Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 314: Strength vs Hypertrophy, High Bar vs Low Bar Squat, Mind Pump Extremists & MORE

Episode Date: June 22, 2016

iTunes review winners and Quah! Sal, Adam & Justin answer your questions about how to balance training for strength and hypertrophy, what is more important... diet or programming, the impact Mind Pump is making and the concern of extremism and what they think about low bar squats in comparison to high bar squats.

and Justin's going to get the coffee room. It's the Adam and Sal show, starring Adam and Sal. And Doug. No Justin in here right now. He's getting coffee. Bro, we could talk about aesthetics now. It's macros.

Yeah, let's talk about macros. Let's talk about bodybuilding. Yeah. Justin hates that. So bad. He does, he gives me dirty looks when I start to talk. We're talking about that. He rolls his eyes.

He rolls his eyes and then like, I can tell you just stops listening completely and then you just throw the jab, zero, so. Like, oh, macros. Yeah. No, I think he balances out the egos is what I think. Maybe that. Maybe that.

Maybe that. You know what I'm saying? Because you have such a big egos. You know what, dude? We're getting ready to interview Dom and we're getting ready to hit the road. Let's give some motherfucking t-shirts away. Oh, we're giving away shirts.

Yeah, we do that. We do that. And today we have 12 reviews to work off of. Oh, why would we do? So I don't know what's happened here. Atrophy. We're atrophing. I think so.

We got to get into a new phase. What do you think that was? Why do you think we had like this huge spike for like two weeks and then I think we were calling for people that have reviewed. Yeah. I thought we'd try that again last week. Listen, listen.

Yeah, we did a half-hearted effort. If you leave a review and it's a good one, it's a five-star good one, there's a good chance you'll win a free, limited edition Mind Pump t-shirt. They're pretty damn awesome. We've given it a lot of them. So leave us a review.

They're black on black, the black on black on black on my pumps are dope. Yeah, they're nice. Yeah, they're really good. Who wins? All right, we got Shadow Art 13. This one is quite mysterious, but it's basically my idea of it is,

I Lil' Alloy. There's lots of like eyes and elves and guise. Anyway, you know who you are. And then Ty Lidell. So simple yet so elegant. Ty Lidell is not one of our new form guys. I think it sounds familiar. His name is familiar. Yes. Well, how do they get their shirts, Doug? Well, they send a message to iTunes at mindpumpmedia.com. That's to me. And then also include your shirt size as well as your shipping address. And we'll get that right to you. Boom, thank you, we love you.

Enjoy the shirt. If you wanna pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Might, might, up with your hosts. Salta Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. I was talking to a friend of mine the other day. Oh, you have friends other than us. I do. You beat me to that.

I do. I don't think you do. So I asked him, I'm like, I'm like, do you like the sound of your voice? And he's like, no, nobody likes the sound of their voice. Because you know when you listen, you watch a video yourself and you hear your voice, you're like, oh, hey, everybody hates that, right?

Yeah. Except there's definitely, there's maybe all of us, but there's definitely two of us that really likes the sounds of our voices. And it's not because we like to talk, it's because we literally like the sound. And you know how I know that? What's one of the first things that either Adam or I will do

when we put the mics on, and then you can hear our own voice? You go, ooh. Or Adam will go, oh there it is. Yeah, oh, thanks. Finally. Your own voice is singing to yourself. To yourself. I don't know though.

That's weird. I think it's the, because I get it. I enjoy my voice. I think it's more the surround sound effect. It's that, it just sounds cool to like to hear it in, to talk and hear it in your ear.

I only sound good in headphones. Yeah. Yeah, but no, but don't you remember when you were younger or before we actually started doing it? Oh, bro, I didn't hear your voice. You'd be like, oh, no. No. I'm not a fan of it. I'm to hear your voice. You'd be like, ah, no. I'm not a fan of it.

I'm not a fan of it. It sounds okay on radio because I asked Doug to, uh, to, uh, to make it. He does a lot of auto tune for me. He fought over. He photoshopped your voices. Yeah. He photoshopped. The dopey gains on my voice over your tape.

I can sing now. So shreds is going to come after us. When we all first met, I get, I slit him a few bucks at a table. You know, auto tune. You didn't take care of a few bucks at a table, so he had to. You know, auto-tube. You didn't take care of me, for sure. Well, what he actually does, what Doug does is, he actually lowers our voices by a couple octaves,

just to make it sound like we have more testosterone. You know, it's funny, I've run into people at the gym. He could add more bass to yours. To mine. Yeah. Why would you have to talk to him about my stuff? I actually have, if we were to rank our voices in terms of projectability, I think I win. Yeah, I just

Jack the ability to Jack the most You know, you just projectile right in your face. You guys know the how I win contest. I create the parameters I see them and you create your That's it. You're really good. Hey, you guys want to have a who's the most Sicilian contest boom first place Like you know, what ever did you see my boy, who just got back from his first powerlifting me? And yeah, why is he so strong? I told you,

people who lift more than we can and are bigger than us are not allowing the forum. Fuck that. It's the press. He's too many of them now. I got a chance to talk to him a little bit afterwards and he got, he's got to sharing with me. He pulled about 60 55. Yeah, but he was really disappointed because that was he he spent the first what two or three times getting red lighted. He didn't he didn't get the white

light. He saw those all of his things, right? I don't watch the video. Oh, you should have watched the videos. You should point out. Why do you get red lighted? He said so he texts me after the meat, right? Because I told him, hey, let me know how it goes. Keep me posted. He sends me a message. He goes, well, I got my first taste of politics and powerlifting. Those mother.

I was like, what do you mean? And I'm thinking, I said, well, I don't get it. Like, I've never really thought about how it could be political that he says, well, I went to, you know, some small local, local meat. And he says, the guys that were all, you know, part of the click and everything like that, we're getting, you know, white lighted all the way.

White light means you've patched, you locked all the way out, you complete the map completely, right? And he said the judges were hitting red on him like every time and he shows the videos. And he's like, even everybody afterwards, you walked off and they're just like, man, I don't know what you didn't do.

He's locked out, dude. You should see the watch. So they were saying that he's not locked out? Yeah, they were saying that it wasn't a full rep.. He's locked out, dude. You should see the watch. So they were saying that he's not locked out? Yeah, they were saying that it wasn't a full rep. Like, he literally locked out, like, looked over, you know, set it down. And then, yeah, yeah, and then they still didn't give it to him. You see his frustration by the second time it happened to him. Finally, on the third one, like, he's like locked out, holding, retracting the shoulders

forever, then finally, they, they, they, they white light up on the last one. So he didn't get a chance to, to progress or anything like that. He just Fatigue him for all the rest so he pulled six fifty five like three times then yeah, oh Well, yeah, he's a frickin horse, isn't it? Yeah, so watch the watch the video But I we have a lot of people on the forum now that are Beasts like strong like really strong and some really ripped people on there. Yeah, we're no longer the strongest or fiddest guys No, that shit ended a long time ago It's it back in my coaching chair. Yeah, that sucks. I joked around about pulling people's videos or posts that

We're stronger than you bus and it was funny at first, but now it's just like Everybody yeah, well everybody's really taking off with this maps program. Awesome. You know what we're gonna do? We're gonna design a new. We're saying in a chair right now. We're gonna design a new maps program

that's incorrectly programmed. We need to like level play and feel a little bit. Equal it out a little. Just bring everybody down a few notches so that we appear stronger. It's a good idea, so. So I'm excited. We dropped maps anywhere already getting great. That's maps white maps anywhere. Yeah. Came out man. All kinds of great feedback on the meaning anywhere.

I'm excited. You know the four. It's awesome because the forum, you know, and I don't know how much we've mentioned this before. We've talked about the forum. We talked about how cool. Yet. But one of the things that too that the forum gets is, they get access to any of the programs, any of the guides, any books, any information that we ever release. It goes to them at least three days before it goes to the general public. And for a discount.

Yeah, and they, yeah. And also are- They get additional discount off the regular ones. Same thing, and that goes with a parallel too. So they're a parallel, they get 50% off on all parallel always. So they- Perks, man. There is some benefits to that. So if you're somebody who's even was even thinking about you know picking up a guide or thinking about picking up a

Program or picking up and that just keep that in mind that you know the form gets you know half off on a peril they get discounts on Guides and things like that they have to get free to get first dibs to get first dibs on the program You see Justin's nudes, but it's neat to see. I like I like them because most of them have gone through a majority of everything that we've produced and they're like the pulse, you know, they give me great, they give us great feedback on, you know, what they liked or didn't like or the challenges that they're having. So, and one of the things that we've always admitted on on my pump and we will continue to do is we produce content is evolving and growing like, you know, it's not like when we produce something,

it's like, oh, it has to be this way. We're not changing anything. Like, you know, part of my goals of what we're doing right now is taking everything that we've already developed and continue to improve on it and build on it and add to it. So, you know, and once you are in the program, you've got a maps program, anything that any additions or mods that we continue to add to that

will just add to your programs already. It won't be like a purchase for you. So, yeah, probably one of the guarantees you could always make is that things will evolve. That's a guarantee, it's gonna happen. As we continue to learn more about how to apply different aspects of programming. And as people complete the programming,

how to modify and change and continue their progress. It's one of the hardest things you could ever do with exercise is continuously, you know, see yourself progressing over the years. It's very easy to progress when you're a beginner, very hard to progress once you've reached a certain point. So that comes along with more expert and, you know, specific type programming. Speaking of which, would you end up working out this morning, Adam?

Adam, I didn't. Yeah, just because by the time I didn't realize that, Dom's interview was as close as it was back here. We all were talking about three. So I had an extra, I lost two hours. Yeah, I would have been perfect because I wanted to make sure the denolid was washed and everything like that

before we head off on the road and everything. So I rushed over here just to get over here. Hey, then I woke up this morning, right? Yeah, I would have been perfect because I wanted to make sure the denol is washed and everything like that before we head off on the road and everything so I rushed over here just to get over here. I woke up this morning, right? And this has happened to me maybe two other times in my life woke up in the morning Open my eyes and my eyes start shaking because I got vertigo you guys ever have vertigo Fucking horrible horrible. It's like you're you're it's like I spin you real fast and then that's how you know You know, I know it is. And so I was doing that thing.

So I had to do a few Eppley maneuvers which are these head positional things and luckily it got rid of most of it but now I still feel a little bit like I have morning six. So like the drinking spins? Uh, kind of. It's just, like your eyes, like it feels like the room is spinning. It sucks. It's a gross, gross feeling. It's horrible.

And you got that on top of your tummy problems? You're just a fucking mess. No, it just happens. I want everybody to hear this. You know, because I know everybody falls whatever Sal does all the time, but I don't know. Well, he'd be doing all the way here in Vertigo.

Fucking tummy problems. Oh no. I'd rather have the iron stomach over here like Justin, just fucking in. Let's just give it, you know, shovel it down and shoot it out. Just, just cast iron stomach ceramic coin. Let's just give it you know shovel it down and shoot it out Cast iron stomach ceramic coin. I was looking for cast iron. That's what you call before what's up? His holy it got me oh shit

Shit no, it's the mother fucking car Eagle has landed I think you got it down. Yeah, son. Yes. All right, starting with our Tyler Farar, how do you balance strength and hypertrophy training? I like the way he asked the question, because he, without realizing it, I think he's kind of falling into this kind of myth in which strength and hypertrophy training

are not related. How do I balance? It's almost like he asked, how do I balance long distance running with weight training? Because the way he asks is it sounds like they're super separate. Here's the thing. Strength and hypertrophy contribute to each other tremendously. So balance really is about, it's not even so much about balancing, it's about whether you are interested in just hypertrophy or just strength, you should train for both of them and you should put them together in a program that trains specifically for both of them

because the stronger you get, the more likely you are to build muscle and the more muscle you build the stronger the muscle contractions and the stronger you get, the more likely you are to build muscle, and the more muscle you build, the stronger the muscle contractions, and the stronger you get. So, that's number one. But I would say, one of the mistakes I see people, in people, tube mistakes I see when training for strength, is that, A, they don't do it, so everybody gets stuck in the hypertrophy, you know, eight to 12 rep range, or B, when they do train for strength, they think that the low reps means that they also go to failure. So, okay, I'm going to go do, you know, today I'm going to go to train for strength. I'm going to do two reps. That means I'm going to literally max out. Yeah, right. That's right. Two reps. Yeah.

Which, which is, which is not the way you train for strength, the way you train for strength is you do go on those low rep ranges, but you don't go to failure. So if I'm doing sets of two reps, I'm doing them with a weight that I could do maybe four or five times. And so I'm just going and I'm doing two really good reps, and then I'm resting and then I'm repeating them.

And you typically want to do a lot of sets when you do this kind of training. So because you're not doing lots of different exercises, you're kind of focusing on squats and deadlifts and overhead presses. And so it's cool to do five, six sets of two reps of a weight that you could do five reps with. And then the other thing is I found that it works better

to train for strength, specifically over the course of a couple of two or three weeks, versus doing it once a week, and mixing it in with hypertrophy. I see a couple of two or three weeks versus doing it once a week, you know, and mixing it in with hypertrophy. I see better results in five or two. There's lots of studies to show both sides of that, right? That's probably one of the most debated. This is my opinion.

Yeah, that's definitely something that's that's debate right now, which I don't think either one's wrong. But here's the thing when we, this is why we phase, phase the, all the maps programs for this exact purpose is everything has carry over. Each one plays into the other one. They're both extremely important to program design. Now the same way that I normally respond to someone with a question like this is the same way I respond to somebody with like nutrition, like how we talk about our mini cuts and mini bulks is let's say your primary goal is to lose body fat

and to cut, you're trying to lean out. Well, when I'm phasing your diet, it is a majority, it is gonna be in a deficit and we're heading that way, but I won't stay in that deficit and cut forever and for a very, very long period of time. I'll still phase you out, but then I'll phase you right back in, because that's our primary goal.

We have a ways to go. Same thing I feel like goes with high-perture fee training or strength training. If that's all we're discussing, and you're like, how do I find the balance? Which one's more important? I would say, okay, which one is more of a priority to you? So maybe you feel like you lack a lot of strength,

but you feel like you like your look and the way you fill out your clothes or what about that. And so maybe the pump and the fullness look is less of a priority and you want to really build strength. Now, I would probably tell you to spend more time and strength and then make sure you phase out into hypertrophy. Cause like Sal said, they both have carryovers to each each other and they're both important. But that's how I've phase it, you

know, but we do this naturally already in the maps programs for this purpose. Yeah, you're just trying to stay, you know, you're trying to stay ahead of plateau. As you go through that, Adam is saying, you might have a preference as far as a look or you like the way you look right now, but you still should train for strength like that. You should get outside of that 10 to 12 rep range in order to, you know, stay ahead of your body and not like hit a wall and get in that comfort zone where now your body knows that exactly what's in front of it. So it starts, you know, making it more efficient

as far as like how do, you know, utilize energy and all this kind of stuff. So, you know, in a sense, you're not going to progress. So you really have to kind of look at it from those terms. And then, you know, for me, personally, it's more like, I want to stay athletic. So that's going to be a priority for me. So I'm going to, I'm still going to go through hypertrophy phases. You know, I'm going to, I'm going to do that because it's going to fuel my strength gains. So you just have to keep it all a part of the program whether it's your focus or not.

Well, I'll tell you, the original maps program, maps endobolic or maps red has three phases. And the first phase is focused specifically on maximal strength, which we call central nervous system adaptation. And then it moves into hypertrophy, which is more traditional. And then we move into another form of hypertrophy called sarcoplasmic hypertrophy training. But nonetheless, the first three weeks is this strength phase. And I'll say this, for most people, whether you enroll in our program or not, most people listening who are just looking to be more muscular and leaner, most of you will benefit from having

a two to three week strength cycle every, I don't know, every three months. Every three months, throw in a three week strength cycle where you go in, you're focusing on your big lifts, you're going, you're doing squats, you're picking a weight that you could do six reps with and you do just sets of three or four reps or two reps and you do six sets or seven sets and then you pick another big compound movement and do the same thing. And watch your strength explode. People get blown away by the gains that they make in strength because they don't ever train this particular phase.

Now on the flip side, if you're a strength athlete, you're a power lifter, you get stuck a lot in that phase. I would say same thing every three months, throw in a couple of weeks of hypertrophy training with auxiliary exercises like side laterals and curls and stuff like that, and then go back to your powerlifting training and see what happens.

You're gonna notice that you feel more stable in your lifts and certain lifts. You're gonna notice your strength is gonna feel a little bit better. You're gonna give your joints a little bit of a break. So strength and hypertrophy, that's hand in hand. You really don't wanna separate them for any reason, whatsoever.

But again, if you're more focused on hypertrophy, throwing some strength every three months, if you're more focused on strength,rophy throwing some strength, you know, every three months if you're more focused on strength and just flipped that and throw some the key the key is the key is that And there's a little jab right there. The key is really this and I think the the most common thing I see is people Getting stuck in in what they love to do and and that's it's I think we're all victims of this right like I know I know I do I start going away. I think we're all victims of this, right? Like I know, I know I do. I start going away, I go ahead at phase one red and I love the power lifting type feeling,

lifting the heavy singles and doubles and triple. I love that and I love to see my weights go up. Like, and then I also love the pump. And I remember when I, no matter what, like once I start to get good at a phase, that's typically when people get addicted to it and keep going to a winning reality, that's really when people get addicted to it and keep going to it when in reality, that's really when you probably should be phasing out of it.

So learning to have that mentality is really tough to do. You gotta really mentally check yourself. And a lot of times you have to check your ego because when you just came out of doing like lots of strength training and you're pulling 500-something pounds out the floor with that, then I'll send you a drop down to 300 and something, or same thing goes for any of your other exercises, when you have to reduce your weight significantly

in order to do 12, 15 reps and supersets like we do and, you know, phase three of black, like, you have to like check your ego and say, it doesn't matter that I'm lifting 10 pounds and I can do, I've done 50 some pounds. It takes a lot more mental discipline. It takes a lot of mental discipline. So I think that's the big takeaway on this is you got to get out of those phases. Don't stay in phases too long. East Coast Kinney. What is more important diet or programming? Diet? Yeah, well, well, depends. Depends on what you're asking for. Okay. If you're also was asking like why the aesthetic

ises diet right away, right? Yeah. I would emphasize program so much instead of like, like why we don't put out diet as many diets, yeah. Okay, so I'll answer that first. Why do we focus on exercise programming? Like, if you look at our, if you want mind pump media.com, you'll notice that we offer, most of the stuff we offer is exercise programming, whether it's, you know, maps and a ballic or maps aesthetic or maps performance or even the one that we just released or we'll be releasing soon Maps anywhere, which is the you know, no gym required workout program at you do at home

You'll notice that we don't have lots of stuff on diet. We have a nutrition guide But we don't tell people we don't program diets and here's why two reasons number one. We are Unabashedly experts at programming, exercise program. We understand nutrition very, very well. But if we were to compare our, just being totally honest, if we were to compare our knowledge and expertise on programming versus on diet, I would say we are, and it's just because we're so good at programming. It's not because we're not great in nutrition.

It's just we're bad asses at programming. And so that's why we like to focus on that. And the second thing is, nutrition, there's just where bad ass is at programming. And so that's why we like to focus on that. And the second thing is nutrition, there's so many damn variables, individual variables, that it would, we have too much. It's the biggest factor, let's guess. I mean, we have too much integrity to say, eat this. Like how can you tell anybody to eat something

when the variables associated with diet are so vast and ridiculous that telling people to eat a specific way is not only not effective, it's bad advice. Well, I have a big problem with that because it's just, I mean, if unless we're addressing you individually like one on one, I think that we could actually have a pretty good handle as far as to address

and like how to help you with that. However, we can't write a guide for somebody who's just purchased that isn't just like on some level. It is somewhat generic, you know, and this is the tough part because it's generic enough to where like most people will benefit from it. However, you really have to do the work to identify how that fits you specifically because everybody does have so many variables that they, you know, were born with. And these are all things that, you know, any professional will look at it like that. Like you can't say that, like, okay, here's your diet for this week. Here's, you know, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. Like, here's

what you're going to gonna wanna stick with. You might be able to do that on an individual basis, but putting out a program for everyone? I don't know. Well, let's be honest too. I think I would add a third to what Sal said. We talk a little bit about this on some Q and A's, but we knew business wise what we were doing.

We knew there was a huge need in the fitness industry for programming. If we knew there was a huge need in the fitness industry for programming. If I thought there was a ton of people writing great programs out there, I wouldn't think that's a market I'd want to get into. I wouldn't want to try and get, come in and be like,

man, well, there's this point. They do a great job. They do it. No, there's a lot of shit out there. There's not hardly anything out there. It's rare I come across somebody's program and I go like, oh, damn, this guy knows this guy or girl knows what the fuck they're doing. Like this is some serious good programming done here.

You don't see that. Everything is is wrapped around all the food gimmicks and the supplement gimmicks. Like, so that we wanted to stay away from that as much as possible. And we wanted to fill a void where that we felt we could make the greatest impact, which was coming in and designing programs that are gonna blow people away, because actually somebody knows what the fuck they're doing, spent some time doing that. No, we knew we'd have a hurdle and a challenge

because you can get $25 programs out there all over the place from all kinds of fitness celebrities, but none of them know what the fuck they're doing or how to program design people. Plus, not a lot of them have a podcast and a forum, which I feel like that's the biggest piece to all of this. And that's also, if you pay attention, a lot of our episodes are very heavily weighted

in nutrition. We talk a lot about nutrition, a lot about food, but that's just it. We talk about the relationship with foods and how different macronutrients affect the body and learning how to listen to that. And we find that far more powerful and beneficial for people than writing out a diet. I've written a million diets a million different ways. You want a car blow, you want a back load, a front load, you want a cycle,

you want a keto genic, you want. These conversations are all important for people to listen to because then they can sort of put themselves in that place. Like, oh, I understand, I have tried that, right? I have some experience with that, or they can sort of project themselves into our conversation as far as nutrition goes.

And I think that's a more powerful way to do it, because then you can identify what the real questions are that pertain to you. Well, it's more sustainable that way, and this is what we always discuss. Like, having the experience that we all have, you know, I would like to say that, you know, 90% of my clients, you know, change their lives forever. They get this phenomenon, but in reality, you know, a majority I've watched way more than 60% of my people fail

for most of my career. And that's hard. That's hard seeing that. But a lot of that is because because of all the poor programming programming the poor diets the poor Gimike shit that's all out there. Everybody's looking for quick fix And that's why we all felt so passionate about this is exposing all that stuff and giving people the truth that hey This is gonna be a journey. There is no fancy diet that's gonna get you in great shape and keep you that way for sure Sure, you could starve the body of calories and do it some fancy new way that somebody wrote some book about that has a little bit of science to back in. All looking for performance enhancements. Right.

Yes. Yes. We are too. You know, but we're trying to cut out all the BS. Well, the same time. The second part, too, the question is what's more important. I'll say this. If for longevity, for health, diet is the most important thing for athletic performance.

Programming probably will make a bigger impact. Like if you want to build muscle and get stronger, you need good programming, just eating right won't necessarily do it. But again, it's literally one and two and for different goals and things. It's king-swing, man. You gotta have them both.

You gotta do both. I mean, if your diet is horrible, to have said, excellent programming is gonna do a little for you. And if your programming is horrible, excellent diet to do a little for you and if your programming is horrible excellent diet We'll do a little bit for you, but if you know if I had to trade one for the other. I don't know I wouldn't You got to kind of have you got it you got to have both diet really affects health Programming really affects performance and you know strength and stuff like that

Cody 31. How do you feel about the impact that you're having on people? And are you concerned about people becoming extremists? We actually kind of talk about this. This is something I think about a lot. Yeah, we discussed this outside. We're very careful. I think this, we've all talked about, this is one of the benefits too of us being three guys

that have different backgrounds and in different points of view and different temperaments. Like, you know, it's kind of neat. There's there's always one of us who is his got his rough is his feathers ruffled recently and and is kind of, you know, fired up about something and maybe push something too far or say something that maybe collectively we don't all want to. Justin. Yeah. Let? No.

No. No. Since we've been doing this, there's definitely been at least one or two times that each and every person in this room has been frustrated and probably expressed it differently than how we'd probably want to come across. And I think we always are really careful of that. And it's pretty neat. This is what I love about these guys is everyone's very mindful of that and then let's say I get off on a tangent And I probably say something that I shouldn't say

Sal's pretty good about cleaning my mess up and yeah backpedaling for us as a whole Which you know something that we also just this just happened recently too like Sometimes people like to separate all of us because we have different personalities and you know, something that we also just just happen recently too, like sometimes people like to separate all of us because we have different personalities and you know, Justin has his fans and saldas and myself and even Doug, like everyone's got their people, they're super, they relate to and so they probably gravitate more towards, but don't get it twisted. Each and every man in this room, like, you know, when we make a decision, it's a collective decision on what we're going to do and we stand behind each other. But sometimes, you know, we're...

We're mid-tri-pod. You know, sometimes we're gonna say things or do things that, you know, one of us may went too far, but the other guys are always very careful to back that up. So we're, I also feel like we're also, we're very honest about making mistakes and doing things like, I mean, I mean, you have to be, dude, we're on air.

Everything we say is recorded forever. Guarantee we're gonna say some stuff. Just get that shit out. Well, dude, this is something I think about all the time. I've met a couple of people who just listened to the show, right? And when they meet me, it's for them, it's awkward because, and I've talked to a couple of them afterwards, because then we became friends, and they'll say it's weird because when I met you, you knew nothing about

me, but I felt like I know everything about you. You know what I mean? So it's a very strange situation, and I can tell that they immediately feel like they know me. Like, imagine right now, if you're a listener, imagine meeting a stranger, but that stranger's like, knows it, like, oh yeah, I know everything about you, and they're acting in a way in which that they know you, it's a very interesting phenomenon. And I also think too that we are very responsive to feedback from fans. And we actually include our fans more than most podcasts and shows I've heard.

Like we really feed off you guys as far as questions. And what we're doing with the show. We're always pretty receptive as far as constructive feedback. That kind of stuff does determine our voice and what direction we're going. I want to make sure even for myself, I'm portraying what I wanna portray. I don't want people to think of me in a certain light that I'm disappointed in myself. It's hard though, because I think we've all

kinda gone through it, right? Where we've struggled with that, or it's just like, man, that's not who I am. You know what, here's the thing, because it goes up and down, and I think that it's just, we pay attention to it, just like anybody else would. Here's the thing that, this is the good thing

and the bad thing about mind pump. The good thing is that we're extremely real. The bad thing is that we're extremely real. So what I mean by that is, I find it almost impossible to filter my opinions. Like I, there's times when I'm like, okay, I gotta be very careful how I say this because people might take it the wrong way or whatever.

And you know what ends up happening, ends up coming out the way it comes out. And I, it's very hard for me to feel to that. And especially when I'm around you guys, and I know you guys do the same thing, we've said some things where, you know, afterwards I get stressed out a little bit. But it's just one of those things like we got to be careful, you know, some people may listen and they may take that advice and take it to the next level. And so one thing that I'm always careful to do

is to say, hey, make sure if you do it something like we're saying or I don't necessarily advise this or because you gotta be careful as a responsibility. Well, I think we've done that since day one. You remember when we first started, I mean, when we first started really growing to the point where now when we open one of our social media platforms, you know, we're tagged all over the place, there's, you know, there's all kinds of so much that we can't even possibly get to half the ones

that we see, right? They're waiting for some kind of specific reaction. Yeah. And I remember when we first started, you know, kind of throwing jabs at shreds and, you know, talking shit about the whole IIFYM stuff. And you know, people started to get kind of aggressive and talking shit. And we came back and remember the very, and I remember very next episode, I was like, listen, I want to make this very clear with everybody that, you know,

we express ourselves on the show. And I know we're reaching tons of people, but our intentions aren't to harm anybody else. Our intentions are not to, you know, weren't to collapse the shreds business or isn't to come after Lane Norton for IFI Am or Jim Stepanee for his bullshit stuff that he talks about. It's not to attack these people, you know, personally, it's to expose things. And, you know, it's unfortunate that their names are the people that are tied to some of these things, but it's not like, we're not looking to bully people. No, but I'll tell you right now, though, if we see some shit, we're going to call it, you know, we're going to call it as it is. We're just trying, you know, we're just trying to bully people no, but I will tell you right now though if we see some shit We're gonna call it you know, we're gonna call it as it is. We're just trying you know We're just trying to steer people back to you know truthful information and you know just make sure that

You know people are are a little more You know They they vet their source a little bit better, you know, because I think that's a big problem with the internet, you know. It is, but good luck, man. Yeah. Good luck. It's all crazy stuff. I mean, here's an example.

Like, we talk about how bad artificial sweeteners are, right? So let's say we're at some fitness event in Vegas and the pool and I grab a diet red bull and I'm drinking a red bull and someone takes a picture of that. Yeah. Someone will make a meme, and be like, sell the hip-ha-cree. He's like, no, that's what we get, that's why, again, while we're careful,

because we inform, but it's also, we're not like Nazis with our own advice. Like, I guarantee you, we've had, we'll have our official sweetener here and there, we'll eat a certain way sometimes, or I'm not gonna fast every single day, or I don't always eat keto a hundred percent of a time. But that's where the extremist stuff

that we gotta be careful is that people will see us, we're like, I thought you said you don't, the artificial sweetener's a bad. It's like, well, I'm at a pool, I'm having a red bull with vodka. I actually struggle with that. Yeah, with CrossFit too, because I had always mentioned in the beginning, I have friends that do it,

and I have friends that own gyms with it. And it's like, I'm not trying to like bash anybody, like I just wanna like, bring about awareness that like you can do a lot of those same moves and have an awesome kick ass workout that's, you know, knocking into people. There's another way you can do it, that's all. Alejandro Sanchez 33.

He's asking about the squat. What do you think about the use of the low bar squat or should everyone high bar? I think you should find what works best for you. You know are the high bar squat supposed to encourage more of an upright squat low bar squat you change the leverage a little bit So you tend to bend forward more of the ways squat, low bar squat, you change the leverage a little bit, so you tend to bend forward more of the waist. Personally, I teach and I use a, I would say medium, in between low and high bar, that's how I train people. Too high of a bar squat, a lot of people,

a lot of clients, I don't know about you guys, but a lot of my clients just can't find that comfortable sitting on their traps that way. So I have to have them set it a little lower for them to feel more comfortable. If you really like how the mechanics, like when you have it up too highly, that too, when you drop down, like it makes you round your shoulders

forward. It does a lot of, yeah. Just the compensations that happen is a result in my opinion. But yeah, like you said, I would probably go somewhere in between the two, however, if I'm doing, I tend to go a bit lower than most people, but that's just because of my levers.

I really, I was the one who really wanted to answer this question, and the main reason why I wanted to talk about it was because I've just did a post recently on Instagram talking about the depth of my squat and mobility and everything ever since I went through maps performance. One thing that I can definitely tell you guys, being somebody who is inconsistently squatted my entire fitness career and then until just probably about now it's been about two and a half, three years of really consistently squatting. But I really consistently, it's a bad week

is one day a week I'm squatting, sometimes I'm squatting three, four times in a week. And the main reason why I started to increase my frequency of squatting so much was, I finally really put it together that, man, this is, I stopped looking at it so much like an exercise to build my quads or build my glutes and that man this is I stopped looking at it so much like an exercise to build my quads or build my glutes and that was like and started looking at it like a skill like I wanted to get

fucking good at it like I wanted to get so good at it that I looked pretty when I did it I felt a little nuance. Every little yes master every little exactly. I love that. And and I still man we're talking three years of of religiously doing that. And I feel the best I've ever felt. I'm the proudest of my squat that I've ever been in my entire life. But by no means do I think that I am like this awesome, great squatter. But I've come a long ways. And I think that, man, if I'm a personal trainer, like I really understand mechanics, I've been doing this for a long time. It's not like I just started squatting

and it's taking me this long to really, really get good at it. I can't express that enough to people that, you know, all these things are things that, and now I play with all of it, high bar, low bar, go mid. I'm now I'm playing with my stance a lot. I was just squatting really, really narrow. I couldn't do that before. I didn't have the mobility to do a really narrow stance squat.

I had to get a really wide base and I couldn't get my hips all the way down where now I can go really wide. I can go really narrow. You know, I can mess with the position of my feet. And so I'm always constantly tweaking the mechanics to figure this all out. And you have to, you just, and it doesn't always have to be like you're going into squat to lift super heavy weight, or like really get after it, or feel sore after your workout.

I wanna get into squatting so much that it just feels comfortable. It feels comfortable and natural, and I ain't gotta think about anything anymore. And if that's the case, then I would treat the same way, I would treat a sport or anything else to where it's... I'm gonna say that's what I loved about sports, is because, you know, there are not, like what I loved about sports, is because they're not, like depending on your position or whatever sport you're doing,

there's not a whole lot of variables in there that are outside mechanically. Like you're gonna be doing a lot of the same thing. But in practice, what it's all about is defining those very specific movements and then how to optimize those to their fullest degree. Because once you really are meticulous and you take your time and you figure out like each little intricate movement is going to set you like a fraction of a second before

your opponent, you know, that's a big edge. I want to give an example of that exact point you just made. So I just said how I've been playing with my stance. So when I'm really wide, you know, when I originally started that way, I did it because I didn't have hip mobility. Now my hip mobility, I've got great hip mobility and my even my shoulders have came along with.

So now I can take this really narrow stance. What I notice is I can generate a lot more power for my hips with my stance in versus this really wide stance. And so just getting better at that, I'm seeing a huge difference in my strength in my lifting. So that little nuance right there was like before I squatted this way because my body would only allow me to squat this way. Yeah, and you're just making that work for you. Exactly. Where now I'm tweaking and like really trying to optimize, you know, how I squat so I can generate more power, it's more comfortable. That's something I've noticed is like, wow, originally I would never squat with this

close of stance because I couldn't. Now that I can, I'm seeing the benefits behind it. And so that's those are those little subtle tweaks in your sport, like you're saying. And I would say for the squat, you know, back to in terms of the original question of low and high bar. Most people, if you're a beginner, you're going to do better with a moderate low bar squat. It's a high bar squat is requires more technique, more mobility, you need to be able to stay more upright in your squat and you be able to position, you need to be able to stay more upright in your squat and you'd be able to position you and you need to be a little different.

So I would say if you're just starting off, go with a lower type positioning and get good at that. Once you get real good, like Adam's saying, you start practicing your squat and you're getting really good and it's becoming a skill for you. Then I would say you could start playing with the positioning of the bar and see how you can squat. But I've met very few people who do better with a high bar than with a low bar. And of course, if you're an Olympic lifter,

you high bar squat all day long because they stay real upright in the hole. But for me, even for myself, when I go to high with the bar, it just doesn't feel as good. I definitely feel more stable with it lower. But I've seen some really low bar squats where it's down by the rear delts or lower. Mine is a little bit above that

and I think yours Adam's probably slightly above that too. I definitely tend to come forward more when it's high. So yeah, when I bring it down, I'm very like a lot tighter solid. I like how when I kind of go mid like you're saying, so when I get into a squat, I grab with one hand,

I swoop my neck and head underneath, and then I retract and squeeze my shoulder blades as far back as I can, and then I wedge the bar between my back and wear my shoulder. So it just kind of holds me in that retractive position. And I find if I go too high, that gives me too much play with my shoulders. Well, there's another point though,

people that don't have good shoulder mobility You know a lot of times like they won't go lower because they can't like you know position their arms and into a good spot And that was my original problem my original problem was my shoulder mobility was so bad So I had to do more of a high bar squat which actually caused me to do have more of a rounded shoulder forward head squat when I would dip down And I was remember when I was pushing off my feet Yeah, and that was part of why I got to pull you back. Yeah. And I would come off my feet a lot, right?

So, now that I can actually retract now that I can pull the shoulders all the way back, I can get the bar deeper down. It kind of wedges behind there. It helps me stand more upright when I sit down. So, And by the way, think of it this way. Like if you look at someone squatting from the side,

you have a bunch of joints and levers that are moving. but if you look at the upper body down to the hips, that's a big lever, okay? And the way physics works is if I put weight, if it's further away from the pivot point, then that weight becomes heavier. And what I mean by that, it's like, if I grab a broomstick and I grab it by the middle of the broomstick, it's going to be easier for me to lift than if I grab it at the very end because now I have length in the lever. Well, every time the more you raise the bar on your back, the further the lever becomes

from the hips. And so this is why a proper high bar squat is very upright because if you lean far forward and that weight is high up on your back, You've increased the amount of tension on your hips and your lower back. And so if you lean forward, it's better to have it lower on your back because you shorten the lever. This is why power lifters will go with a super low bar squads, because it just, it makes them stronger.

But the point I'm making with this is also this. This is one of the reasons why I almost always never recommend a bar pad for people who squat. I never recommend bar pads because a nice thick bar pad will raise in length of the lever by a couple inches. The bar is now sitting on a fat pad, which is also sitting on your upper traps because it's hard to use a bar pad with a low bar squat, but with a high bar squat, that's what they're designed for, right?

It sits right on top of your trap. So you get Mrs. Johnson, who's a beginner, and she's your client and your training, and you want to teach her out of squats. So you get the bar pad out because we don't want to hurt your neck with the bar pad. What you've all you've done is you've lengthened the lever from the hips all the way up to the neck, and then on top of that pad, and you're making it more difficult. What you should do is practice proper bar positioning lower on the back, don't use a bar pad.

And don't put any weight, just do the bar for now. That's it, and you'll do much better. It's why every time I see people using a bar pad, it's like, don't use one, I don't care how to do it. I don't think you're, or whatever. Yeah, what do you think about like stingray trap? So the stingray is thinner, it's not gonna add as much material, however the stingray also, still a's not going to add as much material. However, the stingray also it promotes a hard bar, high bar squat.

It's designed to sit on top of the traps. And again, if you have good mobility, good positioning for high bar squat, and you want to use one of those things, that's fine. But I would say learn. And this is a great example of how the smallest things can make the biggest difference. Because the difference between a low bar and a high bar squat is inches. It's not like we're not talking feet. It's the same exercise. It's a difference of maybe three inches, four inches max. But that four inches, you know, makes a big difference in how you perform it within your movement. And a bar paddle ad add an inch an inch and a half Some of Jeff seems to be just really fat. Yeah, some big ones bar pads out there. Yeah, to help people so Go raw exactly. Hey check check out our site mind pump media.com. It's where you find all of our programs We have some of them bundled together. We actually have a build your butt bundle

Which is six months of program designed to give you a fantastic ass You can also check us out on Instagram at mine pump radio and picks you can find me at mine pump south Adams at mine pump Adam Justin's at mine pump Justin Doug is at you guessed it mine pump Doug and Don't leave don't forget to leave us a five star rating review on iTunes. You may win a free t-shirt Thank you for listening to mine pump We are reading review on iTunes. You may win a free t-shirt. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body,

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