Today we’d like to introduce you to Kevin Young
Kevin , we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I started Fasted Athlete because I needed a better way to fuel my body and mind. As a catastrophe adjuster, I worked long, grueling hours, relying on coffee and energy drinks to keep me going. Over time, I built up a tolerance, needing more and more caffeine just to function. My sleep suffered, my energy crashed, and I knew I couldn’t keep up this cycle forever.
So, I started experimenting—testing different ingredients, adjusting formulas, and figuring out what actually worked for sustained focus and performance. After a year of refining, I finally landed on the right formula, and in 2022, Fasted Athlete was born.
The first product, Lift, launched on Shopify, and I hustled—running ads, working with micro-influencers, and sponsoring local events to get it in front of people. It didn’t take long to see that Lift was making a real impact, and soon, I expanded to Amazon, bringing in freelancers to help scale the business.
Around this time, I met Heather Carroll. She was a serial entrepreneur renting a room in my house, and we instantly connected—talking about business, growth, and ideas. She loved Fasted Athlete’s mission and believed Lift was a game-changer, especially for women looking to improve focus, strength, and brain health.
Heather had a sharp business mind, and her belief in Fasted Athlete was so strong that she invested, becoming an advisor and part-owner. With her input, we expanded beyond energy supplements and decided to launch a colostrum product, tapping into the world of gut health and immunity.
As our business partnership grew, so did our personal relationship. In 2023, we got married, and by then, Heather was playing a major role in Fasted Athlete. She handled marketing and branding, while I focused on product development and operations.
When we launched colostrum on Amazon in 2024, it was a breakthrough moment. The demand for a clean colostrum from grass-fed cows was strong and we saw the opportunity to take Fasted Athlete to the next level. Heather made another major investment, and together, we decided that her leadership and expertise in marketing and strategy made her the right person to lead the company forward.
We restructured ownership, with Heather becoming President/CEO and me taking on the role of Vice President/COO. Today, we run Fasted Athlete full-time—growing the brand, expanding our team, and staying true to our mission: “Build Yourself. Lift Your Team”
Looking back, Fasted Athlete started as a personal solution to a problem. Now, it’s something much bigger—a movement that’s helping people perform at their best and show up for those around them. And we’re just getting started.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Definitely not smooth.
Packaging Challenges – In the beginning, we went super-custom on the packaging and it caused massive delays and drove up the initial costs. Kinda similar to how Tesla made the batwing doors on the Model X and it was a huge design challenge. We worked through the delays and managed to still have a successful launch.
Capital Challenges – We funded Fasted Athlete with 100% of our own capital. We had worked over 12 years to raise enough money to launch this company and support ourselves on a leaner, start-up style paycheck. Early on we had an opportunity to have an outside investor come in and provide funding. He was a successful entrepreneur with a few solid exits and a few big failures. His current business aligned with our business perfectly, he had strategic insight, and he could help carry some of the capital load. The problem was that his moral compass was not aligned with our values and he was a cut-throat businessman. His checkered pasts and a few statements he made to us on the phone caused big uncertainty. So, we decided to not take his investment, and fund the project ourselves. We are so grateful that we passed on the “easy money” because a good business with a bad partner cannot function.
Marketing Challenges – Coming into this business, I knew a lot about supplements, but very little about marketing. Turns out, marketing is very difficult, very expensive, and most of your experiments fail. Over the past 3 years we’ve hired tons of “experts'” and had numerous agencies. The majority of the agencies we hired ended up over-charging, over-promising, and under delivering. I’ve learned that most marketing agencies start with someone who is an expert, then they scale, and as they grow, the quality of work drops. One of our Amazon ad agencies burned through $20,000 in fees and ad spend with almost zero returns in a couple of months, and kept blaming it on the “learning phase”. By month 3, we had to let them due to lack of performance. Now we only work with proven experts, not agencies.
There are too many other business struggles to elaborate on, lol. Overall, we are content with our current position, but there were some expensive experiments along the way.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
Fasted Athlete is more than a supplement company. Its a movement. Our brand believes people can achieve optimal health by rooting their fitness/health goals in the idea that you are getting stronger so you can help others. When you see a person on the street wearing a Fasted Athlete t-shirt, you know that he/she is investing in their long term health for the right reasons.
We are the health brand that shares ideas on how to train your body to run on fat for fuel. We believe occasional, moderate fasting is the best tool to boost longevity, burn fat, lower inflammation, stabilize energy, and optimize gut health. This type of flexible fasting involves doing a mix of 16 hour, 24 hour, and 48 hour fasts. Depending on where you are in your journey, you may do 16 hour fasts 3x/week, a 24 hour fast every 2 weeks, and a 48 hour fast every quarter. This can fit into any schedule, lifestyle or diet. Alongside the fasting, eating clean, walking, and doing moderate weight training 3x/week can really boost your results.
To compliment the Fasted Athlete lifestyle, we offer a creatine-based focus supplement, Lift, that provides key brain & muscle nutrients, plus gives you energy all day long. We also have PureGold colostrum, which is a gut health superfood. Our grass-fed, New Zealand sourced colostrum supports gut health and helps heal the body from the inside out. We believe that gut health is the foundation to optimized health.
We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you?
Luck has definitely played a role in my business.
Good Luck – In 2021 I had a dinner party at my house in Austin. A guy came in who had a supplement company on Amazon. After having a conversation with him, I realized that launching my own company was within reach and I started working towards Fasted Athlete.
Bad Luck – In 2023 I was moving capital from my personal bank accounts to the company bank accounts to fund inventory. My bank had not informed me that they did not want any business related activity happening in my personal checking account. So, out of nowhere, they froze all my funds without explanation. They wouldn’t explain the reason why (I know now), and they wouldn’t release my funds. I had no other checking accounts and I went to zero overnight. At the time, I was dating Heather Carroll (future wife), and she stepped up in a big way. She loaned my $15,000 so I could continue to pay my mortgage and bills until the bank released my funds. Once I got the funds back, I left that bank, and opened an account with a bank that doesn’t freeze your capital without reason.
Pricing:
- Lift – $39.95
- PureGold Colostrum – $49.95
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.fastedathlete.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fastedathleteco/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FastedAthlete
- Twitter: https://x.com/FastedAthlete
- Other: https://www.amazon.com/stores/FastedAthlete/page/AC831468-FDE4-4039-AE78-E8CE62A9922A?ref_=ast_bln
