The thing is, my dad, when he was at his peak of competitive strength, he was benching 600 pounds. He was squatting 1,000 pounds. He was deadlifting hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of pounds. But, on multiple occasions when I was telling him about what I was doing in the gym, he was like, “Even when I was at my peak, I could never do a pull-up, not a single one.” I was like, “Man, you can have so much strength, but if you can’t control your own body weight fully..” You know what I mean?

Yeah, you’re kind of useless.

There’s a weakness there. Maybe you can still bench 500 if you want to, but if you can’t pull your own body up, there’s something to that. I feel more comfortable in my own body knowing that I can do that, than I would if I woke up and I was like, “Yeah, I could bench 500 pounds.”

Did you listen to music during the Spartan Race?

No, I was totally music free. Some people, if they run the whole thing, they’re getting through in a little over an hour. But it took me a while to get through the entire thing, just because I was really taking my sweet time. On top of it, from what I understand, it was one of the more gnarly Spartan Races. I guess at the one that we had, there’s more mud. There’s even a thing that you have to submerge yourself in and go under. It was a whole water obstacle.

Oh, so headphones would complicate things.

Exactly. We had to totally submerge ourselves in mud. So they’ve got mud, barbed wire, water obstacles, stuff like that. I passed through, but headphones would have definitely complicated things.

What do you normally listen to in the gym?

A lot of the time, I’ll be listening to stuff that I got to review, or I’ll be listening to a podcast. But if I’m just looking for a jolt, it’ll be something loud. I’ve been enjoying the new Hives album. That’s been sounding pretty good when I’m working out, or maybe a Westside Gunn record or something like that, some Griselda stuff, or some Wu-Tang, that sort of thing.

I have one more question about the Spartan Race. Who was the woman on your shirt?

That’s Barbara Mandrell. She’s a country singer. I picked up that shirt, I think, when I was in college. I got a lot of awesome ass shirts during that time period, and that is one of my favorite shirts. The material’s really good, I think the print is really funny. There are a few Barbara Mandrell songs that I like for anybody. I recommend the song “I Was Country When Country Wasn’t Cool,” it’s this cute song about how she was into country music before it had a trendy commercial moment.

I wanted to ask you about the mental side of the health equation, as someone who lives a pretty public-facing life on the internet. I’m sure you have a different take on what people say about you now than you did five, 10, or 15 years ago.

I don’t think I would be where I am if it wasn’t for my exercise regimen. It’s a great outlet, a great way to blow off steam. On top of it, it’s just a great way for me to take the edge off of stress that I might be dealing with as a result of dramas that are coming out of my job, opinions that I have, or whatever crap. On top of it, there’s the added fact that I am on camera all the time. I’m always confronting and always contending with the way that I look and the way other people perceive me all the time.