Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 308: Barefoot Training, Apple Cider Vinegar, Plyos + More!

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome in everybody to a rapid fire Q&A episode of the Dynamic Dialogue podcast. As always, I'm your host, Danny Matranga. And in this episode, I'm going to be answering a ton of questions very quickly with a good amount of detail on a ton of different health, fitness and productivity topics. So enjoy today's episode. We're getting right into it. This episode is brought to you in part thanks to some of our amazing partners like LMNT. LMNT makes the best electrolyte product on the market. In fact, I've actually started drinking my LMNT each and every morning before I have coffee so as to optimize my circadian biology, make sure that I'm hydrated, and make sure that I'm getting ahead on

Starting point is 00:00:50 my water intake throughout the day and not reliant on stimulants, but instead being somebody who's reliant on hydration and the proper balance of minerals and electrolytes. If you want to feel your best all day, mentally and physically, it's imperative that you stay hydrated. LMNT provides a balanced ratio of sodium, potassium, and magnesium to support brain and body hydration. This combination of electrolytes improves health, performance, body and brain performance, mind you, helps to reduce cramps and soreness and get you more hydrated. There's no sugar. LMNT is sweetened with stevia. It's perfect for exercise and perfect for the sauna because the flavors are natural, tasty, delicious, and not overpowering. And if you're like me, you'll use

Starting point is 00:01:38 them multiple times a day across your training sessions to get hydrated early to replenish after sauna use. And again, it's not just me. LMNT is the official sports drink of Team USA Weightlifting, and it's used by athletes in the NBA, NFL, Major League Baseball, as well as athletes like you and I looking to take your fitness to the next level. My favorite flavors are definitely the raspberry and citrus. When I put a box together, I try to load up on raspberry and citrus. And when you put your box together, you can get a free sample pack containing all of Elements' amazing flavors like mango chili, citrus, raspberry, orange, and more. To get access to this free gift with purchase, scroll down to the show notes and check out using the special link for Dynamic Dialogue listeners.

Starting point is 00:02:27 show notes and check out using the special link for dynamic dialogue listeners. Okay, folks, just a reminder, all of these questions were fielded from my Instagram, danny.matranga. You can follow me there. You can follow me on threads, TikTok, YouTube, where I have a huge library of exercises that literally is probably like the most efficient exercise tutorial channel on YouTube. It literally is probably like the most efficient exercise tutorial channel on YouTube. Over 200 exercises. Every tutorial is like one to two minutes max. So you don't spend a ton of time like, how do I do this? It's literally like a clip of how the exercise is performed properly for 10 seconds. And then a detailed one minute explanation featuring me and an athlete.

Starting point is 00:03:00 I recommend following me across as many socials as you can if you like the content here. Okay, first question is from MTNGirl48, MountainGirl48, at home workouts, should I be barefoot or wear shoes? I would recommend being barefoot as often as you possibly can. 70% of the cells responsible for proprioception, identifying where your body is in space and feeling coordinated, are on the bottom of your foot. Training barefoot increases intrinsic foot muscle strength and input into proprioceptive cells, which for 90% of people, we are not getting enough of, okay? So think about it like this. You exercise for one hour a day because it is good for you and you know it is good for you. However, you don't spend as much time barefoot. A lot of times people spend every freaking hour of the day. They're not sleeping in shoes and that's not good. You want to get some input into

Starting point is 00:03:59 the bottom of your feet. So if the habit stacking effect of, let's say, using a workout hour to also be a barefoot hour does the trick for you, I'd highly recommend it. I might also recommend getting a pair of Vivo barefoots. They are fantastic shoes with minimal cushioning that allow you to get input into the bottom of your feet in a way that you just simply can't do with most kinds of shoes. Okay. This question, I like this question. It's from, let me see if I can read this right. Simon Watanabe. And the question is, oh, Shimon Watanabe, is vinegar supposed to do anything for health? It's supposed to, but I don't know if it does. You hear a lot of people hype up apple cider vinegar, more so than any other vinegar. I do think that like rice wine

Starting point is 00:04:51 vinegar and balsamic vinegar might have unique health promoting effects, but you always hear with weight loss that apple cider vinegar is great for blood sugar, is great for cholesterol, is great for diabetes, and it aids in weight loss. This probably has something to do with the fact that all vinegar contains acetic acid. Okay. Vinegar is on average about five to 6% acetic acid, especially apple cider vinegar, which is pretty good and it's health promoting. Now unfiltered apple cider vinegar also contains the quote-unquote mother, which is a kind of bulk of proteins, enzymes, and friendly bacteria that kind of makes this like little gunk at the bottom that might promote health as well. So, that is kind of the starting point. We know that apple cider vinegar can help to reduce blood sugar levels, but a balanced diet is probably better than just relying on a supplemental form or a supplement of

Starting point is 00:05:55 apple cider vinegar. However, a 2021 review of clinical trials found that apple cider vinegar consumption can benefit glycemic status in adults. However, authors note that the findings should be interpreted with caution, which is to say it's too early to make definitive claims. I don't think you will do any negative things to your health and well-being by including apple cider vinegar in your routine. And there might be a net positive, but the only way to know is to try. I would recommend organic with the mother, mix it in a tiny bit of water, pump it back and see how you feel. Okay. This one is from Kitty Kosu and it is plyometric exercises. Are they really needed for bone health? They are not, but they are an effective tool for bone and

Starting point is 00:06:45 tendon health. Plyometrics are often done incorrectly. People consider them a form of cardiovascular exercise when in fact, they're more a form of explosive training. And when you think about explosiveness and force production, you also need to think about force acceptance or force absorption. And plyometrics are fabulous for both of those things. What plyometrics allow you to do is turn force acceptance into force production. And this is via things like tendons and bones. While weight training, body weight training, calisthenics are all great tools for increasing bone and tendon health, I think plyometrics, when done properly, are right up there. Just make sure the number of ground contacts or the number of times you are hitting the ground are actually

Starting point is 00:07:37 reasonable for your current fitness level. A real plyometric workout is not a cardio workout. It is an explosiveness workout, and you want to make sure that every rep is done with intention. If you're looking to add plyometrics into your routine for the first time, I might try it for five to 10 minutes before you train upper body as a way of creating a potentiation effect, getting warmed up, but I wouldn't do it at the end of a lower body session. It's going to compete a little bit too much. Okay. Question from Playa Cabo is cardio before or after strength training. If the goal is weight loss, assuming it's cardio of low intensity, I don't think it matters. If you're trying to use hit, I would do that after upper body sessions. Um, if you're trying

Starting point is 00:08:23 to just increase the total amount of energy expenditure to enhance fat loss, I typically would recommend getting between 10 to 20,000 steps a day and doing that lower intensity cardio after you work out. Okay. Question from Savannah Banana is how to improve conditioning slash what is it? So conditioning, put it simply, is aerobic fitness across various aerobic zones. And developing conditioning is like developing strength, speed, muscularity, all these physical properties that we associate with anaerobic work. Conditioning are the physical properties that we associate with aerobic work. So that can be aerobic peak, that can be aerobic, let's call it a base. So essentially like if you're working on your conditioning, it might be working on your top end aerobic output, and you might be working on your

Starting point is 00:09:16 just aerobic base and cardiovascular health. Conditioning is another way to say aerobic training. That's my read on it. Now, does that mean I'm right and everybody else is wrong? Absolutely not. Not even in the slightest. But it does mean that when you hear the term conditioning, you should start thinking about complete and total aerobic fitness. And when you work on your conditioning, you need to work on that kind of base level aerobic fitness and that peak level of aerobic fitness. If you can get those two things figured out, you're going to be in a really good place. But that's what conditioning means. Now, how to improve it? I would start with thinking about both your top end and your kind of base conditioning. How long can you jog or run?

Starting point is 00:10:07 conditioning. How long can you jog or run? That might be a good way to gauge your aerobic base. You know, what is your VO2 max might be a good way to boost your aerobic peak, which would be like short bouts of high outputs. A good way to train this would be using a combination of low intensity, steady state cardio with some higher output intervals. Okay. Next question from Lucy Lafea. I recently started using creatine. How do I manage the water weight increase? Okay. Remember, it's water in the muscles, folks. So that's not a bad thing. What you need to do is have a sit down discussion with yourself about your weight. Your weight is allowed to trend upward. If it's muscle water retention, you should not look at that the same way you do. Like if you were to say, oh, I took creatine and after a month I was up two pounds. And you look at that as the same way. If you're

Starting point is 00:10:55 like, oh, I ate an extra meal a day of pure potato chips. And after a month I was up two pounds. Like do you think that those two pounds are the equivalent in how they're going to help you look, Do you think that those two pounds are the equivalent in how they're going to help you look, feel, perform, and produce in your life? Hell no. So how I would tell you to manage that increase in weight is to look at it as a benefit to you. It is water in your muscles. That's beneficial. Not bad. Okay. From Lauren Donovan, I made more progress last year in my cut than now. Why? I'm eating more protein too. What tends to happen is we all look a little better. We all look a little bigger when we're leaner. I know this sounds weird, but one of the best ways to look 10 pounds bigger is to get 10 pounds leaner. And a lot of times people go, Oh, when I was dieting, I was, I looked better.

Starting point is 00:11:42 No shit. You were leaner. You could see your progress more. Does that mean that you were actually making more progress? I don't know. In fact, more often than not, that's simply not the case. Taking a break from this episode to tell you a little bit about my coaching company, Core Coaching Method. More specifically, our app-based training. We partnered with Train Heroic to bring app-based training to you using the best technology and best user interface possible. You can join either my Home Heroes team, or you can train from home with bands and dumbbells, or Elite Physique, which is a female bodybuilding-focused program where you can train at the gym with equipments

Starting point is 00:12:20 designed specifically to help you develop strength, as well as the glutes, hamstrings, quads, and back. I have more teams coming planned for a variety of different fitness levels. But what's cool about this is when you join these programs, you get programming that's updated every single week, the sets to do, the reps to do, exercise tutorials filmed by me with me and my team. So you'll get my exact coaching expertise as to how to perform the movement, whether you're training at home or you're training in the gym. And again, these teams are somewhat specific. So you'll find other members of those communities looking to pursue similar goals at similar fitness levels. You can chat, ask questions, upload form for form review,

Starting point is 00:12:59 ask for substitutions. It's a really cool training community and you can try it completely free for seven days. Just click the link in the podcast description below. Can't wait to see you in the core coaching collective, my app-based training community. Back to the show. You were in a better position to make progress with resistance training when you are in a small surplus. But typically when people are in a cut, calories are at a premium. Their focus is a little higher. Their intentionality is a little bit more present. You'll get a little bit more out of your training. Yes, it can be hard to sustain a deficit for a long period of time, but I would not stress about it. I believe that you made better progress during that time because you were leaner and more

Starting point is 00:13:45 capable of seeing it. Okay. Question from, let's see if I can get this right. Walla underscore shait. How to lose weight after thyroid removal. Weight is stuck. So this is one where you should definitely speak to your physician. There are a number of thyroid interventions on the internet from shamsters, from shucksters, from scammers, and I would recommend trying to stay away from those and instead get on the same page with an endocrinologist about medical interventions for replacing thyroid hormone in your body. If you don't have a thyroid anymore or you had a partial thyroid removal, getting on the right medication is going to't have a thyroid anymore, or you had a partial thyroid removal, getting on the right medication is going to be critical. And again, I'm not a physician,

Starting point is 00:14:29 so I'm not going to speak too much on this. I would just say, really get on the same page with your doctor, with your endo, and let them know you have a weight loss goal that you take very seriously and want to do the best you can in your current situation. Okay. Question from Emily Megan is, if I'm doing two strength days, one upper, one lower, what exercises should I include? On your lower days, I would include a squat, a lunge, a hinge, and a hip thrust. I like barbell squats. I like Romanian deadlifts and traditional deadlifts and hex bar deadlifts. I like split squats.

Starting point is 00:15:04 I like walking lunges. If you have bonus time, add some calves. And I really do like glute work in the shortened position, like hip thrust and 45 degree extension. For the upper body, do a vertical pull and a vertical push, like a pull down or a pull up and an overhead press. And do the same thing in the horizontal plane, a horizontal pull and a horizontal push. This would be a row and this would be a press. Okay. Once you've done those four exercise types, then you can sprinkle in any of the isolation work that you like, but you need to stick to compounds that you can progress over time. If your goal is to make progress when training twice a week. Okay. Question from Margie Nagel. What are your thoughts on supplementing with HMB? So HMB has been around for a while and it's mostly bullshit.

Starting point is 00:15:53 It's a metabolite of the amino acid leucine, which is the amino acid most closely associated with muscle growth. It is one of the amino acids in the BCAA family or branched chain amino acid family. What we know about HMB is that there are really only a few studies that show any type of increase in meaningful outcomes. Okay. There was a study done a while ago on HMB that showed like some ludicrous muscle growth effects that has been largely called into question by a number of very intelligent people. But a quick perusal of examine.com will show you that there is only one

Starting point is 00:16:37 study with eight participants that shows a moderate decrease in blood glucose, which one might expect from a higher protein intake. And another study with 28 adults that showed no effect on HMB supplementation and anaerobic capacity. So, you know, outside of that, folks, I'd probably stay away from hydroxymethylbutyrate or HMB and opt for just a high quality protein supplement because HMB is pretty expensive to produce and HMB supplements typically cost quite a bit of money. Okay. Another question here. This one comes from Liz. Liz takes pics. Liz takes pics, wants to know app tracking, any food tracking app recommendations. Macro Factor, MyFitnessPal, and Carbon. Those are the best. Okay. Amanda Phillips, 1982. I can't get past eight reps aside on shoulder press for weeks.

Starting point is 00:17:33 I tried 25s, but I can't do it. Why? This is true of all shoulder movements, front raises, lateral raises, rear delt raises, face pulls, and presses. People tend to make smaller and slower rates of progress for two reasons. The muscles of the shoulder are tiny and the joint itself is not very stable. It's a very mobile joint. And when you have a mobile joint, it's harder to produce a ton of force. Think about your joints that are less mobile, like the knee and how much you can do on like a tricep extension for the elbow or a leg extension. You have a lot of stability in that machine. You're locked in, you're seated, you're, you know, you're pulled in, you have everything locked in overhead presses, lateral raises, all these things.

Starting point is 00:18:15 You've got a very mobile joint, oftentimes in an unstable position. If you do like a standing shoulder press where it's even less stable, you usually can't do as much as when you're seated. like a standing shoulder press where it's even less stable, you usually can't do as much as when you're seated. So this isn't a problem that you deal with exclusively. It's a general challenge for everybody just because of the way that the body is put together. And it's definitely not something that I would stress about. Okay, question from Holt Hot Quilts Photography. What is CSCS in your bio? CSCS is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist. It is the most well-respected certification for strength and conditioning coaches and personal trainers. It is essentially a requirement to work in professional sports.

Starting point is 00:18:56 When I got into training, I had the goal of working with a professional sports team. And after decades of studying sports performance and the way that one increases physical properties and the psychology of athletes, and quite frankly, learning how much these dudes get paid at the pro level, I was like, no, thank you. The best jobs are at the division one college level. But even then, I like the freedom and autonomy of being an entrepreneur more than I do working for an institution. So the CSCS is a certification that is very well respected. It is challenging to pass, but it can be done by anybody with a desire to work hard and study. And that's really what it is. Okay. Eva Jeanette asks the

Starting point is 00:19:39 best shoes to wear when lifting. I'd say barefoot if you can, if not Vivo barefoot, I am absolutely in love with these shoes. They're fucking amazing. I've never had a better pair of shoes. Uh, my friend, uh, Adriel sent a pair out to me, uh, super jacked black dude on Twitter who works with, or on, on Instagram and Tik TOK and everything. He worked, he uses kettlebells works out in his house. Fucking huge. It looks like a Saquon Barkley legs. And I was like, dude, you're jacked. You're mobile. You're flexible. Is it the shoes, bro? And he was like, yep, it's all shoes. I'm just kidding. But he's the one who turned me onto him. And I swear to God, I put the shoes on and my legs looked more jacked. I felt more plugged in.

Starting point is 00:20:21 I've never trained better or harder in a pair of shoes in my life. Like just such a good shoe. So good for the feet. We talked about proprioceptors and, you know, the capacity of the foot earlier in the show. Can't recommend these enough. If you want something that's a little bit less expensive, I might recommend Vans or Converse just because they have that lower cushioning profile that tends to be good for leg days or a Nike Metcon Free 5. Okie dokie, Monica Fit asks thoughts on fasting for PCOS, which is polycystic ovarian syndrome. We have covered this a ton on the podcast. I'd recommend looking into some of the episodes I have done with Lyle McDonald on the topic. But suffice to say, done with Lyle McDonald on the topic. But suffice to say, exercise, high protein dieting, and a calorie deficit are the best for blood sugar regulation that I can think of.

Starting point is 00:21:18 And many people who have PCOS have poor blood sugar regulation capacity. So fasting could be helpful, although I think I might recommend something different. I might just recommend something simpler, which would be more exercise, more lifting, more aerobic work, and being mindful of the diet. But if fasting helps you do all that, then I don't think there's a problem. Okay, from Kirkhoff Matt, know anything about BPC-157? BPC-157 is a peptide that helps with tissue recovery. I believe it is a banned substance in many sports, but I don't dislike BPC-157. I've learned quite a bit about it. Studies show that BPC-157 exerts beneficial effects on strokes, schizophrenia, spinal cord injury, as well as tissue injuries. It's been shown to be healing for the gut. Very, very remarkable compound,

Starting point is 00:22:06 something that I would not get on the black market, that I would not get from somebody that you do not trust. I think it is very, very important that when you are using any injectable, you get it from a reliable source. It's too easy to fuck this up. I recommend doing it properly. If you are injured or you would like to get access to high quality BPC-157, you can do that through GetBlox or GetJoy, the lab companies that I work with to do my blood panel that will compound it for you in a reputable pharmacy. Do not buy this from somebody on the internet. It can help with tissue healing, but buying it from a non-reputable source could be very dangerous. And remember folks, I am not a physician. So don't take

Starting point is 00:22:49 anything I say seriously. I get weird questions and I'll put this in here, folks. The same person for months has been asking me, do you like to get your ass eaten on almost every question box? And I'm going to answer this question publicly once and for all. No. Okay. Next question from 61, uh, PGW 2036. I'm a 61 year old female, 30 minutes of weightlifting three to four times a week with cardio. Can I use creatine? Heck yeah. Creatine's for anybody. You do not have to do a certain amount of workouts or a certain number of sessions to benefit from creatine. I have 85-year-old clients who work out twice a week taking creatine. It is uniquely beneficial for older adults, and I very much

Starting point is 00:23:35 recommend it. Shan Hayes wants to know, who should drink pre-workout? I'd say anybody who trains early, who wants caffeine, who wants supplements or compounds that enhance performance. And if you were training in the mid to later part of the day, I think you would still benefit from pre-workout, but I would recommend a pre-workout that is stimulant free like Legion's Stim Free Pulse. Okay, folks, that does it for the rapid fire Q&A. Thanks a bunch for listening. Thanks for tuning in. Do me a favor, share this to your Instagram story. Tag me so I can say thank you and leave me a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Whichever one you listen on, both help a ton and it helps other people find the

Starting point is 00:24:16 podcast so we can make more people healthier. Thanks for listening and I'll catch you on the next one. you

Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 308: Barefoot Training, Apple Cider Vinegar, Plyos + More!

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