 Want to gain more stamina, but don't want to lose any muscle gains? Watch this our first caller is Daniel from Georgia What's going on Daniel? How can we help you? Hey guys first off? Thanks for having me on so High-level overview sort of headline here is how do I increase my VO to max while having a Nicular metabolism and not sacrificing gains So the context here like I grew up Sal probably very similar to you like long-distance runner very skinny like strong wind there goes Dan and found strength training and was able to pack on a bunch of muscle and Now I've been going through MAPs anabolic, which is awesome But I've worn a like wrist worn heart rate monitor for the last seven years Whether it's Fitbit or Garmin or loop or whatever And I've noticed with weight gain and strength gains via to max Going down and resting heart rate going up and trending in a way that I don't like so I'm curious if you guys have any tips or tricks on how to do that while Not sacrificing You know mass and strength gains in the gym Dan any any particular reason? Why you want other than just you know, you know having a better VO to max Do you have anything specific? Why why you want to improve that? No, it's more of just like a longevity thing like a big fan of like Dr. Peter Tia and and some of his research on via to max being a sort of all-cause mortality reduction and closely followed by strength So I want to make sure that I can you know be Capable in any scenario that I encounter got it But I'm not like a professional athlete or anything Didn't you poke holes the other day in the Peter? Yeah, it was a little extreme But okay, here's a deal you like you said something that I I like you want to be ready for whatever right? So you kind of want to be fit overall You're noticing that you're losing some stamina because you're not focusing on it That's totally normal and you don't want to lose your gains or do too much to the point where you start to lose muscle and strength Your best bet is you know sprints or sprint type activities So you could do like high-intensity interval training style Workouts a couple days a week will do a good job of maintaining a decent VO to max But it's more like resistance training than long-distance steady-state type cardio type training it so Sprints are really good on a on a bike or on yeah on at on hills or running Intervals with a jump rope where you're doing lots of speed or intervals on a rower These are short bouts the total session would be 20 minutes Maybe or 30 minutes at the most with these bouts of you know maximal exertion for 30 seconds and Then you slow down and wait for your heart rate to drop back down and then repeat it And that's this is a great way to build Stamina in a way that is more muscle friendly Then you know doing you know an hour or more of kind of steady-state type of training I want to point out to that increasing your VO to max is Something you could do pretty quick too though. So like it responds real quick. Yeah, like in a week So you you could literally improve it that fast So there I see lots of different things that we can do here We can take the advice that you're saying Sal or you can interrupt your strength training every four weeks or so with a Week of you know really pushing on the cardio and trying to get the VO to back up I mean there's nothing that says that he's not gonna lose all his muscle in one week You know so you're not gonna it's not gonna and it'll probably benefit you somewhat and your strength training So if you just want to so I don't do anything. I don't I'm not like this Hard up on my VO to max But this is I'll run the mile and I am probably not as frequent as every month But I like to get on there every couple months to make sure I can do it And that's and all I all I'm really trying to do is to say hey I want to be able to if I need to turn it on for a mile I can get after it and keep my mile time under say, you know eight minutes in case the coppers get you Well, no, I mean actually for the exact reason that Daniel saying like I I agree. I want You know, I want to be able to still get up there and move and do those things I think there's tremendous benefit as we age to still be able to do that stuff And I just don't want to lose it But I also care more about being stronger and building muscle and I tend to lean more that way But then what I'll do is I'll just you know every month or two Get on there and make sure that I can get that mile time under under eight minutes If I can't then you know for a week or so I'll train it and get after it and get it back down Yeah, I always consider this too just for athletic purposes and wanting to move Quickly and to be able to maintain that ability. So that's something I'll cycle this back in and To Sal's point doing a little bit more anaerobic type cardio Where I'm doing it in bursts because it's to me. It's always translated more to things that I'm more interested in doing and You know having those abilities to be more explosive. I want to train that so And it will help, you know in terms of like increasing that VO to max You'll get the benefit of that as well. You know, it's a great program Daniel I know you're doing maps anabolic, but have you tried maps strong? I haven't yet. No work sessions are amazing. Map strong is incredible. The work sessions are Focused on improving your work capacity and there's carries and sleds and you're doing now Amrap session I mean, it'll get your it definitely gets your heart rate up. I loved that program And remember consider, you know, when we wrote the program with Robert Oberst He said there's a there's somewhat of a stamina component in a high-level strongman competition And he says, you know, if you go in there and you're super strong like a power If you get your ass kicked if you don't have some athleticism and some in some stamina Map strong this work sessions are incredible and they're along the lines of kind of what I'm recommending except they're They're structured and their program. So if you don't if you if you don't have that program will send it to you if you do Try it out. I think you'll really like it What I love about it's just people don't really consider that it's this is such usable endurance and usable Cardiovascular effort like when you're carrying things like you you have that kind of stamina you need, you know for everyday activities And it definitely has this massive carryover for everything else just functionally throughout the day Yeah, that would be I've got anabolic and performance and aesthetics. I'm strongest like the only one I don't have but You got it now. We'll send it over to you. Thank you guys so much. No problem. Thanks for calling Daniel Yeah, that I like You know, I mean, okay, so when it comes to training, of course There's specific skills you can train for and then there's specific I guess aesthetic goals and longevity goals and when it comes to like you like Justin was saying like usable stamina the Explosive kind of higher intensity stamina tends to be more usable in everyday life when you really need it Aside from being able to walk, right? So if you can walk good distances, that's probably pretty usable The sled heavy carries Sprints have always given me a tremendous amount of return and they and they've really never I mean you can overdo anything, right? But they've never taken away from my strength or muscle gains In fact oftentimes they actually contribute to the strength of muscle gains simultaneously while I'm building stamina In those things. Yeah, and just in terms of like doing cardio and like going long distances Like it's just there's a lot less opportunity for that now I know a lot of people like their days are just crammed with a million different Activities and work-related items and so to be able to kind of be efficient with that But also have a lot of like cardiovascular carryover doing work sessions to me makes the most sense I'd be really curious to see Some studies or research around, you know if you actually just ran a mile every day before your workout and you Less than eight minutes right and you just keep that mile time low So, you know, you can do it and you know, maybe and it obviously improve on it If you're doing it every single day, that's not gonna hinder you building much muscle I mean eight minutes are less especially when you get to the point where you're really your condition Right condition and you can you can run that mile. It's just more health focused Yeah, and I think that's his main that's what I got from this right So he listened to Peter Tia and him talk about all the research around, you know In having improved vo2 max hey run a mile every day run a mile every day before your training your training and keep that mile time down and I'm sure that you're gonna your vo2 max will be in a very good place for overall longevity It'll probably carry over into your training and support that it only make you better at your workouts you know other things that are overlooked they're like complexes three exercises put together they used to call these Giant sets and bodybuilding but or or even one look you do barbell squats at a relatively high intensity for 20 reps With a 45 second rest in between sets. It hurts gonna be screened. Oh, yeah You do five sets of that and you're you're you're done right and you're gonna get a lot of work capacity Or you you string together three exercises That are somewhat difficult of course maintain good form. You're gonna get a decent amount of stamina Now you're not gonna get that long endurance type of stamina, which you know if that's your goal Then you want to train that way but in terms of the health effects You don't need you can do those kind of shorter bursts of anaerobic activity and get quite a bit Hey, if you enjoyed that clip you can find the full episode here or you can find other clips over here And be sure to subscribe