Mike Israetel

Michael "Mike" Israetel is an American exercise scientist, bodybuilder and Brazilian jiu-jitsu competitor, born on May 30, 1984, in Moscow, according to Wikipedia. He holds a PhD in Sport Physiology and Performance from East Tennessee State University (ETSU), awarded in August 2013 with the dissertation "The Interrelationships of Fitness Characteristics in Division 1 Athletes", according to the university's digital repository. His company biography states that he taught exercise science at Lehman College, Temple University and the University of Central Missouri, and worked as a sports nutrition consultant for the U.S. Olympic Training Site in Johnson City, Tennessee.

In 2012 he co-founded Renaissance Periodization with Nick Shaw. The company now trades as RP Strength, and its app developer listing on the Apple App Store is RP Strength, LLC. RP's own site describes him as co-founder and Chief Content Officer and names Andrew Zey as a third partner who helped scale the apps.

He is the main presenter of the Renaissance Periodization YouTube channel, which showed 3.89 million subscribers when read on September 14, 2026. His TikTok account @drmikeisraetel, which links to a page on rpstrength.com, showed 388,300 followers on the same date. RP also runs the Instagram account @rpstrength, and Israetel posts on X as @misraetel.

What RP sells, with prices as listed on its official pages on September 14, 2026: - RP Hypertrophy app: a training app "designed by Dr. Mike Israetel" with premade and custom training plans and technique videos. The App Store lists a monthly subscription at $34.99 and a yearly subscription at $299.99. - RP Diet Coach app: a nutrition app. Its price was not read from an official page. - Ebooks co-authored by Israetel, including Scientific Principles of Hypertrophy Training ($37), The Renaissance Diet 2.0 ($37), Scientific Principles of Strength Training ($27), Recovering From Training ($27), How Much Should I Train? ($22) and the Minicut Manual ($19). Scientific Principles of Hypertrophy Training is co-written with James Hoffmann, Melissa Davis and Jared Feather and is also sold in paperback and audiobook. - Training templates, such as the Simple Training Template ($119.99), and bundles such as the Ultimate Beginner Bundle ($99.99). - 1:1 coaching with RP coaches: Coaching Essentials at $349.99 per month with a three-month minimum, and Full Access Coaching at $599.99 per month, which adds a weekly video call and text access. Clients choose a coach from RP's directory. The coaching page does not say that Israetel coaches clients himself.

RP says on its about page that it has helped "millions of folks worldwide" and on its coaching page that it has served more than 25,000 clients. These are the company's own figures, and no independent source for them was found.

Reputation. In late September 2025, law student Solomon Nelson published a video pointing out errors in the data tables of Israetel's 2013 dissertation. Calfkicker reported on October 7, 2025 (article by Ben King) that Israetel first said a wrong draft had been uploaded to the university system. He later accepted that the version in the repository was the final one, and he described the errors as clerical. As of September 14, 2026, the ETSU repository lists the dissertation as restricted to ETSU users at the author's request. A search of ftc.gov for "Israetel" and "Renaissance Periodization" on September 14, 2026 returned no enforcement case.

Not confirmed: RP Strength's state of registration and company number (the OpenCorporates search was blocked by a captcha), the price of the RP Diet Coach app, and whether Israetel personally takes coaching clients.