282: The Sardine Fast: Elimination Diets, Ketosis, and Firehouse Grunt Work

Summer is in full swing, the sleeves are off, and the yard work is endless. This week, Nole and Kevin sit down to look back at how their perspectives of the fire academy have changed after 15 years in the county—shifting from anxious tension on the grinder to warm bro-hugs in the captain's office.

We also circle back to a massive conversation that sparked incredible listener feedback: Can you be a leader if you're overweight? We share a brilliant perspective sent in by our academy classmate, Captain Dave Tebo, that completely reframes the debate. It turns out the true test of leadership isn't just your BMI—it's the deeper root of personal discipline across every single area of your life.

Plus, we break down:

• The Viral "Sardine Fast": Nole and Kevin dive deep into the elimination diet taking over grocery store shelves. From Kevin’s history with clinical GI protocols to Nole and Diego Garcia eating kippers out on the station lawn so the crew doesn't mutiny, we talk about using small baitfish for fat loss, ketosis, and fighting inflammation.
• The Art of Coaching: The unique dynamics of coaching your kids, why gifted athletes often make horrific coaches, and the sheer joy of watching a lightbulb click when teaching someone how to throw Atlas stones.
• Media & Recommendations: A shoutout to Nole's childhood youth pastor, Cliff Carey, and his podcast Back Shed Bible Study, alongside a review of Cliff Graham's brutal, violent, and highly engaging historical fiction audiobook series, Lion of War.

Grab a dark roast coffee, pull up a chair, and join the conversation.

Big thank you to My Epic and Facedown Records for the use of their song "Hail" in our podcast!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dz2RZThURTU&ab_channel=FacedownRecords

Cliff Carey - Back Shed Bible Study episode on Forrest Frank

https://open.spotify.com/episode/2jl9qIs4YACGYFYYHs7cFU?si=dd54f51355694a5d

Day of War - Cliff Graham

https://www.audible.com/pd/Day-of-War-Audiobook/B0FL93ZGPT?ref_pageloadid=not_applicable&pf_rd_p=f3abc0ee-320d-4c19-8388-fcd3a8e6c3a4&pf_rd_r=YGHMVYEAWMW0NZ0P2N6G&plink=8wlAphfm3PKx5lBX&pageLoadId=prjnKazT1kto41GO&creativeId=73c32a9a-e504-4597-bb87-c30c58fc0204&ref=a_author_Cl_c19_lProduct_1_3

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Transcript

Nole (00:04.686)
There it is.

Kevin (00:17.143)
Welcome back to the Fire You Carry podcast. Summer's in full swing. Noel doesn't have any sleeves on, and I am jealous. Yeah, it is. Yard work never ends. Dude, this morning I got to go to the academy to the guys that just graduated yesterday. Sh

Nole (00:25.326)
It's hot on the shed, dude. Really hot.

Nole (00:36.912)
yeah, Diego Garcia was leaving here this morning to go down there.

Kevin (00:40.481)
Shout out to all those guys. Congratulations. Welcome to the county. They were wearing their bear proudly. They had their badges on. They were getting their red shields. And I, you know, they I came, it's my day off and I had to be there super early. So I wore the uniform, which is my new uniform now. Everyone jokes around. It's just basically either a fire-up shirt or a fire you carry shirt with jeans, and that's it.

Nole (01:05.368)
Yep. Yep. Samsey's, yeah.

Kevin (01:07.799)
But anyways, it was it was very cool to see that even like incoming guys kind of like, I've heard of that podcast, I've heard of that coffee. So it was kind of cool to see that some of the new the youth of America were listening. So shout out to those guys and welcome to the county. I'm sure we'll see you out there soon. But it's a funny thing to go to the academy and I remember like y I remember for a very long time you were so intimidated when you went there.

Nole (01:26.381)
Love it.

Kevin (01:35.747)
It was just like you still wanted to like jog on the grinder. Your whole life was on the line. And it's it's just it's definitely a different feeling now. I walk into the captain's office and they're my friends. They're like Sal Alvarado and all these guys that I'm bro hugging people and everybody, hey, buddy, buddy, buddy, buddy, all the way around. It's bro hugs all the way around. It's just such a different animal to think that we're kinda on that side now.

Nole (01:46.262)
Yeah.

Nole (01:57.75)
It is so different. You used to get that feeling of anxious tension in the pit of your stomach when you went down there and now you remember that, which is kind of fun to remember, but you definitely don't feel that way anymore. It only took like fifteen years to get past that, so that's pretty that's not a lot of time.

Kevin (02:14.614)
But I it made me think of our academy mates. Of one of them was the great Dave Tebow, who we talked, he's been on the show, he's he's been on incessantly, and he has been one of the more impressive humans that I've been around. and he's a great friend. But he had hit us up. We've we've caused the quit of a a a bit of controversy. Now we've w on the episodes we were talking about, can you be a leader if you're overweight? And he had a great perspective on this. He hit us up after that.

Nole (02:39.553)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah, for the record, if you don't know, d Captain Dave Tebow is not an obese captain, and far far from it. But just so you don't get the wrong idea. No, no, never. He's one of the most disciplined men we know. But the thing that he and I'm gonna read from his text, the thing that he said was you don't have to be fit to lead, but you have to be disciplined, regardless of the job.

Kevin (02:50.505)
Nowhere close.

Nor ever will be, right.

Nole (03:12.717)
Pastors included, right? Because we mentioned my my buddy Cliff Carey pastor sent me a message about that episode. And I thought we thought that that actually probably summed it up and maybe said better what we were trying to say in that episode. I don't think it really changes the main point of what we were saying, but I do think it changes the the focus, right? Because it takes it off your you know, your BMI and puts it on well, what's behind the BMI, your discipline.

Kevin (03:41.707)
Right. And the the lack of discipline is actually kind of the root of what you would see as some somebody that then the the cause of that would then be obesity, or if you saw somebody that came in that smoke and drank all the time and didn't eat well, like well there's a lack of discipline there and there that's that's the root, that's the end result.

Nole (04:02.667)
Right. Which I feel like we touched on just kind of the idea that this isn't the only thing, right? Yeah, alcohol, smoking, food eating, like you know, whatever other things could be a problem if you're trying to lead men. But yeah, I we thought that was a good perspective and kind of almost puts a neat little a neat little bow on it and takes it away from focusing strictly on your BMI.

your body your body weight, how fat you are or not, and then expands it out because you could certainly you could certainly be a a lean fit captain and be just a horrible person, a horrible individual because you're undisciplined in other areas of your life or or whatever. So that's obviously not the only measuring device that that we think should be used. And I don't think any of you got that out of that episode, but I did think that that was worthy of

Of kinda highlighting and and bringing back because that episode has although we haven't got any hate about it that I've seen yet, but it's caused a lot of a lot of guys to reach out

Which is always encouraging. I mean, even if we get negative feedback we like it, 'cause any feedback is good feedback, but yeah.

Kevin (05:17.558)
Yeah, it seemed like it was a catalyst for some guys to say, Hey, maybe I gotta start doing something different And you know it's been Yeah.

Nole (05:23.137)
Yeah, we had some guys hit us up and ask us for some advice. Like how what do I what should I do in this direction?

Kevin (05:27.66)
There's this there's this old saying, the like those who can't coach, you know, or those who can't play coach or whatever. And I feel like I'm in that realm, but I've always liked or it's enjoyable to me. I I consume a lot of this stuff almost as a hobby on on different methodologies and what works and what doesn't. And it it's interesting to me when I come to people where I as I saw Nessa compete recently in a powerlifting competition, which I no longer do, but I was like

Nole (05:34.027)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kevin (05:54.197)
Right there, I like, Hey man, we gotta bump this weight up, you gotta open with this, you know. And and you know, it seemed relatively accurate. And then you know, other people have hit me up on, hey, literally day one, what do I do starting kind of stuff? And you know, that's with no equipment, with no nothing. And and we had some ideas and it it's it's fun to kind of get into that coaching realm. And it all stems because it's like I have experience in some of these things, I can't do them all anymore. You know what I mean?

Nole (05:56.588)
Yeah, yeah. You had some thought on it, some insight.

Kevin (06:22.134)
But it's fun to be able to impart a little bit of that wisdom. And I'm I'm kinda helping coach in my daughter's team again. And there's something fun about that. I know like if there was a different universe and a different world, I think I would highly enjoy coaching of some sort.

Nole (06:38.029)
That's a really interesting thought because I've heard the phrase those who can't do teach, you know, throughout my life. And I've always assumed or heard it as a negative thing. Like, such and such couldn't make it in the g in the real game. So now he just teaches, you know, college kids or high schoolers how to do it. I do think there's an aspect of that. I think most people use the term that way, but when you're talking about it from like you the perspective you just laid out.

Like you and I are no longer competing in the Highland games and we were never experts at it anyway, but like I could right now go teach my son how to compete in the Highland games. Right like

Kevin (07:11.884)
For sure. And I get like an insane amount of enjoyment when the light bulb comes on and something clicks. Right.

Nole (07:15.423)
Yeah, and it would be really fun to do. Yeah. Yeah. Every time somebody comes over to visit me here at the firehouse, at the rock house, I have my atlas stones in this the former sand trap. It's now my sand pit. And I teach people how to throw the atlas stones because people are always curious about it. Nobody's ever done it, and it's fairly easy to teach somebody how to do it. I love doing that. I love teaching people how to do stuff like that.

Kevin (07:36.195)
It is fun and it it it goes from breathing and you know, to getting in the ice bath to doing sauna work. I mean, there's all these little things that we've been passionate about for a long time. And it's been my experience that like some of the best athletes that I've been around are horrific coaches. They're just very self disciplined and obviously genetically gifted. They're just not I think it it some of the best coaches I've had would be

the ones that would look like, well, you've never met you would never be able to do this. How would you know? You know what I mean? But I think there's a passion for the sport or there's a passion for technique that they're gaining a lot of information and then they can see generally what would work for you. some of the best coaches, which goes al along the lines of this, like, can you be a leader? I think there are some there are definitely some leaders and coaches out there that are not the best athletes, but they could find a way to motivate you and push the buttons and encourage you to get to go.

Nole (08:08.127)
Right.

Nole (08:21.538)
Mm.

Nole (08:31.947)
Yeah, and I will say this. There is there is a reality, bringing it back into the fire service. There is a reality that when you and I were on the truck together, we were we were the workers. We were the bash brothers, right? We did we did the heavy work of the truck when it was required of us. We did not need our captain to be at our physical level, right? Because that's not his job. We needed him to lead and we needed him to be disciplined and all the things that our captains at fifteens were.

Kevin (08:44.662)
Bash, brother.

Kevin (08:54.454)
No.

Nole (09:01.207)
They were those guys, but they didn't need to be able to do the things physically that we were going to do because that was our job. And so there is a time and a place, I think, for for you to be able to say, I don't need to be

as fit as my fireman, I should strive for that, sure, but I don't have to be at that level if you've got some crazy fireman that's, you know, just doing that all the time. But you do have to still maintain that discipline.

Kevin (09:29.654)
And I get it now because at their level at fifty three years old, they still had discipline. They were still riding the bike, they were still doing lightweights, they were doing they didn't have to do Atlas stones overhead, you know what mean? And that was effective. And I finally get that now. After mm you know, being elderly and now with some injuries, I get it now. You know, I'm like, okay, I can do what what works for me. Elderly.

Nole (09:32.725)
We're also older, yeah. Yeah. Right.

Right.

Nole (09:46.197)
Hm.

Nole (09:50.841)
Did you just call yourself elderly? You are gonna anger some of our listeners by saying that. They are gonna be upset. I can see their faces right now.

Kevin (09:55.716)
Hey, this I'm talking about on this job. This is a young man's job, and I am not young anymore. But there's it it's fun. I think the interpersonal dynamics are interesting. Like I only have two children and they're both women, but coaching them is different. Each they're very individualistic. I could look at my youngest daughter in the wrong way, and she just breaks down in tears. The older one.

you almost have to beat with a bat to like get to you know what I mean? And there's there's different motivations there. But generally speaking, I've noticed with the girls teams, they definitely re they and we had Sean on the show who talked about that when he was coaching water polo. He could just scream bloody murder at the boys and he got zero response out of the girls. And that was super helpful talking to Sean about that because with the girls, like I started out with positive. Hey, we're gonna work hard.

Nole (10:27.235)
Yeah.

Nole (10:40.973)
Yeah.

Kevin (10:50.167)
You can do this. I believe in you. Believe in yourself. Let's go have some fun. And then you go train. You know, like they need, they need that positivity. and I I'm just generalizing. I'm sure there's other girls that don't need that, that need the hard stick, but it's fun to watch the individuals on and seeing and learning what motivates them and how you can coach them better.

Nole (11:11.394)
Yeah. Coaching, teaching, leading. It's all good stuff. And most of that stuff comes later on in life when you're elderly, as Kevin just said. Because you need that knowledge. You need that experience. But it doesn't mean you can let go of the things that got you there and got you to that experience and that knowledge. All right, I gotta shift gears real quick. I did mention him a little bit ago. My buddy Cliff Carey is a pastor. He listens to our show.

Kevin (11:15.245)
Yeah.

Kevin (11:20.287)
Elderly.

Totally.

Nole (11:37.711)
Which is awesome and humbling. He was my youth pastor as a kid, so I've known him forever. really good dude. He hit me up after we did our episode where you talked about the Forest Frank concert that you went to. And he said, Hey, funny, you guys should be talking about Forrest Frank. I just did an episode last week about a Forrest Frank concert and his experience there because he took his kids, probably to the same set of shows you guys went to, I'm sure. But I want to recommend to you guys if you listen to Forrest Frank, if you found that dialogue on that.

Kevin (11:41.025)
Red.

Kevin (11:48.483)
Mm.

Nole (12:07.416)
topic and that kind of world interesting, go listen to this. I'll put a link for it in the show notes. Cliff's podcast is called Back Shed Bible Study. I have to be transparent because that's what we do here. I do not listen to anybody's podcast religiously.

I'm not even gonna go into why, but I don't listen to podcasts on a r on a basis anymore. The only time I will listen to podcasts most of the time is if someone recommends to me an episode, then I'll usually listen to it. For Cliffs, I have listened to quite a few of his episodes. I've enjoyed them a lot. It's a totally different format than what we do here, but he's a really good dude, solid Bible teacher, and just is a great guy. So I would recommend that episode to you. I will put the link in the show notes if you're curious about hearing another perspective, kind of a different angle.

On the Forrest Frank thing. So go check that out. Back shed Bible study with my good friend Cliff Carey. I got another recommendation for you. You good? You ready? There's a book series. It's called the Lion of War series. There's three books. It's The Day of War, Covenant of War, and Song of War. They're by a guy named Cliff Graham, and they are

Kevin (12:54.507)
Yeah, I'd love to hear that.

Kevin (13:00.323)
Let's go.

Here we go. Yeah, let's yeah, hit it.

Nole (13:22.072)
fictional books based around the life of David and his mighty men and the wars and the Philistines and killing lions and Goliath and I read them in like an actual book form and I don't remember how I came across them, but I read them honestly it was probably fifteen years ago and have since given them to my son North to read when he was at an appropriate age.

Kevin (13:26.795)
Mm.

Nole (13:51.917)
Because these books are very violent, they're very brutal, they're very real world. So they talk about the things that were going on at that time, the you know, the Philistines coming in and raiding villages and taking taking the women to basically be slaves and s you know, all the horrible things that would happen during that time. He doesn't shy away from the brutality of the reality of that time in in the in world history, but he also weaves in

the actual historical accounts from the old testament. So really good, really engaging books. I, as you guys know, because you know Kevin and I are both fans of Jack Carr and the Terminalist series, I love I'm just gonna say it. I love violence. I love to read about it. I love to watch it on the big screen. I love it. And these books are definitely that. So I would recommend these. The reason that I'm revisiting them now is they actually just came out

Kevin (14:38.957)
Who doesn't?

Nole (14:50.24)
with audiobook versions of all three of these for the first time. So I've been listening to them and listening to them in the same way that I listened to the Terminal List, where it's just like every free moment I have, the book is playing. So definitely recommend those. I'll put a link to those also in the show notes. They're definitely worth your time if you like violent historical fiction. And then there's a there's a weird

Kevin (15:05.058)
That is awesome.

Kevin (15:11.703)
Yeah, I mean

Yeah, I think the problem with me now is that we we we have we got a lot of people that send us all these stuff and like I'll start an audible book and then somebody else will send me something like this and then I get excited about it and then I start and I'm like halfway through like six books right now.

Nole (15:20.738)
Yes.

Nole (15:24.682)
I know, yeah.

Nole (15:29.11)
Me too. The ones that are not as engaging as these. Yeah. And then finally when I run out of these type of things, then I go back and start trying to finish those ones that have been sent to me. But I have dude, I have some books in my in my Audible library that I've been working on for probably two years. They're a little more academic and yeah, a little deeper, a little less fun.

Kevin (15:44.641)
It happens, dude. The line of war. You had me at the line of warden. That's let's go.

Nole (15:51.457)
It's so good. I love it. I would love to hear anybody else's thoughts on it because I'm I'm a huge fan. My son, North, loved them. And it was fun too because it was kind of like I mean, they're violent and brutal enough that it it was like I'm not Indy is interested 'cause I've been talking about it at home, but he's eleven. He's not ready for that for this. So I he's like, Well, when can I when can I listen to these? 'Cause he's he can see that I'm excited about it. I'm like, I don't know, maybe when you're thirteen.

Kevin (16:10.413)
You know already, yeah.

Kevin (16:18.795)
No.

Nole (16:19.032)
have to revisit and see. So now he's kind of got that thing to look forward to, which I think is better than how, and this is not a dig against my dad, but I can vividly remember when my dad let me watch my first R-rated movie, which was Navy SEALs with Charlie Sheen. And it was like a big like coming of age moment to to watch on the screen some guy get his head evaporated by a sniper's bullet. I just thought that was the craziest thing I'd ever seen.

Kevin (16:23.053)
Yeah, thirty.

Kevin (16:34.55)
yeah.

Nole (16:45.602)
But I think this is probably a better kind of like you're a man now, you can listen to this. Listen to this audiobook where it describes that but you don't see it with your eyes. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Kevin (16:51.265)
Yeah. Right, right. Yeah, I think that's appropriate. There's a debate out there whether reading versus listening to a book is still educational or informative.

Nole (17:06.464)
I had some videos suggested to me on YouTube about that exact topic. Like was listening to an audiobook as good as reading. And I, to be completely transparent with you, refused to watch the video because I was afraid that they would say that listening to an audiobook isn't as good. And that's how my life is. I've got the drive time. I've got you know, like right now I was doing yard work and I'm listening to an audiobook while I do yard work. Sometimes I even work out while I'm doing listening to an audio book if it's good enough. So I don't wanna know if it's worse.

I love it.

Kevin (17:36.439)
I n yeah, n I don't know what the answer to that is, but I think it's still better than than nothing, right? You know I think it's fantastic. You're still getting vocabulary, you're still getting a story, you're still yeah, I think it's fantastic.

Nole (17:42.54)
Well yeah. Yeah. It's bet yeah.

For sure. Yeah. It's better than some of the other things I could be listening to.

All right, dude, I've got one more thing. Save the best for last. We talked about it before we hit record. You made a face. But I wanted to know if you've heard about this sardine fast.

Kevin (18:03.925)
man.

Nole (18:05.666)
And you said that you had heard about it.

Kevin (18:07.661)
Well, there's lots of people that do elimination diets for various GI issues. And so I've long had GI issues from SIBO to H. Pylori and probably still do. So one of the GI people that I went to put me on sardines. Ugh Bruh. I mean just sardines, dude. So it yeah, that's it. So in the beginning I was probably like three or four.

Nole (18:10.198)
Right. Right.

Nole (18:23.502)
Mm-hmm.

Nole (18:26.818)
Like just sardines only.

How how many cans a day were you eating?

Kevin (18:38.347)
And then it's so monotonous and so and like I got so disgusted at it. 'Cause sardines, if you don't know, come in a can with olive oil, if you're lucky, and then they have the bones and everything. And so it's got grit to it. And then before long it was like I was eating two. And then I was trying to like and yes, my stomach i improved and you know what I mean?

Nole (18:41.378)
Yeah.

Nole (18:49.388)
If you're lucky, yeah.

Skin.

Kevin (19:05.815)
But I felt like trash because of I felt like one of those guys on like the Alone shows, you know, where I'm just like, This is all I got, you know what I mean? And I'm rationing it out. I'm making sure a muskrat doesn't steal it or a beaver or something. And yeah, and then note to self, if you're going to do these sardine things, your wife does not want you to throw those empty sardine cans in the regular family kitchen trash can. And she was

Nole (19:09.858)
W yeah, this is like all I have. My canned rations. Yeah.

Nole (19:27.82)
my gosh. God help you.

Kevin (19:31.541)
irritated enough that I was just doing that and smelled like fish all the time, but then also the trash can would also smell like fish. So then you gotta take it outside and it was a whole thing. So where did you where did you hear this sardine and are you getting into it?

Nole (19:35.138)
Yeah.

Nole (19:41.708)
my gosh, dude.

Nole (19:45.975)
I gotta I gotta do a w we we gotta flash forward to the current time 'cause I'm I'm doing a version of this. But but then I'll go back. So two days ago, my buddy Diego Garcia, he's an engineer here or was he recently left but or just left right now. But it was time for my my afternoon can and I'm at the station, so I get my can out of my locker, I get my fork, I walk outside of the station.

Kevin (19:52.171)
Right now.

Nole (20:14.508)
Because you can't eat them inside. It it makes the whole station smell like fish. And the guys the guys generally don't like that, especially not at like three o'clock in the afternoon. So I walk outside to have my can of fish and Diego is standing in the lawn with his shoes off, of course, because that's what you do when you're the grass, eating his can. So we just kind of stood there together eating our sardines and chuckling about it. And then when you're done at the firehouse, because we've learned your exact lesson, you can't throw it in the regular trash. It either you just kind of

Kevin (20:16.291)
No No.

Kevin (20:30.103)
Gotta ground.

What?

Nole (20:43.382)
You walk down to the dumpster and throw it away outside because you can't bring it inside because it'll it'll permeate the entire station. So that's the process. I can't do it at home. My wife hates the smell of it. It does linger on your breath. There's nothing you do about that. But the way I think I came about this is when we did the function blood tests a while back, I was low in omega threes, but was one of the things that was low. So function gives you recommendations of ways to address that.

Kevin (20:49.389)
Yeah.

Kevin (21:06.083)
Mm.

Nole (21:11.49)
with both food and then supplements. So of course you could take a fish oil supplement, but it also said that you could eat sardines or kippers, which is a smoked fish, their herring.

Kevin (21:22.093)
Never had a kipper.

Nole (21:23.766)
It's a well I'll get to that. But so I started eating kippers again because I had grown up eating them as a snack. For some reason my parents would would have those in the house. I loved them. I'd put them on crackers and I thought they were great. So I had eaten them, knew I liked them. So I just started eating those. I'd add a can a day and my levels came up. Fixed my it fixed my omega three levels. They got really good after that, after doing that for a while. So I had already been eating these fish just as part of my diet anyway. Not every day, but you know

Kevin (21:48.141)
Follow.

Nole (21:54.159)
Probably three or four times a week. And then for some reason, I saw I saw I started seeing videos in my YouTube feed of people talking about sardine fasting. And I'm a kippers guy. I'm not a sardines guy. The the nutritional profiles are very close, really close. The sardines are slightly better because you're getting the bones, whereas the kippers have less bones. But anyway.

I finally ended up clicking on one of the videos because it was Dr. Dom Diagostino. Augustino. I don't know how to pronounce his name. And I've I've seen that guy's content, watched enough of it that I feel like, this guy kind of knows what he's talking about. I wonder what he's saying about it. So I watched his video on it, and his thing was interesting because he had stumbled across just being in his lab working when he was working on his doctorate or whatever. He had found that.

Kevin (22:24.909)
Yeah. I know okay, yeah.

Nole (22:47.372)
the nutritional profile of the the sardine, a can of sardines, was such that he could eat those while he was working, not have to pause to cook a meal, didn't even have to reheat it, just would eat this. It was good, had a lot of protein, a lot of good fats. So he did a time in his life where he was just eating those pretty frequently and that was kind of all he ate during the day because he was just in the lab all the time, wild doctor stuff. But it was working really well for him. And then he had a buddy who got cancer and he put him on he he

suggested that he go on this elimination diet using sardines. And of course, we don't know anything. You know, there's too many things that could have happened. But the guy went in basically into remission, ended up surviving, and did really well. And so he started using it kind of using it on himself, using it on his patients, and had just found that people feel really good when they do it. They lose weight and they call it a sardine fast. It's not really fasting, but

Just to distill everything he said down into like broscience, essentially what you're doing is you're putting yourself into a a caloric deficit because he recommends eating three to four cans in a day. You're putting yourself into a caloric deficit, but you're still getting a decent amount of protein and you're getting all the good all the good fats, the omega 3s and stuff. So your brain and everything else is functioning really well. So you feel good. So it's easier to maintain that versus like fasting for 72 hours. So

Kevin (24:12.467)
Yeah, no doubt. And I mean, you're essentially you're going to go into ketosis. And ketosis, from what my just completely uneducated research has said is that obviously starves some of the cancerous cells too. So so you're which feed off of carbohydrates and sugar and blah blah blah. So

Nole (24:16.556)
You're into ketosis, exactly.

Nole (24:31.072)
Right. Which there are other ways, of course there are other ways to get to that, right? Sardines aren't the only way. Th but it's it's a fascinatingly easy way to do an elimination diet to get in ke ketosis, which spurs fat burning. And so anyway, I started I was like, Well, I'm at the station a lot. I'm working a lot of extra days right now. Normally I do beef and eggs and cheese and you know, sometimes I'll do rice, but I I try to eat really simple at the station, so I'm not spending a lot of time doing food prep. I was like, I could easily eat.

Three or four cans of kippers in a day and just eat that. So I did that for a handful of days, got noticeably leaner, you know, less inflammation, all that kind of good stuff. Like you would like you would get if you fasted for, you know, 48, 72 hours, very similar to that, but I felt really good. So then Diego got on board, a couple of the other guys in the station started trying it. Across the board, everybody that I've talked to that is that has done this for three days, two to three days.

Kevin (25:11.171)
Yeah.

Nole (25:27.99)
notices an immediate reduction in inflammation. They get lighter on the scale. They look leaner. And they feel really good. And it's easier to maintain than like I said, just a a normal straight fast. I've had to I've had to add in some eggs. I need more calories when I'm being active. So I we've been doing a ton of yard work here. It's just the season. So I'm working outside for hours in the sun. I'm still working out and three to four cans of kippers a day is just not enough food.

Kevin (25:37.987)
straight water fast, which is brutal, right.

Kevin (25:57.123)
Mm.

Nole (25:57.263)
For the amount of activity that I do. So I've added in hard boiled eggs, I'm drinking heavy cream in my coffee. Like I'm doing other things. I'm basically just doing keto, but I'm using the cans of kippers because the nutritional profile is so good as my as my main meal. which is what yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. Those are the those are the ones he recommends. Yeah.

Kevin (26:13.729)
Fascinating. Now, I was doing let's get specific here. I was doing the wild planet sardines with olive oil. Does he say olive oil or just straight water?

Nole (26:24.408)
I don't remember if he made that distinction. I would I would encourage if you're wanting to try this for for fat loss, health reasons, I would actually say get the stuff with olive oil. Stay away from any of the other seed oils. Sometimes you can find them in other oils, but I would say do that because you're getting extra fat calories out of that, which is gonna make you feel better and help with the ketosis aspect. They taste better. Yeah. I the reason I don't do sardines is because the kippers to me

Kevin (26:46.103)
Yeah, and they were dramatically tastier in olive oil.

Nole (26:54.616)
taste so much better. And like I said, the nutritional profile is really close. And there's nothing extra in there. The literally the only difference is it's a different, it's a different fish. But there's still those those little fish that live in the ocean. They're all very similar in their nutritional content. But because they're smoked, they they taste better to me. So they're literally just caught out of the ocean wild. They're smoked and salted.

Kevin (26:55.723)
Mm.

Kevin (27:20.963)
Is that the same brand you're using? Is it does Wild Planet do Kippers? Hmm.

Nole (27:24.532)
No, they don't. there's a couple different brands that do it. I find them cheapest on Walmart. actually, I should I don't remember the name of the one that I that I've been eating. Interesting side note, this has probably been a three month thing for me messing around with this. There has been a dramatic, noticeable decrease in the availability of

Kevin (27:42.755)
Wow.

Nole (27:51.755)
Of sardines, kippers, all kinds of canned fish products. People are getting on this and doing it. And so they're harder to find. So where you used to be able, I could get on Walmart, I would order them on Walmart because they're cheap. A can of it is two bucks. I get the Crown Prince naturally smoked kipper snacks. They're non-GMO organic, whatever, because they're just caught in the wild in the ocean. But they're hard to find now. A lot of times you'll go to the store, like if you go to Sprouts and you try to buy sardines, good luck. You're not going to find.

And Trader Joe's has a shortage. They're not getting a shipment at a local Trader Joe's for like two months. If you go on Walmart, most of the time the kippers are sold out. So a lot of people are jumping on this. It's it's kind of gone viral. but anyway.

Kevin (28:27.661)
Yeah.

Interesting.

Kevin (28:36.291)
There were places for me that I found that had the best price was like Smart and Vital. Shockingly, they'd have a section of like canned stuff by the I don't know if there's people using these in restaurants or something, but it was like the best price. You know what I mean? You can get a bunch of you know. And if I remember, there was about twenty grams of protein per can. Is that right? Does that sound about right?

Nole (28:50.252)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you can buy them in bulk.

Nole (28:59.246)
Well, I'm looking at it right now, so let me get it perfectly accurate so I don't give bad information. All right, a can of kippers, because I'm I'm only on kippers. I I don't like the sardines. It's about two hundred calories, thirteen grams of fat, you're getting some vitamin D, some calcium, some iron, some potassium. Obviously there's no carbohydrates, and it's eighteen grams of protein per per can. So about about twenty.

Kevin (29:07.203)
All right, all right.

Kevin (29:20.535)
Alright, so about yeah, about twenty. If you're doing four of those, you're getting eighty you're gonna retain some muscle, but you're not getting the probably the growth factor that broscience recommends, like a pound per body weight. But that's not your intention. Your intention is to feel good, decrease inflammation, and probably lose weight, right? So

Nole (29:30.584)
Right.

Right, totally. Totally.

Nole (29:39.34)
Right. Yeah, I mean I'm a big fan of losing body fat and but I also don't want to lose muscle mass, right? Is that's always the trade off. So I kind of feel like this is probably the better way to go about losing body fat while maintaining muscle versus just strictly fasting.

Kevin (29:55.969)
Right. Which like the doctor Peter Tio, which was huge on fasting for long jet long what do you say it? Longevity. Longitivity longevity. But he kind of he kind of revamped that and said like it's more of a two to three day because you will lose muscle when you're fasting. That's just a fact. if you're straight water fasting. So curious to see. I mean, now listen, we are not doctors.

Nole (30:03.266)
Yeah. Long longitude l latitude. Latitude longitude.

Yeah.

Nole (30:18.732)
Right.

Kevin (30:25.687)
Go talk to somebody. It's a but I we've both played with this noel's deep in right now. But you can play with it as long as you feel medically safe to do so. And I feel like yeah, I think you're right. I think that would probably give you enough protein to stay though where you're not decreasing your like not muscle wasting, but you're actually keeping what you got.

Nole (30:26.86)
I don't even play one on T V.

Nole (30:49.558)
Yeah, I think it does. And just as a a little bit more of a not a caveat, but just kind of a recommendation, listen to your body. Like pay attention. when I was first doing it, doing three or four cans a day and trying to be active, I I didn't feel bad, but I felt I felt tired. And I felt at the end of the day I was really hungry and craving food. And, you know, don't put yourself in a situation where

you feel so crappy that you're gonna end up just bonking or making a bad decision and eating a gallon of ice cream in the middle of the night, right? 'Cause that's where that kind of stuff leads. So if you're trying to do this and it's not working, you know, don't worry about it. Like maybe it's not for you or add in other foods to supplement and just kind of use this as part of the tool. And yeah, like Kevin said, we're not doctors. We're actually w I mean, legally we shouldn't even actually recommend you do anything. But but I recommend you try this.

Kevin (31:41.571)
Right, anything.

Kevin (31:46.499)
But just know that there is an adaptation phase. Like everyone says the first day is no big deal. Second day starts getting weird. And then third day you might feel like crap. But there is people, it varies wildly. But I see people that if you've never done anything related to ketosis, you know, your stomach will change, your bowels will change, you'll have some diarrhea. You know what I mean? It it's all over the place, right? But then there's a there's usually a breaking point for me where all of a sudden I start feeling good and then everything starts meshing in. So, you know

Nole (31:49.666)
Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

Nole (32:04.76)
Yep. Yeah.

Kevin (32:14.389)
It's just like anything. You have to break through the adaptation to get any results.

Nole (32:19.02)
Yeah. And the if you're concerned because of the the news surrounding fish products and mercury, if you're tracking any of that, the small fish, the the bait fish essentially, they don't really have mercury in them, or at least not at any kind of level that would matter. So it's in that sense, eating kippers on a regular basis or sardines is relatively safe, at least in that sense. It's not like if you were eating a ton of

tuna every day or or s or salmon or whatever where you're gonna possibly see elevated levels of mercury. So that's not a concern.

Kevin (32:56.579)
It's pretty funny to watch my kids revolt though because I've taken my daughter's deep sea fishing and they usually use squid or sardines and it's in this giant puke bucket and there's blood and eyeballs and this disgusting stuff. And so when I've eaten them at the house, it's almost like they revert right back to that bucket of death. The chum bucket, and they're like, How could you possibly eat that? So I think I've ruined them forever for trying that. They would they refuse to even try a bite.

Nole (33:00.75)
Mm.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Nole (33:13.878)
You're eating out of the chum bucket, dude.

Nole (33:24.748)
Yeah, you definitely have to go into a a mentality if you're trying to do something like this for elimination for health reasons or for losing weight or whatever you're doing. You have to change your mindset from eating for pleasure and enjoyment and satiation. Sati I can't say that word. Being satiated to I'm just eating for fuel, right? It's a different mindset. Because if you're trying to eat f four cans of sardines a day, like you mentioned at the beginning, like that's boring.

It's monotonous, it's terrible, it ain't fun, but if you've got a reason you're doing it and you've just kind of changed your mindset, it's t it is doable. So anyway, that's enough on that. But I had to mention it 'cause it's it's going on. It's out there.

Kevin (34:05.11)
Anything's doable.

Kevin (34:09.323)
Yeah. And I think if somebody does it for three or four days and then they all of a sudden start dreaming of chocolate cake and stuff like that, I'd suggest you just try a little fruit and maybe a little honey and then start back over. You're gonna yes, you will get out of ketosis, but you're still eating something, your your your body, and then you know, you start adapting for those type of things. That's cool. How long do you think you're gonna try this starting situation?

Nole (34:18.795)
Mm, yes.

Right, but that's okay.

Nole (34:35.138)
I don't know. It'll probably become kind of part of my normal rotation where some days I do the the beef and eggs and rice and other days I just do the kippers. I I'm I'm kind of in a phase of life right now where I know that I'm getting into the the elderly years of my life where things are I n I n I heal noticeably slower at this point. I I've noticed that I heal slower

Kevin (34:57.175)
Hm, yes, yes, yes.

Nole (35:00.276)
it is more difficult for me to lose weight. So I know eventually I'm gonna get to an age where it's not only difficult, it's really difficult to lose weight. I know my body, I know I default to fat. I like I have a lot of diabetics in, you know, in my family history and stuff. And so I wanna I basically am kind of in a mode right now where I'm trying to get into the best physical shape that I can now while it's still quote unquote easy so that I can maintain that going into

my fifties and sixties and and hopefully seventies and beyond. So I'm kind of just fired up on this idea that I'm just going to try to get into peak physical condition and see see how physically fit I can be when I turn fifty. That's kind of what my mindset is. So I I don't really have a short term goal. It's definitely not something that I'm doing every single day. I basically am doing it right now most days at work and then when I go home I just eat whatever the family's have.

Kevin (35:38.029)
Let's go.

Kevin (35:44.587)
Let's go. I love it.

Nole (35:57.987)
to kind of be more of a normal person, but

Kevin (36:01.259)
And and fun fact, it's it's w it's cool to watch like an innate dog. I would pour like a sardine and some of the juice on top of his kibble and it was like the greatest thing in the world. There's a guy I seen online multiple times, he has these unbelievable cane corso dogs, and they're like the most be beautiful coats you ever had, and he feeds them like a full on raw diet. They eat they eat once a day and you see it, it's like a duck leg, ground beef, like

Nole (36:12.012)
The best day of his life.

Nole (36:19.432)
Mm, those are cool. Yeah.

Kevin (36:30.667)
Sardines. There's some fruit in there. I mean, it's like the most natural, like wild dog. And they inhale everything. They eat the entire bones. They're eating chicken necks. You know what I mean? They're like and they're just destroying it. So I'm like, man, that's what a wild, somewhat tamed wolf should have, you know? Why wouldn't we do that? That's gotta be better than cinnamon toast crunch and milk, right? It's gotta be better.

Nole (36:34.306)
Yeah, yeah.

Nole (36:38.786)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nole (36:46.348)
That's what you need, yeah. It's got everything you need. Yeah, we should do exactly the same thing.

Yeah. Now your dog will still eat the cinnamon toast crunch if you put it the bowl. He he will. But his coat not gonna be as shiny. He's gonna get the diabetes, he's gonna have arthritis in his dog knees. Do dogs have knees?

Kevin (36:58.456)
Yeah.

No. No.

Kevin (37:08.119)
Bees do.

Nole (37:09.506)
Bees have knees. Dogs dogs have stifles. It's like an elbow.

Kevin (37:10.909)
well that's cool. I might yeah, I might I might you've inspired me. I might get back on the sardine trip. Not I mean I'm just dabble. I mean I have like wait, I I still have some cans up there and there's no reason why I can't throw that in for a lunch.

Nole (37:20.374)
Yeah, just to play with it, yeah.

Nole (37:28.204)
What Diego and I well, actually, I think this was Diego's idea, but after he got got on it and has been using it periodically, not all the time. like most of the time we're honestly doing it for two or three days at a time and then kind of having a normal week and then two or three days at a time. But anyway, strike team bag. Kansas kippers and sardines last for like five, ten years. They're they last a really long time. And if you dude, I just can imagine myself out

Kevin (37:47.252)
good idea.

Nole (37:57.923)
hiking the hills with the packs. If I had some Kansas sardines or kippers in my bag, like that would be amazing.

Kevin (38:05.047)
Yeah, 'cause otherwise they give you a uncrustable and and an MRE. Right. It's trash.

Nole (38:08.214)
And you're not gonna get that for the first twenty four hours. Like you're kind of on your own for the first twenty four. So that could be amazing, especially with the the the fat and the protein.

Kevin (38:14.261)
I I have some like yeah, I had to go out and I had in my bag like fifteen year old like melted protein bars and that was just not the way. Yeah.

Nole (38:22.412)
Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah. I usually keep in mind like those what are those what are those bars that are made out of like they have like four ingredients. It's like dates, almonds, and what are those called? Rx bars? Anyway, I had a box of those and like some beef sticks, which is great. But I don't know, dude, sardines might be better nutritionally. The guys are gonna be annoyed if you're trying to eat that in the rig, but whatever, they'll be alright. All right, that's enough of that.

Kevin (38:34.838)
Yeah, yeah.

Something like that.

Kevin (38:50.531)
So mm one of the things I've noticed, just this is recently, I do feel like fasting helps me in the morning. And I'm not super religious, I'm not trying to get an eighteen hour fast or fourteen hour fast. I just I'm trying to just be intuitive and listen to my body. But I tend to not eat till like eleven thirty or so or noon or whatever. But I have noticed that it it when I when I do eat something with some carbohydrates and some protein in the morning.

Nole (38:59.298)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Nole (39:06.36)
Yeah.

For sure. Yeah.

Kevin (39:18.423)
I feel I have more energy to work out and I feel like I have a little bit more drive and a little bit more and so it depends on my goal. Like, hey, if I wanna get like if I wanna be an athlete and really participate in games and stuff like that, I gotta eat. If I'm just trying to lean out or heal my stomach, then I can easily do that and some sardines. But it's a matter of like what the what I'm trying to optimize the most.

Nole (39:25.814)
For sure.

Nole (39:30.722)
Mm-hmm.

Nole (39:35.981)
Yeah, totally.

Nole (39:42.531)
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. If I'm if I'm in a mode where I'm trying to work on I don't know, I don't really work on heavier lifts, but if I'm trying to work on lunging, like if I'm lunging with some weight or something like that and I know I'm gonna be pushing, I love to have some honey in my coffee before I work out, like some tablespoons of honey or I'll eat rice immediately after. Like a hundred percent there's a benefit if you're trying to work for performance to

Kevin (39:59.587)
There it is.

Nole (40:10.712)
carbohydrates in around that time. There's definitely specific times and reasons for for everything. There's not a one there's not a one answer for any of it, which is why it's complicated and most people ignore it.

Kevin (40:14.647)
Yeah.

Kevin (40:23.285)
It is, but if you're a skinny guy that wants to gain muscle, this is probably not for you, right? This is not for you. You need to eat like meat and rice often, right? And then start increasing meat and rice often and have a gallon of whole milk a day.

Nole (40:26.774)
Right. This is not for you. Don't do it. Yeah.

Nole (40:32.332)
Yeah. You could add in yeah. You could add into your diet you could add into your diet a can of sardines to get those extra fats and a little bit of extra protein. Like it would be good for you, but yeah, don't go strictly on this. It won't get you what you want. Good point.

Kevin (40:49.175)
Have you seen this alone show?

Nole (40:51.948)
My kid my kids watch it, so I've seen parts of it. I've never sat down and watched a full episode. I'm aware of it.

Kevin (40:57.613)
pretty fascinating. We were in our we were the family was watching this latest season. I think it's on Netflix now. It used to be on the History Channel. But they went to the Arctic Circle and these are kind of like the season of champions. They have these dudes and it's like below eleven degrees and immediately they have to start getting shelter and then finding ways. But it's it's amazing to me. The guy who won the thing I think went eighty two days.

Nole (41:04.494)
Mm.

Nole (41:13.581)
Yeah.

Nole (41:18.071)
Right.

Kevin (41:22.761)
And it was heroic what he did and it was incredible. He was probably the toughest dude I've ever seen. But I kept thinking like the dude went eighty-two days, but like and that was an amazing feat. But there are people that have got generations out there that like you know what I mean, like generations of people that have like lived there, the Intuits and Inuits or whatever they call I mean, you know what I mean? But it was but the one that that I freaked everybody out and think I thought it was the biggest, he trapped

Nole (41:36.544)
Yeah.

Yeah, I've lived my entire life in this place. This guy just won a million dollars.

Kevin (41:52.019)
a hare, a rabbit. And he had this really intricate way of taking the jawbone out and eating the brain out. And how delicate that was a delicacy and like the fats inside that and how it was and you can't and making sure you eat the liver, but it's it's wild to watch a a normal human being revert back to a complete and total savage when you're so food restricted that

Nole (41:54.21)
Yeah.

Nole (42:00.072)
yeah.

Right. man, yeah.

Nole (42:14.627)
Yeah.

Right.

Kevin (42:17.891)
Yes, innately like so I always think of that like as on a vegan. Sh no offense to you vegans out there, but it doesn't seem like that's natural. Like when you put these people out in the wild, the first thing they want to eat is protein. They want to catch a fish and eat everything included in that fish. They want to catch a rabbit, a moose. No, no.

Nole (42:31.906)
Yeah, right. For sure.

Yeah, they're not they're not desperate to dig up a turnip. They'll eat it if they find it, but

Kevin (42:43.137)
Yeah. So it just seems like it's more of an to me, it just seems more of a natural way of actually what we're supposed to do.

Nole (42:44.235)
Yeah.

Nole (42:51.31)
Yeah, for sure. For sure. Yeah. Hear us vegans. We're praying for ya.

Kevin (43:01.087)
long-winded, but I want to make sure that you guys know that on sub Sunday, September thirteenth, this is the Sunday after 911, is our sixth annual memorial stairclimb. 911, this is the 25th anniversary of one of the most impactful days of both Noel and I's life. And we started this thing six years ago. It's pretty wild and now we're having it. This one's a special one. It's gonna be at the museum on Sunday 913.

Nole (43:02.414)
Nole (43:18.286)
Mm.

Nole (43:29.678)
A fire museum. LA County Fire Museum, which is really, really cool if you've never been there. It's worth going just to see that place.

Kevin (43:30.829)
The LA County Fire Museum in Belfart. It's an amazing place. It's it's gonna be iconic. But this is a family event. So we do a lot of stuff with the Fire O program. It's just the boys, but this is a family event and it's one of my favorite days of the year. There's a lot of hanging out because you're gonna wait your turn to climb. And so there's a lot of hanging out and people bring chairs and pop ups and f there's always there's food and drinks. It's a completely free event. but we do make it a remembrance. There's some pipes and drums.

you're gonna climb for a specific member of n of the fire department that passed away on 9-11. And I think it's just an important day we say we never forget. And this is Nolan I's way of saying that and doing that. And then there's just there's a vibe that reminds me of immediately post nine eleven, where that was the most I don't know, that was the most American I think I've ever felt

Nole (44:18.574)
Mm.

Nole (44:23.328)
United. Yeah.

Kevin (44:25.847)
where people didn't care what political affiliation what everybody had an American flag outside. Everybody had an American flag on their car. Neighbors were talking to each other. People were outside. You got and and I feel like in a very small way for that day at our event, you have a lot of people just just being together. And I think that's an important thing for us to remember.

Nole (44:28.27)
Mm-hmm.

Nole (44:48.802)
Yeah. Amen. September thirteenth.

Kevin (44:51.101)
maybe we can put a link to that. They are asking you to register. I'll give you the link, no, that you can put in there, but there's a there is a registration link so that we know how much food to bring. And man, I hope to see you guys out there. And this is really cool. We've had podcasts and program guys and their families come from all over the place, from across the country, from down from San Francisco, like Eric, and it's been a really cool thing. So please come out.

Nole (44:58.103)
I will put it in there.

Nole (45:14.296)
Yeah. Yeah.

Kevin (45:24.045)
This has been the Fire You Carry Podcast.

Nole (45:37.378)
Thank guys for listening. We will see you next week.