Mark Bell's Power Project - Call In Show with Nick Wright!

Episode Date: October 7, 2020

After a long day of shooting content with us, we decided to open up the Fan Line and give YOU the opportunity to speak one on one with The Jacked One, Nick Wright. Thank you to everyone who stepped up and called in, we had a blast! Please follow Nick on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/scondore Subscribe to the Podcast on on Platforms! ➢ https://lnk.to/PowerProjectPodcast Special perks for our listeners below! ➢Freeze Sleeve: https://freezesleeve.com/ Use Code "POWER25" for 25% off plus FREE Shipping on all domestic orders! ➢Piedmontese Beef: https://www.piedmontese.com/ Use Code "POWERPROJECT" at checkout for 25% off your order plus FREE 2-Day Shipping on orders of $99 ➢Sling Shot: https://markbellslingshot.com/ Enter Discount code, "POWERPROJECT" at checkout and receive 15% off all Sling Shots Follow Mark Bell's Power Project Podcast ➢ Insta: https://www.instagram.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ https://www.facebook.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/mbpowerproject ➢ LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/powerproject/ ➢ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/markbellspowerproject ➢TikTok: http://bit.ly/pptiktok FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell ➢ Snapchat: marksmellybell ➢Mark Bell's Daily Workouts, Nutrition and More: https://www.markbell.com/ Follow Nsima Inyang ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/ Podcast Produced by Andrew Zaragoza ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamandrewz #PowerProject #Podcast #MarkBell

This has definitely been my favorite format as far as podcast goes because of the connection that we have with the humans. Yep. So there we go. The humans. The human interactions. So right now it's pretty dope. So even on top of that, we're actually notifying subscribers via text right now. Oh, cool.

So eventually we'll have people trickling in left and right. But for everybody that's listening, you guys are hearing something a little bit different. For one, Mark and Seema decided to be fat and lazy and just kind of head out early. Whereas my boy Nick Wright Fat and not lazy. How many videos have you recorded for us today?

Like 87? Yeah, a whole lot. We've been here all morning. All morning. I appreciate the hustle and so he was filming another video for markbell.com and then all of a sudden out of nowhere we're just like hey dude do you want to do a call-in show and he's like absolutely so that's what we're doing today you guys will have an opportunity to hang out with us on air you actually be able to talk to nick on the phone it's going to be sick but before i do that i just want to pay a quick bill a shout out and thank you to a free sleeve for sponsoring this episode of the podcast. Um,

again, like I said, this episode is a little bit different, but we still need their support. If you guys don't know the free sleeve, of course, is a wearable, uh, cold therapy device, especially if you have like achy elbows, achy knees, you just slide it right up over and you get the doctor recommended 15 minute cold therapy treatment. Uh, so drop your, uh, achy knees, you just slide it right up over and you get the doctor recommended 15 minute cold therapy treatment. So drop your straps, wraps and ice packs and just freeze it, sleeve it and relieve it. Head over to freesleeve.com at checkout, enter promo code power 25 for 25% off and free shipping on all domestic orders.

With that out the way, Nick Wright, you are a competitive bodybuilder, competitive power lifter. On top of that, what I want to just say is that you stay jacked year round. Thank you. How do you do that, dude? Don't eat too crazy. I don't go crazy with tracking either. I just try to keep some balance, man. I just eat, make sure I get my protein in obviously. And just I intermittent fast, I train fasted and then I eat big in the second half of the day. Yeah. And then I train for both bodybuilding and powerlifting at the same time. Okay. So with, with that in mind, um, you know, for me personally, like, uh, I did a cut and I got in really good shape and then everyone's like, Oh, do you need to like put on some size now? Like you're too skinny.

Like, let's get you a little bit bigger. So that way you can develop more muscle. I did it completely wrong because as soon as I started seeing that definition go away, I got so depressed. Yeah. How do you avoid like, uh, getting in that weird mindset of like, no, I gotta stay, I gotta stay shredded. And then you don't. And all of a sudden you get like really sad and depressed that you're like, all that hard work is gone now. Well, it depends on where your threshold of going crazy is so if you are somebody who this like the second you just go above five percent body fat you freak out that's something that's a little more psychological you're gonna have to work on psychologically kind of detaching yourself from that but you know if you're talking just realistic moderate amounts of change like

you go past 10 maybe even into 12 plus range, and you start seeing the veins and the ripples disappear, you can find a happy medium of bulking slowly and making gains slowly to where you don't really have to get too much heavier than that. You just got to understand that to lift optimally, really high volume, really hardcore year round, you're going to have to be in a caloric surplus. And then with a caloric surplus usually comes a little bit of extra fat and just know that you're just building, you're building the muscle in this time and take advantage of the extra water weight

and the extra fat that you have and use it in the gym because the extra fat and water is going to help cushion your joints and make lifts feel so much better. So get that heavy lifting and get that overload in it, but you don't have to go crazy though. You don't have to get up to the point where, you know, cheeks are looking like chipmunks and you're gaining 20% body fat. You can keep it pretty lean. You just have to be patient and remember that muscle gain is really, really

slow. Don't be afraid to not go crazy. Keep a little bit of leanness going. You don't have to gain 10 pounds, 15, 20 pounds. Just be patient. But at the same time, if you lose a little bit of the veins a little bit of the ripples that's okay it's it's part of the process and take advantage of it in the gym and when you talk about like the process right of it being a little bit on the slow side you started lifting at a very long young age

so like around what age were you when you're like oh this is actually starting to like i can see a difference now right i started lifting at 14 and it wasn't so that was my freshman year of high school it wasn't until probably my junior year like 16 years old that i started uh finally feeling a little more filled out kind of being happy with the results so first couple of years there you know and um that was kind of just doing things trial and error before the the age of social media and so much information being available. So, you know,

even after I'd already been training for like six or seven years, when I started powerlifting in 2014, it was almost like I relearned how to train all over again. And then suddenly I made leaps and bounds just from like learning the real technicals of the power lifts. It even helped my bodybuilding side of things. So learn as much as you can, but keep in mind that it's just a slow process that takes time. And, uh, it takes a lot of learning and learning takes time. And if you actually look

at my PRS, I've hit a decent amount of PRS and it's easy to forget how much time has gone between them. So it's easy to look at it and be like, Oh, you squatted 500 pounds. It just feels like yesterday. Now you're doing 600 pounds and same with the deadlift and all that. But if you actually look at the dates that I hit each of the different milestones on, it's a lot of time in between. Yeah. And so like, what, what is your diet look like though? Like, are you tracking, uh, you know, I mean, obviously like Mark does carnivore stuff, he keeps everything's pretty low carb, except for right now, he's actually implementing a lot of carbs and he's having a lot of fun with it. But for you yourself, uh, what type of diet do you stick to mostly? Yeah. Mark's looking juicy with the carbs. It, I know it's so much fun for us when we get to see him,

like start to like, uh, I think I'm going to lean out a little bit. As soon as he says that, like we all get excited. Cause I mean, you know, in,

you know, I'm still a part of media. So like whenever we see that, right. Oh, we're going to have a good opportunity to take pictures. It looks great. Yeah.

Um, I don't do anything fancy right now. So when I, when I was doing my bodybuilding show in June of 2019, I did low carbs, high fats. I preferred that. So close to keto, but not quite keto. There's still a little bit of carbs in there.

And then I developed this bad binge eating issue from it, which is really common with people who compete. So over time, I got over that binge eating issue by basically just reintroducing some balance back into my daily nutrition. So I don't do anything fancy and I don't even track macros. I've been doing this long enough to where I can ballpark what I'm getting in calorie wise. I know when to eat more, when to eat less and how my body's responding. That's something that people can get to once they've been doing it for years and years and years and years. But I just, one thing I do is I intermittent fast, not because I think it's anything magical, just simply because it allows me to eat larger meals later on in the day. So I'll be fasted all morning, train usually around mid-afternoon, and then I'll eat my

first meal post-workout. And then I'll try to only have like maybe three major meals that day. And I keep it pretty well-rounded. Like my post-workout meal is usually like a big old chicken breast. I put some like barbecue sauce on it now. And then, you know, grits with some cheese and eggs mixed in there. Something like that, you know, or some oatmeal. Pretty basic stuff.

So I keep it pretty basic. Pretty, I guess, quote unquote, clean. But yeah, I'm not afraid of like having a lot of it. And I'm not afraid of throwing things in the mix as well either. Because I just know I'm not eating a whole lot. So that's the way to do it. You can eat big fun meals that are large as long as you're not overeating them and eating too much of them. Yeah. And it's like, I mean, you're pretty far removed from those binging days and stuff. So I don't want to say we can joke around about it now, but I remember you were saying you're like, it wasn't like a

matter of like one or two bowls of cereal. It was like one or two boxes. Oh yeah. So I have to ask, dude, what's your go-to cereal? Oh man. I haven't had cereal in so long now. Actually, speaking of binging in cereal, I knew I was starting to get over the binging issue when I could finally make a cereal box last for like a week. That was, that was something else. That was unheard of territory, man. So, you know, one of my favorite cereals are? This hurts me because this isn't even actually my favorite cereal if I had to break it down.

But I just love it. It's the Sour Patch Kids cereal. It's a cereal that you're either going to hate it or you're going to love it. There's no one that just kind of likes it. It's not even my favorite one but man, it's addicting. Some of the best cereal though,

there's like a Nutter Butter cereal that's good been wanting to try that i haven't stepped up though i'm afraid it's gonna be too good no it's yeah it's really good dude it's amazing obviously the classics like cinnamon toast crunch are always amazing i mean almost i can't think i'd be better uh off listing cereals i don't love. True, true. So I guess if somebody's listening, what are some telltale signs that may be like, hey, shoot, maybe I should pay attention to this because I might have a binging issue? One of them is eating really fast,

which sounds really funny, but when you binge, that's just part of it. It's almost like that animalistic side of your brain coming out, which it actually is. If you look at the science behind what's going on in your brain when you binge eat, it is the quote-unquote animal side of your brain. Basically, the portion of your brain that controls the survival instincts. So if you push yourself underwater, you're going to suddenly fight tooth and nail to get up to get oxygen. Things like with hunger that, that applies as well. And you kind of just get miswired and you create a new habit with that

side of the brain to give you almost like a starvation response with everything you eat. So one of the things you will do is you'll eat really fast. You'll inhale it really, really fast. So that's one thing to note. And that's one of the things that actually helped you help me get away from binge eating was just take, force myself to take time between bites. Take a bite, force myself to put down the spoon for like a few seconds. Sorry, I had my phone on while I was still live streaming and whatnot. The guy sounded good in your phone. Yeah, that was you.

My bad. Yeah. Yep. Another big one is you get anxiety and stress going on when it comes time to eat. Especially if you start off trying to, especially if you tell yourself, like, all right, I'm just going to have one cookie, and that's it, or just like one of this or just one bowl of that, and then you start getting kind of anxious and wound up and stressful,

and you go back for another one, and you try resisting, and the more you resist, the more anxiety you get, which is easy to confuse with just kind of, you know, slipping into a cheat day when you've been dieting for a while. It's kind of what you do when you cheat on a diet, but like, you'll notice that you kind of start to do that with everything all the time. So coming from a, like a background, a bodybuilding background here at super training gym, we have a lot of power lifting gear, but as a bodybuilder who maybe is like, Oh, I obviously don't need knee, you know, knee and elbow sleeves.

Cause I'm not going heavy. But for, for someone like that, how can those type of knee sleeves or elbow sleeves help them out with their training? I think everyone can use knee sleeves. Cause it's not something that's like, it's not just for when you're doing crazy heavy weight.

I mean, it's longevity of your joints period. Like even if you're squatting, just if you're a 200 pound male and you're squatting just 300 pounds you know nothing earth shattering but that's still 300 pounds on that tiny little joint that is your knee over and over again that's going to add up so if you wear knee sleeves it compresses the knee it keeps the joint moving it basically it's like it's like warming up your knee joints for you instantly. So it gets the knee moving nice and fluid. It gets the tendons moving, and it helps the muscles just fire better.

So even if you are bodybuilding, I still recommend a knee sleeve. It's just efficiency and longevity for the joints and the tendons. Dope. So for the first time in Power Project history, the fan line actually crashed on me. Wow. So my bad. That's all good. But we'll get that thing back open and running again.

Let me see. Make sure this is all good but we'll get that thing back open and running again let me see make sure this is all good it's a bummer all righty anyways all right well we'll get back to some of these questions uh and again if you guys are on the uh the live stream right now please hit that fan line we are open everything looks like it's working this time around so my bad my apologies we're good to go we're good to go now what i wanted to ask you though is uh you started youtube also at an extremely young age yeah you were like one of the first ones dude uh like what drove you to start that channel yeah man it was just um scott herman and scooby when i started youtube there was no one else um i had been documenting my progress in just competing in bodybuilding for myself. I've been documented on body space, which was like bodybuilding.com is my space at the time.

This is before like Instagram before all of that. And, um, I noticed there's, there's a pretty big platform documenting all sorts of bodybuilding, pro bodybuilding, amateur bodybuilding on major sites like bodybuilding.com. They do these huge web series covering it, but I realized there was really nothing covering like bodybuilding.com. They do these huge web series covering it, but I realized there was really nothing covering teen bodybuilding. So I started uploading videos on YouTube just basically to store my contest footage on there. I would just upload my contest footage and just forget about it. It was just there so I could look back at it, you know, kind of like a, like a Dropbox or a Google docs. And one day I looked back at it and I noticed I had a pretty good amount of views and subscribers

built up from it. And I was kind of shocked. But then it kind of clicked. I love public speaking. Love it. Love speaking in front of a camera. And I think I'm pretty good at breaking things down in a unique way when it comes to giving information out.

So I just decided, you know what? I'm going to create a platform to document teen bodybuilding since there isn't one. And it'll be YouTube. And then I just started my channel and I started interacting and the rest was history. So, um, so I guess for, for people out there right now, like, um, YouTube in 2020, uh, it, it seems like it's probably going to be like damn near impossible to, to kind of get big now just because the, the is, there's so much noise going on, right? What advice do you have somebody specifically in the fitness realm to help build their YouTube channel? Run.

No, I was like, we're like jogging. Like, I don't get it. Run away from YouTube. The best advice I can give you, there's no real tricks of the trade anymore. It's a crazy time right now. So you're dealing with an industry that's so overly saturated. You're dealing with algorithms now on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, all social medias that work against you. They don't even let your content get to your organic followers anymore.

Everything's working against you. And then there's no real trend to follow either. On one side of fitness YouTube, you have guys giving informative lifting tips. On the other side, you have Larry Wheels hitting PRs. fitness YouTube, you have guys giving informative lifting tips. On the other side, you have Larry wheels hitting PRS. And then on the other side, you have just gimmicky shit with people pulling up in like supercars doing backflips and crazy stuff like that. That's just kind of eye catching and goes viral. So there's not one real right track to jump on. So my advice now would be what my advice was back when I first started YouTube and what it has always been, which is decide what you

are passionate about and pursue that passionately. And then just use YouTube as a way to share that passion. Boom, that's it. If you do that, you'll never go wrong because you may run into a point where you're not getting views. Things are not picking up. It's not going well, but you're not going to care because you're just following your passion first and foremost. And then eventually you keep doing that enough. You never know something could finally pick up. Do you think it's like a viable option anymore these days to just rely just on youtube like ad revenue for somebody to like you know because what i'm thinking is like okay like even doing like all this right now like i'm putting in so much work and attention into this podcast that is very much obviously

worth it is it worth it these days to put that much time and energy into a YouTube channel? No, not just for straight revenue. And actually, glad you asked that. Starting a YouTube channel for the sake of revenue and making money is an absolute guarantee to failure. I've said that before a billion times, and I still stand by it. If you're starting a YouTube channel to make money, you're going to fail because already your head's going to be in the wrong place and

you're going to be number focused. You're gonna be focusing on the numbers and those numbers do not climb fast and you're going to get discouraged and you're going to get fed up and you're going to quit. And also the viewers are going to be able to tell that your content is not genuine. There's something about content when it's genuinely creative and it's coming from a passion. It just feels different. It sits with you different. And you're not going to have that. So do not focus on the money at all and don't get into YouTube for the sake of making money. And also, is it feasible?

So in theory, yes. Like, I still make money off my YouTube channel. And even when I start uploading more, I see that money go up again. But you got to get a pretty big channel to make sufficient money now. You know, nowadays it's like, okay, YouTube's cool, but we're really relying on sponsors. We're relying on our own businesses, our own sites, whether we do coaching programs, run a clothing line, whatever it may be, other endorsements. There's other things that come from the YouTube channel that make us money. So we're not really focused too much on the ad revenue because that's getting smaller and smaller and smaller, too.

Companies are paying less and less money because ads are just becoming less and less effective. Ad targeting was huge in like 2015. It's quickly becoming saturated and not as effective anymore. So they're paying less and less. So the CPMs are less and less. And then, like I said, the algorithms are working against you, you know, and now you got to jump through more hoops just to get monetized as a new channel. I forget what it is now, but you've got to reach a minimum amount of views and watch time every single month to stay monetized. Yeah, it's something like 9,000 minutes or something. That sounds right. Something like that. And then like 10,000 or maybe it's just like 1,000 subscribers. Right.

or maybe it's just like 1000 subscribers. Right. But yeah, I guess, yeah, the, the, the barrier of entry is getting a little bit higher, which I actually appreciate.

Cause I don't think, you know, I think the harder it is to actually get monetized, I think it will be like the, the market will be less saturated. But as far as being a viable option of like, you know, cause like my daughter's 12 years old and like most kids,

she's like, I think I just want to do YouTube. It's like, well, it's going to take a little bit more than just making like a YouTube channel. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It takes stuff like social media.

So D is, are you guys like you and Ariana, the only two that like run your social media? Yeah. We're the only ones that run it. And, um, what you said, I want to go back actually, what you said about, um, it kind of the tighter standards for getting monetized, kind of weeding out a lot of the non-deserving content. That is true as an ideal, but I don't think it's working that way in practice. Because I think what's happening is you're getting less and less efficiency from ad targeting. So people are paying less and less and less. And what ends up resulting is the few companies that have the money to spend

are going to start becoming very choosy in what kind of channels, what kind of content they do put their ads into. And then what YouTube ends up doing and all social media is I'm doing is they end up conforming this algorithm that's going to eventually favor these sort of videos. And we're already starting to see this a little bit. Now you're starting to see more censorship happening on YouTube now, um,

because it needs to appeal to advertisers. And then you're also seeing, and I think it's still a little bit more robotic right now. I don't think it's necessarily someone's out there favoriting certain videos, but I think this is the direction it could very easily go in, and it's starting to go in, where the type of content, the type of genres

that do make money, the investors just want to invest their AdSense into that. So therefore, YouTube's going to start favoring those. And those are going to be the recommended videos and the videos get circulated in the feed. And what you're going to see is entire genres start getting fizzled out and pushed off to the side. So initially, you started off with,

okay, cool, we're making it so you can't just be anybody and jump onto YouTube. But now you're going to make it so, okay, even if you're a deserving channel, you just don't fit the criteria of advertisement, so you've got to get shoved off to the side. Dope. Okay, cool.

It looks like we got a call. All right. All right, let's see what we got. And boom. Caller, what's your name and where are you calling from? Hey, my name is Louis from Texas. Texas in the house. What's going down, man?

What's up, Louie? Very much. Cool. What's up, dude? Do you have any questions for Nick? Yeah. Fire away. What's the difference?

What's the type of diet to do for power lifting for power lifting um simple is best in my opinion so you don't need to overeat and get fat like a lot of powerlifters think you do you can keep it pretty similar to what you would eat for body building so eat enough calories to where you're in a caloric at least caloric maintenance if not a caloric surplus and they have a lot of videos on, on YouTube right now that you can just type in how to, to find my macros, how to track my macros. And they'll give you some equations, how to figure out how many calories you need. So make sure you're getting in a good amount of calories overall. Make sure your protein intake

is nice and high, roughly one pound, one gram of protein per pound of body weight. So if you're 200 pounds body weight, roughly 200 grams of protein. And you want at least 20% of your diet to be good fats. That helps your hormones there. So you can make a decent amount of it fat and then just fill up the rest with carbs. It doesn't need to be anything too fancy or too crazy. Actually, Louie, while I have you on the line, you know what I have? I have the exact math, I think, for that diet. Ooh.

Let me see. Breaking down some macros for them. Yeah. I had it. Where is it? Oh, here it is. Yeah, okay. So for calories, to find your calories, take your body weight, multiply it by 14 to 16 times.

So, if you want to be safe, just times your body weight by 15. That's about how many calories you should start with. Then protein, about one gram per pound of body weight. Fat, you want to do your body weight times 0.3 or 0.4 if you want it on the higher side. And then whatever is left, you calculate all that out, whatever is left, you can just fill it up with carbs. But keep it simple, man. Just protein, get those carbs and fats in, and just eat well.

What kind of food do I have to stay away from? Well, that's going to come down to you more than anything i mean in a general sense you know eating uh eating higher quality foods so like obviously um your meats your vegetables fruits things that are going to be higher in vitamins um nutrients overall getting good fiber in is always the best way to go so then foods that wouldn't really fit into that would obviously be, like a lot of the processed sugar stuff. Processed sugar isn't evil.

You can have it. It's not going to destroy you, but you shouldn't make your entire diet be ice cream and chocolate and things like that 24-7. And as far as lifting goes, be very careful. This is going to come down to you

finding out what works for you. But you're going to want to make notes of what foods don't sit well with you when you're lifting. So, you know, if, if you're someone who gets lightheaded or you have high blood pressure when you lift,

you know, maybe don't have a whole lot of sodium. Don't go have sushi with a bunch of soy sauce right before you lift, you know, or if you have a sensitive stomach, stay away from maybe greasy foods, no fast food, stuff like that.

Things that are going to make you sluggish and possibly mess up your stomach and performance. You do cardio three times a day? Yeah. That seems like a lot of cardio. What do you do? More like Running and all that Well If you are doing cardio that much

I mean I don't know exactly What your schedule looks like Exactly what your goals are But if you're doing that much cardio No, not three times a week But more like Once a day

Do you mean three times a week Or three times a day? I do it like every once a day. Once a day. Okay, yeah, that's good. Yeah. Yeah, that's good. I like that.

I like doing cardio once a day. Do it after you lift. I wouldn't do it before you lift. Okay. And you don't have to do it right after you lift. You can lift. You can eat. You can come home.

You can relax, whatever. You can have dinner. You can do the whole nine yards, and then you can do it later on in the evening if you want. Or you can lift, and you can have dinner, you can the whole nine yards and you can do it later on the evening if you want, or you can lift and you can just have like one scoop of protein. That's what I like doing when I do them both at the same time. I'll go into the gym, I'll lift, I'll bring one scoop of protein with me, usually in like a small little Tupperware, right? And I'll mix it up in my, in my water bottle at the end of my weightlifting workout.

And then I'll just, I'll pound that and then I'll go onto the treadmill and do my cardio. So you get a little bit of that protein in right after the workout, which is good, you know, because protein repairs muscle. So you want some protein definitely throughout the day, especially after you work out. You're not going to die if you don't have it. You're not going to wither away if you don't have it,

but it doesn't hurt. You know, but you could do that. You could just work out. You could have your protein right there in the gym after your weights, and then you could do your cardio. Or you could work out, go home, eat a real meal and then do cardio on its own time. But I wouldn't do cardio before

you do your weight training stuff. Just because cardio can drain you. It can tire you out a little bit. And it can even make you tight. So if you did cardio, then you're coming in and trying to do a heavy squat. The squat might feel like trash. How long is the cardio? That's also up to you. If you're in and try to do a heavy squat, the squat might feel like trash. Is it a matter of how long in the cardio?

That's also up to you. If you're walking, like if you're doing a steady walk, usually 45 minutes is a good minimum. If you're running, that's up to you and it depends exactly what you're doing. You can do a 30-minute jog. You can do intermittent where you do sprints and then slow down and sprint and slow down. So it depends on what you're doing. That would be HIIT, high-intensity interval training.

Good to know. Thank you, Nick. Awesome, man. Hit me up on Instagram anytime you have a question too. I'm always there. Cool, man. Appreciate you taking the time to call us. Take it easy, bud.

Later, brother. That was dope. Real quick on the, the cardio thing. Cause what I like to do is I actually just go for calories. I don't go for time. So like I make sure like the, I at least get 500 calories burnt,

like estimated. I, I'm not saying like, Oh, I, I can now eat a 500 calorie meal extra at the end of the day. Yeah. It's just the target.

What do you think about that? So I think all it comes down to is consistency. Consistency is the only important thing there. So if you're counting calories on the machine, the machine's obviously not going to be accurate. It says you're burning 500 calories. Maybe you are. Maybe you aren't. Maybe you're burning less.

Maybe you burn more. Who knows? Maybe you have a weighted vest on and you're actually burning more calories than it says. Whatever. But what it does mean is that you know that walking at that pace, you know, if it's on a treadmill, you say you're walking in four miles an hour, whatever pace you're doing, you know that at that pace for that amount of time, you're burning the same amount of calories.

So even if 500 calories isn't accurate, if it's only 300, whatever, if you repeat that same exact pace and time every day, you're guaranteed to be burning the same amount of calories every day. Right. And you can figure out if it's enough or you need more just by eating. You know, if your weight isn't going anywhere, then maybe kick it up a little bit or eat a little bit less in proportion. If you're doing that and you're dropping weight really fast, then, hey, maybe you're burning more calories and you realize you can eat a little bit extra.

You know, man, four miles an hour. Who are you, David Goggins? Yes, I am. All right, let's take another call. Let's see who we got. Caller, what's your name and where are you calling from? Yeah, what's up? My name is Mitchell.

I'm calling from Atlanta. Mitchell, what's going down, man? What's up, man? Not much. This is Nick, right? Yes, dude yeah I was wondering so uh yeah I'm 19 I'm basically doing like a kind of like a power building split right now I love it and um I'm wondering like what set and rep range do you think is the best for bench press because i've been doing a five by five but i was wondering uh i've tried different things like before i was doing like just a typical pro

split like three sets eight reps right uh doing a five by five now i was wondering uh what your take on the best like rep ranges to increase the bench so rep range is a little different uh from person to person one person might respond better to high reps than low reps. And then another person might be the total opposite. And it also can depend on where you are in your training. But personally, what I found for definitely myself, and I found this for a lot of people, it's not the golden rule, it's not the law, but it's something I've definitely found that works a lot, is typically lower reps for bench press.

So I personally stick to around four actually. So I have a power building program that I designed in 2018 and it's the same one I've used for the last couple of years now. I haven't switched off of it and I'm still making progress on it. And a lot of my main bench days there are four by fours. And then I'll have like a variation bench day. I'll bench twice a week and I'll have a variation bench day. That'll be like a long pause day, you know, so like a two second pause. And that one, I might do like five sets of three, something a little bit different there. But for my main working bench day, I'll do like a four by four and I'll progress the weight up a little bit each week. And that's the other big thing too. It doesn't

necessarily, it does matter what your reps and sets are but it also matters how you're progressing with the weight because that should also be strategic kind of like the same way you'd drop your calories down strategically when you're doing a cut it's kind of how you want to move up and wait as well so first four three weeks will be a four by four and then starting on week four i actually start doing a heavy single not a max just a heavier single than my reps so i'll do a single and then I'll drop down to a slightly lighter weight and do a four by four after that, if that makes sense. Yeah. Um, and also what do you think is the best, like, um, like accessories for bench press? So one accessory that gets so overlooked in powerlifting is the dumbbell press. It's so simple,

but so effective. And you can do, you could do the flat dumbbell press, or if you're already doing a lot of flat benching and you're kind of gassed from that, you can just do incline dumbbell press and you don't even have to make it heavy. Heavy dumbbell pressing can work well,

but like what I'll have some of my guys do when I train them is, um, they'll do all their flat bench work. And then afterward I'll have them do like a three by eight on incline dumbbell press. Nothing too crazy, not super light, but not super heavy either. And it works amazingly that and close grip pressing for the triceps are probably like the two biggest exercises. And then man, the biggest thing for benching. So dumbbell pressing, close grip pressing, and then just the biggest fixer of all

for everyone is simply pause reps. Start pausing all of your reps. It doesn't have to be a long pause. It can be a half a second. It can be one misses up. That easy. Start pausing your reps and control the bar. Go on.

You think I should do that on every set? I should do that Like on every Like on every set I should do a Pause reps Yeah ideally Yep And It may suck at first

Because like They're tougher When you're not used to them So you're probably Gonna have to go down And wait And just practice With a slightly lighter weight

But I'm telling you man Once you get used to it They will blow Your bench press up Because if you've ever Failed a rep And you got it like Off your chest

But then it kind of Started failing like Midway up That's usually because You don't have enough Power off your chest, but then it kind of started failing midway up, that's usually because you don't have enough power off your chest. And so pause reps will help that. Okay, yeah, thanks.

I never really did pause reps. Yeah, man, that'll be the biggest game changer right there. Cool, man. Thank you so much for calling in. We sincerely appreciate it. All right, yeah, thanks. Awesome, dude. Catch you later. Awesome, man. Thank you so much for calling in. We sincerely appreciate it. All right. Yeah, thanks. Awesome, dude. Catch you later. Awesome, man.

Dope. Cool. Let's just hop right into it. But I was going to ask you, actually, I'll ask you after this. Let's see who we got next. Yo, caller, what's your name? Where are you calling from? Hey, what's going down, man? It's your boy DW from that big H-Town. What's going on? Hey, here's Stan. What's up, man?

Hey, man, I had a question regarding I'm getting ready for a meet in here next year, but I'm currently in the cutting phase. I'm about, let's say, 190. I'm kind of down to 175. That's my goal around January. And I had a question for you regarding that. I competed at 181. So would you recommend me during my cut when I'm in about that range of 181

to go ahead and compete or just finish my cutoff at 175 and just kind of, you know, kind of not bulk up, but like kind of, you know, ease your way back up to 181 meat. Yeah. How would you go about that? I would do your second option, 100%. I would cut down. Already?

Yep, I would cut down 175 and then ease back up into that 180 range and then do a meet. just because when you are in the middle of cutting especially when you're deep into a cut you're going to be zap man you just don't have enough calories uh to really be your strongest um you're going to be kind of withered low energy so you want to have some energy you want to have some calories in you you don't have to be necessarily heavy but you want to have at least energy and calories. So I would do the cut, get shredded, get lean. And then after 175, slowly, you don't have to get fat, just slowly kind of add a little bit more calories in slowly. You know, even if you come in light, like 180, at least you're going to have extra calories and energy and you're going to feel a lot stronger.

All righty, man. Thank you, man. You answered my question. I had another one. So where do you think the state of powerlifting is heading to right now? Like the future? And obviously Raw has taken over. And it went through a cool transition, in my opinion. So you went from the older school, you know, West Side Barbell era of guys, where they took it, I don't want to say too seriously, but I mean, they were very extreme with it, you know, willing to die for it, to the point where they almost were dying during it.

Then you had kind of this new internet wave come out, and a lot of the USAPL, the raw guys came out on social media. And then it kind of went in the opposite direction to where like the cool thing was to be humble and talk about how lame power thing was and act like you don't really care about it. And that was kind of lame, too, because that's just stupid. And so now we're coming around to this point where we're getting this nice, happy medium where people are getting really serious and amped about it again. But while kind of maintaining like they're not killing themselves over it and we're seeing some badass slippers coming up man like john hack smashing numbers you know oh man that shit's crazy man it just boggles my mind seeing that dude yeah human it doesn't even make sense man he's nutty

yeah all righty man. I had another question. What kind of music are you into right now? What have you been listening to? Oh, rap. I'm always into rap, man, especially trap. Did you check out that new Nas, though? I did. I saw the new Nas.

Yeah, his new single. Yeah, I did see that. Dude, that shit's dope. But, like, I had, like, old Jeezy on just this morning I had to lose my mind on. And then, actually, speaking of Houston, dude, I had to lose my mind on. And then actually, speaking of Houston, dude, I had like Paul Wall's old stuff and like some Slim Thug on on the airplane over here. I went and found it.

Oh, shit, alright. Like I found like... Yeah, man, I love it. I found like Throat and like all those old songs. I love it. Yeah, alrighty, man. Hey, what's your favorite viewer man i remember that i don't know man one video has always reminded me is that breakfast of champions

years ago wow that uh video man so i've been watching ever since man that's a throwback with you i appreciate it man yeah for sure thank you for calling what question for you you're from houston what who's your favorite h town artist right now Thank you for calling. What question for you? You're from Houston. Who's your favorite H-Town artist right now? Oh, man, Zero, hands down.

Nobody can top that boy. Zero. Anyone y'all listening to, listen to Zero, man. Hit up on Spotify or YouTube, man. Change your life. Hell yeah. Hell yeah. Hey, thank you for calling, brother. I appreciate it.

Thanks a lot, man. Have a good one. You too. You too. That's fun. I love that. that was cool man yeah i love houston dude uh it's a badass city yeah houston where was i think i was in houston have you ever been to taco cabana i don't think so no it's like uh if taco bell and chipotle like had

like a like a pretty cool looking baby so it's like it's like almost as good as chipotle but as fast as Taco Bell. Wow. Sounds great. So good. Sounds great. Yeah. Well,

speaking of speed, uh, out of the big three, so squat bench dead, uh, which one did you actually progress the slowest? Ooh. Okay.

That's a cool one because there's context here. So overall, yeah. Overall grand scheme of just from the day I picked up a weight, the bench press, it took me like nine years to finally hit a 405 pound bench press. But if you throw in the context of once I actually learned how to power lift, I started power lifting in 2014.

So I've only been powerlifting for about six years, right? Yeah. My math's good there. Yeah. Six years. So out of just the six years I've been powerlifting, my deadlift actually crawled the slowest.

My squat went from high three hundreds, hit four Oh five for the first time in 2014, you know, so that went from high three hundreds all the way up to six Oh two in the last six years, my bench went from three 45 up to four 25, you know, and for a bench bench that's pretty good progress over the last six years nothing crazy but you know benches move slower in general but my deadlift went from like 500 to 650 over the last uh six years which is a lot number wise but it's like given how heavy the deadlift is and how much more leaps and bounds you can typically make in it just because it is you're able to lift more weight is definitely proportionally the slowest mover. And it took me forever to finally find my groove in it, too. I hated it for the longest time.

So did you have to get like a little bit bigger to help with the leverages? No, actually, I cut down to 170 in 2018 and re-hit all my maxes again on deadlifts. So I think deadlift is actually one lift that's not very body weight dependent, but it was just a lot of the technicals. I actually just on my YouTube channel, my most recent video called a form check, fix your deadlift. If you go and watch that and you have to pull up now, it's a long video, but if you go and watch that, I go into a lot of technical stuff that most people miss. I guarantee you that'd be probably one of the most informative, helpful videos you've ever watched on the deadlift. And it's just a lot

of things like those that I get into in that video that really just started clicking for me that I picked up on and helped it the most. Yeah. So everybody who's on the live stream right now, we got time for about one more phone call. So if you guys have any questions for Nick or you want to just say what's up, just say what's up. You don't have to have a question.

Hit that phone line right now for people like some like I know here in California, gyms are I think at 10% capacity. Oh, nice. So it's something. It's silly, but it's something. Yeah. So for you, how was quarantine? And then any advice for people that are now in that 10% that are trying to get back into the gym?

For quarantine, man, I just kind of, like when everything was fully shut down, I would stay active, like go for walks, do pushups. I had some little dumbbells. I'd do some shoulder stuff in my basement. But outside of that, I just kind of didn't care about lifting. I just didn't think about it. I just, you know, I took those several months

to just focus on building other skills. And I knew lifting would be there when it was done. And I knew I wouldn't lose all my gains. You know, we feel like we are, but three years from now, what's three months of no lifting going to be? Nothing. A little blip on the radar. So I just relaxed, and I was confident.

I knew I'd get back, and muscle memory would be there, and I'd get right back on the horse easy. And I did. In eight weeks, I was hitting PRs again. So for people just getting back in, and it's limited capacity, just be patient, do what you can. You can't control it.

You can't go and make your gym, let more people in or, you know, kick people out so you can get in. Just understand it's going to be limited and try to just enjoy getting what you can. And don't stress. If you can't get in your normal level of training, if anything,

do a program that's maybe only three days a week right now, four days, you know, something maybe that's a little less than what you're used to just for the sake of getting in and getting moving again. You know, if you've been taking time off, you're not going to be super strong right now anyway. So just get moving again and just don't stress. You can't control what you can't control.

Yeah. Just funny comment. Baby Mahara has tried to use her. I think I'm assuming it's a her. Maybe it's a he. They try to use their Wii Fit during during quarantine but the thumbstick was not working that shit would be frustrating yeah what about goal setting especially when you're trying to get back in you know because you're like hey like let's be a little bit more patient you know you

might not even be able to get into the gym today if they're at capacity if that even is a thing let's just assume that it is uh how can somebody set a realistic goal moving forward from here you know like what can they do like should they like maybe schedule out like a show and like a year from now should they do a powerlifting meet what can somebody do to stay motivated uh and like help set a goal yeah i'm always a big fan of um goal setting that's outside of your comfort zone. So a power-up to me and a show are definitely great. That said, you want to be a little careful because

if you're committing to a show, I mean a year out is a long time, but if you're committing to a show and you're not positive you're going to be able to make all your training consistently, that could be problematic. You can make a lot of progress and you can make gains with limited training. But to do a show or even a meet, that can be a little trickier.

You kind of want everything to be on. So, you know, play that one safely, but you can still set other goals. Like I set a goal to hit a 600-pound squat. I want to get back in the gym. I've been wanting to hit a 600-pound squat for a while. I just never had. And I was like, I'm going to do this. And believe me, squatting felt heavy my first day back in the gym

because everything felt heavy. I was starting from square one again, like everyone. But I just got on my lean strength program. So get on a program, a good program, and commit to it. And then if you can't hit every day of your program, rearrange it and readjust it a little bit. Make it a three-day-a-week program if you have to, and make that be your goal.

See what PR you can hit just with that three-day-a-week training. And if anything, take it as a challenge to learn about programming because that sort of trial and error is going to make you, especially if you learn how programming works, that's going to make you good at programming your own strength. And how did you learn how to program? Well, years and years of studying and applying it, obviously. And then also, I was coached under a few different good coaches,

but I was coached under Brett Gibbs, who is a three-time IPF world champion and just a phenomenal powerlifter. And he coached me for about three years, and I learned so much from him. He has such a technical eye. But I always wanted to learn it for myself, because it's really easy to let a coach just tell you what to do and make whatever changes he wants you to make and not really think about why you're making them and then you can get some progress but i

always wanted to like understand it so i would learn from him i'd figure out why he wanted me to do what and then i'd also like just be studying on my own time constantly studying physics biomechanics the way the body works leverages programming the principles of programming structuring it how the central nervous system works. So just years of like studying it, applying it, learning from the best and just accumulate knowledge. And I'm still learning to this day all the time, constantly. Yeah. And today's day and age with social media, social distancing, it's creating a lot of introverts. Do you think somebody can learn how to program for themselves without getting a mentor or a coach first? Yes, definitely.

Definitely. The coach is just a nice advantage. It can help you fast track. You know, like if you have me telling you how to peak for a meet and giving you the ins and outs of why you're doing everything to peak, you're going to understand it that much faster. But you would be able to still take your time. YouTube search a bunch of

videos of programming of peaking of how the central nervous system works of how tapering works volume frequency that whole nine yards you could google uh articles and articles on it you could learn uh the scientific side of movements the biomechanics to really learn the technicals of a lift um you could learn all that on your own it was just you're going to take a little bit it's going to take longer you're gonna have to do your own research and stuff so obviously that takes longer and it takes some discipline because it's not the most exciting glamorous thing in the world to do um so yeah definitely definitely if you don't have someone telling you you have to do your own work but it's it's all out there on the internet it's a beautiful time to be getting into lifting right now yeah um so outside of you and Mark Bell, who are some YouTubers that people can go to for some good information?

Definitely me. I'm not even saying that mostly, dude. I've just been like, it's kind of it's kind of frustrating. I have been busting ass. I've been so proud of the content I'm putting out for informative videos. And I think this content is gold. I don't think, and the feedback has been agreeing with me, so I'm not just assuming this. But YouTube is not circulating these videos recently. It's like the last month and a half. I cannot get a video circulated. The algorithm. Yeah, yeah.

So definitely check some of those out, though. I don't even care at this point. I've been doing it forever. So it is what it is. But really, if you want some good, solid info, check out my bench videos, squat videos and deadly videos. I think you'd be really impressed. Mark Bell has some amazing videos.

And who else was on the channel that I've learned? No one really does like too much in from informative stuff anymore. Yeah, it's been a while. I just remember watching like Elliot Hulse back in the day. Like he was good back in the day. I remember Omar Aesop did a lot of powerlifting content back in the day. I don't think he does too much powerlifting now. I think he did a lot of Olympic lifting, you know, but he had some great stuff back when

he was doing powerlifting. And, um. Yeah. And I don't think it's like a bad thing to obviously, you know, promote your channel. Yeah. Candido, a lot of his older videos are, are, um, definitely very informative. Yeah. And those are helpful. Yeah. Cause it's funny. Cause like, uh, you know, videos are, are, um, definitely very informative. Yeah. And those are helpful.

Yeah. Cause it's funny. Cause like, uh, you know, I've heard Mark say this on a couple occasions and the first time I heard it, I got a little emo to be honest, but he was like, yeah, people aren't going to understand what I'm talking about. So I'm dead. And I'm like, Whoa, dude, like that's heavy. Like calm down with that. But then he said it again. I'm like, okay, now I understand because like what you just said, like I have so much content on my channel and it's like, okay, because of a silly algorithm, now people aren't going to pick it up and watch it. But now it's like, okay, maybe like, uh, so one of our regulars, Robo Hobo just said he went and subbed on your channel. So, uh, yeah, dude, he's going to get a ton of information.

His bench is probably going to go up now. Cool. Yeah. Yeah. So I have literally, if you just type in for anybody, you just type in Nick Wright, the key to a, and then insert one of the big three, the key to a 400-pound bench, key to a big deadlift, key to a big squat. I have a ton of different videos on those. And I really am not trying to boast, all jokes aside, because I can roast myself.

There's a lot of things I suck at. I suck at sports. I'm an average powerlifter compared to like genetic freaks out there. Right. But I think one thing I really am good at one strength I do have is my ability to relay information in a way where it can apply to an advanced lifter who already knows what he's talking about. Doesn't want to be bored with the basics, but also makes sense to someone who's brand new. And I've gotten a lot of awesome feedback to confirm that I've heard, which makes me

really happy. I've heard that from people, um, people telling me, Hey, I've, I've read this book and I've been under this coach and I've watched this video, but nothing clicked just like it did when I finally watched that from people. People tell me, hey, I've read this book and I've been under this coach and I've watched this video, but nothing clicked just like it did when I finally watched your video here. I just think it's something that it just happens to be just one of my strengths. And I am amped if it can help anybody out at all. I really don't care about the views for view's sake. At this point in the game, I've been doing YouTube forever.

But just know that that stuff is out there for anyone to use. It's a bunch of free information. So I hope it helps. Yeah, absolutely. So again, just one last reach for, or calling out if anybody wants to give us a call. If not, we're going to probably wrap things up pretty soon here.

For you, Nick, you get this question a lot, I'm assuming, like what's next? Like I know you're here, you're going to hit a huge squat tomorrow. I think that's tomorrow, right? Or is that Thursday? Yeah, I think that's tomorrow. Okay, one of these days you're going to hit, one of these days while you're here, you're going to hit a huge squat tomorrow. I think that's tomorrow, right? Or is that Thursday? Yeah, I think that's tomorrow. Okay. One of these days you're going to hit, one of these days while you're here, you're going to hit a big squat. But like you're, you

know, you were talking about YouTube, you're powerlifting still. Is there any other like maybe business ventures that you're hoping to get off the ground soon? Like what's next for Nick Wright? I had a huge business venture going that I was really excited about. I put a lot of money and time into, and then COVID kind of just squashed it. You know, especially when you're outsourcing things, it just kind of squashed it, but it's kind of a blessing in disguise.

Cause it really like between that and the gym being shut down, forced me to dedicate my time to learning, um, trading on the stock market. I had always, I had always invested. So I got heavily into trading and I mean, really into like full time,

really learning technical analysis. So only trading pattern breakouts. I trade specifically options, and I do this full-time now. But same thing as learning programming. Anyone can go to the gym and just mess around and have some luck and move some weight. But real programming really sets you apart. Same thing with the trading thing. Anyone can go on and gamble their money away.

But if you really learn technical analysis, it becomes a lot more structured. It becomes a skill set. And it becomes pretty awesome. And it's full-time. And it's something that's always there. So that's honestly, that's become my new obsession. That's my new full-time thing. Minus these last couple of weeks because I've been traveling.

Yeah. Where else have you guys been traveling to? Before this, I was running back and forth between Rhode Island, where I live, and then New Hampshire. So it was a four-hour round-trip drive just to take care of my grandparents. So it just involved a lot of up all night. So it wasn't even that far of traveling, but it felt like it. I was glad to be up there and help them, definitely. But it was a very busy couple of weeks.

Yeah, especially for the help that you were offering right which we'll get into on the podcast tomorrow i'm sure yeah so if you guys were digging this conversation that we had today um thank you everybody that did call in that was really cool of you guys to talk to you guys yeah i do love this format apologies for the uh the miscue early on but dude um seriously dude like i look up to you so much like even more so now just because like, I know what it's like to have a busy day. Um, you know, back when I was doing more photos and more videos for the, you know, for the team, like I would be next to you or whoever the guest is all day as well. And I would get exhausted and I'm just holding the camera, you know, I'm not in front of it performing the way you are.

So to watch you do all that, I'm just like, like, I get it. Like, I get why you're Nick, right. And I'm not saying that you think like you're the rock or anything like that, but like you're, you got flown here, you're featured here for a reason. And it's because like, dude, you're hustling and you're still, your energy is like top notch. So I sincerely appreciate the time, dude. Like I really, like I do, I admire the shit out of you. So thank you so much.

Where can people find more information about Nick and just like what's going on and especially what you're going to be doing here? Yeah. Yeah, man. Oh, that was first off. That was really cool to hear. So thank you. I appreciate it. Yeah, that was, that was awesome. Really cool to hear. And yeah, people can follow me on my channel, of course, YouTube.com slash Nick Wright, just my name. Subscribe, check on it every week, because apparently it does not like to circulate my videos.

No, this month anyway. And then, of course, Instagram and Twitter, man. I'm on both, at Nick Wright's NWB. What's the NWB for? Nick Wright Bodybuilding. Oh, okay. Started way back and just kind of stuck. I wanted to change it to just NickB for? Nick Wright Bodybuilding. Oh, okay. Started way back and just kind of stuck. And then I wanted to change

it to just Nick Wright, at Nick Wright, but they're taking it. That's too late. So, I'm stuck. We're cool, dude. So, yeah. Thank you everybody again for checking out this episode. Yeah, man. Thank you to Free Sleeve again for sponsoring this episode.

For more information on them, please check the YouTube and Facebook description as well as the podcast show notes. And yeah, since we don't have Mark

to say strengths never weakness, weakness never strength, do you want to give that honor? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay. This is Mark Bell from Super Training Gym, the strongest gym in the West. Strength's never a weakness and weakness

is never a strength. Peace!