I'm with, I don't even like admitting this.

00:38:35.660 The buddy I'm with is like, hey, good news.

00:38:37.040 We found her.

00:38:38.320 She's right up there.

00:38:39.080 We got to finish her off. 0.99

00:38:40.380 I'm like, okay, I'll go finish her off. 0.99

00:38:42.120 Well, the bad news is it's not a her. 0.94

00:38:44.780 I shot this buck that was probably had these little four-inch, five-inch little spikes. 0.99

00:38:50.320 And I'm like, damn. 0.99

00:38:51.380 Oh, no. 0.99

00:38:52.380 Yeah, I don't know how I didn't see it.

00:38:53.860 If it was too dark, it kind of looked like it with the shape of the ear, whatever.

00:38:57.160 But I ended up shooting this little five-inch spike. 0.97

00:39:02.080 And I was so disappointed and all the guys busted my balls about it. 0.73

00:39:06.180 I get a call the other day from my buddy who I hunt with. 0.80

00:39:09.460 He's like, hey, we found your deer.

00:39:11.760 I'm like, what do you mean?

00:39:12.840 He's like, we found your buck from last year.

00:39:16.180 I'm like, what?

00:39:16.800 You found it?

00:39:17.580 He sent me pictures.

00:39:18.520 It's a beautiful buck.

00:39:20.440 He's a little weird.

00:39:21.080 He's a little strange.

00:39:21.900 He's got some good mass.

00:39:22.980 He's probably one of the best deer I've ever shot.

00:39:26.560 And of course, obviously, going through the winter and the coyotes and everything, he's

00:39:30.200 completely useless at this point.

00:39:33.320 But man, I felt so bad. 0.99

00:39:34.680 I felt pride because I'm like, well, at least I killed him. 0.56

00:39:36.820 But I felt bad because I wasn't able to harvest the meat that I wanted to. 0.78

00:39:40.840 And yeah, sure enough, the arrow was still in him.

00:39:43.600 And it was a decent shot left to right.

00:39:45.860 It was just high. 0.98

00:39:46.700 I shot him high.

00:39:48.840 And it's just, you have stories like that. 0.91

00:39:52.320 I have stories like that.

00:39:53.840 Everybody who's ever hunted for any amount of time has stories like that.

00:39:57.260 I really want people to see that side of it because that's the reality is it's just not

00:40:02.660 easy.

00:40:03.260 It's fun and it's worth it when it all comes together, but it doesn't come together as

00:40:07.200 often as people think.

00:40:10.220 Yeah, I think that I think the more that that is talked about, the better.

00:40:15.660 I think content can make things look like you're going to roll out there and harvest huge animals

00:40:25.280 in that first year.

00:40:26.820 And I don't think that people having that reality is helpful.

00:40:30.800 And I don't think if that was the reality, it would make hunting as cool and awesome and

00:40:36.340 as amazing as it is.

00:40:38.100 It's so amazing because it is so difficult and going into it, knowing that it's really

00:40:45.480 difficult is helpful.

00:40:47.940 I think it's really helpful.

00:40:49.080 To move back to the conversation around fitness, I have a bit of a loaded question, but I'd like

00:40:55.060 you to answer it if you can and give me a thought on this.

00:40:59.220 I have my own thought and I'll share that with you in a minute.

00:41:02.020 If there was one exercise, just one, one exercise that anybody listening could do to improve their

00:41:10.980 physical fitness, but also as it applies to backwoods hunting, backcountry hunting, being

00:41:17.880 in the outdoors, et cetera, et cetera, what would you suggest would be that one exercise?

00:41:25.860 I'm going to answer you with two comments, even though you asked for one.

00:41:30.760 No, you can't.

00:41:31.200 Just one.

00:41:32.000 Give me what you got, man.

00:41:34.900 All right.

00:41:35.480 So first, I think that it's really important that the number one hack for sure is going to

00:41:43.720 be mindset and mental toughness.

00:41:45.560 So when we launched mountain tough in, in 2016, we, we knew that we knew that like the

00:41:53.220 consistently successful backcountry hunters, and it's the same in every area of life, every

00:41:59.500 sport, the consistently successful in their craft are the most mentally tough.

00:42:06.640 And so the mind, the mind trumps the physical.

00:42:11.920 And so someone who is mentally tough, that's not as physically strong, oftentimes will be

00:42:19.000 more consistent.

00:42:20.140 And hunting gives us a really good lens on that.

00:42:22.940 Like the, the backcountry hunters that we researched in 16, 17 and 18, we were looking for

00:42:30.600 backcountry archery, elk hunters, public land, do it yourself that had been successful consistently

00:42:38.260 for 10 or 20 years.

00:42:39.980 So a lot of people can have a couple of good years, but we wanted to know like who's consistently

00:42:46.320 successful over a 20 year timeframe.

00:42:49.840 And physical fitness was a component there, but, but it was their mindset that was changing

00:42:58.360 the game.

00:42:59.080 They were able to stay out there longer.

00:43:01.820 They were able to push a ridge further back.

00:43:05.440 They were, they were more patient.

00:43:08.300 They were able to sit there and wait for storms to roll in and roll through.

00:43:12.120 Um, they didn't come home early when hunting wasn't that great.

00:43:18.280 Uh, they didn't come home early when they started missing, uh, their family or missing the comforts

00:43:25.820 of home.

00:43:26.300 So these really mental tough, they're really mental tough individuals outshined everyone

00:43:34.820 else, regardless of physical capabilities.

00:43:39.080 And so you see this in professional sport, you see this in the military, but in, in backcountry

00:43:46.840 hunting in a, in a lot of other industries, it's not talked about very much to, to work

00:43:53.260 on your mindset, to work on your mental fitness, to work on your mental toughness.

00:43:57.580 And so for someone who has never worked on that, that can be a big wake up call when they

00:44:04.840 enter the backcountry.

00:44:05.960 And so for sure, I think the number one thing that people should work on before a gnarly back

00:44:14.180 country hunt is their mindset and just being able to be comfortable being uncomfortable

00:44:20.760 to think about overcoming adversity, to think when they're tired, uh, to think about supporting

00:44:27.220 those around them.

00:44:28.220 I think that we've seen a huge difference between someone who has had a really easy life without

00:44:37.980 much adversity or adversity training in it versus someone who has when they, when they enter

00:44:43.980 the woods.

00:44:44.600 And so for sure, I would, I would put that at the top of my list is, is, is mindset training.

00:44:53.600 The, the second one, the second one that isn't talked about a lot that is really interesting

00:45:00.820 is that training to hunt is more popular now than ever before.

00:45:05.060 So a lot of people are training, a lot of people are doing heavy pack walks in the summer to

00:45:11.600 get ready for backcountry hunting.

00:45:13.540 A lot of people are doing step ups or stair climber.

00:45:16.600 So the number one kind of mistake we're seeing right now is no one is training for really steep

00:45:25.920 descents under heavy load.

00:45:28.640 And in the back, in the back country that just devastates people.

00:45:34.680 So if you have an 80 pound pack on and you're coming out of a drainage, maybe you have to work

00:45:41.840 your way out of that drainage for three or four hours at a very steep decline, that scenario

00:45:49.140 is going to be highly common in a back country hunt.

00:45:51.680 And it's probably a scenario that most people, if they don't live out West, have never trained

00:45:57.580 for.

00:45:58.580 And it creates this perfect storm because you have a heavy pack on gravity is pushing

00:46:03.740 you down.

00:46:04.280 You're going down that descent and, and your joints and your quads and your hips are just

00:46:09.380 getting pounded.

00:46:10.320 And so the, you see a lot of back country hunters bonk going steeply downhill versus steeply

00:46:18.780 uphill because most people have trained a little bit going uphill and you can work your way

00:46:24.160 uphill slowly, but really steep descents create a lot of variables that cause a lot of trouble.

00:46:31.960 And so you have knee, hip and ankle stability getting compressed under extreme stress, especially

00:46:39.880 when you have, you add a heavy pack.

00:46:42.220 So to answer your question, we would, we would make sure that someone is focusing that as part of

00:46:50.260 their training.

00:46:51.000 So, you know, putting on a heavy pack and working some downhills, if you don't have access to that

00:46:56.340 in your area, like if you live in a flat area, there are some really cool hacks that are a game

00:47:03.320 changer on the treadmill.

00:47:04.520 And so you put the treadmill at a 15% incline.

00:47:09.200 That's where most treadmills you see are going to max out unless you have an industrial one.

00:47:14.680 Uh, so 15% incline, and then you're going to go at about two miles an hour, 2.2, but instead of

00:47:22.340 working your way up that treadmill, you're going to turn around and walk backwards.

00:47:26.280 Go backwards.

00:47:26.660 Sure.

00:47:26.940 And so you're going backwards.

00:47:29.060 Your hands are off the guardrails and you have your pack on, you can progress that pack weight.

00:47:34.360 So you can start at like 50 pounds, go to 60, go to 70, go to 80, and you're working your

00:47:39.920 way down that hill on the treadmill.

00:47:42.240 And it simulates that exact load.

00:47:44.600 Like your quads immediately are going to be on fire, um, right above your knees going to

00:47:49.700 be on fire because you're working that downhill angle that your, your body's not used to.

00:47:55.260 But that's a big, big, big game changer because that's where, that's where we see most injuries

00:48:00.780 and most, um, kind of collapses on the mountain.

00:48:04.860 It's interesting.

00:48:05.800 I don't relate with that.

00:48:07.000 Like it's so really, no, you don't, I, I talk to a lot of people about, you know, like running

00:48:12.960 and hiking and things like this.

00:48:14.360 And they all say, a lot of them say, oh, downhill's harder than uphill.

00:48:17.400 I'm like, what the hell are you talking about?

00:48:20.220 Like, that's not reality, but maybe that's just not reality for me.

00:48:24.680 It's way harder to go uphill than it is to go downhill.

00:48:27.380 You can control your pace and your tempo, you know, and, and I almost wonder too, I'm

00:48:32.560 not discounting what you're saying.

00:48:33.900 You've done more research on it than I have.

00:48:35.500 I'm just saying anecdotally, it's hard for me to relate with.

00:48:38.640 I'd much rather go downhill than uphill.

00:48:42.340 Um, I almost wonder though, on workouts though, also if the downhill side of things is just

00:48:48.200 worked into the movement, whether you're doing deadlifts or squats or box step-ups like

00:48:53.960 you were talking about, I think, uh, the stair climb may not work any of the descent in,

00:48:59.600 but if you're doing a box step-up, you also have to step down.

00:49:02.780 It seems like it would be worked into it.

00:49:05.080 The, the one thing I was going to say, go ahead, go ahead.

00:49:07.540 And I'll, I'll give you my answer, what I think, but I'd like to hear what you say about

00:49:11.260 that.

00:49:13.140 Yeah.

00:49:13.500 I think it just depends on like what your biomechanics and what type of athlete and train training

00:49:20.020 you've been doing.

00:49:20.840 I definitely saw the same thing in the, in the ultra running community.

00:49:25.000 There are these guys that can just bomb down these Hills and these races. 0.99

00:49:30.840 Like they just fly straight downhill and they, they kind of struggle a little bit more on

00:49:36.340 the uphill.

00:49:37.200 So we've, we've certainly seen both.

00:49:38.980 I think it depends on like historic athlete training, what kind of biomechanics you have.

00:49:44.520 But I think the, the nice component about that treadmill hack, it is, it's also trick tricking

00:49:52.140 those athletes at the same time to start wearing that heavy pack because for sure, what we've

00:49:58.260 seen a lot of is, is people will obsess over their gear.

00:50:03.520 So they want like the perfect boot, the perfect pant, the perfect pack.

00:50:09.340 But then they, they enter the woods on these hunts of a lifetime without ever wearing that

00:50:14.980 gear.

00:50:15.900 And so that causes more problems than, than anything is people just not testing their gear

00:50:23.680 or even feeling what a heavy pack feels like before going on these hunts.

00:50:28.360 Yeah.

00:50:28.580 So it's like the adage of, would you rather have the skillset or the gear?

00:50:32.340 If you're an intelligent individual, you'd always choose the skillset over the gear.

00:50:36.500 But yeah, some, some people think I've got friends who are gear drunkies.

00:50:41.700 We all do.

00:50:42.460 And it's like, they always have the latest and greatest, but they can't hack it when it

00:50:46.440 comes to the physical aspect of, of the hunt itself.

00:50:49.320 So no gear is going to make up for that.

00:50:52.460 For sure.

00:50:53.860 All right.

00:50:54.120 So my answer, my answer to this, tell me what you think about this.

00:50:58.000 The number one movement or exercise for this type of stuff lunges. 1.00

00:51:03.960 I, I, I don't, I don't think there's a better move for what we're talking about than lunges.

00:51:11.660 Yeah, sure.

00:51:12.120 You can be working some deadlifts and squats and work your arms and shoulders and core and

00:51:15.540 all that kind of stuff.

00:51:16.420 But I think if you can only pick one, do lunges, weighted lunges, dumbbell lunges, throw a sandbag

00:51:23.080 over your shoulders.

00:51:24.380 To me, lunges, they, I hate them. 1.00

00:51:26.380 They're miserable. 1.00

00:51:26.900 They're the worst. 0.99

00:51:27.560 They're worse than burpees, but it's the one exercise.

00:51:30.200 I think that it's way better than anything else for what we're talking about.

00:51:33.840 Agree or disagree.

00:51:34.740 What do you think on that one?

00:51:37.620 I would, I would definitely agree.

00:51:39.560 Mountain tough is big on lunges.

00:51:42.200 Like we've been pretty famous historically for the amount of lunges you're going to see

00:51:46.720 in a lot of our programming.

00:51:47.880 Um, it's funny cause I think the volume too, not only do you need to be doing lunges, but

00:51:56.660 you, you need to be doing untraditional volume compared to what you'd see in a traditional

00:52:01.520 strength program.

00:52:02.800 So like a, a traditional strength program might not have lunges.

00:52:07.800 And then if you got to one that did, it's going to have like three sets of 10, but for

00:52:13.060 the back country, you need extreme muscular endurance.

00:52:16.260 So we've even had, we've had programming where we've experimented in the lab with like 800

00:52:22.480 meters of lunges several times a week.

00:52:25.020 So we're, we're definitely big, big on the lunges as well.

00:52:28.540 Everybody just stopped listening and they're like, no, not for me.

00:52:33.080 When you say the lab, tell me about that.

00:52:35.220 What do you, what do you mean?

00:52:36.040 Do you guys have a facility where you're doing all of this training where you're experimenting?

00:52:40.500 Um, also how do you, how do you test that?

00:52:42.760 Cause it's easy to, you know, for example, you might call a guy like me and I'm not inviting

00:52:46.800 myself by any means here, or maybe I am, I don't know where you, you might say, Hey,

00:52:51.360 Ryan, come into the lab and let's, you know, go through some exercises, but that's not enough,

00:52:55.640 right?

00:52:55.920 Like when you say the lab, what do you, what do you mean?

00:52:58.440 And how are you going through these, these exercises, this training to actually ensure

00:53:05.140 that it's going to be valuable for a person?

00:53:09.020 Yeah, for sure.

00:53:09.840 It's been awesome.

00:53:10.460 Cause that was our founding.

00:53:12.280 One of our founding ethos was to have a lab.

00:53:15.240 So it's called mountain to fitness lab.

00:53:17.400 And that lab was in there for a reason since the beginning.

00:53:21.400 And the reason was we were strict on that.

00:53:25.980 We would never release a program to the public unless it, unless it had been tested in our

00:53:33.280 own lab. And so we're very, very fortunate to be based in Bozeman where there's these world-class

00:53:41.680 mountain athletes all around us. And there's all the hunting companies have their headquarters

00:53:47.400 here, but in addition, just do a lot of hardcore hunters. There's a lot of hardcore mountain

00:53:53.260 bikers and skiers and snowboarders and mountaineers. And so since the beginning, and it's only gotten

00:54:01.320 better and better every single year, we've had this lab concept. And what the lab concept means

00:54:07.000 is that we are going to test programming on the people that it matters to, to see if it works or

00:54:14.960 doesn't work. So for example, if we're testing back country hunting programming, we're going to test

00:54:22.120 it on back country hunters. And then to see if it works or doesn't work, we want to go through a year

00:54:30.600 or a two-year cycle on that same cohort of athletes. And then we want to know how they're

00:54:36.400 feeling on the mountain. Are they moving better? Are they less sore? Are they stronger under load?

00:54:43.780 And so we're able to work with them for a year or two on specific programming to see what's happening.

00:54:50.360 So it gets pretty specific. Like if we're, if we're building a smoke jumper program,

00:54:55.440 we're going to test it on smoke jumpers. Cause we want the real people. We want the real skill

00:55:01.500 requirements. And we really want to see, is this helping them at their job or not? And how can we

00:55:07.880 make the tweaks to make it even better? And it's a constant evolution. Like our, our pre-season prep

00:55:14.020 program, that's specific step-by-step plan to get someone for like an Alaska doll sheep hunt.

00:55:21.480 It's 16 weeks of training on full gear. That's like our step-by-step plan to get someone for

00:55:28.820 ready for a rugged train dream hunt. That one's been revamped three or four times. Cause like these

00:55:35.840 learnings never stop and there's constant improvement that can be made, especially under

00:55:41.520 human performance. And in the last year, our lab just continues to get cooler. Like we're,

00:55:47.680 we're pulling a little bit of blood now, uh, to see like lactate thresholds. Uh, we're pulling VO two

00:55:55.620 max at the beginning of a program in the middle of the program at the end of the program, um, heart

00:56:02.000 rate zones. And so it's, it's really, really fun. Yeah. That's cool because most fitness guys,

00:56:09.240 and I'm not saying it's wrong. Like I, I have, I have Johnny Loretty, who's my nutritionist and

00:56:14.240 fitness coach. He can get me a better deadlift. He can get me a, a bigger bench press. That's

00:56:20.180 awesome. That's great. That means I'm getting stronger. It's a metric to measure, but does

00:56:24.840 the deadlift or the bench bench press equate to the real world? Like you're talking about

00:56:29.940 based on what I'm trying to accomplish as, like you said, a smoke jumper or a back country

00:56:35.900 hunter or, you know, fill it firefighter fill in the blank with whatever your, whatever your

00:56:40.600 thing is. I think that's really cool. I did want to go back to something you said earlier

00:56:45.420 about when you were talking about your wife and running. I'm, I'm really curious as to

00:56:49.900 how this relates to our ancestors. Uh, when, when, when we think about who we were as hunters

00:56:59.020 and gatherers thousands of years ago, I imagine we were more lean and thin and that might've just

00:57:06.060 been because of the scarcity of resources, but we're definitely bigger people now. Um, and not

00:57:13.200 just obese, but even the most fittest people are generally taller, larger muscle mass. Like

00:57:20.560 we're just bigger people, uh, outside of some, maybe some cultures. What do you say to how this

00:57:27.220 relates to how we used to operate as, as our ancestors did is, is, is there a valuable discussion

00:57:34.220 in there and, you know, what, what is the, the balance, the right balance between being lean

00:57:41.480 and, and building endurance versus being fit and strong and then the downsides of the muscle

00:57:49.220 mass associated with that? Kind of curious about that take. Yeah. It's super interesting

00:57:56.000 question. Cause I, I do think that we were lean and mean. I think that like you read the book

00:58:05.020 born to run and you think about, you know, archery hunters running around the Midwest and in the West

00:58:13.840 200 years ago. And certainly like that, that cardio and that running and being able to move efficiently

00:58:22.820 through the country was quite, quite helpful. I think that there's, there's great significant

00:58:30.960 value in that. And I do tend to probably believe that those ancestors weren't doing pack outs very

00:58:42.280 often. I think the hunting style was different there with that tribal mentality around, um, like the game

00:58:50.920 was more out on the plains and they were, someone was harvesting that animal. And then the tribe was

00:58:57.620 kind of coming around to support them and processing it there with them, um, as a group of people. And so

00:59:05.980 I think probably that difference of like someone going in the back country alone and unpacking that

00:59:12.800 mountain, that animal off the mountain is probably slightly different than the way our ancestors hunted.

00:59:20.920 And it's a, it's a really interesting topic because there are some highly, highly successful

00:59:28.400 hunters that are really lean and smaller framed guys still now today that do these insane pack outs.

00:59:37.860 Like that is not that rare. And one of the things that we've talked a lot about is there are these,

00:59:46.860 there are these differences that should be talked about when we look at individuals like that,

00:59:53.400 because sometimes what is happening is a professional hunter or someone who works for one of these

01:00:01.680 hunting brands, uh, maybe a photographer or videographer, they are, they are hiking under load

01:00:09.200 for, uh, 150 days a year. And so their training is in the back country all the time. Their lifestyle is

01:00:19.440 for sure. Yeah. What we, and we kind of balance that out with what we do know is like

01:00:26.860 someone who has never strength trained before, that's like a 160 pound guy that's fit and lean.

01:00:38.220 We know that they can do an 80 pound pack out over seven miles. But what we have seen is like their,

01:00:47.400 their risk for injury is much higher. And so they're going to do it and they might do it really

01:00:54.680 well, but their risk for injury is significantly higher than someone with a really solid strength

01:01:00.880 baseline. And a lot of that comes from the military research. They, they did all that research of guys

01:01:08.040 with heavy rucks on, and most people can grind out a heavy ruck. Like you can grit your teeth and

01:01:15.820 grind it out and eventually you're going to get to the truck. But if you don't have a strength baseline,

01:01:21.040 your risk of injury is significantly higher than if you were to have a high strength baseline.

01:01:26.440 Got it. That makes sense. I guess it really comes down to, and this is a little bit about what you've

01:01:31.460 been talking about as well is what are you training for? Are you training to play in the NFL? Are you

01:01:36.640 training to, to hunt on three hunts, two, three hunts this year? Like build a program around whatever it

01:01:43.220 is you're trying to accomplish. Dustin, I know you've got a, an event coming up in this summer,

01:01:47.780 and I'd like you to share a little bit about that event called, um, Tough Fest and also share with

01:01:53.480 the guys how to connect with you, learn a little bit more about Mountain Tough and what you guys are

01:01:57.600 up to. For sure. Yeah. Tough Fest is coming up. It's June 14th here in Bozeman. It's our, it's our

01:02:05.940 annual event where kind of the Mountain Tough global community can gather in it. It's, it's an epic,

01:02:13.520 really special day and you don't have to be doing Mountain Tough training to attend. If you're not,

01:02:18.980 we, we highly encourage you to attend. Really what it is, is it's an environment where like-minded

01:02:26.300 people can get together and have a really special day of growth. So we start in the morning, we do a

01:02:35.440 really awesome morning hike, um, up that Ridge I was talking about earlier. So we hike the Ridge in the

01:02:42.720 morning. We do a conquer hunger food drive after that for Mountain Ops. So Mountain Ops has their

01:02:49.120 conquer hunger program. And we teamed up with them last year to give out 42,500 meals to the Bozeman

01:02:57.380 community. Uh, we're doing that again this year. So we go from the hike, uh, to packing meals for kids.

01:03:04.440 Uh, once we're done packing meals, we have the Mountain Tough workout. So we've already worked out

01:03:11.280 once on the mountain, but the second workout is, uh, in our lab, in our headquarters, in our gym,

01:03:17.720 where we have a really unique team style where you're going to, you're going to wind up on a team

01:03:24.620 with someone you don't know, which is, you know, really like really a special moment. You might wind

01:03:30.800 up on, on a team with, uh, someone like yourself, uh, the, the COO of go rock, or you might wind up on

01:03:38.220 Bert Soren's team. We do that by design so that, um, you have to kind of shine as a leader with

01:03:44.900 someone you don't really know or haven't met yet, which creates a, an amazing bonding experience.

01:03:50.240 And then we have some really talented guest speakers after that. And then we grill a bunch

01:03:55.380 of meat and hang out. And that's the best part.

01:03:57.660 Oh man, just hanging out over food is the best. And then total archery challenge and

01:04:07.720 big skies the next day. So a lot of people will do tough fest Thursday, um, tack on Friday.

01:04:13.860 Awesome. Well, how do we learn more about what you guys are up to and connect with you?

01:04:17.300 For sure. Yeah. Everything's on, um, mountain tough.com. If anyone wants to check out the app,

01:04:24.320 so all of our training is in a native app that streams on iPhone, Android, all the smart TV

01:04:30.040 platforms. Everyone comes on to mountain tough training with the 14 day free trial. So you can

01:04:35.840 just go mountain tough.com and then you can click start free trial. That gives you two weeks to kind

01:04:41.260 of play around in our app. You'll see our training, our programming, you'll see our mental

01:04:47.280 toughness curriculum, our spiritual curriculum, our nutritional curriculum is all in there.

01:04:52.800 And then our website is loaded too, with blogs on a lot of the stuff we've talked about today. So

01:04:59.500 educational content on getting ready for your trip. The, the blog is loaded with that information

01:05:06.500 as well as mountain tough fitness on Instagram and mountain tough fitness lab on YouTube.

01:05:12.740 Excellent. We'll sync it all up. Thank you, brother. I appreciate you joining me today. I appreciate

01:05:16.560 what you guys are doing and hopefully at some point in the near future, we can get on a hunt

01:05:20.540 together. That'd be awesome. That would be awesome. Yeah. Thank you, man. I appreciate

01:05:25.620 you and everything you're doing. Gentlemen, there you go. My conversation with Dustin

01:05:30.840 Diefenderfer. I hope that you enjoyed the conversation as much as I did. I've known Dustin for a very

01:05:35.800 long time, years now, and I've actually used their training. I don't specifically use it right

01:05:40.800 now, but I have used it in the past and I can tell you it kicked my butt and it helped me to become a

01:05:48.040 better hunter and also just show up more powerfully in everyday life. So connect with Dustin on the

01:05:54.100 gram, on Facebook, on social media, wherever you're doing that. Let him know, take a screenshot of the

01:06:00.240 podcast real quick and tag him, tag me in it. Let people know what you're listening to. And then of

01:06:06.000 course, check out their programs, especially if you're getting ready for some hunts coming this

01:06:10.640 fall as I am. In addition to that, guys, check out the store at store.orderofman.com and check

01:06:16.640 out my good friends over at Montana knife company and use the code order of man at checkout. Now,

01:06:22.720 guys, we've got a good one lined up for you tomorrow for our ask me anything. Lots of powerful

01:06:26.860 questions from our friends and followers on Instagram. And then also we've got our Friday field

01:06:33.920 notes where I'm going to be addressing something very, very important that I think you'll want to

01:06:37.480 tune into. So make sure you subscribe wherever you're listening, whether it's Apple podcasts or

01:06:42.120 Spotify or any of these other places, please subscribe, leave that rating and review and

01:06:47.220 continue to support what we're doing here as we work to support you. All right, guys, that's all I've

01:06:51.540 got. We'll be back tomorrow for our ask me anything until then go out there, take action and become the man

01:06:56.800 you are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of

01:07:04.940 your life and be more of the man you were meant to be. We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.

Order of Man - April 23, 2024

DUSTIN DIEFENDERFER ｜ Are You Tough Enough？

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