Josh Appel: Pararescue, Emergency Medicine, and a Lifetime Commitment to Service
The Ready State Podcast
Kelly Starrett & Juliet Starrett
4.9 • 623 Ratings
🗓️ 24 August 2023
⏱️ 70 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Start Your 14-Day Trial to Virtual Mobility Coach
Join Our Free Weekly Newsletter: The Ambush
Josh Appel is an Emergency Medicine Physician, and Chief of Emergency Medicine at the Southern Arizona VA. He is a former Air Force Pararescue Specialist (PJ) who deployed on the rescue/recovery missions for OPERATION: Red Wings, including Lone Survivor Marcus Luttrell and LT. Michael Murphy. Working with the Murphy family, Josh founded the Memorial Day Murph tradition. Josh is a husband, father of three active girls, a teacher, mentor and wellness evangelist.
Kelly first met Josh while out training his PJ squadron when they were new to strength and conditioning. We get into the origin story of the Memorial Day Murph tradition, Operation: Red Wings and the subsequent film, emergency medicine, and the state of healthcare in the US.
SponsorsThis episode of The Ready State Podcast is brought to you by LMNT, a tasty electrolyte drink mix with everything you need and nothing you don’t. That means lots of salt — with no sugar. The Starretts just got back from a hiking vacation in Norway, and LMNT was a critical piece of the puzzle. Everyone had LMNT in their water bottles daily and were able to replenish all the electrolytes lost climbing big hills and sauna-ing. Order through our link and receive a free sample pack with all of LMNT’s flavors. Go to DrinkLMNT.com/TRS and check it out!
•
This episode of The Ready State Podcast is brought to you by Vitruvian, a technology that revolutionizes strength training. Normally this type of thing doesn’t interest Kelly too much, but when he tried the Vitruvian, he was blown away. You can deadlift over 400 pounds on it, you can do eccentric-only loading on it, and it's really easy to set up and store away. IF you want to learn more about Vitruvian, go to thereadystate.com/vitruvian.
•
This episode of The Ready State Podcast is brought to you by Momentous, a leading high performance lifestyle company making the best supplements and sports nutrition products for individuals looking to optimize all parts of their lives. The Starretts are just back from vacation and it has given them a renewed appreciation for what they call “The Juliet Stack” - a single serve protein packet, a sleep pack, and a collagen shot. No more traveling with weird bags of powders and pills. If you want to hit Juliet’s travel stack, go to livemomentous.com/TRS and use code TRS for 20% OFF your first purchase.
•
This episode of The Ready State Podcast is brought to you by YETI, from coolers to drinkware to bags, YETI products are Built for the Wild. We have been begging YETI for a lightweight bottle forever, and we are so glad it is here. We use them for all our adventuring and beyond. Add the Tether Cap and you can clip it right onto your pack. If you want to check out the lightweight and shatter resistant Yonder Water Bottle for yourself, go to thereadystate.com/yeti.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hey everyone, I'm Dr. Kelly Starrett. |
| 0:06.8 | And I'm Juliette. |
| 0:08.3 | And you're listening to The Ready State Podcast. |
| 0:11.6 | You got it. |
| 0:13.5 | You've got it. |
| 0:16.5 | This episode of the Ready State podcast is brought to you by our friends at LMNT Element. |
| 0:20.9 | So we just went on a big family trip to Norway and Germany where we did a ton of hiking. That would describe it as a hiking vacation. It was a hiking vacation. Like we hiked like eight out of the 10 days we were gone. Ask our 15 year old. Yeah. And one of the things we really relied on to survive these huge hikes, and I'm talking like we hike |
| 0:37.6 | between 10 and 14 miles a day, was element. And our kids did as well. Yeah, you know, it's easy. |
| 0:44.1 | These packets are easy to pack. And then, you know, you're not worried about sugar. You're not |
| 0:49.6 | worried about carbohydrate. We could get, we made sandwiches and things on the road, but having that |
| 0:55.9 | nutrition, hydration part separated was great. And I mean, what a difference. I mean, I am a |
| 1:03.1 | sweater. I'm a spitzer. And also, you know, we came into it being totally jet lagged and probably |
| 1:07.7 | a little bit dehydrated. So to just hit the ground, doing these huge |
| 1:10.9 | hikes and know that we could just be replenishing ourselves with Element was really clutch. |
| 1:15.1 | Not to mention a little bit of Nordic sauna that happened and you got to replace those electrolytes |
| 1:19.5 | after the sauna. So as you guys all know, we literally drink Element every day. Right now, |
| 1:24.8 | if you order through our link, you get a free sample pack with all of |
| 1:28.4 | elements flavors. Go to drinkelement.com slash tRS. This episode of the ReadyState podcast is also |
| 1:35.7 | brought to you by our friends at the Truvian. The Truvian was an interesting thing that came. I saw it on the |
| 1:41.0 | internet. I saw some of my athlete friends using it. And imagine a force plate that has a couple cables. And traditionally when I see those things, I'm like, |
| 1:49.6 | it's not serious because I can't put enough heavy load in it. And it just is kind of a one-chipone. |
| 1:54.8 | However, this thing kicked my butt. You can deadlift over 400 pounds on it. You can do |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Kelly Starrett & Juliet Starrett, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Kelly Starrett & Juliet Starrett and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.