Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 408: Sumo vs. Regular Squats & Deadlifts, What to Look for in an Assessment & How to Deal with Unwanted Advice

Episode Date: November 25, 2016

Kimera-Quah! Happy Thanksgiving! In this episode of Quah, sponsored by Kimera Koffee (kimerakoffee.com, code "mindpump" for 10% off), Sal, Adam & Justin answer Pump Head questions about what they look for when doing an assessment, how to deal with unwanted advice and the difference between sumo and regular squats and deadlifts. Have Sal, Adam & Justin personally train you with a new video every day on our new YouTube channel, Mind Pump TV. Be sure to Subscribe for updates. Get MAPS Anabolic, MAPS Performance, MAPS Aesthetic and the Butt Builder Blueprint (The RGB Super Bundle) packaged together at a substantial DISCOUNT at www.mindpumpmedia.com. Please subscribe, rate and review this show! Each week our favorite reviewers are announced on the show and sent Mind Pump T-shirts! Have questions for Mind Pump? Each Monday on Instagram (@mindpumpradio) look for the QUAH post and input your question there. (Sal, Adam & Justin will answer as many questions as they can)

So I'm really excited thanksgiving. And you know, around the holidays, this is the toddler. This is the time where I like to go Christmas shopping. I always like to adopt to a family every year. I know we're doing that this year again. So it gets me excited to the year of giving. I thought we should do something cool. And it was funny.

You just saw just brought up really what was it two days ago. A story about someone who emailed you and I thought, this is perfect. We got Thanksgiving around the corner. Yeah, we had a person who's been a long time listener's contact us, it's happened a couple of times now. I've had students too. Yes, long time listener got a lot of benefit

out of listening to my pump, really wants to do maps. Just, she's a single mom, can't afford it. And so, you know, there's got to be a lot of people, Adam brings us up all the time. There's got to be a lot of people who listen, who are on the fence, want to try our programs. We always recommend maps and a ballad being the starting point, right? That's the foundational program.

Which, this is why we decided we're just gonna do that, right? We're just doing that. Just maps and a ballad. The one program, the one we decide is the entry. It It's like hey, this is what we're all about you know You get introduced to the to the whole system of maps that way Yeah, and we want and we don't want to devalue our program. So this is a Literally a black Friday day sale 24 hours I guess as soon as you listen to this episode. This is Thanksgiving today. So happy Thanksgiving

This is us mind pump giving back hopefully to our listeners that have not enrolled into the programs. You've got 24 hours from listening to this basically to get on that website, to get on to MindPumpMedia.com. You'll see the half off, 50% off. 50% off. Yeah. So it's half off. Maps and a ball like half off until midnight Friday night. It's the biggest discount we've ever given on any program. I would love to see all these people doing maps in a ball Yeah, I mean to the New Year. It'd be awesome. Yeah, it'd be perfect So mind pump media.com. You'll see it right there. It'll say have 50% off. Happy Thanksgiving If you want to pump your body and expand your mind There's only one place to go

Mind up, mind up with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. Did you make those shorts or were they like that? No, I did, they were like that. Oh yeah, they curled at the bottom like that. You buy it, you buy it like that. They curled up naturally at the bottom like that or is that just like, they're just, I guess they're just scared of my calves.

Damn it. Fuck. Ooh. God damn it. Big cast reference, boom. Whoa. So loud in man. I'm a man. I'm a man. I'm a man. I'm a man. I'm a man. I'm a man.

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I'm a man. I'm a man. I'm a man. I'm a now. Karen Kankles. Because we'd be the ectomorphs always lean. But the nice slim have. Well, I'd be the one wearing the pumps. No, I have great chick legs if I was trying to do that. You have a chick ass. We've talked about this before. I think it's just that. It's weird.

It has to be the worst compliment. It's the arching of the bag. No, it has probably the worst compliment. That one time you moondess, I was like, that's kind of, hmm. You were partially turned on. I was like, I'm gonna slap that. I was like, this is a weird, I have a weird bone. I have a weird feeling right.

This is right. I don't know why I kind of like this. So bubbly. It's just, it's just, yeah, it's high. You could really confuse him. It's high and, it's high and smooth. I'll look, I'm all messed with him with all all joking aside. Oh, stop looking at me All jokes of meat all joking aside all I'm saying is if there was some kind of natural disaster

We were trapped in this building for a month Adam's here for first. I thought it takes a month like I say a month We be trapped for 30 days within 30 days. Just knowing it's gonna be a long time. It's like the second day. Let's be honest guys. Puget disaster happened. There's nobody else. We're weekend. We're weekend guys. Day three, they like they they rescue us. Yeah. We're like we already fucked each other man. Oh man. But there's more people. We thought we're like we already fuck each other man. Oh man More people

We thought we were gonna stuck in here for a long time. I think I myself would let's make a pack Right now, we're not gonna talk about it. They're all it's only been 10 hours guys guys good lord We've all fucked each other already. I do now. I just tossed around guys you guys seen the that TV series yet that called alone Just have you seen? I haven't seen oh wow. I thought for sure you would like to it's I think it's on discovery. They do it's called a loan and they use they go up and I want to believe I want to believe I want to say it's I want to believe I believe it's up in Alaska somewhere up in Alaska They they drop these guys off right right? And they do 10. I haven't seen it, but I've seen the commercials.

My two best friends love it. We were all, and they've actually done a really good job. So what they do is like, I think it's on it's second or third season now, where you get to see all the profiles of the guys that are going first. And you know, they have all these attributes, they have like, they have 10 things they can bring, right?

And there's a list of things. Do they score them? Yeah, they're allowed like 10 things. And they're like, it's small things. Obviously you can't bring like a pro-cater. Yeah, you're so. So they don't, and then they leave them with this emergency phone.

And if they use that emergency phone to come get them, they'll send a rescue team out there, and then they evacuate you out and you lost. It's over. And the object is, so there's 10 of them and they drop them off and they spread them out like miles and miles and miles apart. So they're never going to run into each other all over the place, right? And it's in there's country. I mean, what's the goal? What's the goal? Bears and wolves? Who can last the longest? Survive. Yeah. And the longest. Yes, the longest. And you don't know when the other guys are dropping off.

So you're watching the show It's fucked up. Yeah, it's totally fucked up So and they they have a little camera that they do the daily check-in It's they are all alone by themselves Dude and they do like and they have to build themselves a camp and the weather is ridiculous So I mean they go through like stormy weather and it's and they have to survive on here Definitely building a Wilson and you watch these guys build their little camps and then search some guys last like three nights Bro, three nights and they like they hear the wolves like hella close and they come and counter like a bears den

And they're like fuck this I'm out. We like to say about my I feel like if Justin was in that show He would die. Let me tell you why Justin would die. Okay. He's so fucking competitive That that motherfucker would not call anybody He just he just die. Yeah, just be like emaciated. Like, Mrs. Andrews, we have some good news and bad news. The good news is your husband won the competition. Yeah.

Bad news is he died. Yeah, it's not like my last word. How much weight like all these guys lose? I mean, they just lose. But it also, I think it's also fascinating because we talk about you would lose first for sure Oh, probably yeah, I wouldn't even be an idiot dumb enough to get on Yeah, I'm like, well how much money do I really that's it? How much money? Yeah, really how much would it take cuz yeah for me and for me It's like five million dollars. Oh five million. That's a that's a good amount of money to put myself through misery for guys

I think the only last like I don't I think the longest was like 45 days or something like that. Holy shit. I mean, just really shitty camping if you think about it. Exactly. I mean, I could do really shit. That sounds so easy. Yeah. But the big thing to have to make, to get their own food, water, the big mind fuck is a

juice. That's when you really, you don't know. You don't know, there's 10 guys, right? So I could be on day 29 and think that there's still eight dudes left that I got to outlast. And you have to, you have to, you have to, you get the mental warfare. Exactly, because if I knew I was going heads up with somebody and it's down and we're,

You want real time statistics? Yeah. Who dropped yesterday? Yeah, I would be like, oh, I got this. The competitive side of me would be like, Coast, I could make it, but if you think like, you for the guys that, and that's where it gets interesting when it's like 30 days in for all they know Everybody is still there. Yeah, you know, and you're still how shitty like you show up after like 60 days

I'm gonna post it and they're like you won you're like oh my god. I like everybody quit on the third day I'm the last dude the whole time. I'm in the shaper no rings. He's the last dude. Well, or imagine being the guy, right? Imagine being so, and this is kind of how it plays out. It's a quick like an hour before. There's like, there's always a couple, there's always a couple punksies that drop off

the first like three days. Like there's always a couple of them. And then there's like to solid eight that last. And then after that month, and then after that month, then they start really dropping off fast. And imagine if you're the second to last guy Who outlast everybody else for that whole time and then you and then the one guy just outlasted you by the next day

You know saying you're like That close you know I'm a million dollars not five million dollars though. Yeah, that's how we used to what do they get? It's like a free trip to Alaska. Is that their price? No, I think they went, I want to say like a hundred grand. Oh, they went like a Prius. Maybe they went a million. I don't think they went a million though. I don't remember it being a hundred grand. It's not a lot of money, bro.

It's not enough for me to do. Here you go, it's dying. I love it. I would be like, man, if I actually worked, cause to me that like surviving like that would be like work 24-7. So if I worked 24-7 for 30 something days, I can make a lot I would like to see I'd like to see a That I'd like to see a competition about being like you have to live

Homeless like in a city. I think that'd be a kind of a cool little competition Just kind of fucked that. Yeah, yeah, you just see people. I don't know like just the it would be weird How would you set that up? What's? To live within that community without exposing them to like, or exploiting them, I would say. Well, how is that much different than this? Like you're way different. Didn't living homeless? Homeless on the streets in a city?

Oh yeah, dude, you're living in the wilderness? I mean, that would be crazy. The wilderness would be way worse. That's what I'm saying. Oh yeah, yeah. I'm just saying it'd be interesting. It'd be interesting. Oh, I thought you were comparing like,

I was like, no, I was like, my kids, I don't know. I would wait, I could totally do the city thing. You know, we'd be under a bridge and like, say for a whole. We're making it all like competitive. Like, oh my God, you know, I'm not eating today. And then we get some guys over there. It's like, I have an eight,

like 10 years. Half the fear, half of why some of these guys left. You know, some of these dudes were like, you know, staring across at a mama bear and their are three cubs and they're like And it's right by their camp. Wait, who's filming this? They film themselves. Oh, shit. So it's legit. Oh, yeah Yeah, so they have their own little camera and they're like there's like rules like they're they're required to do a check-in every single day You know, so then they gather all this footage someone you they killed That's why they have the emergency phone and I believe you fucking call someone. Well, I believe

I Like bring a chopper Oh my god, I don't know if you're gonna make it in time Just fucking shreds this guy down. Well, okay, it's a First of all, it's a It's a black bear so their black bear so those aren't really bears. I don't give a fuck what color bear? No, no, it's bear. You're right. It is and they happen and there has been although it's rare I've been only bear. I'm not scared of as a teddy bear

And then they have a flare gun right so they have a flare gun for emergency so it tastes lady extra flare. Yeah Make this an event No, we're gonna find my corpse. Oh my god. Hey, hey you over there get a what I always said I wanted fireworks on my death Bear and you over there getting by bear put some flare into it. Just look back good Oh, by the way, put me on speaker for a lay-bomb. Oh my, I'm getting eaten by a bear. Somebody needs to summon the eagle. I would imagine even though they don't tell you on the show,

I bet you they have like a, they've gotta have like security or they gotta have like somebody that's like quick. That's close, you know what I'm saying? It can't be too far away. It's gotta be like a two. Well, that ruins the show then. Yeah. Well, they don't tell you that, but I mean, when you think so,

for safety purposes. There's some producer people around. There's some badass snipers that are up in the trees that are waiting. Like, don't worry. I don't think it's like hung around now. No, I doubt it. Like, hung her game and shit.

That would be legit right there. Kill people. Yeah. It can make good ratings. Shh. Oh. About time. It's a bear. Oh shit, no, it's just a bird. It's a good ratings. Shhh. About time. It's a bear.

Oh shit, no, it's just a bird. It's a bird bear. Shhh. Shhh. We call single-hand slammer. We call our mayor a co-! Today's co-s being brought to you by Kai Maricopi. It's the only coffee that is infused

with all natural neutrophics for a cleaner, calmer, and more focused buds without the crash. Click the chimera link at MindPumpMedia.com and input the discount code MindPumpACheckOut for 10% off! It's the motherfucking flaw! The English Landis! Our first question is from Eduardo 110.

What do you guys look for when doing an assessment? Well, it's kind of a cool question. Assessments. Okay, so I'll tell you why fitness, why big fitness gyms use assessments. To sign clients up for personal training, typically. Yeah. I'm just being honest. Yeah, I'm just being honest.

The reality is, a good trainer is constantly assessing their client. I don't care if you train a person for a week or you train for 10 years. Your initial assessment means nothing after a month of training them. You know what I'm saying? Oh, yes, I just changed. I use an assessment for two reasons when I first do it. Reason number one is I want to know what direction, the direction I should take my presentation.

Right, what message are you gonna have to tell this person? Yeah, because I have to present my value to this client with this assessment. And I can't present my value to them if I don't know what their goals are, if I notice muscle imbalances, recruitment patterns, or exercise history, you know, medical history, all those different things that come as part of an assessment, I can't, I don't know the direction of my presentation if I don't know those things.

So when I'm doing the assessment, part of it is I'm using that information so I can personalize my presentation of personal training. And this is important, by the way, because I know, and I know some of you guys listening, you're like, oh, it's just sales, sales pitch. Here's the reality. The reality is you have to sell this person And this is important, by the way, because I know, and I know some of you guys listen, you're like, oh, it's just sales, sales pitch. Here's the reality. The reality is you have to sell this person on something you know is going to help them. Like, I know if the person hires me, I am, and they do what I say, and they work with me, I know that it's going to make a positive impact on their health, their life, their mobility, all these wonderful things.

But in order to get there, they have to pay me and hire me and I have to convince them If this is somebody, especially who's never worked with a trainer before or never felt the benefits of working with someone who's really good as a trainer Then it's gonna be my job to convey that and I have to be an effective salesperson to do that and the the What's gonna make me effective is if I can personalize it and connect it to that person so So an example would be, you know, I'm doing a, I'm having them do a cable row and their shoulders don't retract and I can point that out and point out that there's a weakness in their bid back. And then I can have them do a row again,

stand behind them, force their body into position with my hands so they can feel the difference and see the difference. And now I've made a nice example for them to see why working with me may be better than not working with me. Aside from that, the typical assessments include posture assessment, a squat assessment, an overhead press assessment, a row assessment,

some cardiovascular assessment. Maybe a cardiovascular assessment. They all generally will have those things. My favorite part of the assessment are the row, the squat and the posture. I can do with those three things. I can typically really see a lot about somebody. Well, I would say just the squat alone.

I, my assessment process has significantly changed over the years of training for sure. Like Sal said, when we first started doing assessments and when I first started as a trainer, the main goal was literally just to sell somebody personal training. So I think my assessment really looked like that. It was a lot of questioning the other person

and feeling them out and what their goals were and then it was me pitching them on what they needed to do to get themselves there and how I played a role in that, right? So a heavy part of my assessment was geared around sales where now like it was my experience. And I would have to say, if I, you know, I know we don't talk a lot about formal education and certifications and stuff like that

because we agree that we've learned so much more outside of that. But I will say that the corrective exercise specialist through NASM, the CES, really took my assessment to another level. And I started to really change how I do that. So in the past, because I kind of naturally had the gift of GAB and I could talk to people and that was a comfortable situation for me

I relied a lot on my sales skills whereas as I got to be a better trainer and I really really learned the body my assessment really evolved and changed and so Now I love to like just take somebody. I'll take their shoes off get them on the ground do squat assessment with them And I'm just gonna watch their body move. I'm gonna watch the way they walk, I'm gonna watch the way they sit, stand, salabut up like a seated rose and excellent movement,

but I am literally just going to watch their mechanics completely. And then my whole presentation now is geared around that, because this is the way I look at it is, losing weight, which typically is the main reason why people hire you, like to lose body fat or to get in better shape. Building muscle and losing body fat for me,

to teach people is very easy. I find that's the easiest part of our job is to teach nutrition and to teach, basically the law through dynamics and to break that down for people to get to them, to lose weight or gain weight or whatever their goal may be. The hard part is explaining them the importance of learning how to move better and understanding

and realizing who you're talking to too. So if I'm talking to someone who's 25 and they don't know about aches and pains yet and they don't know about things like this because they haven't felt it yet. So that is really, that's a challenge. It's very challenging for us to do. Now, if I'm talking to someone who's 30, 35, 40 years old or older, it's a lot easier because they've already dealt with it or they're dealing with it currently and that speaks to them right away. Like, when I explain that, listen, you know, this is what's going on with your body. I noticed that your right foot, you slightly pronate, you know, your knees adduct when we come down, when you squat,

your shoulders are rounding forward, your head is coming forward, you have a excessive pelvic tilt. These are all very common issues when you see somebody squatting or moving. And when you see this, you want to be able to take each and every one of those and explain. And so I'll look at, I'll address each one of those movements and then I will break it down and I'll show them. And I always exaggerate what they're doing so they can see. So for example, somebody who has the forward shoulders and the forward head, which is super common Especially where we're at in the Silicon Valley where everybody sits at computers all day long You know, I I show them what that looks like and I show them What that's gonna look like if they continue on, you know, this is people always they look at people that are 70 80 90 years old

Walking around in a walker and we just all assume that they got there because they're old Hmm, and that's not the case like you didn't just wake up one day and then require a walker, and we just all assume that they got there because they're old. And that's not the case. You didn't just wake up one day and then require a walker and you're all hunched over and rounded forward and holding a walker. Yeah, what happened? What's inactive? Yeah, that was a progression of 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years of that person's life of having these imbalances that they never learned to correct.

And that's a big part of our job is getting people to understand that, that listen, you're at a point in your life right now where we can do something about this. You don't have to head down that same path that you saw your great grandmother go down. That's all preventative. It's, yes, very much so. And so when I'm doing an assessment, I'm really looking at the individuals imbalances that I see, especially the ones that are glaring, especially ones that I know are setting them up for major, major issues

down the road. When you do this, and I'll use one example, and this is recent in my arsenal since hanging out with Dr. Brinkhalot, and when somebody squats down, I used to never take them out of their shoes. I would just watch all the others have now, because of him, I break people down to their bare feet and have noticed a lot of people with the pronating of their ankles and then they'll see that they have like a callus

on one side of their top big toe. And then from there, I can probably guess that they've had some sort of knee issue on that same side and hip issues and then I can probably guess that they've had some sort of knee issue on that same side and hip issues And then I can probably guess on the opposite side They're gonna have some shoulder stuff going on and when you point that out and with somebody who you don't really know very well They're normally like holy shit. Yeah, how did you? Blown away. It's it's such a great and why it's so brings up a you know the sales end of it is because it is such great

You know ammo for you to bring up later and how to address in the message that this person needs to hear, as opposed to taking it in direction that they want to go as far as this is what I'm looking for. Yes, of course, and this is where the compromise happens, especially as a trainer and professional, where you do have to compromise a lot of all these different things you want to work on really badly. And that's definitely a priority, but they have to sort of work in also, how am I going

to be able to really get this person to buy into this? That's a man, that's such a good point. And this is probably one of the things that I think a lot of trainers fail at is how do you, how do you do something that is customer service base? Because you are someone's buying a service from you that you have to provide. So how do I do that?

But then at the same time, you know, give them what you know they need more than anything else, right? And so there's this very fine line that you have to learn to jump. You have to be a good, you gotta be a really good communicator. This is why the most effective trainers I've ever seen

were also some of the best sales people because they're able to communicate. Look, if I got somebody who comes in and says, I wanna lose 30 pounds in the next two months, I got this wedding, I gotta go to whatever. And I know that's not the best route for them. It's up to me to be able to convey that to them in a way where they understand and agree with me. And that just tell them, you know,

that's a bad way to do it because they'll end up doing it anyway with someone else, you see what I'm saying? That's just one example, but if I see that before we can work on your squats, we need to correct these imbalances, but this is a guy who comes in who just wants to get a heavier squat, I need to be able to do a good job of communicating what I understand about fitness so that they understand and they buy in.

So an assessment does, that the initial assessment does, but don't forget this as a trainer. You are assessing every time you train your client, every single time you're working with them. You can see things. And I also wanted to add in, because Adam started to talk about kind of the progression of his understanding of different things, to look out for through the whole process. This is all comes from experience, too,

how to tweak a just and modify based off of the information that you have retained. And so you use that to the best of your abilities, but then you increase by learning new techniques. And there's a lot of evolution that's happened as far as like understanding the human body and the mechanics and how everything all interacts and how much more neurological it is than we initially thought. And so, and this is something like, you know, I haven't really interjected what I've

been working on in a long time. And like, this is really like, like, a lot of the focus for me with this invention I've been working on with this stick is to get to a point where I'm very passionate about metrics and self-understanding. This is a way that I can provide another avenue to test connectivity between the muscles. How much pressure, how much force am I providing from that particular response? And so for me, to build and develop upon a better way to actually have numbers to associate with these types of assessment processes, I feel, be very valuable to trainers and to their clients as well.

So, I'm excited about this part of fitness because the assessment process has always been something that really drove me because I'm very curious as to how to improve on the human mechanics and what to address and how we can benefit more people and alleviate pain. Well, part of this is why I picked this question because I knew this would really stir up some good conversation because I think, at least I know personally and I assume

that you guys are the same way too, of the evolution of your assessment. Like, that's why I just shared that I never used to make people take their shoes off. And that was just because, you know, like Justin said, through all these years, like you can, we continue to grow and learn and more and we're evolving and we're, and we learn so much more about mechanics and how little, little subtle things can affect other things. And, you know, people's daily habits, and this is the type of shit that we're experiencing

really fucking kicks in. It's just, you know, I've seen enough clients now that when I see a certain deviation, I ride away, know some of the things that they're probably dealing with, you know, I already know what movements are going to be challenging for them. I already know some of the areas that they're going to feel it in right away, and when you can say that to somebody, man, that's where you get that really good buy-ins, when you can tell somebody like, yeah, you know, you're about to do this, and when you do this, you're probably going to feel it here, here and here, but I eventually want you to get it to here, and we got to do this first to get there. And that is really, really powerful when you're trying

to get somebody to understand the importance of moving better, too, not just their goal. The goal part, believe it or not, is actually the easiest part, I think, for us to accomplish, but really learning that individual's body and learning how to help them with that and to overcome any of these deviations that they already currently have, or they're going to have because of poor patterns that they've created over the last 10, 20, 30 plus years. So... 30 plus years. So will Aja or it might be will aha. How do you deal with unwanted advice? How do you deal with unwanted advice? Yeah, like I think I think the whole question was and we're going to make out with them and then they move out. Well, we talk a lot about

unsolicited advice and how do we deal with people approaching us and telling us like and how do we deal with people approaching us and telling us like, what are you doing, like doing searcher squats or doing a movement that people are like, you know, we just shot a YouTube video recently of me doing old school hack squats and somebody made a comment like, oh my God, if I did that in the gym,

people would be like, what the fuck are you doing? Like, how do we deal with that when people? Well, so it depends who the advice is coming from. Because when I first read, when I heard the question, I didn't know that background, but what came to me was, sometimes you're gonna get advice that's unwanted from people that you trust that are close to you,

and sometimes you should take that advice. So, you know, this maybe doesn't necessarily have to do the fitness, but it could, but let's say You're a dude and you're bulking and you're eating all this food and you're trying to gain weight and People close to you are coming up to you saying you know you should, you know, maybe you should eat less or You know, you're not looking too healthy or and you're like, oh fuck that they don't understand because I'm just trying to bulk I'm just trying to gain like sometimes Sometimes you need to step outside yourself and if it's somebody you really trust

under other circumstances You might not want to hear that advice because your ego is doesn't want you to But you might need to step back and and look at their advice and kind of consider it I've changed a few things about myself. God you really have to The person who's saying that's you really fucking matters, right? I mean Well, if it's if you're there's a handful of people that I think could say something to me like that where it would really stop me and my tracks to assess what I'm gonna make you upset too, right?

Yeah, it's gonna be somebody you trust and you don't want to hear it, you know, so yeah, it's definitely. That's what I mean. Like there's things you might not want to hear. Like some of my, you know, people you know, might come to you and say, hey, you know, mine pump up and listening, but I don't like, you know, you guys do this a little bit too much or that. And if you almost want to be like, well, fuck know, people you know, might come to you and say, hey, you know, mine pump up and listening, but I don't like, you know, you guys do this a little bit too much or that. And if you almost want to be like, well, fuck you, you're not doing it. I know what I'm doing. But if you trust, if these are people you're, you

really trust, or people who are close to you that you know aren't out to do you harm, then you might want to, you know, kind of step back a little bit and consider and kind of look at everything objectively. Now, you're in the gym and you're doing an exercise that people haven't seen before and they're in a conversation to you, just brush it off. I mean, there's a lot of exercises that were popular a long time ago that nobody does today that, you know, they just never seen them before. I mean, had I, if I brought a kettlebell into a gym 15 years ago and started doing kettlebell swings, people would have lost their fucking minds.

Okay. I mean, literally, I probably, you probably would have got kicked out of the gym because you're doing something that's going to hurt your back. And what are you doing swinging that way? You're not going too fast, it's too ballistic slow down. So that's going to happen, especially when you do some of the old school exercises that people don't do anymore, since the advent of machines. If you know what you're doing and you've gotten the advice from people like us do anymore, since the advent of machines. If you know what you're doing, and you've gotten the advice from people like us

or whatever, then just keep doing it, maybe educate them and tell them, hey, this is a hack squad. Well, I used to use that as a way to pick up clients, man. I used to always do, like if I was learning something currently, like about training or mechanics or a new movement, you would find me doing it. Like I would ride away, apply it in the gym. And because I knew that if it was new to me,

it was probably new to a lot of other people, knowing that I was probably gonna get looks and stairs. And I was doing that now because I really wanted the attention of looks and stairs. But I knew that that would potentially drive someone over to ask that question, like what the fuck are you doing? But you're distinctively doing something outside of the box.

So it draws a certain type of attention whether you like it or not. So it's like you just gotta own it. And that's what I love about it. Like I honestly, it used to bother me a little bit because I definitely don't like a lot of attention. I don't like people bringing all that energy towards me or whatever.

Like I have to do my own thing. But then, you know, at the same time when you get confident that this is what you're doing and I don't give a shit what you think, like you just get this, I don't care mode, you know, it's liberating, you get out there, you do your thing, you know, you know what you're doing's good and you just kind of nod your head like, okay, okay, bro. Yeah. You say bro or say chief or you say, you know, one of those kind of like demeaning words.

Condescending. Condescending boss like demeaning words. I'm descending. I haven't condescended lots. I like to. Okay boss. Yeah, no, I don't think it's even worth, I don't think it's even worth getting into something with that with someone like this. You know, this happens a lot too.

Women. This happens a lot to women. Not as often as guys, but if you're a chicken or look smart though. If you're a girl in the gym and you're doing a zircher squat or a barbell hack squat, or a girl, you know, you're gonna get some dude, some girls, you're gonna come over to you and tell you what are you doing. Oh, you shouldn't do that.

You should do this exercise a little better. We actually had a girl doing one of our math programs in the gym and some fucking trainer came up to her and was like, well, you shouldn't lift that heavy because you'll start to look manly. He actually fucking said that to her. And yeah, she's so hilarious. This probably happens a lot more to girls than the guys, but that's because, well, you shouldn't lift that heavy because you'll start to look manly. He actually fucking said that to her. And yeah, she's so hilarious. Yeah, this probably happens a lot more to girls than the guys, but that's because, you know,

that's actually a really good point. This guy's one of, you're probably right. There's normally guys will find the hot chick who's doing a movement who they don't think is what she should be doing in the approach. So that's probably something like an asshole. A little more challenging. But even then, I still think Justin has it

with the right answer, which is just like, okay, okay, chief. Okay, chief. All right, boss. Good one there, Captain. Healthy, happy free. Sumo versus regular stance on squats and deadlifts. So let's start with the deadlifts because I think with deadlifts there's this, and I used

to be one of these guys where they were interchangeable, right? Deadlift, you'd assume old conventional take your pick and go for it. But I'm realizing more and more, it's so funny, like you get so brainwashed that you don't realize how brainwashed you are. There are two different exercises. If I never saw a deadlift, as a personal trainer now, I know you guys right now, your mind is going the same direction. As a personal trainer, if I'd never seen a deadlift and I saw someone do a Conventional deadlift and I saw someone do a sumo deadlift I'd say those are two different exercises now

You're you're still pulling weight off the floor and there's a lot of similar muscles involved But they're different they are different. Yeah, and isn't it just your ability that you tend to sway your decision? Right like it might which one you're strong, right? I'm strongest in. Yeah. That must be the way I have to do it. Well, one thing that I learned with myself was that one has some carry over to the other. If, especially if it's strengthening a weakness within your deadlift, so I'm a, I,

conventionally, I can pull way more than I can when I sumo. And that's because I have some hip mobility issues. So, a sumo deadlift requires you to get a wide stance and get down nice and low, which I have a problem doing. So I sumo deadlifted for a while, and I realized that when I got my sumo deadlift got stronger, I went back to my conventional. My conventional went up faster because it kind of worked on some of those weaknesses. So, I now tell people to, you know,

go, you have your favorite, but make sure you throw in training cycles, not just every once in a while, by the way. Like everything we recommend, we recommend that you stay with something for a little while to yield the benefit from it. So don't just do like, you know, sumo. We can actually adapt to it.

Yeah, like okay, I'm gonna do all my dead lifts now, sumo style for the next, you know, six weeks. Like, give yourself some time, five weeks or whatever. And then watch what happens. They are different though. I mean, a regular conventional deadlift is more posterior chain, a sumo deadlift, you get a little more anterior.

It's a lot. More hips versus back, more shearing forces in the spine with the conventional, which some people are great with. I have, I can do fantastic with sharing forces. Other people have a, not a good, not a good time with the sharing forces of the spine. With squats, it's very different. Yeah.

Yeah, with squats, it's very different. A narrow stance versus a wide stance on squats. I mean, you'll feel it the next day, the soreness. And again, I recommend messing with all of them and getting good at each of them. But that's the thing. You're still splitting it as two different skills. And I feel like, especially with squats,

this is something that opened my eyes to the fact that, it's just that I didn't train now with a wider stance. I didn't train incrementally so. Like, so that's something too that I've been experimenting with. And I know out I've seen Adam do it with narrow stances and to address totally different firing sequences and the way that your body's responding and has ability to get into that range of motion

in that stance. And it's important because when you start getting so fixed in certain elements of each one of those exercises, then it's really gonna limit you as far as where you get the loudest response Like when you go to do actual activities doing anything else. So I picked this question because This is something that you know, Sally shares it sometimes when, you know, we go through something and it's just like, oh my God, I just had this epiphany that, when I do this, I do this and it's just like,

duh, it's kind of obvious, but it's like, it even got me, right? This is something that, and this is what I've loved about being with these guys, is it's always challenging the way I train, the way I eat, the way I assess myself. It's this last two to three years. I have progressed so much in my training on all levels because of that. I can't thank the other guys in this room because of that enough.

I have done this a lot lately, and I've seen huge gains because of it. I just came off of the last probably four weeks or so running everything Sumo. I was Sumo deadlifting, Sumo squatting. Yesterday, day before yesterday, I went back to really narrow. I will do exactly that. I will mess with the Sumo stance and narrow stance and conventional stance. And here's the epiphany part, right, is we know and we've talked about this before that, you know, the people that see like the most gains out of everybody, you know, that we're talking all

natural besides people that are on antiballics, is when you first start lifting weights, when you first start lifting weights, the gains are rapid because it's a total new adaptation to your body And the body is like responding. I mean, that's how amazing our bodies are now when you've been training for you know a decade The gains are few and far between and much smaller and more incremental Something that I have put together in the last couple of years especially is Something that I have put together in the last couple of years, especially, is holy shit. When I give my body a really new adaptation or stimulation, like, there's a huge difference between deadlifting, sumo, and narrow stance or conventional. I mean, like, it feels completely different, just like Sal said.

As a train or I, if you were to look at the mechanics when you're looking at someone, you would say those are two different exercises. And guess what? The body responds that way. It responds like they're totally two different things. And if you've never really trained that way, guess what, it responds like it's the first time you did a fucking movement.

It's really, really fascinating. And you know, consider this too, like we're talking about squats and deadlifts here, right? Squats and deadlifts are too, easily, I can argue this all day long, the most effective muscle building, functional strength building, you know, functional movements that you can do. Period, end of story.

Why not do variations of them so you can maximize the benefit of them? I mean, the reason why a squat is so effective or a deadlift is so effective, it's because it's a basic human movement involves hinging at the hips, involves flexion at the knee, involves tension in the core and in the torso. Why not? If squats are going to give you such great results, why don't I do other variations of squats, front squats, wide stance squats, narrow stance squats. If dead lifts are so awesome, I can squeeze more dead liftsifts by doing variations of the deadlifts. We'd even talk about the trap bar deadlift. That's another one. When I pulled 600 pounds with a straight bar, I had to do it with a trap bar first before

I could do it with a straight bar. I was stuck at 5.85 for a long time and then the trap bar got me past that hump. So I mean, the proof is in the pudding, doing these variations of these amazing exercises is, although it's different, it's gonna yield incredible results. Oh, huge, huge, especially in comparison to the other things that people are focusing on. And this is, and I think this goes back to the message,

like, because I know we always turn some people off when they hear us, like, you know, and I went on a rant like a couple months back of, you know, I remember Joe D and some people were put in fucking bands on Hammer Strength machines, right? And I was just starting ripping into that. And I know that I rub some people the wrong way that are like, hey, I do that or hey,

I utilize that technique and I've seen great benefits or they want to argue the strength curve and how that works and get into semantics and it's like, no, I get it. I understand that it's a different stimulus and stuff. What I'm trying to get through your fucking head is that there's moves like the squat, the deadlift, you know, that varying those in ways

that I bet you've never done before. Like, if you've never done a zircher squat, if you've never done a sumo squat before, if you've never done a six inch narrow squat before, if you've never done some of these things, but you're outputting bands on fucking hammer strength machines. Like you got the order of operation, way the fuck wrong.

You got so many other things that are going to change your body and give you results. So that's what I mean by that. And that's where that, I guess that attitude or that ship comes off when I get that way with people is that I'm just passionate about it because it's like, even I have this epiphany sometimes when I'm going through my own training and going like, even I have this epiphany sometimes when I'm going

through my own training and going like, holy shit, I've been missing out on some huge gains because I was messing and manipulating things that really don't matter that much. When there's something that I've left out of my routine for a very long time because I wasn't good at it, because I wasn't a good sumo deadlifter. It feels awkward, well, how about this?

Instead of neglecting to do it because I'm not good at it, how about addressing it, working on my mobility, getting to a point where I can mechanically do good, and then watching how fast I progress, like if the strength gains are every week, every week when I first started sumo deadlifting. Progress quickly. Yes, every week.

That's what happens to me too. Every week shows, it just shows those like main staple lifts. Like there's so many variations to perform. And if you even look at it from like the way that you can do it with performance and you add bands or chains or like these, these variable resistance techniques, you know, or you, you mess with the tempo, you know, or, you know, you mess with like, you know, the angle of your joint So yeah, you have a wider stance or you know, like you're in a different bar position on your back or you know like if you Haven't ever really dove into like three four weeks of doing just that one technique and then you're you're immediately going to some like

Smith machine exercise, you know, that's where we want to slap you. Yeah you're immediately going to some like Smith machine exercise, you know, that's where we want to slap you. Yeah, yeah. No, it's true. That happened to me too with Deadlift. I went from being able to pull four plates to five plates with the sumo within a, like a five week period of time, which is a 90 pound inquiry, which nothing else you'll ever see that from, right? Especially on my level. Yeah, where we've been training this long, like, you see a two and a half to five pound strength gain somewhere and you're pumped. long, like you see a two and a half to five pound strength gain somewhere and you're pumped. So for me to see adding 10 pounds every week for four weeks straight is just like mind-blowing.

But that's how the body works because it was it to that movement mechanically is so new. So think about that too. So learning, it's learning how to fire the muscles optimally. Learning the biomechanics and practicing the skill. And when you get good at that skill, then you yield the muscle benefits too. The visible benefits. That's how it carries over to the other lifts.

Exactly. Listen, leave us a five-star rating review on iTunes, if you like our show, if we like your review, we'll pick it and you'll get a free Mind Pump T-shirt. Also check us out on Instagram at Mind Pump Radio. You can find me at Mind Pump Sal, Justin is at Mind Pump Justin, and at Adam is is at mine pump Adam that was a weird way of saying that Adam thank you for listening to mine pump if your goal is to build and

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