On BiOptimizers' Awesome Health podcast I have the pleasure of bringing you some of the greatest contributors to the health, fitness and wellness world. And today's guest is a prime example: he is a world-renowned coach, former competitor and best-selling author. This man is an important guest for me as well; I wouldn't have a career in this industry if it weren't for him! In 1996 I first saw him speak and hired him as my coach a year later. Over the next 9 months with his coaching and guidance, I made the biggest transformation in my career. He helped me win a few national championships and compete at the Mr. Universe contest. I also spent time with him personally and saw his lifestyle as one of the world's premiere trainers, which inspired me to do the same thing. I'm so excited to have him on the BiOptimizers' Awesome Health podcast for episode 2, please join me in welcoming Scott Abel! More About Awesome Health with Scott Abel As someone who has coached over 400 titled champions at every level (including Olympic level), Scott Abel knows how to produce consistent results for his clients. He has a mind and a spirit for coaching and personal performance, physical as well as emotional, mental and spiritual. Unlike many coaches, he communicates with his clients at their level and in a way that is effective for them. Ultimately, Scott says coaching is about serving. When I asked how he has produced such remarkable results consistently, he explains there are two keys to doing so. The first is keeping his "horses" (his clients) thirsty. A lot of coaches want to lead their horses to water, but he believes his job is to keep his horse thirsty. So he was always looking for how his clients think, what they respond to, what is the best way to reach them and where is their self-esteem level. He also thinks the best of the best liked working with him because he always thought of himself as an athlete doing bodybuilding, not the bodybuilder everyone else saw him as. And by best of the best I mean people like Joe Gold, Bob Kennedy, Joe Weider, etc. As a coach he also looks at how to reach people, how to see and find their gifts, accentuate those without spending lots of time on their weaknesses. It's also about understanding what bodybuilding actually is (which most coaches don't understand to this day). It's about how to bring the person to their peak level at the right time at the right day, without a cookie cutter approach. Scott is known for many things, like the concept behind metabolic training and tenets of intervention training, etc. So I wanted to know how he has been able to continually innovate for four plus decades. He attributes much of it to his liberal arts education: they taught him HOW to learn, rather than what to learn. He has always been able to see the trend of what is next, rather than most coaches and trainers who look at what IS. He's been around since before females were actively competing in bodybuilding, which led to fitness competitions and then figure competitions and bikini competitions. He saw the trend of eating disorders and metabolic damage coming from that industry and his book, The Dangers of Dieting, was one of the ways he tried to do something about that. He soon realized that by participating in this industry he was part of the problem - the old adage if you aren't part of the solution you are part of the problem. In this particular instance he was trying to dissuade women from competing at all. Which of course begs the question: what was that experience like? What was it like for him to be at the top of the mountain, not like the view from that mountain and climb back down?  What was that journey like for him? Scott said he had come to a cross roads, he knew he was done with it. But this was before he had his own transformative experience, he realized he wasn't actualizing his talents and knew he was being lazy with the talents he was given. He was given a "booming message from beyond" that if h