2656: Machines Vs. Free Weight... The Final Debate! & More (Listener Live Coaching)

18:31Adam Schafer:This is why like a bodybuilder who's got all this muscle, more muscle and strength than the average person will hurt themselves throwing a Frisbee because they don't have, their CNS hasn't been trained to have the right amount of stability. Free weights provide this. They provide this because you have to balance, because everything has to operate in a stabilized way because the weight is free. And if you do free weights properly, lots of different full ranges of motion, train appropriately, different planes of motion, you'll actually get incredible functional flexibility. You'll get really, really good protective functional flexibility.

19:05Sal Di Stefano:I would argue of all the points we're making, this is the most applicable to like all for gin and pop this is this is why most clients their programming was built around free weights is for this totally yeah yeah because i mean look at the opposite if you just train with machines you can look at the dysfunction that creates uh when you go to move in unison and organize your body for these other types of movements like it's dysfunctional because you've been training it to be limited to these certain ranges that's 100

19:35Adam Schafer:100%. And when you train clients, they want to look good, which is, of course, that's their number one goal. But if they hurt themselves, you failed. Yeah. Like, if your client comes to you after you've trained them for six months and it's like, I got to cancel my session, what happened? Oh, man, I went to go pick up my kid or I stepped off the curb the wrong way and I hurt myself. You got to ask yourself, am I training this person? I mean, they're fitting the gym. How the hell did they hurt themselves picking up their kid? Am I setting them up for success? That's right.

19:59Sal Di Stefano:This is an area that, admittedly, I think I failed a lot of my early clients. Oh, totally. Me too. I defaulted to the machines so often because it was easy. It was safer. It was less work. You know what I'm saying? I could get them - Less coaching. Yeah. It was way less coaching and easier. And I justified it because, oh, you know, she's older and she has this. And the risk injury, this, that, it's like, I would have been far better off just reducing the load to next to nothing and teaching them free weight stuff versus machines. Totally. It wasn't until later in my career that I realized the value of we could literally spend this whole hour just trying to get the barbell back squat and you'll get more value than me taking you through 10 machine exercises every single time inside the gym.

20:44Adam Schafer:All right. Next up, what if you got a weak body part? Like what if you have, you've been working out and everything seems to be developing well, but you got that one body part that's lagging. What's better for that weak body part, free weight or machine? Well, this one goes to the machine. Machine, yeah. machines are superior for weak body parts because I can sit on a machine and isolate and think about the muscle I want to target it and not have to worry about balance, not have to worry about stability. In fact, oftentimes a machine is on a track that puts me in the right position. Uh, and so this is another reason why bodybuilders like machines is they can go on there and isolate the rear delt, the rhomboid.

21:22Adam Schafer:They can get just the lats. They could get just this part of the quad, even they'll say, or this, you know, this part of the hamstring or my outer glutes. machines are great for this. So if you have a body part that's lagging and you're like, okay, I want to like really develop this. Machines might be a great way to go to, to get that body part to catch up. Now there's more that goes to it like programming considerations, but when it comes to weak body parts and getting them to activate, because free weights, you can do this with free weights, but free weights require so much more that oftentimes you'll revert to your old patterns, which is what developed the lagging body part.

21:57Sal Di Stefano:And or just tax the CNS more. I think this is one of the biggest misconceptions around why bodybuilders seem to be doing so many machines is because you don't see that they're in the gym seven days a week, sometimes twice a day. And they're still probably barbell squatting and barbell bench pressing and doing all those movements as much as the average person, if not more. What you see, though, is all this volume. All the accessory lifts. Yeah, all the little detail lifts like that. And so then a lot of, I think people think that, oh, they must lift like all, they must only train like this way.

22:29Sal Di Stefano:And it's like, no, it's just a part of their training and their programming is so they can focus on a small body part. Right.

22:37Adam Schafer:All right. Lastly, which one's better for injuries? This is actually divided. If you want to prevent injuries, free weights. If you get good at free weights, you have more stability, more balance and strength that carries over into the real world. in all injuries that where you hurt yourself, not the ones where you get hit by a car, but the ones where you actually hurt yourself, all of those are because you lack the strength and stability to deal with what you just did. And free weights are better at that. But what about if you are already hurt and now

23:06Sal Di Stefano:you need to rehab? That's what the machines were. Now machines. I mean, this was actually the reason for the invention. It was designed for rehab. Their best use. Yes. So this makes total sense for machines. is I just got knee surgery, but I still want to train my quads. I am not going to barbell back squat with that client when they're six weeks post-surgery. That's right. But you absolutely could sit them down. And I remember even my rehab starting that way, sitting down with like an ankle weight, and you're doing leg extensions. And so in that space, where you're keeping the knee in a very fixed and stable position, this makes a lot of sense.

23:44Adam Schafer:Yeah, and I'll give a more real-world example. It's like, oh, my hurt my low back. How do I train my back? How do I train my legs? Machines. Machines will hold you in place, and you can still work out without hurting it. But which one will prevent, done properly, of course, which one will prevent these kind of injuries more? Free weights. So it is divided there. I think what we're getting to is it's more nuanced than they make it sound. And ultimately, if you're smart and you're doing this for a while and you're consistent, use both when appropriate for best results. Anyway, I got to tell you guys about, I looked something up over the weekend because I was super annoyed.

24:21Adam Schafer:And I'll tell you why I was annoyed. One of the dumbest features in new cars that I'm like, why do they put this in here? Does anybody actually use this? It's so stupid. Is the stupid start-stop function. I hate it. Does anybody keep that on? I turn off immediately. Every time I got to hit the button to turn. They say like the gas saving elements. Yeah, I don't like my car turning off every time I stop.

24:45Sal Di Stefano:Didn't you also look it up though?

24:46Adam Schafer:It actually saves pretty good. I looked it up. It does. I'm going to read you guys. Yeah, I bet it does. I'm going to read you guys how, like how much of it, because that's what I was like.

24:53Sal Di Stefano:Is it worth putting up with?

24:54Adam Schafer:Well, I was looking at, I'm like, how much of a difference does it actually make? Like, why do they have this? Like, what's the deal? So check this out. If you're in a, if you are in start, stop conditions, like traffic or, you know, you're in a city. Like constantly. Bro, it could say between 10 to 20 % fuel. 10 to 20? 10 to 20%. 20 is a lot. A lot. That's if you're in really bad traffic. So you live in LA.

25:19Sal Di Stefano:But even 10%, I mean, everybody in here is probably spending north of$600 a month in gas.

25:24Adam Schafer:Yeah. Now, if you're on freeways all the time, it's a waste of time, obviously. It doesn't make a big difference.

25:29Sal Di Stefano:But it's also not kicking in then either. No, exactly. That's why it's a waste of time.

25:33Adam Schafer:So I looked it up and I said, okay, well, what's the average car? How much would the average car save? This is based off of$287 a gallon, which is a lot more than that. $287? I know. This is what I got off of. Where is that? It's 2021. It's a different state. We also live in California. Yeah, I was like, is that in North Dakota or something? So based off that, so it's going to be more than this if you live in California.

25:57Sal Di Stefano:I mean, it's going to be double to triple this, so go ahead.

26:00Adam Schafer:Yeah, so this would save the average driver about$10 a month. So here, probably save the average driver$20 a month. That's not nothing. That's not enough. That's not nothing. So it would take like a year or so to offset the cost of the actual saving thing. now they did it for EPA standards right so I think if you add it up on all the cars in the cities it actually makes a difference but it's so annoying I hate it it is especially because you're probably trying to race everybody

26:30Sal Di Stefano:you get to the stop side and you're getting ready to race damn it this thing's turned off on me

26:34Adam Schafer:I just hate stopping and then you hear the car turn off and then you hit the you know you take off a little bit turns back on you know who keeps them on all the time everybody's getting you on the jump That's why, huh? Like Uber drivers and taxi drivers. They always keep it.

26:47Sal Di Stefano:Well, then, yeah, because they're -

26:48Adam Schafer:They're saving every dollar to increase their margins.

26:52Sal Di Stefano:God, I got a ticket this weekend, dude. First ticket in - I was just bragging about you guys getting out of tickets. Dude. Here we go. I know.

26:59Adam Schafer:I can't believe you didn't listen to the show, dude.

27:01Sal Di Stefano:I didn't even try. You know what for sure screwed me? You should have name-dropped Justin. He had a ride-along, dude. Yeah, he got pulled. And I knew it when he pulled me over, and I saw the - because first of all, CHP gets you, it's tough. They almost never let you off. They almost never let you off. And then on top of that, a ride along. I'm like, man, I'm for sure going to be. He's going to show them how it's done. Yeah. Let me show you the ride. He was really friendly. I tried being friendly with him too, but it still didn't go over. Just, bro, the worst timing. I mean, it was right where the freeways converge, and I was passing on the right side right before the shoulder disappeared, and so I gunned it.

27:36Sal Di Stefano:Plus, you drive exotic cars. I think you're driving a motor car. And I like this. And then look right to my left, and he's looking right at me. And I'm just looking down. Big turd. Oh, man. Instantly speeds right behind me. And I'm like, ah, fuck. There was a moment where, because he was so friendly, I thought maybe he was going to let me off. But when I saw him talking to the kid in the back, I was like, oh, he's teaching this guy how to write me a ticket right now.

27:59Adam Schafer:This is a horrible time. I'm going to name drop Justin, bro. They all like Justin. I'm going to go meet my friend Justin Andrews from Mind Pump.

28:05Sal Di Stefano:So I think the CHPs all have body cams, don't they? I don't know. I think they do. Okay. Remember, I told the story about the last guy that let me off because of that car. He didn't say anything.

28:16Adam Schafer:He just let you go.

28:17Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. So I think they're being recorded, so they got to be undercover about it. So you can't be like, hey, I'm Mind Pump. Last one saved me because that one was registered to Mind Pump. So this one's registered to me personally. So he don't give a shit. Last time I got pulled over. What's it say? What's it say? so they don't have them uh yet everyone but by march of 2026 they should yeah oh wow yeah that's

28:40Adam Schafer:good i like body cams i uh i i got pulled over this was a while ago with my son in the car so i had my my four-year-old in the car and we get pulled over and uh because i had gone past the line at the stoplight there's this weird light by my house and i i went past it and then i you know turned green i passed and i took off and then he pulls me over in my small city so it's of embarrassing but i pull in the parking lot and i'm like you know this is a good it's a good time to show my son how to be how to be respectful to police officers so i was very respectful and before the guy pulled me over i told him i said hey i'm getting pulled over i think i might have broken a law i said these guys do a really good job so i was trying to show my son because i don't want him to be fearful or hate yeah police because i think sometimes people can be like that and

29:25Sal Di Stefano:their kids pick up on that you know it took me until i was deep into my 30s before i got rid of that like anxiety from cops because of my bad experiences as a young kid so it's it's wild how that sticks with you yeah i remember like it was a long time how many bad experiences you have uh quite a bit i mean i i mean i almost lost my license in one year so yet that's for that you you hit your fourth ticket in a year and they'll pull your license and so i got i got four in a year and luckily i went to court for the fourth one and the cop didn't show up so i i got to keep my license but yeah when i was in when i was in high school i was saying yeah an idiot you know and so justin never did he look how white he is i mean i did a lot of dumb things yeah but they look at you like oh he's one of us well now i got the mustache yeah oh yeah for sure he's like hey

30:12Adam Schafer:you off duty you're not a fireman i'll show you my car i got thrown on the hood i got thrown on hood at 16 years old oh wow yeah dude i did a burnout i was in the car girlfriend my cousin with his girlfriend in the back and i was showing off uh it's like i had a car to show off with but you know you're 16 you think yeah and i did a little burnout and three of them came up i don't know what they were they were but they both came they all came up to me and he looks at me do you know why i pulled you over i said no and he started yelling at me get out the car and like threw me on the hood wow and i think he was trying to scare me yeah he was trying to teach me a lot and it did scared the shit out of me i was like what's happening i saw this happen to my friend we

30:53Sal Di Stefano:were in milwaukee and we were it was like a blizzard and you couldn't really see um these cops directing traffic it was very hard to see but uh they were trying to tell him to turn like turn turn turn turn and he just kind of went past him was like oh oops and then turn then they pull him over and then uh they're talking to him uh and pulled him out of the car and then literally grabbed him and slammed him on the back of the truck and we're like hey hey and they're just manhandling him, and then they took him off and left us by ourselves, took him to jail overnight. Did he have a warrant? No, they were trying to make an example out of him.

31:29Sal Di Stefano:We were pulling that away from a concert. We were in college, so I'm sure we were just like... They thought we were just dumb college kids. Was Marcelo CHP or was he local? He was LAPD. He was LAPD.

31:42Adam Schafer:I couldn't remember if he was CHP. He's a great example of a good cop. super good integrity he looks and talks like a cop he does he's a trainer as well as a trainer

31:50Sal Di Stefano:so for all you cops that might want to be trainers you want to know it's funny people love people

31:53Adam Schafer:love him i talk love him i i talked to him the other day oh i've talked to him about this i said hey because you hear stories lapd like there's some crazy areas down there like do you have any crazy examples he's like no man never i'm like what and he goes i this is what he told me i hope i don't get him in trouble he goes i firmly believe that the way you treat people uh it it really makes a big difference on whether or not they're going to comply. Yeah, the energy put out. He's like, I was always respectful. I was always, you know, and people just kind of, you know.

32:22Sal Di Stefano:Anytime I got, yeah, you know, in trouble, it was like I was an asshole. So I put that out there, I got it back. Well, they have that option to be, like the guy was really nice to me. Like even though I got the ticket, like I couldn't be mad because he was polite. He even said, hey, man, I said, he was like, you're probably doing over 100. I clocked you at 90. He goes, I put 75 on the ticket. It's like, well.

32:43Adam Schafer:You're taking 75? Yeah. That's nothing, dude.

32:45Sal Di Stefano:Well, bro, I don't care about the dollar. I would rather pay me the - You shouldn't brag about your ticket insurance. I don't want - It's not cool. It wasn't a cool ticket. No, I care more about the insurance than I care about the actual fine. I'd rather pay a higher fine.

33:00Adam Schafer:Does that mess up your insurance? You're doing just 10 over?

33:03Sal Di Stefano:Oh, yeah. You get a speeding ticket. Period. It doesn't matter if it's five miles an hour or - Now, if you go reckless, you can get big time trouble. But it affects the insurance all the same. Yeah. but I still have because I haven't had a ticket since I was God remember how old I was me neither

33:17Adam Schafer:I haven't had one a long time

33:18Sal Di Stefano:that I can do traffic course so I haven't I wonder what it's going to be like did I ever tell you guys my traffic course story I'll never forget when I got when I was getting one of my tickets off when I was younger and my first traffic school that I ever done I got so excited to go because it was pizza comedy and fun was the title of the thing and I'll never forget showing up and there was pizza but there was no comedy and there was no fun and even there's a point I raised my hand At one point, I was like, hey. Where's the comedy of fun? And he said some stupid joke. And I was like, oh, my God.

33:49Sal Di Stefano:It's a ploy just to get you to. This is how it was back then. I don't know how much this has changed. But when I was a kid, there's. Yeah, you just look at the title. There's a list. Yeah, there's a list.

33:58Adam Schafer:And they get paid by the city.

33:59Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. And there's just tons of them. And they all have these different titles and names. So they're just trying to attract people. Yes. What a smart. So I chose Pizza Comedy and Fun Traffic School. And there was nothing fun and nothing funny about this traffic school. The only thing that was on point was we got pizza for lunch.

34:14Adam Schafer:Do you know what they used to do in traffic school? They stopped doing this when we were going, but they might have been doing this before. I don't know. Doug, have you ever been to traffic school? No.

34:20Sal Di Stefano:They make you watch the scary videos? They make you watch videos of dead bodies. That's what we had to watch.

34:26Adam Schafer:And brains and traumatizing. Red asphalt.

34:28Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, that was a staple. Did you watch it? Yes, that's it. That's the name of it. I never saw any of that. Oh, I saw that. So they played. We had to watch that. Bro, it was so boring. It's probably too traumatic for the, you know, gin's ears and everything.

34:39Adam Schafer:Wow. It is traumatic. You want to see someone's brain blast all over the place. Yeah, that's real.

34:43Sal Di Stefano:It was from the scary straight model. Scary straight? Yeah. That's our whole childhood is scary. So what is it? Has anyone in here, Doug, have you done travel school any time soon? Never have. You never have. Doug's a good guy. Goody two-shoes. You don't think he's ever broken a lot. Have you ever even sped in any of your cars? Have you ever seen any top tickets?

34:57Adam Schafer:Ever? You know I've sped. Following you. He's like, Jason. No, I've had a couple tickets over the years. Yeah. Two? Like two. Your whole life? Two or three, yeah. Wow, that's good. That's good. That's good. Good for you. Yeah, good job. I'm pretty good at spotting, you know. I shouldn't give out my secrets. Avoiding it.

35:20Sal Di Stefano:Dylan, have you done Travis School lately? No. I want to find out what they're in. You want to go with a friend? Yeah. You know what they're like now? I have no idea. I have no idea. Could you imagine? Hey, could you imagine? Can you do them online now, you think?

35:32Adam Schafer:Yeah. Maybe. Really? I think so, yeah. Oh, that'd be awesome. Yeah. Are you going to have Katrina do it? Are you going to do it? Shh, come on, bro. stop hey could you imagine the three of us in traffic school when you're kidding us so fast you know I was that guy

35:45Sal Di Stefano:like going through their manuals and books and just like drawing drawing dicks

35:50Adam Schafer:why always that why can't you draw something else I don't know

35:55Sal Di Stefano:it's relevant it's his favorite thing to draw it's iconic Justin Anthony dick artist you saw a therapist

36:03Adam Schafer:about this there might be something there might be something going on there I avoid therapy. Therapy is for whips. That's for whips. All right. All right, I'm going to change topics. I just learned, so rarely do I get excited about a new compound or supplement. And I just learned about a fatty acid called C15. So we just started working with them.

36:25Sal Di Stefano:Oh, I couldn't wait to ask you about this. So I saw Fatty15 on there. Well, so the audience. That's the name of the product, Fatty15. I don't know if we've ever told the audience how a lot of partnerships work. not all, but most of our partnerships get run by Sal. I help manage and run it with Katrina, but she would always be asking me, well, what about this? I'm like, I'm not going to be the one who's going to say yes or no to this. I'm like, so just direct it to Sal. So now we've gotten so good with our system. Sometimes I don't even know. We come in here and I'm like, we have a new partner I have no idea about, but I know it was approved by you.

36:56Sal Di Stefano:So I'm always curious to like, what is it? What are we doing? I'm really excited.

37:00Adam Schafer:So I'm actually really excited about this. So C15 is a fatty acid, uh, and there's debate as to whether or not it's essential, because if you don't have enough of it, it can cause some, uh, well, it can actually, to put it bluntly, it can cause accelerated aging in the body. Uh, so.

37:15Sal Di Stefano:Which by the way, okay. Uh, super common, especially when we were trainers in the early years, still is common. How often did you have a female client that grossly underate, uh, uh, protein and fats? Oh, and you can see it. Oh, yeah. Hair, hair loss, skin was actually really common. And we still, people that listen to our callers, many times we'll have someone break their macros down. We're like, you got to bump your fat. Yeah, that's right. Where's the fat?

37:40Adam Schafer:So C15 is a fat that's found in full fat dairy, okay? And a lot of people just don't have a lot of full, and it's a healthy fat. Yeah, most people avoid it. It contributes to cell integrity and structure and strength. and if you have too little of it, which about 25 % to 35 % of people get too little C15. And what happens is you have accelerated aging in the body, so they can actually test this. So C15, in my strong opinion, will be one of those fatty acids like, well, like omega-3s that you're going to hear talked about a lot. Wow. Like take this, you need to take this. It's a big deal. And it makes a big difference.

38:20Adam Schafer:The data on it's pretty remarkable. See, this is a dairy intolerance. You guys would say if you have a dairy intolerance, can you still take it? Yes. Oh. It is not dairy. It's just the fatty acid. But that's where you would get it naturally. Right.

38:30Sal Di Stefano:So it makes sense that if you're somebody who already eats a lower fat diet and or has an intolerance to dairy, this would be probably beneficial to you.

38:36Adam Schafer:I'm going to take this for sure. A hundred percent. So anti-inflammatory, pro-cell integrity. It's going to help basically your body function more. Is it pill, powder? What is it? Oh, it's capsule. Capsule. That's it. Nice. So this is - So again, I think that this is going to be like, for a lot of people, like Omega-3s. You start taking Omega-3s, you feel - Is that the company's name right there, Doug? Fatty 15. I like the branding. And so we're going to be working with them. TEDx, CNET, Fatty. So it's one of those supplements that, like I said, you got fats, carbs, and proteins. Fats and proteins are essential.

39:12Adam Schafer:This one, for a lot of people, you'll notice. You'll take this, and within a couple months, you'll notice.

39:17Sal Di Stefano:It says on the website, obviously healthier skin, balanced metabolism. and that's all. Oh, better. Deeper sleep.

39:24Adam Schafer:Deeper sleep. That, to me, is very interesting. Yes, deeper sleep and microbiome health. Well, when your fatty acid profile isn't ideal, your inflammation's up and your brain isn't operating well. Your brain isn't operating the way it should. More cellular benefits than omega-3. That's what the data is starting to show. So it's three times more cellular benefits. In some cases, yes. I wouldn't go as far as to say, you're not going to switch out omega-3s for this, but I think in combination, with your omega-3s, you should take this. Interesting. But it's a supplement that I would put based off of what I'm reading.

39:58Adam Schafer:This is pretty close to a must-have for a lot of people. So it'll be interesting. That is interesting. Yeah, yeah.

40:05Sal Di Stefano:Maybe if this is a new partnership, maybe I see maybe one of the doctors get somebody on here that we can actually talk about. Oh, we will.

40:11Adam Schafer:Yeah. I want them to break down the science and the data on it. Yeah.

40:14Sal Di Stefano:I dug deep. No, I know you do. If we're talking about it, then it was obviously something that you would approve. And so people probably have no idea how.

40:23Adam Schafer:You know, when you get your fatty acid profile, right, here's what it feels like. Because people are like, all right, what would I notice? Here's what you'll feel. Your joints will feel better. You'll recover faster. You'll notice better sleep, better digestion. You'll just feel and move better is what it's going to feel like. When fatty acid profiles are off, you just feel off. And you feel more stiff. That's what it feels like. More inflammation. More inflammation isn't just pain, by the way. It's also grogginess or I can't think straight. That's also an inflammation.

40:54Sal Di Stefano:It makes sense. This would be super valuable too. Like, I mean, I think back to like my dieting days when I'm cutting really hard and aggressive and totally. And then I would supplement with something like this. That's right. Yeah. This would be interesting. Nutrients there. Yeah. Oh dude. I, I mean, can you guys tell I got like sunburn over the weekend? Yeah. I mean, it's, it's a lot better than it was. I was like, so red dude. My kids were like, I've, I was that guy that didn't put, the suntan lotion on them like i just was like hey let's just you know we're gonna be fine like the weather was nice we went to the drag races up in sonoma again of course sonoma is like once the sun comes out it's like it makes just a laser yeah yeah so dude we were there and um i so you have you ever been where there's like nitro uh ever oh yeah dude nitro fuel is so crazy and loud And anyways, they started up this funny car and we went and like walked right behind it.

41:51Sal Di Stefano:And we were all excited. We're like, you know, yeah, like it's so cool and loud. And like all the smoke was billowing up and we're like, you know, immersing. I'm looking around and all of a sudden this huge crowd like just dissipates and everybody's leaving and like, you know, running for the hills. And I'm just sitting there like, yeah, this is great. And then all of a sudden my eyes start tearing up and start burning. And then I'm like, oh, I can't breathe. And like, oh, oh, my God. I was like in panic mode and my son behind me, the same thing. And we're just like scrambling. Dude, it felt like I got maced like in the face.

42:25Sal Di Stefano:I don't know if you've ever got that close from the fumes. I've never been that close. And I look in, in like, uh, some of the guys there, like the mechanics, they had like gas masks on and everything. And I'm just saying, yeah, this is awesome. Right.

42:36Adam Schafer:Like filming, getting blasted, like crying.

42:40Sal Di Stefano:Like my eyes were like bright red. Did it go away quickly when you moved away? I mean, it went away from, I could taste it the whole day. So I was like, oh, this is great. I'm sure that's healthy. Did you look up and see if our homegirl was there, the mind pump list? I actually reached out to her. Was she out there? No, because I didn't have her class of drag. Oh, damn, that would have been cool. I know. I want Meg, I think is her name. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We should shout her out. I forget her handle. Yeah, she's great. I was hoping she was there to watch. Did you talk to her at all? She said, yeah, I talked to her, but she was like, no, we're not there.

43:09Adam Schafer:So, okay, so this is a great segue, way but you didn't use the caldera lab sunscreen i didn't yeah which was stupid because i i did

43:17Sal Di Stefano:have it in my backpack uh and i left my backpack in the car and i was like no i'm actually i've been using that yeah yeah i didn't realize it was 30 spf so and it uh it it feels like i'm rubbing like any of the other caldera creams like it just it goes into my skin like sometimes when you rub like suntan lotion on it feel i feel like i'm rubbing plastic on my skin or whatever that and it actually feels really good and so we've been laying out the pool and i've been using it i don't It's not all oily. No, no. It absorbs right in, and I know that it's all natural, so I know I'm not putting a bunch of crap on me.

43:48Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, people need to know the difference between sunscreen

43:50Adam Schafer:that is mineral-based and well-made versus the chemical ones. So the chemical ones, I mean, they get in your blood, and the levels, when they do tests on these, the levels of these chemicals in people's blood are higher than what the FDA says is actually safe. And they have hormonal effects in the body, maybe carcinogenic but not good for you mineral based ones sit on the skin and they reflect the UV rays and I would argue that 30 SPF with mineral based ones like the Caldera Lab one is stronger than the 30 SPF with the chemical based ones because it reflects it off I've used both of them my kids have used both we don't use the chemical ones anymore I use that and that's it we're done for the day because that reflects it off

44:36Sal Di Stefano:I imagine if it's going on your face it has to be safer than even the mineral. Oh, yeah. So I've been using it on Max completely. So I know it's not a huge bottle, but it's like, I'm like, okay, this is good for my face. It's 30 SPF. I'd just rather, because I don't know the stuff that Katrina has been getting him, and I haven't done my own digging on hers, but I know that's good. So when him and I have been going to the pool, which we've been doing a lot of.

44:57Adam Schafer:You don't break out from him and all that stuff? Because I'll break out a little bit. Oh, yeah. I know. Yeah, and Everett's like real sensitive with his skin.

45:03Sal Di Stefano:So yeah, some of those do not do well with his skin.

45:06Adam Schafer:I got to tell you guys, my dad, uh he cracked me up this weekend so uh he so a while ago when i got baptized uh we had a bunch of people from the church come over um our house and my dad was so excited to make people espresso he loves doing this right he loves making espresso for people yeah he was making it yeah and he's got it's like he's like his famous espresso and it's like a thing right and italians are really funny about about their foods and things they're very like no there's only one way to do it so

45:31Sal Di Stefano:he told me like it's a lot of the secret is the the water right the purified water of course of Of course. He talked to you about it.

45:38Adam Schafer:Yeah, he talked to me about it. I was like, oh, really? So he makes these espressos, and my friend Charlie, who runs a lot of the operations at the church, he had some. He's like, oh, my God, Dominic, this is so good. And he's like, hey, I got to tell you, we're going to open up a coffee shop at the church. I don't know if you guys know this at Venture. They have a coffee shop now. Yeah, it's really cool. And he's like, when we are open, I want you to come and give me your honest opinion on our espresso. You got to tell me. Oh, no. So they did it. They opened it. It's beautiful. It's really popular.

46:06Adam Schafer:Church-run coffee? Come on, dude. It's actually - It's actually - Step above Folgers. No, no, no. They're using holy water? Well, no, that might help. You have to get in the selling point. Yeah, dude, I feel so much. The fruit of the spirit. I mean, they made it professional. Like, they got - It's like you're going to, like, a pizza or a Starbucks. Okay. Okay, so they made it very professional. Okay. So, now, the problem is, my dad would say, nobody - He just left the story. He says it. Nobody in America knows how to make espresso. So, anyway, it's nobody. Nobody makes it. It's always, what does he call it?

46:36Adam Schafer:He calls it octopus water. You know the ink? Octopus water. Because I don't know why they milk so much water. So anyway, we go to church. My dad, Charlie sees my dad. He says, hey, you got to come see this. I want you to try it. Give me your honest opinion. So my dad's like, okay. So they go in, and they got this really fancy espresso machine, like one of those real expensive ones. And he's like, and this guy, he used to run a Pete's Coffee. He knows what he's doing. He introduced him to my dad. This is Sal's dad. He's from Italy. Make him a really good espresso. so they got the real good coffee.

47:06Adam Schafer:They prepared it. So my dad's telling me the story, right? So I guess they made it for him. They gave it to him. And my dad drinks it. And he's like, you want me to be honest? I was like, yeah. I give it a six. And he goes, on a scale of what? One to 10. I'm sorry. I'm like, dad, that's mean, dude. It's great. He was honest. He's like, it's okay. It's not bad. Nobody knows how to make espresso. Oh my God. It's so good. It's so funny. He's like, I think I heard this feeling.

47:31Sal Di Stefano:The water thing is actually a major hack. It is. For almost, I want to say, a year or two. In fact, this is actually what moved me from drinking coffee on the morning on a regular basis. When I was at my last place, for some reason, my coffee just – and I actually thought it was a beans. I'm like, I've been using these. And I wrote – there's like three beans brands that I like that I kind of rotate through. All of them were just – then I thought it was the coffee pot. I bought a whole new one. Still, I'm like, what is – why does my coffee taste like shiver? and I remember one day pouring in like already crystal geyser water in there and I just said it's a tap water and I just assumed it's so funny you said crystal geyser

48:09Adam Schafer:that's the one my dad says is the best

48:10Sal Di Stefano:oh he says use crystal geysers and it made it was like I just thought that because it was boiling it's like oh it should I don't know neutralize everything it should be the same it's the mineral content bro it was a huge difference and I thought this whole time I had no idea that I should have been doing that

48:28Adam Schafer:no my dad is crystal geyser. That's the secret water that you have to use every single time.

48:33Sal Di Stefano:Dude, I'm telling you right now, it was, I stopped drinking coffee and I was so irritated that it wasn't right. It was like, I've been making the same coffee, same everything for so long, and they just went through this phase where it was like, it tastes like shit. And I was using the tap water.

48:48Adam Schafer:Yeah, you got to talk to Mike Salemi. He's got it down to science, dude. He'll break it down. He's like a chemist.

48:54Sal Di Stefano:Doug, you have espresso quite often, don't you? Oh yeah, every day.

48:56Adam Schafer:Yeah. I should have my dad come over. Yeah, you should come over. Because I'm pretty serious about it. I'll take the challenge. I'll take the challenge with your dad. You know what it is? I'll tell you right now, the mistake a lot of them make, according to my dad. When they make espressos here, they're just like a lot of coffee. You go to Italy, it's a little bit and it's thick. Yeah. It's got to be thick. Like a 30-gram pull. Yes. You got to do a short pull. It's got to be concentrated. That's the espresso. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I take it seriously. So, I mean, I would like to take the challenge.

49:27just because you have a nice piece of equipment doesn't mean you know how to use it right

49:30Adam Schafer:your five million dollar coffee espresso machine not just that i've told you guys about people

49:35Sal Di Stefano:like jimmy butler and stuff like that like they're they're so particular about that he flies all over oh yeah i saw him he has the same machine i have yes yes and he flies with it he flies with it he takes it on yeah because you're not gonna go to a coffee shop and get it you got same experience

49:50Adam Schafer:yeah yeah they get all crazy i used to train this old guy uh so in the 90s is when starbucks started exploding. And then, of course, it took off. And I used to train this old guy to make fun of Starbucks all the time because he would go to Dunkin' Donuts. He was from the East Coast. Dunkin' Donuts is the best coffee. Yeah, they've always said that. People spending all this money on coffee. They're so stupid.

50:08Sal Di Stefano:So I had a coffee expert guy tell me, spit game on me about Starbucks. And you know why Starbucks is considered shit coffee is because they intentionally burn it. Yeah, they make it uniform.

50:19Adam Schafer:Yeah, consistent flavor. That's all they care. You know who gets high ratings for coffee? McDonald's. and they do in Dunkin Donuts look it up Dunkin Donuts has for sure but just their drip for just the drip McDonald's gets high reviews look it up really?

50:32Sal Di Stefano:yes I knew that about Dunkin Donuts but I don't know about it just their drip coffee

50:35Adam Schafer:I mean Verve is great

50:36Sal Di Stefano:but you know no standard Dunkin's angry yeah I would think your small like mom-and-pa type of places like Verve that have like somebody back there doing it it's probably better they care a little bit more McDonald's being compared to Starbucks Dunkin Donuts all the like commercial I think Starbucks used to care a long time ago. Yeah, you're probably right. They used to have the machines, they used to have the shots. That's probably how they started. Now everything's automated.

50:59Adam Schafer:Well, they're more well-known. They branched out so far. Starbucks is more well-known, not for their just coffee, but for their flavored drinks. That's where they excel. They make all the money on the food that they brought in. That's where they started making real money. Yeah, when you look into it, yeah, when they started incorporating food, they make so much more money on that.

51:16Sal Di Stefano:They make way more on the... Yeah, the margins in coffee are that great to begin with. Oh, that makes sense. Yeah, it became like a place to eat. That's like gas stations. Gas stations don't make their money off gas. That's true. They don't. Because that is competitive as hell. Oh, yeah. A lot of gas stations damn near lose it so close on the gas itself. It's all the snacks and stuff. It's all the snacks and stuff. They make all the money. Wow. That makes a lot of sense. It's interesting to see what the average actual gas profits are on the gas. But, yeah, they're subject to whatever is going on in the market and this and that.

51:46Sal Di Stefano:And it's so competitive. It's like you can only profit a little bit. Yeah, that's already fixed. And so, yeah, for them to make money, they have to add all these accessory items. It's all the other stuff. Yeah, they make a few cents per gallon.

51:55Adam Schafer:It's because it's so competitive. There's a gas station in every corner, and you're going to go to the one that's cheaper. Right. So they push each other. So you have to go as low as you can.

52:02Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, it's smarter to go lower and eat that profit a bit and then bring people in. This is what people, like, places like Costco and stuff does. This is great gas. Like, we had one of those open up, and that's what they do. They bank it on people showing up and buying stuff. It's the same strategy that Costco does with their chicken. Like, they lose on that. Knowing people will buy other things. Yeah.

52:19Adam Schafer:This is what I wish people understood about markets, is the more competitive you make a market, the - Better gets for consumer. It's always better. They're fighting for you, your service or your purchases, and if they compete over price, then that's great. It's got to make all the high pricers come back down. That's right, and the less competitive a market is, the bigger the margins.

52:42Sal Di Stefano:You know, speaking of that, I think this is in our space, our wheelhouse. Watching the gym industry involved right now

52:49Adam Schafer:was really interesting oh it's so funny you said that i just have this conversation with my cousin oh yeah yeah that middle that mid-range gym is gone gone it's the dirt cheap or they're really

52:56Sal Di Stefano:nice yes that's luxury or yeah dirt that's it yeah it's really gone that direction which is cool to see some of these really posh ones i've been forever the bay is just done terrible with that for considering we're in silicon valley where you would think we have one or two yeah yeah and they're just okay they're not even that like there's way better i've seen better gyms in reno i know than we have here in the bay area and it's like why it doesn't make any sense to me that

53:22Adam Schafer:we haven't catered that market somebody has to i i made a i made a semi-viral post on x that where i said i think there's i think now might be the time where a gym can put forth a dress code and ban pulling your phone out during workouts really yes i think those two things need to happen i think a lot of people with gyms starting to become less serious. You're seeing people film themselves and I think a dress code should be important in a gym. I think you're in there to work out. That's a hot take.

53:55Sal Di Stefano:That's a hot take. I don't know if anybody's really brought that up. I think that I don't know if I agree with you. Just because I think that

54:02Adam Schafer:I think a lot of gyms will be afraid. That sounds like three old dudes talking about the good old days. It could be. but I

54:09Sal Di Stefano:so it's like as things are evolving and changing I mean there's probably more case to be like you have people like what's his face you know Bradley Martin and some of that that encourages the shirt off they make it even more oh yeah they make it very you know social media friendly and so it'd be interesting to compare I feel like what model is more profitable

54:27Adam Schafer:and I could be totally wrong but I feel like a gym that really tried to create a serious fitness culture not serious like you have to be hardcore but like that's what we're here to do we're here to work out you're not going to film yourself film other people you're going to you know dress appropriately like this is a gym and i feel like you if you create that culture yeah i feel like enough people would be attracted to that it'd have to be people who've already done it and know

54:52Sal Di Stefano:because because like you know the outside perspective i own a gym best thing you can do is get more marketing by people like promoting it on social media and reinforcing it and bringing awareness you know so it's like their mindset's going to be there so to talk them out about it's I mean, here's where I'll agree with you in your point. I don't think that's, I don't think, generally speaking, that would do well. I do think there is a market for somebody who would pay a premium for an experience like that. Yes, of course. For example, Katrina pays to go to this gym that nobody knows about. It's pretty small, but it's very private.

55:26Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, but she likes that. Yeah, and it doesn't have a lot of amenities, but she likes that it's quiet, private, not a lot of people and stuff like that. And so we're at that point in our lives where that's more appealing to us and we're willing to pay a premium price for that type of experience than the super busy, everybody there, cameras out or something like that. So I think there's a market there. But I think that leans more towards the super high-end place.

55:54Adam Schafer:I also think a gym that would be trainer-focused would do really well with really good trainers for the same reasons. one that is like this is about really helping people become fit and healthy and a trainer centered gym would do that because they're instructors

56:11Sal Di Stefano:I think we'll build one within two years mark the date Doug when I said that two years I think within two years of today we will build one I think that would be awesome what's going on with our training staff right now and the way it's growing and how it's going I think that's for sure in our future. A lot of interest there for sure. Would not have said that a year or two ago. I didn't think that was. We've been avoiding that idea. I don't think it'll be our most profitable thing, I'll tell you that much. But I think it'll be cool. I think it'll be really neat to go in with. And I do like this idea, because I have no interest in the race to the bottom being one of the cheapest gyms.

56:48Sal Di Stefano:I love the idea of something that is, you know, semi-private, high-end. Results-driven. Very cool amenities, results-driven. with the best of the best trainers. I think that this area is ripe for that. I don't know why we don't have something like that.

57:09Adam Schafer:I think you would need something like us because we have such a wide-ranging podcast. We could do it. If you just open one in the middle of the city, you'd have to really do a lot of outreach to get people aware of what's going on.

57:21Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

57:22Adam Schafer:But I think we would be able to.

57:24Sal Di Stefano:Do you know how, I mean, you're pretty close to the UFC gym guys and stuff like that. You talk to them more than I do. How is that chain doing in general? Great. They are. Yeah. They're still.

57:34Adam Schafer:Yeah, really good. They do really, really well. Of course. Mark is behind them. Yeah, of course, right? Mastroff is just, he's the.

57:41Sal Di Stefano:Do you have any idea how many they had? I mean, I remember when they, you know, they had just a couple. Doug, look up UFC gym, how many locations they have, and if you have any numbers on money and stuff too. I'm curious. yeah just curious how they're doing had an opportunity to open what the second one the second one in concord you did yeah i think that was all right too yeah i mean i almost did it i mean i i met i met with uh adam and in in gallop over there uh but it was gonna be a lateral move for me so it didn't make a lot of leave leave what i've been doing for 10 years already had a name for myself to make this same you know so it was interesting and i the idea of switching at that time I wanted to, but...

58:21Adam Schafer:I think it was a smart move, too, because look how much jiu-jitsu has exploded. And they offer things like jiu-jitsu. I mean, that was the...

58:29Sal Di Stefano:I remember when they first partnered. What do you got, Doug? 150 locations. They're up to 150. Yeah. Wow. They are on them. And each brings in about 3.7 million per year. Gross? Well, revenue. Yeah, gross. Okay, gross. Still, that's pretty good.

58:47Adam Schafer:3.7, you're looking at probably close to a million in profit? That's pretty good for a gym. That's not bad.

58:52Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, no. If you're pulling a quarter to a half a million in a gym, you're doing good. You're doing really well. You're doing really good. To think that you could actually pull a million.

58:59Adam Schafer:Now people are listening like, I'm going to open a gym.

59:01Sal Di Stefano:It's hard. Yeah. I know. It's really hard to be very profitable. I think most people that I have met that have had a lot of success in it or love it is because you love the culture. Yes. You want to live there. You're cool with living there. And I get that because that's a... Man, I stayed there. You can make it work. I stayed at that gym making a lot less money than I could have made for most of my 20s because I loved the environment so much. I just, you know, it was one of, even working for a company that I watched go downhill, I still put up with a lot being there because I enjoyed the culture so much.

59:37Sal Di Stefano:And so if you love that vibe, owning your own place and, you know, making a living is a very respectable way to live a life. And so, you know, it's not like I would not encourage somebody who wants to be a millionaire. It's not a good course of doing that.

59:53Adam Schafer:There's easier ways.

59:54Sal Di Stefano:Much easier ways.

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1:00:36Our first caller is Issa from New Jersey.

1:00:39Adam Schafer:Hi, Issa. Hi, Issa. How are you? Hey, guys. Thank you so much for taking your time. It's an honor to speak to you, honestly. Thank you so much. How can we help you? So, yes, I do have an email that I sent and it's very specific. Would you like me to read that out or would you prefer me just to ask my question at the end? Whatever you prefer. Why don't you give us some context, give the audience some context and kind of talk a little bit about your email and then you can ask your question. Gotcha. Of course. So, yeah, for full context, I'm a 23 year old female currently recovering from subclinical hypothyroidism for three years.

1:01:11And I'm very sorry to say, but I followed a strict keto diet and I felt great on it. And it was just, it would serve me. I would travel, I would do many different things and I felt my, and did blood work and it was always, everything was always stable. But then I started waitressing full time. And that's when strange things started happening. I started having these cycles of kind of like under eating and then kind of binge restricting. I accidentally underestimated my calories. I would do stupid fasting things to make sure I don't gain too much weight. And then I ended up just crushing my thyroid, leading to like a 15 to 20 pound weight gain and just sluggish energy, bad psychological function, etc.

1:01:51And I checked my blood work, did extensive like things, background checks. And I don't have Hashimoto's or any other autoimmune markers, but just a sluggish output on my thyroid when it comes to like my thyroid levels and my hormones. so I began to actually work with Transcend Telehealth and they prescribed me about 60 milligrams of Armour thyroid I started feeling much better I started losing weight steadily and of course I'm eating I'm eating carbs again finally and I'm just like following just the more relaxed protocol when it comes to working out I'm actually following Max 15 Advanced with just some core work maybe something's tailored for like combat because I'm a martial artist on the side and yeah I began losing weight steadily then I was switched to a lower dose of Armour thyroid.

1:02:35But then I had a lot of stress happen in the family, just like conflicts, like job loss, et cetera. And that triggered just again, the water retention, the weight gain, everything just came back. Even though I was on the armor thyroid, I increased the dose to 60 milligrams. I started feeling good again. And currently I'm just in a weird place. So I weigh about 117 to 118 pounds. I used to weigh about 100 pounds and I'm about I'm a little under five foot I eat rather I would say I came from eating 1200 calories to eating 1900 calories so I'm pretty happy about that and I make sure to eat enough carbs I eat between I would say 120 to like 150 carbs like nothing too crazy just lax but enough I follow maps 15 I have a rather active lifestyle I travel I used to waitress.

1:03:24Now I don't do it anymore, but I still, I work, um, like receptionist work. So it's not too much stress. I make sure to supplement. I take multivitamins. I take, uh, omega-3. I take D3. Um, I take like a, what's called the ashwagandha, like adrenal restoring supplements. Uh, yeah, I'm currently taking armor thyroid on 60 milligrams. The only issue is that like, I have a very high T3 and suppressed TSH. And I remember they wanted to put me down to a lower overdose because they don't want that causing any issues long term. I feel great on the 60 milligrams and it's like, I don't know what to do.

1:03:56So my main question is basically, how can I most effectively return to my weight, which was like around a hundred pounds or kind of not deal with this constant hormonal flux going back and forth of weight gain, drop, weight gain, drop, just recover a steady weight without doing any aggressive cardio restricting. Basically, how do I continue the reverse diet that I have strategically, maintain my energy, keep my thyroid supported long-term, uh, given my current routine, stress level and, um, lifestyle, et cetera. I hope I didn't lose you guys.

1:04:29Adam Schafer:No, you didn't. That's a good question. By the way, it's a, it's not uncommon. There seems to be a correlation between, especially for women, uh, long-term, uh, ketogenic diet and thyroid, uh, issues. So, uh, not quite sure why, but we do sometimes see this. I'm assuming you're already avoiding gluten now, even though you eat carbohydrates? You know, I cheat with Ezekiel bread because I like it, but I make sure I'm very, very, I would say very strict with it. Like if I were to eat gluten, it's only maybe like whole grains like quinoa or something like that. And that's usually organic or something.

1:05:04Adam Schafer:Okay. Quinoa, I think it's gluten-free, but yeah, typically with thyroid, you want to stay away from gluten because that tends to be something that's reactive. How much fat are you eating every day? Oh, I would say around 60 to 70 grams. I make sure to eat like a, like, you know, I love fish. Yeah. So fish, walnuts, avocado, like usually nut butters, that kind of stuff. No, you're good. And what makes you feel like your ideal body weight is a hundred pounds? Oof, I know. Oh, that's, this is a question. So what happened is that I used to, for a long time, I was a hundred pounds and I felt great at that weight.

1:05:43honestly it's just a psychological benchmarking I just feel like I still am retaining that water and I just want to get rid of that that kind of fat that I've accumulated so to speak so 100

1:05:55Sal Di Stefano:pounds is like a rough gauge for me I think it's definitely important to point out something that I heard you say that I think is really a positive thing the fact that you went from 1200 to 1900 calories and you also went from a waitress job where you're probably moving on your feet like crazy to a little more sedentary probably in the job you're at now that and you didn't put on a bunch of body fat you actually have assuming that you put on some muscle with some of that weight gain and so kind of back to sal's question is like i i don't know you know and it's it's obviously it's your body you can do whatever you want with it but you you probably are in a pretty healthy good spot right now.

1:06:38Sal Di Stefano:And I don't know how much we'd want to change that. And also keep in mind when you increase those calories and now add carbohydrates, which you weren't really eating, your body's going to naturally hold a little bit of more water. I mean, you can literally reduce that in a day or two just by cutting that or having a low carb day one day and you probably see water come out. Like you would see yourself lose some of that. So as long as it's just your basic water retention and it's not inflammation that we're talking about. It's good. It's healthy. Yeah.

1:07:09Adam Schafer:If you went ketogenic now, you'd probably lose 10 pounds on the scale, but it wouldn't be body fat. It would be water. It used to be water. Yeah. So what you might be thinking is like too much water is that you're used to having very little water from going ketogenic for three years. So here's the formula. And right now you have it reversed. Okay. You want to look at your energy, your health, your strength, your function. And if those things feel good, like I'm getting stronger, I feel good, I've got good energy, no pain. Then you look at the scale and say, okay, well, this seems to be an ideal body weight for me.

1:07:43Adam Schafer:What you don't want to do is chase a body weight. Because if you chase a body weight, then what tends to happen is you sacrifice all those other things. And at your height, let's say you're 4 '11", if you're strong and your strength training, 117 to 119 pounds is fine. It's actually a good body weight. 100 pounds is a bit light unless you were absolutely shredded, which you don't necessarily want to be as a young woman. Walking around at 14 % body fat, probably not a good idea. It'll probably have a negative influence or impact on your hormones. I'd like to see, if you were my client, I'd like to keep you in the low 20s for body fat percentage.

1:08:22Adam Schafer:and I'd watch your strength in the gym. Have you tested that by any chance? My body weight? No, no, body weight. My body fat. Sorry, sorry, yes. It's hard to find an accurate model, of course. I've done a DEXA scan when I was in Poland and I think it was like 24 percent. And the thing is, is that I still feel fluffy. And sometimes when there's a photo, I'm like, I still, I hate the fact that I see a double chin and all that. It drains my confidence. and a thing for context if i'm i'm an actress and i i work in in the uk i work in the u.s and like when i audition i'm like oh crap i see myself i often go out for young roles because i look younger yeah and um i'm like i i don't want to look like i don't want to be chubby because that's not me i'm always disciplined i'm always on top of myself yeah you're not you're not chubby you

1:09:12Sal Di Stefano:know if you were my client and and i'm hearing hearing you right now like i would show you something in a week's time just to show you that all we're doing is letting go of water and holding water and then just remind you that and you could do that before an audition if you really wanted to like look a little leaner when you go do an audition or whatever but you i think you're

1:09:30Adam Schafer:in a really healthy you're great you're doing great yeah how's your strength how much strength have you gained since doing the reverse diet well i mean my deadlift i would say is about 170 pounds that's all i need to hear yeah you're strong too yeah i'm going to tell you something this is really hard to do, especially in the field that you're in, but stop studying yourself. Like stop staring at yourself and trying to find, uh, you know, things that you don't like because you'll find them and, uh, that'll become the focus.

1:10:02Sal Di Stefano:Not only that, you'll always find them. You'll always find them where you're at body fat percentage, but you'll always do that.

1:10:06Adam Schafer:That's just, that's just human nature. Now you're also a young woman, uh, and you're going to have, you have a young face, which is good. I'm going to tell you something right now. You're going to, you're going to, when you're in your forties, you're going to be like, Oh my God, I loved it when I was in my twenties and I had this young face. And cause then that starts to hollow out as you get older. So, uh, yeah, I think you're being very harsh on yourself. I think your, your body weight's good. If your strength is good, your energy is good. You're kind of finding, you know, you feel great.

1:10:34Sal Di Stefano:Do you also want to have kids one day? Do you plan to have kids one day? I mean, yeah, sometime in the future. Like I'm not thinking about it now, but yeah. Well, the reason why I say that is because even though you're not thinking about having kids right now, the way you diet and exercise right now will impact that. And you're at a very healthy place right now. And you came from somewhere where you were starting to go down the wrong direction. And where you're at now is to go from 1 ,200 to 1 ,900 calories. Yeah, 411. Yeah. That's great. Yeah. You almost doubled your calories. You reduced the amount of activity and movement you on a daily basis.

1:11:10Sal Di Stefano:You are strong. As long as you're hanging around that 20 % to 24 % body fat, you're lean. So, I mean, yes, we can push lower, but then now we risk what Sal said. We risk health. You're going to be, I mean, yes, you can look that way, but it would be unhealthy for you and you're in a healthy place.

1:11:30Adam Schafer:No, I'll sell it. I'll sell it to you, okay? Okay. Keep strength training. Keep your calories where they're at. Slowly increase them. if you want to keep increasing your strength and just keep getting stronger. And what'll happen over time is you'll develop more strength, more sculpt, more shape to your body, and you're going to continue to progress. And you'll continue to feel better. So aesthetically speaking, you're going to keep progressing as long as you continue to focus on getting stronger in the gym. And your calories, they can hover. They can probably get up as high as 2 ,300, 2 ,400 calories over time.

1:12:03Adam Schafer:So I would continue to just kind of move in that direction. If you feel uncomfortable eating that much, like, oh, my God, I'm eating too much, that's fine you can pull back but keep working on strength 170 pound deadlift at your size is phenomenal that's excellent so yeah yeah i appreciate that i i'm with sal too you if you

1:12:19Sal Di Stefano:keep focusing on getting strong and building muscle you will tighten up and be more sculpted on that path if you try and cut right now you'll just end up sacrificing muscle so you might lose a little bit of water and maybe a percent of body fat but you'll also lose some of that good muscle that you're building, which impacts your metabolic rate.

1:12:38Adam Schafer:It'll make it much more difficult later on.

1:12:40Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, but if you just stay the course and keep on the reverse diet, keep getting stronger.

1:12:44Adam Schafer:Yeah, you look healthy right now. You got good skin, your hair looks healthy. From what I'm hearing, you're totally doing the right things. Just stay the course and be very careful with judging and studying yourself in the mirror or pictures because it'll never go right if you do that.

1:12:59Sal Di Stefano:How much MMA are you practicing too? So MMA, my sister loves it. I'm more like strike your wing chun based, but I honestly, it's like an inspired thing. It comes on a daily basis. Like, oh, like if I have five minutes here, I'll work on something. I also fence. So I'm like, oh, let me like, you know, grab a sword and like do something. So it comes inspired and I don't have a regimen about it.

1:13:22Adam Schafer:Okay. Oh yeah, you're good. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I like Mass 15 for you. I think the other original Mass 15 would be another good one to toggle between. Do you have the original Mass 15? Yes, I do because I've purchased it. and I've also got MAPS TRX. Oh, she's doing advanced. Sorry. Do you have MAPS 15 performance? No, no. Oh, let's send that to you. You'll love that. Oh, thank you. You'll love that. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah, I appreciate it. And I know I do have TRX and that's fun. MAPS TRX, I enjoyed that. I just have, just because I remember we, thank you so much for the advice. I did kind of touch on the armor thyroid and the fact that I, like taking the 60 milligrams, I have a pretty high T3 and low TSH.

1:14:05I do remember there was an episode that you spoke to Dr. Lauren Fitzgerald and she did mention something that like she has clients that walk around with kind of higher T3, low TSH. I was wondering, would you say that is safe for me even though it's kind of out of range in my labs or should I find something a little more in range? Because like, I feel great on it. I tried the lower dose and it's not bad, but I feel sluggish.

1:14:30Adam Schafer:Well, I'll speak from the interview. So this is not my field of expertise. But she would say you want to base it off both labs and symptoms. Yeah, how you feel. So how you feel. And you're going to have low TSH when you're supplementing with thyroid. There's a negative feedback loop with hormones. So of course your TSH is low because your body's sensing that you have more thyroid. So that's to be expected. And thyroid is one of those hormones that if you optimize, it's typically a good thing. And it's a pretty easy hormone to optimize versus other hormones.

1:15:07Sal Di Stefano:It seems like you've kind of figured this out too because you went down a little bit and you notice when you went down, you feel sluggish. And if I know Dr. Lauren, that's what she would say back to you is like, how do you feel? And if you lower the dose and you still felt great, she'd say, great, let's keep it low. But if you lower the dose, feel sluggish, as soon as you go right back, you feel great, she'd say, looks like this is where we should be. That's probably what she would say to you.

1:15:26Adam Schafer:That's right. Okay. And it seems that I will be taking this for a long time, if not forever, or? Typically, I mean, you were subclinical, so maybe you could go off and have thyroid come back up. You could experiment with that later. But if I had to choose a hormone deficiency, if I had to pick and someone said, you have to have a hormone deficiency, which one would you want? It would be thyroid. It's the easiest to remedy. All right. I see. damn the keto diet i'm so sorry yeah i hate it i the age of the internet literally screwed with my mind and i i do not like that because there was not enough literally you guys were the main source of information that i followed that has no bs so thank you guys for that and thank you also you guys inspired my sister to pursue a master's in kinesiology she's a personal trainer she loves you guys so she kind of referred me listen to them they know what they're doing Oh, good, good.

1:16:21Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, good, good. You know, very positive thing is you caught this early. Yeah, you're young. You're 23. You're doing well. A lot of people don't listen and don't try and figure it out, and they just keep hammering themselves until they're in their late 20s. And then a lot of the stuff, that's why I was asking about kids and things like that. Then they have struggle having kids and stuff in the future. So you're in a good place. You're doing good. And I think if you just keep building muscle and focusing on getting strong, and you're not going to build muscle cutting so that you just know that, right?

1:16:47Sal Di Stefano:So if you get tempted to want to go back down in calories is just so you can lose a little bit of water weight. You're not going to build muscle there. You need to be where you're at in calories or above. And so if you keep focusing on that, the sculpting and shaping of the body is going to happen over time. You're very young in your lifting career. The more years, trust me, you keep getting better and better. As a woman who's lifting how you're lifting already, you continue down that path and that body will continue to sculpt and get better and better. I think my wife looks better at 45 than she did at 29, way better.

1:17:15Sal Di Stefano:And it's just from years and years of lifting and sculpting. So stay with it. thank you yeah bless you guys and like and even the stress i i assume that like it's a natural part of life but like i hope that's gonna balance out too because i hate the fact like oh you stress as a woman and you put on so much water and then you get puffy and then you can't like your home

1:17:34Adam Schafer:and said yeah you guys are lucky yeah i know well thank you very much keep it up thank you we'll send that over to you awesome thank you guys bye you know what this makes me think of adam What? You know in bodybuilding, how they talk about muscle maturity?

1:17:49Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

1:17:50Adam Schafer:You know what they're talking about is muscle maturity, they'll refer to bodybuilders who are like in their 20s, but they're jacked. But they have a look, and they'll say, oh, in another 10 years, it'll look way better. Even if they're not bigger, same muscle, there's a different look to muscle. What it is is your skin gets thinner as you get older, which you don't necessarily want. Like when you're younger, you have thicker skin and dermis, and it's what gives you that youthful look. And so sometimes when we're as a young woman or even a young man and you're like idolizing these shredded bodies and you're like, man, I kind of look puffy.

1:18:25Adam Schafer:No, what you're looking at is youth. And believe me, when your skin gets thinner, you want it to go be, you look back and go, man, I wish I had that.

1:18:31Sal Di Stefano:It also takes, I mean, think both your journeys, our wives' journeys, like it takes a long time to build muscle. Muscle doesn't just come on overnight, especially when your calories are moderately low. Especially if you're a female. Takes a long time to do that. And I mean, 100 % Katrina at 45 post-kid has a better body than she did at 29. And I know a lot of that is just through - It's the muscle. Yes. She's built a lot of muscle in the last decade and a half. And so she'll keep getting better. If you start lifting in your early 20s as a girl, your body will continue to get better as you continue to have that.

1:19:05As long as you feed it appropriately and take care of it.

1:19:09Sal Di Stefano:If you cut hard all the time and carry it, then good luck. it's going to be really tough. And then you're not going to be healthy and not get the body you want, but stay the course. You'll continue to sculpt that physique. Our next caller is Lindsay from Tennessee. Hi, Lindsay. Hi, how are y 'all? We're good. How are you doing? I'm well. Okay, I will read my question. So it is regarding whether or not I am failing my reverse diet. So I've been listening to your show for around six months or so. And as a result, I started a reverse diet three months ago and I've gone extremely slow. I add 70 to 100 calories every two to four weeks or so.

1:19:47I started at 1500 calories and I'm now up to 2000 to 2200 depending on the day. I subjectively feel I have more fat around my abdomen, legs and arms. Just for context, I am 33 years old. I am 134 pounds and I'm five foot two. I eat 140 grams of protein every day and I track my calories, but not my other macros. And I haven't gotten back on the scale since I started my reverse diet because it messes with my mind. Currently, I am in phase three of muscle mommy and I've gotten much stronger. I went from no weight on the bar for my squat to adding 50 pounds to the bar and my deadlift is around 100 pounds.

1:20:35I'm discouraged that I'm not visibly leaner as we often talk about on the show with people who reverse diet. And if anything, I feel like I've put on more body fat. I am encouraged that I am stronger. I just was hoping my aesthetics would follow my strength gains. I feel that I'm in a surplus despite me really trying to slow my reverse diet. So what advice do you have?

1:20:57Sal Di Stefano:Wait, what makes you think you failed? Yeah. What makes you, you're doing good. You're doing good. Yeah. Yeah. You added 40 pounds. You need somebody in your ear telling you that squat. Yeah. You're doing good. And you don't look any different.

1:21:09Adam Schafer:Are you married? Do you have a husband or someone that could tell you like, you know, do you have somebody there that could tell you like you look different? Um, I do. Yes. I can ask. Cause if you added 40 pounds, your squat, your butt probably looks way different.

1:21:22Sal Di Stefano:yeah in addition to that you've also added a significant amount of calories already you're doing good you're heading the right direction and by the way it's a very short period of time right now yeah by the way it hasn't been that long here's the thing a reverse diet is not designed

1:21:36Adam Schafer:the goal of a reverse diet is not to make you leaner no no yeah it's to get you stronger build muscle and the other part of it is to set you up so it's easier to get leaner later on ability yeah but in a reverse diet by the way the reason why we call it a reverse diet is because when i say bulk, which is what we used to call it back in the day, women run the other direction. It's like, yikes. Yeah. But you're doing what's called a bulk and a bulk in the old days and the new day and today, the idea of it is to build muscle, to build that metabolically active tissue that burns calories, that makes your hormones move in a more optimal position and way.

1:22:12Adam Schafer:And then later set us up for a more effective cut for fat loss. Let me ask you some more questions. How do you feel otherwise? How's energy, sleep, libido with the higher calories? Are you noticing any improvements in those things? Yeah, I feel the best that I've felt. A really long time. All positive. Wow. I'm hearing. Yes. I think it just aesthetically, I feel a little fluffier. Well, you gain 40 pounds of squat.

1:22:39Sal Di Stefano:You probably build some muscle. Lindsay, have you ever had a personal trainer? Have you ever considered having a personal trainer? No, I've never had a personal trainer. I'm fairly new to strength training. Okay. Yeah, and the reason why I say that is I think just to have a trainer kind of in your ear, letting you know what's going on, why you feel the way, where we're at, how good you're doing, really, really worth its weight and goal because this is very common, especially somebody who's early in weightlifting, to get in their own way, to get in their own head. Because I don't care how good you look.

1:23:13Sal Di Stefano:We find a way to look at all of our flaws and the worst part. You're not assessing all the good.

1:23:17Adam Schafer:And building muscle will make you feel more full in your body.

1:23:19Sal Di Stefano:I used to have to do this with clients, okay? And I would tell them, I don't care. I just want you to take this photo, do this. And then what I do in a moment like this, I'd be like, hey, those photos that I had you taking, I want you to take them again. And I'd put them side by side. And I would have to tell a client like you, Lindsay, look at your butt right here. Look at your shoulders right here. I'd have to point out every positive thing because all they want is like, I feel like my waist is bigger, Adam, or I feel like my thighs are bigger. And I'm like, yeah, you built muscle. and look at all these and look at and i'd have to i literally would have to take them through their own body and point out all the things that i could see that you were doing so well and to get them to trust the continue to trust so you're doing great uh don't give up on it you're heading the right direction uh it is still really early um give it some time you have you

1:24:07Adam Schafer:have you got a couple years of getting stronger uh let me let me give you some let me just like put this in percentages so it makes more sense, right? You started squatting with the bar, right? Just the bar. And now you added 40%. You almost doubled your strength. You got, in three months, you got twice as strong. So you right now versus you three months ago, you're two times stronger. That's crazy. That's like superhuman if you actually think about it.

1:24:36Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, yeah.

1:24:36Adam Schafer:And you've done that by increasing your calories, 600, 700 calories. so you're doing great keep going yes how long what should i shoot for in terms of calories

1:24:47Sal Di Stefano:when do i as i with someone like you my goal always is this is i want to get you to a place where you look back at me go adam this is i can't eat anymore it's so much food because then i know that i've got you to that where it's like okay this is almost uncomfortable how much i have to eat because it's just a lot of volume and then we just go okay let's cut back a meal or let's reduce your portion size in half and then you just lean out and it just comes off but we got to get there first in order for that to work if you do it too soon then you might notice a little bit you definitely the waste will come in a tiny bit you might even drop a pound or two but then it'll plateau really hard and so we want to get to a place where you're built up where you feel like you're eating more food than you ever had your energy level is great your libido is great so everything's we're strong and you're just like man this is a lot of okay let's cut a little bit out.

1:25:38Sal Di Stefano:Let's cut a little bit out. And then you land in a place where you feel satisfied still. You don't feel like you're starving or having to restrict hard, but yet the body is just leaning out. That's what it looks like.

1:25:48Adam Schafer:But yeah, you're only three months into it too. This is like, yeah, you're, you're, you're actually going to start seeing accelerated results. If you keep moving, you can go, you can reverse diet as slow as you want, whatever you're comfortable with. And just keep focusing on, on getting stronger.

1:26:02Sal Di Stefano:It says you, uh, you said you've been listening the show for six months are you pretty consistent with listening yeah i listen every day okay good okay good so i feel like if you don't have a trainer at least have us in your ears every day talking to you to hopefully keep you on the path because yeah i think you're doing i like to um if you're not already in it i'd love doug to put you in our private forum too okay no i'm not in

1:26:23Adam Schafer:it the other thing too lindsey is before three months ago were you kind of a chronic dieter were you like oh i cut i'm trying to always cut i'm trying to over you know work off these calories I'm trying to eat little, but yeah. Yeah. I grew up in the era of 1200 calories, lots of running. So yeah.

1:26:40Sal Di Stefano:Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You got to give it some time. Well, I'm putting you in the forum now. So now you got direct, direct access to us. Okay. So every time you start thinking like this, I want you to message us in there. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Write a post. Tell us how you're feeling. Tell us where you're at, what's going on. And then let us, let us talk you off the ledge and keep you heading the right. Cause you're, cause you're doing a great job. You're doing a really good. Yes. Yes, I'm going to finish Muscle Mommy in a few weeks and start anabolic. Oh, you're going to get strong. Yes, I love that.

1:27:10Sal Di Stefano:This will be great. Yep. Thank you so much. You got it. Good job. Stay close to us, okay? Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Thanks, Lindsay.

1:27:16Adam Schafer:Bye. So I know what this feels like in the reverse. Adam and I, you and I have talked about this before. I never went on a cut because as soon as I started to cut, I would start to feel smaller and I'd freak out and I'd go back on the bowl. so i never got like really lean because i was uh i would just get in my own way paranoid you were

1:27:36Sal Di Stefano:losing muscle yeah and i remember she's the opposite paranoid she's putting fat on yep and

1:27:40Adam Schafer:i remember there was like one summer where i was just like i'm gonna just do the course i'm just gonna stay i was really hard for me and i'd cover myself up because i freaked you know i'd look in the mirror and i'd end up messing with myself and i got for the first time ever i got like lean i got seven percent or something like that body fat and then it was like i got through it like okay not

1:27:56Sal Di Stefano:only that i know what it feels like i know i know this happened to you too i i because i i vividly remember this moment is uh people seeing me yeah you look like you're bro you're jacked how much how much muscle you put on and i'm like are you kidding me i'm down 15 pounds yeah yeah i'm smaller than what i but that just shows you how we mess with our own head psychologically just like she's feeling right now she's in her head she's going oh my god i'm putting on body fat we're probably her husband's like oh you look great yeah we're going the right direction i like this but you tell yourself this story that's trapped so i hope uh one i hope she stays listening to the show i wouldn't mind i would i like one of the trainers to call her because i think her having somebody

1:28:33Adam Schafer:who's kind of the value of working one of the values of working with yeah so having off the

1:28:37Sal Di Stefano:leg having having someone coach her along because she's doing a really good job our next caller is

1:28:41Adam Schafer:bradley from texas bradley what's happening what's going down oh it's good man it's weird to see you guys i've been following you guys i don't want to say day one but i want to say episode around to 100 or so. Wow. Oh, wow. Right on. The old days. It's been a long time. I know you've got a lot of callers, so let me get to the question. Kind of like what everyone says. I've been listening to you guys, like I said, for over eight years. I want to say longer than that. I have similar stories to all of y 'all. I was a personal trainer in the beginning of my career after college when I graduated in 2013.

1:29:14Played sports in college, baseball and football. I was a personal trainer for a big box gym. I wound up being general manager and eventually DVP for Big Box Gym in California. Originally born and raised San Diego and then moved out to Texas a little over 10 years ago. Even though I 100 % agree with all your philosophies on correct dosage, training, intensity, sleep, recovery, all this kind of stuff for the average person, I'm no longer the average person job. And I'll get to that in a sec, but my sleep is interrupted consistently and I have to perform at a high mental and physical level. I'm a firefighter paramedic for the third busiest department in the country, the Dallas Fire Department, and I work 24-hour shifts on and then I have 48 hours off.

1:30:05Some shifts, I only ride the ambulance where it's more busy, more calls, where I just do my paramedic duties, where I have to be mentally sharp to help people. I have to think fast to help others even in the middle of the night, 2 o 'clock in the morning analyzing rhythms correct drugs to give and so on some shifts I ride, and other shifts I ride the engine and truck where I'm doing more of the physical stuff going to multi-alarm fires not only at any time where it can be 2 o 'clock in the morning, 10 a.m but I'm also wearing all the gear where it's extremely hot It's also Texas, so it's always hot.

1:30:47Wearing the gear, carrying tools into the structure. My training-wise and all of that, I'm required to have, you know, incredible cardiovascular strength and endurance to be able to breathe on an air bottle. I always tell people this, you know, the air you and me are breathing right now, you know, if that's at 100%, the actual air we're breathing is at about 70 % of that. So we're not getting the full amount. um you know climb upstairs confined spaces climb over objects meanwhile carrying you know 100 pound hose that's charged um carrying tools finding people being in a fire not be able to see all that kind of stuff i understand recovery and understand your philosophy on the average person doing traditional strength training two to three times a week when i was a trainer i mean i preached that all day every day uh fortunately uh that kind of training won't cut it for what i need to do now.

1:31:42I know you guys talk about stress on the body adaptation, not just that kind of stress, but obviously I'm married and I have a two-year-old daughter working on child number two. I'm active in my church and serve on the medical team. So I have obligations there as well. Justin, you're going to love this. I'm going to say a bad word here, but I think CrossFit is the best type of gym for me or to workouts saying that, you know, I'm not a huge believer on their programming mean and all that kind of stuff so i totally get it just it might be better towards me uh but obviously i want to get y 'all's input uh on what that looks like uh not just in the acute training job now but obviously i need a long healthy life and healthy not just outside but internal stuff as far as heart health and all that kind of stuff goes so it's interesting you say that because the

1:32:34Sal Di Stefano:first thing that comes to mind as you were listening is i was thinking micro dosing my training and then doing what I need to do endurance and stamina. So I stay at the top of my game performance when you can.

1:32:43Adam Schafer:Yep. Yeah. I'll say this, Bradley, first off, thank God for people like you, the sacrifice, uh, just to help people. I don't think people realize how difficult it is to do the job that you do. Uh, by the way, what big box gym did you work for in California? LA fitness. All right. Good deal. So, all right. So, so here's the deal. It's a shift in mindset, Bradley. Uh, If you are chasing progress, fitness progress, this is where you can run into some problems while doing your job. So if I'm trying to simultaneously do a stressful job where my sleep is interrupted and try to gain strength and endurance and stamina at the same time, you have to tread very carefully.

1:33:28Adam Schafer:So what that's going to look like is when appropriate, you can push yourself a little bit. But you got to be very judicious with it. For the most part, for a job like yours, Bradley, you're already fit and healthy. We train you more like a pro athlete. Yeah, and yes. That's how we train you. What you want to do with your training is to prevent injury and degradation of health. So if you chase performance while doing what you're doing, they're going to cross and you're going to run into some problems. You're going to actually lose performance. you're gonna start getting hormonal issues you'll start to really degrade your health so think like this 90 of the time i'm preventing i'm just trying to keep myself healthy and then every once in a while when the stars align you got some time you feel good you'll throw in that challenging workout so that's what that looks like that's the mentality but if you're if you chase uh if you're trying to chase performance gains consistently while doing what you're doing it's going to be a problem.

1:34:30Sal Di Stefano:I mean, I'm microdosing your training, and we're doing on your off days some of your endurance training. That's what it looks like. It looks like you're doing two lifts, the 15-minute MAPS 15 type of lifting, and then when you have days off, that's when we do some of your endurance running and stuff like that to keep your cardiovascular endurance up and stamina up like you need to, and that's what it looks like. And it goes off of how you feel in your shift. I don't know if you heard Justin time in. He's like, you know, some days you stack that. So you have the MAPS 15 protocol, which is basically six days a week of 15 minutes.

1:35:02Sal Di Stefano:But sometimes you're not going to be able to lift at all. But that's okay because on other days you're going to be able to stack two of those workouts because you're off. And so it's like you're following the 15 protocol. And then when you have the days of rest and you feel good, we can stack two of those workouts. Other times you just do the two lifts and that's all you do lifting-wise. And then the days that you have off, we do our endurance and stamina training.

1:35:24Adam Schafer:Yeah, so I've trained quite a few people that work in a field like yours, firefighters, paramedics, ER doctors. And what it typically looks like, and correct me if I'm wrong, is you go through periods of time where it's like nothing really stressful happening. You're just, you're at the station, whatever. And then there's like all of a sudden shit hits the fan and it's like, okay. So that's how you got to gauge this, right? So it might look like, you know, you're just kind of maintaining, maintaining, maintaining. You're like, wow, I've had a few days where it's been slow. You throw in that hard workout.

1:35:56Adam Schafer:But there's times, and I know this, right? You probably have times where it's like, oh, my God, it's like, I don't know what's happening, but this has been a lot. And that kind of serves as your training. Like you're out there carrying the hose, and like you said, you're putting fires out. That's not the time to challenge your body with your workouts. You're already getting challenged. Do you have mass performance as well? I don't. I was thinking about that one. I just didn't know what the layout looked like, including a cardiovascular type of workout.

1:36:29Sal Di Stefano:So phase four has pretty intensive cardiovascular type workouts in it. And again, I would compromise because CrossFit, you could use one of those Metcons for one of those intense days. I know I could do my intense workout now because I've had X amount of days where it's not super stressful. but you're going to undulate your training based upon like you know the stress at work and lifestyle and everything else and that's why maps 15 the you know the 15 performance i think is a good compliment because you can kind of tailor that for your uh you know just just microdosing and then we we hit like that that hard intensive day yeah uh as it comes up i i would love to give a maps 15 performance and give a mass performance yeah your base that you run 90 percent of the time to Sal's point is, is maps 15 performance on the days you feel great.

1:37:21Sal Di Stefano:You pull from the full performance maps performance program, which is like a full workout. So when you want to get after it, because by the way, we built that to kind of counter the CrossFit philosophy. It's like our answer to what you get from CrossFit. It's our answer to that, but better programming. So you pull from that. And, and that's kind of, you have, if you haven't listened to the episode we did with, why is my boy's name slipping me right now, basketball coach for the Suns. Corey Schlesinger. Corey Schlesinger. Did you listen to that episode? Yeah, but it's been a while. Because you've relisted to that.

1:37:53Sal Di Stefano:I'll go back to it. Yeah, because all the science and the things that we're talking about in that episode applies to you. The way he treats his basketball players in season, you're a basketball player in season. You train like that. You perform. You train like that. And then when in the offseason, what Sal's talking about, when you've got those weeks that might be total down, time and not crazy, then you can pull from MAPS Performance and you run those workouts. That's when you can handle that.

1:38:18Adam Schafer:I had clients like this, and what I would do is I would judge it for them because people like you tend to be terrible judges. That's a good point. So I'd always ask them, like, hey, how's it been or whatever? Oh, did you get any calls last night? No, nothing's going on or whatever. So sometimes what it looked like was once a month, they'd have a really hard workout. And then most of the workouts were like mobility, taking care of the body. and then other times we'd have like like one or two hard workouts a week just depending on what work look like because it's so unpredictable like your job is so unpredictable that you're gonna have to kind of feel it out but think like like i said like uh it's prevention most the time and then during those times and you're like oh this is it's slow i'm getting sleep everything's good then you can push and by the way you will you will build more muscle and you will get in

1:39:03Sal Di Stefano:better shape training that way it doesn't feel like it because it feels counterintuitive you're like oh i'm doing way less but that's what your body needs yeah and you'll you'll get better that way if you try just grinding it can you know all the time is oh you're just gonna spin out yep yeah and that's what i'm worried about i i i feel good right now uh it's been about what are we in i started trt about eight months ago uh my my levels were in the ground so uh not just from the job necessarily but life had a newborn all that kind of stuff and uh really uh they've come up obviously huge and feeling great right now uh and so i've been consistently every workout's been solid solid solid um i also they just put me on because we're trying for kid number two and it's been a couple months and nothing should happen uh no it actually it's called it In clomiphene?

1:39:58Yes. And I started that a couple of weeks ago and I'm feeling even better. So it's like, oh, I want to drive off that.

1:40:04Sal Di Stefano:So you have to be careful. You are getting an artificial signal right now. So that's the one thing I always tell my TRT guys is that you feel better than what really is going on. You got to be careful, right? Okay. So of course you feel better. Your testosterone was in the dumpster and now it's optimal all the time. And so that sometimes will make you think I'm optimal, be training hard all the time. And that's not necessarily true.

1:40:30Adam Schafer:So to put it differently, the pro of hormone replacement therapy is your hormones are always optimized. The con is that your hormones are always optimized, meaning they don't react and respond to your life. So what would normally happen in a normal situation is if you overstress your body, your hormones move in a direction that force you to rest because you feel like dog shit. But because they're always high, you're like, oh. I'm good. Yeah, I'm good. But don't do that. Yeah, don't do that because you can mess yourself up on TRT. In fact, I've seen more men go on TRT and overtrain. For that reason.

1:41:07Adam Schafer:For that particular reason. Exactly. Because they're like, oh, yeah. So you got to kind of look at things objectively because your testosterone is always going to be high no matter what because you're taking testosterone. So don't necessarily just listen to that.

1:41:20Sal Di Stefano:I mean, I remember telling the guys this all the time off air about my experience with all the pro bodybuilders. I'd be like, dude, these guys train so stupid. They don't know. And the reason why is because they have all these drugs in them. They're like, I feel great fucking on zero calories and I'm crushing these work. It's like, yeah, because you have an artificial signal that's telling you you're better than what you really are. And yet it's not the more it's not the appropriate way to train. There was there would have been a better way for them to train. But because they could get away with it, they keep doing it.

1:41:48Sal Di Stefano:This is why guys like that have so much problems. So in spite of progress. That's right. That's right.

1:41:51Adam Schafer:So there's actually way better progress on the other end of this if you're a little bit more objective.

1:41:56Sal Di Stefano:And the fact that you are on TRT, man, a beautiful dose of microdosing MAPS 15 is going to be perfect for you, bro. That with a compliment with some endurance and stamina training on your days off, you're going to be good. That's right.

1:42:09Adam Schafer:Okay.

1:42:09Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Cool. Yeah, that works. I appreciate it, guys. Thank you for your time. You got it, man. Thanks, brother. Yep. All right.

1:42:15Adam Schafer:Yeah, that's a tough one. Yeah. I'm glad he said he was on TRT. Yeah, me too. Because then we have to comment on that. Yeah, it does help. Yeah, because it doesn't just affect your muscle. It affects your central nervous system, your mental capacity. And so then you suddenly are like, and now here's the thing. Oftentimes, people will look at soldiers and look at their training. And what they got to understand is that they're not training. In many of these positions, you're not training someone to make them improve physically. Mental. It's a mental attitude. Yeah, we're trying to beat you up so you can be okay with getting beat up all the time.

1:42:45Adam Schafer:Because that's what's going to happen. You're surviving. Yeah. So you don't want to, I mean, if he's doing this as a job, and hopefully he does this for 20 years, you can't just survive for 20 years. You're going to break yourself down. Build yourself up.

1:43:00Sal Di Stefano:And getting on the TRT is a quick path for him to head the wrong direction because he feels, just like he said, like, oh, it feels so good. Like, yeah, definitely. You're going to feel like that because of that signal you're getting. But the danger of that is that now you don't have those natural signals for the body to go like, hey, today we should probably take off. But, yeah, no, less is more here.

1:43:18Adam Schafer:That's right. Look, if you like our show, come find us on Instagram. You can find us at MindPumpMedia. 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 Super Bundle at MindPumpMedia.com. The RGB Super Bundle includes MAPS Anabolic, MAPS Performance, and MAPS Aesthetic. Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal, Adam, and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos, the RGB Super Bundle is like having Sal, Adam, and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price.

1:44:04The RGB Super Bundle has a full 30-day money-back guarantee, and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at mindpumpmedia.com. if you enjoy this show please share the love by leaving us a five-star rating and review on itunes and by introducing mind pump to your friends and family we thank you for your support and until next time this is mind pump