Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2684: Do ONLY These 8 Lifts to Achieve an Amazing Body

Episode Date: September 13, 2025

Mind Pump Fit Tip: Do ONLY These 8 Lifts to Achieve an Amazing Body. (1:49) Probiotics are the best fat burners! (22:29) Adam’s evolution with his diet & exercise. (27:44) Functional Justin. (34:12) The Botox stack. (37:37) Due process. (39:22) You can totally manufacture popularity. (46:14) The curse of fame. (48:12) Downsizing to live near family. (50:50) Going down the 3rd rail with Justin: The Secret Pyramid of Alaska. (56:40) #ListenerLive question #1 – If you are working with a sports team only two days a week in the gym, as that is the only time we have due to the team schedule, what would your focus be on? (1:00:47) #ListenerLive question #2 – I don’t feel like my physique is changing for the better at all, although my weight remains stable, and I find myself still struggling to want to eat more.   What should I be doing? (1:10:42) #ListenerLive question #3 – Given my current stats and goals, how do I move forward without backsliding into old patterns? Is it unreasonable to expect strength and muscle gain without fat gain alongside it? (1:19:18) #ListenerLive question #4 – How do I fight the atrophy in my injured leg, while it’s stuck in a walking boot? (1:31:38) Related Links/Products Mentioned Ask a question to Mind Pump, live! Email: [e-mail] Visit Seed for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Promo code 25MINDPUMP at checkout for 25% off your first month’s supply of Seed’s DS-01® Daily Synbiotic** Visit Luminose by Entera for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! ** Promo code MPM at checkout for 10% off their order or 10% off their first month of a subscribe-and-save. ** Muscle Mommy Movement Quiz Mind Pump #2135: Barbell Squat Masterclass Mind Pump #2122: Deadlift Masterclass Mind Pump #2357: The 7 Overhead Presses Everyone Should Be Doing Strengthen Lateral Movement with a Lateral Sled Pull Add Windmills to Your Workout to Increase Your Deadlift Strength – Mind Pump TV Shrink Your Waist With The PERFECT Sit-UP (SIX PACK ABS!) Use of probiotics in preventing and treating excess weight and obesity. A systematic review The U.S. blew up a drug boat in international waters. What is the David Goggins deadbeat dad controversy?  Why the Super Millionaire CEO of Zappos Lives in a $950-a-Month Trailer Home The Great Underground Pyramid Of Alaska Visit Hiya for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! ** Receive 50% off your first order ** Mind Pump #2320: Throw Away the Scale! Mind Pump #2555: The Muscle-Building Secrets of Unilateral Training Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned David Goggins (@davidgoggins) Instagram Mike Boyle (@mbsc_online) Instagram  

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind Pump, Mind Pump with your hosts. Sal DeStefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. You just found the most downloaded fitness health and entertainment podcast in history. This is Mind Pump. In today's episode, we had callers call in. We got to coach them on air with their fitness. But this was after the intro.

Today's intro is 58 minutes long. In the intro, we talk about fitness and fat loss and supplements. supplements. Talk about conspiracy theories today. It's a good time. By the way, if you want to be a caller on one of these episodes, email us your question. Send it to live at mindpumpmedia.com. Now, this episode is brought to you by some sponsors. The first one is Seed. This is the world's best probiotic. By the way, probiotics have been shown to enhance fat loss. It's true. Probiotics are probably the most effective fat loss supplements you can take based on the studies. Anyway, go check them out. Go to seed.com forward slash mine pump. Use the code 25 mind pump. Get 25% off.

This episode is also brought to you by Luminose by Intera. They have this combo of products. They call the Botox combo. These are peptide-enhanced skincare products. Peptides are powerful, okay? Nothing works as effectively as peptides when it comes to changing the appearance of your skin. And Luminose by Intera has the highest concentration.

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Which one do you fall under? Get some personalized advice. It's a free quiz. Go to musclemommiemovement.com forward slash quiz. All right, here comes a show. Strength training, you already know it's amazing. It's the best form of exercise to shape and sculpt your body, build muscle, burn body fat.

It's great for health. That's awesome. But it can be complicated. Here's what we did. We're going to give you the eight lists. That's it. Just these eight lists. If you just did these and that's it, you'd get an amazing physique with balance, muscle,

strength, functionality, fat loss. You'd look great. We're going to break them down. Here we go. I mean, I saw this list and I would make the argument that you could damn, you just do these eight things for the rest of your life. That was the goal. Yeah.

It would be pretty well balanced, not just looks wise. but functional and health I know these are this is it right here this is it right here like you literally you just did

and what's great about them not to get ahead on all of them and so with that but they all have a lot of room for improvement you know and treated like a skill

like improving upon the just the not just the strength of them but the movement of them like boy these would just you would reap so many benefits yeah there's a few things

right to consider obviously how you look she write a program called the grade eight. That's important, hey, maybe. Great eight. Got a ring to it. They're, you know, you want the exercises that build the muscle, that give you the look,

that help burn body fat. But you also want functionality, even if you're not an athlete, because if you don't focus on functionality over time, you'll develop problems. Longevity. And then you're not able to do all these great exercises. So you want that as well. And also, functionality contributes to symmetry and balance in a physique. So you don't end up looking imbalanced or causing problems.

problems in that direction. So we literally picked the exercises that, again, like what Adam said, if you just did this forever, you'd be good. You'd be great. And we wanted to simplify it because strength training can be very complex. Strength training programming can be some of the most technical program that exists when it comes to exercise. Other forms of exercise, they benefit from good programming as well. But they can be a lot easier to figure out than strength training. So we simplified it. And we picked the best exercise that covers all your body, your entire body, and different ways of moving, different planes of motion. And so we'll start with the first one, okay? We'll start with the king. They call us the king of all exercises, the squat. Now, why did we pick the

squat over a leg press or another machine or even, you know, another lower body exercise? Well, the squat involves pretty much the entire body. You have to have good core stability. You have to have good thoracic strength and mobility to hold the bar. And then when you squat, you get this real great full range of motion that strengthens all of the muscles of the lower body from the hips all the way down to your ankles and even your feet if you perform them properly. And the squat will develop an incredible lower body, but also an upper body. They can support the lower body.

So it gives you all of that stuff. So they call it the king of exercise for a reason. and that is because it produces incredible, incredible gains. And you could spend years consistently doing this. It's always going to give you. Yeah, I mean, I still, I don't think I'm a great squatter. I'm a good squatter. Yeah.

I've been working at it for a really long time. And so, and that's not a bad thing. It's a good, it's great that, that movement is so valuable, so complex. and the longer that I can continue working at or working towards being a great squatter, I can continue to reap benefits from it. And so it offers a lot total body-wise, muscle-building-wise, functional-wise, and improvement-wise, which is, I think, why it's been crowned the king of all movements. Yes.

And even when it comes to just building muscle, it's a phenomenal exercise for building muscle. There is pretty much no exercise that will compete with the squat, generally speaking, for developing the lower body. From the glutes to the hamstrings of the quads, you even get ankle mobility and some calf involvement. It's a primal movement pattern. That's right. This is just one of those fundamental exercises you have to include. I mean, even to the point of like mechanically, there's pressure, internal pressure within your body. And this helps to depressurize, you know, all of that just by sitting in the, you know, all of that just by sitting in the body.

that squat and so there's just there's all these like benefits to squating that people don't even realize i'm so glad he said it was foundational uh if you don't squat and train this you'll lose this ability even if you leg press all the time so you can leg press for your entire life develop uh you know strong legs and not be able to do a good squat now the reverse is not true if you practice squats and get good at them you'll always be able to get on a leg press and perform a leg press. You'll always be able to get on a hack squat and do a hack squat.

You'll always be able to do all those movements. But because it is foundational, it contributes so much to everything else. Then again, from a development standpoint, if you're just interested in that, you really can't compete with the barbell squat. Next, we have the deadlift. This is picking something off the ground.

Another foundation movement. Very close second. I mean, my arguments for both. I have, yeah, I've made arguments. we've had podcast episodes where we've we've debated this and I've actually made the case that I think the deadlift is the ultimate just purely because how much we do in the anterior plane and how much we neglect the posterior chain and so and it's not that the squat doesn't include that also but it's a little more anterior driven than it is posterior driven and I think that focusing on all those that entire backside just bring brings people back into better posture and alignment. And then it also carries a lot of the similar benefits as the squad does. So I can make the case that this is this is one and two or interchangeable.

To counter, yeah, it's such a great point to counter daily life on the movement patterns. They're all anteriorly driven. So it's like, yeah, this is such a great counter to that. And if you get, you know, good at deadlifting and don't neglect other planes of movement, that's important as well, which we'll get to. But if you get good at deadlifting, you get pretty. close to bulletproofing your back. I mean, low back issues are so. And I know some people are like, oh, deadlifts are bad for your low back.

No, they're not. A properly performed deadlift is amazing for your dead. Not improperly performed deadlift is like an improperly performed any other exercise where the risk starts to skyrocket. It's got to be appropriate, yeah. But if you do it right, good control, good stability, the right amount of weight, challenge yourself, you're going to develop strong hips. You're going to develop a really solid, strong low back, a strong midback.

You're going to activate your lats. Your grip is involved. You have an isometric contraction of the biceps even. It's, and it develops a nice looking physique. I can often tell when somebody doesn't deadlift when I look at their back. I can tell when somebody just does other back exercise. You can see it in the lack of depth. Dude, it's impossible to build holding a lot of weight.

Yeah. You know, whatever argument somebody wants to make, it's just like, if you're holding a substantial amount of weight, your body's going to, yeah, form into that. Totally. Next up is the overhead press. I mean, standing overhead press. When you push a weight overhead,

this was, by the way, for a long time, this was the way that strength athletes demonstrated their strength. This is how they competed. It didn't matter what else you could do. If you could pick something up over your head, then you're pretty strong. And let's see you could do the most with that weight.

This is what strength athletes did for a long time. It is a shoulder exercise, but when you're standing and you're pressing something overhead, it's you got to be stable the whole base has to be stable to press up overhead so you have to have strong lower body stability

you have to have good core stability this promotes incredible shoulder function the scapula has to move in a good way with the humorous you have to have good mid-back stability to press straight up overhead

involves the triceps it's a it's an exceptional it's actually the most functional pressing movement the pinnacle upper body I think we do it a disservice by calling it a shoulder exercise. That's right. It is the squat of the upper body.

Literally. It would be like calling a squat a quad exercise. Yeah. And leaving it at that when it's like it's so much more than that. The overhead press is the squat of the upper body. And it incorporates so much of your upper body and requires so much good, so good of mobility and stability to do that, especially a full. range of motion, right, all the way down, all the way up, full extension, and the ability

to stabilize with your core in that standing position. I mean, it is far more than just a shoulder exercise. And to call it just a shoulder exercise, does it disservice? Because you would never call a squat, just a quad exercise. Yeah, any weak point in the kinetic chain will get exposed really quick with this exercise. I think that's, yeah, that's why we hold it to such a high regard, because you really do have to put a lot of work in to pull it off. And it's also, and it's also, you know, we talk about a lot, we tell a lot about our personal journey and working in gyms and the evolution of, you know, how cool it was to see the squat getting introduced with that.

I'd actually say that the overhead, standing overhead press is still neglected. It is. I don't see it very much. I'm going to say it's the, it's the squad of the 90s. Yep. Right? In the 90s, when we saw the squat racks, squat racks dust all over it, nobody ever doing it. You could still go to the gym today, commercial gym, with lots of people working in it.

and actually not see an overhead press down. No, no. I mean, think about that for a second. No, it's true. And we talk about it as being the squat of the upper body. It is that valuable. It's that fundamental. It's that good for you to get good at it.

Yet it's being utilized like squats were 20 years ago. Well, just to give an example, an athlete who could do a standing overhead press with 135 pounds, with good technique, good stability, is going to be more dangerous on the field than a guy that could seated overhead press 185 pounds. even 200 pounds. That's how much more functional it is. Because when you're pressing like that, you've got to have everything else supporting you. You know, you're not just sitting and pressing something up. Now, seated presses are gray. They, you know, they hit the shoulders and, you know, the bench is kind of holding you steady. It's a good bodybuilding exercise.

But move to overhead press and see what happens. First of all, you won't lose shoulder size, but what you will gain is a stronger kinetic chain all the way through. But great observation at him. I agree 100%. Next up, we have the incline press. Now, you could say bench press would be in there. But I'll argue that the incline press, both from an aesthetic perspective, it'll develop a nicer looking chest. And also from a functional perspective, there's more carryover into the real world because when you tend to be pressing things, you tend to lean into them and not lean away from them.

But mostly, this is just aesthetic. Like, if you only ever did incline presses, you'd have a nicer looking upper body than if you only ever did bench press. No rebuttal for me. I've been arguing for the incline press over. the flat bench press for so long you get a better range of motion the average client their technique in form will be naturally better because it just puts you in a more advantageous position when you go get into it the aesthetic reasons to building the upper shelf of the chest i think like you're making

right now i just functionally risk reward like and i went through this a lot you know because i definitely hold the bench press you know up there is like one of the main ones to to focus on but uh yeah in terms of that, like having just that grade of incline, like really sets your shoulders up in a nice position. Like, you can really load it substantially. So you get all the benefits, just a little bit less risk. I almost never

flat bench ever anymore. I mean, even if, like, I might play with the degrees of the bench where I might go down to like 15 degree like it is like kind of a lower incline. But I never do completely flat anymore. Inclined bench and maybe just a little bit lower than like your traditional 45 or whatever, what the

gyms are set at, that 50 15 to 45, playing in that degree for me is all I ever do anymore. Yep. Next up is a row. Rowing is one of the best back exercises you could do. Now, why a row, why not a pull-down or a pull-up? All great exercises. And I think pull-ups are phenomenal.

But people mostly lack, or the issues that you tend to see with people's back, mobility and strength and stability, oftentimes is in the mid-back. Forward shoulder is quite common. You row and you row well, you're going to have good healthy thoracic strength. Whereas you could do tons of pull-ups, which is also great, but you could actually not solve forward shoulder by just working the lats, which is what that exercise does. Again, pull-ups are great. It's actually, you know, if I had to make 10 exercises, it would probably be in there. But a row, if I had to pick a back exercise.

For an antagonist, you had to all this chest work and overhead work. I mean, rowing was always staple with clients, beginners. every client. I don't think I don't think. I know. There's not a single client that I didn't do a row was always regardless of their level. Yeah, exactly. Didn't matter the goal level we're at like a row is a staple movement and that I don't think ever left a program for me. I mean, I might do some variation of it. I might move and rotate different types with dumbbell, barbell, some machines that would. But it's like that's a staple movement that is in every client's programming at every level regardless of the goal. right. And next up, we need something for lateral strength, moving side to side. Like, we just named some great exercises, but if you just did those, you would lack lateral strength, which you would get away with for a little while, but eventually you'd run into problems. Eventually, you'd run into hip problems, maybe some knee problems, maybe some back problems, because you need that lateral strength and stability. And I think the best exercise

for this is a lateral sled drag. It's extremely functional. It connects everything together. It works all the muscles on the sides, but most importantly, it helps all those strong muscles communicate well laterally, and it keeps you healthy. And so I think if you're just going to do, again, all these exercises we list, you need to have something laterally. And I can't pick a better one than a lateral sled drag. Yeah. And I mean, it just strength and supports those muscles, yeah, laterally. So you do it in a way that it's not so risky as well. So this is one of those things, if it's all in the concentric part of the contraction, like, you know, we're not getting a whole lot of damage cause, which anybody can do this. And it's one of those things

too. You can even implement it like on a daily type of a routine. So I love it. Well, I knew we'd have no debate from Justin on that. I mean, this is like his staple go-to movements. I'm like such an evangelist for Slad. I'm pretty sure he tried to put this in every program we ever wrote, if I recall. I did. And he usually wins. So yeah. So here's how I look at like, okay, so you've gone through these. Obviously, you wrote them kind of in order, too. The, the, the first five are like the staple five of building the most aesthetic physique. In fact, you could just do the first five and you will build a great looking physique. Then I look at the last three that you put in that you're going and lateral sled jaguarium. This is like supporting it. Exactly. This is what

will will, this is the health side. This is the side that's going to protect your joints and overall movement, the functional side. So it's like I think most people are familiar with the big five. We talk about the big five all the time. They tend to be in anybody who has rights a good programming will have the big five, these last three are the three that will protect you forever, in my opinion. Yes, because if you don't do them, those big five eventually. Hips, knees, ankles, yeah, we got to protect them. You'll hit some issues. All right.

Next up, the windmill. This is a rotation exercise that moves you in different planes of motion. It really protects the spine. This is phenomenal for the spine, and it does address a weakness that you often see in people who deadlift and squat a lot, which is that strength and rotation, the strength in the, and the QL. There's a massive deficit in thoracic rotation. Totally. Yeah. 100%. In fact, if you don't do these, go try and do it without weight right now. If you work out a lot and you're going to find you can't even do one without weight.

And this is me. Like, if I don't practice these, I lose this ability. And when I lose this ability, I can tell. When I start training them, everything else does better. This is such a good. I remember when we all first started kind of getting into it. I know Justin's been into it for a long time. It was really him who challenged us. to do more of it. And I remember how glaring it was, like where the holes in my movement patterns were and the breakdown.

Because the thoracic mobility, the shoulder mobility and stability required to this, your ability to rotate equally on both sides because what you'll find with a lot of people, they might be okay on one side. And then the opposite side will be really bad. And that just gives you so much insight into probably why you have some chronic pain on one side or why you're having issues.

or you noticed imbalances. I feel like this really helps you recognize that. And then if you just make sure if like the goal was, I just want to get great on both the left and the right side here to where I can get them looking almost exactly the same. If you accomplish that, I'm willing to bet that you've got minimal to no chronic pain going on through most of your body.

Because if you have a even and evenly distributed communication down the connect chain on both sides here equally and you're equally strong on an exercise like this, you're probably pretty well balanced through your entire body in order to perform this movement. If you're resilient to lateral and rotational forces, like you could go so much further in your training and getting back to like the lateral sled drag and all this for the lower body. It's like if people just considered that fact alone, like they would have so much more progress and less plateaus. Well, I also think of a lot of my clients, like,

Like, the, this is, this was definitely, this highlighted to the, the weakness in my programming as a trainer. As an early trainer, you know, even as I started to evolve and get better, I understood, like, balance aesthetically. But from the functional side of protecting clients, and I would always have clients get in, my strong clients, clients that have been training for a long time and that I got in good shape and that were filling in some of the best of their shape. But they would injure themselves with these most basic stuff. It would be like picking a shampoo bottle or pulling a weed in the garden or reaching back to feed their kid in the back seat or something so little and basic. And I remember early on it baffled me like, what is what's going on? I've got this client so strong. Really?

They got hurt doing that. And this was because I lacked this in my programming. I lacked addressing this with those clients. And because I got them in good aesthetic shape and they felt strong and they were giving me all this feedback. I thought I was so on point with what I was doing. This wasn't something that came along until much later. in my career is understanding the importance of incorporating this into all clients programming. That's right. Last we have a core exercise. It's the perfect setup. It's a flat on your back

exercise where you slowly articulate each of the vertebrae in your lower back. As you do a full setup, it works the obliques, works the core. It's very controlled, very low risk. I mean, if you just did this and you did this with good control, you would develop an incredible core, good musculature, good aesthetics, a good functionality, especially when you combine it with the windmill and the lateral sled drag, which really work with the lateral sides of the core. And again, you put all these eight together. If this is all you did, if you broke this up throughout the week and all you ever did was practice these exercises for the next 15 years, you'd have a pretty darn good physique bulletproof with a low risk of injury so long as you perform that. Dude, I'm so inspired right now

to ride a great eight program. I just think that's a, it's got a, it's got a catchy name to it. It really is perfect. I mean, it'd be fun to write it in a very minimalist approach, right? So instead of like trying to like the ultimate problem, it's like a very minimal. Yeah, very, very simple. Like you're saying, like you're just kind of practicing all these movements throughout the week to where you're spending very minimal time in the gym, but you're addressing all these movements. Oh, what a great, simple, solid program that you could spend years working towards and see incredible programs. 100%. All right. I got some interesting studies on you, for you. On you. Studies on you. I got a study on you, Adam. For you. You paid for this. We've had cameras in your house. Wait a minute. Four months. This is a study on probiotics. And this was a systematic review on probiotics for preventing and treating excess weight and obesity. So this is a review of six clinical trials. They found that 66% of the studies showed significant.

Significant reductions in body weight and BMI, 80% of them, so a majority of them, reported decreased waste circumference in both analyzed studies noted reduced total body fat mass from probiotics. Okay, so I'm going to put this in context for everybody. If you took all fat loss supplements, all fat, all supplements that say they help you lose fat, and you compared them with probiotics, based off of just this right here and more studies, I have more. here. Probiotics are the best fat burner. It sounds like this is the... They're the best fat burn. This is funny to me.

Isn't it? It sounds like this is the most, um, I don't know, groundbreaking or cutting edge stuff that they're finding out about pro we've known about probiotics for a long time. We know what it does for overall gut health. We've been touting that for a long time. But the last few times you've brought these studies up,

they're related to fat loss. Mm-hmm. So is that because this is relatively, knew that we're figuring this out. And so there's more and more studies that are going in this direction because that really wasn't the focus. Well, you know when this started, what prompted this was they would take, remember those studies on mice where they took, the fecal matter studies. That's right. And they changed their, all they did was take, they took a lean mouse and an obese mouse. And they took the microbiome of the lean mouse and literally put it in the

obese mouse and changed nothing. The obese mouse got lean. And vice versa too, right? And they're like, what is going on here? Like, what is happening? So that prompted more and more studies in these reviews. And these reviews are crazy. There was a review that really tried to break, like, what's happening? What they're finding is, because they see lowered visceral fat, reduced body weight, less abdominal fat.

They think it has to do with mechanisms that, with enhanced energy expenditure. So healthy microbiome increases your metabolism. Okay. There's appetite regulation. so a healthy microbiome reduces things like cravings. And then there's just all just, they also just see this, where it seems like your body is less likely

to take those calories and store body fat. Remember, your microbiome is what breaks the food down. Yeah. You have more bacteria cells in your gut than you have human cells in your whole body. I mean, you're basically more bacteria than human. So your microbiome plays this huge role in your health, which we've known by.

by the way. It's not even controversial. Yeah, I've definitely heard a lot about the cravings being attributed to that. It's so crazy. So we have a partner, uh, seed. And they're just, they're the best probiotic company in the world for, for many reasons. But the lead researchers in the world work for this company. They get it. Uh, they're ahead of the curve. They're the, they set the trends. They're the ones that do, that conduct the research. They have, again, the best product. It's, it's crazy because I can literally say that taking seed, a probiotic is a fat loss supplement. We don't sell fat loss. It's interesting that can they market it that way? Why don't

they market it that way? I don't know. That's interesting. Because you could show the studies indefinitely. If it's outperforming anything and everything that's ever been marketed as fat loss, you know that that's a trigger for people, right? Because there's still people buying fat loss pills that don't even work. That's how much it's effective. The marketing works. So interesting that they wouldn't promote it as that. I don't know if you start to run into like potential issues or challenges that maybe they don't want to touch that you know that because fat loss uh as a category and of selling supplements like you got to be careful uh because regular regulators love to hammer them for good reason fat look at if you've listened to our podcast if we talk about fat loss

supplements we'll typically talk about ones that build muscle and indirectly you'll see some fat loss we almost never promote like a quote unquote fat loss supplement or fat burner because they don't do that no some of them will have stimulant effects so they're It's more of a stimulus. Give you energy. Maybe they'll suppress your appetite for a little bit. But probiotics literally are fat loss supplements, which is wild. Yeah.

It's so wild to me. Yeah, because it's like healthy. It's like, oh, we have a supplement. What we're probably going to see, Adam, just, you know, touching on what you said, is I think over the next five years, that will be how probiotics are advertised. I think everybody knows it's good for gut health. Then they start talking about mental health because you see benefits there. skin health we see benefits there i think over the next five years uh it's going to be fat loss

uh because these these studies i mean it makes sense yes if they're outperforming any supplement right now that's that's that's been marketed that way like and that's obviously a very good strategy for marketing something so you would think that that they would go that they should what we're talking about yeah yeah i'll start to train anyway i was going to ask you adam yeah about your uh how are your workouts going because yeah i asked you the lack of them is that what you're saying you know why i'm saying this yeah it's here what was it was yesterday the day before i'm like hey how's your workouts going you're like you know i barely have to do me a thing yeah i'm really uh i'm really i'm really i'm really bad right now i'm really

inconsistent i'm uh i'm on a one one day a week you know what i'm laughing maybe maybe two because you always say do the least amount of work to list the most amount of i'm living the brand no i think you're doing i'm living my brand i think you moved to a new level i think it's the least amount of work to achieve the least amount of results. Oh, no. Yeah, I am moving into the least amount of results real soon here. So I definitely. That's crazy once a week. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Once. And you're maintaining really really well, dude. You think so? Thank you. Yeah, you are. I appreciate that. I'm, I'm, I've definitely. You don't look out of shape at all. That's not why I asked you. I definitely, uh, I definitely see a

difference when I lose. I can see that I can get away with the one or two day a week for a while. But after a while, I can tell. But what's nice is that I just got to kick it up a little bit and then I'll notice that. And again, I think I've talked about this at nauseam on the show, so I apologize if it's annoying to hear. But I really, my relationship with diet in relation to exercise has really evolved in my 40s.

Oh, you don't let the die go crazy. Yeah, I mean, I don't know about you guys, but admittedly, I guess I didn't even realize how much I actually struggle with that. I think I had a really hard time with, because I know you can relate to this of always eating to build and to bulk and to

be the big guy, because I was so insecure about being little. But what I think I realized, I never moved out of that of like, you know, until much, much later. Like, I feel like I would, I was always so afraid of missing protein. I was so like,

and so it was always still pushing the calories, even if I was inconsistent on the lifting. And I'd even, and I would justify even overeating and treats and all the things because I'm like, oh, well, I don't want to get small. Oh, yeah, I feel that. And so, so it took a long time.

I mean, it's like you'd rather be, you'd rather get fatter than lose. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and, and, and, and, and, but, logically I don't think that like if you ask me that I'd be like no but but but I do I rec I recognized in my 30s all the way into probably my 40s that I was still eating those behaviors I think I've brought it up before in the show where I remember one time I just you know five guys was always been a staple even when I was competing I included burgers and stuff into my diet and so you know

burgers make their way to my diet on a regular basis and the staple go to is you know I get two double doubles plus or the two you know double cheeseburgers or whatever I was still ordering that and I was I was finding myself like oh my god like so stuff yeah what am I doing like it's not even satisfied I'm beyond satisfied and so it took me a long time to even like realize like I'm not in full 240 pound training seven day a week at him what am I doing eating that way and so the last four or five years I've really gotten better about just being more self-aware of my eating patterns in relation to my movement so less and energy expenditure, less energy intake. Yeah. And it sounds so, duh. But just, again, admittedly, like, I had created so many habits, behaviors around eating a certain way that I struggled with disconnecting or moving away from that when I

probably should. And so I don't know. I don't know how much somebody else can relate to that conversation or even maybe on the other side. People have had that right. I mean, I think we see this with live callers who've been eating to be small for so long, you know, that even when they know they need to. a reverse diet or gain, they can't, they can't move out of that. I think what happens with a lot of

people is, uh, when they stop working out, then they say screw the diet completely. That's probably what I'm yeah. That's how, and that's how I've been. And so I just, I've gotten much better, um, about that is, is really going like, okay, like, you know, as much as I would love to enjoy that ice cream tonight. It's been a real low week of activity and this and that. Like, this is just now to do it. And then the times where I am, it's like, okay, there's a day that I can enjoy that. It's also muscle memory. I I pulled up here, like, there's an epigenetic memory where you get modifications in your muscle cells, their DNA, when you build muscle to where they kind of want to stay muscular. Even if you stop training, at the very least, you build them back very, very quickly. And so what this speaks to, and I'll speak to you, you know, just about you, since we're talking about you, Adam, you built so much muscle in the past to the point where you were a professional competitor in the IFBB that you had so much muscle.

You've invested so much in the epigenetics that once a week for you produces a physique that most people would need to train, you know, three, four days a week to accomplish. I think there's another factor that I think aligns with the grade eight that we're talking about today, too, is that I remember in my 20s, in my early lifting career, if I was like having this inconsistency where I'm on and fall off and then I'm consistent that I'm not. I always went back to like training. I started with arms. I started with what I like to workout. where I like, it's like, sometimes I might just squat, but I'm definitely squatting. You know what I'm definitely deadlifting.

I'm definitely, like, I may not do a lot that week, but I'm the, what I do do are going to be the big movers. I don't mess around with any of the other bullshit. Unless, if you start seeing me doing trisip push downs and bicep curls and it's your third or fourth workout. Yeah, exactly. You can almost, if you see me doing that in here, you know I'm on workout two or three already that week because I've,

and that's again, I've, it's almost. like a treat to me to get to do the fun machine type stuff. Otherwise, I go, oh, you need to, you need to squat out of them. You need to do those big movements. Get those in. And then I, afford the right to kind of play around with the other exercises. And it's served me, it tends to serve me really well. You know, it's cool about this. I saw this discussion on X. There were some exercise scientists that were talking about muscle memory. And the speculation or the, the argument or discussion was around whether or not using performance enhancing substances

and then going off them, whether or not you benefit from the muscle memory later. Because there's always been this argument. I know there's an argument right now, but I mean, personally, bodybuilders. I think it's... So do I.

I think so. But you know what? There's a downside to it, right? If you use performance enhancing substances to build a certain amount of muscle and then go off of them and then you benefit from the muscle memory, you do run the risk of,

really hammering your hormone levels forever. So there's that side of it too. Sure. You know the other side of it. How's your training, Justin? I know you've been, you're getting back into it. Yeah, I've been getting back into it.

I mean, somebody asked me to, like, if I increased my overhead press now since I'm like, no, dude. Like, I'm going to be able to be lower. Yeah, like, put $2.25 up every now than just to mess around. But I don't like, I'm not, not pushing that hard. Yeah, we're going to go $400?

Yeah, exactly. It's like, we're done. More, more, more, more, more. More more. No, that was peak. Yeah, I'm so functional right now. I'm like, the biggest thing for me is to try and keep up with training with my son. And so I was actually more endurance focused right now. I'm like trying to like move in different directions and planes and just get back some more of that athletic type skill training. So I have actually been pretty frequent at least three times a week doing like real focused like sled work and in a lot of. kettlebell work and stuff like that. So it's a lot less of barbell training for me these days. But yeah, I'm just trying to feel like I can move and feel like I have stability and control.

I got to do more of that. Yeah, I mean, I am too. That's actually kind of where I mean, I told you guys that my fantasy football league, they did a 40-yard dash to do the, to decide the draft order. And I, they were, everybody was pissed in. You just accepted last. Oh, I did. I opted out.

I totally opted out. And everybody was so mad at me. Fitness guy doesn't do. the four-year dash, you know? And I'm like, oh, because I know better. Yeah, but tell us what happened, though. I'm just the smart move. Oh, no, four. Okay, actually, so five guys actually did it, okay? Five guys did it. Five guys opted not to do it. Uh, no, excuse me, five guys actually did it. Two guys walked it just to do it, you know what I'm saying? And then there's three of us that

didn't do it at all. Of the five guys that actually did it, four of the five got hurt. Oh, my God. Pull the growing, pull the quad, pull the hamster. hip issue like everybody and I'm and those guys are all completely deconditioned and I'm trying to try to explain this to them was like going over all their heads and they didn't want to hear it right because they just want to talk shit to me but what I was trying to get them to understand is like I'm at more risk believe it or not to pull the hamstring than they are you guys are all weak you guys are all hell of weak you have no horsepower so the fact that you even pull a muscle is is pathetic right so it's me

I'm like me on the other hand I'm still significantly be stronger than all of you guys. And I, if I run, I have, I do not, I not train that athleticism at all. And so I'm more likely to pull and tear and do something than they are. And they just, they, you generate so much force, but you haven't practiced. Yes. Yes. And I'm very aware. I'm, I am no business doing that. Decelerating is. Yeah. So, so I'm like, I was trying to explain that to them. And of course, when I tore Miami in, uh, in Hawaii. Yeah. I like that. No, that's the exact example. I mean, look how good a shape you're in, aesthetically, right?

Aesthetically, you're in phenomenal... Yeah, aesthetically, you're in phenomenal shape. But then this is where the average person doesn't register. They think that like, oh, well, then you should be in a way better situation than the deconditioned person when it comes to a sprint like that. It's like, no, not at all. He's more likely to hurt himself because he could deadlift 500 plus pounds. And you ask those hamstrings to go that fast explosively.

Pop. Yeah, and they pop. It sucks, yeah. I got to torque. I got, you know, I got to tell you about what people are labeling. And this is such a great, such a great label for these two products. So luminos by and terra, they have skincare products that are like peptide. They're all peptide based.

They have, people are calling this the Botox stack. Oh, I've heard that. Yeah. Because they're saying when you combine these two. Such a better thing to do. Right? Yes. You're not, you're not deadening muscles, you know, using Botox.

But you use there. And I'll pull up the two products that people are talking about this. This is my favorite part of this is not to interrupt you, but to tell you because this has been a topic for Katrina and I. You know, we're in our mid-40s. So all of her friends are either Botox or facelifting. Oh, wow. Yeah, everyone's facelifting or Botoxing.

And I'm like, I'm all for the peptide stuff. I'm like, go that route. Do everything you can naturally. Red light, peptide stuff. Do that stuff. Petite cream. So much better for you than shooting. something into your face that kills the muscles to obtain a certain look. It's so crazy.

Yeah. So it's their daily firming serum and then their line lifting serum. And you combine those two and people are like, oh, this is like, this is like natural Botox. Like my face looks like, it's like I gave myself Botox for a few weeks. So it's, I mean, I know I'm biased, but I think my wife looks better than all of her friends by far who have paid for all kinds of crazy surgeries and Botox and that's all she's done. Katrina's never done any of that stuff. Oh, yeah, we're at the age now, right? We're at that age now where it's a, it's like Botox has become a regular thing and then

many of them are already exploring facelifts or going that, going that route. I'm just like, no, man. Did you guys see the video that is now going all over the place where there's U.S. forces striking a drug vessel off the coast of the hospital? Oh, I just saw it this morning. Did you see that? So these were... Venezuela?

These were drug, like, big-time drug traffickers. And they were in a speedboat, and the U.S. forces, like, hit him with a missile. And blow them up. You know, and I got to say this because, okay, bad guys, I get it. Bad guys, dangerous. They probably kill people. I get that whole deal. But we got to be careful when we allow this kind of stuff because there's no, there was no due process.

There was no court order. It was like, and now you think to yourself, how can we get away with this? Because some people are like, it's a bad guy. You got to be careful with that because if you allow. Who decides it's a bad guy? That's right. If you allow. And I mean, everyone in this room could probably say they were a bad guy at a moment.

Well, if you allow the government, this is why we have due process because you got to be careful who says who's a bad guy. Well, is this been like a long time operation that they had, like kind of reveal itself at some point? Yes. And here's how they get away with it. Whenever they declare a quote unquote war. now they follow different rules. Sure. And so, you know, the government said we are now going to be...

This is a muscle move. It's war against the drug cartels. Well, that's, I mean, didn't he come out already and was targeting? And so, yeah, I mean, I feel like they're ramping that up. Yeah, dude. And so when you say war on whatever, what happens is they don't follow... Then they start to follow the rules of war, which is no due process. It's like, bad guy, kill him.

Yeah. I mean, you've got to be careful with that. It does say, under here, that the... this terrorist organization operating under the control of Nicholas Maduro responsible for mass murder, drug trafficking, sex trafficking, and acts of violence. Oh, they're bad guys. For sure. Yeah.

But the, I mean, that's pretty, that's like real bad guys. It is, but the part that you have to be careful with. Like, I'm not a fan of, like, not to, like, justify a drug dealer or anything like that, but it's like blowing up a boat because people are smuggling drugs is one thing, killing somebody who is a mass murderer. Agreed. Agreed. I'm just always weary of whenever we do something like that.

And it's, there's no due process. Because it's not, we're not in war. It's like there's an actual war going on. But when they declare it that way, then they follow those rules. And what can happen is, because then it becomes whoever's in charge. I mean, I get where you're going, because here's a thing, too, like, it's so much of stuff. You could always make the case. Well, yeah, it's very easy to get everyone to get behind that because of that.

And what I'm always cautious of is, was that the real desired outcome was that we wouldn't got to coach bad guys? Or is that to get us all the support behind like, yeah, get him. so we can sign that contract for $2 billion to build more missiles and to do more things. It's like, I don't know. If that's where this is really heading, and that's the whole point of all this, definitely because I'm very, very cautious of how much I get behind. I'll use another example.

After September 11th, we passed these bills that said if you, if the government says you're a terrorist, they just take you. They could detain you forever with no due process, not even tell your family or anybody, which if you are a legit terrorist, okay. I still can't believe we pass that. But if we have, and it's still there, by the way, we still have it. That means that they could call you a terrorist.

And none of us in here know how much it is or is not abused. That's the thing. Yeah. And maybe they don't abuse. You see people going into vans and then see you later. Maybe they don't abuse it. But I think if you ask anybody, even if they love the current administration or the past one or whatever, you don't love all of them.

There's going to be one where you're like, I don't trust them. Well, now they have the power to say, bad guy, no due, process. And you can always point to due process and say it gets in the way. You can always say that. Like, no, no, no, we got to do fast. We got to move quickly. We can't take that time. We got to get these guys. But once they get over that, now you're done. Now it's like, it's a slide. Power always wants to move quickly. Yes. Yeah. And that's why we have all these checks and balances. And people get pissed off when it's slow, but you want it to be slow. You always want it to be slow because, you know, then you really have to critically analyze is this the right

move. Yeah. So when I saw that, I'm like, okay, bad guys, they probably are. I'm not making the case at all. I don't know anything about them, but I'm pretty sure they're bad guys. But I'm like a little bit like, oh man, they're just going to, and I don't know if it was a drone launched missile or what, but you see the video of this boat going and then. Of course, the part of me is like, yeah, dude. Of course. Get all these assholes. Of course. But you know, you could be labeled, like, there's been times when they've come out with reports and they've said things like, you know, right wing views are, you know, this is the biggest terror threat. And I'm like, wait a minute. Or radical left-wing views could be. And it's like, well, who determines, like, what do you mean by that? Yeah. And who determines that? Well, that's the thing. We need due process.

My point is that, I mean, less government. I don't know. I feel like we, there seems to be, uh, the government is playing 3D chess and then you get bits of information that they want you to. Sure. I don't have all the information. Yeah. And so then, then you go, well, and I don't mean that in a positive way.

So I mean that to defend what you're saying is, is that, you know, they're like, again, you, you Like, the plan is they care about a contract going through that's going to make, put, line their pockets for billions of dollars. And, hey, well, how do we get majority support? Oh, I know what we do. We pointed all these bad guys over here. And then it gets everybody stirred up of, yeah, go get them. And then we go, oh, by the way, we need to pass this to do that. And we're all, yeah, do it.

Because we need to get more of those when it's like, man, the whole, that person was used as a pawn to really get something else to get pat. And it's like to find out later we're supporting the terrorists. Right. Supplying them. Right. So to pretend like you, to pretend like because you get an Instagram clip shared for you or that Trump put something out that you know the whole story. Come on.

On either side, whether you support or not support it. Well, what's cool about this? I don't know if it's cool. Maybe the wrong word. It's like we found them. We have film of them. We're watching this boat speed, you know, off the coast. And then we watch a missile hit it.

And we don't have video of Epstein hanging himself. We don't know what's going on there. Come on. That's right. Come on. Yeah. Come on, bro. Yes.

I'm still pissed off about it. Yeah, whatever. Stop. Yeah. Stop it with all that. Oh, it's so crazy. You know, it's nuts because obviously we've been talking on this podcast for 10 years. And I have seen the, I don't think I've ever seen something switch from left to right so fast in my life.

I know. It is a trip. I know. It's crazy. Yeah. And I have to check myself because obviously I lean. more of that direction. And so I like a lot of those narratives more than I like the other narratives. But I also am not a fool to know that that's being fed to me. Yeah. You know what I'm saying?

Same bird. Oh man, dude, it's crazy how quick it moves now and how quick media and everything gets behind whatever direction. You know, you just reminding me of, did you guys watch the new Superman? Did you guys see that? Oh, I heard about it. My son watched it. Yeah, it wasn't that. It wasn't that good. But anyway, there was a scene in there that made me go, whoa, this is crazy. So this one scene where I don't know if this is a spoiler alert but Lex Luthor traps Superman and he's trying to Lex Luthor is trying to gain public support for labeling Superman as either like a bad guy or a terrorist right and so he has he has all these engineered monkeys who are on computers he has like millions of them and all they're doing is commenting on social media about and hashtagging how he's a bad

superhero he's an alien threat this kind of stuff and it's like you know that's funny we obviously you don't have genetically altered monkeys doing that. No. But we do have... They do have factories. They do. They do. Speaking of that, did you know, okay, you know the, the mega song, um, gangam style? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So apparently this is, this has come out that, um, it was part, like, it literally got its popularity because of bot farms. So, yeah, it, it was nothing. And then all of a sudden came up as like, millions searched all, like, in or organically and then after that took off and became like a global phenomenon because of this

artificial lift in the beginning you could totally manufacture popularity but yeah that it was like such a clear example of like how that works and then you know to to put that into the zeitgeist out there for everybody do you guys remember okay you guys remember the show saved by the bell we're going to date ourselves you remember that episode i don't remember who it was yes lisa or kelly were they like anything she does everyone else in the school does and then they tested it and she wore a pizza on her head. Yeah. And everybody else started wearing a pizza on her head because she's, you know, that's what they do, right?

You get a few, like, cool, whatever, influential people. Yeah. To start promoting something next to you know, everybody's like, this is the new style. I don't know, man. I think that kind of attention and fame is way more cursed than it is a blessing. I agree. I mean, look at what, man, you see what David Goggins is going through right now? Yeah.

I actually feel bad for him. I mean, part of me does a little bit. The irony, though, the irony of us feeling bad is that we had denied ever having him the show and so that just because a lot of his message is yeah a lot of his fitness advice is counter to what we've been trying to preach to people because i don't think that the average person needs to to it to it's not a good message yeah to just grit their teeth through it and do it it's like there's there's there's not there's a much better healthier approach than than that and so that was the only reason nothing personal against him i think a lot of other stuff he says or does is very

inspiring i don't know him as but again look what happens you know you get all this global attention and revered by so many people. And then out comes this, you know, TikTok video from his daughter. Saying he was such an absent father. Yes. Yes. I feel bad. I feel bad for two reasons. One, because he come, I think he came out and he's like, I was an absent father. And, but I feel bad because, well, first, personally, it hits me in my heart because I was an absent father from my older kids for a long time. And I worked a lot. And I thought I was doing the right thing. Really what it was, a lot of pride and valuing the wrong things. And valueing the wrong things my children suffered greatly for it so i feel for anybody uh who did that looks back and

then feels terrible because it could it'll tear you up it tears me up still to the same even just talking about it yeah so i feel really bad about it but i also feel bad because i couldn't imagine if one of my kids went on social media oh bro and said that about me yeah you know i like oh it would crush me it would totally crush i think why it's got to be so or why it's you know why he's getting so much backlash is because he's the you know hard is no excuse get up to it no matter what and it's like even if fixing that relationship with your daughter is hard you're the guy that should be able to figure that out well you're the guy that should work hard enough or figure a way out to do that at all cost and it's like it also points out just how fake uh online love is it's not real because

you look at the comments the guy that got all these accolades oh he's great suddenly people People are pilot. Oh, of course he's got time to do with his crazy routine where he works out or whatever. He's not even a good dad. Oh, yeah. Oh, my God. He's a clear example of the mob mentality. That's terrible.

That's why I think it's a curse to be that famous, dude, to get that much attention. Because everybody is waiting for you to. Is waiting for you to fall from grace. Yep. And in fact, many people are trying to push you from grace. That's right. You can't wait. Yeah, they're not even waiting.

People aren't even waiting. They're trying to find ways to get you to fall from grace. And it's like, oh, no, no, no. Thank you, dude. It's terrible. I was watching, I watched this show every now, and it kind of relaxes me. It's like this aerial footage of, like, cities, and it kind of gives you a little bit of the history. I know, I'm totally telling the left turn here. I like to do that.

Is it just music in aerial photos? Because I watch that. Well, no, it's like out of narrator. There's a conspiracy twist. I guarantee you. I have something to bring up later, but they flew over the aliens base. This isn't that. This is actually maybe Adam might like this.

But, um, so, just. goes over some of the history and like it was going over at Las Vegas and you see it from all these cool new angles and everything and there's this one like it goes over it's a trailer park and it kind of starts talking about it and apparently the act or I guess he's still somewhat of an owner of Zappos but he sold it off to Amazon and made like I don't know like almost a billion like hundreds of millions of dollars right but decides to literally just live in this molecule home and it's this tiny little trailer park home with all these other kind of radical weird eccentric people and they're like

walking around a multi-millionaire multi-millionaire downgrades and then goes and lives in Vegas when it's hot in like a trailer home I was like weird possessed him to do that I was like tripping on that for a while I think you figured out what makes them happy yeah well that's the thing I was like you start thinking about that and you're like you hit your pinnacle like you hit some level that most people don't even can't even fathom and you realize that like, well, what got you there? And like, and I think that he just, like, really pulled himself back to the roots of, of, of, of his whole journey.

Why did he, what did you say? A trailer park with his two pet llamas. Shut up. Yeah. What's it say there, Doug? Yeah, he was CEO, I believe. Yeah. Create fun and a little.

Weirdness. Weirdness. Yeah. You know, I'll say this, look. 240 square feet. Oh, my God. That's, bro, that's extra. Because I, it's super extreme.

Listen, I totally get the. One, I think sometimes, you know, back to, like, curses. He sold it for $1.2.2 billion. Yeah. Yeah, he's a million. Yeah, no, he's really. His net worth is at least $780 million. Yeah, dude.

Living in a freaking trailer home. I'll say this right now all day long. And if you asked me this 15 years ago, would have been different. But I would trade a beautiful house all day long. So I could be near people I want to be around. Bro, I'm an example of this. Yeah. We, the last two houses or three houses,

I've downgraded each time, square footage-wise. And I left Ocean View, biggest one, all of them, to be closer to family. Because we went out there thinking that we have this epic place. Everybody's going to want to come stay. I mean, I even put all this energy into the, I mean, our guest place was better than our master bedroom. And I thought I'd have friends and family and stuff.

And nobody came and visited us out there. And it was like, what is this all for? Why the big property and all the space, if it's just me and Katrina Max nobody visits us and so I left and then again and then the last one

we had a little more square footage and I went down even more and so I definitely can relate to realize and to us like when we did this place a lot of our conversation was like how do we we've had that we've been blessed to have lived

in what five six different houses together and they're all very very different everything from condos to big houses to great locations to remote locations to city all of it and we're like you know, what are the things that we value in a presentation? Well, one of the number one for us is to be have family. that's it. It's like, that's number one. So we've got to be somewhere remotely close. And we didn't realize like how much even just a 20, 30 minute jog could be for people. So it's like, we need to be within five, 10 minutes if we're probably going to see them. And then it's like, okay, what's the next layer to that? Well, how do we use the house? You know, what rooms are we in? You know, we've had a separate game room where we had some of that. No one ever went upstairs because it wasn't around where the area was. And, you know, is it the size of the house or do we need more entertainment room for outside? Because we barbecue. What do you think that? So, um,

A lot of thought went into us finally moving to this place, and I downsized and went, and I was explaining this to my siblings about the place. I mean, granted, it's a very, it's beautiful. It's nice. We, we put a lot of effort into the aesthetic of it, but I mean, compared to what I would have thought in my 20s, when I reached the level, what I would, I mean, I thought bigger, more, this and that. And so I get that.

I don't know if I'd ever go all the way back down to a trailer because I think there's some level of comfort that I like of some sort of space in some room. So that's that's wild to me to go that. But I totally get the, you know, why have this big giant empty mansion that nobody's in, you know, and if anything, it's a pain the ass to keep clean because you're not using and it's just like to show people like what you have or what you've a call, like, you know, who cares about all that? It's like what you're going to actually use it for and like, you know, help your family get closer together and like have friends closer by or have proximity to school or you know like you're weighing all those things out that's like for me it's all about like being near people I love

and a kitchen and maybe an another area connected to the kitchen that's where we spend all our time we're always there not in your bedroom not you but like a room where everybody in living space that's right that's right no that's exactly how we've designed our place the first time i've ever been in a place where every inch of the house is used a lot. Yeah. Like, you know how they do those heat patterns and they show where people kind of bounce between two or three? Like, that mind would be lit completely up.

Like, there is not a spot in that house that doesn't get daily use. That's how cool, like, it's got, but it has nothing to do with size. It's more about the footprint and layout and then being real close to family. So real quick conspiracy. You brought it up. Yeah, so I was actually, like, I've never even heard. heard about this because like and I'm big on especially pyramids that I don't know about like I'm always you know we talked about Antarctica and all kinds of like weird stuff down there but

I had never heard about a underground pyramid in Alaska so within the Alaskan triangle apparently there's this unzoned area in the map where it's like there's nothing like mapped out and apparently according to some military like report and people have come out and talked about this. Like, there's this, like, massive, massive, like, they call it the Dark Pyramid. But it's, like, apparently it's like another sort of like Area 51 type place. Yeah, where they. Look it up, Doug.

Dark Pyramid Alaska. I want to see what this looks like. There was this reporter. And she does, like, a lot of the UFO kind of reports from, from people that have been in the military have, like, some kind of clearance. And so, you know, as far as credibility goes, that's about as close as we got, for credibility, but, like, there was this whole, like, a show. And I think even Netflix had, like, kind of a documentary about people's reports of it,

but apparently, like, it's a big military operation. So I think we've kind of talked about this before because you guys have talked about your conspiracy theories, but I think the thing that, now that I've embraced the tinfoil hat with you guys a little bit, I think the theory that I've come up with the most, like with the aliens and UFOs, is that, especially, in the lines with what Justin is sharing right now is that I believe it's more likely that we had way better crazy technology

long, long time ago and government has found some of that technology. We have things and we're capable of doing things that most people don't know we're capable of. And that's what explains a lot of these crazy UFOs and stuff. Not that it's some alien from some other planet. It's found technology. It's found knowledge.

That word dissecting. Yes, it's a found technology that we had found probably a long time ago in some of these hidden pyramids, you know, that we still can't even explain how they got built. Yeah, and the government just zones it off, so the public doesn't know that is. I'll go, I'll go hard to, hard in this direction. I now think, because they talk about these interdimensional beings, I think it was demons. And I think demons influenced humans and gave them technology a long time ago and had them worship pagan gods. Oh, my God. That's the spiritual side.

That's right. That's what I think. Hey, just as viable is in it. I mean, yeah. I mean, you're... I mean, it's all up for grabs. Yeah. After 2019, I feel like everything has shaken up.

I definitely think that we probably then all kind of agree more or less, though, that it's more likely... It's not aliens. Yeah, it's more likely not aliens. It's more likely we've had this technology. Whoever gave it to us, I'm sure. Really advanced civilizations that, yeah, they're not going to talk. Talk to us about it. Doesn't that seem more likely to you? Like when you, especially like, I mean, I'm just...

Well, there's the Fermin. What is it called the Fermini paradox? Is that what it is? Fermi Paradox. Look that up, Doug. If I'm saying that right. The furry paradox? No, not for, yeah, not the furry paradox. Don't Google that, though.

Don't you see that. Fermi, F-E-R-M-E-R-M-E-I. What is it? Fermi. Yeah. It's the apparent contradiction between the high probability that extraterrestrial civilizations exist in the vast universe and the lack of any evidence or contact with them. And so it's like, why have we not?

Why? And so, yeah, so I think it's demons. Okay, demons it is. Multivitamins for kids are typically just candy. Well, not Haya. Haya is legit. It is not a gummy candy. It's got efficacious amounts of nutrients.

It's the only multivitamin for kids that we promote. Check them out. Get 50% off your first order. Go to Hayahealth.com. That's H-I-Y-A-Halth.com forward slash mind pump. back to the show our first caller is matthew from canada what's up matthew what's that man hi guys how are you good good how can we help you good i just want to tell you first off it's a big honor to be speaking to you guys i listen to you guys daily and uh really

respect what you guys do thank you brad thanks man so i'll tell you a little bit about me because it'll lead into my question which you'll probably make it easier um i'm a father i have twins who are two years old i'm a kinesiologist and they run a small studio here in montreal i am the strength and conditioning coach for the men's hockey team at kikordia university and this is what's leading me into my question for you guys is at kikordia as the strength coach we only have the opportunity to train uh two two days a week tuesday tuesday and Wednesday back to back at 10 a.m. because of the schedule and because of schools. Hockey is a very intense sport and it's very hard to hit everything in the two training

sessions that we have available to us, right? Like you got your strength, your power, your speed, mobility, agility, injury prevention, the biomechanics of the skating stride. I can't hit it all obviously into two sessions. And I've been there now for six years and we've done we've done very well, but I feel like I've never maximized the training I'm doing with this team to really improve performance, I would say, but really just capitalize on the training. So I wanted, I was wondering, what would you guys do with the two blocks that you have available for the training sessions? Is this all year?

The only two, like, does this change in season, out season, or is it like consistently, these are the two days, that's all we get? These are the two days. This is all we get, and it's all season long until, we lose in the playoffs or win? So this is always... Pack it all in, man. This is always in season, then.

They're always playing and practicing. What's their practice and play schedule look like? Yeah, the rest of the days. So usually they have games on Friday and Sunday. Sometimes they have games during the week that really changes training up, depending on when the game is. It's never consistent. Monday is usually a day off for the guys to,

catch back up on schoolwork, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Thursday, practice, game Friday, game Sunday type of schedule. Yeah. The biggest challenge. Injury prevention is about all you can do. That's it. Yeah, the biggest challenge. And you almost nailed it.

I think you nailed it, Matt, is that you're trying to, you know, like, how do I fit everything in? You can't. In fact, if you try to fit everything in, you're going to increase the risk of injury and reduce their performance. It's really going to be about mobility and injury prevention. It's actually less is more. Yeah.

So it'll be very, very minimal with strength training, some correctional exercise and mobility. And your goal, you know, with your background in kinesiology would be look at biomechanics and focus on correctional exercise, really. Because if you try to push the strength training while they're in season, that's going to, it's not going to help. Especially that high of all. They've got two games a week, sometimes more. Even then, yeah, ideally I would have spread it out. So it's like micro workouts, you know, throughout the week.

But, like, it doesn't sound like you have that ability to program that with them. No, it's very difficult. Yeah. I mean, just to put it differently, if those two days were focused on correctional exercise and recovery, they'd probably do better than if they were focused on. I'm just going to jot that down. Yeah, because they're all, I mean, these are college, you know, high-level athletes. They're redlining.

They're big-time athletes. Some of them have been to NHL development camps, rookie camps. that main camp, so they're big-time athlete. Yeah, yeah. And so if it's focused on like active recovery, mobility, you're going to get more out of them than you would if you were pushing performance. The only window you're going to have to do that is like after, yeah, off-season, after playoffs.

I don't know how long they have before everything kicks back up again, but that's the short period of time that I would ramp up any of the intensity and volume of training. I probably, even if you do any kind of strength training exercises and keep it more unilateral, more than anything. I don't know if you're familiar with Mike Boyle, but I would go through. Oh, yeah, big fan. Yeah, okay. Yeah.

Like, yeah, it's just, again, this is a really tough question in terms of like condensing your focus there. But I think they nailed it with this injury prevention is the highest thing. But, I mean, you still have to include just a little bit of strength train to maintain. But with them performing and explosively moving, you're going to get a lot. lot of wear and tear already. So yeah, just maintaining, managing that, assessing them in those sessions and figuring out those needs that you can fulfill, I think is ideal. Yeah, but less would be more with intensity, with driving, with pushing. It's really about, like, can I get them after these strength training sessions to feel like they've recovered more? It's really the idea.

Okay. Keep them healthy. That's awesome. I really appreciate that. It's just been an ongoing battle for to six years and yeah i can imagine i can imagine that that's a tough question bro yeah oftentimes it's the athletes uh besides you know the talent you know talent factor oftentimes the athletes that do best are the ones that avoid injury the most uh and the ones that get the best recovery yeah because everybody's pushing so hard at that level i mean we're not talking about you know high school you know or rec league this is like high level they're going for it every practice and every game I mean, multi-planar isometrics would be my first kind of thought process to maintain a bit of strength and less in terms of like wearing tear, like in recovery. Like the recovery will be pretty substantial.

But yeah, to be able to maintain that kind of strength control, especially in like lateral type of poses and, you know, working on a bit of rotational type of isometrics, I think would be very beneficial. okay that that's awesome that's exactly kind of the route we're going to stay on with it i just thought maybe there was more we can get out of it to peak at the right time do we can maintain more strength this and that you know you're always kind of looking for the edge to help with performance and uh yeah help go after those titles so that's always the ongoing battle to that i'm looking at no you know what's interesting matthew years ago i remember they did this huge study uh this influenced personal trainers i think in the wrong way in many cases but they had pro athletes or high level athletes they started training them on instability balls and dinah discs and one-legged this and one-legged

that. And what they found was a reduction in injury. Now, what they attributed it to was the instability training. But that's not what caused the reduction in injury. What caused a reduction in injury was the fact that they were training with a lower intensity and less volume. Yeah. And less volume.

I mean, when you train on a dinah disc and physio balls, you're not driving and pushing as hard. Yep. And so these athletes were getting less injury. Less impact. And it was less about what they were doing. It was more about what they weren't doing. which was pushing their bodies.

So if you become the strength coach that figures out how to facilitate recovery, you're going to be very effective. Yeah, and you can tap into their nutrition a bit more. I don't know, athletes are terrible with that. So if you can kind of lecture them a bit with nutrition, that would help. Yep.

Yeah, it's tough for the university athletes, but we try to stay on it as much as we can, you know? Yep, absolutely. Do you guys have, like, recovery tools and stuff there, too? What do you have, like, you have red light? Do you have coal plunges? We got, like, the, we got, like, a lot of cold tubs. We got, like, the thorough tax.

We got the red light, the foam rollers. Like, it's not the state of the art, but we got a good amount of tools at our disposal. How are the boys with using it? Are they consistent with it? Or is that even that a challenge? That's about, that's a battle to go get them to the treatments. That's a battle of the university students, I would say. Yeah.

I mean, that's, I mean, pushing that and holding them accountable to that is going to be as sleep. It's going to be so big with these guys. If they get good sleep, that'll be like a game changer for a lot of them. But it's really a game of recovery. That's the game that you're playing with this level of athlete. So what I got here just from my notes for you guys, I got correctional exercise, recovery and mobility, less volume, and less is more, and we can put in more isometric training. Yeah. Yeah. That's great. I nail that? Yeah, I love that. Okay, that's going to be the plan going forward. I really appreciate it. Yeah, I can't wait to hear what happens. Yeah, yeah. Keep us posting that. For sure. Thanks, guys. Really, really appreciate it.

Yeah, I got it. All right, man. Yeah, I remember when I had that realization, because you guys remember that study came out, right? And then all of a sudden, the Dinah did, everything became the rage. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And you're like, this doesn't make any sense. Like, building general strength is like the best thing. But it's because these athletes were training so hard that instead of doing traditional strength training, which is just too much for that. Did I hear him correctly that they're playing two games or more? Hockey's brutal. Yeah. Hockey's brutal. And it's sometimes three. is it during the week.

Yeah. And then you're also practicing. You know what? This is going to be controversial, but I'm going to say this right now. Like if those two sessions during the season was nothing but recovery, we're literally mild fascia release. Well,

that was why I, so. Mobility and that's it. Why I asked him is how good are they about using those recovery tools is because here's a situation where I might dedicate that hour to that. We're all getting in the ice bath together. We're all doing the hip, like if they're not doing a good job of doing that and you have this dedicated time with

them, implementing that. As lame as that may sound, but that is going to take them further than pushing their bodies. They're already redlining without the strength. Yeah. Yeah. Our next caller is Danielle from Missouri. Hi, Danielle. Hello. Hi. Hi. How can we help you? Well, I guess I'll just read my question and I can give you guys some more context. I've been a listener for a few years and I really like your approach to fitness. At this point in my journey, I guess I need some direction. I am 5-7, 100. and 33 pounds. An in-body says I'm 18% body fat. However, visually, I disagree. I believe I'm higher due to the fat I carry around my belly area. I am trying to give myself a little grace in that

area as I've had three C-sections, but I do believe I could be better. I lift weights four to five times a week, average 10,000 steps through walking my dog or longer walks with a weighted vest. I am also a stay-at-home mom. I've had a history of an eating disorder, started with the anorexia, until at some point my body had enough, and I started binge eating. That was 10 years ago before having kids. Since then, I have under-eaten at times to lose baby weight, and then I do end up overeating later. Right now, I'm eating around 2,000 calories a day, body weight and protein, not from shakes or bars, and low-processed food. I don't feel like I could cut at all.

I would end up overeating later, but I do want to lose some body fat. As for lifting, I have gotten stronger since starting to eat 2,000, but I still feel like, Overall, I have a ways to go in strength. My squat is 115 pounds, deadlift, 110, and bench 80. I don't feel like my physique is changing for the better at all, although weight remains stable. And I find myself still struggling to want to eat more. What should I be doing? Do I need to suck it up and just push through a cut?

Continue where I am, even though I feel like I'm spinning my wheels or attempt to increase calories and try not to fear the fat game that comes with that. The last one. Yep. It's the last one. I'm not a bump calories and get stronger right now. And you're probably overdoing everything. So you have three kids. How old are they?

Yeah. I guess it goes back to when I talk about the eating disorder piece of it. At one point in my life before kids, right around college, I was 220 pounds. So then I lost about 100 and then have never really wanted to, like, gain weight again because I fear going back to that. spot of course of course i totally get it yeah let's let's look at the context first also you have three kids how old are you kids uh nine six and four so you're busy yeah very busy okay um you have the history of kind of the the challenging relationship with diet and exercise you fear getting weight i totally get that the the scan says 18% body fat you don't agree with that

you're trying to give yourself grace i appreciate that the the right answer is going to be the hard answer, which is you need to slowly reverse diet and focus on getting stronger. It'll actually give you what you want. It'll give you what you're looking for. You're just going to have to kind of be patient. You're going to have to be patient and not be so, and fight through the fear that you're going to gain all this weight. And now you can do it in a way that's controlled if that makes you feel better.

So you feel like you have your hands around it. So if you're eating 2,000 calories a day, I would have you add 200 calories and you'd stay there for a little while, get yourself stronger, wait a little bit, maybe two, three weeks, then bump it up again. but you have a lot of room to go with your calories. And you know what will probably happen with this, Danielle, as you'll probably get leaner simultaneously. About the only thing that I would probably get you to stop doing

is weighing yourself because as I reverse diet you, and I know that I'm only adding 200 calories every, say, few weeks or whatever, I know we're not going to put on a bunch of body fat, and I'm not concerned if the scale goes up three to five pounds here or there. And that will normally mess with a client psychologically that's challenged with this. And so I would probably tell you, what's not way for a while. Let's just focus on getting strong, increase these calories and be consistent. And then, you know, we'll check back in in a couple months.

Give you an example what I'm talking about. Let's say you gained, let's say it was just crazy and you gained 10 pounds of muscle. But let's say you also simultaneously gain three pounds of body fat. So now your body weight is 146 pounds, but you're leaner. Would that mess with you? Would the scale saying 146 mess with your head a little bit? I don't think the scale would. It would be more like, how do my clothes fit? Okay. Well, if you build muscle, they're going to fit differently in different areas,

especially around the butt area, the quads, and that kind of stuff. Yeah. But it's going to be a reverse diet and focus on strength. And I agree with Adam. Don't weigh yourself. And I also wouldn't study myself in the mirror. Your best metric is going to be how strong you feel and energy. Those are the two things you should pay the most attention to.

because you can really fool yourself by looking in the mirror as well. You can start to study yourself and, oh, I don't like this area and this area. I don't know about this. And that can mess with you just as much as a scale can. Have you ever considered having a coach take you through this process? I haven't. I mean, having three kids and I'm a stay-at-home mom, so my husband's the one working. I feel like I should save the money for something else.

one of my daughters also has a lot of orthopedic conditions so we end up at having tons of medical costs and a coach is just not really in the budget for us. Yeah, that's totally understandable. Can you do the reverse diet is what I'm saying? Does that sound like something you can do or is that too scary? No, I mean, I think I can do it. I always, I guess I think a lot about the future that I'm like, okay, after I reverse diet, do I have to try and then cut again?

is, again, I guess that goes back to the fear. Then, like, I feel like right now there's no way I could cut. What if I end up then reverse dieting and feel like, nope, you can't cut again. And now you have all this extra body fat from reverse diet. You could go as slow as you want. You can go as slow as you want. You could bump your calories 100 every four weeks if you want. You could take your time.

But I don't think you should go backwards with calories at all. No, no. Especially with 10,000 steps working out four to five times a week. You're wearing a weight vest. You're doing the whole thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're active enough and you're training enough to support well over 2,000 calories. Would you say then I'm probably under eating now? Yes, yes.

Absolutely. Uh-huh. But that's, it's not horrible. You're not in a place where it's really bad, but you're low. And so we don't want to go any lower. In fact, in a perfect world, we end up taking you to a place, say, 26, 27, maybe even 2,800 calories. calories, and then you end up landing at like 24 and leaner than you've ever been. That's where you want, so you're eating, you're satisfied, you're not eating crazy

amount of calories, but you're eating good amount of calories, and you are the body fat percentage, the weight you want to be, but we got to get there by slowly reverse dieting you and getting stronger. And really take your time, if it's scary, just take your time and really pay attention to your strength. That's going to be your North Star with the whole thing. Do I feel stronger? Am I able to lift more?

that's going to point you in the right direction. Way better than the mirror of the scale, for sure. And since the coach thing is probably not an option, let's get you in the private form so we can at least go through this with you. So you can just check in with us as you go through this process. And you have a home gym, Danielle. Is that where you work out? Yeah.

So about two years ago, my husband bought a squat rack for me, and then I have adjustable dumbbells, and he's actually getting ready to upgrade it to some other stuff for me soon. Nice. Can I send you MAPS Anabolic? You want to follow that? Do you have that program? I don't.

Oh, yeah. That'll be way better than I think what you're probably doing. You're doing a lot of strength training, which you don't need. MAPS Anabolic would really move things in the right direction. I'll send that to you. Okay. Cool. Thank you.

Yeah. Thanks for calling in. Yeah. Thank you. You got it. That's tough. That's a tough, scary thing for someone to move out of. Yeah.

I would keep her away from the scale right now. For sure. Because as soon as she bumps her calories, reduces her training. training down to three days a week she might see a little bit of a bump on the I had a client once like it was she reminded me of a client I trained a long time ago where I had her stay off the scale and her body fat percentage was going down yeah because we would test body fat and she was getting stronger yeah she stepped on the scale saw if the scale went up eight pounds she was so mad and I said but you're leaner you're stronger you feel better yeah and you know what she said to me I just don't want to weigh this much don't care yeah I just don't want to weigh this much it's very difficult I know it can be very difficult our next color is Ashley from Tennessee Hi, Ashley. What's happening. Hey, guys. Thanks so much for having me on.

I really appreciate it. Yeah, thanks for calling in. How can we help you? So I'm a 5-1 female, currently weighing in at about 140 pounds. According to an in-body scanner where you weigh yourself, you hold the probes. When I first started, I was at about 80% of the ideal muscle mass for my height and weight, so pretty under muscle, which is a common thing, as you guys talk about. Over the summer, I increased my calories to about 1,700 calories a day.

My maintenance, I believe, was about 1,500. And I also started in taking about 125 to 130 grams of protein. I was lifting about two times per week, playing Ultimate Frisbee in the summer one day a week. And I gained 1.5 pounds of muscle, which is great. I think that's the first time I've ever gained muscle in my life. That's great. And that was only 49 days. However, in that 49 days, I also gained about 2.5 pounds of fat, and my body fat percentage went up.

So my clothes got tighter, so I got stronger. I could tell, but I also gained fat, and so I became really discouraged. So then I started waffling between kind of cutting, kind of not. I just, right now, basically, I feel lost. Since then, I have discovered I went to my doctor. Apparently, I may have hypothyroidism. So I have a follow-up visit in a couple of. of weeks to do more blood work to get some confirmation on that, but I've been gluten-free now for

about six weeks, brand new, which is really tough. So I know that maybe that's playing a role, the hypothyroidism, the metabolism. But my goals are build strength and muscle. I think that'd be really cool. But mostly I want to lose fat. I don't want my clothes to keep getting tighter and just to be feeling uncomfortable in my body. So I've been kind of wavering. I just listened to the SBC episode. So I have a feeling I know what you guys are going to recommend. But I just think maybe my expectations were off. I guess I thought maybe I could gain muscle without gaining fat. And so, you know, I'm wondering if maybe one, that was unrealistic. And I'm looking between, I've considered the maps anabolic or the maps 15. So basically, I'm not someone who loves to be in

the gym. I go in the gym two to three times a week. And I just have been doing two lifts. I've been doing push and pull and then hopefully a leg day, which sometimes I kind of skip. If I'm being honest, I don't love legs. And so when I consider the programming, I thought it seems like either I can do the same kind of list, like two lifts every single day, like Maps 15, or I know you guys recommend Maps Anabolic, but it's a full body. So it would take up more time. So I guess my question is, given my current stats and goals, how do I move forward without backsliding into old patterns or sabotaging the progress I've made, and is it unreasonable to expect strength and muscle gain without fat gain alongside of it?

Yeah. Good, good question. Really good question. A lot of good stuff, too. I want to ask one more thing, though, to get more detail on the, when you went to your, the 1700 calories, do you know what you were before that? I think, based on eating patterns, it was probably about 1,500 calories. But before that, I had gained a lot of weight just from processed food.

I was in a happy relationship. I was doing really well. And so I think I just realized, oh, I'm eating unhealthy. And so when I got my eating in order, I think it was about 1,500 calories, but no idea on the protein, probably pretty low on the protein. Yeah, the reason why I'm asking that is because I didn't think that you, 1,700 was going up very high from wherever you were. And the likelihood that you put on that much body fat. And it's more likely that the body fat test was just a. little off or you had a little more water in your system when you took the test and so it

registered higher or lower like I doubt you increased by only 200 calories and put on that much body fat you probably did better than you think you did well there's a couple things too because you're moving in the right direction but there's two things two factors play a role here one the hypothyroidism if that is indeed something that is confirmed and you treat that makes a big difference. Makes a huge difference with fat loss and muscle gain. Hypothyroidism also affects muscle gain. A lot of people don't know that. So that's one. Number two, when I talk to someone like you who's doing what you're doing, typically what happens and correct me if I'm wrong, when they do strength training, they don't push the strength.

They kind of go in and do the exercise, but they're scared of pushing the intensity and really challenging themselves. Is that what happens with you, Ashley? 100%. So I tend to lean more towards running. So this is, I focused on just the foundational lifts. So I watched a lot of the Mind Pump TV actually to kind of guide me. And I do stuff out from like my home gym. It's basically Facebook marketplace stuff that I got for cheap. But I watched Mind Pump TV to make sure I'm doing the lifts. I go slow. And I did a program on my own through a smart app where it was to increase my one rep map. But like I said, I really have very little muscle. So, I mean, I could tell. I was like, oh, wow, I definitely, I could feel it on my own. But yeah, I'm still pretty low as far as, like, weight on the bar goes because sometimes the bar is still all I can do for, like, overhead press.

It's really hard. Yeah, so if you were my client, I would, I would, one of the things I would help you work on is feeling confident pushing the weight. And that alone would make your strength explode. The fact that you gained a little bit of muscle anyway just tells me that you practicing the lifts, which is not bad at all, but you do, you need to also push the intensity a little bit. I think Maps 15 would be the perfect program for you. And I want you, now don't sacrifice form, so I'm not telling you to go loose with your form, but push yourself, see how

strong you can get while simultaneously continuing to increase your calories. And what you'll see is more muscle gain. By the way, the, the in-body scan that you got is well within the range of the margin of error. So there's a margin of error on that scan for how accurate it can be. It's never perfectly accurate. It can be. So the best correlate you have as to whether or not you're getting muscle is strength. So when I hear you say, I think I feel like I got stronger, what that sounds to me like

is you're not testing it or pushing it. You just kind of feel stronger. But if you're stronger and you're pushing it, you'll know because you're like, I did 10 more pounds or I'm doing 20 more pounds or I just did five more reps. one of the ways that I will coach a client like you through this process is as you go through Mass 15

you're going to open it up you're going to see there's going to be an exercise in there and it's going to call for 10 reps when you choose that weight I actually want you to fail before that 10 that's not normal normally when I coach somebody

I want them we always say two in the tank but if I you know make sure you can do at least two more I actually am going to push you to go like listen make it hard make it so hard that you may only be able to get eight.

And that's okay, stop at eight. If you can only get eight, stop at eight. But that tells me like, okay, she put enough weight on that bar and she was not getting anywhere near 10. I want to challenge that side of you because if you know that you're already somebody who leans to like lighter weight, I'd rather do cardio, I don't really push the strength.

I'm a little more nervous that way. That's one of the ways that I'm going to build the confidence in you is like, don't worry too much if it says 10 reps. I want you to choose a weight that's going to be so challenging for 10, you may only get eight. Now, one last thing I'll add, Ashley, is if hiring a personal trainer in person is feasible for you, I think you'd be a good idea just so you can get that, feel, that security of having a spotter and feeling comfortable. Because I've trained a lot.

Look, there's a few things that you said that reminded me of many people that I've trained. Like, I feel like I'm getting stronger. I don't build a lot of muscle. I never have a lot of muscle. What that usually means to me is that you've never really been able to touch that side of yourself. You've never really been able to get in touch with, like, what it feels like to summon strength. And that's actually something you have to get used to. And a trainer can help you do that.

But nonetheless, if you just follow Mass 15 and push yourself a little bit, you're going to see, watch what happens to your strength. So I get nervous about going too hard because I tend to still be on the side of being sore right now a lot because everything is pretty heavy. So I get nervous about pushing it just a little too far, kind of like you guys have mentioned in several episodes. So I think that's partly why I've not pushed myself. What would be a good factor of when I'm lifting the weight? Because I can, you know, when I'm doing my overhead press and I'm doing the bar, I keep wanting to add weight to it.

So far, I can't really effectively do it and get more than like three reps in. So I'm like, well, maybe if I just do the bar for 10 reps and then next time I could add weight to do two. Like, does that make sense? Yep, that makes sense. You could also switch the dumbbells because the barbell is heavy by itself. 45-pound overhead press for a lot of people is pretty heavy. So you can switch to dumbbells. And if you're still getting sore from the weight you're doing right now,

you're probably doing okay. I mean, normally what ends up happening with someone like you is you're no longer getting sore anymore. You can do the weight relatively easy, but then you're just afraid to go up and push yourself. But if you're still getting sore from the workouts, then you're probably doing okay right now and just to me to be patient. And one last thing to add is that being hypothyroid affects recovery.

so oftentimes adding thyroid if that is appropriate it's like I said it people think of fat loss which is true but it also contributes to muscle gain there is a function of thyroid when it comes to muscle health and function so that could also be playing a role that's all super helpful yeah I've been dialing it on the diet trying to get the thyroid under control and then like I said I go back but I also started doing B12 and ashwaganda or actually a mold type of methylated B complex. So it has a lot of stuff in it. Um, so that's really great. So then for someone of, you know, my height and size, I think oftentimes I am pretty short. I'm only 5.1. Uh, I know you guys said average woman to shoot maybe for like 150 pounds, which would be 150 grams of

protein. Uh, based on just what you know about me right now, is that still what you would recommend or should I dial it back in? Because when I look on all the different websites, they all have a different idea of what my calorie intake should be and what I should be shooting for. Yeah, 150 grams of protein at 1,700 calories is too much protein for that low of calories. So I would have you aim for like 120 grams of protein, would be plenty. But I think you should aim for about 1,8,450 to 1900 calories with good strength training. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you guys so much.

I really appreciate that. You got it. You're on the right path. You're on the right path. Keep it up, Ashley. Yep. Thanks, guys. You got it.

I mean, how many times have you trained a client like that where they're just afraid to push? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I could tell when she was like, I don't build muscle easily. And I feel like I'm getting stronger means you're not really, you don't know because you're not. Right. It's not tangible. Yeah. It's quantifiable once you start seeing actual load increase.

Yeah. Have you guys ever had that? That's a process. This has happened to be so many times. I'll get this client. They'll come in. And then I'll be like, okay, what do you normally do for this weight? Yeah.

And then they'll do it. And I'll be like, you know, you could add like 10 pounds. No, I can. Yeah, you can. And since she's so new to this, like, yeah, she'll be sore a bit. Yeah, you got to have to work through that. And I think, you know, because we've talked a lot about, like, that's not a good indicator of a good workout and this.

But when you're brand new to the whole experience, you've got to get through it. Yeah, I mean, it's obviously it's opposite advice that I normally would give, which is, you know, hey, make sure you leave two in the tank. But when you have a client like that, a lot of times they have no idea what they're even capable of. And so whatever we're doing rep wise that day, I'm like, listen, you pick up a way that I want you to not be able to do that way, which is not normal. advice I give to anybody else, but what happens a lot of times is they put a weight on and they

end up surprising themselves and they end up doing it. It's like, oh, wow, you could have even went up higher. Our next caller is Morgan from New York. Hi, Morgan. How are you? How are you? How are you guys? We're good. How can we help you? Okay, so I broke my cidula on a run June like 17th or something. I think I probably had some stress fractures that just finally had enough. And then I tripped and I fell and I didn't think I fell that hard. So I walked around for two weeks and then realized something probably wasn't right. So long story short, I ended up in a walking boot. And I was kind of trying to do single leg moves to try to prevent some of the atrophy. But at this point, I'm out of the boot.

I'm still in a brace, but I have, like, no muscle on that leg. And so, like, when I sent this email in, I was trying to combat that atrophy at this point. It's already already happened. So kind of just wondering, what are the best ways to fix that imbalance? Like, do I only do that leg and try to catch it up? Do I try to do both legs and just balance them out that way? Yeah, I guess that is. my question. He'll heal first,

map symmetry, lead with the weaker leg first, it'll catch right up. Yeah, Morgan, are you, typically that kind of a fracture happens when you're just overdoing it with your exercise. That's why I just said heal. And under-eating. Is that you? I don't think so.

I mean, I'm a marathoner, so I've always run, but I've had, I've never been hurt before, and I've been running for like 20 years. So I guess I don't know. Okay. Do you under eat?

At one point, probably, but now I would tell you no. Okay, good. I feel like I don't. So it came at a weird time because I felt like I was the strongest I'd ever had been. So I don't know. Okay. Bone takes longer to strengthen muscle. So sometimes that muscle go and then the bone takes time to go.

So there's a couple things here. One, you don't have to worry about the atrophy. Even if you didn't do what Adam said, which what he gave was great advice. Comes back pretty quick. Yeah, muscle memory. is remarkable. So even just getting into regular workouts, that muscle will come back so fast. So that's one thing that you want to consider. Here's the second thing, and this is counterintuitive, but there's interesting studies on this. Training the leg, so you're not fully healed yet, right?

Correct. There's actually been, it's been annoying. I had an autoimmune disorder at some point, and so I feel like that's delayed my healing, but I'm still waiting because even though the leg never felt broken. Um, the bone hasn't sort of built as much as they would have hoped for at my age. So yes, still still delayed healing. Okay. And I see you supplementing with vitamin D calcium, probably throw some magnesium in there. Yeah. If you work on the healthy leg, it'll actually prevent some of the atrophy, believe or not. Okay. Yeah. So keep working out the rest of the body. Machines will be great for this. Machines are good for, and then when you're, when you're ready to go, uh, unilateral training and then be patient and it'll catch up very quickly. Okay. Um,

So, like, with my, I've had my vitamin D and calcium checked, and I've had a lot of symptoms of vitamin B12 being low, but I had that checked as well. Do you, is there anything else that could be causing the delayed healing? Yeah. How are your calories? Before I got hurt when I was running my normal workouts and stuff, I was close to 3,000 every day. now since being hurt, since I haven't had as much expenditure. I've cut it to like 2000 just because I'm not moving as much. Do you take methylated B vitamins?

I don't take any B vitamins. No. Try methylated because sometimes people have issues with absorption or sometimes B levels can look normal, but they're actually not adequate. So I'd go methylated B vitamin supplement, D, calcium, continue to feed your body. and when you're ready, start strength training. And then as far as the autoimmune condition is concerned, would you mind talking a little bit about that?

Yeah. So when I was 16, I did probably have an eating disorder. And I was diagnosed with hyperactive thyroid. I lost all the weight, and it was kind of bad for a while. And then they sort of got me medicated on that. And then it became Graves disease. And so I had Graves and Graves Eye Disease. And then for the last two years, I've been in remission, they say.

So it's sort of calmed itself. I still get blood work to check in every six months, whatever. But yeah. So I'm in remission for that. But because of that autoimmune disorder, I'm probably just always going to have a little bit of weirdness, you know, with hormones and everything. Yeah. And then you avoid gluten, right?

I haven't. Um, I've been tested for celiac and it comes back negative, but I've never gone off gluten. I would avoid it. Uh, I mean, you're probably okay, but whenever you see any kind of thyroid dysfunction, gluten oftentimes makes it worse. It exacerbates it. Not always, but oftentimes. And it won't hurt.

Alcohol. It wouldn't hurt. So I would cut the gluten, replace it with other carbohydrates and do that for about 30 to 60 days and just see if you feel different. And if you start to feel really good, stay off of it. Okay. Yeah, but that's it. Other than that, I think you're going to be okay.

Take it easy. Rest up. Let it heal. Yep. Get a lot of sleep. Yeah. Do we send Matt symmetry over to her? Send Map symmetry to her, so she has that too for afterwards.

Yeah. That'd be awesome. I was doing performance before I got hurt. And then obviously kind of had to back off a little bit. So once you rehab and you're back to normal strain training, follow symmetry and lead with the weaker leg first to let it dictate what you do on the other side. Do you have access to a vibration plate, by the way? I do not. Vibration plates can actually, in some cases, speed up the healing of bone. So that might look into it. I would say look into it and see if that's something

you want to try. It would be pretty easy. You could just stand on it. And in some cases, that does help speed up the healing of bone. Okay. Do you mind if I ask one other random question? I know that's like the written rule in the email. No, you're good. You're good. Go for it. Let's break it. So I'm obsessed with health and nutrition and everything.

So I kind of did like a holistic blood test a little bit ago. And they came back saying that my, what was it? AST was too high. And so they actually said I probably had too much protein. Is that actually something to be worried about or? That's interesting. That's a liver enzyme. So that's interesting.

Are you on any medication or anything that could cause that? I don't think so. The only supplement I took before breaking my leg and adding in the vitamin D and calcium was creatine. Okay. And then your urea was good. Kidney function was good? Yeah, it was just the liver one. And then my BUN was a little high as well.

BUN can be a little high when you exercise and stuff. So I wouldn't be worried about it. But liver enzyme's interesting. That's an interesting one. So I would look a little deeper in that. I doubt it's protein. It's pretty rare that protein would cause. I mean, what was your protein intake?

I get close to 180 every day. Yeah, I mean, you could try lowering it to see if it does anything, but I doubt that's causing an elevation in that liver enzyme. Typically, it's like medication, alcohol, some kind of toxin. It could be something like that. So, but that's interesting. I would look deeper into that. Okay.

I will see if I can figure something out with that. Okay. all right thank you guys you got it thanks for calling in yeah god bless you too that's the first time I've heard someone say that high protein would cause yeah I haven't heard that either to go up yeah yeah the doctor just says tells her to lower it because he's like how much protein yeah yeah yeah that would be that's an interesting one interesting the thing about her before no she looked really

familiar the thing about her her bone not healing though is interesting to me that's really interesting well she did she did drop from 3,000 to 2,000 calories too. I doubt her, I doubt she was, she was making that much of a difference in her movement to drop a thousand. Yeah, but even then, like to be that young, uh, that's indicative of like nutrient deficient. Well, yeah, she had an eating disorder. So, and she's a marathon runner. Are you kidding me? Yeah. I mean, that, I know that pernicious anemia, your B, your B levels can look like they're high, but you have symptoms of anemia. That's why I recommend a methylated B vitamins, because that could be the case when you have the, I think it's called the MTHFR gene, uh, gene.

variant so another another example in my opinion of a somebody who's marathon running is not good for it it tends to attract it tends to attract the wrong person to do it and it's like it's not that it in itself is bad it's just that someone who comes from an eating disorder like that eating low calories doing endurance type of training like that the repetitive banging on it like just not ideal just not ideal at all pure strain training I know would be so much yes that's right look if If you like the show, come find us on Instagram, Mind Pump Media.

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