Geoffrey Woo discusses ketone supplements that special forces use to think 30% faster. Ketosis improves cognitive performance and endurance, with applications from military operators to professional athletes seeking competitive edge.
When you have lower oxygen, your reaction time increases. Meaning that when you respond to a threat, you trigger pull. You lose about 30% of your reaction time. Or it increases 30%.
You know Jake Paul, Controversial, viral, unstoppable.
You're not even a fighter. Like, you do exhibitions and lost like four years ago.
But what if the guy helping engineer his rise isn't a boxing coach or a PR rep? It's this man, Jeffrey Wu, founder of Ketone iq, Stanford trained computer scientist and the brains behind the biohacking elite. He doesn't coach influencers, he programs performance.
Don't lose that childlike curiosity and spirit. A core operating hypothesis I have is that there's two scarce assets in the world of business. One is capital. But I think what's arguably more scarce is actually attention.
He fuels cyborgs, the ones launching billion dollar companies, breaking records and outthinking everyone in the room. Because today's flex isn't followers. It's focus. It's glucose that never crashes. It's willpower on command. You've heard of ketosis, but this, this is performance eng. This is nutrition as code. This is what happens when you stop eating like a caveman and start fueling like a machine. Because your limits aren't physical. They're metabolic. You need ketones at altitude to stop that inflammatory cascade. They also seem to inhibit Alzheimer's disease. And they're just a straight up nootropic. If your ketone levels are high enough or you have good metabolic flexibility and all the right minerals, all the stuff that makes hardware work, you're unflappable.
I know that ketones post workout increases muscle protein synthesis.
What do you know about ketones and testosterone? Everyone has a plan until life punches you in the mouth. But comebacks aren't random. They're coded. And yours starts with a shot. You're listening to the Human Upgrade with Dave Asprey. Today's guest is Jeff Woo. Jeff and I have known each other for a long time because he's a fellow Silicon Valley nerd and also the founder of Ketone iq. You might have heard me talking about the different types or methods of extending ketones in humans. And you can do intermittent fasting. You can do longer term fasting. You could do a ketogenic diet without too many carbs or too much protein. You could take MCT oil, which I would say is the original exogenous ketone. Too much will make you poop. Oops. Right? And then in my books, I've talked about things like ketone esters and ketone salts which I typically don't recommend. And Jeff's company makes something called a ketone dial which I think hits the sweet spot. So I want to talk with him about ketosis and ketones and performance enhancement. But more importantly, he's a computer science guy and a systems thinker and he's also a very successful entrepreneur at computer science from Stanford. So we're going to talk about how to think about human performance, how to think about biohacking. And I think your latest claim to fame is you're working with Jake Paul on a bunch of stuff.
Yeah.
This is like a venture fund or what's the thing with Jake?
I started a venture capital fund back in 2021 called Anti Fund and well, one, thanks for having me. And two, it just like, like, it just, it's cool to like go from just friends and acquaintances to like doing some content together. Because I think in terms of just all the attention on longevity, biohacking, all this stuff, I feel it comes full circle that I think you deserve a lot of credit to being really the father of biohacking, kind of anchoring a lot of these ideas. So cool to trade notes and share ideas here.
It's not a trademarked term for a reason. I want it to be a movement and you're definitely a part of it. There are a few companies who've been really innovating in the ketone space and yours is I would say the most successful one right now. Right. And I'm not with bulletproof anymore. And we had, you know, MCT oil, which is still good, but it doesn't do what your stuff does. So you've really focused and stayed the course and I think it's making a difference. So tell you I don't get on an airplane without using ketone IQ because I know the science. Right?
Yeah.
Do you ever fly without it? No.
I mean I think that's actually some of the most, I think like less understood use cases. Right. Just the anti radiation of impact of being in ketosis and I think the cognitive benefits. Right. Like I think the Tour de France alliance, Armstrongs like the MMA fighters are big customers, including the military. But I think just for brain, that's my favorite use case personally.
There you go. I have told every professional athlete I've ever consulted with if you are in a sport where you might get hit in the head, you need to be on ketone IQ before you get hit in the head so you don't have long term brain damage. And I don't know if you can make those claims because you're involved with the company. I'm not. So, like, the science is very clear. Ketones stop that inflammatory cascade, and they also seem to inhibit Alzheimer's disease. And they're just a straight up nootropic, right?
Yeah. No, I mean, just touching on the use cases. I mean, I think the genesis of the latest versions of Ketone IQ came from a $6 million SOCOM contract. So when you're in high end special operations, one, it's the performance enhancement and the reaction time. But the second part, these guys are taking traumatic brain injury left and right. You're a breacher, or you're just taking concussive hits from grenades and whatnot. So that's some of the recovery use cases that isn't just validated in the field, but we're actually just putting more and more effort to partner with university research clients.
