Performance-enhancing drugs and hormones: risks, rewards, and broader implications for the public | Derek: More Plates, More Dates

**Peter Attia** (0:11)
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My guest this week is Derek from More Plates, More Dates. Derek is a fitness educator and entrepreneur behind the More Plates, More Dates, YouTube channel, podcast and companion website. I've been following Derek now for a couple of years, and I have always found him to be very thorough in his analysis and assessment of areas that are very difficult to get insight into from the mainstream channels by which we would go about searching for insights, for example, using published literature.
Derek in particular has a lot of expertise around molecules and the types of molecules that are both used and abused by bodybuilders and athletes. And a lot of our discussion today focuses on that. By way of background, Derek himself is heavily into bodybuilding, fitness, and talks very openly about his past use with performance enhancing drugs and his real interest in understanding the science around these things. So we really cover these things in great detail, and you might be asking, well, why is this relevant to a general audience? I think it's because not a day goes by when I don't get at least one patient asking me a question about one of these compounds. And the compounds I'm referring to, of course, include things like growth hormone, testosterone, HCG, androgens, other hormones, SARMs, SERMs, peptides, oh my God, don't get me started on peptides, Clomid, estrogen, and much more. So throughout this conversation, we look a lot at how bodybuilders are using these compounds, because bodybuilders use them in the highest amounts. They'd also talk very openly about these things. And then we ask the question, what can we learn about this for the general population? Are these things all bad, carte blanche, or is there some nuance to this that we can understand? This interview with Derek really is a part one, because we just don't get through most of what I want to cover. So we'll likely be doing this, and there'll be a part two, hopefully in the not too distant future. So without further delay, please enjoy my conversation with Derek.
Derek, awesome to have you here. Thank you for swinging by, Austin. I know it's a little bit out of the way for you, and great to meet you in person. We've had a lot of communications over email and text, but.

**Derek** (3:22)
You as well, thanks for having me.

**Peter Attia** (3:24)
Let's give people a little bit of background on you, and maybe how you've come to know a lot about stuff that's awfully technical actually.
So I don't know much about you, or I'll pretend I don't know much about you, other than that we share the same nationality, and that you're a fellow Canuck. So tell me about yourself growing up.

**Derek** (3:41)
Yeah, so I am from the west coast of Canada, born and raised Vancouver, British Columbia. How do you summarize childhood? How far do you want me to go?

**Peter Attia** (3:52)
First of all, when did you get interested in lifting weights, nutrition? When did the topics that you now have pretty significant expertise in start to become a passion of yours?

**Derek** (4:02)
Probably grade 11 I don't know if in the US., seriously.

**Peter Attia** (4:06)
We call it 11th grade or junior year, but yes, continue.

**Derek** (4:10)
That one.

**Peter Attia** (4:11)
I can translate between the two.

**Derek** (4:13)
So I was a rail, probably 130, I think 138 pounds at my same height, and basketball player, a lot of my friends were getting into working out, putting on muscle, and I was the last one to get into it, and they were heavily encouraging me.
I was the only one who was left out if I didn't start. So I thought, okay, well, I might as well join, and I have nothing to lose by putting on some weights because I was pretty damn skinny at the time.