Sprint training is the ultimate cognitive enhancer

[Carl-Richard]

18 hours ago, RendHeaven said:

I like bryan johnson but I would never elect to live like him.

the neurotic planning and scheming strikes me as autistic as fuck and I would personally find it suffocating.

He is on a mission to actually stop aging. That's incredibly noble and exciting. He doesn't care about merely feeling good. He wants to elevate humanity to the next level. It's a bit like Leo having truth as his number one value. The level of meaning he experiences probably outpaces any of the things he has to do 10-fold. And it's only a 5 hour protocol. So many people spend 5 hours pissing away their life on their phone doing nothing and destroying their brains. Also, his protocol is probably unmatched in terms of healthspan. The only knock you would have against it is that it's 5 hours long.

 

18 hours ago, RendHeaven said:

I also think it's silly that he could just eat meat and go get sunlight, but instead he goes for vegan + 100 pills + TRT + expensive light therapy

The fact that he is vegan doesn't change anything, he would still take 100 pills. "Just get sunlight" is like one pill.

Quote

As a doctor who treats patients who have melanomas, I want the general public to be advised that under no circumstances can the use of a tanning bed or tanning in general be justified on the basis of vitamin D. Take a supplement instead.

https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/vitamin-d-myths-debunked

When you're at his level of wealth and power, maximizing your healthspan and longevity this way is arguably the smartest thing you can do. You can easily adapt to a 5 hour protocol. People are completely blind to how complex and specific their habitual life already is. If you were to make Bryan adopt your "simple habits" at this point in time, it would be incredibly "hard" for him. It's changing a habit that is the hard part. Keeping it is easy.

Edited July 11 by Carl-Richard

[Carl-Richard]

Besides, your own "protocol" probably already rivals 5 hours if you work out regularly (and not in a home gym, so you have to travel), take saunas, meditate and don't have people to cook, clean and do errands for you.

Edited July 11 by Carl-Richard

[Schizophonia]

If you have gut problem because of your diet or something else who generates brain fog you will benefit from extra stress hormones bring by sport.

[Sugarcoat]

I find when I try to run as hard as I can I always reach a certain point of intensity that I can handle then I stop, and it’s like no matter how many times I try I always stop at that specific point

I’m planning on starting to run again particularly sprinting after my vacation when I get back home. I try to push my limits but it’s so hard (I mean it’s supposed to be hard)

Edited July 11 by Sugarcoat

[RendHeaven]

3 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

He is on a mission to actually stop aging.

That's a dumb exaggeration on his part. You're gonna age. It's just a matter of how fast.

Indeed if you're interested in slowing the rate of aging, then brian is carving a strong path.

3 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

And it's only a 5 hour protocol.

only!?

3 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

The fact that he is vegan doesn't change anything, he would still take 100 pills.

This is absolutely false. If he ate meat, many of his pills would become redundant.

3 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

"Just get sunlight" is like one pill.

This is downright insulting to sunlight lol. Sunlight has a cascade of synergistic benefits which no pill can replace 1 to 1 (vit D is NOT a complete sunlight substitute)

My comment that he should get sunlight is a response to his advanced indoor lighting setup (blue light, red light, etc)

3 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

If you were to make Bryan adopt your "simple habits" at this point in time, it would be incredibly "hard" for him. It's changing a habit that is the hard part. Keeping it is easy.

Good point.

Clearly he does what he does because he loves it.

Just saying it's not for me

Edited July 11 by RendHeaven
typo

[RendHeaven]

39 minutes ago, Schizophonia said:

If you have gut problem because of your diet or something else who generates brain fog you will benefit from extra stress hormones bring by sport.

or just eat more beans (fiber is good for you, guys!👺👺)

Edited July 11 by RendHeaven
👺

[Schizophonia]

6 minutes ago, RendHeaven said:

or just eat more beans (fiber is good for you, guys!👺👺)

fart*

[Carl-Richard]

7 hours ago, RendHeaven said:

That's a dumb exaggeration on his part. You're gonna age. It's just a matter of how fast.

Indeed if you're interested in slowing the rate of aging, then brian is carving a strong path.

He'll the very least be the Newton to some Einstein of aging. And stopping aging is not impossible in principle. I don't know where you got this from. It's partially a scientific challenge and partially an engineering challenge, and Bryan is one such engineer, maybe an early one, or maybe not (big daddy AI is presumably around the corner).

 

7 hours ago, RendHeaven said:

only!?

It's nothing if you have personal assistants and don't doomscroll your life away. How long is your daily health protocol on average (including time spent on food, cleaning, errands)?

 

7 hours ago, RendHeaven said:

This is absolutely false. If he ate meat, many of his pills would become redundant.

He supplements everything that he gets from plants as well. Many of his pills are already "redundant".

 

7 hours ago, RendHeaven said:

This is downright insulting to sunlight lol. Sunlight has a cascade of synergistic benefits which no pill can replace 1 to 1 (vit D is NOT a complete sunlight substitute)

Enlighten me (kek).

 

7 hours ago, RendHeaven said:

Good point.

Clearly he does what he does because he loves it.

Just saying it's not for me

One time in life, I only smoked weed and played videogames and thought that was the thing to do.

I would personally love to sit in a hyperbaric chamber and chug pure oxygen while working. But that's just me 😂

Edited July 11 by Carl-Richard

[Carl-Richard]

8 hours ago, Schizophonia said:

If you have gut problem because of your diet or something else who generates brain fog you will benefit from extra stress hormones bring by sport.

I was like "wut why are you talking about gut problems?", but sure. "Stress hormones" is one thing though; actually growing your body in response to stress is also a thing.

There is a state I get into if I do a really good sprint (during it) that can only be described as ecstatic rage, where I literally feel like nitroglycerin is flooding through my veins. I wouldn't chalk that down to something like lactate for example, where you hit a ceiling of fatigue and you can't go anymore. It's more like the state of having absolute crushed some ceiling of performance and your body is trembling and surging with high-octane juices.

Because to be clear, I don't do the "sprint til failure" method to maximize lactate. I do "sprint as fast as you freaking can", maximizing speed and performance during the exercise. This I believe is the main driver of the cognitive enhancement, or which pulls it to the next level. It's when you absolutely disintegrate your ceiling of performance.

And if it's not clear, I haven't checked, but my heart is definitely max BPM after the sprint. And (I believe) my breathing is much heavier than if I do a 4x4 (unless the concominant feeling of fatigue makes it feel that way). Your body is truly pushed to the limit, and that has to do something to your brain, be it biochemically (acutely) or structurally (in the long run).

And this state of rapture is also something I believe you will only achieve with running sprints, because you need that biomechanical edge to push you into that perfect flow state / state of rapture.

Edited July 11 by Carl-Richard

[Natasha Tori Maru]

I have trouble with Bryan. Some things good ... But then he does some things clearly for vanity. 

Then there is the 'Dont Die' religion cult stuff he is pushing. 

'My competitor is Jesus' 

(He said that lol) 

I feel like his previous hardcore Mormon upbringing is reflected in this 'Dont Die' stuff. 

So in my little brain I see some good stuff, then I question his intentions due to all the additional WEIRD (Jesus comment, hair dye [aesthetics only??], new religion). Plus all the weird summits he has and hug dance parties. 

He's just an odd unit hard to swallow 😜

[Carl-Richard]

20 minutes ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

I have trouble with Bryan. Some things good ... But then he does some things clearly for vanity. 

Then there is the 'Dont Die' religion cult stuff he is pushing. 

'My competitor is Jesus' 

(He said that lol) 

I feel like his previous hardcore Mormon upbringing is reflected in this 'Dont Die' stuff. 

So in my little brain I see some good stuff, then I question his intentions due to all the additional WEIRD (Jesus comment, hair dye [aesthetics only??], new religion). Plus all the weird summits he has and hug dance parties. 

He's just an odd unit hard to swallow 😜

I have a strong weird radar and I have detected all this (except the mormon connection which is interesting). And this is when I will drop my "virtually everybody is weird, society is weird, humans are weird". The person who runs this forum, is weird. The mods on the forum are weird. The users on the forum are weird — except the lovely ones, they are lovely and weird.

Edited July 11 by Carl-Richard

[Natasha Tori Maru]

5 minutes ago, Carl-Richard said:

This is when I will drop my "virtually everybody is weird, society is weird, humans are weird". The person who runs this forum, is weird. The mods on the forum are weird. The users on the forum are weird — except the lovely ones, they are lovely and weird.

I'm with you here 🙃 

Even when someone presents as normal through a curated online persona, or professional persona.... I know behind the scenes. There's some oddness lurking. 

The question for me is, can *I* accept their flavour of weird! Red flags come up for me if I suspect the propensity for their strangeness is likely to infect/taint the rest of their work

[aurum]

Wait till Bryan realizes he wasn't born and can't die.

That'll be a laugh.

[Asayake]

Cycling is extremely good for this, I don’t do it personally but I’m into running and many runners push hard on cycling to spare their joints etc as too regular maximum effort in running can lead more easily to injuries compared to cycling. In cycling you can push hard more frequently so this might be useful to know for anyone who wants to pursue this. With that being said sprinting and running are both awesome too. I like your connection between this and problem solving and the transferable skill that underpins both that is effort. Interesting idea man! 

[Schizophonia]

10 hours ago, Carl-Richard said:

I was like "wut why are you talking about gut problems?", but sure. "Stress hormones" is one thing though; actually growing your body in response to stress is also a thing.

There is a state I get into if I do a really good sprint (during it) that can only be described as ecstatic rage, where I literally feel like nitroglycerin is flooding through my veins. I wouldn't chalk that down to something like lactate for example, where you hit a ceiling of fatigue and you can't go anymore. It's more like the state of having absolute crushed some ceiling of performance and your body is trembling and surging with high-octane juices.

Because to be clear, I don't do the "sprint til failure" method to maximize lactate. I do "sprint as fast as you freaking can", maximizing speed and performance during the exercise. This I believe is the main driver of the cognitive enhancement, or which pulls it to the next level. It's when you absolutely disintegrate your ceiling of performance.

And if it's not clear, I haven't checked, but my heart is definitely max BPM after the sprint. And (I believe) my breathing is much heavier than if I do a 4x4 (unless the concominant feeling of fatigue makes it feel that way). Your body is truly pushed to the limit, and that has to do something to your brain, be it biochemically (acutely) or structurally (in the long run).

And this state of rapture is also something I believe you will only achieve with running sprints, because you need that biomechanical edge to push you into that perfect flow state / state of rapture.

Yea it increase noradrenaline/adrenaline that increases also brain metabolism and makes you more sharp.

[Guest Nilsi]

On 11.7.2025 at 1:26 AM, Carl-Richard said:

Sprint training is when you do maximal effort (95-100%) for a short period of time (20-30 seconds), ideally while running.

Why maximal effort? Because solving difficult problems is like a sprint. Remember all the times you've read a difficult text and you feel like you're straining your brain while reading one particularly difficult sentence. Reading a sentence takes maximum a few seconds. Understanding or grasping the idea takes the time it takes to read the sentence and maybe a little more, but not much more. Either you grasp it there, or you don't.

You can try again, sprinting again, but chances are, if you read it a few times and you still don't understand, you probably won't understand it for a while (you either have to for example go back and read some of the previous text or take a break). You have to make the sprint then and there. You have to engage in that level of intensity then and there, or else you won't grasp it.

Now, lower intensity training (e.g. moderate intensity cardio) might help you sift through more problems over a longer period of time and increasing your general work capacity, but the quality, the depth, the weight of the problem depends on your level of intensity. Thus training at maximum intensity will increase your ability to solve difficult problems.

Also, I've noticed sprint training makes your thinking incredibly fast (the rate of thinking), which is maybe not so unexpected either. That's probably also a big part of solving difficult problems, of being able to present a wide range of alternatives in a short amount of time before your attention runs out.

Why ideally when running? Because you are biomechanically most equipped to expend the most energy per unit of time by moving your body in a way that resembles running. Running is not just about moving your feet; it involves the entire body, the upper body arguably just as much as the lower body. You were built to run, there are millions of years of bipedal evolution driving your body to run, and therefore your body should expend the most energy by running (because energy spent running is essentially congruent to evolutionary fitness).


So far, I've made the case on a purely mechanistic ground, call it "philosophy of physiology". But you can make the case on more concrete scientific and neurophysiological grounds. Sprint training, or more accurately in this case "working out until failure" (which is achieved most time-efficiently by sprinting until failure), induces the production of lactic acid, which is converted to lactate, which is a neurotransmitter that is involved in brain function. It increases BDNF (which increases the growth of neurons), it's involved in monoamine neurotransmitter synthesis (dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine), it's used as an energy source for neurons.


Again, there are other cases to be made for again moderate intensity cardio, or 4x4 training (for increasing VO2 max), or even lifting weights, as these all produce their own particular signatures in the body and which feeds into the brain in their own unique ways. If you want to be a well-rounded person, you want to engage in all of it from time to time. But if you care about solving difficult problems, if you care about "thinking fast", and if you care about feeding your brain a very beneficial nutrient and signalling molecule (lactate), you should consider incorporating some form of sprint training (ideally running sprints) into your workout routine. Other alternatives than running sprints are assault bike, normal bike.

I find that I can only sprint around 1-2 times a week (on top of weight training 3.5 times a week) because it is very fatiguing. So keep that in mind, because fatigue will also inhibit cognitive functioning.

Nothing enhances cognitive performance more than hopping on a high-ticket sales call or talking to a hot girl.

This perfectly tracks with the logic you’re laying out here: intense, consequential engagement leading to massive neuronal recruitment and full-spectrum activation.

[Carl-Richard]

41 minutes ago, Nilsi said:

Nothing enhances cognitive performance more than hopping on a high-ticket sales call or talking to a hot girl.

This perfectly tracks with the logic you’re laying out here: intense, consequential engagement leading to massive neuronal recruitment and full-spectrum activation.

I guess. Physical training is just one way of enhancing cognition. I also do brain training. But physicality is a power tool. Your brain is intrinsically tied to physicality.

[Guest Nilsi]

1 minute ago, Carl-Richard said:

I guess. Physical training is just one way of enhancing cognition. I also do brain training. But physicality is a power tool. Your brain is intrinsically tied to physicality.

Dialing a number that catapults you into what could be your final conversation with someone holding the power of millions in marketing budget is serious physiological training. Your heart slams against your ribcage, every neuron firing at once. By the time you’re walking them through the contract details, voice steady but your body drenched in sweat and trembling, you know this is it - only your words, your tone, and your presence will decide whether hundreds of thousands of dollars land in your company’s account.

This is peak physical and mental exertion. This is your ultimate workout.

[Natasha Tori Maru]

@Nilsi Do you perform this sort of training? I am assuming you do.

I do also (probably have 17 years of fitness behind me) . And I work a job that requires the sort of high stakes negotiations and resultant tangible outcomes. Yes, millions of dollars.

You describe what I would call an adrenalin rush and huge dopamine spike - very different to the long term effects of interval training: ie increased BDNF levels, better baseline attention, stronger stress resilience and adaptive hormesis. I find sprinting experienced as a sharp wave that clears the mind. 

I really think @Carl-Richard is onto something with greater depth of benefit. And I don't think you can give a fair comparison in this way.

[Guest Nilsi]

19 minutes ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

@Nilsi Do you perform this sort of training? I am assuming you do.

That’s my job. Yes.