The Expedition: A killer core exercise, Ozempic hot take, blowing sh*t up, and more ...
18 new ideas that will improve your life.
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Audio/podcast version
The post
The Expedition is a monthly journey into thoughts, opinions, ideas, observations, studies, facts, figures, etc.
Good ones, insightful ones, interesting ones, weird ones, and ones you can use to live and think better.
It’s a roundup of all the worthwhile stuff I’ve encountered in the last month. The Expedition is a bit of an island of misfit toys. But, hey, the greatest journeys are winding.
This month, we’re covering:
Numbers on:
How many minutes of TikTok gets kids hooked.
A new marathon world record.
The amount of money pharma companies paid to influence studies.
Your odds of dying if you regularly ride a motorcycle
How mental health issues impact longevity.
How much your genes influence your body fat.
An explosion in farming yields.
The percentage of people who reveal their true political opinions.
How ice baths alter muscle repair.
Miles a lost cat trekked to get back home.
Fact check: Did America really start losing weight?
Las Vegas blowing shit up in fabulous Las Vegas fashion.
A killer core exercise (I love this one).
A fascinating theory on the real reason fit people criticize those who lose weight using Ozempic.
My thoughts on Ozempic and other GLP1s.
What science says about the number of people who are toxic online.
A parting quote.
A critical parting question.
Let’s roll …
By the numbers …
35
Minutes of TikTok it takes for kids to get hooked, according to internal documents from TikTok that were improperly redacted and discovered by Kentucky Public Radio.
That’s equal to about 260 videos. Please enjoy the crystal meth of social media, children!
2:09:56
Is the new women’s marathon world record, recently set by Ruth Chepng’etich at the Chicago marathon. That’s about two minutes faster than the previous record.
$1.06
Billion dollars pharmaceutical and medical device companies paid study reviewers in order to influence medical literature from 2020 to 2022.
31,576
Average number of steps my wife, Leah, takes a day, thanks to a treadmill desk.
ICYMI: Read what she learned from all those steps here.
1 in 860
Is the chance a motorcyclist who rides 15 miles every day will die over one year. For comparison, the risk of dying for a person who takes a 500-mile flight daily for a year is 1 in 85,000.
24
Times higher the fatality rate per 100 million miles driven on a motorcycle is compared to a car. (1.26 vs 30.2 deaths per 100 million miles).
64 Years
Is the average life expectancy of people with clinical mental illness.
60
Percent of body fatness is heritable. I.e., from your genes.
The scientists wrote: “The results also highlight the importance of environmental factors...”
My take: Genes factor into body fatness. But how you live plays a larger role in your weight.
180
Percent that wheat, corn, soybeans, and rice yields have grown since 1961. This is due to improved seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, irrigation, and farming practices.
61
Percent of Americans “self-silence.” That is, they keep their true political opinions to themselves.
For example, “36% of Democrats and 14% of Republicans say they trust government to tell the truth, but just 5% and 2% agree with this statement privately.”
5
Hours that muscle protein synthesis—a marker of muscle repair—drops after people do an ice bath after exercise. That likely hurts long-term muscle repair.
800
Miles a cat lost in Yellowstone trekked to get back home to California.
FWIW, if lost in Yellowstone, here’s what my dogs would do:
Stockton would dash to the food court and eat until he became ill. Then he’d eat again.
Conway would find a pack of wolves, asserted dominance, and quickly lead them to a revolutionary takeover of the park. (She studied management and revolutionary history at Tulane).
Beyond the headlines: Did America start losing weight?
New data suggests U.S. adult obesity dropped two percentage points from 2020 to 2023. Many people theorized that this was “the Ozempic effect,” a result of GLP1 drugs.
So you may have seen recent headlines stating that we’ve reached “peak obesity.” A sampling of some headlines:
But Deirdre Tobias, a Harvard Obesity and Nutrition Epidemiologist, thinks it’s too early to know if obesity is dropping.
She explained:
“Since 1999-2020 the prevalence of obesity has actually been lower four times—in other words, almost HALF of the biannual obesity reports in the past two decades made us epidemiologists think there was finally a turn of the tide. It never lasted.”
The data showed a decrease in obesity (BMI of 30+), but it also showed an increase in severe obesity (BMI 40+). “This suggests a subset with obesity actually gained weight, not lost.”
The use of obesity drugs during the period of data collection likely wasn’t widespread enough to make a big dent in weight.
Deirdre thinks the drop is likely random noise in the data and a weird data sample taken during COVID-19 lockdowns.
In the meantime, please continue being a Two Percenter.
We interrupt this newsletter to take you to Las Vegas, where we are blowing up old casinos in spectacular Las Vegas fashion
Welcome to town, Las Vegas Athletics (and sorry we keep taking your teams, Oakland).
A killer core exercise
Having powerful, go-to core exercises is critical to performing well and avoiding injuries. A stronger core makes you a stronger runner, lifter, rucker, cycler, swimmer, (insert any other sport).
So I have a handful of go-to core exercises. I do one of them every workout.
I used to do the following core exercise often, but then my exercise ADD kicked in, and I forgot about it.
I don’t know how—because it’s fantastic. I’ve woven this exercise back into my routine and I’m better for it.