2916: 5 Ways to Get Fitter Without Adding a Single Workout

16:41Adam Schafer:Essentially the pain that you feel, the exhaustion that you feel music changes how you perceive it because there, there There are real pain signals, but how you perceive it is part of how it feels. Right. And so, yeah, a personal example for me, you know, I grew up watching the Rocky movies. Love them. Talk about them on the show all the time. Absolutely love them. And one of them was so instrumental with my workouts because when I first started watching this movie, I also started working out. It was Rocky IV, the one where he fights the Russian. There's all those compilations of him running. Montages.

17:15Adam Schafer:Montages. And so I have this, like, association. like when I hear that those montage songs I remember the movie and how it made me feel as a kid and it's right around the time I started working out yeah till this day if I'm doing something to exhaustion and I feel like I can't do it anymore if that song plays literally what happens to me is I get the chills I literally feel the chills and I can keep going you know it's funny and it's all because of the perceived my the perception of the pain change I have yeah very similar but it's uh from karate kid and it's uh the best around and i'll play that every now and then because it dude it's the words it's like you know it's the nostalgia but yeah it's just like you're the best you get ready to kick ass in the old valley competition you just get into it except you're johnny yeah yeah it was a legal kick so you gotta give him that yeah he actually won I love that.

18:09Adam Schafer:You know what I used to do back in the day? So when I first became, uh, I was in this, I think it was a senior sales counselor. I wasn't even an assistant manager yet. So I'm 18. So it's what year is this? 1997. And back in the day, this is the 24 fitness on Hills. They're the old one. It's not even there anymore. Uh, and we used to, the general manager's office controlled the music and there were, we had a, back then we had like, it might've been satellite where you can You picked different stations? Yeah, it was satellite.

18:36Sal Di Stefano:You only had like 12 or something. Yeah, like certain stations.

18:38Adam Schafer:Yeah, yeah. There was also a CD player that you could play if you wanted to change it. Nobody ever did that. It was always satellite. But I used to have fun with this. So the old GM office was by the front desk, and it had glass tint. And if you looked out, there was the cardio. So back in the day, the rooms were all divided. So you had cardio room. Then you'd have to walk into another room for a free read. But the cardio was right when you walked in. And I used to do this with my staff. I'd have them come in the office, and I'd be like, watch this, guys. and I turned the music off. So you'd see people running the treadmill.

19:06Adam Schafer:I said, check this out. Watch them running. They'd be running. I said, watch this. I'd turn off the music. Put techno on. No, I'd put Rocky. Oh, Rocky. Yeah, yeah. I put the Rocky one, you know, the famous one, right? Yeah. And I hit play. I said, watch this. I give it 30 seconds. Watch the effort. Bro, people be running 30 seconds into the song. Everybody's turning the speed up. Everybody on the treadmills. We would start cracking. Lots of arms going up. I just love it. I just love it. That's so great. It does affect you for sure. All right, next one. This is a chemical enhancement. Caffeine.

19:34Adam Schafer:Caffeine is the most consistently supported immediate improvement in athletic performance ergogenic aid. It works. It works. Everybody knows it works. It's about three to six milligrams per kilogram of body mass. This is what the whole industry around this. What the data shows.

19:50Sal Di Stefano:It's very well studied. It's interesting. I haven't used a pre-workout in a long time. Probably a year and a half, two years, maybe longer since I've used it. Really? Yeah, yeah. What, you just coffee? I consistently have our energy drinks, and by the time I actually get to my workout, I've capped myself at my caffeine.

20:09Adam Schafer:Oh, so that's right, because you have them early in the day.

20:11Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, so I shut it down. So you're not even using caffeine. I don't even use it, but I had a workout on the weekend the other day, and I had only had my cup of coffee in the morning, so I'm like, oh, I got 400 milligrams of caffeine to spare, so I'm like, oh, this will be a good time to have like a 200-something milligram. You get so – it's funny how it adapts, because I'm drinking these 100-something whatever, you know, milligrams of, of caffeine a shot. And then all of a sudden go do a 250 or 300 right before your work. Oh, right before the workout. And I'm reminded of like, Oh wow. I forget how effective that is.

20:43Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. I just, uh, I hadn't had a, I hadn't done that in a, in a long time. And in my head I'm going, Oh, I've been consistently taking 600 milligrams of caffeine a day. So what's this two 50 going to really, or 300 going to affect me in a workout, but I hadn't done it all in one shot like that. And it was just like, Oh, Whoa, this was, you feel it. It's

20:59Adam Schafer:such a immediate thing if i gave my buddy i gave my buddy justin he's the guy i trained the er doctor i gave him a pretty cool guy because sometimes he does uh shifts and he's like man i'm so dead and so hard i'm like are you okay with caffeine or is that gonna mess you up and he's like no sometimes it's good so anyway he sent me a message the other day he's like my face was itching but then it went away he's like man i was i was on fire dude he's like this you're like you're taking a pre-workout you know save some lives which is cool definitely Last is a good night of sleep. So the data on this is pretty remarkable.

21:31Adam Schafer:There's more data on poor sleep than there is on like a good night of sleep. But poor sleep is so detrimental to athletic performance and in particular injury risk. Yeah. Almost nothing you can do will raise your risk of injury more than having a crappy night of sleep before a hard workout. Your body does not respond the same. No. Yeah, it's a real big problem if you don't get good sleep.

21:54Sal Di Stefano:I don't know if it's because this is something in the last few years that I've just tracked so consistently for so long now. But I can routinely predict I'm going to have a good workout based off of my sleep patterns. Oh, yeah. I mean, I can see. You've connected the dots, yeah. I can go, okay, 87, 85, 92 scores in a week. I'm like, oh, this workout's going to be good. flipped out i can have a 70 sleep score 65 sleep score 80 sleep score and it's like oh i don't know how good this is this is a hit or miss or then i can have like a back-to-back bad sleep days it's like guaranteed terrible workout yeah i mean it's that predictable for me yeah i i literally like um scheduled out a time to do the pr when i was doing that whole series and all this kind of stuff And like I was basing it completely off of like the two days prior that I got sleep.

22:48And it was like, I actually moved it out because I was like, no, I just, I didn't get that optimal sleep. And then once I got the optimal sleep, you completely felt that. And you're like, oh my God, today's the day. And it just, you know.

23:00Adam Schafer:You know where I feel it the most is in my mobility. If I have poor sleep, I am. Like it's like my mobility goes down like 15%. Yeah. Immediately.

23:08Sal Di Stefano:So my mobility, stiffness, I just feel, that's how I know. I can't push the weight on a back-to-back bad rest day like that. And it does. It takes two good days. Even one good day, I feel okay, and I'll get a workout in, but it's not until the second good day in a row do I feel like, oh. That's when you're humming. You're like, oh, man. I got all this to you. I've just noticed a huge difference from that.

23:28Adam Schafer:Speaking of stiffness, so... Not what you think, Justin. Sorry. You just opened my eyes. My bad. Join stiffness. I got to shout out the Organifi creatine chews. Okay. So I've tried lots of creatine gummies. They're so good. Theirs taste the best. What theirs has in it. So it's got a, it's got really good dose of creatine. They're five milligrams. It's five grams. Sorry. It's the tart cherry.

23:53Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

23:54Adam Schafer:Tart cherry. You guys know what its effects on inflammation are? No, I remember you telling us though. It's phenomenal. Yeah. It's phenomenal. So I'm, I'm using theirs as my primary source of creatine because of, you know, I'm doing jujitsu. Yeah. So I need the anti-inflammatory effects. Yeah. So that's the source your creatine i'm i'm going you brought that up when they're formulating this they also

24:12Sal Di Stefano:they taste the best yeah the best texture yeah they take that i know i know we had this debate the other day i was just like i think the the organified creatine gummies are the best by far

24:20Adam Schafer:yeah by far and they're sourced by crepe here right that's the creatine they have in their

24:24Sal Di Stefano:yes i believe so yeah it's well sourced true's always got good yeah because you know what sucks

24:27Adam Schafer:about uh about you know creatine chews or gummies uh is when they do third-party testing bro so many of them don't have a single ounce not not a drop of creatine crazy they're selling candy it's a lifters i tell you it's pretty well not only they're lying but they're also just selling candy yeah i wonder now too because you know back a little bit uh i remember they said there's like a shortage happening now because everybody's like on the protein kick and you know now like the sourcing must be even more like like riddled with shucksters out great kreapur is one of the best sources of creatine.

25:03Sal Di Stefano:I heard whey's going up in price right now. Is it spiking right now?

25:07Adam Schafer:Yeah. Well, you know, fitness, creatine, whey protein or protein in general is going mainstream. Part of it, I want to say is, I think fitness media has done it. It's just more mainstream, but I think a big part of it is the GLP surge. More and more people are aware of the potential muscle loss from glp and so they're all looking okay what do i do to prevent muscle loss increase

25:33Sal Di Stefano:my protein and then creatine and it makes that makes sense because liquid shakes are so much easier when you can't eat that's right so 100 i gotta share with you guys so i just had this

25:43Adam Schafer:so i worked i just signed up at a different gym uh because it's close to my house my and jessica signed up with the kids because they have an outdoor pool and we're trying to teach the kids

25:52Sal Di Stefano:how to swim this summer so have you guys ever been to abac i a long time ago okay so you're not going to the other one anymore? Yeah, I used to have clients. I froze it for now because I wanted to test

25:59Adam Schafer:this other place. What was that like, by the way?

26:02Sal Di Stefano:Sorry not to cut your story off. To freeze it? Yeah, it was. It was, no. Yeah, it was cold. Remember back in the days it used to be like, hold on, let me go get the manager. Yeah, yeah, just this whole. The manager comes out, oh, it's going to be about this, that, you bring a note in.

26:12Adam Schafer:Can you fill out a form You didn't have to fax this. And write a letter. Fax it to our home office. No, anyway, no, that was easy. But, so I didn't know this. AVAC's been there for like 40 years, I think. It's a long time. It's a long time. Anyway, it's a great gym. It's a great facility, right? They got lots of stuff in there, but it's been there for like 40 years. So the reason why I wanted to maybe work out there is it's closer to home and it's easier for me to go there and then come here type of deal. Plus I like to go there on the off days with the kids anyway, so I'm paying day fees. So I'm like, let me just switch and see what's up.

26:41Adam Schafer:So I'm working out in there today and they have equipment. They have two areas where you can lift. There's an indoor one and then they have this outdoor lifting area and the outdoor lifting area has older strength training equipment. So you can tell that AVAC's been there for a while. So like, you know, we're going to buy new equipment. Let's move this stuff out here. Keep it in there type of deal. Totally get it. But it's clean, but it's all older equipment. And I know you guys have experienced, I know Adam and you and I have talked about this. Old strength training equipment just feels better.

27:09Adam Schafer:Did you see, by the way,

27:11Sal Di Stefano:this is just last week, Joe DeFranco's story?

27:14Adam Schafer:No.

27:14Sal Di Stefano:Oh, I was totally. Did you talk about this? Oh yeah, I was totally. So he was at, I wish you would have seen his story. Maybe he'll still have the video. He was in some, he was at some place. I don't know where he was at, some old office. And he did a whole video walkthrough. And he had all of them, all of the old chain. Okay. Oh, yeah. And so he was doing the video. And he showed the pullover machine. I'm like, oh, greatest machine. It was all the chain. All the old stuff. All the old stuff. Everything you could think of, he had found it. Where it's at. So everybody in our age group. It was in his story.

27:45Sal Di Stefano:I don't know if he did it on his post, Doug, so you might be able to find it.

27:48Adam Schafer:It feels way better. Listen, you run into guys in their 40s, 50s, 60s who've been lifting weight their whole life. They will all say the same thing. The equipment back in the day, obviously free weights are the same, but the machines back in the day were better. Now, I chalked it up to nostalgia. I'm like, maybe it's just because I have an association.

28:06Sal Di Stefano:No, no. Whatever. They feel better.

28:08Adam Schafer:Okay, they are. So again, I went to the - Is it just because the chains are dangerous for people? Yes. So I looked it up. I actually looked it up because I - That's why, right? Well, there's more to it.

28:19Sal Di Stefano:Okay.

28:19Adam Schafer:So I looked up, you know, why, you know, basically, is it actually different or is it just my own nostalgia? Because I never really researched it, but I always felt it. And it's true. Old school machines, they were designed for bodybuilders and lifters. So when they designed equipment in the 90s, strength training was not nearly as mainstream as it is today. The people who lifted weights in the 90s, a lot of them were like fanatics. And we knew this. When I managed gyms in the late 90s, the cardio space, that was where you took your potential members. Strength training had to sell people on lifting weights back in the day.

28:57Adam Schafer:It's just not a lot of people did it. Now the footprint is changing. The footprint is more strength training, less cardio as people figure out and start to learn how effective it is, how great it is or whatever. But equipment back then was designed purely for athletes and bodybuilders. It was not designed for space saving. it was not designed to be safe or to switch easily or to clean easily it was like they would test it on on guys who were like serious lifters like this works that's why it's so different it feels different because it's better yeah yeah it's better yeah for lifting it's just harder to

29:30Sal Di Stefano:take some more space what's funny is that they did all these changes and stuff like that for all the reasons you're talking about and it's like that those old ones last forever yes i mean Some WD-40 is about all you need to keep those suckers running. It's like a bike chain, dude. Where I felt like the belt ones and all the cable shit ones always were breaking it down in the gym. You remember the gym? There was always three to five machines down the gym, and that was part of your job was how fast could you get these things repaired constantly?

29:56Adam Schafer:So this is what it says here also. Older commercial equipment used heavier gauge steel, more robust frames, and simpler, over-engineered mechanics built for high-volume, serious training. They were designed with bodybuilders and strength athletes in mind. And then much, you know, current commercial equipment prioritizes lower production costs, easier maintenance and high traffic settings, quicker user turnover, aesthetic finishes, and reduced injury liability. Yeah. All the lame stuff. Yes, dude. But it's true. Like, I'm using this older equipment in the outdoor area, and I'm like, oh, this feels good.

30:28Sal Di Stefano:If we had the space, I would be so down to collect these with you. Bro. Like, just slowly. God, don't get me excited. Just refurbish them. I would.

30:38Adam Schafer:Could you imagine opening a gym and it's all vintage? It's all refurbished, vintage strength training equipment.

30:44Sal Di Stefano:We probably would just have that as some sort of a different liability waiver that we signed. Yeah, exactly. Lift at your own risk. You've got to sign it off before you - His finger gets caught.

30:54Adam Schafer:You could even design the inside of the gym to look vintage. You know what I mean? You could put the lights and everything in there and just have - Yeah, yeah. Walk in there. Everything is changed. It would be cool.

31:03Sal Di Stefano:I mean, even if we just started slowly collecting them, the pullover one and the donkey calf raise that goes to 600 pounds slowly just collecting all these great old old school machines yeah i'll be down i love it no i totally i know man i have uh i have something embarrassing to admit oh yeah no here we go you know i'm super can we guess yeah you want to guess what's embarrassing where do we guess i don't know if i want you to guess i'm like no bro i wasn't going to say that on the podcast. I'm just kidding. Go, dude.

31:36Adam Schafer:Go ahead.

31:37Sal Di Stefano:Another injury. No, but it's along those lines. No, no. What it is is that - Does this have to do with your pickleball? Yes. I like it a lot. That's what's embarrassing? Yeah, it's embarrassing to admit that I like it. It's kind of like, you know, it's like the sport they say that like if you can't play tennis, you play pickleball type of deal. Yeah, well, you don't have to move. I mean, I was drenched in sweat. So you definitely get a workout, but it's like the perfect level of intensity that I could have. I didn't stretch. I just, it's the old ladies. I just got out there and played and had fun, competitive, sweat my ass off.

32:18Sal Di Stefano:And I'm like, and I didn't have to prime for 45 minutes. I've been holding out. Cause I know exactly. I'd have the same. I would love it. I was so reluctant. And I'd been, and I had multiple people tell me, I mean, Remember we had Stan Everding that was like, he was obsessed. Everywhere he travels, he has to go find a pickleball cart. I was just kind of laughing about it, whatever. So I've had lots of people tell me, our good friends.

32:43Adam Schafer:You have your fanny pack and your New Balance. Oh, man.

32:45Sal Di Stefano:I already went out and scoped out where all the courts. No, you didn't. Oh, yes, I did. Are you going to compete? No, I'm not going to compete. I'm going to play.

32:52Adam Schafer:They have competitions. Oh, I know. No, no, no. My buddy plays all the time, and they have levels of competition. He's super into it.

32:57Sal Di Stefano:It's like anything, right?

32:58Adam Schafer:You're for sure going to compete. Can we sponsor you? Hold on. You're going to compete. There's no way you can't.

33:04Sal Di Stefano:What I wanted to do, and this has been bothering me for so long, is that I have the competitive side of me.

33:12Adam Schafer:I was going to say, you don't know how to not have that.

33:13Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, so it gave me a taste of that. And I went, oh, this is going to be cool because I don't feel nervous. Now, granted, you can hurt yourself doing anything. But the level is definitely, you know what I'm saying?

33:27Adam Schafer:Did you get a sore?

33:29Sal Di Stefano:No.

33:29Adam Schafer:Oh, good.

33:30Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, I didn't get sore. I didn't hurt myself. I didn't warm up. And I got a great little workout, and I had some competitive fun. It's like bowling with gutter guards. It's just a step. Stop talking crap, bro. You're going to go play next. I have to because I'm holding out. Hey, I'm recruiting him next, dog.

33:46Adam Schafer:I'm recruiting him next. Hey, can you guys please compete? Do they have doubles? What I'm trying to work on is this guy that changed his tennis court to a pickleball court. Well, yeah, temporarily. Ultimately, I want it to be a tennis court. I'm going to compete. Atticute, Doug.

33:59Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, we're going to be into it.

34:00Adam Schafer:Adam closes.

34:01Sal Di Stefano:No one's going to play tennis. You know you're going to do it. Exactly. You might as well give in to him. It might be a multi-purpose court. Who knows? It's going to be a multi-purpose court. Okay, okay. We'll see. We'll see. You know why? Because we're all, you know, it's just like, there's a new movie. If you're willing to chip in and pay for it. Yeah. Well, I would consider it. If I get a gate key. I'm sorry. It's full body. Garage key. I will definitely, I will definitely. Hey, it was, it was a lot of fun. It was a lot of fun. and I had not played yet, obviously.

34:25Adam Schafer:I so badly want to watch you guys compete. I'm late to you. I'll cheer for you guys. Just I'll sit. You'll have like -

34:31Sal Di Stefano:I mean, it was my first time. So I was just like learning the rules and all the things and how to play and stuff like that.

34:37Adam Schafer:Is it like the same rules as tennis,

34:38Sal Di Stefano:just with the pickleball? Similar. There's some little bit difference, like the serving and the points and the -

34:43Adam Schafer:Tell me a pickleball word that's for only pickleball that I don't know.

34:46Sal Di Stefano:Get out of the kitchen. No way.

34:48Adam Schafer:Yeah, I don't even know what that is.

34:49Sal Di Stefano:What is the kitchen? Okay, so the kitchen is considered the front part. Okay, so what you can't do in pickleball, that you can do in tennis, you can't brush the net and spike it down. So the kitchen is that, you'll see in a pickleball court, they have that probably. So you have to stay out of that. No, you can go in it, but you have to go underhand. Oh, you can't spike down. You can't spike down if you're in the kitchen. Oh, okay. So they call it the kitchen, and there's all kinds of slang around that too. Like, oh, you left the refrigerator door open because there's all this talk that they do.

35:19Sal Di Stefano:Oh, yeah, this is hilarious. Were you playing people you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was good friends of ours that have a pickleball court on their house. And so absolutely, probably my first time in an epic experience to play pickleball court.

35:32Adam Schafer:You know what's cool about all these different things? For sure, there's going to be a kind of shoe that you need to wear. There's a type of uniform. You're going to get into all it. Because I've never seen you get into anything and not get all of the stuff. He gets the gloves. You're going to get gloves. You're going to get everything. You get the embroidered jacket, the visor, whatever you do.

35:48Sal Di Stefano:That's why I'm embarrassed to admit, because it looks pretty silly and ridiculous. You know what I'm saying? So who knows if I go that far. They just came out with a movie on Apple. I watched it. Did you watch it? That's how I know all the lingo, because I don't know it from the one time I play a pickleball with my friends.

36:01Adam Schafer:Okay.

36:01Sal Di Stefano:But I watched the movie. The movie. Okay, the premise of this, it's a comedy. It's a Ben Stiller comedy, right? Mm-hmm. And it's cheesy, funny. It's a good throwaway movie, or we got nothing to watch. Watch it. It's funny, but it's not right outside. So it's not on par with like dodgeball or what it is? Dodgeball was, to me, was a classic, you know, because it was so original, but it is like in that vein. Okay. And the premise of it is, which is what I find, what I think is interesting about it is this is probably really happening. And it never once dawned on me because I'm not into this until now.

36:38Sal Di Stefano:And it's this tennis club, like really high end, fancy tennis club. they got like 30 40 courts kind of like what we have over here the racket in los gatos we're like that but uh all these people are wanting to convert the tennis courts to pickleball courts because pickleball is becoming so popular and i was like oh i bet that i mean pickleball is like one of the fastest growing sports right now let's piss off and i bet a lot of tennis tennis clubs or don't get a lot of traffic and it's probably a lot of times tennis courts are empty and not being used i've been over los gatos many times and seen three courts not being used like it's it happens all the time but pickleball is so crazy right now you can't even go you go find me a pickleball court somewhere it will be someone's be using it right now middle of the day all day long like that's how crazy it's become and so this whole comedy is about this like the old taking over yeah the old guard trying to hold on to this is a tennis court place but then all these people moving in being and they're slowly converting these tennis courts over to i did tell you they played in a dodgeball uh league when i was in in college and then afterwards for a while

37:41Adam Schafer:Oh, that's fun. Yeah, it was a good time. We're team Ballstein. Ballstein. Yeah. Why? Yeah, from Zoolander. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I used to love it. We're male models. Do you guys remember Nation Ball? It was a type of dodgeball. Do you remember that? No. Nation Ball? Yeah, it was called Nation Ball, and you had someone on the other side that was on your team, and they tried to throw the opposite direction. Anyway, it was similar to dodgeball. That's a fun sport, dude. That was so much fun, dude. They don't let kids play that anymore. You know that, right? That's cool.

38:07Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, you can't do Steal the Bacon. You can't do Red Rover. you can't do I understand Red Rover

38:12Adam Schafer:I've seen a few broken arms that's why they got cry closets but Dodgeball was like then again used to blast oh yeah you could blast I could still smell the red rubber ball the sound of the red rubber I can too when you hit the face it hurts the way it and the way it

38:30Sal Di Stefano:hums too through the air you get a real good one it'll leave like some of those like marks like lines like checkered isn't that funny how like how this stuff like that like a smell or a sound or somebody that can stay with you for that long. Yeah. No, I can tell you.

38:43Adam Schafer:I was going to say, Adam, when you're playing, because if you're going to play regularly, try taking the Troscriptions Tromune before. So that's the one for immune system, but it's for stamina too. Oh. It's got the really, really high extract. I mean, I have that. I wouldn't think to use it for that. For stamina, it's really good. Is it because of coraceps? Yes, but it's got the compound in coraceps. It's got the highest amount of the active ingredient that I've ever seen. Oh, interesting. Yeah, take that before you go play and see if you notice a difference. Oh, interesting. Yeah. I'm going to have some more sent to us because it's all gone because I'm going to take it before jujitsu.

39:18Sal Di Stefano:They're going away from retail and only medical, right?

39:22Adam Schafer:Only to practitioners. That's going to be switching.

39:25Sal Di Stefano:So when the audience hears this. Get it as soon as you can.

39:28Adam Schafer:Because pretty soon you won't be able to get it unless you go through an actual practitioner.

39:32Sal Di Stefano:And we should probably announce that because I know at one point our customers, The partnership that we have with them, the advertising side, you'll hear it freeze on the show, but not because we don't think the product is amazing. It's because they're no longer going to be selling to direct-to-consumer, and they are going through practitioners. So when you no longer hear us talk about it, it's not a matter of it wasn't a great partnership, it wasn't a great product. It's that they are just going away from direct-to-consumer and straight. You know why? I know you know him a little bit better than I do.

40:02Adam Schafer:No, I'm not 100%, but it makes sense from this standpoint. Their supplements are the most medical grade. I think that's maybe the best word to describe that I've ever seen. Their dosing is high. It's like medical grade. It's concentrated, yeah. Yeah, like if you take their supplement, if you want to feel something, then you can try their stuff. You'll feel it.

40:27Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, yeah.

40:27Adam Schafer:Like all their stuff.

40:28Sal Di Stefano:Oh, this is why each little box only comes with like four of those little squares that have.

40:32Adam Schafer:I mean, each one you can break into four other. I wouldn't even mess around with any other methylene blue out there. No, no, no, no.

40:37Sal Di Stefano:I've tried other methylene blue. Yeah. No. Oh, I didn't even think about it. I still have some of that at the house, too. So I could totally do that. But I tell you what. I'm still taking that. It's great. Pickleball's cool, dude. It's cool. It is. It's just going to circle back, dude. It is. I liked it a lot more than I thought. Well, you got that one in Campbell, like, we're off the freeway. That huge. Where I just signed up has pickleball. Surprise. Everywhere does now. Oh, yeah, yeah. They turn that into a whole indoor. Dude, the whole thing is pickable. It's blown up like crazy. And I get it now.

41:06Sal Di Stefano:I get it because, and it was awesome because Katrina and I played on a team together against another couple. Yeah, that's fun. It's our first time playing. So, yeah, for me to be able to pick up a sport with my wife the very first time, and we almost won. So, like, here we are playing somebody who. You know what? It makes sense.

41:21Adam Schafer:It makes sense because exercise that includes socialization. Yes. That also has a lower risk of injury. It makes sense that it would go through the roof. I get it now.

41:34Sal Di Stefano:I get why. Because I looked at it as kind of cheesy or just like, again, probably what the stigma is, oh, these are people who can't play tennis, so they play pickleball. But when you understand that part of it, it's definitely like social fun.

41:48Adam Schafer:If you can combine exercise with socialization, you have hit the gold. I mean, for the average person, like if you're a fitness fanatic, it doesn't matter. Like I'm going to work out no matter what. But the average person is not a fitness fanatic. They don't fall in love with working out. And what the data shows, the most consistent people are people who are not fitness fanatics or ones who do some kind of exercise, and there's a component of community. Well, I got to tell you, I'd rather play pickleball with Courtney than go antiquing. What? What's antiquing? Horrible. Have you guys ever had to do that?

42:21Adam Schafer:Is that where you go around looking for antiques? Yeah. I didn't even know it had a term. I mean, I think the term antiquing is actually something else. Like back, they remember they used to take like, I don't know if it was baby power or whatever, and they hit you in the face with it. That was called antiquing somebody. Wait, what do you mean remember? That didn't happen. That was a thing. You guys still remember? I don't remember that. No. It was a thing. It was like, you know, when everybody's planking or like, this was like a trend. Oh, it was? Like the cheese one? Like the cheese one where people throw the cheese on your face?

42:53I don't know why, what the thought process was with it. I didn't know that was called antiquing.

42:58Adam Schafer:Doug put, was antiquing throwing baby powder in someone's face? Yeah. Yeah, just fact check me here. I don't, so that was a thing. That was a thing.

43:06Sal Di Stefano:I thought you were talking about we were a kid. Yeah, we're doing it. I totally just hijacked your story. Make sure, yeah, make sure I'm not just speaking out of time. But now you got me all curious about throwing baby powder in someone's face. No, look that up, but like, wow. Oh, yeah, you're right, Justin. Of course I'm right. Class is a classic. Oh, jackass. oh that's where oh that's right oh yeah I remember it now where they're sleeping they just run up on them yeah I remember it

43:32Adam Schafer:throw this white powder and it just plumes now I understand why it means antiquing because we have white powder all over yourself yeah you look like a ghost I don't know you look like a statue I'm all like yeah I remember that term and nobody knows cool anyway so yeah so it's like history lesson the stuffiest um dude these places are they're like sheds and there's like no ac in them and then it's like all old to me it's like all old trash all it reminds me of is like i've in my childhood my my mom is very thrifty and very like bargain hunty and like would just bring me on errands all the time and like i would go i'd literally dumpster dive like in this they called the bargain barn but really it's like dumpsters dude and like you pay for things by the pound.

44:22So if that says anything, it's just trash, dude. Like, like, come on. Like, anyways, I'm a little tainted by that. But so like, we're only doing this because we're trying to like get stuff to kind of decorate like these shelves to make, you know, our house more presentable. We're going to put it on the market, you know, do all this stuff. And so you like have to find an AI is great now because you can kind of like, you know, at least find an idea of like some things that could fit those needs. But now you have to hunt for it. It's not obvious. There's only a few amount of stores. So this place in SoCal, there's a few of these antique stores.

44:59And I'm in there with all these old ladies. And I'm like, sifting through. Elbowing somebody to get to a product. I almost broke some vase. And I caught it. And I was just hot and sweating. And dude, it's just an awful experience, dude.

45:14Sal Di Stefano:Did you guys buy what you wanted? We found a few things. But it was just like, you know, I think people get like a thrill out of that. Oh, I know. Some people love that. Oh, my God. Some people love hunting for a piece like that and finding it for a bargain. Yeah. Like, that's what it is. It's just like, this would have been$100.

45:31Adam Schafer:It's crazy.

45:32Sal Di Stefano:They would sell it for this.

45:33Adam Schafer:Is there anything that you guys would really like that's old? Like, is there anything you'd be into?

45:37Sal Di Stefano:Oh, I love. So we have it at our house, Katrina's, which old furniture is very cool. It is cool. it's well made heavy durable heavy well made yeah with the the wood yeah we like we are the one we have in our bedroom is 100 years old and we re-sanded it refinished it when i first when i first did it it was hard for me to wrap my brain around because i'm like i'm paying more to refurbish

46:01Adam Schafer:this thing than i could for a brand new yeah but they're made so sturdy you're right and then when

46:04Sal Di Stefano:it was all done they refurbished it so up to date and style now that it looks modern but it's like heavy wood and so like that's an antique thing that was that's really valuable you know what i

46:13Adam Schafer:love that's like old stuff and you don't you can find originals that are really expensive but you can get copies but i i don't know what it is i'm fascinated by old uh war propaganda oh my buddy is

46:23Sal Di Stefano:into the old old planes he's the art where my one with the camaros at right in the garage it's one of those big huge ones uh he hangs old airplane wings that's so cool yeah yeah like and he finds airplane old parts that are so cool yeah yeah he's like super into that i also would love

46:40Adam Schafer:I've done this before where I'll look up old supplement labels and old gym equipment. I could see having some of that stuff.

46:49Sal Di Stefano:You probably like old records. Yeah, old records and maybe like tobacco pipes and stuff like that. Remember when we all bought tobacco pipes? It was you, bro. It was me? Was it me who did that? Yeah, dude. You know what? Listen, I'll tell you something right now.

47:05Adam Schafer:Having natural sales skills can sometimes be used. because Adam's done this a couple times where he gets an impulsive itch and he makes us jump on. Like, what was that? We're going to be pipe smokers now. Well, there wasn't, right? When we first moved into this,

47:19Sal Di Stefano:there was a smoke shot. I like that phase we were in, dude. It lasted like three days. We were cool. We did it for a while. You know what it was? It was also back in the day when the business was still early years and we didn't have a bunch of good friends. We had like three times. Yeah, it was like four of us. It was four of us. We had to record a couple episodes and we were done. We did it in here, dude. Yeah, yeah, dude. We were smoking tobacco.

47:41Adam Schafer:What's wrong with the not to fire code? We're a fitness talk podcast.

47:44Sal Di Stefano:Oh, God. Because the store was there. It must have just been around the time, too, when I was into that. I was probably personally into it. And then I brought you in. And I think everybody was like, oh, yeah, I wanted a pipe. It wasn't hard to convince you guys. I got into cigars right after that. And yeah, so I was like, I could probably get back into that down the road.

48:01Adam Schafer:Dude, I got to share with you guys a peptide that I got from our partners at MP Hormones. So you can take it orally. I think I told you guys about it. What's it for? So it's called 5-amino-1-MQ. And what it does is it inhibits an enzyme that breaks down NAD in the cells. So in other words, you take it and you get more NAD in the cells naturally. And it also encourages like thermogenesis. Okay. So they could take white fat, for example, and make it act more like brown fat. Yeah. With more of a thermogenic effect. Anyway, they're capsules. So you don't have to inject it. They're capsules. the dose is between 50 to some people will take as much as 200 milligrams so i started at the 50 and i noticed like a little bit more energy or whatever and so i started scaling up just to see today i used 150 milligrams before my workout and and it does boost uh metabolic rate right so i took it bro i was sweating that's how you always know something like that no like really like sweating sweating like a lot and my body was hot and warm i'm like whoa not it It wasn't uncomfortable.

49:07Adam Schafer:It was just noticeable. So like, and so people take it for energy, but people also take it for fat loss. And I can see why. I bet you, I bet you it would probably increase my caloric expenditure by a hundred or 200. Well, there's something about that. It doesn't sound like a lot, but that's like, that's like 20, 30 minutes of cardio.

49:25Sal Di Stefano:There's something about that breaking the sweat earlier too. Like that once you break your sweat in anything, you know, whether you're doing like a run cardio wise or training, it's like, I feel like there's like a switch that happens where you're all of a sudden like I'm into the workout now. Getting to the sweat sometimes is a little bit of effort and work and you're dragging your feet together and then you break that sweat and then it's like, okay, now I'm in my flow. But I could see like,

49:45Adam Schafer:you know, because there's always, there's always the promise of like fat burning supplements, right? It makes your body burn more calories. Really one of the only ways to really do that with something is to increase energy expenditure and naturally. And when that happens, it has to get released somewhere. And so the way it would get released is through heat. And there's a lot of thermogenic supplements that supposedly do this, but they really don't do much, if anything. They might be stimulant. They give you a little bit of an energy boost, but you're not going to like, man, I'm telling you. Yeah.

50:12Adam Schafer:This was like - Make your heart pump a little harder. It was just, I was just sweating. Yeah. I could definitely tell it was doing something. So I'm going to look up some more studies on it. But if I had to estimate, I would estimate based on how I felt. Like it was probably 100 more calories just from sitting there. Oh, you should try it.

50:31Sal Di Stefano:You should track and see what it is.

50:32Adam Schafer:I'm going to track. I am. I'm going to track and see what that is.

50:34Sal Di Stefano:Are you guys' kids back in school? Did Brie go back? Yeah, Brie heads back on Wednesday. Your son go back? No, not yet. But she doesn't start for two to three weeks after. Oh, she just goes back early? Yeah. Dude, I got something for you guys, since you guys have the college students. New degree, did you see it? What is it? Have you heard about it? What is it? It was AI? Influencer. Oh, Influencer. It's a degree? No, it's not, dude. Yes, colleges are - Yeah, look up the college, that first one. I want to say it was Arizona. Oh, don't get that degree. Face palm. Please don't get that degree. Bro, it's going to sweep the nation.

51:03Sal Di Stefano:What a waste of money. It'll sweep the nation.

51:06Adam Schafer:You know what, though? We might be able to get honorary degrees. Well, I guess. Finally. Hey, bro, that would be hella funny. I want to get a master's.

51:12Sal Di Stefano:We'll be doctors. Yeah, it's at ASU. ASU. I see. I thought it was. I thought it was Arizona. Here's the thing about colleges is that they're going to capitalize on anything they can. Oh, yeah. Whether it's a worthless degree or not. Hey, let's be honest. There's more worthless degrees than influencer degrees. Yes. Yeah. I would agree with that. Yeah, 100%. There's people that make legitimate money doing influencers. I mean, so that's, I mean, wild. But what's cool, everybody's like, Q's dropping. They're going to have to come up with a lot more options. Tell me this is not going to be one of the hottest degrees.

51:37Sal Di Stefano:I mean. Tell me. What are the stats on kids already that want to be, when you ask them what they want to be when they grow up, what do they say, a YouTuber? Yeah. That's like 60 % or more or something like that? Sure. This is going to be one of the hottest degrees at colleges. Oh, God.

51:50Adam Schafer:Can you believe that? I know. I can't. Wow. Graduates are prepared for careers as content strategists, digital marketers, and podcasters. Adam, I'm telling you, you and I might be able to get an honorary degree, dude. We should contact him. You guys should be guessing. You got the end over there. Why don't you reach out to him and offer a call. Say, Adam is going to teach a core degree.

52:08Sal Di Stefano:Hey, actually, it's not a bad idea for us to potentially put our name in the hat to go talk over there. Yeah, I think that's a good idea. I mean, have an opportunity even just for the podcast reasons. My guess is a lot of these professors who are teaching this really have no real experience. No, just like all my business professors. What's new? I mean, no, I'm serious because. Well, it's all theory. I remember taking a sales class at university. Yeah, a guy never sold anything. He never sold a thing. Or a business course from a guy who never started a business. Yeah, he was teaching you all these alternative advanced clothes.

52:39And I asked the guy, I said, what kind of sales experience do you have? He goes, well, I've actually never sold anything.

52:47Adam Schafer:Just widgets, you know, theoretically. Wow. Isn't that crazy, though? Yeah. Influencer degree. Speaking of education and stuff, did you guys see what they did in California? Did you see? You should know this because you're kids. What? 12-year-old thing?

53:02Sal Di Stefano:Bro, such bullshit.

53:03Adam Schafer:You cannot get access to your kids' medical records without their permission anymore after the age of 12. Your kids can lock you out of their medical records. Not only do they lock you out,

53:13Sal Di Stefano:they automatically do. He has to get a written letter from your kid. You have to ask your 13-year-old for a permission slip. How crazy is that? Isn't that insane? When are we going to start strangling people? They automatically get the legal right. You have to go get them to write a legal permission so that your parent can see their -

53:34Adam Schafer:This is insane. The state owns your kid, not the parents.

53:39Sal Di Stefano:No, not okay.

53:39Adam Schafer:This is the most insane thing I've ever heard, ever. So now your kid can literally be like, no, mom and dad, you can't see my medical records. That's preposterous. Okay. And what are you going to do, ground them? Yeah. What do you think they'll do? Well, I'll tell. I'll tell the - This is just in California? California. Of course. This is crazy. Isn't that wild? I saw the same thing too. That's horrible.

54:00Sal Di Stefano:I was like, get out of here with that, dude.

54:02Adam Schafer:They can sign a form. They have to sign a release. I'm just saying.

54:04Sal Di Stefano:It automatically goes to the kid. This thing is so corrupt. The kid has to sign a release for the parents. So the kid has to ask them to please let my parents have access to it.

54:14Adam Schafer:This includes mental health counseling, substance abuse treatment, and sexual health care. the the things that are most important that the parent is involved in right that's more important than anything no that if my kid has to get some kind of substance abuse treatment that they're doing some kind of sexual health my 13 year old has an std locked out i can't know what a crazy world yeah crazy down yeah upside down oh yeah how did we who voted for that that's why i don't think anybody did dude nobody no man no nobody's voting for any of this stuff they're just doing it California is just crazy.

54:48Sal Di Stefano:You want to talk about more crazy California stuff. So I'm up in Sausalito heading up to Tiburon, right? This last weekend. Swear to God. Okay. I've talked about this before. When I remember the first time, I remember on the podcast, I talked about this way back when here in the Bay Area, how you'd seen homeless people with like cell phones and stuff like that. Just like, this is so weird. You have like an iPhone and you're, you know, had a sign for money. Dude had a QR code. I've seen that before. It was this big, and no sign. Resourceful. Just holding a giant QR code that I could hit from driving in traffic.

55:24Sal Di Stefano:Wow. Is that wild? Yeah.

55:26Adam Schafer:That's cool.

55:27Sal Di Stefano:By the way, if you have a QR code, it means you have to have a link to go to a phone, which has a link to go to an account, which is like. It's a whole economy. Isn't that crazy? I know. It's wild. That's wild to me.

55:37Adam Schafer:I wonder if they have to pay taxes on that. That's like stripper ideas. It's California. They'll come get you. That's it. Yeah. I don't care if you're homeless. Here's my wish list on Amazon. I used to, you've seen that.

55:49Sal Di Stefano:I have never seen that. You haven't seen it before. Oh, I never go over there either. So that's the first time I've been, I've been.

55:54Adam Schafer:I mean, you know, someone can have a cell phone and all that stuff and still, you know, struggle and, you know, need help. I get all that. Like food or something like, you know, but that's ridiculous. I don't know. Well, what's crazy to me is that they're gonna have to pay taxes on that, which will really be hilarious. You see, they're gonna be. They're not gonna have to pay taxes. Why not? Because they don't make enough money. Oh. You see, people who don't make a lot of money don't pay taxes. Oh, okay. All right, that's true.

56:18Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, you'd have to be getting, what, over 30 or 50? What's considered? Yeah, I'm not sure with all the standard deductions and everything, but you'd have to be making at least$15 ,000. Yeah, but to Sal's point, though, he'd have to file. That's it. So, yeah, as soon as you're over 10 grand, you've got to file. Now, if you are under 35 or somewhere in California, you won't pay any taxes, but you got to, you got to file. Yeah. So if you have a QR code, obviously you have a bank account. That's right. Right. The bank account will see all this money coming in. Yeah. And that would be considered, you know, income.

56:55Yeah. So I would think so if, if the state is able to track that, which I'm sure they probably are. I think so too. Coming soon.

57:02Sal Di Stefano:Now, mind you, I don't think they go bug 30, the, probably the paperwork and, and when everything's digital,

57:07Adam Schafer:it'll be easy. Have you looked, have you looked how much a skid rose grown? Yeah. Like neighborhoods and neighborhoods. It's like a mini city. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But what I'm getting at there is just there's a whole economy to this. Yep. So it's like, you know, it's different than what people realize. It's not just like a need. It's like this is a whole, like we're inviting a lot of like incentives here.

57:33Sal Di Stefano:Yep. Wow, 23 % in a single year? It surged. Almost a quarter? Yeah. It's insane. And it's not shrinking.

57:41Adam Schafer:No. And there's a lot of money. This is going to sound terrible, but it's true. There's a lot of political money in, quote unquote, helping the homeless. Billions of dollars in public funding. So the question is, where is that money? Where did it go? Look up the audits. They don't exist. They can't show where it went. It's a massive void. They went to the same place that the rail system went to. Oh, wow. Same, yes.

58:08Sal Di Stefano:So how many tens of thousands of people is that now? Good question. It's got to be up.

58:14Adam Schafer:You could just look up how many homeless people in Los Angeles. It's as much as a city. I thought I saw this. It's its own city now. And they have their own structure. Yeah. So it's a 50-block area, and it's 3 ,800 to 4 ,500 people.

58:27Sal Di Stefano:A total neighborhood population. 9 ,000 to 15 ,000. It's literally like Mad Max status now.

58:32Adam Schafer:Yeah, but total, total, if you put homeless population of LA, so and Thank you. It's a big number. Our homeless population of California is a massive, massive number. Yeah, it's crazy. They actually show, I follow this one guy who's like, he posts up like this is, you know, he shows like examples of where we spent money. Whole city itself, 45 ,000 people. 45 ,000 homeless people in Los Angeles alone. There's companies now advertising on tents. On tents? On tents.

59:01Sal Di Stefano:Do you remember what I'm saying? There's an economy behind this. Do you remember early Pine Pump, like the first few years that I talked about signs? I talked about that being a business where it's like you got these guys that are always up and down on the streets. They're holding signs anyways. They need to make money. Why wouldn't you not as a business go like, hey, I'll pay you like a rate. Remember when we were going to, I told you we were going to do that back in the days with Mind Pump. Yeah, but then we were like, ah, that's probably not a good idea. That's why we didn't do it. I'm pretty sure Doug shut it down.

59:24Sal Di Stefano:Doug's like, it's probably not a good idea. It's not a good look. Yeah, it's not a good look. I thought it was like.

59:30Adam Schafer:But now companies are doing that. 182 ,000? In California. Yeah. Yeah. You know, what people need to realize is this, is that if there is a, if there's a way for, for politicians to bring in money that sounds virtuous or is easy to make people, convince people of. So in other words, if it's like a scary thing or, Hey, this is to help Trojan horse. This is to help this thing. And everybody's like, we should help this situation. There's people in need and then they just steal from them. It's an easy way to manipulate people. And that's exactly what they did. California alone has billions of dollars for this.

1:00:08Adam Schafer:And it gets worse. It pisses me off.

1:00:10Sal Di Stefano:It's theft. It's really bad. The annual dollar amount per homeless person was that we spent.

1:00:15Adam Schafer:Well, you know there's private companies that have tried to build mini homes for them, have tried to do that, and the state shuts them down. Yeah. They said, no, you can't do that. We have to do it. Yeah, because they need to prove that they're doing something with the money, which, you know.

1:00:27Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, what's 1.5 billion divided, or no, the direct massive amount of it towards crisis.

1:00:34Adam Schafer:So$37 billion towards housing and homelessness since 2019. Oh, since 2019. Yeah.

1:00:40Sal Di Stefano:But divide that by, what was it,$140 ,000 or whatever the number was. What is that per person? It's like six figures. It's like six figures per person.

1:00:47Adam Schafer:It's wild.

1:00:48Sal Di Stefano:It's like, how did we fail that miserably? Because you could have put that person in.

1:00:53Adam Schafer:Because you as a good taxpayer say, yes, I want more help here. but you don't see what it does, where it goes, how it's working.

1:00:59Sal Di Stefano:Of course.

1:00:59Adam Schafer:Meanwhile, the problem gets bigger. And so this is the perfect situation for a politician. How much? Like eight grand a person. Yeah. Per year, if they're spending$1.5 billion. Well, anyway, my point is, my point is, if a politician, this is why it's so perfect. It's a virtuous issue. People are like, we need to fix this. The problem gets worse. Politician comes back and says, you guys, we need more money. Yeah, it's just more. And it just, the never ends. Need is just more money. And if you oppose it, if you're a politician that says, hey, we're going to cut this homeless fund in half. Oh, if there's accountability, we're going to - So you're right, Adam,$42 ,000 per person.

1:01:37Annually. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah. Wow. Anyways, sorry to take us down this road. Thanks, Justin. It just makes me so -

1:01:48Sal Di Stefano:Well, I mean, I'm guilty too for bringing it up first. I brought up the QR code that I just was just never seen. I've never seen that before. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I remember bringing it up on the podcast when I'd seen the first, like, iPhone person.

1:01:59Adam Schafer:But do you think that the average homeless person is seeing$42 ,000 a year?

1:02:03Sal Di Stefano:No, that's my point. My point is, if they did, I mean, imagine what you can do for somebody. That's a life-changing amount for someone to make$0. Yep. Yeah. Sure.

1:02:14Adam Schafer:You know how seriously we take gut health? Well, we've devoted countless episodes to the probiotic, and the best one we've found by far is Seed. Seed's Daily Symbiotic. It combines 24 clinically validated probiotic strains with a prebiotic that comes in a patented capsule that survives digestion. It delivers the live probiotics all the way to the colon. Most probiotics never even make it there. Seed is totally different. It's beyond digestion. It supports things like gut barrier integrity, skin health, heart health, micronutrient synthesis, the crosstalk between your gut and your immune cells.

1:02:52Adam Schafer:By the way, studies show probiotics help with things like anxiety. They help with recovery, muscle gain, fat loss. I'm telling you, probiotics are worth the money, but don't just go with any of them. Go with Seed. They're the world's best. Go to seed.com slash mind pump. Use the code two five mind pump and get 25 % off. Back to the show. Our next caller is Lori from Ontario. Hi, Lori. Hi, guys. It's great to be back. I called in about a year ago when I was around eight months postpartum with my first son and now I'm about 12 weeks postpartum with my second. Awesome, welcome back, congratulations.

1:03:28Adam Schafer:How are we doing? Thank you. So before we get into my question, I just want to say thank you to you guys again. I've been listening now for over three years and your podcast and the MAPS programs had a huge impact on my approach to pregnancy and postpartum both times. My fitness journey goes back to 2013, which includes a history of overtraining, under eating, and just doing all the wrong things. But because of what I learned from you guys, I went into both pregnancies focused on fueling my body, staying active and trusting the process, and not letting fear of weight gain and losing progress affect me so much.

1:04:04And that shift in mindset really made a huge difference. So thank you for all of that.

1:04:07Adam Schafer:Awesome. How can we help you? So I've updated my question a little bit, just because I submitted it over a month ago, but currently 12 weeks postpartum, I'm breastfeeding and getting about five to seven hours of broken sleep each night. It varies a bit from one day to the next. As I mentioned, this was my second pregnancy, both were healthy overall. And I trained from start to finish in both pregnancies up until the day before I delivered. I did MAPS programming completely through both of them. After my first pregnancy, I did MAPS starter completely and then ran MAPS 15 programs up until I got pregnant again.

1:04:43And then after my second baby, I began MAPS starter again a few days postpartum. But after about five weeks, I was starting to feel that urge to do a little bit more, even though I know you guys are always cautioning against that. But also was really drawn back to the 15 minute per day format, just because it works so well for me. So I did switch into MAPS 15 performance. um, just training very conservatively in phase one. But when I got into phase two, when I submitted my question, um, I was feeling actually really good and starting to progress the weights a little bit. Um, despite the inconsistent sleep, I was, you know, getting a little bit of muscle soreness, but nothing that made me feel like I was overdoing it.

1:05:27Um, I'm currently in phase three and have continued to be able to increase weights where I feel able and I'm continuing to recover pretty well. Um, I've also been doing some pelvic floor and core recovery work throughout the day. When I have time, I'm getting 8 ,000 steps a day, um, eating 25 to 2 ,600 calories a day and I'm exclusively breastfeeding, but honestly, some days still feel like I could eat more. Um, the breastfeeding hunger is not something people talk about enough. Um, so I started this pregnancy around 152 pounds delivered around 167 and then back down to like 155 right now. Weight loss isn't my goal.

1:06:04Um, it's just kind of happening. Um, and I just trust that my body composition will continue to improve. Um, as I gain strength as any woman does, I would like to see some development in my legs, glutes and shoulders. Um, but I know that will come from just getting stronger. Um, my main goal right now is just that like to get really, really strong. As a mom of two boys, I want to be as strong and capable as possible and showing them from a young age that exercise and lifting weights and taking care of your body is just a normal part of life. So with my question being, you know, given the broken sleep from having a newborn, you know, I have been feeling good.

1:06:41Is it realistic to keep trying to progressively build strength right now? Or should I really just be focusing on consistency and letting strength come as sleep improves. And then as I mentioned, I am still feeling hungry a lot of the time, even though, you know, I am eating quite a lot. So I'm just wondering if I should consider increasing calories or continue just, you know, kind of eating based on appetite. I know from what I've learned from you guys, how much sleep plays on, you know, cravings and things I've been eating really well. You know, I give into my cravings from time to time, obviously, but, you know, I'm really tracking to make sure I'm eating enough, but also being mindful not to

1:07:18Sal Di Stefano:overdo it so what's a what's a what's a lot of calorie what are you eating where you at calorie 25 to 2600 okay okay it's not too bad and like hitting protein every day like that's my number one if i hit protein if i get to the end of the day and i'm like hey i've got you know 400 calories left i might eat some ice cream because that's my weakness yeah yeah i think you're doing great

1:07:37Adam Schafer:yeah i think stay the course i wouldn't change anything at all and the way i would approach progress is like this. Because the sleep is still pretty broken, I would approach it like this. Consistency, technique, feel good. When the strength comes, it's a welcome surprise. So I wouldn't chase the strength, but when it comes, it's like, this is awesome. The fact that you're getting stronger and that you feel good and that you're eating 2 ,500 calories and your body weight is down to, you know, kind of where you were pre-pregnancy is phenomenal. That's really a testament to your health. And so I would just stay the core.

1:08:19Adam Schafer:I wouldn't change anything. I wouldn't change. The fact that you're getting stronger now is telling me you're doing a great job. The only mistake you could potentially make, Laurie, is to try to push it. Yeah, do too much. You got to make it happen faster would be the mistake. But right now you seem to be in a good balance. You feel good. It doesn't sound like you're feeling burnt out. Strength's coming. And your appetite is up and your body weight is good, which is actually a good sign. You're eating your protein targets. You're eating mostly whole foods, right? I am actually. So that was one thing that I thought about a few weeks ago.

1:08:51Just because of timing, I was often having a protein shake for lunch and then finding in the afternoon I was really hungry. But then thinking about, you know, everything I've learned from you guys, I'm like, hey, I really need to try to get that from even if it's cold chicken out of the fridge and even just making that switch to prioritizing whole food for that lunch meal. even if I have to eat a little later, um, that has made a difference and making me feel fuller longer and not having cravings as much too, without the shake all the time.

1:09:17Adam Schafer:No, you're great. You're totally great. And if you're hungry by the end of the day, I would stick to another whole, whole, a whole food, uh, meal.

1:09:23Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Where were you, Laura, you know, where your calories were like pre-pregnancy? Oh, like the most I've done on like a regular basis was like 2200. Oh wow. You're doing good though. Yeah. Yeah. You're doing great. Yeah. I've always been scared to increase, but then, you know, going into, I didn't breastfeed much with my first son. I didn't get really great milk production, but this time has been a lot better. So I was not prepared for how hungry I would be. So I just kind of was slowly increasing and I was continuing to feel good. I I'm pretty mindful not to use the scale too much because I've had a bad history with the scale in the past.

1:09:55So I, I use it mostly for data if I'm in a good mood day that I know it won't affect me. But yeah, I just, I really have been trying to be cautious of not overeating and just like, worried that I was maybe just more hungry because I'm not sleeping well. Like the sleep isn't always good.

1:10:12Adam Schafer:I wouldn't worry too much about that, Lori. If you're, if you're sticking to whole natural foods and you're hungry and you're in your strength training, I would eat. I would eat when I was hungry. Um, are you drinking enough water? You mentioned the, you know, milk production. I drink a lot of water. Good. And then do you add electrolytes? Like that makes a difference for some women with, uh, with breastfeeding, they'll throw some element in there. I have been. Yeah. so element i in canada elements really expensive here in canada um otherwise i totally would um especially because like i know they have the ready to drink ones but i do um often get like the redmond relight because i can get it on amazon and it's like 800 milligrams of sodium i think because i have low blood pressure so that's why i like oh yeah oh yeah it's great and helpful laura you're kicking butt yeah i'm doing great you're totally kicking butt when your sleep gets better i wouldn't add anything i would allow your strength to just climb and the fact that you're getting stronger now uh is such a good sign everything you're saying is good yeah there's like zero concerns or actually zero changes i wouldn't make any changes what you're doing well that's just a testament then to you guys because it's mostly everything i've learned from you guys so great great job yeah i wish i could give you some advice i know yeah yeah stay stay the course you're doing great how old are the boys right now you got you got one that's like one some one and a half or yeah so my first he'll be two in september i can't keep track of the months anymore because now i have the little so he'll be two in september and then my youngest is 12 weeks well you're gonna need all that strength and energy for a few years yeah keeping up with them is a lot but it's it's fun good for you doing great thanks laurie keep it

1:11:47Sal Di Stefano:okay thank you guys so much thank you that's great is the um are the estimates that they put out about breastfeeding accurate like eight to nine hundred calories more a day a woman burns when she's breastfeeding.

1:12:00Adam Schafer:You know, that's the estimate. I've read 600, I've read 500. It depends. I mean, it does make a difference. I've also read that it's overshot, but I think the way to gauge it, because so with, with Jessica, she had issues with producing enough milk. And so we kind of dived in deep and the way you judge it is, are you producing enough milk? And sometimes you got to increase your calories and your water. Yeah. And that makes a difference. So with Jessica, I remember with Dahlia, we really had her drink a lot more water, and it made a big difference.

1:12:35Sal Di Stefano:Well, that's a range and a half right there. So AI kicked off 300 to 700 calories. That's why I said so different. Yeah, yeah. I've heard of as high as 800, 900 calories before. But that's a huge difference.

1:12:45Adam Schafer:But I think sometimes it's -

1:12:46Sal Di Stefano:But even, I mean, that's a meal or two more for a small female. That's another - That's either one big more meal or two meals.

1:12:56Adam Schafer:Yeah, but the other thing to consider too, Adam, is like, let's say, we'll go right in the middle, say 500 calories, right? If someone's like, oh man, I'm breastfeeding, my metabolism's way faster, and they're not sticking to whole natural foods, you overshoot that. You could overshoot that. Super fast.

1:13:10Sal Di Stefano:Oh, well, you add that to, I mean, you know, great awareness on her part too, to know when you have poor sleep. So you got poor sleep, your metabolism is kicked up a little bit, and now you're craving like crazy. And so, yeah, no, I think that's where the eating for two thing came from. Our next caller is Natty from Georgia. Hi, Natty. Hi, Natty. Hi, guys. How are you guys doing? Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you, too. How can we help you?

1:13:37So I'm having a bit of issue. I'm just going to read my question, if that's okay. Yeah, for sure. I mean, my original email. All right, so my name is Natty, a.k.a. Nardya. Well, Nardya, a.k.a. Natty. Hi. I'm sorry. I'm a little nervous, guys. All good. I'm a 37-year-old female, 5 '5", currently at my heaviest around 224 pounds. My comfort spot was usually around 165 on 75 pounds. I work as a local Intermodo truck driver. I pretty much go in and out of the rail yards all day to and from customers. My schedule starts around 5 a.m. I usually work long days between 12 to 14 hours so the biggest battle I'm having is after a long day of work knowing trying to figure out if I should go to the gym to do a workout just go home and sleep or just try to recover eat, what to eat something like that so I've been inconsistent with training for about 2 years I started going back to the gym Around December of last year I was pretty consistent With the job that I had previously Just because I spent most of the day Sitting in a truck And not really moving around Unless I'm making an effort to move around I was working on a construction site So I couldn't really move around too much But now that I'm back doing like trucking, I'm in the truck most of the time, but I do get to hop out and move around.

1:15:24So like, uh, I sort of get 5 ,000 to 6 ,000 steps a day. Um, and so basically my inconsistency, uh, I'm sorry. Um, my main goals are fat loss, strength, uh, better energy, and to get back my life in order physically and mentally. I have ran MAPS programs before, Resistance and Anabolic and MAPS 15. I did do Anabolic twice. I do have other programs from you guys. At work now, I try to do a couple sets of squats and push-ups in between you know whenever I get in and out the truck just to get I guess trigger session I'm currently running anabolic now I'm starting on phase two this week and so my issue basically is I'm trying I overthink a lot I have like analysis paralysis and I having an issue with consistency with my schedule and my days and I have a really weird appetite sometimes I don't eat I don't have an appetite and sometimes I get cravings so like I'm all over the place and I just need to know like where do I start what to focus on at least for now between now and the end of the year I don't really have a end date or goal I just want to get back on track and get healthy pretty much.

1:17:09And I also wanted to know if GLP-1 is an option for me. What's my game?

1:17:15Adam Schafer:So Natty, just to paraphrase, it sounds like, and just correct me if I'm wrong, it sounds like the biggest challenge is consistency, and that's largely due with your schedule because your work schedule can be so difficult. Yes, consistency with training and nutrition is the biggest thing. And then just to add, what you said about your appetite is not weird. That's actually very common. Where someone's like, on the go, no appetite, no appetite. And then it kicks in, and then you're like, starving. Yes. Very common. There's nothing weird about that. Super, super common. Okay. Okay, so the number one thing that we need to consider, which is actually the number one thing we need to consider for most people, is consistency.

1:17:57Adam Schafer:It's not the perfect routine or the most effective routine. It's what am I going to be able to do reliably? Yes. Okay. So I'm going to throw a couple things at you, and you just be real honest with me. Okay. I know you start work early, and I know you get home 12 hours later or something like that. What is more realistic in terms of consistency for you? Would doing something short before you get to work be better for you or when you get home from work? After work. Okay. So we'll start with after work. I don't think a long MAPS anabolic style, you know, three days a week workout would work as well as a short MAPS 15 style workout.

1:18:45Adam Schafer:Two exercises. That's it. Get in, get out. After work, you go in and you have a, do you have a home gym or do you go to a gym? I have a home gym, a full home gym, barbells, squat rack, dumbbells and everything. But I do also have access to a gym. Like, sometimes I like to get out of the home environment because as soon as I get home, I just want to decompress. So, like, I don't want to go into the home gym. So, you got the option then. So, then you had the option. Which is great. I think MAPS 15, perfect. You get home from work, it's two exercises, you're done. And it's most days. This helps a lot with consistency, the daily frequency.

1:19:23Adam Schafer:Huge momentum builder, yeah. It builds a lot of momentum, and you're devoting about 20 minutes to 25 minutes.

1:19:26Sal Di Stefano:And I love you still going to the gym. I think that's great because I relate to that too. Like once I get home, I want to just settle down and relax. I don't want it. But just make that commitment to yourself is I'm going to go to the gym and do this. If I don't go to the gym, then I'm going to at least knock out my two exercises in the garage real quick or wherever you have your gym.

1:19:43Adam Schafer:It's literally two lifts. Yeah. But when you add it all up over time, you'll be far more consistent. It'll be more effective for you. You'll get better results doing that. Better results. So it's really, it's going to be like 20, 25 minutes. Okay. So my, like, yes, I agree because I listen to you guys' podcasts. I'm like your best friend that you never met. But my thing is I will do that for a while and then I will start to feel like, oh, my gosh, am I going to get to where I want to be doing this? Oh, yes, you are. Oh, yes. If you, listen, how do you walk a thousand miles, right? One step at a time.

1:20:25Adam Schafer:If you take a step every day, eventually you get to the end result. That's what happens with this. So what you need to press is not the result, but rather the way. Consistency. It means you can string together. That's it. You're pushing and pressing on what causes the result. The result will happen, guaranteed, if you're consistent. So your goal is, I'm going to do my two exercises and I'm done. Every day. It's going to be like five or six days a week, two exercises. You miss one, it's not a big deal. And I can stack that. My days are for back-to-back. It's Wednesday and Thursday, so I double up on those days and then the rest and break it down.

1:21:11Adam Schafer:Yeah, if you want to. If you want to. In my opinion, this may be different for you, but in my opinion, I think you're probably better off doing it on the days you work because it's a busy day anyway. weekend comes around that's your day off relax enjoy yourself on the weekends so or on the days off and then on your days off i'd rather you meal prep because that's the second part with nutrition yeah yeah with nutrition it's going to be all about meal prepping setting yourself up and and

1:21:40Sal Di Stefano:natty i want you to i want you to uh reframe the way you look at a missed workout because this is i think the part the mistake that people make is they they miss a workout and they beat themselves up and then they go, ah, man, I can never be, and it's like, we all miss. Yeah. So the way I want - I used to be like that. Yeah. Everyone is. I swear everyone's like this. And this has helped me, it's helped my clients out so much is I don't want you to look at a missed workout as like a failure. I want you to keep track of how many days you got in a row before that missed workout. And let's say that we - Okay.

1:22:12Sal Di Stefano:Tomorrow we start, right? Tomorrow's a new day. We start and you string three days in a row of getting those two lifts in and then you miss day four. You were just fucking tired. You couldn't get whatever. You came home. Don't beat yourself up. Go, man, I got three in a row. Tomorrow, I'm going to get back on the wagon again, and I'm going to get at least four days in a row. And compete with yourself because you're going to miss days. It happens to everybody. And what happens is people allow that day to spiral them out, and one day turns into two days, turns into three days, turns into a week they took off.

1:22:42Sal Di Stefano:So instead of looking at it like that, I want you to look at how many days did you string together in a row of consistency, and then the next day you get going again, that's your new goal. Can I get four days? And then if you – you know what I'm saying? And just keep stacking on that. And when we look back six months from now, you'll have completed way more workouts than you've missed and you'll also have a different attitude. That helps. Between that and then the meal prep on your days off, I think, is the recipe for us.

1:23:08Adam Schafer:The workouts, if you just do that, that's going to be the easy part. I promise you. You just do your two lifts. So how do – what do I do as far as the nutrition though? Because I know you said the meal prep. So my thing with that is I have no problem meal prepping. I have no problem eating the same thing every day. But I get to a point where I get stuck and then I don't want to eat the meal prep. Or maybe my appetite is just real bad that day. I'm not really hungry and I just don't eat.

1:23:41Sal Di Stefano:So I like having certain meals and shakes for things like that. Okay, so what it would look like is, if you like ground beef, chicken, you like all the things, if you like that. Bulk rice, bulk chicken, or ground beef are the easy go-to anchor meals. And so you've got six or eight of those that you got in your refrigerator already, and then you can bring some to work. And then I love things that are like high-protein Greek yogurt, ready-to-drink protein shakes. And your job is to try and be consistent with your eating. When you don't have the appetite, and you're like, man, a full six ounces of ground beef and rice just sounds like so much right now.

1:24:16Sal Di Stefano:liquid option have have that shake have that shake okay or have that greek yogurt so you do the quick the quick easy thing like you know those little i don't know if you ever seen those little oikos uh greek yogurts yeah i actually drink the chobani yes yes i've seen drink yeah that's what i drink that every morning yeah you have you have two or three things like that or even like uh our paleo valley beef jerky you've got a handful of these like high protein snacks the goal is to eat a meal but every couple hours two to three hours but if you're like man i'm not even hungry right I should at least get those three pieces of beef jerky in, or I'm at least get that Oak Loose, or at least going to get that Chobani.

1:24:50Sal Di Stefano:Do that so you stay consistent. Because what will happen is, and this happens to so many clients, is they get busy, they're not hungry, they don't eat for six, seven hours, and then they're fucking starving. And then the cravings come in, and then it's really hard to make that decision, oh, I'm going to go heat up that boring ground beef and rice. I'd much rather drive through and grab that thing that sounds way more palatable. but if you keep feeding yourself every two, three hours even if it's small, it'll help out

1:25:16Adam Schafer:so the name of the game for someone like you and again, this is very common is to eat on a schedule so when you're not hungry, have something otherwise you're setting yourself up so basically, just force myself to get the protein that's right, that's right

1:25:31Sal Di Stefano:and get those easy drink ones like you said, I love that I love that as an option when you don't feel like the meal

1:25:38Adam Schafer:because here's what can happen sometimes Sometimes, Natty, and I don't know if this happens to you, but I would have clients that would be like, yeah, but I'm trying to lose weight. So when I'm not hungry, I'd rather not eat. And I'm like, well, what happens later? Yeah, I'm starving. That's right. But I just grab something. So you got to eat on a schedule. Decisions are worse. So you just make it happen. Like, okay, can I eat my meal? I'm not going to be able to do it. Can I eat half of it? Yes. Or let me try one of those easier to down shakes or whatever. And you just eat on a schedule. And that'll keep you very consistent.

1:26:09Sal Di Stefano:If we just focus on those two things that we talked about right now, we're going to get a long way just from that. Just trying to out-compete your days that you missed, keep getting better, and then the protein meal is ready for you. So how long should I sit in that MAPS 15? MAPS 15, I actually just got the MAPS 15 mommy and I think MAPS 15 performance. Like what should my training schedule look like? Those two. Yeah, start muscle mommy.

1:26:36Adam Schafer:All the MAPS 15 protocols, as long as your schedule remains the way it is, that's how you're going to work out. Okay, so just stay in the MAPS 15. Stay in the MAPS 15 right now. That's so good for you. Forever. Unless your schedule changes and you get whatever, but you just stay in those. Okay. You can go 15 muscle mommy, 15 performance. More options. 15 power lift, you know, the original 15. You just follow one after another. Okay, I never thought to stay in those. Like I always wanted to like go back to doing a regular.

1:27:03Sal Di Stefano:No. Nope. No, you don't. This is way better for your schedule. The best and see is the biggest thing.

1:27:07Adam Schafer:This will really help. You'll get the best results this way. Okay. I feel a little better now. Just stick with it. Yes. I'm going to send you another 15. I'm going to give you something for free. I overthink. Yeah, yeah. Don't take on too much. Just do the simple things. Yes. Natty, I'm going to send you another 15 program just so you have a free one. So you could go one. You got 15 Muscle Mommy. Do 15 Performance. And then which one should we give her next? 15 Symmetry? Yeah. Let's go 15 Symmetry. So you got one, two, three. Yeah. That'll give you nine months of workout program.

1:27:37Sal Di Stefano:Natty, are you on Facebook? Do you use Facebook at all? I am. I'm in you guys' – I'm not on Facebook, but I am in you guys' forum. Okay, well, use that to check in with us, okay? So as you go through this process, if you start overthinking it and doing that to yourself, reach out to us. Let us know where you're at, what you're going on, and let us help you through this process. But if you just focus on those things that we're talking about right now, I think in 60 days you're going to be feeling totally different. Mm-hmm. Okay, how do you guys feel about GLP-1? Not yet. You know. I think you can get a lot further right now.

1:28:12Sal Di Stefano:Here's why. Here's also why I wouldn't recommend it by the way. I don't know where your calories are at, and if you're at a place where you're already kind of lower, on the lower calorie range, I wouldn't want that. And you're already somebody who's admitted you go long times without eating. That'll make you never want to eat. Yeah, I'll tell you what, Natty. But then there's days where I know for sure I'm, like, high on calories. That's the thing. Like with everything that I'm consuming for the week, I know I'm over calories. And I only mentioned that because last year around August, September, I was in a pre-diabetic stage.

1:28:45Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. And I did get my numbers down like six months for my six-month follow-up. I haven't been to check. I'm going next week for, you know, a new checkup and blood work and stuff. So that's one of the things that I wanted to mention or talk to my doctor.

1:28:59Adam Schafer:Listen, I don't have an issue with the GLP-1. If you do what we say, you're going to do just fine. But I want you to promise me that. So stay off of it for now. Listen, if you do a GLP-1, I want you to call back and work with one of my coaches. Do not do a GLP-1 without a coach.

1:29:13Sal Di Stefano:I mean, I was going to tell you to do that. Before you even do a GLP-1, I'd say consider having one of our coaches take you through this process and really dial you in on the nutrition side before we go that route. Because if a client's going to do a GLP-1, I like to know where their calories at first before we do that. because if I slam your appetite all the way down and you're somebody, and even if you overeat on certain days, if you're already a person who goes a long time not eating, that's like a recipe for someone who just doesn't eat anymore. And you'll lose weight, but you'll lose a ton of muscle.

1:29:42It's my cravings that I really want to get rid of because I have bad cravings for certain things. Protein will help a lot with that.

1:29:47Sal Di Stefano:I think if we really drill down the, like eating even when you're not hungry, this is what, here's the, I would be even more specific for you. The goal is to eat every, about every three hours. Do not let more than four hours go by.

1:30:00Adam Schafer:That'll solve it. Okay? That'll solve it. And just a snack, protein, drink. A high-protein snack. A high-protein snack. Yes, a high-protein snack.

1:30:09Sal Di Stefano:And do not let four hours go by. Three is the goal. Try and eat every three hours. Something that's got 20 to 30 grams of protein at least in it. Okay? But do not let four hours go by. Because once that fifth hour and sixth hour hits, that's when that craving's happening to you. So really make those two things a goal. One more question, if you don't mind. Do you think that would help with my energy? I know sleep has a lot to do with it, but I feel tired during a certain point of the day. I only have one cup of coffee in the morning around 6, 7. But I don't know. I feel drained.

1:30:50Adam Schafer:Yeah. If you do what we say with the nutrition and the Mass 15, I think by week two, you'll notice a significant amount. significant improvement in energy. I think you'll notice a big difference. Yes. Within two weeks. Yeah, yeah. All right. You got it.

1:31:05Sal Di Stefano:We got this. I just got to trust the process. That's right. You got us too, okay? Reach out. You start overthinking it. That's it. All right. Thank you guys so much. I appreciate it. Thanks, Natty. All right, Natty.

1:31:14Adam Schafer:You got this. I'm going to say this just for anybody listening. I don't like anybody using a GLP without a coach.

1:31:21Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

1:31:21Adam Schafer:Yeah. You get a GLP one? Totally agree. Work with a coach.

1:31:24Sal Di Stefano:Well, especially if you have eating habits like that. because she's already got the habit where she can go six to probably eight hours and not eat and then she then she knows she recognizes she binges on something you give someone that glp1 who already is used to not eating didn't eat just not eat yeah there's not eat for the full day going yeah and so i i would want to coach her first on having regular meal times and then if she's still like if i got her eating like we just the goal is right now and then uh we're coaching i'm coaching her six months later she's like man adam i still keep fucking up i still keep drilling that ice cream at 10 o 'clock at night or what she says something like that then i'm like okay well this might be an option for doing glp ones now that we've built this consistency around meal times and eating but giving someone like that a glp one right out the gates when they're already a huge meal skipper and 40 so lose 30 to 5 to 40 percent of the weight will be muscle mass

1:32:14Adam Schafer:she'll have less energy she has 800 calories a day she has to work 12 hours a day feel terrible yeah no terrible idea our next caller is jason from missouri jason you made it going on jason Finally. What's going on, man? Us old people don't do this well. How can we help you, dude? Oh, man, I was looking at you. I just happened to stumble across you guys probably maybe two months ago, maybe a month and a half ago. Oh, wow. I was interested in a program, but didn't know which one to pick. Back in 05 and 08, through 08, I worked out every day, six days a week, and running three miles a day, lifted all six days.

1:33:00And I loved it. I loved the way it made me feel and look. But it became a second job. I couldn't keep it up with three kids and a job and a wife. And as you know, but I quit doing it. And then it got worse, of course. Everything goes downhill. I'm a pretty active person I work outside a lot but then I stumbled across you guys your podcast and started listening and what not but I don't understand the programs that well how to make it functional for me I guess I just recently bought a big old set of dumbbells and a functional trainer, rogue functional trainer. And it's been going good. But I walk, I get about probably average 15 ,000 steps a day plus what I get at work.

1:34:07And I've been lifting every day in some way or another. I just recently had a setback, but just an injury, but it's no big deal. It's going to heal itself. I walk six miles a day, roughly, anywhere from four to six miles on the road, outside, trying to get some sun, some time outside, fresh air. I've done a lot since February. I've probably lost close to 40 pounds since February. Oh, wow. um i started me my wife both started talking to a functional health uh people got it with the doctor they prescribed i did a lot of blood tests and did a gut test a genetic test they started me on TRT which I just turned 50 in May and started TRT glutathione injections as well as retitrutide so it's all up and up I guess not really the retitrutide I was a little concerned with but it's a 503A FDA regulated pharmacy compound pharmacy that I get it from so and it's all prescribed by a doctor they're monitoring I do blood samples every so often which is good but I didn't know what program would be the best for someone that's really active I guess

1:35:51Sal Di Stefano:yeah okay where would you say because you are very active you're very active and on TRT and doing a lot. Curious to where your calories have been. I've been tracking for the past month or so. It's put me at 2709, if that helps, but I don't get it all the time. I probably, I mean, yesterday I went over by 300, so, which was, I felt good this morning on my walk. Yeah, that's not, that's not, I'm actually glad to hear that. I was more concerned you'd be too low. So 2 ,700, you were over 300 calories, you said yesterday. So 2 ,700 to 3 ,000 is a better answer than what some people who are on that will tell me.

1:36:37Sal Di Stefano:So that's a good sign. It's not a bad thing. I sat back to Retta. They wanted me to up it, you know, every incrementally. We just steadily increased it. But it was after like every four weeks, it went up a little bit. I was reluctant to go up because the appetite suppressant is really what they were after. um i i still am i'm hungry in the evenings i i want to you know raid the cabinets but um not really that bad it's not i'm not fighting it but i'm i'm low i'm i still haven't got my 2700 calories like most days i'm probably 200 short so i try to get it anyway but i do get all the protein i'm putting in 200 grams of protein a day minimum well good jason how tall are you how much you weigh i'm six two almost six three i guess uh right now this morning i weighed 222 okay

1:37:37Adam Schafer:okay and you want i'm reading your email it says your main goals are to get a little leaner and increase flexibility to keep you in shape in shape for work tasks so you're looking for like Like good movement, mobility. I need to be strong. Really strong is my biggest focus. Flexibility with work is a highlight too. I'm a journeyman lineman and climbing poles. Pulling, tugging, shoulders and back. Yeah. And all that is a daily struggle sometimes.

1:38:16Sal Di Stefano:It's got to feel good though. Climbing poles, 40 pounds lighter, huh? no crap dude i'm oh i could imagine i climbed on the other day and my belt probably weighs 80 pounds and everybody complains about my belt because it's i got a big back saver belt but it's comfortable when you're in the air i don't care how much it weighs um my legs take care of that it's not that

1:38:38Adam Schafer:big a deal uh well i got i got the program for you jason and i and i think in combination with what I'm going to recommend to you, I think you'd be better off aiming for closer to 3 ,000 calories a day. With the level of activity that you have and the size that you are, if you go too low on calories, you're going to compromise muscle, which will make the fat loss difficult. In fact, I think you'd be better off consistently eating about 3 ,000 calories. Agreed. Following MAPS performance. That's the program I'm going to put you on because it comes with, it's three workouts a week, plus on the other days are what are called mobility sessions, which you're going to love.

1:39:20Adam Schafer:The mobility sessions will be really good for shoulder mobility, spinal mobility, hip mobility, just to keep you functional. And I wouldn't do anything else. That's it, 3 ,000 calories a day, follow MAPS performance, and what will happen is you'll, over time, get leaner and build strength and muscle.

1:39:38Sal Di Stefano:That's what I need. I mean, Jason, one of the beauties of being older and being on TRT is it keeps your testosterone levels at peak all the time, meaning your body is primed to build muscle all the time. And if you're lifting weights, you're then sending the ultimate signal paired with that to build muscle. So additional calories will get partitioned over to building muscle. And you're a big dude. So if you were at 2 ,500 calories for the night and you're still hungry, I would want you to go eat. And even if you ate a couple hundred calories over than what you were supposed to, those are more likely going to get partitioned over to building muscle than putting body fat on.

1:40:20Sal Di Stefano:When you're lifting the way you are, you're moving the way you are, and you're on TRT, suppressing that and not eating, and that's why I like that.

1:40:27Adam Schafer:I'm glad you didn't keep going up with the RETA because that's not a good recipe for a guy like you.

1:40:31Sal Di Stefano:You're already at a good weight. 220 at 6 '2", I mean, that's a good way. It's what I carry myself at. You can be absolutely lean, strong, and never move another pound down on the scale. So that's, I want to build muscle on you right now. And so the focus needs, we need to be fed. We need to be fed and take care of that. That's where I got it. It's from you guys. I got it from you that, you know, you tell so many people they don't eat enough. And my wife had her birthday the 15th. We went out to dinner, you know, for the first time I haven't eaten anything that didn't come out of my kitchen for four months.

1:41:05You know, we eat whole foods. We switched, got rid of all that processed junk, and we both switched. She's lost a bunch of weight, which is awesome. And we both feel better. And we did it for our grandkids. You know, we got three grandkids. I got another third one coming. Oh, congratulations. Awesome.

1:41:24Adam Schafer:It's awesome. Good for you, man. No, no, no. You follow mass performance, and just do that. That's your workout. Don't add any other stuff. Do the mobility sessions. You're going to love that. bump your calories consistent 3000 and you're going to build muscle and get leaner at the same time. Once you start to strength starts to plateau a little bit and you're like, okay, I think I need to, you know, change something, add another 200 calories, a guy, your size, your activity level, uh, you're probably at some point going to sit around 34, 3500 calories and you're going to be lean and you'll feel good.

1:41:56Adam Schafer:And so we're going to, you'll gradually build into the body that you're looking for. I wouldn't bring you down lower than 3 ,000 calories at all with your activity level, ever. That's what I told my wife when we went out to dinner the next day. My workout felt better. I felt better. I slept better. That's right. It was too. Yep. No, no. You're getting old. That's all the signs that you needed that. Yeah, you're probably going to end up around 3 ,400, 3 ,500 calories.

1:42:23Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. And lean. And lean. Lean and probably right around the same weight or even up a pound or two on the scale.

1:42:29Adam Schafer:Yeah, but the body composition will be different. I mean, just to give you a reference, Jason, I eat, I'm not as big as you are. I'm shorter than you are. I'm about six foot, about 218. I eat about 3 ,000 calories a day, and I'm way less active than you. I sit in here all day long. If I was as active as you, my calories would have to be closer to, like I said, 35 to 4 ,000 calories a day I'd have to eat. Right. So you're going to feel better, and you'll get the body comp change. And then performance, you'll love that. If you're looking for the kind of strength that you can feel at work. It'll bulletproof your joints so you'll feel great.

1:43:00Adam Schafer:That's right. That's the killer is the shoulder. I've had coworkers got back issues and shoulder problems and elbow problems and knee problems.

1:43:10Sal Di Stefano:You follow performance the way it's laid out. It'll address all those. The way we're telling you right now, it's going to blow your mind. Yep. Yep. We'll send that over to you, Jason.

1:43:19Adam Schafer:Keep listening to the podcast. If you're new to the show, keep listening. Yeah. I think you'll get great information that'll help you as you can tell. I've been back into 2025 stuff. Oh, okay. Good stuff. While I'm walking. It's awesome. Good stuff. Adam, I'm sorry about your solar. I listened to that one yesterday. Ain't that some bullshit? That's some bullshit, bro. You're so angry. Well, I'm telling you, as a lineman, I'm just telling you, that's the biggest racket there is.

1:43:46Sal Di Stefano:Oh, my God, man. I needed a friend like you in my corner to tell me that. You guys made me laugh every day. I mean, everybody, you know, busting each other's balls kind of. I love it. All right. Right on, Jason. Welcome to the family, man. So we're going to send Matt's performance over to you. Follow that up. Love to hear back from you, too. Follow up with us in a few months. Let us know how it's going. I will. All right. All right, man. All right, Jason. Take it easy.

1:44:11Adam Schafer:Thank you. Take it easy, brother. You got it. See, even he knows it was a racket. That's so great. Some bullshit, dude. It is. Hey, you know, two things I want to comment on. Retta from a FDA-regulated pharmacy. That's interesting because I know that that's not a. Yeah. But I guess that's - That's why did you see me look at you? I know. I guess you could do that. Did that just happen? Yeah. But dude, he's a big dude. Yeah. He's 15 ,000 steps a day. Well, I think -

1:44:37Sal Di Stefano:Physical job. Awesome. I'm so glad he's been listening as much as he has because he had the wherewithal to not go up on the dosage like they wanted him to.

1:44:46Adam Schafer:If he sticks the whole natural foods, gets off the retta, and feeds himself, he's going to have body comp change.

1:44:52Sal Di Stefano:He's going to have leaner and build muscle. He looks great though already. He looks like somebody who gets outside, is moving and stuff like that. And, man, dropped 40 pounds, and you can see he's got arms on him. He's got a lot of steps over there. Yeah, no, he's primed right now to build some more muscle. Our next caller is Nick from Ohio. What's up, Nick? What up, Nick? Hi, guys. How you doing? Good, good. Thanks for having me. You got it, man.

1:45:11Adam Schafer:How can we help you? So my question I wrote in was about back development. So I'm 42 years old. When I wrote in, I was running MAPS 15, the advanced version. And in general, what I think I'm dealing with is I sort of made the mistake, as many young men do, of like underdeveloping my back. Like in high school, it was all about, you know, benching and chest and arms. And, you know, surely I'd skip back and legs whenever I could. And in addition to that, I have like a sedentary sort of desk job. So I've got that, you know, I've got rounded shoulder posture. Some of that I think is genetic, but it sure isn't helping with environmental factors in my lifestyle.

1:45:53And so my question was about catching my posterior chain up to my anterior chain, sort of the way that map symmetry addresses the left and right. I've been thinking about addressing the back a little bit more and making sure I get a little more volume there. And I've heard your advice on some of your episodes about swapping out volume or pushing it to the top. And that was sort of my question is I was just wondering, you know, when I was running Maps 15 advanced, I found myself wondering what if I what I was doing was correct. And just curious if you had any advice about, you know, swapping out volume, maybe like a more focused period, like a three to six week period phase of really just hitting it hard.

1:46:39Or if you have a program that you think would be best for this modification, because I

1:46:43Sal Di Stefano:found that maps 15 everyday one i didn't know if i was sort of messing with principles of programming that would be you know in conflict with other things great great question that we don't get a lot that i think actually a lot of people probably are riddled with yeah what i would start with is

1:46:58Adam Schafer:just consider when you have a lagging area uh and this is a large area right the posterior chain um it takes much longer than three six weeks uh to kind of bring it back so give yourself a year of focus, of focus, you know, with the volume and the programming. And here's what you're going to do. You're going to take a set off of a compound lift in another area and you add it to the compound lift for the back.

1:47:24Sal Di Stefano:Another thing I would add, Sal, is I would lead all workouts that way. Yeah. So I would lead workouts with deadlifts or rows as my first big lift. Instead of like, we traditionally do like squats, right? It's like always like a, it's like a leading exercise. I'm going to lead the workout out with with rose and with you're currently following what maps 15 i was when i when i wrote this uh i'm on a break right now we just uh my wife and i just had a baby uh so we so i'm on a pause but that was what i was sort of running um i was shifting over to those everyday kind of

1:47:56Adam Schafer:15 programs no perfect so just to make it simple for you when you're following maps 15 when a chest exercise comes up or a leg exercise comes up take a set off of each of those and when it comes back around and you're going to do a back exercise, add that set to the back exercise. That's it. That's good. Okay. Yeah.

1:48:15Sal Di Stefano:So like two, two on legs and then four on back. If it's normally a three and three.

1:48:19Adam Schafer:Yeah. So, so exactly. So now you don't want to take all the volume and switch it over. Uh, but a couple sets, um, uh, moving over to back away from the compound lifts on the other exercise on the other body parts. Perfectly fine. And you're going to do this for about a year. I would give it a year of just doing this until you feel really strong and really good with those back exercises. And that's pretty much it. You don't have to change anything else about the programming. Okay.

1:48:43Sal Di Stefano:And so that would then lend itself to any of the programs.

1:48:46Adam Schafer:That's right. Yes.

1:48:46Sal Di Stefano:Yeah. Yep. Okay.

1:48:47Adam Schafer:Yep. Very simple. Yeah. So because it doesn't change our programming, it doesn't change much because you're swapping out volume. Now people might make a mistake is they would just add a bunch more, add a bunch more, or they would swap out exercises that don't swap out so well. So I'll say, okay, cool. I'm going to do one less set of curls and one more set of deadlifts. Well, deadlifts tax you way more than curls do.

1:49:08Sal Di Stefano:Yeah.

1:49:08Adam Schafer:So, you know, that's why I said compound, right? So like bench press to rows, you know, squats to deadlifts, you know, that kind of stuff.

1:49:15Sal Di Stefano:Yeah, yeah, definitely. The struggle is that when you're in it, you're like, oh, it takes some discipline to take that away because you feel like you're missing out. And that's the challenge.

1:49:27Adam Schafer:And you're not. You're still going to develop the other areas. You're just going to build up the area that is lagging. That's it. Okay, great.

1:49:33Sal Di Stefano:And then there's little things you can do, like prone Cobras or band pull-aparts throughout your day. You have volumizers. Yeah, to combat the posture at work and stuff like that. So if you can get a hold of a band if you don't have one already. Yeah, I have some at home, and I have Maps Prime, and I always am exploring that, figuring out ways to address this. And it can also cause shoulder problems. I feel like I'm addressing shoulder. You are. It helps the same thing. 100 % you are. That's what's going on. Perfect. You're rolled forward like that, and then that's bothering that. So, yeah, just if you can every hour, get up and just do two sets of band rows real quick or band pull-aparts.

1:50:10One pull-up, yeah, every one then.

1:50:12Sal Di Stefano:And that'll really help that. So you can't with a band like that. You're not going to overdo that. So if you can every hour, do two sets of 15 doing some band rows real quick. Okay, nice. That's great. Yeah.

1:50:23Adam Schafer:Awesome. Thank you. You got it, man. Great question, Nick. Congratulations on the baby. Thanks. Thanks so much. All right, brother. You got it, Nick. uh the the volume swapping is um i wanted to very straightforward i can't i can't remember what

1:50:35Sal Di Stefano:what exercises are paired in every day on maps 15 see typically if he's following another mass

1:50:41Adam Schafer:program right where it's like let's say full body or split and there's an order uh i would have said what you did but he mentioned that he has yeah but i'd still say that because if there's gonna

1:50:49Sal Di Stefano:be days that he has like a squat in a row i'd want him to row first yes but here's here's the

1:50:55Adam Schafer:thing and yes you could totally do that um i'm not sure if they're paired that way which was number one number two it's going to be mass 15 because he just had a kid so it's like and it's only two lifts so it's not a huge difference protocol right now so it's like just simplify

1:51:08Sal Di Stefano:the hell out of it i mean the other thing the other thing that i've done at periods of time where like this was like this was an area of focus at one point for me is like i really dropped a lot of squat volume completely and just just deadlifted for a while yeah so that's also an option so we tend to have a lot of a lot of squat focus in almost all of our programming because it's just it's such a foundational movement but with someone specific like this that wants that much more posterior chain uh you're not going to lose a lot of leg gains by focusing heavily on deadlifts for the next six months and not really focusing as much on squat so it's obviously a little bit more nuanced because i'd have to look at the program and be like okay here's where i'd pull that out

1:51:44Adam Schafer:and put it in i was just trying to simplify the heck out of it yeah uh but i mean i think simply

1:51:48Sal Di Stefano:the two sets moving over are always starting with the back. And then of course the next layer to that would be, you know, running where we have a lot of squat stuff. I just replaced with a bunch of deadlifts and just really deadlift focus.

1:52:00Adam Schafer:Look, if you like the show, come find us on Instagram. It's 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 the rgb super bundle has a full 30-day money-back guarantee and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at mindpumpmedia.com if you enjoy this show please share the love by leaving us a five-star rating and review on itunes and by introducing mind pump to your friends and family.

1:53:04We thank you for your support. And until next time, this is Mind Pump.

1:53:11Sal Di Stefano:When you need to send the perfect rose bouquet, only one brand can say they've been the floral authority for 50 years. 1-800-Flowers. Why should you trust 1-800-Flowers? They hand-select every stem to ensure top quality. And with nationwide delivery, smiles and satisfaction are 100 % guaranteed. And right now, when you order a dozen multicolored roses, we'll double it at no extra cost. Don't miss out on this limited time offer. Order today at 1-800-Flowers.com slash podcast. That's 1-800-Flowers.com slash podcast.