Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 290: The *worst* Fitness Myths Keeping You Fat

Episode Date: May 23, 2023

Help the show (and enter for a chance to win some swag) by leaving a review on:  - APPLE PODCASTS - SPOTIFYTrain with Danny on His Training App HEREOUR PARTNERS:  Ice Barrel: The best cold water imm...ersion and recovery solution on the market HERE! Use the CODE: Danny to save $125!Legion Supplements (protein, creatine, + more!), Shop (DANNY) HERE!Melin makes the BEST hat's on earth. Try one using the CODE DANNY to save 20% HERE!Get Your FREE LMNT Electrolytes HERE! Care for YOUR Gut, Heart, and Skin with SEED Symbiotic (save with “DANNY15) at SEED.COMRESOURCES/COACHING:  Train with Danny on His Training App HEREI am all about education and that is not limited to this podcast! Feel free to grab a FREE guide (Nutrition, Training, Macros, Etc!) HERE! Interested in Working With Coach Danny and His One-On-One Coaching Team? Click HERE!Want Coach Danny to Fix Your S*** (training, nutrition, lifestyle, etc) fill the form HERE for a chance to have your current approach reviewed live on the show. Want To Have YOUR Question Answered On an Upcoming Episode of DYNAMIC DIALOGUE? You Can Submit It HERE!Want to Support The Podcast AND Get in Better Shape? Grab a Program HERE!----SOCIAL LINKS:Follow Coach Danny on YOUTUBEFollow Coach Danny on INSTAGRAMFollow Coach Danny on TwitterFollow Coach Danny on FacebookGet More In-Depth Articles Written By Yours’ Truly HERE! Sign up for the trainer mentorship HERESupport the Show.

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome in everybody to another episode of the Dynamic Dialogue podcast. As always, I'm your host, Danny Matranga. And in this episode, I'm going to be sharing with you one of my favorite training toolboxes. These are 10 tips for improving the quality of your training sessions, whether you're training for fat loss, for muscle growth, for an endurance competition, or just to be in better shape. Maybe you want to get ready for an event like a wedding, or you want to feel better for a birthday. You might be turning 50. These are 10 tips that I think can make every single one of you feel more confident in the gym, have more energy to start and finish your workout strong,
Starting point is 00:00:45 to recover better from workout to workout, and to make sure that you're making progress. So sit back and enjoy the episode. This episode is brought to you in special part, thanks to our awesome partners over at Ice Barrel. If you're like me, you want to get the absolute most you can out of your fitness and out of what it is that you're doing in life. I like to make sure that I'm recovering well and prepped for hard workouts. I like to make sure that my cognition is sharp and I like to make sure that I'm doing what I can to maintain my long-term health. And cold water immersion is a phenomenal tool I use and have used for a while to help me do this. Cold water immersion or taking ice baths is a great way to improve your recovery
Starting point is 00:01:24 and performance. Just a few short sessions a week can really make a difference in how you recover. It can increase and improve your heart rate variability. It can enhance performance. It improves mood and brain function. It also provides an awesome boost of energy and focus because when you hop in an ice bath and you get this amazing vasoconstriction effect and your body starts releasing epinephrine and norepinephrine, it kind of lets you reenter the world awake,
Starting point is 00:01:50 energized, excited, and enthused. And I would much rather take an ice bath in the mid-afternoon, especially if I had a hard training session in the morning, than consume more caffeine. Ice Barrel allows me to do this in a super sleek, aesthetically pleasing packaging. It's a beautiful barrel that comes with a matching lid for keeping the ice cold and water inside clean, a nice step up stool, a cover. It's portable and durable, and it comes in a beautiful matte black and a gorgeous tan. I have the matte black out on my patio and I absolutely love the way it looks with the fencing I have around the yard, but you can put this inside, outside, on the front porch, on the back porch, in the side yard. It's quite portable. It's very durable. Like I said, the design is super,
Starting point is 00:02:29 super sleek, and it's very easy to drain to make sure that you are only getting in to cold, clean water designed to help you improve your performance, improve your recovery, enhance the way your brain feels and functions throughout the day. This is an amazing one-time cost tool that once you have it, you use it a couple of times a week. It is one of the best investments you can make in your health. And again, if you want to improve your cognition and performance, and you have those midday lulls, or you want to be more present for your family or for your friends when you get off of work, and you don't want to caffeinate, temperature modulation like ice baths or cold exposure or
Starting point is 00:03:02 sauna heat exposure can be really valuable for increasing that subjective sense of wellbeing and bringing you back to a place of alertness and a really chaotic world. It's also great for just cultivating resilience. I find I'm much tougher. Again, this is a more anecdotal thing, but I find that I am much tougher, ready to face the day's tasks when I am consistently exposing myself to the elements. Call it bromeopathy, call it anecdote, but I will tell you one thing is for sure, cold water immersion has made a huge difference for my health and well-being in just a few short sessions a week. And Ice Barrel is the sleekest, best looking, cleanest, and most affordable way to do it reliably. You can head over to icebarrel.com slash Danny to take advantage of their 100% satisfaction
Starting point is 00:03:46 guaranteed with again, a 30 day money back guarantee and save 125 bucks on your ice barrel using the promo code Danny. So again, icebarrel.com slash Danny and check out using the promo code Danny to save 125 bucks. Okay guys. So the first tip I have for you with regards to having a really high quality workout is to create a condensed or semi-condensed 10 to 15 minute window where you do approximately six to 10 minutes of cardiovascular exercise. This could be an incline walk, a spin, a row. You could utilize the stairmaster, the elliptical. You could push a sled. You could go for a run outside. You could go up and down stairs, something that's going to elevate your heart rate. Now, how high really depends a lot on the goal of the session. Assuming this is not a cardio only session,
Starting point is 00:04:46 we only want to get our heart rate up so high during the warmup, we don't want to exhaust you. So let's keep it around zone two, maybe. So while you're doing this, if you have a workout partner, talk to them, assess, can I talk? Can I have a conversation? Or am I having a hard time catching my breath? And I think what you're looking for here is any cardiovascular modality that you'll find tolerable enough to do, even on the days you don't want to go to the gym, because you're going to dedicate six to eight minutes to this first at the very beginning of your workout to warm up your tissue, to get your blood flowing and to sneak in some additional aerobic activity. If you train four days a week, that's an additional anywhere from 24 to 32 minutes, which can make a pretty big difference in the long run.
Starting point is 00:05:30 You know, 32 minutes of cardio in a week is like a hundred, it's like 1500 minutes of cardio added at the end of a year. That's pretty considerable. And from that, once your tissues warmed and your heart is pumping, the blood is flowing, the blood's always flowing, but you would move into something that's more dynamic and specific to your sessions. So dynamic just includes and kind of is an umbrella term for things that are a little bit more movement based than like static stretching. So a lot of times you'll hear terms like dynamic stretching or dynamic warmup. And usually this just means it's going to be a movement based and movement specific warmup, right? It's not going to be foam rolling,
Starting point is 00:06:15 using massage balls, using massage guns, doing static stretches. These are all great options to include in your warmup. If you have something like, oh, I really have a tender tissue or a tight tissue. It's chronically tonic. It's very tight. I need to get it into a position where I can really train it well and not have it give me too much fuss. Yeah. Then go ahead and target those tissues. Give that two to five minutes. But in a perfect world, you'd get your tissue warm with an aerobic bout of around six to 10 minutes max, jump right into a dynamic warmup. This can be very simple. I like couplets. So if I'm going to squat, I'll do something like a 90, 90 hip switch for a minute, switching back and forth between the two to get some mobility in and out of the hip capsule, to get the adductors going, to get the glute meds going, to get my trunk and extension muscles going. And then maybe I'll pair that with like a core stability because I'm going to need to use core stability for my squat.
Starting point is 00:07:09 I'll do a RKC style plank and I'll do like two rounds of those. Those will have enough sport specific carryover that by the time or skill specific carryover that by the time I get under a bar, I feel like my hips are moving well. I feel like my trunk is stable. My chest is an extension. I have a tight core. I'm compact at the bottom of my squat. I'm not collapsed. I'm not rolling over. And like those things can happen very quickly with a good aerobic warmup and like one to two movement specific priming exercises that just kind of get the right muscles ready. Or like at the very least, before you throw weight on the bar, just do a few sets with a naked bar or do a few
Starting point is 00:07:51 sets slow and light with a dumbbell exercise before you start loading it up. A few warmup sets at the minimum. These small, you know, 10 to 15 minute investments before your session that become easier and easier to skip the longer you've been doing this can be really, really valuable for your long-term kind of training career. And that it will help, in my opinion, keep you more free of injury. Although there's really no way to avoid injury or prevent it. They're kind of just freak things that happen. Hopefully this doesn't happen to you often. If it does or it has been, don't get discouraged. Training injuries do flare up. They happen to all of us from time
Starting point is 00:08:31 to time. It's a normal part of having a training career and you're probably more likely to have more injuries flare up from just life in general if you do not train. So there's always a trade off with this stuff. Moving on to the second tip from today's training toolbox, and that is to stick to about four to six workouts, four to six lifts, four to six exercises. There's different vernacular per session. And I know when people hear like exercises, that's probably a more general term
Starting point is 00:09:01 that includes multiple different exercises. When you hear lifts, it sounds like it only includes weightlifting. If you hear workouts, it could mean any and all. So really what we're talking about is just select four exercises, maybe six if you're more advanced in a session, that tends to be a pretty good number. These don't have to include warmup exercises. These don't have to include mobility exercises. These don't happen, have to include any tissue work you might do, be it, like I said earlier, stretching or foam rolling, but select four to six exercises that will move you closer to your goals in a perfect world. that will move you closer to your goals in a perfect world. If you're training like most of you for some degree of aesthetics, wanting to look better, some degree of health, wanting to
Starting point is 00:09:53 be stronger and age well, you're probably going to include cardiovascular exercise as well. So we don't need to touch too much on cardio here. We'll frame this as like a resistance-based training kind of criterion to work within. Four to six exercises, hopefully compound, meaning they work multiple muscle groups. At least half of them, in my opinion, should be a compound movement, meaning more squats, lunges, rows, presses, pull downs, then say lateral raises, then say calf raises. Those exercises are typically known as isolation exercises because they work mostly one muscle or joint, whereas compound movements work multiple muscles and multiple joints. Most of the time, these movements are more complex.
Starting point is 00:10:46 You can lift heavier on them. I find that really allowing those to be the focus of your training session can be a very good way to develop a solid foundation, but also to help you make progress in the long run. I'll give an example. I've been training for a very long time. Sometimes I have less equipment depending on where I might be traveling, whether I'm lifting at home versus say whether I'm lifting at the gym or at my studio. And if I'm lifting at home, a lot of times what I'll do is I will select one compound movement. So if I'm training legs, let's say I picked a squat and what I'll do is I'll put 225, 235 on the bar and I'll do 10 sets of 10 squats through the fullest range of motion that I can ask to grasp because that's how mobile I am, how mobile you are might be different with
Starting point is 00:11:38 about two to three minutes in between each set. I'll take my time working up to that. So that'll take me about 30 to 35 minutes to get through all the squats in about 15 minutes to warm up. So in 50 minutes, I can do a warmup, aerobic warmup, a dynamic warmup, and then 10 sets of 10 on one lift. I don't even get to like four to six. Now in, in between those sets of squats, occasionally I'll do things like flying hamstring roller, standing calf raises, ab wheels, although not many of them just to sprinkle in some assistance work. But if you pick four to six compounds and you train them hard, it's going to be pretty difficult not to kick
Starting point is 00:12:18 some butt in the gym, not to get some really solid progress. And I think a lot of people make the mistake of selecting for like four to six isolation exercises and like one to two compounds. And what I think you might be better off doing is sprinkling those isolation exercises across the week, getting them in there. Sure. Make, you know, make your training fun. If you have time, you can do more, but let the bedrock of what you're doing in the gym, in the weight room, whatever it is that you're working towards be built on a foundation of these, you know, big time lifts. You know, whether you are a pro athlete, whether you are a bodybuilder, whether you are a weekend warrior, whether you want to lose weight, whether you want to just get in shape, increase
Starting point is 00:13:03 your bone density, there is a very good likelihood that it makes the most sense to focus the majority of your time on these compound lifts and to do the highest quality, biggest bang for your buck exercises each time. And if you can't do them as they're done at the highest level, so for example, if you can't squat with a bar on your back, squat down to a bench and get up, use a leg press, do a goblet squat, train those patterns, not necessarily the specific exercises. I think you can also make a very, very good point here to, you know, if you want variability, don't necessarily look at variability and exercise selection, look instead at variability and maybe the exercise variables. The best exercises stay the best exercises for most people. But if you want to
Starting point is 00:13:52 change things around, you can change sets, you can change reps, you can change rest periods, right? A variety of things that I think when you really break it down are more than enough, more than enough for you to feel like you're getting a moderately new stimulus mentally. You won't be so bored. It's not like I'm saying do five by five on every compound ever. You can play with tempos. You can rotate different exercises through. There's enough variety there, but you don't want to do so many exercises that aren't stimulating that you're just in the gym for a while, not making progress. Okay. Third training toolbox tip I have is to do a balance of unilateral and bilateral training. So a lot of you are familiar with these terms,
Starting point is 00:14:43 but you don't know exactly what I mean, but you want to do a combination of the two. Unilateral exercises are things like lunges, single leg Romanian deadlifts. Okay. I would argue that things like dumbbell chest press are more quote unquote unilateral than things like barbell chest press press, or bench press, because what you'll see is each arm is moving independently, right? It's not as simple as like, oh, are you on one leg? I think a lot of people think unilateral functionally means that you're on one leg, but I look at unilateral as meaning more like I have the opportunity to train either each side of the body independently, to have the opportunity for one side to create more stability
Starting point is 00:15:32 where the other side works. Now, bilateral exercises, right? Things like squats, deadlifts, barbell presses can really help you build strength and power. And we know that the unilateral ones are great for balance and stability, but they're also really good for symmetry and helping you cultivate a very, very strong. And I hate to use the term functional because it is oftentimes just a proxy for athletic. I think they help you maintain a little bit more of the movement qualities that we associate with athletes. There's a degree of stability, nimbleness, agility, mobility that comes from being able to get into the positions that we train a lot with some of the best unilateral exercises. So I think doing a balance of those two things is very, very good for maintaining a long, enjoyable training career that kind of doesn't
Starting point is 00:16:27 allow you to develop too many holes in your game. A little bit of unilateral work sprinkled in will make a huge difference. Okay, the fourth tip in the training toolbox. Don't be afraid to use machines and cables. I've noticed that over the last couple of years, there's been a big focus on the term resistance training and on the term free weight. And machines are oftentimes thought to be less effective. Many trainers for many years, especially as somebody who worked in a commercial gym setting, would say things like, oh, machines don't require you to use stability, or machines don't activate stabilizer muscles, or machines aren't as effective as free weights. And the truth is, what's going on guys, Coach Danny here, taking a break from the episode to tell you about my
Starting point is 00:17:23 coaching company, Core Coaching Method, and more specifically, our one-on-one fully tailored online coaching program. My online coaching program has kind of been the flagship for Core Coaching Method for a while. Of course, we do have PDF programming and we have app-based programming. But if you want a truly tailored one-on-one experience with a coach like myself or a member of my coaching team, someone who is certified, somebody who has multiple years of experience working with clients in person, online, somebody who is licensed to provide a macro nutrition plan, somebody who is actually good at communicating with clients because they've done it for years, whether that be via phone call, email, text, right? This one-on-one coaching program is really
Starting point is 00:18:03 designed to give you all the support you need with custom training designed for you, whether you're training from home, the gym, around your limitations and your goals. Nothing cookie cutter here, as well as easy to follow macro nutrition programs that are non-restrictive. You'll get customized support directly from your coach's email, or they'll text you, or they'll WhatsApp you. We'll find the communication medium that best supports your goals, as well as provides you with accountability in the expertise you need to succeed, as well as biofeedback monitoring, baked-in accountability support, and all of the stuff that you need from your coach when you check in. We keep our rosters relatively small so that we can make sure you get the best support
Starting point is 00:18:45 possible. But you can apply today by going over to corecoachingmethod.com, selecting the online coaching option. And if we have spots available, we'll definitely reach out to you to see if you're a good candidate. And if we don't, we'll put you on a waiting list, but we'll be sure to give you the best shot at the best coaching in the industry. So head over to corecoachingmethod.com and apply for one-on-one coaching with me and my team today. There is tremendous potential to use machines in your training. For example, we'll go back to a chest press. A plate-loaded converging chest press isn't all that different from a dumbbell chest press, isn't all that different from a cable chest press, isn't all that different from a cable chest press, mechanically isn't even all that different from a barbell chest press.
Starting point is 00:19:30 But what you might find, and I saw this for sure training clients for over a decade, what people can do, tolerate from a pain standpoint, get away with from a volume standpoint, enjoy from a mental standpoint varies a lot and allowing yourself access to the greatest library of exercises. But remembering, Hey, we just talked about picking four lifts that don't suck six lifts max. We know the patterns that don't suck are those compound lift patterns. But if you're somebody for whom a barbell chest press sucks and a dumbbell chest press feels unstable because perhaps you have a former injury and the joint didn't heal properly, but a cable chest press or a machine chest press feels great. Well, I still want you to train the
Starting point is 00:20:21 chest press, but I want you to train it in that capacity. Let's say you're somebody who wants to work towards a pushup, but you can't quite reach the floor for a pushup, or you can't quite get up and down off the floor to do a pushup, I should say. You can literally set a bar on a Smith machine and use a Smith machine to do pushups. Then you can put it on the floor and train hip extension in a super stable hip thrust. Then if it goes and orients itself in the right direction, it can be an amazing tool for reverse lunges. And this is a machine that many people say is stupid, pointless, and doesn't work at all. And it ends up being a very useful piece with a lot of utility for training movement patterns that are important
Starting point is 00:21:07 compound movement patterns to train. A lot of people bang on machines and cables, but what they do is they provide a super safe, super stable environment to target specific muscles, hit specific patterns, right? We can use them to supplement our free weights, not as a replacement for them. Like I said, we're doing four exercises. Why the heck can't one be a machine or a cable, especially if it's easy to do one of those compound patterns in a way that's easier on the joints? To me, that makes a lot of sense. And there's so many different machines that you can really experiment. And like, there might be three leg presses in your gym and you'll find the one that feels best. And on the day you don't want to squat or your lower back's a little tight,
Starting point is 00:21:49 or you're feeling like you can't quite get mobile enough through the ankle to squat. Maybe you use that leg press or you use it to supplement another exercise on another day, or maybe you just love the leg press and want to build a whole block around it. Cause it's basically a machine squat. You know, you got to think if you're just hating on every single machine and never trying out the ones in your gym, never seeing how you might be able to incorporate them. Now, granted, some suck, but please don't stay away from them because there's a lot of ways to use machines to help make your program a lot more fun, a lot more effective and probably feel a lot
Starting point is 00:22:25 better. Okay. The fifth thing I have for you guys is to track your workouts. And if you can, I would recommend tracking them on pen and paper. Now, of course, I have a training app through Train Heroic, which is like the best UI interface training tech out there. It is a really beautiful interface that allows you to log your sets and your reps and your weights, make comments, engage in a chat, get feedback from me, post or upload, I should say, videos for form review. That's the kind of stuff if you're going to be on your phone while you're training that you should be doing is using the technology to actually enhance your training and log your workouts. You shouldn't be doing what I do sometimes,
Starting point is 00:23:09 which is reading your Instagram comments, going on Twitter, fussing with a playlist. The phone can be really distracting. I recommend having a small journal, open it up. Okay. Log your workouts, focus on making progress week to week. You spend so much time on your phone. I bet if you're like everybody else out there, I know for a fact that you spend a lot of time on your freaking phone. And one of the best times to get off of it is when you're working on your body, right? You're working on yourself. You're improving your physical fitness. You're focusing on being present. Get the heck off your phone, write your workouts down in a nice workout journal. And if you're going to be on your phone,
Starting point is 00:23:56 make sure that you're using a good interface that allows you to stay focused on your training and not on things like social media. And look, if you're working out from home on your work shift where things are hectic and chaotic, then sure, I understand. And we all have families or we don't all have families. For those of us who are lucky enough to have families, you know, if there are people that you are perhaps in charge of, maybe your kids and you need to have the phone on standby. I get it. But the number one thing you can do to like instantly inject some gains into your progress and into your program is to get a log book, to keep that journal, make sure you're progressing on your sets, on your reps, on your exercises, on your rest periods, make notes of how you're doing,
Starting point is 00:24:42 how you're feeling. go back in the journal to see your progress, to see where you might start the next time. You can't mess this up, guys. I promise. Okay. Tip number seven. And this has to do with something most of you probably do a lot when it comes to training and that's listen to music. And I think what makes a lot of sense to do at the end of every month is to create a new training playlist. I like to use Apple music. You can use Spotify, but you can find new music in genres you really like and just peruse for 15 to 25 minutes to pull. All you need is about 10 to 15 new songs. And then to that, you can add songs you still really enjoy from the previous month's playlist or classics that you like
Starting point is 00:25:28 that you constantly keep in the mix. But having a new training playlist each month has been a really fun and effective way to actually go about enhancing workout quality. I don't always listen to a playlist of music, but one thing I do is I always like edit and audit my podcast queue at the beginning and end of each month. And when I start my podcasts or I start my day, I open the podcast app and a lot of you guys listen to my podcast. So it's one of the
Starting point is 00:25:56 first things that you see. So I see the podcast that I listened to and I know this sounds kind of strange, but I've actually created the same positive association I used to have with music around podcasts and my gym time. So I know when I go to the gym, I'm excited because I have podcasts that I like to listen to that I only really listen to when I'm training. And if I like a new one, I add it in and I make that the one I listen to while I'm training. And if I don't, I rotate it out. And a lot of times because, and you might even tell from the pace at which I talk on this show, a lot of times I'm listening to a podcast
Starting point is 00:26:29 at one and a half times speed. So maybe I talk faster on here because of that, but I can get through two of them in a one hour workout oftentimes. And that is super exciting. And when I get to those heavy sets, those hard sets, those close to failure sets, I will blast some shit that really helps me focus. I'll find that one song. I have a list of 20 to 30 of them that I just go to, but I think you should audit your audio material going in and out of each training month. Okay. Moving on to the next one. This would be number seven. Find a good training partner. Find somebody who's going to consistently show up for you. Find somebody that is maybe around the same fitness level,
Starting point is 00:27:10 around the same height and weight preferably, but not always, especially if you're going to be lifting. It could be a pain in the butt to make adjustments to lifts, to lift setups, but more like literally the most important thing, a living, breathing human being who's going to push you and hold you accountable. A personal trainer is a phenomenal example of this. If you have a one-on-one personal trainer, they'll be the best gym partner you've ever had in your life. It should feel like it's an opportunity to just get to the gym and get through a workout safely where you're told like literally everything to do and push to work hard. And that's hard to find. And a lot of you will maybe aren't in a position where you can afford that, but a good gym partner can help you get a lot of the
Starting point is 00:27:48 same out. We're talking about accountability and motivation for sure, right? If they're a little bit ahead of you where they have similar goals and body types, you guys can work together to help each other transform and take that next step, which can be really powerful. I think working with a partner requires both of you to elevate the level of accountability you have because you're not just accountable to your own goals, but you're also accountable to the pact and the promises you made to each other. So I think that's a pretty big one. And that's one that I've tended to deploy over the years more when I really want to take my fitness now to a higher level. So let's say I want go, like I'm going to Mexico for my bachelor party. And one of my very close friends is doing a
Starting point is 00:28:30 triathlon right now, but he said, Hey, after the triathlon, before we go to Mexico, let's do a bodybuilding block. Like let's just train just bodybuilding. I'm sick of training for a triathlon. I'm like, Hey, I haven't trained like a bodybuilder in a really long time. I'm game. Let's do a bodybuilding block. It'll be a blast. And so he and I are going to start that and we're going to incorporate some very simple movement pattern goals as well, where we both want to be able to squat 225 pounds for about 20 reps minimum. Um, maybe even something like three, 15, four. I don't know. I don't know. That doesn't matter. What matters is we both set like some specific goals. We're both going to show up, hold each other accountable. This will push our
Starting point is 00:29:10 workout quality through the roof. If you can find somebody like that, I highly, highly recommend it. Okay. Number eight, have a freaking pre and post-workout meal. Look, if you're like me and you train fasted in the morning and you just bang on some LMNT because it is a high quality, tasty ass salt nectar of the gods for like an amazing pump. Even when you train at five in the morning, I was like so pumped to this morning training at 5am. I had like veins popping. I had fullness that I never have because I was hydrated because I just woke up and slammed my LMNT in a crap ton of water instead of doing what most of you do and just wake up and slam coffee. But if you're going to train fasted, I really like the idea of having like an electrolyte. But if you are not going to train fasted, which I don't know if
Starting point is 00:29:54 most of you train as early as I do, having a little bit of a pre and post workout meal can make a big difference. A nice balance of protein and carbohydrates that can be something like fruit and yogurt. It can be a shake and cereal. It can be very fast, very simple. It could be something like eggs and toast. There are so many options. Having a little protein and carbohydrate on either end of your training session to bookend it, so to speak, to help you recover and perform, that's going to be huge.
Starting point is 00:30:20 It's really going to help you take your training to the next level and it will help you recover. Okay. The ninth tip I have is to be sure to pay attention to your top set. And what that means is whatever exercise you're doing, let that last set that you do be a hard set, a top set, a bust your butt set. So you maybe do three, two sets, three sets, four sets of an exercise. Well, if you do two, two should be harder than one. If you do three, three should, three sets, four sets of an exercise. Well, if you do two, two should be harder than one. If you do three, three should be harder than two. If you do four, four should probably be harder than three, unless you're doing something like a back offset. But I want you to record your top set, your hardest set, the set you're the most proud of. Put the weight, put the
Starting point is 00:30:57 reps. That's all you got to do. In a lot of these situations, you can be this simple. I I'm going to the gym. I know I got a squat. I I'm not on a program. I don't have access to a program. I don't have a coach. Like I'm trying to make this very simple. Look, if you want to coach work with us, if you want a program, try our programs. If you're totally new to this, you need resources. Go to the gym, pick three exercises, do three sets. The first set is your groove set, your grease set. You're figuring it out. Set the second set, you ramp it up, you push it hard. The third set, you go very close to failure. You really push. Maybe it's low reps for five. Well, you record the weight. Maybe it's like, you know, Oh, I picked a hundred pounds and I did it for 15, as many as I could.
Starting point is 00:31:39 So you put a hundred by 15, you record that top set, that peak set. And you do this in the log book. I told you to carry around. And then after that, you can go back. You record that top set, that peak set. And you do this in the log book I told you to carry around. And then after that, you can go back, you can look at the previous top set and you can say, how can I beat this? How can I top this? How can I get similar? Oh, I did 15 reps of a hundred pounds. What if I did 120 for 12 or 120 for 15? Oh, I did five reps of 185. I'm going to do five reps of 195. Literally, if all you have the opportunity to do is track your top sets, track your protein, track your calorie intake, you can have the best body you've ever had in your life. It's crazy, but it can be simple. It just depends
Starting point is 00:32:17 on the level of dedication you have at the most granular level. You have to be able to show up in different ways and take it different levels to reach the top. But for most of you, a little bit of discipline is going to go an awfully long way. Okay. Tip number 10, if you haven't done it already and you haven't had an in-person trainer or hired a coach or had a program written for you or followed a program of any kind, that is a very, very good approach. If you'd like to take your results to the next level. If you're somebody who's going to the gym, I have a guess or I'd venture to guess that like most people, you're going to the gym without a program, without a plan. You're going to go. And that is so
Starting point is 00:32:55 much better than not going. But following a program will make it a lot easier. We have a bunch of them. I have created a bunch of them. I have a coaching company. I have so many friends and guests on this show who do a fabulous job running their own programs and their own coaching companies. There's so much amazing stuff out there, guys, that if you're just going and kind of guessing, I think you'll find that your results are better and that you have more fun if you follow a program. Okay, folks, that'll do it for this episode. I hope you enjoyed that training toolbox and you take these tips and tricks with you to the gym and on your fitness journey. I think this will help a lot of you, and I think you'll really enjoy it, but please share it because I know there are a great deal
Starting point is 00:33:33 of beginners and people starting their fitness journey each and every day, and I want to help you all succeed, train, live, and thrive.

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.