Brian Johnson shares notes from Peter Attia's Outlive, highlighting VO2 max as a longevity marker and Attia's practice of four weekly Zone 2 rides. Johnson emphasizes that reaching elite fitness levels requires building strong fundamentals first, quoting Thomas Kempis: the loftier the building, the deeper the foundation must be laid.
Questions this episode answers
706th philosopher's note.
9,510 quotes.
411 pages, plus ~40 pages of references.
Four times a week, one hour per session on a stationary bike at Zone 2.
Target the elite range for their age and sex — roughly the top 2% — and ideally the elite level for someone two decades younger.
Chapters
Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another heroic one. I'm typing this while working on my notes for Peter Attia's great book Outlive. This is the 706th philosopher's note I've created. As you can imagine, having read and distilled that many books into philosopher's notes, 1000 here we come. I've developed a process. My process starts while I'm reading the book I read, as Twyla Tharp put puts it, in the creative habit. Archaeologically, I'm digging for great ideas I can share with you. Now, when I find a big idea that I know I want to share in the note, I underline an asterisk the passage. Then I fold the page over in half. These days I'm looking for 5 of what I consider the most interesting, practically relevant ideas that I will share on the note. Now, when I find a great quote or a piece of wisdom that's fantastic but doesn't quite make it up to the big idea standard, I fold the top corner of the page over that. Wisdom will become a sidebar quote in the notes and it will also appear in our Quotes database. On the site and in the app, we have 9,510 quotes I've personally typed out over the last couple decades. You can find those by going to the compass, finding a virtue, and then looking at the quotes. You also see them in some quote in some search results. You'll see the Quotes tab. Then, when I'm working on the note after I found the big ideas in the quotes, I'll often start by going through the book, finding the folded corners and typing out the quotes to get a feel for how I want to approach the note. Which brings us back to Peter Attia's book. It's a 411 page book and it has another 40 pages of references. It's packed with wisdom. Here's a snapshot of a handful of the quotes I just typed out. And then we'll get to the one that made me want to create this plus one. Atiya tells us. Again, this is from Outlive. The conundrum we face is that our environment has changed dramatically over the last century or two in almost every imaginable way. Our food supply and eating habits, our activity levels and the structure of our social networks while our genes have scarcely changed at all. Then he says it turns out that that peak aerobic cardiorespiratory fitness measured in terms of VO2 Max is perhaps the single most powerful marker for longevity. He also says the fittest People had the lowest mortality rates by a surprising margin. This study found that someone of below average VO2 max for their age and sex that is between the 25th and 50th percentiles is is it double the risk of all cause mortality compared to someone in the top quartile 75th to the 97.6 percentiles? He says this poor cardiorespiratory fitness carries a greater relative risk of death than smoking. It's a big idea. He also tells us the healthier and more efficient your mitochondria, the greater your ability to utilize fat, which is by far the body's most efficient and abundant fuel source. This ability to use both fuels, fat and glucose is called metabolic flexibility. And he tells us, I am so persuaded of the benefits of Zone 2 that it has become a cornerstone of my training plan. Four times a week I will spend an hour riding my stationary bike at my Zone 2 threshold. And finally, he says, I I push my patients to train for as high a VO2 max as possible so that they can maintain a high level of physical function as they age. He says, ideally I want them to target the elite range for their age and sex, roughly the top 2%. If they achieve that level, I say good job. Now let's reach for the elite level for your sex, but two decades younger. This may seem like an extreme goal, but I like to aim high, in case you haven't noticed. End quote. Note those VO2 max blurbs are why my current number one energy target is going from superior in my VO2 max, the top 5 to 10% for my age, to elite than to elite for someone two decades younger. Now each one of those blurbs could be its own plus one. But for now, as promised, well get to the one that made me want to create this plus one. Here it is. At the beginning of one of his chapters on the art and science of training, Attia quotes Thomas Kempis who tells us the loftier the building, the deeper the foundation must be laid. I love that the loftier the building, the deeper the foundation must be laid. Now, one of my favorite slides in my go to keynote is has a jumbo font title that says greatness equals consistency on the fundamentals. Then in smaller fonts I have wooden socks. References coach John Wooden's practice of teaching his players, the greatest athletes of his generation, to do the simplest things with excellence. How to put on their socks. McRaven's bed references Admiral William McRaven's number one pro tip for those of us who want to change the world. Make your bed. And that Thomas Kempis quote will be my new go to quote for the wisdom I always share regarding tall buildings. I usually say, you want to see how tall a building is going to be. Look at how deeply they're digging the foundation. A single story house doesn't need much of a foundation. A skyscraper needs an incredibly deep foundation. In other words, the loftier the building, the the deeper the foundation must be laid. And that's today's plus one. How's your foundation? And how could you dominate your fundamentals just a little more? Get on that. Let's dig deep and activate our heroic potential today.
