2846: Why People Quit Personal Trainers (And Whether AI Can Replace Them)

21:39Adam Schafer:You know what we're probably going to do, but you love being with me. That's totally true. I mean, there was, like, some overcoming that in the beginning, though, for sure, because, like, people come in with expectations. They see all the fancy, you know, P90X workouts and things on TV. And they're like, where's all this? And it's like, no, this is what works. And then you literally have to just have conversations with them and be entertaining. And that's the job. That's what you have to do. You know what it is? If you're a trainer and you don't want to be there, they're not going to be there.

22:08Adam Schafer:They want to be there. Be energized. If you love what you're doing, I guarantee they won't feel bored. Yeah. And, you know, as far as a workout's concerned, like do what's right. and the person will be engaged with you. That's the most important thing. Next up is scheduling issues. I guess this is a real concern. I guess AI is always available at any moment or time. I don't know how you would overcome this with a trainer. I guess if you like your trainer but you can't meet with you anymore, then I guess that's a thing. I don't know. Yeah. No, I mean, this is a common.

22:44Sal Di Stefano:I mean, when you survey a bunch of people and say, what are the reasons why you quit, this would obviously come up there. I think we've all seen scheduling conflicts with clients before, and it's part of the business. I don't know how much AI, like you said, AI is available 24-7. Yeah. But I don't know if that's like if -

23:02Adam Schafer:I don't know if it solves the problem because I hate saying this because this sounds very invalidating, but oftentimes not having enough time isn't really the issue. Now, I know some people have more time than others, obviously. uh but regardless of what your schedule looks like in my experience the people that are successful carve out however much time they can a window and stay consistent yeah even if it's just like a brief like one or two days a week where you have like that one little chunk i've never had anybody

23:31Sal Di Stefano:even the even the busiest clients i've ever had that actually figured this piece out would tell you they gained all that time back and so of course so that the the the hurdle is when you are that person kids work you got a you got a ton of stuff on your plate that it doesn't seem feasible to me i know what that i understand that feeling totally but the reality is if you find a way to make two to three hours out of the week whether that's broken up or you know one or two days or whatever but find that time to carve that out for yourself and then you become consistent with that what you'll find is you'll get every bit of that time what and i think i don't know I think their studies say like four times that back, something ridiculous.

24:16Sal Di Stefano:And so what you thought you lost, you actually gained because of productivity. But you first have to take that leap of figuring that out.

24:24Adam Schafer:I'll also say this when it comes to scheduling and time. The least successful strategy with – not saying that you can't be successful this way. It's just really rare. The least successful strategy with schedule is to do this. I'll work out whenever I find time. and then you just go about your week. That almost never works. I've seen it work, I think, once with people who have a home gym who are very dedicated. That doesn't work. What typically works is you carve out a little bit of time, whatever that looks like, 20 minutes once a week. I don't care. And then you make it happen. So that's where I think the solution is with that one.

25:00Adam Schafer:And then lastly, this one's crazy to me. And this definitely falls on the trainer. But the last reason, you guys want to know what the last reason is?

25:09Sal Di Stefano:Let's see here. We got two sugar.

25:10Adam Schafer:This is the last number six. The trainer doesn't practice what they preach.

25:14Sal Di Stefano:Ooh.

25:15Adam Schafer:What? Yes. Now, this is the trainer's fault. And I don't mean it's because the trainer isn't perfect, but the trainer presented themselves as perfect. That's your fault, dude. They're chastising them, and then they see them at Burger King. Yeah, dude, you got to be real. First of all, it'll make you a more effective trainer. The most effective trainers are the ones that clients think are real people that also struggle with diet sometimes, that also are challenged. That's the most effective. But if you present yourself as like this perfect fitness god and then you hammer your client for every little mistake, there's no grace, which is a terrible strategy.

25:50Adam Schafer:The second they see you slip up, they're like, screw you. I'm out of here.

25:55Sal Di Stefano:Do you think it's more of that or do you think these are people that are judging the trainer because the trainer is not as fit as they would want?

26:01Adam Schafer:This is people canceling their training. So they hired them in the first place for a reason. So I don't think it's that. But I mean, if we go on that path, yeah, if you look really at it.

26:12Sal Di Stefano:Because imagine you hire somebody, and maybe they're not the most jacked, Greek god-looking trainer, but they're like, they look like they're semi-fit. But then you start training with them, and you realize, oh, my God, they eat like crap, and then you're like, okay, I'm not. So you think it's more the trainer presenting themselves that way?

26:29Adam Schafer:Yeah, I think that's only a problem if the trainer hammers the client for every little mistake they make, hides the fact that they struggle, and then the client finds out. I think if you're honest, especially if you struggle, look, there's people who really struggle with weight and if they hire a trainer who also struggled with weight, who now maybe has lost a lot of weight but tells them, I still struggle with this, man. Like, hey, I know you screwed up last night. Listen, I screwed up last week. I know this is really hard. That is a very powerful and effective relationship building strategy.

27:03Adam Schafer:It works, builds trust. but you sell yourself as something you're not and then your client kind of finds out then you're and you shame them on top of it they're not going to want to work with you no it's just not going to happen so and ai i don't know how ai works around that i guess what ai is what do they look like how do we fix that so yeah i mean i think we're finding more and more i mean ai is going

27:28Sal Di Stefano:to be this incredible tool for a lot of reasons but there's a lot of things that i don't think it's going to replace i mean we all agreed uh professions that that require human connection it won't it won't no no no it'll be a poor substitute poor it'll be really poor the day

27:41Adam Schafer:that ai replaces humans for human connection we have way bigger problems than sure not having

27:46Sal Di Stefano:jobs sure way bigger problems at that point hey you uh you referenced p90x yeah did you see huh they're reviving that no they're not yes they are doug google google uh p90x like big health problems right there for a minute so i don't know who they're using a different model guy yeah it's a and i and uh but i just saw this that uh p90x revival wow um see what it see what comes out trying to make a comeback yeah wow you're getting marketed by a mind pump yeah i know i like that the first thing that came up i like that nobody bought everything uh so it's called p90x generation next oh so it launched on february 3rd i didn't even know that see show me the show me the image here we go here we go just if interesting they brought it they

28:35Adam Schafer:they're going to be able to revive this huh well i mean it's sold a lot yeah it's it's a name yeah

28:41Sal Di Stefano:it's a household name because of all the money they put maybe i mean is that true that maybe they they sold so many millions of copies that even the you know hundreds of thousands of people that have moved on and are like, this Beachbody is whack, is going, there's still hundreds. There's still hundreds of thousands more that will be like, I've been waiting for the new generation to be 90X. They still got the flag in their garage.

29:07Adam Schafer:Listen, I'm just going to read some of their training pillars. I want you guys just to be okay. I'm already reading them right now. They're inside my body. I feel bristling. So there's three core modalities, training pillars. There's metabolic, overload. Metabolic overload. Strength and power moves with minimal rest to build muscle. Cardio. You won't build muscle doing that. There's neuro performance. Neuro. Drills for coordination, reaction time and speed. More cardio. Keep going. Active recovery. Purposeful mobility and flexibility. Moving while you're supposed to be resting. More cardio.

29:50Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Got it. So our three - Where's the muscle confusion? That was like their whole thing. I want to be confused. You know what it is? It's three modes of different cardio. It's a confusion muscle. Yeah, 30 to 45 minutes a day for seven days a week. Oh, my God. Of intense training. Whoa. 45, okay. Yeah, you guys, seven days a week. What are they selling it for? Can we look up what's the pitch?

30:16Adam Schafer:Let's see here. Hey guys, I started this new program and I'm losing weight. It's crazy. Really? What are you doing? Going crazy seven days a week. Seven days a week. I just moved. Only 10 bucks a month. $9.99. Oh, it's monthly.

30:27Sal Di Stefano:You got to pay monthly. 145 workouts total? Yeah. Holy moly. That's a lot of workouts. A lot of workouts. Well, they got seven days to fill.

30:39Yeah, they got to be stacking.

30:40Sal Di Stefano:I mean, talk about it. I mean, a great transition from our conversation we're just having. You know, talk about, you know, just doing a bunch of creative shit for your clients. You know what I'm saying? Put together 145 words.

30:49Adam Schafer:Hey, I'll tell you this. AI is better than that.

30:51Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

30:52Adam Schafer:AI is free.

30:53Sal Di Stefano:I think it's on par. AI is, well, it's better. It's cheaper.

30:56Adam Schafer:AI is free.

30:57Sal Di Stefano:I mean, they might have used AI to build it. That's what I mean. I bet she's run by AI.

31:00Adam Schafer:You can go on your AI right now and be like, I want a 30 to 45 minute nonstop moving workout for 145 days. Yeah. Different workouts every day. Done. Free. Yeah. Just say, hey, everybody, I just saved you. Yeah. You know? 50 bucks or whatever. Hardcore yoga. Just throw that in there.

31:16Sal Di Stefano:You know, the hardest part about the biggest challenge for the consumer, because I think AI could be a great tool. I use AI all the time. We use it within the business, is the prompting piece. Because if you don't know how to prompt it correctly for you as a client. Like what to ask. Yeah, what to ask it. That's the part that would be challenging. Okay, so both my brother-in-laws were using AI. for this stuff. And when they showed me what they had, I was like, okay, that's pretty decent. So good, generic workout and kind of plan for you. But when I sat down with them, we spent an hour on the phone talking and it was just like, I'm asking all these questions and then I go, oh, okay, this is where I want you to start.

32:02Sal Di Stefano:This is what I want you to do. And here's the things I want you to focus on and don't do this and don't do that. And he's just like, wow, that's all different. It's like, well, yeah, because you told me this and then you told me that. You know where else to end. Right. So I know if I knew all that information about him ahead of time, I could then go to a prompt and go, hey, spit me off a workout based off of somebody who has this issue, has only been training for this long, can only do this, is eating this meat. Like if I knew if I was prompting the AI, I could have gave him a better setup than what he got.

32:29Sal Di Stefano:But since he as a consumer doesn't know better, he just goes, I want to get in shape. Yeah. If you have a coach brain that can ask. That's what I mean. objectively so that's the problem here is that like someone's going to make the argument that oh you can totally i'm sure we have a listener who's a trainer our coach is like oh i definitely think you can use it it's like yeah that's your trainer brain yeah that knows how to prompt it and so that but the problem's going to be people won't know you know they don't know what they don't know yeah so they don't know what to ask i have a good example of that dude yeah it's kind

32:59Adam Schafer:of it's related but even then they're like oh do you feel like you can keep going keep going yeah It's AI, dude. I had my cousin, this was last, this was months ago. He had this really weird like back pain. His back was hurting and his shoulder was hurting. He was in so much like upper mid-back pain, low back pain, shoulder pain. He had to stop training jujitsu. Couldn't figure out what was going on. Went to the doctor. Like, oh, maybe you got injured while you were training. and it was just this was like two months of just so much pain you had to take like medication to sleep and was doing massage and went to the chiropractor and the doctors were like it must be your training maybe you need a time off maybe you got an injury they did imaging couldn't figure what was going on so he came and was telling me about this and this goes to your point about knowing what to ask yeah so him and I are talking and uh and I'm just randomly I'm thinking to myself i'm like wait didn't you say a couple months ago your kids had like this random fever and then they had kind of like a little rash he goes yeah and i'm like i wonder if any of those childhood diseases because there's these diseases that kids get that we become immune to when we get them and then we're adults when we get them anymore but sometimes you don't you never get it

34:12Sal Di Stefano:you never got it and so you so as an adult box as an example you get it really bad as an adult

34:15Adam Schafer:and it's different symptoms yeah yeah so i said what what did your kids have and so we started asking him questions i'm like bro i think and i said didn't you get kind of sick he's like yeah was mild so i looked it up and uh i said i think this is what you got and i looked up the symptoms of what it is for an adult and it looks like severe arthritis throughout your whole body and that was what it was he brought to the doctor and the doctor's like oh yeah but had we not know what to ask this poor guy was freaking out he's like am i dying oh wow he's very active thick guy yeah yeah but nobody knew what to ask there was no he didn't know he didn't know the two could be connected it's like he went to the doctor said hey i've got all this back pain he does jujitsu when he works out that's what he thinks is going on yeah he doesn't think oh yeah my kids had a fever yeah do you think there's a connection yeah you know so it's like if you don't know what to ask or what to connect your your information is only going to be as good as no that's exactly

35:06Sal Di Stefano:right that i think that's going to be the biggest hurdle with people that are trying to use it is that they won't know what to ask it or prompt it and it's going to be tough and it's going to require a good coach or to a trainer to do that you know so yeah i gotta tell you guys about my my daughter

35:21Adam Schafer:or my three-year-old. I almost filmed it. I didn't because I'm like, if she sees me filming this, it won't be good. But dude, she threw this. She's so dramatic, dude. She threw this just the most. So she's been having these like little tantrums with Jessica. And I haven't seen the big ones yet. So, you know, praise God. He's been, you know, saving me from these. But I haven't seen any of them yet. But I've seen some of the, I've gotten a little taste of just the drama that happens. And so with toddlers, they call them terrible twos threes you talk to any parent threes and fours can sometimes be worse and so she's in the stage now where she's like defiant and like you could try to discipline her and she'll just one-up you like you could you could even be like look if you don't do if you if you don't stop doing that thing i'm gonna throw away your toy she'll take the toy and throw it away herself and then continue like she'll one-up you and you're like what do i do anyway we were all hanging out and it was just me and the two little ones and i'm like hey guys all right let's clean up the playroom and then we get to, we'll watch this movie.

36:21Adam Schafer:And so they're all excited. So they all did that. And then there was one, one toy, little toy that was on the floor in the hallway, 10 feet from her room. And it was her toy. So they're all done. Everybody's happy. High fives. I'm like, Oh, Hey, Dahlia, one more toy. Get that and put it in your room. Oh, no, I said, it's one, it's one toy. Just pick it up. I said, honey, we're not going to watch. We're not going to do the thing unless you pick that up and bring it to your room. she gets on the floor she grabs it and army crawls so slowly to her room while going

36:57Adam Schafer:like she's in pain bro it takes her 15 minutes goes in a room and then she army crawls back on her back so she's sliding back on her back ah flopping around the whole time i'm like wow dude dude, this is amazing right now. That's a lot of effort. It was like 20 minutes, dude. A lot of effort, dude.

37:16Sal Di Stefano:Now, does Jessica let you know like on a scale of one to 10 what that is rated to what she's seen? I know that what she's seen. She's like, honey, that's like a three just so you know. for sure. She's like, that's a three. You haven't seen a nine or a 10 yet. no, no, no, no.

37:27Adam Schafer:She's so much like my older daughter. My older daughter was little. She would throw these tantrums. I remember thinking like, there was one time I had to get her in her car seat and she wouldn't get in her car seat

37:40Adam Schafer:so I had to like physically use my strength to like push her in there and lock it in and she freaked out so much she took her shoe off she threw it at her mom and I remember thinking to myself like if we had a way to capture this energy this would be like we could power it oh yeah you could power power city dude I had that same thing like Everett it was totally different cause you think like the car is that's your safe haven that's like where you drive around the block and they're going to go to sleep and everything's going to be great. And every time we'd go to put him in, it was like you're putting him in a straight jacket.

38:15Dude, some kids are like that. Some kids love it. Some kids hate it. Swinging at me and screaming. I'm like, oh, my God. It was just the car seat. It was just like he did not like to be confined. I was like, we can't go anywhere. Like, we're never going to go anywhere.

38:31Sal Di Stefano:It's so wild how some kids are so opposite like that. Like, some kids are just, like, resistant to that. And then other kids are like.

38:38Adam Schafer:pass out.

38:40Sal Di Stefano:That's Max. Max can be in one of the loud cars, dude. I'm like, oh my God, dude. How's that? Yeah, top is down, engines roaring, and he's just like this. I just cannot figure it out, dude. I do remember, though, when he was a baby, so when we lived over by the coast, and he, I would take him for nap time. I would just throw him in the car, in the car seat and we would just cruise one and just drive along the coast yeah play music and just you get to go on a drive yeah yeah i get to go on a drive and he'd fall asleep so we've been doing that since he was a baby so i wonder if it has something to do with that that from from infancy you know i'd put him in that car seat and we would just drive for a nap time i was just

39:24Adam Schafer:talking with aurelius yesterday i don't know where this came up and he goes is it true that when you were little you guys didn't have car seats and i'm so i'm explaining to him i'm like no we didn't have any car seats he's like where did you sit i said everywhere we wanted you sat in the front i sat on my mom's lap i sit on the dashboard i was like we'd crawl around the back and play he's like the police didn't stop you i'm like there was no laws and then he goes there were no laws there were laws he's like didn't they care about kids i said i mean they did but

40:01Sal Di Stefano:different energy katrina gets so mad i let max i let max ride in the front seat all time katrina gets so mad you're not supposed to do that i'm like dude he's freaking he's almost five foot already really his legs are dangling off this he's in a he's in a booster seat and his legs are still almost touching the ground i'm like this is ridiculous oh yeah i've been sitting in the front seat like years before that dude he's fine he's gonna be totally fine i know like wearing helmets riding bicycles you know it's like i'm like hammering the kids about just because you know courtney's like freaks out about it and i'm like thinking like i never wore a helmet never ever ever if you were a kid i never wore a helmet let's never wear a helmet if you were a helmet in

40:41Adam Schafer:the 80s or 90s you were 100 gonna get bullied yeah yes for sure everybody why are you wearing

40:46Sal Di Stefano:yeah if you rolled up like because we all used to meet as kids we all met after like school all the bikes from all the neighborhoods i get punk if you were the kid that rolled up the one kid I don't even remember. Hey, guys. What's up, safety? Yeah, yeah. Yeah,

41:02Adam Schafer:yeah. What a mushroom head. When I used to go to work with my dad in his work van, he had this old work van. Yeah. And it was a two-seater because the back was all open. So they'd fill it up. You used to sit on one of those crates, probably. A milk crate, right? They used to fill it with sand or materials. And he would have his helper. And I'd sit in the middle. He made a wooden box. And that's what I'd sit on. Yeah, I've sat on. I've sat on milk crates before. Did you? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, I don't know what my dad was thinking. He's like, I'm going to make this more safe. He gave me a little rope that I would put on my lap.

41:31Adam Schafer:Like a bungee cord? A little rope? You did like a bungee cord over your lap? I just thought you had to stop it up.

41:36Sal Di Stefano:I did. I told it before, but we'd usually, dude, we'd just sit in the back of my dad's pickup truck. Oh, with the gas. The gas tank was right here. Yeah. Just breathing it in. Just fused. Maybe that's why I'm buffering all the time, dude. I'm going to start attributing it to that. It's not all the football trauma, man. I just thought the football was a gas team. Gasoline, dude.

41:55Adam Schafer:Well, my dad, it was even worse than his generation, especially because he was poor. He was operating heavy machinery when he was 13. He tells me a story of how he drove a cement truck up into the hills, and he'd have to put it in first gear to make it. And he's telling me the story of how the road is so narrow that he had his buddy hanging out the side, looking down to make sure that they didn't fall off the cliff. And they're going up like five miles an hour, ten miles an hour. 85 ,000. Bro, as he's telling me the story, I'm like, that's terrifying, this and that. And then I'm like, I just thought to myself, you should ask him how old he was.

42:30Adam Schafer:I'm like, how old were you when you're doing that? He's like, I don't know, 13, 12. Oh, my God. That was what you were doing, dude. That's crazy. That is crazy. That's wild. I know. I know. That's a good time. Anyway, I wanted to ask you about, you were saying off air, how you've been using, well, I'll just, I'll prompt you, honey on your ribs.

42:50Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what are you doing? Yeah, so I use the Monocora on there now. So the Monocora, did I say it right? Monocora?

42:55Adam Schafer:Monocora. Monocora, yeah.

42:56Sal Di Stefano:I use the Monocora honey on there now.

42:58Adam Schafer:Is it better than just your regular old?

43:00Sal Di Stefano:I do like the taste of it. So I've grown to really like it. I've also used it when I, since the last time we talked about them, I had gotten sick. And so I was taking like, I noticed the difference. I took it like a tablespoon. Hot water, lemon. Or I make a hot toddy and I use it inside there. So that's been like my go-to move. But for my ribs, I'll make my ribs where I do the first three-hour smoke, and then after that, in fact, I'm doing it today, right? So I'll do a three-hour smoke. I'll have Katrina. It's already prepped, so I've already seasoned it and everything. And then I'll tell her around 1 o 'clock, hey, throw it in at 220.

43:31Sal Di Stefano:She'll put it in the smoker. It'll sit there for three hours. And then I already have on the counter right now. I set up, so in case I don't make it home in time, she can just throw it on there, my foil. And then I have brown sugar, the monocular honey, and then butter. And then the rack of ribs sit in that. and then you wrap it all up and then you put it back in and then there's the juices and the honey.

43:53Adam Schafer:I mean, it's a medicinal nutritional kind of based honey. So there's honey and then there's monocora. Yeah. This stuff is like gold.

44:03Sal Di Stefano:Well, you got me using it for the cold. I'd already been using it for things like this, but I didn't think about using it for the cold.

44:09Adam Schafer:What's the ingredient? Is it MGO? MGO. Okay, this is a compound in honey that has these incredible medicinal and health benefits and the amount that's in Manukora is significantly higher that we'll find in other types of New York 100.

44:23Sal Di Stefano:Do we know what the comparison is? I know you've talked about it before.

44:27Adam Schafer:Yes, yes. Doug's going to pull it up right now, but it's significantly higher. You'd have to buy or take a lot more of another brand to get the same amount of the MGO. But MGO is antimicrobial. Yeah. It's got anti-inflammatory benefits. It's pro gut health. And this particular type of honey that they make, that they get, I should say, is the highest percentage of MGO versus the other ones.

44:57Sal Di Stefano:Oh, it even has, that's what the number 850 means on it. Yeah, so there's a rating. I've seen the number on an 850 plus, and there's other ones I've seen before that have numbers that aren't as high as that.

45:06Adam Schafer:I think other ones are like 60 or something. Yeah, they vary quite a bit. But this is, Monocora is definitely some of the highest I've ever seen. It's the highest, yeah. You know what it's good for, that I think it's really good for? So, and we talked about this years ago, but this is important to talk about. When you look at people, when you look at populations with gut health issues, it's really interesting. There's this really strange, we know why, but when they first discovered this, they were like, this doesn't make any sense. You expect people with poor health, poor health habits who don't exercise to have gut health issues.

45:40Adam Schafer:And that is the case. That is the case. they have a higher percentage of gut health issues for people who eat like garbage, who smoke, who don't exercise, right? But then on the other side of the spectrum, people who exercise a lot actually have a higher rate of gut health issues than people in the middle. And they couldn't figure out what was going on. Why is that the case? These are like really fit, athletic people. And it's because when you're training at that level, you do cause systemic inflammation. and you're encouraged, and this isn't a bad thing, but this does increase the risk. You're encouraged to eat or take a protein shake or something like that right after you work out.

46:19Yeah, when you're all inflamed at the same time, yeah.

46:22Adam Schafer:Right, and so a lot of gut health issues can start, many of them can start with inflammation. And when your gut is, because your whole body's inflamed from a hard workout, you're including your gut. And when your gut is inflamed, the junctions, the tight junctions that seal your gut can become spaced out and can cause things to pass through. And so what you'll see is sometimes people develop food intolerances with the foods that they eat post-workout. So it's like, I could always have dairy. Now I can't have dairy. Well, your shake is dairy. Or I could always eat eggs. Now I can't have eggs. Well, you eat eggs post-workout.

46:54Adam Schafer:So monocora, because post-workout, it's good to have a little carbohydrates with some protein. Monocora is good for your gut. It's anti-inflammatory and could help with the maintaining of the junctions. Oh, interesting. So if you want some carbs post-workout, honey, people have been using honey for a long time. Post-workout. Honey is a natural post-workout carb. Athletes have been using that for a long time. Monucora would have some protective effects. So you would add that, tablespoon or two of that with your shake. Now you've got your carbs and your protein. Oh, smart. And it's got some protective.

47:23Adam Schafer:Oh, interesting. Yeah.

47:24Sal Di Stefano:That's actually a cool idea. Sweeten it up really nice, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

47:27Adam Schafer:And it tastes really good.

47:29Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, you brought up talking about my ribs and stuff like that. But, you know, ButcherBox has been, I still have yet to find anybody else that does ribs with that. I know Doug has done it. Have either one of you guys ordered their stuff? Have you used their ribs? Have you cooked their ribs in?

47:41Adam Schafer:I don't make ribs, but I've had yours and Doug's, and I've had other people's ribs. And then, was it at your house? Yeah. It was someone's house where they had - I know Courtney reached out for that recipe because we've been trying to get the ButcherBox version of it. Well, I think it was your house. We were all eating over there, and you had the ButcherBox ribs, and then you had to buy extra another brand.

48:01Sal Di Stefano:It might have been, yeah. Because if I run out, I have to order something else. And if I'm cooking ribs for everybody, I'm like. They don't taste. They taste way better. No, yeah. Way better. They're nowhere near as tender. And it's because of the kind of pig, right? Yeah. I believe it's a heritage pork pig, which is a certain breed. Oh, I thought it was what they feed on. Well, it could be that as well. Yeah, absolutely. No, I did ribs for a friend of mine. And he could not stop eating them. He goes, why are these ribs so good? Yeah. And I mean, I told him it's the way I cooked them. but the truth was they were the butcher box ribs.

48:35Sal Di Stefano:I mean, it takes both. I mean, you still got to be decent. You got to know what you're doing and stuff like that, but it's, they're definitely, there's a huge difference. And we'll, Katrina and I will just, we'll eat a rack each and that's like dinner. Oh, yeah. You know, just sit down and eat a whole rack. They're so good. They are so good.

48:47Adam Schafer:I also like their ground beef because I was over at my parents' house this weekend. They were barbecuing. We had like a barbecue. It's like burgers and sausages. That's what Italians do instead of hot dogs. And we were all eating them and my dad bought the Costco burger patties. Yeah. just regular beef. I don't like I think when it comes to ground beef I like the grass fed better. They just don't taste as greasy.

49:08Sal Di Stefano:Oh I so with ground beef I prefer that. I was just going to say. Some of my steaks if I go to like a fancy restaurant.

49:13Adam Schafer:Yeah if I get like a ribeye. Yes. And then traditional's got that better flavor. Then I'll

49:17Sal Di Stefano:prefer a grain fed. But ground beef. But ground beef it's better grass fed.

49:21Adam Schafer:Because the other one's so oily. It's too oily. And it's so like. 100 % I agree. So you see me.

49:26Sal Di Stefano:It doesn't taste as good. I've been posting it almost every time I've been prepping the the the ground beef and the mushrooms and onions and i've gotten a bunch of people dm me that have been that have been doing that same exact recipe and i prefer the butcher box ground beef when i do that for sure it's it's otherwise it just gets too oily and then it sits at the bottom and it's not as good so i like the the breakfast sauce is super convenient it's like a patty um and here's the thing we're flying out of the house early in the morning now the kid's eating a lot more so So, like, especially Ethan, he'll eat, like, two of those patties and then, like, three eggs and then stuff it into, like, a sandwich.

50:06Oh, wow. Teenage boy, dude. Dude, he's getting huge. So that just comes in the clutch. We've been, I mean, the last, you know, month or so, been using and going through just bags of those things.

50:18Adam Schafer:I was just talking to my brother. So my brother's having a third kid. Did I tell you guys this? Did you know that? Three? He's got a third one coming. Oh, right on. Boy. We just found out it's another one. He's got three boys. He's going to have three boys. Oh. and and so my brother when he was a wild house and he's a he's a he was my brother's great he's a great he's a great father i love seeing him with his kids it warms my heart because he's such a good day such a loving engaged good dad but when he was little uh my brother was um i don't know nuclear power i guess you would say he's on fire all the time like drove my mom crazy uh constantly running constantly moving constantly climbing breaking things it was just it was it was insanity he has two boys that are just like him right now so he's got two sons that are just they're just like him too they're so you can't get mad at them because they're so loving they'll come up to you and they'll hug you and if you pick them up they'll cuddle with they're just so loving but you put them down and they're tearing my you know because i said we were having a barbecue yesterday they're tearing my dad's tree down they're throwing lemons they're fighting you know they're wrestling with each other you know they're they're they're just nuts they're just nuts right he's got two of them he's gonna have a third one and so i was just talking with them dude i'm like bro i'm like first of all god bless you and his wife is so patient too so i'm like you guys are the right people to have these kind of kids i said but also bro when those are teenage boys because they're big kids funny my niece was there and she she works at the kids club at a gym and she's like you know i'm working with a lot of kids now and i realize kids aren't supposed to be as big as your kids because they're big old kids they're big sons they're big big they're like my brother big big dudes so i'm like man when you're gonna have three teenage boys in your house eat you at a house you're yeah dude you're gonna have to you better is he you better make a lot of money are

52:00Sal Di Stefano:they are they shutting it down or they're gonna keep going is he trying to get a girl

52:03Adam Schafer:do you know i okay so we'll have to wait a few years because you know how it is when you first have a baby yeah i don't want to have any more yeah yeah i would love to have i would love to see him go for number four yeah i want a little niece so bad dude yeah so bad but threes yeah especially if the third boy is like the other two boys oh my god oh my god i feel like three of any

52:24Sal Di Stefano:sex is a lot three girls three boys three of the same sex i feel like like parents just need a little bit of a breakup you know like you just need a little a little change of pace three of the same of anything is is just every parent i know that has three girls or three boys it's just like that's a lot it's a lot to have three of the same well i could see three teenage girls uh

52:45Adam Schafer:obviously I'm being stereotypical, but I could see three teenage girls making you want to pull your hair out. But three young boys, that's a lot, dude. Especially active boys. You've been around little active boys. Don't buy anything expensive. It's bro. His older one breaks stuff all the time. Yeah, he's get real durable furniture. Make sure you get the scratch-proof floors.

53:09Sal Di Stefano:Hey, speaking of boys, weren't you on the side of the road with your boys' car? Yes. What happened to that? Did you see that? No. These guys got, like, I heard for, like, three hours. Yes, three hours. His new car broke down? Yeah. So we were. That sucks. And we were just taking it because, well, it got smogged before. And this was on, like, the seller to smog it. But it just, like, that window where we were, like, registering it, it had, like, expired. And so we were like, oh, man. And so we have to go smog it ourselves. We go to smog it. And it's like it was the RPMs were going way too high.

53:43and um and they were like running it i think for an hour or so just like you know pressure testing it and whatnot uh and they're like you're gonna have to take this to us you know the the mechanic to to check it out and so i was like okay i'll follow you and i followed courtney it was driving it and i was following her like and we were just taking the side roads and it was just like getting hotter and hotter and she pulls over i'm like oh man it's like it's heating up on us and And I'm like, well, let's just wait a while. And I'm like, you know, testing the engine blocks, you know, how it is. Okay, it's not too bad.

54:16I'll go get some coolant, throw some coolant in there, you know, go a little bit further. And we went like maybe another mile. And then like she started getting a little bit of smoke coming through the vent. And like it was, I'm like, dude, just stop, you know, like we're just going to park it here. and she she parked unfortunately like right where like in this neighborhood where you have to like it's not like there was a side of the road where you park it was like right in the middle of the road and so everybody's like driving around us and like it was it dude we were there just kind of sitting on the on the curb for looking at our phone and we kept looking for updates and it was like it was an update it was like maybe 45 minutes like oh man it's a long time but yeah i guess we'll just wait 45 minutes and you know somebody would come out of their house you guys doing all right we're like yeah we're doing okay like really nice people dude actually like made me like somewhat optimistic about people again i was like wow like everybody in this neighborhood was super cool and nice and offering us drinks and things and we're just like sitting there and then we go look at the update again it's like two hours and we're like what no way it was like 15 minutes to two hours and it just kept going like back and forth and like changing on us uh forever and we're just kind of laughing about it because we were kind of held hostage but there's really nothing we could do uh and and dude it was man it was brutal we just kept waiting uh and people driving by and this one guy comes out and like was talking to us for a bit sort of walk around and then he's just like mind pump and then like walks away you know i'm like cool and courtney's like he just said i'm like what i didn't catch that and i'm like why who does that like who says like mind pump yeah he's like all scared to talk to me or something yeah i'll get that like in the airport

56:05Sal Di Stefano:i'll hear someone then i'll like turn around and look i have no idea where it came from but i'll hear it you know where someone does that when you go by so yeah did i tell you guys the the the the

56:13Adam Schafer:when i got my vasectomy how the the one of the people in there shut up or listen oh yeah dude That's a great place to get recognized. Oh, it's the worst. It's the worst, dude. You know, I'm getting set up, and they're doing the thing. The cough, please. White balls are in head. Hey, you know, I know you, right? Love your show. Hey. No, dude, it was after. It was afterward. Everything was done, you know what I mean? I'm all set. You got to eat a lot of protein, am I right?

56:42Adam Schafer:That's exactly how I'm like, whoa. Healthy, healthy. You know, I listened for a while. That's exactly how I pictured it. no after we were done after we're done the colon's healthy they're giving you all the they're giving you all the instructions you know you gotta do this as a yeah and i'm on my way out like oh by the way really like your show yeah at the end when i'm leaving i'm like i guess it's

57:01Sal Di Stefano:better i was gonna say that's probably better if they tell you me before i'm like oh man this is awkward now yeah yeah can you bring someone else in you know me too much oh my god that's funny So did you guys get, so you guys finally get towed three hours later? Yeah, but where's the car? Finally towed. Yeah, so, yeah, we're finding out because, like, you know, it was the weekend. And so it's like we just had to, like, drop it off, like, right at the place in the Keys. And so we're going to find out today since it's, you know, it was over the weekend what was wrong with it. But, yeah, it was just, like, revving.

57:34The thing is, like, we already drove it from L.A. all the way up there. No problems. and the thing about old cars like it just kind of like comes out of nowhere you know uh so i'm just like remembering all these things again like you kind of forget like how the little nuances and and stuff like happens with these old cars and um you know it it's so much fun though to drive with the manual stick shift oh yeah i forgot like how just involved you are like in just the feel of everything and the sounds and it's like so much of a visceral experience as opposed so just down shifting and revving and then i just found like a rad um parking lot to really have like ethan trying to open up and uh i was waiting for like a good rain so we could go hydroplane and figure that out my dad did that with me and i was oh i wanted you had a hand that's a great idea yeah go hit it hard you know and and fishtail a bit but like be calm and you know slowly correct it and kind of slide through it and yeah all that stuff like i'd rather him learn there than just like

58:42Sal Di Stefano:caught off guard so no of course i saw your daughter's park job too but that was for real that was for real she like i didn't like did she not say anything and she just came in the house and you just saw that i went for a walk you went for a walk obviously

58:57Adam Schafer:she didn't have a passenger uh no bro i mean i'm trying to picture her you know what i sent to her What'd you say? You guys know that, that gif where Homer Simpson goes. Yes. I'm like, this is you.

59:10Sal Di Stefano:She was half in the bush. Yeah. She was half in the bush. Like, what are you doing? Like, you can't tell me when she's parking. She doesn't hear. I'm like, what are you doing? Like,

59:22Adam Schafer:I mean, do you just like hear all that? You just get out. I took a picture of it and I sent it in a group text with Jessica and my niece and her. Yeah. And I'm just, we're just teasing her and making fun of her about it. I'm like, dude, you're going to be that close to the bush. You leave a little space on me. You leave a little space between.

59:39Sal Di Stefano:I was just picturing like if that was like how she was pulling in, then she just said, F it, get out and just leave it. Because I feel like you do that and you're like, oh, that was a little close. Back it, back it, back it out, redo it. She just said, no, I'm committed. I'm committed to parking in the bush. I don't know, bro. I don't know what happened there.

59:56Adam Schafer:I don't know what happened there.

59:57Sal Di Stefano:Oh, I would have died if I would have came out and saw that, dude. That was hilarious.

1:00:01Adam Schafer:element is an electrolyte powder you add to your water it tastes great but there's no artificial sweeteners there's no sugar and it has a thousand milligrams of sodium per serving here's the problem with most most electrolyte powders they don't have enough sodium just sprinkling enough sodium doesn't make a difference if you need electrolytes if you'll benefit from electrolytes if you sweat a lot when you work out or you work in the sun or you're on a low carb diet you're going to want sodium, a decent amount, in your electrolyte powder. That's what makes the difference. An element has 1 ,000 milligrams, and it tastes great, and there's nothing in there that's artificial.

1:00:38Adam Schafer:Go check them out. Go to drinklmnt.com forward slash mindpump. Now, that link is going to get you a free sample pack of their most popular drink mix flavors with any purchase. Back to the show. Our first caller is Nikki from Georgia. Hi, Nikki. Hi, Nikki. Hey, how are you? Good. How can I help you? Good. So my son is 15 years old and he's been having knee pain when he does barbell squats, but he does not have that knee pain when he does box squats. So he'll do 225 for reps with barbell squats, but he can do 315 with box squats and not have any pain. So I was wondering what could cause that issue his ankle mobility usually it's almost certainly that he so the reason why

1:01:29Sal Di Stefano:it doesn't bother his knees is because he doesn't have to go down very deep with the box squats and so he's got that support he can sit back on it or he gets barbell squats his ankles need the mobility for his knees to travel forward and because he lacks a little bit of that ankle mobility he feels a stress in his knees as his knees go to travel forward change of direction puts an excess amount of stress too so that box really helps to kind of slow that down yeah let me ask you

1:01:54Adam Schafer:some more questions is the box squat as deep as his regular squat Um, not quite. No. Okay. So, uh, so yeah, so a number one, it's deeper. Uh, and then what Justin said, right, when you're going down and then you change directions, there's this fraction of a second in which the weight is actually generating more force increases force than the weight itself, because you need to change directions. Cause now you're actually, you're, you're not just lifting the weight. You're having to change the direction of the momentum. Okay. And in that change of direction, which a box squat stops. So a box squat is I sit.

1:02:26Adam Schafer:I don't need to stop the momentum. The box does that. And then I squat up. So even at the same distance, sometimes a box squat feels better on somebody's knees than a traditional squat because I'm not having to reduce or slow down or reverse change or change the direction of the momentum. And so what happens is either the knees don't want to travel forward, like Adam said, or because there's a little lack of ankle mobility, there's a little torsion on the knee. You might not even be able to see it, right? But when there's ankle mobility issues, the feet want to do this. They want to turn out. But let's say his knees come in just a little bit on both.

1:03:03Adam Schafer:Yeah. So that's so there it is. So a little bit of pain in the meniscus. Now, there's something else here that I want to address, if you don't mind, because I see your question. There's more to your question. You said that his doctor warned him that lifting too heavy would basically stunt his growth. Yeah. So he had his physical for football and he's 6 '1 and he wants to get taller. And so the doctor was like, well, just be mindful that, you know, lifting heavy is going to make your bones grow out and not up. And I was like, really?

1:03:36Sal Di Stefano:No, no. I've never heard that before. And she's like, yeah. And so my son was like, mom, do I need to, because she's like, so you should do higher reps, lower weight. And I was like, I don't think that's a thing.

1:03:46Adam Schafer:No, so let me address this. It's not, Nicky. Those are going to grow out, not up. So there's some truth to it, but I'll explain what's going on. What truth? Well, this is what's going on. At his age, he's not done growing, right? He's 15. Right. And there are growth plates that, if they become damaged, will limit the growth of the bone. Yeah, if he hurts himself. Right? And so the fear is, with too much tension on the growth plates, they'll cause damage and then stop the growth. Now, here's why that's almost always not a problem. The amount of tension required to cause damage to a growth plate is incredibly high.

1:04:23Excessive, yeah. Excessive amount.

1:04:25Adam Schafer:Now, this is a unique situation, though, Nikki, because I'm going to just talk a little bit about your kid. He's 15, and he can squat 315 on a box, and he can rep out 225. He's strong. Dude, yeah. He's actually one of the strongest 15-year-olds in the world. He's a very strong kid. Yeah. Okay. If he's doing legit squats, he's really strong. You said he's 6 '1". How much does he weigh? 164. He's crazy strong. Yeah, he's strong. So here's the deal. So what I'm going to tell you as his mom, okay? Because he's still growing. And so what happens when you're still growing is you don't have as much time to acclimate to your body.

1:05:05Adam Schafer:Your body awareness. Do you ever own a dog and you see it grow into a large puppy and it's like super awkward? Yes. They just got to get used to their size. So this is your son right now at his age because he's going to keep growing. And, you know, he'll probably grow in spurts. Like he'll grow three inches out of nowhere or whatever. Or he'll just gain all this muscle out of nowhere. Right. And he's got a new body. And so he has to acclimate to it. And so because your son is so strong at his age, I will encourage you. Now, I don't think he's going to damage growth plates, but I will say this.

1:05:43Adam Schafer:I would be very mindful of pushing the weight only because your kid is hella strong.

1:05:48Sal Di Stefano:He's already there. He doesn't need it. This is what I would do. I'm going to have Doug give you Prime Pro and have him work on his ankle mobility because that is absolutely going to serve him. So have him do ankle mobility stuff all the time. He can work on it every day, multiple times a day. If he improves his ankle mobility, that's going to help a lot. Then tell him to get on Instagram and follow a page called Squat University. Their content is 100 % built around improving the squat. And what he should do instead of trying to go get his weight any higher because he's already really strong would be to perfect his squat, is get better at the squat so his knees aren't caving in, his feet.

1:06:30Sal Di Stefano:So normally, too, if a kid's knees are caving in, his feet are probably flattening a little bit or his feet are turning out. So in Squat University, he talks all about this, about his foot placement, about where his knees are at, and just have him really dive into perfecting the squat. Because if he just moves the weight he's moving with a beautiful, perfect squat pain-free, he'll see great gains and improvement just from that.

1:06:54Adam Schafer:It'll be better gains. In fact, I'm going to send you another program that I think will be very valuable for your kid, which is Symmetry. Symmetry, yep. I think because of his – here's what will happen. If I take a 15-year-old playing football, I'm going to get him strong at squats and deadlifts and overhead presses. now if I run into the 0.001 % of 15 year olds who can squat 315 on a box I'm going split stance he's already strong yeah like to get him in a split stance is more applicable towards any sport and so to reinforce that and get stronger there in multiple planes uh it's like he built the foundation he he established that like he's he's rock solid there so now we got to kind of express Yes.

1:07:36Adam Schafer:We actually want to put some breaks on that kind of load with those exercises. And split stance exercises, unilateral exercises, that'll improve his performance as much, if not more, at his strength. And it'll reinforce his stability so that when he's 18, 19, 20, he's in college, he starts squatting again. He's squatting 500 pounds and he's got really good technique and no pain. Because what can happen at this age with that weight, because here's what happens. There's always a risk of injury with exercise. The heavier the weight, the greater the risk of injury when you move outside of perfect.

1:08:12Adam Schafer:So like one degree outside of perfect with 100, you know, if he had 90 pounds on his back and he was one degree outside of perfect, his risk of injury is not that high. 300 pounds on a 15-year-old's back, one degree outside of perfect, risk of injury is kind of high. Right. So because this is such an exceptional case, I'm like, I'm going to go unilateral pretty much all the time. He's going to do split stance exercises. is we're going to focus on technique. If a weight feels light, I'm going to make it feel heavier by slowing it down and by perfecting the technique, not by adding weight on the bar.

1:08:42Adam Schafer:Because, again, he's one of the strongest. If he's doing genuine squats, he's one of the strongest 15-year-olds in the nation. And so you want to be really smart about how he trains because this kid will develop some incredible strength so long as he's smart. We've got to support that now and reinforce the joints.

1:08:59Sal Di Stefano:Follow that Squat University page. We've got a ton of good information on there.

1:09:03Adam Schafer:that's completely dedicated to improving does he have a strength like a like a personal trainer or coach so i was training him and we were working out together and then it got to the point where it's not real cool to go to the gym with your mom um so then he is actually and they do it's like seventh period football so it's one of the coaches that runs the workouts so that was what my next question after this so the workouts aren't the best and he tells me you know what they do every day and there's just there's not a lot of structure to it it's kind of random it's like wherever you can find a station go do this um so how would you if i give him symmetry like and we do that how do you do that around these workouts that they're doing can you do you ever can you bring the he can bring the blueprints in with them i was just gonna say do you talk to the coach yeah i can yeah i'd say hey hey coach uh my son's got a little bit of knee pain he's really strong.

1:09:58Adam Schafer:I talked to some, uh, some, you know, strength and conditioning experts. They suggested that he do split stance exercises. So, you know, like lunges, Bulgarian split stance squats and that kind of stuff, lateral, you know, lateral lunges. I think I want him to focus on this during strength training. Um, and the coach I'm sure is not going to care cause he's trained a whole class. I'm sure he's totally fine with it. Yeah. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah. You got it. Yeah. Thank you so much. Awesome. Keep in touch. Can't wait to hear about this kid. Stud. Yeah. Thanks. All right. You got it. Yeah, 99.999 % of the time when someone's like, you're going to stunt your growth at a 15-year-old, I'm like, get out of here.

1:10:36Adam Schafer:Then you get that occasional, listen, a 315 box squad, a 15-year-old kid, 225 for reps. That's a strong-ass kid. For a 15-year-old? I don't know. At 160. He's a tall, skinny kid.

1:10:45Sal Di Stefano:And he's light. He's a tall, skinny kid. Yeah, he's not like, I thought she was going to say like 250. 6 '1", 280, like a big old. At least 185, maybe. Yeah, I thought he was going to be a big lineman kid. Like a big, heavy-ass kid. Yeah, those are like lineman numbers in high school. Yeah, bro. And he's like a freshman, right?

1:11:01Adam Schafer:Yeah, that's a freshman. That's right. Damn. Yeah, dude. Yeah, bro, that's a force. So again, typically, you're 15-year-olds. I'm like, squat. Let's get you strong at squats. But dude, you're pushing that much weight at 100. And you're a tall, skinny kid? No. I completely agree. Just split stance and do the boil method from here on down.

1:11:21Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, bro. Yeah, at this point. I mean, at this point, you're right. Right. I mean, he could totally avoid bilateral squatting stuff for a year or two and then come back to it.

1:11:29Adam Schafer:He could avoid it all in high school. Guys, seriously. This is going to be a 600-pound squatting college kid is what he's going to be. Yeah. Our next caller is Mike from Ontario. What's up, Mike? How you doing, Mike? What's happening? Hey there, fellas. I appreciate you taking the time to chat with me today. Much love from up here in Canada. How can we help you? All right. With respect to your time, I've consolidated this down the best way I can to point forms. So a little bit about me. I was an obese child and teenager. uh I was five foot and 260 at my worst um I got into boxing in high school competitively I did that I did that for a couple of years I got my first membership to a gym at 19 years old so I uh just through obsessive cardio like honestly I didn't really have any knowledge for lifting or I wasn't following any kind of programming just like a ton of cardio I got into running as well.

1:12:20I lost 100 pounds. So went down to 160 ish, but it was really skinny fat. Like I always had like, you know, the the ripped fat guy calves, but I just I was never really a defined muscular dude at all. My mid 20s, I got my first coach and my first meal plan. He's a friend of mine who did fizzy competitions and stuff like that. Now his first protocol for me was like, bring my calories up, like get, get me into like a reverse diet. I was really resilient to this. I'm like, no bro, I need to eat less to get abs and tail as old as time. So I've yo-yo dieted a lot of the last 10 years, but it was never out of control.

1:12:58Like I never got like to a point when it was like, okay, I really got to rein this in. So I got married this past November, I guess coming up on six months ago. And just after the wedding, I weighed in at two 215 and my body wasn't looking good. Like I sent Doug some current and pictures from around then. So we're moving in the right direction. I started a pretty hard cut around then, went to 2000 calories a day. That looked like 160 proteins, 65 fat, 180 carbs. I was lifting five days a week, 20 minutes daily of cardio. I've got a Husky, so I walk her every day and I work in a very successful high volume cocktail bar.

1:13:39So when I'm at work, I'm, I'm moving a fair bit too. So the weight was dropping, uh, strength was holding. I think my programming's pretty decent. Um, I got down to one 95 ish. So I lost about 20 pounds that held for a couple of weeks, uh, readjusted, went down to 1900 calories and lost another five to 190 pounds. And it was a hard stall.

1:14:05My wife and I would order pizza for dinner, and I'd go up a couple pounds. I'd hold on to that for three or four days, and it just felt like a really hard stall. So I discovered you guys around the time I started this cut back in November, and I knew the advice would be to reverse diet, but I didn't know what that looked like. So I just cranked it overnight from 1900 to 2500. I went up to 201 protein, 84 fat and 239 carbs, cut out cardio completely. And my strength completely took off. Like I didn't realize how much my like the thing is, like if I lift the same amount of reps as the week before, but I'm struggling a little bit more mentally, I'm still like, oh, I'm moving the same weight.

1:14:53I'm not losing strength, but there's a lot to be said for the amount of effort it takes to do that. So my strength completely took off. Every lift is up in that time. My body feels great. Sorry, there's a cat on the table now. Yeah, so my body's tightened up. I went down another pound or two. I've been sitting around there. I'm still in the gym five days a week. Feels like a good number for me. I like the ritual. It's good for me mentally. And yeah, it's the weight is about leveled off. I feel like I'm kind of stalling again. I'll be at eating 600 more calories a day. I'm not hyper focused on the weight.

1:15:33I just track it for a data point. Like it doesn't ruin my day if I'm a little up or it doesn't, you know, drastically skew where I'm going to go if I'm a little bit down. But my question then lies into what this actually looks like moving forward sustainably for me. So I want to be able to go out with my wife for a nice dinner, like have a, have a glass of whiskey with dinner or something like that. Like I'm not a, I'm not a party. I'm not a drinker, but I, when I hear like, you know, you guys talk about in the long run, oh, like you'll just, you'll have an easier time getting to, you know, these things won't affect you quite as much because your calories will be higher.

1:16:09I want to know what like the pathway to that looks like, But also, like I'm still, I would guess, probably mid to low 20s for body fat right now. I'd like to be low to mid teens. So getting to that goal while still looking for the long-term sustainability of, you know, having calories high and building muscle in the long term.

1:16:32Sal Di Stefano:You're on the path. Yeah, you're doing the right thing. You're on the path, bro. I mean, I'm looking at your original pictures in November, where you're at now. Now, you're making – and keep in mind too, you're up 600 calories, right? So you're – so the way you look and up 600 calories is phenomenal.

1:16:51Adam Schafer:You drop body fat and build muscle. Yeah.

1:16:53Sal Di Stefano:You're on a great path right now.

1:16:56Adam Schafer:Think of it this way. This is the mentality that I want you to adopt that will help you right now. Build into a leaner physique. Yeah. Don't cut into a leaner physique. now five days a week of exercise uh the amount of activity that you're doing your weight uh your calories are still low yeah yeah oh yeah 2500 is still low yeah absolutely like yeah i'm uh i'm gonna be 38 in a week and i'm uh about 5 8 now i i still figure to be about uh you know the 12 to 14 uh percent range and i'm not fixated on that number i'm just figuring that's like you know probably i had a reasonable goal to shoot for yeah so probably one year so no no don't cut into that so just to encourage you you bumped your calories and got leaner yep that's going to happen for a

1:17:42Sal Di Stefano:little while dude yeah it'll continue to happen and and you you're back to your question about how do i get to a place where i can have a glass of whiskey with dinner with my wife on a friday night or what like that and not feel like it's you know it affects me that where that is is is higher calories so when you get to a place kind of like where you are now but you're eating 3 000 calories. So you put on even more muscle, you lean out a tiny bit more, but now you're eating 3000. Now you have this metabolic flexibility. Now, if you really wanted to, too, you could cut for a short period of time to get down real fast.

1:18:14Sal Di Stefano:But if you just keep going the path you're going to Sal's point, you build into a leaner physique, you'll get the thing that you want, where you have higher calories. So you have more metabolic flexibility. And then you'll also be at such a high calorie i mean a great goal instead of a body fat percentage goal would be can i not put any weight on the scale kind of hover where i'm at but get my calories up to 3200 3400 calories a day because if you if you don't move on the scale much and just keep kind of doing you're kind of in that goldilocks zone which by the way is one of the best places to be but also one of the most mentally challenging places because sometimes not seeing the scale move also messes with people's heads a little bit like am i seeing progress i mean it's very obvious when you look at the picture from November to now, you're making great progress.

1:18:59Sal Di Stefano:You're up 600 calories and you look radically different.

1:19:02Adam Schafer:You lost a lot of fun.

1:19:03Sal Di Stefano:Like, like go, if you just kept going down this path for six more months, I bet you, you'll look back at that picture and go, Oh shit, I'm look even better than that. And so you're in a great place, but Sal's right. Like try and build into that leanness. Don't try and cut into that leanness. So I'd go up in calories. I also think too like uh i mean i i know you like the five days a week i'd like to give you one of our programs because there's i mean there's there's something about having somebody else program for you and following it and i don't know if you've been kind of doing similar stuff as far as your training like how have do you change your training up does it look pretty similar like what what's the split look like i i was originally i don't know is it is it bad decorum to say if i was using a different program no no it's okay so like you guys have mentioned jeff nippard in the past he's a local guy to me so i i was following a program of his okay and um it's five days full body that's fine oh wow five days full body yeah it's like heavy light you know okay so does you periodize like the the like how you're is your lifting intensity change each day or what's it look like with a full body well it's um it'll be like uh the volume changes week to week so some days or some weeks like you'll have one week where uh the rep range is like four to six and you'll be uh like aimed to hit, you know, uh, two reps in reserve on that.

1:20:22And then the following week, it'll be like, uh, 14 to 16 reps and hit two. So it's like, uh, I imagine the volume will be fairly similar because when I'm doing 14 to 16, I'm using way lower weights. But, uh, yeah, it's like one, one to two big lifts a day. And then a lot of auxiliary stuff.

1:20:39Adam Schafer:And that's every day. Yeah. All right. If you like it, you can keep doing it. I think, uh, if I put you on, uh, MAPS anabolic, I think it'd probably serve you a little better. So I'll send it to you. You can decide to try it or not. Let's do it. Yeah, I would love to. I'm down to try something new and see what goes up. But you could easily, you could bump your calories 27 right now. You think that's the next, if I'm at 25, I'd repurpose it tomorrow, go up to 27? Yep. Look, now, this is give or take, right? So if I coached you through this process, then we would be able to be much more individualized.

1:21:12Adam Schafer:but generally speaking with what you're saying, I'd eventually probably get you up to about 3 ,200 calories. Yeah, that's right. I think that'd be a dream, dude. That's a pizza without the nightmare. Yeah. By the way, by the way, the two or three pounds you gain from the pizza is water. Yeah, exactly that. And like, like I said too, it's like when I, when I see the scale go up, I'm like, yeah, this is waterway. This is like, you know, excess, whatever. And it goes away after a couple of days. Like I analyze it as a data point. Like I'm not stewing on it. Okay, good.

1:21:40Sal Di Stefano:No, you're bro. You're on the right path.

1:21:41Adam Schafer:Yeah, go up 300 calories. Keep doing what you're doing or follow our program. If you're getting stronger, you're building into getting leaner.

1:21:48Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

1:21:49Adam Schafer:And keep moving in that direction. And once you get to a place where you're like, whoa, I'm eating a lot of food and I feel good, if you want to pull back and do a cut, you can go back down to 2 ,500 and that'll be your cut. Yeah. Amazing. That'll be the dream. Yeah, I'm excited to try out some of your programming as well. That'd be killing. Yeah, you got it, dude.

1:22:04Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, you'll do great, bro. You're already doing great. Stay on this path. Amazing. Well, I appreciate your time, guys. And I just like to say as well, like my job is incredibly social. So when I'm when I'm in the gym on a day off, like just like having you guys in my ears, it just it's this weird like parasocial thing. Like I feel like I'm a fly on the wall for just conversations that are helpful. It's it does something for me and I think for a lot of people. So I appreciate that. Thank you, man. Appreciate that, Mike. That's cool. Thank you, brother. Amazing. Take care, guys.

1:22:32Adam Schafer:Thanks. Yeah. What's great about his picture for fall? He lost a lot of body fat. Yeah. He built muscle and he lost a lot of body fat.

1:22:39Sal Di Stefano:And he didn't really move on the scale, which is like the Goldilocks. That's right. Yeah, he did perfect. And he could probably just hang around here, but he's got room to go up in calories.

1:22:50Adam Schafer:I think if he hangs around here, he'll still see some body comp change, but I think he'll see more body comp change with a bump in calories. With that much activity, what he's doing. Agreed. And it's obvious because his body was holding on to body fat because his calories were so low.

1:23:03Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, yeah. And he's seeing strength gains. He'll build muscle. He'll continue to go down. And the other part that's important to hear is what he said is just like, you know, the guy wants balance. He wants to be able to have a glass of whiskey. Of course. And that will serve him going the direction you're saying. Because he could cut from here if he really wanted just to lean out a little bit and go down to 2 ,000 calories and he'll lean. He'll lose some body fat. But then he's stuck. Yeah, then he's stuck at a low calorie. He probably won't be happy where he's at physique-wise. It's like, no, keep building.

1:23:29Sal Di Stefano:Keep building to a place like 3 ,200, 3 ,400 calories and then come back down to 2 ,700, 2 ,700. be eating more than you've ever ate and leaner and stronger than you've ever been. Our next caller is Kayla from South Carolina. Hi, Kayla. Hello. Good morning. Hey, guys. How are you? Good. How are you doing? Good. Thanks for having me back on. I will just read my question if that's okay. Yeah, let's go. All right. So, hi, guys. I'm writing with a question around reverse dieting, building muscle, and BMR. A little background for context, I have been on the show before. I'm a full-time working mom of two.

1:24:04I have a nine-year-old and a one-year-old, and I also coach fitness on the side. So I've been consistently training myself for about six years. I'm currently still breastfeeding, though I am starting to wean. A few years back, it was probably around 2022, before finding you guys, I was definitely under eating and overtraining. So when I came on the show at the end of 2023, I was still in that pattern to a lesser degree, but still there. And you guys had encouraged me to scale back my training and increase my calories, which I did. Shortly after, I got pregnant, which was something that we were working toward for a long time.

1:24:40And I now have a healthy one-year-old as of March 15th. So since then, I have stayed fairly consistent with tracking. Of course, not perfectly through pregnancy and everything, but pretty consistent overall. And through pregnancy and breastfeeding, my appetite naturally increased. I've gradually brought my calories up to around 2600 2700 per day and I consider it somewhat of a controlled reverse or a mini bulk that I've been in really just kind of listening to my body and trying to fuel myself has been the goal without putting on too much fat postpartum I've adjusted my training I feel like I've built a solid amount of muscle I'm getting stronger I feel like I look leaner and more toned and my weight is now around 127 128 pre-pregnancy I was about 131.

1:25:27But of course, my body has changed as well. I gained about 25 pounds during pregnancy, I've since lost that weight, and then a few extra pounds, but have continued to rebuild the muscle. So here's where my question comes in. I had done a body scan in August, and then again recently. And even though I feel confident that I've built muscle and lost body fat, my BMR on those scans really hasn't changed much. I mean, I think it went up maybe 20 some calories. I recently was actually listening to one of your episodes and I think you guys had said something, giving somebody the advice of trying to increase that BMR.

1:26:04So that's kind of when this question came to mind. So it just kind of seemed confusing to me because my current maintenance is around 26, 2700 calories without weight gain. So my questions are, should BMR increase as you build muscle and improve your metabolism, how accurate are these scans? Just for context, my most recent ones and my TDEE was around 2100, I believe it was. And then is real world maintenance intake a better indicator than the scan data? And when you talk about building your metabolism before a cut, is maintenance intake the more meaningful metric that I should be focusing on?

1:26:42Yes.

1:26:43Sal Di Stefano:Sorry, go ahead. Yes, no, yes yes okay so bmr increase it should yes it should improve your metallic it should yes but how accurate are those bmr things terrible okay terrible uh is real world is real world maintenance intake a better indicator absolutely i never i never use any of the aura app dexa scan it's never accurate to myself it's never been accurate to my clients and that's why i'm i'm a big fan of like Like you telling me, and as a coach trainer, and you're obviously track, you pay attention, you have a better idea of how many calories you maintain at and how many calories will increase you and how many calories is it cut?

1:27:24Sal Di Stefano:You are, I can tell already, you know that.

1:27:26Adam Schafer:Yeah. Well, Kayla, let me ask you, like, I think, uh, like, what do you think the answers were to these? So I think that your real world tracking is definitely the way to go. That's kind of what I've been doing with the clients who I'm working with. Um, I don't, I tell them not to focus too much on what these numbers say, but in the gym setting that I'm working in right now, I don't know if it's the demographic, the age or what it is, but people get so hung up on these numbers where my online clients, I feel like trust me, um, to track, I'll have them track usually for 10 to 14 days. And then that's where I start their maintenance and go from way, way better.

1:28:03Adam Schafer:So here's the deal. Okay. You're, you're tracking, you're eating 26, 27 her calories. you're not gaining any weight correct the machine says 1300 yeah you're going to gain weight at over 2100 calories okay yes it's not happening right you see the real evidence in front of you right yeah absolutely obviously it's a terrible estimate yeah also for the people in the gym you have a wonderful testimony you could show them hey listen you know what mine says and you show them your paper do you want to know what i ate yesterday and then show them your tracking and I'm not gaining any weight. It's so, to estimate somebody's metabolic rate

1:28:42Sal Di Stefano:off of those machines is terrible.

1:28:45Adam Schafer:There's only one way to accurately do it and it's in the moment and you got to wear a machine that you breathe into and you move and it's measuring it in that moment. There's really no super accurate way to measure this incredibly complex thing known as metabolism.

1:28:59Sal Di Stefano:Not to mention it moves. It's not a stationary number. yeah you a night a bad night of rest uh overstressed uh you know there's a whole host of things that will change that in a day so and that's why the tracking for a week or two weeks like you've done gives you a way better estimate than some sort of algorithm that's based off of your age your sex your weight and your estimated movement like that's just so that what you're

1:29:27Adam Schafer:doing with people by having them track for 10 to 14 days is exactly what we do yep yeah okay that's how we coach our coaches that's the only accurate number there is no more accurate way you'll get there there's no other way to do it in a more accurate way and the few people that are listening

1:29:41Sal Di Stefano:that go well mine matches just right it's more by luck and chance that that there's match up perfect good for you like yeah yeah then you're the norm you're i've those bmr things are almost always way off for people and i just don't even pay attention to them and when we reverse diet

1:29:58Adam Schafer:someone like you who's fit, who's strength training, who's doing it right. I'll crush whatever a BMR scan will say. Like what you're saying, that's the norm. We'll reverse diet someone and we'll be five, 600, 800 ,000 calories above what their machine tells them they should be at. That happens all the time. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We recently got an evil body scanner. And I think that because of that, it gives so much good data, but people are getting so hung up on those numbers.

1:30:26Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Yeah. And they, they find it hard to believe that I eat as much as I do. And I'm trying to tell them, Hey, I'm tracking, I track pretty religiously. I mean, I'm pretty disciplined, but I do allow myself some flexibility, but, um, okay. My favorite, so out of the three of us, I'm probably the biggest nut when it comes to tracking data stuff. There's three things I, I, I use and I like, uh, steps. So I like to see, so having some sort of step count i like some sort of a sleep monitor to to do my sleep score and then a consistent body fat test that's it and they're and again they're not end all be alls no you're looking at trends but they're but they give me a really good indicator on trends of activity level how well that person is probably sleeping and probably their stress level is normally connected to that and then a body fat test that am i in the right heading in the right direction or not and None of them are end-all, be-all, but they're like the three best data points, in my opinion, to come together with a conclusion of, are we moving in the right direction?

1:31:26Sal Di Stefano:Are we not moving in the right direction? All the other shit that's out there is way too much noise, in my opinion.

1:31:32Adam Schafer:Yeah, what you're trying to do with body fat tests is you're looking at trends. So after three of these measurements, what direction are we moving in? But there's really only a few objective measures that a coach can use. strength strength is one of them there's no room for error you did 10 more pounds that's real you just lifted 10 more pounds that's objective i love strength that's why i always point to strength i love that how do you feel that's subjective but if the person says they feel better they're more energy well then it's then it's true body fat percentage this is more of a trend thing don't get but the way you set this up kayla is when you do these scans with your clients you got to let them know ahead of time yeah because what you don't want to do is come around the back of it and then it sounds like you're trying to comfort them.

1:32:16Adam Schafer:Exactly. So what you want to do, yeah. So head it off. It's right. Before I do the scan, here's what I want you to know. There's a, there's a, there's a margin of error with body fat percentage. That's between four and 6%. So we're just looking at trends here. The art, the BMR, we're going to ignore that. That is, that is almost never accurate. The only real accurate way to measure is, is I'm going to have you track for about 10 days. And for, you know, here's an example and then tell them about yourself. So we're going to ignore that number and we're just going to look at, so you got to let them know ahead of time otherwise what happens as a coach is somebody comes out of it and they're disappointed and then it sounds like you're trying to like comfort them yeah and then and then they're like do i believe you or not maybe they're just trying to make me feel better the best the best

1:32:55Sal Di Stefano:coaches are coaches that do a good job from the jump forecasting so and that's and that's everything like letting your clients know like hey i i expect that we're going to have some plateau weeks i expect that we're going to see numbers like this i and so the more you can forecast for them of what's normal and that's okay. It's no big deal. Then this stuff isn't a big deal. And it's literally, it's reminding them like, this is for me, just so I know that the adjustments that I'm making are aligning with it. I don't want you to get hung up on the body fat test number. I don't want you to get hung up on the BMR number.

1:33:25Sal Di Stefano:This is just data points for me that I can, I'm moving you in the right direction. And so forecasting that to Sal's point before they go in and do that is so huge versus waiting until they get it. And then trying to answer their questions of, but why is this saying this and why did we go up 1 %? And then they start freaking out and then you're trying to backpedal and explain yourself versus saying, I don't even give a shit if this says we went up 2%. I just want to see where it's at. Cause that'll give me an indication of where I want to go from there.

1:33:52Adam Schafer:That's right.

1:33:52Sal Di Stefano:And so I use it. Like when I talk to my clients, that's how I communicate before we do any of this testing. It's like, it's not an end all be all. It's just more data for me to know that I'm doing the right things with you. Okay. That sounds great. Thank you guys so much. That definitely helps. I think forecasting is definitely the way to go now with these new scans because people are getting very hung up on those numbers. So that's super helpful.

1:34:13Adam Schafer:100%. Great job. Yep. Thank you, guys. You got it. Yeah. If coaches know ahead of time how to use these tools and then explain how they're going to be used, very valuable. If you don't do that well, the tools start to do the coaching. And then everything's reactionary. Exactly. And then it's going to suck. You're in a bad place. Like, hey, but my body fat went up a percent. Well, it's okay. You're doing – then you sound like you're just trying to make a – Damage control. Yeah.

1:34:42Sal Di Stefano:By the way, this is the type of stuff – I didn't mention it to Caleb, but this is the type of stuff that is in our course. This is what we teach. This is the type of stuff that we teach. And I think this is the stuff that all the best national certifications out there that go over human physiology, biomechanics, nutrition, exercise science. No, this is coaching. This is coaching. This is what will make a really good coach. You can have all those certs, degrees, all this stuff like that. Knowledge is great. But if you don't know how to do things like this with clients, that is the difference between you being a good and a great coach.

1:35:11Our next callers are Hannah and Tyler from Ohio. Hey, what's up, guys? What's happening, guys? I'm going to go ahead and read off here so I don't forget anything. And I hopefully remember how to talk this whole time. I'm so excited to see you guys. Like, I kind of can't believe this is real life. So I just wanted to thank you for taking my call and for the information you put out. You have shifted the way that I view health and fitness, and I have exclusively been running your program since 2019, and don't see myself changing that anytime soon. I'm a 37-year-old female mom of a 2 - and 4-year-old.

1:35:48I've been working with a functional health practitioner for the past year due to low testosterone, and honestly, this is the best I've felt since before having kids. My energy levels are a lot better, more constant and consistent. And I don't have the energy crashes and significant fatigue that I was having before. I usually sit around 122 to 124 pounds prior to having kids. And that was what my weight was also prior to working with this functional health practitioner. So I got down to my pre-baby weight. And I would estimate I was around 20 to 22 % body fat. I'm 5 '4", currently 130 to 132 pounds, depending on the day.

1:36:33I just hit a PR deadlifting at 225. And it was one of those ego things where I felt like I could do more, but I didn't want to injure myself. I'm a PT. So I try to like, live the way I teach people. Anyway, I just did a body scan at my gym and it estimated that I had 24 % body fat, which feels about right to me with how my clothes fit and what I look like. So I know this is still a healthy range, but I'm having a hard time psychologically with this. As I work out very consistently, focus on protein and cycle through your programs pretty religiously. At this higher weight and body fat, I feel like I look soft and my definition doesn't show unless I am flexing hard.

1:37:21And I'm a physical therapist and a former D1 athlete and have been told a perfectionist at times, but I really want to let go of that mentality and listening to your podcast over the past five to six years has helped me significantly with this to the point where I'm hoping to help coach people through this at some point and potentially even go into training or functional health in the next five years. However, I'm just really struggling to know if this new weight and size is just a healthier place for my body to be at this point in my life, or if I can try to get back to where I was previously, where I felt more athletic and confident and actually fit into my clothes.

1:38:02I know it doesn't seem like a huge difference, but with this size and weight, I basically need to buy all new pants because none of my pre-baby stuff fits anymore. any help or guidance is appreciated i'm currently running maps performance and prior to that i ran map strong which i loved and that's where i hit my pr um dead lifting hey great question and

1:38:26Adam Schafer:i love that your husband's here for support because i can see his face while you're talking

1:38:29Sal Di Stefano:yeah i have a feeling he's waiting for us to say what he's been saying i'm reading his mind right

1:38:35Adam Schafer:now and i'm gonna guess what you're thinking but he's like you're kicking ass honey you're doing such a good job like you're so hard on yourself yeah so here's the deal it's the athlete and you kick it in you are you listen you're killing it yeah you're doing really well your body fat percentage very healthy you're super strong 225 at your size is really really good and you probably could have lifted more but you want to be really good with your technique and you just had two babies by the way in your in your email both c-section yeah and your last pregnancy was rough It says you were nauseous the entire time.

1:39:09Adam Schafer:Really, really bad. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. And you had two kids within three years. Yeah. And how old is your youngest? Two. He's two and a half, technically. Yeah. Listen, you're being way too hard on yourself. Yeah. Here's my advice for you. Yeah. Buy new clothes. Okay? Stop worrying about it. Buy new clothes. Also, you're going to continue to see your body progress. Yeah. You just got out of. Yeah, you're just now getting in the good spot. Yeah. So I've trained a lot of women pre, during, and post babies, okay? And I really hate the fitness space for how it communicates to women postpartum.

1:39:50Adam Schafer:They get this idea that eight months postpartum, like you're back in shape, and I'm back to my old size, whatever. That's crap. Every woman I've ever trained who was disciplined and, you know, even an athlete like you, I've trained a few that were athletes in college, it takes like two years before you actually start to feel like yourself. You know exactly what I'm talking about. Totally. Yeah. And you've still got little guys at home, so it's still like hectic. Sleep can still be a bit off. Yeah, you're being way hard on yourself. If you just stay the course, stop judging yourself so harshly, go ahead and buy some new clothes right now.

1:40:28Adam Schafer:You're going to keep – your body's going to keep progressing on its own. but if you if you beat yourself up if you let that happen you're going to set yourself back i'm going

1:40:38Sal Di Stefano:to tell you too something that i feel like has been the theme of the calls today that we've been telling people too is you're far better off trying to build into the body that you want than thinking about trying to cut into the body you want to oh yeah which is a tendency that everybody seems to want to have like the fact that you're you're hitting prs right now is just like lean into that keep getting stronger keep building muscle signal and don't try and cut because you feel like oh i'm lose a little bit or I want to lean out a little bit. Like you're just now getting in this good place. Your body is starting to respond where you're hitting PRs, like lean into that and get stronger.

1:41:12Sal Di Stefano:And you're going to, you're going to be happy. And six, six months from now, you're going to look back and go like,

1:41:16Adam Schafer:Oh shit, like build, build what you want. Don't cut into what you want. So if you, if you just kind of like keep building, you know, slow reverse diet, feed the body, feed your hormones, feed the muscle. You're probably going to get down. If you're walking around 24 % right now and you've got a two and a four-year-old and you're lifting weights and everything that I read here, you'll probably settle around 21 % just by building into it without trying to cut. Just by having fun with your workouts, enjoying yourself, feeding the muscle, you'll probably fall somewhere around 21%, 22 % with good shape, good muscle, good strength, the whole deal, good hormone profile, the whole deal.

1:41:56Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. How long have you been working with a functional medicine practitioner? A year? About a year. And when I started, I had, I think my, what's like mind blowing to me right now, is like you always, you want to be lean. I don't, in the fitness world, like I've lifted weights for decades at this point. And I feel the best since I started doing your program. So I just respect you guys so much. And I truly believe what you say. And I will do, I will do what you're saying. I, it resonates with me because when I was leaner, before working with the functional health practitioner, I felt terrible. Like I've just felt, but I felt like I looked like I wanted to look.

1:42:36So that's, it's so hard, I think. And I really, I do want to get over that. And I do believe because I'm like, I feel good. I have energy.

1:42:44Adam Schafer:Hannah, it is a terrible trade. Yeah. 3 % body fat is a terrible trade to feel like crap.

1:42:50Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

1:42:50Adam Schafer:That's not a good trade. And right now in your head, you don't realize that. But if I were to snap my fingers and have you switch back and forth, give you an hour there and an hour back you'd be like no no i'm good by the way the the i really do think you're going to settle probably around 21 22 body fat with more muscle and a faster

1:43:07Sal Di Stefano:metabolism probably going to settle you'll you'll look better than what you did when you were leaner and you'll feel better but yeah but you got to build into it yeah totally what are your calories at right now um at least 22 to 2400 and that's that's since i started um working with the function I like, I don't track religiously, but when I do, it's pretty easy for me to get about that.

1:43:30Adam Schafer:Yeah. I bet you when you're around 22, you're probably hungry. Yeah. And I felt like it wasn't even the hunger. It was more like the just feelings almost ill because I just felt depleted. Yeah. You need to be probably consistently 24, 25. Like don't ever go below that is where I would have you. Yeah. And you'll, you'll actually get leaner with that because you're going to build into it. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That's where I keep you. That should me the focus yeah stop being so hard on yourself you're doing so great yeah you're doing really really great yeah you're gonna keep you're gonna keep improving but if you place that hyper focus on yourself uh that's gonna that's gonna it's gonna set you back for sure focus on getting

1:44:04Sal Di Stefano:strong on the lifts feeding the body uh reverse dieting continuing to go up you could easily continue to go up calories too by the way you could land you could end up landing in a place like 27 2800 calories easily easily and and in getting stronger if you do that you'll build into the body that you're you desire right now don't think about cutting into it like you're you're as low as i would want you calorie wise i want to keep reversing you and the signs of hitting prs is such a good sign we're moving in the right direction i think if you consistently stayed

1:44:32Adam Schafer:about 24 25 never went below it you'd see this nice body composition change okay i appreciate that yeah when i first started your programs i was using straps for 145 and i was like barely doing that and now I felt like I could definitely just hold on to the bar at 225 no problems yeah it's like crazy how much your programming helps and um what would you suggest because I just came off as strong and then performance and um that's pretty much all I'm doing I do a little bit of the elliptical but I mostly just walk into your programs yeah um right now I didn't know like what to do next I guess uh symmetry would be good I think you would appreciate it too as a PT yeah that's so hard though it's so hard because i love the heavy like stuff but i do i haven't done that one yet i do have it i should lean into that still though i mean you still power lift go

1:45:23Sal Di Stefano:power lift you could do power lift yeah because you did you've done strong you've done performance you've done performance so always my recommendation is a cycle of performance or symmetry a year so always cycle one of those in there because that'll keep you balanced really well so if as long as you're cycling performance or symmetry once a year. And then if you really enjoy the lifting heavy, I'd push you into powerlifting.

1:45:44Adam Schafer:Yeah, you want to do powerlifting? But you got to eat 2 ,500 calories a day for that one. Yeah, yeah. I can do that. I feel so good lifting that 225. I made him come out and watch me because I was like, good form. Like, you're going to witness this. And it flew off the ground. I was like, why am I out here when it's your powerlifting? I feel like that would feel good.

1:46:04Sal Di Stefano:Oh, yeah. I'd love to see you do powerlifting. Powerlifting feed. power lift and feed and if you're hungry feed so even if you're landing at 2500 calories you're hungry your appetite if eat more so that's what i really focus on the strength there we get strong and we can reverse diet right now even more that would be a huge win in the next three months sounds great all right awesome you guys keep it up yeah thanks for calling in yeah yeah thank you

1:46:28Adam Schafer:you got it guys see you i can i can literally hear his thoughts oh yeah yeah i feel like that's That's why he was on here. That was like a - You better tell him what's going on. Well, let's see what the guys have to say. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe I'm wrong. I don't know. Because I know he's thinking. He's thinking like, honey, you're killing it. Yeah. You are really hard on yourself. Yeah, of course. But you don't want to hear it from your - I get it. I get it. But man, she is doing really well.

1:46:53Sal Di Stefano:Very, very common with ex-athletes. Oh, yeah. Very, very common with ex-athletes. So when she said that, I was just like -

1:47:00Adam Schafer:Oh, she's got a two-year-old at home. And her pregnancies were rough. I mean, if you read the people, she didn't read the whole, the whole email, but, uh, I mean, she was diagnosed with hyperamesis. I mean, she, that's like where you're vomiting all the time because you're so nauseous. Two C-sections. Remember they cut through your core.

1:47:16Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Uh, and so, and she's doing phenomenal. Yeah. And just hit a PR, what, a couple of days ago. It's just like, no, we're on the right track. You just stay. You know, it is, it was the theme of the calls today is like, you know, build into the body you want versus trying to cut into the body you want will serve you so much more.

1:47:31Adam Schafer:That's right. That's it. If you like the show, come find us on Instagram, Mind Pump Media. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Super Bundle at mindpumpmedia.com. The RGB Super Bundle includes MAPS Anabolic, 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.

1:48:16The 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 5-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.