And we have this white powder in front

of me. You got a big smile on your face.

>> I do because I don't care who you are,

you should definitely be having this.

Let's talk about creatine. Phenomenal

research shows you can creatine your way

out of sleep deprivation. It can protect

your brain against a concussion, stroke,

from stress. And there was a study done

on Alzheimer's disease patients. And

they found that patients not only

preserved their cognitive functions, but

they had more energy and they were able

to exercise more. And I know this

because I'm a clinician and over the

last decade I've been surrounded by the

greatest neurosurgeons in the world

studying the brain. And so I'm here to

tackle one disease and that is

Alzheimer's because it generally starts

in our 30s and 60 million people

worldwide have Alzheimer's. 70% being

women. And I get angry and I get

passionate because women have been lied

to. They've been underrepresented. They

downplay their symptoms or they're too

scared to ask their doctor for advice.

And what people don't really know is

that it is a preventable disease, but

it's like endstage cancer. Once you get

the diagnosis, there is no cure. And the

fact that so many people are at the

mercy of a disease that is preventable

is not okay with me. And I don't think

people understand these things. Like

people don't really know that we're

becoming more sedentary, which is a

disease. And there was a study that was

done on this that showed that if you do

10 air squats every hour, this can

compensate for your sedentary lifestyle.

And then we have several lifestyle

factors that can lower your risk of

getting Alzheimer's disease, as well as

showing you what 5 minutes a day can do

for your brain performance. Just using a

tennis ball and an eye patch.

Guys, I've got a quick favor to ask you.

We're approaching a significant

subscriber milestone on this show, and

roughly 69% of you that listen and love

the show haven't yet subscribed for

whatever reason. If there was ever a

time for you to do us a favor, if we've

ever done anything for you, giving you

value in any way, it is simply hitting

that subscribe button. And it means so

much to myself, but also to my team

because when we hit these milestones, we

go away as a team and celebrate. And

it's the thing, the simple, free, easy

thing you can do to help make this show

a little bit better every single week.

So, that's a favor I would ask you. And

um if you do hit the subscribe button, I

won't let you down. And we'll continue

to find small ways to make this whole

production better. Thank you so much for

being part of this journey. Means the

world. And uh yeah, let's do this.

Louisa,

what is it you do in simple terms? And I

guess most importantly, why is it that

you do it? And why now?

>> Over the last decade, I've been studying

the brain. I'm both a clinician and an

academic. So, I get to see the brain and

I also get to research it. And I'm

really here to tackle one disease and

that is Alzheimer's disease.

>> Why is this so important now?

>> Right now because 60 million people

worldwide have Alzheimer's disease. That

number is going to triple by the year

2050. 110 million women will have

Alzheimer's disease by the year 2050.

This is a disease that robs you of who

you are, your complete identity. So,

we're going to get really into this

straight away cuz I brought Henry with

me, right?

>> And for anyone that can't see, Henry is

a model brain that she's holding in her

hands.

>> This is around 2 lb. And if you actually

feel it and you know, if you actually

feel a real human brain, it feels like

tofu, but this is everything you are.

And the fact that so many people are at

the mercy of a disease that is

preventable is not okay with me. It

doesn't sit well with me. We used to

think that women were disproportionately

affected by Alzheimer's disease because

we lived longer because age played a

role in it. But we now have substantial

evidence to show that it's not the fact

that women live longer or people in

general because dementia and Alzheimer's

disease are not part of the natural

brain aging process. For women, and they

differ from men, and we can separate the

sexes and talk about it, for women, it

is purely because being a woman is a

risk factor for getting this disease.

Now, if we go through and we have a look

at all of the people that currently have

Alzheimer's disease, 95% of them could

have been prevented because this is not

a disease of genetics. It's a disease of

lifestyle.

>> 95% of it could have been prevented.

>> Correct? We're we're born with our with

our genetic makeup. Meaning that, for

example, if you have a genetic mutation

on chromosome 4, you will get

Huntington's disease. There is nothing

we can do about that. That's how you

were born. But when it comes to

Alzheimer's disease, there's around 20

to 30 genes involved in the disease.

Only around 3%

of the disease cases right now were

driven through those genetic mutations.

The genetic mutations that you are born

with, you get them from mom and dad are

presinelin one, presinelin 2 and the

amaloid precursor protein. So you if you

have a genetic mutation in one of these

genes, you will get some form of

dementia.

>> What is the age range where people will

start to experience Alzheimer's?

>> Let's just actually take a broad

overview of what Alzheimer's disease is.

Okay. So you've probably heard of

dementia. Yeah.

>> So dementia is the umbrella term. So

Alzheimer's disease is sits under the

umbrella. It's a form of dementia.

There's fronttotemporal dementia which

is what Bruce Willis has. There's

dementia with Louis bodies. There's

Parkinson's dementia. There's vascular

dementia. This disease dementia or

Alzheimer's disease is a disease of

midlife. And so it generally starts in

our 30s. It starts in our 30s, but the

first symptoms show up in our late 60s,

70s and beyond.

>> When you say it starts,

>> yeah, our brain fully develops at around

25 years old. 25 to 30. And after that

that's when we if we don't take care of

our brain we start getting a decline in

these functions. Now let's go back to

the brain. The brain is 87 billion

neurons around 5 to 10,000 connections

per neuron. The my favorite area of the

brain is the cerebellum. And the piking

cells inside the cerebellum have upwards

of 50,000 connections per cell. So so

tightly dense and there is so much

happening. It takes 20% of the total

calories that you consume every day to

power this thing. And it's the most

vascular richch organ in the entire

body. Over time, through things such as

sleep deprivation,

poor diet, lack of physical activity,

environmental toxins, this slowly

erodess at the functioning of the brain.

And over time, this starts to compound

because that's what biology is.

Everything is compounding. One night of

sleep deprivation raises your risk of

amaloid beta, which is one of the

hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease

pathology, by 4%. That's just one night

of sleep deprivation. Imagine a new

mother or a shift worker or a physician

in their residency getting countless

nights of sleep deprivation day in and

day out. Imagine all of that

compounding. And what happens? Well, we

end up with either neuronal loss, which

is like the complete atrophy of certain

parts of the brain. And that's what is

mild cognitive impairment. Mild

cognitive impairment is a pre-dementure

state.

>> So, what is this that I have here? This

photo um of a brain.

>> You've got the sagittal view right now

of the brain. And we're looking at a

healthy brain on here. As you can see,

I'm going to show it up here on the left

hand side. You can see that the brain is

thick. We can see that the integrity of

the gray matter which sits out here is

thick. It's voluous. Okay. We can see

that the ventricles are smaller. We go

over here and we see thinning of the

cortex. You can see these big spaces

between the gy. These are thick because

the gray matter has atrophied. It's

shrunk. You can see that the space

between the cortex itself and the skull,

there's a bigger space. You can see

these ventricles here, these

butterflyshaped ventricles. This is

thicker. This is thinner. We can see

atrophy down here. So essentially, the

brain is getting smaller and smaller

>> at the age of 30. If I do everything

right, and we were to sort of plot this

on a graph of where I land at 70, what

is the variance of where I'll end up at

70? You know, my brain is quite

important to me. And I do worry. I think

like I think I worry in part

because I I I sit and interview a lot of

people at a lot of different ages and

one thing you notice as an interviewer

is some people at 60

have are razor sharp

>> and some people at 60 are not as razor

sharp.

>> Yeah.

>> Their ability to articulate their words,

their memory recall, their ability to

understand stats and stories, all of

this. And I sit here and go, I wonder

what the difference is.

>> Yeah. And that's actually beautiful

because it brings up this important

concept in neuroscience called cognitive

reserve. And that's your brain's ability

to withhold capacity to overcome

stresses. Okay. So you've probably heard

for example, let's use the analogy of

physical performance, your V2 max, which

is a measure of your peak respiratory

fitness. You know how well you can

utilize oxygen

>> when you are at a at a high intensity

state. How well does your body utilize

oxygen? The the fitter you are, the more

reserve you have to overcome stress.

Stress such as an infection, everyday

stresses, sleep deprivation, surgery,

the more reserve you have in your bank

to overcome that. The same is with your

brain. The more cognitive reserve that

you have, the more cognitive capacity

that you have been training year on and

year out will save you at 60 from

harmful insults such as you can get a

woman at the age of 80 with a head full

of amaloid beta.

>> Amaloid beta being

>> the one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer's

disease. You can get somebody with a

head full of amaloid

>> which is like a plaque on the brain.

>> Yeah. it it's a protein that's actually

it's a it's a protein that lives inside

the neuron itself and we can explain

what that is which I will in a second

but let me just tell you you can have a

head full of amaloid in this person and

they have retained their cognitive

functions then you can have somebody

else with hardly any amaloid but they've

lost their cognitive functions and this

all comes down to cognitive reserve

>> and cognitive reserve lives where in the

head

>> you've got around 5 to 10,000

connections per cell. Over time, those

connections fail. Now, those connections

are responsible for your thinking, your

processing speed. Every time you have a

thought, you build a new connection. The

more connections that you have, the more

things that you see, the more novelty

that you give your brain, the richer it

gets, the more stable it gets. So, the

ends of these of the neurons, we have

dendrites. And coming off the dendrites

are these little trees. Imagine a

branch. That's the dendrite. And all of

the leaves that come off it, all these

little dendritic trees, if you will, and

they connect to nearby cells, 10 10,000

cells over time, those are the

connections that fall. Those are the

connections that fail. They fail because

you don't utilize them.

>> So, the way that one would build reserve

at the age of 30 is to

>> is by exercising. We can build reserve

in a number of different ways. In fact,

there was a really wonderful study that

just came out that I just read about and

they found that those who preserved

cognitive capacity at 75 years old were

handwriting and reading. So, handwriting

and reading preserves cognitive

functions.

Exercise is one of the most potent

stimulus for brain health and

Alzheimer's disease prevention and

cognitive reserve. The more you

exercise, the bigger your brain.

>> What about scrolling on social media?

Does it improve my reserve if I'm

watching videos?

>> It's in the opposite.

>> Why would that be? Cuz I'm still

learning stuff.

>> Yeah.

>> When I'm on the internet.

>> Because what you're doing then is you

are relying on short dopamine hits.

Every time you scroll, you're sending

signals to your brain that you're

getting a dopamine hit. And your brain

gets used to it. Remember, your brain is

only there for two things, survival and

reproduction. So every time that you

stress your brain in the smallest amount

of times, you're giving it dopamine

hits, it doesn't allow us to do other

things for a sustained period of time

like focus, read, have a conversation.

>> So writing and reading are good for

building up my neurological reserves.

>> Yeah, neurological reserves. It doesn't

compare to what exercise can do for the

brain. And it's so sad because around

80% of the US population don't exercise

for at least 30 30 minutes a week, which

is actually quite scary. The physical

activity guidelines are 150 minutes to

300 minutes of moderate to rigorous

physical activity per week. What's the

most compelling study you've ever

encountered that proves that exercise is

central to Alzheimer's prevention and

brain health?

>> When we look at all of the data, we can

see that the biggest amount of return on

investment is from resistance training.

>> Resistance training being

>> strength training. One of the most

compelling studies was probably the um

the smart trial where they uh took a

group of people with mild cognitive

impairment and gave them two to three

times per week of resistance training

and they not only preserved their

cognitive functions. They enhanced their

processing speed. They enhanced their

fluid intelligence and they had slowing

of the gray matter.

>> The gray matter.

>> Yeah. So your brain consists of both

gray and white matter. So gray matter

are the cell bodies that lives on the

outer side outer portions of your brain

and the white matter is deep within the

brain and that's where all of our

myelinated neurons live and over time we

see that we can have little lesions in

the white matter of the brain. So, a lot

of the times people will ask me,

"Stephen, I'm scared my mother had

Alzheimer's disease. I'm scared I'm

going to get it." And we were talking

about genetics before. And there's

another genetic risk factor that we

didn't talk about. The APOE E4 gene uh

is one of the the strongest risk factors

of getting Alzheimer's disease, but it

is not a foregone conclusion that you're

going to get it. So, Chris Hemsworth was

tested and he has two copies of this

gene. So you get two copies, one from

mom, one from dad. It's the apo

lipoprotein E gene and it comes in three

main variants. So you've got APOE E2,

ApoE3 and ApoE E4.

So I'm a 33 carrier. I've been tested

and that's the general population.

They're 33. So it doesn't raise my risk

of getting the disease, but it also

doesn't protect me. If you've got a copy

of the APOE E2 gene, it protects you

against the disease. But when you have a

copy of the APOE E4 gene, it raises your

risk by two to three times.

If you have two copies of the gene, it

raises your risk by 10 times. If you are

a male,

here's the devastating thing. If you are

a female with one copy of the gene, you

are at doubled the risk than your male

counterpart. So one copy of the gene of

ApoE4 gene for a female raises your risk

by about sixfold whereas two copies

raises your risk by 15fold.

>> And how would one go and get checked?

>> You can get the ApoE4 gene checked uh

with your doctor. It's a simple blood

test.

>> On this point of resistance training,

I've heard you talk about how the legs

>> Mhm.

>> are so important. Having strong legs,

>> having strong legs is by far the most

important tool in your toolbox for the

prevention of Alzheimer's disease. And

this was made certain to me when I read

a study done on identical twins, exact

same genetic profile,

>> and they tracked them. And they did

cognitive tests and MRIs, and they

tracked them over a 10-year period. And

what they found was that the twin who

possessed the greater strength and the

most leg power had a bigger brain,

larger gray matter volume. They

preserved their cognitive functions.

They uh did better on different

cognitive tests.

>> Why is resistance training increasing

the size of my brain?

>> Resistance training does so much for

your brain. The first thing is we have

to think about the journey that we're

going on, right? So when you look at all

of the studies, I want to make it really

clear, all of the studies show that in

order to produce the neural effects of

resistance training, you need to be

lifting at around 80% of your one

repetition max. So 80% of one RM. So

that's quite heavy. There is so much

controversy on social media right now.

Should I lift heavy? Should I lift

light? And when it comes to hypertrophy

alone, so increase in muscle, muscle

mass, muscle cell size, you can get

there, men can get there, women can get

there by lifting light, high reps, or

you can get there by lifting heavy and

low reps. It just depends on who you are

and how much time you have. But when it

comes to the brain specifically, you

want to be lifting heavy for several

reasons. The first one is when we lift

heavy, when we literally like when we

contract our muscle like this, we are

releasing a whole set of chemicals.

They're called myioines. And when

they're released from the muscle, they

go up to the brain and they do

beneficial things for our cognitive

performance, our cognition, and they

help with the growth and proliferation

of new neurons in the hippocampus.

And it's the first thing to go during

Alzheimer's disease. it actually

shrinks. This holds our memory. This is

where a lot of our memory consolidation

and learning takes place, which is why

short-term memory is the first thing to

go during this disease. Okay? And as we

get older and what we found is that you

can grow new neurons in the hippocampus

from structured exercise and consistent

exercise. the biggest growth is going to

occur because of BDNF, brain derived

neurotropic factor. So this is a growth

factor for the brain and it gets

released when we exercise. It gets

released abundantly when we are doing

aerobic training, when we're running,

when we're cycling for long distances,

but also gets released when we do

resistance training. Now, here's the

beautiful thing about it. When we do

resist resistance training and we're

releasing all of these myioines, these

myioines are signaling molecules. They

work together. So we've got one called

irri, okay? And that's a messenger

molecule. So what it does is it actually

helps BDNF express itself. So when we

release this myioin, it goes into the

brain, crosses the bloodb brain barrier

and it tells BDNF to express itself. So

then BDNF goes in and it helps grow new

neurons in the hippocampus. But then

we've got another mioine. Let's just

take isle 6. Interlucan 6 that comes

from the interlucan family.

>> What is that? Sorry.

>> The interlucan family is a a class of

pro-inflammatory cytoines. So these get

released when we are under stress or

you've got an infection or a virus for

example. But when we exercise, it

depends on where the site is. Interlucan

6 instead of acting as a

pro-inflammatory cytoine.

>> Mhm.

>> Instead of creating inflammation, it

acts as an anti-inflammatory cytoine.

So, it goes into the brain and it lowers

inflammation. In fact, this is uh one of

this was one of the uh first ever

myioines to be studied and they showed

that interlucan 6 is also responsible

for the down reggulation of tumor cell

growth. So exercise is a potent

anti-cancer intervention as well by way

of myioines. How much exercise does one

need to do to avoid the uh cancer

related um side effects but also the

Alzheimer's problem?

>> Well, just 30 minutes a day of aerobic

physical activity can downregulate 13

types of cancers and the most prominent

ones being breast cancer, colon cancer

and prostate cancer. So these three have

been studied most and you get your

anti-cancer effects from the myioine

release. So quite specifically when we

exercise we're getting a robust release

of something called natural killer

cells.

And when we get these natural killer

cells into the plasma and into the

bloodstream, they go into the tumor site

and they do what they were born to do.

They kill. So they go into the tumor

site and they start to kill the tumor

and this is where you get your

anti-cancer effects of it. But you can

also get it from the anti-inflammatory

effects of resistance training,

anti-inflammatory effects of aerobic

training. So these myioind

powerful in fact pharmaceuticals are

spending billions of dollars trying to

replicate these myioind.

I want both men and women lifting heavy

because you've got areas in your brain.

Right across here lives your motor

cortex.

Think of your brain as real estate.

There's real estate in your brain

reserved for lifting heavy. So every

time you lift a heavy weight as opposed

to a lightweight, it takes more neural

real estate to lift that heavy weight.

So the heavier you lift, the greater the

neural drive. The greater the neural

drive, the better it is for your brain.

>> If you had to do just one exercise for

the rest of your life to protect your

brain and you could only pick one,

>> what would it be?

>> Deadlift.

>> Why?

>> If done correctly, the deadlift can use

almost every muscle in your body. Erect

spine a you've got the glutes, you've

got the quads, you've even got seratus

anterior, you've got the you've got your

calf muscles. There is so much

compounding in that one lift would

probably be comparable to a barbell

squat as well.

>> According to the World Health

Organization, we're getting increasingly

more sedentary. I we're moving less and

less in part because of technology, but

also there was this really interesting

study done by the Cleveland Clinic where

they talk about people who are active

sedentary. And this

this felt a little bit personal if I'm

honest. It says a major finding in 2025

found a danger of being active

sedentary, which is people who exercise

for like 30 to 60 minutes but sit for

the remaining 10 hours a day. If you sit

for more than 10 hours a day, your risk

of cardiovascular disease increases even

if you meet weekly exercise goals

because prolonged sitting shuts down

lipoprotein lipes, an enzyme essential

for burning fat and cleaning glucose

from the blood.

That wasn't that's annoying to read

because I feel like that's me.

>> Yeah. And being sedentry is a disease.

You can change the trajectory of your

life by doing 10 air squats every hour

on the hour. And there was a study that

was done on this that showed that if you

do 10 air squats every hour, this can

compensate for your sedentary lifestyle.

Because unfortunately, this is the life

we're living in. We are becoming more

sedentary in our day-to-day lives. We're

sitting more. We're not going out as

much. There's younger kids uh on video

games. They're scrolling. There's so

much happening that is involving our

sedentary lifestyle, which is obviously,

like you said, increasing our risk of

type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease,

etc.

>> Yep. You can do it

>> like this.

>> There you go. 10 of those. If you do 10

of those, you can outweigh the benefits

of a 30 minute power walk

>> every hour.

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> For how many hours?

>> 8.

>> Okay. So, I could set an alarm on my

phone.

>> Every hour. Just get up or every 45

minutes get up and do an air squat. And

this is primarily because have you heard

that when you eat you get a massive

spike of glucose. And the best way to

bring that glucose spike back down is by

doing any form of exercise. You can albe

it go out and go for a a fast run, do an

air squat, bring that uh bring that

glucose level back to baseline. And do

you think much about aerobic training as

a preventative measure for Alzheimer's?

>> I love aerobic training. Women are

facing a dilemma on social media because

they're being given so much information.

There is this huge uproar of should I do

zone 2 exercise or should I not do zone

2 exercise?

>> What is zone 2 exercise?

>> So we can think of uh physiology in

zones. Zone one is what you and I are in

right now,

>> right? Zone two is that next level up

and that's generally when we're looking

at exercising at around 60%

of our maximum heart rate and it's where

you can where you're jogging but you can

have a conversation but where you're

huffing and puffing. When we're

exercising we need to produce energy and

that energy firstly starts in the

mitochondria. So we need uh all of our

energy gets created. We create ATP and

that's how we are able to perform the

given task. As soon as we get out of

that zone and we go into zone 3, zone 4

and zone 5, we're producing energy

outside of the mitochondria in the

cytoplasm. And when we're doing that, in

order to do that, we're breaking down

glucose so fast via a pathway called

glycolysis. The byproduct of that is

lactate. And then we produce lactate and

that's actually a fuel source for the

brain. It's also a mioine, right? So

that's when we're in zone 3, zone 4,

zone 5. So a lot of women have been

doing zone 2. They've been going to the

gym. They've been doing zone 2. And I'm

trying to push women to get out of zone

2 for several reasons.

Not because it's not good for you. I

think all forms of exercise are good for

you. The more you move, the better,

right? But let's be really honest. A lot

of people in midlife are busy. They're

time poor. Men actually get a greater

return on investment by doing zone 2.

Women don't get the same return on

investment from doing zone 2. So, I'm

trying to push women to first work on

zone five, zone 3, zone 4, zone 5. If

they can, just do zone five.

Then do two to three sessions of

resistance training a week. And if you

have time left over, that's right there.

I've just described around 4 hours of

exercise. If you have time left over,

then you can work in zone 2. Now, zone 2

is great. If you're going to go out and

go for a long run, you're doing many

things. You are secretreting a lot of

BDNF, which we need. It's a growth

factor for the brain. You're getting a

massive uh amount of blood that's going

into the brain which is great as well.

It's sustained blood delivers oxygen and

nutrients to the brain. You're doing a

lot of things, right? But what you're

not doing is having a complete effect on

the chambers of your heart.

>> Is it better for me to do 5 km on a

treadmill or outside? I would say it's

better for you for the brain to do a

smaller amount of exercise and a higher

threshold

>> because I I was I think I read somewhere

one time that running outside is better

for the brain because it stimulates the

brain

>> of well you're outside so you've got so

many things around you. Imagine your

brain I told you it's got prime real

estate. Every part of the brain is

responsible for a different function

from what you see to what you hear. You

go outside and you can see so many

things. You've got forward ambulation.

So that's going to help you with drive,

motivation, dopamine, but then you're

also taking in the sounds, the senses.

It downregulates inflammation. So you

get so many other things from doing

that. Yes. But 5 km outside compared to

20 minutes of high aerobic physical

activity. What is better for the brain?

I would say that the zone 5 is better

for the brain. The zone 5 training does

a lot for the chambers of your heart as

well. Now, I'm going to grab this. We've

got a little model here, and we can see

that we have h a left chamber. We have a

right chamber, we have actually four

chambers of the heart, but we have

something in the heart called a

ventricle. We've got a left ventricle,

and we've got a right ventricle. Now,

the left ventricle delivers oxygenated

blood to the entire body. It's really

interesting because the chamber of the

left ventricle is like a is like a

muscle, right? It's responsible for

pumping blood to your entire body. It

first gives blood to the brain, which

means it's the most important part of

your body. After it's done giving blood

to the brain, it goes through to the

rest of the body. As we get older, we

get stiffening of these arteries. Okay?

Stiffening of all of the arteries in the

heart. and we get we get something

called left ventricular hypertrophy. So

that's when the ventricle

the left ventricle it starts to get

thicker and when it gets thicker that

means that we can't it's not as strong

it can't pump a lot of blood as much as

it could when it was younger to the rest

of the body. Ben Lavine, Dr. Ben Lavine,

he's a sports cardiologist and he did

this landmark study which changed how I

thought about zone 5 training. He took a

group of sedentary males, average age, I

think it was around 47 to 55, so around

50 years old, and he scanned their

hearts. He did, you know, he looked at,

he did echo cardiograms, he took photos

of the heart. He did everything he could

to see when they was first starting the

protocol, what does their heart look

like? He then subjected them to around 4

hours of exercise per week. And that was

stratified against he did one resistance

training session a week. One was

highintensity physical activity at

around 90% of the maximum heart rate,

the V2 max heart rate. And then in

between he did some long sessions as

well, right? But it was all moderate to

rigorous exercise and that was done over

two years. At the end of those two

years, what he found was that he

remodeled the heart by 20 years. So he

reversed the age related effects and

defects of the heart by 20 years.

Essentially turning the 50-year-old

hearts into 30-year-old hearts just from

physical activity alone.

>> 4 hours a week for 2 years.

>> 4 hours a week for 2 years.

>> And what kind of exercise was it?

>> So he got them to do like let's say for

example one of the um one of the

protocols was exercising at 90% of your

maximum heart rate. So when we do this,

we're generally looking at increasing

our V2 max. So you've probably heard

that V2 max along with strength, but V2

max is the strongest predictor of all

cause mortality, right? So if you want

to improve your V2 max and if you want

to get the heart related changes that he

did, what you want to do is you want to

do 20 minutes of V2 max per week just to

keep your V2 max because it does decline

year on and year out. Starting at the

age of around 35, we start to see a

decline in V2 max. So, if we want to

work on our V2 max, we want to be doing

a what we call the Norwegian 4x4. It's

the gold standard of increasing your V2

max. So, you want to get your heart rate

elevated to 90 to 95% for 4 minutes on,

4 minutes off, repeat four times.

So, how do I do this? Well, I actually

do this twice a week because the more

you do, the better. I do this on a

stepper. I do this at the gym and I put

my stepper onto I think I'm at like a

level 14 and I'm working my way up and

I'm staying on there for 4 minutes and

then I'm having a complete stop and a

complete rest for 4 minutes and I'm

repeating that four times.

>> Mhm.

>> So what I'm doing in that moment, I'm

not just getting a massive shunting of

blood to the brain. Okay, which is good.

I'm not just getting a massive release

of myioines and exocines to the brain.

I'm also remodeling the heart. I'm

downregulating tumor cell growth. I'm

improving my cognitive performance. I'm

doing so much more than just exercising

alone.

>> So that's once once a week in Lavine's

study that reversed these guys hearts by

20 years. Y

>> um

>> that you do that once a week. you only

have to do that once a week, but he also

did um he did around 70% of maximum

heart rate for around 2 hours a week.

And he also threw in one resistance

training session.

So consistency is key.

>> I'm just looking at some of the findings

of that study and one of the surprising

things is it showed that there is a

biological exploration date per se for

the reversal of the heart. Yeah. And

then the heart retains its plasticity,

the ability to remodel itself until the

age of 65. If this intervention had

started after the age of 65, the heart

was too stiff to be physically remodeled

to get that 20 year reversal.

>> Yeah.

>> You have to start in late middle age.

>> Exactly. So midlife is the window of

opportunity for brain health and for

longevity.

>> I didn't realize you could sort of

remodel the heart yourself. That's

interesting.

>> Yeah, you can remodel the heart. And the

heart is amazing. Okay. Because what you

see with the aorta, right? So the aorta

goes up and we've got we've got two

we've got uh the main blood supply for

the brain exist in the vertebral

arteries. Okay? So there's branching off

of the aorta comes from the heart.

Vertebral arteries which supply the

posterior part of the brain and the

cerebellum with blood. And then you've

got the corroted arteries. So one on

each side branching off the aorta which

supply the uh frontal and middle part of

your brain with blood. The brain is the

most vascular rich organ in the entire

body. In times of stress such as

hypertension, okay, that is elevated

blood pressure. We see that we can

actually kill off the tiniest parts of

the blood vessels which are called the

capillaries. You can see the capillaries

up here. They supply even the bloodb

brain barrier. So they supply mainly the

outer cortex of the brain with blood.

When we have elevated blood pressure,

we are starting to kill off those tiny

little capillaries of the brain. Those

capillaries are feeding different

neurons in the brain and also feeding

the bloodb brain barrier. So when we get

breaking off of these, we lose the blood

supply, we lose the oxygenation, we get

um a breakdown of the bloodb brain

barrier itself, which is scary. And we

see that in patients who have got mild

cognitive impairment. You can call it,

you've heard of leaky gut, we can call

it leaky brain. If you have a leaky

brain, what happens eventually is so

your bloodb brain barrier sits like

this. Okay? And there are cells and we

call them parasites for example and

they're bound together by tight

junctions. That's what the bloodb brain

barrier is. It's like a you think of the

bloodb brain barrier as the bouncer of a

nightclub. They are all standing there

like this responsible for who can come

in and who can't. and they don't allow

some molecules to get in. But over time,

when this starts to degrade and become

leaky, they start to spread apart. And

when they do, you can have the passive

diffusion of all these molecules coming

in. And that's really bad for your

brain. So, we want to maintain the

integrity of the bloodb brain barrier by

maintaining the capillary health. We

don't want the capillaries to die.

They're one cell thick. Any type of

damage can damage them and kill them.

hypertension. There was a really great

study. It was called it was actually the

sprint trial and it was it's now the

gold standard for the recommendation of

120 over 80. What's

>> that?

>> So when you have your blood pressure

taken, we get the systolic over

diastolic. And you've probably I don't

know if you take your blood pressure,

but doing your blood pressure every day

is a really great inexpensive and

effective tool for maintaining good

brain health. So you measure your blood

pressure and if you are hypertensive

this is anywhere over

135

okay systolic over 135

that's when things start to break down

that's when we start to get the

breakdown of those small one cell thick

capillaries. So in this trial, in the

spring trial, what they found was that

when they aggressively manage these

patients and they bring their blood

pressure down, they did it

pharmacologically through something

called an ACE inhibitor. It's a

medication to drive down blood pressure.

When they bring it down

pharmacologically, these patients

preserved their brain gray matter and

their cognitive functions. So we now

have a gold standard. And this is what I

would recommend anybody on Amazon. And

it costs about $25 for a blood an

automatic blood pressure monitor. Do it

every single morning and watch your

blood pressure.

>> And then if it's high, what do I do

about it?

>> Well, outside of pharmarmacology, if we

don't want to take a medication, we want

to get stronger. And we want to do this

via exercise.

Stress is one of the biggest things

driving high blood pressure. manage

stress, manage cortisol, manage chronic

inflammation by way of exercise, sleep,

all of the things that mother nature

gave us.

>> I was just looking at the um the study

that reversed the heart by 20 years and

trying to figure out what exercises they

did. And as you said, the first one was

a highintensity workout, the 4x4.

>> Um then they did a long aerobic

exercise. Again, this is all once a

week. So 60 minutes once a week doing a

longer exercise like it could be hiking

or tennis or cycling. a moderate

intensity workout, 30 minutes where they

did the talk test, you should be able to

break a sweat but still be able to

speak. So that was once a week. And then

lastly, strength training once a week.

So it's really a variety

>> of exercises that caused such a profound

impact on the heart.

>> And I think cardiovascular diseases are

the single biggest killer.

>> Yeah. Cardiovascular disease,

dementia is the number one killer of

women in the UK. The number one

>> really. It's the number one cause of

death in Australia for both men and

women.

>> How does it kill you? Because we all

think about memory loss and stuff like

that, but

>> and so this is the actual devastating

part. We don't die of Alzheimer's

disease specifically. Over time, what

happens is in these patients, you have

to remember Alzheimer's disease is like

endstage cancer. Once you get the

diagnosis, there is no cure. There is no

going back. There is no reversal. you

have the disease and that's the scariest

part. Mild cognitive impairment, you can

slow the progression of that. Like I

said to you, it goes for 20 years. Mild

cognitive impairment, you can slow the

progression of mild cognitive

impairment, but as soon as you get

diagnosed on that awful day that your

mother or your friend gets diagnosed

with Alzheimer's disease, it's a sad

day. And what ends up happening with

these patients is you can die of

esphyxiation. You can die of you. Your

brain loses the signal to swallow. It

loses the signal to maybe you fall

because you've lost balance. It's really

it's a really scary moment, but it's not

like you die of Alzheimer's disease

specifically.

If you were diagnosed with Alzheimer's

disease,

it's an interesting reaction.

>> Because I would have no hope. I think a

a better question is

>> you'd have no hope.

>> If I was diagnosed with Alzheimer's

disease, there is nothing I could do.

>> How would that change

your life and the decisions you make? Or

would it at all? I would aggressively

aggressively exercise. I would monitor

my diet. I would aggressively monitor my

diet and I would potentially have a

ketogenic diet because what we've found

is that during this metabolic crisis

that happens in your brain, okay? Where

you lose the ability to use glucose as

your primary fuel source. So the brain

doesn't know how to use glucose as its

primary fuel source. So it's under

attack. during Alzheimer's

>> during Alzheimer's but also during this

window in of for women as well in the

pmenopause state. So the brain cell when

it's under attack and it can't utilize

glucose effectively and it doesn't have

any energy it starts to think about

survival. It starts to think what can I

do? I'm under attack. So it starts to

break down the myelin sheath. And in

that moment it's actually the

aststerittes they're the supporters of

the brain so of the brain cells. So they

start to think okay let's break down the

myelin sheath from that the astroytes

produce ketone bodies and then the

ketone bodies get shuttled into the

brain and that's how we use uh energy in

the brain. So in that state of metabolic

crisis I would make sure that I am

having a ketone rich diet or I may be

getting exogenous ketones. I would

aggressively exercise. I would

aggressively manage my my lipids. I'd

have a high intake of omega-3 fatty

acids and I would preserve if I could

any form of cognitive function by way of

talking to people by going outside,

socializing, having hard conversations

if I was intact and I could do so. I

would throw tennis balls to the wall.

So on that point of the ketogenic diet,

the reason is because ketones are an

alternative fuel source to glucose.

>> Y

>> and the brain likes ketones.

>> The brain loves ketones and it actually

utilizes them more effectively than

glucose. But glucose is the primary fuel

source for the brain. And here's what's

really interesting uh and devastating if

you will for females during the onset of

pmenopause, right? when we see a decline

in estrogen, right? We see a decline in

estrogen, what happens is a 30%

reduction in brain glucose metabolism.

So, when these receptors start to die

because we don't have uh we don't have a

lot of estrogen circulating in the

bloodstream anymore, what happens? Well,

we can't utilize glucose as effectively.

So during that state, that's when we

start to get the breakdown of the myelin

sheath to use that as uh as ketone

bodies as an alternative brain fuel

source.

>> So do you think women going through

menopause should be

considering a ketogenic diet? Yes, I do

think that I think that women who are

going through pmenopause and who are at

the mercy of this brain energetic crisis

should be adopting if they can a

ketogenic diet. It's one of the best

diets for the brain.

>> I didn't really understand this idea

that during menopause there was a

glucose

deficiency or metabolism problem in the

brain.

>> 30% reduction in brain glucose

metabolism. Is this why women report to

having brain fog and all these kinds of

things?

>> Yeah, absolutely. Because when the brain

can't utilize its fuel source

effectively, what happens? Well,

metabolites start to shift. We don't

sleep properly. Around 60 to 65% of

women in menopause report having a hot

flash or night sweats. It wakes them up

at night. That's also causing cognitive

decline and brain fog. So, I mean, this

graph is pretty shocking.

>> Um, can you explain what it shows?

>> Oh, this is showing the um estrogen

levels at birth going through all of the

life cycles that a woman will go

through, puberty, pmenopause, and then

eventually menopause. There is one thing

that is certain.

After age, I mentioned earlier being a

woman is the next strongest risk factor

for getting this disease,

>> forgetting Alzheimer's. forgetting

Alzheimer's and that largely lies in our

par in our menopausal shift that occurs

the downsizing of estrogen. However, we

do have forms of estrogen that we can

you know supplement with.

>> So I just need to keep the estrogen up.

>> Yeah.

>> Because then the brain health is going

to be up and normal.

>> This is where the controversy lies. Yes

and no. So I want everyone to understand

I am sitting right now. So my entire

doctoral thesis is focused on women and

Alzheimer's disease and I'm Switzerland

right now when it comes to hormone

replacement therapy. That is replacing

your hormones.

>> You're Switzerland.

>> I'm Switzerland. Meaning that there is

no evidence to suggest right now we

don't have largecale randomized control

trials to show that hormone replacement

therapy prevents dementia. So what I

will tell you is this. It is a signal.

It is a supporter. It will help you do

the things that can lower your risk of

dementia. We've seen multiple times that

having hormone replacement therapy can

reduce your risk of getting Alzheimer's

disease by up to 30%. We know that. But

it's not because estrogen alone is

minimizing your risk. It's because when

you have estrogen, it helps get rid of

the hot flashes. It helps with the night

sweats because during menopause when we

actually have a disregulation of the of

estrogen in our brain, what happens in

the hypothalamus which is an area in the

brain that controls our temperature

regulation when we lose the ability to

monitor our temperature for a woman.

What will happen is when she feels the

slightest bit hot, her temperature, you

know, is rising a little bit. The

hypothalamus doesn't know what to do.

So, it signals, I'm super hot. So, it'll

raise your temperature right up, and

that's a hot flash. And then it'll bring

it right down. And as a result, this is

keeping women up at night. And we know

that sleep deprivation is a risk factor

for Alzheimer's disease. Of course, it

is. compounding sleep deprivation will

accumulate amaloid beta in your brain.

So if we can replace if we can use

hormone replacement therapy as a signal

and as a support to help us sleep at

night then that's a good thing. Another

thing estrogen is anabolic to muscle.

>> What does that mean?

>> It means that it helps with muscle

protein synthesis.

>> Oh it helps me make muscle.

>> Yeah. We've got estrogen receptors on

our bone. We've got estrogen receptors

on our muscle. So if estrogen is

anabolic to muscle, if estrogen helps

with muscle protein synthesis, if

estrogen helps with bone mineral

density, then replacing estrogen during

that menopause state is going to help us

with all of the risk factors of

Alzheimer's disease.

>> So when does estrogen I mean it really

in this image drops off a cliff

>> and Yeah. And it varies. So it tends to

generally happen at around 45 years old

as an average and that that pmenopause

stage lasts around 10 years

>> but it starts going down on this graph

at about 30.

>> It starts to go down and everyone's

different. Okay, you can have a woman in

her late 30s go into pmenopause or the

general age is around 42 to 45. Most

OBGYNS that I've spoken to say that you

need to start checking in with your

doctor at around 40 years old to check

for this.

>> So, do you thinking about my fiance now,

do you think that

someone like her should go on hormone

replacement therapy at like 40?

>> Well, so that's the that's the big

question. That's the elephant in the

room. Should you go on hormone

replacement therapy or should you not?

And that's definitely a conversation

between you and your physician. However,

we've got largecale studies right now to

show that we don't have to be afraid of

hormone replacement therapy. And without

going too deep into the weeds, there was

a massive study that was done, the women

women's health initiative, that scared

women out of taking hormone replacement

therapy in fear

>> of getting breast cancer. Correct. We

went from having 40% of women on hormone

replacement therapy to just 4% of women

on hormone replacement therapy. We know

that even at the onset of menopause, a

woman's risk of having a heart related

event triples. A woman's risk of getting

Alzheimer's

disease increases. So there is something

to posit here about the benefits of

hormone replacement therapy that we

still haven't yet studied.

>> Will you do hormone replacement therapy?

>> I definitely will.

>> And what kind of hormone?

>> And look, so this is really interesting.

So um this was given to me by a friend

and there's this is the um this is the

capsule. So this is estradile and

progesterone. Okay, so progesterone is

that one that's going to help you sleep

at night. This one here is vaginal

estrogen. So, this is a cream that

actually gets uh you know, depending on

how it is, it can get inserted and the

vaginal estrogen apparently if you put

it on your face is probably the best

form of skin care that you could ever

have. Yeah, we have estrogen receptors

all over our tissues, including our

skin. These are estradiol inserts. So,

that's not the cream itself, but if you

get vaginal estrogen in the form of a

cream, you can put it on your face and

it can help with skin elasticity,

collagen, uh dermal thickness. This is

why I'm actually most excited about it.

>> So, I mean, is this are these the only

ways that one can do hormone?

>> No, there's also um a patch, and that's

what most women are opting in for. The

transmal patch

>> when the time comes.

>> Uh I will probably do the the the patch.

>> Why? because it's the the easiest.

That's the one that um I've researched

the most. Uh I'm not afraid of hormone

replacement therapy in the slightest.

You do have to, you know, everyone has

to check with their doctor, but I

definitely think that this is going to

be one thing that is going to help with

the Alzheimer's disease crisis that is

occurring.

>> Go ahead.

>> I mentioned earlier plaques, right? So a

lot of people ask well what

distinguishes Alzheimer's disease from

the rest of the dementias and it comes

down to two proteins amaloid beta and

tow protein and here's where it gets

really interesting and actually dates

back to 1901 the first ever Alzheimer's

disease patient Augusta she was 52 years

old and she went to the hospital her and

her husband went complaining of

difficulties of word finding

word fluency and she couldn't remember

where she put her keys and her husband

said she is delirious and Augusta told

the doctor on board he was a

psychiatrist his name was Eloise

Alzheimer she said to him and I quote I

don't know who I am anymore

as I mentioned this disease robs you of

who you are in 1906 066 August busted

died and that was the first ever patient

to be recorded of having Alzheimer's

disease and so postmortem they cut her

brain open and they found that she had

these plaques in her brain and they

didn't really know they didn't really

understand what it was but that was the

first ever induction of this disease in

society and ever since then ever since

then we are still trying to tackle this

disease in the 2000s We had this notion

that Alzheimer's disease was the amaloid

cascade hypothesis. Meaning that great

Alzheimer's disease means when you get a

head full of amaloid, this toxic protein

that builds up. So we were demonizing

this protein. We were demonizing this

peptide protein that builds up in the

head. And so then came the medications,

okay? In the form of IV drugs. So you go

to the hospital, you get an IV in the

promise that it will clear out amaloid.

Great, we've got a cure. But what they

found was that when they were taking out

the amaloid in these brains, they were

taking with them brain tissue and

causing microhemorrhages.

And in some patients, it was resulting

in death.

So we now know that the problem here

isn't amaloid. In fact, amalloid is a

antimicrobial peptide. So, amaloid is

actually a good thing. Amalloid beta is

a good thing because it protects the

brain cells. Now, here's what happens.

We have this beautiful process during

sleep that occurs when we get into deep

sleep. We activate the glimpmphatic

system. Okay? So, the glimpmphatic

system comes from the word gals. Gal

cells. We have gleal cells in the brain.

They sit outside of the neurons and this

is what uh is responsible for immunity.

They're our chief um immune response

cell. During deep sleep they shrink and

when they shrink all of this amaloid

beta that's floating around in the

cerebral spinal fluid gets washed out.

So it's like a washing machine that

occurs in your brain. Right? But what

tends to happen in Alzheimer's patients

is they don't get a chance to wash out

the amaloid. What happens in pmenopause

and menopause due to the hot flashes,

you don't get to get into deep sleep

because you're having a fragmented sleep

because you're waking up due to hot

flashes and night sweats. So that is

what's do that is what's causing the

buildup of amaloid. Now stick with me.

We've got another protein that is a

hallmark of Alzheimer's disease. It's

towel protein and towel lives in the

axon of the cell. The one that I said is

covered in the myelin sheath and what

happens under times of stress. What

happens is this tow protein

phosphorolates.

So it breaks off and basically tow

protein stabilizes the microtubules.

Okay, imagine these railro road tracks

in the axon, okay? Just going up and

down the axon.

>> The axon's in the in the cell or in the

brain.

>> And so the the the brain cell itself,

the neuron is the neuron cell body and

the axon is like the trunk of the tree.

>> Okay.

>> Right. So holding up the tree are

microtubules and those microtubules are

bound by tow proteins. The the tow

proteins keep the microtubules intact.

So the trunk of the tree is stabilized

and it sits there. Why does it need to

be stabilized? Because that's how speed

of thought travels. Information

processing speed travels up there. When

the tow protein phosphorolates,

it starts to form tangles. They're

called neuroiary tangles. So that

happens in the axon. And when all these

tangles clump together, we get the

collapse of this axon, the collapse of

these microtubules.

So we're not just having a cascade of

environmental disaster inside the

cerebral spinal fluid of the brain and

inside the brain, outside the cells.

We've also got this cascade happening

inside the cell body itself. So the

brain is under attack inside the cell

and outside the cell.

>> Why? Why exactly? Why? Why does this

happen? Because of how we treat our

brains.

>> Because of how we treat our brains.

>> Yes. The reason why your brain is

hyperphosphorilated and the reason why

these tower proteins are

hyperphosphorilated is because of many

things. One is we have seen time and

time again that we have estrogen

receptors

that are on in the brain cell themselves

in the axon. So when we don't have

adequate estrogen, estrogen actually is

so smart what it is doing, it's blocking

an enzyme that is responsible for

phosphorolating

the towel. So if we don't have the

estrogen there,

then the towel, the enzyme is there to

phosphorolate the towel and break it

down and cause these neuropiary tangles.

But let's just say you're a man and you

don't have you don't need the testo you

don't need the estrogen there. Although

testosterone is neuroprotective.

Testosterone actually aromatizes into

estrogen which is why you actually have

an extra added protection in your life.

Um

what else causes this? Well stress.

>> You're talking about sleep there.

>> Yeah. So sleep is, I think, by far the

most underrated

Alzheimer's disease prevention tool that

we have. It's underrated because

we have been doing it all our lives and

we think that we can just go to sleep

and the magic happens. But I think now

in 2026, we actually need to train for

sleep. So during deep sleep we activate

the glimpmphatic system and sadly a

large proportion of us aren't getting

into deep sleep. So sleep is uh one of

the reasons.

>> How do you sleep?

>> Yeah, I sleep I make sure I sleep 7 and

1/2 hours a night.

>> This message is brought to you by Apple

Card. It's a great time to apply for an

Apple Card. You'll love earning

unlimited daily cash back on every

purchase. That includes 3% daily cash

when you buy the latest iPhone, AirPods,

and Apple Watch at Apple. Through this

special referral offer, when you get a

new Apple Card, you can earn bonus daily

cash. To qualify, you must apply at

apple.co/gety

daily cash. Apple card issued by Goldman

Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City branch.

Offer may not be available everywhere.

Terms and limitations apply. All I had

to do was brain dump. Imagine if you had

someone with you at all times that could

take the ideas you have in your head,

synthesize them with AI to make them

sound better and more grammatically

correct and write them down for you.

This is exactly what Whisper Flow is in

my life. It is this thought partner that

helps me explain what I want to say. And

it now means that on the go, when I'm

alone in my office, when I'm out and

about, I can respond to emails and Slack

messages and WhatsApps and everything

across all of my devices just by

speaking. I love this tool. And I

started talking about this on my behind

thes scenes channel a couple of months

back and then the founder reached out to

me and said we're seeing a lot of people

come to our tour because of you. So we'd

love to be a sponsor. We'd love you to

be an investor in the company. And so I

signed up for both of those offers and

I'm now an investor and a huge partner

in a company called Whisperflow. You

have to check it out. Whisper Flow is

four times faster than typing. So if you

want to give it a try, head over to

whisperflow.ai/doac

to get started for free. And you can

find that link to Whisperflow in the

description below.

A lot of people struggle with sleep and

um they've just kind of gotten used to

it. I hear this from friends of mine

that will say, you know, I'm a bad

sleeper. I'll sleep for 5 hours. And

they kind of have just gotten used to

it. Do you think that's okay?

>> No.

And they will pay for this in their 60s

and 70s.

>> How do you know?

>> Because I know that just one night of

sleep deprivation is raising your risk

of amaloid beta by at least 4 to 5%.

just one night.

>> So you can imagine the accumulation of

this. Not only that, we know that you're

interrupting with the hormones that are

responsible for hunger and society. We

know for hunger and satiety. We know

that you're increasing your risk of type

2 diabetes with um sleep deprivation.

But not just that, we also see that this

compound effect can't be reversed.

Meaning that a lot of people think, I'll

just sleep for 6 hours a night and then

just bank on it on the weekend. But

sadly, that's not how our brain works.

It's not like debt that we can repay to

the bank.

>> I heard from Matthew Walker the other

day though that we can save it up. He

said um he said you can't make up for

lost sleep.

>> Exactly.

>> But if on Monday I've got something

where I know I'm going to be deprived.

He says on the weekends like Saturday

and Sunday, if I got a huge amount of

sleep, it's kind of like

>> I can use that. Yeah, it's kind of like

Yeah, it's kind of like the reserve.

Yeah, actually I do this. I do long haul

flights. I'll be it like 6 hours between

LA and New York, but also to Australia.

And so if I know I'm going on a long

haul flight, I'll bank on my sleep for

about a week leading up to that cuz I

know I'm going to be sleepd deprived on

the plane. So, if you were one of those

people that struggles with sleep, that's

listening right now and they're slightly

concerned that, you know, you talked

about this um glimpmphatic system which

sort of comes out at night and cleans up

the brain

>> and they're hearing, you know, my

glimpy system isn't going to be optimal

if I'm not sleeping.

>> If that was you, and for whatever

reason, you start sleeping poorly.

>> Mhm.

>> What would you do about it?

>> I would get really serious about

examining my lifestyle the day before.

So, this generally involves two things.

You have to ask yourself, are you having

trouble falling asleep or are you having

trouble staying asleep? A lot of

women report trouble falling asleep,

meaning they've got a racing mind. Men,

too, they've got this racing mind. They

can't, you know, just stop that default

mode network and the the racing thoughts

that happen. That's one thing.

And then there's the I can't stay asleep

meaning that uh I'm waking up due to

heat. I'm waking up because uh I'm

stressed and I'm having bad dreams.

There's all different reasons as to why

you wake up. So for the person who is

having trouble falling asleep at night,

I would strongly recommend

introducing a supplement called GABA,

which is gamma aminoic acid. It's our

chief inhibitory neurotransmitter.

And when you have this, it really helps

stabilize all those thoughts. It helps

with erasing mind and it can help calm

you down at night. The next thing I'll

do is I will think about what I'm

eating. Actually, it turns out that um

eating starchy vegetables, something

that's going to make you like, you know,

sweet potatoes for example, it's going

to have a better benefit uh backloading

uh your carbs at night for helping you

sleep. If you start training for sleep

as if sleep is your marathon and start

preparing for that at 8:00 p.m. at

night, getting off, you know, don't

email, don't have any hard

conversations, don't watch anything

crazy at night, you'll settle your mind

down, you'll settle your nervous system

down,

but where I think uh most of the

optimization occurs is when you're

actually in sleep. I would also work on

um sleep regulation. So, what we know is

that in order to fall asleep and stay

asleep, our core body temperature needs

to drop at least 2°. And I'm doing this

with a temperature controlled mattress

cuz it's working on thermal regulation.

A lot of people who don't have that can

do uh several things like sleeping with

their feet outside of the sheets or turn

turning the the air conditioning on, the

thermostat on to cooling the room, to

cooling down your body temperature, core

body temperature. One thing that um you

can supplement with is glycine, which I

think is amazing because it helps with

sleep by way of temperature regulation.

It can bring down your core body

temperature. And in fact, and I don't

know too much about the mechanism behind

this, glycine itself has one of the

greatest longevity benefits for

improving lifespan. So, taking glycine

can also help with that. Now, in terms

of the person who is having trouble

staying asleep,

>> what about this one? You don't talk

about the um the old ashwagandha.

>> Oh, yeah. Ashwagandha is great. Okay.

Ashwagandha is going to help you with

stress. And you've got here Ashwagandha

rodeiola. So, what they both are, they

are adaptogens.

And basically an adaptogen is great

because it it goes in and it adapts to

what is happening in your body. So let's

just say you have elevated cortisol. And

this tends to happen you know during

different cycles during the day mainly

during the uh daytime when we wake up

where cortisol levels are at its peak

but it can also happen at night. Having

this can actually stabilize that

cortisol because it can go in and

combine to cortisol and bring it down.

likely if something is not elevated and

it's low, it can bring it up. So, it's

really good. It's an adaptogen and

studies show that you can actually take

this three times a day and you won't

feel fatigued. It doesn't disrupt

anything and it pairs really well with

caffeine, for example. So does

theineine. So, this is actually a really

great um adjunct to your supplement

stack. And you really talk about how you

need to sort of warm up to warm down or

warm up to go to sleep.

>> Oh, yeah.

>> Starting at like 7:00 p.m.

>> Yeah. Starting at like 8:00 p.m. And

that's in line with circadian rhythm and

circadian biology. You want to try and

when it comes to sleep and your

circadian rhythm, you kind of want to

mimic the sun and mother nature. And

when does the sun start to go down? It

starts to go down at around 8:00 p.m.

depending on where you are in the world.

And

when this happens, we also get the

natural release of I love that you're

taking that, by the way. You must be

stressed right now. You get the natural

release of melatonin. So melatonin is

that sleepy hormone that gets released

in response to darkness. This may also

be another reason why somebody somebody

is having trouble falling asleep and

staying asleep. So we want to get the

natural release of that. So, these bio

hacks that occur right now, sleeping

with our red light mask on, dimming the

lights. Look, dimming the lights is

great. Um, I've actually replaced all of

my light bulbs um at home with in my

bedroom as well with red light bulbs.

So, I'm getting um I'm getting rid of

the blue light, the junk light. I'm

replacing it with red light to help down

regulate the nervous system. Yes, I do

wear blue light blocking goggles or

glasses, I should say. Do I think that

they're providing an immediate and huge

benefit? I don't know. But they could

have a minor benefit there. So warming

down involves doing these things that

are going to help you downregulate your

nervous system so you can fall asleep

faster.

>> Sticking on supplements for a second.

Omega-3.

>> Yes.

>> Um I've got some omega-3 here. I've got

two of them here. Mhm.

>> But when I brought both of them out, you

said that I've got to be quite careful

about what brand I buy, but also

something about temperature.

>> So, by far out of all of the

supplements, omega3 is probably the only

one that you have to make sure that you

look at the supplement label for there.

There was this study that was done that

showed that around 95%

of the most popular omega-3 supplements

in the US, and there was about 85 of

them that were tested, exceeded the

normal oxidation level, meaning that

these pills, because they're omega-3

fatty acids, they come from fish oil,

they are oil, they can become rancid and

oxidized. And they usually do this when

they're in a heated environment. Here

are the here are the rules of thumbs.

One, you want to look for a manufacturer

that is highly credible and that is

certified.

>> Certified.

>> Yeah. So NSF certified. So it's an

external governing uh board that

certifies them on, you know, everything

heavy metals. They make sure that the um

oxidation levels are met and they make

sure that, you know, what's in the

capsule is actually in the capsule.

That's another thing that is scary. The

supplement industry is highly

unregulated. And I treat my omega-3s the

same way I treat my olive oil. You want

to get oil that is sourced in the area

that you are. We're in California right

now. So, you might want to find an

omega-3 that is sourced in California.

>> Do I want to put it in the fridge?

>> You want to put it in the fridge the

moment that you get it.

>> Really? Yeah.

>> Why does nobody talk about that?

>> I'm not sure. But, um, it's just the

same as olive oil. You don't want the

olive oil to become rancid, so you don't

leave it near the near the stove. You

want to put it in a cupboard away from

the stove.

>> And these are good for the brain.

>> Oh, omega-3 is by far uh one of the most

potent stimulus that you could have for

the brain. They help with cell membrane

fluidity. So, where your cells meet

neuron to neuron, they create something

called a syninnapse. And in order for

that to occur, we have a massive influx

of all of these neurotransmitters,

dopamine, serotonin. We've also got

calcium and potassium. And these help

our brain cells communicate. Okay? We

want to make sure that our membranes,

the cell membranes are fluid and they

glide in order to help with that

synaptic transmission. Another thing

that they do is

they are comparable to an NSAID, an

anti-inflammatory

medication.

These have massive anti-inflammatory

effects. In fact, I think that these

have the safety profile of an FDA

approved drug and there's only benefits

from it. There's no side effects from

it. Uh not just that 60% of our brain is

made of fat.

70% of that is made of DHA. And DHA

comes from omega-3 fatty acids. So why

do I not want to replace my brain or the

fat in my brain with what it's made of?

And that's what you do when you have

omega-3 fatty acids. In fact, there's

been several trials um to show that

omega-3 fatty acids are most beneficial

and most effective for mild cognitive

impairment patients,

people who have the APOE4 gene and

people who have got Alzheimer's disease

because when I told you that our we get

the breakdown of the bloodb brain

barrier, those parasites on the bloodb

brain barrier require DHA. In fact,

there's a transporter on the outside of

our brain that allows the um that allows

the DHA to come in and get into the

brain.

>> And I know you're a big fan of vitamin D

as well because there's been some very

encouraging studies done there.

>> Vitamin D is phenomenal. We have vitamin

D receptors all over our brain brain

stem and and they're abundantly

found in the hippocampus and the memory

centers of our brain. And there was this

act there was actually a study done on

centinarians in China.

>> Centinarians?

>> Yeah. Those who lived to 100, but it was

done in women. And they showed that the

women who preserved their cognitive

functions and who didn't get Alzheimer's

disease had high levels of vitamin D. So

they weren't vitamin D deficient. In

fact, being vitamin D deficient can

increase your risk of all cause dementia

by 40%.

likely being having a high level of

vitamin D which is around 60 nanogs per

deciliter can lower your risk of getting

Alzheimer's disease by around 80%.

>> And then we have this white powder in

front of me.

>> You've got a big smile on your face.

I do because there is just so much

benefit to this. Depending on which

brand you've bought, of course, but I

can't say enough about creatine. I have

my parents on creatine. They're 71 years

old. I've got my dad on highdose

creatine. I've got my mother on lowdose

creatine. It's the most widely studied

supplement on the market.

>> I've never seen you this excited. I'm so

excited because I think that this is a

really cheap and effective way to get

everything you want from both your

physiology, an upgrade on your

physiology and your neurohysiology.

So, let's actually talk about creatine

because I know it gets a lot of air

time, but women and men are still scared

of it. And they're scared of it for two

reasons. One, they're scared it's going

to cause kidney damage. And two, it's

they're scared their hair is going to

fall out. And I'm going to address both

of those fears. But first, let's talk

about what it is. So, creatine is a

naturally occurring molecule. We it's we

get we produce around 2 to three grams

of creatine per day. Gets secreted from

a bit from the brain, but a lot from the

liver. And 2 to three grams a day is

great, but it's not enough. So, we have

to supplement with it. And all through

the 90s and all through the 2000s,

people were supplementing with five

grams a day. That is this scoop here. 5

g of creatine per day. Now that we're

getting more uh rigorous with our brain

health studies, we have found that

creatine has enormous benefits for the

brain. But here's the problem. When you

have 5 g of creatine, you're saturating

the muscles. Okay, remember the muscles

are so hungry, so they get first dibs

and they take up all of that creatine.

So then there's none left for the brain.

We also lose a bit of the

bioavailability when the creatine goes

into the brain. It crosses the bloodb

brain barrier, but when it goes into the

brain, we lose some of it. So, we have

to supplement with more than 5 g. And

one of the studies that changed my

thinking came out last year. It was the

first ever pilot study done on

Alzheimer's disease patients. You're

talking about patients whose brains are

under attack. They're in an energetic

crisis. They cannot produce energy

effectively. ATP is all skewed. Brain

glucose metabolism is skewed. They don't

remember left from right. Cognitive

functions are declined. They put them on

at 20 g of creatine per day,

>> which is how much? I mean

>> that well actually that is four of this.

So you want to go one and I don't know

if they did this all at once. That's

two. Or if they did it like me over four

separate intervals throughout the day.

There we go.

>> That's a lot of

>> That's a lot. Which is why you probably

want to have this skewed throughout the

day, which is what I did. I had 20 grams

today. I had five grams in the morning,

five midm morning, and then I think I

had 10 all at once before I got here. So

that is a lot for all at once. And what

they found was that these patients not

only preserved their cognitive