Ladies and gentlemen, instructors, masters, parents, grandparents of Songam Taekwondo, welcome back to the ATA Nation podcast.

We are thrilled to be back with you for episode 133, starting 2025, another amazing year for Songam Taekwondo.

Let's get things rolling.

We have an awesome interview today, but before we get to that, how's your.

How was your holiday season?

How did you guys enjoy the time spent with family?

I had a great time spent with family.

I know we had some crazy stuff happen at the school we needed to get.

The furnace went out, and we had to get that.

But we did some remodeling, some.

Some work to make sure everything's up and going.

I hope you spent some time working on your goals for 2025.

I would love to hear those.

I would love to know what you've got going on.

And I've got a goal for you, something that I would love for you to take and run with.

Have you heard about the Belt Ambassador campaign going across all over ATA Nation?

This is where you bring a friend to class and you get then a wristband that is equal to the belt color of how many friends you've brought to class.

So you bring your first friend to class, you get a white wristband because you're a white belt belt ambassador, you get.

Bring a second friend, you get an orange belt.

Now, every school might be doing it a little bit different, but it's something similar to that.

The idea is that in 2024, we talked about going beyond the belt.

And, you know, Atas mission is to build champions beyond the belt.

And we want to help participate in that.

We want to be an ambassador to helping students go beyond the belt.

So this year, what I'm encouraging you to do, hopefully your ATA martial arts school is participating in the Belt Ambassador campaign.

If they're not, just talk to your instructor and be like, hey, what's this Belt Ambassador campaign thing?

Um, but if you are participating, we would love to really set goals as individual students to bring 2, 3, 4.

Can you become a Grand Master Belt Ambassador?

One of the things I'm really excited about this campaign is that there's going to be a leaderboard online each month where you'll be able to see you as an individual if you brought in the most compared to other, like, other students across the country.

So super excited about that.

Become a belt Ambassador today.

It's going to be a lot of fun.

Now we're going to get to our interview.

We've got Master Hines with us today talking about her supplements.

She's A pharmacist.

This is the perfect time to be thinking about our health and moving forward and setting those goals for our health.

So we want to make sure that we are doing that today.

Let's get to that interview.

ATA Nation.

I am super excited to have with us Master Sally Hines.

How are you, ma'am?

Doing great, sir.

How are you doing today?

I am great.

For those of you who might not know Master Hines, probably what you recognize her most from is picking people up on social media.

That's the thing.

Just lifting.

Lifting people up.

How did that become a thing real quick?

Uh, it actually.

It started with Senior Master Melanie Berkey.

Did it start with her?

Okay, yes.

And then.

I know, yes.

So, yeah, after that, it just kind of like.

Like, I started asking people, and at this point, people just asked me, so we do that.

It just snowballed, huh?

Yeah.

Well, let's go back in time.

Before that.

You are a master in the ata.

What got you started in martial arts?

Oh, my God.

I wanted to be a ninja Turtle back when I was, like, seven.

Which one's your favorite?

Leonardo.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I respect your choice.

I'm a Donatello guy, but.

Okay, okay.

A fair one.

Okay.

He's a techie dude, so I get that.

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Yeah.

But no.

So my parents put me into a program that was out of the local park district at the time, and it was an ata, and since then, I've.

I've had some ins and outs since with school and stuff, but never fully 100% less, so.

Very cool.

Just a matter of time.

And you said in and outs with school and stuff.

You.

You had a.

A lot of schooling, if I'm not mistaken.

Yes, sir.

What kind of schooling have you done?

Well, I'm a doctor of pharmacy, so, you know, that.

That.

That was for me.

It was three.

Three years of undergrad, four years of pharmacy school.

So, yeah, yeah, too much school for me.

Not.

Not for me.

I'm kicking people.

Okay, this is a random question.

I was listening to some podcast recently, and they were talking about how we would be better served if we utilized pharmacists more often in things.

Because what in the US we think of as pharmacists are like, I count how many pills to put in a bottle.

And then I do the thing where in other countries, I think I was talking, listening to somebody who might have been from England, Australia, somewhere else.

And they use their pharmacists as.

They consult with them, they talk with them, they get information from them.

We don't do that.

What's the deal?

Actually, we do do that, but you don't necessarily see them.

If you were to spend any time on, you know, being in the hospital, you would see the pharmacist being a part of the full medical team and doing consultations and the whole process.

Unfortunately, what majority of Americans think of as pharmacy is going to your corner pharmacy to get your prescriptions and maybe you ask them some questions every once in a while.

But, I mean, I spent a whole entire four years of pharma pharmacy school learning about drugs.

And I can tell you that most medical doctors get one class, one semester about drugs.

See, and that's what this, this podcast was really talking about.

How, you know, we go right to doctors to answer every question and, like, we would be better served sometimes to alleviate some of the.

The stress on the doctors, you know, to, to be able to go and talk to pharmacists more.

I mean, I know when I go and pick up my medicine, they're always like, do you want to talk to the pharmacist?

I'm like, why would I?

I don't need to talk to the pharmacist.

They gave me my medicine and whatnot.

But it makes a lot of sense.

So you've been in this, this pharmacy thing.

What, what drew you to.

To pharmacy, to that kind of work?

So I started working in the pharmacy as a tech technician right out of high school.

You know, that was my, My, my first in.

First kind of real job.

And it was part time.

And at the time I kind of thought I wanted to do pharmacy and ended up that, yes, I really did want to do.

Do pharmacy.

Most of my family's in the healthcare field.

So, you know, it was just kind of a matter of, you know, which.

Which healthcare field am I going to go into?

Really?

You knew you were in that field no matter what?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So how has it been, you know, all those years of schooling and still being a martial artist?

How do you balance that through the education?

Because we've got a lot of students, you know, who listen and watch whatnot that.

Are they.

They often are like, oh, I'm gonna go to college.

And then they're like, done with martial arts.

I'm just never, just never doing martial arts again.

And we know that you can still do martial arts some.

Yes.

And you're a master.

You know, you, you.

Even if you were off for a while, you picked it back up, how did you balance that?

Well, there, There was a lot of pairs periods of time where I would be training a lot, which was usually at the beginning of the school semester.

And then as things got, got, got harder, maybe I wasn't going to class.

One of the things is that for me when I was in pharmacy school it was literally a matter of traffic.

I was living downtown and I think halfway through one of my, my, my years, the class times changed by like maybe 30 minutes and that literally was the difference of me getting to class in 45 minutes or not an hour and a half.

Oh.

So that, yeah, that things that are outside of my control probably made the most, the most thing.

But for, for me, taekwondo has always been my friends, my family.

And so it wasn't a question of, you know, ever stopping, it was just a matter of, oh, I'm not going to be there for a couple months and then I'm going back.

And then you'll be back.

Yeah, yeah.

I think it's important for people to realize that you can, you know, it's so hard for people I think sometimes to get out of the, they get to college, they're doing some things and to get back into the habit of coming back to class in the summertime.

But you know, you get, if you want to set those goals and keep going and obviously, you know, you.

Do you work in the pharmacy field right now?

Yes.

Are you, you got a regular full time job?

Yes, I am a overnight pharmacist actually.

No, that, Ooh, that's rough.

No, yes.

Well, I work overnight in the pharmacy at night by, by myself taking care of people who have been in the er, you know, all day.

Okay.

Yeah, gotcha, gotcha, gotcha.

That makes sense.

Cool.

And do you, so you still actively train?

Obviously you're a master.

You, you make it to class every once in a while.

You, you what?

I make the class normally twice a week at least.

Luckily Chief Master Barnum still has morning class and we, I usually get off work at 8:00 in the morning and go straight to class.

If I'm, I, I have a schedule where I'm seven days on, seven day days off for work.

So when I'm off work, if I can make it to evening or you know, weekend seminar type stuff, I, I.

Do hit up a tournament every once in a while.

We've seen you at some.

When I get over to 102 West, I see you over there.

Yeah.

And districts.

Yeah.

Lots of judging.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, all the time.

Gotta do that.

Okay, so you have recently it seems started kind of a side venture that kind of ties these two Things together.

Yes.

Tell us a little bit about what you're doing.

And then I got some questions about some supplements and stuff.

Okay, so just about exactly a year ago, I started the Nutra Warrior supplement line.

So throughout the many years of being in pharmacy, I've obviously gotten to learn about the over the counter products and specifically things that you can naturally take and put into your body that change the way that it works or improve the way that it works.

And unfortunately, a few years ago, my wife went, went through chemotherapy and I got super into learning more about over the counter supplements and things that, that she could use to alleviate the joint pain she was having from chemotherapy.

So after that I kind of really got into figuring out what I could do to start my own line of supplements because as being a pharmacist, I know that unless things are rigorously tested, it's hard to know what products you can trust, especially over the count.

So I wanted to bring something that I could recommend because I know what's in it.

Yeah, no, that's super cool.

Okay, so I've got a couple of questions about supplements.

Number one, I know I've learned more recently that creatine is just a great thing.

Really good brain health, all kinds of things with creatine.

But I remember when I was growing up, creatine was like, oh man, you're gonna take creatine, that's bad for you.

You know, it was, I don't remember what the deal was, but it was something.

So tell us a little bit about creatine.

Should take it.

Who could take it?

What's it good for?

So creatine is really actually ideal for, I would call sprint athletes.

Now.

Martial artists are sprint athletes.

We're not out there trying to run a 24 mile marathon.

We work within, you know, right to, you know, maybe a span of like, you know, two to five minutes of, of actual, you know, in intense energy.

Yes, ma'am.

So, so this is where creatine is actually perfect and ideal.

Now those of us who are, you know, over 30 kind of remember creatine being kind of a big thing when, when it first came out as being for bodybuilders and or I remember them talking about it way back when, like Mark McGuire and Sammy Sosa were hit hitting all those home runs and stuff.

I totally remember that.

Yeah.

But creatine is not just for building muscle.

Creatine gets in it.

We're going to go back to biology class for like a second here.

Okay.

It dumps into what is called the krebs cycle, which is inside the mitochondria, which powers every cell in your body.

Okay.

So that port, it helps to increase the energy output of your cells.

So if you're increasing your energy output of every cell in your body, you know you're going to have that, that little bit more intense energy output when you need it.

I like that.

I won't turn that down.

Yeah, yeah.

The thing about creatine is that it's not one of those things that you can, you know, just take when you're going, going, going to class or think.

It's one of those things that has to build up in the body to really get the most benefit.

So it is something that should be used on a daily basis if you're going to use it.

Yeah.

So I should be taking it every day as just an additional supplement added to my drink or whatever I'm doing.

Yeah, yeah.

And you can mix it into literally anything and pop it in your coffee if you want to.

Yeah.

And I know I've seen that on your site.

You guys have creatine.

What's, let's go outside of creatine.

What' Maybe the, the top couple of things that I'm a martial artist, you know, an adult, maybe past my, you know, 20s, I'm into my 40s.

What, what should I be looking at supplement wise?

So my top three, you know, are creatine, glutamine and protein.

Okay, okay, tell me about glutamine.

Glutamine is a amino acid and although it is naturally occurring within your, the within things that you eat, that that's actually in smaller amounts.

When you take it in, in large, larger amounts, it helps the body to recover, recover faster.

And so obviously if you're working out, if you can recover faster, you're going to be able to hit that, that, that next workout harder.

Yes.

You know, we're not going to walk around feeling sore or waking up feeling what, like you're 80 perhaps.

The next thing I always talk about is protein.

The majority of Americans do not eat enough protein.

And especially if you're an athlete, you need a significant amount of protein.

And about a year and a half ago, I took a real hard, hard look at what I was eating every day.

And man, it is hard to hit for me because everybody, you know, if, if you, if you've met me, I'm six foot three, you know, I need at least 200 grams of protein a day and that's hard to get in.

I heard, I've heard a lot recently.

I mean, there's a big range, but trying to hit something like a gram per pound of.

Of weight.

Is that something that you recommend around there?

Yes, yes.

Yeah.

And that is hard.

I mean.

Yes.

You gotta be, you know, if you're not doing a protein shake, right, you gotta be plowing chicken like just like.

Crazy chicken, steak, just anything.

Yes.

And if you're protein big one.

Protein big one, I really like that.

So my protein is strictly 100% isolate.

Whey isolate, meaning that it's much more broken down because it takes the lactose out.

Okay.

Yeah.

I'm lactose intolerant.

There are many, many, many more Americans finding out that they are lactose intolerant.

So this is one.

So the way isolate actually absorbs better within the system because it's more broken down and it also mixes up a lot nicer.

You don't get that chunkiness.

Chunky.

Yeah, that's.

How do you do yours?

Your protein?

Do you do it just in?

I.

I make a thousand calorie protein smoothie every single day.

Oh, what's in the smoothie?

So smoothie I do, I do bun like cup to a cup and a half of frozen fruit.

Okay.

I put some hemp seeds in.

I put some, I put my, my double scoop of protein powder into it.

Is it a flavored protein powder?

Vanilla.

And within this next week I'm gonna add.

Be adding chocolate.

Okay, awesome.

Yeah, yeah.

And then some sort of alternative milk that I have on hand, like, you know, coconut, coconut, oat milk.

And just blend it up and that's.

And sometimes I'll pop in some MCT oil.

Cause that's great.

Really great for the brain and fats too.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Cool.

Yeah, the, the one you mentioned before.

I forgot.

Not protein, not glutamine.

Glutamine.

How is that?

Is it a powder?

Is it a pill?

Is it.

What's glutamine?

How do you take it?

It's a powder as well.

Powder.

It's a powder just like creatine.

I actually pop that, that in with my pre workout before I work out in the afternoon before work, and it just mixes up really nice.

You don't.

So is that one that you don't like?

Creatine and protein?

You basically probably should be taking these every day because you're just always.

Is the glutamine like you said, something.

That I also recommend taking every day also?

You can, if you've had a really hard workout, you can add a little more in, you know, but most of these things are things that, that Build up within the system and work and help the body work better over time.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah.

I have a question about you.

You're in the Chicago.

You know, you got these winters where we've got no sunlight for like, months and months and months.

What about, what's the, the supplement we get from the sun?

A lot.

I hear a lot of people are fishing in that.

Is that.

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

So unless you are lucky enough like the Isaac family to live down in Florida where there's lot.

Lots and lots of sun.

Yes.

The majority of us do not spend enough time outside in the actual sunlight.

If you're not spending 10, 10, 10 minutes a day outside, you know, exposing skin to make vitamin D, you're probably going to be deficient at some point in your life.

So I do have.

Have a vitamin D3 plus K2 supplement.

Okay.

And what, what vitamin K does is, is that it helps vitamin D work more efficiently.

It helps.

So you need.

Vitamin D helps your body absorb calcium.

You need calcium for stronger bones.

However, vitamin D will sometimes tell.

Tell calcium to put itself into places like your heart or your arteries.

And with vitamin K, it kind of helps to tell vitamin D, hey, let's put it into the bones.

Gotcha.

Okay, gotcha.

So it helps.

So you want to take those two together if possible, and that's why your supplement has them, both of them together.

Okay, cool.

Yes.

Yeah, go ahead.

So for those people who maybe have a more frail bone structure, what they're finding right now is that vitamin K can help vitamin D put the calcium into the bone in a way that has potential to restrengthen those bones.

Okay.

Yeah, excellent.

So probably especially something to look at older generation, you know, people who are generation women, breaking bones, falling, those kind of things.

Right.

I gotta talk to my parents.

Don't tell them I said that.

Okay, cool.

Those are your top three.

If you had to put in like a, a four, like a fourth place, what, what are you gonna put in your fourth place supplement?

My brain and Focus Booster.

Yes.

So a lot of us get it and we see a lot of kids in ata and even adults who have attention deficit issues or just over time, our attention span has gotten shorter and shorter and shorter because of technology or as you're getting older, if you're prone to dementia within your family or loss of memory or you're having COVID side effects.

This is where my Brain Focus Booster comes in.

You know, increasing blood flow to the brain, but also it has things in it like COPA and gaba and in the Mushroom supplement that I like to pair with it.

You have lion's mane.

And so those things all come together and help the brain work better.

Okay.

Okay, That's a good one.

I've looked at some different ones for, you know, I've talked to my parents about it a little bit.

You know, they're just, you got to keep that brain healthy, you know, and going.

And so I might, I might look at that.

Okay.

Tell people where they can find these things.

All your supplements.

All of my supplements are on rx-warrior.com I also have several social media sites.

I think I'm on all the, the major ones like Facebook and Instagram and I think I'm on pin, Pinterest and YouTube.

So all those cool ones, we'll put milk.

Sure.

We put links to everything in the show notes.

So if people want to go over there and get stuff, you know, this is coming out in January.

Perfect time to just make sure you're dialing in all those.

You know, we're working on getting healthier a lot of times, not just hitting your workouts, but making sure that recovery, you know, the things that you need to build that strength and power and whatnot.

So that's awesome.

Any last things for ATA nation out there about maybe your supplements being healthy, those kind of things?

Well, I mean, first the years coming around and that, that's when everybody kind of tends to start to relook at their, their, their health and what they're.

They're doing.

And I'd encourage anybody who has especially chronic medical issues to go ahead and rate, reach out to me.

I'm happy to answer questions and work with, with people because sometimes you don't know what you don't know.

And there's a lot of times that a couple of simple fixes can help really improve the way you feel.

Well, that's just like, hey, we got to use our pharmacist more often.

We've got our ATA pharmacist right here.

Reach out.

She can help you out.

That's awesome.

Well, I really appreciate your time today.

We're going to be diving in.

You know, everybody's working on getting healthy.

And I know I was on the protein and I kind of, kind of gone off the protein.

I need to.

You know what my big issue is?

It's winter time and I don't want a smoothie because it's darn cold.

I'm like, I need, I need a coffee.

I know they make some coffee ones, but I've heard they're not, not you can pop.

You can pop protein into your coffee and just mix it up.

I'm gonna have to.

You said yours mix is really good.

Yeah, it mixes really well.

Yeah.

Talk to Senior Master Seth Berkey about.

About how much he likes it.

Okay, I will definitely.

We'll get a testimonial from him.

Awesome.

Great.

I really appreciate your time today, ma'am.

Thanks so much.

Thank you, sir.

Super cool.

What great information.

Now, I forgot.

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Let me.

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Oh, man, I'm gonna be in trouble.

I'm not gonna be able to find.

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Really thankful for her for doing that for all of our listeners.

I know I am gonna be looking at my health and definitely looking at some supplements from her as well.

Ladies and gentlemen, I am just really excited to be back with you.

It's going to be an awesome year.

We've got some great things planned.

One of the things that we're going to do though, this year, at least for a while, is we're going to go with every other week new episodes.

ATA is now got a podcast that I'm helping run business beyond the Mat that is just for ATA licensees.

And so that's every other week as well.

So that gets me doing one podcast basically every single week.

And if we do this one twice, it just.

It just gets a little crazy.

So we're going to go to every other week content.

For now, I want to know how that goes for you guys.

If you're like, hey, no, we got to have some more there.

There might be a third episode every month.

I can't tell you about it yet, but we're going to be working towards that.

So just know subscribe in your podcast feed.

Make sure you're hitting that subscribe button in your podcast feed.

You know what would be amazing?

If you le us a rating or review in Apple Podcasts, Spotify.

You know, wherever you listen to your podcasts, you can leave us a rating or a review and we'd really appreciate that.

Okay, until next time, make sure you are out there going beyond the belt.

Thanks for listening to another episode of.

The ATA Nation podcast.

Be sure to subscribe and share with your Atlantic GTA family.

Secret part.

Do you guys think?

What?

What?

Oh, I got some more stickers.

I've got a couple I have I didn't send out yet.

I'm really bad.

I gotta send those out.

I'm so sorry.

If you're waiting for a sticker, I think Ms.

Kearney's waiting for a sticker.

I'm so sorry.

I will get those out, I promise.

How are things going?

Who would you like to hear on the podcast next week?

We're going to be talking a little card game.

Tell you later.

Bye, guys.