RECESS: Hiking the Haute Route, Thorne Sold to P&G, Kasia Niewiadoma's Historic Climb & GLP-1 Watch

View This Week's Show Notes

We're back from one of the most bonkers trips of our lives. Juliet and I just finished hiking the Haute Route, the classic alpine traverse from Chamonix, France to Zermatt, Switzerland, roughly 90 miles over 10 days with our daughters Georgia and Caroline. Caroline's senior trip. Years of mental infiltration paid off.

Neither of us trained specifically for it. I spent the spring managing a torn ACL and calf. I skipped the surgery because we had this trip on the calendar, and I wasn't willing to miss it. Somewhere around day eight or nine on the trail, my knee actually started to feel better. That's the thing about movement as medicine: there's no substitute for the reps.

The trip had other highlights. We've been telling Georgia since she was three that we would someday find wild Edelweiss in the Alps. On day four, crossing one of the high passes, she spotted a patch. She actually cried. It was one of the best moments of my life.

We also dig into the news that Thorne, one of the most trusted names in supplement quality, has been acquired by Procter & Gamble for $3.8 billion, and why this deal raises real questions worth watching.

Then there's the Tour de France Femme and Kasia Niewiadoma's historic climb on Mont Ventoux: 5.3 watts per kilo for 55 minutes. We talk about the coverage problem, the naming problem, and why this race deserves far more than it's currently getting.

We close out with GLP-1 Watch: new data on cancer risk reduction, dementia, addiction disorders, and which grocery category is taking the biggest hit. Spoiler: it's chips.

New episodes of The Ready State Podcast drop every Thursday.

What You'll Learn in This Episode

• What the Haute Route is and why it's one of the great alpine treks in the world
• How Kelly completed 10 days of hiking in Switzerland months after tearing his ACL and choosing not to have surgery
• Why going uphill is easy and the downhill will humble you, and what "tissue exposure" means for how you prepare for a big adventure
• The story behind finding wild Edelweiss on a high alpine pass and why Georgia cried when she spotted it
• What Thorne's $3.8 billion acquisition by Procter & Gamble means for supplement quality, and what to actually watch for
• Why Kasia Niewiadoma's 5.3 watts per kilo for 55 minutes on Mont Ventoux is one of the most extraordinary athletic performances in recent memory
• What the current GLP-1 research shows about cancer risk, dementia, and addiction, and why all of it still needs to be taken with real caution
• Why where your GLP-1 is compounded matters and what the black market problem looks like

Key Highlights:

(00:00) Welcome back to RECESS, and a recap of the hippo attack episode and puppet theater

(01:30) Introducing the Haute Route: Chamonix to Zermatt, and how Caroline's senior trip idea came to be

(02:22) The scale of the Swiss Alps: glaciers, wildflower valleys, and a moonscape where a glacier used to be

(02:41) Meeting hikers at the mountain hut who ask "Have you been training for this?"

(03:12) The bonkers 8-hour day: two 10,000-foot passes, extreme terrain, and extreme views

(03:50) The $500 Edelweiss bounty, day four on the trail, and Georgia's emotional discovery

(05:51) Fit but not prepared for the downhill: what tissue exposure means and why the kneecaps paid the price

(06:07) Kelly's "sprain plus": tearing his ACL and calf in February and deciding to skip surgery for this trip

(07:38) Working the plan: movement, swelling management, and a knee that improved over 10 days of hiking

(09:45) The family dimension: hiking as a unit of four, bird launchers, and the mountain bike trike side trip

(10:50) Thorne acquired by Procter & Gamble for $3.8 billion: what it means for supplement quality

(12:12) Why NSF Certified for Sport matters and the precedent of P&G's 2012 New Chapter acquisition

(14:28) Tour de France Femme: Kasia Niewiadoma's historic climb on Mont Ventoux

(17:40) The coverage problem: Peacock picking up halfway, and why this race needs Phil Liggett on the mic

(18:53) What 5.3 watts per kilo for 55 minutes actually means (and why you should try your local bike)

(19:47) GLP-1 Watch: grocery data from 150,000 households, chips down 10%, and yogurt on the rise

(24:18) GLP-1 and cancer: Penn Medicine study, breast cancer data, and why these are still observational studies

(25:53) GLP-1 and dementia: 40–70% lower risk across large studies, and what the mechanisms might be

(25:56) The caveats: observational data, socioeconomic skew, compounding quality, and the black market problem

(26:32) GLP-1 and addiction: alcohol, cocaine, nicotine disorders, and rewiring the brain's reward center

(28:20) What are we living for: Caroline's college move-in, the river trip, and whether Kelly needs an ACL for ski season