Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 945: The Best Rest Periods for Muscle Gain & Fat Loss

Episode Date: January 14, 2019

In this episode, Sal, Adam & Justin discuss the best rest periods between exercises. Is ‘competitive sleep’ a thing? The power of your mental state and not always fixating on measurable tools. (2:18) Mind Pump: The Whistleblowers of the Fitness Industry. The importance of how you SAY things and COMMUNICATE them. (9:40) Adam gets in a ‘tiff’, over social media, with a trainer about a ‘Jefferson Curl’. The ‘elitist’ attitude fitness professionals have in the space, the risk vs. reward of an exercise & MORE. (14:49) The most under-modified variable: The significance of rest periods. (26:35) The BEST rest periods for muscle gain & fat loss. (35:55) How often do you recommend someone phase their rest periods? (38:15) The art of perfecting the skill and not throwing fatigue on it. (44:13) For the competitor, how much of an impact does varying your rest periods make? (48:20) People Mentioned: David Alexander (@dzandertraining)  Instagram Stuart McGill (@drstuartmcgill)  Twitter Jordan Peterson (@jordan.b.peterson)  Instagram Stan "Rhino" Efferding (@stanefferding)  Instagram IFBB LEGEND FLEX WHEELER (@officialflexwheeler)  Instagram Products Mentioned: January Promotion: MAPS Anabolic ½ off!!   **Code “RED50” at checkout** The Jefferson Curl: Benefits and Proper Form - BarBend Mind Pump Blog Mind Pump Free Resources

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND fitness. We start out by talking about the pluses and minuses of technology and tracking. So you get a lot of new devices that are out there that will track your sleep, track your steps. It's ruining Doug's sleep. Track your food, it has. A lot of benefit to them, but can they also reduce your quality of life and maybe even reduce your progress? Good part of that episode, then we talked about performance versus health in athletics and an exercise known as the Jefferson Curl. Adam got a little tiff with somebody on Instagram again. It was really a tiff.

Now it was more of a, what's below a tiff? Like a friendly nudge. Like a nudge, like a nudge. Yeah, a friendly nudge. Yeah, a friendly nudge. So we talked about that. Little Poke Poke. Then we talked about quarter squats and plyometrics.

And then we got out of the bulk of the episode where we talked about the most underutilized, yet probably one of the most effective variables that you can mess with to get your body to respond again in terms of building muscle and burning body fat and improving your performance, rest periods. Yes, they're that important.

So we talk all about rest periods in this episode. I'd also like to remind everybody that this month our flagship foundational fitness program, Maps and Obolic is 50% off. All you gotta do is go to mapsfitinistproducts.com and use the code red50-R-E-D-5-0, no space, and get half off. That program is excellent for speeding up your metabolism,

building muscle, and sculpting your body and getting stronger. It's got a brand new look, Sal. That's right, new version is gonna be coming out, but if you have it now, or you get it now with the 50% off, you'll be updated automatically. By the way, at mapsfititnessProducts.com, we have other Maps Fitness programs. Many of them suited for different people

and different goals. Go see which one works best for you. Hey, I hear your sleep's getting a little bit better nowadays, huh? Yeah, I've taken away the competitive aspect of it. Compared to sleep, it's a little bit more. This is so many ways that these, there's a app that you can use for your sleep, it gives you a sleep score.

Yeah, yeah. And so I was using it and I was trying to improve my sleep because it's something I don't do well. I don't get to bed early enough in that type of thing. Typically though, I've been able to sleep all night long and not have an issue, but then I started using this app trying to become more aware of my sleep, get to bed earlier.

And it was helping with that, it was helping me get to bed earlier. However, I was waking up all the time. I couldn't figure that out. That's not like me. And then I realized after doing it for about two weeks and getting horrible sleep that I was competing.

I was competing to get a good score, right? Oh, it's funny though, I could see. Totally true. Yeah, no, I could see how that would happen. I mean, think about how many times have you guys had a night where you're restless and you can't sleep and all you're thinking about is trying to sleep. Of course, yeah.

And then it just makes it worse. Or you go to, like you know, you have to wake up at a particular time to be somewhere. So like, I gotta wake up, I'll make sure I set my alarm. And then you end up waking up every hour, checking your alarm, be like, okay, I got two more hours. I got two more. It just goes to show you how powerful

your mental state is. And all these devices and tools that we use are only good if they're used properly. If they start making you so hyper aware and focused on things that you're constantly trying to, you know, sleep is a, sleep is by nature and unconscious thing. This is even how I feel, I have to explain to people

that, because for a long time on this show, I talk about how much I love the fit bit or tools like that and I promote using things like that. The problem is that some people take it so literally, I would say your average person. Yeah, and they hang on every number. And so, and they're always so concerned, how accurate is it?

Is this or it said that? It's just like, whoa, the idea is, it's, there's such great tools. And even the sleep stuff that Doug's talking about, it's like, I think they're all positive, awesome tools. I mean, it's data that us as trainers 15 years ago didn't have that. I mean, wow, if I have something that my client can come back

and say, hey, Adam, I've been using that app. You told me, and I guess I get horrible sleep or hey, Adam, I've been using the Fitbit and wearing it around. And I averaged 4,000 steps and it's saying that my body, that as a trainer for coaching, oh my God, that just, that takes all the guessing out of it for me. And even if it's not precise,

I at least now have a general idea of this person's daily movement, calorie expenditure, intake, and then what they're sleeping in. It's interesting, I've given this a lot of thought because I do feel the same way about technology and how valuable a lot of the feedback is, but at the same time, I even find myself just always, like, I can't keep fixating on it. There's like a three to four weeks sort of period where I'm like, okay, I get it.

Like, you can kind of understand where you are currently, and I think it's important to kind of assess or like almost have a phase where like that's part of the process of like, I'm focusing on, you know, gathering all this data. Now I have to implement a plan and work on those specific things, come back and revisit it later and kind of see where I'm at in order to, yeah, because you can, you can get competitive with it. Like if it's telling me my score is low, that's gonna like build a little anxiety,

subconsciously with me. We see this all the time with people who count macros religiously do it all the time. It becomes that itself becomes a stress. That itself is like funny. There seems to be in that too, right? There seems to be these two camps, either your extreme and proit or your extreme

anti it. It's like, no, there's, I think there's this middle ground of, you know, there's a great, there's a lot of great things that come from tracking and counting and weighing and measuring and learning about the food that you're in taking on a regular basis. But then there's something to be said about becoming so attached to that that you can't just relax and go out and have it. This applies to anything, any kind of objective information, you can completely, it can totally contribute to more stress and more anxiety. I remember, as in my 20s, when I really started to become interested in world affairs, when

I really got interested in politics and economics. There was like a two year period where it was a period where it made me wait like two years way more anxious and way more paranoid just because I became so much more aware of all the shit that was happening around me. And then I had to kind of unplug and disconnect and find this kind of balance where I know information, but now I know how to manage, you know, how to fix me. I mean, if you go to a psychologist and you tell them that you're super anxious, and one

of the, one of the things they may say to you is stop watching the news. Because being so hyper aware of everything that's around you can contribute to that. And all of these, these objective measurable statistics that we use in health and fitness can totally to that. And all of these objective measurable statistics that we use in health and fitness can totally become that. We see it a lot in our space, in the hardcore fitness space, what when you see the bikini competitors or bodybuilders or trainers or just fitness fanatics,

they become so fixated on measurable, objective statistics that they, their fitness and nutrition and health no longer improve the quality of life, it actually becomes a detriment. I know a lot of people like this. I know a lot of people where their workouts have to happen at the exact same time, they have to have exact same right type of nutrition if they're macros or,

if they don't count macros, I coach people like this all the time. Like I'll tell them, okay, we're not gonna count macros for a week and it causes tremendous anxiety in there Yeah, because they know they go away overboard afterwards or they just don't know like I got account I got a measure of it and then what I'll do is I'll sell I'll tell them we're not gonna aim for any targets But I want you to just kind of tell me what you've been eating and you know what they end up doing eating the same thing every day Because they're so afraid of fearing off anything. And so these things cause that type of stress and it's funny how that affects your health,

like Doug was saying, you tried to get better sleep and it made it sleep a lot more. Well, this is one of those things too that always makes it challenging as a coach or trainer to help people because there's, there's always depends on who I'm talking to on if I think this is a positive thing or a negative thing for you.

And so when we get on the mics and we share stuff like this, I always try to be really careful on how much I'm pro, something, or how much I'm anti-synatic. Because depending on the client, I see, man, there's certain people that I have to have you track. It's necessary. It's like, you need to do that because you don't have any clue whatsoever what you're consuming and I need to make you aware.

Then there's other people, like you said, and I've trained a lot of these people that are bikini competitors and have been weighing and measuring food or other fitness professionals that have become so attached to it that they have this really bad relationship with it. And those people it's like, I don't want you to even think about tracking. So, and I feel like that's kind of almost everything we talk about. It really, I really feel, and I think, you know, we are talking the other day, Danny and I, and we're just talking about, you know, part of

Danny and I, and we're just talking about You know part of mine pumps message and I referred to us as being kind of like the whistle blowers of the fitness industry Like somebody need to come out and tell all these fucking gurus that you're all wrong and you're all right Yeah, you know, it's it's it needs to be checked No, that's what it all right is because what we what we try and do is we try to get we try and get into these You know these camps and it my way is better what we try and do is we try to get, we try and get into these camps, and my way is better than your way. And it's like, well, the reality of it is, there's such a huge individual variance amongst all of us

as humans that, almost all of these camps, there's certain things that they talk to as like, foundational or breaks or must-haves that, yeah, it applies to a certain percentage of those people, but then it's totally, the opposite message that I'd probably want to give to another percentage. And there's so many different methods and tools

that are super valuable, but you find that it has no value with somebody, or it has value down the road with somebody. And so it's discerning all of that as a coach. That's why for me, it's always been, it's frustrating to speak in general terms of like, you know, like what you should focus on. It always seems like, you know, for me as a trainer, I would kind of lead with that and then I would find all this information out. I'm like, oh no, no, that's not what we need to be doing. And that's what I really started focusing on the assessment portion and spending way more time gathering information.

And that way it's like, you can, based off of my limited knowledge at the time, like now, if I went back and I was like to sort of plug certain specific tools and methods for individual, I feel like I'd be much more effective because I could say, well, in this situation, a keto diet makes a whole lot of sense, you know, based off of what you just told me, and you know, you could kind of plug in play and match. It's all about how you say things.

You know, what you say is important, but how you say it is as important, if not more important. Like, for example, if I tell somebody, consistency with your workout is extremely important. Okay, now what if somebody took that to heart and could not miss a single workout and it totally took away from their quality of life.

Or I could say consistency is extremely important with your workout. For the most part, be very, very consistent, but I also want you to be OK with missing a few workouts, a few invocations, and stuff like that. How you communicate? I remember, for me, there was a couple huge breakthroughs with my own personal health and fitness.

One of them was being able to not work out when I go on vacation, that was huge. I remember the first vacation I went on, it was a week long, I went to Italy and I had plans, we went to this small town in Italy where my ex-wife is from. And in that small town, we didn't have a car, we would walk everywhere.

And there was one gym that I would work out at, and I had to remember it from the previous time we had visited. Well, that gym had closed down, so I was screwed, panic, nowhere to work out. So I don't work out for, actually it was two weeks, I don't work out for two weeks, and it was extremely liberating. Now did I lose some strength and all that stuff I did, but when I came back, it came right back. Mm-hmm. Very quickly. The other time I got blown away was the first time I started messing around with fasting, and muscle didn't just melt off my body.

I was so rigid and stuck on the fact that I had to eat every three hours, and I had to have this much protein every single day, or I was gonna lose all this muscle. Then I fasted, and I lost no muscle. I felt fine. In fact, I felt great and I was able to kind of break these chains from all these things that was actually, I didn't realize at a time, was causing me more stress than it was taking away. And so it's important. The way you communicate these things is very important. I hate to say everything's about balance because that's so overplayed, but it's totally true and it's especially true

when it comes to, so you know, when you take the average person who has zero idea what they're doing, it's important to track up first, just so you know, you have to know, like, how much sugar are you eating? I have no idea. Let's find out.

Let's look, wow, you're eating a lot of sugar. Let's try cutting that down a little bit. But then at some point, you want to move away from the constant counting and tracking and rigidity of these types of things. Because I mean, imagine if you went to the doctor and you got blood work every week, you know what I mean? Oh, I got to change this.

I got to change it. It'll be so stressful. It'll be a stressful situation. So the solution then becomes the problem. And so the message needs to be communicated in a way, and that's something that I think we try to do all the time, needs to be communicated in a way where people get more of what's really going to benefit them long term, and less of the flashbang. Here's what's cool, here's what's going to work for the next 30 days, but never work again for you type of

deals. Did you guys see the post that I went back and forth with David Alexander, the trainer that trains all the pro athletes over in Florida? No, so you were telling that he deleted the whole thing. Yeah, no, it got, it was hit when he deleted it. I think it had like 45 or 50,000 views, like over four, 500 comments. He did lead the whole post. Yeah, he did.

Oh, wow. What happened? Well, he put a post that he took a video from somebody else's page and it looks like it's another trainer in Florida who has a small following. I think they only had like eight or 10,000 followers, but probably a competitor in the area. And he did a video of it and he says, can someone please tell me why this is being done?

I mean, seriously, I wanna know why I'm not attacking or shooting or criticizing on this person. I would just like to learn from a scientific physiology, mathematical hell, any damn place really. And he goes on and on and talk about this guy doing a Jefferson curl. And I just just made a statement on it, or he didn't know what it was.

He says, why, what is it? And I put underneath there, it's a Jefferson's Crow and, you know, most people don't have the mobility to do a movement like this, but it has its applications. And that's all I said. And then he like responded to me with this, you know, cut and paste of stew, stew McGill, quote. And I, which I love all of McGill stuff, I think he's a brilliant, brilliant man.

And I think what he was saying was correct, but he also cherry picked information to support what he was trying to say. And it's like, well, if you've listened to or read more of what McGill said, he doesn't say, he's probably speaking more to the average person. Yeah, he is. He's saying athlete, which is what I said too.

It's like 99% of all clientele I've trained, I would never teach at Jefferson's Cruel II. Maybe the handful of gymnasts that I've trained, those are the people that I would train that, because it's very sport specific. Like nobody else is gonna really need to be able to take something to that range of motion with a weighted loaded. Yeah, loading right. So that was kind of my my debate. And I kind of jabbed a little bit out of him because I was just like, you

know, that was a lot of words to try and prove your point, you know, that he copied the pace. And then if you're also going to cite McGill, you should cite what he finished saying about that, which is exactly what I said, and that there's an application for it. So I think that, and again, it's this elitist attitude that we all seem to have in the space that drives me fucking crazy is that we think that our method are a way. And the reason I think it why it kind of irritated me

a little bit is because if we going to talk about what's healthiest for his people and for the average person, that's one conversation, then if we're going to talk about performance, it's another conversation also. A guy who trains professional athletes, and that's his expertise, and what he's great at, I don't even have to see what you're teaching. I already know your job when you train a professional athlete is to not correct all their dysfunction and imbalances and fix those people. It's to enhance what they've already built upon for 20 plus years of playing their sport over and over.

Fortify the joints to preserve their career. Right. So from getting hurt. And so if you're training basketball players and I know this because I've been following them for a long time, and I like a lot of the stuff that he puts out, I really do, especially when it supports specific types of talk. And you're doing quarter squats with basketball players that have, you know, fucking an asymmetrical shift

and pronating in their feet. Like you're not trying to fix that, I get that. You wouldn't want to because you didn't know that would actually take away from their performance in that core. So how are you gonna pull the sliver out of somebody else's eye for doing like a Jefferson curl? That's this very sport specific type of movement like for gymnast when you're over here teaching Stuff for professional athletes like it's the same fucking thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, when it comes to exercise and movement If you can do a movement and this is this statement is true for anything if you can do a movement, and this is this statement is true for anything,

if you can do a movement with good control and good stability and good mobility, okay? So you have to have those three things. So good control, stability and mobility, then that movement's okay, that's it. I don't care what the movement is, I really don't care. It could be the craziest movement of all time. If you, the person doing it has really good control

and stability throughout the movement, throughout the entire movement, they own it and good mobility, it's fine. Now, exercises come with a benefit and risk. And some exercises have a lot of risk and very little benefit to that risk. And other exercises have a lot of benefit and very little risk to that risk. And other exercises have a lot of benefit and very little risk.

And when you're dealing with athletes, a lot of times you're playing in that, a lot of, you know, a lot of times you're playing with a high risk, some benefit because you're trying to improve the performance. It's like, look, you know, if I'm trying to make a drag car go faster in the quarter mile, and it's already doing a six second quarter mile. I'm gonna do things to that car that are gonna give it

a little bit of benefit, but increase the risk a lot. Like, okay, let's increase the pressure, even more on this engine, what's the risk? It's gonna explode, but we may squeeze out point to seconds out of the quarter mile. If you're a sports performance guy, you're the wrong guy to be calling out what's healthy and what's not healthy.

Sports are not healthy. Wake up everybody. Like risk management is, sports is not a healthy thing for the body. It's not. It's a fact. Doing anything repetitively over, pushing your body to the limits.

To pushing your body to extreme limits and then doing anything repetitively over and over and over again, especially when it's not balanced on the body is not ideal and healthy. And eventually, like, let's talk about where all these athletes, these great athletes that you're probably training right now are at in 20, 30 years. Like because most of the training that you do

for these athletes are not about health and longevity It's about performance and getting the most out of their body, which is awesome And I'm not shitting on I think it's fucking rad that how far we've evolved as humans And we can teach ourselves to jump up and dunk a basketball and 360 and do cool shit But that's not healthy. No, we're pressing the boundaries So like we want to see where the human potential lies. It's great point, you're pressing the boundaries. So how could you get somebody who's pressing the boundaries

on something like that? Obviously, like a Jefferson curl is the boundaries of your spine. You know, like they are like definitely expressing the boundaries. But you look at gymnastics, what are they doing? They're under an extreme amount of stress in very extreme range of emotion. And so you gotta build strength.

You have to because if they don't, how are they gonna get out of these positions that they put themselves in? And they have to put themselves in those positions because it's part of the sport and they're being judged on it. And so as a coach, you need to be able to get them strong in these movements.

And so yes, it's a great point. It's something that, especially if that's not in your realm, if it's in a different sport entirely, they're gonna have a whole another standard to abide by. Have you, how many athletes have you met who are 20 and 30 years post retirement? Right? How do they move? Oh, terrible. The worst. I mean, like the most dysfunction, Athletes have you met who are 20 and 30 years post retirement, right? How do they move? Oh terrible. I like the worst. I mean like the most dysfunction I ever saw in clients were my athletes and the higher the level the more dysfunction

Oh, I mean you meet a you made a 50 or 60 year old guy or girl who was a professional High-level high-intensity type athlete and just watched them walk. Many of them look like they've either had replacements of joints, they're moving like they're 100 years old, they're on pain killers. And some sports are worse than others. Football players and boxers tend to be worse off than swimmers or whatever.

But it's an extreme level of performance. You're pushing your body to the limit. So like, for example, for myself, I'd love to train for maximal strength. Guess what's probably gonna be something that's gonna end up going away for me soon. Training for maximal strength. It doesn't make sense for me to push my body

to, you know, deadlift 550 pounds at max intensities as I start to get older because the benefit I'm gonna get out of that is small. Am I gonna get some benefit from it? Sure, I'll get a little bit more muscle, a little stronger. The risk is much higher. And the fact that I've been doing it now for... That keeps increasing.

And it keeps increasing. And so it's like when you see some of our friends on Instagram who keep hurting themselves over and over again. It's like, well, yeah, you've been pushing your body now for 10, 15 years. You know, at some point, you got to kind of scale it back a little bit and you got to look a little different.

I'm okay with that too, as long as. There is nothing wrong with that. Especially when you, hey, that's what I'm trying to be the best athlete in the world. I don't give a fuck. I'm not thinking about, I want to live an extra two years. Yeah, you know what I'm saying? I'm thinking about I want to be the best athlete.

Totally fine, I get it. You know what I'm saying there's nothing. With the Jefferson curl, I mean, I get it. And I'm saying that. Now with the Jefferson curl, I mean, I think it's important to be specific on that. First of all, if the average person saw a Jefferson curl, they'd freak out, because it looks like, well, they should. Yeah, it looks like you're lifting something

in the way you were taught not to, right? So basically you're standing up tall, and you're holding a barbell, and while keeping your legs straight, you bend over, but you do it in a way to where you're really rounding your entire back and you're really rounding the whole body. So you're trying to articulate each vertebrae

and pull up with your spine in a sense. Now here's why it's dangerous for a lot of people, because when people push their spine to that level of articulation, they end up relying on the joints of the spine itself to support them. So they'll push their body to that limit. And then what's supporting them is the joint. So it's no different than fully extending my elbow,

but then locking my elbow, almost relaxing the muscles that are supporting in that position, but still being able to keep my elbow locked because the joint itself is now in a position where it's locked. Now, if I add resistance to that, obviously, if I keep resistance to that, obviously, if I keep adding resistance, my elbow's gonna go backwards. The force is gonna go right into the joint.

Right, same thing with my knees, if I lock my knees, and then kinda relax the muscles, so they're not supporting the joint. I'm gonna look like a flamingo if I add too much resistance. So the key with the Jefferson curl is to articulate all that extreme movement, but have control for the whole time and not allow the joints to support you,

but rather the muscles that are supporting the joints. So in order to do that, you get a really good body awareness. You just do. You have to really know your body and know how far to go and how to control all these little joints of the spine. And if you can do all that, a Jefferson curls a fucking awesome exercise. But guess how many people out of a hundred have that kind of

control not even 1%. That's what I said 99% of the people have no business doing it. But I feel the same way about a quarter squat, you know 99% of the people have no business doing that either. Right. Right. But we we still teach it for specific reasons for athletes and it does have its application for them. And it is a no-brainer for those athletes but it's not for everybody else. I feel like that about plyometrics. Yeah.

Plyometrics have been bastardized now for two fucking long. It's way too misused. It's just, if I go into any gym, I'm gonna see some knucklehead trainer having their clients jump on shit or jump over shit because it makes them tired. And it's like, there's no reason.

There's absolutely no, they're not gonna gain it. First of all, they don't have enough control to gain from that exercise. All you're doing is dramatically increasing the risk of their workouts. But do plyometrics have an application for fucking high level athletes who have good control and we're trying to work on power? Hell yeah, plyometrics have an application for fucking high level athletes who have good control and we're trying to work on power?

Hell yeah, plyometrics are a game changer if done properly for a lot of people, but most people don't waste your time. Right, right. You know that reminds me of something that you brought up the other day that you wanted to talk about, which I think is a good transition is, you know, rest periods. The most under-modified variable. I think so too, man. One of my favorite things actually, when I get somebody who's been training

very, very consistently for a long time, is to kind of monitor how they're pace and like, time it without them really knowing that I'm doing it. You know, go at your pace here, and I'm just gonna stop watch it, and then I can see, because we all tend to do this. And just like the way we gravitate to

the same type of exercises that we'd love to do so much, we also gravitate towards a specific rest period. And the longer you've been training, the more likely you've probably been stuck in a rest period. And you just never see or not never you rarely ever see somebody carrying a stopwatch or looking up at the clock to actually hold themselves accountable to a 60 second, a 90 second, a 30 second. 100%. People will count reps, they'll count sets, they'll pay attention to the exercises that they're doing, but very few people will actually look at and count their rest periods and modify.

It's a variable. It's one of the variables in your workouts that you should modify and play with because your body will respond. I remember the first time I figured this out. I was, I don't remember how old I was, I was a kid. I was probably 18, 19 years old. I think I was 19 and I was working out. And I had a meeting with my district manager. So it was 19. This is when I was managing the first gyms that I managed.

So I was out there working out. And for whatever reason I got started late, I think I had to talk to one of my front desk staff members. And so what ended up turning, what was supposed to be an hour workout, and I had, I knew exactly how long my workouts would take and I ended up with like 35 minutes. And I'm the kind of person I hate doing half my workout

and not finishing the half, I just can't stand it. So I'm like, shit, I have 35 minutes, I gotta do this whole workout, my district manager is gonna be here in 35 minutes so I can't, I gotta meet with them. So I went out there and I caught all my rest periods in half, and I didn't time them, but I definitely worked out a lot faster,

and I couldn't go as heavy as a result, right? I can't do as many reps with the second and third set because rather than resting a minute and a half, I'm resting 30 seconds or 40 seconds. And so I started doing this, I did this for the whole workout and I remember the pump that I had from the workout. And then I remember how I felt the day after. And then I maintained this faster pace for like a few weeks and I saw my body change.

And that's when it dawned on me. It's like, oh my god, why am I not messing with rest periods like I do with all everything else in my training. And so it's just, and it's easy. This is such an easy one. Like you don't have to get complicated with your workouts. Just look at your rest periods and say, okay, this week I'm resting, you know, and by the way, for a lot of people, this is the funny part. For a lot of, I would say, I'm gonna be a little generalized here.

I found that my female clients had a tougher time with the long rest periods. And my male clients had a tougher time with the short rest periods. Yeah And my male clients had a tougher time with the short-rest periods. So yeah. You guys find that? They want to get shit done. Yeah, they're in there to work. And yeah, that was always the case.

I was always trying to kind of, okay, it's okay to relax. Like, you know, take our time and, like, kill what's next. Kill what's next. Kill what's next. And, you know, I'm ready. That was very, very, yeah, very much like,

you know, something that was common amongst a lot of the females I tried. Well, because it feeds into the whole aerobics type thing. Yeah, I need to burn body fat. Yeah, that's what's been marketed the most. Yeah, circuit training in aerobics classes have been marketed to them so much for so long that it's just, it's in their nature. I mean, I train one client right now and she loves to go take orange theory.

And so when she gets me, it's like I always have to like stop her. Like, no, rest. Yeah, I know you, I know you can go back and do it again, but rest. Yeah. You know, I want you, I want you to rest. And if it's that easy, then I'm going to put more weight on this motherfucker. Yeah, it's, we need to communicate why it's a variable that's important to, to mess with because, because rest is like your sets. In the sense that your rest periods will change how your workouts affect your body. So if you rest longer, it affects everything else. If you rest longer, you're going to be stronger

with your sets and be able to lift much heavier. If you cut your rest periods shorter, you're not able to lift as heavy, but you are going to build more lactic acid in the muscles. You are going to create more waste products. And you're going to increase what's it called transient, circle plasma hypertrophy, which just a way for me to sound real smart and reality just means pump. You're just going to increase the pump or improve the pump. And the pump itself has its own benefits. And I mean, we can get real complicated

and talk about all the energy systems and stuff. Yeah, well, you can do that in a simple way. You can do that in a simple way. And I used to do that to explain that to people is, when every time that we sit down and we rest between sets, or every time we exercise, we do movement, our body uses energy molecules. It breaks down ATP and ADP, right?

It utilizes that in order to perform that set. When you sit down and you rest, your body is naturally starting to replenish that storage. So, and the longer you rest, and it maxes out at about three minutes, is what the most of the studies point to. So once you hit that three minute mark, the difference between three minutes

and four minutes and five minutes isn't a major difference. But there is a major difference between three minutes, two minutes, one minute, 30 seconds, on how much more your body replenishes for you to have to go into the next set. So what most people that, and what I normally recommend before you try

and manipulate your time is to first track it like anything else I would normally recommend is figure out where you're at and then I normally push people to the opposite into the spectrum so they can really see the benefits. So you know, regardless, we did an overgeneralization of, you know, women tend to do this, men tend to that, but there's exceptions to those rules. So what's more important is find out where you are. Are you the guy or girl who sits on their phone or spends a lot of time between rest periods and you tend to push the two and a half minute

beyond mark between sets? Or are you the person that tends the link closer to the 30 second to one minute mark? And whichever one you are, go to the opposite in the spectrum. If you're somebody who is used to the fast rest periods and you rarely ever rest longer than a minute and a half, maybe two tobs, well, then do three minute rest periods and see what

that and increase weight. Because you're going to see you're going to be able to increase way more weight. If you're somebody who fast, fast, fast, and you've gotten really good at that, and then I'll send you decide to give yourself long rest periods, watch how much stronger you are set after set after set. And really pay attention to your composure. Like, especially if you're new to a certain workout or just like new in general to come into the gym, I was always having to have them really pay attention to when they felt like they recovered.

And then they could come back to the exercise with the proper mechanics and they were able to maintain that composure and be able to perform the left versus just like a very specific time. And I would time it out, but this is as a coach, I would look and pay attention to how long it took them to even recover you know, recover fully in terms of being able to communicate back with me and they're not breathing heavy, you know, they're not shaky, like all these sort of like indications of, okay, let's, okay, now

again, here's the next set. That's such a great, such a great point because I think it's important to communicate that for beginners. I usually use a long rest period. Now, it's not because the long rest period is better or worse. It's because with a beginner, their form is so hard to get them to move properly anyway. That I want to get rid of every obstacle

that's going to prevent them from moving really well. And fatigue is the biggest one. And so if I don't have them, if I have them rest too short, then they're fatigued in their form breaks down. And in the beginning, what the beginner, my goal is, I gotta get you to move right. And really anything I throw at you is gonna work,

but I need you to move right so that later on, when we're pushing your body, you've got good movement patterns. It's later on that I start to mess with the, with the rest periods where I can shorten them because now they've got those good, those good solid foundation and your body will respond in, in all new ways. And so that's what's so powerful about it. Well, so here's what I hate about studies with, with fitness.

This is the thing and I'm, you know, I, I'm really grateful that I have as much experiences I have in fitness because it's allowed me to view all other studies in realms I don't have in expertise in more of a skeptical eye. So here's what I'm talking about. If you were to look up what rest period builds the most muscle? Yeah, and burns the most fat. Yeah, yeah.

If you look up those two things, you're gonna find two different answers, but let's just talk about building muscle. If I look up what rest period builds the most fat. Yeah, yeah. If you look up those two things, you're gonna find two different answers, but let's just talk about building muscle. If I look up what rest period builds the most muscle, here's where you're gonna find long rest periods, build the most muscle. You know, two, three minute rest periods, one and a half minutes maybe for people

who have more more condition. But essentially what they say in the studies is longer rest periods are better. They're stronger, you replenish more ATP, which is the energy that Adam was talking about. And they build more muscle in these six to 12 week studies when they compare them to short rest periods. And that is absolutely true, 100%.

If we were just solely to compare head to head, rest periods for six weeks. And we have for that amount of time. Yeah, and we were never gonna change anything. And we're like, okay, here's where you're gonna stay for the rest of your life. Yeah, and you just want gonna change anything. And we're like, okay, here's where you're gonna stay for the rest of your life. Yeah, and you just want to build muscle and you want to maximize what weights do for you.

Sure, the longer rest periods are gonna work a little bit better, but there's some other things you need to know. The other rest periods also work. Now, when you compare them head to head, the longer rest periods build more muscle, but that doesn't mean the other ones don't build muscle too. They also do, and here's the second part.

At some point, whatever you're doing, if you do it all the time and you don't change it, stops working completely. So if I were to take and extend that study out for a year, and then I were to compare two groups and say this group over here, focuses on a 30 second rest period for four weeks and then moves to a 90 second rest period for four weeks and moves to a 30 second rest period for four weeks and then moves to a 90 second rest period for four weeks and moves to a 120 second rest period and then goes back down and then this other group over here, they just do the long rest period the whole time.

What you'll find is the one that cycles through the different rest periods will have better results. Which is the exact same thing that we find in the studies that talk about rep ranges. Exactly. If you go look at studies for what rep ranges burn the most fat or what rep ranges burn them or build the most muscle, they're going to say in a, hey, this one builds like reps that are for building muscle are the eight to 12 rep range. Well, yeah, that's true.

Like you said, in a six week study, but over the course of a year, give me the client that I've now rotated through high-purchase strength, power, and endurance training, which I'm manipulating reps as low as one, all the way up to 15 to 20, and I'm cycling them through every four to six weeks over the course of a year,

and I'll build way more muscle in that person. So it's the exact same thing. I mean, you just, so that being said, with the rest periods, how often do you guys recommend people to vary it? And then do you tend to vary it with anything else? Like do you like to, like when you phase or transition like we do in maps or do you like to stay okay

for a whole program? We're gonna stick to, you know, so for a whole 12 weeks, we're gonna stick to a rest period and then we're gonna switch to another, like how do you guys normally like to? So I typically will phase rest periods, the same way I'll phase rep ranges. So it's typically anywhere between three to five weeks maybe.

But and I also like to combine variables and help them multiply their effects. So what I mean by that is, if my goal, if the rep range I'm in is the low rep range, which is great for strength, then I'm gonna combine that with a longer restful period, which is also great for sure. Yeah, so I'm trying to combine variables that all speak to the same type of goal.

If I'm trying to work on the pump, which is higher rep ranges or endurance, then I'm going to also typically shorten the rep ranges. And here's a good rule of thumb. Change the rest period, and then once you start to get good at it, change it again. Literally, that's what it is. Like, once you start to feel like you're getting good at it, then just change it. Which is the hard part, right? Sucks. It sucks because I know when I shorten my rest periods, it's like my workouts are, oh my god, I'm dying. And then I start to get good at them and it's like, okay, well, it's time to change it again. You know, one of my

favorite things to do with the client is change the rest period from short to long because it's counterintuitive for them. Like if I get a client and they're so used to resting 20, 30 seconds in between sets, and they say we're gonna rest a minute and a half, they're always like, but I'm gonna lose progress. My workout's gonna feel easier. I'm not gonna, and I love that one

because it's so counterintuitive. I'll have them rest longer and then we'll measure body fat and strength and all that stuff. And I can't believe I'm building muscle, I'm getting leaner. This is weird, I feel like my workouts aren't as hard. Well, for the most part, yeah, I totally agree. And I do very similar, my thought process with that,

especially with the multiple reps and then having shorter rest periods in terms of what adaptation I'm typically seeking with that. But there is, when I do have an athlete or somebody is trying to learn a very specific skill, there's times where we'll do multiple reps, but there's long rest periods in between. And for me, there's different ways to play I mean, there's, there's, there's different ways to play with it, but that's, that's when I found very effective because

then we're really like sharpening the skill and we're repeating the pattern of it, but then we're not degrading by adding fatigue as a component. No, what a great point. I think you're, when you're perfecting a skill, you want to, you want to rest for a long period of time Once you perfect a skill and you're solid There may be some merit into learning how to maintain that skill under fatigue. Yes That's more of an advanced thing. Yeah, and I think too and and and this is where when we're programming I know people try to point out like inconsistencies

You know in the way that we like with performance or anabolic or certain things that they're looking at in terms of how we programmed it and the Y. I think they're just really trying to unpack the Y. And you know, with plyometrics, especially, it's, it is, that's more of a, I look at that more as a skill. And so we're really trying to refine the process of being able to generate force and under control. And it takes a lot of practice. And so, but you do need rest and you need

to be efficient in that process. So that's why you'd see, you know, on some exercises, more reps, but you have to really pay attention to the composure in the rest period of that. Well, I agree 100% with you guys. I think I typically gravitate towards, you know, what tends to pair the best. But then that also varies and changes based off of who I'm training. So if I have somebody who I think is like me and gets that, and when they're strength training, they like to give their long rest periods because they like to see themselves hit PRs and pushed, and they do that. And when they're strength training, they like to give their long rest periods because they like to see themselves hit PRs and push and they do that. And they've been training

for a long time. Those sometimes with the best candidates to say, hey, you know, I'm going to do with strength phase, this phase and maps, you know, our first phase where normally I'd be giving you three minute rest periods. We're going to really shorten those up. Why? Because you've never done it. You know, so that's it. That's the thing about, you know, a lot of the stuff that we talk about where, yeah, the studies would prove that this is the better way. And this is the problem, I think, that for the average consumer that's, you know, digesting a lot of the information that's getting presented by all these gurus and professionals is,

you know, they'll cite a study that says, oh, this, so when you strengthen, you should rest like this, because this is where you'll build the most muscle. Well, I don't know. If you've been doing that for quite some time, that's not true anymore. Oh my God. Context matters. Yeah. So much. It's not even funny. It's like, you know, it's like a, it's when nutrition, you know, I could say studies show that eating a diet that contains adequate carbohydrates will make you perform better on the field. You'll have better strength, you'll have better endurance and better performance. And that's true in studies. But what if I got somebody with really bad gut health issues

and one of the ways that they feel better is to avoid carbohydrates, which diet is going to make them perform better. A diet that's got higher carbohydrates or one that's very low in carbohydrates. Well, for that particular person, the lower carbohydrate diet is going to improve their performance. That's why we see people like Jordan Peterson who's on this carnivore diet, and he's like, I feel amazing. Well, yes, you do feel amazing

because you felt so shitty eating all these other foods, but for most people who are fine eating all these other foods, going carnivore is to make them feel worse. And the same is true for training. I want to go back to the whole, you know, perfecting the skill and not, you know, throwing the fatigue on top of it. You know, it makes me think of high-level soldiers. When you see like an army ranger or Navy seal, you know, learning to fire their gun under extreme

duress, like just sleep deprived, fucking cold as shit. You got your commanders yelling in your ear and throwing sand in your face and you got to hit a target with your gun. That came after lots of training under perfect quiet, simple conditions. Yeah. First, let me perfect and master the skill of shooting this gun. Well, not only that, they had to basically take the entire gun apart first and then put it all back together perfectly, oil it perfectly, like almost like make their own bullets. You know, like they went to that level

of detail. So you're so in tune with that process. Don't they don't they say something like your your guns like a part of you. It is. It's a dependency. Yeah. Right. So that's what they train you to become so one. But they don't your gun before they even ask you to go, you know, take, you know, whizzing bullets by your head or throwing sand in your face or doing that stuff. That all comes first. Well, think about, take, you know, whizzing bullets by your head or throwing sand in your face or doing that stuff. That all comes first. Well, think about, let's think about a very simple action that requires not a whole lot of skill for most people. Walking, right?

Walking for most people doesn't take a whole lot of concentration and skill because we've been doing it since, you know, we were, you know, two years old. And so if you're really, really, really tired, can you still walk? Yeah, you probably can. Now, think of something that's very, very complex, a very complex skill, juggling something. Would you be able to juggle when you're really, really tired? Probably not because the higher the skill level, the more difficult it is to do under the rest.

And so what, you know so what Justin was saying about beginners and resting long periods of time to perfect their form totally true. In that case, I would just say practice your skill, rest the long period of time. Don't worry about messing with the energy systems and pushing your body with rest periods because you gotta get really good.

But once you get good at movements, man, it is, I love messing with things. Then it's on. Then it's on. I love it. I love it. I love the scales. Get creative. It's the most simple, black and white variable I can think about. Like, rep ranges, more complex. Okay, what rep ranges? How do I stay within them?

Exercises, even more complex, which ones do I combine? How do I do the... You know, whatever I've been doing this one for a long time, which one should I move to? Respirates easy. Yeah. You know, whatever I've been doing this one for a long time, which one should I move to? Respirance is easy. You know, you could literally keep your workout exactly the same, same everything, same exercise. And then just go to the other end of the spectrum.

That's it. You probably have to change the weight that you're lifting. Oh yeah. But your, but your respiratory just changed that alone. And what you may notice is your body starts to respond. And it's funny to me how that one's the one that people fuck with the last, the least. It's, I never see it.

No. I never see it. Never see somebody like looking up at the clock or using a stopwatch and it's such an easy, like you said, it's one of the easiest variables for you to manipulate. I appreciate it for me personally. I mean, there's times when I know, I don't necessarily want to lift heavy, but I want to get a good workout. I know I have good times when I know, I don't necessarily want to lift heavy,

but I want to get a good workout. I know I have good form. You know what I'm gonna do? And this is how I do it, by the way. I don't use a stopwatch, I count in my head. So I'll do it and it keeps me in the moment. So one of the reasons why I do it, because if I don't do that, I tend to get lost.

So I'll do my set, I'll rack the weight and then I'll go a thousand, one, thousand, two thousand. You know what's kind of old school, which I used to see some clients use and apply. And I would see this sometimes in the gym, but it definitely was not popular. People would actually do the pulse check and they would watch the clock and then wait till their heart rate came back down to a certain, you know, manageable level. And I mean, I could see value in that in terms of,

if you figured out like, okay, around this range is where I feel the most productive. That could be a measure of valuable sort of a metric to kind of apply. Well, these are all the things that I really started to appreciate on a whole other level when I was competing because the average person, if you're just, well, gosh, you're tracking everything.

Right. And that's what I'm alluding to right now, is that, do I track, do I, am I messing with my rest periods a lot right now? No. To me, working out right now is more therapeutic, and I'm enjoying it, and I'm in the moment, and I'm not it and I'm in the moment and I'm not

carrying a stopwatch because I don't care if I'm not progressing very fast. You know, it's not. But I know a lot of people, especially right now, it's January time, are trying to progress, are trying to change their body. I don't, every time I work out, it's not always like that. But when I was competing, it was. When I was competing, I was always, every workout I wanted to be better. I wanted to look better, I wanted to perform better, I wanted to be better on all levels, every single time I came to the gym. These were the things that 100% I was tracking and manipulating. If you're somebody who's trying to make progress and trying to change your physique or improve,

this is a very important variable to measure track and to manipulate. And if they for somebody who already is in great shape and you're consistent and you love going to the gym, like, you know, carrying a stopwatch around, maybe maybe it would be less enjoyable, enjoyable for you. Babjoo Joy, baboo, baboo, baboo. It's a bum bum bum. Easy for you. Bibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibbibb to the gram, you're measuring your sleep, and you're, you know, so you could probably tell, just changing one thing, you'd know, okay, this is what's happening to me. What would you say?

It was one of those things that was very obvious to me how much of an impact that it would make. Very similar to the first time that light bulb went off for me for like, rep ranges, like you said. I mean, I remember being a young kid, and reading in a magazine that, you know, if you wanted to build muscle and build strength that you wanted to be in that four to six rep range. And for years, I didn't leave that

because I was a skinny kid with no muscle. So why the fuck would I ever want to train like a endurance athlete or somebody who's in the high, like high rep range, I didn't want that, I wanted muscle. So I stayed in that forever until, and I can't remember if it was a trainer or another study or article that I had written or read. And I go, oh shit, well maybe I should apply,

maybe I should try this 15 reps. And I literally, it was years, years of not training in a higher than six reps. Like it was like blast for me to go above that like if I did seven reps I want math. Yeah, it was it was more towards four reps You know I'm saying that every once in a while I might be able to get six out So when I went to 15 and I'm lifting way lighter weight everything's way lighter Weight than what I was doing before, my body blew up. Like it was one of those pivotal moments in my journey

that I saw this huge change after training, and that was like holy shit. And so it was very similar to that. The first time that I really applied the timing because what happens, years and years of lifting, and if you're never really, really track rest periods, 100%, you gravitate to a certain rest period for certain exercises for everything.

And so, oh yeah, everybody likes what they're good at. Yeah, so, and I knew this going into other variables that I had manipulated and I knew better. And so I understood the science and I knew the importance of it. What a great time, I'm a competitor and I'm training and so I understood the science and I knew the importance of it. What a great time, I'm a competitor and I'm training and everything is in line. So, you know, what is great about that,

like you said, Sal, is that you can really tell, you know. You drink a little bit more water. Oh, I see this. Yeah, you do one little change, one little thing and you can tell and it is. It's a game changer if you've never manipulated it, especially when you go to the opposite of the spectrum. Like if somebody decides to track their rest periods

and they find out that they're resting like 90 seconds and they drop it down to like 60 seconds or they increase it by 20 or 30 seconds, we'll make a difference, but not a game changing difference. But if you go to the opposite of the spectrum, it'll be like a, it's like a different workout. Like you've never worked out. It's so different. Yeah. If you're the circuit girl going to like a strength phase with three minute rest periods, we'll completely change your body. Don't change anything else.

Aside of those totally sexist, but I mean, it's it, it, it, it, it, it goes to the point we were talking about earlier that they've been more of them. Yeah, they've been, yeah, they've been marketed to that way for a very long time. And those are the clients that circuit guys. I typically would gravitate towards the three minute rest periods. And then my meathead dudes that love to put three, four plates on the bench press and make sure that every girl in the gym sees that it's on there before they actually lift it.

They sit there and eat a sandwich. Yeah, they go to the bathroom and go to the news, they fill their water jug up, they ask three people to spot them. You know, they get a five minute rest period. Put that fucker on a little circuit, 30 second rest periods and watch his body change. Dude, you think you just reminded me that was back way back in the day when I was younger working out. There was this fucking just as big, but also overweight, older, powerlifter looking dude,

in the gym, and he used to fucking literally do that. He would sit on the bench in between sets and read the newspaper. Yeah, did you think that we remembered this guy? Yeah, he would be like where the leg press machine was and he would just be there all day. And I was like waiting to get in. Like can I get in and he's reading his newspaper,

he's like just chilling. Dude, it's so funny Adam, you're talking about how you got stuck in rep ranges and stuff as a kid. I was writing one of our blogs the other day and I started to write about the first bodybuilding magazine that I bought. And it's so funny how certain things you'll just pop in your mind.

This tends to happen with me. And I remember like, oh, it was 1993 Flex Magazine, Mike Mata Rotto was on the cover. So I went on eBay and I found the exact magazine, the same one, and it was Mike Mata Rotto on the cover. And the reason why this was so impactful to me besides being one of my first bodybuilding magazines was in it, first of all, Mike Montorazzo, a tying guy,

so I identified with him. Jack, yeah, these really big arms, just really muscular guy, he's now deceased. But in there, there was a article that was mass gaining principles. Like, these are the principles for mass gaining. And one of them was low rep, like you have to lift in the low rep range You have to rest a long time you have to forever and and then there were cutting principles

Which ones do you think I followed to the tea which ones you think I avoided like fucking crazy? Yes, I was like, oh those are for cutting. That's exactly how I'm doing that Exactly how I looked at it like in my eyes is a young kid lifting, you know I thought that if you wanted to lose weight or get lean, which I never had a pro, I could see my ribs, I was so lean. I'm so sick of it. I didn't need to get any leaner,

so I didn't want anything to do with. Is that a 10 pack, no, is my ribs? No, I don't want nothing to do with 10, 12, 15 reps. That's just gonna make me skinnier. I was scared of death of those reps. It's so funny because I did that for so long, and then I read an article by another body builder. I wanna say his name was Francis Hillobran.

I think I'm saying his name right. He wrote an article about how he got his body to look amazing by doing 15 to 20 reps and how he's like, no, I do 15 to 20 reps, I get a good pump and it builds a lot of muscle. And so because I like the look of his physique, I did it and then my body responded, and then I got stuck on that for a second.

And it's just funny how we tend to do that, you know? This is one of the things that I really love about Stan Effording because he's like a huge advocate for 20 rep ranges. Well now, yeah. And so, and I think it's such a great message for his community of people that are probably following him. I mean, you if you're following Stan and your big fan of Stan, most of these are big, burly guy or people that want to be big and burly and strong,

the guy squats, you know, 600 pounds for like 20 fucking reps. He's insane. You know, like what he does is crazy. But I think that a lot of people that probably follow him are, I think the avatar is similar to me when I was 20, you know, I would see a stand and be like, man, I want to look like that. And he's like the Hulk. And to hear him promote 20 rep range, I think is such a great. Because that's what Flex did, right? Yeah.

He started training with Flex Wheeler and Flex is like, yeah, you've been training like this for a long time. Let's have you slow down. Yeah, let's have you like do 20 rep, you know, squats and leg presses. And let's have you slow down and squeeze the muscle because he trained like a, like a power lifter for a long time. Yeah. Strong as hell. And he gained hella muscle, you know, and he's like, oh, shit, it works. And so I mean, that's just it.

It's, I would say it's the most overlooked and easiest variable to manipulate. And so if you're listening to this podcast and you're a little confused as to what you need to change with your workouts, because there's so many different things and you've been working out for a while. And I don't know what exercises to do and all that stuff. Just change your rest period.

Literally, just change the rest period. Give yourself a couple weeks and watch how awesome your body responds. Right. You can also go to mindpumpfree.com and download any one of our free guides. We have a lot of them on there. Some of them teach you how to squat more weight, develop your midsection, build your arms, your calves. There's quite a few of them there.

They're all free. Mindpumpfree.com. You can also find us on our individual Instagram pages. So if you wanna check out and see what we're into, what we're doing, we provide different information on these pages, you can find my page on Instagram, it's mindpumpsal, Adam is mindpumpatum, and Justin, everyone's favorite is mindpump Justin.

I love you. Thank you for listening to Mindpump. 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 Superbumble at Mind Pump Media.com. The RGB Superbumble includes maps and a ballad, maps performance, and maps aesthetic. Nine months of phased, expert exercise programmingming designed by Sal Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels and performs.

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