Massenomics Podcast - Ep. 480: Alex Bromley talking Science, Strength, and Strongman

Episode Date: June 16, 2025

Big Alex Bromley joins us for this one to discuss World’s Strongest Man, the squat of the upper body, and science based lifting. Don’t forget to sign up to become a supporting member before it’s too late! Build Fast Formula Use code MASSENOMICS to save 10% on every order! BearFoot Shoes Use code MASSENOMICS to save 10% on every order! Juggernaut AI Use code MASSENOMICS to save 10%! The Strength Co Get some Go-To Plates! Texas Power Bars Get the Barbell that changed the game!

Thanks for what you do with your podcasts and all the rest. You're doing a great job. Hope everybody keeps tuning in. You get a lot of good info, a lot of insights, understandings of how to get strong, how to stay strong, how to use your strength. You do a great job, dude. You make things better than they are in real life, I think. If you don't follow Massanomics, y'all do it.

Social media, website, everything. Massanomics. What's up, everyone? We're back for episode 480 of the Masanomics podcast, the Lifting Podcast about nothing recorded live from the corners of the Dakotas. My name is Tanner. And my name is Tommy. We've got a hell of an episode this week,

Tommy, we're bringing a guest interview back. It's, well... It's been one week since you looked at me I'm thinking maybe it's been a little longer than a week. Yeah. It's been a while That seems more accurate, yes. It's typically, it used to have been about a week every time,

and now it's been considerably longer than a week. So we're going to have to dust off the old interview skills. But luckily, when we get someone on, it's not an interview. It's just a friendly chat. It's just a warm, friendly hello. So we're going to got a big Bromley coming up on a little bit here in this episode. But first, I want to let everyone know about The strength Co check him out at the strength deck Co

They've got the best made in America Olympic Olympic means two inch. That's your usual Barbell size unless you're some weirdo using a one inch standard barbell if you are I'm like get out of the I still think About the time I was selling those old plates and the guy thought they were one inch plates Which is really funny like you wanted those. Yeah, I don't want a one inch plates, but No, so you can get some plate Olympic plates Olympic iron plates from the strength co They're black e coated smooth easy to grip that the go-to plates of Mastinomics gym use them every day. I train there I used them today I did some dead lifting with them

I squatted with them dead lift might be my favorite lift to use the strength coplates for what's your favorite lift to use the strength? Coplates for I mean it probably would be dead lift like a dead lift more. Otherwise, I don't know So they just like look good like the way they hit something out of squat though the way they're loaded up Yeah, I a very imposed I Impose you don't think there's a I don't think there's a wrong answer is What I'm getting out there so you can get some some for yourself, and then you decide what's your favorite lift to use? Use it for the strength co And this episode is also brought to you by our fine friends over at Texas Power Bars. Texas Power Bars

are proudly made in the USA since 1980 by none other than the legendary Buddy Caps. They produce some of the finest bars like the original Texas Power Bar, the 29mm Texas Power Bar, the Texas Deadlift Bar, the Texas Squat Bar, the Texas Bench Bar, just to name a few. That's a pretty good lineup right there. We have several of the varieties in our home gym. Masanomics, I believe, has every variety of Texas Bar ever made in duplicates, triples, maybe even four in some of them in the gym. They really are that good.

Get one for yourself. You will not regret it. Head on over to texaspowerbars.com. Thank you, Texas Power Bars. As this episode comes out, that means we are about one month out from the Lift Hard, Live Easy Classic 2025. Not gonna give away too many

of the particular details this week. There'll be more to come on that in the weeks to come, but just a reminder. Liftin' and drinkin' is all I know. Man, takes me back. that in the weeks to come, but just a reminder, and takes you back. If that doesn't get you in the mood for the lift hard, they've easy classic. I don't know what the heck does. That's all I needed to hear. It's summertime South Dakota sun lifting, drinking, so you and a couple

hundred of your closest buds doing all that stuff for three, four days. What more could you ask for? I'm getting pretty excited for the festivities. It's all a guy needs and a gal. Yeah. It's all a guy and a gal need. Over the weeks to come, we'll talk more on a Lift Hardly Veezy Classic.

But just a reminder, be excited. The hay, you got a little time left to get hay in the barn, but not much, and whether it's your first rodeo or ain't your first rodeo, we're gonna be excited to welcome everyone to Western Northeast South Dakota again. Still a lot of work that needs to be done between now and then. True.

You know? Yeah, it's that Mastinomics machine, and we're just on the back holding on to it. It's the Mad Max Mastinomics machine. It is approaching full speed here. Yeah, just with a hope and a prayer, as they say. That's all we got. Home Gym Con and other news.

By the time this comes out, I'll be in Home Gym Con in about a week from that, I guess. Yeah, so I think next, or actually, you and got a lot we got to talk about with that still. Yeah. Like I said, there's just so much going on. It just still feels like it's on the back burner for us. But yeah, that'll be I would imagine about five days from now we'll be having a lot of conversations regarding home gym gone.

Yeah. So any listeners that are going to be in home gym Khan, I'll be there. Big mini action Jesus will be Tommy's fill in so we're gonna get him. I got the guy that we look the closest to me It was a tough edition closest in size action Jesus Fit the part as good as anyone so so if you're looking for me just look for the six seven four hundred pound guy with a Beard down to his navel and he'll probably be carrying. No that is not me that is Justin

And that's for tanneries yes, so Come say hi Any massonomic supporting members that come and say hi will get a free home gym nerd Glitter sticker also anyone that's wearing nerd glitter sticker also anyone that's wearing Anything massonomics related at home gym con and you come point it out to me You will get a home gym nerds so you better have thousands of those things on you limit one customer or one sticker per customer So might need thousands of those That's true. So I hope to see a lot of massonomics apparel there. I hope to see a lot of home gym nerd shirts there

We did sell out of most of our Home Gym nerd shirts, but we're going to reorder that one. So if you happen to be missing out on the first run, there might be another chance. Tommy, are you drinking anything over there this week? Yes, I am. And it's not just what I'm drinking, but how I'm drinking it.

Oh yeah. In the drink spot or chill. Of course it is. I only regret is not having more metal stuff around me to stick this to That's what I've always said It's what she said What do you got there some sort of lime or something Kirkland lime? It might even be better I think it's better even out of the drink spot or chill. This makes it that much more delicious. I'm having a Guy Fieri's flavor town huckleberry cobbler. Oh my god taking everyone to flavor town flavor there. Yeah

Really that guy cut loose. Yeah the flavor factory Quick get it back in the drink spot or chill before it gets on chilled There we go. This is a hell of a good product We've been moving a lot of drinks spot or chills one of our most affordable products on our website Don't forget to snag one of these if you couldn't tell it's got really high-power magnets on the back So you can affix it to any metal people are buying two three four five of these things at a time And that's think five's the record so far. That's a that's a smart buy right there. Yeah That is a tasty beverage out of there. Okay. What do we want to get into though this week?

Mmm, we've got a little time here to talk some stuff. Yeah, let's look up the the old to-do list here trying to think of I don't know all my stuff's pretty random. It's not very masonomics relevant, so okay. I don't have more mom Well Mmm Okay, I've got a couple fun games that come up, but these games are gonna take too long They they wouldn't be a good fit for this episode I got this a little teaser and upcoming web so to get a couple real fun games

We're gonna stick to Tommy and see how he performs on though So I got one thing I got one thing right here that we got those on hold Yeah, and I'm just catching eyes of it. You got this too. I got a little sack a little package this week Oh, yeah, and I see yours appears to be more assembled, but mine showed up in this box and From our old buddy Darko Yep, of course. I recognize that address right away when it showed up, but I won't bring it all out here But he did send over his mini racks with all of his

to scale barbells Attachments There's a full throw. There's a drink spotter. There's dip attach there's plates and then of course There's a whole rack in there too. Oh, you got a black one. Yeah, there's oh, yeah yours is red. Oh, yeah. There you go Yeah, yep. I got a black. Oh, yeah, because I have a black rack obviously That's probably minor red dark. Oh, he doesn't skimp on the details. You don't you don't slip anything past idea. What's crazy? so he has these mini racks on his website and If you watch the gym tour with him, he was just getting ready to launch these things

So you can see a few of them in there But what's kind of cool about these things is as far as I understand it They are a hundred percent to scale right like there wasn't any artistic liberties taken. I believe. And it uses actual real hardware, doesn't it? Yeah, there's nuts and little bolts for each. Like the barbell is a real metal shaft here. I mean, I've assembled multiple three by three racks in my day and you assemble it exactly like you do the big one only it's just that way down to scale Here's the bag the bag of bolts there

It's pretty cool. So I'm uh, oh I actually just read Jake just said it in the live chat But I need to set some horse doll mat coasters underneath the mine. I make it really like a little home Yes, you do. I posted a video today of me assembling the whole thing. Oh, you did. I stayed up. Yeah, I stayed up late last night to assemble it, and I did a time lapse. Oh, man. She said I'm calling the Internet for one afternoon. I miss out on everything. Yep.

So I said it takes a little while to put it together. Oh, yeah, that's why I was. That's why I hadn't cracked into this yet, because I did not want to get halfway and quit And those are for sale now on Darko site. What is Darko Darko lifting calm? I believe Yeah, so and then what are they called the mini rack by Darko? I think so and you can select four posts or six post options You can get the hardware in black or stainless steel.

You can choose like 12 different colors for the uprights and cross members. You can pick your plate color, black or silver. You know, there's all these little add-ons that you can get. It's actually, it's quite wild. The tiny little drink spotter, it's got a tiny little Darko can in it.

It's pretty cool. Yeah. So thank you's pretty cool. Yeah So thank you Darko One day I'll be like Tanner and have mine put together somewhere as I was putting it together Like can you go through all the parts? I'm like, how is this even pop like His time is not being compensated I was actually surprised for because I'm like that would take so long to even just sort it all out and get all the tiny little parts right. This just shows how little I know about 3D printing

but I genuinely am actually impressed. That with 3D printing you can do something as detailed as this miniature three by three upright. I'm trying to get this to focus on the camera. It's so little but that it actually has the, I mean, it's like Lego quality. Like the holes are cut that well. Like it's not, it just, it doesn't seem like it was made

by a 3D printer. It's pretty cool. I'll say this too. I obviously played with Legos as a kid. I played with a Rector sets quite a bit and it felt exactly like I was doing that stuff. You just sit there, although you don't need any directions, especially if you own a rack,

you kinda know how a rack goes together, so there's really no step-by-step directions like that that you need, but it felt just like doing that. Like it was exactly the same as that, it takes you back a little bit. So this is like the total evolution of home gym nerd status, I would say. This is like like the total evolution of home gym nerd status. I would say this is like to the 10th degree home gym nerd.

From having the big version to now needing the little version that you also have to assemble. This is the home gym nerdiest of home gym nerd stuff is, and I like it, it's awesome. Thought about putting it in the gym, but it's pretty petite, you know, I thought about putting it in the gym, but It's pretty petite, you know, and like there's a lot of brutes in there I just got sure where it would go that someone grab it and get destroyed. Yeah Yeah, I

Feel like I would walk in the next day and it would be broken somehow Good chance Yeah It's pretty cool. I was excited about that What was this you have did you do your in body scan? Oh, yeah, we can talk. Yeah, I actually kind of forgot about that one Okay, when we went to the Watertown Throwdown Build fast formula HLT formula HQ in prep for this year's lift hardly easy classic

What was that about three weeks ago? No two weeks ago Yep, something like that The Thomas's have an in body machine last year I I'm pretty sure I don't know that the full rules on in body and how it all works and everything We talked about it a little bit last year and compared some of our our numbers and things I still had the app on my phone, and after we were done lifting, I went and typed my stuff in and did the scan.

And again, I don't think we're doing it totally, I think you're supposed to do it dry kind of first thing in the morning in an ideal situation, I think. And both times it's been like after a workout when you're chugging water, pre-workout, whatever. So I'm sure it's not as accurate as it could be, but just as a quick note from last year,

my weight is up nine pounds year over year, which doesn't surprise me. That's a good jig. That was. That's putting on a jig. That's, you know, that's getting after it a little bit. So my weight's up nine pounds. My skeletal muscle mass was up about three and a half pounds

which then means you know my body fat would also be up about what five ish pounds four pounds four and a half five pounds so fat was up a little bit muscle was up a little bit but that's okay we can cut some fat out when we need to no big deal there did say my body fat percentage went from that said 17 to 18.3 so again not nothing that concerns me too much but did find that interesting the other more more detailed part and again I don't know I have no clue how accurate in body actually is but what stood out to me from the first comparison was that according to in body and I can't find the exact thing was that according to InBody,

and I can't find the exact thing here, but according to InBody, like my upper body, my right and left arm had both gotten, where do you actually see, oh, here we go. Ah, I can't, the app has so much stuff in it. But I remember that what surprised me the most was it said that my legs had not changed at all. And I'm'm like I know for a fact my legs are significantly stronger than last year like like significantly stronger. So, I don't know maybe Maybe I haven't put any mass on them. I'm just better at

Expressing that strength seems a little odd but it did say that I had gained some mass on my arms according to the in-body scan again, not sure how true that is, but I did find that to be interesting looking at it. So we'll check in again next year. See how these numbers look. All them cottage cheese games. Dude, it's right there. It's your cottage cheese testimonial.

All the glory to cottage cheese. That's what it's all about What about a little supporting our supporting members do it we toss that in here All right supporting our supporting members is a relatively new segment to the Mastodon mix podcast where we give back To those that support the podcast they support the podcast by going to Mastodon mix comm slash join and Signing up to become a supporting member. When you get there, you'll find there's a whole bunch of different levels that you can sign up for. There's basically a level for everyone. The only level that's not for someone is no level at all. You just got to get on some level, get on the ground level, get on the highest floor

level. It doesn't really matter. Just get on a level with the supporting membership. And what I would say, if you are an existing supporting member and your address has changed, it's changed since you signed, last signed up, or since you've ever sent me an address change, if it's changed since then, make sure to DM us your new address so that we can change it in our system because there's going to be a big crew mailer coming later this year. I mean, not that much later this year, later this summer, uh, where we send something out to every single supporting member and I don't want to get cocky.

I don't want to be overconfident about it, but it might just be the coolest thing that we've ever sent. We've sent some pretty cool stuff before, and this might be the coolest, might get people talking the most. So two warnings there, make sure we have your right address if you're already supporting member. And if you're not a supporting member yet, for the love of God, get signed up. Are you waiting for now is your opportunity to get signed up. The right time is now. If you waited and missed out on this, you would seriously be kicking yourself.

And I would feel bad. I don't want that for anyone. Like I- I couldn't imagine anything worse. I can't bear to have that on my conscience if somebody doesn't get signed up in time. I feel like we failed. Like this has all been for nothing.

If you're a listener and you've been considering getting signed up and you don't get signed up now, you're real shame. Like what? Where did we go wrong? Like I'll be questioning everything we've ever done in the last 10 years. If that's what what this boils down to. So that's not a stock comp slash join. There's other things there like how you get in in our discord.

It's how you listen along to the podcast live. It's how you listen to the pre-show. The pre-show is the show before the show it's live on recorded on cut. And, uh, the only way you listen to that it's where, it's where we bring out all the grease to all the greasiest greasy stuff that we have to dish on comes out in the pre-show cause it never gets recorded. Uh, and you can check that out if you're a supporting member. And then we like to shout out some of them in return.

So this week, big Sam lifted the Galloway stone in Ohio. That was very cool. Yeah. Had a little road rash and his arm to prove it. Big Jen competed in, I believe her first strongman competition. She won the car deadlift event and finished third overall in her class. Nice. All in preparation for the lift Hard Leave Easy Classic Strongman

event. Big Paul and Big Berg had a crew meet up in Spain. Yeah, that was very cool. An unplanned crew meet up in Spain. Paul just saw him wearing the aerodynamic stuff. Paul's always so sarcastic and everything. I assumed when he said unplanned that he meant it was totally planned no Oh, he couldn't even remember what his name was that there was big Berg that that it was an unplanned

He saw him wearing the country runs into people in massonomics gear. We're always going all over the country doing stuff We don't see a single person that knows us outside of planned planned visits I don't see a single person that knows us outside of planned visits. Right, so that's pretty cool. And then Big Scar was this week's guest on Unpaid and Underrated, so go give that a listen. She's preparing for the powerlifting meet

at the Lift Hardly VZ Classic. So we got a lot of strong women competing this year, a lot of strong supporting members. So thank you for everyone that supports and continues to support. Well, I'm still just in shock that that was a random meetup, that they both had that. Yeah, in Spain.

The way they're, like, the way, I just thought for sure that was planned. Wow. Isn't that, and Paul wasn't even wearing anything Masonomics. Let that be a lesson. Always wear something Masonomics, because you never know when and where

you might meet up with someone. Wow. Impressive stuff. Let that be a lesson. Always wear something massonomics because you never know when and where you might meet up with someone. Wow. Impressive stuff. Yeah. Should we do a certified training facility of the week? Yeah, you know, while you were talking, I was just kinda clicking around randomly.

Okay, good. And I think I landed on one that I do wanna look at here, but just one observation. We don't have any gyms in the Southern Hemisphere. Are you aware of that, Tanner? Oh, have you heard about this guys? Have you heard about this? So what? We don't have an Australian one. Come on. I know. I know. Like that's

what that's where the that's where it's going to come from to get us in the Southern Hemisphere. Yeah, that's odd almost. Isn't that's what I thought for sure. We would have Australia because we send a fair number of product to Australia't that's what I thought for sure we would have Australia because we send a fair number of product to Australia like that's maybe someone from South America could get on it but Australia you're gonna carry you got to carry us on this yeah like Australia is where I mean that's where the southern hemisphere transactions are taking place so one note there second note no one

from New Mexico or Maine has taken us up on our offer yet to be the certified training facility featured next week so and if you sign one from New Mexico or Maine has taken us up on our offer yet to be the certified training facility featured next week. And if you sign up from New Mexico or Maine, you automatically get on as a certified, we'll also say this, or Australia. Anyone Southern Hemisphere too. And you do have to provide pictures of your gym, otherwise we can't talk about it.

Right, true. But those are pretty easy steps to do. That's not that complicated. You just go to the Mastodonics website, website get this taken care of and you can be featured next week Otherwise you're leaving it open to all these other people and we do have some certified training facility packages available You just have head over to a massonomics comm slash certified. That's where you can Find more information about getting certified you get your Pin on the map get yourself a certificate, a flag, some

limited editions stickers that are only for certified training facilities and the map looks awesome. We shout one out every week. I think last week we're at Spanky's Wad Barn. Where are we headed this week? Okay, this week, just clicking around. I was looking at the Atlanta area. Hotlanta. Just clicking around I was looking at the Atlanta area hot Lanza Atlanta is what I was thinking in my head and Believe this oh boy Justin Hollis certified and that's a certified training system caught my attention. Do you see why?

It looks awesome. Yeah, yeah, doesn't it? Yeah So yeah, let's pull this out. He's got two photos here. They both look great and On the first one here So this is a basement right an unfinished basement. Let me take a little look. I was adding the Um, what do we got? Oh, we got a gotta be a basement for sure. Look at all that all that Well, yeah, I don't know. I suppose so I'm assuming it is it seems like it'd be a basement for sure. Look at all that. Well, yeah, I don't know. I suppose so I'm assuming it is It seems like it'd be a basement. It seems basement vibes. Okay, a couple things just looking We'll just start before we get to the equipment. Okay, so we same base always got multiple photos here, too

He's got two photos. Yes. So we got the horse stall mats on the floor, obviously Because there's a quality gorilla tape. Yep, black gorilla tape. We got about every Masonassenomics banner. I was gonna say holy crap. That's ever existed. And I don't know if you've noticed, Tanner, but it looks like he's used the PVC frame technique that you have.

Can you see that if you make him really big? Oh. You see what I'm talking about? Great, that is, yep, that's why they look so crisp on the wall, too. Yes. For anyone that doesn't know the trick, you make a frame out of, especially for, it works especially great for flags.

You make a frame out of like half inch PVC with just four elbows and four straight pieces and make it a little bit bigger than the flag itself. And then you use zip ties to drill holes through the elbows in the PVC elbows and then zip time and you get a really taut flags out of that that look really crisp all the time. Yeah, so he has it looks like he has that on all of his banners in the gym. So that makes them look awesome. And then he has

those Burina shop lights that so many people have for his lighting Which also makes it nice and bright down there to to add another level. So that's without even talking about equipment He's already checking all the boxes here once start looking at equipment Tanner if you want to look at your favorite spot the foreground you will notice there's a deadlift Jack Or ground a deadlift Jack covered in a massonomic stickers as well There is a on the wall. I'm seeing it looks like the rogue Arnold deep dishes But it looks like he's done a little customization to those do you see that on the wall there right behind the deadlift jack? Oh Yeah, they're painted which is pretty unique he's got a bunch of bars on the wall I see the

Safety squat bar a curl bar behind the barbell rack on the wall I see the Safety squat bar a curl bars behind the barbell rack on the wall That massonomics yeah, I don't know what that is. I was actually hoping you would know what that is It's something with our logo on it that we don't even know what it is. Yeah Did he ever order a flag some people look you know what it looks like is the Did he ever order a flag some people look you know what it looks like is the That looks like that almost that it's like it's like a singlet almost yeah But it looked I wonder cuz some people have ordered the og banner and asked for different colors over the years Is it possible different side? Well? Yeah, they've also asked for different sizes, too. Is it possible he did that maybe? Yeah, that's possible. I don't know

That we don't know what we're looking at though Yeah, that's good. Yeah, he's got the Titan SSB. He's got the earthquake ban or earthquake the Rhinox Rhino flex bar got some different easy curl bar. Yep, some different Arnold posters. I See some crash pads Bunch different that of plate loaded chest press machine I was thinking it looks like that isn't it yeah I'd say that's a plate loaded adjustable bench chest press of some sort we got a red six-pulse

rack in the middle of the gym some more weights on that going back farther I think there's like a hack squat maybe that's a hack squat leg press combo maybe. You know, look at the second picture that he's got. Yeah, I keep looking at this first one here, what else we got? And then look at, what's the Mastinomics thing on the wall, like to the right of the picture behind the rack, the red Mastinomics, it's like half a OG logo there.

Oh, it's the mirror. It's the mirror reflecting from the OG. Oh, OK. Yeah, from the OG. They're going to be like, what's he got? All these secret Mastodonics things that we don't know about? Yeah, that's the mirror reflecting the banner

on the other side of the room. Yeah, he's got the mono lift hook attachments on his rack there. It's hard to say, would you say a hack squad? It's hard to almost tell what's about it. It's a very long room. Yeah, I think it's a long narrow room. Yeah, I think it's a hack squad. It might be a hack squat leg press combo because it kind of looks like there's, because it has the shoulder pads up top, but it looks like there's a seat in the bottom of it too, which makes you think there's both. From the one photo you can see

he has the rogue, it looks like the rogue quick draw dumbbells, or sorry, the rep, the rep quick draws, which are pretty nice dumbbells. I could, if you're fine with your dumbbells going up to like 60 or 65, whatever it is, I think those are a very compelling option. Then he's got a TV, I'm sure he watches a lot of the Mastodonics podcasts on there

because, or gym tours, because of what else would he watch? Obviously, right? Obviously. Yeah. I think we kind of hit most the highlights there Yeah, what? Really what I'm wondering it's actually brought up a few questions with primary one I'm thinking do you think do you think you could get strong there Tommy? You know, I have no doubts that you could get quite strong in this gym. Oh Yeah, we get strong as hell in there

for sure, I Like it. That's us. That's that's that's why they call it a certified training facility Don't give that to just anyone. Oh, they don't just give those away So they literally do not you have to buy it at massonomics.com. And if you have not become a certified training facility, I'm looking, our stack of flags is actually pretty small right now. We may need to do a reorder, but maybe we won't.

So if you haven't signed up, I just got one other question. Now what the hell are you waiting for? And actually, if you are signed up, don't forget to send photos in. Yeah, good call good cause I'm clicking on a lot of these gyms They don't have their photos which makes it really hard to talk about your damn gym There are more people that continue to send send photos But please make sure you have and don't wait for it to be perfect. It doesn't need no Stand in one corner your gym take a photo Yep

Yep Get me get me some photos of your gym and we'll get them added to that map because every photo we add it just makes It look that much cooler. I think it just makes the browsing of that page even that much cooler Mm-hmm our guest has arrived Tanner. Do you want to read an ad and I'll start giving people the boot here. Let's do it Bust these punks out of here And while he's doing that I'll make sure that everyone checks out a build fast formula.com. It's the supplements that Tommy and I both use and trust. We trust them because we use them.

You use them because we trust them based out of South Dakota, much like a fine podcast. I know they use formulas that just work. It's that simple. We enjoy their Veso Blitz is their nitric oxide support pre-workout, non-caffeinated pre-workout, and then also their full blitz, fully loaded pre-workout supplement.

Try out either of those. Also try out their 8020 protein powder. When you check out, you can use discount code Mastinomics on every single order there. It'll save you 10% every single time. If you order over $100, there's free shipping in the US. If you sign up for subscription on any product,

you save an additional 10%, so you can get 20% off by doing that with discount code Masanomics. Check them out at buildfastformula.com. So we've got our guest here, big Alex Bromley. We are excited to get you on. We got to meet you at the Arnold really briefly this year for just a couple of minutes, we got to say hi, do you get you to do a grip test? And then you were competing there.

So we didn't get to talk too long and we didn't get to ask you our number one question, we're just going to jump right into it. We're not going to beat around the bush. Uh, what would you consider to be the squat of the upper body? Obviously it's bent over a dip rose with an upright snatch variation. That is how you sufficiently hit. Anyways.

So I ask you that because we had an odd amount of discussion about it a week or two ago on the podcast where we had posted this joke of a reel and said, Bench Press, you know, the squat of the upper body and the number of people that came out that had

pretty strong opinions on whether that was true or whether it's something else. And like very opinionated responses on it. So what if you did had to pick an exercise? What would you say is the squat of the upper body and why would you pick that? Whoo, that's pretty hard. Because the funny thing is I don't even think squats are the squats of the lower body. So, um, yeah, I like that already. Um, no, I mean, if we're good, if we're going to talk about one lift that's going to encapsulate

like what we think of that is doing where you have so much range of motion, so many muscles hit and you get just so much economy and bang for the buck. Um, there's going to be a lot of people that say it's, it's a dip and those people are wrong. Um, uh, I would, we agreed with us. We agree. Yeah. Um, um, and I have a hard time going with a pressing exercise, honestly, because there's just so much more musculature in the upper back. Unfortunately, unlike the lower body, you can't hit all of the musculature of your upper body in one movement. Um, w without some technology we haven't stumbled across yet. Um, so I would, I would go and I think I had a video title as such, uh, as far as bent rows being the like squats for your upper body. Okay. You did. Okay. Yeah. Because you

have that. That's why I appreciate the joke. I was like, Oh, he's seen some of my video. We definitely have, but I didn't see that one. Yeah. Yeah. I think I've recycled that title like four or five times. Um, but yeah, if, if you look at a bench press, you're going to get people, uh, complaining about the, the limit and functionality, um, and that you're so supported and you're laying down. I mean, it's the odd duck and powerlifting and most strength sports, because you're supported. Um, yes, it's good at building a lot of mass in the pressing muscles. Um, but you know, there's some limitations that way.

I love overhead pressing. I love it. It's my bread and butter. It's a great exercise. Um, if you want strength, it transfers over in those muscles. Like that's great. But as far as a percentage of your upper body, not really, there's just so much meat in your upper body.

And if there's one part of it to look at, it says that's a percentage of your upper body, not really, there's just so much meat in your upper body. And if there's one part of it to look at this as that's where most of your power size yoke and this comes from, it's going to be your traps, lats all the way down through your rectors. So yeah, I think that's a, that's an easy one. All right, good. Finally, we settled. I know that was it. I know that was a joke question, but I took it way too seriously. No, that's actually what we're that's actually exactly what we wanted that that joke question is kind of derived from something that we asked many people for for several times. And I'll ask you this, too. I think your answer could be interesting. Also, if someone was to walk into the gym, you've never seen this lifter train before.

And it's your job to determine how generally strong they are. And in order to determine how generally strong they are, all you get to do is watch them perform one single lift. What lift do you choose to watch them do to make your best, to arrive at what you think is gonna be the best conclusion based on only one lift. And so I'm trying to predict like how they're gonna do

in like generally everything. Yeah, like we could even say, you know, we usually don't say, oh, they're a power lifter, they're a strong man competitor, but you could even make that assumption, say like they compete in strong man even, and you just wanna watch them, you just want to watch them. You only get to watch them do one lift to be able to determine how much success they

could have, whether they're novice experience, whatever you don't even know yet. So sure. The low hanging fruit would be just to have them do a deadlift because I mean, you can tell a lot about somebody's like, uh, hinging is so important to strong man. You get to see, uh, exactly, you know, where they're strong, where they're weak based on how much give they have in their back and how strong their lockout is. You can make a lot of deductions about which points are going to carry over more to events

or less. But if I'm really trying to extrapolate a lot of information from just that one lift, I might have to go with something a little, a little fancier. Um, I would probably have to have them do something that had more range. So it'd be like a, a steep deficit or it'd be something like a, um, God, I hate, I hate this. I hate to say this. I'd probably go with something like a, like a Zercher, um, like, like a, like a deficit

deadlift into a Zercher, um, like, like a, like a deficit, deadlift into a Zercher or something. And you'll just get a lot of information about where they are along the chain. Yeah, that is good. Have we had, have we ever had Zercher as a suggestion before on the standard? Maybe Zercher is a pretty good answer. Yeah. So I don't know if we have, anyway. Right. Yeah. I like that. Yeah. I wouldn't, I wouldn't go with like, I don't know. I can barely tie my shoes, but you got guys that can like start with their elbows in from the ground and had, I would go with like the, um, like the straight, I don't,

I don't know the technical it's just a searcher lift, I guess it did lift setting in on the legs re-gripping then standing up. Cause you kind of get the deadlift strength paired with the, the squat strength and it's a little unique when it's in the front slot like keg loads and so on. So yeah final answer Searchers. Yeah, I like that the thing that always is That I always wonder about just you know, if you just say deadlift because that's a popular Response but the concern there is some people I mean it's true for any lift But some people are so built to deadlift, you know, like what is their pressing ability? What is their squatting ability even at that point or whatever? I don't know

But you can analyze that a hundred different ways to but I like the searcher answer Yeah, and I do analyze it a hundred different ways Which is why I have very strong opinions about like the minutiae of technique where? People are getting mad because I spend too much time picking apart Lifting mechanics, but even if you have one of those lanky a holes, like go to limit, I mean, reasonably you can say like, that's a lot of weight on the bar, but you know, because of physics, I know that if you know, your hamstrings really have to work by themselves or their glute glutes really have to work by themselves, you can deduce a lot from that.

Right. But yeah, yeah, We do have several other training questions if you can consider what we're asking you so far, training questions. But you've kind of alluded to a couple of things that we really want to talk to you about is your content, your YouTube, everything you put out there. We've got several questions around that. We're particularly interested in that ourselves

because we've been posting to YouTube quite a bit lately and trying to grow that over the last couple years and You do a really good job running a successful YouTube channel. You know you got a lot of video you have very consistent content a lot of content and have had a lot of good success with a lot of your videos that you've made and We got a lot of questions about it also, but just generally We got a lot of questions about it also, but just generally, um, how long have you been attacking that the way that you are now? Like maybe, maybe when you first started your channel, uh, you weren't as intentional as you are now.

I'm not sure if that's true or not, but how, how long have you been like doing it with this kind of intent that you do now? Obviously. Yeah, actually it's been pretty much from the start and I was lucky the way that it went off. Um, I want to say it was 2017 or 18 was my first one. And I owned a gym, a strongman gym in California at the time. And I had the luxury of having all this equipment to demo on. I would kick people out like, Hey, I got a film.

Like, I don't need you to see my outtakes get out more. I'd come in late or whatever. And I'd have the whiteboard. I'd, you know, it looked like a greasy frying pan. Like I'd be writing on the dirty whiteboard. Um, but no, when I started it, it was kind of a mission to do it consistently. I had like dicked around with blogs and stuff in the past. It was ever consistent, but I liked the video format.

And then I got a surprisingly good response in the beginning, just from simple explainers. And then it's just been like, I mean, I've always done multiple videos a week, if I'm able to, um, and I, I mean, I'm consistent now, but even now I'm like, I don't even know that this is the most I've been like, um, nose to the grindstone COVID. I mean, I'm one of those, uh, guys that there was like, Oh yeah. COVID was great.

Freeways were empty and I got so much stuff done. Um, but, but really it was like, I was in a unique position to capitalize on that. And that's when it's like, that's when I was like, there's something wrong with my brain, because if I have an open office, I can't get anything done. But if I was stuck in my room for eight hours, cause my wife was doing, um, you know, her, uh, work remote from the living room and, you know, taking calls and I had to be in our bedroom and our one bedroom apartment, like typing and writing, whatever, like I and I had to be in our bedroom and our one bedroom apartment, like typing and writing, whatever. Like I got three books turned out at that time.

Um, and I haven't been able to write one since. So, um, and, and that's just been, it's been just the consistency and trying to evolve things and figure out different ways to, to not suck online. Well, you're doing a pretty good job. Not sucking. I would say it. I appreciate that. It is good, but I'm very, but I'm sure. But I'm curious about because you do talk about it like the way your mind works and some of that stuff. And I would say from watching your mind does work differently than what the typical person

does. And like the level of detail you get into on some of that. So are you what's the process? Are you writing that stuff? of that. So are you, what's the process? Are you writing that stuff? Is that all off the cuff? Or how much time do you have into a video? Because of the level of detail, I'm just wondering what your process is. Because it seems like you'd have a lot of time into it,

but you're pumping out so many that you've gotta have a formula down that works pretty well for you to be able to keep at it, keep, keep at it. One would think, okay. One would think, no, I, and it's, uh, my biggest problem. And especially after so many years of being on my own, um, you know, there's a lot of value in it, I think having. Partners and even a boss, dare I say for this exact reason, cause I've been on my

own, um, I keep running into the same problem of not being able to stay on one thing I like to experiment. I like to try the things I have ideas pop in and out, whatever. So, um, there was a time where I'm like, I'm just doing video essays and those I would research and then I would script and then I would like, and a lot of it's stuff I have in my head. Some of it's stuff I learned for the first time as I'm researching. And I mean, some really, some really hearty ones would take like 10 days to put out, start'm researching. And I mean, some really, some really hearty ones would take like 10 days to put out, start to finish. Like I just did one on Soviet programming.

It's kind of like that. Yeah. And, uh, that one, I got done pretty fast. Actually, I think I'm getting better at leveraging stuff to help with that. But then like, if I'm doing a whiteboard video, I can get that out in a couple of hours. Um, you know, provided I have the house to myself or talking head stuff where I just have, like, I don't have one thing. So the process is always a bit different. I am probably, I would guess better when I'm scripted just because. And that's why there's detail. I can't not put things in that I know about this thing.

Like I just can't, I mean, it's like that, a big bang theory episode where, you know, Leonard has to wear the wool coat to see what it feels like to be Sheldon, um, you know, from not returning the DVD to blockbuster or whatever, like I get itchy. I'm like scratching, but like, no, like I have to say this. So it's all super wordy and I repeat the same thing 10 times and I plug in, do a little of the sides that aren't there. So there's a lot of info to anybody who's interested, but I definitely get like broader appeal when I can be like, no, no, like let's stay on track guy. Like we got one thing to talk about.

Is there a certain style of those videos that you prefer to make that like you have more fun or just it's a better time to do? Yeah, no, I, I love all of them. They're all like my children and kind of a mess away because they all let me do something different, you know? Um, and again, like I'd probably be exponentially more successful if I did stay on one thing, um, and made that, had that kind of predictability and that target that audience. But, um, I liked, I like lecturing, man, like I'm in the process, like I'm trying to slowly eke out a degree in the next 10 years. I don't know. So when I retire, I can teach like, I like just being in front of class, don't know. So when I retire, I can teach.

Like I like just being in front of class, like, Oh, Hey, I got an hour to talk. I can do that. And I read, nobody loves lecturing more than when they like actually have experience and know something, you know, it doesn't matter what it is, how boring it is. So I really do like that stuff. I like venting my shower thoughts as to the chagrin

of some of my viewers. So when something crawls up my butt and I want to like yell about it for a 20 minutes, like I'll do that. And then I'd like being creative. Like recently I've been doing some, trying to do some drawing stuff like, um, um, having drawn since I was like a teenager. So I've been trying that different format. So my videos, some of them people really liked some of them people really hated.

Um, but the video essays are fun because I can be kind of creative and I can go deeper on a subject. That's where I learned a lot of stuff, too. So, yeah, it's really a mixed bag. Yeah. And so with, you know, with your your content, I mean, obviously being kind of along around the strength world, but covering a diverse variety of topics, you know, you can cover a lot of ground. Do you keep sort of like a log of here's rough ideas or is it like,

no, this idea kind of hit me this week. Let's roll with this. Yeah, I am always forever trying to have that organization, you know, it's that search for that system that I'll never get. Um, and it's honestly part of my process where every couple of weeks, probably I ended up trying to like revisit old stuff and get something, um, from all my notes and thoughts compiled, you know, try to marry what I know worked well before with this other idea that I have and see if I can make it work.

Um, I would say probably half the time it's I'll have 10 videos on deck and I'll ditch it to do something else. And then when I don't have any ideas, I'll go to something that I, that I, you know, pulled out before. So it really is a mixed bag, but I mean, I have multiple whiteboards behind me. I can't think unless something's in front of my face. So, um, I have to erase it for stuff like this. So people don't think I'm schizophrenic.

Um, and then, uh, that's it. I'm just constantly writing things down and then when it's time to make something, it's just kind of on the fly, you know, assuming current events haven't like captured my attention. And then when it comes to, to playing the game of YouTube, like how much, how much thought process time effort are you putting into the title, the thumbnail, that that concept? So a lot overall, um, but probably not, not as much as people think, or at least not in the way that people think. Like, like my mission is to grow.

Like I adamant that I'm going to cover things I want to cover. Like if I found out tomorrow that I could be like rich as shit, but all I have to do is pivot to like athlete and ex videos where everything's killing your games. You know, um, I probably wouldn't do that because I wouldn't enjoy it. So it has to meet some requirement where I think I'm of service and doing something that is satisfying or at the very least entertaining. Um, but beyond that, yeah, I'm trying to figure out how I could

service a wider audience. Um, it gets a little tricky doing that with the comments, cause you're, you're close with people either in the comments or in the discord or whatever, you know, social media makes it easy to do that. And you get a lot of feedback, but really the best way I know that I'm servicing people is okay. Did a lot of people watch it? Did a lot of people like it? Did it meet my standards? So yeah, I live in there. Um, and honestly, the algorithm really, it mostly, um, is at least as far as I'm concerned, it's different if you're Mr. Beast and you're actually able

to get 75% of the audience to watch your whole video, but, um, that's rare. I mean, I've experimented the long form video. I just did, um, the bodybuilding video that was an hour and 45 minutes. It took me like a month to make, um, whiteboard videos. It took me 45 minutes. They all clock about the same of you retention by percentage, which is bizarre. Um, it really comes down to the topic and the title and thumbnail.

So if the topic's interesting and if I can frame it in an interesting way, um, and really the thumbnail, it's stupid stuff like color and contrast or recognizing who's on. So yeah, I spend an exorbitant amount of time on that. Uh, and I've had big turnarounds. I've had videos that were sucking where all of a sudden it's like, Oh my God, it took off and it's like, I think the information's good, but people don't know, uh, where it doesn't really come in.

It's, um, a lot of people mistakenly think that, um, when I'm like being an argumentative prick, uh, about, you know, the 10th nipper video I made or something about exercise science or whatever, they're like, he's just doing it for clicks. He's playing the algorithm. It's like, no, I'm really like argumentative and kind of petty. And, uh, and those videos will get like 20,000 views. It's like my video essays that have gotten a few million. So, um, it's definitely not for the sake of my family or my income. I could tell you that that's satisfying a different urge.

Yeah. So do you, uh, I mean, would you say your controversial at times, you know, like you said, argumentative, would you use you're controversial at times? You know, like you said, argumentative, would you use like word, is the content ever controversial or like what, would you use that word or not? I would, I mean, anytime people have strong opinions one way or another and you firmly land yourself on one side of the fence,

I mean, that counts as controversy. I mean, I think the question is, am I intentionally doing something to Russell Jimmy's? Even then, like I think it would, I think if you have a plot, if you have a megaphone and you say you never have it go through your head, like as you're putting something out there, like anticipating the blowback and you have your response is ready. It's like getting ready for a, I'm not going to say a fight because I can't relate to that. I don't know.

It's like, exactly. It's like, yeah, it's like getting ready for a game of ping pong or something. I don't know. Um, but, but no, you, you get kind of, um, it, it scratches an itch. Um, I enjoy writing paragraphs and unfortunately again, do so in the comments because it's like, it's like practice for me and I indulge in it way too much, but yeah, it controversies having definitely part of it, but I don't, um, I don't think that that's really a dominant force in like why I have

opinions I have or what I choose to settle on. Yeah, that makes sense. What about the, uh, something I like from watching more of your videos, uh, is the animation that you do, you know, the, the drawing, uh, how long does that take? You know, how much the problem, like if you're putting out a video, how much of the time does that part of it take you?

Yeah, so it takes a while, but it's easier in a sense. I just started doing that, I don't know, a month or a couple months ago. Yeah. And I went, I was like, Oh, people like this. And I'm like, I'm having fun. And I spent like three weeks like trying to figure out like an animator software. And I put together this monstrosity that was like

20 years of pent up creative energy that just had nowhere to go. And, um, and it was a big wet flop, but I had fun. So I don't care. Um, anyways, uh, if I'm doing a regular video, even if it's something that's all B roll and I'm pulling most of it off of my old training footage, stuff on YouTube, Google images, whatever it is, um, even though that's technically easier, it's like busy work and it can take a long time. And then because it is kind of low effort, I'll make it high effort by trying to find the perfect clip or like, no, there's this thing I saw 15 years ago.

I need to find it because that's appropriate to this right now. So the drawing, it's like, I get an idea for something I think is funny and then, or whatever. And then I can draw it. I mean, I can illustrate like lifting diagrams pretty well, pretty fast, I think that isn't that, it's not that intensive.

And then as I go about it, I get other ideas and that kind of spawns things off and it kind of leads it. And I actually think again, I'm like really visual. I need things in front of me. I get a lot of the ideas for like, um, you know, what a joke is going to be or what analogy I'm going to use, like visual representations, I think help a lot anyways, to get people to understand more complex ideas. So if I can make it kind of entertaining and funny, it's like, I can do that. So I get in the habit. Like if I need it noise free, cause you know, my wife and kid are homeless a day.

I go to Barnes and Noble. I take my tablet, I'll get an Americano and I'll be there for like seven hours straight and I won't look up from the tablet. And as far as I'm concerned, I had fun. Cause I haven't been able to do something like that, that intensively, um, since I was a kid, um, since I was a kid. Um, but it services this really well. So I want to say, I don't know, I did one, like, I don't know, six barbell nerfs that are actually overpowered or something like that.

Um, and that one, I mean, it's, it wasn't my best drawings ever, but, uh, it served the purpose, uh, that didn't take more than a couple of days where, again, like this, uh, last one I did, I mean, I probably spent four days just like compiling footage and quotes and B roll and messing with graph. And anyway, so yeah, it's, it's hard, but in a different way. Well, that's cool. Um, here's switching gears. If you could only pick one of these general, very general two training styles,

and you had to use that general style for the rest of your life, that's the only way you could train, would you choose Jeff Nippard style science-based training, or would you choose Eric Bugues horse cocking training, and you could only do one for the rest of your life. Oh man. Yeah. Um, yeah, I, I do, I do, uh, Jeff nip birds just cause I know how injury prone I am and I just call it

something else. I just say there was no evidence involved in this. This is just, this is bodybuilding. It's been like this for 50 years. Do you enjoy Jeff's content? I actually, I mean, considering I've made probably, I'm not even like technically like in that hypertrophy space specifically, so I've probably made a disproportionate amount of comments responding to stuff he's put out. But I think, I actually do, like I think he's smart. I don't think he's put out. But, um, but I, I think I actually do.

Like, I think he's smart. I think, I don't think he's given particularly bad advice. I think, um, my bugaboo has always been that, um, it's just leaning on evidence because it's good for marketing because putting science in the title, it's the same reason you put science on supplements and books or whatever else you're trying to sell it's extraordinarily good for getting engagement because people have faith that this is the thing that's going to do exactly what you say it's going to do, but it creates the precedent of. Um, it creates the precedent of having people try to pull out of research

things that you just can't pull out of research, uh, that everybody in the field knows except the people that are on YouTube. Um, and then, and the consumers don't seem to really know either. Anyway, so as far as are you going to get gains like doing it as a shirt? I mean, if you replace your bench pressing for like the weird turning cable thing, like probably not, but any program that has a variety of exercises can tolerate a little bit of bullshit anyways. Um, so, and that's one of the reasons you do multiple exercises and so much volume and so on is, uh, it masks, it creates noise, you know?

Um, so something may have been really effective or maybe kind of stupid, but you covered a lot of your bases. Um, and it's like, it's not, the fundamentals are good. I mean, he tells people to train hard, you know, you're doing a decent amount of work and you're actually going hard. It's really hard to mess that up. It just really is.

There's too many right answers. We were hoping for more controversial take than that, but I guess we'll make that work. Team WIC, team WIC. There you go. You mentioned,'re a, you got a maybe a one year old in the household. You mentioned it there earlier. We're both, we're both fathers to a whole bunch of little kids ourselves. Right. This episode will come out on Father's Day. Do you have any advice for a lifter that's gonna be a new father,

like someone that's maybe hasn't had a baby in the home and they got one on the way as a father to be able to, as related to training? Sure. Everybody's situation is gonna be different depending on how much you have to be involved, whether or not you work or if um, if you're, you're there for that period of time where you're just getting no sleep and we have neighbors that their daughter

is a couple of months older than my son. And like, they still can't get her to sleep and they're still, um, like they still have to give her a bottle when she goes down and they have to sleep with her and it's, and it's hard. And she's like the sweetest little thing. And it's just, it's difficult because every child is so different and you're just holding on by a thread, trying to get to the next moment. And, um, we were fortunate with our son for a couple of different reasons. Some of it might be temperament.

Some of them might be some strategies we tried to, I don't know, but all I can tell you is that, um, have no expectations for what your schedule is going to be. Uh, you might get more sleep, um, that you thought you would get. You might actually realize you never knew what sleep deprivation actually felt like. It's and, um, and then there's going to be a mix of days. You'll have, you know, better days and worst days or whatever. So, um, I think that all lies in like the assumptions people have about lifting anyways, as long as you don't believe that you need a certain amount of sleep to

grow, you do not, this cuts back to people overusing optimal in their titles because people think, Oh, if it's not that, it's like, well, what's the point? It's like, I've known many in EMT, you know, uh, first responders, um, nurses, so on people that were crazy shifts. I had a guy, he was a 650 pound bencher. Uh, it was a member of my gym and he would come off of, uh, an overtime shift where he'd been up for like 36 hours. And he's like, I'm just going to get one in before I, you know, go home and go to

sleep and it's so one, you don't need as much rest as you think you do to train. Um, two, it's probably okay for the sake and health of your family. If you bias towards rest, instead of just chasing another PR, if you are, you know, there's some scary stories about moms that you don't realize until you become a parent where when the sleep deprivation hits, you know, you start hallucinating and stuff. It could get pretty wicked. So, yeah, if your mental health is, uh, is, uh, hanging in the balance, comebacks are super fast.

Do not like break down because you had to take time off, like do what you need to do. But if it's like, Oh, I'm just a bit tired. Then there's also a case to be made where this is self maintenance, like go get a workout. Uh, and, and again, as far as optimal goes, like any. Just bullshit amount of work you get with one lift for a couple of sets is a billion times better than doing nothing at all. And you just can't get into like, Oh, if I can't get a full workout, what's the point saying?

No, no, no, no, no. The point is it in six months, if you do nothing, you'll just turn into this like wet frump of goo, where if you do like one set twice a week, you will maintain a surprising amount of muscle mass and, and actually maintain a surprising amount of a body composition. So yeah, just completely throw your expectations out the window, get the bare minimum in when you can. There will be blue skies ahead. Uh, as some Tommy, you'd probably maybe have your own opinion, but some of this has been through it a few times before. I'd say that's great advice.

You know, that's. Yeah. Oh, I would even add in the, I mean, Tanner, I'm sure you can attest to this too, but like even when you do one, like for me, the first one was like, okay, yep, I got this down. And then we had a second kid and it was like, oh yeah, everything I thought doesn't apply to number two here.

Like, yeah. So even when you think, you know, you don't know. True. Yeah. How many kids you guys have? I got two. And I have four. So.

Four? Yeah. Oh my god. It's like, yeah. I haven't earned this beer. But never stopped lifting. But sometimes it takes more of a back seat. Sometimes it comes to part of the front seat.

But I agree. you keep doing what you can within reason and don't freak out if it's gonna be a little bit different. But keep doing what you can. And then it's also very true, like when you get to a point in your life when you have more time, again, and you're already staying halfway on the horse, it's just that much easier to get all the way. It was not that long ago on this podcast is about six months ago. I'm like, I tell you what Tanner, it's like,

everyone's sleeping good. Life is pretty normal. I feel like I got superpowers all of a sudden, like training has never gone back. It makes you really appreciate the good days is what it does. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You took the, you took the weighted vest off. I can handle it. Yeah. I would, I would just tell anybody just, just think of it this way. Just keep one toe in the water. That's it. Yeah. Because on a day, on a day where you're able to, you can jump in. But if you, if you abandon it too quickly, it's, it is harder

psychologically I think to get started, just keep a toe in the water and you'll be a okay. You'll be super fine. Yeah. That's good advice. Um, who is the strongest man ever in history and why is it Louis Sear? I was waiting. I do. There was something that, um, because obviously it's the, uh, the French heritage, um, and the, and the height, I mean at five, eight, unstoppable. Tommy, you maybe haven't seen it, but you really should go watch this, that,

what is the, do you know what the title of that video is? I think it's a fairly recent one that you've got. I changed it a few times because I really wanted people to see that and nobody cared. I loved it and I'll tell you why that one was a particular note to me because we have this interview with Kaz that's like 10 years, it's like eight years old from the Arnold maybe Arnold 2018 or something like that.

We interviewed Kaz and one of the questions we asked him was who's, it's basically I think like who's on your Mount Rushmore of Strongman all the time or who's the great, I can't remember who's the greatest or that was the general thought that we were discussing. And he, you know, talked about Brian Shaw, I talked about Z, I've talked about himself quite a bit of obviously to and whatever he said. Yeah. about, he also went on to talk about giants that, uh, you know, from the book, from the book of Enoch that were 40 foot tall, 200 foot tall, 60 foot tall, a hundred foot tall men. I saw that I actually saw that. So I, and I'm happy to talk to you guys now because I can't

remember, I can't remember if I actually use that or commented on it for another video. But, um, yeah, I mean, that just fits in exactly with everything I thought about Kaz because he's like, I'd go backwards in time. And it's like, of course you would because talent has gotten better. And people are taller. They can move faster. Yeah. Um, you know, and, uh, you know, you go back to guys that were like,

what vaudeville performers in the 1800s, it's like, of course you would, you'd have a wall. Well, that's the same guy that talks about the gap in points. Like, yes, you had no talent back then. That's why you talk about the gap in points. Numbers are numbers. The gap in points depends on who was there. So that's what you wanna know.

Yeah. And that was a, I don't know what that that video Performed fairly well for us and it caught this group of people I don't know how this was going around in this circle exactly. We didn't know this was a thing either at the time We were so naive It caught this group of people that are obsessed about Paul Anderson that Paul Anderson was never mentioned even in the video and there's probably 100 Paul Anderson comments

on this video, whereas that are like, oh, what about Paul Anderson? You forgot Paul Anderson. Paul Anderson is the greatest of all time. I don't know if you mentioned Paul Anderson in the Louis Sear video, but like, do you have a Paul Anderson background at all? So, well, I mean loosely because he gets mentioned enough. And uh, well, I mean, loosely because he gets mentioned enough.

And it's like, I mean, when I was, when I was younger, the types of things I was reading, I was so desperate to find anything strength and it's like, you know, around 2000, it was like, there's bodybuilding stuff and that was it. I mean, the first powerlifting USA I came across, I'm like, this is a thing. And I like almost wet myself. But when I found iron mind, that was like next level. I'm like, Oh my God. Um, and, uh, they had a lot of stuff and I'd since gone down, you know, the,

the books and the, there's the little niche forums and like the communities. Right. And if there's anything true about lifting, it's like, it doesn't matter what population it is, what the topic is. You'll find a cult dedicated to it somewhere. And the old timey stuff, it's just really attractive to people. Um, whether it's they're nostalgic for it. If you frame anything in a grainy black and white photo, if something happened a long time ago, people will believe that, you know, he picked up a 9,000 pound, uh, bison and hurled it over the

fence. Like they just do. So, you know, you talked about being controversial, um, earlier and it's like, okay, that's where I'll call myself controversial because one thing I hate is idolatry, um, especially, I mean, it's, it's there and then you're like, well, is there something to this? When you get to the point where it's idolatry and it's like completely baseless, that's where I just go and hinge. And that's one of the reasons I've kind of biased towards talking a lot of shit about Kaz cause he's everybody's hero. Everybody loves him. And I

think most people don't know that he's a fucking lunatic. Um, and he's insufferable to talk to. So, so what I consider like Jamie Lewis, like plague of strength, I don't know if you guys ever end up there, don't go on that site with our kids around because he loves putting like, you know, certain X rated gifts in the middle of his articles and stuff. But the guy, the guy's a lunatic, but he's kind of the same way he loves just, Oh, this is your sacred cow. Let me butcher it.

I've seen him and he's kind of a strength historian, but I've seen him go. And on Paul Anderson, um, I want to say primarily cause he was so peace, but also when you look at, um, the era, I mean, he competed, competitions were big and you have these huge claims of like really ridiculous feats, except none of it just happened to happen, just happened to occur in any verifiable competition. So, uh, you know, it's like, okay, that's cool. You see him squatting with barrels in the dirt in the pit that he dug or whatever. And it's like, it's, there's some things that look good. Like, you know, we still don't he dug or whatever. And it's like, it's, there's some things that look good.

Like, you know, we still don't know how to gauge a one-arm bent press. It's still like a weird thing to equate, but it's like, when you look at this stuff, we know, we know what he did in Olympic lifting, we can equate that. So it's, I don't know, to me, it's more likely that things that weren't tracked were embellished people do that today. Why wouldn't people have done that? You know, 70, 80 years ago? That to me, it's Hawkins Razor.

That to me is just much more likely than he was everything that everybody thinks he was. Yeah, one other part of the video, just because I liked it so much was all obviously how you call out his stature, his, you know, he's five eight and he's just kind of, I mean, he was probably pretty strong. You know, like I don't doubt that he wasn't a strong person especially relatively speaking, but then it's the stone

It's the one that Derek Poundstone was picked up and you look at Derek Poundstone an absolute freak of nature in his prime you know just physique and strength wise at that point in time and a motor on them and everything. And you're like, this guy's barely getting this picked up to a platform. And the thought was that Louis Sears shouldered that rock or the comparable rock, whatever the, you know, it's not the rock, I guess, but it's not, it's not one thing that gets you to the point where you're like, this was complete bullshit.

It's when there's like nine things and that story has like nine things wrong with it. It doesn't have anything going for it other than people say this is what happened and you must be a hater. That's literally the only thing they have going for it. Um, and if you're involved in stone lifting, if you're part of that community, we're actually lifting stones. You think about the things that other people don't. The first thing is like, well, what was it shaped like lifting a stone is not

lifting a stone. I mean, Martins did that thing. And that was another, another thing I hopped on, started, you know, picking apart. Um, because that's where he was doing square stuff, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. But it's like they had the long tall ones and they pick it up with a towel. And I thought it was kind of cool, but it's like, if you look at the shape, you look at the way they lift it and it's like, well, it's a completely different thing. You can't, Oh, well, he lifted a stone. That's good enough for us. That's what somebody who has never lifted a stone says the implement.

It's like a specialty bar. You know what I mean? Like if you have the transformer bar and you got 400 pounds, but you know, the plates are like eight inches that way you're like, holy shit. But if anybody just reported, well, that was just a 400 pound squat. It's like, okay, you don't know what you're talking about. So I could foresee some implement he lifted that might've weighed that much, but then you still have to trust that people actually were like, Hey, I

know what we should do. We should haul this across town and weigh it. And then just word of mouth, we'll pass it down and it'll be completely preserved accurately. Nothing will add on to that. But yeah, it's his height. It's the length. It's a lack of the talent pool back then, the lack of the training. So you have to engage with magical thinking. Like magical thinking makes up for it. And I hate it. I hate it so much. It's all over lifting. I can't stand it. You competed at the Arnold in the Arnold strong man. We had a couple competition questions.

Do you have a plan to compete next at any point or no plan as of now? So I didn't. Yeah, I came back. I don't know if I came back too quick. I tried to do too much too soon. I don't know that I competed at the Arnold. I was present. But last year went pretty good.

You know, we got comfortable with Theo and, uh, I started training again. And I went to regionals here and I won and that got me the Arnold invite. And then I saw the world's events come out and I'm like, Oh, I haven't done that in a while to see that. So I'm prepping for worlds. Uh, I got kind of chewed up. I got injured, um, worse than I thought it worlds. And, uh, then I limped to the Arnold.

Um, didn't do much better. Um, I mean, it wasn't, it wasn't terrible, but it's, you know, you, you have this prep and you think you're going to do X, Y, or Z. And then it's like, Oh, I'm a little bit older and I haven't been going hard for a couple of years and, uh, you're not just going to snap back like a rubber band. So now I'm like, nah, I'm going to take it easy. I'm going to heal up my shoulder. I don't know, see if I need a surgery or two.

See if I can get some duct tape or super glue to put myself back together. Um, but then I saw that nationals for strongman corp is in Vegas. Um, and there it's like, I mean, we're moving to Arizona pretty shortly. Um, so we're going to be close to that. Uh, my wife and I, uh, our family's in California. So my wife and I haven't had a proper trip in, in quite a while. So it's like, okay, well, maybe we'll drop the kid off with my mom, spend a weekend in Vegas.

Maybe I'll play strong man for a couple of days. And there's like a rule, like when they put it in a good venue, cause they never do, they never do like you have to go. It's like, it'll be at a warehouse in Wyoming, um, because they found cheap space and then you're like, Oh, it's in Vegas. It's like, it'll be at a warehouse in Wyoming because they found cheap space. So then you're like, oh, it's in Vegas. It's like, okay. Yeah.

The stars have aligned. Yeah, right, right. Someone from our discord had wanted to ask, would you ever consider doing a powerlifting meet? Would that ever be on your radar? Would you have no interest in ever doing that? I mean, I would. I did. Well, I mean, guys, technically,

I did one powerlifting meet. I mean, I'm a powerlifter. Okay, yeah. That makes me a powerlifter. No, I did one, like, I don't, God, that thing was like 10 years ago by now. Okay. I don't really have a desire to like compete, but I would do one as a bucket list thing.

I mean, if that's all I'm doing, I just, I would rather switch to like, honestly, I'll be doing like, uh, Atlas power shrug stuff that I make fun of before I think I go straight powerlifting. If I had to go one way or the other, I just find powerlifting too dry, too monotonous, too boring. Um, and, uh, I like doing things that make me feel bad that I'm really terrible at, which usually involves some type of kinesthetic awareness and flexibility.

So, you know. Okay. So Tommy, what do you think about overrated, underrated? I think we should. I think we should, yes. Okay, we've got this game, time on our tradition. We play with every single guest we have on. Overrated, underrated.

We'll give you a list of handpicked topics that are for you. It's just your job to decide if each one's overrated, underrated. We'll give you a list of handpicked topics that are for you. It's just your job to decide if each one's overrated or underrated. You shouldn't have a problem with this, but you're not able to ride the line. You have to definitively come down with an opinion on one side or the other. So I think you can handle it. Okay. First first one overrated or underrated iron bibi. Ooh. Ooh. Um, I'm going to say underrated. I'm going to say underrated. God, it depends who you're talking to. Do I give an explanation? Yes. Yes. No, that's it. That's, I forgot that in the rules. You do have your druthers to elaborate as much or as little on each one as you'd like so so this is where I get it

Yeah, this is where you you add in your own special sauce for the answer my if sensor butts. Yeah Yeah, I would I would be inclined to say underrated because I mean his upper body strength It's I mean it's on par with like just as far I mean obviously it's a different lift but it's on par with like, uh, just as far, I mean, obviously it's a different lift, but it's on par with like what Julius Maddox is doing. It's just, it's completely unchallenged. You just have the biggest MF or moving the most amount of weight with his upper body and the most like just raw, powerful way possible. Um, and I think a lot of, I, especially in strongman that's it's like, there's no overhead specialist in strongman. It doesn't exist. It's one event out of five or more. Right.

And, uh, you know, but where you can be a deadlift specialist and do extremely well, just because it carries over to everything else anyway. So the type of power it takes to do that. Um, I haven't followed it long enough. I don't even know where the rest of his lifts are at, but, um, I mean, it hints it so much potential, you know, I, at this point, I don't know that he's ever going to tap into any of it, but, um, yeah, no, that is just insanely strong, just physical power. Yeah.

Is there anything like you watch his overhead press or his log press or axle, whatever it is. And it does seem like just such a raw, strict press. Is there a thought that like, uh, as a coach or would anyone watch that and be like, man, if I could just, if I could teach that guy how to really, uh, take advantage of a push press, what could it, what could it be? Or do you feel like, no, you're not going to get anything like that is what works for him and nothing else would take that higher. Like what's your thought on that?

Yeah, it's, it's tricky. The stronger, the more advanced you get in that one particular method, because it stands the reason that well, you got to do is use your legs, your legs are longer or sorry, stronger than your arms, stands a reason you should be able to push press more. But that's, that's not just a technique. It's one that you have to foster as you get stronger. And I actually know guys, Jesse Nelson is a great example. I always use him.

The guy could do a 400 pound, I think that's like four 15 or something, standing strict press out of a rack. Now he would, he would lean back a lot. He'd do like the, you know, the Mitch Hooper, like back lean as he pressed, but no leg drive to speak of. And he was a middle weight. He was a one Oh five kilo guy. He got within a pubic hair of setting the log record that way. He lost it at like, you know, three inches from lockout, but, um, he can't push press, you know, if he was going to push press, he'd have to drop a hundred pounds. So then you're talking about, okay, you have to get your timing down with weight. That's appropriate, which would be lighter than that. And then you have to condition yourself to be explosive through your legs, but then time it through your upper body. It's definitely doable. It's certainly doable more so than getting somebody to like jerk at that level.

Cause that's completely different, even though the potential is way higher, but it's doable. It's just very unlikely that at that stage of development, anybody gets it. And when you're that good, the question is like, like, why would you, you know, that there's no, there's no reward for doing that. Now, if there were a bunch of guys that could do that, that were at 550 or knocking on 600, then the reward would be there. But, you know, at that point, I think he's doing just fine. Yeah. Okay. Overrated or underrated the WNBA.

That's what I get for getting out of my wheelhouse. I'm going to say, I'm going to say underrated because most of the feedback, I mean, I made a critique video just because I just thought I had something to contribute to the conversation and nobody did just based on, you know, it's the thing that people don't talk about like talent selection and stuff like that. I thought it was really interesting video. I thought I watched that full video and I was very engaged like that. I thought it was really interesting video. I thought thank you. I watched that full video and I was very engaged with that. I'm a basketball fan so I thought it was interesting that way too. So okay it was cool. So a lot of the comment and I say underrated

because a lot of the comments are kind of just the default like you know saying well you know they get beat by high school boys blah blah blah it, blah. It's, it's lame, whatever. It's like, I've spent a lot of time, like I'm involved in female sports. I've coached, uh, I've coached my wife. I've coached a lot of female athletes. Um, you know, uh, world-class female athletes. Um, Kristen Rhodes was at our wedding. Like she's like, I'm very close to that aspect, especially being in strongman.

You get, you get really close to it and you start to view the competition a bit differently. So I think it gets a lot of idiots kind of layering that on now. Now that being said, you know, do I think it deserves the shit it gets? A hundred percent. But I think it can be more than what people think it is. Yeah. It's also part of the aspect of it too.

The WNBA historically is not rated all that highly. So it'd be almost hard for it to be overrated because it doesn't get a whole lot of credit all that often. Yeah, that's true. That's true. Unless you're asking them, if you're asking what they think of it,

then it's probably a bit overrated. But you know. The lowering of the rim height is a very really, I've never, I don't know why that's never it's funny the comparisons you made to all the other sports where they essentially do that exact thing. Volleyball is like an apples to apples comparison almost that one I started, you know, in my early 20s, I got involved in like a rec league volleyball team. And I was like, oh, volleyball, this is pretty fun. And I watched like actually paid attention to my first college girls basketball, college girls volleyball game. Like God,

I can't believe how high these girls can jump. And someone's like their nets lower. And my mind was just blown. I didn't realize that that was what was taking place out there playing on the same size net as, as a men's one. So yeah, there's levels to that. Yeah. The, the, the pushback on it has been kind of weird, honestly, because it does seem self-evident. There's people say, well, it's the culture. And like, I don't know how the height of the rim, like, why isn't the size of the ball of the culture? You know, I never seen that. Yeah. I've never seen a basketball court where there's a bunch of balls around. It's like, Oh, and we also got the women balls over there.

It's like, it's a specialty thing you gotta get. Um, and a lot of people saying like, it's about dunks has nothing to do with dunks. You need a vertical to do a really convincing, you know, glass shattering dunk. So if you have an eight inch vertical, it doesn't matter how well, you know, I can have a trash can in front of me. I'm not going to do a dunk on it, right? You're still not going to do a three 60 Tomahawk. Uh, right, right. Exactly. But if you got middle school girls, you know, somebody was saying, you know, oh, we start playing in elementary school, you know, the boys shoot on the 10 foot rim. It's like, have you ever seen an elementary school

girl shoot on a 10 foot rim? Cause I haven't. So they're blocked out early on and by the time they play, they're in high school. So you gotta be tall. And at that point heights, the only thing that matters. So it's better to have a giraffe than somebody who's actually athletic. So you get a league filled with people that are outliers of outliers of outliers in terms of height, which means they're probably not going to be very athletic. So yeah, I mean, to those who haven't seen my scathing review

of the WNBA, like I have anything to say about basketball. But yeah, that was just a take. I really thought it was interesting. I would recommend checking that out if you're interested at all in the WNBA or basketball culture is cool. Um, overrated or yeah, overrated or underrated grip strength. Last time we met, we tested you on the grip gripper. You seemed upset with your, I can't remember your, your score, but you weren't happy with it.

Yeah, I knew it was going to be bad. And also like I knew, because, uh, um, you know, rehydrating for a meat, my blood pressure was through the roof. I was coming like 10 pounds heavier after I had to cut like 25 pounds. And I come in and I'm like, I'm going to look like a tomato. Cause I'm like squeezing that thing. I got a little bit of it right now. I get that beer at night and it kicks the rosacea, but, uh, yeah. So, uh, um, and I, I, I have kind

of long fingers for my like height. Um, and I've always gotten by with grip in strongman. So I've never trained. So I don't have a good grip, but I'm good enough to carry the farmers and to work around an axle and whatever. And that it's very, very rare. It's a limiting factor. So I don't focus on it anyways. Um, I, yeah, I think it's overrated. I think it's one of those culty things where people build it up. If you're actively arm wrestling, actively competing in grip sports, or if you're, um, in strongman and like you're a hundred pounds under the farmer walk weight, like, okay, it's a problem. So you do grip specialist work, but, um, most people get it. Even if you wear straps, regular gym

work gets your hand stronger. It's like the take on like your neck. People do neck training. I've never done neck training in my life. My neck is like three inches bigger than when I was like, you know, in my early twenties, just cause it gets hit with just about everything you do. So, um, if, if that's a specialty of yours, that's fine. But people treat it like it's like the, uh, it's like the fountain of, uh, I don't know. It's, it's, it's like the, the, the thing you need to be as strong as possible is you need the grip strength. It's like, ah, you really don't. Yeah. It's a lot of times it's kind of like a parlor trick almost like there

is people that competed in it and that's a little bit different I would agree with you there too But sometimes it's just also some people are just really good at it when they roll out of bed like it is a weird thing, you know, like That just people are just like so Good just almost naturally like without training it so it's kind of it's kind of odd in comparison to the other strength sports to me because I'm like, no one rolled out a bed and squatted 800 pounds or log press 350, you know, like

that almost nobody. I said, you know, maybe there's some extreme outliers there, but like Greg knuckles, uncles that we've talked about before. Have you ever heard the stories of the strength in his family before? In passing, I think I heard him mention it. But what is it? Some legendary it is, they were just stuff that doesn't even seem fathomable like the like. OK, just just for the sake of telling you one of the stories and Tommy, maybe you remember this better than me, but Greg was getting into training. He's maybe in high school. He's starting to lift more. He's down. And also the important thing to know, this is his mom

side of the family. And he said, like, the shortest male in his mom's side of the family was like six, four or six, five. And Greg was saying, you know, as like a five, I don't know, nine man or whatever, five, 10, he was like the obvious runt of the entire family like that's the point he's trying to get across here but yeah so he's getting into training in high school and he and he's maybe he's squatting 405 in the basement and one of his uncles comes you know he's talking to his mom and upstairs and she's like yeah you got to check out Greg he's starting to get serious about it you know he's getting serious into his training you know he's making progress so his

uncle comes down and he sees that Greg has four or five loaded on the bar. And he comes down. He said, Greg, your mom says you're getting serious. I just wanted to come check on you. He's like, yeah, four or five. It sounds, seems like it must be going pretty good. And he didn't understand Greg was squatting that day. He thought Greg was doing overhead press.

So his uncle proceeds to go cold press 405 pounds overhead. And Greg's thing is that's a flavor of the story. He presses it, puts it down, it just ain't quite as easy as it used to be and walks away. And that's that was Greg's story. And then the other one he told us was that was it his mother was going? His mom. Was like, did she have like breast cancer or something? Or surgery?

Yeah, she was recovering from some sort of cancer therapy. And he wanted, you know, he's like, well, to, you know, improve your quality of life, we should work on, you know, building a little strength. And dad, his dad decided, we'll get in on this too. And, you know, as their first day squatting, he thought, okay, well, let's just kind of get a gauge for where you guys are at.

And I think he said his dad got to like 135 and you could tell it was a little tough. And so his dad quit there and he's like, it was very easy for his mom. And I think he said, did they get up to like 315? And she was like- Yeah, they were doing plate and quarter jumps and they just kept doing it

and it kept just being exceptionally easy. Like where it's like, well, you're nowhere near. Yeah, she got to like 315 for like four or five and it still wasn't hard yet. And he was like, okay, mom, we better stop there. And like that was, but- And she had never really lifted before. But apparently that was that entire side

of the family, I guess. And this is Greg Knuckles. This is Greg Knuckles. He also claimed like at one of his family reunions, one of his cousins who was around his age was talking to him about deadlifting. and Greg had said, you know, he was feeling very proud. He'd like deadlifted like five plates for the first time. And his cousins were like, when

they were asking Greg what his numbers were, they were like, kind of disappointed that like five plates was where he was at because they were all deadlifting like in the high 600s or 700s even. So these are Greg's claims here. I've always had this and I've always like, God, I have a Greg Knuckles quote in my video. God damn it. I've always seen him as being like,

especially in like the exercise science crew, I've always thought highly of him because he has a really good, like a know-how. He's a great bullshitter. An analytical mind. Yeah, I think he's really good. and he's good at doing really deep intent analytical breakdowns but also with like a lot of common sense. We've did it. Yes, I agree with that.

Yeah. And there's very one of the big problems. He's the one that told me this actually because I interviewed him some time ago. He's the one that told me and I didn't want to come out and say it though. It was my inkling from my time in the kinesiology program. He's like, people that are good at math and science go to math and science. Like they don't get into exercise science. Like, yeah, no shit. Um, you know, we know who gets into exercise science. It's like, there's brilliant people there. That bell curve is skewed. Um, anyway, so, uh, so he was telling me about this rampant

statistical errors. Um, there was some like met, uh, there was some study that showed it was like 85% of like meta studies had statistical errors in them, something ridiculous like that because we anyways, um, and Greg, on the other hand, he's the guy that was able to like sift through the data and figure out the inconsistent statistical patterns that like busted Barbala down in like Brazil that like made all of those studies completely like, Oh, you guys were just manufacturing bullshit studies like twice a month for whatever. Anyways, it takes a very special type of the type of mind and approach and way of seeing

the world to do that. I'm just very, very, very surprised that, uh, that those legends would come from. I did not see that. That was it. I'm a big old car to ourselves too before though, like there's a lot of people telling those stories and we'd be like, yeah, okay. But the fact that it's Greg, it's like, man, like he knows his stuff. Like that's, yeah. And he's been very strong, you know, he's totaled over 2000 pounds and you know,

he's walked the walk as well personally. So he, he's not a random guy that tells you his dad bench four or five in high school. You know, he understands the reference of these numbers. And on the, on the one hand, like on one hand, is it possible? Like physically, is it possible? Like, yes, I think it's, I think it's technically physically possible, but it's so outside the realm of plausibility. I mean, I would just think there would be like

a self-awareness not to offer that story up because nobody's going to believe you. Like, even that's kind of alarming. It's like it happened, but it's like, you know, seeing a unicorn in your backyard. I know it happened, but I'm not telling you. Because you're gonna be like, I'm fucking nuts. That's funny, man. That's a good, uh, that's a good analogy. Yeah. All right. Uh,

last one, this one's worth all the marbles overrated or underrated. The title of world's strongest man. The title of world's oh, overrated. Good God. Do you want to go another hour? The topic of strongman titles. Jesus. No, I mean, that was one of the first things I noticed this back in like 2004. That like you have a contest, you know, there's like five people in the United States competing in amateur strongman. You have a title, a contest titled like, you know, there's like five people in the United States competing in amateur strongman. You have a title, a contest titled like, uh, you know, Iowa's strongest, whatever. Somebody wins or somebody takes fifth place and they're like, you know, well,

I'm the fifth strongest man in Iowa, whatever people love, love their bullshit titles. They love it so much. It's in every strength sport in powerlifting. It's like divisions and weight classes. And yeah, getting, getting awards in divisions. They didn't sign up for because people pushed them over so they could give out more trophies. But yeah, and strong men, that's where it is.

People love their, their bullshit titles. It makes me cringe so hard, but a world strikes man is a contest. You know, it's a first, we have good memories of it. I got into strength because I had a bunch of VH, you know, kids my age probably had VHS tapes of something else. I had VHS tapes of like Puginowski, right? And it's like, that's what I do in my free time. Um, yeah, a lot of good memories, but it's a contest. You judge a contest based on the amount of talent based on their ability to determine who's the best. And this particular contest, uh, sucks in my opinion, at least compared to the other ones.

So, uh, I think in a very short period of time, if shot keeps going this way, um, people won't be talking about the world's strongest man. That we talked about the strongest man on earth because it means the exact same thing and people will know that's the heaviest contest in the world. And per example, like random, I don't very little about him. I've sifted through his videos, very strong across multiple domains, very athletic. Looks like he has a shit ton of potential. Most people that get into this level,

especially with that breakout performance, don't continue improving. At least not very quickly. Anyway, so I'm just looking at his gaps. One of the things that people that were going back and forth with me were saying was I don't think going to strongest man on earth is the right move for him right now. It's like, well, how does that work? Where you're the world's strongest man in this contest is the contest, but your winter can't go to a show that 12 other guys are going to,

because it's not the right move, meaning it's too goddamn heavy. So, uh, anyway, and maybe he'll do well. Turns out he's going. I mean, I, I was just going to ask, is he lifting there then or? I heard that he's, last I heard he's confirmed, but I saw that from a thumbnail. So to take my word for it, that's what I use as a news. That's what he used for news nowadays. You just see the headline

and you take it as being accurate reporting. Yeah, so I don't know, but just the fact that, not one, like multiple people were saying like, I don't think that's the right move. It's like, okay. Well, you know, that's a branding issue for worlds. They got a they got to figure that crisis out Yeah Good news. Do you passed overrated underrated? So it was a pass fail. So you got it Nice big one for the man. That's all my all my favorite topics to you guys know how to get me going Yes, that is the goal. Ah

I'm really appreciative that you came on. This is a lot of fun I would mention we had a couple people also in our discord saying that their base strength is a base strength AI Is that the that their base strength AI users and they've had great success Wow. So oh, that's fantastic It's good to actually ran into a guy in the park the other day. He recognized my massonomic shirt. He said he's been running bull mastiff one of his favorite programs. Oh, that's fantastic. That is awesome to hear. Now I'm I'm that's his validating because I didn't put that out

the way this is the best thing you're ever going to do in your life. I was just the one I like doing the most and I'm like I made this so the fact that people use it and they get something out of it, like that's, uh, that's cool to hear. So obviously they should check out the YouTube channel. I mean, that's, that's my favorite content of yours. I mean, I assume that that's where you would want to send people, but where, what about for base strength AI and anything else, where do they go? Yeah.

My YouTube channel has all my stuff on it. Alexander Bromley. Why my full name is there, I have no idea, but you know, a little pot committed now. So, um, uh, uh, just go to base strength.com and that has, uh, Oh, it's got my books right here. Uh, I got a book. I wrote it during COVID actually pretty good. It came out all right. Maybe some typos, but it's pretty good. Um, and then, yeah, the, the base strength AI, um, titling issue I wish we could go back on, um, because when juggernaut AI came out chat, GBT didn't exist. So now everybody thinks, AI means chat, GBT, write me a program. Uh, and it's not the AI, you know, it's, it's my program templates. The AI just determines, uh, uh, based on your inputs,

uh, how your recovery is doing, you know, what metrics you're hitting. And there's just a very, very complex flow chart that makes sure that you're in the pocket. So that's what it does for you. Awesome. Well, we appreciate it. Uh, I don't know when we'll see you again next, but whenever we'll do well bust out the grip tester again. So absolutely man. I appreciate it guys. This is a lot of fun. That's great. Awesome. Thanks man. You got He got those double dose of cool beans. Double dose of retro Louis here grip strength beans right there. Oh, been a while since we've had a good interview on the show while since we've had an interview and got to bust out the cool

Beans that just doesn't happen. Yeah, so it anymore That's fun. It's like right. I think it's like riding a bicycle I just get back right back on huh get back right is it like riding a horse or riding a bicycle? Um, I think it's kind of like riding a tandem bicycle, you know, yeah That's true. I get balancing but there's another guy there to kind of like riding a tandem bicycle, you know, yeah, that's true. You're balancing, but there's another guy there to kind of guide you along. It's what about those bicycles like the quad bikes like they have, you know, they have at storybook land in Aberdeen where it's like

a car. It's like in the shape of a car and four people can get kind of like the kind of like the party, the pedal pub sort of where people are no or the storybook lands Do those all face the same direction though those all face the same those all face forward like a car was kind of like Actually the pedal on land Yes best analogy you could have possibly made actually now that you mentioned that because

Paddle boat looks kind of cool looks kind of fun fun, not fun, not cool, not fun, not entertaining, not fun, just pure work, and incredibly slow. Incredibly slow. It's actually shocking how slow a paddle boat is. Those four person bikes, or I may even wager to say those beer ones, also not near as fun as you'd think. No, I don't think so either. I frequently, you know, in Sioux Falls here, it's not uncommon for me to have to drive through downtown to get to the other side of town. And like, it was like, it was last week, last Thursday, I'm going to my son's T-ball game.

We got to drive through the middle of downtown and at a stoplight, you gotta wait for a pedal pub to go through. And I'm thinking, are they having as much fun as they're pretending to be having right now? Because I don't know if that's, if that's as enjoyable as it seems. You know what might be more fun than that?

Just drinking and not riding a bicycle. Just post it up, not moving at all, except to grab another beer. Now we're talking. I don't have to mix the two things. I'm decent at both of them, and I prefer to do them separately, if I'm being honest. My exercise and my drinking.

My cardio and my drinking my cardio and my specially Right What do we got for other other things here you see you got something about gems first another Long-term follow-up. I have finished the last and I believe final season of The Righteous Gemstones.

Oh, you're just knocking them out. I mean, it helps that only had a few episodes of that show left too. But, uh, Oh, Righteous Gemstones featuring a Masonic crew member, big Ryan Johnson, Jacton didn't remember if the God squad. How could we ever forget? It's great show. I love it. So funny. so stupid. It's it's good On that note actually not that reminds me. I

This is kind of breaking news. I started watching something Yeah, I started watching a show there's been a lot of talk over the years about me starting to watch a particular show and Buckle up everyone. I did start to rewatch Band of Brothers. I introduced Jack to Band of Brothers and he watched the first episode and surprisingly liked it quite a bit. Has he seen Saving Private Ryan? No, we haven't watched that, but I actually was thinking about watching Saving Private Ryan. I've been consuming a lot of World War two just out of the blue or I what I've been lists

I've now on my sixth season of this World War two podcast and I don't know. I think I talked to you. What was last week? Oh, I don't called again what the podcast That is a good question It's a British dude Well, it was actually The first few seasons were just about Adolf Hitler. So it's called Adolf Hitler. Oh, yeah Yes, the season of my on now is just all of D day. Okay, it's just like ten episodes of D day

Are we talking an hour each or how? Oh, yeah. Yeah and it's really good and you know, they're kind of the joke about like D-Day. Are we talking an hour each or how? Oh, yeah. Yeah. And it's really good. Yeah. And, you know, they're kind of the joke about like. Middle aged white guys loving work like World War II history. And I'm like, I don't know, I am that stereotype, I guess, because maybe I don't know, I almost can't get enough of it. I maybe was perception when I was a kid, I kind of like if you told me in elementary school, I've just been like oh Everyone over the age of 30 like everyone that's a dad knows everything about war and maybe it was because the world was a little

Lesser move from any major conflicts, you know, there's always right, right, you know lately I mean the last what 30 some years like the major conflicts have been like Smaller skirmishes in the Middle East or something years like the major conflicts have been like smaller Skirmishes in the Middle East or something like it. It hasn't been these You know, there's less and less people that had a direct family member that served in a world war in this day and age right when we were right, you know when we were so I am losing my train of thought here, but I guess my point is I did think at one point that just everyone knew a ton about war and I'm like actually War is less of a hobby of a lot of people are in interest of a lot of people that might be true

Maybe it's the history. I feel like that might not be a bad thing. Well, but I even I'm I don't even really meaning from that Point I think even the history right I think a lot of people there's a lot of people work Seems like they don't even really care about history anymore Which is probably just a fact also there's just so much Engaging content. Yeah, like much more riveting content that's captured in HD. Right, right. Yeah. Photos from war and grainy old footage. But I can report back. Band of Brothers. It's as good the 11th time as it was the first 10. I've only

seen, you know, I started that one. I tried to start with my wife and she was checked out very quickly. So I've only seen like the first episode and a half. So I got to try it again. Great actors though, too, in that show, you know, there's just. Just tough to beat it. So tough that I refuse to watch it. But I had a new watching partner, so it was like, oh great, I have someone to like

bounce things off of like, oh, what do you think of that? And what do you think that means? And you know, all this dialogue about Band of Brothers, something to share it with. A fresh face. Yeah. So no, I have not started the wire yet for anyone that thought maybe I was gonna say

I've started the wire. I really did not think you're gonna go there But do you almost you almost made me think so? Yeah, did we mention I already forgot now do we mention the new Nathan Fielder show or the rehearsal? Yeah, you told me about that. Actually, I do have I am going to watch that at some point in time But that's like a watch by myself kind of show. Yeah, okay So I could not remember if I brought that up to you or not. So I have that on my list. I'm excited to watch. Check that out.

I'm going to hit that one now that Righteous Gemstones is done. What's the pest control? Dude, OK. Have you ever had a pest control door salesman come to your house in Aberdeen? No, I never had once either. Did not know this was a thing.

Apparently, I can't imagine this is only a Sioux Falls thing. I'm assuming it's a city thing. Metro. Oh my God, it is crazy. The door to door salesmen you get for pest control people. And it's like they all ran them through pest control salesman school because I could do the sales pitch right now. So you get different companies.

They're all different companies. Yeah, different companies. Like how many? Oh, in're all different companies. Yeah, different companies. Like how many? Oh, in over the course of a month, three or four of them will come to your door every spring. What? Yes, every spring. This is the script right here.

Doorbell rings, you go and you're like, oh, fuck, I know what this is gonna be. And you go out there. It's always a guy between the ages of 21 and 25. Yeah. And this is this, it's the same thing. They all have the same script. Like this is, hey, yeah, so I'm with XYZ Pest Control Company. Yeah, we got the truck coming through town today. We're already, we already do pest control for a bunch of your neighbors on the street.

I got the truck coming today because we're already doing everyone else. We can offer you a big discounted rate because it doesn't take that much more for us to come here. You can get some massive savings. We'll get you in on the plan right now if you if you agree to this. They all do this exact same thing. And the only variability, because it's all the same guy, it's, you know, it's a guy freshly out of college. The only thing that changes is one guy tries to be really cool about it.

One guy tries to be really professional and straight up about it. One guy tries to be friendly, Like they all take a different approach for how they present it, but they all say the same goddamn thing. And it's that. And then you go, Oh, okay. Um, yeah, I guess this is, I do this every time. Are we talking mice or what are we even talking about? No, this is the next thing they do. Um, yeah. So it's, uh, how long has this house been here? You say, oh, it's a newer house. Okay. So have you seen much for pests yet? No, not really. Okay. Well, what are they referring to? Like, oh, well, you know, with things, just I'll give you a heads up things you're probably going to see, you know, could be spiders, ants, pests, wasps,

hornets, bees, you know, they run through their like 10 list of things that they can do. Insects, yeah, sure, of course. And how they're like services superior. But the one, and you know, they'll go through the whole of the things that they can do, and I have no doubt they can stop the pests, but what they wanna do is they wanna get you

on a quarterly plan that's like 200 and some bucks, a quarter, so they basically wanna get you for like almost a thousand bucks a year to have them coming. Right. And you know, they talk about how theirs is so much better than the other guys. And I'm like, let's be really, you're not formulating any chemicals over here. You don't have a chemist on your franchise here.

Like you guys are probably all getting the stuff from the same place. But yeah, but what's great about this is I'm always like, oh, and I'm going to just quit answering the door on these guys. Because I'm just so, my wife is like just downright offended that these guys even show up anymore. But they'll be like, so, yeah, if I can just get you to sign up today, you know, we can save you a bunch of money and we can just we can get you taken care of. And I'm like, I guess you have a brochure or something. So I know what I'm signing up for. Now, we don't do brochures.

We know you're just going to throw them away. So we don't do that. I'm like, oh, it's just hard for me to agree to something when I don't know what I'm signing up for. Well, I guess what questions do you have? I'm like, first of all, how much does it cost? You said a hundred dollars today. What am I signing up for? Oh, okay. Well, yeah. So, all right. So we'll become every quarter. We'll do this and this and this. And yeah, this is your great rate you're getting right now. I'm like, okay, well, what about next year? Oh, yeah, okay, so next year will be 225 each time we come. Like also the price doubles. And then like, okay, what do you do this time?

What do you do the next quarter? What do you do the next quarter? Right. So they're not telling you a thing. They're just trying to get you on the urgency factor right now is what they're trying to get you on. And they just can't answer the questions. And I'm like, ah, you know, I'm not the type of,

I don't make split decisions like this on something. So, and they all do this. They go, okay, well, you know, I'm just, I'm not the type of, I don't, I don't make split decisions like this on something. So, and they all do this. They go, okay, well, uh, it'll, it's always like two or three in the afternoon. What do you say I stop by again at five o'clock and we'll just see if you change your mind. And I'm like, sure, man, whatever. I need to just start saying no. And then I, so I go down, do not think about it one bit, go down to work do do do my doorbell rings

And I'm like, ah damn it. It's five o'clock again the guy standing there He's like well and I'm like sorry to waste your time man. I know I'm not doing it. Okay. Yeah walk away and Repeat that I've done that four times. I guess I'd say just it's done like the season is done now But I've just just so caught off guard that door-to-door salesmen did not exist in Aberdeen. No, I've never had. I've gotten door-to-door salesmen for financial services, financial, you know, with major, major national brands. Like, just introducing myself, you know,

I can help with 401Ks, IRAs, anything you might have. And it's like, okay, cool. Like, I appreciate you're being professional not annoying But that what else cleaning services you get a lot of door-to-door cleaning service people like it's wild like Door-to-door salesmen not a thing in Everdeen. They do exist here Yeah, so pest control not like I could I could I mean if someone told me hey You have to your micro dirty jobs. You have to, you're Mike Rowe, dirty jobs, you have to be a pest control salesman for the day,

I'd be like, dude, I got the script down. I can hit this right now. I can hit the ground running. So the pest control guy, like that's also the guy doing the work, correct? No, no, no, this is just the sales guy for it. Oh, it's just a sales guy. I mean, I'm assuming this guy isn't doing the work.

I'm assuming he has another guy or two that's running the truck behind him. Okay. And he's just out here just trying to hit homes and just drumming up and get his commission check for the day so he can move on to the next thing. Yeah, I don't like that. Yeah, it's it's in this day and age. Come on.

You keep that you keep those down there. It's so annoying. Don't send them up. Don't give them me as a referral if they ever if they ever con you into it and they ask 10 friends. Don't give them my address. It's wild. And then the hours they check, you know, just be guaranteed. Like they've also came at times where it's like seven, thirty, eight o'clock at night.

It's like, dude, oh, that's when I would like to almost like in this. That's what I'm like. It's a zoo right now. Get the hell out of here. Oh, no, we're finally winding down like people are almost in bed like that's how I know you're in like your early 20s And the only thing you care about is a commission check because you don't know how this works at all right Yeah, you keep that down there

You know what you can't keep down there's juggernaut AI because I'm gonna use it too. You can't keep it down there I'm taking some for myself word I've been on juggernaut AI back on the horse for about five or six weeks now Got to tell you loving every minute of it training is going great. I'm enjoying every day in the gym and Juggernaut AI is a part of that rejuvenation for me Been using it actually I'm it's I think I start last day of a strength block this week and then it's onto a peaking block already. So you can check out Juggernaut AI also. We'll probably talk a little bit more about our training here to give you a spice of what we got cooking on Juggernaut AI.

But if you want to find out more through the website, go to juggernautai.app. And if you sign up, you can use discount code Mastinomics. save you 10% for the lifetime of a mere membership it makes it about 30 bucks a month pretty affordable for what you're getting a pretty comprehensive app that'll guide you towards your training whether you're a power lifter or just someone that wants to get stronger generally works for both of those applications so Tommy how's your training going you know it's going pretty good bench bench is just right on track. It's just following juggernaut perfectly I've been ramping back into it from our other movements last week

275 was you know coming back from a little bit of a back injury testing the waters This week was 315 because technically it was a D load on squat or not a D load but a very light week 315 for sets very very easy just playing playing it slow and conservative at the moment so still staying hopeful still staying hopeful over here gonna be in you could say an unconventional prep is how this one's going but conventional deadlift unconventional prep conventional deadlift So it is I mean it's not you're not going backwards at all though like the the back progress has all been yeah The back progress has all been good still when this happens. I think actually I'm probably I'm I'm probably gonna make a run at actually just doing the

The juggernaut numbers for my actual peak here. Like it's gonna be a pretty big jump. We'll see, I'll feel it out. But, cause like pretty soon my peak, I think like next week, well next week I'm supposed to have an RP 10 squat day. It's actually technically supposed to be this week, but my things are all messed up.

So that one might just get, I might just treat next week as one more of like an in-betweener, and then just like go full into the the peak Um, I think i'm gonna be okay on squat like i'll figure that one out in a hurry But I think i'm gonna be okay on squat the one that i'm most confused on right now is deadlift because it still is That bottom bracing position still is very uncomfortable I think just in a matter of time

There might just not be a whole lot of deadlift going into this prep is might might be be the case but right? Right, that's fine. It's it'll be there on that day. That's what meat days for right test those numbers That's that's right. It will it's always been there on meat day Someone at the gym asked me the other day how is using juggernaut with my knee, you know Like what cuz I'm like, I see you're squatting and using juggernaut What do you do? Like, how are you doing that? And I'm not using like the, you can be like, are you recovering from any injuries? And I'm not doing that. I'm just, you could say sand bagging the numbers, but I'm really actually more what I'm doing is I'm still using RPE, but it's just like a comfort RPE. Right. It's just kind of graded on a curve

right now. Right. It's graded on a curve. That's the best way. It's cause like a comfort RPE scale. Right, it's just kind of graded on a curve right now. Right, it's graded on a curve. That's the best way. It's because like the heaviest squat I've done since knee surgery was this. Is that this week? Was it like 325 or 335? Yeah, I did 325 for a set of three.

And I called like, because it was supposed to be an RPE 10 instead of three. And I did 324, like the most I had done was like 310, I think for a set of three. But like as to be an RPE 10, so three, and I did 320. Like the most I had done was like 310, I think, for a set of three. But like as a post surgery RPE 10, like that kind of is realistic. That's yeah, right, right. That's I'm like, it's more than I've done before.

It's a weight that I'm still pretty comfortable doing. Realistically, could I have done five more reps and probably not hurt myself? Probably, but I didn't call it an R five because training like a big time. I do that. Right. I called it like an RP 9.5 where I'm like, or a nine or whatever I called it because I'm like, I could have done another one and I would have been safe. But if I would have done like three more, start getting to the really

uncomfortable for me, you know, so that's kind of how I've been in and I guess sort of the same with deadlift just to a lesser degree because the deadlift feels A little better. Yeah, and you can push. I mean you are pushing that one way more though like in comparison Yeah, I did five there again. It was supposed to be like an rpe 10 double deadlift I did 535 like could I have done more than that and for more reps? Yes. But I'm still like, I'm just like, slow rolling. You do you got to just ease back in these things. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Bench on the other hand, though, I'm just using at full form, you know, I've no injury there that I'm record, you know, the

knees not relevant to, you know, I'm able to be in whatever the ideal bench position is for me just fine. So I'm doing that. At the same time as the program's going, I'm doing the bench whole hog. You know, I'm not like, I'm not tempering back the bench. I'm doing that true to the app. Yeah. So I mean, do you feel like, do you

have the feeling of like, oh, my bench is getting stronger every week? Do you kind of have that feeling right now? What is this? This week, I have an RPE 10 set of three. Yep. And maybe I would do 355 for that if I feel good that day. That's kind of the number that I was thinking I would do.

355. And if I get that, that'll be a good, I mean, certainly not the strongest I've ever been, but at my current body weight relative to other times, it's probably getting up there with fairly strong. So, especially if I can do that and it goes pretty well, bodyweight relative to other times, it's probably getting up there with fairly strong. So especially if I can do that and it goes pretty well, I'd say I'm like, Oh, things are going, going pretty well.

And where is your body weight sitting by right now? I'm like 248. So I'm under, you know, staying on and I've been very consistent. I've been very consistent at like 245 to 250 for three months now. You know, that's kind of where I've settled right now. Where as getting back into doing some real training and eating the way I'm eating, it's like 245 to 250. And you know, I used to weigh like 275 regularly or 265 to 275.

So right, right. And I still, like if I would go up to 265 or 275 now There's no doubt my bench would get better. Oh really God. Yeah. Yes, but I don't want to do that You know, I just I would like to stay about this weight Yeah, I don't know if I came back from a knee surgery of like gaining 30 pounds as to your advantage No Like and I don't know that I'll ever want to weigh that much more.

Yeah, like ever really. Like, you know, I just don't. To be like getting closer to 40 and then be like, you know what I need to do? Start getting closer to 300 pounds. When I was 28, that was less of a concern. I was like, yeah, I'll be huge. Or not calling myself huge, but like, I'll be.

Enormous. Yeah. Like, I'll be, there is no limit You know, like, I'm bigger as always, but like, that was sort of my mentality. I'm like, I got up to 285 pounds and I wasn't like, this is too big. I was like, God, I'm going perfect. I'm like I am so strong right now weights feel like nothing but now I'm like don't know if I feel very good if I weigh 285 pounds now, but and It's all relative to what the individual and for me that's right Well, and also just different life demands to his right, right and plus I got to keep my rower time That's the real goal Keeping my brother can't affect our times and can't keep my rower time. Keeps it those rowers. That's the real goal.

Keeping my times and check that rower programming. Yeah. My knee is still not a hundred percent, uh, making progress, but in seven or eight months post surgery and it's still still go to physical therapy, still work on stuff and I make progress, but it's not fast. Yeah. It was the other one better by now. Like, was it mostly fine or was it still in the, I make progress, but it's not fast. Yeah, was the other one better by now?

Like, was it mostly fine or was it still in the same ballpark? I made progress faster. At this point last time, I was further along. But that's been pretty much true throughout the entire process this time. I'm not not on the right track. Or I'm not out of whack with where it should be. It just was faster last time.

I probably made faster than average progress last time. The physical therapist has been impressed with how much you can sandbag your training, your physical therapy. Yes. It's just a lack of effort. Is that what they say is holding you back? Physical therapy, I had that on Tuesday this week

and my physical therapy, like some people go in and probably don't do that much. Like my physical therapy. Most people, actually I watch what other people are doing there and most people are barely doing anything. I leave there and I'm like, damn. Do I need to go to the gym today? That was a fricking workout.

You know, like I'm tired, I'm sweaty. You don't need to go to the gym today. I do try and schedule it on my, now that I am training, I try and schedule it on my not normal training days because I could still go do stuff, but I wouldn't want to do that. Then go do like my heavy deadlift. I'd be like kind of worn out.

My quad is lit up like my glutes, like my legs are fried. Yeah. So that's the thing. You basically are getting like how many days of physical therapy are you doing? One or two a week? I'm only doing once every, now I'm down to, I'm only doing once every other week actually.

Oh, okay, okay. See, I thought maybe you're getting like six training days a week in. I'm like, well, yeah. No, I was, you know, I was doing like three physical therapy, then two a week, then one a week, now every other week.

And some people at this point wouldn't be done going. Yeah, well, I didn't even realize you were still going until we were talking on the phone there. They're like, oh, I gotta go to a physical therapy appointment and I hadn't heard you say anything so long. Like some people could quit, like if my goal was to walk around.

Yeah, you've done it. I would not go to physical therapy anymore. I can walk around, you know, like, but I'm like, no, this is still actually helping me. And especially a lot of the jump, cause right now even it's and especially a lot of the jump because right now Even uh, it's funny like some of the stuff I feel like I can even jump off of two feet pretty well

Uh-huh, and my vertical is probably not like that much worse than what it would have not that my vertical is ever good anyways But my vertical off of a two-foot jump is probably still not that Far off of what it would have been but my left only foot is still so hard. It's just like the proprioception and just like the lack of power and just the lesser control. It's crazy how deficient it still is actually. But is it because of muscle or is it just because of the whole system?

My muscle size is actually catching up. OK, that's kind of what I thought, too. I guess that can't be like, yeah, like, because we take measurements of it sometimes and Mike size is not that far off. So I guess it's not muscle size. It's more just like the control. And I don't know for anyone that's rehab, that sort of thing. You probably understand what I'm saying without even me saying it but it's just like not there. Like you just go I just go to you like to skip off of my left leg like on my right leg it's just effortless and I feel like I can glide up into there and my left leg I'm like why won't it spring up yeah you know like why does it feel like I'm just like jumping in quicksand, that sort of thing?

Yeah, a big scar who was on unpaid and underrated this week, I listen, she said she tore both ACLs playing soccer. So I actually had heard somewhere that soccer is the most dangerous sport. Really? That is as far the most in per player, the highest rate of injury. Saying the most dangerous sport is not is a weird per like competitive player, the highest rate of injury, I think, is this. I mean, I could just come up with a lot of guesses right now for why that's the case. But I'm sure someone has decent reasons.

I'm just I'd be curious what I think it's the all the I think a lot of it is like knees and it's cutting Yeah, you know, it's knees and cutting I suppose but Maybe that's also come someone fact-check me on that. I don't even know. I'm not I'm not Professing that to be a fact. That's just something I I heard somewhere, right? That's just something I I heard somewhere right Could be completely wrong drop a comment in the lies on her let us know why is soccer the most dangerous sport Soccer unsafe at any speed We need to get Bromley to do it we'll get Bromley to do a

YouTube videos on his soccer danger, the most dangerous sport. And they're entitled soccer unsafe at any speed. The statistic is probably soccer is the most safe sport. Probably is. It just has a higher risk for knee injury than like other sports. Yes. So someone fact check in. I'm certainly not doing the homework on that someone's gonna have to let us know All I know is that it's unsafe at any speed. That's all I need to know Yes, you'd think football would have to be fairly high up there too. Yeah, but I also don't know if like knee injuries like Certainly happens. Yeah, but it's just everyone on the team is plagued with knee injuries. Like certainly happens. Yeah, but it's not like it's just everyone on the team is

plagued with knee injuries in high school. No. Well, so many of the people I think part of it, so many of the people based on their position in playing football, they're not going to be prone to that happening because of what their demands were as running out on the soccer field. You're making so many more open field cuts like everyone is, I would think. Yeah. So much of soccer does happen, you know, like below the waist, you know, right on the, you know, it's all about what's happening, you know, with given

the no hands. Yeah. Yeah. Right. We're like football. It's like, well, really. I mean, yeah, I get it there. I mean, it is a full body sport, but like so much of it is catching the ball and running. And then you, a lot of times know when you're getting hit. So you brace yourself and prepare accordingly to right. Right. I'm making up these theories based on a fact. I would also say maybe, I mean, this is probably a very big generalization, but I would just think from a certain level of

muscle mass that the average football player is probably a little more resilient in that Aspect than a soccer player, and I'm not saying like soccer players are weak, but it's like not to your advantage to be like super muscle Heavy and play a soccer game, you know, right right Yeah What else we want to cover this week you got monster trucks we're talking about about okay. I'll do this really quick really quick big foot or grave day So I've never been to monster trucks ever Who would you prefer? I mean I would fight I would pick What are you doing had to pick between the two big foot's a little older little to vanilla for me

Yeah, grave digger would be our right up a little more flair a little more showmanship when you got graved it so you've never been to monster never been in my life and They always they always have monster trucks in Sioux Falls here like every I've been to him in before it's like every three to four months there's monster truck showman town it seems like and I Always just it's like oh, yeah, I take my boy to me See if you probably think it's cool. And then I always forget about it. And then this weekend, mowed on the morning, my wife goes, Oh, got monster truck tickets for you guys.

I'm like, Oh, I forgot about that. What weekend is that? She goes, it's in two hours, better get ready. I'm like, Oh, cool. Okay. And this was Hot Wheels monster trucks, which means that a lot of times the lights are dimmed down and they have like lights on the trucks, you know it but

Okay, so having never been to a monster truck show This one I feel like they do it wrong because they're trying to do like some Theatrics to like they're trying to like make it a show like all right up turn it into WWE kind of yeah like up first is the long jump and we're gonna we're gonna get a score like so it's Whoever's it's skull crusher's turn first. He has 30 seconds let's see what a score is and like they try to like run over the cars once and Like the high score is 25 like a max score is 25 and no matter what no one does worse than 20 and Like maybe someone gets a 25 and i'm like watching them like you can't tell the difference

does worse than 20 and like maybe someone gets a 25 and I'm like watching him like you can't tell the difference don't know if this is pre-planned or if they're trying I can't even because like all right then when that's done it's like all right the next one is the doughnuts and I'm like come on guys it's whipping a shitty here we're not doing doughnuts we're whipping shitties it's like the whip and shitty things I just got to say the number of people that have sent me meme or reels of other podcasts having this whippy shitty conversation, like it's like two women and it's like, you know what they call doing donuts in the Midwest? Whip and shitties. And I'm like, we did that bit on the Maths-Science podcast 10 years ago. I'm like, on all these

ones that are going viral now. I'm like Welcome to the club comics did it also welcome to the Midwest Congratulations on learning that's whipping shitties. We taught people that years ago culture over here so yeah, then like the second challenge is whipping shitties and like the first two guys couldn't even really do one I'm like Do you really not know how to do one or is like part of the show that you're not supposed to do good like a professional Right, so that because I'm like the first two guys were god-awful and then like the next three guys just got better and better Better I'm like, oh, it's the classic showmanship of like oh it looks hard but then they get better and it's even more exciting because you saw some guys struggle and

Anyways way too much downtime and talking between the things like, it's like, no, just let those trucks go crazy and rip around. And it's always just like this one guy taking turns and then there's breaks. And it's like, you have headphones on because it's so damn loud, but then like, you're always like taking them off to hear the announcers tell some story. But then also you're putting them back on because the monster trucks going again. It was confusing anyway. So then you take a you take a, you know, intermission because you got kids

and then you go back and have it set up for dirt bikes. And I'm telling you, man, dirt bikes are just fricking insane. That's where it was where it's at. Like the dirt bikes get done. And my son's like, why? Why are the monster trucks coming out? I'm like, well, it's a monster truck show. He's like, no, I just want those motorcycles.

And I'm like, yeah, my buddy, I ran into one of my buddies there and all the dirt bikes are going. He's like, why can't the whole show just be the dirt bikes? And like, dude, the frickin jumps they hit on the dirt bikes. I'm like, this is like actually like making me sweat and nervous. I'm like, OK, yeah, you're on a straight up concrete floor. They have this little skinny ramp set up and then they're landing on like this giant inflatable ramp. But I'm like, if anything goes wrong, I don't know, you're 70 feet in the air and you just land on

cement and die. Like, and it's at first the guys are just going out and just like airing it out. And then all of a sudden, I don't know my dirt bike turns, but they're like doing like the tail whips and like the Superman, like what is it? Like the kiss of death and the thing where they're doing like the handstand on it. And then all of a sudden it's like, oh, yep, backflip, like three backflips. They're all doing backflips.

And then the guys kind of go away and then they're like, you want to see something crazy? And the guy's like just, you know, going nuts trying to get everyone going. He does a flip and I'm like, dude, this is insane. Like these guys are wild. Like this is the one that's actually getting a reaction out of the crowd. And then they got to pack them up and bring the then they bring the monster

trucks back out. You're like, oh, this isn't that exciting. And we were really we were in the very front row. Like the cars were not that far from us. We're in the front row. Monster trucks are really. Oh, my God. I could not imagine. I was looking at the lady next to me. Did they say how many horsepower? I actually know a bit of a car guy.

I've talked about this a lot. Aren't they like 800 horsepower or something? What I was seeing. So it's all like, what is in these things for an engine? And it says they're all Chevy big block engines. And I thought it was saying like 1800 horsepower. Okay. Yeah. It's a 540 cubic inch Chevy big block engine, usually supercharged and methanol injected and generating around 1500 horsepower and 1100 foot pound of

torque. So yeah, I mean like they they're like from an engineering standpoint, like they're crazy. Like it's cool What they can make those and they all have like rear steer like the rear wheels are turning to you know They can turn they probably turn sharper in those and most people can in their cars, you know Yeah, so I mean they are cool, but yeah, they're freaking loud You feel it in your bones even with your earplugs on It's they have the stupid thing there it's like robotic that looks like a dinosaur that pin that has pinches the car up and it looks like a Zamboni and then all of a sudden yeah the most pathetic excuse for wings pop out and then the world's slowest tracks yeah

takes like a minute for this and then the head comes out and it takes way too long and then it like to go pinch is a car I have the roof off of a car and then grab the seat. I'm like This is probably cool in the 90s But like the world's kind of progressed since then and I don't know if this is am bony box dragon thing has so they had that Exactly. Yes. Okay. I didn't know that was a staple I didn't know if that was a hot wheels thing or a staple. I'm sure sure I've seen it at least a couple of times before Yeah

So I will say I don't know the tickets were 50 bucks a piece. I was entertained for $50 I had a when I talked to my buddy that was there He's like, oh when you would like to monster jam, they kind of just let him cut loose and like they're just going You know, there's trucks going wild. They're doing stuff. He's like this was a little like It was a little too restrained. So I could see how a different format would would assist. But my main takeaway is that dirt bike. I don't, Hey, dirt bike riders. I'm saying this unsafe at any speed. Those things are crazy soccer. I'm like, dude, these guys are, I'm assuming it's all three of these

guys. If I had to guess, are probably their early 20s and are just like willing to just put their life on the line for some kids that have no clue what's going on and like these guys are just going for it though man it is and they're they're good they're living the life presumably they're traveling around getting oh rip it around their dirt bike get the crowd going and just getting hyped up and yeah I mean I can see why they'd like to do that but whoo that's that is that is living on the edge Yeah Do we got do you have one more ad to read? Oh, you know what?

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Barefoot shoes it's where it's at head on over to barefoot.store while you're there use code Masanomics and you can save 10% on your next order. Thank you barefoot shoes Thanks barefoot. Oh Make sure to check out our YouTube channel massonomics.com slash YouTube. That's not right, but we'll pretend that's how that works. This week's YouTube video, the most recent one, was the Garage Gym Tour with Big Jake of Garage Gym Experiment. And then the one that's actually new

by the time this comes out is our Garage Gym Tour with Dr. Tattie Waffles, Doc Tatt Waffles. Is there a doctor in the house? There is now, it's Dr. Tattie Waffles and he shows off his impressive garage gym with a lot of tech, a lot of Vultra setups in there and just a lot of even cool like DIY like almost like high-end DIY a lot of customizations things that yeah cuz it's been a while since been a

while too slow on the button too slow on the button to bear with to how overstayed how long it took Tanner to find that button there just watching It's been a while. I can overstate how long it took Tanner to find that button there, just watching it happen in real time at an incredibly slow pace. It took like, it took about a week for you to hit that button. But watching back on the video, I was actually surprised the number of things that I had forgotten about since when we recorded it what month and a half ago and Yeah, he had some very impressive things from building at one point. It's really funny. Tanny. You'll see in the video he's talking about his

but whatever the Elite FTS glute ham machine he has is is called. And he custom fabricated some handles that he can use for dips. And it was like those handles are made to fit just into that machine and also work with his Rogue Velocidor knurled handles. And you're like, oh, is this a product someone can buy? He's like, no, this is a very very specific product like

well I'm watching I'm like yeah there's maybe one other person in the world that would be like yes I need that for my for my elite yes boot ham developer where I also want to do dips with my rogue velocidor handles so there's there's a few things like that that I liked and And yeah, he did just, he has customized a lot of things in the gym exactly to his specification. And it's all, none of it is just like dumb stuff. Like it's all very practical reasons for why he did it. So I really enjoyed his gym tour.

Yeah, and I'll said it before, I'll say it again. We're the best at home gym tours. Nobody's better. Everyone else's leagues behind us as far as the home gym tours on YouTube. And if we don't have the most out there now, we're going to, there's like a new one coming pretty much every single week. We're just racking them in. We're racking them up and racking them in racking them and stacking them,

stacking them, stacking them up. Bodies high on these home gym tours. Do you think anybody has more home gym tour anymore? Do you think anyone has more gym tours on YouTube than us? Who the hell would it be? Is there someone out there that we don't know? The only possibility is just what is Coops backlog look like, you know He does I bet he doesn't have like 30 gym to well, but he has like 10 years of videos So he would only need to do a couple a year But I mean it could be around there

We will we will pass him up shortly here though if he is ahead of us even that is right So it's true what I'm saying if we don't have the most on YouTube now We're going to very soon and ours are better That's kind of the trump card Ours are better. It's the ultimate decision maker. Ours are better, it's just factual. Yeah. There's no room for debate, it's just factual.

There's not debatable. It's not. I'm not open to debate on that actually. Leave us a comment on this YouTube video. What should we have people comment about on this YouTube video if they made it this long? If you made it this long, I want you to leave a comment about something so we know you made it this long.

Tell us how long you made it. Like what would it be? Let know but what would we have them mentioned that would they would never mention otherwise so that we just know that they made it this far into the video? You can mention Tommy having wool in his hair. Just tell me I have wool in my hair. Say make it tell something something about Tommy having wool in his hair? Yes, just tell me I have wool in my hair. Tell something about Tommy having wool in his hair.

Tommy, his hair and wool. And we'll know you made it this far into the video. Buy something from Mastinomics.com. Tommy, where do they find you? You can find me at tomahawk underscore D. You can follow me at tanner underscore bear. Just make sure to follow Mastinomics at Mastinomics.