You have your buffer day and your free day, and what that really does
is it makes you prioritize your life and set time aside for what matters.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hey, everybody.
We're talking to Tracy Gaping today.
What an amazing guy.
He's a recovering urologist, turned founder of Peak Launch and Precision
Performance Medicine has some incredible stories about facing his own mortality on
a routine physical, walking away from a. 17 year surgical career at nearly 50 to
self-fund a brand new path making family his number one priority while helping high
performance leaders reclaim their edge.
He's a great new friend of mine.
You don't want to miss this incredible conversation.
Welcome to the last 10%.
Your host, Dallas Burnett, dives into incredible conversations that
will inspire you to finish well.
And finish strong, strong.
Listen as guests share their journeys and valuable advice on living in the last 10%.
you are a leader, a coach, a business owner, or someone looking to level
up, you are in the right place.
Remember, you can give 90% effort and make it a long way, but it's finding
out how to unlock the last 10%.
That makes all the difference in your life, your relationships, and your work.
Now, here's Dallas.
welcome, welcome.
I'm Dallas Burnett, sitting in my 1905 Koch Brothers barber
chair in Thrive Studios.
But more importantly, today we have a great guest, TEDx speaker, bestselling
author of Mail 2.0, the founder of Peak Launch , who helps leaders feel
better, live better, and lead better with precision performance medicine.
Welcome to the show, Tracy Gaan.
Tracy Gapin: Oh, thanks so much.
Good to be here with you today.
Dallas Burnett: Ah, man.
It is been, it's exciting.
I was looking and we were talking before the show.
I'm just excited to get into this because you have, you've had such an interesting
career, and not only that, but you've had a pivot and some different things,
and so you are just, you're applying your expertise all over the place.
So I'd love
Tracy Gapin: Yeah.
Dallas Burnett: love for you to share with our listeners how you got, you
went into medicine, you were, you went into surgery, what got you involved in
medicine, and how did you get to that
Tracy Gapin: Oh my gosh.
Yeah.
You know, I, I knew ever since I was a kid, like fourth grade, I
knew I was gonna be a doctor and, uh, you know, my mom was a nurse.
That probably has something to do with it, but I was really fascinated with
anatomy, biology at a very early age.
And so I knew I was gonna be a doctor.
And when I went to medical school, you go through all your surgical rotations,
your, Rotations in the hospital and I had no idea what I wanted to do.
In medicine, but I knew I was a surgeon.
I knew I had a surgeon mentality.
And as you go through the different rotations, you know, men's health
and urology really stuck to me.
And so I ended up pursuing urology and I was, very fortunate to have
a, 25 year career in urology.
Dallas Burnett: Wow.
Tracy Gapin: you know, robotic surgery, treating prostate cancer, men's
health, really, you know, focused on, optimizing lives on a daily basis.
And, it was very rewarding until it wasn't.
So about halfway through that career, I hit a wall where like a lot of
other doctors, I was burned out.
I was in poor health.
I was about 30 pounds overweight.
I wasn't sleeping well.
I felt like crap, and I wasn't taking care of myself because I was honestly
so focused on my patients, on my, on my career, my practice that I was
neglecting my own health, my own self.
And, my wife and I had a son on the way, and so I, was, nudged.
I was urged to go get my first physical and doctors are terrible patients.
And so I went for my first physical ever.
I'm 40 years old.
This was now I'm age.
I'm dating myself here almost 14 years ago.
And I go for this physical and I see this, concierge doctor here in town.
Colleague of mine, and it was a very eye-opening, vulnerable moment to be
sitting there on that exam table, wearing one of those thin little paper gowns that
barely cover some, some really important real estate if you know what I mean.
Right.
And, and I'm sitting there and his only answer for me was that
I needed to be on a statin.
and that's all he wanted.
He said, you need to lose some weight, exercise, and I'm gonna put you on statin.
And here I am, like not knowing much about what I needed.
Other than that, it was gotta be more than that.
It was supposed to be more than that.
and I didn't know what the answer was, but I knew that wasn't quite enough.
and so that got me going down rabbit holes.
I went back to school and I started educating myself on epigenetics,
which is, the science of how your environment affects your, the way
your body works, studying functional medicine hormones, peptides, and
really the science of longevity.
and I was able to, regain my own health.
I found, a path forward that I actually felt passionate about.
I actually, realized that I wasn't just burned out.
I was really ready to have a very innovative, different approach.
And, traditional medicine at this point, I suddenly had this eye-opening
moment Dallas, where I realized that our healthcare system is so focused on
treating disease and symptoms and illness and, here's a, here's your next pill.
And I, I really, found my purpose and passion in life through
my own personal experience.
And that is to really change the way we approach executive
health, men's health performance.
and that's how I really, made the pivot from traditional surgery.
From urology into precision performance medicine and, um, you know, now here
I am after, 1200 plus clients now, in GAP Institute, now peak launch.
I've really, created what I call the operating system for precision performance
medicine, which is not treating disease or illness or symptoms, but knowing
what I needed back then 14 years ago.
That's what most leaders, high performers, entrepreneurs, founders, they need.
It's, how do I. Improve my energy and my focus and my drive so that
I can perform better today and be the leader that I need to be.
And so it really, it changed everything for me.
This one moment there with that doctor.
Dallas Burnett: That's amazing and I think that's a great story.
I'm, we'll get into more of that in, in a second too,
'cause I wanna talk about that.
But it, it's very interesting 'cause I think there's, I think there's
a lot of people in a conversation today that feel like the system, the
healthcare system is a bit broken and you kind of summed it up there.
It's like it.
It's, you go to the doctor and you feel like you're just getting prescribed,
Tracy Gapin: Yeah.
Dallas Burnett: but it's prescription of some type of a pill, and
then it goes to another pill.
And then by the time, you know, you're in your sixties or seventies, you've
got 10 pills, and you're like, I don't even know what I'm taking now.
And then the pills are acting with the pills and it's just like, it's,
it just seems like there's a. better way, and it seems like you feel
like you've kind of stumbled on it.
I would love to know like what is your, what?
Why do you think, and this is a more philosophical, but why do you
think we've gotten as a system?
why has the healthcare system gotten to that point where you go
to the doctor and you just feel like you're getting prescribed medicine?
Do you have any thoughts on
Tracy Gapin: Yeah, I do.
our system is controlled by insurance companies.
It's controlled by, big pharma in a sense as well.
and I'm not saying it's nec saying it's necessarily intentional, but doctors
get compensated based on volume now.
It is simply.
A volume game where you have to do all this documentation
and reimbursement gets cut.
and Medicare and insurance companies control how doctors get paid.
It's one of the few industries where you're actually controlled.
You know how much you make, your revenue is controlled by someone else.
And so, um, what doctors do to make up for that?
is they replace it with volume.
Next thing you know, you are a rat on a wheel trying to go faster and faster.
And now, if you're in my practice, back in my urology career in
Dallas, I had six minutes with you.
I had six minutes to do all I have to do, and there's not much that
I can do in six minutes, right?
And so what happens is it becomes easy just to dispense a prescription
medication to get you out the door and move on to the next one.
There's no focus on lifestyle.
There's no focus on performance.
There's no focus on diving deep.
It's, you get very, narrow-minded in your scope because you have limited time now
because you're a route on that wheel.
And it becomes an ugly, vicious cycle where the ones who suffer other patients.
Dallas Burnett: Hmm, that makes sense.
And I definitely think that we, I think everyone's experienced the same thing.
You have, you feel awkward anyway.
Go in there.
You're in the gown, you're the paper gown, and you feel like you leave sometimes
with more questions than you have answers when you experience that six minutes.
Tracy Gapin: Exactly.
Dallas Burnett: lacking, right.
You know, you just come out and you're like, I think, I mean, I've got a
prescription, but I'm not sure I understand what the real problem is.
So I definitely have had that experience.
So that's interesting.
So now you took a, that's a fairly large pivot.
You're in surgery, you're doing urology surgery on robotics.
So this was just like, you know, I mean this is advanced surgery
Tracy Gapin: That's right.
Dallas Burnett: doing at the time, and so then you go and pivot.
Did you have any colleagues when you made that pivot?
your colleagues like look at you like,
Tracy Gapin: Oh my God,
Dallas Burnett: we'll buy you a car or
Tracy Gapin: right?
Dallas Burnett: going through a midlife
Tracy Gapin: Yeah.
Right.
Dallas Burnett: of
Tracy Gapin: Yeah.
Dallas Burnett: when you went through that transition?
Tracy Gapin: It's funny you say that.
I was, treating prostate cancer, kidney cancer, bladder cancer,
like serious conditions every day at high intensity career.
Once I saw this path forward, once I found my passion and really, honestly, what I
was meant to do, like I realize now that in my career in urology, I was one-to-one.
I was in an exam room, in an operating room with one client,
one, one patient at the time.
Now I can help serve millions of clients.
It's the one to many approach where I can really transform
healthcare through that route.
And so I, I really found my path forward and once I saw that, once I learned a
different way to approach it, I couldn't unsee that and I couldn't go back and
suddenly surgery felt, it was critical.
I'm like, I'm saving lives one at a time, but I felt like I
was meant for something bigger.
And so when I made this leap, my colleagues thought I was batshit crazy.
I'll be honest with you.
They thought I was insane.
They're like, whatcha doing?
Because.
I went from, you know, I was making a, about seven figures
to suddenly going down to zero.
My first year, I started from zero and from the ground up.
But I had no other choice.
I had to follow my heart, and now I'm so glad I did because I now love,
love, love what I do every single day.
And I couldn't say that before.
I certainly couldn't say that.
And now I'm changing lives.
I'm transforming healthcare.
I get to have these fun conversations where I'm reaching many millions of
people that I couldn't otherwise reach.
Yeah.
Dallas Burnett: I love that.
I
Tracy Gapin: Again.
Dallas Burnett: great story.
'cause I think you definitely know that you're passionate about something
when in spite of your colleagues or friends, maybe family, they're like.
You're insane.
What are you doing?
And the money, because look, I mean it's, being a surgeon and curing
cancers and operating on that, it's huge money and you were doing really well.
So having the faith to step out and say, Hey, this.
I think that shows, obviously you are very passionate about, so that's really cool.
I think that leaders.
There's so many things that you've said that's already peaking people's
interest because we've got leaders that are going through transitions and
pivots and trying to figure out their passions and it's very encouraging them,
I know for you to say, Hey, I took the jump off the diving board in the deep
end and a and the water feels fine.
So, uh, I think that's really encouraging, but I think it's also a huge thing
that you're kind of unpacking because.
I think for leaders, you're on one, you're always looking for an edge, right?
You're always looking for an edge.
'cause you're always, you're in shark infested waters, right?
And you're trying to, you're trying to win.
And so whether you're leading a team, whether you're leading an organization,
whether you're starting a startup, a venture fund is startup, or you're
bootstrapping, you need energy, you need creativity, you need peak performance.
And so you hear a lot of things online and I think there's.
A lot of things that are great and a lot of things that may not be so
Tracy Gapin: Yeah.
Dallas Burnett: so
Tracy Gapin: Yep.
Dallas Burnett: stiff through all that, I think a lot of leaders feel like they're
with understanding, what's the best
Tracy Gapin: Right.
Yeah.
Dallas Burnett: especially for them, as an individual.
Tracy Gapin: Right.
Dallas Burnett: I'd love to hear like, what are some of the biggest that you see
leaders making as it relates to their own
Tracy Gapin: Yeah.
Yeah, so I, I look at it as three different categories.
The first is fundamentals versus hacks.
What I mean by this is there's a lot of noise out there, right?
The space of longevity has become such a popular buzzword, and people are
talking about all these magic hacks, like, um, these different toys and
peptides and gadgets and cryo and red light and sauna, and PMF, and all these
different cool things that have their time in place and those context that's so
important, but they miss the fundamentals.
If they miss focusing on optimizing your sleep and your gut health,
your microbiome, we could talk about your hormones, your fitness,
toxins in your environment, the nutrition, the food you're eating
and what's right for your body.
And so I, I think that a lot of people think about the frosting first.
When you gotta bake the cake first, you know you have the
key ingredients of your cake,
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Uh, yeah.
Tracy Gapin: doesn't rise, right?
I think of it the same
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: this stuff where it's nutrition, it's sleep, it's
hormones, it's gut health, it's blood sugar control, et cetera.
Then when you've done all that work, heavy lifting.
The fundamentals of the foundation, then you could introduce the
awesome peptides that may help and all these other biohacks.
Most people have that in reverse, and that's the problem
that I see a lot of times.
The second one is
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: versus noise.
I call it.
You know, signal is, what do you need to get your body to work the right way?
And that's hormones, the nutrition that's right for your genetics.
Optimizing micronutrient levels, getting the right fitness, clearing toxins.
then there's a lot of noise that gets in the way of that as well.
Noise as in like gut issues, microbiome issues, excess cortisol.
S hormone,
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: lot of other, issues, blood sugar, imbalance, all these
things that can affect the signal when you know people are trying to lose
weight and they can't understand why everything they're doing in the gym's
not paying off, it may very well be
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: getting in the way.
You don't even realize it can't tell how many people I've seen where the
issue is actually in their gut or issues in poor quality sleep, and they don't
even realize that this noise is getting in the way of the signals and that's
why they're not seeing the results.
So that's the second one.
The third one is stress versus recovery.
You know, this is like resilience.
We look at, stress.
People talk about, oh, stress is bad.
Stress is not necessarily bad.
It's the balance that you need.
Recovery as well, you know, training, working out is stress.
You need that stress to build muscle, right?
in fact, you're not building muscle when you're training.
You build muscle, when you're recovering, when you're sleeping, when you're
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: and that's when your muscles get bigger and stronger.
A lot of people miss that and they're in go mode.
how to execute.
They know how to perform.
And leaders, visionaries, entrepreneurs are so good with
this, but do you ever turn it off?
Do you ever allow your body to repair and recover?
And so often that imbalance, you lose resilience, and that's
really a big problem as well.
These are the key things that I think are really at play.
It's not that you're missing some magic peptide.
I love peptides, don't get me wrong, but
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: the nuance of what your body needs that's getting lost.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: I think it makes sense because
what you're saying is ultimately there's always gonna be a fad.
There's always gonna be something new coming out.
There's always gonna be some new, whatever pill or formula drink or whatever it is.
the problem is that if we.
If you miss the basics, like you said, the fundamentals, if you're
not getting to sleep, you don't have the hormones Right, you don't have
the gut health, then it's so big.
Those are so impactful that taking the little, last little bit is
not gonna really make that big of a difference as those things.
Is that right.
Tracy Gapin: Yeah, absolutely.
it's about context of, there are, there's a time and place for everything.
There are peptides that I love that are amazing, that are very powerful
molecules in the right context.
But if your blood
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: adequate, you know, for example, GLP ones, there's a lot of
talk and noise If you, over the last several years about GLP ones and
these peptides are, Are very powerful for weight loss, for fat burning.
They help control blood sugar.
They help control satiety, hunger mechanisms in your brain.
powerful for weight loss.
However, if you're not eating right, if you're not eating enough protein,
too many carbs, if you're not training, if you're not sleeping well, if
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Mm.
Tracy Gapin: proper nutrients, then they may actually be
more harm than good for you.
That's the nuance of understanding when and how do you use them.
And that's where I think that, precision performance medicine is
understand that there, there's a real nuance in science behind it I think
there's a lot of influencers out there that, that are missing that point.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: that's just great advice because I
think they are, you know, whe whether you're talking about peptides, when
you're talking about GLP, all those things where we're losing weight.
we focus on one metric and I think that's a problem if you are just focused
on weight, like, okay, I wanna see the scale dick, go down five pounds.
Then while that's good.
You can do that one way and it not be good for you long term, or you
can do it another way and or, be more holistic in your approach.
And that's the result.
I kind of feel like, it's if you focus on profit in your business or on your team
and that's the only metric you focus on, then that's kind of like, that should be
the outcome of a well run business, right.
It's like, it's what we produce, but if we don't just focus on that.
So I, I, think that's the same thing.
if you've worked with many, many different leaders.
High, you know, I mean, huge caliber people, Hollywood, you know, actors and
famous P folks, athletes, pro athletes.
what are some recovery routines that you find to be.
Because we talked about you, you mentioned stress versus recovery.
We talked about that.
We've talked about that quite a few times on this is very important.
The difference like is stress is not necessarily bad, it's
stress without recovery.
Just like you said.
What are some of the top recovery techniques that you see to be
so, uh, just fulfilling giving to people, especially in leadership.
Tracy Gapin: think one of the most underappreciated aspects of
our health and recovery is sleep.
And most leaders undervalue sleep.
And, the phrase I'll sleep when I'm dead.
Well, that actually promotes that right?
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: You'll sleep sooner than you think.
Right.
Tracy Gapin: And so, you know when you have poor quality, so I'll talk
about quality in just a moment, but when you have poor quality sleep,
what that does is it turns off hormone production, especially growth hormone
testosterone and other key hormones.
It raises blood sugar levels, it raises cortisol or stress hormone, which raises
blood sugar, which makes you store fat.
Makes impossible to build muscle, affects neurotransmitters in your brain.
it alters metabolism, it alters immune system.
So.
There's a lot of downstream negative consequences by simply
neglecting your sleep when you're
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: Again, sleep is when you're gonna build muscle.
That's when you're going to have the best ability to increase
metabolism and burn fat.
And it helps, the brain has this, what's called the glymphatic system, which
is how your brain basically clears the trash, cellular debris, okay?
Clear cellular, debris that.
Your brain needs every night.
When you don't get enough sleep, you're actually depriving your brain
of that, and that can actually promote.
There's been studies that show that it may actually promote long-term
to cognitive decline in Alzheimer's disease, and so sleep is so
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: So when it comes to recovery, one of the most
important things people can do is optimize and focus on their sleep.
I think of five quick tips I like to give for sleep hygiene, they call
it, which is, what do you do, those two hours before you go to bed?
first of all, no food or drink for at least three hours before you go to bed.
but if you need to take a sip with your pills, that's okay, but in, in
general, you wanna avoid any food or drink for those last three hours.
But five things in those two hours before bed, you can read a book.
This is the best time to read a book and not a Kindle, but an actual paper book.
time to journal.
So, so important to document gratitude.
Document, what are you grateful for?
What are you thankful for?
What did you accomplish today?
And also your goals of what do you wanna accomplish tomorrow?
Right?
Journaling is so, so important.
The best time to do is right before bed.
Third time.
A third thing you could do right now is you can meditate.
Mindfulness, breathing exercise is such an incredibly powerful way to turn the
body off and get you in the state of mind and, relaxation state for sleep.
Number four, sauna.
People always ask, well, when should I do sauna?
A great time to do saunas just before you go to bed.
The heat is very, very powerful for promoting.
it, it's a reflex where it actually stimulates you, but
then it actually brings you back down to where the parasympathetic
response is great for sleep.
sauna's number four, and you know what the fifth
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Wow.
Tracy Gapin: the best way to get your body and mind ready for sleep.
And that's sex.
Okay.
So I am sex every night before you go to bed.
very
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Wow.
Tracy Gapin: five things, great ways that you can do.
Obviously I didn't mention blue light, I didn't mention your phone, I didn't
mention scrolling on Twitter, Instagram.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: those five things are great things that you
can do, that you can instill.
These are the only five things I'm allowed to do in those two hours before you go
to bed, and that'll really be helpful.
finally, I'll give you, Dallas is.
you can measure it.
So people talk about recovery and I work with a lot of
leaders who will say, I'm fine.
I'm not stress.
Stress doesn't affect me.
It's the next guy.
And we're not just talking about psychological stress.
We're, and when we talk about recovery, people say, yeah, I'm fine.
I'm recovered.
I feel good.
Well, I say, let's measure it.
Let's track it.
So in, in my approach, the third step, test design track, the third step is
track where we're gonna measure it.
can measure a metric called heart rate variability, HRV, and a lot of people
have heard of this, but there's a specific way that you should be measuring it.
Heart rate variability.
You can track it with, you know, I'm wearing an R ring,
which is great for sleep, but.
RV you're measuring at 24 7 is not very helpful because there's a
lot of noise involved in that low.
So if I do a heavy workout today versus a light workout tomorrow, that HRV number's
gonna look very different because during the day my activity was different.
But if you measure
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: heart rate variability in the morning with a chest strap first
thing in the morning when you wake up, now you're in a arrested state, you're in
the same condition every day, and now you can compare apples to apples and actually
understand what your HRV is every day.
Okay.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: for the listener who has, isn't familiar with it, heart rate
variability is a metric that's really a surrogate, a measure of your internal
stress levels, your the balance of your nervous system, it should be very high.
You want your heart rate variability to be very high and consistent over time.
it drops down, it's a sign that you're stressed.
You're either, suffering from poor sleep or you're over
training is a big one I see.
Or it's from alcohol or eating the wrong foods or toxins or, hormone deficiencies.
A lot of different things that can cause low heart variability.
But now when you see HRV of 54, 52, 53, 50, 37.
What's wrong?
What's happened, what did I do?
And you can learn from that and understand what's causing that poor recovery state.
And now you can really start to understand what do I gotta do to improve it?
That's the key because a lot of people don't even, unless you're tracking, you
don't even realize how far off you may be.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Oh my gosh.
You know, That's so, that is so true because I, just personal experience.
So as it relates to sleep, I'd gotten to a place, a couple years ago where.
I was waking up like constantly at night.
Just if the air conditioning turned on, if my wife rolled over,
if the car, it was a car drive.
I was never, I was sleeping all night.
I was getting hours, but I wasn't getting quality and so I was like
frustrated 'cause I was getting up every day and I was exhausted.
Like I was exhausted.
I sleep, it didn't matter if I slept four hours or eight hours,
10 hours, I was getting exhausted.
And so then.
I was reading on something and so I don't know what happened.
I was reading some blog or whatever, and so all of a sudden this
thing comes up about magnesium.
I never had, like, I never even thought about magnesium.
I'll take supplements, different things like that, but here and there,
but I never thought about magnesium and it said, helps you get better,
deeper sleep, puts you in deeper.
I was like, well, I'll try it out.
Oh my gosh.
Like it was un, it was almost instant.
Because I was never getting into a deeper sleep.
I started taking magnesium and it was like instant that night.
Like that night I get to bed, what do you do?
That's like that instant, that night I had the best sleep.
I woke up, I was like, I haven't felt this good in like, and so
I had not realized, well see.
It's like you said, because I wasn't tracking it, I just had this
general malaise and it had been getting worse over a period of time,
but because I wasn't tracking it.
I didn't even know until I was to a point where I'm like completely exhausted.
I'm like, this, I'm falling apart here, missing stuff, wanting,
not wanting to get outta it.
That's just totally not my, personality.
And then all of a sudden I start taking magnesium and it's like, boom, I'm, back.
But if I had been tracking, like you said, if I'm tracking recovery.
I would've known way sooner that my numbers were way off, and then
I could have said, what's going on?
You know, like, why am I not like whatever?
Because I'm, I've got a baseline that I can compare against.
I had no baseline, so it wasn't until I got, a bad, like in a bad way.
so I love that.
Now you said you wear it, you would have a chest punch, so you
actually literally strap on like this chest monitor in the morning
that's gonna tell you your HRV score.
Tracy Gapin: of great straps out there for H rv and I love Aura for Sleep.
We'll talk about sleep in a sec. But, for H RV heart variability, there's one called
the Morpheus, which is what I recommend.
It has a great app that, that on your phone that you can use.
and Polar makes one called.
The polar H 10 strap a little older.
with that one, you need to combine with the elite HRV app on your phone
so it doesn't have a great app to track, you put it on in the morning.
And what I recommend first thing in the morning, you wake up, sit on the couch,
you be drinking your coffee if you need to, you could be journaling, whatever
you gotta do for your morning routine.
And it takes two and a half minutes to get a scan done, a reading done.
Okay?
In two and a half minutes, you'll get your heart variability, and then you're done.
You take it off.
Now you, you're good for the day.
And then tomorrow you could do the same.
So that's how I recommend tracking HRV to see, again, apples to apples
one day to the next for sleep.
There are a lot of devices out there.
I personally find r to be the most accurate.
nothing's a hundred percent, but it's as close as you can get.
And what I find a lot similar to the story you shared Dallas, is I had a can, one
of my clients who told me he slept great.
He's like, yeah, I sleep fine.
I'm like, okay, well let's just, see.
Let's just track it.
Let's measure it.
I'm big on data.
And his
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: that he slept.
In fact, seven hours looked great, seven hours, three minutes, looked awesome.
Deep sleep is one of the key restorative stages of sleep that
we really care about, right?
And you're supposed to get 60 minutes of deep sleep every night.
And on this particular night, when Ken got seven hours of total sleep, he only
got one minute of deep sleep, one minute.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Oh,
Tracy Gapin: that's what.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: I know what that feels like.
Tracy Gapin: like crap.
Exactly.
and, but you would never know unless you're tracking it That's why I'm
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: No.
Tracy Gapin: I'm really obsessed with tracking data to know what's working
and, where you gotta address your energy.
Because with Ken, it wasn't just improving the quantity of a sleep,
it was specifically deep sleep, which happens in the first half of the night,
and that's a very different approach.
Yeah,
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
So the deep sleep happens on the first half.
Tracy Gapin: that's
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: first half of the night is when
you get most of your deep sleep.
That man, okay, That's interesting.
I didn't know that.
All right.
so I wanna talk a little bit about this because you have.
You have come, you we're a surgeon in urology, but you, but now you work with
all kinds of different leaders, but you also you have very special, have a high
specialization in males specifically.
So let's, if you don't mind, just for all the dudes out there, for all
the male listeners of the last 10%, which by the way, thank you guys for
the last 10% that has been growing.
We're now over 78 countries globally.
So thank you for all the listeners.
Just want to tell everybody, thank you.
This been tuning in the last 10%.
So this is for all the dudes out there.
What do dudes need to be?
Because there's all this stuff you see on television like, you need to buy this, you
know, these pills that take testosterone.
You need to do this, you need that.
But we see that, I mean, Right.
now there's the epidemic in the US that, fertility rates are falling And we're
just seeing a lot of problems in the.
With the dudes, with the males.
So what advice would you give men, who are not only leaders, but are also men?
What should they be paying attention to specifically?
Tracy Gapin: shout out Kudo to you and your podcast.
Awesome podcast.
You guys are doing a great job there the last 10%, so great job.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Thank you.
Tracy Gapin: yeah,
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: you.
Tracy Gapin: what men need to know, I'm gonna give you the bad
news first and then the good news.
So bear with me.
The bad news is, like you said, fertility rates.
a great study at Israel show that fertility worldwide is about.
50% lower than it was 20 years ago, and it's getting worse every, year.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Wow.
Wow.
Tracy Gapin: Similar decline in testosterone levels.
Three studies worldwide, one in the us, two in Europe, all showed the
same, all three showed the same thing.
a 50% decline in free testosterone over the last 20, 30 years.
and it's declining every year.
And, a lot of culprit, a lot of explanations, reasons the biggest
one are toxins in our environment.
Chemicals, plastics, toxin, et cetera, in our food, in our drinking
water, in our personal care products.
and so testosterone levels are plumbing.
Now, why do we
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: Why does that matter?
Well, it's not just about sex, not just about building muscle,
not just about looking good.
It's about brain Brain function focused.
Mental acuity, concentration, metabolism, blood sugar control are lipids.
Men with lower testosterone have increased.
LDL, they have increased in some cardiovascular disease.
show that men with low testosterone, this is very powerful.
Here, Dallas with low testosterone have a 30 to 50% increased risk
of early cardiovascular mortality.
Compared to men who
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Good.
Tracy Gapin: testosterone.
So we're not just talking about sex and muscle and quality of life, we're
talking about actual health benefits of optimizing your testosterone,
and that risk actually goes away when you fix testosterone as well.
Numerous studies have shown this.
The fears around testosterone are, false news if you will.
Testosterone replacement therapy does not cause prostate cancer.
Unequivocally, I'm a urologist.
25 year plus in urology does not cause prostate cancer and testosterone
replacement therapy does not cause heart attacks, does not cause heart disease.
It actually reduces that risk.
Okay, so TRT is, in general, it's safe.
It should be done only with a, under the supervision of a physician for sure.
but most of those testosterone boosters out.
that you could buy over the counter, they're garbage.
They're not gonna really make an appreciable difference.
lifestyle can help a little bit.
So, lemme give you an example of what I see guys always say, well,
like, I'll just do the natural stuff.
I'll just, you know, I'll, I'll train, I'll, you know, some of the
things you can do naturally are, strength training, especially the
big muscles like the quads and the hamstring in the back and the core.
improving nutrition, improving sleep quality, reducing stress, clearing toxins.
All these things can definitely help.
what I find in my practice, again, 1200 plus clients now that we've
been working with men will come in 20 plus years in urology.
I'll see this as well.
Men will come in with a free testosterone of 4, 5 consistently, and that number used
to be like 20 for men to be optimized.
Free testosterone should be somewhere around 18, 20, maybe even
as high as 25 for some men, but call it 20 as our general target.
Most men I see come in and there are 3, 4, 5, maybe six or seven,
eight, somewhere in there.
You do all this natural stuff for six months religiously.
You're compliant every day.
You have perfect lifestyle, which no one's going to.
Of course, life gets in the way,
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah, yeah,
Tracy Gapin: social life and dates with your wife, you know, et cetera.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: yeah.
Tracy Gapin: say you are perfect for six months, then that free
tee of five may become 10.
That's a hundred percent improvement.
Yes, it
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: hmm.
Tracy Gapin: percent improvement.
That's awesome.
However, you're only half the way there.
Again, you're at 10.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: You only have it there.
Tracy Gapin: most men because they're so far.
so far declined, so far diminished from where they're supposed to be.
They don't even realize it.
You don't even feel it.
It's such a gradual decline that you don't even realize how far you are.
This is why I'm a huge proponent of the benefits of testosterone.
Now, that's not all you need.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: I've seen men coming in and they've been on testosterone and
they're like, doc, I still feel like crap.
That's just one piece of the
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: one ingredient to that cake we talked about earlier.
But it's a critical hormone that most men, don't necessarily recognize as low.
So every man out there should get your free testosterone level check,
not total, but free testosterone.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Free testosterone.
All right.
That's great advice.
Great advice.
You heard it here last 10%.
If you're a dude, you're listening to last 10%, doesn't matter your age.
Go get, go, get that free.
Free testosterone checked out.
You should be around 20.
That's your goal.
Maybe even higher.
But you gotta get to, we gotta try to get to 20.
And, I think that's really good advice.
And too, it's it's like you're saying that it's not something that you feel
like, Hey man, I'm not doing something.
I need to be going out and doing something so I can get more testosterone.
That's great.
You can, but you still it.
It may not even be that, like you said, environmental factors, different things.
Toxins in our environment, different things that's going on that exist today
that didn't exist a hundred years ago.
They weren't having to deal with the plasticizers, the forever
chemicals, all these things that can affect those hormones.
you can't do anything about it.
in terms of what you do, you may never, ever be able to overcome that,
inertia that you're pushing against.
But hey, you get it checked and you get that replacement.
So that's really good.
I love that advice.
So.
When you were going through, was there a time like, 'cause you were in, I think
this is a hangup like so as a leader too.
'cause a lot of leaders are busy people.
they're wide open.
They're charging the hill.
They are very focused on, driven on getting their goals.
You were a doctor and you have all the information about health, but
we were talking before the show.
You had gotten to a place where you didn't feel like you were healthy,
and you even mentioned it when, in the beginning of the show, you didn't feel
like you were in place, were healthy.
What was it that was the wake up call that helped you connect?
Like where you were, where to where you wanted to go?
what for you, what was that?
What was that moment?
Tracy Gapin: through my own health journey that I share, I really
came to recognize that our approach to health has been bastardized.
It is all
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Mm.
Tracy Gapin: you go to a doctor when there's a problem and.
My passion is men's health.
It's always been men's health and I probably go back to some childhood issues
that can explain that, but nonetheless, men's health is really my focus.
we're simple creatures, like men don't ask for directions.
We don't seek help unless like something's falling off, like, or something,
unless something's really wrong.
Right?
And, and even then we'll try to GPT to, you know, chat right?
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: I.
Tracy Gapin: Yeah.
and so that really drives home.
The problem that I see in men's health is that most men are They're reactive.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it kind of mentality.
and I think that gets you in trouble because what happens
is it's a gradual decline.
decline 1% today, the 1% tomorrow, and you continue to decline.
You don't even realize how far you've fallen.
I'll give you a great example.
I to.
an event two weeks ago.
Now, one of my colleagues, he was a surgeon here in town and I've been outta
urology now for five, six years now.
I left the traditional medical world here in town, but my, a good
friend of mine who was a surgeon, just retired had a retirement party.
And so I went to this retirement party to support my friend, there
were about a hundred doctors there.
Doctors I hadn't seen in five years.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Oh wow.
That's cool.
Tracy Gapin: of this world, right?
I'm now in this whole new world of optimization and
precision performance medicine.
I'm speaking, I'm on stages, podcasts like this
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: I'm, serving leaders who come to me 'cause they wanna be served.
Not when, not like when I was in urology, when you come to me
'cause of kidney stone or you have cancer, you need to be served right.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Right,
Tracy Gapin: go
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: right.
Tracy Gapin: this, happy hour, this cocktail party celebration of retirement.
And I'm surrounded by all these doctors I haven't seen in five years.
And I'll swear to God, Dallas, they must have aged 30 years.
In the five years since I've seen them.
they all
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Ooh.
Tracy Gapin: decrepit compared to when I saw them.
And I think that just speaks to.
That's like every other leader out there where you're stressed out.
you're driving your body into the ground.
You're not focused on your own health.
You're not focused on anything other than your career, your job, and
getting stuff done every day instead
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: a very proactive, very different approach.
And so it was very powerful and surreal to see these doctors who I respect,
but damn, they've aged 30 years in the last five years since I've seen them.
And.
I think it just drives the point home that you're either, I think of it like cities.
You know, some cities, like my wife's from Youngstown, Ohio, that city's decaying.
it's it, right?
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: it's like old.
It's decrepit.
it, it's falling apart.
cities are very, they're very young and they're like, I grew up
in the Dallas area, prosper Texas.
It's this little town.
Wasn't, it wasn't even on the map when I was a kid.
Now it's like this thriving, growing community.
they can't build houses
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: keep up with, like, growing.
I think of you're either in an anabolic growing phase like that, or
you're on a catabolic decay phase.
Which one do you want to be?
'cause you can only be one.
And that's how I look at
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm
Tracy Gapin: during, in, in the catabolic, Youngstown, Ohio decaying
phase rather than in the prosper, Texas growing anabolic, how can I
be better kind of phase And it's, know, your approach, your podcast.
So focus on mindset.
This is a mindset shift that you gotta more intentional and proactive about it.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: I think that's so true.
It reminds me of your story when you talked about those surgeons
at the party and how they'd age.
It reminds me of the president, Right.
So they, you've seen those pictures of like when you go into office as
the president, it doesn't matter which president, like look at all the pictures
when they go into office and when they come outta office and you're like.
Dude, good gracious.
because they just age so much.
Now, granted, I know it's like, you know, four to eight years when they're
coming out, but still, it's like, man, that is a hard four to eight years.
Doesn't matter.
it just, because again, like you're saying, they're focused every day
getting up, rolling to it, doing their thing, Uh, you know, set up some down.
They're probably not taking care of their bodies as much as
they should, during that time.
And it just, it does have an impact on you.
So I think that's, I think that's really true.
I think you've really given us some things to think about, today.
I think this, obviously the fundamentals versus the hacks.
I think that's so true.
Everything you said, even in, in, in the advice that you shared, about What you
do in terms of recovery that you gave about sharing in terms of no, you know,
no eating three hours before bed reading, doing the gratitude or journaling.
Meditation, the sauna, sex, all those things.
It's hilarious because when you talk about it, you are like, Hey, the fundamentals
are first, and that's like, you know, sleep, uh, you know, gut health and that
way you eat clean eating and that type.
And then some of the things on recovery, all these are things that have been
around since the, almost the dawn of time.
Right?
It's just doing the, those things well and being intentional about it and then.
All these hacks and things that we're coming out with and technology and all
this other stuff, it just adds to it.
It can add to it, but I think this is so good because it shouldn't
be overwhelming to leaders
And if you're listening to this and you're busy, pick one thing.
don't listen to the list.
Now, you may have if, listen, I'm gonna defer to the doctor on this.
That may, you may say, do five.
But I would say start somewhere.
don't get overwhelmed while the list and go, well, I've got,
I've got too much going on.
I don't, I can't think about sleep and hormones and gut health
and all this at the same time.
Look, pick one.
Let's do one better.
Let's get one better.
Let's start on the path and then we'll feel better and we'll go
to, we'll go to the next one.
But, I think those are all great things.
It shouldn't be overwhelming.
It doesn't have to cost you a fortune.
Just get on the path.
And then once you start feeling a difference, I know for me, when I
started taking that, magnesium, it was like game changer, like life changing.
I would do that if I could go back five years before I'd start taking
it sooner, maybe even before that.
And I'm sure there's other things, are the same way, but it's
not, it doesn't cost a fortune.
It's just getting on the path and making those changes.
So I think that's really great if people are stuffing, this is one
thing I'd love for you to talk about from medical perspective.
And then we'll wind down.
But I would love to hear, 'cause a lot of leaders struggle with burnout, right?
they're burning at both ends.
They're not getting their sleep.
we know sleep is important, but what would you specifically say
to leaders who are struggling?
they're not kind of struggling, they are in the middle of burnout.
What advice would you give leaders in, in that scenario?
Tracy Gapin: question.
I think it comes down to intentionality.
It comes down to boundaries.
It says down, it comes down to balance setting boundaries in your life.
What I mean by this is, I'm a big proponent of Strategic Coach
Dan Sullivan's, coaching program.
and one of the things he talks
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yes.
Tracy Gapin: you have your, focus day.
You have your buffer day and your free day, and what that
really does is it makes you.
Prioritize your life and set time aside for what matters.
for me, you mentioned this in the intro, I, first and foremost, I'm a dad.
Like, uh, everything
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Hmm.
Tracy Gapin: to I'm a dad to my two amazing, beautiful kids.
Nothing else is as important as that role.
And I think of wearing a hat, like I have a lot of hats in my closet.
Most men have a lot of hats, right?
I think
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Yeah.
Tracy Gapin: as.
You wear a lot of hats, right?
You're a CEO, you're a community leader, you're an employer, you're a
husband, you're a homeowner, you're a dad, but each of those are a hat.
But you can only wear one hat at a time.
that's how I think about it
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Mm
Tracy Gapin: hat are you wearing right now?
You can wear one hat at a time you gotta be sure you wear all your hats, right?
And so the only way you can do that is to set time and to prioritize.
And so I have on my calendar times that are blocked out.
I'm a dad right now.
I'm a
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: mm.
Tracy Gapin: these three hours.
I'm dad.
I can only wear that one hat, and if someone tries to reach me,
you literally cannot reach me.
There are other times in
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: That's good.
Tracy Gapin: where I'm making content or I'm focused on doing
what I have to do for the business.
That's my focus time.
It's called, you cannot reach me.
During that time, my team can't reach me, no one can reach me.
My wife can't reach me because I, everything's unplugged and unfocused.
When you do that, you start to create.
More of a consistent schedule, and now you're gonna create time.
A free day.
It's called a free day.
And you can even do it half a day if you have to start.
But a free day is where you're literally not allowed to work.
And it's hard at first.
It's freaking hard.
You're literally not allowed to answer an email, you're not allowed
to text, you're not allowed to slack.
You're team, you're not allowed to do anything that's really to work.
And that free day can be something as.
Monotonous as yard work or something as, taking your kid to a
soccer game or my son's a golfer, so I got a caddy for my son,
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: That's awesome.
Tracy Gapin: fun, so rewarding.
but that free day is mentally checking out of work so that you
can, again, wear that different hat.
unless you.
Are intentional about that.
It just doesn't happen and it leaks and work leaks into everything.
And so I'm very intentional about that at night too, whenever my workday is
done, whether it's five o'clock or whether it's 6 37 when, you know, seven
o'clock, whatever that time is, I'm done.
I'm now dad and husband and it's so important.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: I love that.
I love that advice.
I think the free day probably made certain, entrepreneurs or leader
skin crawl because they don't feel like they can take any time.
They're like, free day, ah, my everything's gonna fall apart.
But listen, hey, if you're leading in the last 10.
And you're coaching and you're developing your teams like, you should, and
you're putting the systems in place and doing what you're supposed to do.
You could take a free day.
That's part of recovery, that's part of, That's part of
living something called life.
and, and life is bigger than business.
And so we've gotta remember that as leaders.
we're not just leading our organizations, we're leading
our life and everybody in it.
And so I, I think that I think that's really good advice.
I think the free day.
is awesome.
I love Dan Sullivan as well, so that's really good advice.
Boundaries.
Oh man.
Yeah, that's really good.
It's really good.
So
Tracy Gapin: team.
I make sure that my team does the same and like my key leaders, I make
them take time off on the weekend.
don't be slacking me, don't be emailing me.
You need to get like, like turn off, unplug, and when they don't,
they're burned out when they come back to work on Monday.
And so it's so important that they take
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: yeah.
Tracy Gapin: as well.
And, I think that just allows you to be more focused when it is time to turn on.
Yep.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: I think that's a great,
that's a great advice too.
If you're leading a team, if you're leading an organization,
how intentional are you a about, how you're leading yourself.
Right.
Because we can't give what we don't have.
Right.
So if we don't have sleep and we're not getting, we're not taking the
rest and recovery like we should.
If we're not doing those things, we can't give that to anybody else.
I was talking, I was actually, it's funny you say, I was speaking at an event one
time and the whole event, the reason they brought me in was to talk on burnout.
'cause they said this whole industry is burnout.
And so they had these business owners there and this lady was like, I
said, because, I made that comment, you can't give what you don't have.
And I asked the question at the end and she said, well, I just
wanna let you know, I think you're exactly right 'cause I'm burnout.
And that's what I've given to my team
Tracy Gapin: that's right.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: because I can't take, I can't turn off.
So I'm emailing people late at night.
I'm doing all these things I should, which is causing them to do it, and then
It's, causing them to burn out and their turnover's high, and this is going on.
There's dramas over here.
And so you can't give what you don't have, but you do give what you do have.
So if you're burnout, you're giving that to your team.
so do your team a favor and set boundaries and get, and don't be burnt out, right?
Do what you need to do to get to a good place.
Tracy Gapin: Yeah.
And the other part, you know, a lot of leaders think, like you just
described, oh, I can't take a day off.
Oh my God, there's no way my team needs me.
The way I look at it as you either have a job or you have a business,
because if you have a business.
If your business should be able to run without you there, especially
for one day, one single day.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Mm-hmm.
Tracy Gapin: then you have a job.
you gotta do something
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: That's right.
You gotta do something different, That's right?
That's great advice.
Well, listen, I trace this has been, this has just been fantastic.
I know our listeners have just really enjoyed it.
you have shared so much.
wonderful advice and great wisdom.
We got two questions to round out the show.
Number one, how can people find out more about you, connect with you.
I know you got some book coming out, so let's talk about that.
How can people get, more information?
Tracy Gapin: So, um, I have a great guide.
It's called a High Performance Health Handbook, and you can
go to peak launch.com/guide.
Again, peak launch.com/guide, G-U-I-D-E and have a high
performance health handbook.
For any of the leaders out there, it's 15 strategies and tactics
that you can start using today.
Have better energy, better focus, better drive, better resilience.
And, again, that's my gift to the listener and I check out
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Wow.
Tracy Gapin: peak launch.com and also have a mail 2.0 is again,
book I released back in, I think it was 2020 now, my second book,
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Nice.
Tracy Gapin: specifically helping other doctors follow my path and
really change medicine as well.
Comes out in October?
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: Wow.
Wow.
That's awesome.
you.
got a lot going on, man.
That's really awesome.
Well, if you're driving, you're listening to last 10%.
We're gonna put that in the show notes, so don't worry.
You can just click on the show notes, get that link, download
the God Connect with the.
And we just, appreciate you for being on the show.
One last question.
That is, if you were to have, or listen, wanna listen to a guest on the last 10%,
who would you like to hear on the show?
Tracy Gapin: man, I would have to.
share my man crush, Ben Hardy.
So, Dr. Benjamin Hardy, he's an organizational psychologist.
I
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: That's awesome.
Tracy Gapin: He is actually
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: That's really good.
Tracy Gapin: mine, uh, through a, a genius network that I was in.
dallas-burnett_49_04-14-2026_152159: we really appreciate you today and
uh, and thank you For sharing that.
we'll have to see if old Ben, we can reach out to Ben and, and then
see if we can get him on the show.
Thank you for, again, for, uh, being on the show.
Uh, Dr. Tracy, appreciate You and thanks again for being on last 10%.
Tracy Gapin: You got it.