2954: How to Lose Fat Without Losing Muscle (The Exact Strategy)

24:26yesterday's prepped meal and today's prepped meal I have today is Katrina's meatloaf and just a straight baked potato. And I'll even allow myself to salt it, which adds a little palatability and easier. And yesterday, I didn't. I got through like three quarters of the baked potato. So I won't, I mean, I eat it until I'm satisfied and I'm good. I really am eating it just to compliment the - You want to know what's funny? They just came out with these studies on diet and everybody's blown away. But those of us who've trained people for a long time are like, obviously. people who eat the same foods every single day uh so they took a group of people and they said here eat the same kind of foods every single day they all lost weight now the reason why they lost weight is one of the the factors that plays into palatability is novelty yeah and so if you eat the same foods every day yeah they just they just don't eat as much yeah because it's boring yeah that's the point so when i read the study i'm like well of course you know that happened everybody's blown away though eat the same foods it's the new diet just eat chicken breast broccoli swapping any like sweet to salt or like you know fat and you kind of mix around those combos it's like it's a lot easier to all of a sudden restoke it that's why when you're full you can always eat dessert yeah hey talk about blown away i um so i whenever my friends uh reach out to me with like uh you know blood work stuff uh cholesterol if they're uh anything anything medical related always defer to sal so i called sal up because i had this was like i don't know a few months ago probably three months ago or so, somewhere around there.

25:51Your buddy's lipids were... Yeah, yeah. And it puzzles me when it's a buddy of mine that I would consider pretty healthy. He looks in relatively good shape. He's an active guy. Does a lot of mountain biking stuff. Now, I don't follow him around and see exactly what he eats, but he doesn't carry a bunch of body fat, and he's active. And he was asking me because he showed me his cholesterol was really high. I have the numbers here. Yeah, and I sent it to you, so you got him. And I was like, what are the things that you would have him do? And you had to make a few modifications nutritionally and then include Dose.

26:29And his improvement was crazy. So Dose is a company that makes these – one of them lowers cholesterol. It's proven in studies. It's all natural. It's got natural compounds. It's actually liquid, by the way. It tastes like juice, so you take like a shot of it every single day. And they have studies that show that it works. And I like studies because there's so many supplements out there that say this, that, and the other. And if I don't see the studies, I'm always very skeptical because 90 % of supplements don't do anything. So he tried those. And here's the numbers. His total cholesterol went from 293 to 201.

27:03His LDL went from 200 to 124. Remarkable change. It's like he took a statin. Yeah. Which is great. Yeah. It's great. And without the side effects of a statin. So by the way, that's why he reached out was he's like, they wanted to put him on a statin. And I'm like, whoa, before you do that, hold on. let me let me talk to sal and see what he would he would advise you to do and i said i'll get back to you and so you i talked to you and then sent it oh i mean that was you bro um yeah no yeah no he that's exactly what he did he really just cleaned up say good job to you yeah good job for telling me dude thanks thanks bro thanks you pat yourself on the back there you know what i'm saying uh you know that he he i know he uh he cut out um the he knows he was like a snacker and processed foods and stuff like that and so he stuck to the the whole foods uh tried to he didn't cut out red meat but he he limited it he wasn't just going you know buck wild on it and then added the the dosing every day and i bet his doctor's tripping oh you know what i meant to ask him what is that what his doctor should do i know his wife originally was like hey why don't you just do all these things first before you take a the the supplement of that and i'm like i'm so glad you still did it anyways because it's an all-natural supplement yeah it's something you could take forever.

28:09Everything in itself. It's not a pill or it's not like this. No, it's not a drug. It's not a drug. All it is is all these all natural fruits and things that are combined in a little liquid that. You know what's crazy with cholesterol is, I'm going to get flame for this, but when you look at the data on statins and how they actually, now they for sure reliably change your blood lipids. That's a fact. You take a statin, your numbers will change. That's a fact. But when you look at the data on what does that actually mean in the sense of does it actually extend life? Does it actually reduce heart attacks and heart disease and all that stuff?

28:46It gets a little bit murky because you also have side effects in there. So there's always controversy around statins. When should you take them? Should you take them? It seems like the data points to if you've already had a heart attack, it's more beneficial than if you've never had a heart attack. And you can look through the data, everybody. You can look it up and see for yourself. But here's the deal. When people change their blood lipids through exercise, diet, natural ways, like the compounds that are in dose, you see, you definitely see an improvement in longevity. Definitely. So what we tend to do with medicine is we look at a number that connects to an outcome and we try to control the number.

29:25And then we hope to see, or we think we're going to see an outcome when sometimes that's not the case. Sometimes the number itself is saying something else and it's what's causing that or other things. And that's why when you change those number, even if, look, by the way, even if your blood lipids didn't change much, but you exercise and change your diet, you see great outcomes. So pretty cool. Speaking of which, dude, I got a processed food study for you guys. That's interesting. And, you know, years ago, I trained this woman that she conducted studies. I forgot what university she worked for, but she helped run studies.

30:01And she really helped me a lot understand how to read studies and how to look at maybe possible causes or whatever. So I'm going to read to you guys a study, and then I'm going to show you guys kind of what I came out with. So here's a study. So this is the Radiological Society of North America. So this is the title of the study. It's in Science News on ScienceDaily.com. Ultra-processed foods linked to hidden muscle fat that may threaten your knees. Okay. So here's what's wild about the study. Eating more ultra processed foods, which we just talked about earlier, was linked to greater fat buildup inside thigh muscles, according to MRI scans of 615 adults at risk for knee osteoarthritis.

30:43Here's where it gets crazy. Surprisingly, the association remained even after researchers accounted for caloric intake, physical activity, and other factors. In other words, what they think they found is that ultra processed foods, independent of the increased caloric intake, would cause more intramuscular fat. So I'm thinking about this and I'm like, hmm, are there obesogenic compounds and processed foods that can cause these things? There's some data that suggests maybe, but there's actually way more data that shows that it's really about the calories. That's the big thing. So how is this possible that it's independent that they tried to control for calories?

31:27And I'll tell you why. What they did is they took 615 people and they compared them against each other. What they didn't do is take these people and compare them to themselves. So what I mean by that is everybody has a different resting metabolic rate. If you're eating a lot of ultra processed foods, you're eating way more than you should. So if I control your calories against another guy's and I'm like, oh they're eating the same calories but you have more intramuscular fat what i don't know is that your body burns less calories yeah so you're just eating more than you would if it was whole natural foods yeah so what it's not saying i know the the title says it's independent of calories the only way to know that is if you took the same person put them on the same caloric intake ultra processed foods versus not and then look and see what i'd also be really curious to like how accurately are are they measuring calories?

32:12Because we know what FDA allows with processed foods. So there's a 20 plus percent room for error. No, people don't know that. And if this study is conducted and we're like, oh, well, we took these, this is 3 ,000 calories in processed foods, according to what? The label on the back of it? Yeah, it could be 3 ,600. Or did you actually independently take each and every one of those foods and measure what it is? Or did you just take the label for it? That's another one. And I would imagine in a study that are expensive to do anyways, that you just said, oh, this is good enough. We'll just follow that.

32:43When we know that there's room for 20 % to 25 % air, which that alone could make a difference. Well, here's what I know. If somebody's eating a lot of ultra-processed foods, they're eating way more than they would if they didn't. For sure. Fact, bottom line. Okay, so that makes sense. So did anybody speculate on obesogenic-type compounds? So that, not in this study. Not in that one. But there are studies that suggest, and I think they're decent, that there are certain compounds that promote fat storage, things like xenoestrogens. So I'm not saying that that's not playing a role, but I don't think that's the case here.

33:17I think what the case here is, is that Mrs. Johnson and Mr. Smith and Mrs. whatever, we're looking at their caloric intake, we're controlling it. But what we are not considering is that Mrs. Smith, who's eating 80 % of her calories from ultra processed, is eating way more than she would for herself. And that's gonna cause more fat storage. As a result. But yeah, I really appreciate that client because now I can look at studies. You can kind of read between the lines. I'm not the best at it, but it helps a lot because so many studies with the headlines. Oh, I know. You just read the headlines. I always wonder, yeah, like what they're actually hoping the outcome is going to be and what the purpose of the study is to begin with.

34:00You know my favorite example? I mean, I think a large percentage of all studies have like a desired outcome. Yeah, there's a bias going in. they're being funded normally by the which I know that our friends like Lane and stuff have talked about you have to have a bias no one's going to fund it so here's what happens with that it's less that you have this nefarious company that is tweaking this study to try to make it look the way it wants or they're lying that may play a role it's less of that it's more of this if you're a pharma company or you're a food company and a study comes out with a result that you don't like, you're not publishing it.

34:37Right, yeah. So you're not like, I'm not sending this out. So you just disregard that. Yeah, we're not going to put this out. Unless it benefits your product. One of my favorite examples, I have a few examples, but one of my favorites is the old studies that showed that, so when I was a kid, they were still saying this, like, oh, don't drink too much coffee. Oh, yeah. It causes cancer. They actually used to say that. I know. Oh, too much coffee, I know that's associated with cancer. Well, it was because in the 80s, 70s, 60s, 70s, and 80s, people who drunk the most coffee also smoke the most cigarettes and so they just weren't controlled that was a definite thing that was coffee and cigarettes i thought i saw coffee coffee's anti-cancer i thought i saw somebody actually recently um how was it israel or one of the i can't remember who it was that was talking about some recent studies on caffeine in fact they're saying justin would love this saying that like the health benefits all the way up to like six eight hundred milligrams a day like that healthy for you yeah that's a that's a high dose just keep watching all these studies like backing caffeine and cheese dude i'm like yeah here's the thing with caffeine it's so individual so when you look at a group of people that that drink 600 milligrams of caffeine regularly you're looking at a group of people that tolerate caffeine there's such a difference yeah there's such a difference with how you're gonna be something about adrenals later but whatever well i just know that i know it's for a fact like in this room alone you have a high the probably the highest tolerance for caffeine in the room yeah adam would be second and i'm third doug's last yeah so if i had 600 milligrams of caffeine in a day i would feel horrible i would feel 400 is my as my max doug sticks at like 50 to 100 at the most right which is interesting on average on average yeah i mean i even it took me till college to even start drinking any kind of caffeine like the first time i even had it was like black coffee i drank at when i was working at a restaurant and i was working a double and i I was just so incredibly exhausted.

36:29And I tried it, and then it was like, whoa. All of a sudden, it was this energy rush. Because before that, it's like the sugar drinks. You thought Jolt had a lot of caffeine. It had barely any in it in comparison to the drinks now. Dude, I think Jolt had 81 milligrams of caffeine. Yeah, yeah. I think. About half of it. It's all sugar. Half of it. I mean, my first introduction was my junior year in high school when I started the dairy in the morning before work. Oh, you had to. Yeah, and so I'd swing by 7-Eleven, and I was drinking those. I mean, it's like chocolate mocha coffees. It was like a lot of - I wish my introduction to caffeine was what you guys have to do.

37:06And so it was literally out of necessity. It was like four o 'clock in the morning before school. Never been a morning person as it is. And then getting up to work, I needed something. And this was really before - Energy drinks weren't as popular as they are today. I mean, now there's like a plethora of them. I'm trying to remember when Red Bull was first coming on the market. Do you remember when Red Bull was first coming on the market? Much later, dude. Yeah, it was much later. This is like the 90s, right? There were no energy drinks. There was Jolt Cola, and then there were Bodybuilders. So Mountain Dew was like one, I think, that they increased the caffeine a little bit.

37:42I mean, Red Bull might have been coming on the scene, although I didn't like Red Bull. I never liked the taste of Red Bull. Never been a fan. But they were probably the first. Oh, look it. No, no, no. I'm getting right. 1987 in Austria, but in the US it was like the, probably the late 90s, early 2000s. Yeah, 97. And I don't remember seeing that. So that's literally what. 97, yeah. So this is exactly, so 1997 is the year I'm referring to right now. So I'm like, I don't even know about Red Bull at this point. So coffee. It was 81 milligrams of caffeine. So literally, oh yeah, and low. So like your way of getting energy back then was only coffee.

38:17And kids didn't drink coffee. Coffee was old people. Oh yeah, no. I remember like doing it. It wasn't like a - It tastes gross. I thought it would just stain my teeth. I had to drink the sugar bomb version of it to get it down. And it was like, I needed this to get it going. My association with coffee was either espresso, because obviously my family's Italian, but my main association were my teachers, whose breath would be terrible. Breath, yes. Because they would have coffee breath. That's the thing. And I guarantee they smoked too. Yes. The combo of both was horrible. It was horrible. Dude, you guys.

38:45It was my grandma. I wish my introduction to caffeine was coffee. my introduction to caffeine bro i went hard right out the gates because remember i was into lifting weights at 14 i super nerded out on supplements right out the gates so i learned real early ephedra and caffeine and yo himby and sinifrin and i learned it right right out the gates and i didn't know what i was doing just making your own cocktails i did dude and i mixed them together because i first i did uh caffeine and ephedra and of course i went to the gym and was like Superman. I'm taking meth. You know what I mean? I'm working out.

39:19This is the greatest thing ever. Homemade meth. And then I did this combination of them. And I'll never forget, dude. I went to 24 Fitness on Hillsdale. So I was a kid. I was like 15. My dad dropped me off. And I was like two and a half hours. I was getting after it. It was crazy. Then he brings me home. I come home, eat dinner, barely had an appetite, laid in bed. And I was like, my mom's going to find me dead because my heart was beating. And I was like, please don't let me die, dude. I really don't want my mom to fight me this way. Yeah. And then it had Ultimate Orange and Rip Fuel. I think my first pre-workout was Phosphagen.

39:56I think the EAS. I don't think there was no caffeine in that. I think the EAS had a - No, Phosphagen was creatine. And then there was Phosphagaine. What was EAS's pre-workout? Did they have a pre-workout? That's a good question. Maybe they didn't then. So then maybe it was the BPN, the red one. Yeah. Because those are the two, like - No explode or something? I have the furthest memory back is like the red BPN or the phosphatidine EAS stuff. So EAS didn't have a pre-workout. I don't think they did, did they? What was it called at the time? Myoplex, no, that's now. That's protein butter. Yeah, I don't think they really had one back in the day.

40:34It says caffeine in there. Yeah, but that's later. Well, that's back in 2016, yeah. No, that's not. No, that's later. Do you know what EAS had? Talk about brilliant marketing. So Bill Phillips came out with a supplement guide. You guys remember that? Yeah. It was actually pretty informational, but it was really just a big commercial for his products. It was brilliant. They sold so much. Bro, he had a three-capsule stack, three-supplement stack. He had creatine, vanadyl sulfate, okay? I don't know if you guys know what that is. No, what is it? And glutamine, okay? And you take them all three. And this is how brilliant he was.

41:04He said in his magazine, he had Muscle Media 2000. He said, creatine, that's like D-ball. He said, you get big muscles real fast. Wow. Vanadyl sulfate and glutamine, those are more like DECA. Like, more of the quality. This is literally what I said. We're selling creatine all wrong. Bro. So I bought all three of them and I took them. And it worked because it was creatine. The other stuff did that. It's so funny that, because I so can connect to that because I remember how old I was. And, like, you wanted the supplements that looked the most aggressive. Great market. Like, if it had, like. Bro, the more illegal it was made in some crazy, like, mad science lab.

41:38This was banned in 50-something states. It was like, what? I'm taking that, you know? Or it had like a syringe on the back. It had like a cheetah or a dragon on it or something. Bro, I bought a supplement from the back of the muscle magazine. It was called Muscle Mix. And the picture of it was a vial. So it was a vial. Yeah. So I ordered it. And what it was, it was a dropper. Yes. And it was Smilax was what was in it. This is like a, it's supposed to race. It did nothing, right? But when I bought it, I was like, oh, this is going to be. Oh, this is straight from the lab. This is crazy. I can't believe.

42:08And it's in the back of the magazine. They don't know I'm 15. I'm going to buy this again. You should still sell stuff in beakers. Hey, did you guys – you guys didn't see this data. Dude, trip off this. We've been talking about GLP-1s and what they're doing or whatever. You guys want to hear the – this is the first time we've seen this in decades. Adult obesity stopped and reversed. What? Right now? Right now. It is on the down. It is now reversing. So it peaked at 45%. Right now it's at 43%. So it's been on this uphill climb for decades. Year over year over year for decades. Decades. It's just been climb, climb, climb, climb, climb.

42:48Nothing's really touched it. We saw it start to stop right around 2022 or so. And everybody's like, what's going on? Maybe we reached peak obesity or whatever. And now it's going down. And 100%, 100 % it's the GLP one. Oh, yeah. Well, what was the number? Was it Dr. Tina? We talked about the number of people now that are - On one? So look up this. It's 10%. I saw this stat. 10 % of Americans. How many, yeah, but what's even crazier is how many people per week are onboarding to it. It's like in the, I want to say tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands. Oh, it's crazy. Weekly are coming on board of starting it.

43:25Yeah. Every week. I think conservatively, and maybe I'll be wrong, but I think half of America is going to be out on GLP. Half of them. Especially when you consider, I'm looking at these studies that they're doing right now, guys. They're not out yet. in other words they haven't published what's going on but they're showing some of the stuff GOPs obviously help with weight loss we know that they're showing effects on what does that say tens of thousands to over 100 ,000 people start a GOP on medication each week in the US alone that's insane so trip off this works great for weight loss we know this now there's caveats there you gotta lift weights eat enough protein doesn't work for everybody some people get bad side effects But as far as medical interventions are concerned, there's nothing we've ever had that comes close.

44:13Nothing, not even close. So here's what's crazy. We've heard this from practitioners who use GLPs on how people are less likely to drink, to smoke, to gamble, how autoimmune conditions seem to be getting better, what's going on. the speculation was it's affecting the hedonistic pathways of the brain that's with all the other addictions the autoimmune issues well it must be the reduced calories because we know this when people start to eat less oftentimes autoimmune issues get better i just saw the study that's coming out that showed that psoriasis got better before the weight loss even started happening independent of weight loss wow yeah and they're studying glps for all kinds of stuff so we may I mean we might be tapping into something that is going to reach more than just so are you ready for me to switch teams again so I came out originally and you know argued with you that I believed it would be a net positive you were skeptical early on then I jumped ship came over to your side and said I think you're right and now I'm now I'm now I'm jumping back on the other side and I'll tell you why I think a lot of it has to do with my personal experience proper usage So, and maybe that's what was what, and I don't think you were per se wrong, but I think that we had to swing so hard the other direction where it became alarming and then course correct.

45:41And more people are becoming privy to how much muscle you can lose, how important the protein intake is. Doctors now are probably prescribing lower doses than what they were early on because we've seen enough of this alarming stuff come back. and maybe that's enough because obviously there's still going to be people that abuse it, don't do it right, neglect, and I see that. I definitely still see that. But I also do see some people, I've had people in my circle that I kind of shook and woke up like, hey, you're losing a ton of muscle, you're taking too much of this, have gone back, modified their medication, and then now much better.

46:20Like got muscle, look healthy, eating an adequate amount of calories, And so maybe this does end up being a net positive once more education around how to properly dose it and pairing it with making sure that you strength train and protein. Now I kind of feel like I'm jumping back on the other side again where I think this could be, especially when you start seeing this stuff like why I got back on it with this, like psoriasis and autoimmune stuff. These other benefits aside, just people who need to lose weight. I do think the lack of education was resulting in a lot of those alarming stats that were coming back.

46:58And I think, too, because it's been out long enough and, yeah, like doctors are a little more accepting some of these alternative ways of prescribing. And I think it has made a positive. There was another study that showed that people with COPD and asthma had less attacks when they were on a GLP. Now, I know that obesity is connected to that, but I think there is an autoimmune connection just because of what I'm hearing from experts in the field who we know that we trust and what some of the data seems to be suggesting, that this may affect in a positive way, and maybe not all, but many autoimmune issues.

47:38I know for me personally, part of my gut health issues had to do with treating myself for SIBO, maybe parasites that made a big difference. There's another part that is probably autoimmune related a little bit. And taking a very tiny, tiny, I'm talking about drops of a GLP for me seems to help my gut. Now there's two reasons for that. One, it slows down motility, which I think helps me because my motility is really fast. But it may be the autoimmune aspect of it. Yeah, I'm interested, too, because originally it was like addressing diabetes, right? I wonder what those numbers look like now in comparison.

48:14Because I know like some of these - It works great for diabetes. Yeah, dialysis clinics and like a lot of them have shut down. Really? Yeah. Oh, that number has to be crazy good because they don't give a shit about even muscle in that case. It's just like, let's get the weight down to get the diabetes, right? So the desired outcome is even different there where I imagine they're hitting it out the park all day long. It's interesting to me to think because of all the treatments and things because this is big business in the medical world. So if you look at trends, I don't know, maybe, Doug, you can look this up.

48:44Are we seeing a trend in smaller clothing sizes being sold? Maybe set that up. So I read that that's happening, that snack food companies are seeing losses. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. So they're already back to the drawing board, right? I mean, they're on the drawing board of finding ways to put stuff in here that counter the GLP-1. So, yeah, that actually signal. Whoa. The fashion industry is experiencing a measurable trend towards smaller clothing sizes. Wow. The ozempic effect. Well, they even have a name for it already. Yeah, dude. Wow. This is like, there's a few times, and this is why we got to be careful.

49:24Crazy. This is why we have to be really careful. There's a few times in history when a medical intervention drastically shifts culture. The last one I can think of is birth control. Birth control pill changed culture dramatically. And I think there was some good. I also think there was some bad, for sure. We could talk about that. But the GLPs are shifting culture, literally. It'll be the same. There'll be some good and there'll be some bad. Yeah, probably. I want to speculate a little bit with you on something I think I asked you. and I think you were like, man, I'm not sure about that with my experience with it and you brought up motility.

50:01And the way I described it to you is I feel like my appetite is very similar to what it was like when I was a kid. Like for, and I'm sure you can relate to this, for much of my teenage years, early 20s, I had to force myself to eat bigger meals, more meals frequently to put on the size of, and over decades of eating and training that way. You've trained yourself. I've trained myself to look at even portion sizes differently and eat differently. And what I feel like this low dose has done has knocked me all the way back down to where I would struggle to try and eat. 4 ,000 calories would be really, really tough.

50:47I don't think I could do that right now. Like I'm landing around 3000, low 3000 calories, uh, and even sometimes high two thousands, which that reminds me of what it was like growing up forever. And so can I, can I, could I have impacted both my motility and my ability to like, can I have changed that? Yeah. Like over, over decades of pushing it and training it. Oh yeah. And could this just kind of be reversing me back to like. Bro, how much does psychology play a role in the amount of food you eat or don't eat? I guess that's the question. Well, I mean, I definitely, there's an obvious psychological.

51:24Oh, yeah. There's a distortion of even the way I visualize. Oh, like you and I, bro. You and I, very similar, right? Skinny, tried to always gain muscle, always trying to overfeed ourselves, a lot of stuff. You and I would register as eating enough has been skewed by decades of just eating. Sure. Like crazy. Yeah, so I already know there's for sure a psychological. I'm more curious on like mechanistically like is there something going on well it does lower your appetite for sure and it does slow down motility which probably changes the kind of foods you want to eat because oh yeah slower motility will make things sit in your oh yeah like I I this is something that it's it's it's been really good for me because I've had to like where I would keep eating because I know I need to to be big I go I have that natural signal I'm full and I've pushed that a few times where I'm like, oh no, I have more on my plate.

52:14I'm like, versus I'm done. Just like I told you, my potato, right? I would never leave part of my meal. Yeah. What's wrong with you? Yeah. Especially if it's a healthy food and it's carbs. I need that. It's extra calories. I'm going to shrink. Do you have the extra to Justin? So I've just, I've just, I've learned now, I've learned my lesson. If I don't, like it'll, it'll really mess up my digestion because how much my motility has slowed down. And so I've learned now to, once I eat my, I eat my meatloaf i'm eating my baked potato and oh i get about halfway to three quarters way through and like oh i'm good and i'm like okay i need to i can put this away you're not ignoring that exactly i'm not ignoring that where i've ignored it for so long by the way for people listening so if your issue is slow motility glps can make that really bad so if you're somebody that stuff like has issues with constipation you got to be very careful when you're on one now i know you eat less so that helps but you got to pay attention to what you're eating don't eat things that constipate you when you're on a glp1 if that's your issue and make sure you you you increase your fiber otherwise because i've i've talked to enough of our listeners oh it makes total sense why it does it because i see how much i've had people call and get sitting there they got sebo they got sebo from it because they wanted a glp it slowed down they were already slow motility yeah it slowed it down so much they developed gut issues yeah as a result so now for someone like me where it's fast motility it's actually a welcome uh thing no for other people it's been it's been a it's been a It's been something that my wife's teased me about forever.

53:40She always makes fun of me because I'll eat dinner, and then 10 minutes later, I'm already in the bathroom. Already? In and out. Yeah, it's ready to go. You know what I'm saying? So it's a nice thing that I feel a little normal now that it's not like that. You know what I'm saying? I have a normal schedule where I've always been really, really fast. That's cool. Dude, I've got to share with you guys. So I have not done MAPS anabolic or phase one MAPS anabolic in a long time. Yeah, that's your bread and butter. It's been a long time since I've done that. Now, one of the reasons why I'm doing it is my strength training is only three days a week right now, which is the lowest it's been in a long time.

54:22Yeah. And so typically it's leading up into this, it's three or four days a week. We're all strength trained. I've been working to three. now I've made like a concentrated effort like I'm only going to lift three days a week and it has more to do with my attachment to working out and all that stuff and on one of the other days I'm gonna do something else that's uh that's more beneficial uh so I'm kind of using that for for that but so I'm only three days a week and I've I've done you know bodybuilding style training for a while haven't done anything you know heavy low wrap you know low volume like phase one anabolic in a very long time I've avoided deadlifts for a little while barbell squats for a little while just because i just want to work on other things and i this is now week two maybe two and a half of maps anabolic and i know why people like it so much it's addicting to see the strength gains it's crazy yeah like this really fun bro i mean it's like 15 20 pounds in fact you know what i'm doing and this was inspired by you adam is because i remember when you were regaining all that muscle how you kept hurting yourself and it was like it was kind of perplexing at first until we figured out like well yeah you added 50 pounds to your lift in like a week like of course that's a yeah so what i'm doing is i'm not allowing myself to go high add more than like five like if i can add 15 i'm only adding five because i'm like you know what if it takes a lot of discipline to do that bro you kidding me i'm like pulling off the floor i'm like dude i could add another 50 pounds if i'm not yeah because i don't want to hurt myself yeah but i see why people love i mean because when you listen to all when all of our listeners all of our maps program uh customers MAPS anabolic, especially phase one, is the one that people tend to talk about the most.

55:56It's addicting. It's just the strength gains. I can't help but laugh because we talk about the psychology of eating, the psychology of lifting around what you're saying right now, especially with deadlifting and squatting. And I do the same thing right now because I learned that lesson. In fact, I was just squatting the other day, and I felt really good and strong. And it reminded me. literally like my old powerlifting workout partner from years ago one of my early 20s was in my head of like uh 10 pounds doesn't count on squats we only move up in quarters or 45 plates like i swear to god i'd say i'd trade for decades without tens and fives on squats yeah never used tens and fives like if i can't go up a quarter i ain't going up bro and so like i i'm adding two and a half like i felt really strong and i'm like my natural instinct is to go over go grab the 25s i'm like i can put a 10 on you know i can put a reasonable yeah if you had a 10 on each side it's 20 pounds yeah i know that's a big job it is but in my like i have trained myself for so many years that tens don't count bro i know i'm gonna get there i just want to get there to the point where it's like okay here's the real weight you should see me right now dude i'm working out in the gym and it's like you know week two or week three and i go i get the two and a half and i put the little tiny two and a half and i'm like this is stupid that's even better this is dumb i was proud i went down to 10 i haven't done that forever yeah that that actually it's a cool strategy when you get in that mindset and you're just adding the two and a halves and you're just like really like gently progressing well the hard part is i know what were my potential i know what i've left before so i'm adding five pounds and i'm still 200 pounds no that's exactly what's hard for me too it's like i'm like this still isn't even that impressive of a way for me like what what I'm talking about right now is I was doing 275.

57:42Yeah. And I'm like, four or five. And I would normally go right up to three 15. And I'm like, well, you know, let me just add another, I'm just battling all this stress. So I'm like, I I've literally reduced it down to a few functional movements. And then like, I like maybe two, three functional movements a day. Because dude, like my, my forearm flexor and like my grip and everything is dude, I must've done something, but it's just, it, it's just so achy and it's pissing me off. I love how Justin says I must've done something. You moved two tons of rock, didn't you? How many tons? Four tons. No, four tons.

58:14I wonder what happened. Why is your arm hurt? I didn't quite put my finger on it. I must have slept wrong. Yeah. Yeah, well, you're working out. You're like, oh, God. It hurts my grip. The only person I believe when they're confused why they got hurt is Adam. Because he literally will be like, I did nothing yesterday. I have no idea. Why am I hurt? Well, I'll be that guy that I'm sleeping and I'm also doing wrist and shoulder cars and all that. I'm really trying to work and spiral my way out of it. Speaking of knowledge and stuff like that, yesterday we had my buddy Ryan. I was just going to shout Ryan out.

58:47I was just going to shout him out because you brought up my injury. I can't tell you how nice that was. Ryan DeVita, a good friend of mine. I go way back. Him and I worked at 24 Hour Fitness way back in the day. Him and I started the personal training studio that I owned for so many years. We split up after a few years. but he's one of the most I learned a lot from him when it comes to correctional exercise he's one of the most I didn't know that either I just never knew like I didn't know him well enough obviously as you did and I just assumed that like he was I just thought he was more the business acumen of the two of you in the business I didn't realize he was that brilliant on the correctional exercise when it comes to like exercise correctional exercise biomechanics correctional massage like the guy's like he's one of the best I mean, he literally unpacked me in like two minutes.

59:37And it was that I've been troubleshooting with you guys. You didn't even buy him dinner, dude? No, dude. Bro, he put his finger. Adam was telling him about some of his issues with certain exercises. And Ryan literally put his finger right where the origin of the pain was. And Adam's like, whoa. Yeah, that's right where it's at. And then I'm like, well, you got to explain to me why is it this? Because for me, what was perplexing me was, why is it when I actually put myself in a proper form in what we consider optimal position for bicep curls, I have pain. Whereas if I put myself in this weird, hunched over, rounded position, I have minimal pain doing that, which is counterintuitive to me.

1:00:17Yeah, because you shorten. And he broke it down. And this whole time I thought it was my pec minor. It was pec major. He's like, oh, it's pec major. He goes, you tore your pec major, and it's just a matter of how much you tore it. It's like you obviously - It sucks. You got to go ahead and come around. Oh, yeah. It sucks. I mean, it does suck, but it also feels like Katrina was, because I was so excited when I came home, and she's like, I don't understand why you're so excited. Like, you knew you tore this, and I'm like, yeah, but to be like more sure of - Pinpoint it. Yeah, dude. Because like - Otherwise, you're like, what's going on?

1:00:45What's wrong with me? Yeah, yeah. Like, that's - And I don't know. It has to be like top two or three pet peeves to be a personal trainer. Yeah. And to not be able to solve - To diagnose yourself. I've helped so many people in so many ways. And then to be, you know, for you to be perplexed on your own body, who you, you know, everything that's going in it, what you're doing is I can't get to the bottom of what's going on exactly. And why can't the last time that happened was when Justin and I figured out that we needed to strengthen our hip flexors. Oh yeah. That was, that was like an epiphany.

1:01:18Yeah. You almost never have to do with a client really target their hip flexors. And so, and you and I were getting similar issues and I don't remember what it was we saw something yeah and i'm like i wonder if it's that it's hip pain yeah and i started doing like specific hip flexor actually went away i was like oh god yeah of all things just like that i know crazy anyway i got i got to tell you guys so One of the interesting things about some supplements, well, some supplements you take and you feel right out the gates and others you feel, but then you get used to how they feel and you forget that they're really doing a lot until you stop using it.

1:01:47You guys ever have that experience where you? That's the only way I decide if a supplement works really well for me. I'm the one who's, I'm, you know, me, whenever we talk about supplements, I'm like, even when I first are taking it and you're like, how do you feel this? And I'm like, well, I feel pretty good. I'm still skeptical. it's not until I've been doing it for a while I take it off and then the discrepancy of that is where I feel like I can really hone in on like okay that's how impactful So Seed's a probiotic company for people listening and so Seed hasn't sent us a shipment in a little while and I actually got I asked our assistant to make sure that they send some and she's like it's on it's way.

1:02:23I haven't taken Seed for a couple weeks I noticed a huge difference in my digestion huge difference and i take it religiously every single night out of the multivitamin like every day every night empty stomach i take seed every single night we hadn't been getting a shipment i've kind of been not thinking about it and kind of forgot otherwise i would just buy it and uh and and i'm like today i'm like you know i keep i gotta remember to get some seed and then i'm like oh yeah we don't have any but i can tell yeah i could tell my digestion makes it makes a big difference such a big difference you too well yeah it does it makes a huge difference for me mainly like the whole day like as my digestion and everything else like yeah i feel like way way more symptoms uh from you know my gut like throughout the day if i haven't done it so i'm more inspired now than ever to to get consistent with it um because of what i'm noticing with the psoriasis the glp1 and it's like i feel like adding that into this and trying to repopulate my gut with healthy bacteria while this is probably a combo best times i should try and do this and so um i was actually waiting for the shipment to come back in too for the exact same reason is because it's one of the things i haven't been good i've been really good since we met with cabral last time i've been dialed with my my vitamin d and my fish oil i've been really consistent with that i haven't been consistent with um my seed and that's i've been waiting for it to come in so we could do that especially with what's going on because i'd love to report like okay let's see if i can make a difference with that let me introduce you to butcher box who are they what are they so this is a company that delivers healthy meats to your door and more.

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1:04:41You can get free ribeyes, New York strip steaks, filet mignons in every order included for free for a year, plus$20 off your first box. Again, it's butcherbox.com slash mind pump. Here comes the show. Our first caller is Kyle from British Columbia. Welcome back, dude. How you doing, Kyle? What's up, Kyle? Hey, guys. Thanks for taking me back. You got it, man. I got an update for you guys. Let's go, dude. All right. So the last time we had spoken, I just finished my first round of anabolic, and I just switched to free weights during that time. and because of that, I got much stronger during my first round because I was getting used to the bar and getting used to the free weights.

1:05:25So you guys suggested that I repeat anabolic now that I'm adjusted to see how much strength I can actually gain now that I'm all leveled out. Excuse me. So I've still been working on how to properly fuel myself during this time as well. I had taken your advice in our last conversation to up my protein. currently I'm hitting about 160 to 170 grams per day some days a little more my low days which happen mostly on weekends just because I'm out with the family most of the time would be about 150 but I'm trying to fix that at the moment not sure how much of a detriment that would be a couple days on the weekend like that but overall my digestion is feeling better as last time I'd spoke and I was kind of getting used to eating more.

1:06:13So that seems to be working out well now. So in terms of my training, I've continued to split the anabolic workouts into upper and lower like the first time. I personally just enjoyed that style and it was working for my schedule there. However, please don't hate me because on this round, I didn't follow anabolic exactly, mostly due to another inspiring failure that I had experienced. So essentially, the part where you're supposed to lower the weight and up the reps, I ended up keeping the weight heavier because I was very motivated to lift more. And the main reason why was I had my brother-in-law over and he was doing some bench press and I was spotting him.

1:06:59He's much stronger than I am and I wasn't working out at the time, but I was just hanging out. and then he eventually got up to 230 and then I was like I just want to feel what this feels like I was feeling stronger a bit confident it's like I just want to see if I can do like one rep just just let me go so I tried I got it about halfway down and I needed his help to get it back up but after that just one like half lift I felt really sore uh for about two days after that and I was just super motivated to just keep going, keep going. I don't know if that soreness was a slight injury or if it was just muscle soreness, but throughout my training of anabolic, I kept it as heavy as I could, just adding like two more pounds to the bar, try to do that on the last set.

1:07:49And I did still get stronger, but I don't know if my approach was wrong or how much of a detriment that was. Um, but personally, I just got really into just trying to lift more and more throughout this round. I really just found it, uh, super motivating, super fun. I don't know what it is. It's just like adding two more weights just makes my day or two more pounds makes my day feel so much better. I don't know why, but it's just a, uh, personal, um, fulfillment throughout the day. So, um, that was my training. but overall throughout this round I'm overall very happy with my results and I really truly appreciate all the help you guys have given me I feel the strongest I've ever been I've learned a ton about strength training and keep improving my eating with your guys advice to sum up my results after this round I certainly did get stronger I'll share my numbers in a second here I improved my digestion.

1:08:51I hit some new tough goals I set for myself just for fun, like pull ups and doing some rope climb stuff. I really have never been able to do those very well. But I'm actually able to do 10 pull ups. Now I can do some rope climb, which is a fun little thing. And I've just overall increased my main lift. So my numbers went from my bench before was 155. But now it's up to 165. um my deadlift went from 165 to 200 uh overhead press i managed to do one rep of 100 pounds which was a big achievement for myself because i've always kind of struggled with that one particularly my pull-ups got up to 10 which has been a lifetime goal for me so very happy with that my body weight I've increased I'm up to 73.5 kilograms from 70 kilograms before so I've put on another three kilograms and yeah so those are my overall results I got a couple questions in terms of nutrition and training so I can start with whatever you guys prefer well first i just want to say you killed it yeah yeah so 90 days you gained uh well six pounds well about about a little over six pounds of of muscle you actually look a little leaner in your picture so it's probably more than that i think you might have lost a little body fat in the process your strength went through the roof this was all in the course of 90 days which is phenomenal i want to get clarity too on that on the strength because i think you got stronger than you think you got because if i heard you correctly as you progress through maps anabolic which starts in a low rep phase, then goes to moderate reps, then goes to high reps, you increased weight all the way through that?

1:10:40You lowered weight or reps, right? No, he lifted his weight. He increased weight because he's - I thought he said that he didn't follow the protocol of the reps. No, he didn't follow the protocol of the program of lowering the weight and increasing the reps. Yeah, but so you kept the weight the same and you kept the reps low. Is that right? Yes, that's right. Like I kept adding weight progressively, but I kept the reps like, um, on my main, that's like bench press, especially I was around like the five, five to seven reps. Okay. So I was like, I thought you, you increased the reps and the weight.

1:11:14No. So you, yeah. So you're like phase one, your whole thing. Yeah. You, you, your strength went through the roof and you gained, uh, uh, I would guess based off your pictures, closer to seven to eight pounds of lean body mass through that whole period of time. We could have ate a lot more calories. Yeah. That's it. Yeah. That's it. Still crushed it. Eat more, eat more. and watch what happens yeah okay power great yeah it sounds like he would do well with yeah you do you would do really well with power lift or ppl or upper lower yeah i think any of those programs would crush for you with with higher calories you're gonna keep building dude you'll probably gain another if you bump your calories effectively follow some good programming uh i i think within 90 days you could probably gain another five to eight pounds of lean body mass wow yeah that's awesome.

1:11:58Like I'm hearing your guys initial response here in terms of eating more calories. I feel like that's probably my biggest, that was actually my main question. Cause I've started to notice like I'm eating the same, but however now, which has never happened before, like in the evening after dinner, I'm getting hungry again. And I'm just like, so it's like, I think I just need to overall eat more throughout the day. And that's, that'll alleviate that. You got to listen to that, Kyle. Yeah. You got to listen to that when you, when you, when you feel that way, especially when you're eating good, you're eating clean, right?

1:12:27We're not eating foods that increase appetite. So you're eating good food, whole foods, and you're lifting weights like you are, and you feel that appetite increase. That's a, that's a good signal. That means your body's trying to grow more and build more muscle. You not feeding it, depriving it is going to slow your progress down. You feed it. You're going to build more muscle. Yep. Cool. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. You did great though. You did great. I mean, really good. That's the only critique is like, we could have ate more. Yeah. That's it. Okay. So literally go back and do it again, but do it, follow maybe upper lower, follow a maps power lift.

1:12:59And this time feed more. Yeah. Listen to that. Go up another, I would go up another 400 calories at least. Yeah. Okay. Excellent. That's actually how much I've been kind of, uh, kind of calculating my snacking to overcompensate that hunger. So yeah, I'll just add that throughout the day. Excellent. Yeah, dude. Yeah. Um, one question, um, just in terms of I've sometimes noticed, though, I wanted to start adding a little bit of mobility to either the beginning or the end of my workouts because the one thing I noticed was like sometimes when I'm in like a plank position or even when curling I noticed I had like a tight pain here in my shoulder so I started doing just like against the wall like the shoulder up and down DLEs and that actually alleviated it for quite a while but then I kind of stopped doing that and then I noticed it coming back so so here's why that happen, Kyle.

1:13:53So the mobility helps, but you didn't listen to us and you stayed low rep. There's always a consequence for not doing the right... No, I'm serious. All joking aside, staying a low rep, heavy for too long, that'll start happening. That and also the lesson is you should do that before every bench day. So before you do a pressing movement, you should prime with that always. Always. Especially if you're going to not adhere and you're going to lift heavy longer. So you should do that no matter what. But to Sal's point, if you would have followed the program, you probably wouldn't have noticed that as much because you probably would have phased out of the really heavy lifting.

1:14:33Does it mean that we don't all in here in this room do the same thing too sometimes where I'm feeling, hey, I want to stay lifting heavy for longer. But you bet your ass when I'm doing that, I'm putting in the work on the mobility stuff or else I pay for it. We feel it. Yeah, and this is why too we end up like recommending sometimes to bridge, you know, and take a break and do symmetry. so we can, you know, address a lot of these joint issues for stability and control there. So, you know, it might be something to consider after you get through, you know, your next phase, your block program. Kyle, how many of our programs do you have?

1:15:05Is it just anabolic that you got? I got anabolic suspension. I got Prime and Prime Pro. And I got Maps 15. Okay, good. So I'm going to have Doug put together a package for you of the programs that we think would be best for you. and we're going to discount the crap out of them. So if you want to get the next year of programming set up, we'll send that to you. And then if you want to sign up, you'll save a ton. To Justin's point, having symmetry or performance or both and a power lift, those three programs and what you already have, you're set for life on those and should just make it a habit of when you notice things like you notice like that, that's a good time.

1:15:43Follow symmetry. The next program, I'm going to do symmetry or performance, something that's more mobility focused, unilateral focused. That'll help dress it. then you can get back to the heavy lifting and power lifting and just kind of toggle back and forth we typically recommend once a year somebody does either symmetry or performance that typically addresses all those issues and then feed more okay eat more uh supplement tip for you uh if you if you see that you're challenged a lot on the weekends to push those proteins you're somebody who would uh do well with like uh key on uh yeah the um essential amino acids knowing that you're not hitting your optimal protein on those days you could take some of those that would help you just put it in your water yep just just take just drink having some right now so that's something that uh i would recommend to somebody who knows they have a hard time always consistently hitting protein adding that while we're trying to build what is only going to help the process totally um and then yeah dude stay the course that's it dude feed that appetite good job man yep perfect well thank you guys so much like honestly the last like through your guys's advice on these calls i've made more progress than my whole life so it's been uh very helpful i really appreciate you got more you got more good results coming dude yeah keep it keep us posted i love seeing the updates you're killing it awesome will do thanks guys take it easy i think it will be a good program package for him would be symmetry uh upper lower and power lift yeah would be a good good three because he's already got prime prime pro to switch through yeah i mean predictable and you know this is good for people to watch because he said it he's had better results last 90 days than he had in his whole life and it wasn't for lack of trying this is the this is the thing it's not for lack of trying you're just you're doing this on hard mode you're trying to dig a massive hole with a spoon and we're offering you a backhoe by doing things the right way and you'll notice again and not to point out his folly but just he went his own way in a small way by not phasing his programs and kind of paid the price he felt some pain right and so you know our programming is written specifically the way it's written because avoid it this is ideal and this will give you the best kind of long-term success and results but also he's got another seven pounds of muscle he'll gain also a big thing to point out for the audience that could see that actually can see the video and see the pictures uh it's really clear that uh he gained weight but he looks like he's leaner which always tells me that we could have ate more that's right right he was It's like he needed to lose weight.

1:18:10He was already lean. Yeah, exactly. So he, and then on top, that was before. So just seeing his pictures, I would have said that. And then he goes, man, I noticed at night I was hungry. So that's a clear sign. The body's trying to grow, trying to build muscle. You ignoring that signal because you're afraid you're going to get fat or put body fat on will only hinder your progress. Feeding that signal, especially if you make good choices. My kind of rule for myself is, and this is how I don't count calories on a regular basis is just, man, if I'm lifting consistently, I'm eating whole foods. And you're hungry?

1:18:43And I'm hungry. I did it last night. Last night, I got up at 10 o 'clock at night. She was like, what are you doing? I went downstairs. I'm like, I'm hungry. I went down, and I literally had what was prepped meal for me to eat today for lunch, which was my ground beef, mushroom, and onion, and rice meal, and had a full meal. And so my rule is as long as it's a healthy, balanced choice like that, and I'm hungry, I'm lifting, I'm eating whole foods, feed. Feed. That's my body telling me it needs to build muscle. Our next caller is Justin from California. What's up, Justin? What's happening? What's up, guys?

1:19:14How are you? Good, man. How can I help you? How are you guys doing? Good, dude. Yeah, so I'm kind of looking for some guidance. So for backstory, like in my email that I prefaced with, I'm in law enforcement, and I feel like this is kind of unique for a lot of people that are in law enforcement that are looking at health and nutrition-wise. because I know how important sleep is to gaining and losing weight, gaining and losing muscle mass. So kind of looking for some guidance on that because, you know, when I work my night shifts, I'm working three or four nights a week, 12-hour shifts, so I'm getting maybe four or five hours on a good night of sleep.

1:19:48And I know that's completely detrimental to trying to gain lean muscle mass and lose weight. So looking for some guidance on that and just how to minimize my habit of overtraining because I know I do that all the time. Yeah, great question, dude. We've definitely worked. We've worked a lot. with law enforcement and first responders and people with these kinds of kind of schedules. The main thing you need to understand around this, Justin, because it's a big deal. Okay. So having a sleep schedule like yours, where you're not getting optimal sleep or you're getting way below optimal sleep or a schedule that constantly shifts your circadian rhythm.

1:20:24Sometimes people will work nights and then try to make up for it, you know, on the days that they're not working type of deal. The main thing to understand is your body's tolerance for stress, which includes exercise, uh, is far lower than what it would be if you had ideal sleep. That's the main thing to understand. So overtraining is a lot easier for someone like you, like way, like can significantly easier. And so if you apply too much exercise stress, you're just going to burn out. Uh, at best, you'll just spin your tires in the dirt and really not move anywhere. So the workouts for someone like you are, are absolute minimal.

1:21:03Now that doesn't mean you're not active. So, so people sometimes confuse it too. It's good to be active every day, you know, walking and moving. You don't want to sit down all day long, but workouts themselves for someone like you is typically looks like a maps 15 protocol and that's it. You're not doing anything more than like a couple lifts a day. And even on some days you're skipping because you're tired. To tailor it even more for you. And I love with my clients that have shifts like you do. I would invest if you don't already have one, like an aura ring or a Fitbit that tracks sleep for you.

1:21:37And we're using that a boy. Yes. I'm doubled up. Okay. Okay. So like, and that's, and that is what I'm using that and how I feel, right? To help me gauge what that workout, if I even have a workout looks like that day. So, you know, let's say it's one of those days where you got horrible, you score a 50 or a 60 on your night of sleep. That might be the day I don't get a lift in that day. I just walk, do something more recuperative, you know? And then the next day I get more optimal, 70, 75. I'm going to go do my MAPS 15 workout. Then I have a day later where I didn't have work. I actually get a full day off, got a great night's rest.

1:22:14I score a 75, 85, 90. I'm like, oh, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to put the two MAPS 15 day, the MAPS 15 day I missed in today's MAPS 15 together and work out. So I'll do four exercises. That's it that day. So that's how I would modify for someone like you. A MAPS 15 would be the protocol. I'm never doing more than everything in that, in that week on days where I get incredible sleep. I might do a two day stack on days that I get less than optimal. I'm either doing nothing or I'm doing just the two exercises. That's it. Moderate intensity. Now I want to add something, uh, Justin, cause I, you know, I see your email.

1:22:46So there's a lot of information in your email. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, should I, should I touch on any of that? I don't know if you guys want me to or not. I mean, I can go through it. And so you are a classic, uh, kind of over trainer, which you kind of mentioned. So absolutely. Yeah. So CrossFit competitively, you taught it for 10 years. Uh, that alone tells me quite a bit. One more rep on your hat. You're also, I'm a walking stereotype. maybe i maybe i wouldn't let you do a double day actually maybe i'd make you stick to that issue is like my my thing that i try to gauge it off of because i try to track uh you know what my hrv is my sleep score and all that and i can get a sleep uh score of like you know 70 off of four and a half hour sleep my hrv is 180 so i feel good to go but i know realistically like for some reason i feel like that's skewed because i know i should be getting it six to eight hours every night.

1:23:42So that's why I like, it's hard for me to gauge personally. No, no, no. Let me touch on that. So, uh, and you're also, you run three to four days a week, about 20 to 35 miles a week. And you're also training for a marathon. So, Oh my God. So that's over. That's over. Oh, you're not doing the marathon. Okay. Okay. So here's what happens. I still run, but that part's over. So here's what happens. And some people just are more resilient than others. You're probably one of those people. Yeah. Yeah. But how you feel now is not how you potentially could feel. Right. Okay. Also, how old are you, Justin?

1:24:1331. Okay. Here's the other thing. Cumulative stress is a thing. And so, so either we start to shift in a direction that's more appropriate and better, and you'll know because you'll get stronger and you'll feel better and you have more energy, or you hit a wall that hits so hard that you're forced. And it typically looks like injury and hormones crashing, one or the other or both. By the way, have you had your hormones tested? A while back, maybe like six months ago, everything seemed to be in the normal range. So it wasn't too crazy. Yeah, he's resilient. Yeah. So do you know what normal was?

1:24:49Because I know what the normal range is between 200 to a thousand on testosterone. I think my testosterone was right around 700. Good. Yeah, yeah. Good. So I would scale everything way down. Yeah. And then what you'll notice is better performance. The gauge that you should use is your performance, not your tolerance. So I know HRV, all that stuff. Some people are more resilient. So those measurements are going to look better on you than they will with someone else. But that doesn't mean you can be much better. But I can tell you this, with that little sleep and this much exercise, if we cut our exercise down, what you'll notice almost immediately is an improvement in performance.

1:25:27Almost immediately, you'll feel stronger and faster. And that's how you know you're going in the right direction. MAPS 15 is all you need. No more. That's it. For your lifting, that's it. That's it. That is it. no matter how and it's gonna be so hard for somebody like you because you're gonna feel like it's not enough it is more than that's what i was gonna get at yes it's going to feel you're gonna do it and by the way just so you know like literally i was having this conversation with two of my best friends this weekend who do not have a job like you they're just that we're all the same age we're in our 40s and i i see how they're training and i'm like dude and i so my thing that i started with them this week is i'm texting them what i'm doing which is two exercises when i go lift because they're always asking me, man, how do you, what do you do?

1:26:08I'm like, I do way less than what you guys do. You guys have been lifting for our whole lives. You've been lifting for a long time. You don't need to do nearly that much to hang on to your muscle. And if you want to build with all the stuff you got going on, you definitely need to reduce your volume intensity and it's going to feel like you're not doing much. But like Sal said, what you'll see, if you just stick to that, you trust the process in two weeks, you'll see strength go up. You'll see your strength. You'll get, you'll get stronger. And that's your indication of you're doing the appropriate amount now.

1:26:35Yeah, you'll see it in a week. So because you're in law enforcement, you want to maintain some certain amount of athletic ability. So MAPS 15 with a couple days a week of running, here's what you'll notice. I'll tell you right now what will happen. You'll get faster in your running and stronger in your lifting. And you'll know this within one or two weeks. and if that's what happens you're in the right you're going the right direction okay and you got nothing to lose by the way so you could try it for two weeks and then go back to the crazy stuff that you're doing if it doesn't work but it will you'll see like i said i was so different when you recover fully yeah i was gonna say for me it's gonna be the mental battle of yes not feeling like i'm feeling i'm not doing enough that's that's how it is for me like i you know it's not diagnosed it's self-diagnosed by dysmorphia so i feel like i have to put in extra work and do all this extra stuff because if I don't, I'm going to, you know, I grew up as an overweight kid.

1:27:33So I feel like I'm going to go back that route if I don't do more. So that's the hardest part. Justin, if this is really important and you, and you, and you're at a place now where you're like, I'm committed to making this change. You know that about yourself. It may be a worthwhile investment for you to do like our concierge or just you meet with the coach once a month. That's it. Once a month they check in and they're basically going over your nutrition going over your training just accountability piece not like you need someone to tell you what to do workout wise but it's more of like i need to have somebody who's reminding me that this i'm on the right path um very minimal investment to do that and someone like you who's as advanced as you are i think it's like perfect it's not full-blown training where you're with a coach all the time it's just once a month you're checking in and they're kind of modifying your program and you guys are going back and forth do they also work with you on nutrition and programming or just checking in off?

1:28:25Both. No, mostly. Yeah, they're going to, they're going to, so for example, like if I, if we were working with one of our coaches, they're going to set you up on maps 15 and they're going to be like, this is kind of what it should look like through the week. You get your first call, your first check-in call and hey, how are things going? You're going to feedback. I feel this. I noticed this. And then they're going to go, okay, this is what I want you to do. You're going to drop this day, add this here. Let's bump your calories to this. They're going to modify like that and then send you on your way again.

1:28:49then you're going to come back, report again. Oh man, I know the strength is going up. Okay, great. Let's hold the line. Stay the course. They're going to keep tweaking it for you and you just follow it and then you let them know how you're feeling and they're going to adjust nutrition and adjust workouts. Okay. One last thing I just want to touch on. This is more just for anyone that might be in shift work kind of perspective is to help with sleep when you are working those crazy long shifts or overnight shifts. I mean, you know, I take magnesium, you know, have blackout curtains, sleep mask, all this other stuff.

1:29:24Do you guys have any other tips to help improve sleep for people? Switching your circadian rhythm so often is where melatonin actually has benefit. Okay. So it creates a shift. Your circadian rhythm will adjust faster by taking melatonin. Legion has my favorite product for that, just so you know. So they have, it's a chewable, which I like so I don't have to drink water with it. So I can just chew it. It's a chewable tablet. It's called Lunar. It's called Lunar, and it has magnesium and just a small dose of melatonin. So it's not a mega dose, so it's just a little bit, because you don't want to take a ton of that shit, but a little bit of melatonin with the magnesium, and you can take that at night.

1:30:00I take it every night, religiously. Okay. All right. Yeah, look them up. Legion, Lunar. And then as far as the mental part is concerned, Justin, focus on the objective measures of strength, speed, and performance. That'll get you over the mental part right after. because you'll start to see it. You're like, man, I'm faster. I'm stronger. And that typically gets people out of their head with the like, I'm not doing enough. It's because you see the results. Energy increase. Yeah, that's where you want to. Possibly. It depends on how well you know yourself. If you know that you really struggle with body dysmorphia and you know your challenge with this, sometimes this is where you outsource it.

1:30:34Well, the challenge is you'll get stronger and feel better and then that'll make you think you should do more. Exactly, exactly. That's the challenge. Yes. But like I said, within a week or two, dude, you'll see it. You'll see improvements in those things. Stick to the programming though. Trust us. You don't need more than that. That's more than enough for a guy your experience and that what you do with your sleep, you've got to stay there and you'll see way better results. Way better results. Okay. Cool. Alright, Justin. Thanks for calling in, man. Sweet. Thanks, guys. I appreciate it. Have a good rest of your day, guys.

1:31:05Alright, man. You got it. Yeah, that's... Hopefully he heeds this because he's 31, so he's still young. Obviously, his body has a lot of resilience. Some people are really resilient. The fact that he can score 75 on four-hour sleep is beyond me. He's somewhat resilient. Yeah, but it's what'll happen if he stays down that path. You're right, he's 31. Major injury or... He's barely out of his 20s. You do that and you're 40. I did crazy things in my 20s and early 30s too. Now, I would have gotten way better results had I not. That's the thing to understand is that you can get away with it, but it doesn't mean it's ideal.

1:31:44nowhere near that. Our next caller is Casey from North Carolina. Hey, welcome back. Hello. Hey guys. Good to see you again. Yeah. What's happening. Um, yeah, I'll jump right into it. I've got kind of just some updates, what's happened, questions I've had along the way, and maybe some questions for what do I do next? Sure. Okay. Let's go. Um, so I just want to give you guys a huge thank you. I think just you guys doing podcast calls and callers is a fantastic aspect of your show, but I resonate with a lot of people. But this, you guys taking the time to really dive in with me, like helped me a ton.

1:32:23I've had a lot of people give me missed messages, if you will. And so it was nice to kind of have a solid, solid way to go. So just some background, I was with you guys a little while ago regarding lifestyle changes in living with Hashimoto's. so again goal was to simply just feel healthy feel strong with the added bonus of looking like i work out over the years i received a lot of mixed messages around diet workout all of it just being not working if you will um so during our call i was incredibly grateful that you guys recommended map 15 and i've really enjoyed it i've loved it honestly um not only the program itself I felt strong with it, but it like just helped me relax a little bit.

1:33:10It was a quick workout, whether it was something I could do down in my gym, in my, at my home or get over to the gym. Um, but it's like, it relieved a little bit of stress, um, which was nice, especially as I went into the summer months, summer Casey is a little bit, um, able to do more of that to get there every day. Um, but even now that I've gotten back to school, we've been back two weeks that it's just been easy to do. Um, So that's been great. I really, really appreciated you guys giving me that program. So I went back and listened to our episode and I took what you said to heart. Adam, I really appreciated you being like, I love you say not winning the weekend.

1:33:49So I zoned in. I did that. I was probably right after Fourth of July. I listened to our episode and was like, OK, I can do this. And I think maybe 4th of July, maybe a few days after I was back home with family and really didn't have any of the dairy, any of the gluten. But I know like we were your advice was like lock in on the gluten, kind of cut that out, act almost as if you're allergic. But took what you guys had had to say to heart. I really appreciated that because I think it gave me this like pathway of like, no, cheats are going to kind of off off rail you. What else? So since then, I have been gluten free, dairy free, sugar free, caffeine free, alcohol free.

1:34:35And it sounds absolutely terrible, but it's really not been bad. Honestly, I've had less cravings. I've noticed just mental clarity. And yeah, overall, those kind of improvements have has been nice. So into it, though, I think with the programming, doing like the diet aspects, I just haven't seen any of the scale change. And I just want kind of your input. I didn't expect to go in losing 30, 40 pounds in the last 90 days, but I was hoping to maybe get on the scale here recently. Just knowing I was going to talk to you guys and be like, OK, I'm down, down some weight and haven't seen anything. Haven't seen any on the scale and just like overall, like how my clothes fit, what I usually go off of, how I feel in the mirror.

1:35:26It's just not exactly where I would like to be still. So just questions throughout what I've had, throughout what I'm going to go through, hopefully after this call is Maps 15, run it again. Where would you have me go next? um ideally I'd love to see what you say for like the next nine months like to put a calendar year together like what that would look like um yeah I wondered about sauna sessions I wondered if that was too much if that is just gonna override some of the the the things that I'm doing just as I'm in recovery mode is that too much and then something that has popped up recently with my functional health practitioner.

1:36:11She mentioned the GLP one. I know you guys just did a podcast on it. And so I've got just kind of curiosity if like working on inflammation, which I feel like that's what kind of I'm working on. Would that be something you guys would suggest? Casey, I want to back you up real quick though on the frustrating part with the scale. Just curious, because I know you've listened to the show for a while. Do you think that we would have asked you, what did the scale say no not at all we would acid how's your digestion feel how does inflammation feel how is strength in the gym how is those are the things that we would have asked you and yeah sounds like a lot of that stuff has been doing pretty damn good yeah so it's true and so uh and and so you've made incredible progress but we we get so attached to this scale and mirror and then allow that to dictate oh i did good or didn't do good you did phenomenal you've made some major changes you've seen the benefits of it and you're starting to make a major lifestyle change we are heading in the right direction yeah 90 days is a short period of time but i just want to remind you that aesthetic changes are downstream from improvements in things like energy health inflammation and strength yeah so as those improve over time, the aesthetic changes follow.

1:37:32It has to. Yeah. Okay. So that's the, and the cool thing about that is something like strength is objective. So it's like, I can look at it and be like, well, I'm lifting more. I'm definitely moving in the right directions. The scale, uh, I mean, it's objective number, but it doesn't tell us body composition and the mirror is very subjective. Uh, so, so all that stuff, so aesthetics follows those other things. Okay. So keep focusing on those and the aesthetic changes uh tend to follow um as far as programming is concerned i like the mass 15 protocol for you i remember you saying you're a teacher you're in the school year now so um i don't care which ones you follow uh but what i'll do is i'll put together a 15 package for you if you don't have any more and we'll discount the crap out of it for you and we'll set you up for the next year um so you can just follow one after another um and you'll be set up um what was the last question oh glp yeah so your functional medicine so off label a lot of functional medicine practitioners are using glps at a really really low dose what they'll call a microdose because again this is off label and this is a lot of anecdote now there is research going in this direction but i can't point to any yet because it's not established but i do know a lot of practitioners who are getting who are having positive results with autoimmune and inflammatory issues by micro dosing things like trisepatide.

1:38:57I've personally seen it. So, uh, that's all I can tell you. So now they're your functional medicine practitioner. They're the ones working with you on this stuff. So, uh, you know, I would talk to them about that. The only thing I would caution you on is going on too high of a dose, which will crush your appetite and could throw things in, which would show you movement on the scale, but would also move us backwards, uh, with what we're trying to accomplish. Cause here's what it looks like. okay, we keep doing the right things. And I think you're doing phenomenal. You keep getting stronger, health, getting better.

1:39:28Energy's getting better. The fat loss is more of a snowball effect. It starts to happen after. Okay. Okay. If we just start to cut calories now, we'll see some movement on the scale, but then we'll have this real hard plateau. Uh, and then you'll have to go back to what you're doing now and reverse and do all that stuff. So I'm, I don't know. Have you, have you heard me talk a little bit about, uh, me using trisepatide right now? well to be honest it's kind of you guys it was a couple weeks ago maybe now and it was something you said adam that like you had used it in just micro dosing sense and felt like the inflammation had decreased and what was interesting is probably the week prior functional health practitioner was like well we're not seeing any i don't know it was kind of disheartening but her hers was like we're gonna put you on a glp1 if we don't see any progress i'm like that's not really what i want to do it all.

1:40:18But then I heard you guys mentioning in the microdose sense of like, Hey, it could find like some benefits. Um, but that was kind of it. I didn't really do any, my own research or anything. So let me share like the way I've approached it myself personally. Again, this is my own personal story. So this is not me giving you medical advice or telling you what to do. It's just like how I'm using it. So I'm, I found for my dosage, I'm like that 0.5 to one unit, which is like, it's not quite a micro dose. It's not even a half of a starting dose would be. It's like in between that, that number. And what makes me decide whether I take 0.5 or one unit for myself is I, I need to be eating enough.

1:40:59And so I know that if I take, sometimes I remember I tried one point or 10, 10 units, a little over 10 units, and it crushed my appetite too much to where it was really hard for me to hit my protein intake. and so I backed off so what we don't want to happen so your dose is going to look different than mine we're different completely whatever she decides if you do decide to do this whatever she sets you off on if you notice you can't even hit your protein intake because it's crushing your appetite it's too much and you need to talk to her so that's how I'm because I'm noticing the anti-inflammatory benefits big time I can see it in my face I can see it on my psoriasis and so that's what I'm really enjoying But I don't want it to crush my appetite to where I can't get my whole food meals because then I'll just lose weight on the scale and I'll lose muscle.

1:41:49So that's how I've landed on my dosage. And so if you are going to use it, that's how I would want you to also use it if you were a client of mine. I'd say, listen, I'm okay with you because of the autoimmune stuff. I have definitely noticed that benefit. And if you get similar benefits from it, I'm pro it. So long as you can hit those adequate protein numbers every day consistently and you can lift and you have the energy to lift weights, then I'm okay with it. But if you notice it, suppress that appetite and you're like, I'm having a really hard time hitting my protein. I don't like it. Yep.

1:42:23Okay. Cause I think that's where I was kind of at. I was like, I don't really want to use it at all, but I've heard enough where you guys have talked about it. A couple other people in my life, they've mentioned it of like how it can kind of help with that inflammation and sometimes that's all it just that's all i need is that to come off and then even yeah the bigger snowball effect of feeling better happens go go with with your with the functional medicine practitioner so that's the person who's who's managing all that that's why i would turn two for that uh but again you know off label people are using it in that way with their practitioners and some of the people we've had on the show talked about it who are experts in the field so yeah just pay attention to the main thing i said just if you're and let her know.

1:43:05So whatever, I have no idea what she's going to start your dosage at, but whatever she starts it at, if you struggle with that protein intake, that's a big red flag and tell her and say, Hey, I'd like to try a lower dose. Are you okay with that? And then most likely probably cut whatever she gave it to you in half and it'll probably land you at a better place. Okay. Yeah. That works perfect. Cause I think that was kind of where she was headed next. And knowing that I wanted a little more information, maybe. Um, I think the only the other thing was just as I'm in kind of this recovery mode, I feel like I will be for maybe a little while.

1:43:38Is there any other things you guys would recommend? I know I kind of asked about the sauna sessions. Is that something to do is I know red light therapy I've kind of talked about, but that was kind of the other thing as I went through the past three months. I'm like, is there any other recovery? I love sauna for you. Sauna is great. Don't go in there to be a hero. You just kind of sweat and don't go crazy with pushing it. Sometimes people with thyroid issues have issues with temperature regulation. Make sure you drink a lot of water. Throw some electrolytes in there. But otherwise, you'll improve.

1:44:13It's good for endothelial health. It's good for VO2 max. Good for inflammation. Red light therapy is totally different. It's not a stress on the body. It accelerates healing in a lot of different ways. And aesthetically speaking, red light therapy is very obvious. So you'll see the difference with red light therapy, but you won't get the performance benefits or the health benefits like you would have a sauna. So, but both of them would be great to add. I love adding that to your routine. Yes. Yes. Love it. Okay. I've done. Yeah. I've done the sauna for a while and something in me, I was like, I hope this is okay.

1:44:46I think I've just gotten to a point where now I question everything. Yeah. No, you're fine. Yeah. What you don't want to do is go in there. Like you're trying to beat your best time. Yeah. Yeah. It's not a workout. Yeah. Okay. Yep. Cool. That's it. Yeah, that's really all I have. I really appreciate you guys sending me maps 15. I think I was just, yeah, what I needed and you guys' advice and what you guys do. I just really appreciate it. Good, Casey. Casey, you're doing good. You're about 60 to 90 days from seeing a big turnaround with how your body responds. Stay the course. That's what I would guess.

1:45:19Yeah, I would guess about 60 to 90 days. So just keep staying consistent. Keep focused on getting stronger. That's the main thing we're looking at. Cool. I really appreciate it. gives me a lot to go with. So thank you again. You got it. Thanks, Casey. All right. Bye, guys. Bye-bye. By the way, do you guys remember what she looked like on the last call? Yeah, she looked. She looked trying to remember. Way different. Yeah, I think she was way better. Like healthier. Yeah. Healthier, more energy. Yes. Yes, 100%. And again, I want to remind people like aesthetic changes are downstream from improvements in health and energy.

1:45:50They don't show up right away. Although, aesthetic changes do show up right away. They're just not the kind that people tend to pay attention to. It's like that meme where the guy's digging for gold and it's a great there he stops but it's like i know this is in fact we talked about this off air last uh last week i can just through experience i can look at someone's face and i can tell like this person's over stressed and overdoing it totally and those aesthetic changes are visible everybody you can see it on her yeah from the last time we met she just doesn't see it the scale not to not to mention that i mean if it sounded like all other markers were positive and doing great, I actually don't want the scale to have moved.

1:46:28No. I don't care about the scale. Because probably what actually did happen was she probably actually lost a couple pounds of fat and gained a couple pounds of muscle. And it's not a big enough number for her to go like, whoa, radical change. Like everybody notices, but it's enough to be like, we are heading the right path. She had to get healthy, okay? She had to get healthy first and she's doing it. And she cut out gluten, which was all I asked, but she did all that other stuff. All of them. Let's go. She's going to kill it. Look, if you like Mind Pump, you got to come find us on Instagram. It's Mind Pump Media.

1:46:57Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Super Bundle at mindpumpmedia.com. The RGB Super Bundle includes MAPS Anabolic, MAPS Performance, and MAPS Aesthetic. Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal, Adam, and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos, the RGB Super Bundle is like having Sal, Adam, and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price.

1:47:38The 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 MindPump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support. And until next time, this is MindPump. Rubrik is the security and AI operations company built for what happens after an attack hits. Not just the moment before. AI has turned the threat landscape into quicksand, moving too fast for any human to fully predict. That's why an agentic cyber resilience platform matters.

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