Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 027: Bonus Episode: Naked Tanning & Insider Muscle Building Secrets

Episode Date: February 17, 2015

Adam is our resident IFBB* Pro men's physique competitor. In this episode, Sal and Justin grill him on what goes on behind the scenes at a pro competition. Included in this conversation is an insider exposé on how to use intensity, frequency, volume and recovery to maximize muscle growth. *International Federation of Bodybuilding and Fitness

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, please only one place to go. Mind, hop, mind, hop with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. Welcome back to Mind Pump. Please subscribe to our awesome show so you can hear some of these incredibly informational topics. Is it really awesome though? It's pretty awesome. It's there.

I've been told it's Howard Stern meets fitness. I mean, I know, I go right for the fucking top five. I've been told a lot like the fucking number one. We're pretty much, we're speaking to the four of you that are listening to ice. Yeah, exactly. You know what subject I want to go into? So one of us sitting here

Had and it had an experience what maybe a week or two ago on a stage. Where is he go? Oh, okay Just that can't was me. Yeah Adam just finished competition physique for the first time. He was on the Olympia stage not the Olympia stage. What was it? No, we're down at What a dick Formets. Yeah, that's what I meant Competition it was my pro debut is your pro debut. Sorry. I got confused Right to the Olympia. I'm not that way your mind's after that's what I'm trying to go to that's where that's where you just

Compete it in your first pro competition as a competitor. Correct. So what's that all about? So I've been to competition, I've watched them, but I want to know what it's like backstage. I want to know what it's like with the other competitors. Who puts the oil on you? Yeah, okay. Do you get afraid of getting a boner on stage or a little bikini tights?

First of all, let's start about. Men's physique has only been around since 2012. Why did they create men's physique? Okay, that's a great question. Why not just bodybuilding? So bodybuilding has a, oh, it had a peak, right? So after Arnold, there was this huge flux of new fans. Before that, I mean, bodybuilding's been around forever, right?

I mean, you would know the probably beginning of the body even better than I would. So it's been around forever. But during Arnold's force nigger time, he was the first like personality. Shorten niggers like Jesus. He is. Yeah. So like it's like BC 80 before Christ. Absolutely. We're like shorts and nigger time. Exactly. When that happens, it's going to need that we were there before. I or we were there afterwards. Let's see it happen. We were, you know, kids growing up when it was

when it was going on. Right. So anyways, what happened was you saw it grew, right? Now it became commercialized, now it was kind of cool thing to do before you were like a circus act, you were weird. Yeah, weird if you did things like that. Well now, after Arnold, it became kind of hip. But then it got to the point where bodybuilding got so extreme that in the last 10 years, you've actually seen a decrease in just viewers and magazines subscription.

So what do you mean by extreme? I mean, I know what you mean by extreme, but there's gonna be some listeners that. So, okay, perfect example. Arnold Schwarzenegger was massive of his time. Arnold Schwarzenegger would get his ass kicked and handed to him by Phil Heath and by Jay Cutler and some of your ex Olympians now.

He was what? On stage, I think he was what, 6 to 230 pounds. Yeah, I should say. Or lean, I should say lean. Yeah. If you're 6 to now on stage, you need to weigh like 280. Yeah, yeah. Right. So, okay. And what's happened is, and it's not the bodybuilders fault, right? Because it's what the audience wanted to see. It was always cooler to see the next big guy, you know, the bigger guy who was bigger, who was bigger. And it turned into this whole thing now where these guys have to take so much hormones

to get to that size. And it's hormones, by the way, in bodybuilding and then around, it's a beginning of time also, all those guys, those people, it's funny too, so those people think that Arnold Schwarzenegger was all natural. No, it was not. Everybody took hormones and bodybuilding.

No, the first Mr. Olympia Larry Scott, he took Diana Ball, he had my, and that's the first, those were the first of that. Yeah, they used to be able to get prescribed from their doctor, wasn't like it. And so anyways, you've just now seen now time that they've just taken to the next level and they're continuing. Because they're honestly, we don't have anything that shows that taking these crazy amounts

of testosterone haven't even long-term effects. We don't have anybody that's been taking them this for, you know, grams of synthetics on a weekly basis for long periods of time, we don't have any generations to show how dangerous I could be and all these guys tend to be living and being fine, so you just see them continuing to push the limits and get further and further and further and get crazier and crazier.

And it's gotten so crazy that it shrunk the amount of people that are interested in it. Yeah, it's like a cult sport. A small group of hardcore fans and that's it. Yeah, because you gotta be, you wanna get crazy like that too, but a majority of the population, I think, and I know this was a long-winded answer

for what you just asked me with the whole men's physique, but this is why I believe, and I'm pretty sure it is evolved, is because the physique look is a much more obtainable look. You could actually be a natural guy and get that physique. Now do a lot of people still use, oh absolutely, but it's more, what's the word commercial? Yeah, commercial. Yeah, well it's more appealing.

It's more appealing to the average. Yeah, because the average woman, especially the average woman, looks at a pro bodybuilder. What are the first thing they say? Oh, grump. No, yeah, you saw that shift where women are just like, oh, that's disgusting. Yeah, they're mortified by it's too much.

So, and there still is a small percentage of people that disagree, but it's very small. And so by going to Men's physique, it's a much broader population. So do they judge differently than I'm assuming? Oh, yeah, in fact, my second. So if you're too big, you. My second show, so okay, my very first show

that I ever did was the first time I'd ever pushed my body that extreme, I got extremely ripped. I was, you know, 2% body fat at maximum. And I was just shredded to the bone. Well, when I came up on stage, the judges told me that I was too conditioned. And I was trying too hard and I was like, oh crap, I was too, too ripped. So my second show, I decided, okay, I'm going to come in a little fuller and a little softer, you know,

so I bumped at the calories. I came on stage, I hit stage about eight to ten pounds heavier. And that show, I didn't even place in the top five. This is a previous show I'd finished fourth and second place. And then this show I finished in sixth place. It cracked the top five and the response I get from the judges was I was too big. I was like, I'm bodybuild. So literally eight pounds difference. So me putting eight to ten pounds on my way of objective, if you're using their gilding deck. It is. And then you know, we could, I can, we could talk a whole other episode just about all that stuff too. But too, but overall what they're trying to do, the image they're looking for is they don't want to start to creep into

bodybuilding. So if you start to look to bodybuilder-ish where you look a bit, and by bodybuilder-ish- And you don't even pose when you're on stage. You don't flex. You don't do back double-by-step. I mean, so Vince and Zika, this is that when you get out there, we have a little walk. It reminds me of what a T-walk is for women for their bikinis.

You walk out and you come out in a little T and you do your little turns. You let the judges see you from the front, the side, the back and you turn back, you wave and you leave. And you blow on my kiss and you just say, I do that, that's right. You're really? That's my move, you know.

Just as, at least Justin's watched one of my shows. I was there. I was there. So, support this guy. So, you know, that is how it works. And if you get to a point where like I said, you get too big now, especially at the amateur and the national level now at the professional level, the way they look at it is the typical guy takes a few years to be able to even make it to the professional level. And by that time he's got a lot of muscle maturity, he's

put some time on the iron. And so they expect the size of the guy to be a little bit bigger. So you can definitely have, I was definitely, normally, I'm used to being the biggest guy on stage. And more concerned about looking too big next to my other competitors, where I looked like an average guy with the professional level. There was a couple guys that were much larger than me. Most guys were built similar as far as muscle size. So who will you up? I'm honest to God. I've always wanted to know.

So there's always like a company that is, and I forget the name of the company that was just here done. Yeah, I'm gonna Google it. And there's, there's no make couple girls, probably three or four girls that they have their level gloves on and they got this little spray thing and they, they call it glazing. So you get glazed before you have stage. And so don't, don't Google glazing, don't Google girls and glazing at the same time. I promise you you're not going to find girls that are glazing above. So I'll tell you, it'll be something.

That was not my weirdest experience. If you want to talk about glazing, getting ready for a show, my whole, so here was the weirdest one, so check this out. So this is the first time, now I've tanned before in a tanning salon, I've even done the little automated spray tan thing, but I've never had somebody spray me. Oh, okay, that airbrush. Yeah, so I've never been airbrushed tan before.

So let me tell you my first experience with that. So I go to my first show and it's in Sacramento and I go through a company that is offsite there. So most all shows they have one company who comes in and they spray a lot of the competitors within the location. But then if you want to save a couple of bucks or maybe you know somebody else who you like the way they tan or they're formula better, you can tan outside

that there's something that says you can't do that. So I typically, I like to do my own thing. I don't like to be where everybody else is. It's just, I like to be the guy who's kind of, doing my own thing, right? So I'm signed up with somebody else to go do this. Well, I get the address of the hotel that I need to show up to you this Friday tan.

So I get there and I come walking up and I'm already thinking, okay, you're in short. So I'm probably gonna be naked, you know? So I need to be tanned everywhere with that. So I'm gonna make sure that I'm either that or have some you're in short, so I'm probably gonna be naked, you know, so I need to be canned everywhere with that. So I'm gonna make sure that I'm either that or have some really small bikini- The listeners are listening. Right there, right?

So I get in and walk into this hotel room and I kid you not, there's 15 dudes, ask naked to stand around in a little, you know, single, single room, I mean, the thing is no bigger than the living room right now. And we're all standing next to each other. Everyone's naked getting right in there, just like pumping dudes through to get 10.

Well, after you get sprayed, you can't just put your clothes on. No, you gotta wait for it to dry. Yeah, wait for it to dry. So you're in line. You're in a naked line. I'm in a tight room. You know what this sounds like today.

So let's just pick for this right? A bunch of really lean dudes, nude in a line waiting for something. Yeah. It sounds like a horrible Japanese porn. Wait, wait, wait, wait. The music in the background is like, there's still music.

Yeah, there was still music. And you guys are warming up while you're in line. So the talk about the most awkward thing was, I played sports my whole life, so I'm used to showering around other dudes and do that, that's not the weird part. The very part is just, normally when you're doing that, I played sports my whole life so I'm used to showering around other dudes and do that. That's not the weird part. The very part is just, normally when you're doing that, right, when you're after a full

of dudes, would you sit here? Which, no, no, no. But when you played sports, you shower, you dry off, you put your clothes, you don't stand around naked, talking to each other. You know what I'm saying? There's nothing else. It's more awkward not to talk because you're standing almost shoulder to shoulder. I'm broke.

Check out my flex. So, yeah, you're looking at each other and you're like, hey, you look pretty good. Hey, you look good too, man. You work hard. Yo, yeah, who put your dice? Yo, you've got all this small talk standing there. Ask Naky looking like a brownie, you know, saying like, it's just a weird, weird, odd. That was my first experience.

So I had zero interest to compete and now I have, I'm thinking, now I even have a less interest for them. I didn't have any real interest to compete and now I fuck no matter what I ever think about competing. Yeah, so that was my very first show, it was like that and it was quite the experience. So comparing physique to bodybuilding, because I grew up a following bodybuilding,

I loved bodybuilders, the routines, of course I wanted to build muscles and at the time those are the guys that you followed, you listened to. This was during the time of Dorian Yates, which of course, I think is the most bad-ass Mr. Olympia of all time, probably because he was Mr. Olympia at the time.

I was really into it. But nonetheless, are the workouts different then? Are you physique competitors trained differently then, the bodybuilders, or is the big difference really just about the amount of hormones that they take and the fact that they take more extremes. Well, I think I think as a generalization, I think it would be the hormone thing. I mean, so the workouts are pretty much the same. Yeah, I mean, I think typically everybody does whatever they read in muscle and fitness. I think I think that's why I'm a little bit unique and different.

It's also why those that are listening that are friends or buddies of mine that lift and other competitors. Why here's here's my thing. Like I don't like to lift with other people. I am all by yourself guy. I've always been that way. And a lot of that is because I don't, whenever anyone asks me like, Oh, how do you train you? Which in these days, I don't have this split or full body routine or this like program that I follow,

which, you know, not to say that I haven't followed programs and done them before, but I'm constantly, especially now, like I'm into physique, I'm constantly critiquing my physique and looking at its weak points from a symmetry standpoint, and I'm addressing muscles that I think I need to develop more to balance my body out. So does that mean sometimes I work shoulders in a week three times? Absolutely. Does that mean sometimes I go two to three weeks with

not even touching my arms? Absolutely. Does that mean sometimes I work my calves out four times in a week? Absolutely. Does that mean I always do that? No, not necessarily. I'm always looking and always changing and I'm addressing that workout according to what I need and also feeling my body out. If I'm extremely sore from my leg workout two days ago, even though I'm still trying to develop my legs, I might not quite hit my legs yet until I feel fully recovered to hit them or maybe my quads are really sore but my hamstrings aren't. Maybe I'll hit hamstrings and I'll couple it with my biceps today. Like, I do that on the fly, constantly.

Well, I find that most gym rats or guys that work out the gym, and I see Justin nodding his head because he's probably on the same page as me. Most of them follow splits. Oh, absolutely. Right, like day one is chest. Day two is shoulders, day three is. Oh, Monday's always chest.

Monday's chest, why do they start with chest day? Because is there any fucking scientific reason? Yeah, that's fun to train That's the reason I think that you know You know what I found just through my years of training Clients is that for most people to build most to build muscle a full-body routine is superior to a split I think splits got really popular because you the anabolic that entered the fray. People started taking these anabolic, super anabolic all the time, which means their body wanted to build muscle. So it became more effective to beat the shit out of one muscle once a week and then focus

on the next muscle, hammer it and then let it rest for a week. Whereas the average natural dude needs more frequent stimulation and maybe less intensity Yeah, you know, you don't necessarily want to work out just your biceps for an hour I don't know if you think just yeah, no, well that like as far as rest and you brought that up like I remember the split routine Being because I I started out doing splits and that was like the thing that was like you know program to me I just remember going through and destroying the chest with like 10 different exercises and just like completely annihilating it.

And then what, you know, you can't, it just completely obliterates you. And then all your synergist muscles at the same time, like my triceps and, you know, shoulders and everything, we're all burned out. And so this is other programming issues when then you go do like an overhead press or something like that, like the next day or so. You know, me personally, I definitely

started to go into more of a total body, you know, workout and that just just the frequency of it. I've seen a lot better results as far as functionality strength, size, personally, but, you know, I mean, it, it, if you're taking antibiotics and all these things, you, you, you almost want to, you know, get, get as much effort as you can into just destroying that one body part and then you recover so fast, right? Well, I think it just changes the way your body responds a little bit. I don't think, I don't think I would, like, anabolic or non-anabolic, I don't think I would change my, my approach to how I still lift. I think that, I think you're,

you're about to go with it. I know you're going is, I think it's, it's a good point, but I still think that the same, the same science applies as far as, you know, why you would do your full bodies versus. Well, you know, you have the, the, the volume. If you look at like, you look at non people who don't work out, who will have certain muscular body parts, like a mechanic with muscular forearms, for example, or a male carrier with muscular calves, they have a lot of frequent stimulation, rather than the once a week blast of stimulation. And if you look at the way your body builds muscle because it's an adaptation response, there's really no, that's why your body builds muscle. It's adapting to a particular type of stress.

Well, if we look at all the systems of adaptation in the body, if I've used this example before, if we use this skin, for example, what's going to give you a better tan? If you go out and fry yourself once a week, or if you get a little bit of exposure every day. So it's that frequency of stimulation. I think that frequency principle that we've missed with modern workouts because we've replaced it with these splits where we beat the crap out of one muscle group. And so I did splits for years on myself and I switched to a full body routine, old school, Steve Reeves, John Grimic, pre-st Grymmick, you know, pre-steroid type workout, and boom, I built more muscle.

I don't lift to failure, I stop, you know, couple reps short of it, and I don't do, you know, 18 sets for my chest, I might do five or six. And though, here's an interesting thing too. When you do a full body routine, you do the same volume per week, roughly. You know, if you hit your chest once a week, you're probably end up doing more, actually. Maybe, right? If you hit your chest once a week, you're probably end up doing more actually.

Maybe, right? If you hit your chest, that's how I do it. Yeah, well most people, when they hit chest once a week, they might do on average 15 to 20 sets, right? But say 12 to 20 sets, 15 being the average. If I work out my chest three times a week, and I'm doing five sets each time, it's the same volume, but I'm getting three times

a week muscle stimulation. And I think it's important to note that recovery can be completely separate from adaptation, from growth, from muscle growth. And if you don't believe me, do this test for the listeners. Go hammer your legs really hard with an insane workout and then stay in bed for one week. Let them recover all you want. Don't move, literally lay in bed or lay on the couch. I promise you'll be weaker the next workout.

You'll recover, but you won't adapt. So they're completely, they can be completely separate things. And this is where the frequency of stimulation comes into effect, I think, with a full body routine. And it's not true for everybody. Like, some people, everybody responds a little differently to routines, but I found that more, more frequency with a little less intensity and playing with those two things, you tend to get better results. I mean, I could take a client, a complete beginner, and I can have them do very easy squats every day, and they'll be fine,

or I can beat the crap out of once a week, and they'll be destroyed. You know, so it's, so I think that's a principle that we're kind of missing today and I think if people started playing with that full body routine, I think you'd see a good chunk of people would discover that it's more effective for that. Well, I think it's, and you probably do something similar to that.

You're talking about a distinctive training, right? You go in and, but I bet you train everything. Exactly. Pretty frequently, yeah. So that's, here's my thing. And I think we're kind of agreeing on the same thing, just kind of different approaches on it here, because ultimately, things that are important for stimulating muscle growth is because you said our bodies are adaptation machines. And so you're throwing something at it, it's adapting to it, then you throw

a new thing at it, it adapts to it, and that's what you're constantly doing, and that's what's causing this growth. The other thing that's directly related to that also is volume. Right. And it's probably, I think volume is the simplest and the most effective singular thing that can affect muscle growth.

And the way you measure volume is sets, times reps, time weight, equals your total volume on that. So if you look back and just like a guy who does splits, like you said, he probably trains chastles to say once a week and he does 20 sets. Okay, he does 20 sets once a week, there's four weeks in a month. So he does a total of 100 sets in an entire month. Well, somebody who does a full body routine three days a week, I mean, and he's a more

volume. Oh, yes, significantly more volume. You'll probably end up doing 150 to 200, which is you're talking about a 50% to 100% increase. If you just simply increased your volume on specific, so those of you that are listening right now, if you took whatever in how you're working out right now and start tracking for the next month, if you can, at least two weeks, get an idea of your patterns. Exactly what Sal is talking about, how many sets that you left, and then figure out how many reps you're weight and multiply that and get your total volume.

And when you get your total volume on, let's just say, let's just use chest hypothetically, you get your total volume on your chest over just say, let's, we're gonna use chest hypothetically. You get your total volume on your chest over the next two weeks and figure that out for the month. So let's just say for hypothetical reasons, it's, you know, 10,000 pounds that you lift every two weeks on your chest. So a total in the month, you do 20,000 pounds. Increase that number by 15 to 20% and watch how much

change you see. Right, right. And adaptation comes from progression. It's the underlying thing for what we're talking about, really. I mean, if the volume definitely plays a major factor in that, I personally, too, like, I fluctuate my intensities quite frequently. Yeah. So that's something that keeps me with the ability to recover just for the simple fact

that I'm not, you know, I might beat the shit out of myself, one workout. But then the next one, I'm still moving, but I'm not at that high frequency. I'm not at that high intensity, rather. Well, I found that a sore muscle, if I go to the gym, because oftentimes I'm still sore. I train my whole body three times a week. And oftentimes I'll go in and I'll still be sore. But what I do is I reduce the intensity and it actually facilitates recovery and I get another muscle growth response. So

just because your sore doesn't necessarily mean you don't need to train that area, many times it just means you can move it in a much less intensity. And in fact, you'll find that you recover. Well, I was going to say watch yourself like, you know, go through that for weeks and see how sore you really get. I mean, actual soreness, like I feel when I'm doing a high intensity day is pretty much diminished. So, well, I think something that's important to say,

though, to what you both you're pointing out because you don't want someone to go to the extreme. There's also a fine line there, I believe, where if you, let's say you hammer the shit out of your chest or your full body routine and your chest is extremely sore from that workout, doesn't mean you can't do it again on Wednesday. But if you're looking for maximum strength and growth in that area, hammering it again wouldn't be ideal. Moving it and getting a good workout

at a much lower intensity, because if you were to hammer it all the time, then you're spending more time breaking down and not giving enough adequate rest. So rest and recovery is very, very important. Now it's not as important as like, I think a lot of supplement companies out there and a lot of the hoop law that you see.

Well, what is rest and recovery? I mean, like, is that just like sitting on your ass and... No, not at all. Right? I mean, they have to understand that like rest and recovery can mean functional movements that just like you're just moving the joints in order to create lubrication in order to keep things stimulated, more blood, more oxygen going back to an air. Because really, like, yeah, blood and circulation is what helps you heal.

Absolutely. If you don't have that and you're not moving, then you're not gonna heal properly. Very good point. And that's where I'm getting at is that, how you train, if you're gonna train that way, is important to you. You don't take what we're saying that,

okay, it doesn't mean you can't go hit that muscle again because you're not super sore. You don't wanna be hammering it all the time. I think another common thing you say splits wanna be hammering it all the time. I think another common thing, you say splits, guys training to failure all the time. That's the biggest mistake. Everybody think, everyone, and I think- Every set is to fail.

Oh, and I think, I'm just gonna give you an instant. Instagram, I always love blaming social media on these things because a couple buff dudes post it and then it becomes this thing, beast mode and like, do your pussy unless you're freaking just, you know, I puked and my workout was awesome. Yeah, and I mean I tell you what a handful of dudes

I've worked out with that are fits Martin television guys, you know working out And that's how they always train him like dude like that's why I don't train with you or anybody else because I don't train that way all the time Does it mean I don't get after it sometimes hell yeah? There's been many workouts I've been hugging a trash can afterwards because I wanted to break myself I wanted to break myself out. I wanted to shock to shit out of my system. But then I don't train that way all the time. I know you won't progress if you do that.

I'll say this. I'll make this claim right now. And I'm going to do this. I'll say this just to get, I'm sure I'm going to piss off some people. But if you take 10 people, average dudes or average people, men and women, and you put, or you take 20 of them, and you take 10 of them and you put them on a full body routine, three days a week, and the other 10 you put on a split. I guarantee you, on average, the full body

retainers will build more muscle, more strength, and be more functional. They will look better and they'll get better results. Eight out of 10 people, I will say, I will bet all day long on this, I'll put money on this. Eight, seven or eight out a 10 people will respond better to a full body routine that utilizes compound movements and focuses on the big gross motor movements versus your typical body parts split,

all fucking day long, especially if you're natural. Amen. Here's my one thing, though, to somewhat challenge that, is that you take those same two groups of people that are, you have your one group of person that's doing the full body splits or the splits and the other person that's doing the full body routines. Each of them have been training that way for six months. You take the person who's on the full body workouts

and you now show them splits on their body and then vice versa, what do you see? Well, I think within the first, maybe within the first month, you might see some change in both of them, but that, I mean, that's just the change. I think if you kept them on the routine, just talking about variability. So yeah, variability is one.

Variability is definitely one, but I think if you kept them on the routine, I bet you the full body people on the whole. It's the same, but you stick one, I don't know, you take one concept and you run with it, but then you shock the system like periodically, right? But there's so much you can change in a full body routine.

There's so much you could do with the workout. And it's funny, I would say one of the biggest mistakes people make is they listen to the most ritt buff dude in the gym or in the magazine. And that's the guy that they're gonna listen to. And I'm not saying that because Adam's the most buff-ritt dude at the table. that they're gonna listen to and I'm not saying that because Adam's the most Buffer You should listen to a guy like me because I'm as buff as all those buff dudes and you don't see me in the gym half as much

Cuz the stuff a lot of you gotta get on the Smith machine That's why that's why you should listen to me because man is motherfuckers never in the gym But he'd be looking like he's being a hell of a pissed off. That's why. That's why you should listen to me because Man, his motherfuckers never in the gym, but he'd be looking like he's in the gym all the time. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. For more information about this show and to get valuable free resources from Sal, Adam, and Justin, visit us at www.mindpumpradio.com. Until next time, this is Mind Pump. Until next time, this is MindPump.