Mark Bell's Power Project - Lifting Like A Bro Is DESTROYING Your Functional Human Movement - Functional Patterns || MBPP Ep. 1059

Episode Date: April 17, 2024

In episode 1059, Michael Mucciolo & Rodney Acero of Functional Patterns, Mark Bell, Nsima Inyang, and Andrew Zaragoza talk about how traditional gym exercises are creating tons of dysfunction and destroying your functional human movement.   Official Power Project Website: https://powerproject.live Join The Power Project Discord: https://discord.gg/yYzthQX5qN Subscribe to the Power Project Clips Channel: https://youtube.com/channel/UC5Df31rlDXm0EJAcKsq1SUw   Special perks for our listeners below!   🍆  Natural Sexual Performance Booster 🍆 ➢https://usejoymode.com/discount/POWERPROJECT Use code: POWERPROJECT to save 20% off your order!   🚨 The Best Red Light Therapy Devices and Blue Blocking Glasses On The Market! 😎 ➢https://emr-tek.com/ Use code: POWERPROJECT to save 20% off your order!   👟 BEST LOOKING AND FUNCTIONING BAREFOOT SHOES 🦶 ➢https://vivobarefoot.com/powerproject   🥩 HIGH QUALITY PROTEIN! 🍖 ➢ https://goodlifeproteins.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save up to 25% off your Build a Box ➢ Piedmontese Beef: https://www.CPBeef.com/ Use Code POWER at checkout for 25% off your order plus FREE 2-Day Shipping on orders of $150   🩸 Get your BLOODWORK Done! 🩸 ➢ https://marekhealth.com/PowerProject to receive 10% off our Panel, Check Up Panel or any custom panel, and use code POWERPROJECT for 10% off any lab!   Sleep Better and TAPE YOUR MOUTH (Comfortable Mouth Tape) 🤐 ➢ https://hostagetape.com/powerproject to receive a year supply of Hostage Tape and Nose Strips for less than $1 a night!   🥶 The Best Cold Plunge Money Can Buy 🥶 ➢ https://thecoldplunge.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save $150!!   Self Explanatory 🍆 ➢ Enlarging Pumps (This really works): https://bit.ly/powerproject1 Pumps explained:      ➢ https://withinyoubrand.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save 15% off supplements!   ➢ https://markbellslingshot.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save 15% off all gear and apparel!   Follow Mark Bell's Power Project Podcast ➢ https://www.PowerProject.live ➢ https://lnk.to/PowerProjectPodcast ➢ Insta: https://www.instagram.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/markbellspowerproject   FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢https://www.tiktok.com/@marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell   Follow Nsima Inyang ➢ UNTAPPED Program - https://shor.by/untapped ➢YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/NsimaInyang ➢Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/?hl=en ➢TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nsimayinyang?lang=en   Follow Andrew Zaragoza & Get Podcast Guides, Courses and More ➢ https://pursuepodcasting.com/iamandrewz   #PowerProject #Podcast #MarkBell #FitnessPodcast #markbellspowerproject

With so many people involved in coaching in the fitness space, there's bound to be disagreement on the best way of working out. Some people like lifting heavy, some like tons of volume, some focus on athletics, and then there's functional patterns. Deadlifting to be a better deadlifter, fine. If you're not doing that for deadlift's sake, then don't fucking do it. The risk to reward ratio is a joke. There is footage out there of Usain Bolt lifting weights, which helped his power output, right? Did he succeed because of the deadlifts or did he succeed like despite them? Why would something like a squat or a deadlift be bad or dysfunctional

when those are normal human movements? Is it because of the way that we're loading it? That is a big piece of the puzzle, particularly the deadlift, because of the shearing load by the time you get to beyond like the midpoint. Also, the nature of it being a bilateral movement. You don't really see too many people past their 50s or 60s doing a lot of heavy weightlifting. We know people in their 70s that are still able to deadlift. Those individuals, they're the exception because of the way they do these things. How else can you get better at? You don't, but getting better doesn't mean increasing load. And

what I'm saying is the problem is for a lot of people that enter the gym, constantly getting better is constantly lifting more weights. The thing that we believe is that to get better, you don't always have to lift more weight. There's some movements in themselves that completely erode the function. A lot of people that have been lifting for a long time are broken. If you guys have been enjoying the concept we've been bringing here on The Power Project, consider leaving us a review on Spotify and Apple. We've had podcasts with people from Functional Patterns to Ben Patrick to Jack Cruz who roasted us on air. But we did that for you to bring you some of the best information in fitness.

We're learning along with you. And leaving a review with how you dig the podcast is really going to be something that helps the podcast move forward. So if you can leave us a review there and enjoy the rest of the show. Thank you guys so much for coming out. I really wanted to have some sort of representation of functional patterns on the show for a long time. I think Nseema has actually known about it for longer than I have. And I started finding out about it and did some of the practices and took some of the classes, signed up for the course online and found it to be really useful. Would you guys mind explaining a little bit about what functional patterns is? Go for it.

Sure. Yeah. So functional patterns, essentially, there's a blueprint for a human movement. Anthropologists will say, okay, as humans, or just through observation, you can say, okay, humans walk, they run, they throw, and they stand, right? Where we're standing right now, when you go to the grocery store, you walk on the sidewalk, right? When you look at most sports, most of them involve some sort of sprinting or running and throwing. And because that's the blueprint, we say, okay, that's the

framework for human movement. And then everything that we do is a derivative of that. And I think the difference between us and many other methodologies is that there might even be methodologies out there that are like, oh yeah, we agree with that, but you can do this other stuff too. Or they skip steps and they're like, oh, you know, there's, there's this like climbing motion that you can do. And that's also, which it is, it's a, but it's a derivative of gait. We're very non-compromising. And if it's not enhancing your g gate, then it's likely making you worse in the long haul, or it won't be sustainable in the long haul. Yeah. And it seems like you guys are after function, you know, functionality of people maybe getting out of something that

somebody may call dysfunction. I guess maybe what in your opinions would be like dysfunction? Is dysfunction always associated with a symptom or is dysfunction like just a poor movement pattern perhaps that might down the road end up leading to something? I think you have to define what function is first. So and to be able to define function, you have to have a context. So function for a dog is different than function for a human. In terms of movement, it's different than function for a bird. So we have to say, okay, what's functional for a human? And what Mike was talking about with, okay, we sat on two feet.

We reciprocate our feet as we walk, we rotate our ribs. There's certain things that why our muscles are built a certain way in our bodies, and we have to respect that. So when you're talking about functional movement or function, then it has to go back and relate to gait. So I think when you're talking about dysfunction, whatever is disconnecting you from that or whatever is, I guess you would say, degrading your ability to move like a human, then I guess you can classify as a dysfunction, whether that's whatever you're doing movement-wise or whatever you're doing, say, like If you're eating something that has lead in it, that's going to be dysfunctional, right? If you're eating something with arsenic,

it's probably going to kill you, so it's going to be dysfunctional. So it's not just movement-based, but also the way you think about something. There's information you can consume that can be dysfunctional, that cannot relate to well-being in terms of you being a human. And again, you have to relate it to the context. Humans in society right now, I think you can define what function is and go from there. So with that context and that definition of everything relating back to proper human movement. It has to progress your ability to move as a better human being. Things like excessive amounts of powerlifting, things like excessive amounts of bodybuilding are inherently dysfunctional when taken to a certain

level. I wouldn't say taken to a certain level. I would say there's some movements in themselves that completely erode the function. Like if you're thinking about putting weight a certain way on your spine, like when you're loading your spine in a certain way or when you're- Actual loading the spine with a squat. Actual loading or even like when you're doing like a deadlift, there's not really a bar in nature that you're going to have to lift. Usually, if there's an object, you're going to have to approach it a certain way and lift it a certain way. So yeah, I don't think it's just a certain level.

Maybe that level is very low, but I think just in general, there are some movements that you can classify as dysfunctional based on that they don't really respect or they end up degrading the body. I think it's just some of the people that are drawn to those practices. They tend to be more resilient so they can get away with more. But I didn't do too much of the power cleans or stuff like that, but I did the back squats, deadlifts, bench press. By the time I was 22, I was done. I think, Mike, you had the same experience. Absolutely. And we also feel like the negative externalities of the exercise

outweighs the benefits that you could get because we would say that, okay, well, maybe there's not, it's not zero in terms of the benefits that you may get from a back squat or a deadlift, but, um, especially over time. And for some individuals, the threshold is very low where they'll hurt themselves with even like a light amount of weight on their spine or whatever the case may be, you know what I'm saying? So, but just also that's important to note because we're also saying like every exercise and functional patterns is not necessarily optimal yet.

We're moving. That's why the method is continually evolving. We're trying to make it to a point where there are essentially zero negative externalities with the exercise and it is only optimizing your ability to, you know, walk, run and and throw, or, you know, enhancing also the other derivative movement patterns of gait. Why would something like a squat or deadlift be, you know, bad or dysfunctional when those are normal human movements, like a hip hinge, right? A squat. Is it because of the way that we're loading it? Because of the, as you were mentioning, the barbell? That's part of it. Is that a big, big piece of the puzzle? That is a big piece of the puzzle, particularly the deadlift because of the shearing load

by the time you get to beyond like the midpoint, the shearing load on the spine. Also the, the nature of it being a bilateral movement and, and doing that. And, you know, it's because of when we look at gait as the blueprint, it's like, okay, well, what about like a broad jump? Or what about when, you know, people do like a bilateral jump in basketball or something like that? And it's like, well, even then there are aspects of that and rotations happening, like in your joints that aren't happening when you're doing something like a back squat or a deadlift. So let's say some, let's say everybody has a scoliosis to a certain

degree, like you, Mark, you were talking about. So what exactly is a dysfunction? I think Rodney also went into like understanding that it's also dysfunctional patterns of behavior overall. It like becomes a whole kind of life philosophy, but also when it comes to just like on a basic level, what is a dysfunction? Okay. Well, like a hip shift or, uh, you know, a scoliotic pattern or a knee valgus in a certain context or et cetera, et cetera. So if you take those dysfunctions and then you hammer, um, bilateral movements under heavy load, then you end up having problems with that. And typically, it results in injury. And when that happens just depends on the individual.

I think many people that are listening are probably already getting mad. But I think bear with us a little bit because if you are listening and you participated in bench press squats and deadlifts, you most likely got hurt from those exercises or got hurt on your way to, you know, strengthening those exercises. And that's exactly why you guys are here today. For me, I really just like to think about stuff, you know, a little bit outside the box. I like to have a white belt mentality. I only know what I know. And that's all I can know, right? Until I continue to try to expand and try to open up my mind into possibilities of other things. The stuff that you guys showed us today was absolutely phenomenal. You showed us some exercises in the gym.

You feel them. So it's – when somebody – jiu-jitsu I think is like the ultimate example. Does jiu-jitsu, I think is like the ultimate example, you know, does jiu-jitsu work? You know, UFC won, you saw the results of what jiu-jitsu is. Brazilian jiu-jitsu at that time, it was almost completely unstoppable. And Hoyce Gracie defeated everybody, I think for the first, at least two UFCs. And so I think that, you know, I'm always in search of, is there a jujitsu out there of lifting? Is there a jujitsu out there of exercise, of fitness? And maybe there's not, maybe there's not like one, you know, straight modality, maybe even along with functional patterns, maybe it would be good if you played a sport or did something else that would elicit coordination and maybe some other things that maybe possibly you're not getting from just one aspect of functional patterns or anything else.

Because a lot of times we tend to box ourselves into what we call a gym. And then we're not really thinking outside of the box, but a lot of what you guys have been communicating about, a lot of the founder, Naudi Aguilar, has been talking about things like sprinting and what a powerful exercise that is. And we just kind of forget about that as an exercise, but that is kind of the master exercise in a lot of ways. Yeah, if you asked anyone, do you prefer to be able to deadlift a thousand pounds

or run faster than Usain Bolt? It's like most people would probably say run faster than Usain Bolt. I'd say that. Yeah. I agree. And let's talk about that a little deeper. That's actually a really cool question. Now, one person might say, hey, the thousand pound deadlift sounds bitching because I would be big and massive.

But you're going to be big and massive. Like you're going to be big and massive. Like you're going to be big and massive. And what are the negative externalities that come along for that? Yeah, and I'd rather have – I'm saying Boltz 6'5". And so I think that if you think about what someone's going to build in accordance to being the fastest man in the world, in accordance to being the strongest man in the world, in accordance to being the strongest man in the world. They're going to be, you know, and each person can kind of pick,

you know, pick whatever one they want. Yeah, I think people tend to forget to then, to be able to run like Usain Bolt or faster than him, the amount of force that he's able to produce to get to that speed is if not the same or more than what you would have to produce when you're lifting a thousand pounds and then just considering the said principle if we are kind of understanding gate as the blueprint um the specific adaptations to impose demand the the person that chooses

usain or to be like usain ends up having more transferability. So that's what you were, when you were talking about Mark, about, you know, what else is outside of functional patterns. I understand what you're saying, but what I think is that like, you know, you will already get that transferability into different sports. And so, cause I know a lot of times people will look at functional patterns and they're like, well, they're exclusive for example. And you know, you got where we feel. You can't just do one thing. You can't just do one thing. It's like, it cannot just be one thing, but really what it is is that functional patterns isn't really the one thing. You have a combination of physics that gets you the opportunity. You

initially consolidate so that way you can then spread out. But there is always going to be a reference point in physics. So we are just non-compromising on that reference point. We try to stay intellectually honest about the fact, okay, well, just from a physics standpoint, if it's not, if based on the said principle, if it's not leading me more towards sprinting, like you saying, then it's not getting as much transferability into the function of my everyday life. I have a question for you because like Usain Bolt is, is put forward as like this, the great avatar, right? Sure. And he is because he's the fastest man we know in human history.

But he did a lot of things. And there is footage out there of Usain Bolt lifting weights, which helped his power output, right? So my curiosity is, I know that aspects of lifting can lead to dysfunction. Like we were talking about the thousand pound squat. When you get yourself to squatting a thousand pounds, the level of movement ability that you probably lose is phenomenal. It's like, there's no way you're going to even attempt to sprint. You're going to pull everything, right? But at the same time, Usain was able to achieve that level with some resistance training. So it gets me to wonder when I think about all this, I totally agree with you guys. And that's why when I asked you the question about bodybuilding and

powerlifting before, I was like taken to a certain level because in my belief from what I know and what I've experienced, what I've helped people do, it's like we can build tissue and then express that in sport and still have amazing movement ability. But there's a level that you just, the gym shouldn't be the sport, you know? So I'm wondering why do we label these movements dysfunctional? Whereas I think it's more so how far we take these movements as far as the intensity and the load. Yeah. With that, I think what you're talking about is a certain percentage of people that may have some benefit from those things. Like if you're, if you're talking about is a certain percentage of people that may have some benefit from those things. If you're thinking of Usain Bolt, did he succeed because of the deadlifts or did he succeed despite them?

I don't know if we'll know that though. Yes, but you can also look at many other athletes like Bo Jackson, Barry Sanders. When you see all these athletes that excel or that move really well, you start to see common things. And it's like when you look at everyone else doing the deadlifts and the squats, why aren't they moving like them? But I mean, for every Bo Jackson, I'm not a football watcher, but there's another amazing running back that does use resistance training. So the thing is, again, I get what you're saying because Bo was famously known for like just doing calisthenics, right? And he didn't really lift weights, right? But then there's other running backs, other wide receivers that did lift and they were also amazing movers, right? So that's the thing where like we can pull the examples of

the people that didn't, but we can also pull the examples of people successfully that did. Sure. You know? Yeah. So I would say we don't attribute the deadlifts based on the- I'm not saying deadlifts. I'm not saying deadlifts. Or the powerlifting.

I'm just talking about just lifting in general. Because I'm not saying that. I don't necessarily think that the deadlift is the greatest movement ever. I don't really do normal deadlifts. I don't. don't necessarily think that the deadlift is the greatest movement ever. I don't really do normal deadlifts. I don't. But at the same time, you know, there are other movements in the gym that again, people do, people do, squat athletes do use these movements and they're still, it helps them produce power, helps them build mass. I think it helps them and they're able to

extract or they get some benefit. But I think what we're trying to say is, okay, that's good that it helps them. But what about everyone? Like, what about the 99% of the population? Yeah. And I see what you're saying. You're not necessarily saying to like, oh, if you, if you deadlift and squat, then you're going to move like a Barry Sanders. Like, I don't think you're fully attributing that the resistance training to their success in a complete way. You're saying there's a certain percentage that's assisting them to getting a certain force output or strengthen their hips or whatever the case may be. But, you know, with what you guys experienced today, you know, we're still going to be crossing over that

threshold eventually. I just started training Amir Abdullah and he's got a 10-year, you know, Amir Abdullah, and he's got a 10 year, you know, track record in the NFL, but you know, he was starting to feel the, you know, he, he's somebody like, it's very interesting too, because you're talking about the back squats and stuff like that. And I don't even know how much of that he was doing. I think he was already starting to fake the strength and conditioning a little bit. Cause he was like, ah, it doesn't really make me feel good. When we initially had our conversation, he was like, I feel like I've always just gotten stronger from running and sprinting and jumping and stuff. Yeah, exactly. And so I was like, okay. And then there were part recently was like, you know, actually I felt my lower back a little bit during this like strength and conditioning, um, workout we did, or it was just running routes

actually. And I said, well, were you getting a lower back pump? He was like, yeah. And it's like, you think about that. And it's like, there are people that I have in session one where I put them in a hinge and they're getting a lower back pump. And then here I am with this NFL player and he's getting this compensatory lower back pump. I don't want to say that a lower back pump is like always bad or whatever the case may be, but this was clearly like, okay, I'm getting tired and I'm starting to compensate. My lower back's getting turned on. Now I have sciatica again. You know what I'm saying? And it's like, okay, well, you know, based on the movements that we did, for example, it's like even somebody at that level and like the genetic differential between somebody like him and your average

person is like a 10 X, a 50 X in some instances. So, and he's still getting a lower back pump running routes. It's like, so I see what you're saying. Um, we're not going to know, like in terms of, you know, time will tell, but we have to look at things in probabilities. You know what I'm saying? Like there's a, there's a probability based on the physics of this stuff, based on the amount of muscle burn and the amount of potentiation that I can get in somebody's posterior chain without nearly that much load, that will end up enhancing their practice

way more than a barbell back squat or a dead, or resistance training, because we're using resistance. So let it be known, what we're doing in functional patterns is resistance training. I had 20 pounds on there when we were working in there. I was shaking, bro. I was shaking. Yeah, you get it. You were like, oh, it's heavy. We can really potentiate that stuff. We can really potentiate that posterior

chain and your whole body very globally and in a way that will integrate into your performance that more closely respects the said principle. That's really what it comes down to. So let me just sum that up real quick. The said principle, I think the theory is that if you gave me LeBron, if you gave me Usain Bolt right now, I think we could make him faster. You could give it to me, not even like nowdy or like the best practitioner in the world. You could give him to me right now and he could nix most of that stuff and we could probably make him faster because of that genetic potential as well. You know, I think I find these conversations to be amazing because, you know, it just kind of blows up so much of what

we've known. But I think you're going to continue to see weight rooms across the country continue to change and continue to evolve. And we have seen that. We've seen it time and time again. There used to be quite a bit of machines years ago. Now there's a little less machines, and then they shifted to free weights, and now they're trying to incorporate some other pieces of technology in some of these gyms.

So it's constantly evolving. And a lot of it has to do with we don't really know. We don't really truly know what does make someone bigger, stronger, faster. Like we know some stuff. And the strength coaches that are currently out there have learned X, Y, and Z. And then they teach that. They teach some principles of powerlifting, some principles of weightlifting, some bodybuilding.

And conditioning part is usually kind of, unfortunately, shoved off to the side. And you see guys working out like Christian McCaffrey. And you see even some of the stuff we saw from Bolt right there. You are seeing them lift, but it's like what percentage of their workout is really dedicated to like a lot of lifting? And just my own experience and knowing a lot of professional athletes, they'll do the squats. They'll do some of these movements.

I don't really, they don't really enjoy them. They're not normally very proficient at them. A lot of times they kind of gripe about it because they're like, I think it just like opens me up to injury. But at the same token, I know a handful of other guys who really swear by the squats and swear. So it seems to be kind of an individual basis for some of these, for some of these folks, but it just leaves us in a confusing position of what the hell's really working? And we think about something like the hamstrings, like if you're thinking with someone that's sprinting, like let's hypothetically say that we know for sure that strengthening the hamstrings helps you run faster. Well, sometimes all that we can think about from an old school perspective is

let's get the guy doing some types of leg curls. How about some stiff leg deadlifts? And we're going to overload these muscle tissues this way. This is going to make us stronger. And this is going to assist us in this particular practice. But the functional pattern stance, I don't think believes in that practice. And I think that I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I believe that you guys are more of the belief that you have a better way to get into those hamstrings and to get into those muscles that maybe don't require you to get that laid out, lay face down on a leg curl machine or even do a glute ham raise or the Nordic. Yeah, just think about it this way.

When you're something like you're doing a squat, you have weight on two feet. You're not moving forward or backwards. You're not rotating your ribs. And then when you're running, you're doing almost the exact opposite. Your weight is going to be completely on one leg. Your ribs are going to be rotated. Your hips are going to rotate. So the hamstrings don't just like bend and flex the knee.

They do a lot of other things and they work with different, it's not just knee flexion, right? So they do a lot more. So if you're just training the hamstrings with a leg curl or whatever else, or maybe you're doing different sorts of things to account for the different functions, but until you account for all those at the same time as it's happening during gait, the probabilities are, or maybe just the actual output that you's happening during gait, the probabilities are, or maybe just the actual output that you're going to get from respecting the set principle versus not,

it's going to be way, way higher, much less risk of injury as well. In my head, just what came to mind was something like a step up. It's like, well, now you change the dynamic of you're trying to, you know, someone in the weight room still wants to overload. They still believe that some of these methods of normal strength training instead of, excuse the term, but you guys hear it all the time of twirling around with a bunch of weights. You know, and cables and stuff like that. Somebody still wants to get after it. So maybe a weighted step up or weighted walking lunge or something might start to get us. That's going to be way less

risky than doing a squat for sure i would say oh yeah i mean if you just take it from bilateral to unilateral but you know just keep in mind um you're still kind of loading it longitudinally like when we were working um we're mostly loading from a horizontal force vector. So those horizontal force vectors are what are going to be most apparent in gait as well. That's the other aspect of something like a barbell back squat and a deadlift that doesn't respect the said principle is the force vector. So it's not that, I mean, obviously longitudinal,

a mixture of longitudinal horizontal force vectors are present in whatever movement that you do. But when you make it primarily longitudinal, that's when you're going to have problems. But then also, you're just not going to transfer based on the sedge principle to sprinting as well. Go ahead. I was going to say, ideally, you're loading the longitudinal, but then you can load the transverse. Then you can load the frontal plane. And if you can do that at the same time, then you're just the longitudinal, but then you can load the transverse, then you can load the frontal plane. And if you can do that at the same time, then you're just going to get way more out of.

It's like, I know in Sima Dos Jiu-Jitsu, it's like if you're going to do a Jiu-Jitsu submission, you don't want to just pull in one direction. You need to pull in all of them. And you also need to create like press. There's like so many things that need to happen at the same time. And you get an instant tap. Because if you're just focusing on one, then you can pull all you want and it's not going to work. I think, you know, again, thinking of the squat versus like, you know, other types of movements that you could potentially do. When you think about a squat, like you said, you're on two feet.

You're only moving in one direction. You're not moving forward or backward, side to side. There's no rotation of anything. And if you just start to think, I think it's a good idea for everybody listening to just start to incorporate some of what we're talking about here today. I'm not saying ditch everything that you love to do and then all of a sudden hop into some things that maybe you don't understand or maybe you don't enjoy yet. maybe you don't understand or maybe you don't enjoy yet. But I think it's a good idea to think about some of these things as a practice because we have to admit, we have to take responsibility and realize that a lot of people that have been lifting for a long time are broken.

They are severely messed up and in some cases more messed up than if they didn't do anything at all. And there's a lot of people that didn't do anything at all that are more messed up than people that are paying attention to, you know, keeping themselves strong and everything. But I think these are really good things to consider because if you think about a squat versus something like a step-up, you know,

a step-up, you know, your hamstring is going to fire on one side, your hip flexor is going to fire on the other. To me, that's like more relatable to something that you would be doing outside, something you might be doing when you're running. Yep. It's closer on the spectrum for sure. Yeah. It's moving in that direction. It's actually interesting what you were mentioning right there, Mark, because it's a tough thing because obviously both of us have lifted forever. You've lifted since you were like 10 or 11. I've lifted since I was 13. Right. Um,

but I live very differently now than I did, uh, like maybe in the early years of lifting, because with my sport focus of jujitsu, you have to be a good mover. If you want to become a better grappler, the better mover is going to be a better grappler. Right. And the ways that I was lifting in terms of using power lifting before my, I could deadlift up to 755 in the past, but that capacity made me very, very stiff. And over the years, over these years, I've worked that stiffness out to where I now have full use of a lot of things, right? There's still things I could work on. I can still find weaknesses, but I don't do the classic things that I used to do. I don't lift in that classic way because that creates too much much. Yeah, absolutely. It creates too much stiffness. But at the same time, there's this, there's this pull where you

wonder, right? You see individuals who let's say they're, they're athletic. They, they can produce a lot of force. Um, but was that necessary? Right? Like with these, I know when we talk about everybody, right? The individual with scoliosis and a lot of the people that you guys have amazing transformations for doing a deadlift is not a good idea for them. Doing a back squat is not a good idea for them. Doing these classical movements might not be the best way to start. And you guys have amazing befores and afters, right? But it then gets us rolling because on the internet, when coaches are looking at your

stuff, right? They're always like, they wonder about the aspect of force production, which we were talking about before. It makes you wonder, well, all of this is good and there's amazing concepts here that everybody can learn from and should learn from. do we then get this to the, so that this individual can become someone who can move well, has a great gait, has great sprinting ability, et cetera, but then can produce a lot of athletic force and be a dominator in whatever there is that they're doing. And I'm not saying you need to be big and muscular, but you need the ability to produce a lot of force and handle impact force. Yeah. Well, you probably will get, especially with somebody like a scoliosis or a lot of the people that we initially get when we're changing their structure. One of the things that I say to people is if you practice the piano for, let's say you never played piano before, you practice piano for a year. If you practiced every day for an hour a day for a

year, you would still be a beginner at the end of that year. So, you know, if you take some of the individuals that we have come in for us and they either have scoliosis or more severe movement dysfunctions, and you get to a point where you change their frame, it's like, okay, that's only step one. And then when it comes to force production, um, I, you know, though I know they're measuring force using the force plates and stuff like that sometimes too. So it, once again, it's tricky because we don't have the side-by-side where somebody does functional patterns and somebody does, you know, back squats, et cetera, or whatever the case may be some sort of traditional lifting. We don't have that

side-by-side just yet, but, um, you can like, for example, somebody like Kyle Dake, if you're running faster, you're producing more force. Well, that's what is, that's pretty much what I'm getting to is that like, you know, somebody like a Kyle Dake certainly was producing more force, um, with an increase in his overall movement abilities rather than where he was at when he was deadlifting and back squatting. And then you can get really creative with it. Like wrestling is particularly tough. It's probably harder with an athlete like Kyle Dake. Um, you know, I always can't help but laugh a little bit when they're out on the beach. And then he does like this whole sequence where he

does like the shot and then he picks up Pablo and throws him over his shoulder. And then he picks up the next person and throws them over the shoulder and then he ends up like tackling Naughty and sends him all over you know what I'm saying but like that kind of stuff you will get an increase in force production um from that type of training rather than just loading yeah like heavy load heavy load I think is not necessarily required. I would go as far as say is not required in order to increase your athletic force production. What about in terms of like – let's see how I can word this. What about in terms of like somebody willing to sacrifice X amount of years to be the best in the world at something, to really go after something, something like what I was doing, something like these offensive

linemen in the NFL are doing. And I think a lot of them are aware. I think a lot of them know, like, you know, I'm lifting this heavy. Maybe some of them are using PEDs. I'm doing some things that just aren't in my best interest long-term. But, you know, in order for me to be an offensive lineman in the NFL, I have to be 300 pounds. So one requirement is like eat a lot of food. Maybe another requirement is like, maybe they, maybe for them, they, they feel that they really need to lift or maybe they're even required to lift, you know? So in some of these cases, what if, uh, what if some of these types of athletes are kind of trying to be conscious and incorporate both at the same time, they already have a

good skill. Obviously, if someone's going to get drafted to the NFL, they got to be an animal. Uh, this guy looks like he's an animal's wrestler. Um, so what, what if somebody is trying to, they're just, they're kind of willing to give up a little portion of their health for wealth or for fame.

Yeah, that's on them. But it's not to say that, like for most people, that's not the case. And it's not something that I would advise personally. But if that's what they want to do, I mean, they're still going to get benefit from doing functional patterns and then they can do whatever they want.

But the, I think the misconception is, is that you can do that and still be honest about like, Hey, this is like what you said, right? I know this is taking years away from my life, right? I know this is going to kind of, I'm going to pay some of the consequences later because that's, and that's really all that we're saying. We're not saying, okay, you have to,

everyone has to ditch everything and do functional patterns. It's more of like, hey, and going back to your point in SEMA too with the power lifting or the force production, the principles are there. Like the stuff that gets Kyle Dake and this guy to do that, it's still, we're still starting off.

Like we're still not where it needs to be. So I would say like, if you look at the probabilities, like Mike said, we're going to get there. And it's just, it takes a lot longer, like to build something, to create like a we're going to get there. And it's just, it takes a lot longer. Like to build something, to create like a good foundation, it takes longer. So the people that know of it now,

they might have to wait a little bit, but I think it's coming. And the results that we're showing now shows that no one else has really even started on this path. So it's like, it's been what? 10, 12 years? And it's still pretty early on. For the month of April, you're going to receive 25% off all Vivo Barefoot shoes.

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And obviously, they're flexible. So your foot's allowed to be a foot. And when you're doing all types of exercise, your feet will get stronger, improving your ability to move. Andrew, how can they get their hands on these? Yes. And for the month of April, you're going to receive 25% off all of your Vivo Barefoot shoes. That is a limited time deal for the month of April only. So if you've been waiting for the perfect time to buy your Vivo Barefoot shoes, now is that time. Head over to

vivobarefoot.com slash powerproject, enter the code for April and receive 25% off your entire order. Link is in the description as well as the podcast show notes. I would also say you'd be probably be surprised at what we could do even with someone like an offensive lineman. Um, I know with training Amir so far, he hasn't lost a pound of muscle. Um, he's actually, he just weighed himself the other day. And I mean, we're probably going on about anywhere between six weeks to two months. And of course there's stuff going on. So we don't train three times a week, every single week. But, you know, and I'm only not trying to name drop or anything because he's just, he's

really the first NFL player that I know of that has actually been like, yeah, I wanted this to be my primary training. But he just weighed himself the other day and he weighs exactly the same as he did when he came in, uh, for the beginning of the beginning of the off season. So, and then, um, the other part too, is, uh, we are going to be, you know, now that he's been talking about on lives, we do have more tech coming that is going to help with somebody like a offensive lineman or a wrestler at a higher weight class or something like that. Is it called testosterone? It's better than testosterone. Yeah, exactly. Well, it will certainly give you

endogenous testosterone is the idea because I know a lot of the belief behind like you know doing a barbell back squat or a bench press etc is that you're hitting a lot of muscle groups therefore you get a big testosterone response from it so you know we think that about sprinting so we're creating tech that's going to be able to like give you that level of a response um but is going to be more that's going to respect the said principle more in terms of gait mechanics. You know, it's the, the, the, that the first thing is that's pretty amazing about a mirror. But the other thing is like, it's still a chicken or an egg sequence because like, I don't, like I said, I don't lift like I did in the past. Sure. It's the lift, but I don't lift

that amount of volume. Cause there's a bunch of things I do now, but at the same time, not much tissue has been lost over the past, like six to seven years. Right. So it's, it's the, the, the thing that we won't be able to answer and we'll only have to like, just watch and see is we know, I know what helped me build the tissue and I know what helped Amir build the tissue absolutely like his initial base exactly but and it's not it's going to be hard for him to lose that tissue unless he starts under eating and he's not doing anything right but what's going to happen to him he's going to start moving a lot better now that he's working with you guys that that we know okay that we understand so and that's still the thing it's like will and i i know you guys said that there's a lot of things coming up

but it's the tissue building that's like we'll have to see that happen said that there's a lot of things coming up, but it's the tissue building that's like, we'll have to see that happen. I think there's a difference too that with athletes that build tissue using like traditional methods, I think they're creating probably more functional tissue, which is why they're not losing it versus just- Because they're athletes. Because they're athletes. Yes. Versus like strictly just power lifters that just build tissue on top of tissue and they don't use it. So that's why when they stop, they lose it. They only use it for that one purpose and it's pretty much locked into that purpose. Yeah. Which is what I was going to say before when you said

that you lifted a lot and you felt stiff. The stiffness is just that your body only knows how to move in one direction where it's meant to move in many different directions. So that stiffness is really just like you trained your body in one direction so that when you try to move in a different direction, it's stuck. So yeah, I went from playing soccer and lifting to just lifting. Sure. Sure. So then, so then the athletes, when they lift, they're not, they're still somewhat training their muscles to have function. So I don't think it's the same thing. Gotcha.

And I think building that tissue, respecting that said principle, if you could in the first place, would ultimately be better. And I understand where you're coming from. We can only talk in probabilities. But I know for myself personally, I feel like I would look and feel a lot better having done a lot more sprinting and if something like FP had existed. When I was weight training, I didn't... A lot of the tissue that I was building, it's like too much quad dominance,

you know what I'm saying? Too much load on the lower back. Not enough, you know, really outside of putting yourself in the correct position or changing my structure, there was really no way for me to access those muscles that would have built more of more muscle tissue. Because when I was initially lifting, obviously, it was just, you know, because of my insecurity, you know, I wanted to look bigger because people will respect me more and because I'll be cooler and more popular or whatever, you know, in one of my teenage years, but I never really, I never really got that big, you know what I'm saying? So it's like, well, if that's the case, what about that person? It's like, I just feel I would have been much better off having something like FP, having my structure, playing sports, being able to sprint well. And I would probably look, you know, more athletic than even I do right now. You know what I'm saying? So that's something that

we spoke about it in one of the podcasts that we did. I never felt my glutes before FP. I never really, like when I was doing squats or deadlifts, I never felt my glutes before FP. I never really, like when I was doing squats or deadlifts, I never felt my glutes. And obviously I don't have big glutes. Yeah, mostly lower back and quads. Yeah, my lower back was messed up. Yeah, some of the criticism of FP is that a lot of the people that do it aren't that big.

Sure. Do you think that's something that needs to be addressed or do you guys kind of think that there's really no reason for people to be that big. Sure. Do you think that's something that needs to be addressed or do you guys kind of think that there's really no reason for people to be that big? I would say it depends because obviously there's going to be a genetic differentiation between humans for sure. There's going to be some variability. I think that maybe some people just aren't meant to be that big. But I would say that sometimes they're not looking because somebody like a Johnny Ebelin, you know, walks around at about 200 and, I mean, he looks pretty big. And then, you know, like Derek Diesel in Florida,

Alex Berg is another one to look at. But even then, we're not saying that we're where we should be. Oh, yeah, no, exactly. It's more so that when I came into FP, I had already stopped working out completely because I was in so much pain that I lost a lot of the muscle that I did. I just want to say for a second here that I actually don't really know how beneficial it is to slap on a lot of muscle. I'm definitely not against it. I love it. Like, and this is, I love lifting.

I love power lifting. I love bodybuilding. I will be doing and participating in some forms of that the rest of my life. It's ingrained into my system. I enjoy it. How effective is it, you know, for other things? I don't really know. You know, it's an interesting one.

We had a guy on our podcast, goes by the name of Muscle Doc, and he was talking about how they had, he knew some scientists that were studying people in the NFL. And they were studying the bone density. And kind of based off the bone density is how much muscle they can hang off of that skeletal frame. And it was super interesting. And he even went into it further. And some guys had too much weight and some guys were too light in accordance to their bone density and in accordance to the position that they were in. So it was super fascinating to kind of hear that, an analysis like that. Yeah.

So the people that come to FP are generally not prone to be muscle-bound. The people that are prone to be more muscle-bound go to powerlifting, go to weightlifting. So it's a little bit of both. Obviously, some people are able to build the muscle with traditional weightlifting, but it takes a longer time to build the framework. It's like, imagine,

yeah, it's like you have to build a foundation from, from, from the very beginning and it just takes a long time. But the, the idea is, is that we do need some muscle. It's not going to be, um, sure. I mean, if you see sprinters, they have a certain amount of muscle, some have more than others, but the fastest sprinters will have a good amount of muscle. Yeah, for sure. So, you know, that is, that is our goal in the long term is to build a certain amount of muscle. But like, for example, um, somebody was saying, oh, they all look like track athletes. I'm like, well, track athletes are super in shape. Yeah. I'm like, well, and if anything, yeah. And I appreciate that, but yeah, actually that was

always a thing at Equinox that I found, um, was when, you know, that's where I started working as a trainer was people would come in and they would be like, oh, I don't want to look like a bodybuilder. The, one of the main ones that people would say was, I really want to look like a swimmer. You know what I'm saying? Cause they're just thinking they're svelte and like, uh, and like, I get that, you know, sure. But it's funny. It's like, well, you're using a bodybuilding method to look like a swimmer. And it's like, you know, sure. But it's funny. It's like, well, you're using a bodybuilding method to look like a swimmer. And it's like, you may not get that result because kind of the said principle, it's like, well, you know, you could either swim or work on the derivatives of gait,

which is going to be sprinting, which is going to have transferability to, you know, if you want to look like a basketball player or a, you know, baseball players or whoever you think, you know, looks and shape, there is a general framework for like an athletic build. And that's always what we're going to be going for outside. And I also think that people are a little bit, um, diluted with, you know, how much kind of like, um, you know, steroid use is in like the fitness industry as a whole. And you see these guys that are so big that I feel like we almost have a little bit of a body dysmorphia as to what a human should really look like. You know, I think that is part of it. That's definitely part of it. People do have different capacities. Sure. We'll see that they're going to people that are going

to be people like in the NFL and they're huge and they're not in the fitness industry, right? Right. But at the end of the day, those NFLers can move. And it's like we shouldn't kid ourselves to think that, you know, I think a lot of people that listen to this show are fans of like bodybuilding, powerlifting, and some play sports. But when you think of the bodybuilder and the powerlifter, you don't think of a good mover. You think of a good mover of a barbell and a good mover of dumbbells and weight, but you don't think of a good sprinter. They don't sprint. There's a reason why when they walk, everything's stiff, right? So it's like, there's a certain amount of muscle that any individual can have on their frame, but the

puzzle is trying to figure out what's the perfect amount of muscle. So if your goal is to be able to sprint well and to move well, what's the perfect amount of muscle that you can hold on your frame where it doesn't cause you massive levels of dysfunction? And also, yeah, over time, because a lot of the people that do the weightlifting and the deadlifting and the heavy lifts, you don't really see too many people past their 50s or 60s doing a lot of heavy weightlifting. It's like what's sustainable. weightlifting right it's like what's sustainable so the idea is yeah like be able to sprint and we're and we're saying sprint well well into like 80 90 100 like only thing the only thing i'm gonna fight back on that is you do see some but you see some who like again are smart about the intensity and the load that they're using again it's a tough thing because it's people. Up until what age?

We know people in their 70s that are still able to deadlift. You see it on like people are posting on Instagram. We've pulled those types of stuff up on the show. But the thing is those individuals, and I will say this, they're the exception because of the way they do these things. Again, if you are constantly pushing yourself in the gym how do you know though like if you can't know what if you

can't know that if that lifts and and the power lifting doesn't help or helps or doesn't help athletes then how can you know that it's the way that they're doing it that's getting into old age because a lot of if you're constantly trying to increase the load of a movement you're doing in perpetuity you will injure yourself and you'll never do it again and you'll think that the movement's the thing that messed you up but if you can maintain the capacity of doing the movement without constantly trying to increase the load forever which is what a lot of people do which is why they fuck themselves up but how else can you get better at like you don't but getting better doesn't mean increasing load and what i'm saying is the problem

is for a lot of people that enter the gym, constantly getting better is constantly lifting more weights. And what we're trying to say here, but what we're saying, the thing that we believe is that to get better, you don't always have to lift more weight. It's not always lifting more or doing more volume. The capacity. Here's a good example. We got Bill Maeda lifting with kind of a slower technique. I do think that you can squat bench deadlift and do a lot of these movements for the rest of your life. It really does depend largely on the loading. It depends on how much weight we're talking about

because I think that to grab a barbell and to be able to deadlift 45 pounds or 135 pounds or what's going to feel kind of light to whatever person, like it could even be up to 405 or 500. If that still feels light to that person, I still think it's within range of them being able to do something they enjoy.

I guess the question to ask is if they, if he worked on being able to sprint better, would he be able to push this way farther? Like again, the probabilities, the probabilities. I like that thought process. He's getting away with it or he's able to do it, but it's like, could that be a lot better?

And if he doesn't want to do that, that's fine. But it's more like, at least let people know that just because he's doing it and he looks like that, doesn't mean that that's going to apply to the average person. I really like the principle overall of you guys having that North Star of apply to the average person. I really like the principle overall of you guys, you know, kind of

having that, that North star, you know, of like, you know, better at sprinting. I think that unfortunately in fitness, we don't always have that. Sometimes all we have is like, you know, if you're currently powerlifting or currently bodybuilding, you got these kinds of like things that you kind of get a little laser focused on. And sometimes when you bench press and bench press and bench press and bench press and work on bench pressing and do everything to get better at the bench press, you do it to your own detriment, which we can do it with anything. We know we can do it with anything. You can do it with running, sprinting.

You can do it with anything. But with the North Star being sprinting for a lot of people, that would be an excellent place for a lot of people, that would be an excellent place for a lot of people to start. And I'll also add being able to perform well into old age without having to take any stimulants or depend on our painkillers or testosterone or anything like that. So that's the other thing that if you want to actually get there, you need to respect those other functional aspects of being a human that we don't really, we didn't really need those things 10 or a hundred thousand years ago. I agree with that. I think in the future too, what'll end up happening, you know, and I'm right now,

it may seem like I'm biased cause I'm clearly like, you know, about functional patterns. But I think what will happen is, Naughty said this the other day, and it was when it comes to the way that things progress and the way technology moves forward, like, you know, you could take a horse and carriage to work still. You know, if you wanted to, you could do it. But if you had a Tesla, then why would you? You know what I'm saying? Like, most people don't make the decisions. They don't need to be convinced.

They don't need to necessarily, like we could sit here and talk about, oh, these are the benefits, et cetera. But to Encina's point, he's what he's saying. He's absolutely right. We don't, we don't absolutely know for sure until time progresses. And that's true. But I think that there will come a certain point where it'll be like, oh, well, I'm not going to take the, I'm seeing this working for people and they're riding the Tesla and this is working a lot better. I don't think I'm going to take the horse and carriage anymore. You know what I'm saying? Because bodybuilding has reigned supreme. And I think that that's why people are, you know, are so ingrained in that. And it's going to take a while to change. People talk a lot about industry

and we kind of forget that bodybuilding and fitness is an industry. And we've been fed these certain things for who knows how many different reasons, but there's Arthur Jones who invented a lot of the machines, a lot of the Nautos machines, and there's Joe Weider and there's this guy and that guy. And there's a lot of money. We kind of forget there's a lot of money behind a lot of this stuff. And all those magazines, all those publications with the information about hypertrophy and how to eat and how to train, we forget that there is dollars. Or at least at that time, there was dollars attached to that for a lot of people. And so I'm not saying that any of that's wrong. There's still some great information from all of those things.

So I'm not saying that any of that's wrong. There's still some great information from all of those things, but it is an interesting thing to think about. Oh, wow. Like maybe I should, maybe I should think about this for myself more so than just what has been fed to me. Maybe some of these machines aren't great for me to use. Maybe they are great for me to use. I don't know. But is there somebody that's selling these machines and so forth? So I think it just brings up a lot of conversation and it brings up a lot of things to really question. One thing I'm wondering from you guys is like, what's the harm in like broing out? Like what's the harm in just you guys saying like, F it. No one's around. There's no cameras. You know, you're, you're, you're, you guys, you guys are out here in, in NorCal and you, you go to Gold's gym and you do a bicep and tricep workout. What's the, what's the, maybe the, what's the reason why you choose to really no longer do those things? So the first thought that comes to mind is just like, there's a lot of things that people don't engage with that are harmful to them or damaging to them that they choose not to do just because of that, right?

It's like alcohol. Or even, I was going to go a little more extreme, like, why not take a little bump of cocaine, right? Hey man, this ain't no fentanyl, come on now. It's like, it's just, you're not going to, like it's, one, it's not good. You know the detriments. You've learned through either your experience or others' experience. And you just don't want to deal with what comes from that. It's like, we've been there, we've done that. And it's like, when you have the better alternative, like with FP, you get way more than what you would get from doing something like that.

It's like, just like, there's no, yeah, no, I feel like I bro out still with FP. I feel totally bro. I feel more bro because when I was,

uh, when now I can bro out and do like boxing and wrestling and like stuff like that too. And I'm feeling very bro when I'm doing that stuff. I'll tell you when I didn't feel bro is when I was doing a lot of weightlifting. You couldn't walk out there. Because I totally get what you're saying. I completely understand.

Yeah, like fuck it. I really do. I'm going to do it and then I'm going to drink a protein shake afterwards and I'm going to feel great. And I totally get that. That used to be my whole life. But then I would play. And this is not every single person's experience experience but I'm sure some people can relate but then I would go and play a game of basketball

and it would be horrible like it would be not only would it be just my lower back hurt it would also be never scoring never getting past the ball after one time because then you got it stolen from immediately because you don't know what you're doing can't dribble in between your legs

you know what I'm saying it's not being able to relate with like, you know, these other people on the court, you know, and I'll say men, cause you're talking about broing out, but that's just what, that was the thing. It's like, wow, I can't even relate to these other guys and it's humiliating and horrible. And, uh, you know, FP gave me the ability to do that. And it also gave me a framework for dealing with my reality. You know, it's like, that's why we talk about things like tyranny of words and stuff like that

because how specific can we get with what we're talking about, right? So that framework really changed my whole perception. And then now that I have consolidated and I don't do that stuff for now, well, excuse me, that I don't do that stuff anymore. But when I say for now, there are things that we can do that incorporate lifting-like aspects of it that will make me feel like I'm more of a gym bro. But without the negative externalities now Now I'm able to, you know, play basketball with a group of 10 guys and it feels insane. It feels so good. And, and some of these guys, you know, over in Santa

Monica, I'll be playing with guys that are in their mid twenties. You know what I'm saying? Do you go to Venice where they did the white man can't jump? Yeah. You know what? I haven't graduated to Venice yet. Like Venice full, like Venice when it's actually busy, I think maybe I would still get rocked, uh, over there, but there is a small court, uh, right by the gym that we, and we've gotten to know a couple of the guys that, you know, are there regularly. And it's just, it's been a real blast. Um, and even that, you know, I'll have to take steps away from that just to say, Hey, you know, I'm really working on my mechanics, my recovery, the way that I move and changing that intrinsically rather than just going and playing basketball and trying to get better at basketball. So I still do that too. But that what my, I'll finish this by saying,

you know, when it comes to tapping into athletic movement, I think that that is like really the most bro that you can feel. And that's what I've always wanted. And that's what lifting never ended up giving me. You know what I'm saying? So for me personally, that's what FP gave me is that ability to feel like a bro, you know? No, I totally get that. And I think it's an amazing thing that that practice helps you do better in a sport because I can totally see how, again, I'm using powerlifting because there are powerlifters in the audience,

but like powerlifting or bodybuilding won't necessarily just prepare you for sport unless you're already doing a sport and you use it as a supplement to maybe put on tissue for the sport, maybe. But I have a question for you, because Rodney, you actually alluded to it earlier with the foot to glute connection. And with what we were doing in the gym with the cable machine, you were really having me cue in

to tension in the glutes. But that tension was created through activation in the feet or movement. There's a bunch of things., the cool thing is that I think that when a lot of people are lifting, they, they don't think about that. They don't think about their feet first off. Um, but then they'd also think about creating that type of tension in the glutes because of those movements. And I can see how, what we were doing can relate to helping somebody move better. So my question to you is, I know there's probably a lot of things because with what you guys do, there's a lot of permutations of stuff, but when it comes to the feet and the glutes and getting better connected to your feet, how do you guys think about that?

How do you guys work through that with people who come in and let's say they really don't have much foot connection? Yeah. A lot of the times I'm not even worried about the foot. I just think people tend to, either what you said, either people don't consider anything at all and they just move however they're going to move or people tend to hyper-focus on one thing, whether it's the foot, whether it's the knee, whether it's the spine, whatever it is. So I try to…

And you can reinforce that. Like if I was going to… Because we were talking about the foot yesterday. So if I would have kind of focused on the foot for you, then it's like you're… It's kind of like tunnel vision. You're not seeing the rest of it. So what I try to do is cue someone and not give them that much only if they need it.

Because it's not the foot. It's not the knee. It's not the hip. It's not the spine. It's not the cranium. It's just everything. And it's like how you're oriented in space. And then the moment you move, it's like you could do like that exercise that we're doing.

Maybe when you're like in one leg. The moment you start taking a step, the moment you start taking weight off, it falls, it falls apart and you've got to account for a whole new set of variables that may not even be related to the foot, for example. And the way, and it's funny because you were talking about him cuing the foot and I think he did, but he also actually more so cued where your weight was in space. It was more weight. So that's actually an important thing to think about because the way that you distribute your weight is going to be a big part of actually what ends up determining what the foot is doing. Absolutely. The only other thing that I would mention is that there are amputees that can sprint probably faster than me. So, you know, when we look at a hierarchy of prioritization, in many instances, we'll look at torso, hips, spine, core, that kind of stuff first. And then,

you know, I guess you could say we go proximal to distal, like for the most part, more so in a very, yeah, just kind of like traditional way. But you're trying to account for the whole body at the same time as it's moving. So it's very, it's something kind of like traditional way. But you're trying to account for the whole body at the same time as it's moving. So it's very, it's something that you have to develop. And maybe that's why when people look at the before and afters or it's hard for people to understand what we're doing. So it's something you have to develop, but it's kind of seeing where I want you,

or like when you look at an athlete move well, like a Bo Jackson, Barry Sanders, it's like you're visualizing that. And then you're like, how do I get this person to incorporate some of that? And then just kind of problem solving from there, like troubleshooting from there. And it is funny when you look at like Usain's feet or LeBron's feet, they have gnarly feet. It's like crazy how gnarly it is. I might have been saying like, of course, yeah, sure.

If you did some stuff with their feet, would that make them better? I mean, maybe, probably. But then, you know, what really makes them insane is probably just the way their whole body's moving. Yeah. And what you guys were showing it like the foot automatically gets involved. You're like, shit, I feel it in my feet because of the amount of kind of stabilization. And now you're like, shit, I feel it in my feet because of the amount of kind of stabilization. You're probably wondering why am I wearing these glasses? Well, it's because I'm being bathed in blue light. And blue light isn't necessarily bad. There's blue light in the sun. But if you're in your office, if you're indoors, if you're in front of a screen during the daytime, it's not a great idea to have your eyes being bathed by blue light all day long. That's why EMR Tech, a company that we've partnered with, has blue light daytime glasses and blue light blocking evening glasses. These glasses right here are meant for you to wear

during the daytime when you're in front of screens, et cetera. But if you're outside, take the glasses off and get the natural sunlight. And if you're at home in the evening when sun sets and you need to be in front of the TV or you need to be in front of your computer or on your phone, these glasses are the ones to get. They also have the best red light therapy devices on the market. If you stand in front of any of EMR Tech's red light therapy devices, you will actually feel how much stronger the output of the red light is on those devices versus any of the competitors. They also have some of their smaller red light devices like their Fire Wave, Fire Dragon, and Fire Storm. And then if you want to get some of their bigger panels,

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Again, that's emrtech.com, promo code POWERPROJECT. Links in the description as well as the podcast show notes. What's the tagline of Functional Patterns? Does it treat the system, not the symptoms? Not the symptoms, yep. Can you guys expand on that? You want to go for it? Sure, yeah.

No, just that's the idea of the blueprint. So that's what I'm always going to kind of refer back to is that's another tyranny of words concept. So when I mentioned tyranny of words, it's a book written by Stuart Chase. And, you know, I'll plug that whenever I can, because one of the things that when Jacque Fresco, we talk about Jacque Fresco, which who's an older school kind of scientific philosopher in a way, engineer. And the reason why I mention them is because if you want to understand where a methodology has come from, or if you want to better understand a methodology, then if you look at the framework of thinking that created it, then you can have a better understanding of the methodology as a whole. So thinking of that kind of framework,

we needed objective measurement as to what a human being, how a human being is supposed to move. So having thinking like that would be, okay, gait mechanics because a human was made to walk, run, and throw. And we don't even need anthropological studies to determine that. We can determine that by observing them in real time. When we see people walking, we're not hopping around like kangaroos. We're not swimming like fish. As we're traversing space, we are walking. And so with that being the case, it's clear that the system is gait. So when we say treat the system, we're saying integrate everything as complete as you can as a whole using the reference point of gait, and you're going to get better outcomes for it. Like for example, it's a very evolved version of kind of like

stop chasing pain because a lot of people like to refer to to that and they'll be like, Oh, look above and below the joint. We're saying like, look everywhere, look at, look at the way that they're moving holistically. Like a shoulder problem is a hip problem is a lower back problem is a knee problem. Yeah. I guess just to add to that a little bit, we get people that have done physical therapy, done traditional training, alternative training, all kinds of stuff. And they're usually treating the symptom. So when they come to us, they're like, okay, I have this knee problem. I've seen 27 therapists and you're the 28th. And then they kind of know all about it, right?

Oh, it's because of my knee. And then when I was five years old, I did this. And they kind of tell you all about it. And then when we start working, we're not even thinking about the knee and then their knee pain goes away. So that's another thing that it's a bit of a misconception because people don't have that reference of gait. So then they're trying to do their best. Like, okay, if you have some sort of problem at the knee, then it's something around there. It's like the logic kind of makes sense. But then when you actually have, I guess, a better way of thinking about it,

then it falls apart. It's like linear versus nonlinear solutions. So it's like, okay, you know, oh, my knee hurts. Therefore I must do exercises for the knee as opposed to my knee hurts. I likely have a systemic problem with my system, with the way that I'm moving. Yeah. And you see the same thing in the shoulder, right? People are like, oh, my rotator cuff, you know, they're not trying to work on that area. And maybe it's just their gait. Maybe it's the way they walk. Maybe it's steps they take every day. Totally. A hundred percent of the time it is. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yes. That's, that's basically what we're saying. And that's why something like, for example, the anatomy trains and stuff like that, like, you know, we have the anatomy trains

in Santa Monica so people can see, but really, you know, they're only so relevant because you need to observe people in real time. It's not like we're cutting people open and being like, this string of fascia is definitely the thing that's hurting your shoulder, whatever the case may be. But it just gives people a visualization of how everything is connected. And now since we're talking about fascia, you guys have that 10-week online course, which Naughty's explaining a lot of myofascial release stuff. And actually going through some of that, I've never heard someone mention certain things about like the dehydration of fascia, et cetera, and certain things that he talked about within that. So what is the importance of that for people? Well, first off, like why should they consider myofascial release? Because some people think about that and they're like, ah, it doesn't do much. Like, why do you need

to continue doing that? Why is that even beneficial? So I think it's beneficial, but what's the reasoning behind it? I think the first thing with that, especially when you're mentioning the course, it's that people are doing too much. And when they have a problem, and we can talk about people that don't have a problem, but like pain or anything like that. But if you have a problem and then you're doing 30 things, problem, but like pain or anything like that. But if you have a problem and then you're doing 30 things, it's going to be really hard to pinpoint what the problem is. And people understand that with like their diet, when they do an elimination protocol for the diet, but they usually don't apply that to movement or what they're training. So that's kind of the first step is obviously doing as little as possible.

And then the myofascial release helps you account for all the, you do have a sense of dehydration in the body. It's essentially you're like, you have certain patterns that you always use. Therefore, there's always going to be sticking points that, or parts of your body that are going to tend to overwork. And then you're going to push all the fluid out of that specific part. So with the Manifestor Release, it allows you to pinpoint those areas because again, we all have two legs, two arms or ribs, et cetera. So they're going to be somewhat ribs, et cetera. So they're going to be somewhat the same for a lot of people. And then it allows you to just feel into your body a little bit and start to figure out what may be going on. And then after that, obviously it gets into the posture stuff.

Well, I think that this also opens up a little bit of a can of worms because fascia, we're still obviously determining many characteristics of it. But another reason why, and this is actually, I think why this is a good conversation, because I think this is a big part of what's missing from kind of like body lift, bodybuilding, powerlifting community, even the athletic community. Um, you know, fascia, this gets into the work of like Gerald Pollack and, um, you know, even Jack Cruz and stuff like that because your, um, your body actually has, uh, uh, they call it easy water, right? And your easy water that relates to mitochondria and things like that. So the way

that the water, uh, the characteristics of the water in our bodies is not the same as the characteristics of the water that you just like see outside of our bodies or water that you drink. You know what I'm saying, right? So your mitochondria actually make water. And when you look down at the cellular level, that's why fascia is important because fascia is the extracellular matrix and that's going to relate to how your mitochondrial and your cells function. So it relates back to your cellular biology as well. So even just from that, you can be dehydrated on like the molecular level rather than just like, oh, I haven't had enough water to drink today. You know what I'm saying? So, but what people don't, a lot of people will say, okay, and we incorporate these protocols. So let that be known.

You know, get grounding, you know, increase your redox potential, which has to do with like the electron transfer, right? Make sure you're eating fish, et cetera, et cetera. But the thing that in many instances that they're missing is whether or not you're moving well. Because a lot of people can do all those protocols to like rehydrate their tissue. But if they're not moving well, then they typically only get so far. So that's the other aspect of it too. So it's- Mechanotransduction.

That's mechanotransduction, which is incorporating the characteristics of fascia with the idea of, okay, we have a cellular biology and mitochondria with movement. Yeah. Essentially, it's a mechanical signal that's going to create a cascade to your biochemistry. Yeah, in some cases with the changes to the face, that's sort of the theory behind like mewing and some of these things, the activation of the jaw and the constant like chewing

sometimes of hard things, doing certain things with your tongue and the roof of your mouth and so forth. What this does is it, at least what they believe it does, is it produces more stem cells. And then you start to get some of those bones and some of those structures to change. Do you guys think that, I mean, this is like just super basic, but like, do you think that sometimes because someone's tight or because something's quote unquote, like knotted up that they kind of just have a kink, you know, it's

like, it's like the, there are certain areas of the body that might be kind of shut off a little bit by tightness or improper movement or something like that. I think that what you're keying into is actually really important because that's exactly what mechanotransduction essentially is. And what we're, at this point, we're hypothesizing, you know, we will be digging into it deeper into the future, but, and especially just with our own experiments and case studies, et cetera. But, and that's basically what Mu did because I do see some parallels between Mu because he had to really go against the traditional orthodontic kind of industry. And so what you're talking about with stem cells is your bones actually create stem

cells. And we're always talking about creating those bone changes. So it's like when somebody has calcified tissue, they end up creating, they have bone spurs, right? And I think a lot of that can come from not having good movement. So it's like, it can be a kink for sure. Like there's definitely going to be torsions and certain things that femurs have developed, but, and that is based on the orientation of your fascia and muscles, et cetera. But the way that those bones reform is probably going to be similar to the process that you mentioned. There's going to be similar to the process that you mentioned. There's going to be actually like a stem cell production, and that's what leads to the change in their structure more than likely. I guess I don't know what you mean by kink.

I just mean like your neck is super tight, and then maybe therefore over the years, maybe your eyesight's not great. Things of that nature. Sure, sure. That could definitely i could leave yeah for sure thing yes just like tightness in the body maybe uh leading to uh circulation not being as good oh 100 percent nutrients not getting there you're mentioning you know this fourth phase of water yes water yes that's exactly what we're saying stuff's not flowing absolutely going around the way it needs to that's why andrew you're gonna hop in with some questions over there yeah absolutely um so one thing that i've always found interesting about

something that i've heard through functional patterns was the um what you hear everyone else called the natural s curve of the spine but when it comes to functional patterns and when i look at my three-year-old son, that natural S curve is doesn't exist. It's a, not a straight line, but it's definitely not an S curve. Can you guys please help educate me on that? Because I it's yeah, that's one of those things where I'm like, no, no, no. Yeah. We all have an S curve. Everyone else says this functional patterns comes in and was like, no, this is how we're naturally supposed to be. And at first I was like, man, that's weird. They're the only, you know, people on the internet

saying this. And then I look at my son and I'm like, oh, whoa, like his back doesn't curve. So what's going on there? Do you want to? Well, yeah, no, it's, it's a good question. So really, so when it comes to posture, like, yes, the spine is going to have a certain amount of quote-unquote curve as like naturally. But at the same time, like how pronounced that curve needs to be, there's going to be certain degrees of, you know, kyphosis or whatever the case may be. And that's not even that a kyphosis, quote unquote, is bad, but whether or not it's optimal. For example, if you take an athlete that has a pretty hard kyphosis and you give them less of a kyphosis, our hypothesis is going to be that their performance is going to go up and their movement is going to get better. be that their performance is going to go up and their movement is going to get better.

So one of the things is as you like your, um, child, like it's older, that could certainly change. Cause a lot of people will use the same logic for like the deep squat. They're like, well, I see my baby deep squat, so I must be able to deep squat. And that's probably what's healthy. And then we move away from that. You know what I'm saying? Like your child's bones and cartilage, et cetera, will change quite a bit. And then they're going to have stimulus from their environment, et cetera, et cetera. But more than likely, like here's, okay, here's where the theory, once again, tyranny of words, the map is not the territory. So people keep drawing these maps of the S curve of the spine. But when you see a Canelo Alvarez, when you see a Floyd Mayweather, when you see a Barry Sanders, they don't have some sort of massive S curves, you know, at least visible from the outside in,

right? They typically do extension very well, right? That's one thing. And somebody who doesn't do extension very well, we usually see movement aberrations throughout their Rolodex of movement abilities. So, whether or not, like, other methodologies might believe that, what it sounds like is they're saying, we can't change it. Exactly. We can't change it. Therefore, they're doing something that we call normalizing. So they're like, oh, we continually see people with this S-curve and all the anatomy books say that there's an S-curve. Therefore, there must be an S-curve. Yeah. There's a lot of people to add to that. There's a lot of people or clients that I have that have scoliosis people to add to that there's a lot of people or clients that i have that have scoliosis that they were told that it was normal when they were when they were younger by their doctors and then um

before functional patterns it's like the only thing you could do is um put some rods in there and try to fuse it so it stops it stops uh getting worse and i think it's just like it's essentially the the scoliosis is going to be an S-curve in the frontal plane and then what you're talking about is the S-curve in the sagittal plane. That's right. It's the same thing. I think we're just maybe a little, it's a little bit

harder to stabilize in the frontal plane. So that seems to be getting worse over time where we can kind of see it throughout someone's life. Or I guess it's a bit of a newer phenomenon. But it's still getting worse. I think over time that S curve from the sagittal plane, the kyphosis and lordosis, it's still getting worse because so far no one has been able to really like change it.

And we do see high level athletes have more of a straighter spine, like closer to being flat than a skirt. And we're really using them as the reference point, even more so than like, oh, Not a kid. than like even a kid. Because even though a kid, it's like, because a kid, you know, who has the, you know, movement abilities

and it's going to be, you know, the higher-level athlete. That's why we use them as the reference point. If you're going to make, you know, the higher level athletes. And that's why we use them as the reference. If you're going to make a better comparison, it should be more of an adult. But it is something that you would notice for sure.

And then that extends all the way into the neck as well. Like, because I know like if you go to like your like Diamond Desert chiropractor, they're going to say like, oh,

a lot of your problems is because your neck, it doesn't have the same like curvature, right? Right. Because I have heard that multiple times. Sure. But with you guys, again, a lot of your problems is because your neck, it doesn't have the same like curvature, right? Right. Because I have heard that multiple times. Sure. But with you guys, again, that's not the case.

Here's the problem. People tend to, like, and Simo was talking about the foot. So people tend to look at the foot. Oh, you got to start somewhere, right? So you start at the bottom and then you work your way up. There's people that start at the top and they work their way down. So they're like, oh, well you have a lordosis or the extension of the cervical. So that's just what it is. That's just like where you start. So then therefore you need to have a kyphosis to compensate for that. But if you didn't have the kyphosis, you wouldn't need that lordosis

or that bend at the neck either. So it's like if the spine generally was straighter or was more flat, then yeah, it applies to the cervical and all the way down to your lumbar. Am I wrong in saying that you guys don't believe in things like text neck and stuff like that? Oh no, that's a thing.

What do you mean? That was my next question actually. He's talking about forward head or quote unquote forward head. Some people can do it. Some people can't. I think it's how you define it. It's like

with using that word like what are you exactly you're not able to be specific with what you're describing. For some people it might be more of a hard kyphosis. For some people it might be like lordosis. They'll have there's functions in different parts different presentations yeah it's just more of like where the spine or how the spine is positioned and the line i guess i guess what i'm saying is that it it maybe appears that it's not just the phone it's like the way that

people are moving sure for sure and then also like the way to address it is not by putting your head back and just forcing it because you're not accounting for what's all the way like below that. Exactly. Like what's putting the head in that position. And generally, yeah, how you move is going to be more impactful than how you like sit

or like hold your phone in terms of like adaptations. The way that you the way that you do that stuff should change if you work on the system so like that or it shouldn't matter all that much yeah you don't see like professional athletes with texnic and i'm sure they're on their phone a lot too right it's true yeah yeah so because like i uh i mean it's not fair right because i get to stare at market and SEMA for majority of my day. And then when I look back at the footage and I'm on the microphone, you know, my, my, I feel like I'm really extending in comparison to them.

Like, and I know they have way different skeletal muscle and all, everything's way different. But the more that like, I see it, the more I'm like, dude, I want to reverse out of that. And I see the positions that you guys put people in. I've been in those positions and I'm like, I way bigger but i i don't know where to start when it comes to that thing 10 week course okay thank you yeah for sure and this is this is what we're talking about with like the accessibility for people i'm i'm exactly like you like i had the kyphosis not very muscle bound but then when i start getting into these positions, it's like you see the potential and you kind of, and then what functional patterns is doing

is kind of slowly like filling in that to where you begin to develop those attributes that you should have. And it should correlate with you moving better as well. So then when you're sitting here, it shouldn't matter. You should be fine, yeah. If you're someone that's taking supplements or vitamins or anything to help move the needle in terms of your health,

how do you know you really need them? And the reason why I'm asking you how do you know is because many people don't know their levels of their testosterone, their vitamin D, all these other labs like their thyroid, and they're taking these supplements to help them function at peak performance. But that's why we've partnered with

Merrick Health for such a long time now, because you can get yourself different lab panels like the Power Project panel, which is a comprehensive set of labs to help you figure out what your different levels are. And when you do figure out what your levels are, you'll be able to work with a patient care coordinator that will give you suggestions as far as nutrition optimization, supplementation, or if you're someone who's a candidate and it's necessary, hormonal optimization to help move you in the right direction so you're not playing guesswork with your body. Also, if you've already gotten your lab work done, but you just want to get a checkup,

we also have a checkup panel that's made so that you can check up and make sure that everything is moving in the right direction if you've already gotten comprehensive lab work done. This is something super important that I've done for myself. I've had my mom work with Merrick. We've all worked with Merrick just to make sure that we're all moving in the right direction and we're not playing guesswork with our body. Andrew, how can they get it? Yes, that's over at MerrickHealth.com slash PowerProject.

Andrew, how can they get it? Yes, that's over at MerrickHealth.com slash PowerProject. And at checkout, enter promo code PowerProject to save 10% off any one of these panels or any lab on the entire website. Links in the description as well as the podcast show notes. What are the implements that you guys are, because again, I know, yeah, what are the implements that you guys use? I see kettlebells, I see cables or the specific cable machine that was invented by Naughty, but what are the implements that you guys use? I see kettlebells, I see cables, or the specific cable machine that was invented by Naughty. But what are the implements? Those are the main ones, probably.

I was going to answer that differently. I think there's a lot more, and there's a lot more coming. It's just a matter if you can make it work. So essentially what a tool is, is just feedback. Like if a deadlift or a squat is just, you're using gravity as a way to like create resistance, right? But it's just, it's only gravity. So it's just in the sagittal plane. When you use a pulling machine, it's pulling you into it.

So you're having to fight it in this direction. Or with a kettlebell, the weight, or let's say with a dumbbell, the weight is in your hand. With the kettlebell, it's off the hand. With a mace, it's really far away from the hand so it's really just it's really just tools and like resistance like you could potentially I don't want to say this is probably not something that's

as useful but essentially like something that doesn't move like an immutable object you could potentially use as a form of feedback as well right so it's like you could use a water bottle as a form of feedback like how, right? So it's like you could use a water bottle as a form of feedback. Well, now there's water. Like how full is it? It's going to give you different feedback, right?

So I think… It's more about how you use it. Yeah. And like I said, there's a lot of things. Like Nadi has shown the RG bell, right? So now it's a kettle bell, but there's water in it and you can slam it. RG bell? I've never seen it. Yeah, it looks cool. I think I've seen him knee it before.

He like was punching it and stuff, right? Yeah, he uses it as a... There's actually a video on his Instagram. You can throw it and smash it. He's been throwing it. Yeah, yeah. So it's like he's developing new tools based on what we might need as feedback to

solve our... I have a question for you guys. Because I mean, I'm curious about this because we recently got a bunch of sandbags in the gym. I've been working with sandbags quite a bit. And by doing some of those movements, lifting them, walking with them around the block, squatting with them, doing a bunch of things that are classical movements, I was like, this seems like something that would be kind of up the alley of being something that I think you

guys would be, you guys would assume, you guys would think promotes human movement because putting a sandbag, picking up a sandbag in that position, putting on your shoulder and going for a walk, you have to create just the right amount of tension so that you can walk, but not too much tension where it's like, you know, you can't move through space. Right. But when you're putting 300, 400, 500 pounds on your back, um, you create so much tension. So your spine doesn't move at all. And it, you, a lot of times people are creating so much tension, right? Like, let's just say this, let's use an example. Let's say like you put 300 pounds on your back, but you create 500 pounds worth of core tension. Not, but when you're walking with a sandbag or something on your back, you're creating just the right amount of tension where you can breathe and walk through space. And you're still getting the benefit of slight compression,

but you're able to walk, right? So I'm wondering, what are your thoughts on that piece in general? Because you can do a lot with it, and it seems like it's great for gait. Yeah, it comes down to the specifics. It comes down to the specifics, okay. Personally, I wouldn't grab a sandbag and start walking with it. Really? Why not? Even though it sounds like it gives you some

feedback, it's like, I can probably do either better things with it. That's the RGB right there. You probably do either better things with the, that's the RGBL right there. You can even do better things with it in terms of relating it back to gate and things that are going to give you more, more like a better return. I forgot what the other thing that I was going to say, but I wouldn't, I wouldn't walk with it.

I was just, it's like, it's the same thing. It's like your rotation might be limited. It's like, if you're not trying to improve, it doesn't seem like it's going to help you improve your mechanics. So, but there's ways that you can throw it, you can pick it up and rotate with it and throw, you could probably make that work. And it's- So the question I, well, I don't want us to spend too much time on this because there's so much more, but the walking with it, you know, when I went to Nigeria, I have a lot of relatives back there. There's still certain areas where people have to go get water, put it on their shoulder or their head and walk for miles home. But probably in like the 50s and 60s, farmhands would have to literally pick heavy objects up, walk those objects from place to place, whether it's here, whether it's here, et cetera.

And that's part of their work. And one thing you notice about those types of individuals is they have a different type of strength than people in the gym. That's why people say farmer strong, right? Or farmer body. Or farmer body, right? But the thing is they have this level of grip strength and this level of strength that you cannot replicate by doing stuff in the gym. So my question is – I think you probably could. At some point you could replicate that in a way that it – because I think the farmer body and the farmer strength, it's probably like a stiffness like where you were talking about.

Just the right amount. But if you're developing – but it's also how you develop it. Yeah. So you need to account for how you develop that stiffness and where. And I think if you're able to, again, going back to the sprinting thing, if you develop the right amount of stiffness that helps you sprint along with the force production, along with the legs oscillating and the arms and the ribs rotating, if you have to go and lift something and carry it like that, it's going to help you with that.

So it's like the sprinting will help you with that. That's probably not going to help you with sprinting. Got you. Okay. It comes down to hierarchy of prioritization. So it's like carrying is a derivative of gait and you could train that to an extent, but then when do I start getting more negative externalities because of it?

Something that people don't realize too is how quickly the body adapts. Like we were doing some exercises today, right? And you're like, oh, I could do this for a week and then like kind of get it a little bit, right? And then, but then that's when you have to give your body like a different stimulus. Absolutely. So something with lifting,

it's like you can only lift something so much that where you're already exhausted that pattern. So that's why when you see maybe like Naughty swinging the RG bell, he's lifting the RG bell, but then now he's, well, let's see it here. I think it's more of the last one where he's, oh, there bell but then now he's well let's let's see it here i think it's it's more the last one where he's oh there we go this heavy one so he's swinging but he's also lifting and then he's he's throwing it up in the air so it's more like what what are these or how are these movements going to help him eventually move better and address the the asymmetries and and what's preventing him from sprinting well

and then um like do that it's like i find myself doing this a lot where i do one thing and then i just don't do it for a long time then i focus on the other thing and then it's like you don't have to do it that much and then you can keep um progressing to the next thing that's going to help you. So let's say maybe, for example, like a hypothetical, walking with a sandbag helped. You probably wouldn't need to do it for that long, like once or twice, and then you could probably get what you need from that and do something else. That's kind of actually, now that I think about it,

I did the sandbag lift the other day and that's not even, oh, I can lift a 225 sandbag. I know that there are guys – we actually watched the strongman. I think it was a record, and he did the 440-pound sandbag lift. But yeah, that's not – that is not something that I have prioritized at all. I don't have anything in my gym that's over 200 pounds, and I can just walk up to it and lift it. You know what I'm saying? But because my training prioritizes those sprint mechanics, you know, I have enough base level strength where, you know, I could, if it was a little bit higher, I could probably do a fairly heavy sandbag and just get it over

my shoulder and walk with it. But it's not something that I would have to prioritize much in my training. What do you guys think about walking with a sled? Forward, backward sled dragging? Same thing. It is a similar thing, yeah. I don't think you could be as specific with it. I'm sure there are things that you could do for sure.

Yeah, no, that could be somewhat sports specific etc but i think people would be surprised how how often you would have to do it in order to get that sim as i think what rodney said is exactly right like and eventually it has to evolve like yeah you can't you can't always push the sled the same way or push into something the same way like at some point you're gonna have to rotate or something you're gonna have to tilt your ribs something you're gonna have to yeah just drop your level etc there's like a lot of exactly you have to account for for more things there's a lot of variables that pushing a sled won't account for yeah i think one thing i i i like in the way you guys are thinking about this is because you know in the gym i think mark asked you guys like

how do you guys work out right and you And you mentioned intuition, right? Like you kind of, over some time you'll be like, oh, okay, you know, I'm feeling this. Let me start working out this. Let me start working out this. And I think like, that's how I look at everything for myself. You know, I try to figure out, okay, where are the weaknesses in terms of the way I move? Like if I try this, what am I weak with? What is, uh is uh what can't i do and then if i'm like oh god that's that shouldn't be that hard delve into that for a little bit and so i'm like okay proficiency that proficiency brought this level of like movement ability that i can see it affects my grappling positively all right i can leave that for a bit um so and and i think you know

one thing that's one thing that i think is really good good about FP is that it's a full on system. Like here's a system and there's a lot of different ways to, to change it up for the specific individual. Um, but I also think, you know, and it's, it's outside of it, but I think that like with, with what we do here, there's a lot of ways to get to that specific type of goal of being able to sprint with different modalities. I think the argument is maybe it's not as organized. I think that would be it, right? No, I would say that no one has really shown that it can be done. Ah, but that's the problem. You've never seen someone take a slow-mo video of themselves and then post a year later, six months later, anytime,

and then post an after and put them side by side and show that they can get there. That's literally all that needs to be done. If it is possible, people need to... And can they do it with a 45-year-old that is really broken and came in with knee pain?

Well, yeah, eventually. But have you seen any people, like when you say that it could be done? I think the issue with what I guess this line of conversation is, we know many coaches who are achieving this with people. But let's just say they're not marketing it with putting slow-mo videos of people on the treadmill, but you're like, they're giving, they're bringing clients benefit and be able to sprint faster, sprint better, or actually get to be able to sprint, but they're not marketing it the same way. So what I know is like with FP, you guys, first off, you guys are doing a great job of taking everybody from the most basic individual.

I don't want to say the word basic. From the individual who has even the lowest starting point. Maybe a lot of people aren't going to be willing to work with getting them from point A to point B. But at the same time, I'm going to use an example. I know this guy, Jared Cardona. He's been on the podcast before. I don't know if you guys know who he is, the crazy trainer. He does a great job with people in that sense.

We know, what's his name? Real prep AZ. What's his name? Uh, why did I forget? Ian Danny. Ian Danny. He's a, he's a really, he's a really good straight and true coach out of Arizona works with a lot of Olympians, but also works with like a lot of athletes and he gets people moving faster. He uses quite a few different modalities too. We know many coaches who are able to do it. So what I'm saying is like, you asked me like, oh, but are they showing? Yes, they are showing that there's a different way to do it. But yeah. It's hard to like, it's hard to know if they are actually doing that.

One, you could get someone faster and make them like the sprinting not actually be like better for them. Like the form, I guess, like the sprinting form may not be the… Because they may not be. They could maladapt and sprint faster. That's one. But then it's not really like a… I wouldn't say like the before and afters are just marketing. It's like if you're going to buy a microphone, you want to

know that it works. So how can you show people that what you're doing works if you're not able to show them like the end result or like the actual product? Like you, I don't understand how you're, how, how you can say like, these people are running faster, they're getting better, but there's like no way to make it an objective thing. It has to be quantified. So it's like, okay, so this person, all right, sure. Maybe they got people to, you know, run faster, et cetera, like in their practice, but even then it's like, it's what you were just saying. It's like, is it across populations? Is it what exactly does their gait look like? You know what I'm saying? Like, how were they sprinting before and how are they sprinting now?

You know, it's hard to say unless we've seen, okay, this is what they were doing before. This is what we're doing after. That's actually a result of tyranny of words as well in Jacque Fresco is the whole idea that if there's not an objective measurement for it, then it's really hard to tell. I think with Ian Danny in particular, his background is in sprinting. So like he might agree with some of what you guys are saying. He might say, yeah, that is kind of the thing that I keep in mind. I hold, hold myself accountable to make sure these guys can sprint really well. Sure. Yeah. And is it like, is it the actual like methodology or is it like this? Cause you're also doing, she's probably doing sprint training as well. So is it like the sprint

training that's making it better? Like that's where it gets really good point. It's harder. Is it because they're practicing sprinting? Whereas when we work with people, we don't have them sprint at all for the most part. And then their gait will improve. And that seems to be the guy that you were talking about that trains athletes. So the population is going to be… The population matters. Is going to matter a lot there. And then with us too, maybe there needs to be a better job doing this too.

But like their sprinting is getting better, but it's also their posture. It's also everything else. Like again, what we're saying, if the sprinting gets better better, but it's also their posture. It's also everything else. Again, what we're saying, if the sprinting gets better, everything else gets better. And you guys don't do any drills or plyometrics? There can be some ballistic plyometric stuff, for sure. But they're also done, I guess you would say they're modified. It's like in the 10-week course, there's a plank, but it's modified. It's like it accommodates the

or respects the set principle I guess a little bit more mainly the only running that you're doing is just kind of for testing yeah exactly it's like okay let's try to go on this treadmill here's week 1 and then here's week 5 but you're not like always going on a treadmill to like

no because again you can adapt you can only get so much out of the same stimulus. So, and that's what we find is like, we're actually trying to show a difference. And even though the differences might be small or sometimes a lot of people can tell they're very, very hard to change. So we have to constantly test and we have to constantly modify what we're doing to make sure that we're getting that outcome. So that's why when we say, okay, there's other people that are doing it. I don't think people understand the level of detail and technicality that it takes to make those changes. So that's

why we're skeptical. It's like, okay, maybe they are sprinting better, but it's like the structural changes, those are like, I don't think people understand like what it takes to get those. I was watching some, there was like a documentary on the New England Patriots on Apple TV called Dynasty. And it showed Tom Brady, the team went undefeated and they got beat in the Superbowl and it was like demoralizing to him. Next year he thought, you know, they're going to come out and they're just destroy everyone. I think it's like just a couple of games. Next year, he thought, you know, they would come out and they'd just destroy everyone.

I think it's like just a couple of games into the season and he gets hit in the knee and he's out and he's out for like the whole year. What he does from there changes the course of like the rest of his career and makes him the GOAT, makes him the greatest of all time. He already won a Super Bowl at that time. He was already kind of like on fire,

but it was like, you know, he was like one of the best uh he then decided to take care of himself better he decided to uh exercise more and do stuff outside of football even though he already did take care of himself a little bit he hires a trainer hires his coach and this coach ends up getting really good such good results with him and brady's all pumped about it. And Brady tells Gronkowski and some of the other players about it. Now there's tension from Bill Belichick and from the New England Patriots organization because there's this outsider teaching practices that go against the status quo. And so what do they do? They ban him from the facility, and they call him a snake oil salesman.

Now, I don't agree with the way that that guy trains people really much at all. I don't think he's like, I don't know. He worked for Brady, obviously, and worked for Gronkowski. I don't believe in a lot of what the guy shares, but the guy did get them off of some traditional lifts that they were doing that it was clear that those things weren't,

not only were the lifts not progressing, but they weren't progressing them as athletes, but they were still just there. Why? Because we have this squat rack because we have these weights and because we have these strength coaches and you have this whole system. And I just think, again,

I think it's a good idea to sometimes take a step back and say, is this shit actually working? Is it actually helping? Right. Yeah. And it's really hard to change, right? It's really hard to evolve. So, so on that, on that front, it's like, I, at least I don't think like people are just going to drop everything and ditch them. Well, I think that that's our differential advantage ultimately is like you said, Mark. One, you mentioned kind of the conflict of interest just in the industry. It's a money-making industry.

So if it goes against making money, then people aren't going to – industry leaders aren't going to want to do, or admit that that's the thing that's working. But then also number two, um, you were talking about how, um, Brady had the knee injury. Well, in many instances, that's what ends up bringing people to us. Either they've had some sort of blowout in their knee or in their lower back or in their shoulder, and they can't, they've tried everything else, you know what I'm saying? So I think that ultimately leads to our differential advantages when people have literally done, you know, physical therapy, chiropractic and all this other stuff. And then they come to us and they feel a lot better. So that that's really what's bringing us to critical mass. And that's why we want to focus on that so much because we understand the politicking that happens at those levels. So that's why I'm really glad you mentioned that,

because a lot of times people are like, well, why is an FP like, you know, scaled up more or whatever the case may be it's or, or why aren't you guys training an NBA team or whatever the case may be? It's like, you guys don't understand the level of red tape that comes along for the ride when you're dealing with, you know, an, an, an, an NBA team, you know what I'm saying? There's so many levels of politics that you have to negotiate. We'd rather just focus on gen pop. Why is it behind a paywall is what I hear all the time. If it's so great, why is it behind a paywall? Right. I mean, what's free in this world? So it's like anything that you get. A lot of people say this. I have a bachelor's in exercise science.

For sure that course has way more value than my bachelor's and I'm still paying it off. And I don't use it at all with my clients. I paid a fraction of the price to learn from functional patterns. Nevermind. Like that course is what, $200? I paid thousands of dollars, not even that many, but to get certified with FP.

And it's like, there's so much value. And there's also work that goes behind that. Like you got to set it up, you got to update it, you got to maintain it. So yeah, I mean, just anything that I, I don't mind paying for something as long as I get what I'm, as I get value from it, which I'm sure you guys feel the same way. And this thing, first off, the paywall thing, how is somebody going to make money if they don't charge people for it?

That's right. But I think one of the things is, for example, when I started looking at FP stuff, I got, I got a parable and a bunch of other stuff. And I was literally just like looking at it and trying to see what's going on because there was no explanation of what's going on. And I think that's where maybe a lot of people are like, fuck you. And I'm not saying fuck you, but I think that's where people are saying it because they look at it and what they see is they see like maybe some movements or they see why this is not good and why this is better. But there's no explanation on what's going on to understand why it's better. It's just saying that this is better. You know what I'm saying?

And I think that's where a lot of frustration lies on the other side of people because they're like well you're telling me this is bad and you're saying this is better but you're not telling me why and now why should i believe you along with that's what the frustration along with nowdy clowning everybody and the thing is you tell people why it's better and they're like, oh, but what about this? Oh, well, and then you explain that. Like there's always going to be someone that's going to have an objection. But also, what else were you saying about the paywall? All the, I lost my train of thought.

Lost my train of thought. No, I think too, like when it comes to that, it's funny because I think sometimes it just depends on the disposition. This is also the thing about functional patterns is that we're not necessarily trying to sell to everyone. You know what I'm saying? And like, because that actually the way that nowdy is when people say, oh, that really puts me off or whatever the case may be. And I'm not saying that I can't put myself in their shoes and see where they're coming from, but I have never been able to relate with that. It's very funny. And I've always been that one, and there was a video and it was just one,

I was like following everyone on Instagram, you know, when you first start out as a trainer and you're kind of trying to figure out how to train people and what you're even doing. And, you know, there was one, you know, I started following Naughty and functional patterns and blah, blah, blah. And Naughty made a post and I was looking at it and he's like, humans were, you put one foot in front of the other, the hand comes forward. That's contralateral reciprocation. It's not rocket science. You fucking morons, blah, blah, blah. It was like super intense. And this, this is when, I mean, he's intense now, but this is when he was like, really like, Oh, he was more intense than he was now. Yes. I think so. I think so. It was very, very, very intense. And I was

like, whoa. And then I went ahead and I showed it to somebody that was like master. That's what brought us in. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Like there was somebody that was like a master trainer, like somebody that I really respect. And I was like, what do you think about this? And she was like, well, he's right. I was like, well, then what are we doing? And then she was, then she backtracked and she's like, well, he's exclusive and blah, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, that's all I needed to hear. So then I just like bought in and whatever the case may be. But, you know, like I said, that that's the thing is that a practitioner of mine once said, it'll either make sense to you or it'll make sense to you eventually.

You know what I mean? And that's that thing where, it was kind of like that comment that was posted the other day on NowDeesLive where it was like, everything this guy has been saying for the past decade has actually kind of like come to fruition. I see the CrossFitters and they're all messed up

and really banged up by the time they're 35 for the most part, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. When they prioritize that training. So he's like, I'm in now. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Sorry. And then the other thing that I was going to say, I remember, um, when we were, we were showing you as somewhat of a simple exercise and it was hard for you to keep track and like, even understand as we were doing it, it's very hard to expect people to understand what we're trying to do online. To articulate that online, yeah. So that's why you just have to give,

you just got to try and go through the steps and then give it some time to see, to allow yourself to understand because it's like, it's not really, have you, I don't know, you guys have done, you did a little bit today and you've done it. Is it like anything else you've ever done? No. No, it's nothing like, and what've done it. Is it like anything else you've ever done? No.

What I would say for people is if you don't have symptoms and you feel good about what you're doing and you enjoy what you're doing, fuck it. Just keep doing that. No, do fuck something. You've got to get more out of it. If you're someone that's banged up

or you're looking to change things up or you just want to try to explore because you may recognize maybe eventually I that's banged up or you're looking to change things up or you just want to try to explore and try to – because you may recognize like maybe eventually I'll be banged up or won't be able to do some of these things that I love in the same way with the same intensity. They should definitely look into what you guys practice. And this is the thing I want to kind of add in on that. Two things I want to elaborate on. I get what you're saying. And like with the amount of coaching you were giving me with those movements that you were showing, like, you're like, Oh, shift the hips this way, shift the

ribs this way. Uh, go forward on the knee. Okay. Stop right there. You cannot communicate that in a post. Right. But the other aspect of it, and this is, this is the, this is the tough thing is like, well, I was still able to do it. Right. Um. And there were so many cues that it didn't feel so, I guess, like when you do other things, it's like when you do jujitsu, right? It feels foreign, like absolutely foreign. It feels like a foreign language. Everything's going over my head. Like when I first started, right?

But when I was doing this, it wasn't like anything I've ever felt before. I knew it was definitely something I could progress at, but the things that I've done on the outside didn't take away from my ability to do this. Do you get what I'm saying? Yeah, but that's not, I wouldn't say that's the case for most people. For most people, for sure.

And I see what you're saying. Or maybe if you were like, I don't know how old you are now, but 20, 30 years down the line, you could probably say that it could take some away. And this is, okay, I'm actually happy you said that because this is what I wanted to ask you guys about. You mentioned CrossFitters, right? CrossFitters are, okay. So, I mean, you do anything at the highest level.

you do anything at the highest level, um, fucking football, CrossFit being lifting crazy weights for a crazy amount of reps and then doing something else difficult for crazy amount of reps. The amount of stress that does on the body. I totally get what you're saying there. Jiu Jitsu. If you train way too hard, way too often, you things will like things will degrade if you're not smart about your training frequency and how you're handling your body right but one thing i notice and this is something i'm curious about is like for example you said 20 30 years down the road right we don't know until we get to 20 30 years down the road and if 20 30 years down the road i'm it could be foresight but i also think and i'm going to say

this with full understanding that I dig you guys right and I dig what you guys taught us but I feel as if it's massive fear mongering and let me say this because I've seen certain things online where like let's say it's a split squat that's shown right or a certain lift that's shown and I see practitioners

certain FP practitioners like just wait five years wait wait six years, wait eight years, wait 10. And I'm like, I can understand kind of where you're coming from because if this person is like deadlifting in perpetuity and just trying to increase weight forever, there's a good chance they're going to fuck themselves up like a lot of people do when they don't realize, hey, stop increasing weight. But there are other movements where I'm just like, okay, if someone's doing a split squat and they're not just continuously increasing load forever because that's not how you need to make progress. Like you can do the movement without having to increase the load forever.

That will not fuck their knees up in three years. And when I see people say that, I'm like, ah. Well, you're still deconditioning. You're still not following the set principle to – you're not being as specific. So then you're deconditioning your ability to sprint. And when you do that, chances are like the probability is that you're going to suffer some consequences. It's like, are you in your 30s? I'm 31.

31. Yeah. Like I was talking to Mike this morning. I have a brother that he's 20. And we were talking about like we were doing in high school, like lifting all that stuff. And I was like, yeah, I remember being like 18, 19, 20 and thinking that I knew more than what I actually did.

Like being, being very naive. Yeah. And now I'm looking back at my brother. I'm like, and I'm trying to, and I remember back then listening to people that were older than me telling me things. And I was like,

yeah, this guy's just like, like you couldn't even say fear-mongering like how you deal with money how you deal with your health uh buying a motorcycle like there's things that we all agree on that you like do you wear a seat belt when you drive 100 is that like if people tell you if people tell you like hey put your seat seat belt on is that fear-mongering so it's like you can you can see patterns and then you can kind of understand the the physics or the principles and and then also yeah and you just

observe and and like like that guy say it said uh naughty has been has seen this stuff and then now we're starting to see it with time and I do agree I think if people continue to do certain things that decondition like they're not respecting the gate and all that stuff it's gonna it is a pretty good bet though that if someone's participating

in just about anything physically that over a period of time they're going to probably get fucked up I actually so I want to address that because I want to kind of sum up a few things here. So, you know, what Encino is saying is that if you have the correct type of load management, intensity management, frequency management. Along with paying attention to your body. Certainly. No, certainly, certainly. And then, you know, Mark, you know, what you were saying just now is, or, and also, Amitino, you're also saying, you are things that fundamentally will not lead to that result.

And I think that's fine. And I think that's why we're here. And we're completely okay with agreeing to disagree on that. But that's what we're saying is that we think that people should be able to move extremely well at a very high level. You will have to pay attention, of course, to frequency load management, even with the low risk. When you're loading something horizontally, there's a much just lower risk by nature than loading it longitudinally on your spine. I think we can all agree on that. But it's like, we can continually increase the ROI while continually decreasing the negative externalities. And we do that by respecting this fundamental framework.

So what we are saying is that I understand where you're coming from saying that it's fear margarine, but like, I'll use another example, like something like yoga. We really believe that that is the correct information. You know what I'm saying? So when we're saying don't do yoga, we really, I mean, we do with everything else too, but I just, yoga is a very easy example where don't do that, guys. Like stop. You're talking to guys who did a lot of yoga too. So don't get me wrong talking to people guys who did a lot of yoga too so don't get me wrong yeah you know we did a lot of yoga we did a lot of stretching like we know we say this i have this phrase that i use as a joke but i really mean it which is like

stretching is the real pandemic you know like really stretching um doing all that so i hope i can am i gonna get us canceled i'm so sorry sorry. Okay. Okay. I appreciate that. Okay, good. But yes, that is really like the thing. But yeah, even with what Rodney is saying is true, and I just want to highlight that again, the said principle isn't just, we want to get as close to the said principle as possible. It's that over a period of time, whether that be a year, two years, or like what we're talking about, which won't be known until a a period of time, whether that be a year, two years, or like what we're talking about, which won't be known until a certain period of time, 10 years, 20 years, is that if you're not working towards the said principle of that blueprint, you are deconditioning it. So it's

not just that, you know, oh, if I just do this for a period of time, then it'll just be like everything else. Eventually, I'll hit a wall or whatever the case may be. We're saying that you can continually get better and better and better rather than, oh, I'm banged up at 50 no matter what I did or whatever the case may be. You know what I'm saying? So you can really continually reduce those negative externalities and reduce the risk and really, really get huge increases in ROI per exercise, per stimulus. Have you guys heard of like the exponential progress in like technology and stuff like

that? A little bit. Yeah. Like more recent times, like progressing faster and faster. It's almost like Moore's law. So it's like back in the, I want to say 80s or 90s, like they made the prediction of like by 2029 or by 2045, like AI was going to be in a place where it could essentially replace humans. And like people maybe like four years ago in 2020 or even now in 2024, they're like, oh yeah, they were wrong. That's not going to happen. But what people don't think about is that the exponential progress, it's like there's very

little progress 2000, 2010, 2020, and then it just shoots up. Yeah, the internet's a great example of that. Yes. So with that being said, right now, if you're thinking about FP also, and I do think it's growing exponentially and it's going to grow as technology, it's a technology as it advances in 20, 30 years, it might be that we're like reversing aging or slowing it down to a great amount. So when we say, hey, if you keep doing this, you're essentially putting yourself in a position where you're going to wish you wouldn't have done those things. Yeah. And I was going to say

another thing, fear is not a bad thing. Fear is something actually that it's very useful. And we all use it. Whenever you wake up in the morning or whenever you have to do your work. There is some sort of fear that you utilize to get you to achieve a goal. So it's a good driver for many things. It's a good driver. But the thing I have an issue with is when it's purported as absolutely being true. Because no one knows my future. I mean, shit.

Fuck. I mean, I don't want to say it, but like I could die in a car accident. So it's not 20, 30 years, right? It was just next year. Or I could end up being 70 and I can move amazing because there's certain concepts that I keep in mind with the way I move and the way I do things that are keeping everything in line.

And then, okay, now we know you're wrong. But at the same time, it's, I don't think that that's the best way to go about things by telling someone who's just like, let's just, cause I've seen this on posts of people who are just average exercisers. I'm just like, why are you going to tell somebody who's just trying to get better that in four years, they're going to blow their knee out? Like, I mean, I get that it's a motivator for them maybe to think, but at the same time, for a lot of people, it's one of those things where it's like, Oh God, it fear maybe it'll make them think but at the same time

it's i think there's a better way of going about that that's what i'm saying yeah a couple things uh if there's people going into other people's posts and telling them that then that's we do actually try and discourage that it's not even even discourage it. It's like people shouldn't be doing that. They shouldn't. Don't do it. Stop it. Then the other thing about you saying like saying something like an absolute truth, that's again where tyranny of word comes in or like semantics. We never, there we go.

I said never. We try not to operate from absolutes. So what we're saying is the chance, like the way things are right now and the way they're trending, the probabilities are that this is going to happen. Based on the probability, based on the physics. It's just the quicker way to say it, right? It's like when you say someone I love you or whatever, you're expressing different things. So it's like the quicker you say it's like, hey, in 20, 30 years, you might experience it. But it's not an absolute you might okay

or the probability yeah you should I think tyranny of words is dope yeah people ignore it a lot but it's a very very important especially when you're trying to figure out something like training because you need one you need a good attribution but two you need to be like specific

it's like engineering right when you have to build a bridge or build a house, you have to be very precise and actually use numbers and physics, like certain type of material. For something like architecture, it's like you have to kind of get it right the first time. You know what I mean? I'm sure there are exceptions, but for the most part, you can't build a bridge. And then it's like, well, there was no way for me to know whether or not that bridge was going to break down and everybody was going to fall to their death. When people are worried about like scam artists or like snake oil salesmen, reading this book and understanding semantics, just completely, you can like see through a lot,

like politicians, all that stuff. You can really see like the way people use language, how it's a big part of it. it's a big part of it it's a big part of the equation so when it comes to uh scaling the exercises i find that to be really interesting um and a lot of the movements that i've been introduced to so far yeah i would say all all of the exercises that i've done all the exercises that i've uh messed with um while they do have their challenges, they maybe aren't as intimidating as like an Olympic lift, you know, a power clean or snatch. I would say a snatch a lot of times, I mean, people coming into a gym that are in like their mid-30s,

like that eliminates a ton of people that will be able to have any sort of expression of being able to perform that exercise to the point where it looks like the way that it's supposed to look. Even after they train it for a while and even after they try to work on it for like a long period of time. I find that the scalability of the functional patterns movement to be really cool. And, you know, a lot of the cable exercises, some of the other things um obviously you can reduce the weight you can do that you guys showed me a couple exercises with no weight um but i think that that is a a big factor in being able to work with the variety of people that you guys are able to work with because i know you mentioned you're starting to get some better athletes but there's not real

there's not a ton of real high level athletes yet. That's right. Um, but you guys are having these massive and crazy transformations, uh, from people that are, they're broken. Their, their bodies aren't working well anymore. We see the x-rays that you guys post pictures of sometimes, sometimes we'll see somebody walking or shaken or, uh, maybe unfortunately they have, they have some sort of disorder or disease of some sort. And you guys are kind of hitting a lot of people that maybe otherwise aren't getting worked with. someone for football or they want to train someone for volleyball or train somebody for like a sport or some sort of expression of maximum human capacity. But you guys are taking a lot of people that maybe aren't, they're not serviced. Like no one's, no one's been excluded.

Yeah. They've been excluded. Totally. A hundred percent. And that is what we want. That is, that is also a big part of the mission statement or almost the mission statement is to take the populations that have been excluded and make fitness accessible for them. scale them to the highest degree possible. You know what I'm saying? Like, even if, you know, sure, maybe someone with cerebral palsy, that's, but that's exactly what Rodney's saying is that in that 20 or 30 year time span, we actually don't know what we're going to be able to do

with populations like that. Like, I'm not trying to make claims that we're going to like completely reverse things and stuff like that, but we don't, the thing is that we really don't know yet because it's constantly evolving. You know, we'll, we haven't yet had a scoliosis reversed. I know. Yeah. Crazy. We haven't yet had a scoliosis be reversed like a hundred percent where it's like, okay, this person had a wicked 40 degree curve and now it's completely 100% straight, but you know, maybe we'll be able to get to that point. So that's why. And then even beyond that, taking somebody like me and Rodney, it's like, could we turn them into a Floyd Mayweather or a Barry Sanders movement-wise? You know what I'm saying?

That's the goal. We don't want to stop until we get to that point. point. It's interesting too, the, uh, the changes in people's physiques a lot of times is that you guys, is it typical in functional patterns for people to be sharing a lot of information about nutrition and other protocols, or is it sort of a by-product of some of the training? It's mostly the training. There are some, um, nutritional things that we cover, but usually like in 10, 15 minutes, you can cover most of it. Maybe just some adjustments here and there.

There's a lot of behavioral aspects to it as well. What are some of the big nutrition concepts before we get to behavioral stuff? Yeah, eliminate grains, eliminate, for the most part, processed foods, industrial seed oils, things like that. Pretty standard, protein first. Yeah, certain things in moderation, like milk, maybe certain nuts or something like that. And then primarily eating fish and meat.

Right, animal products. That's what I should have said. Yep. And then some fruits or veggies too, depending on what it is. Yeah, then some fruits or veggies too, depending on what it is. But for the most part, it's things that are going to aid with the mechanotransduction. So fish is a big one because we don't produce DHA. So we need DHA.

And that's directly, I guess, feeding the mitochondria. Our redox potential. It's part of the cell membrane. So that's very important. And then meat as well has some components that are going to relate to improving your fascia essentially. Exactly. That whole concept of hydrating your fascia. Okay.

That's mostly where we think about in terms of nutrition because then weight loss, muscle building, etc, will be like a byproduct of that. And then I guess you can say the portion size is the big one. So a lot of people try to manage their weight by exercising. Right. We generally manage it. That's really the big one. By managing your portions or restricting your calories.

Which comes down to addressing your anxieties and addressing your behavior as well. So those things kind of like go hand in hand. You know, if you don't respond to stress well, then you're going to have more of a tendency to overeat, for example. Or overexercise. And if you don't feel good. Yeah. If you don't feel good, you're in pain.

That's exactly right. On the behavior side of things i remember it was years back i i voice messaged naudi about something and he mentioned something about like people need to be more forward intention or have more forward intention or something but i'm wondering when it comes to the behavior stuff that you try to help people with or that you talk to people about what are some big concepts there that like maybe people don't really think about i think the language is the semantics that we mentioned through any of words that's a big one okay and then the jack fresco to just being more mechanistic so essentially like

realizing that things happen uh there's a cause there's a causality to things so things don't just happen like like oh i'm just i'm just not feeling well today or or you know yoga is just good for people yeah no there's that there's a there's there's mechanisms that lead to other things and then along with the language being specific what those mechanisms are and what you're trying to describe i think that is a big one and then um i don't know if you have any others. No, I think that those are really the big ones because when you address the semantics, the value system.

So it's like, well, like for example, Naughty talks about being like a biological conservative, for example. And it's like that whole concept of, you know, is it aiding in the regeneration of my biology or is it taking away from it? And that's almost like the said principle that we were talking about. It's like, is this exercise conditioning my sprinting or is relevant to that blueprint or is it deconditioning it? And a lot of things in life

are actually that black and white. And whether or not you get on board with that all at once or whatever the case may be, we understand that it's totally about meeting people where they're at. There are people that we end up moving the needle with at Santa Monica that we would have never have thought that we would end up moving the needle with in various ways in terms of their behavior or whatever the case may be. And sometimes it is too slow. So we'll be like, okay, well, this is just too slow for me where I'm at right now, because I have other people that are willing to get on board and buy in completely. So it just depends on the situation. But in many instances, especially in the beginning. As an example, let's say someone's coming in with lower back pain and then they have bloating and then you're

asking them, okay, you have to maybe stop eating grains, but they value eating grains because it's part of their culture or just because they have an association. I just love them. I just enjoy them. I just love oats in the morning or whatever the case may be. So then at some point, you're not going to be able to help them as much so that's when it's like then yeah that's when the value system becomes an integral part it's like or yeah or they like to go and and drink beer right like or excessively or whatever the case may be which again bloats them so then um dehydrates them it's it's essentially like it's not just like oh we want you to be this way because of no

reason. It's more like, hey, this seems to be something that is creating a plateau. It happens a lot with veganism. A lot of people that follow the vegan diet, they don't want to let go of it. And we see a physical limitation with how far they can get. And when people have started eating fish or meat, then you see the structure change and everything get better. So those are just some examples. Let's grab a couple of questions from the Discord if we could. But while they're going to look some of that up,

what do you think it is like what's that uh like what's inside you guys like why do you care so much why do you want to help people that's a loaded question uh for me i started with trying to get out of pain and trying to fix myself and i do think that we are all self-serving it just happens to be that I I guess ran into this and I'm able to do it and yeah I think the more

people that like when I help someone it's going to benefit me so I think for the most part it's just like we need to coexist as humans and what kind of pain were you in?

back pain, that was the worst I would have to roll out of bed or I would wake up and try to brush my teeth and my back would seize up and I would fall to the floor that was the biggest one, knee pain. I tore my labrum on my shoulder and then some neck pain. And it was like 24-7. Like it started slowly. I remember when I was like 20, 21, I was like, I've never had, I think

someone was talking about knee pain. I was like, I never had knee pain. And I would like lock out my knees. I'll be like, I feel great. And then there was one time that I did that and I got a little twinge. And I was like, oh, is this the start of knee pain? And then from there, just little by little, I think I sprained my ankle. And after that is when I started feeling it more. But then it just kind of started going downhill. And I was 24-7 for years.

And I tried mobility. I tried yoga. I was still lifting lighter. I was still doing that list. I was still doing pull-ups and, uh, yeah, I wasn't able to tough spot to be in,

you know, when you're in a lot of pain, you know, people reach for painkillers and drugs and food and all kinds of stuff. Never, never painkillers. Um, but for sure,

coping with probably alcohol, coffee, things like that. And then, but yeah, so I think I just started. Yeah, I was kind of forced to do it. And then now, it's hard for me to not,

I guess it's, I don't see myself not helping. Like this system works for so many people and I'm in the position where I can do that. So, yeah. I also just really like, I've always identified with the message of the company and the message, like not just the overarching mission in terms of, you know, getting people out of pain and, you know, treating the system and not the symptoms and the training aspect of it. I almost, I would love to see the whole concept of functional patterns also being functional behavioral patterns. The whole

idea of reading Tyranny of Words, like Encino saying that he's going to read tyranny of words is like, that's a huge payoff for me. We don't hear that ever. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Like that, that kind of stuff almost more so because that's really like the root of it all. So that's the thing too, like imagine if, you know, um, everybody had that type of influence and they're thinking when we were all like at a younger age, I just feel like the world would be a lot more sane. And then that's the thing that really drew me to functional patterns. And that's actually probably one of the aspects that I'm most passionate about outside of the training because the training was really just like born of that methodology. However, though, the body is like that really the body was the part of like Tyranny of Words and Jacque Fresco that was missing.

That's what I think Naughty brings to the table is really combining that in terms of being like a real behaviorist. So that's the thing that I want to impart on people the most because that I feel like solves the most problems on like a on a on a systemic level in society. And you were in a lot of pain yourself, right? I was, yes. I had really bad lower back pain. I had the last straw with a deadlift injury, but I always had lower back tightness. And then I also was somebody that never was...

I wouldn't even say that I wasn't athletic. I just couldn't figure out... I didn't have a formula for figuring out how to play sports. I was always fairly fast, and I didn't have a bad frame per se. And like I was telling you guys in the gym, my dad was a super athlete and could play any sport and coached a bunch of sports as well. sports as well. But like, I just like could not figure it out. And when functional patterns gave me that framework, that was like a big saving grace for me. I think I would be a lot like, I would be a very different person if I didn't have that. And I think that that did a lot for me. So even outside of just being in pain, I think the framework to be able to actually do that stuff and, and to be able to do, you know, um, one thing that I always mention, and I hope we'll see as, as I go along here, but, um, I always men's health and men's mental health is like a big topic nowadays. And for me, I really identify

with that. And I think that's, I don't want to like make it about this, but this is just my experience. FP gave me the framework to like figure that out. And I think it, you know, it can also help for women, et cetera, whatever the case may be. But I do think men in particular nowadays, like if you don't get that experience when you are younger and then you end up crossing over a certain threshold, you really end up missing out. And I think men really feel that and know that. And then they end up with major problems. So like, for example, you know, somebody who's never done boxing or stuff like that, it's like everybody needs, I think even women, but men in particular, like you got to get punched in the face. You can't go through your whole life and not get punched in the face and feel like a man. You know what I'm saying?

Like there's just a part. But the thing is, if you just throw somebody, if you had thrown me into that at the time when I was like vegan and doing yoga, I would have gone home and cried and been depressed for two weeks. You see what I'm saying? So it's like you need a roadmap for that. You know, you can't just say, okay, now go get punched in the face. It's like, that's not going to solve their problem. You know, so people need a level of scalability to like get to that point. And that for my, just me personally, strictly, I can say that that has been the

framework that has given me a path to get there. Yeah, I want to add to that. I think what's different too about functional patterns, it's like what Mike was saying that if he didn't have this, he wouldn't kind of be who he is today. In the sense like people have like, it's almost like a destiny or like an archetype, right? So it's like there's the nerds or there's the yogis, the spiritualists. So it's like there's the nerds or there's the yogis, the spiritualists. Your body type almost tends to want to dictate who you become and who you're stuck for the rest of your life. I think what's cool, what Mike was talking about, and it just came to my mind, you're actually able to get people out of the limitations that is limitation that, that is, um, the limitations that is brought upon by their frame and by their body and actually help them like, it's like, it's like real self-development because you're, you're, again, you have that framework.

So you're actually changing the foundation of what's going to get them to, uh, become a bro or play a sport or things like that. Eventually, like me, I've never, it's like, I've learned so much in terms of like how to work, how to communicate better. There's like a lot of things that I didn't, that I didn't have. And I don't think I would have been able to adopt without also building my, my body. And that's like being here, like public speaking, that's like not something that I would have, I don't think been able to do before. A constant thing that's been beneficial for all of our health has been intaking enough protein,

but also intaking quality protein. And that's why we've been partnering with Good Life Proteins for years now. Good Life not only sells Piedmontese beef, which is our favorite beef, and the main reason why it's our favorite is because they have cuts of meat that have higher fat content, like their ribeyes and their chuck eyes, but they also have cuts of meat that have higher fat content, like their ribeyes and their chuck eyes. But they also have cuts of meat like their flat iron. Andrew, what's the macros on the flat iron? Yeah, dude. So the flat iron has 23 grams of protein, only 2 grams of fat.

But check this out. Their grass-fed sirloin essentially has no fat and 27 grams of protein. There we go. So whether you're dieting and you want lower fat cuts or higher fat cuts, that's there. But you can also get yourself chicken. You can get yourself fish. You can get yourself scallops. You can get yourself all types of different meats. And I really suggest going to Good Life and venturing in and maybe playing around with your proteins. I mean, going back to the red meat, there's picanha, there kinds of stuff. There's chorizo sausage. There's maple bacon.

That stuff's incredible. The maple bacon is so good. Maple bacon is really good. Yo, my girl put those in these bell peppers with steak and chicken. Oh, my God. It was so good. But either way, guys, protein is essential. And Good Life is the place where you can get all of your high-quality proteins.

So, Andrew, how can they get it? Yes, you can head over to goodlifeproteins.com and enter promo code POWERPROJECT to save 20% off your entire order. Links in the description, as well as the podcast show notes. I agree with you guys. And when Graham was talking to you in the gym, he was like, yep. That's right. He had a very similar story. And where people have these kind of years of their life that kind of robbed from them, where they just unfortunately ran into, I know Andrew dealt with a decade of back pain it's like it's you know we said we say that things hurt and we say that you know i had pain but it's it's miserable like it's real like just think anybody listen just think of your worst day when you're in the worst pain and then think

about having that all the time yep and and it gets gets worse. It's like when you keep having it, it's really bad. So if we can help people with that, that's good. Totally. What do we got? All right. There's a few.

These are going to be good. Is it all insults? No, no, no. Fuck those guys. No, no. They're good questions. I think the first one, since we've mentioned it so many times,

from Noe99A, what are some really good workouts and stretches for the lower back for someone who has had lower back surgery, lumbar microdisectomy? One, you know, definitely outside of just an opportunity to plug the 10-week course, you know, do the 10-week course. It's actually perfect for somebody like that because of the fact that it starts with myofascial release. And it's definitely the movement that's going to ultimately solve the problem because that's the thing about surgery is that it doesn't get to the root of the problem. So whatever movement dysfunction led to surgery is just still there. Yeah. Um, so, um, surgeries are always like always just as a, as something, uh, to note here, if you can avoid surgery, you want to avoid surgery. And I've had people who are just too quick to go under the knife and you really, really, really don't want to do that. That's number one.

Also, surgeons want to cut into you. They really do. They do. They really do. And not just once. If they get a chance to cut it in for the same thing multiple times, they do it. They are butchers. They are butchers. They are.

It is crazy. So, you know, if you look into the history of that, it's just horrifying. But without going too far into it, that's number one. Number two. Okay. Yeah. Cool. So there you go. There's your, that's number one. Number two, okay, yeah, cool. So there you go. There's phase one, phase two, phase three. Phase one is going to be the exactly tissue plasticity techniques is what they're calling. I actually haven't seen this, but it's essentially myofascial release.

They're probably calling it tissue plasticity because, I mean, that is what it is. But myofascial release might seem a little bit not as accessible to people. So that is true. Especially after surgery, there are going to be clients that need a lot more myofascial release initially than others. So that's number two. And then number three, don't stretch. I'll just say that across the board, please, for the love of God, just do not stretch. The myofascial release will be better for you. Stretching will end up giving you problems over time.

Yeah, problems that are very hard to account for, even with something like FP. And then I would just say there's a lot of people in your situation that have tried a lot of things that haven't worked. So it's worth giving it a try. Even Johnny Nielsen, he's had a spinal fusion. Yep. Yes. His spine is fused.

And he's been able to obviously… He moves well. He sprints, he moves well. That's right. Yep. And it's been over, I think, 10 years now or something like that. Yeah. Since he's had it.

Yeah. It keeps getting better. Absolutely. So yeah, you're definitely in a position where you need to pay more attention and be more specific with what you do with your body. So if you're going to do something like a 10-week course, I guess you should do that. But then also try to eliminate all the other movement for now until you kind of become a little more educated and understand how your body's supposed to move. That's important. Because it could create,

definitely the stretching is probably the worst one, but there's other things that you can do that may just slow down the progress. That's right. And that's the movement elimination protocol if people are wondering what that is. So movement elimination protocol, myofascial release, try the 10-week course. Are there any special tools required for that 10-week course? That's a good question. They do sell the, there's an MFR bundle on the website

and then that just covers your basis on everything that you're going to need for it. It's like access to a pulley or a band. You can use resistance bands. It should be on the, if you go down, I think there should be like an FAQ there. If you scroll all the way down, maybe. So that's the, yeah, that's the MFR bundle.

And then keep going down. There we go, FAQ. So the tool, there should be a question there for the tool. It's got a couple of things there. So yeah, all the information's there. Yeah, exactly. Okay, so a quick question to add on to this, because you guys mentioned yoga multiple times.

For all the people that are listening and they go to a hot yoga twice a week and they're like, I love my hot yoga and I feel good. What do they need to keep in mind? That's a good question. For the people that do it. Because people are like,

you know, these practices I get at yoga, but then there are these people like, I do yoga and I feel great, right? But again, maybe they're not sprinting. So what do they need to keep in mind? Actually, there is something that I'll add to that. You can still, like yoga, the meditative aspect, like that, yes, you can even do too much meditation. I know maybe we sound crazy with that, but you can do too much quote-unquote meditation.

But the concept of meditation or really what I call it is HRV training essentially because that's basically what it is. I have no problem with a group of people sitting down for 10 or 15, 20 minutes and everybody just shutting up and chilling out because society definitely needs more of that. You know what I'm saying? For sure. Everybody sit down, be quiet, zone in, just be chill. You know what I'm saying? And it's a good way to just reassociate how to rest. You actually need to teach the body how to rest again. So you can still have that aspect of yoga. So if you, because we get this stuff online where it's like, well, yoga, it wasn't even meant to be a physical practice and blah, blah, blah. It's like, well, the physical practice is what

we're talking about. And we made that pretty clear, but either way, if you want to maintain that aspect of it, where you just need a space where you're able to be calm and like light a couple of candles or something, or have a specific space where that's all where you feel like good and relaxed, then you can still do that. But that physical practice, when you're doing something like yoga, you are going to ultimately, that's the whole thing about conditioning out your ability to sprint. And then yoga is just particularly hard to correct for because when tendons and ligaments make those adaptations, that's when you're going to start really having a hard time getting people to hit the positions that we were like having you guys do. Yeah. I would just add yoga, unfortunately, doesn't take into account

like the force production that you need in order to move on and sprint. So it's almost like there's no bound. Like when we operate in society, there has to be some, like when you're growing up as a kid, you have to have some structure and some bounds. Guardrails. Yes. That's right. Otherwise things can get pretty weird and out of hand.

So in a sense, a lot of, not just yoga, but a lot of stretching or mobility, they're kind of operating in outside of reality in that sense. So that could lead to, and that's why people end up in the surgery room with a lot of problems because it's, yeah, you need to guard the rails for sure. Yeah. I grabbed this band right here because I've seen Naughty, you know, use a band as an example of like stretching and what stretching does. And basically it just kind of talks about how your tissues, you know, for band as an example of like stretching and what stretching does and basically just kind of talks about how your tissues you know for sake of argument your tissues kind of look like this and they stretch and pull as you move and then if you stretch and you don't have

good movement and you stretch and you potentially need like myofascial release when you go to move you'll have this big old knot sitting there and you won't be able to get rid of that, whatever that thing is that's kind of blocking you from getting the relief that you're looking for. That's right. And if anything, you just anchor from that adhesion more. And you stretch everything around it. You're only stretching everything around it. So it makes the dysfunction worse in that regard. So Mike, I'm curious and we'll move on to the next one because I think it falls in line, but what if it's somebody who's doing things like yoga, but they're also doing things like sport?

I bring this up because again, our buddy Ian Danny, sometimes he has his athlete stretch, right? And I know many other coaches that that utilize that right but it's there's still the bigger function of sprinting that's kept in mind right so what are your thoughts there do you think overall it's a net negative and it's not bringing any positive to the ability of the athlete to move because i get how in isolation no bueno but when added together do you guys still think that negative it should be added together at the same time so if you're like stretching but then doing a movement it's like you're you're yeah you're you're making it worse because when you're stretching you're again you're stretching the parts that probably you shouldn't be stretching and you're not if

you're adding the strength component to it then now the that is going to make the quote-unquote stretch it's going to make it um a bit it's going to work more so i would say it's probably not doing much it's probably just like it feels kind of good you're getting that that stretch reflex that feels good but the but it's there for the stretch reflex is there for a reason because when you you move, you're stretching, but it's like prompting the contraction. So one of the problems is when people stretch, they're kind of conditioning, they're ignoring that stretch reflex and just pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing until there's no stretch reflex left.

The reciprocal inhibition, like, okay, if I flex my bicep, my tricep stretches. And if I flex my tricep, my bicep stretches. Think about that on a systemic level. So then if I just take my arm and stretch it in isolation, I'm not getting that contraction on the opposite end. So that's the most efficient way to stretch. Gotcha. What do you guys think about something like mobility drill, like a 90-90

or something? You guys are familiar with that? Sure. Garbage? Or what do you think? Yeah, same thing. It doesn't really, mostly. I don't know if there's actually on Nadi's Instagram, there's one where he's doing a para bar. With a region bar.

From Nostradamus. Nostradamus. Yeah. So let's see. Scroll down a little bit. We'll pull it up. That one right there in the middle next to the patent. Yep.

Yep. So he's kind of getting into a 90-90, right? Yep. Yeah, totally. But he's incorporating his upper body. He's producing force. And there's a force transmission And there's a force transmission. There's internal external rotation.

There's accounting for rotation in his rib cage. So it's not that the position is bad in itself. The way most people are doing it, they're probably missing a lot of things. Because that's the thing. So I know it sounds like, oh, we just hate everything outside of functional patterns. But really what it comes down

to, we're just like very rigorous about that whole idea of does it condition my ability to sprint or does it decondition? If it's not conditioning, it's deconditioning. I like that movement because I have a better chance of doing that than I do in 99 sure sure you know what's the the what i find

cool is like this movement right here i've done a movement like this with our old cable machine at the old st with loan and it's it's super helpful because like you're actually loading those tissues out of the position that's right but the cool thing about that bar is it allows you to really add in that rib rotation yeah you know what i mean which is what like the the thing i was using was a cable strap sure i'm not able to get that rotation so this is really fucking cool not just the rib rotation what's driving the rib rotation as well so the arms are potentiating to drive the rib rotation sure so yeah that's dope all right I think this is actually this next question kind of is a good follow through from Mien7736. I saw a post a few months back kind of bashing ATG and Ben Patrick. Can they elaborate on why his training style isn't effective? Because

I've been incorporating some of those exercises like the ATG split squats and feeling much better, split squats and feeling much better, especially mobility wise. Thanks. Yeah. I mean, it's the kind of a similar idea. Ben Patrick puts a lot of length on a lot of areas that probably aren't ready for that length yet. So the idea of like going that deep into the knees over toes, like think about, for example, the, I would look at it as like skipping steps. It's not like those positions are bad, but how you get into those positions matter a lot, right? So when you have that super deep knee flexion, bringing the knees over the toes, like when you see a wrestler do it with a certain degree of like force transmission, when they're going into a shot, it's going to be very different from the way that Ben Patrick gets into it with that stuff. Like,

like that right there. And actually I've done a lot of that. I've done a lot of that, but I see a lot of lumbar compression there for most people. Um, it may feel good that their rec fem is getting so lengthened like that because it's true. You know, is it the orientation of the hip flexors? Is it the length of the hip flexors as to why they feel tight? Is it because of quad dominance as opposed to post-two-year chain dominance? You know, that would have to be a trouble shot in a session. But just putting all that length on it right there and then just assuming that, okay, now we're going to, that's kind of what we were just talking about in terms of reciprocal inhibition, because he's just like,

okay, I'm going to put all this length on the quad and then I'm going to just going to hammer the hamstrings. And then that's going to give me the mobility and the health in the knee joint. And that's just not accounting for the whole system and especially relevant relative to gait. So even though he may end up with that result, some people get results with what they're doing for their knees. There's a concept that we haven't said yet that I think is important. We call it kicking the can down the road. That's the thing that we would say that for many people, when you just put all that length on that stuff, they may feel better initially, but then they're kicking the can down the road and they end up having problems.

They end up creating another problem somewhere else. Yeah. And we touched on that earlier when people hyper-focus on one aspect of the body and not account for the rest. That's right. So it's like, oh, this is for your knees. You know what I'm saying? It's like knees over toes. It's like, okay. And even though he may be, let's like, oh, this is for your knees. You know what I'm saying? It's like knees over toes. It's like, okay. And even though he may be, let's say, like separately addressing different parts, again, it goes back to, it needs to be done at the same time. Like, you know, like going back to that video that we saw of Nadi, like there's not a part of his body that's not working in the movement that he's doing. Versus here, you see like the hand on the hips and you see like, there's lot of um gravity being involved in a lot of those motions or how they get into those motions they usually don't get out of those motions it's a lot of passive work it's very very passive yeah

so there's one thing i do want to add in real quick on this because as we're talking about this right like when i see stuff on the fps page i see there's a lot of things that are shown, right? But there's a lot of the same things that are shown. One thing that Ben does is he shows a lot. But I think what that causes people to think is that there are no regressions to the level that's being shown. Sure. This is the thing. There's no things before the thing.

There's no things before the thing. And the problem is that when you do look at the things he does in depth, there are a ton of regressions before you get to being able to do something like an ATG. There's a program called Zero Program. There's a Zero Program that addresses a lot of minimal movements before being able to get to that point. So that no matter what your level is, you can work through your pain-free range. And the reason why I'm mentioning this is because like I had knee pain forever. I had Oshkod slaughter when I was a soccer player. Um, and I thought that I just had to deal with that knee pain, especially after I started, stopped playing soccer. Um, and I, like when we met Ben, maybe three years back, I couldn't do one of those. I couldn't do an ATG split squat. I couldn't do

any of that type of stuff. It was just painful to get down there. But the thing is, is I worked the pain free range, progress that. And now the thing is, is I can get into those ranges actively with no pain, which I thought would have be couch stretching or we should just be doing the split squat or these movements. But a lot of people don't realize there are regressions to all of this. What I'll say to that is earlier, we were talking about how people may become better at a sport and look more athletic, but they actually just like maladapted into that. So it's the same thing with this. You worked your way into that. So that's fine. You're able to do it. You're able to do it without pain. But what did you compound? Like what were the compensations that you put yourself through to get there? Oddly enough. I mean, I think, again, we were talking about this yesterday with the nature of my sport.

Like you are pulling on one side of the body and pushing, especially when playing certain types of positions. But on the outside of that, I can sprint, I can jump, I can do all these things without pain. And my sprinting is constantly improving. So even though like there's no perfect, I'm always looking for things that I am weak at. At the end of the day, from here to last month, to last year, to the year before, to the year before, there is a constant level of improvement and getting rid of issues, trying to get somewhere better. How are you quantifying you getting better at sprinting? My abilities of sprinting, the ease of sprinting, the form of sprinting.

I would look at the spine. When you see someone sprint, there's going to be asymmetries that happen. You're going to rotate more to one side. You're going to just an example, bend the knee more on one side, drive the hip or drive the knee up on the other side better or whatever or rotate. That's what I would look at more to quantify

if the sprinting is getting better. Stuff like that doesn't account for the force you have to produce and how things need to be in place as you're scoring a full out sprint. So chances are that it's that those things are not getting better. They're actually, you're just exacerbated,

like going into, like you saw how difficult it was to do some of the things that we showed you today because you're working against what you're, that's what we have to keep cuing you because- I would say that, I'm sorry to interrupt, but I would say the difficulty I had in doing what you had today was this amount of cues I'm having to pay attention to.

And I like your coaching, do not get me wrong. It's amazing coaching, but I'm doing something- You know why we're having to cue you that much? One thing is I'm an athlete who's never done it before. No, it's because your body's compensating to get into that position. So we're trying to get you out of the compensation. So when you're doing something like that,

you're getting into those compensations. It's just that no one's cuing you out of it. So when we put you there and we're like, hey, there's this compensation. Hey, there's this. And we're not even mentioning all of them. So when we're trying to get you out of there, it's going to feel like we're just cuing you a lot,

but it's like, we're just trying to hold things together the best that you can. So then you actually get the benefit that you should, or like it actually relates to when you move around in space. But isn't there some like novelty to it? There's absolute novelty. For sure. Yes. Yeah. There's novelty, but we see that with people that have done it for years. They still struggle with like, and like, and I've heard this before where you're like,

yeah, it's just because it's new or like, oh, it's just because I'm holding the position for a long time. Don't think, I know it's good. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying what you've shown me is not beneficial. That's not what I'm saying.

Yeah, but I've seen it before where it's, I guess the best way to describe it, it's a bit of a cognitive dissonance. Like the compensations are happening. And if I put you on video and I showed you like exactly what's moving and then we can do that same exercise over and over again,

there's going to be compensations. And it's like the cues don't get less because there's less things. It's like right now we're only accounting for certain things. And it might feel like there's a lot of cues. Once you get those cues, the same cues that I was giving you today

might not be there. Then there's going to be a whole set of cues and a whole set of it. And it's not just the novelty. And it's not just because you've never done it before. Your body's actually really trying to compensate. And it's very, very hard to get out. That's why we say it's really hard to, like what you felt today, maybe part of it is because you've never done.

But you have done it. You have been on one, you've put weight on one leg before. So you have done that motion before. I put weight on one leg before, but not loading in the way. I've never like. Exactly, because we took you out of some of the compensations. So that's the novelty. But it's not really, that's just a, like, it's nothing new really. What I'll say is, uh, to, it's like,

there's one of the reasons why we are careful, even if here's the thing, sure. Perhaps there are some people who may get some results, like just doing a very linear progression like that. But the idea is that there's a certain amount of, like when you did the single leg stance we did today, there's a certain amount of ankle flexion, a certain amount of knee flexion, and a certain amount of hip flexion that gets that glute to fire. You know what I'm saying? So, usually when we do extreme ranges of motion like this, in many instances, that actually ends up working against what we're doing. So it's actually kind of the novelty that helped you get that to fire, I feel like, initially, because at this moment, we caught you when you're probably not doing like a whole, I don't know how much stretching you're doing right at this moment in time. But as of right now, we were able to get

you to connect because there was just like a certain level of – there's just certain ratios of movement. That's something that we haven't mentioned yet. So we're trying to respect a certain ratio, and there's an optimal ratio, and then there's like lengthening the muscles for the sake of lengthening them. You know what I'm saying? Okay. I get what you're saying. But I hear you in the sense of like, hey, listen, I did this and it helped me. You know what I'm saying? And you're like, and I don't necessarily feel like my sprinting has gotten worse. And like that may be the case, but it's hard to say how, like, if you really progressed all the way to

where, okay, now I can just like shove my knees way over and whatever the case may be without accounting for the gait mechanics. It's one of those things again where it's like where what ends up – if we did an objective measurement, yeah, there has to be some sort of compensation somewhere else. Yeah, and you guys also – you also believe that you have a superior system. somewhere else. Yeah. And you guys also, you also believe that you have a superior system. You believe that if somebody was to get themselves out of knee pain, utilizing functional patterns, that they would be progressing forward. Right. And that if they got themselves out of knee pain, it's not at the expense of something else. Yeah. Right. If they got themselves out of knee pain, doing something else, maybe it got them out of knee pain, but it didn't make them better at sprinting. Right.

Right. That's kind of some of the basic concept. Yes. Sure. This next question is really good from Sane Falcon. How do you reconcile that the functional patterns approach to not doing any traditional strength or weight training? Is there a space to use corrective exercises from functional patterns alongside more classic training techniques? Or do you truly have to be all in to benefit? It is a good question. I think that you will benefit for sure. But what it ends up happening is like, okay, people see functional patterns as just like corrective exercise in order to be able

to do traditional lifting. And that's kind of the injury rehab prehab cycle is what we call that, where it's like, okay, I am doing CrossFit or a lot of traditional lifting. Then I have an injury. Now I have to do the rehab. Then I'm going to prehab in readiness to get back into what I was doing previously. And then sure enough, I end up getting injured again. So you can, but you're probably, what's likely going to happen is that you're going to be spinning your wheels. You know what I'm saying? Like here's, okay, here's an interesting experiment. So they've done studies where some people use this type of study to justify squatting for sprint speed or claiming that squatting will make you better at sprinting. And it's a study where it's like, oh, the sprinters who were the fastest had the highest one rep max in barbell squatting, right?

But here's the thing. you would have to conduct, is it that the people who barbell squat the most are the fastest sprinters, or is it that the fastest sprinters are the ones who barbell squat the most, right? So that's the thing, until you have two timelines, right, where you can experiment that simultaneously, then you don't know.

So that's the thing that we'll say is that if you are going to you're either conditioning the your sprint or you're deconditioning it in that regard following that framework so you can you'll be spinning your wheels by trying to do the corrective exercise and putting that alongside traditional lifting cool and i think that a lot of people that you guys work with, they just start to adhere more and more and more to what you're doing, right? Sure. When not, what Mike said earlier, like people move the needle.

So people will start kind of trying it out, mixing it up and they're like, okay, they get caught into that cycle and eventually they're like, okay, let me just stop and see go all in. And then usually they'll stay. It's just, yeah, if you're feeling better doing something, then you're going to keep doing that. Right, right. All right.

This question comes from Nat Kemp. This is an interesting one. Thoughts of jaw and body connection and how they will train someone who has a misaligned jaw and scoliosis. Thanks. Same, you have to address the system so we we account for the spine that means that we account for the cervical spine and when we account for the spine we're accounting for the pelvis for the ribs so that means that we're going to account for the pelvis, for the ribs. So that means that we're going to account for the cranium. It's just that going back to the question earlier,

like people either tend to think like it's feet first or head first. We're kind of approaching it, like what Mike said, proximal to distal. So like somewhere along the spine, like the middle of the body, like the torso, I guess, and then going out from there. So yeah, I mean, we are trying to address the whole body and the whole system. So the cranium and the jaw is involved in that. Exactly. And that is part of like fascia. So the whole thing about like your face and your eyes and your cranium and how that relates to your neck and your shoulders, et cetera, like all that is definitely relevant. I would say that that technology is still kind of like being developed in terms of how, like it was really HBS4 where we started kind of working although there had already been other changes. I actually had a client who had some big facial changes. I wasn't cuing anything

with the cranium at all. And his like jawline and his facial structure changed. I think they may have posted like on FP maybe or on Nowdy's. Nowdy's page. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And he was making some of those changes. Jeff Harris has made some of those changes. Yeah. So sometimes it just comes from what Rodney's talking about, accounting for the structure as a whole. And you also get practitioners who experiment with different pressures and creating that pressure in the head and cranium, et cetera. So that's why actually I did, because there was a comment where it was like, yeah, he just started weightlifting and that's what happens when you do weightlifting. I'm like, well, that could be true.

There are some weightlifters that actually will develop that, but then you have people like- Because they can prompt that in their bodies. Yeah, but then you can see Danny had done a lot of weightlifting previously and then you can see his neck there and he's got like a pencil neck you know what i'm saying so it obviously doesn't pan out that way for everybody yeah and to add to that too like with the whole mewing and people that maybe chew gum or or they they do the the jaw thing it's the same thing as the knees over toes is the same thing as foot stuff or the foot stuff yeah you can do it and you might get some benefits out of it, but you're still working around the asymmetrical body. So again, the whole thing should be addressed at the same time.

So as you get better at sprinting, your cranium also or your face also changes and your cranium gets bigger or your face also changes and your cranium gets bigger or shifts forward or whatever it needs to do. Yeah. Anything else over there, Andrew? Yeah. Hopefully this doesn't like, you know, ruin our relationship period.

But so with this amazing program, we can see the results are coming. Again, we know the paywall. We talked about that and I think we did a good job of that. But it seems like now he stays home only and we're not seeing him on like other podcasts doing interviews. And the thought is, if the system is so great and he believes in it, then how come he's not more outspoken and more open to having discussions with more people? And I know you can't speak for him, so I apologize for putting you in a bad spot. No, no.

We'll do our best. That's not the problem. So I think when it comes to that, it's like you have roles and you can't expect someone to fill the role for like developing and researching and also being like the spokesperson for that there's also like a certain mind space that you have to get into when you're innovating and when you're doing something like this the time there's a lot that goes into it so I think

there's also like you can I think it was what Dana White he was doing some podcasts and then he got into one and he just left it's like

it's not always and for someone like him like it's not always fun to like put yourself out there and then kind of being in that position but he started doing podcasts again I think he just fucking hates the dealer no deal yeah fun to like put yourself out there and then kind of being in that position.

But he started doing podcasts again. I think he just fucking hates the dealer. No, yeah. Maybe that's a bad example, but then the other thing is, is like, do you really need to hear from, from him? It's like, is it, is it just something that like when, when I, when I did my first HF course, a lot of people were like, Oh, I thought Nadi was going to be teaching this course. It's just something that people want in terms of they just want him to be there and then, I don't know, be the face. But he doesn't have to be.

Again, it's not Nadi Aguilar Incorporated or LLC. It's Functional Patterns. Aguilar Incorporated or LLC, it's functional patterns. And he's, obviously he founded it and he's in the forefront of like innovating, but I don't see how it has to be him. I guess people have examples of like Dana White or Elon Musk or things like that. But with other, there's a lot of things like you don't hear about other companies that essentially the, yeah, I guess if there's like a scientist, like you don't hear about other companies that essentially the – I guess if there's a scientist, you don't hear the science. It's like the chief engineer is not going to be the guy who comes out here and does the podcast.

But you also don't see Elon Musk shitting on Ford. Oh. Yeah, he doesn't – I guess – Well, I guess he kind of does. He does a little bit. But I see what you're saying. But at the same time. Now he's just so active on social media.

Yeah. That's just part of the thing. Yeah. And I think he goes back and forth too. So, you know, I'm sure that there are times when he's, you know, maybe podcasts he's never going to do. I'm not sure. But, you know, there are times when he's less active on social media and more active on social media. You know, he took a seven-month break from social media. So it's that whole idea of like,

you know, if you really want to create radical change, how far are you willing to go? You know what I'm saying? And I think he's afraid to get caught up in like the notoriety. And not even that, I don't even think think I'm sure he's not afraid that like, Oh, it'll get to my head or something like that. I think he's way past that. I don't think that's good. Think something he's even thinking about.

He's just like thinking about his health and what that's doing for his mechanics, et cetera, 24 seven. I can promise you like whoever is the most obsessed individual that you have ever met. He's like multiply that multiply that by a few

you guys don't even know I don't even have art yeah and I think we don't even know like we exactly it's really on another level but it's good to have people like that

honestly it's good to have people like that, honestly. Sure. It's good to have people that are that obsessed about these things. That's right. You think? Exactly. You know what I mean?

That's great. Yeah. Yeah. What he explained to me is that he's still working on stuff and I respect that. You know, he still wants to explore.

He still wants to figure things out a little bit better. And I think that's great. 100%. You know, I think it's a good way of doing it. And I think that's great. 100%. I think it's a good way of doing it. But I do think because he shits on some people, I think that people are like... People want the chance to get back.

Yeah, or just even like we did today. We were combative a little bit here and there, right? But it's important, I think. As you're trying to find and figure out and discover things, I think it's important to get involved in some of that. Sure. And understand why he doesn't want to get tangled up in it too much. Yeah, and to be fair to him, he does go on lives and he's like, hey, if you guys have any contentions, come in and ask your questions. And people generally don't show up.

Yeah, I just feel cheated because um you know no really no because like in the the like the you know tiktok generation right like he has a reel he says something and in that context it's like like where does he get off saying this and but like if we have an hour or two hour almost three hour conversation yeah it would be it's like i'm pretty sure everybody that tuned in would be like, oh, actually, I get what he's saying. It makes them sure. I know a lot of people listening today probably came in hoping and wishing

that they can find more stuff to shit on with FP. They're going to leave thinking, damn, I didn't get anything else out of that. Yeah. You know, so that's where I feel like I feel cheated that he's not doing more stuff and, you know and coming on podcasts. And he has done podcasts in the past. We did one with him. That's on the Functional Patterns YouTube channel.

So he's done it here and there. It's just like how much and again, like how much that's going to take a toll on him. It's like we're talking all these things about like, oh, we want to reach a certain point, but it's like what's actually going to get us there is Naughty doing what he's doing. So if he doesn't, if he starts coming out on podcasts or doing whatever, then it's like he

doesn't get where we need to go. He has a different goal. He and I spoke about it. He's like, I'm not you. He's like, I don't want to share that much all the time. He still shares a ton. Sure. He shares a fuck ton.

So he's just going through his own process, his own way. That's right. And I'm glad that you guys were able to make it here. Strength is never a weakness. Weakness is never a strength. Catch you guys later.