Sevan Matossian (00:00):
In the, uh, private chat, man. We’re live. Andy. Hi.
Andy Holmes (00:05):
Hi. How you doing
Sevan Matossian (00:06):
Dude? Stok.
Andrew Hiller (00:07):
Andy, how are you to meet you? Good name. Good name.
Andy Holmes (00:09):
<laugh>. Thank you. I owe that to my parents.
Sevan Matossian (00:13):
Why? Why, why? You say, why do you say that? Oh, Andy, Andrew. God,
Andrew Hiller (00:17):
I’ve always wanted to go by Andy, but something about it, and it didn’t like stick with me for some reason. Everyone just kept calling me Andrew or Hiller? <laugh>. Hiller. I do like Andy, like the toy story thing where they got on the bottom of the shoe.
Andy Holmes (00:29):
That’s people. Yeah, that’s how people remember me. I’m like, think of Toy Story
Andrew Hiller (00:35):
Easy. <laugh>.
Sevan Matossian (00:37):
And, uh, and that’s Andrew
Andy Holmes (00:40):
And Andrew
Andrew Hiller (00:41):
And,
Sevan Matossian (00:42):
Uh, Andy. Uh, that is, uh, C Beaver, Caleb Beaver, uh, in the gray sweatshirt in a undisclosed, uh, location, part of an equity experiment run by the US government.
Andy Holmes (00:54):
Nice.
Sevan Matossian (00:54):
Called the US military. And, uh, Andrew Hiller, uh, shirtless. Um, that’s always nice to see in the morning.
Andrew Hiller (01:02):
Uh, just worked out
Sevan Matossian (01:03):
Great. Great to have you guys on. I’m super excited. Uh, there’s a lot to dig into. And I’m gonna, I’m just gonna jump the gun here to get the, the audience, uh, right on the click bait and super interested. Yes.
Andrew Hiller (01:15):
Well, what was it? What’d you make it?
Sevan Matossian (01:16):
What I make what? Oh, I, I’m not the title with the question I’m gonna ask and then we’ll start backfilling. I’m gonna say a couple things really quick. We’re gonna get into the details, but Andy comes, uh, from a company, uh, that has more experience in this field than any other company that is on the planet today. By at least, uh, 10 years. The company goes back its origins, go back over 150 years in the medical space. They’re located, the parent companies located in 23 countries, 27 countries with, uh, 2300, hold on, 2300 employees. Andy, when our beloved athlete friends pop and they respond with, I didn’t do it, it must be tainted supplements. What, how should we react? Uh, I, I know compassionately we should always treat people the way our moms and dads taught us. We should treat people the way we want to be treated. And I try to do that my very best, even to the worst people on the planet. Um, but, but how, what would be the mathematical radical assessment that we should use when, when they say, when we find out our dear beloved, uh, athletes and friends have, uh, popped and they blame, um, their, their plastic jar of
Andy Holmes (02:35):
Stuff? No, that’s a great question. That’s, um, no, honestly, I think what we should do is, obviously
Sevan Matossian (02:42):
I knew it, I knew it. The smart people never just wanted to fucking hang it out on
Andy Holmes (02:46):
The Yeah, I’ll, yeah. I think, uh, give them, give ’em the benefit of the doubt. Uh, innocent, I’ll prove him guilty. But, uh, maybe, uh, you know, <laugh>
Andrew Hiller (02:56):
Maybe what, maybe, maybe what,
Andy Holmes (02:58):
No, maybe that they, maybe they did find it in a, in a supplement. And the reason why is cuz uh, you know, I hate to say this, but they’re, they’re taking the wrong supplements and they’re being stupid. Um,
Andrew Hiller (03:08):
What if it was an NSF certified supplement,
Andy Holmes (03:11):
Then I would say it was probably very unlikely. Uh,
Andrew Hiller (03:15):
What if it, what if it’s proven otherwise?
Andy Holmes (03:18):
If it’s proven otherwise
Andrew Hiller (03:19):
Then, and it was an NSF certified supplement,
Andy Holmes (03:22):
Then I say think NSF has got some problems with their testing. Um, but, um, that would be between that athlete and nsf.
Sevan Matossian (03:30):
What is, what is nsf, you guys, what is nsf?
Andrew Hiller (03:33):
Andy, tell me if I’m wrong, but it’s the company that CrossFit recommends you use the products from because they’re certified to be clear.
Andy Holmes (03:40):
Yeah. Well, I I don’t know if they certified to be clear. I know they, uh, they’re one of our competitors.
Andrew Hiller (03:46):
<laugh>. Okay.
Andy Holmes (03:46):
Okay. Um, but they, uh, and they, they have a, a very large, uh, footprint in the major league baseball. Major League baseball uses nsf, uh, exclusively. And so with that being said, um, you know, as far as what they do as far as their testing and how robust their program is, I would recommend you guys bring someone on there. I’d like to be, uh, on, you know, a fly on the wall when you talk to them about that. But, uh, what I can tell you is back to the, you know, your question Sivan is, is that one in 10 non third party tested products has a band substance in it? One of the things that Lgc does. Yeah. Go to Walmart, look at all those, you know, or Target or GNC or wherever.
Andrew Hiller (04:29):
Uh, e Fortress,
Andy Holmes (04:30):
You know, and I can’t, yeah.
Andrew Hiller (04:32):
<laugh> container at Walmart. Oh,
Andy Holmes (04:35):
Yeah, yeah. I got a funny story about Walmart supplements. But, um, no, a uh, what’s interesting is we go throughout the, the world every, you know, four to five years or every six years, and we’ll do a, we’ll pull supplements off the shelves. And what we usually find, you know, the last one I think was 2017, we did it in Australia. And one in 10 supplements usually has a band substance. And so once it goes through our program, uh, you know, in the robustness of our program that, you know, eliminates to like one in 10,000. Um, and the reason why is it’s prevalent. You know, band substances are, do show up in supplements. Now, does that mean that a athlete didn’t cheat? Like I in an athlete? And I know athletes cheat, but the thing is, is, um, what I can tell you is, you know, back to the stupid, uh, remark, and it’s not, you know, for me being, you know, a smart alec, it’s, it’s honestly, if you’re being drug tested, you shouldn’t be taking any product that hasn’t been third party tested. If it’s not third party tested, throw it out.
Sevan Matossian (05:39):
And what is third party testing mean? Tell me what
Andy Holmes (05:41):
That means. No, no, thank you. Yeah. Um, third party tested means it’s been tested for banned substances. There’s only a few labs in the world that can kind of do that kind of testing. And what we’re talking about banned substances guys, is when it comes to things that are on the water list and what WAA is the world world Anti-Doping agency, they decide what’s banned, what’s not. You’re talking about things like anabolic steroids, SARMs, uh, you know, methamphetamine compounds, diuretics, uh, masking agents, uh, you know, just about anything you can shake a stick act that’ll make you win a competition. And so
Andrew Hiller (06:16):
It’s that green PDF that I’ll always post. It’s got everything on there. If you pull, you go to wa.com, there’s a PDF with everything that you’re to take on there. I post it as often as I can so everyone can see that thing. It looks like this. Yeah.
Andy Holmes (06:30):
Yep. There you go. There you go. And it’s, so, it’s a big
Sevan Matossian (06:34):
Deal. Just to go back for a second, Andy, third party testing is I have a company and regardless of whatever I’m making, I choose someone outside of my organization who’s supposed to be non-biased. And I said, Hey, can you look at this and tell me what’s in it?
Andy Holmes (06:48):
Yes, sir. And the other thing too is like, to keep in mind is you’ll have kind of, you know how the supplement industry is, a lot of ’em will put on the label, third party test it. Well, what the heck does that mean? You know, you know, it’s like, oh, you had my brother who works at a lab test to see if there’s any iron in there or any lead. Like that doesn’t mean anything. There’s only a few labs that actually, I mean, it’s great you don’t have lead in your product, but like, you know, you wanna know that it’s, um, tested and it’s been by a third party, uh, you know, anti-doping lab and you know, us nsf, those we’re all, uh, ISO accredited. And what that means is it’s not just us saying that we can test down to these levels to detect, detect these compounds.
(07:33):
Um, it’s a third party coming in to audit us to say, Hey, can they really do this? Are they just feeding you a line here too? And so, and the reason why it’s becoming more and more prevalent, I mean, you know, everybody on this, you know, our group here probably works out. And we, we know what we take. We know why we take it. People are more educated than they’ve ever been, but they also demand higher quality than they ever have. And the other thing too is, you know, we’re in a very, uh, legalistic society where, you know, if I’m taking a product and, uh, you know, I fail a drug test and it costs me money, I’m not gonna admit to taking anything. I’m gonna go get a lawyer and, uh, you know, the money’s involved. You know? Right. So that’s, that’s the thing that’s driving a lot of this too, I believe.
Andrew Hiller (08:20):
So all that said, I have a quick question. You, you said, uh, one out of 10 products have been seen that there’s something in there on average, something you’ll read every everywhere. Is that, and I think I’ve even said it in the past, it’s like, if you find a sub a substance in there, let’s just say it’s a red one 40 or a whatever, Austria in a pre-work, everyone’s like, why would they taint you with something more expensive than every other product in there? Is that kind of insane to think? Or is that because it’s been made on the same conveyor belt? Do you have any insight on that?
Andy Holmes (08:49):
No, you, that’s a, like, honestly, these are good questions. Like the thing is, it’s, they’re not, not most of the time, I’d say over 90% of the time, probably over 99% of the time, it’s inadvertent contamination. And it’s not people like, Hey, I know let’s throw a bunch of Decca in there and make this supplement awesome. You know, cause it, cause you know, you know, that’s, that’s a realistic thing. But they wouldn’t be in business very long. But what we’re looking at most of the time is gonna be inadvertent contamination. And you have to keep in mind, we’re testing down to parts per billion what you’re testing, like heavy metals, pesticides, stuff like that. That’s GMP testing where it’s about parts per million. We’re
Sevan Matossian (09:31):
What’s GMP stand for?
Andy Holmes (09:33):
Uh, good manufacturing practices. Okay. And, um, that, you know, everyone says, you know, those are some of the things that the government has actually said to regulate the supplement industry. Things have to be tested in to that degree. We’re going above and beyond that, and we’re testing about 50,000 times more sensitive than GMP testing. And that’s usually what athletes and brands are like, why would you do that?
Andrew Hiller (09:54):
What’s, what’s that called? So it’s GMP versus
Andy Holmes (09:58):
Well ba uh, you know, uh, band substance testing.
Sevan Matossian (10:02):
Okay. Is there, there’s no fancy acronym for testing down to like the billionth of a micron or whatever you guys do.
Andy Holmes (10:07):
No, we could make one up, but not really. You
Andrew Hiller (10:09):
Should. You should.
Sevan Matossian (10:10):
So GMP is making sure that there’s no rodents in the facility kind of shit. Yeah,
Andy Holmes (10:15):
Yeah. Like making
Sevan Matossian (10:16):
Sure there’s not rat poop in it.
Andy Holmes (10:17):
Yeah, there’s, yeah. Not rodents making your stuff and you know, you know,
Andrew Hiller (10:23):
QT test the test you trust test
Andy Holmes (10:26):
<laugh>. So, you know, that’s the thing is like, you know, can it kind of give you your, your audience the kind of idea, like what, how low this is, is if you took a teaspoon of methamphetamine and you threw it in an Olympic size swimming pool, our lab would be able to find all of it. Wow. Hell yeah. Yeah. That’s the sensitivity of what we do. And
Sevan Matossian (10:47):
Now, so, so if, if someone snorted a line of coke and jumped into my home pool and then you tested the water and some came out, theoretically you could, you could find it.
Andy Holmes (10:56):
We could probably find it, but like I’d have to get it, the pool guy to come help. So <laugh>
Sevan Matossian (11:03):
That, that’s, uh, that’s fast. That’s fascinating to me. So can, can you give us an idea of how that process works? How,
Andy Holmes (11:11):
Yeah. I mean,
Andrew Hiller (11:12):
Great example. Wow. Yeah. That’ll give some perspective.
Andy Holmes (11:15):
Yeah. And that’s the
Sevan Matossian (11:17):
Thing. Don’t, don’t swim. I mean, you know what they’re saying now. They’re saying if you kiss or have sex intercourse with, and there’s like, I heard one other thing with people who’ve taken the mRNA, uh, gene therapy that it, it could transfer to you.
Andrew Hiller (11:29):
It was a butta moron was transferred via some sort of sexual relation. And that was a big case maybe four or five years ago in the CrossFit space. And that’s totally likely is what you’re saying,
Sevan Matossian (11:41):
Uh, is
Andrew Hiller (11:42):
That not totally likely, but there’s, there’s a chance in l
Andy Holmes (11:45):
There’s always a chance, you know, we test, we test low enough, we’ll find something. And
Sevan Matossian (11:49):
Like, you mean like through semen Hiller or through just spit?
Andrew Hiller (11:51):
It could have been through kissing, it could have been through some sort of other interaction between the two. But it was in, in, in, it was leading towards that way. The word escaping me, but it was a, but Amar, it’s, uh, the growth hormone secreted go, well, what’s the take under the tongue at some sublingual? So it would make sense if it were a
Andy Holmes (12:12):
Kiss, you know, Andrew, you, you’d make a, that’s a, that’s an interesting story because here’s the thing is like when you talk about protein compounds, like, you know, HGH and secretagogues and this kind of stuff, let’s say that we, you know, had a, a protein powder and we overtly, you know, through something like that in there, well it gets destroyed in the gut. So it’s not gonna be absorbed. That stuff has to be intravenously or subcutaneously absorbed. And so, you know, those are things to kind of like, this is really like, the science of anti-doping is very interesting cuz you’re like, all right, what’s the compound? All right, well what are they, how much is in ’em? And, you know, or how much did we find in our product? And oh, are they saying that came from the product? Well, that’s kind of impossible because that stuff gets destroyed in the gut and it’s not absorbed.
(13:00):
So like, you know, someone’s saying, Hey, this is growth hormone, you need to take, you know, five pills of it. You’re not gonna absorb any of that. So I mean, it’s, it’s not gonna do you any, any good, probably waste your money. But it’s like that’s the, there’s, there’s different, a lot of what goes into this is, and what’s on our list depends upon what is most prevalent in the supplement industry. There’s a lot of repeat offenders. I mean, we see a lot of things like D H E A, I’m sure, I don’t know if any of you guys take D H e, you can buy it at Walgreens, but that’s on the water list. They consider that a steroid
Andrew Hiller (13:34):
That happened this year with a team, I believe it was move fast, live heavy. And it was a female who was taking D H E A. Yeah. Just a positive for
Andy Holmes (13:43):
It. Yeah. And um, and everyone’s like, you gotta be kidding me. I bought this at, you know, you know Walgreens, like I said. Well, the thing is, is um, you know, it does a lot of different things as far as, you know, helping with insulin, helping with testosterone, or not testosterone, but hormone regulation, things to that nature. And you make less and less of it every, you know, as you grow older. And so a lot of people supplement it, but Waa, who is the granddaddy, they decide what goes on as far the list. They said, no, that’s too much of an advantage and you can’t have that. Well, what we find is, you know, is D H E A is a problem because it’s really a light and sticky substance so it can get into the machine. Um, you know, if they say, Hey, we got rid of all the D H E A in this place, you know, we come back three months later, we swab down the place, we still find D H E A cuz it’s sticky and it’s light and it’s airborne.
(14:36):
It’s like, it’s a pain in the butt. So that’s always a problem. And so, you know, there’s people who will pot for that. Um, you know, a lot of methamphetamine type compounds are always a, an issue. Um, and you know, it’s because they’re being, there’s two places you’re gonna find banned. Substances end up in a product. Number one, it’s gonna be in the raw materials that are being shipped in from different countries. And the other one’s gonna be in the manufacturing process. Um, you know, because they have poor, so standard operating procedures, um, you know, that’s not cleanly. They, they’re using the wrong detergent to clean the machines. They don’t, uh, segregate where these, you know, if they have banned substances and they’re raw materials, they’re not segregating ’em, they’re not in a separate facility, so they don’t get close to your product. Um, you know, there’s all these things and that’s something, you know, we talked a little bit about our history. That’s one of the cool things I like about us is like, we look at it from a very, uh, tactical or very, you know, holistic point of view. It’s like, how do we mitigate as much risk to the end consumer and also to the brand, you know, of having something like that show up and, and all this goes into it.
Sevan Matossian (15:44):
So the, so there’s the raw materials, the machine, the person.
Andy Holmes (15:51):
Yep.
Sevan Matossian (15:54):
And, and then, and then I guess maybe the container. Those are the four.
Andy Holmes (15:58):
Yeah. All those things. And those last three are all in the manufacturing facility. Like if they’re, you know, if they’re not, you know, a lot of times this sounds bad and I don’t wanna throw any manufacturers we work with. There’s a lot of great manufacturers and there’s a lot of great brands out there. But like, you know, you go to some manufacturers and they’re like, I’m like, Hey, you know, we asked do you have banded substances in the facility? And they say no. And then they send us a raw material manifest of everything they have and there’s like five on there. Wow. They have no idea. And, you know, and so, you know, that doesn’t mean everybody’s like that, but like, you know, there’s, there’s a, there’s a potential problem right there, you know, that we try to mitigate as much risk on the front end, which is where it’s being manufactured. So on the back end where you we’re actually doing the finished product testing, we have very little chance of, of something going awry.
Sevan Matossian (16:50):
Speaking of ban substances, good morning, hunter
Andy Holmes (16:54):
<laugh>,
Sevan Matossian (16:54):
Uh, high Rock’s, uh, champion. Nice to, nice to see you here, brother. Um, can, can, so can you give us a, if, if, if when you did these tests, um, in Australia, you guys basically would walk into a store, I don’t even know if they have GNCs anymore, but when I was a kid, they had the store called gnc. You would walk into those stores around the country, you’d buy like just a container of shit like anyone else would. You’d swipe the Lgc corporate card, you’d take it back and then you’d take a scoop out and then you’d test that.
Andy Holmes (17:27):
Yes. Yeah, we need about 30 grams to test.
Sevan Matossian (17:30):
And, and what is that, what does that look like? Can you kind of walk me through the dummy version of what that test looks
Andy Holmes (17:35):
Like? Yeah. And it’s gonna be real dumb down because, um, they don’t let me test the stuff, thank goodness. So, um, um, basically what they do is they, we have a list. Um, we’re testing or surveying for over 285 compounds and they’re gonna take it, prepare a sample. Um, we’re gonna use things like a gas spectrometer, a mass spectrometer, and something called high resolution, accurate mass. Uh, and these are all fancy words for machines <inaudible>. Yep. Gas spectrometer. Yep. So,
Sevan Matossian (18:11):
Like, sounds expensive.
Andy Holmes (18:12):
It’s, they are, I wish, um, it’s only a couple hundred grand, right? Yeah. I’m not sure how much they cost. They don’t let me near ’em cuz I think they’re afraid I break ’em. So, um, <laugh>. But, but no, they’ll, um, prepare a sample. They’ll run that through, through all the machines. Um, and they’re gonna, they’re gonna basically, uh, look for the presence of those, uh, band substances in that sample. And if, uh, you know, for example, if they can’t pull, um, data, they’ll run it again. Um, if they can’t, you know, pull data because say it’s a weird matrix, say it came in a gel or it, um, you know, came from, um, it’s got a lot of different components in it or something to that nature, they’ll run it again. And, you know, until we’re satisfied that there’s nothing in there, nothing gets released. And so they’re very conservative about it.
Sevan Matossian (19:04):
Let me, um, take a stab at this. Um, Kayla, what was that machine that they were using that spins and they were using it to search? Uh, look for Covid, um, that spin machine, the guy won the Nobel Prize for inventing it. Uh, he told Dr. Fauci, Hey, absolutely do not use this machine to try to find viruses in people. Because basically you could spin something down to such a small molecule that you could find anything in anything. Like this guy, I don’t know if you remember the guy who won the Nobel Prize. He was, he, he then died, which is kind of another fascinating rabbit hole. But basically they said we could find, uh, uh, broken viruses, particles of the AIDS virus and every human being on the planet if we spun their shit down enough. And, and then, and then you’ve also, uh, heard that our water’s contaminated. You can take a sample of water anywhere in the United States and you can find pharmaceutical drugs in it, you know, um, because from people flushing that shit down the toilet. Is it like that what you guys do too? Is is there, you guys just find just the craziest shit and is there some threshold where you’re like, okay, um,
Andy Holmes (20:07):
No, this is the best podcast. Like you guys ask good questions.
Sevan Matossian (20:10):
Thank you. Thank
Andy Holmes (20:11):
You.
Sevan Matossian (20:12):
No, like, I wish I heard that every show only 99% of the shows
Andy Holmes (20:15):
No, no. They, uh, of them test low enough. We’ll find something like we can test the ice cream you give your kids and we’ll find something. Um, heard
Sevan Matossian (20:26):
You tell the story that you, one place you went into, you guys swabbed a pallet and there was cocaine on it. Yeah.
Andy Holmes (20:32):
We went
Sevan Matossian (20:32):
Into a fucking pallet. For those of you who don’t know what that is, that’s the wooden things that are stacked up everywhere, all over the world.
Andy Holmes (20:37):
Yeah. Part of what we do when we go into a manufacturing facility is certified is we’ll take 20 swabs at contact points throughout the manufacturing facility looking for stuff. Well pallets, those wooden things that are, you know, you’ll see barrels or whatever boxes stacked on ’em and forklifts moving ’em around. Well, those don’t belong to that facility. They’re just on a truck that show up. Well, who knows what was on it before? Well we, you know, we swabbed it and they found cocaine on it and like, I mean, you know, who knows where that came from? But like, one of the things that you’ll find in our certified facilities is no wooden pallets. Everything’s plastic. So like, again, mitigating risk as much as possible
Sevan Matossian (21:19):
Because you, because you can clean plastic and you can’t clean a wooden pallets.
Andy Holmes (21:23):
Yeah. It’s not gonna be as absorbable as wood, you know, to, to carry a lot of that stuff. And you can, you can clean palace, you’re
Andrew Hiller (21:32):
All I hear is I’ve probably done cocaine before and I didn’t even know it.
Andy Holmes (21:35):
You Yeah,
Andrew Hiller (21:36):
<laugh> it’s, it’s, it’s everywhere.
Sevan Matossian (21:40):
I don’t, I don’t
Andrew Hiller (21:41):
Pallets.
Sevan Matossian (21:41):
I don’t remember what year it was, but I remember being a kid and someone did this test on hundred dollar bills and it was, it was a preposterous amount of hundred dollar bills that had cocaine on them. Yeah. It, it was absolutely nuts. What’s your background? What sports? Did you come from a sport background? What did you play?
Andy Holmes (21:59):
Yeah, in college I did football and track and field and Olympic lifting. And then, um, later in life, um, I got to, uh, try out and made the US men’s bobsled team and then later Fisher <laugh>, no, I, I think he was after me. And then, uh, afterwards, um, I was able to, uh, do judo under, uh, ed Liddy and, uh, Brian Reer in Colorado Springs.
Sevan Matossian (22:28):
Did you go to the Olympics for judo also?
Andy Holmes (22:30):
No, no. I got to train with a bunch of Olympians, which was a lot of fun too. So,
Sevan Matossian (22:36):
Um, I’m trying to remember. I cannot believe, I can’t remember this guy’s name, but I made a movie called Pooling John about professional arm wrestling and, and one of the main characters in it from Russia, he went to the Olympics. A big Russian guy really? He went to the, he went to the Olympics with Judo and then he went to the Olympics on the, uh, Russian bobsled team. What
Andy Holmes (22:55):
The fuck? No, wait, those guys are dangerous. Those like the, those Eastern European Russian guys, yeah, those guys are dangerous.
Sevan Matossian (23:03):
I saw him do stuff in a rust gym in, uh, in Sochi that, uh, I would tell people or show people the footage and uh, even believe it pulling John, see, lemme see if I can find this his name.
Andy Holmes (23:19):
Yeah, they’re brutal. They’re brutal when they fight.
Sevan Matossian (23:22):
Did you, this is a totally off subject, did you see the Kayla Harrison fight speaking of judo? Yeah,
Andy Holmes (23:27):
No, I, I’ve met Kayla Harrison a few times. My old coaches knew her really well, but how’d she do?
Sevan Matossian (23:34):
She lost, really? Yeah, it was, it was, it was, it was actually heartbreaking. But the girl who beat her was really good. I mean, it went the distance it went to the decision. The guy’s names, uh, Alexi Vavoda, is that name ring a bell?
Andy Holmes (23:47):
Not to me,
Andrew Hiller (23:48):
No. Are you talking about Devon Ette? Like how would you forget that? Darren Devon?
Sevan Matossian (23:53):
Uh, yes. Um, when, when, when you, when you, when these things are transferred to the product, let’s say unintentionally, could, could it just be just someone hanging over the mix in a, in a bead of sweat come off of them and go into the, uh, supplement?
Andy Holmes (24:10):
You know, I don’t know about a bee of sweat, but
Sevan Matossian (24:12):
I do like someone who’s all juiced up like Andrew and then he drips into their shit and then,
Andy Holmes (24:17):
Yeah. Well if, you know, if Andrew’s inadvertently doing cocaine on the line while he is putting lids on, well, whoa, whoa,
Andrew Hiller (24:22):
It’s a pelle, right? <laugh> al I swear
Andy Holmes (24:25):
To God thanks. Sniffing the pallets. I mean, yeah, it definitely could happen that way. I don’t know about a bee of sweat, but maybe, I mean, there’s always a chance somehow of stuff getting airborne and getting into something. And so, um, you know, that’s the, the whole idea is like you can’t ever be a hundred percent sure on, on any of this. So we’re trying to mitigate as much risk as possible. And so that’s the one thing I like, uh, you know, what we do is we do have that background and we’re like, Hey, this is where the most likely problems are gonna be. And so we try to mitigate that.
Sevan Matossian (25:03):
Um, we had a guy on here recently, um, Sean Ramirez, uh, master’s athlete in the CrossFit space. Uh, he tested positive, then he had his supplements tested and they found whatever he was taking in his, um, supplements. Okay. And, and then, and then he sued the supplement company and won. Yeah. Is that, uh, is that, is that what happens? Is that a standard, standard practice?
Andy Holmes (25:29):
That’s what happens now. So like in the past, like, you know, back when I was competing, if you got busted for taking something, you’re just done, they’re gonna kick you out. Now what is really lenient, you know, with these athletes, they’re like, Hey, if you can prove that you didn’t know when it came from your supplement, then you know, it’s up to two year suspension and or time served. And they’ll say, you know, oh, he didn’t know or she didn’t know whatever. And so they’ll be reinstated. Um, they might have to set out for a little bit, like a really good famous, uh, case was Yolo Romero, UFC Fighter. Yep.
Sevan Matossian (26:07):
Beautiful man Cuban.
Andy Holmes (26:09):
Yeah. And he, uh, he sued Gold Star Nutrition for 27.5 million. Um, cuz he got suspended by usada, um, for two years. And then I think what if I if, and I like, and again, I’m not real familiar with the case, but I’m almost sure that that 27.5 turned out to be 12.5 in reality. But I mean, it’s 12.5 million bucks.
Sevan Matossian (26:35):
So he was kind of glad his shit was tainted.
Andy Holmes (26:38):
I don’t know if he was glad
Sevan Matossian (26:39):
Cuz he was, he was, I’ll speak for him on his behalf
Andy Holmes (26:42):
<laugh>. He was like, but you know, that just says like, you know, here’s this guy and I, you know, and I don’t know him, nor do I, you know, I got nothing to say about him. But like, what I will say is, any athlete just like him, I’m like, Hey man, you’re different than everyone else. You get drug tested a lot. I mean, you know, when you’re at, you know, an Olympic hopeful, they’re all over you like white on rice, man, they’re at your, you know, house at three in the morning. You better be there. You gotta be. I mean you’re just different. And if you’re, you’re competing in, in athletics where it’s drug tested and there’s money on the Oh, and there’s money on the line or there’s bedding on the line, you better freaking, you know, be advised you don’t just take stuff cuz your buddy said to take it. Or my buddy’s friend who’s a big dude is got a new company and he’s taking it, he’s giving me free stuff. You’re not that, you’re not that guy. <laugh>. You gotta be a little smarter than that. And so
Sevan Matossian (27:42):
Yeah, we had, we had someone in the CrossFit space say that he didn’t even know someone just gave him a bag of pills and said, Hey, take this
Andy Holmes (27:48):
<laugh>. Yeah, yeah.
Sevan Matossian (27:49):
That’s a no-no. If you’re a professional athlete,
Andy Holmes (27:51):
Super. No-no. Um, so I’ll give you like, um, a Safa pal. Do you guys remember him? Remember you saying Bolt? Yes. Um, and on the four by, I think it was four by four team was a pal and a sofa. Um, he got busted for oxen, which is a stimulant. Um, and it was, if I remember right, uh, my, uh, my, our our, uh, global director worked on that a little bit. He got a phone call and he got busted because it was, he was given something because his, if I remember correctly, his trainer knew a guy who had a supplement company and said, Hey, you need to try this. And so like, tried it pop hot and they said, Hey, send us what you have. And of course there was this knew it was Austrian Oxil or Austrian, but it was in there. And so then we waited, you know, if I remember how Paul told me the story, but like we waited three to three weeks or three months, then we ordered the stuff again. It wasn’t in there anymore. Like, oh yeah, it wasn’t in there anymore. But the thing is, is the stuff that he took, it was in, so here’s the thing is like, and this is a dangerous thing. It’s like, here’s the, you
Sevan Matossian (29:06):
Went and got another package of the shit and it wasn’t in there. Yeah,
Andy Holmes (29:09):
We ordered it. Yeah, we ordered another pack. And like, and uh, here’s the dangerous thing I think is like, this is a guy who’s your trainer, you know, saying, here, just take this. My buddy’s got a supplement company going, no, unless it’s been third party tested, it’s crap. Don’t take it. So there’s just too much to risk. And so that guy got busted. All those guys lost their gold medal from the four by four, all of ’em.
Sevan Matossian (29:34):
Oh wow. This, this, this Gold star, um, supplement company that he sued were, were they third party tested?
Andy Holmes (29:40):
No, they weren’t.
Sevan Matossian (29:41):
They weren’t. They were just do do you ever hear of stuff being, um, being tainted that was third party tested?
Andy Holmes (29:49):
Mm. Every now and then you hear something, but um,
Sevan Matossian (29:52):
You always hope it’s your competitor. You always like, God, I hope that’s not us. I hope that’s not us. No.
Andy Holmes (29:56):
Huh. We’ve never, and no athlete has ever tested Paul.
The above transcript is generated using AI technology and therefore may contain errors.
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