Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 275: How To Build Muscle With Machines

Episode Date: April 18, 2016

It is no secret that Sal, Adam & Justin are not super excited about machines. They have ranted on more than one occasion about how machines are used in place of exercises that really work to build muscle. So does this mean they are totally against machines? The answer is NO. But machines must be used strategically and properly. In this episode they reveal HOW machines can be used to augment your workouts and how they can, in fact, be used to build more muscle. Please subscribe, rate and review this show! Each week the best reviewers are announced on the show and sent Mind Pump T-shirts! Learn more about Mind Pump at www.mindpumpmedia.com.

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. Hey, so funny story for you guys. You guys know I virtually coached and stuff, right? And a majority of everybody that I take are, you know, local in the area. And I've had a waiting list that I don't talk about it on the radio. Are they are they local or local?

Local local local. But anyways, uh, you know, I've, I've thought, okay, you know what, I haven't taken a mind pump fan. So all the people that I coach, they're like I said, they're people that already knew me before mind pump existed and I've got now they are, they're mind pump fans now, but I've yet to take somebody who like found me through mind pump and now wants coaching. I've just kind of there's special breed, aren't they? Well, you know, here, I've already got like this crazy waiting list of people that referrals that I know here. So I kind of feel obligated to go

that route. But for just for shits and giggles, I thought, you know what, I'd like to take a fan. I'd like to take somebody who found that way. They've already listened to a lot of the episode, so they'd probably be really fun to go. So I get great rapport. So I get this kid, right? And- Most of the kid you were talking about?

Yeah, yeah. So, and this is why I think this is so neat is, so the first time though, I'm kind of communicating with him. No, I mean, my mind is I'm a million play, I'm all over the place all the time, right? And we communicate via text, we do our one hour consultation, we met kind of went over his goals. And as I'm talking back and forth with him,

I kind of feel like he's either being snarkier, or he's being like a little smart ass a little bit to me. And you know, a lot of times I'm multitasking when I do this, I'll read like what they're saying to me, and then I give him a response pack. And it took me a minute to kind of like that bitch. Well, no, I had to go back and reread it and stuff and then I realized like, oh man, he just, he wants me to be very thorough with him.

Most people just want me to tell you what to do. Like, you know, do this, do that, do this right? Ever like that. He wants to learn. He wants to learn. He's a super intellect. He's a good kid. So yeah, he's, he's, I mean, he's a young man. He's, uh kid. So yeah, he's a young man.

He's getting ready to finish up his law degree. And you can tell he's super intelligent. He was sharing the podcast that he listens to besides us and everything's all intellectual stuff for sure. So is this what you were texting? How about I do? I just wanna talk about butt wipes. Well, I do know.

So, so, let's take it down and, I'm watching the Warriors game and he's sending me the solar system and shit, right? And I'm like, dude, I so got a young Sal, dude. I'm coaching a young Sal right now, for sure. But it was actually, it was, it's really cool because, no, no, I like him a lot too. It's been, it's already that we've only been going for a little over a week now

And I'm very excited to help him out and just you know now I'm explaining a little stuff a little bit more Detail with him because normally I'm not used to that. I'm not used to you can actually absorb it Yeah, like I tell him something in and tell him good job with this that then he's like well, why do you say that? You know, what is it? What is it you see? What is it? You know, he wants to know What you know, why are you saying it's a good job or what do you notice? Even I'm like, okay, so you want to be a break every. Okay, cool. You know, so yeah, that was. I'm at me like that.

Super interesting. You know, it's and I'm on Wikipedia. I'm like, here's why I'm not sure. Do you hear it? You look good. Cut and paste. Check this out. No, very cool though. Kids names Eric.

Great guy. Shout out to him, dude. I'm pretty excited to help him out. But it's officially my first mind-punk person that I decided to take on. So what does that tell you about our fans? There's smart little, awesome people. And sexy. Yes.

Every time I run into one, I'm like, I want to have sex with you. And I'm just talking about the dudes. Just in jetties. Shicks are even harder. I've noticed it more and more. I trust the way I'm doing it. I don't know if you saw on your page, Sal. I actually got it and I forget his name. Kemp is his last name.

But I saw when I was doing the post about animal fats. Yeah, and I just saw some of the stuff that he was riding. I clicked on his page and I went through some of his page and saw some of his post really intelligent kid too. And I was like, man, are you on the forum? He's like, ah, I clicked on his page and I went through some of his page and saw some of his posts really intelligent kid too. And I was like, man, are you on the forum? He's like, ah, I gotta get on there, college kid, this and that, I haven't spent the money yet, but I know I should be on there.

I just wanna tell anybody who, if you're a listener and you're an intellect, the forum is where you wanna be. 100%. And I guarantee you, and if you're not 100% happy after one week of being on there, I'll give you the money back personally, whether dub likes it or not. You for sure, I mean, it's filled with doctors, doctors, nurses, PT's, and personal trainers, lots of people that are super intelligent, that are sharing good

information and healthy debates. I mean, if you're that type of person, I mean, anybody is going to benefit from it, but if you are somebody who is a super intellect and you thrive off of things like that, which most people that are that way do, they love to surround themselves around others. I'm learning, I learn from the form every day. Every single day, somebody will post something

and I'm just like, whoa, this is very interesting. Oh, everyone's curious. It's nice, because they're all seeking out like all these articles and like latest studies and things too. So it helps to kind of feed what we're doing. Well, here's a deal. They've done, they've done this, they've demonstrated this. There was this, think it was a physics problem

that was unsolvable or hadn't been solved for like 80 years or something like that. And so what scientists did, I was just guessing. I've seen this movie. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no It just, this is one of the amazing benefits of being in the age of information. Absolutely.

Is that you can share information with others. And I'm telling you something right now, if you're, if you want to learn advance your knowledge on fitness and take it to the next level, being part of a community of like-minded people, I don't care how smart you think you are, it will accelerate it exponentially. It's happened, like I said, it's happened to me.

I go, I've learned so much just from being on this forum and these are people that follow and listen to us. And so you're thinking, oh, there are listeners or our fault. No, man, I learn like crazy on that forum. Well, that's why this dynamic works. It's because we all have that sort of mindset that collectively we're gonna be so much better as opposed to a lot of these gurus that allow these people,

they find out there that are smart people, but they're by themselves. And they're probably the most resistant to this new information and all these different things because they've done all their own work and their own study and all their own ideas. Well, they're afraid of how- They're not real receptive.

They're afraid to lose the power. It's okay, so this is beautiful that you guys brought this up because you're just talking about ego here. And I had an epiphany today, because working out, because I trained right before I came here. And in between sets,

I look around and I watch people working out, mainly because I like to- People watch. Yeah, I like to people watch. people working out mainly because I like to people watch. Yeah, I like to people watch. I do too. I like to, I like to pick up on, you know, new, maybe new techniques exercises and then the trainer and me can't help pick out. Wait, this new lemon pants? Exactly.

Can I give it a man? Yeah, mainly what I'm looking at. But no, I mean, the trainer and me can't, can't help but notice, you know, imbalances and how I would change someone's routine and then I do my set and then I continue doing that. So anyway, there's this big dude in there with really good muscle building jeans. I can usually see that from across the room. Big dude looks real strong.

So you told him that. No, horrible posture though. He's wearing wrist straps and his whole workout. He's got really bad forward shoulder and I know it's because he's training wrong. I know if he trained properly, the dude would be an incredible shape. He's in decent shape now, but he just doesn't look put together well because his training is wrong. Now, I'm looking around the whole gym,

and I'm noticing something. I'm noticing that the men that lift weights consistently have glaring imbalances, but the women that lift weights consistently tend to not have imbalances that are as glaring. And this is, I don't know, if you guys noticed this, women are much tend to be much more likely, and I'm trying to ask myself this, like why do I notice that these women are lifting? I know you're going this. Yeah, they see all these women that are, the ones that are real hardcore about it,

I see all the time. And they seem, they look like they have more, more they get into it, the more they start asking questions and is seeking more knowledge within that realm. Well, dude, as opposed to a male where, you know, they get like into more expertise and that one thing, they want to like just stay in that mold. Well, not just that, but guys are just, they tend to, because, I mean, let's be honest,

the male ego is an entirely different thing. And it's men are far less likely to ask for help. We know this is personal trainers. If you're a trainer, a woman is twice as likely to hire you. That's a good way to share time. You're the man with the guys. How funny, you know, that's a good point. Look at our pro, look at maps, look at our programs.

Look, when I first put maps together, before MindPub started, we were thinking of how we're gonna advertise it, what we're gonna do it. And I advertised it specifically to men. And here's why, because men would buy, maybe buy a program, advertise to them, but women would definitely buy a program that was advertised to men,

because women don't have that type of ego. Now, if I sold a program to women, even if it was the same exact program, not a single guy would buy it. Not even one guy. Not a single guy would buy it. Yeah, if you wrote maps in a ball, it was a pink color instead of red.

Not a single man would buy it. Not one. No, it's funny how that works that way though. Whooo! Just one. Yeah a single man would buy it. No, no. It's funny how that works that way though. Dude, just one. Yeah, it might be some man. No, not even, maybe not. Okay.

But even look at it this way, how many emails do we get from women who say to us like, oh, I've been trying to convince my boyfriend or my husband to listen to Mind Pump or to get maps and I finally did. And it's because guys, we have these huge egos. And so one of the things that I'll say to everybody who's listening who if you're interested in progressing your knowledge of fitness is to be as humble as fuck, throw your ego, leave your ego at the door when you walk in the room, this way you can tell people that work for me and ask questions and be okay with not knowing.

And that's something that I made that decision a long time ago. And man, ever since I did that decision a long time ago and man ever since I did that I've learned I've had paradigm shattering after paradigm shattering as a result because I'm open to learning I'm open to saying you know okay I don't know let me ask you some questions. Well it just reminds you craft I mean if you're if you're not open to do that then you're just gonna be locked into like one thing and everything else around you is going to evolve and you're going to be a dinosaur.

Huge. Huge. And I think this is why a lot of the fitness professionals, especially a lot of the male fitness professionals who are authorities are so resistant to saying, oh yeah, I was wrong or look at this new technique or let me modify my views. Instead, what they do is they double down on their stupid ideas that I have been proven a million times over, or if they have a fan that comes on their page and says, hey, you know, Mr. So-and-So, this new study came out that refuted what you're talking about.

And then they'll just hammer them a little bit, belittle them, rather than saying, let me take a look at that. And, oh, there's some valuable information here. They just doubled down on their information, which the fitness industry, on top of men having big egos, people in fitness tend to have these massive fragile eagles anyway, walk around like, oh, nobody can tell me what to do.

And I'm buffed, so therefore I know everything, type of deal. Well, I think it's important to talk about something then, since you bring that up is the whole idea behind Machines and how to use them and how not to use them because I feel like we talk so much about compound lifting and barbell movements and you know I know I've caught some of our like mine publishers kind of like shaming other people for using machines or stuff like that We're shame, you know, And I feel it's important that, because the platform that we have,

that we're very clear the way we were with the ketogenic diet and we had to come back and just remind people that hey, just because we talk about positive things about something, doesn't mean that we're shaming something else or saying that you shouldn't this or you shouldn't that. And I feel a little bit of that has happened with with machines and they and they most certainly have their place. And I think every single one of us in this room utilized them. We just, you know, and Justin said this on a podcast recently about, you know, when we when we talk about

things, you know, we are talking to the majority 80% of the people that are out there that are just getting into fitness or trying to learn about things and the direction that they the steps that they should take and this is the order of that. And the reason why we don't talk a lot about the machines is because it goes towards the end of the order of things of what you should be focusing but I also feel like it's something that we should address because I have noticed that I've noticed that people have you know been kind of prodding at other people. Well, I see people give me funny looks when I go to goals

and I'll do a machine type workout. And they recognize me and they look like splits. Like, what's that motherfucker doing on machines? He's full of shit. Well, it's like the tightening of the screw that's the last refining things. So obviously there's a place for him. And we try and present it in such a way

where we give you the meat of everything you need, you really need to focus on first. And so, you know, machines will play a factor when, you know, you look into different types of adaptations and, you know, rehabilitative purposes and, you know, there definitely is a place for it. Well, let's look at the negatives and the positives of the machine. So obviously we focus a lot on big gross motor movements, barbells and dumbbells because there's a lot more bang for your buck. If you're going to only go to the gym two or three days a week, then you want to focus

on the exercises that are going to give you more for the time that you spend in there. Machines however have some positives as well. Before I get into that, we'll talk about the negatives. Here's the negatives of machines. You tend to be forced in a particular plane of movement. They don't activate as many, you know, nor muscular connections. They don't challenge the body as much.

The strength carry over to the real world as high with machines as it would be with a barbell movement. For example, if I do a seated machine shoulder press and I add 50 pounds to that, I'm not going to be as strong in the real world as I would if I added 50 pounds to my standing barbell shoulder press. However, there's some positives to it. Check this out. So with a machine, I can train with a similar intensity that I can with barbells and dumbbells,

but I'm not gonna cause as much damage. So in other words, if I did a leg press and I went to failure on my leg press, it isn't gonna tax my body as much as a squat. Or if I go to failure, and we don't, by the way, we don't really typically recommend failure. I'm just using that as a gauge, or if I go to failure, and we don't, by the way, we don't really typically recommend failure, I'm just using that as a gauge of intensity.

If I go to failure on a machine chest press, it's not going to damage and fatigue my chest as much as if I go to failure with a dumbbell chest press or with a barbell bench press. Now that might sound like a negative, but it's not. It's actually a positive because, not when you're talking about the pump. Well, not only that, but I can use,

I can take that difference, and I can use that in programming and plug it in to a routine. And so you gotta ask yourself, when would it be valuable to do an exercise that would cause less damage than another one? And one of the first things that comes to mind for me is when I'm trying to dramatically increase frequency and volume, but I have a limited capacity to recover. So I can't

continuously add volume with, you know, tons of barbell and dumbbell movements, because the damage may be too great, but I may be able to add a lot of volume or add more volume with machines, which won't cause as much damage, but may still send some type of a muscle building signal. Well, and a good example of this is, I mean, I think out of all of us in this room, I probably use machines the most. I also think that I probably take the least amount of days off of the gym too,

as far as I'm in there seven days a week. I go eight days a week, but whatever. So when I'm going in there, you know, it really, I'm listening to my body and how my body feels. And you know, it's like, let's say it's a focused, I'm focusing right now. I like, let's say on my legs and my back, those are my two major muscles that I'm trying to develop. And, you know, two days ago, I just, maybe I PR on squats and I just, I can feel it still. I mean, I can, my body is still trying to recover from that. But then you know, on a hammer and again, yeah, I just, maybe I PR'd on squats, and I just, I can feel it still. I mean, my body is still trying to recover from that, but then you don't want to hammer them again.

Yeah, I'm sick. I don't. Exactly, but I know I want to touch them again. I want to make sure I work them out again because I'm trying to increase frequency. I'm trying to increase volume because it is a focus. It is something that I'm trying to grow, develop more so

than other lagging, or it's a lagging body part in comparison to other muscles in my body. So I do want to touch them again, but I don't need to destroy them like maybe they felt from two days prior. So perfect example where, you know, I will utilize a machine instead of using like squats or dead lifting. So I do that a lot. I do it a lot because I and I like to go to the gym every day and I always feel like, you know, if I am so beat up from some my heavy big foundational movements, there's something that I can be focusing on. from some of my heavy, big foundational movements, there's something that I can be focusing on. There's always something that I can focus

on, whether, and, you know, what I loved about when I was going through mobility was that was my mentality. A lot of that was, hey, I need to work on mobility. I'm going to the gym every single day. And if I, if I can't handle a foundational day, then I'm going to be all focused centered around my mobility and flexibility. So now when you start talking about using machines and stuff, to me it's more like focusing on specific muscles that I'm trying to develop. And I know we don't like to use the word shape because you don't shape a muscle. But in reality you're shaping and you're sculpting your body. And I think of this way, when I give the analogy to somebody, and I'm explaining like, you know,

building an aesthetic physique or, you know, training to compete or get on stage or to look that way, right, is thinking of it like you have this huge, you know, big block of ice, giant block of ice, and you've got to sculpt it down to this, this tiny little detailed sculpture. And when you first start off, you're not gonna use this tiny, fine little tools

to chip away at a majority of that. You're gonna use a big chainsaw or a big pick. That's gonna break away the big chunks. But as you get closer and closer to the size that you're looking for, then the fine tuning, then the smaller stuff comes in. And I think of like the small tools is like the machine. You know, the machines that are inside of our gym are those small fine tuning, you know, specific little areas

that I'm trying to pump up more or hit more often. Yeah, that's a great point because most people would think going into the gym and they have a specific split routine that they're doing, they're going to try and get as hard, you know, work as hard as they can to, crease that weight within those machines and they value their progress through the machines. But then when you go to translate that, let's say from a chest press machine to bench press, there's zero translation there.

And this is where the, if you differentiate that and you think of machines as being supplemental to the major compound lifts and the motor movements that we want to accomplish, it kind of opens the door for you. Then, yeah, you can kind of specifically target specific muscle groups on your body and enhance them further because you don't have that damaging effect like Sal was kind of bringing up in the beginning. Well, I was just going to say too, right along the lines of what you guys are saying, like

machines also can do a fantastic job of helping you isolate a muscle. Yes. Now, typically you don't want to focus on isolating muscles, you want them all to work together. Which, which clarify that, please, when you say that? I will. You know that isolating is probably impossible. It's impossible. But what I mean by that is the most emphasis on.

The most emphasis on. So let me give you a good example. Let's say today's Monday and as part of my whole body routine, I do really heavy overhead presses and I do a lot of them and, you know, maybe five or six sets. And I really fatigue my shoulders and a lot of my body because of standing overhead presses is a closer to a full body movement than it is just a shoulder movement. Now it's Tuesday, and but I wanna really increase the volume and frequency

of the work that my shoulders may receive. Now I'm not gonna go in there and do standing shoulder presses. I'm not even gonna do dumbbell presses. It's just, it's gonna damage my muscles too much, but I still wanna work the shoulders a little bit, and maybe I don't wanna hit the triceps along with it. So I may get on a seated lateral base type machine or maybe I'll use some cables

to just kind of work on those areas. So that's one, and I'm not really damaging the muscle not nearly as much, but I'm still kind of sending that signal. And number two, when you're doing that, that's also another valuable way for you to help muscles fire. So let me give you an example. If I'm, if I'm quad dominant,

and I have some clients that are very quad dominant, we do squats, it's very hard for them to feel their glutes and there's certain techniques that I'll use. But in the days in between those squats and deadlifts, I may have them do more isolation-based kind of glute movements to continue sending a signal to the glutes just to get that neuromuscular connection.

And that's another way that machines can be used. Now, the way that machines tend to be used today with the typical body part split type routines is that the reserved for the end of the workout and people will call them finisher's or whatever. And this is really a horrible way to use the machine because by the time you're done with your big gross motor movements, if I'm doing chest for example. You're fucking done. You're done.

You're not getting, you're not getting, you're not getting, you're not getting, you're not getting, you're not getting much out of it. You're better off doing it the next day to increase frequency and still have that volume but not be so damn fatigued because you just did your heavy incline barbell press in your barbell bench press.

By the way, this is one of the reasons why full body routines are so much more effective for the vast majority of people that do them than body parts splits. It's because you could, at the least, at the very least, with the full body base routine like the ones that you have in all of our maps programs, is that you can keep the same amount of volume at the least. So same volume for my chest throughout the week, as if I was doing, you know, chest on Mondays, I'm doing chest three days a week.

Same volume, however, the frequency has increased dramatically, and we can take that a step further. If chest is a real weakness of mine, then I can dramatically increase frequency without causing too much more damage, because damage tends to be the limiting factor in workouts. Like if we, if damage wasn't a factor,

it sets you back. It does, and here's a deal. This is why anabolic steroids, one of the reasons why anabolic steroids are so effective with people is because it allows you to damage yourself much more. It covers so much faster. And recovers so much faster.

Now, if you don't have the luxury of, you know, taking anabolic steroids and you don't want to break the law and you don't want to deal with all that stuff, then you want to still take advantage of the fact that you can increase your frequency, but you're more limited with damage. Well, that's why full body routines work better.

And that's where you can throw some machines in there. And not on the same day, on the other day. So now you're going to the gym, five, six, seven days a week if you want, it's not necessary, but I know a lot of you are listening. I've gotten people telling me like, I wanna go to the gym every day, so how can I do that?

This is when you take your programming and you incorporate some of these movements and plug them in. And in fact, one of the programs we're about to release really goes into detail on how you can do this. And this is when machines are appropriate. This is when you're going to get so beneficial. It's so appropriate that it follows up sequentially from the first map Santa Bob to performance

to then this one, because we really are refining a lot of things this way. And like you said, Adam, with your analogy, with the big block, we started with the big block and started to give you all those tools that will cut you down to get to the meat of it and the heart of it. And now we get it to perform well and now we're going to get to that next level of what you want to present and get to a point where your body is going to look totally different.

Well it's important too that I think we know, you know, piggybacking off of that too, Justin, is that, you know, I've had a lot of people I've heard that, you know, the rumors out, people have found out, you know, a math black is coming out and everyone's excited about it. Everyone has a lot of people have kind of an idea of the direction that it's designed for. And so I know there's a huge buzz about it already, but I can't stress enough how much I highly recommend someone going through red and green before that beforehand, not that you can't go right into black or go right into green or go right and red. They're all designed that anybody can start anywhere on that, but there is a purpose of why we released them in that order, just like we've talked about

with the nutrition guide. There's a reason why we're doing this. We're not trying to, since day one, we've always said, we're not trying to say this is a cookie cutter diet. Everybody should follow this if they want to look a certain way or be a certain way. No, there's steps, there's phases. There's an order to everything as far as importance goes. And ideally, you know, you would, you want to chip away at those big blocks, which is, you know, a map's in a ballroom for sure.

You want to address any sort of imbalances or mobility issues, which is what map screen is a lot about. And then you transition into the next level of focusing on your body and specific areas and weak points, and that's what maps black is about. So I think that's important to stress. There's also, when you talk about machines too, there's also a great use for them when it comes to rehabilitation work. When you were trying to, you got somebody who's got a major injury and you need their body to stay stable. They can't.

They're coming fresh off a surgery and we're not ready to barbell squat yet. And so I need to keep them, especially if it's a back or anything of the core, where it's very limited as far as how much stress you can put in positions. And ultimately, the goal is to get them to be able to squat. So if I'm rehabbing somebody and they might be on a machine currently because we can't yet, but the goal is to get them to be able to do a bodyweight squat and then a barbell squat because that ideally is going to be always the biggest bang for their buck. But they have their places.

They serve for sure a purpose in your workouts. You said something earlier, Justin, that I wanted to chime in on to, that I thought was it, you know, just kind of dawned on me when you said it, that, wow, you know, that's crazy. I've never, I've never watched my machine weights. And if you're using hammer strength or using a machine, I could not tell you, you can give a shit. Just say, yeah, I don't give a shit. What I'm putting on it does not matter to me

because the purpose that I'm not trying to build my preacher curl machine strength, and it doesn't matter to me. The only PRs or numbers I care about are like, my bench press, you know, your barbell squat, you're overstanding overhead press. Like, and yet it doesn't translate it also. It's, therefore, ineffective.

That, exactly. So you could, you, you may be one of those guys who can, you know, leg press, a thousand plates on there and it looks hallowed cool. We do it. We've seen that all the time, especially at 24-off, and this is, I literally walk by and laugh, because I'm a dick.

Also, because I'm like, why the hell are you taking all the weights in the gym to just do this silly thing? Yeah, right, go eat it. Take that same guy and put two plates on a barbell. You can't even do two plates on a barbell. And you have him do 10 deep squats and see if he's walking the next day. Fall over. So, you know, they're right.

They don't translate. And let's be honest, somebody who can leg press a thousand pounds on the leg press, but can't squat to 25, trust me the way their legs look or night and day difference. The guy who's squatting 400 plus pounds is. It's a different treatment pattern. Yeah. And, you know, I can say this confidently because I was that guy too. I mean, I talked about not being a big squadder from from day one.

And I was I was always leg pressing in a machine guy and doing all that shit. And until I got it, I realized like, oh my God, you kidding me? Like the amount of the amount of work that I have to do of squatting in comparison to leg pressing and leg extensions and leg curls and all those secondary movements on the machine. Seriously, it's crazy what a difference just squatting with a barbell. I could do a tenth of the reps and get twice as much results that you'll ever get doing any of them machines.

Right. But knowing what you know now, you can take some of the benefits of those machines and you can plug them in into your program. It's amazing to me how workouts have become so secondary in terms of importance nowadays. Now, I always hear people saying like, I go to the gym and it's just about,

I went to the gym, it's not that big of a deal. But how you work out makes such a huge difference in how your body responds and how you look. It makes a massive difference. And it's all about how you work out makes such a huge difference in how your body responds and how you look. It makes a massive difference. And it's all about how you utilize the tools that are available to you. And machines are another tool. And you have to, in order to use them properly, if they understand what they're good at and what they're not good at.

And machines by themselves are not great at building lots of real world strength. And they're not great at building lots of muscle and they're not great at getting your metabolism as fast as barbells, no, but however, they're really good at teaching you how to activate particular muscles. They're really good at dramatically increasing frequency and volume without damaging your muscle too much.

They're really good at training you, especially if you have some type of an injury that's preventing you from doing other movements. They're fantastic for rehab. So knowing that, now we know what that tool is, good at training you, especially if you have some type of an injury that's preventing you from doing other movements. They're fantastic for rehab. So knowing that, now we know what that tool is, now we can use it appropriately. It's just like having a tool chest with a screwdriver and a hammer and a wrench. I'm not going to use my wrench to hammer nails into the wall.

I'm going to use my wrench for what it's good for. And that's how you utilize machines. And I know a lot of guys listening right now are fucking excited because now mine pumps said you get to use all kinds of machines. And you do, you just gotta plug them in with the right programming and it will blow your mind. I'm gonna give you, we've thrown nothing but analogies out today, right?

So I'll just throw another one in there for you. I honestly, I look at this to like machines like a lot like supplements. If we're talking about, we've had stuff where we've combatted a lot of supplements as far as it would be like taking your protein powder and replacing your entire meal with protein powder. Right, good enough. So, for me, it's like you could do it, but that's just not a good way to do it.

But there's a place for protein powder in a pinch. If I'm deficient, I'm at the end of my day or whatever the case is for recovery or if you use it, it's intended purpose of it. If you use it correctly, there's definitely a place for supplements. No, I tell you what, that is a very good analogy, is to compare it to supplements, because we've been known as somebody who, we talk a lot of shit about supplements too,

but yet we all have covered it's full of them. Because we utilize them still, there is a place for them. There is times to implement them, and machines will do it is exactly the same way. But you see how like these, like the gyms, they have the supplemental stuff, like as the same way. But you see how like, these, like the gyms, they have the supplemental stuff like as the entire focus.

So you have, you know, the everything in these fitness expos is supplements and then the latest machine. You're like, you fucking idiots. Right. That's why we get so like, crazy with this, because we're like trying to tell you,

no, like, that's not step one. It's just not sexy. Like you walk into a gym. first of all, big box gyms tend to have a shit ton of cardio because everybody can get on a piece of cardio equipment and move and sweat. Then they have lots of machines because the average person can sit down on a machine,

look at the instructions and do their exercise. That race it go. A gym would not be very sexy for the average person if it was just a bunch of power, you know, a bunch of cages, barbells and dumbbells. You'd be like, okay, that's all you have is barbells and dumbbells. Where's all the rest of your equipment? Not realizing that I could do a million exercises with those, you know, those two pieces of equipment. Now that being said, again, machines have their

place. I will say this though, gyms, especially the hardcore ones seem to be changing a little bit now. It seems to be happening. You see, you're starting to see that the meat and potatoes is becoming the, what's supposed to be the meat and potatoes and all the supplemental stuff. Flat racks and platforms are showing up. Exactly.

You're starting to see some of that stuff, but just to hammer the message home, if you have a weakness and you, one of the best things you could do with a weak body part Is to increase the amount of frequency of stimulation Do your big movements, but then you can work it out more frequently You can honestly if you train with the right intensity and with the right programming you can train a weak body part Probably six days a week maybe maybe maybe seven days a week, depending on your recovery ability and how advanced you are. And how you train is very important. And how you train it.

I don't think you could squat hard seven days a week. Most of you will kill yourself doing that. But if I squat hard twice a week, a little easier, squat another day a week, and then the other days I might do some machines, well now I increased their frequency, and I'm not limiting, I'm not limited by my recovery ability. So it makes a huge difference. It's extremely important to look at your routine that way and understand the benefits of what you're doing and the detriment and plug them in accordingly and do the most important things first

and the less important things, use them as tools, just like Justin was saying, to tweak or to turn the screws, the final turns of those screws to tighten them up. And you would be surprised at just how effective doing something like that can be. I want you to revisit something you said earlier and get a little more nerdy into it, because I think it's a really good topic

that we've never, I don't say never, we even talked a lot about this. You mentioned about using a machine for somebody never, I don't say never, we even talked a lot about this. You mentioned about using a machine for somebody who, like for their glutes, they might be very quad dominant. People don't realize, or understand this concept very much. So I wanna get into this a little bit of why you do that

and how common it really is in a lot of bodies where your muscles don't fire properly. When we have imbalances, when muscles are extremely overactive and the antagonist is underactive, what ends up happening, especially with compound movements like dead lifting or squatting, the main movers may not be carrying the load like they're supposed to. So what you are trying to do is you're trying to basically teach that. So I wanted you to kind of explain on, like, you know, an example of that, like with your, with your squat, like a client like that and why and how.

Well, you have understanding the science behind that. Yeah, when you're doing a big movement, any movement, but we'll talk about a big movement because it's easier to illustrate. When I'm doing a squat, there's what's called a muscle recruitment pattern. This means that literally certain muscles are firing before other muscles. And this all, by the way, happens in the blink of an eye. It's split, split seconds, okay? But some muscles will fire first. Connection.

And there's a pattern of which muscles will fire next. And then some muscles are going to fire harder and carry more of the load. And others are going to play kind of secondary stabilizer roles in this whole pattern. Now, if you have a muscle recruitment pattern, that's not ideal, then it's important to change that recruitment pattern as you progress with your routine. If I continue to train without addressing that recruitment pattern, what'll end up happening is I'll strengthen that improper recruitment pattern. So to use the example of the squad, if I'm doing a squad, or I have a client doing a squad, and they're quad dominant,

what you're going to see is you're going to see that the glutes, or the hips aren't going to sit back as, and I'm doing like a super glaring example, because it could be way more subtle than this. But they might not sit back as much in their squat. They might have a lot of knee extension. You'll see the knees come forward pretty far. In extreme cases, the heels come off the floor.

In some cases, that won't even happen. And they'll just, what's moving their body from the bottom to the top is a lot of quadricep. And to a less degree, it's the glutes and hamstrings. Now, in the case of a barbell squat, the glutes are the prime moveers. They should be the glutes and hamstrings. Now, in the case of a barbell squat, the glutes are the prime movers. They should be the glutes and the quads. The quads are also prime movers,

but they're not, they're kind of, they play a little bit of a second fiddle to the glutes because they're such big, powerful muscles and they're on this huge joint known as your hips. And if I don't correct that recruitment pattern and I just continue to get stronger in my squats, then my pattern doesn't change. My quads get overdeveloped. My glutes get underdeveloped. And in some times, you don't always see it this way. By the way, recruitment patterns aren't necessarily visible by muscle development. Like I could look at someone

and say, wow, their quads are really big and their glutes look underdeveloped, but their glutes could also be firing very well. They just might not build muscle as easily in their glutes. And that's something different. That's an aesthetic point. But in terms of recruitment patterns, you see it from movement. So from that movement, someone will develop bigger quads than their glutes. They're not happy with the way their body's looking. In that case, what I would do is I would focus on squatting perfectly improper properly, go lighter, have them sit back, you know, activate the glutes as much as they can. And that's on my squat day.

But on the days in between, I may do machines to isolate and continue sending a muscle, you know, firing signal to the glutes. When it comes to recruitment patterns or to neuromuscular connections to muscle, frequency is king. Yeah. Not intensity.

Intensity is not king because intensity, if I hammer someone with intensity on their glutes and their glutes are having trouble firing, they're going to recruit all kinds of other muscles. Even if I'm doing a glute exercise, even if I'm doing a hip thrust or like a donkey kickback or whatever, and I'm using a shit ton of weight, they're gonna recruit every other muscle to help their not firing as hard glutes. So what I wanna do is I want a lot of frequency with perfect form and maybe not as much heavy weight.

So we're gonna do this isolation, isolated glute movements on the days in between, we do our squats, and really we're just focusing on feeling the glutes, and this is what bodybuilders are really good at. This is what bodybuilding has taught us. It's how to isolate muscles. Now for the most part, you don't want to necessarily feel

a particular muscle working, but in this particular case, it's invaluable. And so on the days in between, I would have that client use a machine or do movements that are more isolatory for the glutes to feel and squeeze, feel and squeeze, feel and squeeze. Maybe they get a little sore, but maybe they don't, but what we're really doing is we're getting them, we're getting them familiar with firing the glutes.

Then when we go to squat the following day, they're familiar with the feeling of hip extension. They're familiar with the feeling of firing the glutes, and they go from going, for being quad dominant to having a more favorable recruitment pattern. So then you start to get into more corrective mindset with this. And so this is like something like you mentioned frequency. So thinking of it like priorities that you're sending out from your brain as many tally marks as you're accumulating within your week, that's your priority.

So whatever that movement pattern is, is what you're telling your brain, you need to put up in front of the list. So, you know, as simple as that, if you're doing squats and you've never addressed the fact that your quads are firing predominantly, it's just gonna keep doing that. Right, and Michelle.

The more that it has to do with, I mean, we're in hip extension so much, that's just gonna keep doing that. Right, and, and, and, Michelle, it has to do with your, I mean, we're in, you're in hip extension so much, that's why people that people have a hard time with, you know, getting out of that, you know, and so when you go to squat, it's just like you said, you're, you're, a lot of people already have a natural anterior pelvic tilt. So lower cross syndrome, you know, second to upper cross syndrome is the next,

the next is a common one for sure. Very, very common, you know, and some people, it's, it's more obvious than others where you, your butt is really sticking out when, and then when you go to skill into your squat, those hip flexors are shortened so much, your chest comes over and you end up putting all the weight and stress all in those quads and glutes are doing, even though you're going through the motion like and looking like you should be squatting correctly, so much, so much of your quads and hip flexors are having to do all this work,

is there used to doing all that work? Well, and speaking from an aesthetic standpoint, now let's just talk about that. Now, one thing that we have in addressed is that besides the fact that exercises, well, you're limited by the amount of damage that you caused to a particular muscle, there's a systemic effect as well.

So let me explain. If I'm constantly doing a heavy barbell squats every single day, yes, I'm fatiguing the hell out of my legs and I'm probably overworking them, but I'm also tapping into my body's ability to recover the rest of my body. So my bench press will suffer, my deadlift will suffer, my overhead press will suffer, my even my curls and my tricep extensions will suffer because there's a systemic effect that's going on. Machines don't cause nearly as much systemic damage to the body, so it's just a fantastic way to add lots of volume and frequency without tapping into so many different things.

If you look, all of us have areas of our body that we really want to focus on and develop faster than other parts of our body that we really want to focus on and develop faster than other parts of our body. Of course, you want to do the big things that we talked about, but everybody, look, I could say my calves and my chest, or my weaknesses. So why not include or increase the frequency and volume with those dramatically and kind of keep everything else training the way I have been doing? Well, number one, I got to be careful with my recovery ability. I got to be careful with that systemic effect. If I continue to do just tons of bench press and stuff, because that's going to affect my other lifts as well.

And I don't want to develop my chest at the expense of weakening everything else. And so then boom, I plug in machines. And I do those on the other days. And I've dramatically increased the frequency. And again, this is a fantastic example of what I like to refer to as expert workout programming. And this is the kind example of what, you know, I like to refer to as expert workout programming.

Right. And this is the kind of stuff that you'll find in routines that are designed with all of these things in mind. Routines are not just routines. It's not just, you know, I'm hitting chest, I'm hitting back, I'm hitting legs. It takes all randomly throw variables out there. You got to take it all into account. And when you do that and you put in the, and you put in the numbers, and you plug in the formula,

the results that you get will blow you the fuck away. I literally, every single day, I know you guys see, literally have people sending me messages on a daily basis. I feel like I'm doing half, I feel like I'm doing half the work, and I'm getting twice the results, like this is crazy. I didn't know that it could work this way. And it's, you were spinning your tires in the dirt. That's all you were doing.

Yeah. Well, and that's, I'm most excited because we have gotten a lot of that. Those people that have gone through red now when they get into black, because something that we did with black is we put some emphasis on not only the focus on, you know, specific areas that you're trying to develop, but also the progressive overload of as you come through, as as you cycle around how you progressively start to increase volume. And I think the results that people are going to be seeing from that is going to be tremendous, especially if you've gone through red like you're supposed to and built that solid foundation. And now

you get to see what happens when you slowly apply extra volume and frequency inside and do a progressive overload the way you're supposed to in a routine and a program on how much gains you continue to see week over week. Right. Well, without giving away too much because it's not ready yet, but it will be soon and Doug, you can edit this out if you want. But I have a feeling it's going to be ready by time this goes, right? Doug, I don't know.

Tell him, Doug. Look, lots of pressure. Look and tell him, Doug. There's lots of pressure on me. Yeah, we're gonna be looking at this coming week and this may actually air the week that this is dropping. It's dropping. It's dropping.

Oh snap. Just to be safe, not to give away too much, but I guarantee you, we're gonna have a lot of stage presentation type athletes are gonna jump on this like frickin' you know, like. Well, they'd be so, they'd be so smart. Yeah, they'd be so, they'd be so, they didn't you know, I think I think we're going to see a lot of people do. We were just squeam their way to the scene. We are we are coming

around summertime. It is it is almost summertime. A lot of people are wanting to focus on that bikini or beach body right now. So it is you know, this is you know, where another another program would be gimmicky and and sell it that way. It's just happens to be we're dropping around the time and it is a pretty good. The universe provided us the perfect time. He did it. He did it. It did because this is the time

where you want to be focusing on sculpting and everything like that is getting ready for Beach Stats. Well, if you want to look at, check this out. If you want to see what real people have to say about some of the programming that we've put together, you can go to mindpumpmedia.com. We've got lots of testimonials on there.

We've also got some pretty awesome apparel that you can get if you want to rep, Mind Pump and look super hot and sexy for your friends. You can also find Mind Pump on Instagram at Mind Pump Radio. You can find me at Mind Pump Sal. You can find Justin at Mind Pump Justin and you can find Adam at Mind Pump Adam. Imagine that. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. For more information about this show and to get valuable free resources from Sal, Adam, and Justin, visit us at www.mindpumpradio.com. Until next time, this is Mind Pump.