Barbell Shrugged - Barbell Shrugged  — Nutrition For Weightlifters w/ Alex Maclin  — 321

Episode Date: June 27, 2018

Alex Maclin (@alexqmaclin) is on a mission to light the fire within you, to help you have a body you are proud of, perform amazingly, and live a healthy life. Alex is a long time friend of the Shrugged crew, and you may have seen him on many videos and our programs. He even hosted Barbell Shrugged for a moment. Alex has coached hundreds of athletes through online training programs for weightlifting, strength and conditioning. He has also competed at national-level and regional-level meets in Olympic Weightlifting. In this episode, we dive into how to periodize your nutrition at different times of the year. Going over gaining strength, making weight for competition or sometimes gaining muscle to move to a new weight class. We also cover how much body fat a weightlifter should be carrying, whether macros are better than paleo for weightlifters, how to pick the best weight class for you, and much more.   Enjoy! -Doug & Anders Show notes at: http://www.shruggedcollective.com/bbs_maclin --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Please support our partners! @organifi - www.organifi.com/shrugged to save 20% @thrivemarket - www.thrivemarket.com/shrugged for a free 30 days trial and $60 in free groceries @OMAX - www.tryomax.com/shrugged and receive a free box of Omega 3 Fish Oils @Onnit - www.onnit.com/shrugged for a free 14 pill bottle of the leading nootropic Alpha Brain and 10% savings on all purchases. ► Subscribe to Barbell Shrugged's Channel Here ► Subscribe to Shrugged Collective's Channel Here http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedSubscribe 📲 🎧 Listen to the audio version on the Apple Podcast App or Stitcher for Android Here- http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedApple http://bit.ly/BarbellShruggedStitcher

Shrugged family, this is Anders Varner. We're back another awesome week with Barbell Shrugged. This week we're hanging out with Alex Macklin. What a gangster that guy is. There's like a little rite of passage that comes with being the host of Barbell Shrugged. You got to meet all the people and Alex is one of those guys that has just been a huge piece of the Barbell Shrugged story. There's so much love for the dude out there that I was just really excited to meet him, interview him. And turns out, what an amazing dude. We hung out with him here in San Diego as well as down in Austin at Paleo FX. And it makes so much sense why everybody in the Barbell shrug family just loves the guy and every time his

pictures up on Instagram there's always just so many cool comments about Alex thought he was an awesome guy I thought it was an awesome interview and just more importantly like another piece of the barbell shrug story that I am now a piece of and just really cool to kind of see like all the pieces, all the lineage and everyone that is a piece of this big family of ours. Had somebody last week asked me the most terrifying question in all of strength and conditioning, which is, Anders, what does your training program look like? The reason this is the most terrifying question in the world to me is because I'm supposed to be a professional that's able to give a very clear answer to exactly what I do in

the gym and for training. And the truth is, is that it couldn't be more of a scattered mess if I were to try to explain it to people. I train every single day, but that doesn't mean that I'm in there trying to PR my clean and jerk and my back squat seven days a week. It's a very spread out thing. And when I try to start explaining it to people, I feel like I am explaining this gigantic puzzle to somebody that makes so much sense in my head, yet it's very challenging because there's 20 years of training and knowledge and coaching and education that I take for granted a lot of the times. And when I start speaking about what I do in the gym, I believe that it just, it goes

over people's heads so much because I don't operate off of a program. I don't operate off of sets and reps. I very rarely ever have a plan when I go into the gym. In fact, I never actually have a plan. There's no program that I follow. But I have a list of things that I need to do each week that I believe keep me healthy and moving in the direction that I would like to do each week that I believe keep me healthy and moving in the direction that I would like to do.

There's only really three main goals that I have in my life as far as strength and conditioning go or just general health as you could call it. My goals are not short term. One of those goals is I would like to live till I'm 120 years old. I'm really dedicated to that. I feel like I have built an education and a knowledge base that will allow me to live a very healthy life. If I can do cool things past 100 years old, I think 120 is doable and I'm really stoked on it. I'd also really love to squat 315 pounds when I'm 80.

I don't even know if that's possible, but I feel like if I do it every week and it's not that hard, why couldn't I do it when I'm 80? Like I'll just never let my body think that that isn't something that it has to do. And this is coming from somebody that's 35 and probably completely naive to what happens when you're 80. But I just believe that I should be able to have a pretty good squat when I'm 80 years old

and if 315 just remains on my back my body will always be adapting to that number I'd like to squat 315 when I'm 80 and then just as a general rule like I want to be pain-free and I don't I don't want to have to deal with nagging injuries. I've lived that life and it sucks. And I just never want to be a part of it ever again. So when I talk about my training program, you have to know it's seven days a week. One to two days a week, I'm running. Usually that's one five to six mile long trail run, or it's hill sprints up the nastiest, grossest, meanest hill you've ever seen in your life. And those are kind of like my conditioning pieces. There's going to be a day of CrossFit in which I consider that to be like a weightlifting day.

And then two to three other days of just weightlifting, more on the bodybuilding side. And just, I like to call it just kind of like structural integrity and just making sure all the muscles are turned on, making sure I'm doing all the proper shoulder things, hip things, core things, just to make sure that everything is moving right. The other days I spend a lot of time doing just down regulations. So like yin yoga class, maybe hit a hot yoga class, just a lot of things that are very movement based, yet they are not the beat down that goes on in the gym but I was watching a Netflix documentary called um I was about the chefs I can't remember it now and now I'm drawing a blank in the middle of this awesome monologue but chef's table and Christina Tosi they they interview her and they're

watching her walk through a grocery store and a light bulb kind of went off of like, man, that's a lot what it looks like when I walk into a gym. Like if I was a chef and walked into a grocery store, there's zillions of options. When I walk into a gym, there's zillions of options from barbells to kettlebells, to sleds, to dumbbell to dumbbells to weird stuff that's not in every gym, but is at the gym that I train at because it's a weird powerlifting gym and they have a bunch of grip strength stuff. And man, there's so many, so many options. And I never know what implements I'm going to use. And I never know the reps or the sets or the pieces that are actually going to comprise of what I'm doing. But every single time I go in there, I end up doing

horizontal pulling and horizontal pushing. I do a lot of vertical pulling and a lot of vertical pushing. I do a lot of squatting and I do a lot of hinging, but whether I do all that stuff on one leg or two or with one arm or two, or if I'm pulling a sled or pushing a sled, or if I'm carrying things with one arm or carrying things with two, the majority of the time, that's not just changing from workout to workout, but it's changing from set to set. And I may just pick up a 53-pound kettlebell and do a five-minute kettlebell flow right into some single-arm shoulder press, and then the next set is going to be a single-arm shoulder press but bottoms up.

And then I may do it from a knee. And all these things are going to come into vertical pressing, but every single time it's different. And if I was following a program and was relegated to, I need to be at 70% of my press and I need to be doing it for three sets of five and I need to have two minutes of rest in between each. That would be terrible for me. I've done that so long that I have to have flexibility in my training. And I have to have the ability to just kind of go feel out where my body's at. And the truth is what makes it so hard for me to answer that question is everything I do in the gym is based off feel. I very rarely lift heavy weights, but I can always go lift heavy if

you want it. I very rarely am maxing out sprints or running a half marathon or doing these things at like maximum intensity because at any point in time I could, I just realized that I have a choice that I can make of really treating my body the way it should be treated and like acknowledging that my life is stressful and that I have a lot of things going on and that health and being pain-free is the primary function of me going to the gym knowing that I'm going to be strong knowing that I can be fast I can do all these things if I need to but in the long-term plan if I want to live to 120, I can't PR my clean every two months. It doesn't make sense, but it doesn't mean I can't clean 300

whenever you want me to. And that's a really important thing I think that everyone should look at in their journey is you need to be on programs. You need to learn how to do these things so that training becomes a language to you and a feeling to you versus something that's written on paper. There's nothing wrong with being on programs. It's just you need to use those programs to create feelings and create emotions and create stories around the weights and the rep schemes and the movements so that later on in your training, in order to keep it fun, you still know what to look for, what to expect, what to feel so that it can still be fun

and you don't have to move perfectly. You can add a little sloppiness to it because you've done things well for so long that now you get to go and explore movement and do things different. And that's really what's so tough to me is I might not have the perfect recipe when I walk into the gym, but every single day when I leave, no matter what ingredients I decided to grab, I'm always going to come out with a really, really awesome recipe for health, longevity, strength, conditioning, and general wellness. And that's my goal. And for those people that don't have that feeling, I highly recommend you getting into the program vault. Please get over to shrugcollective.com

backslash vault. There's 11 programs in there. They're written by incredibly smart coaches. They're written in a manner that progresses you from where you are today to where you would like to go, whether it's getting your first pull-up, getting strongman into your routine, long-term programs for CrossFit, mass gain. If you don't know how to eat, you need to be a part of those. Olympic weightlifting with flight weightlifting. There are programs in there to teach you about mobility and stability. All of these things that go into creating an emotional feel to go along with your training so that you can be on a program that allows you to meet your goals, but there's also an

education system along with it so you learn how to move well. You learn how to move well, you learn how to feel movements, you learn how to structure this stuff in your own life so that you don't have to be on a program forever. In fact, you're creating a system where you're telling stories through movement and you're learning all about the intricacies of how to write a program for yourself by learning what others are doing that have been there and are really, really smart at it. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate the Shrug Collective Program Vault. The amount of knowledge and the programming that's

in there is just so top-notch and you need to be a part of it. If you don't have the ability to just go into the gym and figure it out on the fly and write something off the top of your head that's just really well put together and touches all the bases, go to shrugcollective.com backslash vault. Get into the programs. They are written by really smart people. You are going to achieve your goals. You're going to do it in a very healthy manner. And it's very important that you're able to get in there and to go do these programs.

They're going to make you better and they're going to help you learn about strength and conditioning in a very practical manner. I want to thank our friends over at Onnit. Love Onnit. I've been sleeping so freaking well lately. The melatonin kicks ass. And then I wake up and I go get me some alpha brain. My day,

I'm buzzing just like this. You hear me? I love strength conditioning. I want you to go into the program vault and get signed up because you're going to learn how to do awesome weightlifting. You're going to learn how to structure things in your brain. Go there. But the way that I get so excited about all this stuff is because alpha brain's gangster. I wake up. I take it in the morning. My day is just, I'm humming perfectly. Brain cognition. I stay attentive. I'm able to get like a strong six hours straight in.

All I need is one little break to go outside, get some of that SoCal sun on me, and I'm good to go. Melatonin at night, sleep like a baby, AlphaBrain for the day, keeps me moving, keeps me focused, all the good things. Get over to onnit.com backslash shrugged. You're going to save 10% on all products that you buy and you're going to get a 14 pill bottle of AlphaBrain and you need to do it. You need to sleep better. You need to be more focused during the day. That combination right there is for champions. I'm stoked for you to listen to Alex Macklin right now. Huge piece of the barbell shrug story. First time I got to meet him, we threw the mics on, made it happen. Can't wait to see you guys in the middle of the break.

Talk soon. Welcome to Barbell Shrugged. I'm Anders Varner. We broke out of the Hilton at the Fitness Business Summit 2018. We're on the roof. Close enough. There's a higher roof 2018. We're on the roof. Close enough. There's a higher roof, but we're on a roof. Hanging out with Doug Larson, Travis Mash. Today we're talking nutrition for weightlifters with someone that needs no introduction to the Barbell Struck fam.

Alex Macklin. Welcome back to the show, dude. Yeah, thank you. I'm stoked we get to hang out. We never met before, though, until today. But, yeah, it's cool, man. You had to come all the way to San Diego. I should have at least come to Memphis and hung out.

Yeah, see where it started. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right on, dude. Well, let's talk about some nutrition stuff. I've seen you on the Instagrams. You've done all the weightlifting things. But where did this journey from being – are you still just a weightlifting – or just a, but are you still a weightlifting things but where did this journey from uh being are you still just a weightlifter just a but are you still a weightlifting coach and how do we kind of transition into a little bit more of the nutrition side of this um so i mean i've been competing in

weightlifting for a while yeah like since pretty much since i got started um with mike and doug back in back in memphis and actually mike bletzo is my first coach. But, you know, went through, started learning how to lift, and then got better and then realized, okay, okay, I can go to some bigger meets. So, you know, I started doing that and then teamed up with Travis, and then that's where I went to the American Open in 2015. He makes everyone stronger. I know. Unbelievable.

He can survive it. That's why I'm always standing next to him. Yeah. So like while I was working with Travis though, I started to pay attention more to finer details in my nutrition. I started working with Adi, working against gravity. So I was doing like the macros

and things like that. And I started to realize like, okay, this is where there's a gap here. Like where I'm losing out by not paying attention to my nutrition. Because before, you know, it would just be like, all right, let me just eat whatever. Like, you know, I lost a bunch of weight doing cross,

getting into the fitness, and then, you know, it was just more paleo. But then – You lost good weight. Yeah, I lost really good weight. You got leaned up. Yeah, but then it was also difficult to really balance that out between, all right, I need to be really freaking strong and do travis's programming which he that's i mean he gets you strong but you're going to work for it so like if you if i didn't have if it didn't have

proper nutrition it would i wouldn't be able to do as best as i could yeah yeah so that's when i really started to get like more into it but it. But, however, like, even after doing, you know, the American Open and really dialing in my nutrition, I realized that there's still more left on the table. Like, there's still things I could be doing to improve it. Like, not even just looking at, like, from a – purely just from a weight loss perspective, because that's a lot what weightlifters look at things.

Weightlifters look at a lot of stuff about, okay, I need to cut weight. I need to make weight for this competition. But're not thinking about like okay well how is this affecting my performance how is this affecting my ability to recover and how is this affecting my health because if you if you don't have those things then you still are not going to be a good weightlifter because yeah because you just won't be able to to maintain and sustain the beating that you're going to get in training i see a lot of weightlifters make huge mistakes with, you know, making weight. They'll cut. And normally it doesn't really affect the snatch so much. But clean and jerks, you know, so many people who have never gotten lightheaded before,

you know, when they cut lots of weight, the clean and jerks, they'll start to get dizzy, you know, passing out. It's because, you know, their body's not fueled. And so they're nervous. Cortisol's up, and now they're beat down and not prepared. Anytime someone's standing there just a little bit extra long getting ready to jerk, I'm just like, they're going to fall over backwards right now. They're going to collapse. They're going to collapse.

They're going to ruin my life. I'm going to admit, it's like I have a thing with people passing out. It absolutely makes me laugh every time. I know it's dangerous. It'll be my own athlete, and I'm concerned and laughing at the same time. So one of the things I think, especially in weightlifting, where it's like eat big to be big. If you're going to get strong, you've got to eat everything in front of you.

And then all of a sudden the meat comes around and someone has zero idea how to cut weight to make whatever weight class it is where do how do people fall into this trap i mean it's not there are pieces to the puzzle where you do have to eat a lot in order to recover from the training right but how do you do that in say the healthiest way or in the most effective way so that when the meat comes around you have some sort of control over what's going on. So that's a really great question. And when you ask that, that's when you really need to get into the periodization part of nutrition. A lot of people will think, like, okay, I can just cut you around or I can just gain you around.

They're not thinking about the long-term play here. You're not thinking about on a yearly scale, what are you trying to do? There are some periods of time where you do need to eat at a surplus. You do need to add some mass to your body. And perhaps that time coincides with a very, very high volume phase, especially in weightlifting. But there are some times where you need to cut weight. And you don't want to do that when you're trying to peak for meat. Because the thing is, is that, yes, if you do nutrition properly, if you have good nutrition, like you should be able to maintain your strength while cutting. Sometimes some will go. That can happen.

However, the thing is, is that if you want to perform your absolute best on the platform you have to eat for performance and if you're not doing that then you are leaving you're leaving kilos on the table and so people need to start thinking about the big picture and and the longer time frames rather than just thinking okay what do i gotta do for the next like couple of weeks now when you yeah too late yeah too late when you think about like your competitions like all right what competitions and this is especially true for high level lifters because high level lifters have several now the way that it works now you got to go to several meets if you want to make a team like you got to be thinking about okay what meets do i have to it's like i've got to be on my shit like this meat. And you definitely want to make sure that you are eating properly for performance then.

And so you're not going to try to sit there and be like trying to cut like 10 kilos at that point. Because you're just going to you're just you're asking to do terrible. And a fallacy that needs to be addressed is this is that, you know, when someone tells an athlete you need to gain weight because you're maybe you're 5' you're a 94-kilo lifter, which puts you at a disadvantage. 105 is probably better. But just getting to 105 any old way is not good because fat does not lift weights. Right. You look at the best athletes, you know, internationally, even in America, they're going to be lean.

Like when they compete, like look at Harrison. That dude's ripped. You know, look at Nathan. He's very lean. Like he gets kind of heavy, but then when he cuts down for 94s, he's very lean. You just mentioned that a 5'11", a guy that is 5'11", would want to be a 105 lifter rather than 94. Like, is that something that is, in your mind, a bigger factor? It's like how tall you are should determine your weight class?

It really should. I mean, at the end of the day, when you're 5'11", going against Nathan who's 5'7", Nathan can obviously put on more muscle mass on a 5'7 frame more than you can 5'11". And so you're going to have to go against Nathan who squats 700 pounds. And you're 5'11", weighing 207, you're not going to squat 7. Have you ever put out any charts that would show

kind of what the ideal weight class might be for a particular height? Takano has done that. Oh, has, you know, so, yeah. Have you ever put out any charts that would show kind of what the ideal weight class might be for a particular height? Takano has done that. Oh, has he? Yeah, in his book. Take it off old data from, I think, the Russians or whatever, but he has some data. Like, if you are within certain, like, height, this is what you should be.

But that's also looking at, like, the elite of the elite. Like, you're going to see big spectrums between an elite and a normal person so i mean really i like i like i don't know i can't remember who said this but i think like maybe shankle or north like you've got a you got to be thinking about the total if you're adding weight to your body just to add weight and you're not adding it to your total what are you doing like you're losing you're losing at that point so like when you say like yeah you're adding all this weight like a weightlifter thinks about i need to get bigger i need to get bigger well is that actually adding to your total because if it's not then you don't need to do get bigger if you're at a certain weight that's close to whatever your

weight class is and you can't seem to put any pounds on your total in the off season do you think it's there's an advantage to putting on like 10 15 pounds of muscle just to add some weight to your total and even like psychologically break through like if i normally snatch 120 and now i put on 10 pounds like it's not 125 130 now you you felt it overhead you know that it's possible then when you diet back down maybe you're that much more likely to still hit 122 123 that type of thing i mean you could build that strength and build yeah like build comp uh comfort with with those weights but the thing is that when you die back down you've got to do it in a way so that where you maintain strength so like getting to the point where you are you are paying attention to those finer details especially a lot of people i don't

i don't really understand it's took me a while to really figure this out. But, like, quantity just matters. Like, yeah, you can clean up your diet. And sometimes that's going to help you. That will help you lose weight. But the thing is, is, like, if you are not eating enough food to properly recover and to perform, you are not going to maintain those gains that you just made. You just won't. I think you need to look at body fat percentage. You know, so, like, if you're – when you're at, say, you're a 94-kilo lifter

and when you make weight, like, what is your body fat? It should be, in my opinion, you know, 8% or down. You know, I think that is – 8% you can, like, you know, you're lean, but you're not so low that you don't have energy either. I think there's probably too lean too. Yeah, I mean, the thing is is that to maintain a super, super low body fat, you're not going to be able to eat as much as you need to eat. Yeah, my point is like that's when they're competing. But like if they eat a little bit of surplus in the off season

and you have hypertrophy phases. Right, right, right. So they can go up, say they, you know, they can go up to 98 kilos, put on a little, because you're going to gain a little fat when you add muscle. But, like, the key is, like, you know, where's my body fat? Is it still at a point where if I drop down fat that my lean body weight is still going to be 94 at 8% body fat? Yeah, yeah.

So there's no one magical way to prescribe a nutrition or a diet to somebody. Some people love doing macros. Some people love the more quality-driven diets, so to speak, like the paleo methods and whatnot. In your mind, what has worked the best for you when working with athletes? Is that more of the personality of the athlete

you're dealing with is the most important factor and what they're willing to do? Or do you, do you generally suggest one particular model over another? Right. So that's a good question. So it's a little bit of both of that, because here's the thing is that ultimately it does have, it does, it is what the athlete or the person is willing and ready and able to do. Like Like that's a big thing that in my coaching that I really emphasize because if, again, if you're not ready, willing, and able to do these things that we've talked about, then do you actually want to do this at all? So that has to be discussed, and the athlete has to be on board with that.

Now, again, it depends also on what's the athlete. Okay, now, so if they're on board with that, all right, well, where are we? So in one of Travis's lifters' case, we are very close to a meet that she's competing in, and it's an absolute necessity she has to get down and wait. Like, there's no question about that. Otherwise, she's not going to be able to lift. So when I'm talking about, okay, this is the situation that we're in and this is what we need to do to get there and are you on board with that and athletes high level

athletes this is their job this is what they do and you know sometimes i was just talking to aj about this but like sometimes what they're willing to do they have to give up they have to be willing to sacrifice and that's just what it boils down to so if you get two different athletes and you say oh you're gonna weigh and measure all your food and they're like perfect no problem like i'm meticulous i'm detailed like i'm organized i can do that easy i take my scale with me everywhere i go i cook all my own meals i portion everything out like it's the perfect setup for that person but if you get another person who's not like that at all like they are not organized they don't care about details like measuring everything and doing the math behind it and counting their macros it It's just like, whoa, way too much work.

Like do you suggest that person just go somewhere else? Cause they're not, they're not dedicated or do you work with them and their personality style to, to just make it work for them? Cause they're just a different type of person. Yeah. So ultimately what we're trying to do, we're trying to get the results. So I'm going to work with them and figure out okay what can or what are you willing to do because there's not any one way to get results like we can we can do this any one way mac counting macros jason said this uh yesterday counting macros is the pinnacle and like there are so many things so many low-hanging fruit so many things we can do to to get somebody to that point but that's not necessarily what they may need to do all the time to get there.

Now, here's the thing. It's also my job as a coach to explain the tradeoffs and the consequences of not doing that. So if you are very close to your meat and it's like, we've got to get you down, but you're not willing to do what we know will help you get there, then you've also got to be willing to say, well, maybe I don't make weight for that meet, and that's just something I'm going to have to accept. And maybe I don't want it as bad as I'm saying. Right. You know, when it's talking about mastering the little mundane things of life, that is what really separates the person who wants to be great

versus the person who's okay with good or average. Hopefully the girls on my team, they better darn well be looking and doing everything he says because they're the ones that are telling me they want to go to the Olympics, they want to make a world team. So this is what's cool about your program. Like, you have people that are looking at their training blocks and quads, like the Olympics every four years. And you can sit down with a nutrition program and literally lay out the periods in which we need them peaking, the flow of how a four-year block is going to go.

How do you break that down into maybe six months, a year, and with nationals, American Open, and then getting someone to the Olympics? How do we kind of periodize that on a nutrition side? Yeah, so typically you're going to have four phases. You're going to have an end season. So that's when you're gonna have four phases you're gonna have an in-season okay so that's when you're trying to peak for a meet right now yeah so that's that's gonna be you're eating for performance you're you should not be cutting at this point like you should be close to or very very close to your weight that you're going to walk around at weightlifters tend

to walk around at a weight slightly heavier, like a few percent, like small percentage heavier than they would weigh in because, again, like it still allows them to get the food in that they need to get. And, you know, you cut some water weight, you step on the scale, you only have to weigh that weight for two seconds and then you're done. Yeah, put it right back on. Yeah, exactly. So in season, we're looking at eating for performance.

And then after that, you're talking about off season. And this part is where Travis would do more GPP type stuff. And it's all about recovering from being in season. Yeah. And so, yeah, we're shifting more towards food quality. We may play around with macros like change, increase fats or things like that, but just trying to get the body to a normal, healthy level. It's very health-focused at this point.

Is that in a surplus kind of maintenance? Yeah, we're looking at maintenance at this point. We're just trying to get the body back to a healthy state so that when it is time now to cut or mass, now we can do it in a way where it's going to be healthy. And during this time, too, like a lot of people, a lot of people hate being in a plateau or maintenance. important time where you can work on skills like where you can learn to eat in social situations that are going to happen when you are trying to cut weight. Or just basic stuff like getting sleep, recovery, basic, basic stuff. Travis is always talking about mastering the mundane. This is where you can now really practice these things. And so then we move into uh the pre-season which is where you're

going to start that's when you're going to try to start changing your body composition and changing your weight so if you want to gain weight you want to move up a weight class this is where you would start really trying to shift into a surplus or if you're if you're slightly overweight by the end of this off-season phase that's when you would start now trying to come back down. And really, by the time you get back to the end season or very close, like very close to that end season, you should be reversing. So reversing your calorie deficit or your calorie surplus to get you back to a maintenance and optimizing for performance eating again.

And each weight class kind of has their own, like, where coaches feel comfortable with body weight. And men and women are different as well. See if we agree on this, like, you know, like 94-kilogram boy, I'm good with three to four. A 105, I'm good with four. You know, heavyweights, it doesn't matter. Well, that's what I was going to say. So heavyweights, are we just always growing?

No. Just feed them Cheetos all day and, like, see what we can do? I'm going to tell. So heavyweights, are we just always growing? No. Just feed them Cheetos all day and see what we can do? I'm going to tell you right now, since I have Morgan, my long-term vision for him, he's going to be a heavyweight just because he's a big old boy. But I will not grow an obese heavyweight because, number one, I care about him and I don't want him to have a heart attack someday and die. And number two, I think when these weightlifters get big and obese,

it's not helping because they don't move that well. So you take a guy like Lasha versus the dude from Iran. What's the heavyweight from Iran that's so good? Salimi? Yeah. So you take them and just Salimi is kind of fat, you know, and then Lasha is big and athletic. Lasha is whipping his butt because lasha moves better i think that's

it's it's an interesting thing in the weightlifting world because it's always it's this mass moves mass but it's it's not true there's so much athleticism that goes into the lifts and if you can't get there and you can't get to the positions and there's good i i've been in these like mass gain or just eat everything periods in my life, and I just feel so slow, so sluggish, and you just can't get out of your own way. To take that onto the platform is just going to kill your performance. Yes, and you do want, when it's all said and done,

you do want to be healthy. You don't want to go to the Olympics and get a gold medal and die 10 years later. A lot of weightlifters they i mean uh nine just early early death yes because he didn't care about his health at all you know like he's like smoking backstage in between lifts yeah drinking yeah yeah he's partying and living the life and he's he's not that big so god you can imagine like how much he's throwing back like oh he's like 4 11 or something he's not very tall let so, God, you can imagine, like, how much he's throwing back. Oh, he's like 4'11 or something. He's not very tall.

And let's think about this, too. Look at the weightlifters we all love, like Piros, Dimas. My favorite is because now I know him. Lou Zhaozhong. Lou Zhaozhong. Those are the posters I have about to hang on our walls because they're lean. Yeah, they're shredded. Everybody remembers the Iron Mind picture of Piros in a singlet

where you can see his abs through his singlet. And Lou's back. Lou's back. It's jack. It screams athleticism. That's why they're good. They don't have fat. Everything they have is muscle.

So then you've got an 85-kilo athlete stacked with muscle. Well, muscle can contract, and it is what fires the body you know you know try to try to flex your fat you can't it doesn't do anything just sits there well some people are like i wish i could so do i everyone's in their car well in a weight class sport like you're at a disadvantage if you have extra mass that you have that that's not contributing to your ability to perform so i mean you know i'm i think i want to i ability to perform. So, I mean, you know, I think I want to say this, though. Like, people put a lot of being lean on a pedestal. Like, it is important to be lean and athletic.

However, like, you do have to look at it in terms of, like, where are you going to perform best at? Like, if you are trying to get so, so lean that you're just, you can't perform, that's not helping you at that point. That's the other end of that. Yeah. Absolutely. So you have to find that balance where now you can perform.

Right. So. I think it's about optimizing relative strength. I mean, absolute strength is important, but without relative strength, it's irrelevant. You know? Yeah. You got to be able to get stronger, but still move your body weight better than you did when you're lighter in the off season is is absolute strength more of a focus than in season off season i'm looking more hypertrophy because you know a bigger muscle

is a stronger muscle and so right so i'm looking more at that and then the closer we get you know absolute strength i try to like everything is closer we get, you know, absolute strength. I try to, like, everything is different now. Like, I try to peak absolute strength, like squats and pulls, about eight weeks out from a competition. And then the last eight, I'm trying to peak snatch, clean and jerk, and maintain, you know, the strength levels. When you're looking at maybe a quad for some of your athletes,

and in between there we've got three nationals, maybe four nation nationals is there something different that you guys are doing for nationals versus maybe olympic trials and the fact that you know maybe we can be a kilogram or two off on the perfect weight but then when we have to have that thing dialed in are those different approaches totally like you know earlier now we're in the thick of things but like from when 2016 we're in the thick of things. But, like, from 2016. We say in the thick of things. Well, because right now every international meet now counts. Now it's crazy. So Pan Ams matters.

Yes. Yes, gotcha. Well, Pan Ams counts because we need to earn as many points as possible for the Pan Am Games, which is next year. So if we don't do well this year, we won't get as many spots for next year. And here's the thing. The new rule is that you have to have at least six international competitions starting right now before the olympics come so

that's that's a lot of meat these guys gotta make so we totally changed everything like like i would look for a lot of our top dudes not to go to nationals anymore because they don't have to you know uh as long as they keep doing well like the pan ams and at the worlds and we don't go so we're not going to be taking a monstrous team to nationals because um like nathan and jordan they're so high now i'm not trying to go i don't feel like anyone's in danger of taking their spots so you're not even worried really when it comes to maybe the american open because nationals will be the step up and then you actually need to be just dialed in when it comes to the trials i would say the next you know until the olympics of 2020 like nathan and jordan will probably only do pan ams worlds and then they'll do some smaller international meets where they

won't peak at all but we will only peak twice a year so we normally do 20 week blocks where we're really going hard so that leaves six weeks on both sides to do an off season what about gbp add some weight get healthy so yeah we're gonna take a quick quick break when we get back i want to talk about we mentioned earlier some of the differences between male and females and their cuts their uh their mass phases we'll get back shrug family we're back hope you guys are enjoying this big hangout with alex macklin awesome hearing his voice back on the microphones on barbell shrugged want to give a special shout out to our sponsors organifi look i can't rave about these people enough i love them i love

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free shipping on those groceries, a 30-day free trial to Thrive Market. Go to thrivemarket.com backslash shrugged. Back to the show. Welcome back to Barbell Shrug. We're here with Alex Macklin. We're going to get into a little bit of understanding differences in male and female nutrition gains, cuts. But one thing I want to talk about before we get going, you have a 14-year-old that's a total monster right now.

Right, monster. And at 14, your goal is to get him into the heavyweight division. I mean, that will be just – It will just be what happens. Happens. It's not like you're going to overfeed him until he becomes this giant. It doesn't matter what I do. If you try to wrap your arm around his wrist, it's probably like halfway. He's just a monster.

He's a true monster. Yeah. So what does that look like, though? Like when do you think he's going to get there? Like what is the long-term approach? I mean, I feel like if I want – when someone – I started working out when I was 13, and if someone came to me and was like, hey, dude, one day you're going to weigh like 250, there's a chance you're going to put 600 pounds over your head.

Yeah. I'm like, what? This coach is on crack. He's starting to believe me. He's already on top of his own nutrition. He came to me. He said, do you think it's time for me to track my nutrition?

I'm like, since you came to me, yes it is. The fact that you're concerned about it. He is aware that this is a thing. He's probably the most aware athlete I coach. He's only 14. The fact that you're concerned about it. So he is aware that this is a thing. Oh, yeah. That dude is probably the most aware athlete I coach. He's only 14. He's well aware of his recovery, how much he sleeps.

That's good. Well, his mama's into that too. So, yeah, it helps, you know. But when you're working with younger athletes, is the conversation a little bit different and just realizing, I mean, they're processing centers. They're crushing food. They have the ability.

Like, they're not 35 years old worrying about, you know, things are moving perfectly for them at that time. He has a huge advantage. So, like, if he were working with Alex, I would need to tell Alex this, is that his big advantage is that he is a heavyweight, you know. So, even as a youth, he's already, it's like 94 kilogram plus is the heavyweights. But he has an advantage. So, like, when they're at the end of this year, it's the Youth Olympics is what everyone's battling for. And so they have certain numbers.

You know, the main kid, Jerome, who he's battling with, who's 69 kilos, basically has to stay in that weight class. If he were to go up, like the world numbers are so much higher, he would drop him so far down we would automatically win. So he's forced to stay 69, whereas we can get as big and heavy as we want, and those numbers don't change. The whole pound for pound, it doesn't matter. So it's just a number he's got to beat. So it's an advantage for him to continue to, you know,

either at a slight surplus or, like, you know, like maintenance. But, like, definitely not go at a deficit for him. Yeah, and if I was coaching like a kid like Morgan, I would definitely want to talk with his coach and see, like, what the long-term plan is because, yeah, again, like ultimately that's what Travis is thinking about too. One thing I think that you're particularly good at, you're talking about dealing with a 14-year-old kid,

and he probably doesn't know every single detail of all the aspects of nutrition that you might need to know if you want to optimize your nutrition. You're really good at simplifying things and making it really easy to understand. One of the coolest parts about your Instagram account is that you're always posting meals and they're always like super simple you got this whole hashtag basic basic as fuck nutrition like it doesn't have to be complicated like you make super simple meals all portioned correctly like like go and expand on that because i think people over complicate nutrition sometimes and you you do a really good job of keeping it keeping it very very. Keeping it basic? Hashtag basic as fuck? Yeah, no.

No, man, but that's the thing. It doesn't need to be that complicated. A lot of times, again, if you look at what somebody's doing, very, very obvious, simple things, small changes can still make big, big results. So doing the basics, like Travis always said, it's like mastering mundane. Are you eating vegetables at all or most of your meals?

Are you eating lean proteins? Are you eating mostly whole and unprocessed foods? Are you quantifying your foods in some way? I don't care if you whip out a food scale and weigh and measure all your food. You can use your hands. You can take pictures. You can write down.

It's about doing the basic stuff. take pictures you can write down like it's it's about doing the basic stuff and then once you get a handle of it then you can you can expand on it and make it and make it uh more personal and and you know whatever level that you need to do you can dial that dial up as much as you need to dial it so i mean a lot of people want to jump in and do the most like crazy sexy shit but it's like are you don't you don't even have the basic shit down yet yes and let's start with that first like let's let's look at the one thing like you're just pounding sodas every day like how about you just not pound that soda like a couple times a week there you go like so i try to keep it basic but also like explaining it to somebody you have to a lot of, a lot of coaches miss the boat on this

is that you have to know your audience. Just like if you're speaking out here at this conference, know your audience. If you've got a 14-year-old kid or a mom or somebody who doesn't know a damn clue about what a macronutrient, protein, whatever is, like don't use that language. Just say like, hey, how about you have some food?

Like we want to eat meat. We want to have vegetables. We want to have some say, like, hey, how about you have some food? Like, we want to eat meat. We want to have vegetables. We want to have some rice, like things like that. Like, let's speak in a language that they can understand. Because you start sitting there spitting out, like, all right, I want you to have 150 grams of this, and we're going to get your, you know, hormone levels up to check, to spar, like all your ghrelin and peptide YY. Like, you're going to overwhelm them, and they're gonna overwhelm them and they're gonna be like i'd i'd i'm done so you gotta keep it as simple as possible for that person and then yeah educate

them along the way build them up teach them how to do this on their own because ultimately that's what we want to do i don't want to sit there i tell all my people i'm like you shouldn't have to pay a nutrition coach when you're 80 years old. Like, this is ridiculous. Like, yeah, you're going to learn along the way, and we're going to build you up. I like that. One of the advantages of doing macros is that you actually learn what's in your food. But eventually, you shouldn't have to weigh everything. You should understand eventually what's in your food.

That way, you can eyeball it and move on and not spend so much time every day, like counting and quantifying and plugging it into spreadsheets. Well, a lot of it boils down to, you know, one, building habits, like, eating habits, being mindful of your food. Like, what are you eating? Like, how much of it, how is it making you feel? Like, what is it doing to you? Like, being mindful about your food then you can say okay i'm just going to eat like a normal person and not eat like an asshole but i know how to do

that like people say like don't eat like an asshole but like how do you do that my wife tells me that all the time if someone's used to eating like that though so you have to teach someone i i with with my people i try to teach them how to build a life with sustainability in mind. Can you do this for the rest of your life? Because that's, again, you shouldn't have to pay a nutrition coach when you're like 80-something years old. Totally. A lot of people, they might know what to eat, but they're not very good at cooking. Do you do much in the way of educating people on how to cook food and then how to do cooking bulk meals cook in bulk meals and like how to just do something simple like baking chicken in the oven and making

rice in a rice cooker like like little things like that like what what has worked really well for you as far as teaching someone how to cook that doesn't know what they're doing so yeah with cooking like you got to keep just again you got to meet them on their level so we may may give them some recipes and things like that but basic stuff like all, all right, get you a crock pot. You can throw meat in the crock pot, throw some season in there, and, like, you have a really great meal, right? Like, you know, learning how a lot of things, too. What I like to do with cooking is just keep it simple. Cook a meat.

Cook a couple of meats. Cook some starches. Cook a couple of vegetables. You don't need recipes. Just mix and match. learn some seasonings try different things like people are afraid to try stuff like i mean yeah you're like well i don't know if i like it if you don't like it okay cool you don't like it you don't eat it again but like try some things and mix and match and play around with stuff like i make like i make taco meat like

we make taco meat every meat it's like half ground beef half ground turkey i can make a lot of stuff with that i can put it in soups i can put in stews i can make taco meat every meat. It's like half ground beef, half ground turkey. I can make a lot of stuff with that. I can put it in soups. I can put it in stews. I can make spaghetti and meat sauce. You've got to learn how to make what you got with the staples. There's nothing easier than browning some ground beef in a pan.

Start with staples. Not much more delicious. It's fast. It's really fast. Figure out what you like to eat and okay, and then play around with combinations. If you don't like it, then you learn something. I love asking people. They're like, that's not enough variety. It's like, okay, well, what do you eat? And it finds out they eat the same three things all the time anyways.

It's like, oh, I need more variety. It's like, no, you're saying you need Cheetos at your office. You're not telling me your dinner does not change. You're going to eat the same beef, chicken, pork. Make it variety with the spices, the way you cook it. If you saute it, steam it, whatever. Whatever you want to try to do. Mix that shit up.

So as a weightlifting coach, I'm sure there's a lot of other weightlifting coaches out there and other weightlifters who want to know, like, meat day nutrition. Like, what would you recommend that an athlete eats? Because I see a lot of people go wrong. They won't eat it all, run their meat, and then they get lightheaded at the end. But how would you prescribe that? So that's super, super individualized for sure.

Because, I mean, you can give somebody a prescription and then they just have disaster pants on the platform and then it's no bueno. So, yeah, I mean, but that's the thing. Like if you eat something that doesn't agree with you, then your performance is going to affect or like, yeah, it's going to start messing with you mentally. And so then it's going to just boil down to that. So, I mean, general rules of thumb, okay, what do weightlifters typically do before they get to a meet? They restrict. Right.

All right. And then they cut a whole bunch of water weight so they can dehydrate and step on the scale as light as possible. So hydration is going to be the number one thing. Right. Like, period. How do you hydrate? So, yeah, I mean, we can do this with, like, I learned this from you, actually, like half-cut Gatorade and water, just a little bit of that,

like half-cut Gatorade because you got the carbohydrates in the Gatorade plus the electrolytes. Plus the just water. Yeah, plus water, right. And it's not super, super sweet, so it may not irritate the gut because maybe you didn't eat all that much coming up to it so you pound a bunch of food and it's sugary sugary stuff it's not going to sit well with you right so hydration is going to be going to be really important what about you know

a lot of people will go get um what's it called the kids like pedialyte pedialyte yeah i mean that can also work too which is better is there one better than the other i mean pedialyte is going to have a lot more like electrolytes and things like that. So, I mean, yeah, either one. It's, again, just like you're just trying to hydrate at this point. Like let's not get super, super into details. You're just trying to get liquids in. Into your body.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. And then, yeah, when you're feeling better, like usually I suggest if someone is coming off like a really hard like weight cut, like, all right, you're going to start feeling better once you start getting some liquids then you start thinking about food right and so yeah you want to have some protein you want to have some some some carbohydrates right like combination i think a combination of fast carbs from the the gatorade or the pedialyte plus something like slower, like, like whole, like whole grain breads or whatever. Right. But like, again, or fruit, but again, that's going to depend on what they like to eat and what sits well with them.

Personally, for me, I, I, I tended to do, um, like light proteins, like tuna or chicken. That's what we eat. Yeah, exactly. Like very, very light, not super heavy, digestible, Cut it low on the fat. Like maybe have a little bit of fat just to slow down digestion depending on how long, like, you have to lift. But keep fat pretty low because you don't want it sitting in your stomach. Maybe a few walnuts or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And then, you know, have some fruit or, you know, some applesauce.

What about rice, brown rice? I mean, yeah, you can do that. You can do that. Again, it's just going to depend on that person. How many times, and I guess maybe this is a way, this stuff just doesn't happen anymore, but how many times are you guys facing really aggressive cuts and we're talking, what are some of the largest cuts that you have

anymore or have you just gotten rid of that completely by being able to partner with somebody that knows what the hell's going on and the dates that are coming a girl definitely doesn't want to do that yeah that was absolutely i've seen a lot of girls try that and it will zap their strength you know um the biggest one i might you know do would be like as a 94 like nathan maybe he gets up to 98 because to cut to 94 it never bothers him plus he has two you need to look at um and something that i'm sure a lot of nutritionists are looking at is that person um very efficient or not so like jordan cantrell every kilo he can squat he can clean it clean and jerk you know so like if you drop but if you cut him too much.

Killer. I'm talking about front squat. Every ounce he can front squat, he can clean and jerk. And so, like, if you cut his weight too dramatically and it takes away from his absolute strength, well, you just messed his clean and jerk up. Nathan, I mean, he squats 700. So, like, if he loses a few, if he loses five kilo on his squat, it won't affect him, you know, at all.

Yeah. I mean, the thing is, along with that point, you want to – for weightlifting, like, you don't have that much time to eat and rehydrate. Two hours. You have two hours. And really, you may even have less than that because depending on how long the weigh-in takes – I've weighed in, like, was the last person to weigh in. I had maybe, like, 30 minutes to get out there. So you don't have a whole lot of time, like, in some powerlifting federations and things like that.

So you really, as a weightlifter, you really want to hang out pretty close, like, comfortable, cut down, like, not trying to cut, cut like 20 pounds eight weeks out. No, that won't work. That will not work. I wouldn't allow a lifter. If he's 10 kilos or 20 pounds over, that's a wrap. I just feel like I would say the education was around, but when I was competing in weightlifting, it was like, okay, I'm a week out.

I'll just stop eating now. And then next thing you know, I weigh in i would make weight and then i'd go eat like a whole chicken it was like this is there's got to be a better way and there just wasn't like the the science i mean the science was there but the resources and the number of resources to have somebody and you're like you in the corner that knows every single thing that's going to happen minute by minute if once you put it into your body it's just you have to corner that knows every single thing that's going to happen minute by minute once you put it into your body. You have to have that now. I think in America, a lot of the weightlifting coaches are trying to do it like they

would do a wrestler. You can't do that. We are a sport that relies on being strong. Wrestling is skill and endurance and how tough you are. In weightlifting, it doesn't matter how tough you are. If you just lost 10 kilos, you're weaker. It's not and how tough you are. But in weightlifting, it doesn't matter how tough you are. If you just lost 10 kilos, you're weaker. Yeah.

And it's not coming back. I think it was on Facebook, and I saw some older weightlifting coaches. They were talking about – somebody asked something about nutrition. I think it was in a Facebook group. Yeah. And they were like, you don't need to measure. Just eat and eat however much you want to eat. I remember Shanko, like someone asked him, like,

what should I be doing for my weight? And he was like, no, just keep eating and getting stronger. Like, is there an end? Like, there has to be an end to this. There's definitely diminishing returns to that philosophy. Now I just feel terrible. Do you set weight goals for people? Like, eight weeks out, you've got to be here.

Four weeks out, you've got to be here. That type of thing. And then, ideally, like, plot a graph where they can see like, here's like your trend line. You got to be following this trend line. Are you above it or below it? You know, every day that you're measuring. Yeah. I mean, you want to, you want to have that level of detail for sure, because then, you know, if you're on track or not, but typically I'm, I am. So with, with, uh, Travis's lifters, I have them log their weight every single day. Um, and I've got a plot going, man, like it's there and i'm watching

and i'm like if it's not if it's not the right slope we gotta we gotta figure out what's doing something like because because yeah because ultimately we're we're we're racing the clock here because with one of travis's lifters i i want to get her to the point where we're not stepping from straight from a cut to getting on the platform. Like she came to me, she was like, I got this meet it's in May. Like I've got to, I've got to make this weight. She already came to me trying to lose this weight. It wasn't budging. So, all right, this is what we got to do. Let's do it. But I want to get you to this point where we can now get that weight off and then get you back up to a maintenance so that you are fed and feeling good stepping on the platform.

So we're on a very, very tight, tight schedule. And I emphasize with her all the time, like, we got to stick to it. We got to stick to it, be consistent. And, yeah, it's working. I mean, you know, guys like Shanko, and he's a great lifter, and I like him, he's my buddy. But, like, things have changed yeah the eras have changed like he was in an era that was not near as competitive like he was like smoking cigarettes his numbers nowadays like he wouldn't even his best numbers of all time he wouldn't even be in the top five you know so like you know it's changed

so now you have to you know number one we one, we've all, as coaches in America, have all gotten together and we all agree that no longer do we want to make teams. None of us really care about American records. We're trying to compete on an international level. So for us to compete against people who are obviously taking drugs, we have to do things differently. So, like, you know, when you don't care about your nutrition, you just took a very important aspect that you could have gotten a leg up on the people who are doing drugs but

you're not doing it so you just wasted an opportunity that's what we talk about with their lifters every choice you make every decision you make you know every time you don't go to bed and you go out you just took an opportunity and wasted it because as natural athletes which all of us are in america like you can't afford those mistakes and judgment. And you're coaching one of the best up-and-coming girls in the country. And what are some of the things we talked about coming out of the break, but differences in males and females? And how are you changing her kind of nutrition prescription as you would somebody that's 14 that's a male? Well, with her, she already came to me in a deficit. kind of nutrition prescription as you would somebody that's 14 that's a male well with with

with her she already came to me in a deficit so it was it was kind of this point where it's like okay we're we're already in a calorie deficit and she was coming to me like complaining of not having a lot of energy and recovery hurting um so we immediately we have to resolve that so that was the main important thing. So, yeah, we're doing things like refeeds to help her recover. You're her best friend. Yeah, exactly. I told her I was like, hey, how do you feel about like 350 grams of carbs?

She's like, twist my arm. You want me to eat a loaf of bread every day. Exactly. Okay. She packed her bags and went straight to the hall of fame. I love this guy. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, we're trying to get her performance to improve while we're still in this deficit.

So that is the main priority right now. And, yeah, as a female, we are going to be dealing with issues. Like you had Lori King on the show. And I don't know if she talked about women's women's health or hormones or things like that but that does play into effect that does not happen for men so yeah like we're we're having to work around like periods and menstrual cycles and things like that and make sure it changes huge yeah it's i mean every month there's going to be and i all my female clients i have to be like, okay, you know this is coming.

And a lot of them I actually have track it. So you know this is coming, so we're not going to worry about this right now. Because a lot of that will mentally derail an athlete. But also we have to make sure that we're getting enough fat in their diet. So if we take too much fat out of her diet, then her hormones could suffer. What actually happens with the menstrual cycle, food, hormones, all that good stuff? Like from your nutritional perspective, like what are they looking at?

I don't know. Yeah. What do you mean? Well, I mean like so as you prepare for that happening each month, what's going through your head to prepare for it when they come out of it? I'm not a nutrition coach, so I don't know what I would be even looking for. Yeah. I mean, just basically, I mean, we're going to see water retention.

Gotcha. We're going to see that. We're going to see the scale go up. Again, it's not permanent. So a lot of it just has to do with damage control, like trying to say, like, look, this is going to happen. This is not permanent. They're going to get cravings. Like like trying to say, look, this is going to happen. This is not permanent. They're going to get cravings. It's going to be – their sleep is going to suffer.

I'm saying this to them because – You're more preparing the behavior patterns to prepare them to get into it. To not derail themselves. Because the ultimate thing is that we have to stay consistent to the plan. So if you run into these situations and it throws you off, well, then we're not following it right now. And so that's when we run into trouble. Gotcha. Yeah.

Very cool. Thanks for joining us, man. Yeah. This has been awesome. It's great. I actually got to do a show with you. This is so cool. Where can people find you?

My Instagram is AlexQMacklin. And then my website, I just I just made it look at that I know I'm solo me myself and I alex Macklin calm original. I'm not so I'm really creative guys So make sure you get on the Instagram though. I really enjoy seeing the posts. I appreciate super cool stuff Thank you coach go to mash elite comm check me out go to Ashley performance on Instagram Yeah, watch 14 year olds make you feel bad about yourself. Douglas E. Larson, what's up? Right on, man.

That was fun. Yeah, dude. Like old times, do a show together. That was killer. You can find me on Instagram, Douglas E. Larson. Make sure you follow our boy Colton on the cam at BitsbyCo. He's got all this sweet gear. Get hooked up.

You can find me at Anders Varner. Make sure you get into iTunes, YouTube, subscribe, like, leave a comment, be friendly. And we'll see you guys next week. Peace. Another killer episode of Barbell Shrugged. Want to give another special shout out to all of our sponsors, Organifi. Make sure you get over the sunrise to sunset green, red, and gold drinks at Organifi.com backslash shrugged. You're going to save 20% on all things that you order over there,

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