Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 334: PCOS, Training when sick, Intra-Workout Supps, stomach fat + more!

Episode Date: November 2, 2023

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Hey, everybody, welcome into episode 334 of the Dynamic Dialogue podcast. As always, I'm your host, Danny Matranga. And in this episode, we are going to be discussing supplements, nutrition, training when sick, what one might take intra workout, PCOS, supplements specifically for women and much, much more. This is a Q&A episode and all the questions have been gathered from my Instagram. So if you want me to answer your questions directly and inject 10 years of training and coaching experience into a thoughtful answer, be sure to follow me on those platforms, whether that be TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Threads,

YouTube, you name it, so that we can engage and I can bring your questions here where we can go a little deeper. I hope you guys enjoy episode 334. This podcast has some awesome partners, and one of my favorite, of course, is Legion Athletics. Legion is my go-to supplement manufacturer for what I like to call my big rock supplements. This would be my protein powder, my pre-training formula, my post-training formula, and creatine, and my kind of ancillary vitamins and micronutrient protection. So why do I like Legion so much? What sets them apart? It's quite simple. Legion uses all natural

ingredients. All the formulas include natural coloring and natural sweeteners. No artificial sweeteners, just stevia. And every single formulation, be it a pre-workout or a vitamin, contains clinically effective dosages of ingredients shown to work in humans in clinical research supported by robust trials. No filler, just legit ingredients in each and every formulation proven to work. The whey protein isolate is so light. It's fantastic. It mixes in water. It tastes amazing. And I drink it every day, even as somebody who's lactose intolerant. That's just how high quality this whey protein is. And it's sourced from Irish dairy cows that

are raised well, eat their natural diet, and packaged in climate friendly packaging. I love their plant protein too, for those of you who like something that's a little on the thicker side and you aren't a fan of animal products. Also, I love Legion's pre-workout, but specifically the pre-workout that does not contain caffeine. That would be their Stim Free Pulse. I'm a huge, huge fan of beta alanine and L-citrulline, but I don't like taking in wildly high amounts of caffeine. So if you are somebody who likes pre-workout with caffeine, you can try pulse. Or if you like it without caffeine, because you maybe want to enjoy your morning coffee or monitor your caffeine consumption, try the pulse stim free.

My favorite flavors there for sure are the new grape and the amazing, amazing tropical punch. As for my creatine, I get that from Legion's Recharge, five grams each and every day. I take it on the days I train as well as the days I do not because Recharge also contains L-carnitine, which can help with promoting muscle recovery and decreasing soreness, as well as some ingredients to help with creatine utilization. And of course, my favorite supplements for my ancillary micronutrient health are Legion's multivitamin and Legion's greens powder. Not only do these two products contain a ton of high quality vitamins and minerals, they also contain unique adaptogens like KSM 66 ashwagandha and reishi mushroom, which I like to take each and every day to promote my health if you want to cover all your bases with a high quality protein creatine post-workout or the

ancillary micronutrient health stuff like greens powders and multivitamin i encourage you to go over to legionathletics.com and check out using the promo code danny that'll save you 20 on your first order and you'll rack up points that you can use the same way as cash every time you use the code and you'll also be supporting the show. Okay, everybody, here we go getting into your questions. So let's start with one from Mary underscore Elizabeth underscore Anderson. She asks, do you track your calories and macros daily, even in maintenance mode? So for me, the answer to this question is yes. Now, I'm not going to suggest that everybody tracks their macros all the time. I have a fairly analytical brain. I like numbers. I think I might've been an engineer maybe in a past life, but just from a

pure enjoyment perspective, tracking the stock market, tracking sports statistics, tracking macros, the granular numerical things like that. I know this might sound strange. I promise I'm not tooting my horn here, but I will look at lifetime stock values, how they change, how they adjust. I'll look for trends. I look at weird football stats like unrealized air yards and, you know, offensive efficiency beyond expectation. I like weird numbers. So for me, tracking macros isn't really that hard. In fact, to a certain degree, it kind of makes sense because I already know I'm going to go to the gym. I already know I'm going to train. I already know that I'm going to allocate time and money and resources to training, to equipment, to supplements. So I certainly want to make sure that I'm getting at the very least the

macros I need to perform. But that's not how I want to answer this question. I want to answer this question from the standpoint of, do I think everybody should track or what's a good option for other people who are at quote unquote maintenance mode? So if you've been tracking your calories for a very long time and you've been tracking all of your macros for a very long time and you reached your goals using these tools. You built the physique you want, the body you want using macro tracking, but you're nervous now that you're going into maintenance. Should I still track? What do I do? Well, I find that this strategy works pretty good and it's the strategy of don't track all your macros, just track your calories and just

track your protein. I think this works very well because from a composition and physique standpoint, the two biggest things that have the biggest impact on how you look are your caloric intake levels and your protein intake. So if you've been tracking all three macros, protein, carbs, and fats, and you need a little break, but you still want to focus on your physique, you can just track your total calories and your protein. And I find that while this isn't optimal for performance or health, this is certainly a great way to make sure that when you kind of backtrack from tracking all the time,

you still hit on the most important things, which are, of course, protein and calories. Now, for a lot of people, even that is going to seem like a lot. So the simplest thing you can do to change your physique, improve your physique or maintain your physique without tracking everything is to set a protein goal and have a calorie cap. Very simple. These two things will make a huge difference in your physique. They don't require you to use MyFitnessPal. They don't

require you to use a food scale. They can be very, very simple. You track your total calorie intake, which again is more accurate when using a food scale, and say, hey, I'm not going to eat more than 2,000 calories, and I'm going to make sure that I have more than a hundred grams of protein. It can be as simple as a calorie cap. Can't go higher than this number and a protein goal. I must go higher than this number. And that allows the fats and the carbs to fall where they may, but it will let you have a better handle on your physique, the maintenance of it, the development of it than simply just guessing, which is never a great strategy. Next question from Holstova V. And she asks, is doing eight exercises on a leg day too much? I want to say yes and no. So if you look at the

app-based training protocol I have for, you know, essentially the development of glutes, hamstrings, upper back, it's a female bodybuilding program, elite physique. Show notes will have information on that. You can check it out. It's through train heroic, really awesome daily app-based programming. Great for developing your body. It's designed for women. There's eight exercises on almost all the leg days, but it's not eight leg exercises. You know, it might be one or two warmup exercises, one or two ab exercises. And usually I think the sweet spot is between like two to six exercises. Just depends on how that session split up. If it's like all glutes, you might have three glute exercises and then

like one accessory quad, one accessory hammy. If it's like a glutes, you might have three glute exercises and then like one accessory quad, one accessory hammy. If it's like a full leg day, you're trying to hit everything. Maybe you do two lifts for the posterior chain, two lifts for the quads and like a little bit for the hip abductors and the calves. So there's a way that you can get to eight total lifts for a leg day. Um, and like, man, this is a good question. I think it's like, I think it's a great actually opportunity to kind of break down like what a sloppy, like garbage leg day would look like, like just too much volume, junk volume compared to like what a thoughtful and practical leg day would look like. So let's compare a good leg training session to one that

has probably too much volume for most people using that eight exercise reference. So too much would be something like exercise one, squat, exercise two, reverse lunge, exercise three, leg press, exercise four, hip thrust, exercise five, RDL, exercise six, walking lunges, seven, leg curl, eight, leg extension. I know people who actually do that. They try to do every freaking exercise in the gym. And the likelihood is by the third or fourth one, you're going to start to see serious decreases in performance. But what if you wanted to do eight exercises on a leg day and actually have it kind of yield results? Well, that might look a little different. It might look something like exercise one and two are a mobility couplet designed to help you get ready to train.

Something like a 90-90 hip switch and a couch stretch to unlock your hips. Exercise three could be a lateral band walk to open up the abductors. Exercise four could then be a big lift like a hip thrust, a squat, or an RDL. Exercise five could be another big high output lift. Like those are the two exercises, four and five. You spent three to get ready and four and five are the show. That's where you empty the tank. Now, six, seven, and eight can be accessories to support the main lifts. Let's say exercise one was RDL and exercise two was hip thrusts. And the session focus is the glutes. You might take exercises five, six, and seven to be, or I should say six, seven, and eight to be things like 45 degree hip extensions, lateral band walks, hip abduction, cable hip abduction cable hip abduction things that are a little less strenuous

but support those big lifts you want to empty the tank on the biggest lifts save a little bit of volume at the end for some accessories but don't try to survive like eight compound movements on a leg day i think that's a little bit aggressive and I don't know if that positions you to actually make very much progress. And I think you might incur a lot of what we call junk volume. Okay. From Sims Jonks, the question is, I am desperately trying to lose weight around my stomach area. Please give the best tips. I know you can't target body fat. So a lot of people say, okay, you cannot spark target body fat. And, uh, I think that's true. But what if the inverse is also true that while you can't spot target fat loss, can you accidentally promote fat gain in

certain regions? And I do think this may well be the case. I'm of the impression that high amounts of stress and considerably high levels of alcohol intake can increase central abdominal fat storage, meaning more booze, more stress equals in many cases, a greater, you know, kind of accumulation of body fat in the midsection. So if we know damn well, okay, I can't do a million sit-ups and burn all the fat off my abs. But if I'm super stressed and drinking a ton of booze and eating too many calories, I might store more body fat than I want in my abdomen. I would recommend making sure that while you're on your weight loss journey, prioritizing your calorie intake, your protein intake, your sleep, that you also make a point

to cut out any of the habits that might influence body fat gain in the midsection. And those are high amounts of stress and things like alcohol consumption. But the truth is, I really think you're limited in how much you can enhance body fat loss in the midsection. A lot of that is driven by hormones, genetics, individual fat pattern, and where your fat accumulates. So there's only so much you can do, but I would definitely keep an eye on stress and alcohol. A question from Liz Takes Picks, best food tracking apps. I've been using Foodprint. I've actually never heard of Foodprint. Maybe it's good, maybe it's not. Can't speak to

it. Might take a peek at it here in a second just so I can kind of understand what that's all about. But I'm a huge fan of MyFitnessPal. I still think they do the best job of anybody. I still think they do the best job of anybody. Um, not, I'm not saying it's a, you know, um, as perfect. I know that a lot of people are not happy with the fact that they kind of took their premium product that had, um, you know, all the bells, all the whistles, the barcode scanning, et cetera, but, and they kind of got rid of it. And essentially what they did was like make, you know, you have to pay to use a lot of those premium features. I still think they have the best food library. Really, really good macro factor. Another excellent food tracking app from Greg Knuckles, uh, carbon from Lane Norton, another excellent tracking app. I would say

pick a couple, try them out, see which one you enjoy using the most because that's actually going to have the greatest implication on whether or not you're going to use it. If you are able to use it daily, consistently, without feeling super stressed, without feeling burnt out, without being like, fuck, I hate this, you're going to have a way better time with food tracking. So play around until you find the perfect app. I am impartial to Macrofactor, Carbon, and MyFitnessPal. What's going on, guys? Coach Danny here, taking a break from the episode to tell you about my coaching company, Core Coaching Method, and more specifically, our one-on-one

fully tailored online coaching program. My online coaching program has kind of been the flagship for Core Coaching Method for a while. Of course, we do have PDF programming and we have app-based programming. But if you want a truly tailored one-on-one experience with a coach like myself or a member of my coaching team, someone who is certified, somebody who has multiple years of experience working with clients in person, online, somebody who has licensed to provide a macro nutrition plan, somebody who is actually good at communicating with clients because they've done it for years, whether that be via phone call, email, text, right? This one-on-one coaching program is really designed to give you all the support you need

with custom training designed for you, whether you're training from home, the gym, around your limitations and your goals, nothing cookie cutter here, as well as easy to follow macronutrition programs that are non-restrictive. You'll get customized support directly from your coach's email, or they'll text you or their WhatsApp you will find the communication medium that best supports your goals as well as provides you with accountability in the expertise you need to succeed as well as biofeedback monitoring, baked in accountability support, and all of the stuff that you need from your coach when you check in. We keep our rosters relatively small so that we can make sure you get the best support possible. But you can apply

today by going over to corecoachingmethod.com, selecting the online coaching option. And if we have spots available, we'll definitely reach out to you to see if you're a good candidate. And if we don't put you on a waiting list, but we'll be sure to give you the best shot at the best coaching in the industry. So head over to corecoachingmethod.com and apply for one-on-one coaching with me and my team today. Now, another question about macro tracking, and this is one that I really like, but it's a little bit different. And the question comes from Ash L. Cash, and she asks, what's the best macro tracking for women with PCOS. So what's the best macros if you have PCOS? So PCOS or polycystic ovarian syndrome is of course specific to women. Got to have ovaries to have PCOS, but you actually don't have to have ovarian cysts. The Rotterdam criteria, the criteria that's used to diagnose PCOS,

only requires that you have a few different things going on. To make sure that we get this accurate, I've actually pulled up the Rotterdam criteria here on my computer. Now, one of the three things that will kind of like make a test positive, if you will, for a polycystic ovarian syndrome is having multiple cysts on your ovaries. But there's two other criteria, irregular periods and elevated androgens or more testosterone than the average person. So if you have two of those three, or I should say more testosterone than the average woman, if you have two of those three, maybe you have cysts and elevated androgens, maybe you have

elevated androgens and you have irregular periods, maybe you have irregular periods and cysts, you might be diagnosed with polycystic ovary syndrome or ovarian syndrome. And one of the kind of common and let's say most present side effects is dysregulated blood sugar. A lot of women with PCOS have a hard time regulating their blood sugar. So what does that mean for your macros if you have PCOS? Well, you should definitely work with a physician who specializes in this. But as is the case for many people who struggle with insulin resistance, a high amount

of fiber, a high amount of dietary protein, good amounts of exercise, and a mindful approach to your carbohydrate intake and fat intake are critical. So if you have PCOS, you have polycystic ovary syndrome, because you've been diagnosed, not because you've self-diagnosed, and you know that you fall into the Rotterdam criteria, you have two of the three going on. It probably makes sense to exercise a good amount, to eat a lot of fiber and protein, to be mindful of your total caloric intake and to make sure that you manage your blood sugar on a fairly regular basis with activity, even monitoring it. But those are kind of the ways that you might adjust your macros or tailor them to living with PCOS. I don't think there's any special crazy protocols, but I do think you have

to be aware of the insulin resistance that's oftentimes associated with PCOS. Next question from Arch. And the question is, training sick, push through or rest? Man, this is a good question. And it's actually something I really, really struggled with early on in my training career. I just love training and exercising so much that I made a really, really big deal about it. I never wanted to miss. And I remember playing sports in high school. You couldn't miss for being sick unless you were like about to die. It was expected that you would really, really push, really, really drive, really, really work hard, even when you were sick or under the weather. And I carried a lot of that over to my own training. I said, you know what? It's just a head cold or it's a stomach bug. I'll push through. I'll get it done. And what I didn't think about at all, and this is embarrassing to look back on, but I

didn't think about other people. I didn't think about other people in the gym that I was contaminating, my clients, all that shit. So I would go to 24 hour fitness all the time. And I remember when I first started training, I was training at 24 hour fitness and I was training my clients at 24 hour fitness. And there's like 50 bajillion members and they were always coming in sick. I was getting sick all the time there. Cause I wasn't doing a good job of washing my hands. And then one year I just got sick of being sick. Like once a month, I was like, fuck this. I'm going to use a hand sanitizer all the time. And remarkably, like my sickness is cut down, like way, way down. Like

I was getting sick every five months instead of every month. And so I realized very quickly, clearly people are bringing shit in here and I'm picking it up by touching shit or just being near them, whatever. Right. Um, so if, when you're thinking about training, when you're sick, the first thing you got to think about is, uh, if I'm going to a gym, am I going to get other people sick? And if you are probably don't do that, it's, it's super inconsiderate, but if you train at home or, you know, you can train intelligently or your gym's not that crowded, I think you can agree to train sick if it's isolated to kind of just the head area, which is to say like, if it's just a head cold, I think you're probably good to train. Um, but if it's, you know, respiratory, if you're

feeling it in the stomach, if you have a fever, uh, odds are you're still fighting it off. It's not isolated to just being like, you know, a respiratory tract thing or a head thing. You might do yourself a disservice. The quality of your actual workout is likely to be pretty poor no matter what you do, especially if you're super sick. And it might just be worth it to recover because while you're recovering from the sickness, your nervous system is recovering from hard training, your muscles are, and so are your joints. And if you have to partition even more resources away from your immune system to recover from even more training, you might just be sicker longer and just having shitty workouts the entire time you're sick. So not a huge fan of training when you're sick,

unless it's really, really light. Okay. This question comes from Amely P1. And the question is, EAAs intra-workout, are they worth it? EAAs are different from BCAAs in that there's more than three. So BCAAs are the branch-chained amino acids, leucine, isoleucine, and valine. There are three. Now, the essential amino acids are a total of nine amino acids that we have to get from food. There's 11 non-essential ones that we make on our own, but those nine essential amino acids are really important because we get them from food. So, it's reasonable to assume that nine essential amino acids that include the three BCAAs might work better as an intra-workout than just BCAAs alone. And I do think that's true. However, when it comes to intra-workout supplementation, I'm not particularly worried about getting amino acids because if I'm getting enough protein

throughout the day, my circulating amino acid pool has what I need all the time. And I'm not worried about having amino acids immediately during my training. If I wanted an intra workout supplement to improve performance, I'd rather have something with carbohydrates, electrolytes, and water so I can stay hydrated, get a good pump and fuel my training. And I'd rather have protein before and after training, making sure I'm getting enough across the day than worry about supplementing with amino acids. But that being said, I don't think there's any negative effect one might incur from including BCAAs, EAAs in water that they're drinking while they're training. I just think

the opportunity cost of those supplements, meaning what it costs to use them, is going to yield lower results than what it would cost to use an electrolyte, a carbohydrate supplement, a high quality hydration drink, a sports drink for endurance running, et cetera. Depending on the type of training you're doing, it might, you know, that might make an impact or have an impact on the supplements that I would choose to use intra-workout. But in most cases, for most people, I'm recommending eating whole foods across the day, making sure that you're fueled through your training. And if you're training fasted, be sure to load up on water and maybe something like electrolytes before worrying about things like small individualized amino acids. But I'm certainly not bashing amino acids. I like them. I just prefer to get high full spectrum protein from a high quality protein like a whey protein isolate, a plant protein blend, or of course, all of the whole food

proteins like cheese, yogurt, dairy, of course, the umbrella that holds cheese and yogurt, eggs, meat, those are my go-tos. And if you are getting between 0.7 to 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight, supplemental amino acids are not particularly useful. And if you wanted to kind of ingest more amino acids on a price per serving basis, you'll probably get more from a high quality protein powder than you will in EAA. Imagine an EAA yields like five grams of essential amino acids per scoop or per serving. A protein powder is going to yield 20 grams of full spectrum protein. This will of course include some of the non-essential aminos, but you will get tons of essential amino acids. And you know, a BCAA scoop might be a

dollar a scoop, $30 for 30 servings. Protein powder might be $1.25 a scoop, but in the protein powder, you're getting somewhere between like five to six grams of BCAAs plus 15 grams of essential and non-essential aminos. Whereas in an amino acid supplement, you might get five grams of BCAAs for the same price roughly. So I just think there's better value in supplementing with high quality protein than there ever will be in BCAAs. So to try to put it as flatly and as simply as possible, if you're buying BCAAs, you're pretty much flushing your fucking money down the toilet because if you look at the price per serving data on BCAAs, price per serving data on EAAs and the price per serving data on a high quality whey protein isolate, um, they're roughly

the same. It might be a little more expensive to do the whey protein isolate, but you'll get all your essential aminos, all your non-essential aminos, tons of BCAAs. And you know, you will be doing a much better job of ensuring that you're getting enough protein throughout the day, which is super, super important. And that's what's driving so much of your growth and your recovery. It's not amino acids in a certain time. It's all the amino acids throughout the day. All right, folks, I hope you enjoyed this episode of the podcast. If you did, be sure to leave me a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Hit the subscribe button and share it with a friend.

I have the goal of growing this podcast a lot in the new year, and I want to reach more people on my mission to help other people live healthy and fit lives. So if you haven't yet, subscribe, review, and share. Thanks so much for tuning in. I'll catch you on the next one.