Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - Research Roundup: Hyperventilating Helps Lifting, Low-Carb Lowers Testosterone, Exercise Variations Improve Gains, and More

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hello friends and welcome to another episode of Muscle for Life. Thank you for joining me today. I am Mike Matthews and I have another research roundup episode in store for you where I am going to break down four studies for you on how to get fitter faster. One of them is going to be on using exercise variations to gain muscle and strength faster. Another one is going to be on hyperventilating and how you can safely do it to boost your performance in the gym. Another is going to be on low carb dieting and how it can impact testosterone levels in men. And finally, a study on the different forms of creatine and which is the most cost effective. creatine, and which is the most cost-effective. Before we get to it, if you like what I'm doing here on the podcast and elsewhere, then you will probably like my award-winning fitness books for

Starting point is 00:00:52 men and women of all ages and abilities, which have sold over 2 million copies, have received over 15,000 four and five star reviews on Amazon, and which have helped tens of thousands of people build their best body ever. Now, a caveat, my books and programs cannot give you a lean and toned Hollywood body in 30 days, and they are not full of dubious diet and exercise hacks and shortcuts for gaining lean muscle and melting belly fat faster than a sneeze in a cyclone, but they will show you exactly how to eat and exercise to lose up to 35 pounds of fat or more if you need to lose more or want to lose more and gain eye-catching amounts of muscle definition and strength. And even better, you will learn how to do those things without having to live in the gym, give up all of the foods or drinks that you love, or do long, grueling workouts that you hate.

Starting point is 00:01:51 And with my books and programs, you will do that. You will transform your physique faster than you probably think is possible. Or I will give you your money back. If you are unsatisfied with any of my books or programs, the results, anything, for whatever reason, just let me know and you will get a full refund on the spot. Now, I do have several books and programs, including Bigger Leaner Stronger, Thinner Leaner Stronger, and Muscle for Life. And to help you find the one that is right for you, I created a short quiz that asks about your goals and circumstances and then recommends the book and program that will help you the most.

Starting point is 00:02:30 So to take the quiz, go to muscleforlife.show book quiz muscleforlife.show book quiz. Okay, so let's start here with exercise variations and how training a muscle group with several different exercises can cause more complete muscle And this was published on January 13th, 2021 in the International Journal of Sports Medicine. And so for a long time now, decades now, many bodybuilders, many weightlifters have been saying that you really only need a handful of exercises to build muscle. You need the big compounds, the squat, the deadlift, bench press, overhead press, and maybe a few variations of those exercises or just a few other exercises that train those muscle groups. And that is it. Some people even say that doing more than that, venturing beyond just the traditional staples is not only unnecessary, but counterproductive because it really just wastes energy that could be spent doing more reps and sets of the tried

Starting point is 00:03:53 and tested breadwinners. And there is some truth to that. That approach will certainly allow you to gain a lot of muscle and strength. But if you are trying to gain as much muscle and strength as you possibly can, as is genetically available to you, then I would say that is a myopic position and studies don't support it. And so that is not the approach that I recommend, again, for people who are trying to get as jacked as possible. So in this study that I referenced earlier, which was conducted by scientists at Londrina State University, researchers had 22 detrained. So these are people who used to lift weights, but it stopped. stopped. Men train three times per week for nine weeks, and each workout contained a horizontal pressing exercise, a vertical pulling exercise, a biceps exercise, a triceps exercise, and a

Starting point is 00:04:52 quad dominant compound leg exercise as well as a hamstring exercise. So a pretty well-rounded full-body workout, basically. Now, half of the men performed the same set of exercises in each of their workouts, while the other half vary the exercises they used. So for example, the first group did the flat bench press in each of their workouts, but the second group did the flat bench press on day one, the incline bench press on day two, and the decline bench press on day three. And the researchers took various body measurements. They measured the thickness at the top, middle, and bottom of the participants' quads, biceps, and triceps. And what they found is at the beginning and the end of the experiment, overall

Starting point is 00:05:38 muscle growth was similar in both groups, but the group that used a variety of exercises gained muscle at all of the points that the researchers measured, whereas the group that stuck to just the same exercises didn't see growth in two of the 12 sites. So basically training a muscle group with only one exercise, the flat bench press for your pecs, for example, is kind of like trying to grow a garden with half of your plants in the shade, or maybe in that case with one third or one fourth of your plants in the shade, because the biggest part of the pecs is trained very effectively by the flat bench press and the smaller upper portion of your pecs, not so much. And if all you did was flat bench press and maybe decline bench press, for example, what you would probably find is your

Starting point is 00:06:32 chest would start to develop in a bottom heavy manner. I guess I'm mostly speaking to men here, but if women were really working hard to grow their pecs, they would see this as well, where the lower part of their pecs would be very defined, very pronounced, and the upper parts would be much less so. So anyway, this isn't the only study that has demonstrated this effect. I know of at least three other studies that have shown that doing a couple of different exercises to train each of your major muscle groups in different ways, so from different directions at different angles, that that produces more balanced growth, more rounded growth, I guess, kind of literally, than doing just one exercise per major muscle

Starting point is 00:07:19 group. And that's why my programs like Bigger Leaner Stronger for Men, Thinner Leaner Stronger for Women, Beyond Bigger Leaner Stronger for Men, Thinner Leaner Stronger for Women, Beyond Bigger Leaner Stronger for Men, Muscle for Life for men and women who are over 40, and particularly those who are new to fitness, that's why all of my programs have you rotating exercises every couple of months. Now, we are sticking to compound exercises in the beginning of most workouts. We are always doing some sort of squat, some sort of hip hinge, some sort of horizontal press and some sort of vertical press. But even those exercises change. So you might be doing a back squat for a couple of months and then a front squat for a couple of months and then maybe even a safety bar squat for a couple of months. You

Starting point is 00:08:03 might be doing a traditional barbell deadlift for a couple of months and then a trap bar deadlift for a couple of months. You might start a chest focused or a press focused day with a flat bench for a couple of months, and then you might start it with an incline bench for a couple of months. And the same pattern applies to each of the other exercises in all of the workouts that are in my programs. The same basic movements don't change, but the exercises change. And in those changes, you'll find that your muscles get trained in slightly different ways from each of those different exercises. Okay, now let's talk about hyperventilating between sets and how that can boost your performance. So my source here is a

Starting point is 00:08:52 study called Hyperventilation Aided Recovery for Extra Repetitions on Bench Press and Leg Press. And this was published on May 1st, 2020 in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. Now, one of the reasons that your muscles burn and your performance drops during workouts is the buildup of acidic compounds in the blood like lactate, hydrogen ions, and carbon dioxide. And supplements like beta-alanine, for example, can help lower the acidity of your muscles and thus boost your performance. But scientists at Nintendo University wanted to see if hyperventilating while training could produce similar results. Now, hyperventilation sounds a bit dramatic. It's also called over breathing. And this is where you are taking rapid, deep breaths. So your body expels more CO2 than it creates. And that causes your blood levels of

Starting point is 00:09:45 CO2 to drop, making your blood less acidic. And while you can take that to an extreme and that causes unwanted symptoms like lightheadedness and shortness of breath and numbness or tingling in your hands and feet, it's harmless so long as you don't take it too far. So you don't want to push until you are about to faint. And according to this study, if you do that in between sets, it actually can have some benefits for us weightlifters when it's used properly. And so here's what the researchers did. They took 11 experienced male weightlifters and they had them come to the lab on two occasions to do identical workouts consisting of six sets of bench press followed by six sets of leg press with 80% of seconds before their first, third, and fifth sets, and then after their sixth set of each exercise. And on the second visit, they hyperventilated before their second, fourth, and sixth sets.

Starting point is 00:10:58 Now, before and after the workouts, the researchers took blood samples from the participants to measure their blood pH levels. the researchers took blood samples from the participants to measure their blood pH levels. And during the training sessions, the researchers had the participants wear masks that measured a variety of respiratory parameters. And the results showed that when the participants breathed normally before their sets, the speed at which they completed each rep and the number of reps they could perform in each set decreased as their workouts progressed naturally. But when the participants hyperventilated after a set, they could perform significantly more reps in the next set and did not experience the normal drop in reps throughout the workout that occurred as they got more fatigued. And when the researchers looked at the blood samples,

Starting point is 00:11:42 they found that hyperventilating did indeed cause blood acidity to plummet after each set, which is likely why it helped their performance and why the participants experienced less muscular fatigue. Now, you should always be wary of any hacks or shortcuts for doing really anything in life, certainly anything in fitness. But this study is interesting in that it offers good evidence that hyperventilating, which remember in this study was just breathing deeply and rapidly for about 30 seconds in between sets, can improve your performance. Okay, now let's talk about creatine. Which form on the market is the most cost effective? My source here is a paper called Efficacy of Alternative Forms of Creatine Supplementation on Improving Performance and Body Composition in Healthy Subjects, and this was published on February 11, 2021 in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research.

Starting point is 00:12:45 strength, and conditioning research. Now, you probably know that creatine monohydrate is the most well-studied and scientifically supported sports supplement on the market, but there are many other types of creatine on the market, and they are often sold as superior to creatine monohydrate in one way or another. Sometimes people say that creatine citrate, for example, which is one is better absorbed by the muscles or creatine hydrochloride produces bigger boosts to strength and muscle growth, and you'll find buffered creatine and others. And so many people wonder, are any of these fancier designer creatine supplements, as they are often promoted, are any of them better than monohydrate? Well, that's what scientists at the University of Colorado wanted to find out when they performed

Starting point is 00:13:34 a systematic review of 17 studies looking at the performance benefits of different forms of creatine, including magnesium, creatine chelate, creatine citrate, creatine malate, creatine ethyl ester, creatine nitrate, and creatine peruvate. So a pretty extensive lineup of creatine supplements. And of the 17 studies that they reviewed, seven looked at creatine's effects on weightlifting, which is what I'll focus on here because they are the most relevant to most people listening. And in three of the seven studies, researchers compared creatine monohydrate and an alternative creatine against a placebo. And in the other four studies, researchers compared one or more alternative creatines against a placebo. And the results

Starting point is 00:14:22 showed that alternative forms of creatine did indeed work. They did significantly enhance performance more than a placebo. And they also found that all of the forms of creatine, including monohydrate, enhanced performance to a similar degree. And so that means that you can expect similar benefits from all kinds of creatine. And although creatine monohydrate has gone way up in price over the last six to 12 months, it still is significantly cheaper than many of the other forms. So there's no good reason to buy anything else. Just stick with monohydrate. And if it upsets your stomach, get micronized creatine monohydrate. That is often a simple solution for people who get an upset stomach from creatine monohydrate. And if you are not

Starting point is 00:15:12 currently taking a creatine supplement, or if you are and are open to trying something new, check out my post-workout supplement recharge, which has a clinically effective dose of creatine monohydrate, micronized creatine monohydrate, five grams, as well as a few other ingredients that can help your body better absorb and use the nutrients and also reduce muscle soreness. You can go check it out at buylegion.com, B-U-I-L-E-G-I-O-N.com slash recharge. Okay, now let's talk about low-carb, high-protein dieting and what that can do to testosterone levels in healthy men. So my source here is a study called Low Carbohydrate Diets and Men's Cortisol and Testosterone Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis, and this was published on March 7th, 2022 in the journal Nutrition and Health. Now, testosterone is the

Starting point is 00:16:08 primary male sex hormone, right? It plays a major role in sex drive, bone density, muscle mass, strength, fat distribution, many factors. And as such, most men, particularly men who like to lift weights, they will go to great lengths to keep their testosterone levels as high as possible, including buying and taking worthless testosterone boosters. I wish there were something natural that really did work because I would gladly take it myself if it were safe and I would sell it. But unfortunately, there is nothing that I know of. And my research team and I have looked everywhere because testosterone boosters are very popular. And I wish I could make one worth taking. But anyway, there are a lot of people who buy and take those supplements.

Starting point is 00:16:58 There are a lot of people who just take straight testosterone like TRT. You know, testosterone replacement therapy is more popular now than ever. Many people are getting on testosterone who really don't need it, who have normal testosterone levels, but who just want a bit more. And so this study, which was conducted by scientists at the University of Worcester, is going to be of interest for many men listening and many women listening probably know men who would like to know this as well. And in this study, researchers wanted to look at how low carb dieting affects testosterone in healthy adult men. And the researchers also looked at how low carb diets affect cortisol levels, but the results were lukewarm. So I'll skip that and just

Starting point is 00:17:46 stick with testosterone. So to do this, the scientists, they performed a meta-analysis of 27 studies. So a study of studies involving 309 participants, and the studies lasted from two days to eight weeks. And 95% of the participants in those studies were physically active during the experiments. And the average carb intake in the low carb diets reviewed was about 12% of daily calories. So that is a pretty low carb diet. And the average carb intake in the high carb diets reviewed was about 58% of daily calories. So high carb diet. Now, as a general rule, the low-carb diets also tended to be higher in fat, of course, but also higher in protein and cholesterol than the high-carb diets, but lower in fiber and sugar. And what the researchers found for the low-carb diets with

Starting point is 00:18:37 moderate protein intake, so less than 35% of daily calories, low-carb dieting did not significantly affect testosterone levels. But when protein intake was high, when it was more than 35% of daily calories, like it is with many fitness people, many men who are into lifting weights, for example, low-carb dieting significantly reduced testosterone levels. Now, I don't want to get carried away with the results of this study and declare that low-carb dieting is anti-masculine because there are a couple of reasons why I think the results are maybe not as bad as they look at first blush. For instance, there were only 26 participants across three studies that followed a low carb high protein diet and one of those studies was only three days long and it involved an unrealistic

Starting point is 00:19:31 diet protocol so you had five percent of daily calories from carbs 50 percent from fat and 45 percent from protein some people do eat like that i guess keto folk but many low carbers don't go that low what's more another of the studies involved only seven participants one of whom experienced an unusually large fluctuation in testosterone when he switched from low carb to high carb eating and that of course greatly impacted the final results particularly the averages that were looked at. However, on the whole, testosterone levels did tend to drop when men switched to low-carb diets. Thus, it's fair to say that anyone concerned about their testosterone levels, any men in particular, these results would not apply the same to women per se, but they should avoid low carb dieting and opt for a more moderate

Starting point is 00:20:28 approach. So maybe something like 0.8 to 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight per day, 30 to 50% of daily calories from carbs and the remaining, you know, anywhere between probably 25 and 35% for most people of daily calories from fat. And I should also mention that although it wasn't included, it wasn't a part of this meta-analysis that I just shared with you, there is research that has shown that when you combine a lot of exercise, when you combine multiple hours of intense exercise per week with low-carb dieting, you usually get higher cortisol levels. Cortisol levels generally are higher. And we know also that when cortisol levels are generally higher, testosterone levels are generally lower. There is an inverse relationship there. And so that's also just supporting evidence

Starting point is 00:21:20 for what I just shared with you. For athletes, for people who take their weightlifting seriously, take their fitness seriously, most of them are just going to do better in multiple ways for multiple reasons with a moderate to maybe even moderately high carb diet versus a low carb diet. Protein is relatively fixed if you are eating correctly, right? So really what we can manipulate is our carbs and our fats. And most people are going to do better even with the old 40-40-20 approach or 40-30-30 approach, 40% of calories from protein, 40-30% from carbs and anywhere from 20-30% from fat. Most people are going to do much better with that, even though it's kind of boring than a very low carb, very high fat approach.

Starting point is 00:22:15 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 muscleforlife.com, muscleforlife.com, 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.

Starting point is 00:22:57 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.

Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - Research Roundup: Hyperventilating Helps Lifting, Low-Carb Lowers Testosterone, Exercise Variations Improve Gains, and More

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