 One of the highest sources of natural creatine you can find in the world is red meat. In fact, this is probably why athletes of the past, bodybuilders at the turn of the century, the Bronze Era athletes, why they found so many strength gains when they ate primarily red meat. It's very high in creatine. It's also one of the most nutrients dense foods you can find on the planet. Do you know what the, how many ounces of red meat is equivalent to? 2.2 grams of creatine per pound of red meat. 2.2 per pound of red meat. So five grams of creatine per kilo of red meat and you'll get five grams. So I mean, you figure a guy like me or you who's probably eating easily a pound and a half to two pounds of meat is almost getting it through food. So do you do, I mean, you are pretty consistent with your creatine no matter what. So there's data now that shows that there's probably benefit probably, so it's not conclusive, but probably benefit to taking, to getting 10 grams of creatine a day, cognitive benefits. And there's no comparable compound from plants, right? Your body can make its own creatine and it makes it from, I forgot the amino acids, maybe Dougie could look up amino acids that make up creatine. The problem is is that your capacity just to utilize creatine or store it as much higher than what you tend to convert and much higher than what you tend to consume. So creatine is naturally occurring in animal products, in muscle, muscle sign creatine, right? So you eat animal muscle and you're going to get, you're going to get creatine, but your capacity to store creatine is higher than what we tend to consume. The amino acids are methionine, glycine, and arginine. And then there's two enzymes that are... Red meat is definitely your best option in terms of the most. This is why, again, back in the day... It's the only punch, right? You can't get creatine from white meat, can you? Yeah, you can. All animal sources. Oh, it does. Yeah, so fish, pork, chicken. It just takes way more of it in order to get... It's less. I don't know how much less, but it's not as much. I know red meat has got one of the highest sources. But again, bodybuilders in the 50s and 60s, 40s and before, they would talk about how if you really want to get strong, make sure you eat a lot of red meat. And so in bodybuilding circles, red meat has always been known as this strength muscle building type food. And then later what happened is people are like, well, there's nothing special about red meat. You get protein and chicken because people don't understand creatine. And then when we started learning about the benefits of taking creatine as a supplement, we looked back and we were like, oh... It was a contributing factor for sure. Definitely, definitely. So, okay, in regards to creatine then, does it matter if it's grass-fed or not? Wow, great question. Okay, I'm going to make a speculation. Maybe we can look this up. Grass-fed beef tends to be leaner per pound. So a pound of, you know, rib eye or tri tip that's grass-fed is going to be leaner among other things. It also has a little bit of a different fatty acid profile, which is beneficial. And it's got higher levels of other nutrients that are better for, grass-fed meat in general is just a little bit better for you. But the fact that it's leaner per pound, I would assume since creatine is stored in muscle, that it would be higher in creatine per pound. Interesting. I don't know how much higher. And if you were going based off a calorie, say I'm allotted this many calories for this meat, you're going to be able to eat more of a leaner cut too. Yes. From that perspective. So I would imagine that, but I don't know if there's more creatine per pound of lean tissue in grass-fed versus, you know, conventional, although I would say I'll make another speculation. And again, I don't think this is a huge difference if it's true. But this is a speculation again. But grass-fed animals tend to have more freedom. They tend to move and roam more. Happier. Happy cows. I don't know. That's that commercial, right? Yeah. So their muscle might be healthier. Definitely not as sickly. Right. As some of these that are just like confined in their space. I mean, that's really where like the antibiotics and all that played a factor was because they were just like so confined, right? You had to. But yeah, like the marbling that people like, there's less of that in grass-fed meat. So they just don't have as much body fat. So I would assume it's got more creatine as well. Did you find out what you got? Well, this is interesting. Herring actually has the highest. Oh, wow. Look at that. Second is beef. Yeah, beef and then pork and then chicken. So chicken has half the creatine per gram that beef does. So let me just paint the picture here. Imagine if you're a bodybuilder and you're eating or somebody who wants to build muscle and you're eating 150 grams of protein a day from chicken. And then you go to 150 grams of protein a day from beef, even if you control the macros, even if you eat the same- Get double the creatine. Double the creatine. And so this is why people have noticed, wow, I feel so much stronger. And they used to think, oh, maybe it's the B12, maybe it's the iron. That's crazy because I know those tilapia and that for a while, all you saw was like tilapia and asparagus was like the bodybuilder. That's still standard, really. That's the cut. Yeah, on the cut. But by that point, when the tilapia craze happened, creatine was a staple. If you're a bodybuilder- You can't supplement it anyway. Yeah, first of all, I mean, pretty much everybody will benefit from supplementing with creatine regardless of where your goal is. But if you're a bodybuilder and you're not taking creatine, I don't know, what are you doing? You can take it a lot of the other way. Maybe you don't care. Maybe you don't care. Yeah, you can take it- You didn't take creatine. You can take it, trend and test and deck out. You can take creatine. Yeah, Winnie and everything. I was like, sure, throw some creatine in there. You took debal monohydrate. Let's sprinkle some of this on there. I actually used to think that was funny. They got my peers that like, you know, they're- Spend a lot of money on something. Yeah, their anabolic stack is like crazy. It's like, oh, you're throwing some branch chain amino acids in there, huh, buddy? Truly making a difference. Yeah, good thing. You're digging that, you know what I'm saying? Wow, what are all those- It's probably not that Trimbalone at all. Yeah, this is an anadrol 250. This is debal and this is leucine. But yeah, I think, you know, yeah, generally speaking, grand-program, you're going to get better. I mean, overall, right, fatty acid profile on grass-fed meats better. And it's not a huge difference, but it's enough to where if you eat enough, if you eat a lot of red meat like I do, it makes a difference. You know what I mean? I eat so much red meat that I want it to be grass-fed. Almost all of the red meat I eat, I don't want to say almost all. Yes, majority. At least 80% of the red meat I eat is from Butcher Box. At least 80% if not more. Yeah, I'm probably about that. Everything I'm cooking from home is I shouldn't say everything because there's times I'll go over to Butcher and go get something really nice. That's not grass-fed beef. That's when you want the fatty marbles. Yeah, but you know what? You can only have so much of that. When I moved to the new place, and I have this super high-end Butcher right around the corner, I got on this kick for a while where I was like A5 Wagyu all the time. And it was like after about three times in a row in a short period of time, I was like, it's too rich. It's too much. It's like a nice treat to do it occasionally, to eat it on a regular basis. It's too rich. That's why it's almost creamy. Like the ones that we've had or so. Yeah, no, it's so much. It's like fiery. I was explaining to Katrina, because she's always asking, a lot of times I'll cook to me and she'll pair with it. And I tell her, I'm like, when I make this type of meat, I don't want a fatty side at all. It needs to be a really light side with it because there's so much fat in that. You know what's like that for me is bone marrow? Yeah. If you eat bone marrow, obviously it's pure fat. So rich and so delicious. But after like, just a little bit, after I have a little bit, and then I'm like, I'm done. Yeah, it's a nice treat every now and then, but to get on, like to do it all the time. Have you ever eaten foie gras? You guys ever eaten that? Uh-uh. You know, you've had that, right? You know what that is? Uh-uh. Oh, it's terrible. What is it? Not that you don't know what it is, but it's a terrible food. What? It's fatty geese liver? Goose liver? I believe it's goose. Yeah, goose liver. Or duck liver. So they take a duck. I don't know if it's duck or goose. The way they get it. They force feed the hell out of it until their liver gets diseased, and then that's what they serve. A lot of restaurants abandon it. It's huge, yeah. Because of that. Oh, interesting. Yeah, it's like, no. It's not cool how they make it. You're going to show a picture of Doug and make it terrible. No, I'm just looking it up. You watch the video. Yeah. But it's like a super rich, you know, they add it to steak at, you know, really nice steak house. Yeah, I was at some crazy fancy restaurant. They did that. Yeah. Surprise you never had it. No, yeah. No, I don't think, I mean, I don't know if I'd ever, yeah, I'll have some duck liver. There was a place where I used to live a long time ago that was called Mallards. That was a, like, specialized in all duck stuff. And I think they had it there. But I don't think I remember ever had it. There's a restaurant that Doug's been referring me to that serves lots of organ meats. They're like, organ meat, like skewers and stuff. Where? Haven't gone to a Japanese restaurant. Gaku is a Japanese restaurant. Yakitori restaurant. What does yakitori mean? Tori is like chicken. And then yaki is like to cook it on a fire. Okay. And so they do it over a special, really hot charcoal. And it's, I mean, they have liver. They have heart. They have gizzard. They have, of course, thighs and everything else. Fantastic. I'm excited to go eat a no-boo this week because it's so funny right after we booked that trip to go to there. I've seen so many people sharing. There's one in Palo Alto. There's one down in San Diego, I think, all over the place. So some of the craziest strengthings I ever saw as a kid was when I ate chicken liver on a regular basis. Crazy strengthings. Really? But it's high in cholesterol. Super high in cholesterol. That's when I started to piece together that. Was it from that or from your age? Because I know you- That's when I first figured it out. Is I started to eat, because I know that bodybuilders took desiccated liver tablets back in the day. Yeah. And then drank cream and everything, too, right? Yeah. So I bought, or I had my mom buy chicken liver, which by the way, half the time they'll give it to you for free because they're throwing it away. And I had her fry it up on a pan and I just, you know, ate it because I was stupid. You know, I was a kid. I didn't care. I just ate whatever. And I got really strong off of it. And the hack on that is to grind it up, put it with your hamburger and cook it together. That's right. You don't even know what it goes to. We did that with beef liver and it wasn't that good, the only beef liver. Nah, you do chicken liver. Chicken liver is much better anyway. Today's giveaway is MAP's performance. To win that, to enter the win, leave a comment below this video on the first 24 hours that we drop it, subscribe to this channel and turn on notifications. If you win, we'll let you know in the comment section. Also the sale programs for the month, the program's on sale. Ready? MAP's anabolic, half off. MAP's anabolic advanced also half off. If you're interested, click on the link at the top of the description below. All right. Back to the show. I got an interesting statistic for you. Jared. Justin will like this one. Oh yeah. Sometimes I read things and I'm like, Justin, sometimes I read things and I'm like, It's rarely for me. No, I didn't get a car one with you the other day. I had a two for you. The Rolls-Royce one. Yeah, one for every 10, I think. That's true. So I was like, may as well you two have a conversation. Yeah. All right. So check this out. So the inventor of the automatic machine gun, Hiram Maxim. So he invented the machine gun. By the way, did you guys know when the machine gun was invented? They thought that that would be the end of the world. Did you guys know that? Really? World War I happened and because before that warfare was like charge, you know, charge against me. Load the gun. There were just mowing people down. And there were people who thought this is, this is the, this invention will unfair, unfair advantage. It'll just end the world is what they thought. Little they know we'd make it. Accurate. The last samurai with that depiction. Yeah. Yeah. They showed that. Yeah. I don't remember that part. You remember that part? They charge, get mowed down. Like a Gatling gun. Yeah. It's basically a Gatling gun. They showed and they're just mowing down everybody. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, this is the guy who invented the silencer. What? Yeah. That's weird. So he invented the machine gun and his dad goes deaf and he's like, we need to do something about this. And his son events the silencer. Kind of cool. I don't want to go out like that. Family business. Get ahead of this. Yeah. Last weekend, you're speaking to that silencers. This guy over here. We go. That doesn't want to tell anybody. He's making a face right now. I would tell everybody right now. Adam can't keep a secret for the life of him. I'm like, bro, you got something you want to tell me? I'd like to keep my business. You got every gun store to go pick some guns up. And he's like, yeah, my silencer's in. You know what I'm saying? You signed my silencer for my AR-15. Yeah. We got John Wick over here. Yeah. He's like, John Wick, dude. I'm like, what are you? Yeah. So why is this? Because you think it'd be cool to hear it? I just think it'd be fun. Plus they're loud, right? Guns are loud. Yeah. I mean, we can wear your protection. I get it. I get it. It's cool. Okay. It's cool. Yeah. He wants to change the crime scene with someone breaking his house. Yeah. Oh, crap. He didn't have a weapon on him. You do now. Here's a knife. All right, all right. Sprinkle a little drug on him. You're getting me in trouble here. Sprinkle some crack on him. Yeah. Actually, you know, that was the, how funny is this? I didn't see that coming. That was the, the single most light video I've ever posted. It surpassed Ab's pictures and it surpassed Food Pictures. What? In my stories? The guns. Wow. Really? People were really excited to see me get guns. Wow. Yeah. I thought that was really interesting. Yeah. You got a bunch of shotguns. I did. I did get a bunch of shotguns. Just a bunch of shotguns. Well, home protection, mainly. And then also some for sport, for shooting clay. Yeah. Because I really enjoy shooting clay. Katrina enjoyed doing that. So I want her and I to be able to kind of do that. And then of course us, if I ever get all of us planned to go do something like that. And then, and then home protection. Like that's, I want something easy. Like that's, in a moment like that, I think that's the thing that a lot of people, I know, I know you're more of a revolver handgun person, but it's like, I don't know, in a situation like that, that's really scary. And you're, and if you ever shot a pistol, like it takes some practice to shoot a pistol straight and well. Not just that, but the panic of the anxiety of all the safety and what you've got to really practice often. Yeah. To make sure. So I, she's, I got her a shotgun. You want to be like, what the frickin? So you grab it. Yeah. Honestly, they say, they say that, is that true now? So I've heard that. Our, our cop friend said that. That's what I heard. That oftentimes racking the gun is enough. It's enough to hear. Yeah. The noise. Now, here's the thing. Is that true? Or is that one of those like things that urban? Yeah. Like, like the shotgun, you know, PR company. Well, here's an easy way. Makes sense. Here's an easy way to probably figure that out. Like someone who's robbing a house, how often do you think they're even armed? Right. I bet, I bet more than half. Well, the vast majority don't want it. And also who wants resistance? So that's what I'm saying. So I would, so if we could first figure out in, in, in a home robbery situation or home break in. Okay. How often are those people armed? If it's less than, if less than half the time they're armed, unarmed, then imagine how scared they are when they walk in and they hear somebody. You know what I'm saying? And they don't got nothing. So I know. So my ex father-in-law, somebody broke into his house. Okay. In the middle of the night, which is not, it's actually more often they break into the day. Yeah. Someone broke in when he was home, he runs out out of his room. And as he comes out, he yells, I have a gun. He didn't have a gun, but he yells it and the guy ran away. Just from him saying that. Right. Yeah. So I, you know, I just said, that's what I'm like, my thought was this, like, so it was like, of course I'm thinking of the worst case scenario. I'm not home. Katrina and Max, they're upstairs. And she hears the alarm go off or someone is in the house. And her being able to grab a shotgun that's got a freaking laser on it coming around from out upstairs. And just imagine a red dot flying all over the wall. Red dot. Yeah. Dude, I hear the cuckoo. Like, I'm hoping that, that's enough. She ain't got to kill nobody. You're quiet. The dude's going through your stuff. There's a red dot. Turn the van on. Turn the van on. Your friend's all, brother, there's a red dot on it for him. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Yeah. So this is where my head goes with stuff like that. I don't necessarily think about somebody breaking into my house. Okay. I just don't feel, that's just not something I think about when I'm home. Like that's going to happen. I think more like this. Like I need a gun if there's a natural disaster or we lose power for two weeks or something happens. Like apocalypse stuff. Well, not just Max. You hear like, he's like, I don't think it's something that's more likely. Everybody's driving diesel trucks. I know it's more like, I think more is something like apocalyptic that's going to happen. You'll say like in the movies. Like vampires. My neighbors got all this food. I'm just like hungry. Have you guys ever heard of the blackout in the 1970s in New York City? Have you heard of this? I didn't hear about that. How long was the power out? It was a few days. Bro, so it went crazy. The crime may be a week. So I didn't know about that until we had that rolling blackout that happened in California not that long ago, a couple of years ago where it was taking a while to come back on and people, I didn't even think of this. But how long? It was only 25 hours. So 25 hours. So I didn't know about that until we had those rolling blackouts in California and because it was already hours that we didn't have it, people were freaking out because they said, hey man, if it's pitch black for more than a day or two, people will start to freak out. That's weird. That's why I don't go to cities. I'm not a city guy. I guarantee that's one of the bigger problems is they already have a lot of crime. Yeah, they didn't have it out in your guys' place. Power goes out every week. Power goes out all the time out there. All I got to do is get out of banjo. They're gonna run. Yeah, that's where my head goes. If something like a power grid failure or something like that, then... I think Doug's the same way too because he's got the zombie apocalypse. That's why he hasn't silenced her for silencers here. They're killing zombies, dude. We just ran out of water. Don't worry. I just want my wife safe. That's how I think about it. She's got to go to the range with you often, dude. You need her to feel as comfortable as possible. She's into it. I mean, she already likes the shoot, so she was like... When I told her I was getting her, she said, oh, I can't wait to shoot. So she's like... We had a really good time the first time that we went and did the clay shooting, and so that's part of why I wanted to finally go get this done, and so we could actually go up. What's crazy to me is that there's insurance for people... You talked about this. You can get insurance. This insurance, if you have to use your gun in self-defense, a lawyer will represent you, but here's the crazy part. They'll also clean up the mess. They'll send somebody to clean up your house and shit. It was actually... Which I didn't even think about. You have like a guy. Yeah, well, when Doug and I were learning about it, I actually was like... I mean, we both got... You bought it too, didn't you? Yeah, we both paid for it because I was like, wow, I guess this is... You don't think about that stuff. No, like imagine you keep... Oh, honey, I saved you, and then, oh, shit, there's brains and stuff. Well, yeah, and not to mention, heaven forbid, in California, someone's in your house, and if they weren't armed and they got shot or something like that, like you're potentially going to go to jail, and they try to sue you for breaking into your house. Yes. So that was... That was... They got me for sure. I paid for both Katrina and I both to have that because I was like, obviously the reason why I'm doing that is just for protection and if some scary thing like that happened. Yeah. And another thing that the guy when he was telling me that, I just again didn't think about how you communicate to the police officer on how it happened. The words you use are such a big deal. Really? Yes. Like what? Like you need to have expressed you were afraid for your life Oh, so don't act like a tough guy? Well, yeah. Like you can't be like... That's all good. He broke into my house and I shot him. I saw him. Like he blasted him. Like even though that happened, but the way you say it and communicate can make all the world of a difference in your defense. Of course. I know. I would have never thought that. And who would in the heat of the moment? Well, I mean, I'd probably be in shock. So I don't even know if I'd show any major emotion. Sure. But in the last thing you're thinking if you defended yourself is like, oh, I need to make sure I say this. And so they actually teach you or these that do the insurance is like, you tell the officers that you're fully cooperating but can I make a phone call to my lawyer and they have somebody who will literally handle it from right there with you. Wow. Because of that. And I'm like, wow, I just never thought about like how much that could screw you on how you say that. And just think you're scared adrenaline's going. You're not thinking like, oh, I need to make sure I communicated this way because if I don't. The whole fear that the crappy part because a lot of house on the east coast, I think a lot of them are not like this that the scary part is because here in California the houses are all sheet rock. And you fire a gun. It's going to go through several walls. Even if it hits the guy or the perpetrator, that scares me. You know what I mean? Because your kid or whatever could be in the other room. That scares the shit. That's the part that I know. Hopefully none of that happens. I have something to speak of our kids and stuff that I feel like Katrina was just like, you know that's going to blow up in your face. Right? What happened? This started like maybe a month ago and I thought it was funny and cute. And then, you know, like many things I'm sure we do with our kids where it's like, you think it's funny and cute and then you start to catch it happening more and more. And you're like, oh, maybe this is not a good thing. Right? So I don't even remember what the thing that we were doing but Max and I were doing something and he's like, where are we going or what are we doing? I'm like, oh, me and you, just the boys. Just the boys are going to go do this, right? I did that. He's like, okay, like you could tell like clicked on him. Not mommy. Just the boys. Just the boys are going to go. And so that's become this thing. Like, daddy, just the boys, right? Just the boys can do that. Just the boys. Yeah. Katrina's like, yeah. Katrina's like, he's like, I mean, now it's like turning to everything that he does. He looks over at me and it's like, yeah, the only boys can do this, right? Oh no. He was like doing homework. Yeah, let him from school. Yeah. It's like turned into like, like it went to something cute that him and I, just the boys go do to now like, only us boys do can do this. And mommy can't do it. Girls can't do it. Just boys can do it. And I'm like, oh, I'll tell you a common one that backfires. Have you, have you taught your kid how to pee outside yet? Yeah. That often backfires. You gotta be careful. Yeah. I think every dad goes through that. Yeah. Teach your kid to pee out backyards. Then he just does it. That's all he wants to do. Or he pees out in public. Yeah. My, my youngest did that when we were downtown Santa Cruz. And like, it just fought because we'd find a tree, you know, my backyard. So he found a tree and he's just like, he's outside of Starbucks. He's like, pants are in his ankles and he's just, and then I just stop and it's like, I'm not going to stop a mid-stream. People walking by like laughing. And I'm like, is he cracking up? Or what are you going to do? Yeah, they're cracking up. He was young enough to get, you know, you know, it's different when you're a man. It's taking me forever to break him up from, from peeing is cause his mom taught him how to, how to use the restroom initially. Right. She potty trained him is he, he wants to wipe his wiener after he's done peeing. I'm like, no, you shake it with shake. So I'm like, teach him to shake it. And he has this, he wants to grab the toilet paper. I'm like, you don't need the toilet paper, bro. You just, we just shake, we just shake all the time like that. But because he learned how to do it that way, cause mom taught him to wipe. We've always taught the little ones, the little boys to wipe. Oh, you have to. Oh, interesting. The little bro, you'd get a two and a half year old. Yeah, they don't shake. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Shake becomes. Shake and spray. Yeah. Real fast. That's exactly what her thought process was. Okay. So he'll be okay. Yeah, he'll be fine. But it's hilarious. Wait a minute. Jackson Pollock or whatever. It's like dots. Yeah. The shake. Yeah. Anyway, shake. So I read, so you guys hear about this bill that passed the house on Tik Tok. Yes. Okay. So it would ban Tik Tok. That's, no, here's the deal. Okay. That's a cover story. Justin's on it. I love it. He's always on it. Bro, I'm a Patriot act type of boy. You guys have gotten good with this. I'm full. I'm full Tim Foil hat now. I'm all in converted. So I now default to that first. Now somebody that I respect quite a bit in government because they're very transparent just in a mosh. He always breaks bills down. He always talks about, you know, what's in them or hey, we can't pass this yet because it's 300 pages and we just got it. They want us to pass it an hour later, you know, stuff like that. Right. So here's what he says. The so-called Tik Tok ban is the government's latest effort to control speech and control you. The bills definitions ready for this, give it broad potential applications. As with the Patriot act, FISA and AUMFs, the executive branch, the executive branch, the president will maximally exploit each provision to amass and abuse power. In other words, this bill, what they're doing and this is what they always do very well is they said, Oh, we think we could get Americans behind this Tik Tok ban because China owns it. Yeah. And they don't like their kids using it. I mean, even me, like initially I hear this and I'm like, yeah, let's ban this social media. Right. But really what they're doing is they're using that to put through a bill that gives them power to start to really regulate social media companies and regulators. Is there ever, is there ever a bill that's just pure? Nope. Is there ever like a straightforward like, hey, this is just cut and dry or is it like, there's always this like, I'm always fascinated by that. Delicious intent. You know, with how many lawyers it must take from the right, these like novels of, you know, bills and things are trying to push through. And then the timeframe they give all of, you know, the House of Representatives and the Senate to vote on it or even read it. They don't even have people that can read the whole thing. I've heard of scenarios where it just drops. Mind blown. And then they're voting the next day, 24 hours later, and it's like, there's 500 pages. It's like, who the fuck reads 500 pages in 24 hours? Not well. And the strategy literally is, if you are a politician and you want to give funding or your, your funders, right? The people that donate to your campaign or whoever, they want money. One of the best ways to do it is to throw it in a bill, in the middle somewhere, and then name the bill something or have something in it that people would get behind. Would get behind. And then next thing you know, your buddies are getting money and or you're getting more powerful. Just all the foreign aid and stuff like that just ends up, you know, getting smashed in there. You're just like, what? We're giving like billions of dollars elsewhere. I know through this. Do you feel like this is like last ditch, ditch effort by the government to like do these, because I feel like more and more people are waking up. Like, I don't know. Like I expect after watching the, the octopus desk thing that I watch, I was just like, so, I think everyone's been asleep for so long that it's becoming, I feel now the average person when something gets posted that's coming from the government or a new bill comes out. I feel like there is this, there's more distrust than there's ever been before. Where in the past it felt like, oh, it's their government. They're here to protect us. Like where I feel like way more people distrust the information first. What's the expression grasping straws or it's like their last ditch effort, I believe. Maybe. I don't know, man. All you got to do is scare people and then you typically get what you want. I mean, what they passed, I mean, we were alive in September 11th. We were all held in our 20s or teens. And after that, they passed shit. They would have never passed before and they would call it things like Patriot Act or the National Defense Authorization Act and because people are scared. Look what happened with COVID. COVID comes. Now by the way, they're labeling it a flu. Many countries now are saying, oh, we regard this like a flu. When COVID happened, it wasn't that long ago when it happened, and the stuff that they got away with that people allowed them to get away with was just insane. It was supported half the time because people were scared. You didn't have a choice. It was pretty insane. Well, I mean, you kind of did if everybody kind of stuck together, you know, but people were just scared. It's easy to scare. Yeah, we were eliminating your choices. Yeah, so I don't know. And speaking of this, the whistleblower for the Boeing. Oh, bro. Yeah. Wow. Can we just... Yeah. So what happened? So this guy... He committed suicide. Is that the story? Yeah. So he... This is the guy that came out and said Boeing is... They're putting stuff together too fast. They're not doing enough, like, checks on their equipment or they're putting things out that are faulty, like the whatever that system is that comes down that gives you the mask, the oxygen system. So he was about to go to court to testify against Boeing and then killed himself. They found him committed suicide. Yeah. Now, the crazy thing is that Boeing, almost half of their funding comes from the government because of their military contracts. So that's where everybody has, you know, everybody's alarm bells are ringing. Because, you know, that's national security, right? If you crush that company with a lawsuit that could hurt national security. It's just like there's so many cases like that of suicide that are just suspect. Are we ever going to see one of them get thoroughly investigated by like an outside party that has no vested interest in military industrial complex? Nothing was worse than Epstein. Come on. Well, that's what I mean. That one too. It's just cameras stop working. It's the go-to. It's still working. It's like, like, what the hell? How quickly we just forget about it too. How quickly that was like so wild and everybody like up in arms and then it's just like, oh, we forgot about it. Like no one talks about it anymore. We never got the full list of people. You know, he killed himself. She'd go to the cameras. Eventually she'd come out with a black, you know, and then it's like a tell all and they're all like dead already. He's great. Thanks. You got to love it. I have other news, business news outside of the conspiracy theories. We'll move away from that. Did you see Prime now is so Jake Paul, Logan Paul, the boys, right? Yeah. Signed with NFL with I think the Kansas City Chiefs. Wow. What? Absolutely. WWE. I mean, you're talking there. Those are two mega contracts. I want to know and maybe we can keep an eye on this. How much? How much money? I want to know the market share of like, of electrolyte, energy drinks, whatever and what, how close they are to like catching up to like a Gatorade, right? That's been, that's been established in the sports world for, you know, decades now. Like they are, they are making moves. Quick moves. Fast, dude. Real fast. So they create this partnership. How do you think it works? Do you think the NFL, who is it? The NFL or no, it's not the whole NFL. It's the Chiefs. Yeah. It's the Chiefs right now. But I mean, that's your first, I mean, that's, I don't know. So I don't even know. How would that work? Would that be like, we pay you to do this or we work together, share the revenue? So I imagine, no, I imagine. Okay. So I don't know this for sure, but I imagine the way Gatorade always worked. I mean, it's massive advertising for Gatorade. Totally. So Gatorade is going to supply all the drinks you could possibly want for your teams. Plus they're going to pay the NFL huge, to be the official drink. Yeah. And they're going to make sure that none of the players are drinking the competitor stuff. Right. Right. Yeah. So in that, in fact, that's such a strict rule that if you were playing on a team and you were drinking a competitor Gatorade, you'd have to put tape over it. You couldn't even have a bottle that had something else. Like, okay, there's the market share. Wow. They're not even scratching the surface yet. So what's Gatorade at? What is that 6.7 billion. Prime is only at 250 million right now. But boy, look at death. Yeah, they're above Pedialyte. That's pretty legit. Look at death. Wait a minute. Hold on a second. Sports and energy drinks and Pedialyte. This is a cool screen. It's an electrolyte drink. That's you, Doug? I want that clip. I've never seen that before. What's that one? Look at five-hour energy. Wait, what are all those? Okay. You know all of them. Gatorade body armor. You know that. Five-hour. Five-hour energy. Bang. Bang. What's that one after five-hour energy? What is that? Body armor? No, no, no. Lucosade. I have no idea what that is. That's the only one I don't know. All the rest I know. Rockstar, Bang, Prime, Liquid Death. Lucosade is in Europe. Yeah, it must be another country. Wow. And then Pedialyte. It's eight. How impressive is five-hour energy? Just that shit product has been around for so long. No, it's not shit. No, it's not shit. Dominated gas. Yeah, it's not shit. It's strong. It was like the first. It was the smartest. I remember when five-hour energy came out. Yeah. Because it's been out. See how long it's been out? Just a small container. Yes. You know, for a middle of the day. I'm like, this is brilliant when it first came out. I'm like this little tiny bottle. Everybody box in the middle of the day. You get your massive boost of energy. Yeah. And you don't have to drink a big can of whatever or take pills because people feel... Now, body armor either merged or was acquired by somebody. So there's a reason why they're that high already, too. So 2004 was five-hour energy. 2004. Really? Yeah. What if you came out with like a... Impressive. What if you came out like six-hour energy? Yes. Six-minute apps. Yeah. Yeah. Five-and-a-half-hour energy. Oh, there it is right there. Oh, start. It was... It's with the quarterback. Oh, it's with... Okay, so it was with Mahomes. Yeah. So the partnership isn't with the chiefs themselves. Interesting. So I wonder how that works. It's a surprise they can do that. How he can sign with them while Gatorade is an official sponsor of the NFL. Maybe off. Maybe on a social media? Maybe on a social media? Yeah. Yeah. He might not be able to drink that at the games. We'll see. That'll be, you know, try telling the face of the NFL. He can't do that. I mean, you're talking about... I know. He is the golden boy right now. Yeah. Yeah. So that... You know, I heard a stat... I heard a stat on something, Sal, that I want to know if it's true. It was... It's actually in one of like... I was reading one of Max's books. And it's like... It's like a science. It was actually like a science devotional and something else book. It was like... And they made a point about... And they were talking about electrolytes in it. And that in back in the days, and they were talking about like desert lands and stuff like that, where there's not a lot of water and stuff, milk. And that you can get as much electrolytes from milk as you can from any of these like... Or that you need... That milk provides you with those... Yes. Yes. Probably. That makes a lot of sense. I didn't know that. I didn't know they had that much... Yeah. Did I? Yeah. That would make sense. It's a... I mean, it's a milk, right? So you would think that human breast milk would probably have that as well. Right? Yeah. So that would make a lot of sense. Look up the electrolyte content in milk. So I thought that was really interesting. Because it was talking about desert lands, right? Where there's not a lot of water and rain and stuff like that and how they survive. Decent source of sodium and potassium. Wow. Do you know who drank a lot of milk? The Mongols. Wasn't it? Yeah. The Mongols? Yeah. They would... That was one of the secrets to their ability to conquer, besides their fighting style, that they would travel and they would drink, they would have milk and they would have cheese that they would consume. Look it. They found that milk may be more effective than water or sports drinks is restoring and maintaining normal hydration status after exercise. Yeah. Most likely to do to milk electrolyte content and energy density. You know what's crazy? Whenever we talk about milk... Whenever we talk about milk, there's always people that comment afterwards that I don't know how that this weird, it's got to be PETA. It's got to be this... Super propaganda machine. Yes, dude. That somehow milk is like, it's one of the most nutrient dense, like healthy foods on the planet. How weird is it? We've been steered so far away from things like eating meat that's like obviously bioavailable and has lots of nutrients in it. And we've been doing since the dawn of time and drinking milk and clean water. It's like... It's all propaganda. It's propaganda and people are so swayed by it and they don't want to use their brain. Do you know there was a period there where... It's not like this anymore. Now people understand and know, but there was a period there when formula was first created. They said it was better. They said it was better than breast milk. Such bullshit. And women were encouraged. Didn't formulas sign big contracts with hospitals and stuff like that? Yes. Yeah. And they were encouraged. Yeah. Do you know that? There was a time where it was being promoted on TV as better than... Like our scientists have made it a superior formula. Yes. Such bullshit. It's arrogance too. It's wild to me, but there was a period there and I want to say... I think it might have been the 50s or 60s or maybe 70s. Oh, longer after that. No, no, no. When they were told when women were encouraged. Yes. I thought that was like 80s. That wasn't that long ago. Even the 80s were encouraged? I think so. Man. Wow. I don't know. Were you guys formula? No. Yeah. You were too? No. You were breastfed? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh my God. The women in my family are funny. I have a cousin who was breastfed too. It was like three and a half. He'd walk up to his mom. Hey, he would ask for it. Mom, can I have some milk? Katrina's got family. That's like that. Their daughter was all the way till almost four. Oh my God. Like walk over and just like pull the shirt down. Yeah, man. It makes you think of Game of Thrones. I mean, little, like it is, it's so weird to us. But in reality, back in the days when food was so scarce, if you had a natural source of food to be able to feed your child, you would probably have done that for as long as you call me. Absolutely. I mean, survival wise. Yeah, of course. Absolutely. I mean, you're talking about taking the pressure off of me going and hunting. I got to get one last fucking deer. You know what I'm saying? You got that covered all the way. Make sure your wife's like, yeah, well fed and everything. Yes. Yeah. So I know we need to be socially weird and unacceptable. I'm like, for me, I'm like, I think we should stop when they remember. You know what I mean? I don't want my kid to grow up and remember. They're definitely going to have a preference. Like, I don't remember. Or you could get a bar guy. No, I want it right now. No, not right now. We're in public right now. No, I want it right now. Like, I was breastfed. I don't remember it. I'm happy. I don't remember. I don't want to mess that up. All these kids walk around. What you got over there, Doug? It seems like it was in the 1960s that doctors started to really promote it. Yeah. And the idea was that it was more scientific and complete and better than breast milk. More scientific. How long did that run for? I think it ran for a while, Sal. It was starting. I think there's a lot of people who still think that maybe. I do think so. No, not anymore. Not even the doctors will say it anymore. It said in the 70s and 80s there was finally pushback. There is people that still think that. I do think there are people who think. There are people that think, you know, part of it, just naive. Just naive because they're not around. You won't find a medical source anymore that says that. You would have to ask the doctor, is this better or not? They don't say that. Oh, that. Yeah. So if that has been perpetuated since the 60s, there are people that think that. There's a lot of reading material that will point to that. And on top of that, formulas have come a long way. Like the fact that they said this in the 60s when they first invented formulas. It was basically protein powder. They haven't even tested it. It was like nonfat milk, you know, and throw it by the designer way. Now it's, you know, now it's come a long way. And now, of course, it serves an incredible purpose. There's definitely situations where. It's amazing. Carnation beat God at what he does. But man, that's. More business news. So do you guys know the company that bought out Blippi? I think they're called it's called Moon. Oh, Moonbug. Moonbug. Moonbug. Yeah. I think Moonbug is the company. Did they buy Cocoa Melon too? Yes. Okay. Yes. Very good. Very good. Dad. These are dad guys. Dad trivia. Here's your dad trivia. I skipped past the Blippi phase. So Gary Vee just signed a big deal with Moonbug to make his Vee friends into I think a cartoon. Vee friends. Yeah. Are you not following all that? No. Okay. It's like his NFT project that he did. So he did like a bunch of NFT stuff that was called Vee friends and signed a big deal with Moonbug. And maybe one of the guys over there, one of our two producers can pull up the article for me. It sounds like they're going to make a cartoon. There we go. Moonbug and Van Irwant co-animated series based on Vee Friends franchise. What? Yeah. That's weird. It is. Really, really interesting. Especially since a lot of these NFT projects really have flopped. I mean, if you're not getting sued... All of them. Yeah. Yeah. Almost everybody I know is... So this is how he's like pivoting, trying to still use that content? Yeah. Yeah. I don't know like how he's going to integrate that into NFT. What's it say right there? YouTube in September. It will launch in YouTube in September. Moonbug and Van Irwant, both attached. I don't want co-founder of Vee Friends. It's billed as a... It's a contemporary... Oh, okay. Vee Friends is focused on collectibles, events, games and technology based around characters who aim to make soft skills cool. What's a soft skill? Soft skill. Yeah. It's communication skills like one-to-one. Like being able to have like small talk. Oh, interesting. Do you... Are you noticing the... So we talked about this a while back, right? And I think it was at least a few years ago when we predicted that education would be like the next big industry that would be disrupted. Yes. Super disruptive. Are you... Okay. So here in Peterson, you have... Who else did we just talk to? Jocko. Jocko. You have Alex Ramosy. You have all these guys creating... I'm missing some other big one that's being created right now, too. Tim Kennedy has a school. A lot of people are creating their own education systems in schools. Of course. And it's starting to pop... Big people, too. Elon Musk? Huh? Elon Musk? That's right. There was the one that was... I was like, there's someone bigger. There's... Interesting. Huh? Super wild. They're kind of weird-looking characters. They do look a little creepy. Look at the guy in the middle with a big nose. Yeah. That's weird. I don't know... Andrew, are you familiar with how his NFT project worked? And if it was successful or not? Or if it's still hanging in there? I know that he created hundreds of them. And each one had some sort of utility, which just means it could be used to be a VIP or have ticket access to one of his events and things like that. But I know that all of his... The names were... They were drawn purposely as if kids drew them. And the names were like Gratitude, Gorilla, Clever, Crocodile, things like that. So it makes sense for them to go in this direction. Ah. Interesting. Do you think you could be someone like that? Like that... In Elon Musk, we get thrown in this category. Peterson, we get thrown in this category. That obsessed with... We call it money, power, growth, network, whatever you want to call it. And be balanced in your life at all? Oh. No way. No. Most of them, I think the self-aware ones do admit that. That there's definite deficits in certain areas of their life. Finding an extreme performer in any category. And I would be shocked if they had balance in their life. How do you take from that the skills that they've learned to apply to become very successful for financially free, but then also find a way that, oh, I also want to be a good husband and a dad and a friend and I want to enjoy, be present and all these things like that. How do you juggle that? Is it run like them and have their mentality and then be self-aware enough when you reach a level that you provide all these comfort things? Or is it along the way you're always checking back in, going like, hey, am I too much in this direction? What is the... I don't know, man. I think part of it that I've seen when... I've seen like high performers like that are really famous people try really hard to make that work or have some kind of family. They have to incorporate them in all their stuff. They bring them to the set. They have them do their school right around them. But again, then at the same time, they're all grown up just experiencing everything they're doing. They don't have their own life that they're really... Yeah, I feel like... I mean, is there anybody that inspires you that you guys see? I don't even want to... I would never want to be any of those dudes. None of that sounds even appealing to me. No, I can't think of one. I think they're tortured too. I think it's a torturous existence. I think... And what's interesting is we idolize them because they offer society so much. Like, oh my God, they built this and they did that. They're super valuable, yeah. But there's probably a lot of sacrifice on their end and pain on their end. I think ideally what you would do is, before you have those really important things in your life like family, that then you can say, well, it's just me and I'm young, so let me just go as obsessive as I can. But then when you're ready to start a family and do all that, then you have to figure it out. That's... I think that would be like, if I was to like lay out a blueprint of, you know, and assessing how I did things or how I didn't do things and going like, okay, talking to like a young teenager or someone in their early 20s, I think the advice I would probably give is like, take a lot of what those guys have done and the obsessiveness with the career path and the passion and the drive to grow and do all those things like, and read and learn and level up and network and take from them. But then at one point, you know, if you're this person who does want to have a family and settle down and have it like that, be self-aware enough to recognize that that's a massive shift in... Yeah, you're gonna have to start sacrificing. Yeah. And balancing in a different way, right? Like your priorities will shift. I also think it's... Because I got caught in that trap, right? When I was younger and I had my first two, I think we don't quite understand, a lot of people don't understand what really makes people happy. So we think it's a lot of money is gonna make me happy or looking perfect is gonna make me happy or achieving a certain level of honor, which could be fame or prestige or wherever you're at, right? Like I have the highest PhD or all these people know me on social media. And so they chase that, but that's not gonna make you happy. The stuff that makes you truly happy in the data shows are the things that you don't hear people being like, here's John, he's like the father of the year. You know what I mean? There's no like... You know what I mean? We're not talking about John, the father of the year. We're talking about Elon Musk, who created all these incredible things. And I'm not taking a thing away from that. No, because we need those people. We do. It's absolutely necessary. You know what's weird? If humanity, human behavior was different, we wouldn't. If human behavior was so that we kind of work together and we're friendly and giving with each other, we wouldn't need... Too much to ask, Sal. We wouldn't need like these geniuses to invent these crazy, you know... Now you're advocating for the social system. No, no, no, no. I didn't say force. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Co-ops and shit, bro. No, no, no, no, no. That's forced. Sal the socialist. Come on, but no, voluntary is the key here. That's an unfortunate ring to it. There's a big difference between force and doing it voluntarily. But it's, I mean, you're right. It's human nature for us to not be that way, which is why I think the capitalist model works so well. Yeah, it mitigates the worst of us and kind of helps spread the good of us. Yeah. By no means does it make it's perfect, you know what I'm saying? And you're still going to have your outliers and stuff. No, but I'd rather have an evil capitalist than an evil dictator. Yeah, a lot more options. Yeah, a lot more options. Think about messing with the dictator. Heard me. The dictator is really scary. Okay, so I got to ask you guys now. We're now about 70 minutes in after everybody took a dose of joy mode. Okay, so joy mode. What's your joy level? Yeah, no, no, listen. So joy mode is marketed as a supplement for blood flow, you know, pre-sex, right? Helps with, you know, that kind of stuff. Does it promote that you like get really energized? Because that's what I feel. So that's not what it's sold for. It's sold for blood flow, nitric oxide for sexual performance, that kind of stuff. But I take it in the middle of the day because it makes me feel good. And I think it's the combination of the ginseng that's in there and some of the nitric oxide. Doug knows the same thing. I mean, I will take it for the same thing. Yeah, I do feel like it might be a little hack when we, because when we get about this time in the studio. Besides the boner justice. How is that, by the way? Here's a towel. Can you hold it up? No. The camera's going all the way. When we're in the studio at this point, right? This far into the day. After being in the cave? Yeah. I tend to really dip. But I don't have that feeling today in this, like this claw, right? Like I feel like I have way more energy. So maybe that will be like a little hack. It's like after I eat lunch, maybe I'll pound one of those joints. Yes. Because it's not caffeine. Yeah. That's when you see me back to go back and I'll take it. Yeah. I like it. I feel it for sure. Have you been getting, because we've now re-signed with them a few times. It was a company that, this is a, there's sometimes those companies where I hear it and I'm like, yeah, I'm not, that Sal's got to approve that because I don't know enough or I'm not like, I don't know. I don't see people really getting into that. You go, yes, I like it. Let's do it. Have you gotten feedback from people? Yeah. Oh, you have? Uh-huh. So of course you get the messages like, oh, you know, my girlfriend and I, or I took it with my wife. I definitely noticed an improvement. But I'm getting a lot of messages from people who like it for energy or as a pre-workout because of the pump, because of the blood flow. So that's how I like to take it. Like I said, I take it midday here so that I'm, you know, aroused when I'm around it. I take it midday because it's not a stimulant. I don't want to take caffeine this late in the day, but I still want to have it. Now if I were to not work out, say for another hour or so, would it still be effective or is it not close enough to that? Because we took it now almost 45, 50 minutes ago at least. No, you, I think the, the increased production of nitric oxide should last you for a good, at least few hours. Oh, okay. Yeah. So yeah, I'll report afterwards what the, what the workout was like. All right. Who's the shout out? Oh, here's a shout out. So a podcast episode. So Alex Sermozzi and Chris Williamson, Chris Williamson, modern wisdom, I think one of the best. One of our favorite interviewers. I think he's one of the best podcast interviews in the game. In fact, I would argue that he is. I think he's, I enjoy his interviews better than Joe Rogan's. And he does this thing. He does this thing with Hormozzi. He's, so if you pull it up, you'll see he's got quite a few interviews with them. About every six months, they're friends. He will bring Hormozzi on the podcast. And Chris is a very intelligent guy as it is. He's a very talented interviewer. And one of the styles that he does is he lets like six months pass by between him and Hormozzi meeting. And then he'll take all of Alex's like most controversial tweets and basically make him explain himself. And he'll, you know, he'll defend it and then he'll go deeper, ask him deeper questions on his thought process on that or challenge it. And so it's just a really, really cool, especially if you follow or pay attention to Alex Hormozzi. I definitely think that his interviews with Chris are by far the best that he ever does. So go check out that podcast, Modern Wisdom. Get Dynasty is a company that allows you to get a trust, a living trust in five minutes for free. It costs nothing. You can go on the website, set yourself up with a trust. By the way, trust is better than a will because a will has to go through probate court. A trust doesn't, a living trust is a personal and private entity that you create. You can move your property into. Nobody knows who it is. So instead of owning your homes, investments, banks, your trust owns them and then you control the trust. Again, it's free. It takes five minutes to set up. There's no hidden costs, nothing like that. It's the first of its kind. Go check them out. Go to getdynasty.com. All right, back to the show. Our first caller is Matthew from Illinois. What's up, Matthew? How can we help you? What up, Matt? Hey, how's it going, guys? It's awesome to be on here. I appreciate the time. Just to start off, I wanted to say, I know there's been some debate over Team Adams and Team Justin and Team Salz. And I'm just here to represent Team Stand 1 IP. I don't know where I fall. That means you're on... Yeah, you're cutting out, Matt. We can't hear you anymore. Sorry. Your team man card is what we call that one. Good job, bro. Good job. It's okay. Are you able to hear me? No, he was just kidding. You heard us. Dang, you walked right into that, dude. I did it, I did. But also, just before I get into my question, I wanted to say it's been... Your podcast has given me a lot of knowledge. It's helped a ton, both personally and professionally. Went through a reverse diet after losing the weight the wrong way. Increased my maintenance by 1,000 calories. And was able to have a successful reverse diet, able to fix my mobility that didn't allow me to squat, even get the bar behind my head was impossible. And then professionally, becoming a trainer, becoming a lead trainer, going to manager, it's just been an awesome ride. And a lot of it is in part to what you guys provide. So thank you. That's awesome. But you're still pissing all over the seats like these clowns, huh? Yes. It's all right, dude. It's all right. It's all right. All right, no hands too. How can we help you, man? I can tell. So basically, just calling. I'll kind of just read what I emailed. So in the past few years, I've gone on multiple bulks. I've tried smaller calorie surpluses going into the bulk, larger surpluses going into the bulk. And in both scenarios, I'll add weight to the scale slowly over time. But all the weight tends to be body fat, I feel. For reference, during my bulks, I'll typically gain 12 to 15 pounds through the fall and winter. I'll do three to four weeks in a surplus and one week at maintenance or a slight deficit. During the entire bulk, weigh myself, measure fat percentage, get waist measurement every week and just follow the trends. My waist and fat percentage will always go up with the scale. I've tried going slower, adding only 100 calories every few weeks. And I still increase fat percentage with the scale weights. Workouts are traditional strength training, whether I'm bulking or cutting, just changing the stimulus or the program. I follow a lot of the maps programs. I've been slowly getting stronger over the years at my big compound lifts and just non-compound lifts. But I feel a lot of that has to do with my mobility and just practice of the movements getting better, giving me those strength gains. Appearance and body metrics haven't really changed. I've also noticed one of the weird things that happens is every time I go into a cut phase, especially the beginning of a cut phase, I'll actually put muscle on for the first few weeks, being in roughly a 500 calorie deficit. I'll get stronger while the scale's dropping. After the first few weeks, then I just seem to maintain muscle and lose body fat. But all of my PRs, really my biggest strength gains are during a cut. You think he's eating something he's intolerant to? Yeah, that's strange. Yeah, it's a weird thing to cut calories and you notice strength go up. Do you change your workout? I do, but it's typically like, so I've run anabolic on a cut and in a bulk. I've run performance in a cut in a bulk. Those are the two I can think of where I've done both. And I've responded the best to both of those programs in a cut or at maintenance. When I go into a bulk, really the only thing I notice is maintaining everything but gaining body fat. So you don't go into a cut and change programs right when the cut. You're doing the same program the whole time or do you change when you go into a cut versus a bulk? I'll change, yeah. So anytime I change, yeah. That's where the strength gains are coming from. Do you typically go to reduce the volume when you go into a cut? Is your maintenance less than you think? So first for Sal, you said do I do less volume when I go into a cut? Yeah. Probably not. I know I went from anabolic in a bulk one year to performance in a cut. So performance seems to have more volume than anabolic. Yeah. Okay. It's the change of the program. I think that's giving you the strength gains. It could be that. But the other example I have when people, that's happened to people is when they are, they have some sort of an intolerance and the reduction of that. I mean, you're an example of this. Do you talk about this? Yeah, when you're in your... Do you have any gut issues or what kind of foods are you eating in the bulk or are they different foods? So it's typically like protein. I'm always able to maintain, whether I'm cutting or bulking, I'm able to maintain 180 to 200 grams just from chicken eggs, meat sources, no problem. And then really all that's changing is like carb load, more or less rice, more or less oatmeal, more or less potatoes. But yeah, basically whole foods all the time. I've gone the other way too where, because I'll change the stimulus or the program, like I'll jump from one maps program to another when I'm going from maintenance into a bulk as well. But I don't seem to notice those same strength gains is when I change it going into a cut. Yeah, that's weird. I would... My inclination is to say there's some kind of gut or inflammation issue that would contribute to that because that's very counter to what typically would happen. It wouldn't make any sense in the other way unless protein intake was different. Programming would be the other thing I would look at. Other factors we might not be considering like sleep and stuff like that. Do you generally feel better in a cut? I would say not towards the end of a cut when calories are getting down to like 2,000. When I first start a cut and I'm in the mid 2,000s, I'd say that's when I typically feel the best is when my calories are in the mid 2,000s. Have you tried to shorten the time period of cuts in bulks where you undulate calories more regularly? In other words, instead of doing it for extended periods of time, you give yourself a low calorie for a few days and then go right back to kind of maintenance or slight surplus and go back to low calorie and then kind of undulate like that. Because it sounds like you're getting this great response when you reduce calories. My guess is it has something to do with food intolerance or gut or something like that because that's really weird. But if that's the case, you reducing like that is obviously sending it. And it's not until the end of your cut you're saying that you feel the adverse effects of it. So why not shorten the cuts up or the time periods and undulate the calories on a more regular basis and kind of try and be more maintenance versus trying to be in a cut or necessarily a bulk all the time? Well, I think what's clear here, Matt, is if all the factors are controlled, right? If everything's the same except for the calories and you notice you're stronger and you feel better when you get to the mid 2,000s, what you want to do is always listen to your body and ignore what might be conventional wisdom because you would think on its face it doesn't make any sense. I should feel stronger eating 2,800 calories, 2,900 calories. I do at 25, but I always feel better at 2,500 calories. Well, there's something we're missing. Nonetheless, just listen to your body. So I would stay in the calorie range that makes you feel the best and not worry so much about whether or not you're in a bulk and a cut. In other words, I would base it off of your strength and how you feel and not so much on the I'm eating a surplus or a maintenance or deficit because there's something we're missing here. But regardless of what it is, if you just follow with how you feel, then you're going to move in the right direction. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. I kind of had, I guess, an idea that maybe you guys would point to the gut too because that's kind of what I've maybe thought that it is. I don't really tend to get any extra blow or any gut issues when I eat certain types of foods, but that's kind of the same thing. I just, that's kind of my unknown area too, is gut health. Yeah, but here's... Okay, let me give you an example of myself in this case. Like, I have really subtle issues with this. Like, so forever I thought, way never even bothered me. But what it really was, the only time it bothered me is when I had it three times in a day. If I have it once or twice, the response is so low level that I don't see this physical response of like major blow or major fatigue. But then when I would push it in a calorie surplus where I'm trying to eat a lot more in a bulk, that's when I'd see some of these adverse effects, right? And they still weren't loud signals. It was just enough to me to start to piece together. Man, when I cut that out, I just feel so much better. And a lot of times it's the things that we eat on a regular basis. And when you're maybe in a calorie... So it's the dose that makes the point. Exactly. So maybe when you're in a calorie deficit or look closer to maintenance, those signals don't really pop up until you are like in a bulk for a period of time and you've been over consuming whatever said food is. And that now said food is starting to bother you a little bit. And the best way to do that if you're trying to... If you don't go through the whole blood work and try to figure out, is just kind of tease those foods out what they potentially may be. And there's the high offenders. I'd start with some of those and see like, oh, what happens when I switch that food out in a bulk and in a cut? Does that make a difference? But it really points in that direction. But no matter what, to circle back to Sal's point, none of it matters if we don't get the for sure answer. The answer would still be the same of let's listen to your body. It sounds to me like you have found kind of this area where your body likes to be calorie wise. When you go too low for too long, you start to see adverse effects. When you go too high for too long, you start to see adverse effects. So maybe hovering around closer to that maintenance, dipping into the deficit for just a couple of days, going back up to and kind of playing with the calories like that may be your best answer. And instead of being so focused on am I on a cut or surplus or my calories, just kind of try and go off a feel and intuitively. Face it off your performance in the gym. That's what I would do. But if you want to really get granular, I would work with a functional medicine practitioner and they could run some tests to see, you know, specifically what might be going on if anything. But at the end of the day, just follow, listen to your gut. If you feel good at 2,500 calories and that's where you see the best performance then stay there. Yeah. Yeah. And the last thing I was going to add too, just to get your opinion is like it just so happened that this week I had to change up my programming and nutrition a lot because actually a week ago, I ended up separating my shoulder a little bit. So I've got to take things down in the gym, obviously. But with the heavy reduction in volume, just focusing on, you know, I went from like seven hours of sleep tonight to seven and a half hours of sleep a night and up to my calories a little bit. In this case, I've actually lost a few pounds in the scale in the last week, even upping my calories and dropping volume. So I wasn't sure if potentially volume could be an issue too. Of course. Of course. That's why I asked about your workouts, you know. I would focus on the workout programming and eating the way that makes you feel the best. And you might be overdoing it. You might need more sleep and less volume. Sure. Sure. I've seen people going to cut and get stronger because they cut the volume. And it was the programming that did it. That also would point in the direction of the calorie surplus thing be having an adverse effect too. Because remember, your digestive system is like your muscular system. They're all systems of the body. They're all, you know, uniquely connected. And if you're stressing all the systems out, your body's not going to respond very well. So if you're stressing your digestive system by over-consuming, simultaneously overstressing by overstimulating and overtraining, then you could have a negative response inside the gym in performance. And then the reduction, it gives you some relief, at least on the digestive system. So then you see this positive like, oh, thank you. At least one of my systems isn't stressing like crazy. And then you get this positive feeling. And then you continue that for a period of time where then now your body's like, okay, we've been low calories for a couple of weeks now. Now we're not seeing as much positive effects. So that might be what we're noticing. Yeah. What's the name of our forums? MP Holistic Health. Yeah, go to Facebook. MP Holistic Health. It's our functional medicine forum. And you can ask some questions there. I do think this might be gut health related. That's what would make the most sense. But the only way to know for sure is to do some testing. Yeah. Yeah. And I'll, yeah, I am actually in that forum, but I just have never really asked anything in there. But I'll definitely make a post up there. Yeah. I would say when I eat more, when I eat more of the same foods, I actually get weaker in the gym. When I eat less of the same foods, I feel stronger in the gym. What could be going on? And then you'll probably get pointed in the right direction in terms of testing. Yeah. Well, I appreciate the feedback. And once again, thanks for everything you guys do. Found you guys probably six years ago and listen almost every episode since. And it's awesome. Thank you so much, man. What gym, by the way, are you running? It's an anytime fitness. Oh, good deal. Nice. All right, man. Thanks for the support, man. Go hit goal. Yeah. Thanks. You got it. All right. Those are the big, those are the big. No, no, no. I almost bought one of those franchises. Oh. The ones where you only need like three people to manage. That's right. And they're all self-automated. That's right. Yeah, yeah. That's right. They're still trucking along. I wonder how interesting model. Yeah, I was, I really seriously considered it and then never pulled the trigger. I can't remember what I ended up pivoting and doing at that time in my life, but like, I remember having. The cost of starting one of those is, they're still expensive. No, not bad at all. They're not that crazy at all. The equipment and stuff. It was quarter million or less for a gym. That's not bad at all. Well, that's what I mean. It's still a quarter million. Half a million for a, for an orange theory. For an orange theory. Really? Oh, yeah. You want to do a big gym. You're talking a million. Yeah, a couple million. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a weird scenario, but it does point to, in my opinion, something with gut health. Of course. Because and it does make a little sense that the, he gets this initial positive. Yeah. And then inflammation goes down. He's absorbing more nutrients. Everything feels healthier. And the people have to understand that this is the part of our space, the health space that I don't like, is we have so many like specialties and like, they only talk to one system of the body and they all are connected. And so you have to understand that if you're stressing the shit out of multiple systems that the body rebels and doesn't give an answer. Then all of a sudden you give a little bit of relief or you take care of one of those systems. And then all of a sudden you see this positive effect. And sometimes it could be in a different one than you think. Like he's all of a sudden, he relieves his digestive system a little bit by reducing his calories. And then he sees this positive on the muscle side. Yeah. So it's like, it's not, it's just trying to get to the bottom of where, where the stress and the, the potential overtraining or over consuming of something that he shouldn't be eating. The next color is Rajni from Australia. Rajni. How are you? Nice to talk to you. I think I talked about you on the show, right? You're that amazing before and after we talked about and the whole transformation deal and all that. Yes, you did. Thank you so much. We, she, she went to, she had a really, really rough time, lost her daughter. And then she went through this amazing transformation, competed, fitness really changed all that. You guys remember that? Yeah, I do remember now. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, awesome. Great to see you. Nice to meet you. How can we help you? It's first of all, I never thought it would be, and I hear you show all the time and everyone says it. They never thought they'll be nervous, but they get nervous. And I thought, oh, it's like talking to you guys. I listen to you guys every day. I won't get nervous, but I'm nervous. First of all, thank you very much. You guys helped me. Through a lot of things, a lot of things, not just exercising and eating and working with my anxiety, even the fear at the gym. You know, I'm one of those people who went to the gym, did the deadlift and someone made a comment, or it's a stripper's bum. And you're like, what does it even mean? I don't have a stripper's bum or not knowing technique or getting conscious and listening to you guys. I had learned so much and just kind of thought, I'm going to get myself a coach and be perfect at it. Still not perfect. I mean, there's no perfection. But you have really, really, really helped me through a lot of things and also made me realize what it resonated with me when Adam said that, you know, sometimes we use gym something to run away from. So you guys also helped me to face that and not use gym as an addiction. I mean, when I say not to use, I still do to certain level. I do when I don't want to face something. I still go to the gym sometimes to just to process it. But it is a way of dealing with things, but it's amazing. And thank you for your honesty and courage to even talk about these topics on running away from the gym, from situations and using gym and addiction to exercising because there's so much mixed information and no one talks about it. And when someone tells you, oh, you addicted to the gym, you think it's a compliment. Whereas you learn that I'm running. Actually, it's not a compliment. Listening to you guys have opened my mind so much. It's unbelievable. So thank you. Thank you. And Justin, thank you for showing windmill. I hate it. I really, really hate it. It's good for you. I'm one of those listeners who transformed from nothing to who I am today or because of you guys. Like I've implemented everything from diet to using novelty, exercising, using from CrossFit to strength training, listening to good information. And I love listening to you guys about your kids. Sometimes when I'm listening to you guys at the gym, I laugh in between sets and everyone's like, I think she's got mental. No, I'm listening to this guy's mind pump. And my brother says, I think I'm on commission with you guys. So this is me saying thank you. My question is not that complicated. And I think so I know the answer. It's like a confirmation I need from you guys. So I've taken a job which requires me about 90 minutes to commute one way. So it's about three hours minimum. Sometimes it goes into four hours. And then my hours are, I mean, I'm going to move closer to work, but it's in July and it's still three to four months. And the work is eight to five, which is another nine hours. So I still train five days a week, which I want to reduce to four because I'm getting tired. But I don't. And I always hear you guys talk about steps like walk every day. And I use walk also to get out of the house because I still don't have a social life as in friends to go out with or hang out with. I think so you guys have become my friend. I hang out with you guys all the time. With that, I eat 1800 calories and I'm only 152, 411. I was about to say 411. Not that small. And I weigh 50 kilos right now. My body fat is 18%. It was 14% at the calm. I needed to bring it back to a normal place where I can work, be happy, take care of my life and things that in a life admin. So I feel good at 18% or 19%. And with 1800 calories, I get to eat enough. But without any walk, it takes away any active aspect of my life. I'm just training and then I'm sitting on my hands all day at work. So what do you guys recommend I should do so that I can stay in a good mental health space and also maintain this. Like I'm in a steady place. I want to maintain it. And I do have programmed for 18 weeks. I want to use your maps and a bullet going forward. Why I have 18 weeks is because I was planning to compete again in July before I turned 50. And I was like, it's too many things happening, not the right time to compete. Let's just give it up. But I still have the program. So what do you guys recommend? I'm glad you made a decision to not compete with what you got going on. I think that that's too much with that kind of a drive, with that much of a shift in lifestyle right now. And it sounds like we only have, it's really just till July, right? July you plan to move closer. Is that right? And if you could handle this, my recommendation would actually be to reduce the volume of training and replace it with walking. So if you like going to the gym still four or five days a week, I wouldn't stop that. That's healthy. But I would actually drop you all the way down to one or two days of MAPS anabolic and then the other two or three days walking. And, you know, put us, listen to Mind Pump or read, listen to a book or do something, listen to music, whatever you like to listen to. And, and get a nice walk in on the treadmill or low level cardio on the elliptical. I think that would be a great way to get, or go outside if it's a beautiful day, even better and go for a walk. But, and you've heard us say this, I know you have, if you listen to all the shows is that it's amazing how little of volume you have to do to maintain from what it was compared to get there. So you already have an amazing physique. You work so hard to get here. You don't need to do nearly as enough, enough as much to maintain what you have, especially if you keep your diet in check. And you, you look like you eat really well too. So if you're eating really well, you probably don't got to train. And this is a time where I would reduce the volume of training way down, especially with that kind of a commute. And I'd replace it with more walking. I like the reduction in volume. I mean, you can even go, you can even do maps out of all three days a week. And now here's the other, here's the other aspect with activity. Forget the calorie burn. Sitting down for eight hours straight. Even if you're active outside of that tends to not feel so good. So what I used to do with clients of mine that work, because we're here in Silicon Valley. So like most of our clients did that. That's what they did. They would sit for 10 hours. I would have them every two hours. I would have them stand up and walk for five minutes. So every hour or two, get up and do a five minute walk. And that turns into like 20 minutes of walking throughout the day. But you'll notice your productivity increases. You feel better, better energy, blood sugar control is better. So literally you just have a little alarm on your watch. And when it goes off, maybe 90 minutes it goes off, get up, do five minute walk, maybe around the office, come back, sit down at your desk and get back to work. And then you don't have to worry about outside activity because you've already made up for it with those little mini walks throughout the day. But I wouldn't change your calories. Don't drop your calories. No. Okay. I'm dropping calories. Yeah. Because you'll feel great. I think you'll feel great doing that. I love that advice, although I still think you should reduce volume. Three hour drive plus an eight hour day of work. If you're lifting five days a week, like MAPs and a ball of three days a week, it'd be perfect. And then the other two days, you could do mobility, whatever. And then the little mini walks throughout the day, I think you'll feel amazing. Thank you. Yeah. I appreciate this because I was like, oh, I'm sorry. I'm very careful of using my words because, you know, what you tell yourself becomes reality. I don't want to use addiction. I like going to the gym five days a week because it's kind of a routine. It's just same thing every day. But I do understand of keeping myself mobile more than just do that one hour and then just sit the rest of the day. The other option you have that I would love to do and if you don't have it, we'll give it to you. Do you own MAP 15 already? No. Okay. So I'll have Doug send you MAP 15. That's a six day a week program. And do the advanced version. But it's only two exercises. So what I'd love to see you do is go to the gym, do those two movements, and then walk for the other 30 minutes. That'd be great. That would be awesome. So that way you still have your routine because I don't like breaking a client who likes that. Like when you're in, I know what it's like to be in that routine and being a good groove and you like that whole process. I don't like to disrupt that. And so I'm all for you still going to the gym five, six days a week. Just now drop it down to the two. So we'll literally follow MAP 15 advanced. And then the other spread it out. And then the other time you're in the gym, either go for a walk on the treadmill or do mobility or do something that's more working inward. Do something like that. That would be awesome. By the way, the comment you made about running from things with exercise, if you exercise and you did, and then you said sometimes you process with your workouts. If you put yourself in your body while you work out, if you're in your body, feeling your body while you work out, that helps the process. That's actually helps processing. It's called, it's somatic. When people run away with exercise, what they tend to do is they're out of their body. They're just, oh, they're just going. And then they're not processing. They're running, but be in your body, allow yourself to feel what you need to feel even while at rest in between sets. That's a great way to process difficult things. One of my favorite ways to do that is kicking shoes off, getting barefoot and doing mobility stuff. Oh yeah. Where you're like, you're moving your feet in the grass or the artificial turf if you're indoor. Connects to all ages of motion. Yeah, you're going slow. You're pausing in the movements. Yeah. That's a great practice for working inward. No, I love bare feet and my gym doesn't have air con, so sometimes they don't have a choice, but see me bare feet. It's too hot here. I'm going to die. Well, that's awesome, Rajni. Well, we're going to send you the Maps 15. I think that's a great program for you right now. Yeah. Thank you so much. Hey, guys, I really appreciate your advice. And I don't have anything else to say, just to say thank you. Thank you. Are you in our forum? I want to see more of you. I'm not on social media. It's just one of those people who... Stay off of it. Don't let us encourage you to get on it. Stay off of it. Yeah, you know what? Check back with us in a couple months. Yeah, check back with us in a couple months. Yeah, I'd love to hear how you're doing once you make the move. Thank you. I will do that. But I have thought of... The only problem with the social media is the link to your phone and then other people stop sending you messages once you're a friend and you're like, I really don't want to be friends with you. I like you. Yeah, yeah. We don't want to encourage that. You can just email us every couple months. We'll stay in touch. Thank you so much. All right. Thank you, Reggie. Have a great day. Thank you. You too, you too. She's lovely. I didn't recognize her. Do you guys remember that? Well, yeah, no. I remember once Doug pulled the pictures up and showed her before and after. Not just amazing transformation, what she went through and all the stuff that she... To go through that. I mean unbelievable. It's such a great attitude. I know. Such a great attitude. Yeah, yeah. And she looks phenomenal. I mean, she looks healthy. She does look really healthy. You know, you talked about going barefoot. I've been doing that lately more, even with my kids, like when my three-year-old is just acting crazy. We take our shoes and socks off, walking the grass. It brings everything down. Yeah, there's something to it, man, for sure. Our next caller is Maddie from Colorado. What's up, Maddie? How can we help you? Hey, how are we doing guys? What's going on? What's going on? Right on. I just want to start by thanking you guys for the information you put out. It's been a great help over the last couple of years. Right on. What you got for us, buddy? I'll just jump into my questions. That's all right. Yep. All right. So a little background. I've been training since I was 14. I'm 20 now, about to turn 21. I've been consistent since the time I started, but with consistency and diet and programming about three or four years. Freshman High School, I was a skinnier kid, about 150 pounds, and I graduated around 220 with probably 16, 17% body fat. So it wasn't too crazy, but I've done a few phases of cutting and bulking. I'm currently bulking, eating around 3,500 calories a day, eight to 10,000 steps. And I'm back up to that 220 weight, but I have a lot more muscle strength than I had last time I was at this weight. I'm relatively strong. I'm benching three plates, squatting four. And when I was deadlifting, I got up to 500. I haven't deadlifted in like a year and a half because I've been lazy, honestly, but I've dropped 189 pounds and I'm back up to 220, like I said. And my arms have stayed nearly the same size. They're lean and vascular. I don't really hold much fat in my arms, but I just have been having a hard time growing them. I've ran your guys a split program and I started those, the push and pull days with, I started them with arms. So I was exerting, I was my energy from the jump on arms, but I just want to see what you guys thought. That would be the first thing I would do consistently is, and you never say this typically to the average person or typical, but hit arms before you move to your compound lifts. That should work over time. Also, have you done any occlusion training for your arms? Where you put like the occlusion band and you restrict blood flow? No, I've not. That'll probably add a quarter inch to a half an inch in your arms within a couple months. Just practicing that. And what you would do is, at the end of your arm workout, just do like a couple sets of occlusion. And it's gnarly. If you do it right, it's gnarly. And it does tend to add muscle. I mean, I was able to see a good quarter inch on my calves from adding that. Yeah, I like maps anabolic protocol with trigger sessions focused around arms. So I like, yeah. And then also doing what you're doing, right? So following maps anabolic, starting with the arms, which is not normal, what we tell someone. So if your goal mainly to develop your arms, I'd be like, let's do maps anabolic, let's start with arms always like you're doing. And then your trigger sessions on your off days, I want focused around arm pumps like that. And you could probably cycle in the occlusion training in there every once in a while. Just be careful of not overdoing it. You know, I would do with maps anabolic, I would do occlusion once a week. Yeah. With all that. Once a week? Yep. Yep. Would you recommend doing that on the back? Yes. Those last two sets of arms? No. So if you start with arms, start with arms, do your workout. And then at the end do one of those days, do like three sets of occlusion for biceps and triceps. Okay. And just stick to the wraps in the program. That's it. And then do trigger sessions for, you know, all three of them on the off days, make them arms. Right on, right on. Yeah. And you should get a good, I would say a good half an inch, probably in 60 days or so. Yeah. By the way, a 15 and a half, 16 inch arm, that's lean is way more impressive than a fat 18 inch arm. You know, we get caught up with the inch, you know, inches of our arms type of deal, but when you're lean, you don't need huge arms to look, you know, muscle. And we just looked at your pictures. You look pretty balanced. Yeah. And you're strong as fuck. Thank you. A lot stronger than I was at that age. Yeah. So you're ahead of the game, bro. For sure. You're already, you're doing really. Yeah. You're doing really good. And it's just, if they're smaller muscles, they take a lot longer to see. Frequently seen volume is really good for you. Yeah. It takes a long time to see a big difference on arms, because they are small muscles. It just takes consistency. You've came a long way for how young you are already. So you're going to be just fine, dude. I forgot. He's 20 years old. 20 years old, bro. Yeah. You're doing good, man. You're doing really good. Thank you. Yeah. And is there, I don't have anabolic, but is there deadlifting in there? Should I start doing that again? Yeah. Deadlifts are in there. Yes. I was just going to say the deadlifts are in there and deadlifts are great for seeing arm growth. So it's like one of those side effects that you get to the biceps that not a lot of people think they're going to get. We'll send it to you. So that in itself is probably going to help. I love anabolic for you and focusing trigger sessions on the arms. And let's see what that does. Right on. Sounds good. Well, that was my only question. All right, Matt. We'll talk to you guys. Thanks a lot for the help. All right, Mattie. Take it easy. I forgot how he was 20. Yeah, bro. Bro, 500 deadlifts in 20 and three plates. Yeah. He'll get his arms over the next few years. He'll get his arms up to a good 17 inches, which is like really good. And, you know, to point out that that was a side effect of deadlifting. I didn't anticipate that extended tension, that lengthened bicep tension. Yeah, it's an isometric position for the bicep and forearms. Fucking 500 pounds. Yeah. Where else do you do that? Yeah. No, I saw huge gains in my forearms and my biceps from that, not anticipating that at all. What's the biggest you ever measure arms? You ever measure them? That's a good question. I don't know what they were at the peak. I don't know if I even, how funny is that? I was in the bodybuilding. I mean, it doesn't matter. Yeah, I know. I know. And you know what I also realized too was that they were probably the biggest when I didn't like the way I looked, like when I was just big, bulky. Oh, lean? Yeah. I was probably, yeah. I probably had 19 inch arms when I was 240. Yeah. But then I looked better with 18 inch arms when I was lean. Yeah, of course. So, you know, that's the thing too about like the, this is something. We get people get caught up on that. Yeah. I remember this age though. At this age, I remember, oh bro, I got 19. I remember guys saying stuff like that and getting caught up like you go through this enough and then you realize like, oh wow, I got fixated. I got the most jacked arm compliments when I was lean. When I was smaller. Yes. I know. Yeah. Next caller is Marta from Minnesota. Hey Marta, how can we help you? Hey guys. I feel like I know you guys. You do? I hear you all the time. Thanks so much for everything you do. I'm great. I'm really excited for this opportunity and just want to thank you guys for everything you do. It's very much needed, especially with my background. And I'll go into that too here quick. I'm, I'm about five four. I'm about 175 and I've already lost about a hundred pounds naturally. Awesome. I, yeah. Thanks. I lost it doing low carb as I was type two diabetic diagnosed with that back in 2019. And I have since reversed that with a combination of weight training and cardio. Hell yeah. That's great. Yeah. I completed my first triathlon last year and I'm now looking to compete in a physique competition. This is completely out of my comfort zone. I listened. I have been listening to you guys for a while and I ran maps anabolic twice last year. I was always doing more circuit type training. Did that. And that's when I saw the most change was not doing so much. I was consistently tracking my macros, keeping cars between 15, a hundred grams as I was a bit nervous with the type two diabetes being in remission. Fats are generally around 70 grams. Protein was always high and calories were around 17 to 1800. I've been at it that for a while and stuck with that for about a year and a half. And I didn't see much movement on the scale. I didn't want to cut more calories because I hear you guys and that's pretty low already. I know the scale doesn't matter as much, but with about 30% body fat, I still have a lot of work to do. And I had been so stuck and thinking that I need to just jack up the calories a bit as 1800 is not enough to really cut from. But I was nervous about that too, of course, since I've eliminated cardio, maybe taking walks here and there. And I purchased maps anabolic advanced back in December. And I'm not going into phase three and see significant changes. I know you'll be happy to hear I have, I've just heard more of the content and put my faith in and fear aside and just trusted the process as you guys say all the time and went from 1800 to 2300 calories while doing anabolic advance. Wow. Yep. Yeah. So protein is between 150, 200 carbs went up at about 170 and fat are always between 70 and 100. I'm currently in the D load week and I'm now going into phase three and I feel great. I'm stronger. My hormones are really balanced. I feel in great health and shape right now. At this point, I'm looking for how to get leaner from where I am. This would be a big change for me. I'm between the same three to five pounds during this process, which is great because I feel strong and I'm getting good sleep and everything you guys reference. I feel great. I'm just not sure how to start cutting. I really need to build my legs because the triathlon training and running and all that really messed those up with all the cardio I did. And I just want to get into competition physique and I'm not sure where to go at this point being in the place I was extreme overweight disease and everything else to now. I was looking at maps aesthetic, but then heard that I should do performance first and now, but I'm looking for the hard sculpted physique now. And this is my first time doing it. I'm nervous. I'm scared. And I'm just kind of looking at you guys for a little advice, you know, being that I was in a more extreme and now I'm going to the other. You're doing great. Amazing. You have continued to make better and better and better choices along this entire journey. I think you've come full circle as far as like where I'd want you to be. So where you're at right now, mindset, the way you're training right now, the way you're eating right now is where we need to be. We can interrupt the current like calorie intake with many cuts, but I act that you're nowhere near right now where I want you to be. If you were a client and you said you wanted to compete at one point, I don't want you. I don't want. And the reason why, and I'm sure you've heard me say this, that the real work is done in the off season, not in the cut for the show while all the hard work is in building the muscle, building the metabolism to get us ready to cut for a show. And your, your intuition was right. Being at 18, even being 2300 calories is just too low of calories to say, Hey, let's do a show in November and let's start getting ready for it right now. Bad idea. Right now you want to continue doing what you've kind of done right now, which is, and by the way, to have cut out cardio, to have increased to 2300 calories and did not have put on any body fat and to be getting stronger, you have done a ton in that short period of time. I just want you to keep doing that. I want us to keep going in that direction. And again, if you want to see a little bit of movement on the, on the scale down or whatever. Okay. I might let you go. Okay. We're going to do a cut for three weeks. So we reduce calories back down to 1800 for three weeks. And then I want to go back up. Now this time we go up, we're going to go to 2400 calories. And I'm going to keep you at 2400 calories for a while. And so you start to talk to me like this again and I'm going to go, okay, let's go cut for about two or three weeks again. So you can feel it and see that. And then, okay, now let's go up to 2500 calories. And I'm going to keep playing that game with you. Until we are at a place where your, your metabolism is roaring. You're eating so much food. You're looking back at me going at them. I can't even eat all this food. And you feel strong and the scale hasn't gone up at all during this whole process. That's where we want to be. Well, in that place for a while before we even say, okay, here's a date for when I want to get ready to try. Marta, what do you, what's the, what do you look into accomplished by doing this competition? Is it because you like to train for a target or a goal? Is it that you like to work toward something? I've always admired the muscular physique. I, I mean, as far back as I can remember, just the work that goes into it is something I was never capable of doing. My mind wasn't in it, you know, being 100 pounds overweight and you're doing it. You're doing it right now, Marta. You're doing it. Listen, you're doing it. Such a challenge for me. No. You're doing it right now. Competing won't do that for you. No. If you get into competition right now, it's going to send you in the opposite direction. You're doing it already right now. You are doing exactly what you, if you hired me to get you ready to compete and I had no time. You just said, Adam, you're, we're building towards this long-term goal to compete one day. This is the process, what you're doing. What you're doing right now is the process to do that. This is the hard work. You are building muscle. You're building, like you're kicking ass right now. If you jump too fast, if you jump the gun too fast, you're going to backfire. You're going to backfire. Everything's going to go backwards and you're going to send your body in too much stress. Potentially could cause more issues with your blood sugar, believe it or not, because of the low calorie, the training, the stress can actually cause metabolic issues as well. I wouldn't compete right now. I would do what Adam said. And if you want to compete, if you're really interested in some kind of a competition, what's probably going to give you better results, even in terms of getting a hard physique would be a powerlifting competition, not a competition where you get on stage and you extreme diet. I would rather see you do powerlifting than physique. And if you still want to do physique, I would do what Adam said and just slowly, you're moving in such a good direction, trying to compete now you would throw a wrench in the whole thing. Right. And I debated that because I'm just getting started with everything, but it's just something that, you know, it's a challenge for me. I see it as a good thing, you know, that I'm able to put in the work to do that and show myself, you know. Well, you know what's I just, I just saw your, we just saw your before and afters and what your progress picks right now. Like you're, you're fucking killing it. Yeah. You know what's happening right now is you're, you're, you feel so good. Yeah. You're on fire. You've, you've already tackled the biggest hurdles, which is losing a hundred pounds and beating type two diabetes. Not a lot of people can do that or say that they've done that. So you feel so good. You're like, all right, I'm ready for the next. Yeah. And what you don't want to do is jump the gun and throw a wrench into the whole machine. Keep moving in this direction and you're, you're crushing and just bask in this amazing feeling that you have right now where you feel balanced and strong and rested and healthy. You don't need to push your body beyond what you're doing now. It's not going to get either faster. It'll actually slow things down and maybe even cause a reversal. And like I said, if you want that competition because I know you did it before, it's, you know, this to me, I had clients like this where they like to have a target. You'd be much better served doing a powerlifting competition than you would a stage presentation competition. So if you need to sign up for something, find a local powerlifting competition. I'll send you maps powerlift and you can follow maps powerlift. By the way, through that process of following maps powerlift with a slow reverse diet, you're going to build more muscle and get better shaped than if you were to start a capitalism is going to go crazy. Then you would if you were going to enter into a physique competition. Another good goal for us to have if you want goals is the goal is to get to 2,800 calories without putting weight on the scale. And the way you do that is by doing what you're doing right now. And then every once in a while, interrupt it with a small cut. Yeah. Never longer than two or three weeks. Okay. So never longer than two or three weeks. Do I want you to cut back down to 1,800 calories or so and then come back out of it every time you come back out of it, try and come at a little bit higher calorie than what you just keep doing that until you can get to a point where you're like, I can eat 2,800 calories and I'm maintaining this weight. That's amazing. That means that we had built a bunch of muscle in that process that has now sped your metabolism up that your body needs that many calories just to sustain. That is a massive win. That's incredible. That is a massive win. Yeah. You were at 1,800 calories. What were you eating? What were your calories when you were losing the 100 pounds? What did you bring them down to? It was, I didn't really count. I kind of just got aggressive and eliminated a lot of the crap I was eating, you know, processed food, nasty carbohydrates, pastas, things like that and just kind of, I didn't really dial it in until I started training for the triathlon and all I need to have, you know, more weight to lose and everything else. And it wasn't until I actually started listening to you guys that I'm like, wait a minute, I want muscle. I need to lift more weights and I'm not an idiot in the gym. You know, I've lifted here and there, but nothing like I'm doing now. And, you know, just, I was just afraid of gaining the weight, of course, you know, even, even though I was eating healthy, but there was nothing happening. And so then I heard you guys, you know, slowly reverse. I'm like, oh, man, you know, like, all right, you know, finally, I just, I pulled the trigger and I'm like, I'm just going to do it. I mean, what, what's the worst that can happen? You know, I just go back and it's been working beautifully. So thank you. It works. For that advice. It really does work. It's insane. How would you feel following Maps PowerLift as a workout? Um, yeah, I'll give it a try. I mean, I do have some shoulder issues that have slowly been going away with some of the working out I've been doing with anabolic and the mobility and anabolic advance. So that's helpful. But yeah, I mean, that sounds great. All right, then I'll say, do you have Maps Prime Pro? I, I, yeah, wait, no, I don't, I have, what, is that a program? Yes. Yeah. So I'll send you. I'm going to send you both PowerLift and Prime Pro, use the mobility movements and Prime Pro for your shoulder and follow Maps PowerLift and continue on this process. It's going to be amazing. All right. Thank you guys. I appreciate your time. Are you in our forum? I'm not. Okay. I want you in our forum or anything else. I want you in there and I just want you to check back with me once a month. Check in with me once a month and let me know where we're at calories, find that. I'll keep you on the right track. Awesome. All right. Sounds great. Thanks, guys. I appreciate your work and appreciate your time. Thank you. Thank you. I love hearing that. She's doing so good. I love hearing that. Reversed her type two. Pro, so good. I mean, incredible. I mean, she's made a massive transformation already and she's cut out the cardio, increased the calories, reversed diabetes. I mean, fuck, are you kidding me right now? The worst thing she could do. Oh yeah. No way. She's my client. I would never let her do that. Never. That'll throw everything backwards. No way. We're not ready. We're not ready. It takes a bit of the wind out of the sails, but that's the right advice. No, she needed to hear that. I mean, there was something that drove her to triathlons, which was a bad decision back then. Also. Right. Right. But I love that she put piece that together and got rid of that and look at the winds that she's having right now. She's now, whatever was in her head that made her think to triathlon is the same thing. For physique. Same thing. It's like just a different state of course. Exactly. Look, are you a hard gainer? Check out our free hard gainer guide, mindpumpfree.com. Also, find us on Instagram. Justin is at Mind Pump. Justin, I'm at Mind Pump to Stefano. Adam is at Mind Pump Adam.