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How NASA's Artemis II Astronauts Maintain Muscle Flying to the Moon · Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40

• 0:00
  Philip Pape: Hey, this is Philip, and it's Monday, April 6th.
• 0:02
  Philip Pape: Quick bonus episode because I want to nerd out on something happening right now that I think anybody interested in space, but also strength and nutrition will appreciate.
• 0:12
  Philip Pape: So NASA's Artemis II mission launched on April 1st.
• 0:17
  Philip Pape: Four astronauts, 10 days flying around the moon for the first time since 1972.
• 0:23
  Philip Pape: And as of today, they're going to be doing their lunar flyby around the far side of the moon.
• 0:29
  Philip Pape: And I've been following the mission details because I love this stuff.
• 0:32
  Philip Pape: I'm in I've been in aerospace for many years myself.
• 0:35
  Philip Pape: And the exercise and nutrition setup is a nice little case study for what we talk about on the show.
• 0:41
  Philip Pape: And I just want to kind of go through what I read I've read up about it in case you weren't aware.
• 0:46
  Philip Pape: So let me tell you what's on board.
• 0:47
  Philip Pape: The Orion capsule, remember the mission Artemis II, the Orion capsule where the astronauts are on, it's it's like the size of a large SUV.
• 0:56
  Philip Pape: Four people are in the capsule.
• 0:58
  Philip Pape: They live there for 10 days.
• 1:00
  Philip Pape: And if you compare it to like the International Space Station, which has a ton of equipment, including 4,000 pounds of exercise equipment, like a treadmill, a stationary bike, a very large resistance device.
• 1:14
  Philip Pape: Orion is tiny, right?
• 1:15
  Philip Pape: So they can't, they don't have the room to fit that kind of stuff.
• 1:17
  Philip Pape: So what they do have is this flywheel device.
• 1:20
  Philip Pape: And I remember seeing it on TV and they were demonstrating it.
• 1:23
  Philip Pape: I'm like, oh, this is pretty cool.
• 1:24
  Philip Pape: How do they maintain their muscle in space?
• 1:26
  Philip Pape: Because one of the fears I would have of going to Mars, let alone just the moon, is you know, losing all that muscle mass.
• 1:34
  Philip Pape: And this flywheel device weighs 30 pounds.
• 1:37
  Philip Pape: It's the size of like a carry-on suitcase.
• 1:40
  Philip Pape: And they keep it under the capsule door and it doubles as a step for the crew to get in and out of the spacecraft.
• 1:47
  Philip Pape: So I love how they reuse things for multiple purposes.
• 1:49
  Philip Pape: And that's all they have.
• 1:50
  Philip Pape: That's all they have.
• 1:51
  Philip Pape: But what it does is it allows them to do squats, deadlifts, and rows.
• 1:55
  Philip Pape: So think of it as a cable-based mechanism, kind of like a yo-yo.
• 2:00
  Philip Pape: Again, it has a flywheel, and it re-the resistance is proportional to how hard you pull.
• 2:06
  Philip Pape: So it goes, it can apparently go up to about 400 pounds of load.
• 2:10
  Philip Pape: And the crew does 30-minute sessions almost every day.
• 2:13
  Philip Pape: So NASA is, you know, very innovative when it comes to this stuff.
• 2:18
  Philip Pape: And they had to answer the question look, if we could only bring something small, a small piece of equipment, given that every pound of weight costs thousands of dollars to launch into space, what's the minimum that we need to keep four humans strong enough to survive re-entry?
• 2:33
  Philip Pape: And again, this is only a 10-day mission.
• 2:35
  Philip Pape: This isn't like going to Mars.
• 2:36
  Philip Pape: But still, the answer here was, hey, let's make sure they are lifting weights.
• 2:40
  Philip Pape: They're doing compound movements, which we love squats, deadlifts, rows.
• 2:44
  Philip Pape: It's not a treadmill or Peloton or leg extension or anything like that, which you may have seen on other missions.
• 2:50
  Philip Pape: You may have seen them doing lots of running or even running with like resistance on them.
• 2:54
  Philip Pape: But these are just lifting, you know, compound lifts.
• 2:57
  Philip Pape: Because in microgravity, you lose muscle and bone density really quickly.
• 3:02
  Philip Pape: Again, that's why I'm afraid of ever going into space, let alone the other reasons.
• 3:06
  Philip Pape: So your body is in a micro, in a lack of gravity environment.
• 3:10
  Philip Pape: So of course, it doesn't have any resistance like it normally has on Earth.
• 3:15
  Philip Pape: And you're trying to tell it, hey, I still need this, and give it the signal you need through mechanical loading, which is the same signal your body would respond to on Earth, except you'd have the extra weight as well.
• 3:27
  Philip Pape: So if you are older and you're listening to this, if you're over 40 and you want to preserve muscle and bone density and metabolic health, the stimulus, it's an extreme example of what we need to do.
• 3:38
  Philip Pape: Whether you're in orbit or you're doing it yourself in your basement gym, heavy compound lifts.
• 3:43
  Philip Pape: And I like that it goes up to 400 pounds.
• 3:45
  Philip Pape: I don't know, again, if it's a continuous load, kind of kind of like a cable machine, but I imagine that it is.
• 3:50
  Philip Pape: Now, to complement this, they have an interesting food situation.
• 3:54
  Philip Pape: My daughters and I were watching the live feed on YouTube and watching them drink their water out of the bag.
• 3:59
  Philip Pape: And then they and the uh mission control was like, okay, now we're gonna do some sort of snack situation.
• 4:04
  Philip Pape: I don't I didn't listen long enough, but they were specifically prescribing how they were gonna eat their snacks because everything they're doing up there is an experiment as well.
• 4:12
  Philip Pape: So they want to see how astronauts fit can fare long term with these different things.
• 4:17
  Philip Pape: And I'm not even gonna get started on the fact that their toilet is broken.
• 4:20
  Philip Pape: But if you think about a space capsule, you don't have a refrigerator, there's no ability to resupply, you can't really have fresh food, everything you have to eat was packaged before launch.
• 4:29
  Philip Pape: You know, think astronaut food, like shelf stable, it's stabilized against temperature, they have to irradiate it, they have to freeze dry it, all that.
• 4:38
  Philip Pape: Then they have this water dispenser to rehydrate their meals, and then they have this little like briefcase-sized food warmer, even though I think most of the food is not warmed up, most of it's eaten at room temperature.
• 4:49
  Philip Pape: But then they have this menu.
• 4:50
  Philip Pape: They've posted on their ex account, NASA has some infographics with what they eat.
• 4:55
  Philip Pape: And there's like 189 items: vegetable quiche, scrambled eggs, barbecue brisket.
• 5:00
  Philip Pape: That's the one that stood out at me.
• 5:01
  Philip Pape: They probably fight over that one.
• 5:03
  Philip Pape: Mac and cheese, there's couscous with nuts, there's 58 tortillas because tortillas don't make crumbs, and you don't want clums, crumbs like floating around a spacecraft.
• 5:13
  Philip Pape: So they don't have bread, things like that.
• 5:15
  Philip Pape: But what's cool is they have food scientists in NASA that build each crew member a daily menu to hit their calorie targets, their hydration, their nutrient needs.
• 5:26
  Philip Pape: And they had the astronauts taste and rate everything during the pre-flight testing.
• 5:31
  Philip Pape: And then they asked them what they like the most.
• 5:34
  Philip Pape: Like, what are your preferences?
• 5:35
  Philip Pape: And it got balanced against the nutritional requirements of what the spacecraft could carry.
• 5:40
  Philip Pape: So, you know, that appeals to me as well, because that's kind of the essence of nutrition coaching.
• 5:43
  Philip Pape: It's like you've got to have your calorie macro targets, then you match them to the constraints of the real world, whatever that is for you, and then build a plan you're gonna follow because you actually like the food and you don't want to get sick and tired of the food.
• 5:55
  Philip Pape: The constraint that NASA just happens to have is, well, we don't have a refrigerator and we're also a quarter million miles from the next grocery store.
• 6:02
  Philip Pape: Whereas you have a kitchen and a car most likely, and have easier constraints than that.
• 6:07
  Philip Pape: And, you know, they don't have anything that I could tell, like any superfood, like special powders.
• 6:11
  Philip Pape: They don't have any special nutrient timing or anything like that.
• 6:14
  Philip Pape: That although they might have a schedule that I'm not aware of.
• 6:18
  Philip Pape: But it's a it's a very rigorous, constraint-based, evidence-based approach related to human performance in different environments.
• 6:27
  Philip Pape: And of course, they said, look, we need to keep you strong.
• 6:29
  Philip Pape: We need to give you enough protein, enough calories so that you can function, so you can have energy in this like really crazy environment that's gonna do a number on your muscle and bone.
• 6:38
  Philip Pape: So I just wanted to nerd out on that, guys.
• 6:40
  Philip Pape: I hope you found that interesting.
• 6:42
  Philip Pape: I guess we we can be grateful we're here on Earth and we don't need special equipment or you know, freeze-dried astronaut food.
• 6:48
  Philip Pape: We just need to do what we need to make progress and track and adjust and all that.
• 6:53
  Philip Pape: But regardless, go ahead and share this episode with a friend if you thought it was cool, if you thought it was interesting, or just reach out, say hello, or just move on with your day and then catch our normal, our next normal episode tomorrow.
• 7:05
  Philip Pape: If you enjoyed it, share it with somebody who gets a kick out of out of nerding out or the space angle, or hey, you know, maybe it motivates them to work out.
• 7:12
  Philip Pape: I don't know.
• 7:13
  Philip Pape: If you're new here, this is wits and weights.
• 7:15
  Philip Pape: I drop episodes right now every Tuesday and Thursday on strength training, nutrition, you know, building a physique using evidence as opposed to all the trends and the hype out there that just don't work.
• 7:23
  Philip Pape: And we tie we try to take, break apart a piece of fitness advice on every episode, examine it, and then tell you what really works and how to implement it in your life.
• 7:32
  Philip Pape: Go ahead and hit follow, please, so you don't miss the next episode.
• 7:36
  Philip Pape: And until next time, keep using your wits, lifting those weights.
• 7:39
  Philip Pape: And look, if compound lifts and having enough protein and calories are good enough for a trip around the moon, then they're good enough for your average Tuesday here on Earth.
• 7:48
  Philip Pape: I'm Philip Pape, and I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits and Weights podcast.