“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” – Confucius

Randy spent most of his youth overweight. In just 5th grade, he weighed well over 200lbs!! In 6th grade, he lost over 40lbs on Weight Watchers, thanks to help from his favorite mother that made his meals & counted his “points.” He spent the rest of grade school around 175lbs, and then entered high school at 185lbs. As just a sophomore football player, Randy weighed 205lbs. As a junior, Randy weighed 235lbs. He then finished up his senior season weighing 346lbs!! On a funny note, Randy then had to lose 50lbs to go on a big trip with Boy Scouts, spending 10 days on a large sailboat in the Bahamas (The max weight limit was 300lbs). While playing college football at Missouri State University, he averaged between 295lbs & 325lbs. After 3 long years of football, Randy retired so he could focus on his professional career (construction management). Without football, there was no need to be very large. He continued to gradually lose weight through diet & exercise. It was a big struggle to maintain the weight loss, but one day he decided he wanted to get RIPPED!! On January 11, 2010, Randy began the Men’s Health / Spartacus Transformation Challenge. He finished the competition on March 12th, only 2 months later, down 25lbs!! Exactly 1 week later, Randy took on his very first food challenge at Pointer’s Pizza in St. Louis, Missouri. He and his friend Dan Graham finished the 28″ Pointersaurus Pizza and won $500!! On March 19th, 2010, Randy discovered what he wanted to do with his life… he wanted to make a living eating and working out while traveling around the world, and he wanted to help other people along the way. He just had to figure out how to execute & make it happen. One month later, he won his second challenge, the 18″ “Haus” Pizza Challenge in Jefferson City, Missouri. That victory earned him $450, and he kept on going from there.

Who is “Atlas” and how did Atlas & Zeus Promotions get started?

Randy went to Missouri State University (round #1) and played college football as an offensive lineman with his friend Dan Graham, who was a defensive linebacker. They remained great friends after college, and Dan played a major role in Randy winning the Men’s Health / Spartacus Transformation Challenge. Not only did Dan help Randy with his nutrition and fitness regimens during the 2 month contest period, but he was also a constant source of motivation and help whenever needed. Dan had previously lost the 28″ Pointersaurus Pizza Challenge with a different partner, and a few weeks prior to the diet and weight loss period ending, asked Randy to team up as a way to “treat themselves” and celebrate the end of the 2 months (8 weeks) with intense dieting and grueling workouts. As we all know, Randy quickly accepted the invite and challenge!!

The two things they lacked were not appetite nor desire. The pair needed cool eating nicknames and uniforms!! Randy was living in the Kansas City, Missouri area at the time, and before heading back for the challenge, he found the two original shirts worn that said, “These Aren’t Guns, They’re Cannons!!” Dan had the great idea to tear the sleeves off and write their college football jersey numbers on the back. This all happened around the time that “Jersey Shore” was popular, right after Season 1 ended & before it got “trashy.” Randy and Dan spent hours trying to come up with names half as cool as “The Situation.” Dan one day texted Randy that he wanted to be “Zeus” and because of that, Randy kept with the theme and picked “Atlas” to be his nickname. They wrote their nicknames on their uniform shirts & successfully tackled the 28″ Pointersaurus!!

Dan attempted the 18″ “Haus” Pizza alongside Randy one month later, and unfortunately wasn’t able to finish. That was his last food challenge attempted, but as we all know, Randy kept going!! Randy wanted to start a promotions company, and simply put, he thought “Atlas Promotions” sounds stupid. Because “Zeus” was so involved with his start, he decided to pick “Atlas & Zeus Promotions, LLC.” as the company name. Randy liked how the logo could have A&Z, the first & last alphabet letters, allowing the company to eventually grow beyond just doing food challenges. Dan got married in 2012 to his wife Erica, and Randy was proudly his best man!! Randy is now the “Godfather” for their second daughter, Rose.

How did Randy get started on YouTube and social media?

A few days before Randy attempted his first food challenge, his cousin Patrick Murphy called to see how he was doing, and joke about the funny transformation “after” photos that Randy recently posted. Their families lived just 5 minutes apart, and Patrick was scheduled to be off work on the day of the challenge. His family owned a camcorder for filming home videos and such, and fortunately said, “If you two idiots are going to do this, I’m going with you and I’m going to film it!” Patrick went with Randy and filmed the whole thing, and thankfully drove home since Randy was full and hurting. He then edited all the footage together and produced Randy’s first ever food challenge video. Randy created a YouTube channel called AtlasZeusPromos and posted the video (Randy deleted that channel in 2011 and posted all the videos on his new Randy Santel channel).

Lots of his friends watched the video and loved it! Because of that, before trying his second challenge, he figured, “I filmed the first challenge, so I might as well film the second one too.” Randy bought a ~$200 camcorder on Craigslist that he used to film the 18″ Haus Pizza Challenge. Patrick edited the footage together and produced Randy’s second video too. The process repeated itself, and Randy paid a girl named Amy that he also found on Craigslist to edit videos #3-5. Randy loved all this so much that he wanted to do it full-time, and he knew that he didn’t have the funds to pay someone to edit every single video. He then taught himself to edit videos as best he could, and he edited all the videos until “Magic” Mitch Dombrowski took over in March 2013 (Arthur Davis joined the team in 2016). Working in the construction (management) industry wasn’t at all fulfilling for Randy. He quickly realized in 2010 that if he worked hard enough and kept focused on progressing “all-in” with everything, growing his social media (YouTube & Facebook) through traveling and winning food challenges, things would eventually work out so he could retire from construction, become his own boss, and “make a living eating and working out while traveling around the world, helping people along the way.”

To learn more about Randy’s pre-challenge ritual with his signature “hat turn,” please click here.

To find out the origin story of Randy’s (FC mascot) Teddy bear Leonidas, please click here.