We had the amazing opportunity to catch up with the one and only Dr. Mike T. Nelson at the Arnold this year! Dr. Nelson was one of our highest downloaded episodes last year when we talked about metabolic flexibility during our nutrition deep dive. This time we brought him back to dive into another area of passion for Mike, the autonomic nervous system.

Time Stamps

How did he get into studying HRV, metabolic flexibility and the autonomic nervous system? [3:15]
What is an example of someone who is starting to lose their heart rate variability? [11:03]
What are some of the implications, short term, as far as performance and stress? [13:02]
What are some of the most obvious implications of improved HRV? [17:30]
Does he have some progressive strategies that he implements to train people to be able to push their sympathetic/parasympathetic nervous system higher? [20:46]
In his studies, what did he learn about the autonomic nervous system from his subjects? [26:16]
How does HRV influence someone’s training? What training they should be doing? [32:26]
Tips to balance lifestyle stressors with training. [37:06]
Why your perception is EVERYTHING on how things impact you. [42:46]
Does he change nutritional interventions based on their HRV levels? [47:46]
If someone has high sympathetic stress and low HRV, can we deduce that cortisol will always be high? [53:50]
Does he have any supplemental interventions to manage cortisol and stress? [56:43]
How fitness is a culture of extremes. [1:02:55]
What has he seen fasting do to HRV? [1:09:42]
Does he think that HRV is correlated with body composition? [1:12:38]
How much are estrogen and testosterone playing into HRV? [1:13:45]
What else SHOULD the listener know about the autonomic nervous system? [1:15:46]
Has he done any digging into the correlation of capnography and the autonomic nervous system? [1:21:42]

Featured Guest

Dr. Mike T Nelson (@drmiketnelson) • Instagram
Website
Flex Diet

Related Links/Products Mentioned

People Mentioned

Rick Hanson (@rickhansonphd) • Instagram
Dan Pardi (@danielpardi) • Instagram
Dr. Rhonda Patrick (@foundmyfitness) • Instagram
Wim Hof (@iceman_hof) • Instagram
Brian Mackenzie (@_brianmackenzie) • Instagram

013- Releasing the Gas and Applying the Brake- The Autonomic Nervous System's Effect on HRV, Lifestyle and Performance with Dr. Mike T Nelson