The guest
Kurt Angle: 1996 Olympic freestyle wrestling gold medalist and WWE Hall of Fame professional wrestler, now actor and owner of supplement company Physically Fit (joined on the show alongside comedian Tony Hinchcliffe).
What this episode covers
Kurt Angle and Tony Hinchcliffe join Joe Rogan for a wide-ranging conversation centered on the brutal physical toll of wrestling. Angle details winning the 1996 Olympic trials and gold medal with a broken neck via Novocain shots, then breaking his neck four more times in the WWE. He opens up candidly about a devastating painkiller and alcohol addiction, the night his sister died of an overdose, his DUIs, and his 12 years of sobriety. The discussion ranges across artificial disc replacements, MMA history, weight cutting, testosterone, and the Sackler family's role in the opioid crisis as depicted in the Netflix series Painkiller.
Recommended on this episode
ProductRecommended
BPC-157
“I use it it's great it's fantastic it's very good”
“no I use it it's great it's fantastic it's very good yeah very good when you get injured you'd probably love it”— Joe Rogan
MediaRecommended
Painkiller
Netflix
“the series on Netflix is Sensational”
“the story from the documentary sensation the series on Netflix is Sensational and it just it just shows how evil evil those people”— Kurt Angle
MediaRecommended
Cop Land
“good movie very good movie man”
“that movie Copland you ever see that movie Copland good movie very good movie man it was like one of his first movies”— Joe Rogan
MediaRecommended
Glass Onion
“that's a great movie man”
“that Glass Onion Movie that's a great movie man he was great in that yeah”— Joe Rogan
MediaRecommended
Gracie in Action
“Gracie in action is very good”
“have like a good Gracie documentary explaining how these guys basically invented jiujitsu and stuff yeah Gracie in action is very good”— Joe Rogan
The guest's own work
ProductBy the guest
Smart Snacks
Physically Fit
“we have a product called smart snacks they're um little crispy protein bites um they're a bunch of flavors 11 different flavors”— Kurt Angle
ProductBy the guest
Chicken Snacks
Physically Fit
“those are uh chicksen what is that how do you say that chicken snacks chicken snacks um those are uh those are chicken protein”— Kurt Angle
MediaBy the guest
Thy Will Be Done
“I just uh finished a movie called thy will be done it's a really good independent movie”— Kurt Angle
Also referenced (named, not recommended)
ProductReferenced
Kill Cliff
Kill Cliff
“as I look at a kill Cliff with CBD in it this is this is 25 milligrams this is nothing”— Joe Rogan
ProductReferenced
Prime
Prime
“Logan Paul goes out there drinking a Prime energy drink so a Connor could conceivably go out there”— Joe Rogan
ProductReferenced
Proper No. Twelve
Conor McGregor
“a Connor could conceivably go out there with a bottle of uh yeah proper 12 yeah I think he sold that too though”— Joe Rogan
ProductReferenced
WWE Network
WWE
“it was the day that the WWE Network came out cuz I got it I'm like this will be fun to watch”— Tony Hinchcliffe
MediaReferenced
The Smashing Machine
“what's crazy about that documentary The smashing machine is they caught him in his prime”— Joe Rogan
MediaReferenced
Concussion
“really that movie concussion when that movie came around then people started looking at like what's going on with football players”— Joe Rogan
MediaReferenced
True Romance
“remember True Romance oh God and that's just one of them one of them how about Dracula”— Joe Rogan
MediaReferenced
Bram Stoker's Dracula
“how about Dracula oh yeah yeah he was really good and he played old Dracula and Young Dracula in the same movie”— Joe Rogan
MediaReferenced
The Expendables
“he's done two Expendable movies how many of them there are there gosh there's like the fourth”— Kurt Angle
Big reveals from this episode
- Angle won the 1996 Olympic trials and Olympic gold with a broken neck, taking 12 Novocain shots before each match.
- At WrestleMania 19 Brock Lesnar landed on his head doing a shooting star press while Angle himself had a broken neck.
- At his addiction's peak Angle was taking 65 extra-strength Vicodin a day, using 12 doctors, 12 pharmacies, and a Mexican supplier for about 2,700 pills a month.
- The night before his Iron Man match with Brock Lesnar he learned his sister died of a heroin overdose and swallowed 20 pills.
- He got four DUIs in five years and went to rehab only after his wife threatened to leave; he is now 12 years sober.
- Angle actually wrestled Brock Lesnar for real for about 15 minutes and beat him.
Worth remembering
- Aljamain Sterling defended his UFC title and dominated after getting an artificial titanium articulating disc placed in his neck.
- Yoel Romero's neck was fully fused with zero mobility, yet he became one of the best middleweights in UFC history.
- Angle's five-day hospital stay for pneumonia produced a $165,000 bill, including $12 ginger ales and $200 bed linens.
- Vince McMahon, in his late 70s, does 3 a.m. workouts after Raw and only sleeps about two hours a day.
- McMahon bought WWE from his father for about $1 million and it reached a roughly $9 billion valuation.
- Rickson Gracie, considered far superior to Royce, choked Funaki unconscious with his eyes stuck open in a famous Pride finish.
- A child once dented Angle's Olympic gold medal, so he now keeps it locked in a safe.
- Angle never cut weight, wrestling heavyweight at 197 lbs against a 270-lb, 6-foot-6 opponent in the NCAA finals.
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