I love podcasts. They might be my favorite part of the Internet revolution. World-class lectures on every topic. Interviews with experts from every field. Hilarious comics ripping on each other. And it’s all free. Today, I’m going to list some of the health podcasts I’m enjoying lately.
First, check out the post I did several years back. All those podcasts are still great, and you should still listen to them. But as the movement has grown, so has the stable of health podcasts. It’s impossible to keep up with all of them, but it’s fun trying.
Here are a few I’m digging lately.
Primal Blueprint Podcast
It might be shameless self-promotion, but I love what my team does. Primal Blueprint Podcast host Elle Russ always serves up great conversation no matter who she’s interviewing each week. You’ll find me there periodically, too, either talking with Elle about a new book or project or acting as host myself, as I did this week with Chris Kresser.
While we’re on the subject, I’ll mention that soon I’ll be announcing a new podcast that’s currently in the works…. Details to come after Thanksgiving.
Bee the Wellness
I go way back with Bee the Wellness hosts Adam and Vanessa Lambert. They were featured presenters at PrimalCon. Vanessa worked with us doing expert consultations for clients. And we’re good friends. For the past few years, they’ve been making big waves in the ancestral health community with Bee the Wellness, a company devoted to providing health and fitness coaching and running paleo retreats all over the world.
They cover traditional “Primal” topics like health, fitness, and nutrition but also branch out into more esoteric arenas, including Burning Man, shamanism, life coaching, body work, and plenty more. There’s something for almost everyone.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The Joe Rogan Experience isn’t exclusively (or even primarily) a health podcast, but the health and fitness guests he has on are top notch (and the other guests are great too). I’ve been on the podcast. Robb Wolf has. Chris Kresser was just on. What’s great about the JRE is that the interviews run long, so you can really get into some deep conversations.
Paleo Magazine Radio
By entering the physical magazine space—and not just surviving, but thriving—Paleo Magazine has broken new ground. Hats off to them. Meatspace is tough. Their podcast, Paleo Magazine Radio is just as impressive.
Bonus: The host of the show, Ashleigh VanHouten, is a certified Primal Health Coach. You can learn more about her and connect with her by visiting her Primal Health Coach directory page here.
Renegade Radio with Jay Ferruggia
Jay is a world-famous fitness professional. His show, Renegade Radio with Jay Ferruggia, focuses on fitness and health but, as tends to happen whenever you try to optimize your physical health, he’s expanded to encompass mental and psychological health. In short, he wants to help people become their best, most actualized selves. He pulls together some of the best and biggest names in the health, fitness, diet, and business worlds to help listeners achieve exactly that.
My longtime writing partner, friend, and Primal Endurance Podcast host Brad Kearns covers the best around endurance training (he’s offers a great post-season rundown for rest and recovery), but he doesn’t stop there with subject matter. Everything’s game with Brad, and the podcasts never disappoint. I get a lot of questions about fitness in later decades, and for many of those interests, I’d recommend episode #117, “Scaring the Crap Out of Older Athletes” in which Brad takes up questions from older endurance athletes to cover the importance of recovery and a reframe of fitness and competition goals.
Primal Potential
Sometimes you don’t want to buckle up for a 3-hour epic podcast. Sometimes you want little nuggets of truth, wisdom, and advice. The Primal Potential podcast provides exactly that: 10-20 minute episodes full of tips for losing weight, staying motivated, following your dream, and pretty much anything else related to health and self-improvement. They occasionally run longer, like when I showed up to talk about keto.
Optimize Paleo
Chas and Autumn Smith are a husband and wife duo who love talking to health and fitness experts. Luckily for us, they record these chats and upload them to iTunes for Optimize Paleo almost every week. On top of that, they make some great paleo products.
Failure is a dirty word in our society. It shouldn’t be. Failure is a learning opportunity. It tells you exactly what not to do, what doesn’t work, and by process of elimination it improves your chances of getting things right the next time. So when I was asked to be on the Failure Factor Podcast to talk about what I’ve learned from my failures, I jumped at the chance. It turns out the rest of the podcast is fascinating, too.
Iron Radio
If you’re at all interested in strength training, bodybuilding, or powerlifting, you’ll want to subscribe to Iron Radio. This certainly isn’t a Primal or paleo podcast, but it will help you get stronger, faster, leaner, and more powerful.
The First 40 Miles
I don’t get to go on as many long hikes or backpacking trips as I’d like, but it’s great to hear from people who do. The First 40 Miles is a backpacking and hiking podcast full of hacks for making your experience out in the wild more satisfying, adventurous, safe, and fulfilling. I’m not one to go for “hacks,” as you well know. But these are hacks that enrich the experience, not shortchange it. So, I’m totally on board.
That’s it for today, folks. You know what to do: What are your favorite health podcasts? What are your favorite podcasts that have nothing to do at all with health?
Mark Sisson is the founder of Mark’s Daily Apple, godfather to the Primal food and lifestyle movement, and the New York Times bestselling author of The Keto Reset Diet. His latest book is Keto for Life, where he discusses how he combines the keto diet with a Primal lifestyle for optimal health and longevity. Mark is the author of numerous other books as well, including The Primal Blueprint, which was credited with turbocharging the growth of the primal/paleo movement back in 2009. After spending three decades researching and educating folks on why food is the key component to achieving and maintaining optimal wellness, Mark launched Primal Kitchen, a real-food company that creates Primal/paleo, keto, and Whole30-friendly kitchen staples.