Things Dan John Has Said on Podcasts

“I thought for a long time it was an all-out war. You went after it. You did the velocity diet. You did the tough stuff. And the weight came off. But like dropping a bowling ball off the Empire State Building, there's that bounce.” — Dan John, Two Percent with Michael Easter

Asked what he believed about strength and fitness at 30 that he now thinks is wrong, Dan starts with body composition: crash approaches worked in the short term, but the weight came back.

Two Percent with Michael Easter · 2026-11-05 Permalink → Listen →

Two Percent with Michael Easter Around 04:15 into the episode

Dan John

Yeah.

Michael Easter

What's something that you believed about strength or lifting when you were, say, 30 years old that you think is wrong today?

Dan John

Okay. Get out a big piece of paper. It's not a small piece. Okay. So let's just, we can just, I'll try to do it in parts if you don't mind. So the biggest mistakes I think you make, well, first, the biggest mistake is letting yourself, it's kind of like getting in debt in the financial thing. You know, I would say in debt in our world is accumulating fat. So the first thing I'd recommend anybody, do your best to not get in debt and don't get fat. Okay. Let's just take those two things and go. Okay. Those are the two truths. Okay. When it came to things like body composition, I thought I thought and I thought for a long time it was an all-out war. You went after it. You did the velocity diet. You did the tough stuff. And it did. The weight came off. But like dropping a bowling ball off the Empire State Building, there's that bounce. When it comes to weightlifting at 30, and I'm glad you picked that age. I was already sliding over into the ideas that are right. But famously, I wrote in my journal in 1992, when I…

Michael Easter

There's not a ton of bells and whistles. Your stuff is very approachable and very simple. And it's sort of, I can't remember the phrase you used. It's like easy and often over the long haul. So talk to us about that. Like, how has that shaped you? Because I do feel like there's today there's more…

Dan John

Michael Easter

heard that at one point you were, I believe it was the Olympic Training Center you were training, and they told you to max everything out, eat as much as possible, gain weight. And you said that wrecked you. And you actually had better results when you weren't lifting as hard as often and when you…

Speaker names come from our own diarization. The position is estimated from where the line sits in the episode.

“I asked him the secret to throwing the discus far, and he said famously, lift weights three days a week, which of course I ignored. Throw the discus four days a week over the next eight years. And of course, the thing everybody misses is that eight years part.” — Dan John, Two Percent with Michael Easter

Asked about his 'easy and often' philosophy, Dan credits an early coach for the idea of 'little and often over the long haul'. The punchline is that patience matters more than the program.

Two Percent with Michael Easter · 2026-11-05 Permalink → Listen →

Two Percent with Michael Easter Around 05:29 into the episode

Dan John

…I wish I would have known at 30, but it's the loaded carry family. I mean, I know a lot of people take credit for it. But if you go back to the late 90s and then, of course, with my big injury, I think I'm one of the first people to write articles about it. I think loaded carries were a big miss.

Michael Easter

…how has that shaped you? Because I do feel like there's today there's more information than ever. People want to throw in as many shiny things as possible. But you keep going back to the fact that like do the basic human movements. Don't overdo them. Progress slowly and you'll end up in a good

Dan John

place. Yeah, I got that from Coach Ralph Mond. First day I go to his office, I come campus, I say, I'm so excited to get going. And he's more like, take it easy. And he told me the secret, two secrets. One of the first things out of his mouth was little and often over the long haul. What's funny about that? It's true for parenting. It's true for education. It's true for your finance, your savings, your body composition goals, you decide to go do a thing, whatever that thing is, maybe climb Mount Kilimanjaro or something like that. And you get a program from this person who tells you to, you know, do you do a little bit every day over time, and good things happen. Then I asked him the secret to throwing the discus far, and he said famously, lift weights three days a week, which of course I ignored. Throw the discus four days a week over the next eight years. And of course, the thing everybody misses is that eight years part. I

Michael Easter

Dan John

Well, that this is always the problem, Michael, inner field. Always. More must be better. Once you hit strong enough, adding more doesn't do anything else except make you. I got to tell you that that decision, you know, I only know the number in pounds, but I got my squad up to 605 for three.…

Michael Easter

This idea of enough, what do you think that looks like for the average person at different stages in life? So you're 30, you're 50, you're 70. Like, how strong do people need to be in order to for health outcomes, for function?

Speaker names come from our own diarization. The position is estimated from where the line sits in the episode.

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