Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2555: The Muscle-Building Secrets of Unilateral Training

Episode Date: March 17, 2025

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind Pump with your hosts, Sal DeStefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. You just found the most downloaded fitness, health, and entertainment podcast. This is Mind Pump. Today's episodes, you are going to uncover the muscle building secrets of unilateral training, build muscle you thought you couldn't by training in a way that you haven't ever or ever in a long time. That's what we're gonna talk about in today's episode. By the way, for today's episode we're putting Maps Symmetry on 50% off. So if you want to

get that program go to mapsymmetry.com use the code SYM50 for half off. Now this episode is also brought to you by a sponsor, Viori, Viori makes the best at leisure wear you'll find anywhere. And if you go through our link, you'll get 20% off, that's one of the biggest discounts you'll find anywhere. Go to Vioriclothing.com, that's V-U-O-R-I, clothing.com forward slash mind pump.

Again, on that link, 20% off. All right, here comes the show. If you're not doing a phase of unilateral training, you're losing gains, we're gonna talk about the secret powers, the gains you can get from unilateral training. We're gonna break it down for you and why it's so effective.

Let's get into it. You guys remember how long it was in your career until you did like a true training cycle of this? Forever. I know, it was a long time before I actually made it like a full training cycle. I always- It's like sprinkled in.

Yes. But never had I programmed like, I'm going to run this for four weeks or six weeks at a time and see what happens. That's the difference. The difference is actually making it a training block. Yeah. Because I'd done unilateral. So for people who are like, what are you guys talking about?

Unilateral means one arm or one leg at a time. Bilateral is both at the same time, okay? So dumbbell work tends to be more unilateral, although you could do bilateral dumbbell work. Barbell work tends to be more bilateral. And I would do unilateral exercises here and there, but I almost never, not until much later, did I do a block of unilateral training.

And that's when I saw the craziest things. Yeah, the only time I really did it was when I had an injury and I was recovering from that, but it's like that limited you from doing a lot of bilateral exercises to begin with, and then it definitely showed me how effective that was in still building muscle and also to reinforcing some weaknesses that were there. Well, this is why I think this is such a cool conversation is because I'm sure we're not alone in this where almost everybody has somewhat of unilateral training, probably that's programmed into their program already or intermittently do it too.

programmed into their program already or intermittently do it too. But probably like us, because of that, you go, oh, I do it. So I don't do a whole block for four or six weeks of just that. I think there's a lot of value to just training in a pure unilateral block like that. So you can really go into it with an intent of like, this is what I'm trying to acquire from this. What happens if I purely focus just on that? and then what happens on the backside of that wasn't so much later. And then once I figured that, that became something that was like a go-to move for me with a lot of clients. Now, a good example of what you're talking about, Adam, is like, you know, someone could

throw in, I'll use a common exercise, bench press here and there. Or someone could do a training block that's focused on getting stronger the bench press, which means you will doing a lot of bench press. Which one is going to produce the best results in relation to that exercise, right? The one that's focused, the one that you're doing a specific training block. So there is value in sprinkling in unilateral exercises, but if you want to really get the most out of them, do a full training block and watch what happens. The gains that come from it are remarkable.

In fact, I, I, some of my favorite times of the podcast when we've had people call in who have followed our unilateral training program, MapSymmetry, and they show us DEXA scans before and after. And what the DEXA scans show is remarkable. So whenever you get a DEXA scan, you can actually see how much lean body mass you have in your right arm versus your left arm and your right leg versus your left leg. And everybody has a little bit of discrepancy left to right.

Everybody. And the body's really good at compensating. So if you've been lifting weights for a long time, you don't have crazy right to left imbalances like a beginner. Like when I would train brand new clients, people who are right handed, like the difference between a right and left hand

was comical. They could lift way more with one side than they could the other. And that's just because they don't work out and they use their right arm a lot more than their left arm, for example, for people who are right handed. But if you've been lifting weights for a long right arm a lot more than their left arm, for example, for people who are right handed. But if you've been lifting weights for a long time,

a lot of that balances out, even with bilateral training, even with just a lot of barbell work, but there still are discrepancies and your body gets so good at compensating that you can't tell until you do true and real unilateral training for a block of time. Then you can see the difference. But you can see this with DEXA scans,

where you'll look and you'll see there's a one or two pound difference between the right leg and the left leg, or the right arm and the left arm. And so we've had people call in, they follow, MAP Symmetry is a unilateral program, right? It's a 12 week program. They'll follow it, and then they'll come back and say,

I gained five pounds of lean body mass, which is a lot of muscle for somebody who's experienced. These are experienced people. But then they'll show us where they gained it. It was all in the areas that were underdeveloped. So like the body wanted to balance them out, you just have to give it the right stimulus. We're just such creatures of habit.

We have tendencies and we have preferences and we also do a lot of the same things every single day in terms of movement and activity. And so, if you're not really taking a month or this became a new protocol for me with my clients because it was like, I didn't realize how im imbalance you could get over time. And especially like staying within that bilateral type of training, um, you know, it, it masks a lot of these underlying imbalances. Uh, and when you take them out of that situation, you put a more unilateral train, it really reveals, um, you know, where some of these like performance leaks were. And it's, it's,

it's a powerful thing to just break up your normal training cycle and throw this in. It also highlights how unbelievably adaptive our body is, the ability for it to just compensate for the other side to the point where you don't even think it's a big deal or you realize it until you get a scan like that and realize that you're like oh there's a pound difference between my right arm and my left arm. And you know, by the way, when I'm talking about these DESCA scans where people are gaining four

or five pounds of lean body mass, these are experienced people, they wouldn't have gained that lean body mass had they not trained unilaterally. In other words, training unilaterally forced their body to, for lack of a better term, catch up the side that was underdeveloped, resulting in more muscle mass. By the way, when we of a better term, catch up the side that was under developed, resulting in more muscle mass. By the way, when we talk unilateral training, what we're not talking about is dumbbell

chest presses or dumbbell shoulder presses. That's still, it's unilateral, but it's not really, it's still kind of bilateral. Real true unilateral training looks like one at a time. I'm just doing the right, I'm just doing the left or I'm alternating. That's the kind of training that we're talking about that really uncovers these right to left development issues. And if you don't, if you think you're balanced, I dare you to go to the gym and go do one arm or one leg exercises and see the difference and you'll feel the difference in it's typically one or two reps in well-trained individuals between the right and the difference and it's typically one or two reps

in well trained individuals between the right and the left side, at least one or two reps. Definitely a stability thing, you'll definitely notice more balance and stability on one side versus the other and training this way uncovers those imbalances and then the body does a great job of catching it up. So you build muscle in ways that you wouldn't have built had you done the similar protocol bilaterally.

It really does tap into, because your body does want to, it wants to adapt to the stimulus. You just have to give it a reason to. And if I continue to train bilaterally, it's so good at compensating. But if it's noticing a big discrepancy, which again, you're really highlighting by one arm at a time, one leg at a time type style training, then the body adapts and the adaptations result in this more muscle loss, which by the way later

turns into phenomenal results in your bilateral lifts. Just because you balance them out. Well, that's kind of a cool hack for, you know, if you're a trainer and you're training someone who's an advanced lifter, this is also kind of a cool hack. Yes. Because almost everybody is not perfectly balanced, If you're a trainer and you're training someone who's an advanced lifter, this is also kind of a cool hack. Yes. Because almost everybody is not perfectly balanced, nobody is, right?

There's always opportunity for us to improve this. And if you know that most people don't train in a full unilateral training block like that, it's a quick, easy way for me to show a advanced client who knows a lot of training, show them cool results. So as to your point, like, if you didn't have that massive discrepancy from left to right, you're probably not gonna see that five to seven pounds

of gain muscle in that short of a period of time. But because there was such a large discrepancy and because you trained it appropriately to catch up with that, the body does wanna do that. And so you saw that if you would have kept going bilaterally in a normal program like that, that person would be lucky to maybe gain a pound or two pounds over that same same time. Well, here's the, here's the, the sequence of events, right?

Uh, I go from bilateral training to, to real unilateral training. And I do this over a period of time, the initial adaptation that happens in the central nervous system, just like all strength training, my CNS really has to adapt to bring up the weaker side, the side that has less stability up with the stronger side. Once that happens the muscle follows. The CNS always is first, muscle follows after. So as I get a better CNS connection, just imagine this right now to give you a good example. Imagine if you could snap your fingers and you could do everything that you could with your dominant hand with your non-dominant hand now suddenly.

Suddenly you're ambidextrous, truly. You could kick as well with your left foot, you could throw as well with your left hand if you're right handed. Imagine what that would feel like when you're doing bilateral lifts and doing anything else and also imagine what that would translate to in regards to muscle. And if you're thinking probably some serious results, you're right. That's exactly what happens. And it's a very underutilized method of training in the sense that we're talking. Again, people don't make it a focus.

They just kind of sprinkle it in. It makes up 15 to 20% of the workout, but it never makes up 80 plus percent of their workout. You know, totally off subject, but you just made me think of something that's such a cool thing. I'm always talking to my buddies about like the evolution of sports and stuff. One of the biggest evolutions in basketball has been the attention to those types of details. So you have players like Kyrie Irving, who's like, who's famous for practicing and shooting almost as much with his left hand as he does with his right hand. And then you watch that display in real time in game. It's why he's, he's revered as one of the

best ball handlers of all time of like understanding, putting that time of attention to detail. And it's like, you could go practice all the same drills, but if you're always using that same dominant hand all the time like that, there's this gap that you, you, you'll always kind of have. And so by going over there, which I'm sure there's, and why probably a lot of people avoid this too, is there's that those growing pains. There's that initial, this is harder, I'm not as strong, I'm not as good, I'm missing more, but it's like, you know, you stick with it and it opens up this opportunity for so much more gains. And you're not just seeing it in muscle, like you're talking about, you're even seeing this in like professional sports. It's cool.

and you're not just seeing it in muscle, like you're talking about, you're even seeing this in like professional sports. It's cool. Totally. One of the other points is that it'll make an old exercise new again. So what I mean by that is let's say you're always doing bilateral chest press, and now you're going to

a unilateral chest press, or an overhead press, or a row, or a pull pull down or a squat, right? When you switch to the unilateral version, it's actually a new exercise. Even though it looks identical, you're just doing one side. It's actually a brand new exercise as far as the central nervous system is concerned. This is how you tap into newbie gains. The reason why brand new people gain so fast is because of that initial adaptation, it's something totally new. And everybody talks about this. All the experienced lifters talk about this. brand new people gain so fast is because of that initial adaptation.

It's something totally new. And everybody talks about this. All the experienced lifters talk about this like, Oh man, if I could just get those newbie gains again. Well, one of the secrets of tapping into newbie gains as somebody who's experienced is to find an exercise that's brand new and get good at it. This is how you get newbie gains as someone who's experienced. We've talked about this on our podcast many times.

Try weird and new and different exercises, actually practice them over a long period of time and get good at them and you'll get that, that, that real snowball effect of results, right? Or that hockey stick of progress because you're going to tap into those newbie gains. Well, now you can do that with unilateral training because a chest press now becomes something completely different. A shoulder press becomes something different. You know, a raise or a, all the exercise becomes

something different because it's being done unilaterally. And now you're tapping in again to those awesome newbie games. Novelty, you're always seeking, I mean for me that's always your way of seeing continued progress or growth in the gym is finding different ways to create novelty within this gym that you show up to every single day. And there's a thousand different ways to do it. And this is an area, I think it just gets overlooked because you

sprinkle it into your routine. You justify that, oh, I already tap into that. I don't really do it, but because you don't train it in a block like that, you do still miss out on some of the gains that come with it. You do. And just to give a couple examples you know I'll use examples of exercises that people tend to do with dumbbells anyway right so like let's say a shoulder press a lot of people do dumbbell shoulder press

but everybody performs it you know 90% of time both dumbbells at the same time so although there's independent resistance and it's more unilateral than a barbell it's still bilateral. So if I were to do that where one dumbbell press up while one dumbbell stay down, or both dumbbells stay up, one comes down and up, one comes down and up, or one by itself, they're all totally different. They all involve an isometric contraction, the opposite side. They all involve different types of stabilization and they all require my CNS to adapt to the movement in a different way. I've literally

taken the shoulder press and just given you two or three different versions of a shoulder press and get good at any one of those and you're going to see some of these newbie gains. Yeah. So this is one of the benefits of that. Well, it's like offset loading. I mean, it's, it's, you're adding in a new element of balance and a new element of stability that your body has to strengthen and has to overcome. And that does nothing but benefit, um, your

bilateral movements because the more, um, stable and the more, um, you know, range of motion, you might actually end up getting stronger in, the stronger your lift skin. You're literally eliminating a weak point in your performance. Yeah, and I'm glad you said that because this is a trainer's secret, or should I say this is for people who don't work with a trainer.

You hear the term correctional exercise get thrown a lot by trainers. So correctional exercise, just real quick, correctional exercise, just real quick, correctional exercise aims to use typically resistance training in a way to correct movement balance issues or movement imbalances. So there are optimal ways to move, there are optimal ways to row and press and squat, and there are less optimal ways. And the more you move away from optimal, the less results you're going gonna get and the higher the risk of injury

okay so if I do a squat perfectly I'm gonna get a hundred out of a hundred in terms of all the benefits and results I can get from squat I bring that down to 90 now I'm gonna get 90% of or 90 out of a hundred for the results but I'm also gonna increase my risk of injury if I continue moving down that that that row I'm gonna get no results and all risk of injury. So correctional exercise is something that really experienced trainers and coaches understand and are educated in and they can train your body in ways to help you with shoulder function and hip function and ankle mobility and you know

rotation all different things. Well in easy way, now this isn't a fix all, but it covers a lot. Like, this will probably cover 75 to 80% of muscle imbalances in most people, okay? So there's another 20% that requires real specific correctional exercise. But the vast majority of muscle imbalances would get corrected if people did blocks

of unilateral training. Just one arm and one leg. This is what unlocked it for me was actually correctional exercise. unlocked it for me was actually correctional exercise. So it was me rehabbing myself back from my torn ACL and MCL. And I was forced to do unilateral work and correctional work. And what blew me away was when I finally came back and

reintroduced by like how strong I was. Yeah. And it was, it baffled me that, wait a second, I'm coming from the biggest injury I've ever had in my knee, wasn't even at peak strength or anything like right before it. And I'm coming out some of the strongest I've ever been in my leg. That was like the first time I peered into like, oh, wow, there's something here that I haven't unlocked as a trainer. And

that's when I started to reintroduce it to my clients. Yeah. If you do this right, what ends up happening is the first thing you'll notice is there's a difference in strength and stamina. If I'm doing my right arm versus my left arm and I'm doing let's say a shoulder press, I'll notice like, man, I could do 10 with my right, but I can only do 9 with my left. That's the first thing you'll notice. The second thing you may notice is when you watch yourself in the mirror and you're doing

these, it's easier to notice differences in my technique. My right arm, my elbow is closer to my body at the bottom of the lift than my left arm is when I'm doing the press. Or I'm noticing that at the top of the lift I can really lock out my right arm but my left arm it's much more difficult. So now I can place emphasis on those areas where there's weaknesses and actually start to develop symmetry. Symmetry isn't just a bodybuilding term. Bodybuilding, they talk about symmetry like a bodybuilder gets on stage and right side

matches left side when they turn and they pose and everything looks real balanced in that way. But symmetry in this sense isn't just muscle development, it's also function. One of the ways to balance out your function is to do blocks of unilateral training. And when you balance out function, when you go do your main big lifts that are bilateral, that was typically one of, if not the, weak link.

In other words, what's preventing you from lifting more weight often isn't your ability or your inability to generate more force it's often that your body won't allow you to generate more force because There's some kind of a weakness or imbalance there So your body's only allowing you to push or pull or squat as much weight as you are Correct that imbalance through this kind of training and the next thing you know, you add, you know 10 or 20 pounds to your PR well many many times for the trainers

This is the root cause of the chronic pain. So this is what I'd start to find with my clients that would complain of chronic pain, and then I would see their movement patterns, and I'd see this major discrepancy left to right. And a lot of times it wasn't like we had something structurally wrong with them, it was just like, I just had to balance them out,

was because they were moving barbells or moving weights bilaterally, and then that moving the weight like that. And they would blame all people always blame the exercise. Like it was the exercise. I can't do squats. Yeah, I can't do squats. I can't deadlift. I can't overhead press because it bothers my low back or it bothers my shoulder. It's like that. And then you watch how they move and it's like, Oh no, there's a clear discrepancy from left to right. And then once I would balance their left to right out, then we go back to that movement and then, oh, you know, all of a sudden all that chronic pain

has gone away. So this is a great insight for a lot of coaches and trainers many times going to here, going this route to solve their chronic pain issues ends up eliminating it. Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of cases where there's overdevelopment and they're too strong in one direction.

There's underdevelopment and, you too strong in one direction. There's underdevelopment and you know, all of this gets highlighted and exposed when you break it down and we just work on one side at a time. And so, yeah, it's definitely worth your time to go through that process because it's just, it's so revealing. And then it too, it extends the longevity of your training. When you hit these plateaus and you end up getting to this place where, you know, you could only compensate so far. So to peel back and then really, you know, fine tune and find where these opportunities are is huge.

Yeah, by the way, side note, an easy way to develop an incredible core is to do unilateral training because the core has to stabilize laterally or front to back because I'm holding a weight on one side. So you see what this kind of training is, a side effect of it is this really, really well-developed core. But here's what's funny about this. There are two kinds of people that use strength training that like unilateral training a lot and they couldn't be more different. Okay. They couldn't be more different on the one hand, athletes, athletes love coaches that train athletes,

love unilateral training. They love split stance exercise. They love you a lot because in the sports world, your feet are typically not together flat footed. You're typically one way contra lateral. You're throwing a punch, throwing a ball, swinging a bat. You're, you're, you're typically split-stacked, one leg, contralateral, you're throwing a punch, throwing a ball, swinging a bat, you're running, everything tends to be, they do a lot of unilateral training in athletic

conditioning or athletic strength training, okay? It's very, very common, they use it quite a bit. The other athlete that loves unilateral training are bodybuilders. Bodybuilders love unilateral training, they could care less about athletic performance, they just want to develop nice looking muscles. Now the reason why bodybuilders love unilateral training, because of all the strength athletes, of all the athletes that where strength training is like the core of their sport, right? You could say that for

bodybuilding. There's a power lifting, there's strong man, there's Olympic lifting. Bodybuilders by far use un lateral training the most. Now why is that? It's the mind and muscle connection. Test this yourself by the way. Do a typical dumbbell exercise like side laterals. You're doing both arms at the same time. Now go do that one arm and watch how much more

you can focus on feeling the side delt. Do rear laterals, do flies, do any exercise that you typically even use dumbbells with, and suddenly you can feel the target muscle more than you could before. This is why bodybuilders love it, and I don't think I need to argue that bodybuilders develop some of the best looking muscles.

No, I mean, they're judged on this, so it's like, and if you, I mean, they're in the business of building big muscles, and if you don't balance them out, it becomes more obvious on a bodybuilder than anybody else. Very visible. You could hide it in an athlete, right? An athlete that isn't trying to overdevelop their muscles and has some sort of asymmetry going on.

You might not even see it if you don't know any better. But a bodybuilder who's in the business of building all his muscles. Getting shredded and heavy. Yeah. And then presenting his physique. It's like, I mean, that was like literally the whole game was I go to a show, I come back after I get judged and I would always meet with the judges afterwards

and say, how could I be better? And they said, ah, well, you know, your shoulders are a little over built for this or your left side here is that or your rights. And then they'd give you that feedback. And then it's my job to go back to the drawing board and go fix that, to fix that balance and balance it back up

For the next show to make sure that I can show that I've brought that up Yeah, and you can do this you'll see bodybuilders even do this on machines Which I'm not necessarily a fan of but when it comes to muscle connection, they get it You'll see them do a one-arm chest press a one-arm Cable fly a one-arm, you know one-legged, you know press. And the reason why they're doing it is because when they're doing it, they're feeling every bit of that muscle, they're squeezing and connecting to it. Excuse me, this is a great way to develop

underdeveloped muscles. If you have a hard time connecting to certain muscle group, unilateral training does make it a lot easier to connect, to get that mind muscle connection. By the way, the data shows, the better that connection, the better the development. Yeah, and I mean,-muscle connection. By the way, the data shows the better that connection, the better the development. Yeah. And I mean, as trainers, we knew this from like somebody coming in that's brand new.

And you can see a visible discrepancy in the way that they're lifting or they're pulling or pushing an object. And you could see like an underdeveloped mint that needs a lot more attention. So to break it down into unilateral training, we could slow down the tempo, we can even throw isometrics in there, but we can really get them to squeeze in and connect to the muscle and be able to fire and recruit

more effectively when we isolate, we focus on that specific issue. Best pumps, best pumps ever from this kind of training for sure. I mean, I think, so, you know, if you've listened to the podcast for long enough, you've probably heard me say this or recommend this to live

callers before that. I think everybody should at least once a year, run a cycle of this. Once a year, you should have a training block that is purely, you know, unilateral training. It's almost like a diagnostic that you should be checking on yourself because there's so many variables from injuries to compensating because it's a new movement,

to new jobs, sitting, I mean, you name it, there's a lot of things that could cause this asymmetry in your body and it's always evolving and changing. And so checking back and always doing that. And if you just make it a habit of running a training block every single year of this, like you'll take care of a lot or you'll prevent a lot of potential chronic pain and problems down the road. By the way, when we came out with MAPSymmetry,

I talked about that earlier, that's a unilateral training program, that was and still is one of our most popular programs, hands down, because people did it, and they all came back and said, I hit PRs, my body looks incredible. And it's not that the program itself is magical. It's just a well-programmed unilateral-based program.

It's that nobody does a block of training that way. So we had all these advanced people follow the program for the first time in their lives, did two and a half months of pure unilateral training. Everybody saw crazy results. I still think the funniest part about all that is how long it took us to write that program. We were taking live callers for years, helping people.

I would recommend you. I mean, at least, I don't know, one caller a day that we'd have the callers who'd be like, well, what you need to do is go focus on unilateral training for a few months. What does that look like? Yeah. Why haven't we written a program like that again? Like, it was silly that when I look back at the order of a lot of things that we wrote and created for the audience, it probably should have been one of the first programs when you think back, its usage and how it applies to no matter what your goal is. Again, you should probably be running that at least.

Pretty universal in terms of who is going to help. Got some questions here. The first one, when training unilaterally, does all dumbbell work count? For example, dumbbell chest press. Yeah, so technically, so technically both dumbbells at the same time is somewhat unilateral, but there's like a scale, right? So if you look at the sliding scale. Well, they're independent loads, but. Independent load, but it's not really unilateral.

Unilateral is one arm or one leg moving at a time, and then the next phase is one arm, one leg moving at a time while the other arm or leg is not doing anything at all. So in other words, a dumbbell chest press where I'm alternating could be considered unilateral and then the next level will be just one dumbbell while I'm stabilizing on a bench. So that's kind of the range. I always want to train purely one leg or one arm when I'm training this way because what I'm actually doing with my other hand is I'm actually like using it to like fill my core and make sure like I'm being-

Yeah, the anti-rotation is a part of that. Yes. Making sure that I'm stabilizing equally on each side too. Because a lot of times it's hard for even the trained eye to actually see something in the mirror that there's something going on. But a lot of times you'll feel it in the core first. Like you'll feel yourself to Justin's point, start to rotate in the core before even the movement in the arm breaks down. Whereas if you're holding two dumbbells at one time, you're so focused on moving the weight up that you're not really paying...

Still balanced. It's hard to tell. It's hard to tell. Am I moving a little more on the left or the right versus I'm focused on one arm, I had the other hand that's like my chest or my core, and I'm focusing on feeling that and feeling if I notice any sort of seeing any discrepancy in the mirror and then feeling any sort of rotation going on in my core, that's what I want to do with my free arm. Which side do I start with? This is a good question. Weaker side.

Yeah, weaker side. So you will totally mess this up if you start with your stronger side. Start with your stronger side and you let that lead. Weaker side. Yeah, you're going to, no, I'm saying you'll mess it up. If you start with a stronger side, you'll mess this up. Start with the weaker side, allow the weaker side to dictate the reps for the stronger side. So that means that you're probably gonna be doing, it's gonna be more intense for

the weaker side, especially the first few weeks. In other words, if I could do a shoulder press with 40 pounds overhead with my right hand for 10, my left arm for 8, I'm only gonna do eight for both arms. So start with the weaker side, copy it with the stronger side. This is such important advice too because I remember what a discrepancy I had.

Remember my left to my right on my arms was like so crazy different. Like I was so much stronger on my right side than my left side. And so if you don't do this, it'll take forever for you to catch up. But if you do, you also have to have the patience because you're like, oh my God, this is so light for the dominant side. And you feel like, man, I'm shutting it off.

It feels pointless sometimes. It almost feels like, what am I doing? Because it's like, I can do so much more. Catches up fast. But it will, and it will catch up fast. And then before you know it, they'll be almost identical. So you got to be patient and that's the way to do it. Do I rest between sides? You can if it's really intense. So, you know, minimal, but you can. It doesn't make a big difference. So if I'm going real heavy, like a dumbbell row, I can go pretty heavy. I'll tend

to do one arm and I'll wait like 20, 30 seconds before I go do the other arm. It really doesn't matter if you rest or not. The long rest is in between sets. So the long rest will be when I've done both arms and then I'm gonna go back to doing both arms. Unless you're doing, I mean, sometimes I'll do that for explosive moves or if I'm doing like a snatch or something with one arm, but yeah, typically, you'll be able to rest recover pretty easy.

Yeah, especially considering you're starting with the weaker side. Yeah. This would be, there'd be a major gap here if you did the stronger side first. If you go the stronger side where you're expending energy and then you go to the weaker side right afterwards, you're going to be even weaker going into the weaker on and then you're going to create a bigger discrepancy. But since you're starting with the weaker side and then you go to your

dominant side afterwards, the rest period, I give a little bit of rest so I'm not like exhausted, like if Justin, like he's talking about an explosive movement, I'm definitely going to give myself some rest of that. but if it's a standard push press or a curl or you know shoulder press a movement like that row like yeah I pretty quick I can go right into that other one because I'm starting with my weaker side. How long should I train unilaterally? Oh you know I would say for the average person who's been strength training for a while at least six weeks ideally eight weeks

to 12 weeks, like really go for it, make this something you get good at, that's where you're gonna see all the benefits. I know our program, Symmetry, starts with some isometrics and it ends with bilateral five by five, so I think the unilateral portion of it is something like eight to nine weeks, if I'm not mistaken. That's like six to eight weeks.

Like six to eight weeks is actually the unilateral portion of it. Give you a chance to get good at it. I think that's the biggest key. I mean, I just think that everybody, regardless if you're running our symmetry program, everybody every year, and if you're a trainer training clients, you should run your clients through a round

of unilateral, or at least a full training block, four to six weeks minimum. Speaking of which, I mentioned isometrics. Isometrics are a great way to start unilateral training because isometrics are a great way to activate muscle fibers and really gain connection. Especially with like newbie type clients who really have a hard time.

Like a newbie client will have a really hard time like really focusing on form and technique to balance their left, right out. So get working on that mind muscle connection through isometric first is a great way to jack them in early and get them going, getting moving in the right direction faster. Will unilateral training help with PR's? Huge, hugely. Most people will go back to their traditional training afterwards and within a couple weeks are surpassing the previous PR's. It takes a week or two to get used to the bilateral training.

But what they tend to say is, oh my God, I just went back to it, I just feel way more stable. And then they try it again and then they go on PR. This is how I've hit PRs. Oh, this is what made me, this is what hacked into it for me was the, after the injury, it was like, there was no reason why I should have been hitting

leg PRs after a major injury like that. But what it was, was the attention to detail in the unilateral wing for such a long period of time before I went back to bilateral and then again hit something like that. By the way map symmetry because of this episode is gonna be half off 50% off if you're interested go to mapssymmetry.com so there's two S's in there mapssymmetry.com the code is SYM50 and that'll give you 50% off. Also, if you like the show, come find us on Instagram. You can find Justin at Mind Pump Justin,

you can find me at Mind Pump DeStefano, 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 Super Bundle at mindpumpmedia.com.

The RGB Super Bundle includes maps anabolic, maps 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 and over 200 videos, the RGB Super Bundle is like having Sal, Adam, and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Super Bundle has a full 30-day money-back guarantee, and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at mindpumpmedia.com. If you enjoy this show, please share the love

by leaving us a five star rating and review on iTunes and by introducing Mind Pump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support and until next time, this is Mind Pump.