Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 2361: How to Speed Up Muscle Growth, the Benefits of the Front Squat Vs. the Back Squat, Signs it is Time to Reverse Diet & More (Listener Live Coaching)

Episode Date: June 19, 2024

In this episode of Quah (Q & A), Sal, Adam & Justin coach four Pump Heads via Zoom. Email [e-mail] if you want to be considered to ask your question on the show. Mind Pump Fit Tip: When it comes to fitness, there are three categories that you should aim for. Balance is best. (2:51) Adams shares and opens up on the scariest week of his life. (13:52) Shout out to John Delony! (51:37) #ListenerLive question #1 - How can you speed up the time to complete the "adaptation cycle?” (52:33) #ListenerLive question #2 - I try to stop my reps when my form breaks down, but sometimes I feel like I have heaps left in the tank. Should I white-knuckle another rep or add another set? (1:08:53) #ListenerLive question #3 - Any advice on how to get good at front squats to add to my skill base? (1:17:39) #ListenerLive question #4 - Would you discourage a woman from prepping for a bikini competition and if so, what would you encourage them to do instead? (1:24:48) Related Links/Products Mentioned Ask a question to Mind Pump, live! Email: [e-mail] Exclusively for Mind Pump Listeners, register for your chance to win a full NCI scholarship! ** The winner will be drawn on Sunday, June 23rd - so go register ASAP! ** Get your free Sample Pack with any “drink mix” purchase! Also try the new LMNT Sparkling — a bold, 16-ounce can of sparkling electrolyte water: Visit DrinkLMNT.com/MindPump Listen to the Dr. John Delony Show wherever you get your podcasts or click the link here June Promotion: MAPS 15 Minutes | Bikini Bundle | Shredded Summer Bundle 50% off! ** Code JUNE50 at checkout ** Mind Pump #1942: Lose Fat, Perform Better & Live Forever With Jason Phillips 3 Day Mind Pump Personal Trainer Webinar Mind Pump #2112: Is 15 Minutes Enough Time For An Effective Workout? MAPS Prime Pro Webinar BEST Front Squat Regression & Mobility Tips (START HERE) Front Squats- How to Place & Hold the Bar – YouTube How Do I Choose The Right Weight? (LIFT RESPONSIBLY) – YouTube Mind Pump #2180: Is Powerlifting Beneficial For Women? Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned Jason Phillips (@realjasonphillips) Instagram Adeel Khan, MD (@dr.akhan) Instagram   Dr. Gabrielle Lyon (@drgabriellelyon) Instagram Bishop Robert Barron (@bishopbarron) Instagram Arthur Brooks (@arthurcbrooks) Instagram Dr. John Delony (@johndelony) Instagram  

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind pump with your hosts, Sal DeStefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. You just found the most downloaded fitness, health, and entertainment podcast. This is mind pump, right? In today's episode, we answered live caller's question. People called in, we got to help them out on air, but that was after the intro portion. Today was about 49 minutes long. Today was a special one. Adam's back, he had a very tough time.

Family emergency, you get to hear about what happened in the intro portion. It was a bit of an emotional intro for us today. By the way, if you want to skip around to some of your favorite parts, check the show notes. We have timestamps. Also, you can actually email us and be on an episode with us where we can help you out. The place that you send your question is live at mindpumpmedia.com.

Now this episode is brought to you by some sponsors. The first one is NCI, it's an incredible certification course for online trainers and coaches and right now they are giving away a full scholarship. That means somebody will get all their education for free. Go to NCIMindpump.com, enter to win. This episode is also brought to you by Element. They are an electrolyte powder company. No sugar, no artificial sweeteners. It has the right amount of sodium to fuel your workouts, give you good pumps, give you better energy. It tastes great. Go check them out. They actually have cans now of ready-to-drink sparkling Element, it's actually delicious. It's awesome. Go check them out. Go to

Drink LMNT comm forward slash mind pump You'll get a free sample pack with any drink mix purchase and then you can also check out their new sparkling line This episode is also brought to you by the John Delaney podcast incredible podcast This episode is also brought to you by the John Deloney podcast, incredible podcast. Um, you want to grow as a person, go check it out. It's the Dr. John Deloney show, uh, go to John Deloney. So that's John D E L O N Y.com forward slash. Mind pump.

Also, uh, we have a sale this month. Maps 15 is half off the bikini bundle of workout programs is half off and the bikini bundle of workout programs is half off and the shredded summer bundle of workout programs is also half off. If you're interested, go to mapsfitnessproducts.com and then use the code June 50 for that discount. All right. Here comes the show. T-shirt time! And it's t-shirt time! Ah, shit, Doug. You know it's my favorite time of the week.

We have six winners this week, three for Apple Podcasts, three for Facebook. The Apple Podcast winners are Husker Kuzkast, PleaseGodHelpMe, and KatieAnn96. And for Facebook we have Kelly Page, Randy Arias, Natasha Studemeyer. All three, six of you are winners. Send the name I just read to iTunes at mindpumpmedia.com, include your shirt size and your shipping address and we'll get that shirt right out to you. When it comes to fitness there's three major or main categories that you can kind of aim for. One of them is longevity, the other

one is performance, and the third one is aesthetic. So get this, if you aim too long and too hard at one of those, you lose the other two. It's true. If you go super hard in performance, you will sacrifice longevity and to an extent aesthetics. If you chase aesthetics, you start to sacrifice longevity and performance and if you chase longevity, well of course you lose the other two as well. So depending on what you're looking for, keep this in mind. And for most of you, balance is probably best.

And of course, by the way, when you start to pursue fitness, you get a lot of each. So it's not just black or white, although in the extremes it is, so pay attention. What our good friend Jason over at NCI. He talks about this. What does he call that triangle? He calls that something.

Doesn't he have a name for it? Longevity, performance, aesthetics. And so it's like, yeah. I just think it's a really good, and maybe the boys, when they edit it, either one can click that. Or like a Venn diagram, right? I just think it's a really good way to explain that to somebody.

Because I mean, when we have to answer questions on the podcast, probably one of the most common things that we have to answer is when people have, and they're not conflicting goals, but they definitely, one's gonna pull, if you're extreme in one, it's gonna pull from the other. Totally. And trying to communicate that, right,

to the people that are calling in and asking questions. They're like, yeah, well, we can work on longevity at the same time of building performance, but understand that if we get a lot of performance, we're gonna lose a little bit of longevity. And if we're all longevity, we're not gonna quite get as much performance if we were all focused on that.

So I just think that that triangle diagram that he draws up to explain, it's one of the best ways to explain that to somebody. You're gonna make sacrifices when you go and all in on one direction on the other categories, but that's also too, it's like you're not gonna be able to balance everything like all the time. So it's like to focus on something for a period

and give yourself that sort of schedule of like, this is a phase where I'm doing a few months where I'm really working in the performance side and then I'm gonna move over into the aesthetic side and then I'm gonna move over to longevity, just a healthier way to handle that. It is, and this is good for the average person to know because I think oftentimes,

the people that get the most attention who communicate health and fitness. Are the extremes. Yes. Of all those categories. Always, right? It's like either the aesthetic extreme, so it's the physique competitor,

the bikini girl, the extreme in that sense, or it's the extreme athlete, the high level NBA player, NFL or track athlete or something like that. Or you got the longevity fanatics who are like, oh my gosh, if you do this, then you compromise this inflammatory marker and if you whatever. So it's important to know all these things. And then also it gets even more complicated.

In the mix is also quality of life. So longevity, you might look at that and say, well, that should be the goal, right? Because I just want to live as long as possible and be as disease-free as possible. But there's also quality of life. You may improve the quality of your life by pushing performance a little bit.

Like, okay, so you got lots of longevity, but you can't perform as well, play the sports you want on the weekend like you want to. Or maybe aesthetics, like, okay, I know walking around at 12, 13% body fat probably is better in terms of longevity than let's say 8% body fat, but I get a lot of quality of life from chasing,

going into some of those single digits type of deal. So it's just something it's important to consider. And then of course, they all do contribute to each other, right? So somebody who does nothing, if they start moving in either direction, they're gonna get a great deal of the others as well. If somebody does nothing, they start to focus

on performance, they're gonna get more longevity. They're gonna obviously get more aesthetics. But those extremes where you start to lose things, and when you go super extreme, you lose a great deal of the other two. I mean, like performance is a great example. We tend to look at, for a long time, we tend to look at the highest level athletes as the epitome of health. They have sacrificed longevity quite a bit to perform at those levels in

terms of injuries and damage to the body, oxidative stress, and that kind of stuff. In fact, if you look at the longevity of super extreme athletes, they're not phenomenal, right? It's not exceptional. So, you know, what does this mean? Well, don't look at their workouts. Don't look at their diets and lifestyles unless that's what you're aiming for. Unless you're aiming for that extreme kind of pursuit or whatever. But for most people, happiness probably is a nice blend of all three and considering, you know, like again, quality of life.

What do I enjoy the most? If you guys all had to plot yourself on that graph, where do you think you land right now? Oh, right now? Yeah. Yeah. Like if you had to plot yourself on that triangle, where, where would you say you probably your dot lands right now?

I can tell you the one I sacrifice the most is longevity I would say. I go probably aesthetics and performance, but aesthetics above performance, and then longevity's probably the one that I- Oh you think aesthetics even over performance for you, huh? Lately I would say, but performance, yes, cause I could get very focused on strength, but I started noticing more aches and pains

and injury type stuff, so now it's more aesthetic. But that's just now, it could definitely change. I think I've been living a little more in the longevity performance, right there, sort of maybe more longevity as of late, just because of just trying to give my joints a break. I was going pretty hard there for a while, and like waking up it was like eggs and pains and my hips and my back and I'm like, okay, I gotta relax on the

backloaded squats and deadlifts, but I think I'll always kind of toggle there and then you know Force myself to do the aesthetic thing at some point, you know Eventually concede and go over there. What about you, Adam? What do you think you're? I'm probably definitely towards longevity the most with a dabble of aesthetics right now. Probably the things that, like when

I make decisions eating wise or stuff like that, it's for sure more aesthetically driven than it is performance. So I only do enough performance to make sure I can do the things I need to do, be strong enough, move long enough, right, mobile enough. So I would say my performance side probably lacks. I like to think I'm pretty close to the middle, I think, but probably a little more on the longevity side of what drives my training. Well, this kind of, I think, but probably a little more on the longevity side of what drives my training right now. Well, this kind of, I guess, illuminates like the seasons of life, right?

Sure. I think if you make this a lifelong pursuit, or I should say a part of your life, then it's sometimes gonna move in one direction more than the other. I think typically this happens when you notice a deficit. In some of those areas, like, oh, you know, I look good, but I ran across the street the other, I think typically this happens when you notice a deficit in some of those areas. Like, oh, you know, I look good, but I ran across the street the other day

to go get the ball and didn't feel very stable running, so maybe I need to focus more on performance. Or, you know, I'm not feeling as good as I normally do. I may look good, but I just don't feel as healthy, so maybe I should focus a little bit more on longevity. I think that's a nice, healthy way to look at it. I think it's even healthy to hit the extremes. I think just becoming aware of it.

I think there's nothing wrong with running a season in your life when you decide, I'm gonna get so ripped, I can get on stage. And you go, I'm gonna discipline myself and do that, whether that's a year or two year stint, you do that. And then there's a stint in your life where you're like, you know what, I'm gonna see what this body is capable of, athletic performance, and I'm gonna pursue jumping higher,

running faster, or endurance, or whatever it is that you please, and do that for a little while. And then it's like, I'm gonna really get into optimizing my life for longevity. I think running in extremes for short periods of your life are really healthy to challenge yourself in that direction to see what your body is capable of and what it takes for those extremes.

Yeah, you start to develop fitness maturity. Yeah. Because, so fitness maturity is- Stretches your capacity too. Yes, and it's an understanding of what works, your body, how different things affect you, how different diets affect you. And then you have this toolbox that you're familiar with

that you can use at different times in your life, which is, that's fitness maturity. And I think there's some wisdom to be had, Adam, with going to those extremes, not marrying those extremes, right? But going to them and experiencing them, especially for coaches and trainers. If you're a coach or a trainer,

you don't have to do this, okay? You could do this with your clients. But if you did do this for yourself, there's something to be said about experiencing each of these personally in combination with experience with training other people that makes you a better coach. I think the, I mean the knowledge that I acquired

previously before I competed versus afterwards, I had all the book knowledge going into that and so knew what to do, but to actually go through it firsthand and feel what it felt like to go through those gave me the words to communicate it to my clients way better. Same thing even in this little experiment that I just recently did with the GLP-1s. Obviously, I understand the science. I understand what the peptide does, I understand what's going on, but the knowledge that I gained of going through it

and the ability now for me to communicate that when somebody else is potentially going through some of the similar challenges, I just see tremendous value in that. And so you're right, as a coach, to push the boundaries, to go to these extremes for periods of time, I think are tremendously valuable

to becoming a really, really good coach. Yeah, it's like the difference between a coach who can read a map, knows how to get you where you need to go, and then the coach who's traveled there, who's actually been there, who's actually walked the path and knows what it's like. Speaking of NCI, by the way, you know we've been with them for four years.

Wow, really? They've been around for seven. They've been with us longer, or we've been with them for four years. Wow, really? They've been around for seven. They've been with us longer or we've been with longer than they have not been with us. So four years we've been with NCI. I mean you could even count the, so Jason and I were communicating a year plus before that. I remember when he tells a story all the time too,

I've heard him tell it when him and I were having these phone calls and he was like, you know I wanna advertise on the podcast and I was telling him what our rates were back then. To be more specific, you said you can't afford us. Yeah, I did. I said, hey, you're a good buddy of mine. Perked his interest.

Yeah, yeah, I remember telling him that. A good buddy of mine, so I got it. You can't afford us. We'll give you love and everything like that when we can. I said, but to actually do an advertising, and I said, you're probably not there yet. And then I remember him setting that as a goal for himself. I want to not only advertise with you,

I want to be your biggest advertiser one day. And I remember when he hit that milestone, that was such a big deal for them to not only get to be able to advertise, but then also to be one of the biggest partners that we have. They're doing a full ride scholarship, by the way, right now. Wow.

Yeah, people listening. So if you go on their site, what's the site, Doug? Let me, let me. Yeah, it's ncimindpump.com. Yeah, so full-ride scholarship, so somebody will win and get paid everything, all the certification. All right, so we gotta talk about this, Adam, because people right now are like, where's Lenny?

Where's Lenny? Where's Lenny? That's the main thing everybody wants to know. It was anticipating Lenny. He was gone. Where's Lenny yet? Why'd you bring him up? I mean, I see the comments on YouTube are going crazy. Why don't you guys do more podcasts without that? I've never read.

You wrote that one comment and I know why you're like, oh cool, you guys, we launched the lame one first. Yeah. Do you guys not know me well or what? I do. I know when I said that, I knew you would laugh. All right, so you were gone. We couldn't really, we didn't really talk much about it. But what was that? It was a fucking scary time. We'll be straight up. All of us were freaking.

Scary speaking my life, hands down. Not even, there's nothing that even comes close to the feeling that I felt to receive a phone call when I wasn't even there with Katrina, right? So to be able to get a, to get a phone call, uh, when she's out in Mexico and hear her and I can just tell that something wasn't right. So she went out there to do, um, I wouldn't say a routine, but a, a pretty, you know, somewhat basic stem cell, uh, treatment, right? So she was doing it for her ovaries, for fertility and, um, you know, flew, flew in flew in the top surgeon in the world from Dubai to come do it.

So she's in good hands. She's with Dr. Khan and all them. And so the best of the best is taking care of her. We couldn't get anybody to watch Max because the way it went with summer school and him being off and then like it being Memorial weekend. And then it was gonna bleed in from Friday all the way till Tuesday.

And so I kind of told her, I was like, you know, maybe we don't do it right now. Well, this is the only time this doctor is flying in from Dubai. And I was like, well, if you can get one of your best friends or your mom to go with you, then I'll stay home and I'll watch Mac so you can go do it.

Because I knew how bad she wanted to go do it. So she called her good friend, Christina, and Christina said like, yeah, I can go. I'll go with you for sure. So they take off and they go. And she goes and does it. And something that we kind of know about Katrina is the way she reacts to anesthesia.

Now, I wasn't 100% sure until now. Now I know for sure. She reacts really, really bad to anesthesia. So when we had her cyst removed five years ago, she went under. And they had to wheelchair her out. And for the next four to five days, she was bedridden and just out of it, like totally out of it. Now what I thought back then, five years ago, was I knew the anesthesia

definitely hit her hard, but I thought maybe a lot of the slow recovery and everything had more to do with the surgery. The procedure. Yeah, the procedure. And so it hadn't fully dawned on me how much of an adverse effect that she has to anesthesia. What are the side effects? Just tired, nauseous?

Not coherent. Yeah, she gets nausea, so throwing up. She's not coherent. She can't walk. She's just, yeah, really, really bad. So anyway, she goes through this, she comes out. And they did general anesthesia there? Yeah, so she went under, she comes out, and according to her and them,

and she called me afterwards, and she was actually pretty fine, a little loopy, you could tell she was off coming off the anesthesia, but coherent enough to go home and they took her home. And then I hear she's throwing up and stuff and so I'm calling her and talking and checking up on her and she's just, she's not there and I can tell she's not. And now I'm starting to freak out because I'm all to it. So she went home to a place in Mexico.

Yeah, a condo. So it was supposed to be an in and out procedure. It was in and out. It was supposed to be, in fact, she had scheduled a flight the next day, right? So that's how routine this was supposed to be for us to get in and out. And so I'm talking to her on the phone

and my wife is really good about being tough through stuff and not complaining. And I could just tell that something's off. She's not talking to me correctly. I can tell she's not feeling right. And when I'm asking her about pain, she's not complaining about the pain. She's just like, oh, I feel really tired.

I feel really weak. So I'm freaking out because I'm not there to be there with her. I know Christina is flying out the next morning at that. Well, what if she's bad and she can't fly out? So I called Dr. Khan. I'm like, hey, something's wrong with Katrina. She doesn't sound right. And he's like, yeah, well, it's kind of normal, this and that.

There's an immune response, 24 to 48 hours. I said, yeah, I don't think so. I said, I want a nurse with her. I said, so whatever it costs, whatever it take, get a nurse over with her. I want someone staying by her side and at least measuring and checking her vitals until we can get her home to me or whatever.

And he said, OK, no problem, we get that done. So they sent a nurse over there. Nurse is there for maybe, I don't know, she hooks her up to an IV there for about an hour or so. And then I get a phone call from Christina going, hey, they're taking her in an ambulance to the ER right now. And now I'm like, oh fuck. So I know, one, I'm relieved that a nurse got there

and had the whereabouts to get her in an ambulance. But now I'm freaked out going, obviously, the nurse saw something bad enough to call an ambulance and take her to the ER. So now I'm trying to get on the phone, get a flight right away. Jerry's all over. And bro, it had to have been the hardest thing to get me there. The closest thing I had to getting me there within 24 hours

was flying to Texas, a three-hour layover, then to like Vegas, then back down to Mexico, and then I would arrive at 8.30 or 9 in the morning the next morning. Or I could take the first flight out at 9 o'clock in the morning, direct flight with that. So I'm like, fuck, do I go fly for the next 18 hours just to get there three hours before? Okay, we're going to book the flight at 9 o'clock. I'm going to just go straight there and see what's going on.

And I'm on the phone nonstop, like, you know, the feedback from the nurses and stuff and so she's in the ER I'm flying I get there and when I get there We're in Mexico. So I'm having to communicate with these doctors and they're talking in Spanish So I've got like my translator out and I'm like trying to read labs in Spanish, you know I'm so blessed that we have people like the Gabriel Lyons, the Dr. Kahn, the Dr. Shaw. We are Dr. Ross's. I have some of the most brilliant doctors that are friends of ours now at being able to text them. So I'm texting everybody, sending them labs, explaining to me what's going on, this and that. And they're going, she's going sepsis. And for the audience to understand that's like when bacteria

gets into your bloodstream and that's like life or death. Oh that's a 100% medical emergency. And what's really crazy about this whole situation was just six months ago you guys remember we lost a friend of ours that was healthy young to exactly this. He did a he had a recent, he had a regular in and out procedure surgery, he came home, he complained of stomach pain, and he went sepsis and they didn't get him back in time and fast enough to the hospital to save his life and he died.

And so I know that's in the back of Katrina's mind that this is what happened to our friend just six months ago and here she is and the doctors are saying, you're going septic. So your blood platelets should be somewhere around 150,000, to be in the normal range. She was plummeting. At this time, she's at like 60,000 and diving.

You get under 10,000, it's like life or death. And so she's at 60, and she's plummeting. Her white blood cells are through the roof, her kidney functions are shutting down, she's like barely even coherent. I can barely communicate with her and I'm having these conversations. So when you see her and you're at the hospital, so you can see like she was just... Oh yeah, I don't let her, she doesn't know this but I broke down later when she couldn't see me. Like when I saw her like I try to keep my shit together so

she could see me like oh we're gonna be fine honey I got this you I got this, you know, I'm acting like that in front of her. But internally, I'm fucking scared to death because she doesn't get that way. Katrina does not get scared. Katrina can toughen anything out. Like she's the girl who goes and gets ACL, MCL surgery and says, no, thanks for the Vicodin, I got this. Like that's the type of person she is.

And her looking at me going, honey, I'm scared. I don't feel right. And then looking through me when she's out of it. You could just tell that she wasn't doing well whatsoever. So I'm trying to do all this communication through Spanish while all these things are diving. So of course, we're in the emergency room and we're hooked up.

And 24 hours go by and now we are dropping blood platelets dropped down to 36,000. So now we're even lower. So, and numbers are not improving. She's not holding water down. She can't even, she can't do anything. She's now at a point where she can't even get up out of bed to go to the restroom or anything, like she's not good.

And it's either, it's coming out both ends of her and she doesn't look like she's doing any better and they keep her basically on antibiotics anti-inflammatory steroids IVs and Just constantly monitor her through the night 24 7 and the next day she leveled out So we didn't plummet anymore and that was the first sign of like stabilization. Like, okay, like she's not getting worse. If she is, if she's not gonna go full septic,

we've stopped that. But we now have got to get these numbers back up before we can let her out. So we stayed five days or six days in the ER in Mexico. And this point now, so that was the first like, holy fuck, stressful, scary, freaked out, finally coming in. Now, imagine Katrina's family, our friends,

people we're all connected to, everybody is concerned, of course, right? And we're in Mexico. So like, nonstop, everybody is calling me. Everybody wants to know details, everybody has an opinion. And so now I'm like, I'm, I'm switching from the emotions of scared and freaked out and sad. And for my wife,

so now I'm getting like bitter and angry because people are trying to tell me like, see, you shouldn't have done this. And Oh, you know, I have a, yeah, just you, you know, and in a lot of, exactly. Everyone, and you have to understand that like, of know, I have a, Yeah, just you, you know, and, and a lot of, Everybody's scared. Exactly, everybody, Nobody knows what to say. And you have to understand that like, of course, everybody, Everybody's scared. Everybody hears Mexico, surgery, you know,

elective surgery, you know what I'm saying? And so everybody right away wants to blame somebody. The surgeon fucked up, they did it. Oh, the Mexico, they don't know what they're doing over there, it's their fault. It's like, why would you let her do that? Like, it's like everybody is searching for blame and answers. And that, of course, adds that level of stress and pressure to me. And then you then the part I think I was probably the next thing that was most angry or irritated is that, and this

really was tough for me because it was family who's concern, but I got really frustrated because it's like my own family, I was so disappointed and I'm like, if all the people in our family, when something happens medically or health-wise, I'm probably the fucking person you want there because of my connections, not because of me, not because I'm some medical genius, but because I'm surrounded by them. I'm connected to not because I'm some medical genius, but because I'm surrounded by them. Like I'm connected to the brightest neuro, physio, medical, like you name it, we have friends that are a phone dial away

and I'm thinking who your ER fucking friend nurse is not gonna give me better insight than I'm getting already from some of the brightest minds. So that really was tough for the next like three days of being stuck in an ER, finally getting her stabilized, then now trying to manage the family and the friends and everybody that's calling and putting their two cents in. Now did they let you stay with her the whole time?

No, so because it's an ER, I can only be with her till 10 p.m. at night and then they would kick me out every night. So imagine we're in Mexico, she's alone, all she has is me, right, we're scared for our life and then at 10 p.m. at night they're like, you gotta go sir, ugh. And when were you able to go back?

Not till eight o'clock in the morning, the next morning. Holy cow. So, you know, now luckily she has her phone on her and we could text, they're pretty much doing stuff to her every two to four hours anyway, so she's pretty much not sleeping, So I'm pretty much not sleeping. So we're at least communicating, right? So she didn't feel like I'm, and she knew I was right up the street that I would be there in two minutes if, you know, something went down, right? So I had to do that every, every night back

and forth, which was fucking stressful on itself. And then she starts to like level out on day four or five, whatever it is in the ER. And now it looks like we're not really getting much better. We're not getting worse. And now I started to get really sort of the third layer of like frustration and anger is I start to see these signs of like my wife coming back, like she's coherent now, like she's even smiling every once in a while. And like, we're still not holding any fluids down or any food or anything down, so we got to stay IV'd up. But then every day, they got a run test. And so she would like finally get a little bit of sleep.

She'd wake up in the morning and she'd be like, how you doing, hon? She's like, I feel a little bit better, I feel a little bit better. Then they come in and take four or five vials of blood from her. Now mind you, she's at 36,000 blood platelets. So losing blood to a body that's that low already,

so then all of a sudden I would see the life get sucked out of her again and I'd be like, fuck, we're going backwards again. And then she would finally rebound from that about lunchtime or two o'clock, and then they would hit her with drugs, some sort of pain medication, and then my wife doesn't handle pain medication whatsoever,

so then I'd see her dip again. So I did that for like two more days. And then finally I looked at her and I said, "'Honey, I feel like we can do this. "'I feel like you and I could get home "'and I can nurse you back to health "'and I don't want you to have,' and I told them no more pain medication,

so I shut down the pain medication because she's like, I'm not in pain anymore, so why told them no more pain medication So I shut down the pain medication because she's like I'm not in pain anymore So why are we taking pain medication? So we shut that down? But I still couldn't stop them from taking blood every single morning. That was like protocol they had to So anyways, I finally get I get dr. Khan and dr. Shah over there to basically Advocate for me to get her out like at least let her out get her out and they're like, don't worry We'll stay in contact with you. Monitor her hour by hour. So we take her back to the condo. Mind you, every day I'm booking flights so we can get out as soon as it's route. So I'm like cancel, we do it.

So every day I got Jerry on the phone, canceling flights, booking the next day, canceling. So we did that for six days. You know, cancel, rebook, cancel, rebook, right? So I finally get her out and we go back to the condo in Mexico and I'm like, okay, cool. Like we're fucking home stretch. I'm gonna get her home. I'm gonna get her home. And that night she swells up like a fucking balloon her insides.

Her insides get so swollen, it starts to put pressure on the diaphragm and she can't breathe. And so now she's like complaining. She's like, honey, I can't breathe. And I'm like, are you kidding me right now? Like Katrina, if this gets any worse, I have to take you back to your room. I don't want to go back.

I don't want to go back. I'm like, honey, I don't care if you want to go back. You're complaining to me. You can't breathe. Then we're not. So I'm on the phone again with all of our doctor friends so that they're like, here, do some hot compresses. Give her this.

Get her this anti-inflammatory. See if that brings it down. She can take aspirin. She can take that. So doing all that, and finally, it gives her enough relief to get through the night. But then she wakes up in the morning. She's like, I'm too scared to fly.

And I'm like, I'm too scared to take you on a plane like that. What we just went through last night. So again, we rebook for the next day. And so we get one full day. She starts to hold some fluids down, and she starts to hold some things down, like Greek yogurt, some berries, some of that. So now I'm seeing signs of like we're getting some nutrients

in her body and some fluids in her body. And we're like living off of electrolytes. That's all we're doing is basically drinking electrolytes. And every once in a while, can handle a little bit of Greek yogurt or strawberries. And so finally, we're like, okay, let's go, let's try and fly the next day. That was like stressful as fuck too.

Granted, the airlines were amazing. Like I called ahead of time and said, hey, I'm coming in, this is what I need. And so they had a wheelchair waiting. They had a person who assisted me. Cause I was thinking like, how the fuck am I gonna take all her luggage while I'm pushing a wheelchair like stressing out?

But they were really accommodating. Somebody met me there as soon as we pulled in, wheelchared around, he stayed with me the whole time so that was a really nice experience to actually have that like relief that somebody was assisting me through all that thing but the whole time you should have seen like all the airlines like ma'am are you okay to fly and she's like and she's like put on a smile yeah I'm ready to go and so they're like are you sure and they're looking at me like is she cleared to fly and we're like yeah she's like, and she's like put on a smile. Yeah, I'm ready to go. And so they're like, are you sure? And they're looking at me like, is she cleared to fly? And we're like, yeah, she's cleared to fly, even though she shouldn't be flying.

Yeah, she's cleared to fly. And so everybody was like that with her. Get her on the plane and she's like, the way she's squeezing my hand too, like to take off on the flight. And the whole time I'm just like, keep it together, keep it together. I gotta be the one who's like solid and strong

through this whole process, right? I don't wanna see her see me scared, crying, you know that stuff. So I'm trying to be as solid as I can. Meanwhile, seeing everything she's going through, we get home, back in the States, feel so relieved to be back home. And now she's on this protocol of antibiotics

and anti-inflammatories that she needs to take. That night, we're in the bath and she's taking a bath for the first time, feels really good to be soaking in water and she just fucking blah vomits all over herself. All in the bathtub, a huge mess like that. I'm like, oh my god, honey, you okay? And she's like, yeah. She's like, okay, I just, I had that soup and I couldn't hold it down, you know? And I'm thinking in my head like, okay, she had just taken her antibiotics. Okay. And obviously, again, back to the whole, was she septic or not? All I'm thinking about is bacteria in her body. Right. That's the only thing. Right. And so that's what I'm thinking I have to pay attention to and manage. So I now see her puke. I know she took the

antibiotic that night. I'm like, okay, not good. But she feels that she's seen her signs that she's given me. She seems okay. We sleep through the night, up and down, not to great, okay, not good, but she feels like she's seen her signs that she's given me. She seems okay We we sleep through the night up and down not the greatest night of sleep that next morning I'm coming to come see you guys. That's when you were here. That's when I was the first I was gonna come back to work and I come here. Obviously you guys probably see me. I'm probably still stressed I'm on the phone so at that and I'm talking to her mom her mom's with her, right? We have family all my family stepped up it was amazing to have max taking care of and everything. And I'm calling her mom and I say, Tina, I said, if Katrina throws up,

I need to know right away because she's taking those antibiotics this morning and I don't care if she says she's okay. If she's giving me those, if she throws up again, I'm taking her to the hospital. She's like, hun, she said she will not go back to the hospital. I said, I will come back there and I'll fucking drag her to the hospital if she does not hold that down. Sure as shit, I get the phone call. She threw up again. And that's where I came, you guys, and you guys were like, just go.

So I took off, went back there. She was pissed. She did not wanna go. I don't wanna go. I said, Katrina, I said, if you have a bacterial infection and you're not holding down the antibiotics to potentially kill that bacteria, we could go

back right where we started in all this. So that ensure shit, we get her back in the hospital and they're like, thank God you brought her in here. Cause she wasn't holding it. She was dehydrated like crazy, wasn't holding fluids anymore and stuff like that. And so now we're back in the States and back to the ER ICU for the next three days inside there of recovering. And you know, we're. And we've been home now for what, four days now or what's that? So we're out. Yeah, you're out of the woods.

Yeah, so now she's doing really, really good. And now they don't know. This is the crazy part. Because this whole time, you're gone, we're all, I mean, I was, we were praying night and day, man. You know, it was a tough were praying night and day, man. You know, it was a tough time. It was scary, really scared to know you guys were going through that time.

And to have her back is pretty amazing. But they don't know what the fuck happened. No, yeah, so they took the culture, right? And it takes two to five days to get a reading on the bacteria, even though they told me that there's a potential that we won't know. But they should get a better idea of where, because she, we obviously, I skipped the part

of all the fucking scans and ultrasounds and stuff, that we're running that nonstop, because when someone's body is going into septic like that, they've got to find it, right? They're trying to find where- Yeah, the worry is, was there an infection? Is there damage to find it, right? They're trying to find where. Yeah, the worry is, was there an infection? Is there damage to the organs, right? Because that's typically when something like this happens

is a organ gets nicked and some sort of bacteria gets into the bloodstream. Well, what happened to your friend was that they nicked his bowel. Yes. And they didn't know it, and that was leaking bacteria into his system. Right.

And so they're running all these tests because her body is showing signs of sepsis. And so, but all the scans she's passing, no signs of any arteries nicked, no inflammation in any of the major organs, no bacteria found in the body somewhere, no upper respiratory issues going on, just crazy. No answers to why the body was going sepsis. And the prevailing theory. This is crazy. At the end of all this is that she might have just been

hit with this crazy compounding of things. I didn't mention, but she had to go fast in the surgery. So she's got no nutrients. Already depleted. Right, interpleted. She's also on her period, which is fine. That's fine. That already depleted right interplay she's also on her period which is that's fine too too so she's depleted and losing blood okay then on top of that she she has a terrible reaction to anesthesia then on top of that there's a normal 24 to 48

hour immune response to new stem cells into your people are more extreme than others other people get no yeah we got no symptom no symptom I couldn't even tell some people do have more severe immune responses, so I think she had one of the highest immune responses from this on top of that. And then in addition to that, the only thing that the doctors could put their finger on, the fact that she was still puking and shitting herself

six, seven days later, she caught some sort of virus or flu. Oh my God, on top of all that. On top of that. So we think that if they come back and I get no answer to a bacteria found for sure it's most likely this is what happened is all those things dominoes all at once caused this crazy storm of events that her body reacted this way and it was just like oh my god dude so

so crazy you had a lot of people over here praying for you man. I sent out messages to, I called them the big guns, the team at Bishop Barrett. It was a really warm experience for me considering to see the amount of people that stepped up to help. Like my son has is nothing wiser. Like he went like a week without his parents and somehow managed to not get him to, who is very attached to us, to get him to not, and he literally, a niece, an aunt, a grandma,

a nana came in every couple days to change the face to him. And every time someone came, they spoiled him and took him places and did things. He was just nonstop being stimulated and entertained that he never stopped to think, where's my mom and dad? And so until literally like the last day or so, that was the last day, her mom said that, like he started, where's mommy, where's daddy?

And they told him that she was at the doctor because their tummy hurts. And so that's the extent of what he knows was going on. Because Katrina is like he, she did not want him to see her like that. And I don't know how he would have done to have seen her that way. So yeah, he, I mean, family, friends, everybody really, really stepped up. We got, even when we came in, it was like such a blessing too. So I told you all she's been drinking is like electrolytes and Elementee had sent, we had like eight cases of it at the door. The best. Yeah when we got there. So like literally that's her drink. So it was so nice to see those bottles while I was there in Mexico.

I'm getting like Gatorade and all these other generic like electrolyte drinks. And so as soon as we roll up to the house there's like literally six cases of the new ready to drink LMT cans. And so she's been sipping on those and then eating whatever foods that she can. And then it was cool too. We had, you know, so many, like you said, people praying and sitting. I mean, she's been getting flowers nonstop. I mean, the doors every four hours or so and every time. And it's been really cool because it lights her up is she was actually pissed at me for telling people a fact I was like Katrina people are gonna find out first of all your husband wasn't on my week you know I'm saying so you're gonna get it eventually people are gonna know it's like there's nothing to be ashamed of you know I'm saying like let me tell the

story and let me and you're gonna be okay but she's so like that right she doesn't want her business a lot of her friends sent you guys John Delaney contacted me want to know if he could. Yeah, dude, Deloney sent us a really nice Mastro's dinner. A Mastro's dinner, that was really, really cool. He texted me, he's like, what do they like to eat? I'm like, Mastro's. Yeah, really nice steak.

I thought it was, I had no idea he talked to you guys, I was like, wow, how did he know to get us that? That's like our spot, you know what I'm saying? I was like, that's so great. He's such a good guy. No, no. I had people contacting me wanting to send you guys things for sure.

People were like, what can I do? Can I do anything? I know, I had a lot of that. That was what was really hard too. I was trying to tell Katrina that. I'm like, listen, you're fucking loved by a lot of people. And a lot of people just want to show that they care and be there.

So how are you man? Because you have to be. I'm not sure yet. I've been asked that a few times. Yeah, I know. It's a lot to take in. Have you had a moment to like, have you had a moment to like,

let all that shit out? Not really, not really. I think that. Because you had to hold, I mean I know it, look, I told you this when I saw you a few days, I don't know how it was, four or five days ago, I said you're having to lead the ship and it's fucking scary

and your main job is to not waiver. But here you're looking at your wife and I mean I'm sure all kinds of scary shit's going through your head and you don't know what's happening. I think because of how it all ended up playing out and where we're at now, I'm latching onto the feeling of joy and gratitude and just I'm so grateful of the people that were around me

and so like that and so, and that we made it like, I somehow in Mexico communicated to doctors and got my wife through this and got her home. So I'm hanging on to that. Like I'm not sure, I'm sure there's a bunch of other emotional stuff like Justin that I fucking Yeah, I'm sure I got some of it down there but for now like what I'm letting out is like man I'm just I'm so happy. I knew you were feeling joy because when you got back

I don't know if it was the day or the second day after he got out of the ICU over here You were sending videos of, and music, you were sending music to us, songs. So I knew, you had sent a song to Jessica and I, and I knew, I know what you do when you're in joy. You play music, you sit down, you watch your family. So I'm like, I know what he's doing right now. He's probably in the backyard hanging out.

Yeah, so that was a really good moment for me to be home and to see Katrina sitting in the backyard I had blown up the big By the way, I think it's one of the best child. I'm gonna get one. It's the best investment I saw the video as a best investment you can ever make I've already got my money six times over on that thing Yeah, because he just will play on it for hours, right? So it's such an easy way to see him be entertained and enjoy himself And so yeah we were all in the backyard with Katrina's mom and me and Jerry

and then my niece Danielle and Max. And just, it was so nice to be sitting there and just be like, oh my God, we're home. My wife is healthy enough to be sitting upright by herself. She's sipping on her element tea. And we're just watching the kids play. Like, yeah, no. So yeah, I've been in a really, today in the last,

I'm exhausted so I can only imagine her. That's what's kinda tripping me out right now. We go to bed at like 8, 30, nine o'clock right now. And then I wake up and feel like I coulda kept sleeping. Oh yeah, bro. And so- That emotional stress and things. Oh come on.

You'll be allowed to catch it up. Yeah, and it's wild to me that I still don't feel like I fully have caught up to that. And so again, I can only imagine what she feels like. Cause man, what you don't think about, uh, like in, when you're ER and ICU, they, they, they have to check your vitals every four hours or less. Then you have nurses that are on their eight to 12 hour shifts that they're rotating. Uh, and then you have medications that are on different timing and

shift. And so you never get two full hours. No. Because just as you start to doze off, they wake you up for one of those things. And they have to check your vitals or they have to introduce you to the next nurse or they have to take the medication. So it's not only that, it's like,

you have massive inflammation, potential infection, so damage to the body, then you're not sleeping. Then the fear and the stress of all of it, not being home, what's gonna happen, whatever, tremendous toll, tremendous toll. Yeah, yeah. So it's, I... Has she, now, so she's gonna take a little while to recover.

Yeah, so the, and that's probably the hardest thing that we're going through right now is coaching her through that. I keep reminding her, I mean, cause she understands adaptation, She understands building the body. Recovery is very much so like that, right? It's not, it's about the stuff we preach, right? To do as little as possible to elicit the most amount of change. The goal is to not, just because you think you can sit up and do all these things

right now to push your body there, you'll regress and go back the other way. So it's so, you know, crazy to be having that conversation with my wife who's listened to every single MindPub episode, and she knows, but she's in this place and she just wants to be back and she feels good. And so she thinks, so she has these moments where she overdoes it a little bit by being up and wanting to. She probably wants to get that, like I'm done with this.

She wants to be back to normal. She does, but she's definitely, reality slaps her in the face. And she's like, she'll, and I'm like, her mom and her kind of got into it because her mom's like, don't move, don't do anything. And she's like, want her to do everything for her. And I'm a little more like, if you feel good, go ahead and stuff like that.

But keep in mind, I'm like talking to her, but I'm not telling her what to do, right? I know better than that, right? So I'm just kind of being there for her type of deal. And then when she doesn't feel good, reminding her like, see, that's more than what we should be doing, you know, we only need to be this. So her type of deal. And then when she doesn't feel good, reminding her like, see, that's more than what we should be doing, you know, that we only need to be this. So her mom and her like got into it.

I guess when I wasn't there, I took off for something to go run into the grocery store or something. And she came back and she goes, my mom and I got into it really bad. Really? Like over what? She's like, she was telling me I can't do. She wants her to put her feet up.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Her mom wants her to just not move, which understandable, right? That's also so against Katrina's nature. Yeah, exactly, which I know that. I'm like, exactly. You can't tell him how to ask everyone for help personally. Yeah, yeah.

If I can identify with it. Yeah, I can only keep her away from not doing work stuff for so long. Before long, she was in her emails and already. I know, I saw some emails from her, like, what are you doing? Yeah, yeah, so I couldn't. I'm not even gonna respond.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I know better, you know what I'm saying? I know, this is where her and I are alike. There's a part you have to let us do that, because we love that stuff. She loves that, she wants to be back to herself. And so if you rob her of all those little things. It helps her feel normal too, bringing it all back.

And she's told me that. She says, I want you to know that I appreciate that. You don't make me feel like I can't do stuff. I know that I'm gonna take time to heal, but at least you make me feel like I'm back to normal. Everybody else still makes me feel like I can't do stuff. I know that I'm gonna take time to heal, but at least you make me feel like I'm back to normal. Everybody else still makes me feel like I'm broken in the hospital still. Something's coming of this.

There's definitely a purpose for this ridiculous, scary challenge, for sure. Man, we're so glad you guys are back. You brought up the GIF from John Deloney when we've been talking and promoting his show a lot lately and I've been getting a ton of feedback. I actually saw on the forum the other day of some of the people that have started listening to his show.

I saw that, yeah, people really love his show. And I'm like, yeah, duh, he's amazing. Yeah, you talk about personal growth, not because he's lecturing or teaching you, but because he's helping people on his show. So you hear these real challenging situations and stories and it's so powerful. It's so much more powerful than having someone talk

out and just kind of like lecture. It's like you hear him talking to real people, what the challenge is, what the potential solutions are. Yeah, he has this authentic side to him that is so relatable. You know, I think, you know, even though he's a doctor and so he's brilliant at what he does, he's so relatable. And I think that's what makes his show so attractive in him as a person. You know, why you're so attracted to someone like that who's that intelligent, but has so much humility

and is so relatable. And I think that comes through in his show and his podcast is totally like that. So were you worried about us doing shows without you? He was a little worried, huh? No, I was more worried than anybody. The most worried I was was that everybody was going to not work. That was what I was more worried. It was like, oh man, these guys are going to be concerned and they're going to be wanting to know what's going on. I'm like don't Yeah, I'll tell you what that is the hard part the hard part You know no disrespect the hard part wasn't that you weren't on the show that you know We could we could manage not a big deal Justin and I can go off on

Tangents and we did a lot more conspiracy Yeah, we could have fun with it, but the hard part is like length to the conversation. Yeah, we could have fun with that. But the hard part is shutting off the fear and the concern of what's going on and trying not to communicate that on the podcast. Yeah, we didn't know we'd bring up your situation. We figured you'd come back and do a good explanation.

But we did a few quad episodes. The first one felt a little, the first one was literally- We felt your absence the first one. Well, it's because you left. That was the day you were sitting there and you got the call. That had to have been the first one felt a little the first one was literally felt your absence the first well It's because you left that was the day you were sitting there And you got the call that had been the tough that you go to rush to the ER Yeah, and all of us are like what? Concerned and worried and then it's like well we have to do an episode

So that one was a tough one the next two were fine. We had a good At that point we kind of okay We were still a little worried, but we heard the news that everything seemed to be moving in the right direction. I mean, it could be the new format of the show if the downloads are good. People need to know this. Adam would definitely be like,

I'll just run the business side. You guys do the show. That's how he used to crack me up when we get haters. You know what I'm saying? They'd be like, oh, Adam, bro, bro, bro. Bro, gratefully, you wanna take my shot? Come do it. I didn't do this business. Like I talk on a podcast. I mean, I enjoy it. Don't get me wrong. I enjoy hanging out with my buddies and so that chocolate shit. We don't even record it. Yeah, exactly. We don't need to

record it. You don't need to put it out there. You know what I'm saying? I enjoy the business side way more than I do that. So we had fun. You know, Justin, I have fun talking about, yeah, all kinds of conspiracy theory stuff. I mean, I definitely had to research a few more items for conversation, you know? All right, you know, Adam talks a lot. It turns out, you know? He actually has a really long winded story.

Justin talked about competing and, you know, winning. Yeah, Justin Goh-Hulk. They're all acro, horses. I was trying to bring up all, like, what's wrong? He's just like, I got a sore throat. And I was like, fuck, I'm never gonna talk this much more. Bro, I was so exhausted. Just get home, just don't talk to me.

Don't even talk. Don't even talk to me. I would say something and look at him. I tell you what, man, that was a, so, you know, again, I feel like I'm in this place of gratitude, but being in a situation with the type of business that we have built, having partners like I had to,

I could only imagine if there was this added layer of stress of, because God knows I haven't got all the bills for all this. So the financial stress of it, having someone who could keep a business running on the back end, having family that can step up and do the things that they did, man, to have the support of people being able to help me coordinate everything I did, the

doctor, I mean, God, it was just, I've latched onto that, that wow, how lucky and how blessed I am that I had all these resources and these things because that was the scariest and worst week of my life, hands done, bar none. But the fact that- You have people in your corner. Oh my God, if I didn't have that. If I had a normal 9 to 5 job where I had a boss harassing me about being to work at the same time. If I didn't have some of the most brilliant doctors that I could communicate her labs to to make me feel calm and tell me what I should do next.

Like, if I didn't have family to step up and take my son, like, oh my God. Like, I could only, oh my God. I could only imagine what that would have been like. So boy, it was such a nice feeling to know that a lot of the other things that would probably be some major stressors in somebody's life, I had some of the best people in my corner. That was a cool, which is probably why I think I feel as positive as I feel, and I'm hoping that stays that way. I mean, I had a tough time with it, just because I always have a tough time

with the fear for family and friends, and I love you guys, you guys are like family. I'm trying not to get emotional, but it was definitely difficult. But I had a moment of peace, I texted you what happened, and I used Arthur Brooks' tip again, and it brought me some peace. I was at the grocery store

and there was a woman with her baby. They were asking for money and I asked them to pray for Katrina and this woman got down on the floor, held my hand and started crying and praying in Spanish. She started crying as she was praying in Spanish and I felt a sense of peace, like okay, like it's gonna be all right.

You didn't know it was in Spanish, you told me that too. I needed Spanish prayer at that time. It was in Mexico. That's what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying. I'm like, how did you know? Use the right words. She's sending it to the doctors over there.

The English prayers weren't working, I needed some Spanish prayers. Hey listen, this lady stopped everything and she sat down, she took me down on the floor, held my hand, and cried, and prayed out loud in Spanish. And that's why I texted you right afterwards. I'm like, all right, I feel a little bit of peace here. I feel a little bit more peace here.

I did hijack your stories on Wednesday last week and I didn't tell the audience some stuff about Sal and one of the things I did say is, I think that Sal has cried the most about this. I never used to cry. That's a fucking, I get emotional like that. I think Sal is the most emotional of things. I think he was more emotional than Katrina.

We love that about you. Yeah, no, it's a great trait. Yeah, that's great. I'm so happy you guys are back. Oh, no. You know, listen man, fucking life dude, it's so easy to take for granted, isn't it? It's so easy to take all your health and your mobility.

You know? Yeah, none of that stuff matters. You have nothing. None of it, you know. Nothing, you know? You get in a situation, you trade everything for it. For your family. Yeah, yeah.

Crazy, crazy, all right. Do we have any shout outs for today's episode? I mean, shout out John Deloney, man. John Deloney. Great guy. I know that we've talked about him at Nausium, but I mean, if you guys aren't over there, support him. You're supporting me by supporting him,

so I appreciate people over there. Check out his podcast. Check out his podcast. Support what they're doing over there. They're doing good work, and he's an amazing man, and I love him. If you're a trainer or a coach, you want to be successful. You want to build a career.

You want to be able to support yourself and get people phenomenal results. Go to mind pump, trainer course.com. We have a three day training course. It's free. It's free. So you get to learn from our experience. Remember we train people and we ran gyms.

We own gyms for over two decades. We teach you some of the most important stuff you need to know to become a successful trainer or coach. And it's free. mind pump, trainer, course.com. Get in mind pump, trainer course.com get in there. It's three days of training from us costs nothing. Check it out. All right.

Here comes the rest of the show. Our first caller is Ian from North Carolina. How you doing, man? Can we help you? Morning. Hey guys. Fantastic. See you all.

Thank you so much for all you do. Um, I've been a listener, I think five years pre COVID for sure, but I Fantastic to see you all. Thank you so much for all you do. I've been a listener, I think five years pre-COVID for sure, but I forget one, but you guys have taught not only me, but so many other people, so many different things. Thank you. So my question is about how can I speed up the time to complete the adaption cycle?

So adaptation cycle. Background, I was a swimmer growing up, so I'm in college. And then I transitioned to triathlons. And then I had ended up having two sets of twins was, which was challenging as well. And then I found you guys and I realized that I'd been doing it all wrong for 50 years. I mean, grossly, grossly, grossly over training.

So I started with anabolic, um, saw fantastic great gains. I was absolutely amazed, but, but then it gets better is because, um, for whatever happened in life, or maybe you guys were talking about a five by five sort of training module and I switched to it and life got in the way. So I only could do it like every fifth day. So just five sets, five reps, big five, squat dead, bench rows, overhead press. That was it. And I can't tell you how excruciating taking two minutes of rest between sets is for me.

I mean, it is painful. In fact, I go around and pick up the weights and people come over and they say, do you work here? Like, ah, I don't work here. But anyway, but, but then I got so flipping hungry and I ate and I ate and the scale bit move. And then it dawned on me that even in anabolic, I was over training. Because I'm almost as old as Doug. So I know how you guys think he is.

Maybe I was doing the trigger sessions too hard or whatever. But when I did the math, uh, I mean, I realized that compared to my triathlon training, I was working literally one-tenth as much, barely breaking a sweat, having much more substantial gains. I increased my calorie intake double, all of my core lifts doubled. And then I really started to put together, you know, I was damaging, I was sending the signal, the speakers and the amp. And then I was, my body was doing its best to repeat repair, but I finally got to the adaptation, but now as I'm older, I mean, I would love to change, you know, like every fifth day to every fourth day.

And, you know, what are the big things that I can move? Of course, I know you're going to say sleep course, whole foods, protein targets, water, supplement. Thank God you guys turned me on to mellow. Holy shit. I had a complete magnesium deficiency. I could tell you a story just about that. Creatine, electrolytes, again, thanks for

you guys. So I know those are the big rocks. Checking a lot of boxes. You're doing good. Yeah. And now I know that I'm gonna only move the needle some, but this is where I, is it more peptides, HGH, red light, cold, plunge, or is that splitting hairs? Anyway. This is a fun question.

Yeah, well, I mean, hormone therapy will definitely speed up adaptation and all that, but one thing you wanna consider with strength training is the right dose is the right dose. Now that doesn't mean you can't be active most days. You can. Oh, I walk a ton. Yeah, you're totally fine.

It's really interesting, the individual variance with what is needed, what isn't needed, and there's this weird dance, right? There's this like, okay, I need enough time to repair, recover, repair, and adapt. And then does my muscle building signal last a long time? Is it a short time? And so what you find is,

I mean, you're obviously genetically gifted. I mean, what you wrote in your notes up there was you actually qualified for trials, right, for the Olympics in 1980? Yes, but remember in 1980, Carter nixed that we went to Russia, so we didn't pick a team. Actually, they picked a team and went to China for like a special meeting. Nonetheless, you're an athlete. Yeah, you've got incredible genetics. And what you tend to find with really really high level athletic genetics are two things. One, recovery tends to be faster in those

individuals so among your peers you probably recover faster. But second, you don't need as much to build muscle or strength. That's the beauty of genetics. So a lot of people think it's just about recovering more but the truth is I've worked with people like this where they'll work out a fraction and they just respond. They just don't need as much. And that's really what strength training is. Don't think of strength training ever as the activity itself.

You know, that's okay to do that, but if you realize that it's really just to send the signal and then let the adaptation work, then you can do all kinds of other activity for the sake of activity. Swimming, walking, yoga, stretching, mobility, whatever. So if once every five days is working for you, I wouldn't mess with it.

It doesn't mean he can't try and do four and see, I mean this is the game we play still to this day. You know, that's what Sal meant by it's this kind of dance always, right? It's like, oh, let me see if I did it every four days. Do I continue to see as good or maybe even better results or does it start to go the other direction and I'm not quite doing as well?

And so if you were my client, there's a couple of things. One, I would allow you to do that. Say, hey, let's go every four days and see if you continue to see as good or better results. And if not, we adjust. The other thing too, because you're checking so many boxes, and I know we never point people typically in this direction because we're always gonna go the sleep, the water,

or the natural way first, but you are a good candidate for somebody to try some of these peptides. And if you're open to that and you're like, hey, I would be willing to do that, or I wanna check it out, that and or going like hey I would be willing to do that or I want to check it out. That and or going and getting your hormones checked because you're getting up there in age.

When was the last time you checked your testosterone levels? Do you know where they're at? Well I can look it up quick but I do know that it doubled. I think it went from 450 to 900. Oh wow you're good. You're good there. But, but, but kind of, and what, I don't know if you guys have ever tried this, but have you ever taken like your, your, your blood panel results just as there is send them into AI and you can just start to ask it questions. Oh, no. Oh wow.

Wow. That's actually really bad. That's a trip, man. You guys got to try that. Oh, that's what Brekha and all those guys do at least, you know, to get Oh, wow. Wow. That's actually really bad. That's a trip, man. You guys got to try that. Oh, that's what Brekka and all those guys do. At least, you know, to get a first pass and what to look at. Oh, that's interesting. That's actually really, is there a certain AI bot that you, did you use like just your, the chat GBD or did you use a, like a website? What'd you use? I'm sure. I mean, you use them all, all the time. I kind of AI geek, but, um, you know, chat GPT certainly does.

You just have to find one that's multimodal that allows you to like upload the PDF, or you can even copy and paste just the raw text of it and just dump it into a chat GPT and say, okay, these are my blood results. I want to ask you some questions, dump it in and then start asking asking why. Just explain to me like I'm a kindergartner, what my levels of triglycerides mean. And it does. Wow. That's exceptional. That's very cool. Yeah. If you're at 900 total tests, you're fine. Um, and you know, you could look at peptides for, you know, raising growth hormone, um,

for accelerated recovery, but they're not going to make a huge, huge difference. You know, here's the other thing you do with your workout too. Instead of doing a longer workout once every five days, you could do shorter workouts much more frequently. I mean, Maps 15, the advanced version, is two compound lifts a day, I think six days a week. Oh, have you tried that yet, Ian? You would probably, you would probably crush.

Oh yeah. Have you tried Maps 15 yet? I don't, you would probably crush. Oh yeah. Have you tried mass 15 yet? I don't think I have. And before you give it to me, I do have a lot and I'll tell you what I've been doing now. I mean, to, you know, this is going to sound really arrogant and I don't mean it to be as just kind of the truth. Let it go, let it fly, let it fly in. Is that, you know, because of those gains, which happened well over a year ago, I'm still getting used to the muscles on my body. I didn't have sleepy butt. I had coma butt. I mean, there was nothing there, right? There was no strength. So now that I have something,

I kind of doing something between what I would think is almost like a maps 15 and think is almost like a maps 15 and, um, uh, performance, um, pre-phase kind of those mix it's just body weight stuff. It's 15 minutes. It's, it's getting all the, you know, it's doing the whole body, but nothing strenuous. I'm just, I'm just trying to get, you know, used to this. Yeah. No, that's, I mean, I think you're doing great.

I I'd like to send you mass 15, just so you could see have it. Take a look at it. I think you're doing great. I'd like to send you a Mass 15 just so you could. So you have it. Just go through the protocol. Take a look at it. I think you would crush. I think you would get exceptional results from following a protocol like that. Like I said, it's two compound lifts a day. You would do the advanced version with the barbell.

And it takes 20, 25 minutes. And it's probably close to the volume you use to working now except it's broken up into a daily workouts instead of one longer workout every five days. I mean Ian you know Ian you really I mean it's very obvious to me you've been listening for a long time and the things that you the boxes you're checking your mindset the way you're going to it I mean you're a you're you're like one of my favorite type of clients to have. You can play with a lot of variables. Exactly and you're in a place where I'm like hey let's

let's try the four days and see how they'll, Hey, let's try this. And let's like, you understand, uh, and you have a good baseline. You know, uh, how your body is responding, where you're currently at. You can always return back to that. Uh, but yeah, you're in a great place to kind of my one suggestion. And, and this is what I think all of us can be guilty of sometimes is moving too many variables. So, you know, change one change one, two variables tops,

and stick with it for a few weeks, see how you respond. See what happens, two weeks minimum, yeah. Yeah, but yeah, you're in a really cool place to test stuff out. This is a lot of thanks to you, is because if I had a nickel for every time I heard you say elicit the most from doing the least,

I would be a rich man. And that really is what all this is. Drill it in everybody's head. You know why I slam it so hard now because it's one of those things that I think even was tough for all of us to really grasp. And the more and more I apply that to myself, the more I continue to go, God, man, it really,

it does not, if you check, if you do all the things, if you're sleeping, you're eating, you're hitting your protein intake, you're training, you're doing the right. Yeah. Right. And if you do all that, then what you need to do in the gym is a lot less than a lot of people think you need to, you know?

Oh, yeah. Completely agree. And then to Sal's point that I haven't heard you bring up in a while is your, your great analogy about you change it one degree, you know, they're going to be far apart enough in enough time, but they're not even recognizable. So yeah, like I try to move one variable at a time, but if I could ask one tiny related, um, bonus question. Sure.

Um, so have you ever heard of a study that backs up my brain cramp theory? I believe the body first senses damage and sends out like cytokines and it fixes it. And once the damage is says, Hey, that army's done. Then it sends out the adaptation cytokines like, okay, he's using his biceps a lot more, let's, let's, let's fix it. There seems to be studies around that. No, but there seems to be a lot of crossover. So recovery and adaptation, a lot of it

seems to kind of happen simultaneously. So I don't think it's too distinct, like recovery and then wait and then adapt. It seems to kind of happen kind of simultaneously, but with some crossover is what seems to be the case. So maybe a better analogy is it sends out all those workers but with some crossover is what seems to be the case. So maybe a better analogy is like it sends out all those workers at the same time and depending on what you did a better job with

just decides where they allocate most of their resources. You got 100 of those guys out working on those things. If you do too much damage, all they're trying to do is recovery, none adapting. They're overwhelmed, yeah. But if you have someone in the middle, you got 50 of them working on one, you got 50 on the other,

if you do a perfect job, they hit both. But to be clear, then adaptation after the recovery is over continues, right? So you still see protein synthesis happening post full recovery. That's why it seems like, it's almost like one of those diagrams, like a Venn diagram, where you get the two circles

crossing over in the middle is when they're both happening. And on the outside, it's just adaptation and then the front end is just recovery. I like that. Yeah. And Justin I do not want to leave you out I really wish that the other guys would get half your jokes but I definitely do and I fucking laugh. I'll keep throwing them out there to nobody. I'm here. I'm here catching them. All right. Thanks. There's a reason why you're the fan favorite. Well, good stuff. Good stuff. Are you in our, are you in our private forum yet or no? Um, I am. Um, I think, um, you guys were gracious enough to add me. I'm just not on Facebook that much, but when I did go on, I got some fantastic pointers on my deadlift sort of technique, just from videos.

And the people there are awesome. That's great. That's great. Anytime. We appreciate any of the updates. So I'd love to hear from you every month or two, just kind of updating us on what you're currently doing and what you're noticing and stuff like that.

So check in with us when you can. Yeah. Adam, I'll send you actually, because I think you're mainly in charge of the partners, the ones that I cannot live without. Oh, thank you. Oh, yeah. Love that. Love that.

I appreciate that. Thanks, Ian. Thank you. Y'all have a good day. Take it easy. Thank you, dude. Yeah, I think the important thing for people to understand is that when we say do the least amount

to stimulate the most change, it's not because we're telling people not to waste their time or because it's more efficient, although those are both true, it's because it's also the best dose. So it's simultaneously the least amount to elicit the most change is simultaneously the most efficient and the most effective. And that's what people need to understand. It's not like you're trading off because you're lazy or you gotta say fine.

The way you communicate optimal and tolerate, I think is the best way to say it. There's a difference between what your body can tolerate and handle, but that's not necessarily optimal. In fact, it's not. Just because you can handle a hard-ass workout or a beating doesn't make it the most optimal for results. And we're all searching for that sweet spot. And by the way, it's a moving target. So as you get older, as you have better sleep, worse sleep, as you have less stress,

more stress in your life, as your hormone levels are balanced or not so balanced. Like if you know as you go through this journey in life, it's not like this like two plus two is always an equal four. The right dose is not gonna stay the same. No, no it's always moving which makes to me this is also what I mean it can make it frustrating and challenging for people but it's also what makes it invigorating and fun and interesting is that you're constantly trying to improve. By the way one more comment on, because he was a high level swimmer,

he said he had a glute coma. Or, it helps me think, but one of the only sports where not having powerful glutes is beneficial. You actually don't want- It's drag, bro. You don't want a big strong ass if you're a swimmer. It is like the only one. It is, and that's why swimmers,

hate to say this, swimmers, swimmers are the worst crossover athletes. Like if you're an excellent swimmer, you're probably terrible at super strong back. No, but you're not good at other sports and vice versa. Our next caller is Kurt from Australia. What's happening, Kurt? What's up, Kurt?

Good day, legends, how's it going? Hey, man. What's going on? Cool. Well, thank you so much for taking my question and everything that you guys do. It's really, really awesome. Everything that you guys do,

I've been a listener for probably six months or so. So learned a lot, which is awesome. I'll just jump into my question. Over the last year and a half, I've lost about 30 kilos. I started doing it the wrong way with lots of running, but last July I started in the gym, ramped down the running to only two days a week. One of them is really easy and the other one is just on the weekend with a group of people that do it.

I really like the social aspect of it in that. I do find that I struggle identifying the signs that my body sends me sometimes. The two main things I struggle with is eating and when to back off in the gym. So with food, I've reverse dieted from 1500 calories to 2800 calories with the aim to get up to 3000. Um, sometimes I struggle to eat over about the 2700 mark. Um, I have to fight, you know, that old fat guy thought in the back of my mind. And so I just want to see if I'm doing the right thing there. And when I get to that 3000 mark, mark, should I be cutting from there? When's a good time to start going, okay, well, I'm eating enough now.

In the gym, I try and stop my reps when my form breaks down, but sometimes I feel like I've got a little bit left in the tank when that starts to happen. So just want to know whether I should like white knuckle it and get through to the end of the reps or I should really just leave it there and sort of trust the fact that my form is breaking down and that's sort of the time to stop it. They're my two main questions. Yeah, good. That last part you said it right is, um, trust that your form is starting to break down and stop the set.

And the reason why I'm saying that is you, you already said earlier in your question that you struggle with kind of hearing the signs that your body's telling you. So you're gonna have to trust a lot in programming, you're gonna have to trust a lot in the logic that you understand, and not so much in your feelings, because your feelings are probably gonna lead you in the wrong direction.

As far as the diet is concerned, I could give you some numbers, but a lot of it's gonna be based on how you feel. So when you get up to 3,000 calories, if you feel like, man, I'm eating a lot and I'm like legit full, this is very difficult for me, not just because I'm afraid of gaining weight, but rather I feel stuffed, that's typically a good time to start to cut because then that means you'll end up in a place where you'll still feel relatively comfortable. I mean that's the

big, that's the big idea with reverse diet. There's, there's more to it than just that, but really you want to be, you want to end up in a place that you can sustain that doesn't feel like you're starving yourself, um, constantly. Now, since you, cause 60 kilo, sorry, 30 kilos, a lot of weight. That's what is that 70 pounds almost. Um, since you've lost that weight, reverse dieted, have you gained any weight back? Um, a little bit. Yeah, not a lot though, but I think it was probably the right kind of weight.

Are you stronger? Yeah. A hundred percent, a lot stronger. So like what I was doing. So for example, I was squatting like 60 kilos and yesterday I just squatted a hundred kilos. Wow. Wow. That's, that's in six months. So 100 kilos. Wow. That was so.

Wow. That's huge. And that's in six months. So yeah. Wow. That's incredible. No, you're doing exceptional. You know, it's, and by the way too, you don't necessarily need to like do like a traditional cut from 3000.

Like it sounds like you've found where your, your body is getting fed properly. It sounds like you're building muscle, you haven't really put much weight on. The little bit of weight you did put on sounds like it went to good, right? It went to muscle. You know, it might be like,

hey, 3,000 is a good target for me to hit. And if I fell short some days because I'm just full or busy, not a big deal, but sounds like that might be a good place to kind of be for you. So you don't necessarily need to go like, okay, I reversed diet. Now I need to go on a cut.

Um, it sounds like you're really taking care of your body right now, calorie wise and also movement wise. And so, you know, maybe that's your new, that's your new maintenance. And by the way, what Adam's saying doesn't mean if you did that, it wouldn't mean that your body just stays the same. There's a couple of ways that you create a deficit. One is to eat less, the other is to burn more. And so if you stay in that 27 to 3000 calorie range

and you're still getting stronger and building muscle, your body's actually learning to burn more calories. So you start to create the deficit from the faster metabolism. And that's, to be honest with you, because you've lost so much weight over the last year, which was not long ago, I would probably do what Adam just said. And I'd say, let's just stay here.

Let's just stay here and get strong. And then what you'll see is you'll slowly get leaner as you slowly build muscle, rather than doing the fluctuations that can really mess with people's heads. And that's the big challenge, okay. That's where we start to mess up a little bit, is where we start to do those fluctuations.

You know, commenting back on the workouts, one thing that can help as well is to do those fluctuations. You know, commenting back on the workouts, one thing that can help as well is to do scheduled time off the gym and you put it in your calendar and let's say you take a week off every seven weeks or every eight weeks or every two months, you take a whole week off, write it in the calendar and then follow it.

And just, I have to take a week off. And I'm gonna tell you, the data on taking time off in the gym when it comes to strength training is remarkable. People make faster gains when they do that typically. So that's just one way to do it. You can write in your calendar this week is off and then just listen to it and then that'll help take care of the you know if I'm doing too much or not because you'll get a whole week off every couple months. Kurt did you tell us what program you're following

right now? I didn't know if I caught that. Did I miss that? Did you, did you say, um, it's just, just a full body three times a week. Yeah. You, that you creating, are you not running any, have you, do you have any maps programs? Uh, not currently. No, I do. In between that I run your free, uh, mobility. I think it's the prime thing with the 1990s and some stuff I got from the

physio because I had bursitis for a while there from all that running. Yeah well let's send you a program. Yeah get you a mass program. Yeah I think your maps anabolic would be a great place to start, kind of similar to what you're doing but the programming is obviously you know we really stand by the program. Yeah I like that or performance just because it sounds like he's been running something like anabolic for a while. Oh, he also runs a lot.

I'm gonna say, I think performance is better, actually. Let's send you performance that'll also benefit your running and help prevent some of the potential injuries that you may be accumulating from your running. Are you noticing pain from running? Because you made that comment that you don't listen to your body, you're starting to get any issues from the running? I cut running way back. So I used to run a lot and now I only do it twice a

week, one really, really easy. And then I do the group one on the Saturdays. So I did hurt myself running that much. I did a marathon and like hurt myself halfway through that and was like, right, I need to do something else. So backed off on it a lot. That performance will benefit you. Training in other planes really going to do something else. So I've backed off on it a lot. Mass performance will benefit you. Yeah, training in other planes really gonna help benefit that. And you haven't had any flare ups with the bursitis as of your cutting down the running? No, no. I went to a physio and got some like sort of extra exercises.

And it turned out it was just like I've got a weakness in the glutes and hamstrings and stuff. You'll see when you get performance, you have, um, mobility days in there and we kind of help structure it for you, but don't, you don't be afraid to pull some out and put what your, your, your physio gave you already. You can individualize it for, yeah, you can, but that's great. So it's already kind of built in these like mobility days, which will totally going to benefit what you're doing. So I think you'll get a kick out of that program. We'll send performance to you.

Awesome. Right on, Kurt. All right, man. Yeah. Thanks so much, guys. Really appreciate it. That's awesome. Good luck, man.

You got it, brother. I think he's pretty self-aware, knows where he wants to go with the workouts. I'm so glad you said that, Adam, because that totally slipped my mind. Especially losing so much weight in a really short period of time. He may just find himself frustrated going into a cut.

He's already getting stronger. I mean, he's squat, what do you say, went up from 60 kilos a hundred? So that's tremendous gain in a six month period. Staying where he's at, he'll probably just keep getting linear and building muscle. Especially since even the little bit of weight he said he put back on, he feels like it's good weight.

Of course. And this gym is showing all, so it's like, man, you're in a good spot. Totally. Him going to a cut, he's gonna probably lose strength and potentially lose muscle. And I'll mess with his head a little bit. Yeah, yeah, why do that?

You're in a good spot, so stay there, bud. Our next caller is Dallas from Kansas. What up, Dallas? Go on, Dallas. How can we help you? It's confusing. Dallas from Kansas. What up Dallas? Go on Dallas. How can we help? That's confusing. I'd have Dallas from Kansas. My geography is all scrambled. Um, Hey guys. Awesome to be here.

Thanks for taking my question. Um, love you guys. Uh, been a fan of the show for a couple of years now listening to almost all your episodes, so I'll get right into my question. Um, so I've been lifting for about seven years doing various workouts. I came across you guys a couple years ago and have been following one of your plans since then. Every time front squats are in the program, I swap it for back squats just because I'm stronger, more comfortable. Probably a big ego thing there.

Currently in phase four, or when I wrote this question, I was currently in phase four of symmetry and decided I wanna get good at front squats, pick up a new skill. However, no matter how hard I try, I can't seem to figure it out. So I've tried the method in the videos with my hands under the bar and elbows out,

but it puts a lot of pressure under my wrists. When I squat the bar always and then the bar always moves forward, kind of throwing my balance off and it kind of feels like it's flipped or slipping out in front of me. I've tried the arms crossed over the bar, which is better, but anytime I go heavy, there's a lot of pressure on my shoulders and I have to stop. So any advice or answers you guys have would be much appreciated. Have you, have you tried it using like a towels where you wrap it over the bar and then you pinch grip it?

Yeah. So I have, um, I have like the wrist straps that you rip or wrap around the bar and that helps. However, when I start going heavier, I don't know, it kind of still puts a lot of pressure and maybe I just need to get used to it and do a lot of more reps. There's a little bit of that. There's definitely a major learning curve. I remember going through this.

I too back squatted for a long time before I started to introduce front squats consistently and felt the same way. Like there's definitely a skill to this being able to keep yourself upright and the elbows elevated and your core tight and you are dramatically weaker on fronts with at least most people are dramatically weaker front squats and back squats. And so also just being just understanding that it's going to take,

it takes a little bit of time to like practice this movement. Yeah, you said the arms cross position. You said that that's the most comfortable for you. Yeah, that's what I've, you know, when I do front squats, I haven't really done them, I tend to skip them. But when I do it, it is most comfortable. That's how I do it. That's how I do them. There's also bars too, by the way.

There's certain, you can use like a, what's the, I might slip in my name with a safety bar. Safety bar, safety bar. Or there's a product, by the way. There's certain, you can use like a, what's the, I might slip in my name with a, safety bar. Safety bar, safety bar. Safety handle. Or there's a product, no affiliation. I think it's called the, is it called the Manta Ray, Doug? I think so, yeah.

Or the Sting Ray. One of the two. It's one of those, and there's these two plastic molds that sit, they're on the bar and they go on your front delts. Yeah, it goes over your shoulders. And I've had clients use those in the past. But one thing to keep in mind while you front squat, as you're going down, also simultaneously lift your

elbows at the same time. So that because otherwise what will happen is as you squat if your elbows start to fall forward it rolls forward and then you're screwed and they're trying to hold it up with your hands. All your momentum goes forward. Yeah so what I so because I took me a long time to get better at front squats. I had to practice them for probably a year. But as you squat, lift your elbows at the same time. So lift, lift, lift, lift, lift as you squat, and then you'll find that you'll start

to get better position. But it's one of those exercises that's high skill. One of the reasons why you see nobody front squatting is exactly what you're saying. Is that they just, they take a long time to learn. As hard as it is to learn a back squat properly, it's harder for a lot of people to be able to do a front squat properly.

Unless you have aspirations, like for now, just crossing the arms and doing whatever's comfortable is just totally fine if you're just trying to get the muscles worked on the anterior. And the bodybuilding style. Yeah, bodybuilding style's fine. However, doing it the way where your wrists are back,

I mean, that's crucial in terms of a point, a foundational point for then the transition from that to any kind of Olympic lift or any of these other crossover lifts. That's like a base position that you have to learn to master. And so that's why it is worth the effort if you want to put the work in. And you're going to have to do some work

on your mobility with your wrists and your shoulders to be able to accomplish that, make it more comfortable. But if you put work into it, it will happen. By the way, the way I approach this too mentally for myself, because if I was getting hung up on the weight I was using, I'd get so frustrated. My body could handle just a much lighter day of training anyways, and I thought of it like a skill day.

It's like, hey, you know what? I'm doing front squats today, and it doesn't matter that I've got 135 on the bar or less. It's technique day to day. My body probably needs that anyway. So I started to program my front squats in kind of days like that, right? I just had the last time I let you know, two days ago

I lifted and I hit heavy squats or dead or some of that. I'm like, you know what? I'm gonna go real light and do front squats and be more technical today I still want to stimulate my legs But I don't need to really load them hard because I already loaded them hard on the last workout So that's kind of a cool way to wrap your brain around because I know how frustrating it can be when you're just like you're So much stronger on the back squat and you're like, oh, this sucks. I got to do this. But just like what Adam's saying is it's a skill.

So when you're doing it, you're just practicing the skill, which means the weight is so the way you determine how much weight you need to use in a lift is not determined by how stressed the muscle is. It's by your technique and your form. So if your form starts to break down past a certain point, well, that's the weight, that's the weight you use now. And you got to practice with that way and eventually you'll get better for sure. But it does take a while.

Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Thank you. I know I, I maybe I just need to swallow my ego cause I have to go down like way like a lot. I did too, bro. I did too. Nobody cares.

I tell you what, I caught it. I caught it up. So it just, it takes time and focusing on the technique of it and it'll come. It will. Okay. Awesome. Well, thank you so much. That was my only question. So thanks. Bye. I went through, we haven't talked about that actually, you know, that's not a bad conversation to talk about that.

We haven't really talked that much about front squats, the value of it. I mean, how many people probably do that? Just change it out, they don't say nothing to us, they just. It's one of the most underutilized valuable exercises. You rarely, rarely ever, unless somebody's doing Olympic lifts like you said.

It's all constant, I make a concerted effort to switch that out with the back load squat, just because it is one of those, if you don't address it, you're gonna lose the skill of it all also but like it's just so good to balance yourself crazy core stabilization too in that oh and it's more quad I get nasty quad hit oh yeah I enter but I normally fatigue in my core first that's how it's like to get in the can you keep loading that like loading and keeping that weight upright your core works he hella hard doing that. So it's a great movement for that.

Our next caller is Jill from Texas. Hi, Jill. How you doing, Jill? How can we help you? Hello. Hi guys. How are you? Good. Good. Um, I'm just gonna read my question. I'm excited, nervous. Thank you for taking my call. I just listened to Mind Pup episode 2264. You had a couple of male callers wanting to prep for a bodybuilding competition, but you encouraged them to consider powerlifting instead. My question is whether you would also

discourage a woman from prepping for a bikini competition, and if so, what would you encourage them to do instead? And then just a little bit about myself. I am 53 years old and in 2020 I transitioned from an endurance runner OCR competitor to bodybuilding, competed in six shows in the bikini division. Currently three months post show, now six months. It's been a few months since my email. I'm still working with my prep coach to reverse diet, contemplating whether I will do more shows in 2024. I hear you steering people away from bodybuilding shows and focus on health rather than aesthetics. Curious what you

would steer a woman towards. Not really interested in power lifting or going in that direction with my body, but I love to compete and I like to discipline of following a plan and I love to hear what you have to say. I am 5'4", 124 pounds currently, my calories in my reverse are at about 2,600. Well, that's pretty good. Yeah, that's pretty good. Nine out of 10 times, I will talk someone into doing power lifting. Yeah, that's pretty good. Nine out of 10 times I will talk someone

into doing power lifting over bodybuilding. Yeah, yeah. Nine out of 10 times. And as many times for a woman, if not more. Yeah, and now here, look, here's the deal. Here's why, okay? Here's what you can learn from bodybuilding, and this can go bad too, right?

Because bodybuilding is so, it's so visually focused. I mean, that's the whole sport, right? The whole sport is you're on stage, you're getting judged by how you look, the whole deal. If you have good body image issues, you don't develop any kind of insecurities or doesn't flare those up, you're confident, you can take the kind of criticism that you'll get

in bodybuilding or bikini. What you can learn from bodybuilding is more to do with the diet than anything. Like you could really learn how to dial a diet in, how proteins, fats and carbs affect you, how different foods affect you, how water affects you. You can, I mean that's what Adam really comes, you know, got out of it, is you can really break that down

and learn a lot, but you have to be a very confident, secure person to go through that whole process because it could be, it could also wreak havoc. So now powerlifting, the reason why we tend to move people towards powerlifting is it's all performance driven. Now you could have a terrible diet with powerlifting and sometimes people poke fun at powerlifters for doing so,

but if you have a pretty good handle on your diet, what you'll get out of powerlifting is probably more muscle, better performance, you'll feel better, you'll feed yourself, you're not gonna be so worried about what the mirror looks like. And a lot of women who want the look that they'll get from bodybuilding or bikini

actually get it from powerlifting. And not from bikini or bodybuilding. So I think, so power, and the community's, it's a great competition in the sense that you already competed So, you know what? It's like right you get on stage. Do you think? Sometimes there's politics. I think I look better than they did but they won I don't know what they're looking for then you ask the judges I want more of this less of that type of deal powerlifting you win or you lose like you either lift the weight or you don't

So it's an entirely different type of competition Probably you're probably gonna probably gonna get a similar feeling to what you did when you competed in OCR or other types of races where you win or you lose. There's no judge that's gonna tell you you lost because somebody looked different than you did. But with your experience, and you don't have to have any aspirations

of being like this super competitive, high-level power lifter. But I think the muscle, the strength, and just how you feel from that kind of lifting, I think you're gonna enjoy it. Okay. Jill, just a quick question. What is it, tell me a little bit about yourself

and like your personality, you runner, OCR, competitor, bodybuilder, you strike me as somebody who's like, I like to have competition Are you a were you an athlete in the past? Do you feel that you need to have a competition? Like where does that all come from? Yeah, I have been an athlete Pretty much all my life, but mostly in like an individualized sports not so much team sports sports, not so much team sports. But what I enjoyed about running the OCR and the bodybuilding competition is just the discipline of following a plan. Yeah, and I enjoyed that the process. I actually didn't like, you know, the stage as much with bodybuilding.

And I think that's kind of where I'm at where there's a lot of things that I liked about bikini competitions, but the things that I don't like are kind of starting to be more and more. I feel that. I feel that. Yeah. I was saying what, you know, another reason why we push people in the, you know, going to the powerlifting direction that have competitive mindsets of all three of those, that one is

going to be the healthiest for your body. You know, competing to be a powerlifter, you know, is going to be the healthiest one of the three, even though some people think that might be. You can go wrong to powerlifter too, but in that context, your painting, Adam, is 100%. And that's true. There's examples of healthy and bad in all categories, but generally speaking, the wear and tear on your body from marathon running or OCR running is pretty rough. The dieting nutritionally, not the best thing metabolically and also for us visually what's

going on like being obsessed with like the aesthetics and being judged on them not the best thing for a lot of people and so typically training to get strong and in order to get stronger you have to feed your body appropriately so they it goes hand in hand with better food choices. And I love to take somebody like you, who is already experienced in dieting for bikini, to powerlifting world because you understand macros really well compared to the average powerlifter, where the average powerlifter is just like, oh, eat more to be strong, eat more, whatever,

where you have a better discipline and understanding. So taking your discipline, understanding around nutrition, but now starting to shift it and apply it to getting stronger in the gym is just a good place to be. Even if you don't want to go to a meet and go compete, like let's just say you followed our Maps powerlifting program, doesn't mean you got to go sign up for a meet. Maybe you just take what you've learned from bodybuilding and the nutrition piece and you apply that knowledge to, Hey, let's go get stronger in the gym. And what I think you'll see is you're going to get some incredible body results from that. You're going to build a body that you're going to be very impressed

with was the initial reservation because you still felt like this might create this bulky sort of aesthetic. And, and it was like something that was unappealing to you in that regard. bulky sort of aesthetic and it was like something that was unappealing to you in that regard? Yeah, and it's like mentally, I know that that's not true logically cause I know you guys talk about it all the time, but it's still hard to get around that.

Oh yeah. I still feel like if I go to the gym and if I feed myself well and if I'm lifting heavy, I'm gonna grow. Yeah, so I would do this Jill like if you were my client and you gave me the reins to like this what I want you to do I'd want you to follow our Maps powerlifting program with the intent to get strong build muscle feed your body accordingly and then I would allow you

to let's say the last because let's say we're not gonna go compete like you don't care about going to the actual meet I'd say okay let's now for the last six weeks pretend like we're getting lean I'd say, okay, let's now for the last six weeks pretend like we're getting lean for a bodybuilding show and let's reveal what this powerlifting training and dieting did for your body. And so that way you kind of get the best of both worlds. I'd reverse diet you and train you in the powerlifting style. And then after we've been doing that, after we've been doing that for two or three months,

then I'd let you go to kind of a diet to like getting ready for a bikini show so you could see not that extreme, but to let yourself to go into a cut and then reveal what we just built and did. The most ideal situation and what Adam was kind of probing you about in terms of being competitive, like if you can figure out how to be competitive going through our programs, like this is why we tried to really craft a lot of different options for people to go through to be able to get a novel stimulus and get your body to keep being able to react and respond while progressing. But take you on this journey. Take you on a functional journey.

Take you on a more restorative journey. Build yourself up and then also reveal this new physique that you've built through this entire process. So it doesn't necessarily have to be a sanctioned competition per se. Like you can really just challenge yourself to get through some of these other types of adaptations to seek. OK, I do like the idea of it being more of a performance-based sport than in getting away from the aesthetics. Yeah. I think you're going to be, you'll be playing, if you can do this, if you can stick to it,

I think at the end of it, you're going to be like, oh, I look better. I think that's what's going to end up happening. You're like, oh my God, okay. My fears were unwarranted. And I actually like the way I, I tell you what, look, I've worked with people who compete on stage and especially women, I'll have them go through powerlifting cycles all the time and they'll come, they'll hit the stage

and they'll look better each time from doing so. You know what's funny, Jill, is that, so I train a lot of bikini competitors and what I would do, because a lot of them had reservations around powerlifting, is I wouldn't even tell them, but I would create basically a powerlifting program and I'd make them follow it,

but I wouldn't tell them that we're doing that. I would tell them we're reverse dieting, this is our focus right now, but really what I was structuring is something almost identical to our power lifting program. I just didn't call it that because I know that people hear that they have reservations of, oh God, I don't want that to look like a power lifter,

but all my bikini competitors, when we got out of a show, that's exactly what our training looked like going afterwards, so, you know know if you trust the process you trust us that's what I would do with you and I think you'll be really happy so I'd love to give that to you and I'd love to hear back from you as you go through it. Yeah absolutely that sounds great and I absolutely trust you guys so. Awesome. Alright good deal we'll send that over to you and then give us some follow up okay. Follow back up Jill okay all right thank you

thank you have a good day you too you got it yeah the I want to bring some up real quick yeah just for the audience to know like so we we do have programs that are competitive right right we have the dark horse which is old-time strength which starts out with a standard of like, these are the exact lifts, these three lifts that you're gonna be competitive with, here's the way to build it up to that point in degree. Compete within the program.

Compete within the program, the OCR trains you to build yourself up for that specific type of competition, power lifts, same type of thing. So it's there for you. I just think you don't have to be sanctioned. No, you said it perfectly, Justin. You said it perfectly. We wrote a lot of the programs with that intent of, hey,

go approach this competitive mindset to that program of, I'm going to get good at these things that these guys created in here. And it was really structured with that way. And if you have an open mind and you approach all the maps programs that way, you're going to garner a ton of results and you're going to find yourself progressing consistently instead of what most people, what happens to most people is they seek good results for awhile and then they

hit a hard plateau and they don't know how to break out of it. Like that's your answer right there. Totally. Look, we have a guide. It's a free guide that teaches you how to squat like a pro, like everything that goes into maximizing your squat. It's how to squat like a pro. It's a free guide that teaches you how to squat like a pro. Like everything that goes into maximizing your squat, it's how to squat like a pro. It's a free guide you can find at mindpumpfree.com. You can also find all of us on Instagram.

Justin is at Mind Pump Justin. I'm at Mind Pump DeStefano and Adam is at Mind Pump Adam. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Super Bundle at mindpumpmedia.com. The RGB Super Bundle includes Maps Anabolic,

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