Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - Interview With WBFF pro Bree Lind: Staying Fit Like a pro (Even While Pregnant!)

Episode Date: December 22, 2014

Interview with WBFF Pro Bree Lind: The road to pro and staying fit while pregnant In this podcast, I interview WBFF Pro Bree Lind, and we talk about... The WRONG way to prepare for a competition (the way that leaves you weak, small, and flat). How to train and eat while pregnant to stay fit and healthy. Why a good fitness routine helps you find balance in your life. Bree's take on proper weightlifting methods for women. Why overly restrictive diets are counterproductive in the long run. The science of how calorie restriction relates to muscle growth. And more... ARTICLES RELATED TO THIS PODCAST: Carbohydrates and Weight Loss: Should You Go Low-Carb? http://www.muscleforlife.com/carbohydrates-and-weight-loss-should-you-go-low-carb/ How to Speed Up Your Metabolism for Easier Weight Loss: http://www.muscleforlife.com/how-to-speed-up-metabolism/ How to Speed Up Your Metabolism for Easier Weight Loss: http://www.muscleforlife.com/how-to-speed-up-metabolism/ Workout Motivation: The Power of Habit: http://www.muscleforlife.com/workout-motivation-part-1-the-power-of-habit/ 3 Powerful Ways Working Out Makes You Better at Life: http://www.muscleforlife.com/3-powerful-ways-working-out-makes-you-better-at-life/ 8 Ancient Laws for Creating a Simpler, Happier Life: http://www.muscleforlife.com/8-ancient-laws-for-creating-a-simpler-happier-life/ The Ultimate Leg Workout: The Best Leg Exercises for Big Wheels: http://www.muscleforlife.com/best-legs-exercises/ The Best Way to Gain Muscle Without Getting Fat: http://www.muscleforlife.com/the-best-way-to-gain-muscle-not-fat/ The Definitive Guide to the "If It Fits Your Macros" Diet: http://www.muscleforlife.com/what-is-if-it-fits-your-macros-and-does-it-work/ The Definitive Guide to Effective Meal Planning: http://www.muscleforlife.com/healthy-meal-planning-tips/ The Definitive Guide to Vitamins and Minerals: http://www.muscleforlife.com/guide-to-vitamins-and-minerals/ The Ultimate Fitness Plan for Women: http://www.muscleforlife.com/the-ultimate-fitness-plan-for-women/ The Definitive Guide to Muscle Recovery: http://www.muscleforlife.com/the-definitive-guide-to-muscle-recovery-and-muscle-growth/ Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter! Click here: https://www.muscleforlife.com/signup/

Hey, it's Mike, and this podcast is brought to you by my books. Seriously, though, it actually is. I make my living as a writer, so as long as I keep selling books, I can keep writing articles over at Muscle for Life and Legion and recording podcasts and videos like this and all that fun stuff. Now, I have several books, but the place to start is Bigger Leaner Stronger if you're a guy and Thinner Leaner Stronger if you're a girl. Now, these books, they basically teach you everything you need to know about dieting, training, and supplementation to build

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about my supplements at www.legionathletics.com. And if you like what you see and you want to buy something, use the coupon code podcast, P O D C A S T, and you'll save 10% on your order. All right. Thanks again for taking the time to listen to my podcast and let's get to the show. Hey, this is Mike Matthews from MuscleForLife.com doing another podcast. And on this podcast, I have Brie Lind, B-R-E-L-I-N-D.com. And she's a former WBFF pro and fitness model. She's 29 years old, doing a lot of good things, helping people get fit in amazing shape herself. So I contacted her and she's

on the show. Hey, Bri. Hi, how are you? Good, good. Thanks. Thanks for coming on. So tell me and tell the listeners kind of like, what's your story? How did you, what motivated you to get fit? How did you go from where you started to where you are today in terms of your fitness level? I was about 24 years old. I'd been working in the bar industry for six years. And the late nights kind of get to you after a while. You know, your nutrition isn't exactly probably where it should be.

And around that age, I guess I started noticing I was putting on weight. Yeah. Not intentionally. And so I decided to start working out. And then that being said, I just hired a personal trainer. And he had suggested that I, you know, as a goal, sign up for a show. And I thought that was a great idea. So I did that, met with him. Literally, like, I signed up for a show three months from then.

That was my first experience with contest prep. That's like a trial by fire. Yeah. I've always been the kind of person like all or nothing. It was good. I enjoyed it. I found that it kept me focused. The only problem that I had with it at that time was, you know, I didn't really have the background in fitness.

Right. So I basically dieted down all my body fat and I just ended up really skinny. Yeah. Where you lose muscle in the process. Sorry? You lost muscle in the process. Just like too much muscle. Yeah, I didn't really have enough.

I didn't really have a lot. So I just ended up kind of, but I loved it. Like, I loved being on stage, and I've always been a really goal-oriented person. So that being said, I did that show, and then I kind of finished it and was like, okay, when's the next one? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, and then, of course, your goals change, but, you know, I decided to take a year to train and, you know, set myself up. So a year later, I competed again.

I kind of was yo-yoing back and forth. Like I was finding that the people who I had coaching me at that time really weren't that knowledgeable in the nutrition part of it. Yeah. It's like the play you can hear about it. I hear, I mean, I get emailed about it every, every week or two, I get emailed usually from girls that are either have been competing or want to compete and they're running, you know, Hey, my, my coach told me to do this. And a lot of times it is just the, basically my coach told me to starve myself and do two hours of cardio a day. Should I do that? Yeah. Yeah. And that's the same thing that happened to me.

I, I, um, there was a certain trainer here where I'm from Calgary and basically everybody in this federation went to this guy and I thought, I didn't really know much about it. So I thought, okay, you know, he must be good. And, um, so I went for my initial consultation with him and paid what it was it was an outrageous amount of money and ended up showing up and i was put into like a group training um situation where i wasn't really getting any one-on-one um so then i had already paid for it so i just you know stayed in that and then when it came down to diet down for the show he basically uh put me on like a

chicken and asparagus diet eight times a day for a month and i lost all the muscle i worked for for that entire year so ridiculous yeah and it's like everybody else's story and i'm super frustrated but ended up competing again and then um i placed top 10 i think that time and then I was like even despite the horrible diet sorry? you placed top 10 despite the horrible diet or that was a lie? yeah and I think what it kind of

boiled down to was like I felt very comfortable on stage and I was always told by the judges I had excellent stage presence so I just kind of decided that okay well there was another show two months from then um I took I kind of went with another coach um and he changed my diet a bit where he had me on more of a high fat diet still kind of low carb but it ended up working for my body and then um I ended up um winning that show and and winning a pro card so that was super motivating

I think yeah that's awesome and then just from those experiences like I just decided like okay well I want to become a coach but I I want to take all these things that happen to me and make sure that I educate myself properly so that I would never train my clients the way that I've kind of been trained, you know? Yeah. And how, and what were the big changes in terms of like how you train now and how you diet now versus the starvation and do a bajillion hours of cardio a week? Well, it's crazy. I eat, um, probably 2,200 calories a day. Um, I had, I reversed dieted myself. So I'm, I basically went from having, you know, under 50 grams of carbohydrates a day. I reversed dieted myself. So I basically went from having under 50 grams of carbohydrates a day up to 300 on days that I train and maintain my body weight. And I hardly do any

cardio and I just lift. I get my cardio workouts from my weight. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny because I write about a lot of this kind of stuff on my website and I wrote an article recently on metabolic damage and how you get there and then how do fix it, what's a reverse diet and so forth. And those are the basic kind of recommendations of whether it's girls or guys is heavy weightlifting, focus on compound lifts. You have to get stronger over time. Um, and you know, you have, depending on the rep ranges can change based on, you know, guys versus girls and, and kind of conditioning level, but you should always be including, uh, heavy, heavy lifting in your routine. And personally, I, I like, I actually like cardio even as a part of maintenance.

I enjoy it. Um, I don't know, it makes me feel good, but I always, I like high intensity cardio and I always keep, you know what I mean? Keep it to like 20, 30 minutes. And even when I'm cutting, um, like, you know, I guess I, I stay relatively lean, maybe around seven to 8% or so, just cause I kind of have to for what I do. But if I, you know, need to get down to five or six, then, uh, I still am not doing more than, you know, four 20 to 30 minute hit sessions per week.

And a lot of people, when they first hear that, they're like, they, that doesn't compute. They're like, that's not possible. How, how can you get that lean?

Uh, just doing what is really just about maybe, you know, two hours of cardio or an hour and a half a week. Uh, so I'm with you on that, on, on helping kind of dispel that,

that, that myth that you have to eat very little and do a shitload of cardio to get lean. Well, I find that like it worked in the beginning for me and then all of a sudden i just like i kind of started hovering at this one body weight and i just couldn't get back down and i actually ended up um after doing some research online and like talking to different girls that i know in the industry ended up hiring Lee Norton. Yeah. And he, yeah, he was the one that actually fixed me, which was amazing. That's awesome. Yeah. And not to mention, I mean, I learned a ton from him, so. Yeah. Yeah. I did

an interview with Lane. I'm going to be posting it up here soon. He's a cool guy. He's a, I mean, I'm in Tampa, Florida. He's in the same area. Yeah, he's a great guy. I mean, he fixes people. And he teaches them what's right. So, you know, at the end of the day, I was tired of not, you know, feeling right. Not being able to eat food, feeling like shit, having no energy. Yeah, all the time yeah yeah i understand and that's and this is how i coach my clients now and um it works like um

you know i don't like i don't ever have people updating me each week that they feel like garbage yeah they always have energy for their workouts and i mean this is the way that it should be right i mean yeah you kind of want to do this and get, and it's like a long-term thing. You don't just want to get to stage and then, you know, a month after stage feel like garbage because you put on however amount of weight, however much amount of weight, just by going back to a normal diet. Yeah. Not even by, you also, you have that tendency. Yeah, totally. Cause you have that, you have the tendency also to overfeed, you know, way overeat. And then, as you know, when your metabolism is really bottomed out like that, your body is basically primed to just get fatter. So when you combine that with, oh my God, I just want to eat food now, and you overdo that, I mean, you'll have, I know you've seen this before, people will end up, you know, they'll start at whatever body fat percentage, They'll diet down, you know, severely restrict calories, kind of do it wrong. They'll reach whatever body fat percentage they reach,

and then they'll start eating a ton again, and then within a couple months, they're higher, you know, their body fat is higher than even before they started dieting in the first place. Yes. Yet the metabolism is still actually kind of slow. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so when I started working with him, he, he, we basically, um, started from the bottom and built it up. And I mean, I've, my body changed.

I started keeping my muscle. Um, I filled out like in a good way. Um, you know, so, so yeah, so that's pretty much how I kind of got into it. And I mean, it's now been years. So, I mean, it's just become like my lifestyle. Yeah, yeah. Same here. And my job. Yeah, yeah.

I find a lot of, I find a lot of competitors end up being personal trainers. Right. Yeah. I mean, I've had that same story from very similar people. They experienced the dark side of it and the bad side and they're like, well, and then they figured out how to do it right and then wanted to do that for other people. Yeah. Which is great. So you're pregnant right now, right? I am. I'm about to have my baby in two weeks.

Awesome. Congratulations. Boy or girl? It's a girl. Yeah. Cool. I have a boy. He's one and a half.

It's an amazing thing. It really is. And my pregnancy has been unbelievable. Yeah. How has your... I've actually... I've been emailed by quite a few women that are pregnant and ask about training and stuff. How has your, how has your, I've actually, there's a, I've been emailed by, by quite a few women that are pregnant and, you know, ask about training and stuff. How has that gone for you? What have you been able to do? How have you, how have you kind of worked it?

Um, like basically when I found out I was pregnant, my doctor just said like, whatever you've been doing, keep doing. Um, you know, obviously I toned down the head, but I still do intervals on the stairs. So I just make sure that I can still breathe properly. Yeah. But I mean, to be honest with you, my training didn't really change much until I started getting, until I really started showing. Yeah. And then I just kind of like, I kind of just listened to my body.

Like if I'm squatting and I feel like, okay, maybe this is like a little bit too heavy, then I'll, I'll drop the weight. Or, um, you know, I don't do really heavy overhead pressing anymore. Um, yeah, things like that. But I still train six days a week and sometimes seven. I, for me working out is, is like a stress reliever. So, um, I just, even if I just go walk on the treadmill for 20 minutes, I just have to sweat. Yeah, my wife did the same thing, and she had an awesome pregnancy. It sounds similar, like very smooth.

The birth was very smooth. Staying healthy is huge in terms of just not running into any real complications. It's so true. Like, it saved my ass. Like literally like, I mean, I'm, I've gained probably 25 pounds, but it's all baby. Um, no, not at all. And, um, yeah, so I'm just, I mean, you also get the, the, the hormone boost too, where you just feel, you know, you just get the, a lot of the good hormones when you're pregnant. Yeah. Yeah. I think working out is really, really key to having a good pregnancy. And the thing is,

is like in the first three months, I really didn't feel like going. Like I was exhausted and I, you know, I would have rather had a nap, but I just kind of like would, like I said, listen to my body. So if I thought, okay, maybe I'm tired right now, but I could go work out, I'd go for a workout. If I felt like I was exhausted where my eyes were burning, I'd have a nap. And then by the time I got to my third or second trimester, it was like I just got this second wind of energy. And, you know, since from then it's just been smooth sailing. And the way that I'm kind of looking at labor is like,

they don't call it labor for nothing. So I basically feel like the last nine months I've been conditioning my body to go through labor. I've been training for it. And I've had that frame of mind since day one. So it's like signing up for a marathon and, and not doing any training for it. It's going to be really difficult on your body, but if you go into it well prepared, you know, I think that it, I think it can be a pretty amazing thing.

Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I mean, uh, I know whether I'm sure the exercise, I mean, the, that's what we had our kid with a midwife and the midwife was saying that, you know, she's been doing it. She delivered like 3000 babies and with the basically no C-sections, she's just like a Jedi midwife lady. And she was saying that a lot of women that come through that, that have exercised through their pregnancy, they always just have the smoother, uh, labors where it's shorter. Sometimes it can be more intense, but it's over quicker and, you know, just no real complications. And then also you'll be able to bounce back much quicker, which is going to be great as well. Yeah.

And the thing for me, like I've always been somebody who's like been really big on goal setting. And when I found out I was pregnant, actually, I've been engaged for almost two years and we had our wedding date already set. So when I found out I was pregnant, I was literally counting down the months. I'm like, okay, I have one, two, three, four months to get into my wedding dress. I'm like, this is perfect because it's going to keep me in check. Like after I have the baby, you know, obviously I'm going to give myself time to heal, but I have that goal to be in my wedding dress and feel good. So yeah, yeah. I'm sure you'll, you dress and feel good. Yeah, yeah. I'm sure you'll be totally fine.

Yeah. Cool. So next question here. So beyond just looking good, what do you feel are the biggest benefits of being fit? Like they say, healthy body, healthy mind, right? Yeah. I just feel like when you're physically fit,

it just kind of makes everything in life kind of just fall into place. If you have like, you know, if you feel good about yourself, I just find for me like I'm easier to cope with stressful situations. Yeah. You know, I feel like everything's kind of balanced for me personally. At the times in my life where I wasn't working out or wasn't taking care of myself, I felt very stressed out. I felt depressed. I felt, you know, like I wasn't good at making decisions

because I wasn't really happy with myself as a whole. So I just feel like, you know, I mean. Yeah, there's a lot to that just in how you view yourself and where things are going. A lot of that is, of course, it's just our own viewpoints of ourselves and to, to, to what, to some, you know, to some people, you know, what, what makes them happy, what they see as progress is, and is motivating may not be to you or to somebody else or to, you know, to some people, you know, the, the type of, uh, ideas that, or, or this, uh, you could say standards that

you might hold yourself to might seem ridiculous to other people. But I think it's a, definitely a point of like, everybody is when, when you feel like you are improving, even if it's just a physical improvement, uh, it definitely changes your, uh, overall outlook. definitely changes your overall outlook. It changes your mood. It gives you not only physical energy, but it gives you that mental or you could say even spiritual energy to pursue goals in other areas of your life and to have the confidence that you can put in the work and make things happen.

Yes, 100 hundred percent. It does. Yeah. I mean, that's a point I always talk a lot about of like, just, there's a, there's definitely a parallel there between working out and life in that. So you have, you're in the beginning here, uh, uh, let's say it's, if it's fitness and you go, okay, uh, your, your body looks a certain way or whatever, and you have this goal and you get excited for this goal. I want to look this way, or, uh, I want to be able to, you know, lift this much weight or whatever you're getting excited about. But then you have to go do that work every day. And some days are more exciting than others.

Like, you know, I enjoy working out. It's an activity I just like to do. But some days I like it more than others. You know, some days workouts are great. Some days workouts are not so great. Um, and you know, it's, it's more good than it is bad, of course, but you still show up every day and you put in the work and you kind of learn to, you learn to enjoy the process. Um, and I think that that that's a, that's a skill almost that, that you can learn via working out that then when you go, if you're going to be starting a business or like in your case, you know, where you, that's what you're doing is

running your own business and you're running a career. It's a very similar thing where you show up every day and you know the things that you have to do. And some days you're super into it. Some days you're not so into it, but you know, you just keep on doing the work. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I, and there's definitely, I think there's also that physical release too, where it's nice to just go move around heavy stuff and exhaust the body oh I totally agree yeah yeah so what is your you mentioned that you're working out six or seven times a week uh what does your routine look like like in terms of uh you say you're not doing a lot of cardio, but what kind of weightlifting, what are the basic principles that you follow?

Right now, and for the last nine months, I do a split. I do two leg days a week. As I said, I can't really go super heavy, but I still try to push myself to where I find it somewhat challenging. Yeah. And before your pregnancy, were you into heavy, heavy? Or what was it like then? I love squatting. As soon as I learned how to squat properly and I started noticing development in my glutes, I became obsessed with it. I'm not joking.

I would squat three times a week if I could. But so basically what I do is I try to do five to six days of weight. I'll do a really high intense, lightweight, high rep workout, like a thousand rep workout where I'll combine two body parts like legs and shoulders. Or usually those workouts are an upper and a lower body. So I'll do that once a week with legs, and then I'll have like a day where I go in and do legs with a little bit of a heavier weight.

So kind of like that power hyperfutry kind of split. Exactly. Yeah. And then I just kind of like go with the flow to be honest with you like if i feel like okay well you know i did this one day and then the next day maybe i'll do like an interval um of of stairs something on the stair master if i have energy i'll go you know do an upper pick up pick an upper body part um and do like a really high rep, low weight workout. So that's just the way I've been training now.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And when you were kind of going through, because obviously maintaining a physique is much, it's different than building one. Yeah. Is that, I mean, I'm assuming you probably trained a little bit differently when you were starting out, you know, going, okay, I need to add 30 pounds of muscle on my body or 20 pounds of muscle.

How am I going to do that? Yeah. Well, and I think when I started out, I was just kind of leaving that up to the people I was working with. But it wasn't working for me because I wasn't eating properly to build muscle. So I was almost yo-yoing. Like I would start to see a little bit of muscle and then I would diet down for a show and I would lose everything. Um, and this happened to me so many times. So I think like I have noticed the biggest changes in my upper body since I, since I found out I was pregnant. And as soon as I found out I was pregnant and I started eating normally, um,

all of a sudden my shoulders started filling out. And, just noticed all this change that, you know, honestly, like now after I have the baby, I will always be eating properly to make sure that, you know, I'm getting the full benefit of what I'm doing in the gym because, you know, and the thing too from competing, it kind of gave me this, I had almost body dysmorphia. Like I would look in the mirror and I would think, oh my goodness, I'm gaining a little bit of body fat. This is terrible. I need to diet more,

you know? So, so I, being pregnant has been the best thing that ever happened to me because I've like literally taken a step back and, and been like, oh my goodness. Like I look at pictures of myself and I remember taking, you know, um, I would take pictures weekly to just kind of see where I was changing. And I remember I would look at them and they would stress me out and I would be like, oh my goodness, I look fat. And then now that I actually am like in a situation where I've had to put on weight, I look back at these pictures and I'm like, I look fantastic. What the hell is wrong with me? Yeah, that's great. I mean, that's something that is, I'll get asked about that as well. Or people will write me that are kind of going through that a little bit.

And it does seem to be more with people that are competing than more than the casual. Well, I say casual, than people that aren't competing, basically. But yeah, I mean, I guess I can relate to that to some degree. I mean, I haven't competed, I guess. I mean, I probably could. I don't know exactly how well I would do just because, I mean, there's a lot of drugs in this game. And you can't, if you're not on the drugs,

you're not going to look like the guys that are, period. It's just the way it is. But, but, uh, you know, I, I know how that is. Like when you, if you get super lean, you just kind of want to stay there. So then you, if you can pinch a little bit more, I've had, I was like, Oh, or, or if I'm intentionally like, okay, I'm done. You know, I did all the, I did the photo shoots that I have to do. I'm going to start eating more now. And I'm going to, even, even with reverse dieting, I mean, you're not at least, I mean, I haven't been able to figure out how to stay 5% and actually be able to eat a lot of food and be strong in the gym. Um, so, you know, I've even had that, you know, where you're just like, yeah, okay,

it's time to get fatter. Essentially it doesn't make it, uh, necessarily like thrilling. Yeah. So whatever. I find when you get that lean to you kind of always compare yourself to that you know yeah then it does that becomes the like well how am i now compared to that yeah yeah yeah i i can so and i feel like that's where the kind of the mind part of it comes to right like i feel like the next time that i do a show, I'm going to have to be telling myself like, this is not, you know, this is not realistic for me to look like this all the time. Exactly. Maybe 10 pounds off. Yes. But yeah, exactly. And that's, that's how I've kind of just come to accept it. Like, you know, I'm happy to stay lean and, uh, look good and be

four to six weeks from, uh, you know, really lean or whatever, and be able to just go back and forth between that and, and be able to enjoy food as well. Like you, I, I, I don't eat an obscene amount of food. I've never had like a crazy fast metabolism, but you know, my, uh, I'm eating on my training days about 3,200 calories. And then I'm in a slight desk, a deficit on my off days around 2100 or so so that's enjoyable for me like I get to eat quite a bit of food I go out to a restaurant once a week and I save up some calories on Friday and my wife and I will go somewhere and you know I don't gorge but I'm not counting macro I don't care I'm just eating whatever I feel like eating you know what I mean

is that what you do you follow the IFM? Yeah, but I, I, I do, but you know, I'm not really into like flexible dieting is definitely the way to go. And it's been around, you know, since the seventies, but I'm not into the whole like eat junk food, get shredded type. Oh, me neither. You know what I mean? Like, I think that's a stupid use of it because people like we eat food we don't just eat food for protein carbs and fats like we eat food for micronutrients as well so yeah but but yes very much so of like dieting is just a numbers game i mean i talk about that in my books i'm always you know in all my articles that eat foods you like it's actually a big part as you know like if you want to make your diet work make it create your meal plans with food that you like to eat.

Now, if all you like to eat is Pop-Tarts and white bread, well, okay, you have a problem. But if I talk about in an article I wrote on vitamins and minerals, different types of vitamins and minerals the body needs and why, I gave a pretty extensive list. It was based on a study done, I think it was actually commissioned by Dole or something like that, but of the most nutritious, nutrient-d dense foods. And there's a lot of great stuff on there. Superfoods. Yeah. All kinds of tasty stuff that have plenty of nutrition. So absolutely that, you know, dieting is just ultimately about, you know, energy and energy out. And then of course, how you break that down into protein, carbs, and fats does matter.

But eat foods that you like. So then, and then also, you break that down into protein, carbs, and fats does matter. But eat foods that you like. And then also, you know, when it comes to going out to dinner, going out to a restaurant and stuff, I think, you know, having that cheat meal or whatever is important also just for the psychological boost, you know? Yeah. I always know when I need a cheat meal. Like my body will tell me, okay, it's time to have a burger and fries. It doesn't happen all the time, but, I mean, it does. Yeah. Yeah, I've had that. Yeah, yeah. me, okay, it's time to have a burger and fries. It doesn't happen all the time, but I mean, it does. Yeah.

Yeah. I've had that. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, totally. And you know, I usually just kind of almost, it's almost just on the schedule now. Like, you know, once a week I'm going to go out to a restaurant, I'm going to eat something. I'm just going to eat, you know, whatever I feel like eating. And otherwise I'm following a plan, but it's, you know, every day, every meal I'm looking

forward to it because I'm eating something that I like to eat as opposed to that. Like, you know, you, you said that, you know, earlier the, the, was it chicken and asparagus or whatever? There was a guy, he was competing. He's trying to, trying to win his card in physique. And his coach was having him on orange roughy and asparagus every day, eight, eight meals a day of orange roughy, which is like grouper. It's a fish. Yeah. So it's like steamed fish and steamed vegetables eight times a day. Oh, God.

Why? And I was asking him, I was like, why? Why are you even doing that? He wouldn't listen to me though. I'm like, you realize that you can eat carbs, you can eat food you like. It doesn't matter, man. My hair actually started falling out and I had like terrible skin. It was the worst I've ever looked. actually looked anorexic yeah i mean there's some pictures on my website of that show oh yeah um yeah and

you would it was the skinniest i've ever been in my life i'm i'm close to 5 foot 11 and i was 129 pounds wow so yeah it was my bones were sticking out and it wasn't, it wasn't cute. So, so what do you feel are the three biggest fitness lessons that you've kind of learned over the years? Um, fitness lessons. Yeah. To listen to your body. Um, a hundred percent. I mean, if something isn't right, your body's going to tell you don't

do something because somebody tells you that it's good um that's like what are you what's what's an example of that like so people can kind of relate to how that would feel or how they might know i think that would go back to the dieting part of things like you know when i when i was put on that chicken and asparagus diet eight times a day like I couldn't even see straight I felt like garbage I couldn't work properly I couldn't think um I didn't sleep like and just because I had somebody coaching me that I was paying them to help me I just kept doing it yeah um so I think you know if I could go back in time, I would have been like, you know, this isn't right.

Um, this isn't, this isn't normal. Um, and, and not to mention, I think, I think generally speaking, I think, you know, I'm sure you would agree with this, that when you're dieting now, I mean, getting down to super lean, um, in my experience, the last, I guess the last few weeks, I wouldn't say they were, they weren't grueling by any means, but my energy levels were lower and I was a little bit weaker in the gym. I felt fine. Generally I was, I didn't reach the point of like depression and where I'm feeling all messed up. I just wasn't, I was like ready to eat more food and have energy in the gym. But for, uh, I mean, that's really though I'm talking like,

yeah, getting as a guy, getting down to that five, 6%. And I think, I think when you're doing a show, that's kind of like normal to feel like that. Yeah.

I don't think, I don't think it's, there's any way around that, but for the average person that's dieting, like even if it's, if it's a guy getting down to seven, 8%, or if it's a girl getting down to 15,

16%, you should feel totally fine throughout the entire diet. You should not be dealing with many hunger issues. You shouldn't be fantasizing or salivating over the idea of eating some carbs. You should be sleeping fine. Your workouts actually shouldn't be that bad. I have a lot of people that, especially people that are newer to weightlifting, that they'll spend two to three months cutting, like, cause you know,

they'll come, let's say it's guys at 20 something percent body fat and they need to get rid of a lot of that to kind of see where they're at. And they'll, they'll cut for two to three months and get down to the 10% range and actually make strength gains the entire time. And like, it's like they never, it's like they never even, it's like they never even restricted their calories, you know? So that's, that's a little bit ideal, but I think like, has your experience been with proper guiding that you, you generally actually just feel fine when you're doing it right?

Yeah. And I think, I mean, I think it's normal to just kind of feel like, okay, I'm tired or whatever around that time. But to feel like, you know, like something's not right, I think is, um, is a little bit excessive. So I definitely would like tell people like, you know, listen to yourself, listen to your body. I mean, it's normal to not feel great, but to not feel like healthy, I think is, is a big one.

You shouldn't feel like you have a disease. No, no no definitely not and right and then the thing that all goes back to is like fat loss is totally hormonal too right like yeah i mean when you're dieting down like that and i mean you feel that bad i mean you're not just you're messing with some serious things definitely um yeah so and then sorry i've what was the question again because like yeah so what was that yeah yeah yeah so that that's one big lesson is there another big lesson that you've kind of learned um whether i would think for i would think yeah like for women like go in and lift heavy um i was kind of scared to do that in the beginning and like that

this misconception most women have like you're going to get bulky you absolutely will not yeah um you know and i mean just mixing it up um you don't need to lift heavy six days a week but um definitely like don't be scared to get in there and push yourself a little bit totally talk about that as well that it's just women don't have the hormones to get big and bulky. No. They just don't. And the girls that, you know, of course, many women, they immediately associate heavy weightlifting with, like, you know, the massive bodybuilder girls.

And those girls, one, are on so many drugs, and two, have been lifting for a very long time as well. It's impossible to naturally have a physique anywhere, even in the vicinity of that. And the only time where weightlifting wouldn't benefit a woman, I think, is if a woman is overweight and doesn't do anything to correct that. Well, then, yes, if you add muscle, it's just going to make her look a little bit more overweight. So the name of the game is to get lean. And then when you're at that baseline of being lean, then when you add muscle, it just adds curves. It makes girls look great. yeah um and then i guess the third thing that i would say is like i mean the advice that i would kind of give somebody that's looking to

maybe do a show or something is take some time in the beginning to um put some muscle on um you know that that was a mistake that i made as i i kept competing and i i kept going around in circles because I would get a little bit of muscle and I would diet down. And you are always going to lose some when you diet down. If I could go back in time and do things a little bit differently, I think it would have taken like two or three years and I would have really trained hard. And just make sure you're eating enough food and such. Exactly. Yeah. And find a good coach.

And just make sure you're eating enough food and such. Exactly. Yeah. And find a good coach. Find somebody that has some credentials and somebody that has a good track record. Yeah, exactly. That has real results that they can show with their own bodies and with others. And it's actually interesting you bring up that point because that applies to people that aren't competing as well. I've run into it mostly with guys.

But what will happen is, so they'll, I had a guy recently who was, he finished his first year of weightlifting. And in terms of what he was doing was great, you know, focusing on heavy weightlifting, compound weightlifting. And, but he had gained, I want to say, cause he had DEXA scan both before and after it was something like 15 or 16 pounds in his first year that's not bad but you know he should be able to do more than that should be able to do between 20 and 25 and then when when he was just kind of going over what happened what he did what it turned out that he was basically his first six months were in a mild calorie deficit because he didn't want to like cut really hard. This wasn't a client,

somebody that I don't really have time to do one-on-one, but I'm always like available via email and I answer people's questions and I just help out. Um, so I would have done something if I would have known if we would have contacted him earlier. Uh, but basically he was like in a mild calorie deficit for, I think it was four to six months. Cause he didn't want to like cut too much, but he didn't want to, he didn't want to bulk. And so what happened is he just, you know, obviously for that time period, because, um, you know, you, the listener, if you, if you're familiar with my work, you already know this, but if you're not, or you haven't read about it, it's that when you're, when your body's in a calorie deficit, its ability to synthesize protein, which is related to muscle building, of course, is just impaired. So your body's not, your body's not able to build muscle effectively

when you're in a calorie deficit. So, um, my, my mentality with cutting is always to get it. You want it to be as quickly as possible without sacrificing muscle or health. Um, because you don't want to spend, you know, that every week that you spend in a calorie deficit, you're more or less not going to build muscle unless you're brand new to weightlifting. You're going backwards. Exactly. So that applies to people that aren't competing as well, where don't drag out your cuts or don't drag out your calorie deficits over long periods of time if you need to also put on muscle because you're not going to do it effectively.

Because sometimes they'll see bodybuilders that they'll hear, oh, well, the bodybuilder, he cut for, he prepared, he took five months to prep for his contest. Well, what people aren't realizing is like, one, there's the drugs involved, and two, sometimes people are just trying to maintain during that time period or whatever. Yeah.

Yeah, that's good. So now what are your plans from here like what are your future fitness goals and goals for your business and so forth um well i can have my baby yeah and then i'm gonna get married um and then i'm thinking um you know i would like to do another show. Um, probably I'm going to do, um, the, uh, Alberta bodybuilding association show in July, 2015, the provincials. So it's a second tier. So, um, I'm just going to go with the flow. Like for me, I guess the most important thing right now is just, um, is making sure that my daughter is, um, is happy and healthy. And, and, you know, once she's born, and if it's in the cards for me, I absolutely want to compete again. And if I have to take a few years, then, you know, I will.

But at the moment, I'm just kind of training girls for their shows, and, you know, just that's it for now. Cool. But I definitely do want to compete. Do you work with people just competing or do you also work with other people I have a ton of

different clients all different walks of life but yes I do I think I have like 10 girls doing shows this year that's awesome so I do I mean I like it. And I have clients that are moms.

I'm going to send women your way. Because I'll get women that will ask, you know, they're pregnant, and ask what exactly should they be doing with weightlifting. And honestly, I'm not even sure. So I tell them, like, it's not really my specialty. My wife, when she was pregnant, she worked with someone that that's, that's one of the things this person specialized in was, you know, which exercises to stay away from, which exercises to do and just kind of help her out. So yeah, I think that's something that I, I would love to like, kind of touch on is helping pregnant

women, even with just nutrition. And yeah, that's a big side. Um, yeah, because I mean, I've been able to, to maintain my physique through this entire month. And I think once you live it, um, it's much easier to give people advice, right? Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. I've, you know, I've like, I've always just kind of like said, you know, I'm not, I can't say for sure. I'm sorry. It's not, all I know is what my wife did, but I don't even know exactly. I don't know all the details because I was at work and she was doing her thing and, you know, it wasn't necessarily like the topic of the day of like what kind of workout she did. You know what I mean?

Yeah. Yeah. Well, cool. So people can find you at Bree, B-R-E-E-l-i-n-d.com right yeah and then from there on facebook as well yeah exactly i have an instagram account it's my fiance's last name it's l-i-l-b hunter um yeah and i have twitter too and i think that that one is little b hunter too so l-i-l-B Hunter. Okay, great. Yeah.

Cool. So is there anything else you'd like to share with the listeners before we wrap up? No, I think we covered everything, but it's been nice to talk about this stuff, you know? Yeah, yeah, totally. Yeah, thanks for coming on, and when I have pregnant women coming my way, I'm going to send them your way thank you so much you