Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 1330: Unconventional Training for Fat Loss and Muscle Gain

Episode Date: July 6, 2020

In this episode, Sal, Adam & Justin discuss how to add unconventional training to your workout to accelerate muscle growth & fat loss. How effective and impactive unconventional training can be for t...he body. (1:52) The value of doing things differently. Creating a novel stimulus. (5:31) Making you stronger in a functional, real-world, way. (10:51) Using unconventional training as a short-term way to lose more body fat. (15:14) How it trains and strengthens your weak links. (22:13) Why Mind Pump promotes this style of training. (27:40) Understanding how to program design unconventional training. (30:42) Related Links/Products Mentioned July Promotion: MAPS Strong ½ off!! **Promo code “STRONG50” at checkout** Visit Paleo Valley for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Code “Mindpump15” at checkout for 15% discount** The Other Best Muscle Building Exercises of All Time – Mind Pump Blog MAPS Macro Calculator We Burn as Many Calories as Hunter-Gatherers, So What Makes Us Fat? Mind Pump Podcast - YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned Robert Oberst (@robertoberst)  Instagram

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Starting point is 00:00:00 If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, with your hosts. Salta Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. In this episode of Mind Pump, the world's number one fitness health and entertainment part. Word number one! We talk about unconventional training and its value in benefits for the average person. So whether you want to burn body fat or build muscle, unconventional exercises and unconventional methods of training can provide tremendous, tremendous value for you.
Starting point is 00:00:37 Now this episode is brought to you by one of our sponsors, Paleo Valley. Paleo Valley has a lot of amazing organic supplements and food products. Our favorites are the meat sticks. Their grass fed, they taste good, no joke of the best tasting meat sticks we've ever had. High protein, of course, no carbohydrates, a great, easy, healthy snack. Now because you listen to my pump, you get 15% off the meat sticks and any other product that they have. Here's what you do. Go to paleovali.com.
Starting point is 00:01:06 That's palial.iovali.com. Forge-mindpump. Use the code MindPump15 and get 15% off your first order. Also all month long, MapsStrong is 50% off. This is a very effective fat burning muscle building unconventional workout type program. It's very, very effective. It's strong man inspired. You could do this with the home gym.
Starting point is 00:01:30 You don't need lots of fancy equipment. It is pretty intense. So make sure you've got a decent level of fitness before starting it. Here's how you get the 50% off discount. Go to mapsstrong.com. That's MAPSTROMG.com and use the code strong 50. That's STRONG50 on no space for the discount. When's the last time you guys followed strong?
Starting point is 00:01:55 You guys ever follow that? It's been a minute, but I'm going to be honest. Probably one of my favorite programs. I have pool from that program. Probably more than I pool from any other program. It was, you know, it's just so different. I love it. That's the thing. It's like, and even as an experienced trainer, I always learn new things and the thing that I learned
Starting point is 00:02:14 from that was at how effective and impactful, unconventional type training can be for the body, especially if you're somebody who's done it conventionally for so long. It makes a huge difference, you know, just to just make it up a little bit. To me, that's the message. The message is to the majority, really. If you were somebody who trained like a strong man, this is less valuable of an episode, but I think if you're like any of us who trained in a gym for most all of your career, these exercises were just they weren't favorable. Very few people were doing them. I never saw
Starting point is 00:02:55 half of the movements that are in strong. I'd say you never saw anybody do in the gym and it wasn't until and be honest very insecure to try and try one. I mean, here I am, there's a different, yeah, 25, 26 year old personal trainer and I'm a trainer, so people are watching the way I work out. I'm supposed to have quite a bit of experience at that point, I have almost 10 years of experience
Starting point is 00:03:19 of lifting under my belt. So the last thing I wanna do is look like a fool, trying some exercise that I've never done, never really seen anybody do inside the gym. And so I really avoided a lot of those movements for a long time. And this, you know, I'd say when Justin and I started hanging out together before MindPump and I started training over at his gym, get a lot of really, really top-not notch trainers in that gym. In fact, I remember working, that was the first time I'd ever been to a gym where I actually saw eight different trainers training clients on the floor and all eight of them were doing exercises that I may have never taught somebody before.
Starting point is 00:03:57 Yeah, yeah, it all kinds of different specialists in different directions, whether it was kettlebells, whether it was sports specific, you know, like Strongman competing, powerlifting, but yeah, it was very interesting and everybody was at the top of their game. So, yeah, I definitely loved that environment and took a lot from it. And, you know, speaking to the the Strongman type of lifts and, you know, what really I've noticed from strongman training is how they can not just lift heavy weights, but how they can move quickly with heavy weights. And how they can move around fully loaded like that is something totally different. Well, unconventional training gets its name unconventional, mainly because it's not
Starting point is 00:04:39 what is considered mainstream ways of working out, really, because the reality is, if you go back in time, unconventional training was conventional. That's the way people worked out. That's the way people worked out. I think about hundreds of years, right? Yeah, you go back to when people were first started working out. It was like, oh, it's hard. Let's do something else.
Starting point is 00:04:56 Yeah, I mean, you know, a good example, okay, I'll give you a good example. A farmer walk is a good example. Farmer walks, you almost never see anybody do them in the gym. Probably because it's not like a body part specific exercise. And so I never really did them myself. Once I implemented them in my routine on a regular basis, I couldn't believe the results I was getting from that exercise.
Starting point is 00:05:19 It's now become conventional for me, right? Now it's something that I include all the time. So there's a lot of value in doing things different from how you always do them. Now the first big reason for this is the novelty. It's different. And the body responds really, really well to different. Now it's not so well that you always change things all the time.
Starting point is 00:05:42 So like you're shaking dyes to figure out your workout. But when you do something for long enough and you're good at something, you're used to something and then you just switch it just a little bit, it gets your body to respond kind of like it did when you first started working out. I think that's games. I think that's because it's not a little bit sour
Starting point is 00:05:59 because somebody hearing that goes, well, I mean, my workouts are novel. Last time I did arms, I did skull crushers, and this time I did tricep pushdance. Oh, I see what you're saying. You know what I'm saying? That's novel, and that's different. I rotated my wrist.
Starting point is 00:06:12 Right, so, and this is important, though, to have the, to explain this, because I fell in that camp. You know, I fell in the camp of like, you know, I was doing novel things, and, you know, confusing my body every time I trained and doing different exercises, but unconventional training or strong man-type lifts when you talk about snatch grip dead lifts, zurchar squats, circus presses, you start talking about movements like that.
Starting point is 00:06:38 They're so novel that the signal that it sends to your body is so much louder than you varying arm exercises. It's a brand new stimulus. Right. I remember the first time I experienced that was as I was either 15 or 16 years old, I've already been lifting weights for about a year or two. And you know, like any teenage boy, one of my goals was to build my arms, right?
Starting point is 00:06:59 And the biceps, of course, that's the show muscle. If anybody ever asks you to flex your muscle, that's the one that you flex, even though you have hundreds of them all over your body. I had somebody flex their quad from you one time, see it? Let me show you really? He's like, what?
Starting point is 00:07:10 Who does that? Weird. To make fun of that guy. Yeah, so I was, you know, like most people when they first start with guys, when they first start working out, like arms are super important. So I was always doing arm exercises,
Starting point is 00:07:19 trying to get my biceps to grow, whatever. Oh yeah, I was 15 because I had bought myself a BMX type bike. And you know, back in those days, it was real popular that you get these BMX bikes and you jump curbs and you make ramps and do all this kind of stuff. And when you're first learning how to bunny hop
Starting point is 00:07:35 or jump, you just yank on the handlebars. Like you're just ripping them up, trying to get the bike to move because you don't know the skill, the technique of bunny hopping or whatever. So I was doing this all day long and it took me like a week to figure out how to bunny hop. But during that whole week I'm yanking on the bar, trying to get my tires to come up off the ground.
Starting point is 00:07:54 And I kept track of my bicep measurements as I'm doing this, except working out at the same time. My biceps grew. Now my workouts didn't change. It was because and I had peace of the together because I was yanking on didn't change. It was because, and I had peace the together, it was because I was yanking on those handlebars. It was unconventional, it was novel, and my body responded as a result of it.
Starting point is 00:08:11 So this is what happens to the body when you change things up, especially if you're stuck in a rut or doing the same thing, unconventional training provides that novelty that the body just sends a loud adaptation signal. If it's unfamiliar with it, and there's lots of different techniques to provide new stimulus that your body will respond to, and one of them is that fast twitch movement. That your body really has to figure this out quickly. It has to be able to apply
Starting point is 00:08:43 force right at that moment, and your muscle changes as a result of that. It has to be able to apply force like right at that moment. And, you know, your muscle changes as a result of that. It's a different type of muscle fiber that you're activating with this. And so, you know, to add some elements of power in there and speed, you know, your body is really going to respond, you know, completely differently than it would just, you know, in your seated position type of machine, you know, hypertrophy set. Totally. I find any exercise that is like this novel or this skill base too, you just get more bang for your buck for that also because the amount of, like, you do, if you've never done a circus press before, the first time you do it, you know, maybe you have some natural shoulder strength
Starting point is 00:09:23 and you get up a decent amount of weight, but there's a lot of technique. There's a lot of room to go. Right. There's a lot of room to improve. And that's where a lot of these results come from. First time you ever do a zircher squad or a snatch grip deadlift. The very first time, you probably don't pull nowhere near what or do as much weight as you possibly can because it is such a skill-based move. Yeah, those are two barriers right there. You're talking about, there are some high skill type movements that you do have to learn
Starting point is 00:09:49 and you have to learn with lighter weight. And so there's two big things where the ego kind of has to be checked. And then also, like you really have to study like the mechanics of it and try and duplicate so you don't hurt yourself. Right. And then there's another part too, which is when something's new, it's a new movement, there's a lot of central nervous system adaptation going on as well.
Starting point is 00:10:09 And when you get a lot of central nervous system adaptation going on, it also tends to compared with muscle. It tends to compare with muscle growth and strength. Those neurological adaptations are just as important, if not more important than the muscular adaptations. And so that novel stimulus, the fact that you're doing an unconventional exercise,
Starting point is 00:10:30 something that's really different from what you're used to, you're getting a very loud central nervous system signal that's saying, hey, we need to start routing neurons and start making connections. We need to start developing the central nervous system muscle, which then talks to the physical muscle. And so you just get better results. Now the next one is, this one's an obvious one, I think,
Starting point is 00:10:52 which is that unconventional exercises, or the ones that I think are considered unconventional today, they just make you more strong in a functional way, you know, like in a real world way. Well, weren't a lot of these, like, I mean, when you go back to like before we had plates and dumbbells and barbells, like, they were like lifting stones and bells of hay and like, weren't a lot of these competition. What was that?
Starting point is 00:11:15 What was that Netflix series that you turned me in? Yeah, it was a Highland Games stuff like that. Yeah, I mean, when you think of like real world functional type strength, these, the movements that they were doing, a lot of them they didn't have done, they were like rocks, holders or stones. And so to me, like what I love about how functional these are, and when I think functional, I think the most carry over into real life.
Starting point is 00:11:35 That's it. Like, you know, as much as we, we tout how great barbell back squats are, which they are when it comes to CNS, building muscle, burning body fat, still high level of functional. Still high level. It's still nowhere near as functional
Starting point is 00:11:51 as some of these unconventional lifts like we're talking about right now because never once in my life have I taken something loaded on my back and squat it down like that, where there's a lot of times where you'll grab something, pick it up off the ground with one arm and push it up over your head
Starting point is 00:12:04 or lift it up on the shelf or put it above a covered or hand a bag of some heavy sand to somebody. There's a lot of times where you might find yourself doing these movement patterns a lot more than we might see the traditional type of exercise. Yeah, a lot of that has to do with stabilizing certain parts of your body and anchoring yourself. Wow, you know, allowing certain movements to occur. And I think of sandbag training and I think of different unconventional type
Starting point is 00:12:30 of besides rocks and things like that, where the weight might even shift on you. And think about in real life, if you have dog food, if you have cement, if you have, weight isn't always just stationary weight. A lot of times it'll move on you. I love that point. I wasn't even thinking about that.
Starting point is 00:12:47 This is so true that when I think about our strong program and those exercises, they have so many great anti-rotational components to them, which not a lot of traditional programming addresses that. Unless you're going out and specifically putting in exercises to strengthen rotational movements or anti-rotation. If you're not already aware of that and doing that, these type of lives force you to get strong in those areas which are so important to real life strength. Totally.
Starting point is 00:13:17 So here's an example of functional versus less functional versus more functional, right? You can get really good on a machine type of a leg press, you know, where you're sitting in the chair and there's a stack over there and you push the pedals out and you're working your legs, you're getting your muscle stronger, versus an exercise like a barbell squat or a walking lunge,
Starting point is 00:13:37 because one of them is going to be more like real world and the other ones, like, do you want to just be strong in the gym, or do you want to be strong all the time? Not only that, but here's a thing too. Functional strength tends to be more broad-based strength anyway. Functional strength tends to develop a more balanced physique anyway. It tends to give you a better look to your body anyway.
Starting point is 00:14:02 Now, I'm talking about just the average person when they work out, not talking about the roided out bodybuilders, that's a whole different story. But the average person that works out when they do these unconventional movements and they become more functional, they look better. They look better partially because the bodies, when they develop their body, it looks like it's put together better, but also because they move better. I mean, we all know those, you know, muscle bound, you know, meathead type guys that, you know, you see them out in the real world, you know, pulling a chair out and sitting down at a table or lifting something or opening a door and just like, that just looks awkward, you know, they don't look like they move very well.
Starting point is 00:14:39 Now, of course, they do have a lot of strength, but it's not that functional kind of, you know, deri-sat athletic type of strength that you can get with functional movement. Um, and unconventional training provides that. It provides that more than your conventional style of, of, of training, especially isolation movements. Those are not very functional in comparison to the compound type of stuff. But just in, just and you mentioned like carrying dog food and stuff, a form of unconventional training would be lifting sandbags.
Starting point is 00:15:05 Yep. Sandbags are an excellent form of unconventional training and it's much more like what you would encounter in the real world anyway. Now the third one, and this one is an interesting one. And this one connects to the novelty part. When you do something that's different and new, you actually burn more calories.
Starting point is 00:15:24 This is an interesting thing that a lot of people don't realize. If you were to take somebody who was an excellent, excellent cyclist, like they're just a trained cyclist, and you measure how many calories that they burn, writing for an hour, and then you compare them to somebody who's equally as fit, but not a trained cyclist.
Starting point is 00:15:44 Somebody just writes the bike. I love the high rate just skyrocket. Well, I love the swimming and bike analogy with this, right? Get the highest level swimmer, the highest level cyclist. And when they do their sports, the both are cardiovascular wise and incredible shape, right? Both of them in great, great shape. But if you make them switch their sports, how unbelievably challenging they would be.
Starting point is 00:16:08 You put that cyclist in a pool and ask him to swim for an hour, and he's gonna be dying, trying to swim for an hour and vice versa. Even if they weren't necessarily dying, because they're fit, they're still burning more calories because their bodies are not super efficient. So here's the thing about your body. Your body's always trying to become as efficient as possible
Starting point is 00:16:29 with whatever you do. So if you do something a lot, your body gets really, really efficient at doing that thing. Unconventional training, when it's novel, it's something you don't do a lot. So you may be, you know, you may deadlift all the time, burn X amount of calories. Now you go do a zurcher deadlift,
Starting point is 00:16:46 and your calorie burn goes to the roof. Unconventional training is a great short term way of burning more body fat. This is a little off topic, but I think it's a good time to make this point because this is the reason why if you've used our macro calculator, why we recommend that most people go to sedentary.
Starting point is 00:17:02 Regardless if you have a very active job, if you've been a construction worker for 10 years of your life, even though your body probably is burning more calories than the guy who's sitting at the desk, believe it or not, your body's gotten so adapted to that and so efficient at that, that you're not burning as much as you think you're burning,
Starting point is 00:17:21 or what maybe you were when you first started that job. So if you've been doing like a really, really active job and you've been doing that for years, I would always tell clients when we're using like a tool, like a macro calculator, to still put themselves as sedentary unless they're doing all this outside physical activity. They did this, and I've brought this up on the podcast before.
Starting point is 00:17:40 They did this remarkable study on one of the the few remaining modern hunter gatherer societies that we have in the world today. Obviously, you know, the year 2020, not too many hunter gatherers exist, but there are some tribes that are out there that live the way that we did, you know, thousands of years ago. And so scientists went to study one of these tribes and noticed that the Hots of people they're from the Tans of Nia, I believe and What they wanted to test was to see what their calorie burn was like now their modern hunter gather So what's a hunter gatherer do during the day while they're searching for food? They're walking they're hunting. They're running. They're they're pulling things out of the ground
Starting point is 00:18:21 They are active all day long. Way more active than the average, you know, modern Westerner. Way more active, right? So the scientists hypothesized that the hodza people would be burning two or three times as many calories as the average person. They thought, oh, these, you know, we know we know how they live. They're burning like six, seven thousand calories a day. There's no way. They're running all day long. They're doing all stuff all day long. There's no way. They're running all day long. They're doing all stuff all day long. There's no way they're not burning a ton of calories. Then through some pretty sophisticated technology, they actually tested their calorie burn, their metabolism.
Starting point is 00:18:52 And they were shocked to find that the hodza people burned just a little bit more calories than the average person. Then the average Western couch potato, they burned just a little bit more calories. And they got otherwise they'd be dead. Right, that's the thing. So at first you think to yourself, how is that possible? But then you realize that makes perfect sense.
Starting point is 00:19:11 Hunter gathers, do not have access to high calories. Dense food like we do. They don't have, like, if I want to eat something, I'll eat it in five minutes, I can have Mexican food, Chinese food. I can go to a pub. I can do whatever I, in five minutes, I can eat pretty much whatever I want. I have access to so much calorie dense food.
Starting point is 00:19:29 Hunter gatherers did not. They didn't have this access. So the human body evolved to learn how to be efficient. And so this tribe, through all their activity and movement, that they are used to. They're adapted to. Their bodies are efficient. Now, if I went and lived with the tribe,
Starting point is 00:19:44 I would burn 6000 calories. Yeah, a day. But if I did it for 10, 15 years, my body would eventually be adapted. It would become like theirs. Right. So it's just a great study to illustrate how efficient you get with your calorie burn when you exercise and how unconventional training can spark the heck out of that. So you're 60 minute workout.
Starting point is 00:20:04 All of a sudden, it's burning as. So you're 60 minute workout. All of a sudden it's burning as many calories as a 90 minute workout. Well, and back to the point that I was making earlier about doing a tricep push down versus a skull crusher is novel, it's different, it's a different stimulus. But the difference is so close that the benefits that you get from a calorie expenditure is very, very small.
Starting point is 00:20:24 Your body doesn't recognize that as really novel. Sure, it's a little novel because of the different movement, different playing. Different angle. Different angle. So, okay, my body recognizes a little novel. Sure, it's a little more challenge. Sure, it kicks up a little bit more calories miniature.
Starting point is 00:20:37 But it's not like the difference between a school crusher and a circus press. Right. That is so novel, so different. And then with movements that are in strong, all of them are these full body movement. The whole body needs to speak to each other. Everything from the way your feet are gripping the ground
Starting point is 00:20:55 to the ends of your fingertips, the way you're holding on that weight, and your core being able to stabilize through the entire movement. So much is having to communicate, and it's so different and novel to whatever else that you've been used to doing that you see a huge difference in calories. Another thing I really love about Strongman Train
Starting point is 00:21:13 is that when they do heavy carries where they round their back and reason being is because we're always taught to never round our back in any kind of heavy lifting situation which is great in terms of technique, like being solid and being supported for your spine, but come in real life, there's lots of times where you have to grab something that you just have to bare hug that into your body and round your back in order to even make that possible. So, and there's a way to strengthen that, and that's something that you really need to
Starting point is 00:21:47 consider. Oh, heavy carries. Pick up a heavy stand bag, hug that thing, and then walk for distance. Your shoulder blades are spread forward because your upper back is rounded, and you're strengthening those muscles in a completely different position. You want to talk about developing your back. My gosh, if every back exercise you do focuses, like if you deadlift
Starting point is 00:22:06 and always focus on keeping your shoulders back like you should, doing something like this is totally different. Watch what happens, which brings me to the next point. Unconventional training, strengthens all your weak links. You don't even know you have them. Right now, you're listening right now,
Starting point is 00:22:20 you're like, what are you talking about? I work out all the time, I train my whole body. I don't have any weak links. You sure about that? Go, I tell you what, first time I learned about this, I did some clubs for my shoulders, club training. And I realized that my shoulders had some weak links. They weren't the rotational stability and strength,
Starting point is 00:22:38 wasn't what I thought they were. Even though I did rotator cuff training and I did overhead presses and laterals and all these other exercises, doing unconventional training with the clubs made me realize that I had some weak links in my shoulders. A lot of people's weak links might be their hands. Do some heavy farmer walks and you'll figure that out real quick, that that's the thing
Starting point is 00:22:56 that's weakest. All these small supported muscles oftentimes are just, they're not as strong as they could be because you've gotten really good at the exercises you do all the time. Yeah, and it's difficult at first. It seems like, why is this so hard, but it does expose those weak links in the kinetic chain, and it's great to address those things, because the payout is now it translates going back into something that's loaded equally with a barbell.
Starting point is 00:23:25 Man, your lifts go up. Obviously now I can lift even more weight because I've put the work in on these other parts of my lifts with my joints. Now they're supported and I'm able to then drive more force output there. When I think of weak links, when we talk about unconventional training, what I think the majority suffer from in regards to weak links is the full body communication. Most exercises that we do in the gym, aside from the good compound lifts that we all talk about, which most are done in the sagittal plane, you're not moving in multiple planes and
Starting point is 00:23:59 you're not having to do a lot of anti-rotational stuff. For the most part, we do a lot of isolation type exercises. We're focusing just on that body part. And when you do these unconventional lifts, most of them require this full body communication. That's where the breakdown is. Sure, maybe a circus, maybe I have great shoulders. Maybe I could sit in a military press and military press 225. But ask me
Starting point is 00:24:25 to rip the dumbbell on one side up from the floor, stabilizing the press over my head, just completely different. And I, and the breakdown, I can't do nowhere near. If I could military press 225, but then also then I go to a circus press and 75 pound single dumbbell is really, really hard to do. So that's where I think most people listening, or I would say, and speaking to the, you know, avid gym goer, where there we clink is, is the ability for the entire body to communicate. Well, really well and strong together. Let's focus in on that lift specifically, right? The circus press.
Starting point is 00:25:02 So, I'm taking it from the ground and bringing it up over my head, okay? To do that, let's think about your average person that's lifting what they would be doing, a bent over row, then transitioning up into an upright position and stabilizing my spine with my core and now pressing it overhead. Now I have to put all that together
Starting point is 00:25:23 and make it a fluid movement in one go and be stabilized and not throw my back out of wax. There's a lot going on there. Here's something else you need to know about weak links. Your body has safeguards that prevent it from being too strong or building too much muscle. And the safeguards are typically the weak links. Okay, so it's like a car with a rev limiter or let's say you have a car with 600 horsepower,
Starting point is 00:25:49 but the car can sense that using all 600 horsepower is going to break the axle. So it only exerts 300 horsepower. Your body does this as well. You may have the capacity to lift, let's say 300 pounds, but your body picks up that there's a weak link in the chain and that's, you know, that 300 pound lift might hurt me. So I'm only going to let you lift 200 pounds. You don't even realize this is happening.
Starting point is 00:26:13 I remember the first time this happened to me, you know, when I was a kid, the lift that everybody compared was the bench press. That was the lift, right? Yeah, it's a standard. Yeah, how much can you bench? And I remember getting stuck and I remember what the weight was. I got stuck at some weight and it wasn't budging and I couldn't figure it out. And then I read this article on this device that strengthened the rotator cuff.
Starting point is 00:26:31 I think it was called the shoulder horn. It was a weird looking thing that you put your arms in. And I started reading articles about the rotator cuff and then someone did a good job of communicating that your lack of strength in your rotator cuff may be what's preventing you from lifting more weight. And I thought, that's kind of weird. My shoulders don't hurt, but let me give this a shot anyway and see what happens.
Starting point is 00:26:48 I gained 10 pounds in my bench press almost instantly because my body sensed that that weak link now was a little stronger and now it can allow me to exert more force and more strength. So you have these trust me, you have these weak links, especially if you do the same exercises all the time. You just don't know it. Try unconventional lifts and you're going to find areas your body getting sore and you're going to feel areas your body that you normally never feel. You know, I've had people do squats and I changed their position, have them go a little lower and they feel in their calves because that was the weak link in their positioning, for example.
Starting point is 00:27:25 So, unconventional lifts, puts pressure on those weak links in different ways, forces them to get stronger, which then increases your capacity for strength and for performance and for muscle for the rest of your body. And all of this makes it fun. Yeah. I mean, it really does. It's challenging. It's probably why I say that I pull from this program more than any other program
Starting point is 00:27:48 I really enjoy Training these movements now something that I was intimidated to do for most my career because I've never done this before I'm not sure I don't want to look like a fool when I do it to now like really really enjoying facts There is to mention earlier or on another episode I talked about how, you know, sometimes I'll just go to the gym and just squat, you know, and that's all I'll do. Sometimes I'll just go and circus press, or I'll just go, you know, snatch grip deadlift and just get good because they're such high skill level exercises and their full body, entire body communicating. Sometimes I just love going to the gym and practicing them and getting really good.
Starting point is 00:28:23 And then I leave feeling like I got a great workout because everything gets stimulated so I think it's a lot of fun to train this way especially if you've never trained this way totally it's different it's fun and here's the fun part for me So I'll tell you that this is kind of silly, but this is what I like about Unconventional lifting you know, I've been working out for so long now that you know I know what my potential is for the major lifts. I know what I've done in the past. At this point, adding five pounds to a lift is like a big deal because I've been doing it for so long.
Starting point is 00:28:55 So I'm kind of hitting that limit or whatever. But when I do unconventional lifts because they're different, because they're new and I have to learn them, my strength gains on them are crazy. You know, like I'll do a snatch grip deadlift and, you know, the first few times I'm doing it, I'm kind of getting used to it and figuring out the positioning. Now I know what to fire.
Starting point is 00:29:12 And I'm adding like 10, 15 pounds each time because my CNS is responding because it's a new thing that I'm doing. Now if you, can you tell me that your body's not going to have crazy results if you're not adding that kind of weight every time you work out? Now of course it doesn't happen all the time. It's not going to have crazy results. If you're not adding that kind of weight every time you work out. Now, of course, it doesn't happen all the time. It's not indefinite. But when you do a new exercise, initially, that capacity for improvements is so big, mainly because you suck at it the first time you do it.
Starting point is 00:29:36 I've almost got addicted to it. This is very similar to how I got into mobility training as well. It was just understanding that what I wasn't doing, I was so weak in those areas and I couldn't understand why. I just wasn't doing these types of movements. And then once I started to incorporate more mobility, my joints start to feel like my end ranges were strong, gain range of motion, but also gain stability and strength. Then immediately that applied to my regular lifts. I just felt
Starting point is 00:30:11 even more capable. My form was better. My body didn't shift as much as it used to. I could hold the weight for longer. Unconventional training is much like that. I'm really exposing all these different planes of motion simultaneously and I'm loading in ranges. And so my body just has to account for that. And it has to get stronger to account for the load being in a different position. And so your body just naturally will have to rise to the occasion. Now, we're talking about all the things that are really fun
Starting point is 00:30:43 about training this way. I do when I dress up or talking about fun, all the things that are unfun, and one of the unfun parts about this is understanding how to program design it. When I think back to all the programs that we created, I would say strong was probably one of the more challenging ones for us to piece together and figure out, aside from the fact
Starting point is 00:31:01 that none of us were strong men and didn't train that way for years and years and years, and that's why we enlisted someone like Robert Oberst to come in and support us when we wrote it. What we understand was it was programming really well, and you know, when you're trying to put together a program that is incorporating all these unconvinced lifts, you do want to think about how you insert them into a workout. Yeah, big challenges like, you know, where does a farmer walk go? You know, where does a zircher deadlift go? Is that Zika on back day? Yeah, is that back or is that late?
Starting point is 00:31:33 I think this is why a lot of people avoid. That's why I want to address this. Yes, because I think there's a lot of people that are like, Oh, yeah, okay, that sounds good. It's because most people, when they understand, you know, what most people understand about workout programming is chest exercises, back exercises, shoulder exercises, and it's hard to, like a Turkish get up, where do you put that
Starting point is 00:31:51 in your routine, you're kind of doing everything? So you're right. It's more like loaded movement. So if you just think of it as I'm training movement and my whole body has to work together versus training specific body parts, like that's a little bit more close. Yeah, I would say exactly what Justin just said.
Starting point is 00:32:07 Rather than focusing on body parts, focus on movement. So here I'm lifting, here I'm squatting, here I'm doing some pushing and some pulling type stuff. And of course, if you want, all that guess work taken out, as Adam said, we created MAP Strong, which is full of unconventional exercises, and it's an unconventional workout, and it's become one of the favorites.
Starting point is 00:32:30 It was funny, it was a dark horse. We didn't know how people- I have females. Yeah. It's like our number one goal. Oh, I know. For females, which I really surprised me. Blue my mind.
Starting point is 00:32:40 It's because it's posterior chain. A lot of butt stuff. Yeah, Katrina loved it. I mean, everybody I've talked to, and that was not ready for that. I mean, honestly, when we wrote it, I was thinking of like the dudes that like really love strong men training,
Starting point is 00:32:52 but it's become one of our most popular programs for girls. Same for Jessica. It's our absolute favorite program, and then second place is Maps Antiballic. So, so you can get that program. It's 50% off all month long. You go to mapsstrong.com, that's MAPS, S-T-R-O-N-G, and then use the code strong50
Starting point is 00:33:12 for the discount, that's S-T-R-O-N-G five-zero without a space. Also, we record the podcast on video as well as audio. So if you like listening to us, imagine how much you like looking at us. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Go to YouTube, Mind Pump Podcast how much you like looking at us. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Go to YouTube, Mind Pump Podcast. Also, you can find us on Instagram.
Starting point is 00:33:28 You can find Justin at Mind Pump Justin. You can find me at Mind Pump Sal and Adam at Mind Pump Adam. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Superbundle at MindPumpMedia.com. The RGB Superbundle includes maps and a ballac,
Starting point is 00:33:50 maps for performance, and maps aesthetic. Nine months of phased, expert exercise programming designed by Sal Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints in over 200 videos, the RGB Superbundle is like having sour, and an adjustment as your own personal trainers,
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