Living his best life ❤️

"For us, he was our rock, our guide and our shield. We miss him more than words can say." ❤️ An inspirational captain. A devoted family man. A much-loved friend. In a moving tribute, Matt Salter's wife Charlie, former head coach Richard Hill and former teammates share their memories of a remarkable man, and how his legacy will live on through the Matt Salter Foundation. Read an extract from this heartfelt feature now, with the full story appearing in Friday's special edition Legends Night matchday programme. 📖 Available to buy at Ashton Gate on Friday night for £5. bristolbearsrugby.com/news/m…

June 6, 1944. An American paratrooper jumps into Normandy in the dark and lands on the roof of a church. By the end of the war he had been declared dead, held a funeral he didn't attend, escaped the Nazis, and fought his way toward Berlin in a Soviet tank unit. His name was Joseph Beyrle. He's believed to be the only American soldier to serve in both the US Army and the Red Army during World War Two. Beyrle was from Muskegon, Michigan. He joined the 101st Airborne, the Screaming Eagles. His buddies called him Jumpin' Joe. On D-Day night his plane was hit by flak and he jumped early. He came down on a church roof, slid off, and lost his unit in the chaos. For a few days he fought on his own, blowing up a power station and cutting German communications. Then he was captured. Here's where it gets strange. A German soldier ended up wearing Beyrle's uniform and dog tags. That German was killed. When the body was found, the Americans identified it as Joseph Beyrle. The army told his parents their son was dead. His hometown held a funeral mass for him. His obituary ran in the local paper. Meanwhile, he was very much alive, being moved from one German prison camp to another. He escaped more than once. One time he and two other prisoners jumped off a train heading east. They thought they were heading for Russia and freedom. They got lost and ended up in Berlin, where they were caught by the Gestapo, beaten, and tortured. In January 1945, from a camp in eastern Germany, he finally made a clean escape. He went east, toward the gunfire. Toward the Soviets. When he found a Soviet tank unit, he walked out with his hands up, holding a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes, and shouted the only Russian he knew. American comrade. It worked. He asked to join them. And they said yes. For about a month, an American paratrooper rode with Soviet tank crews as they pushed toward Germany. He used his demolition training. He fought. He was reportedly welcomed by a Soviet officer who was one of the rare women commanding a tank battalion. Then a German dive bomber attacked. Beyrle was badly wounded. He was evacuated to a Soviet hospital. Soviet Marshal Georgy Zhukov reportedly visited, heard his story, and gave him papers to get to the American embassy in Moscow. When he showed up, the embassy didn't believe him. As far as the US was concerned, Joseph Beyrle was dead. They held him under guard until his fingerprints proved who he was. He made it home to Michigan in April 1945. In 1946 he got married. In the same church where they'd held his funeral. Decades later, in 1994, he was honored at the White House by President Bill Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin for serving both countries. And the last twist. His son, Joseph Beyrle II, grew up to become the United States Ambassador to Russia.

Speak to any hard-bitten older farmer around me in Somerset, or anywhere in Britain, and they will tell you that they grew up among fields teeming with corncrakes, grass snakes, hares, hedges full of yellowhammers and other songbirds, car windscreens splattered with bugs after the shortest summer drive, nearly all now gone. 98% of wildflowers, gone. Huge shoals of herring, cod, and other fish in the sea, a distant memory. Across almost every indicator, the losses during just one human lifetime have been catastrophic. The data is all there, as are the anecdotes. Britain is among the most nature-depleted countries on earth.

Two episodes of “The Ancients” podcast with Prof Chris Stringer. “Origins of Homo Sapiens” and “Rise of Humans”. Really worth a listen if the below interests you. (He’s a regularly a guest and could make any subject interesting).

Thanks @CJRugbyPhysio for the book. Looking forward to reading it 💪🏼💪🏼

Steve Ford scored a club record 198 tries from 234 appearances for Cardiff, but his Arms Park career almost ended after two matches at the age of 21. Here’s my interview with him as he tells his remarkable tale. zee-on.com/article/player-fe…

Saddened to hear about the death of Darryl Jones. Had so much influence on my rugby and life. I loved being coached by him as a teenager. Condolences and love to his family 💔

Ian Winship with an inspirational run at the age of 90 ‼️ The Scottish Masters athlete, who served as a paratrooper during the 1956 Suez Crisis, completed the 10km course in his hometown of Cumbernauld in 64:37 (chip time). Winship ran with his daughter Fiona Fleming and grandson Kyle Fleming [of Kirkintilloch Olympians] and bettered Gordon Porteous' British M90 10km mark of 67:02 from 2004. His grandson states that he walks 20,000 steps a day and wants to live to 100. 📸 @scotathletics

Performance and physiological responses to repeated-sprint exercise: a novel multiple-set approach buff.ly/QRIQfu3

Testosterone decline is blamed on aging. A new study analyzing nearly 5,000 men found age explains only 2.5% of testosterone variation. Body fat explains 18-20%. The difference matters clinically. Researchers at the U.S. Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine analyzed National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data from 2011-2016. They included men aged 20 to 59 years with measured testosterone levels and body composition scans. The goal was to separate what actually drives testosterone decline: chronological aging or the body fat accumulation that typically accompanies aging. Key findings: • Age alone explained only 2.5% of testosterone variation across men • Total body fat percentage explained 18.2% of variation • Visceral fat (belly fat surrounding organs) explained 18.4% • Waist circumference explained 19.9%, slightly better than advanced imaging • These patterns held across multiple testosterone thresholds (300, 250, 200, 150 ng/dL) Think of this as explanatory power. If you only know a man's age, you can barely predict his testosterone level. If you know his waist circumference, you have 8 times more predictive information. The study measured body composition using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry, the same technology used for bone density scans. This provides precise measurements of total body fat percentage and visceral adipose tissue area. Visceral fat is the metabolically active fat stored around your abdominal organs. It's distinct from subcutaneous fat, the fat you can pinch under your skin. Visceral fat drives metabolic dysfunction through multiple pathways. How does body fat suppress testosterone? First, fat tissue contains aromatase, an enzyme that converts testosterone into estradiol. More fat means more conversion, lowering circulating testosterone. Second, visceral fat promotes insulin resistance. Insulin resistance reduces production of sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG) in the liver. SHBG is a protein that binds and transports testosterone in your blood. Lower SHBG means lower measured total testosterone. Third, visceral fat releases inflammatory molecules that suppress the hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal axis. This is the hormonal control system that signals your testes to produce testosterone. Chronic inflammation dampens this signaling. The relationship is bidirectional. Body fat suppresses testosterone. Low testosterone promotes fat accumulation by reducing lipolysis (fat breakdown) and allowing increased fat cell development. This creates a reinforcing cycle. Across every age group, men with testosterone below 300 ng/dL had substantially more body fat than men above that threshold. For men aged 30-39: • Low testosterone group: 30.3% body fat, 130.5 cm² visceral fat • Normal testosterone group: 26.4% body fat, 94.6 cm² visceral fat The body composition differences were larger and more consistent than age differences. Testosterone levels declined from ages 20-29 to 40-49, then plateaued at 50-59. This plateau occurred despite continued increases in body fat, suggesting that the testosterone suppression threshold is crossed primarily during midlife rather than progressively with aging. Waist circumference performed as well as advanced imaging for predicting testosterone levels. A waist circumference above 110-115 cm corresponds to visceral fat area above 300 cm², where predicted testosterone drops by more than 400 ng/dL compared to men with minimal visceral fat. This has practical implications. Clinicians can use a tape measure instead of expensive body composition scans to assess obesity-related testosterone suppression. The researchers also examined whether these associations persisted after accounting for SHBG. In models adjusted for SHBG, body fat remained inversely associated with testosterone. This indicates that fat suppresses testosterone both directly and through SHBG reduction. As always, we have some limitations of this study. The study is cross-sectional, meaning it captures a snapshot in time rather than tracking individuals over years. Why does this matter? This prevents establishing whether fat accumulation causes testosterone decline or whether low testosterone drives fat gain. The bidirectional nature of the relationship means both processes likely occur simultaneously, creating the reinforcing cycle described earlier. NHANES measured testosterone once, without confirmatory testing. Clinical hypogonadism requires repeat measurements, symptom assessment, and evaluation of other hormones. These findings describe biochemical testosterone concentrations, not clinical diagnoses. The study included only men aged 20-59 years. Findings may not apply to older men, where primary testicular aging may play a larger role independent of body composition. What does this mean clinically? Current guidelines recommend evaluating reversible causes before starting testosterone replacement therapy. In men with excess body fat, particularly visceral fat, addressing metabolic health and weight loss should be prioritized. Weight loss studies, including trials of GLP-1 receptor agonists like semaglutide and liraglutide, show that reducing adiposity can increase endogenous testosterone production. This supports a functional, potentially reversible suppression rather than permanent testicular failure. Experimental data reinforces this. Healthy lean men subjected to prolonged caloric restriction and high physical stress can experience testosterone decline to near-castrate levels, with rapid recovery upon refeeding. This demonstrates that testosterone suppression can represent an adaptive response to metabolic stress rather than irreversible dysfunction. The proliferation of direct-to-consumer testosterone therapy platforms raises concerns about inappropriate prescribing. If low testosterone is attributed to inevitable aging rather than modifiable metabolic factors, men may receive lifelong androgen therapy when lifestyle interventions could restore endogenous production. This matters for both individual health and population health. Testosterone therapy carries cardiovascular and behavioral risks. It suppresses natural production, creating dependence. If the underlying cause is reversible metabolic dysfunction, addressing that cause is preferable to pharmacologic replacement. The framework matters. If testosterone decline during adulthood primarily reflects the metabolic burden of excess adiposity rather than intrinsic gonadal aging, then the decisions made about physical activity, diet, and body composition in your 30s and 40s shape your hormonal status in your 50s and 60s. Body fat accumulation is not inevitable with aging. It reflects the cumulative balance between energy intake, expenditure, and metabolic health across decades. Maintaining lower body fat, particularly visceral fat, appears to preserve testosterone concentrations independent of chronological age. The study provides a quantitative framework for understanding what drives testosterone variation in adult men. Chronological aging contributes minimally. Body composition, particularly visceral adiposity, explains substantially more variation and represents a modifiable target for intervention.

蒙古国总统，100公斤，卧推20下，这简直太牛逼了！

Effects of Weekly Set Distribution on Volume Load, Lower-Body Strength, and Quadriceps Muscle Thickness in Trained Men ovid.com/10.1519/JSC.0000000…

My most recent article on Threshold versus VO2max Training. jamesgalanes.substack.com/p/…