Chasing Excellence

We're exploring why we can't maximize every goal at once, and how picturing life as a Frisbee balanced on a pencil - instead of a seesaw - changes the way we chase what matters.

By identifying the 20% of effort that drives 80% of the results across our health, work, and relationships, we build awareness of where we're overextending, intention around the handful of things worth our full focus, and action toward a life of health, happiness, and purpose - instead of the exhausting pursuit of having it all that leaves us drifting and dissatisfied.

Keep Going<...

We're exploring how to pursue ambitious goals without making our identity dependent on the outcome.

By placing the person and the process ahead of the goal, we build awareness around what we can control, intention around the habits and character traits we want to practice, and action toward a life of health, happiness, and purpose - even when reality doesn't match our expectations.

Keep Going

🐾 Start your Free Trial of the ChaseTracker App

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & the Chase Club

Reach Out

✋🏼 What questions do you have for us?

📧Got feedbac...

We're kicking off an October Experiment, a shift from one longer weekly episode to short, daily episodes every weekday.

Today, we explore why this change matters: showing up with something short to think about each day keeps us focused on today's choices, instead of waiting for one big leap forward.

By building this habit of daily attention, we hope to help you build awareness around the small decisions that add up, intention around showing up consistently, and action toward a life of health, happiness, and purpose—instead of drifting through another week waiting for change to...

What if the problem with your diet isn't discipline — it's that you've never learned to think for yourself about food? In this episode, our friend EC Synkowski (author of A Good Nutrition Book) joins us to explain why calories, macros, and micros — not keto, paleo, or intermittent fasting — are the real levers that decide your results.

We break down her Three Pillars Method — the 800-gram fruit-and-vegetable challenge, a simple protein target, then a calorie baseline built from your real life instead of a calculator — and why it builds freedom instead of restriction. You'll also learn where cravings actually c...

Plateaus, leaderboards, and the real reason most people stop making progress in the gym — we answer the questions you've been too afraid to ask.

In part two of our training Q&A, Jamison and Ben explore why fitness follows the stock market (not a straight line), how to use the leaderboard as a tool instead of a verdict, and why the law of diminishing returns is actually proof you're advancing — not stalling.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & the Chase Club

👋 New to Chasing Excellence? Start here

See Privacy...

Ever wonder whether that soreness means rest—or push through? If one bad night of sleep wrecks your training? Or whether all those YouTube influencers are right that rep ranges don't really matter?

In this episode, Jamison fires community questions at Ben, and the answers are exactly what coaches and athletes need to hear — clear, direct, and rooted in how the body actually works.

We dig into the frameworks behind recovery, pacing, and strength training that separate athletes who keep getting better from those who keep spinning their wheels. Health, performance, and the Awareness → Intention → Action c...

What if the single greatest predictor of your health at 80 isn't your cholesterol or blood pressure — but how satisfied you are in your relationships?

In this conversation, we sit down with Dr. Robert Waldinger, director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development — the longest-running study of adult life ever conducted — to unpack what 85 years of research reveals about what actually makes a good life.

Good relationships don't just feel good — they're stress regulators that protect your body from chronic inflammation and cortisol overload, directly affecting your Health and Happiness. We explore the concept of social fitness...

What if the most important training you'll ever do happens nowhere near a barbell?

Annie Thorisdottir and her co-writer Christine Bald join Patrick to discuss their new book, Iceland Annie: The Evolution of a CrossFit Games Legend — five years in the making and built on a prologue Christine wrote before Annie ever agreed to write it.

You'll hear why Annie believes character is trained the same way fitness is: in private, repeatedly, often without immediate reward. And you'll hear Christine on the discipline required to prepare for moments you can't anticipate. Together, they make the ca...

Short and sweet this week: Our latest challenge is kicking off today, and we don't want you to miss it.

❤️‍🔥 More information on the Happiness Challenge

🐾 Join us inside the ChaseTracker app

👊 Jump into the Chase Club

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We’re kicking off our new 21-Day Happiness Challenge — and it's probably not what you expect. Instead of focusing on what you have to be grateful for, we flip the lens: what don't you have that you're grateful to be without?

That single shift — from counting blessings to counting absences — sits at the heart of this challenge. We explore how modern culture, the "affluenza virus," and the pull of speed and convenience are actively working against our happiness, and how 21 days of focused attention can start to change that.

🐾 Start your Free Trial of the ChaseTracke...

What does depression look like when nothing in your life is actually wrong?

Ben shares his first real experience with depression — not born of circumstance, but of chemistry — and why it changed everything he thought he understood about mental health.

In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Rich, Ben's physician and friend, to unpack the autoimmune response that attacked Ben's brain, the treatments that actually helped, and why the fitness buffer matters more than you'll ever know in the moment.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

🐾 Start your Free Trial of the ChaseT...

What if every day you could see — in real time — whether you're drifting or chasing?

In this solo episode, Patrick unpacks the rebuilt ChaseTracker app and the foundational framework behind it: drifting is the slow, often unseen move toward convenience, comfort, and conformity, while chasing is the daily decision to organize your time, energy, attention, and money toward what truly matters.

Learn how six key areas of life and four time horizons — daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly — give you a system to catch drift before it costs you months. Plus: why James Clear is right that you...

What if you could assess your mental fitness the same way you track your lifts, your miles, and your macros — with honest data, asked on a regular schedule?

In this episode, Patrick hosts Chris Irwin to build a practical self-assessment tool rooted in the Five Mind Killers: a set of diagnostic questions mapped across each mind killer that, asked honestly every three to six months, reveal whether your mental fitness is trending in the right direction.

You'll learn why the sickness-wellness-fitness continuum applies one-for-one to mental health, how the language "I have anxiety" is quietly ke...

What if the most important question in programming has nothing to do with the workout itself?

In this episode, Ben breaks down how to design training that works — whether you're coaching a packed class or programming for a single athlete — and why the answer starts with one question most coaches never ask.

Learn why compliance is the real metric, how logistical constraints shape every programming decision, and why the goal isn't a perfect workout — it's getting people excited to come back tomorrow.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & the Chase Club

👋 Ne...

Hard things don't get easier when we pretend they aren't hard — they get easier when we stop wishing they were different.

In this solo 5x5, Ben answers one listener question from each of the five factors: dealing with a chaotic home situation with a napping toddler, chasing a federal special agent fitness standard, eating clean on the road, deciding whether to have more kids in your 40s, and navigating a child's fear of the dark.

Acceptance is not approval. When we stop spending energy wishing our circumstances were different, we free that energy for actual so...

How much responsibility do we actually carry for where our teenagers end up — and how much is simply out of our hands?

In this episode, we dig into a powerful listener question from David about parental influence, the six factors that shape teenagers, and the three things fathers can genuinely control: modeling, connection, and agency.

We explore why control and influence are two very different tools, why unconditional love may be the single most important input a parent can offer, and why the real enemy isn't bad peers or broken environments — it's an ego that's neve...

What do you do when the person who loves you most says something that makes you feel shame — even when they don't mean it that way?

In this episode, we answer a question from Chase Club member Ashton, who's 31 weeks pregnant and navigating the emotional complexity of a husband who keeps checking in on her workouts.

We explore the gap between what someone actually says and the story we tell ourselves about it, why seasons of life demand fundamentally different things from us, and how to communicate your real needs clearly and without judgment.

...

Twenty tactics. Five factors. One episode worth pulling back from the archives.

In this replay, we walk through the four highest-leverage actions you can take in each of the five key areas of life — Move, Sleep, Eat, Think, and Connect — and unpack the why behind each one.

Drift is the enemy of excellence, and this episode is one of the sharpest tools we've built to fight it. You'll leave with a concrete checklist of daily behaviors designed to close the gap between where you are and where you want to be.

👉🏼 Get the full Liste...

What if the thing overwhelming your kids isn't screens — it's a culture of too much?

In this episode, Patrick sits down with Kim John Payne, author of Simplicity Parenting, to explore why children today are exhibiting what used to be considered trauma responses, and what parents can actually do about it.

We explore the five causes of childhood overwhelm, why the antidote starts with the parents — not the kids — and how defining "enoughness" for yourself is the most powerful act of social activism a parent can make.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

❤️‍🔥 Fr...

Is the label "high performer" quietly holding you back from becoming one?

In this episode, Patrick unpacks four lessons from the 21-day High Performance Challenge — and makes the case that high performance isn't a status reserved for athletes and CEOs. It's a set of actions anyone can adopt.

From Tony Robbins' "musts vs. shoulds" to Kobe Bryant's marathon gym session, we connect high performance to the core belief that true excellence is something we pursue for others, not for ourselves.

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & the Chase Club

👋 New to Chasing Excellence? Start here

See Priva...

What does it actually take to connect — with your kids, your partner, your community, and the strangers you meet every day?

In this episode, Ben answers five listener questions on the CONNECT factor, from parenting across different households to rebuilding friendships in your 40s and 50s.

You'll learn why kids become what they repeatedly experience (not what you tell them), how to distinguish a values divergence from a seasonal slump, why adult friendships require intention and initiative, how to create hope and agency in a loved one without becoming the health police, and which questions ac...

What if the problem isn't your program — it's how you're showing up for it?

In this episode, Ben and Jamison break down 10 training hygiene habits that can transform your results, regardless of what you're training for, where you train, or what program you follow.

From intentional intensity and the recovery-adaptation curve, to learning to breathe, filming yourself, and never negotiating mid-workout — these principles serve the Train factor in the Five Factors framework.

The goal isn't to do more. It's to finally get what you came for.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

What if the guilt you're calling loyalty is the very thing keeping you stuck?

In this episode, we answer a question from Chase Club member Mike about whether to switch gyms — and it turns out, it's not really about gyms at all.

We unpack the difference between loyalty (a choice) and guilt (a feeling), explore the three pillars that make any community worth staying in, and give you a framework for knowing when it's time to move on — and how to do it with integrity.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & t...

What if raising a child well means releasing your vision of who they're supposed to become — and learning instead to see who they actually are?

Patrick is joined this week by Christina Watka, an installation artist whose entire practice is built around entering a space without a plan, noticing what's there, and letting the work lead.

In this Raise episode, they explore how that same artistic openness transforms the way you parent: the role of noticing, the power of solitude, and what it means to receive your children instead of trying to shape them.

...

High performance isn't a talent — it's a system.

This week, we bring together three of our most foundational conversations to show you exactly what that system looks like in practice.

From the two non-negotiables that underpin every kind of success, to the five specific characteristics we see in every high performer we've ever met, to the seven quiet habits that keep most people from closing the gap — this is the raw material behind our new 21-Day High Performance Challenge.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & the Chase Club

👋 New to Chasing...

What if high performance at work isn't a talent you either have or don't — but a system you can practice starting today?

In this episode, Patrick introduces the 21-Day High Performance Challenge and walks through the five interdependent characteristics that, together, make up a practice for doing the right things at the highest level you're capable of.

We connect this system to the Five Factors of health you already know — because drift, the quiet enemy of excellence, doesn't just happen to your body. It happens to your work, too. And these five characteristics are how you...

What does it look like to go from 500 pounds to a CrossFit coach - not out of inspiration, but because fear was the only thing in the room?

In this episode, Jamison sits down with Athena Perez: affiliate owner, coach, and author of a two-part memoir about identity, worth, and what fitness spaces get dangerously wrong.

We explore how compounding habits shape who we become long before we notice, why a 40-day fast became Athena's clearest window into emotional eating and genuine purpose, and why placing people on pedestals - in the gym or anywhere...

Every parent who cares about health eventually hits this wall: your kids don't want to do what you know is good for them — and the more you push, the harder they pull away.

In this episode, we tackle Chase Club member Brendan's question about getting his 16-year-old son and 13-year-old daughter to move consistently, despite shared custody.

We dig into why the modeling you do today isn't for the teenager in front of you — it's for the 26-year-old they'll become. We explore the power of structured environments over parent-led training, how external rewards bridge to inte...

What if becoming extraordinary isn't really about your own habits — it's about the habits you build that make everyone around you better?

In this episode, we sit down with Jon Gordon, author of 33 books and 18 bestsellers, to explore seven habits that transform ordinary people into the kind of person others genuinely want to be around.

We explore how the ratio of positive to negative interactions determines whether your relationships thrive, why shouting praise and whispering criticism builds deeper trust than you'd expect, and how the abundance mindset — giving freely, making the pie bigger, winning the pers...

What if your triggers aren't random — they're a map back to yourself?

In this close-out episode, Patrick reflects on the 21-day trigger challenge with two reframes that change everything: the tug of war between wants and reality, and the difference between surface triggers (your mental dojo) and the serious ones rooted in your own history.

Learn why the fastest road to context-independent peace of mind runs through accepting reality — not fighting it — and why turning the spotlight on your triggers is the first step to responding instead of reacting.

👉🏼 Get the full 21-Day Trigger Chal...

What if the key to being capable at 75 isn't training harder — it's training more completely?

In this episode, we introduce the Heavy, Fast, Far, and Free framework: a simple weekly approach to strength, power, endurance, and mobility that keeps every fitness bucket full.

You'll learn why power declines 10x faster than strength (and why that matters for staying formidable at any age), why VO2 max has a 400% greater impact on all-cause mortality than smoking does, and what the minimum effective dose looks like for each pillar.

If you want to be able to sa...

Coaches and mentors aren't essential — but they might be the best shortcut you'll ever find.

In this episode, we answer Chase Club member David's question about whether coaches need coaches, and explore how Ben has built three very different mentorship relationships, each running on a different value exchange.

You'll learn why reciprocity is the non-negotiable foundation of any real mentorship, and why curiosity, vulnerability, and patience are what you must bring as the mentee. Whether it's a paid business coach, a peer who trades expertise, or a friend who keeps you accountable — the best guidance alwa...

What if the reason you keep falling back on old habits isn't a lack of discipline — but a failure of persuasion?

In this episode, we sit down with New York Times bestselling author Jay Heinrichs to explore how ancient rhetoric holds the secret to becoming the person your best self already believes you can be.

You'll discover Aristotle's three-part framework for identity — craft, caring, and cause — and why shifting your self-talk from past-tense shame to future-tense action is the single most powerful lever for lasting change.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

❤️‍🔥 Free...

What if you didn't need a prescription to fix your testosterone — and what if training through surgery was simpler than you thought?

In this 5x5 episode, Ben answers five listener questions about training — covering HRT, surgery recovery, rucking, bite-sized movement for busy parents, and the essential home gym stack.

🙋🏼 Ask a question

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & the Chase Club

👋 New to Chasing Excellence? Start here

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-i

What if the most powerful thing you can do for your kids' emotional health is regulate yourself first?

In this episode of our Raise series, Patrick sits down with Jenna Cain — a pediatric physical therapist, Level 3 Enlifted coach, and mother of two — to explore why the nervous system of the adult in the room determines what's possible for the child in front of them.

We dig into why asking questions beats giving answers, how language shapes identity, and the simple daily practices that build psychological and emotional immunity in kids long before the crisis hits.

Ryan Rivard went from a homeless overdose survivor at 19 to summiting Mount Everest at 40 — and the most powerful thing he learned is that neither rock bottom nor the summit was the point.

We explore how gratitude transforms daily life, why everyone is recovering from something, and why the person showing up at work needs to be the same one your family gets at home.

Ryan walks us through the Dodek Method — a 12-dimensional operating system for aligned achievement that rewires how you move, think, connect, and execute, so success stops costing you yourself.

👉🏼 Get the fu...

As we age, the Five Factors don't disappear — they shift. And most people wait until something breaks before they start paying attention.

Answering a Chase Club member’s question, we break down exactly how to adjust how we train, eat, sleep, think, and connect across each decade of life — and why the most dangerous thing isn't aging itself, it's the drift that comes with it.

You'll walk away with a clear framework for fighting back against the declines that are real (and faster than you think), protecting the things that matter most, and using more intent...

We're launching a 21-Day Trigger Challenge: a structured daily practice built around five pillars (trigger identification, recovery speed, response vs. reaction, regulation strategies, and self-compassion) designed to shorten the gap between stimulus and choice.

Whether you join the Chase Club, use the ChaseTracker app, or rely on nothing but a notebook and three questions at the end of each day, this challenge is an invitation to start chasing our highest goal: context-independent peace of mind.

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & the Chase Club

👋 New to Chasing Excellence? Start here

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/pri...

What does it actually mean to be fit for life — not just for a competition, a season, or a phase?

In this episode, Ben, Cole, and Jamison unpack six foundational principles for anyone who wants to build fitness that serves them today, tomorrow, and forever. You'll walk away with a clear framework for training with sustainable effort, building real-world capability, and stacking weeks and months into compounding progress.

This is the Health pillar in its most practical form: fitness not as the goal, but as the foundation for everything that matters.

👉🏼 Get the full Lis...

In the first of our new 5x5 series, Ben takes five listener questions on the THINK factor, covering growth mindset, the Fragmented → Focused → Flow framework, and the distillation process behind the CE frameworks we talk about all the time.

You'll walk away with a clear process for building a growth mindset in others, a new approach to retaining what you read and listen to, and a reframe on why letting go is the highest-effort move you can make at home.

👉🏼 Get the full Listener's Guide here

🙋🏻‍♂️ Send us a Question

❤️‍🔥 Free Newsletter & the Chase Club