Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - Q&A: Deadlift Variations, Problem-Solving Tips, Best Foods for Gains, & More

Episode Date: January 29, 2025

In this episode, I discuss the best carb and calorie-efficient foods for muscle growth, how to optimize deadlift variations, my top tips for problem-solving, and lots more. As always, these questions come directly from my Instagram followers, who take advantage of my weekly Q&As in my stories. If you have a question you're dying to have answered, make sure you follow me on Instagram (@muscleforlifefitness) and look out for the Q&A posts. Your question might just make it into a podcast episode! If you like this type of episode, let me know. Send me an email ([e-mail]) or direct message me on Instagram. And if you don’t like it, let me know that too or how you think it could be better. --- Timestamps: (00:00) Intro (03:59) Behind neck press safer? (05:58) Are you natural? (06:15) Alcohol? (06:44) Night shifts, thyroid issues (08:05) Problem-solving tips? (12:51) Trapper vs. sumo (14:27) Trump conviction (15:37) Eating disorders? (19:37) Best recent books? (31:17) Bulking/cutting duration (32:05) Zone 2 during workouts? (33:19) Carb-efficient foods? (34:21) Favorite oblique exercises? (35:01) CrossFitters jacked? (35:46) Best reps for growth? (37:57) Lean bulking tips? (40:16) Why no Legion in stores? (43:27) Kayaking step count? (43:48) No TRT? --- Mentioned on the Show: Whey+ Thinner Leaner Stronger Coaching Page The Story of Philosophy The Martian: A Novel Can't Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds Never Finished: Unshackle Your Mind and Win the War Within The Four Pillars of Investing, Second Edition: Lessons for Building a Winning Portfolio The Art of Strategy: A Game Theorist's Guide to Success in Business and Life

Hello, hello and welcome to Muscle for Life. I am your host Mike Matthews and today is a Q&A. Q&A number 70 that I've recorded and per usual I'm going to be answering questions that people have asked me over on Instagram. If you want to ask me questions you got to follow me on Instagram at Muscle for Life Fitness and then you have to watch my stories and every couple of weeks or so I put up a story and I ask for questions you know little questions sticker and then I get a bunch of questions I go through them and I choose the ones that are topical or interesting or ones that I just haven't answered a million times already answer

them briefly there on Instagram and then bring everything over here to the podcast where I can answer the questions in more detail. And so today I answer questions related to the behind the neck press, is that a necessary exercise, whether I drink alcohol, my top three tips for problem solving, if you are missing out on any benefits by doing the trap bar deadlift versus the conventional deadlift or the sumo deadlift, the three best books that I've read recently,

and how long you should lean bulk for before you cut, how should you plan out your lean bulks and your cuts to get the best results and more. Before we jump into today's episode, I need to tell you about the protein powder that I use every day. It is called Whey Plus, and it's from my sports nutrition company, Legion. Now Whey Plus is a naturally sweetened and flavored 100% whey isolate protein powder

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And all of that is why Legion has sold over 1 million bags of whey plus and why it has received over 9,000 five-star reviews from verified buyers over on Amazon and Legion's website and right now you can save 20% on your first order of Wey Plus and anything else you might want to buy in Legion's store by going to buylegion.com slash Wey that is B-Y-L-E-G-I-O-N.com slash W-H-E-Y and using the coupon code MUSCLE at checkout. And if heaven forbid you don't like Weigh Plus or you don't like anything else that you buy from us, simply let us know and we will just give you your money back.

You don't even have to send the products back to us. So again, go to buylegion.com slash Weigh try way plus risk free and see for yourself why it is one of the most popular truly grass fed whey protein powders in the world. And don't forget to use that coupon code muscle to save 20% on your first order. Klebs asks is behind the neck press a necessary exercise safe or alternative? So my thoughts on the behind the neck press a necessary exercise, safe or alternative? So my thoughts on the behind the neck press. So first, most people find the behind the neck press uncomfortable because it requires above average shoulder mobility to do correctly and many people lack the above average amount of mobility required. And also the exercise forces you to tilt your head forward in an awkward position to press

from. And second, the behind the neck press puts your shoulders in an inherently unstable position which increases your risk of injury, particularly as you get stronger and have to use heavier weights to get or to produce a sufficient training stimulus to make the exercise worthwhile. Sure, you can do a bunch of warmup sets, I guess, but if you want to do hard sets, working sets that can actually produce muscle growth,

you have to train hard. You have to use heavier weight and you have to push close to failure. And unfortunately, many people do exactly what you don't want to do to compensate for the two disadvantages. They do a bunch of warmup sets. Basically, they use much lighter loads

and they leave several reps still in the tank in every set. And so then they progress more slowly and they progress in smaller amounts on the exercise. And that of course limits your ability to gain muscle and strength. So on balance I think it's reasonable to regard the behind the neck press as a viable exercise but given its shortcomings I would rather use a standard press so in front rather than behind to maximally and safely overload my shoulders, my front delts in particular, and rely mostly on effective isolation exercises like a lateral raise or a rear raise or a rear delt row to

train my side and rear delts. I do not do the behind the neck press. Okay, Al Cidiz Ferrara asks, you natty? Yes, and I'll take a little victory lap for that. 40 years old, lifting three days per week. I do cardio on the other days and I'm still getting asked if I'm natty. Annelies Rowe asks, do you drink alcohol? No, I don't. I still don't. I never got into drinking alcohol and I figured it's not a habit worth taking up. That said, a couple of months ago I did have my first drink in probably eight years or so. At a wedding it was two shots of some shitty vodka thing and it just made me feel kind of lightheaded for maybe 15 minutes and then I felt nothing. So yeah, that was cool. L Leon 22 asks, my girl

works nights and has thyroid issues following plan but not getting results. Ideas. Yes, a few things that can help here. One is maintaining a consistent sleep schedule including on the days off, which is not fun. I know, but it really can help a lot if she can do it. Two, using light to help regulate circadian rhythm. So that means bright lights when you are awake, darkness while you are sleeping, darkness starting probably at least an hour or so before bed. There's also a device I came across recently

that may be helpful in such a situation. Also may be helpful with traveling. It's called the Re-timer. and it's just a clever and convenient, very portable little device for exposing your eyes to blue-green light, which has been shown to be the most effective in affecting the circadian rhythm. And there are a number of papers that have been published with this device. So there's research to support its efficacy. And anyway, getting back to the tips, the third tip for again, someone who is working

nights has thyroid issues, use melatonin, so just a standard protocol and then finally incorporate a 20 to 45 minute nap after being awake for about six to eight hours, if possible. OK, next question comes from Ezekiel Swanson. Top three tips for problem solving in general. Well, aside from the basics like developing critical thinking, developing metacognitive skills. So planning, monitoring, evaluating your own cognition and so forth. Understanding the scientific method, et cetera.

I have a few specific tips. One is firmly adopting the mindset that there is a solution. You don't know what it is yet, but you have to get into that mindset. There is a solution and you are going to find it. And then you are going to face it, which brings me to my second point,

accepting that sometimes the solution is in the place that we least want to look. Sometimes it is the thing that we do not want to face the most. And so we can often shortcut the process of finding solutions by just starting right there. By just being honest with ourselves. Where do we really not want to look? What do we really not want to look at What do we really not want to look at? Maybe we should just look there first and maybe the solution is staring us right in the face. To use a simple example in fitness, look at weight loss, right? How many people are struggling with weight loss and do not want to look at calories of course. They do not want to look at how

much food they're eating. They're willing to look in so many other places. They're willing to consider so many other absurd propositions just to avoid facing the simple fact that they eat too much food. They just need to eat less food. My wife is German and she has told me that in Germany, in German culture, there is a meme, I guess you could call it, for weight loss and it's just this. Eat half of the amount of food you normally eat. Like that's actually a thing that just Germans hear, I guess guess growing up. Oh, you want to lose weight? You just need to cut your food in half. Very German, very cold,

practical and workable. Anyway, coming back to my list of problem solving tips, number three is understanding that sometimes the right solution, the best solution is also the least emotionally satisfying, the least emotionally palatable. And as a corollary to that, sometimes the most emotionally satisfying, at least in that moment, the most emotionally palatable solution is actually a really bad choice. And so sometimes we just have to force ourselves to do things that don't feel great, maybe even feel bad, make us feel bad, make us feel sad, make us feel disappointed, make us feel angry, whatever. But we know are right because they're supported by sound reasoning, they're supported by facts, they're

supported by logic. But then we often feel a lot better after making that difficult decision than we thought we would feel before we made it. I mean, think about working out, for example. How many times have you forced yourself into the gym to start a workout that you really didn't want to do. And you figured you will give it 10 minutes. And if you still feel the same way after 10 minutes, you're just gonna leave and you're doing it one rep at a time, one set at a time.

And then after 10 minutes, you are starting to enjoy yourself. And then by the end of the workout, you're feeling great. And you are so happy that you didn't skip the workout and you know many people say that their best workouts often started that way. Their best workouts are often not the ones where they came into the gym full of energy, full of motivation and crushed their workout. No, their best workouts, the ones that stand out the most in their mind were the ones that started terribly, that they barely made it into the gym to do.

They almost drove back home and then they forced themselves to start the first set. And by the end, they felt totally revived. And if you've spent enough time in the gym, I'm sure you've had that experience more than once. And it works the same way in other arenas of life, in other endeavors. So often we just have to force ourselves to do what we know should be done, to do the right thing according to truth, facts, logic, and so forth regardless of how we feel. And then afterward, we feel great. iMegaBeast asks, Do we miss out on any benefits by doing trap bar deadlift over sumo or conventional? Nothing meaningful. No, the trap bar deadlift is a great exercise despite what some people would have you believe.

We're mostly talking about skill and strength specific to those exercises. So if you do a lot of trap bar deadlifting, it is not going to translate over maybe as well as you would think into a conventional deadlift or a sumo deadlift, you will have to work on those exercises to build up the technical skill to be able to fully express the strength that you've built on, let's say, the trap bar deadlift. The reverse is probably not true, at least not as true in my experience, meaning that if you do a lot of conventional deadlifting or sumo deadlifting then go over to the trap bar you will be able to express probably the majority of your strength on that exercise because it is less technically demanding and so something that I've done for a long time is

alternate between the conventional and the trap bar I don't like sumo it doesn't feel good to me. And so I just don't really have a reason to do it. But for a long time, I've alternated between conventional and trap bar deadlifting, mostly to just give my joints a little bit of a break because the trap bar deadlift is a bit easier on your back, for example.

You also can load it up a little bit heavier than the conventional deadlift. Jacob Callahan asks, thoughts on the Trump conviction? This was asked back in November, I think it was before the election, just for some context. But my thoughts at the time was that it seemed to be high risk, practical politics that was likely to fail. That's what I was saying at the time. I didn't think it was going to do much of anything, but boost Trump's fundraising, boost his polling, which is ultimately what happened. And the reason for that is it was just too contrived.

Like I didn't really understand the strategy from the Democrats beyond maybe desperation. And if I were Trump, back then, I would have been begging for a jail sentence that would have been successfully appealed to the Supreme Court. I wouldn't have actually went to jail, but I would have been begging for a jail sentence, hand that down, because that would then further improve my numbers, my polling, my fundraising. And again, I would appeal it to the Supreme Court confident that it would be overturned. So I'm not going to jail. Never interrupt your enemy while they

are making a mistake. Right? Okay. The next question comes from Jess Dunning-Abersock. And she asks, are eating disorders something you regularly advocate or are you just mindless? Okay, so first let's calm down dear because there is no need for the hysterics. In fact, let me speak to your husband. I need to tell you about my best-selling fitness book for women who want to lose up to 35 pounds of fat or more and gain whole body muscle definition in just three to five hours per week and without giving up delicious foods or doing grueling workouts. Now the book is called

thinner leaner stronger and while it cannot give you a toned Hollywood babe body in 30 days and it is not full of diet and exercise hacks for gaining lean muscle and melting belly fat faster than a sneeze in a cyclone. It is a science based nutrition and exercise book that will demystify muscle building and fat loss and show you exactly how to get a lean, strong and fit physique without spending hours in the gym every day and without giving up your favorite foods like hamburgers or pizza and even ice cream. And the kicker, you will see visible results in the mirror and in the gym in just your first month on the program that comes with the book. Now, how is all of that possible?

comes with the book. Now, how is all of that possible? Well, the truth is, muscle building and fat loss just aren't nearly as complicated as you've been led to believe. You don't have to obsess over clean eating. You don't have to avoid unhealthy foods like sugar or meat or bread. Some foods are more nutritious and should be more frequently than others. That's about it. You also don't have to grind through hours of punishing workouts every week. Sweating buckets, getting really sore, training until you are bone tired. Those things are completely overrated for gaining muscle and strength. You also don't have to slog away on the treadmill. In fact, you don't need to do any cardio at all to get rid of belly, hip, and thigh fat. Cardio can help, and cardio is healthy, but you don't have to do it to get into great

shape. And those are just a few of the harmful lies and myths that keep women weak and overweight and confused. And in my book, Thinner, Lear, Stronger, you will learn something that most of those women unfortunately will probably never know. And that is how to cut through all the confusion, all the clutter, and create clear, structured, no-nonsense diet and training plans that are tailored to your fitness goals and your circumstances and your preferences.

And all of that is why Thinner, Leaner, Stronger is one of the most popular women's fitness books of all time, with over 500,000 copies sold in 13 different languages, and why it has helped tens of thousands of women of all ages and abilities transform their body composition, fitness, and why it has helped tens of thousands of women of all ages and abilities transform their body composition, fitness, and health. The Thinner, Lear, Stronger system of eating, training, and recovering is also supported

by 367 peer-reviewed scientific studies that are referenced in the back of the book. And Thinner, Lear, Stronger has been regularly revised over the years based on the latest findings in nutrition, exercise, and supplementation research with the years based on the latest findings in nutrition exercise and supplementation research with the latest version, the fourth edition released in 2023. So the bottom line is this, you can get that head-turning beach-ready body without following weird extreme or complicated

diet exercise or supplementation strategies and thinner, stronger, we'll show you how. complicated diet, exercise or supplementation strategies and Thinner, Leaner, Stronger will show you how. So head over to Amazon, get your copy now and start your journey to a fitter, leaner and stronger you. Walking Pause asks the best three books that you've read recently. I've been on a bit of a book losing streak this year. There are a number of books that I just barely finished, almost quit, but found just enough value to finish.

I've quit a number of books, particularly genre fiction that I'm reading because I'm interested in writing genre fiction. I've been working on that as a hobby for some time now. I started with educating myself, reading a bunch of books on writing genre fiction and just writing fiction in general and then processing all of my highlights and notes and building out a system that will allow me to actually apply what I'm learning in those books because it's way too much to try to just keep in your head.

You have to build out, I chose to do it in a checklist. I think that's the simplest way to turn the information into something that you can actually use when you're writing. And now I'm working on what will be a short story, maybe something between a short story and a novella with the logic there being that if you can't make short stories work, if you can't make novellas work, then you have no business writing novels, right? So anyway, I've quit genre fiction, Name of the Wind boring, Lies of Locke Lamora boring, The Blade itself boring, Assassin's Apprentice boring, Earthsea boring.

Not only boring, but I'm actually surprised at how many best-selling fiction books, I mean these are fantasy books obviously because that is a genre that I have an affinity for but it's surprising how many of these popular books are deeply flawed from a storytelling perspective, violate some very fundamental principles of effective storytelling. I'll give you an example. A good story always has a protagonist with a very clear goal, a very clear desire, something they are trying to achieve and you can know very clearly whether they have achieved it or not and in good stories that desire becomes a burning

desire. It becomes something that maybe they would even sacrifice their life for. And that might be figurative depending on what type of story it is. And according to time proven storytelling principles, your story actually doesn't even begin until you have established that. And so something I'm so sick of are stories that start with a protagonist with no real desire, with nothing really at stake, kind of just wandering around, stumbling their way into something that might at some point turn into a desire. But still after a hundred pages, a hundred and fifty pages, no clear desire, nothing they really care about, nothing they can't just walk away from. That's another simple test of whether your story has really

started yet is what happens if the protagonist were to just walk away or to just say, you know what, I actually don't care about this anymore. I'm just going to go do something else. Does anything bad happen? If there are no consequences of the protagonist just giving up, your story has not even begun yet. And so again, I'm finding story after story after story, particularly in the fantasy genre that starts this way. Protagonist has no clear desire, doesn't really care about much of anything, really. And after a hundred pages, 150 pages, 200 pages, I'm giving these books enough pages, I'm not quitting after 20 pages, but after a hundred to 200 pages, the protagonist is still basically just puddling around and at any point could just quit and there

would be no negative consequences whatsoever that we are aware of. That is just a poorly designed story, period. That's just one thing. I could go through probably 10 examples of storytelling 101 foundational principles that are grossly violated by a number of these bestselling books that I've been starting and quitting. And I'm surprised. I'm guessing at this point that many professional, meaning traditionally published fiction authors, people who make most of their income or all of their income from writing fiction books, I'm guessing that many of these people

have not studied the craft of storytelling all that deeply. I'm guessing that a lot of them have just read a lot of fiction and through osmosis picked up enough to be good enough to get as far as they have gotten, but have not made a true study of the art. That's my assumption so far. Anyway, I haven't even answered the question yet. So let's look at my spreadsheet of what I've read this year. The four pillars of investing, I would recommend that if you want to learn about investing, that was a good book. 12 against the

gods. I liked some of it. It was a bit too overwrought for me. Like the writing was a bit too frilly. But I did like some of the ideas in that book. Let's see, Can't Hurt Me by Goggins was surprisingly good. To me, I didn't think I was gonna like it, but I actually quite liked it. Found it inspiring. He has a wild story. Definitely a motivational book to help you stop being a

victim, stop making excuses and just do the things that you know you need to do regardless of how you feel about doing them. I also read his next book, Never Finished, which I also liked but not as much as Can't Hurt Me. There was a book called The Art of Strategy because I wanted to read about game theory. I've read some game theory 101 type stuff in the past and found it interesting and wanted to go a little bit deeper. So The Art of Strategy, which was by Avinash K. Dixit and Barry J.J. Nailbuff did like that book. And let's see, the psychology of money did not really like, barely finished it. Not only is it, I guess, not very applicable

to me and my circumstances, but I found a number of the arguments in the book very superficial and in some cases, just completely wrong, like not true. For example, in the book, Haussle says that many people are terrible with money because they buy things that they don't need to try to get recognition from people,

to get admiration from people, to signal status, and he acknowledges that as an acceptable desire and maybe even a natural desire to receive that type of attention from people, but argues that buying things like a fancy car, for example, is actually not an effective way to get that because you might think

that you are getting that attention from people, but what they are actually doing is giving your car that attention and just imagining themselves in the car and completely ignoring you. No, that is completely wrong. One of the easiest ways to get that type of attention from people and to get treated better, to get interest from people who otherwise would never be interested in you. And this includes the opposite sex more so with men and women than women and men, but it works both ways is to make sure that they know that you have a lot of money. And what is the easiest way to make sure that people quickly know that you have a lot of

money? Well, it is to drive a fancy car, to wear a fancy watch, etc. etc. Conspicuous consumption. It works. If what you're trying to do is get that type of attention from other people, you're trying to get interest, you want people to be interested in you? Easiest way to do it. Now, the problem actually then is feeling like you need that attention, feeling like you need to be interesting all the time. You need people to be interested in you. You need people to ask what you do for a living and want favors from you and want to be around you and maybe even wish

they were you. That's the real problem. But of course, people don't want to hear that because they don't know what to do about that. And so in the book, Morgan just glosses over that. It just says that's actually that's natural. There's nothing particularly wrong with that. It's just the strategy of conspicuous consumption doesn't really work for that. No, it absolutely does. And the

real problem is that. So anyway, that's just an example of things that irk me when I'm reading books, because I wonder like in this case, if the author even believed what he wrote, or if it was just marketing, I think of there was a marketer Blair Warren and he published somehow at some time something called the one sentence persuasion and it goes like this people will do anything for those who encourage their dreams, justify their failures, allay their fears, confirm their suspicions and help them throw rocks at their enemies. And I think there's a lot of truth in that. And I think that the psychology of money did a good job tapping into that.

Each of those elements actually encouraging dreams, justifying failures, allaying fears, confirming suspicions, throwing rocks at enemies. But anyway, on balance, the psychology of money is definitely a net positive. It has good advice, and I'm sure it's helping a lot of people make better financial decisions. But as far as investing 101 books go, I much preferred the four pillars of investing. It doesn't have all the emotional cope

that the psychology of money has. And so some people probably should read the psychology of money maybe first to get the copium that they need to be willing to make better financial decisions. But if you don't have a bunch of emotional psychological baggage around money and you just want to know how to be a competent investor that can get rich slowly and intelligently. Again, The Four Pillars of Investing, I think is a better book. Anyway, coming back to my 2024 reading list, I'm currently reading The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant, which I love. I basically at this point love anything by Will Durant. I've read, let's see, four or five of his books now and have really enjoyed every single one. He is one of my favorite authors,

actually, period. Certainly one of my favorite writers of history and just one of my favorite thinkers. I just like the way that his mind works and I like the way that he expresses his thoughts as well. So I'm reading that and I'm reading The Martian by Andy Weir, which I'm liking. One of the reasons I'm liking it is, page one, what do we have? Oh, look at that. We have a protagonist with a very clear goal, a very clear desire that matters a lot to him. The stakes are very high.

We also have very clear forces working against him that he's going to have to overcome. He is clearly an underdog and you have to wonder how is he going to do this. You figure he's probably going to make it in the end, but you have no idea how and what it's going to cost. All right, let's move on. K Lifts Forever asks, how long should bulking slash cutting slash maintaining phases last? A good rule of thumb is at least three months of lean bulking for every month of cutting. And that's assuming that you don't need to first lose a lot of fat, of course, because in that case you just cut for as long as you need to lose the fat you need to lose. But then when you are alternating between lean bulking and

cutting, again, the target is at least three months of lean bulking for every month of cutting. And you don't have to insert maintenance phases in if you don't want to, but you can if you want to, because maybe you just want to break from overeating or under eating. And of course, you can still gain muscle and strength while maintaining. It's just not going to be as effective as it is while lean bulking. Milkman82 asks, does keeping my heart rate elevated into zone 2 while lifting count for weekly cardio? Yes, it would, but I don't recommend that you do that because it'll require shorter than optimal rest periods that then will result in less muscle and strength gain. And when we're lifting, that's the focus gain muscle, gain strength. If we want to do cardiovascular exercise, then we should hop

on a bike or we should go for a run, we should do cardio, try not to make your weightlifting into cardio, unless you have a specific reason to do that, unless you have enough muscle and strength to be happy and maybe you want to work on your muscle endurance and so you're intentionally using shorter rest periods. You are basically turning into kind of metabolic conditioning. That's a reason that you might do that. But if it's just about cardio and training your cardiovascular system,

then I would recommend doing cardio. And generally I would recommend lifting weights to gain or to maintain muscle and strength. Mario Hugon asks recommendations on carb slash calorie efficient foods. Yeah. So we have grains like rice and oats, whole grain bread, whole grain pasta. We have energy dense fruits like banana, grapes, mangoes, and so forth.

There are some energy dense vegetables or at least denser than vegetables that have very few calories and carbs like potato. That's very filling though. So that can get in the way of lean bulking depending on your appetite. We have sweet potato, which is energy dense and delicious. Corn peas, easy to eat a lot of those and so forth. There are also energy dense legumes like lentils, chickpeas, black beans, et cetera. And finally, there are high carb treat foods like popcorn, rice cakes, crackers, pretzels, candy, I guess, but again, that would be a treat.

I would not recommend getting a significant portion of your daily carbs or calories from candy. Mopar Johnny asks, favorite obliques exercise? Well, it's going to be the squat, it's going to be the deadlift, it's going to be the overhead press, because that's really all most people need to get obliques that they're happy with. If you do direct oblique work, like side bends, for example, in addition to the squats, the deadlifts and the overhead presses, yes, you can build bigger obliques, but you can also get into a situation where you have large, very developed obliques that look

cool when you're really lean, but then just make you look fatter when you're not. And so just be aware of that. Rich MCC1975 asks, why are people who do CrossFit jacked? They do more volume and cardio than you would prescribe. Well, keep in mind, there's often a selection bias in play when you are looking at people who do CrossFit. So often these are people who were jacked before CrossFit and then they use it to stay jacked. In some cases, what you don't know is in addition to

the CrossFit workouts, they go into just a traditional gym and they go lift weights a couple of hours per week as well. And now if you're referring to elite CrossFitters and other hybrid athletes as they call themselves in general, there's also drugs. Let's not forget that. Robert Maelstrom asks, what's better for muscle growth, six to eight reps or 10 to 15 reps? Well, theoretically, neither. Six to eight can be just as effective as 10 to 15 and vice versa. If you are pushing close to failure on the right exercises with the right form and so forth. However, practically speaking, I would say six to

eight because it's better for gaining strength than 10 to 15 reps. And as you become an intermediate weightlifter, it becomes more important to continue gaining strength to achieve progressive overload. And so regardless of how you are setting up your rep ranges, you wanna make sure that you are doing at least some heavier weightlifting, something between let's say four and eight reps per set, because that is more effective for gaining strength than 10 to 15 reps per set.

But there's also the enjoyability factor. Most people would say that doing six to eight reps, maybe 10 reps per set, but most people would say six to eight reps taken close to failure on most exercises is more enjoyable than 10 to 15 reps because 10 to 15 reps just hurts more. And it also takes more time for what it's worth

because obviously a set of 12 or 15 reps takes about twice as long as a set of six or seven reps. And that's especially true on compound exercises. Like go do a set of six or seven reps. And that's especially true on compound exercises. Like go do a set of any type of squat, whether it is a barbell or a machine, just any squat, six to eight reps, and you have to push close to failure, not up to failure, but that final rep needs to be difficult. It needs to be slower than the first rep and maybe you could do let's say two max three more if you had to. Now in the next set do that chain you're gonna have to adjust the weight but do that for 15 reps. So again by the 15th rep your legs are on fire your 15th rep is significantly slower than

your first or even your fifth and you think that maybe you could get two more, maybe three more if you had to and see which one you like more. Now apply that to a bunch of other exercises every week forever. Robie 11 asks, what have you seen work the best for someone to bulk while staying lean. Well one thing that can work quite well is five days of a moderate calorie surplus, let's say five to ten percent surplus, followed by two days of a moderate deficit, so something like 20-25%. This is also called calorie cycling. Now of course it does require more management than many people want to engage in because

you basically have to follow a meal plan or you have to track your calories and your macros closer than most people want to seven days a week. But if you're willing to do that, it can work quite well for gaining more muscle and strength than you would just eating at maintenance because maintenance really means you're either a little bit over or a little bit under. We're never eating the exact amount of calories that we're burning, of course. And if you like being lean-ish, you're going to tend to under eat rather than overeat. So maintenance for a lot of people, unfortunately, tends to look like three, four, five days of a slight deficit followed by,

well, not necessarily followed by, if we look at it in terms of a week, like seven days, at least half of those days, if not two thirds of those days are a slight deficit. And then the remaining days are enough of a surplus to maintain body composition over time and that's not ideal from a muscle building perspective. So with this calorie cycling approach you are intentionally being in the surplus five days out of the week and then you're using the next two days to lose some most maybe even all of the fat that you gained in the five days of the surplus. So that can be more effective over time for gaining muscle and strength than just trying to eat at maintenance calories. But I will also say that that is inferior though to all days in

a moderate surplus. It's hard to say how inferior, but if you want to gain muscle and strength as quickly as possible, especially if you are an intermediate or advanced weight lifter, just maintaining that steady calorie surplus is key. If you're natural, Sam Huffler 23 asks, is there any reason Legion isn't sold in stores or at least I've never found it? Legion isn't sold in stores, or at least I've never found it. Yeah, we are launching with Vitamin Shop finally in the beginning of next year, 2025. I'm not sure when this is going up, so maybe I should be saying this year, but 2025, Q1, we are rolling out with Vitamin Shop and we're going to be pursuing some other opportunities as well. And then the beginning of 2026,

we are going to go much wider than vitamin shop and a handful of other possibly grocery stores and independent chains and so forth. And the reason that I've waited this long is, uh, well, we focused on e-commerce and we've done very well on e-commerce, but waiting this long was probably a mistake. So typically the playbook looks like this. You start your brand, uh, whatever company really, if it's a CPG, you're

selling something to people, you start online, you use e-commerce to prove that you have product market fit to prove that you have a value proposition that can scale a business and typically that looks like maybe 5 million in annual revenue, like once you can show that in the previous 12 months, you like maybe $5 million in annual revenue. Like once you can show that in the previous 12 months, you've sold $5 million of stuff, you can get retailers interested. And at that point, you typically just go into retail. And many CPG, probably most CPG brands that do that end up focusing more on their retail

and relying more on retail for their revenue than e-commerce. Now in the case of Legion, we've gotten quite far considering the circumstances in e-commerce. I mean, we'll do about 45 million in sales this year, but I'm recording this in 2024, but I think it's going up in 2025. So last year we did about 45 and 2025 growth. We're forecasting significant growth, at least 25, 30%. It could be as high as 40. We haven't finished the forecast yet, but that's looking like what it's gonna be

just because we are rolling out new channels. We are rolling out new products. We are rolling out new flavors. We are rolling out new marketing initiatives that also really should have been done some time ago, particularly with paid acquisition. And so to wait this long to go to retail, probably just a mistake. But at this point, it's an opportunity, I guess, because the brand really should be doing probably 40 to 50 million in retail would be appropriate.

And that's probably three to five years of smart work straightforward. I wouldn't say it's easy, but all of the elements on our end in terms of the brand, in terms of the brand equity, the product market fit, the value prop, it's all there. So there's no reason why it can't happen like that. It just needs to be executed on, which means you need the right people and so forth. And so that is going to be one of the top priorities for growth for the next few years. International distribution as well. We are really just getting started with international and there's a lot of demand.

And it's something that we should have pursued more aggressively some time ago. But here we are. Sienna Gianelli asks, how to convert kayaking into your step count? I would count that toward physical activity rather than steps because moving your lower body actually is important for maintaining hip and back function and health. In some ways, walking actually is medicine. Sterling Leck asks, no TRT at all whatsoever. How the hell do you look like that at 40? Natural. No, no TRT. I actually recently got blood work done and my total test was 714 and my free test was 9.2, which is not great. My SHBG was 50 or 51, if I remember correctly.

And I'm curious, I just got blood work done again because I'm doing a sleep program called Absolute Rest, which is run by Dr. Andy Galpin, and that involves blood work. And so I'm curious to see if my SHBG is still high. I haven't seen the results yet from that blood work because in the interim between those two tests, I increased my carb intake because when I looked at my blood results, I saw SHBG high, fasting insulin low, not problematically low, but just low, blood sugar low, not problematically low, but just low, blood sugar low, not problematically low, but low. And I looked then at my carb intake and it was probably at that time it was between 200 and 250 grams per day. And for someone who's fairly physically active and trains

moderately hard, that's kind of a low carb diet and you would expect to see the high SHBG, the low insulin, the low blood glucose on a low carb diet. And a simple fix can be for that situation specifically, can just be eating more carbs. And so that's what I've done. I've added 40 to 50 grams of carbs to my meal plan in the interim. So I'll be curious to see in this new blood work if it had any effect at all. But anyway, regardless, no TRT, high-ish total T for my age, normal free T because of the SHBG. Otherwise, that would probably be high-ish too. And I just practice what I preach, nutrition, exercise, sleep, no alcohol, supplements. Of course, that's the least important,

but I take basically all of my supplements. I mean, one of the reasons I started Legion was just to scratch my own itch and make the things that I want. And yeah, I mean, it's just, there are no secrets. There's only the work, and especially the work you least want to do. We will conclude today's episode shortly, but first I need to tell you about my one-on-one

coaching program, which might be for you if you are feeling like no matter what you do to eat better, no matter how much you work out, no matter what supplements you take, nothing seems to work. And I know what that's like, I've been there. It can be very frustrating. It can even make you feel a little bit crazy. You try and you try and you try. And then when those things don't work,

you try something else. You jump onto the new diet, the new workout plan. And then when you give your all to the newest things that don't work, you finally feel like giving up. Or maybe you can muster the will to keep the cycle going, but either way, you remain stuck. And this is how people can go to the gym for years, how they can eat well, at least well enough, they can take good supplements, and still look more or less the same as when

they started. And today, I'm going to give you the solution. I'm going to show you how to get unstuck and finally out of that vicious cycle once and for all. And it starts with this. The biggest thing that I see with the people that we help is this. They are often missing just one crucial piece of the puzzle. And I bet it's the same with you. You are probably doing a lot of things, right?

However, there's probably something you are not doing right. That is giving you most of the grief. For example, maybe it's your calories or macros, maybe it's your exercise selection, maybe it's your food choices, maybe you're not progressively overloading your muscles. Whatever it is though, here's what's important. Once you identify what that one thing you're missing is, once you figure it out, that's when everything finally clicks. That's when you start making serious progress. And this is exactly what my coaching team has done for over 3000 men and women

of all ages and abilities. For example, they did it for Sarah, one of our clients who lost 21 pounds and six and a half inches off her waist in just 90 days. And in her words, quote, I'm in the best physical appearance of my life "'at age 45 and I have more energy and confidence. "'I feel like I found the secret to success.'" And we also did the same thing for another client, Andy, who cut 11 pounds of body fat

and over four inches from his waist while also gaining over 50 pounds on his key lifts. And he did those things also in just 90 days. And in 90 days, we helped another client, Jen, slash four inches from her waist, add 30 pounds to her squat and cut almost 15 pounds of body fat all while eating foods she loved. And in her words, quote, rarely feeling hungry.

Now I could go on like that literally for hours but in almost every success story first and foremost we helped our clients figure out that one thing that made all the difference for them. It's kind of like typing in a password to log into your computer. You could have all the letters, numbers, symbols, and so forth, right, except one, and then what happens? You can't log in, right? But as soon as you get that last remaining character right, voila, you are in business. And so if I've learned anything

from the thousands of success stories that we've racked up over the years, it's this. You too are probably just one major shift, one important insight, one powerful new behavior away from easy street or at least what feels like easy street compared to the street you've been stuck on. And if you want some help figuring out what that one thing is, that one thing that's missing for you, then my one-on-one coaching service might be for you. And of course, it could be a couple of things. It doesn't have to just be one. And we don't charge extra for that either.

And so if you want to see if my coaching service is right for you, go to bylegion.com slash coaching. That's B-Y-L-E-G-I-O-N.com slash coaching and schedule your free consultation call so my team can learn about you, your goals, your lifestyle and then, so the both of you can determine if the program is right for you. And by the way, there are people we speak with

who are not a good fit for the program. That does happen, but we almost always have other experts and other resources to refer them to. And then if the program makes sense to you, you sign up and you show up every day, you do the work and then we guarantee your results or you get your money back. So again if you are still listening to this and are even remotely interested in what I've said, don't put this off for later and then forget. Take the first step now.

Schedule your free consultation call over at bylegion.com slash coaching. Well, I hope you liked this episode. I hope you found it helpful. And if you did, subscribe to the show because it makes sure that you don't miss new episodes. And it also helps me because it increases the rankings of the show a little bit,

which of course then makes it a little bit more easily found by other people who may like it just as much as you. And if you didn't like something about this episode or about the show in general, or if you have ideas or suggestions or just feedback to share shoot me an email mike at muscle for life comm muscle for life comm and let me know what I could do better or just what your thoughts are about maybe what you'd like to see me do

in the future I read everything myself I'm always looking for new ideas and constructive feedback so thanks again for listening to this episode and I hope to hear from you soon.