Changing "Fields"

I grew up not on a farm exactly but smack next to one from the day I was born until the end of high school. My backyard literally came up against what was at the time one of the largest farms in my hometown of Oregon, Wisconsin, A small suburb of ~8,000 people just a few miles south of Madison. So yes, a cheesehead through and through in case you’re wondering. As a kid, that field of corn just off my backyard became the grounds for the ultimate game of hide-and-seek with my friends at the end of each summer when stalks were taller than we were. Sadly, that farm, that corn and those games of hide-and-seek are long gone and stowed away as fond memories. I started college at UW-Milwaukee and every summer over the next four years when I would come home to visit, I noticed the farm quickly being replaced with more and more residential homes. Back in grade-school our house was right on the edge of town facing south, now you could say we are almost near the center of town given how far back these residential areas currently stretch. It was not till well after this farm, that corn and those games of hide-and-seek were long gone that it really appealed to me how much I miss that proximity to American farmland, the smell of dirt, a harvest, the dew off the corn in the morning, fresh cut grass and yes, even the manure at times lets you know exactly where in the USA you are. My high school football team was well known for being over half farm kids every season. We were known as the “hick team” and we were proud of it! Our record most years also showed that those farm boys could play the game pretty damn well too! Those farm kids on the team joked (or so we thought) that the two weeks of six-hour, 2-a day football practices in early fall were really not that bad compared to working the heavy season on the farm. The one summer I did spend working as a part-time farmhand with a fellow player for some extra cash, I learned quickly this was never a joke, it was honest fact!

Those days are well behind me now but I relish in the memory of them as they are where my roots lie, my early exposure to Wisconsin dairy farms, the deep, shared pride we cheeseheads have in being one of the best and biggest producers of milk and cheese in the USA. Which is funny, as I joke about the fact that I “chose” to leave Wisconsin in spring 2010 to take a position at Mizzou as a strength and conditioning coordinator with campus rec. But as one who openly admits to not really caring much for beer and as one who just a few years ago found I no longer handle dairy, it could be said the state would have probable reason to plain out banish me.

For those that do know me…it may have come as a surprise over the last seven months that here I am now working for one of the worlds largest agricultural and biotech companies in the world given my background in a completely separate industry. I’m a little surprised yet myself. Had a peer, friend, or professor in college told me that I could take a degree in Kinesiology or Exercise Science and work in agriculture I would have smiled, shrugged and said: “yeah, sure I can.” Had you even told me this just a year ago I would have responded much the same way. I have worked with one major league baseball team, two college division 1 sports programs, I ran my own personal training business, and I just transitioned out of a five-year civilian role as a Navy ship fitness director in San Diego. So for eight years now, I have worked in the frontline trenches of being a field practitioner of strength and conditioning, personal training and tactical military performance. I loved what I did and to this very day still love what I could do for those groups through proper training, nutrition, supplementation, and recovery tactics to name but a few. But the issue that I came across time and time again in every population, every demographic and in each setting I worked was the misinformation, misunderstanding, and confusion people have on what really works and what’s just garbage/hype when talking health, nutrition, and fitness. Myth dispelling and dogma crushing through education, explanation and hands-on demonstration became half my job. Sure I still impacted many and changed lives for the better. I was doing this at the community level, campus level and at the command level (for those two ships I oversaw). But this was never quite enough for me. I always wanted more, to reach further, to impact deeper. The state level, national level, and even the global level through the same means of education, interaction, and demonstration. In the last year or so this desire and ambition to reach as many people as I possibly can to help the masses lead healthier lives has never been greater.

It’s really quite ironic I landed this position but I am beyond fortunate to have done so in that over a full years time I applied to about fifty some tactical strength coach positions across the country and the world hoping to move up within that domain. Reluctantly due to very high application numbers and quality competition, technicalities, selection preferences, and overseas time commitment minimums, I never made it too far beyond second phone interviews. Frustrating to say the least! Then, late last summer I applied to two positions a bit outside my intended wheelhouse of tactical performance training. One was a lead performance coach for a private sports medicine clinic in northern Wisconsin and then of course this position as the food and fitness engagement director for Monsanto. Even more ironic is that these two positions both being outside my primary and intended career path all lead me to final stage interviews and eventually offers….all in the same week! No pressure right!? With two positions on the table of which all had promising new career outcomes and highly desirable personal lifestyle perks, I had to ask myself some really deep questions. In fact, I don’t think I had ever had to reflect that deeply on just who I was, wanted to be, my values, beliefs, and ambitions professionally and personally. After much deliberation and consultation with close friends, family, and peers, it's obvious what choice I made. Given that burning and growing desire to impact people’s health and fitness on mass scales, it became clear that this new position with Monsanto could offer me exactly that platform to do so, the resources to do so, and of course the right people to do so with.

So yes, I stepped a bit outside of an eight-year track as a personal trainer, college, MLB and military strength coach to go work in agriculture. I no longer blow whistles, design programs, yell motivational comments at groups of athletes, run stopwatches or teach proper exercise technique on a day to day basis. This was the hardest and biggest pill to swallow by taking this new role. But the tradeoff was that now I had the opportunity to impact and ignite the key people within each of those realms of college athletics, military performance, personal training, sports nutrition and many others. I can now reach people across state lines from coast to coast, athletes, men, and women, young and old. If you eat food, enjoy food and want to eat food for the rest of your life to be healthy and fit, I was going to be able to help that person.

My role here at Monsanto is not corporate fitness. I don’t train the people of the company. Most would at face value assume that’s exactly what I am doing here. My real role here is still pretty fascinating as I see it. I get to go out and engage with and establish outreach to any and all key figures within my peer network that I feel have a stake in the integrity of the fitness profession/industry. This includes strength and conditioning, bodybuilding, powerlifting, CrossFit, runners, tri-athletes, researchers, and several others. The engagement and outreach goal is to collectively educate and impact the millions of people who look to find effective, safe, accurate and evidence-based information and guidance on fitness, performance, nutrition, and wellness.

Ok so now for the elephant in the room… Genetic Engineering (GE) and Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO’s). Yes, this is and will be a crux of the outreach and engagement I will be spearheading within the fitness community at large. My support of GE technology, the production, distribution and consumption of GE foods has been strongly supportive even before I took let alone applied for this position. As someone who has always used an evidence-based-practice (EBP) within my past roles for training programs/tactics, exercise selection, recovery methods, training gear, analytics etc….I have relied on science and research to guide my professional experiences and coaching methods. That same EBP is what lead me to my current stance of accepting GE foods. My purpose here is not just to push and espouse how effective and safe GMO’S are. Far from it. I have made my job here a mission to recruit, partner and collaborate with key figures inside and outside the fitness realms to better educate the public about where the issue of genetically modified (GM) foods fall within the big picture of fitness, performance, and health. I have found and still find all too often that people get hung up on one small “pebble” matters of training and nutrition that stalls their progress and steals their focus from bigger “boulder” matters. Anyone working in fitness right now knows how our field is truly blowing up bigger and faster than ever before both scientifically and in mainstream popularity across not just the USA but the world. More information is available from more places than ever and yet people are even more confused and misguided than ever before as well. Sadly this stems from the fact that just as many charlatans and “quacks” exists within our field as do legitimate experts and credible sources.

In my opinion (as a member of it) few other domains of today’s culture bind together as tightly as the fitness “tribe” in which sub-tribes of athletes, celebrities, coaches, and professionals bond together for identity and cohesion with a set of shared beliefs and purposes. Between such tribes, I have found that the methods of which they eat and how they train are often as polarized as religion and political affiliation. To attack or argue on one's food or training beliefs is to attack the persons very being in some cases. Now I can understand people’s ties to their food and food beliefs. We all eat every day and will continue to do so for the remainder of our lives. That being the case for every single human being on this planet, I want to be darn sure I am doing my part to assure that people have the FACTS on what matters most in their health and fitness goals. It frustrates me to see so many people get hung up on issues of everything always organic, GMO food safety fears, dietary supplement overuse, avoiding every single processed food, fasting cures all, macro counting magic, primal Paleo diets, and the craze of ketogenic diets? Too many people talk to one trustworthy friend, read one study, one book, or watch a documentary and fall victim to complete states of anoesis, void of any skepticism or critical thought. How about we look beyond the minutia and consider what the current consensus science continues to show what actually works as well as what does not. Things like drinking alcohol in moderation, eating whole grains, controlling calories and portions, not smoking, being active 30-60 minutes a day, drinking more water, controlling stress, keeping strong social relationships, and yes, eating whole fresh fruits and veggies from ANY farming method.

My call to action is this; As perhaps one of the few applied exercise science practitioners with a formal background in exercise and sport sciences to change “fields” I charge my fellow fitness tribe members in all respective domains to join me. But only if you alone truly share my beliefs, concerns and hopes for better EBP and information to reach the public as it relates to food production and nutrition. Not just for the sake of GE food acceptance and understanding (as all modern consensus research shows to be true) but to also rid our tribe of the woo-woo science, the fakes, the charlatans and witch doctors clouding our field and stalling the progression of millions of peoples health and wellness. I call on you academics, strength coaches, group x instructors, trainers, athletes, nutritionists, writers, bloggers, podcast hosts and of course fitness-minded farmers who have a genuine shared interest of your own on this matter of science speaking the truth, guiding action and helping our people and our planet thrive in the process of better health.

I am asking alot of you as a topic as hot as this right now is not an easy one to be public and vocal about. But to quote one of my favorite orators, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “The day we stop living is the day we become silent about things that truly matter.” I ask you to put some skin in the game and join in what I don’t feel needs to be called “a fight” exactly but frankly that’s what it is right now, a fight on more levels than it seems to be at face value.

I do not plan to nor want such supporters to go in “throwing rocks” at those in opposition to using good science or logical reasoning. I do not have major issues with those who choose not to eat GM foods or who farm organically either. This is your choice and I deeply respect that. I have some small caveats with this sure but I’ll save that for a later talk. Where I do have issue is when those in opposition cannot and refuse to “play nice” and do nothing but “throw rocks” at me and my beliefs when the science and evidence clearly support my stance. This also tends to lead to a waterfall of logical fallacy, dogma, fear and unwarranted guilt for many seeking honest answers. I hate to call this a fight personally because on the issue of organic or not, GMO or not……we all want the same darn thing! Healthy food safely produced for the entire world today and 100 years from now without draining the planet of precious farmland and natural resources period! That we can agree on and because of that I respect and want to hear from both sides of the debate. How we get there is where the discrepancy lies and that is something we need to work on sooner than later as our food system, our health, and our planet will depend on it.