Loading...

PODCAST

Dave Tate"s Table Talk

Are you sick of "fitness influencers," training fads, and crappy advice that barely applies inside the gym or on the field? Then sit down with elitefts CEO Dave Tate as he interviews the strongest & smartest minds across the strength sports community to talk real, hardcore training, business, life, and more. If you"re looking for real, applicable information on all things training, join the crew.

health & fitness fitness

All Episodes

02:29:10

#431 To Fix Your Body, You Have to Destroy Your...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/07/20

To survive the brutal reality of elite-level strength, you might have to destroy the very person you spent a lifetime building. Ben Pollack earned a PhD in physical culture history while systematically destroying his own body, ignoring years of excruciating warnings for the sake of world records and plastic trophies. But when a sudden, terrifying neurological shutdown left half his body completely unresponsive overnight, he was forced to abandon the self-destructive addiction to pure suffering and

en

02:13:57

#430 Why "Bought Fitness" Will Never Make You Strong...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/07/16

You can buy fat loss with an injection, but you cannot fake the raw, violent physical capability required to survive when the lights turn on and the floor turns into a warzone. Before stepping under the Hollywood lights as the new faces of American Gladiators, Daniella Means, Lu Faustin, and Kailey Latimer forged their armor through shattered orbital bones, grueling Division I athletic politics, and the unforgiving reality of immigrant grit. Along the way, they realized that true elite-level

en

02:28:50

#429 I Ignored My Surgeon's Warning (And Benched...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/07/13

The worst thing that can happen to an elite bencher might be the exact psychological reset needed to save their career. Before Jordan Wong could break all-time world squat records and scale a massive commercial gym facility, he had to navigate a catastrophic, full-tendon pec rupture without health insurance and a surgeon who treated him like a dumb meathead. By ripping up the traditional six-week immobilization protocol on day three and treating his recovery like a full-time corporate job, he

en

02:24:34

#428 Stop Training Athletes Like They're Good at...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/07/06

"Your skill set's not going to be lifting weights—it's going to be the sport, but you still have to learn how to strain." For thirteen seasons, including eleven in the collegiate trenches, Lucas White has survived the brutal, revolving-door reality of Division I strength coaching by adapting elite powerlifting principles to hyper-talented athletes who have never had to grind out a rep in their lives. By rejecting the copy-and-paste templates of traditional football programs and introducing

en

02:35:55

#427 The Trap of the 300-Pound Power Clean | Monte...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/07/02

Most high school strength coaches are hiding behind a rigid workout template because they are terrified of what happens when the plan fails on the weight room floor. For Monte Sparkman, fifteen years of building elite teenage athletes across Texas proved that being married to a specific exercise rather than a training principle is a shortcut to baseline mediocrity and broken potential. By shedding the dogma of traditional barbell chasing and embracing an aggressive, auto-regulated approach to the

en

02:14:55

#426 What Powerlifting Judges See (But Never Tell...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/06/29

You aren't truly learning how to lift until someone forces you to pull the slack out of a stiff bar with an opener that's completely out of your league. For multi-time world champion Valerie Smith, transitioning from a decade in corporate HR to the elite tiers of Master's powerlifting meant trading worst-case scenario corporate risk models for the cold reality of the platform. Her evolution from a rookie who bombed out of her first meet to an international referee and state chair reveals why true

en

01:52:09

#425 We've Broken Our Natural Hormones to Survive the...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/06/22

Your body naturally produces testosterone, but it doesn't make the gallons of coffee you are using to survive a modern, unsustainable lifestyle. Mike Stratton built a multi-million dollar health optimization empire from the ground up, yet he nearly killed himself in the process by abandoning his own health to keep the business alive. He walked away from a successful company to rebuild his vision from scratch, a high-stakes gamble that triggered severe physical and mental burnout. INSIDE THE EPISODE

en

02:25:57

#424 You Learn More From One Loss Than 100 Wins |...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/06/18

Most people think discipline is about pushing harder, but Phil Daru argues that real growth begins the moment failure exposes the flaws in your plan. From coaching UFC champions and elite performers to nearly destroying his body attempting a 150-mile ruck, Phil's most valuable lessons didn't come from victory—they came from painful setbacks, brutal self-audits, and the willingness to start over. As his career evolved beyond fight camps and conditioning, he discovered that the same principles that

en

02:33:02

#423 Powerlifting's Dirty Secret (The Real Freaks...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/06/15

The elite coaches dominating the fitness industry aren't out-programming you; they are out-communicating you. For twenty years, Matt Levine didn't just survive the brutal meat grinder of competitive powerlifting—he used its systemic failures to rewrite the rules of modern strength education. Now, he's lifting the curtain on why chasing "optimal" templates is a death sentence for your business, and how the future of coaching belongs to those who master human psychology over spreadsheet algorithms

en

01:32:50

#422 The Barbell Giveth, and the Barbell Taketh Away...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/06/11

If you think your current training routine is built for longevity, you are lying to yourself about what decades under a heavy barbell actually does to the human frame. For over twenty years, Jim Wendler, Matt Rhodes, and Vincent Dizenzo chased the white rabbit of absolute strength through the unforgiving gauntlet of elite powerlifting, accumulating world records, catastrophic injuries, and a mountain of now-obsolete beliefs. But when the competitive spotlight fades and the realities of joint

en

02:44:07

#421 Why Most Dedicated Lifters Crash Out Outside the...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/06/08

The illusion of world-class strength is built on rigid programming—but the truth is that strict protocols are often what cause elite lifters to plateau or break. Long before he was known as The Swolefessor, Marcellus Williams discovered that textbook biomechanics and conventional gym culture rarely produced championship-level results. By combining a formal education in kinesiology with advanced athlete psychology, he uncovered a hidden variable in human performance that transformed talented lifters

en

02:27:06

#420 Why D1 Strength Programs Are Actually Ruining...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/06/04

Most college strength programs are actively making their athletes slower and weaker. I had another kid go to a D1 school with a 425-pound bench and come back only able to press 345. Elite strength coach and Westside Barbell disciple Jared Bidne is destroying the traditional, over-complicated sports performance model by proving that elite speed is built through brutal simplicity and high muscular tension. INSIDE THE EPISODE: The Death of Transfer: Why a 600-pound squat means absolutely

en

02:12:11

#419 Do ONLY These 3 Exercises for the First 5 Years...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/06/01

Stop majoring in the minors and trying to fine-tune a physique or training split you haven't even earned the right to optimize yet. Dr. Ian Butcher runs four distinct brick-and-mortar health and fitness businesses in the real world, completely outside the digital echo chamber, because he's too busy actually doing the work. True progression isn't found in flawless, hyper-fixated social media algorithms — it's forged by leaning back into foundational heavy metrics and mastering the basic pillars of

en

02:36:58

#418 To Total 2,000lbs, I Had to Change Who I Was |...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/05/26

To dominate the platform, you have to survive the lifestyle that builds it. For over a decade, Matt Sharafinski chased the limits of human strength, moving through weight classes and dismantling standard programming until his body forced a brutal reckoning with reality. From running a thermos of alcohol into high school classes to maxing out medical breathing machines just to survive the night, his obsession with the barbell became a masterclass in psychological warfare and physiological

en

02:29:46

#417 The Truth About Your Breaking Point (It's Not...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/05/21

Most elite athletes are walking genetic marvels who survive on habits that would ruin the average person. Dr. Dylan Seeley spent years treating the damage caused by this genetic lottery before realizing the entire industry is chasing a ghost. True high performance isn't found in a laboratory metric—it's forged by knowing exactly how close you can fly to the sun before you burn. INSIDE THE EPISODE: The Myth of Optimal: Why chasing perfect metrics is destroying athlete longevity

en

02:35:14

#416 Why "Data-Driven" Coaching is Failing the Next...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/05/18

The weight room isn't just a place to build muscle. It's a battlefield where psychology meets physical adaptation — and most coaches are losing because they're coaching numbers instead of people. Dr. Justin Lima joins Dave Tate at the elitefts compound to dismantle the myth of "optimal" training and explain why giving athletes a stimulus they aren't prepared for can rob them of long-term development. From scaling Strength Coach Network to his PhD research on reactive force development, Lima connects

en

02:24:27

#415 The Raw Truth About the American Gladiator Arena...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/05/14

The staged spectacle of the ring and the curated edits of prime time are stripped away to reveal a raw physical reality that cannot be faked. Eric "Bull" Bugenhagen, Jesse "Steel" Godderz, and Michael "Fang" Wardlow endured a month of sensory deprivation and high-stakes violence to resurrect a cultural legend. From the agony of competing with a ruptured bicep to the psychological warfare of gladiator lockdown, these three modern-day icons reveal the grit required to weaponize a 280-pound frame.

en

02:19:13

#414 Your Strength Has an Expiration Date | Sean Noriega

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/05/11

The world isn't your oyster forever. For elite powerlifter Sean Noriega, realizing that 300kg squats were no longer guaranteed forced a complete psychological and technical rebuild. After a five-year regression that left him chasing the numbers from his junior career, the MIT-educated mechanical engineer turned world-class coach applied the same analytical mindset he used in the lab to rebuilding his body under the bar. What followed was a transformation from "meathead" lifter to

en

02:18:19

#413 How to Handle 10x More Weight: The Secret to a...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/05/07

Taming your "dumb strength" is the only way to survive when 900 pounds is trying to crush your spine into the floor. Jordan Buchla spent a decade as an emergency room trauma nurse while simultaneously becoming the #2 all-time strongest female squatter on the planet. From intubating patients during a pandemic to unracking 855 pounds, she built a high-performance life by forcing a "Type B" personality into a disciplined "Type A" structure. Inside the Episode: The Physics of Focus: Why the "pick" is

en

02:36:46

#412 How Westside Training Saved Me From 4 Years of...

Dave Tate"s Table Talk ·

2026/05/05

One heavy squat at 400 pounds was all Kalil Sherrod needed to know the poison hadn't won. Seven weeks before this recording, Kalil walked into elitefts HQ to hit his first major milestone since a brutal cancer diagnosis. That moment bridged the gap between his life as an elite performance coach and his reality as a survivor. Through two stem cell transplants and multiple rounds of high-intensity chemotherapy, he developed a conjugate-based survival blueprint—one that reinforces a hard truth: muscle

en

465 results

Similar Podcasts

Доктор Тройняшкин

Доктор Тройняшкин

The C3Method Podcast

Robert Polenik

Dave Tate"s Table Talk

elitefts.com

Optimal Health Daily - Fitness and Nutrition

Optimal Living Daily | Dr. Neal Malik

Boundless Body Radio

Casey Ruff